Epilogue: It's Not Over Until The Fat Robot Sings
"Where the heck is Blues?" Roll glanced out the window of the lab irritably. "We called him up yesterday… what, did he get stuck in a hold pattern over Hong Kong or something?"
"He'll be here soon." Kalinka Cossack assured her with a smile. "He wouldn't miss this for the world."
"Yeah." Rock agreed with her. "He wasn't here for your or my waking up, Roll… no way in heck he'd miss this one too." He turned to the two doctors. "You guys made good time on him… only two months."
"Well, it was good to see I haven't lost it." Dr. Light shrugged, blowing a smoke ring from his pipe.
"Easy for you to say." Dr. Cossack wiped his brow. "I STILL don't know how half of what you had me do works. I'm just glad you know what you're doing… which is fitting, I suppose, since he is yours. Now all that's left is to see if it all went right."
"Oh, I don't think that's in question… you guys are the best, after all." Whistling his favorite tune, Blues Light vaulted in through the window. "Yo. Sorry I'm late-a cop wanted to have a few words with me on my way down the street towards here. You know how it goes."
"Believe it or not, some of us prefer to keep our encounters with law enforcement to a minimum." Roll disagreed. "Well, whatever. At least you're here."
"Indeed I am." Blues looked over the newest member of his family, lying silently on the table in the center of the lab. "Hm… went with a different approach this time, I see." Whereas the other children of Light could appear perfectly human if they wished, the newcomer was obviously robotic even in a poor light. His entire surface was polished green metal without a trace of synthskin or hair, and massive nuts and bolts were visible on several parts of his large frame, as tall as a human and wide around the waist as well. He even had a comical lantern jaw much like Dr. Light's earlier "Guts Man" models. "This guy will stand out in a crowd, no doubt about it."
"That was what I was aiming for." Dr. Light admitted. "You three can all pass for human unless people know better, but Auto here will be clearly robotic to anybody who sees him… it may be necessary to see if that has any effect on his personality and development."
"Necessary?" Rock blinked. "For what?"
"Well… the future of robots, I guess. Call it that." Dr. Light replied a bit evasively. "Well, anyways… now that we're all here, shall we boot him up?"
"Go for it." Kalinka urged him. The others all cheered as well, and with a smile of his own, Dr. Light flipped the switch. For a moment, there was absolute silence… and then, the robot's eyes slowly opened, red and blank.
"I… I am…" He spoke haltingly, trying out his voice synthesizer for the first time. "I am… Auto. Auto… Light." He sat up and looked around. "Sergei and Kalinka Cossack… friends. Rock, Roll and Blues Light… brothers and sister. Thomas Light… father." He smiled. "How may I serve you, father?"
"State the first law." Dr. Light informed him, happily but firmly.
"A robot must not harm, or through inaction allow harm to come, to a human being." Auto replied without any trace of uncertainty.
"State the second law." Dr. Light continued.
"A robot must obey humans unless doing so comes into conflict with the First Law." Auto answered just as quickly.
"State the third law." The aged robotocist finished.
"A robot must act to preserve its own existence unless doing so comes into conflict with the First or Second Law." Auto paused a moment. "Is that all?" That one caused his siblings and Kalinka to snicker.
"Oh, he'll fit in just fine." Blues grinned, and Auto turned to him.
"Did I say something funny? I wasn't sure."
"It was good enough." Roll shrugged. "A little crude, but you'll be up to family standard soon enough."
"I see." Auto thought for a moment. "With luck, perhaps not as long as you would estimate."
"Yeah, maybe… HEY!" Roll's eyes widened.
"Did I say something else funny?" Auto inquired innocently.
"Something like that." Rock grabbed his sister's hand as she went for a nearby lamp. "Ah ah ah, sis. No whacking the new guy over the head QUITE yet. Give him at least SOME time before you start on that, huh?"
"I believe it is termed a head start." Auto agreed.
"She'll give you a head SOMEthing, all right." Blues muttered.
"Behave, children." Dr. Light sighed. "You'll quickly learn, Auto, that this family is like a circus sometimes. All we can do is bear with it."
"I see." Auto nodded. "Well, if it is like a circus, I must wonder as to who the clown is." Everybody's eyes turned to Blues, who growled something unflattering under his breath. "Aha. Question answered."
"And you all wonder why I spend so much time away from home." The eldest son of Light sighed. "Well, before this gets any more demeaning, what say we take Auto here down to the library?"
"Yeah." Roll nodded. "He seems to have a better grasp of the basics than we did at first, but he'll probably still need some time hitting the books."
"Punching books?" Auto raised an eyebrow. "That seems like an odd hobby to me, but I suppose I could give it a shot…"
"No, no, no." Roll groaned. "He meant READING them."
"With my fist?" Auto persisted.
"NO." Grabbing him by an arm, Roll steered him off, patiently explaining things to him.
"Well, I THINK he was a success." Dr. Light looked after him as they walked off. "Mostly, anyways."
"I'd say he has a great deal of potential, myself." Blues chuckled. "So he has a sense of humor. That's a GOOD thing, dad. What do you think, Rock?"
"Yeah… he'll be just fine." Rock watched them go and smiled as well. "For now, at least, the future looks bright for robotics."
"Indeed it does…" Thomas Light smiled as well, thinking to himself. "Indeed it does."
Author's Note
All righty, that's another one under the ol' belt. At least it wasn't a TOTAL disaster, huh? Whoof. At least I think that last chapter came out okay. Mostly, anyways. WELL, regardless, it's over and done with now. Almost, anyways-just this same old hippo to put out. Might as well get it over with before the grape soda buzz wears off.
Thank Legalities And Youse
This is probably gonna look awful familiar to some of you, but it's necessary anyways. Mega Man 6 and all related such-and-such are copyright Capcom. I'm not claiming it as mine, this is just for the hell of it. HOWEVER, the novelization proper and independent characters-Doc Corbun being the biggest example-are still mine, and on the off chance that somebody someday tries ripping 'em off, keep in mind doing so is asking for IT.
Next up, the usual thank-yous. Number One, Editor Man himself, the fantabulous DS. He's the one who spots most of my misspellings, everybody, so give him a hand. Right behind him is my old mentor, Erico the Super Bard. Give him a hand too, folks, he deserves it. And yes, I KNOW this wasn't up to standard, bardman. More on that in a bit. Then there's my oldest best buddies, the Ethereal Ferret, Mister Chimpo, Lark and Chibi Schala, thanks for enduring my sense of humor this long. Also to the folks at Snipe Hunt (we have a WoW guild on Llane server! LFG Uldum!) for much of the same. Then there's the four greats of the MM writing community as I see 'em-Erico, who I've already mentioned, as well as Red Draco, Maelgrim and Jetstorm. I never woulda got this far had I not read their stuff in my youth. And finally, one I've missed for too long now, to EVERYbody who reads this drabble of mine. Really, thanks to all of you. And on that note…
Get Letters I!
Er… that is to say… some of these reviews I love so much, they ask questions. And I like to answer 'em. The ones that aren't already answered by the end, anyways. To start off, RandyPandy asked why I skipped the first two games in this series. I think I've answered this before, but I can't properly remember at the moment, so to be safe… well, back then I was a young and unskilled writer, and I needed a plot with a significant amount of leeway to break into the Mega Man game. 3 seemed to me like the best place to do so, what with Doc Man, who I happily monkeyed around with (and still am). Also, Mega Man 1 had been novelized by Maelgrim, and I knew right then there was no way I'd be able to top his. So I didn't try. Next, None Of Your Business notes my Redwall ref. Yes, that's true, although I hear that really is an actual place out there in England. Jacques claims he didn't know at the time, but I remain skeptical. Right, onward. Blazer-6 asks if I'll be doing the GB games, while Jessi Tsuki wonders about the X series. I'm afraid that'll be a no on both… the GB games are non-canon for all intents and purposes, and as for X, that's already being covered by the man who got me into this biz, Erico the Super Bard. I'll be sticking to the Classic series. And finally… we come to the last one, and the most painful. Quite a FEW people noticed that the stages this time, particularly Yamato Man's, seemed to be, well, rushed. That's my fault-see, Yamato Man's really IS that short if you take the path that doesn't require the Power Armor. Which Mega didn't have at that point. I could put the blame on the game design for that, but I'm not going to-it's a shoddy workman who blames his tools. I should have looked ahead and planned that out. Matter of fact, let's just make this a separate section…
Apology
This one wasn't up to par, and I know it. I don't know quite what went wrong along the way… I thought the beginning was promising, but once I got into the levels… it slipped. Big time. The parts about going through levels got hit hardest, but it's detectable throughout the entire thing. Again, I could just say it's because MM6 is the shoddiest of the lot, but that would be a TOTAL crock… plot aside, I've actually always liked it in terms of gameplay, enemy design and musical score. I can't blame it. No, the fault rests solely on my own authorial shoulders, and all I can say is that I'm going to do my damnedest not to repeat it. I'm trying to keep these on an UPWARD climb in quality, and this time… I slipped. All there is to it. I just hope I haven't actually lost any fans in the long-term sense with this. I'm still not entirely sure what it was that went wrong, but I'm going to make absolutely SURE I'm over it before going on to my next work. That, by the way, is going to be heading into realms even more foreboding than Zelda. That's right… time for me to try my hand in the realm of Final Fantasy. The realm of Square for the second time, you're going to be picky. Regardless, it'll be the very first one, and I've got all sorts of interesting plans for it. It might take bit-aforementioned problems to work out and all that-but it WILL come, so watch for it. Right, that's about enough. Any more self-blame and I'll sound like Nobuhiro Watsuki. I'll see you all around.
Magus523, September 7 2006