Space Oddity
April 19th, 2017. 12:51 P.M
My name is Astrid Galilei, and this is my first entry, the date is April 19th, 2017. It's a requirement for all of us to do a weekly entry, a way to record all of our findings while also documenting our every move. This also happens to be my first week so there isn't much to document. I'm still adjusting. They don't give you much time to adjust, you're just expected to digest everything they tell you and then start contributing. It's already a pretty select group as it is. The top of the top of every class, kids who started building working model rocket ships at 7 years old, kids who then went on with full rides to the best universities in the world, kids who in their free time tear apart the Theory of Relativity, kids who read The Cosmos for fun. I was one of them, we all were. It started off as an email about an internship with NASA, those who responded went through multiple screening processes. If you made it past that stage and got the internship, you were then secretly analyzed by them. You didn't know what they were looking for, or that they were even looking at all. But then suddenly, a year or so later, you get approached by them. You get offered to join them on their research and progression of Space travel. They aren't NASA, they're a part disguised as NASA to go undetected by the government. You feel special, you feel important. You take the job. They don't tell you much of what they are really doing your first week. I was just told what not to do. Don't tell anyone what you're working on, don't bring in any devices that they haven't already cleared, et cetera. And never, above all, do anything outside of what they tell you to do.
"Each and every person in here has a very specific, important and unique skill set needed in order to work on this project," is what they told us. "You are here on that skill set and that skill set alone. Do not function outside of the skill set, or you will be removed" My skill set? I'm a code tracker. I'm here to analyze all the codes that go into this project and all the code produced by it. They've been giving me basic code configurations so far, I guess cause it's the first week and they don't trust me with the real stuff yet. Hopefully, by next week, I'll have a clearer understanding of what the hell this project is. Project XTRL.
April 30th, 2017. 8:20 A.M
This is Astrid Galilei, entry number 2, the date is April 30th, 2017. Three days ago, I was finally able to get a good look at the codes used to develop Project XTRL and it's not like anything I've ever seen before. Normally, each number is reconfigured into letters similar to the alphabet. A coder has to look at the sequence of the codes to determine the language of the code, once you do that, you can interpret the sequences as easily as you can read a book. Each country has its own language of code that it functions by. I'm fluent in every code sequence in the northern hemisphere and yet the code used to develop XTRL is nothing like anything I've ever come across. This, of course, is on purpose, to keep anybody outside of this program from figuring out what it is. But by doing this, they have developed a computer that produced a code sequence that even they have a hard time reading. This is the problem with humans creating a self-sufficient computer entity that is supposed to do their work for them. A room filled with the most intelligent people on the planet and yet none of them realize how stupid it is to create something smarter than them. Now I have to take the codes created thus far by Project XTRL and figure out the language it created, then translate that language to ones they can analyze and manipulate. I've got my work cut out for me.
May 6th, 2017. 5:04 A.M
Astrid Galilei again, entry 3. Today's date, May 6th, 2017. I've been here three weeks and they still won't tell me what we are really doing. The computer entity that I was given to un-code is just a small portion of Project XTRL, that much I know. That much they had to tell me since I'm the only one allowed to work on it. The computer was designed to help XTRL move along at a much faster pace, rather than having actual humans develop code and punch in one at a time. Unfortunately for me, the computer they developed happened to be very good at its job and ended up creating its own language out of the code. However, they didn't want to kill the computer, afraid that it would set them back years. But because "each person is here on one skill set and one alone" no one was allowed to help me. I've been at this for a week now, functioning on three hours of sleep, and constantly pressured to "hurry it up, or we'll find someone else more qualified for the job". It's an empty threat of course. I'm the best coder in the world, otherwise, they wouldn't have approached me in the first place. I told them they needed to stop their development on XTRL until I figured out the language the computer was operating under. The last thing we need is some terminator bullshit. They didn't like that of course. They have been developing Project XTRL long before I came into the picture. And I'm guessing by their eagerness for me to crack this code, they are close to getting whatever results they were looking for. But it's not my damn fault they created something smarter than them. Anyways, I'm letting my emotions getting the best of me. I need to get some sleep. I really need to get some sleep.
May 13th, 2017. 3:36 A.M
This is Astrid Galilei, the date is May 13th, 2017, entry four. They lied to me. The computer I'm decoding isn't a supercomputer that's just created its' own language out of the blue. No, this computer is receiving codes from a satellite they sent out god knows how long ago. I don't think I was supposed to know this, at least not yet. But the language, the code I've been given, it's all backward. Like literally backward and upside down. The only way I know this was by accident. These past few weeks I've been functioning on little to no sleep and living and breathing work. It's been tense at work since everyone seems to be waiting on me. They have been looking over my shoulder and breathing down my neck in anticipation. Vultures. Last night, I had taken some of the code home with me in hopes of a new environment stimulating my brain again and to get some breathing space. I left a page of it on the counter in my bathroom while I went to shower, and when I got out, I looked at it through the mirror, and suddenly I could see words. I thought I was just hallucinating, lack of oxygen combined with lack of sleep or something. But then I brought all the codes in and laid them out, upside down across from the mirror. And about every third sequence was recognizable to me. The more I looked at it, the more confused I got. I rushed back here to look over everything again and I think, I think I made a breakthrough. But this shouldn't make sense. XTRL, this project, what they are doing, it shouldn't be possible. The code I'm looking at, if I am in fact reading this all correctly, then it means that XTRL sent a satellite through a black hole, and it survived. And is now sending codes back.
May 18th, 2017. 5:30 P.M
Astrid Galilei, entry five on May the 18th, 2017. I had a meeting with them yesterday. If you can call it that. I had yet to report my findings to them and they were getting rather impatient. Right when I was about to leave work last night I was stopped, and lead to a boardroom where they were waiting. They asked me why I had been sitting on my findings for so long. Like I am the one holding all the secrets here. So I refused to tell them what I had found until they told me everything. For once, since being recruited I finally felt like I had power. Like I was equal to them. Finally, I would get some answers. They were reluctant to share, but as we both knew, I wasn't just a new recruit anymore. I was a necessity. Satellite One, they told me, had been sent out over 60 years ago, and just a month before I started got sent through V616 Monocerotis, the closest black hole in our galaxy. They won't give me the details of how they built a satellite that could withstand the force of a collapsed star, but just that they did. Once it went through the codes used to send out and control it got scrambled, and they can't further their research until they figured out how to unscramble it. Enter me. I was brought on five weeks ago, right when they first started receiving the mixed codes. Now that they know the code can be read, they can now send out instructions for the satellite to report its findings. That's all they will tell me. Not what they are hoping to find, not what they intend to do with any of the information received, and not what they plan on doing next. But they don't have to. Because I am the only one who knows how to unscramble the codes and the only one who can take the information given, and reconfigure it into the language that this satellite now functions by. They have no choice but to keep me in the loop now, and I can tell it bothers them. But they need me, whether they care to admit it or not.
May 27th, 2017. 4:25 P.M
This is Astrid Galilei, entry 6, the date is May 27th, 2017. It's been theorized by many that black holes, or wormholes, are essentially a tear in the universe. An opening to another dimension, if you will. Others theorized that it is just nothing. It's just a collapsed star that has such a strong gravitational pull that not even light itself can escape, and it leads to nothing. Well, I think that it's safe to say that last theory is out the window. We sent Satellite One through a black hole and its sending information back. It comes in slowly, and it's not perfect. But it's something. We just proved that a black hole, a wormhole, actually leads to something. I've been trying to see if the codes, much like how they are being encoded backward and upside down, are being sequenced in an order that isn't left to right, much like how we are used to. If you read the codes in a diagonal sequence, it starts to make more sense, but I'm guessing some of the codes just get lost in translation simply because of time it takes to travel. Since contributing my findings, I'm now the hero around the office. I'm included in more discussions and development. Work has been less heavy and more passionate. I think it's because we are all still in shock. I mean, we actually proved the Einstein-Rosen bridge theory. We know that there is something actually out there, on the other side. This is huge, we are making history, maybe even changing the future. We so far have just been receiving code reports of Satellites One's status. The lifespan of this satellite, post-wormhole survival, is estimated to be only a year. We apparently already launched a second satellite 20 years after the first one, but it will still take around 40 plus years to reach V616 Monocerotis assuming nothing technical happens between now and then. So Satellite One, with only a year-long lifespan, might be our only chance to explore as much as we can in our lifetime. All reports so far, at least to me, seem to be as good as they can be. I'm still amazed that we are even getting a signal back let alone full system reports on the satellites mechanical status. Tomorrow will be a big day for us. We will begin to give Satellite One instructions to start recording the, I'm not sure what to call it, the scenery around it? Satellite One was equipped with two 360 degree cameras. Its unsure if the signal transmissions will go come through and if we will receive actual pictures and live images or not. If not the satellite was given a computer system with enough central intelligence to record what it was seeing and transmit it into code. Either way, we will start to find out what we are looking at here. This is all so crazy. Almost impossible to wrap your head around. But what we are doing here is changing science as we know it. I can't believe I get to be a part of it.
June 1st, 2017. 7:45 P.M
Astrid Galilei, entry 7 something. Date, June 1st. We lost contact with Satellite One. Up until 1:26 A.M. last night, we were receiving solid communication back, and then just nothing. They called me in as soon as it happened, and I've been here trying and failing to find a signal. We weren't sure if one year was a good estimate but we sure as hell didn't think it would only be 7 weeks. Up until now, it felt like we were living in a science fiction novel, with everything that we were uncovering. And now it's like we've been dumped in cold water, forced to wake up from the fantasy dream we'd been living in thus far. Don't get me wrong, what we have uncovered in just this short time span from Satellite One is dumbfounding, and is more eye-opening than any of us ever expected. But I think we all got caught up in the moment. We got too comfortable with the steady flow of information that we forget that space is so demanding. I keep making excuses but it doesn't excuse the feeling of heartbreak all of us at Project XTRL are feeling. It's like someone died at the office. Everybody wants to blame the other, but more so everyone is just so dejected. But I don't want to give up. I've invested too much time and energy to believe that this satellite is just, dead.
June 10th, 4:00 A.M
Something is wrong. At 3:00 A.M this morning, Satellite One started sending in codes again, like it always had, like it never broke down in the first place. I've been living out of my office this last week, watching the computer system night and day waiting for any signs of activity. I should be overjoyed that Satellite One seems to have woken up, that it's sending in codes like it always had. But something feels off. The codes, they aren't right. I mean they are, they look the exact same, but yet different. I called everyone in when Satellite One came back online, they arrived 30 minutes ago. They are of course thrilled, they want to carry on business as usual. I tried to tell them that something feels off but they just told me it's the lack of sleep. Told me to be happy, research can continue. But they aren't listening to me. As the only person who knows this computer sequence by heart, the only person who essentially speaks this satellites language, I know something isn't right. It's been dead silent for a week and a half, and then just starts back up as if nothing happened. No, I don't buy it, and I'm going to prove it.
June 17th, 5:05 A.M
This is Astrid Galilei, the date is June 17th, and this is my last entry. I'm only recording this in hopes of whoever sees it next understands why I did what I did, and understands that they cannot be allowed to send any more Satellites into V616 Monocerotis, or any other wormholes out there. Us humans have this, unbelievably naive belief, that nothing is beyond our understanding. And that we have the ability to control our destiny, and control the course of events of life as we know it. This is not the case. We are nothing. We are as insignificant to this universe as flies are to us. We cannot begin to understand what lies beyond our comprehension, and by pretending that we do and that we can somehow use that to our advantage is laughable. I know I sound crazy, and that's what they think too. But they don't know, they didn't see. They don't even care. Once Satellite One came back online, I went back and looked long and hard at the codes, from start to finish. From the very first codes received, to right before it suddenly died, and then to what was being sent again. There were messages, codes, inside the codes. I had to read it right to left, down to up, crosswise and backward in order to be sure. Each way you read it, it gives a new message. Think about it, a wormhole. A tear in the universe, a tear in time and space. A different dimension. A Satellite doesn't survive that. Not without help. There's something on the other side. Something that hijacked our Satellite, and something that sent out this new language of code. Code that can be read in an infinite number of directions and each with a unique message. I don't know what I was communicating with, but I know it's not just code from a satellite, and I know that whatever it is, it's using our signal against us, to track us, to find us. I know that whatever is on that other side of that wormhole should be left alone. I tried to tell them that. And suddenly I'm being asked to remove myself the project. Tomorrow is supposed to be my last day. They told me I am too mentally unstable to continue further research. That this happens to some people. But I know what I saw, so I discontented Satellite One. I took bleach to the hardware operating Project XTRL and I sent a self-destruct code to the second satellite on the way. I am leaving these entries for whoever finds it, in hopes that whoever sees this hears the urgency in my voice, and trusts that I am telling the truth. I will also leave all the information I have gathered about their language here. Those codes, that language, it shows you things, bad things. Please, for whoever sees this next. Do. Not. Let. Them. In.
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