This is the third part of a four-part story: "The Net"
It's a lovely blue sky with thin white clouds (think of the Microsoft shutdown screen) that turns to game-cube purple and black.
Yet another voice intones the warning: "incoming game". This time the game cube descends on a world completely covered with big dish radio antennae. Must be a remote monitoring system; there are no sprites or binomes in sight.
Our three heroes are seen in a glass-walled elevator rising up the central spire of an antenna. Once again Matrix's negativity is showing; they've left with the game five times now, and the user keeps putting the same game cube back into this forlorn system.
Matrix: I give up.
AndrAIa: Too late, lover
Inside the game is a series of floating golf-course links. "Oh, great. Another golf game." Glitch doesn't work at all in this game, but AndrAIa has noticed something a lot more important. Mainframe. (Or an incredible simulation.) They walk to the edge of the lawn and look down on city that has a Principal Office colored with pastel blue, green and yellow. It looks like Mainframe, but can't be.
AndrAIa and Matrix are debating its existance, when they are distracted by two rocket powered robots and two people on zipboards flying overhead. Hack (the red one) and Slash (the blue), look like they are playing along with some sort of gag. Bob says, "we'll never catch them". Then Dot winks, and says (obviously wanting to be overheard), "Oh, Bob! I have never seen you so angry. Please don't hurt Hack and Slash when you catch them."
Of course, the two bumbling mechanoids start arguing with each other allowing Bob to sneak up. He's not really angry at them, but has them "assume the position" and uses Glitch to knock them, golfball wise, into the top of the Tor. Just before he declares a hole in one, Bob circles his eye with thumb and forefinger, and calls out, "be seeing you".
Matrix does not believe it is possible to have the entire city as game sprite mode. "The city is firmware - that wouldn't explain Bob, or a functional Glitch." AndrAIa wants to reboot to see what happens, but Matrix is afraid to - he might turn up as little Enzo, and he doesn't want to see any part of that weak little boy now. But it's the only way to find out.
The three heros reboot simultaneously, but Frisket's transformation gets over quicker. He is now the basketball sized cat - Scuzzy. AndrAIa is wearing Hexadecimal's old red costume, and Matrix is the blue metallic Megabyte. "We've gone viral. I guess this rules out the family reunion."
Phong is discussing with Bob and Dot the ramifications of Hexadecimal and Megabyte teaming up. The last thing he says is that they must not find out about Number 1 when it becomes ovious that this scene is being replayed on Scuzzy's projection dome. "Stop replay, Scuzzy" says Andria in Hex's voice. (Frisket hates being called by that name, and "Scuzzy" displays his fangs.)
Matrix is sitting in Megabyte's chair (sans legs), and just slides around when he tries to get up. AndrAIa/Hex is amused.
Locating Number 1 must be the objective of the game, but Matrix isn't so sure. His statement triggers more useless chatter from Hack and Slash, which is silenced only when Megabyte's voice yelling "will you two imbeciles be quiet!". They give the "be seeing you" sign and exit.
Back in the Principal Office (the old marble hall), Bob is remarking that Megabyte's change of face is more like Hexadecimal's actions. They are interrupted by a binome warning of an incoming bogie. Or maybe a birdie. (Not an eagle?)
The signature tune from "The Prisoner" starts up as Megabyte is seen in a flying car. (Actually, its more like a three-wheeled motorcycle.) He goes down a hallway (severely backlit), then the camera view alternates between a head shot (going in and out of shadows) and his feet. He bursts through the door, talks a bit, and puts his fist down on the table, causing the tea cup to bounce.
Matrix tries to talk to Bob, and get them to trust him. "Why should we trust you, Megabyte?" asks Dot. Bob and Dot refuse to believe that Enzo is under Megabyte's skin. Instead, Bob yells out "Your cycles are numbered, Megabyte!" and attacks him with an energy beam. As MB is forced to retreat, his image shows up on a VidWindow, and the picture gets X'ed out. Phong declares that he must be filed and index. Dot says "be seeing you". MB gets picked up by a giant card picker and as he is being carried to the file cabinets, he calls out, " I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, [indexed,] briefed, debriefed or numbered. My life is my own. You won't hold me!" He infects the card picker and escapes.
AndrAIa is in Hex's lair, sitting in a hemispherical red chair. She thinks she is in touch with her emotions, but Hexadecimal's voice keeps coming through. Matrix drive's MB's trike through a hole in the ceiling, and as it shuts down, it sounds like a Harley Davidson at idle. "That's a nice bike!" "What is it with you and bikes?" Hexadecimal states the advantages of being like Megabyte. Matrix rejects that, declaring that he has to prove to them that he's Enzo ... even if he has to delete them all to do it!
Phong decides Bob and Dot should meet Number 1. (As they leave, Phong asks the butler "How's your back, Nine?") Matrix and AndrAIa follow them from Al's Diner to Dot's Diner. MB bursts through the front door and finds...
... a dimly lit room with Cecil and Mike on a teeter-totter, a jury of 12 binomes with face masks (half black, half white), Dot scowling, a giant One (in charcoal and grey), two pits with poles sticking up, and Bob as "Da Judge".
The defendant is charged with believing that the ends justified the means and with becoming everthing he claims to hate. Hack and Slash appear from the pits as character witnesses (singing "Dem Bones") but do not help his case. The jury declares him guilty. Dot strikes MB/Enzo on the chest, then is de-rezed by the blue virus's claws. The entire courtroom gets slashed, leaving only Hexadecimal's face. She, too, disappears, leaving Matrix alone. He demands to know who is Number 1, and sees a reflection of himself in a VidWindow. Megabyte's voice explains that he, Hatred, is Number 1. Then the grown Enzo is looking at the little Enzo, who accuses him of loving only himself. The apparition is replaced with the original Enzo (wearing 01 on his shirt). The little guy states the obvious: "You hate me." "You have forgotten your family - you let yourself become a prisoner of the games."
Little Enzo's last line is: "There can be only one. Be seeing you." He throws a golf ball that turns into a white weather balloon and smothers Matrix.
He wakes up on the golf course; AndrAIa is standing over him and laughing. "The mighty Matrix was knocked down by an errant golf ball." Their partners are a stuffed tiger (from "Calvin and Hobbes"), a somberero and a shark.
Matrix decides that the search for Mainframe and Bob needs to get serious, now. His targeting computer rotates into view, and Matrix blows away the game with a final "Be seeing you!"
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