Netto walked into his house and was immediately greeted by his cat and dog whining for food. Netto groaned and Rockman wouldn't hear it. "You make the worst pet owner ever, I swear. You left them for a day without food!"
Netto walked into the kitchen and pulled out the cat and dog food. "Rockman I left extra, see there's food left in the bowls," Netto said a pointed to the bowls.
"And water?" Rockman asked.
"There's water left too, Rockman. See, I'm not so bad, besides if it bugged you that much why didn't you yell at me last night?" Netto retorted. When he didn't receive and answer he snorted and said, "I thought so."
Rockman huffed, "Hey, just I don't yell at you as much as Enzan does about the way you live doesn't make it right."
Netto snorted and poured the dry kibble into the bowls. Almost immediately the cat and the dog sprinted to them and started eating furiously. "Don't you dare start harping on me. Not now," Netto said.
Rockman crossed his arms. "I'll save it for when you're in a better mood," he said.
Netto inclined his head almost mockingly, but not quite. "Thank you," he said.
The corners of Rockman's mouth quirked in a small smile. "No problem, as long as you promise me you'll go to bed."
"Fine, but you have to go into stasis mode too. We're both tired," Netto replied while filling up the water bowls.
Rockman nodded, "I still can't believe you finished that program without me."
Netto smiled coyly at his navi, "Who said I need you help?"
"Hey!" Rockman said.
Netto laughed and went into his bedroom. Rockman followed in the cyber version of Netto's house. Since they had been younger there had been many advancements to the cyber world. One of which being that all houses had a cyber replica that the navi's could live in. It was nice and Rockman enjoyed having the illusion of being so close to Netto.
They both climbed into bed and Netto turned off the light. "Good night, Rockman," he said while pulling the covers over his body.
"It's morning, Netto-kun."
"Whatever," Netto muttered and pulled the sheets over his head. In a matter of minutes both were fast asleep.
Enzan couldn't escape one meeting and he was very upset about it. He spent the whole time fidgeting in his seat and giving frequent glances to the clock as if he was in a coring class. The board directors he was meeting with did not appreciate it.
"Are we boring you, Enzan-sama?" one of them asked.
"Yes," Enzan said absentmindedly as he gazed at the clock. Then his blue eyes widened, "No! I mean no! I'm sorry, I tried to take today off because of other pressing matters that I should be attending to."
In the net Blues shook his head from side to side in a honest effort to not laugh.
"Well, Enzan-sama, be that as it may I and the other board members would appreciate it very much if you would kindly, pay attention!" he barked.
Enzan nodded, "Yes, of course. Please continue."
The man in his mid fifties cast a weary eye on the young president. True he had over 14 years of experience but he was still very young. And it showed up all too often, or so he thought.
"Now as you see here, we've had a steady increase of sales in our electronics but our software hasn't been selling well. I would like to offer a few suggestions that would help this." He pulled out a packet that was 20 pages long. "Now if you turn to page three I have outlined the exports and imports of all electronics all over the world, the ones in red are from IPC."
Enzan gave a silent groan and did as he was told. Some days it just wasn't worth it to be Enzan Ijuuin.
Enzan finally got out of the meeting around noon. Three hours after he made his vow to yell at Netto for blatantly ignoring him and staying at work all night. It was probably for the best as his temper was quite subdued and he no longer felt the need to scream at the top of his lungs. He just felt the need to talk in a loud voice.
"Enzan-sama?" Blues ventured.
"Yes Blues?"
"Do you think going to Netto-san's is the wisest decision right now?" Blues asked.
Enzan frowned, "What makes you say that, Blues?" Enzan asked.
"Well, you seem very," Blues paused. "Uptight, Enzan-sama."
"I'm fine Blues, I need to talk to Netto."
"But," Blues started.
"I said I'm fine," Enzan said.
Blues sighed. "Yes Enzan-sama." He silently wrote an e-mail to Rockman warning him of the impending doom. Maybe they could get out before Enzan got there.
Too bad they were both fast asleep.
Enzan went straight up to the comfy looking one floor house and knocked on the door loudly. "Netto, I know you're in there. Open up!" he said.
There was no reply but the loud barking of Red. Enzan sighed and tried again but again there was no answer. "Maybe they're not here?" Blues said innocently.
Enzan narrowed his eyes and didn't answer. Instead he rooted around in the mail box until he found a key. "He always leaves it there, even though I tell him not to," Enzan murmured. He inserted the key into the lock and went into the house.
Almost instantly he was attacked by Netto's dog and cat. He pushed the dog off of him and knelt down to let Sitio smell his fingers so the cat wouldn't tear him apart. "Maybe he doesn't need to hide the key," Blues said.
Enzan smiled wryly. "Yeah, he should just have a big sign that says, 'Enter at own Risk.'"
Sitio rubbed his head against Enzan's fingers briefly and then lumbered off into the dark house.
"Maybe they really aren't here?" Blues said again.
Enzan shook his head, "No, they're here. Netto was up to late last night to not be in bed." And to prove his point Enzan went into the next room and pointed at Netto's inert form on the bed. "See?"
"Yes, Enzan-sama, I do see. Maybe you should leave them alone for now," he suggested.
Enzan sighed. He gazed at Netto's sleeping form for a bit longer then retreated into the living room. "I'll lecture him when he wakes up," he said and flipped on the TV. Sitio came in and jumped into Enzan's lap almost immediately and he was followed by Red not long after.
Around 2:30 Netto woke up and ventured out into his living room to see Enzan sitting there and watching "Arsenic and Old Lace" on TV. Netto glared at him, "What the hell are you doing here?"
Enzan flipped off the TV and stood up. "You know very well why," he said.
Netto's hair was pushed to one side and his eyes had a tired look to them. He was still in the clothes he wore the previous night, they were rumpled and the overall effect showed Netto as being worse for the wear. "I don't know what you're talking about," he muttered.
Enzan narrowed his eyes. "Yeah right, Hikari! I told you to go home at 11 and you gave me your word. Then you pull and all nighter? What kind of promise is that?"
"I finished the program didn't I?" Netto asked airily.
"That is irrelevant!" Enzan steamed.
Blues silently went into the net to search for Rockman. He was still asleep and Blues decided to wait for him to wake up. He shut off the sound program so the yelling of the two men wouldn't wake him up. Someone deserved sleep after all.
"Look, I wanted to make sure I wasn't working till 11 for three nights okay?" Netto said heatedly. "This isn't even any of your business to begin with!"
"Netto you promised me! Not only did you promise me but you said when we were out last week that you started the program. Now why would you say something like that?" Enzan retorted.
"I knew I could finish it! Who are you to tell me how to live my life?" Netto asked.
"A very good friend. Look Netto, you're hurting yourself doing this. Not only you but Rockman as well," Enzan said. Netto shifted and he knew he hit a soft spot. "Netto, I'm not trying to be mean but living like this will only hurt you in the long run."
Netto crossed his arms. "Well, maybe so. But as I recall when we were kids you would do the same thing."
Enzan nodded, "And you would yell at me. I guess I'm a horrible role model."
Netto snorted good naturedly. "You flatter yourself."
"Ah, maybe so, but do you deny that you're starting to do everything you yelled at me about when I was younger?"
"I still yell at you," Netto said.
"See!" Enzan said. Netto shut his eyes in annoyance because he knew he lost the argument. "That's what I mean."
"Well, how about this then, how about we make a deal," Netto said.
"Such as?" Enzan asked.
"You and I promise to leave work at the same time every day. We will plan out our projects together so we're not in crunch time and we can still hang out. When we're on business trips we'll call each other to make sure the other isn't cheating," Netto said.
Enzan stroked his chin thoughtfully. "That's a surprisingly good idea," he mused.
"Let's make it a tad more interesting," Netto grinned.
"I'm listening," Enzan said, not missing the mischievous glint in Netto's eye.
"First one to mess up has to do whatever the other one says for a week."
"Oh, come on, that is so overused," Enzan said.
"Because it's so good!" Netto retorted.
"Fine! I'll do it!" Enzan said.
Netto nodded, "Good, good."
"Now you have to do something right off the bat," Enzan said.
"Such as?" Netto asked.
"Take a shower and change your clothes. I took off the rest of the day, do you want to go get dinner?"
"Curry?" Netto asked.
Enzan shook his head and smiled. "What else?"
"I'm in!" Netto cheered.
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
Oh how I love writing this. I think this will be an ongoing fic :3
