Dr. Agata Vance operated in a glass-and-metal tower overlooking the river Limmat, in Zurich. Her laboratory was filled with scanners, pipettes and vivid intense brain maps. For weeks her thoughts had been turbulent a tempest of sorrow and rage centered on one focus: her sister, Elara.
Following the Europol investigation and that dreadful calm discussion, in a service station storeroom Agata activated the sole tool at her disposal: science. She leveraged connections, accessed forgotten passwords and redirected scanner time funded by grants. She arranged for her sister to be brought in under the guise of a " follow-up" from an "earlier wellness study." Elara, unconcerned, consented.
At this moment Agata gazed at the results illuminated on a display. Comparative fMRI images. Elara's brain, captured prior, to her Somnum retreat revealed the known vivid bursts of activity in a highly active prefrontal cortex, alongside the restless movements of the amygdala linked to motivation and outcome. The latest scans appeared… altered. Not impaired. Not diminished. Redirected.
Aspiration, discontent yearning—these were not eliminated. Rather they were softly precisely segregated. Neural circuits that previously linked a trigger to an emotional or motivational reaction now ended in a calm self-sufficient circuit. It resembled witnessing a citys network carefully severed with every streetlamp now lit by its own small everlasting power source. The lights shone,. The city remained shadowed.
Her fingers danced over the keyboard gathering data matching it against pilfered anonymized scans, from Vacants"—a label she had created that was gaining quiet traction in medical circles. A pattern formed, precise and geometric. It wasn't a blunt force injury. It was a delicate procedure.
That evening inside a secured lab she connected to a hidden server. Using cryptocurrency she purchased a black-market data bundle: pieces of the initial "Lethargic Calculus" found in Kale Kane's notebooks along with blueprint files from an early Somnum research and development server. She placed Kane's spirals and Somnum's precise flow diagrams adjacent to each other, on her tablet.
Her breath faltered. Kane's creation was untamed, visionary a philosophical argument, for yielding. Somnum's version was a refinement of it. They transformed a metaphysics of indifference into a medical technique. The icons employed in their " meditation" sessions weren't mere pictures; they functioned as visual catalysts fine-tuned to particular neural frequencies intended to steer a conscious mind toward executing its own deliberate deconstruction.
It wasn't therapy. It wasn't wellness. It was a spiritual lobotomy.
A fierce intense fury, pure and piercing surged through her sorrow. They hadn't merely abducted her sister. They had inflicted a fundamental operation, on her essence. They transformed a intricate and contentious woman into a calm pulsing heart linked to a sponge.
She composed her work all night long. Her manuscript was not intended for a peer-reviewed publication. Those had already been compromised by Somnum "research grants." Instead she released it on Veritas, a encrypted platform for scientific dissenters. "The Somnum Protocol & The Lethargic Calculus: A Neurological Blueprint, for the Targeted Ablation of Human Striving."
Within an hour it spread rapidly among groups.
At a Somnum retreat nestled in the Swiss Alps Flavio Fergal perused a printed copy of Agata's article in a bright sunlit lounge. A fire. Cracked nearby. Rex Ralph was positioned by the window observing the snowfall.
"'Spiritual lobotomy,'" Flavio said aloud his tone entertained. "What an intense metaphor. We provide serenity; she regards it as disfigurement."
"It's making a stir " Rex remarked, his voice practical. "Not through outlets yet.. Within neuroscience circles, on obscure forums. It's a flame."
"Each sector has its detractors, Rex. Oil firms face activists. Social networks have privacy campaigners. They belong to the ecosystem." He placed the paper aside. "Dr. Vance is mourning. She is currently, in the anger phase. She perceives what's missing not what's there. She fails to grasp the elegance of our product."
"Her credentials are impeccable. The data is… compelling. To a certain mind."
Flavio interlaced his fingers. "In that case we need to address that mind. Dispatch Hugo.. Extend an invitation to the esteemed doctor for a discussion. Our doors remain open, for dialogue."
Agata's laboratory resembled a fortress, under siege. Her coworkers averted their gazes. The head of her department had sent a note regarding the "unauthorized use of imaging equipment." She was gathering her belongings when a man showed up at her door. He was not one of her coworkers.
His face was tranquil. Marked by time dressed in a plain dark jacket. "Dr. Vance. I'm Benjamin. I was acquainted with your sister. Once before."
Her hand reached for a taser, on the desk. "Leave."
"I'm not affiliated with them " Ben murmured, his tone quiet and pressing. He raised a phone. Displayed on its screen was an image of Devon Duncan, positioned inside Ben's bookstore, in Copenhagen. "He attempted to assist. He didn't succeed. Your newspaper… it's a beacon.. It has just marked you as a target."
"Let them arrive " Agata sneered. "I will reveal to everyone what they've done."
"The world refuses to witness " Ben remarked as he entered and shut the door behind him. "The world is queuing for their treatment. You're not exposing wrongdoing; you're challenging a remedy. They won't muzzled you by violence. Instead they'll dispatch a philosopher."
Just as if timed perfectly the phone at Agata's office buzzed. A calm computerized voice invited her to a video call, with Hugo Hubert, Somnum's Head of Philosophical Outreach to "examine her discoveries in a spirit of cooperative truth pursuit."
Ben's gaze locked with hers. "Notice?"
"What do you need?" Agata inquired, her boldness mixed with a hint of apprehension.
"I need you to have a conversation with him. However not in this location. Somewhere... Offline. Somewhere, with observers who can't be easily influenced. I am aware of a spot. A bookstore. In Copenhagen. You publish you speak you turn into a voice. Then you vanish. Because once you speak with him they will. Enlist you or Remove you."
Agata gazed at her sister's brain scans, that dreadful chart of calm. She remembered Elara's gaze. She gave a nod.
The encounter didn't take place in a laboratory or a business office. It occurred three days afterward within the corridors of Analog Mind. Ben had set it up. Several dependable concerned patrons—a historian, a journalist—acted as if they were looking around attentively listening.
Hugo Hubert showed up embodying compassion. He donned no business emblem a sweater made from natural wool. "Dr. Vance. I appreciate you taking the time to meet in this… sanctuary of ideas. It seems appropriate."
Agata held her position near a shelf marked "Critical Theory." "Don't talk down to me. You ripped my sister's spirit apart with math."
Hugo exhaled deeply a noise filled with sorrow. "We handed her a key for a lock she was incapable of unlocking on her own. The torment Doctor… you observed her brain. The unceasing battle, within her amygdala. The continual flood of cortisol. Was that her spirit?. Was it an illness of endless desire?"
"It was her existence!" Agata's voice resonated throughout the store.
"A existence of suffering. We healed it. Observe her currently. Is she in torment? Is she sobbing, worried tense?. Is she at long last genuinely at ease? You quantify blood circulation and neural circuits. We quantify tranquility. Your measurements are not better, than ours; they are simply more rudimentary."
He moved nearer lowering his voice to a murmur that the onlookers couldn't catch. "You mentioned a ' lobotomy' in your publication.. Tell me Agata… what else is spirituality if it's not the quest for tranquility? We have merely discovered the neural path. We are not ascetics in solitude devoting years to calm the mind. We are healers providing a permanent remedy, for the human state of discontent. Is that wickedness?. Could it be the most profound compassion humanity has ever created?"
His reasoning acted as a tranquilizer. It transformed her fury into sentimentality her facts into a misinterpretation of a greater purpose. For a moment she understood his perspective. The world was, in pain. Elara had been anxious. Could this be kindness?
Then she spotted Ben on the side of the room purposefully dislodging a large stack of loose proofs, from an upper shelf. It fell to the ground with a bang.
The surprise shattered Hugo's enchantment.
"Leave " Agata said, her tone now. Precise. "You may wrap it in wool and philosophy. In the end it's just a factory. You're not restoring people. You're completing them…. I will keep telling everyone that."
Hugo's gentle smile remained steady though his gaze grew a touch colder. "What a shame. Your intelligence would have been an asset, to our Archivist's crew. That said, the offer won't last forever." He offered a courteous nod to the room before departing.
Quietness gathered behind him. The former reporter exhaled with a trembling sigh. Ben approached, retrieving the dropped book.
"You were nearly caught " Ben said softly.
"He truly did " Agata murmured, shaking. "Oh my God he actually did." She glanced at Ben her scientific belief now overtaken by a cold unsettling realization. "This isn't a method. It's a transformation.. They possess all the strongest arguments."
Ben nodded toward the back room. "Your flight leaves in two hours. Your data is backed up in seventeen places. Now, you become a voice from the shadows. And I," he said, looking at his silent, vulnerable shelves, "I think I need to learn how to shout again."