#are projecting their own lack of confidence in their sense of agency/control. have more faith in yourself (+ others) as readers ffs | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

puddygeeks · 4 years ago

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𝑊𝑎𝑟 𝑂𝑓 𝐻𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑡𝑠 - 𝐶𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙 𝑀𝑖𝑛𝑑𝑠, 𝑆𝑝𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑟 𝑅𝑒𝑖𝑑 𝑥 𝑂𝐶 - 𝐶ℎ𝑎𝑝𝑡𝑒𝑟 2: 𝑅𝑜𝑐𝑘, 𝑀𝑒𝑒𝑡 𝐻𝑎𝑟𝑑 𝑃𝑙𝑎𝑐𝑒

Masterlist

Rating: Mature

Summary: 𝐴𝑙𝑖𝑐𝑒 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑖𝑚𝑎𝑔𝑖𝑛𝑒𝑑 ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑓 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑘𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑖𝑛 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑖𝑔𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑑𝑒𝑠𝑖𝑟𝑒 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑒𝑙𝑝 𝑜𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑢𝑙𝑡𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛 𝑡𝑟𝑜𝑢𝑏𝑙𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑙𝑒𝑓𝑡 ℎ𝑒𝑟 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑒 𝑜𝑝𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑠. 𝑊𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠𝑢𝑝𝑝𝑜𝑟𝑡 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝐴𝑈 𝑓𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑙𝑦, 𝑚𝑎𝑦𝑏𝑒 𝑠ℎ𝑒 𝑐𝑎𝑛 𝑓𝑖𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑏𝑒𝑔𝑖𝑛 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑒𝑎𝑙 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑤𝑜𝑢𝑛𝑑𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑝𝑎𝑠𝑡.

Fandom: Criminal Minds

Pairing: Spencer Reid x OC

Status: Ongoing

LONG TERM ONGOING PROJECT :)

My writing is entirely fuelled by coffee! If you enjoy my work, feel free to donate toward my caffeine dependency: will work for coffee

𝑾𝒂𝒓𝒏𝒊𝒏𝒈𝒔: 𝐺𝑒𝑛𝑒𝑟𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑎𝑑𝑢𝑙𝑡 𝑐𝑜𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡, 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑠𝑜𝑚𝑒 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑔𝑔𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑠 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑠ℎ𝑜𝑤. 𝑃𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑏𝑒 𝑎𝑤𝑎𝑟�� 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑑𝑜𝑒𝑠 𝑚𝑒𝑎𝑛 𝑐𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑐𝑎𝑠𝑒𝑠 𝑜𝑓 𝑚𝑢𝑟𝑑𝑒𝑟, 𝑐ℎ𝑖𝑙𝑑 𝑎𝑏𝑑𝑢𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 & 𝑠𝑒𝑥𝑢𝑎𝑙 𝑎𝑏𝑢𝑠𝑒 𝑎𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑠 𝑖𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑛𝑎𝑡𝑢𝑟𝑒 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝐵𝐴𝑈'𝑠 𝑤𝑜𝑟𝑘. 𝐼𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑚𝑦 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑛𝑡𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑡𝑜 ℎ𝑎𝑛𝑑𝑙𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑠𝑒 𝑖𝑠𝑠𝑢𝑒𝑠 𝑎𝑠 𝑐𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑓𝑢𝑙𝑙𝑦 𝑎𝑠 𝑝𝑜𝑠𝑠𝑖𝑏𝑙𝑒, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑖𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑟𝑒 𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑛𝑦𝑡ℎ𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑡ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢 𝑓𝑒𝑒𝑙 𝑐𝑜𝑢𝑙𝑑 𝑏𝑒 𝑖𝑚𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑣𝑒𝑑 𝑤𝑖𝑡ℎ ℎ𝑜𝑤 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑠𝑒 𝑎𝑟𝑒 𝑚𝑎𝑛𝑎𝑔𝑒𝑑, 𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑒 𝑙𝑒𝑡 𝑚𝑒 𝑘𝑛𝑜𝑤.

Eᴘɪsᴏᴅᴇ: Pʀᴇ Sᴇᴀsᴏɴ 1

Chapter Two

As I followed Penelope toward the meeting room for our afternoon briefing, I could feel a lump in my throat caused by nerves. She had decided that we should arrive first to allow her a chance to introduce me to the members of her team and I reluctantly agreed. I didn’t exactly have the most successful history with work colleagues.

We stepped into the room to find a pretty blonde woman busying herself with setting out case files and generally preparing the space for use, and though I felt awkward interrupting her, Penelope charged in without hesitation.

“What’s for dinner, mom?” She teased brightly, prompting the young woman to glance up with a fond smile. “Alice and I thought we’d help with setting up. We’ll handle the tech for you.” Penelope explained, causing the woman's brows to shoot up in surprise and she glanced over at me curiously.

“You’re Agent Hawthorne, Interpol's technical analyst?” She asked casually and though I was caught off guard by her knowledge, I nodded back politely. “I was planning to greet you on arrival, but Garcia whisked you away before I got the chance. I’m Jennifer Jareau, communications liaison for the BAU.” She introduced herself confidently, stepping forward to shake my hand and I could sense the motherly warmth in her that Penelope had referenced before, allowing it to relax me enough to manage a response.

“Yikes. You’ve got the toughest job of all. The press.” I commented, causing an appreciative chuckle. “Alice is fine. I’m not really into formalities.” I added with a smile and she eagerly returned it as she finished laying out papers.

“Great. You can call me JJ. Garcia, if you two are happy to do the rest, I’ll get everyone’s drinks ready. God only knows when they last took a break.” She offered, waiting for Penelope’s approval before beginning to collect mugs from a nearby cupboard. “I made sure to get some breakfast tea stocked for you all. Alice, do you want a cup, or are you more of a coffee girl?”

“She’s all about the tea. At this point, I’m honestly pretty sure that her blood stream is more tea than anything else.” Penelope answered before I could even open my mouth and JJ wasted no time in rushing toward the kitchen.

I rolled my eyes at my friend’s teasing, but she didn’t display an ounce of shame at my judgement and I found myself standing around awkwardly as I awaited instruction. I was usually a proactive person, but after months of disrespect in Interpol, I’d learned to stay out of the way and mostly attempted to not cause any problems.

“I’ll get the screens ready. Alice, if you could get your laptop set up with the case files and I’ll use mine to present our plan.” Garcia instructed as she began fiddling with the display on the wall and I obediently placed my laptop on the table, before crawling underneath to plug in a power adapter to allow me to use the European device.

Fortunately, Penelope had already thought of everything for my workspace with her, but I still needed to provide for myself everywhere else.

“My mug is missing. I left it on my desk. Have you seen anyone in my office in the past ten minutes?”

I overheard someone questioning Garcia in a stressed voice and as I slowly slid out from under the table, I noticed that the person was almost blocking my exit, giving me a clear view of their bright white trainers and blue jeans which seemed entirely too informal for the setting. Their gaze fell on me immediately as I straightened up to find an older man with greying hair and thin framed glasses examining me with a deep confusion.

“Who’s this?” He enquired toward Garcia, whilst maintaining his intense scrutiny of me and I struggled under his investigation, feeling a flood of insecurity.

“This is Alice from Interpol, Sir. Alice, this is SSA Gideon. He’s our unit chief.” Penelope spluttered, seeming equally unnerved by his arrival and he gave me a rushed handshake, before seeming distracted again. “JJ just went to make some drinks for the round table. She might have your mug, Sir.” She answered, prompting him to dart from the room impatiently.

“Gideon’s intense and at times eccentric, but brilliant. You get used to him.” Penelope muttered under her breath with a wink and I released a sigh that I’d been holding due to nerves.

We settled at the table together as we made the final preparations for our portion of the meeting and JJ returned to place a mug of tea beside me with a warm smile. She took the seat on my other side, almost as if she was protecting me from my team and I knew that she had already been reading my behaviour to identify my discomfort. My anxiety rose at the sight of the rest of my team approaching the doors, led by a man that I didn’t recognise and I prayed that their lack of faith in my abilities would not pass onto the BAU team.

They filed into the meeting room, cramping it with their bodies, followed by Reid and Gideon, who was gripping a mug of coffee rather protectively. They were deeply engaged in a hushed conversation, until the unfamiliar man stepped forward to call us to attention.

“Good afternoon, everyone. I’m Supervisory Special Agent Aaron Hotchner. This is our first joint agency case with Interpol in some time, so I would like to start by reminding everyone that we are now a joint task force. All required information will be shared freely and case details for both investigations will be openly available. We welcome the Interpol teams guidance as the primary investigators for this case.”

Agent Hotchner made Gideon’s expression seem thoroughly welcoming by comparison and despite his words sounding warm, his face remained set in a permanent state of disapproval. I wondered how Penelope managed to work under someone so deadly serious, despite her constant need to treat everything as a joke and decided to ask more about him later. As he paused, another agent rushed into the room, closing the door behind him and took a standing position behind Penelope.

“Morgan, did you find anything at the warehouse?”

Agent Hotchner turned to the newcomer with a hopeful expression, only to receive a subtle shake of the head in return. I glanced over at the agent in question, sudden recognition at the name striking me and couldn’t deny that he was handsome. It wasn’t surprising that Penelope became so distracted around him, but fortunately my tastes were different enough to avoid sharing this issue.

“Let's start with the basics. Shepard, I’ll let you open with your cases.” The BAU leader easily drew the attention of the meeting as he commenced conversation and Shepard got to his feet with a confidence that unsettled me.

“The group that we are looking for is a well established human trafficking ring that have been working in Europe for at least four years. They first came under our radar when their leader was murdered by his ambitious second in command, a man that we have identified as Robert Valeno.”

Shepard brought up a photo of the man who had dominated my psyche for longer than I cared to admit. Valeno was a prominent figure in my nightmares, as he continued to be impossible to catch and I regularly obsessed over the awful things that he could be doing to people whilst we floundered around behind him.

“Valeno has expanded their operation substantially since he took control and has proven to be an expert in evading justice. Every time that we get close he vanishes, only to appear in another country. So far, we’ve managed to connect twenty missing women to him, but realistically, we estimate the number is more likely to be in the hundreds.”

Penelope set the screens to flick through the images of the victims that we had managed to identify and I felt my stomach lurch. I didn’t need to see the photos, each of their faces was burned into my mind as a waking nightmare that only worsened when I closed my eyes. Each and every one of them represented a failure to me, another girl who would never know freedom again.

As Shepard stepped aside, JJ took his place to present the new details.

“Four months ago, local PDs in multiple states began noticing a dramatic increase in their missing persons, particularly women from the ages of fourteen to thirty-five.” JJ explained as she redirected the conversation to the American portion of the case and I was met with a new set of faces that I knew I would be unable to forget. Before she could continue, Gideon jumped in with his own opinions about our suspect.

“Valeno has mostly targeted women who were low risk. No family, no job, no connections and until now, anyone who did not meet that criteria was deemed to have been a mistake. Now, he is targeting any female who matches his desired age range. That tells us that he is growing more confident and likely catering to a wealthier clientele. He’s comfortable in his methods and clearly believes that he has successfully escaped the pursuit of law enforcement in Europe.” He revealed, having already begun speculating on the cause of this change in victimology and Morgan sat forward with interest, as if he had noticed something.

“How did he manage to even get to the States if he was on Interpol’s radar?” Morgan asked, glancing around the table in confusion and whilst the rest of my team seemed offended by the question, I noticed that Shepard was staring directly at me, as if the responsibility for this laid primarily at my feet.

“That’s where we need to start.” I stated, drawing the attention of the room and I strained to keep my nerves from showing in my demeanour as I continued.

“He wasn’t just on our radar. His picture was circulated everywhere, MI5, ESISC, border control, immigration and transport services. I blocked every known alias that he has, had software scanning CCTV for his face. We set up roadblocks, monitored drug busts and even placed digital traps. It should have been impossible for him to travel anywhere.” I explained, allowing a hint of my frustration to flow into my words and it was clear that everyone was considering the tactics used for any further ideas. Reid drew my attention as the first person that I noticed who did not seem to be blaming me for this failure, instead thinning his eyes reflectively.

“That level of evasion would indicate an exceptionally high intelligence and knowledge of law enforcement, border policies and even technical expertise. If he’s also present at the time of abduction and responsible for the transport of his acquisitions, it wouldn’t leave any time for the rest of his roles. Which means he has some high level employees with an in depth knowledge of the organisation. Have you discovered any of his accomplices?” Reid enquired, rapidly realising the flaw in my information and I smiled at how easily he had noticed the discrepancy that I had been pointing out for months, much to the teams irritation.

“The guy is a ghost. There’s no threads to follow.” I sighed, still feeling disappointed in the minimal information that I’d been able to dig up about Valeno. “What we do know is that he has at least employed technical help. The skills that I’ve encountered are far too advanced to belong to someone who has any priorities other than hacking. I can also confirm that it is not the same person that he was using in Europe.” I added, causing Shepard to furrow his brows at me.

“How can you be sure of that?” He asked, already dismissing my opinion and I was flustered by this subtle dig against my knowledge.

“I’ve compared the logs from my laptop to the digital attacks that the BAU experienced when they tried to track him. They’re completely different.” I argued, only causing him to seem doubtful and I felt my gut twist in annoyance.

It was one thing for him to disregard me within our own agency, but I didn’t appreciate his lack of interest in my input when we were surrounded by new people and felt my temper fuelling me to elaborate on this theory, even if I knew that my team would likely not understand the relevance.

“There are hundreds of ways to do things when it comes to cyber activity and every hacker has their own methods.” I began, attempting to simplify the experience that Penelope and I had gathered over the years into something that could assist in the profile. “Think of it like their signature. This new person operates in a more aggressive manner, whereas the original person that he was using was all defensive. He’s not waiting for us to find him. He’s seeking us out, almost challenging us. I analysed the commands that he uses and they’re much more commonly taught in the United States than any other part of the world.”

There were a few moments of silence as people processed the babble of technical talk that I had just spewed at them and Penelope smiled proudly from my side. Shepard seemed lost for words, despite his ongoing desire to undermine me and I noticed that several members of the BAU team were now watching me with interest, especially Morgan.

“So, he’s making new contacts. That gives us new opportunities to infiltrate his network.” He clarified, making it clear that he trusted my experience on this matter and I nodded at him confidently, noticing Penelope smiling at him with extra appreciation as she took over the technical talk.

“Because this new hacker is aggressive, we may be able to draw them out. Alice and I have planned a bait and switch situation. With your permission, Sir, and our combined expertise, we can have your hacker trapped and traced.” Penelope presented our plan with a faith in her leader that was unfamiliar to me and I awaited his answer with baited breath.

“Absolutely. Keep me updated.” He agreed as he permitted us without a moment of hesitation and I was shocked by how easy it had been to gain his permission.

“Reid. Morgan. Go to the latest crime scene. We need to get an idea of how he operates. Gideon and I will take the rest of the Interpol team to the local PD.” Hotchner announced, immediately getting to his feet and setting the room into a buzz of activity.

I was frantic as I gathered my things to follow Penelope and could still hardly believe that we hadn’t needed to fight to be able to put our plan into motion. I piled up my laptop and paperwork into my arms, and jogged to catch up to her, glad to be alone again in the hallway as the others split into their assigned teams.

“Nicely done, Ally. You hold up well under fire.” Penelope muttered, sneaking a smirk in my direction as she walked and I shook my head in denial, feeling as if I’d barely managed to avoid drowning back there. “You give yourself too little credit. This team gives a serious grilling and not everyone can hack it. You did. Even from your own unit chief. He’s a real peach, aye?”

“Oh, you have no idea.”

--⥈--

“Hey, double trouble. Anything fallen into your net?”

Morgan’s warm voice on the speakerphone filled Penelope’s remarkably quiet office, where I sat with my head in my hands. The feeling of waiting was suffocating and I was beginning to worry that even our combined experience wouldn’t be enough to catch this mystery attacker. Valeno seemed to be incredibly gifted at seeking out the best of every profession for his organisation.

“Just a huge pile of nothing. I don’t fail, Morgan. This is not a feeling that I’m used to and I don’t plan to get used to it!” Penelope pouted, seeming personally offended by the lack of response to our bait and I looked up to smile sympathetically at her.

“Get used to it with this guy. He only hires the uncatchable.” I offered, revealing the bitterness that had begun to grow inside of me since I started on this case and Penelope huffed in a childish manner at this statement.

After a few more minutes of listening to Penelope talk to Morgan whilst I reviewed the logs of our previous contacts with our target, a bolt of inspiration struck me. I turned in my seat to face Penelope with wide eyes and she shushed Morgan as she honed in on my changed demeanour.

“Just before I spoke to you on the phone, I told Shepard that I thought we had an inside agent. It’s the only way that it made sense for Valeno to be avoiding everything.” I began, causing her to tense up in alarm, but she waited for me to finish.

“What if they’re helping him to find staff? Every agency in the world has watch lists for people like you and I. If Valeno is working with someone inside Interpol, they would be able to recommend someone with the right skills and keep the hacker from coming up on our radar as a threat.” I thought aloud, setting Penelope into a typing spree as she pulled up countless agency lists for a search.

“They’d be right under our noses!” She exclaimed, setting up the parameters for a new scan of the lists immediately and I stared intensely at my logs to piece together details about the hackers style that we could use to identify them. “Okay, we know that they’re probably American. I’ll start with local names.” She explained for Morgan’s sake and it was clear that he was already fully invested in our guidance as he dove into adding information to our search.

“Valeno wouldn’t recruit somebody nearby. If he’s outsourcing, he likely hasn’t told them anything about what they’re doing. He’d want them distanced from the organisation. The less that they know, the less risk in using them. They won’t be near enough to see the missing girls on local news and he’s banking on them not watching anything further.” Morgan specified over the phone and I nodded along in agreement, as Penelope struggled to keep up with us.

“Then I’m looking at every other state? That’s a lot of names! We need to get more specific.” Penelope argued as her computer struggled to even load the mass of names that her search presented and I leapt into reeling off information that she could utilise.

“We know from their techniques that they are aggressive, impatient, likely seeking a challenge. The commands they use would indicate that they are self taught rather than formally educated, so rule out anyone with a relevant qualification. They don’t have a strong signature yet either, meaning that despite being talented, they are inexperienced so they wouldn’t have been on the watch list for long.” I rambled, moving to pace the room and Penelope keenly adjusted her criteria as I spoke.

Over the speaker, I heard Reid seeming as if he were particularly surprised by the level of information that I was providing, before he provided a theory of his own.

“Aggressive and inexperienced? Statistically, it’s more common for these traits to appear in a young hacker. Someone who hasn’t matured enough to appreciate defensive methods.” Reid’s voice chimed from the phone and I stopped dead in my tracks.

“Very young. Their methods are disorganised, frantic. Penelope and I haven’t been able to predict them as they’re too chaotic. We thought it was a tactical choice, but from my experience in these kinds of circles, it’s highly likely to be a high schooler, probably a male with a superiority complex.” I theorised, feeling a crushing clarity and Penelope stopped her activity so that she could turn to face me with horror.

“Wait a second. You mean like the Rapture crew from our old forum?” She breathed, seeming disgusted that someone as young as the other hackers that we once worked alongside could be involved in something this dark.

I practically fell into my seat as I flashed through screens in search of a specific log and an old memory of a particularly young male hacker in the Rapture group came to mind.

“Oh my god.” I muttered as I replayed the clip several times. “Penelope, look at this. This manoeuvre right here. I’ve only seen it used a few times. It’s an old method, definitely not taught officially by anyone. The only few people that I’ve ever seen use it have all had one thing in common-”

“They studied the Boston Phantom obsessively.” Penelope gasped, thinning her results down and having to fight through more red tape than I’d ever seen to unlock the records.

“There definitely was a result here within the original content, but they were removed from the watch list six months ago and all our records of them were wiped clean.” She explained for our team members that were on the phone and I covered my mouth in shock.

This small accusation confirmed the suspicion that I had held for some time now; someone in our team was feeding Valeno information. The call went silent for a moment as I imagined that Morgan and Reid were sharing the same realisation and Reid cleared his throat to question us, seeming somewhat less confident about technical matters.

“Is that a normal occurrence, Garcia? I thought once you were on a watch list, that was it. There was no way of returning to anonymity.” Reid queried, whilst Penelope busied herself with attempting to recover the files.

“That’s true. Unless you’re recruited as an agent.” She clarified, causing a chill to run down the length of my spine at this idea. “But nothing can be removed from my glorious all seeing skills. His name is James Miller. He’s fifteen years old and lives in Boston, Massachusetts.”

“Babygirl, you never fail to amaze me. You two are the dream team.” Morgan announced, causing Penelope to smirk in satisfaction. “Send over his details. Reid and I will pick him up now.”

“Your wish is my command.” Penelope crooned, before the line abruptly cut off and she turned to fix me with an expression that sparkled with curiosity.

“Okay. What was that?” She asked, causing me to furrow my brows in confusion and I shrugged obliviously. “You just profiled! Alice, what are Interpol doing using you as an analyst? You should be in the field.” She exclaimed, examining me with a new sense of wonder and I shuffled awkwardly on the spot.

“And I’m sure that if I’d been recruited by any method other than arrest, I probably would be.” I commented, fiddling with my hands and she seemed to struggle to understand the correlation between these two things. “Shepard and the others barely tolerate me as it is. They feel like they’ve been dumped with a criminal, rather than an asset.”

“You’re kidding! All of the best hackers come from a risky background, don’t they know that?” She argued, thoroughly frustrated by this attitude and I chuckled under my breath. “You can’t teach what we know how to do in any classroom. They need to get over themselves and realise how lucky they are to have you!”

--⥈--

Penelope updated the BAU team and Shepard on our activities via video call, allowing me to avoid discussing my part in the situation in front of my already scowling unit chief. I was painfully aware of his disapproval for my opinion on anything that he deemed as outside of my role, but Penelope decided that it was important for me to be credited with the arrest of the hacker and ensured that she emphasised my work.

I fidgeted in my seat, feeling bashful as she recounted the conversation and I was thankful for the webcam which dulled the power of Shepard’s glare. It seemed that the rest of the Interpol team weren’t present for the briefing and I was glad that I didn’t have to bear their scrutiny too.

“Good work. Both of you. Gideon is interviewing him shortly, so we’ll let you know what we can persuade him to reveal. In the meantime, we’ve seized all of his equipment and will be sending it over for you to analyse, Garcia. We need as much from it as possible.” Agent Hotchner announced, making me squirm from the praise and Penelope responded with yes sir immediately.

“Alice, pack your things. Once the agent has delivered the equipment, they’ll be bringing you to the PD to assist us here.” He added resolutely and I felt my back straighten at his order. I opened my mouth to question it, but before I could get a single word out Shepard interrupted.

“Absolutely not.” He argued, turning on my newfound advocate with evident fury in his posture, but the BAU chief remained completely unmoved.

“Alice assisted in both profiling and identifying the young man who we just arrested. This is the first viable lead that we’ve discovered. Her insight would be most useful alongside my team.” Hotchner suggested, almost causing my mouth to drop open in shock at his appreciation of me and I could feel Penelope fighting not to smile beside me. “With all due respect, she has a familiarity with this case which is not being utilised by keeping her remote from the investigation; not to mention the behavioural skills that she demonstrated today which are disregarded in her current role.”

“With all due respect, Agent Hawthorne is an Interpol agent and I will dictate her activities. She is a technical analyst, not a field agent and does not have the relevant training to be based anywhere other than the office. Do I need to remind you that this is an Interpol investigation that your team is assisting on?” Shepard growled, stepping closer into his space and though I could tell that the BAU leader was angered by his disrespect, he retained his composure.

“Hawthorne. Assist with analysing the equipment.” He spat, looking toward the screen with an obvious disdain and I struggled to keep my voice even as my heart sunk.

“Yes, Sir.”

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legalseat · 7 years ago

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Fighting Climate Change in a Climate of Regulatory Uncertainty

[Yogini Oke is an NUJS graduate currently pursuing the Young India Fellowship]

Climate change has emerged as amongst the most significant challenges of the present times. The ubiquitous nature of this problem has prompted diverse responses from stakeholders across the world addressing its many strands. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (“UNFCCC”) is an attempt of the nations of the world to arrive at common policies and standards necessary to the arrest the process of climate change. Nations which are signatories to agreements[1] under UNFCCC are required to take steps to reduce their carbon-footprint. One of the many mechanisms adopted by nations to control their carbon emissions is by reducing their reliance on fossil fuels and increasing their capacity to produce energy from renewable energy sources. India too is moving in this direction.

The spectre of regulatory uncertainty has haunted India’s renewable energy sector since the last decade. In this post, I argue for the conscious creation of a regime which advances a climate of predictability, and demands compliance, in the realm of renewable energy.

The need for the creation of such a regime becomes even more urgent, as India seeks to comply with its ambitious commitments to the Paris protocol. India aims at reducing its emissions intensity[2] vis-à-vis its GDP by 33 to 35 percent by 2030 from its 2005 levels, in pursuit of its commitment to the Paris Protocol. It also seeks to achieve about 40 percent cumulative electric power installed capacity from non-fossil fuel-based energy resources by 2030. India’s ambition with respect to renewable energy include achieving 60 GW of wind power and a 100 GW of solar power by 2022.

One may surmise as to what are the legal, regulatory and financial measures which will facilitate achieving such voluminous targets. If there are such measures in place, why the argument for the need for creating a climate of regulatory certainty? This post is dedicated to understanding the above issues, specifically in relation to regulating grid-connected solar and wind energy projects.

Section 86 of the Electricity Act, 2003 laid down that the State Electricity Regulatory Commissions (SERCs) promote renewable energy by providing targets to distribution companies for obligatory purchase of renewable energy as a percentage of the total consumption of electricity in the area. These targets were also termed as ‘Renewable Purchase Obligations’ (“RPOs”). A further push in the field of renewable energy came in 2008 from the National Action Plan on Climate Change, 2008 (“NAPCC”). The NAPCC envisaged the concept of a ‘dynamic minimum renewables purchase standard’, which was a dynamic and incremental re-invention of RPOs as imagined under the Electricity Act, 2003. Dynamic minimum renewables purchase standard, which is used interchangeably with the term RPO, laid down “purchase obligations on electricity distribution companies to purchase certain amount of their energy requirements from renewable energy sources.”

According to the Electricity Act, 2003, which is the law governing renewable energy, the transaction of renewable energy between the generators and distributors, and thus the fulfillment of RPOs, could take place via two routes: (a) through renewable energy certificates and (b) through tariff-based contracts between the generators and distributors. The Renewable Energy Certificate Regulation, 2010 regulated the former of the two. The Renewable Energy Certificate (“REC”) is a “market based instrument to promote renewable energy and facilitate compliance of RPOs.” The RECs were framed as saleable and tradeable between distributing entities and had been introduced to assist distributors in states with less renewable energy potential to fulfil their RPOs.

Another way in which the RPOs could be fulfilled under the Electricity Act, 2003 was through tariff-based power purchase agreements (“PPAs”). Until recently, renewable energy tariffs were regulated and decided by the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission under sections 61 and 62 of the Act. The Ministry of Power released ‘Guidelines for Tariff Based Competitive Bidding Process for Procurement of Power’ for grid connected solar as well as grid connected wind energy projects in pursuance of National Tariff Policy, 2016 which recommended introduction of competitive bidding to keep tariff low. This objective, as envisaged under the National Tariff Policy, 2016, seems to be on its way to delivery as wind and solar prices have plummeted to grid parity levels with the introduction of the competitive bidding regime. The fall in prices has been noted to be indicative of ‘low-internal-equity rates’ which is suggestive of developers investing on the faith in an optimistic future scenario.

Undoubtedly, there has been an attempt in the past decade to incentivize and mandate generation and distribution of solar and wind energy connected to the grid. However, there is still a sense of looming uncertainty over the future of renewable energy due to the questionability of the effectiveness of instruments such as RECs and PPAs. Why is that?

While the REC mechanism was introduced to overcome the geographical disparity between various states as regards their capacity to produce power from renewable sources, a concern regarding the actual compliance to RPOs has been expressed due to the failure on the part of most state utilities to comply with their targets. Such non-fulfilment of the RPO in many cases has led to low-trading in RECs. Shrimali and Tirumalachetty have opined that achieving the full potential of this instrument would be impossible until strong compliance to RPOs is made mandatory and confidence in the bankability of the REC instrument is created. In the absence, or inadequacy of such measures, the opinion of the authors seems to have been validated by the crash in the REC market caused due to the lack of demand for the REC certificates. Problems in enforceability of RPOs is thus a major blockade on the path of making the REC-RPO mechanism effective.

Power-purchase agreements have been recently in news due to the surge in renewable energy sector. This surge has also been compounded by the falling of prices of renewable energy with the introduction of competitive bidding to determine tariffs of renewable energy. Prior to the introduction of the recent guidelines for grid-connected solar and wind energy power projects, the determination of tariff was carried out through the system of ‘feed-in’ tariffs determined by the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission. Even as the fall in prices of renewable energy due to the introduction of competitive bidding was only expected, and also desired, was the impact of such falling of prices on existing PPAs factored in? If indeed it were factored in, were any safeguards or mechanisms set up to contain the risks?

Currently, investor sentiment in this sector is at risk as state utilities which entered into PPAs earlier desire renegotiation or cancellation of existing PPAs quoting tariffs to be higher than the current tariffs. Such attempts at renegotiation of PPAs or their cancellation has created uncertainties in the renewable energy market and has the potential to hurt the union government’s renewable energy commitments.

While tariff-based PPAs and RECs are not directly comparable, they do point towards a certain trend in the renewable energy sector. While ‘any person’ can be a distribution licensee under the Electricity Act, 2003, very often distribution licensees required to comply with renewable energy obligations have been state distribution companies (“DISCOMs”). The financial condition of DISCOMs creates risk with respect to investing in the renewable energy sector, opines Moody’s. Therefore, a solution to the issues of lack of confidence in the renewable energy sector will involve (i) creation of an effective and enforceable compliance system for the mechanisms therein and (ii) the restoration of the financial health of the DISCOMs.

The Government is seeking to achieve the former through framing a legislation with strict and punitive measures for ensuring compliance to PPAs and RPOs. Steps towards restoration of the financial health of DISCOMs have been undertaken through a scheme The Central Government announced Ujwal Discom Assurance Yojana (UDAY) on November 5, 2015 in order to effect a turnaround in the financial viability of state-owned DISCOMs and improve operational efficiency. This scheme has recently been shown to have a positive impact on the profitability and operational efficiency in 23 out of 27 DISCOMs who have joined UDAY.

Such policy measures towards reducing the uncertainty associated with the generation and distribution of renewable energy will hopefully allow India to fulfil its international obligations. They will, if framed and implemented properly, also go a long way in creation of a ‘sustainable market’ for renewable energy.

What needs to be examined whether off-grid solar and wind energy markets and the clean energy-finance instruments and institutions such as the Indian Renewable Energy Development Agency are also affected by the issues of lack of compliance- enforcement mechanisms and setting of standards. Further exploration of these issues is crucial to understand the regulatory climate of the Indian renewable energy markets in an exhaustive way, and for suggesting means to bridge the existing gaps.

– Yogini Oke

[1] These include for instance the Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, 1998, Paris Agreement, 2015.

[2] Emission intensity is “the level of greenhouse gas emissions per unit of economic activity, usually measured at the national level as GDP.”

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miettawilliemk1 · 7 years ago

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5 Reasons Your SEO Consulting Project Is Failing and How to Turn It Around

5 Reasons Your SEO Consulting Project Is Failing and How to Turn It Around was originally published on BruceClay.com, home of expert search engine optimization tips.

The relationship between a business and its SEO consulting firm is a delicate balance of give and take.

In order for an SEO strategy to deliver the best results, the SEO consultant must give accurate and useful recommendations, and the client must take that guidance and implement those recommendations.

This is a team effort where the consultant solves problems and mentors the client, and the client then learns and implements.

Seems fairly straightforward, but it’s not always so.

You have no doubt experienced this in your business. A project can have great energy at the outset. But as time passes, progress can be delayed and momentum stalled for a variety of reasons.

Here’s the good news: We’ve observed that there are five common roadblocks affecting SEO consulting projects that can absolutely be surpassed — once you know how to identify and push through them. Many potential failure points can be addressed even before the project starts, for maximum results.

In this article, I’ll list five common issues that threaten an SEO consulting project’s success AND how you can overcome them:

Misaligned expectations

Time constraints

Budget constraints

Lack of SEO knowledge

Website back-end and architectural issues

What roadblocks stand in the way of your SEO consulting project’s success? We’ve seen five common types (goats not included).

1. Misaligned Expectations

Misaligned expectations are a huge reason why consultants fail with their SEO projects.

This situation leads to scope-creep and client-satisfaction issues. It often disrespects the SEO team, and sometimes disregards the client’s desires for extra services.

Some clients — especially those that are already knowledgeable about SEO — may want to retain unyielding control of their SEO project. This is understandable when you’re a company that had an SEO team and strategy in place already. Issues arise, however, when that in-house team thinks they are better than they are and the consultant is ignored.

Generally, our favorite consulting scenario involves working closely with the client’s in-house SEO team.

But sometimes conflicting efforts or opinions between the consultant and the client’s SEO team lead to mishaps. A large amount of time may be lost due to drawn-out discussion or inaction. Eventually, the project may see little success. And even worse, with two cooks in the kitchen, sometimes neither can get things done.

At the end of the day, both the SEO consultant and the client want results. The challenge for the SEO consultant is to create a list of recommendations that will have the greatest effect while aligning with the client’s expectations.

Challenges on the client’s side may be that they have no power over the IT implementation team, or their influence is weak. But once they see and evangelize results within their organization, client teams will be more receptive to future recommendations.

The SEO consultant can sometimes help their client contact make progress within their organization.

Example: A national auto service chain we consulted for had a site speed issue, but their IT department didn’t think it was a priority. IT’s lack of cooperation was hindering the project. We finally included their IT team in a conference call, where we demonstrated how much faster competitor sites were compared to their own. Soon after, our speed recommendations were implemented and that project roadblock was cleared.

Solution: Ultimately, the best way to avoid misaligned expectations is to speak candidly about each party’s role in and ideas for the SEO project. Do this up front, followed by often. Keep focus on the KPIs for the project.

Clients should be sure to communicate their major pain points and goals. And they should celebrate wins.

Meanwhile, consulting firms need to create strategies that address these pain points. Remember, an SEO consultant becomes an important part of the client’s digital marketing team.

Taking unilateral action can alienate you. Instead, create a partnership between yourself and the rest of the team, so you are working together to achieve the business’s goals.

At the end of the day, both the SEO consultant and the client want results. Click To Tweet

2. Time Constraints

Clients want the biggest bang for their buck. As such, they often don’t want to spend their staff resources to follow recommendations that appear minor or insignificant. Makes sense to me — focus on what drives the most traffic first.

For instance, clients often discount the value of editing meta tags — a page by page task that can seem time-consuming and trivial. And time consuming it is, but certainly not trivial.

Those who do see the value usually have seen positive results from optimizing titles and meta descriptions in the past. We have never seen it hurt, and almost always see solid improvement. What is especially helpful is if the client’s team understands how SEO really works at an advanced level.

Providing recommendations to a client with time constraints is difficult because, as with the budget barrier, everything must be justified in terms of the resources they are spending on the task.

Solution: Clients can request conversations, instruction and deliverables that show how SEO proves its value in terms of time commitment.

On the SEO consulting firm side, here are a few ways to justify value:

Make the recommendation and its explanation thorough. This gives a sense of confidence to the client that the work follows the best SEO practices.

Perhaps propose a proof-of-concept test that will prove the recommendations are valid.

Reference Google, Bing or other expert resources that align with the recommendations.

Have confidence in what you say and the client will, too.

Provide a comprehensive training class that shows the consulting agency’s expertise and teaches a proven methodology.

The best way to avoid misaligned client/consultant expectations is to speak candidly about each party’s role and ideas. Do this up front, followed by often. Click To Tweet

3. Budget Constraints

No one likes spending money on what they believe is useless. And let’s face it, any project that takes months to see substantial results requires a leap of faith. You just must be a believer that SEO will eventually pay off.

A microscopic focus on the ROI of every individual recommended task, however, can disrupt an SEO project. By scrutinizing the cost and return on investment of each individual task that the consultant recommends, some business clients miss the big picture.

SEO often requires that many tasks reach completion for the needle to move, and often an individual task is little more than a piece in the puzzle.

For example, budget-wary business owners might incorrectly believe that:

Editing meta tags, rewording main navigation links and other detail tasks are too time-consuming and unnecessary for SEO strategy.

Their content is fine as is, which is really very seldom the case.

Their main problem is not having enough backlinks to their site.

Since SEO success or failure results from a combination of efforts over time, it can be complicated to quantify (although some have tried to measure KPIs for SEO).

While SEO consultants understand SEO as a long-term game, client teams may not. They’re often more concerned with their monthly investment and how that translates to immediate results.

Solution: Budget-conscious clients almost always want recommendations to be justified in terms of ROI. On the client side, it’s important to remember that data analytics aren’t yet able to completely track customer journeys across the wide range of digital marketing touch points available.

SEO consultants, on the other hand, can help clients to feel more comfortable by presenting a clear, concise project plan. The consultant should be able to explain the value of each step of the SEO strategy — even when the costs and results cannot be precisely tied together.

SEO often requires that many tasks reach completion for the needle to move. Click To Tweet

4. Lack of SEO Knowledge

Many clients don’t understand the art and science of SEO — after all, it’s not their only job.

They know they have a problem with their website and want more online visibility. And they’ve hired an expert to fix these problems.

However, a client should never feel “in the dark” about what the consultant is doing on their behalf.

The expert consultant should be willing and able to explain complicated topics in an easy-to-understand manner. You, as a client, should be comfortable that you can ask questions and receive clear answers that increase your knowledge of SEO. The consultant should be able to cite credible sources like Google and Bing to give more weight to their recommendations. And if the SEO consultant refrains from using unfamiliar industry jargon to explain processes, even better!

Lack of SEO knowledge can often be at the core of other common roadblocks, such as the time and budget constraints I talked about earlier.

Solution: Besides finding an SEO consultant who is able to provide the kind of Q&A described above, clients could also become familiar with at least the basics of search engine optimization. This will help them ask the right questions and see the value of the recommendations — and help prevent the marketing consulting project from failing.

For our own SEO consulting clients, we provide formal SEO training. Each new client gets a seat in the Bruce Clay SEO Training course at the start of their project. We’ve found that providing training is one of the best and fastest ways to get a client up to speed on how SEO works and why we recommend the things we do.

5. Website Back-End and Architectural Issues

Terrible content management systems don’t discriminate.

We’ve seen some of the world’s largest brands have a content management system (CMS) that is either outdated, broken or cumbersome to use. This is a problem because SEO implementation often requires flexibility to make proper changes.

In addition, sometimes the way a site is structured or designed does not allow the SEO consultant’s recommendations to be fully implemented — and sometimes they cannot be implemented at all.

For example, sites using the Magento CMS often experience structural issues when organizing product categories. As a result, the CMS often creates duplicate content — two identical categories with links pointing to both pages. In the end, these pages compete for rankings and confuse the search engine and user experience.

What happens in cases like these is that the client usually won’t be receptive to the SEO consulting firm’s (our) recommendations because they simply can’t implement them with the current CMS in place. Understandably, the client may even get annoyed when the SEO consultant repeats the same instructions. The client often believes that there’s nothing that they can do about it.

As a result, the SEO consulting firm ends up backlogging important but not implemented SEO tasks. To-do lists for the client switch to smaller, more actionable changes that may not make as big of an impact but which reduce the friction of the project.

Solution: Discussions about the client’s CMS and potential implications to the project’s success should occur before the outset of the project. Both parties should be fully aware of what can and cannot be accomplished with their SEO consulting project within the limitations of the existing CMS.

Sometimes, the full scope of the limitation is not known until after the project begins. However, the proposed solutions should be on the table so that the client knows in advance that they may have to upgrade their CMS to fully realize SEO success.

Summary

Both the client and the SEO consulting firm want the project to succeed. So it’s in everyone’s best interests to work as a team and see results.

Unfortunately, misaligned expectations, time and budget constraints, lack of SEO knowledge and other problems may crop up. An experienced consultant can often identify the weakness and steer the project back on course.

For example, one of our clients, a beauty-products retail site, came to us with a small budget. We took them on as a client because we saw opportunity for them to expand their market. However, right away we had a scope-creep issue. They had big plans, moved fast, and wanted us to be involved in every move they made. For about two months, our analysts were working double what the contract paid for. In month three, we nailed down a project plan for the next 90 days that included goals and deliverables. Regularly we show the client this rolling 90-day plan so they know what to expect. Now, if they throw in a new request, we ask what part of next month’s project plan they’d like to table to make room.

If your SEO project seems to have stalled, you may be experiencing one of the five common roadblocks I’ve outlined for why consultants fail. Whether you represent the consulting service or the client, I hope these observations will help you to turn things around.

If you’re ready to find an SEO consultant who understands the challenges and is committed to success, contact us to request a quote — we would love to discuss how we can be a great team member.

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#5 Reasons Your SEO Consulting Project Is Failing and How to Turn It Around

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elenaturnerge · 7 years ago