Ted finally figures out the way. He will kill all the Pilos agitators that try to provoke violence. It must happen in such a way that the manner of their death, and who brought it about, will be a total mystery. Essentially the protestors will come to view further participation in the goals of Boris Pilos as simply suicidal.

Ted will use tiny darts made of a hard, but blood-soluble, undetectable poison that stops the heart of the victim, but only after eight or nine minutes. It’s best to hit bare skin, but the projectiles will easily pierce thin clothing, like light nylon shells or T-shirts. At the time, the victim will slap at what seems to be a bite from an ant or gnat, then after the time delay, will suddenly collapse, without the usual gunshot.

Ted designs a powerful nanotech pneumatic cylinder-shaped gun that can fire twenty poison darts before reloading and recharging. The unit can be encased in a ballpoint pen, sunglasses frame, or book. It is fired using an electronic push button unit in Ted’s trouser pocket. Easy to aim and shoot without notice.

He will be able to walk along as he shoots each agitator, but is also aware that everything will be on film, and decides to use as disguise, a variety of clothes, wigs, moustaches, beards, and ways of moving.

March 11, 2029

Pilos has organized a big anti-Benedict protest at that seething hotbed of lunatic liberalism, U.C. Berkeley. There will be eight hundred protestors, including plenty of the highly trained operatives that Ted will target. Most of these are dressed like ninjas. Look out.

C 10:00 A.M. All the protestors are in place, and nearly four hundred Libertarian counter demonstrators are forming up opposite them.

The Pilos people start off with name calling. Ted wants to make life easy for himself, so he decides to walk among the Pilos people as though going to class, and thus greatly decrease the distance of his targets.

One of the Pilos standard ninjas, wearing thin nylon, with hood and face mask, is poking at a young man with a long “self-defense” stick, calling him filthy names. Ted is using the book today, but has a ballpoint backup. He carries the book normally at his side and lines up with the target. He fires, hitting the ninja about midway on the outer edge of the right thigh. The fellow doesn’t seem to notice.

Ted keeps walking and uses thirty-six darts in eight minutes. At one point someone throws teargas grenades into the Pilos group, the crowd disperses temporarily, and people run all over the place. Because of his, and the fact that the poison takes longer for some than for others, there is no discernable trail of victims suggesting that there might be just one shooter walking through. The angles of entry, however, will suggest that the shooter, or shooters, are not facing opposite the Soros people among the Libertarians.

All thirty-six targets collapse and die, mostly while Ted is enjoying a deluxe cheeseburger at a small grill just off campus. The cable television news starts in on the story as Ted is starting on a big glass of chocolate milk. He sips this very slowly so he can watch.

An old retired lady school teacher exclaims,

“Oh, all those poor young people.”

A cab driver guffaws,

“Hell lady, don’t waste your tears. They’re just a bunch of doped-up Pilos-funded traitors.”

Ted chuckles, delighted with the growing public awareness of world events. He pays the check, and walks to his car. On the way back north, he tunes on the radio, and learns that the police have no clue as to what happened. Undoubtedly the forensic boys will find the little bug-bite holes and deduce something about causation, but for now, religious patriots are hoping that it’s the “Wrath of God.”

March 14, 2029

The forensic team has issued a statement that the victims were “pierced from a short distance with a slow-acting deadly poison, probably fired from a nanotech device of some type”.

As Ted watches this on the television news at dinnertime, he smiles and says to himself,

“I surely am proud of them boys. I knew they would figure it out, and it didn’t take them very long. A bunch of fucking genii, I tell ye, plus some very good training to boot.”