A BIG thank you to everyone who has been putting up with my super slow updates. Things have been slow in terms of writing, but I've been doing what I could to move forward step by step.
For you guys, if you didn't check out my one-shot, Musings of a Villain, then you missed a test run of ideas that may show up at some point in this fic. :) I don't know if more of these tests will show up, but they are something that may give you guys a hint of things to come.
Reminder of the disclaimers:
1. The Megaman universe does not belong to me.
2. There are references to Mega Man X: Warmachine by Renegade Vile, but this is not part of their non-canon continuity.
3. Yamir is my idea. No stealing but you can ask for his help. :P
Last time on : Save a New World, Netto-kun launched a risky rescue mission to save me and Hub Light, which got him into a lot of trouble. Between Alpha-1 getting booted up for hacking, and Maverick Hunters joining in, Netto was able to trick Tornado Tonion into letting us go, destroying him afterwards. The Hunters wanted to bring my brother in for questioning, but like the hot-head he is, he didn't stick around.
Episode Three: Making of a Network
"NETTO-KUN! THAT WAS RECKLESS!"
"I know Rockman, but what else was I to do with that hostage threat?"
"You still could have found another way somehow! Now people are going to be looking for you as if you're one of the bad guys!"
Netto felt really lucky that it seemed like no one outside was within hearing range of his blue navi's yelling. The Hikari brothers had found an old abandoned apartment building to hide in for the night in a war torn area of the city near a highway that had seen better days. The boy looked around the room again as his brother chewed him out.
The old brown dusty sofa, the small emergency generator and an old broken computer were all that was left behind. Almost like whoever used to live here was in a rush to move out of here and chose to leave without this stuff. Oh well, his gain. A place to sleep and what power he can get off the generator for his two PETs is good for him until morning. Yamir really needs it after what he did today.
"ARE YOU EVEN LISTENING TO ME?!"
"Come off of it already Rockman. What's done is done. We still got a big task ahead of us and I don't know how much time we even have." Rockman crossed his arms in front of himself, glaring at his human twin as he got quiet at Netto's words. "Us getting separated isn't going to help us at all. We still need to figure out what that voice was talking about so we can head home as soon as we can."
"Point made." Rockman said with a sigh."But the only things we saw there was some dragon statues and a bunch of colors."
"How many of each? I didn't count the colors but I think there was more than 5 dragon statues,"
Rockman thought about the colorful vortex that had been in that place. "I did counted ten statues myself. As for the colors, I recall seeing red, green, white, black, blue, yellow, and brown."
"So seven colors and ten statues." Netto stated. He couldn't help but smile. It was almost like the puzzles he had to solve in some if his video games back home. Looks like he needed more information before he could solve this one. The clues didn't add up as far as he knew. A groan that met the net op's ears made him look to his old PET.
"Agh... Did we win?" The black navi's voice echoed weakly over the device he was in.
"Yeah Yamir." Netto said as he moved the Advanced PET into the new navi's line of sight. "You told us who you were but we never told you our names. I'm Netto and this is Rockman."
Rockman waved in greeting. "Sorry to ask you so soon but can you try to explain what happen to Alpha-1? Netto is worried about him."
Yamir looked at the boy for a minute before he looked down at his feet. "Apologies, but I don't remember too much young sir. What I do recall is hearing some child like voice helping Alpha. Alpha and the child told me the mission is to help you in any manner I can."
"A voice?" Netto mused out loud, as the memory of Alpha looking around for something they couldn't see came back to him. "I wonder if that was what he was hearing that I couldn't when we were hacking the Radio Tower's gates."
"So you got no idea what happen to them? None at all?" Rockman questioned.
"None at all. They weren't there when I open my eyes." Yamir confirmed with sadness in his tone. "The viruses on the other hand were there and they wanted to help for some reason. I think that the child had an impact on them at some point."
"Odd. One of the viruses pointed at you as a form of answer when we asked them where Alpha-1 went."
"Really? Then I don't know what else to tell you." Yamir stated before he looked back to the human boy. "I'm at your command young sir. I was given a mission by your missing friend and I don't want to fail it."
"Alright but something's been bothering me since the tower: Why did the cameras come back on? I'm been put into some major trouble due to that since everyone saw me."
"I think it was a miscalculation on my part. What I did was recreated what they called a cyber field. It can range in characteristics based on the power source used, which in this case was me and the Radio Tower. The cameras might have been hit by the power surge of the field into coming back on and resume what they got programed to do."
"Guess we're just rolling with this punch." Rockman said, sounding annoyed.
"At least I got a change of clothes with me so I can try to look different."Netto stated with a relaxed look in his posture.
"But your backpack will look the same I'm afraid. May I suggest for you to get a second bag young sir?" Yamir pointed out, not missing a beat.
Netto felt his blood run cold at that. Mr. Light had seen the backpack on him when he was in his care and everyone saw it on the hijacked broadcast. All it would take to nail him would be that one man telling the hunters that he had been in close contact with him...
Yuichiro didn't know what to make of the whole thing. That boy had left the DIRS building just to dodge getting registered, confusing the man on why the child went back on his own words. But for that boy to show up at the Radio Tower shortly after to save his son had made him feel even more torn about what to do. Should he report the child and go back on the child's request to not be reported? Or keep quiet out of gratitude for the daring rescue?
"Dad!"
Yuichiro snapped out of his thoughts and braced himself for the impact of Hub's rushed hug which partly knocked the wind out him. He looked down to see his boy was unharmed but he still looked like if he still needed time to calm down from this experience. The man's eyes glanced to the doorway to see the two hunters who had came with his son, X and Axl.
"Thank you for helping my son get out of the area safely when you got ahold of him. This means a lot to me."
X nodded to the words of gratitude. "It wasn't any trouble for us since he is a very well behaved youngster. I'm relieved as well about things working out in his favor. I hope you don't mind about us questioning him about how things had happen since the mavericks being able to take a hostage from within the city is a big concern."
"If Hub was fine with it, then I'm not going to mind it either."
"Thats good. Since we're done already, go ahead and take him home." X said, allowing a small smile to show up on his face before he turned to head back deeper in the base. "I wish you both a safe trip home."
Axl looked back to the two humans, grinning. "Hey Hub, don't forget what we had talked about a bit ago. After all, we're pals now."
Yuichiro felt a bit of surprise at those words but he glanced at his son to see Hub returning a smile to the younger hunter.
"Yeah, I'll keep in touch." Hub replied.
"Then see ya later." Axl said with a wave of his hand as he headed after X.
"Hub, what did I missed?"
"Axl had a personal talk with me. It's alright, Dad. We found a bit of common ground and now we're pals."
"Alright then." Yuichiro felt like something was off but didn't want to push his luck when Hub was still needing to recover from the event. Not to mention he trusted his boy to talk to him if something was really wrong when he was ready.
As for the child who did him a priceless favor, Yuichiro decided that maybe his silence was a small repayment he can do.
"Netto-kun... Netto-kun..."
Rockman sighed as once again, his brother was sleeping in. Time for the morning racket. "NETTO-KUN!"
"AHH!" cried two voices as the human boy fell off the sofa with a loud thud and another device's screen turned on.
"That was rude, Rockman." Yamir called from his screen in a grumpy tone as he recovered from the starlement. "Young sir, are you alright?"
The black navi heard a chuckle then laughter before he got an answer. "Been odd not having you wake me up Rockman. Glad that I got you back."
Rockman just stared at his brother for a minute before letting a smile show itself. "I'm glad too, Netto-kun. We should focus on getting you a disguise today as well as look into this whole Hunters vs Mavericks dispute that's going on around here. Knowing our luck, we are going to be pulled more deeply into this mess then we think."
"Right Rockman. I'm going to get changed before we go out." The boy picked up his backpack and headed for the bathroom to do just that as Yamir looked towards his fellow navi.
"What did you mean by that, Rockman?"
"Netto-kun's reckless as you have already seen. He has, by mistake, gotten into the way of powerful criminal groups and end up becoming their worst nightmare of a netop more than once."
"Oh my. Looks like things aren't going to be boring with you two."
"Never has been." Rockman said as Netto walked out in his yellow, long sleeve shirt with the black shorts. Both navis looked from their viewpoint on the floor at the human before the black navi spoke up.
"Shoes are still the same too. Should we add that to the list?"
"Geez guys! You really are on my case today." Netto complained as his unplugged the PETs from the small emergency generator and placed them in his carry cases.
Picking up his laptop after hiding the rest of his stuff in the abandoned apartment, he headed out to learn about this new place.
An alarm clock had started to beep it's morning call, waking up it's near by human boy. He reached over, turning the noise off as he sat up.
"Man, that was a rough night." Hub said to himself as he got up to change his clothes. Looking in his closet, he grabbed a yellow short sleeve shirt, tan pants, and a blue hoodie. The events over the last 48 hours had been overwhelming for him. Thank goodness he has Axl to talk to about the whole thing now.
His mind wandered back to the memory of when he had been back at Abel City's Hunter HQ...
Safe and sound after the hostage ordeal, Hub had been requested to tell X everything he could remember of his kidnapping. As relieved as he was about being able to go home, the Maverick Hunters really wanted to prevent a repeat from happening. The blue bot stood up out of the chair he had been sitting in for the last hour or so just talking and asking much needed questions. "I think that covers everything. Thank you Hub, you've been so helpful with allowing me to hear of your encounter."
The boy nodded. X had been willing to wait on him throughout the whole conversation since the boy was still feeling nervous. As the hunter left the room, the boy leaned back into the chair he was in as his mind wandered back once more to the events.
The young boy had never felt so scared before in his life nor so helpless. How did someone his own age have the courage to face and fight a Maverick? Which brought him to the enigma in question; the boy who X, Zero and Axl are calling 'Net'.
Net looked a lot like Hub himself. It was almost like looking at a brother he never knew of. Then again, the computer systems around him had always acted up around him for some reason and as he overheard from the 3 S class hunters themselves, Net had the same occurrence but it seemed like he could command the source. Or maybe there was something more to the system reactions, but what would make this happen? At the sound of heavy footsteps that most likely belong to a reploid, Hub looked up to see Axl coming over.
"You doing ok kid?" Axl asked as he sat down next to Hub.
"Yeah, just deep in thought." Hub replied.
"Me too. It seems that you and I see something good in Net, yet a lot of the others want to look at him as a potential threat." Axl stated as he looked around the room. The room was plain with very little in here since this room was not used so often. It was for any visiting humans who had to wait here to stay out of the way of the busy Hunters.
"What bothers me is that he looked so much like me, yet he is so different from me. He was able to stand up to Tornado Tonion who is a S class threat without fear. Me, I was afraid and just wished I could hide from the Maverick." the boy said, envy lacing his voice.
"Well, fighting is scary at first for some of the new guys while others enjoy it right away. I think he's just one of those guys who has trained for some time in it since he acted like it wasn't anything new to him." the shapeshifter commented, recalling Net's actions with his own eyes. "I think the biggest surprise to him was the cyber field. Even then it was like 30 seconds before he regained his focus."
"So some fighters find it scary at first..." Hub mused for a moment before speaking again. "I guess I'm like that. Then that just means I need to overcome my fear of fighting."
Axl looked to the boy with confusment on his face. "Huh? What are you thinking?"
"I'm thinking of finding a human fighting style to train in, like kendo or something else along those lines." Hub answered, determination in his brown eyes. "I hated the feeling of helplessness that maverick made me feel. I want to be able to face threats with the same courage as Net did so I can protect the ones I care about instead of being a burden."
Axl couldn't help but smile. "A sword skill won't be a bad choice. After all, if you can get ahold of a beam saber during a run in with a dangerous reploid, you would be able to use it."
Hub smiled at Axl's encouragement. "Yeah. But what's the word on what the hunters are going to do about Net? We both think there is something more to him that he don't want to tell us, but he isn't evil in the first place."
"Protocol says I can't tell a civilian about classified stuff..." Hub begin to look downcast at Axl's answer. "But I can tell you what I wish I can do. I want to learn more about that kid since I feel like I saw a bit of my old self in him."
Hub's eyes lit up as he looked at the young hunter. "Really? But how are we going to do that?"
"Not sure how to do it myself yet, but I think if we both look out for stuff and keep in contact, we'll find a way."
Hub looked to his phone. The young hunter had showed him a low key way to reach his commlink with his phone as well so contacting him shouldn't be hard. Of course, he was not to share that trick with others.
Well, he had plans for today. If he was going to find a fighting style, he better get looking.
Part 1 End
I love honest critiques, hate flames. And for the record, a critique is NOT you telling me about how I made a 'mistake' of adding your most hated character/pairing and you hate me for it. A critique is telling me what you like and didn't like about my story and if I have things like spelling errors or plot holes. :)