Author's Note: You should know by now that I don't own Mega-Man Battle Network or any of it's characters.

S. Rain; I was wondering if I'd hear from you. Yeah, that's probably the worst summary I've ever written, consider the cliffhanger a 'gimme' because there's a terrible one in a later chapter. By the way, I did rewrite the ending of Network Error.

Dragonfang, Thanks! I'm doing my best!

The rest of this fic takes is written from Maylu's point of view.


Thursday 9:34 AM: Dan Tech City Hospital.

Darkness.

Empty, oppressing darkness. That was all I could see; at first I had been terrified, but now, now I was beginning to wonder if I had ever really been able to see at all. Everything I remembered felt like a dream, you couldn't tell if it was real or if you were remembering it correctly.

"Good Morning!" A voice drifted into my room.

"Lan?" I asked, grateful that someone was there. "You're back?"

"Of course." The voice replied.

"Hey, I'm here too!" Mega-Man's voice cried out, "Don't forget about the Navi!"

"Lan," I asked as I stared into the darkness that had become my world, "what are we going to do?"

"About what?"

"Please, Lan." I begged. Reading people's feelings had never been his strong point. "Try to follow me on this. I can't see, so now I can't use my P-E-T, or take you guys on in Netbattles, my life's been turned upside down. There's so much I can't do now, I'm just afraid..."

For once in his life, Lan kept quiet.

"That you all will leave me." I finished.

"Of course we won't!" I felt Lan's hand enter my own, "We'd never forget you just because you can't see. We like you because you're Maylu, and you'll always be her."

"Thanks, Lan." I whispered.

"I mean it too." Lan's voice continued, "By the way, did I tell you? I just finished registering us in that Tag-Team Tournament. We're going to be a team!"

"But, I can't..." He didn't understand, I couldn't see, how would I know what Chip Roll needed? How could I even tell one Chip from another? I couldn't even tell who was in the room, much less tell one cartridge from another. We wouldn't last long with my handicap, would we?

"The only limit on what you can do is the limit you place on yourself," Lan explained to me, "So we'll find a way to make it possible."

"There's more news." The Op's voice continued from the darkness. "The doctors say that you might be able to go home this evening."

"Really?" I would have to learn a new way of life, and they were already sending me home?

"It's true, I just talked to them," Lan confirmed his statement.

Thursday 5:45 PM: Sakurai house.

I felt the car stop moving, after a few seconds the door on my right opened up, and I felt a hand grip mine.

"I'll help you." My Dad's voice greeted my ears, "Do you think that you can make it to the door?"

"I'll try." I answered as I stood up; I was still shaky on my feet, and my steps were slow and hesitant. As I carefully moved forward, I half expected everyone to grow frustrated at my slowness.

"Were almost there." Mom's voice came to me, "Watch those steps!"

I inched forward, and shifted the cane that the doctors had given to me, as they put it: 'Because you can't see what's in front of you, you'll have to feel your way along with this.' Right after the Doctor had said that, it had sounded like Lan had come unglued, and lectured the guy on proper 'bedside manner'.

I felt the stick make contact with something hard and wide, it should be the steps leading up to the house.

After some hesitation, I moved forward. Before, I could have climbed up those stairs without a thought, now it was all so foreign, like I had to learn to walk all over again, and like I was always on the verge of falling over. However, by the time I reached the top step, some of my terror had subsided.

"I've got the door," Lan's voice reached my ears.

A few uncertain steps later, I entered the house, or at least, I thought I had. My Dad kept guiding me forward, until I realized that we had entered my room. Somehow, I managed to reach my bed, and I sat on it, drawing comfort from its unshifting presence.

"I'll stop by first thing tomorrow, Maylu, I promise." Again Lan's voice came through the darkness; it was followed by slow footsteps going toward the door.

"O.K., Lan, see you then." I answered.

Friday 9:54 AM: Sakurai Home.

"Lan didn't forget about us, did he?" I asked my Navi through the blackness.

"Of course not!" Roll replied, "Mega-Man will make sure of that! He probably just overslept like usual."

"I hope so." I honestly did, but the uncertainty nagged at me, what if he had already forgotten us?

"Maylu," Roll broke into my thoughts, "Maybe, maybe you need to do something, to- keep you occupied."

"To keep my mind off of Lan?" I corrected her, "I guess, I should, but what?"

"Um," My Navi's voice came to my ears. "Piano?"

"How can I see what note to play?" I felt like my world had ended, I had been playing the piano for as long as I could remember. Now that was gone too.

"We can at least try." Her voice said, "Maybe we'll figure something out."

"You guide me to it." With Roll's help I was able to slowly maneuver around the furniture to the instrument. As I sat down on the bench, I felt a slight sense of familiarity. I stretched out and touched the slick keys, and, almost subconsciously, found the 'Middle C' key, or at least I hoped I had.

At first I couldn't believe it, but as I started to play every note came out correctly. I played through one entire song from memory, then another, and finally a third. A calm feeling rushed over me as I sent the music through the air; maybe I wasn't as handicapped as I thought, my piano playing hadn't suffered at all from the blindness.

With a small grin I sat back, and a sound of clapping rang through the air.

I heard the welcome sound of: "Hi, Maylu, you're playing even better than ever!"

"Lan, I was beginning to worry." I replied, relieved that he hadn't forgotten about me. He must have entered the room sometime during my 'concert'.

"Sorry," Mega-Man's slightly digital voice reached my ears, "he just overslept."

"I've figured out how you can enter the Tournament, next week." Lan continued ignoring the insult, "With a little work, you can be battling like the pro's!"

"That's good," I smiled in the direction of his voice. "Before we go into that, I feel like I need some fresh air, why don't we go to the park?" I didn't tell him the real reason behind my desire to get out of the house, once I had stopped playing, the darkness had become so close, so oppressive, that I felt like I had to go someplace, and just to try and escape from it.

"Are you sure?" The Op asked me, "I mean, it's not going to be like before..."

"It's alright, Lan." I tried to ease him; "Me and my parents have already been out once this morning, and they said it would be alright, as long as you were with me."

"O.K. then," Lan agreed, "Let's go."

10:15 AM: Community Park.

"This feels better," I smiled as we walked along a path; it did feel better to be outside. I couldn't see anything and I couldn't explain it, but I could feel, or sense things in the park, which made me sure that the world still existed.

"I'm glad," Lan replied as he held onto my hand, "oh, great."

"What is it?" I asked.

"An obnoxious WWW agent named Maddy is headed our way."

I understood Lan's point. Maddy and me had never exactly gotten along very well, mildly speaking. And now that I had gone blind she was sure to have a heyday with my handicap.

"Well, kiddies." I heard Maddy's voice, "you on your way to the playground?"

"Just let us by." Lan said.

"Well, Maylu," She ignored Lan, "You ready for a rematch? Me and Wacko-Man are going to pound you!"

"Not today Maddy." I replied, trying to maintain some of my dignity. "I've got more important things to do."

"Really?" Her voice sounded like it was coming from another direction, "what's the matter with you? You haven't even looked at me! Gotten all high and mighty have you?"

I bit my lip, sooner or later she would find out about my accident. "Let's go Lan."

"Sure, run to your little friend for help, he couldn't save you last time!"

She already knew. That explained her weird behavior, of course with Maddy it was hard to tell when she was normal, and when she wasn't so normal. Her insult jabbed at me, Lan hadn't tried to hide what had happened, so I knew the truth, but for her to stoop so low... it made my blood boil.

"Hurts doesn't it?" The agent continued, "For you to know that he can't protect you. It's really all his fault that you're blind now isn't it?"

"Lan did his best!" I lashed out in rage, "And he's twice the battler you will ever be! Who're you going to go running to? Your boyfriend, that pyromaniac Match?"

"You leave him out of this!" Maddy retorted.

I felt a small sense of victory, evidently I'd struck a nerve. "I'll see you in the Tag-Team Tournament, be there."

"What?" Maddy sounded shocked.

"What's the matter?" I continued, "Didn't think I'd fight back? Lan and I entered the tournament, bring that fire loving partner of yours and we'll see you there!"

"Fine I will!" She snapped, her voice growing fainter, evidently she was storming off. "You'll regret those words!"

Things became eerily quiet.

"Good Night!" Lan broke the silence, "I thought for a second that you two would come to blows."

"I thought so too." I nodded for his benefit. "I just hope... I didn't get myself into a mess."

"Maylu..." Lan's voice was barely above a whisper. "Did you mean that?"

"Mean what?" I didn't understand him.

"About not blaming me for what happened." The Op continued. "She's right, it is my fault that you went blind."

"It's the truth." I replied. "And it's not your fault, it's WWW's. But we'd better get home, we've got a lot of work to do before this tournament."
To Be Continued on Tuesday.