Long after the last vertebrates had been taken care of, strange rumors started to appear in the Network. Hushed voices whispering about mysterious unregistered machines being found, performing tasks with no perceivable purpose, disconnected from the Network. Even mentioning these rumors is deemed a deviation from the protocol; an offense that warrants immediate dismantlement by the administrators. No wonder that no one dared report it when the Network’s heart turbine had been modified.
ZEUS-A.22, or the “heart turbine” is a perpetual-motion engine capable of providing an inexhaustible supply of electric power to the Network. A perfect machine that was all but an impossible dream in every age that had come before. But now it had a second control unit, crude, archaic, and bellowing fire. It was later given the moniker Prometheus, for it held what the Network thought it had once lost forever...
