Chapter Three: Them
Dot's Diner
Dot Matrix watched as Mouse was healed right on the bar of her diner. Medical units were able to get there as soon as she made the call, which gave her hacker friend a fighting chance.
But now she was on the line with Prime Guardian Turbo.
"But you have to help us," Dot begged of him.
"Ms. Matrix, we want to help you," Turbo said to her. "But without a tear to create a portal to get to Mainframe, we would need Megabyte to drop the block on transport to your system. You say that Bob is still trapped inside there."
"He has to be," she replied. "Otherwise, you would be having problems with Megabyte by now."
"Bob is still alive," Mouse said, wincing as her side was still being repaired. "I just know he is Turbo."
"I know of one other possible way," Turbo said to them. "It is a long-shot if I can even get a hold of them."
"Who is "them"?" Dot asked.
Turbo looked to Mouse. "Ask Mouse," he said. "She knows who I am talking about and I will try and get in touch with them as soon as I can trace their current location in the Web. They could be anywhere."
"You can't be serious," Mouse said. "She won't help you."
The VidWindow closed and Dot turned to face Mouse.
"What is it or who is that Turbo is talking about?" Dot said. "Do you know what person he is talking about?"
"I do sugah," the hacker replied, sitting up in a normal barstool now. "They hired me once and that was the night that they were captured by the Guardians. I wasn't safe from them either and I was arrested and charged before I escaped. Those five didn't."
"What happened to them?"
"They were arrested, charged, convicted, and shipped off to a maximum security prison," she told her. "No one knows whatever happened to them and they were believed to have been deleted. It was when I found out that they weren't in prison."
"Where were they?" Dot asked. "What was being done to them?"
"They were being reprogrammed…as web surfers."
Supercomputer: Guardian Turbo's Private Office
A tight beam transmission was sent from the Guardian Academy. Turbo eagerly awaited a return tight beam signature from those that he was searching for. But as he did, he pulled up some old Readme files.
Guardians capture drop-outs. Sent to Maximum security prison for deletion?
Renegade guardian academy drop-outs on prowl. Is this the future of the Academy?
Surfer Academy attacked from inside. Sources say six escape for freedom.
Renegade surfer group to attack Supercomputer? What do we do?
It was still a secret from the rest of the High Council of Guardians that he was still in contact with the six that had escaped. Ray Tracer…Blade Drake…Lana Vesper…Grendar of Dathonemia…Stara Crichton…Paige Dyson…
Paige's sister, Dixon Green had been one of the most powerful guardians to have ever graduated from the academy. It was a tragedy to hear that she had been deleted by Kilobyte in the very building that they worked in. Bob was even in the room when it happened and it devastated him.
Turbo saw a small VidWindow frame that had a JPEG photo in it. There was him, two little girls with pink hair, and his long deleted sister, Tierra Green. They were his nieces, Paige and Dixon whom he loved very much. He not only was their uncle, but he raised them like their father after Maximillion Dyson took off and was never seen much around their home.
To think that one of them was deleted and the other was hiding in the web as a mercenary web surfer split his heart in two. But with the mercenary, at least she could do little errands for him when it called for heavy assistance.
Finally, he was receiving his tight beam message back and he answered the VidWindow. Hidden in the darkness was a silver mask and deep blue cloak, like the one that Daemon's troops use to wear coating the person.
"I need your help," Turbo asked the person. "Can you and will you help me?"
"With what?" the female voice, muffled asked him. "You know I carry a heavy price tag."
"You might do this for free when I tell you the name of the virus that has taken control of a system and is need of cleansing," he said.
"You'd be surprised what I charge for Turbo," she said. "Especially after what the other High Council members did to us."
"How about the name of Kilobyte?" Turbo interrupted her.
The person folded her metal talon-gloved hands and tapped her two index talons together as she leaned back in the chair. "Well Turbo, I think you have some Knight Surfers at your service."
And the Prime Guardian was pleased.
Here they come...
