They might be negotiating a contract for supplying phase 3. The CFO answered one of the questions on expenses by saying the next quarter might be high again if a ramp up such as Merrimack's MM-093 occurs.
The 3rd quarter ended 33 days ago, so the only thing that is definitive is that Merrimack was still on board as of September 30th. Your statement "We can put to rest the worst-case scenarios about Merrimack" is patently false.
My impression from the CC is GTC knows nothing about the status of MM-093. Others, assumably, were not similiarly impressed.