Chapter 2

When Adam woke up, he nearly flew off the couch to pick up his RPET and wake up DeeJay-exe. He sat up, took the device off the coffee table in front of the couch, and pressed the buttons in reverse of what Dr. Ito did to turn it off.

The RPET lit up and after a moment, DeeJay appeared on the screen. Appearing slightly groggy he said, "Time to get up?"

"Shh…" Adam said. "Zoey—er, my girlfriend—is still sleeping. Let's go outside."

Adam walked outside as quietly as possible with his new navi. Finally outside, he found a nice comfortable spot in the shade underneath a tree and sat down. "I suppose it's time to show you what I can do," DeeJay said.

"What you can do? I thought Ito designed you to not be a battler…" Adam said.

"Well, I wasn't designed with compatibility for battle chips," DeeJay said, "but Dr. Ito commented in his code that I was meant to protect your audio equipment from viruses. Therefore I've been given a few weapons to use in that capacity. If we go into the net and find a simple virus, I can show you…"

"Well, okay…but we're not going to do anything else." Adam said, reassuring himelf more than DeeJay.

Adam walked across the street going towards the University to a NetCafe that existed there. He walked in the door to a rather large room with windows along the walls, bar-like tables under the windows, and normal tables dotting the center area. Spotting an open computer, he asked the employee behind the counter for a password and went back to log on. Realizing what he had to do for the first time in over a year, he hesitated for a moment, and then pointing at the computer's jack in terminal said, "Jack in! DeeJay, execute!"

Adam saw DeeJay emerge on the computer screen on the very large NetCafe homepage. It was diamond-shaped with blue tiles, and a few BBS's along the sides. Many navis were on the homepage interacting with each other. Adam felt sort of out of place, but said, "Okay, DeeJay, why don't we look around for a few viruses, and then you can show me what you've got."

Deejay traveled out through a warp in the center of the page straight to Central Area 1. He walked around for a few seconds before he noticed a few mettaur viruses munching on some data in the corner of the internet's road. "Perfect for a little target practice, yes?" DeeJay said.

"Well…maybe we ought to find some viruses that are actually hurting someone. These guys are just having lunch…" Adam said.

"If that's what you want." DeeJay said, still retaining the entirely emotionless expression on his face.

DeeJay kept onwards around a few turns until he finally found another green "standard" navi in the process of busting a few mettaurs and some canguards that were attacking him.

"...alright, how's this? Acceptable to you?" DeeJay said.

"Yeah, go ahead. Help out that navi over there." Adam said.

"Excuse me, why don't you allow me to deal with a few of these viruses," DeeJay said to the navi.

"Be my guest," the green standard navi called back. He wasn't having too much trouble, but still seemed to appreciate the help.

"Alright, let's get ready, Adam." DeeJay said. "This should be a simple battle, so I don't need any operation; I'll take care of everything."

Two of the mettaurs and one of the canguards turned to face DeeJay, aligning themselves with the canguard in the middle and the metts on the sides.

"First, is a regular buster, as I'm sure you've seen before." DeeJay said. His arm changed to a buster and he shot at the mettaur. The virus recoiled somewhat, but ultimately looked unscathed. "As you may have guessed, I'm not really a gun-based navi…"

As he said this, the canguard raised its shield, and sent its crosshairs to lock onto DeeJay. Noticing this, Adam started to say "look out," but DeeJay interrupted him by raising his arms. Suddenly, a MuteAnt virus appeared to the right of and behind DeeJay, and began to play its music. The crosshairs went away, as the canguard and the mettaurs all seemed to be searching for where their opponent went.

"Trumpy-summon," DeeJay said, smugly. "I have data for four trumpy viruses and I can therefore summon Trumpy for fanfare, Tuby for discord, Tromby for timpani, and MuteAnt for silence."

All three viruses immediately seemed to become quite frustrated, and realized what was causing the problem. They all turned to the MuteAnt who started looking anxious. As the metts raised their picks to make an attack, suddenly Adam watched DeeJay extend both his arms to his sides and then quickly whip them inward. About half a second afterward, both mettaurs were deleted.

"Wow! What was that?" Adam said.

"One of my charge moves, note-shuriken." DeeJay said. "What you just saw was two very fast shurikens hitting and deleting their targets."

"Amazing," was all Adam could say. He could feel the desire to start training building up inside him, but did his best to ignore it.

DeeJay turned his attention to the canguard. The MuteAnt had expired in the while DeeJay was explaining his attacks to Adam, and the canguard had raised its shield. By this time, the other navi had also finished his viruses and was watching DeeJay fight out of pure intrigue.

The canguard had locked on to DeeJay and took its shot. DeeJay was hit in the chest and recoiled slightly, but not visibly damaged. Looking intently at the canguard, who was keeping its shield up trying to get another shot in, DeeJay took his right arm and swung it outstretched to the side with an open palm. Immediately after doing so, a small whirlwind just under DeeJay's height flew across the road towards the virus. Upon contact, the virus sustained a number of very quick hits and then exploded.

"That was great, DeeJay…you have some nice attacks." Adam said. DeeJay looked towards Adam's RPET screen and said nothing.

The standard navi walked up to him. "That was some pretty sweet bustin'," he said. "Ya know…I'm the navi for a man named Dak Burner, who's one of the judges for an a tournament that's coming up in about three months. Maybe you'd like to sign up for it? Normally we wait for navis to apply, but we need some INTERESTING fighters. For example, I wouldn't be accepted because I'm just a standard navi. But you, you're pretty spiffy, and those attacks were quite entertaining. I can't wait to see what else you've got in you…

"Anyways, I'm rambling. What do you say? You think you'll want to join?"

"I'll have to defer to my op on that one." DeeJay said, looking once again towards the RPET screen.

So many thoughts raced through Adam's head. It would be amazing fun to join a tournament, but that would mean…training for it. Back when he had his last navi a year ago, his ultimate dream was to join and win a tournament, but what would it mean now? Losing his girlfriend and possibly even getting so obsessed again he would quit school? They only barely agreed to let him back in last time…Then again, DeeJay couldn't use battle chips, so perhaps there was no point. But maybe he didn't need them! After what Adam had seen a few minutes prior he couldn't be sure what other tricks the black and purple navi had up his sleeve.

After some more internal deliberation, he decided on a response. "Let me think about it," he said.

"That's fine, I get it, you can't rush into big commitments like these," the navi said, "but don't wait too long! The deadline to apply is a month before the start of the tournament. That means you need to figure it out before two months from now, ya hear?"

"I understand, thanks." Adam said, and the navi jacked out. "DeeJay, why don't you sit down for a cup of cyber coffee or something. I'm gonna get something to drink myself."

"I guess that sounds good." said DeeJay, and Adam walked off to order his drink, putting his RPET in his pocket. DeeJay walked further down the main road in Central Area 1 to the InternetCafe near the entrance to Central 2. It was a relatively small, enclosed building with green walls and a few windows along those walls with booths underneath, as well as see-through glass doors.

Walking inside the door on the right side of the front wall, he looked around and saw many navis of all sorts talking and socializing. DeeJay walked casually up to the green standard navi behind the medium-height counter in the back-right corner of the room, and said, "One coffee, please," handing over 10z.

"No problem," the navi said, turning around to make the coffee.

But just as DeeJay sat down at a table in front of the counter, about fifteen medium-height orange and dark blue navis with single transmitter antennas on their heads surrounded the café. DeeJay looked around, observing them carefully. The rest of the navis in the café were alarmed, looking around frantically, wondering what was going on. The navi behind the counter had also stopped cleaning cups and making drinks.

Just as the orange and dark blue navis finished getting into formation, one of them near the entrance announced over a sound amplifier, "This is the net-police. We have surrounded the café. Come out with your hands up and your op's PET on the ground."

DeeJay wasn't alarmed, but still watched and waited. He looked at each navi in the café, trying to figure out whom it might be that the net-police navis were "surrounding." He couldn't see anybody suspicious.

Peering outside through the windows, DeeJay could confirm that the officials had then indeed surrounded the building. Whoever they were looking for wasn't getting out.

"We'll give you exactly five seconds from when I start counting," the same police navi said, "and then we are going to close in on the café and apprehend you by force."

"Five.

"Four.

"Three.

"Two!

"One!

"Alright, let's go boys. He's in there, I've confirmed visual."

The navis immediately blitzed the café, with most of them entering through the front door and the rest standing outside as backup. All the civilian navis were now standing in a compressed group off in the left side of the café in a state of mild panic, except DeeJay who was still calm yet alert. As the net-police came in, DeeJay saw who they were looking at—him! He pushed back his chair and stood up, as one of them said, "Stay where you are. There is no escape!"

The net-police closed in further around DeeJay, moving very cautiously and aiming all sorts of battlechip weapons from vulcans to wideswords to highcannons. "What the hell do they want me for?" DeeJay thought to himself, taking steps back as the officials took steps forward, until he was flush against the counter. He looked upward at the RPET screen, but only saw the inside of Adam's pocket. "Guess I have to do THIS on my own, too…" he said.

"Hold on," DeeJay said out loud. "I don't know what you think you're doing, but you have the wrong guy."

The net-police ignored him, and kept advancing very slowly. As the navis moved within a few feet, DeeJay jumped in the air and did a backflip, landing behind the counter he was sitting at. The navi previously behind the counter jumped away from him and ran towards the group of scared navis to the left, who were now jacking out one-by-one. He ducked underneath, and got ready to act. Just then, he noticed Adam pull the RPET out of his pocket, and look at the screen.

"Wha—What the hell is going on?" Adam said

"No time to explain. Just be silent for a moment." DeeJay whispered, and Adam just watched.

DeeJay changed a setting on his yellow mp3-player-like device. Then he began to speak. "COME AND GET ME!" he yelled; except this didn't come from his direction. The voice came from the opposite corner of the café; and it was so loud and forceful that every navi left in the café couldn't help but turn their attention out of surprise.

DeeJay took that instant to do what he needed to do. He stood up and immediately waved his arm outstretched in an arc in front of him. "Tornaudio!" he yelled, as a whirlwind of sound flew out of his body and traveled in a curved path hitting most of the police navis, and creating a clearing between a few of them by propelling some out the door and the rest to the other side of the café.

All the navis left were looking terrified or otherwise very anxious, as were, Adam noticed as he looked around the real NetCafé, most of the other net-ops around him.

DeeJay darted out the door, throwing it closed as he left and running away from the café as fast as he could.

Finally realizing who DeeJay's opponents were (not having seen what the Net-Police navis look like in over a year), Adam said to him, "DeeJay, those are the net-police! They're on our side!"

"Our side? They were intent on arresting me!" DeeJay said, with contempt in his voice.

"For what? What did you do while I was gone?" Adam asked with dismay, in as low of a voice as he could so the other ops in the café wouldn't realize that he was DeeJay's op. Looking around, he noticed that nobody was looking at him so his identity seemed safe.

"I didn't do anything," DeeJay said, still calm but somewhat stressed. "Just jack me out!"

"Okay…jack out!" Adam said, pointing the RPET at the computer. Nothing happened, except a message appeared on the screen:

JACK OUT FUNCTION LOCKED BY OFFICIAL AUTHORITY.

"It…it says the net-police locked my ability to jack you out! I didn't know they could do that…" Adam said.

DeeJay continued running away from the café, bumping into various navis along the way. He hoped to get to the portal that would take him back to the NetCafe home page, from where he might be able to jack out using the portal at which he appeared when he jacked in.

Unfortunately, when he finally reached it, he found that the portal back to the NetCafe homepage had been disabled. Looking back at the police navis chasing him, he realized this was the end of the line. There was no way he could escape 15 navis plus whatever backup they had already summoned, with no battlechips.

"Damn it," was all DeeJay could say.

"Graaaah!" Adam yelled, as he continued trying to jack him out, but it was still no use. The net police came within a few feet, and DeeJay decided to give no further resistance, instead putting his hands up.

"You are under arrest," one of them said. Seeing his hands up, two other net-police navis ran up and handcuffed him.

"Alright boys, great work. We got him," the same navi said to the other police navis still running behind him, who then stopped and jacked out. Next he turned back to the two navis holding DeeJay.

"Take him away," he said. "Jack out!"

And all four of them disappeared.