64: Chapter 61 Daoud's Chemistry Lesson

Ahvaz.

On the day Daoud Najjari arrived, Reza did not go to meet him, instead having a regular liaison from the workshop pick him up from the bus station and take him to a temporarily arranged residence, where he was settled in to await further notice from Reza.

The reason for his arrival was the invitation letter regarding the "Agricultural Fertilizer Technology Improvement Project." This project was real; three months ago, Reza had already had the Provincial Department of Agriculture complete the full procedure. There was a budget, project approval documents, and two grassroots technicians actually working on it; all they lacked was someone with a chemistry background capable of solving a certain type of nitrogen compound catalysis problem.

Daoud did not know the true purpose of this project. He thought he had accepted a decently paid technical consulting job that would allow him to temporarily leave the increasingly dangerous circles in Tehran and catch his breath somewhere else.

Reza waited two days before going to see him.

They met at the agricultural project's workstation, an ordinary bungalow. On the table were real soil samples and fertilizer analysis reports. Daoud sat there, his face still showing the fatigue of a nearly fifteen-hour bus ride, but his eyes were bright with that instinctive focus young people have when encountering actual technical problems.

When Reza entered, he stood up and called out "Your Highness," clearly a bit nervous—he likely had not expected the Governor himself to appear here in person.

"Sit," Reza said, sitting down opposite him. "Have you looked at the project materials?"

"I have," Daoud said. "Regarding the catalytic efficiency of nitrogen compounds, the current plan's conversion rate is too low and the loss is high. I have a few ideas, but I don't know if the experimental conditions here—"

"We will take care of the experimental conditions," Reza said. "Write down your ideas, and I will have someone set them up according to your requirements."

Daoud nodded, opened the notebook in front of him, and began to write. Reza did not interrupt; he simply sat there, watching him write.

After writing for about five minutes, Daoud looked up and said hesitantly, "Your Highness, I have a question."

"Speak."

"The agricultural fertilizer project does indeed need to solve this type of catalysis problem," he paused, "but when I was a graduate student in Tehran, my research direction leaned towards the chemical synthesis of energetic materials, not agricultural chemistry. Is my background in this area… something Your Highness is aware of?"

When this question was asked, there was a subtle change in the air for a moment.

Daoud was not probing; he was confirming—he was smart enough to know that someone seeking him out specifically could not just be for a fertilizer project. He chose to proactively put his true professional background on the table, a self-preservation move by a smart person facing an uncertain situation: telling the other party that I know you know, so we don't need to beat around the bush.

Reza re-examined him.

The nephew of Director Najjari, a chemistry graduate student whose research focus was energetic materials. He had been hanging around revolutionary circles in Tehran, but he was clearly not the type to be swept away by emotions. He knew what he was doing; he just lacked a clearer direction.

"The agricultural fertilizer project is real, and your work will be real," Reza said. "But if you are willing, there are other problems here that need your thought, related to energetic materials."

Daoud's eyes did not dodge; he looked directly at Reza and asked, "Is it legal work?"

"From one perspective, yes," Reza said. "From another perspective, the question itself is meaningless—in 1975 Iran, was it legal for you to pass around Ayatollah Khomeini's cassette tapes in a basement? Was your uncle the Director's work legal? All truly important things in this world exist in some gray area before they become official records."

Daoud was silent for a moment, then said something that Reza did not expect at the time:

"My uncle told me to come."

After this sentence was spoken, Reza replayed that meeting with Najjari in his mind—he had said, "When the time is right, I will tell you." He hadn't brought up Daoud, but Najjari had clearly connected the two things himself and had taken the initiative to give it a push.

This meant that Najjari's choice was no longer that of a "spectator."

"What did your uncle say?" Reza asked.

"He said," Daoud paused, as if repeating the exact words, "'Go to Khuzestan, see that person, and do your work well.'"

Just that one sentence, nothing more.

But there was a lot in that one sentence. After hearing it, Reza did not continue to press, only saying:

"Then do your work well. Solve the problems of the fertilizer project first, and I will have Iskandari come to see you; he will tell you what comes next."

Iskandari and Daoud's first meeting was three days later, in an independent workshop on the outskirts of the main workshop.

Reza was not present, but Hassan later told him what happened: the first twenty minutes of the two men's meeting were spent entirely discussing the optimization of an ammonium perchlorate synthesis pathway. It was completely technical language that an outsider wouldn't understand, but the density and speed of that exchange, Hassan said, were like two people solving the same problem in different places, suddenly discovering that the other person held the missing piece of the puzzle.

Twenty minutes later, Iskandari took Daoud to see the existing workshop equipment. He didn't explain anything; he just let him look.

After looking, Daoud only said one sentence:

"The propellant formula you are currently using—the combustion efficiency can be increased by twelve to fifteen percent."

Iskandari was silent for about two seconds, then said, "How do we increase it?"

And so they began.

Reza later saw this detail in Fatima's monthly report. Fatima's evaluation of Daoud consisted of only one sentence: "Good theoretical foundation, engineering conversion ability still needs polishing, but he learns very quickly."

For someone like Fatima, this was already a quite high evaluation.

On December 12th, a letter arrived from Najjari. It was not through work channels, but a private letter, sent in the name of a businessman Reza knew, from the local Ahvaz post office. On the letter paper, only two lines were written:

"I entrust Daoud's affairs to Your Highness's care. This child sometimes overthinks things, but his heart is in the right place."

"Regarding that matter Your Highness mentioned before, I have thought it through."

Just these two lines, without saying what the conclusion after "thinking it through" was. But after reading it, Reza folded the letter, put it in the drawer, and on the page for Najjari in his notebook, he wrote two new words, crossing out the original "waverer":

"Choice made."