BZRK

possession of a nanobot. What if we had not managed to retrieve it?”
    “And we know that MI5 is actively investigating.”
    “There have been repeated efforts by Anonymous to penetrate our AFGC networks as well as Nexus Humanus,” Benjamin said.
    “Oh yes, the hackers are after us.”
    “The FBI is thwarted for now. But MI5 persists.”
    “Indications of Mossad interest.”
    “An attempt by Swedish intelligence to penetrate Nexus.”
    “Too many eyes are turning toward us, brother.”
    That image troubled both men. They watched: they were not themselves watched.
    “BZRK is weakened by McLure’s death, but not defeated,” Benjamin cautioned.
    “Fuck BZRK,” Charles snapped.
    “Fanatics.”
    “A death cult.”
    There followed a long silence, during which both men looked down at the cards, and the third eye wandered lazily. Beneath the cards the table screen showed a lab worker entering data.
    “Time is short.”
    “The time is now.”
    “If we are to succeed, brother.”
    Another long silence.
    “Six targets,” Benjamin said with a deep sigh. When he sighed, it stretched the flesh between their heads, slightly distorting Charles’s mouth. “Four men, two women, all surrounded and watched. Each requires a fully resourced team, a main twitcher, a relief twitcher, housekeeping, security . . . a minimum of ten people per team. And each is a potential target; each presents the possibility of discovery.”
    Charles sighed. “Bug Man. Kim. One-Up. Alfredo. Dietrich.” Pursed lips. “Burnofsky. Six at the top level.”
    “Average age, what, seventeen, if you leave out Burnofsky?”
    “Twitchers,” Charles said, and made a snorting sound. “Young and arrogant, intelligent, and unstable by definition.”
    “Twenty-two more at the second level. Seventy-one at third level.”
    “Risky and useless respectively, for this kind of work.”
    They looked down, all three eyes now, at the cards.
    Benjamin placed his finger on the one that read “Chancellor of Germany”. And pushed it to the side. “He’s likely to lose in the next election. A waste of resources.”
    “Five, then,” Charles agreed. “US, China, Japan, India, and the UK.”
    “Five.”
    “Not later, but now.”
    “Now,” Benjamin agreed with finality.
    Their dog, a beagle, came trotting across the polished wood floor and rubbed against Benjamin’s leg. Charles took a treat from a jar on the desk and dropped it into the animal’s mouth.
    “There you go, Maisie,” Charles cooed. “Good girl.”
    “That dog of yours,” Benjamin muttered. “Why does she always rub against me?”
    They went then to take their shower but were interrupted by news, brought to them by their body servant, Hardy, who was an old man with a wonderful ability to resist flinching when he looked at his two charges.
    Hardy handed them a pad, open to a message. They read it as Hardy helped them out of their tailor-made clothing with the unusual zippers and openings.
    “The trap,” Benjamin said.
    “The Vincent flytrap,” Charles said, and that
bon mot
gave them both a hearty laugh.

ARTIFACT
    To: Vincent
    From: Lear
    Proceed to equip Plath and Keats.
    Note: The UN General Assembly attack must be stopped. No one’s life or sense of morality is more important than that goal.
    Follow orders, Vincent. It will be your salvation.

ARTIFACT
    To: C and B Armstrong
    From: AmericaStrong, a division of Armstrong Fancy Gifts Corporation
    Status: EYES ONLY ENCRYPT Read and safe-delete
    A recent Wikipedia edit included information prejudicial to our interests (see paragraph #3 below). That paragraph has now been deleted and was online for only twelve minutes. We suspect source material from KSI, Swedish Intelligence.
    Project MKULTRA
    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
    “MKULTRA” redirects here.
For other uses, see MKULTRA (disambiguation).
    Project MKULTRA , or MK-ULTRA , was the code name for a covert, illegal CIA human research program, run by the Office of Scientific Intelligence. This official U.S. government program began in the early 1950s, continuing at least through the late 1960s, and it used U.S. and Canadian citizens as its test subjects. [1][2][3][4]
    The published evidence indicates that Project MKULTRA involved the use of many methodologies to manipulate individual mental states and alter brain functions, including the surreptitious administration of drugs and other chemicals, sensory deprivation, isolation, and verbal and sexual abuse.
    Recent