unforum

[CCS]

I sent Alexa two suggestions:

1. The Met has one of the oldest known chess sets on display in the Islamic Art Center. Notably, the bishop is different than on modern sets, it is an elephant. She said she'd check it out.

2. This morning I suggested she check out the Apple store on the upper west side. This one's a bit more far-fetched. First, Broadway is the only major street that cuts a diagonal across Manhattan (the Big Apple Bishop). Second, you can start at Wall Street and head up to Lincoln Center. Follow the money, and Silicon Valley by way of New York? Also, there's an Apple store on Broadway near 67th, near Lincoln Center. The address is 1981 Broadway. Pretty close to 1975 (also a notable year in Apple history). If she paid for her latte with a five dollar bill, the barrista could have been giving her a Lincoln Center clue.

Daphne told us that the beginning was hard to pinpoint, but the end was known. We already had a bunch of clues about Apple, Jobs, and Cupertino. So the Apple store in the Big Apple sort of makes sense. The one at 1981 Broadway seems to add up.

Of course, I could just be seeing patterns in the haze, as you do.

[CCS]

Happy May Day, Searchers

[CCS]

"Pass Phrase'

[booba]

CCS said:
"I'm assuming that others here also received an update email from Alexa about a week ago."

I personally don't sign up for all the updates and stuff, just kind of rely on someone posting important items here. Lazy I know, but it kind of helps to concentrate precious free time. Please feel free to post any communiques for the benefit of all. That Alexa used "pass phrase" rather than "pass word" helps a little.
I have looked at "oxnyjcwpfblbqn" from every angle I can conceive of and still no cigar. There is a plethora of clues, but it's kind of like sorting through a big cardboard box of Legos and trying to build one particular model without knowing what the finished product should look like.
From the amount of views compared to amount of posts, people are working on this, but just don't have a lot to say (yet).

[CCS]

Alexa's email dated May 7:
Hello Fellow Searchers!


I apologized for being out of touch. As some of you know, I pretty much left college, but Daphne told me that was madness and that I shouldn't burn bridges. ​ She contacted my professors, and with her considerable influence, they allowed me to take some final exams and write some papers. Phew! Basically, I will be back in college in the fall, continuing my work as a Searcher and possible recruiting some more Searchers from among the people on campus.

Last Friday was an interesting day. I spent quite a bit of time wandering around NYC but nothing seemed to happen. Then Moira and I put our heads together and tried to make sense of some of the clues we've been given up to now. After looking at the little icon that Daphne put on the site, which reminded me of a bank, and thinking of the barista's comment "follow the money," I decided to head down to the New York Stock Exchange. Because it's a huge place with thousands of people, and I had no idea what I was looking for, I decided to sit outside with a chess board.

After almost an hour I almost gave up, when a woman walked up to me and sat down across from my board. She smiled at me, picked up a pawn, and said, "Do you like chess?"

I gestured to the board and smirked. "Obviously."

"Okay," she said, putting back the piece. "Make your move."

I had to admit I didn't know how to play, and she laughed out loud.

"A beginner," she said, "that will be useful."

"Because I'm easy to beat?"

"No, because you're difficult to predict."

I decided I was done dancing around the real question. So I asked, "Do you have a piece?"

She gave me a puzzled look, then recognition dawned on her face and she smiled and said, "I may or may not have what you're looking for."

"What do I have to do?"

"I'll tell you in a minute. The first thing you have to do is think about the big picture, and decide if you really want to continue along this path."

"What's the big picture?"

She picked up the pawn again and rolled it back and forth between her palms as she spoke, not looking at me, only looking off in the distance. "There are two sides, light and dark, white and black, just like a chess game. Good people, and bad people, on both sides. Both fighting and striving for one thing. Money and power. In order to achieve end game, you don't have to land on all sixty-four squares, but you do have to land on the right squares. You don't have to make all the right moves, but you have to do the right thing when it counts. You have to capture the right pieces at the right moment, keep your own pieces safe, and not get pinned in a corner.​ There is so much you don't yet know, but some of it is right under your nose. Remember that the labyrinth was built for a very specific purpose. The scrolls were hidden in sixty-four caves for a reason. It's all the same thing."​

"What?"

"The containment and protection of something either dangerous or valuable, and the search or quest for what is hidden, contained, protected. To kill the Minotaur you have to negotiate the labyrinth, to capture the king you have to get past the other pieces and win the game, to find the treasure you have to decipher the clues from the scrolls."

"I'm still confused," I said. "What do I have to decide?"

"Whether you want to help those who are containing the Minotaur, or whether you want to help those who are hunting and killing the Minotaur."

"Well, that clears things right up!" I said sarcastically. "What do I have to do to get a piece."

She shrugged. "I may or may not have what you want, but first I need the pass phrase."

"Pass phrase?"

"You'll know it when you see it."

[fernandocarulli]

Alexa Mail 14.7.15

[Billy Brown]

Great to have this back up and running. I went for Black; I guess it would make sense for us to get all three clues between us (although I suppose there could be multiple clues for each colour).

There are also a few new posts on Street Urchin Rainflower:

https://streeturchinrainflower.wordpress.com/2015/07/13/category-small-things/

https://streeturchinrainflower.wordpress.com/2015/07/13/welcome-back/

https://streeturchinrainflower.wordpress.com/2015/07/14/plaza/

And this link was posted on Alexa's Twitter account:

http://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/a-portrait-from-the-final-approach-to-pluto-and-charon/

[phenexfirf]

Very excited to be back. Now I need to brush off the cobwebs in my brain.
I chose Gray.

[phenexfirf]

Alexa responded to my Gray choice with the following sentence:

[fernandocarulli]

I choose white:

[booba]

Yay! This came back when it said it would. That's refreshing nowadays.

I also choose white.

Guessing that we were headed towards

[Awuke]

Protected: Museum of

[booba]

Nice password solve Awuke.

Email from Alexa:

[Billy Brown]

Some new updates to be working on including an email from Alexa and several new posts at Street Urchin Rainflower. My thoughts:

[phenexfirf]

This is an interesting one, for sure. One thing to note also is that all of these novels were adapted into films.

I am stuck trying to assign specific cities to a story (especially And Then There Were None and The Hunt for Red October, since these take place on an un-named island and a moving submarine in the ocean, respectively). Even if we do find cities, what would be the password? I doubt it would be all cities in one long string...