A New Start

Dos, Trez and Ocho were quite befuddled at the wrecked state of the arena. Iris was nowhere to be seen. They looked helplessly around, as though awaiting for orders from the air. Then when they saw Uno stumbling to get up, they immediately rushed over to him, though most unfortunately they were intercepted by Agents Ganz, Rizwan and Viktor.

"Hoi, Quarto, what do you think you're doing?" Trez said in outrage, though he made no attempt to attack him from under the nose of two qualified agents. "You're siding with the enemy!"

"Isn't it obvious, Trez?" Dos growled, clenching her hands into fists, but not daring to take her Shox Stix from her hair too. "The little brat has decided to betray us."

Ocho did not say anything, but continued to breath heavily through his gas mask. It sounded as though he had a rather bad asthma.

Out of nowhere, Agent Zain had appeared behind the weakened-state Uno and shackled him from behind with magnetic cuffs. But even then, Uno did not protest as he was hauled onto his feet.

"How dare you, Viktor..." he muttered angrily under his breath, while Viktor only looked at him with an almost similar level of anger.

"You did not care about me after all, did you? I realised that. Ever since I tried to convince you that IRIS would not help you succeed in the mission and it would include a risk, you shove it away like, what? You think I'm your slave? I'm your son, father. And ever since eight years ago all you've been obsessed with is MATA and you never cared about me. I may be willing to serve you for the past eight years, but now all I see," he said with a final sort of voice. "Is a father taking advantage of a son."

His words should have had knocked someone off their hinges for all they knew, but Djin, as being the arrogant self he was, decided not to reply.

"I'm sorry, Djin, but the damage you have cost is unforgivable," Rizwan said coldly at his former mentor.

"This is the end of it, Djin. No matter how worse evil can get, the good will always win," Agent Zain said sternly to him.

Uno puffed, flexing his arms a bit to get it in a more comfortable position. He did not meet Viktor's eyes as he did so. "You may have destroyed Iris, but don't think I would go quietly in your orders."

Agent Zain raised an eyebrow. "Oh, is that so?"

Uno had shot his remaining members a sharp look and had said sharply, "Protocol Retreat."

"Protocol-" Rizwan had started, alarmed.

Before anyone could exchange confused looks, towering silver walls made of tiny microbots had rose out of the floor so that everyone was separated individually. Viktor had even stumbled a few steps as they pushed him aside. He looked around. He was surrounded inside a cylinder of microbots, and there was no way out.

"What's this stuff?" Agent Ganz was heard grunting.

"We have to get out of this thing!" Viktor bellowed. He threw his entire body weight on the wall of microbots, but they were hard as steel and was especially spiky, which made him howl in pain when he came into contact.

"This won't be the last you'll see of me, MATA agents," said Uno's echoing, menacing voice. Before Viktor could so much than think of another way to escape this microbot-prison, the microbots had withdrew, all scuttling towards the entrance of the arena like tiny million flies.

Viktor watched the last of them leave, feeling foreboding at the same time. He had just left his father and told him words of painful truth before he left. And seeing on how none of the Numeros were left except for him, they must have left him like how he betrayed them. Sighing back his reluctance, it was only then he noticed something.

The floor he was standing on was uneven. Curious, he bent down, and lifted his left shoe to see that there was a microbot there, trembling on the spot, unsure of which location to travel. Surely because it's master was too far away. Viktor picked the trembling microbot up, observed it closely, and decided that perhaps, now that he had betrayed the Numeros, it would be better for him to work for MATA. After all, their security could mean something to help him, because for sure the Numeros were angry at him for betraying them right at this moment.

"Agent Zain," Viktor said, turning timidly to face the Neuro Chief Pillar, who was closest to him and who looked extremely grim. "I have...something for you."

A streak of curiosity crossed his face as Viktor showed him the microbot he had collected just now.

"Oh, my." Agent Zain said, smiling. "This is excellent. Excellent, excellent. We would be able to track their location with this very microbot! Thank you very much...?"

"Viktor. Viktor Ong," Viktor said, removing his sunglasses and stowing them aside, as he has no use to hide his identity anymore.

"Nice to meet you, Viktor," Agent Zain said, shaking his hand. Then, as though he had just read his mind, he added, "And welcome to MATA."

Viktor gaped open mouth at what he had just said. Sure he had wanted to ask, but he didn't think that he would be welcomed so easily with such open arms, especially directly from one of the Chief Pillars.

"You...you really don't mind?" Viktor asked incredulously.

"I see no objection." Agent Zain said, looking around at the intrigued agents around him. "Unless if-"

"No, no, I really want to be part of MATA," Viktor interrupted excitedly.

Agent Ganz grinned from over Agent Zain's shoulder. "Great, then. Another member on the team."

"I think the Neuro pillar would be most suitable for you," Agent Dayang added thoughtfully as she strolled over towards them.

"Why? How do you know?" Viktor asked. Half curious and half awestruck on how they could decide so fast.

Agent Zain chuckled politely. "My dear Viktor, you have demonstrated yourself as a good Neuro agent since the start. By thinking strategically, you knew about the Numeros' plan and found loopholes in it, and you used it to your best advantage. Like how you managed to tell Rudy about the plan beforehand and your plans on how to counter the Numeros' one themselves. Without your plan, Rudy would not have been able to act convincingly to confuse the Numeros. Because of your plan, more lives has been spared today. You did your task as the Numeros asked, to divert us away, yet you found us and led us back the right track."

"Not to mention your gadgets are moderately ranged to long ranged," Agent Dayang pointed out. "That is the typical range of a Neuro agent's gadgets."

"You have shown real potential, Viktor," Agent Ganz said proudly. "And we will be most honoured to take you in as our agent."

***

It was a fine, fresh Monday morning. Birds twittered happily in trees, neighbours greeted each other happily as they passed in the streets, the sky as clear as ever, giving a magnificent sense of freedom and happiness for the residents of Cyberaya.

Ding dong ding dong.

"Ali, go and get the door," Ghazali was calling from the kitchen.

"Coming!"

Emerging coolly from his bedroom was Ali. He hopped onto the railing of the stairs and slid down to the ground floor, where a blast of delicious smell seemed to be coming from the sizzling kitchen.

"Meow?" Comot started as Ali landed beside the cute furball and walked towards the door. It observed Ali most curiously when the door was pushed aside to reveal Viktor, grinning from ear to ear and wearing his featured white and green hoodie.

"Oh, Viktor! I didn't expect you this early in the morning," Ali said, confused but still grinning.

"Just thought I'd discuss a few things with you, if you don't mind," Viktor said happily. It seems as if he was really excited to tell something.

"Come on in, then," Ali smiled, stepping aside to let Viktor in.

"Ali, who was it?" came Ghazali's voice again.

"Just Viktor!" Ali shouted back, for at that moment, there was an even more ferocious sizzling noise that he was sure he would go unheard. "We'll be up in my bedroom! C'mon," he added at Viktor, and together they proceeded up the stairs, onto the first landing and into Ali's just-cleaned bedroom.

"Whoa...powerr," Viktor praised, giving a thumbs up. "Getting up on scratch, eh?"

"Eh, it's nothing much." Ali waved dismissively, dropping into a bean bag in the corner of his room while Viktor took a seat on his neat bed. "Errr...what was it you wanted to talk about?"

Viktor casted the room a quick look, as though checking for eavesdroppers. Ali could not help but look around too. Well, the door was closed, his dad was cooking, and the next door neighbours were not dawdling outside their garden right now.

"Erm...Ali, if you would forgive me," he said in reluctant tones. It seemed odd for him to be looking suddenly sad that Ali felt confused. He thought just now he had been excited to tell him something. "You know, for everything that has happened. I didn't know, really, I just-"

Ali shook his head. "You don't have to apologise. Let's just leave that in the past."

"So...um...I was just asking..." Viktor said nervously, as he held out a hand as though for a hand shake. "Can we start over?"

Surprised, but not hesitant, he grabbed his hand and shook. The both of them rather grinned stupidly at each other for a few seconds before letting go.

"I think there's something more you wanted to tell me, right?" Ali added as he settled himself back in his bean bag.

"YES! Guess what," Viktor said in low, excited tones. "I got my suit and gadgets already!"

"Really?" Ali said, sitting up much more straighter than he had before. This was bound to be interesting to listen in. "Cool! What have you got?"

Viktor quickly fumbled in his backpack he had brought along and extracted his tablet. He tapped on it a few times before showing it to Ali.

"Here," he said. "This is the suit, and these are the gadgets. Pretty much the same gadgets, if you ask me. I think they only renewed it so that it won't be tracked or something."

Viktor's new suit was almost the same as his previous one, though with new highlights. It wasn't completely black. Instead, now it has yellow linings which reminded Ali a lot of Roza, another Neuro agent he had met back in his Academy, who has almost a similar suit. Tight and black with yellow linings. He guessed the exception was that Roza's top might have a bit of a V-shape at the bottom while Viktor's didn't. It looked fairly more like a jacket to him. A really tight one.

"Nice, right?" Viktor said, who had been observing Ali, as though nervous for his opinion. Ali looked up and grinned.

"Of course it's nice," he said pointedly, though he puff a bit to show he didn't meant it to be offensive.

"What about you, though?" Viktor asked, taking back his tablet and replacing it back in his bag. "I heard you gave up IRIS 2.0. Is it true?"

"Yeahhhh...I gave it up," Ali said, jerking his head a little.

"Ohh..." Viktor said. That was one thing he liked about Viktor, he wouldn't really nag Ali for his decisions and all sorts of stuff, unless if he thinks it's really unreasonable.

"Ali!"

A voice seemed to be coming from the floor below. Ali nearly fell down in his haste to get the door. Once he reached there, he yelled back, "What?"

"Lunch's ready. Ask if Viktor wants to join!"

"OK!"

Ali pulled his head back into the room, glancing back at Viktor he asked, "You wanna eat lunch with us?"

Viktor smiled. Considering he was quite hungry now, why not? "Sure."

The two best friends got up, all harsh events forgotten as they ate their lunch animatedly with Ghazali watching them satisfyingly. Maybe Viktor might be a way better friend for Ali than he thought. But also, this might not be the end of all.

-The End-