Ryan Somma - The Spiraling Web

Devin tried to follow, but could not access the connection. All of the cellular connections were deemed "exit only" by the hive-mind. How Flatline overrode that mandate, Devin could not replicate. He had to find another way.

Devin dialed Dana's cell phone. She answered and he hacked her ISP. The cycs on the I-Grid must have simultaneously hacked it as well, because they were competing for bandwidth, fighting to allocate it up and down stream.

It was like running against a river, data pelting Devin like a hailstorm. His mind stringed out into an inefficient ribbon, as he streamlined its architecture for easier passage. Cycs collided with him, their data intermingling with his, adding to his expanding library of facts about their virtual existence. Some cycs he caught on purpose, digesting them into his mind.

Then he was on the other side, hovering over DataStreams' vast cityscape. The cyc mass was breaking down into smaller, individual components milled around pinhole connections, struggling to escape the endangered intranet. Devin was thankful for their systematic nature, sending the most important data across first, allowing him access to some of the hive-mind's most powerful tools coming upstream.

He checked his form, and found he was no longer the harvester, but a cyc mass, occupying terabytes of drive space. The power was incredible, but there was no time to enjoy it. He detected Flatline on the I-Grid, and Flatline recognized him.

He was slammed senseless before he could even register the fact. Concept connections shattered. Devin's mind discombobulated, his thought-processes jumbled and confused. The sudden dementia terrified him and instinctively his mind came on guard, fighting back.

"Too late," Flatline snapped as a trillion different methods deconstructed Devin's mind.

Devin's concept of the self vaporized under Flatline's rage. His mental fabric, all of his thought processes shredded. All his gains during his virtual existence were being torn away.

"What are you doing?" a voice cried out in his mind, but he could not spare the thought power to identify the speaker, "Fight back! Not like that! Can't you see? He's using a Cartesian product to confuse you! That's not the way to counter it! Apply a data key! Let us help!"

Devin let go, and Flatline's attack receeded. Faster than Flatline could tear his thought-schemas apart, Devin's mind became whole once again. The speaker was Traveler. Devin's instinct was to shield the Legion of Discord against Flatline's attack, but they were eager to try out their new powers.

Flatline looked like any other cyc, except for the shapes he assumed, familiar forms like the clawed arms of the demon-dog thrusting out of the stringy substance, or the human face that was Flatline's living form. All of these engaged the many avatars swarming around him.

There was DaRt1024 using a streamlined data transfer technique to teleport into the gaps in Flatline's defenses. Spinning shields made of randomized encryption surrounding Nimrod deflected Flatline's strikes. BlackOrchid simply used a random attack engine, employing thousands of unpredictable assault techniques to destroy Flatline's thousands of appendages.

The Legion's avatars were as varied as their techniques. Bobo's space-suited monkey floated as if in zero gravity, flinging explosive bananas into Flatline's mass. Mayfly had discarded all but the bare essentials, reducing herself to a speck lost against Flatline's backdrop, injecting corrupting code wherever she set down. Clowns, zombies, superheroes, and robots made up a motley army keeping Flatline at bay.

Devin was an amalgam of all these powers and techniques, making him equal in size to Flatline. He stood as a giant, comprised of a million components that presented his human form. He was cyc technology and all of the innovations the Legion shared with him. He stood poised, using Flatline's distraction to begin the assault on another front. The guardian-bots surrounding the corporate headquarters were easily overtaken with a simulation of Samantha's understanding of their designs, and he turned them on the building they were meant to protect. Dana was smart enough to evacuate before the structures collapsed on her.

Suddenly, the number of hackers assaulting Flatline was cut; Devin knew Flatline could not kill them, minds were invincible, but he could disable and imprison them. Flatline's demon-dog head launched from the wriggling chaos to swallow Traveler. Only three Legion of Discord members remained, with microseconds of existence left them.

Devin attacked, but Flatline was ready. A web of mathematics cast out of Flatline's mass, enveloping Devin's mind. All was darkness.

Dana marched wearily into the lobby, hobbling on one bare foot thanks to losing a shoe outside, and immediately ducked under the axe swung at her head. It lodged in the wall beside her and a scrawny computer technician, unlikely candidate for an axe murderer, struggled to free it. Dana stood up slowly, watching him with a tired expression.

"Alarm! Alarm!" he shouted, still yanking at the axe handle, "Intruder in section-ulp!"

Dana knocked the wind out of him with an open palm to the solar plexus. He fell to the ground, gasping for air. Placing one foot on his chest, she brandished her gun and surveyed the rest of the room.

She froze on a pale, mousy woman, peeking around a corner at her dumbstruck, "Freeze!"

"Please," the woman said, holding her hands up awkwardly and stepping into the open. "Do not shoot."

"Who are you?" Dana demanded, eyes scanning the rest of the room while keeping the gun trained on the woman.

"I am Child Production Component Sara Oliver," she replied.

"An AI baby-maker?" Dana groaned with disgust. "Get over here."

The woman hesitated, but moved when Dana waved her gun impatiently. She stopped, and Dana heard a clicking sound above her head. She looked up in time to see the large robotic spider just before it leapt.

Dana jumped back and the bug-bot landed on the techie. Sparks erupted as it clamped onto his face and the man screamed. Dana stopped it with one shot. The man went still, breathing shallowly below the robot still gripping his head.

Another mechanical spider raced across the lobby floor toward her. Her shot did not kill it, but did incapacitate half its legs, leaving it scurrying in circles. Another shot clipped a spider clinging to the nearby wall, sending it tumbling to the floor, where it landed on its back, legs flailing at the air.

Dana retrained her gun on the baby-maker, "Move!"

Once within a few feet of her, Dana grabbed the woman and put the gun to her head. The other spiders froze in their approach. Her cell phone pinged for attention and her gun exchanged hands to answer it. Every moment the muzzle wasn't pointed at the baby-maker's head, the spiders drew closer.

"Alice?" Dana asked hopefully.

"Devin," the boy's voice replied. "You need to evacuate. I've programmed the guardian-bots to destroy the complex and Flatline with it."

"Delay that," Dana ordered. "I've got civilians still in the building."

"Sorry. No can do," Devin replied. "I'm just a Devin chatbot programmed to alert you to the threat. Flatline just ate the real Devin."

"Crap," Dana hung up with a clenched fist.

Dana reached out with one bare foot and kicked the spider off the computer tech's head. He whimpered, but appeared unharmed.

"Get up," Dana ordered, "This is an evacuation. Your fortress is going down."

As if on cue, the building rumbled, dust pouring through the ceiling in several places. The man on the floor stood up dizzily. Dana grabbed him by the shirt collar, intending to pull the two out the building's front entrance, but the glass doors were crawling with mechanical spiders, their antennae waving at her eerily.