Disclaimer: I do not own Megaman Battle Network or any related properties. Capcom does. All other characters and concepts are the sole property of the Chaos Coalition.

Author's Note: Sorry, but this chapter's a little shorter than usual, as a transition between events. The next chapter might be a bit longer, and will probably last about a week, and then the action will pick up again. Read, review, and enjoy!

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The battle was over. Atos had finally been defeated, and the Chaos Union was triumphant yet again.

Matthias lounged peacefully in his dormatory, trying to relax. A majority of the Chaos Union members were on the mainland, seeing what had happened to the remainder of the world while the Chaos Union had been saving it. Shroud was across the hall, and through his open door, Matthias could see that he was talking with his new netnavi, Juno, while contacting the ONB. He was still trying to get them that job with the ONB, and Matthias couldn't really blame him. Saving the world didn't pay the bills.

As for the remainder of the Union, the new kids Raymond and Chris were upstairs, in the Labyrinth, and Brian was around somewhere. The base was somewhat empty, and quiet, which hadn't happened in some time. The silence was broken by the pinging of his laptop, and Matthias walked over towards it, typing in the commands to bring up his e-mail.

There was only one message, but Matthias didn't recognize the address. Still, he put Gizmo on standby in case there were any virues lurking within, and opened it.

To: Matthias Terre, White King

From: The Black King

Re: Opening Gambit

As always, White makes the first move. Strike hard and fast, or my following moves will cripple you to the core. If you need aid deciding who your players should be, let me recommend your fellow Chaos Union members. After all, Shroud Taruka would be an excellent Vizier, and the manipulative Brian would be an excellent Bishop. Still the remainder is yours. So, will you send out a Knight to vanquish me alone, or let a Pawn be the scapegoat to spur your other pieces into action. The choice is yours, but move soon, for passing your turn could be fatal. And always remember to castle, because while Kings are important, Rooks are stronger.

Black

Matthias could scarcely believe the audacity of whoever had sent this. It was odd though, several phrases seemed familiar to him, such as the entitling of the piece commonly considered Queen as Vizier, or the recomendation to castle. Well, it wouldn't really be of much consequence at this point, and he filed it away, reminding himself to tell Shroud about it at a later date.

And so, White passed their turn. Black did not make the same mistake.

-

Chaotic We Stand

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Chapter 8: Copulae Sanguinis

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-- 10: 43 AM, Hikari Hospital, Rho Complex, Neo Arcadia --

The initial shock wore off quickly, and Shroud began to explain Matthias' condition to him. "It's not a large problem, because you only punctured the spinal cord enough to cause paralysis. Any less and you would still have some mobility. You might have even been able to walk."

"So how is this not a large problem?" Matthias retorted. He and Shroud were now the only ones in the room, the others having left during the uncomfortable silence. Shroud sighed and took a seat beside Matthias.

"My wife--"

"Irine." The distinction Matthias made was clear, but Shroud didn't really care to have this discussion now.

"Irine then, if you insist. Whatever you'd like me to title her as, she's been developing a shot to restore nerve tissue, similar to her heal patches and her bone repair shot. We already prepared you for it if you'd like to take it, by repairing your vertebrae strategically to allow an injection to be effective."

"So why weren't you giving me this before?"

"You can't use the medicine while the patient is asleep, or unconscious. It requires a certain level of brain function, since the spinal cord is directly connected to the brain, and that's only available while you're awake." Matthias looked interested, so Shroud thought it best to begin to forewarn him now. "The injection doesn't work all the time, and if it does, it will be painful once you regain feeling."

"What's the success rate?"

"30 of the people we've tested it on have had some recovery, and there was no visible effect on the other 70. Of that 30, only 5 recover completely, 40 regain either movement or feeling in their legs, and the other 55 only recover slightly, barely enough to make a difference."

Matthias lay back in his bed, almost defeated. "I guess we'd better give it a shot then. Am I allowed to leave the hospital?"

"I would suppose. Your ribs are healing normally, because we didn't have time to apply the repair shot to it, but they should be fine as long as you don't overexert yourself."

Matthias laughed, half bitter, half slightly amused, and Shroud realized the irony of what he had just said. "I'll try not to run a marathon, Shroud. Now get me a wheelchair and let's get out of here. I want that shot of Irine's, and I want to know what I've missed."

-- 11: 28 AM, 1580 Iota Complex, Neo Arcadia --

Matthias winced as Irine injected the serum into his spine. He was lying on a couch in their living room, and she was leaning over him, a needle inserted into the lowest vertebra in his back with feeling remaining in it. Unfortunately, this also meant that it hurt, especially once the medication began its work several moments later, after Shroud and Irine had helped Matthias into a sitting position. "You weren't kidding, Shroud," Matthias said in slight dismay. "That did hurt."

"If you think it hurts now, wait until feeling comes back to the rest of your body," Irine said as she packed the needles away. "You're not the worst case I've treated though. You should start to regain movement in a week or two, and you should be able to move stiffly in three to four weeks, although your feet will still be fairly non-responsive. Feeling generally returns after four to five weeks, and in about two months, your paralysis should be clinically gone, although I advise maintaining the treatment for a few months afterwards to restore more nervous tissue."

"Amazing," Matthias said, smiling at Irine. She returned the smile, but Seitoka began to cry in the room adjoining and Irine hurried to calm him. He then looked over at Shroud, who was coming out of the kitchen with a pair of soft drinks.

"Still no alcohol, right?" he asked, passing Matthias a can while opening his own.

"Nope," Matthias said, opening the can with one hand. He took a sip, and then held it in his useless lap, trying not to notice the fact that he couldn't feel how cold it was. "So, what's happened over the last few days? All I know is what you told me on the way here: that Pavo and Chris came to rescue us and helped us out of the cavern. But what happened after that?"

"Well, you were unconscious, so after we got those rocks off of you, we got you to the hospital as fast as possible. We stayed there for a majority of the day, while you were in critical condition, and then after you were finally stabilized that evening, we just went to my place and crashed, except for Link and Alistor, who were forced to remain at the hospital for one evening. The next day, you had slipped into a full-blown coma, and there was nothing more we could do. We just stopped in to see you whenever possible."

"What about my son? How much does he know?"

"Nothing. X forbade us to contact him because this was a national affair." Seeing the anger growing in Matthias' eyes, Shroud held up a hand to silence him. "I told him not to, but he insisted. He still needs the Chaos Union as a bargaining chip amongst the remainder of the world. His army isn't very mighty as of yet, but having us might help keep countries like Netopia out of our way until it is strong enough to face them. But if anyone discovered that any of our members had been paralyzed, much less our second-in-command, they would surely strike."

"Well, I see that I'll need to have a conversation with X then," Matthias bitterly replied. "I have no intentions of being used by a country I'm not even a part of. I didn't go on this mission for X, I went on this mission because you asked me too. So I'll stay long enough to get walking again, and then I'm headed home. I'm sure someone in Electopia can figure out Irine's little system, or perhaps I'll just take a few vials with. But I have no intention of remaining here to frighten the world into submission, especially since I'm not to threatening at this point."

"You and I will probably be talking to X soon anyways," Shroud said, crumbling his empty can and setting it aside. "He's scheduled a press conference for tomorrow. I think that he's going to announce the treaty with Sharo."

"What! He can't! Didn't SH tell you that's what the Vile 5 are waiting for?" Of the many things that his paralysis had taken from him, Matthias missed pacing the most at this point. It was always nice and relaxing.

"Yes, he did, and he managed to persuade us. But X was a harder sell. Since the mission was a trap to begin with, he feels that the Vile 5 may have intentionally lied to us. Personally, I think that they would have had nothing to lose by telling the truth, but I can't sway him, and Harpuia is the only one of his generals on my side. He won't sign the treaty itself tomorrow, but I think that announcing it is just enough for the Vile 5 to consider an attack."

"Well, we'll need to convince him otherwise then," Matthias said, pushing the button on his wheelchair's remote control. The chair rolled over towards him, and Matthias managed to struggle his way into it, ignoring Shroud as he tried to help him. As he finally maneuvered his way into his seat, Gizmo materialized on one of the armrests, a frown upon his face.

"Matthias, maybe you should rest. You've been through an awful lot lately." The netnavi was wearing his battle armor, surprisingly, and Matthias concluded it was a subconscious emergence of his preparation to battle with Matthias and keep him from pushing himself.

"I can rest once I'm back home and this nightmare is over. But since I'm not fully capable of flying a jet at this point, and generally dislike letting millions of people and netnavis die, I have to try to save this country. And I need you to be my legs, Gizmo. Shroud kept you with him while I was in my coma, right?"

"Yeah, like he's supposed to," his netnavi responded. "I even managed to record several conversations between him and X." Shroud looked a bit surprised by that, but Matthias continued anyways.

"Then you know what's at stake better than I do right now. Hack into the Arcadian servers and set all important documents to send a copy of themselves to a dummy email account. Then get back to the Electopian servers and contact Luke. Tell him everything he needs to know, and then check out our finances over the last week or so, like we normally do. When you're done with that, feel free to take the rest of the day off or something. I'll contact you when I need help."

Gizmo looked hesitant, but realizing the level of trust Matthias was showing, he nodded and jacked into Shroud's home network, taking a roundabout path towards the Core Building's server. As Matthias began to roll towards the door, Irine returned, Seitoka's protests having been quelled several minutes ago. "Matthias, are you leaving?"

"Yes, Irine. Shroud and I need to go talk to X and try to stop him from signing that contract with Sharo."

"Well, take care. You're welcome to stay here for the evening." Irine walked towards Matthias and bent over his chair, giving him a gentle hug, promising nothing more.

"Thank you, Irine. I really appreciate it." As she let go of him, Matthias adjusted the chair, shifting it into a hovering mode, and floated out the door, feebly attempting to wage war against his crippled self.

-- 1: 03 PM, Cain International Airport, Eta Complex, Neo Arcadia --

"If I may have everyone's attention, please? Please remain seated until the plane has come to a complete stop. Then, please remove your belongings from the overhead luggage compartment and exit the plane in an orderly fashion. Once again, thank you for flying Arcadian Air, and we hope you have a pleasant stay in Neo Arcadia."

Jules rolled his eyes at the stewardess' comment regarding his seating preference, and unbuckled his seat belt before she even finished talking. An exasperated click of his wife's tongue sounded in his ears, but he ignored the barb, instead standing and opening their overhead compartment as others had begun doing.

"Jules, don't you ever listen to anyone?"

He smiled, pulling her purse out and passing it over to her. "Only you, my dearest Miko, and only when it's convenient." She threw her stiff airline pillow at him, but he caught it one handed and stuffed it back into the compartment. He grabbed his own pillow and wedged it in after removing his own bag, and then closed the compartment back up and looked back down at his wife. Miko was a slim woman, with dark red hair trimmed to stop right above her shoulders, and wore a business suit of red and black. He, on the other hand, was totally opposite, having slightly spiked hair so blond it bordered on white, and wearing a pair of tan slacks, a white shirt, and a pale grey jacket. They were polar opposites, yin and yang, and perfectly suited for each other.

He and Mikoto had met years before ever even considering dating, but that was made a bit more understandable considering that they were only 12 and 13 the first time they met, and in their line of work, romantic relationships didn't fall into place. But some years later, after Jules had finally managed to escape the political entanglements of Electopian society, they met again, and seemed drawn to each other even before recognition kicked in. Fifteen years and one child later, they were stepping right back into the madness that had nearly cost Jules his life, and Miko her family. For they had been no ordinary teenagers upon that first meeting. They had been contemporaries, Mikoto Sakura, the fiery Chaos Delta, and J.G, the new recruit who would later be known as Chaos Fox, a warrior of mystery.

Neither of them had kept those names after the disbanding of the Union, and few today even knew that the Swampopolan couple had any ties to Electopia, much less their famed Chaos Union. Their son, Kitsune, was probably the only one who wasn't a former CU member, but they could trust Kitsune. The boy seemed blessed with an uncanny sense of luck, and that sense was the primary reason why they were here in the first place. If it hadn't been for him bumping into Matthias' kid last weekend, he and Miko would never have known that Shroud was throwing himself towards danger again, and the two of them never would have come to Neo Arcadia.

They began to walk down the aisle, carefully evading those who had actually waited for the plane to stop before getting out of their seats. As they neared the exit, they stopped beside a built-in console and plugged their PETs into it, receiving their netnavis back from the Aerial Lounge, a wireless net that allowed netnavis whose operators were traveling by air to communicate within a chat room. Neo Arcadia was the first nation to pioneer the concept, and it was one of their few innovations that had been adapted by the remainder of the world. Jules' navi Elder returned to his PET stoically, without any complaints, but as Miko's netnavi Kyuubi returned, Elder's eyes flickered in her direction, and Jules soon discovered why.

"Well, I was certainly surprised by the lack of a decent reception in that lounge," Kyuubi said later, as they waited for their luggage to come around the turnstile. "It was at least halfway decent while you stayed within the plane, but browsing about the surrounding networks…horrible. Absolutely horrible." Elder rolled his eyes, and Jules completely understood. Kyuubi was a masterful netbattler, and she and Miko had actually won a tournament once together. But take her out of the arena, and she was nearly impossible to live with; very arrogant and haughty. Her appearance reflected that, in battle she wore an elaborate suit of golden armor over her white albino fur, and out of battle, she wore a pearly white cloak that seemed to extend an aura of aloofness over her vulpine figure.

Elder, on the other hand, was her total opposite, similar as to how opposite Jules and Miko were. His hair was pure white, and he wore robes of red and silver. He showed no outward hostility, but behind his aged eyes the flames of battle still raged, and the flaming longsword he could summon was a testament to that. Elder was the result of an error, one that had occurred the first time Jules had tried to Cross Fuse. A hidden programming string within his netnavi Elphine had activated, and his navi was partially deleted, with Jules going to the hospital as a result. The Chaos Union had been worried about a traitor within their ranks while he was unconscious, but when he awakened, Jules informed them that it was his fault; a bit of stray coding that must have escaped his notice. They backed off after that, and Jules restored his netnavi as Elder.

"Well, we'll have to file a complaint with the administrators of that server, won't we dear?" Jules smiled and nodded as Miko spoke, but he didn't honestly think that the system administrators would care. As soon as the Aerial Lounge went worldwide, Neo Arcadia was forced to pass control of the system off to a privately owned business, and they could probably care less about the needs of one incredibly arrogant netnavi. Still, Jules didn't really care, so he just grabbed their luggage off of the turnstile and began to wheel it down the aisle.

"You're still sure about all this, Miko?" Jules asked as they came to the front gate. "I mean, Shroud is your cousin, but he has an entire country on his side. We can still go on that second honeymoon, if you'd like." Honestly, Jules truly did want to see Shroud and the others again. But if Miko had another relapse…

"Of course I'm sure," she said before he could finish thinking. "We agreed to this earlier, Jules. You and I are a team now, but we can't let down our old team. Now, let's get a taxi, find a hotel room, and then get on with this whole mission thing." Miko walked past him, waving her hands at the passing yellow cars. She seemed normal, but as she walked past him, Jules could have sworn he saw a flame in her eyes that had not been there before…

-- 1: 54 PM, Core Plaza, Neo Arcadia --

"What do you mean he won't see us?"

"Sorry, Mr. Taruka," Shroud's underling Leite said, barring his way into the Core Building. "But Lord X has closed off the building to all but his highest level counselors, the Elite Eight."

"That's ridiculous!" Shroud said, turning away with distaste.

"What do you mean?" Matthias asked, waiting at the bottom of the steps. "What's the Elite Eight?"

"It's a group of counselors that X has formed to help advise him on day-to-day affairs within the city. Four are netnavis, and four are humans. The only problem with this particular scenario is that the four netnavis are his 'children', and the four humans are Drs. Cain, Gate, Weil, and Lumina." Shroud reached one of the tables beside the nearby café and sat, while Matthias rolled into an open space.

"So basically, he and his generals are planning how to defeat the Vile 5 best, and probably how to tie us in with the bargain."

"Exactly." A waiter came by to ask their order, and Shroud spoke up right away. "Something with lots of caffeine in it. How about you, Matthias?"

"Just coffee." The waiter nodded and left, returning a few moments later with their drinks.

"Here is your coffee, sir, and then this is our triple caffeine lemon latte, the most caffeinated thing on our menu." Shroud looked at the middle-aged waiter oddly, but then took the drink and pulled the lemon garnish off of its edge before taking a sip of it.

"So what's next, Shroud?" Matthias inquired, adding some sugar to his beverage. "If we can't win over X, he's going to have that press conference tomorrow, and then it's only a matter of time before the Vile 5 drops that satellite on us."

Shroud ignored the abrupt dilation of his pupils and leaned over the table, to keep their words from being overheard. "Well, perhaps later this evening, I might be able to get into the building and mess with some files. It might delay the conference a day or two. But the Chaos Union needs to hold a meeting, and soon, too. Tomorrow would be best, if possible."

"What's this I hear about another meeting of the Chaos Union?"

Shroud whipped around to see who was behind him, and was quite startled when he didn't recognize the couple that stood there at first. But slowly, looking at the woman, and imagining her with a red jumpsuit instead of a red business suit…"Mikoto? Is that you?"

She nodded, and hurried over to give her cousin a hug. Matthias, on the other hand, had recognized J.G. first, and rolled over to shake his hand. The two of them exchanged a few words while Mikoto greeted Shroud, and then they switched, Mikoto hugging Matthias and muttering her condolences while J.G. walked over to Shroud.

"So, you're the guy that my dear cousin ended up with, J.G?" he said, giving him a friendly hug. "I always did wonder who she'd dropped off the map with."

"Well, you did a fairly good job of vanishing yourself, considering you were under arrest for murder at the time." J.G. hadn't changed much, but his name had. "And I choose not to go by my initials anymore. It's just Jules now. Jules Yukamara."

"Yukamara?" Shroud asked, as the four of them sat around the table again, Mikoto and 'Jules' pulling up chairs. "Last I checked, Yukamara started with a Y, not a G."

"It was just a way to escape the aftermath of our disbanding. It was hard trying to maintain a job when people saw you as a traitor to your country. So after Miko and I got married," and at this Jules' hand intertwined with Mikoto's own, "we both changed our last names to Yukamara, and moved into my old home in Swampopolis. Since then, I've just been working as a programmer, and one of the only decent ones in the country."

"No kids?" Matthias asked, finishing off his coffee.

"Just one," Mikoto said, her eyes brimming with pride. "Kitsune. Your son recently met him, didn't he tell you?"

"No," Matthias said, now quite interested. "I haven't spoken to Luke in a week. How would the two of them have met?"

"Apparently they challenged each other to a netbattle, and afterwards realized that they shared parents from the Chaos Union. Kitsune said that his netnavi was quite strong too. Ion, or something like that."

"Aeon." As Matthias spoke, a light went into his eyes, and Shroud wondered what he had realized. But he never found out, as Matthias quickly changed the subject. "So, what are you two doing here? Did X contact you?"

"No," Jules replied. "Luke told Kitsune that you all were on some sort of mission. After he told us, Miko and I decided to come and help, and so here we are."

"So what are we doing, Shroud?" Mikoto asked. "What's the big crisis?"

"Mikoto…a satellite is probably going to destroy this city within a week, and so far, we've got no way of stopping it."

Shroud's words brought silence to the table, but Mikoto was never one to be depressed by the odds. "Well, then. Let's get the gang back together and figure out what to do with this thing."