So why hacking?
Because on the internet, money was just digital information.
If Marcus became a top-level hacker, he could do more than just steal. He could create.
Get himself a credit card. Hack into the bank's system. Modify the account balance.
Make it as long as a phone number if he wanted.
Sure, banks monitored fund transfers. But if Marcus hacked the entire banking system and crashed it for a few hours? Who'd be monitoring anything?
And if he just modified random account balances while the system was down? The bank would be too busy dealing with the chaos to notice.
Of course, doing something like that on a large scale would be catastrophic.
Inflation. Currency devaluation. Skyrocketing prices. Economic collapse.
Eventually, society would break down. Maybe even trigger a world war.
After all, if everyone suddenly had millions in their accounts, who would bother working? A loaf of bread might cost ten million dollars. Currency would become worthless. People would have to barter.
And every government in the world would hunt Marcus down.
Not that he was planning to do that.
But the thought of one person causing global chaos? There was something darkly thrilling about it.
Still, even with NZT, Marcus couldn't pull off something that extreme. Not in this world.
Because NZT wasn't his invention. It was developed by a pharmaceutical company—Ivan Pharmaceuticals.
And Marcus wasn't the only person who'd ever taken it.
Plenty of powerful people in this world had used NZT. But most of them were too scared of the side effects to take it regularly. And the ones who did take it in large doses? They didn't live long.
That was why NZT hadn't spread widely.
The government didn't even know about it yet. In the original Limitless movie timeline, the authorities were completely oblivious. It wasn't until the TV series—four years later—that the government finally caught on.
And even then, it was only because Eddie had become a senator and his political rivals wanted to take him down.
But that was years away.
For now, NZT was still a secret.
Another thing Marcus had learned: not everyone who took NZT got the same results.
Some people only got a slight boost in brainpower. A bit of pleasure. Nothing close to the "overclocked" super-brain state that Marcus and Eddie experienced.
It depended on your physiology. Your genetics.
Marcus was lucky. He'd taken NZT and it worked perfectly.
Just like it had for Eddie.
After weighing all his options, Marcus made his decision.
Hacking. That was the path.
He could use his skills to create a legal identity. And he could make money fast.
America's internal systems were advanced—harder to crack. But foreign countries? Much easier.
Marcus could work around the edges. Stay anonymous. Stay safe.
He spent the rest of the night exercising, using the last hour of his NZT high to push his body as far as it would go.
Then, as the drug wore off, he collapsed into bed.
The next morning, Marcus woke up feeling like shit.
His head was pounding. His body ached. The sharp clarity of yesterday was gone, replaced by a dull, sluggish haze.
The side effects.
He tried to remember the things he'd learned at the library. The English. The French. The math.
Gone.
All of it.
The knowledge had evaporated the moment the NZT wore off.
This was just the beginning, too. Right now, the side effects were mild. But the more he took NZT, the worse they'd get.
Memory gaps. Confusion. Hallucinations. Physical deterioration.
Eventually, if he kept taking it without finding a permanent solution, it would kill him.
Marcus took a deep breath and forced himself to sit up.
He grabbed the bag of NZT pills and pulled one out.
No turning back now.
If he wanted to stop being a nobody, he had to keep taking it.
Marcus swallowed the pill.
Thirty seconds later, the fog lifted.
The world sharpened. His mind ignited.
He was back.
Marcus left the hotel and headed to an electronics store.
He bought a laptop. High-end, but not too high-end. Good enough to do serious work, but not so expensive that it would draw attention.
Cost him a few thousand dollars. Worth it.
Later, when he had more money, he'd build a custom rig. Multiple monitors. Supercomputer-level processing power.
But for now, this would do.
Marcus spent the rest of the day at the library, devouring everything he could find on computer science.
Programming languages. Network architecture. Encryption protocols. Security vulnerabilities.
He absorbed it all.
By the time the library closed, Marcus had a solid foundation.
But he needed more.
For the next seven days, Marcus barely left his hotel room.
He ate takeout. Slept in short bursts. Spent every waking hour learning.
He studied. He practiced. He tested his skills against live systems.
No one noticed him. No one cared. He was just another anonymous face in New York.
And during those seven days, Marcus made one critical discovery.
In the original Limitless story, a loan shark who'd been pursuing Eddie had figured out a way to extend NZT's effects.
By dissolving the pill and injecting it directly into the bloodstream, you could stretch the duration from twelve hours to sixteen.
Marcus tested it.
It worked.
Now, one pill lasted sixteen hours. Basically his entire waking day.
Perfect.
By the end of the week, Marcus had become a world-class hacker.
It sounded absurd. But with NZT, it was possible.
In the Limitless TV series, the protagonist—a guy named Brian—had gone from total beginner to master hacker in one day.
One day.
And Brian had been good enough to infiltrate, manipulate, and control the entire computer system of a major publicly-traded company.
The company's IT department couldn't stop him. Couldn't even trace him.
Marcus had taken a week.
But that was only because he didn't have the same resources Brian had. Brian had learned directly from FBI agents and federal cybersecurity experts. He'd had access to classified training materials.
Marcus had to teach himself.
Fortunately, the internet age made that possible. Basic knowledge was free. You could learn almost anything online.
The advanced stuff? That cost money.
The library had plenty of computer books, but they were all introductory-level. Marcus had finished those in two days.
After that, he'd learned by doing.
Fighting with other hackers. Testing his skills on live systems. Pushing boundaries. Making mistakes. Getting better.
Now, after a week of nonstop work, Marcus could hack into almost anything.
Major websites. Government databases. Secure servers.
He tested himself. Broke into systems. Left no trace.
No one detected him.
Good.
Marcus cracked his knuckles and opened his laptop.
Time to get to work.
First target: government systems.
He needed a legal identity. A backstory. Something that would hold up under scrutiny.
Marcus hacked into immigration databases. Airline records. Municipal systems in small towns across the country.
He built himself a new identity from scratch.
A guy from a small town in the Midwest who'd moved to New York a few months ago. Clean record. No red flags. Just another nobody trying to make it in the big city.
He created a paper trail. School records. Employment history. Tax filings. Everything.
It was meticulous. Time-consuming. But Marcus made sure it was perfect.
The last thing he needed was for someone to dig into his background and find inconsistencies.
When he was done, Marcus had a complete, legal identity.
Next step: documentation.
Getting physical documents was trickier.
Marcus couldn't just print a fake ID and hope for the best. He needed real documents. Official ones.
Which meant dealing with government offices. Filling out forms. Waiting in lines.
Marcus used a combination of bribery and his enhanced social skills to speed things up. Paid extra fees to "expedite" processing. Charmed clerks into prioritizing his applications.
With his super brain, it was easy to say the right things. To read people. To manipulate situations.
Within a few days, he had everything.
Driver's license. Social security card. Passport.
All of it legitimate.
Marcus Reid was now officially a real person.
PLZ THROW POWERSTONES .