Page 88 of Hollow State

Gideon snorted. “You mean everything you stole.”

"You've always been an arrogant little prick," Finch said. “If it weren't for me, you wouldn't have had the chance to create your precious telemetry system.” Finch pounded his chest. "I gave you that. I gave you the funding, the resources, the power to create HELIOS. So, don't tell me I stole a fucking thing."

“Hyperion might have funded the programs, but you couldn't have created what Darwin and I did," Gideon said. "You needed us because we were smarter than you. Our only mistake was believing you had morals."

Finch laughed. “You're mistaking morals for vision. Something neither of you ever had the stomach for.”

“That’s an interesting word for experimenting on people," Darwin said.

"Pryce was useful until she forgot the parameters of her assignment and went rogue," Finch said. "I needed proof of concept. Nothing more.”

“What exactly does that mean?” Darwin asked.

“Proof the delivery system you abandoned could push the compound through the skin. Proof the modified watches could read the body in real time."

Finch smiled. “You never gave it a chance.”

“It doesn't work, and you and your girl, Emma, proved that just like you proved TTN-3 doesn't work.”

“That's bullshit," Finch said. "You always drew the line too close to fear. You saw trauma. Emergency medicine. A soldier bleeding out in the dirt waiting for evac.”

“That soldier mattered." Darwin had understood getting into this conversation with Finch would be difficult, but he hadn't been prepared for what it would do to his mental capacity.

“One soldier is not a business model," Finch said.

Darwin felt the metal of the weapon strapped to his ankle digging into his skin. He took a step forward.

Gideon grabbed his arm.

“That offended you." Finch shifted his gaze as two of his guards, the ones that had disappeared into the row of racks, came back into view.

“You just reduced a human life to a bad investment.” Darwin knew this showdown was about to end. He just hoped it would end quickly, with Finch in cuffs, not bullets flying everywhere.

“No, I reduced your limitation to a sentence.” Finch signaled to the guard near the exit. That couldn't be good. “You had a drug that could keep a body moving past pain, past fatigue, past injury. Gideon had a system that could monitor that body, direct it, correct it, and track decline before the person wearing it knew they were failing. Pryce helped prove delivery. Isaac helped prove command integration. Others helped prove compliance.”

“Interesting way to look at it,” Gideon said.

Darwin wanted to hit him.

Not shoot him. Not yet. Something more primitive than that. Bone meeting bone. Blood on the polished floor. A reaction Darwin hadn’t ever felt.

“What was the endgame?” Darwin asked. “Selling it on the open market?”

“Look at you growing some brain cells,” Finch said.

"So, you're going to sell government contracts." Gideon shifted slightly to the right. "To outside buyers."

“Technically, not the contract," Finch said. "Just the products and procedures."

“You found people who didn’t care about the risk." Out of the corner of Darwin's eye, he saw movement. That had to be Coulter. Things were about to get busy.

“I found buyers who understood value.” Finch continued. “War isn’t only fought on battlefields. Espionage. Extraction. Interrogation. Influence. A body that can survive longer, recover faster, withstand pain, and remain visible to command from anywhere in the world is worth more than any single weapons platform.”

“Visible to command?” Gideon mumbled.

“Don’t sound so horrified. You designed the foundation.”

“And you corrupted it," Darwin said.