capturing Alignment agents
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by zuluwiz
» Mon Jan 13, 2020 8:53 pm
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zuluwiz
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So finally someone starts to notice how many colleagues aren't coming in anymore, and tumbles to the fact that they're all dead. Rumor Central starts buzzing, and Management makes it official: everyone on the flag staff will have to come in and be "interviewed". Let's just take note of how many people drop dead at the very thought, and how many try to disappear.
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by ThinksMarkedly
» Tue Jan 14, 2020 1:17 pm
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ThinksMarkedly
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Can you just imagine the conspiracy theories that would be going around? The non-agents would be doing all they can to avoid "the interview"! |
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by zuluwiz
» Mon Jan 20, 2020 8:40 pm
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zuluwiz
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The next thing to consider would be that some of those 'rumors' would have been planted by the ghost hunters to the effect that what they are investigating is corruption, at which everyone is guilty. (Except the ghost hunters themselves, the only honest people in the Sollie armed forces.) This would serve to raise the angst levels considerably, and just possibly to put the agents not yet discovered more at their ease. Absenteeism would skyrocket, and the officers who least want to be "interviewed" would be the ones most likely to be guilty. Someone could write a whole book on this subject.
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by George J. Smith
» Tue Jan 21, 2020 5:18 am
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George J. Smith
Posts: 873
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According to narrative in UC capturing and interrogating the agents is possible, until the trigger word (whatever it is for each agent) is used.
The 1st agent captured was drugged, came-to handcuffed to a chair, was questioned about who he was "really" working for and admitted to working for one of the transtellers, only when the interrogator mentioned the name Shafiqa Bolton did the agent collapse, obviously the name was his trigger word. If they can capture Shafiqa Bolton by drugging her and do some sort of procedure whilst she is knocked out, could they then remove the nanites from her brain and subsequently find more of the agents she was handling and capture them the same way? .
T&R GJS A man should live forever, or die in the attempt Spider Robinson Callahan's Crosstime Saloon (1977) A voice is heard in Ramah |
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by ThinksMarkedly
» Tue Jan 21, 2020 1:49 pm
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ThinksMarkedly
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That is the big question. There's no currently known way to remove the nanites. |
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by Theemile
» Mon Jan 27, 2020 7:14 am
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Theemile
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Once again, there has to be at least a second part of the trigger if not more, or else every time the subject of the agent's financial advisor comes up in ordinary, innocuous conversations, he would die. Just her receptionist saying " Ms Bolton will see you know" when he goes for a "financial review" would trigger it. The trigger cannot be as simple as a word, name or subject, of else they run the risk of random events which happen in everyday circumstances killing off their carefully trained and placed agents. There would have to be other items like heightened stress hormones required to trigger the suicide device. ******
RFC said "refitting a Beowulfan SD to Manticoran standards would be just as difficult as refitting a standard SLN SD to those standards. In other words, it would be cheaper and faster to build new ships." |
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by SharkHunter
» Tue Jan 28, 2020 11:57 pm
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SharkHunter
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I don't think EVERY MAlign agent has the nanites -- because (my belief and question here) they all would have to have come through Mesa in a relatively narrow time period to get "infected" with them (yes/no??). The nanites have to be tailored per person, etc. etc., with different triggering mechanisms, etc.
For the sake of argument, let's assume 500-1000, with a concentration on Old Earth and the other main "non-Renaisance Factor" worlds, and a heavy correlation to the corrupt tran-stellars, who can't use the wormhole network to go back and get their updates on Mesa any more. Does the nanotech and the instruction set last forever? or kill folks if no update is given (there's some textev for that in Cauldron of Ghosts, if I remember right). With the MAlign now in Darius, folks can't keep disappearing of to this hidden world. Nanotech wise, what is the shelf life, who communicates to the networks, and how are instructions to the microbugs updated control mechanisms (the who what where how)? Interesting questions, no? ---------------------
All my posts are YMMV, IMHO, and welcoming polite discussion, extension, and rebuttal. This is the HonorVerse, after all |
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by Brigade XO
» Mon Feb 10, 2020 4:54 pm
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Brigade XO
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The Alignment agents don't have to have come from off world to have been given the nanites. Honor's Flag Lt. was on leave at home. A number of these people have been oultined in text as Alpha Line sleep agents and the families may have been on their particular homeworld for many generations.
Others, as described in text, have no clue who they are working for or even the real identies of their contacts. They may be criminals of varying degree (incuding Treason) but only data sources for the Alignment who think they are selling/passing information in what amounts to commerical espionage to make more credits. So the SLN, amoung others, is now catching a whole lot of people who don't drop dead in an interview but are involved in traitorous or at least criminal activity. Certainly Manticore is finding that as they are using Treecats. Lots of questions, and finding people who are doing things they were not supposed to. Either way, agent networks are getting at least cut off if not rolled up compleatly. With Treecats involved they are going to smoke out a lot more than the SL Atty General's office and the SLN because the Sollies arn't going to be able to press as hard on the ones who don't drop dead if they have "just been doing what everybody else was" as far as influence and graft. |
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by kzt
» Mon Feb 10, 2020 5:28 pm
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kzt
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Here's an amusing example of a people doing something under a false flag and without understanding how it was portrayed:
"A recent example (late January 2020) occurred outside a western Canada (Vancouver) courthouse as demonstrators assembled to protest efforts to extradite a Chinese telecommunications executive. This was a big deal in China because this defendant worked for Huawei, the largest telecom company in China and the world. A crowd gathered carrying signs demanding the release of the Huawei executive. One sign even made reference to a pair or Canadian diplomats arrested in China and charged with espionage. That was relevant because the diplomats were actually taken as hostages to pressure the Canadian government to release the Huawei executive. Soon after the demonstrators began their protest things took a turn for the bizarre. "When reporters went to interview some of the demonstrators it was discovered that the demonstrators didn’t know they were demonstrators. The sign carrying group had been hired as background performers for a music video and were paid a hundred dollars each for two hours work. " |
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