Chapter 2

A Chance? Me?

The lights were dimmed in the room. Scanners swept his body, leaving green trails. Up and down, left and right, around all ways. The report came in soon to the Hunters.

Stryfe laid in the capsule, aware of his life but not being able to move. Only to think. This seems so familiar…maybe it was all just a dream after all? But sadly to himself, Stryfe could only wave away that possibility. The pain was real. His chest crystal was chipped, and the slash that ran his back up was amazingly deep.

But he could hear voices, he swore. In his head, probably. Just Altimus trying to tease him more about his failure. Just all of the Projects trying to ignite his fury, possibly. Just his own voice, talking down at himself at the failure, probably. All of those at once? Definitely.

But it was not so, unfortunately. Just voices in his head that would not leave.

Failure…

Get up! Show these puny mortals their folly!

And to think you were the link…!

As the final voice guffawed into the distance, Stryfe did realize behind those voices were different ones. The old voices definitely seemed surreal now. The new ones spoke with amazing clarity…they seemed real.

"Hazard…prepare the ESP chamber," the first voice said. Stryfe tried to open his eyes to see who it was who was talking, but they were being quite

"I will…but first, consider this…what if we didn't have to kill him?" the second voice, "Hazard", answered.

"What?! How? He has…" Signas stopped to check a clipboard in his hands…then shrugged, "way too many different viruses!" Signas began to walk away, convinced he was right…

Hazard's voice stopped him dead. "Project Evane? What about that?" Hazard knew he had hit somewhere deep. Signas had long been proud of the project, but after it was proved to be faulty and unworking, he had lost quite a bit of pride. If he could get the project to work, he could reunite all of the hunters under him without further ridicule. He only had one quarrel…

"But…that could kill him!" he yelled back at Hazard. Project Evane was highly dangerous, and the last 3 patients under it's care died of a complete hard disk wipe.

"Oh, NOW you show sympathy," Hazard rolled his eyes, "Come on, with Evane, either all viruses are removed, or he dies. It's better chances than the ESP chamber, I know that much for sure." Hazard smirked to himself, careful not to bask too much in the glory.

"…but—" Signas started, but Hazard quickly and forcefully put a finger up to his mouth, scowling. "Either way we win. Right, Signas?"

"I suppose you're right, Hazard," Signas admitted. Inside, he was happy that Hazard still had any faith in the work, but he simply feared the consequences of it not working again far too much to admit it openly. Hazard smiled one final time, and footsteps were heard to Stryfe. Stryfe fell to sleep, convinced he would not survive whatever this oncoming project was. Finally, the eternal sleep hung over him like a welcomed pendulum.

He woke up again, much to his distaste—now, VERY much to his distaste. He heard a machine whirring, as a circle of glass was removed from the top. He heard whirring, a strange whirring. Then, his body filled with horrific pain as a large needle seemed to rip right through his chest effortlessly. Stryfe was in excruciating, unearthly pain, but didn't move. Inside he felt as if his heart was ripped from him, but he wasn't dying. Torture if there was any. He was convinced that he had died and gone to Hell. Anything's better than…it stopped. Stryfe's thoughts cut off.

Signas grunted as the machine had stopped with the virus removal bar only at 42. He thought it was all over. He prepared to rip off his badge… But then, like a godsend to his ears, the whir that sounded of the seraphim's song, and the machine started up again. It finished virus removal even faster than expected, and the glass was replaced. Turbines in the Capsule moved as the entire glass lifted off. Stryfe was quickly taken out and rushed to the repair wing by Hazard. Signas smiled.

Stryfe woke up. His subconscious enemies were dead. He almost seemed normal. Then again, it was hard to tell—he had never really been normal before. He opened his eyes slowly, glad that he could finally move again. And to Stryfe, it felt so good. It reminded him immediately of what just happened. He tried to move his arms up to inspect his gaping wound if it was still there, but he had not the energy. He then focused back to reality, and yelped at his careless mistake. He stood face to face with an EXTREMELY bright light over him, and quickly closed his eyes again shut again. He heard a chuckle from beside him, and lolled his head over to open an eye, let focus, and look upon his addresser.

"That light is epsilon energy, you shouldn't open your eyes to it," Hazard said. "They could burn. However, don't worry, I assume you know what this does?" he asked. Stryfe shook his head. Inside his head, Hazard was grinning. He had an odd urge to teach people about the world one day. He continued, "Well, it's epsilon light. The epsilon energy takes the atomic information of anything and creates more. Your armor, and inside CPU components are back, but that diamond's going very slowly."

Stryfe mumbled something. "What's that?" Hazard asked, leaning closer, eyes narrowed by the light.

"…Nothing." Stryfe replied, and, smiling, he once again allowed himself to fall into a deep sleep. This time, however, he wasn't to be assaulted by any voices, or pains. He truly thought his life would be better now.

When Stryfe woke up the next day, he was in a new room he had definitely never seen before. He stood up and rubbed his eyes. A silly reflex, he had to think, as it seemed to only mimic humans, but reploids two got contaminates in their "vision sensors."

The room had no one in it but a central column in the center of the room and supplies draping most of the walls. He had just woken up from the last note of interest beside the opposite automatic door, a pretty nice recharging capsule. The column in the middle was three sided, and rounded, with a screen crossing it. Something blipped onto the screen suddenly, a wav file playing it seemed.

The computer voice said, "Good morning, Stryfe." Stryfe blinked, and laughed aloud to himself. What am I here for? Do they truly expect me to stay in this dump? What a joke! A new file. "What's on your mind?" the computer advanced.

Stryfe's laughter died down, and he chuckled out a "nothing." He reached onto his back to check for his weapon. Not there.

He frantically looked about, but soon found that it lay on a desk, newly cleaned and n

doubt fixed from any damage. He walked over and picked up the Ultimus Blade. The hilt read strange runes that Stryfe had never figured out, but glowed eerily. The runes seem to stand for something familiar, yet so distant. And it only reminded Stryfe of his obligations he had to get to. Stryfe looked out a nearby window and growled. Altimus…

Stryfe walked out of his chamber, and looked around. It was a long hall, lined with doors with Squad names and number of commands on top. Stryfe noticed he had been assigned to the Training squad, number of command: 13. Stryfe sighed, shrugged, and walked around a bit, determined to dig around before leaving without another word.

He eventually ran into a red-clad reploid with long hair. Stryfe laughed inside, but didn't dare out loud. He was daring, not stupid. "Hello," Stryfe said.

Zero looked at him with apathy. "Bah. You must be the new recruit." Zero chuckled, and locked his gaze with Stryfe's. "I'll enjoy destro—err…training with you." Stryfe felt like beating his down then and there, but something distracted him from his uncontrollable violence. Stryfe noticed he had a badge on one of his shoulders that read 'ZERO - Commander of Special Unit #0' but then noticed a smaller one under it that read 'Trainer of Command 13' Stryfe faked a gulp, very much pretending to be scared, and walked away. He heard Zero laughing at him. Tool.

Later he met another reploid, but this time blue-clad and not nearly as armored. Stryfe read the badge again, smirking. 'MEGAMAN X – Commander of Elite Unit #17' "Hi there," the friendly voice of 'X' said to him, throwing him off quite a bit. "H-hi…" Stryfe replied.

Dammit! He's breaking up my rhythm…I'll have to get him later. Of course…

"…? Why so shy?" X asked and tilted his head. "…it's nothing!" Stryfe blurted, incredibly rude for the reploid he was talking to. X shrugged, "Whatever you say. So, where do you come from?" "…I can't quite answer that. I'm just terribly sorry," Stryfe said sarcastically and was on his way. X blinked to himself. "Whatever then," X shrugged and walked away oppositely.

He finally reached the main lobby. The walls were lined with awards the base had got from the council of Maverick Hunters, and under each award, a different teleporter Doors with the names of units over them led everywhere about the complex. He finally found the Training unit, grinned to himself, and walked right on in. This ought to be interesting.

When he went in, he encountered a ring of 30 more doors. Dammit, no time for this…what was the number? He shrugged entered 13, and sure enough, there stood Zero, saber withdrawn. "So, ready to start?" Zero grinned. Stryfe slowly got into a fighting stance, easily fooling Zero with clumsy movements.

"Good!" Zero charged him with his saber drawn, and slashed at Stryfe wide. The strength and precision were perfect; the cut doubtlessly would easily sever even a novice reploid in two. But Stryfe was no novice. Stryfe had jumped before Zero even started the attack, and was still in the air, boot brought backwards. He brought it forward and his foot smacked into Zero's face, the force of the attack sending Zero skidding and tumbling backwards like a fool.

"What's this?! …play me for a fool, will you?! No such luck!" Zero charged him again, and this time feinted a stab, spun backwards and overhead to slash downwards at Stryfe. A tricky attack, Stryfe had to admit. Stryfe again wasn't about to die. He brought his blade upwards forcefully and almost managed to push Zero's blade back on himself, but no such luck. They held in a deadlock until Stryfe quickly dipped low, snapped the blade downwards, and raised a large slash upwards, just barely dodging Zero's saber. Zero jumped backwards, and, now fully engaged in battle, stabbed downwards quickly. A subtle shift of Stryfe's saber parried, and he took a leap forward, bringing his other hand came up, leading his saber to the right, and uppercut to Zero's chin, again launching him upwards nicely. Zero landed on the floor, scrambled to his feet, and jumped, screaming a war cry. The downward slash was sidestepped this time, and Zero's throat met Stryfe's hand.

Stryfe's saber hand shot out and harmlessly disarmed Zero. However, Zero was not the only one engrossed in combat. By now, Stryfe was determined to take Zero's life, and he squeezed his throat harder, ignoring the useless swings of Zero's arms and the labored gasps. This would be the end of this fool, he thought. But something had to finally stop him. It was the voice of the people he would hesitate to kill, stopping him from doing something so stupid and so harmful to his future. He let go.

"I give up!" blasted out of Zero's mouth breathlessly as he hit the floor, blasting most air out of inside him still. Stryfe sighed, nodded and sheathed Ultimus Blade. Stryfe turned around, and winced to himself. He spoke up, "Sorry, I got carried away…" and he walked out before Zero could get another word in. Outside, he met up with a crowd of reploids. 'What's that? A new recruit beat Zero?' 'Impossible!' 'He had to have been cheating!' But then Zero walked out, holding his relatively few wounds, and yelled over the crowd, silencing them.

"No. He won fair and square." Zero addressed Stryfe formally, limping up to him though. "Stryfe, I, Zero of Special Unit #0, grant you special permission to be assigned to a unit. Stryfe, you are to report to Unit #9 within 5 hours." Zero coughed. "And…good job." Zero smiled, and fell to the ground. Stryfe walked back to his quarters.

Well, maybe I'll hang around a little bit more. Just for the entertainment, of course. And nothing more. These pitiful fools need me.