video + text » shortly after sam's post;

[memorari]

[ before clara speaks, she cracks her knuckles. this is big news and big business, so she speaks crisply, ]

Alright then, so, for those of you watching the network, Mr. Winchester was nice enough to sound the alarm on subnetwork shenanigans.

At first, all you see is a cryptic-ish message, complete with a signature from our favorite shady benefactor. [ ☺ ]

[ She copy/pastes the original clues for reference. ]

☺
SUCH IS THE APPEARANCE OF THE BLACKBIRDS.
SCYLLA TURNED BACK; SHE DARED NOT TRUST HERSELF FAR OUT AT SEA
HERE ARE THE GRAVES OF THE CHILDREN OF IPHIMEDEIA AND ALOEUS.

It's all very literary and Greek — as was discussed. To make long story short, all the hints point to Anthedon, a town in ancient Greece and, more relevant to us space cadets, one of Alexandria's moons. Both Homer and Pausanius wrote about it — the old town, that is — Pausanias moreso. I think it was the farthest port, which makes sense in the context of the clues. No idea about the blackbirds, although I'd wager the two names at the end were mythological heroes or something of that sort. See Sam's post for more on the underlying meaning, if you put stock in that stuff. [ said as if she does, tyvm. ]

Anyway, I'm Clara Oswald, and I want to talk about the transmission that comes after you pop this buzzword in. I've transcribed it as best I can below, for convenience's sake. Of course, you can listen to it yourself, if you like.

[ in clara's transcription 'deep off-mike thumping' is LOUD CREEPY NOISE you're welcome. ]

UNKNOWN AUDIO LOG [LIVE FEED]

W: ░▓▓▒▒▓▒an’t keep this up forever. Th▒▓▓▓ ooking for you.

R: Watch me.

W: Hidi▓▒▒ will only ▒▒▒▓▓▓░▓t worse. ▓░▓▓▓▒▒▒▒░▓░░nly do so much to—

R: I can onl▓▒▒▒▒░ so much.

W: What are you going to ░▓▓▒▒▓▓▓▒▒en the ship st▓▓▓▒▒▒▒▓▓░░▓▓▓▓▓▓ damage contr▓▒▒▒?

R: If you want to take ove▒▓▓░░▓▓y guest.

[ DEEP OFF-MIC THUMPING ]

W: ▓▒▒’ll talk about this later.

So, we all agree that the woman is Resnik and the man is Ward, right? Any other thoughts?

[ aaand she pings THE DOCTOR because he's the smartest guy she knows. ]

Comments

[andblockbuster]

My theory about them running a death cult still stands.

[memorari]

[ okay, she offers a small, amused smile at that. ]

Slightly off-center, but still a possibility, I suppose.

[functioningperfectly]

The words "damage control" aren't particularly comforting.

[memorari]

Better to know they were said, as disquieting as they are.

[not here, and with apologies]

[ryuuzaki]

[He isn't sure that there will ever be another list, nor is he sure of whether or not being on it is a good thing, but this is certainly a way to draw attention to yourself. That, in itself, doesn't seem to be a good practice here, not in the long run.

When his frown clears, L follows the comments with detached interest.]

video.

[unsoldiered]

... Well, that sounds pretty damn ominous.

Damage control; wonder if they mean whatever happened in the 19th jump.

video.

[memorari]

It makes sense. I have a theory they found trouble and engaged the double-jump as a sort of failsafe. Doesn't quite work with the Lone Ranger about, but... [ she finishes her sentence with a shrug. ]

video.

[avengeful]

Iphimedeia and Aloeus were actually husband and wife in ancient mythology... and uncle and niece. [Thank you, Freshman English.] Odysseus ran into Iphimedeia during is journey through the Underworld.

[also she got pregnant once by splashing ocean water on her naughty bits

greeks are weird]

Apparently she, uh, had a thing for her grandfather.

[... ancient greeks, man]

video.

[memorari]

Human Encyclopedia Sam Winchester, very handy. [ forget brittanica, man. ]

Do you remember anything about their kids?

video;

[cargojet]

Solving the ancient greek bullshit is all very well, but there's no point if you're gonna take the clues as standalone. We're being told a story, and it's up to us to construct the whole narrative outta what we get.

Course it doesn't help much that you and Mr. Winchester haven't been around so long--I keep forgetting that. There's a lot of information you sorta absorb just from being around here this long. [ Nathan rubs his chin, shakes his head. ]

video;

[memorari]

You mean all the clues together, the clues and the transmission, or everything that's been happening, as of late?

[ she offers a small smile. ] Good thing we have you then, yeah?

[ex_inventive578]

"Loud creepy noise"? Bit of transcription bias, there.

[ also thanks and good job. probably. ]

[memorari]

My bias is well-founded.

[ use your words, doctor. ]

voice »

[unparental]

It's them, all right.

[ :| :| :|

jenna hates all three of them trust no npc bitch, that's her take. ]

voice »

[memorari]

You're not a fan, I take it. [ not that most people are — though smiley has some supporters. ] Have you spoken to any of them?

text.

[kringlefuck]

So much for getting a good nights rest.

Um. But ive had a chinwag or two with our supposed leaders of this ship.. back when were stopped to refuel at a station which was a horrifying experience in and of itself. They seemed moderately harmless but i didnt trust them in the least.

_{[ Jake's horrible at reading people and the air between them. ]}

Im not precisely certain what to think of the message however. It would help a decent amount if we could make out the rest of it.

_{[ no shit. ]}

text.

[memorari]

My thoughts exactly.

How long has it been since you spoke to them? A vague approximation is fine.

[voice]

[yardbird]

Kinda convenient that somebody would have a recording of that... [But fuckit, Murphy will take what he can get.]

Maybe the skipped jump wasn't so accidental as I'd figured.

[voice]

[memorari]

That's what I think, too. I can't say I'm one-hundred percent certain this is a recent recording, but it fits, all things considered.

The ship finds trouble, the crew reacts accordingly — and we double-jump to relative safety.

video

[refusing]

[Well. All of this sure is...somewhere right in the middle of horrifying and fascinating.]

This all goes way over my head, but -

[But she wants to help. She's never been all that book smart, never has known her mythology or her Greek literature, or anything like that. And clearly, she's not good with technology like Clara is. So she feels beyond useless in all of this. But Clara's told her a way she can help, and she knows that she needs to take it.]

Damage control? So does that mean the jump everyone's going on out about missing might not've been an accident after all? Or do you think all this doesn't have anything to do with that?

video

[memorari]

If we could pinpoint the time of the recording, I could give you a better answer. [ she frowns. she wants to ask questions, hundreds of questions, but there's no-one to ask. ]

[ still, she sticks with her first theory. ] I think it's recent, though, and that the double-jump was definitely a fail-safe of some sort.

[askedtobe]

Part that interests me the most is what they mean by 'damage control.'

[memorari]

Here's to hoping they don't mean the ship is deteriorating.

video »

[oikodomae]

[ well that is certainly problematic. ]

They sound worried about the ship. [ which ding ding ding definitely pings a lot of other things she's been thinking about. ] What do you think they mean by damage control?

video »

[memorari]

Either the ship was damaged and needed fixing or they're worried about what we could do and their reputation — or, the other oh nineteens needed to be kept quiet or — I have a lot of theories, at this point.

text » late triple tap ahoy

[starked]

Damage control is always such an awesome thing to hear.

[ tony no. ]

text » aaand late triple reply

[memorari]

Really brightens the day, right?

[ but will he say anything useful. that is the question. ]

voice »

[surrogates]

Depends on who we're talking about when it comes to blackbirds. But— [ excuse the loud rustling noise in the background. ] Greeks actually liked blackbirds.

voice »

[memorari]

So, the appearance of blackbirds is a good thing, but the blackbirds are too far away. The Scylla wanted to go to them "but did not trust herself far out at sea"?

video »

[suit]

Did they actually talk about it later? [ a beat. ] And if she's hiding and he's not but we can't find either of them, where are they hiding.

[ there's also the comment of damage control tho but gonna side step that one for now. ]

video »

[memorari]

Unless the loud, creepy noise got them, I imagine they did. [ a small grimace. ]

Probably in a a part of the ship we're unfamiliar with.

text; sorry this is so long

[extrospector]

i don't know much about greek mythology but here's what i've got.

maybe i'm going about this the wrong way but a lot of the facts don't line up. resnik is hiding from someone/something, but two/actually three jumps ago ward killed all those pirates so the outside world couldn't find out about us. assuming this is actually the reason he killed them and not just for fun the question is WHY? what are they trying to hide from the outside world??

ok because:
1. obviously the outside world knows the ship exists. every jump our location changes by a lot, right? i don't know anything about the physics behind this but that's what i'm guessing. so it can't be the location.
2. the ship is driving itself. we can't even control the location and nobody has any idea where we're going. knowing the location isn't going to help anyone find us. also we are somehow magically avoiding anywhere we could possibly be found despite being "wanted" which is probably a lot of places.

so it's not the existence and it's probably not the location.

i guess maybe we have a preprogrammed flight path and if someone knows where we are now there's a risk they could figure out where we will be in the future? but if we had a preprogrammed flight path someone would have figured out where to find us already i mean it's been 40 years that's a lot of time in the technology world. also that would mean ward and resnik know where we're going and aren't telling us which is also a possibility.

anyway location is still doubtful. so what do they need to stop the outside world from finding out about us, and why would the outside world finding out be bad?

also do we know what the loud creepy noise actually is?

text;

[memorari]

If you've been keeping up with Mr. Nineteen, his admissions might shed some light on this whole thing.

According to him, as far as anyone from Pasiphae knows, the intended purpose of the ship was colonization, not intergalactic kidnapping. He didn't even know about grav couches or jumps until he showed up here (and he's no southern bumpkin). There was a lot of media coverage for the ship when it first set off, but that centered around Gallagher. Joe hasn't heard of Ward or Resnik until now, either. Maybe they hijacked the ship and they don't want word getting out that the ship still exists. If the ship is, as Joe said, believed to be a lost cause so much that people laugh at the idea of finding it, then our absent leaders can do whatever they want.

We're avoiding most people because of the rate we're traveling, jumping all over the place, though the pirates did find us. I'd wager we're far away from the colonized areas, at this point, especially since this ship was apparently meant to go to an uninhabited place.

I think they want to keep our final destination a secret as well.

Also, no idea, but it sounds like a banging or thumping to me. Maybe something found them or fell to the ground.

voice;

[leaps]

That's them. Both of them.

[ resnik why you ducking his calls. ]

If they're fighting that can't mean anything good.

voice;

[memorari]

[ clara frowns, though sulu can't see it. ]

Maybe it means one of them will join our side. Whatever our side is.