[Ciara] Date: Evening of Thursday, April 22 (Tokyo) / Morning of Thursday, April 22 (Orono) Subject: Followup on Findings To: Katie Andrews, Kaede Takeuchi, Kyon Sorata, Wataru Yamada (encrypted e-mail) I'm attaching a scan of the letter to Hideo that talks about the setup for the ritual (I still have the actual letter and will be bringing it back with me when I return), as well as some photos of the room that I took a few days ago. To the best of my knowledge, everything looks the same as it did after Kaede, Akemi, and I left it. (Kaede, would you please confirm?) For scale, the diagram is about large enough to sit inside. Also, please let me know when you think it's safe to share these with Haruko. Satoshi [N.B. This is the same text as in Sessions 160 and 175; I'm just reposting it here for convenience.] [The first attachment is a scan of a letter, typewritten and in English, that reads the following:] ["The requested service is now completed and one building in each of the listed states is available for your purposes. Only ones you settle near for months will be stable enough. Since you insisted on one per state, Portland would have been preferable, but your commercial competitors saw to it that you would not have a permanent foothold there. If you are reading this, I hope you enjoy the winters as much as I did."] ["The candlelit preparations in your leased room are complete, if the room is remodeled or otherwise significantly disrupted, than so are the preparation. To attune this space and stable it, after having lived nearby, follow the outline I laid out downstairs. It will function best if you have a compatriot to field (the word is underlined) the problem. However, a meditative night may serve the same function, if not as pleasantly. I make no promises that the other buildings will remain available once you have attuned one. My debt is paid, farewell."] [There are also several scanned Polaroid photographs of the ritual diagram: a Pentacle with missing sections is on the floor of a storage room. There are wax drippings at some of the interesction points. Ten half-burned candles lie around the room, some lying on their sides, along with a few broken pieces of chalk.] --- [Ardweden] (encrypted e-mail) From: Katie Andrews To: Satoshi Watanabe, Kaede Takeuchi, Kyon Sorata, Wataru Yamada Date: Morning of Friday, April 23 (Tokyo) / Evening of Thursday, April 22 (Orono) Subject: Re: Followup on Findings Thanks for the scan & photos. I'll try to find some time to look through Kyon's books & see what I can figure out, but I'm not really an expert on this stuff. Kyon or Wataru are probably better bets. Or Kaede even, because of the ritual stuff I think he might be working on. idk basically I'm the worst. Still, I'll try to try. Thanks! The letter is mysterious. So that's a major ally over in the United States who also knew what was going on, but? Not many Arcana survived the bomb & the Reversed looked like they were in a similar place. So it's either someone who isn't Arcana or a survivor. Either way the options are limited. Hopefully Wataru will be able to read something off of the original letter when you come home for summer. About Haruko, she's asking Taki to tell everyone about what happened & in more detail. I'd wait until after Taki sends that email and then let Haruko know about it privately & ask her not to share with Taki because you're worried about what she might do with it. This way Haruko won't know I've been talking to you guys about it & it's honest so you don't have to lie. But Haruko's never been the real problem here. She might even be able to help with containing Taki, depending. Katie --- [Rowyn] From: Kaede Takeuchi To: Satoshi Watanabe, Katie Andrews, Kyon Sorata, Wataru Yamada Date: Evening of Friday, April 23 (Tokyo) / Morning of Friday, April 23 (Orono) Subject: Re: Followup on Findings (encrypted e-mail) It was definitely an odd scene. One of which Shiraishi-san wanted to get away from as quickly as possible. Thankfully, we didn't need her for a secondary field. I don't believe we found out who the letter was from exactly, correct, Watanabe-san? World was suspected but I don't recall if it was ever verified or not. In any case, the fact that it was important enough that it was passed down generationally... The woman who gave it to us had no way of knowing any Watanabe, including Hideo or Takeshi, but recognized him regardless. This implies that it was important enough to be passed down. I have to do some archive diving again to find the whole listing which occurred, once I'm sure my computer is stablized. Remind me never to access the internet from a Tower Reversed again. There's another possibilty. What prompted all of this is you stated that Jin brought you there, correct? And the Tower was being used by Temperance? We are going under the presumption that the letter is ancient or that all of these were set in place for some time, but clearly there is some maintenance here. Given what we know of Temperance, it's fully possible none of the information we are getting (especially those of Mundanes) is accurate. And if that's true, I don't want to really think of the implications of what that means for our investigative skills. Not saying this is likely. Just something we should keep well in mind. i sent out another thread just a moment ago. People should definitely look into it. This whole situation is a mess as usual. -Takeuchi out --- [Ciara] Date: Evening of Friday, April 23, 2004 (Tokyo) / Morning of Friday, April 23 (Orono) To: Kaede Takeuchi, Katie Andrews, Kyon Sorata, Wataru Yamada Subject: Re: Re: Followup on Findings (encrypted e-mail) Remember that the building manager did have the photo of Hideo, so she had something to work from given my... strong family resemblance. If she follows local sports, I'll bet I've been mentioned in the paper a few times. Even if there was no reason for her to put two and two together before then, my name's uncommon enough in America (especially Maine) that she might have just gone "hmm, Watanabe, like the letter." So that kept it in the front of her mind. The letter certainly seems authentic, age-wise. So did the photo (which I will get a copy of). I mean, sure, it's possible that Temperance planted stuff and messed with the lady's memories (and she may have done the latter anyway just for getting in and out of the building) but there's not really a reason for her to do it. If Jin hadn't brought me there, I wouldn't have known the place existed at all. I had absolutely no reason to go to that particular building. I didn't feel mysteriously drawn to it or anything. It was just a building. Why have me find out about something that probably works to their advantage if I don't know about it? ...unless it does work to their advantage that I know about it. Like if it's keyed to me, and they need me to stabilize it for some reason? I don't know. We can chase theories around all day. I'll bring the letter back when I return and we can verify it then. In the meantime, you guys can do the mystical research and I'll keep an eye on things here just in case something changes or comes up. I'm not sure I've thanked you guys for helping me out with this yet. I know I probably don't need to, but I want to. So, thank you. This is kind of a hard thing for me, because I feel like I'm asking without being able to offer that much in return, but I really, really appreciate it. And Katie, you are totally not the worst. :) Satoshi P.S. Regarding Haruko and Taki, I'll wait a few days for a response, and then I'll send out the information to Haruko. It's good advice. Thanks. P.P.S. I'll look at the other thread soon; it's a bit later than I realized and I have to get to class. --- [Capfox] Date: Evening of Friday, April 23, 2004 (Tokyo) / Morning of Friday, April 23 (Orono) To: Kaede Takeuchi, Katie Andrews, Satoshi Watanabe, Wataru Yamada Subject: Re: Re: Followup on Findings (encrypted e-mail) First: don't need to thank us. Better to let us know about this, anyway. Might be over there, but you're still on our team. So we'll help. Second: Took a look at the photos. What they used's not a spread I'm familiar with. But I do have some resources. I'll look into it. Someone's trying to set up something, sounds like they know enough about it to pull whatever it is off, so now we just need to match. Could make some guesses, but better to be sure. I'll check in again once I've looked through things. Sorata