Chapter 83

• Scott knows what’s happening is wrong.
• Once upon a time, he was an idealist. He wanted science to change the world for the better, and he worked as hard as he could to make that happen. So hard, in fact, that he got noticed by a government agency important enough that it officially doesn’t even exist. Top secret is an euphemist, the President himself is only made aware of this operation on a need-to-know basis, the budget is secret and controlled directly by the Department of Defense. Here, he and many others are allowed to use science to its fullest potential, to fabricate greatness regardless of the ethic conundrums that hold back human-made advancement everywhere else.
• At first, he had been ecstatic to be here, the opportunity beyond his wildest dreams. But with time and observation, Scott has noticed things that increasingly kept him awake at night. Project teams could be dismantled from one day to the next over failing or insufficient advancements. Notably, team leaders have the unfortunate tendency to be fired from projects and never seen again. With an operation as confidential as this one, the human element cannot be trusted. It didn’t take Scott long to put two and two together and figure out that those team leaders weren’t leaving to go into the vacation type of retirement, but another, much more permanent and benefit-free one.