Cryptonomicon

The gentle slope stops abruptly at the edge of a cliff that drops almost vertically at least a thousand feet down--then it passes through the cloud layer, so there's no way of knowing its true height. They find the memory of a trail traversing the slope. It seems to head down more frequently than it heads up and so they follow it. It is new and exciting at first, but then it grows just as brutally monotonous as every other landscape where soldiers have ever marched. As the hours go by, the snow gets patchier, the clouds get closer. One of the men falls asleep on his feet, stumbles, and tumbles end-over-end down the slope, occasionally bounding into free fall for several seconds. By the time he vanishes through the cloud layer, he's too far away to see.

Finally the eighteen descend into a clammy mist. Each sees the one in front of him only when very close, and then only as a grey, blurred form, like an ice demon in a childhood nightmare. The landscape has become jagged and dangerous and the lead man has to grope along practically on hands and knees.

They are working their way around a protruding rib of fog-slicked stone when the lead man suddenly cries out: "Enemy!"

Some of the eighteen actually laugh, thinking it is a joke.

Goto Dengo distinctly hears a man speaking English, with an Australian accent. The man says, "Fuck 'em."

Then a noise starts up that seems powerful enough to split the mountain in half. He actually thinks it is a rock avalanche for awhile until his ears adjust, and he realizes that it is a weapon: something big, and fully automatic. The Australians are firing at them.

They try to retreat, but they can only move a few steps every minute. Meanwhile, thick lead slugs are hurtling through the fog all around them, splintering against the rock, sending stone shards into their necks and faces. "The Nambu!" someone shouts. "Get the Nambu!" But Goto Dengo can't fire the Nambu until he finds a decent place to stand.

Finally he gets to a ledge about the size of a large book, and unslings the weapons. But all he can see is fog.

There is a lull of a few minutes. Goto Dengo calls out the names of his comrades. The three behind him are accounted for. The others do not seem to answer his calls. Finally, one man struggles back along the path. "The others are all dead," he says, "you may fire at will."

So he begins to fire the Nambu into the fog. The recoil almost knocks him off the mountain, so he learns to brace it against an outcropping. Then he sweeps it back and forth. He can tell when he's hitting the rock because it makes a different sound from hitting fog. He aims for the rock.

He spends several clips without getting any results. Then he begins walking forward along the path again.

The wind gusts, the fog swirls and parts for a moment. He sees a blood-covered path leading directly to a tall Australian man with a red mustache, carrying a tommy gun. Their eyes meet. Goto Dengo is in a better position and fires first. The man with the tommy gun falls off the cliff.

Two other Australians, concealed on the other side of the rock rib, see this happen, and begin cursing.

One of Goto Dengo's comrades scampers down the path, shouts, "Banzai!" and disappears around the corner, carrying a fixed bayonet. There is a shotgun blast and two men scream in unison. Then there is the now-familiar sound of bodies tumbling down the rock face. "God damn it!" hollers the one remaining Aussie. "Fucking Nips."

Goto Dengo has only one honorable way out of this. He follows his comrade around the corner and opens up with the Nambu, pouring it into the fog, sweeping the rock face with lead. He stops when the magazine is empty. Nothing happens after that. Either the Aussie retreated down the path or else Goto Dengo shot him off the cliff.

By nightfall, Goto Dengo and his three surviving comrades are back down in the jungle again.

Chapter 49 WRECK

To: root@eruditorum.org

From: randy@epiphyte.com

Subject: answer

That you are a retail-level philosopher who just happens to have buddies who are in the surveillance business is simply too big a coincidence for me to accept.

So I'm not going to tell you why.

But in case you are worried, let me assure you that we have our reasons for building the Crypt. And it's not just to make money--though it will be very good for our share-holders. Did you think we were just a bunch of nerds who stumbled into this and got in over our heads? We aren't.

P.S. What do you mean when you say that you "noodle around with novel cryptosystems?" Give me an example.

Randall Lawrence Waterhouse

Current meatspace coordinates, hot from the GPS receiver card in my laptop:

8 degrees, 52.33 minutes N latitude 117 degrees, 42.75 minutes E longitude

Nearest geographical feature: Palawan, the Philippines

To: randy@epiphyte.com

From: root@eruditorum.org

Subject: Re: answer

Randy.