KUNPENG_DING

In the power meat grinder that is Washington, D.C., the Blackstone Group controls political scavenger Emily Watson through barcode tattoos. When avenger Victor Stone scorches her skin with an electromagnetic pulse, a dying Emily scans the barcode on her collarbone, accidentally activating a nerve gas canister buried in an underground pipeline on Capitol Hill.Within 72 hours, a toxic fog containing genetically-targeted technology envelops Washington, specializing in killing politicians registered in the DNA bank. Victor discovers that the biochip under his burn scar is counting down, and a jailed and reborn Adam Crawford holds the key that will shut off all the gas valves-but that will permanently lock tens of billions of the Blackstone Group's dirty money into a blockchain tomb. The trio must choose from the ruins of power: destroy all evidence and be reborn, or save their arch-enemy in exchange for a filthy immortality.

black balance sheet

A spiderweb of cracks suddenly appeared in the bulletproof glass at 23 Wall Street, and Victor knew it was Emily's greeting. He activated his office's electromagnetic shielding and removed the ten-year sealed memory chip from his dentures - it held all the dirt from Emily's Yale Law School days, including how she used a professor's skull as a marijuana bong.

"Blackstone Group Clause 7," he read the encrypted email aloud into the air, "automatically initiates organ retrieval process if Clean Tech generates emotional swings in excess of 47% of budget." The holographic projection showed real-time monitoring data of Emily's kidneys, which were flowing with enough metabolites of banned substances to prosecute three presidents.

The moment Emily broke the window, Victor hit the Tesla coil switch hidden in his pocket watch. Her platinum bracelet suddenly heats up to 300 degrees Celsius, and the smell of burnt skin mixes with Chanel No. 5 perfume in a hellish cocktail. But the real killing trick was hidden deeper - those tracking chips implanted in her bone marrow were currently synchronizing the Blackstone Group's dark accounts to the FBI director's private server.

Chapter 8: Shorting the Soul