Rebirth of America, this is my era

Chapter 69 Acting and Practice

"Brother! Brother! Calm down! Calm down!"

As soon as Don Valentine finished speaking, Nolan Bushnell stood up.

He put one hand on the other's shoulders and patted his back with the other hand, and his mouth was like a spring, constantly bumping against each other.

"Brother, calm down, we are discussing something."

"Ethan has been very good since he came in. No matter how we questioned him or how we expressed our emotions, he was very restrained. I think he wanted to show his willingness to communicate, right?"

Nolan Bushnell winked at Ethan.

Ethan, having received the clear instructions, walked down the stairs and nodded slightly.

Nolan Bushnell breathed a sigh of relief, and then he said to Don Valentine, "Ethan may have caused us huge financial losses, but since he is willing to communicate, why don't we sit down and talk first?"

"I admit that I was filled with rage when I first saw him. I wanted to strangle him to death! But we all know that killing people is useless in this kind of situation, right? Besides, we are in a civilized society now, and no one uses such barbaric behavior anymore."

Hearing these words, Don Valentine glared at Ethan fiercely.

"Humph!"

He made a nasal sound and shook his hands vigorously.

"Fuck You!"

He broke free from Nolan Bushnell's arms and walked out of the office without looking back.

Then, there was a muffled "bang" sound.

That was venting the dissatisfaction in my heart.

Nolan Bushnell shook his head after seeing this action. After turning his gaze back to Ethan, he shrugged and spread his hands, looking helpless.

"Ethan, I'm sorry, our emotions just now were a little extreme, but I believe you should be able to understand."

Nolan Bushnell pulled a pack of Marlboros from the drawer, took out a cigarette and handed it to Ethan.

When Ethan didn't take it, he put it in his mouth and lit it himself.

As the light blue smoke rose, Nolan Bushnell exhaled a smoke ring and sighed, "Ethan, you know that we, Atari, reached a settlement agreement with Milova a few months ago. We paid them hundreds of thousands of dollars and were unable to sell our self-developed games for a year."

"Under these circumstances, Atari's survival environment was actually very difficult. There was not much money in the company's account, and the entire company was completely on the verge of bankruptcy. That's why I asked Steve, who had just returned to China, to find out about our competitors. If they developed a popular game, Atari might fall into the abyss overnight."

"There's nothing I can do. The business world has always been so cruel."

"but……"

At this point, Nolan Bushnell moved the cigarette in his hand to the ashtray and flicked it.

As he moved, the ash, which was already difficult to shape, collapsed instantly.

The pale red flame suddenly appeared like a star in the night.

"Steve discovered you, and you brought us Snake Game, which was a huge surprise to us."

Nolan Bushnell looked at Ethan and smiled. "To be honest, we have been very grateful to you over the past few months."

"Although we have conflicts, for example, the initial negotiations were not pleasant, but business is business, and everyone's core goal is to seek greater benefits for themselves, and there is no intention to target anyone."

"It is precisely because we have no ill will towards each other that our cooperation is so pleasant, isn't it?"

Although it was a question, Nolan Bushnell did not give Ethan time to answer. Playing with the cigarette in his hand, he continued, "We believe in you, so we will settle your share after the first round of sales..."

"We trust you, so we would like to ask for your opinion on the distribution..."

"We trust you, so we'll ask you to look at the accounts right after the second round of sales..."

"But what happened today caught us off guard."

Having said this, Nolan Bushnell also put out the cigarette in his hand.

With his arms folded and his elbows resting on the table, he looked at Ethan with a complicated expression.

"Ethan, you know what? When we received the lawsuit from Mirowa, we felt like the sky was falling. We don't understand why this happened. We don't know why you, as a former employee of Mirowa, would make such a mistake."

"We desperately wanted to find you and get the real answer to the matter, but we looked for you for an entire afternoon and couldn't find any trace of you. So when you finally answered the phone, we may have unconsciously used some tough tones in the communication process because of our urgency."

"I'm very sorry about this. Of course, I also want to apologize to you on behalf of Tang. After all, he invested all the money he earned in Atari over the years. If Atari is gone, then all his work over the years will be in vain."

"We are all smart people, so I think you should be able to understand what I mean. Since you said that this matter might be a misunderstanding, I will believe you again. I hope you can communicate well with Miluohua after you go back. I hope you can reach an agreement with them. After all... everyone wants to make money, right?"

"At the same time, we hope you can understand us. We will suspend the payment of the second phase of dividends because no one knows where this case will develop. So before the case is over..."

"I'm very sorry."

Nolan Bushnell sighed.

He forced a stiff smile at Ethan.

Ethan looked at him deeply, then gave him a formulaic smile and left Atari.

With his departure, Don Valentine returned to Nolan Bushnell's office.

The two looked at each other.

Then they all laughed at the same time.

"How did I do?" Don Valentine asked.

"Great! Brother!" Nolan Bushnell gave a thumbs up. "When you yelled at Ethan, I thought you were going to punch him! Especially when you said - 'Ethan, don't you want to abide by the law? Then go to jail!' Your expression was really scary! I was really afraid that you would fight with him!"

"Hahaha~" Don Valentine liked Nolan Bushnell's comment very much. "If you think I'm fierce, then we just need to wait for Ethan to come back, because the pressure you put on him was so strong that he didn't say anything just now!"

"Of course! My acting skills are good enough to win an award in Hollywood!"

Nolan Bushnell boasted, and then returned to the main topic, "Of course, this is also related to Milowa's lawsuit. They claim one million from us, and at the same time they claim one million from Ethan and his team? Oh... This idea of ​​separate lawsuits is really amazing! It's all about the money! And Ethan can't afford to pay so much money, so he can only sell Snake Game to us..."

…………

Palo Alto and Los Gatos are not far from each other. When Ethan returned to his new home, as the door closed, he threw himself on the newly bought sofa. The soft feeling made him ache all over, and the endless darkness made him feel cold all over.

He didn't know why things had developed to this point!
He didn't even know why things happened so suddenly!
Mi Luohua, who had never had any contact with him in the past few months, suddenly took him to court?
Isn't this a sick thing?
If he really infringed his rights, wouldn't it be enough for Milova to send a lawyer's letter?

Why was he given a taste of the iron fist of the law with such force?

Ethan really couldn't figure it out.

Compared to this incident, what made him even more angry was Atari's attitude tonight!

Don Valentine and Nolan Bushnell's technique of singing the same tune is so crude!

Anyone can see their core purpose, which is to put all the responsibilities of the "Snake Game" project on him!

Although there is nothing wrong with this practice and it’s all business, the face of being a whore and wanting to be a virtuous woman is so disgusting.

It's understandable that people talk about things and vent their emotions. But after venting, they still try to build relationships? They say they are forced to not share dividends?
Do I pull you? Do I have no choice?
From a business perspective, not distributing dividends is the right thing to do!
Putting on a hypocritical cloak for yourself is so hypocritical!

Perhaps it was because he was too angry, or perhaps it was because today's events were too stressful, Ethan fell asleep after lying on the sofa for only a while.

When he woke up again, an enticing fragrance entered his nostrils, stimulating his taste buds.

'? '

This situation made Ethan stand up in confusion, and then he saw the blanket on his body.

Following the smell into the kitchen, Evelyn was frying eggs there.

"Are you awake? Go wash up." Evelyn glanced at Ethan without stopping her movements. She smiled and said, "I've fried the eggs and it's ready to eat. The bread is toasted, the salad is mixed, and there's milk."

At the same time, she also made a joke.

"If Linda saw us eating these in the morning, she would definitely feel bad, right? But there's nothing I can do, these are the only things I can cook."

"When did you come?" Ethan did not respond to his sister's question, but directly asked the question in his mind.

This question made Evelin pause, then she smiled and shook her head, “Last night.”

"Last night?" Ethan was even more confused.

“Yes, last night.” Evelin sighed and said, “The doors of our two villas are facing each other. You left not long after I entered the house. How could I not know about this kind of thing?”

"Although I don't know where you went, I know you didn't come back until after twelve o'clock last night."

"You didn't even turn on the lights when you came back, so I came over, and then I found you lying on the sofa."

"Oh, by the way, this shouldn't be considered trespassing, right? I used your key to open the door."

Evelin’s tone was brisk.

Ethan also smiled and shook his head, "Oh... not really..."

Pursing his lips, he added, "Thank you."

At the same time, he also told what happened last night, “Evelyn, last night I…”

Unfortunately, before he could finish his words, Evelin interrupted him and said, “Go wash up first, and we’ll talk about anything later.”

"Bread tastes best when it's freshly baked. It loses its flavor when it's cold."

Ethan accepted Evelyn's advice and went upstairs to take a shower and brush his teeth.

When he returned to the restaurant, he talked about what happened last night while eating breakfast.

When Evelyn learned that Ethan had gone to Atari last night, she nodded slightly.

After she finished listening to Ethan's story and learned about the problems and attitudes Atari was facing, she wiped her mouth with a tissue and said with a smile, "It seems that Barbara is really experienced. She guessed everything."

"Since she can see through everything, I am not in a hurry at all now."

"Isn't it just being sued? This kind of thing is too common in our country, right? After all, a simple traffic violation can put people in court."

"I have classes today. You can go find her yourself later. I trust her."

Ethan knew that his sister wanted him to relax and not have too much pressure.

He smiled and nodded to show that he understood. After cleaning up the house, he drove to Stanford.

I found Barbara who was attending a class at the law school as if I was familiar with the place, sat down at the end, and sat through the class quietly.

Although the women's protection class that Barbara took had nothing to do with him, that confident figure made Ethan feel extremely at ease.

After Barbara waved to him and asked him to help her move the case collection on the podium back to the office, the wizard sitting behind the desk also listened carefully to Ethan's story.

Since he had already recounted the story to his sister in the morning and had sorted out his thoughts, Ethan spoke very quickly this time.

But his clear and logical words made Barbara very dissatisfied.

"Ethan."

"Ok?"

“An old problem.”

"what?"

"You speak too fast." Barbara knocked on the table and said, "Ethan, you have to know one thing. Our country is a maritime law system. It is different from those continental law systems that follow legal provisions. We often talk about empiricism."

"So you have to tell me all the details. Maybe many of the details may not be important to you, but I can judge from experience whether Milova's lawsuit and Atari's response are abnormal."

"Now, this is the kind of anomaly we're looking for, right?"

"Because we still don't understand why Mi Luohua suddenly sued you."

Barbara's reminder made Ethan nod decisively. He was silent for a long time and recalled the whole thing.

After he told her everything that happened last night, Barbara, who was scratching her head while listening, looked very distorted.

She thought for a while, and then said uncomfortably: "Ethan..."

"Ok?"

"Did you offend Atari as well?"

"Why do you say that?" Ethan was a little confused.

And his confusion made Barbara clasp her hands together, close her eyes slightly, and gently touch her head with her index finger, as if casting a spell, but more like thinking.

"Ethan, to be honest, if you didn't miss any information, then this case you're involved in is really weird."

"Because, according to your description, the two subjects, Mirohua and Don Valentine, behaved very abnormally."

"It's like, how can I describe it to you? Milohua doesn't fit the profile of a plaintiff, and Don Valentine doesn't look like a defendant at all... I don't know if you can understand what I mean?"

'...'

Ethan shook his head, because he really didn't see it.

When he expressed his doubts, Barbara slammed the table and took out a piece of white paper.

"Ethan, let's put aside the law for now and have a question-and-answer session."

"Once we sort things out, maybe we'll get the answer."

"The answer may be right or wrong, but it doesn't matter, right? Finding the flaws of all parties in a matter is a long and arduous process."

"Well, first of all, please tell me how you feel about Miluohua, or in other words, when you were working at Miluohua, did you have any conflicts with Miluohua?"

Barbara pulled out her pen, narrowed her eyes, and looked at Ethan seriously.

(End of this chapter)