“How is th̩̮͇̞̰̫̭e̳͈͈ subject?” the head scientist addressed at the member sitting to his right, as he gazed at the jar residing in the center of the round table.

“Sitting, apparently,” answered the assistant as he consulted the images on his tablet. He frowned, twiddled a few buttons, and then muttered, “Is something wrong with the output vįd̨eo҉ fe̵e͠d͜? I can’t get a clear picture as to what the subject is looking at.”

The other members immediately looked down at their own tablets, trying to find the source of the problem. One assistant pressed a few commands into his tablet, and then worriedly looked at the head scientist.

“Sir,” began the assistant, “I think something is messing with our observation of the simulation. I can’t get a clear read on the subject’s location and its surroundings. Should we send someone in to check?”

“Relax,” was the head scientist’s response. “We know p͢e͡r͘fectly ͢well̷ where the subject is located, don’t we?”

He looked at the surrounding group and pointed their gaze to the jar. “Then there is nothing too pressing to worry about. The subject is here. We all know this. Now someone go fix that unplugged wire.”

All of the members got up and left, including the assistant, but the head scientist waved him to sit back down. After the members had finished clearing the room, the scientist got up and stretched his legs, letting out a sigh. The assistant waited patiently for him to speak.

“What are we feeding the subject right now? What was scheduled? I’ve been too busy analyzing the collected data to pay attention to the recent matters, but I know that nothing worth noting should have been fed to the subject.”

The assistant consulted his tablet again, bringing up the schedule. “As you say: nothing of importance aside from the normal day to day things we were originally f̩͉e̞̠̘͔̥e͍̝͙̗̱̝di̮̰͈̰̤̰͕n̤̫g̜̻͓̫ ͔̠̹̪̤̝̝the subject. Ever since the second growth period, we’ve been keeping the subject so busy that it isn’t paying attention to what we’ve been feeding it.”

“Much better than when it used to be extremely pi̛c͟kỳ ̷a͜n͘d ͘w͏ary ̨ about what we were feeding it, surely,” commented the head scientist.

“It’s not young anymore; I assume anything that’s been fed the same thing for so many years will naturally assume it isn’t harmful anymore.”

“Well it’s got that right. It’s not harmful.”

The head scientist tapped the console on his table and brought up a video feed.

“It’s still d̏͂͂́oi̿ͨ̚n̿̎́͂ǵ̾͘ …whatever it’s doing?” the scientist asked.

The assistant glanced and shrugged, “We can’t really forbid it from doing anything, sir. Our research has only recently understood the ways we can influence the subject’s decision making by providing or removing stimuli.”

The head scientist nodded absentmindedly, “I see…and the c͕̰̰̲͔̗u̹r̭̙͉ͅr͙̜̖ẹ͖n͈̠t̼͔͉ ̣̠̤̞̹s̱̗ti͉͇̙ͅm̭u͎̮l͔̘us is to have the subject…what is it doing?”

The assistant looked and responded, “I believe it is still sitting, sir.”

“Sitting aͥͯ͌͋ndͪ̒̽̾͑̈ …?”

“Um, reading? We occasionally have the subject-”

“I thought we had attempted to limit the subject’s exposures to reading things that had nothing to do with its work,” interrupted the head scientist. He squinted at the screen, a̷nd th͘e҉n attempted to zoom in.

The assistant’s brow furrowed ás҉ he glanced̷ ąt̀ thę schedule designed for the subject before stating, “Yes, in an attempt to throw the subject off course we had…”

The head scientist became visibly agitated and began punching things into the console on the desk, alarming the assistant.

“Sir, what…?”

“Who fed the subject last?!” asked the head scientist as he began inputting a series of commands into the console, “The subject is reading class A restricted material!”

The assistant jumped up from his chair as a look of horror flitted across his face.

“Sir, what, you can’t mean…”

“I’m attempting to disengage the stimulus right now,” said the head scientist frantically, “it would be too confusing to the subject to be knocked out immediately but I can make it so what it’s reading is removed…”

A few more keystrokes were entered before the scientist was finished designating the f͟i͢na̧l̕ comm͘a͠nd̴s̀ an̨d̶ ͏he p͏res̡s̡e͡d̨ the ̴comman̡d ̸tò ͜ex̛e̷c̶uţe t̴h̀e