{"id":15935,"date":"2013-06-11T23:00:50","date_gmt":"2013-06-12T03:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/?p=15935"},"modified":"2013-06-12T04:49:14","modified_gmt":"2013-06-12T08:49:14","slug":"nothing-to-fear","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/2013\/06\/11\/nothing-to-fear\/","title":{"rendered":"Nothing to Fear"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"cell-tower-1351714045\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cSteve, what did we decide to codename her?\u201d<\/p>\n

Steve clicked through his notes. \u201cTurnkey<\/em>, sir.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTurnkey? Who the hell came up with that?\u201d Raymond knew The Agency was running out of codenames, but this was ridiculous. As a top official, he had enough on his mind; how was he supposed to keep track of this shit?<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I think it\u2019s because\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo does that mean we\u2019re moving ahead?\u201d Isobel interjected.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe data is there,\u201d said Michael. \u201cWe\u2019re positive she has one of the stronger connections to Wedge that we\u2019ve been able to identify. The frequency of their SMS communication alone\u2014plus the fact that they so often text late at night\u2014indicates that this is clearly more than a working relationship.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNot to mention,\u201d Patricia added, \u201cthat Occupy essay they wrote came out almost a year ago. If it was purely a working relationship, they\u2019d have no reason to still be in contact.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you think they\u2019re lovers?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, we\u2019re not certain yet,\u201d Michael replied. \u201cI\u2019ve got Steve filing for a warrant to go through the SMS content, and her email content as well. We\u2019re hoping she\u2019ll turn out to be less opaque than Wedge\u2014\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cThat bastard lives to spend words but say nothing at all.\u201d Patricia still hadn\u2019t forgiven Wedge for the two days she\u2019d wasted pouring over the dense, obtuse, & poorly punctuated prose that populated his outbox. The man was a journalist by trade; that his private communications were so terribly written seemed nothing short of a deliberate (and successful) effort to antagonize The Agency. Patricia was certain Wedge must have at least one other account somewhere<\/i>\u2014probably several of them\u2014in which he communicated more clearly, and through which he conducted most of his conversations. But so far, despite a week of effort, no one at The Agency had been able to find it. Though her specialty was code in text, and not text as code, Patricia blamed Tor. Anonymity was the scourge of The Agency.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat about the cameras?\u201d Raymond asked.<\/p>\n

\"beetle-drone\"<\/a>\u201cWe\u2019re working to get more of them placed near her condo, and Steve\u2019s going through our drone footage from New York last spring. But we\u2019re pretty sure they haven\u2019t been in the same city at the same time for a month or two, which is well before we considered Wedge a priority target, so it\u2019s hard to tell.\u201d Michael forced himself to bite his tongue about the drones; a year later, he was still angry that The Agency hadn\u2019t funded his project fully. If he\u2019d had his way, each of them would have had a small swarm of micro-drones shadowing their every move\u2014not just Turnkey and Wedge, and not just this new Gang of Eight, but everyone in their whole Twitter cabal, all 50 or 60 of them. As it happened, Michael only got 20 drones, and neither Wedge nor Turnkey had seemed among the most urgent targets at the time. As a result, Wedge had managed to take his computers and his phone and slip straight through The Agency\u2019s fingers sometime during the last three days, perhaps mere hours after agents first attempted to question him. Michael\u2019s old anger over budget cuts and partial funding was compounded by his new chagrin at apparently having failed to deploy the drones correctly.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey haven\u2019t been in the same city for two months?\u201d Raymond looked at Michael with disappointed skepticism.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot since the Personal Democracy Forum, no. We don\u2019t think.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI may not be a young man,\u201d Raymond said, as he took off his glasses and folded them into his shirt pocket, \u201cbut I do seem to recall there are critical parts of taking a lover that require\u2026in-person participation. Explain to me how\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh, don\u2019t be such a digital dualist, Raymond,\u201d Isobel quipped. She was the only social scientist on the team, and she knew no one else would get the joke, but it didn\u2019t matter.<\/p>\n

\u201cA digital who-what?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not so uncommon, especially among that set,\u201d Michael said. \u201cSpring semester at the University didn\u2019t end until mid-May, and she\u2019s teaching summer courses, so her ability to travel is limited. And obviously he\u2019s been off covering\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, we all know what he\u2019s been covering,\u201d Raymond snapped. If it wasn’t for Wedge, they could all be going home right now.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo you see, the fact that they haven\u2019t been in the same place doesn\u2019t necessarily indicate\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThen what does make us think that\u2014goddammit, what\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTurnkey,\u201d Steve supplied.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat makes us think engaging Turnkey will be useful? Does communication between the two indicate any sort of special relationship? Any secrets to which she\u2019d be privy? Any reason at all to believe she knows where he is?\u201d He was looking at Patricia.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot the communication we have right now, no\u2026not directly. But again, right now we\u2019re only looking at metadata and the contents of his email communication. We don\u2019t have hers yet, and his are clearly\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShouldn\u2019t you have her responses in his account?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"1245-1-sms-encrypt-+\"<\/a>\u201cNo new ones for a year, no. Which is part of why we believe he has an additional account, or accounts, probably stored locally on his machine and sent using encryption, at minimum. As soon as her responses start to become personal, they stop. And there\u2019s no mention of the Occupy essay at any point\u2014no initial idea, no exchanged drafts, no discussion. There\u2019s no way this was his only email account. We\u2019ll have the contents of his SMS transmissions in a day or two, which might help, but since we don\u2019t know when he started encrypting those, it\u2019ll take some time to figure out when the clear messages became decoys. But given the patterns we see in his communication before the fall of 2011, and the patterns in her communication throughout, we believe it\u2019s highly likely that their communication moved off email as they became better acquainted. We\u2019re working on getting full access to his Twitter account, though Twitter is being characteristically uncooperative. And unfortunately, we know they\u2019re both avid Snapchat users.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t have a backdoor there?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, not yet,\u201d Patricia sighed.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrankly, it\u2019s unlikely we\u2019ll ever get one. They delete all the images server-side as soon as recipients view them,\u201d Michael added. \u201cRight now, the only way for us to get the \u2018Snaps\u2019 sent between Wedge and Turnkey would be to pull the files from one of their phones using recovery software. But we have no reason to believe she\u2019d just hand hers over, especially now that Wedge has left the building (so to speak). We could easily get a warrant, but as soon as we show up with orders, we lose the opportunity to form a more\u2026collaborative working relationship with her. Which is what I think\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd you have no idea where his phone is, because you have no idea where he is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Michael could feel his cheeks pinking with anger, but he swallowed his pride and did his best to speak in measured tones. \u201cAt the moment, we are short on leads. But that\u2019s why we want to move forward with Turnkey. Right now, she looks like the most promising available target.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause you\u2019re somehow convinced that they\u2019re\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHonestly, I don\u2019t know if that matters,\u201d Isobel said. \u201cWhat we see in the metadata alone\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it matters. Until very recently we\u2019d tied him to that actress, and an illicit\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRaymond, if we want to go the discrediting route, we\u2019ll have plenty of ammunition for that. There\u2019s always<\/i> plenty of ammunition, no matter who it is. Everyone is discreditable now. What we need tonight is an indication, a reason to start taking action, and we already have that in the metadata.\u201d Isobel was firm. \u201cUp until his disappearance, they were in near-constant contact. When we look at the last year in particular, the only times we see gaps of more than 48 hours are times when we know they were both in the same place. So what this tells us\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s true,\u201d Michael said, cutting her off. \u201cWe\u2019ve got their movements very well documented, even without going to The Archives for camera data. Public speaking engagements, passages through airports, locations of credit card purchases, Facebook and Twitter activity, occasional photos. Location data for both from cell phone towers, and from her toll transponder. And when you line up the dates from all that with\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo if their movements are so well documented, where is he now?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSomeplace where he\u2019s not using his phone or his credit card, clearly.\u201d Patricia was ready to go home for the day, too.<\/p>\n

\"tower<\/a>\u201cYou know this could have been prevented if\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRaymond.\u201d Isobel was going to have her say, even if she had to talk over Michael and Patricia both. \u201cLook, right now the sex thing doesn\u2019t matter. It doesn\u2019t matter what was said in the text messages, or what was shown in the Snaps, or whatever. We have everything we need<\/i> to move forward<\/i> in the metadata. It\u2019s right there.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd what is it? What are we looking at right there?\u201d<\/p>\n

Isobel suddenly noticed the room had gotten quieter. She felt awkward. Her title may have said one thing, but after two months at The Agency, she still wasn\u2019t sure exactly where she fit within its hierarchy. Steve stared studiously at his keyboard, poised and ready to type.<\/p>\n

\u201cFeelings,\u201d she said, on the spot and lacking a better word.<\/p>\n

\u201cFeelings.\u201d<\/p>\n

God, this building was quiet after hours.<\/p>\n

\u201cFeelings,\u201d Isobel said, as if she wasn\u2019t aware of how stupid she probably sounded to the rest of the team. \u201cThey have been in constant<\/i> contact, and that\u2019s all we really need to know. We don\u2019t need to know what they\u2019re talking about. What we know is that they rarely go two days without talking about something\u2014anything\u2014and that it\u2019s been that way since even before they wrote the Occupy piece. Sex or no sex doesn\u2019t matter; what we see in the data is that this consistency of dialogue isn\u2019t common for either one of them. It shows some kind of closeness, some kind of attachment. And maybe it means she knows where he is, or maybe it doesn\u2019t, but what it almost certainly means is that they care about each other. One way or another, that\u2019s something we can use to our advantage\u2014and we need to do that before we lose track of her, too.\u201d<\/p>\n

*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *<\/p>\n

Behind thick blackout curtains; through the rarely unveiled windows in that Agency meeting room; down below, as a city was growing still and its streets going silent; out in the nearer distance, where electric lights shimmered on the rippling mirror surface of a river: night had arrived.<\/p>\n

Patricia read over the most recent posts on Turnkey\u2019s blog, highlighted and tagged passages that seemed like patterns, pieces that might be of possible interest. She updated her notes. She thought about her son, who was probably asleep by now. Or hopefully asleep by now. She realized she felt more relief than guilt over missing another bedtime story, another bedtime struggle. The Agency was so peaceful once most of everyone had gone home, so quiet.<\/p>\n

Raymond pushed his carton of takeout aside, and leaned heavily on the conference table. He was tired, in more ways than one. He didn\u2019t want to go home; he didn\u2019t want to stay here. He wanted a drink.<\/p>\n

Isobel washed her hands, checked her face in the mirror, and reached for the door\u2026then hesitated. She paused to pull out her phone, while she still had some privacy. \u201cAnother late\u2014\u201d she started to type, but then heard the echo of her earlier words, and thought about feelings laid bare in quantified frequencies, and rode backspace back to its inevitable conclusion. She put the phone in her bag, and stepped out.<\/p>\n

\"chinese-take-out\"<\/a>Steve collected the takeout cartons, wiped down the table, & brought in a fresh carafe of coffee. He sat down, and waited for Raymond to reconvene the meeting. He stared at his laptop, and wished he could check Facebook. More than that, he wished he could check other people\u2019s Facebooks, other accounts. Well, maybe just a certain someone\u2019s Facebook account. Someday. A few more promotions. A few more missed opportunities, and a few more Friday nights sacrificed to this room.<\/p>\n

Michael ran one last query using a new program he\u2019d been tinkering with, but his mind was on the drones. His drones. If The Agency had just given him the allocation he\u2019d wanted, none of them would have to be here right now. If he\u2019d deployed the drones that he had gotten differently, none of them would have to be here right now. Anger. Guilt. Frustration. Regret. Focus on next year\u2019s budget. Spin this the right way. The first step toward making The Agency believe that this mess was their fault was believing it himself. He was short on belief. He was certain that drones were what The Agency needed, that drones would finally enable The Agency to keep the Nation safe. He was less certain how he could have known, how he would prevent himself from making the same mistakes with the drones in the future. There might never be enough drones. He tried to set that thought aside for the rest of the night.<\/p>\n

All five were seated at the conference table again.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo. Turnkey,\u201d Raymond said. \u201cWhat do we know? Steve, give us the basics. Refresh our memory.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019ll be 36 this fall. Single, never married, no children; some fairly ambiguous friendships but no clear significant other, at least not for the last few years. She had one sister, who died in a car accident a couple of years ago. It doesn\u2019t seem like they were close. Her parents are both still alive, though. They have a family business that makes signs near Cincinnati, and are active in a local Tea Party group\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

Patricia couldn\u2019t keep from smirking. \u201cGiven her line of work, there\u2019s your \u2018discrediting.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe don\u2019t get to choose our parents\u2026or our children,\u201d Raymond responded, perhaps more pointedly than he\u2019d intended. He made it his business to keep close tabs on his team, just as his team made it their business to keep close tabs on The Agency’s targets. He knew, therefore, that Patricia\u2019s son had already been expelled from two preschools, and that they were having trouble finding a kindergarten that would take him next year. The child was a terror, and Raymond had quietly given him the \u2018honor\u2019 of being the youngest name on a watch list of potential school shooting perpetrators.<\/p>\n

\u201cDidn\u2019t your own daughter turn out to be a real, card-carrying Communist?\u201d Michael joked. \u201cI heard that\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMy daughter is not the topic of conversation here.\u201d Raymond glared at Michael while nodding at Steve to continue. He had no patience for this tonight, nor did he have a sense of humor about it on any particular night.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s it for family, really. Her father is an only child, and her mother has been estranged from her family since before Turnkey was born.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat about friends? Mentors?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBased on her metadata and the communication we\u2019ve been able to pick up so far, there aren\u2019t any big surprises. Most of her closer connections map onto our existing network model, and none of the new nodes seem likely to be persons of interest. At least, not at this moment.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"detective-leather-holster\"<\/a>\u201cTomorrow, start with looking at the parents. If they\u2019re Tea Party, there\u2019s probably something<\/i> you can get them for. Guns? Disgraced mega-church pastors? Sedition? How many employees at the sign shop?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThree, plus the two of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThey do their own taxes?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, I think so.\u201d<\/p>\n

For the first time that day, Raymond almost smiled. \u201cGreat. Perfect. Nobody gets that right\u2014and if they\u2019ve done it by the book, they still don\u2019t have the capacity to absorb the work-hours they\u2019d lose responding to an audit.\u201d<\/p>\n

Isobel was uneasy. \u201cYou really want to send the IRS after a pair of Tea Partiers, after all the\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, I don\u2019t. Not if there are better options.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd we don\u2019t really need to audit them,\u201d Patricia added. \u201cAll we need is for Turnkey to believe we\u2019re willing to audit them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow much do we think that would affect her?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt absolutely affects her\u2014her father is the cosignatory on her mortgage,\u201d Michael said. \u201cShe was still working as an adjunct when she bought the condo. Couldn\u2019t have done without the family help. They\u2019re more entangled than you\u2019d think.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSteve, add \u2018condo inspections\u2019 to the list\u2014Stick side. Put \u2018mortgage\u2019 on both Carrot side and Stick side. Michael, fixed or adjustable?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFixed, unfortunately.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDammit. Well, look into zoning at least, see if there isn\u2019t something at the city level that we could use for leverage. Isobel, what do we know about her inner circle? Who\u2019s important to her, other than Wedge?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cLike Steve said, it\u2019s about what you\u2019d expect. She has a fairly extensive network of weak ties, especially when you take her social media presences into account\u2014her Klout score is 72, to give you an idea. But she really has only a dozen or so people that we\u2019d consider strong ties\u2014the rest of the Gang of Eight, one friend from her PhD program, a few friends she\u2019s known since college, and one friend from her job in between college and graduate school. None outside the Gang of Eight are involved in any political activity, so there\u2019s no new information there. One of them spends a lot of time on autism awareness. That\u2019s about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, add the new ones\u2014what is that, four of them?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFive.”<\/p>\n

\u201cAdd them to the list of people we start investigating tomorrow morning. I want every possible vulnerability exposed, every opportunity to make any of their lives better or worse\u2014whether we can use those openings to persuade Turnkey, or to persuade her friends to help if we have to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Steve typed away on his keyboard, making lists as instructed. Raymond raised his mug, swallowed coffee, and set the vessel down hard. Click-click, bam.<\/p>\n

\"mug-black\"<\/a>\u201cPatricia, the job. What do we know about that?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019s an assistant professor of American Studies at the University. It\u2019s her first tenure-track position.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd when is she up for review?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTwo or three years from now, most likely.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHow does that look?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cHard to say. The Occupy essay she and Wedge coauthored got them both a lot of exposure, but it wasn\u2019t published in an academic journal\u2014so it won\u2019t be given as much weight by the committee, and some of the senior faculty may hold it against her. She\u2019s published two other short papers since she joined the University, but nothing of note. And her blog is fairly popular, but again: a lot of academics don’t think that’s a good thing.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWho are our friends over there?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNo one in American Studies, unfortunately. We have the Dean of Social Sciences, but administration isn\u2019t supposed to participate in tenure decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Raymond had no patience for academia\u2019s archaic, Byzantine protocols. \u201cWell certainly he has some influence.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cShe, actually. And yes, influence, but\u2026it\u2019s tricky. That\u2019s not the kind of thing\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t care what kind of thing it is, I care whether we can directly impact Turnkey\u2019s chances of getting tenure.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know we can do it indirectly,\u201d Isobel volunteered. \u201cShe\u2019s well-enough known that any personal scandal will at least embarrass the University, if not worse. But the trick will be getting the scandal right. That she\u2019s a public figure in some circles is why she can\u2019t risk losing face and disgracing the University, but it also means that if we don\u2019t choose carefully\u2014if we pick something related to social movements that she can put a good spin on, for example, or that she can make into some kind of statement\u2014then we\u2019ve damaged her publicity just to hand her fame and potential notoriety in the process. At which point, she may actually have an easier<\/i> time finding a new job, and at an even better University.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think she\u2019d take that risk,\u201d said Patricia. \u201cShe knows she\u2019s on thin ice as it stands, especially if they want to review her case in two years instead of three. She bought a condo. She\u2019s not planning to leave, if she has any say in the matter.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat are we working with here?\u201d Raymond asked. \u201cMichael, what have we got on tap for discrediting?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, this is just the tip of the iceberg. There\u2019ll be much more to go through once we get the surveillance camera footage, and her email, and the texts, and the rest of the social media pieces, but there\u2019s already much more than enough here to work with.\u201d Michael\u2019s tone seemed to indicate that this was one hell of an iceberg.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd? Is this\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are some repeated web searches that her health insurer would probably like to know about,\u201d Isobel said, \u201cand more than one extra social media profile she\u2019d probably prefer the University not<\/i> know about. But our strongest hand here is by far the gender card, which will be very easy to play.\u201d She and Michael exchanged a knowing look. \u201cGranted, our society has become more accepting of a lot of different behaviors, and even identities. But the fact remains that women are still held to different standards than men are, especially professional women. And while some of these photos are very old\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\"mirror\"<\/a>\u201cWhere did we get the photos?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll over the place, really,\u201d Michael responded. \u201cI crawled the Facebook database looking for accounts with overlapping IP addresses, and sure enough: she has a second account. It was clearly not a professional page\u2014a lot of profanity, nothing of intellectual merit\u2014but I didn\u2019t find any discrediting photos posted there. There were a few pictures that showed her wearing a lot of eye makeup, though, and when I combined those photos with the more professional photos we already had, the facial recognition software I\u2019ve been beta testing did an incredible job. I let it run for 30 minutes during our dinner break, just to see what would happen. When the program can triangulate with those two different image sets, Turnkey\u2019s face becomes pretty distinctive. The images the software returned are spread over 20 some-odd years, but we estimate 70-80% of them are<\/i> photos of her. That\u2019s almost unprecedented. Most of the photos are embarrassing, but benign\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBut there are also some clear exceptions,\u201d Isobel interjected. \u201cThere\u2019s a range of photos in which she is clearly intoxicated, at least one of which appears to show her both underage and possibly unconscious. There are some unfortunate subcultural phases, one of which involved some questionable cosplay and one of which included a runway show where she worked as a fetish model. But most importantly\u201d\u2014she paused briefly, for emphasis\u2014”we\u2019re nearly positive we\u2019ve found a still from an amateur pornographic film.\u201d<\/p>\n

Raymond may have been skeptical, and Patricia flat out didn\u2019t believe them, but Steve couldn\u2019t help himself. \u201cReally?!\u201d he exclaimed. As far as he was concerned, it would be the first interesting thing that had happened all week. Isobel, too, was fighting hard to contain her excitement; she felt as though\u2014for once\u2014she finally had a contribution to make, rather than an argument.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a crappy scan of a paper photograph, and the photograph was probably taken around 16 years ago if we\u2019re reading the date stamp correctly,\u201d she said. \u201cBut the webpage states that this film was created in the same town where Turnkey went to college, and the date stamp places the photo within the timeframe that she would have been living there. We\u2019re almost certain that she\u2019s one of the women in the scene\u2014and if she is, that film is an incredible liability.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere did this come from?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cA page tucked in the way, way back of the Way Way Back machine,\u201d Michael said, with some resignation. He had to admit: Sometimes it bothered him that the Way Way Back Machine still<\/i> had files The Agency\u2019s network of databases didn\u2019t have, or at least couldn\u2019t find.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd what is this film called?\u201d Though he\u2019d never have admitted it, Raymond was afraid to ask. His own estranged daughter was the same age as Turnkey, and he just didn\u2019t want to think about it.<\/p>\n

\u201cA Virgin Sacrifice<\/em>\u2026so not terribly original,\u201d Isobel said. \u201cBut to be fair, based on the plot synopsis on the archived webpage, it seems clear\u2014at least, from a critical perspective\u2014that this is really just a group of young, college-age girls, who happen to have access to some old 8mm equipment, and who have chosen the medium of film both to counter Freudian notions of \u2018penis envy\u2019 and to explore nascent notions of queer subjectivity. But to most audiences, it\u2019s not going to read\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n

And just like that, the fledgling acceptance Isobel had been starting to feel again seemed to evaporate. Sometimes she wondered why coming to work for The Agency had seemed like a better idea than working as an adjunct, specter of food stamps or no. She sighed, dejected.<\/p>\n

\"camera\"<\/a>\u201cBasically, they thought they were doing something artistically edgy and intellectual, but I\u2019m fairly confident most people who watch this will just think it\u2019s really fucked up,\u201d Isobel said. She paused a second to see if anyone was going to comment on her F-bomb, but that<\/em> no one blinked at.\u00a0\u201cAnd since Turnkey doesn\u2019t do film studies, or even gender studies, she\u2019s going to have a really hard time explaining this to the University, to say nothing of the general public. It would be very, very difficult for her to salvage her academic career if this went public, so we\u2019re looking either for a digitized copy online, or for someone who holds a film copy\u2014there may only have been 3 or 4 of them. If we can find one, I think we have our trump card.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRaymond,\u201d Patricia asked warily, \u201cIs destroying both her career and<\/em> her name really on the table?\u201d<\/p>\n

Isobel was unsympathetic. \u201cShe could easily get a book deal. Wedge got two!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, and that essay will obviously continue to be far more beneficial to his career than to hers,\u201d Patricia snapped, to her own surprise. When had she started to feel protective of Turnkey? She\u2019d never met the woman. They had little-to-nothing in common. Yet, Patricia had to admit: The situation was making her feel increasingly angry. The more research she did, the more time she spent reading and learning and watching, the more she believed the trajectory of Wedge and Turnkey\u2019s relationship\u2014whatever its precise nature may or may not have been\u2014was one in which he consistently took more of the credit, yet left her with more of the blame. Turnkey wasn\u2019t even a suspect; she was someone who probably had information about someone who almost certainly had information about, and had perhaps collaborated with, some people The Agency wanted very much to interrogate. But were they really thinking about dredging this film up just for that?<\/p>\n

\u201cLook,\u201d Patricia began again, \u201cTurnkey wants to publish books, not get \u2018a book deal.\u2019 It doesn\u2019t matter what she could do in theory; it matters what she will and won\u2019t risk on Wedge\u2019s behalf. We don\u2019t need to find this film\u2014she won\u2019t be willing to risk her shot at tenure, not after getting this far. Intimations will be enough. We don’t need the thing itself.\u201d Whether more for Turnkey or more for herself, Patricia wished she could believe her own words. But the truth was that, the more she learned about Turnkey, the less likely it seemed that she would ever betray her friend Wedge.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo we’re certain we can have a negative, indirect effect on her tenure evaluation, and we believe we can have a either a negative or a positive direct effect on her tenure evaluation. What about a positive, indirect effect? Do we have that capability, Patricia?\u201d At the end of the day\u2014and this one had ben such a very long day\u2014Raymond did prefer carrots to sticks. He believed they built better long-term relationships, better networks of informants. And they didn\u2019t require such a strong stomach.<\/p>\n

\u201cShort of coming up with grant money to fund her research, I don\u2019t see how,\u201d Patricia replied. But she wanted to see how.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt won\u2019t work,\u201d Isobel replied. \u201cShe has to state where the support for her projects comes from every time she publishes, remember? What\u2019s she going to write, \u2018This paper was made possible by a generous grant from\u2014\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cMichael, do we have anybody at\u2014who gives money to American Studies, anyway?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have a few Board Members at some of the bigger private foundations. It might be a possibility.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, look into that tomorrow morning, too. I want to make sure we\u2019re clear on all our options before we make contact with her. In the meantime, all of you, go home and get a few hours of sleep.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"ExitSign1\"<\/a>None of them needed to be told twice; it was nearly one in the morning. They went to lock computers and notes in their offices; to wait for the elevator; to be anywhere other than here, however briefly. Raymond stared blankly into the room, empty but for the curtains, the chairs, the table, and the coffee carafe that Steve had forgotten in his rush to leave. It would wait until the morning. He flipped the row of light switches in the meeting room, one by one by one, and walked back toward his own office in the dark.<\/p>\n

\u201cRaymond?\u201d<\/p>\n

It was Isobel, stepping out of the ladies\u2019 room. Her face was lit only by the green glow of an exit sign a bit further down the hall. She spoke softly.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m positive\u2026we find that film, we can end this whole thing now. I know it.\u201d<\/p>\n

He sighed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI know. Go get some rest.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGoodnight,\u201d she said, and paused\u2014then turned to go. He waited until the hallway door had shut behind her, until the faint chime of the elevator announced her departure.<\/p>\n

He walked back through the darkness into to his office, and pulled back the curtain.<\/p>\n

*\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 *<\/p>\n

Three stories up, on a wooden porch; at a metal table with a glass top, surrounded by pots full of plants. A mere suggestion of a breeze, just enough to stir cover sheets on two stacks of term papers. A Saturday afternoon, partly cloudy, a little too warm.<\/p>\n

The doorbell filled the space left vacant by her still and silent phone.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

This essay is a work of fiction inspired <\/a>by<\/a> recent<\/a> events<\/a>. It makes reference to previous scholarly work by the author, as well as to work by Erving Goffman (spoiled identities<\/a>), Mark Granovetter (strong and weak ties<\/a>), Nathan Jurgenson (digital dualism, IRLfetish<\/a>), and Sarah Wanenchak (ephemeral media<\/a>).\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Whitney Erin Boesel likes to push the boundaries of different formats. She does so with far fewer words on Twitter: @phenatypical<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

Cell tower image from here<\/a>; tiny drone from here<\/a>; encryption graphic from here<\/a>; stormy tower from here<\/a>; takeout carton from here<\/a>; mirror frame from here<\/a>; camera from here<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cSteve, what did we decide to codename her?\u201d Steve clicked through his notes. \u201cTurnkey, sir.\u201d \u201cTurnkey? Who the hell came up with that?\u201d Raymond knew The Agency was running out of codenames, but this was ridiculous. As a top official, he had enough on his mind; how was he supposed to keep track of this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1875,"featured_media":15936,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[9967,892,22846],"tags":[22848,4447,2131,36428,19985,55,1331,19990,19986,1528,22847,2143],"class_list":["post-15935","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-commentary","category-essay","category-experimental-format","tag-edward-snowden","tag-erving-goffman","tag-fbi","tag-fiction","tag-fisa","tag-gender","tag-mark-granovetter","tag-metadata","tag-nsa","tag-sexism","tag-snowden","tag-surveillance"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/files\/2013\/06\/cell-tower-1351714045.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15935","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1875"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15935"}],"version-history":[{"count":24,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15935\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15970,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15935\/revisions\/15970"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15936"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15935"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15935"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesocietypages.org\/cyborgology\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15935"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}