# Weekly Prompt - 2025-01-26 > [!important] Author's Notes > Sorry I couldn't participate in the last Weekly Prompt. I was kinda goin' through some mental health stuff. > > This isn't my best writing, but the point is I got it out the door. I'm proud of that alone, and I'm proud of everyone else who participates. I can't wait to read your stories! (✗╹◡╹)ﾉ > > \- Axi, 2025-02-01 > [!quote] Scohui > ##### Prompt > **Defend, Fame** > ##### Optional Theme > Espionage ##### Velvet Grader's personal network, Entrance The violet lattice of cyberspace extended to the horizon, topped by a shattered sun against a starry sky. Velvet typically just skimmed PANs. Unlike crypto thieves or cyber-assassins, all the information she typically needed was accessible from Layer 2. Someone went to work, sent an encryptomate to hubby about staying late. Meanwhile her signal's caught on the South Side, and she trades datagrams with a known [[Chicago Lexicon#joyboy|joyboy]]. Velvet watched, touched that up, dropped a timeline to whomever was willing to pay. Typically that meant corpo types keeping an eye on backroom deals and treaties with shady characters. In personal circumstances, she'd play on insecurity. A nudge in the wrong direction was all it took to score that sweet moolah. ###### Secondary Memory Tonight was a special case. Someone had tried to give Velvet a taste of her own medicine. He'd failed, of course, but she didn't exactly appreciate the mess he'd caused to her personal net. As hopped off the bus to Secondary Memory, she found her library in utter shambles. Bookshelves toppled, glowing tomes with entire megabytes ripped out. She took particular offense to the ransack of her reading room. Only someone with a grudge would erase core-memories, and he'd tried to set the whole place alight. Velvet's safeguards stood firm however, and they must've moved on. As she replaced a book on a high shelf, a tap on the shoulder. Velvet kicked behind, and spun about with pistol in hand. Meanwhile the Librarian program dusted off his robes, and kowtowed to his User. "Ms. Grader. The Kernel wishes to see you in Main Memory." Velvet's muscles eased. She let out a small sigh, and confirmed, "Yes. Understood. Let's get to the bottom of this." ###### Main Memory With a thought, Velvet sent her consciousness racing down the memory bus. Heavy doors - easily a hundred tons if built in realspace - quickly opened at her approach. Great walls of fire parted in twain, and hulking security daemons stepped aside. When she'd finally manifest at Main Memory, she found the Kernel directing a handful of Librarians, and her [[Sprite]] Hector dead on the floor. Main Memory represented itself as a datacenter. This layer was hot, even in the command center, and the roar of fans agitated the air itself. Nonetheless, Velvet entered a cold silence as she knelt beside Hector. He'd been her cherished creation, a testament to the person she was before getting kicked out of school. Now he laid in a puddle of his own corrupted code, flickering and fading as he began to derezz. The Kernel dropped beside her, placed a hand on her quivering shoulder. For her own sake, Velvet imagined a soft gaze behind his enclosed visor. "I'm sorry, Ms. Grader. He fought valiantly - we all did - but they were incredibly fast." > [!success] Velvet > **Notice:** 4 - *Success* Velvet took a moment to close Hector's eyes. Then she stood, brushing the corrupt data off her gloves. "They? As in more than one?" The Kernel pulled up a trio of large, translucent terminal windows. With a flick of his wrist, he'd highlight the records of three unauthorized visitors. One from Jupiter, one from Scotland, one in North America. > [!success] Velvet > **Hacking:** 4 - *Success* ... Right here in Chicago, in fact. As she pored over the logs, the pieces began to fall in place. Likely some script-kiddie hired professionals to smash through her defenses, while he got his grubby fingers all over the goods. He'd tried to vandalize her private thoughts, before rushing to Main and popping off random queries left-and-right. The pros didn't even bother mentioning her hardware killswitch. Just scrubbed their logs and waited to disconnect. The script kiddie had no such finesse. Hammering like mad on a virtual keyboard, he'd left his name several times in the log. She knew exactly who he was. `Crypt0nite`. Her former partner in crime. Velvet carefully measured her next words. Through gritted teeth, and an unsettling cadence, she ordered the Kernel to clean up house, and open her neuroport back in realspace. Within seconds her conscious landed back in the apartment she shared with Amber. ### Amber and Velvet's Studio Amber wasn't here. Good. She tore off her VR gear, ripped the ruined Hypernet chip out her neuroport. Failing to crush it in her palm, she threw it across the room, smiling when it drew a puff of dust from the cheap concrete. Then she threw herself on the bed, face-first. Morning had arrived. The cacophony of cars and heavy machinery was quickly picking up as law-abiding citizens skittered to work. Meanwhile, Velvet had no intention of leaving this apartment, even this bed. For a moment, she imagined grabbing her cash, getting zeroed, starting another life farming in Antarctica. But that was the coward's way out. So she'd whisper, as she unboxed her spare Hypernet chip. "Breaking hearts to this day, eh? All's fair in love and war. But I'm not afraid to hit back."