Part 1: Crash Course
Part 2: Component X
Part 3: Box it up

After you finish hooking up the the component, you turn it around. It is easy to see it looks like it has a reflective surface, like a mirror would. There is a power key at the top, but upon turning it, the mirror starts beeping and shaking. You turn it back off, and instead turn your attention to the text at the bottom of the mirror when a fellow agent comes in.

"We have discovered Contraplexus is getting ready for more action, but information on where they will strike next is limited", he begins.

"I have their Component X with me -- maybe it will tell me something."

"Wow, let me have a look at it", he replies, and you pass it off to him. "Wow, the text is really strange -- I haven't seen any text like this. It's probably just encoded"

You write down the text: "tsfacns emb tond rofht ebns eftpmd sp mdon kbnhob lsbe emhx udz dnbu duf emb lbeb kmb ep sfmbdi rshbegb xuifhdx"

"It probably has instructions on how to operate this thing. It just started beeping and shaking when I turned it on. I also have no idea what these f, s, n and t buttons do. Have any ideas?"

"I don't know, but don't press anything until you know what to do. It will just start beeping again if you just start pressing things."

You sit down for a while, thinking about what the mirror's text means. Which buttons should you press, and in what order?

(In reply to Decryption by Gamer)

"I think being a good perplexii, I will say you are onto something in both paragraphs."

This paragraph, from two comments down gives away a lot while giving little.

No Gamer!  Don't buy into this yet.  I'd like to see other commentary here.

Where is Mindrod, Hugo, JLo?  Well, someone with minds as fertile as theirs.

"One away" says many things but has a connotation different to the earlier problems.  For quick reference there is One Away  and One Away II.

I have looked at the first character and moved to the third which is "one away".  I have considered moving that which is "one away" under this concept to be adjacent to my reference 'piece'.  Interesting concept, 'one away' and reflecting that one back part way!  Devious thought!
On the data provided this wouldn't work, but a "Caesar shift"?
I have looked at the character in question and looked at its neighbour (one away) from it. 

Reflecting, as like a mirror, on the past does seem pointless other than to eliminate two methodologies.  That is clearly not the intent.  Reflection does imply some degree of reversal.  Reversing a letter is meaningless whereby a word, or the entire message, has some merit - maybe.

Also, as I have already noted, this appears to be presented as natural word length and letter frequency. 

At D4 this needs some inspiration, and I think I'm close to expiration!

24 hrs hold on another prompt please Gamer.

Posted by brianjn on 2007-02-07 07:57:37