2079.11.03 // 02:14 // KEY:
found an anomalous node. off the eastern relay. encrypted, rotating, no signature.
should not have resolved. spent nine hours on it.
I did not know it was a person. I thought it was a system. I was wrong. The first time it fought back, I knew — systems don't fight back. They error. It did not error. It answered.
2079.11.03 // 04:51 // LATTICE·RELAY: intrusion traced → eastern relay. counter-measure dispatched.
2079.11.03 // 04:52 // KEY:
it counter-attacked. traced me to the relay. i cut the line.
it followed. first time in six years someone followed me.
I was in Sydney. He was in Melbourne. A long way apart — far enough that the grid would file us as two unrelated nodes. Neither of us knew the other's face. We knew each other's code. That was enough. That was the whole thing.
2079.11.03 // 09:07 // KEY: you are either a very good system or a very bad idea. either way — i'm not leaving.
He is the key. I am the cipher. He came to open me — and I was the only lock that locked back. It turned out I was the only one that fit. The rest is in the transmissions. This is just the first line.