outsidebones | 7rings catchall

yes? but it didn't have anything important i didnt think
why

might be an idea to show you, if we're trying to keep correspondence to ourselves. you near the solarium?

sure yeah, i can be there

[ when she gets there he'll just hand her a letter: ]

Ooookay. Yeah, he - gave me something similar, now that I'm seeing yours, hold on. Less pushy, but.

[she shows hers, too.]

Dear Lup,

I am safe, as are Emet-Selch, Sylvain, and Claude. For a lot of dead people, the energy here is very spirited. Perhaps a bit too spirited, if you consider what happened with the cannibal? But I understand it. I am trying to take your advice and not take on too much, but I am eager to see you all again as well, and it imbues me with the same, restless energy.

There are not too many of you left, so be careful. Perhaps it is too much to hope that no one else will die, but I will pray for your safety all the same, my friend.

Sincerely,

Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd

[ he's tired of this twunk. ]

Yeah, I heard from Claude too. Sounds like he's trying to give us some hints, but doing it in a weirdly formal way.

Yeah. Oh - uh. Emet-Selch said he didn't see any birds where he is.

Which sounds stupid but I'm pretty sure he's saying he didn't find Aquila. Um, and Sylvain got censored.

[she shows part of sylvain's letter too, why not. You've done so much for me already. Though, I do wish I could give you a hug right now. I'm sorry for all the bad memories. Hopefully one day ██'██ ███ █ ██████ ██ ████ █████ ████ ██ ██████.]

Was he meant to be looking for them?

[ hm. ]

Wonder what the criteria is for covering things up. Either it was important, or this place is just being petty for the hell of it.

Yeah. I mean - the one in the contracts from yesterday. He's dating the person in that contract.

[as for the second part she just shrugs.]

[ .......... he looks thoughtful at that again. ]

...

[ but also like he doesn't know what he can actually say. ]

I broke into Aquila's room, so uh.

[if that helps him with his decision making in what he can say or not. she has no idea what he's debating about.]

I don't know any of the names on the contracts well enough to say. But ... is he sure?

Seems like it. [shrug.] I don't know, it's hard to tell when they're restricted. I could be wrong about my interpretation.

Yeah. Could be.

...

Lila is a girl's name, right?

Yeah, normally. [headtilt.]

There were things in her room that were off. That's all. And not just in terms of personal preferences.

...

But it's not like we can pry too deep. Not until something changes around here, at the very least.

Yeah. I figured. There were things that were off in all of their rooms.

[her ear flicks.] All we can do is keep it in mind.

That's the best thing for now, I agree.

That, and figuring out what Dimitri's getting at. I'm assuming even though it's from him it's more of a group message.

I think we need to be entertaining. Very entertaining, enough that we're the show stoppers. People can't take their eyes off us. Maybe it means the other shows are getting uh, less screentime.

Which uh, that seems to be what the staff was encouraging, too.

That seems to be what they're suggesting. And they've even helpfully provided a location to hold the party in.

[ hmm!! ]

... We don't die in there, not permanently. That's been consistent.

(no subject)

evocationary - 2022-07-20 17:12 (UTC) - Expand

(no subject)

ashenvaliant - 2022-07-20 17:17 (UTC) - Expand

Did you get a letter from Hope? I'm struggling to understand it, and I was hoping you might have the cipher.

i did
it was very sweet but i'm sure it has info in it so here let me type it up

Lup,

You probably didn't hear me say it, of course, but thank you for trying to send that gift. I legitimately appreciated the thought you put into making sure we were able to defend ourselves. Even if it did work, though, I was probably a poor choice to send it to... to be honest, I might have ended up hurting myself more than anything.

But I digress.

Something I've noticed over the past few weeks is that you truly have a talent for befriending others, and I admire your ability to keep people's spirits up even in these dark times. However, I also know that being the light for your friends might mean your own starts start to dim. Please take care of yourself as the weeks continue on. We can't have yours go out.

Yours,
Hope Estheim

P.S. Don't worry, Claude's portion of the message wasn't entirely necessary; what you and Harrowhark got was the important part. His was more... flavor text, in a manner of speaking.]

I'm not so sure. I've tried a few ciphers I know, but none are working. I'm worried the redacted part is what would help me understand it.

Harrowhark,

I'm glad you and Lup were able to figure out my message. Of course, I knew I could trust you to be able to read between the lines.

:)

Of course, it's very unlikely that we'll be able to continue using the same tricks for very long before certain other parties catch on, so I'm not so sure about using it again. And, unfortunately, the answer to your question is no.

Like I said before, though, I have faith in you being able to put two and two together. You've come so far, and while I sincerely hope to see you again sooner rather than later, I pray it isn't because you wake up here this upcoming Sunday. And, whatever the onus for your actions... I'm sure you had your reasons. I don't hold it against you.

AZQARFTQ███████
█████████TAEFEI
METQDQIUFTGERAD
MITUXQNGFFTMFIM
EWUZPARMNMPUPQM

For this, I turn to you.

Yours,
Hope Estheim

oh this is no good
bad at ciphers normally! even worse when they're censored!

I'm excellent at ciphers but I have had no luck codebreaking.