Dawn Bloom

Dawn Bloom
Completed
The Dawn Bloom ARG is part of the Black Watchmen series of ARGs.
Type	Official
Creators	Alice & Smith & the Lovent Group
Discovered	2016-12-24

Main Page > List of Investigations > Dawn Bloom

For a condensed timeline of events, see the timeline.

Operation DAWNBLOOM is an operation in the Black Watchmen (a permanent ARG). It differs from past operations within the Black Watchmen in that it is expected to run for several months.

How Do I Join?

If you want to join the operation, it's really quite easy. Read through the Plot Synopsis, take a glance at the Timeline, check out the To-Do List, and make sure to hop into the Official Discord. The Discord is where the Taskforce directly communicates with the Agents working on this operation-- if you want to be involved, you need to be in there.

Core Information

Dawnbloom Subpages		Off-site Resources
Timeline	Condensed timeline of events.	Official Discord
Investigations	Topics that are currently being researched, solved or otherwise have agent activity.	A&S Forum Thread
Incidents	Major events that have occurred in the Operation either with input from agents or without.	Q98A66 Email
Personnel & Organizations	Individuals and groups introduced or frequently referenced within the operation.	Operation DAWNBLOOM FAQ

The mission itself has three major parameters (it began with two, but a third was added when Lphabeta's involvement was realized. They've since been revised further after confirmation of SIGIL involvement). They are updated from time to time, but the most up to date mission parameters follow:

Parameter One: Prevent anyone but the Agency from gaining critical information about the origin of the Signals.

Parameter Two: Destroy or Capture SIGIL critical assets.

Parameter Three: Identify, communicate, and secure the advanced technology being used by "The Expedition", whom are sending the signals.

Initial Call to Action

In the Christmas Eve newsletter, Alice & Smith announced Operation DAWNBLOOM.

Agents, Special Task force Q98A66 needs your help - a abnormal radio signal was picked up across the Atlantic in the last two weeks, it’s meaning and origin remain unknown. We understand little about this bizarre phenomenon, besides the fact that it must have come from a satellite, it originates from a single location, and it is growing stronger...

Welcome to Operation DAWNBLOOM, an experimental project created by the Lovent Group [head writers of Ahnayro: The Dream World] in collaboration with Alice & Smith. This project is all about dynamic, reactive storytelling putting control of the narrative fully in the hands of our community.
[...]

For your first mission briefing, head to the Situation Room (In-Game) and look for static.

By accessing the Situation Room (a page within the Black Watchmen's game client where Operations are often announced), players were directed to Archive Case File S2J3L9. In short, a mysterious signal was picked up around the 14th of December and a taskforce set up to analyse it. The intensity of local interference is strongest at Camp Hero in Montauk, New York. We were given a copy of the recording and a contact link to the taskforce: [email protected]

Plot Synopsis

Updated 2017-03-23

Operation DAWNBLOOM is primarily focused around a series of AM radio signals that have been and are continuing to be received in Montauk, NY (also referred to as False Point). The signals themselves are faint, requiring that they be recorded underwater to minimize background noise. They are also received as individual ‘packets’ that are out of order, but a second SSTV signal is broadcast alongside the AM signal, and by using that signal they can be reconstructed and analyzed.

The contents of the AM radio signals and the SSTV signals are related to an expedition of explorers who appear to be in a shadow version of our world. Their expedition is called ‘Faunus 2’, and they are currently stuck in their location without a means to return to their home. They seem to be from a different reality than us, and one member of the expedition (Bud Vaughn) appears to be from a separate reality than the rest of the expedition. Most of the SSTV images we have received are notes from the expedition’s biologist, who Bud claims is a very important person and represents hope for everyone. Other members of the expedition include their navigator Noah Vance, Captain Zhang, and their service engineer Randall Churchill (who is currently separated from the rest of the expedition and injured). A second set of signals stolen from Lphabeta Inc. (a third-party group unaffiliated with the Agency), were distress signals from Service Engineer Randall, indicating that he might not have a way to contact the rest of the expedition.

The Expedition (as they’ve become known) has a ship called the Thronn, which utilizes a particular type of technology called a Kick Drive. This technology was initially developed at Montauk in the 70’s and 80’s, possibly with Agency involvement. Because the Kick Drive itself is such a valuable (and powerful) piece of technology, securing it (and the other technology utilized by the Expedition) has become a parameter of the operation.

In the process of receiving the AM signals, the Special Taskforce that has been assigned to this operation ( Q98A66) has come under attack from an outside party that is presumed to be Lphabeta Inc. The attacks have primarily taken the form of unmanned aquatic drones engaging their boat as they attempt to receive signals, but cyberattacks have also taken place against the team and the Agency as a whole that have been attributed to Lphabeta. We have begun moving against Lphabeta in retaliation, even conducting a strike on one of their drone storage facilities and pushing further into what appeared to be a research facility. Infiltration of their organization is well underway, with one member of Q98A66 (Control) having successfully constructed a cover identity within their ranks. The main focus of Lphabeta from a publicly facing business standpoint appears to be wearable bioinformatic devices. There is a strong suspicion that they have ties to SIGIL (a major enemy of the Agency) but as of yet direct ties are not confirmed.

Throughout the course of the operation, a member of Q98A66 designated with the handle ‘Diagnostic’ has been at the center of a series of incidents coinciding with lunar phases. The working theory at the moment is that the initial SSTV signal recovered from False Point triggered some kind of change in him that caused him to become a sort of ‘spirit bottle’. Various demons or rift entities (the two terms are somewhat interchangeable within our understanding) have been getting, for lack of a better word, stuck to Diagnostic and causing major incidents that disrupt the entire operation and imperil many Agents and civilians. An effort is being made by the Agency to better understand and eventually harness this unique property. As a side effect of his condition, Diagnostic’s health, strength, and size increases and declines in sync with the amount of the moon that is illuminated.

As the result of one such incident, at least two members of Q98A66 appear to have been replaced by parallel timeline variants of themselves. Liaison and Diagnostic have different memories of past events than the Agents who are working on this operation remotely through the official Discord server, and Brain (another member of Q98A66) has confirmed they are different individuals. However, they are physically identical to the Liaison and Diagnostic that previously were involved in the operation, to the genetic level. It is also possible that the original Agent on the taskforce who was designated Tactical and was presumed killed in action was replaced by a timeline variant, and it’s extremely likely that a barn cat the Taskforce had adopted and named Adjective Alpha was also swapped. The current working theory on these swaps is that the incident reproduced the conditions which a Kick Drive uses to operate.

To-Do List

Decode OMT Cipher

During the Lphabeta Double Date operation, the agent that was sent to assist in the operation passed out after what seemed to be them getting Glasswicked. During this period they appeared to get in contact with Virgin Sacrifice and Bud somehow where they received a strip of paper with some strange cipher on it that agents are working to translate. Additional pieces of paper with the same cipher were located at Turkey Mountain and Mystic Shipyard. Efforts for the translation is available here.

Decode Signal 3 Cipher

In the third signal broadcast, we were sent a cipher that seems similar to the cycle cipher in the first broadcast, although no one has gotten too far while attempting to decode it. The cipher includes similar wording and style as in the first broadcast, but has some new additions as well. Liaison hinted that the narrative portion of the broadcast contained literary references in it. This may or may not serve as a clue, but we should definitely look into it. In agent Codex’s second AIM discussion with Bud, he briefly brought up a language that he references to as Glyph, and said a few things that seemed to surround the broadcast. (lines ~73-103)

Decrypt and Transcribe Signal 5 SSTV

The fifth broadcast included another SSTV signal, but we haven’t been able to transcribe it yet due to the amount of static in the signal. Our two best choices in order to decrypt the SSTV now are to try and recreate it, or to try and modify the original broadcast in order to decrypt it. Control claims to have a “better way” to decrypt the signal, although that hasn’t been specified yet.

Search for online documents related to the Expedition and its crew

So far, a few documents have sprung up online that are related to the Faunus 2 expedition. These have been found on multiple social media sites. (YouTube, reddit, tumblr, etc.) More information detailing the posts and how we’ve found them so far can be found at Online Document Leaks.

Solve Lphabeta Twitter Puzzles

On 2017-03-12, a post was made on the Lphabeta twitter account, that seemed to have some Morse code playing in the background, which was masked by music playing. More posts were made later that we have looked into and only the video morse has yet to be completely solved. More specific details on what we have looked into can be found here.