Naturally, Travis kept it secret from George. His insight had gained the older man's respect, and Travis loved it. If he revealed his source, George would likely accuse him of sleeping with the enemy and end their friendship and partnership on the spot.

Hunched in front of his computer, Travis shuddered, sensing that one day he would have to pay a price for the information he got from Deep Throat.

George entered the office carrying brown paper bags.

Travis rubbed his hands together. "Chinese food. Gimme gimme gimme."

They broke open the cartons and started wolfing down their lunch.

"I got a good one for you, George," said Travis, his mouth full. "You know how I told you I could check the site stats and find out what servers are visiting us? Well, you won't believe it but I hit paydirt. We're getting a lot of visitors routing through servers at the Army, eighteen government agencies and eight major investment banks."

"That's excellent!" George said, laughing. "Good one. Sure, they're watching us, but just remember, we're watching back." Saying this made him feel powerful.

Travis laughed with him. "We should post the list of servers."

"That'll sock it to 'em."

"Our site is really skyrocketing in hits, too."

"Great. We can raise our banner ad rates and attract some bigger fish to advertise."

"Yeah, I guess."

George said, "We've got good information here. People really eat it up. People love to get paranoid, it's like an amusement park ride for them. Others make a religion out of it. But they have a right to know."

Travis said, "A paranoid American is a good American."

"Yeah," said George, chuckling.

"Hey, I dug up some fantastic details on that story you want to go live this weekend. I'm stretching out the story and I'll show you a draft before I post it."

George shook his head in admiration.

"You're a whiz kid, Travis."

"Grab 'em by the nose and kick 'em in the ass, boss."

"So what are your plans this weekend? Want to go to the shooting range tomorrow?"

"Sure thing, boss. Got to keep the Second Amendment going, don't we?"

That night, George read an article in Time about conspiracy theorists and saw his name mentioned, which made him glow with delight.

So even the Illuminati-owned, so-called liberal media are starting to catch on to the truth, he thought.

The article called him a professional fantasy writer.

He crumpled up the magazine in a rage.

So this is how I fit into the Illuminati plan, he thought. I just create more noise that makes people paranoid but doesn't help them fight the Illuminati.

His eyes wide, he began to see how badly he had been suckered.

The Illuminati sent him press releases and he posted them because America had a right to know. But two things happened. One, if the press release contained predictions that came true, it actually created a sense of relief, not shock, among his readers. His site visitors were titillated, those information addicts, not warned. Two, the best smokescreen for a secret plan is to tell the truth since the truth is, well, weird to most Americans, who are asleep.

George, unwittingly, had become a dupe and a cog in the machine of world domination. I tell America the truth, he thought, and then America says well that's a conspiracy theory from a conspiracy theorist so it must be fantasy, the dreams of a wacko.

The Illuminati, he sensed, having a major epiphany, are true masters of the game. They run the mainstream media that ridicules and stigmatizes conspiracy theories as well as provide information to the conspiracy theory community that creates these theories.

He also sensed that he wasn't alone. He sensed that many leading conspiracy theorists, like him, were also being fed information in what he named, on the spot, the "dark pipeline."

How else could they know so much about the secret Plan, he deducted.

The Illuminati was giving the conspiracy theorist community a big Cassandra complex, dooming them to predict a future that nobody would believe.

They were saying, "Go ahead and have the truth. Nobody will believe you and there's nothing you can do about it. And if anybody out there says hey the Illuminati do run America, they'll probably say we do a pretty good job and thank us for it."

George almost admired the sick beauty of it.

He swore never to use another press release. He and the Illuminati were through.

After a restless, sleepless weekend, he got another release in the same crisp envelope bearing the tell-tale eye-in-the-pyramid logo.

"I won't use it," George told himself. "I'm going to write lies from now on."

He didn't know what purpose that would serve, so he paused.

"I'm going to shut down the site."

That wouldn't do much either.

The truth was, he didn't know what to do. He was thoroughly boxed in, damned no matter what choice he took. He decided to open the release and see what it said. He was a conspiracy theorist, after all, and he had a right to know

His mouth dropped open as he read:

Travis Walker, co-owner of Illuminati Watch, a non-profit organization devoted to publishing conspiracy theories at its popular web site, shot and killed partner and organization founder George Meade Tuesday afternoon. Meade, who had devoted his life to publishing fantastical conspiracy theories, was pronounced dead on arrival, according to hospital sources.

George swallowed hard. Why would Travis do such a thing?

He found the answer near the bottom of the release.

Walker had unknowingly been a dupe of the Illuminati, an international secret society devoted to one-world government and the abolishment of Christianity, liberty and private property. A year earlier, he was kidnapped, at which time a chip was surgically implanted in his head. According to spokesmen for the Illuminati, the organization's award-winning scientists were able to control Walker's actions by remote radio control, turning him into an assassin at the mention of a secret word that would be spoken over the phone. After the assassination, Walker had no recollection of the event and turned himself in to local police authorities, which triggered a wave of news stories further discrediting the conspiracy movement as "paranoid" and "wacko extremist."

George broke out in a cold sweat. His hands were trembling.

His first thought was to leave the country.