"Where's Yai? I can't do this without her!"
"Calm down, Tory, calm down." Maylu Sakurai placed her palms on Tory Froid's shoulders, though it did nothing to calm down the younger student. Mind, why should it? I mean, Yai Ayano -- at two years younger than us -- was the second-smartest person we knew, had known, or ever would know. BONUS: He also liked her -- which didn't help matters in a case like this.
So, one could see why Tory was panicking. Maylu's reassuring touch helped him somewhat; he fell limp in front of the specialised computer.
"Wow. This is tough." Dex paced around the small back room of SciLabs. My dad had told me to e-mail my friends and get us all over here, though I wondered where he had dispersed to. We were now in a war, a war that - oddly enough -- involved Navis, Navis, and more Navis. I was chewing my lip – and anytime you can actually get Lan Hikari to start pacing most agitatedly, you know something's up. "First it was Mega Man, now every single Navi we know is caught in the Real World. And, not to mention, there's a big war going on at the good ol' park." Dex paused his pacing, his eyes wide and worried. "Yup, definitely not good. Especially when NetBattles are supposed to be fun."
"I'm stocking BattleChips. I'm stocking BattleChips," Tory muttered quickly to himself as his fingers flew, a skin-coloured blur, over the keys. "I'm preparing them from NetNavi data and DNA. Some of them were just invented by Yai and me, but I don't care. I'm saving everyone." He looked at the sky-blue PET in his pocket and a smiled curved his features. "Isn't that right, Ice Man?"
Tory's face fell as he realised his Navi was not there. We were all deeply saddened by the thought – then our attention was snapped back into reality as something happened on the computer screen in front of Tory. Something very odd indeed.
My Net Navigator, Mega Man.EXE, was walking onto the battlefield. And it wasn't a nice sight.
The CyberSword was fused with his gloved hand. Unaided by me – just goes to show you that a Navi in the Real World can do anything they set their heart to. And this thing was fighting. Not going down in the face of danger. Falling, yeah, but not going down; always back on their feet in the matter of seconds. Either way you looked at it, Mega Man was not over yet. Nor would he be for a looooong time.
I watched, my mouth open, my breath bated, as he mounted an imaginary podium. Watched in shocked amazement as his opponent stepped up to fight him.
Proto Man.EXE.
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The sword fused with his hand, Mega faced Proto Man. The now-evil red-clad NetNavi looked back, his expression hidden under the shades that were always perched upon the bridgeof his nose. He faced the humanized Navi, and his expression was one of hatred and scorn.
All at once, they began to fight.
The swords were clashing, one against the other, in blurs of yellow and white. For me, it was a replay of the fight he had with Proto before, when we thought Mega Man had been deleted. In reality, well – what? I didn't know what that meant; I'd saved him from deletion, but... NAVIS WERE IN THE REAL WORLD. That had to mean something. (rolls eyes) Anyway, it was different this time, though – as if I could tell it was his dying day – deletion day – doomsday – whatever -- and that he wouldn't be rescued by yours truly. The spectators had all fallen silent, Navis and humans, good and bad, all temporarily halted as they watched the spectacle before them. The life had been sucked out of the very air, it seemed; everything had gone frosty and dead. The echoes of sword upon sword filled the silence, resonating off the people, the Navis, everything. Even the slide... I remembered when Arnie and I had met Dex and Mega there. Now, it seemed like really long ago, like a distant memory lost in the past... But it was still there, as was the NetNavi who was now duelling with Chaud's, right in front of my eyes...
Suddenly, I was snapped out of my thoughts by a cry – a muffled, suppressed cry, but a cry nonetheless. I stared as Proto Man allowed his own CyberSword, which was normally fused to his arm like a replacement hand, to melt away. The data particles shimmered into nothingness, and I saw why. Proto Man placed one foot across Mega Man's chest, as he had done so many eons ago...
He looked evil as he held up two fists. A soft silver sheen spread over his forearms, and two CyberSwords appeared on each one. He dived in for the kill...