Mega Man, Protoman, and Bass had little resistance after their face off with Vile. Soon they had arrived at the vertical passageway. "What the...?" Mega Man had to ask when as he craned his neck to see up the tunnel.
Bass grinned. "Oh, that's something Siggy likes to do just before his lair. As if a simple vertical path could keep somebody out that could get this far in the first place. Still..." Bass scratched his chin, as if in deep thought. "The climb wouldn't be all that fun. Whaddya say we take the express?" He held both of his hands slightly outward, obviously inviting them to grab on and allow him to jet them to the top. Both Mega Man and Protoman hesitated. "Aw, c'mon," Bass added in a half teasing-but only half-voice. "Trust me."
A small smile played on Mega Man's lips. It was certainly a difficult task, even with the fact that Bass had recently rescued his butt and everything else. Still, Bass seemed to be changing for the better, and Rock was never one to deny anybody a second chance. He grasped Bass' right hand with both of his. Protoman blinked at his brother, but followed suit and grabbed Bass's left.
"Top floor; Home Repair, Hygiene, and Women's Underwear!" Bass announced cheerfully as he landed at the top of the shaft and the two brothers let go.
"Heh, funny," Rock replied sarcastically.
Protoman was silent, marveling at how these two bitter enemies could be engaged in such friendly banter, like they had been friends all their life. Behind the visor, behind the facade that was Protoman, Hadrian Blues suddenly realized that his world was going to be different forever because of this little adventure, and he wasn't entirely sure if it was for the better.
Protoman's musings were interrupted by a rasping, almost purring, voice that demanded, "Stop where you are!"
Bass grinned. "Well if it ain't Beastie Boy and Stripy Butt!"
And standing before the three robots, with their claws unsheathed and snarls on their faces, were Neon Tiger and Slash Beast. "Go back the way you came now, and maybe we won't hurt you," Tiger snarled.
Mega Man laughed. "Go back? That would kinda defeat the whole purpose of coming here, wouldn't it?"
Bass grinned. "I wouldn't try it, guys. I beat you up pretty bad before, and this time I'll be playing for real."
Slash Beast grinned, showing off all his pointed teeth. "As are we," he purred.
Bass simply shrugged and made a great show of cracking his knuckles. "Well, as the man says, 'let's get ready to rumble.'"
Iris found herself swatted to the floor once again. Make no mistake, she wasn't just lying down and taking the beating that Sigma was handing her. Every time she was knocked down, she'd get back up and would deliver a devastating attack of her own. But however good she was, she found that Sigma was infinitely better. He'd block her most advanced techniques as if they were amateur material and would retaliate in a way that was impossible for her to defend.
Sigma grinned inwardly. Zero was fuming now, and that was what he wanted. Long ago, Sigma discovered that whenever Zero's temper rose to a certain point, he'd become a raging demon that would attack whatever was in range. Sigma had since theorized that if he could take that anger up to another level, have it surpass a limit it hadn't reached yet, then Zero would be his. The trouble was finding a way to bring the anger up to that point. Nothing Sigma could do to Zero himself could rise the anger up to that level. However, Zero seemed fiercely loyal to his friends, and in them was Sigma's catalyst. Sigma delivered a nasty palm thrust to Iris's face, a blow that would have shattered a human's nose, just as he finished that thought. Zero let out with a scream. No threats. No flowing profanity. Just the primal, wordless cry of a wild animal. Almost there...
Sigma's beating, as well as Zero's rising temper, were cut short by an explosion. Everyone turned to see a large fireball that seemed to resemble Neon Tiger fly across the room, where it exploded upon contact with the far wall. From the hole that Neon left behind, strolled in Bass. Behind him were Mega Man and Protoman. "Hi, Honey, I'm home!" Bass said with his trademark smirk. "And I brought some friends from work!"
And then all was chaos.
Bass shot a searing beam of violet energy at Sigma, forcing him to stop beating on Iris and defend himself. Iris, now free of her tormentor, quickly scanned the room for something that might help. She saw Dr. Doppler running toward the controls to his Strobe Trap. Apparently he realized the odds had shifted a little. Oh, no you don't! she thought grimly before charging after him.
Iris wasn't the only one who caught Doppler's movement. Protoman had too, and though he didn't know what the controls were for, he did know that they couldn't have been for anything good. So, he switched from his Mega Buster to his Flash Bomb, and fired one of the metal spheres at the computer. The computer exploded at almost the exact same time that Iris hit Doppler in the side with a flying kick.
Mega Man took command, naturally. "Proto, you help Bass, I'll free the others."
Protoman nodded and fired off three Flash Bombs at Sigma, causing him to disappear in the resulting explosions. Mega Man ran to the cage holding Zero, and began typing on the control board on its front. "You okay?" he asked of the red Reploid.
Zero shook his head. "I am now." Zero took a look at Rock and decided a double take was in order. "Woah, Rock. You look awful!"
Mega Man grinned, wryly. "So I've heard."
Dr. Doppler may have been built with some self defensive measures, but he couldn't fight a battle the likes of which Iris engaged him with. She attacked him with unbeleivable speed, and always hit a spot that would do most damage. He had no chance. Finally, Iris punched him hard in the chest-hard enough to actually pierce his armor and the circuitry within. Then she yanked her hand to the side, before ripping it out of his chest. Doppler fell and did not get up again. Iris shook the circulatory fluids off her hand as she gazed around to see what she could do to help the others.
"Aw, crap!"
Zero gazed down at Mega Man, somewhat impatient to get out of his prison. "What is it?"
Mega Man looked up at Zero. "This thing's password protected! It could take forever to figure the code out." Mega Man looked down at the console in front of him for a second, then a wicked grin crossed his face, as his armor changed red and orange. "'Course, when in doubt, break something!"
Mega Man ignited his Fire Sword and drove it into the offending console before him, causing it to spray electrical sparks in every direction. It also turned the bars off on Zero's cage. "All right!" Zero yelled as he leapt out of his prison.
"Where's X?" Mega Man asked.
"Try that direction," Zero replied, pointing.
Rock turned in the direction Zero was indicating and saw X unconscious and strapped into the machinery. The design was a bit more advanced than the models he usually saw, but Mega Man had a pretty good idea of what it was. "A data extractor?" he asked.
Zero's reply was short and to the point. "Yup."
"Crap."
"EEEAAAAARGGG!!" Protoman cried as he flew away from Sigma. The attack had been so fast that the red robot would not have been able to describe what had happened, but it was a pretty nasty attack. He landed on a worktable and shattered it, scattering the various pieces of machinery over the ground. Proto shook his head to clear the stars from his vision and saw a familiar goldish cylinder right in front of his eyes. He reached out and picked it up, flicking a switch on the upper lip of the handle. A neon green blade shot out of it, sending an eerie green reflection on his visor. "Cool," Protoman couldn't help but say before turning the Beam Saber off to take stock of the situation. Bass was fighting Sigma, keeping him destracted long enough for Iris to run up from behind and deliver a nasty flying knee to the small of Siggy's back-an attack that Protoman couldn't help but wince at-Zero was charging into the fray, and Rock was running the other direction, toward a goal that Protoman couldn't see yet.
"Hey, Zero!" Protoman called, catching the red Reploid's attention. "Catch!" Proto hurled the Saber across the room and Zero caught it easily.
"Thank's, Proto!" Zero called before igniting his blade and facing Sigma. Protoman grinned as he readied his arm cannon. The tide of this fight was definitely going in their favor.
"X!" Mega Man called as he reached the taller blue Reploid. "Can you hear me?" X didn't respond. "Crud," Rock muttered under his breath as he unhooked his friend from the apparatus. "We need to get you to a safer place 'till you wake up." Mega Man looked around for a second and saw that a doorway next to the machine was clear. This led to the only hall to Sigma's living quarters, but Mega Man didn't know this. "Okay, hear goes nothing..." he muttered as he tossed X over his shoulder like an oversized bag of potatoes and began his mad dash to the door. It opened easily and he was in the clear. "Yes!" Mega Man shouted, just before the ceiling began to come down on him. "Crap!" he amended.
"This grows tiring," Sigma sighed. "It think it's time we end this little fiasco right now, don't you?" With that, Sigma raised his right hand palm up over his head as a purple sphere of energy formed above it.
Bass stopped and his eyes widened, as he recognized energy. No...it can't be...
Sigma seemed to be reading Bass's mind as he grinned a grin that seemed to say Oh, but it is before whipping his arm around and sending the energy forth in four different directions. One hit the wall just above the door where Mega Man and X dissapeared through, causing a cave-in. The other three rammed into Protoman, Iris, and Bass-slamming them into the wall and pinning them there. Sigma turned to Zero, who still had his Saber drawn and was preparing for the fight of his life. "It's you I want," the tall green Reploid said.
Zero was actually quite rattled by the display of power that Sigma just showed. "How...?" he started to ask.
Sigma chuckled. "Why not ask Bass? I'm sure he recognizes the energy I used. Don't you, Bass?"
Bass managed to get his senses back and glared at Sigma. "Evil Energy. But that's impossible."
"Is it?" Sigma asked-he was clearly enjoying himself. "I got it from our dear departed friend Sword Man. Ripped it right out of his chest before Tengu Man rescued him."
Bass suddenly remembered the gaping hole in Sword Man's chest. He scowled and called Sigma something that would be better if left unrepeated.
Sigma's grin twitched. "Very nice, Bass. I can see where Zero got his charming repertoire."
"There's no way you could have done that! I've had this energy a lot longer than you and even I don't have that level of control."
Sigma grinned as if talking to a lovable but stupid child. "My dear Bass. It was child's play for me to learn how to control this energy. The part of me that is the Maverick Virus was created from it!"
The others in the room were stunned into silence. "We're all gonna die..." Protoman muttered.