LeeSki_SkiMore's SciFi Site: Future.Novel: Lev.UP, page 15

"You're max lev on my list Dumaurier. Full comp time I'll be devoting to you," said
Eller's cop, his heavily-amped arm pushed off of Eller on his way up.
Blink! The cop was gone. A big show of TelCo pixel power meant to be fearsome.
Eller was glad they were gone, but the flashy exit left him with a feeling of ill-ease he
hadn't had before they left. It felt too easy to him. What about that exit they had made.
It was as if they were letting him know that they knew about his access to fed.real. But,
he knew they would have dragged him off if they had even had a passing thought in that
direction.
"Maybe. Maybe not." Eller considered, his ego lev.up at the unexpected no-sweat run-
in with the Big Bad Blues.

"death is a bet, yet still they ride, reaping the wild winds, spinning on high. . ." sang the
Binary Bandits--lead guitar with Leslie effect fading into bass solo, swirl lights on with
pulse--as Eller's copnet squashed rockware returned to the barnet.

"Tap! Tap!! Tap!!!" A ghostly giant of an emerald-encased foot solidified. It stomped in
Eller's face. "Bitchsoft," thought Eller as the display caused him to remember some of
the reasons why he had dropped-off-the-key on this scene. Eller has been running on
hind brain too long. He had gotten very touchy. Violence bod-chems were lev.up. He
didn't realize that he was in such a dangerous state. Mischief in mind, Eller clic'd on
the govware's special icon.
His spy.esp govware, that he didn't quite know everything about, had just gotten a
carte blanche. It rushed into Phara's barnet. It crashed through channel after channel,
level after level until Phara's net domain became its slave. It leapt onto Phara's personal
paths, its spy.espware's worms bored and twisted through her domains tearing them to
shreds. It blasted through her audio pro.tec routines. Totally in control it sent carefully
tailored max-lev audio waves pulsing through Phara's brain. She rang from ear to ear.
Designed for virtual warfare the intense sound waves it generated used her brain as
the carrier medium for the special audio vibrations trapped in the resonate cavity of her
skull. The waves grew, mixed, changed. Phara's brain began to resonate with a
particular frequency. That done, the govware wiped away her visual world. Replaced it
with a shifting, boiling mass that had no beginning, no end. When it sensed her loss of
voluntary function. Its cleaner, and training routines came on-line. Began to remold
her battered brain.
To Eller it was as if a black pit had suddenly appeared in his personal universe where
Phara had been just an eye-blink ago. Shocked, Eller clic'd. Then, clic'd in vain again
as the hole seemed to grow darker, sucking the light from the scene. Frantic, fumbling
fingers finally found the right place. He pressed hard against his neck. The bioware link
of his bodyware cache that contained the govware's core code was physically
broken.
As the govware's E-puppet strings were cut, Phara's 'invisible' form slumped
bonelessly. He was knocked from his seat to the floor as Phara fell against him like a toy
cast aside by an infant giant. Cushioned as his fall was by the nano-reactive spongesteel
of the floor Eller was almost knocked unconscious as Phara's slight, but tight, real.bod,
slammed into him.
Eller made a strangled whooping noise as he desperately tried to get his breath back.
He shoved Phara's limp form to the one side, then pulled himself up by climbing the bar
stool. He stretched out over the top of the redwood concealed bar, while he held his
stomach. Over his sharp, staccato breaths, Eller heard the demands of the contained, but
still active govware.
"Alert! Restore access now. Extreme danger! Restore access now! Repeating..." yelled
the govware to Eller just below his pain level.