Chapter 6 The Heist
South of Khabarovsk, Russia
5:00 a.m.
Proto Man and Karate traveled all night long in the stolen step van after they made their 'escape' from the Russian syndicate's clutches, heading south to the rendezvous place to meet up with Nioh and Wai.
After the whole night's driving, they finally reached an abandoned gas station in a small town on the border before dawn, Proto stopped the van by the side of the road to take a break and wait for the rest of the crew member's arrival.
"It's freezing out here." Proto shivered as he sat in the cabin, he didn't want to go out yet because it was minus fifteen degrees outside, and dark. He was still half naked since his top have been ripped off by the gangsters. As a robot, he doesn't need clothes to keep himself warm, only his energy would use up faster to maintain his internals' working temperature, but he hadn't refuel for a whole day, and started running low on power. His belongings, including the spare energy cans and his precious scarf, were left in the Karate's shop when the goons took him, he will have to wait until Wai and Nioh bring them to him.
"Hey, Chop, can I ask you something? Why did you borrow money from those scum in the first place?" Proto asked, trying to ease up the physical discomfort because of cold and the damage he sustained on his skin.
"I didn't borrow any money from them, that was the money of the noodle shop's rent and the ransom of Wai and Nioh." Karate replied, "Originally we were planning to do something after we paid them, we need to raise funds to achieve a greater purpose."
"What greater purpose?"
"Do you know about the first international robot fighting championship tournament? It is going to take place in New York, by the end of this year. I heard you came from New York. I thought you know about that."
"Never heard such thing before... "
"It's tournament to challenge the best fighting robots from all over the world!" Karate explained in excitement, "The winner will become the world champion, and then his name will go down the history!"
"So you guys are going to participate the tournament, maybe - just maybe win the award, then hoping your original owner will take you back home?" Proto said, "Good luck then, I will be on your side during the match." He added, although he knew the possibility of Karate to win would be very slim. According to Proto's fighting experience, they wouldn't even stand a chance facing a robot master, let alone fighting with stronger ones such as Mega Man, but he doubted that his brother would interest in such 'violent' event though.
"When is it going to happen?"
"It's in the first week of December, the open week of the Light University's third Anniversary, and the tournament is going to take place in there!"
"The Light University? That academy for robots and robotics geeks?"
"You have been there before? Are you a student?"
"Yeah, I have been there. And no, I am not a student, that was...for business only. Now you already got all this 'compensation fee' from Darden's boss, what's your next move? Guess you all can go to America now." Proto asked,
He did consider giving them one more hand help to deliver them to America, but he denied the thought quickly. He knew he couldn't afford any more trouble over here in this foreign land, or anything that might get him caught up in the crossfire between some affair which he wasn't want to be in, he already had enough on his plate looking after Wily and the robot masters.
"Us robots without owners are not permitted to go to another country, the only way we can make it to the other side of the ocean is to stow away by sea route. No ships would go across the ocean right now, it is too cold and too dangerous, we are planning to gather more money around here until summer, and then we will begin our journey." Karate replied.
"But I lost you your shop, how are you going to make more money out of this?" Proto asked with a bit of remorse, as he knew that was his fault as well. "I am thinking...maybe there is some way to restart your business, just wait until we met Wai and Nioh to discuss it."
"You know what, Chop, I am so jealous of you, at least you know what to do to make the best out of yourself, and have a goal to achieve. Me? I don't even know where I am going to wake up next week." Proto sighed.
"To achieve the highest award of Martial arts is an objective in my programming. You can find a goal as well; don't you have anything you want to do?"
"Well, I am constructing a light aircraft of my own, I am hoping I can finish it soon, does that count?"
"That's a start; perhaps you just don't believe you have the power to achieve it."
"Heh, I don't know about that, there certainly a lot of things I DON'T want to do, but for self-achievement? That's way out of my league, guys like me don't have a 'future,' I don't qualify."
Ten minutes later
Wai and Nioh arrived in their pickup truck carrying all of their kitchen appliances on the back, "Mr. Proto! Karate! You have made it! It's good to see you both still alive!" Wai greeted. Proto hurried to look for his backpack, pull out his brown leather coat and pull it on, and then instantly found that his phone has been ringing all along.
"Here we go again." Proto hurried to pull out the phone; the screen showed there were 220 miss calls, including the incoming call which he still not answering.
"It's time to make a progress report anyway." He sighed, then pressed the answer button.
"Proto Man, did you serve your purpose? "The voice surprised Proto, this time it wasn't King on the other side of the line, it's the person who gave him the job.
"Am I just a disposable little tool to you? Do you have any idea how many troubles I ran into to fulfill 'my purpose'? " Proto snapped, he felt like being used and disrespected, not even receiving a single appreciation after all those troubles he had been through last night to retrieve the robot for them.
"Calm down, that's your own decision to make for the way to get things done, as King told you, we won't interfere what sort of method you use to get the job done or the choice you made. Let me ask again, have you got the asset?"
"Damn A-hole..." Proto muttered under his breath, "Yes, I have got the crazy horse over here, what do you want me to do with him?"
"What status he is in?"
"Well, he has been controlled by an external device, I removed it already, apparently no external damage. He is still offline right now, and I think he will be back to normal after a reboot." Proto reported and opened the back compartment of the van to take a look at Centaur Man.
"Boot him up; we need to ensure that he won't cause problems or endanger anyone before we ship him back to the states. You are permitted to deactivate him if necessary."
"What about me? My job's done over here; I am going home."
"Not so fast, Proto Man, here's another objective for you, I need you to visit Cossack's house and obtain any information you can find in there. It's located in the north of Vladivostok; I will message you the address."
Originally Proto was going to decline any more job request, but he changed his mind at the instant as he heard of Cossack's house, that's his main reason to agree to go on this mission in the first place. "I am telling you, this is the last one, I am going back to America as soon as I finish the business here, I don't give a shit about your orders or the truth!"
"Just get this done, then you will receive your ticket back to the States. Bring along Centaur Man to assist you; there are rumors in the area saying that Cossack's 'ghost' attacking people and stop anyone from getting near to his house. There might have troublemakers in there, go deal with it."
"Cossack's ghost? Does mean that body I found in Khabarovsk is..." Proto hurried to asked, tinge of discomfort rush through his mind.
"No, it's negative. That's why I need you to make an investigation and look into it. Don't sweat it! No civilian casualties!"
Proto put back the phone in his pocket and sighed, strangely he didn't felt angry about the extra work this time, he was glad that the corpse he found in the morgue wasn't Cossack, which means he wasn't dead yet, at least it's still unconfirmed.
"Now, It's time to wake this 'Crazy Horse' up." Proto kneeled down at Centaur Man's side, trying to locate the switch compartment on Centaur Man's torso.
"Are you sure it's safe to wake him now?" Karate came over to Proto's side.
"No, I am not sure, but that's my employer's request. We...I mean, at least I have to work it out as he says. Don't worry; I have experience on this scrambler stuff after I have planted one to my..." Proto discontinued his sentence as he thought of the event that Wily had him to play switch sides to put a scrambler chip on Mega Man.
In fact, he did feel guilt for planting the scrambler chip on his own brother for Wily, only because Wily started to question his loyalty, blaming on him for the fails to stop Mega Man and let him took the advantage in sabotage every plot they launched. He had to do that trick to ensure Wily's winning, nothing personal.
But he knew it well that was definitely personal, and he knew bad intentions would lead to worst consequences as well, and he was the one who was paying for it, not Wily. He cut himself from the one last way to spin himself off the wrong side; he was sure he is going to hate by everyone for being the biggest traitor on earth.
Not that he cares about what general majority think about him, he only cares about how his brother felt of his betrayal, as Mega was the one who was trying hard to accept him back then.
And, he betrayed all of them.
Mega Man would definitely hate him to the bone as well, and Proto was 100% sure about it.
"Hey, I have found the control panel." Karate's voice broke into Proto's thought.
Proto clenched his fist, shook his head lightly. "Focus, just get this over with."
Proto opened the panel and hit the largest button in it without hesitation, and then there was some swirling sound came Centaur Man's body, his internal was working. Proto pulled Karate out of the van to prevent anything that might happen.
They waited for a couple of minutes, but Centaur Man was still laying there in the van's trunk and had no sign of awakening.
Proto climb into the back of the van to check Centaur out, but he couldn't find anything abnormal, "Weird, he should haven't sustained serious damage that would cause a startup failure..." Proto wondered, and then he got off the compartment and closed the door. Before he left, Proto noticed Centaur Man's hoof twitched slightly, but he decided to ignore it for the moment.
"What should we do now?" Wai asked.
"Let's head south to Vladivostok, there is a place I have to visit, and then we need to think of some way for you guys to get on with your lives, and safe a place to settle down." Proto suggested as he tied his scarf back on his neck, "Chop, you take the wheel, I need to recharge, don't wake me unless it's necessary or I will get pretty irritated."
Meanwhile
Skull Fortress
While Proto Man was having his 'vacation' on the other side of the planet, Dr. Wily was busy trying to make something happen upon Ivan's request. Since the expirer date given by Ivan was already passed, he couldn't wait for Proto to return anymore, he had to act out the plan on his own.
Then there was a knock on the door, "My noble master Wily, are you there?" It was Saturn's voice; he was waiting outside the room along with his designated partner, Jupiter.
Dr. Wily was busy handling something fragile, and he didn't have more hands to divert his mind on the visitors. The robot masters stood there for a while, but there was still no response from the inside, the two took a glance at each other, then decided to go in themselves.
The robot masters marched into Wily's work shop, seeing Wily was busy working on something under the electron microscope. It's gold, round shaped device in the size of a tennis ball. The projectile Proto Man stole from the heavily armed train couple of weeks ago had been dissembled into pieces, resting on the lab table in the center of the room.
"That's it, what a marvelous thing!" Wily laughed to himself as he held the device up and studied it carefully under the light, he didn't even notice there were two visitors came into the room.
"Uh...master Wily?" Jupiter cleared his throat, which startled Wily.
"What do you want? Did nobody tell you not to bother me when I am working? Get out of here!" Wily replied displeasingly, while he still studying the object in his hands without even looked at their way.
"But...you summoned us?" Saturn replied.
"Whatever!" Wily ignored the bots and kept his mind on the object, suddenly he turned around and faced Saturn with a cunning smile as an idea stuck across his head, he then stuffed the object into Saturn's hands. "Since you both are here, I have just thought of the first mission for you both serving under my force."
"What is this thing? It looks kind of sinister to me." Jupiter commented.
"You are very right to be afraid of it, this thing is powerful enough to take all out half of America's electronics in just one second," Wily replied with a monstrous evil grin. "Mega Man won't be an exception, of course."
"But what is it?" Saturn interrupted bluntly; he was annoyed by Wily's pointless speech already, only Jupiter instantly halting him from losing temper by pushing him lightly on his shoulder.
"It is an E-M-P, an old-time warfare technology that has been discovered for over one hundred and fifty years ago," Wily explained. "A terrifying weapon that even the military would think twice before they put it to use in any war.
"An electromagnetic pulse bomb?" Saturn exclaimed, hurried to put it back onto Wily's hand and took few steps away from him. "If this thing goes off, it will fire off all the electronics in the vicinity, anything relies on circuitry would get taken by the pulse, even the power grid! Can't even get fixed!"
"Yes! That's what my purpose is! To bring fear to the world! Hahaha!" Wily laughed, while Saturn was watching him in disguise. "I have just successfully obtained one from their testing weapon. Now I own this technology so I can use it to take over the world!"
"But...didn't they reinforced building structures to reduce damage already?" Jupiter asked.
"But there won't be protection for those outside the building, and there still have no ways to protect EMP effects from robots. Before I use it to paralyze the entire planet's electronic systems, I need you to run a little test for ME."
"What? No! I am not going anywhere near this stuff!" Saturn interjected at the instant, Wily's eye grew furrow at once. Jupiter hurried to grab Saturn's shoulder to stop him withdraw from the room.
"Huh? What did you just say?" Wily questioned with a doubtful look.
"No...nothing," Saturn forced himself to spit out his words. "I...I will handle this as much as you want me to."
"Good, I am going to launch the biggest heist in history, I want you to transport the robot masters to the bank they are going to rob, and then get them out of there after they made the large withdrawals from the vault. If I heard it right, you can create a Black Hole and travel through it, is that true? "
"Yes, I can do that," Saturn replied with obvious disfavor in his voice. "But why what do we do with the EMP bomb, shouldn't we just grab the cash and get away?"
"As soon as someone informed Mega Man about what is going on, he will fly over there to play his little hero game, by then, you launch the bomb right next to him, that should take him out for good, Muhahahaha!"
Jupiter and Saturn flinched after they listened to Wily's terrifying plan, the plan was endangering themselves as much as Mega Man, but they didn't say anything in return.
"If Proto Man were here he wouldn't allow me to act such a brilliant plan out; now I only have to tell him that his brother was destroyed in an accident!" Wily sat back in his chair in satisfactory, "Now, you two go get yourselves prepared and start heading out to Lancaster, the heist will begin very soon."
After the two robot masters leave the room obediently without any more protest, Wily contacted Shadow Man through his frequency.
"Shadow Man, you go follow those two newbie Jupiter and Saturn, keep your eyes on them. I want to know if they are loyal to me, or just some other fraud trying to drag me down. I need you to tap every conversation they have and track every move they made, then report to me." Wily ordered.
"I am sorry Dr. Wily, I am afraid I take orders from Proto Man only. I only obey the person who gave me the name, that's what my programming says." Shadow Man refused to carry out the order directly, which was out of Wily's expect.
"What?" Dr. Wily yelled, slammed his fist hard against the keyboard hard, his face instantly turned into blood red. "If it wasn't ME liberated you from that sunken container ship in the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, you should be stuck in that capsule forever or scattered on the ocean bed already!"
"But it was Proto Man who gave me the name, according to my programming, I can obey him only. I can take your orders with his permission, but right this instant he is not here, so I don't think I am obligated to obey your order. I am sorry." And then the call has been terminated.
"Damn it!" Wily cursed, he ripped the microphone off the console and threw it against the wall fiercely, kicked over the garbage bin next to him, making the rubbish inside spilled all over the floor. "Disgraceful pricks! All of you!"
An hour later
Lancaster County, Pennsylvania
3:00 p.m.
"Why can't he just send one of his bumbling robots to do this?" Saturn complained as him and Jupiter was going through the Lancaster County Central Park, and since Wily couldn't get Shadow Man to work, he ordered Snake Man to keep an eye on the two new recruits instead. "I know all of the robots in his stinky fortress are useless, no wonder he is so afraid of that Mega Man, that blue jerk wasn't so tough."
"Shhh, that tongue-tie reptile bot would hear. " Jupiter snickered, stealing a glance at Snake Man's way, "Wily is a real genius, he probably is the first person in the world that would create a robot with Ankyloglossia!" Both Jupiter and Saturn giggled among themselves.
"Not sssssso fasssssst, you two!" Snake Man called from behind, "And sssssstop gossssssiping, I am part of your team assssss well." Which the two ignored him, they even walked faster and disappeared into the woods, Snake Man tried to catch up, but soon he found himself getting lost in the woods.
"Psssh, if he is such a 'great genius,' how come he is such a broke-ass? Have you ever heard a terrorist with no source of income? No! 'Take-Over-The-World' my ass!"
"That's right; I had heard master Ivan said that he was already in bankruptcy before he became a terrorist, and owe master Ivan a lot of money." Jupiter laughed.
Saturn looked around incautious to make sure Snake Man or anyone wasn't anywhere in sight before he continued. "Wily doesn't trust us, let alone to have one of his clumsiest robots to keep watch on us! Snake Man will be an obstruction to our work! We have to either shake him off, or erase him."
"Easy there, bud, let's just leave him be, he is a fool, he won't be able to catch up with us! If he dares do anything against us, we make him disappear for good." Jupiter whispered, trying to calm his partner down. "We at least have to pretend to play ball before our real boss gives us a new objective, and we haven't even met our target yet."
"No wait, J." Saturn stopped walking all out of sudden, "I'd say, let's not do what he says, we can take out Mega Man without triggering this thing, then keep it ourselves and give it to master Ivan as a gift. Then we can gain a good impression of both sides."
"Wily will know! That bomb is supposed to disable everything that consists a circuit; he will see if there is no damage done to other things such as police bots. We have no time to create a blackout for now." Jupiter argued.
"Then we say that his little toy didn't work! Wily doesn't care about our lives; he doesn't even care about his robot's lives, the only thing that he cares about is himself! Besides, that old fool won't even be there on the ground without his guardian angel; he won't know what's really been going on." Saturn persuaded, which Jupiter didn't say anything but nodded. "I have a plan, and this should work out."
The two arrived a remote location which is discrete enough for their work; Snake Man was still following them, there was something Saturn had to do before the mission starts.
"This place should do, this is the furthest point counting from the city center where my ability able to get to," Saturn said as he placed his Hula loop on to the grass and pressed his finger in the center of it. "Far-end exit, activate!"
The hula loop sparkled, and then Saturn picked it back up leaving a dark, circle burnt mark on the grass.
"What are you fools doing? You should have arrived the town an hour ago! Everyone is waiting for you!" Wily barked through their frequency.
Both robot masters looked at each other and shrugged, "We are just doing some prep works, we will there soon."
Little does Wily knows; there are limitations for Saturn's ability. There are several conditions to meet to activate the 'Black Hole,' preset the Black Hole's exits is one of them; plus, there are distance limits between Saturn and the exits. Of course, Saturn had no intention to tell Wily about that, only his designated partner Jupiter, know best about his ability.
"Exits are all set, we are good to go...Snake Man, would you please come with me, and see you later J." Jupiter flies away by his jet engine. Saturn turned to Snake Man. "Snake Man, I think you better go get us a large vehicle, truck or something, we are going to need a getaway vehicle and a driver to bring us back to that ugly chopper of Dr. Wily's."
"But Dr. Wily ssssssaid..." Snake protested.
Saturn ignored him completely. "Look here pal, as you see, me and J need to handle that abomination Dr. Wily gave us, if this thing goes off anywhere near us, we will all die, so it's best for you to stay away from it, we will make sure it goes off right next to Mega Man, take him out for good."
"I want to take out Mega Man assssss well." Snake Man protested, seemingly eager to follow Wily's order.
"Okay, as you wish." Saturn sighed, shaking his head. He then uses his hula hoop to open the entrance of his black hole, then made the gesture to signal Snake Man to go in, "Get in here, I will be right after you, buddy."
Snake Man hesitated, as it took some guts to step into a terrifying black swirling oval, but still he walked into it as instructed, just for fulfill Wily's volition.
Snake Man felt horrified as he stepped into Saturn's black hole, but it was different when he came to the other side, he found himself standing inside a room, only it's narrow and led to endless void ahead like a corridor, and the whole place was in plain white.
He heard a sound of footsteps, he turned around and saw Saturn closing a door behind him.
"Hey, what issssss the...?"
"Welcome to my 'Parallel Residence', this is the other side of my 'black hole,' not exactly that 'black' isn't it?" Saturn joked, leading the astonished Snake Man to walk through the corridor. "Ever heard of 'parallel universe'?"
Snake Man shook his head as hard as he could.
"Can't blame you, I will explain to you a little; there are several layers of universes exist at the same time, my black hole is only a gateway lead towards one of those universes, only this is my universe!" Saturn stated, as they walked past several doors along the corridor.
"In here, I can control everything, I am the king in here, and these doors are all lead to different places, maybe even different universe, they change from time to time, that's the only thing in here that I CAN'T control, so beware. But I can create the 'Exits,' and each of the 'Exit' has a span of six hours, then they will be deleted when time is up."
"Why are you telllllling me thissssss?" Snake Man had a bad feeling about this.
Saturn put one of his elbows onto Snake Man's shoulder. "Listen pal; I already spilled the secrets of my ability to you, only you and Jupiter know about this, so we are friends now, huh? Special friends. Just pay me some tribute when I need your help."
Snake Man nodded, he began to think Saturn was going to shut him in there if he refuses.
And actually, that's exactly what Saturn intended to do.
"I know you are dependable, my friend, just walks straight ahead and open the door at the end of this corridor, then you can go out and continue with the mission," Saturn said, and place a key card onto Snake Man's hand. "I am lending you the 'passkey' of all rooms in this place, but if you lost it, you would stick in here forever, so hold on to it with your life. One more thing, this universe is unstable, it will shrink or expand from time to time, I suggest you not to hang around in here for too long, you wouldn't want to get crushed when it shrinks."
"Where are you going? Aren't you coming with me for the missssssion?"
"I am going to aid the other colleagues and wait for that blue boy; you do your job, I do mine, okay? Your job is to find us a getaway vehicle so we can get the cash back to Dr. Wily." Saturn said, and then opened a door and went out, leaving Snake Man alone in the parallel universe of his.
"That's easy, now for the real job." Saturn snickered, he stepped out of the 'exit' he created, where Jupiter was already waiting for him there. The place was on the roof of the building right opposite the Lancaster National Bank, where they could see clearly what was going on.
New York
Dr. Light's lab
It was a peaceful afternoon in New York. Dr. Light was writing for his new book about robotics in his study; while Roll was busy cleaning the attic and Mega was helping her out.
While Mega was helping to put the boxes up on the shelf, one of the paper box's bottom come apart, and its content all came down to the floor.
When Mega and Roll were trying to put the things into a new box, Mega spotted something unusual among the scattered items. It's a photo album, the cover itself was aged and discolored, he picked it up and quietly sat on the floor and looked at it.
"Look what I found, it's an album," Mega called as he flipped through the album, it was the pictures of Dr. Light when he was younger, and Roll also leaned for closer look.
One of the pictures caught their eyes, and it was a picture of two young boys around the age of ten, the decorations on the background indicated that the photo was taken in an assembly hall, the two boys were standing and holding a big, gold colored prize cup together. Each of them holding a small handicraft robot on the other side. One of the kid is slightly taller than the other; his hair was stack with a headband on his forehead and a delighting crack smile.
"Who are these two boys? They are kind of cute." Roll commented out loud, "Dr. Light have sons we don't know about?"
"How could it be possible! He never told us about it..." Mega retorts but realized how weak his point was, Roll instantly point out the evidence to support her statement.
"Look at this kid on the left, he looks a bit like Dr. Light, isn't he?"
Mega took a closer look at the picture, and found that she was right, the kid has similarity in facial features with Dr. Light.
"There is only one person can give us the answer," Mega suggested, pulled himself up from the floor.
"Good idea, and let's find out about this one too." Roll got up as well as she took out an old cracker tin, the color of the coating on its side was faded already. There were a few items inside, a battered yellow shirt, a memory chip, a supermarket receipt, and a paper plane with a handwritten word "Blues" on it.
"This stuff is kind of...creepy, in my opinion." Roll said.
"No need second-guessing, let's ask!"
The two headed to Dr. Light's study, only they saw Dr. Light was sitting in front of his desk but looking at the cell phone with one arm supporting his head deep in his thoughts, and he didn't even hear Mega and Roll knocked.
"Dr. Light?"
Dr. Light startled, then quickly turn off the screen of his cell phone he's been looking at, which both Mega and Roll saw.
"What is it? I thought you two are cleaning the attic."
"We are, and we have found something interesting. Just want to ask who these boys in this picture are? We are curious." Mega said as he showed the picture with the photo album to Dr. Light.
Dr. Light couldn't help but let out a gentle smile, "This? It certainly stirs up a lot of fond memories."
"That was me, when I was ten." Dr. Light said slowly, pointing to the boy on the left. "It was taken on the Junior Robot Olympiad, the day we have won our first award on robotics."
"We..?" Mega doubted, but he didn't want to interrupt the elder scientist in the middle of reminiscing, it was rare for Dr. Light talks about his early days, especially about his childhood, Mega was really interested in hearing more from him.
"You have been making robots since you were ten? That's fascinating. Who is that boy next to you?" Roll exclaimed in excitement.
Dr. Light let out a genuine smile as look at the other figure in the picture, he pulsed a little before he made his answer, "He was my lifelong partner, and my best friend, we have known each other for fifty years." He sighed, "Of course, You both know him as well."
"Who was that then? Dr. Umlauf? Mr. Pfister? Who?" Roll was too impatient to wait for the answer, while Mega had already guessed it.
"If my guessing is right, it's 'You-know-who,'" Mega shot Dr. Light a glance, who nodded in response.
"Wily?" Roll gasped in astonishment, "I thought you and him met during the postgraduate courses!"
"That's what I told people when they asked me, but that's not true...I met Albert at grade four, after I got expelled by three public schools and ended up being sent to a therapeutic boarding school for problem kids."
"School for problem kids? I thought you were a model student or something." Dr. Light's avowal amused Mega.
"Nah, I was bad when I was a child. I had emotional problems after my parents divorced, I came to America with my mother, I got separated from my beloved father and my siblings, and forced to leave the country I was born, and I didn't take that very well. So I did bad things to release my emotions."
"Dr. Light have siblings...?" Mega interrupted purely out of amusement.
"Yes, a brother and a sister, I am the youngest one, but we are not that close. I haven't seen them in a decade. Last time I saw them was on the wedding day of my nephew back in Stockholm." Dr. Light explained.
"I met Albert at the boarding school; we didn't get along well when we first met, we almost fought each other every day during the first month. He was competitive, and a strong desire to be number one at everything, at least want to get ahead of me, even for the bunk bed in the dorm. But we both had a great interest in robots, and we went to junior robotics competition together, as a team." Dr. Light continued, stared at the ceiling land stroking his own beard. "We won several prizes in the science fair afterward, and we did a lot of crazy things together, we were the naughtiest boys in the academy. We even planned to run away from that school and travel to Europe in a dinghy by ourselves."
"You two didn't actually do that? Did you?"
"We did, but we didn't make that far." Dr. Light tilted his head and smiled, "Albert and I have been through a lot even after we grown up. We have a complicated history than anyone can imagine. But...I had never thought that he would turn into an insane psychopath."
"Wily didn't turn into a terrorist because of you..." Mega tried to soothe as he saw Dr. Light's expression darkened, so he pulled out the cracker tin Roll found, hoping it could alleviate Dr. Light's sadness, "How about this box? Is that yours as well?"
Mega regretted as soon as his words came out of his mouth, Dr. Light's expression went dark once he saw the tin. He opened it slowly and took the paper plane with the word "Blues" on it, stared at it for a while without saying a word, the time was like frozen inside the room.
"Dr. Light, are you alright?" Mega patted Dr. Light's shoulder a lightly.
"I am fine." Dr. Light answered with a low voice for Mega barely could hear.
"These things inside this box belongs to him." Dr. Light took out his cell phone and show Mega the picture he took during that 'afternoon tea' with the casual clothing Proto. "He was my robot, Albert and I build him together. He was the main reason Albert split up with me as well."
"He is your robot? Why you never mentioned him to us?"
"That was complicated." Dr. Light leaned back in his chair, his eyes still staring at the paper plane on his desk. "He was...dead, at least I thought he was."
"Dead?" Both Mega and Roll exclaimed out loud at the same time.
"How could that be? He is definitely alive in front of every eye! We all witnessed it! He shot those invaders in that ball, sort of; You had tea with him the other day, and I have heckled..." Mega stopped his question bluntly, trying not to mention what he did to Proto the other day. As he attempted to probe deeper in this topic, he was halted by an emergency call came through his arm communicator.
The call was coming from the commissioner of New York police department, one of the few designated people who have Mega Man's personal frequency. "Mega Man, the governor of Pennsylvania just called, some Wily's robots are causing trouble all over the Lancaster county, they are holding hostages inside the biggest bank in the town center, there are not enough officers to deal with them all, we need your help to stop them, please!"
"Damn it! I want to hear more about that guy..." Mega cursed in his mind.
Dr. Light's expression turn into a relieved one for a split second, both Mega and Roll didn't notice since they were focusing on listening to the emergency call while the police chief was giving them the details about the robberies.
Dr. Light turned the television on with the remote; it was reporting about the bank robberies in Lancaster at the moment, the news footage showed Dark Man attacking robot police officers with his electromagnetic net just outside the front door of Lancaster's largest bank. "That's bad, you better go and rescue those citizens before any casualty comes up, Mega."
"Wily must have run out of cash real bad, let alone rob four places at the same time. I better take them down once and for good!" Mega said, then ran out of the room with Rush immediately.
"I am coming with you, wait for me." Roll hurried to go after Mega, leaving Dr. Light sitting alone in the lab.
Once Mega and Roll were gone, Dr. Light lets out a sigh of relief. He hurried to put the cracker tin into his personal safe installed behind his bookshelf and locked it. "That was close; they almost had me."
Mega Man and Roll flew off to Lancaster to stop the robberies, Mega was on Rush jet board mode as usual but Roll was flying in a two-person light hovercraft instead of her skycycle, which was under redevelopment by Roll herself.
"Mega, which one are we going to hit first?"
"Uh...Except the bank they took over in the town center, where else are they?"
"What, you forget already? It's not like you; you used to be enthusiastic when it comes to fighting against Wily?" Roll frowned.
"Sorry sis, I got something on my mind." Mega replied, "This is not normal, this time he only sends out his robots to rob places, but not destroying anything or taking over a facility or trying to brainwash people, this is not like Wily's style, is it?"
"He is taking over a national bank building, is he?" Roll retorted, "Perhaps Wily is out of recourses to even maintain his living anymore, let alone to have his robots to run street crime other than his stupid schemes trying to take over the world, and that suits us, let's take them down!"
"That's not what I meant, sis. My experience tells me things are never that simple, but whatever...where are they?"
"Aren't you listening to the chief when he gave us the details? Magnet Man, Metal Man, Ring Man and Crystal Man just hijacked two tankers full of premium liquidized plasma energy and sighted heading west via Interstate Route 76; the police pursuers are tailing them already."
"I think the police can handle those clowns earlier than us, what next?"
"Bright Man, Guts Man and Cut Man are ripping an off-track wagering office apart on the east of Lancaster County."
"These three need to be taking care of, but I think they couldn't run too far, and?"
"Quick Man was spotted stealing an exclusive bike from a Harley-Davidson motorcycle showroom in Beaver Valley this morning. Then he robbed three liquor stores and a supermarket in the area, he is now racing Turbo Man on the highway, they have already run over three roadblocks, and the police cruisers are still figuring ways to stop them.
Mega furrowed his eyebrows, "Turbo Man? I thought he was working for the Haas Formula One racing team? Why is he hanging out with a Wily bot robbing liquor stores and supermarket? What exactly are they up to? What else?"
"The Nation Bank at downtown Lancaster! Now we only know Dark Man and Elec Man are inside the bank, there should be more of them inside, they are holding a dozen of citizens as hostage, security and bank staff included."
That was quite obvious all other three robberies were just distractions to divert police attention, the primary target of Wily was the National Bank.
"Weird...where is Proto Man?" Mega thought for a second, then considered his brother must be inside that bank, or staying with Wily to watch over the operation from a distance, as he was always trying to make a scene at the showdown.
"Okay, I think we should go to the bank downtown, we need to make sure those citizens are safe first, then we help pursuit for other Wily bots."
Lancaster
Pennsylvania National Bank
Dark Man was duck taping all of the hostage's hands and mouth in the lobby of the bank, then made them laid on the ground with their belly downward.
Top Man was standing high on the teller counter taking precautions of any resistance from the humans, about fifty of his tops were scattered on the floor spinning amongst the wreckage of the fallen robo security guards while Elec Man was monitoring the situation outside in the security room of the bank.
"Bomb Man! Are you going to set the charges all day? You should have blown the vault door into bits and pieces half an hour ago!" Wily's edgy voice barked through the specific encoded channel for all robot master's communicator.
"You think it's easy to set up explosions of a vault door twenty inches thick? This is my masterpiece; you can't rush art! I am going to make this firework look good." Bomb Man answered.
Elec Man looked at the security camera footage through the bank's front entrance, and he saw the building was already surrounded by the police force with a large number of extra reinforcement robot troops. There even several APC were standing by on the street right outside the bank, at least six choppers were hovering above the building, including the news choppers.
"They are sending an army on to us, and we are heavily outnumbered, they seemed determined to take us down without asking Mega Man for help, this time we are really screwed." Elec Man ran out of the security room and announced to his colleagues nervously.
"I thought Dr. Wily said those two newbies Saturn and Jupiter would be here getting us out? Where are they?" Dark Man asked, dropping a duct-taped teller onto the floor of the entrance hall.
"I don't know, I saw them when the heist begins, god knows where they are slacking right now. They are jerks." Top Man commended, "Proto Man will be pissed if he came back, that's for sure."
"Speaking of Proto Man, is he really dead or what? Where did he go?"
"How would I know? I wasn't there when he disappeared!" Top Man spat.
"You are his lieutenant. I thought you should have known something."
"I wish I do, it doesn't matter, if this thing goes bad, we all gonna get busted in a couple of hours and ended up in a scrap yard."
Bang!Bang!Bang!Bang!Bang!Bang!Bang!Bang!Bang!
A string of explosions came from the basement of the bank. It was loud enough for the ground level to hear, the whole building was shaking due to the quake created by the explosion.
"Go down there and grab the money, all of you!" Wily ordered through the channel.
"What about the hostages? Don't we need someone to keep watch on them?" Dark Man asked.
"Just leave them there! You fool! Saturn! Where the hell are you?"
"I was just dealing with some resistance upstairs; I am coming over now!" Saturn replied, as he and Jupiter were inside the chief executive's office on the top storey of the building, where the CEO of the bank had been tired up and gagged on his armchair.
"This is the thing the master wanted," Saturn said, walked over to a glass dome covering an exquisite artifact, it's made out of glass, or crystal, looked just like a mechanic part of something. It was semitransparent but there would drift in different color while the spotlight shines upon it.
"I will take this, thank you," Saturn said, opening his blackhole and placed the artifact into it. "Master Ivan will be thrilled about this!"
Jupiter was looking out of the window to keep watch on the movement of the authority outside, and keep looking out for their main target Mega Man of course.
"Just in time, there that blue boy comes!" Jupiter pointed as he saw two figures coming from the east side on the air.
"Let's do this." Saturn fist bumped with Jupiter before he opened his 'black hole' and stepped into it.
Outside the bank
As Mega Man and Roll flying into the area of Lancaster County, they can already hear the sound of sirens coming from the town center. When they were above the bank, all they could see was nearly over three hundred of robot soldiers surrounded the bank building; it was full of police vehicles, officers, and robot troops.
"They are taking this seriously! Do they really have to have such large amount robot officers in a town of the size like this? Even with the Noose team?" Roll pointed to the troops down on the street.
Mega noticed the robot troops on the ground were not wearing the police badge on their armor, the sign on the APCs were not army or noose as well.
Just as Mega attempted to land on the bank's roof, a string of electric spark like lightning slashed right on top of him. Mega barely blended himself to dodge, he looked upwards, and saw a green bot with a jet engine on his back hovering about him.
Mega Man could recognize the bot at once, "Jupiter, you really are one of the Wily bots!"
"Does it matter to you? Are you scared because your worst nightmares have joined your sworn enemy? " Jupiter taunted.
Agitated, Mega shoot a level five blast towards his opponent without thinking, Jupiter jumped to the side to dodge, the shot blasted a hole on one of the satellite dishes installed on the roof.
"Wow, look who is doing destruction now? Now, this is your own fault; I have nothing to do with that!" Jupiter teased, "Doing damage but shift the responsibility to the bad guys, even for the thing they didn't do, that's the way to do things for you 'good guy' kind, you are a hypocrite!"
"You are not to judge me!" Mega yelled, he fired another level 5 shot towards Jupiter, who dodged it easily by hovered away, this time the shot hit a transmission tower on another building, the tower started to melt like a crayon and split into two half.
"Mega, calm down!" Roll called, noticing her brother wasn't in his usual self.
"Look at that, the so-called hero!" Jupiter probed, "You are such a weakling, just like your dead brother!"
"What are you talking about?"
"Oh, isn't anybody break the news to you yet? Proto Man is dead!"
"Dead? How come?"
"He has been vaporized by me!" Jupiter bragged. "I took over as the second-in commander of Skull Fortress right now!"
Mega froze, he could instantly feel a chill ran down his circuits, he recalled the memories of how bad it was during his previous encounter with Jupiter in that ball, he didn't want to believe him but there still have a possibility. The anonymous anger was dwelling up inside him. He instantly fired a string of rapid shots towards Jupiter, who dodged them agilely and smoothly.
"Wow, somebody got his sister's underwear on by mistake!" Jupiter taunted, fired back with his electric shock, which was missed as well.
Mega's inner rage boiled even hotter; he fired on maximum power of level 10 shot towards Jupiter.
The shot gazed Jupiter's jet engine on the left side, ruined one of his stabilizing exhaust, causing him to spin around in the air, until he managed to balance the exhaust rate and keep himself in the air.
Jupiter attempted to fire his electric shock towards Mega Man again. Roll grabbed the chance shoot her saw blade from her utility arm. The edge sliced in another Jupiter's jet engine, making him unable to hover in the air anymore, he began to lose altitude, like a fly that loses one of its wings.
Jupiter knew that he had no chance to win with the half-ruined jet engine, he began to make his way to escape. Mega had Rush to fly close to him, and leaped onto his back once they were close enough.
"What have you done to my brother?" Mega strangled one arm on Jupiter's neck.
"You are crazy! Let go or we will hit the ground together!" Jupiter was struggling to get Mega off him and trying to stop himself from descending too fast, but with a damaged jet engine plus Mega Man's weight, he was already out of control in the air, and the two began to crash to the ground like a meteorite.
"Mega! No!" Roll watched them in horror as they crashed onto the pavement right in front of the bank with a loud bang. She hurried to land her aircraft to aid her brother.
The crash kicked up a lot of dust and created a huge sunken area on the pavement. Jupiter's jet engine took severe damage when hitting the ground, some spark and smoke was coming out from it.
Jupiter himself could barely move, he crawled on the ground trying to get away from Mega Man, but Mega had no intention to let him leave just like that.
He grappled Jupiter's angles and swung him hard onto a wall, he then grabbed on Jupiter's neck and pinned him on the ground, he got on top of him and started pummeling Jupiter's face.
"What had happened to Proto Man?" Mega heckled, his both grip tightened as he pinched Jupiter's neck fiercely.
"I don't know..." Jupiter grasped, as Mega clenched his neck even harder, his brain circuits began to short out due to obstruction of energy flow, and started to drift in and out of consciousness. "I haven't...even meet him...he wasn't...there...when I...got...to...Skull...For...tress."
"Stop! Mega! Stop!" Roll had never seen her brother to behave in such horrible way as this, she ran over and tried to pull Mega away from Jupiter, which Mega completely ignored her.
"You are lying! Where is he now? And I will put you out of your misery!" Mega roared, he drew his blaster and powered it up, pressing it against Jupiter's face.
"I said I don't know...ask Guts Man and Cut Man; he was there when Proto Man..." Jupiter grovelled.
Jupiter reached out for the EMP bomb that Dr. Wily gave him, he pressed a small red button on the top, and then the golden shaped spheroid began to glow. "Take this! You stupid shit!"
The EMP bomb started to glow in a dazzling bright light that even robot's visual circuit couldn't afford. All of the personnel on the scene have to turn away or shield to avoid being blinded by it.
Mega managed to push Roll out of the way before the EMP bomb exploded, but he was too close to the bomb himself to get out of harm's way, and then everything went blank as his conscious sink into nothingness.
It took only a second for the EMP to proliferate, all of the robots in the area went offline and fell on the ground at the instant, including Mega Man himself. The power transformer on a nearby wire pole sparkled and exploded, and all of the electronic appliances in the area had been shut down.
But amazingly the News helicopters weren't affected, as they were far enough to evade the E-bomb's effect on the air.
"Yes! Yes! What a beautiful sight!" Dr. Wily hailed as he watched the EMP went off through the transmitting footage from the Batonton he sent off to Lancaster, while he holed up in Skull Fortress munching peanuts in front of the screen. "Mega Man is history! Soon the world will be mine!" Then he switched the channel to watch Guts Man, Cut Man and Magnet Man raiding the wagering office.
Meanwhile...
Bomb Man, Dark Man, Elec Man, Top Man reappeared in a discrete location of Lancaster County Central Park. They have successfully transported the bank's money by Saturn's blackhole without even have to fire one single shot (All except the robot guards inside the bank) or deal with the police outside nor with Mega Man.
"This is the most successful mission I have ever participated in!" Bomb Man said.
"Don't get overjoyed ourselves just now! We aren't safe yet! Where is the transport?" Top Man asked.
"I have told Snake Man to get us one...but looks like he screwed us up," Saturn replied lightly, as if he doesn't know anything about Snake Man. and he received a distress signal from his arm communicator.
"Oh no, my boy is in trouble, I gotta help him, you guys take care of yourself!" Saturn said, then quickly get back into his black hole.
"Wait! You can't just leave us here!" Elec Man called after him, but Saturn was already gone.
"What should we do now?" Bomb Man asked.
"Let's get a car and get out of here!"
Just as this moment, they have heard some beeping sound came from the bag of money they took from the bank. Dark Man opened a bag to see what was in there.
Pop!
A small explosion occurred inside the bags of money they were carrying, soon the bots found themselves surrounded by some red colored smoke, and more was coming out from the bags, the smoke dyed all their armor into the color of bright red.
"The dye packs! They just went off!"
Downtown Lancaster
Mega began to regain conscious a few minutes after the explosion, first he felt dizzy, like he has been thrown into a washing machine, and the warning messages rang inside his head like a buzzer.
"What happened...?" He checked himself, and confirmed that he hadn't taken any severe physical damage, just a little scratches on the armor, he had been blown off ten meters away from his original position though. His limbs weren't responding to his will very well, and the world was swirling in his eyes.
He felt weak, and he still couldn't figure out what exactly had happened just a few minutes ago. Then he recalled what had happened before the explosion, and then he thought of...
Roll!
Mega looked around searching for Roll, he saw all of the robot officers and robot troops were laying on the ground not moving, and he found Roll was laid unconsciously by an APC that was twenty feet away, Rush was also laying there unconsciously next to her.
He still not managed to stand, he crawled to Roll side and held her up in his arms, "Roll, wake up!" He shook her lightly.
Mega could feel his strength was restored, at a slow rate but recovering. He reached Rush and took an energy can out of his storage compartment, and poured the energy can into Roll's mouth, he then put Roll down on the floor and opened the control panel on her back, trying to reboot her.
Luckily Roll hadn't suffered serious damage as well; she woke up shortly after the reboot procedure has completed. Amazingly the robot officers and the troops nearby were beginning to boot themselves up and started functioning again.
"What's going on?" She yawned like she had been taken a long nap.
"I don't know, something exploded and shut us all down. That thing looked like a golden sphere or something. It really gives me a chill down the spine." Mega shivered as he thought of what had just happened, and then he remembered what he was doing before the explosion.
"Where did that jerk Jupiter go?" Mega looked around, but Jupiter was nowhere to be found in the area. The police were already ramming the bank's front entrance and broke into the bank with the aid of the APC.
The hostages were found all safe and sound inside a backroom, only a bit frightened. Mega and Roll rushed to the basement of the bank, where the vault door had been blown off perfectly like the locking mechanism has been removed. Of course, most of the banknotes stored in there was gone, and the safe deposit boxes had been looted as well. But no Wily's bot was found inside the vault, and there wasn't any hole or tunnel for them to escape.
"Damn it; they got away!" Roll said indignantly. "How did they do it? Like they have vanished into thin air!"
"It must be Saturn. He has the ability to generate a black hole and get away in it, the coward!" Mega said in anger, what Jupiter told him about Proto Man's death was still caught in his mind, and he was determined to get some answers. "Let's go get some other Wily's bot while we still can."
East of Lancaster
Guts Man, Cut Man and Bright Man finished their raid in the Off-track wagering office, scared all employees and visitors away and took all the money in the store. It wasn't a racing day, and soon the three found themselves bored, and shifted their interest to the shopping mall right next to the betting office.
Most of the local authority enforcement were sent to deal with the bank heist in the center of the town; there were only several security bots at the premises, Guts Man smashed them easily by pinning them under a car.
The three struts into the shopping mall freely, the people inside weren't much fear for the notorious bot's presence, just thinking that was an activity arranged by the mall, or a parade to attract more visitors.
Guts Man walked into a clothes store, he saw a XXXXXXXXL size Hawaii shirt and put it on and walked out without paying. A female robot sales assistant came in his way and said, "You haven't paid yet. This item cost twenty-five dollars, sir."
"Huh? I thought this is a free gift!" Guts Man bellowed, he walked over to the cashier counter and grabbed handful of one-dollar bills from his bag over to the female human cashier, who was frightened and shivering under the counter, and was too scared to take the money from Guts Man's hand.
"Weirdo." Guts Man turned to the female robot sales assistant, "Hey, You! Come with me!" Guts Man than grabbed the female bot and swung her over his shoulder, and walked out of the store.
Cut Man was just having fun making paper cutting dolls from the books in a store, and the kids were surrounding him watching him to cut animal shapes out of paper.
Guts Man stomped into the store and called, "Look, we got us a hostage. Let's go and get Bright Man, and we are out of here." He then swaggered out of the mall with Cut Man and the robot sales woman struggling on his shoulder, "Put me down you lousy shit!"
"Wow, she's a wild one. Let's hogtie her first." Cut Man jeered
"Stop this!" Mega called, running to the scene with his blaster drawn. Roll wasn't there since her vehicle had been damaged by the E-bomb's effect.
Both Guts Man and Cut Man blinked, "Mega Man? Dr. Wily said that you have been eliminated already!"
"Not before I take all of you down! Now surrender!" Mega shouted.
On the other hand, Dr. Wily spurt out his drink at the monitor before him, as he saw Mega Man still functioning on the live image.
"What? Mega Man is still alive? Impossible!" Wily sprung up from his chair in astonishment, "The EMP should have taken him out for good! What the hell was that Saturn and Jupiter doing? I shouldn't trust them in the first place!"
Wily turned to the communication station and switch the frequency to Snake Man's channel, "Snake Man! What the hell are you doing?"
The channel was dead, only the sound of jamming noise could be heard.
Wily switched to Saturn's channel, there was still no respond, it was the same with Jupiter's.
"Damn! I should have trigger that thing myself!" Wily throw the communicator on to the table, then roll his chair to the console. He retrieved the data collect by the Batontons, and discovered the electromagnetic radiation detected during the explosion occurred was much lesser than he expected, to the level that would only cause minor damage, such as shutting down the electronic appliances such as mobile phones and robots temporary or causing a disturbance on wireless communication.
Wily slam both his fists on to the keyboard, "Someone must have sabotaged my device!" He then took glance at the blueprints on the desk; those designs were sketched from the projectile thing when he dissembled it, based on the E-bomb as the reference.
"This is only a test, I still have it, and I will make a better one!" Wily turned back to the communicator and shout into the receiver, "Retreat! All of you! Come back to Skull Fortress at once!"
Mega fought Guts Man in the carpark so he could reduce the chance of endangering humans or making any more damages on properties.
Guts Man dropped the hogtied robot female shop assistant to the ground, he ripped off a lamppost and started to swing it towards Mega like a golf club.
"Usually this is about time he shows up...where is he now?" Mega wondered, as he was busy dodging Guts Man's attack and Cut Man's rollerblade. But he wasn't exactly in the mood to fight them, just edgy to wait for someone to make his appearance.
And finally, he couldn't hole it up anymore. "Hey, Guts Man, where is Wily and Proto Man?"
"Dr. Wily is back in Skull Fortress." Guts Man replied.
"Guts Man, you are not supposed to tell him!" Cut Man jabbed.
"Oh, sorry."
"Where is Proto Man then?"
"I ain't telling you!"
Guts Man and Cut Man's attitude was drying Mega Man patience, he shot a level six blast on to Guts Man's chest, knocked him down and fell into a dumpster right behind him.
"Where is Proto Man? Tell me! Now!"
Seeing Mega Man was pissed, Cut Man backed off raising his hands up. "I don't know, he has been missing since that exchange happened two weeks ago."
"Hey! You shouldn't say that out." Bellowed Guts Man, his body was still stuck upside down in the dumpster.
"What exchange?" Mega heckled.
Just at this moment, Bright Man joined in the battle and light up his 100000w bulb, Mega had to shield his eyes by his arms and hide behind a car to avoid getting blinded.
Turbo Man in his racing car form knocked Mega Man from behind in a high speed. Mega has been knocked ten feet away and smashed into the mall through the turnstile, and came to stop after crashed on a flower stack.
Quick Man drove over to Cut Man on his stolen bike, where Magnet Man, Metal Man, Ring Man and Crystal Man also arrived to the scene with their hijacked tankers.
"Hey dude, need a ride?" Ring Man offered. "The bank team has successfully made it to the Skullker, our job's done, now let's roll!"
"Of course! Hey, take this one! She already called shotgun!" Guts Man thrown the robot sales assistant into the driving cabin.
Cut Man got in another tanker which Metal Man was driving, and Bright Man was riding on Turbo Man's racing car form.
Mega Man bushed away the flowers pedals that stick on his armor, he ran back to the carpark and attempted to pursuit. Bright Man instantly lighted up the 100000w light bulb on his head, which blinded Mega again, then speed away with Turbo Man and Quick Man.
When Mega's optical circuit was recovered, the Wily's bots were already gone.
Roll arrived on her aircraft and met Mega at the mall's car park, and saw Mega Man punched a nearby lamppost in frustration.
"Sorry I am late, what's happening?" Roll asked with concern, seeing her brother in a fragile emotional state.
"They said he's gone!"
"What? Who?"
"Proto Man! They said he has been missing for two weeks!"
"Huh?" Roll blinked in disbelieve.
"Something must have happened in Skull Fortress! I need to do something about it." Mega sulked. Roll didn't know what else she could say, just followed her brother aboard the aircraft and flew home.
To be continued...
Author's note: It's been too long since the last update, this chapter is way longer than I originally planned, much longer than the last one.
