The Hollow Warden

*Zeno cautiously approaches the window and looks inside.*

~Edge~

???: <I don't think so.>

*Surprisingly enough, the woman takes him on, ramming him into a wall before stepping back and backhanding him in the face so hard his balls shake. She grins at him, hurries backwards towards the door, and opens it, walking in.*

=====

~Zeno~

*He sees a large office with bookcases all around the walls, a large wooden door, and a desk with a large armchair. A black-haired middle-aged man is frantically smashing a laptop's keys, and a cute dark blue-haired girl wearing a light blue tank top, jean shorts and black hiker boots is standing next to him looking worried. Suddenly, they both turn to the door as it opens and the sexy woman from before walks in with a grin on her face.*

=====

~Alto~

*He finishes off quite a few, but they just keep coming, a whole army walking down the path and spreading across the net. Soon he reaches a wall of flames that goes on seemingly infinitely in all directions.*

<"Jack out, we're going to go to the source">

"Roger that" Axl jacks out.

---

Alto makes haste for city hall on foot.

*Zeno crouches and gets to a place where he can roughly hear what's going on in the room.*

Protoman: <Eavesdropping? That's not very morally sound.>

Zeno: <Shush.>

Spider: <Ha ha ha, your dignity just hit rock bottom. Beat up by a girl? How low can you go?>

Edge: <Ugh, shut up! She took me by surprise...>

Spider: <How? You were going right at her. Unless you weren't actually serious about ramming her... in which case you should back out of the whole "Hero" thing as soon as possible, kid.>

Edge: <Just... just never mind that! I'm not letting her get away with this.>

*Edge gets up, recovered from the blow, and runs through the door after her until he catches up to her again, this time in an office with other people in it.*

Edge: <Hey, lady! You won't get rid of me that easily!>

Spider: <Idiot... do you know anything about planning ahead? Anything at all?>

*Spider facepalms.*

Mayor: <Who are you? Are you responsible for this?!>

???: <I know all about your past, and I need your help.>

*She walks in front of the desk, staring at the Mayor. Kelphy steps forward.*

Kelphy: <What are you talking about?!>

???: <You be quiet. So. You saw what happened down in the lobby. I can do a lot worse.>

Mayor: <What are you saying...?>

???: <I need your... hidden talents to do something. Either you help me, or you help me.>

*She steps backwards and stares at him silently, crossing her arms.*

=====

*He finds the front glass door to be shut, and can see a few people lying unconscious on the floor immediately next to it, even though it's quite dark inside.*

"Can you get this door open from the net?" Alto asks his navi.

<"Dunno, find me a place to enter and I'll see what I can do">

"Alright then"

Alto begins to look for a jack in port.

Edge: <Hey! I said not to ignore me!>

Spider: <(No you didn't...)>

*Edge runs at the girl again, raising his fist to attempt punching her.*

*Zeno sits back and waits for something that would harm him to happen. He sighs and tries to keep cool.*

Zeno: <Alright, I can do this...>

*She grabs his fist and body slams him towards the window, kicking it opened before pushing out into the terrace and into Zeno.*

???: <I don't like noisy kids.>

*She stares at Edge, then grins at Zeno.*

???: <And I don't like nosy kids either.>

*She takes her sunglasses off, revealing her brown eyes, and turns back towards the Mayor.*

???: <You're taking too long to answer...>

Kelphy: <Dad!>

*She points at the laptop on the desk. The desktop is flashing red and the folders seem to be fading into the background one by one.*

Mayor: <What?!>

???: <I told you. Too long.>

*She walks back out the door, waving backwards.*

???: <I'll be back.>

Mayor: <My work!>

=====

*He finds the door to have a port for maintenance purposes.*

*Edge is extremely shocked at being pushed out the window and into another person, who appeared to be listening in.*

Spider: <Ha. Sucker.>

Edge: <God freaking dammit!>

*Edge stumbles to get up, completely ignoring the person he just landed on.*

"Jack in Axl.EXE execute!"

He jacks in and Axl immediately begins to search for a way to open the door.

*Zeno is twitching a little, being an obvious nitpick about personal space.*

Zeno: <W-well... l-looks like my c-cover is blown...>

*He shivers as he stands up.*

Protoman: <Ugh, so childish.>

*After the woman leaves, the mayor's laptop's files just keep disappearing. Kelphy takes her own sky blue laptop out of her bag and opens it on the table, plugging her PET in.*

Kelphy: <D-Don't worry, father, I'll go see what's wrong! Iceman.EXE, jack-in!>

*The mayor then turns to Zeno and Edge, glaring and pointing at them menacingly.*

Mayor: <Are you with that woman?!>

Kelphy: <They're from my school.>

Mayor: <Well, maybe they can help then! The plasma TV over there has an internet connection and a port. The other one can jack into my laptop directly.>

-----

*Iceman appears in the network, but everything is darker than usual. The floor panels are dark blue and the background is very dark purple with the occasional flash of red light. The path leads forward, in which direction a few Mettaurs are hammering around for no reason.*

Iceman: <Something's really wrong!>

=====

*A large yellow gate is standing ahead, in the middle of the green platform. Images of a key are floating around in the yellow background for decoration purposes because fuck yeah. There's a circular silver lock sealing down the two doors that make up the gate.*

<"Blow it open Axl.">

"Are you... serious?"

<"Yes">

Axl nods and fires at the lock.

*Edge ignores the boy completely and runs to the plasma TV upon hearing the mayor's words.*

Edge: <Witness this, as this will be my first step towards heroism!>

Spider: <Oh, get over yourself. I'm going to be the one busting my ass.>

*Edge plugs his PET into the TV port.*

*Zeno stumbles into the office, then jacks in by Edge.*

Zeno: <Let's roll...>

*Protoman is sent into the network and appears next to Iceman.*

Protoman: <The hell?>

*Iceman holds his hands out, shooting snowballs at the Mettaus. Two of them are knocked over and frozen. Up ahead they see Spider appear. A Mettaur swings its pickaxe at him.*

-----

Kelphy: <Mettaurs?>

-----

Iceman: <There's no way Mettaurs could have caused this to happen to the network!>

=====

*The lock explodes and the gate falls apart, dissolving into data blocks that fade away.*

-----

*Lightning starts shooting out of the sliding glass doors and the glasses shatter, smoke flowing out of the port.*

Alto has Axl jack out. before the pannel explodes.

"That was too close Axl"

<"You're telling me">

"With some fresh air in there we should be able to move in safely and investigate soon."

*Spider dodges out of the way and counters by throwing two cards at the Mettaur. The second followed behind the first by about 2 feet, so if it blocked or dodged the first, the second would have a high chance of hitting it.*

Spider: <This place is a mess in here!>

Edge: <Do you see the cause of it?!>

Spider: <No, just a bunch of Mettaurs.>

Zeno: <Those Mettaurs might be the key...>

Protoman: <On it!>

*The Navi begins attacking one of the Mettaurs.*

*They're having fun obliterating Mettaurs when they hear repeated metallic clicks. Further ahead in the path a large bulky knight in silver armor with a red and golden cape holding a huge spear is slowly walking across the panel road down a narrow path to the left.*

=====

*Soon, doctors and SWAT agents are invading the lobby.*

Alto follows behind them somehow managing to use their swarming in to make way to the mayor's office.

When he enters he nearly facepalms, "You guys!?"

*Spider turns to the knight and cautiously pulls out a card.*

Spider: <Hey, who are you?>

*Spider eyes him suspiciously.*

*Protoman charges the knight head on, leaping high into the air for an attack at the thing's head.*

Protoman: <Eat this!>