Phoenix Phire

Anyone who jumped into the v-Hive automatically appeared on the platform near the 10th floor. The usual quiet of the Hive was flipped upside down when Dex was forced to dodge a ball of light that whizzed by his head. The ball impacted the safety railing before bouncing into a nearby person. That person faded into nothing while displaying an impressive knowledge of curse words.

Darsi glanced at the three remaining jumpers that had been playing H-ball on the 10th level. "You clowns know there's no playing on the 10th level. So notify your teammates that all of you just gained a floor."

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In the hive, the lower you lived, the more prestige you held. Bottom feeders like Darsi had an almost unlimited supply of resources and could basically freelance any job they wanted to. The upper levels were assigned missions by a controller; how they performed impacted the rewards they were given.

Dex could see from their expressions that gaining a floor was pretty severe.

Darsi was still wearing a frown when she turned back toward him. "How did you dodge that? Your back was turned."

"I know. But yours wasn't." There was a window in his point-of-view (pov) that displayed what Darsi was seeing. "Check out the pip on your pov. You should be seeing whatever I'm looking at." Dex held his hands in front of his eyes, staring at his palm.

"That's the shared resources?" Darsi swiped at the pip window, moving it to a more convenient location. "What else?"

"Let's head to the bottom." Dex jumped over the rail and floated gently down toward the lowest level. "Are there more virtual doors than real ones?"

"Yes… We have several long-term virtual guests who are deep-stayed elsewhere." Darsi followed him down…

When Dex arrived at his door, he was confronted with his first surprise. Three virtual locks were sealing it. When he touched it, the first lock opened. "How do I open these?" The second lock opened at the sound of his voice. He paused to study the third lock. "Is this an optical scanner?"

Darsi nodded… "This jump feels different; colors are brighter. Not just that, everything is more acute."

Dex stared into the scanner, causing the third lock to open. "The Brandish hardware is cutting edge when you combine that with our shared resources; I'm guessing we're getting an acuity increase of ten or twelve percent."

Darsi whistled softly… "Fucking Da Vinci."

"Not only that, but when we're out of direct view of each other, a communication window should open up." Dex opened his door and entered, making sure to close it behind him. Immediately a full-sized miniature holo of Darsi appeared in his pov.

Darsi's smiling face was visible as she started trying out different options. "Good… Good… I can close both the shared view and holo windows whenever I want."

Dex touched his pip, instantly changing it to his pov. "By clicking on the pip, you can make it you're primary pov."

"Company…" Darsi waited next to Dex's door as Thumper joined them; she wasn't alone. Although Dex was on the other side of the closed door, his pip showed him Darsi's view of Stiletto, Gadget, Mongoose, and Thumper.

"Bring them in." Dex noticed how Darsi didn't barge into his virtual room without his permission. There were also safeguards on his v-Hive door that weren't there in reality. Apparently, virtual privacy was not to be fucked with.

Darsi started listing off the options that the tandem jumper had while they listened closely. Dex ignored the group and was already working in several windows at the same time.

Darsi smiled at the guys. "Even though my back is turned, I can see that my co-pilot is breaking into Kenji's personal server."

Stiletto glided around Darsi and sat next to Dex. "When did you design this?"

"I didn't," Dex admitted. "My design was a six-tandem pod, but I couldn't get the software to synchronize during simulations."

Gadget seemed to find the idea interesting. "Using three sets of spliced 12-line NTI?"

"Initially, the simulation was set up that way. But I spliced an additional NTI to add six more lines. This placed seven neural connections per jumper. Darsi and I are now sharing six each, with advanced memory functions. I reasoned that six jumpers should be able to handle seven neural connections each. I couldn't get the simulation to work."

Gadget shook his head slightly. "Fucking Da Vinci… Mind if Mongoose and I give the Tandem jumper a go?"

Darsi wasn't following the conversation; her concentration was focused on Dex, who apparently could multitask without really trying. "You're taking Kenji's Exe?"

Dex nodded. "That smug bastard…." He sent the fat boy into Kenji's server and then watched the event.

"Hey!" Mongoose leaned over the couch to view what was happening. Hacking was much more visual in the virtual world. "The fat boy code is growing?"

"Not growing… Absorbing." Dex built the defensive juggernaut with a particularly nasty multiplier virus. After some alterations, the code would attract every Exe in range. They became like flies on sticky paper, unable to escape. Every piece of code that joined increased the range and size of the Fat Boy. If given enough time, it would completely clog the data stream.

Thumper frowned at Dex as she played out the obvious conclusion. "You can later retrieve the Fat Boy and the foreign Exe?"

Dex nodded. "Once I deactivate Fat Boy, the Exe can be separated without damaging them."

Thumper crossed her arms in front of her chest. "This means you have copies of our Exe."

Dex laughed at the face she made. "Potentially, but I only kept Stiletto's code."

Stiletto wrinkled her nose at him, not sure if she should be upset or complimented. Code belonged to whoever could take it, so Dex hadn't done anything that they wouldn't have.

Darsi was still watching Dex's progress on her pov. "Kenji's code is weak-ass shit."

Dex nodded in agreement. "Let's kick a few doors down. Anything useful on Yuli's inner circle?"

"Yeah…" Darsi was still watching Kenji's Exe; Dex opened it up and added a few lines. It was closed again before she could decipher what he had done. "Yuli has three lieutenants, sending you their individual finances. None of them are using the Swiss banks, local Mediterranean branches.

"Perfect, I'll throw up my secondary target," Dex noted that the Hive account in his name didn't have viewable numbers on his hud.

[Louie Bremmer]

1st Bank of Lisbon

Savings Account 123,323 euro

Checking Account 14,210 euro

[Jacque Talbot]

Athens Credential

Priza Investment Fund 1,330, 778 euro

[Renee Gomez]

Nazionale, Banca d'Italia,

Shareholder Account 4,988,233 euro

Savings Account 25,985 euro

Checking Account 151,588 euro

[Kendal Jace] Secondary Target!

Massena Credit Union, New York

Savings Account 45,433 dollars

Checking Account 12,858 dollars

Dextron

Hive Member Account XXX-XX-XXXXX

No Current Funds.

Darsi had already changed her pov to match Dex's. "Which one is first?"

Dex opened virtual interfaces to all four of the Mediterranean banks. "I'll kick down the door on all four at the same time. Just work your way down the list."

"Ready, Partner!" Darsi focused on the screen.

"Going in!" Dextron manipulated his glove and sent his fat boy code into all four banks at once. At the same time, he released 70 breakers into the first target. The breaker's task was to completely overwhelm normal system operations. Within seconds of their release, the local network inside the bank would become inoperable. This would attract the bank's ICE; financial institutions could pay for the very best. Unfortunately, the fat boy operated like quicksand; the more you struggled, the faster you sank.

"Slicing into Bremmer's accounts." Darsi's manipulated the interface; the account numbers were already saved into the hud.

"15 seconds," Gadget called out.

"Got his checking… Slicing savings…" Darsi glanced at the progress bar; the time was good.

Then, Dex had a moment of clarity… time to put the screws to that fake. "Send that to Kenji's account! We'll leave it there until he accesses it."

"Done! Sending it to Massena Credit Union."

"30 seconds…" Gadget was watching the breaker activity. He hadn't seen Dextron's breakers in action. "What did that kid do to make them so disruptive?"

Dex pulled his fat boy out of the Lisbon bank and withdrew the breakers. Before he left, he flooded the system with Kenji's copied Exe. "Lisbon is clear!"

"Slicing Talbot," Quicksilver's voice sounded like she was telling a funny story, calm and full of humor.

**************

Kendal's personal hud buzzed; he paused his paperwork long enough to open a window.

6,634,117 euro (Awaiting Conversion) has been deposited in your Credit Union Savings Account.

"I fucking wish..." Kendal keyed in his bank account, freezing when he saw the amounts. He opened an additional hud to the credit union help desk and waited for them to answer. "Shit… It's lunchtime. He moved back to his banking window and immediately leaped out of his chair.

"WHAT? MY FUCKING MONEY!" Kendal's voice rose in both pitch and volume until he sounded like a shrieking coed in a horror movie.

Meanwhile, at the v-Hive, Darsi placed their gains in Dex's account. "Dunzo!"

"Front to back, less than four minutes." Gadget clapped in appreciation. "Well done."

Darsi winked at her co-pilot. "It was a good effort. Kenji's code isn't well known; I doubt they'll be able to track it to him."

Dex smiled innocently. "Unless I coded his personal server address into his Exe…."

Quicksilver raised an eyebrow. "Look at you! Sexy Dexy, getting some payback!"

Dex shrugged slightly, his smile widening when he glanced at his account window. "Sending half to you now, Darsi."

[Dextron]

Hive Member Account XXX-XX-XXXXX

58, 291 dollars

6,634,117 euro

"This is only the beginning, Partner." Darsi closed her open windows, one by one. "Today was just pocket change; the big fish is Yuli."