TO: THE CIRCLE

5/8/2008: URGENT - from the Overseer

I have several updates for you this morning in the search for the lost Book of History.

Last week, members of the Circle de-ciphered a cryptic photograph that was found on Jack Stroud's hard drive. Embedded in the photo was a puzzle that, when solved, yielded the numbers "787683". The numbers turned out to be the remaining digits of an IP address our intelligence technicians gleaned from Stroud's hard drive.

We accessed the website this morning using the word "Paradise", which the Circle recently discovered had been hidden in a book titled "Chaos". We found what appears to be an incomplete set of 27 GPS coordinates stretching from a desert location in Nevada to a castle in the south of France. I have sent operatives to 14 of the sites, but the Book has yet to be found. We are working right now to piece the rest together, but we are missing some parts to the puzzle.

But, things seem to be turning a corner...

*UPDATE ON THE SEARCH FOR KARA*

This morning at approximately 2:30 a.m., an Alabama state trooper was patrolling a stretch of I-65. Barely visible through the rain, he saw a figure standing in the middle of the road. He swerved and barely missed the person, whom he thought was a desperate hitchhiker caught in the storm. When he got out of his cruiser he noticed it was a woman, swaying on the brink of unconsciousness. When he stepped closer and saw her bruises and the skin on her wrists rubbed raw and bleeding, he knew that she had survived something more sinister than a bad night in the rain.

She reached out to steady herself and collapsed. The officer caught her, radioed for medical help, and held her until the ambulance arrived. Before she passed out, the officer asked about her name. "Kara," she said. When he asked why she was clutching a small wooden elephant, she just smiled and said, "They never forget what they're told."

Kara was transported to a Birmingham hospital, where she is being treated for hypothermia and some mild injuries. I spoke with her briefly a little over two hours ago. She is battered, but in good spirits. She remembers very little about her ordeal, except her initial attack and abduction, then later when she awoke in a dark room tied to a chair.

She hopes to give us a full account of her story later today, as well as some information she says Black stole from Stroud. Information that she now has and hopes will lead us to the Book. I am scheduled to talk with her again this afternoon and will pass everything I learn on to you as I have it.

The Overseer