Beethoven's Virus

by Lexiroth

Forte learns that the easiest way to go completely berserk and royally kick someone's arse is simply to find something - or someone - to protect.

Beethoven's V I R U S

By: Lex(iroth)

Part One

* * * *

Life is full of problems that can't be solved. Although the hardships of a human being may have been a tad more complicated on the mental side of it all, the problems that a robot faced were – in a nutshell – absolutely ridiculous. Usually programmed with one train of thought or a universal set of commands to pursue, few could think for themselves, and often had to follow the orders their creator. Of course, the 20th century generation of robots couldn't do much of anything without the fear of their current programs erased, and having a harsher fate inflicted upon them. Most were laboratory assistants anyhow, and without the free will to do what they please, most wondered what they wanted in life.

…And that's why, to say the least, Forte had no interest whatsoever in conversations like that, and to hy he was obliterating everything he could once again.

Forte looked positively bored. The entire city may have been going up in flames below him: tiny cars coming to a sudden halt when a dense hoard of people ran berserk around the streets looking for cover, buildings and highways becoming nothing more than a crumbling mass of rubble and concrete with a mere energy blast from his buster, electrical wires snapping and flying in all directions, the elegance of a city completely ruined from his position high above it - but he couldn't kill a soul. Like it or not, the Laws prevented it. Even if he wanted to kill Wily – (although he had been dying to do it for some time, but had no motivation for – he couldn't physically kill a human being with his bare hands. He also couldn't drink or digest food, walk into a store without the irritating feeling that someone was staring at him, throw small stones at railroad tracks in the midst of trying to derail an oncoming train, and all sorts of fun things forte would like to do, but couldn't. They weren't THE Laws of Robotics, but they were still things society prevented him from doing. The three real Laws of Robotics all robots were programmed with didn't prevent him, however, from provoking the blueberry hero of humanity to the point where he had to destroy some of it to protect it.

The storm brewing above him also continued to assist Forte in the mindless destruction. Occasionally lightning gently rippled through the clouds; the heavy rain that accompanied the casual lightning strikes made it a festive sight to see. As he waited – indirectly ruining thousands of innocent lives just to provoke the rage of a little kid in aqua tights – it gradually rained harder. Though completely drenched, he continued to stand there motionless, rain continuing to trickle down the purple slashes underneath his eyes. All in all it probably sounded quite ridiculous, but while staring out into the digital distance just waiting for him, their perpetual quarrel was all Forte could think about. About how he was just so perfect, how although Forte may have been taller and stronger and had a better personality than Rock's boring and charming and ever so obedient personality, he couldn't win. It was one of the many problems in life that Forte simply couldn't solve for himself, and was forced to ignore. Forte buried his brow meditatively, one hand absentmindedly scratching the top of his companion bot's head to calm his whimpering, before he started mumbling to himself.

"Yeah, Gospel, I know. He's late."

* * * *

With an uncommon display of wisdom beyond his years, Blues looked all but surprised at Forte's outburst of destruction to attract Rock's attention. Forte, of course, had not been informed that Rock was currently halfway across the world attempting to deal with matters clearly beyond his capabilities, and that it was up to Blues to complete the dirty work left behind. While patrolling the skies looking for the Wily bot, he took some time to regard the scene below. A complete chaotic mess laid below him, all unnecessary, all to provoke his darling little brother. It really was a ridiculous quarrel, and Blues predicted in the long run, Rock would – more or less likely – end up losing everything by simply giving up to Forte's demands. Nevertheless, although tired and feeling morally bankrupt, Blues dragged himself across the skies in the desperate attempt to locate Forte and tell him to "shut the hell up and get over himself." In all actuality he would probably not say those exact words, but Blues mused that at least it sounded nice .. for the time being.

Meanwhile, Forte's thoughts were clumsily trailing off! While attempting to see his handiwork through the agitating haze of large dust clouds and masses crumbling of buildings, the contributing rain and lighting turned his prevented him from doing so, and turned his vision into that of muck. Some city equipment had started to arrive in order to clean things up whereas nothing had been destroyed in the past half-hour, but Forte knew that it would take them quite some time. He definitely started considering wreaking some havoc all over again, that is, before he was broody awakened by the murderous look in Blues's eyes, of course. Well, if he could see them and all, Forte suspected that they carried that appearance.

"Forte," he asked, stopping a few feet in head of him, breathing heavily. "What in the hell do you think you're doing?"

Folding his arms across his chest, Forte gave Blues a sideways glance, whereas he was still attempting to see the people run for their dear lives. And oh what a sight it was to see! If he had been standing closer, he probably could have seen some people trip over the masses of dead bodies piled upon each other. Of course, Forte didn't know for sure. "What does it look like I'm doing, old man?" He laughed back.

"It looks like you have a stick up your ass, and that you're trying to make my work load a hell of a lot heavier, that's what," Straight and simple, shrouded in a stereotypical, cool, monotonous 'Blues' kind of way.

"Brilliant observation there, buddy!" the little black terror countered mercilessly, his grin stretching from ear to ear. "And I was trying really hard not to destroy anything this week."

"What happened? Blues inquired, tilting his head sideways a bit.

He opened my mouth for a witty retort, but whatever he was going to say he must have deemed unworthy and decided to simply state the obvious. "I got bored."

"I guess there really is a first time for everything," Blues sighed, calming down a degree. He graciously let Forte's sarcasm slide with good humor. To be frankly honest, he wasn't in the mood for a fight.

Blues had noted while they were both merrily floating above the city for quite some time just staring at each other, that Forte's attention had begun to sway. Sure enough, the younger bot was staring happily at the catastrophic, mass bewilderment and chaotic mess below him, like he was a little kid who had just been given an excessive amount of candy. While the RoboPolice had deployed no patrol helicopters, Blues could vaguely see the outlines of red and blue Disaster Containment vehicles parked and blinking on the surface below. His vision was impaired, however, due to the thickness of the rain that poured on them. To his amazement, Forte seemed to be actually happy while staring at it. Blues's head tilted even further as he started at the younger bot, figuring that it was just apart of the programming. In his gut, though, something told him it wasn't apart of the programming. Forte was many things, but stupid wasn't one of them. He was different. The little rat bastard had some goodness somewhere deep inside of his diminutive, almost nonexistent heart, and he knew it. Before Blues had gotten his hopes up, though, Forte had completely changed his way of thought, and begun being his rat bastard little self again. Damn him.

"I'd love to chat with you and all, Blues, but if you'll excuse me, there's a forty year old man below me who is dying to have a penny dropped onto his head. I think I'm at the right altitude where his head would be severely damaged upon - what the hell are you doing?"

Blues had begun to charge his buster and now was firing energy blasts one after another. None were directed in Forte's general direction but some randomly wound up scratching the edges of Forte's armor. Forte found Blues's attempt to stop him amusing, but in the long run, had become quite annoyed by the fact that Blues has switched over to rapid fire. This suggested that he wasn't purposely missing; the weather conditions were simply preventing him from remaining on target. Nevertheless, all of Blues's charitable efforts going towards preventing Forte from running off like a maniac and gruesomely killing more innocent people paid off. In this bizarre battle between a weak, angry prototype and a giant yet equally angry copy, Forte's opponent was rapidly starting to gain the upper hand. Blues would had almost successfully stopped Forte if the excess rain and wind hadn't of shifted into their own personal arena, caught Blues off guard, stalled him, causing a very idle Gospel Forte to take a huge bite out of Blues's side and completely wreak havoc on the circuitry in that particular area.

Blues immediately stopped and wavered a bit, a hint of a smile creeping up his face. "You may have won," he panted, hugging his stomach in an attempt to divert the lightning elsewhere.

"Won?! My pet-bot nearly sliced you in half!"

"You may have distracted me to the point where your sleeping wolf bot realized that you were in some sort of danger and needed help and therefore took a chunk out of my side causing me to fall into a horrible predicament where I would be the theoretical loser.."

"That's much better." Forte smiled, nodding his head. This battle gave Forte the reassurance that he was clearly capable of beating Rock, whereas Rock was basically a copy of Blues all the way down to the eyes.

"But just because you beat me doesn't mean you're stronger than Rock, if that's what you're beginning to think," Blues quickly added.

"What did you just say?"

The red bot sighed, staring down at the city skyline. Go figure, he's so predictable. He narrowed his eyes thoughtfully, mulling over his choice of words, before promptly starting again. "You really don't understand why you keep losing to him, do you, Forte?"

"Why do I keep losing to the aqua boy in tights?"

Blues hissed.

"I honestly haven't the faintest clue." And for once, Forte was being painfully honest.

"I'm not like Rock, so don't base your predictions because of one measly battle I lost to you. To me, it seems that you constantly lose because you're lacking an important quality that Rock seems to have."

"Ever the fucking details.. spare me, okay old man? Just get to the point," Forte said stiffly.

"You're just as strong as he is, if not stronger, considering the amount of work Wily must have put into your creation--"

"Get to the point, old man." Forte snapped, cutting Blues off midway. He idly dug his boot into the nonexistent dirt in the air, grumbling a few meaningless words. He must have thought he was on the ground.

"Forte, you're fighting for yourself, aren't you?"

"Of course."

"That's your problem. You may be powerful but you'll never win against Rock with your" pathetic excuse "one-path programming. Rock is simply fighting to protect people he cares about in order to protect them" from you. "He would rather not see the mindless destruction you and Wily inflict upon his loved ones."

"Shut up for a minute!" He cried out, sidestepping a bit before nearly tripping over Gospel. It was too much information that Forte did not want to know. There were a lot of things that Forte didn't want to know and didn't want solved, and this – his inability to defeat Rockman – was one of them.

"Why don't you just find something you want to protect?"

"Because I don't have one," He spat out quickly, without thinking. Forte immediately stuttered and corrected himself. "I don't need one."

"Then you'll just have to find one."

The younger bot mumbled something without looking up, bending over a bit to get a closer look at the ground. He was still thinking about what Blues had said to him, and how, for the most part, everything he had said was quite true. Still in a stage of denial, and cursed under his breath. Motioning for Gospel to come back down to the ground with him, he thought deeply about it all while descending. He did not completely agree with the older bot's philosophical musings, partially because of his diverse views blinded by an undying hatred for his virtually unbeatable counterpart. The other reason was never mentioned, never said, always denied. He would be deactivated if he ever let his secrets out.

"All I want to see is the destruction of Rockman. His death will be at my hands," Fote stated, doing the best he could to sum up his feelings.

Blues mouthed a few words that Forte did not catch – whereas Forte was already preoccupied with contemplating Blues's musings – and began to descend to the ground. Blues figured that he could at least lend a hand to the Robo Police, who were quite confused as to who had caused the mass destruction even if it was painfully obvious. He didn't blame them; they were new to society, and Forte's path of destruction usually did not come near this particular city. What Blues had mouthed, however, was as simple as "I know."

Meanwhile, halfway across the world, Rock buried his heads in his hands, and cried.

* * * *

It had been hours since Forte returned to the fortress, unsuccessful in one of his numerous attempts to destroy Rockman simply during the present week. The fortress was unusually quiet; Forte had noticed that the old coot hadn't been standing at the launch gate waving his hands around – usually occupied with a wrench or tool of some sort – like a madman. The tools suggested that Wily was working on a new robot while Forte attempted to destroy Rock, but with all of his other unsuccessful Robot masters, why would Wily want to waste his efforts building another? Forte didn't press into it any further and just shrugged it off. He was the strongest robot in the world, anyhow. Anything Wily manufactured couldn't be stronger than him. It just couldn't.

The fortress had definitely seen its better days, while still on subject. Ordinarily it was brimming with Wily constantly yelling at his robots for their repetitive failures, and in return the robot masters would poke fun at Wily's own personal failures, although the fear of being deactivated was always present. Piles upon piles of boxes were neatly stacked on top of one another, all empty yet neatly packaged. It was one of the stranger things about Wily, not the fact that he planned to take over the world with a new generation of robots or the fact that the man really was insane – just the fact that the man had an infatuation with empty boxes. He liked to leave them in the strangest places, too. Sometimes Forte would find himself walking aimlessly down the hall minding his own business – and BAM! – he'd walk right into an empty box. While the inside may have been messy and a little on the weird side, the outside of the fortress must have been the most intriguing part. Surrounded completely by molten lava, it was the most interesting piece of architecture that some people laid their eyes on – if they ever did. It was only natural for a madman to have a giant skull on top of his castle. Light's lab was very plain and simple – Forte had noticed that when he raided it a while back – and was very, very different from Wily's elaborate "castle." Wily obviously took a lot of pride in it, and constantly was remodeling, refurnishing, and restoring certain parts of it each week. It was one of the many tasks that Wily commanded Forte to perform, even when Forte openly opposed it. It was also one of the things that Wily slowly had started to neglect, and Forte had begun to miss it.

Come to think of it, there were a lot of things Wily was neglecting. Lately the fortress was just – to put it bluntly – as interesting as a damp sponge.

Forte took an opportunity to absorb some of his surroundings for the first time without being completely and utterly uninterested. What he did notice, after quite some time fixated absentmindedly on one point, was the dramatic contrast to that of what it was in the past. Wily had gone into seclusion, and thus the fortress seemed near deserted. Even if a pin dropped onto the dusty, disshelved tile floor, you could hear the pin audibly roll away for miles. The boxes were pried open, and hundreds upon hundreds of robots lay in them, missing legs, arms, heads, and most of the circuitry that a normal biroid was composed of. He immediately recognized every single one of them. For reasons unknown even a few successful – or at least powerful robots – had been completely ripped apart. Forte found remains of a skull and a ring, possibly belonging to comrades of him, but the rest of their composure was lost in the masses of robotic parts that were obviously too trashed for Wily to reuse. The biroid hesitated for a brief moment and opened his mouth as if to reply to the scene before him, but for lack of better words, came to the unspoken decision that it would be much more easier if he simply kicked one of the boxes and mutter some incoherent curse words and walk off ..instead of actually having to think about of all that sentimental bullshit.

All Wily does is make junk, Forte scorned, forgetting, of course, that Wily created him too.

It was a while before Forte actually decided where he wanted to go within the fortress. Gospel had already retreated to Forte's room when they first returned. His wolfish pet-type bot probably went to lie on Forte's broken mattress (despite the springs that presently tore through the padding) and hope auto repair began fixing some of the circuitry that still wasn't fully repaired. It had been badly damaged in his own individual battle with Rock's robotic companion, Rush, a week preceding. Although Forte was still not completely psyched about accepting help with his endeavors to destroy Rockman, most of the time he was rather pleased to have Gospel by his side when Wily recommended it. Forte had decided that, with such an epic battle shaping right before his eyes, he could probably use a partner to go down with.

Or maybe, at the time of his decision, Forte was just lonely as hell.

Something bugged him about this gradual change, no, it nagged his internal sensors like hell – so Forte decided that maybe he would give the old coot a visit in his lab. He had figured Wily had lost a few of his marbles in his later years, but Forte at least deserved a goddamned answer to why the hell perfectly well and able robots were completely smashed to bits. Forte cringed as he treaded down the hallway, nearly ramming into a couple of boxes overrun with deactivated robots, but nevertheless he eventually – somehow – made it to the room where Forte assumed Wily locked himself up in, a voice called out to him.

// you really don't understand why you keep losing, do you forte? //

shut up shut up shut up shut up..

"Forte, come here," Wily sang out gleefully, grinning down at Forte from the pedestal he was currently standing on. Forte could have sworn the computer nearby also sang out to him – weirdly enough, simply through Wily's unorthodox typing style – but maybe it was just Forte.

// you're much stronger than rock is. ..you're just lacking an important quality. //

I'm not lacking anything I'm the strongest in the world don't wanna hear this now..

"Why don't you pick on some poor little sucker and leave me alone for ten friggin minutes?"

"There aren't any left."

"Can it geezer," Forte had retorted so quickly that he was unable to hear what Wily had actually said. He then folded his arms across his chest, turned his head in the opposite direction and then promptly added, "I've got more important things on my mind." It's not the complete truth, he thought to himself, but screw it. The old coot wouldn't know the difference.

"Fluch Sie! [1]" Wily cried out in frustration, but did nothing to vent his anger like he usually would. He seemed too preoccupied with the plans on the computer screen, and merely continued typing. He didn't need to force Forte to come over, anyhow, Forte's own personality defaults – such as his persistent curiosity – prevented him from not wanting to know what the he had been preoccupied with for such a long time.

// forte, you're fighting for yourself, aren't you? //

can it old man I don't need to hear this.. not now..

"Eh? Whatcha' workin' on you old coot?" Forte called from halfway across the room, and as he was advancing closer to the computer in order to get a better view, added, "I actually came here to find out why in the bloody hell all of the robots are trashed and in boxes."

"I deactivated them," he stated matter-of-factly. "Used them for the monster here."

"You WHAT?"

"Come come, do you think this armor style suits him well?"

"That's a him?" Forte gawked at Wily while advancing further, his open mouth accompanied by a lone finger pointing at the super computer's monitor. When he finally reached the platform, he slammed his hands on one of the many keyboards, leaned over, and immediately burst into giddy laugher. "Old man, I think you're losing it."

"No, I'm quite serious about it being a 'him.'"

"It's a girly-looking biroid with long hair!"

// rock is simply fighting to protect people he cares about. //

shut up this isn't right I don't care about anything but rock…

"Reploid," Wily immediately snapped back at Forte and corrected him. "And speak for yourself. You can't even defeat a bastard child."

"Can it, old coot. I underestimated him," he murmured, and although he was talking both to Wily and his conscious, Forte was still embarrassed. Next time I won't make the same mistake

"Whatever," Wily stated, before immediately turning back to his creation's blueprints. "Do what you like. The robot I'm building will blow you both out of the water."

"Why do you need another robot, anyway?" He asked, inquiring. "I'm already the strongest robot in the world. I can destroy Rock by myself."

// find something – someone – to protect, and then you'll have a chance. //

oh, spare me the bullshit. there isn't a soul in the world who cares about me. That is, except for…

"Whatever."

Forte studied the plans carefully while Wily informed him on the reploid's complex circuitry and

format. He found it rather interesting, especially since the robot was not of his own kind: a biroid. It didn't even remotely look like a biroid, and if Forte hadn't of known it was a robot, he would have called it a human. Wily had obviously had one of the more agile robot masters steal the plans from Light before he deactivated them – he was the only one who would be able to devise such a complex robot like this. Wily explained the differences between the two races of robots such – that his new creation was much different from biroids simply because of the 'emotion' circuit that he would be placing within the internal central processing unit. It allowed the robot – now a reploid – to not be restricted to the Laws of Robotics that all biroids were programmed with. Meaning, in short, with this free will, the reploid was capable of killing humans.

That, and Wily and Light must have been becoming pretty damned desperate.

With this realization, Forte's laughter had slowly started to drain, and the lab suddenly became deathly quiet. While Wily's mouth may have been moving still, Forte's subconscious had tuned everything out, except for the clickdy-click-click-click-clickdy-clickdy-click that was still present. It was like a symphony with the exception that a madman was creating it. It was a parasite, a poison ruining what Forte considered a beautiful composition; Wily's typing was a composition of a symphony: Beethoven's Virus. And that's exactly what Wily was programming.

Forte realized that Wily was creating a virus. A virus designed to destroy its counterpart, to destroy everything, something Wily would not live to see.

// Forte! Why must I fight you? We are not enemies.. //

bzzt..

// This is ridiculous Forte! Can't we just be friends again? //

bzzt.. bzzt..

// Forte, you can't resist the truth forever.. //

bzzt..

// Forte…. //

A new thought seemed to suddenly strike Forte and his weary expression grew sly. He leaned further over the edge of large keyboard until he was nose to nose with the monitor, and ran his thumb across the pair of lips on the screen. Although his smile was sickening sweet, and unknowingly, evil intentions were racing through his mind, Forte, for one, had finally found what he was looking for.

"...something to protect, eh, old man?"

(end part one)

* * * *

[1] German for "Curse it!"

All those nasty little grammatical errors and plot holes I kept reading over are now (HALLEJULIAH, HALLEJULIAH!) corrected as of 5/6/02, and thus the overall plot shall become even more confusing.

Rock, Forte, Blues, and everything that looks remotely recognizable is © Capcom, and surprisingly enough, some people become really offended if you don't add this notation.