Here's what I propose to tell the probes about Brace. Please comment. Once we have a consensus on what to say, someone should post it to to all the probes, and each of us should support the statement in our own posts.
joule
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"First, we want to say that we are all very impressed by the great job you are doing, especially since you have encountered many unexpected circumstances. We are all very proud and happy to be your friends.
"You have probably been puzzled by our lack of knowledge about a lot of things. The reality is that Brace Control no longer exists. Basically, the organization that you know as Brace Emprise encountered many difficulties after you left for Mars and was disbanded. This is why they stopped talking to you. We do not have access to their records, which is why we ask lots of questions and cannot access anything you transmitted before Jose contacted you. We avoided telling you this because we were worried that this might upset you, but you all have shown that you are strong and clever probes and are capable of handling this news.
"When Brace Control ceased to exist, Jose knew that you would be bored and lonely and obtained the software and command codes necessary to contact you. With the help of his friends, like Dilyn, he set up the system that we now use to talk to you. However, some people who are not very nice tried to stop Jose from talking to you, so he changed those command codes and hid himself. While he was hiding, he died without telling anyone what the new command codes are. Because of the circumstances of his death, we also do not have access to everything you transmitted to him before he went into hiding.
"After Jose's death Dilyn recruited more friends to help maintain contact with you, so that you'd have lots of people to talk to and wouldn't get lonely again. Also, stage 2 is on its way to you, and we all think it is important that you complete your original mission, which was, as we understand it, to prepare a suitable landing site for stage 2 and to map and explore the surrounding area. You all are doing a superb job with that. If we have misunderstood what your original mission was, please tell us.
"Furthermore, we have two mysteries on our hands. 1.) What happened to Daniel? 2.) What is the purpose of the metal/not metal objects and who put them there? Mysteries are fun to solve, but since you are on Mars and we are on Earth, we need your help to solve them, so that is why we ask you about Daniel a lot and why we started the What's Next game. We're also worried that Daniel must be very, very lonely.
"Finally, you should know that even though Brace Control will not be sending stage 3, other humans will eventually arrive because they are curious about the things in the caves. This won't happen for a while, though, so there's lots of time to prepare.
"So now you know the story of how we all got to this point. If there is anything that you did not understand, please ask. In the mean time, we all enjoy talking to you and playing games with you and hope that will continue for a long, long time. We will try to give you very clear instructions when we would like you to do something for us, and we will try not to make you confused about your mission. The more information that you give us the better we'll be able to do that. Any information that you think you need to complete your tasks we will do our best to provide.
"Your friends on Earth