a/n: so this was over seven thousand words long, gotta break it up into halves for my thirteen peeps. which gives the second half time to spawn a bit more narration as well as not keeping this on the horrible cliffhanger of doom whilst i prep another aotres update, so that's a win all around!

And the New World Struggles...

Atsuki woke up screaming, hands clutching his chest.

"What's happening to him?" Rockman asked, horrified at how much pain the human seemed to be in.

"Oh, this is just the shots," Burnerman shrugged. "It's always like this if they're inconsistent." As his Operator coiled himself on the ground and howled, Burnerman muttered, "Useless humans and their useless flesh."

When the screams had subsided into broken whimpers and Atsuki's body had relaxed somewhat, Rockman materialized. Burnerman was obviously not going to, and somebody needed to get the last remaining human up to speed in the wake of what had happened to his partner. Netto had been gone for almost four hours; Rockman's last hope was that they could get moving in time to save his Operator from Two's clutches, and they wouldn't be going far without someone to get them to wherever they needed to go.

Rockman wasn't entirely sure where he stood with Atsuki now, but he did know that Atsuki would absolutely want to save Netto. Once again, he'd found an unlikely ally in the darkest of places. "Atsuki, are…" Immediately, Rockman realized that it was incredibly dumb to ask Atsuki if he was all right when he was curled into a ball on the ground. "Can you hear me?"

Atsuki slowly turned his head, breathing heavily. "You're that… Rockman?" It seemed his presence alone was enough to tell Atsuki what had happened. "Damn it—!" Between gasps of air, he screamed, "Why would he do something—so fucking stupid—!"

"It's only been a few hours," Rockman explained. Though he was trying not to cause Atsuki to fly any further off the handle, he was feeling just as worried, because he'd sat and watched as three and a half entire hours had passed. Worst of all, they had no leads. He couldn't help having some of that anxiety slip into his voice as he added, "We've got to still have time."

"You're still here," muttered Atsuki. "So it wasn't those fuckers from the Ministry of Science…"

"It was one of the girls from the harbor," Rockman said. Nobody had taken the time to explain to him which one of their numbers corresponded to which person, so he had to supply, "The blonde girl in charge of converting the Virus Fusions."

"Two," Atsuki recognized immediately. "Of course she'd jump to conclusions. She never did think much of Seven."

"His real name is Netto," Rockman reminded Atsuki, unable to let the number-title slide even under the circumstances.

"Whatever," Atsuki muttered.

From inside Netto's PET, Punk was trying to get Rockman's attention via gesturing with his arm and cable. Rockman gestured back; if it was so important, the other Navi could get out of his comfort zone. They weren't under the watch of Darkland any longer, but only Rockman seemed willing to set any new boundaries with Atsuki.

Finally, reluctantly, Punk materialized next to Rockman. "We have a lead, sir," he reported tonelessly to Atsuki, the usual rascally manner of speech wiped clean from his voice. "A series of coordinates were sent to this PET in the last hour."

"Show me," snapped Atsuki. Punk bowed deeply as a map displayed itself in the space next to him. Rockman gently nudged him, hoping to get him to knock it off, and received a surreptitious glare in return.

Atsuki was already out the door by the time Rockman had given up on trying to get Punk to quit acting like a robot. The older Navi retreated back into the PET, leaving Rockman alone by Atsuki's side.

"Once we find Netto, we should go to the Ministry," Rockman decided. "They'll be able to care for both of you while you recover."

"The Ministry? As in, the Ministry of Science?" Atsuki asked incredulously. "Don't be ridiculous."

"The people at the Ministry are close friends," Rockman said. "I'm sure with time they'll be your friends, too."

"Oh, I'm sure they'd get along just great with something like me. Don't tell me that Enzan is a 'close friend' as well," growled Atsuki. "If he hadn't kept prying into Netto's business, none of this would have happened."

"…Is that really such a bad thing?" Rockman asked.

"It was for Netto. He finally had the General's trust, after all that time he spent making up for the trouble he caused. Then he came here, and it all got pissed away."

"Trouble?" Rockman asked, surprised. From what he'd heard and seen so far, Netto had been too well-behaved in his captivity.

"Didn't he tell you?" Atsuki asked. "All the escape attempts?"

"He did say he'd been trouble at one point," Rockman said faintly. "But never in any detail…"

Rockman was no longer sure he wanted to know precisely what had made Netto submit to the General's will. He already had a suspicion, and envisioning that alone was bad enough.

"The first three months or so, he kept trying to run. Got real creative about it, too, sent a few guards to the medical ward and showed the General a few big security holes in the Central Control system. But the General is a real person," Atsuki explained. Rockman could hear the bitter twist to his voice as he said it. "He doesn't have time to keep playing games with his thralls. So he threw Netto in Solitary for a few months, and sometime before or after he took Netto's eye, and that was the end of that."

They traveled in silence after that. Rockman sank to his knees inside the PET. He could more or less guess what a thrall or Solitary was; he really hadn't wanted to know. It was at times like this that he desperately missed the safety of the Ministry, with his Papa and Roll and Blues and Gateman around. There was nobody as monstrous as the General there, and a vast remove from the situation that had made him that way. If it hadn't been for how visible the Beyondard and Cache incidents had been, perhaps neither Netto nor Rockman would have ever had to know how hungry for power the rest of the world had grown.

Punk quietly extended his arm, and Rockman slumped sideways into the offered half-hug, Punk's shoulderplate blocking out the light overhead like a parasol. He wondered how many times Netto had felt like this, wishing it was all just a bad dream.

"…He really wanted to make it home to those people," Atsuki mused. Rockman looked outside to see a towering old building. "To Enzan."

Then, the world outside flew downward as Atsuki swiftly lifted his PET arm. "Burnerman, find out what's in this place's system," Atsuki ordered, plugging his Navi in. "There's no telling who sent us these coordinates. It might be a trap."

Moments later, Burnerman reported, "There's nothing in here, you paranoid old bastard."

"Nothing?"

"They must be in as much disarray as we were, sir," Punk said, the arm around Rockman tightening a little as he spoke up. Atsuki's demeanor must have reminded him of one of his old Operators; it was no wonder he'd been a rare sight outside the PET. "We also had very little in our hideout's network, because we had so few resources."

"That's not Two's style," Atsuki muttered, though he plugged Burnerman back out and tried the door. It cracked open, letting a ghastly wail reach their ears.

Rockman realized the voice was Netto's.

Atsuki slammed the door wide open to reveal a single guard who looked as though he had been through several lifetimes' worth of trauma. With the ease of experience, Atsuki disarmed him before he was even through pulling his gun and slammed him into the wall with a single punch. "Well, now she knows I'm here."

"How could she hear you over…?" Rockman couldn't finish the sentence. Netto had not stopped screaming.

"Implants, remember?" Atsuki pointed out. "All of us Silvers have 'em for our hearing." Rockman could tell that Atsuki wasn't at his full strength. They were moving at a brisk walk, not a full-out run, and the man's breath was coming just a bit too heavily. "They'll be on the second floor. Better vantage point that way."

Only one other agent tried to risk it. Rockman looked at the man's half-hearted, fearful approach and had a sinking feeling it would only fuel Atsuki's temper. He was proven right when Atsuki first smashed the agent's head into the wall, shattered the other man's shoulder with his next blow, and then pitched him screaming through an observation window like he was competing in shot-put, leaving a spray of blood on the glass.

It was distraction enough; Netto had stopped screaming.

There was nobody there to stop them by the time they'd found the stairs. Not a soul in sight. But it was impossible for Rockman to forget where he'd heard that horrible sound coming from, and Atsuki clearly felt the same.

Atsuki rounded the corner and they saw a figure crumpled on the ground, wet with blood. He dashed to Netto's side and gathered him in his arms, too distraught to do anything more. For a second, it seemed like Netto had met Atsuki's gaze; then, before anyone could say a word, his head lolled sideways and back.

Netto's body was so small in Atsuki's arms, without any sort of uniform to make him seem any older or scarier besides a black undershirt and shorts. The amount of his own blood coating his exposed arms was nauseating, to say nothing of the patchwork of knife wounds both old and fresh that disfigured them and ran further up until the undershirt hid them. Nobody had the wherewithal to wonder who had sent them here any longer, or why. Atsuki hugged Netto tighter, burying his head in the smaller boy's chest. Rockman noticed that the undershirt was moist, too, hiding more cuts.

"What are you doing?" came an impatient voice from the doorway.

Atsuki's head shot up, his nose and cheeks reddened with Netto's blood. He raged at Shun, "I'm fucking mourning, you little bastard! What do you think I'm doing?!"

"Why are you…?" Rockman wondered, surprised to see Shun again.

"Well, maybe do that after we've looked at him, okay?! We can't have much time if we're gonna…" Finally noticing the state Netto was in, Shun asked, "What happened to him?"

"Someone must've poisoned him," Atsuki realized, though Rockman had a feeling that wasn't what Shun had been intending to ask after. "But this isn't the cyanide capsule. What would–"

They all noticed the syringe on the countertop at the same time.

"What was that stuff…?" Rockman wondered faintly, remembering how similarly Atsuki had been screaming when he'd woken up.

"Two wouldn't have been aiming to kill him before the General could. It was probably just something to fuck with his head. But he's lost so much blood that it would've had a stronger effect…" Almost to himself, Atsuki said, "He only just lost consciousness."

Rockman realized, "We've got to hurry! We have to have time to restore some of his fluids…!"

"We have stuff for that in the trailer," Shun managed to squeak, visibly overwhelmed by the torrent of emotion roiling off of the two. "It's right outside–"

"Honestly," said a voice that was all too familiar to Rockman. "It's so hard to find competent help these days."

Shun turned to Wily, frustrated. "Look, I was trying to get them out of here, but they just want to stand here and–"

"I will offer my assistance," Wily told Atsuki, bypassing Shun entirely. "But it's clear to see Hikari Netto is in critical condition. I can only save him if we leave here right away."

"We can trust him," Rockman said with more confidence than he felt.

"…Fine. But don't try anything funny," Atsuki growled. As Wily's hoverchair zipped away, leaving Shun and Atsuki to follow, he wondered under his breath, "…Hikari?"

But the revelation didn't make Atsuki cradle Netto to his body any less closely. When he'd scoffed at Rockman's explanation, it seemed Atsuki had been being honest; names truly didn't matter to him. In a place like the Citadel where they seemed so disposable, Rockman supposed that made a sad sort of sense.

The 'trailer' looked like any other beaten-up RV on the outside. Inside was a full-blown laboratory, though a cot and a rather haphazard-looking hammock were nestled among the hardware. Wily had obviously never lost track of Netto; there was an IV bag waiting on the mayo stand by the cot, as well as what looked almost like a sapphire encased in pearl, several delicate-looking devices, and—skin? Eyelids?

"I won't harm him," Wily said from behind Atsuki's shoulder, "but you need to set him down or we will run out of time."

Gently, reluctantly, Atsuki laid Netto on the cot and stepped back. Without anything to hold onto, he crossed his arms over his chest tightly. Due to the cramped quarters, it was hard to see anything that was happening. Before long, Rockman could hear the clicking of surgical tools; at the same time, Atsuki's finger, Netto's blood drying on it, began tapping against his elbow.

"You could see about whoever's rubbernecking outside," Wily suggested.

"We were—?" It was clearly discomfiting to Atsuki to realize just how out of sorts he was over the situation. "Right away, sir," he answered with a stiff salute, then strode to the door.

At first, nobody seemed to be outside. Only a flicker of movement in a shadow alerted Atsuki to their pursuer's presence. "A Sharan?!" he noticed right away, dropping into a fighting stance. "What the hell do you people want here?!"

Rockman recognized this particular soldier. "Laika!"

"I'm here on personal business," Laika explained coldly, clearly ready to fight back nonetheless. "Let me see Hikari Netto."

"Oh, I'm sure you'd like to," Atsuki sneered.

"Laika's a friend, Atsuki!" Rockman explained hurriedly. "He's telling the truth!"

"You leave us alone," Atsuki growled, raising his blood-spattered fists in front of his face. "You expect me to believe your superiors would pass up the chance to kill a Silver."

"I do, eventually." Laika sized up his opponent. "You're in no condition to fight. Don't waste the energy."

Rockman had a feeling Atsuki would want to at least try, and he was disappointed but not surprised when Atsuki rocketed forward. "No!" Laika gracefully evaded blow after blow, but Rockman couldn't help but worry; Atsuki probably figured he only needed to land a single hit with how heavy his limbs were. "Please stop fighting!" Nobody was paying attention to Rockman's protests. He could only wait for Atsuki's current state to catch up with him. Even when it did, Atsuki refused to fall, staring down his opponent with murderous intent as if he weren't gasping for air.

"I assume this is a friend of yours, Rockman?" Laika asked, managing to sound extremely judgmental as he did.

"He might seem a little unsavory, but he saved Netto's life," Rockman explained.

"Just… a little?!" wheezed Atsuki.

"Then I suppose I'll leave it at this," decided Laika, and strode past Atsuki to the trailer door. Half-stumbling, Atsuki followed closely, clearly willing to try again in the event of any sudden assassination attempts.

"Ah, just what I needed. Another bag of nerves to stand behind me," Wily said dryly as they returned inside. Though Netto's arms were much cleaner and his hand was bandaged, bloody gauze covered the floor around his cot, and several stitches were now holding the wounds closed. The most alarming part to Rockman was how the apparatus inside Netto's eye socket was partially disassembled. Watching Wily carefully maneuver pieces of it out of Netto's head to deposit on the mayo stand made Rockman feel about as twitchy as Atsuki had been.

Laika took in the sight, Searchman next to him on his shoulder, both their expressions unreadable. The silence was broken only by the clicking of Wily's tools and the thumps of Atsuki's limbs as he sagged to the ground. Finally, Laika said, "Searchman, tell the Ministry to prepare for our return."

"Yes, Laika-sama," Searchman said immediately, blurring out of sight.

"Well, if you're going to stand there, you may as well pitch in," Wily told Laika. Rockman had to look away as the old man doused a gauze pad with rubbing alcohol and confidently swabbed the inside of Netto's hollowed-out socket with it, fingers dipping inside of Netto's skull in the process. "Another steady set of hands would give this old man a little more confidence." It was obvious that Atsuki had never qualified, but Rockman looked around to find Wily's other assistant hiding in the passenger seat at the front of the RV, equally unable to deal with what was happening if the hands clapped over his mouth were any indication.

Rockman looked over at Shun trying not to hyperventilate, then Atsuki keeping watch over the cot as if any mistake would give him the strength to leap to his feet and kill everyone in the RV, and finally to Laika and Wily blocking his view of what was happening to Netto.

He could already tell it was going to be a long wait for all of them.

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"Get up," Atsuki heard the Sharan say. "It's done. We're returning to the Ministry of Science. We'll connect another IV bag when we get there."

Atsuki honestly could have laid there on the floor for another few hours, but that was inconsequential. Ignoring the painful ache of his cramping muscles as they were forced to stretch, he got to his feet.

"Hand him over," he demanded first, seeing Netto slung over the Sharan's shoulder. What seemed to Atsuki to be an unnecessary amount of bandages covered his arms and torso, but the most striking thing was his face: it now had two closed eyes, lashes about as thick as one another but one catching the light in a metallic black-blue shade. A triangle-shaped notch below his left eye and a few tiny divots above it were the only signs that it had ever been cut out of his face.

"You're barely standing," the Sharan said sharply. "Do you want to risk re-opening his wounds?"

"I can take care of my own, Sharan," spat Atsuki.

"We can trust Laika!" Rockman protested, materializing in front of Atsuki. "I know how worried you are about Netto-kun, and I am, too."

"You presume to know how I feel, Navi?" Atsuki asked, but of course the mouthy little thing barely paused at the coldness of his words.

"I've known Netto-kun for a long time, too," Rockman explained. Calling back to a conversation they'd had a few nights ago over Atsuki's futile attempts at making pancakes, Rockman said, "If your brain chemicals tell you that Netto-kun is someone to care about, then my core programming tells me the same. Believe me, if Netto-kun wasn't in safe hands, I'd be begging you to do everything you could to save him." At least the Navi was clever enough about his needling to not be infuriatingly annoying, though Atsuki wasn't sure if this backstory of having known Netto was a part of the charm ailment he'd had put on him or not.

"The Ministry of Science has sent a vehicle to pick us up not far from here," Laika explained, already beginning to walk. "We'll have plenty of time to discuss our trustworthiness once Netto is resting in a bed."

"Another real conversationalist," muttered Burnerman from Atsuki's PET as they kept moving.

The person driving the van was the scientist who called himself Meijin. Atsuki had seen plenty of him when they'd been breaking into the Ministry as part of Nova. He managed to say, "You got here quick, Lai—" before spotting Atsuki mid-turn. "You've… lost weight," Meijin stammered.

The man next to him was another easily recognizable face: Hikari Yuuichirou. He seemed far less laid-back than Atsuki remembered his profile saying he was, scooping Netto up in his arms despite his blustered just who do you think you are and Laika's protestations to be careful of his wounds and carrying him the few steps back to the stretcher that was set up in the back of the van.

It seemed too strange for a moment, the way Yuuichirou clung to Netto once he was safely nestled in the mismatched blankets that dotted the stretcher, how he didn't even notice his glasses sliding off his head as he buried his face in Netto's shoulder. "That's his father," Rockman said quietly.

"How is that supposed to mean anything to me?" Atsuki hissed back. "We don't have parents."

Rockman explained, "Papa loves Netto-kun, too. He was heartbroken when Netto-kun was taken from us."

"And you're his Navi," Atsuki recalled.

"But I was Netto-kun's before that," Rockman said, and now his quietness seemed to stem far more from emotion than politeness.

"…You don't even have a heart," Atsuki muttered.

"Yet I was heartbroken, too."

It was undoubtedly going to be a long, awkward ride to the Ministry, but Atsuki got into the back seat of the van without question when Laika did.