Talbot could no longer trust his ears, all this money might have finally clogged his brain to influence hallucinations. For a second there, he thought his Lawyer had stated that he was not only betrothed through paper, but there was a wife tagging along with the heritage. He was 25 this year, in this day and age where teenagers were starting small -outside of wedlock- families without much thought, he was considered an old bull, an outdated specimen if you will.
His mother would be proud actually, but then again, what if the supposed wife did not value vows? His last experience in a relationship was not at all that pleasing, was he ready to just waltz in from one emotional knot to another? He decided to confirm with his Lawyer if what he stated was indeed not his ears failing him, but Oliver had beat him to it.
"Yep! There we go," the blond finally retrieved a neat looking envelope from the massive stack Talbot is to sign through.
Opening it, he took out a booklet and a couple other sheets and brisked through them for a bit before raising his gaze to meet Talbot's.
"Well then sir, congratulations are in order," the man smirked and pressed a button beside the table which was shortly answered by a well dressed man in white uniform who sauntered towards them with a bucket of iced champagne.
It was a bottle of Veuve Clicquot which Oliver popped open and tipped his glass for some tasting. He swirled the golden essence, took a sniff and threw it back his throat then closed his eyes to savor the masterpiece. He sighed in mild pleasure and poured Talbot a glass, then did so for himself and raised the glass in cheers.
"Cheers to your new life my friend, may this not be the last of our meeting!" Clinking his client's glass, he indulged himself.
This being Talbot's first wine intake, he mirrored the Lawyer and picked up minute details on what he deemed to be the norm. He took the first sip and the essence exploded in his mouth, numbing his taste buds. This variety was that of brut; it burned his throat as it descended and warmed his belly. The drink was elegant, and he almost forgot what he was doing. Oliver brought him back to earth with his next words though.
"Now then, there was actually a condition that was tagged to this heritage. Excluding the two Billion, the rest of the ownership shall only fully take effect once both you and your spouse sign the marriage registration. Not the whole of it though, only 95% of the 30 Bill shall remain dormant for a little while, this will only leave you with the-"
"1.5 Bill," Talbot cut him short, swirling his drink with an analytical gleam in his eye,"3.5 Bill huh, well, having a wife set aside for me already narrows down the hustle of actually looking for one in this type of world," he sighed.
"Now that's the spirit! Once that is settled and y'all lovey-dovey, we shall get to part two of the inheritance," Oliver sighed, there is going to be more work ahead it would seem.
Talbot chocked on his drink,"What, what do you mean part two? How many ancestors do I even have?" This was utterly absurd, if the second heritage was to be as unreasonable as the first, Talbot would get worried. What had he sacrificed or achieved in his past lives to accumulate such luck?
"Apparently, this condition was agreed upon by yours and your wife's patron even before your parents were born. Well, it actually was for your parents, but not everything goes as planned, thus; we have you," the Lawyer tapped the registrarion papers and pointed at Talbot.
"Haaa~at least tell me my better half is aware of this. It would call for compensation on our part if I drop over and find a happipy married woman with triplets," Talbot massaged his brows, mentally preparing himself for another cuckolding.
"Ahahaha~mahn, your choice of words is simply," Oliver performed the chef's kiss,"gold!"
Talbot downed his glass and resumed the signing, he did not rush, he had the whole night to work through all of this. Oliver watched with amusement as his customer drilled through all the paper work, at least someone else was suffering as he did. As night settled in, Oliver suddenly recalled an issue he had previously forgotten.
'Heh! Is my age finally catching up to my body? Hope I don't start balding!' He rose from his seat and headed for one of the rooms in this great suite.
Oliver knelt down before a built-in safe, he spun the dial, and later tapped in another code on the digital screen; double verification. Once the locks clicked in place, he pulled the lever.
Back in the office, Talbot kept grinding through the title deeds and logbooks, it was currently half past 22:00. He glanced at his left and sighed, the anatomy model was flat on its back, its small chest rhythmically rising and falling.
'Is it suggesting I should be asleep?' He mused.
{Affirmative! Host is adviced to follow a set sleep scedule. The current body requires abundant rest for top notch functionality.}
'But its still early, am I going to have curfew from now on?' Talbot pouted.
{If need be, certain commands shall be overridden.} The robotic voice vowed.
'Wait, so what, you're gonna shut me down before the clock strikes midnight?' Talbot raised an eyebrow. But the automatic voice did not comment further.
"Hold up! For real?" Talbot sprung from his seat.
Suddenly being rendered immobile and not having a say in such matters was not sitting well with him. Curfews? He was fucking 25! He had run two days with nothing but coffee for his tests, so suddenly having to sleep at a set time like a bird was concerning, and he was not about to just lay there while the system crossed such boundaries.
"Hey there, juice finally ran out?" Oliver walked in, holding black boxes. "We've got more rooms than needed in this place, sleep wherever!"
He walked over to the table and placed the objects down.
"And these are? Don't tell me more paper work?" Talbot slumped down defeatedly.
Oliver chuckled as he too took a seat. "Nah, just remembered your phone went out of commission the last time we were on a call, so, I had actually forgotten that one of the Tech firms you now own had packaged a gift of goodwill, if you would," he passed the boxes over and Talbot upackaged them.
The first was a smaller and long box bundle.He pulled and the top came off like a lid. Inside was a black surface atop a white interior, he picked it up and turned it over. The back was also of dark material, but this in addition reflected light like a black snake's scales. It was of sleek make and did not posses any distinctive features to strike up a memory. It was longer than his hand, he flipped it over and glanced at Oliver quizzically.
"It is a phone." He said, happy that he was not the only one in the dark about such an invention. "Speak your name into it and it shall be bound."
"Ok, Jacob Talbot Voss," Talbot muttered to the black screen.
No sooner had he completed his introduction, than the device came to life with a slight vibrate. The screen lit up with a blinding flash before finally dimming to eye-friendly. It did not have buttons, Talbot assumed it to be one of those fully touch-based devices.
He unpackaged the last box and it revealed a sleek black slate, same shiny material as the phone. He raised an eyebrow to his Lawyer, who nodded at him. Talbot leaned and murmured his name against the object and a white light raced along the width of the device and as if cut in two, it opened up. This device had buttons.
"A laptop?" He confirmed to himself rather than asking.
"Yep, now lemme tell you a bit about the specs before you dive into the manual,"the Lawyer smirked like a child that was about to boast to his friend on the latest toy.
"Firstly, both your phone and laptop are made from carbon fibre; so they'll totally be durable. Water proof, Lava proof, Mud proof...all the proofs against whatever, that screen can survive a 30 storey fall and can tank the weight of a car. These apply to the laptop too. It uses a different frequency of network, so rest assured that you will not be hacked neither will you have lagging net!
" The camera quality can reach microscopic levels. Sensitive screen and you can say no to an overheating CPU, these babies can allow you to play whatever high spec game without a single rise in degrees. Has enough storage to withhold a country's data and still have space to spare. The RAM is quicksuilver. And many more such specs you shall later learn of,"the Lawyer finally calmed down.
So apparently, his new computers were unmatched? Well, not entirely maybe, as the upper echelons might have bought such ground breaking technologies. The devices did not have any famous brands appart from a golden wolf profile decor etched into the carbon material, the Lawyer also confirmed that it was indeed true gold. Also, it did not have any inbuilt software download apps, but required to send a request to the manufacturers (they came with a single contact) for the updates.
On a different note, it was linked to a private radio frequency thus did not share a domain with any users. Yes, he was on limitless WiFi from who knows where.