Chapter IV
DOT GLANCED UP AS THE DOORS TO HER OFFICE HISSED OPEN. "HOW IS HE?" SHE immediately asked, anxiously pushing herself up from her chair.
"Still off-line," AndrAIa said, stepping gracefully into the office, as the doors closed behind her. "But stable. The medics are watching him, so we'll know as soon as he comes back around. It could be a while. The baud looked like he'd taken quite a beating before going through the portal."
Dot eased back into her seat. She felt her stomach twist slightly, the added anxiety making that familiar sensation even sharper. "Please, sit down." She gestured to a chair in front of her desk. AndrAIa settled into it. "Was there anything else in the sensor logs?"
"Not very much." AndrAIa knitted her fingers together and shrugged. "The techs say it's all but impossible to pin down where the portal originated from, but they're trying anyway. They did figure out that he dropped in from the Net, rather than directly from the Web...it's not much, but it's something."
Dot sighed. Her mind had already been racing with ideas about what might've happened to Ray all those hours ago, but that merely added to them. How had he found his way back here from the Net? She tried to clear her mind, to set aside all the questions and theories. They would simply have to wait until Ray regained consciousness.
Above all else, one question burned in her mind, even as she tried to ignore it.
What had happened to Mouse?
"Dot, are you feeling all right?" AndrAIa asked, a look of concern on her face. "Can I get you something---?"
Dot shook her head, trying to clear it. She hadn't realized she'd gotten so wrapped up in her thoughts.
"Thanks, but I'm fine," she smiled, putting up a hand.
"Just thinking, that's all."
"Is it anything you'd like to talk about?" AndrAIa asked quietly. Before the twins had been born, she had wordlessly taken on the job of Dot's personal aide---and Dot wasn't ashamed to admit she needed the help, then and especially now. Even after she'd grudgingly left the better part of her business empire to her associates, that still left her with a husband, two children, and the entire city to deal with.
AndrAIa was levelheaded, intelligent, and well suited to the tasks of building Mainframe's defense force. As a game sprite, she'd been programmed with a warrior's mind, and she and Matrix had had far more experience with the enemy Guardians than anyone else in Mainframe. She was perfect for the job.
But in the time since, she'd become more than just an assistant. She was a close friend, someone Dot could talk to when she couldn't go to anyone else. Jaric and Jana adored her, and she adored them, watching over them when their parents could not. Sometimes Bob would joke that if they'd never had AndrAIa to help them with the kids, they would've never even thought about having a third.It didn't seem like it had been all that long ago...when AndrAIa had been the "dangerous" little game sprite that Dot barely trusted. Now she could only hope that she was half the friend to AndrAIa, that AndrAIa was to her. She certainly tried to be.
"I don't know," Dot sighed. "I guess I just have a bad feeling..."
"About...?"
"It's hard to place," Dot said. "It's just that it's been so quiet for so long. After as long as it's been since Ray and Mouse disappeared, as long as we've been waiting for Daemon to attack, which she never did. I just feel like this---" She gestured vaguely with one hand. "---means that something terrible is about to happen." She shrugged. "I'm probably starting to sound like Phong...or worse, Bob."
Both of them laughed at that thought. "Let's hope that never happens," AndrAIa smiled. "One of him is bad enough."
"You don't have to live with him," Dot said wryly. "Or those two little carbon-copies he's made of himself." Her thoughts drifted back home, where Bob was already.
She glanced down at the desk's chronometer. He probably would just now be getting the twins into a bath---or at least, trying to.
She should've been home cycles ago. As always.
"I've been meaning to ask you, AndrAIa," she said, shaking the thoughts away. "How's Enzo?"
AndrAIa looked puzzled, narrowing her eyes a little. "Just fine, as far as I know. Why, hasn't he been talking to you? I thought he'd been spending a lot more time at home, with his training..."
Sighing at her mistake, Dot shook her head. "Wrong Enzo. I meant, how's Matrix?"
"Oh." AndrAIa's face and tone changed abruptly, dramatically, but she tried to mask it. "He's all right, I suppose. Other than a few bruises to his rather inflated ego after that last game." She smiled a bit, but it looked thin and forced.
Dot opened her mouth to probe further. Matrix was still her brother, and if something was wrong---which she could tell just by AndrAIa's reaction---she wanted to know. And if it was bothering her best friend as well, she wanted to try and help.
But AndrAIa quickly and smoothly changed the subject. "Shouldn't you be off-duty by now?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.
Dot's eyes flicked to the chrono again, then back to AndrAIa. "Well, I thought I'd better stay here a while longer in case---"
Rising, AndrAIa put her hands up. "None of that. Come on, you're needed back home more than you are here." She walked behind the desk, took Dot gently by the arm and started her out of her seat and towards the door.
"But---"
"Don't worry. I'll make sure you know the nanosecond Ray comes to," AndrAIa promised, now literally shoving Dot out of her office. "Now, get going."
Dot's shoulders slumped with defeat, and relief. "All right," she conceded, heading out of the war room. She glanced back over her shoulder at the blue-haired game sprite. "Thanks."
"Don't mention it."
Turning to leave, Dot distantly realized that she had left her organizer back in her office. Shaking her head at herself, she kept walking. Oh, who cares.
She came home to the fading smell of something spicy, and the sounds of splashing and giggling in the distant background, occasionally punctuated by Hack or Slash's voice wailing. As Bob came into the room from the hallway, dripping wet with a towel in one hand, Dot hid an amused smile behind her hand.
"Oh, hi Dot," he smiled. He started toweling himself off. "The kids are in the tub."
"So I gathered." She leaned over and gave him a kiss on the cheek, tasting soap. "Poor Hack and Slash." Bob waved a hand dismissively. "Ah, they can handle it."
As if on cue, a particularly loud cry from Slash sounded in the bathroom. Dot could barely hear him, but he seemed to be complaining about having soap in his eye. Another infectious bout of giggles from the kids.
"Those two can barely handle themselves, Bob, let alone the twins," she sighed. She gave the air another sniff. "I guess I missed dinner again."
"We ate a little while ago. I can reheat yours, if you want..."
Dot shrugged, heading over to the couch. "That's all right. I'm not too hungry anyway."
Bob followed and sat down beside her, laying a damp arm around her shoulders. "How's the Surfr doing?" he asked quietly.
"The medics are watching him now. They'll let us know when he wakes up again." Tiredly she leaned her head on his arm. "How long as it been since he and Mouse left?"
She thought she felt Bob flinch just a little at the mention of Mouse's name, but she let it pass. A long time ago, it might have made her jealous. Now she knew better. "Six hours? I think that's close, anyway."
"Six hours." Dot sighed. "That's a long time...so much can happen."
"Yeah. Just look at us," Bob said, showing the beginnings of a smile.
Dot grinned at that. Back during the war, she never would've imagined that her life could be like this. It had been hard to remember what happiness had even felt like. "I just wonder what he's been through in all this time. Where he's been, what's happened to him."
"And Mouse..." Bob gave her shoulder a squeeze. "Do you miss her?"
"A lot more than I ever thought I would," Dot replied. At first, she and Mouse had both felt immediately threatened by each other's obvious interest in Bob. The competition hadn't lasted long, but while it did, Dot usually ended up losing.
"More than I ever thought you would," Bob smiled. He'd actually been oblivious at the time to any rivalry between her and Mouse, and when Dot had later mentioned it, he thought it was funny---he'd even seemed a bit flattered. He had, however, reassured her several times that whatever romance there had been between him and Mouse was long over before Dot had met the drawling hacker. And if it wasn't over then, it certainly was now.
Dot smacked him on the chest. "Oh, like you didn't enjoy having us fight over you."
"Just a little." He gestured by bringing his thumb and forefinger close together.
"Right," Dot rolled her eyes. The Web had changed Bob in a lot of ways, but in others...well, he was just the same as he'd always been.
She stood up and crossed to the window. The light outside was waning, and the city lights began to flicker on. "She was the only friend I had, Bob, for the longest time," she said quietly, folding her arms. "After I lost you and Enzo...there were so many times when I was ready just to give up. But she wouldn't let me."
She heard him come up behind her, felt his hands rest on her shoulders and give her a comforting squeeze. "I just want to know what happened to her," she whispered. "I guess we'll find out when Ray wakes up, but it's hard to wait after not knowing for so long." "Hey," he murmured quietly in her ear. "I know." They both turned sharply at the sound of the twins crying loudly from their bedroom. "What's going on?" Bob took his hands back and started down the hall, with Dot close behind him.
Jaric and Jana were sitting upright in their beds, wailing, with the covers tossed aside in protest. Between their small beds, Slash stood with one giant blue hand on each twin's shoulder, attempting to console them. Hack was nearly, looking rather upset, holding a storybook in his hands.
Bob rolled his eyes. "That explains it."
"Bob! Dot!" Hack exclaimed, noticing the two of them. The twins continued crying. "I was just reading..." he said, looking pathetic.
"Yes," Slash chimed in," we picked a bedtime story for the twins..."
"The Little Lost Null," Hack pointed to the title on the cover.
"And they just started crying!" Slash finished, waving his arms. The twins wailed even louder, as if to emphasize.
Dot tried to suppress a grin. "I wonder why." Megabyte's former servants, Hack and Slash were now unwaveringly loyal to her, and they extended that loyalty to include Jaric and Jana. But the twins still didn't know what to make of their two robot "uncles". Half the time, they thought Hack and Slash were funny---the other half, almost frightening.
"Here, give me that," Bob sighed, snatching the storybook out of Hack's hands and sitting on the edge of Jana's bed. Almost immediately, the children began to calm down. "Would you guys rather have me read this to you?"
"Uh-huh," Jana sniffled.
Jaric, still sobbing, nodded in agreement, rubbing tears from his cheeks. "Much rather."
Opening the book, Bob smiled at the two of them. "All right them." He opened his mouth to begin reading, then glanced up at abruptly at Hack and Slash, who were still standing over Jaric's bed. Bob cleared his throat, and nodded towards the door.
"Oh!" Hack exclaimed. "Sorry, Bob."
"Very sorry," Slash added. With the hum of servomotors, the two turned towards the door and wheeled off down the hall. Once he thought they were out of earshot, Hack immediately began telling how the entire thing was Slash's fault.
Leaning against the doorjamb, Dot listened quietly as Bob turned to the first page and began reading. The twins were now completely silent, leaning forward in interest, their brown eyes wide even though they'd heard this same story at least a hundred times before. Somehow, it really was different every time, as long as Bob read it.
Dot just had to smile. Trying to calm this two made all the viruses, came cubes and system crashes look downright boring, but Bob managed, as always, to make it look effortless.
By the time he'd finished reading, the kids weren't just happier, they even looked a little tired. They didn't put up their usual fight when Bob pulled the covers up around them, and kissed them both on the forehead. "G'night," he said quietly.
Jaric and Jana both raised their tiny hands and waved at him as he headed for the door. "Night," they said in unison.
As they walked back out, Dot leaned on Bob's shoulder and slipped an arm around his waist. "You're a wonderful daddy, Bob," she murmured.
He blushed modestly.
It had been nearly half a second since Ray had been pulled out of the energy C, when he first began to come around.
AndrAIa was the first one the medics called. On the 'lift ride to the medical wing, she debated whether or not to call Dot immediately. It was late---she and Bob would be asleep now, and Dot needed all the rest she could manage. On the other hand, knowing Dot, when she said she wanted to know the moment something changed, she meant that very moment. If AndrAIa waited a nanosecond longer, she'd never hear the end of it.
She can at least wait until he's fully conscious, AndrAIa finally decided, stepping off the 'lift. What the medics had told her was that his vital signs were going back up again, but he wasn't really awake yet.
She could call Dot when he was. Not before. Walking into the Infirmary, she spotted the Surfr, lying on one of the biobeds, with his surfbaud propped up against the wall nearby. If the board had looked bad, Ray himself looked even worse. His face was pale, bruised and patched in places where he had been cut, a few seconds' worth of dark stubble on his chin. Every so often he would stir feverishly, as if caught in a bad dream.
"How is he?" she asked worriedly, turning to the chief medical officer, Dr. Cursor, a short Zero binome in blue medic's scrubs and a long coat.
"He's finally waking up," Cursor said, glancing at the monitor window. She brushed back a stray wisp of red hair. "He must've taken quite a blow to the head before coming through the portal, but other than a few scrapes, he looks like he'll be all right."
AndrAIa had settled into a chair beside the bed, watching the battered Web surfer intently. For a few more nanoseconds he was still, then his arm began to move, his fingers flexing. His breathing started to pick up.
"Ray? Can you hear me?" If he could, he didn't make any sign of it. Patiently AndrAIa sat by, watching him slowly come out of unconsciousness. He began to toss his head, and he moaned softly, as if trying to speak. "Ray, it's me." She reached over and placed a hand on his arm. "AndrAIa."
His head rolled over towards her, and suddenly his eyes blinked open. "An...drAI..."
"Easy," she said, getting to her feet, probing over his bruised face with her fingers. He had a lot of lacerations. Briefly she wondered what could've made them. They looked like wounds from either flying shrapnel...or claw marks. "It's all right. You're back in Mainframe."
Ray's lips moved slowly, repeating the word, but no sound came at first. "Mainframe?" he tried again, his voice hoarse and confused. The start of a weary smile tugged at the corners of his mouth. "I made it..." he whispered, looking absently at the ceiling. "I made it, I made it..."
"You," AndrAIa spun around on one of the medics, jabbing a finger at him. "Call Commander Matrix, tell her the Surfr's awake. Now!"
The binome nodded nervously, and trotted over to a vidwindow, punching in the transmission code in a hurry. "I made it," Ray repeated, before springing upright and seizing AndrAIa by both of her arms. His grip was tight, but more startling than painful.
"We've got..." Ray's voice faltered, and he repeated the thought. "We've got to help her..."
"Who...?"
"Mouse!" he shouted. "We've got to help her!"