Sheepdog 23

Sheepdog’s Direct Action Assistance was pre-authorized by the client, which meant Sheepdog had free reign as to the type, timing, and target of the mitigation. It also meant that Sheepdog would spend 3 weeks afterwards justifying his actions despite the client’s unending praise. The Splicer Council Hearings were big news in the intel community, and little was leaked, until someone had a few too many at the bar and a scavenging young reporter picked up on the rumor with minimal details. All that was announced to the public, prior to the story breaking, was that Total Information Awareness was a program that had died on the vine decades ago, and that CCTV cameras were exclusively the realm of local police and business owners. The news story didn’t unveil the breadth or depth of the Splicer security apparatus, but it got people asking questions. Particularly after Sheepdog 23’s choice of mitigation left 4 armored SUV’s with a perfectly square 2-foot hole in the front and back of the vehicles, along with anything unlucky enough to be in-between.

It was public, it was difficult to explain, and it was just plain weird to local emergency services that came to assist. One of the firemen took photos with half his arm inside one of the impossibly perfect holes. Needless to say, the vehicles were quickly collected and crushed in a local junkyard before anyone else had time to snoop around. As part of the mitigation, any and all PVC’s (personal video clips) on anyone’s devices in the immediate area were automatically corrupted or removed from the cloud, with only a system error message reminding the individual that “the future sucks and things still break”. Still, the ASE’s were very impressed at how effective a railgun could be, and how quiet it was, until the projectile made contact with the targets.

Regardless, Sheepdog didn’t feel that excited during the live mitigation or even afterwards. Things just went so perfectly it was like nothing was ever really on the line, but that’s the service they sell.

Teaser for next post follows:

Resonant’s DAA was more interesting. Big tech trillionaire Jeff Steinberg was being hunted as he traveled across New York state, visiting friends and family. A terrorist organization, hiding behind a banner of environmentalism, had been trying to get close to him for years due to his corporation’s flagrant violations of environmental control laws, to the tune of millions of dollars’ worth of fines. But to the ultra-wealthy, fines were just speed bumps, and the government had no power to stop them. The “Golden Gaia” militant organization watched his movements so closely, that on more than one occasion he had contacted them to ask about a meeting he was supposed to attend; this time, he had misplaced the address, and they supplied it. This was the opening they had waited for, and baited him into a trap at a meeting location they had chosen, with an entire hotel rented and actors within told they were meeting with an impostor for a prank.