[Paragon Group] Cold Calling

[Legione Sumus]

EPHRAIM HAART

A self-styled vigilante. How delightful. Paragon was hardly the ethical powerhouse it portrayed, but one might argue the entire Custody was like that. Ephraim certainly would. And he worked within its boundaries – nothing here was illegal, strictly speaking. Governments were far easier to work with than against. It was why Rafael Janssen had been given over to the authorities without fuss, and the resultant research material from his “condition” kept largely quiet. It wasn’t censorship, just a mutually beneficial arrangement concerning knowledge that affected the Ascendancy personally. Proof that godhood was not immutable being very sensitive, of course.

He leaned back comfortably while Sage talked.

Ethically speaking, Ephraim was entirely flexible. His loyalties were deep rooted and personal, which meant he nearly always considered the bigger picture, not the immediate harm. Kaelan Muller being a fine case in point – the man was a sociopath on the fringes of something far worse, but he was brilliant at what he did. In exchange for that brilliance, Ephraim both sanctioned and facilitated whatever experiments he deemed necessary for his research. Including the ones on the classified Project Visakanya, which most would find abhorrent.

So what reasons would outweigh Sage’s own sense of morality?

Ephraim himself was often a liar. He was corrupt, when it suited him. He hurt others for personal gain. Yet when people benefited him he was a staunch enough ally. Paragon was consistently rated a trusted and popular employer in polls which recorded such things, and it was lauded as a company which gave back regularly to its community. On a personal level Ephraim’s natural charisma simply won hearts by the multitude, but he wasn’t bogged down by kindness for its own sake. It wasn’t that he went out of his way to defend bad people. It was just that the ends so often justified the means.

“Forward the modified NDA,” he said. “My people will look it over. Might as well do that while we’re talking, eh?”

Secrecy mattered less than one might suppose. Not that Sage would be allowed to just wade through any classified file he desired, but Ephraim accepted readily enough that he could show restraint – that there was a governing code of ethics here, even if it was a ridiculous vigilante one. What he was uncertain of was what Sage would make of any of the things he might discover. But he was going to be a pest either way; might as well be a useful one. There were always contingencies if things went… sour.

“In the spirit of honesty,” he said, tapping his own temple with a smirk, “it’s going to make you popular here.”

The knock was unexpected, and frankly an annoyance. He had a secretary for a reason. But Audaire wasn’t the only one interested in the gift landed on their doorstep, or the way it might be used to further several classified projects. “Make it quick,” he called, glancing an unruffled apology in Sage’s direction. It was Forrer who entered, at which point Eph assumed not a careful machination but a lack of social awareness. The man lived and breathed Project Ghost like oxygen. Eph doubted he had it in him to engineer a meet with the singular host of the brain-chip processor, like Luther had done.