Whistleblower

Your genius should be bottled! Traumatic head wounds for all! :joy:

But… it makes me wonder if there are others like Whistler on the inside who, perhaps, are experiencing a weakening of their brain drain.

3 Likes

There very well could be!! Though how would we ferret them out?

1 Like

I hate this time zone difference! Apologies for the rambling post that follows:
I agree with pretty much everything that’s been said. I’m wondering if they haven’t targeted Marty because they’ve been so busy trying to find Aether. Or maybe they’re just not worried about him because they know they can mind wipe anyone they like…
Whistler needs to be given some direction before he does something crazy. There is the risk that all of this is a trap but otherwise we’re just flying around in a holding pattern not getting anywhere. Let’s tell him some more… What’s happened to him is so weird that he might not be too surprised at anything we share with him. Should we meet with him?
Knowing where the shuttle picks up and drops off would be good as well. I’m not for bashing everyone on the head but what about the driver?
Kidding - not into violence really - but I keep wondering if the driver is also zombiefied or one of the bad guys.
As for Climber. She went willingly but that might just mean that she knew she would lose if she resisted. She may not have any freedom to do anything. Maybe if Whistler could find and free her/Portencia they could help themselves?

8 Likes

Is there some way we could sabotage the shuttle system to get Whistler out of there and extricate a whole bunch of other people?

Someone with greater back story knowledge than I - @Revenir maybe - we need a list of everything we can be sure KS knows of us. That’s the limit of what we can tell Whistler. Then we tell them, and support them to get them safe. I’d rather not lose more people to this.

What is Climber doing? That’s an excellent question. The answer might, sadly, be that Climber can’t remember to do anything at all. If KS are happy to continually wipe their staff, I doubt they’re leaving much of their captives intact.

There have to be long term side effects to daily memory wiping. I wonder what their staff turnover rate is. Do they need temps? Volunteers?

6 Likes

@MissEvans even if we could sabotage the shuttle I don’t think getting everyone out of there would be enough to break whatever has their memories scrambled/distorted/erased/edited after all it took an accident involving a car and his noggin to jar Whistler out of his stupor. But I agree there does have to be long term side effects to manipulating another person’s mind…like the longer the manipulation the less you remember or the leas likely you are to come back to reality? (Wasn’t Augie’s mind distorted/manipulated? And look what happened when we returned just a fraction of it :frowning: )

4 Likes

Yes, the getting them out of there would get them out of there. Sorry for the tautology. If they are away from that influence, they’re safe. Depleting their staff numbers can only benefit us, too.

2 Likes

So, the unfortunate truth is that we’re not sure exactly what KS knows about us. I’m pretty sure they know something, but we can’t entirely be sure what. Regardless, here’s a rough timeline of things that have happened so far that are related:

  • Early October - Recruits find the Forest of Darkening Glass website and contacted by the Devoted. Using materials stolen from Brandon Lachmann’s backpack, they guide us partially through Brandon’s journey out of this world.
  • Late October - We are contacted by Reader who tells us that a large, sinister group has spread through The Devoted like a virus, and has corrupted their leader, Sacha.
  • Late November - Reader tells us The Devoted have disbanded and Sacha had “been brought into the fold’ and her work with The Devoted was done.”
  • Early December - Recruits encounter the Kemetic Solutions logo for the first time, within The Cagliostro’s email server. Nothing can be found about the company.
  • Late March - Aether leads us to Kemetic Solutions - the second time we’d heard the company name.
  • Mid April - Aether’s livestream includes clips of Brandon Lachmann’s stolen materials, the same ones from Fragment Four.
  • Late April - Aether reveals Teddy’s logs, including one about the Lachmann Project. The date the Lachmann project was started unknown.

And, that’s more or less what we’ve experienced. There’ve been theories about KS being the shadow group that took over the Devoted (and thus how they obtained the Lachmann materials) or that they were part of the cult of the Cagliostro but the truth is, we don’t know. The most we’ve really encountered has come from Fragment Ten onwards.

My guess is that they at least know what The Low does - that we’re a group being public about magiq. They may even know about the BoB. If Sacha is indeed with KS now, then they most definitely know about our forum and what happened in Fragment Four. Whether they know about our involvement with Aether is another story - though it’s entirely possible they don’t, given they seem pretty frantic right now.

7 Likes

Yes but once we get them out of there then what? We hold them until their memories return to normal? If their memories return at all… :confused: if simply removing them from the situation was enough to negate the effects of what’s happening to them then wouldn’t KS simply keep them at the “office” as opposed to letting them shuttle to and from?..unless the shuttling to and from/allowing them to go home provides enough of a time span to negate any negative effect manipulating their minds might cause… Hmmm very curious…

3 Likes

So maybe we need to turn this on it’s head.
Maybe we tell Whistleblower everything. If KS find out, the truth might freak them out further. Then they get irrational enough for us to find a hole in their defences.

Vs. My instinct for safety.
And I’m still worried about Aether now they have the hounds out on him.

6 Likes

If Whistler turned out to not be so trust worthy or was found out after we gave him information about what we know it very well could work them into a tizzy…which could be exactly what is needed to keep Aether safe…permitting we exclude the knowledge of Aether from the information we give to Whistler that way of he is found out or turns out to be a spy, either way KS might turn all of their attention towards us…we could act as a decoy of sorts! Even if it doesn’t expose a hole for us it might expose one for Aether! :slight_smile:

5 Likes

So what we need to do is give Whistler a small amount of important information that will have a large impact on him, but not enough of an impact an Aether or us to cause a problem?

6 Likes

What should I tell him?

2 Likes

From what he’s said so far, he’s barely getting his head around the idea that it’s some sort of technological brainwashing. But I agree, if we are going to enlist his help with whatever we do we might have to tell him more than he knows right now. Not everything, but enough to make sure he trusts us and understands the stakes of all this.

8 Likes

What if we tell him what we know about the kidnappings and the experiments they’ve been running on people? That’s a pretty significant secret that he is likely to believe and it isn’t a lie. We can tell him that our other informant was someone they had been experimenting on that escaped, and we know that the experiments involved The Chair. I feel like this would be enough of a brief on the dangers that KS poses, a big enough reveal to satisfy his curiosity, a motivation for him to work towards bringing them down, and possibly jog more of his memory about how he was involved in the experiments around The Chair and what it was.

11 Likes

I agree with @Mr.Fern; we should disclose that we know about human experimentation and that we’re looking for ways to stop it, after coming in contact with a survivor from those experiments (our informant [Aether], whom we’ve already disclosed the existence of to Whistler). Given his current fragility, we should definitely focus on technological, rather than supernatural explanations for what he has seen. In that vein, I would like to reiterate my idea of posing as human rights activists, which is totally plausible.

10 Likes

Just what @Augustus_Octavian said.

4 Likes

I agree with all the things that have been said.

3 Likes

Yeah, I agree with Augustus and Mr. Fern. Focus on the human rights aspect, frame it as human experimentation on patients being held against their will. KS certainly wouldn’t be the first to dabble in that. If they can accept the brainwashing thing, then they might also be ready to know that Aether has a special gift with technology, though they don’t need to know it’s from a magiqal source.

5 Likes

I concur with everyone with what is said.

2 Likes