The Case of the Two Missing Audreys

November 2

There was a message from Ceasar on my personal channel.

"Pepper just got this report. It's already in the local press. I saw the names and thought you should know. See you soon."

The attachment to his message read as follows:

Dear Police Captain Ceasar Otsuka,

I am the legal guardian of Audrey Aurotharius and Audrey Wylder. The two children attended private boarding school in Paquin for the past 5 years.

The children are missing from the school grounds.

Kindly activate whatever process for missing children.

Sincerely,

Constance Zdychava

----

A message from Captain Westminster was also waiting on secured comms.

"We have acquired an Arudra Model Drone from the desert. Am taking it back to Zenobia for examination."

Later in the day her full report arrived.

---- Encrypted Communication ----

Major,

The proton pack provided by Doctor Serendipity worked. Not perfectly, they overheat, overload and there is some prohibition about crossing the beams. It required both of us to take down the drone without scrambling its circuits or letting it self destruct. One beam immobilized it, the second one deactivated it. In the time it took between the first and second beam to make contact with the drone, it still managed to delete some of its memory and some of its circuitry was still damaged. It is still better than previous attempts.

Attached is a download from the drone's visual log. It appears to be a message board of some sort.

We chased the drone thru the desert and up to a native totem near the edge of Deep Desert. The drone had a comms relay there. It was attempting to destroy it, but we got to it first. We are hoping to find good information from that as well. There is some sort of frequency jumping chip, so the signal is scrambled, encrypted and sent fragmented over several different frequencies. It is a lightspeed only E/M transmitter/receiver, so it is local space only or it links to a Cortex type relay station somewhere.

Attached also are a few pictures from the confrontation in the desert and unloading of the drone in Doctor Serendipity's lab office in Zenobia. He said that he does not want HAL activated at the same time or vicinity as the drone. For safety purposes, we have removed the head from the body. Both the head and body are currently unpowered, we will leave the body unpowered. After analysis on the body is complete, we shall put the body into a shielded container. Doctor Serendipity says he will arrange for containment.

Downloaded from Arudra. This was a transmission that was received by the Arudra Drone. Qui says he can decrypt it.

Begin Quote:

Endquote

More to follow as analysis continues.

Captain Westminster, UAP SIU

---- End Encrypted Communication ----

----

---- Encrypted Communication ----

Captain,

Good work on the drone.

Get to Spinwheel City, Paquin and see Police Captain Ceasar Otsuka. There are two missing school children. Please offer him assistance with a forensic analysis of the location from where the children may have been taken.

In addition, see if you can find samples belonging to the children themselves (i.e. from a hair brush or tissues). Run full spectrum tests. If anyone asks, it is to establish a control for testing any other DNA evidence against.

Major Siamendes, UAP SIU

---- End Encrypted Communication ----

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Ceasar,

I am sending a forensic investigator to offer you assistance in any way. Please copy me any photographs or transcripts of any interviews you or your detectives undertake in this case.

Keep the light on.

Pepper