Mars Diary

Mars Madison's Diary

• A red book written by Mars Madison and retrieved from the Businesswomen at the end of the Central Park Event.

Contents

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• Relia's Hi-res scans of the postcard handed out by Joey: (front), (reverse)
• These are much larger png (lossless) versions of the jpgs above.
  • (written) page 1, page 2, page 3, page 4, page 5, page 6 (Detail of scribble)
  • (coded) page 7, page 8 (Detail of scribble), page 9
  • (torn) page 10
• BostonBeats4 from Unfiction is in possession of the book.

Notes

• The message from the Central Park Event that led to the ice-cream parlor where thebook was retrieved read:

I MADE A MISTAKE WORKING HERE, BUT I'M TOO DEEP TO QuIT 888 @ 8 AV FOR BUSINESS AND EVEN SOME PLEASURE PHASE TWO NOW BEGINS <3 MM

. Puzzle solved by arranging the notes in sequential order, each note had a letter on it.

• The book contains 18 pages, the first 12 are unencoded (pages 1-6 above), the last 6 are coded (7-9 above), the rest of the diary was torn out. The coding method on each pair of encoded pages is different.

Transcription

Pages 1-6:

In case of loss, please return to: MM

As a reward: $20 DD

Entry 1

Wanted to start a new journal because a lot has been going on. I haven't kept a diary since Wichita so I'm probably a little rusty. But I feel like if I don't keep track of these days and make sure my thoughts are organized, I could end up making some bad choices. Also I still don't know too many people around the city, so this will make a good substitute for social interaction. ha

MM

Entry 2

This is not an easy town to find work. I've been able to do some freelance stuff here and there but I'd prefer something a little more steady. Although I have to admit, knowing my way around machines has really started to come in handy. I went to an information session about treasure hunting. But it really doesn't seem like a very easy field to break into.

Thinking about taking my application down to Blackstar. They get a lot off ill will in the city but frankly stability in a time like this is appealing to me. Sure they're a little on the menacing side, but if everyone in Milwaukee would spend a few weeks wandering the desert like I did, I bet they'd have a greater appreciation for what "menacing" really means. (I still have nightmares about the creep!)

MM

Entry 3

Stupid, stupid, stupid. I've been trying to meet up with some of the so-called rebels. Supposedly the biggest group, the Medical Front, has a semi-legitimate way of life and is always looking for people who are mechanically inclined.

Long story short, another group called the Snake Charmers said they could introduce me. Big mistake, should never have fallen for the whole anti-establishment thing. Never even got a meeting with (the Front?)

Going straight to Blackstar tomorrow and seeing what work they can give me.

MM

Entry 4

Found a job in communications at Blackstar!

(Illegible)

Pretty easy so far (3) and I've even made a friend or two, starting with my boss, Ms. Leroux. She's really friendly and a little bit older (ha ha, my type).

We're all working really hard on some new public informational campaign. Not sure what it's for yet... pretty important though, measured by the level of secrecy.

Oh and guess who's the head of the Communications Department?

Terry Nanny.

Solutions

page 7 (p13-14)

• Turned out to be references to the grid cells from the table on pg.26 of A Reasonable Haven, where the cells represented 25 letters, A-Y, numbered top left to bottom right.

MAYBE IM BEING PARANOID BUT IM GOING TO START ENCODING THESE WORKING ON PROPAGANDA FOR INDEPENDENT POWER TRIUMVIRATE WENT OUT WITH LIPPS A E DRINKS AT JMC HAD GREAT TIME

page 8 (p15-16)

• Was the last part to be solved (after 3 weeks) using the table on pg.11 of A Reasonable Haven

DOUBTS. TERRY HAD A MEETING WITH US FOR I.P.T. IT'S A THREE PERSON BOARD TO DICTATE ENERGY POLICY GOING OUT WITH LIPPS TO CELEBRATE THE NEW ACT MM

• The first letter of each box in the three columns constituted the code, the alphabet was laid on them row-wise (three letters per row) - hence the large number of Fs due to "Febrizzio's". Thanks to Anonymous AntipoJamesDean and Relia.

page 9 (p17-18)

• Was decoded right after page 7 in Morse, line breaks caused some confusion here but answer:

MUST DO SOMETHING. BS CAUSED OUTAGE SECRETLY AS PROPAGANDA.

BS = Blackstar.

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