Chapter 10 - Old Friends, New Family
Wily has a few more memory flashbacks of his own daughter being licked by the robot cat Haru. He feels his eyes start to well up. Thomas and the love he taught me with his sacrifice. I was able to give it to my daughter and Haru because of you. I had just started to be cured from my illness by Lights treatments. I took everything I had in me. All my love, all my pain, I took the dna of Victoria , the remains of Forte, the dark energy from space, and Blues volunteered to be the new base and I created Zero. I had completed a purification process for making zeros dark energy source neutral. But he was awakened far too soon during the factorys building phase of his body. Many different sizes, lengths and attributes were tested before settling on a final design. I left it all up to his own core program. Zero was purging his on dark energy from within the safety of the computer system when someone or something happened to force a transfer of zero into his body while it was still full of dark energy. Wily was forced to flee .Zero is Wilys son in most respects to the definition. A son who has never met his father. A father who has never allowed himself to meet his own son and feels the guilt of Blues's fate and his failure as a father to build Blues a fully functional body for a second time. Wily is a very strong believer in free choice and never was in support of the robotic laws programmed into the first generation of self aware robots Light made. Light wasnt in favor of it either, stating that his artificial souls would replicate a true neutral starting point for development. Every bot as innocent as a baby. Shaped by the reality around them and certain unique traits they are born with to give them a stronger sense of individuality among themselves. Aiding identity, expression and freedom. The way Wily envisioned the world of robots was perhaps the most compassionate one. Giving Blues a massive blaster capable of even destroying his own body if charged too far, wasnt done out of a lack of concern for Blues safety over power. It was done to give Blues the power to choose anything. Freedom by fighting. Freedom by dying. Freedom by pacifism. The energy core that powered Blues energy was defected and beyond repair and would slowly seep out its power until Blues would shut down. Sadly as Wily started to fall victim to his mental disease, all of his ideals were warped into an apocalyptic view of how humans should just all be slaves to robots because its sweet ironic justice. And Wily never got around to fixing Blues and when he was cured, asked Blues to let him fix his responded, there was nothing worth fixing. Wilys attention gets brought back to the present as the facility underground shakes.
Rush stops licking X and X also stands up alert. Again something pounds down and the facility shakes again even more violently.
X - Dr! I have to go up! The facility will cave in on you!
Wily looks at the dog with a sharp look of judgement.
Wily - Someone followed you here! Damn it LIGHT! that bleeding heart of yours again! getting ME in trouble. AAaAhhhhh damn!
Wily storms off down the hallway, past the observation lab where X was held. Heading toward a set of double doors that leads to who knows what in the back. X notices that Wily didnt tell him not to go up.
X opens the hatch and darts up. He jumps up way way way up past the manhole entrance until he has a good birds eye view of the surrounding area.
Two helicopters with crane units are carrying killer armors. Two generic reploid units are piloting them while being suspended in the air , waiting to be dropped.
There is another robot X can spot standing on the landing rail of the helicopter.
Hes got long blonde hair and is aiming his buster at the object that just jumped from out of the hole.
Zero can tell right away who it is.
Zero - SHIT! its an X! Retreat! Retreat! While I take him on! GO GO !
Zero jumps down from the helicopter rails at over 400 feet. As he falls a blast of energy pushes out from his feet and he darts to the side and fires a blast from his buster at X.
X has plenty of time to see it coming but hes also in the air and doesnt think he can dash in the air like he just saw this blonde bot do. Instead the only option is to fire his own blast at the one coming at him. Preferably something bigger than his to avoid damage himself.
X charges up his blaster, he gets a warning message about 60% of full power being available and he charges it to that much. Just over half power? I sure hope this is enough.
X releases the charge. The blast bellows out with a hallowing boom. The windows in the nearby run down industrial buildings all shatter, the sound is deafening. The heat from the blast melts a nearby fire escape guard rail. It glows red in the tenth of a second it took for the blast to fly by. It smashes through the proton blast that was coming at it, showing its own size to be 10 times larger by comparison and twice as bright. It has Zero dead to rights. Zero crosses his arms in front of his head to brace for what he knows will be an explosion he wont survive. He allows himself an internal question as if his last words would be unspoken. Where the hell did this power come from? X and his clones are not this powerful at all.
Zero closes his eyes and then Rush flys in to grab Zero out of the way of the blast.
Zero uses the save to take aim against X but Rush throws him into the side of a building before he could. Zero bounces off the concrete wall and falls down, the dog comes back in for another save but zero air dashes out of they way. He takes aim against the dog but hesitates. Something doesnt feel right to Zero. The dog saved him? Then saved X? Then tried to attack me ? Or save me again?
Zero lands...and waits. The dog flys off toward X and meets him and lands next to him with his tail wagging.
X pets the head of Rush.
X - You saved him Rush. Is he a good guy?
Rush barks happily and rounds around in a circle.
X - I see. Well then I suppose we should go greet the good guy instead of blasting him. You sure hes not gonna trick us?
Rush springs up and down a little and runs another circle.
X - Ok then.
X and Rush walk toward Zero who is also walking toward them. Zeros buster is pointed at them still as he walks. X does not raise his buster to Zero in return.
Zero looks more and more puzzled the closer he gets to X. Zero even starts to feel something. Something emotional. Its almost like he can recognize a very old very dearly missed friend for the first time in years.
Zero lowers his buster and as he stands now in 20 feet from X, he can see the smile on his friends face.
Zero feels his eyes swell with tears but forces it away immediately. No one noticed.
Zero - X. Is it really you? My old friend?
X - No. Im afraid I do not know you. But its nice to meet you. Apparently your a good guy.
X gives out his hand to shake.
Zeros face turns to a frown.
Zero - if you dont know me, your an X clone.
Zero raises up his buster and starts to charge it.
Rush starts to growl and jumps in front of X.
Zero looks at Rush and then X. X still isnt putting up his buster.
X gives a look of concern and confusion.
X - No , i know about the clones though. Dr. Wily told me. I am the original X. That much is sure.
Zero - Then why dont you remember me? WE have fought side by side for years! Decades!
X - Factory reset.
Zero grows silent. Then walks a few feet away with his head down. His head turns...
Zero - Factory reset...
Zero knows about it. He knows all too well about it. His creator had built him a protection program too along with a cat program that protected his core from the evil energy controlling his body. These new personas in Zeros head have in truth, been keeping him company too for about the last 3 years. Zeros conditions for the reset happened early on but the personas were not made aware to his conscious until much later. Zero had need of a reset but not need of personas for company until he lost X to the sigma virus. Zero too had been captured once by X. Lured in by a trap where X pretended to be cured to gain Zeros trust.
X then cloned Zero and hid the clone somewhere Zero doesnt know to this day. The evil energy inside Zero was neutralized but should he be infused with more of it, he could revert back to a deadly powerful maverick. X cloned zeros body without the Z heart that contained the energy matrix. X , even as a maverick, he feared that cloning that evil energy , even after being purified neutral, may result in creating new evil energy. The risk of evil energy was too great. A demon wouldnt summon a devil. Evil never wants to share or risk power. He wanted clone zeros to command. Not clone devils that could destroy him. Maverick X had a paranoid fear of Zero and so do all the clones. To substitute for the Z heart, X cracked his own code, and copied it. He erased certain data and inserted it into the zero clone.
Zero - I. understand. And you know what ?
Zero turns to smile at X. He walks up and throws his arm around him.
Zero - This is actually even better! We can start over X. For you, anyway, no bad memories of the past only good memories of our future. You once stood as the strongest symbol of hope and justice X. Right now...I feel like that symbol of hope may just shine again on the world.
X smiles and feels a little embarrassed but happy to have this guy as a new friend. Rush puts his paws up on Zero and licks his leg and Zero pets him quickly and then pushes him down gently.
X - well...i guess you should come in. The Dr is probably worried and hopefully, hes not about to launch an attack. Best to keep the buster lowered this time. X turns with a smirk in zeros direction.
The three bots enter the manhole and the cover seals behind them, they walk down the hallway to the magnetic hatch. It opens and they walk down another hallway toward the double doors X saw Wily go through.
As soon as they get about 5 feet from the door, the double doors swing open and a fast walking Dr. Wily almost runs into the chest of Zero.
Wily backs up and falls down to his butt. He looks up at Zero as if hes seen a ghost.
Then he picks himself up and brushes himself off and plays a role.
Wily - are you the one blasting my facility, shaking it to bits?
Wilys hands are trembling slightly but Zero doesnt notice.
Zeros face is contorted with the expression that hes seen this man before but cant place it. Then the urge to place this man in his memory gets much much stronger. Suddenly he feels an emotion deep down that this man is very very important to him. This man...is the man in his nightmares.
Zero suddenly shows fear and falls down on his own butt. The nightmares Zero faced were always at the hands of this man. Inflicting pain, controlling his body, tearing out his parts while he was conscious. Terrible tortures in his dreams. All from this man!
Zero points his blaster and it starts to whirl and glow...
Zero - Who are you old man!
Wily suddenly has a very angry look..
Wily - On your feet son! If your going to kill someone, you do with on your damn feet with pride!
Zero then suddenly feels mistaken and his buster powers down. He stands up.
Zero - Your the man in my nightmares that tortures me. I may kill you. You had better talk.
X - Stop !
X stands in front of wily with his arms outstretched. The look on Xs face is serious.
Zero turns his head and creates a little space between them to ease tensions. He crosses his arms and waits for Wily to talk.
Wily - factory reset?
Zero - ...factory reset.
Wily - evil energy was controlling your mind during the time of those nightmares. Residue left over in your psyche from when the evil energy consumed you. The memory of its evil is powerful enough on its own to affect you. But rest assured son, I would never hurt you unless you gave humanity no other choice. Or you gave reploids no other choice. You and X are supposed to lead this world together, as Light and I failed to do. I did originally intend for you to kill X when I first made your prototype body Zero. I was still ..."mad" so to speak. I should have never even used evil energy for your power source but in its neutral state its only half strength and no evil attributes. So at least I was able to fix it in a long term effort through your protection programs and factory resets. Light gave me those advanced programs as a gift after his death. He actually gave me...a lot more but ...anyway...another time! Come! Zero. Now that youve forced your way into my life I cannot hide my influence from you any longer. I wanted you to grow without influence. A true free being with no laws, no guides, no role models, from which you could develop perhaps the worlds first true original identity as a sentient reploid.
Wily - X and more so ROck, were both so, goody goody that it I would question Thomas sometimes as to whether he was force programming goodness into his bots. Against the notion of free will they both agreed on. But I was wrong. X and Rock both are original good beings of free will and Light was a great man and a great friend.
Wily - Our next mission is all too clear. We must wipe out the X clones and give our world the chance to rid itself of hatred , once and for all...
