[ She's so not ready for making a video and putting it up here for the Transports to see...but this isn't the sort of thing you can just convey over text. This is actual important information she needs to share with them, frustratingly vague as it seems to be. ]

Hello Ex-Exsilum.

[ Perfect start. ]

My name is Charlie, Ch-Charlie Dyer. I was w-with the rescue g-group on the compound.

[ She stops there and takes a breathe. While she had some time to clean herself, she looks...well, beaten up, Even with long sleeves and jeans the darkening purple creeping up her neck and the cut over her left eyebrow make it obvious she got in one too many unfair fights. ]

I found something. It was be-being guarded, so I knew it w-was important. [ She holds the diamond storage device up for a moment. ] Had the Initiative p-people crack it. It has...um...

[ She puts the device down and picks a paper sheet up. ]

"A system of sch-schematics that show the breakdown of an un-unnamed event over the Island of Exsilium, including m-models tracking the presence of some element o-or another for fifty, one hundred, and two hundred years."

[ She puts the sheet down. ]

Wh-whatever it is, they're l-looking at us. B-been looking at the island f-for a while. Maybe th-this makes more sense to so-someone else here? A-anyway, that's that.

I n-need to sit down...

Hey! Anyone here know their food science?

I found a bunch of boxes of food capsules while we were sneaking around that UE base, and the food-science types figured out that one of these little bits can provide all the nutrition needed in a day. They're working to copy them now.

Not sure how that works, I'd think you'd need stuffings to not feel hungry, but... Well, yeah.

I kept a box. Anyone care to try and analyze it, see if we can get some stocks of our own built up?

They're banana-flavored, too...

You know, my missus is very suspicious of me. She says that my eye wanders. Maybe she's right. [ He sighs, an overdramatic sigh, with his shoulders raising and falling. He does miss her, and it occurs to him in this moment just how much. ] Don't tell her I said this, but she usually is.

[ And then he straightens up and his expression levels. ]

The UE is authorizing their Black Code. By the end of the month— so a week, give or take. [ Nash doesn't quite know what this means, but the previous posts, and the way the UE talked about it, have given him an idea. He turns very grave, very quickly, and uses the tone of voice to order soldiers around. ]

I think we should evacuate as soon as possible. As many people as possible—

And I don't think we have much time for debate.

[ the video opens on a table, spread with long cards, most of them face-down. the one showing is xvi, the tower. the camera pans out, a little jittery, to show physis sitting at her card table, turned to the side in agitation. blue is knelt on the floor beside her, glancing up at her with concern.

it was almost like it's all happening again, but this time she can't be quiet about it. she doesn't know the initiative as well, she can't really trust their efficiency in the face of something like this. the mu were always mobile, the moment they knew their location was compromised, they would find another one. that wasn't the case in exsilium, and the warning was necessary. ]

To those who don't know me, my name is Physis. I have the [ gift? not hardly. ] ability of foresight, clairvoyance.

We've made ourselves known, acted openly against our enemy, and they are preparing to make a retaliation. We are to be an example of how they retain their power, I have seen it.

Does anyone know what the Black Code entails?

When I was a kid, FDR would do these little— he'd come on the radio, and he'd sound cheery, and he could talk about all kinds of awful things. Poverty, and debt, and then war. [ His voice drifts off, for a second. ] And no matter how bad it all got, he could make you feel safe. I was always crap at that. I can't make you feel safe. But some stuff you've gotta know anyway, I figure.

I got a copy of one of the UE's field guides, and what it says is that the Black Code is the all-clear for a nuclear warhead drop, then carpet bombing. They have… fancier nukes now, I guess, with more than one point of impact on drop.

Now you know.