ReBoot Timeline (Hour= year/ Minute=month/ cycle=week/ second=day/ microsecond=hour/ nano=minute/ nanosecond=second/)

Chapter 2: Revelations

Dot zipped down Baudway, looking up at the high rises with a touch of longing. 'I really need a break.' Though only three seconds had passed since she had last taken time off, those seconds were filled with non stop account problems, system incompatibility errors, jobless binomes, and frustrated sprites. Dot did her best to see to each crisis as it came to her attention, but even she was bound by 24 microseconds in a second. As always, she threw her full weight into her responsibilities, and now her neck was so tight her shoulders were almost in her ears. Even though she was requested to review a building schematic for the new transport dock near the Mainframe pier, she promised herself at least 15 nanos to check on her Diner.

The place was busier than usual, and Dot was pleased that business had picked up since the restart. A few binomes greeted her and asked questions about updates in the Wall Street sector. She promised to get back with them while she scanned for some familiar faces. One towered over the rest, and Dot made an underscore line for her big little brother. She saw him chatting with AndrAIa and Enzo, and her heart warmed that Matrix was putting on his best show of tolerating his younger self. She knew both were having issues with the situation, but they were strong. They were Matrices.

"Hi guys, what's processing?"

Enzo tackled her before she could catch Matrix's answer, and she only dimly heard what he said while she caught the eye roll of her renegade.

"…and they'll let me try out the new zip sneakers if I beat them both, but only then if my homework is done, which it is, and then if you let me go, so I promise I'll be good and I won't get hurt and I'll even clean my room when I get home, so can I?"

Dot's smile was frozen on her face as she tried to recall the first part of the conversation. AndrAIa mouthed the words "JetBall Extreme", and realized that an improved system was just installed to better accommodate multiple players. She was hesitant to agree, but latched onto some leverage. "Your whole room?"

Enzo's head nodded vigorously in reply. "Promise!"

"Dinner's at 1800, be home in time to clean up, and be careful out there!" She laughed as Enzo jumped off her chest, grabbed AndrAIa's hand and started dragging her out the door. Matrix helped Dot from the floor, gave her a kiss on the cheek, and left.

Dot scanned the rest of the booths, feeling mildly disappointed at the absence of the one occupant she was hoping to see. After getting a quick pass down from Cecil on the Diner's current statistics, she left and jumped on her zipboard to make her meeting at the docks. A small crowd caught her eye, and she zipped over to see numerous binomes crowded around a young "1", his eye red from crying and a large gash along his left leg. Next to him was Bob, his hands glowing softly as they hovered over the wound. Soon, there was nothing but a thin blue line, and Bob began to put a small wrap around the mostly healed wound.

"There you go," he said with a smile. "Always make sure to look twice before crossing the road, ok?"

The little "1" moved his leg, blinked, and smiled at Bob. "Thank you," it squeaked. His friends looked at the bandage and back at Bob, before gushing to the repaired "1" how cool he was to be patched by the Guardian. He was soon on his feet and running off with his friends toward the park. The crowd dispersed behind them, and Bob started to walk towards the Diner to find Dot cruising slowly next to him.

"Dot! Hi."

"Hi, Bob. Nice patch."

Bob shrugged. "Comes with the territory." He smiled at her. "What are you up to?"

"Oh, you know," she sighed, "business as usual. I'm heading over to the docks to review the building plans for the Net Port." She gave him a critical once over, and arched an eyebrow at his sudden discomfort. "You look awful."

Bob stumbled a little and shook his head. "Great to see you, too!"

Dot zipped in front of him, gliding backwards as he continued walking. "No, seriously. You look like you haven't downtimed in seconds." She stopped gliding. "Are you ok?"

Bob shrugged again, and smiled as casually as possible. "Just a few restless nights at the apartment. Nothing a Dot's Diner energy shake can't fix."

Dot crossed her arms and stared.

"Really, I'm fine."

An arched eyebrow.

"You're really pretty when you do that."

"And you're really bad at changing subjects."

Bob seemed to deflate in front of her. "Dot, I appreciate you trying to help, but I'm going to be fine. Don't worry about me."

'I like worrying about you.' Dot gave herself a mental shake. That was a discussion for another time. Right now, she needed to give Bob something else to think about. Glancing around her at the mostly empty sidewalk, she grabbed his hand and pulled him into a side alley, away from prying ears.

"Uh, Dot? The pier is the other way."

"So is the Diner." She stopped a few meters in, and turned to face him, her hand still gripping his. "Bob, there's something I want to tell you about, something during the time you were gone." Bob's eyes narrowed slightly, but eased as she shook her head. "No, it's not what you think. It's about you. No, not you. Us."

"…Ok."

Dot took a breath and pressed forward. "Not a day passed when I didn't pray to the User that you were safe, and that you would come back to us. But as the seconds passed, and cycles turned into minutes, I faltered. I started to hold out for you less and less each second, until, well, until I just stopped looking to the sky." She dropped her eyes, only encouraged when she felt Bob's hand tighten on hers. "I gave up hope that you would come back. I found hoping just hurt more the longer I held on. And then you came back, and when you did…" She looked back up to him again, locking her eyes with his and silently begging him to understand. "When you walked in that room, I just wanted to run and hide, because I was too ashamed of myself that I gave up on you."

Bob moved closer, his eyes sympathetic. "Dot."

"And you know what happened next? Mouse." Dot smiled at Bob's surprised and confused look. "She sauntered right into my "office" and told me to get over myself, and to go after you." She smiled as she remembered the hacker's words. '…you're love for him, and his love for you.' "Don't you see? I would still be running from you right now if I didn't tell Mouse about my misgivings, because had I not confessed to her why I was avoiding you, she wouldn't have pointed out that I was letting myself be controlled by my own fears. Fears that were wholly unfounded." She squeezed his hand. "I couldn't do it alone, Bob."

Bob stared at her then looked at their hands. His thumb moved in slow circles across her palm, and Dot couldn't help but wonder at the electric current that went through her from the tiny gesture. She held her breath, hoping he wouldn't shut her out again.

"The system could crash without you."

Dot chuckled, unsure of where Bob was going with this. "It could crash without you, too."

"No, I mean, being the Commander, you have a lot of responsibility and a schedule so packed I have to make an appointment three minutes in advance to take you to lunch." He raised his eyes to meet hers, a touch of sadness in his smile. "You have so much on your mind right now, my baggage would only make things worse for you. And I know I'm going to need a lot more than a few nanos of your precious time."

"Don't tell me that's why you've been avoiding this," Dot scolded lightly. "I know I am busy, but I know where my priorities are."

"Our priorities are the system first, Dot."

"And more than one sprite operates the system, Bob. I can make the time. Will you?"

Bob gave her a small smile, one that reflected a weariness in him that came from more than sleepless nights. "Yeah."

"Good." She released his hand, the sudden coolness a mild shock to her system. 'Wow, I've really got it bad, don't I?' She pulled open her organizer, tapped a few icons, and then nodded once. "Ok, 1900."

"What's happening at 1900?"

"I'm picking you up at your apartment."

"Tonight?" Bob stumbled over his words as he continued, "Dot, that's a little short notice, don't you think?"

"No, I don't." She smiled at him. "No time like the present, right?" She checked her watch and feigned panic. "Oh, no, I'm late! Gotta go, see you tonight!"

"Wait, where are we going?" Bob asked as she started to zip up into the sky.

"Only time will tell!" she called back, laughing at the mystified look on his face. As she zoomed past Baudway, she allowed herself a smile in anticipation for the quality time she and Bob would share. Her eyes glanced again at the high rises, and she pushed her board a little faster, eager to get the day over with.

/

"Where are w… Wow." Bob's voice left him as he followed Dot into the room. A rather large and upscale room. A room near the top floor of one of the most expensive condos in Baudway. To the right was the kitchenette complete with jet black appliances and a granite bar. To the left, a wide staircase wound around the room to a pair of double doors at the top. Straight ahead, a sitting area complete with overstuffed loungers, a simple glass table and a fireplace was dwarfed by the two floor high windows that looked out over a better majority of Mainframe. Bob stepped over to the windows and looked down into the heart of Baudway, bustling with night life activity. The lights were bright and flashing, but the noise was non existent.

Again, he could bring himself to say nothing more than, "Wow."

Dot chuckled. "Yes, that's how I felt."

"Someone lent this to you for tonight? And on short notice? Being has it's connections, huh?" Bob joked as he walked back to her.

"You could say that. A close personal friend secured this for me. She's quite popular around Mainframe, and so involved with the citizens. I've even heard rumors she's seeing the most eligible guardian in the system." She smirked at Bob's confused look until he noticed a piece of mail on the counter.

"D. M. Trixa." He put the letter down and with a dramatic sigh he rolled his eyes to the ceiling. "Well, I can neither confirm nor deny such a relationship at this time, but I can say she is such a babe." A dish towel hit him in the face, hiding his smirk.

"I bet you say that about all the sprites."

"Just the green ones."

"Matrix must love the attention," Dot grinned as she pulled a bottle of red wine from the cabinet and two glasses, handing him the bottle and an opener. "You pour, I'll turn on the heat."

"So, Ms. Trixa, exactly what are you doing with a place like this?"

"What do you mean?" Dot was kneeling in front of the fireplace, striking up a match.

"You have your apartment with Enzo, you have the dinner, you have private quarters at the P.O. in case of emergencies; this seems like extra fluff for someone so practical." He brought the glasses over to the table.

She scooted back away from the glowing fire and beckoned him to sit down on the floor with her, their backs against the loungers. "Well, it started out with a business partnership. A while back, when the diner was just starting to get going, I had some pretty heavy competition in the area. I need more help getting the diner advertised, and one of my friends from school was going into the real estate business. She, too, needed a boost in advertisement. So we helped promote each others business at our respective locations, and everything just went up from there. I let her use the dinner for luncheon meetings parties, and she let me buy one of the newer condo models she designed at an incredibly reasonable price."

Bob was surprised. "So you've had this for a while?"

"Yep." She sipped her wine and leaned back, relaxing into the soft cushions. "I'm always so involved with people from the diner or the partner accounts, and now with my new format, I get almost no time to myself." She looked down at the floor, her voice softening almost shyly. "And as much as I love Enzo, sometimes I just want to shut out all of Mainframe, just to enjoy a moment of silence." Her eyes swept the room before coming back to Bob. "I don't come here often, and usually not for very long, but it's always a comfort in the back of my mind to know that I have this here, a secret place where I can decompress when I really need it."

"And what a secret it is," Bob complimented. "Here we all get so worried you work too hard, and yet you've always had your own little way to cope." Bob laughed lightly into his glass. "And it raises the question: what other secrets are you hiding?"

"If only you knew," Dot answered in a low, sultry voice that made Bob cough into his glass. She laughed, and loved how it sounded free and warm to her ears. "But not tonight. You'll just have to start coming over more often."

"Is that an open invitation?"

Dot looked at him closely, and the mood settled into a more serious tone. "Yes. I want you to take a key with you." She shook her head slightly as eyebrows shot up. "Not that open, Guardian," she chided lightly. "What I mean is that this place is a safe haven for me when I need to get away from everything, even myself. I want you to have that, too."

"I do have my own apartment."

She reached out and took his free hand. "Yes, and everyone knows where it is. Here, only you and I know about it. So if you need to stop being Guardian 452 and just be Bob, even if only for a few nanos, this place is yours."

Bob stared at her quietly for a moment. His hand tightened on hers and with a soft, "Come here," he turned her, pulling her back to his chest and circling one arm around her waist as she settled against him. His hand gently stroked along her side and he placed his chin on her shoulder while Dot sighed. "Thank you," he whispered.

They sat quietly for some time, gazing at the crackling fire, before Dot spoke. "Matrix and AndrAIa are watching Enzo tonight, and Phong knows to only call in a dire emergency. Short of a game cube falling, we should have the whole night to ourselves." She felt Bob's breath hold as he waited for her to continue. "We can talk about whatever you want… if you want." She sunk into his embrace a little deeper and turned to nuzzle her head lightly against his. "Or we can stay just like this." She didn't say the words, but she just knew he understood her meaning. 'Whatever you want to do, Bob, I'm here for you.'

Again, they lapsed into a comfortable silence. Dot let herself start to drift in his arms, the comfort in his closeness causing her to lull in the sweet space between asleep and awake, and deep down she reveled in the idea of waking up beside him in the morning. She stirred when his other arm wrapped around her body and he sighed.

In the quiet of the night, in the light and warmth of the modest fire, in the security of her concern for him. Bob softly began his story…