Sixty-Five Roses

05

The next challenge didn't come until the next day as the sun began dipping below the horizon. Their next challenge was to create an app and whichever app was most popular, won.

"All right guys, let's take this new team spirit, and let's apply to this app challenge," Billy said. "We've got this."

"Yeah, it'd help if we had an idea for an app," Stuart shot back.

"You bet your sweet ass it would, Stewie," Nick told him from where he was seated.

"No," Stuart argued without looking up from his phone. "Never Stewie."

"Okay, no Stewie. Perimeter breach acknowledged, Stuart." Nick turned to Billy who was playing with a hacky sack on the couch. "It'll feel good when this one, well, those two, warm up to me. You know it's gonna happen, right?" He glanced between Stuart and Parker, both of whom gave him a weird look. "I'm gonna break you two down like a two-by-four bronco. Watch me do it."

Parker gave a small smile. "You've already kinda broken me down. Doesn't mean the others have."

"You've already started warming up to dark and stormy."

She glanced at Stuart and nodded. "Well after yesterday, I guess it makes sense. Thanks for that, Stuart."

He nodded. "Don't mention it."

After a moment, Billy said, "Okay guys, let's brainstorm this puppy."

"We're gonna put the coffee in the pot and let it percolate," Nick told the others as he snapped his fingers several times. "Let's go."

"I think it'll be good to explore what apps have been most popular in the past," Yo-Yo said as he made his way to his computer.

"Go."

"Go back and forth," Billy encouraged.

"Nice," Lyle commented in response to Yo-Yo's idea.

"Oh, and we could bit it, you know?" Neha offered as she went to do so.

"Fall out," Nick said.

"Categorizing needle-movers by the type of user might work," Parker suggested to Neha, who nodded excitedly and continued working.

Billy frowned. "You're gonna do what?"

"There you go, girls," Lyle complimented. "Hit it both by function and by old two-prong. You're on the forest moon of Endor, taking out the shield generator, and you're launching an offensive with Admiral Ackbar. It's not a trap."

"All right guys, I don't wanna kill the momentum or the mojo that you have cooking, but to be fair with you, labels and categories don't use apps. People use apps. So I have an idea... Nowadays, people are taking pictures, right? They have their phones now; they're out. Something catches their eye, they want to take it. But then the photo's just sitting there. What if they take that photo and instantaneously put it out there on the line and they share it with their friends?"

Parker frowned as Stuart took a seat on a computer chair and rested his ankle on his other thigh as he scrolled through his phone to say, "That's Instagram. It already exists."

Parker nodded. "It's one of the most popular apps in the world. Facebook bought them for like a billion dollars."

"That's billion, with a 'b'."

Billy waved them off. "Oh, no, mine is very different from that."

"How is yours very different from that?" Yo-Yo asked.

"Because in mine, you're taking the photo instantaneously and putting it on the line." Billy tossed a hacky sack in the air and caught it repeatedly.

"Online," Lyle corrected.