MEGA MAN X: THE SOUND OF MAVERICKS
By Eric Lawson
CHAPTER FIVE: MYSTERIOUS ACTS
Canark clocked out of the industrial building that served as Tokyo's central net server. He sighed, looking up.
"Been a long day." It had been, a long grueling fourteen hour shift with so many emergencies, it would be hard for someone not in his line of work to believe that such problems existed. "First, a stinkin' rat gets loose in the fibre optic tunnels, then there's a contamination in the main processor from another lousy virus-they don't pay me enough to do this." The sun had set long ago, and the quiet hum of the night comforted him. The starry sky was blurred by the neon lights and flashing signs advertising everything from razors to repair companies, sodas to drug pharmacies and everything under the sun.
"Tokyo, Japan. The jewel of the Orient." Canark huffed. "Oh, well. Home again, home again. And I don't have to work until two days from now! YEAS!" That thought kept Canark happy. Very happy.
For even reploids like time off. Canark was a reploid, although it rarely showed. He was a basic model not built for rugged conditions or hazardous areas-he was just a reploid who made a living keeping Japan's internet connections well functioning. He didn't know how many other reploids there were like him.
His icy blond hair rustled in the wind kicked up by passing hovercars. His white flannel shirt whipped, but stayed shut. Underneath, he would have looked as human as a human could be, with synthskin perfectly mimicking that of the tanned tones of flesh.
He wasn't strong. That always seemed to be the tradeoff. Few humanoid reploids out there who could don human guises and clothes were strong.
"Too much of a danger." Canark muttered. That seemed to be the theory. "If you can't see them as walking abominations as metal, don't give them the power to wipe us out." He shrugged. "Shoot, I wouldn't harm anyone." He smiled widely. "I'm just too darn happy!"
Whistling, he stuffed his hands in his pockets and continued to walk down the city streets. But something didn't feel right. Something felt out of place, horribly wrong.
Canark decided to keep his eyes open. Even reploids had a sixth sense.
Too bad his couldn't pinpoint the giver of bad juju.
A pair of dark figures standing on a building above in the shadows.
Holding dimly lit twin beam sabers.
The night was half through its pattern when Bristol stirred from stasis. Her eyes opened in the darkness, zooming in to get used to the darkness. A check on her internal clock cinched it; 2 in the morning. Sighing, she rubbed her eyes.
"Lights." The lights came on slowly, allowing time for Bristol to hop out of her personal stasis chamber and shake the dust from her glossy blond hair. The red streaks in it became more apparent as the light increased in intensity. She had decided whatever she was doing before she lost her memory, it was a choice of personal highlights.
She yawned, an involuntary reflex from her being around X and the other 'humanized' reploids. She was just tired. And for some odd reason, having another possible image of her tattered past in her mind.
She picked up the personal voice recorder Cain had given her, and activated its record function.
"October 12th. In lieu of the constant training with Bastion, X and the others, more blips have come to light. Another one popped in my head while I was in stasis tonight. In this one, I was walking down a dimly lit hallway while people passed me, muttering. Whether or not they were reploid or human, I can't rightly recall. But I did pass one in particular that looked at me. This figure frightened me terribly, and the only thing I can recall is that set of glasses and a burning pair of eyes, glaring right into me. That is when I woke up. With this in mind, and all the other images I can recall, I was working in a facility of some kind, where at least one person hated me." Bristol paused, shutting her eyes and placing a hand to her head.
She wasn't dressed in her armor, for Hazil had discovered that while her boots were forever attached, the rest of her armor was mysteriously removeable, like X, Zero's and even Bastion's. Instead, a modest blue nightgown covered her slender frame as she sat down in the chair beside her stasis chamber, leaving only her delicate hands, head and boots showing. Taking in a breath, she continued.
"But I must also contend with the possibility that what I'm viewing might not be recollections of the past at all, but rather a warped view of events happening around me as I can recall. Psychotherapists for years have contended regression in opposite respects; some viewed it as dead accurate, while others viewed it as a process that corrupted the unknown with jumbled mindwork. I am neither a psychotherapist, nor a philosopher." Bristol's eyes began to cloud as she fought the anger of her helplessness. "But what I do know is that no matter how hard I try, there is always the possibility I shall never recover my past." That was a frightening thought for Bristol, and one which led to utter hopelessness.
She shut her eyes, squinting the irritating fluid from her optics. At last, she shut the digital recorder off and let it drop to the floor. Then she began to choke softly, her body shaking with the sadness. She crumpled to the floor beside her recorder, curling into a fetal position, rocking back and forth as at last, she gave into her feelings and began to cry. She bit into the soft fabric of her cotton nightgown, trying to dampen her cries.
But then the door to her room chimed.
"Bristol, you all right?" It was Bastion, and he had heard her crying. Bristol told the door to open, and Bastion rushed in. His face covered in worry, Bastion knelt down beside her.
"Hey, you all right?" He asked softly. Bristol started choking on her sobs again, and she shook her head.
"Bastion, I don't know if I'll ever be all right! Why can't I remember? WHY CAN'T I REMEMBER?! WHY??! WHY??!" She finally completely broke down, and Bastion hugged her tightly. She cried on his shoulder, her sobs growing softer after the outburst. Now Bastion began to blink tears away, feeling utterly helpless to alleviate her pain. His shoulder grew wet as her eyes shed water droplets.
"Just cry it out, Bristol. Just cry it out." And she did. Kneeling on the floor, Bastion held her tightly to him as she cried away her last sobs, finally giving way to stasis as her systems tried to overcome the high levels of emotional stress.
Gently, Bastion picked her up, holding her light frame in his arms once more. He looked down at her tear-streaked face, the utter agony of her inability to remember anything.
"And even though I try, there's nothing really I can do to help her." The training sessions were helping less and less than the first one with X.
Bastion lay her sleeping body into the stasis chamber. Then he ruffled his hair and sighed.
"Lights." The bulbs above blinked off, and the room filled with black silence. Bastion watched for a moment, watched the blinking red and green lights of the stasis chamber shine a pale glow on her tender, teary features. He felt torn about what to do with her.
He wanted to help her, but-
Clenching his fist, he realized there was little in his power to be done. It would have to run its course.
"I'm sorry, Bristol. I really am." At least he thought, while she tried to cope with the loss, he could be a friend.
A shoulder to cry on, like he had been tonight.
Bastion promised himself that no matter what, he'd be there for Bristol to comfort her in time of need.
And as he slipped silently out of her room, he felt his own pain eased.
"Perhaps there's hope yet. As long as we have each other…"
Canark had no doubt of it now.
Someone was following him, and with hostile intentions. He could feel it in his frame, feel the fear work its way through his bloodstream, finally reaching the source of his brain.
His logical half was trying to yell at him, tell him in this crowded environment he had nothing to fear. The streets were bustling, and no one would dare attack him.
"But what if they're all after me?!" Canark whispered, his body trembling slightly. "I have to get out of here now!" The logic which he used to do his job finally left him, giving way to blind panic.
And he ran. Ran for his life, as fast as he could. He ran through huge crowds, knocked people over in his mad dash. Angry cries filled the streets, and someone finally yelled for the police. Canark didn't hear the exact words, only a buzzing in his head.
"Hey, you! You on drugs or something?"
"Watch it, youngin!"
"BAKA!" Someone finally yelled, snapping him about. With that simple term in Japanese for idiot, Canark stared in a stare of fear and surprise.
"No, no no!" The middle aged Japanese man with glasses and slicked black hair suddenly transformed into a monster, with a massive gun pointed at him. Canark's hands trembled, and he ran. Ran some more and smashed into the approaching policeman. The flustered cop steadied himself and pulled out his tranquilizer pistol.
"Stop, citizen!" The policeman yelled. Canark paid little attention to the voice behind him, he just kept running. Running for his life.
The policeman glared angrily and fired a dart. It went straight for Canark, where it would sink into his body and inject the fluid. Then, Canark would be knocked out for an hour.
But it clanked off with a hollow sound, the dart clattering to the ground. Canark had felt an impact, but underneath his synthskin was pure metal, which deflected the dart. The policeman swore and pulled out his radio.
"Station, call the Hunters! We have a reploid on the loose, dressed as a human. Direction of travel is southbound on Main. Suspected maverick, he's highly neurotic." He clipped off his comm, and swore again.
He had other places to be tonight. Let the Hunters deal with their rabble rousing cousins.
Hazil had woken up earlier than usual, and was rolling about his Medical Bay with little effort. Still, he bitterly kept the count of days left until the Ultimatum sent by Cristoph and the GDC was done.
"Twenty seven days." Until then, he had a lot of work to do. One task involved replacing his blasted wheels with a decent set of legs, so he could act somewhat normal. Then a chirping at his door filled the silence, and Hazil perked his head up. Frowning, he finally sighed.
"All right then. Enter." Bastion came tromping into the room, clothed in a baggy pair of shorts and a loose fitting T-Shirt. "Up a little early for your checkup, Bastion."
Bastion sat down on one of the bunks and shook his head.
"Couldn't sleep. Too much on my mind." Hazil watched him for a moment, then placed his materials down and rolled into the back of the wall opposite the Arabian Hunter.
"All right then. What's keeping you awake at night?"
"Hopelessness."
"I think that's something we're ALL enduring, Bastion." Bastion's eyes flared.
"Not about the Hunters being forced to cut down to three Units. About Bristol." Hazil's eyes perked up in surprise, but he hid it quickly enough.
"Oh, really? What about our little British Bombshell?" Bastion shut his eyes and dragged his arms across the top of his head.
"She's suffering, Hazil. Terribly so." Hazil began to clack his arms with his fingers.
"I assume this happened recently, then."
"Two hours ago." Hazil harrumphed.
"What's pushing her to suffering?" Bastion got off the cot and began to pace back and forth, hands behind his back.
"She can't remember a damn thing about her past. And worse, she's even doubting the flashes she's picking up. I can't blame her-a false memory is worse than no memory. But either way, it's a lose/lose situation, and she finally broke down." Hazil sat up, listening very carefully to the tone in Bastion's voice.
"Do tell."
"I was walking around the HQ, when I heard a noise coming from inside her room. When I went in, she was curled up on the floor, crying. She was CRYING, Hazil." Bastion's eyes began to cloud up, and his fists clenched up. "She was crying because she couldn't remember. This is tearing her apart." As Hazil watched closely, he saw Bastion's fingers dig into his palms, beginning to leave marks.
"Hazil, she cried herself to sleep on my shoulder. My T-Shirt still feels wet from her tears. Is there anything else we can do to help her?" Bastion finally looked up into Hazil's face, his own teary optics pleading for salvation with Hazil's wisdom.
Hazil thought for a very long moment, then rubbed his chin. Sighing, he shook his head.
"The best we can do for her now is to help her move on. What's lost is lost, and if I couldn't recover it before, I can't do it now." Bastion shook his head, his mouth clenched with the rage he held inside.
"So there's nothing we can do then. THERE'S NOTHING I CAN DO!" Bastion slammed his fist against the cot nearby, shorting out the monitor he had just punched. Hazil at last frowned.
"HEY! KNOCKITOFF, HOTHEAD!" That brought Bastion back to his senses, and Hazil took in a breath.
"I said there was nothing we could do to recover her memories. She still has a life, and we have to help her live it again. It'll be tough going, but there's only one person I can think of that can help Bristol move on: YOU." Hazil spoke with deep conviction, and his answer was sound. As a very old reploid, he had seen many things in his life, enough to tell Bastion what needed to be done. Bastion sniffed in a tear, and spoke.
"So it's up to me, eh?" Hazil nodded.
"She's the only person she won't throw across the room when you catch her by surprise." Hazil was beginning to have a blaring thought rage in his mind, but he dismissed it for later. Telling Bastion what he thought now wouldn't do any good. "So get out there, form a plan of attack, and get on with it. It's your charter to set things right with Bristol, and I suggest you do it." Bastion nodded at last, and finally left the room to return to his own.
Hazil groaned and scratched his head.
"Looks like I have another mess to clean up now." He set to work, but there was still a flurry of afterthoughts in his head.
With twenty seven days of service to the Hunters left, he was beginning to suspect an event that had happened rarely, but was as powerful as the human equivalent.
More so, perhaps.
But then, maybe he was wrong. Bastion-
Could a reploid really-
But Bastion didn't go back to his room right away, because he heard the quiet chirp of an incoming distress call. It rang through the halls and drew his attention. So he jogged off, at last reaching the main control room. Gavin, Jad and Kol were watching with fascination at the incoming signal, then Bastion harrumphed.
"What's this, fellows?" Jad turned, his mouth breaking into a sheepish grin at Bastion's appearance.
"A little underdressed for duty, aren't you sir?" Bastion folded his arms.
"Frack my appearance, buster. WHAT'S THAT UP ON THE SCREEN?!" Gavin coughed for a moment, then finally got up from his post.
"It's a distress call from Tokyo main, sir. Apparently, there's a reploid running loose through the streets. Highly paranoid, scared of everyone and everything, and is running through everything in his way." Bastion rubbed his chin thoughtfully for a moment, then nodded.
"Very well, then. Suit up guys. Action time." Kol raised a finger at Bastion.
"You coming along, sir? In that?" Bastion chuckled.
"Not quite." He clenched his fists, silently sending a signal to the main computer to activate his armor. The return came fast, and in a flash of light and teleportation, Bastion was covered in full battle armor. The charge pack held his classic purple saber, and even more amazing was the two slots on either side of the bottom. Jad motioned to them.
"What are those?" Bastion grinned fiercely.
"Air support." With a subconscious thought, Bastion activated his Powerstorm armor. A pair of metallic purple wings shot out from the slots, making a definitive 'shiiink' as they slid open. Jad, Gavin and Kol let their eyes widen in surprise, for they'd never seen it before.
"Holy Mother Truckin'-" Jad began, but Gavin raised a hand in front of his face.
"That thing let you fly?" Bastion closed them again.
"Not only does it provide great flight ability, but the ports on top spew out shrapnel. This sucker's nasty, and I have Airborne Albatross to thank for it."
"Airborne Albatross?" Kol asked. Bastion sighed.
"When we're done tonight, I'll relate the story of my early Hunter career to y'all. But now we have to go make sure whoever's running around out there ISN'T maverick-at least not infected." The trio activated their weapons, grinning fiercely at their leader.
At last, they'd get to see some real action.
And if Bastion was the Hunter that everyone else in the 21st had proclaimed him to be, they could learn a lot.
Bastion left a note on the Hunter's Main Computer logs before warping out, trailing his subordinates.
"It's magic time, chilluns." Bastion whispered silently as he began to disintegrate. "Bristol, just hold the fort for me."
Cristoph was well to do in life. That much was obvious as he walked about in comfort, the sun streaming into his room. Where as it was night in Japan, it was day here.
His towertop suite took up a whole floor, then again he was the AmeriCanadian Representative in the GDC. The carpet was well kempt, but there was a distinct lack of robots about.
Cristoph lived by himself, did things for himself. Self-reliant, and calm to a T. He was a personality who stayed out of the limelight, did his job and went home. That was all people cared about, too. One of the reasons Cristoph kept getting re-elected was that he didn't screw about and make a fool of himself like others did.
Just then, his computer chirped. Cristoph lifted his gray head in annoyance, then walked over. Placing his sparkling mineral water on a coaster, he brought up his PC Phone. The other end blinked rapidly, waiting for confirmation of the other side's signal.
Finally, it came.
Type: Text only.
Source: UNKNOWN.
Cristoph nodded. This was how it was done. Never more, never less. Just text, scrambled and cryptic which would seem harmless to anyone else's eyes but his own. Able to decipher the text mentally, Cristoph silently read the message. Nodding his head, he sent a three letter confirmation, then ended the connection. He shut the computer screen down, then picked up his drink.
As silent as he'd ever been, there was little sign that he had done anything out of the ordinary.
But Cristoph harbored a dark secret.
"Twenty seven days." Cristoph mused. "Twenty seven days until the Hunters are no more."
"Something wrong, father?" Sergei Cossack lifted his gray and wrinkled head, as gray as he had ever been. His eyes faltered, but his glasses helped him adjust.
"No, Kalinka." Kalinka walked in, a late middle aged woman who was still as stunning as she was in her twenties. She folded her arms and frowned.
"It's late, father. You should get to bed. You're much older than you'd like to think." Cossack baahed for a moment, then waved his hand.
"Kalinka, it's not that I don't want to sleep. It's that I CAN'T." Sergei motioned to Pharaoh Man, who paced back and forth, as restless as his master. As dangerous as he had been to Mega Man, re-programmed by Wily, Pharaoh Man rebuilt held more of Cossack within him than he had ever been.
"It's not just him, Kalinka." Pharaoh Man finally stated in bland English. He stopped moving, then walked over to the two of them. Kalinka watched in amusement.
"Oh? Why is that, Phare?" Pharaoh Man blinked at the misterm of his name, then shrugged, one of the few emotional physical responses he had learned to use.
"When I was rebuilt by Cossack, he also added a part of code that would allow me to mimick his 'defects' as I grew to understand his personality." Cossack coughed loudly, trying to laugh.
"Pharaoh Man, it's not a defect. It's a thing called being human." Pharaoh shrugged again.
"As you yourself have stated before Master, I am not Rockman, nor am I a reploid. I am merely a Robot Master, programmed to see to your well being and the smooth operation of this castle." Pharaoh turned back to Kalinka. "As I was saying, it is not just him. I also feel 'slightly off-kilter', which is as best a term I can offer. A sensory ghost which is not there, but which seems as rational as a real impulse." Kalinka frowned.
"Are you saying you and my father are getting weird vibes?"
"Precisely." Pharaoh Man clipped. He turned around, and then went over to check on Toad Man's progress with the sewage system. Kalinka shook her head.
"Father, you should really reformat them once in a while. Their quirks get worse over time." Cossack chuckled.
"Ah, my little child. Do you not see I leave them be? They are as much my children as you are, and deserve a life. In the outside world, they have no chance of success. But they are faithful-they stay with me." Cossack turned back to his scanners. "But Pharaoh is correct. There is something amiss out there. I can feel it in my bones, but I can see nothing." Cossack rubbed his eyes, finally switching his system off.
"Go to bed, father." Kalinka said. Cossack nodded.
"Yes, daughter."
Bastion finally gained a sense of his environment again, realizing he was high in the air above Tokyo's streets. With a thought, he activated the thrusters on his Powerstorm Armor. He double checked his charge:
"A good twenty minutes." He looked below to see his trio looking about in confusion. Bastion activated his comm.
"Hey, guys. De-activate the weapons, eh? No sense in scaring the local yokels while we're trying to FIND our person." Gavin obviously heard him, and he looked up. A flash of recognition, then he waved his hand.
"Hey, Commander! Getting good airtime, I see!" Bastion watched with concern. Already some people were beginning to crowd around the Hunters below, some in surprise, respect-and others in disgust. Bastion frowned.
"Guys, I suggest you get off the streets. Try rooftops for now. If we're gonna trail this reploid, we have to do it without getting humans in our way." Jad clipped in on the frequency.
"You got my approval on that, bossman. These people don't look exceptionally plucky tonight." Jad, Kol and Gavin leapt into the air, touching building side and hopping up with ease. Standing on the rooftop, they looked up at Bastion again.
"So Kol, where exactly did the report say our mystery friend was traveling?" Kol spoke up instantly.
"Southbound, Main. Do you think we should split up?" Bastion thought for a moment, then nodded.
"Affirmative. But stay within sight range of each other, okay? I want to be able to act as the eye in the sky here." The replies were short, curt, and full of feeling.
The Hunters were hunting again.
But someone else was watching with interest. The pair of shadowy figures had tracked the warp signatures, pinpointed them with their long range sensors. While still trailing their own target, they quietly acknowledged the possibility of these four being more secondaries.
Their twin bladed beam sabers thirsted for blood.
They would obtain it from someone tonight, Hunter or civilian reploid alike, there would be blood.
Canark continued to run through the streets. It was getting quieter now as he got farther and farther away from the hustle and bustle of the main streets. Ducking through alleyways had sent him farther away-
But the presence was still there. No matter how hard he ran, it always caught up with him. And the terror was re-instilled and he ran again.
"I can't escape it!" Canark shivered. "I can't escape it!"
Then he snapped. His fevered mind suddenly came across an idea, like a bolt of lightning that strikes the one inch nail on the road.
Canark would fight it. He stopped running, ground to a halt and clenched his fists. He raised his head to the air, and screamed at long last.
"I'M HERE! COME AND GET ME!" Canark laughed crazily after that.
He would run no more.
"What in Blue Bomber's Blazes-?" Bastion snapped at the scream. Floating above the streets in a secluded section of Tokyo, he had heard a shout of angry words. He flipped his comm on and sent a message to his roof-hopping teammates.
"Gavin, you hear that?" Gavin grunted an affirmative.
"I did more than hear it, boss. I traced it. It came close by-probably no more than five hundred feet." An unheard of distance to human ears, but their reploid sensors were more advanced. "And the direction came from over there!" Gavin pointed with his finger, and Bastion followed it.
It led to a bunch of warehouses and storage areas.
"All right, then. Trio, follow me!" Bastion switched his thrusters on full, and sent a blast of superheated gas into the stratosphere. Like a purple and red bolt of lightning, Bastion hurled himself across the atmospheric bottom, following the curve of the horizon towards his target. The wind whipped his brown hair back, away from his eyes. Bastion allowed himself a small grin, noting the feel of at last giving in to full throttle.
But at full speed, he reached his destination within seconds. And then he saw it.
There was a reploid below, screaming his guts out. Bastion frowned, focused in. What he saw surprised him.
This was no industrial reploid. This was a basic weakling, constructed for delicate tasks and placement within human society.
So why was he a threat? Bastion had to convince himself he wasn't looking at a human, for was it not for the tattered shirt and the unusually odd boots, it would have been a perfect disguise.
"Trio, I've sighted the reploid. But it's not industrial or military. Follow me, then move in. I might need backup." His receiver got three definitive twin clicks of acknowledgement, and Bastion deactivated his Powerstorm Armor's Thrusters.
He fell downwards at 60 feet per second, maximum speed allowing for air resistance. His boots took the force with ease, his entire frame crashing to the ground like he had landed from only six feet up.
"Thank the maker for super-absorbent shocks." Bastion muttered to himself. The reploid was close by, breathing heavily and staring with dead eyes at him. Bastion pulled in his wings and at last remained grounded.
"All right, buddy." Bastion said quietly. "Mind telling me why you're running about like a banshee on Bourbon?" Canark still breathed raggedly, then he finally swallowed to speak.
"Who're you?" Bastion folded his arms, trying to show as little aggression as he could.
"I'm Bastion. A Maverick Hunter." Canark's eyes widened.
"You've come to kill me!" Bastion shrugged.
"Depends. You haven't killed any humans yet, and the damage done is based more on your inability to avoid collisions. Nothing suggests to me you're maverick, so all I want to know is why you're running." Canark nodded, still wary of Bastion.
"It's chasing me."
"It?"
"I don't know what! All I know is that it wants to kill me!" Canark shivered again. "I thought you might be it, but you're not." Bastion nodded. He pulled out his hand, reaching for Canark.
"All right. If you come with me, I'll protect you from whatever wants to kill you, all right?" Bastion drew in a sigh of relief. It seemed there wouldn't be a fight this night. Canark shivered again, then slowly sent his own hand out, quivering.
But it stopped. Canark froze, his mouth went slack jawed once more. Bastion's eyes went up in surprise, and Canark underwent a reverse transformation.
"No-nonononono! NOOO!" Canark jerked away from Bastion, closing in on himself. Bastion felt his body tense up, a natural response over his many years of fighting.
"What's wrong?" Bastion barked. Canark shook his head, now a frightened monicker of himself.
"It's back-IT'S BACK!" Canark suddenly bolted away from Bastion, running into a darkened building nearby. Bastion swore.
"Blast him! But there's no one around but me and the Trio!"
"Oh, but there is-HUNTER." Bastion's eyes flew wide in surprise as the growly voice behind him rang true. But it also accompanied a sudden pang of fear, of knowing there was an enemy close by. Bastion's hand reached up for his saber, and he began to turn into a defensive position.
His saber was barely lit when he deflected the flourescent saber blade coming for his head. A darkened figure stood close by, and Bastion sent his blade going for its target.
He never saw the blade on the other end of the handle fly up and dig into his side.
But he did scream.
And he did go down for the count.
Gasping in pain, Bastion found himself unable to move. Then the darkened figure stood above him and drove one end of the twin bladed beam saber into his stomach. Bastion screamed again.
A second figure joined the first, staring down at the badly damaged Hunter. Their twin beam sabers, glowing a dark blackish purple in the night, were nearly invisible, especially to his mind, screaming with pain signals and system malfunctions.
"You foolish Hunter. You should have stayed out of our business." Bastion's mind suddenly felt a connection to that sentence, but he was still in too much pain to clearly identify it.
The first figure raised his saber staff in the air, ready for the ending chop to Bastion's life.
"Too bad you know nothing about defense. Now, you will pay for that mistake."
"Commander?" A new voice came into range, and the two figures looked the other way. They hissed for a moment, and then extinguished their blades.
"Your time will come later, Hunter. We have a primary target to destroy."
Then they vanished out of sight. Bastion continued to gasp in pain, and then the new voices grew closer.
"Oh my God-COMMANDER!" Bastion couldn't move a muscle to stretch his head. "Fellas, GET OVER HERE! THE COMMANDER'S DOWN!"
Gavin's face suddenly peered into his, and Bastion breathed in relief. He could hear Gavin pull out a medical scanner, activated and furiously run it over him.
"Jeesus, Commander! Did that reploid do this to you?" Bastion gasped, tried to speak.
"No-someone else. Twin beam sabers, Gavin."
"God, Bastion." Gavin shook his head. Kol and Jad showed up as well, then gasped in surprise. Gavin glared up at them.
"Check the area! Bastion's attacker may be nearby!" Jad and Kol growled in response, charging up their Busters.
Then they heard the scream. A huge scream of pain from within the building, whose doors were open.
"Good GRIEF!" Jad and Kol yelled in unison. They ran inside, and left Gavin squatting beside Bastion. Gavin lit his saber, holding it in one hand while he finished the scan.
"Commander, you are NOT in good shape here. Massive wounds in your chest and abdomen, with plenty of bleeding. The only good part of this is whoever attacked you missed your fusion generator by CENTIMETERS." Gavin shook his head. He scanned the area, ready to defend his leader if need be. Then Jad and Kol returned, their faces flustered.
"What's the news, fellas?" Gavin barked. Kol shook his head.
"The reploid inside that building is one messed up fellow. Whoever got Bastion got him as well. His head is a giant melted puddle of metal skull and control chip." Jad growled.
"I have a feeling that whoever did this is responsible for the same thing we saw five days ago. Reploid murder-control chip destroyed forever." Gavin shook his head.
"Let's file the reports later. Right now, Bastion needs Medical Help-NOW!"
"HAZIL!" Gavin screamed. The Medical reploid snapped from his semi-stasis, staring in annoyance at the warped figures who stared at him. But then he saw who they surrounded.
"Oh, God no." Hazil rolled with as much speed as he could next to the prone, groaning and bleeding figure lying on the floor. "Did you do a pre-scan?" Hazil snapped as he carefully picked up Bastion's broken body and laid him on a medical bed. Gavin grunted, trying not to let his own emotions drip into his choked voice.
"Bleeding in his left side and stomach. The beam saber missed his fusion tank by inches, so be careful!" Hazil whipped around, his own eyes getting misty.
"I want you three out of here now, Comprende? I want to be able to save Bastion's life in peace and quiet." The three stood in dumb stupefication, and at last Hazil exploded, waving his arms about in crazy circles.
"JUST DO IT!" Jad and Kol looked to Gavin, who at last nodded.
"I guess we'll go tell everyone else the bad news then." Hazil looked up at the clock on the wall.
"Just wonderful. It's about Five O' Clock now, so you can go spoil everyone's breakfast." The Trio left, and the door to the rest of the HQ shut with a hiss, and Hazil sighed.
Bastion was still glazed over, in a world of pain and unable to speak any longer. Hazil rolled over beside him, and activated a few commands on his table.
"Bastion, I'm going to have to stick you in stasis now. It's the only way I can save your bacon." Hazil pushed his hair back.
"Just promise me you won't keel over and die when I'm working, okay?" Hazil pleaded. "I've had that happen to me one too many times already." Bastion was unable to speak, but he did understand Hazil.
And then darkness swallowed him. Hazil blinked a tear out of his eye. He checked his equipment, then nodded.
"Bastion, you must have been caught completely by surprise. These kind of wounds aren't normal for you." Hazil shook off a nagging thought, then finally spoke one last time.
"These kind of wounds are the things dead Hunters get."