-Mega Man Battle Network --Shadows of the Past ---Chapter 1: Introductions in Order

Around the time of the Gospel incident, I hadn't been fortunate enough to get a PET in the backwater town I lived in. The town was behind the times and I knew it, reminders came to me everyday in different forms that I was a part of it all. It wasn't until my dad's workplace had him relocated to ACDC Town in Electopia when I had to get one for school, in fact, nearly the whole town operated on a PET. I was Rioichi Lon, or Rio as I preferred to be called. My family had just moved to ACDC Town when the whole mess started...

It was Sunday, a rainy Sunday and I was combing my thin black hair. I liked the way my hair hung down in front of my eyes, it gave a mysterious impression I thought. I had all ready dressed in my usual clothes, some black shorts, blue shirt, and a gray jacket over top. As soon as I stepped out of the bathroom, my mom was waiting there for me in the hall. She had piercing brown eyes that demanded attention and it was a bad move to ignore her, she wasn't afraid to throw a punch.

"Aren't you ready yet? You need to get a PET before Monday, you understand?"

"Yeah, I know, I'm going. Don't worry."

We got a paper via my father's PET his work assigned him, there was an auction, and several of the items up for bid were PETs. This was my chance, but since we had just moved in, there wasn't an alarm clock so the majority of the time I could have spent going toward the auction, I was in the bathroom. By the time I was out of the house and moving toward the bus stop I think the auction was halfway over with. I wouldn't know for sure until I arrived in Dentown Block 1 where the auction was being held. The paper said it was in a warehouse. Yeah, I thought it sounded pretty shady, but my mom assured me earlier that there would be plenty of signs to get me there.

The streets of ACDC Town were barren because of the crappy weather, and so was the bus stop. Luckily, I didn't have to wait long before a bus rolled up and opened up its doors. One thing I wasn't use to in Electopia was all the autopilot transportation. Where I came from, mostly everything was manual. I couldn't help wondering what would happen if the system went haywire or broke down. It didn't take long before the bus dropped me off and onto the rainy streets of Dentown. This place was huge. Even though the paper narrowed it down to one block, I still felt like a mouse in a maze looking for the cheese.

But like my mom told me, there was signs so I quickly located the warehouse and stepped through it's open doors. My heart jumped seeing all the items left for bid, they must have almost begun to wrap it up! I grabbed a program and took a seat near the back and flipped through, sighing in relief that there was still one more PET up for bid. They went through some junk like servers and chips and so forth before they got around to the item I was interested in. Some man in a dark suit brought it up and set it on the table as the auctioneer grabbed his hammer to begin bidding.

I could hardly contain myself and shot my hand up before it even began. Some of the people in front of me looked back with surprised expressions. Even the auctioneer seemed pretty surprised I was bidding. No one else in the room even gave the smallest bit of suspicion they were going to raise their hand and no one did. Not even the auctioneer did his "going, going, gone" routine. My bid? It was a mere 500 zenny, and instantly I felt suspicious. A new guy in town, everyone is acting so surprised I bought this thing, and even the auctioneer is relieved to let this PET go. Yeah, something is definitely going on.

People were clearing out as I fought my way to the front where the auctioneer was organizing some papers. The pudgy, bald guy set his hammer down on the podium and set the papers down on the table next to the PET when I finally got to him.

"So, what's wrong with the PET?" I began sternly.

He looked up as if I asked the stupidest question in the world.

"Nothing's wrong." He answered calmly.

"What do you mean, 'nothing's wrong'? No one else in the room even acted like it existed, and to add on top of it, it's only 500 zenny! It's busted isn't it?"

The guy sighed and took a pen out of his pocket before shoving it into my hand.

"I saw you come in late, so I'll give you a break. The PET used to belong to a mercenary who tried to hack the Mother Comp of Electopia. The Navi inside got all the way to the CPU before being deleted. The mercenary was caught later and everything was taken. You do know this is an Offical Netbattler's auction right? Everything here was confiscated from criminal organizations."

Wow, that was pretty heavy for me to take at the moment. I gave a quick glance toward the PET and looked over it's purple designs. Then I looked back at the guy, angry. If this thing was involved in a huge hacking operation, I wanted no part of it. I just came here, I wasn't looking to get arrested.

"Really? You mean, the Navi I'd be using committed criminal acts? Just what are you trying to do here? Frame me?"

"No no." The guy waved his hand in a frustrated manner. "The entire system of the PET was reformatted. Meaning the Navi's memory was wiped clean. It's completely legal to use this unit... But uh, don't expect other people to forget what it's done."

"I want another one." I demanded.

I think I went to far cause the guy nearly shoved the papers down my throat when he picked them up and threw them at me.

"Look kid, sign the papers, take the PET, and get out!"

Angrily, I scribbled down my name and picked the unit up making an about face and exiting the warehouse. That had taken about fifteen minutes, so I had plenty of time to go home and brood over my new purchase. Involved in hacking a mother computer? Of Electopia? Some reason, I knew I wasn't getting the full story but I really didn't want to think about it. When I got back on the bus, it had people which left me a seat in the back. There was a bunch of people my age and a business woman all working on their own PETs. Suddenly I had an urge to turn mine on, but the speech the guy made about all that criminal stuff, I was scared what I would find.

A mercenary huh? Wonder if he killed anyone? It was guaranteed he deleted plenty of crap, illegally. This was freaking me out. Say I turn this thing on and suddenly I'm wanted for some international incident? The bus jerked coming to a stop at ACDC Town and snapped me out of my trance. I must have been really out of it, cause the business woman and the other people were gone. I headed home when I got off the bus, still looking down at my own PET... Well, maybe it was still that mercenary guy's...

Soon a droplet of rain hit the screen, I put it under my jacket and began to run home as the rain came hammering down on the area. There was no way I was going to find my route to school in this weather. Hm... Maybe I could catch one of the local kids and make a new friend? Then it hit me, I was freaking lost in a freaking small town. None of the houses looked familiar. Nothing did actually. Now I was losing it, maybe I got off on the wrong stop? I took shelter under an overhang of a house and gazed out at the darkened streets, then it hit me.

Maybe this PET thing had a map of the area? Or at least it could find one. I was desperate, so I hesitantly switched it on. The screen came up much like a normal computer desktop with a design of a ninja star in the background, but that's when he popped up scaring me half to death. Didn't think much of it at the time, but he looked really cool. A ninja type navi, with a red scarf and dark purple suit. I think he was looking me over before he said anything and eventually spoke up.

"Greetings, master..." His voice trailed off waiting for a name.

"Rioichi, I mean Rio." I stuttered.

"Master Rio, it is then. I am Shadow Man, your Navi."

Naw... Something didn't sound right the way he addressed me. I had read before that most owners of navis were called operators so I figured maybe he should call me "Operator Rio". That didn't sound right either, sounded like some Datawood Movie. I finally decided on just calling me Rio.

"Hey, Shada... Uh... What was your name again?"

I think he gave a quiet chuckle and then nodded.

"Shadow Man." He told me again.

"Right, Shadow Man, why don't you just call me Rio?"

"Rio? Fine with me."

Now that the introductions were all in order, I decided to get to the situation at hand.

"Hey Shadow Man, I'm kind of lost. Is there some map you can pull up for me or something?"

"Well, yes and no. I could easily pull up a map if I was jacked into a computer."

Hm... He left me in the dust there and I scratched my head trying to figure it all out.

"Confused? There should be a cord you can pull out of the PET, you use that to plug in to jack-in ports. Are you near a bus stop?"

"I just came from one..."

"Go back to it." He ordered me.

Man, his voice was so calm. Kind of cold almost, but at least one of us was thinking straight. I sprinted through the rain and went back to the bus stop. Shadow Man told me to find a port in the booth where the bench was. Least it was dry in there and eventually I found what I was looking for. I plugged it in and told him that I had.

"Good, now just sit tight."

He gave a bow and suddenly the screen changed to show him "inside the net" as I had read before we moved over here. Looked like a pretty big place, he didn't go far before coming up to a scrawny looking green blob. Said it was a program or something and the screen changed back to the desktop set up. Shadow Man was downloading something, eventually a map popped up.

"There's your map, you can use it at any time..."

He stopped in the middle of the sentence and put one of his hands to his chin like he was thinking about something.

"What?"

"This all seems, kind of familiar in a way." He explained slowly.

Now I was kind of hesitant to tell him that he was actually reformatted. Maybe he wouldn't know what that meant? Naw... Shadow Man knew more about PETs and jacking in than I did. He wasn't stupid.

"Well, that happens. De Jevu right?" I told him finally.

"It's not important. We need to get home right? Ok, now jack me out."

Shadow Man was out of the bus network and back in the PET as I hit a button on the screen. It was touch sensitive, neat. He brought up the map and gave me directions when I found out I was in the right town after all. To my relief I got home and went in the front door finally home and out of the rain. I could see mom in the kitchen and she could see me putting down some pans and moving over to me.

"Oh good, you got a navi after all. You were late so I figured you didn't get there in time and had to wonder around the city."

"Oh no, I got it. Pretty good bid too. Only 500 zenny."

She frowned and wiped her hands on her apron.

"Only 500? Is there some sort of defect?" She sounded kind of annoyed.

"Oh no, it's working fine. Say hello Shadow Man." I said offering her the device.

Thinking back, I wish I could have given him some warning about my mom, you know, to be extremely polite or something like that. That she has a short temper, you know, something along those lines.

"Hello. Your son didn't have the time to tell me your family's last name." Shadow Man greeted in a smooth voice.

Crap! Forgot about that back under the house's overhang!

"Mrs. Lon." She informed him.

"Greetings Mrs. Lon, I hope to be of service to your son as well as your family as his Navi." He gave a bow as he spoke.

Well, if there something I could say about Shadow Man right off, he was pretty damn polite and to the point. There was no way you were going to catch him being sarcastic. Eventually she gave it back to me and gave an approving nod.

"Good Rio, you'll be ready for your first day of school tomorrow."

She then moved back towards the kitchen as I moved closer to my room.

"Whew, you handled that perfectly Shadow Man." I sighed.

"Something wrong?" He asked casually.

"My mom is kind of hard to please. She's very..."

"Strict." He finished for me.

I nodded and could see him give another silent laugh.

"They often make the best teachers Rio."

I guess that was true, I never really thought about it that way. I made my way into my room to see it all set up, well the bed and computer and recharging station for the PET my dad received from work as a condition of moving all the way out here. The bed just called to me and I collapsed onto it. My mind wondered back to the fact that Shadow Man was reformatted, used in a hacking scheme a long time ago. The Mother Computer of the country I was living in.

"Shadow Man..." I started slowly. "Do you... remember anything..."

"What would I remember?" He asked instantly catching on to the meaning of my question.

"Well... Your... reformatted... I was told that... well..."

"Something concerning a part of my past that I will never recall? We will cross that bridge when we get to it, but right now. The past it the past. The only thing I am concentrated on is now and the future, Rio." He reassured me.

Well, I slowly set him back on the recharging station and collapsed back into my bed. I think I got lucky getting a navi like him to start out with. Tomorrow would be a whole score of firsts for me, and I guess for Shadow Man too. Perhaps... maybe they might recognize him... But... Naw.