Chloe and her syn-biote slime

"Ah, Dr. Dawson! I'm glad you're here."

You entered Dr. Chloe Walker's lab, directed to a seat by her desk. She shook your hand, with a charming smile of her own as she brushed back her blonde hair. Dressed fairly casually in a button-up blouse and a knee-length skirt, she would be a perfect co-host for a Hideki chemistry video. So far, though, neither she nor Dr. Hildebrand had shown any interest in talking on camera, preferring their privacy instead.

"Please, Devin's fine." When your eyes finally left Chloe's friendly gaze, they found their way to the vials on her desk. You pointed to them as you sat. "Is this what your email referred to?"

Dr. Walker sighed and took a seat. "Cutting to the chase, I see. In short, yes, I've been working on a project that I don't really think is ready for prime time at Hideki yet, but I don't have the bandwidth to conduct trials on it. It's better suited to a university study, I think. But first, I need you to keep what we discuss in here confidential, at least anything that ties this research to Hideki Labs." The blonde doctor slid an NDA and a pen in front of you, crossing her arms as she waited for your response.

You glanced over the NDA, signing without reading too deeply into it. Chloe smiled and picked up a vial, shaking the blue goop inside a little.

"This is a project near and dear to me, as it is an extension of my biopolymer research. I know you'd done a video on Hideki's smart-gel so you're aware of the basic principles of this biomatter, but this extends into new fields of neural stimulation. Basically, it's an ingestible gel that will boost cognition and memory by some degree. I don't know the most effective mixtures of my four compounds yet for best results."

You blinked, and took one of the vials into your hands, to examine it closer. "I feel like I've seen this movie before. But okay, I'll bite. If it's useful for learning and retention of information, measuring performance in my students is cheaper than conducting trials through Hideki?"

"Bingo," Chloe said, leaning back in her chair, stretching out. She'd strategically unbuttoned her blouse before you came in, happy to be a little showy in front of you with a bit of cleavage to help sell her project to you. She didn't need it, but the sight was certainly welcome. "You conduct the research, collect the data, and get the credit. I get to evaluate the data and speed up my other research, since this research will improve another project of mine. ...There's more to it, though, and I kind of need an outside perspective on some of the side effects versus cognitive improvements."

You picked up another vial, looking at the contents of the second vial, each a slightly different shade of blue. These vials were numbered from 1 to 4, which looked like they corresponded to some charts on Chloe's desk. "What, like a C-student becomes a B-student, but they can't stop sneezing?"

Chloe's lips upturned in a momentarily sinister smile. "Not quite. Let me be clear: this is an extension of my smart gel, which you would understand has some degree of its own intelligence. In order to augment a human brain, there will be a degree of behavior modification due to this extra intelligence incorporating into the mind. Basically, the smarter these students become, the more they may act differently, driven by what is essentially a secondary brain that will exist within them."

Warning lights went off in your mind. Something about this sounded like it could cross all sorts of ethical boundaries if you didn't set up experiments properly. But... an opportunity to do some legitimate research, get the credit, maybe write some books in the future...

Realizing your conflict, Chloe slid a binder of data toward you, putting a hand on yours. "I've already tested each of these substances independently in a controlled setting. All my research is in here, as a starting point for you. Before you say no, read it over in detail, and you can return the vials if you don't want to participate. But let me assure you, this is smart gel version 2: it will respond to specific auditory and written commands even in a test subject to compel the slime to exit the body, and even return to its individual compounds, so you can end any trial at any time. The only residual effects are the awareness a subject has about the slime's behavior modification since that will be tied into the host's memory that remains after the gel leaves, but otherwise it leaves synaptic pathways unchanged."

That all sounded so reassuring, although the comment about awareness seemed odd. Was Chloe suggesting some sort of double-blind study, or is she saying the smart gel actually hides its own tracks in a mind?

"Synaptic pathways... synaptic-linked symbiosis, I take it?"

Chloe nodded. "Just give it a look, there's no rush. Start trials whenever you like. Just make sure to give the vials some sugar water regularly so they don't dry out, at least once a week."