Alex's unoriginal POG Championship Entry #1

[.Alex.]

No one has submitted anything good so far besides chuckles and dmk, so I figured this was ok to post even though I didn't create it.
________________

The professor was found dead on his study floor. A pool of blood was running from the knife in his chest.

"Is there a motive?" asked the Inspector.

"Well, sort of," said the Policeman. "See - his safe is wide open. They were obviously after whatever is inside."

"What's inside?"

"It is another safe. The thieves couldn't open that one... neither can I," the Policeman admitted.

"Pity," the Inspector muttered. "I'd like to know what they were after. What did you say he's a professor in?"

"History."

"Interesting. I wonder how they opened the outer safe?"

"Well, we found this on the floor," said the Policeman, handing the Inspector a scrap of paper. "An aide memoire - the murderer must have found it on his desk."

The Inspector read the note.

I seem to never remember the code for my safe,
So to quit worrying I am going to write it down.
It is worth reevaluating, but for now it is 1 to 9 without the 8.
The second of our codes is 4 digits long.
To kick off, ? eases us in.
Then there's ? to type.
Next, of course, ? enters the sequence.
To end, then, ? needs pressing.

"The first part refers to the outer safe," the Policeman explained. "12345679, we checked that. But the second part... I suppose that's telling us the code to the inner safe, but all the numbers are missing."

"So they are. Still, I think we can figure out what they must be. Let's find out what he was killed for..."

The Inspector reached towards the inner safe and entered the combination. What was it?

[clowntable]

<font color="white">
Ok, those are the ones that could make sense so far:
8-5-11-6 (total vocals can't be it because 11 &gt; 9)
3-3-5-3 (vocals before ?)
5-2-6-3 (vocals after ?)
6-4/5-6-5 (number of words; 4/5 depending if the is is counted)

Somehow the , are also kind of suspicious. Maybe some vertical reading etc. all possible
</font>

[durron597]

this one is clever.

[Iron_Yuppie]

<font color="white"> 1-9-8-4; the 4 numbers in the note. </font>

[Spook]

<font color="white"> 1-8-9-4; the 4 numbers in the note. It seems to me that this is better than IY's. Since in the first string there were 8 numbers to enter, then after eight comes nine. I am not completely sure how the four fits in, other than that it is the only remaining number.</font>

[FCBLComish]

<font color="white">none of this takes into account the history professor angle. Is this just a red herring? </font>

[chim17]

<font color="white"> 1903? If not, 1950? </font>

[ScottHoward3.0]

<font color="white">To kick off, ? eases us in.
Then there's ? to type.

does anybody like 8 and then 4 for the first two? </font>

[mute]

Got it, I think. I'm not really 100% sure on the logic behind it all, though. I'll have to think some more about that. In white:

<font color="white">5-6-7-9. Insert the roman numerals 4 (iv) in the first line, 9 (ix) in the second line, 5 (v) in the third line and 1 (i) in the last line. Don't know why it has to be those numbers, though.

EDIT: I guess the answer could be 4-9-5-1 as well.
</font>

[mute]

Oh yeah, I got it now.

<font color="white">Eight lines with representing each number in the first code. Each digit is written somewhere in each line, and the ? represents the second code, so the answer is 4-9-5-1 </font>