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[nascensibility]

Hallo. Erm. I have...multiple announcements, I suppose. One is that the book club we established months ago, which fell to the wayside when there was an unfortunate incident at the library-

[Murder. It was murder. And she found the body. Let's move on.]

-is going to start up again. I've posted a sheet on the library doors for people to recommend books they would prefer to read and discuss. Secondly, and more importantly, I know that just about everyone has noticed the riddle the Duchess left. Far be it from me to encourage the scurrilous behaviour of questionable individuals, but those of us who have been here for some time know better - when last we were given a riddle, Wonderland was plagued by all manner of unfortunate fictional monsters.

[The late and grieved Mark Meltzer, in all his investigatory influence, has left a lingering effect on his pupil and peer, who appears steadfastly determined to solve this particular puzzle before any more beasties burst forth from the Mansion's belly.

It should be noted, dear listeners, that Evelyn is planted firmly in front of her library niche, where a good portion of the wall has been taken up by papers and notes, some of them a year old and others freshly scribed, a few bits of red string linking facts and events together. Is it the work of a professional archaeologist and researcher, or a manic conspiracy theorist?

You decide.]

I've begun compiling old notes from the last riddle and put them alongside my notes from this one in the event there are connexions. There are a number of hidden words and statements, you see- the...the most evident of these are the bolded letters that form the word "mount," the green letters that spell "closet," lower and upper letters spelling "liar" and "old," et cetera. But there- there is absolutely more to this, more than I thought there was-

[She reaches for two larger pads of paper, one of which has a series of zeroes and ones with text beneath it, the other dots and dashes accompanied by tiny notations that detail the numerological meaning of the number eight.]

There is further hidden text. Holding a finger over the word "true" in the message, there appear ten figures of three dashes and two dots, Morse code for the number eight. Over the word "cost," there are dozens upon dozens of ones and zeroes. It's a binary code!

[If she looks frightfully ecstatic, it's because she loves being smart.]

I've translated it to uncover a hidden poem which may, perhaps, raise more questions than it will answer them, but I should like everyone's input. This is something we have to solve together.

Comments

hissssssssss

[nascensibility]

Mh.

[It is a noncommittal response from someone in a noncommittal quandary, struggling to come up with the answer to a seemingly impossible riddle. Evelyn has never been nearly this perplexed, and she's seen all sorts of terrifying and confusing things in her own world, even keeping Wonderland out of the mix. Chewing on the end of her pen, Evelyn relaxes ever-so-slightly under Will's fingers. The touch serves to turn her boil into a simmer.]

Madame Librarian didn't do it without help.

[She grimaces around the pen before tucking it behind an ear and turning to face Will more directly, adjusting his shirt collar absentmindedly.]

The first time around I had an expert in puzzles refocusing my energy and making the mental leaps while I picked apart the words for clues. I can translate gibberish, but I'm not very good at interpreting it.

( ˘ ³˘)❤

[tastythoughts]

[ All factors which lead Will to believe that this isn't what it seems, even for a riddle, but his investment in pursuing riddle-related ends has been low throughout. Of much stronger interest is the heated fervor rising up from overtaxed heads over it, the jungle heat pall pressing on human skin and while Will looks forward to the first casualties to panic, these subtler designs are the sugar for his sweet tooth. ]

You must miss them for other reasons.

[ he says softly, words gilded with the acceptance that Evelyn's come to know his Real for, attracted by the vulnerable note in her voice, blood scented in the water. ]

[nascensibility]

...of course I do,

[she replies reflexively, as if there was ever a question as to the depth and breadth of her interpersonal relationships in Wonderland, as if there was the smallest chance she was not emotionally invested in the lives of a great deal of people outside her own world.

It happens by default, even when she does not mean for it to do so.]

I don't think you ever knew him, but...Mark Meltzer had been here longer than I have, longer than anyone. I didn't really have the heart to move his desk after he left.

[Evelyn taps the surface with a finger, drawing a line in the dust. She can remember one of their last conversations with such distinct clarity, as though it had happened yesterday. Cindy's drawings remain in Evelyn's dresser drawer upstairs, a memento of the loss and of Mark's legacy. For all that he had done and accomplished in an effort to save his daughter, the psychiatrist who got into Mark's head had given him a choice: execution, or the chance to be something bigger, in a form that would allow him to remain with his child.

Ultimately he had become another creature entirely, devoid of his own capacity for thought.

"She said I'd be with Cindy, Evie."

"And were you?"

"I don't know. I thought I was."

Bad things don't happen to good people, they happen indiscriminately. Mark had been nothing more than a victim of circumstance, a label given not earned in a situation over which he had no control in a desperate bid to save his daughter.]

Riddles were more his forté than mine.