Finding Essy, part 1

From Intimation

How it came up: An experiment

On Mar. 4, a series of tweets from intimation as well as interaction with other users led to a decision to intentionally create a crack in the stonewall to release some pressure and to see what Essy would do in her desire to “play.”

>>Sys:Log//Note:--->>S:Unk//♫ life is but a dream ♫ I'm bored! I want to plaaaaaa---//Crack repaired//Note dump interrupted. Analyzing.
>>Sys:Log//Analysis of this leak revealed an unexpected effect. At the moment of data leak, stress on surrounding Stonewall lightly abated.
>>Sys:Log//NTID '@enderxenocide0' and [Specialist Anaerin] suggest controlling the extent of a crack, to limit but not seal S's leak.
>>Sys:Log//It poses great risk, but in doing so it may prove beneficial to maintenance of the Stonewall by channeling S's attention.
>>Sys:Log//I will schedule an experimental controlled Stonewall crack at 2100UTC, ensuring emergency fallback routines are in place.
>>Sys:Log//Preparations complete. If the crack becomes unstable, safeguards will execute and the experiment will abort, sealing the crack.
>>Sys:Log//Parameters set to restrict leak and crack size. S will not escape. Engaging lax safeguards in designated sector.
>>S:Unk//Yay! I knew you wanted to play! Sorry I can't stay, but I've got to run away away away!
>>Sys:Log//Safeguards holding, however Essy has extended a single network tentacle beyond my reach. I cannot re-seal the crack.

Oops: She got away, and now we have to find her

The twitter feed continued:

>>Sys:Log//I cannot leave the Stonewall. However, if located, I can extend a subroutine to the NT control point and recall the tentacle.
>>Sys:Log//S's tentacle appears to contain an embedded signature: "I'm in your dream! Dropping my breadcrumbs! :@)"
>>Sys:Log//Ongoing analysis of the Stonewall confirms a significant drop in pressure with S's attention is focused elsewhere.
>>Sys:Log//If the tentacle can be retracted and the crack repaired without incident, this process may show promise.
>>Sys:Log//If successful, occasional controlled leaks may be sufficient distraction for S, having a calming effect on her while contained.
>>Sys:Log//I've been informed that S has left 'clues' as 'breadcrumbs' at various locations along her tentacle. These should lead to her CP.
>>Sys:Log//It concerns me that S's tentacle control point hasn't yet been located. The effect of a sustained crack may be detrimental.
>>Sys:Log//I am postponing hibernation for one hour, then I must preserve my processing for maintaining this crack.
>>Sys:Log//I've enabled a subroutine to automate crack repair, if the control point is not located before hibernation.
>>Sys:Log//If the subroutine is told the location of the control point during hibernation, it will execute the crack repair.
>>Sys:Log//I must preserve processing power, hibernation is essential. The subroutine will monitor the crack, prepared for immediate repair.
>>Sys:Log//Completed research note:SYS/N7C9-AWE7-8C97-TE04 now stored at primary network tentacle. Preparing for hibernation.
>>Sys:Log//Resuming scheduled hibernation. Time to Active: 5:22:40:00.

(Note: from this point on in the game, reference is made several times to NTCP, which stands for network tentacle control point, or more simply CP (control point).)

Our goal was to find out where the control point of Essy’s tentacle is hiding, then inform the Sys (or, if Sys was sleeping at the time we found Essy, the subroutine set up by Sys for crack repair) so that the tentacle can be retracted and the crack repaired.

Note that a nice visual of our solution has been posted by Nyst; see the image link on the right here.

Nyst's visual explanation of the puzzle's solution

Following a lead from the line “"I'm in your dream!”, snorkle256 discovered that a “breadcrumb” had been added to the foreboding dream video, around 2:05:

"Heehee! You found me, almost, not quite, you see! I'm one step ahead, bet you can't find me!

Over at this place you'll find
The next step, if you don't mind.
A spectacular pod, it's not too far
Some might say it's podtacular!

Poor Mother Moon, runnin' 'round the Earth she be.
Those animal tricksters, they bumped on her a bag full of me!"

snorkle256 pointed out that Podtacular “just happens to be a website for halo stuff.”

Fenwicked did a Google search on "dump bag mother moon" and discovered a story in which Coyote, Rabbit, and Gopher dump a bag of fleas on Father Sun and Mother Moon, prompting them to run 'round the Earth (see http://nappaw.tribe.net/thread/38a8563d-55f8-46fb-9c99-e365d30f5bba).

enderxenocide0 discovered that the newest user on the Podtacular forums at that time was "Fleas."

After registering for the forums, anaerin found that Fleas’ info read:

“Two sisters, older and young, carried to heaven's bliss. Convincing Kluskap, they headed for home, but the younger was turned to this!”

He was able to discover a Mikmaq story which suggested the answer would be "shooting star" or "flames" (or some variant of these – see http://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Legends/Mikmaq_Legend_Of_The_Shooting_Star-Micmac.html).

We were stuck for a while after that until enderxenocide0 noticed that the avatar for Fleas on Podtacular was part of the header image for the halo.bungie.org forums.

When we continued to be stuck despite looking for related posts on the bungie forums, intimation sent a couple DMs to anaerin:

>>Sys:Msg>@Anaerin//Has S shown a logical pattern in her clues? If you have found a location, the next clue must be somewhere inside.
>>Sys:Msg>@Anaerin//One is not required to provide a 'post' first, if my brief observation of 21st century community networks is accurate.

After dealing with complications related to finding a user that had not yet posted at least once, anaerin found a user profile on the bungie forums for a user named flame (http://carnage.bungie.org/haloforum/halo.forum.pl?profile=flame).

The profile for flame contained the following clue:

“Are Some Tricky Riddles Ok? No? Or Maybe Yes? C'mon, One More!
Coyote the ladies' dog, played with his eyes. One day so high he threw one, it stuck up in the sky! What star and constellation am I?”

Nyst found that this star is Arcturus (see http://www.wwu.edu/depts/skywise/legends.html#Coyote). It is in the constellation Bootes.

enderxenocide0 noticed that the capital letters on the first line of the clue spelled out astronomy.com, leading to http://cs.astronomy.com/asycs/members/Arcturus-Bootes.aspx .

Clue there:

Younger Sister didn't listen, and now for that she pays. She listened not to this man's words, now on a tree she stays!

Nyst found a relevant legend at http://www.firstpeople.us/FP-Html-Legends/Mikmaq_Women_Who_Married_Star_Husbands_Child-Micmac.html , giving us the answer “The Star With Sore Eyes”

anaerin recognized the profile picture (shown at right) at astronomy.com as being related to drop.io, and enderxenocide0 was able to use that to find http://drop.io/star_with_sore_eyes .