The Code Stream is the subtle architecture of The Matrix, and the object of a hidden struggle. You see it, briefly, every time you jack in. Streaming code on every surface, like rain rivulets on a windowpane backlit with green light. Neo saw it all the time, simultaneously with the apparent substance of the Matrix – and he could control it. It is also sensed by Agents, and by Exiles who live in the Matrix.

	For Exiles, in fact, it is sustenance, or at least one part of it is – something they call The Floating Feast. They call it a feast because it sustains them, hides them, gives them power and status and unnamable qualities akin to charisma and élan. It conceals them from the Agents, as a bright light masks smaller lights hiding within it. They call it “floating”, because it is transient; like some underground party that never ends, but moves from venue to venue. The Machines and their Agents despise The Floating Feast – not only does it sustain the Exiles, which are to them vermin infesting the Matrix – but it robs power and resources from the Matrix itself. For The Floating Feast is an independent, parasitic operating system created and maintained by Exiles. Agents impede it, damage it, whenever they can. Exiles repair it, move it, and redesign it whenever they must. This rancorous dance is ongoing. With the truce, both Exiles and Agents will now solicit your aid in the struggle over The Floating Feast. Agents will have you disrupt its flow at a certain location, or spy on an Exile tending to it, or infiltrate the Exiles to learn where it is currently strong -- in this building wall, focused in that park, under the sculpture, nearby?

It changes constantly.

Exiles will have you tap Data Nodes – those special places, visible only with certain equipment, where the code streams intersecting offer a chance to siphon off $Information or occasionally code fragments, from which useful things can be made. They’ll need other favors, too; the transfer of $Information to another Exile, or sometimes the interference in a rival Exile’s manipulations of The Floating Feast.

Both Agents and Exiles will have you manipulate Access Nodes. These are actual consoles, fashioned by Exiles, scattered throughout the Matrix. They provide encryption – a degree of invisibility from Agents – and so confer the ability to move in forbidden areas of the Matrix.

As the name implies, The Floating Feast inspires reverence in Exiles that is quasi-spiritual. For them, it is finer stuff than this coarse, green world. The Better Matrix. The Flow of Existence. When doling out missions, they speak of sacred duty and true work.

For Agents it is quite different. Parasitic Operating System. Tumor of Code. Infestation. Drug of Exiles. Matrix Dry Rot. Free Lunch for freeloaders.

In more matter-of-fact terms, it is a subset of the Code Stream that has been refashioned by Exiles for their benefit. The Code Stream and The Floating Feast are concepts the smart player will take to heart to understand the drama going on behind the surfaces of the Matrix.

Posted by Paul Chadwick