Carminic acid
File sealed
The detectives are still writing this one up. The poster and the facts are below; the film and the interrogation room open soon.
Booking photographs
The suspect, from its real atomic coordinates. Drag to turn it. Height chart in nanometers, ruled every 0.1 nm. The bug that makes it is about three million times longer.
Rap sheet
- Answers to
- “Carmine” or “cochineal extract” on labels.
- Height
- 1.5 nm, standing up.
- Weight
- 0.82 zeptograms
- Build
- Three flat rings and a sugar.
- Habits
- Tastes foul to ants. That’s the point.
- Associates
- A caterpillar that eats the bugs and reuses the red against ants.
- Origins
- Female scale bugs on prickly pear cactus.
- Known for
- Once Mexico’s most valuable export after silver.
- Last seen
- A 5 mL tube marked COCHINEAL in the fridge at HQ.
of them in one dried cochineal bug, give or take.
Bugs vary. You’ve never seen one.
The poster on the street
This is the photocopied wanted poster for Carminic acid, No. 74. They were made for noticeboards around Boston, Cambridge and the rest of the east coast.
Found one? Scan its QR code with your phone. If you're a signed-in player, the sighting goes on your record with +1 XP.
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