A/N: From this point on, the chapters alternate between Lan and MegaMan. Sometimes they'll overlap slightly, and give you the other's point of view on the same event.
Unless otherwise noted though, they'll alternate in order, starting with Lan here.


'Terminal Transmission Error'
An error message not seen for years.
In the earlier days, when the PET and Navi were relatively new, the network often had trouble handling the load. It wasn't designed for this kind of use originally, and had to be extensively redesigned in order to support it properly.
Until that had happened though, unreliable connections were commonplace. Usually though, it just meant a temporary loss of connection from one's Navi, giving a 'Transmission Error', but once in a while, 'Terminal' would be added. In this case, your connection, and in most cases Navi, was toast.
Those days were long gone now, however. No one could remember the last time there was a recorded case of either.
So it was with a mixture of surprise, apprehension and a sinking feeling in his stomach that Lan saw this message, frozen to his chair, uncertain of what to do. How long he sat there, he could not be sure.
It was broken only by the sudden feeling that everything had moved. Nothing had even so much as wobbled, however.
Instincts told him to look about to be sure, however, and ensure everything was safe. A few things seemed out of place, but he couldn't put his finger on why. Everything looked normal, even he looked exactly the same as a few moments ago, but there was definitely something that wasn't the same. If only he could tell what it was-
"Is something wrong, Lan?" the voice interrupted his chain of thought, coming from his PET, but it wasn't MegaMan speaking.
A Navi he didn't recognise, looking for all the world like he belonged there in the now white PET, looked concerned. It looked human, and bore some resemblance to himself, but older. Like MegaMan, it was blue, but only on the lower half – the upper was bare but for a simple sleeveless white shirt, behind which were a pair of matching wings.
He couldn't explain why, but he knew the name of this Navi – Angel.
"You look worried," Angel continued. "Is something bothering you?"
"What happened? There was an error..."
"Yes, I managed to leave only just in time."
A name stuck in his mind though, someone familiar, someone he should remember, but all he had was the name. "What about MegaMan..."
"The other Navi? What of him?"
"What happened to him?"
"I assume he is still in the area, if he hasn't already left to go about his own business. A Navi without an operator cannot leave the net, remember."
"No operator," Lan echoed.
"Don't you remember? He said so himself."
"Uh... yeah, I guess I forgot."
"That's not like you."
"Remind me of what happened? Just to make sure I've got it straight."
"Of course. You met that blue Navi on our homepage. He told you there was a link he wanted to investigate, but wasn't strong enough to do so alone, so we agreed to help him. He lead us to Scilab area 2, where we encountered a strange link. On the other side was a strange town area, infested with viruses. After we fought them off, we met an apparently human boy, who handed him an orb. He thanked us, then we left, and it was then we experienced a transmission error."
"And you got back to the PET after it passed," Lan continued for him, starting to remember these events himself now he was hearing them.
"That's right."
"Huh. Guess that's a good deed for the day done then."
"You could do another one and clean up downstairs. Dad's due home in a couple of hours, remember."
"He is?" Angel nodded. Lan shook his head with a sheepish grin, "I guess I got a bit rattled by that error popping up and gave myself some amnesia."
"It'll pass. If the copybot in the cupboard is charged up, I can give you a hand." He grinned slightly and added, "To make sure you don't forget anything else!"
Working together, the house was cleaned and tidy before Dad had returned. While they waited for him, Lan turned his attention to some issues still nagging at him.
"Where's Mom?" he asked, sprawling into a chair. Angel had refused a seat himself, instead sitting cross-legged on the floor.
"I couldn't say," he replied. "Dad said she left yesterday for something important, and that was all he knew."
"That doesn't sound like her."
"I know. Don't worry about her though. I'm sure she'll be safe. Dad alerted the officials; they'll keep an eye out for her."
"Some comfort that is," he snorted
"Just because we keep dealing with the larger incidents when they get out of their depth, doesn't mean they're bad at what they do," Angel replied in a sentious tone.
"Coulda fooled me. How many times could they possibly have stood up to it?"
"You've got a point there," he conceded. "They weren't any match for some of our opponents, and I doubt any of them would have handed Nebula's net takeover better than we did. They could at least have acknowledged us as officials too afterwards," he sniffed. "Doing their work for them like that."
"Now who's accusing them of being bad at their job?"
"Well, if you hadn't stepped in and started ordering them around to get the information you needed, let alone track down worthy allies to fight with us, nothing would ever have got done."
Something bothered Lan about this too, something about a boy named Chaud, but he remembered nothing about this boy but that name. He remembered clearly the events Angel was telling him about, but like other things, there was something out of place about them.
He put this feeling down to after-effects of seeing the error, since many things seem to cause this feeling now. Still, it was bothering him, so...
"Angel, does anything seem... wrong, at all?"
"Wrong? In what way?"
"I dunno... just some things don't quite feel right to me for some reason."
"An example?"
"MegaMan. The other Navi. For some reason I feel like I should know him better."
Angel shrugged, "I don't see how. You'd never met him until today."
"It's not just that either, when you mentioned Nebula's takeover, I remembered a name of someone, but I don't know them at all."
"What name?"
"Chaud."
"I think I heard that name somewhere. Maybe we can find out more up at Marine Harbour tomorrow."
"Why not today?"
Angel nodded toward the door. As Lan glanced over, his Dad came on in, looking slightly distracted, as he always did when something was on his mind.
"Hey boys," he greeted them, looking around. "You've done a nice job tidying up. Mom will be proud to hear you've done it so well."
"It was easy," Lan replied airily. "Nothing to it at all."
"Glad to hear it. If you don't mind though, I need to examine Angel for a few moments. There was an error reported on the net earlier today, and he was seen there, so I'd like to make sure there's nothing wrong with him."
"Sure thing, Dad. Just let me send him back to the PET for you."
Neither of them mentioned anything about it while he examined the PET and Angel, humming and muttering to himself. Eventually, he seemed satisfied, and handed it back.
"It looks like you're in perfect shape," he told them. "Just remember to be careful Lan, you know I can't replace Angel if he gets deleted."
"I know, I know, one of a kind Navi that can't be backed up. Why did you make it like that?"
"It's hard to explain without getting too complicated."
"Well, what can you tell me about it?"
"Some of the code is too complex to duplicate safely. The only time we tried it, there were widespread issues in the systems we were using, so we stopped trying. Now, what do you say to some dinner?"
Lan's stomach grumbled it's vote in favour of that.