Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Log Entry 00000001

"Everybody stand back."

Matrix, AndrAIa, Ray Tracer and the crew of the Saucy Mare took a preemptive step unsure of what was about to occur. Bob looked down to his wrist, a final moment of doubt in his heart.

"Are you sure?"

I was sure.

The guardian smiled. "Thank you old friend." Then, bracing himself, he gave the command. "Glitch! Download!"

It was a moment no keytool had ever experienced, and a function that many feared, yet I embraced the duty as if it was my greatest honor. Bob was my friend, partner, and responsibility; someone I would be erased for. I wondered if that was what I was doing. Flying from his arm I reformatted to pure energy and wound about him finding open patches and integrating into his code. My own consciousness began to loose alias and blur, yielding to his. I dove deeper into his data until there was nothing left that was uniquely myself.

Bob's transformation was visible, he now wore silicon armor, edged in gold and barely resembling the guardian uniform he'd been compiled in. I wasn't getting signal anymore. For a moment I thought I'd been deleted, the absolute silence, darkness, and senselessness was frightening. I couldn't remember a time when I'd been so scared, which was in itself unnerving. I became aware of new sensory inputs, strange new sensations I had a hard time parsing. That was when I heard Bob call me.

Now, understand, my guardian had given me commands before, and I'd do anything he said, but there was something very different about this time. I heard him. Heard. And all he said was "Let's go home".

I couldn't agree more. I flooded his veins with my energy, he willed it into his hands, the two of us cooperating more perfectly than we ever had. I could feel Bob's excitement as he took command of our strange new powers, I thrilled with him as we levitated off the ground, through the ship and out into the web. I became awakened to the world in new ways, as sights, as sounds, I took part in his perceptions, seeing through his eyes. Before us was the tear. He tried to will up energy for a portal.

Right, Bob, I'm on it.

Let's go home.

Chapter Text

The Mainframe we met was on the edge of crashing. My heart broke as the ship sailed over the coast. I couldn't believe that a dead Mainframe was the first thing I'd 'see' in my process time. Inside, I wanted to go back to sensing statistics, strings of numbers never held these kind of connotations. But there was hope in the knowledge that Bob had new abilities, powers that could save this place, and that I had given them to him. It made me proud. These new emotional extremes took some getting used to too… I found I was getting as much from Bob in the merger as he had gotten from me. Why hadn't every keytool merged with their guardians a long time ago? This new awakening alone was worth it! It was like passing into another dimension.

Bob wasted no time. That's my guardian! Mending tears, saving people, just like old times! And of course the first thing he did was find Dot. I knew her at first by her voice pattern, I'd channeled her signal through my comlink millions of times, but I'd never actually heard or seen her, no wonder Bob was so sick with her. He took his sweet time doing anything about it though. It was horribly frustrating to watch. Still, we were all together again, that at least was reassuring. I was gaining confidence in our survival. Bob can get up the nerve to ask her out when the world wasn't ending.

Standing around and listening to backstory, I took a moment to regard Matrix. I'd watched him compile, monitored his strength and endurance, and seen his stats rise over a span of minutes that should have been much much longer, he'd been a temporary partner, but he'd had his own charm, we both had been damaged. I wondered what his future would be. When Enzo first got his protocol I thought maybe after Bob retired I would transfer to him and become his true keytool, but I guessed it was too late for that now. More than likely I would delete with Bob when the time came.

Wow, mortality…that must be why we never merged with our guardians. I was in shock for a little while after that.

Yet all it took was a good plan to get me back on track. Dot had one of course, she always did. Time to kick Megabyte out of the Principle Office. If Bob and I had been here he never would have gotten IN to the Principle Office. Ahwell, better late than never. Bob was back. I wasn't broken anymore. This promised to be quite a show!

Chapter Text

Figures doesn't it, right when we're about to dole out sweet justice we get kidnapped. Hexadecimal was always fun to scan. Her power levels were off the scale. I was stuck scanning her with sight now and she seemed a lot more frightening… she had an unhealthy fixation with my guardian, read most obviously by her tone:

"I don't know whether to kiss you or kill you."

We both gulped.

"Hex," Bob said, a little panicked, "this is great and all, but we've really got to get going."

"Going?" Hex cried, putting on a sad face. "How rude! We have just begun to get reacquainted!"

Bob was having a hard time coping with the situation. His heart was pounding in my ears. I tried to take matters into my own hands as it were, running another statistical scan, trying to remember how in the net I'd done it before all these strange sprite senses appeared. She'd been changed by Megabyte, her code wasn't quite as tight as it used to be, she was once an impenetrable fortress of viral energy, but I could read weaknesses in her now, places where her code was patched, like she'd been reconstructed out of recovered data with non breaking spaces and strange characters. The biggest hole was in her mask, a crack on her cheek. Bob and I had learned that the mask was the plug for all her power. I tried to send him a hint.

Like I said, we both understood each other better merged, he read my nudge loud and clear, on the inside I think he was pumping a fist in victory. "Hex… your mask, what happened?" Hex covered her face. Cha-Ching! I win, clock one up for the keytool.

"It looks painful, please, let me touch it."

"I-I don't think I can let you do that Bob."

Her power over Bob's body was failing. He got up and went to her, trying his best to put his charm on her. He'd gotten a little older and a little wiser in the web, it had made him a bit more sincere an actor. I wondered what kind of adventures I'd missed. Bob leaned in. "Let me help you."

It was working, I began calculating up what kind of energy pattern I'd need to take advantage of this weakness and delete her. Bob let his intentions be known to me. He wanted to heal her. I aborted and took a second to recover. It shouldn't have been a surprise. I mean this was Bob. I guess I'd gotten too used to Matrix and his thirst for deletion. But I shouldn't have been so eager to erase her right on the spot. Helping was a part of my programming too. Perhaps I was still broken.

Oh well, the guardian gave me a command, time to get back to work. I reformatted my strategy and when he was ready and I was ready, we fired energy into and through Hexidecimal. I aimed the defragmenter to hit all her frayed edges but it healed much more than even I had anticipated. When she looked up her face was one piece, all her emotions at impulse, changing on the fly. I felt a deep satisfaction. Doing good is good! We like doing good! See, I'm okay. It helped of course that she pledged allegiance to Bob and sent us back into the fray just in time to miss Megabyte's demise.

Cursors.

….

Chapter Text

"Don't worry, its not like we're never going to see each other again right?"

Bob and I plunged ahead on into the core! Another thing I've done for him, I've made him resilient to the high-energy of the system core. Silver armor pretty… Wow, I'm getting random. Must be the radiation.

I gotta remember my priorities. If I don't keep a level head then Bob won't keep a level head and he's the one who's got to actually DO stuff in here.

We took the lift up into the sector control center to shut the system down. If my calculations were correct it should only have taken us 1.6microseconds to snap all the sectors off if moving unhindered at top speed. Unfortunately unhindered was not what we were. Megabyte had left us a present, and Bob was getting distracted.

Come on, Guardian! You can't waste time talking to a hologram! You'll only survive three micros in here even with my help! Ignore the dipswitch and do your job!

What I wouldn't give for hands.

I think I'm getting spoiled with the sprite senses…

An alarm blazed across the chamber. Megabyte turned and sniggered. "Oh well. There goes Sector 31, pity."

Cursors and Crashes. Bob! Get moving! We're loosing the city! You're loosing your energy! You're loosing MY energy! And I'm loosing my mind! Too long… we're taking too long… you've got to survive. You can't give up… !

My grasp of his sight was failing. I watched a cascade of sparks flying off of the switch at the apex of the current sector board. A Megabyte hologram stood to bar the way. He said something but I'd already lost the sense of sound. Just leave it Bob, what's one sector. What am I thinking? That's one sector of Mainframe, every sector was precious. But on the other hand, why was Megabyte's ghost so adamant to keep this sector active? Could it be…

I scanned quick, my lower level senses still functioning. The world was going black except for streams of data in my mind's eye. There was a patch on this sector, a patch that glowed a viral green.
Bob… this is where the simulation's being stored!

He reached out and grabbed the switch. I could feel the pain of the heat in his hand. Our energy was draining, the calculations didn't look good.

Here Bob! Take my energy. Take all I've got. Do what you can with it. Get us out of here. Save Mainframe.

I released all the strength I had in my own consciousness. Even the data was fading and vanishing. I finally logged off. I hope my reserves were enough to save him.

Chapter Text

What in the net? Is… is that light? Gold light? At the end of a deep darkness? Is this a dream?

All my scanners came alive, the lower level ones, then the higher level ones. A restart? The User does have mercy! Bob looked around. The city we both knew and loved was being restored before us. All our friends were there, alive. We were alive. It was beautiful.

Bob turned from the scene to Dot. I hadn't realized they were standing so close together. Could it be that he'd actually made a move while I was gone? I'm glad my energy went to good use. He leaned in, closing his eyes. I felt the swell of his heart, the touch of the kiss, I think I was the first keytool in the history of keytools to actually blush.

Uh…um… I don't think I should be here….

Ehhe… any time now guys.

Phong interrupted the moment with a camera flash. Thank you Phong! Boy, look at me, just breaking all the records around here. I think I'm the first keytool to get kissed too. Well, happily ever after! Ah, its good to be alive. Roll credits! I'm kidding, we can only wish this was the end. We've got a LOT of work left to do.

Chapter Text

We managed to save ourselves by our own dumb luck. I accessed the README files for the elapsed time I'd been out. It was kind of depressing to find that Bob had risked the lives of everyone on the slim chance that the User might restart. Restarts were very rare. Mainframe's own twin city didn't earn a restart. Of course the User is a mystery. Bob's written files on the subject, presenting ideas about User motives. Is there one or many? Do they try to help us or harm us? Do they even know we exist?

I had a lot of time to think about this stuff. When our anti-Daemon campaign began it wasn't really very exciting.

Dot had plans. She always did…as previously mentioned. "The first task is to make sure systems that are still clean stay clean." Dot reported. "Mouse, can you seal us off? I don't want anyone to access Mainframe, not from the Net or the Web."

"Already done, honey." Mouse assured, popping open a workstation vidwindow.

"But with our ports to the net closed, how are we supposed to access the other systems?" Matrix asked.

"The answer is right in front of us." Dot said, self-assured. "Phong? Can we create tears here in the Principle Office?"

"It is possible," Phong answered, "but it will require accessing core energy, and any tear we create cannot be kept inside the Principle Office for long without risking interior damage."

"That's not a problem." Dot told him. She looked to the six sprites, Captain Capacitor, and the rest of the war room. "We'll split into three teams, two network teams and one home team. Bob will open up portals using the tears made here at the Principle Office and send a network team in to seal off the system. If we coordinate well, we'll be able to take a healthy percentage of the net offline before Daemon's infection grows much further."

"It sounds like a good plan, Dot." AndrAIa said. "But wouldn't Bob be more helpful as a network team member? Both he and Surfr can make portals, we could hit three or four systems in a circuit before returning to base."

Dot didn't like that idea. I suspect she partly wanted to keep him close, which I could understand, but the Command-dot-com in her had a good reason as well. "We need Bob here to defend Mainframe in case the g-" She stopped. No one had told Bob that the Guardian Collective had been infected, but I could tell from accessing network communications how bad the infection was. Not telling Bob was an emotional decision. They probably didn't want to crash his world. I think it was smart because it would have made him hold back in the fight. Yet another reason why he was better off a homebody. "Bob would be of better use here."

"No worries." Ray said, eternal optimist that he was. "We'll be a tough enough pill for that virus to swallow. When do we get started?"

Dot was glad to have the subject changed. "As soon as possible. Matrix and AndrAIa, could you be Network Team A?"

Matrix seemed pleased. "Wouldn't want it any other way."

Dot nodded. "And Ray and Gavin, could you be Network Team B?"

Capacitor tipped his hat. "We won't fail ye, Madam!"

"Bob, Mouse and I will be Home Team." Dot announced. "And if there are no questions, we might as well begin."

"I've got a pair of coordinates set for two neighboring systems." Mouse announced, pulling up a map of the Net. "Ready when you are, Sugar."

"To the roof, teams." Dot directed. "We're going on the offense."

Chapter Text

As each team entered and exited, systems were taken offline. We began to take the board in our hand. But it was almost hard to be excited when all you did was open and close portals. Bob and I spent much of our time floating around the city, fixing instabilities resulting from the frequent tears and the siphoning of core energy.

Daily life went kind of like this: float around the city fixing stuff, fly back to the PO to pop open a tear and let one or the other team in, head down to the war room to refuel, get new coordinates, pop open another tear and let the team back out, fly around, come back, let the other team in… it got sort of routine. The war room was an upbeat and positive place, to the Rebellion's eyes we were winning, and admittedly it looked like it, but I remembered that we were just closing off the peaceful systems. Our little resistance hadn't even begun to fight the infected systems yet. The hard stuff had yet to start. Things got a little more interesting when Hex started stalking us. She didn't like the tight air of the PO, and no one trusted her enough to let her help with the plan. Well, except Bob, which put a little bit of friction between he and Dot. Bob enlisted Hexadecimal as Tear Locator 101… meaning she would float around like she always did, except this time when she spotted a tear or an instability she'd actually TELL us instead of ignoring them. I guess you work with what you've got.

Then came the cycle when the boredom was interrupted, something I'd be thankful for except for the circumstances. It was the fateful second when Daemon finally took interest in us.

Bob and I were headed back up to the roof after the typical refresh and get-new-address-from-Mouse session. Matrix and AndrAIa floated behind us on a pair of souped up hoverbikes. They really seemed to like those bikes, I guess it suits them. Matrix revved his engine.

"Okay, Bob, open the portal."

I reminded my guardian that he was scheduled to open a door for TeamB in less than 25 nanoseconds. He nodded and turned to his friends. "Wait for me to let the others in first."

Matrix leaned back and crossed his arms. "Fine. I'm anxious to go."

"You're not in the least bit drained?" AndrAIa asked. "This will be our fifth trip this cycle."

"I could do this all minute." Matrix replied. "It gets my energy going."

She laughed at him. "There must be some guardian protocol in you somewhere Sparky."

"Should be." Bob replied. "I put it there." I counted off the nanos. Bob waited and threw open the portal casually when I was done. Glimmers of another system could be seen warped around the bubble. It was hard to read, but Bob's eyes registered activity. Something that looked like a guardian spider cruiser skimmed the surface. I couldn't make out the shapes of either the surfer or the reconstructed Mare. I was starting to get a little worried, considering the pirate ship was a little hard to miss. The portal was very strategically timed. It was to be opened thirty nanos after Mouse got the signal from the system that the shutdown was ready. After that we'd open the portal for ten nanos and then it would close, sealing the system behind it. After that, no one could get into that system, and it was safe. We all knew the drill, yet here the portal stood open, waiting patiently for someone to come out. It must have seemed like an eternity to the sprites. Bob and I of course knew the exact time, and there were five nanos left.

There was motion on the portal, a ripple like something passed narrowly by. AndrAIa and Matrix leaned over their handlebars. Something came through. A laserblast! It flew past AndrAIa's head and she ducked. More laserblasts, hitting the roof around us or shooting up into the sky. We held our breaths. Three nanos. The laserblasts increased in intensity and gained a direction, which happened to be straight for us. Bob and I swerved to the left. Matrix and AndrAIa banked right. The laserfire persisted as we studied the rippling surface for any sign of our companions. Two nanos. One. The portal closed. Everyone stood in silence.

Besides the burn marks on the roof of the Principle Office, there was no sign that the belligerent system ever existed. Calculating the rate of increase on the laserblasts all it would have taken would be three nanos max before the guns firing them would have joined us on our side. What happened was impossible to say, the only truth was that we were missing half our team, and our friends. A vidwindow popped up. Apparently it had taken a bit for Dot to recover too. "Get down here. We need to talk."

Bob and the others didn't need a second thought, we shot down the side of the PO, paused at the front door long enough for AndrAIa and Matrix to ditch the bikes and charged into the war room. Dot dashed straight to us when we arrived, but Matrix was the first one to get a word in. "What happened?"

"The virals –" Dot replied, she seemed to be full of adrenaline, her hand shaking a little as she pointed. The blue dot that represented the system we'd just sealed was glowing green.

Bob was getting scared now. Across the board, blue systems changed to green, even some we'd already sealed. Mouse was typing madly in the corner. "There's no way to reach Ray and the Captain, the line is closed!" She pounded her fist on the console. "No!"

"We're too good." AndrAIa said, sadly.

I couldn't help but think we weren't good enough. But that's just me. The entire room was looking pretty down, all their efforts had been for naught, and now we were half-staffed and up against a more powerful virus than most had imagined. Dot took this moment to rally her troops. She really did make a good Command-dot-com.

"I know this is hard on all of us, but we can't let a bad turn of events bring us down. Ray Tracer, Captain Capacitor, and the crew of the Saucy Mare were friends and comrades, warriors to the end. They came from outside to help us in our time of need, but now they are casualties. We mustn't let their sacrifice become a stumbling block, instead, lets take it up with us and honor their memories by defeating Daemon! When Daemon is gone there will be no more casualties, and the Net will be free again! We have to strive toward that hope! We are the only ones who can stop her, and to do so we need to be as strong, as diligent, and as driven as we can! I'm ready to take that initiative! Can you stand with me?"

The room was empowered by her speech. They let out a cheer. Bob's heart was soaring, I nearly felt crowded by it. Dot turned to us and leveled her voice, sounding more serious than she had ever been. "Guys, I've got a new strategy."

Chapter Text

Her new strategy wasn't much different than the old one, only this time Matrix and AndrAIa got to go in guns-a-blazing and take over control of major net junctions. I'd become convinced, now, that she was keeping Bob in Mainframe for his own good. She wasn't being very romantic to him anymore, wrapped up tightly with the war and her duties therewith. My guardian was still in the dark about the rest of his collective. I would have preferred that he blissfully remain so, being tied so close to him now, I didn't want to have to feel the hurt he would feel when he learned that he'd been fighting against his friends and academy-mates this entire time. Unfortunately he found out on his own, but he was too busy to feel sad.

Mainframe was under attack.

We hovered between Matrix and the collective, a sea of familiar code bobbing before me. I ran a quick scan to see who was there. Carden, I couldn't find Turbo, hopefully he was still battling the virus somewhere, I'd run into nearly every one of these guardians at some point in my career, excepting the youngest of course, but I was more alarmed to find not a single keytool among them. None! That would explain why the guardians weren't using portals, but what happened to all of my friends. Keytools are few, we all knew each other by name and signal. Picking through I recognized the code of some of their partners. Were the keytools removed? Destroyed? I shuddered.

Total war broke out over our heads, Bob battled very well. He couldn't break his code and delete his own, but he used our powers to disable and remove the guardian ships from the system. I was proud of him until nearly a second had passed… then I started feeling woozy.

I'd resigned myself to giving Bob all of my powers, but he was draining both me and himself. I could feel his code start to come apart at the seams and dashed to patch things up. This excessive work was taxing his body. He was defragmenting. This was bad. Yes, it was very bad. The degradation in the web hadn't helped either, it seemed he was missing some of his frame code. It made his physical structure even less resilient than I had thought. You can use my powers, Bob, but I'm going to work for you now, I'm going to hold you together, for both our sakes.

And access some energy soon would ya?

Chapter Text

I take back everything I've ever said about Hex. She kicks so much ASCII its hard to describe. While Bob sat and refilled, she did just as she was told and evicted any and all Dameon's forces from Mainframe with a wave of her hand. I was awestruck let me tell you.

There seemed to be some real damage done to Bob after the last battle. No matter how hard I try I can't seem to defrag the loose pieces of his structure and get them to stick. Plus I'm growing weak. About now I'd need to be stuck in a recharge-unit but that's kind of impossible. I'll just have to try and hold out, maybe suggest Bob eat more. I'm sure there's a way to access his energy and transmute it into my own. I feel like such a leech.

Well, I've patched him up well for now, and the extra energy is helping. I suppose I should keep some reserve and log off for a while. I'm sure Bob'll wake me up when he needs me. Maybe Hex'll just go ahead and win the war for us. It seems like all the good stuff happens while I'm asleep anyway.

Chapter Text

Surprisingly, it wasn't Bob's voice that awoke me. He wasn't even awake himself. It was someone else… someone familiar. I was aroused in the dark of Bob's unconsciousness by its signal.

"Glitch? Glitch? Ya in here?"

I took a moment to try and parse the input. I hadn't heard signal in so long… all voices and sounds… that it took me a moment to even translate what was being said. I pulled just enough of my energy to become fully aware. Bob was still very weak after all. "Who is it?"

"Glitch! You're processing! Perfect!" The signal came closer, I locked on, and found to my surprise that it was another keytool. Not just any keytool, but Copeland, Turbo's keytool, existing in pure energy. I took a start. "Copeland? What in the Net are you doing here?"

"Glitch, you're talking like a sprite."

"I'm sorry," I said, "I've gotten a little quasi-logical since the merger." Why was I apologizing! There were more important things to think about. "But Copeland, how are you here? Inside Bob?"

"I had nowhere else to go." He replied.

I leveled my signal, trying to sound pointed. "What happened to Turbo?"

Copeland paused. I sensed the worst, a keytool would never abandon its guardian, they shared code. Something awful must have happened. It was the only explanation. "You've got to understand, Glitch, Turbo was only one sprite. He couldn't hold off the strength of Daemon's power alone. He succumbed to the infection, I couldn't stay with him anymore."

"The infection drove you out?" I asked. I remembered our last meeting in the bar with Matrix. Turbo had been infected then, but Copeland had remained loyal.

The keytool replied negatively. "No matter what my code details, I can't be used for evil. If I stayed with Turbo, I would have been used to further Daemon's plan. I can't do that. I had to run."

"But what about your physical form?"

"I snuck off in a firefight." Copeland explained. "I needed to find a physical body to stay in. I recalled the message we received when you merged with Bob. I thought that if I came here, I could possibly help you and stay out of reach of Daemon. As long as Daemon can't get me, I can rest easy."

I felt a little defensive about letting someone else live in my guardian. I mean it was my body too after all, Copeland may have been pure energy, but it was my code linked into Bob's data not his.

I recognized the emotion as sprite-based and tried to tamp it down. Perhaps Copeland could be useful. In any case, it was someone to talk to. "Okay, fine, you can stay. But Bob is running low on energy. Will you be willing to donate some so that he can still use our powers?"

"It would be an honor."

"Deal."

Chapter Text

Copeland proved to be most helpful. He poured his energy into Bob's powers and I held his ever-fragmenting code together. Bob never knew he was there, and it was just as well. I was starting to assume he'd forgotten I was there too. I was getting exhausted with the whole thing. Merging was great to start with, but it was no picnic in the long run.

And I was starting to get suspicious that I was malfunctioning.

In my efforts to keep Bob in one piece I noticed that the parts I held were degrading faster the tighter I took. Plus I was loosing power exponentially. I asked Copeland to perform a scan.

"Whoa." Copeland said.

He had an excellent bedside manner. "What's wrong?"

"What happened to you, Glitch, you seem to be damaged." He took a second. "That's right, you were damaged when we met before." I sighed and he ceased the scan. "Why in the Net did you merge when you knew you were malfunctioning?"

"Now you're talking like a sprite." I chided him. "Bob and I knew the risks when we tried it. It was the only way to get back into Mainframe. I guess I'd hoped too much. I thought perhaps getting rid of my physical form would fix me. Seems I was wrong."

"Dern straight."

I focused more critically on him and he took a second to recover himself.

"Wow, I guess I really miss Turbo."

"We'll get him back. When Daemon's gone he'll be fixed and you can go back to him." I told Copeland. "You're lucky."

"Well, you're on the other side of lucky." Copeland told me gravely. "If you keep up what you're doing you'll run so low on power you wont be able to stay in one piece!" He pulled some energy from his 'Bob' reserve. "I'm sending out a sublevel message. If the other keytools are out there in hiding, maybe they can help us out. Until then I'm giving you some of my energy. If you come apart, there's no way to keep me in here and we'll all be erased, you, me and Bob."

I sighed, exhausted and in no mood for arguing. "Fine, do whatever."

Chapter Text

Bob ended up being the place to be! It was like a keytool fraternity in there! Apparently the fact that I had merged with Bob made him the only body capable of hosting keytools as energy. Until their arrival, the rest of them had translated to physical form in walls or stored themselves in data consoles. Kink had even nested herself into the core of her guardian's home system, which left her a little frazzled and rather spacey. I guess becoming radiation and being radiated had the same affect. They came in the night one by one, sneaking into Bob while he was asleep. By morning there were twenty-three of us. That left seven still floating out there somewhere lost or erased.

It was a burden and a blessing. To start with, I had all the help I needed holding Bob's bits together. There were at least fifteen of them devoted to that. The rest were stuck on trying to find a way to fix me, which was of chief importance. Copeland managed everything. When the fighting caught up again each of the 'repair us' teams split in half devoting energy to give Bob powers. Even with the backup his strength seemed to be waning. Most of the keytools had been weakened by existing without a physical form and all of them were missing code without their guardians. I felt useless… I wasn't allowed to do anything except exist.

Martin poured his dose of energy into me. "Wow, Glitch, this is amazing! I mean, you actually merged! I can't believe I'm transmitting to a merged keytool, this is incredible."

"Well don't just gawk." I said, feeling irritable. "And don't tell me I'm talking like a sprite either… User knows I've heard that from at least fifty people today."

"There are only twenty-three of us in here, Glitch." Martin reported. "And you wouldn't tell that to yourself so technically you can only have heard it twenty-two times."

"Would you log off?" I spat. "This isn't a picnic, you know, I'm not something to study or stare at. Bob and I are in trouble and I'm getting a little claustrophobic so just leave me alone."

"Sheesh, fine." Martin went back to stabilization duty.

I was beginning to feel pain now. I'd never felt pain before, not even when Megabyte nearly squeezed the life out of me. It was the same feeling that had come in through Bob's hand in the core. I felt like I was being pulled apart from the inside. A wave of wincing pain passed through us and Bob phased. Copeland's signal boomed over our heads. "Stage 2 divisions drop duties and reinforce the host! Now!"

Martin stopped loading me with energy, another quarter of the fixit squad gave up posts and poured some reserve into Bob's system, the wave passed soon and he was back to solid form. I sighed as the feeling ended. My nurse keytool turned again to me. "You okay?"

"Not really." I felt terrible being so brash, and spoke again to him a little kinder. "Sorry, Martin, I'm alright, I'm just having a hard time with this. I never imagined things could go this wrong."

"You're doing your best." Martin said, considerately. "Its all any of us can ask. Without you we'd all be lost."

"Glitch." Copeland butted in. "Something's going on out there, can you take a look?"

"Can't you take a look for yourself?" I asked.

"You're the merged not me." Copeland replied. "You're the one with the access to Bob's sprite senses. I can barely use my scanners from inside here."

"We all have our problems." I said, less than compassionate. The guilt kicked in even stronger with Copeland. "I'll take a look." I pulled some energy and came into Bob's awareness. He took a bit of a start. I guess he had forgotten I was there.

I heard his voice: "Copeland, his keytool's name is Copeland."

Now I took a double take. Was my attention in or out of Bob right now. This was getting strange. We were in the brig, by a holding cell. There was a sprite in there in a Daemon Shock Troop uniform. There was something about that voice pattern. I sent signal down into Bob's data. "Copeland! Get over here!"

"What is it Glitch?"

"Its Turbo!"

"What?" Copeland nosed up close, as if crowding me would help him see something. "Where? How do you know?"

"He's standing right there! We've got him in a cell."

"Is he alright?" Copeland demanded. "He's not hurt is he?"

"He's infected." I reported. "But otherwise I think he's okay. They're trying to get information out of him." The Daemon infection was really rather creepy. It seemed to have robbed Turbo of his own free will. He was a lobotomized drone as peaceful as an idiot who didn't know any better. I didn't break this to Copeland, he was lucky he couldn't see. I had respect for Turbo too, and this was hard. Bob let me know he wanted to give his Prime a little Glitch medicine to see if it would help.

The sad thing was, I knew I couldn't give him what he needed.

"Copeland." I said. "Bob's going to try and cure him. He needs me to help but I barely have enough to do anything right now. Can you add some? You've been more than generous about sharing your energy so far…"

"I'll do anything." Copeland said quickly. "If there's a chance…"

"Okay, here goes then." I said, gearing up for the transfer.

Copeland called behind him. "GUI, Errol, Grace, lend me a hand." The other keytools floated into proximity. "I'm going to give Glitch all my energy. Back us up okay, keep us online."

"But Sir?" GUI buzzed. "Is that wise? What if something goes wrong and you get erased? We need you!"

"And Glitch is weak!" Grace agreed. "If he goes we're all doomed!"

"Do as I say." Copeland commanded. "That's my guardian out there! He deserves no less than everything I have. We're all professionals here. If something happens, you know what to do."

"No fear, Sir." Errol announced. "We have plenty of backup. We will not fail you."

My programming was set now. Bob took a hold of the bars of the cage. I transmitted to the chain that was assembled behind me. "This is it. Everyone ready?"

"Compiled ready." Copeland said firmly.

I read his meaning as loudly as if Bob had said it. "Then here goes." I opened the channel with the healing energy. Copeland transferred his power into me. The three others transferred their power into him. The seventeen keytools left over sensed what we were doing. I found they sent energy, what little they could spare, up through our ladder and out to Turbo who's condition was improving painfully. I transferred I could, but my grip was slipping…

I felt that ache from before begin to take its course again. For the first time I recognized what it felt like. It was as if all I was, every place I'd found to hook onto Bob's code back at the download, was being stripped off. We were coming apart, the edges frayed and jagged like torn tapestry. The wave hit strong and hard. I felt the sting and let go of the channel, closing the link. Bob fell to the ground, his body phasing to near deletion. Copeland and I faded into darkness.

Chapter Text

I awoke to the signal stream of Kink's rattling.

"I said it wouldn't work and I knew it wouldn't work, and you said it would but you didn't know it would, so why did they try it? I meant to tell them not to try it, but they went and tried it anyway because nobody listens to me…"

"Kink, please." Grace mused, her signal sounding sad. "You are not making it any better by droning on like that."

"But I didn't tell them did I? I meant to but I didn't. Is this my fault? They probably hate me now. When they wake up they're going to tell me they hate me and then I'll never be friends with them again and Copeland is the keytool for the Prime Guardian which means that Su will be in trouble even though I don't know where she is or if she's even alive anymore still infected by Daemon. I hope she's okay, I worry about her every nano! Do you worry about your guardian, Grace because I know I'm worried about mine, she might do something evil or stupid or vulgar or fatal while I'm gone!"

"YES! Kink, I worry about my guardian but I don't transmit continuously about it. We just have to make do." Grace ticked a little sorry. "As long as Glitch is still processing there's hope."

"I'm still processing." I spoke. It was the first time I'd said anything in cycles. Grace and Kink focused tightly on my signal. I loosely gathered my thoughts. Errol moved beside me. He was channeling a thin stream of energy into me.

It seemed unnaturally dark.

Grace's tone was almost motherly, she was a caring keytool and was always known for picking the compassionate and wise guardians of the collective. "Glitch, it is so good to receive input from you, we were afraid you were going to erase."

"I can't." I replied, trying to gain strength. "Bob would fall apart."

"Is that how it works?" Kink cried. "You and Bob are threaded together now so is like you both share the same body? I guess that's what a merger is isn't it? Boy am I basic I should have answered that question before I asked it. Silly me! Being random! Haha!"

"Martin!" Grace called. The keytool streamed up. "Get Kink out of here please."

"Get me out? But I'm helping! Its my turn on maintenance watch, you know that. Everyone's taken a turn, my turn's not up for another three micros I shouldn't leave yet!" Her signal strength lessened as she was removed from the immediate area, the input fading off into the depths of Bob's data. "Great now there's another thing Copeland will be mad about! He'll be mad at me and he'll hate me more and its all your fault but I guess I get what's coming to me when I try to help out! I only try to help out…..!"

Grace regarded me with a sigh. "That's better. Glitch, how are you processing? Do things seem any better?"

"I don't know." I replied. "I still feel weak and shaky."

"We've been pouring energy into you and Copeland for some time now. Our only hope is to get you back online. You both drained yourselves nearly to deletion trying to save Turbo. It was a noble effort."

I scanned for Copeland's signal but found nothing. Strengthening the field I noticed it very faintly. He was located beside a keytool called DeNure who was streaming energy into him. I focused back on Grace. "Did we do it?"

Grace's reply was sad. "I'm afraid not. You logged off before the transfer was complete."

I groaned. I felt useless. It seemed I could do nothing right.

"Glitch?" Grace asked. "What's wrong?"

"I'm broken, Grace." I replied. "If I were undamaged this merger would have gone smoothly and I would have been able to support Bob and heal Turbo. We could have destroyed Daemon a lifetime ago." I took a moment to parse the time. "What's happened since I logged off?"

"We don't know. There is no way to tell what is going on on the outside." Grace reported. "But what I can tell you is that Bob is getting weaker and weaker. We tried our best to feed him energy to use his powers, but I'm afraid we are unable to see what he is doing with them. And we are growing very weak, Glitch. The missing few have joined us but their excess is not enough to maintain us for very long. It is all we can do to keep you and Bob in one piece. Some of us are too low to contribute to the work anymore and are only trying to survive in here. I'm afraid we cannot last much longer. If it wasn't for the brief lull recently we would surely have been depleted. Bob was at his worst not long ago but right now he seems to have recovered at least a little. I truly wish we knew what was going on."

"Don't worry, Grace, I'll find out." I turned to Errol. "Don't worry about the transfer, save your strength."

"You need me." He replied.

"I'll be fine." I reported. "Don't exhaust yourself."

"I will stop transferring to you, Glitch if that is what you want, but I am not as weak as many others. I will give some energy to Copeland, with hope that he might also regain his strength."

"Do that, Errol," I assured him, "its very brave of you."

I surfaced up to touch Bob's senses. The world seemed remarkably bright after all that time in the dark. He was standing on a ridge watching a game cube rippling on the horizon.

Bob had been unable to reboot in games since our merger. It made things difficult for both of us. It reminded me that I was failing him, and it kept him out of the cubes. I noticed the nearly bizarre lack of activity in the system. Could it be that I'd missed the entire end of the war? Cursors and Crashes I sleep through All the good stuff! Oh well, at least Bob and the others survived. Or at least Bob, little Enzo and AndrAIa, because those were all I could see.

The game cube rose from the ground into the sky, the system voice announcing its departure. I waited patiently for something to happen, an explosion, a summons to the PO… it was too calm. From what it sounded like on the inside we were still hard at work fighting viruses.

What I did finally see was unexpected to say the least. Up soared Matrix and… another Bob. I think I stopped processing for a moment. What was this new insanity? The second Bob coasted over. "Hey guys."

I felt my Bob's heart twinge. There was something in essence very wrong with this situation. I signaled into his depths. "Errol… come back, I think I might need you after all."

AndrAIa noted Matrix's elevated mood. "How was the game Sparky?"

"A cinch." He said. "Played it before. Although we kinda cheated this time around."

"Cheated?" She cocked an eyebrow.

Matrix thumbed at his companion. "It was Bob's idea."

My guardian crossed his arms. "That was real responsible of you."

"Hey, you weren't there." The other Bob replied. "That game needed to end in a BAD way."

Errol crept his way up beside me. The bunch of us really were moving slowly. "What can I do for you, Glitch?"

"I need a little energy for a scan." I replied. "I don't think I can muster it by myself."

"Alright." Errol said. "But I don't have enough for such a function and my own duties in maintenance. I will have to call for aid."

He signaled down to one of the newcomers, Gibson, who I'd run into last when Dixon was fresh out of the Academy. He came up a little more quickly and conferred with Errol while I waited watching the outside. I didn't really know what to make of the other Bob. I'd never truly seen Bob before the merger, and even then it was in mirrors. It wasn't until Gibson stepped up for the energy transfer that I got a clear idea of what was going on.

I set my scanner in motion and targeted the new sprite. Gibson bleeped in my ear. "What's going on out there?"

"Something's wrong."

"Has the fighting stopped?"

"I don't know." I replied. "Give me some room to parse." He backed up and I resumed my previous activity. On the surface the code looked like Bob, but only on the surface. I found a patch I could sneak under to get at the core of him; I knew Bob's data pretty much back to front at this point. Whatever it was it was definitely not Bob. It was a virus, a Trojan horse, but who and what its identity really was I couldn't be sure. Trojans were tricky viruses. They could fool most medical scanners and even some antivirus software, but a keytool knows his own. I'd never heard of a Trojan horse getting up the gall to impersonate a guardian before.

Errol and Gibson hovered close at hand, the latter still streaming to me. I closed down the scan and dropped from Bob's higher functions to conserve energy. Gibson was anxious. "What'd it say?"

"There's a virus in Mainframe." I reported.

Errol seemed to sink into sad resolve. "Daemon?"

"No," I said, I think Gibson sighed in relief, "there's no evidence of Daemon, Daemon's forces, or anything. This is a new virus, and he's masquerading as Bob."

"But Bob's still here." Errol replied. "How can the others mistake the virus for him if he is still processing before them?"

"Don't ask me." I replied. "But it's working anyway. They seem to trust him enough. Except Bob."

"Well I wouldn't." Gibson said, obviously. "If there were another me or another Ralston wandering around I think we'd both be skeptical."

"Speaking of which," Errol interrupted, "if there are signs that the fight is over, did you receive any input regarding our guardian partners? Can you sense them in the net? Are they alive?"

"You don't understand Sprite senses, Errol." I told him. "They are of a limited range, and I wont be strong enough for that wide a scan even with all of your help. We'd need to get access to a command console or other such transmitter to get that kind of information."

"Perhaps we can send out a scout." Errol suggested. "There are thirty of us in here, we can spare one to leave and integrate into a net-link long enough to try and get a lock on our guardians."

"I'm anxious to get back." Gibson admitted. "I miss Ralston… not to mention the rest of my code! I feel so broken in here without them."

"You don't know the first thing about broken." I reported.

"Well," he replied, "in any case, I'm going to go spread the word about the whole scout idea. If no one volunteers then I'll go. I'm ready to be done with this whole merger business, it's always kind of freaked me out."

Chapter Text

I sank back down to Copeland. I felt for some reason that I should stay beside him. He'd over calculated his reserves in an effort to save his guardian. It was something I could relate to and my heart went out to him. I watched as the twenty-eight other keytools cycled in and out of the temporary ward, some there to transfer energy, others just to pay respects. Copeland had always chosen well in guardians. He'd been bonded to over half of the Prime Guardians in the collective and countless others in the span of his career. He had an intuition for spotting great leadership in young cadets. It had gained him great respect.

I was a surprised when I discovered that the keytools had come to see me as well.

"Glitch, you're the bravest keytool in recorded history." GUI told me, her signal always held admiration. "You're risking it all. It's the most noble thing I've ever seen."

"Thanks, GUI, I guess." I said.

"The rest think so to." She replied. "If we ever get out of here, I wouldn't be surprised if you get high honors, a plaque, an award or something."

"Lets just worry about getting out of here first."

Gibson dashed up, a little less quickly than he had the last time we'd spoken. "Glitch."

"Yeah?"

"Bad news." He reported. "Real bad news."

"What's wrong now?" I grumbled. I was sure he was about to tell me that my code had lost all structural integrity and we all had five nanos to live. There was nothing in his tone to give me that impression but that was the place I was at right then. Much to my relief (or dismay depending), the news was not so drastic.

"We can't get out." He reported.

GUI nearly passed out from the shock. I regarded her briefly and turned back to Gibson. "What do you mean you can't get out?"

"We got in easy enough." He said. "But I've just spent the last several macros trying to find a way back out. There just isn't one. Nothing I've tried has worked! We're stuck in here!"

"That can't be." I resolved. "There has to be some way out." I knew I couldn't live in this body with twenty-nine keytools and a guardian forever. I read Gibson, GUI and the current power transferor, DiDio for responses. They seemed to be losing hope. DiDio's signal faded, but she located Copeland again and regained strength, taking up the channel into him. I regarded my friend as well.

Copeland had never reawakened from the episode with Turbo. He had been the first to find me in here, and he had given of himself for Bob and I. He'd been our unhindered leader, and even now when many were running on the last of their energy, volunteers came to transfer what they had to him to keep him alive. That's the kind of devotion we all have for our guardians. I realized then what I hadn't thought much on before. We had always been a force to be reckoned with, but never on our own. We'd always had a guardian to help us fulfill our potential, protect the net, fight the bad guys. Keytools were made to take direction! We had strength when we followed Copeland's orders and we were dying without them. It was time for me to take a stand. I had Bob to back me up, and I had a fleet of friends to protect. What we needed was a goal! And I was going to be the one to give us one! I could pull from Bob's experience and this new perspective he'd given me. I turned sharply on Gibson. "We'll find a way out, I promise you."

The keytool took a start, used to my gloomy demeanor. It felt good to let those oppressive shackles fall. If I had a mouth, I would smile.

"We're taking the initiative guys! If we work together we can pull this off!" Turned my attention to the rest of the Bob colony, Gibson and GUI on my heels. "Everyone! It seems like it's a dark time now, but I'm telling you, don't give up yet! If we ban together we can achieve anything! And I'm going to see that all of you get out of here and back home to the guardians to whom you belong! You'll see your loved ones again! I need you all to help me on this!"

The response was incredible, the deep deep darkness I'd been privy to lightened with the glow of their hearts. They took strength just hearing that they'd reunite with their partners again. I surveyed my kingdom with satisfaction. Useless? Bah! Who's useless? I may be broken but it'll take more than a couple minor setbacks to get a good keytool down!

Chapter Text

Bob I love you! You were right with me even when I didn't know it! Of course, you were at it with different motives.

"Phong, you've gotta split us apart!"

Bob burst in on Phong in the middle of whatever he was doing. I was enjoying being along for the ride, charging down the halls of the Principle Office, angling around turns, skidding to stops. Things were going better than ever! I wasn't in pain, we weren't at war, I'd never felt more alive!

Well, except for when I had my own body… I felt pretty alive when I had my own body.

An Irony at most! On with the de-mergifying! Maybe while he's trying to get us apart he'll open up some kind of door for the rest of my little friends to get out. Won't he be surprised when he finds out he had a race of beings in him? The look on his face will be priceless.

If it works that is.

Or if Phong ever gives us the wretched archive passcode

"Great now you don't trust me." Bob said, sounding remarkably cynical to my ears. I guess the two Bobs thing was finally arousing suspicion among the locals. "You don't think I'm the original."

"Yes I do!" Phong said quickly.

Go Phong! Wait… you don't really do do you? OF COURSE HES THE ORIGINAL! Hello? Can you see me in here? A Virus Bob would NOT have my loyalty let me tell you.

Well, in any case we weren't getting anywhere with Phong. Bob marched out and back down to a private workstation. "Crash it all… why's everyone gotten so basic around here." He stopped in the doorway of the white walled room, the entrance sliding shut behind him. "Maybe I'm the copy."

What are you saying? Of course you're not! Look at everyone in here! You're the real deal, a real sprite who's really merged with a real keytool! The other guy's a Trojan Horse, Bob! Why can't you see that? "Maybe Dot's better off with him… she likes him better."

…

… so that's it. One track mind Bob, one track mind.

He was so lovesick for Dot he wasn't thinking straight. I guess its natural. I've watched sprites fall in love before. But now's not the time.

After I get out of here I'm telling him off.

Chapter Text

"Hey, Ray, is Mouse there?"

Ray Tracer… wow… I never thought I'd see him again. I guess this does mean that the war is over. Maybe Gavin's okay too… there's hope in the net if the deleted come back to life … again… anything's possible.

The web surfer had that look on his face that read 'no one ever calls for me' but cheered up quickly and gave Bob an answer. "She's off somewhere. Can I help?"

Bob hesitated, he really wanted to talk things out with a close friend. Surfr'd helped us through a lot but we really just met the guy. I'm afraid the answer was a 'no'.

"Thanks for offering, but its something I wanted to chew over with Mouse, you know how it is."

"I guess." Ray replied. "Well, I'll try to track her down for you. I'll tell her to call when I find her."

The surfer prepared to leave but something in Bob didn't want him to go. Perhaps it was having to face the loneliness of being in this closed space worrying about whether or not your fiancé was in love with you or not. "Wait, just a nano."

"Yeah?"

"You've been around. Have you ever heard anything about guardians and keytools un-merging."

"To tell you the truth, mate, I'd never heard of them merging to begin with. Why? Having problems?"

"You could say that." He replied. "Its complicated. Its what I need Mouse's help with."

"You're right. She's the hacker, she's transfinitely more code-wary than I am." He agreed. "Don't worry too much. She wont be too hard to find. She'll get to you in a micro tops I promise."

"Alright." Bob said. The vidwindow closed and he slouched in his chair. "What in the net could Mouse be doing that she can't be located by a vidwindow? Vidwindows go anywhere." He drummed his fingers on the console and laughed lightly to himself. "She's probably trying to hack into the Supercomputer sourcecode again… I remember when that was the extent of my problems."

Amazing how a risk to the Supercomputer took an easy back seat to Dot.

In any case Ray kept his word and Mouse popped up shortly, all smiles. "Hiya Sugar! What's up?"

"Nothing, Mouse, well, I need to talk to you." Bob said, sitting up. "I've got a problem."

Mouse got a look on her face that read 'here we go again'. I began to get the feeling that the two of them had been through this song and dance before. Much like her travel buddy the firey haired sprite perked up right away. "And what can I do to help, honey?"

"Well, you see, I've got to separate from Glitch, and I can't think of as to how."

"Separate from Glitch?" Mouse seemed a little confused. "What for? You seem to have recovered alright from the problems you had in the war. Has something else happened?"

"Well you see… it's the other Bob…"

It was about then that the conversation turned from 'Mouse please help me with your technical skills' to 'well, it all began when I was 01'… but at least I got a full update. I'd been out of the loop for a long time.

Mouse ended up being less than helpful in terms of what Bob should do. She even suggested that we NOT separate which was so far out of the question from where I was sitting that it wasn't even visible. But she did open up the archives so that was a plus. Now we could actually get around to solving this problem! Let the search begin!

Chapter Text

Grace angled up next to me. "Anything happening?"

"Not really." I replied. "Bob's gotta make this up all on his own."

"Have you found anything about releasing all of us?"

"What might be relevant he pages through too fast." I reported. "He's searching more for devices than for figures and theories. We'll just have to see how it goes."

Grace conceded and sighed. "What should I tell the others?"

"Tell them there's no reason to lose heart yet." I directed. "Perhaps something Bob tries will work."

She floated back out of proximity. Nanos passed like minutes as Bob sifted through the archives. He stumbled across a decryption command file that involved the combining of two different data elements into one. The product was highly unstable, but the premise was right. "This looks promising!" Bob declared. He pulled open the file to investigate further.

That would be great, Bob, if we were merging again, but I guess it was worth a try. At the very least the two of us fused together ran the risk of being highly unstable.

The plans were relatively simple to parse, and with a little work and a helpful .exe construction kit Bob had the three pods built, wired up and ready for business. He grinned and looked proudly at his handiwork. "Now, all I have to do is get it to work backwards and things should be good. This'll be easier than I thought."

Chapter Text

Trial 1. This should be interesting. I descended below to inform the troops. "Bob's about to give separation a 'go'. Now I don't know what will happen. He's bargaining for one keytool not thirty. It may not even work at all. It might have unforeseen side effects. I'm just warning you all now that something's about to happen. Now whether its good or bad we'll have wait and see."

"What's the odds, Glitch?" Martin asked. "What's our probability of success?"

I paused. "Martin, to tell you the truth, I haven't thought in odds and probabilities in so long I can't even tell you right now. We'll just have to lean on hope okay."

"Glitch, to tell you the truth," Errol said, quoting me, "we've never leaned on hope before."

When DiDio spoke up her signal sounded a little more sincere. Meaning it sounded a little more frightened. "We've never had to hope before, Glitch. I've been growing concerned over being unable to scan any sort of figures from inside here. It has been my primary occupation for my entire runtime. Being in this blackout is very unsettling."

"How does one run on hope, Glitch?" DeNure asked. "Is it like a battery pack that fuels you when you have run out of energy?"

"Kind of like that, DeNure." I replied. "Only without the level indicators and input ports."

"How do we use it?" GUI asked. "You can tell us how right?"

"Just trust that I'll get us out." I told them. "Bob's trying in a nano, but even if it doesn't work I'll get you out. Remember that."

I floated back up into Bob's senses. Sheesh. Next time I give a speech I'll do the homework.

Chapter Text

We were in that little pod for less than ten nanos, but it only took me that long to realize that this little experiment was not going to work.

There were three pods. We'd need thirty-two if this contraption ever dreamed of working. I wish I could speak to Bob directly. It seemed like we understood each other so well before, but I suppose I didn't want to translate such complex ideas as "This is not going to work because you have a race of keytools living in your body".

As predicted, all the machine created was a cloud of noxious smoke.

Bob stumbled out of the chamber disappointed and gagging. He took in a lungful of real air and rolled his eyes. "Well that didn't work."

You think flyboy?

"I guess its back to the drawing board."

Dern straight.

…

Do I miss Turbo or Copeland?

On that note I recalled the rest of my followers on the lower decks. I went down with the unhappy news.

"It didn't work."

"Well that's obvious." Gibson said.

"But we'll try again." I assured him. "We can't expect to succeed on the first try."

"So much for holding on to hope."

I was trying my best to put on a positive face and didn't really feel like taking his sass. Instead of promptly telling him off, I changed the subject and looked to Grace. "How's Copeland?"

The place saddened and I knew I'd made a mistake. I was trying to raise morale around here and nothing gets a crowd unhappy faster than reminding them that a loved one was dying.

"He hasn't changed." Grace replied. "He's still processing, but not by much."

"We'll be out of here in time to help him." I assured her. "What he needs is a recharge and his guardian back. That will fix everything."

"It'll fix me." Kink said with enthusiasm. "I could use a recharge so bad right now, I can't remember the last time I was able to perform a system scan!"

"That's because you're inside someone else's body, hun." DeNure said.

"Wow! I'd totally forgotten about that!"

I groaned again to myself and made to leave. "I'm going to go check on our next attempt. The rest of you, just persevere as best you can."

Chapter Text

Nope.

Nope.

Nope.

By the Web Bob! That one's not going to work! Put it back! Cursors, okay fine go for it then, we'll just move on to another one in two nanos anyway.

This was attempt number seven. He'd gone through one gadget after another in rapid succession, flying through the archives. He seemed to be stuck on the break-into-two-pieces approach, which was so far off base... cursors. If he would just focus on me and getting me out of him we'd probably make more headway.

As expected the latest scheme dropped like a rock and we were back to the console to pull up another plan. Bob put his head down on the interface and moaned in frustration. "This is impossible."

There there, Bob, I'm sorry I was being pessimistic. You can keep trying, we'll figure it out eventually. As long as eventually comes soon. What brief recharge I'd gotten from my friends wasn't lasting very long. I was starting to feel drowsy again.

Bob put his head in his hand and stared up at the hovering windows. "I've tried all the data splitters, code splicers, transducers and transporters. What's left? Maybe there's some viral breakdown methods I can employ."

Scary stuff… but I guess whatever it takes.

He pulled up schematics for radiation chambers, decoding guns, and other types of gruesome deleting machines. I gulped watching the plans move by. Blades… polar magnets… yeesh…

Bob must have felt the same way. He was getting a little sick at the thought of submitting himself to the mercies of these arcane chambers of torture. Unfortunately I knew that the lines he'd drawn would be pushed back eventually. If nothing we try next succeeds, it was more likely than not that we would be revisiting the swirling blade machine and magnetic crucifixion device before long.

Bob pounded his fist on the desktop and growled. If only we were in the Supercomputer. If only we had access to more advanced technology, or more experienced scientists. He ran another search for virus-splitting and came across some file footage from back before the war, when Hex and Megabyte merged.

Hey merged…

I'd made a portal, then split the portal into separate pieces. Now why hadn't we thought of this earlier! It was perfect! He could go in, I could split us apart and thirty-one little portals would fly off in different directions… home to their guardians. Let's do it! Bob! Come on!

He got excited and charged out of the lab and up to the war room. There was a game in progress and Dot was watching with anticipation. I guess that must have been what the alarm was before. No matter.

"Dot! I need you to release this tear for me okay?"

"Bob, there's a game in progress," she said, shocked and a little annoyed, "do you think this is a good time to be fooling around with tears?"

Bah, Dot, don't worry about it. We'll be right back and then we can fight all the games you want okay? But we've got to do this first. Just trust us.

"-Just release the tear when I get up there okay?" Bob said with a hopeful smile.

"Bob, where are you going?"

"I'm not going anywhere." He replied. "But I hope to come back, if you get what I mean. Well, you'll see!"

We bolted out and up to the roof. I took a moment to give an overexcited report to those waiting inside. "Okay, guys, we're gonna try something new."

"Do you think it will work this time?" Errol asked.

"There's a good chance." I said. I was whirring with excitement. "We'll have to see."

"What are you trying?" GUI asked.

A timid keytool, Painter, pressed in. "Is it dangerous?"

"Its all dangerous." I reported. "But we're trying to split ourselves apart using a portal. It's got real promise."

"Real promise is all we can ask for." Gibson agreed.

"Great!" I said. "Just hold on tight! We might be out of here in a nano!"

I rushed back up to the higher-level senses and looked around. The tear rose before us sparkling in the brave magnificence of a new hope for the future. Bob called for portal making energy. It was a bit of an effort but I provided it. He surveyed our handiwork with satisfaction. "Now why didn't I think of this sooner?"

Because you've been on a misguided train of thought but never mind that! Forward ho!

We charged into the floating orb, the purple of the reflected gamecube bending over its surface. On the inside all I could see was the warped image of Bob on all sides. He took a deep breath. No moment of doubt this time, he was desperate. He focused inward and gave me the command. He actually said my name.

I was free already!

"Glitch! Splitter!"

I gave it a go, having a hard time remembering how. It had been a long time since I'd split or cut or 'wide-field-energy-beam'ed anything. I tried to force us apart, my 'gears' running at full-tilt.

A nasty wave of pain flashed across my consciousness.

Gahh! What was that?

That's right. I was broken! I couldn't do it! This was a malfunction! A possibly FATAL error! I tried to pull back but the portal was growing unstable.

I'm broken! I'm broken! Bob! I can't do it!

User!

I'm sorry! I'm basic! We should never have tried this!

There was a blinding white flamelike pain throughout and the walls of the portal collapsed on us. I felt like I'd been blasted apart, bits of my own energy scattering throughout Bob's data and bouncing off the inside of his skin. His eyes and ears went dumb. I couldn't receive sensory transmissions. I must have been deleted.

I deleted everyone. Even Bob.

That's what I get for hoping.

Chapter Text

"Glitch! GLITCH?"

I was jolted awake. GUI was screaming signal at me. "What is it?"

"Glitch!" She rejoiced. I was instantly crowded by a host of keytool energy, dog-piling on me.

Gibson's signal boomed over the flitting of the crowd. "Back off! Back off! Give him some room to parse!" The others did so and I took a moment to gather my bearings. Gibson pulled in. "Glitch, are you alright?"

"I guess so." I said. I could sense a deep ache. I thought immediately of Bob. "What happened?"

"Something went wrong." Gibson said obviously.

"Yeah!" Kink added, sounding entirely too upbeat and excited for the situation. "Yeah something incredible happened! Look!"

My direction was routed to the datastream around me. It was dancing with the cosmic light of tears and portals. It reminded me of being in the web, and in the net, perhaps both at the same time. It was beautiful. I felt energized. I don't know what had happened on the outside, but in here, it seemed like the entirety of the internet had come into my body and was flowing through me. It calmed and frightened me, but mostly awed with its brilliant patterns and coursing energy. The whole space was alight. "Its wonderful."

Grace idled up. "Do you know what it is?"

"Nah." I replied, slackjawed. "But it's giving me such a strength…"

"Strength?" Martin cried. "Could it be? Like a recharge?"

"It is all of Bob's energy." Errol said, braving a scan. "Its being reflected and reverberated about, gaining intensity."

"Sprites make their own energy." DiDio recalled.

"Something has happened that is preventing Bob from burning his normal energy off." Errol informed further. "This could be a problem. If he gets too over energized he'll become unstable and be erased."

"You mean more unstable than he already is?" Gibson asked. "Then this must be what doom looks like."

"Not if we can find a way to release the energy and even out his vitals." Errol said.

Did someone say energy? I was brimming with energy! Bob and I shared more than just code, we shared everything, including this new well of power. I drank it in then looked to my companions. "I think I have a solution." They focused on me. "Who needs a recharge?"

Chapter Text

A muffled transmission slowly gained strength. "W-What? What's going on?"

The rest of the keytools bleeped with murmurs of relief. They had insisted the first one I heal be Copeland. Now, hearing his signal again, I could feel all our spirits rising, even my own. "Welcome back, old friend."

"Glitch?" He noted the energy uplink. "What's this?"

"You've been logged off for a long time." I told him. "Its good to see you online again."

"It's good to be back, but…" He scanned me. "How did you get this power?"

"Look around, Copeland!" Kink cried. "Look at the lights!"

He scanned. "Wow! In all my process time-" He aborted and launched a new train of thought. "What happened to Bob?"

"He's in a strange crystalline state." Errol told him. "His body is overloading, making these pattern instabilities."

"But don't worry." GUI assured. "Glitch can use it! He's going to heal us all and then we'll get out of here!"

"It looks like you all did find without me." Copeland said, then focused on me. "Good job, Glitch."

"Thanks." I think I blushed again. Sprite senses, pshaw, any keytool can feel these kind of things if they would only take a moment and appreciate what they have. I had a body full of friends and a chance to overcome all my limitations and save them.

I also had a dying guardian. Time to get back to work!

"Line up, people! Refills start here! Then we'll find a way to break out of this shell and go home!"

Chapter Text

Everyone was up to speed. Those who'd been running on their base functions were able again to move about and help us. Copeland was directing again, but he had me right there with him, making sure everything he did was okay with me. I felt strong. When everyone was ship-shape he turned to me. "Okay, Glitch, got any plans?"

"Well, I've been thinking…" I started. "Bob kept trying to break us into two pieces, but that didn't work because there were so many of us in here. It occurred to me that what we as the keytools really needed was a path out, not a forced split."

"Sounds logical." He agreed. "But how do we get out of this prison?"

"How do we get anywhere?" I asked. "Through portals."

"A portal out of Bob?" Copeland asked. "Its so simple it might work."

"But I've tried that already." Gibson recalled, coasting in. "I couldn't do it."

"You're not the merged." I said. "I am." I glowed with pride. "I can get us out."

Copeland took it in stride. "How's that?"

"We've released energy before." I replied. "OUR energy has gotten to the outside before this, and that was through me and Bob working together. If Bob helps us we can get out through his and my cooperation."

"Hey, you're right!" Gibson exclaimed. "Why didn't I think of that?"

"Because you're not Glitch." GUI said, lightheartedly. She quickly slipped back to whatever she'd been doing. Gibson also excused himself. That left Copeland and I to plan.

"Can you speak to Bob?" Copeland asked. "Transfer signal to him? Will he understand?"

"He could understand me when I was on the outside." I replied. "I'm hoping the same goes when we're both inside."

"What are you getting at?" Copeland pressed. "Perhaps speak to him in a dream?"

"I hadn't thought of that but that's not a bad idea." I said. "He'd probably be more impressionable in a dream anyway."

"All you need to do is convince him to open a way for us all to escape. Then we'll make portals and pass to the outside." Copeland resolved.

"Perfect." I agreed. "Let's fill everyone in and get to work."

Chapter Text

I addressed the other twenty-nine of us, laying out the plan. "I'm gonna try and dip into Bob's psyche and get him to open up the way for us. When he agrees, I'll give you all an energy charge and you create portals and take off out of him. Then, we should be free."

"Then we'll be out, sure, but what about you, Glitch?" Martin asked. "You'll still be merged with Bob. Your code is so deeply tangled in his… you won't be able to come free so easily."

I hadn't thought of that, but Copeland covered for me in my moment of hesitation. "We're not just leaving them high and dry. Glitch and Bob have done too much for us to abandon them. Once we're out, we'll have access to all our previous functions. We'll save Bob and completely decompile him from Glitch. We owe them that much."

"That's right!" A signal came from the back. The others joined in a cheer that made my heart swell. It was an overwhelming moment. Out of all the uselessness, failure and pain, I was one who saved them all, and they were going to do the same for me.

Copeland came to the front of their ranks. "You've done great things for all of us, Glitch. We'll support you however we can."

"Thanks," I said, "and if we're done having a little moment here, I say we get to work!"

The vote was unanimous.

Chapter Text

It took energy to tap into my guardian's head, but once I was in, I was in. I found him suspended in white, unconscious in his unconscious, and loomed up to get his attention. He awoke with my shadow pouring over him.

"What?"

Bob stepped toward my clean surface, not recognizing me at my immense size. Don't ask me why I decided to portray myself as gigantic. I think it was a bit of a statement. I'd been so important to him in the last few cycles, so much had happened that he didn't even realize. Plus I was kinda swollen with his energy. He looked at his reflection in my surface.

"Am I real, or… just a copy?"

I turned on him. He stepped back, astonished. It was strange coming face to face with Bob. I'd never spoken to him on this level, and it had been so long since I had a unique identity even if it was a figurative world. He stared up at me, I focused down on him and signaled, hoping that he'd understand.

"Bob!"

"Glitch?"

He got it! I trilled with my accomplishment.

It was time to give him that lecture I'd been saving.

"How can you think you're a copy? You're the real deal! You've got to survive and go back to Dot!"

"What do I do?" Bob called back to me. "We're merged! When she sees me I remind her of things she wants to forget."

"Leave it to me." I assured him. "I have friends who are going to help us! What you've got to do is let them through."

"Through?"

"Open up and let them help." I told him. "Can you do that?"

"I can." He replied. He paused. "You're helping me again, Glitch."

"My primary function, Guardian."

I signaled back to the others waiting in the wings, sending them energy and instructions. Now was the time. Everybody out!

They swirled into the dream, unable to sense it as anything but strange patterns of bits. What they did see was a light at the end of their long winter where code, signal and data danced through the air. The exit was right through the figure of Bob and he opened up his heart and let them pass, a strange feeling of release passing over us both. The energy levels about us were dropping. The twenty-ninth keytool passed through and I prepared to log off. Bob opened his eyes and looked at me. "You too Glitch."

"But…"

"Leave." He said. "We were always better as partners anyway."

I could feel his heart stir. Or was that my heart stir? I compressed down into energy form and b-lined for the opening. "Thanks Bob."

I entered a portal, and exited into clear cold air. It was a bizarre feeling. I was missing most of my code, unable to sense sight, sound, or touch, but I could feel the paths of transmissions floating through the air. Two signals came alongside of me. One was Copeland, I know because he transferred to me. "Hold on, Glitch, we'll have you taken care of in a nano."

The keytools about-faced, fully charged. They shot beams of light down into the figure laying on a medical table. The white energy traced Bob's code through the opening he'd made with his will. It penetrated and patched the empty spaces, frayed edges and broken parts. I felt my code come free of his, like separating stripes in a pattern. Quickly my good old-fashioned keytool functions came back.

I sensed the scale of the room. I could identify its occupants. I sensed the processing power of the equipment, the landscape of the surrounding building, and the format of the system. I could sense the levels of each of the keytools around me. My friends. As I recovered I turned my healing power on Bob as well, breaking off the crystalline covering and knitting his code into its unique shape. He was safe. The keytools turned and focused their beams quickly on me. I was stunned and froze, a strange sensation, stranger now that I was without feeling, touched my bits and bytes and reformatted what was myself. "What's happening."

"We're giving you the greatest reward we can." Grace told me.

An Upgrade. It was an honor to be sure. It healed my broken pieces and enhanced my abilities. When they'd finished I fastened fast to Bob's wrist. This was where I belonged. I recognized an emotion I had dismissed ages before when I didn't know it had a name. I was happy.

The others floated around me, thanking me. Copeland's signal predominated the others. "Wear that badge with pride, Glitch." He'd scanned the room and sensed Turbo standing in back. His tone was glowing. "Now, if you'd excuse us. We have to go."

"Go on you guys!" I signaled up. "Thanks for everything!"

"Thank you Glitch!" Kink called back. "You kick ASCII!"

I tracked them as they moved back from Bob. Copeland was in the lead, flew straight for Turbo and fastened tight to his wrist, latching on to the Prime Guardian as fast as his gears let him. Turbo looked down with a broad smile. "Copeland!" Copeland whirred a reply. "Welcome home! We're joined again."

The rest shot for the halls of the Supercomputer PO, their scanners locked on their respective guardians. I sighed and eased back. It was me and Bob, the way it should have been. Nothing would hinder us now, nothing.

Wayne scanned the degraded Bob for health. He was always an interesting little guy. I regret I never got a "look" at him, but ce la vie. He turned to Turbo. "Bob's fine, but his code doesn't match what we have on file."

"I guess that means he's the copy. That's gonna hurt."

Copeland and I both were shocked. "WHAT?"

"Copy my bitmap!" I shouted. "He's the real Bob! REAL! I know his code better than anyone!"

"There's gotta be some mistake." Copeland agreed with me. "I wonder…"

Bob woke up slowly. It was good to read him from the outside for a change. It was so right, it made everything on the inside feel like a bad dream. He looked to Turbo. The Prime Guardian regarded him with the best smile he could put on. "Welcome back, Bob."

"What happened?" Bob asked.

Ooooh! Bob voice patterns! Hooray! Its like coming home!

"The keytools saved you." Turbo told him.

Bob sat up and looked down at me. "Glitch!" He smiled. "Thanks Glitch."

I whirred up at him. 'My pleasure, really!'

He looked to Turbo and Wayne. "I'm in the Supercomputer aren't I?"

"Yes." Turbo replied.

Bob jumped up off the cot. Wayne seemed to object, but Bob was moving too fast for him. "That means I've left Dot with that Copy Bob! I've gotta go back!"

"But Bob, wait." Turbo bade.

Yet the power of love was too strong to be stopped by words. Bob shot down at me. "Glitch! Portal to Mainframe!"

I was more than happy to comply.

Chapter Text

"And if any sprite knows why Dot and Bob should not be joined together let them speak now or forever hold their peace…"

Bob and I charged out of that portal just in time. Bob's tones were angry as he marched straight to the altar. "I do."

I can understand why he'd be so mad, no one told US Dot and the other Bob were getting married. I was getting a little put off at the fact that they hadn't figured out the other Bob was a virus yet. Read my lips VI-RUS.

Dot turned surprised and not outwardly happy to see him. "Oh! Bob, you're okay!"

A growl echoed in his throat. "I'm pretty far from okay. How could you do this, Dot, I love you."

The other Bob clenched his fist. "I've had enough of this." Now that I was reading voice pattern again, this did seem a little more like Bob then the sprite I was attached to at that moment.

Virus Bob wound up and socked a punch across my guardian's face.

Okay! Nevermind! Not Bob!

Bob retaliated by bringing me up to face level with the cretin. "Glitch! Energy b-"

"Wait!" Dot interrupted. "Stop, Both of you!"

"But Dot-"

I took the moment to scan the other Bob. Trojan Horse virus, we'd determined that, but how is it that he seemed more like Bob in some ways than my Bob did? It was more than just grabbing a likeness of him and making a disguise. He had something else. I scanned my Bob in turn. He was missing code sure, but I assumed that it had been degraded in the Web, and most of what I'd been used to reading was there. Dot pulled close into Virus Bob. "I'm sorry, Bob."

"But-" I could sense Bob's heart breaking. It was something I wouldn't have noticed before the merger, but I could read it now. She was letting him go.

"I'm sorry."

Bob turned and walked me away from the group, passing little Enzo on the way. The young sprite spoke up. "But he has to be the real one! He's got Glitch!"

Good boy, I knew you'd amount to something someday! Well, something different than what you amounted to the last time, poor Matrix, but still that was something too. Takes a quick one to see real and absolute truth in all this randomness.

"It doesn't matter, Enzo." Dot said.

My figurative jaw dropped. I was totally with Enzo when he asked: "Why?"

"You wouldn't understand."

He wouldn't understand, my bitmap! He's understanding more than anyone here. I wouldn't be stuck on this guy's wrist if he didn't have a bit of my code and I didn't have a bit of his.

Hold the phone… that's what was missing. A bit of code… a bit of code that I'd never read before because it had belonged to me! And that virus's got it! I don't know how, but he must have gotten it out of me at some point, and I'm going to get it back!

I came off of Bob's wrist and took off for the other Bob. My guardian watched me go, a look of betrayal on his face.

It'll only take me a nano, Bob, I'll be Riiiiiiiight back.

I fastened onto the other Bob's wrist, seeping down into his code. This was how you get at a virus. Thankfully this Trojan knew nothing about keytools. He would have surely drop-kicked me if he knew I was about to steal from him. Attached to his wrist I could slide beneath his alias and read him for what he really was. Trojan Horse virus… with some Bob code… I tracked that down… and another strain I was familiar with. It was too eerily familiar to be a mistake.

Megabyte? How in the Net?…. or how in the Web rather? Well, we'll take care of you in a minute. Bob! Hold up! I've almost got all your code out of this thing!

Phong continued with the ceremony. "Now if there are no other objections…"

I've got objections! I've got lots of objections! Just give me a nano!

"..ah.. well then if either of you know any reason why you cannot be joined together, speak now."

Ahha! That's the code! I began the process of code exstraction, nabbing what was not rightfully his from the sprite that was not rightfully Bob. Megabyte winced. It must sting. It satisfied me.

Megabyte began to cry out in pain. He could no longer hold onto his foreign shape without the code I was now containing in myself. I picked up off his wrist and sailed back though the air.

Seeya sucker.

Bob turned when he heard the screaming and saw me bullet toward him. I latched tightly and began to transfer the code again, putting it back in the frayed places where it belonged.

"What are you doing, Glitch?"

I've got a present for you Bob.

A change took place in both of the blue guardians. Megabyte had lost his strength to maintain form. Bob was resetting himself to get the new pieces back into alignment. The two of them changed shape, Bob coming back to his whole and Megabyte showing us what he really was. Dot didn't take it well.

Mouse searched herself. I could read that she wasn't in war mode or casual mode but wearing a temporary format that didn't provide her usual tools of the trade. AndrAIa spread her nails. "I've got him." "No!" Bob brought me up for the fight. "he's mine!"

"I missed you Guardian." Megabyte snarled darkly. "Welcome back."

The two of us sneered at him "Back and fully charged." Bob was revved for battle. "Let's do it."

They took off. I formed an energy shield at Bob's command. But it wasn't really a command, it was just like before when we were merged. He wanted me to and I read his intentions. We were working together better than we ever had before. It was even more satisfying knowing that we could cooperate this way without sharing the same body. Megabyte was going to feel our wrath.

I formed into a nightstick, manipulated organ pipes, pole-vaulted out of danger and blasted that sick dipswitch out of the PO. He lay at the foot of the steps as Bob and I sprung out, a figure of divine justice. "Why, Megabyte?" Bob demanded. "Why do this?"

The virus regained his feet with a chuckle. "It amused me."

Sick…twisted…

"Then laugh this off!" Bob said. "Glitch!"

Yes sir!

"Power Ram!"

You got it!

I sent a thick energy beam out toward the virus. It hit and carved a trench with him through the ground. Take that.

"Impressive." Megabyte said. "You seem stronger than I remember."

Why thank you.

Bob fell back on his healthy sarcasm. "I've been workin' out."

Megabyte waited for him to get closer then hit him in the eye with a venom spray.

No fair! When'd he learn to do that?

I tried to summon up some energy to wash out Bob's eyes but realized quickly that I no longer worked from the inside like that. I scanned the area, waiting for him to recover on his own. When he did, Megabyte was gone back inside the PO. Bob looked to Matrix. "You ready?"

He waited for Gun to get there, then turned. "Yeah. And Bob, welcome home."

Welcome home indeed.

"Let's do it."

We charged inside, the place was empty but I scanned diligently anyway. Bob held me out in front to give me better range. I knew Megabyte's patterns when he was Megabyte, but if he shifted again his code would look like whoever he'd aliased. I could tell Bob because of the bond we share, but anyone else, no matter even if I had a copy of the exact code handy, I wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Specky was on the floor. Bob spotted him as I did and ran over. He was out cold. Bob turned to Matrix, Dot, and the others, and told them. "Megabyte's been changed in the web. He's become a Trojan Horse virus."

Duh.

Matrix spoke. "So how're we gonna find him?"

Good question… Trojans could hide from just about anything. We'd have to get him in a hole, trap him and seal him tight so that he couldn't shape shift and escape. Bob stood up and shook his head. "I'm not sure."

Chapter Text

Answer A… call Turbo. We used a vidwindow so the rest of the crew could listen in. I read Copeland's signal through the link, but we pretty much sat back and let the guardians have their chat. It felt both good and bad to be support again. I miss being proactive but at least it wasn't my responsibility to keep Bob from deleting 800x600.

"I'm sending a Viral Incident team immediately." Turbo announced. "They'll be there in nanoseconds."

"No!" Bob put an end to that option. Matrix seemed outraged. The renegade never saw merit in saving viruses. Sure it wasn't really my function to decide who should live or die, but after all we've been through I've become a little partial to getting rid of viruses when we have the chance. Not only regarding the past few cycles, but in the careers of all my guardian partners before these… Dixon coming to mind first… how many had been deleted by viruses? Bob's theories were radical (and Turbo said so) but risen out of a strict translation of guardian protocol and the compassionate heart he had for any and all processing persons.

I was always the one to choose the revolutionary guardians….

"I don't care what you think of my ideas anymore," Bob said, "if we'd done it your way, if we'd deleted Hex when she first arrived, the entire net would be destroyed by Daemon."

Turbo didn't like this little insubordination, but he couldn't argue with facts. Not to take sides, but it was and remains to be impossible to forecast future events. Hex turned good under unique circumstances and it worked out in our favor. She's the only virus in the history of the unified systems to ever come clean. Somehow I felt Megabyte wouldn't succumb to Bob's good looks and charm.

"If we need your help, we'll call for it." Bob said icily. He hung up. It was kind of mean of him, but who am I to say anything, he was in a bad mood.

"Okay, Bob, its your show now," Matrix conceded, "what do we do?"

"First what do we know?"

Megabyte's succeeded in ruining everything we had ever planned and hurting everyone we've ever loved for a second time. Sorry, I'm being pessimistic again. I guess I'll never truly grow out of the lessons I learned in Bob…bitterness can sometimes be helped with a dollop of sarcasm, and other times you've just gotta tell it like it is.

The others bantered over stuff I already knew. He had my code, must have grabbed it from me back on that spammed platform, and used it to slip easily past our guard. He was now running free in the guise of no one in particular and preparing to bring our home down around our ears… again.

Mike the TV opened up a channel to release a special news bulletin to the people. News to Mike must equal 'scare the public out of their wits' because that was the result. Still it was the only news report I've ever parsed to end with "Panic Now! Like only you know how to do!"

Bob was on top of it. For once this cycle. Yeesh. "That's not Mike! Its Megabyte!"

"Yes!" Phong saw the logic. "Panic only helps him and causes us nothing but trouble."

"But how do we catch him?" AndrAIa asked.

Wellman Matrix, the null in the robot suit, spoke like the scientist he used to be. "Perhaps we can devise a test, a way of identifying him. Then we can determine who's real –"

"But Dad," Enzo spoke, "when he was Bob, he fooled us all!"

That's little Enzo being smart again! I guess I never noticed last time how useful having a kid around was. It seems like the youngest of us always recall the obvious at key situations.

AndrAIa must have missed her childhood days as she added to the info dump. "And even Phong's scans couldn't tell the difference."

"Right," Bob determined, "so if we can't ID him, we'll just have to outsmart him."

A tad ambitious for this crowd. Heh, I'm kidding, we always find a way out of sticky situations, why should this time be any different? Still we'd need a plan. A good plan. A plan that would work.

Bob's one track mind comes through in the clutch. "Where's Dot?"

Chapter Text

Mouse greeted us as cheery as ever. If I didn't know she was a data shredder on the inside, I'd have probably passed her off as harmless by now. Of course the scale-like armor and sword on her back helped. Dot must have felt the same way regarding the outfit because she was hiding behind her. Mouse waved at us. "Hi boys."

"Hi." Bob greeted. "Hello Dot."

Dot snuck back into her little hole.

"What's up?" Mouse asked.

This time talking to Mouse was not the favorable scenario. "I need a word with Dot."

If I wasn't mistaken Mouse's voice pattern seemed greatly relieved. "Good! You to have things to talk about! I'll be moseying along."

"No wait!" Dot said quickly. Mouse seemed anxious, Dot searched for an excuse to keep her there. "What if that's not Bob?"

By the Net… Dot, really? Do we have to run this race all over again?

Bob rolled his eyes. "Oh brother."

The attempted to support her argument. "How do we know its really Bob? He could be –"

"Megabyte!" Her bodyguards freaked out and sped off to who knows where. Useful pair of tin cans.

Mouse was right with me… for some reason I sensed she wished she was getting paid for this. "Some bodyguards…"

Matrix came to our defense. "Sis, of course it's Bob! I've been with him all along."

Bob tried to put on a smile. "Dot, its me! It's really me, can't you tell?"

What a viral thing to say, guardian. Use a little more tact than that okay?

"No… I can't … not now."

"Look Dot we-"

Tact Guardian!

"I need you back at the Principle Office."

Much better.

"Megabyte's out there, somewhere, help me catch him and we can end this, together."

There was a pause, I scanned Dot for a response. Having been introduced to the extremes of sprite emotions first hand, I found it strangely fascinating trying to determine how my quasi-logical friends were feeling. I think she was coming around, a little. She wanted things to be upgrades and daisywheels just like we did. "Okay, Bob, I do want this to end."

We took off for the PO. Dot's plans were always full of flavor. I hoped this one would pack a punch. Once inside the orbital building she seemed grounded. "Okay, what we need to do first is force him out of hiding."

"If we can expose him once, I can get a lock on him." Matrix offered tapping his left temple with the edge of his gun.

"What would get him to drop his guard?" AndrAIa asked. "He's still Megabyte. He's still smart."

"We've always brought him down by his greed." Dot resolved. "Its fool proof."

"Will he be expecting that?" Wellman asked.

Bob shrugged. "Hasn't stopped him in the past."

Dot looked to her father. "I need you to build another Gateway Command."

"Another one?" Wellman nearly groaned. I found it very amusing.

"We'll escort the gateway command down to the archives." Dot determined. "Megabyte will attack and then we'll have him cornered."

Seemed pretty easy to me. I don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

Chapter Text

Bob, Matrix, AndrAIa, Frisket, a troop of CPUs and I hid out in an ABC waiting for the trap to spring. Perhaps I should have been comfortable in the nostalgia, but in truth I was just anxious to get rid of Megabyte and give the whole thing a rest. Bob had Mouse watching the scanners, but I kept my channels open too. If something happened I didn't want to wait for sprite reflexes to alert us. To spare you the details Megabyte moved in just as expected. He'd already raised an army complete with ABCs, so we followed our kidnapped gateway command back to G Prime undetected.

There's nothing that can quite compare to camping out waiting for your enemy to make a fool of himself. When we sprung the trap there commenced a firefight that put me back in the action. I shot laser pulses at the viral forces, their file-lock canons lighting the air around us. Matrix put a target on Megabyte. The virus tried his best to escape, but the bull's-eye on his chest was a red flag to all of us. He took his entire force out one by one in an attempt to confuse us. It was a feeble and panicked effort, there was no escaping Matrix's eye, a fact Meggy soon found when he stood alone among the unconscious bodies of his own men. He came out of disguise and Matrix leveled Gun on him. "Game over, Virus."

"No don't!"

Matrix fired, Gun set to scatter and create a tear, not delete, and once Megabyte was being tortured by the energy fluctuations it was time for me to go to work.

Bob popped up. "Glitch! Portal!"

To the brig you go, you nasty thing.

"Dot?"

"We've got him, he's in the holding cell." I relayed her image through my comlink.

Bob spied Matrix and AndrAIa sharing a touching moment of celebration and looked back on the image in my screen. "Dot?"

"Yes Bob?"

Say I love you you clotz!

"We make a great team."

Okay, that'll do for now.

Dot's pattern was actually cheerful when she responded. "We always did."

Chapter Text

This imprisoned Megabyte was showing entirely too much interest in our plans for my taste. He knew the location of the Gateway Command, the rest of our friends AND the exit, now.

"I assume I have the lovely Dot Matrix to thank for my present circumstances."

"Seems fair." Bob said, sharply. "After what you tried to do to her."

You tell 'im Bob.

Megabyte wasn't phased. "Well this must go a long way to satisfy your overactive sense of 'fair play'."

He was brewing something. There was more in that line than just mockery. I couldn't scan him behind that firewall. Matrix growled. "Lets get this over with."

Megabyte's eyes narrowed on us. "So what now? Deletion?"

"No," Bob said lightly, "just a scan." I sensed his energy tighten up. "I don't believe in deletion."

"Ah yes," Megabyte recalled, "you can't go against your code."

"That's right, and neither can you, that's the problem." Bob said, triumphant. "Its not your fault. You were programmed this way. We've just got to work out a way to reprogram you."

Could it be that Megabyte almost sounded hurt? "So, I wont be a virus?"

Bob was glowing. "That's the plan."

"So…" Megabyte resolved, "a fate worse than deletion…" His tone dropped low. "And they call me a monster."

A strange energy seemed to come over the room. I could read elevated stress levels in the two sprites, the virus's words must have hit them in an unexpected place. Parsing them for myself, I can see why. I doubt Bob ever thought of cleansing from the virus's point of view.

My guardian said nothing and began the scan. I waited less than patiently, letting the technology on the inside of the firewall do the work. It was completed in a micro and Bob pulled the data up on screen. "There, now that wasn't so bad was it?"

No reply.

I filtered the data too, wanting to participate. Strings of code passed by without a hint of viral anything. There wasn't a trace of Megabyte. Bob's eyes widened. "There's nothing here… or there!"

It was an alias… just like in the core, only this wasn't a downloaded simulation, this was being supported from inside the Principle Office somewhere. I launched a building scan, even though I knew it wouldn't do any good. If he was in disguise I would have no way of locating him, but I needed to do something. Matrix must have felt the same way.

He blasted into the cell and attacked the alias with a vengence. "Where are you?"

I could recognize the levels of Megabyte's evil laugh even when it came out of nothing, he peered cunningly up at the renegade. "Guess."

Matrix punched his face in for good measure.

Bob pulled up a link to the victory party. "Dot! We don't have Megabyte! It was an alias! He must be in the War Room with you! One of you is Megabyte, do you understand? He's tricked us! Get out of there now!" Bob closed the link and dashed out of the brig. We had to get up to the war room and save Dot. After coming this far there was no way we were going to loose. Halfway there we stopped at a junction when Megabyte's voice came over the loudspeaker:

"Attention, as you are no doubt aware, the Principle Office is now under my complete control. You're probably looking forward to one of my erudite speeches about me, Megaframe, the new Viral Dawn, etc, etc. But I'm afraid I'm going to have to disappoint you. There is no grand scheme here. This is about revenge. Viruses are predatory by design, and it is time for me to follow my function. Prepare yourselves…"

I gulped.

"For the hunt."

Chapter Text

Megabyte didn't only have the creepiness factor going for him, the minute he was in control of the PO he opened the doors and let all of his viral troops in. Matrix, Bob and I ducked into the shadows of the corridor system of the lower levels, attempting to hide. Bob looked to me for a readout. Forty troops on this level in squads of five. Two were headed our way from opposite directions. Arrival in proximately ten nanos. The War Room held Megabyte and the fifteen binome staff members, most likely infected. I could read Enzo, Wellman and Phong among them, but no news on their state of health. Dot was in an adjacent hall with Hack and Slash. Mouse and AndrAIa were over 100 feet away from her. I reminded him of those approaching squads and he nodded. I closed down the scan.

"We've got to get up a level." Bob whispered hoarsely to Matrix.

The renegade got Gun ready. "Then let's do it."

"No, there're virals coming." Bob bade. "We'll go in a nano."

The two squads marched past. I could identify the infected code easily. These individuals had been viral before. The Neo-Virals from the protest actually. No real surprise. The ten of them met in the middle of the four way junction we were facing. Bob and Matrix squeezed behind the extended archway in hopes of fading into the walls.

"Any sign yet?" The leader of the first squad asked his fellow soldier.

"No. But we haven't checked the side corridors yet."

"You go do that." The first instructed. "We'll take this passage and meet up with Squad 2."

"Right."

The two parties split and moved off. Luckily they neglected to head down our hallway. Bob pulled up my readout again. "We need to do something about all these guards."

"We should find Dot first." Matrix said, commandingly. "If they've infected her I swear I'll –"

"Don't worry, Matrix, she's the Bob assured. "Her format prevents her from being infected by a virus at Megabyte's level, even with his new powers."

"But Daemon –"

"Daemon was different." Bob insisted. "She was a super virus capable of infecting anyone. Guardians are immune to viral infection and you saw what she did to the collective."

Matrix growled in frustration.

"But you're right about one thing, we need to find Dot first." Bob resolved. "We'll make sure our friends are alright, then we'll work together to force Megabyte out."

"I'm not worried about AndrAIa and Mouse." Matrix announced. "Its Dot being taken care of by those two idiots…How do we get up there?" He was growing impatient.

Bob watched my readout. The hall behind us was clear. A squad of virals were moving perpendicular to it but they moved slow enough that their paths could be well predicted. "We'll just have to pick our way along." Bob gave me a command. "Glitch, locate the nearest elevator." I did so… if the floor was broken into blocks, it was three down and two to the left. Or any permutation of zigzagging roundabout. Bob was satisfied. "Follow me."

We dashed down the hall, I tracked the soldiers ahead and alerted Bob when they would be within range of sprite perception.

'Bob! Duck left!'

He followed my orders and led Matrix into the left hand hallway. The virals turned into our previous passage and ignorantly marched in our direction. They'd reach our new hideout in nanos. I scanned the adjacent hall, a set of binomes were moving down a parallel corridor a block to our right. They were facing away and gaining distance between us. Bob made the judgment and dashed down the hallway. He slowed when he hit the hall the troops occupied. There was no harm in caution. I alerted him that a squad had just exited our lift and was marching up another hall. They'd come out right in front of us in five nanos. Bob snuck down the hall closest to us on his left. Sprite legs moved much faster than binomes' and we reached the mouth of our passageway at the same time the retreating squad did. There was no way of telling which direction they were going to turn once in the intersection. We could have been caught in an instant.

Bob's will nudged me to scan beyond a door behind us on the opposite wall. It was clear of guards. The three of us ducked in quickly to evade the troops.

"This is so basic." Matrix snorted once we were safely inside.

Bob shushed him. "Keep it down."

"We shouldn't be sneaking around our own PO, let me delete them all! It'll make things a lot easier."

"No, Matrix," Bob warned, "no deleting."

"You know, I'm getting really tired of you."

Bob waited for my scan to read the all-clear. "Okay, lets go."

We made it to the lift without much hassle.

Chapter Text

Megabyte must have thought he had a wicked sense of humor. He'd unleashed 'Game Mode' on the upper halls of the Principle Office.

I read game-puck signals and belligerent mops racing up and down the hallways as we stepped off the elevator. It seemed like Megabyte's forces were moving faster up here too. I highly doubt the evil janitorial equipment was playing favorites. Random disk explosions reverberated about the floor.

"We'll have to move fast." Bob reported. "We need to find Dot, Mouse and AndrAIa. They should be ahead of us along this corridor."

Matrix looked up and down the hall on either side. Another 'boom' shook the walls. "What was that?"

"The floor has been flooded with those pucks from Phong's game." Bob said. "Dot and I faced this before when Megabyte was in the core control chamber. The pucks are packed with high explosives. Plus they're heat sensing, we'll have to try hard to avoid them."

Matrix rolled his eye and shook his head. "Perfect."

Bob looked to his wrist. "Glitch, I'm counting on you."

I live to serve. There were pucks puttering all over, but they seemed to move in packs accompanied by cleaners. There were two such groups chasing binome squads, but the ones scouting had split wide to cover many halls at once. If we ran like mad straight ahead for fifty feet it would be perfect. We'll see where they all are and plot our next move when we get there. Bob felt the same and signaled for Matrix to take off. We sprinted down the hall and stopped in the intersection at fifty feet. We'd picked up some pucks on the way. They bounced up the hall behind us.

Bob squinted down at me. "Mouse and AndrAIa should be down one of these halls."

Matrix fired Gun and blew one of the disks behind us to smithereens. The explosion triggered the others to go off as well and sent shockwaves echoing down the halls all around us. Bob whirled on him. "Matrix!"

You dipswitch!

"What?"

Bob shook his head at him. "They had to have heard that."

"What do we care?" Matrix asked. "Would you rather have exploded instead?"

A voice came down the hall. "Matrix?"

We all turned. AndrAIa appeared around the corner, breaking into a wide smile when she spotted us. The renegade dropped all negativity and dashed forward to meet her. She clung fast to his chest. "I'd recognize that blast anywhere!"

"AndrAIa," Matrix looked down at her as they came apart. "Are you okay?"

She put a hand on her hip. "Aren't I always?" She looked quickly down the halls. "We can't stay here. The floor is in Game Mode."

"We know." Bob replied.

She gestured for us to follow her. "Come on." When we turned the corner we saw a firewall blocking off a hallway. The plink of game pucks coasted in from the hallways on our left and right. AndrAIa called into the fire. "Mouse! Open up!"

A sprite-sized opening dropped and we ducked inside. It resealed in time to have the tracking pucks impact on the surface. The girls, Matrix and Bob covered their ears as the sound's intensity jumped off the scale. The hacker was standing at a console by the door to the War Room. "Bob! Matrix! Boy are we glad to see you!"

"What happened?" Bob asked.

"Megabyte's reset the entry codes." Mouse replied. "Nothing I've tried has helped."

"And we don't know where Dot and the Robots are." AndrAIa added. "We're lucky Mouse was able to protect us with this firewall."

"She's the best." Matrix shrugged.

"It doesn't seem so." Mouse said grouchily, turning back to the panel. "Or else I might be able to open this spammed door."

Oooh! Ooh! Ooh! Pick me! Pick me!

I whirred to get Bob's attention.

'I can do it! Let me try!'

He nodded. "Let's see if Glitch can help." He aimed his wrist at Mouse's console. "Glitch! Decryption Command!"

I flew off and locked onto the panel, spreading my data down into its wiring. My screen extended out to form a touch pad with streaming code. Wow… that code was flying by. It must have had a random number generator built into it. I couldn't sort out any specific passcode, but Mouse seemed to find my display helpful. Her face lit up when she saw it, anyway. "Ah, I see… it's got a scrambling program attached. Well, I can break that easy enough." She looked back to Bob and gestured to me. "Mind if I use him?"

I bleeped.

He shrugged.

Mouse commenced work. I brought up whatever her fingers asked for, taking paths through the circuitry of the PO I would have never thought to take without her guidance. She thought of code patterns and access names that were remarkably out of the ordinary and led us on detours through strange places I'd never expected to be seeing on such a mission.

I mean, who knew you could access the security system through the chess table in Phong's office?

I sensed more explosions behind us and Bob's voice pattern cut in over my computing. "Before we charge in on Megabyte, we need to make sure Dot's okay."

"I'd love to, Sugar, but I don't know where Dot is."

Matrix answered. "Glitch can find her. Glitch! Pull up a scan for Dot!"

Okay, but this one's for old times sake. I popped open a scanning window beside Mouse's touchpad. Dot was on the move, it looked like some of those game pieces were following her. AndrAIa pressed in tight. "Oh no!"

"Don't worry honey, I'm on it." Mouse opened a separate input window and began typing. A firewall appeared behind Dot and her pursuers vanished from my scan.

Bob was pleased. "Great Mouse! Can you get her to us?"

"Easy said, easy done." She replied. Firewalls popped up in front of all the hallway openings along Dot's path, leaving one route that led to our location. It was a genius little trick and she followed the maze easily. Before we knew it she, Hack, and Slash were knocking at our door. Mouse opened it up and shut down the rest of the firewalls, returning to my console to try and cancel the scrambler.

"We're glad to find all of you, I had no idea what was going on with those firewalls. Figures it was you, Mouse."

"Naturally, Sugar."

Chapter Text

I wished I could have watched the greeting between Dot and Bob, but I was busy trying to keep up with Mouse. Did I mention she was incredible? Did I mention how fast and random she was? Yeesh.

….There was the random number generator… sneaky little Megabyte nesting it so deeply in here. Mouse grinned. "I've got it." She pulled up the link and mashed it off. The streaming digits in the console evened out. She backed off. "Thank you Glitch."

I compacted back down to normal size. Aw… no problem. Heh, she actually thanked me!

I flew back to Bob's wrist and stuck on.

Matrix nodded slowly and tightened his grip on Gun. "Time to erase that monster. Save Enzo, Dad and Phong."

"No, Matrix." Bob stopped him again.

"Bob." Dot stepped forward, her two bodyguards trembling in a huddle behind her. "I know you don't like it, but we have to."

"I still say we don't. We can reprogram him! Like we did with Hex."

"I'm sorry." Dot said, sharply. "I'm not giving Megabyte a PID and a waver. He's done terrible things. He's holding my family hostage…"

Bob shook his head. "I've got to believe it's not his fault, Dot. I've got to believe that viruses can be made good. I can't live with the thought of a User creating something that was purely evil."

Dot was on the verge of tears, I could sense it in her energy patterns. "He's trying to delete us, Bob! What's more evil? He's doing all this just for fun!"

Bob tried to respond but couldn't. I monitored him closely. Dot calmed herself down and continued.

"Perhaps some viruses can be changed, but sometimes life is more than just proving a point. If we don't act now, who knows what Megabyte will do. He's got control of the Principle Office. Once he finds and deletes us he can load up the Gateway Command and invade the Supercomputer. Are you prepared to risk everything for the sake of some theory? Your past, your present, your future? Our future? Please, Bob, you've got to see that this has to be done."

Bob brooded, his heart pounding. Dot put a hand on his arm. "Hex knew… sometimes we've got to make sacrifices. For the greater good, some people have to die."

"We're talking about a living thing." Bob replied. "Deleting a living thing."

Mouse looked up from the console. The firewall dropped behind us. "I've turned off Game Mode. We've gotta watch for guards but I'm pretty much in control here. I can open this door anytime…"

"Bob." AndrAIa pressed.

Mouse looked him in the eye. "If you're so against it you don't have to do it. Just stay here and we'll take care of Megabyte."

"Yeah, stay behind." Matrix snapped at him. "I let him go once, I'm not making that mistake again."

"Just let me try." Bob pleaded to them. "Let me have one shot, then you can do whatever you want. But just let me try."

Everyone paused. Dot held the power in the situation. They waited for her to speak. "Okay Bob," his heart lifted, "one shot. But that's all."

"Thanks." Bob snapped down to me. "Glitch! Do you have a decent scan of Megabyte?"

'Sure, I explored his entire code looking for that piece of you that he stole, Bob. I've got a pretty decent map of it on file.'

"Great. Run a scan for the code pattern that defines his predatory viral functions."

'Scanning… … …'

I searched through. I didn't want to tell him, but there really wasn't one piece that made him good or bad, it was a lot of things, just like no one number in an encryption can open a door. Still there was a sequence that defined his behavior patterns. I fished it up and displayed it for Bob to see.

"Thanks, now write up an algorithm to block out that string and get ready to fire it." He looked up at the who's heart was very heavy. Bob's shoulders drooped a little. "We've only got one shot."

I quickly compiled the needed elements and formatted into a crude wrist cannon. Bob looked to Mouse.

"We're ready."

Mouse looked to the others. They nodded. She hovered her finger over the button. "Here goes… 010, 01, 0!"

The doors flew open. A voice was heard within. "No! They're HERE SIR!"

Megabyte turned to us. The movement was slow, a cape of thick gray cables cascading down from his body. The cables twisted through the stairs and up the walls, attached to the consoles and scanners, permeating the guts of Mainframe's defenses. He sneered down at us. Little Enzo's voice pattern traveled through the tension in the air.

"Dot? Bob?"

"Hold on, little brother." Dot called over to him.

Megabyte chuckled deeply. "So there you are Miss Matrix. I thought I had you cornered. You are a tricky one aren't you." He looked to the woman beside her. Mouse held her katana ready. "Of course that was probably your doing, Mouse. Tsk, tsk…leading my scanners all over the map tracking your signal…. You always were the artist." Mouse bared her fangs. He looked straight at Bob. "Come to delete me, Guardian? Have you finally… learned… your… lesson?"

He absorbed the negative effects of his words like a sponge. Bob looked darkly on him. "Glitch! Fire!"

I shot from his arm, twisting and fastening at the center of Megabyte's chest. The virus reeled in shock. "What?"

"Glitch!" Bob called. "Download program!"

I transferred the masking code into Megabyte's data. He looked up to Bob, seeking answers. He really had no idea what was coming, I completed the transfer and geared up.

"Glitch! Run program!"

I did so… the countercode rushed in aimed straight for the element at the heart of Megabyte, the part that made him viral. A white light edged its way out from around me like the branches of circuitry lacing a synthetic suit. He tried to claw me off of him, raking white stripes in his own skin. "Noooooo!" His cables snapped, the tendrils flying madly about the room, tearing bulkheads from walls, dislodging the beams of the staircases and breaking windows. The Binomes were thrown about, battered by the flailing cords. The power Megabyte had over Wellman's robotic body faded and the null rushed his son and fellow captive under cover. A chunk of the ceiling fell and crashed, revealing the level above. Bob shielded his face as bits of the room smashed into the walls around him. Dot and the others backed into the doorway. I continued to tear away and replace Megabyte's core.

The white light spread over him. His eyes blanched. Shakily he raised his arm and tried to flip open a panel above his wrist. It had been degraded shut, so he dug in his claws and pried it open with an intensified cry of pain. Inside he accessed his self-destruct command. "Guardian!" He shouted through clenched teeth over the sound of the ruination of the War Room. He held his arm out to Bob, showing the swelling energy therein. "I will blow this system out of the Net before I will cross over!"

Bob's face was struck with panic. He expected me to work faster than this. He wanted me to turn this monster good before he could do any more damage. Megabyte's will was stronger than I'd expected. There was no way to jettison him out of the PO this time, he was going to take us all out. I could feel his data start to turn over to the self-destruct command in my grip.

Abort program. Recalibrate. I had to save the system. If I didn't we'd all be erased.

I drank some energy from his well, the format raw and nasty compared to Bob's sprite energy. Tears opened around him as his tendrils pulped what was left of the machinery. I couldn't wait for a command. Nanos were vital.

Let's just pretend Bob said 'Glitch! Anything!'. Just for kicks.

I made a portal. Megabyte and I vanished into it and teleported out of the system.

I could hear Bob shouting my name as we left.

Chapter Text

Where else to go with an exploding virus? The Web of course! The nature of the web would see Megabyte's bits scattered to the four corners of known space, unable to affect the Net again. I snapped off him and floated freely, hoping my inertia would carry me far enough away to save me when he blew in three nanoseconds. The mighty virus Megabyte, terror of Mainframe, self-destructed with a forceful flash of light that propelled me through the void toppling end over end. An unstable tear ripped wide from the spot, lighting up the web. My signal became snowy, but I could still sense web creatures off in the distance turn their attention and flee at the sight of the rip. I sensed sprites, codes that might have matched the webriders we'd met when Matrix and I found Bob. They followed their pods away from the blast, swirls of orange fragmenting data forming around the break. The tear was becoming the eye of a storm. I was caught in the twist of it, being spiraled in.

I'd thought for a moment about whether or not keytools degraded in the web… now I thought about surviving at all. I quickly sent out a broad-range distress signal, in case any perceptive sprites or vessels were willing to brave the storm and rescue me.

The bright crackling brilliance of the tear increased in size. I found myself tangled in the mess of data fragments. Almost all my signal was being lost in the colliding particles, yet what was this? An ID? Who the…of course… the only sprite brave enough or basic enough to jump into a storm like this. The Surfr himself.

Ray located my signal and scooped me out as easily as if I were setting on a table. Grabbing the edge of the SurfBaud, he banked hard and shot straight out of the storm without more than a scratch. He turned back over his shoulder, then grinned down at me. "Hey, I know you."

I know you too! Fancy meeting up in a place like this.

Chapter Text

Ray and I thoroughly investigated the tear/storm but I was getting anxious. I wanted to get back home to my guardian, he must be worried sick about me seeing as that I left so abruptly with a live grenade and all…. At long last Surfr plopped down on his hovering surfboard to regard the storm from a relatively safe distance. "I can't figure out what caused it… its far to big to be a simple code anomaly."

I tried to speak in signal to him but he couldn't understand. He set me on the board next to him.

"Well, mate, whatever it was, I hope it had nothing to do with Bob. Something with major energy must have caused this rift and most likely didn't survive." He took a moment to study me, "I'm getting a little worried. Last I checked you and Bob were inseparable so to speak… if you're here alone…" he stared at me as if in time I could give him some kind of hint.

Hey, I would if I could man…

He gave up with a shrug. "I'm sure everyone's fine. No use in getting worked up over a 'maybe'. In any case, this storm is dangerous. I'd better put a warning out on it in case anyone's headed this direction. Then whaddaya say we get you home?"

I bleeped a positive reply and he actually laughed out loud.

"I'll take that as a yes then." He punched some buttons on the stern of his board then hopped back up, balancing expertly. I was stuck on his belt. My scanners were still garbled thanks to the Megabyte storm, and we had to veer wide to get out of its range. Ray had to read the meta in the web and locate Mainframe's address, but I just needed to find a tear. If I could get a fix on one big enough I could reroute it into the proper portal and get home in an instant, but as it was all I could read was static and faint glimmers of web events. I was pretty much useless again.

The last time we'd hit the web, I was damaged and unenlightened. Now, after being upgraded and exposed to the wonders that were sprite senses, I could connect these strings of code and patterns of bits into visual cues and imagine what it looked like. The inside of a crystalline Bob basically… streaming light and dancing colors. I wondered if my keytool friends could parse these kind of things. They'd picked up some things in Bob I know, but sight… that was something I alone had ever experienced. I actually got distracted imagining what the arm-like spirals of the storm would look like through Bob's eyes. I sure hope he's okay.

Chapter Text

Ends up keytools are immune to the degrading affects of the web! We're awesome little things.

It took nearly a second for us to break free. The storm had been gaining strength and size, but I think it was slowing down. Megabyte's destructive power still had limits after all, and I expected the web to start taking back some ground shortly and whittle this mess down to a more manageable size. Still Surfr made some comment about how the space could never really heal. There would probably be a storm here indefinitely. Megabyte had left his mark. It's all he ever wanted, I'm sure. I guess that viral scourge got his wish in the end, at least in some perverted way.

Now that we were cruising through clear (or at least clear by web standards) space I could pick up the signals of all the tears in the immediate area as well as those pods of webcreatures I'd sensed earlier. Mainframe's address was nowhere in sight but no matter! There was a juicy little tear straight ahead that would make a worthy replacement.

If only Ray could understand signal.

Hey! You! Up there! Goggle boy!

I began to whirr and buzz at his hip and he jumped, clipping me off.

Now you notice. He slowed down and gave me his attention. "What's wrong?"

YOU CANT UNDERSTAND ME!

He made a quick visual scan of the space. "You're getting something aren't ya?" I parsed desperately for a way to translate my ideas. I missed Bob. Ray's grasp of the web turned up nothing suspicious. He was getting ready to put me back so I chose the first idea I thought of. If I didn't send a message now, it might take cycles for us to find and return to Mainframe and I was not prepared to be separated from my guardian for that long. I fired a pulse shot out past his face.

"Woah!"

That way! Go that way!

He pulled to a stop and watched my pulse peter out. I fired again straight at the tear I wanted.

There! Take me there!

"What? You wanna get that tear?"

Yes! For User's sake, yes!

"That's not the address, but… what could it hurt? I'm not on the clock." He veered off like I wanted him to. Thank goodness for old-fashioned charades, and thank goodness he's the kinda basic nut who looks for adventure and does things for no good reason.

We hovered next to gargantuan orb of broken energy and he held me out to read it.

"There ya go. See?"

I shot a beam of golden light, rerouted the tear, and popped a portal to Mainframe.

His eyebrows went flew up in woder. "Huh? Whaddaya know!" He took another look at me then back at the portal. "I gotta get me one 'a you somehow." I went back on his belt and we dove into the portal, the link sealing and recalibrating behind us.

Chapter Text

'Bob!'

"Glitch?" Bob rushed out of the PO to the portal with the rest. I was relieved to see them okay. I'd left Mainframe so suddenly, I hadn't had time to think about giving them some sort of clue about what I as doing. I suppose when they saw the portal open up they didn't know who or what to expect from it. They certainly weren't expecting me. Bob seemed so happy to see me. I flew straight out of Ray's grip and smashed into my guardian's wrist. He put his hand up to me and felt my dial spinning with glee.

I think I'm going to give myself a stroke one of these days! In Bob, out of Bob, without Bob… this stress I'm under! Yet I can't help but feel that I'm learning what really counts.

My sprite friends crowded around Bob to get a good look at me. Mouse broke company and ran to the Search Engine. "Ray! But... how?"

"Popped up in the web." The Surfr replied. "Pure luck really, your little friend was about to be erased by a data storm." He put an arm around her and walked over to the group. "It's good to see you processing, Bob! When I found poor Glitch floating alone I didn't know what to think."

"That storm must have been Megabyte." Bob answered. I didn't know if he was sad or relieved. I don't think he even knew himself. "Glitch transported him to the Web and saved us all."

AndrAIa nodded, "It was amazing."

Enzo was elated. "It was Awesome!"

Dot smiled, a peace seeming to pass over her. "Then he's really gone! Megabyte's gone forever." Her older brother put a hand on her shoulder.

Bob looked up at Dot, his confusion passing at the sight of his loved one looking so at ease. He regarded me again, I could feel a stir in his code as he did. He was proud of me, and glad to have me back. It felt good to be reunited with him too… gave me flashbacks to the moment Copeland rejoined with Turbo. Keytools could survive alone. I'd proven this to be true. Keytools could survive without a guardian or within a guardian but nothing compared to just being with one. Ours was a partnership that defined the word loyalty. This was a sprite I would gladly be erased for. And I knew Bob would never loose me again. I was his constant support. His back up unit. His crime fighting tool. Not to mention his friend. He nodded at me. "Good job Glitch." Then looked up at Ray. "Thanks, Surfr."

"Don' mention it." Ray smiled. "Glad to help." Yes it is. Boy it was good to be home. end prog