Computer networks and those who maintain them rarely sleep. The world’s largest network, the Internet, has many thousands of hubs, and many thousands of sleepless operators attend them. In the early morning hours of Thursday, two such people still worked on the main campus server for U. C. Davis.

“Who’s eating eleven gigs of my bandwidth?” demanded Brenda Hastings, the sysop. “It’s three fucking A.M.! We need to shut down the internet link for maintenance.”

Dr. Raymond Vance smiled to himself, his fingers clittering rapidly over the keyboard. Brenda always spoke to him (and everyone else) in a very informal fashion. People often assumed that she was his boss, not the other way around. He never made a big deal out of her cursing and her loud “suggestions” that often sounded like orders. That was just… Brenda.

A bluish light bathed his face, flashing in time with the screen. He used a net-sniffer utility to learn who the user was, although he already had a pretty good idea. “Just a sec,” he said.

Brenda pointed toward her monitor accusingly. “Twelve! They just cranked it up! Twelve gigs! Who’s sucking up all of my resources?”

The answer swam into being on Ray’s screen. “It’s Nog,” he said simply. “He’s probably just surfing.”

“Of course-surfing with twelve sessions at once.