BZRK: Reloaded (BZRK 2)

Nijinsky leaned close to Burnofsky and said, “What do you think

of that?”

Burnofsky said, “Complicated. You have to locate the memory.

Then you have to do what? Connect it to all my better angels? Or just

burn the memory out?”

“Yeah, I could do that, thanks to my spiffy new four point oh. But

Plath nearly fried herself playing with acid down inside Vincent. So I

think I’ll stick to good old-fashioned wire.”

“Maybe you could make me queer,” Burnofsky spat. Nijinsky shook his head. “We’re not recruiting. No, I think I have

a simpler approach: I think I’ll find that memory, the one that tortures you so badly, and I’m going to wire it to your accumbens.” Burnofsky had nothing to say.

“So you’ll remember it, you’ll remember killing her. And when

you do, you’ll experience deep, intense pleasure.”

“No.” Burnofsky shook his head.

“The emotional need for drugs will diminish, you won’t be selfmedicating anymore. You won’t need to. The rewiring will alter your entire motivational structure. That murder will become your greatest

source of joy.

“No,” Burnofsky said. He shook his head violently. “No. No!” “Kind of interesting, isn’t it?” Nijinsky said. “Grey McLure

became involved in nanotechnology in hopes of saving his wife and

later his daughter. His motivation was to save his daughter, and yours

flows from the fact that you killed yours.”

“You won’t stop it,” Burnofsky blustered. “If I don’t do it the

Twins will. Sooner or later they’ll come to it. Right now all they want

is acceptance and love. They’ll come to it, though, the gray goo. Even

without me they’ll see the truth—that it’s all foul and filthy and

degenerate and deserves to be wiped clean.”

“Feel free to keep ranting, Burnofsky. Billy, since we have your

nanobots to do some drilling, we’re going in through the nose, up into

the sinuses. It’s easier to reach the nucleus accumbens. It will be fun!” “No,” Burnofsky pleaded. “No, don’t do this. She was my daughter! She was all I had!

“The man who would kill us all begs for his humanity. Rich,”

Nijinsky said. “Follow me in, Billy.”

They had let themselves into a vacant office two floors down from where Bug Man was slipping into the twitcher station. They had the keys, of course; a janitor had given up his pass key for the six hundred dollars Plath withdrew from a nearby ATM.