‘And of course the head of this, the most highly publicized research project in history, was Robert. Not without some friction, though. He’d married a few years ago, and the marriage was looking in poor shape. What was more, they had recently had a daughter, and his wife wasn’t pleased at all about being left to raise her alone while he locked himself up for years and years more to make the world a better place for complete strangers, even though she understood what everyone knew—if there was no Robert, there was no Project Icarus. Besides, there was no keeping him away—he was truly a man who lived for his work. Of course, this was more than work—it was his brainchild, his dream and it was obvious that it was he was the reason it existed in the first place. But she refused to budge and the entire project was held up, until finally, Zacharias Bosquanet stepped in himself to resolve the issue. Eventually, Robert’s wife gave in—not that she could ever have done anything else once the Chairman had made it clear that he wished her to—not that she could ever have done anything else—and Robert joined Project Icarus as head of the team that had been put together to change the world. From Day One, that was exactly what seemed destined to happen. Every day brought new breakthroughs and record-breaking viewership numbers. The only thing that really seemed to bother him was the fact that, this time, he couldn’t keep away from the glare of public scrutiny, no matter how hard he tried to have the broadcasts stopped. All he could manage was to ban the feeds from his own laboratory, but that didn’t protect him from them every time he had to visit any of the others.’

He sighed. ‘And, of course, he never failed to let them know his distaste and, of course, the tantrums only added to the ratings. Somehow he never realized that, even over the hours and hours he spent complaining to me and everyone else about them.’

‘You—’ Albert stopped and took a deep breath. ‘You were there? You were a scientist?’

Father smiled. ‘A scientist? Oh, no. More of an accountant-cum-errand boy, actually. And general agony aunt, as it turned out, which should probably have been an official position to begin with. It was a nerve-wracking job—developing technology—back then. The pressure of expectation was unbelievable, with everyone watching you all the time. In fact, nervous breakdowns and suicides in the community were so common that, despite the millions they made, for years scientists found it almost impossible to obtain life insurance. Until the Company took over the insurance industry as well, and then nobody needed insurance anymore because they just replaced everything. Including the people, when it came to it, but that’s another matter entirely.’