The air in the Northwood Lecture Hall seemed to have thickened to concrete, leaving Mel's lungs burning. It took her two full, agonizing minutes to regain control of her legs. She finally stepped forward, moving like a deep-sea diver against invisible pressure, and claimed the packet of paper from the marble table. It was heavy, literally and metaphorically, and the glossy cover felt cold and alien under her fingers.
"Come on, Mel. Breathe. Let's get out of here."
Chloe grabbed her arm, her strength surprising, and practically dragged her out of the double doors and back into the normal, bustling university corridor. The change in atmosphere was instant and overwhelming. Students were laughing; the air smelled of stale coffee and printer toner. Mel felt like she had emerged from a pressure chamber.
Chloe was vibrating with manic energy, a rare and unsettling state for the usually composed finance student. She gripped her own packet like a winning lottery ticket.
"Did you feel that?" Chloe whispered, her eyes wide and glittering. "That sheer, unadulterated power? It's electric. Most professors are just academics, but that man… he's a titan. He makes you want to bleed for the grade. I loved it."
Mel leaned against a wall, trying to slow the frantic rhythm of her heart. "You loved it? Chloe, he just told us our academic futures would be reassessed if we fail. That's corporate speak for 'my scholarship is dead and my family is ruined.'"
Chloe waved a dismissive hand. "That's just Kallen being Kallen. High pressure, high stakes. It separates the wannabes from the winners, darling. It's what you signed up for when you got that coveted spot."
"I signed up for a stipend to pay for my education," Mel shot back, the panic finally starting to curdle into cold, sharp anger. "I didn't sign up to compete for a billion-dollar market entry project in three weeks. This is impossible."
"Let's see what madness is inside this thing," Chloe said, already peeling back the cover. They huddled over the packet on a nearby bench.
The first five pages were an immaculate Request for Proposal (RFP) outlining the pitch: an investment strategy for an aggressive, high-risk sector in a volatile emerging economy. The requirements were listed in a dense, bulleted section on page six.
Mel's eyes scanned the demands, her mind immediately translating the jargon into impossibility:
A predictive financial model that accounts for a full political upheaval contingency.
Negotiated-term contracts with three separate, real-world regional suppliers.
A comprehensive legal brief demonstrating a complete understanding of local tax evasionloopholes.
A mandatory in-person presentation of the proposal to Kallen and a panel of actual Venture Capital partners.
She stared at the words, her mind racing through her syllabus. Sourcing contracts was the job of a corporate legal team. Predicting political crises was a think tank's job. This wasn't a paper; it was a functioning business plan meant to be executed next Monday.
"This is an impossible project," Mel stated, her voice dangerously quiet. She looked up at Chloe, whose excitement had finally, visibly faltered.
"Wait, the tax evasion loopholes?" Chloe admitted, the word "electric" gone from her vocabulary. "That requires research access we definitely don't have. And negotiating real contracts?"
"Impossible? Chloe, this isn't an academic assignment. It's an RFP a Kallen analyst would spend six months on," Mel said, tapping the page with a shaking finger. "Rhys Kallen isn't testing us; he's trying to cull us. He wants to know who will break and who won't. My potential, my debt, it means I have to submit something that is genuinely investment-ready."
Mel closed the packet, the overwhelming weight of the task settling over her. Her fear didn't vanish, but it suddenly transformed into a clear, cutting focus.
"Three weeks means twenty-one days," she murmured, starting a terrible calculation in her head. "To build the full model, secure even the fake contracts, and write the report, I need a minimum of 400 hours. The math doesn't work with my current course load."
She looked at the hallway, at the smiling students, the pizza flyers, the casual normalcy of campus life, and she saw nothing but noise.
"I have to eliminate everything that isn't this project," Mel decided, pushing away from the wall. The sacrifice Jenna had warned her about was no longer theoretical; it was the only possible equation for survival. "No study groups, no nights out, no friends. Everything is a distraction."
Chloe stared at her, her eyes reflecting concern rather than fascination this time. "Mel, you're not thinking straight. You'll burn out. You'll break."
"If I burn out, I'll have enough money for next semester's tuition," Mel said, already walking away. "If I fail, I go home with nothing and a debt I can't repay. The choice is made."
She clutched the heavy packet and headed toward the deepest, darkest corner of the library. Rhys Kallen had put a price tag on her dreams, and Mel was ready to start paying the first installment, even if it cost her everything else.