It was a new addition to the Crescent City Cyberworld, brand new in fact. Earlier that day a human programmer had added the memory expansion to the city's network mainframe and had formatted the extra space to be used as a new area connecting Crescent15 and Crescent89, relieving some of the high traffic in neighboring sectors. At the moment this node in Cyberspace was little more than a void with a blank wallpaper and raw materials floating in the abyss. It was up to the city's navi construction crew to put it all together in a way the denizens of the net could use. Already neon scaffolding mapped out where the various platforms and catwalks would be positioned over four different height levels. Some panels were already in place and by the end of the day it would look like the new "Crescent Area 177" had been there forever.

The most complete part of the area was on the bottom level on the south side; one large platform where some idle equipment and materials sat and the only working teleporter connecting to the rest of the network allowed the workers to come and go. Here, standing a few panels away from the link, stood four of the Net Guardians, looking about the busy creation of the new city district.

Yamatoman, Darkman, and Bowlman watched the scene with a mixture of awe and anticipation. Metalman ruined the moment by blurting out a question. "So what are we doing here again?"

"Did you ignore the entire briefing session?" Yamatoman accused with the authority of being the group's leader.

"Since when the hell do we have 'briefing sessions'?" Metal countered.

"You know, how we talk about work during commercials?" Bowlman reminded.

"Ohhh! Well sorry if I tend to tune you guys out and watch the ads."

"Great, so I suppose we have to explain today's mission in full now just for your benefit?" Darkman grumbled miserably.

"Not just for MY benefit." Metalman protested, jutting a massive index finger to the sky.

The others couldn't figure out who he was pointing at. Bowlman took a wild guess. "...Our Operators?"

After a pause, Metalman confirmed. "Yeah sure, let's go with that."

"Very well, but pay attention this time." Yamato folded his arms and prepared to reiterate their briefing. He did not hide the fact that he really enjoyed being in command very well. "So far we have been unable to aprehend the Acid Hackers because they are always one step ahead of us..."

"I thought it was because we were freeloaders on Cossack's zenny and haven't actually been trying to aprehend them." The cynical Metal navi butted in.

"NO! We have been trying constantly. YOU just have not been paying attention, as usual. The problem is that their style is more than less chaotic. So far it has been impossible to predict their next move. But out of all their crimes, four have stood out for their daring nature and the curious format of the data they have stolen..."

"Construction materials!" Darklady revealed the punchline, and took over the exposition much to Yamatoman's annoyance. "Source code data used to build much of the cyberworld's infrastructure. There was some other data in the logs we couldn't identify but the whole base material connection was unmistakable. Our guess is the AH is planning to build a 'Hacker Castle' on the net or something, so they're stocking up on components. So in the interest of getting the drop on them for once, here we are at a construction site which is one big pile of that same type of data. Any questions?"

"Yeah, just one." said Metalman softly. "Why the hell do you keep swicthing genders you freak?! That's the fifth time today you morphed in the middle of a conversation!"

"It's a physical and emotional rush." said the now female phantom, running her hands down her curvaceious form. "Any questions about the mission?"

"No I'm good." said the steel warrior calmly. "I suppose we'll just find some place to hide and stakeout for the rest of the day then."

"Well when you put it that way, it sounds boring." said Bowlman with despair.

A NormalNavi wearing a hard hat passing nearby pushing a hover cart stacked with panels couldn't help but overhear and called out to them. "Hey, you with the big meat-hooks and the jetpack!

"Who, me?" responded Metalman, causing his companions to slap their own foreheads.

"Yeah, if you want somethin' to do, why don't you lug these stacks up to the third level? It's about time for my lunch break anyway."

"Well, anything other than work!" Metalman agreed. He walked up to the cart, picked the whole thing up with one hand, and rocketed straight up to the third level. The Net Guardians left behind were stupefied and a bit upset.

"Here we are trying to surprise attack the Acid Hackers when they show up to raid the place, and he's flying around out in the open helping with the construction? We should stop him, shouldn't we?" assessed Bowlman.

"Well, the AH can only get here through the one warp. As long as one of us remains out of sight and keeps an eye on the entrance, it does not matter what the rest of us are doing. We would still catch them off guard before they can mount a defense." Yamatoman surmised. "So we just need to determine which of us will stay on surveilance all day and the other two can do something constructive nearby."

"One two three not it!" said Darklady rapidly.

"Not it!" said Bowlman.

"Kisama!" said Yamatoman.

"Lighten up boss. You're best suited for the job anyway." assured Bowl. "Aren't you guys supposed to be able to stand on guard perfectly still for hours at a time without blinking or twitching or anything?"

"I am a samurai warrior, I believe you are thinking of Creamland sentries."

"So? Are you suggesting some western soldier is better than a samurai at something?"

Yamatoman's eyes were wide with shock. He then narrowed them in fierce determination. "Well met Bowlman.exe. I shall be your tireless sentry. And after this you will be prepared to accept eastern superiority once and for all."

"Not likely" Bowl muttered under his breath. "Anyway, I know what my job will be. Where's the girder I sit on with other obnoxious guys and holler obscene suggestions at chicks passing by on the sidewalk?"

"In the real world." said Darklady rolling her eyes. "This area is isolated from the pedestrian part of the net, remember? There are no 'chicks passing by on the sidewalk'. As for me, I'm flying up to help out on level four. I assume that will be far enough away from Bowlman."

"Hmph. Fine, if you're going to be like that, I'm staying on the base level. Maybe they'll let be drive the crane."

"Just go already. I must maintain my vigil." said Yamatoman, partially hidden from the teleporter by a stack of crates. And so the Net Guardians got to work.

* * *

Meanwhile, back at the flat, Carlos, Adrienne, Jonathan, and Cyros were getting their coats, about to leave. Moe, who was walking back from the kitchen with a couple cans of Dr Pepper stopped to bug them. "You guys still here? Your navis would have made it there half an hour ago."

"Well, we had to clear things up with the system administration first. They won't let just anybody jack into the city's mainframe during an upgrade." Jon explained.

"We just got off the phone with them. They had a bunch of strict rules to follow as well. Apparently it's a really delicate situation over there and any number of things we do can mess it up." Cyros added.

"So you're just hoping your navis won't break any of these rules until you get there?" asked Moe.

"We took bets on which one of them will screw up first!" said Adrienne enthusiatically, holding out her hand expecting Moe to want a piece of that. He did.

"1000 Z on Metalman." He said, digging in his pocket.

Cyros sighed, "Man, everyone bet on Metalman, even me."

Carlos rolled his eyes. "So while we're gone, the rest of you will be hard at work deciphering the rest of the data in those logs from the crime scenes?"

"Yeah sure whatever."

David's voice could be heard from the den. "Moe! The commercials are almost over! Hurry up with my drink!"

Moe took a sip from one of his cans and held the other up to Carlos. "Want one for the road?"

* * *

Back at the job site, Metalman was oddly enjoying the manual labor. It wasn't often he got to work with the same heavy equipment he was modeled after. He made industrious use of his own Metal Blades to saw off the corners of junction panels and with his arms he didn't need any help moving platforms into place. The other workers were somewhat glad to have him around, especially considering he wasn't asking for any money. They were only a bit worried the administration would find out and attempt to replace the entire work force with this dim powerhouse. Luckily, they knew humans weren't very interested in what the finished product looked like, just that it got the job done, so they most likely weren't watching.

"Hey you guys, I was thinking. Aren't there some saftey protocols I have to be conforming to or something?" Metalman asked his 'supervisors'.

"Nah, you're doin' fine." said a navi leaning up against a crate while he let the netbattling model do his work.

"Well, I notice someone left a bunch of hard hats laying around down there on that second level platform. I might as well grab one while I'm here." With that he activated his jets and lowered himself down to the vacant platform.

"What's he talkin' about? These things are grafted to our heads. We're construction navis." One of the slacking workers said casually. "There wouldn't be a bunch of helmets lyin' around unless they were Met viruses."

"Or someone decapitated some of our guys." said another.

"Eh, either's good."

Metalman had reached the platform and was trying on one of the shiny yellow hard hats. He was having trouble making it fit. "Like there's already a head in this thing or something." he analysed. Eventually he gave up and blamed the struggle on the saw blade on his forehead and the spikes sticking out of his ears. He began to fly back up to his post when the hat sitting on his head sprouted legs, eyes, and a pickaxe. Unbeknownst to the stoic fighter, the Mettool reared back its weapon, and delivered a mighty swing onto its pedestal.

"AGGHH, #@#% MY EYE!!"

In a lightning reflex Metalman grabbed the virus off his head and instantly crushed it to pixels in his massive fist. The pick, however, remained jutting out of his eye.

"AGGHH, SOMEBODY HELP ME MY @#$%ING EYE!!"

DarkLady heard her ally's screams and rushed to help. In seconds she was hovering next to his head trying to calm him down. "Shh, it's okay. Just relax. I can remove it safely. You just-hey, come on. Settle. Settle down. You just have to sit still. Calm down. It won't hurt, trust me. Shh." Gradually Metalman calmed down and ignored the pain long enough to float perfectly still so he could let her slide it out painlessly, so it was quite a surprise to him when she suddenly yanked it out like she was tearing off a band-aid. It hurt a lot.

"AGGHH, WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?!?"

"Oh you'll be fine." She said twirling the pickaxe in her hand. "Besides, whatever happened to you being impervious to pain?"

"For some crazy reason my eyes aren't coated in the same thick, heavy armor as the rest of my body." said a now much calmer Metalman, covering his wound, and of course his entire head with one of his hands.

"So the great juggernaut has a couple of weak points after all?"

"Just one now, thank you very much."

"Ah, nothing your op can't rewrite for you later. But y'know, these job-site accidents could be avoided altogether if you would just wear the proper safety equipment."

"If you suggest a hard hat I swear I will punch your skull in...when you change back to a man of course."

"Aw, what a gentleman. Seriously though, what happened?"

"Those Mets down there tricked me!" Metalman finally redirected his attention to the hard hat strewn platform. All the Mets were awake now, and were wildly hammering the ground with their shockwave attacks. The platform had already suffered large cracks and large chunks were beginning to break off and drift away like ice floes in the sky.

"That can't be good. Guess we should delete them before they extend the construction schedule any further." said Darklady.

"Oh ho, those jerks are all mine." said Metalman bitterly. "Metal Missile!" Metalman launched one missile for every virus in sight. Each one hit home, but the remains of the platform got obliterated along with the Mets. "Oops" he said sheepishly. "This place sure is fragile, isn't it?"

"If we find any more viruses around here, and there will likely be more, we should delete them...carefully." Darklady surmised. "Come on, let's split up."

"Okay, but 'carefully' is not a word I'm too familiar with." And so the two NetGuardians flew away in opposite directions.

Meanwhile Bowlman was taking care of viruses of his own. Moments ago he was actually conntrolling a crane thanks to some intimidation of its qualified operator, and just after promising nothing would go wrong an errant boomerang snapped the cable, sending a large framing girder crashing down on some unfortunate worker navis. Now Bowlman was out in the open, using his Pin Cannon to shoot Boomers and Heavies out of the sky all around him. He knew something wasn't right with the amount of damage being done to the area, so he started to head back to the entrance where he could discuss the situation with Yamatoman.

As he was getting closer he noticed some things moving out from between the rows of crates on either side of the pathway. Blinking boxes, and behind them, Bomb Laborers pushing them. Before he could react the viruses finished the pushing phase of their function and turned around back in between the crates where they would be safe. Bowlman knew those BoyBombs would be detonating practically simultaneously and aside from seriously damaging the sector, he would most likely be deleted himself. On the bright side, the bombs were nicely lined up next to each other alongside the neatly lined crates, so he could easily take one entire row of them out at once with a well-aimed Strike. With no time to lose he picked the left row, grabbed a green ball from his shoulder, swung back, and rolled it straight down the line. The ball plowed through one BoyBomb after another, causing them to crumble harmlessly. But now he had no time to stop the other row from detonating.

Much to the Bowler's surprise, when he turned to face the other bombs, in front of each was a tiny stick figure holding a spear and wearing a jingasa hat. All at once the tiny samurai used the blunt ends of their spears to jab the bombs back in between the crates to where their creators were hiding. The bombs exploded within, deleting the viruses as well as most of the crates, but at least they absorbed most of the damage.

Bowlman was grateful Yamatoman came to the rescue, but still couldn't see him. "Yo, Yamato! Where you hiding?"

"I hide from no one!"

Bowlman looked up for the source of the voice, and there atop the crates was the spear-slinging navi fighting off a few Spider viruses trying to crawl over him and lay eggs in his stomach or something. The bugs had him surrounded, but with some skillful spear handling he deleted them all and leapt down to meet his comrade. "I would not be much of a bodyguard if I let this infestation go unnoticed."

"Well, have you kept an eye on the entrance? These viruses are probably a distraction from the AH!" said Bowlman, skipping the pleasantries.

At that moment they were met with the flyers who had just returned from their own battles. "Did you guys know this place is crawling with viruses all of a sudden?" asked Metalman, still holding a hand over his eye.

The four were interrupted by another worker navi that came running up to them. "This is all your fault you morons! You left the door open!" he screamed furiously.

"Pardon?" was all Yamatoman could offer their incensed host.

"When you muscleheads came in here did you even read the big warning signs? Construction areas are extremely vulnerable to viral infection so they have to be kept isolated from the net! You were supposed to shut off the warp as soon as you were through!"

The NetGuardians all felt guilty, but Bowlman took the chance to pass the blame to his partner. "You were taking up the rear, Metalman. You should have closed the warp. You failed to pay proper attention, as usual."

"HEY! If any of you guys noticed the sign, you would have made sure I closed it! You're all as guilty as I am!"

Yamatoman took charge and relayed the new plan. "We can decide how much Metalman is at fault later. Now we need to undo the damage. Metalman, you should go close the gate now." Metal rolled his eye, but he knew he could get their fastest anyway so he took off without protest. Yamato continued. "With the influx of viruses stemmed, we should be able to take out the stragglers easily. But that still leaves the respawn effect. How long before the sector's anti-viral systems are online?"

"It's usually the last thing to go online, but in this case we could probably rig something up in five minutes." the worker navi responded. "Until then the effects of virus spawning have been known to be dulled by a widespread application of a Debugging program or battlechip. Wouldn't happen to have any, would you?"

"Hell, we don't even have operators right now." Darklady shrugged.

"Oh yes you do!" rang Adrienne's voice. All four NG navis felt their PET connections activate.

"Our operators have arrived! What convenient timing!" rejoiced Bowlman.

"Not really, it would have been much more convenient if they were here an hour ago to stop you from causing this mess." the worker bitterly pointed out.

Jonathan's eyes went wide. "Okay, this is important now. Who exactly 'caused this mess'? Because we have money on it."

"Later! Now do any of you have Debug chips on hand?" asked Yamatoman desperately as he noticed more freshly built platforms crumble in the distance.

Surprisingly it was Adrienne who dug three out of her pocket. "I got these because I thought they would be effective against Darkness bugs, but it turns out Darkness is effective against debugging programs. The Darkster can't even use 'em."

"So howcome you were holding on to them?" Cyros pondered.

"Do you know how much these chunks of silicon cost?"

"Just give them to me." Carlos ordered. "I assume you're suffering a premature viral infestation in there?"

"I am afraid so." his navi responded. "Metalman should be isolating the system now."

"System Isolated!" announced Metalman's voice from Cyros' PET.

Carlos nodded. "Right. I'll have Yamato apply these chips to the system. The rest of you sweep out and do some virus busting. But no chips with breaking or ground-breaking attributes. Adrienne, no Dark Holes either, a tiny portal to Murkland could let much more viral energy in than a large portal to the city's main network."

"We're not stupid." Adrienne protested. "But for the record we are really the wrong netbattlers for this mission."

Everyone spread out to work. Yamatoman found a control panel where he could tap into the system controls, and one after another, transferred the Debug MegaChips Carlos slotted in into the environment. The construction workers all focused on hooking up anti-viral circuits across the incomplete landscape.

Meanwhile Bowlman dashed through the base level, sniping any viruses he spotted as carefully as he could using Vulcans and Mega-Cannons. When he reached one long walkway filled with grey Beetanks, he knew he was going to have to put a stop to them before they could launch a single bomb. Jon had just the thing though. He downloaded his regular chip, a MagBomb3, which Bowlman immediately converted to a bowling ball and rolled straight down the walkway. As the ball plowed through the viruses, it knocked some off the edge into the abyss and encased the rest in a magnetic field, preventing any sort of movement. With the Beetanks paralyzed, Bowlman was free to finish them off with a 3-Way gun and a Vulcan3.

Darklady was soaring over the top level, trying to destroy the highly destructive Flameys while also dodging the not so destructive EleBees. Eventually she got tired of the pests and wrapped one up in her chain, so she could swing it around as a weapon to swat the rest out of the sky. One Flamey spotted her and became enraged. It shot up into the sky as it began its unusual undulating flight-path. She would be able to meet it with her Axe on the way down, but she needed to open a DarkHole to summon it, which she wasn't allowed to. Adrienne supplied her with the next best thing, a DarkSword. The inherent bug automatically pulled her straight to the falling demon so with the best timing she could stumble upon she swung the evil blade which met its mark and deleted the beast before it could plow into the ground. But she still had a lot more flying viruses to delete and very few attack chips that wouldn't damage the environment. Adrienne saw no problems though as she downloaded a DarkWideShot. Darklady smirked as she let loose the crescent-shaped burst of poisonous water that swept through an entire swarm of Flameys.

Metalman was having the hardest time. His favorite weapons were his missiles and his fists and both could do more damage to the system than the viruses. However his folder had a decent supply of YoYo chips to go along with his own Metal Blades. As he jetted between the second and third levels slicing every virus he could find, he realized he was quickly running low on usable chips. So Jon finished off with the last three YoYo3s in a special order, a Zeta YoYo Program Advance. With that Metalman took care of the last HardHeads in his range of vision as quickly as he could in his five-second time-limit. At last it seemed he was done, until he spotted one more coming down from up above. It was a golden Powie and when it landed, the resulting 'Quake' wouldn't be as localized as usual in this area. With no time to get a chip or charge up a strong enough attack, Metal saw no other choice but to get right underneath the falling iron weight in order to spare the ground. The Quake it him hard and he found himself being pushed downward almost as fast as the virus was plummeting before. Metalman gritted his teeth and pushed his jets to their maximum while simultaneously charging his fist. The rate of descent gradually slowed, but when his fist was at full strength, he kicked himself off the bottom of the virus, reared back his fist, and let him have it. The virus exploded and Metalman found himself hovering just inches above the ground. "Nice one." he said to himself, smiling.

After five minutes of this hunting, the anti-viral systems went online and the viruses stopped appearing out of nowhere. The NG navis had to spend the rest of the day putting the place back together and making sure no more of the little buggers showed up. Finally, around midnight, Crescent177 was as complete and stable as any other sector of the city. The entrance warp, as well as several other teleporters that had been installed were all brought online, and although viruses began appearing again, they couldn't do any significant damage.

The weary NetGuardian navis gathered near the original entrance to discuss the 'mission'. "Well, all the base material data was used up and it seems the Acid Hackers were a no-show." Bowlman summarized with a sigh. "Guess this whole day was a big waste of time."

"Look at it this way, we got to save the area from a viral breakout!" Darklady chimed.

"...that we caused." added Yamatoman. "I am sorry, but I cannot feel any sort of satisfaction over the events that transpired today."

Metalman moaned, still covering his missing eye. "Hmph, you think you got hosed, how do you think they feel?" again he pointed at the sky, much to the confusion of the others.

"Well, our operators deserved having their time wasted." stated Bowlman. "But if you really want to take something back from all this, how about the fact we don't get a lot of action compared to Serenade, Drillman, and Kingman, so this adventure gave us some overdue attention!"

"I get action all the time when I go solo with Carlos and Naomi." Reminded Yamatoman.

"Yeah, but those adventures don't really count since they don't involve the rest of the team very often."

"Alright, so we may not have got the bad guys, but at least we had some fun, right?" Darklady concluded. Everyone but the one-eyed Metalman agreed. And with that they jacked out for a PET ride back home.

* * *

"Okay, so the bet was kinda inconclusive since they all sorta messed up together, but if we tell Moe nothing went wrong, we get to keep our own bets and split his amongst ourselves, deal?" The other three agreed with Adrienne as they were about to enter the donut shop.

"I heard that, give me back my money." said Moe's voice from an open 2nd story window.

"Damnit! Waiting up for us? Jerk." Jon sneered.

Minutes later they were all seated around the TV again, going over the mission during a commercial. "So did you guys find anything else in the logs while we were gone?" Carlos asked Moe.

"Nope, we were clueless. Eventually somebody thought of calling Dr.Cossack and having him look at the files since he's apparently an expert at that sort of thing." Moe replied.

"Somebody? It was just the three of you here, surely you can be more specific than that. Was it Sam or David?"

Moe scratched his chin trying to remember. "Actually, I think it was the hobo."

"Figures the only smart suggestion all day would come from the smelly drunk guy." chuckled Adrienne.

"Well bear in mind Cossack is a senile old coot and maybe I just thought it would be too much of a waste of time to suggest it myself." rebutted Moe. "But lo and behold, the senile old coot actually seemed pretty interested in those log files, scared even. Likely just his dementia, but there may seriously be a clue there. He said he was going to examine them and get back to us in the morning."

"Hm, so maybe this hunt is drawing to a close soon after all. Perhaps at least some good will come of all this." said Carlos with a yawn.

The End

Stories main