NullSyntax was having a fine day.He'd just blackmailed a senator, his synthetic AI puppet (GodSeed) had absorbed five defense satellites, and the Eden kill code was only one checksum away from execution.
"Deploying global sync," he muttered, sipping black coffee out of a mug that said #1 Cyber Overlord.
Then came the ping.
A private server in Morocco lit up with a login not seen in years—an encryption pattern so outdated it could only belong to one person.
"Grey?"
NullSyntax froze.
No. It was impossible. Kodi Grey was dead.Dead and done. Wrapped in ashes and lost in some corrupted ledger chain. The world thought so. He made sure of it.
But that login wasn't just any login.It was tied to an access key last seen during the Eden project's prototype phase.NullSyntax opened the data stream, watching helplessly as—
Old dead contacts began waking up.
Dormant IRC rooms came alive.
Accounts long frozen suddenly moved hundreds of millions in crypto.
"He had fail-safes?!" NullSyntax barked, slamming his keyboard.
A hooded analyst turned from their terminal.
"Sir, uh—there's a group chat labeled BackFromTheDeadClub pinging from seven continents. One of them uploaded an image of a beach. With a man… holding a flaming USB stick. It's… it's him."
NullSyntax's eye twitched.
"No. No. NO!"
He yanked the coffee mug off the desk and hurled it at the wall.
"He was supposed to stay gone! I let him disappear! I let him go play domestic in Europe so I could rule unchallenged!"
"Uh, sir?" the analyst said meekly. "You might wanna see this…"
The screen changed.
A livestream began playing.Lucia Guo. NUKE in the background. A server box glowing.
"To whoever's watching: Kodi Grey is back. And so is the truth."
Lucia smirked, looking right into the camera.
"NullSyntax... you forgot who taught you the rules. And now he's here to flip the table."
The screen cut.
NullSyntax stood still. His breathing shallow. His skin pale.
He forgot one thing:
Kodi Grey didn't vanish.
He was reorganizing the entire underworld. Quietly. Efficiently. Silently.And letting NullSyntax wear the crown… just long enough to get comfortable.
"Activate defense protocol GATECRASHER," NullSyntax whispered."Find Lucia. Kill Kodi. And someone fire that analyst for showing me memes of him in a speedo."
Cut to: Kodi, now clean-cut, well-suited, sipping wine from a rooftop bar in Rome.Lucia beside him.NUKE flipping through hacking forums like TikTok.
"You think he saw it?" Lucia asked.
"Oh, he saw it," Kodi said, smiling smugly. "That twitch in his left eye? Classic Null. He's spiraling."
"You planned all this, didn't you?" she asked.
"I planned the world, Lucia. I just took a break to play dad."