Title: "Infecten – stage 5 – Maturation 14/?"
Author: Nemesi.
Fandom: (MMBN)
Genre: Romance. Humour.
Word Count:3671.
Characters/Pairings: Blues/Rockman; Netto, Enzan, Kuro, Kage, Axl. Others mentioned.
Rating: PG-13.
Disclaimer: , its characters, places and themes belong to Capcom, Shogakukan, ShoPro, TV Tokio, etc.. No copyright infringement is intended.
Warnings: Shounen-ai. Un-betaed. Navi-preg (and I claim ownership on this idea). OC.
A/N: In this stage, the disease fully develops into a chronic condition.
Summary:
* * * * *
Out in the real world, the hunt for the kidnapped Navis was still on.
All of Netto and Enzan's friends - Laika, Raoul, Jasmine, Dingo and Charlie, just to mention a few - had gathered in town, offering support. The Net was patrolled constantly, not only by the Police, but also by the self-assembled squad of their Navis, plus a small contingent of animal-programs lead by Rush.
Maaya (whose hair was now in a pretty, sky-blue bob cut very reminiscent of Rockman's helmet), contributed by slipping information to Enzan regarding IPC, its dealings, its contracts, its investors, supporters, and even enemies (Note to self: Shuuseki really had a knack for not noticing when vital information was stolen under his nose, mh?).
So far, nothing of what she'd found could nail down Enzan's father as the kidnapper. Still, she searched.
And searched.
And searched.
And searched.
…and made photocopies, too. Remember: those are vital, when you want to slip secret info out of an office.
Speaking of Shuuseki, he lived up to our (worst) expectation. He wouldn't drop the charges against Sci-Labs or Dr Hikari, and his endeavours to help the Net Police find IPC's "precious" Navi were tenuous at best, and an hindrance at most.
Also – as Maaya found out comparing some bills and schedules – he'd gone as far as sick that Man-in-black lapdog of his on Enzan, hoping to find some blackmailing material.
Unluckily for him, the worst Enzan had done in his life was having an attitude, and one can't be blackmailed for justified pride. Right?
Right.
So Enzan was relatively safe from Mr Man-in-black's clutches; but that doesn't mean he got it easy.
His life had turned into a string of big, neon-red question marks, pulsing and swirling inside his brain. No matter where he looked, he kept coming up with questions – how did they take the Navis? Where had they be taken? Where the Navis kept together? And if so, what were the odd of them being still in one piece after all this time? Why couldn't the PETs locate them? What were those slimy creatures? How did they get around the protection and into IPC's mainframe? And why was the Uranet's power-level fluctuating so wildly, when several controls had confirmed that nothing unusual was happening in there?
And so on, and on, and on. Plenty and plenty of questions. But answers, they always managed to elude him.
Enzan was having such thoughts, one day as he scavenged the Net for clues, when his PET signalled he had a videocall.
It was a sulky afternoon, chilly after a spell of rain. The Hikari household was surprisingly vacant, with no one to keep Enzan company as he typed away at his PC. In the silence, the insistent ringing of his PET sounded as loud as a child's wailing, and just as unexpected.
Not in very least happy with the disturbance, Enzan flicked the device open, glancing distractedly at the monitor. He was half-expecting to see inspector Oda's face peer back at him, but he couldn't be more mistaken.
As soon as his eyes caught those of the caller, Enzan stiffened. His hand, which had been rubbing his sore neck in an effort to unwind some tension, fell with a thump against his thigh.
"…father."
Shuuseki tilted his head in a silent greeting.
"Boy."
Enzan straightened in his chair, tense like a cat.
"To what do I owe the pleasure?"
Shuuseki spread his hand appealingly.
"Need you ask?"
"No, of course not. But I've told you already. You're not getting any data on Axl from me."
"Be reasonable."
Enzan snorted.
"This coming from the man who ordered a child kidnapped?"
Shuuseki pursed his lips, eyebrows drawing together into a deep, long line.
"Boy, boy, boy. We went through this already. I don't have that piece of junk."
Anger coursed through Enzan's vein like liquid fire. He gripped the PET so hard his knuckles turned white.
"So he's been declassed from a gold mine to a mere piece of junk now?!" he drew a deep breath through his teeth, trying to focus. "I may not have proof, but I know it was you. IPC's mainframe cannot be hacked. Not unless it's done from the inside, and only one person other than me has clearance to access all the main data banks. Furthermore, just a few hours after the Navis were taken by an unknown force, you have me removed from my office and order me to hand over all info about them. That's an awfully funny coincidence, isn't it, Father?"
"Awfully so, boy."
"Don't play dumb with me!" Enzan snapped. "You had someone kidnap the Navis, and once you noticed you couldn't bypass their protections, you came looking for the easy way out!"
Shuuseki smiled tightly.
"If that's what you choose to believe…" he trailed off, spreading his hands again. "However, as you said yourself, you don't have proof."
Enzan gritted his teeth.
"What. Do. You. Want?"
"As you so eloquently put it, I want data. All the data you gathered on Navi pregnancy. Once I have it, I might… ah, how to phrase it… consider to invest more time and money searching for those Navis of yours. Some of our business partners would be eager to help out. If I all but said one word…" he moved his hand, as though to imply: 'the three could be found in no time'.
Enzan took a deeper breath.
"Father… I know you can't get any useful data from the Navis themselves. The security program guarding their core was written by myself, Netto and Hikari-hakase. You can't hack it. If you want to create a newborn Navi in a lab…" he held a CD with thumb and forefinger, and waved it before the PET. "…you need this. Our research. The data we gathered. The Navis themselves… they're useless to you without this."
Shuuseki's eyes gleamed as they followed the CD around.
"…and?"
"And I'm ready to offer a bargain. Give me back…" he swallowed. "…give back Blues and Axl, give back all three of them, and I'll let you have this. I will keep the whole transaction a secret. Even from Netto. No one will need to know that you're the one behind the abduction, you have my word."
Shuuseki frowned.
"As tempted as I am by your offer, I fear I cannot meet my side of the bargain. Ask for something else, boy. I don't have those Navis."
"Damn it all, Father!" Enzan shouted. Shuuseki watched ruefully as the CD was flung across the room and collided with the nearest wall. "How can you refuse me this? I'm your son, and that's my nephew you've kidnapped! My nephew! A child!"
Shuuseki froze, going so unnaturally still one may think the connection had screwed up and the call had been cut off without notifying the video. Then an angry flush rose to his cheeks, and he shook over.
"That nonsense again!"
Enzan frowned, but had no time to question what or who he was talking about, that Shuuseki was in full-blown rant.
"Blues and his blasted offspring are in no way related to you, did I make myself clear? No way! That damned red Navi is nothing to you – he is nothing! Nothing!"
Enzan swallowed a bitter lump. Barely refrained from informing his father that Blues had been more of a parent to him that Shuuseki himself.
"You're wrong," he said calmly. "Blues is family."
A shudder chased its way down Shuuseki's body. His fist came down onto his desk with a loud bang.
"He has never been," he hissed, enunciating. "And never will be family! He's not even human, he's a digital thing, an object. Any relation you think he might have with you is nothing but the delusion of an addled mind! You'd better put this kind of crazy talk behind yourself, Enzan, just the way I did."
And the connection closed.
Enzan watched the static creak and flash across the PET screen for a long moment, then flipped it close with a sigh.
Fantastic. A wagon-load of new questions had just been unloaded on top of those he was already busy answering. Just what he needed.
* * * * *
"…nothing!"
What's with the Uranet and noise? Seriously. This is supposed to be a devastated land of endless quiet, but we've yet to switch to this place and not be greeted by a loud noise or the other.
"We came all this way just to find… nothing!" Kuro hissed again, marginally less loud that the first time. He'd been trudging mutinously in their makeshift camp during the first yell, backpedalled at the sight of a sleeping Axl during the silence, and went to vent his frustration on Kage, who sat just outside the wavering circle of light of their fire.
"No Kyuraweil, no blobs of slime, no Rock-damn-him-man, no-thing!"
Kuro prodded the fire angrily with a stick, then squatted, muttered something through his teeth, threw a blast at the flames – which doubled in size – and turned the other way, all the time frowning, not pouting(you know by now the reason for that specification, so there's no need to reiterate).
Kage's attention didn't seem to divert from his sword. He was honing the blade, pushing a dark, gritty stone along the edge in long, careful strokes. Firelight flowed like water down the steel, was caught and refracted in fat, luminous shards across Kage's visor.
"This is just a waste of time!" Kuro reiterated, hissing in that particular way that managed to convey fury, despite the lowlowlow level of his voice.
Kage didn't bother to turn.
"The delay angers you?"
Kuro darted him a glance with serious health-harming properties.
"No, Kage, I'm actually very happy and even though I look like I'm sitting here brooding in the dark to you, I'm actually dancing about in glee."
Kage tapped the edge of his blade, made it tinkle like a silver bell.
"How nice. I never knew you had an interest in ballet."
Kuro didn't dignify that with a verbal response.
A charged plasma shot more than sufficed.
A very-very silent blast, though – with Axl sleeping nearby, curled cutely into himself like a kitty, head almost between his knees, Kuro was loath to make noise.
And no, Kuro hadn't just thought the word "cute" and "Axl" in the same sentence.
It was your imagination only.
Speaking of the child, Kuro darted him a glance from above his shoulder, and his mouth went on autopilot before he could stop it.
"Do you think…" Kuro began, only to clam up suddenly, lips pressing angrily together.
There was a few moments of silence, then:
"Do I? Yes, of course. Thinking is an habit of mine," Kage said. "Though I can't really say the same for you."
The stone Kuro hurtled his way was dodged effortlessly, as per usual.
"Why aren't you the least bit angry about this all?" Kuro asked, narrowing his eyes into a calculating look. "It was you who insisted we came looking for Kyuraweil in the deepest part of the Uranet. We've found no leads whatsoever, no proof that your brilliant intuition is at all right, but you don't seem to care. Why's that?"
"While I did suggest this course of action, indeed," Kage answered, enunciating. "I always knew it would take us some time to find our quarry."
"Define 'some time', leech."
Kage made a shrugging motion.
"A month. A year. Who knows?"
He did manage to dodge the punch, but the body attached to it came barrelling onto his chest, slamming him to the ground. There was a brief struggle, surprisingly silent despite the huge clouds of dust it whipped up, and then Kage had Kuro pinned underneath him, one hand firmly clamped over his mouth.
"That was a jest, catboy from Hell. A jest. You need to work on your sense of humour if you couldn't tell."
In response, Kuro bit down hard on Kage's hand, and for once seemed to have dealt him some damage. I mean, if the muffled curse was anything to go by. ("muffled" because Kage also found Axl adorable in his vulnerable state and was loathe to wake him up).
Kage pulled away with a pained hiss, and Kuro took the opening to sit up and scoot a little bit away from the swearing Kagemusha. His shoulders were shaking slightly, his cheeks dimpled, and if Kage didn't know better, he would've sworn that Kuro was muffling a peal of delighted giggles behind his palm.
…but know better he did, because Kuro had graciously informed him, in a lecture that had started (and ended) with a round kick to the lower half of Kage's stomach, that he was genetically incapable of giggling, because giggling was Rockman material, and he was. Not. Rockman.
Period.
"Serves you right, samurai leech," Kuro whispered, looking over at his companion with mirthful eyes.
Kage smiled right back at him, a smile like a shark's, all pointy white teeth.
"You realize, yes, that you will have to pay for this?"
Kuro flashed him a devilish grin, and a wicked, eyelash-fluttering look.
"I'd like to see you try."
He was still sitting on the ground, so he had no qualms about unfurling one of his legs, reaching over to poke Kage with the tip of his boot.
Kage caught the offending appendage, smirking, and he was still smirking when he used his leverage to spread Kuro's legs apart and slither between them until their chests were pushing together.
"Watch me."
What would've ensued – be it a fight, or something more monumental such as the release of too-long suppressed emotions – we will never know. Even as Kuro opened his mouth for a come-back, a rustling noise came from Axl's direction, followed by a muffled, tearful whimper.
The two Darkloids turned as one towards the child, their quarrel forgotten.
In the firelight, his cheeks looked flushed, almost feverish; and the barely-dry tracks of his tears gleamed like silver. He seemed to shiver, curling tighter on himself. He muttered: "Daddy… Papa…", very softly and very sweetly, then quietened down.
Wordlessly, Kage went to his feet. Walking over to Axl, he brushed a hand trough his unruly hair, which seemed to calm the child a great deal.
When Kage looked up from his task, he found Kuro gazing intently at them, half-mesmerized by the sight of Kage's big, armoured hand moving gently across Axl's round cheek, drying the tears away.
"You've grown fond of this child, haven't you?" Kage asked quietly.
Kuro looked sharply at him. For several moments, it seemed like he was working himself into a royal frenzy, but in the end he could summon up only enough energy to give a shrug.
He looked away, glowering, not pouting, hands clutching his elbows tight enough to hurt. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse, cracking like gravel.
"No. Not at all."
Kage regarded him in silence. The flames danced and leaped across his visor, but his face was a complete blank.
"There is nothing wrong with it," he offered.
Kuro ground his teeth together harshly.
"Shut up."
"Kuro…"
"I said – shut up!"
"Ku…"
"Shut the Hell up!"
Kage pressed his lips together. Kuro glowered at him, hunching instinctively when the other Darkloid went to his feet slowly, a liquid, majestic motion, and advanced towards him.
Kage knelt beside his ruffled companion, but offered him no words for a long time. Only at length, he said:
"I like him, too." Reaching out, he touched Kuro's cheek like it was liable to shatter if he applied too much pressure. "I like this routine we have. I like how we suddenly look like a family. Me, you, and him. Like a small pack in the savannah. Two parents and one cub, journeying through the wastelands and looking out for one another. It's nice. Isn't it, Kuro?"
Kuro didn't seem to breathe any easier after that. Turning away, he stared at the cracks running across the stony ground, issuing a low, threatening growl from the back of his throat. He didn't acknowledge Kage when he moved, shifting closer. Nor did he flinch when the red Kagemusha curled his body around behind him to push their cheeks together.
"Kuro… I know you like this, too. This life. It appeals to you. It feels good not to be alone anymore, doesn't it? It feels good to have a purpose. To be on the move, to be fighting again, fighting for someone important. Kuro…"
Slowly, subtly, his dark aura was spreading in tendrils around him, enclosing Kuro in a loose, shadowy embrace. His power, his warmth, his voice, his smell, his weight settling — fitting — against his body much too perfectly … Kuro found himself spellbound, like a rabbit before the snake's eyes.
"…we could make this real, if we wanted," Kage crooned, breath fanning against Kuro's cheek. "Make a real family, with a cub of our own, and not just taken on loan from someone else. We could…"
He covered Kuro's hand with his own, and that triggered a reaction, however harsh.
Kuro wrenched himself away like a burned cat. There was a dark, shining mark and a swirl of deteriorating pixel on his bottom lip, where he'd sunk his teeth in his anger. He was breathing hard and fast, back ramrod-stiff, fists clenched, lips pulled back over gnashed teeth. But the light in his eyes… it wasn't anger. It was desperation.
"I know what you're trying to do," he hissed. "You think you are so clever, don't you? But I know, Kage. I know how you spurned your Net-Op, when you first came into being; how you tried to kill Netto, time and again, but wanted, no, begged! Rockman to join you in darkness every chance you got!" he was trembling, hard shudders borne of fury. "I know what you felt for him. But I'm not Rockman. And I won't be used as a substitute for him!"
Kage, he was the picture of calm. Even as Kuro shuddered, heaved and hollered, Kage stood still as a statue, his face impassive.
"Kuro," he said, and his voice was surprisingly gentle. "You are right, I wanted Rockman to join me. I had the memory of his relationship with Blues inside me, when I was created. And I ached to have what they had. I wanted someone that could complete me the way Rockman completed Blues." He paused, and choose his next words carefully.
"I didn't want Rockman per se… I loathed his cheerfulness, his bravery, his golden heart. But as a dark version of Blues, I thought that only a dark version of him could ever satisfy me, complete me as I was meant to be completed. I wanted him to follow me, so that I could corrupt him and create my own perfect mate. But then you came along…"
He'd been shifting closer as he talked, and now he was able to cup Kuro's cheek in his hand, the pale iciness of it burning against his palm.
"…and you were perfection on your own. You were everything I could ever want, or need. And how could it be any different? They are made for each other. And as their darkest selves, so are we."
Kuro let our a short bark of a laugh, a bitter and harsh sound. He slapped Kage's hand away from his face like a vile thing and rose to his feet, blazing with a kind of fury.
"Ah, but this is were you are wrong. Rockman might love Blues; but as his Shadow, I can feel only dark and violent emotions." His expression was cold, his countenance hard and cruel. And yet, beyond the anger, beyond the bitterness, there was a kernel of pain and despair.
"This is to say…" he stated shakily, "I hate you, Kage. I hate you with all my core."
He leapt into the shadows before Kage could formulate a reply.
Kage shook his head, and was about to get up and follow, when Axl began to bawl like a newborn whale, or some other very huge, very noisy thing, screaming and hiccupping and looking so flushed you'd think he'd been baked in the oven for an hour or two.
Kage was thorn between following Kuro and have his eyes clawed out, and try to comfort Axl and save his eardrums from bursting. He decided he liked all his body parts in place and functioning, and went back to the child.
"What's wrong now?" Clipped, but not totally devoid of warmth.
Axl issued a louder bawl and went two shades darker on the cheeks (one can't bawl, talk and breathe at the same time).
"I-I-I-I-I-I'm sowwy!!!!!"
"What for?"
Axl struggled to speak.
"He… he said he hates you!" he managed between sobs. "Kuro-Ojichan said he hates you! But I don't want Kuro-Ojichan to hate Kage-Ojichan! I want them to love each other!"
"Oh, that." Kage smiled, something that surprised Axl so much, it calmed his crying a great deal.
Reaching out, Kage put a hand on Axl's head, rubbed it briskly but affectionately.
"I wouldn't worry about it," he said.
Axl cocked his head to a side questioningly, and sniffled.
"No?"
Kage grinned, shook his head and said, with a pleased air about himself:
"That's the first time he's willingly admitted to having a core, or feelings of any sorts. That's actually a progress."
And what a big progress.
He doubted that he would have been able to crack Kuro's defences so quickly, if it wasn't for Axl. Kage made a mental note to buy the child something – maybe that toy sword he'd mentioned – if and when they all survived this, and went to his feet, squinting into the direction Kuro had disappeared into.
Now, if only the rabid catboy from Hell would realize where their destiny lay, and stop denying himself to Kage, they'd be one step away from conquering the world.
That he meant all of it in the most literal sense, it's another matter altogether.
- Scene 14 cleared.
NOW LOADING…
Soooooo… those of you who thought Kage was just trying to seduce Kuro were right, but so were those who feared he had something darker up his sleeve. Kuro's seduction it's only the first half of a bigger plan…