Finally I had enough ideas and time to finish it -.- Enjoy!

Chisao's in Town

I hate competing. Not to mention the jerky competitors.

It started like this: a megajerk guy called Saburo arrived to town, as a noodle-cook. And I (stupid!) was hoping that he would be a normal guy, and may even help us boost the restaurant, since there was a famous dish called spicy noodle curry, that had legendary flavor, according to some people. Well, Yahoot was the Curryking, so with his curry it would have been unforgettable.

Unfortunately nobody else thought about it, and that idiot Saburo opened his restaurant right next to us. It was a declaration of war. Oh and I haven't even mentioned the ad.

A little, raw-boned, freaking loser NetNavi, Noodleman was in it, who started with this:

- Why settle for the same old curry when you can eat noodles? …

This was too much for Yahoot. For him it almost meant the same as swearing at his mother. And let's face it: that was a very jerky thing from Saburo and his skinny NetNavi.

I have noticed the sheep-like personality of the humans: if someone goes to a place, usually the others do the same. There's nothing wrong with it, I guess. One can't form an opinion of something without trying it out.

The only thing I don't get is why I am the only one around here who can understand it? Why can't our NetOps (who are humans) get it? Everybody's going to the new restaurant, so what? A few days and everything will turn back to normal.

In our place Yahoot declared war against Saburo with whom he had already had some quarrels before, and gathered the gang to let off steam (a.k.a. swearing like heck).

- Eh… Jack? – I decided to get forward with my spicy-noodle-curry idea. – You know, I think we shouldn't…

- Not now, Elecman! – he interrupted. – We're planning how to destroy his restaurant.

- But…

- I think I know what we are gonna do!

- Leave me out of this!

I gave up my plan for a while. Outside the queue was huge. Our NetOps spotted out the kids among the crowd and ran outside. There was a small, 7 years old, cute boy. Jack and the others started shouting at them that what they were thinking going into the new restaurant. I facepalmed.

And soon Saburo appeared too. I thought a fight would break out. I was waiting for Yahoot to beat him up with some kind of cool ninja-move, but it didn't happen. Well at least they didn't swear at each other. That's when Yahoot made the biggest mistake ever: he offered the kids everything free.

Let's mention that not-really-negligible detail that they had birth defects, as instead of stomachs, there were black holes in their bellies. A whale can't eat as much as they, I swear.

- Where do those little brats put all of it? – hissed Jack.

Good question since except for Dex they all are thin. Growing organism or not, that was a scary amount.

I was in the net with the others when Megaman and his friends came. We have met before so I didn't get the "Dude, you are alive?" questions. Heatman immediately got offended and flew away, with Magicman on his tail who went to calm him down.

- How was the Undernet? – asked Iceman with giant eyes. For some odd reason he was very interested in this topic since he asked every stupid detail.

- Believe me, not what you expect – I said. – And I wish you never to get to know it either.

- But… - started Iceman, but Megaman shut him up with a glance.

- It must be pretty boring working here – looked Roll around.

That wasn't nice. Wackoman and I looked at him offended.

- You take that back right now – hissed Wackoman.

- You know nothing about the adult life – I huffed. – To us this is a blessing.

- What? – asked Roll.

- You will understand it with time, why it is so great to own a restaurant – continued Wackoman.

We didn't have time for other mystical stuff cuz Dex borrowed the NetTerminal. I don't really know why we have one. Maybe when we still thought we could rebuild World Three and we planned to face Megaman there. Or not, heck knows.

Megaman and the others ran off, saying something like "they had to help". We didn't really care until Gutsman neatly blew out the side of the arena with a Program Advance. I didn't know I could open my eyes that big. I had never seen one from a distance, only close. Very close.

That gorilla knew something. For a minute we froze. But soon everything went back to normal when the kids quickly left the place. The rest of the day was usual, with a few costumers.

Then… well, then the evening came.

We were about to close, it was quiet and calm, our NetOps let the steam off. Yahoot who was living just above the restaurant had already gone to bed. I decided to try once more.

- Jack?

- Yes?

- I've got an idea about Saburo…

- Something great to ruin his restaurant? – his face lit up.

- No not really, but…

*BANG!*

One of the lamps blew up and the madness started. The dishwasher was opening and closing itself, water poured from the taps and gas cooker burst out in flames.

Man, it was like a nightmare. Jack and the others ran behind the counter to hide from the blowing lamps.

- hat's happening? – shouted Maddy.

- How should I know? – answered Mr. Match. – Must be a virus. Let's send them in!

- Leave it to us – said Heatman.

This wasn't a good idea. As we entered, nothing changed. In fact the entire net was empty, everything seemed normal.

- Show yourself, jerk! – shouted Wackoman, turning to the curry-sea.

Nothing. You know, when chaos rampages in the human world, but in the net it's silent, you can bet there is someone there. It's the truth, anyone would agree with me.

Suddenly I spotted out from the corner of my eye that the sauce was slightly bubbling. But before I could say anything, yellow, slimy, disgusting tentacles exploded out of the sea and grabbed us.

Wackoman screamed, me and Heatman were swearing but all of us almost got a heart-attack. They held us down onto some meatballs, we couldn't move. Meanwhile in the human world the madness went on. Yahoot ran down to the noise.

- What? What is this? – he was taken aback.

- I'm not sure, everything's going high wire! – shouted Jack over the noise.

- We were just closing up when everything went crazy! – said Maddy. – So we sent in our NetNavis…

-… to check it out, but then Heatman, Wackoman and Elecman were attacked and now we can't control them! – continued Mr. Match.

Meanwhile we were fighting to get free, but as long as we couldn't see our enemy, we couldn't do much. I was about to use the dirtiest, dumbest part of my vocabulary that I had learnt ages ago with Jack, when finally the jerk decided to show himself. He emerged from the sauce on a potato. As I saw him, I couldn't stop myself from saying:

- Hey, look, it's Gutsman!

Like heck was he Gutsman, though his appearance was almost the same. The problem was his color. Unlike the real Gutsman he was light yellow and red and brown. Somehow it was so familiar.

- Ha! No, not exactly. I'm Nugetsman – he smirked.

I looked at him with the "Aha, sure" face. Two identical NetNavi in the World Wide Web was very unlikely, not to mention in the same town. He was deceiving us. But why did he choose exactly the shape of that gorilla?

- This is the place. The space aliens' secret hideout – he said to his NetOp. – We need to destroy it so they'll be forced to leave here and never return. Understood?

Great, he even was crazy. I looked at the others. We had had enough of this idiot. So we attacked in unison to make it more effective. But the visitor, as much as he acted crazy, was very fast and clever. Out of his body three more tentacles grew out and forming a shield they deflected our attacks.

I stared at the tentacle holding me. Was it… some kind of pasta?

- What's happening? It has no effect – Heatman was officially afraid of the guy.

- Nugets-nugets-nugets! No curry-shop NetNavis can hurt me! I am Nugetsman!

Man, he was annoying. I was just thinking what would happen if I used the tentacle as a wire to shock him, when Magicman appeared behind him.

- We'll see about that! – he hissed and attacked with his favourite: Magicfire.

Suddenly I felt as the tentacle tug me into the air and in the minute I was hit by the blue fire. Ouch. That hurt. I almost got knocked out.

- Using them as a shield is the coward's way! – Magicman hissed but backed off.

- Ha, that's a good one! – smirked Nugetsman. – Evil space aliens' calling us chickens?

Okay, now I was very pissed. What was wrong with this guy? We heard a familiar voice:

- It's time to defeat all those no-good space aliens! And Tunabeem Battlechip in! Download!

Damnit, that was Chisao, Dex's little brother.

A fish appeared in midair and blasted Magicman who had to log out.

Yahoot started to panic while our NetOps were furious. What had we done to that little kid to deserve this?

The fish fired again, this time it aimed for the system itself. The kitchen went even crazier, the kid didn't realize what he was doing. How ironic, I was just thinking that only a 6 year-old would believe this alien-dumb, and we got one here.

The cooker, the lamps, the pipelines all exploded. I shouted at them to get out of the building, until Nugetsman tightened his grip, but they didn't hear it. The smoke started to cover everything. Suddenly Lan and Dex ran in. I didn't know what they were doing here but I sure was grateful. Mr. Match, on the other hand, grabbed Dex's collar:

- You! Why have you done this? We don't deserve this attack. Why did you send your little brother on us?

- My brother? What does Chisao have to do with this? – asked Dex who, apparently, didn't really get the picture.

They sent in their Navis. Finally! I was getting drowned since Nugetsman tightened his grip.

A familiar purple laserflew across the sea and hit my tentacle. I immediately logged out and tried to pull myself together in my PET: Soon the others got there too. We were safe.

The things that happened after that didn't really get my attention since we had to look after Wackoman who, thanks to the shock, became grey again and was about to strangle me with his hug. I got that our NetOps began looking for Chisao but he wasn't in the restaurant. Then "Nugetsman" finally blew his cover. His voice turned totally ridiculous and he did the same dance as Noodleman in that advertisement.

So that little bastard was a shape-shifter. Sneaky. Dex and Lan to the noodle-shop while Gutsman sent the jerk flying with a GutsHammer, forcing him to turn back to his normal form: the raw-boned little freak. He tried to fight but Gutsman logged him out with a Goldfist.

One crazy night had ended. At dawn Saburo was kneeling in front of his restaurant and our NetOps were standing around him, ready to beat him up.

- I just couldn't stand to see everyone's going into Yahoot's place, I just wanted to make them go away – he finally admitted.

- Well I sorta understand – said Jack. – We wanted to make you disappear as well.

- Right, in that case… - growled Mr. Match and grabbed his collar. -… let's finish this once and for all!

If I had two of those fluffy things used at cheerings, I swear I would have started jumping around like an idiot with them, cheering for Mr. Match. But Lan had to stop the epic fight.

- Wait! – he said. – If you can understand how he feels, why not forgive him?

- Stay out of this, you noodle-eater! – hissed Jack.

- You don't know what you're talking about. We can't go on like this – added Mr. Match. – Two cooks can't share the same street, just like curry and noodles can't share the same plate.

- Hey, now wait a minute! – the kid's face lit up. That's when I realized too. – I thought there is a famous dish called "spicy noodle curry".

- YEEEEEEES! – howled Yahoot like he had just realized the meaning of life. – SPICY NOODLE CURRY! I completely forgot about that wonderful dish! What was I thinking? I was so consumed with jealousy over losing business, that I lost sight of what is truly important: unforgettable flavor! We'll celebrate the new addition to #1 Curry's menu!

Everybody burst out in tears. Why? Hell knows. Heck, even Wackoman started it because "Maddy was crying too". Jack was kneeling on the ground, sobbing and he got even worse when I (stupid! Stupid!) mentioned that I wanted to mention this before. Mr. Match turned into a prophet and talked about perfect harmony. But the moment they compared the sunrise to spicy noodle curry topped everything. Ooookay.

Saburo closed up and moved into our place. The very first dish of spicy noodle curry was for the kids of course, as they were frequenters here. Later the business was boosted like never before. But we didn't forget that easily.

Saburo was okay, I guess, but we tricked Noodleman wherever and whenever we could. Heatman even started a fight with him, and won.

Later turned out that Saburo was only a visitor in DenTech City. Some kind of family problem broke out at home so he had to leave a few weeks later. Yahoot immediately took down the dish from the menu, partly because only Saburo could make great noodle for it, and partly because he wanted to add it again when the guy returns. Which never happened. We didn't really mind, at least Nodleman was away from us.

Whoops, I kinda sweared a lot in this chapter, didn't I? Oh well, I did mention the dirtiest part of my vocabulary… :P

R&R please!