Running…

That was all he could do right now. It was ironic that he, one of the considerably strongest NetNavis around, was fleeing for his life. The alleys of Internet City were completely deserted and devoid of any artificial life or beauty whatsoever. The cyber building structures were wrecked, crumbling, and emptied. As a matter of fact, the atmosphere of the entire cyber world was shrouded in darkness and despair. He was cut off from his human Operator and all sources of help from the external world.

He was all alone, but at the same time, he wasn't alone.

After all, he was running from something.

Or rather, from someone.

Rockman didn't want this to happen. As a matter of fact, it was the last thing he would've wanted. To be cornered the way he was now, powerless to have been able to save Internet City from its total destruction. This threat that was on his tail was worse than anything he could've imagined, worse than Cache combined with the Cyber Beasts.

It was even scarier than a ghost.

"You can't run from me forever~! Tee hee!"

His pursuer sang with childishly merciless glee, chasing him with such vicious tenacity. This one being alone was responsible for all this, all this disorder and the loss of all other life in the cyber world. How this was accomplished within a short amount of time was a mind-boggling cornucopia of disturbing concepts.

The blue Navi had no opportunity to look back and think how this had happened. The fact remained that he had no one to help him, he was powerless, and his hunter wouldn't slow down no matter what.

Out of the desperate programming to survive, he aimed his Rock Buster behind and fired several energy shots at his sole assailant. A couple shots missed the target and the rest were easily intercepted by the aggressor's own projectile attacks. Rockman didn't give up. He continued sending out more shots before ending his wild defensive barrage with a massive Charge Shot.

The smaller Rock Buster shots were shot down once again. Rockman witnessed with rising panic that his Charge Shot was dismantled with a wave of an arm instead of a projectile, showing off that this threat was resilient in purpose and strength.

Running was the only option he had now.

"Not good," Rockman muttered, forcing his legs to pick up the pace.

Unfortunately, he was only able to run so far. As his luck would have it, the blue bomber Navi had wound up trapping himself with barricading walls in front and at his sides. The assailant had caught up, preventing any hope of backtracking.

"Now, you're finally all mine~!" the pursuer sang once again, personage consumed in the blackness of shadows.

"I just have one thing to ask before… well, you know," Rockman requested as calmly as he could. "Why did you do all this? Was it really worth all this destruction?"

"They were all in the way," the pursuer stated mechanically. "They constantly meddled in between us, so I had to do something about it before I lost you for good again."

"Was it worth deleting all of these innocent NetNavis? All our friends? All your friends?!"

"You're the only one I'll ever need, Rock-kun~! And I should be the only one you'll ever need."

She finished with that haunting malicious giggle that echoed in the empty area before taking a step out of the shadows. Rockman unconsciously took a step back, determined to salvage what was left of this situation.

"I'm sorry, Roll-chan, but I definitely have to draw the line at this. No, I should've drawn the line further back to when you began your atrocious crimes against the cyber world, which in turn has endangered the human world."

Roll merely laughed at his adorable attempt of resisting her once again. She bore her Devil Chip appearance, highlighted particularly with sinister purple eyeshadow, sharp heeled boots, a deviating provocative design on her battle outfit, and a seductive leer and grin combination that exuded pure uncontrollable lust for her vulnerable quarry.

She gingerly approached the blue Navi with catty desire, relishing the image of his beaten and submissive appearance through her visual senses. She licked her lusciously sinful lips. Her cyber sensual hunger was at its max. There was no way for her beloved to escape now. Her main rival, Medi, was the first to go, she made sure of that. Everyone else that opposed her, starting with her previous friends and allies, followed. Finally, to ensure that no one would ever get in her way to Rockman ever again, she took down the whole cyber world and cut off all communications from the humans.

Even if the real world managed to reestablish its connection to the cyber world, it would be too late.

"Just lie down on all fours and accept that we were meant to be," Roll hissed, smirking cruelly. "Your rebellious denial is starting to lose its charm, Rock-kun."

*WHOOSH!*

Roll frowned, picking up movement from somewhere nearby their area. Rockman didn't move an inch, signifying for sure that there was someone else active here. The footsteps were quick and fleeting. Before long, she found herself being suddenly tackled from the side, courtesy of the sneak.

"Roll-chan?!" Rockman coughed incredulously.

The demented pink Navi landed on her back with her attacker pinning her on top. She looked up to see that the assailant was none other than Roll; well, her normal innocent self anyway.

"This ends now!" Roll demanded, securing her hands on her Devil self's shoulders.

"Oh, sweet little Roll-chan, how naïve you are to the realities of life," Devil Roll taunted, unfazed by her current position. "This all wouldn't have happened if you took the initiative and claimed Rock-kun before someone else did."

"You know as well as I do what happened the last time I went to extreme measures," Roll countered, looking away guiltily.

"And now, look at this once lively world, all because of your hindering weakness and indecisive tendencies," Devil Roll resumed, smirking spitefully. "Look how pathetic you are."

"I didn't want this to happen!" Roll cried out, shaking her evil self's upper body against the cold cyber ground repeatedly. "Why would you do this?! Why?!"

"Because you couldn't handle the truth," Devil Roll goaded nastily. "You couldn't accept the idea that Rock-kun wouldn't fall in love with you when there were better, more capable NetNavis out there for him to battle alongside with." She slyly narrowed her eyes for this next comment. "And make sweet, sweet data links with." She remained eerily calm, waiting for her normal self to give into the madness. The true Roll was breathing heavily from her previous hysteria of an interrogation on top of Devil Roll's ongoing callous candor. "And you know what?"

*RUMBLE!*

*SLICE!*

*THUD!*

Roll suddenly felt herself paralyzed in sheer terror as she heard something, ahem, roll towards her. The pink Navi hesitatingly turned her head to find Rockman's head separated from his body. Viscous blood was actually escaping from his head. The restless expression on his face was frozen.

Out of shock, she looked back to where he originally stood, only to discover that his remaining tattered body was captured by thorny vines and trapped upon the wall. His arms were spread out to the sides, but his legs were bound together below by the vines. To where his neck was a familiar bloody metal blade sticking out, having been the culprit that beheaded the beloved blue Navi.

"No…," Roll whispered in frantic dread, looking back at her Devil self. "Please stop! STOP!"

"If you can't have, then no one will!" Devil Roll screeched in maniacal triumph.

All the while as Roll lifted up the head with the traumatizing imaged burned into her memory, Devil Roll continued laughing at how low she arrived. Her breathing, the condescending laughter, the stress of reality was too much to bear.

This has been a total nightmare.

"… A nightmare," Roll gasped, having been jarred from sleep mode.

She blinked several times, regaining her bearings on her current situation. She was still lock up as a result of her crimes of assault, destruction, and deletion while under the Mad Love Chip's influence. It was already more than half a month since her incarceration into the Net Police's custody. She was deemed safe enough to be active instead of constantly being in suspended animation.

Roll knew that humans would sometimes have dreams while asleep, visions of random details that have been results from interacting with their external environment while awake and active.

So then, do Navis dream of sheep programs?

She wasn't sure about that, but there was this much that she knew to be true. That nightly playback of events she just had, watching her Devil self run rampant in the cyber world for the sake of claiming Rockman as hers alone was truly a horrific sight to see. This was only the first occurrence of such a phenomenon, but that wouldn't be enough to put her back at ease. She was starting to come into terms on how destructive her obsession could be upon intense instigation by a power like the Mad Love Chip.

When the Mad Love Chip crisis was averted and before the Net Police took her in, she accepted the fact that she lost the love competition to the nurse Navi, Medi, for now. Through her persistence and sincere devotion, she and Rockman were officially together. That was certainly more than enough salt that her wounds could handle.

However, that did not mean that she was going to give up on Rockman for good. She still loved him and blamed both herself and Medi for allowing him to be with the latter. A selfish part of her hoped that their relationship would fall apart due to having no spark or solid commitment, but upon coming online again a few days ago, her Operator, Sakurai Meiru, relayed to her that both Rockman and Medi were still going strong despite the long-distance relationship. Roll didn't press on the matter any further for the remainder of that day.

Likewise, Hikari Netto also maintained a constant friendly contact with Jasmine, but based from Meiru's observations and Netto's own responses, there does not seem to be anything big brewing between the two Operators in contrast to their Navis. Meiru also shared that she had indeed been uncomfortable at first with Netto actually becoming responsible enough to maintain contact with the Choina girl, but somewhat relaxed when he did the same with the likes of Laika, Dingo, and even Princess Pride. However, she grew to fondly accept Netto's associates as her own friends.

Roll wished she was a bit more level-headed like her Operator, even if Meiru did have her temperamental moments. Those, however, were a result of Netto being a careless idiot he still did not appear to pick up the heartfelt feelings Meiru did have for him. And a few of those moments did warrant a smack or kick or two from her in order to beat some sense into him.

The pink Navi floated about in her containment unit, which was fortunately spacious enough for her to stretch her legs. In an attempt to move on from the appalling events of the past, she looked forward to the future where she would finally be released from her sentence and reunite with Rockman and her friends. She even looked forward to participating in the fall festival that Densan Town was going to hold at the end of the month with her friends, even if Medi and Jasmine were going to drop in just for that activity.

Roll had hope for trying again and winning back Rockman the right way by making him see that she was a better partner for him than Medi. Once the month and her sentence would reach their end, she planned on appealing to him strongly enough to make him forget about the nurse Navi.

She also hoped, however, that her most recent nightly vision regarding the destruction of many precious lives, including Rockman's, would not come to pass.

But chances were that if individuals felt very strongly about something, then usually by the laws of the universe, it would happen one way or another.

Are you surprised?

As you have just read, this is the beginning of the sequel that I never imagined I would desire to write. It's probably a good thing I left the ending of Mad Love as ambiguous as I did.

I guess watching Stream again at random times had motivated me to pursue this, though most of the episodes I wound up watching starred Jasmine and Medi, as well as that one episode with Enzan and Raoul wearing their disco disguises, and with Blues and Thunderman following along their antics. Far out, man!

In any case, it rekindled my fascination for that famous NetNavi love triangle that is RockmanxRollxMedi.

I have nothing against Roll and I even support RockRoll from time to time, but these ideas I get from watching Stream are just too good to pass up. I don't know how consistent I will be in updating, but it shouldn't take too long to update.

What do you patient readers think so far? Decent start?

It's been slightly more than a year since Mad Love was published and completed.