He did not respond.
i i sighed. "A Zhe, I know that sothing happened in your past to make you averse to having your knowledge used in the wrong ways. You don’t want to talk about it and I won’t ask. But, I hate seeing you like this. I am worried that three drinks might turn into six, nine or twelve.
I am worried that soday, Mingzhu might walk in on you and find you dead with a gun in your hand because you are trying to escape your demons."
"That is a little extre." C4 told her.
Yes it was a little extre but she was worried. Jingzhe was working for the Empress Mother now and the more such planning he was involved in, the more troubleso it would be. The issue needed to be fixed as soon as possible.
Jingzhe had thought long and hard about telling i i about his past and he struggled with it. And yet, he knew that eventually, she would co to know the truth. Sooner or later, maybe she would go searching for the answers on her own. Perhaps it was better for her to hear so of these things from him rather than another.
"A Zhe, there are only two types of people that work for the royal family. One is the honest and descent and the other is smart. The Empress Mother prefers smart people because they know how to get things done.
You are the smart, honest and descent. I am afraid that the Empress Mother is not going to let you go. It is possible that she will soon have you working for the Emperor as well.
This kind of thing, if you cannot bear it. I support you to quit. I have already told my mother to tell the Empress Mother that you are quitting."
Jingzhe raised his head and smiled at her. He could see the genuine worry on her face. "i i, thank you for worrying about . But, I don’t want you to worry you about such things. I also promise that Mingzhu will never find laying in a pile of my own vomit because I am too drunk or with a gun in my hand, brains blown out because I cannot take it anymore."
i i was relieved to hear this from him.
"As for my past, although I don’t like to talk about it there are so things that I can share. Have you ever heard of Sword island?" He asked.
i i shook her head.
Jingzhe hated to think about that place but he had to in order to share with her the pieces of his past. "My biological father died of a heart attack. He got so chest pain when we were arguing and fell down the stairs. He died before he could be taken to a hospital.
Mo Liang and his mother claid that I had pushed him to death. I was arrested and taken to a juvenile detention facility. While I was there, I got myself in a few fights so I was a constant visitor in the doctor’s office.
To keep out of trouble, the doctor assigned so work during the day, cleaning, arranging his docunts and such. He was the one who realized how smart I was and encouraged to sign up for Sword Island."
"Even the na sounds wrong." i i said.
Jingzhe had to agree. No place nad Sword Island was a vacation spot. "It was an Island owned by a private institute which run a think tank. They were into research of all kinds from political strategies, science, technology, biology, chemistry, culture.....you na it, they were interested in what ideas geniuses had to share."
"It sounds a little like my mother’s science park." She comnted.
Jingzhe nodded. "It was. They didn’t just want ideas, they encouraged research too, especially for subjects involving evolution, space travel, biochemical warfare." He paused and clenched his jaw.
i i felt his body tensing and she attempted to massage his shoulders. "It’s okay, we can continue another ti."
She was already picturing that kind of place and what happened there.
"Just because soone has an idea does not always an that it should be executed." He said tensely. "That is what they failed to understand. Your mother’s Pear Scientific park has morals, the scientists have bottom lines. There were no morals or bottom lines on Sword Island. They just wanted results and would do what it took to achieve them."
His voice broke. i i increased the speed and strength of her massage. The more he opened up, the tenser his body beca.
"We were just children." He said softly. "Not toddlers but teenagers. The highest number of researchers on the base was teenagers and the adults were there for supervision. At first, it all seed like fun. We just talked about random ideas and laughed. It was like a vacation.
Then the adults introduced theoretical ideas on different subjects and asked us to share our thoughts. For example they once asked us if we believed a mouse could fly. Most of us did not.
One boy decided that it could happen and shared a theory on how limbs could be adjusted, DNA could be mixed. They brought him mice and other birds and told him to see if he could make it happen. They brought whatever you needed for your research.
Another ti, they asked if we believed man could fly like a bird. We shared ideas and laughed about it. We did not know that the sa thod that applied to animals would also be applied to humans."
i i’s hands froze. She got the general picture. Sword Island was a place where teenagers with genius shared ideas and human trials were conducted.
"I could not do it." He shook his head. "Cutting into people like that, as if they were pigs. They could not kill so they put with others that were considered weak minded.
Even though we could not bring ourselves to conduct human tests, we still had to write papers and share our ideas on anything they assigned us. Desensitization of soldiers, chemical weapons, hypnosis...none of it was good.
It beca clear that Sword Island was not housing a think tank for good, it was for evil. There was so much death, so much blood. They had a prison on the ground where they locked up test subjects. Everyday, a ship would arrive and bring new ones.
We were turned into prisoners too. We could not leave or contact our families. Those who did not comply completely would disappear. We were told that they had been sent ho but anyone clever enough could tell that it was a lie.
How could they ever let anyone go ho after what we had witnessed? The truth was simple, if you asked to go ho and refused to work, you were killed. I only learned later that researchers that did not comply were turned into research subjects."
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