The VS Project

The Odaiba High School computer lab was silent as Jun sat in front of one of the computers and typed, putting the finishing touches on several thousand lines of code. Behind him, Akira, Tian, Seita and Mana stood waiting.

“Done!” Jun said finally, lifting his hands off the keyboard and turning to face the others. “Now all that’s left is to playtest.”

“Are you sure it’s okay for us to participate?” Tian asked, “I mean, if it’s Minami Academy that’s entered the competition…”

“As long as it’s Minami Academy students who’ve done all of the work, we can invite anyone we want to assist!” Mana said.

Jun and Mana were currently students at the elite Minami Academy, which had an international exchange program for foreign students to experience learning at a Japanese high school. And under Minami Academy’s sponsorship, they had entered a regional computer competition, CompuSARC, or the South Asian Regional Computer Conference, where they would develop an original computer game.

“So…” Akira said slowly, “Jun’s done all the programming, Mana’s done all the pixel art and music, and…” She looked at Tian and Seita. “I assume we’re doing the playtesting?”

Jun nodded. “Right.”

“But why do you need 3 people to do the playtesting?” Seita asked.

Jun smiled. “You’ll see.” He turned back to the computer and typed a few commands to compile the code, then clicked on the resulting application. A simple screen with old-school graphics and music appeared, reading “The VS Project.”

“Okay,” he said, turning to them again, “If you’ll sit down at the three computers to the left of mine, click on the program that just appeared on your desktops.”

Akira, Seita and Tian sat at the computers and started up the program Jun pointed out, launching “The VS Project” on each of their computers.

“Click or press Enter to start,” Jun continued, “and you’ll then see 3 different games. Each of you choose a different game, then start playing!”

He waited as Akira chose a Tetris-like block stacking game, Seita chose a 1 on 1 fighting game, and Tian chose a shoot-em-up bullet hell game. The computer lab was then filled with the sounds of the different games running their course, as if it were a video game arcade.

Akira focused on stacking the blocks, eliminating lines as she went. When she reduced her stack by a large amount, Seita’s character got pummeled by his opponent, and the bullets shot by Tian’s enemies increased in speed and complexity.

“Agh!” Seita shouted, pounding at the keyboard and throwing punches and kicks at his opponent. “Take this!” he said, beating up his opponent and reducing their health by a large amount.

Immediately, Akira’s block stack increased in height, and Tian’s enemies shot more bullets.

“Oh, crap!” Akira said as she struggled to eliminate lines to reduce her stack.

“Come on, come on!” Tian deftly dodged her enemies’ bullets and shot at them, eliminating a large group.

Whenever each of them did something to improve their side, it affected the others negatively, just like a normal VS game of the same types. Jun and Mana watched as the other three played and put the games through their paces, surprised at their own handiwork.

Then, when Akira eliminated a large portion of her block stack, Seita landed a strong punch on his opponent, and Tian shot a screen-clearing bomb at her enemies, all three games suddenly froze, then crashed, showing a black screen full of error codes. All three of them stared at their screens, dumbfounded and surprised.

“Uh…” Akira said, looking over to Jun in confusion.

Jun sighed. “Darn it,” he said, “Just when it was getting good!” He got up from his chair and approached the three computers. “Don’t do anything,” he said, “I need to log these error messages!” He made a note of each error message, then sat down at his computer to take a look at the code again.

“How long will it take to fix it?” Tian asked.

“It depends,” Jun said, “I’m suspecting some kind of overflow error, but it could be something completely different. I’ll need to take a closer look.”

Akira sighed. “Well, it was fun while it lasted!”

“We’ve got a whole week before CompuSARC starts,” Mana said, “so hopefully we’ll iron out the kinks before then.”  

They waited as Jun tinkered with the code further, making notes and corrections. After another 15 minutes, he saved the code, recompiled it, and they were ready to start again.

This time around, all 3 games ran smoothly, with each advancement on one side affecting the other two. The 3 games swiftly reached the endgame, with Akira attempting to reduce a high block stack, Seita and his opponent both fighting with low health, and Tian shooting at a gigantic boss monster. Jun and Mana sat quietly, wondering who would win.

Then, Akira suddenly reduced her block stack twice, 4 lines each, having been given the ideal block pieces to do so. Immediately, Seita’s opponent attacked with a flurry of punches and kicks, sending him into a K.O. At the same time, the large boss monster shot at Tian’s tiny spaceship with a giant laser beam and obliterated her.

Akira pumped her fist triumphantly. “Yes!” she said. Tian leaned back in her chair and sighed, while Seita stared at his screen dumbfoundedly, wondering what went wrong. But Akira’s celebration was short-lived, as the screen immediately froze and crashed, returning to the error-filled black screen.

Jun slammed a palm to his face. “Ugh. Here we go again.” He logged the error messages and went to check the code yet again.

“Well…” Mana said hastily, “at least we managed to finish the game?” She perked up. “That might be just enough for a presentation during the contest!”

Jun shook his head. “No… having it crash at any time would be incredibly embarrassing!” His eyes wandered down the lines of code, looking for what caused the error.

“It doesn’t have to be perfect,” Tian said.

“I’m not shooting for perfect,” Jun answered, “I just want this to be our best work yet!”

Akira nodded. “I get it.”

Seita suddenly pulled his phone out and checked the time. “Crap,” he said, “I’d better dip, or I’ll be late for my Karate class!”

“I’ve got cram school in half an hour,” Tian added, checking her phone.

“I’d better get going, too,” Akira said.

They all shut down the computers and secured the lab, then made their way outside the school building.

“Let’s meet up one more time before the contest,” Jun said, “Hopefully I’ll have all the code ironed out by then!”

Akira nodded. “Sure!”

They all waved and went their separate ways.

The sun was setting below the trees as Jun and Mana walked down the street toward the part of town that housed Minami Academy’s coed dorms.

“That went well,” Mana said.

Jun nodded. “Fairly. I just hope there won’t be any more show-stopping bugs that crop up during our next meeting. We don’t have much time left to fix things.”

“Please don’t pull any all-nighters,” Mana said imploringly, “You can’t afford to lose any sleep with the schedule we have!”

Jun chuckled. “Don’t worry. I won’t.”

Jun and Mana were both in accelerated learning programs, though Jun’s was more technical and Mana’s more liberal arts-focused. They were in class from early in the morning to late in the afternoon, with the evening dedicated to studying and homework. They didn’t join any after-school clubs due to the limited nature of the program, but the CompuSARC competition served as an extracurricular project for them.

They arrived at their dorm building and climbed the stairs to the second floor, stopping at the door to Mana’s room. They both were in the same wing of the dorm, with Jun’s room being just down the hallway.

“I guess I’ll be turning in early,” Mana said, “I’ve got some leftover homework to do, and if Mei Ling wants to have another karaoke session, at least I won’t feel so guilty!”

Jun shook his head and smiled. Mana’s roommate was just as musically inclined as she was, and there were many nights when their voices could be heard singing down the hallway.

“Have fun,” he said, “I’ll be busy fixing the game code for a while.”

“Don’t forget to eat,” Mana said good-naturedly.

“I won’t.” He paused and smiled. “Where would I be without you?”

Mana smirked. “In your basement, as a starving NEET!”

Jun laughed. “Ouch.”

They stared at each other for a few moments, smiling. “Good night,” Mana said softly.

“Good night,” Jun answered back.

They met with the three older kids again later that week in the Odaiba High School computer lab. In a long, extended session, they managed to playtest the game to completion without a single crash.

“So far, so good,” Jun said.

“Oh, come on,” Mana retorted, “That was a great run!”

“So the first day of competition is the day after tomorrow,” Akira said, “At the Tokyo Big Sight. Right?”

“Right,” Jun said. “We’ll play our presentation, and then you’ll play through the game when the judges come by.” He took a deep breath. “We’ll know if we’ve moved on to the next round by snail mail.”

The others nodded. 

Akira reached into her pocket and pulled out a small plastic card holder. Pulling out a handful of cards, she handed them to each of the others. “These are for all of you,” she said, “As a talisman for the contest.”

Seita looked at Gazimon’s picture on his card and chuckled, while Tian gazed at Renamon’s image with a serene smile.

Jun and Mana looked at their cards. “Patamon…” Jun said, amazed.

“Salamon!” Mana exclaimed. She looked up at Akira. “I forgot that you play the Digimon card game!”

“We may not be able to talk to our friends right now,” Akira said, “but this way, at least they’ll be with us in spirit!”

Everyone nodded and smiled.

“Hey guys,” a man’s voice rang out across the empty computer lab, “It’s getting late, and we’re closing up – you’d better wrap up whatever you’re doing and get on home!”

Akira gaped at the man in mock-surprise. “You’re kicking us out, Mr. Akimoto?”

Mr. Akimoto chuckled. “Yes, I’m kicking you out. Just be glad I’m nice enough to let you use the lab for your project!” He looked pointedly at Jun and Mana. “Minami Academy, right? I heard they had a bunch of students competing in CompuSARC this year.”

“Yes sir,” Jun answered, “The competition starts this Saturday.”

Mr. Akimoto nodded. “Well, good luck!”

They left the school building and chatted for a while as the sun set.

“You know,” Tian spoke up, “Akira’s competing in a card tournament tomorrow afternoon after school. If you guys want to come…”

Jun and Mana looked at each other. “We’d like to,” Jun said, “but I don’t know if we can make it. With all the prep for CompuSARC, and our schedule…”

Akira nodded. “Don’t worry about it if you can’t make it. It’s just a small tournament at the game shop. We can tell you how it went on Saturday!”

They all said goodbye and went their separate ways.

It was finally the day of the competition, but despite everything they had done to prepare, Jun just couldn’t concentrate. His mind was fixated on the message he had received on his D-Coder the previous night.

As far as he knew, all of the Chosen Children had received the message, written in long lines of Digicode. With a little bit of finagling, Jun had managed to copy the message onto his laptop. Now, all that was left to do was fire up the Digimon Analyzer, a program he hadn’t used in months, and run the message through the Digicode translator.

Unfortunately, the VS Project required all of their computing resources at the moment – Jun couldn’t run the translator at the same time, not even in the background, and so he was stuck waiting until the competition was over before he could even touch the message.

And the wait was excruciating.

Jun tore his eyes away from the computer screen he was staring blankly at, and glanced at the others. Mana, sitting next to him, had a faraway look on her face, while Akira, Seita and Tian were in various states of distraction and frustration, sitting at their computers.

Their booth was one of many on the main floor of the Tokyo Big Sight complex, full of contestants from various high schools in different parts of South Asia. The sounds of thousands of active video games filled the air and echoed through the massive room as if it were a gigantic arcade.

“Are the judges here yet?” Tian asked, leaning back in her chair.

Mana sighed and looked around. “Nope. They’re still at the booth with the kids from Indonesia.”

Seita let out an exasperated breath. “This is insane. How long are we supposed to wait?”

“Until our number comes up,” Jun said. The contestants had drawn lots to determine the order in which the judges would observe each project, and Jun and Mana had drawn number 73.

“Now serving number 47,” Mana said wryly, mimicking a service receptionist.

Akira laughed miserably. “This is worse than the D.C. DMV!”

They were all commenting on the contest, but deep down, they knew they were thinking only of the Digicode message. What did their friends have to say? Were they okay? Was the message a greeting or a warning?

It wasn’t until the late afternoon that the judges finally came to their booth to observe. Jun and Mana made their presentation, which ended with a live playtest of the game.

Despite their preoccupation with the Digicode message, Akira, Seita and Tian managed to play a good game, without making any simple mistakes. The game ended with Tian winning, her final shot defeating a gigantic boss while subsequently causing Seita to K.O. and Akira’s block stack to hit the ceiling.

The judges looked rather impressed, overall. “Very unique,” one of them said.

“Your coding looks solid,” another judge said, “No show-stopping bugs at all!”

“The art is very well-done,” a third judge said, “Very nostalgic!”

“Thank you,” Jun and Mana said, shaking the judges’ hands.

As the judges walked away, everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

“Now that that’s over,” Akira said excitedly, “Can we run the Digimon Analyzer and start translating?”

Jun shook his head. “Not yet. We need to keep the game running in case people want to play.”

“Crap.” Seita scowled.

“Just a little longer, guys,” Mana said, smiling shakily. “We can do this!”

By late evening, all of the game entries had been observed, and people were starting to pack up and leave.

“I’ll see what I can do about translating the message tonight,” Jun said, packing computer hardware into a box. “It might take a few days, give or take.”

“Take your time,” Akira said, wrapping up keyboards and mice, “It’s worth the wait to know exactly what our friends have to say!”

They packed up, left, and life went on.

A few days later, Jun sent off the translated message via e-mail to the rest of the Chosen Children. It had taken a little extra time, as he had also put together a translator program to convert their own messages into Digicode. Once he received everyone’s replies, he intended to pass them on to Naoko via a certain e-mail address he had found embedded in the Digicode.

He smiled as he read Patamon’s message to him. Patamon had kept busy over the past few months, keeping his mind sharp by visiting Jijimon and Babamon regularly and solving their riddles, as well as making sure the villages across the different servers were peaceful. One time he and Salamon resolved a territory dispute by threatening to evolve and battle all of the Digimon from one village who intended to steal the land of another village. The Digimon ended up backing down due to fear.

“Our reputation precedes us,” Patamon had said, “no matter where we go!” As the Chosen Digimon, they garnered a great chunk of respect from others who had heard of their amazing exploits. It made keeping peace in the Digital World much easier.

Jun finished reading Patamon’s message and immediately started writing a reply. He mentioned his and Mana’s experiences in Japan, as well as the CompuSARC competition. And with a deep red blush, he explained that his and Mana’s relationship had become closer.

After a few more minutes, he wrapped up his reply, saved it and ran it through the Digicode translator. Everyone else’s responses had trickled in throughout the day, and soon he had converted all of them to Digicode, placed them in a ZIP file, and sent the file to Naoko’s designated e-mail address. He hoped it would reach its destination intact.

“It was really ridiculous,” Seita said when they all met in the computer lab again a few days later, “I was expecting something meaningful from Gazimon, but no – I get an entire paragraph of him moaning about how he can’t defeat Kodamon whenever they spar!” He smirked. “So I told him to get good or find another hobby!”

Akira laughed, and Seita turned to her with an eyebrow raised. “What’s so funny?”

“Well, maybe he has something he really wants to say to her,” Akira said, smiling warmly.

Seita glared. “Do you know something I don’t?”

“Maybe,” Akira said sweetly, “Maybe not!”

Both Akira and Tian laughed at the confused look on Seita’s face. 

“Renamon’s well,” Tian said, “She’s currently having trouble finding quiet places to meditate, because all sorts of Digimon keep tracking her down to ask her for help and advice.” She smiled. “I told her that’s a great problem to have, and that she should start her own advice column or channel!” 

“Salamon’s taking singing lessons,” Mana said, “She said she wanted to learn how to sing like I do! But one of her classmates is a tone-deaf Impmon who tends to shout over everyone, so she doesn’t know how good the results will be.”

“Speaking of results,” Jun spoke up, pulling a folded piece of paper out of an envelope, “We got 4^th place in the CompuSARC competition!”

“Really?” Akira said excitedly.

“That’s great!” Tian exclaimed.

“However,” Jun continued, “It’s just below the cutoff for advancing to the next stage of the competition. So we won’t be going anywhere.”

Akira shrugged. “That’s okay.”

“Who won first place?” Seita asked.

“A group of students from Minami Academy’s senior class,” Jun replied, “So at least the school gets to advance, even though we’re not the ones to do it.”

“In a way, it’s a blessing,” Mana said, “If we did advance, the next part of the competition is in November, and we won’t be here by then!”

“Do you get any prizes?” Akira asked.

“Recognition,” Jun said, “That’s about it.”

“Well, it was fun,” Akira said.

They were interrupted by a familiar beeping noise. Everyone looked at each other in alarm, and they each pulled out their D-Coders, all of which were glowing brightly.

“No way…” Seita blurted out.

“Don’t tell me…” Tian said.

As suddenly as they started, the D-Coders stopped beeping and glowing. Akira looked closely at hers and tapped a button. A message promptly appeared on the screen.

Message Packet Received.

Akira looked up at everyone else, a faint smile on her face. They returned it with looks of amazement and excitement.

The connection to their Digimon, broken due to their separation, was now restored.

Notes:

This is meant to be another lead-in to the sequel I’m planning, featuring all the older kids together in the Real World during a (somewhat) normal week. The sequel will have everyone together in Tokyo, at a (hopefully) calmer pace!

Episodes