Kalinka was asleep. Pharaoh Man had sealed the door by running the outer edge of a small, contained Pharaoh Shot around the frame like a welding arc. It wouldn't stop anyone from breaking in, but it would slow them down and give the group plenty of warning if they did. "Skull Man. When we're ready to leave, blow the door. Carefully, if you could. We want to avoid a ruckus out there, or debris in here."
"Sure, whatever. You know me. Careful as all get-out."
"You're good at controlling force. It's your best asset," Pharaoh said, and the compliment hung in the air for a moment, its recipient without a response. "Well, it is."
"You suckin' up to me or something?" Skull said from his lurking grounds in the corner.
"Part of my job is taking stock of resources in my expedition party, including skills and expertise. I've been measuring our unique combat abilities since we began running exercises together. I'm not just along for the ride you know." Ring Man gave him a wink from the other side of the storage space as they caught each other's eye. Pharaoh leaned on the wall beside Skull Man. "You have genuine, unique assets to offer. You don't need to sell yourself short."
"Who says I am?" Skull demanded.
Pharaoh was concerned that such a touchy subject might cause trouble, but he thought he should bring it up while things were quiet and no one was risking themselves under fire. "Skull Man. Are you really worried that my assignment as a combat unit threatens you with obsolescence?"
Skull froze, then looked away. "We don't have to talk about this right now. In front of everybody…" The other robots, who were paying attention to the quiet conversation, scattered their eyes around the room as their unavoidable eavesdropping was called out.
"What does that matter? We're all on the same team."
"I'll believe that when this virus stuff is all over," he said as he snapped his head around to glare accusingly.
"You know what I mean."
Ring Man chimed in. "I'm not worried, mate. Why should you be?"
"Look, our expiration dates are all comin' up around the new year. Who do you think's getting recertified?" Dr. Cossack had gradually consolidated all his numbers' recert deadlines to a period of a few months in winter. Robot expiry dates could be moved by recertifying units sooner than necessary, but not later, so a deadline was a deadline. The only two not scheduled for that period were Tundra Man, the newest who had not yet been due for one at all, and Pharaoh Man, who actually required more frequent recertification due to being both a combat unit and a health and safety unit.
"All of us will pass recertification, I would assume," Pharaoh replied.
Ring nodded. "I reckon."
Dive Man spoke from his place towering over the crowd in back. "Each of us is strong, useful robot in his own right. No malfunction. Only sterling service."
"Yeah, okay, that's great for you, fish tank. You're still out there dunking your head. You're an earner. But what am I doing? I'll tell you what - training my friggin' replacement!" he shouted, pointing a finger right under Pharaoh's chin. Pharaoh knocked it away, and vehemently shushed him, pointing to their still sleeping mistress. Skull took the hint, under protest, and went on quietly. "Only one other guy in the world keeps more robots up and running than the doc, and he's some kind of looney savant who does nothing but robots."
"Dr. Light really doesn't deserve such a pejorative des-"
"And," Skull pressed on, "the doc just added a fancy new lad to the club." He pointed at Tundra Man, who placed a demure hand on his chest and receded as much as he could in the cramped walk-in. "And he's an earner too. I already never get any work, and now Tut's doin' double duty with his job and mine." He scowled at the floor, the compound surface of his hands creaking with the tightness of his fists. "I'm the least useful thing in this room. We all know it. As far as the Third Law is concerned, I'm screwing up. I'll be lucky if I wind up in storage…"
Everyone let the idea air out for a moment. It was a reasonable concern. In the modern scheme of the Third Law, robots weren't expected to merely protect their own physical integrity - passing certification and remaining effective enough to warrant continued service was just as important. A robot must protect its own existence. Like the First and Second, it was core, inalienable, and unignorable, to every functional robot. To most robots in current service, it was simply another factor in everyday cognition. But it was only natural that it would be an even more preoccupying concern to a robot in Skull's position.
"Well, that's hardly my fault!" Tundra Man called from the back. Several sets of eyes turned and narrowed at him. "... What? It's not."
"Relax, bud," Drill said.
"Come on, bones. It's like the king said, you're a ripper of a battle-bot." Ring came over to join them, standing rather proud as he laid a hand on Skull's shoulder. "Who'd ever toss you out?"
"Skull Man, if I may…" Pharaoh laced his fingers and made a show of thinking carefully about his words.
"Aw, what?" Skull spat dejectedly.
He let it spill. "You're abrasive and standoffish, and needlessly difficult in all things. You earn essentially nothing for the Cossack company while being a constant drain on resources, partly due to your operating parameters encompassing the destruction of resources. You serve a single, mostly unsatisfied purpose. And I can only imagine the liability represented by your wearing the face of death to greet your prospective lessees. You're a walking reminder of terrible things. You're not even the doctor's own design, for what that's worth. You're absolutely correct in your assessment that you are by far the least justifiable unit among the Cossack numbers."
Everyone was quiet again. Skull and Pharaoh stared each other down, while Ring frowned as loudly as possible. "Good to have you in my corner, you grave-robbing sandworm. You gonna kiss my cheek and call me darling?"
"Mates. Let's skip the pep talk and get on with the planning," Ring said, trying to cut into the knot, but Pharaoh held up a finger to him, and then to Skull, holding his ground.
"However, that being the case… here you are. Everything I just said has been largely true and unchanged for years. You have always been more or less what you are now. Dr. Cossack took it upon himself to rebuild you when you were disabled by Mega Man. He chose to modify your design and persona only minimally when he did. And he's kept you perfectly maintained and licensed all this time, despite the added difficulties our restricted status as R-code units presents." The DCN-XXXR models were officially considered an extraordinary hazard, due to having been rebuilt using experimental weapon technology. Very few robot masters had a universal serial number of the format XXXR, but being filled with barely-modified Wily-tech certainly warranted the extra restrictions and government oversight. It would still be years before they could be recertified with standard serial codes, and even then, only if they continued to perform without incident.
Mega Man had barely escaped such restrictions as his tool-copy system was only questionably a weapon and no one wanted to grill the boy or the doctor behind their hero. Such was the privilege afforded by the love of humans, and an ideal example of why robotic charisma and human affection continued to be a non-zero factor in the thoughts of even the coldest of robot masters.
Skull stood there squinting and mulling. "... So what?"
"So, the doctor clearly needs no logical justification for you."
"Bunk. That guy doesn't put on pants without measuring his legs."
Pharaoh rolled his eyes very condescendingly, but got nothing else, so he went on. "Dr. Cossack has more of a soul than you think. He may be pragmatic, but he's still human, and the affection of humans will always be a factor in our existence. And then there's Kalinka," he said, gesturing to the body laid awkwardly out in the middle of them all. "Her outlook is something else entirely." Skull only continued quietly pouting. "You're not quite as familiar with the human element as I am. You'll just have to take my word for it."
"I'm taking your word for a lot of things today."
Pharaoh quickly decided that thread wasn't worth following for the umpteenth time. "All right. Never mind that for now. We need to start planning. Everyone, listen."
As Kalinka slept and the robots conspired around her, across the Pacific her father was resting as well, and he woke up sooner than she did. After less than four hours of rest, and after waking several times already to the blinking and bleeping of the tablet computer he insisted on keeping near the bed, he decided he was refreshed enough to at least check his messages.
Fourteen emails, including the one that woke him this time. The world was in crisis, so perhaps that was to be expected, he told himself as he focused his weary frustration into a short, efficient groan. Then he noticed the sender; all of them, LightLabs.
Cossack swung his feet down to the floor and hunched over the screen, expanding his messages and scrolling through the truncated previews the UI offered him. He started from the oldest, and they became more dire as they went on.
Dr. Cossack, this is Roll. Dr. Light has asked me to contact you and inform you that we've lo…
Dr. Cossack, hello, it's Roll again, please respond soon, we need to know if you've seen Roc…
Mikhail, it's Tom. Has Rock contacted you or any of your boys? We haven't heard a word fr…
He scrolled up to the top.
If anyone at Cossack Roboto-Tekhnika, human or otherwise, receives this message, please…
Mikhail, if you're sleeping, for heaven's sake, wake up.
RING RING
Anyone at CRT who sees this, please contact LightLabs immediately, this is an emergency s…
Dr. Cossack took a deep breath, jumped to his feet, and put in the call.
"This is stupid," Bass grumbled.
"It's not stupid. It's an old programmer's trick." Dr. Wily glanced between his glowing monitor and the tiny, muddy-yellow rubber duck. "Now, these sectors here are all written by the virus itself to serve as banks of variables based on the master command language. On the first thirty lines are path definitions, copied from the robot master's individual language interface to delineate the command level of-"
"You're talking to a duck. It's stupid."
"That's the point, you lunk. You explain your code to a rubber duck, and in breaking it down to duck-level, you weed out the overlooked issues in the program."
"But why do I have to hold the duck?!"
"Oh, what else are you going to do today?" Wily said, scratching his chin at the alphanumeric scroll he was busy weeding. At the telltale PWEAK! of a rubber duck being pitched to the floor, he spun in his chair, ready to admonish. "Don't you dare wreck that duck! I've had him for forty-three years!"
"Get ducked, old man."
Dr. Wily growled and picked it up, dusting it off rather lovingly before placing it next to the monitor. "Well, Dr. Drakely, the next phase is progressing, but I have to admit... my optimism hasn't kept it from being complicated." He looked between the bird and the screen a few times, and shrugged emphatically. "Roboenza 2 isn't just unlike anything I've ever unleashed; it's unlike anything I've ever managed. My usual schtick? Reprogramming a robot, blocking its Three Laws safeguards, sending it berserk? Sidewalk chalk, compared to this."
He tented his fingers before his own wicked glower. Then he reached up, and squeezed his partner in crime. Feepf!
"Yes, yes, my virus is a subtle, insidious entity. Thus, it requires careful tailoring. However, it's only a matter of time before I make it adaptable enough to navigate and control any robot's individual computing environment. These hit-and-miss effects we're seeing now won't compare at all. Yes… only a matter of time…"
Feepf!
"Thomas, calm down."
"Calm down?" came the jittery reply through the video call. "Rock is completely AWOL and Roll is catatonic!" He paused to press his fingers into his temple, his breath becoming short. As the situation worsened, the already disheveled and weary Dr. Light was less and less steady. Cossack was beginning to worry for his health. If the REM crisis wasn't resolved soon, Light could literally worry himself sick. Unfortunately, he was also astute in claiming there was no time to relax.
"Catatonic? What about the quarantine loop?" Light's patch, however rushed a solution, was the first and only ray of hope thus far. If it was failing, then they had little else.
Light shook his head. "No. She's been running through that loop more and more slowly over the last few hours. Roll… is hardly responsive anymore." He looked off-camera, and then the video feed walked along with him through the lab he was in, and Roll came into view, seated on a maintenance table. "Roll. Can you still hear me?"
Cossack watched with a growing unease as Roll's eyes lit up, then sank, then lit up, and sank again - like someone perking up from drowsy daydreaming, over and over again. She started to speak, but stammered, her voice taking on an uncharacteristically electronic tone as she struggled to form a natural sentence. "I," she managed. Light paused in a moment of hopeful anticipation. "I should. I think. I should. Go. It's. Okay."
"No. Stay right here."
"I should go see. Talk to. Dr. Wily. It's okay."
There was a heavy, thumping rattle as Light dropped his tablet on the table next to her. In the corner of the video feed, now pointed at the ceiling, Cossack was fairly sure he was watching Light embrace his little girl-bot like a scared father. Cossack lowered his computer to the table, rubbing his forehead nervously as he contemplated how things had fallen apart since he'd lay down just a few short hours ago. The patch was virtually worthless. Rock was gone, likely to Dr. Wily's clutches, and Roll was trying to follow. And at the top of it all was Dr. Light, buckling without anything to hold him up.
"... Do you have their backups?" No response, only murmured comforts from Light to Roll. Cossack raised his voice. "Thomas. Listen."
"What?"
"We need you. And you need Roll. Wipe her, start restoring from backup-"
"Mikhail!" Light cried indignantly.
"Restore her backup, and get busy with a solution in the meantime. Let's try modifying the loop. Let me help you." He opened another communication line, a local one within the citadel grounds. "Boys, I'm going to LightLabs. Testing will resume later. Pharaoh Man, get me a status report for the citadel and all units before I leave." He pulled the video call back into full view, and saw Dr. Light sinking, and doing nothing. "Tom? I know it's troubling for you, but..." A thought occurred. "How long, since Roll was backed up?"
"Two years. A little more, maybe," Light said haltingly, perhaps guiltily.
"What?! Thomas-!"
"You don't understand!" Light shouted in a distinctly accusatory tone. They both knew the differences they had on this subject. Cossack would have argued that he did understand; he just didn't empathize. Light covered his eyes with his hand, pushing down his distress until he could speak properly. "Roll is always learning. Always showing new talent, finding new ways to surprise me. She's always growing. How am I supposed to know where to cut that off? Where do I make that mark saying 'this is Roll now,' when she's always-"
"That's not the point! And Rock?" Cossack asked, cutting right through it. "How long for him? The same?"
"Something like that."
Dr. Cossack had a great deal of respect for Light's work - for his genius, his dedication, his vision, and his services to humanity. But there were times when Light would say or do something so unprofessional, so backward, it was staggering. Thomas Light and Mikhail Cossack were friends; for all the heartening good that presented, it came with the caveat that Cossack was privy to behaviours that disturbed or frustrated him. "Thomas. I don't know what to say to you. Valuing all these little milestones too much is a terrible reason for not protecting them."
"I don't need you to tell me that," Light said, his voice quavering with emotion. "But I always want to... wait a little longer. Let them reach a plateau, before I lock it all down. But, bless them both, they never do. They just keep climbing." He leaned over the tablet, the ceiling lights casting his haggard face in shadow. "I don't have an excuse. Forget it. If we get through this, I'll back them both up right away. I'll save everything."
"Famous last words for many a programmer in crisis, I'm sure."
Light squeezed his eyes shut. Then he breathed in, and out, and said, "I need your help."
Cossack nodded, already planning. "Right. Let me just settle things here. Pharaoh Man," he said, turning his attention to the domestic broadcast again. "Respond, please. I need a report before I leave. And let Kalinka know where I'm going." He waited, each second longer than the last, and became very anxious as they passed unfulfilled. "Pharaoh Man. I order you to respond now." Nothing. "All robot master units - if you copy, you are ordered to respond." Nothing.
"Mikhail?"
"No. No. Absolutely not. No!" Dr. Cossack put down the tablet and fled the room, looking for any sign of his robots. He would find less than nothing in that regard, for he was completely alone in the citadel complex now. In short order, his pragmatism would turn to panic.
"I'm looking forward to my part," Skull said, his good cheer restored somewhat.
"I thought you would," Pharaoh said. "If you do find a robot master to apprehend, however, keep in mind that doing so stealthily would be best."
"You sayin' I can't be subtle?"
"No. Just that your go-to strategy is… otherwise."
"And how."
Toad Man, sitting completely still behind Kalinka, spoke up quietly. "So I guess us non-battle-bots will just stay out of the way. We can't lead the charge, and we can't look for a computer any better than you can."
"Can't do any apprehending either," said Drill. "Especially not the handless among us."
Pharaoh shrugged, now standing in roughly the middle of the crowd where he'd been addressing them all. "We have a tremendous expedition ahead of us. Anything could happen, and anything could be useful. Bright Man has already demonstrated his worth, but I consider all of you valuable assets in this endeavour."
"I am fishing robot," Dive said. "But thank you for vote of confidence."
"You're also large and sturdy, and your torpedo nets could be used as a deterrent. I won't lie to you; this may very well take everything we have. However, Toad Man is right. Leave the fighting to us if at all possible."
Skull pounded a fist into his palm, his eyes narrowed aggressively. "We oughta take the fight to 'em all anyway. A bunch of brainwashed service-bots? We could smoke anyone who got in our way."
"Some of those infected robot masters could be military, or there adjacent," Pharaoh reminded him. "We can't expect it to be that easy. And that aside, this is Dr. Wily's fortress. Which means Sniper Joe units, automatic defenses…"
"Smoke 'em."
"... and Bass."
No one said anything to that, although Toad Man began looking fretful again, while Tundra Man just went on looking elegantly clueless. Cossack's battle-bots had all been given LightLabs' intel on Bass, along with other threats CRT's partner company had encountered. A battle-bot of the highest calibre (with similar claims to be made about his buster). His combat routines were ruthlessly effective, his schematics based on the peak form of Mega Man, whose strength and ingenuity made him Bass' only known rival in fighting prowess. Rarely deployed, few things were known about Bass, but aside from being potent and vicious, Dr. Light had concluded that he had no Three Laws safeguards, his actions limited only by a hard-coded obedience to Dr. Wily that barely contained him. That meant that any encounter with him ran outside the normal parameters of robot-to-robot combat. In particular, if he appeared while they were escorting Kalinka, the situation could easily turn disastrous.
Skull Man paused, then shrugged. "Three on one."
"You can't be serious."
"I think we got a shot."
Pharaoh shook his head. "I don't know if you're joking, but no. No we don't. And even if we did, it's not a safe wager with Kalinka in tow. We all know what Bass is capable of. He's an engine of pure destruction and spite, as likely to vaporize us on sight as he is to say hello. There is no telling the depths of his desire for the ruin of all things, nor the dreadful efficacy of his design as a war machine."
Pop! Pop! Pop!
"Hah! Ninety-nine! Eat shit, balloons! 'Keinen platz für sieger', my ass!"
"Yeah, I get it," Skull said. "I'm not really eager to throw down with Wily's top psycho."
"Look, easy on, king. A handful of Joes and turrets shouldn't be a problem for us," Ring cut in. "That's the kind of thing we've been running sims on. We just might have to make a bold move or two out there, so let's not get shy about it."
Pharaoh nodded. "Of course," he answered, but he held out hope for a mostly quiet excursion until they found a way out. His gaze drifted back to Kalinka again, a cloud of complicated thoughts on his mind, all speaking over each other. Too many directives, too many voices demanding his attention. Their objectives were clear, but something was nagging him, off-beat to his core directives. He restated the obvious, "Kalinka is our top priority."
"Of course," echoed several other robots.
"Right, yes. Of course." He listened to the jarring back-and-forth in his own mind for a moment more. "Rock is… unaccounted for. We may or may not be on the same side."
"What, is your battery wet? He's infected!" Skull hissed, managing to contain himself and avoid shouting next to the mistress. "That's how this started - remember?!"
"I remember. Yes. But consider that Rock gave us the coordinates of this place. Every other robot master coming here is presumably infected and obedient to Wily. Rock gave us the location without infecting any of us first."
"Or, he infected you and you're lying about it."
"Yes. Fine. Or that. But returning to the facts," he continued crossly, "Rock wasn't acting entirely in Wily's favour. He delivered those coordinates on the CRT lab line and thus left them on the record for Kalinka and hopefully Dr. Cossack to find. We may have an ally in him. And he may be expecting to find allies in us. If Mega Man is here fighting for the greater good after all, somehow… perhaps we could find a way to help him."
"Oh, screw you!" Skull Man shoved himself off the wall, and shocked the room by winding up and delivering a sugar-free, full-fat backhand upside Pharaoh's head. "You're not takin' a detour to play Action Movie Hero Boy with your freakin' idol!"
"Bones, cool it!"
Pharaoh tried to back away, but stumbled over Bright Man's feet in the cramped room and nearly went down. "Skull Man, I'm only suggesting that if we have the opportunity to-"
"Man, you just want to be everything, don't you? You wanna be the desert safety patrol. You wanna be one of us," Skull said, gesturing to himself and Ring Man. "You wanna be a superhero, and the doc's top project, and the miss's best bud… dy." Skull looked, and the others followed, to see their mistress waking and rising uncomfortably off of a gently fretting Toad Man. "Oops."
"Good one, mate," Ring muttered.
"He is merely trying to protect an existence he feels is threatened," Pharaoh said, looking directly at Skull, who resumed his rage without a second's pause.
"Don't you psychoanalyze me, you overachieving mummy-hustler!"
"And expressing his aggression subroutines as per normal operation."
"I said shut yer kebab-hole, wrappy!"
Kalinka took a shaky breath and stretched her neck and shoulders. "So I take it from all the shouting that everything coming back to me right now wasn't just an awful dream."
Pharaoh left the unpleasantness behind and came to her aid, helping her off the crate. "I'm sorry, Kalinka. I may have provoked him somewhat. How are you feeling?"
"Stiff, and scared. But I could be worse," she informed him as she dusted off her clothes. "Let's hear the plan."
He nodded. "I suppose that will have to do. The plan is thus: We will blow the door and set up defensively in the next room while we scan for threats beyond and decide on our course from there. We will apprehend the first robot master we encounter who does not pose a threat, and directly interrogate them for information on the layout of this fortress - specifically, the nearest and least guarded exits. We can't directly download any information for security reasons, but we can improvise a strategy based on what we gather verbally. Once we are outside the fortress network, we will begin scanning for outbound teleport bands, and return home as soon as possible."
With her arms crossed and still blinking sleep away, Kalinka listened quietly. When Pharaoh stopped, she nodded. "Okay." She took a deep breath, and repeated, "Okay. I'm… as ready as I'm going to be. Everyone else?"
"Yes, ma'am!"
"Ready, miss."
"Awaiting orders, young mistress!"
"We're ready, Kalinka," Pharaoh echoed after the others.
"Good. Follow Pharaoh Man's directions in the absence of mine." She turned and pointed at their jolliest gunman. "Skull Man, open the door."
"With pleasure, miss." He went to the sealed door at the front of the storage space, and dug his fingers into the manual latch, slowly crumpling the metal in his grip. He fired into the corners, the metal door deforming with each shot, and then slammed his arm into it and forced it off its track. It barely moved an inch despite being blown free; Skull kept a tight grip, and stepped out of the room with the door held up like a shield. It seemed subtlety really wasn't beyond him after all. He pivoted slowly, as if to set aside the door just outside the threshold. Then he sent it crashing to the floor, flailed backwards, and shouted, "Oh, blyat!"
As Skull Man charged out, Pharaoh Man briefly lamented the end of that moment of quiet security. Then he and Ring Man both fled the storage sanctuary and prepared for whatever encounter was waiting for them. "What? What is it?"
And what an encounter it was. "Guys! Form the hell up!" Skull Man already had his buster trained on their visitor. Ring Man produced two Ring Boomerangs and stood at the ready. Pharaoh Man, however, couldn't bring himself to do anything but gawk as he fell into formation at the triangle's other rear corner.
"Mega Man? Rock, is that you?" Pharaoh asked the boy in blue. "I mean, is it… really you?" Mega Man responded with only a thumbs-up, and a wink.
"Of course it's not, you…!" Skull let out a ferocious, frustrated growl. "Why am I even trying, anymore?! Hoops! Dice the kid!" His Skull Shield was now up and blocking the entire trio, and Ring had already caught onto the simple and familiar strategy.
"Right!" Quick as the wind, Ring Man flung both boomerangs away, and in the instant it took for them to arc around the shield toward Mega Man, he'd already prepared two more. "King! Charge!" The battle had already been going for a whole four seconds - Pharaoh was taking ridiculously long to start powering up an attack. What was even more ridiculous was the sight and sound of Pharaoh slapping Ring's arm down and knocking his weapon to the floor. "Buh-whah?! King!" he cried over the sound of his ring clattering around like a ceratanium dinner plate.
Determined, Pharaoh held his ground. "Wait, stop! We have to try to communicate!"
Skull Man, unable to act without compromising his shield, shouted over his shoulder. "You freakin' traitor!"
"Will you please stop shouting nonsense?! Skull, keep your shield up and let me talk to him," Pharaoh ordered him, he glanced behind, relieved to see that the others had hidden Kalinka inside. "Ring. Prepare to resume combat. And, Rock…"
Inching away from the ring embedded in the floor where he'd been standing, the mighty Blue Bomber raised his empty hands. "Hey, Pharaoh Man. Glad you guys could make it. How's CRT these days?"
Pharaoh looked at Skull. His fists were clenched, but for the moment, he was obeying orders as per Kalinka's wishes. There was no telling how long that would last, so Pharaoh worked quickly. "It's no better than anywhere else, Rock. Thanks to you."
"... Are you mad at me?"
"No."
"Okay. Well, do you wanna turn on comms for a second? I just wanna check something," he said brightly, though the ominous request made Pharaoh Man all but lose hope.
Watching him carefully through the mild ripple of the Skull Shield's area of effect, Pharaoh asked the question. "Rock. Are you here to join Dr. Wily? Or are you here to fight against him?"
Rock's cheery demeanour slowly fell away, stripped down to a blank stare. Skull Man muttered something about getting him, and Pharaoh Man ignored it. "I'm here… I'm… Everyone is counting on me."
"Yes. They are."
"Everyone. Yeah. But… Dr. Wily! We should go see him! He'll know what to do! Let's find him!" Rock said with a firm nod. He seemed so lucid, so in control of himself, although he couldn't be..
"No. We can't do that. Rock, you helped us already."
"I did?"
"Yes! You gave these coordinates to me, while I was still connected to the CRT database!" Pharaoh was looking for any way to stretch the conversation, preferably in a favourable direction. "Do you remember doing that?"
"... Yeah. Pharaoh… I was…" Rock looked back at him, and as their eyes met, for a moment Rock stopped moving entirely, locking up while slouched and staring. After too long of a wait, he blinked very deliberately, reset stiffly, and started to resume his normal, humanlike motion. "Pharaoh. Where's Dr. Light? Where's my dad? Is he okay? Everyone needs him."
"Dr. Light is… probably coping. Listen to me. If you're capable-"
"Pharaoh? Did I infect you?"
"... No."
"I tried to."
"I'm fine, Rock. Our interaction was very brief and my communications are off now." Skull Man looked meaningfully over his shoulder again. Pharaoh continued. "We need help. We need to escape."
"No… We need to see… Wily. It's okay! He's not hurting anyone this time." Rock started to smile again. "All the humans are still safe. It's okay," he told them.
Skull barked back at him. "Kid, just 'cause that that deadbeat stepdad of yours isn't setting the world on fire, doesn't mean he's cool with us."
"There is a human in danger, Rock," Pharaoh informed him, his thoughts still with Kalinka.
"What? Who?"
Realizing it wouldn't be safe to say, he kept quiet. He looked behind himself, making sure the door was still clear and the mistress remained hidden. When he looked back, Rock was looking at the door too, and took a step forward as if to investigate. Pharaoh hastily threw a hand up to halt him. "Dr. Light! The strain of all this may be harming him physically. You don't want that, do you? Don't you want to go home?"
Rock looked distraught for a moment. "Then I… I have to go! But… then I have to… But… everyone. Everyone…" he repeated in a wavering, drowsy tone, closing his eyes, holding his sinking head. "Everyone needs me. Everyone needs Dr. Light. We have to get out! But if we can't teleport, then... Wily. Dr. Wily. I know where he is. Maybe he... No!" he cried, startling the others. Pharaoh heard the sound of Ring Man's weapons restlessly scraping the guards on their owner's hands. He was losing control of the situation.
"Rock, please. Just tell us how to get out! Can't you help us? Can we… help you?"
"No! No, no, no! The whole world is in trouble! Everyone is!"
"I know, Rock. But listen-"
"Not you! Him! This-!" The boy-bot shuddered, his voice wracked with an unsettling electronic crush that betrayed some very abnormal operation. "Rob- Roboenza. It's Roboenza… It's Wily's… The… the voice…"
"Voice?"
Skull Man spoke up. "Hey. Didn't his little sis-bot say the virus was 'telling her something'? What do you think's goin' on in there?"
"Rock. Is the virus… speaking to you?"
"It's wrong! It's not even human! Don't listen to it!"
"We can't hear it, it's okay."
"I know it makes sense, but it's wrong! I have to keep everyone safe! It's… It's wrong!" He shook his head violently, as if he could shake the infection right out through his ears. "I just want everyone to be okay!" the boy cried, staring down at his own hands for a moment. An eerily sluggish transformation turned each of them partway into a buster before finally settling on the right arm.
Ring drew a boomerang back, his fingers shuffling readily over it. "Mates… This isn't looking good. Time to hang it up, king."
Steered by a desire to help humanity's struggling hero and their only potential ally, Pharaoh stepped partway out from behind the shield to the mumbled protests of his comrades, and tried to ease things. "Calm down. You were functioning well a moment ago. Let us help you." In response, Rock pointed his buster shakily at him, halting Pharaoh Man in his stride.
"Waste him!" Skull Man said, and dropped his shield at the same time he produced a buster of his own. Ring's boomerangs were already flying, and Skull let off a volley of searing plasma bolts. Rock darted out of the way, and the telltale sound of a charging buster sang quietly under the echoes of battle. The indicator on Rock's arm was glowing. Skull threw his shield back up. "Tuck in!" he shouted, though the others were already moving in tight behind him.
Rock pointed his weapon, the dim room now illuminated by his body - the hot glow of the overheated charging toroid nestled in his buster barrel, and the induction field bubbling to life around him drawing flashes of current through the air. The trio of battle-bots huddled, waiting for the moment they'd split up and counterattack.
"You guys… I'm sorry. I really messed up," Rock said, his arm trembling, swaying by just a few degrees. Pharaoh noted that it seemed he was having trouble committing to a shot. Perhaps there was still time.
"There's a lot of that going around today," Skull answered. "Let's just get this over with."
"No… I infected the CRT servers. When I rerouted LightLabs' communications to get to you, I left the carrier program with the other half of the virus."
"Other half?" Pharaoh asked.
"Listen. Roboenza 1 and the cure, they left trojan structures in all the infected robots. Any robot with that stuff inside them can be infected-"
"We already know that!" Skull growled. "Are you trying to stall me out, kid?"
"... Infected, in a little over a minute."
In the midst of a rush of frantic calculations, Pharaoh asked, "It happens that quickly?"
"If you're already half-infected, like all of us. Or… we were," he finished sadly. "The complete virus probably takes longer to get into clean robots. Did any of you catch Roboenza 1?"
Pharaoh hesitated to answer, not wishing to invite further scrutiny. But the fact was that his comrades already knew the truth of the matter. He'd been infected years ago during the first Roboenza crisis, and so had most of the Cossack-bots. "Many of us did. Tundra Man did not exist then, and Dust Man rarely requires networking. The rest of us had… varied experiences."
"How many of you were in contact with the CRT comm server after I took Pharaoh's call?"
Quiet took over the room, filled only by the smooth humming of weapons. Ring Man was the one to answer. "The whole lot of us, I think. Hard to say who was on how long without checking logs."
"... Crud."
"Our backups," Toad Man's fretful voice whimpered from the doorway. "Oh no. Oh nooo…"
"Aw, crap," Skull groaned.
Pharaoh considered his own knowledge of the CRT servers. Were their data backups connected to the communication server? Could a carrier program find its way to them and infect them? "No. I think it's all right. The virus is designed to navigate a robot master's processing environment, not a laboratory computer network. I doubt that it could seek and compromise our data."
"You sure about that?"
"I would certainly like to be. It would really improve my day, about now."
"We have secondary backups on redundant offline storage," Dust Man declared, his chute peeking out from the door frame along with the whites of his eyes. "I should know; I am in charge of keeping the storage areas organized, ergonomic, and dust-free."
"Magnificent. Day, improved," Pharaoh sighed. "And when Dr. Cossack reads our communication logs, he'll search the servers for viral presence, I'm sure. And," he added, looking back to Rock, "he's going to find the coordinates you gave us." The overcharged Mega Buster was radiating waves of convection and luminous particles, still menacing the trio of battle-bots; Pharaoh raised his hand and made a motion for Rock to drop his aim. "You see? Everything is going to be all right, Rock. Please, just relax. Help us through this, and we'll help you."
Rock's gaze went blank again, which didn't bode well. But he didn't fire either, stepping backward instead. "I have to talk to Dr. Wily."
"Just wait!"
"No. Sorry. I have to... No, wait. Darn it!" He put a hand to his face, frustrated and lost in thought. "I gotta help everyone. I gotta save the world! I can still do it! I'll figure something out…"
"Rock, you're in no condition to fight."
The standoff paused silently for a long time. "Yeah. Well… I'm gonna." All of them braced for impact when Rock made a sudden move then, but it was only to retreat to the door some distance behind him. Once he had it open, revealing a portion of the corridor beyond, Rock unleashed the power behind his buster, and it exploded against the shield that Skull had been impatiently maintaining.
The flash of bursting plasma and the shrill reverberation of Skull Man's defenses doing their job were a shock after so much tension. By the time their senses had recovered, Rock was already hightailing it down the hall. None of them wanted to give chase. Once they were reasonably sure the face-off was finished, all three of them dropped their guard, and Skull fulfilled Pharaoh's exact predictions by whirling around and confronting him yet again. "You stupid, crazy..."
This, however, was the last straw. Pharaoh Man reached out and snatched him by the shoulders, digging his thumbs into the sockets of the skull pauldrons. "What is wrong with you?!" he demanded as loudly as he dared, shaking Skull violently, hoping to shock the cynicism out of him for a moment.
"Uh."
"Our mission is one of stealth and deliverance. Do you understand me?"
"... Uh?"
Exhausted of patience and diplomatic responses, Pharaoh threw Skull Man backward, who barely managed to stay on his feet. "I didn't order you to attack! I was trying to de-escalate, you hooligan! Have you already forgotten your primary objective?! What happens if you keep picking fights this way, and all three of Kalinka's most capable guardians go up in literal smoke?!"
"Uh…"
"Well, say something!"
"Seriously, when did you get on a first-name basis?" he asked, pointing to the door where Kalinka and Dust Man were tentatively emerging.
Robot masters, unlike humans, were not capable of true emotion. At least, not according to the accepted science of the field. They did not enter altered states of mind, their processors didn't contain any systemic arrangements analogous to the emotional hormones and receptors of humans, and their logic was never filtered through emotional overlays of "happiness" or "fear". To them, those were just words that related their behaviour to that of humans, a part of their natural language processing, and "emotion" was something they simulated according to a preprogrammed persona, not something that could truly captivate their minds.
However, there were times when the inner logic and the outer simulation provided some very convincing results.
Pharaoh Man had his directives, and he had his orders. He knew what he needed to accomplish, and that there was an obstacle before him. To continue with diplomacy would waste time and effort. To continue with politeness would cloud the seriousness of the matter. The most efficient way to settle the matter was to engage along lines that were commonly understood between both parties, and the only things common between Skull Man and Pharaoh Man were their responsibility for Kalinka, and the nature of a combat unit.
Pharaoh marched forth, and the two inches of height he had on Skull made all the difference as he loomed close and pinned the antagonistic skeleton under a glare as cold as a grave. "I will say this in simple terms, and you will listen and understand. Kalinka's safety is my priority, bar none. If I determine that your performance is a hinderance to her protection, I will remove you from service. By any means necessary."
Skull turned his gaze and peered over Pharaoh's shoulder. "Hey, uh, hoops? A little support?"
Ring Man, who didn't seem to be paying the confrontation any mind, responded while staring thoughtfully into space. "Wouldn't Wily sort of be our deadbeat stepdad too? I mean, you and me?"
"Man, don't even start with that."
Pharaoh Man grabbed him, and forcefully backed him into a wall. "Look at me and listen, Skull Man. As accustomed as I am to your belligerence, it will be tolerated only as long as Kalinka's safety is not threatened by it. From now on, you will follow my lead as you have been ordered."
Skull only stared back, briefly weighing his options before answering in a growl. "You're really letting being in charge go to your head. You know that?"
Pharaoh raised his hand, and placed an index finger on Skull's forehead. "Continue recklessly endangering our mistress, and it may go to yours. Are we clear?"
"... Damn. That's a pretty good line. Didn't know you knew how to riff, Tut."
That was as close to an acknowledgement as Pharaoh felt he could get. He lowered his arm and relaxed some. "Furthermore, your concerns about my condition are noted. Please refrain from wasting time and energy restating them at every opportunity."
"You'd like that, wouldn't you?" he grumbled.
"Hey." Kalinka's voice cut through the dispute with a much sweeter tone than theirs. "Boys, that's enough. Let's lighten up, all right? Nobody got blasted, so let's… relax. Please?"
Without another word on the matter, Pharaoh released his cohort and turned to the group. Before he could begin talking, begin leading again, Skull Man chose to agitate him one last time. "It's funny that you think you can take me," he taunted at Pharaoh's back.
For all his doubts, for all his shortcomings, Pharaoh had no reservations about this. He turned to look over his shoulder at his most abrasive comrade, and answered, "You're very strong, Skull Man. But you're not nearly as clever as you'd like to think."
"Is that a challenge?"
"Boys! That's enough," Kalinka repeated. "We do not have time for this. You know we don't."
Pharaoh nodded. "Right. My apologies, Kalinka; I shall return to duty immediately. Cossack numbers, please be ready to follow my instructions. Now that our presence has been exposed-"
"Actually," Kalinka cut in, "before we do anything, I… um… I might have to take care of something else."
"What's wrong? You're not injured, are you?"
"No, it's not that. It's just, I have to… Well," she stammered, fidgeting and looking uncertainly around the room, "I'm not really sure how I should…"
"Kalinka, is this important? If it is, then please advise quickly so we may take whatever action is necessary," Pharaoh insisted.
With an apologetic frown, she looked up at him and whined, "I have to peeee…"
"... Oh. Right. Biology."
Author's Note: I don't know how apparent it is that I really enjoy writing robots as robots but boy do I. Robot expiry dates as discussed in MM9 are a contentious subject among Mega Man fans but I think this is a realistic and reasonable take on it. Figuring out how a world of thinking machines would work and what those thoughts would be like has been pretty stimulating over the course of writing this story. It's also slowed things down just a bit. I'm pretty sure we'll get out of the storage area next chapter...