"It's a pretty great morning today."
Marshall said as he entered a meeting room where a few people were already there. There was a cup of coffee in his hand, and his lips were curved up in a smile.
"I would say it's a strange morning."
One of the people in the room said. He was Jim Haynes, the editor that had rejected the pitch of Bruce before. He was one of the oldest editors in the publishing firm, being one of the first employees.
"Why is it strange?"
"The guy whose pitch I rejected met with a celebrity and decided to do a story, and you agreed to listen to the pitch too. Ain't it strange? That could itself be a part of a story."
"It could be. Do you not have any faith in it?"
Marshall asked, sitting down.
"I don't have a reason to have faith, you know. I saw the previous pitch, and there are only a few things that I found interesting in it. It was all very boring, and I'm sure our reader demographic won't like it. I'm curious." Jim suddenly looked up at Marshall. "Why are you here? I never saw you during a pitch before?"
"Because I want to be surprised today. As you said, the previous pitch wasn't good, but I want to know how Aiden would do it. A new writer can change a story, you know."
"Yeah, either in a good way or bad way."
Marshall didn't say anything at that. He and Jim were friends, so he knew full well that he wouldn't be satisfied until he saw the pitch.
He had come to see the pitch by taking time out of his schedule just because he was curious about what Aiden would bring.
Being the owner of a top publishing firm, Marshall would often come across authors that would amaze him. He had gotten a habit of marking them and being an overseer in their writing career.
Aiden was one of the authors that he had marked.
On the other hand, Jim had the perception that Bruce was still a very inexperienced creator that needed to learn a lot to improve and present good enough work. Even with him collaborating with Aiden, it didn't change a lot.
After all, Aiden himself was a new writer, having only published one book.
'Everything would become clear after the pitch.'
Jim thought in his mind and checked his watch.
There were ten minutes to the meeting. Everyone has come early except the authors.
At that moment, the door opened, and Aiden walked in with Bruce following him.
***
'I'm so nervous that my hands are shaking.'
Bruce thought as he looked over the meeting room. Jim and a few other people that he didn't recognise were sitting at one side. He guessed that they were high-tier employees.
On the right, Marshall White was sitting.
Just the presence of the owner of the publishing firm was enough to put him under more pressure. After all, it was only two weeks ago that he had an unsuccessful pitch.
'I feel like I would suffocate.'
He thought as he felt his heartbeat increasing.
"Bruce, get it together."
Aiden whispered to him, and he could only give him a slight nod. His words didn't seem to have any effect.
"I'm pretty excited to know what you have in store for us. I heard that the same graphic novel was pitched to Jim two weeks ago."
Marshall asked, glancing in between Jim and Bruce.
"No, we are pitching a different story today." Jim gave Aiden a stare. "Just the main character and his powers are the same but the story is completely different."
"Sounds interesting."
Marshall said and with that, the pitch began.
Typically, a pitch includes a lot of things other than just a sample of the comic that the author is going for. The core idea of the novel and the future of it, several character arcs and how they would look as well as the demographic that they could cater towards.
In Aiden's own words, "The story is something that looks like another coming of an age superhero movie, and it is that but at the same time, it's more than that and the themes would just get more and more mature."
He tried his best to explain every good point about the story, with Bruce chipping in during the questions about the art and characters.
One of the particular ones was the unique look of the main character.
"Why is the main character's hair so long? He looks like someone from a boy band. It wasn't like that in the pitch I saw."
Jim asked, picking up one of the character sketches for the main character. In the sketch, the guy has long, black hair, and a sickly body with scars on his neck.
Aiden was the one to answer it.
"I just envisioned him like that. At first, there wasn't a particular reason but then, I thought I should give him a scar that he's trying to hide with long hair. It's also something that's different from the normal protagonist out there, right."
Jim nodded at that and the others didn't seem to mind it either. Mainly because it looked good.
Bruce's art was really great and no one could say anything against it. Because of that, the characters looked way better.
They moved on and talked about other things.
Jim was genuinely surprised that there were really a lot of changes in the story. The themes were similar but the vibe was very different.
It now looked like something that would appeal to people and for Jim, there was a particular scene in the story that was the hook for him.
It was the scene in which the main character would ask for help from one of the teachers against bullying, but the teacher would just ignore it. At that moment, a voice would ring in his ear.
'No one looks out for anyone in this world. People would certainly not look out for someone like you. You need to stand for yourself.'
Those words would haunt the main character until he would face the bullies himself and at least try to stand up for himself.
Jim felt like things could be done better in that scene, but character growth was something that he liked, and the last panel in which the god in the main character's mind is shown laughing was also done very well.
All in all, Jim liked it even though he had no expectations.
On the other hand, Bruce was also getting more and more comfortable as the pitch meeting went on. It was his longest pitch meeting to date and going by the expression in front of him, he could say one thing.
'They are liking it. No, I can't be sure of it yet. At least it looked like they didn't dislike it.'
After a while, Aiden had already said most things that he had prepared and now, it was onto the editor.
"It's surely a very good pitch. The story is something very unique and breaks out of the usual superhero formula quite seamlessly. I like it a lot. Good job, you two."
Marshall said, looking through the pages presented to him.
"Yeah, I quite liked it. The art is beautiful and a lot of people pick comics due to the art."
Another person in the room praised and Bruce couldn't seem to keep his smile to himself.
It was only Jim who had yet to say anything.
He opened his mouth after seeing that everyone was expecting him to speak.
"I liked it too." Aiden cheered inwardly hearing that, but Jim wasn't finished yet. "Like everyone here already said, the comic has a lot of great things going on in it. At least, the start seems good, and you have a good enough idea of the direction of the story, but you said that more and more mature themes are going to come into play."
"Are you saying that because children buy our comics more?" Marshall asked and Jim nodded.
"It would mess it up with it. It's a big risk if we keep it in mind. Not like Viking has a great record in comic books. We weren't doing them until the late 2000s, so it would be like going for a swim in a sea full of sharks that are already dominating the market."
Publishers are always concerned about what type of consumers they are getting.
Someone with comics that mostly children read won't go out of their way to publish adult ones until they are trying to take a big leap to attract a different kind of demographic.
Even Aiden knew that adults and college students would like the series more with the early themes of martial arts and later themes into a lot of complex stuff that would be too much for children.
"Jim is right, you two. Your graphic novel is good but it's not what we sell."
Bruce's face froze when Marshall said that. It almost felt like he was being rejected again.
But Aiden had already prepared for questions like this.
"Take a risk. As simple as that." His confident tone surprised people in the room. "I know that the comic isn't for children, but at the same time, there's not a lot of mature-themed superhero novels in the market. It could be something new and you could just publish the first few chaps and see the reactions. You will know if it's worth it."
His words were precise, with each of them well thought out. Bruce almost got a heart attack seeing Aiden talk back to the owner of Vikings publishing like that.
But Aiden was able to do it because he wasn't an employee in the company. He was an author and celebrity who was fairly successful and he knew that Marshall had a good impression of him.
The novel quality was there anyway.
So he could speak without worry.
Thankfully, Marshall didn't seem to take any offence to it.
"You seem confident. Well, okay. Let's publish the first issue and see the reaction. If it's good, we will go ahead with it. I don't think we should shy away from exploring different demographics."
