The quiet in the room is deafening. There are maybe forty people in the audience, but the silence after my last slide feels like a city has stopped breathing. I search the rows for a familiar face and find Maddy in the front, grinning like she expects me to start breakdancing. Jian is off to the side, arms folded, the only person in the entire crowd who isn't fidgeting. I try not to let my knees wobble as I set the clicker down. A man in the back, silver hair, tailored suit, pocket square that probably costs more than my rent, raises his hand. "How do we know this isn't a load of crap?" he says, loud enough to get a few nervous laughs. "If it's so revolutionary, why hasn't anyone published it yet?"
I glance sideways. Jian stares straight ahead, unreadable. I open my mouth, but before anything comes out, Maddy fires from the front row: "Maybe because the best ideas don't come gift-wrapped for you, Mr. McKinsey." That gets an actual laugh, and the suit flushes red. I want to hug her. Instead, I launch into the answer I've rehearsed a hundred times: the theory is too new, the math hasn't finished baking, and we're not about to let some VC strip-mine our IP before it's even out of beta. I see a few heads nodding. The rest are still on the fence.