ProtoMan fucking loves the new Link PET. Mainly because of the Navi-hologram, really - because now, instead of just sitting in his operator's PET, he can walk around in the real world. Sure, he's tiny, but still.

This is more than he could've ever hoped for. Chaud can actually pet him, now. And ProtoMan can touch him, too. He can curl up on Chaud's desk with Dark Shadow and Chaud can pet him whenever he pauses with his work or something, or he can ride around on Chaud's shoulder, purring his head off.

The closest he ever got to this was when Duo let them all exist in the same space for a brief period of time. ProtoMan had, for a few short moments, forgotten all about the danger - and his only focus had been giving his operators the hug he's always wanted to give them. Arcadia was no different, and so, he thinks, were the other Navis.

But now, with the Link PET and the Navi-hologram, he can touch his operator and his operator can touch him. The touch has to be light, otherwise the hologram dissipates, but that doesn't matter - a small price to pay for finally being able to touch Chaud, to be with him in the real world, even if it's just through a semi-fragile hologram.

He doesn't care, because this is the best thing that's ever happened and ProtoMan loves it.

Chaud's just getting ready for bed now - and ProtoMan would think it's about time except they're both kinda nocturnal so he can't really complain. He waits until Chaud's under the covers before shadow-teleporting over from the bedside table, and then he settles down, curling up next to Chaud's head on the pillow. Dark Shadow forms itself and curls up beside him, too.

"You're not gonna try the compression sleep-mode?" Chaud asks him, smiling.

"Why would I, when I can sleep out here with you?"

Chaud giggles a little. "Fair enough," he says. He brings up one of his hands and lightly strokes a finger down ProtoMan's back, and ProtoMan purrs. "Just watch you don't drain the battery too much, okay?"

"It's a solar-powered battery as well as a rechargable one," ProtoMan murmurs, breaking off his purring long enough to speak. "As long as there's sunlight, it's never gonna run out of power."

"Don't be too sure of that," Chaud warns him lightly. "It's winter, remember. That means snow, and lots of clouds in the sky."

"Weather forecast was for sun all day tomorrow."

His operator huffs out a quiet laugh. "The weather forecasts have been wrong before."

ProtoMan grunts and burrows a bit deeper into the pillow, resting his head on his hands. That signals the end of the conversation, and he hears one last quiet chuckle from Chaud before he, too, settles down.

It doesn't take long for Chaud to fall asleep. He's a light sleeper, but he still falls asleep pretty quick - he had to learn how to fall asleep fast because he never usually gets much time to actually sleep, with his job as vice president of IPC and all. There's a lot of work to do, and while ProtoMan used to be able to help him, they can't really risk it anymore in case his glitches mess something up. That's something he'll never really stop feeling guilty about, because him being unable to help Chaud with his work means that Chaud's workload has pretty much doubled, so he gets even less time to sleep.

So, yeah. Chaud kinda has to be able to fall asleep fast. But he's a light sleeper because he needs to be able to wake up fast, too.

All ProtoMan has to do to go into sleep-mode is just activate it, really. NetNavis can fall asleep naturally, like humans, but it's easier and way faster to just activate sleep-mode. He doesn't do that yet, though, because he wants to enjoy being in the real world - being next to his operator - for a little longer.

A few minutes pass by, and the only sound in Chaud's bedroom is ProtoMan's quiet purring. He can feel Dark Shadow's coldness pressed against him at his side, and the faint warmth of Chaud's hand curled against his back. It's a nice feeling.

"Well, isn't that just precious."

The nice feeling vanishes and dread slams into place so quickly that ProtoMan briefly loses whatever air he has in his systems. He scrambles to his feet, whirling around, and Dark Shadow bursts into tendrils and tries to fend off his tormentor.

Too late, though. Proxy reaches out and grabs ProtoMan's arm before his shadows can even do anything, and then he's dragged into Master Blaze's PET.

Proxy carelessly tosses him to the ground. ProtoMan's shadows try to soften the blow, but they can't stop Proxy from kicking him in the stomach, and he lets out a choked yelp and curls up, trembling.

"Absolutely pathetic," Proxy sneers, reaching down to grab ProtoMan again and hauls him up, then pins him against the wall of Master Blaze's PET. "You're apparently oh-so-powerful, and yet you tremble like a weak virus whenever I show up. Pathetic."

"Please-" ProtoMan tries to beg, but Proxy shuts him up by slamming his fist into the side of his head.

"You know the one good thing about these new holograms?" Proxy hisses, leaning down so close that their faces are almost touching. "I don't need to wait until you're in a different network. As long as you're outside of your operator's PET, I can do what I please!"

ProtoMan stares at him in horror. He hadn't even thought about that - but it makes perfect sense, of course it does. The friends program only works if he's inside Chaud's PET or Chaud's computer, but if he's outside in the real world, there's nothing stopping Proxy from coming after him like this.

Suddenly these Navi-holograms don't seem so great anymore.

His shadows are sparking, flickering erratically, and he can see their ends sharpening into points. Proxy glances at them, tightening his grip on ProtoMan almost painfully.

"Stop that," Proxy snaps at him. "If you even think of hurting me, you know what will happen to your idiot of an operator."

"It- it's not me," ProtoMan gasps, just barely managing to get the words out. "I'm n-not- they're- they have- they're sentient! I w-work with them, I don't- I don't control them!"

Proxy leans even closer, and ProtoMan flinches away, trying to press himself into the wall. For all the good it does, because Proxy's the one pinning him to it in the first place.

"Then tell the stupid things to back off," Proxy snarls.

ProtoMan chokes out a whimper. He just barely manages to gather enough strength to look past Proxy, at his shadows, and it takes even more strength to shake his head and make them stop.

"Good," Proxy says softly, a wicked grin spreading on his face. "Now then, I haven't been able to do this in three or four months. Honestly, I've missed it." He tightens his grip again and ProtoMan squeaks. "How should I start, I wonder?"


It's early morning when Chaud wakes up, and he's disappointed to see that ProtoMan and Dark Shadow aren't curled up next to him on the pillow anymore. ProtoMan must've decided to go back into the PET after all. Which is a shame, but it's his choice, Chaud supposes - he's the one who's using the Navi-hologram, so he can do whatever he pleases.

Still, it's a little disappointing. He had been hoping to wake up with ProtoMan purring next to him or something. Sleeping with the ProtoMan plushie that Mimic gave him isn't the same as sleeping with the real thing, even if it's just a tiny hologram.

He pushes the covers off and slides out of bed, yawning. He'd actually gotten a relatively good night's sleep this time - as good as a half-nocturnal cat-human can manage, anyway. Maybe it has something to do with whether or not Mimic's sleeping, too. They seem to fall asleep easier when the other is already asleep.

Chaud glances over at his PET on the bedside table, suddenly puzzled. Normally ProtoMan wakes up before him or at the same time - with the Progress PET, he'd activate the holographic screen as soon as Chaud was awake, and Chaud had assumed he'd do the same with the Navi-hologram. Yet he's not outside the PET. Is he still in sleep-mode?

"ProtoMan?" Chaud calls, picking up his PET. "Are you awake yet?"

He nearly drops his PET when he sees the small screen.

His primary Navi is covered in bruises and wounds. Chaud never thought ProtoMan would ever end up in a state worse than after he came back from Netopia's Internet City that one time, and yet here he is, trembling and hurt, his shadows gently coiling around him looking to be the only things keeping him upright. The screen's flickering erratically, but despite that, ProtoMan's wounds are completely visible, they're that bad.

"ProtoMan," Chaud whispers in horror, "what happened?"

ProtoMan opens his mouth, but nothing comes out. He tries again but can only manage a strangled noise, and a couple of tendrils of shadows drift around him comfortingly.

"Can you sign?" Chaud asks desperately, clutching his PET with both hands. "Can you-"

His Navi raises his hands. They're trembling so much that Chaud can only just barely make out what he's signing.

[bully]

Chaud swears he feels ice in his blood at that.

"Proxy," he growls. "That- that bastard!" Then he pauses, suddenly realising something. "But . . . the friends program should've protected you."

ProtoMan hesitates for a few moments, wringing his hands. He winces, quickly stopping, as if it hurts too much to do that, and Chaud feels anger burning away the ice at the sight of his Navi, so hurt and scared. He wants to rip Proxy apart for doing this, however he did it, consequences be fucking damned.

[hologram outside pet] ProtoMan eventually manages to sign. [friend doesn't work outside]

"Oh," Chaud says softly, eyes widening. "I didn't- oh, ProtoMan, I didn't know . . . I'm sorry, I should've- I should've . . ."

He should've realised. He should've known that the friends program wouldn't be completely foolproof - he should've known that being outside the PET would put ProtoMan in danger in the Blaze mansion, or even at IPC.

And now ProtoMan's too scared to come out of the PET.

"You don't have to come out if you don't want to," Chaud whispers, bringing his PET closer to his chest. "I w-won't force you." He nearly chokes on the words, because he remembers how happy ProtoMan had been just yesterday, how much he'd enjoyed out in the real world and being able to actually interact with things, to interact with Chaud.

ProtoMan makes a quiet, sad noise. He reaches out to brush his fingertips against the screen, then sets his mouth in a determined - albeit nervous - line.

Before Chaud can say anything, ProtoMan's Navi-hologram flickers into the real world on top of the PET. If ProtoMan's trembling was bad before, it's even worse now that he's outside the PET, and he cringes as if he's expecting to be attacked at any moment.

He is, Chaud realises. ProtoMan's expecting Proxy to show up, and he's come out despite that.

"Come here," Chaud says quietly, holding out a hand. ProtoMan steps onto it, crouching down onto all fours with his shadows still coiling around him, and Chaud places his PET onto the bedside table before turning his full attention to his NetNavi. "Just stay close to me, alright? If Proxy comes, I'll get rid of the hologram, and he'll have to go."

[what about you] ProtoMan asks him, sitting up enough to sign.

"Screw what my father does to me," Chaud mutters, understanding what ProtoMan's asking. "I don't care. You're more important to me."

[I care] ProtoMan signs, meek and timid. [don't want you hurt]

"I don't want you to get hurt, either," Chaud murmurs, carefully hugging ProtoMan to his chest.

He jumps when another Navi-hologram suddenly appears in front of him, and then his lips pull back into a snarl when he sees who it is. The growl that rumbles out of his throat would unsettle even some of the criminals that Chaud has faced in Netopia.

Yet Proxy only seems mildly amused. "That's quite an impressive growl, but I'm not here for that half-breed freak of science," he says.

Chaud's growl rises into a fever pitch for a brief moment before it cuts off as he registers Proxy's words.

"What the hell are you here for, then?" Chaud demands. He can feel ProtoMan trembling violently in his hands, and the coldness of his Navi's shadows as they brush against his skin.

"Master Blaze demands your presence in his study," Proxy informs him. "Now, if you can spare a moment from that freak in your hands."

"You call him a freak again and I'll-"

"What?" Proxy lifts his chin defiantly. "You'll do what, exactly? Do anything to me and you'll regret it, I can promise you that much. Now get moving, before I decide to inform Master Blaze that you refuse to see him."

"Fine," Chaud spits out. "Tell him I'm on my way."

Proxy vanishes with a mocking bow of his head, but ProtoMan doesn't relax once he's gone. If anything, he gets worse, and Chaud can hear little gasps from him, like he's crying and trying to be quiet about it.

Chaud doesn't want to let go of him, not when he's this scared, but he gets ProtoMan back into his PET with a little bit of help from his Navi's shadows. Then he gets dressed, as quick as he can, and hesitates for a moment before grabbing his PET and putting it in his pocket.

He doesn't like taking ProtoMan with him to see his father, but he doesn't want to leave ProtoMan alone - save for his shadows - right now. At the very least, ProtoMan's fear should keep him inside the PET, and Chaud spares a moment to feel guilty for being glad about that before he heads out of his bedroom.

The walk to his father's study could be compared to walking to his own death. Chaud wonders if this is what the criminals in Heaven's City's prison feel like when they're walking in, knowing that they'll be there for however long their sentence is - some of them for life, even. He honestly used to think that this feeling was normal, that every child felt this dread and fear whenever their father summoned them, but after watching how Dr. Hikari interacts with Mimic and Lan, he's not so sure anymore.

Is his father the rule, or the exception? Given how some of his friends are trying to subtly help him be more independent from his father, or how some of them check him over to see if he's okay, Chaud thinks his father might be the latter. That's not really a comforting thought.

The doors leading into his father's study are closed. He's not sure if that's a blessing or not - on one hand, he didn't have to feel his father's cold stare as he walked down the hallway. On the other, he's going to have to open those doors himself, and then his dread and fear will slam into him the second his father looks at him.

Better to get it over with.

As he opens one of the doors, Chaud tries desperately to work out why his father would want to see him so suddenly. He can't have done anything wrong, surely - he certainly doesn't remember screwing up recently, anyway. But he could've screwed up or made some kind of mistake without realising it, and he'll only realise now, when Father is staring him down and spelling it out for him.

"Close the door."

Chaud can say, without a shred of dishonesty, that he would rather face Duo again instead of dealing with his own father.

He closes the door, taking extra care not to slam it. Whatever his father's angry about, slamming a door will only make it worse. That's the last thing Chaud wants.

"Come over here," Father orders.

Chaud swallows, and does as he's told. His father's cold stare bores into him as he crosses the room and circles the desk, coming to a stop just beside the man.

Father stares at him for another moment or two, as if he's sizing Chaud up. For what, it's unclear, and then Chaud has no more time to wonder because his father reaches out.

He flinches involuntarily. His father's eyes narrow, but he wasn't reaching for Chaud - he was reaching for the monitor of the computer on his desk. He turns it a little, so Chaud can see the screen.

"What do you see?" Father demands.

Chaud blinks, confusion briefly overriding his terror, and glances at the screen. He sees numbers and dates, and it takes him a few blank-minded moments to realise he's looking at account details. Money, in other words. His own, actually, because his name is at the top of the screen.

"M-my bank account," Chaud says. This is one of the few times his father definitely expects an answer, so he'd better give one.

"Yes, your bank account." Father's tone is colder than nights in the Netopian desert. "Take a look at yesterday's date, and tell me if you can spot any issues."

Chaud tries, he really does. But the only thing he sees is a transaction - the money he spent to get Mimic, Lan, and Raika's Link PETs created and customised. He's not sure why his father is asking him about this, because it's all there on the screen, right in plain sight.

"I don't- I-I don't see anything wrong," Chaud whispers.

His father shoots out of his chair with startling speed, and Chaud squeaks and stumbles back. He freezes a few feet away, almost up against the wall, and stares at his father - the man hasn't moved and is just standing there, glaring at Chaud, and he'd been scared before, but the absolute sheer terror that pulses through his entire body at the sight of his father's glare is even worse.

"You don't see anything wrong, do you?" Father hisses. "Tell me - what did you buy?"

Chaud stares at him incomprehensibly. He should know the answer to that question - it's right there, on the screen.

"I- I bought . . . PETs." Only when the words come out his mouth does he realise the problem.

His father is angry because he bought PETs for his friends.

"I-I used my own money!" Chaud tries to explain, backing away until he's pressed up against the wall. "I didn't- I paid for them with my own money, I swear, it's right there, y-you can see it-"

"Where does your money come from, boy?" Father interrupts harshly.

"It- what?"

Father lunges forward suddenly, and Chaud lets out a terrified squeak and automatically brings his arms up to cover his head.

"I'm- I'm the vice president of IPC!" he yelps. "Th-that's where I get my money from!"

That, and he gets money from being a Net Saver, too. But that's in a separate account, and Father has no access to it, and he doesn't even know about it anyway. Chaud made sure of it.

"Who is the president of IPC?" Father snaps out.

This isn't getting any less confusing or terrifying. His father's inane questions are only making things worse, but Chaud would rather throw himself off the tallest building in DenTech City before pointing that out.

"Y-you are," Chaud replies.

"And who pays all of IPC's employees?"

"You," Chaud squeaks. "You do, since you're the . . ."

He realises it just as his father's expression twists into a thunderous scowl.

"Yes, I pay all of the employees," Father spits out. "Which includes you. So your money does not, in fact, come from you being vice president - it comes from me." He steps forward, slow and predator-like, and Chaud tries to press himself further into the wall to no avail. "So that means you wasted my money on PETs for your friends." He sneers the word out like it's a curse.

Father comes closer, too close for comfort, and looms over Chaud.

"This isn't the first time you've done something this stupid, either," Father informs him. "I overlooked it with the Progress PET, because I thought you would figure it out on your own. Then it happened again with the Null Grids. And now with the Link PETs. I see now that I shouldn't have just let you try and figure it out on your own, because you're obviously too stupid to do that."

He slams his hand into the wall beside Chaud's head, and Chaud chokes on a terrified cry and flinches away.

"You honestly thought you could get away with wasting my money trying to impress your friends?" Father snarls.

"I- I wasn't- trying to- I w-was-" I was being nice, Chaud tries to say, but the words won't come out and he doubts his father would care anyway.

"Don't talk back to me!" Father roars, flashing out his other hand.

The back of Chaud's head slams into the wall and he gasps, too startled to do more than that. His vision is swimming and he swears he can see stars, but his father's angry expression is clearly visible even through all that.

"After everything I've done for you, everything I've given you, this is how you repay me?" Father demands. "By wasting my money for no damn reason?"

His hand reaches out again and Chaud flinches away, but he can't stop Father from grasping his hair with a painfully tight grip. He's dragged away from the wall, as easily as a doll gets thrown around, and then he stumbles when Father abruptly lets go of him.

Chaud's head cracks against the side of his father's desk and he only just manages to stop himself from collapsing entirely by gripping the side and kneeling on the carpet.

Forget his vision swimming, his entire head is fuzzy and dizzy now. There's an odd churning in his stomach, the kind of churning you get when you're about to throw up, and Chaud desperately tries to take a few deep breaths to hold it back, because if he throws up here his father will only get even angrier.

"Get up," Father tells him. "Get up, I said!"

The tip of Father's shoe sinks into Chaud's stomach. He tastes bile for a brief moment, and then vomits up whatever's inside his stomach - which isn't much, really - all over the floor in front of him.

He hears a disgusted growl from his father, sees his hand coming toward him again, and Chaud flinches against the side of the desk.

There's a sudden wild screech, glitched almost beyond recognition. Father jerks back, eyes wide, and ProtoMan's hologram glitches into view just in front of Chaud. It's flickering so badly it almost hurts to look at, but through that flickering, Chaud can just about make out the image of ProtoMan crouching, hair spiked up to ridiculous extremes, his shadows sparking and flickering around him.

"What the hell-" Father begins.

Black energy sparks along the walls of the room. The lights make odd high-pitched noises as they flicker and then burst into shards of glass. The black sparks run up the walls, converging on the ceiling right above Father's head, and he just barely manages to jump back in time to avoid getting crushed by part of the ceiling coming down.

The cracked hole in the ceiling reveals wires sparking with the black energy, some of them snapping in two and flapping around wildly. Some of the metal panelling in the ceiling is flung straight down, directly at Father, who brings up his arms to shield his face and gets deep cuts on his forearms as a reward.

More black sparks dance across the screen of Father's computer, and the whole thing explodes. Chaud ducks down, lucky that he's up against the desk and out of the way, but Father ends up getting more scratches from the bits of scrap from the exploded computer.

The badly-flickering image of ProtoMan straightens a little. He looks over his shoulder at Chaud, somehow managing to convey an expression of infinite kindness and love despite the chaos he's causing, and then jerks his head toward the door.

Chaud scrambles to his feet, stumbling when the dizziness threatens to make him fall again, and makes a beeline for the door. Father doesn't try to stop him, too busy defending himself against whatever ProtoMan can throw at him, and Chaud gets to the doors and shoves one of them open, then takes off running.

He nearly pays for his efforts by tripping over his own feet, but he can run on all fours as well as two legs, and he makes it back to his bedroom in record time. It's lucky for him that his father's study is on the same floor - even if he can run on all fours, he might not be able to handle stairs at the moment.

Chaud slams the door to his bedroom shut and leans his back against it, gasping for breath and trying to will the dizziness away. He can't stop shaking, and his legs almost feel like jelly, as do his arms - but he's safe here. Father won't come for him in his own bedroom, he's never done it before, so-

No. No, what is he thinking? Father's angry enough to do anything, now. Of course he's going to come here. Nowhere's gonna be safe anymore. He's not safe here, he never was, why did it take something like this for him to finally realise that?

ProtoMan's Navi-hologram flickers into view in front of him, standing on thin air. The image is still flickering quite a bit, but not as much as it was in Father's study, though his shadows are still sparking around him like the black energy that saved Chaud less than a minute ago.

"You-" Chaud nearly chokes, and coughs, trying not to throw up again. "You sh-shouldn't have . . . you shouldn't have d-done that. He'll- he could- y-y-you'll-"

"You're more important to me," ProtoMan says.

Chaud lets out a gasped sob, and ProtoMan takes a step toward him, reaching out gently.

Proxy appears behind him. ProtoMan's Navi-hologram glitches and flickers spastically for a brief second, and the look of sheer terror on his Navi's face makes Chaud reach out with both hands and pull ProtoMan toward him, away from Proxy.

"You've done it now," Proxy says gleefully, grinning from ear-to-ear. "Master Blaze is beyond angry. You'll be lucky if you get out of this with both your eyes. And as for you . . ." He sneers at ProtoMan, who lets out a ragged whimper. "You won't survive to see tomorrow. Master Blaze has decided to delete you and replace you with a NetNavi who isn't a half-virus freak. I'll miss you when you're gone, of course - tormenting you was always the highlight of my day. Goodbye, you half-virus freak."

He vanishes with a cold, cruel laugh, leaving Chaud leaning against the door with ProtoMan trembling in his hands.

Chaud's mind is nearly numb with shock and still dizzy besides. He's not sure what makes him remember, but he thinks back to just after he and the rest of the Cross Fusion members came back from Duo's comet, just after they saved the world from destruction, and he remembers what Baryl said to him.

Is this what he meant? Chaud wonders. Is this why he apologised to me?

No. No, please, it can't be true . . .

Chaud grits his teeth, narrows his eyes, and clutches ProtoMan to his chest.

I can't let this happen. I'm not letting ProtoMan die!

He looks up, looks around his bedroom, and the choice he makes is strangely the easiest he's ever had to make in his entire life. You'd think something like this would be hard, that he'd hesitate and have to think about it, but that's not the case. Maybe it was never meant to be hard in the first place.

Chaud heads over to his desk and carefully places ProtoMan on the surface, just next to the keyboard. He steps back reluctantly, but sees ProtoMan's sparking shadows coiling around his Navi, and trusts them to help ProtoMan while he gathers up whatever he thinks he might need.

He has a schoolbag, of course he does. He rarely uses it, since physical textbooks aren't really a thing in the NetBattler's Institute, so his schoolbag has just been sitting in his wardrobe, doing nothing.

It can do something now, though. He dumps the empty schoolbag on his bed and starts gathering things, whatever he might need. Mimic was never given this chance when Father disowned her and threw her out onto the streets, so Chaud takes as much time as he dares, thinking it over, putting things into his schoolbag and dismissing other things that definitely won't be of much use to him anymore.

He has to make sure to put in some of his battle chips, of course. Regardless of whatever's going to happen, he's still a Net Saver, and he needs to be able to do his job to the best of his ability. But he can't take every single one of them, so he just grabs the ones he uses the most, along with a few others for some kind of variety, and dumps them into a small box that he stuffs inside the schoolbag on top of everything else.

Chaud pauses for a moment, wondering if he'll need anything else, and then he catches sight of the ProtoMan plushie half-hidden in his bed covers. He remembers Mimic giving it to him, insisting that he have it because ProtoMan is his NetNavi, and saying that having something to cuddle at night might help him. She wasn't wrong. It did help, a lot.

He picks up the plushie with gentle hands, and carefully fits it into the schoolbag. That's the final thing he needs - the final thing he wants - so he zips the schoolbag shut and glances over at his desk.

ProtoMan is staring at him, still trembling, and silent once more. His shadows have formed into Dark Shadow, but its body looks almost unstable, flickering erratically in response to ProtoMan's emotions.

"Do you need anything from the computer?" Chaud asks them. "We won't get another chance to come back here."

Not unless Lan does what he did back when the Hikaris first took Mimic in. ProtoMan helped him and MegaMan to sneak into the Blaze mansion and steal some stuff for Mimic - the plushies, of course, and a bunch of stuff from the computer that Mimic was forced to leave behind. Somehow Chaud thinks that won't work a second time, and he's not willing to let his friend put himself in danger just because he left something behind by accident.

ProtoMan pushes himself up, crouching on all fours, and looks at Chaud for a long moment. He looks terrified, but he shakes his head. Dark Shadow does too, so Chaud knows there really isn't anything.

"Come on, then," Chaud says, taking out his PET and holding it out. "Let's go."

They vanish from the desk and appear on the PET's small screen. Chaud quickly pockets his PET and then grabs his schoolbag, tugs it onto his shoulders, and heads straight to the sliding glass doors leading out onto the balcony.

Jumping off the railing and onto the tree is easier than it used to be. He's cleared gaps wider than this, with bigger drops, without even blinking. Climbing down from the tree is child's play, and he's off running the second his feet hit the ground, heading straight for the fence surrounding the estate.

The sun is shining, just as the weather forecast predicted.


"Heart container?" SearchMan repeats, looking a little bemused. "That . . . doesn't really look like a heart."

MegaMan shifts his grip on the heart container and shrugs. The core inside pulses briefly, and MegaMan purses his lips, suppressing a smile at whatever it said.

"Heart container makes me think'a the things from Zelda," Mimic comments, peering at it curiously. "But that looks more like the soul containers from Undertale, f'you ask me."

Raika has absolutely no idea what Undertale is, but he knows what Zelda is. Mimic has been playing that game - what was it, Breath of the Wild? - on her Switch for the past half an hour, and she only stopped because SearchMan asked to see the heart container holding Dark MegaMan's core. Apparently she's curious to look at it too, even if she was there when Dr. Hikari made the thing.

"Here you are!" Mrs. Hikari cheerfully says, suddenly appearing with a couple of plates of cake in her hands. She sets them down on the table next to the Navis, who shuffle to the side to make room.

"Thank you, Mrs. Hikari," Raika says, smiling. He hasn't yet had the pleasure of eating Mrs. Hikari's cakes, but the dinner she made yesterday was amazing.

"I think I've already told you once before to just call me Haruka," Mrs. Hikari tells him, tutting playfully. "There's no need for such formalities while you're our guest, Raika!"

"Ah- y-yes, ma'am." He winces as soon as the words are out of his mouth. A force of habit, this formality, even if people insist that he can drop it.

Mrs. Hikari - Haruka, even - sighs with a faint smile, as if fondly exasperated by his manners. Raika, personally, thinks that you should always be polite to your hosts, regardless of whether they insist otherwise, because, well . . . at the risk of sounding slightly redundant, it's polite.

"Ain't even on-duty anymore," Mimic mumbles, speaking through a mouthful of cake. Raika doesn't bother correcting her appalling manners, because this is her home. "Don't need t'be so formal, dude."

"I'll be formal if I choose to be," Raika retorts lightly.

Mimic swallows her mouthful, and gives him a sly look. Raika's heart sinks when he sees that expression - he knows exactly what she's about to say even before she opens her mouth.

"What about Pride, eh?" Mimic sounds positively evil. If she hadn't helped to save the world multiple times already, Raika would almost be convinced that she's some sort of criminal mastermind, just by that expression alone. "Still formal with her?"

"Of course," Raika says stiffly. "The princess and I have a professional relationship, and that's it."

He sees SearchMan giving him a disbelieving look out of the corner of his eyes, and resolves to have a talk with his NetNavi about such blatant disrespect later. Honestly, he would expect this sort of behaviour from Mimic and Chaud, but from SearchMan, of all people? It's absurd.

Mimic leans close, grinning with all her teeth. "Bet that ain't the only relationship y'got. C'mon, everyone can see it! Even Lan."

Lan looks up from the dining table, where he's attempting to do some homework. "What?"

"Nothing," Raika says, at the same time that Mimic says, "Raika's bein' a prude."

Lan looks even more mystified than before, and Raika shoots Mimic a half-hearted glare. Her only response is to somehow grin even wider than before, which is frankly unsettling given how sharp her teeth are.

Raika sighs in frustration, turning away to stubbornly scowl at his untouched slice of cake, and gently shoves Mimic away from him. "How are you even more annoying without your twin brother around?"

Mimic whimpers.

Raika's frustration with her vanishes in an instant, replaced with a brief spark of surprise and then sudden panic when he turns to look at her, and sees her terrified expression, staring at him with wide eyes.

He curses himself immediately - why did he shove her, when he knows what she's been through? What she was almost driven to as a result of that? Even if the shove was gentle, it was still a shove, and he shouldn't have done that.

Then he realises that she's staring through him, not at him.

"Mimic!" Arcadia exclaims, his hologram appearing in front of her. She barely even reacts, and Arcadia steps forward on thin air, arms half-raised but hesitating to touch her.

"The fuck's wrong with her?" Bass demands. There's a scowl on his face, but there's obvious worry, too. "She got a glitch of some kind?"

"Humans don't get glitches," SearchMan reminds him.

"Is everything alright?"

Raika jumps and looks up. Dr. Hikari standing nearby, looking puzzled, and then he sees his daughter's terrified expression and his eyes widen.

"Don't touch her!" Arcadia quickly tells him, before he can even move. "There's- there's something- hold on a moment, please!"

He stares at Mimic desperately, his entire body tense, and it takes Raika a few moments to realise that he's using his Empath Program to figure out what's wrong with his operator. It doesn't take very long, because the Empath Program - as far as Raika knows - is powerful, and in the hands of someone who knows how to use it, even more so. And Arcadia is the only NetNavi who has it.

Arcadia's eyes widen and he slumps in apparent shock. "It's not her."

"What?" Dr. Hikari, despite Arcadia telling him not to, takes a step forward. "What do you mean, it's not her? Arcadia-"

"It's Chaud."

Arcadia swallows, turns to look at them, at their shocked expressions.

"He's feeling so strongly right now that Mimic is feeling it, too," Arcadia tells them, voice shaking.

"Dad, what's going on?" Lan has slid out of his chair and is making his way over, worried. His mother follows him. "Is Mimic okay? What-"

Mimic suddenly flinches and lets out a yelp, hands going to the back of her head. Raika's startled to see a faint bruise on her cheek, suddenly, and he can't imagine where that came from, because no one's even touched her.

She looks up, and her eyes meet Raika's. For an instant, her eyes are clear, but bright with fear.

"Help-" she croaks out, and then cuts herself off with a loud shriek and flinches into a crouch on the sofa, making an odd groan that sounds more like the kind of noise a wounded animal might make.

This is already startling enough to witness, whatever's going on, but Raika is horrified to see a faint trickle of blood running down the side of her face.

Haruka comes forward, eyes wide and hands reaching out to her daughter, and Mimic sees her coming and frantically reaches out as well, gurgling another plea for help. Then her eyes widen, and she just barely manages to scramble away and stick her head over the side of the sofa before she vomits.

Dr. Hikari freezes where he's standing, and Haruka covers her mouth with her hands, letting out a startled cry. Lan looks completely horrified, and so do the NetNavis - though Arcadia's horror is even more substantial than anyone else's.

It's seeing Arcadia's expression that makes Raika remember - the connection between Mimic and Chaud, the thing that links their souls even though they're in separate bodies now. It lets them sense and feel whatever emotions the other is feeling, lets them speak to each other mentally if they're close enough.

And that very same connection lets them feel physical sensations from each other.

If Mimic's sudden terror is coming from Chaud, that means whatever pain she's in right now is also coming from him. There's only one thing Raika can think of that would explain something as horrible as this, and he feels cold - colder than he ever could be even in one of Sharo's famous snowstorms - at the realisation.

Mimic's fit - because there's no other word that can be used to describe it - subsides after a few minutes. It still feels almost like an eternity, especially when no one can touch her, because Arcadia stops them from doing so, worried that touching Mimic will spark a panic attack or something. She obviously doesn't need that on top of this fit.

Only when Mimic is crouching, curled up on the sofa, and gasping for air does Arcadia allow anyone to touch her. But before her parents can even move forward, Mimic pushes herself up, and Raika sees a hard glint in her eyes a moment before she slides off the sofa and stumbles toward the door.

"Mimic!" Dr. Hikari exclaims, reaching out. "What are you-"

Mimic makes a ragged noise, almost a growl, and he backs off immediately. Raika looks at the Hikaris, sees how scared and worried they are. He sees sudden understanding dawning on Lan's horrified expression, and that's what spurs him into movement.

Raika gets off the sofa and follows Mimic. He catches up to her just as she gets into the hallway and staggers to a halt, shaking, and he reaches out to steady her.

He nearly gets his hand bitten off for his efforts, but Mimic's wild anger gives way to recognition when she sees him, and she stops.

"Let me help," Raika says. "Please."

She won't be able to walk around in this state. He knows a concussion when he sees one - even if Mimic can find Chaud, there's no guarantee that they'll be able to make it back here without help. Two concussed kids, wandering around the city on their own? That's practically a disaster in the making.

Arcadia's Navi-hologram appears on Mimic's shoulder, and then Bass appears on her other shoulder. SearchMan appears on Raika's own shoulder, too, and Mimic looks at all of them, still with some of that wild rage in her eyes, and eventually nods.

Dr. Hikari steps into the hallway, making Raika and Mimic glance over at him. Lan and Haruka are peering around the doorway behind him.

"I'll call Dr. Amano," Dr. Hikari says. He's obviously speaking to both of them, but his eyes are fixed on Mimic. "Find him. Bring him back, please."

Mimic mumbles something that's clearly not even an attempt at speech, but it seems to be enough for Dr. Hikari. He nods, and turns to his son and wife.

"Do we have any ice in the freezer?" Dr. Hikari asks.

Haruka vanishes immediately. "I'll get some!"

Dr. Hikari looks at Lan, next. "There should be a first aid kit in the bathroom."

Lan nods, and then vanishes after his mother with one last scared look at Raika and Mimic.

Raika turns to Mimic, gently places a hand on her shoulder - being careful not to disturb Arcadia in the process - and they head out of the Hikari household and onto the streets. Their only guide is Mimic's connection with Chaud, but it's strong enough that even in this state, she can follow it easily.


It's cold, even with the sun shining in the sky. He should've thought to grab a coat or something, but he can't exactly go back and get one - forget losing his eyes, Father would just kill him immediately. And then ProtoMan would be next.

Poor ProtoMan, whose only crime was defending his operator from an abusive father.

Chaud sits, huddled against a wall, and tries to salvage whatever warmth he can with the clothes he's wearing. No coat, just his normal clothes, and absolutely nothing to protect him from the cold.

When Mimic was on the streets, it was raining almost constantly. For Chaud, it's unbearably cold.

"Chaud?" ProtoMan's faint, meek voice speaks up, and Chaud blinks as his Navi flickers into view on his knees. "C'mon, you gotta keep moving . . . You'll freeze if you stay like this . . ."

"Can't," Chaud mumbles through half-frozen lips, huddling a little tighter, for all the good it does. "Too tired. Cold."

It's ironic, isn't it? The cat-boy with nearly-boundless energy is tired. He's betting it has something to do with the cold, actually. Cats tend to get less activate in extreme temperatures, whether it's cold or hot. That obviously applies to him, too, for all that he's still mostly human. Superhuman, anyway.

"Chaud, please, just keep moving," ProtoMan begs, leaning forward and planting his hands on Chaud's numb cheeks. "Please, please, just get up, get moving, please!"

Chaud's breath turns to mist as he breathes out. At the very least, the dizziness is slowly being replaced with numb tiredness - it's still bad, of course, and he knows that, but at least being tired doesn't make him want to throw up like being dizzy does.

Then he jerks his head up, startling ProtoMan, and looks around.

"What is it?" ProtoMan asks. He looks torn between hope and fear. "Chaud?"

"Mimic," Chaud whispers. His Navi jolts in surprise, and Chaud forces his nearly frozen limbs to uncurl. "Mimic!"

He can sense her. She's nearby, somewhere, and he couldn't tell until now because he was too cold, too tired, too hurt to think properly.

He reaches out mentally, and she responds in kind. Relief floods through their connection, warm and welcoming, and Chaud's energy sparks back just enough to allow him to get to his feet.

Footstep by painful footstep, he forces himself to the entrance of the alley, just in time to see his twin sister dart across the road - narrowly avoiding a car in the process. There's no time to think about that, because she's launching herself at him the absolute second she's close enough, and even though she feels just as cold as him, he's glad to have someone's arms around him.

He needs it, he thinks.

While he's focused on Mimic, he doesn't hear familiar footsteps following her until Raika is standing next to them. Chaud blinks up at him, trying to work out why he's here - and then he remembers that Raika's currently staying at the Hikari house.

Raika looks him over for a moment, then takes off his coat. Before Chaud can protest, Raika is gently prying them apart, and then he wraps the coat around Chaud. Mimic immediately reattaches herself to Chaud as soon as she's able to.

"Aren't- a-aren't you- this is- aren't you gonna b-be- be cold?" Chaud asks Raika.

Raika smiles sadly. "I'm from Sharo, remember," he gently teases, reaching out to brush a hand through Chaud's hair. "This is practically summer for me. Come on, Dr. Hikari told us to bring you back."

Home, Mimic adds silently.

Home, Chaud echoes.

That word feels almost foreign to him.


Chaud barely remembers the journey, to be honest. At some point, he seems to have lost the use of his legs, and Raika carries him on his back the rest of the way, with Mimic clinging onto his arm. It seems like Raika is the only thing keeping both of them upright, though Chaud's worse off than Mimic is, and it's only her worry for Chaud that's keeping her on her own two feet.

It's practically a blur, getting to the Hikari household. One moment he's half-conscious on Raika's back, numb fingers clutching Mimic's hand, and then the next he's sitting on a sofa with Dr. Amano shining a light into his eyes.

There's a blanket around him, and a warm ball of fluff on his lap. Ragdoll, his numb mind supplies. Mimic's still next to him - she hasn't left his side even once - and he can see ProtoMan on the table with the other Navis around him, and he's clutching at Arcadia like a lifeline.

That's good, Chaud thinks. He can't comfort ProtoMan right now, and his shadows won't be enough - so it's good that the others can do it instead.

"Concussion," Dr. Amano reports, sitting back on her haunches and glancing over her shoulder at Dr. Hikari. "Both of them, as far as I can tell. The effects will go away on their own, but if they persist, give me another call."

"Thank you," Dr. Hikari murmurs.

Dr. Amano nods, and glances at Chaud and Mimic. There's no reading that expression - it's carefully blank, and Chaud just barely has enough mental energy left to remember Hatsuko Amano and everything that happened with her, and how politely cold Dr. Amano has been with them since then.

But after a moment, Dr. Amano's carefully blank expression softens, and then she leaves.

Haruka replaces her, gently fussing over both of them. Chaud flinches at her touch, unable to stop himself, and Haruka purses her lips and looks to be holding back tears. Meanwhile, Lan and Raika hover in the background, keeping their distance but each sporting equally-worried expressions.

Dr. Hikari looks at Chaud for a long, long moment, and then his expression tightens with cold determination.

"I'm calling the police," Dr. Hikari says.

And Chaud doesn't have it in him to say 'no'.


Continued in Mimic: Intermission - Beast