The Troop

Q: Please clarify something for the court, Dr. Erikson: So far as you were aware, you and Dr. Edgerton were working on a diet pill?

A: What do you mean?

Q: I’m asking specifically about the grant Dr. Edgerton received.

A: From the pharmaceutical concern, yes.

Q: And it was the only funding the Edgerton lab was receiving?

A: Yes.

Q: No.

A: Excuse me?

Q: No, it wasn’t the only funding the lab was receiving, Dr. Erikson.

A: I’m sorry, what…?

Q: Dr. Erikson, for someone who claimed to have a higher IQ than most everyone assembled at this hearing today, is it possible that you were unaware of the end goal of the very experiments you were administering?

A: Of course I know. I told you. A diet pill.

Q: Dr. Erikson, I’d like to show you something.

[Dr. Erikson is handed a piece of paper]

Q: Can you tell me what that is?

A: It’s a bank statement.

Q: It’s Dr. Edgerton’s bank statement. For the account that administers the operating costs of his lab.

A: Yes, all right.

Q: Now if you scan down, you will see the deposits made by the pharmaceutical company.

A: They’re here, yes.

Q: Now can you see the other single deposit—the one made on January second?

A: Yes.

Q: Can you tell me how much that one is for?

A: Three million dollars.

Q: Exactly?

A: Three million, fifty thousand, five hundred dollars. And forty-two cents.

Q: Can you tell me who made the deposit?

A: Is this a spelling test now? T.N.O. Printz Mauritz.

Q: Do you know what that company does, Dr. Erikson?

A: I have no idea.

Q: They are a military research firm.

A: Okay.

Q: Three years ago, they were subjected to a grand jury investigation. The company was indicted on charges of industrial espionage and selling goods to foreign despots for the purposes of cementing various puppet regimes.

A: I don’t keep up on any of that.

Q: As a company, they do not have the cleanest of hands.

A: If you say so.

Q: Dr. Erikson, may I ask you this: If Dr. Edgerton is the genius you claim he is, why couldn’t he keep the worms where they belonged—in a subject’s intestinal tract?

A: As I said, even worms are complex organisms. Terribly complex.

Q: But—and please forgive my ignorance—isn’t it the baseline nature of most tapeworms to remain in the gut?

A: Generally so, yes.

Q: Dr. Erikson, I will cut to the chase: Were you aware that Dr. Edgerton was in fact receiving competing grants? One from a biopharmaceutical company and the other from a military research firm? One of those companies was anticipating a diet pill. The other, Dr. Erikson, was anticipating a biological weapon.

A: No.

Q: Would it shock you, Dr. Erikson, to discover that I have in my possession correspondence between Dr. Edgerton and the CEO of T.N.O. Printz Mauritz discussing this very thing?

A: That would shock me a great deal, sir.

Q: Do you see how such a creature could, in certain engagements, be an ideal method of warfare? Setting ethics and humanity aside, of course?

A: I… I suppose I do.

Q: It would be traceless. It would spread rapidly: An eyedropperful into a public reservoir would do it, yes?

A: Oh, Jesus. Oh, God.

Q: It could tear a country apart in short order, yes? Cause mass hysteria, destabilization, rampant infection, riots, fear, rage, secondary bloodshed in any order. It would defy both the letter and intent of the Geneva Convention—but it’s just a hypervirulent worm, yes? Nobody knows how it came to be. Mother Nature once again works her many strange wonders to behold, yes?

A: I had no idea. You have to believe me.

Q: Dr. Erikson, I am under no obligation to do any such thing. That particular question of belief is up to this court to decide.