His metal boots clomping against the floor, the drenched reploid entered Maverick Hunter HQ. A horrible sight, his sabre had been mangled and twisted, and his helmet was dislodged from his head. The butter-yellow locks that usually flooded his head like the sun's rays on a summer morning were now nothing more than bloody patches of nothing. His face was so completely demolished you couldn't tell that he was once a handsome Hunter. His arms' armor and braces had been slashed through, wires streaming out of every open crevice. His legs were barely working, moving slowly, like he was trudging through syrup. The Maverick Hunter stared at the many staring back at him, sighed, and fell to the ground, out of commission.

At 2000 hours, Zero, Leader of the Special Forces Unit, died.

At 2001 hours, Asterik rose to avenge his friend's death.

This is his story.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"C'mon, you gotta get up," the reploid said to himself, half asleep. Asterik had been in bed for days, trying to forget that Zero, his childhood friend, had died just three days earlier. He had said he would avenge his death, but instead he wept in his sorrow and hate for the Mavericks. His white hands were stained with his tears, and his bedsheets were crumpled and mangled.

He fought the urge to just lay back down, and clambered out of his bed and towards the bathroom. Asterik looked at himself in the mirror. "What have I been doing? I said I would make sure Zero did not die in vain, and instead I'm crying my heart out? What good will that do?" He stood there, almost waiting for a response. He got one.

"You have been mourning, like the rest of us, Asterik," said a smooth voice, wafting into Asterik's ears from behind him. He whirled around and looked at a blue reploid with a calm, stoic face.

"X. X, I am not the type to just break down! I should have been out there fighting! I should hav-"

"You were acting on your first reaction. You were close to Zero, almost brothers. Don't regret mourning. It's a natural thing." He extended an arm in comfort, and smiled warmly. Asterik smiled back as well as he could under the circumstances and took his hand, and fell into a friendly hug with X.

Breaking off the embrace, he marched over to his table, and from a drawer revealed his double-sided Z-Sabre. "I will avenge Zero... with one of his own weapons. It is only right," he stated, and with that, slipped the sabre into its holding pocket on his belt and marched out into the main conference room, which doubled as the main hall.

There was a marked-off section where Zero's lifeless body still rested. No one dared touch it until Lifesaver had gotten back from the South Sea Expedition, and that wouldn't be for another few weeks. Asterik bent down and looked at his friend's mangled face. "Zero... you did not die for an unworthy cause. I will assure that."

He looked back, and his eyes fell onto the faces of Alia, Signas, Douglas, and X. He could see the worry in all their eyes, and the hope, too. "Wish me luck!" With that, he grabbed a couple of life capsules, and teleported to an undisclosed location.

(TBC)