Elias looked at the mouse cursor. It hovered over the "Delete" key.

The file was named , and it had been sitting in the "Downloads" folder of Elias’s workstation for three days . It shouldn't have been there. Elias was a senior network architect for a firm that handled secure data relays, and "Brinkmann" wasn't a client, a vendor, or a known hardware manufacturer.

I tried to unplug it. The router’s status light stayed solid green. No power cable, no battery backup. It is drawing a signal from the ambient static in the room.

Elias opened the text file. It wasn't code; it was a diary—or more accurately, a ledger of anomalies.