The Second Seal is Broken – part II

An Isolated Incident I, II, III The First Seal is Broken I, II, III, IV, V The Second Seal is Broken Part I

The Corrector Novus Occidentis was like a rock that had been dropped into a pond. The surface disturbance from the impact rippled outward, and not just a single wave, but the concentric, repeating pattern. The physics are terribly complicated, three dimensional fluid dynamics and surface tension binding molecules together, including as the rock sinks. The mechanics of all that are well beyond even most adults, but nearly all are captivated by the pattern. The CNO attacks were a series of such disturbances, driven by increasing large rocks disrupting the otherwise placid surface. Beneath that surface, wave refraction was at work; at the pond edges wave reflections took place. Seemingly calm water became quite turbulent and where the pond bottom was soft, all manner of particles danced in suspension in the water; what had been clear was now muddy.

Initially the attacks had struck corruption in the form of police using asset forfeiture, then branched out to others who participated in that activity. The court officers were a particularly sensitive nerve, as judges are generally believed to be impartial and honest. It takes exceptional circumstances to flip opinion on a prosecutor from zealous (and ambitious) to dangerous (and a threat to the innocent, not just the guilty). Curiously, people who’s property had been seized became more insistent on getting it back, and the courts suddenly found less justification for denying them. Actual forfeiture operations by law enforcement had reduced to a trickle, even though only a fraction of the people involved across the country had been targeted. The correction was severe, but effective. Would it be lasting, or if CNO was cracked and broken, how quickly would it all roar back?

CNO had acknowledged publicly the danger in what they had undertaken, and that though they were acting, the acts were not an end but a means. It was a means to a restoration of real justice, paradoxically by unjust means. This of course was an inversion of our notions of justice and governance, that the ends do not justify the means; then again, our system of justice and governance, of accountability on the part of those who act in power was itself inverted. This was all about the absence of accountability on the part of those who had taken on power.

Those in power watched with dismay as public opinion didn’t respond to the narrative they crafted. CNO had also crafted a narrative, using the words and actions of those they killed to justify the killings. It was damnably effective. CNO eluded not just apprehension – they avoided public condemnation; even the blatant law-breaking failed to infuriate the public, though it was driving those in power half-mad. The left-leaning faction were beside themselves, for this wasn’t their revolution; the law-and-order right could condemn the loss of order, but it was a little tough to do when the laws they wanted to defend were patently unjust. The process-loving moderates couldn’t believe that symbols couldn’t be manipulated to counter acts. There was one simple thing that united all of them – bust CNO – with extreme prejudice. It is unlikely that they appreciated the irony in that. That pressure would only encourage the kind of gray-zone (in the realm of law) tactics that were so clearly utilized in the asset forfeiture system that precipitated the whole situation. Blind with power it is easy to lose sight of what legitimates power in the first place. People subject to the abuse of power have an entirely different perspective.

Now one reason politicians get excited about something is they fear how it will be used against them in the upcoming election. The administrative state tends be more sanguine, after all, it weathers all political winds; it endures as office-holders come, and go. The denizens know they are for all intents and purposes, untouchable; and if there is political cover both from Administration and Congress, there’s really nothing they can’t do with impunity. Thus, everything CNO stood for was what they were against, and no component of the vast federal bureaucracy was unwilling to do its part in crushing these dangerous people (and their even more dangerous idea). It is the state that metes out justice, and only the state that decides what is just. In the minds of these otherwise phlegmatic folk, nothing is more just than them enjoying their careers in peace, and that peace had been greatly disturbed.

One such example of operating out of normal bounds was about to play out. Since the FBI had been unable to penetrate CNO, they schemed to create a parallel entity that they could use to discredit the real one. It did turn out that they had some difficulty in finding a set of rubes to be used, for it seems that many who would normally be keen for such were content to sit back and let CNO do the terrible deeds. But with a little patience and luck, some enthusiasts were found amongst the usual rabble, and they were formed into a suitable scapegoat (under a leadership that would vanish at a critical moment). Agent Regan was briefed into this operation because of his detection of the media timing and mechanisms that CNO employed. A false missive would be created and released through the right channel at the right time after this group had perpetrated its attack to make it appear it was part of a CNO wave. It was now merely a matter of waiting for the next move by CNO to spring this false flag and rebalance the equation.

And so the day came, and the plan was put into motion, as CNO exacted accountability from those who had used power unjustly, that another attack – apparently by CNO (but not) – was executed and it went badly awry (which was actually as planned by the real planners). The scapegoats transformed into sacrificial lambs, guilty of terminal gullibility and were killed by those who had led them to the slaughter. They did manage to kill a couple of innocent bystanders as well. Frank Regan was given the signal to release the false CNO claim about the attack, which he did, not knowing what had really happened. Nearly simultaneously, the FBI announced a heroic take-down of a CNO cell in the course of an attack. Frank watched the news incredulously, trying to tie what he knew with what he said (in the false release) with what actually happened. What he didn’t quite know was that the actual planners were current and former FBI agents, who had killed not just some stooges they had set up, but innocent people at the scene as well and that that had been their plan all along.