Another Kind of Nightmare
A Megaman X fanfiction by Black Mantle
Unwanted OptionsThat evening, E Katie, Arm and Dr. Cain sat down for supper to discuss their respective days.
"So, did you two have a nice time?" Asked the doctor.
E toyed with some odd brown mass on his plate with his fork. "I had a good time; it was nice to have a day off."
"It wasn't until halfway through the movie that you finally started to ease up." Katie picked up some green bubbles that were a cross between peas and marshmallows in her spoon and brought them to her mouth. "Yoh wref wewe…"
The skunk chewed her food and swallowed. "You were really tense for most of the day. I'm glad I took you to a romantic movie, you would probably have gone postal had we gone to that action flick they were showing."
Arm chuckled. "You went to a romantic movie; did you lean on each other shoulders, wrap you arms around each other, and start making purring noises?"
Arm got a face-full of the brown thing on E's plate. "'Purring noises'? What kind of weirdo are you?"
"Oh, you want a fight, huh?" Arm scooped up some of the food on his plate with his spoon, and was about to fling it at E across the table.
"Stop it." Dr. Cain sighed. "All the reploids in the world, and I get stuck with you three."
Katie was sitting across from Cain and tried to stay out of E and Arm's spat, undeserving of being grouped with the others. "Doctor, what happened at the town hall today?"
"As good as could be expected, I suppose; you sure set of a fire storm with that bomb you dropped a few days ago." Cain glanced as E. "You really should be there tomorrow."
"Why, what happens tomorrow?"
"The committee has decided to end the debate on bill B-154, they're going to take their findings to the city and come to a decision on it within a week or so. Tomorrow they'll be having some closing statements."
"So that's it. After tomorrow, it's all the hands of the bureaucrats."
"Basically, yes. We could try to arrange a private meeting with some of the city's board members, or even the mayor; but you'd better have a real hum dinger to tell them, or we won't even get in the door."
"Damn, I should have been there today." E slammed his fist on the table. "A crucial debate on the future of all reploids, and I was taking the day off!"
Katie felt a bit guilty over hearing that; if she had known the debate was going to be cut off, she wouldn't have taken the day off either, nor would she have insisted on E coming along. Knowing E as well as she did, this news was going to make him worse than last night.
E started to mutter uncontrollably, hardly coherent. "Stupid idiots… bigots… bureaucrats… legal weasels…"
The other three looked on, not knowing what to say to calm him down. Katie was feeling guilty, Arm was trying to ignore him while eating his meal, and Dr. Cain was trying to think of all the advice that his professors gave him back in university that might fit in this situation; but they never had to deal with emotionally unstable robots. E continued to brood.
"E, I'm sorry about this. I shouldn't have taken you away like that."
E didn't bother answering Katie; he was too lost in himself.
"Forget it. We're all scared, and E needed some time off. You did him a world of good, even if he doesn't realize it." Arm went back to eating.
Dr. Cain looked over his three robotic companions and came up with a sure fire way to break the ice. He plunged his spoon in his mashed potatoes and flung the blob right at E's head.
"What the? Arm!"
"What? I didn't."
Katie noticed that it was human food splattered on E's face. "Dr. Cain?"
"If you're all done messing up supper, I have something to say. E, just what would you have done today if you had gone to the meeting?"
E thought for a moment wanting to blurt out something just in anger over the doctor's stupid question, but he didn't have an answer; everything he knew was on the recording he gave the council a few days ago, there was nothing more to add.
"Then why are you moping? There was nothing for you to say, so there was nothing for you to do. I know you're worried about B-154 passing, but it just makes things worse the longer it goes, whether it passes or fails; it'd be a lot better if this was gotten out of the way. If it fails, you can then rest; if it passes, you can put it behind you that much sooner and get on with your life, whatever you decide to do."
E wiped the rest of the potatoes off his head, thinking about what the human said. "And if it passes, then what do we do?"
"It's your decision, stay and live with it, or try to leave; but worrying about it gets you nowhere. What you said last week was quite effective; you handled yourself well and expressed your concerns. The best thing you can do is get some rest, and go back tomorrow; either to listen, or to express any final thoughts, but to do so calmly and confidently."
E sat for a moment, thinking about it. "I suppose your right."
"Good. We'll finish supper, take it easy for a bit, and go to bed."
After supper, Dr. Cain and the three reploids sat in the living room, watching the television; normally the news would be the first thing on, but since everyone wanted to relax, not one second of the depressing programming flashed on the screen. Ignoring news programming dramatically cut into the choice of viewing, but there were still enough game shows, sitcoms and sports to keep from switching on 24 hour infomercials.
During a commercial break, Katie got up and headed upstairs.
"Where are you going?"
"Just gone to powder my nose."
Katie left, leaving E to ponder what she was doing; that statement always meant that she was gone for a few minutes, but the excuse was lame since it meant that a lady was going to the bathroom, but reploids don't need bathrooms. After a few minutes, Katie came back carrying a box that was tied up with a bright red ribbon.
"Happy birthday."
Katie handed the box to E and sat down next to him.
"Thanks." E quickly glanced around the room. "Where's your gifts?"
Arm responded with the dumbest excuse in the book. "It's in the mail."
"Oh forget him."
E turned back to the present at hand, lifting it to judge its weight, and tilting it to try and hear anything; all he could determine was that it was light and it wasn't made of anything solid.
"What is it? It's kind of light, perhaps a scarf?"
"No."
"It's too small to be a hat."
"Oh would you shut up and just open it."
E could tell that Katie was getting impatient. Her voice had hints of anticipation and even worry; perhaps she was concerned that he might not like it. E undid the ribbon and opened the lid; inside, he could see a shadow of what looked like a small person. He reached in and pulled out a small plush doll.
"It's me?"
The doll was very cartoony with an insane smile painted on its face, and it bore a costume similar to the one E used to wear, the black, red and gold combination made fashionable almost a century before.
(Why did she get one made to look like Elecman?) E studied the doll a bit more, noticing the accuracies and inaccuracies of the model, trying to figure out why Katie would give him such a thing. (I don't know if I should be happy or disturbed.)
"So, what do you think?"
E wasn't sure how to answer. He could tell by how shyly Katie asked the question that she honestly didn't know how he would react to it, whether he would like it, or if it would drive him crazy.
"Well, it's well made and I certainly don't have one."
E looked at it some more, in particular the face. The gold mask around the eyes was similar to his, but it didn't cross in front of the face, instead it just circled around the outside and ended at a point at his cheeks. The large open eyes and the lack of a nose were weird, but E just figured it was the style of the doll. Then he was drawn to the strange open mouthed smile that it had; he thought it was such a totally strange look, no one smiles like that, not even in cartoons. Ignorant that there were people watching, as they were his friends, E imitated the dopy face of the doll. He couldn't hold it for more than a minute before he had to laugh; not really loud, more of a quick chuckle. For all the weirdness and creepiness that the caricature of Elecman held, it was also funny.
"It's adorable; it's cavity-inducingly cute, but I love it."
In a way the doll represented all the things in the past that didn't exist now, cleaned up and spiffed up in a way that hid all the bad stuff that Elecman represented as one of Dr. Wily's minions and shone brightly with all of the good things to be found in memories. It was like looking at the world in rose-colored glasses.
The next morning, the four got on their way to city hall for what would be the conclusion of the debate. The trip was pretty uneventful, as were most of the proceedings. E listened to what everyone said, waiting for anything that was worth arguing; but there were very few things brought up and it seemed that things might come to a close within an hour of starting. The reploid also looked around at the faces of everyone in the room, many of whom had been there for weeks, and were also growing tired of the proceedings; some had only been there a day or two, perhaps taking an interest now that it's winding down and looking for a summary. But out there, E could see that there were many eyes that gazed his way; many really couldn't believe that one of Dr. Wily's robots could still be around rebuilt as a reploid, and wondered what other secrets E might have.
"We can't blame all reploids for what happened."
"My husband died in the war against the mavericks, I can't afford to lose my son like that."
"I have severe medical problems, and my reploid nurse is the only one I can find who can take care of me."
"We don't have to destroy the reploids, but why can't we monitor and track them."
E listened carefully, devising hundreds of rebuttals to most everything negative said, and thousands of examples to back up the positive; but what he really wanted was to judge the feeling of the people, that was really all that mattered. Who cared about Arcadia, or whether or not B-154 passed; if the people here didn't want them, then why stick around?
After almost two hours, many people had addressed the debate, but E remained silent; waiting to hear all he could. Eventually, the chairman called the debate to closure.
"Then if no one else wishes to address the council." The chairman paused for a second.
E wondered if he should jump in and add anything, but ultimately, he had nothing.
"In that case, I am declaring this debate adjourned."
The next day, E and Katie were walking downtown talking about the future; they had done everything they conceivably could, and were leaving it up to fate to decide what happens next.
"This waiting is going to kill me. How much longer do you think it will take? Shopping usually calms me down, but this stress is too much."
"Not sure; there's another bill or two ahead of 154, a week, maybe more. Sure it's possible that the thing might just die from endless arguing; what do they call that?"
Katie thought a second. "A filibuster?"
Despite being so deeply involved in the political process as of late, neither really knew a whole lot about politics or the way legislatures worked, least of all the correct terminology. "Something like that."
"And what will we do if it passes?"
"It'll still take a while for it to come into effect. We could stay and fight, but considering how things have gone so far, I'm inclined to say we should leave."
"Run away, to where…"
"Wherever we can, there must be someplace out there for us. If we have to, we'll make a home somewhere on the surface; at the very least there will be no humans to compete with, but there's not much else up there."
"To live as nomads, to live in a desert, rejected by the rest of the world."
"There must be something better out there, this is but one city, and Arcadia's reach is not infinite."
The next day, the reploids started preparations; knowing that B-154 might pass, they were preparing to leave and find a new home, just in case. Katie and Arm were shopping and packing supplies for their trip, while E was on the surface working on a vehicle to take them as far as needed. E liked the peace and quiet; a small garage in the abandoned upper world was a perfect place to get some work done without interruption, and totally different than the hassle of the public debates he had been going to for the last few weeks.
He spent most of his time elbow deep in the car, far too concerned with getting it working to bother looking out onto the wasteland that was now Earth. Before Sigma's final assault, the upper world was trying to restore itself, new life was growing where there was barren land before; but now the terrain was just that, desolate and lifeless. There were days that E was outside, looking at the desert that reminded him of why some people hated the reploids so much, and it made him very sad; not only because of what other reploids had done, but because of how his kind were being ostracized for it now. He wondered how long it would take for everything to heal, the environment and people's hearts.
But today there was no time for that; he had to get this car working. Many of the parts were badly damaged or rusted out; E hoped that he'd be able to pull enough spare parts from around the garage and other scrapped vehicles to get this one working, but when complete it would be one Frankenstein of a vehicle. E was trying to calculate how far their makeshift automobile would have to get them; the nearest town was less than 20 km away, but it would certainly be under the same pressure from Arcadia as Burlington was. No, they'd have to go further, and the farther the better. Heading west, there were about 14 cities within 500 km; the largest was around 340 km away. E figured he could easily get this thing to go 500 km, but he wasn't going to settle for something that short, just in case anti-reploid sentiment emanated from another place as much as it did from Arcadia.
There were other things to consider for the trip. Although E figured he could get the vehicle into good enough shape to make a long trip, a car still needed fuel; hopefully, the solution to this problem would lie with several large metal containers and a trailer that could be towed behind. But a car also needed a road, if they found the terrain too difficult, a 100 km trip could easily turn into 1000; this was a problem he had no solution for, other than to pray that the land to the west was relatively flat.
This was going to be a long and exhausting trip, and could easily turn very bad, very quickly; all the more reason to hope that B-154 didn't pass in the first place. The trip would be hard; very likely that they might be forced to turn around and return, facing the consequences, or not making it back at all. E shook those ideas out of his head. No, he had to stay positive; he was positive that the car would drive just fine, he was positive that they would find a new home, he was positive that Katie would pick up a box or two of those simulated fruit cakes he liked.
E returned to working on the car. He was sure the engine was fine, but a lot of the accompanying parts were not so good; fuel injector, carburetor, steering, transmission, radiator, much of it needed to be repaired or replaced. While he was back under the hood, he didn't notice that someone was approaching from the main garage door.
"Hey there."
E wasn't sure, perhaps he was hearing things, but he looked up to check anyway. "Hello?"
Over by the garage doors a shadow was seen leaning on the side. "Just passing by, then I noticed somebody in here."
"What are you doing out here?"
"I like it up here, there's nobody around to bother me with everyone cowering underground."
"Perhaps you should spend a bit more time down below, some real important stuff going on."
"You mean that B-154 thing."
"Yah, that thing. There going to clamp down on us, you should be concerned."
"That doesn't bother me any."
E was a bit alarmed, why would another reploid not care about B-154. "What? Why not?"
"I don't care what a bunch of silly humans do."
"Well you should, they're going to come after everyone of us, and turn us into prisoners, or slaves."
"I suppose that's why you've wasted your time in those debates."
"Yes, that's why I wasted my time. I don't know who you are, but maybe you should actually show a little concern."
"Not like anything I did could undo the damage you did. That was a pretty big gamble you made, telling them you were once one of Wily's robots. Too bad all it seems to have done is to scare the living daylights out of everyone. Face it, you screwed up."
"I didn't screw up anything." E removed himself from the guts of the car and looked towards the door, but the stranger he was talking to was no longer in sight.
E headed for the door, and looked around, but saw no one. "Where did he go?" E looked up and saw a flap of the cape as it folded behind a rooftop.
"He's not getting away." E charged his pylons and floated up, not bothering to question how the stranger got up there so fast.
Up on the roof, E had reached the top and had to duck as the stranger fired a bolt of plasma right for his head.
"Hey!"
The caped stranger was easier to see on the rooftop, but still shrouded as he fled, almost flying away.
"Get back here." E gave chase.
The shrouded one ran over the rooftops; but upon reaching the edge he jumped, and seemed to float in the air as he arced towards the next roof. E wasn't about to let him get away and followed the same path, running to the edge and floating to the next roof. This pattern of running and flying continued for several buildings.
E got tired of chasing, and thought a little threat might get the stranger to stop, or perhaps incapacitate him. Charging his power in his right hand, E fired a small electrical discharge at the caped one; though small for E, it would easily put a human flat on his back. The stranger was not ignorant of E's chase or his attack, and stopped momentarily as the charge flew right into him; but it did not reach. The charge struck a barrier a few feet from the stranger and traced a sphere around the tormentor.
"Heh, heh, pathetic."
"Nice shield, I don't suppose you'd be interested in a stress test." E was definitely ticked off enough to really let the electrons fly, but the stranger shrugged him off.
"I didn't come here for a fight, though I'll give you one if you want. I thought that we could talk, about things, and maybe I might have some advice for your little problem."
"My problem, this is something that will affect all reploids, even you. Why are you packing this attitude?"
"Just the way I am. But it really is not my concern if Burlington passes bill B-52, or whatever it is."
"What? Why not? Who are you? Are you from Arcadia? Take off that blasted cape and show your face."
"No, I'm not from Arcadia, but I am from somewhere very close by."
The joker pulled down the hood, revealing a face that E had not seen in a long time, one that he hardly remembered, and took what seemed like a lifetime to recall from the murky depths. When he finally recalled it, E jolted in shock from a sneer that hit him like a ton of bricks.
"Forte?"
To Be Continued
This is a fanfiction, and as such, most of the characters in the story are not mine. Most characters are © Capcom and are used without permission. Pheromone "Katie" Skunk is © Black Mantle.