Enzan was certainly getting near that point, though. He was beginning to feel an odd, sharp pain in his chest that had nothing to do with his own body, he was sure of that. Somehow he knew that it was somehow connected to Netto, and if the pain he was feeling was bad, he couldn't begin to imagine what Netto was going through. He didn't want to think about it, or the calm mask he had put on would break in a second.
"Any luck?" Enzan asked after awhile. The Net Police had spread their search out to the area surrounding the hospital, but Enzan had been told to stay with Yuuichiro.
"I've been able to analyze the Pet's data log, and from what I can tell, Rockman escaped into the net just before the Pet was destroyed," Yuuichiro said, with a hint of relief in his tone. "So Rockman is somewhere on the net. I fear he may be damaged though, so its imperative that we find him as quickly as possible."
"So that we can find Netto."
"Exactly."
"I'll have Blues start looking, then."
Yuuichiro nodded and smiled wanly. "Thank you, Enzan."
"Just for the record, I told you this was a bad idea!" Laika growled as he and Pyp ran from a pack of Garuu that had caught sight of them. Beside him Pyp just managed a grin as she ran, too out of breath to actually speak. The snow made running difficult, but at least the Garuu were having just as much trouble. Of course, they had four feet instead of two, and were slowly gaining on their human prey.
"Okay, this is pointless," Pyp gasped as she stopped and turned to face the pack of Garuu.
"Pyp, what are you going?!" Laika cried as he skidded to a stop as well, turning just in time to see Pyp throw something at the viruses, something that looked like it had a fuse...
The viruses paused for a moment to look at the object that Pyp had thrown. That was more than enough time for the pack of firecrackers, for that was what Pyp had thrown, to explode, deleting most of the viruses, and scaring the few remaining ones away.
"You couldn't do that earlier?" Laika asked, slowly regaining his breath.
"Uh..I forgot that I had those in my bag. I got a bunch of stuff like that actually. Comes in handy when Sketch needs someone to create a distraction. Looks like this stuff comes in handy for fighting viruses too," Pyp replied with a grin as her breathing returned to normal.
"That's good for now, but what happens when you run out of firecrackers?" Laika growled.
"Improvise?" Pyp offered with a giggle. "I'll think about that when it happens. What I want to know is where we should go from here."
"Don't look at me for directions, I have no idea where we are," Laika replied.
The area they were standing in was nothing more than a narrow street lined with dull, snow covered buildings that all looked the same. None of the buildings had windows, and all the doors were covered with sheets of metal. They looked like warehouses.
"None of this looks familiar to me, either, and I know most of the city pretty well. I'll plug Twenty-six into one of those buildings' computers and see if she can't get some directions."
Laika nodded, willing to go along with that plan. Pyp handed him a pack of firecrackers and a lighter, just in case another pack of viruses showed up while she was figuring out where they were. Brushing the snow off of the port on the I.D. terminal, Pyp quickly plugged her Pet into in.
"Hey!" Pyp cried with alarm. "Twenty-six's signal disappeared!"
"What?" Laika exclaimed, dropping the firecrackers into the snow. "Move over. Searchman, see if you can't find out where she went."
"Yes, Laika-sama."
Laika plugged his Pet into the port as well, but no sooner than he had done so, Searchman's signal vanished as well! At the same moment a menacing growl behind them alerted Pyp and Laika to the fact that the remaining Garuu were back, and the two humans had nowhere to run this time.
Just as the Garuu lunged at Laika and Pyp two shots hit the viruses, deleting them while sending up a flurry of snow. Before the other viruses could escape they were deleted as well. When the snow resettled the viruses were gone, and standing in their place was Searchman and Twenty-six!
Nomde watched Netto for a few minutes, then strode out of the room with a pleased smile on his face. So far everything was going very well. His darkness was spreading across the city, and where ever his shadow touched the net and the real world were beginning to merge. Very soon the humans would know just who was the ruler over all things!
"Nomde-sama, a Net Savior has been spotted near the station, puku," Bubbleman said, suddenly appearing.
"Enzan?" Nomde demanded, feeling a very slight pang of fear.
Bubbleman shook his head. "The Sharro Net Savior, Laika, puku. There's someone else with him, puku. I don't know who it is though, puku."
"Just get rid of them," Nomde said, waving his hand absently. As long as it wasn't Enzan. That he'd even felt that tiny pang of fear irritated him greatly. Why should he fear a simple human, especially when he had Netto in his control?
Enzan wouldn't dare come after him for fear that Nomde would kill Netto. Not that Nomde didn't already plan to, just not quite yet. Still...It was better to be safe than sorry. He had no intention of going to Enzan, though. If he still felt fear from the thought of that human, then chances were there was a reason for that fear, and Nomde was not going to risk his neck when he could get someone else to do it instead. It was time to put in another call to his favorite mercenary.
