ic The Bright And The Bewitching (IC)

[Moira Morley]

For the past few days Moira had received cryptic messages in coded in ancient Greek. Mutually intelligibility aside, it was like reading ancient Greek. Smart people stuff. People that could read English couldn't understand all of it. That kind of stuff. She turned to her connections on Olympus and even they had a head scratch. It was machine code. If they were on good terms with Hephaestus, they'd have it solved. But the whole deal with him and them - Aphrodite and Ares, especially - was well noted.

 

There was a hand full of smart people who could help. This was Freedom City. Turn the corner and you could find, like, fifteen geniuses. Still, you needed connections. Not like you could just... Well, it was worth a shot?

 

Mandjet Building, 1 August 2018, Midday.

 

Kamala Kanufasa was a technical genius. Her business was machine code. So Moira looked to her. Showing up after lunch. Walking in the front door and asking the receptionist to speak to Ms Kanufasa.

[Tiffany Korta]

The Scarab III
The secrtary, in this case, wasn't human, she was out on lunch, instead, an incredibly lifelike hologram came to (almost) life.

"Welcome to Khepri Incorporated, I am AREEBAH and your inquiry has been forwarded to the appropriate responder. Is there anything else you require?"

After a few minutes, a well dressed young South Asian woman came to the reception offered her hand to Moria.

"Hello and welcome I'm Nadiya Naqvi Kamala's personal assistant. I'm afraid Ms Khanufasa is indisposed at the moment but I will happily help you if I can."

Several thousand feet above the city Kamala was listening into the conversation, SAFIYA relaying live feed to her in real time, as she tested improvements to her propulsion systems.

[Moira Morley]

Moira greeted Nadiya with a courteous handshake. "Uh, right. Sorry to bother you," she pulled up a backpack and unzipped it. It was full of notes ranging from parchment to uniform stationary. All in ancient Greek.

 

"So the simplified story is: I've been getting these love letters in my native language. But once decoded, are pretty much divine schematics for some machine." She pulled out a few to show her guide, "Ms Kanufasa was the first person I thought would be able to decipher this mess."

 

She watched Nadiya's reaction, "so, do I need to get an appointment?"

[Tiffany Korta]

The Scarab III

Nadiya adjusted her glasses as she looked at the letters, the tiny camera's transmitting the data live to Kamala's display. She spoke no Greek, ancient or otherwise, but SAFIYA's systems quickly took care of that. What she saw was a wonder of some kind of code, a puzzle that she couldn't help but be intrigued by the mystery placed in front of her.

 

"Nadiya please take her up to my office, I'll be there shortly." as she dived back down towards her building she spoke to SAFIYA her suits AI "SAFIYA bring up everything you can find out about this woman."

 

Nadiya had turned away when she'd got the message and gave a little sigh to herself as her boss again found herself a mystery, of cause it was her that had to rearrange all the meets and other business that she should have en doing today. If only her friend didn't pay her very, very well for her position.

"It seems Ms Khanufasa has a slot free for you Ms..." she gestured towards the elevator "If you’d like to follow me and I'll take you up to her office."

[Moira Morley]

SAFIYA found out, well, she had a past. Moira Morley was a former hero - name of Divine - and superpowered socialite from the late 2000s/early 2010s. She was more a party girl than a hero. Saucy content a plenty was definitely caught on camera. Though there were a few good deeds under her belt. After that, there was nearly a decade in absentia. Reappearing in 2017, she was less abrasive. Definitely not cavorting with villains anymore. She became a Hellenistic priestess and shared ownership in her adoptive father's pub, Morley's (which recently added some late night activities). Scion was her moniker all over social media now. While she didnt do much to hide it, Scion and Moira presented as two separate entities, legally.

 

Moira nodded enthusiastically when she was invited to meet Ms Kanufasa, "great!" She followed Nadiya, taking in the architecture of the building. She asked questions and made small talk with her guide. Just pleasantries. Learning things about the place she was in. Until they reached Kamala's office. "Thank you again, Nadiya. I hope we can see more of this place later."

 

Walking in the office, she was measured in her response, "thank you for your time, Ms Khanufasa."

[Tiffany Korta]

The Scarab III

Kamala inspected the information that her AI had gathered whilst she changed back into her pantsuit, Nafiya knew enough to keep the elevator going long enough to give her plan. Whilst such lubriciousness wasn't how she was raised to behave she had was enlightened enough to live and let live. She was even fine with her believing in false gods, though she was mildly concerned with how often she came across such people.

 

With almost perfect timing she took her seat just as Nadiya showed Moira into her office, giving Kamala a knowing little nod as she did. The office was quite small and immaculately tidy the only thing on the desk was a large flat computer monitor.

 

"Please take a seat Ms Morley it seems you quite a story to tell me!"

[Moira Morley]

"Thank you," she curtsied politely. Sitting down, she put her 'work' in her lap, not wanting to mess up the place. "I'm sure you have lots of things on your plate, but I have something that might interest you," she said pulling out a few of the more preserved papers and putting them on the flattest, surface she could find. She looked to the more knowledgeable woman, "I've been getting some cryptic fan mail," she said facetiously. She pointed to it as she read over a few lines. Like she was reciting everything. She obviously knew what she was reading, but not understanding.

 

She turned to Kamala gain, "I've been told it was written by a machine. Or for a machine." She smirked, "not to say you're a machine, but you, my dear, are the first person I thought to figure this out."

[Tiffany Korta]

The Scarab III
Kamala looked at the hero sitting opposite her trying to work out if there was some kind of angle here. Whilst she was proud of what she'd achieved it had only been a couple of years since she'd started her company, and she didn't have the resources of say ArcheTech.

"It's a simple analysis to tell if it's a generated message, it will contain certain easy to spot tell. We can use my AI to tell if the message is from an AI." she explained, finally decided to see how this played out

"I'll need a note and we'll need a few minutes to get a thorough analysis. Whilst we wait would you care for a drink? I don't have an alcohol but I can offer a wide range of over beverages."

[Moira Morley]

She nodded and handed over a few of the smaller messages, and the drive with the actual files. The messages were varied in different ways. She smiled when she offered a drink of the non-alcohol variety, "water's fine." As she took the drink, she explained herself. "While I could have gone to the 'bigger' place," she said referencing Archetech, "I really wanted to keep this on the down low. Besides you're just as knowledgeable as them," she said with a friendly, and flattering tone.

 

As they waited for the results, she did a scan of the room. Kind of understated despite the architecture. It was nice. Business could be conducted here without distractions. SHe didn't know how long it would take to get the results, but maybe the two knocking their heads together would get them faster.

[Tiffany Korta]

 

The Scarab III

"AREEBA process those letters for signs of artificial generation. Feed results to this room main display. Would you like a copy to your cell phones as well?"

 

As she instructed her AI, AREEBA used the same systems as SAFIYA just a different personality interface as it wasn't exactly prudent to suggest that she used the same system as The Scarab. The hologram of the woman Moria had seen in the lobby seemed to scan the documents and the analysis appeared on a large screen built into the walls.