XXV: Ourselves to Know
"We have already lost a few, and we stand to lose more. We had figured on violence, but not this, the way that they have started to decimate our ranks, and we have to take precautions now, batten down the hatches – oh, good. You're laughing. You get the joke. That's good. You understand, though, that it's not entirely a joke. This is serious business. We could fall apart if we do not figure out how they think and plan ahead. We must know. They will be too much of a danger, without the proper information.
"We have planned for this, and our plans are finally under way. For all of our science, it amounts to nothing more than high school lab reports without proper verification. We can only verify with live specimens, and we have all accepted the risk that brings to us. Our controls are already there. They have not found them all yet. They will not find them all. They will turn on each other before they start to suspect what the whole of it is, and if that is how they will result, then that is how they will result. We are powerless to prevent that, and we owe it to scientific research not to intervene.
"Surely you knew that this would be a tricky thing, yes? To find so many people from all over the place, to round them all up and bring them here – that took some planning. Some cooperation. This initiative can only do well, and they have already signed their lives away to us in some form or another. We owe nothing to them, and they have already agreed. Each one of them. Some by murder, some by committing acts that draw the attention of the law in lesser, subtler ways – but they all have relinquished their right to freedom in some fashion or another.
"What? Why do you care? You are sorry for the deaths, as are we all, but deaths happen. Such a thing is a regrettable but sometimes necessary occurrence in scientific experiments, and while we had taken precautions, can we prevent the falling of a plane through no fault of our own, the firing of a gun through sheer happenstance? We cannot. We are playing God. We are not God. We can do nothing but watch, observe, record.
"Besides, how much of a loss was it, really? They were blanks, the boy and girl. There was nothing to be had from them, so there is nothing to be done for them. Why should we waste our efforts on a pair of fools with less ability in their brains than that little boy has in his little finger? I trust you understand the theory of conservation of resources. That is why we have operatives out there – to do the work that we cannot do. We can make more, too, if the situation requires. We have already tested the potential for this, and our spiuni baro, as he liked to call himself, managed to get it to work. It is regrettable – yes, that word again – that he had to die in the process. However, his mission was a success. His target is simply unaware. Given time, though, and the proper trigger, the success will be proven.
"We must lose no more, though. We must isolate ourselves from this possibility, give ourselves some insurance. We have it now. The ones who can go looking for people will all go looking for people. The father for his child, and the others for the hick. That leaves them with a camp consisting of people who dare not lift a hand, our plant, and our trigger. Things are working out nicely, despite the losses, so, you see, you need not worry. Our lives are expendable. So are theirs."