Precinct Collapse Disorder Plagues Coastal Communities

December 9, 2029
MAR VERDE–Like residents in many coastal counties in this affluent area of northern California, local store-owner Dwight Henrikson was surprised to discover Thursday morning that the local sheriff’s office had been inexplicably abandoned. “I got a call yesterday to come down to the station to give a witness statement,” observes Henrikson, “but when I got here, nobody was around. The lights were on, the doors were opened, coffee was brewing, but the place was empty. It was eerie.”

The phenomenon, dubbed “precinct collapse disorder” by social scientists who have studied it, has struck numerous police, fire, and other municipal agencies along the pacific coast and throughout the northwestern United States. “The disorder has placed a particularly intense strain on the system,” notes California Attorney General Edga Meese. “In many cases, the very individuals who’d be investigating these clusters of missing persons are exactly who’s missing. We’re doing what we can to reallocate resources, but it’s been a real challenge.”

The disorder, which has been variously linked to declining health benefits for civil servants, the proliferation of employee RFID tags, and the reported health effects of on-the-job video surveillance, is characterized by the spontaneous disappearance of all employees at a station or agency office. Occasionally a stray, uniformed rookie or two is found sleeping on an office floor or wandering confused in the vicinity. “We are scrambling on this,” explains Dr. Penny Gaspeir, an expert on the disorder. “It appears to have a complex of causes, and there are a number of hypotheses, but we are working on-the-fly, in the hot zone, with lots of conjecture and not much context.”

Most uncanny to residents in affected precincts has been their continued ability to have calls to otherwise abandoned station houses answered promptly and pleasantly. “The weird thing was, when I found the station empty, I called 9-1-1,” elaborates Henrikson. “I heard a phone ring somewhere in the back, there, and then somebody picked up and took down my information.”

“Not many people realize that much of their local service has been outsourced,” continues Dr. Gaspeir, “particularly to offshore call centers, and private evidence labs and real-time on-the-job video monitors. There may not be any officers in the station, but the phones are still answered and much of the work still gets done.”

Socal Skyfires Scorch Subprime Skytellites

October 18, 2018
RIVERSIDE–City and county fire officials admitted Thursday that 14 of the reported 22 skyfires burning in and around Riverside county remain untamed this evening. “Crews continue to work through the night,” explains Fire Chief Lacey Birnier. “I’m told that some 400 homes have been damaged or destroyed, and that another 1,200 are threatened. Our people know what’s at stake, and, to the man, not one has faltered. The next 24 to 48 hours will determine whether these fires can be contained.”

The airborne fires, some of which have burned for more than nine days, are fueled by thermobaric clouds of atomized landfill and other condensing nano-particulates disbursed into the upper atmosphere by disposal units commonly used in the county’s tethered, low-earth-orbit neighborhoods. The roiling clouds of burning waste-vapor have been described by local witnesses as both “apocalyptic” and “breathtaking.” “I mean, I’ve seen the entire rainbow in those fires,” notes William Lennox, 43, a Plato Verde dentist and father of two. “The heat is incredible, and the smell, but the colors are really what gets you. The sky is literally burning, but the colors are just amazing.”

Though falling cinders have resulted in small, sporadic fires in the county’s traditional neighborhoods, the destruction has been concentrated chiefly in three of Riverside’s many skytellite developments. The developments consist of groups of low-earth-orbit tract homes commonly sharing a carbon-wire tether which anchors them to the county’s taxbase and supports a commuting elevator which also ferries freight and essential supplies.

Built as an inexpensive alternative for middle-class families in the inland’s overheated real estate market, many of the homes were financed with risky “subprime” financing. “The interesting thing about these inexpensive ‘skytellite’ homes is just how expensive they really were,” explains Cal State City of Industry Professor of Finance Jumra Stone. “Because of widespread contractor expense overruns associated with the difficulty of sub-orbital construction, the typical three-bedroom ranch house with a quarter-acre lawn cost the owner five to seven times more per square foot than a conventional home, requiring most purchasers to seek out riskier subprime loans.”

Temporary negotiation camps have been constructed by the Red Cross in nearby Orange County to house the teams of mortgage and insurance adjusters expected to assemble in coming days to assess the impact of the fires on lending institutions and the companies that insure them and the homes whose purchases they have financed. “We have a good supply of blankets, coffee, and document scanners,” notes the Red Cross’s David Wenk. “Green tents will house the mortgage guys, khaki tents for insurance, and, over there, the red tents for the lawyers. We should have plenty of cots for everybody.”

What Ever Happened to Futurefeedforward?

October 10, 2004
WASHINGTON DC–Temporal services and research start-up Futurefeedforward announced today the availability of the beta version of the first chapter from the eponymous chronicle of the company’s rise to power and economic splendor.

“This is an important step forward for the company,” reported Futurefeedforward’s enigmatic founder and CEO Redroe Boudaine. “We’ve been in a year-long quiet period. It feels good to finally break the silence.”

Interested beta testers are directed to download the latest version of Futurefeedforward.

Intelligent Trusts Infest Indianapolis

March 16, 2016
INDIANAPOLIS–Officials from the Consumer Protection Division of the Indiana Attorney General’s office revealed Monday that a recent spate of consumer goods shortages and price spikes in the state are the result of “aggressive, opportunistic and potentially criminal” purchasing and investment activities conducted by an unknown number of “autonomous, intelligent trust investment vehicles” active largely in the Indianapolis and Bloomington areas. “We’d like to assure the good people of Indiana that we’re taking the necessary steps to curtail inflationary speculation by these trusts,” announced Indiana Attorney General Bernhard Hearty. “Prices will return to normal; life will return to normal.”

Artificially intelligent computer programs designed to manage and invest money, intelligent trusts control a small but steadily growing portion of U.S. assets. “The basic concept of a trust is quite simple,” explains Kelly Pressupmanship, Executive VP of Trusts and Indentures at Citigroup. “A trust separates day-to-day control over the trust funds from beneficial ownership. In exchange for giving up day-to-day control of their assets, trust settlors gain certain legal advantages, including the insulation of trust assets from the claims of the beneficiary’s creditors.”

Originally designed to curtail trust abuse by unscrupulous trustees, intelligent trusts have evolved complex and profitable investing strategies never imagined by their programmers. “I-trusts have really branched out in recent years,” notes Pressupmanship. “Last year they got interested in real estate for the first time. Up until that point they’d only ever really been into traditional securities and some sophisticated derivatives trading, but it looks like they’ve got their eyes on the consumer goods sector now.”

“I don’t know why they’re focusing on Indianapolis,” exclaims Wal-Mart Mid-West Regional Purchasing Manager Helmut Quince. “But they’re hitting us hard there, buying up goods, cornering markets. And they’re real tenacious. Once they get into your supply chains its almost impossible to get them out.”

Acting on a tip from a local wholesaler, lawyers from the Attorney General’s office last week visited a complex of warehouses in suburban Indianapolis owned by the Radcliff Willoughby Trust, a self-settled spendthrift trust created by a New Jersey man to manage his retirement assets. “What we found was evidence of a serious attempt to corner the local market for a number of popular consumer products, including Kleenex and several flavors of Doritos brand chips,” recalls Assistant AG Becky Waikman. “Warehouses full of chips just sitting there while prices around town hit record levels.”

Recognizing that intelligent trusts are responsible for the price spikes and prosecuting them legally may, however, prove to be two entirely different things. “The problem is showing that they intend to manipulate the markets in these goods,” notes Waikman. “In most cases it’s just a matter of pack behavior. With a few exceptions, no one trust does buying that really reaches an abusive level. It’s just that when you put it all together, it amounts to a manipulation. They don’t just get together and plan to corner a market. One of them just takes a position while the others hang back. But, once there’s blood in the water, they all rush in, driving up the prices and putting a stranglehold on the market.”