All right… no one got where Bobby came from. So I guess I'll give the cookie to LazerWulf for at least trying. Anyways, Bobby was ripped from my personal favorite show: Sue Thomas F. B. Eye, a brilliant Christian drama about a deaf woman who works in the FBI.

Enough of that, once this little romance escapade is finished, the next few chapters will be entirely devoted to resolving the MegaMan DS issue. And hopefully, they'll be better than the last few.

10101010101010101010101010101

"Lan, you open this door right now!" Maylu pounded her fist against the unyielding surface. "We've got to talk!"

Silence, no reply came from the room.

In frustration, the redhead raised her hand, and slammed it against the door. A loud bang echoed through the hallway as her hand met the metal. Again, she hit the doorway to no avail, Lan wouldn't respond.

"So help me, if you don't open that door!"

More silence.

Maylu felt her anger building. True, she had overreacted when Chaud had broken the news to her, but given the circumstances, wouldn't anyone? If Lan would just give her the time of day, she could straighten out this entire mess, and then straighten him out some.

"Last warning!"

Same old silence.

With a groan of annoyance, Maylu reached up and unfastened the Sakurai Crest hair clip, with practiced precision she bent out the pin so that it was extended from the flat disk. Then, satisfied with her tool, she used her left hand to feel out the doorknob. Once she had located the knob, she shoved the pin into the keyhole.

A few twists of the pin later, the redhead girl heard the lock give a barely audible click.

Smiling in success, the blind redhead removed the clip, and then placed her free hand on the doorway.

Then she shoved, hard.

The door went flying open, crashing against the adjacent wall and announcing her entrance.

"What- how did you get in here?" A welcome greeting from Lan's voice flooded the room.

"Look, I have a lot of free time on my hands, O.K.?" The redhead sighed as she replaced her hair accessory. "So let's just say that I've picked up a few miscellaneous skills. But that's beside the point, Lan, about what you saw-"

"What about it?" The brunette's voice came through the air, and he wasn't making any effort to hide the bitterness infecting it. "If you and Chaud want to be a couple, go right ahead. I've lost MegaMan, so I might as well loose you too."

Maylu bit her lip; she was so frustrated that she felt like punching a wall, or maybe a certain brown-haired kid. But seeing as how she wasn't ready for that kind of stunt, she did the next best thing. It was extremely radical, but it never failed.

She felt her way over to the chair, and plunked herself down in it.

"Alright, listen up, Chaud and I are not a couple, nor where we discussing anything like that."

"Sure." Lan's voice was tense. "I bet you were just making dinner plans for the evening."

"Lan, Chaud's- I'm going to level with you. Blaze Quest has developed an experimental surgery… one that could restore my sight."

Silence, evidently the brunette had been stunned into listening.

"And Chaud's asked me if I would be willing to undergo it. So that's why I was hugging him, I… I was just overjoyed at the thought of getting my sight back."

"You- you aren't lying to me?"

"No, I'm not. This is the truth." Maylu spoke honestly.

"Wait a minute, Chaud's company is in the game making business. They don't do medical work." Lan pointed out that minor discrepancy.

"Blaze Quest Games does the game work. But Chaud runs a separate company, Blaze Medical, they specialize in developing new treatments."

"I've never heard of it."

Maylu sighed silently; sometimes Lan could be so dense… "Chaud created Blaze Medical to stay under the radar. He didn't want the reporters digging into it-"

"Uh huh, that sounds real nice."

"Because it was created in honor of his mother."

"His mother? What's she got to do with this?"

"His mother died when he was young." Maylu skipped over her own ideas about Chaud's handling of that situation. "He lost her to HBD-"

Maylu's words were cut off as Lan made a shocked interjection.

"HBD!" The Op's voice was filled with disbelief.

"Um, yes..." The redhead uneasily replied, "Why's that surprise you?"

"I don't really want to talk about it... as you were saying?"

Bewildered over Lan's words, Maylu realized that she didn't have a choice but to continue her explination. "Uh, that's why he started Blaze Medical, to find a cure for the disease, but now it's branched out into many different areas of pharmaceutical work. And he doesn't want it turning into a media circus because of that fact."

"Oh… and you're actually going through with this? Taking an experimental surgery?" Lan expressed his doubt over the idea of his loved friend becoming a guinea pig.

"Its already been tested." The redheaded girl replied, "And it's worked in about 75 percent of the people who tried it. You see; I lost my sight because the nerves connecting my optical areas to my eyes were damaged. This surgery fixes that… by artificial means."

"You mean, you'd be walking around with bits of metal in your head."

"You know, you have a way of making this sound so crude. It's not like that, it's actually a fake nerve that's being developed..."

"I see." Lan's weary voice came through the room. "I see… no offense… alright, if you're willing to try this, then you've got my support. Maylu, I may act like a jerk at times, but I'll always be there for you."

"Thanks, Lan, that means a lot to me." The redheaded girl stood up. "And Raoul just called, MegaMan's been spotted heading for YumLand, Chaud's working on getting us set up to fly there. Hang in there, we'll get him back before too much longer."

101010101010101010101010101010

"He thinks himself so powerful…" Bass watched the Net Navi creeping around the YumLand Network. Ordinarily, he'd have ignored such a pitifully small fry, but this Navi might have an effect on his plans.

The Navi was DracoMan.

"Pathetic." The Solo Navi thought to himself. Shifting his position slightly to get a better view, the UnderNet champion studied the brown Navi. It was obvious that DracoMan was training, and training hard. The Navi was challenging viruses left and right, fencing against them with a long blade, and then stopping every so often to form a white dragon-like virus to blow others away.

"Yet he does have an interesting ability…" The thoughts ran through Bass' mind at a fast clip. From his observations, Bass had seen that DracoMan was capable of creating one powerful customized virus, but the ability didn't appeal to him in the least, Bass had his own style, and that style served him well.

For the moment, the cloaked Navi consoled himself to wait. First he'd see if this pathetic Navi could influence his plans at all, and then he'd make his move.

Unaware that he was being watched, DracoMan continued to practice his skills. He had already failed his master once, and he would not allow that to happen again. As a warrior, it was his duty to fight for his master's honor. In his previous match, he had tarnished that honor. Now he would reclaim his dignity, and the nobleness of his Operator's name.

"Now, DracoMan." The Navi felt his operator restore the connection with his P.E.T. Which could only mean one thing… "I want this to be perfect."

"Yes sir." The dragon Navi tried to get into perfect sync with his Operator.

"Poison Mask, Poison Face, Anubis, Battle Chips in, Download. "

"Program Advance!"

YumLand International Airport.

"It's an E-mail from Laika." Lan announced as he skimmed over his terminal's screen.

"Well? What's he say?" Maylu wanted to know as she disembarked from the aircraft, and onto YumLand soil.

"He says that Otis is after MegaMan too." The brunette's voice was hard. "He won't hesitate to delete MegaMan if he finds him... And I'm not going to let that happen."

Chaud also stepped off of the Blaze jet while turning over this new development in his mind. He'd heard that Otis could be ruthless, but he'd never expected this.

"Don't worry, Lan. We'll get him back, as long as we have these Vaccine Chips then it'll be easy." Maylu voiced her opinion.

"I don't know, they've never worked in the past." The brunette shrugged in disbelief. The day a Vaccine Chip worked would be the day the Network stood still.

Before the girl could reply, a shrill siren cut through the air, stopping all form of conversation.

"What is it?" Maylu shouted over the noise, whatever it was, it didn't sound good at all.

"If I had to guess," Chaud screamed over the blaring horn, "I'd say that we won't have to go looking for MegaMan, he's coming to us!"

"Chaud, I'm receiving an E-mail." ProtoMan cranked his P.E.T.'s volume to the max in an effort to be heard over the ruckus. "It's from KendoMan… he says that he and MegaMan have taken over the mainframe of the airport… And that they're refusing to allow any aircraft into or out of the complex until we wire one million Zenny over into the a Nebular bank account."

"They're holding the airport hostage?" Maylu couldn't believe her ears; she'd never suspected that the two Dark Navi would stoop this low.

"We've got to stop them." The Official barked, taking command of the situation. "There's no way that the governments will give into that kind of demand, so we'll have to take them out."

"Just tell me where to Jack-in." The blind girl agreed.

Lan glanced about, and finally spotted a small terminal, half hidden behind a display of shrubbery. With a brief explanation, he grabbed up Maylu's hand and guided her over to the spot with Chaud trailing after them.

After Maylu had felt out the connection, she raised her terminal and checked to see it Roll was ready. Once she had received an affirmative reply she launched into her familiar sequence.

"Jack in, Roll, Power Up!"

"Jack in, ProtoMan, Power Up!"

"Hang in there, Mega." Roll whipped across space towards the Network. "We'll get you back… just hold on…"

1010101010101010101010101010

Lousy place to stop, I know, but the next battle is going to be insane, and I didn't want the chapter to get too long.

Yep, I dodged the romance issue once again. Before this fic is over, Maylu will choose either Lan or Chaud, but not yet… And only I know who it is!

Next: Chaos Battle!