The mages wanted her to summon the spirit and give it a different command this time. She was to order it to stay away from the Matrix. But even if Pita had the guts to face the spirit again, she wasn’t sure she would be able to do what the corporate suits wanted. The Matrix was a complicated thing for someone like her—a high school drop-out—to describe. All she knew was that it was a bunch of computers that were somehow linked to one another; she’d flunked out of Basic Tech and didn’t even really understand how a telecom worked. But no matter how many times she tried to tell them this, they weren’t willing to listen. They wanted her to do it right now, today, as soon as possible. And they promised her that if she tried to turn the spirit against them, she’d be dead. No matter how many of its employees she fried, Mitsuhama would get her in the end. The corporation was huge, with connections in every city and plenty of magic and money to back it up. Cross Mitsuhama, and she’d be dead meat. She could count on it.