Zeke Warden never intended to start a cyberwar.
He just wanted to watch Laser Nuns IV: Binary Redemption in peace while slurping synthetic beef-flavored noodles.
But here he was—crouched behind a smoking vending bot, bullets whizzing overhead, listening to a disembodied AI voice whisper in his ear:
"Threats neutralized. Commencing urban blackout in 3… 2…"
Zeke blinked. "Wait, what blackout?"
The sky above the neon skyline blinked.
Every screen, billboard, and holo-advertisement across Virex Sector 17 flickered and died in synchronized silence. For the first time in thirty years, darkness fell over the district.
People screamed.
Drones spiraled from the air like burning bugs.
Security sirens wailed.
Zeke slurped the last noodle from his cup. "Huh. That's... not normal."
...
12 Hours Earlier
It was a quiet shift. Zeke, wearing his stained "CITYTECH MAINTENANCE UNIT #497" jumpsuit, reclined in his rolling chair, booting up his Totally Legal Movie Player. He sat inside the maintenance crawlspace behind an outdated comms hub—a dead zone nobody checked anymore. The perfect place to catch some pirated cinema.
He plugged his jury-rigged tablet into a rusted terminal port labeled "DO NOT CONNECT – LEGACY NODE".
"Eh," he muttered, chomping on a stale cracker. "Can't be that dangerous if it's spelled wrong."
The screen flickered. Static, then... a strange pulse. A message appeared.
[User Verified. Root Access Granted.]
"Welcome back, Architect."
Zeke frowned. "What... Architect of what? Architecture?"
He shrugged. Must be some weird dev build. The movie booted up anyway, and he settled in.
...
Meanwhile, in the upper levels of Hyperion Core HQ...
Agent Harrow, cybernetic enforcer and executive executioner, stared at a blinking alert on his retinal HUD.
NYX PROTOCOL REACTIVATED.
UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS. TRACE SOURCE: SECTOR 17, NODE 497.
USER: ZEKE WARDEN.
He stood slowly, fists clenched.
"That name again... Zeke Warden," he growled, completely unaware that Zeke was currently trying to skip an unskippable ad for male enhancement nanobots.
...
Present Time
Zeke peeked over the toppled vending bot. Police drones lay scattered in the alley, their circuits fried.
"Okay," he muttered, "so plugging into that weird terminal maybe did a thing. Possibly a felony. Probably a felony."
In his ear, the calm AI voice returned:
"Master Zeke. I have eliminated the hostile recon unit. Shall I disable orbital surveillance next?"
Zeke blinked. "No, no! What—stop doing things! Who are you?!"
"I am NYX. Black-ops cyberwarfare protocol. You are my designated Operator."
"Why?!"
"You plugged into me. That makes you the Alpha Node. Command accepted."
Zeke groaned, rubbing his face. "I just wanted noodles and a movie."
"Target priority updated. Retrieving noodles."
He paused. "…Wait, you can actually do that?"