NSFW – this content is very hardcore.
The institute was somewhat mysterious, and anyone who worked there seemed always to be quite aloof and vague about their profession despite them often being in the newspaper. I thought of them as a kind of local Area 51. It was quite modern looking, the building, and it was just down the street from where I lived at the time. It was part of the hospital infrastructure and was one of 5 buildings put up in that small conglomerate. It was kind of futuristic and beautiful to look at. Most people, myself included, didn’t think much about the institute. Honestly, they were kind of boring. So little info was to be had about them that they were simply accepted and forgotten in the day-to-day grind in the small-ish town where they held themselves.
My upstairs neighbor worked there.
This was intriguing, especially as she’d often come home late at night, and leave early in the morning. She was 29, a woman I’d interviewed many times through my work as a journalist in a small magazine about technology named Futurum. I was 27. She’d only comment in general terms about the future, and was a go-to source for these kind of speculative articles we’d often have. How will we get our energy? How will humanity evolve? We became familiar, but stayed professional.