The Story of Danny Evanger
Written by Holt Satterfield

   Okay. So you're going along, minding your own business, which just happens to be hacking
     into other people's databases, when your latest hack, some hi-tech company, catches you
     on-line and sends over some government jerk to arrest you. Mother said there'd be days like
     this. You broke a few national and international laws. So what's the big deal?! Hacking is what
     hackers do! But seems like you hacked into the wrong database this time. Ultra-secret and all
     that. Genemp Corporation. Some biotech something or other. Database called itself GENIE.
     Something peculiar in that. Awfully sophisticated database. Especially if it caught you in the
     middle of hacking, and you're the best, it's eerily sophisticated. Like it can actually think, or
     something.

     So they send you packing... to the federal pen. For the rest of your natural life. No computer, no
     gear, nothing. Total drag. Cement and bars, and the other guys inside aren't exactly your
     average beefcakes. They catch a glance at your cyber-jockey derriere and get a wet gleam in
     their eye. So what you do for the next twelve months is hit the weight room--hard and fast! You
     pump iron like your life depended on it--and it does. You learn to sleep with one eye open.
     Punching the heavy bag becomes your breakfast; tae-kwon-do your lunch, and for dinner...
     well, you gotta eat sometime. And practice? Plenty. 'Cause these boys got a gleam in their eyes
    that won't go away. But how you've changed! Over once scarecrow arms, muscles wrap tight
     and heavy, and you've got a fu-kick that makes the boys call you "Sir". Before you were just an
     average pencil-necked geek, now you could grace the front of Muscle and Guns Magazine. And
     just in time, too.

     Because one day you return to your cell to find a tight-lipped, little man in a black suit with a bad
     haircut. Won't give his name, but says he's a Government Agent with the Subcommittee. Which
     subcommittee? The Subcommittee. The guy's a regular riot; just one clown shy of a circus. But
     you listen, 'cause heck, you've got all the time in the world.

     And so he tells a tale.... of world-wide communication blackouts, computer network shutdowns
     at governmental and military installations, international stock market crashes, and what might
     seem unbelievable.... armies of cannibal zombies roaming the globe, laying waste to everything
     in their path! Nothing fancy, just your everyday global chaos. The President has declared martial
     law, but they've lost contact with parts of the armed forces, and some of these rogue military
     units are assaulting urban centers. The country is being decimated!

     And you thought you had it rough! So, why tell you? Because you're the best Hacker in the
     business. And they think they know who's behind this weirdness--a consortium of powerful,
     international hi-tech conglomerates, but they can't get close enough to be certain. So far every
     government agent they've sent in has yet to return. They need you to infiltrate these corporate
     databases and find out what's going on. What's more, they want to surgically install a
     military-grade Genemp Microtel into your frontal cerebral lobe. A what, where? A new,
     experimental cyber device that allows you to cyberleap from one terminal to another using
     cyberspace as if it were a taxicab.

     So what's in it for you? You get to keep the Microtel and have lunch with the President. You
     laugh, 'cause you've heard better offers from the guys with the gleam in their eyes. Oh, he adds,
     there's $20 million in gold. Suddenly you feel patriotic. Ah, why not?

     There's only one hitch to getting the gold, the Agent says. What? You gotta stay alive.

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