TRANSCRIPT OF INTERVIEW WITH KENNETH FISHER
[CONFIDENTIAL]
CONDUCTED: 04/18/2008
REDACTED: 12/12/2009 BY AGENT: ██
Q: Sgt. Arnold Norbrooke
Q1: Det. Kyle Carson
Q2: Det. Warren Cole
A: Kenneth Fisher
A1: █████ ██████
[BEGINNING OF RECORDING]
Q: Well, if she wasn’t trying to do that, then what’s she even doing wearing all that?
A: Haha, right, right.
Q1: Is there anything else we can get you before we get started? A drink, coffee, water?
A: Ah, nah man, I’m good for now.
Q: Let’s get it going then. Recording has begun at… 2:10 PM, April 18th, present is Nazareth police sergeant Arnold Norbrooke, detectives Carson and Cole, and we are interviewing Kenneth Fisher.
Q2: And again, Ken, that’s just all for the records and paperwork. There’s certain things we got to say, otherwise we can’t even, y’know, use the info you have for us at all.
Q1: Right.
Q2: And I’ll just say again, you’re not under suspicion for anything, we’re not investigating you, we’re just trying to piece together the story here.
A: Yeah, I get it.
Q2: And you’ve been a big help already, but we just need to get some of this down on paper…
Q1: Right.
Q2: … Or, uh, tape…
?: [Laughter]
Q: So, uh, for the tape, why don’t you just go ahead and say your name, date of birth, what you do for work here in Nazareth…
A: Right, yeah. Uh, Ken Fisher. Born January 4th, 1988. Uh, I do, y’know, private security around here, it’s all through SecurAll but it’s mostly. y’know, banks, that kind of thing.
Q1: Any armored transport?
A: Nah, there’s big certs you need for that, I’m not working towards that quite yet.
Q1: Ah, gotcha.
Q2: SAVARA?
A: Yeah, we’ve done a lot of gigs there lately, but y’know, not usually.
Q: There much security work needs doing at SAVARA?
Q2: … Making sure people aren’t messing with the mummies?
?: [Laughter]
A: Yeah, exactly. [Laughs] No, I guess a lot of those old scraps cost those museums a ton. Constitution-level stuff.
Q1: Right. You?
A: What’s that?
Q1: You’re working there much?
A: Yeah, I guess so. Since the beginning of the month at least. I think they got some sort of big project going.
Q: Then who’s at the dam?
A: They got Colin supervising out there now.
Q: Oh, great. [Laughs]
A: Right? [Laughs] I mean, I don’t miss the commute, I’ll tell you that much.
Q2: Well, look, Ken. We’ll be straight with you. You heard about this Wesley kid? … Can I get you to say it out loud for the tape?
A: Oh, uh, no.
Q2: Just some Native kid who blew his brains out with research chems. Worked at SAVARA, lived around here… now, you know us Ken, we know you… this obviously isn’t about hammer business. Y’know, we don’t care about any of that.
Q: What we got, though, is a body with more drugs in it than a cartel crack mule whose balloon just popped.
Q2: We just need to put together something that makes sense before feds start coming in and asking their own questions, ATF, DEA…
Q1: Hell, within 100 miles of the dams and the coast, might as well bring in the DOE and EPA.
A: I mean, he’s a Native kid who OD’d. What’s the story?
?: [Laughter]
Q: [Laughs] Right. But, it’s just the absolute… I mean, there’s so much of it. These drugs, you got to understand, it’s like if a body washed up in the harbor with 2 kilos of cocaine…
A: Right.
Q: … in their bloodstream.
A: Oh.
Q: Right.
A: Just in the blood.
Q: Right. So obviously, we need to find something that makes sense. And, now, we know the hammers… we’ll just say, okay, we know that construction company you do side gigs for…
A: Okay.
Q: … has done a lot for us, okay? Now, we do appreciate that. With that old community center burnt out, y’know, puts us where we can talk to the mayor, and get that new Benevolent Association building up…
Q2: Right.
Q1: Oh, absolutely. Y’know on weekends, I’m bringing █████ there, we’re doing potlucks…
A: Oh how old’s she now?
Q1: Just nine, but she’s seeming older every day. Wish I could see her more.
A: Monica’s still being a bitch? [Laughs]
Q1: Let me tell you, that judge is a bitch! [Laughs] But no, I mean, we know the hammers are helping us out.
Q: And this kid’s nobody, okay? Y’know, just a kid… we’ve got him on some old delinquency charges, truancies… y’know, this kid, he isn’t… this isn’t some star student, okay? This isn’t some… he’s not making…
Q2: He’s not joining any potlucks.
Q: … right. He’s not building a Patrolman’s Benevolent Association.
A: Right. Right.
Q1: … and so, we just don’t want some feds from some DC, Baltimore, y’know, uptown, Manhattan office…
Q: … exactly, we don’t want some career-chasing kid from the city coming here, trying to drop this on decent folks, folks who, y’know…
A: Totally.
Q: … and because of this diversity stuff, now, you know, they’re hiring a lot of… those big departments, they’re hiring a lot of Blacks, a lot of Latinas and all…
A: Oh, boy. [Laughs]
Q: … exactly. [Laughs] So, they’re not really going to be looking for the truth, they’re just trying to fit a narrative.
A: Right. Well, okay, let me ask you, did this kid have a ton of crypto on him?
Q: Now, that’d be?
A: Cryptocurrency. My, uh… the construction company takes a lot of payments in this new kind of money, it’s called cryptocurrency. Harder to trace.
Q: Okay.
A: You’d find it with his computer stuff, it’d be online and all that.
Q2: I can tell you, forensics has all his hard drives right now, and they’ll be back in our hands before there’s any feds even thinking about them.
A: Well, you’ll want to look for any encryption hashes, they’ll be long strings of characters that look pretty random… sometimes… I don’t know, like even, y’know, 50 letters long, that kind of thing.
Q: Okay.
A: It’s harder to trace, but not impossible. That’d be the only thing I can see connecting someone OD’ing on malachi and the, uh, construction company, there.
Q2: Oh, well, hell, we didn’t even tell you it was…
?: [Door opening loudly]
A1: This interview is over. Turn off the tape recorder.
Q: Well, if it ain’t the damn ████████ Foundation rep himself.
Q2: Look, we know Ken, we’re just asking him…
A1: You can ask your Lieutenant on Monday. Come on, Mister Fisher. You’re leaving.
A: Hey, look, █████, I… I thought you all would know about this. I thought it was you all asking.
A1: Don’t worry, Mister Fisher. It’s under control.
Q1: You can’t…
Q: …█████… you…
A1: This is over.
[END OF RECORDING]
=====
A Journal. October 12, 1769.
INTERROGATION over the nature of my tome, that is, the tome from Dee’s library, the Book of Soyga, has arrived from every side. Not only from outside, but also from within, as I had fancied quite a different mechanism for the book’s “function”... I had quite expected it to reveal distressing truths and methods for achieving highly desirable – yet ultimately natural – ends, yet… there was little way to describe our ends achieved in terms other than Divinity and Miracle.
Is this truly Knowledge? Or, is it something further? I cannot say, and this is what causes me the greatest distress.
Upon the great Light being cast into the forest, it remained there for some time, quite enough time that we could triangulate its precise location from the surrounding landmarks. However, the party (as well as the Fort’s residents) demanded of me further explanation regarding the book. Indeed, as was their nature, many had taken my discretion to be a betrayal or obfuscation, despite the fact that none among them are particularly forthcoming regarding their own motives and backgrounds.
I gave the group the best explanation one could be capable of; that is, that miracles have been recorded throughout human history, indeed, for its full length; that it is possible such events have a naturalistic cause; that this cause could be a certain power, similar to those powers we find in nature such as fire, gravity, and so forth; and that the historical origin of prayers, across all religions of the world, may indeed be in the recitation of words which call forth this power. It is mere speculation, but that, indeed, is all I can provide to either you, reader, or my company at the time… that this book Enlightens us to an as-of-yet poorly understood Science, which has for all of time been the purview of the priestly class.
Indeed, this runs entirely counter to my own established notions, which were rather that the purpose of the priestly class is to bring Knowledge to those who could receive it, told in riddle and allegory; that it dealt in attaining a certain Truth which could not adequately be communicated with Human language, or with the rationality of Pure inquiry. I did not believe in miracles.
There are sections of the book examining the “language of Heaven”, and attempts at charting its script, however, by its very nature it cannot be written; as such, the characters as depicted are all flawed, and only by observing the similarities across the tables and tables of attempts can one begin to understand its form. It may be that the power associated with recitation bears a connection with the act of speaking this “language”, although this, too, is mere speculation.
It goes without saying that most within the party would quickly have the conversation turn towards more “practical” ends. Balmetti in particular demanded it in order to assess how best to accrue vast amounts of gold, or cast a malign curse (both disgustingly inappropriate and entirely predictable requests for one associated with the Holy See), while Antioc was concerned with amassing a large army. However, I was not so forthcoming with the answers within. Indeed, what we had witnessed in the sky was proof of one thing: that, rather than simple instructions towards an end, this book can contain the ends themselves, merely by speaking the correct words.
I believed it best to reserve usage of the book for only the moments when it was most necessary, agreed upon by consensus among the party, holding for myself the right to veto its usage at any time. This was received with all of the amiability one could expect from a viper pit; I had never felt such an intense leer in my entire life.
And, indeed, I have the Comte to blame! Where did he find this book? Was he even aware of its contents? For all the times the Comte claimed to be centuries old, or from far-flung lands, it was simple to dismiss… I find my mind, now, racked with questions and dissonance.
Despite the reticence of my company, having now armed ourselves with the alchymical knowledge from Dee’s Book of Soyga (Falk has informed me that, as is much of the language within, the title is a reversal-code; Soyga backwards is agios, Greek for knowledge), resolved to spend no longer than a day assessing this book at camp before investigating this graven thief, as we have great cause to recover the missing clue. Thankfully, with knowledge of our prior attempts, we could see that the signal had pointed in the same direction we were already travelling. As such, to detain the rogue (it would not be difficult with the size of our party) would not represent a detour or a delay, but rather, something which may even further our progress towards the Northern Lodge, or at very least, an end which is achievable in parallel.
We leave at first light; it is with this I leave to commit myself to further study of “Agyos”.
In search of meaning.
Arthur Wickham
=====
NoNaTuS Encrypted Blogging Service
Connecting to blog: e-x-t-r-e-m-o’s trip log
Connected!
[99 comments]
[4/09/2008 14:56]: You know, I never finished reading the whole journal.
I thought it was only part of the story, and I’d only see the real thing in person.
I thought half of it was made up to sell books.
Everything changed when I saw Him, draped in his radiant armor, light spilling from his visage.
Knowing now what is possible, my plans have changed dramatically. It is no longer about finding which individual to push and prod into making the right choice, it’s about something deeper. There is some INCREDIBLE power that these creeps are about to stumble onto. Soyga by itself is too much for them to wield responsibly… it might even be what makes the revolution possible to begin with.
We’re only a few months out from the Boston Massacre. I can’t out myself to the group, but already they’re discussing methods for “stimulating the locals into open rebellion” by leveraging false-flag propaganda, playing into racial fears of an “Indian threat” and anti-Catholic sympathies – ironic that half these people are coming straight on the orders of the Church. Soyga changes everything.
I have seen myself in the journal. I know it’s me they’re talking about. They describe what I’ll do on my last dive. There is too much ambiguity for it to be connected to me, but I know. It tells me what I must do.
I’ve added another protocol to the dead man’s switch. Not only DB access and enough confidential “dots” for a motivated researcher to connect, but everything. Everything I know about the malachi supply chain, its connection to the Northern Lodge, even control of the trip log – just in case you psychos want to stay informed. It’s INCREDIBLY important to me that this information not end up in the wrong hands, so I’m putting it behind a layer of encryption and only making a few keys. They’re all self-burning and time-locked, so only the people I trust with my life will be able to make the jump. After all, that might be what’s at stake here.
If I’m right, then I already know how I will die, and when. It’s okay. After the thousands of lifetimes I’ve lived, I’m a bit overdue. The only thing I can control is what the outcome will be… I’m choosing to set the terms. The key cipher will be posted here. That’s how you’ll all know my story is over.
The brittle crystalline bark of the tesselating mangrove trees, the haunting glow of the seven seals towering above, radiating a stream of lavender storms below. I can still see them and feel them. Our lives are not our own; they are touched by more than we know, and they touch more than we know. We are not in control, nor are we in possession; we are only brief stewards, passengers on a vehicle. A raft speeding down an uncharted river, at one point crossing the horizon, slipping out of view to those other unfortunate observers.
We paint the gods as omniscient, but that’s a very Christian-church notion, isn’t it? There’s plenty they don’t know. They don’t know what it means to die, or what it means to truly live. They don’t know what causes the uncaused cause. Look at the various trickster gods of the Native American and African pantheons, diverse as they are; they’re tricking other gods. Gods don’t know everything. They can be fooled. I’ll tell you all right now, whatever dark god is sitting in the basement of that Northern Lodge, he doesn’t know about me.
Signing off
e-x-t-r-e-m-o
