Chapter Two
"Ron?" Kim asked. She was in complete darkness, standing on a hard, yet unlevel floor. She carefully reached her arms out to either side, trying to explore her surroundings.
"Where are we, Kim?" Ron asked from beside her. He looked to his right, catching sight of Kim's eyes that seemed to be glowing in the dark. "Is this what it looks like inside a computer?"
"I don't know." Kim said, reaching out to him and clutching his jacket in an attempt to cure her disorientation. "We should try and find some walls or something to find our way out of here."
"Rufus?" Ron asked the blackness. "You here?" An odd sounding squeak responded and Ron could feel a sudden weight crawl up his side and sit on his shoulder. The couple looked up at the eerie sound of an old wooden door swinging open and light poured into the room. Ron complained, squeezing his eyes shut and Kim blocked out the glare with a hand. There seemed to be a set of wooden stairs leading up to a now open door. Within that doorway stood the silhouette of what looked like a beach ball with arms and legs.
Ron opened his eyes slightly, looking at his hands. "Check me, KP... I'm a cartoon!"
"Ron, company..." Kim whispered, looking out of the corner of her eye at her boyfriend. Then her eyes widened as she caught sight of a slender, pink, slug like and featureless blob perched on Ron's shoulder. "Is that Rufus?!"
Ron turned his head and his face pinched in a look of surprise. "Wah!" he shouted. Rufus was flung to the side and Ron leapt up the stairs and over the beach ball. He shook in disgust, flailing his limbs in an attempt to make sure the pink blob wasn't still on him. When he finally stopped to look around, he found he was surrounded by a number of strange looking beings. Some, like the one he had just jumped over, stood up to his knee and resembled metal balls with facial features pinned on and awkward arms and legs attached. Others stood up to his waist, and resembled a stack of three blocks with one large eye on the top block with various hair styles, a mid section that contained a speaker like mouth with arms jutting out from either side, and a bottom block that passed for an abdomen with short, awkward legs. Ron's eyes widened in disbelief as each of the short creatures pulled a sword shaped weapon from their belts. "Kim?!"
Kim performed an acrobatic flip to land at Ron's side, putting her back to his. "What are these things?"
"Better yet, where are we?" Ron asked. Ignoring the strange beings around them, Kim and Ron took in their surroundings. They seemed to be on some sort of modernized pirate ship as it flew through a dizzyingly bright tunnel of light, powered by half a dozen sails that seemed to float about the ship, suspended by nothing at all.
Captain Capacitor looked down at his crew of binomes, who surrounded two sprites that had just leapt from his storage hold. He dug the hook that replaced his left hand into the railing of the Saucy Mare, then turned his one eye to his accountant, a small round binome. "By the Code, Mr. Christopher!" he gallantly shouted, running a hand across one end of his large, twisted moustache. "What's all this, then?"
"Seems to be stowaways, sir." Mr. Christopher said, addressing his records on the datapad that he held in his hand. "By my calculations, the added mass and reduction in speed is going to reduce our profits by sixty four percent." he continued in a nasally voice. "Ms. Matrix won't be pleased..."
"Yea heard that, lads?!" Captain Capacitor shouted to his crew on the main deck. "Over board with them, or it'll come out of your bitmaps!"
Kim and Ron parted as one binome lunged. He over thrust, however, striking a companion with his sword and encasing the target in a green, translucent cube. Kim crouched, sweeping her leg in a wide arc. Rufus leapt from Kim's hip pocket, his featureless body slapping against the nearest binome that was threatening Kim's back.
"Okay, little computer generated dudes," Ron said, putting his back against the wall. "Prepare to feel some mystical monkey power!" he grinned, extending his arms out to either side and concentrating. When nothing happened, his grin faded. The binomes that cornered him shrugged, poking him with a sword and encasing him in another translucent cube.
"Ron!" Kim shouted, spinning. Ron appeared to be frozen, a worried look permanently chiseled into his features. A blocky crew member passed by with his arms flailing in the air and screaming in fear, running awkwardly away from Rufus, who was crawling like a worm across the deck after him.
Captain Capacitor laughed, drawing his own sword and staring at Kim with his one large, central eye. "Best give yerself up, lass! Nay a villain has ever escaped the Crimson Binome!"
Kim glared up at the Captain. He was one of the taller, blocky creatures, but dressed in an extravagant red jacket and pirate's hat, with a crop of red straggly hair jutting out in a spiky mess, and a wide, tangled moustache and goatee that surrounded his speaker like mouth. A peg replaced his right leg, and a gold hook took the place of his left hand. Kim decided not to waste time with questions. In his good hand, he held a sword like the rest of the crew and pointed it at Kim as a challenge.
A swift kick connected with one of the rotund binomes, sending him flying like a soccer ball towards the Captain, knocking the sword from Capacitor's hand. Kim leapt easily over the various pirate's heads, rebounding off of the cube that encased Ron, and landed with one foot on the Captain's middle block, knocking him to the floor. With one raised hand, she caught the sword on its way down, pointing it at the Captain's suddenly confused eye. "You'd better hope you can set him free." Kim growled, an unfamiliar coolness touching her voice.
Captain Capacitor blinked once, and frowned. But it wasn't the tip of the sword that caught his eye, but the blue, round object on Kim's wrist and the black and gold icon on her shirt. "Aye... Aye! Set the sprite free, men!"
Kim didn't turn away, but listened for Ron. "Ron?" she shouted. Despite the one binome that was still running for his life from Rufus, Kim could pick out Ron's still boyish voice.
"I'm okay, Kim!" Ron shouted back. He looked around cautiously at the sword wielding creatures that surrounded him. He looked down at Rufus and frowned, cupping his hands in front of him. "That really you, buddy?" The featureless pink blob seemed to look at itself and nodded an affirmative.
Kim rolled her eyes, whispering to herself. "Now he thinks it's weird..." She turned her attention back to the Captain that was still under her foot. "Where are we?" she asked, poking the sword forward for emphasis.
"You be sailin' aboard the Saucy Mare... Guardian." the Captain said. He cautiously used his hook hand to push the point of the sword away from his face. "And we be sailin' toward the port of Mainframe."
Kim took her foot off of the Captain's midsection and backed up beside Ron as he climbed the stairs. "Well, sounds like we're on the right track." Ron stated, placing Rufus into his pants pocket.
"You called me a Guardian." Kim said. "Why?"
Captain Capacitor picked up his hat and placed it back on his balding, cubical head. "Don't think me basic, lass. I know a keytool and Guardian Icon when I see'em. We've tangled with your kind before, we have." he said, gesturing to Kim's wrist Kimmunicator and the small badge that Malcolm had given her.
"Coming into port, Cap'n!" shouted the helmsman.
Kim and Ron turned to look out over the deck of the ship as the tunnel of light that they had been flying through disintegrated, revealing a glassy ocean with a digital ripple that seemed to mimic the tide. Ahead of the ship sat an island that floated in the air above the ocean, and it looked as though it was composed entirely of sky scrapers and futuristic buildings; an urban center that stretched from shore to shore. "Boo-yah..." Ron whispered, his eyes widening.
"That's Mainframe?" Kim asked, as Captain Capacitor limped up beside her. Hesitantly, she handed the sword back to him.
"Aye. Tis no supercomputer, but tis been our home for nary a few minutes since running into its Guardian." the Captain said. "Mr. Christopher!" he shouted to the round accountant that never seemed to leave his side. "Let Ms. Matrix and Guardian Bob know of our new friends!"
"Yes, sir." Mr. Christopher responded, tapping on his data pad.
"I'm curious though, lass... why'd yea have to sneak aboard?" the Captain asked, looking up at Kim as the Saucy Mare turned into the dock of the city. "The Crimson Binome is always willing to lend his ship to the aid of the Guardians." he said, digging his hook hand into the railing in front of him. "For a slight profit, of course." he grinned.
"It's uh... complicated." Kim replied with a smile.
"We're from the real world." Ron said, finally taking his eyes off of the city.
The Captain looked back it him, confused.
"Outside of the computer..." Ron rephrased as a crowd of the crew began to collect around them.
"Ron..." Kim whispered. "I don't think they know where that is."
"Oh." he said, thinking. "We're from outer sp–. Wah!" Ron tried explaining before Kim pulled him down the stairs.
"We might want to stay low pro until we find out what's going on." Kim suggested. Waving back at the Captain, she shouted up at him. "Thanks for the ride, Mr. Binome, sir! I owe you a favor!" she smiled, stepping onto the dock that was full of more of the small, odd looking people.
Captain Capacitor waved back with his hook and smiled, whispering to the side to Mr. Christopher. "A favor from a Guardian? Log that down in our inventory, Mr. Christopher..."
"Yes, sir!" the accountant replied excitedly.