-- Chapter 01: Awakening --

- ATMOSPHERE, 0258 HRS -

It was two days after the pod had been launched. The spherical object's engine was now beginning to sputter... it was losing some of its power. With this, it began a slow descent towards the ground. After a short while, the engine finally went out and the pod plunged downwards through the atmosphere, crash-landing somewhere in the snowfields.

- SUB-ZERO SNOWFIELDS, 0600 HRS -

Kardina Zendarquor trudged through the snowfields, sighing to himself as he adjusted his wolf-like helmet. His shackle boots clinked softly as he lifted them to walk through the snow. The necklace around his neck, with its blue gem, shook slightly in the wind. Lord Sigma had been beaten again by the Hunters some time ago, and Kardina had lost communications with his superior. It had been... how long HAD it been?... since he had been felled by the young Reploid known only as Axl. As he sifted through the thick snow, he observed a spherical object in the distance. As he came closer to the object, he could see that it was mechanical and quite big. Looking over it, he saw a set of buttons. Just before he could press anything, however, he observed a sudden flash of light behind him through the pod's reflective surface. Hurriedly rolling to the side, Kardina observed as the buster shot hit the pod. Kardina's advanced Reploid eyes took in the pattern of plasma dispersion from the shot hitting the capsule and identified it to be from a standard-issue Maverick Hunter buster. Kardina whipped out his dual KZ-Buster machine pistols and returned fire, before he was forced to roll to one side and hide behind a snow mound as machine gun fire dotted the ground behind him. He picked up one of the bullets and identified it as standard-issue Maverick Hunter bullets again. He flicked it away... obviously these guys were just rookies out on routine patrol.

Unknownst to Kardina or the Hunters, the buster shot hitting the pod had triggered off something. Inside the pod, a dark form stirred...

Kardina peeked out from behind the snow mound and counted his enemies. Five, six... no, SEVEN of them. Yep. Definately rookies. Seasoned Hunters rarely, if ever, carry out routine patrol missions in such large groups... heck, the best of the best even did it ALONE. He spotted one of them raise his hand to his ear, and realised he was about to send a transmission. He levelled his busters and...

"Azure to HQ, we've spotted... ARRRRGH!"

That was the Hunter's last scream as plasma shots from Kardina's busters tore multiple holes through his armour. The remaining six immediately started firing wildly, kicking up smoke and causing him to duck back behind the snow mound. He spotted another one making a transmission through the smoke, and quickly aimed a shot at his head, firing quickly before ducking down again. He heard a yell... Bullseye.

"Raid's down!"

"Damn it... we can't send transmissions now. This guy's obviously experienced, he'll just pick em' off! Terminate him first!"

Kardina stifled a laugh. Well, at least this one was slightly more experienced than the others, but... "Terminate" him? They would pay for underestimating him...

"Dammit! Where's he anyway?!"

"Search the area!"

Kardina heard the Hunters shuffle their feet, then begin spread out over the area. He darted out again and shot another one to smithereens, but another had apparently gotten a little too close, and he was holding a shock rod. Kardina instantly recognised the weapon; it was another Hunter weapon "reserved" for the rookies, but it was useful in melee combat as it was capable of sending an electric shock through one's opponent... which Kardina experienced firsthand as the Hunter's shock rod connected with his right shoulder. The electric shock coursing through his body, more particularly his right arm, caused him to drop the pistol in his right hand.

Thinking quickly, Kardina holstered his other pistol in his left hand and drew a dagger with his right hand, the blade pointing backwards, all in one smooth motion, just as the rest spun around, and one raised his buster to fire. He placed the hilt of the dagger to the Hunter's abdomen. The Hunter's mouth curled up in a smirk, but that quickly disappeared as a sword blade extended, piercing through his gut. Kardina quickly removed the dagger from the Hunter's stomach, kneeling to pick up the pistol he dropped at the same time, while using the corpse as a shield; luckily they were only standard Hunter-issue busters and couldn't charge, unlike the famous X's X-Buster, for if they could, they'd pierce right through the corpse and hit Kardina. Kardina then pushed forward with his legs and sprung at the second, discarding the earlier corpse, as buster fire connected with the ground behind him. He buried the shorter blade of his dagger in the second rookie's chest. He turned around and pushed the Hunter's body into the path of the rest's buster fire, where shot after shot made contact with the body before it finally fell to the ground. Kardina was about to attack another Hunter when an earth-shaking roar stopped him in his tracks. The remaining three Hunters ceased firing. They all looked towards the pod.

A large claw suddenly punched a hole through the hull of the pod and rushed for the nearest target. The unlucky Hunter's eyes widened, as the sharp claw pierced through his chest and twisted before withdrawing. Another claw took hold of the top part of the hole and used it to easily lift the top half of the pod, throwing it off. It was now that Kardina beheld the contents of the pod. He- she- it?... looked like a gargantuan, limbless Reploid. Its head boasted a sharp horn, and its eyes had an evil look around them. The Reploid had no nostrils, though it did have a set of sharp-looking fangs. Seeing this, the remaining two opened fire upon it, but it didn't even scratch the paint. However, the titan of a Reploid was visibly annoyed, and letting forth another ear-splitting roar, put it's claws together, and Kardina observed the two dark purple crystals in its palms glow once before a large ball of energy formed in front of its palms and an immensely powerful beam shot forth. When the beam dissipated, the two Hunters were nowhere to be seen... not a single bolt remained of them.

Awed by the power of the Reploid, Kardina started to back away from it. As he backed away, the Reploid looked around and spotted him. Kardina started at this. "What... what are you?!" He exclaimed.

The Reploid chuckled at this. "Put away your weapons, little one. You obviously cannot hurt me even if you try." As Kardina resheathed his weapons, the mechanical being laughed again. "Do not fear, little one. I will not hurt you if you don't strike me."

Though he was somewhat reassured, Kardina still kept his guard up, not putting away the dagger or the pistol. He repeated his earlier question. "What are you?"

"Ha! What I know of myself... is disturbingly minimal. All I know is that I known as Diablos."

"Diablos..." The black-armoured Maverick said to himself. "Why are you taking me into your confidence? Aren't you afraid that I would hurt you?"

"Little one, surely you underestimate me. As I said, your little weapons cannot do more than dent me. I have a lot of armour and I would easily have crushed you by the time you could do anything to hurt me seriously. Let us not talk of conflict however. Join me, little one, and I shall give you great power."

"Great power, huh? What great power could I get from you that I can't from Lord Sigma? Also, my name's Kardina Zendarquor, not 'little one'." Kardina had now taken a good long look at Diablos, and was convinced to put away his weapons. He knew Diablos was right- neither of his weapons would be able to dent it. Besides, Diablos did not appear to be attacking him anytime soon, and was wanted Kardina to join him. Judging by the Reploid's looks, it probably wasn't smart enough to do any backstabbing of the sort, unlike Kardina, and was probably sincere in it's request- as sincere, of course, as what such an imposing Reploid could be.

The huge Reploid raised a proverbial eyebrow at Kardina's mention of Sigma. "Sigma... Scanning database..." After a while of pondering, it found what it was looking for. "Sigma, former leader of the Maverick Hunter 17th unit, defeated nine times in the past. You are working with one who consistently fails, Kardina. Why would you follow such a person? Join me and your schemes shall never fail!"

"Hmm..." Kardina pondered this for a moment. Lord Sigma never WAS the type to come back very soon, and when he didn't want to be found, it was nigh impossible to find him, and hell would probably freeze over before you could... unless you were the Maverick Hunters. He hated to admit it, but given their sheer numbers, they could cover more land in a day than Kardina could cover alone in a year. Besides, he WAS kinda tired of wandering, and he needed to pass the time more... interestingly. Besides, the 'power' this giant proposed WOULD be a desirable side-effect... "You have a point there. Very well then, I'll join you."

"Good! Now, I need a staging location to build my army..."

"I know just the place. Follow me..." Kardina said, as he led the other Reploid towards the deserted Crimson Palace...

- SUB-ZERO PLATEAU, 0604 HRS -

A lone figure, eyes closed, was sitting cross-legged on the plateau with his weapon beside him. He would look like he was stoning to the casual observer, but upon closer inspection one could see that he was, in fact, meditating. He'd been meditating for many a hour already, in fact.

That is, until his eyes suddenly snapped open.

"What!! These energy signals?!... Impossible! Has it begun already...? This is sooner than I anticipated..."

The figure picked up his weapon that was beside him and began trekking south, towards the snowfields...

Maybe he SHOULD have cared about spherical objects descending from the heavens after all.

- SUB-ZERO FOREST, 0605 HRS -

"Accelerando! Accel! Do you read me?"

Accel raised an eyebrow. He'd decided to spend a couple days away from the Maverick Hunters for now... X and Zero were constantly bickering due to boredom, and the least Accel wanted to be was to be part of them. Besides, he needed a vacation, mainly due to said bickering, and he LIKED snow... so he decided to take leave and head north to the snowfields, where he was currently wandering. He ignored the fact that he was black-armoured with a red, slightly tattered scarf, thus making him stick out like a sore thumb amongst the white snow.

In any case, it was strange that Signas would contact him now. Signas rarely contacted Accel on matters NOT regarding duty- besides that time Signas told him to do an Irish jig when Accel was away on that other vacation, but X and Zero had later disclosed they'd made him drunk first- so Accel thought the same of this too... though it was strange he would be called back into duty now. It was peace time, after all- no wars, no Mavericks, no bald clown running around making life difficult, and best of all, no casualties... apart from all the times Zero injures someone. Come to think of it, those were pretty common.

Anyway, Accel raised two fingers and pressed a button behind his red demisemiquaver-covered ear and said casually, "Loud and clear, Commander."

"We've lost contact with a rookie group of Hunters on routine patrol in the Sub-Zero Snowfields up north at oh-six-oh-four hours. We want you to check it out. And before you ask, yes, you're the only one in the area, meaning your vacations cancelled."

Accel narrowed his eyes, ignoring the remark about his vacation. A group of Hunters, eradicated? This just had "Mavericks" written all over it. His voice becoming notably more stern, a change from his earlier casual tone, he said, "I'm on it. Independent Maverick Hunter Accelerando, signing off."

"Don't keep saying that-" were Signas' last words before Accel cut the transmission. Off-topic, he was fairly surprised Signas would care about him saying his long, long title at the end of every transmission, especially NOW.

In any case, Accel sighed as he began trekking further north, towards the snowfields.

"Goddamnit."