Full Moon

[Cyclone EXE]

I'll make this short. I'm sick, stuck at home for a week, nothing to do, feel like writing something Rockman, and it's going to take place around Halloween because lots of creepy things can happen then, right?

If you haven't read my fanfics before, it's not problem. This story only mentions the events that take place in previous fics, and you don't have to have read them before to understand. All you need to know is this:

Characters © Cyclone:
Katya Turner - age 14, two years younger than Netto and company.
Cyclone - Katya's Net Navi

Right. Starting now.

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~*~*~*Full Moon*~*~*
<-- AA --- 3PP --- PG-13 for mild language and violence -->



.:Uno:.

The room that I found myself in was strangely and uncomfortably familiar. The walls were a dull gray, mostly hidden by piles upon piles of boxes of many shapes and sizes. This warehouse was definitely somewhere that I had been before. The high ceiling, the lone computer set in the middle of the massive room meant to operate the crane which moved the heavy boxes' contents to the trucks that came and went, doing their duties and delivering the goods to waiting customers. It was all the same and I remembered.

There was a faint noise; a door slid open not too far away from where I was. I froze, panic flaring up in my mind. I knew that I had to dive behind a box, but I couldn't move. I stared in horror as a hazy figure slowly but swiftly moved through the shadows in front of me. They didn't even pause when they were a few feet in front of where I was standing, unable to move, their eyes staring right at me, but somehow...through me? I squeezed my eyes shut as they didn't slow their pace; they were going to run into me.

I waited, but there was no impact. A soft flutter of the air around me pushed my hair out of my face as the person passed right through me. I opened my eyes, confused, and tried to lift my hand to feel my face. My hand wouldn't move. I tried to look down, to see my body, alarm replacing the panic that I had felt moments before. Nothing. I couldn't move...I was frozen.

If I could stumble, I'm sure I would have, for the scene spun around with a quick jolt, so that I was facing the machine that stood in the middle of the room, so out of place with all of the mountains of plain boxes stacked around it. The person moved into the light of the screen, yet I could not see their face, for they had on a cloak of deep black whose hood was shrouding their eyes in shadow. I watched, curious, and an odd feeling of deja vu swept over me like a swift tsunami, bringing with it peculiar flickers of pain and a strong sensation that told me that I did not want to watch these events unfold.

But watch I did. I had no choice but to see all that the cloaked person was doing. Their hand reached into the folds of the cloak and pulled from them a small handheld device which I recognized at once to be a PET. I had a PET of my own...short for Personal Terminal...which I used quite often. Inside of PETs reside machines known as Net Navis, which humans use to complete various tasks and perform numerous jobs that we would not be able to complete ourselves.

This particular person was using their navi to infiltrate the system of the warehouse.

Fury rose in me, but I still had no control over my body, if I even had one. I could only helplessly watch as the cloaked being pressed a button on the PET every now and then, muttering directions to the navi as it made its way through the system. Why this person needed access to the controls of the warehouse, I did not know...but the answer seemed at the tip of my tongue. The more I thought about it, the farther away the answer slipped, so I forced my mind to push that nagging thought aside and simply watch.

A small ping emitted from the PET, and I'm sure whoever was controlling the navi smiled from within the shadows of the hood. "Nice work." The voice was eerily familiar, and the sound of it sent chills down my spine. Did I have a spine?

The room spun once again, and I squeezed my eyes shut. When I opened them again, I was shocked to find that I was looking through the eyes of the cloaked person. Memory came back to me then, and I gasped, but somehow I was not in control of the body that I was now somehow a part of. "Not so fast."

I...the person...whirled around, the heavy cloak making an enjoyable sound as it settled behind them. They smirked under the hood; I could feel it now. "You're too late, Demetri. I already have all that I came for." The screen of the computer behind the cloaked person suddenly went black, plunging the room into complete darkness. I could hear Demetri fumbling in the darkness for a flashlight, but the person was faster. They ran to hide behind a pile of boxes, crouching down and ripping off the hood and cloak before the boy could flick the switch of the torch.

"I know that you're still in here. You can't run that much faster then I can, and I wouldn't have been able to reach the door." His voice echoed, bouncing from the ceiling which was hidden by darkness and useable as it was so very high up. I could feel the person whose body I occupied thinking intently, racking their brain for a plan, anything to help them to escape.

"Climb." They nodded at the sound of the navi's voice, and looked up at the various platforms that stretched from wall to wall, the ladders of rickety metal that allowed passage up, up, into the never ending heights of the warehouse. The person tensed as a box somewhere nearby rustled and the voice of the boy that hunted them rang out.

"I will find you. You're the most wanted out of all of them, you know...they all want you dead rather then alive. I think I'll take you to them alive, though, so that they can deal with you how they choose to." The person didn't hesitate any longer and leapt from the hiding spot, charging toward a ladder that hung a few feet above the floor, secured to the cement wall.

I could feel them launch their body off of the ground, clawing at the metal rungs of the ladder and catching hold of one at the bottom, dangling for a moment, panting. The sound of footsteps came before the flashlight's beam landed on their face. The light blinded me too, and they heaved their weight up and began to climb hastily into the darkness. "Gotcha." They looked down, and the face of the boy in pursuit was lit by the flashlight's beam that reflected from the metal of the ladder for a moment, showing the radiance of his green eyes in contrast to his jet black hair.

I squeezed my eyes shut, not wanting to see anymore, but they kept climbing, and I could feel the rickety solidness of a platform beneath their feet as well as hear the clang of shoes on its surface across the room. The platform shook as someone began to take slow steps toward us, toward the person whose eyes I could see out of. A light, his face.

"There you are little girl." I could feel sobs begin to wrack my invisible body, but the person whose eyes I was looking through did not cry. 'No,' I tried to say. 'No!'

"Don't...I don't want to hurt you Demetri." Her voice broke. 'No!!' He took a step toward her, and then he was inches away...grabbing her arm...I was wrenched from her body to find myself floating a few feet above them. I shook my head as the girl below me stared into the face of the boy in front of her. She was me. I was her. My own familiar face. It was as though I was looking into a mirror...only I could not control the reflection that stared back.

He tried to pull her, me, off of the platform toward the ladder that led to the ground. I could only watch, knowing, as he lost his footing in the uncontrollable rocking of the platform, as he tumbled backward off of the solid surface, surprise and horror etched in his features, as the me on the platform grabbed for his flailing arms, horrified.

"NOO!!!"

/-/-/-/-/-/

I jolted into a sitting position, my hair springing around my face and sticking to my cheeks. I had wakened once more from the same nightmare, shaking, my face and pillow soaked with tears that had been shed while I was in my dream. "Katya, are you alright?" I closed my eyes and didn't answer, trying to control my breathing. "Katya?" I slowly opened my eyes, a few loose tears streaming down to accumulate under my chin, and turned my head to look at my PET which sat in its usual spot on my nightstand.

I closed my mouth, took a deep breath through my nose, nodded, and exhaled, looking back at my shaking hands which were folded in my lap. "Same dream." It wasn't a question. "You sure you don't want to talk about it? It might help, you know." I could tell Cyclone everything, that was true, but this...I wasn't ready to discuss the past. Not yet. I needed to figure out why I kept having this dream, why his death... A new stream of tears flowed from my brown eyes, and I squeezed them shut.

"What time is it," I choked out. My voice was foreign to me, and I couldn't figure out why at first. Only after Cyclone replied that it was nine o'clock on Saturday, October twenty eighth, did I realize that I was becoming used to the voice I had in my dream. I forced all remnants of the nightmare from my mind and frowned. Something about the date today. Something was important. "Oh!" I gasped. "I'd forgotten!!"

Cyclone cocked her head to one side, confusion lining her face. She rubbed her black and gray helmet, watching me rip back the sheets, stumble from bed, and wrestle with my clothes and I tried to hastily dress. "I'm sorry...I think I forgot too. What were we supposed to remember?" I couldn't answer at first, concentrating on hopping on one foot, trying to pull on a shoe while zipping my black vest up over my long sleeved gray shirt.

"Oof." I lost my balance and fell over, always the klutz. Cyclone tried to suppress her giggle, but failed miserably, receiving a glare from me as I pulled on my other knee high sock, buckling the black shoe that followed onto my foot securely. I was going to be doing a lot of running this morning. "We're supposed to meet everyone at the Metroline in...five minutes ago." Cyclone's mouth formed an o of realization as I grabbed her and bounded through my bedroom door, not even bothering to make the bed.

I slid down the banister of the stairs, landing on both of my feet for once and not my face. I raced to the door leading outside, grabbing my favorite pale green jacket and jamming my arms into it hastily, not even bothering to zip the front. My fingers were probably going to get cold, since I had cut the material that usually covered them off of my gloves, but that's not what made me stop cold when I placed a hand on the doorknob.

"Katya, how many times have I told you not to slide down the banister? And did you even make your bed??" My arm fell limp to my side as I turned to face my father, who was in his favorite chair with a cup of steaming coffee and piles of research papers to be checked over and checked again.

"Dad? What are you doing home!" I smiled and bounded over to him, throwing my arms around his neck. Maybe if I showed that I missed him, he'd forget about the banister. "I've missed you so much..." I pulled back to smile at his surprised face, and his mouth turned up at the corners at my gaze.

"Yeah, I missed you too. But I'm home for a few days, isn't that wonderful? Netto's father convinced me that I should take a few days to kick back and spend time with you, since it's not often that I get to come home." My heart swelled with happiness and excitement.

A few days was longer then I had gotten to spend with dad since I had moved here again. He never came when he heard mom and Katrina died, didn't even bother to let me know he was sorry that I had lost my mother and my sister and he was here for me if I needed anyone to talk to. Even when I was in the hospital off and on those first months due to the attacks of my enemies who worked for an operation called Storm, he hadn't bothered to see me, send an e-mail, or even ask how I managed to end up in such conditions.

Now I pushed those memories from my mind, ready and willing to start and fresh slate with him. These next few days were going to be amazing. "So, what are you doing today, honey?" I frowned, remembering.

"Uhm...I sorta had plans today, dad, but I'm free tomorrow." His face fell a bit, and I felt bad.

"Oh. It's alright. I have some things to do today anyway." Our reunion was over, and the awkwardness began to settle in. "Er...when will you be home?"

"Tonight. Late. I promise I'll spend tomorrow with you, alright dad?"

"Okay honey. Don't worry about it." He smiled and put his coffee down long enough to hug me properly. "Now go. I have a feeling you're late." I followed his gaze to the window, where one of my friends was scowling in at me.

"Oops. Bye dad." I looked once more into his chocolate brown eyes that I proudly shared with him and kissed him on the cheek before dashing out the door and into the bitter cold of October. I shut the door behind me, shivering and zipping up my coat with one swift motion. Winter decided to come early this year, it seemed, although there wasn't any snow to be seen.

"Katya, we've been waiting for ten minutes! Lucky for you, I was thoughtful enough to wait and not take the nine o'clock with the rest of them, or you'd be waiting for the nine thirty by yourself!" I rolled my eyes and sighed.

"I'm sorry Netto. But it wasn't completely my fault, you know...Cyclone forgot too."

"You leave me out of this," my navi's muffled voice said from within my jacket pocket. I stared sheepishly up into Netto's face, which had 'annoyed' written clearly all over it. His arms were crossed over his chest, and his expression was formed into a deep scowl. I let out a breath of air, a thin puff of smoke emitting from my mouth and swirling into his face.

His expression, so unchanging, made me want to laugh, even though I knew that he was seriously not amused. I gave him a half smile, not able to help myself. "What?" I let a little laugh escape from my lips and tugged his arms away from his chest.

"I'm sorry, I really am. I completely forgot, and then dad caught me as I was heading out..."

"Yeah, I saw that he was home." Netto's scowl had disappeared, been replaced by a little frown. "You forgot to pull back your hair." My hands flew up to my head and I ran my fingers through the tangled, unruly locks of brown hair that always fought with me in the morning.

"Oops." Netto laughed and shook his head.

"Alright, well, it means that you at least made an effort to hurry and get out here, even though you failed miserably and still managed to be ten whole minutes late." He smiled and our eyes locked for a moment. His grin immediately melted into a concerned frown. "Katya...were you...crying?"

I didn't hesitate to ignore his last comment, replying "well, with all of the conversation, now we only have fifteen minutes left before the nine thirty leaves the station."

"We'd better get going then." Netto turned and started walking down the sidewalk at a very quick pace, so that I had to nearly jog in order to keep up with him.

"Netto, come one, this is hardly the speed we should be going," I panted.

"You never answered my question," he pointed out.

"What question?"

"Don't play dumb." But he slowed to a walk, allowing me to catch up and latch onto his arm, burying my frozen fingers in the material of his vivid blue jacket. We walked like that for the remainder of the trip, watching our breath swirl above us as it proved how cold the air was, thinking about nothing in particular.
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[Midnight]

Well...

This was pretty good. For your first attempt, this outshines a lot of other new writers' works. You certainly spared no expense at developing the details and the actions presented here, and that is a sign of a good fledgling writer.

I'm a tad bit uncomfortable with you having your new character so closely interacting with Netto...since that would seem like you're doing this only to insert yourself into the EXE universe. This is the first chapter, though, so I guess I can sit on my hands and wait and see how it will turn out.

I also noted a rather glaring error with pronouns...you use "they" a lot when you refer to a single masked figure. Even though colloquially people use the former pronoun, it should be "he" or some other singular pronoun.

Other than that, this looks to be on a fine start. Keep it up!
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Today, these three players are after Big Bucks! But they'll have to avoid the Whammy, as they play the most exciting game of their lives! From Television City in Hollywood! It's time to 'Press Your Luck!'--Rod Roddy

The Kingdom of Loathing: An Adventurer is You! // I ♣ Seals

Avatar by Spork. I very much appreciate it! <3

[Cyclone EXE]

Thank you, Midnight, for taking the time to read and comment...it means so much to me. I have a question for you, though, and your opinion would be appreciated.

I was wondering, should I develop the relationship between Katya and Netto throughout the story? I have done so in previous fictions, but it would make sense to backtrack a bit since none of my readers will know how far back they go by simply reading the first few paragraphs of this story. If you are still opposed to this idea (perhaps you like so many others I know are hesitant about fan characters being 'with' official characters or 'dating' them), then please don't hesitate to tell me that you think it's just a bad idea to have them together at all. I adore criticism, and knowing how you feel about this would be very helpful.

Thanks,

Cyclone EXE
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[Midnight]

Well, that is just my opinion. Take of it what you will.

There have been rather successful writers who have integrated new characters alongside the main characters in a reasonable matter and didn't let them hog the spotlight, while there are others who disregarded that and shoved their character to a state of near-paragon-ism. There are examples of both on the forums...I leave it as an exercise to the reader to find them.

Anyway...it still is entirely up to you. However, I would like to see, should you decide to keep the character, some thick development. A character can only come alive through development, and the greater the quality of the descriptions and situations, the more realistic the character becomes, and therefore it is easier for the reader to sympathize, making it a lot better in quality.
_________________
Today, these three players are after Big Bucks! But they'll have to avoid the Whammy, as they play the most exciting game of their lives! From Television City in Hollywood! It's time to 'Press Your Luck!'--Rod Roddy

The Kingdom of Loathing: An Adventurer is You! // I ♣ Seals

Avatar by Spork. I very much appreciate it! <3