Chapter Forty: The "Other" Project

“Do you realize what this is?!”

Steve slammed the coffee-stained stack of papers on Harold’s desk and stared at him while leaning forward with both hands on the desk. From the unconcerned stare on Harold's face it was obvious that he did not know what Steve was referring to.

“It’s just something an old associate gave me.” Harold responded, obviously not grasping the gravity of the situation.

“This is us! It took me all night looking at this and it suddenly hit me. The impossible fusion and the unexplained disappearance and reappearance of the limb. Someone around here is involved with this – I'd be willing to bet on it,” Steve continued without any signs of backing down.

As Steve talked, several things began to worry Harold. One thing was that he realized that Steve could be right. Someone in his company was running experiments without his knowledge. Worse yet, the experiments were affecting civilians, perhaps even being performed directly on the civilians. Involving civilians was something Harold would never do. It was far too likely that civilian involvement would expose the company's secret experiments; however, he had become so wrapped up with Serenity and Billy that he had lost control – something that he had tried so hard for so long not to do. Another thing that worried him was that he had no idea to what extent the project had reached outside the company.

“It's extremely unlikely that this is tied to us – what makes you so sure?” Harold said as dismissively as possible.

“Once I realized what I was looking at I took the 'tissue' sample and tested it for traces of ectoplasm. It came back positive. It was barely detectable, which I guess is practical proof-of-concept,” Steve explained somewhat enthusiastically. He had been involved with this project early on, but at that time it was purely conceptual. Although he fully grasped the potentially horrific implications of the problem at hand, he was still excited to see the materialization of those ideas. “There are so many people looking at this that I don't know how long it will be before someone catches on. It could be even worse than that. You know that this 'arm' thing isn't an isolated incident - there's more that we don't even know about. Given the kind of power we're talking about, what if someone ends up dead?” This comment made Harold freeze momentarily. A story he read in the paper hit his mind with paralyzing force: “Two Dead – Murder Suspected, Cause Unknown”.

“If what you're saying is correct, then they'll just keep chasing their tails. Besides, even if they suspect something, there's no way they can link it to us,” Harold said, struggling to keep his fear private.

Annoyed that Harold refused to deal with the problem, Steve finally snapped. “You know what the real problem is? You've been so obsessed with your 'pet' project that you didn't even notice. This is a big problem that is quickly going to be a massive problem if your behavior continues, Harold. Having so many people looking at this is bad for us. You better find out who's responsible and take care of it or we're finished.”

Harold tried to appear patient, but finally found himself unable to hold his tongue. “I'd like to say that I appreciate your concern, but let's not forget who runs the show, okay?”

Frustrated, Steve left Harold's office. Harold sat with both hands pressed firmly against his forehead until they began to tremble. If his company was involved with the deaths of the two college students it would jeopardize everything. He wanted to believe that it couldn't be traced back to Mind-Tech, as he had told Steve, but there was too much at risk to just assume. How could he deal with it, though? It would be a daunting task to track down those involved on the outside. On the other hand, the problem before him now proved that whoever was in charge was obviously not inclined to let Harold know what was happening.

Steve was right about one thing. Having focused his attention solely on “Project: Prodigy” he had essentially turned control of the rest of the company over to whoever would take it.