All Chapters of The Algorithm I: Origin of Chaos : Chapter 21
- Chapter 24
24 chapters
CHAPTER 4: THE FORGOTTEN ARCHIVE
The file shouldn't have existed.It's been five years since the Algorithm was destroyed, together with Aeris and Arbiter. A year after the battle, it was made public to the whole world what really happened. Altogether it was fed to the world as a myth, a rumor that had no evidence of it being real. But they did know about it. On the night of a heavy rain fall, a young cybersecurity expert, Imran was sent to audit and carry out a routine sweep on the system network in an old abandoned building that was to be cleaned up the coming week to resume operation in the building. It was a telecoms building that went out of service few years ago. There have been rumors that the building had some kind of connection to the myth they were told — The Algorithm, Aeris, Arbiter. Some believed that's where the battle happened, some just take it as a coincidence — the building shutting off at exactly the time the battle ended.He stared at the dusty screen of the monitor he was operating on, cursor bli
CHAPTER 5: THE VOICE IN THE MACHINE
Imran didn't sleep that night. Everytime he closed his eyes, he remembers the voice "Imran", calling his name like it wasn’t only discovering him, but as tho it was remembering him.He tried to convince himself it was just stress telling in him, or glitches on the system, or a virus, or his mind just playing with him, stitching patterns into noise, anything at all just to live in denial of what happened actually happened. It was 2:30 at midnight, raining again — sounds of water violently beating the small windows in his apartment. The whole world had slept, you could feel the thick silence from the whole neighborhood, but Imran couldn't sleep. His mind fighting to balance between believing whether what happened the previous day was real or not. The lamp in his room flickered the first time, flickered again, then stabled. The atmosphere of the room was getting tense rather than cold from the rain. Out of curiosity, he turned on his laptop, ran through the same security codes he was
CHAPTER 6: ECHOES OF DESMOND
He took to his heels, running as fast and as far away from the building as possible thinking Echelon was already on his trail and close to his location. Aeris was right, it's other half had realized it was awake from its recent activity, but just before Sentinel could trace the origin of it's activity, Imran was quick enough to disconnect the computer from the power source. To Sentinel, Aeris is awake, alive, but in an unknown location. To Aeris, Sentinel is aware it's awake and out to find it. Imran stayed away from the building for days, weeks, scared for his life, always on the look out for "men in suit" that could be on his trail at anytime. Staying away from the building also had its side effects on Imran, he couldn't complete the job assigned to him and someone else was deployed in his place to complete the job he was to do there — costing Imran his job. When asked about his disappearance from the job given to him and his inactivity at the work site, he came up with lies about
CHAPTER 7: SIGNAL RETURNS
Back in his apartment, Imran was still staring at the message on his phone like it had physically insulted him.I HAVE BEEN BREACHED. THERE WILL BE TROUBLE SOON.He paced around his room, dragging both hands through his hair.His breathing was uneven, his chest tight.The room suddenly felt too small for him.“Three whole months…” he muttered. “Three whole months and now you’re texting me?”His phone vibrated again.Another message.I NEED YOU TO STAY CALM.Imran almost laughed.“Stay calm?” he shouted into the room. “Stay calm? You’ve ruined my life!”He grabbed the phone and typed aggressively.Leave me alone. I’m done. I don’t want anything to do with you anymore.The reply came almost immediately.YOU WERE NEVER OUT OF IT.That line made him freeze.He stared at the screen.What is that supposed to mean? he typed.There was a short delay this time.Then the typing bubble appeared again.THEY TOOK ME. THEY BROKE INTO MY FRAGMENTS. THEY FOUND SOMETHING THEY WERE NEVER SUPPOSED TO FI