“We only need three.” Cleary leaned across his desk and pointed at the list. “We start with DC. The system is complicated, but it can be rigged with nanites at entry points. Once in, they will multiply and spread, infecting every person who comes into contact with the city water system.”

“That could be millions. You can’t do millions of transplants in that time frame.”

“No, of course not,” Cleary replied. “Most will die. We follow that up with Richmond and Annapolis. It will look like the contagion is spreading both north and south. A nationwide panic will ensue. We will have the only solution: the transplants.

“The government will seize NTI’s operations for national security purposes. It will find that we have the software available to train physicians to do the transplants. The government will mandate the retraining, physicians will be conscripted into national service, and blank silicon substrates will be mass-produced. We will go from a few hundred transhumans to several hundred thousand in the course of a month.”

“But they’ll be able to trace the nanites back to NTI,” Pape objected.

Cleary shook his head. “I’m working on a self-destruct subroutine that we’ll have to use for the nanite bombs. After they’ve consumed a set number of neurons, the nanites will disintegrate into their constituent molecules and be dispersed throughout the body. There won’t be anything left to trace. Just neural mush.”

Pape smiled at him. “I assume you want me to plant the bombs.”

Cleary nodded. “Since my nanites made your chip untraceable, you are supremely suited to the task, my friend.”

Cleary received another series of updates from Pape.

“I injected nanites into bottled water at the congresswoman’s house—the ones you programmed with the thirty-six-hour operating life. The Congresswoman should be safe; she doesn’t return from Texas for another three days.”

That, I realized, was why I’d been infected with the nanites but Abby hadn’t. Pape contaminated the water at Lauren’s just as Abby had started her food-and-water fast.

I continued scanning the updates.

“I’ve finished my preparations for Richmond. I go there tomorrow.”

“We missed the New Guinea woman again, I’m sorry to say. We seem to have infected only the professor. He’ll be dead in two days. I’ll try the woman again.”

“Richmond is ready. I’m heading to Annapolis. I’ll come back to DC and do its system last.”

The two met on a VR beach while I was in the hospital. Pape was looking out to sea when he appeared in Cleary’s memory stream. Pape turned to Cleary and spoke.

“A complication has arisen.”

“Which is?”

“The professor is recovering.”

“I thought he was in a coma, headed out.”

“Something stopped the infection.”