Chapter Two
In Which Val Gets Settled In For The Night

With Dot there, Bob was finally able to get his energy shake. Still a bit fatigued, he went home and sprawled on the couch. Mike the TV was nowhere to be seen, and it was blessedly quiet. Which meant that there was nothing to block out the terrible din that heralded AndrAIa's arrival a millisecond later. Bob yawned and descended to the apartment building's courtyard.

Even over the rising growl of an unnecessarily large and powerful motorbike, there was another noise audible, a high keening sound that drilled straight into the brain by way of the temples. By the time the bike came in for a landing, it could be distinguished as a girl's voice crying "Wheeeeeeeee!"

Just overtaking the bike on their zipboards were the two Enzos. The elder version looked rather haggard. Little Enzo pulled ahead and sped over to Bob.

"Wow, Bob!" He was wearing an awed expression. "Your cousin is supercooled! She beat me nineteen times!"

"Out of how many?"

"Twenty-seven," said Matrix in a hollow voice. His mechanical right eye was spinning slowly sideways, and wobbling slightly. He glided up to Bob, stepped off his zipboard, and bent down until their noses were practically touching. Very softly, he growled, "Let's get one thing straight right now. I don't babysit." Without another word, he remounted his zipboard and zoomed off in the direction of Baudway.

Bob glanced from the departing Matrix to the now-stationary bike and back to Enzo. "What's with him?"

"I think they broke him," said AndrAIa, climbing out of the bike.

"Nah, we had fun!" insisted Enzo. "We had a zipboard race too. And look!" He pulled the yo-yo off his belt and snapped the halves together. "Val showed me how to do Around the Net!" He demonstrated, nearly hitting Bob in the ear.

AndrAIa was helping Val down from the bike. "Hey, Val, sounds like you've got an admirer."

"Isn't she a little old for you, Enzo?" added Bob with a wink.

Enzo looked startled. Val laughed. "Maybe I'll see you next second, okay, spriteling?"

"Alphanumeric!"

"Thanks for the ride, AndrAIa! That is a nice bike!"

AndrAIa smiled. "No problem. C'mon, Li'l Sparky. Let's go catch Matrix before he hurts someone." They climbed onto the bike and were off.

Bob blinked and shook his head. "All right, Val, let's get you settled in."

"Okay! What a great building!"

"I like it," agreed Bob as they entered the elevator tube. He eyed Val's duffel bag sceptically. It was in the Academy colours, and rather small. "Is that your only bag?"

"Yeah." They began to shoot upwards.

"For a whole two minutes?"

"It's zipped," she explained, pointing. It had a zipper pull in the form of a hot pink and purple icon.

"Okay. Ah! Here we are," he said, opening the door.

"Awww!" There was a picture of Dot on the wall of the entryway, directly opposite the door. Val grinned slyly at Bob. "How sweet!"

"Hey, I'm a sweet guy," Bob answered nonchalantly. "Come on, this way. Here's the living room. You'll be sleeping in here, okay?"

"Ooh, spacious!" Val dashed forward, looked out the window, deposited her bag on the icon-patterned table, sat on the sofa and bounced a few times, leaping from the last bounce back onto her feet.

"… And by now you've seen the kitchen… My bedroom's through there, and the bathroom's that way."

"Is that the garage, then?" asked Val, pointing to the remaining door. "Can I see the car? Is the interociter still giving you trouble?"

"Yes to all three," said Bob with a grimace, opening the garage door. Val darted through.

"Oh, Bobby, it's fantastic! Wow! Oh, hey, I brought you something for it!" She zoomed back into the living room, plunked herself down on the couch, and unzipped her bag.

Academy gear certainly was high-quality, Bob mused. The bag's compression must have been excellent, for Val pulled out in rapid succession a rolled-up energy mat, a stack of comic bytes depicting a yellow sprite in a trench coat, a lava lamp, several badly crumpled spare uniforms, a penguin (which looked oddly familiar), and a small trampoline.

"Here it is!" cried Val triumphantly. She ran back to Bob and pressed the object into his hand.

"A random number generator?"

"Uh-huh! A fuzzy one!" Val beamed.

Bob laughed. "Hey, thanks! Just what it needed!" He hung it from the rear-view mirror.

The remainder of the second was devoted to conversation and jam sandwiches. They had, after all, a great deal of catching up to do, Bob having been either too busy, too preoccupied, or entirely unable to correspond for over a week. Turbo had told Val something of what had happened in Mainframe, and she naturally knew about Daemon (everyone knew about Daemon), but she hadn't heard many details and of Bob's adventures in the Web she knew nothing. She listened with rapt attention. When it was her turn, she told Bob of her rather less eventful time at the Academy; she was, she said, at the top of her encryption class, although doing rather poorly in combat training (she was nimble and had good aim, but she wasn't very strong). She also, it became apparent, knew perfectly well why she had been sent to stay with Bob; she seemed oddly proud of the fact that she had managed to exasperate just about the entire Academy.

It was strange, mused Bob. Val certainly was hyperactive, but it wasn't a strictly physical hyperactivity. It was as though some part of her had to be active at all times; occupy her mouth or ears, and the rest of her could stay unnervingly still.

Finally, Bob yawned. "It's been a long second," he said. "I'm about ready to log off. You tired?"

"Not quite yet, but that's okay," replied Val. She went back into the living room, where she unrolled her energy mat. Then she dug in her duffel bag for those few items not yet strewn across the floor. First came a stack of small windows slightly larger than the comic bytes.

"Puzzle applets?" asked Bob, peering over her shoulder.

"Yeah, I've got a subscription," answered Val, rummaging in the bag again. This time she produced a small, shapeless lump of some swirling, brightly coloured material. She gave it a hug and laid it on her mat.

"You've got a toy null?" Bob asked incredulously.

"Yeah, why?"

He looked at her askance. "Isn't that a little morbid?"

"But he's so soft and squeezy!" said Val brightly. "I call him Buttons."

Bob paused, then shrugged. "Hey, whatever processes your data. See you in the morning."

Chapter Three

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