X glowered at the plans he and Tabby had drawn up. They were sitting at a café by the Hawaiian beach, shaded by the palm trees. The sky was a beautiful cerulean blue, and they were sitting underneath a red and white striped sun canopy. Tabby was sipping a Hawaiian punch drink, and giving X a quizzical look.

"What's wrong, X?" She could tell something was making him unhappy, but she wasn't sure what. The plans looked pretty good to her. She had worked with the Planning Committee to find a really good construction firm with a long, honorable history that could create the new Hunter HQ. She'd also found a good site for it and had seen the real estate people about acquiring the property.

But nothing happened overnight, and throwing up the building would take at least six months. And that was when she was paying a premium for speed. It just couldn't be done any faster than that, which meant they needed to find a place to stay for six months. Even with their money, staying at the hotel was prohibitively expensive. They'd gotten a deal on bulk for these two months, and it was the off season for tourism, but soon people would be starting their winter Hawaiian vacations. The hotel would charge them an arm and a leg, if they even had that many rooms unreserved, which was doubtful.

So Tabby had come up with an idea, and okayed it with the real X. And it was giving the alternate X hives.

"It's this stuff about staying in the main Hunter HQ." X tapped away some ash from his cigarette, frowning. "I just… have a feeling that isn't going to work out too well."

"A premonition of doom?" Tabby said with a grin, then sobered as X shot her a look. "Sorry. But what can go wrong? We're going to be Hunters, and those people are US."

"That's exactly what I don't like," X said quietly, taking a sip of his punch. "We've had decades to get used to the idea of meeting ourselves. It doesn't bother any of us… but we've just shoved it on them. Remember what Dynamo said about how his double probably felt about having a copy?"

"Yes, but that's Dynamo." Tabby snorted. "He thinks he's the centre of the known universe." X smiled slightly… that was very true. "And even if they don't like it, so what? We're going to be staying here, and we'll have to work with them. Shouldn't they get used to it now?"

"Mmm." X took a drag on his cigarette, and admitted to himself that Tabby had a point. Still… "I hate walking into trouble." He frowned. "And how does the main HQ have enough rooms free, anyway?" Tabby grimaced.

"Well… the last war. They lost a lot of people. Still, a lot of us will have to share." X and Tabby shared a smile. With all the couples in their party, that wouldn't be a problem… a good ten rooms at the hotel were often left unused. They had rented them anyway just in case a few relationships broke up, and they made convenient gathering places for movies and other entertainments.

"Do we have any contingency plans if it goes sour?" X asked, and Tabby frowned, pulling out a brochure.

"The best I could come up with is a field we can rent for camping… they can accommodate large groups, and they have toilets and showers. It's up near the Rocky Mountains. We'll have to rent tents and stuff, though. Still, it should be a lot cheaper than staying here." She passed the brochure over to him, and X studied the pictures. It wasn't a very good brochure and the campsites didn't look that great, either. A low budget trip to the Rockies, by all appearances, but the meadows should give them enough space to practice. In Hawaii, they'd rented a vacant lot for that purpose.

"Alright. We'll give it one month at the Hunter HQ, and then make an evaluation on how it's going." X grimaced to himself. Despite all the arguments in favor of it, he had a very bad feeling about this…

A week later…

"And the flies of Texas are upon you…" Micky sang, softly but distinctly off key as he and Bicky got off the transport.

"Geez, Micky, if you can't hit the notes could you at least scare them going by?" Bicky shouldered his backpack, looking around. "Hey, it's just like ours was. Sweet!" The main Maverick Hunter HQ was almost painfully familiar, an echo of better times. By the time they had left their own world, all the outlying buildings had been falling apart from neglect. Only the core of the building had been maintained. Here, everything was in excellent condition, as their HQ had been during the wars with Sigma.

"Yeah, cool," Micky agreed. "I wonder if the cafeteria food sucks the same? Ow!" One of the chefs had been coming out behind him, and smacked him on the head with a spoon. "Sorry, Maria. I didn't mean YOUR cooking."

"You better not!" She snorted, but looked satisfied and concentrated on chivvying out her young children. Not many of the support personnel had stayed once the situation started to deteriorate, but Maria had stuck it out. She had gone from being a kitchen assistant to the manager of the kitchen, and once she had found out about Gate's project, she had brought in the rest of her family to manage almost everything else. By now, the Hunters couldn't imagine surviving without her and her clan.

"We're in… um…" Micky consulted a crumpled piece of paper. "H3-22. Rookie wing, ain't that a thing?" Bicky shrugged.

"Wherever they've got space." The two Hunters walked through the familiar halls, making their way to their new rooms. For a while, they admired the cleanly finished metal floors, the off white paint on the walls. It had all been in disrepair in their world, a victim of cutbacks. But eventually… "Um, Micky?"

"Gotcha Bic." Micky said softly, tensing slightly. They were catching a lot of hostile looks. Especially from some very familiar people. Micky and Bicky had no idea why, but it was strange and uncomfortable.

The situation came to a head when five Hunters moved to confront them.

"I can't believe you Mavericks would come back here…" One of them growled, and the pair of Hunters exchanged a look.

"We're not Mavericks," Bicky said mildly. "We're from another world. Surely you've heard?" He casually shifted his weight, and to a stranger it wouldn't have looked ominous, but Micky knew the signs. His best friend was ready for action.

"Yeah, right! That's such a story." A female Hunter chimed in. Micky recognized her from their world… she'd left the Hunters a long time ago, though. He couldn't recall her name. "I think this is some kind of trick of Sigma's. You might get around X, and that stupid Iris copy could get around Zero, but you won't get around US!" That made Micky and Bicky scowl simultaneously. Not at the doubt about their story, but the disrespect to X and Zero.

"Excuse ME." Micky said, extremely offended. "Do you people have freaking EYES? Have you noticed I'm human?" That silenced the female a moment, but she rallied all too soon.

"Just another trick!" She insisted, although one of her supporters stepped back, looking uneasy. One of the others, a large male, stepped forward to shove Bicky's shoulder-

And was met with a sizzling whip across the chest. Micky swore, and dodged a punch, pulling out his own whip.

"I HATE fistfights with Reploids!" In a real battle, he would have tried to get some distance and hit them with his guns. In this one, he couldn't do that without killing someone, and Micky didn't want to go that far. He slapped someone across the legs with his neural whip, and yelped as someone punched him in the chest, silently thanking God that he'd never taken off his armor.

They were outnumbered, but they were good at teamwork. They had a fighting chance.

Elsewhere, in the lounge…

"I was wondering if you could explain some things to me?" X said politely to his double. He was trying very hard to treat his double like an entirely new person, and not fall into the disapproving mindset he'd been in earlier. It wasn't easy. His double was smoking again, and drinking a glass of orange juice laced with vodka.

"Sure, if you want." The alternate X was looking at something else, though, and X followed his gaze… then blushed. Zero was necking with a young rookie Hunter on one of the couches. X spat into his ashtray, a gesture that eloquently expressed his disgust and completely appalled his double. "He's such a puta."

"A… what?" The original X said, staring at the ashtray. Spitting was another thing he would never, ever do.

"A whore." X sighed, taking a deep drag from his cigarette. "Would you believe he's slowing down? Only three orgies since we came here."

"You're joking, right?" The original X paled as his double gave him a level look. "You're NOT joking?"

"I only wish," X said, then shrugged. "He wasn't always like this. It's life-reaffirming behavior. We've all got it, to some degree."

"Life-reaffirming behavior?" X leaned forward, interested. "What's that?" He was genuinely curious, wondering what his double meant. He'd never heard that term before.

"Mmm… well, when I first noticed Zero getting so slutty, and some of the others picking up bad habits, I asked a councilor to come and have some talks with everyone, try to figure out what was wrong." X smiled faintly, remembering. "That was before I started smoking. She talked to everyone, then told me they were just reacting to the stress."

"We've fought almost ten wars and more missions than I can count. Stress?" X frowned at the implication that this world's Hunters weren't under stress. His double waved that away, and X winced as the other X sprinkled ash across the couch.

"That's a different kind of stress. And I bet it generates some of the same behavior, you just don't see it because Hunter HQ is so damn big here. But watching your world die by inches and not being able to do anything… that's serious, long term stress. Then add onto it police actions and riot control duties and you have some serious, nasty stress." The alternate X savagely stubbed out his cigarette, then drew out a new one. "After the army called us in is when I started to smoke. Have you ever killed a human before?"

"Of course not!" X said, shocked by the very question… then he gave his double a long look. "You have." It wasn't a question, but his double answered anyway.

"I don't know. I just don't know, and I think that's what bothers me the most… I ought to know if I killed someone. But riot control is just so confusing," X said softly, staring at nothing as he smoked his cigarette. "Even more confusing than a battlefield. The news about the black hole got out by accident… it was horrible, massive unrest, food riots, crackpot religions, you name it. Stupid, the damned thing wasn't going to affect us for almost fifty years but people were still so desperate… all I know is that I had blood on my armor when the first one was over. It seemed like there was always blood on my armor when we got done one of those…" He blinked rapidly several times, and then his tone turned brisk. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't be putting this on you. It's my problem to deal with."

"That's alright," X said softly, reaching out to take his double's free hand. The alternate X looked over at him, surprised by the contact. "I can't pretend I know how you feel… I don't, I wasn't there. But I need to know these things. I need to know about you, your people, everything you've been through so I can bring us together as a whole."

"Thank you…" The alternate X smiled, and gave his double's hand a squeeze. They might not get along in a lot of ways, and they might have very different values, but his double had his heart in the right place.

Kzzt… Commander X, Signas would like to see you in the infirmary. And is your double there? X blinked, touching his helmet in an unconscious gesture as he heard Alia speak over his communicator.

"Yes, he is… why?"

Signas would like to see him as well. There's a problem. X relayed that message to his double, who grimaced and took one last drag from his cigarette.

"Already? Wonderful." X stubbed out his cigarette, then stood up with a sigh. "Let's see what's gone wrong."

It didn't take them long at all to find out. Micky was lying on an infirmary bed, mercifully unconscious. X's eyes narrowed as he took in the human's injuries. His left arm had to be broken in at least three places, and it looked like someone had beaten on his armor with a sledgehammer. Even with quick healing nanites injected into his blood, along with a powerpack implant to keep them charged, it would take months for his arm to heal.

Bicky, on the other hand, was conscious and swearing. He calmed down a little as the two X's entered the room.

"Sir! Permission to kill the bitch!" He gestured sharply at another unconscious Reploid. It looked like someone had wrapped a neural whip around her throat and attempted to throttle her. Micky?

"Permission denied. What happened here, Bicky?" X said coolly as his double questioned his own Reploids, Signas listening to both sides. He didn't look at all happy.

But with their leader unconscious, the other Hunters didn't have the cohesion to think of a good story. And they were naturally inclined towards the truth in any case. But they did try to justify it with their original logic.

"So, essentially, you disobeyed a direct order and attacked your fellow Hunters." Signas summed the situation up coldly, making the Hunters wilt. They hadn't thought about it in quite those terms.

"But they're Mavericks!" One of them protested. "They nearly killed Tamask!"

"They are from another world." X emphasized his words, as if he was speaking to an absolute idiot. Which he was, really. "They are not Mavericks, you idiot!" X glowered at them. They were all from his own unit. "You're all suspended until further notice." He turned to his double. "I'm very sorry about this." The alternate X frowned, and finally shrugged, pulling out another cigarette.

"I'm not really surprised. This probably won't be the last problem we have." If it was, X would be glad the damage had been so minimal.

He wasn't willing to bet on it, though.