‘‘What’s the catch?’’ Grant said.
‘‘The catch,’’ replied Daniel, looking away, ‘‘is that you’re going to have to trust me. Despite what I’ve been involved with.’’
Grant’s eyes narrowed. ‘‘Why don’t I like the sound of that?’’
‘‘For all the right reasons,’’ Daniel said wistfully.
35
‘‘Lisa?’’ Daniel called. She immediately sprung to attention and ran to him, fearing he was in some sort of pain. When she came near, he said, ‘‘I need you to go get something for me.’’
She looked at him suspiciously. ‘‘You want me to leave? Now? ’’
‘‘I need something from the lab.’’
‘‘There’s nothing left at the lab,’’ she said automatically, watching him closely.
‘‘This will be,’’ he said, not meeting her gaze. He directed her to move aside the desk in his office if it was still there and pry loose the floor tile directly beneath the left rear leg of the desk. Inside, she would find a box.
‘‘I need that box,’’ he said quietly.
She hesitated.
‘‘I’ll be safe here,’’ he said. ‘‘Please.’’
‘‘All right, but I’ll be back quick.’’ She turned to go.
‘‘Be careful,’’ he called out. ‘‘The police could still be watching the building.’’
When Lisa came to the door, she stopped short. She turned back to look at Grant, a quizzical expression written across her face.
Grant answered her unspoken question by reaching inside a pocket and pulling out his keys. He tossed them to her, and she caught them in one hand.
‘‘The blue Corvette convertible,’’ he said.
Daniel listened for her to be completely gone before he spoke again.
‘‘Lisa’s done most of our fact-finding on you. She’s even been here to your apartment, but you weren’t at home.’’ His voice trailed off as he became lost in thought again.
Grant said nothing.
‘‘She’s a good person,’’ Daniel said, looking back up. ‘‘She’s treated me like family—closer, like . . .’’ he swallowed as his eyes moistened. ‘‘But she can’t know what I’m about to tell you. Not ever. It . . . it would destroy her.’’
Grant sat up straight, glanced quickly at Julie. Daniel had his attention now.
‘‘Despite what my detractors might tell you,’’ he began, looking back up at Grant, ‘‘I am a very serious scientist. So please believe me when I say: what I’m about to tell you has taken a long time for me to accept.’’ He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
‘‘Five years ago, I was working as a research technician at a major lab funded by a megacorporation.’’
‘‘Let me guess,’’ Grant interjected. ‘‘Inveo Technologies?’’
‘‘It was a company called Paragenics Group,’’ Daniel replied. ‘‘But I understand Inveo has become one of their largest competitors over the years. Anyway, I wasn’t working on anything terribly special. There were dozens of us working on the same kinds of things, although we were each allowed to have free rein and try our own methods. I was mapping brain responses to various stimuli.
‘‘I had been there for nine months, happily working at proving various theories I had about the capabilities of the human brain and extrasensory perception. I was experiencing more success than most of my colleagues, and scuttlebutt said that my work had not gone without notice from the higher-ups, that I would soon surpass my colleagues.
‘‘Then, one day everything at the lab changed. A full staff meeting was called, and we were told that a private investor had purchased controlling interest in the company, and that we might notice a number of unfamiliar faces around the building. We were to think nothing of it.’’
‘‘Who was the investor?’’ Grant asked.
‘‘I never found out. But just as they said, soon there were dozens of new workers combing the facility—and not just scientists. Men and women in gray camouflage jumpsuits constantly made the rounds. We were never told who they were, but we suspected they were some kind of independent security force. Our building had security already, but these guys . . . they wore no insignia, no emblem, nothing to identify them. Nothing changed in regard to our work, though, so after a while, we just got used to seeing them.
‘‘But slowly, more and more new security measures were put into place all around our building. None of us knew what it was about, but you can imagine the rumors. Some of the scientists even resigned in protest.
‘‘One morning, one of the gray-clad men came to my lab and said I was to report to a sub-level of the facility only available to those with the highest level of clearance. He escorted me through a number of checkpoints and inspections, but it seemed some sort of emergency was taking place, so they couldn’t afford to detain me very long.
‘‘When I reached the secured area, it was a large, white underground hallway, enormous in size, and it ended in the distance with a heavily secured vault door made of steel. Two security guards stood to the left and right of the door.’’
Grant glanced at Julie. This sounded an awful lot like what they’d found beneath Inveo Technologies.
‘‘My escort handed me off to one of the company’s senior staff members— a scientist herself—who met me there in the hall. She made me sign a nondisclosure form on the spot, and warned me that if I were ever to tell anyone what I was about to see, they would be within their rights to bring the full legal weight of the company down upon me.
‘‘To my disappointment, we didn’t go through the vaulted door. Instead, she ushered me into a small side room, where a group of about half a dozen scientists in lab coats—none of whom I recognized—surrounded a man sitting in a chair in the middle of the room. There was nothing in the room but the scientists and their subject, who wore a standard hospital gown.’’ He gestured at his own gown. ‘‘My companion introduced me to the other scientists, and they acknowledged me with guarded expressions. One or two of them shook my hand.
‘‘They asked me to run some of the specialized tests I’d developed on the man in the chair. I still have no idea who he was. He had the most blank expression on his face I had ever seen, and he never moved or spoke except while I ran the test. I had done these tests dozens of times before, so even though I was uneasy with such an attentive audience, I did as I was told.
‘‘I ran my tests for hours. I was used to getting maybe one right answer out of every twenty or so, if I was lucky. That was considered a ‘good’ score, and I’d never gotten anything higher out of the college students and others who volunteered for my tests. So you’ll understand that it was one of the most profound moments of my scientific career when I watched this guy nail every test I threw at him. He was certifiably gifted; it was the most potent case of genuine ESP I have ever seen. Over the course of the afternoon, I tried every test I knew, and he defeated them all, even though he appeared barely cogent. I believe the scientists would have allowed me to keep going indefinitely, but after a few hours, I simply had nothing else left to try. It was the most thrilling, most astounding thing I’d ever witnessed.
‘‘Finally, the scientists thanked me for my time and told me I could go. I suddenly remembered the nondisclosure agreement and was so disappointed that the vindication for all of my work had finally been discovered, yet I couldn’t tell anyone about it. I couldn’t imagine any reason they wouldn’t want everyone in the world to know about this man and what he could do.
‘‘But just as I was about to leave, the man fell to the floor. I was horrified, afraid that one of my tests had somehow triggered this. But the other scientists did little to help him—it was almost as if they’d been expecting this. I watched as blood oozed from his ears onto the floor.
‘‘He was dead in minutes. Some kind of seizure, they told me. I must’ve looked panicked, because as soon as they’d determined the man was dead, they all turned to focus their attention on me. The wo
man who led me into the room grabbed me by the arm and led me back out. As we walked, she assured me that the proper authorities would be contacted and that I had nothing to worry about since I had been conducting perfectly legal, harmless scientific tests.
‘‘I was so stunned, I simply wandered back upstairs to my office. But as the hours passed, the more my suspicions stirred. No ambulance or police cars arrived at the facility that day. No one ever came to question me as a witness. And as far as anyone else in the building proper knew, it was just another typical day at work.
‘‘At quitting time, instead of leaving, I went back downstairs to the underground hallway. I still had my clearance from earlier in the day, and the guards stared at me, but they let me through, probably assuming I had been called back down. I went back to the room where we had conducted the tests, and to my surprise, I could hear from outside all of the scientists from earlier, still in the room. I put my ear to the door and listened.
‘‘I couldn’t make out everything they said, but I heard them repeatedly mention something called ‘Project Threshold.’ From the way they talked about it, succeeding with this project was the focus of whatever they were doing. As these thoughts went through my mind, something hit my head and I blacked out.’’
Daniel took an awkward pause, his eyes closed tight.
‘‘When I awoke,’’ he continued, ‘‘I couldn’t move. I remember it was so cold, and so quiet. I was lying on my back, and I could turn my head to either side, but beyond that, I was completely immobilized. When my eyes adjusted to the brightness of the room, I found myself in this vast space—to call it a ‘room’ would be an injustice. It was what was on the other side of that enormous vault door. Lying all around me, filling the entire space were flat, cold, stainless steel tables just like the one I was on, and they were occupied.
‘‘Men and women, all young adults, were lying on every table. And none of them could move, either, even though none of us were strapped down. I came to realize later that some kind of paralytic toxin had been used on us. Do you have any idea how that feels? To be completely unfettered, yet unable to move. It was . . . horrifying.’’
Daniel closed his eyes again, seeing it in his mind. ‘‘Some of the others were awake, some were unconscious. All of them wore hospital gowns like the dead man, and it was then I realized I was wearing one, too.’’
Grant watched as Daniel paused, closed his eyes, and shook his head.
‘‘I watched as well as I could manage for over three hours as the people on the tables around me were subjected to every stimulus you can imagine. Electroshock, chemicals, gases, even direct neurological surgery. It was grotesque, dehumanizing. I wanted to cry out for help but was afraid to draw attention to myself. I tried to get my body to move, but it wouldn’t obey. It was no use.
‘‘The woman who had met me earlier appeared at the head of my table and looked down at me. I could see her upside down if I craned my head back. I asked her what all this was and what they were going to do to me.
‘‘She said that curiosity may have killed the cat, but here, they had much better uses for the curious. The long and short of it is that my suspicions were essentially true. I had become one of the subjects of Project Threshold, which was dedicated to finding individuals with latent mental abilities, and activating those abilities. This was the ‘threshold’ they were trying to cross and access. What I was proving the existence of upstairs through legitimate testing, these people were trying to force into being through any means possible.
‘‘They ran test after test on their subjects’ mental outputs; anyone who registered a spike in output they referred to as a ‘shimmer.’ It was a shorthand code used to indicate a promising subject. But not one of their subjects survived the radical procedures long enough to be considered a success, just like the man I had tested for them earlier. I asked her why they were doing this, but she wouldn’t say.
‘‘They hooked me up to an artery line, and another scientist appeared with a syringe containing some kind of ugly, brown liquid. I was more scared than I’d ever been in my life, and all I could think about was that man who had collapsed on the floor, bleeding from his ears. I despised them for what they were doing, but I was . . . I was petrified . . .’’
Daniel stopped speaking and suddenly he looked very pale. Tired. Like a feeble, elderly man. Grant wondered how the man lying prone before him could ever have escaped the predicament he described.
‘‘God forgive me . . . I made a deal.’’
‘‘You what!’’ Grant exclaimed. ‘‘How—?’’
‘‘I know, I know,’’ Daniel said, dejectedly. ‘‘But when you’re just lying there, at someone else’s mercy, staring death in the face and you’re absolutely, unequivocally powerless to stop it . . . the ethical questions just . . . go away. There are no options, no alternatives. If you’ve never been in that situation, you can’t know. The human capacity for self-preservation forces all other choices out of the equation.’’
‘‘Of course you had other choices!’’ Grant thundered. ‘‘Listen to you, trying to methodically justify your involvement in this . . . this conspiracy! You’ve actually lived with this long enough to make it into something okay, in your mind, haven’t you? How long did it take you to come up with that bit about self-preservation?’’
‘‘Easy words when you’re sitting in the comfort of home,’’ Daniel replied dolefully. ‘‘Remember that if I hadn’t made a deal with them, I wouldn’t be here now, telling you what I know.’’
‘‘That doesn’t make it right!’’ Grant spat.
‘‘Don’t you think I know that?’’ Daniel shouted back at him. ‘‘Don’t you think I lie awake every night, thinking of all those other test subjects, consumed with guilt?’’ He began coughing, clutching his chest with his good hand.
‘‘Good! You should feel guilty!’’ Grant raged.
‘‘Calm down . . .’’ Julie said quietly. She grabbed his arm and guided him back to his seat, though he had no memory of having stood. Then she went to the kitchen and got Daniel a glass of water. He received it gratefully.
‘‘To finish my story,’’ Daniel continued doggedly after recovering, ‘‘I reminded the Paragenics people of my success rate and managed to convince them that my skills were too valuable to be wasted this way. I suggested that I could help—not with their attempts to create mentally advanced humans, but in finding those who were born with mental gifts. They agreed, and since I had long proven that I work best in solitude, they left me to my own methods. I would function independently, outside of the company. But all of the work I did was for them, and they kept a very close eye on my activities.
‘‘They implanted a tracer device into a filling in one of my back teeth. They offered me a strict budget from which to operate, and I was instructed to report back to them weekly on whatever findings I had, or the deal was off. If I missed a week reporting in, if I refused to continue my research, or if I told anyone what they were up to, they would use the tracer to track me down and I would be brought back to the vault. All they required was that I continue my research, attempting to find people with ‘potent, enhanced mental skills’ like they were looking for. They didn’t care what methods I used to do it.’’
He leaned his head back, spent. ‘‘There, that’s it . . . That’s the secret I’ve been holding on to for five years, the thing that no one knows. Not even Lisa. I made a deal with the devil to save my skin. I’m a—’’
‘‘A coward,’’ Grant said bitterly, but without raising his voice this time.
‘‘Yes,’’ Daniel replied. ‘‘And now I’ve got the rest of my life to try to make up for it.’’
Grant wanted to say more, but he was still angry and didn’t trust himself.
When Grant remained silent, Daniel picked up his story. ‘‘I created methods of detection that were noninvasive,’’ he said. ‘‘If I had to do this, I was determined that no would be hurt because of me. Most of the people I tested
never even knew they were being studied. And every day I hoped and prayed that I would never find what I was looking for. But I had to at least try, or I was dead.’’
Daniel shook his head and then offered the tiniest hint of a smile. ‘‘When those thugs attacked me and my lab was destroyed . . . a part of me was relieved. It meant no more working for Paragenics, no more research. The tracer filling is gone from my tooth; it was knocked loose during the attack. I can finally, legitimately, get out from under their thumb.’’
Grant was still frowning angrily at Daniel, yet as his temper cooled, he tried to keep telling himself that Daniel had only done what most people would do in the same situation. And the poor guy was certainly broken and defeated enough as it was, without needing anyone else’s judgment.
As Grant processed these things, along with Daniel’s story, one question rose to the surface.
‘‘You said you made regular reports to them. You called me on the phone over a week ago, so you’ve known about me and what I can do for at least that long. Did you tell your superiors about me?’’
‘‘Of course not!’’ Daniel looked startled, almost offended.
Grant was unabashedly suspicious.
‘‘Grant, you wouldn’t even be sitting here if they knew about you!’’
‘‘All right,’’ Grant conceded. But another thought was buzzing in his head—one that had been building for a while as he’d listened to Daniel’s tale. ‘‘What if I’m one of those people Paragenics experimented on? Or maybe I’m the product of one of their competitors, like Inveo Technologies. Could I be one of their successes?’’
Daniel sat up straight, his eyes suddenly brighter.
‘‘That’s just the thing,’’ Daniel said, his eyes wider now than Grant had yet seen them. ‘‘That’s what I came here to tell you. Despite the millions of dollars Paragenics poured into its experiments . . . despite everyone that died at their hands . . . they never had a success. At least, not one that survived more than a few hours. They even abandoned Project Threshold about a year ago and filled in their underground labs with concrete, to make sure no one would follow their work. The company still exists, and they told me to continue my clandestine research on the off chance that I might succeed. But the ‘Threshold’ was never crossed. They never succeeded at all.
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