Operation: Jarring Conundrums

Nicole Taylor

Following the neutralisation of Sakura's first clone in Sydney during By Any Other Name, a month passed while further intelligence is gathered on future targets. Eventually, three more locations around the world are found where clones of Sakura have been detected.

## Kinshasa

The location with the most prior intelligence, since the specific target was already identified. Elodi - Sakura's clone - is a diamond trader active in Kinshasa. She is married with three children - children that happen to be older than the clone itself.

Background investigations reveled that Elodi's husband, and his children, look and act suspiciously like a farmer and his family that went missing three years ago.

Patricia fabricated a cover story for meeting Elodi, as Antwerp diamond traders interested in an ongoing deal. While the team was on edge, the meeting went off without much issue; it seemed, like before, that Elodi was unaware of her role in Sakura's plans, and her bodyguards seemed to be of the mundane kind as well. The team's suspicions about the familial relations were confirmed when - inspecting Elodi and later the family's minds - they found proof of memory tampering. While the family seemed to be healthy at the current time, it was based on an invented history, with Elodi being forcefully inserted into their memories just after her cloning.

The team proceeded to implement the same solution to the clone issue as in the previous mission - setting up a nightly brain surgery session to re-target the mental link. While the presence of her family and bodyguards complicated the matter somewhat, they were easy enough to temporarily bring to sleep as well, and the surgery proceeded without serious complications.

While extracting, however, Franklin noted that they neglected to inspect the mundane surveillance this time. Indeed, while checking after the fact, they linked the camera's back to their other end - and found a man waving back at them. A quick check confirmed their worst fear as the target turned out to be a member of the SPD.

Luckily for the team, Patricia remembered that she *did* check and neutralize the camera's after all, so that none of that actually happened. Afterwards, they send the information on the SPD agent that they never saw back to the construct for future consideration. While this earned her some displeasure from her mentor, it meant that the mission could proceed without Sakura's knowledge.

## Area 51

The next location came with considerably less intelligence. The good news was that the clone was located somewhere on the Technocratic base at Area 51. The bad news was that this was a mainly SPD base, and thus any intelligence was not to be trusted.

Luckily, the Void Engineer's Chrononauts also had a decent presence at the base, which gave the team an option for a covert entry through Matrim, who as it turned out knew some of the Chrononauts (and one of the SPD) present. He came up with a cover to enter the base and get an escort from one of the Chrononauts.

While there, they were unable to locate Sakura's clone - in part because they were keeping their scans low-key as to not trip any detectors. They did find ample proof for the bases' corruption, however. Indeed, while the Chrononaut presence seemed not to be directly involved with the SPD's more nefarious plans, they did seem strangely callous to humanity as a whole - even hunting nearby protestors for sport.

While drawing up their plans, Franklin decided to see if he could circumvent the base's anti-Enlightened Science measures by hacking their systems the old fashioned way. He got into the systems surprisingly easy - and found something unexpected. The clone AI of Friend Computer, found in Lost in Waves and since handed over to Iteration X, seemed to be well integrated in the convention and out and about - and in the present, investigating suspicious activity at Area 51.

Franklin being Franklin, he wasted no time spilling the beans about the SPD's corruption. Noticing this, Nicole quickly stepped in and provided some much needed background information to the conversation, including the Syndicate's insistence on the secrecy of SPD's fallen status. Still, the AI now knew - and for now he seemed to agree to help the team without rocking the boat in the wider Technocracy too much.

As it turned out, he did interpret "helping the team without rocking the boat too much" in his own unique way. Procuring a Soul Coin from Salisbury, he revealed that he wanted to test a copy of the SPAM Cannon Salisbury made earlier. He wanted to test the cannon - and would "unfortunately" aim it right at Area 51.

While the AI set about to implement that plan, the team met the Chrononauts to see if they, at least, could be salvaged. It turns out that they had been forbidden by the base commander to use Dimensional Science at the base - and as such could not see the machinations that the SPD was undertaking with Entropic EDE's at the base. While it took some convincing, when they finally did look, they were horrified at what they saw, and quickly agreed to help evacuate any still loyal personnel off-base.

Patricia insisted on one final meeting with said base commander. The conversation quickly turned sour once the commander learned of their knowledge of the SPD's plans. It didn't get much further than him gloating his untouchability, however - once the evacuation plans were in place, the team decided nothing more was to be gained here. The SPAM cannon hit quickly vanished Area 51 off the face of the planet - Sakura clone safely tucked away in the basement with it.

As it turned out, the Void Engineer evacuation was less fruitful than hoped. Nicole had informed DIMH to expect the evacuees - including where they came from, insisting on strict protocols. As it turned out, the vast majority were already too far influenced by the SPD present at the base. Even the personnel that could be salvaged would require intensive deprogramming.

## Kyoto

While the elimination in area 51 wasn't exactly textbook stealthy per se, the team hoped it still wouldn't be traceable to their anti-clone actions by Sakura, and thus kept their investigations on the down-low.

In Kyoto, they went in fairly blind as well. They did have some hints that the Sakura-clone was involved with the Yakuza, and luckily Patricia had some associates there through previous backdoor negotiations. Unfortunately, the trail quickly went cold - while they did find tales of someone fitting Sakura's description, she hadn't been seen in years.

The team had an idea though, and checked the camera outside of the establishment where she was last seen - right around the time when they "killed" Sakura in He Who Fights Monsters. Indeed, the camera feed - analysed by Jane - showed the clone being "taken over" just as the "old" Sakura was killed. It turned out, then, that Kyoto was a dead end - in a way, they had already eliminated this clone.

## Epilogue

The missions completed, the team headed back home for a debriefing. The followup was already in the works for next week, but until then, the team had some time to spare.

Nicole and Patricia set up a plan to slowly "deprogram" Elodi and her family, unwinding the fake memories implanted in their brain and letting them choose their own life. It would likely come as a shock, so therapy would be needed for all involved - but the Technocracy could easily provide for that.

Franklin, meanwhile, went back to Vegas to do what he couldn't do during the earlier mission - totally wreck one of the most wretched casino's present.

Finally, Nicole met with General Blackwell, who she had spoken to on mission and who sounded rather unhealthy. Blackwell was indeed unwell, but that wasn't the worst of his problems. He revealed to Nicole that he wasn't just dying - he *had* to die. All statistical analyses showed that him trying to live through his illness through Enlightened means would end in disaster. While Nicole protested, her own concurring analysis of the data made any such protest feeble. It seemed that, soon, the VE would once again lose it's most senior commander.