Unethical Practices

Quid Pro Quo

"You know, most people here don't usually ask me about my research, unless they want something from me."

The woman who had spoken was Felicia Warden, a neuroscientist currently looking at slides with human brain samples. The desk she sat by was neat and tidy, without even the hint of any personal belongings, instead making space for four monitors. This also made it easy for Rey to note that she also had a core sitting on her desk, similar to the one he had.

"Well, to be fair, I'm hoping that your stuff will be able to help me with mine, but even if it doesn't, I'm still interested in learning more about cores right now."

"All right. How much do you understand so far?"

"In layman's terms you are researching the core's effects on memories. But I saw some things in the notes. You think the cores themselves can store information?"

Felicia looked away from the slides and turned to him.

"I'm surprised you caught on to that. Yes. I just noticed, and haven't entirely figured out how, but I've been able to observe some changes to the core I've used. Most importantly, I've been able to recreate the changes with the same type of stimuli. At least sometimes. There's still a lot left before I can be sure but..."

"But if you're right, that's amazing."

The woman paused her slides and turned to him, tilting her head to the side.

"So, Rey, what is your project about? Since I've shown you mine, and all that."

A smile played in the corner of his mouth before he responded.

"I was working on a new kind of prosthetics that could be powered by cores, when I was found out and asked to join this place. The thing is, it seems the cores seemed to sort of fuse the prosthetic with the flesh. So I'm trying to figure out why and how, and where to go from there."

Felicia rubbed her chin thoughtfully.

"Fascinating. Have you uploaded your data to the library yet?"

"Well, yeah, what little there is. I haven't really had time to continue my experiments here yet. I'm still waiting for approval to get test subjects. Still, I think I have a few ideas to work with now."

"Let me know when you've done the upload. I think there might actually be some interesting cross study potential between our projects. Though my help won't come for free."

"I thought the whole point of this research facility was about helping each other out?"

"Sure. And I want you to help me out first."

"I don't really have much of a choice, do I?"

"Nope."

"Fine, let me know what you want, and I'll see what I can do."

She glanced around and leaned in with a conspiratorial whisper.

"What do you know about what they do on floors one to five?"

He raised his eyebrows in surprise.

"Nothing? I just barely got here. Why, what do they do on those floors?"

"They have a space program there. Rumour has it, that's how they get the cores. At least it would explain a lot if they were actually alien technology."

Rey wasn't sure he was buying any of this, but he should at least hear her out.

"Okay, so what do you need me for?"

"I want you to go there and find out what they're actually doing."

Ray paused and leaned back.

"I've been told I'll get shot if I'm caught doing industrial espionage."