Ava was out of her own car now, in a white blouse and black slacks, her dark hair blowing in the wind. A huge Texan smile was on her face.

Miranda Shepherd closed her car door behind her, and moved towards the mall. Through his car window, Breece watched as Ava hailed her. He saw Shepherd turn, Ava close the distance between them, that huge smile still on her face.

Shepherd listened, then smiled and nodded herself. She turned, pointing out towards the highway, gesturing with her hands, giving directions to a lost young lady.

All the while, the aerosolized DWITY variant was pumping out of Ava’s blouse, making its way into Miranda Shepherd’s lungs, then via her bloodstream to Shepherd’s brain. Within a few seconds, Shepherd was wobbling slightly, woozy now, susceptible to suggestions.

He saw Ava reach out and take the befuddled woman’s hand. The micro-injector on Ava’s thumb would have just pumped more DWITY into Miranda Shepherd’s bloodstream. The televangelist’s wife looked confused now, her eyes glassy and blank. Ava smiled, talked soothingly, then she led Miranda Shepherd by the hand, back to the nondescript car with false plates, and drove away with her.

The Nigerian started up their own car, led them to the spot where Ava had been parked. Breece opened the door, reached down, and picked up Miranda Shepherd’s phone in his gloved hand.

As the Nigerian drove, Breece placed the voice modulator over the phone’s mic, and dialed the hair salon. He spoke, and a software model trained on dozens of hours of recordings of Miranda Shepherd transformed his voice into a feminine Texas drawl.

“Betsy? Hi. It’s Miranda,” Breece said in Shepherd’s voice. “I’m sorry, darlin’, but I have to cancel my appointment this mornin’. No, can’t come in next week, we have the prayer breakfast. But I’ll be back in two weeks. OK, thank ya, Betsy!”

He clicked off the phone, then dropped it into a shielded bag.

The Nigerian drove them on, towards the garage and the reprogramming of Mrs Miranda Shepherd.

Chapter 38: Information Extraction

38

INFORMATION EXTRACTION

Saturday October 27th

Shanghai suffered. Riots broke out. Hungry looters smashed windows in grocery stores and food distribution centers. Murders happened in the streets. Criminal gangs roamed free. Underworld lords enforced brutal order in small isolated pockets. Half the city still lacked power. Subway tunnels remained flooded. Sewage water still choked some streets. Fires burned in now-abandoned buildings. Soldiers patrolled the filthy streets, shooting the looters and rioters they found.

Elsewhere, China herself changed and the hardliners seized power. Chen laughed bitterly at himself. His daughter had done this, had handed the hardliners this opportunity. His monstrous daughter, in trying to save her mother’s life, had doomed her.