Chapter Four: Read, No Reply

Maps denied it existed, yet navigation records traced the first devices to share the last three anomalous memes straight to that site. “How can you identify the first?” Lin Mo asked. Zhou Ye wrote quickly: [MY DASHBOARD HAS A NEW COLUMN.] Before the normal distribution curve was a section marked with negative time. Forty-seven devices had shared “The Whole City Shuts Up” three minutes before Lin Mo posted it. The image had spread before the sentence was written. Qiao Qi studied the graph. “The invitation isn’t asking us to meet them. It’s asking us to complete an outcome that already happened.” She wanted to cancel the operation. Lin Mo looked at the surveillance image on his wall. Lu Chen’s shadow was clearer than the previous night.