New Megaman Battle Network
A complete reimagining of the universe and stories of Megaman Battle Network.
Story 1: New Origins
Chapter 5: A Shift of the Spotlight
Yai hung up her house phone, sighing and walking into her enormous living room, where Mayl and Dex were waiting for news.
"So what did Lan say?" Mayl inquired eagerly. "Is he coming?"
"He's in trouble for homework or something like that, as usual," Yai answered, sitting on a nearby chair. "So he says he'll be a little while longer."
"That's Lan, alright," Mayl sighed. "Though he has been busy lately," she added, glancing back and smirking at Yai, who sheepishly looked down with the memory of two days ago, a little pink.
"Oh, whatever," Dex interjected. "He's just going around looking for trouble. He's really asking for it, getting involved with World Three, you know."
Yai stuck her tongue out at Dex. "You're just jealous 'cause Megaman kicked Gutsman's butt!"
"I am not!" he shot back, causing Mayl to giggle and cover her mouth. "Megaman just caught me off guard, that's all. If Gutsman had used his full strength, he'd have won no problem! Especially now, after that Guts Punch upgrade I bought for him. I could do anything that shrimpy blue Navi could!"
"Well, we'll have to wait for Lan to get here to find out for sure." Mayl sat back, stretching her left arm.
"Well, let's not just sit around and wait for him." Yai hopped off the chair and started walking. "We can probably surf the Net a little bit. C'mon!"
The other two nodded, getting up and following Yai to the computer room, a large space filled with all sorts of entertainment devices, including a massive computer screen on one wall. Yai hit the computer's power button, causing the room to come humming to life, with several lights coming all around. Mayl and Dex looked around in wonder, while Yai, who had seen this many times before, tapped her foot and waited for the computer to power up.
Five minutes later, lights were still flashing, but nothing major seemed to have happened. Dex and Mayl looked at each other, wondering if this was normal.
"Something's not right," Yai commented, walking to the main screen and manually starting it up. Immediately, a bright blue screen showed up, with white fixed-width letters detailing a serious error.
"Oh, great." She rubbed her head in frustration. "Probably viruses again..."
"Viruses?" Dex's eyes lit up, and he stepped forward, startling Mayl a little bit. "Gutsman can take care of those no problem! Let me fix it!"
Before Yai could get a word in, he ran up to the jack-in wall, pulling out the cord to his PET and jacking in, sending his Navi into the Cyberworld.
"Erm... okay..." Yai managed. "Don't break anything though, or you're paying for it!"
Upon appearing in the computer's Cyberworld, Gutsman took a look around to determine what the problem was; it didn't take long.
"Yup! It's viruses alright!" he communicated to the three outside. "Lots of Mettools, it looks like!"
"Mettools, huh?" Dex echoed, as the two girls leaned in, trying to see what was happening on the PET's screen. "They're no problem! Show them what you're made of!"
"You got it!" Gutsman ran toward the nearest Mettool, winding his arm up. The virus turned toward its attacker, raising its pickaxe to attack, but Gutsman punched it hard before it got the chance; it emitted a small squeal and went flying off, disintegrating into deletion.
"Yeee!" Another Mettool jumped at Gutsman from behind, ready to attack; the Navi noticed and quickly turned around, his arm outstretched.
"Guts Punch!" he cried out, as his fist started to shudder. It shot off the end of his arm like a rocket, intercepting the Mettool's attack and delivering a powerful punch, deleting the virus. The fist quickly returned to Gutsman's arm, who reattached it, cocking it like a shotgun.
Mayl and Yai cheered as the Navi continued, handily taking care of the viruses one by one, receiving nary a scratch. Dex felt his chest and his ego swell.
"Almost done!" Gutsman reported, as he turned and rounded on the last Mettool, slamming his fist on top of its hard hat; the hat cracked, then exploded, taking the virus with it. He raised his arms in triumph.
"Well, this is an unexpected complication," came a voice from behind Gutsman; he turned his head to see who it was, only to be met with a particularly red foot to the face, knocking him backwards.
Mayl and Yai gasped, as Dex gritted his teeth. "What the-?! Who's that?"
Gustman slowly stood up, rubbing his head, and turned to face his assailant; he found himself face-to-face with a rather short, red Navi, with a large gray pair of scissors on his head.
"So much for distraction... worthless viruses," he muttered to himself.
"Who are you?" Gutsman demanded, a little nervous regarding his suspicions. "You're with World Three, aren'tcha?"
Instantly, the red Navi darted forward, elbowing his foe powerfully in his gut; Gustman grabbed his midsection and keeled over.
"You dare associate me with those incompetent fools?" the Navi demanded, as Gutsman struggled to get up. "You insult me. My name is Cutman, and I belong to the almighty organization Gospel!"
"Gospel...?" Mayl and Dex wondered, as a furious Yai grabbed Dex's PET away from him, staring into the screen.
"What are you doing in my house, you freak?!" she demanded. "Get out now!"
"Well, you're a rude one, aren't you?" Cutman grinned, amused by her anger. "You must be the young Ayanokouji girl... Yai, was it?"
"What?!" Yai exclaimed. "Who are you? How do you know my name?"
"Just a humble representative of Gospel," the nefarious Navi replied. "I was just taking the time to check your banking records, to see about you making a donation to our organization. I think 100 million Zennys will do quite nicely, don't you think?"
As Yai was widening her eyes in shock, Cutman found himself hit powerfully from the side by a Guts Punch, knocking him over.
"Ha ha! That's the way, Gutsman!" Dex exclaimed, snatching his PET back. "Let's show this guy what we're made of!"
Gutsman grabbed his fist and reattached it, as Cutman slowly stood up, chuckling a bit to himself. For being caught off guard, he didn't look particularly bothered by the attack.
"Such a big fist, but such a weak attack... is that really the best you have?" He grinned evilly, raising his arm and opening his palm; a series of giant scissors appeared before him, firing themselves toward Gutsman, who yelped and tried to outrun them. He barely managed to dodge three, but one pair got lodged in his side; he yelped and fell over, as Cutman let out a derisive laugh.
Gutsman roared angrily, grabbing the scissors from his side and hurling it at Cutman, who dodged it easily.
"No no, not like that," he advised, grabbing the rounder scissors on his head and removing them. "More curve, more angle... here, let me show you."
He bent one knee and threw the pair of scissors as if he was skipping a stone. The scissors arched around the area like a boomerang, slicing a large gash in Gutsman's stomach, who fell onto his behind and grabbed the injury. Cutman grabbed the scissors as they returned to him, advancing slowly on his enemy.
"You're much too slow, you know," he advised. "You're not making this any fun at all. Oh well, might as well finish it."
He gave the scissors one more toss, curving them around toward Gutsman. As the scissors approached, a flash of light intercepted them, and they dropped uselessly to the ground. A few yards ahead, a red Navi with long silver hair had come to rest, his Long Sword extended on his arm.
"Who the...?" Yai wondered, looking over toward the jack-in panel and jumping out of her shoes. In the heat of the battle, no one had noticed a boy with silver-and-black hair entering the room, wearing a red jacket.
"What are you doing here?!" she demanded, startled. "How did you even get in my house?!"
"I'm protecting your bank account, from the looks of it. And I used the door," he answered without looking up. "Now how about staying out of my way and letting me do my job?"
"You absolute jerk!" Yai started storming toward him, surprising the other two a bit with her anger. "You think you can just come in here…" She paused when she found herself blocked by Mayl's arm.
"Yai, look!" she said in a slightly whispered manner, pointing toward the boy's jacket. On the arm was a very familiar insignia, that of the Official NetBattlers.
"What? That's… you're an Official?" Yai blinked confusedly, looking up at him as he continued to operate his Navi. The others turned back toward Dex's PET, wanting to look at what was going to happen.
"An Official Navi, eh?" Cutman remarked, studying this new interloper. "I recognize you. You're the Navi of that little brat, Eugene Chaud. You've been causing a lot of trouble for us." He dashed over to get to his scissors, but Chaud's Navi was there ages before. He picked the scissors up with his sword, flinging them at Cutman at top speed; he tried to avoid them, but they still managed to knick his arm.
"Gah! You punk!" Cutman shot back. "Let's see if you can do that with all of these!" He extended both hands, scissors appearing in each; he flung both of them at the red Navi, who deflected them effortlessly with his sword.
"Let's finish this quickly, Protoman," Chaud ordered, holding up three Battlechips between his fingers. "I'm using a Program Advance! Life Sword!"
"Understood," his Navi echoed back; deflecting one last pair of scissors, he jumped high into the air, in a large arch over Cutman.
"Sword!" Chaud barked, quickly inserting the first Battlechip; mid-jump, Protoman's right arm generated a Sword.
"Wide Sword!" he continued, inserting the next; as his Navi landed in a crouching position, he extended his left arm to make a Wide Sword.
"Long Sword!" he finished, firing one more Battlechip into his PET. Protoman stood and turned to face Cutman, both arms above his head and starting to glow.
"That attack of yours won't save you!" Cutman growled, holding out his arms, each of which glowed and then filled with throwing scissors. "Not even you will be fast enough to dodge this!"
Cutman threw his scissors, dozens of them, straight at Protoman, whose blades were now glowing a bright blue, forming one giant blade made of light. Intently focused, Protoman swung the blade horizontally with all his might.
The shockwave from his swing was of incredible power; as the blade of light flew forward, it cut all of the approaching scissors neatly in half, and they fell and clattered to the ground. Cutman didn't even have time to blink before he was bisected by the blade's shockwave; he stood in shock for a moment before his two halves toppled to the ground.
His job done, Protoman's hands returned to normal as he ran over to Cutman's top half, grabbing it by the collar. "Tell me everything you know! Now!"
Cutman laughed weakly. "You Officials think you can oppose the full might of Gospel..." He coughed and continued on. "You'll get nothing more from me... I'll be seeing you in hell." With one last smirk, Cutman's two halves disintegrated into deletion.
Chaud sighed. "Nothing we could have done. Well done, Protoman, jack out." Protoman vanished from the Cyberworld, just as the main screen of the computer room suddenly changed from blue to white, then to a proper interface, causing everyone except Chaud to blink and look up. Pulling the cord out of the jack-in port, he pocketed his PET and started walking out.
"Hey, wait!" Yai started running after him. "Get back here! Where are you going?"
"Off to do more work," Chaud replied without looking back. "Stay out of trouble, Yai." Everyone watched him leave the computer room, toward the front door.
Back outside, Lan was running up Yai's driveway, eager to make up for lost time.
"You wouldn't be hurrying like this if you had done your homework on time, you know," Megaman lectured him.
"Come on, Mega," Lan replied, exasperated. "Don't you start with me, too…" As he reached the front door, he was startled when it swung open on its own, as a silver-and-black-haired boy in a red jacket walked out. He looked up at Lan, surprised for a moment, before pushing past to walk out without a word.
"Hey! Same to you, pal!" Lan called out, irritated. He watched for a few moments as Chaud retreated, studying him curiously, before shrugging it off and going inside. Expecting to see everyone hanging out normally, he was surprised to find them in the computer room, all staring at Chaud as he left. They turned their attention toard Lan with a bit of surprise, collectively and silently.
"Er... hi... what's up?" Lan managed.
Elsewhere, an old man with gray, disheveled hair was staring into a computer screen, conversing with a Navi encased in shadow.
"So the LifeVirus is no longer possible," the Navi repeated.
"Unfortunately not," the old man replied. "No matter. There is another way to go about achieving our ultimate goal. But it requires more assistance on your part, if I may ask for it."
"Our ends remain the same, Dr. Wily," the Navi replied. "I will help you to any extent, if it means I can exact my revenge on this pathetic race of humans."
Dr. Wily grinned. "I am glad to see we are in agreement. I will contact you when I next need your assistance."
The shadowed Navi nodded and turned to leave, his tattered cloak fluttering behind him. Wily sat back in his chair, cackling to himself.
