Chapter 29: New Developments

When morning finally came, Omega was still fast asleep inside the Star Carrier. Even though he did manage to get to sleep, he still had some restless dreams and was tossing and turning. As a result, he did not really get a good night's sleep and was still out like a rock.

Geo, on the other hand, was already wide awake and had changed into his day clothes. He was busy downstairs eating his breakfast that his mom had made a few minutes ago. He had tried to wake the Wave being up before he went to eat, but the guy just would not budge. Deciding that he was just tired from yesterday's hectic antics, the boy left him alone so he could get some more sleep.

By the time he had finished his breakfast, it was already a little past ten. Seeing as he did not have anything better to do right now, he went to the living room and sat down on the couch. He picked the remote for the TV up from the coffee table in front of him and turned it on.

"What are you watching, Geo?" Hope asked from inside the kitchen as she heard the sound of the TV turning on.

"I'm just browsing around," he answered back as he flipped through the channels one by one. "I'm seeing if there's anything interesting at this hour."

As he sifted through the various channels, he found nothing of particular interest to watch. What he did manage to find were either little kid shows, cooking shows, or those paid advertisement commercials where they demonstrated some kind of cool or "revolutionary" product in front of a live audience and all that other stuff. Apparently, they did not have a lot of good programs to watch during the morning hours. Then again, it was a Wednesday morning five days into his summer vacation. He was usually busy working at school at this time instead of relaxing at home.

Has it really only been five days since summer vacation started? Geo thought as he continued to sift through the channels. It feels like it has been longer than that. I guess it's because all this craziness started about five days ago when I first met Omega. Sheesh, five days into my vacation and I haven't had a single time to rest and relax. I guess I can't complain about being bored this summer, though, since I'm probably going to have a lot more craziness in the coming days. I suppose this is kind of how Omega felt while he was busy trying to lose the FM-ians chasing him a few months ago. How in the world did he bare with continuous running with no relaxation time, though? He was either very desperate, had a body and will made of steel, or both.

When he was almost done surfing through all the channels that his TV had to offer, he stumbled across a news channel. On this news channel, they were talking about an incident that had occurred sometime around lunchtime yesterday. Feeling that he knew what this was about, he stopped at this channel and decided to listen to what they had to say.

"In other news this morning," the female anchorwoman started as she shuffled her papers, "there was an incident that occurred yesterday afternoon at the AMAKEN museum and science building at the boundaries of the Echo Ridge business district. Not many details are being given to us at this time, but from what we could gather, it sounds like the building was suffering from viral attacks that have become recent as of late. To give us some more in-depth information on this disturbing case, we have the head detective of the investigation, Detective Copper, live with us from his office. Detective?"

"Are they talking about what you said happened at AMAKEN yesterday?" Hope asked as she stuck her head out from the kitchen to look at the TV.

"They are," Geo simply replied as he saw the TV shift to a man that he knew, Detective Copper. "The detective in charge of the investigation is about to give us some more info on this."

"Oh, I do hope that this doesn't turn out to be anything too serious," she said with a worried sigh as she dropped what she was doing in the kitchen and came over in order to listen to the interview better. "The last thing we need now is more trouble to be added on to the other troubles this town has already witnessed."

"Thank you, ma'am," Detective Copper thanked the anchorwoman as the camera focused on him with what seemed to be his office in the background. "As most of you have no doubt already heard, there was a virus attack that was focused on the AMAKEN museum and science building yesterday. It started at around noontime and was thankfully resolved at about a quarter before one. We still don't have enough information in regards to how the viruses were able to attack AMAKEN in the first place. However, I will do my best in answering some of the questions that I'm sure are floating around in some of your heads.

"As all of you no doubt already know," the detective continued, "this building is basically our town's entire backbone on the creation of all anti-virus technology and defenses. In fact, it is one of the organizations held in high regard all over the world for their contribution in the study of computer viruses and how to better defend ourselves from their sometimes vicious attacks. And as a little side note, they also create miscellaneous items that help provide some form of entertainment to the general public. Basically, what I'm trying to get at here is that AMAKEN is the most technological and heavily viral-defended building in all of Echo Ridge. For us to receive a call from them in order to respond to a virus problem was beyond shocking and incomprehensible for both me and my crew."

"From what I understand, detective," the anchorwoman politely interrupted him, "it took you and your crew about a good thirty minutes in order to arrive at AMAKEN. Doesn't it usually take you only a few minutes in order to get to the building from your place of operations?"

"Under normal circumstances, the ride there would have taken no more than five short minutes," he explained with a serious facial expression. "However, this time was different from what we were accustomed to. Our response time was unfortunately severely compromised by several different uncontrollable and unforeseeable factors. The first one was that our communications with AMAKEN were jumbled up by the virus attack and we had received their message for help three minutes into the attack. We don't know how they got jumbled, but it could have been some kind of Wave discrepancies caused by the virus itself. We won't know for sure until we have completed our investigation, which would probably take about a month or so since we also have to finish up on the Wilshire Hills incident.

"The second and definitely more time consuming factor was the terrible traffic on the streets. It seemed as though the virus somehow managed to disrupt the service of all the transit buses within a half-hour radius of the building. As a result, all the streets around the area were severely jammed and everybody was in a state of utter confusion. Once again, we won't know if it caused all this until we have finished our investigation. By the time we had arrived at the building, we were already thirty minutes past our targeted response time. As much as I hate to admit it, the Satella Police was considerably late in our response time due to these unprecedented problems. We offer our apologies to AMAKEN at our poor response time."

"I also understand that there was evidence of a fight discovered at the scene of the attack. It sounds as though this virus was having a fight with someone or something else near the scene. Could you elaborate a bit more as to what this fight of sorts was? Was the virus fighting against the defenses that AMAKEN had created or was it fighting against one of its own kind?"

"I'm sorry, ma'am, but I'm afraid that kind of information is prohibited from the public. I'm not allowed to say what occurred during those forty-five minutes at this time. We have yet to conclude our initial investigation of the scene and anything I say now would only be considered a poor assumption and nothing more."

"But could you at least tell us a bit more on how this attack was stopped? Does it have anything to do about what little we know about this other dimension that you call the 'Wave World'? Could you give us some details regarding that?"

"I'm sorry, but I cannot elaborate on the topic. The Wave World is a very complicated, not to mention highly classified, matter that we don't just loosely disclose to the general public. What you already know about it is what AMAKEN deemed safe and necessary for the general public to know. Apart from the fact that you know it to be an alternate reality of sorts where all viruses mingle and dwell, you aren't allowed any information regarding it. I'm sorry, ma'am, but that is all I can say on this and the other previous matters at this time."

"Then could you tell us a little bit more about the virus that managed to break through AMAKEN's defenses? Was this just your regular everyday virus or was it something more powerful than what we all already know?"

"I'm afraid I cannot say as to what kind of virus this was. It had unfortunately ran away before we could even get a chance to capture it. Unlike last time, we didn't even manage to get a Wave sample of this virus. However, we can safely conclude one thing from all of this. The virus that attacked AMAKEN was beyond your everyday normal virus. It's probably as strong or even stronger than the one that attacked Wilshire Hills a couple of days ago."

"From these two recent attacks, can you conclude anything from them?" the anchorwoman inquired. "Do you know what is motivating these viruses to cause such devastating acts of destruction?"

"What goes on in a virus's head stays in their head. We may never know just whatever it is that's driving them to cause such destructive acts. There's no plausible way for us to figure out if such a motive exists unless we were able to directly talk to at least one of them."

Then I guess I'm a really lucky guy, Geo thought sarcastically as he carefully listened to the interview while his mom was glued to the screen and had taken a seat on a chair a while ago. I can talk directly to them and I happen to know the motive behind their recently aggressive attacks. It's funny how I'm probably the only human in this entire town who knows about this.

"I'm sorry, detective, but we appear to be running low on interview time here," the anchorwoman apologized as she briefly looked down at her notes. "Allow me to ask you one more question before we leave you. Judging from all these recent virus attacks around town, both minor and major, do the citizens of Echo Ridge have any reason to be worried at this time?"

"I should hope not," Detective Copper answered as he scratched his ear a bit. "As long as we don't suffer anymore of these major attacks, then the citizens should not be worried too much. However, if I were to combine the damage caused by all of these recent virus attacks and not include the repairs already done to most of the damaged property, then I would say that we have a bit of a problem on our hands. After much deliberation last night in an important meeting discussing this, both AMAKEN and the Satella Police have decided to put this town under level one security alert. It's nothing to fret about, mind you. A level one security alert just means that we want all of the citizens to take extra measures in protecting any and all of their electronics from viruses. It's nothing serious. We just want the public's help in mitigating the possible damage that those pesky viruses can cause."

"Okay. Well, thank you for taking time in answering some of our questions, Detective Copper."

"It is my duty and my pleasure, ma'am."

After they said their goodbyes, the camera that was airing in Detective Copper's office turned off and the newsroom was back onto the screen.

"When we talked with authorities about this incident late last night, they had indulged upon us that a virus had broken into AMAKEN's defenses," the anchorwoman recapped from last night's newscast. "That was all the information we had received then. Now we know that the virus was of the same caliber, maybe even stronger, than the one that attacked Wilshire Hills. In addition to that, the Satella Police, in collaboration with AMAKEN, has decided to impose a level one security alert. Is this a sign of more things to come? Only time will give us the full story.

"As we move onto the News of the World, we have heard of a shocking breakthrough from halfway across the globe. The ambassador of the…"

"What a dangerous world we live in these days," Hope sighed sadly as she got up from the couch and went back to the kitchen to finish washing the dishes. "So many viruses causing havoc in the world we care about so much. Do you think there will ever be an end to all this chaos, Geo?"

"I really don't know, mom," Geo answered as he started thinking about the battles he had already partaken in with some of the FM-ians. "If you were to ask me what the viruses were doing, I would say that they're looking for something of great importance. Otherwise, they wouldn't be causing this much trouble. That's just what I'm thinking, anyway. Then again, I have been seeing a lot of viruses grouping together whenever they decide to attack something."

"Do you suppose what you're seeing is a sign of sorts that those creatures are up to something?" his mom asked as the sound of running water was heard.

"I wish I could tell you," he sighed as he turned off the TV and got up from the couch. "Only dad or Aaron would know the answer to that. Anyway, I'm going to go upstairs and get ready to go out. I'm planning to visit Aaron and see if everything's alright with him."

"Please be careful when you go there. I'm sure that the Satella Police are still there doing their investigation. I'm not even sure that they'll allow you inside AMAKEN."

"Don't worry, I'll be careful. Besides, I still have Aaron's Transer I.D. for the bus with me that I need to return. They should be able to let me in if I show them that. I'm going to go ahead and get ready now."

And with that, Geo went up to the second floor and into his room. Once there, he quietly shut the door and went to get his shoes and a clean pair of socks. He was too busy getting himself ready to go somewhere that he failed to noticed that a certain someone had awakened from their sleep already.

"So the FM-ians finally made it onto the news, did they?" a familiar sarcastic voice asked the boy. "Who would have thought that they would have become this famous?"

"I see you've already woken up, Omega," Geo replied calmly as he was not surprised at the sudden appearance of a voice. "Did you manage to get some good sleep last night?"

"Eh, not really, but I experienced worse," the Wave being said as he shrugged it off. "I think I kept tossing around in my sleep all night, though."

"That's what it sounded like," the boy said with a small smile. "You woke me up a couple of times with your constant tossing around. I was kind of wondering if you were having a bad dream or something."

"You don't know how right you are on that, Geo."

"Anyway, how long have you been awake?"

"Ever since the start of that news broadcast about what happened at AMAKEN. I was listening to it from the top of the staircase. I heard every word that tenacious and nosey detective said."

"Then I guess you heard him declare a level one security alert."

"I did. By the way, what is the level one security alert supposed to do in order to prevent any more attacks?"

"Well, the point in doing so is to try and lower the amount of computers affected by the viruses. It would kind of help the Satella Police pinpoint where they're coming from. They say that viruses are more devastating to a computer that's closer to where they're residing."

"That's pretty much true for the most part. The little guys really like to form their own little groups and call certain parts of the Wave World as their home turf. But even if the places close to where the groups are now were to follow up on the alert, those viruses can still cause devastation to their computers."

"That's kinda the entire point. You see, the Satella Police and AMAKEN have discovered a few years ago that some computers were being attacked even with the alert in place. That's when they found out that they could use this alert to narrow down the places that the viruses could be coming from."

"You humans really are smarter than I first gave you credit for. Just out of curiosity, though, what would happen if the police couldn't pinpoint the location of the virus group?"

"Then they would probably go into a level two security alert. After that would be level three, then level four would come into play. If it has been confirmed to be a major problem, which Echo Ridge has never faced such a predicament before, then the security level would be raised to the highest, level five."

"Okay… Do me a favor and don't tell me what each of the levels stand for. I don't think it would end well for me if the went to that level."

"You really don't want to know. Anyway, do you really think that a level one security alert would help keep the FM-ians from destroying more places?"

"I doubt it. FM-ians are stronger than your average, small-fry virus. They can even break through AMAKEN's defenses, which seem to hold the state-of-the-art technology against such attacks. At the rate they're going, the police would probably raise the alert to level two in a heart beat."

"It's going to become a level two if they don't stop trying to lure you out into the open and capture you. What did you do to make them so angry with you? I really doubt it's another conspiracy charge since Cygnus kept referring to you as a traitor. People who've been branded as conspirators don't usually get called traitors, despite how much that Wave being loved to say it. What did you do to betray them?"

"It's a long story and I don't really feel like talking about it right now. Maybe I'll tell you tonight if I'm feeling up to it. By the way, didn't you tell your mom that you had somewhere to go?"

"Oh, I almost forgot. I told her I was going to check up on Aaron and see how he's doing. He's probably busy filling out a lot of incident reports."

Without saying another word, he quickly put on his socks and shoes. He then pocketed his Star Carrier and went downstairs with Omega close at his heels.

"Try to be back before lunch!" Hope called out to Geo as he passed by the kitchen doorway and towards the door.

"I'll try!" he answered back as he opened the door. "If I can't make it, I'll call you."

"Okay. Be careful out there, Geo!"

"I will. I'll see you later!"

And with that, he went out the door and started to walk towards the bus stop with Omega quietly walking right next to him.