The Desolate Guardians Read Free Page B

soul would hold out. And for how long?
Indefinitely? Did all our lives hinge on the lonely suffering of
one solitary man?
    In my half-dark and very isolated server
room, I couldn't help but feel for him. Merry Christmas to you,
wherever you are, friend…

Chapter Two
    After spending the last several nights trying
fruitlessly to find the source of that haunting message, I was
beginning to lose hope… but, then, I found something.
    It wasn’t the source of that message. Far
from it. Instead, I found that the hierarchy of our network was far
taller than I’d assumed. I oversaw all of it in the off-hours, but
I’d never personally mapped it. There’d been no need.
    Last night, though, I began understanding
that our network was a massive conglomeration of smaller networks
that were each separated from one another in all respects - except
for us. We served as the backbone for an enormous range of systems.
Each was very different, and some were in other languages entirely.
I’d known our organization was huge, but I’d never quite guessed at
the true extent of our reach.
    Maybe I was going about this all wrong… maybe
I shouldn’t have been searching for the origin of a message clearly
made to be untraceable. Maybe I should have been searching for
related initiatives or keywords… had he been military? Had he strictly stated he was military, beyond mentions of a
commanding officer? I guessed I’d have to go with that assumption,
in any case.
    Everything in the message had been too vague.
That was the core problem of the modern age: there was too much
information available. It was impossible to sift through it all
without key words that acted almost like in-plain-sight passwords.
You could have the best decryption software in the world, but it
was useless unless you actually knew what to look for. Certain
combinations of words pulled data out of massive networks like
plucking gold out of the ether.
    Thinking about it like that, I suddenly felt
very certain about my next search: the only defense we have
against nightmare is the power of self-sacrifice.
    I tried that search first on a very small
network, and, to my triumph and amazement, an exact result
appeared.
    For a millisecond, I hesitated. My random
browsing online was one thing, but this was a specific inquiry into
obfuscated communications…
    On the other hand, I would inevitably do this
at some point once the boredom and curiosity became unbearable. Why
not now?
    I opened the file up to the relevant section.
It was an audio log with an automatic text transcription…
curious…

    ***

    01110001 01110101 01100001 01101110 01110100
01110101 01101101 00101101 01110100 01110101 01101110 01101110
01100101 01101100 00100000 01110100 01110010 01100001 01101110
01110011 01100011 01100101 01101001 01110110 01100101 01110010
00100000 01101100 01101111 01100111

    Day three-hundred sixty-three: cloud
cover below is thinning today. Found footprints in the snow.
    Day three-hundred sixty-four: nothing
new to report. Merry Christmas. Tell Lundvik I haven’t forgotten
that she owes me a bottle of tequila. Footprints were just my own
tracks… again.
    Day three-hundred sixty-five: cooking
a rabbit I found. Late Christmas present? Amazing. How could a
rabbit have survived up here? I still see birds sometimes. Nature’s
adaptability is astounding.
    Day three-hundred sixty-six: so it’s
been a year since I’ve heard back, as far as I can estimate. Is
anyone still listening to these things? I think sometimes I talk
just to hear my own voice. Is that weird? Things wouldn't be so bad
if I just had somebody to talk to. I have to admit, I've been
having hallucinations. I'm not sure how much longer I can hold this
down. Tell Lundvik I don't think I'm going to be able to make it to
that date we always talked about...
    Day three-hundred sixty-seven: blizzard raging below. Found footprints in the snow. Spooking
myself yet again with my own footprints… it's like my brain just
doesn't want