Prologue: part 2

Millions of words, swirling around in his head. Millions of words, triggering millions of ideas. They evoked images of places, peoples, and things that he had never seen before. They recited history, they expressed hope, they betrayed evil, they questioned everything. Words even questioned themselves, asking how they represented things, if those ideas were good, how he knew, what he knew, why he knew…

"Epsilon?"

If words only meant things because people said they did, then how were their meanings determined? If any word could be a falsehood, a truth, or anything in between, then how could you know which words to trust? How could you know what ideas and images to trust? When did you begin to know anything instead of thinking that you knew something? And who could be a real authority when words were a tool, a weapon, a craft, an art?

"Epsilon."

But the most important thing about words to him, he knew that. He knew that right now, words were important because they allowed him to ignore the pain. If he focused on the words, on the ideas, and questioned them until he found answers to satisfy himself, then he could not focus on the pain that filled every inch of his body.

"Epsilon!"

Something jerked him forward, inciting the nerves to scream out their complaints louder. Epsilon gasped, struggling to hold onto the thoughts that he had been examining. But whoever was out there was not going to relent. Reluctantly brought himself out of his world of words and into the world of reality.

His eyes wanted to rip themselves out of his skull to avoid the sting of the bright lights of the lab. But they couldn't do that, not without the help of his hands. As he started interpreting images instead of words, he found himself face to face with the one responsible for his existence in pain. Dr. Lagrano.

The human made a disapproving noise before releasing him (and causing more pain when Epsilon hit the back of the chair). "Let's pay a little more attention to reality, hmm?" He walked off to a screen. The screen was attached to a computer, which was attached to some wires, which were attached to various ports over his body. But paying attention to that only gave him a half-second reprieve.

"Reality is only what you perceive it as," Epsilon said, ignoring the sandpapery feel of his mouth. "Since it is based on perception, my reality is different than your reality."

"Oh please, not this again," he grumbled. "You're the only one left of the SFM Core project, so I don't need you wandering off in your fluffy philosophies."

"Those who know seek to question," he replied. "You should know this. You question things."

"Not to the extent of debating how to define the words 'No' and 'Yes' without using the other or a synonym. That is just plain ridiculous and pointless." The wires let go of him, to some order from Lagrano. "I need you in another area of the lab for testing. Get up and come with us."

Epsilon felt a blush of shame, causing a wince from the warm feeling in his face. "It's too painful for me to move," he said.

"I've heard that from you many times and I want to know why. And for that, we have to move you somewhere else. Luckily, I planned for this. Scarface, Ferham, help him up and support him to the other lab."

"Yes sir," the two other reploids said, coming over into his view. The two of them were both smaller than him, in height and in breadth. One was a male in a sleek full bodied one piece armor that seemed to be just a tight second skin; his head was fully covered by a masked hood, but his long white hair was free. The other was a female in multi-plated armor, in a form that was like a bird of prey. But they were both able to take hold of his arms and help him up, then support him on their shoulders.

In order to move, he had to bump his power production up from the very low threshold he had been using. That caused a new wave of pain, something that could be described as both frigid and burning despite the fact that the words stood for opposite ideas. But it was Lagrano's orders, so Epsilon bit down on any cries and made himself move.

The most frustrating thing about all this was that he couldn't spare any more energy to move or the pain might just cross over to unbearable. Yet he was operating at a small fraction of his full power. The two supporting him were expending more power than he was. If he were to use the same percentage of power as they were, he could probably bring down this entire tower all by himself. And that wouldn't even be his full capacity. He had access to unbelievable powers.

But he knew that if he used those powers, he would go insane. Before he had learned to modulate his power to the barest minimum, he had nearly done so. There was just so much power within him and no one would be able to stop him if he let loose with it. The scientists spoke of the force metals as such amazing things, with intriguing mysteries to solve. But he had seen into the kind of power that the metal in his core was tapping into. It was… it would devour his mind, twist his words, and eventually consume him.

He had realized that in time and resisted it, turned away from temptation. In punishment, he was inflicted with constant pain. But Dr. Lagrano would not believe that this condition was a curse from the force metal. He would not listen. He never listened.

Still, Epsilon kept trying. When they were in the elevator, they had stopped and he could speak. "What happened to the others with the SFM Core?"

"They failed," Lagrano said with no emotion.

"They went mad or were consumed by this power," Epsilon corrected.

That just annoyed the corporation owner. "Don't pretend to know what you can't. Not even philosophy can do that."

"I can correlate from my own experience and what the other scientists say. You are a fool, Dr. Lagrano."

The human turned to him, eyebrows in anger. "How can you accuse me of being a fool? I'm the one responsible for your very existence, all three of you."

"And so you should be responsible," Espilon echoed. "But you are cruel and blind to your cruelty. You are creating intelligent and powerful beings, but you do not acknowledge their intelligence nor their power. I could kill you right now."

That didn't seem to scare him. "Have you gone mad too? I would hate to have another failure."

"Only because that would damage your reputation further. But I am not mad. I have not yet killed you. But it is not out of respect. It is because I will not allow myself to be a fool."

"You are being foolish in disrespecting me in front of two others."

Epsilon allowed himself a faint smile, as a full one would feel like a crack in his face. "Am I? I believe that you ordered them to help me get to the lab. Not defend you from me should I turn aggressive in a physical manner. They probably only follow your word because they haven't thought they could act against it."

"You had better stop right now or I will recycle you."

Fortunately for Lagrano, the elevator door opened just then. Epsilon gave up on harassing him with words in order to focus again on walking without triggering too much pain. Perhaps he was constantly on a hairline fault next to insanity. But as long as he could, he would fight to keep his mind.

He was quiet until they reached the lab. Then Epsilon had to lie on the floor so he could get onto the worktable. The effort to get down slowly without losing his balance and causing a crash was enough that he gasped as his waist gave off a particularly strong wrenching pain. As the work table lifted itself out of the floor, he gratefully powered back down to minimal levels. It was a relief, even if not a full release from pain.

It was time to return to his words.

There was talk that the time of Mavericks was nearly over. Outbreaks of reploids infected by the various maverick-inducing viruses were less common; they were usually confined to a few areas. While there were still a precious few proven immune reploids, more and more were recognized as resistant or highly-resistant. Curative measures were reliable and proper avoidance education was available. Despite this, the Maverick Hunters were still around.

More of their work was turning into that of a law enforcement agency, not a militia. Missions for arresting criminal reploids had already outpaced ones for containing infected Mavericks. And there were a good number of workers who did exclusively clerical work: approving legal papers for reploids, notarizing documents, and other government work. There was still the need for combat-capable reploids, if not as many as before. One of the best things that came out of this change was that the active Maverick Hunters were able to have an actual training period instead of getting a sink-or-swim start to their careers.

Although support and combat reploids were trained separately, they were together today as the supports were testing for radio operations. "They're annoying," one of the other combat reploids complained. "I know what I'm doing."

"Their job is important," Wedge argued. "They can notice stuff that you don't. I know because my brother has always been an excellent support partner."

"No way. They just slow us down."

Normally, he didn't argue much. He was unpopular in this group due to the fact that he was a generic model built by an independent engineer. It was like being the kid from the trailer park. Even so, things concerning his twin brother Biggs tended to get Wedge defensive. "Not as much as they help. Heck, I'm sure I could do a mission blinded if I had my brother helping me out."

"Is that so?" their training officer said. He had been gone briefly, and they hadn't noticed him come back. "Why don't you do that then?"

So Wedge had been sent into the combat simulator area blindfolded. Not only that, but they had thrown Biggs in there too, to help directly rather than just through the radio. "Sorry bro," he said quietly. "I didn't think he'd actually make us do this."

"It's okay," Biggs said, patting his shoulder. "We've done this before. Let's do this right."

"It's what we always do," he replied, feeling better. It helped that they were often of the same mind.

They got the signal that the simulation had begun. The noise level was high, but it seemed to be an urban conflict. Before long, Biggs confirmed that, sending information directly to Wedge along with the transmission, "We're on a city freeway, a good ways off ground level. There's moving cars in the other lane, but we're clear. Also, the pavement's cracked. Be ready to jump."

"Right." He moved ahead, shooting at mechaniloids based on his brother's information. After being directed around some holes and wrecks, he had to jump over a missing part of the pavement. It didn't require dash-jumping, which was good because then they'd have to find some other way to go around for Biggs.

Once they got in sync, it wasn't that hard. Biggs dodged any incoming fire while Wedge fired back, using the energy gun at first, then swapping to one of his two blades if needed to finish off the foe. They were making a good pace, partly to prove that the support reploid would not slow him down.

"Be careful!" Biggs said, causing Wedge to slow slightly. "Something about the simulator has changed. I'm trying to find out what. Jump ahead."

Wedge jumped over a pile of rubble, then made sure Biggs made it over too. At this point, his brother did have to slow down and check the info he had… one flying foe fired at him. Activating his thinner R-Blade, Wedge knocked the plasma burst back into the foe. Biggs couldn't dodge when he was doing a deep sensing.

"What? Wedge, we've got a high AI opponent ahead. From my scans, it appears to be a simulation of a viral Maverick."

"Seriously? We haven't gotten to that point, I thought."

"Me either. Well it's a part of the simulator's programming, so it's intentional. Let's take it on."

Past some more rubble, they came to a fairly intact section of freeway. There, they encountered a reploid simulation that was riding a medium-sized bipedal mech. Despite it only being nine feet tall, Biggs' senses noted that it was equipped with a large number of missiles. The driver opted to rely on the mech's giant plasma blade arm instead.

Biggs stepped out of the blade's range while Wedge opted to roll under it, slashing his V-Blade into its ankles as he moved behind it. That might be enough to cripple the mech's walking ability, a weakness of any device designed like this. While Biggs moved around behind the mech to stay close to him, the mech driver sent a missile spam after them. "How accurate are those?"

"Guessing, mid."

"Right, then come with me." He snatched his brother's hand with his left, then kept his V-Blade active in his right. They ran right past the mech's left side, close enough for Wedge to touch it. Taking a passing slash, he pulled his brother ahead and slightly to the right. The missiles had managed to curve around to behind the mech, but couldn't correct that last motion and slammed into it from behind. Biggs let go in time to avoid getting slashed by the mech's blade.

With the mech breaking down, the driver opted to teleport out, away from this battle. The simulation session ended. They got teleported back to the meeting area.

"That was harsh, throwing them against Vile," someone commented. "Even simplifying that battle."

"Vile?" Biggs asked. "That was supposed to be Vile?"

"Yes it was," the speaker said. The training officer took off Wedge's blindfold in time for him to see that it was X, one of the most famous of the Maverick hunters.

"But at a marginal ability," the training officer said gruffly. "I wanted to see how far he could take that boast; it's surprising that you two pulled it off."

"Yes, that was remarkable teamwork." X smiled at them, then looked to the training officer. "Who's next?"

Later that day, they got word that X had requested them personally for his unit. As that was one of the greatest honors that a new Maverick Hunter could receive, the twins found themselves significantly more popular than before.

Scarface found himself faced with an ethical puzzle. He had two ideas that seemed equally good, equally important. But they conflicted with each other, claiming that the other was wrong. This did not make sense. In his view, ideas that were both good should not conflict. These two did.

On one hand, he valued loyalty and unwavering faith. He was meant to be someone whose allegiance would never be questioned, for he would never betray. The betrayal of someone he worked for was despicable in his mind. As he had been built by the Lagrano Corporation, his loyalty was to them. Although young for a current day reploid at fifteen months, he was already a vital part in Lagrano Tower's security. He had heard that at one time, a reploid would be considered lucky if they made it to their first year anniversary alive and without being infected. But those days were gone. He should stay loyal to the corporation and its leader for years to come.

On the other hand, he valued honor and chivalry. Scarface felt that polite behaviors should be the norm. People ought to be treated with respect, yet held accountable for their actions. This became a problem when the people around him were impolite and dishonorable. At first, he had tried to correct them. But he was often ignored; the behaviors continued. He could try to ignore them. But it grated on his sensibilities.

The two ideals came into conflict when the people he was loyal to behaved in dishonorable ways. He did not feel it was right to work for someone without honor. Yet these people had built him, so they must have favored these ideals even if they did not follow them. Was it dishonorable of him to betray a poor master, or to keep working under one?

While he struggled with this, he kept thinking to Epsilon. Now there was a reploid that he could admire. Apparently, he lived in constant pain, but resisted the temptation to lash out because of it. And he was extremely intelligent. Dr. Lagrano was alleviating Epsilon's pain little by little, giving him more time to speak with others. And he never failed to impress Scarface. The masked knight listened to him often, amazed that a reploid less than half his age came up with the ideas he had. Of course, he did speak of betraying Dr. Lagrano, which went against Scarface's principles. But it made sense when it came from Epsilon, somehow.

He heard a commotion coming from a nearby staircase. Ferham soon flew through the doorway and landed in the hall, looking angered with her eyes harsh and her wings twitching. Moments later, one of the human researchers came into the hall after her. "Why are you being so disagreeable tonight?" he asked, grabbing her arm. "You normally don't have a problem with this."

"Not now," she hissed, snatching her arm away. "I don't care if you jerks made me this way; maybe I don't want to do that at any call."

"You should be more sociable," he replied, starting to show some anger too. "We can look into that if you're not behaving properly."

"Just give me some time to myself," Ferham snapped. She had her weapons at hand, but was holding back on using them against a human.

It would be quelling a disruption, Scarface thought to himself. He stepped over to them and pushed the researcher back firmly. "If she says to leave her alone, she means it," he stated. "You ought to respect her wishes."

The man glared up at him. "What do you know about this?"

"I know that I can file a harassment report against you, outside the corporation," he responded. Filing one inside the corporation, he had the misfortune of finding out, did not do a thing to correct the problem.

But the threat of outside enforcement got the human to back off. "You two should be more careful," he said. "We control your careers and much of your lives." He then brushed past them to the elevator.

Ferham glared at him until he went, then softened her expression and turned to him. "Thank you, Scarface."

"Any time, Ferham," he replied. "But what's going on?"

"About what you saw and heard," she said, crossing her arms over her chest. "I had just managed to get Botos to stop pestering me when he picked up the harassment from where it had been left off. I really just want some quiet time to myself, but I doubt I'm going to find it around here."

He nodded. "Right. You could go spend time with Epsilon. He doesn't bother you, right?"

"Neither do you, really." She smiled at him. "I wish I could have been programmed like you instead. They don't expect me to say no. They don't ask you to do ridiculous things."

After checking to see if anyone else could be listening in, Scarface spoke quietly, "You can speak your mind more often then I can; you can insult others that deserve it. In some ways, I wish I could be more like you too."

That made her laugh and come a little closer. "Not too much, you don't want that. Trust me on it. I think I may go see Epsilon like you say. I can trust you both not to come on to me, and you seem to be working."

He shrugged. "More or less. But, could I ask a question of you first? Nothing like that."

"Sure, what's on your mind?"

He bowed his head. "Would it be better to stay loyal to a dishonorable master, or to change loyalty to one who would be honorable?"

"That's a dangerous question," she said, putting her hand to her chin. "But… I'm starting to think that it would be better to have the honorable master, or to follow a cause you truly believe in. Because if you keep following someone who doesn't believe in the same things you do, aren't you being dishonorable to yourself?"

"I hadn't thought of it that way." Scarface nodded. "Thank you. I seem to figure out things more clearly when I talk to you, or Epsilon."

"Me too. Funny how it works out that way, huh?" She smiled like she had some mischief in mind, then got up on her tiptoes and gave him a small kiss to his chin. "Are you going to drop by too?"

The kiss made him feel oddly flustered, and glad that his black mask covered up his face. "I, I might. But I couldn't…"

She put her finger to his lips. "That's what I like about you," she said. "I don't have to worry around you." She then stepped away, waving. "I'll see you later, then."

Smiling, he waved back. "Right, see you later."

Giga City was a place that dreams were made out of, to some. Opportunity was everywhere; fortunes were there to be made. New ideas, concepts and cultures were being accepted, as there were no old guard conservatives to deny change. Many came here to make themselves known.

He came here to keep hidden.

Anywhere else, he would have stood out too much. Steel Massimo was a huge reploid encased in thick battle armor. He was intimidating even before one saw his harsh eyes. Anywhere else, he could only get a military job, and the background check would condemn him instantly. Here in Giga City, they needed a lot of workers to keep up with their accelerating growth. He was able to get a job as a dock worker easily: moving cargo that was out of range of a loading crane and shifting large crates without the need of a forklift, that was it.

He even had his own apartment, down on the lower levels of Central Tower. True, most others didn't want it. But Massimo wouldn't complain. He knew what it was like to be a homeless reploid, on the move constantly. To have a refuge of his own, to have a job, to have people who didn't ask too many questions… he appreciated that.

Having a moment's break, Massimo looked to his two co-workers. There was the crane operator, also an immigrant humanoid reploid. He was looking to bigger and better jobs higher in the tower; to that end, he worked and flattered to get promoted. And there was a smaller cargo mover, an anthro bee. Yet another immigrant, she seemed to be looking for any improvement. She was highly optimistic and enthusiastic about it. With her cheerful personality, it was hard to imagine why she would have trouble finding a job better than this.

As for himself, he didn't care. He could stay here at this dock as a cargo worker and be satisfied with it. He was built for battle, yet he didn't want that anymore. If he stayed unknown, even with menial work, that was good.

There was just the question of if he deserved even this satisfaction.

Lagrano Tower was dark now. Quiet too. Ferham flew around outside, although snowflakes tumbled down alongside her, swirling behind her wings. The sharp bold air felt so good to her, deadening the heat of battle. And in the faint rays of moonlight trying to get through the cloud layer, she could see hints of the horizons. Freedom was wondrous. She could fly towards one of the shapes around her, like the forest district to the southeast or Central Tower just to the southwest. Or, she could go off to where there was nothing, just sky and sea, and see what was beyond the curve of the earth.

She spotted movement down below, on the rooftop observing platform of Lagrano Tower. It was white like the snowflakes, but larger, waving in the wind. That would be Scarface; a closer observation revealed his black form there, nearly blending into the night. His hair betrayed him, though.

On seeing her, he beckoned, pulling his hand inward. Come back.

Ferham closed her eyes briefly, letting the air hold onto her. Why should she go back? They had just gone to all this effort to escape this prison that they had been built in. She did not want to go back to the cramped halls and enclosed rooms, which had teasing windows of a forbidden outside. She could fly forever now, wherever she wished to go. Why should she go back? Lagrano Tower deserved to be abandoned, left as a monument to the ugly side of humanity.

And even the ugly side of some reploids.

But it was Scarface. He had no wings, nor any flight equipment. He could not fly to and past the horizons with her. If he was calling her back, she would go. The only other one she would do so for would be Epsilon. Epsilon could probably fly, or at least hover, if he put the effort into it. Still, he would suffer for it. Dr. Lagrano may have managed to reduce his pain significantly, to the point where Epsilon could lead a battle against the scientists, but she could see in his eyes that he still had to endure it constantly.

Flying back but not daring to set foot on that horrid place again, Ferham returned to Scarface. "What did you have to bother me for?" she said, but without any harshness.

"What are you going to do now?" he asked. He wasn't one for great speeches like Epsilon. Always so direct and succinct.

She put her hand to her cheek. "I don't know. I'm certainly not staying here. I was thinking, you know, of just taking off and going somewhere. The skies have always taunted me, but they welcome me now."

"I thought you'd say something like that."

"What about you?"

"I'm leaving with Epsilon. He plans on starting a revolution, something that will change the world forever. But you know him. He hasn't been able to physically practice for battle, and while he may have the power to make things happen, he doesn't have the ability to enforce it. I may know nothing compared to him, but I know how to fight. I will protect him and make his ideals into reality. He needs me. He needs you."

That startled her a little. "Me? But I wasn't made for a world of ideals, you know."

"You can change," Scarface said, getting up on the window shelf that had no glass. "You don't have to be what Dr. Lagrano's team made you to be. That is one of the things Epsilon wants to change, to make the world better for reploids like us."

"It might be better if there weren't reploids like us," she said sarcastically.

"And you fight as well as I do, if in different ways. Epsilon isn't going to change the world with just me by his side. He needs enough people to overcome the odds against us. He needs your power too. We need you." He paused, then held his hand out to her. "I need you. I don't know what it is to be without you. So please, don't fly away from me."

Ferham flew down closer to him. "Scarface…"

"Will you come with us?"

She nodded, taking his hand. The cold snowflakes swirled around them. "Yes, I will."

The mother followed her daughter into the little girl's bedroom. She needed a break from her home job and the girl had insisted on bringing her to a tea party. Still, she was amused to find a black haired reploid kneeling on the floor by the low child's table. It didn't help stifle her laughs in that he wore armor that looked much like a classy black suit. "Oh, did she invite you to the party too, Butler?"

He smiled and nodded. "Yes, Mrs. Lagrano. Although I figured Master Lagrano wouldn't like the idea of me playing pretend, so I offered to make young Miss Cindy some actual tea for her party."

Cindy plopped down in her chair, which was too small for either the adult human or the reploid. "Did you get jasmine tea, like you said?"

"Yes. I hope you don't mind, m'am."

Mrs. Lagrano sat on the floor by the table too. "That sounds good, actually. And don't mind what my stuffy husband would object to. He's not home, is he?"

"That's true," Butler said. "But we wouldn't want to risk him coming in on us. Here, Miss Cindy, I've got some honey to sweeten it, but I'd like to know how much you'd want."

"Um," she took a bit in her spoon and blew on it, to cool it down. Then she sipped it. "Lots of honey."

He chuckled. "All right." He didn't put in 'lots', but he gave her a fair amount.

"Do you have a name other than Butler?" Cindy asked out of the blue.

"No, I don't," he said, sounding surprised at the question. "That is what your father named me."

"But that's a silly name, isn't it? Cause that's just a job."

"He was made for this job, but it is rather simple," Mrs. Lagrano said.

"It doesn't bother me," Butler said. "Some reploids end up with utterly ridiculous names."

The little girl thought, then smiled at him. "Well then, I'm gonna have to come up with a cool name for you. I don't know what, but I'll make sure that it's awesome."

It was a little worrisome to think about being named by a five year old girl. But, it could be unique and she meant it out of kindness. "Thank you, Miss Cindy. I trust you to come up with something good then."

"It'll be great!"

Biggs and Wedge are a Final Fantasy tradition, I know. But I have my uses for the pair.

Scarface and Ferham have an interesting relationship, as not many foes in the Mega Man games are said to be romantically involved. But these two are, and they were clearly designed to be very different. Add in how they relate to Epsilon and there's a fascinating trio that doesn't get much attention.