Metafire

"Are you kidding?" Jack was beyond himself. "Are you kidding!"

"The're not kidding," said Erisa calmly. "So how is it that they exploded in two salvos, separated by over a year? This is impossible to believe."

Angela continued, "We are a small group. The madman was named Stan Firestone. Metafire was named by him. Stan was an Internet genius. He orchestrated the explosions by manipulating information. We thought we had found the culprits after the first explosions. We had the apparent culprits killed."

"But, the first explosions didn't establish the consistency of the threat. Stan was absolutely convincing on that. He convinced us the culprits of the first explosions were dead. So, we set another set of bombs. Again, these were meant to be discovered. They had to be credible. They had to be capable of going off. Stan had convinced us they could not in fact go off. But he tricked us. We didn't know, even this second time. Afterwards we caught telltale evidence that proved that Stan had plotted all this. So we killed Stan."

Angela, the doctor, now sounded like a doctor telling of cancer, quiet and fateful, "Our secrecy is now essential. If we are discovered, all those millions of people would have died in vain. The world will think it is rid of the threat, and it will ultimately allow the madmen to take control of ultimate destruction. We must still be perceived as a threat. But we have sworn never to plant another bomb. We must stay secret."