Colin-oscopy

Condoleezza Rice sat in her office, staring out the window, thinking about her destiny. She had just finished reading the Washington Post Magazine article on her predecessor, Colin Powell. She worked so much harder than he did...seven days a week...thinking, always thinking. She picked up the other article again, George Tenet's blabbermouth piece. There was no smoking gun! Nobody would ever be able to pin a smoking gun on her! Nobody could have stopped 9/11. It wasn't her fault. Nothing was her fault! Why did she have to spend every hour of her life trying to rewrite history, force it onto a different track? There were so many idiots out there, thinking killings actually mattered. It only mattered when it hit close to home, and she strove to keep nobody close to her. It was all about history, and how you would be remembered, and everything was still wrong. She looked up Evermore Breadman's home phone number: she needed help.

Former Senator Evermore Breadman was not at home: he was in Chinatown, picking up black magic herbs to deal with the fallout from his colonoscopy last week. Nobody had ever put him under the knife, and nobody ever would! He was scared. Just last month his Chinese buddy running that factory in the Marianas had told him all about the herbs that had cured his cancer. Breadman felt ridiculous coming down here and looking for herbs, but he didn't dare send somebody to do it for him. He thought about all the times he had voted to cut cancer research funding, while finding plenty of money for military contractors and boondoggles in his state. Now it was all a pain in the ass.

Lynnette Wong finished bottling up the blend Breadman had requested. She had tried to make suggestions of her own, but he had snapped at her that he knew exactly what he wanted. She didn't think these herbs would help him, and so she sold the herbs to Breadman for a low price. She felt sorry for the old man, so scared of dying. She tossed her Lucky Bamboo tea into the bag, too, hoping he would drink it. She could sense the evil in him. She needed to improve this tea--the evil in Washington kept growing and growing. She would make another research trip down to the Potomac, study the plants there some more, figure out what her father had died trying to stop.

Over at George Washington University Hospital, Dr. Khalid Mohammad stared at the Potomac while munching his lunch. It had taken several hours to regain his appetite after all the rectal emergencies he had dealt with this shift. What the hell was going on? Extra lab tests had been ordered to screen for new bacteria or viruses, but the cases looked more like cancer. What was it? He watched the boats motoring down the river. Suddenly one of them capsized. He reached for his cell to call 911 as he made his way back to the ER.

Out on the river, just after thinking what a beautiful day it was, Marcos Vasquez got the Coast Guard call and headed over to the accident scene, where Ardua was silently sucking the life out of the men overboard. It was the fastest response he had ever done, and it was still too late to revive them. He lay down panting after giving up on the last CPR attempt. He didn't notice the nearby ducks, bleeding into the Potomac.