Chapter 6: Turning Point

Parker asked, “So, what’s your plan now?”

Me: “No idea. What projects are you working on lately?”

Parker: “AI, of course. Everyone’s scrambling for AI now.”

I nodded and sighed.

Parker got the message and tried to comfort me: “Don’t rush back to work. Take a vacation for a while.”

Now that he mentioned it, I realized I hadn’t had a real break in ages. I really should relax.

Me: “I want to hop on the next flight to Maui.”

Parker: “Deep-sea fishing, right? I get it. No need for a flight—just take my helicopter.”

Me: “Fine. Send me your AI project proposals—I’ll read them on the helicopter.”

Parker: “...Are all you INTJs this terrifying?”

I packed light. While waiting for the plane, I saw Parker selling stocks on his phone.

“What’s with the fire sale?”

Parker’s eyes sparkled as he predicted:

“Bet you anything, Vivid’s going to have big trouble soon. You should sell your Vivid stock too—who knows how far it’ll fall.”

I was annoyed. “You don’t trust the system I built?”

Parker: “No, it’s because you do everything yourself, never teach others, and hate writing documentation.”

“Vivid’s about to launch new features. Something’s bound to go wrong.”

I remembered: after the architecture upgrade, there were plenty of hidden risks. I’d planned to write a summary for my colleagues.

That summary is only half done.

Derek only saw that maintenance costs dropped after the upgrade—but that’s only if everything runs smoothly.

If anything goes wrong, I’m the only one who can fix it.

I expected trouble, but not a disaster. And I never thought it would come so fast.

I stared at my phone, a pit forming in my stomach. Parker had a way of calling these things before they happened. I hoped, just this once, he was wrong.