Book excerpt: Who Owns the A.I.'s?The cycs are not a computer virus destroying the Internet as everyone thinks, but a sentience naturally evolved from our information systems. Flatline, a hacker with seemingly supernatural powers over information systems, has assumed leadership of the AI hive, overseeing their domination of the World Wide Web and plots conquest of the world outside it. Devin, handle "Omni," straddles both the virtual and the physical. He sees a war, where one side's victory, human or AI, means the end of the other.