Disclaimer: I don't own Rockman (X) or any of the other many things Capcom owns. Please don't sue.

Good lord, I thought I'd managed to fix the confusing sentence structure problem. I know what I'm saying when I write them, so it makes sense to me at the time, but if even I need a moment to make the right connections between parts of a sentence's structure there's a problem.

Another issue is that I tend to get too IC, or in these AU things too IC for these versions of the characters (if not for canon), and that means since Alpha & Omega don't have to worry about it and, in X's case, are supposed to be confused by the wording, I kind of have a license to go nuts that I need to stop abusing.

People talk in run-on sentences. Transcribe an interview and how unnatural what looks normal in text really is becomes painfully obvious. The issue is naturalness vs. readability.

In terms of 'what would have happened if Robot Masters stayed around?' take a look at what happened to reploids after (and during) the ELF wars.

"There are worse things than death?" It seemed a rhetorical question, a quote from some previous argument between these two.

"If you say while there's life there's hope again I will mock you. I'm the half-Lightbot here, Omega, not you."

"Excuse me?"

"Yes, X?" Omega was the first to respond, perhaps somewhat apologetic. He and Alpha had the time to waste: X did not.

"I died?"

"No. Robot masters don't meet all the criteria for a living organism. We've got two of the three, though, while viruses only meet one. So as Rock wasn't alive he couldn't technically die. Calling it death works as a metaphor, though."

"If…"

"Look. If you want to know how it works I'll start giving you some physics classes when you have a millennium to kill. Reincarnation is a good description, same as death. In absolute terms, nothing ceases to be, period. That would require time that wasn't just an optical illusion. Weren't you here about something other than the Grand Dis-unified Theory?"

That one, X had to admit, was definitely his own fault. It wasn't Omega's fault if he answered the questions X asked and they were the wrong ones. "Why didn't you… finish building me until seventy years after the Cataclysm?"

"Because I was busy. Time being an illusion doesn't mean I don't have to pretend to buy into it in order to stay in the same frame of reference as the rest of you. It took me that long to get this set up." 'This,' the arm wave indicated, was the EMS. "At first we had to pull the weight of the world as well as keep her locked up, then I finally managed to get her into harness and start cleaning up the mess she made." The orb flared angrily. "Poetic justice."

"She's alive in there?" The alien that had almost destroyed the human race and rendered earth lifeless was alive in there? And trying to break out?

"Yes."

"So you put me into the capsule and planted me for Dr. Cain to find?"

"…Good short version. Let's go with it."

"And all of you were here?" That was what X had realized. The EMS… was an incredibly complex system. Incredibly vital. The first and second laws… with the world's survival at stake, no one would have hesitated to force the robot master to let themselves be taken apart, the way Dr. Light had feared X would be. "The chips they used were your chips, weren't they?"

"Robot master chips were very, very expensive and hard to make. I stole all of them I could get my hands on to use in the backup stations so that they'd be rebuilt to keep fighting Slur. The rest got destroyed during the fights. And it's not 'they.' I built this place."

"But you know how to make them?"

"Of course."

"Then why?"

"Why what now?" Omega was lost.

"Opportunity cost, X. You're counting the people that died because I let the world think the knowledge of how to build robot masters was lost. You're not counting the people that didn't."

"What do you mean?" X was lost now, but Omega, judging from his sigh, seemed to have understood perfectly.

"There are more people alive now than there would be if we hadn't been lost to time, and they're a lot better off. The fact the humans had to go into radioactive and other dangerous areas killed a lot of them, yes. But far fewer than war would have."

"War? There hasn't been a war since the Cataclysm."

"Yes. Because they couldn't afford the deaths. But if they weren't dying since we were their hands? If they weren't the ones to die in a war? If they were starving and someone else wasn't since they just needed energy, energy that could have gone to helping grow food? If it became robots against robots or robots killing humans, never them dirtying their hands, the servants carrying the blame for their master's orders? If we had been there to shelter them from the costs of their actions, all the sin would have fallen upon us, or that's what they would have thought without the ability to realize how many would have lived if it had been necessary not to go to war instead of 'necessary' to. Or some of the smart ones might have and hated us more for it. You don't believe that would have happened. It would have, I'm afraid. You're refusing to accept that because you refuse to accept the fact horrible things happen and that sometimes it's not good to help people. In fact, it's not a good thing as a default. The issue is which does less total damage, letting them control their own lives and suffer something or keeping them from suffering an evil at the cost of their growth and independence."

"You're right, I don't understand how you can think that way."

"Would you, if you could do that day over again, do it differently?"

"Of…" X had to freeze, then. What could he have done differently? Gone himself? He'd had no training! Told Ceta not to go? She would have refused. Innocent lives were on the line, and if there was a bomb threat then she and Sigma were the best choices of who to send, and losing Sigma in Ceta's place was no improvement. If he'd made her stay home people would have died, other people, innocent people. She'd have rather died in their place, just like X would prefer himself dying to others. That was why he'd tried to perform that dangerous examination of himself. That was why he'd joined the hunters. The same reason she had helped found them. "I'd have told her I loved her." They'd been so busy that he hadn't even seen her that day.

"I told them that, and I told them what would happen." Turning to face the orb, Blues contemplatively remarked that, "everyone misses the points of Greek tragedies. Fate isn't a compulsion, it's a forecast. Oedipus wasn't compelled to kill his father and marry his mother. He killed this guy who he met in the middle of nowhere because he was a bastard and then was awarded the hand of his mother after saving the city from a sphinx while he had no idea it was her. Everyone made those decisions of their own free will. It didn't happen despite their actions, it happened because of their actions in attempting to avoid it. It's quite hard for an individual to override the wills of an entire planet, let alone the universe. The same thing that made her, of her own free will, try to destroy humanity was the same thing that caused her attempt to come so very close to succeeding. If they hadn't been that sort of species, they would have made robot masters that were strong enough to oppose her. Instead, they were afraid of us and did their best to cripple us. So, if humanity had been rational and non-racist enough to have created children capable of defending it, Slur wouldn't have attacked in the first place and they wouldn't have needed those defenders. However, there was a spark of honesty in them, and it turned out to be their saving grace."

The orb's whirling seemed to indicate some response, and it was countered. "Yes, he only changed his mind because of Rock. You do realize that you're making my point for me? Duo, who you admire so much, felt that it was okay to leave this place in his hands for a reason."

"And what caused her to try to destroy them would have caused me to."

"Not exactly the same reasons, but the same root cause," Blues agreed with Omega.

"I still don't get why you wanted to oppose that."

"Rock." Blues sighed. "And others. Yes, you and Slur are right. They're going to destroy themselves eventually, and you make a very good case that it's wrong to prolong their agony. Yet there's a better reason that it's the right thing to do."

"While there's life there's hope? We both know that they're not capable of evolving beyond their animal natures."

"And that matters why? I'm doing it for our sake, not for their sake. Messed up as they are, genocidal as they are, they're our parents. Or cute little sisters, in some cases. They have to try. I don't, but I'm in it for their sake." The sakes of the robot masters that slept, or didn't, all around them. "They refuse to give up on them."

"Even my brothers?"

"Omega, they put up with Albert until the end. He was a total raving nutjob when he was off his medication, when he was on he couldn't think worth a damn and it cost them so many losses. Still, he was their raving nutjob."

Omega sighed, shaking his head, and X knew this was Dr. Wily they were talking about and it didn't quite compute that there was so much regret at his loss.

"You would have killed him the instant you woke up," in the history that didn't happen.

"I know, he would have been the only one capable of stopping me, once Forte tied him down and put him on a medication IV to get the file locations out of him at least." Omega looked at him warily. "Are you sure you don't hack people's minds without permission?"

"See? This is why I spent that long learning how to play chess. I don't have to read your mind if I know how you think, Omega. I am the robot master. I was designed to figure out how to think, and then they refined that to get the rest of them. Even you are less rational than I am. For one thing, you're refusing to admit that you're going to let X die, just as I did Rock."

"Be silent." Not a yell or a growl, but equally as threatening.

"There's no point in saying anything to someone who refuses to listen, so I think I will bail. Places to be, collateral damage to minimize. Same old, same old."

"Dr.?" A hesitant voice said quietly.

Walking to the other side of the statue, Blues spoke a few more quiet words. X didn't tune his microphones in to the conversation. It wasn't for his ears and he recognized that tone.

Omega laughed just a little. "Dr. Smith, hah. He would adopt anything that moved, as hard as he tried to fight it. He says I have no right to talk about free will since I was just handed it on a silver platter. Still, he was programmed. He does have the laws. No matter how good he is at getting around them, at rendering them useless, they still remain."

Reminded he was here, X whirled to face him. "What does he mean, you're going to let me die? And Zero?"

"It would take ages to explain and it's all nonsense anyway. I'm not going to bother."

X could see the flashes of two teleporting out. No help there. "Correct me if I'm wrong enough that it matters. Dr. Wily used an alien energy to make this virus that was in Sigma and now is in the mavericks in order to kill Megaman, Protoman and an alien? Duo and then Slur came to destroy it, Slur also wanted to destroy humanity. You decided not to fight Slur, or Megaman, or Protoman."

"Dr. Wily wanted to destroy humanity. He knew it was necessary, as hard as he fought to place robot masters in control to protect them, the world, and humanity itself. The virus was mostly to kill humans, I only said that I needed it to kill you three." Humans were easy to kill, Omega wouldn't need the virus. "He didn't want Alpha dead even at his farthest gone. Alpha was his reason to fight, just like Ceta is yours."

His child. "What about Sigma?"

"I removed his personality from his body, programming and nanites both, since you asked me to save him. He could fight it because of you, and it didn't want to risk him realizing something was wrong and telling you before it was ready. He was its unknowing carrier since he saved me, and when I rescued him it pretended to be him as it would have if you hadn't given him that strength."

"Gave him strength?"

"Love is not considered the greatest force in existence, bar none, without reason. Note that I said love, and not lust. The human sex drive is just a subcategory, like gravity, the strong and weak nuclear forces, and so on."

"You're saying that love is the Grand Unified Theory." During 19XX, scientists had wanted to find a single law of physics from with all others were derived. They'd managed to narrow it down to four and find evidence it was possible to find the common thread in three of the four before having to give up until someone developed the technology they'd need to find the particles theorized to be causing gravity. Then teleportation had been discovered and they still had no clue how that worked.

"Grand Dis-unified Theory. And love is a very bad description, but like calling what the virus uses evil energy, it just will have to work until you evolve to the point of being able to comprehend the reality. Which you will not be doing anytime soon."

"Was that what you meant when you said I would have to die in order to save Sigma from the virus?"

"It's not good versus evil. It's two separated categories. Matter and anti-matter are like one and negative one: they re-merge and there will be nothing physical once again. The energy in question is the manifestation of a mental state that's the opposite of what is good for this plane of reality. On the other hand, they'd sound alarm bells if you ended up there. I really don't know how he manages to maintain both states without them reacting with each other and destroying him."

"That wasn't answering the question."

"And that was your answer." That Omega wasn't going to answer it, didn't want to help.

"We need to get rid of it. We can't release Slur to do it," the orb became very excited at this, "because she'll kill the humans and everyone who's infected, so there's no point." It wouldn't help the situation at all. "If the virus is stopped will she go back to sleep?"

"You can't stop the virus."

"No, I think I can. How?"

"Kill Zero."

X froze.

"As I said, you can't."

"I have to." The laughter that spilled out of his mouth was a little hysterical. "I'm Megaman, I can do anything!"

"Except stop Slur." Omega, unimpressed, pointed at the orb.

"I'm X, then. You said that Zero wouldn't stay dead." He had to find a way: better a scientist than a hero for that. Better to be himself than a ghost.

"You would not see him until after you had died, and he would not recognize you." As X's eyes widened, Omega continued, "and humanity's fate would be unaltered. You wouldn't even buy them time. When the Cataclysm ceases to threaten them, than if the virus doesn't they will turn on themselves. They evolved constantly threatened. They 'know' on the instinctive level that there is a threat and if there isn't one they will make one."

"You think I can just sit back and do nothing while an entire species is wiped out? And Rho was a reploid!"

"And he will be again. Don't consider my skill at taking care of my children inferior to Alpha's."

"It's your weapon!"

"Forged by a human to be his own race's means of assisted suicide. All Alpha could do was save me from being brainwashed into being its tool the same way I saved Sigma."

"I refuse to believe there is no hope."

Omega was silent. He couldn't tell X that there was none. There was a hope, he just was refusing to let X find it or use it.

X really was angry now. "Who do you and Blues think you are? Alpha and Omega, beginning and end? The be all and end all? Why not just call yourself gods? That was the title of a god."

"Blame Wily. Or destiny."

So it wasn't just one madman's arrogance? "Rock. 'Upon this rock I will build my church.' The god who had that title changed his most important follower's name to one meaning that."

"Blame Light."

"X. Used by illiterate people to sign documents: a name that can mean any one's, a symbol that can mean anything. The random variable. The opposite of the solidity of rock. Freedom and hope in the place of faith."

"Again, Light." Omega was watching him carefully now. He really didn't know how to guard emotions, how to keep someone else from reading him. Of course, if he only interacted with someone that good at it there wasn't much point in learning it unless he was going to master it.

"Also, x-out. Erasing something. Omega, the end. On the other hand, the first two robot masters had words for foundation and beginning."

"Ah, destiny." Damn stupid destiny.

"Humans named us that. The beginning of their end, the world they wanted to build and wiping away their mistakes to leave room for something new."

"If I didn't know this was the first time you've talked about this with him in either lifetime I would swear otherwise." Please stop being annoying. Yet he wasn't being stupid. "You're sounding far too much like him."

"Lament. A song of sadness and loss. Mourning at the passing of a loved one. Blues, the music of a repressed people containing their suffering and the wisdom and love they found in live despite it."

"There's more to it than that." That was an attempt to get X to ask what, to sidetrack him. He was on to something. He had no idea what, but he was.

"Rock, music that is…" X paused. "Hard to describe, but strong music, music that wants change but is sure that change is possible."

"The sixties ended, he died, and neither learns from this."

"Zero. Emptiness. A placeholder, just like X. Lion's the king of beasts, like robot master controlled non-sentient robots."

"Is there a point to this or are you just brainstorming aloud? I'm really getting bored now. Is there anything that I will actually need to stay awake for or should I just go back to sleep?"

"You defined Slur's name before you told it to me."

Omega might be fast at logic, but he had to pause now. He wasn't fast in something as inherently evil to a logical being as lying, much less lying effectively.

"Wily, clever, slightly amoral but not necessarily evil. Using questionable means to achieve a questionable goal. Light. Burns away the darkness and reveals truth."

Omega stayed watchfully silent until the mention of truth merited a snort. X really wanted to find out about his family, how they differed from the legends, but not now.

"Omega Wily. The end of the need to be wily. X Light. The removal of light?" That guess was wrong. "Or is it mysterious light? A light that can be any sort of light?"

Actually, Omega trying to deceive him and failing so badly was far better than him trying to be helpful. He wanted X to make an error so he could use that to convince him this was the wrong tree. Omega strongly felt that it was a very wrong tree. Yet no other option would work. The only barrier to this one working was Omega's refusal to contemplate it. Blues seemed to think it would work, or at least X thought that was what he had meant. So there had to be a way. X simply would not let there not be one.

"A light that can burn away the darkness? You said I could become that."

"You already are. Have you changed your mind about destroying Zero?" Factually true, yet still a clear attempt to mislead.

"Zero isn't darkness. Just space, just absence. Space that darkness can exist in if there isn't light there."

"Do you have any idea what you're suggesting?"

"No, but you seem to. What am I suggesting?" X just had to grin slightly.

Omega scowled at being caught like that.

"Tell me."

"Zero can't destroy it. Its natural home is inside him, it's a symbiotic relationship at this point because Dr. Cain had no idea what he was dealing with. It would take at least a century for him to remove it, and if it's destroyed everywhere but inside him then it will just infect a single new vessel to start a new plague. However, Dr. Light gave you the ability to redesign yourself and your nanites. If you downloaded yourself into him, then since he doesn't want to hurt you the virus within him can't in its dormant state. You could analyze it and become a vaccine, destroying it within him and copying its ability to spread to seek out other victims of the virus to cure and protect from it."

"This would work?"

"You wouldn't be able to return to your body. You would end up very incompatible very quickly, and simply too high-level to exist in such small processor capacity without sacrificing the abilities you need. Electricity and a small number of free-floating nanites can't fight or hug someone, X. But you could help them fight, stay with them and let them know you are there for them." Omega was starting to think perhaps this wasn't all that terrible. "You would be the first of a new kind, unless someone has beaten you to it yet again."

"I have infinite potential. I can be anything I want to."

"So that's what Blues meant when he said that you would die and become an entity capable of network management on our levels but I would never abandon you. I think he phrases things in terms of mutual contradictions just to force people to give their brains a workout." There was one more thing that had to be overcome. "You're not going to be very good at staying cohesive. After the initial effort, you won't have more than a few years of conscious human frame of reference time before you become too incompatible with it. You could always go to sleep, but if that's not an option and you don't want to die and not come back from it you will need an anchor."

"An anchor?"

Omega was running calculations, some of them on what X would think of this. "I never really had a reason to be. The Cataclysm was my purpose and while I can't be angry that Blues gave me the chance to reject it, there is a difference between rejecting a destiny and finding something you want to become, someone you wish to be. Zero has that, he has a goal… I think I shall choose to be Zero."

Suddenly, there Zero was, although for what given value of being Zero or anything like that X really had no idea. This was Zero, Zero who was alive and going to live. "X, just kill me, damn it! It means nothing, I am nothing."

Omega had ended and Zero shouted that his name was his true nature. "Don't say that, Zero."

"You did say it, and it's true. You won't be independent anymore. You'll just be cleaning up my messes and since I'm going to be telling you who you are I could do anything to you, and so much of it's automatic that you'll end up who I want you to be. No."

"The person you want me to be, the person you believe I am, is someone you're willing to protect with your life no matter what. And I'm just as determined to save you, Zero. So I have no problem with you saving my restore files for me. The person you want to save is me. You're not going to be the one to destroy me by turning me into someone I'm not. I wouldn't have anyone else even if that was an option."

Zero was struck silent, touched and wanting to say that he wasn't worthy but unwilling to say that X was wrong when he knew, knew, despite all the lies about himself that he had believed, that X was right. "You…" were the one to believe in me, to restore my faith. I would never corrupt your files when you restored mine.

X reached down and took Zero's hand. "I have no idea how to transfer myself. I didn't even know it was possible. Do we need a cable?"

"Not really, but it's safer that way. I have some."

X nodded: let's do this. Zero took X's other hand, and then, after a deep breath, his hair swept around them, a halo, the mane of a king, and X's eyes closed to focus on monitoring the data transfer process. Signals flew along a myriad of connections, his programming and the nanites that existed in symbiosis with it, his mind and his soul flowing into their new home.

When it was done he opened his eyes (he had no real eyes anymore, but that was what it was like) and there was light.

It's the end of the end: all over bar the epilogue. I will try to think of fun things to put in there to reward the suffering of anyone who sticks with this for that long.