Volume 11: Memetic Crisis Chapter 561: End of Interlude
Ke Lan naturally didn't need to worry about the follow-up matters. The people from the Crisis Management Department and the Security Bureau would take care of everything. As for how to explain to the public the reason for the blockade of the entire ship, there were so many reasons that could be found. Just pick one that would not easily cause panic and riots among the people.
Of course, some people will doubt this reason, but with the Ark's official control over public opinion, as long as the undead crew members want to control it, such rumors will not be able to be spread at all - "If the problem can't be solved, then solve the person who raised the problem." This method may seem rough and unreasonable, but it is the best choice for maintaining stability.
What's more, most people would just complain about it to people they are familiar with, and use it as a topic of conversation after dinner.
If under such circumstances there are still people who deliberately incite the public in the public media and try to reduce the official credibility of the Ark through slander, suspicion and other means, then there is a high probability that there are some problems with the composition of these people... Who knows, the Security Bureau may be able to take this opportunity to uncover a group of "special elements" hiding among the people.
Even if they are not members of a heretical sect, most of them are members of some radical organizations.
It is difficult to detect such malicious people disguised as civilians, but if they jump out on their own, Ark has always taken swift and decisive measures.
As for the last time when the Morgan Consortium framed Ke Lan, the reason why it fermented was entirely because the Undead Crew wanted to test Ke Lan's ability to respond... If they decided to intervene, even the two "stewardess" would not be able to board the battleship of Fleet Zero, let alone drug Ke Lan and secretly film her.
This time, the "meme crisis" is of a completely different nature. The level of confidentiality of this incident is estimated to be even higher than that of the Leviathan resurrection incident.
Since we are talking about the Leviathan incident, we have to say that the Security Bureau did a very good job of keeping secrets - this kind of thing is not just about blocking the news. A "rich mine" like Leviathan that produces a large amount of energy crystals suddenly disappeared, which has a huge impact on market supply and demand... But not only did the news of Leviathan's resurrection and killing not spread, even the market price of energy crystals did not show any abnormal fluctuations, and tens of thousands of large and small supply chains involving energy crystals in all walks of life were not affected at all.
Ke Lan couldn't understand how the Ark officials filled such a huge gap in demand... Did they just rely on the surplus reserves from previous years?
Logically speaking, there shouldn't be any surplus of hard currency like energy crystals... the market can take up as much as is mined... the Undead Crew can't just use the emergency reserves of each fleet to fill the gap in the civilian market, right?
Ke Lan believed that they would not be able to do such a thing that puts the cart before the horse.
…
Under the escort of Lin Qiming and another elite Crisis Management Officer, Ke Lan quickly passed through the contaminated area. At this time, a large number of fully armed Crisis Management Officers and Security Bureau agents had entered the contaminated area. Gunshots were heard from almost every direction, and the bodies of indigenous creatures and pretenders were everywhere along the way.
After the death of "Seraph", the collections that had been breached did not perish with it, but instead went directly into a violent state. Although they had lost the ability to spread memes, the mutations caused by the memes had not disappeared. From the reports that kept ringing in Lin Qiming's intercom, it could be learned that several "clean-up" teams were in a tough battle.
"Hold on for a while. The third batch of reinforcements will soon enter the contaminated area." Lin Qiming replied in the communication channel, then looked at Ke Lan and smiled helplessly: "At least two-thirds of the people in the entire crisis management department died from the initial memetic infection. Now the manpower is too tight..."
"Then why not transfer the garrison troops to help?" Ke Lan asked.
"The garrison can only spare a few people... The entire ship is still under lockdown, and the garrison has to work overtime to maintain order in each area. Although their mission is not as dangerous as ours, it is equally heavy."
Lin Qiming paused for a moment, then continued, "At present, the blockade of the entire ship is gradually being lifted. The garrison troops in areas far away from the contaminated area will be transferred here first...but..."
Lin Qiming couldn't help but sigh: "There are too few people who can be used in the garrison."
Ke Lan knew exactly what he meant. If they wanted to help in the contaminated area and ensure that the news would not be leaked, it was obviously impossible to simply send the vacated troops to the contaminated area - at the very least, they had to be "elite" like the ones who were previously responsible for handling the East 9th District incident. And such "elite" troops accounted for less than 5% of the entire garrison force, and the few people who could be transferred here were simply a drop in the bucket.
"Then you might as well let non-governmental organizations intervene." Ke Lan said.
"What?" Lin Qiming was stunned for a moment and looked at Ke Lan in surprise - for a moment, he thought he had heard it wrong.
"Allowing non-governmental organizations to intervene is not in compliance with regulations, and it will increase the difficulty of keeping confidentiality..." Lin Qiming explained immediately.
"I don't think so." Ke Lan shook her head. "What percentage of the collections in the underground freezer of the institute were obtained by them personally?"
"Uh..." Although Lin Qiming didn't know why Ke Lan asked this question, he thought about it carefully and gave a more conservative answer. "If all the collections in the underground ice storage are counted, I think the specimens captured by the research institute members themselves account for about 20%..."
"Then could it be that the remaining 80% ran to the underground ice storage on its own?"
"this……"
"In fact, even without you telling me, I know who brought these things here." Ke Lan said as he played with the zipper pendant on his collar. "It's nothing more than field troops, mercenaries, relic hunters, and the 'hunting companies' under the major financial groups... The vast majority of them come from the civilian organizations that you call 'non-compliant'."
Speaking of this, Ke Lan couldn't help but think of the young master of the Morgan family who died tragically at the cocktail party. The heavy-armored rhinoceros shovel was the prey of Angres Biotechnology Company under the Morgan Consortium.
Although this company's registered main business is to study the indigenous creatures of Alpha Planet, it actually does the work of a "hunter" - the "hunter" here is not the same profession as the "relic hunter" like Ke Lan, but the most original meaning of the word hunter.
The frontline employees of this company are actually a group of mercenaries who have been out for years. They hold the official "research license" to legally hunt and capture those indigenous creatures. Whether it is a specific organ, a complete corpse or a living indigenous creature, they can get it for you as long as you can afford the corresponding price.
Later, Ke Lan also used hacking technology to check the background of this company - more than one-third of came from official research institutes.
"In a sense, the personal qualities of employees in 'civilian organizations' at the top of the industry are definitely better than those of soldiers in the garrison who can join as long as they pass the physical examination... Moreover, under the pressure of high liquidated damages, these people can definitely keep their mouths shut." Ke Lan said.
He was not bragging. In the circle of relic hunters, the few who were able to make a name for themselves were not comparable to the group of low-level hunters in terms of quality and credibility. Many of the "treasures" that were carefully protected in the research institute were brought out by these people from high-level relic sites. The confidentiality agreements they signed might be stacked together, and they might be taller than the desk, but there were very few leaks.
On the contrary, the soldiers in the army often get drunk during their rotation leave, and then loudly leak the battle situation on the front line in the bar.
The favorite thing for reporters from those fake media outlets is to hang out in the bars that these soldiers like to go to, sniff out gossip from the front lines, and then publish a bunch of headline-grabbing articles with exaggerations.
Ke Lan doesn't have any prejudice against the military, but people like Lin Qiming have always had prejudice against civilian organizations. As a member of the relic hunters, Ke Lan still feels somewhat uncomfortable.
The Crisis Management Department rarely appears on weekdays, but the people in the Security Bureau have completely different attitudes towards military personnel and civilians when they are doing things - so much so that in the eyes of many people, Security Bureau agents are completely unreasonable.
"Okay... I will tell Chief Schroeder about your suggestion. He has the final say." Lin Qiming nodded. "But... if non-governmental organizations can really provide help, the cleanup progress should be much faster."
"You just need to pick a non-governmental organization that has a long-term cooperative relationship with the institute. These people are probably much more familiar with the relevant confidentiality regulations than the soldiers of the garrison." Ke Lan said, "By the way, I think the credibility of a company is not very good. I personally suggest you avoid it."
"Which company?" Lin Qiming immediately pricked up his ears - if even this "big shot" had to deliberately name the company, then there must be big problems.
"Angress Biotechnology Company," Ke Lan said. As long as there was a reasonable reason, he would not refuse to take revenge on someone. "The management of this company once violated twenty-six safety regulations and sent a dangerous indigenous creature, the 'Heavy Armored Rhinoceros', into a cocktail party for the upper class. It caused the deaths of more than a dozen children of the rich and powerful, including a member of the Morgan family, and more than a hundred people were injured... Afterwards, Angres Biotechnology only dismissed two security directors and did not receive any official punishment. The reason was that 'the incident was a force majeure and no one could have predicted that the sample would undergo stress mutation'... Obviously, some people were seriously negligent in their duties."
Ke Lan shrugged. Although the report was not made public, he had already read all the information he needed to read.
"To be honest, the two security directors were really unlucky. They were not primarily responsible for the incident, but in the end they were made to take the blame. As for all the senior executives of Angres, they were not held accountable at all."
"Is there really such a vicious incident?" Lin Qiming was stunned. The cocktail party incident was handled by the Security Bureau, and their crisis management department had to deal with matters related to the research institute. In addition, Lin Qiming was only the deputy captain of an action team before, and was not a high-level official, so it was normal for him to be unaware of the matter.
"Yeah, do I have to lie to you?" Ke Lan continued, "Because I was one of the participants in that cocktail party... Tsk, if I hadn't reacted quickly, I would have been killed by that big bug."
"Okay, I understand." Lin Qiming nodded solemnly. Ke Lan was not worried that he would go find someone to verify it. After all, everything he had just said was true.
"Also, I will inform the Security Bureau of this matter and ask them to re-examine the case." Lin Qiming added - although the "big shot" did not say it explicitly, it was obvious that he was not satisfied with the Security Bureau's handling results... This may involve the interests of some powerful people, but for the Crisis Management Department, they never care about this kind of relationship.
Lin Qiming secretly decided that if the people in the Security Bureau were unwilling to review the matter again, he would have to do it even if it was an act of exceeding his authority.
…
After returning to the headquarters, Ke Lan first explained the events of the Undead Crew Meeting to other members of the hunting group, and then arranged for Hound and Zhuo Ligetu to be responsible for the contact matters with Thirty-Three - although the "meme incident" caused a huge impact, for Ke Lan, it was only a small episode. Now that the song is over and everyone has dispersed, everything should return to normal.
And their next most important "business" is naturally the further exploration of "Yaguna Kator".
It took Ke Lan two hours to arrange all the tasks roughly. Then he asked Schroeder for a "special pass" and hurried to Zofia's residence amid the laughter of the Hounds.
Just as Ke Lan arrived at the gate of the yard and got out of the car, he happened to see several security agents in dark gray uniforms leading two "white coats" out of the villa.
"Who are they?" Ke Lan stopped an agent and asked after showing his ID.
"They are Dr. Renee's assistants." The agent leaned close to Ke Lan's ear and whispered, "We are here under the order of the Crew Council to 'protect' Miss Soma."
"It seems that Pan is quite quick." Ke Lan said in his heart, but nodded to the agent calmly, walked around them, and walked into the villa.
As soon as he entered the house, Ke Lan saw a girl in a lotus-white dress walking down the stairs - this girl was none other than the "big trouble" that Ke Lan had entrusted to Zofia to take care of before going to the Molten Mine: Ze Luo.
