MPC 58A: Something For Everyone

MPC 58A: Best Day Ever

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Tadayoshi had moved into the AEGIS HQ building once he had learned some assets could in fact live there, as one Satoshi apparently did with his digimon partner. The problem was accommodating so many digimon at once, but by now the members of Silence had grown close enough that not everybody had elected to take a separate room. It was only Renamon and Hagurumon who each wanted their own lodging, and it was there to be provided to their good fortune. For Tadayoshi, he didn't mind sharing a room with his new chosen family, as it certainly beat sharing even a whole house with his father. Commandramon felt duty-bound to remain near the boy at all times, and for him the floor was much more comfortable than a dingy hole under a tree. The Missimon siblings could sleep just about anywhere, and the MetalKoromon... well, they didn't 'sleep' the way other beings do, but they did enter a sort of standby state that reduced power use, allowed internal temperatures to cool down, and prevented overuse of their computational functions.

However, Tadayoshi awoke from his nice, comfy sleep in a nice, comfy bed to find he was all alone in his quarters. This didn't worry him per se, but it did confuse him. He couldn't think of any chance there'd been a late-night emergency that required his partners to respond but not him, so what could they be up to? In any case, Tadayoshi took his time getting dressed and preparing for his daily duties since he had awoken half an hour before his alarm wanted him to and yet felt fully rested nonetheless.

His first stop was in the main office, where he went to one surveillance technician and asked her, "Excuse me, but do you remember that Megadramon I asked you to look after?"

The analyst seemed to know where this was going without any further prodding from Tadayoshi's part. "I've been watching her very close, believe me. But she hasn't done anything to raise concern. She just got off the train, bought some groceries, and checked into a hotel, where she has a one-week reservation. I know you were a little frightened because she's high-level, but all evidence suggests she's just an honest tourist."

Tadayoshi was surprised but didn't doubt the expert's opinion. "Thank you. That's a load off my mind. Unrelated, have you seen my digimon around?"

"Only the MetalKoromon and the captain. The captain's in the training area, and the others are right over there." The woman pointed to one corner, where eight little metal ball digimon had formed an orderly single-file line sorted equidistantly by the letter painted on their backs. They were taking turns sticking the wire in their backs into an electrical outlet, which although a strange sight Yoshi recognized as their idea of breakfast. Alpha seemed to be just finishing up, and when it did it floated to one side politely to allow Bravo its turn. It was at that point Alpha caught sight of its general, beeped a couple of times, and sent a message directly to the boy's Loader screen.

A: POSITIVE MORNING GENERAL/INQUIRY: STATUS The speech quirks of those little things could be a little funny, but Tadayoshi knew it really meant something along the lines of, "Good morning, General. How are you?"

As he smiled with amusement he responded, "Very well, thank you. You're all up early."

Watching his screen again, he watched the letters appear one-by one, A: MOTION SENSORS DISTURBED BY CAPTAIN DURING STANDBY/EARLY WARNING PROTOCOL OVERRIDE ENGAGED What they meant was their motion-sensing eyes detected Commandramon getting up and leaving, which as a safety feature took them out of that standby mode in case it had been a threat.

A: PROCESS "Apology" COMPLETE/STATUS: NOMINAL was their odd way of saying Commandramon already had his apology accepted by them, and there were no hard feelings.

Tadayoshi was curious to talk to Commandramon then, curious about what got him up so early. On his way he stumbled upon Angel the BlackTerriermon in the rec room playing video games with the Missimon siblings. "This stuff is great!" she exclaimed as he passed, "It's got that rush of blowing up a hundred people but without all the annoying cops trying to- nope, spoke too soon!" Tadayoshi had some concerns about the sadistic little she-devil slipping through the cracks of the background check, but perhaps her acceptance into AEGIS was just another example of good fortune coming his way. Even better, she was keeping the Missimon entertained and out of trouble.

Tadayoshi had the good sense to cover his ears as he entered a training area. There, Commandramon had set up moving dummies covered in paper bullseyes, and he was trying to shoot them all while running around and avoiding a bean bag cannon he had rigged up to track and fire back at him randomly. Once Commandramon ran two feet up a wall, shot the farthest target, and landed, he pushed a button on a small remote that appeared to deactivate the bean bag cannon. "Top! Don't you want a little breakfast before you start shooting, at least?"

Commandramon registered no surprise to Tadayoshi's presence. "Breakfast will be the reward for reaching my goal," the soldier reasoned.

"See for yourself." Commandramon checked his chamber for a round, which was empty, unloaded his magazine, and for still more safety turned the safety switch on before passing the gun to Tadayoshi. That let the young man peer through the scope around the room, which he had to in order to easily see exactly where Commandramon had just hit each target.

Every single shot on all thirty dummies was right down the middle. Tadayoshi happened to know thirty was also the number of Commandramon's round capacity, meaning he was expecting to make every single shot. "That must be it, right? You can't really do better than thirty straight bullseyes on moving targets."

Tadayoshi passed the weapon back and made for the break room, where Renamon and Hagurumon were lazing around, the only digimon not acting out of character. While Renamon chomped a bagel, Hagurumon just levitated, not needing to eat or drink anything theirself. "Good morning, you two. Renamon, would you please pass me one of those?" As Tadayoshi opened the fridge for some butter (he liked keeping the fridge stocked well), Renamon threw a bagel through the air at him. He caught it almost without looking at it. As he was halfway through eating his buttered bagel, Commandramon joined the crew. "How'd it go?"

"I look forward to discovering that limit." Without being asked then, Tadayoshi reached behind the fox and tossed a blueberry muffin at the dragon, which he caught with no effort. He gave an appreciative bow of the head before unwrapping and slowly eating his well-deserved treat. "What's the status of the Megadramon watch?"

Tadayoshi had been about to answer, but just then his cell phone had received a text message urging him into the briefing room at his earliest convenience. He smirked. "You know what, Commandramon? I think today is gonna be a good day for you."

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Word count: 1,358