Chapter 3: You Missed

Disclaimer: I do not own Megaman.

Roll was a bit afraid of Bass after she saw how mercilessly handled that robot, but she went with him anyway because he was the only hope of ever finding her brother. She found it odd that she was actually depending on the one robot whose very existence was created purely for the purpose of killing her brother. It was enough to laugh at, but she wondered how Bass would react to her laughing, especially after his current mindset. For some reason though, she found she couldn't help it and just had to laugh at it all, a big laugh, not the giggle that she wanted to come out with, but Bass didn't do anything in response to it. He just kept on walking until he stopped at the sound of his feet hitting a metal object that was a bit foreign to him and he started brushing away at the sand. Soon he found that it was a door leading down into a strange dark tunnel.

"How far are we from the lab," asked Bass as he tossed the eighty pound lid effortlessly behind him.

"Well that is the emergency entrance to the lab," replied Roll, a bit surprised that she had been right at the Lab and would have passed it had Bass been just a few inches to the right. "I guess the wreckage must have clouded my vision or something because I just realized that we've walked long enough for us to be at the emergency entrance. Sorry about that."

"To hell with it, it's not that important so don't worry about it," said the Robot Master as he stood up and turned to her. "This would be the best entrance to go through since we might be seen going through the front entrance."

Roll nodded her head in agreement, but it wouldn't have made a difference because he jumped down anyway and fell right into the dark corridors that lit up once anyone touched the plates. With a sigh, Roll followed Bass down the tunnel and was followed by Treble who had been looking out for them. After she had pulled her buster rifle out of its holster, she ran to catch up with Bass, who had already seemed to found something of interest as he fiddled with one of the computers to an invention of Dr. Light's. The invention would allow him to be able to use the charge ability that he was able to change between. He turned to acknowledge the female robot that was behind him when a shot sped right past the front of his face and he turned to see someone pointing a buster at him with a spherical head that had no neck and was indistinguishable between its torso. At first, Bass thought that he was staring at another one of Dr. Light's inventions, but as he saw it he noticed that Roll had her weapon pointed at it questioningly so he knew that it was something foreign that she hadn't seen him build.

"I don't know what you are, but for that little blast I'll kill you," said Bass as he raised his own buster and fire two blasts at the invading robot. The robot mimicked the blast with two of its own blasts that intercepted Bass's blast. "So you won't be that easy to destroy."

With his dash ability, Bass was able to move right behind the robot and shot it from behind, blasting a hole into its upper body and then blew a second hole higher, up into the center of its head unit. After it had gone down, he turned to see that more of them were coming so he charged up his buster and sent a blast right into the middle of the group, destroying the entire front line of them before letting out rapid fire bursts at the robots. Roll saw that there were more coming from another direction and shot at those robots as they kept on coming from somewhere. Bass was sure that he would run out of charge energy soon if he didn't get out of there so he grabbed Roll's arm and dragged her down to the escape craft bay and pushed her into one of the crafts as he reached back to take a shot at the approaching robots before he finally got in.

"You know how to work these things," asked Bass as he slipped his safety restraining belt on and closed the passenger door.

"Yeah," replied Roll as she flipped the power switch on and took out the brake gears in the craft before hitting on the accelerator and the escape craft went shooting out of the escape craft bay and sent them shooting off into a direction that Roll was uncertain of. It could be piloted but the codes to it were random and she didn't have the master unlocking code in her system so at the moment they were just being shot into the dark. I just pray he doesn't ask for them himself.

"What are the codes to the controls," asked Bass, not in the least bit polite, more of a command that was to be followed or he might hurt her.

"I don't have the master unlocking code and the other codes are random so it looks like we're about to hit something," replied Roll who was red as hell from having to go through the embarrassment of not having the codes for him.

"You have got to be kidding me about that," said Bass as he looked at her and from the look on her face he could tell that she wasn't much to his chagrin. "Why the hell is that code not in your system and why are the other codes random?"

"For security reasons we just had one emergency unlocked code while the individual codes were constantly placed on a zip drive in Dr. Light's pocket," said Roll as she thought that he was about to reach over and slap her.

"Okay then, Treble see if you can unlock into this," commanded Bass to his metallic canine, which began to hook up with the computer and Bass could see the calculations running through the eyes of the canine. "How much time do we have until crash time?"

"About seven minutes, I don't think Treble will make it!"

"I trust Treble with my life, he will not fail to hack this system, regardless of whether it was programmed by Dr. Light."

"Actually I designed the program myself," said Roll with an air of pride.

"Oh in that case, if you fail Treble, I will be totally pissed," said Bass over his shoulder as he started to try and call up the user interface for the controls.

"What are you trying to say about my abilities to program," asked Roll, a bit angry from being brushed off so easily. To her surprise the user interface for the controls responded to his touch and he began to pilot the craft with great ease as well as making sure that it would turn with ease. But I spent so much time on it, how could that dog so easily crack my system when he had problems getting through my other walls and barriers?

"Okay then, next I want you to bring up a map of the surrounding area and give me the direction of the base we left," said Bass as he started to move it away and was given the directions to the base via the map system in his right eye. Dr. Wily may have been a failure but he was good at making useful additions that Bass could use, even though he always seemed to never succeed when it came to Megaman. Bass wondered why he seemed fated to fall to such a loser who was trusting and didn't go through anything like Bass had gone through to get as strong as he could be, but Bass knew that the blue dweeb was running on luck that was about to go out if it hadn't already done so. "This is the Bass calling into Alpha Base, we're about to land in whatever hangar you have, respond."

"Roger that, Commander Eva and Dr. Light will be waiting to give you orders," responded a voice on the communication link.

"Dr. Light, though I am certain that you are a brilliant man, you can't expect me to put my trust in that robot," said the female commander as she stood in the hangar bay with armed soldiers right beside her. "He is a creation of Wiley and though he may act very independent of Wiley I do not find it 

wise at all to trust in him just so he can betray us just like he did when you first met him. Plus he is still a robot master and if he does defeat Adonus then what is to stop him from conquering us and setting himself as the leader of the world. We have our own robot to go in search of Mega Man that you have made repairs to, why not give the enhancements to him and copy the data from Bass to Prideman?"

"I have seen your robot and I must say he is of a good design, but compared to Bass he is flawed," said Dr. Light as he sighed while looking at the technical staff that adored the robot known as Prideman, a robot that was humanoid in form and face except with blue skin and white armor. "Prideman wasn't built for military operations like that one necessary, all he can do is rescue people from danger and equipping him for the same upgrades would take time. It must be Bass unless we can find Mega Man."

"You're risking a lot by trusting him when we could get Protoman to do it," said the Commander as she saw the escape pod land easily with a silent and calm Bass walking out of it and a slightly perturbed Roll following him. Treble was as silent as his master and both looked menacing when silent. "Well then, I suppose you must be ready for the upgrade that Dr. Light will give you. I'll have my technical staff help, but that does not mean we trust you. If you become our enemy we won't hesitate to kill you."

"The same thing applies for you, if you're going to betray me you better kill me soon or else I'll kill you," responded Bass as he silently made his way down to the technical area for his repairs and upgrades.

It took a while for them to finally finish the modifications to Bass, but Dr. Light was confident in his work on Bass and he was more than certain that he had made the right choice as he activated the new chest plate armor that was similar to the one Bass had before except this one had more defense plating to it and stood out a bit more with a red x in the middle of it. It was meant to be an addition to Bass's armor and was built by the technical staff while he observed the new buster that he was building. After erasing all the data taken from Prideman, Dr. Light started to build another buster for Bass that would optimize more power based on the designs for his latest model of robot and it was given a larger battery so he would have a longer energy life span. With great care Dr. Light started to secure the panel on Bass's buster and then looked at the sleeping Robot Master.

"Please Bass, I cannot lose him, he is like my son," pleaded Dr. Light. "I put all my trust in you, please bring Rock back to me."

Roll looked around the base with a bit of boredom and hating that she had to be the one to wait, but apparently she wasn't as good with mechanics as she thought she was. It was pure hell for her, but she had to wait, no matter how hard the waiting was. She had seen him when they brought him in, luckily Dr. Light hadn't seen him, it would be a greater strain on things if he knew who they brought in. If the technicians were good enough then he would live. Please live for us brother, it would be hard on father if you were to die, Protoman.