“What is a wipe? Well, as I said, it’s our law. A wipe is a selective insert into the area of your brain that stores short term memory. Trouble is it’s not as selective as it sounds, and just for the record, I’m against it Rupert. Look, this is all my fault but what’s done is done. What I want to do now is fix it,” Loretta said.
“You’re making me kind of nervous. So what happens with this wipe,” Rupert asked.
“You’ll forget everything that’s happened – short term that is,” Loretta said. “Like I said it impacts your short term memory.”
“Everything in my short term memory,” Rupert said. “Maybe that’s a good thing.”
“It’s not.”
“Why’s that?”
“You’re coming up on the end of your first year of school right,” Loretta asked.
“Yes,” Rupert answered.
“You’ll lose that,” Loretta said and then added, “and most likely a big part, if not all, of the year before.
“Wait, that’s bad,” Rupert said. “You said short term?”
“Exactly. That is considered short term,” Loretta said. “Which is why I’m against it and why I want to convince her that I am about to start training you to be my familiar.”
“I don’t follow,” Rupert said.
“That’s why we need to eat and begin your lessons. I’m hoping by the time my mother Rosaline arrives I can convince her to let me keep you – intact,” Loretta said. “More or less!”
“So how do we do that,” Rupert asked.
“First I’ve got to convince you to come work for me. Then convince my mother that you are fulfilling the role of a familiar in spite of the fact you’re neither a girl nor a demon. Then I’ve got to persuade mother not to wipe you and the CIA not to shoot you,” Loretta said. “Now let’s eat something.”
Rupert just sat there open mouth. It ended up being cheese and crackers…
“So what was that about the CIA,” Rupert asked.
“I’m being a little sarcastic but just a little. Okay, let’s see? I suppose our modern day history begins with our relationship with the CIA, and great grandmother Henretta. Actually it goes back to the end of World War II. That’s when my great grandmother Henretta was rescued from a German prison hospital,” Loretta said.
“You’re great grandmother was part of the CIA,” Rupert said.
“No. The CIA didn’t exist then. She was a prisoner of war, part of a captured gypsy family arrested and known for their, gypsy, witchcraft ways. At the time she was pressed into creating drugs for Germany. Some pretty remarkable drugs for the times,” Loretta said.
“Interesting start,” Rupert noted.
It gets even better because she was making fake drugs. A lot of German men couldn’t get it up after a while. Luckily before she got caught she was rescued by the allies. Unfortunately the allies wanted her to continued her work,” Loretta said and added, “but then China started brainwashing their people.”
“So they started using Henretta’s potions for brainwashing,” Rupert said.
“We’re not sure,” Loretta said and added, “it was still indoctrination Henretta believed but they were making some of her teas into mass drinks so it was most likely a program for mass brainwashing.
“How the hell do you wash a brain,” Rupert said laughing.
It’s funny, but that word brainwashing actually came from the Chinese or rather two Chinese words ‘nao’ which is the Chinese word for brain and ‘xi’ which means ‘to wash’,” Loretta noted.
“So she’s brewing tea for the allies,” Rupert asked.
“After the Chinese went dark no one really cared what they did,” Loretta said. “And meanwhile the allies were grabbing as many German scientist and technicians as they could find before Russian got them.”
“Germans,” Rupert asked.
“Germans. Yes. Near the end of the war Europe, Russia and the US were grabbing all kinds of technologies to bring home” Loretta said and added, “along with the scientist, doctors and engineers. Including people they had captured and used like my great grandmother.”
“So your saying along with our rocket scientists we grabbed a bunch of witches,” Rupert asked.
“Exactly Although great grandmother Henretta wasn’t considered a witch at the time. She was really just classified as a chemist and her familiar,” Loretta said.
“Familiar,” Rupert asked and added, “you keep using that word? What exactly is a familiar?”
“In ancient lore a familiar was considered a spirit usually an animal of some sort that acts as an assistant to a witch. It’s still used that way but for Henretta it was also a lover,” Loretta says.”
“So I could be a Familiar,” Rupert asked smiling.
“No, yes… I’ll explain that contradiction to you later,” Loretta noted and then added, “funny thing is, my great grandmother’s familiar was her neighbor. A woman. They just lied about her to bring her over. Henretta arrived pregnant. The father was actually a German guard. That’s how my grandmother Geraldine came along about 5 months later and how we became part of ‘Project Paperclip’.”
“Project Paperclip,” Rupert repeated.
“Yes Paperclip. That was America’s code word for it. Project Paperclip was authorized by President Harry Truman to sneak people into this country without a lot of red tape. At the time it was under the War Department’s Joint Intelligence Agency, which was the precursor to the CIA
“So we’re getting closer to the CIA,” Rupert asked.
“Pretty much, because among those that followed Werner and the rest into the US was a man named Dr. Albert Heinz. This guy Heinz was to brainwashing what Von Braun was to rockets,” Loretta said. “Albert and Henretta began working together in Virginia on project Bluebird.
“The brainwashing project,” Rupert asked.
“Exactly,” Loretta confirmed. “He had a son Albert Junior a year older than Geraldine, Albert Junior. Albert and My grandmother Geraldine grow up together while Albert senior and Henretta worked from 1950 till 1975. In 1964 the kids go off to college together, and at a rock concert in 1965 my mother Rosaline is conceived…
“So Albert and Geraldine have your mother,” Rupert asked.
“Albert and Geraldine have mom and they graduate and start working a new project for the CIA called Artichoke. Artichoke, for its blooms by the way, involves the actual brainwashing capability within PUSH . So this is also where it starts to involve you and me.”
“Got it,” Rupert said feeling a tightness in his gut.
“Like I said, my grandmother and grandfather created Project Artichoke and work on various applications which ultimately became the program WIPE and their effects that clean the brain. Also by 1968 she was refining our PUSH skills.
“Now I’m starting to hear Push,” Rupert said.
“Exactly. So guess who the first person with the Push skill is,” Loretta asked and without waiting for an answer says, “my mother Rosaline. Rosaline was a little girl when she get’s the first drugs and stats getting her training to “push” people under project Artichoke.”
“That’s where you come into it,” Rupert said.
“Exactly,” Loretta noted and added, “with my mother proving it could work our people under project Artichoke expanded into the clandestine part of the CIA and some, most I suppose, became operatives.”
“Operatives,” Rupert says trying to understand the term in her context.
“Imagine young men and women that can move about the world influencing just about anyone to do just about anything,” Loretta notes.
“Wow,” Rupert said.
Exactly,” Loretta notes and added, “which is why they want to keep it quiet.”
“So you are a CIA operative,” Rupert asked.
“No. A few of us. a lot of my generation, me included, began opting out of CIA intelligence with promises of non-interference,” Loretta said.
“When you say non-interference what exactly does that mean,” Rupert asked.
“Rupert, it just means I can’t interfere in anyone’s life by pushing. They don’t want us advertising this is all. That compliance is mandatory to insure those within the CIA that still push remain anonymous and secret. When I pushed you I violated my terms of anonymity.”
“So bottom line when you pushed me you broke the rules,” Rupert noted.
“That’s right! When I pushed you I triggered two alarms,” Loretta said and added, “one in my family because we’re connected, and the other at the CIA with operatives watching a monitor that tracks my specific frequency.”
“So do they know that you did what you did,” Rupert asked.
“Oh yes. Both are very anxious to discover not only what I’ve done but why. If they find out I’ve pushed you by accident which I did, both will want to wipe you of your memories of it. That’s a standard operating procedure,” Loretta said and then added, “I don’t want to do that.”
“Me neither,” Rupert said and then added, “so what are my options?”
“I’m not sure yet,” Loretta said and then added, “but it’s going to have a lot to do with keeping your mind intact.
“I think I’d like that,” Rupert said.