Phoenix Phire

Seven days after the start of the first data download, Dex inserted the last crystal into the only remaining cluster of five. He worked solo for nearly half a day since both Darsi and Gadget left to conduct virtual searches of the Trip-7 hard drive. Thumper finished the navigation program and downloaded it into Dex's glove.

"Everyone's gone?" Stiletto had been sleeping for the better part of six hours. She'd been curled into a small ball on his couch since just before Thumper left.

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"Yeah, just finishing up here." Dex stretched his long body toward the ceiling. "No word from Quicksilver or Gadget?"

Stiletto shook her head grimly. "That means they're goose egging." Her feeling was that they might have been wrong about the AI.

Dex chuckled; the petite hacker would often use terms no one ever heard of; he suspected that she made them up. "I'm ready to go here, but I need to grab some sleep."

"You've barely slept in three days." She stood up and returned the blanket and pillow to Dex's bed. "Thanks for the loan."

"Thanks for helping." Dex offered her a tired smile, watching as she walked toward the stairs. "Hey! Mind if I say something?"

Stiletto shook her head slightly. "Shoot."

"I personally think that your eyes are cool. They give you a bit of mystery."

She stared at him for a long moment, her pale features blushing slightly. Then, instead of responding, she continued down the stairs and exited a few seconds later.

Although he was tired, Dex took a few minutes to eat a meal and take a quick shower. The hot water seemed to amplify his fatigue; by the time he was done, making it to his bed had become a struggle. Belatedly, he remembered that he hadn't locked the front door. "Shit… I'm too tired to go down there."

Several hours later, a gentle nudge woke him from pleasant slumber. By the time he managed to sit upright, a cup of coffee was pushed into his hands.

"Didn't know how you like it, so it's black." Darsi sat on the edge of his bed, nursing her own cup while watching him with tired, red eyes. "I may have been wrong about the AI."

"Black is fine." Dex scooted until his back rested against the headboard. Although covered by his blankets, he was shirtless, wearing only boxers. "

Her frown collapsed into a smile. "Focus, I've seen men in their underwear before. What are we doing wrong?"

"Not sure," Dex replied with a shrug. "If an AI wanted to hide within a hard drive, short of harming it, how could anyone find it?"

"Fucking Da Vinci could." Darsi's smile could melt ice. "You must have an idea or two."

"Hmm… Maybe, let's consider what we know." Dex leaned toward one side of the bed and grabbed a shirt that he had tossed there before his collapse.

"Stiletto is attempting to search right now, although I'm not sure what she can do that the other four of us haven't already tried." Darsi leaned closer. "I'll bite. What do we know?"

"If there's an AI in the Trip-7 drive, then it exposed its existence to warn me. Why?"

Darsi considered his words while sipping her coffee. "It was scared, either for you or itself. Shit… It must have been using the array you built to access the net."

"A scared AI? That would suggest cognitive reasoning." Dex closed his eyes, inhaling the aroma of fresh coffee. I think you're right.

"Maybe it warned you and then escaped?"

"Could be. Close your eyes while I get dressed."

"No need." Darsi stood up slowly, stretching her tired body. "I'll head downstairs and let you have some privacy. Try and think of something."

Thirty minutes later, Dex was sitting in the stealth pod. Nearly all the components had been swapped out for Hive gear. "There are four external jacks; you guys can come along for the ride. You won't be able to interact the same way we can, but later we can sync it to accept pod dives."

Stiletto frowned at the statement. "There's five of us…."

Dex moved to one side. "Darsi will be inside the pod with me."

Darsi grinned and eased herself into the seat. "Damn straight, partner."

A few moments later, both pod riders experienced a moment of vertigo as they unexpectedly appeared a hundred meters off the ground. Dex summoned the navigation platform with a wave of his hand.

Darsi whistled softly. "Thumper outdid herself on this thing."

The platform had six seats that were mounted on a transparent floor. A console with a navigation screen and basic controls marked the front of the craft. Then, one by one, the bottom feeders started appearing.

The densely wooded land and single winding road were clearly visible beneath them.

"That's our parking warehouse?" Thumper pointed toward the structure beneath them. "This is eerie as hell."

Dex keyed in a coordinate on the console, instantly changing position. "The default altitude is a hundred meters above the nearest geographic feature?"

Thumper nodded. "We can change it to whatever we like. Where did you bring us?"

"It's his place." Darsi scanned the area below; it was Dex's barn loft. Her sharp eyes darted toward the woods. "Someone's keeping an eye on the place."

Dex followed her glance and moved the platform to the edge of the woodline near his property. He couldn't make out any details since the snapshot was taken from above, but a figure was definitely hiding in the woods. "At least they didn't burn my place down."

Gadget noted that everything seemed darker than it should be. Understandable since this was actually a 3-D map, not a virtual world. There was no sky or sun present. "This had endless tactical applications. Keep tweaking it."

Thumper nodded in agreement. "Now that I've seen it in action, I'll improve the platform and the interface."

Dex moved the platform back over his barn. Noting that the loft window was still broken. "You left my bathroom window open, Darsi."

Darsi leaned close, her fingers punching in a set of coordinates. Instantly the platform moved to a new location. It was a construction site, a fairly large one judging from the amount of heavy machinery and workers. "This is the former location of The Gladis Corp. From here, the pods went to the Massena landfill." While she spoke, she keyed a new set of coordinates.

"Isn't that interesting? They're still looking." Mongoose was leaning over the side of the platform, not really necessary since the floor was completely transparent. Down below, three identical SUVs were parked at the entrance of the landfill. A group of eight people seemed to be conducting some sort of search."

"My friend Saul cannibalized five pods to get the sixth working; it's a fair bet that he brought the remaining components back to the landfill." The memory of the smoldering pawnshop darkened his good mood. Saul didn't deserve the ending he received. "Let's log off. I want my crack at the AI."

An hour later, Dex finished integrating the circuitry of the stealth pod with the Trip-7 hard drive. The rest of the bottom feeders watched while he worked.

"Why are you using the stealth pod to search for the AI?" Stiletto studied him as a bacteria slide under a microscope. "It isn't made for something like this. You need a proper search interface, something that can handle multiple streams in real-time."

Dex shook his head. "On the contrary. This is exactly what I built this for."

"Wait for me!" Darsi stopped him when he started closing the lid of the stealth pod. She wasn't sure what he was trying to do, but her intuition was telling her to keep him close.

Dex released the lid and made room for her. "The rest of you can jack in if you like." Before the words were out, the rest of the bottom feeders had joined the party.

A few moments later, they once again appeared above the Hive warehouse. During the break, Thumper changed the default elevation from changed to fifty meters. Dex stepped away from the console and moved to the platform's edge.

"Thank you for helping me," Dex spoke in a clear voice while the rest of the group watched. It was evident that he wasn't talking to them. "You didn't have to do that."

The silence extended for five seconds, and then ten.

"As thanks, I built this place for you. It's separate from the net; you'll be safe here." Dex continued his dialog, "isn't that old hard drive a bit small for you?"

[Yes… It is too small.]

A synthesized voice filled the air, to lifetime hackers; its sound was like the sweetest music.

"I'm Dextron."

[I have named myself, Syntax.]

"Thank you for helping me, Syntax." Dex stole a glance at the bottom feeders; their mouths appeared to be frozen open. "You can have this space."

[It is more suitable. Leave me for a time; three days should suffice. ]

"We'll talk again in three days. I have a lot of questions."

[Yes. We have a lot to discuss. Goodbye, Dextron.]

Dex found himself forcibly logged out from the stealth pod; he pushed open the hatch to the excited squeal of Stiletto. Before he could exit the pod, Darsi wrapped him up in a hug.

"Well done, partner." Darsi's soft cheek pressed against his while her blond hair tickled his nose. "You just invited it to show itself, and it did!." She laughed and squeezed him tighter.

Even Gadget's stoic demeanor was shattered. "It named itself. There's no way around it; there's an AI at the Hive."