She pored over the pictures. She had printed out the profiles and what was known. It had been a week since she had last seen Daniel. In that week the news had spread like wildfire. 7 and 16 colonists dead in the motherland in few weeks in suspiciously similar yet separate circumstances was enough to set the rumour mill ablaze. Plus, the dead in the pressure cookers incidents were relatively famous. She didn’t remember the last time that many colonists died in such uncertain circumstances. Yes, there had been more deaths and destruction as the indigenes slipped past the trade controls their hamstrung economy belaboured under to supply their fighters with materials with destructive potential. But it was understandable, physical, real to see colonist peacekeepers die on the rare occasions they engaged the indigene fighters in close combat. But these stories of growing tongues and exploding cookers did not make any sense. For the life of her, she couldn’t figure it out.

But she had a call with Daniel, a weekly check-in they had agreed to. She put together a quick meeting agenda. Update, exchange of information, questions, next steps. She got a notification that her online meeting had started. Daniel was waiting. And he launched straight into the conversation.

“Good afternoon, Ms. Hayat. So, do you have any theories about what happened?”

Deema took a breath. She gave her 15 second executive summary: that she was still looking into it. She didn’t stop there, though. She thought would be a good idea to talk over what she had reviewed. The first 7 are all very random. They hadn’t known each other before. They had attended similar Colonial schools, and had either gone to the colonies on the ColExplore trips or were planning to, before their demise. They were not really that active online on Yin or any other platform. No information regarding any other similar cases was publicly available.

“The public is treating their deaths from sudden allergies as inexplicably weird and tragic. The government has launched an information blitz talking about the danger of sudden onset allergies and how to protect oneself and has subsidised the price of epi-pens. This would indicate the government is not treating these deaths as suspicious or at least not openly so.”

Deema paused. Daniel motioned her to continue.

The 16 (the injured one passed away after an agonizing few days) were rather different. They were all part of a wider online community that celebrated colonization of the new territories.

Unbidden, a few of the gloating pictures they had posted of indigenes massacred and imprisoned and starving came to her mind. One of them, a girl with short hair and colourful earrings, beautiful and graceful even in death, reminded her of her daughter. She shook her head and continued with her report.

“They were committed colonists and all had, at one point or another, gone viral for their support for the colonies.” She went to her next slide and she paused. It was a list of their most hateful hits. Mhael held fundraisers for new settlements. Mazrim marked every March 16th with pancakes and held pancake design competitions. Taim made posters depicting indigenes insects swarming for food. Savan organized missile signing parties. Deema paused and looked at Daniel’s face. It didn’t change expression even once as he scanned the list of viral memes ranging from extremely distasteful to downright evil.

“Yes, some of us can be a bit… overzealous. But surely they didn’t deserve death for their words.” He finally spoke. Deema immediately thought of that teenager she met – whose name she didn’t know. He was definitely pleased with Mazrim’s death.

Deema tried to put it gently. “Of course, however, there is a significant section of the general public who are treating these deaths as, well, deserved.” For the first time in her short association with the man from CNCA, Deema saw impatience in Daniel’s eyes, tight mouth, and narrowed eyes. She rushed on. “While generally people are mostly still pro-colonists, there are many short-form videos and pictures shared in the ‘this you’ format. You know, of course, that in this format they – ”

“Ms. Hayat. We have hired you for your expertise in esoteric crimes. Not for basic … information gathering.” His lips curled further. “What have you found that may link these tragedies?”

Deema looked straight into her camera. “Part of my work involves understanding the public perception of these crimes. You would be amazed at the professionalism and obsessiveness of some of the, ah, amateur detectives. They are worth listening to.” She paused and took a sip from her glass of water. She didn’t want to encourage the CNCA’s paranoid tendencies.

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“Ok. So, what is the word on the street? Or the online forums?”

Deema had a helpful diagram prepared for this exact question. She flipped to the next slide.

“Well, there are four theories. One, these are just a gigantic coincidence. Two, it’s not a coincidence that wannabe colonists and colonist propagandists got, um, eliminated by local indigene supporters. Three, two, but by indigenes themselves. And four, two, but by magical means.” Daniel started to say something but Deema continued to talk over him “I repeat, these are the ideas of various forums I observe and participate in. These are not my professional opinions.”

“Magic, really? Who did this, Baba Yaga?” Daniel scoffed. “You know, I had to bend some rules to hire a non-colonialist. I expect better from you. Tell me what do YOU think.”

Ok, if he wanted this, he got it. “We don’t have enough information to suggest a specific answer, yet. But this case does remind me of a few past cases I know of. The mass ankle injury event in Ruritaani just before the army instituted a draft for its war with its unruly ethnic minority in its east. The totally natural, proven to be unrelated deaths in their sleeps of Fenk’s air defense operators. The ..”

“What do these have to do with colonialists here?”

“Well, these were all inexplicable events with multiple deaths or injuries and in each case there were significant impacts of their being out of commission. The Ruritaani army was unable to draft many young people and had to negotiate a peaceful compromise with its eastern provinces. The sudden deaths of Fenk’s air defense operators, hidden from its enemies, gave its government the impetus to sign a peace treaty with the neighbour it had been feuding against for 10 years. I think this may be something similar and …”

Daniel scoffed again. “The colonists would love to sign an actual peace agreement with the indigenes, but you know, it’s just impossible. They are savages and need to be firmly dealt with. You know, they raise their children to be willing victims – martyrdom is holy to them! These are a people who don’t even love their children, how can a peace agreement be signed with them and why am I justifying myself to you? Please continue.”

Well, she had known the CNCA had extremely bigoted views about the indigenes in the new colonies and their environs, but it was another to see them in practice.

“There is some talk on the forums that the colonists would need to negotiate to some degree. The current violence can’t continue. The indigenes have not been defeated or their leaders hunted down despite the wholescale destruction of their villages. Even the staunchest allies of the colonists have made some outraged noises at the most recent round of violence and enforced famine on a civilian population.” She saw Daniel force himself to remain quiet and rushed to get to her point. “These deaths may be linked to an independent actor who knows how to cause mass casualties or injuries that have major repercussions for various entities involved in conflict and war.”

Daniel leaned into his camera. He had a ring light on. Image conscious or just good practice? Deema filed that information away as he began to speak. “Well, does the pattern fit, entirely?”

“No. For one thing, the 16 who died have been replaced by hundreds of others who have gone viral even faster. Their methods include posting gory combat or massacre footage, celebrations and / or recreations of the 16’s past viral memes, and new viral memes encouraging the Sio-, I mean the colonists to ‘harden their hearts’ and show the indigenes their place or finish them off for once and for all. These new creators have seamlessly fit into the space vacated by the 16, to contest the new frontiers as the colonialists begin to lose their majority on the internet.” She took a breath.

Before, she wasn’t really invested all that much in this conflict light-hours away, since it was all too complicated, it had been going on for all too long, and well, her own life kept her busy. But now she couldn’t look away. In her research she found inhumanity upon inhumanity, covered up by the compliant media who followed her imperial government’s line: the colonies were a bulwark against oriental recidivism. They were an unsinkable aircraft carrier that could be forgiven every sin.

But that was now changing. The latest round of violence, sparked by an audacious indigene hostage taking operation, had crossed all limits, even those established by the colonists murder sport case where snipers killed 4 young boys playing football on a beach. The colonists did not take this affront to their dignity and security lightly. They immediately imprisoned a few more thousand indigenes to add on to the existing thousands and then really got going. They dropped white phosphorus and sniped doctors. They hunted journalists for sports. They made prisoners go blindfolded into a building to convey instructions and then shot them when they came out. They starved millions, then told thousands to come receive flour, then opened fire. And then they did it again.

Even the notoriously pro-colonist media couldn’t put enough lipstick on this pig. But the CNCA tried its best. The CNCA ran breathless think pieces decrying the new anti-colonism and doxxing college students, like the one who, when shown an article lamenting the evacuation of the 600,000 northern colonial settlers, responded flippantly and said ‘double it and give it to the next person.’ Deema tried to ignore the voice in her mind telling her to tell Daniel to fuck off. Killings were bad, even of colonialists and their sympathisers. She had her moral code.

“All that to say, this doesn’t fit.

Daniel stared at her, unblinkingly. “Is that all?”

Unbidden, Deema thought of the young boy, and the flash of green. “For now.”

Deema asked him if he had any updates, and he didn’t. For next steps, Deema would continue her analysis, anticipating another 10 hours this week of secondary research. They decided to meet again next week.