A/N: -happy-squee- Morereviewers! I'm buildin an army, I tell ya!

moonymonster: That was the whole point of that chapter. You weren't really supposed to know it was Forte then and there. I thought it was pretty obvious though, but that's just me cause I really bloody love him and would know him anywhere.... which reminds me. All of my posted fics have something to do with Forte. I need to change that.

Kyogre: Foreshadowing? Naaahhhh... But, dude, the library? I bloody work in a library! Woo! -hugs plotbunnies-

Bobcat Moran: Yeah, I kinda wanted to keep Dokanru around myself. He was so fun, the guy I had in my head as I wrote, but he wasn't from the original series and I didn't know what else to do with him. I thought about it recently and realized that if I had stuck him as the first commander of the 17th unit, his death would have made a good transition for X's up to commander of that unit. Then I realized X, at this point in my fic, still isn't ready for that, so I bummed.

About his accent, that was a fun one. 's the first time I ever did dialogue with an accented character and I was trying to stay as true to it as I could. Guess I overdid it... I swear, I really can't think outside that damn box sometimes. And hey, length is nooo problem. I love hearing from people. Gives me MOTIVATION. WOOOO!!!

Okie, now that I'm done squeaking about that... I've had very little hell with college recently, so let me keep listening to my Gravitation boys and perhaps I can kick my arse enough to get out a chapter or two here and now.

Sunrise
Chapter 6: Let the Games Begin

The Hunters' presence at the warehouse the day before had been far from unnoticed. Anyone could have told them that, but still the Mavericks waited, keeping everyone at HQ on their toes. Three days later, satellite images and all that jazz brought the much awaited news to everyone: the Mavericks had somehow destroyed themselves and were gone for good. The rumored war to come was just a rumor after all, and the Hunters sat back and breathed a sigh of relief together in the knowledge that they wouldn't have to fight another day.

Or at least, that was how X had vainly hoped it would be. He thought for a moment, in the calm of his mind, what he would give to have things as they once were - quiet and boring, but peaceful, the only violence coming from the training simulations and the occasional scuffle among the rookies. In that moment, he managed to take out two more Mavericks, finishing off with a wild shot into the bunch before diving behind a rock for cover. Several blasts pelted the ground and air where he had just been. After five full minutes, the enemy fell silent again, a fatal mistake for one of them.

X quickly rolled out to the side, firing madly as he did. He was on his feet before the remaining four could catch a good lock on him, and by that time one more of their numbers had fallen. The one of the Mavericks seemed to spaz for a moment as the group fired blindly after the azure Hunter circling them, and X winced slightly. This Maverick was different than the Destroyers he was used to fighting. Destroyers were cold and precise, rarely ever missing their targets; they were killing machines, purely robotic. But this one seemed to feel some sort of emotion, if even on a low level. He was afraid now that the odds had slipped in his enemy's favor, panicky even.

Before X knew it, he had destroyed two more and left the last one standing in the middle of the forest, shaking and whimpering. He leveled out his buster at the Maverick, body posed in a defensive position, but that was where X hesitated. Do I really have to kill him? he thought, wondering over the possible outcomes. It was so much easier to kill the Destroyers, X realized and grimaced slightly. At least he knew they didn't care how things ended so long as they carried out their mission. But something with feelings...

"Aren't y-you gonna kill m-me?" the Maverick squeaked out pitifully. He then dropped his weapon, effectively putting a wrench in his opponent's gut.

"Will you give me a reason to?" X waited, but refused to lower his cannon. As much as he wanted this to end peacefully, he decided it would be best if he didn't take chances.

The Maverick grinned nervously, waving his hands in front of him. "No no! I'll surrender! Just don't kill me, alright?"

X took a deep breath, debating, but for another, his lenience was too much.

Before either had a chance to react, a series of shots from somewhere to X's right crashed into the Maverick and a group of bushes behind him. The Maverick fell to his side, his face frozen in a mix of pain and shock that quickly relaxed as the body lost all ability to contract the biomechanical muscles. X let out a small cry, unconsciously taking a step toward the Maverick before realizing that something behind the Maverick had exploded right where the stray shots landed. Somewhere between anger, shock and confusion, X gazed slowly over at the attacker. There was Forte, kneeling in an odd position on the ground, glaring something awful at the blue Hunter. He stood slowly without a word - he needed none.

X returned the glare, now leaning toward his anger from his friend's hostile expression. "Why the hell'd you do that?!" he cried, gesturing to the now dead Maverick. "He was about to surrender!"

"And I suppose you thought he was sincere?" With a snort, Forte moved over to the smoldering spot in the bushes and lifted the broken barrel of what looked to be a sort of machine gun. "He had a buddy back here the whole time ready to take you down at any moment and there you are, giving them a perfect opportunity to do so if I've ever seen one."

Blinking, X stared at the gun. The proof was right there in front of him, yet he still didn't want to believe he had almost been shot dead in the middle of a trap. The Maverick sounded so honest and truly terrified... "You're starting to sound like Zero," X quickly huffed and turned his gaze elsewhere, but Forte glared more harshly at his friend and took a defensive step toward the other.

"X, these guys would've KILLED you and your whole family if they had the chance and you know it," he yelled, startling X. Never before had he heard his friend scream like this. Something about him was different now, and as X caught the look in the darker Hunter's eyes, the realization only doubled. Forte stood in a partial crouch, as he normally did when he argued with someone. But this time, there was an unusual wildness about him that the smaller Hunter had never felt before. It was almost unnerving... so much so that X opened his mouth to say something about it.

"Settle down," a third voice commanded firmly, cutting X off before he said anything. Both Hunters looked over to see Unit 17's commander standing there with one other of their unit behind him. "The battle's over, so return to base immediately. I'll expect a chat with you both once we get there." That said, the silver Hunter and the soldier teleported out, leaving X and Forte to do no more than scowl and follow them.

X hesitated, turning a softer gaze back to Forte in something of an apology, but the darker Hunter never saw it. His own glance had fallen to the ground to his left, but beneath the aggravation, there was something more. It never registered - in the next instant, he disappeared inside a purple light and was gone.

--------------------

A green and yellow panel slowly filtered across the top half of a black screen. Below that, a second, simliar panel mirrored it, but where there was yellow on the upper graph, streaks of red scratched like lightning over the bottom. As the scan suddenly halted, a small message box appeared to the far right of the lower panel. Ketsu read the words and swore softly. Turning to a second computer, he began typing in commands. At the final few lines, he paused and glanced sadly at the navy reploid lying serenely a capsule. He murmured something to the body before giving the final code to seal the lid for good.

The computer read normal reploid energy signatures as a stream of green and yellow - voluntary and involuntary mental and body functions. What was the top panel was Dokanru's vital readings from exactly five minutes and twenty-seven seconds before he ever entered the same room with this Vile Maverick.

"So what is all this medical mumbo jumbo?"

Ketsu offered the smaller reploid a brief glance, then turned to a third screen and began fiddling with the keyboard. "There's a lot in this," he groaned, "but it basically tells us we're dealing with a virus, and it's ugly as hell. Whatever it was, it tried to block signals from Dokanru's entire neural net and replace them with its own, all in a very short time. The end result is what you see here. His systems tried to fight it, couldn't take it, tried to repair him at the same time, couldn't take that either, and ultimately shut down for good."

Beside him, Delta let out a low groan. "That means we can't reconstruct him, doesn't it."

It wasn't a question; there was no need to respond. The grim look in the medic's eyes was enough, and it was a sad thing to have to come to terms with. The memory chip made the person - it was the human within the machine. Normally when a reploid was "killed," he or she could simply be rebuilt and put back in action if the chip hadn't been damaged too badly. Dokanru's had survived physical damage, but the virus had effectively corrupted his entire system. There was no way to tell how much of his chip had been exposed as well.

In effect, he could still be revived - to a reploid, being out of commision was about the human equivalent of a coma. But the likelihood that Dokanru would come back as a Maverick was great. Too great. Their options were none - they would have to delete one of their own soldiers.

The yellow reploid's eyes widened, but he nodded his understanding. He had never before seen or performed a reploid burial, but he knew how they were done. It was rather simple and much like that of a human burial, but with reploids, the arrangements were sometimes more difficult get in order. A human was one thing - people believed in human souls and in the divinity of such a thing. But a reploid was a machine, some would argue, and didn't deserve a burial. They had no soul, they loved to claim, and the death of a reploid most often had to be kept secret, the funeral held only in the presence of other reploids and those humans who loved or cared about him.

Delta wondered if perhaps even the great Megaman X and Zero and others like them, who fought for the sake of humanity, would receive a welcome burial if they ever truly died. There would always be someone who would oppose it most certainly. Even some of the Mavericks were better than the humans the Hunters fought so hard to protect. He shook his head frustratedly at the thought, and then turned back to his duties to clear his mind. Dokanru's funeral would be taken care of shortly, but for the moment, there was the virus to worry about.

--------------------

Unusual violence, red coloring in the eyes, and any indications of possible insanity. Those were the symptoms, and if it was as bad as the notifications said it was, the Maverick virus, as it was called, definitely gave the Hunters something to worry about. Recent Maverick activity coupled with this new development seemed unreal - just a few weeks ago, the Hunters were living life minute to minute, almost begging for something to happen. Now they were nearly overrun with missions and Maverick attacks. Most units had suffered losses to some extent and everyone was on edge. A war with the Mavericks could break out at any moment, they kept telling the media, but those actually fighting it knew a different version of the story: they weren't on the brink. The war had already begun.

No wonder everyone had suddenly quieted down around HQ, Jett wondered as he read the announcement carefully a second time, then lifted golden eyes to the only other occupant of the room vacantly. The other Hunter wasn't really paying any attention to anything at all; he seemed off in his own little world for the moment. He sat across the table, staring blankly at the cup loosely held between his armored hands. It was almost depressing to see him as he was. The boy was quiet enough as it was without having other things to weigh on his mind.

And now, with the virus running around on top of everything...

"Looks like we're in for the long haul, with this war and all."

Forte tilted his head up slowly and nodded. "I've heard it'll only get worse from here on out."

The print out was cast somewhere on the table to the side, out of the way. Jett straightened in his seat, shifting his weight a little as he did. "Your first mission went well, I see. I must admit, you impressed me. I haven't seen a newcomer do so well since Zero came along. You must've been something in your past life."

Slightly embarrassed, Forte turned his gaze to the walls. "I guess. Memory fails me though." He let the sentence trail off, unintentionally.

He couldn't help it. The silver reploid laughed softly at this, but only for a moment. When he quieted again, he turned serious. Forte happened to glance back at his commander at that time, and the look he saw wasn't very comforting at all. Coupled with Jett's next question, the dark Hunter suddenly realized exactly why the other wanted to talk to him.

"You haven't been feeling anything... strange lately, have you?"

"I'm not infected, sir," Forte responded respectfully. "I assure you."

Jett seemed to consider the opposite, holding his soldier in a calculating gaze. He opened his mouth finally to speak, but the instant he did, the alarms sounded again. Instead of ordering Forte to be scanned, he swore.

"We'll continue this conversation later." Without a word, the commander stood and ran toward the door, leaving no room for objections.

Grimacing, Forte followed the silver reploid out to the teleportation center. He didn't like the sound of that at all, but all he could do was grit his teeth and bear it. The coming battle would provide him with an opportunity to vent his frustrations, and he needed to clear his head before he spoke with Jett again anyway. Arguing now at a time like this would get him less than nowhere.

--------------------

It wasn't too bad at all. Even the battles at the beginning of everything were looking harder than this. Yet X's eyes were wide and nervous, watching his friend finish off the last of the Mavericks. He had seen Forte in action before, but something about him now seemed wrong, out of character. He was moving as smoothly as he ever had, but he seemed to be having a little too much fun destroying the drones. One shot through the chest or in the face, that was his normal method of disposal, but here Forte was tearing off arms and legs, kicking and punching when the enemy was defenseless and causing all sorts of unnecessary torment to simple drones who didn't even have the mental capacity to understand why they had been sent out to attack this part of the city.

X turned at a soft sound behind him; there was his commander, stepping closer to observe the scene as well. Something about the look on his face said he wasn't interested in that the battle was at an end. Uncertainty, suspicion... More than that, distrust. X blinked his confusion. Forte was acting strangely, but he had known Jett for eight months - more than enough time to know that by his expression, the silver Hunter thought something was more than terribly wrong. Glancing back and forth between the two, it suddenly hit him. He'd heard the announcement earlier that day about the virus's symptoms and now it was dawning on him. The reason Forte had been so angry earlier, his unusual violence toward his enemies... It was suddenly so clear.

Forte had been infected with the Maverick virus.

As he finished off the last Maverick, the dark Hunter sighed, his breathing a little heavier than normal. He felt much better than he had earlier, more calm and relaxed now that he had thrown extra effort into the fight. In retrospect, he considered, he probably could have gotten the same effect even if he hadn't been so unusually ruthless. If they had been more than robots, he might have felt a little bad about it, but they weren't and now, facing Jett again didn't seem so bad. His eyes slid closed for a moment as he calmed himself and he turned to look for the others. He remembered he had heard their cannon fire some distance behind him. Fortunately, he found he didn't need to look far - they had already found him.

Or perhaps, as he discovered, unfortunately might've been a more fitting word. Forte blinked, baffled at their expressions. X quickly teleported away, but not before Forte caught the worried look in his eyes. Jett, on the other hand, stayed behind, his own gaze cold and thoughtful, like that of a father with his child behind him, eyeing a deadly viper and determining how to kill it.

"Teleport back to base, Forte."

From his tone alone, the darker reploid realized what had happened. He stood silently, his eyes slightly wider than normal. "Sir, I know what you think, but I-"

"Don't argue with me. Do it."

Forte bit his tongue to keep himself from saying anything else, but did as he was told. For all the good that battle did him, it may as well not have happened at all for the way he felt at that moment, but he controlled himself. Both his commander and his friend now had it in their heads that he was infected with the Maverick virus and it was up to him to prove that he wasn't. Still, he couldn't help his irritation.

Why does no one in this damn base trust me?!

A/N: Grr... This chappy sooo bit my bum. I mean it had my arse grilled with two sides and a soda to go. I know where I'm goin with it; I've known where I'll take this for 3 bloody years now. If only I hadn't made so many changes to the story along the way... But hey! It's long! That's a plus. And I said I would make it long, didn't I?

Okie, one little thing here. There's a flashback line in this chapter somewhere, and some parts are choppy... Apologies to anyone who was annoyed with that because I'm quickly running out of ideas on how to write this thing and I needed something to kick this thing into what I have going for it. I realized recently that my fic is starting to go off into outerspace instead of following the storyline like it needs to, so I'm trying to shove it back on course. Unfortunately, that's not easy, as I'm now finding out. Hopefully, next chappy will be more focussed than this one was and I won't have such a pain in the arse trying to write it.