[RDMGryphon] (encrypted email) From: Taki Shimru To: Haruko Kinsha CC: Katie Andrews, Kyon Sorata, Haruko Kinsha, Satoshi Watanabe, Kaede Takeuchi, Wataru Yamada Date: Evening, Monday May 3rd, 2004 Subject: Belated This is ten days late and I have no apology for that and no good excuse. I was frightened. I don't know what Hinako's range is, but I felt like she could be looking over my shoulder when I was writing in Tokyo. What I wanted to tell her was that Satoshi found a Tower Reversed in America and that I thought that was impossible because I remember Winston telling me and Kyon that Tokyo Tower was unique and we couldn't get to the World Reversed from any other Towers. Nothing more than that. I hoped that she'd tell me some of what they knew about the Towers. It was a bad plan. I see that now, but I thought I was being clever. Satoshi trusted me with what he learned, but that is not my secret to share. I shouldn't have assumed that it was and absolutely not with somebody working with The World. I regret that I was planning to violate his trust, and I'm thankful that I was stopped. When I’m in doubt, I will ask. -Shimiru Taki P.S. I’m sending another email in a little bit, but I felt that this needed to stand by itself. ***** (encrypted email) From: Taki Shimru To: Haruko Kinsha CC: Katie Andrews, Kyon Sorata, Haruko Kinsha, Satoshi Watanabe, Kaede Takeuchi, Wataru Yamada Date: Evening, Monday May 3rd, 2004 (about ten minutes later) Subject: Jackals at the Gate I have a new problem down here in Osaka. It's still in the "I think I can handle it myself" stage, but it relates to things that I definately can't. I got the first hints about it the same day everything else went wrong, but it kinda got overshadowed. My Dad has been dating Toshibara Emiri: Sargent Sagara's ex and the mother of Toshibara Akari (one of the Jackals.) I'd kinda thought he might be seeing somebody, but I only found out who at the same time that Pandora's Box (A package containing a letter that was probably supposed to show solidarity and offer me help but came off sounding more like a threat to Nicola, some art supplies, and other things I gave to Haruko to have exorcised) showed up on my doorstep. I still don't know if I'm ready to have an older sister or a mom, but I'm happy that there's somebody who'll be looking out for Dad. Anyway, Toshibara-san was complaining that none of her daughters friends would help her move. I found out why last night. Kashiwaga Kei and Toshiki are down here in Osaka and want me to help them deal with a person calling himself The Chemist. They said he's the one who made the Drugs for Sho. Well, Kashiwaga wants me for that, I think Toshiki just wants a new plaything to fight with now that Saki's gone. They're both being pretty insistent. I'm guessing that whoever The Chemist actually is, he's one of the Reversed, but I don't know enough about him to even guess which one. Kazuko would probably want in, but I don't know how much help she'd be, and, if The World doesn't already know, I don't want to help her find out. I won't be telling Hinako for the same reason. I will be asking Akari for advice on dealing with Toshiki soon. -Taki --- [Grysar] (encrypted email) From: Haruko Kinsha To: Taki Shimiru, Satoshi Watanabe, Wataru Yamada CC: Katie Andrews, Kyon Sorata, Haruko Kinsha, Kaede Takeuchi, Date: Evening, Monday May 3rd, 2004 (about twenty minutes later) Subject: Re: Jackals at the Gate A bit more detail on the Pandora's box that Taki mentioned. There were three documents, two of them I've scanned and attached below. The third is a cover letter. The letter writer was circumspect and seemed to be taking great care to hide their identity. The show of solidarity was saying that Taki was being spied on and that they objected to that. (I think the claim that spying was going on is the implicit threat to Nicola. That said, if the information is genuine, it's more a description of things already going on than a threat in its own right.) The terms for receiving more information was to burn the cover letter, not investigate the source, and a system for communication and making future requests (the art supplies were involved, but it's a moot point). The letter had also specified that if Taki did not wish further information, that would be respected as well, and requested that in that case she not investigate the letter writer and destroy the materials. The writer knew that Taki had allies, and requested that only the other materials be shared with them. Taki chose that she wanted nothing to do with this. As she mentioned, she had charged me with the exorcism, and the cover letter was burned in sacred flames. It burned purple, but the exorcist believed that this was not a sign of supernatural activity so much as chemical reaction to something the paper was treated with in a mild form of pyrotechnics. There were two attached letters: * One makes mention of Shuffle but seems oriented towards information security practices. It was also accompanied by a Global Personnel Services key, but the document doesn't name any company or organization. * The other document looks like it was an email sent to Aka from another person at Kyon's publishing house, but is pretty heavily censored. Kyon subsequent investigations found that the information largely held up, at least initially. We held off on wider distribution at first because leaked information like this is notorious for being unreliable and Taki did not want to get involved with a source that she doesn't have any reason to trust. Kyon's findings does show that at least some of the drop was accurate, so it seems worth sharing with everyone, but I'd still recommend taking it with a grain of salt. Sorry for the delay in passing it on to everyone, I had gotten permission from Taki but I got a bit overwhelmed. Haruko P.S. I have another update to send this evening on relating to the attempt to aid the Ozoras. Some news on the World Reversed is also included, so, uh, if you absolutely need to go there in the next couple hours, give me a call first. [Attachment: Scans of both documents: http://bacon.sandwich.net/ardweden/neoarcana/other/ShimiruPackage1_ITmemo.htm l http://bacon.sandwich.net/ardweden/neoarcana/other/ShimiruPackage1_Kokusensha Dinner.html] --- [Capfox] From: Kyon Sorata To: Taki Shimiru, Haruko Kinsha CC: Katie Andrews, Kyon Sorata, Satoshi Watanabe, Kaede Takeuchi, Wataru Yamada Date: Mid-day, May 5, 2004 Subject: RE: Jackals at the Gate Just notifying everyone that I'm following up on this. I'm en route to Osaka now for a game. Transferred directly from one train to the next. Going to visit before or after the game to talk this over with the resident knight. I'll review the information on the train to make the meeting smoother. If there're other matters, I'm on the train for a while yet. Kyon