I come from the games. I never before belonged anywhere. Now I have a friend who is more than a friend. My place is with him. His home is my home.

Matrix and I have been game hopping hoping to find our friend Bob. But game time is faster than regular time. Both of us have grown. But Matrix changed. He is not the careless, active, loving child he used to be. He is now stubborn, despondent and full of self pity.

But I still love Matrix. I know there is still part of that child inside him.

We've met many friends along the way. There is the Hero league and the small army of binomes that we trained. There is the crew of the Saucy Mare that Enzo once knew. A Web surfer came and helped us part of the way. I owe my life to him. Most recently, we met a sprite in the Web. We call her Healer, though it might not be her real name. I owe my life to her, too. She also saved all of us from Mouse's traps that were meant to save us from further Web invasion.

After all that we've been through, we finally found Bob in the Web and are now back in Mainframe. We were far out on the energy sea. We are not going to go directly into Mainframe until we know what we're up against. Megabyte might have taken over Mainframe. We are going to do our best to save Enzo's home; my home.

We were aranging a scouting party to see what happened to Mainframe so far. Frisket, Enzo, Healer, and two members of the crew were assigned to go.

We were getting ready to go when Matrix said, "Oh great. Where's Healer? She's not here yet. Someone go find her!"

Three binomes ran to look for her. They couldn't find her.

"She couldn't have just disappeared!" Enzo said.

"Maybe she wanted to stay in the Web," I suggested.

"No, she would have shown us that she was going," Bob said.

"Maybe it's a trap!" Enzo said. "Maybe she works for the Guardians or Megabyte and is going to tell them that we are here and launch a surprise attack!!!!"

"Calm down Enzo!" I said to him. "Let Frisket find her. Frisket! Sniff."

Frisket sniffed the deck and pointed his nose to where Mainframe was.

Enzo's eyes narrowed in hatred.

"I'll look for her in the water. Maybe she's still there," I said.

I took off my boots because I swim better without them. Before I dove, I noticed that Matrix was staring at my feet.

"What is it lover?" I asked him.

"Andraia," he said." I never knew you had webbed feet."

I stared absently at my feet which were webbed and the toenails were blue like my hands. I decided to do something that would surprise him. I extended my toenails and turned to see his reaction. Of course, his jaw was slack and his eyes were wide. I laughed and dove off the ship.

The water was full of other marine animals that looked at me curiously. I am adapted to the water and I feel quite at home there. This made me feel homesick for my original place. But I'm not leaving Enzo for anything.

I couldn't feel anything in the ocean currents big enough to be a sprite. But I saw some disturbance in the sand. There was a trail that started from the ship and went towards Mainframe. But the strangest thing was that this trail was impossible to be made by any sprite and there was no cut in the pattern; which meant that whatever made this can breath underwater.

I decided to go back to the ship. I reported what I saw. Enzo decided that we should go anyways and take me instead of Healer. We took a small boat and headed towards Mainframe.

It is night time in Mainframe. We are at what's left of Floating Point. It is now a place to test out weapons and delete those resisting Megabyte. We were all shocked. Frisket sniffed the ground and started tracking Healer. I looked at Enzo several times while following Frisket. There was saddness in his eyes ever since he saw what his home had become. I can tell that he is sad for his home and is afraid for Dot, Mouse, and his friends.

Mainframe is much different. It seems that people have negleted the care of the city. There was graffiti on the crumbling walls. Trash and nulls littered the ground. The only places that look cared for are the Principal Office and Megabyte's Tor. A few sectors have been nullified. We had to be careful to avoid patrols that were walking around the streets.

We were so depressed by the condition of the city, we didn't realize that we were heading towards Lost Angles until we were on the bridge. The place was completly deserted. Even nulls couldn't be found.

We saw a shadowed figure going behind a corner of a building. Frisket started growling. Matrix took out his gun and backed up against the wall. He pointed the gun around the corner of the building at whoever was there. To my, his and everyone else's surprise, Enzo's gun was pointed at Healer who had her left hand extended, pointing her ring right at the barrel of the gun. Healer was surprised when she saw us. She lowered her hand and stepped out of the shadows.

I could see that her other snake was missing too. She rubbed her finger on the leathery garment she was wearing to make a high screeching sound. Frisket whimpered at the sound and shivered. Two glowing eyes appeared in the shadows. It came out of the shadows and revealed itself to be one of Healer's snakes. But what disgusted me was that the snake had a null in it's mouth! Healer picked up the null and and thew it away. The snake went back into the shadows.

Healer followed it and motioned for us to follow. We went into a hidden passage that seemed to go into Hexadecimal's Lair. Suddenly she stopped and ran the opposite way. She stopped and tugged at my arm to follow her. But she stared into the darkness beyond us and her eyes became wide. She seemed to be frightened and ran on without us. All of that happened so fast, the rest of us didn't have enough time to react. The next thing I knew, there was pain all over my body as I collapsed and the world became black.

.......

I woke. I could still feel pain from the shock that blacked me out. I was in the main part of Hexadecimal's Lair. Enzo, Frisket, the two other crew members, and lots of viral binomes were there too. A few other binomes were sleeping on an unreachable ledge. All of our weapons were taken. This was a prison that is used by resistance members to keep spys and all those who work for Megabyte.

"W.. what happened, Enzo?" I said.

"That..that TRAITOR led us here!" he yelled, scaring the viral binomes. "This is a TRAP!!! I should have deleted her when I first saw her!!!!"

"Calm down Enzo!" I said, "Look, we are in a prison with only viral binomes. Who do you think is the keeper of these cells? And also, Megabyte wouldn't make a prison in such a deserted area."

Enzo calmed down a little. There was nothing else to do but to wait until morning for the guard binomes to wake up and tell them who we are. They were all asleep now and were wearing mufflers around their ears. (Though they don't have any)

I was the first one to see Healer. She usually has bright orange hair but for some reason, right now, it was almost a shade of gray. She was crawling on her stomach towards the edge of the precipice. I saw her first because I was a game sprite and I have better eyes than other sprites.

She was on a ledge that was also occupied by a guard binome. Her snake bit him to keep him asleep. Healer took a control switch from the sleeping binome. She left her snake on the ledge with the switch and jumped into the pit with us. She had my trident, Enzo's gun and the crew members' file-lock swords. She gave them back to us.

Healer went to the corner where the viral binomes cowered in fear. She grabbed one of them by the arm and bit him. The binome was unconsious for a few microseconds but during that time, his viral colors slowly faded away. She took the viral infection out of fifteen more binomes. She signaled to her snake to push the button and a staircase materialized from the pit into one of the empty ledges. Matrix kept the binomes who were still viral from going with us. We headed towards another chamber of Hexadecimal's Lair.

TO BE CONTINUED...