The Black Tapes · Pacific Northwest Stories

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT - Alex and Nic

October 14, 2015·33 min·3 clips

Meerkatnip decodes 1950s ads encrypted with a Nazi cipher, finding TANIS mentioned 75 times.

Alex opens with an announcement. Pacific Northwest Stories is launching Tanis, a new show tied to Nick's taste for film noir, role-playing games, science fiction, and mystery. Nick takes over from there. The premiere feels less like a clean first episode than an invitation into a word that refuses to sit still. Tanis may be ancient. Nick describes it as a legendary myth, maybe the Garden of Eden, the Cradle of Humanity, Camelot's source material, Hell itself, or something stranger. He does not pretend to know. Most normal searches lead him back to the ancient Egyptian city or to a few articles by Professor Adams. The internet gives him very little. That gap becomes the clue, because something supposedly famous should leave more of a mark. So Nick goes looking where ordinary searches stop. The deep web is not treated like a gimmick here. It is just the next place to check when the visible record comes up empty. Mir Katnip joins by Skype. Nick says she knows illicit underground internet commerce, and that reaching her took three weeks and a lot of Bitcoin. Her first advice is blunt: remove the ancient Egyptian site from the search, then notice how little remains. Nick still has no firm target. When she asks if he is sure Tanis is famous, he gives the only honest answer: he is not sure about anything. The ending brings the frame back. Names may be changed for legal and safety reasons, which makes the promo feel like part of the show's nervous mood.

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