me, I gave up trying a long time ago. I spend my nights lying in bed trying to come up with a way to do something… anything to help these people. But I just can’t, no matter how hard I try.
By the end of the first year the mining division had only produced 337 tons of chrysos. After factoring in the months they spent setting up the locations they predicted around 400 for the next year. At that rate it would take almost 20 years to complete the mission. That just made the whole situation seem even more desperate.
Cyrus had me working 16 hours a day, handing him equipment, tools, and taking notes that I still didn’t really understand. All of the other teams would always stop long before we did. Every night when Cyrus dismissed me I could tell he would continue working through the night. He was like a monster that never sleeps, and never stops.
As I headed to the lab for another day of insanity, I was passed by a bunch of militia guys bringing more people in for Cyrus to experiment on. The current batch of “subjects” were all still alive, so I knew something had happened.
When I made it to the lab Cyrus saw me and immediately yelled out “Atlas get in here, I’ve got excellent news!” As I entered the lab I saw one of the natives sitting in my usual spot playing with some blocks meant for children. Cyrus was standing there with a huge grin on his face – “I’ve done it Atlas, all of our work has finally paid off… I’ve already acquired his base intelligence test score and by the end of the day he should be ready to be tested for improvement.”
He walked up to me and put his hand on my shoulder – “I know this hasn’t been easy… As a scientist I may seem cold to what I’m doing, but believe me I’m not… at all. I’m happy to say no more of the natives will have to be sacrificed if this works… and I think it already has. I just have to test him to prove it.” It was nice to finally hear Cyrus refer to them as people instead of objects.
He continued to tell me that all the other members of the team are on break until he was ready to allow mass distribution of the injections he had developed. He believed it had worked because the native went from being totally confused by the blocks to starting to play with them just as a small child would. Cyrus was completely confident he could finally produce results.
I guess it was somewhat of a comfort but all this really meant is they would now go from “subjects” in a lab to being forced into hard labor against their will. I suppose it was better than death, as we would eventually leave and they would all be set free. At least that’s what I told myself.
For the rest of the day Cyrus observed his behavior and tested his blood every hour. He said he had him on “calming” medication to help prevent any violent outbursts. As soon as he said that I found myself wishing the man would turn violent and kill Cyrus right in front of me… With him gone there might not be anyone left to continue the experiments.
Cyrus walked over and handed me a chart – “Ok I’m going to perform a series of tests. For each test you will write in a score of 1 to 10… His initial score was 17, the average person generally scores around 90 to 100. Our goal is to get him up to around a 30 or 40. I think once that’s achieved they’ll be able to do manual labor and take commands without any issues.”
He performed various tests such as showing the native a formation of blocks that interested him, mixing them up and then seeing how long it took him to come close to putting them back. It would seem as though in just a few hours Cyrus was able to teach him quite a bit. It just made me even angrier because the more intelligent the native became the more he deserved to be free.
After a while Cyrus stated the testing was done and walked over to me – “Atlas, I don’t even really need to look at the chart, I already knows there’s been a major improvement.” After
By the end of the first year the mining division had only produced 337 tons of chrysos. After factoring in the months they spent setting up the locations they predicted around 400 for the next year. At that rate it would take almost 20 years to complete the mission. That just made the whole situation seem even more desperate.
Cyrus had me working 16 hours a day, handing him equipment, tools, and taking notes that I still didn’t really understand. All of the other teams would always stop long before we did. Every night when Cyrus dismissed me I could tell he would continue working through the night. He was like a monster that never sleeps, and never stops.
As I headed to the lab for another day of insanity, I was passed by a bunch of militia guys bringing more people in for Cyrus to experiment on. The current batch of “subjects” were all still alive, so I knew something had happened.
When I made it to the lab Cyrus saw me and immediately yelled out “Atlas get in here, I’ve got excellent news!” As I entered the lab I saw one of the natives sitting in my usual spot playing with some blocks meant for children. Cyrus was standing there with a huge grin on his face – “I’ve done it Atlas, all of our work has finally paid off… I’ve already acquired his base intelligence test score and by the end of the day he should be ready to be tested for improvement.”
He walked up to me and put his hand on my shoulder – “I know this hasn’t been easy… As a scientist I may seem cold to what I’m doing, but believe me I’m not… at all. I’m happy to say no more of the natives will have to be sacrificed if this works… and I think it already has. I just have to test him to prove it.” It was nice to finally hear Cyrus refer to them as people instead of objects.
He continued to tell me that all the other members of the team are on break until he was ready to allow mass distribution of the injections he had developed. He believed it had worked because the native went from being totally confused by the blocks to starting to play with them just as a small child would. Cyrus was completely confident he could finally produce results.
I guess it was somewhat of a comfort but all this really meant is they would now go from “subjects” in a lab to being forced into hard labor against their will. I suppose it was better than death, as we would eventually leave and they would all be set free. At least that’s what I told myself.
For the rest of the day Cyrus observed his behavior and tested his blood every hour. He said he had him on “calming” medication to help prevent any violent outbursts. As soon as he said that I found myself wishing the man would turn violent and kill Cyrus right in front of me… With him gone there might not be anyone left to continue the experiments.
Cyrus walked over and handed me a chart – “Ok I’m going to perform a series of tests. For each test you will write in a score of 1 to 10… His initial score was 17, the average person generally scores around 90 to 100. Our goal is to get him up to around a 30 or 40. I think once that’s achieved they’ll be able to do manual labor and take commands without any issues.”
He performed various tests such as showing the native a formation of blocks that interested him, mixing them up and then seeing how long it took him to come close to putting them back. It would seem as though in just a few hours Cyrus was able to teach him quite a bit. It just made me even angrier because the more intelligent the native became the more he deserved to be free.
After a while Cyrus stated the testing was done and walked over to me – “Atlas, I don’t even really need to look at the chart, I already knows there’s been a major improvement.” After
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