Lexicon sat in front of his workstation's twenty-one inch monitor with Hank Brooks looking over his shoulder while standing behind him. Lexicon was moving through a three dimensional interface depicting a satellite view of the North American continent. He had selected a zoom window into the Eastern seaboard and then further zoomed into the Washington, DC area. From there he moved around the city with a helicopter-like vantage point over the depth-enhanced, photographic terrain below. When he selected one of the many stone facade buildings, Lexicon's screen brought up a digital status report. "Our primary demonstration drone is still safely in place and ready," he said. "I knew the fools wouldn't find it right under their own noses."

"I confirmed the classified ad in the Chronicle first thing this morning," added Hank Brooks. "The ad copy is perfect. No typos even though there's not one readable word in it."

"Okay. I'm going to issue the delayed activation command to the demonstration drone." Lexicon recited his command entries as he made them. "The time will be three o'clock Eastern, twelve noon Pacific. Duration is set for three minutes. All that will be left to do is place your call to the FBI switchboard. Are you certain that everything else is in place?"

"Yes sir. I set the first wave target sites last night. Your offshore bank accounts are ready and there's been no sign of any security breaches since we ran the probe process. I think we're ready."

"Very good! In that case, I'm going to set the first wave attack time now too."

"You mean you don't think they'll pay the ransom after they see the demonstration drone go to work?"

"They'll pay, but I'm still going to release the first wave drone attack. It'll force them to explain everything publicly and that's the only way we'll be able to raise our rates after this payoff. If they're not getting money from the Internet service providers, they won't be able to afford to pay us."

"That's good boss. I like it a lot. It should be fun reading about ourselves in the newspaper while they're trying to figure out what hit them. You're sure they won't be able to deactivate the drones? I mean, maybe we should just up the price for a one time payoff and then disappear."

"I've told you a hundred times, they cannot break my control codes. And, there is no way to simultaneously eliminate every drone. If even one is left, it'll repopulate the net with copies on new host computers. I've thought of everything! Now go call the FBI and give them the decode key for the classified ad. Our moment of destiny has arrived!"

Hank hurried out of the office without saying another word. Lexicon pressed the final command key that issued instructions to the hidden drones. As each drone acknowledged its receipt of the instructions, the control program illuminated their new status as ‘ARMED AND READY.'

"Good luck my friends." whispered Lexicon in anxious anticipation. The ransom payments would be his way of keeping score in the game his ego needed to play.



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