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Zero Alpha
Mission Five: Watery Grave
Zero moved down the dimly lit halls of the abandoned city once more. He was slowly recovering from his wounds he had received in the battle he had with Geiger. The city's walls had little strength anymore, as with each step Zero would note the way the wall and ceiling cracked and crumbled slightly. He was unsure if he should go any farther is fear that the place would fall apart on him. He decided to risk it in this case. If he were to go faster or try scaling the walls his recovery system may not heal him as fast as he wished. Zero didn't want to be caught defenseless when the mysterious female reploid Alpha sent decided to attack him.
As Zero passed by a length of hall he became aware of a small breeze that echoed from a crack in the wall Zero stopped next to. With a swing of his saber he broke through the wall to find many machines that were pumping water through tubes. He looked and saw many gauges that he had no idea what they stood for. He found a hydroelectric plant. The mysterious power that was fueling this city still barely was generated from this place of origin. As he approached the machines for a closer look at them the water within the pipes froze causing all electricity to halt. Zero was left standing in the dark room.
"This mausoleum has lost what life it had. I cannot allow that. These reploids, maverick or not, deserve enough respect!" Zero announced with a tight fist. "I must stop the one responsible for this injustice."
Zero darted out of the room turning on a makeshift light that he made by using some energy crystals he had and the lighting fixtures that lined the wall. He crept down the halls with caution knowing full well that his enemy had adapted to the dark in some means all ready. He came to a large echoing gap that spans at least two jumps from him. There was nothing up but death, as that the ceiling was lined with spikes. In response he looked downward seeing no bottom to the vast void. He decided to jump the pit and get to the hall that lied on the other side. With a running jump Zero jumps as high as he can and as far outward as he is able. He reaches out his right hand to catch the floor on the other side and he misses his mark. As he began to fall downward he threw his second arm upward and caught the ledge with a sigh of relief.
"You must be Zero." A young female reploid that appeared as young as Ciel stared down at him from the ledge. Her foot only centimeters from his only hand that struggled to hold on. "So, you're the legendary reploid that killed Sylph and gave Geiger a hard time." She said with a giggle flicking her white hair over her shoulder.
Zero was thinking to attack the girl since he felt endangered by her lingering left foot that lied besides his left hand. Before he did however she helped him up to the ledge with a strong tug on his arm, but Zero helped her in getting him up. "Why did you save me?"
"I, I don't want to kill you." She muttered looking away. "I have to though. For X."
"You don't have to kill me for him!" Zero argued.
"He will kill me if I fail to." The girl said turning to him with a sad face. She took in a deep breath and exhaled. "I will destroy you because he helped me. I won't turn against him no matter what he does wrong." She said with a now determined face.
"I don't want to fight you girl. I only wish to battle Alpha and dispose of his lingering threat." Zero responded standing straight and opened to attack. He had his arms spread beckoning for her to attack first. "What, are you Alpha's woman or something?"
"I, I would never!" She shouted in anger. "I have respect for him and that is all!"
"You can deny it all you want..." Zero said with a shrug making her angrier.
She calmed and formed a smile. "You're trying to make me mad. You want me to be off guard when we fight."
"You're the first in a long while to figure that much." Zero said with a chuckle. "Still, just knowing that isn't enough to win."
"I will show you otherwise." She drew a saber that shed a blue light blade. "Heh. I will find the fight fun, but the outcome will be one I do not favor. I won't like killing you, or, I won't like dying for that man, X."
"Jezz, You have so many hang-ups about this. You probably don't know who you want to have as an enemy." Zero responded. He moved his idle right hand downward to where his Z-Saber would be.
"If you just take my blade without resistance you will make this easier on me. I don't want to kill you savagely."
"If we are to fight tell me who you are."
"I'm known as, Undine."
Multitudes of X-drones hurried about the desert after a common goal. They came towards the same downed highway stretch Zero had been a day back. They were in an uncountable number and they all had Alpha and Zero in mind. As they approached the final dune the first wave was taken down by a large bombing.
Geiger stood with a small smirk as he stood a fair distance from the destroyed forces. "Master X I see that your brother's toys have caught up with us once more. What are your orders?"
"Remember we are a group of four now, and that Undine is off finishing Geiger's work." The mysterious reploid from behind Alpha reminded.
"Hmm. I will take on these enemies. You two just make sure Zero doesn't live. If he defeats Undine I want Phoenix to take him out. As for you Geiger I will insist you check on our other third foe. He must not meet Zero. If he does we may lose. If we can take each of them separately we can have victory." X ordered. "Then after we take down those two reploids we can make a move on Neo-Arcadia and take the spot Zero has emptied for us."
"Right sir." Geiger replied and went off causing much noise and dust.
"I thank you for the honor of killing Zero. I will not disappoint you." The other Alpha henchman replied before running off.
"You think these lousy things can harm me?" Alpha questioned turning his attention to the second wave of X-drones. "Take this!" He fires off a large buster attack obliterating half of the unit upon contact. He quickly charges another attack and takes down the rest of the force.
Zero and Undine's saber's clashed sending a bright spark forth to light the tunnel. With each contact a short fizz erupted from the blue and green sabers. Undine was a good warrior, but Zero had not begun to fight for real yet. Undine was a novice and Zero hadn't the heart to go all out on her. She was weaker, inexperienced, and a woman. Zero did not know how to finish this battle because he had wanted them both to walk away from the battle unharmed.
"You can still stop this." Zero advised her with a swing of his saber.
Undine easily blocks it. "You can drop your saber and admit defeat."
"I don't think so. I must continue fighting for justice and to keep innocent reploids such as ourselves alive." He jumped away from her. "I haven't been fighting you at my full capacity. Barely any if you would believe. I need for you to stop this. We can join together and fight any insolvable problem that may arise like that of Omega X." He offered allowing the green blade of his saber to fade causing darkness to engulf him.
The only light now came from the girl's drawn blue blade. She stared at him in disbelief. She couldn't believe how simple-minded he was. She did not understand why he was doing what he did. He told her to fight for innocent people, but Alpha had been the one who done that for her. Zero was nowhere to be seen when the world needed someone like him the most.
"Please, put down your weapon and leave here with me. You have a strong personality and I admire that. You also show a loyalty to Alpha, but you can't be loyal to someone like him. He wants to form a world without reploids just like his brother." Zero stated. "He will kill you come the right time."
"He would never!"
"Wouldn't he? He's not one to be trusted." Zero countered.
"You're, You're just trying to confuse me!" She shouted. "That won't work! I won't fall for your simple battle tricks."
"I'm not trying to trick you, or even lead you on. I just don't want to fight anymore. I've seen many meaningless battles that could have been stopped by now if people only saw through it." Zero argued. "I only like fighting when there is a meaning behind it, but there are some that lack that quality. Like all the times I slashed through one of X's little drones. It was pointless and made me feel pity for them. Still, battles like the one I had with Omega X meant something. Those are the battles I enjoy."
"I, I have to kill you though." She countered trying to force that thought into her head. "I just have to!" She falls to her knees as if in defeat. "Why do you have to be such a nice guy? If you were someone like Omega X I would have ripped through you without hesitation."
"I'm sorry if my presence has been a bother, but I need to see Alpha as soon as I can." Zero said walking past her and further down the dark hall.
"Y-you can't...you can't leave me...here without...taking me with you." Undine said as she sat on bent knees on the cold damp floor.
Zero whipped around as he looked to her as she shifted to face him. "What? You want to join me then?"
"If I can't beat you...I must do that. I was built by a group of humans, one who was named Ciel. I remember her especially. They all were great people and I learned so much from them. I learned what friendship was, and I learned that fighting wasn't good. I learned to sew, write, read, draw, and my most important lesson was who I should side with, and who I shouldn't." Undine explained. "You're someone I should join with."
Zero nodded and watched as she began to stand. He then gasped when he noticed something further down the corridors. The place was caving in. "Undine!"
She turned to look back, but she froze up and the ceilings and walls began to collapse around her. Each stone falling upon her body and Zero watched as all this occurred trying to decipher what had caused such a thing to occur.
"Pathetic." Alpha said with a scoff leaving the desolate desert filled with pieces of X-drones behind. He had destroyed them all with only wasting little energy and having caused the city below his feet to begin falling apart as if sealing the ghosts of the deceased within. "Why did my fellow copy think these would ever accomplish anything?"
"Zero?" A voice whispered through the dark.
"Be quiet." Zero said with emotion as he cradled Undine in his arms. "You don't have enough power to say such trivial things."
"Wh...what happened?" Undine asked as if she was not there.
"The city no longer has strength. It gave out on you because of something unknown." Zero noted looking around the rubble.
"I, I know that...How did I survive?"
"I got you out of the way, but not in enough time. You're badly damaged." Zero explained. "You can live through this. I'm not about to let you die just after meeting you."
"I'm...I'm afraid...that I am not...built like you Zero...I won't recover from this...You could, but not me..." Undine said as she attempted to move her arm to get up. "I'm not strong enough..."
"If you stop moving you'll get better." Zero advised, but she placed her hand on his shoulder instead. Zero broke from her clutching his head in pain. He let out an agonizing yell as he threw his head into the wall to stop it. A memory flooding back to him that he could not hold onto.
"Zero?" Undine muttered in worry.
Zero could only see him holding the young brown-haired female reploid once more. This time however he had more than a voice. He remembered her vaguely as a member of a group that he had to fight as one time. He still couldn't remember who she was and what she meant to him though.
Zero caught his breath as the pain was relieved. "That same scene..."
"What...what...what..." Undine muttered not able to continue her sentence. Her head fell to the side as Zero watched realizing the fact she was dead.
"You just had to die." He said roughly standing up. "I thought you were better than that!" He shouted at her and bent down to pick her up in his arms bridal style. "I thought you were strong, but you were only offering an illusion of that when you fought me. In truth you are weak, but you didn't feel the need to show that. You didn't want me to know how weak you were." Zero stated as he walked down the hall before halting when he sensed something. A loud eruption had occurred behind him and he had no clue as to what it was. He moved with, as much speed as he could muster and ran until he came to a clearing where at the top was a long stretch of a metal rung ladder. He jumped to the ladder and began his way up the pipe that lead to what he believed was the surface with Undine still in his arms.
He got near the top, but he found he had not enough hands to turn the lock and open the panel to get outside. The unknown noise he had heard came closer to him and he became anxious to get out of the underground labyrinth he has spent what was like a forever in. With clumsy actions he shift Undine's body aside to clutch the metal lock with his two hands. With all his might he begins to turn the stubborn lock that won't budge easily. Finally the panel opens allowing him to move, but as he goes to get out he drops the other reploid's limp body to the floor below him.
"Damn." He began to go down to get her despite the oncoming sound that was ever more closer to him. As he came to the halfway point he was stopped by a second sound.
"Zero...Go..." Undine struggled to say with all she had left. "I'm...I'm sorry...that I...was so...weak..."
Zero was confused as to what to do. Should he go and scoop her up, or leave as she had requested? Before he could respond to that question he realized what the approaching sound was: Water. "No, not enough time." He began upward kicking off the walls as the large amount of water swept away Undine in an instant. The water surged upward towards him as he jumped up even faster. With a last jump he gave a grunt as he flew past the ground and into the air. He landed hard on the soft desert sand as a stream of water shot out into the sky before settling and merely draining out onto the desert sand.
As the water and sand mixed Zero continued to lie in it defeated. He had not the energy to get up, but he soon found he wanted to. "So, you are the other reploid?"
Zero looked up to the male reploid that was human in appearance. Not at all like Fefnir, or other reploids besides he and X. "Who are you?"
"They say I'm a maverick, but I doubt that. You must be Zero. I heard you got Omega, but still you haven't gotten Alpha. That leaves us both with a similarity. We both want Alpha dead, and are his enemy." The reploid stated offering a hand to Zero.
Zero waited with hesitation as he looked over the reploid. With the dirt in his face he couldn't make out what this guy looked like, but something told Zero to trust him. "You still have yet to tell me your name."
"All in due time." He said while lifting Zero out of the mess with his hand. "You need to get cleaned up a bit first."