THE SECOND EXPERIMENT

Victor Kravitz did not look like a predator. He was short, balding, and habitually wore cardigan sweaters that made him resemble a friendly librarian rather than one of Wall Street's most successful hedge fund managers. He smiled easily, remembered names, and donated generously to charity. His public persona was carefully constructed to project trustworthiness, humility, and concern for others.

The reality was considerably different.

Kravitz's hedge fund, Meridian Capital, specialized in "distressed asset acquisition"—a sanitized term for buying companies in financial trouble, stripping them of their assets, and liquidating them for profit. Over fifteen years, Kravitz had destroyed approximately four hundred companies, eliminating an estimated eighty thousand jobs. He'd targeted manufacturing firms, retail chains, healthcare providers, and—most profitably—companies with underfunded pension obligations. When Meridian Capital acquired a company, its pension fund became Kravitz's personal property, its workers' retirement security converted into his quarterly returns.

The genius of Kravitz's operation was its legality. Every transaction was reviewed by teams of lawyers who ensured compliance with regulations written by lobbyists Kravitz's industry associations had funded. Every asset strip was documented, every pension conversion justified by actuarial reports commissioned by Kravitz's own firms. He had never been charged with a crime. He had never even been seriously investigated. The system he exploited had been designed by people like him, for people like him.

Adrian studied Kravitz for six weeks before planning his intervention. The hedge fund manager's public affability masked a private life of extreme isolation. He had no close friends, no romantic relationships, no connections beyond transactional ones. His sole companion was a golden retriever named Buddy, purchased because focus groups showed that dog owners were perceived as trustworthy. Kravitz's interactions with Buddy were minimal—the dog was walked by a professional handler, fed by a housekeeper, and petted only when Kravitz needed a photograph for his carefully managed social media presence.

Neurologically, Kravitz presented an interesting variation on the affective void pattern. Where Whitfield's empathy deficit was consistent and comprehensive, Kravitz showed localized impairment. He could experience pleasure, excitement, even a form of attachment to his work. What he couldn't experience was connection to other humans. His brain processed people as opportunities or obstacles, valuable only insofar as they served his interests. The dog, the charities, the friendly cardigan—all were tools in a lifelong project of manipulating perceptions.

Adrian found this profile particularly interesting from a research perspective. Would Kravitz's partial affective capacity alter his response to the intervention? Would the presence of some emotional processing make the induced empathy more or less devastating? The scientific question was genuinely compelling, independent of any moral consideration.

He planned the intervention around Kravitz's isolation. The hedge fund manager's security was less comprehensive than Whitfield's—he lacked the paranoia that came with pharmaceutical industry competition—but his habits were unpredictable. He traveled frequently, maintained multiple residences, and rarely followed a consistent schedule. Direct access to his environment would be difficult.