The Valenzetti Countdown Theory

He accepted a curious invitation from America's UN Ambassador, and found himself in a quiet conversation with representatives of the Pentagon and the CIA. They had independently followed-up with Valenzetti, and they agreed that the work--ALL of it, controversial or not--had to proceed immediately. The acceptance and backing of foreign and domestic political bodies was not assured, and could no longer be pursued. The US would fund Dharma as a covert project, and would work behind the scenes to ensure that the world didn't interfere with its own salvation. With deep reservations but seeing no other choice, Alvar agreed to the deal, and Dharma went underground.

Widmore Labs & Construction and Paik Heavy Industries had been useful and discrete partners for Hanso in the past. They were enlisted to quietly build research facilities in Iceland, Zanzibar, and offshore from Korea. Additionally, a very special proving ground would be assembled on an uncharted island in the South Pacific. The money changed hands, and construction proceeded briskly. Scientists, researchers and technologists from the Foundation, the US government, and some few trusted members of the world's academic community began to populate the installations...and the experiments got underway.

But there were horrible problems. Efforts to exert electromagnetic control over seismic activity and the world's weather were making remarkable progress, but the pace of research and testing had led to some tragic oversights and costly accidents. Diffusing suspicious inquiries from world bodies about freak storms and earthquakes was becoming more and more difficult. Containing leaks about human genetic engineering and parapsychological/psychological manipulation was essential, and the ethical dilemma therein haunted Alvar constantly. Even misleading the subjects of the experimental communities--who were made to believe that the Apocalypse was Now, that their struggle to survive was real, and that their obedience to the protocols was the sole hope for our species--these things weighed heavily on Alvar's conscience.

The DeGroots had also expressed their reservations about US control. When successes of genetic improvements in the experimental communities began to emerge, the government had unsubtly steered the operant conditioning of the subjects towards military and intelligence applications. They wanted the hardier, stronger, faster and brilliant colonists to be made ready as soldiers and spies, so their heightened intuitions, perceptions and abilities could be put to use "just in case." Maintaining control of the subjects was a problem itself; they were curious, smart, and worried...by design. The CIA had helped to engineer the conditioning programs into an amazingly effective weapon for propaganda and misinformation (the PR efforts had benefited from this as well), so manipulation of the colonists was still possible, but the limits were fast approaching.

From the Zanzibar installation came more disturbing news. The meningococcal strains engineered there, whose potency was intended for rigorous human testing of the successful new super-vaccines, were being mass-produced by order of the Pentagon. The germs were already stockpiled at levels well beyond the needs of testing...and well beyond the amount of vaccine.

Future Candidates

And then there were the reports that secret recruitment efforts were being conducted out in the world, using Dharma techniques to identify and manipulate the lives of a wave of future candidates. To Alvar, if this were true, it seemed highly premature. He knew that the government faction in the project had been working very closely with Valenzetti, studying the predictions...and now it seemed that Enzo had disappeared. Ever depressed, had the brilliant man finally been driven to suicide? Or did the government now know more than they were sharing with Alvar? He saw the signs of a hidden, sinister agenda, and became alarmed in the extreme, suspecting that some senior members of his Foundation could be cooperating without his knowledge.