12:00 UTC (12:00 P.M. Eastern Standard Time)

Kowalski's Lab

(Skipper's POV)

We celebrated in front of The "Imagination Engine". Our mood was so positive that even the sparking of the ruins of "The Defictioner" added a celebratory vibe. Kowalski was running around checking the status on the instrumentation of The "Imagination Engine."

"Portal stable," Kowalski said.

"Once I rebuild The Defictioner," Kowalski said, "I make sure to use high-end motherboards…not one from a vending machine."

"No how about we make sure never to build another one," I said, "Rico!"

Rico fired a missile make sure that The Defictioner was unsalvageable.

"Should have kept my beak shut," Kowalski muttered as he tapped a gauge on The Imagination Engine.

"Now this Imagination Engine is something," I said.

"Well I don't want to go into The Internet again," Private said.

"Rather visit there on my computer," Marlene said.

"We can visit more than just The Internet," Kowalski said, "any realm created in the depths of the mind can be accessed."

"Finally!" I said, "now we can fight the Viking Warriors of Asgard!"

"Hammerguy!" Rico said.

"You can't fight Thor," Kowalski said, "haven't you seen The Marvel movies?"

"Thunder hammer!" Rico said.

"You can't lift Thor's hammer," Private said, "you're not even worthy."

"We see about that," I said.

"Mt Olympus, Asgard, the Egyptian underworld, Hades, Narnia, Wonderland, Oz, Fantasia, and other lands of myth and imagination can be visit…plus obviously The Spirit Realm, Cyber-space, The Soul Stone, The Time War…"

"The Soul Stone?" Private said.

"The Time War!?" I said.

"Not that we would want to go there…but the machine can…theoretically."

"Wait can things came through that thing?" Private said.

"What the worst thing that can come out of The Internet?" Kowalski said.

Suddenly a big red eye appeared in the portal, "Scanning for insecurities!"

"Oh no you don't," Kowalski said, "seal the dark matter injector! Deactivate laser array! Turn off proton beams! Un-sync The Space-Time Teleport! Cut the Huon Particle feeds! Shut down the tachyon convertor! Power down the flux capacitor! Power down the Particle Accelerator! Cut the anti-matter feed! Shut down the mini Anti-matter Fusion Reactor core!"

"You created a mini Anti-matter Fusion Reactor Core!?" I asked as Marlene deactivated, powered down, or shut off the various components of the machine.

The Portal switched off as Kowalski powered down the portal. The Virus gave us one last hateful glare as The Internet faded away.

"That Arthur II could give the Daleks chills" Private said.

"Blast it!" Kowalski said, "I forgot to lock on to Arthur II's code!"

"And that is bad how?" Private said.

"I could have shut that virus down!" Kowalski said, "but now it escaped into the zoo's network!"

"Well we can get on Alice's computer and YOU can track it down," I said.

"Don't you get it," Kowalski said, "that was the most powerful computer virus I ever seen!"

"What's the worst-case scenario?" I said.

"Um…Y2K," Kowalski said.

"Really?" I said, "Private! Ready the bunker for habitation! Rico! Ready the Giant Penguin Robot! Kowalski! Ready Lock-down procedure 8…Nuclear protection mode!"

"Um why?" Marlene said.

"Um…In case the destruction of The Internet causing power failures…and the shut down of water-cooling systems in nuclear powerplants," Kowalski said, "or some rouge government interprets The Internet blackout as an act of war against them. And Fire Nukes as retaliation leading to Global thermonuclear war and then…"

"Bad Ka-boom," Rico said.

"We might have to be prepared for a leave the planet scenario," I said, "so…once we finish our doomsday prep…get the Penguin 1A ready for launch!"

"Whoa!" Kowalski said, "at least let's try and deactivate the virus first…before we go into doomsday preparations."

"Very well," I said, "next stop Alice's computer!"

Zoo Office

Alice's Desk

Kowalski had hooked up his smart phone and had started hacking. The Computer was starting to go haywire as the virus started to infect it. Kowalski tapped away at his phone until some angry red color text started scrolling. Kowalski said to tap away at the code of the virus itself trying to render it useless. But every time Kowalski changed something the code revert back.

"Come on! Come on!" Kowalski said.

"Warning this Computer is infected," Alice's computer warned as error messages started to flood the desktop.

Kowalski tapped in a kill code, but the virus wasn't destroyed.

"Kowalski?" I said.

"Just give me some time…and…"

Suddenly Alice's computer stopped showing error messages. A popup appeared on screen, "virus not detected…virus scan is recommended."

"Crisis averted!" Kowalski said as he did Alice a favor and started a virus scan.

"Whew," I said, "all my previous orders are now countermanded!"

We left as Phil and Mason entered and started to play solitaire. Mason noticed the process bar for the virus scan in the bottom right hand corner. Phil then signed something, but Mason didn't seem to understand. Phil signed again (probably in less technical terms) and Mason silently ah-ed in understanding.

Mason turned to me, "does that process bar mean anything."

"Don't worry that's just the anti-virus running a scan," Kowalski explained, "shouldn't effect your solitaire game. Just ignore it when it alerts you that it's finished…Alice can worry about that."

"As long as their isn't a problem…" Mason said.

"The anti-virus should handle any viruses," Kowalski assured.

"Right," Mason said.

"See you around higher mammals," I said.

"Cheerio," Private said.

"Carry on chaps," Mason said with a salute.

"Move out," I said before we left.

Little did we know that this was hardly the end of our little digital adventure.

(End of Chapter Eight)