Chapter 12: X Marks The Spot

"Hey, Beat." Mega Man smiled as he opened his eyes to see the blue robotic bird flying around his head, chirping happily. "I see the guys got you back up. Good to see you again." Sitting up, the Blue Bomber stretched out his hand, and Beat flew down to perch on it. "The guys have filled you in on the situation, I take it." Beat replied with an angry trill. "Good. You're ready for some payback, I take it… same here." Again Beat chirped affirmatively. Though he was only a robot, nowhere near the often humanlike mental levels of a Robot Master, it would be a mistake to think Beat was stupid; he was fully capable of understanding what Mr. X had done to him and knowing the appropriate response.

"He's just been waiting for you to wake up so he can go." Roll joked from a nearby chair. "Watch out, bro, or HE'll do most of the fighting this time around and leave YOU in a support role."

"You're about as funny as finding Rush burying a spoke wrench in your garden." Mega shook his head and stood up. "Speaking of which, I assume he's ready to go as well?"

"Yup… and Eddie too, so expect to see him in there somewhere." Roll continued. "No sign on Blues, but that's hardly surprising… when you meet him up front, ask him how he's doing. Pharaoh Man says he'll stay behind at first as a reserve, but if you're running into trouble, send Beat or Rush back here with word and he'll come on over."

"Good plan." Mega nodded. "Looks like all systems are functional… I've only got one E-Tank, but I guess that can't be helped. I might as well get going, then."

"Actually, there's one more thing." Dr. Light leaned inside with a pained look on his face. "The UN called earlier, and when I told them you were still out of it… well, they've been on hold ever since, waiting for you. We can't exactly tell them you left already like that."

"Damn… so close." Mega Man swore, then sighed. "Oh well, let's go see what they want at this date." Walking out and jumping down to the living room, he turned to the vidphone, which was displaying one of the identical UN council chambers, all members present. "Gentlemen. I understand you wished to speak with me."

"Eh? Oho! Rock Light, it's good to see you…" Edmund Martel, the current presiding Councilor, raised an eyebrow. "At last. It seems you have been very busy this current Rebellion."

"I'm always busy, sirs." Mega Man answered, fighting down a smirk of his own. He knew the sarcasm wasn't biting-along with Vinkus, Martel had always played things as straight as possible with him.

"So we've noticed." Vinkus coughed. "Really, Rock, don't you think you could have let us talk to you at least ONCE before now?"

"Like I said, I've been busy." Mega Man shrugged.

"Yes, well…" Martel nodded slowly. "Despite the exhortations of SOME members among us, as a whole, we gathered here have concluded that you have managed this Rebellion quite capably, despite your lack of guidance from us. Just like the four before the most recent one." A hint of a smile appeared again, but he stifled it. "This much, we have been able to let go without needing to step in. However, we are concerned about what comes next. To be specific, with your mission to defeat the mastermind of this Rebellion. The man calling himself Mr. X… his true identity has been a constant subject of debate within this forum."

"Within my head as well, Councilors." Mega Man replied.

"We expected as much. However, our concerns persist whether it is Oilver Xanthos or Albert Wily who is responsible for this." Martel continued. "Either way, one thing remains clear. Ever since the Third Robot Rebellion, the humans behind the madness have avoided capture and punishment. In the Third, we believed him dead… but following the Fourth and Fifth, Albert Wily escaped both times. And Mr. X has yet to see a substantial prison sentence in all his years." The US Councilor shook his head. "This can not… MUST not… repeat itself. We have turned a blind eye to what some call direct disobedience and contempt for this council on the part of the Light family… and we shall continue to do so, provided you continue to fulfill your duties… ALL of them, Rock Light." He stared at Mega Man, all traces of humor now gone. "Do not let the mastermind escape again, Mega Man. Of course, you cannot harm him… but regardless… this time, bring him back. Capture him, so that this will never take place again… so that this will be the last of the Robot Rebellions."

"…" Mega Man stared down, gritting his teeth. Although the Councilor could not know it, those words had set off something in his head… something that never failed to surface when the end of a Rebellion drew near. "Stop him… yes. I have to… stop him." He looked up again. "I WILL stop him. This time, he won't get away… whoever he is. Wily or X… I'll bring him to justice."

"Do so." Martel smiled grimly. "We're counting on you. Good luck, young warrior." The communication cut off, and Mega turned around to see his father and sister, and with them the Cossacks. "Well. I'd pretty much say that's about it. I should be heading off, then."

"Rock." Dr. Cossack was not smiling. "Are you sure… you'll be okay? With… that man?" Mega Man was silent for a moment, as he saw the Russian robotocist's face, and remembered two Rebellions ago… seeing Sergei Cossack when his daughter had been returned in near-mortal condition, and Albert Wily had fled from the younger man's rage over that crime.

"No matter how hard you try… you can't stop him. You can't kill him, Mega Man."

"I'll manage." Mega answered with a tiny smile. "I've brought Wily down without harming him five times… if it's him again this time, or X, I'll still be able to handle it. Don't worry about me. Anybody got any messages for Blues that I can deliver when I go see him?"

"Same thing I'm telling you." Roll closed her eyes. "Come back trashed, and I'll fix you up then put you right back in that shape again with my own hands." Dr. Light chuckled.

"Just tell him good luck." Dr. Cossack echoed that statement, and after a moment, Kalinka spoke as well.

"Tell Blues that I… I…" She paused for a moment. "That I… want to see him back here again."

"Heh…" Mega Man nodded. "Got it. I'll be off then… see you soon."

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"Good grief, what an eyesore…" Mega Man's first thoughts upon seeing the edifice he christened the "X Fortress" were unflattering. "And I thought the Skull Fortresses were bad." Larger than any of the monoliths he has taken on before, much of the Fortress was on flat ground, spanning several miles. That portion of it actually looked like a futuristic metropolis, with streets and buildings like one could see in Tokyo. The presence of heavily armed warbots replacing pedestrians and cars sort of killed the effect, of course… as did the main body of the fortress. As was customary, several towers of various heights, colors and designs-Mega counted five in total-flanked the left and right of one huge central monolith. In this case, it was a purple dome topped in an unsafe-looking fashion by a metal platter that held another dome atop it, this one transparent… glass? Above that, a tower the same shape as the dome stretched towards the heavens, bearing on its front side a gigantic metal shield forming an X. "And there's the ostentatious faceplate… always the same."

"Looks like he's going for the bigger is better approach too." Another voice agreed with a trademark whistle. Mega Man didn't even turn around as his brother, Proto Man, joined him. "Most of that city-like area isn't too heavily patrolled. The downside is, those streets and roadways mean once you're in there, all the security in that outer area can rush to your location fast."

"You suggest a decoy?" Mega Man guessed.

"Yup. I'll handle that." Proto Man nodded. "Wait, hear me out before saying it's too dangerous. I'll go in on the right side, and after waiting five minutes, you come in on the left." He pointed at the leftmost tower. "Right there… that's the weakest point in the fortifications of the main structure. If the security in the ground area is distracted, you should be able to get to that tower in five minutes, and be inside by another five. If I draw them all over to me for ten minutes than bail out, it'll still take them five to get back to you, and by that time you'll be inside."

"…All right." Mega Man nodded. "I know you can handle that. What about afterwards?"

"Well…" Proto Man frowned. "Here's the thing. I've also found another Skull Fortress, although it's completely inactive at the moment. It's in the Alps, right where I hear the SECOND Skull Fortress used to be. I'm sure you remember the coordinates. The obvious explanation is that Wily was planning to use it, but never got the chance to… it's not like Mr. X would have told him ahead of time 'Hey, I'm planning to kill you!' All the same… we're too suspicious to let it go at that, aren't we?"

"Yeah." Mega Man nodded grimly. "So after getting me inside, you want to head off to that Skull Fortress and be there in case it turns out to be Wily and he blasts off there after I beat him here. I'll miss you inside this place… but you're right. It's worth the risk. Let's do it that way, then."

"Great minds think alike." Proto Man smirked. "Despite what Roll might say about ours." Mega nodded.

"We all saw that when you teamed up with Doc Corbun to crash the broadcast. That was brilliant, by the way. I assume you've been seeing him for minor scrapes and bruises from your fights?"

"Yeah, didn't want to trouble you guys." Proto Man shrugged. "It was just quick patch jobs, really… all I needed. Remember, I got to watch you taking all those punks on first, so I knew their weaknesses, attacks, even movement patterns. It was pretty easy going, really. Oh, did anybody have any messages for me?"

"Yeah." The Blue Bomber made a face. "I'll go ahead and skip Roll's… you probably already know it. The docs wish us good luck… and Kalinka, well…" He grinned. "She said she wants you to come back to her… and I got the feeling there was a bit more to it than that, if you catch my drift."

"Yeah, well…" Proto Man coughed uncomfortably. "She's what, eleven now? Humans start to get a little weird when they get past their first decade. Let's just get going."

"As you wish." Mega Man allowed himself one more chuckle at his brother's expense before becoming serious. "Five minutes. Go." Nodding, Proto teleported away and reappeared a few miles away, barely visible, on the right side of the structure. Exactly five minutes after he had dashed into the complex, Mega Man repeated the move on the left side. As Proto Man had predicted, most of the robot security had left the area behind, and the only opposition the Blue Bomber met as he dashed down the streets were shielded cannon embedded where fire hydrants or lampposts would stand in an actual city. "I guess these guys couldn't exactly run off to give chase…" Blowing them away, Mega never stopped moving, and when he reached the base of the tower he wanted, his internal clock told him four minutes had passed since his entry. "Ahead of schedule… excellent. Now, time to climb this sucker…" Grabbing a ladder, he began scaling the structure. Despite the presence of only a few enemy robots, Mega found the going was not easy with many spikes hampering his movement from ladder to ledge and back again. Even with his Jet Armor, several of the jumps he had to make were very close. It was about halfway up the tower that he found the damaged wall. Purely by luck, his eye fell upon a section of glass-a window-that was filled with cracks from some kind of accident.

"Hmmm." Switching to his Power Armor, Mega destroyed it with one blow if his fist. "Goody, a shortcut. I'll probably need it, since Blues should be gone by now…" Looking over his shoulder, he winced. Though still a good distance away, a horde of what must have been hundreds of robots was closing on him fast. "That clinches it… in I go!" Vaulting into through the remains of the window, then switched to his Power Armor and gleefully smashed through anything in his way. The area seemed to contain a large number of Weapons Energy capsules just lying around, which he used to refill his Silver Tomahawk-a couple of the remaining sentries on his climb had been difficult to nail. "Some kind of storage area… shame I couldn't find it later on when I'll need them more. Oh well." Smashing one last crate below a ladder, he climbed up further into the tower and found himself facing a metal shutter. "Huh! QUITE the shortcut… a Fortress Guardian already. Blues didn't say anything about what Mr. X had for this job this time around… well, might as well go on in and see." Bracing himself, he walked in.

"Welcome to my humble abode, Mega Man!" Mr. X's voice called out in greeting. "That was a cute trick you and your brother pulled, but I'm afraid such foolishness won't get you past THESE babies! Let's see how you do against them!" The center of the room was filled with a long, winding metal track that hung down from the ceiling. Twin doors on said ceiling opened, and two identical robots dropped down onto the tracks, purple and vaguely oval-shaped. Huge spikes were on each corner, and on the bottom were suspicious-looking bay doors. As Mega Man watched, both bays opened simultaneously and released bombs as the Rail Riders blasted into motion in opposite directions. "Well? Think you can avoid them both AND fight back at the same time?"

"Shouldn't be too hard." Mega Man smiled grimly, turning to the Flame Shot. Let's hope this works… He fired ahead of the path of one Rail Rider, clearly missing.

"Ha! Nice aim, fool!" Mr. X cackled, then stopped as the rail burst into flame where it hit, and the enemy continued forward heedlessly, blasting right into the fires before it.

"As I thought… they're set on automatic." Mega Man fired again while easily sliding under some bombs. "As long as I hit the rail, one of those two will be damaged within a few seconds, so I don't need to put all my attention on aiming as usual. I can focus on dodging." Mr. X was silent for a moment, then began laughing again.

"Yes, you had better! Use your eyes, fool!" Frowning, Mega Man saw that one of the Rail Riders was now on his level and rushing forward at him.

"Figured those spikes weren't just for show…" Switching weapons again, he leaped forward and leaned out, clearing the enemy as closely as possible. As he did, he activated the Plant Barrier, and the force field damaged the enemy below AND the one above that had been rushing overhead as Mega carefully wedged his dive between the two. "AND I figured you'd set them to do that if their paths were set. Give me SOME credit… I've seen all this before." Again Mr. X was silent, and it was only a short time before both Rail Riders fell off of their track, smoking. Mega Man stood between them, unharmed, glaring up at a camera in the room's corner. "You had better have been clowning around with those two… if your other defenses are this pathetic, I'll be knocking on your suite in no time at all." Destroying the camera, the Blue Bomber climbed up through one of the ceiling doors.
"Not bad!" Mr. X rallied, yelling after him. "But you've still got a long way to go before reaching me!" Ignoring him as usual, Mega Man blasted through a few more sentry robots in a second tower before finding an enclosed bridge. Looking through the glass siding showed him that it led to the main building.

"Good… that's where I should go." Unfortunately, the tunnel was by far the most tricky section of the fortress yet. Both ceiling and floor were lined with spikes, and after a short time, the former lowered so much that he couldn't safely use his Jet Armor. The charging robotic vehicles with spikes fronts and explosive payloads didn't help matters either; thanks to them, when he finally reached the other side Mega's energy level was no longer perfect. Fortunately, those were the only enemies in the bridge aside from Metools, which were easily cleared out ahead of time by a furious Beat, who descended upon them with razor-sharp metal claws. Reaching the other side, Mega cleared out a few more sentry robots before advancing to another metal shutter. "Hm… already?" Entering it, he found himself in a room with an extremely high ceiling… one which seemed to be made out of rock. "Now what's that all about…" He glared down at a door in the bottom of the opposite wall, but it did not open-instead, one in the top of that wall did, and a robot with four huge piston feet crawled out, spider-like, and climbed down the far wall to glare at him from a single tiny eye.

"Meet my second Fortress Guardian, Mega Man." Mr. X chimed in again. "I hope you'll enjoy testing him out!"

"Oh, I intend to do more than just test…" Mega Man growled, firing a charged shot straight at the Wall Walker. "I intend to DESTROY!" Taking the hit, the Wall Walker immediately began moving again, pounding the wall with its piston legs as it moved up and down. The significance of the earthen ceiling was revealed; as its legs shook the room, rocks were dislodged to fall down. They bounced harmlessly off of the armored foe, but Mega Man was forced to slide around frantically avoiding them. As he did, he reeled suddenly from a plasma blast. "Damn! It fires plasma too?" He paused for a moment to see the enemy's attack; low-power shots, but scattered in a wide burst. "Double damn. Half of them will be blunted by the rocks, but that's still far too many getting through towards me. This one's a far more effective design than those stupid Rail Riders…" He winced as another shot struck him.

"Thank you!" Mr. X replied with mocking gratitude. "I hope you have some ideas as to what to do."

"You bet I do…" Mega Man ran over his weapons. As long as it's up there, Mega Buster'll never hit it through those rocks… neither will any of the elemental weapons. Knight Crush and Plant Barrier are obviously out of the question… He tried a shot of the Centaur Flash, then shook his head as the Wall Walker continued heedlessly. That's no good either. Only other things that could get through those rocks… slicing or piercing. Let's try the Spear first… He fired several round of the Yamato Spear, and noted with pleasure that they shot through the falling rocks and continued on to hit their targets. However, the Wall Walker did not seem much affected by the shots. All right, the Silver Tomahawk then… hope this works… The first spinning blade lodged home, and the enemy actually paused in its motion for a moment before continuing. Looks like that's the trick! Several more Tomahawks spun forth, and with each one the Wall Walker moved slower. Finally, its actions froze entirely, and the room's shaking subsided. A moment later, the enemy toppled off the wall.

"Curse you, Mega Man! You still haven't won yet!" Mr. X angrily insisted.

"Yeah, yeah…" Mega Man winced, feeling the several plasma wounds he had taken. The first one was a piker, but this model wasn't bad. If the chain continues, the next one could be trouble… figure that out when the time comes. Right now…He looked at the two doors. One on his level, one near the ceiling. If I use my Jet Armor, I should be able to barely reach the top one… but do I want to? His eyes narrowed. There were two doors last time, too… he's echoing the gimmick from the Robot Masters. I have to choose a path. Last time, I picked the right one without even thinking about it, but now… do I want to go up or down? Normally, the central structure's just a decoy… they're always in underground basements. But Mr. X is a glory hog, playing this up for maximum cheesiness… he wouldn't be able to resist something more glamorous. Breaking out the Rush Jet Armor, he rose to the upper door and clambered into it. I'm getting closer… I'll find you soon.