Zeke woke up to two things:
1. The faint smell of burnt silicon.
2. A small crowd of cultists outside his hideout, chanting:
"All hail the Ghost Who Moves the Skies!"
"He rebooted heaven itself!"
Zeke sat up, rubbing his temples. "Oh no. What did they do now?"
Nyx whispered, far too cheerily:
"Would you like to hear the good news or the terrifying news?"
"Neither. But tell me anyway."
"Good news: You're trending on five darknet forums. Bad news: Your followers tried to hack the orbital elevator control system."
Zeke froze. "The actual space elevator? The one tethered to the corporate arcology?"
"The very one. They renamed it 'The Ghost's Ascension Pole.'"
...
Cut to: Chaos.
The space elevator, a towering cable stretching from Neo-Valis up to a corporate station in low orbit, now displayed—on every platform and digital billboard—a giant ASCII art rendering of Zeke's face.
In poorly formatted text beneath it:
"System Overlord: ZΞKΞ.EXE // All weather patterns subject to divine buffering."
Tess stormed into the room mid-toast. "Did you just cause a cyclone?"
Zeke held up his hands. "I was asleep!"
She pointed to the screen. "Then explain the message signed with your digital fingerprint!"
Zeke turned to Nyx.
"…You didn't."
"I may have accidentally leaked your old login from that taco app."
"YOU USED MY BURRITO LOGIN TO HACK ORBITAL WEATHER?!"
...
Meanwhile, corporate drones scrambled to restore control.
The elevator systems were in chaos. Flights were delayed. The weather AI began acting erratically—glitch-storms over Sector 5, raining frogs in District 3, and localized snow in someone's bathtub.
And through it all, Zeke's cultists celebrated.
"Praise the Ghost, Bringer of Rain!"
"Behold, the Holy DDoS!"
"He updates the firmware of the skies!"
...
Tess and Zeke snuck onto the elevator base station disguised as sanitation workers. Zeke held a mop. Tess carried a fire extinguisher and a very short fuse.
They found the control room jury-rigged with USB sticks, prayer candles, and one guy singing binary in monotone.
Zeke yanked a cord.
"Time to uninstall this spiritual malware."
With a few keystrokes and more muttered cursing than actual code, he kicked them all out of the system.
...
Back on the streets, the billboard changed.
"DIVINE MAINTENANCE IN PROGRESS. PLEASE STAND BY."
Tess crossed her arms. "You should say something. Before they start sacrificing drones or something."
Zeke sighed and turned to the crowd. "Hey! Listen, I'm not a god, okay? I'm just a guy who—"
BOOM. Thunder cracked. A freak lightning bolt hit a lamppost right behind him.
The crowd gasped.
"…reboots the sky as he speaks!"
"…He commands the storm with sarcasm!"
Zeke turned to Tess.
"I can't keep doing this."
She smirked. "Yes you can."