"There's a phone number and address on the papers. Everything's in-house, even the lawyers, they'll get you to me or my cousin."

"Family business?"

"Mostly. Inheritable, remember?"

"Ah. I'll be back within a week."

"Thank you, Doctor."

The first third was a description of the research and what his role would be. The middle third was a (partial) list of what implants he could get, and expected operation time - five years of frequent hospital visits, about three years of it in de facto isolation, years of medication for management for several stages. Extending it to ten years for about fifty percent more implants possible.

The last third was a dossier on the dangers, the reason they were doing an extremely expensive crash project that would last a century or more.

It is something like a jump scare in text form.

Followed by diagrams and photos, some of them biological, some of them astronomical. He is informed there is likely a smaller rival project interested in recruiting him to work on electromechanical biochemical implants, and precisely why he should refuse, and if at all possible, inform this project. And if he cannot do either, why death is preferable.

Lesya Shulgin is a coward.

He volunteers for a war anyway.

"I think I want to move to the private site before starting the 'perk' process," he tells Ulric Grammer, "I don't know whether it will interfere with me carrying out work, but I'm willing to start immediately."

"Eager?"

"Scared. But the sooner I start working, the more likely we have an army that can keep them off me."

"A reasonably healthy way to think about it. We have in-house psychic psychiatrists if it stops looking so healthy."

"I am absolutely fascinated to get the sensory psychic implants, though I don't think I have a psychiatric temperament at all."

"Having read your file, I am not at all surprised. Have you given thought to the extension?"

"Seven years, I think. Focusing on the cerebral modifications with the extra. Extra time to be sure the body can handle more changes?"

Ulric nods. "Precisely. Space in the body isn't the main constraint, but stress on other systems is limiting."

Lesya nodded.

"So, we can talk details. The main site is an island in the North Sea, like Iceland but smaller. We're working on establishing one in the Florida Keys, technically extraterritorial, but it's certainly not ready for implantation processing yet."

"The mini-Iceland will be fine for seven years. I can check in again afterward if I'm very tired of the cold."

"Alright. We'll take the dossier back, but you can get a more complete one on-site. Let's discuss the logistics of travel and moving, which are kept secure..."

"Dr. Shulgin. You've looked at the initial wave of cell line treatments?"

"Indeed. Regen cells and Lazarus cells seem like obvious choices. And I'll take the two backups distributing the circulatory organs as well. Motile nerves. Hmm, nothing here for sudden wound sealing or radiation?"

"We're working on them. Radiation isn't difficult but we didn't start on it until the Missile Crisis. There's a few approaches to wound recovery in development; there's one ready for very experimental trials we can include later in the process, we'll have a first version in two to three years."

"What's that one?"