I have returned. I recently started college and I have free time in the afternoon, which is rare in college. So this is the way I've started using that time. So I present chapter 2 of the story, only took almost 2 years...
...
Chapter 2:
A black cladded Navi backflipped out of the way of an energy beam. Once he landed on one knee, he aimed his buster and fired a shot into the chest and head of a faceless, gray Navi, deleting it. Soon after he heard footsteps behind him, another featureless Navi sprinting towards him with a sword. The one in black took a couple of pot shots, the attacker deflected the bursts with a swift move of the sword. With a grunt, he himself switched to a sword. The two locked in a duel. The defender tried to swipe left across its chest but the blade was met with the attacker's own. The faceless Navi pushed the black one back, throwing him off for a second. Before he fully recovered, a blaster shot came within inches of his face. Another Faceless drone was off in the distance with an M-cannon. The plain swordsman went on the offense. It pulled its sword overhead and tried to bring it down into its enemy's head. The defender brought his own sword up over his head and blocked the strike. During this, he heard the canon begin to charge up. He quickly activated another sword on his left hand. The shot fired, with one well-timed swing, he deflected the shot back to the Navi and blew its head off. He carried the momentum and swung his arm around soft ball pitched style and plunged the point of his blade into the gut of the final Navi, deleting it.
The Navi retracted his battle mask and slid his opaque red visor into his helmet. Then the Navi was enveloped in data and revealed his original blue colors.
"You're good to release full synchro Lan." Megaman huffed.
Lan was standing perfectly still with a white, glowing aura surrounding him. His body was standing in front of a battle table in a plain room with gray walls and a white tile floor. The aura surrounding Lan faded away and he put his hands on his knees and panted.
"The higher ups really bumped up the train difficulty didn't they?" Land was wearing his signature headband, jeans, and a tan leather jacket.
"Well they have to make sure we don't die too easily." Megaman replied.
"True that." Lan unplugged his PET from the terminal, returning Megaman to the device.
Lan walked up the exit, the door slid open. He stepped out into the hall to see Mr. Famous.
"You've come a long way in your training, not many people could handle a situation like that and make it out unscathed." He complimented.
"Thanks, and I feel like I could take on harder scenarios as well." Lan replied.
"And that's why you're one of our best Saviors. Go home and get some rest."
Lan sighed, "alright, I will." with that he began to walk off.
Mr. Famous raised an eyebrow, "is there something bothering you?"
Lan stopped in his tracks, and after a moment, he turned back around to face his mentor.
"...How long will I have to keep this all a secret? I hate having to keep all this from my friends, they deserve to know." Though know one could see, Megaman lowered his head in guilt and agreement.
Mr. Famous's expression softened, "I don't know, the decision isn't up to me, I know you feel guilty and I wish you could come clean with them too. But you could get in some pretty serious trouble."
"Yeah I know, I'm glad you understand." with that Lan continued in the direction he was heading. Mr. Famous pushed up his glasses and walked down the hall in the opposite direction. Lan entered an elevator and pressed the ground floor button. After about 15 seconds, the door opened up into a low traveled area of SciLab. He made his way out of the building and began a relaxing walk home. He looked into the sky and noticed it was a mix of yellow, pink, and red colors. He checked the time and saw it was 7:30 PM. They were training for longer than he thought. After a conversation with his mom about their days, Lan finally made it to his room. He plugged Megaman into the PC and collapsed into his bed with an exaggerated groan.
The Blue Bomber materialized on the computer screen. Lan looked at his brother and they smiled weakly at each other.
"I know we're thinking the same thing." Lan started.
"Yeah… I know we're doing the right thing but I hate having to keep this big of a secret." Megaman confirmed.
"If and when they find out, they're all gonna hate us." Lan added
"Maybe they'll understand." Megaman pondered.
"Possibly, but the longer this goes on, the worse it's gonna get."
"Lan? Laaan!" a hushed familiar feminine voice came through Lan's cracked open window.
Lan hopped up from his bed, pulled the window the rest of the way up, and poked his head out the window.
"Hey Maylu, what's up?"
"Where have you been all afternoon?" She asked from her window.
Lan picked up on the suspicion in her voice. Luckily he prepared for the time he would be questioned (which is rare).
"I was at SciLab helping my dad out." he replied nonchalantly as possible. 'Not a complete lie, the location is true'
The reason did sound mostly believable to Maylu, but she still wasn't buying it.
"What were you helping him with?" She shot back, hoping to catch him out.
To her surprise he didn't falter, "mostly programs for Navis that will eventually be released to the public." 'Also not a lie, I do that.'
Though Megaman may not like anything involving his past brought up, Lan felt like he needed to say something more to really melt away her suspicion
"You know the program that lets our Navis take off their helmets?"
"Yeah? Wait, don't tell me you had a part in that!" She questioned.
"Sure did, it was Megaman and I's idea."
"Wow, I didn't think you had the brain power to come up with an idea like that." The redhead teased.
"Hey! Give me some credit." the boy exclaimed.
"Ok then, let me see your homework so I can review the answers." Maylu asked with a smug grin.
"OOOO, she got you there." Lan heard Megaman say behind him.
He spun around in anger to see his brother with panels open performing maintenance.
"You're supposed to be on my side!"
"You need to get your homework done." Megaman said bluntly.
"Why don't you just do it for me then?" Lan proposed.
"Ugh, fine."
"Wait, really?"
"No." The navi added without looking away from the panel.
"I hate you."
Maylu laughed at the two's antics, and most of her doubts disappeared, most. She still felt like he was hiding something. The two went back to talking, since Lan brought it up, Megaman thought back to the day they went to their dad to have the program made.
…
Around six months ago on a saturday morning, Megaman was up before his brother as usual. But there was no need to scream his ears out to wake him up since it was the weekend. He sat in a bean bag chair program with his helmet off, letting his brown hair be free. He was reading through the current news seeing if there was anything interesting or important going on. He almost never takes his helmet off, since it would reveal his human side. But he would take it off if he was alone in his PC and access was set to "invite only". However he forgot to check if that setting was on at the time. He was getting a kick out of an article about a guy trying something strange to evade police in some obscure country when he saw pink in the left side of his vision.
"...Mega?" There Roll was, leaning towards him with her mouth hung open in amazement.
The Navi in question's eyes went wide as he shot up out of the chair to face her and reformed his helmet.
"Oh h-hey Roll." He stammered nervously.
Her face was turning redder by the second, "You have… hair?" Roll questioned.
Megaman noticed the state of her face and thought she looked cute when flustered. So he decided to tell her the truth without revealing too much.
He rubbed the back of his helmet and looked away, "yeah I do."
"Have you always had it?"
"Yep, Dr. Hikari created me with it."
"How come you never showed any of us?" She asked with a pang of hurt.
Lan's secret brother met Roll's gaze again, "I guess I'm self conscious about it. How many Navis do you see with hair? None. I didn't know how you'd react to me having such a human feature."
Roll noticed how he specifically stated her but put that aside for now.
She smiled and put her hands on her hips, "You think having some hair would make me think you're a circus act? I thought you knew me better!" She teased.
He grinned but his mood stayed somber, "You're right.. I'm sorry for keeping this from you." He apologized, now thinking the floor looked more interesting.
Roll didn't know what came over her, but she decided to ask something drastic, "w-will you let me s-see it?" 'Oh my god I can't believe I asked that!"
Megaman looked back up and froze. He really didn't want anyone to see his hair, including Roll. He studied her face and saw how red her cheeks were and how her eyes look everywhere else except at him. He couldn't deny her any longer, she deserved to see. So he slowly raised his hands and placed them on the sides of his helmet. Roll noticed the movement and put her eyes back on her crush. A faint digital whirl could be heard, when it stopped, the blue bomber slowly pulled the helmet off, and his long brown locks of hair fell over his face. He tossed his headwear onto the chair and whipped his head around to get the hair out of his face.
Roll's programming didn't know how to handle the situation. In a way, Megaman was right, she didn't know what to think. She shouldn't feel any more attraction to her crush than usual. She wasn't built to compute such a human attribute since Navis don't have hair. Yet here she was, ready to explode from how much hotter he looked to her.
Megaman was getting worried about how she was reacting, "Roll?"
"Eep!" she jumped at her voice. She realized she was staring.
"Are you Ok?" He asked
"Um… I, uh…"
He was now extremely self conscious, "W-well I-I'm gonna.." He began and turned around and reached over beside him to where his helmet was resting on the chair.
"Wait!"
The boy stopped and looked back to his companion. She was now a lot closer than she was before.
"I really like the way it looks… can I…. touch it?" She didn't know if her processor wanted to learn about what it was seeing, or if it was something she couldn't resist doing. One thing for sure, she would never have the confidence to do this under normal circumstances.
That was the last thing he hoped Roll wouldn't ask. He was about to ignore her and put on the helmet anyway. But he remembered how his mom would play with his hair when they snuggled or when he was scared at night and couldn't fall asleep. He missed the feeling so desperately. He thought that giving Roll, the Navi he cared about the most, her wish would be the way he could re-capture that feeling. After a moment, the brown haired boy sighed, began to blush slightly, and bowed his head slightly to signal the invitation.
Roll hesitated, fully expecting him to reject. But she eventually took one final step towards him to get in arms reach. She placed her left hand over the emblem on her chest and raised her right arm. She placed her hand on the left side of the boy's head just above the emblem where his ear would be. Megaman closed his eyes and leaned into the touch. Roll thought it was absolutely adorable. She focused her gaze onto her hand and began to rub the area. It was so soft and fluffy! The girl moved her hand to his bangs and ran his locks through her fingers. Megaman got the impression she was enjoying herself, but he had to admit, he was too.
After about a minute of this, Megaman noticed how close Roll had gotten to him. He didn't know what to do so he spoke up, "Roll?"
The girl was instantly snapped from her trance and she shot her hand back and began to cover her face. Her face was now the reddest the boy had ever seen, she couldn't look at him.
She took a step back, "O-Oh! I-I just remembered t-that I have to help Maylu p-practice playing her homework! BYE!" She disappeared in a beam of light.
Megaman stared at where she stood for a while, 'play her homework? Heh…" he smirked.
He turned back to his chair and eyed his helmet, it disappeared in a cloud of data. He slumped back into it and got to thinking. How would Roll look with her helmet off? He obviously knew what color and how long her hair would be since she had the blonde, featureless plate of "hair" coming off the back of her head. The thought made him blush more.
"Ughhhhh, good morning Hub." Megaman heard his brother say.
He opened up the display and there Lan was standing in front of the PC.
"Morning Bro."
"Was Roll here earlier? I thought I heard her."
"Yeah she was… I have a question."
"What's up?"
"Do you think dad would be opposed to creating new Navi software?"
…
The next morning in the present…
Megaman made it a habit to come to the central park of Internet City the morning after a Net Savior training session. The spot he likes to sit is on the highest hill under a tall, thick-leafed tree so he can look over the city to remind him what he fights for.
'Crime has been on the down low since Protoman and I took down Rum-runner. I don't know if that's a good thing or bad thing.' he thought.
That's when pink suddenly blocked his vision, "Guess who?"
Megaman smiled instantly knowing who it was, "hmmmm, Gutsman?"
"Not quite, wise guy." she scoffed.
Megaman laughed and Roll removed her hands from his face and took a seat next to him.
"Thought I'd find you here." Roll added.
"You know me so well!" Megaman replied. Earning a giggle.
"Speaking of that, you look like you're thinking." She said,
"I was just thinking about how calm crime has been lately. It's kinda weird me out." The boy explained.
"Yeah I suppose you're right, the last time I remember anything major is when the leader of that smuggling group and his Navi were caught, and that was almost a month ago."
Megaman tensed up at that being brought up, "Yeah I heard about that…"
"I heard that he was stopped by a couple of guys and their Navis. From the way I heard they dressed and how they handled the situation made it sound like they're some kind of secret strikeforce." Roll thought out loud.
"O-Oh I never heard that part." Megaman tried his best to play along.
"It makes me wonder what else is being hidden from us."
"Well whoever they may be, they must be doing a good jobs at keeping things in-" *BAM*
An energy shot hit Megaman in the chest. The blast was powerful enough to send him through the tree and down the hill out of view.
"Mega!" Roll shouted.
She then heard the creaking of wood breaking and saw the tree was falling. She lept a good 15 feet out of the way to avoid the collapsing tree. She looked to where the blast came from. There at the bottom of the hill stood a broad Navi that was about a foot taller than them. The Navi was light gray with black stripes going up his sides. His boots and gloves were a shining gold. He had his left hand turned into a buster. His helmet had two subtle fins that started above either eye and reached behind his head. He had a humanoid face with golden eyes. His gold shoulder pads were wide and tall, extending a few inches out beside his arms.
"Who are you?" Roll demanded.
"This does not involve you." the attacker sneered.
"If it involves Megaman, then it involves me!" She declared.
"As you wish, girl."
Roll formed her hand into her signature bow and fired upon the Navi. He easily maneuvered out the way and fired back. Roll ran and flipped out the way of the assaulting fire, she closed the distance and activated a sword. She dodged one final blast and used the shockwave of it striking the ground to propel her up and towards the Navi. To her dismay, he caught her sword out of the air. He slammed her on her back in front of him. Once her vision unblurred she saw a buster pointed at her head. She took on a face of horror preparing to be shot.
Before that could happen, a shot nailed the attacker in the shoulder. Though it didn't send him flying like Megaman did, it did bring his attention away from Roll, giving her the chance to leap up and make distance. Megaman stood about thirty feet away with a char mark on the left of his chest and side. He kept his buster aimed at the mysterious Navi.
"Who are you?!" Megaman demanded.
"You shall find out soon enough…"