Afterlife

by GrimMoody

Bass is in the X series in this fourth entry to my Mega Man quintology. Coping with a darker future, mechanical obsoletion, and a brother inadvertently responsible for the death and destruction of many is too much for Bass to cope with. Only hope can keep Bass and his friends looking forward into the future.

15. It Turns to Winter, Part 2

"Do you need a breather, Roll?" GrimMoody asked as the vision screen faded out once more. "You look sick."

Roll did indeed look sick. She felt like all of her circuits were overheating, and she wanted to sit down.

"I...I thought you weren't going to show me any of the war stuff..."

"Uh, sorry. Well, trust me, that's...okay, never mind, it's the second worst you'll see." Moody admitted. "But you're going to have to see more. Only a bit more, I promise. This is the fate of the world, and you must see it. This is the task for you, Roll."

"Task?" Roll said weakly. She didn't want a task. She wanted all of this to be over.

"Yes, a task. A job. One of prerequsites of this job is that you learn about what happened to your friends. All will be explained, but for now, listen. The Cyber Elf War went on a total of four years, doing all the harm that I told you about. There's no real need to show you too much of it. The exact details escape me, but what I do know of this war is that at one point X and Zero managed to separate the Dark Elf from Omega. Using the Dark Elf, they took control of some of the enemy reploids and made them fight against Omega."

Images flashed across the screen of these events, but Roll tried her best not to look at them. She buried her head in her hands. GrimMoody only came closer, making sure that Roll could hear everything that she was saying.

"They didn't know how to undo what had been done to the Dark Elf." the author said. "So they did all that they could do, which was to trap her away from everything. The same doctor that invented the Mother Elf managed to invent a containment device, but it would only work if with a complex multiprocessor. Having seen sacrifice first hand, X knew that he would be safe if he donated his CPU and body to this cause."

Roll snatched her head upwards with horror and denial all over her face. "Please...please no..."

"Really, it's fine." Moody said, looking at her as if it was strange to be worried about someone donating their body. "He just became a cyber elf. The process was even simpler for him than it was for Bass. He's a very complex program. He was fine. Just a little different, that's all."

"Well..." the robot sniffed. "I mean...I don't like it."

"Nobody did. This action, however, stopped the war and Dr. Weil. For some reason way beyond me, instead of killing Dr. Weil and Omega, they chose to banish them to space. It probably had something to do with Dr. Weil's armorsuit. Thing was dang near indestructible, and they had to get rid of him somehow."

"But what happened after that?" Roll asked. "What happened to the world? Please tell me Zero survived!"

"He did survive..." Moody winced as she answered this question, and she shuffled her feet uncomfortably. "But things weren't good for him. It was hard to see the world in the condition it was, and you know how he felt about the Maverick Wars in the first place..."

The screen started showing more of its horrible images.

"I can't do this, X!" Zero slammed his hands against the wall's remains, the first floor the only part left of the innocent thing. "Bass. BASS! I hate him! Why did he do this? I don't want this power core! I don't want any of this! Bastard!"

X floated in the air, glowing. He wished he could put his hand on his friend's shoulder, but there was no point anymore. He was now an illuminescent cyber elf, a form that Zero disdained most of all. He could see it in Zero's eyes, without Zero having to say anything.

"Zero, it's really not so bad being an elf." X said, trying to be comforting.

"There aren't that many reploids who got to even become elves." Zero hissed. "Look around you, X! We're in the city that used to be Arcadia! Now it's a scrapheap surrounded by a desert! There aren't any humans that are going to come and fix this, and even less reploids! There's nobody! Everyone is just huddling together in the few cities still standing and waiting for something to happen! When does this end, X? When is that Utopia supposed to be made, again?"

In a second, Zero's saber was out, and he slashed an old public mailbox and parking meter through. X winced, backing away.

"I won't help anyone for you to get angry like this!" said X. "Please stop!"

"What's wrong? So much has been damaged and torn down. A little more destruction won't hurt!"

Zero swung his saber relentlessly, taking out bricks and smashed cars like nobody's business. Finally coming to target an old military truck, it's entire front hood long since blown away, Zero slammed his sword against the thing again and again, ripping holes through the sides and tearing at the old skeletons. Those bones were all that remained of the soldiers inside. The sight of them enraged Zero even more.

"Zero, please-"

"I DID THIS!" Zero screamed, and his voice echoed across the dust and ashes cityscape. "I'm the one who's guilty! I caused the Maverick virus and I am Omega! I killed them all, because I am evil!"

He flung his sword away and collapsed to a tight crouch, weeping. He covered his head as if ducking from all the nonexistent attacks that his scream had generated against him. He rocked back and forth, calling out the names of all the friends he had lost. X wanted to weep also, but this was difficult for an elf. He neared his friend, trying to let his peaceful blue glow assure Zero that he had not lost everything; he hadn't lost this friendship.

"You can't do this, Zero." his voice was very gentle. "Not now. We need you to be strong."

"Strong? I never was strong. Not in my entire existence." Zero hissed, shaking. "I can't do this...I want to die..."

"Please don't say that, Zero. You've survived so much...you can survive this too."

The obvious pain that X felt touched Zero. He lifted his head, looking with tired eyes at his elf friend. Zero felt a stab of pity for X. As bad as things had been for him, X had lost just as much as he had. Only, these things were not the fault of X. Zero sank even further into his depression. He had done this to X, his best friend in the world.

"I'm sorry..." Zero said, lowering his eyes again. "X...I'm so sorry..."

"Don't think about it anymore, Zero." X whispered. "Things can only get better from here. We'll fix this. You'll see."

The scene change at this point, and the wretched city swirled around, becoming instead an empty wasteland.

Zero yanked at the cords, far out of patience. Finally the electric cords tugged out from behind a rock, and Zero plugged them into a cylindrical capsule, one that from the outside had the appearance of a dead tree. He worked more quickly. This was something he had to hurry and do. It wouldn't work if X found him. Then he might not be able to go through with it.

Zero didn't want to do this; it wasn't his first choice. But he typed his proper codes into the computer panel inside anyway. If everything went right, then the computer would be able to effectively cut him off from the rest of the world all while using low amounts of power. That way the seal would last longer. What Zero intended to do after that, he wasn't so sure. He just wanted to be gone and know nothing anymore. He didn't want to see the earth and what had happened to it.

His first choice wasn't going to work, he found out quickly. Though everyone called Zero a reploid, he wasn't much of one. He was still a first generation robot. The most advanced first generation there was on the earth, but still an oldstyle nonetheless. One of the things that typified the oldstyle bots was their programming that prevented them from harming themselves. Zero considered tricking his AI using the trash compactor trick, but in the end even this was too much. Not that his programming stopped him this time. It was X. X had lost his body, but he hadn't lost his mind. Zero couldn't harm himself in that way and thus hurt X. That was just not possible. It was bad enough that he was leaving his friend. Doing so permanently would be far too cruel.

I'm doing what I have to do. Zero repeated to himself. I can't do this anymore...I can't pretend to be a hero any longer...

That was why Zero was sealing himself away again. He wanted everything to go away. There would be no more fighting, no more friendship, and no more devastation. Zero hoped only for nothingness; hoping anything better than that seemed frivilous and a waste of time. He would never be happy, so settling into silence was his only way out. It was Nirvana, nonexistence. It was Hell.

Zero didn't bother looking up at the sky or in the distance before he initiated the final procedures. He knew what both looked like: flat, dull, and dead. His mind might not let him commit suicide, but he could at the very least delete his memories by tricking his mind into a defrag. Zero wasn't sure how effective this would be, but the more he forgot, the easier it would be if something happened to his containment.

There was so much he wanted to remember. Axl had been a true friend - oh, wait, he had been responsible for not only killing Axl's friends but his creator. X was his best friend...hold on, not really. X's life had been filled with nothing but suffering ever since Zero had shown up and made Sigma their prime enemy. He didn't dare think of Iris at all. The navigators had been wonderful, but all they got was doom for their trust in him.

Alia was right after all. he mused coldly. I really should have been destroyed.

Zero stopped for a moment. He wondered if there had been any time in his life when he truly had been happy. The only thing that came to mind was his first adventures with X and the Maverick Hunters, before he had known anything about his horrible origins. How could that be happy? Sigma was still there, poisonous and ready to bring death to many over so many years. It wasn't enough that Sigma had finally died. It wasn't near enough. Zero wished that he could have made Sigma suffer as much as he had.

The robot pushed a button, and several mechanical arms lowered down to hook into his back. This would be the end for him. As soon as he pushed the next and final button, then the containment field would go up, and he would have the appearance of just another reploid casualty, dead and useless.

It's what I deserve...

Zero pushed the button.

"Zero, no!"

Zero swung his head up, looking for the last time at X. He wished X hadn't come. This was hard enough already. Doing the best he could to smile, he just waved at X, who could do nothing but float outside the containment field.

"I'm sorry, X. I can't do this anymore." Zero said, trembling and wishing so much that he had the strength to not do this. "I can't live with what I've done."

"Zero...I need you...I can't do this by myself..." X said, his ambient voice quivering. "You're too good for this..."

"It's the only way." Zero glanced at the computer. He didn't have long before the defrag started. "You need to be able to make the world better, X, and I've only been holding you back. I've ruined things since the very beginning, X. I can't ruin the world anymore. I'm trusting you to build that Utopia now, okay? Make it a good one."

X understood. he didn't want to, but he did nonetheless. He nodded, his voice trying to regain its strength. "I will."

"Goodbye, X."

The scene faded, and so too did the black vision screen. Roll found herself once again alone with GrimMoody, standing in the street. The author was now wearing a little pink snow hat. It was actually very cute, but Roll didn't notice this. Her eyes were hard, and all she could feel for Moody was a cold hate. GrimMoody tugged the sleeves of her coat over her hands as she spoke.

"I don't have any more to show you, chronologically anyway." she said. "There's a bit more to tell. So, the Cyber Elf War ends when X and Zero destroy Omega. Zero seals himself away. I won't ask what you're thinking. You want to know if things really are going to get better in the future. After the war I suppose things settled down, though apparently there were still some Mavericks left to fight. I don't really know what the deal with that was, but I guess since the Mother Elf was the Dark Elf they couldn't use her to cure the Maverick Virus.

"But, about that time humans just got pissed off with reploids altogether. They created the city Neo Arcadia, basically a human's paradise. There were some reploids around for their guardian purposes, but in the end most reploids, Maverick or not, were just killed off. 'Retired' as they said. This city was led by a copy of X, one who was corrupted. He basically just believed in killing all reploids and whatnot. Dr. Ciel, who I told you about before, she reawakened the sealed Zero with a cyber elf to come fight for her."

"Does this war end badly?" Roll asked, her sweet eyes narrowing with doubt. "I don't want to hear about it if this turns out like the Cyber Elf War!"

"Don't interrupt me, chiquita. I ain't done. Zero didn't remember who he was, but he remembered enough to want to protect the reploids. Eh, a lot of nonsense happens, and they call this the Second Maverick War. The short of it is, Neo Arcadia ends up destroyed, X's body is destroyed and the Dark Elf is released. At about this time, the ship that carried the banished Omega and Dr. Weil returned. I said don't interrupt! Don't worry, Zero destroys Omega before it does anything, but the explosion created by Omega was powerful. The only reason Zero survived was because Cyber Elf X used his power to save him."

"X...does this mean..." Roll started to shake. "Does this mean he died?"

"Uh, well, it would mean that for any other cyber elf, but he doesn't." GrimMoody shrugged. "I don't know if he's more powerful or something, but he really just loses the ability to reappear to Zero. Somehow he still exists. I'm not sure how that works but yeah. Zero too...his existence becomes very strange as well. After fighting Dr. Weil in a falling space shuttle, he doesn't have the time to escape, and he burns in the atmostphere. However, this too doesn't seem to end him. His body is destroyed, but later on Dr. Ciel turned both X, Zero, and some other reploids into these thingies called biometals.

"Ah, biometals. Them things changed everything. In the future, there are no longer any reploids. No robots at all, except like mechaniloids, I think. The law changed so that pure robots can't exist, and humans instead merged with them. That was supposed to be the treaty that ended the war, but heck, it just eliminates reploids entirely. X, Zero, and the other biometals merge with the human heroes to give them powers and fight baddies and whatnot. I don't know what bad guys they had to face then, but I bet you can guess the problem with merging people and reploids."

Roll did know this, though the horror of it was almost too much to say. "That means...humans...they can get the Maverick virus..."

"Exactly." GrimMoody seemed pleased that Roll figured it out on her own. "I don't know what happens after that. I mean, I think the good guys win. There's this brother and sister team that work together with the biometals to fight the baddies. They seem to do a good job with that. I don't really understand who they were fighting or why, but that's how it went."

"Wait, hold on..." Roll said. "When was this?"

"About a century after the second Maverick War."

"Okay...so..." Roll stuttered, her lips uncertain if they really wanted to ask what Roll had in mind. "What happened to me? You never said."

"Oh, yes, right."

GrimMoody stepped forward again, repeating the motion of tracing a rectangle in the air. The black screen appeared once more, and on it a scene appeared. It stung Roll's heart to see X, back in his body and operating. After hearing all this, it felt nostalgic. She almost forgot that he was still currently in his body, inspecting copy chip manufacturers out in Europe.

X was watching the monitor, observing Maverick attacks. Now the whole world was Maverick, and they tore down the pillars of civilization. Arcadia was being torn down, and there had been no time for so many to escape...even Signas. Reploid skin wasn't designed to get dark circles under their eyes, but it certainly looked like X had spent several nights awake. This effect was even worse when he looked down at his sister.

Roll was sitting at a computer, fingering her buster arm. She couldn't escape the fighting either, and in the escape from Neo Arcadia her buster rounds joined in with X's and Bass'. For now she was holding her arm still for Bass, who was repairing some of the wires. The dark robot was silently grim, and every so often he interrupted his work to glance up at X, silently demanding something. This demand got a strange and also soundless reply from X; the heaviness in his eyes carried pain, but resolve as well.

Roll paid all of this little attention. She was trying her hardest not to focus on everything that was going on and remember that now she had to be strong. She couldn't remain behind any longer. The girl-bot promised herself that she was not just a housekeeper. She was more than that, she was a fighter, strong and unafraid. She wasn't going to think about hiding. For years she had been the great hero Proto Bot, and she could return to that now.

There would be nothing that would stop her from joining her brother on the battlefield. Not even the frightening memories of Alia's death protecting her. She wasn't going to be a frail thing to just be protected. Roll was afraid, that was definitely undeniable, but she wasn't going to let that fear stop her. Not when the world needed her. She felt for once to be a noble robot, and it made her feel warm on the inside. She was following in Mega Man's footsteps. Not a fighter by choice, but by necessity. Roll would do her duty.

"We can stop this!" Roll exclaimed with enthusiasm, sounding just like Mega Man. "I know we can!"

X smiled a smile that many a parent used when their young child showed them a scribbled picture or the mess they had made while trying to do something like a grown up. It reminded him so much of Axl when she spoke that way. It was the same for Bass, though his smile faded after only a moment of existense.

"It's time, X." he said.

X sighed, nodding. "I didn't want it to come to this..."

"What? What is it?"

X addressed his sister, wringing his hands nervously. "Roll, we at the Hunters always knew that someday there could be a threat to peace on this scale. The Omega...he's very powerful. If we don't get rid of him soon, then the world could face serious consequences. So we made a secret weapon in preparation for this day. We didn't want to use it before, but now we see no choice."

Roll pricked up her ears and eagerly drank in his words. "We can stop them, right?"

"Yeah." Bass nodded. "This thing, it's a giant mech. We want you to pilot it."

"Me?" Roll gasped, not sure if she was excited or not. "I'm not sure I can do that. I'm not trained to pilot anything but helicopters."

"It's not hard." X replied. "Besides, the defensive capabilities of this mech are simply amazing. You'll be able to help with the war, and you'll also be very safe. Worst come to worst you can even teleport out of the mech."

"Sounds great!" Roll forced on herself a cheer. She had no love for destruction, but of course they wanted her to be safe. "Where is it?"

"In the basement of this building." X pointed to the door. "Down in C-level. Go down to the capsule and plug the black cord into your neck. The computer system will take the capsule and load it into the mech. Once you're in the mech, we'll give you further instructions from there. Bass, you're done with that repair, right?"

"Yeah. I just have to close it up."

Bass screwed in the cover panel for the buster, letting Roll step down from the table. She brushed off her shirt, a little annoyed about the stains on it.

Oh well, no one's going to notice it in a mech! ...Huh?

The guy-bots seemed to be acting strange. X stared at her with nostalgic and almost doleful eyes, rather like a parent watching their child graduate. It always annoyed Roll that he was the younger sibling and yet still watching out for her. Bass' expression was for once not immediately easy to tell. It was frozen solid in a state of neutrality, with not one telltale facial feature out of place and giving her some clue of what was going on in his mind.

"What are you looking at me like that for?" Roll asked, going from one face to the other. "I'll be okay, won't I? Cheer up! Things will get better from here!"

Roll tightly hugged them each around the neck before heading obediently down to C-level. With the touch of a button, the heavy armored door began to lift.

"Hey Roll..." Bass said.

She turned back to him, curious.

"Remember...I always promised Rock to keep you safe."

"Yeah, I know." Roll wondered why he was bringing it up. "I'll see you guys later!"

As the doors shut behind Roll, locking into place, both of the remaining robots looked at one another, silent without even wordless conversation. After a moment, X returned to his computer.

"Alright, we still have Alpha unit." he said, firm and nothing but business. "If we can hold off Omega for another week to set up the deep station missles..."

The scene changed to Roll as she went down to C-level. There wasn't much in there other than old computers, piled up and dusty. A few curtain rods leaned against a side wall, making roll wonder when anyone bothered to decorate this facility. Roll ignored all of that. She guessed it must be distractions in case anyone discovered the capsule or the mech.

In the very rear of the room Roll found the capsule. It was a tall yellow cylinder with grey paneling. A small commputer console was beside it, looking comparatively new to all of the older computer junk lying around C-level. It was easy to guess which button opened it, and roll entered, letting the round panel slide back into place and close her in.

"Alright, a black cord...here we go!"

It wasn't hard to find. It just hung from the top of the capsule as if waiting for the robot that would plug in. Roll stuck it in her neck and activated the capsule, trying to relax as it started whirring to life. Without warning, Roll could feel her systems fluctuate. They were beginning to shut down.

"Wait, what? What's going on?"

Roll tried to pull at the black cord, but before she could a warning message popped up in her mind, threatening dangerous results if she pulled away the cord before the programs were finished loading. This message was followed up by another, a personal message. It was X.

" - I'm sorry, Roll. - " it said. " - If you're getting this message, it means that the war has gotten too harsh and we have to take extra measures to keep you out of harm's way. I'm sorry for decieving you, but I can't let you die out there. For a long time I thought that I was the only Light-bot still operating, and when I found out that I was wrong, nothing could have made me happier. I'm not going to expose you to this kind of danger. I have to keep you safe. - "

The mesage cut off, leaving Roll in a state of dizzyness. All she could feel as she heard these words was anger. Glitching, Roll banged on the walls of the capsule as hard as she could, only realizing now that there was no way to open it from the inside. She was trapped.

"X!" she screamed. "Please don't do this to me! I can't do this again! I can't stay behind while everyone else fights and dies! I can't do this again! X, let me out! I...I HATE YOU! I hate you for doing this to me! I...hate you...please..."

Roll fell to her knees, unable to continue her futile banging against the wall. Crying, her systems began shutting down, peacefully beginning her hibernation. She could only cry for a few seconds more, then nothing. She slumped against the wall of the capsule, completely gone.

Roll stared at the screen long after it had disappeared from the air. For a moment, she didn't realize that GrimMoody was still speaking. It took a second for her eyes to notice this and stare back at the author, but her ears were still further behind.

"You survive the Elf Wars." GrimMoody said as the wind started blowing her scarf through the air. "Seeing how devastated the world had become, X was too forlorn to awake you right after the war ended, but overcome by the loss of Zero, he eventually changed his mind. You took it pretty hard to see what happened to the world, and what happened to X. You didn't speak much, for a while, but your human appearance did wonders for restoring human/reploid relations. You helped a lot of people, as many as you could."

""But...what about during the Second Maverick War?"

"X still didn't want you to fight in it. He wanted you to be safe, like always, and since your talents enabled you to help humanity, you were able to stay in Neo Arcadia. You basically stayed out of the wars, growing more bitter and more quiet as the years went by. You survived the destruction of Neo Arcadia, but once X had disappeared, you were alone. No one was ever able to tell you what happened to him, though you did hear about Zero when he died. Everyone did. There was nothing you could do about it, so you just...carried on. You tried, anyway. Once the laws enacting all reploids to merge with humans came into place, you managed to basically disguise yourself as a human, for a while. Your knowledge went a long way for helping half-machines and half humans, but there was no one to help you. You were old, outdated, and the only way you could be maintained was if someone knew you were only a robot and yet wouldn't tell on you. Eventually, you stopped looking. You die of data failure, more or less the robot version of natural causes."

"But...but..." Roll wanted desperately to hear something comforting, and she tried to overcome her increasing anxiety. "Please tell me...is there peace after this? Somehow, after all those wars and deaths...please tell me that there is peace!"

"I'm not really sure what happened after the whole biometals thing." GrimMoody said. "What I do know is, no, there was no peace. Humanity died out. The last human there was lived in space, but he died in the end just the same. After that some weird new people came to earth living there...I really don't know who they were, but they were going around searching for power sources...it was weird. That goes beyond what I know, other than that they were searching for power sources or something. The earth was like...I don't know, half flooded."

Roll was furious. She shook with anger, and her normally delicate face blazed red with enraged passion. This was too much.

"How dare you!" she screamed. "You, the 'author' do all this to us and you don't even know what you've done? You don't even know how hard it was for me every single time I had to watch as Rock left home going out to defeat Dr. Wily over and over again, and THIS happens? Poor X and Zero had to spend all those years trying to get rid of the Mavericks and the Mavericks are still around three centuries later? They DIED saving earth from Mavericks! And that did nothing! They died for nothing! Rock died for nothing! All Bass ever wanted was for someone to appreciate him and he dies like that? How can you do that to us when we gave everything we had to give for the sake of good? We don't deserve this!"

The robot collapsed to her knees, beginning a fresh wave of weeping. Or she wanted to. Instead this urge was interrupted by her act of kneeling; the attempt failed as she realized that something was in the way. The ground was covered in more than a foot of fresh snow, though Roll never saw it falling. She quickly stood up again, realizing that she wasn't wearing the same outfit she had been. She was in thick black pants and a tan coat, accented by a red scarf and mittens. Lifting her hand to her head, Roll tugged off a knit red cap, complete with a white poof on it.

GrimMoody's outfit suddenly made sense. If Roll had been human, she certainly would have needed all of those things. The landscape was still the same location, but the waves of wheat were gone, covered by the vast blanket of shimmering white. The trees too were decorated by the snow, their leaves gone and their bark black from the moisture of the snow.

"I always thought snow was peaceful." GrimMoody said as she adjusted her scarf more tightly around her neck. "We don't get that much of it where I live. The sky gets a nice grey that it only does when there's snow."

Roll was still suspicious as she wiped the snow off of her pants. Her questions, however, had not disappeared. She stared at GrimMoody, her face almost as frozen as the landscape around them. There wasn't any need for complex questions. Only one remained.

"Why?"

Grimm sighed. She looked more sad now then she had ever since she had appeared, and she seemed at a loss. Gearing herself for an explanation, GrimMoody let out a sigh.

"Roll...I'm not really 'the' author. I'm just 'a' author." she attempted to explain. "I'm not the one who imagined you. You, Dr. Light, Mega Man, Proto Man, Dr. Wily...all of you belong to a different author. He is the one that envisioned you in his mind and wrote you into existence. For reasons I cannot explain to you here, I am unable to tell you his name. Let's just call him...eh, Dr. K. Dr. K wrote parts of history for several centuries, starting with Mega Man's time as a hero. He wrote X's heroic years, and he skipped the Cyber Elf Wars to instead write about Zero's time as the hero. Dr. K also wrote about the merged human/reploid time, and also four thousand years from your original time where that new species was running about earth."

"Then...then he's the one that destroyed everyone?" Roll wanted to cry. "Why? If he created us, doesn't he like us?"

GrimMoody shrugged. "I don't really know why he did. Really Roll, all of you really are inferior beings, very manipulatible. Some of the tragedies I wrote myself, like Axl's and Bass' fates. Yours too. X's and Zero's, as well as the world's, were all decided by Dr. K, and everything I wrote was merely in line with what he had developed his universe to become. Heck, if outside influence hadn't stopped Dr. K, then he would have made it so the real X ruled Neo Arcadia instead of Copy X. He would have been the one trying to destroy the innocent reploids, having to be stopped by Zero. I didn't make the world, Roll. My purpose in what I wrote was to merely connect your original timeline with the century where X lived. Remember when Dr. Light first went to the hospital, right before you met Crystal Bot?"

"Yeah..." Roll's voice wavered as she tried to keep control of herself. It wasn't working that well. GrimMoody continued nonetheless.

"Well, that was when I took over. Crystal Bot herself is my creation; she and a few other characters don't exist in the same way that you do. I wrote what happened from that point in time until the end of the robot apocalypse, and I also wrote your return to life in the X series. Dr. K never explained your fate, or Mega Man's or anyone's from your time period. It's assumed that some big thing happened to kill everyone you knew. I merely put words to this sentiment. You never really appeared to X, nor Bass either. Your fates were indeterminable, and so were the fates of Alia, Axl, and the other navigators. I just thought I would fill in the blanks."

"Why are you telling me all of this?" The Light-bot managed to dig out some of the bitterness from the grief that had smothered it. "Why couldn't you just let me pretend to be happy until all of this happened?"

"Chick, what Dr. K did to you was wrong." GrimMoody's features expressed every bit of the sorry Roll felt. "I mean sure, looking at this period of time, there were good technological advances and wonderful people, but your fate had taken a turn down the wrong direction. Think back to your time. There was happiness there, and peace. The brilliance and fun of those days should not have left you. Think of all you have lived through. Isn't it all wrong? You pointed out that Bass isn't one to give up. You're right, that never should have happened. Proto Man too, he's the most stealthy robot there is, and yet he gets caught. Finally, your brother Mega Man. He is the honest, innocent belief that good should always win. And he died. X was supposed to be a better peacekeeper than Rock, but for him every victory was a loss, as the world was only the worse afterwards. What nonsense is this, y'know? It betrayed the soul of what this story was supposed to be. Sure, musing on dark things is interesting for a while, but nobody lives on that. The things that will last the longest, and are the most important, are the things that make people happy. Intruigue, danger, attraction...all these are trumped by one thing: joy."

Roll said nothing. She just shivered, but not from the cold. GrimMoody approached her, placing a hand on the frightened girl-bot's shoulder.

"I showed you all this because I am going to give you the chance to stop all of this from taking place."

Roll's eyes widened. "Don't...don't lie to me!"

GrimMoody's smile was as dark as her name, and twice as ironic. "I'm not lying to you. Well, sort of. It's more complex then I can explain. See, in one sense I can do nothing for you. The reploids and humans will all die out, and nothing I write will ever be able to erase that fact. In yet another sense, I can wipe all of that away and leave for you a clean future, one untainted by the dark musings of Dr. K. There will never be any Maverick Wars. While computer errors will always happen, there will be no Maverick Virus. You and Rock will live normal lives, and everything you fight for will come to pass. I don't promise Utopia, because, well, everybody's got this sin nature thing going on, but there will be peace."

"I don't understand any of this." Roll said slowly. "But...if you really can change the future, please...please make everything better!"

"That's where you come in." GrimMoody seemed proud of Roll. "I will only do so much, because if I just went 'poof' and everything was fine, this wouldn't affect anything in the long run. You have to decide that you're going to keep the world peaceful and do what is right. You and everyone alive, that is. You've got to convince people that doing the right thing and honoring each other is more fun and more sustaining than evil or selfish gain. Do you think you can do that?"

"Yes! Yes I can! Er...well, I'll try anyway!" Roll clasped her hands together, with every inch of herself poised to beg GrimMoody. "Please, I'll do whatever it takes!"

GrimMoody nodded. "Very well then. You're going to have to come with me. This will require some writer magic, but it can be done."

With that, Roll began to trudge her way through the snowdrift, coming up to where GrimMoody stood. For her part, Moody lifted her hand once more, as high as she could reach, and she traced a large circle in the air. She bent down to trace the circle's lower part, then came around again to meet her beginning place at the top. This circle was wide, and the colors within began to swirl, pulsing with new light. This shimmering anomaly was large enough for the both of them to walk through, and Roll began to feel her fear creep back up.

"What is that?"

"It's a portal. It's the way back to your home at the lab a century ago."

Roll backed away a bit, shuddering. "This isn't some kind of trick, is it?"

"What do I gain by tricking you? Haven't you already seen what I'm capable of? Besides, I'm going through this portal too. Anything it does to you it's going to do to me. If you really want things to change...let's go."

Roll stared at the swirling thing, feeling her heart swirl just about the same way. She turned back, taking in one last time the outskirts of Arcadia. This wasn't what she wanted. Try as they might, X and her friends had not been able to make her feel truly at home in this place. This wasn't their fault. The very environment shunned her, as if she did not belong there. Roll shook, pulling her coat about her as if she needed the warmth.

"No one really belongs here, Roll." GrimMoody said softly. "This future should never have been."

"Then I've got to do something about it!" Roll stiffened herself up, trying to gather what scattered bravery lived in her mind. "Let's go!"

She stepped through the portal. GrimMoody watched her go, but she lingered another moment. She too faced the cold of the now snowy Arcadia. Moody did not stare at it, but happily grinned at the fields of snow. She placed her hands side by side, palms upward. As she lifted them the sun sank down into the sky, and a full moon appeared, larger and more close to the earth than it ever had been before. Its light shone down on the snow, making it glitter and glisten. Overall, the scene looked like the end of an adventure story, one that was drawing to a close. Moody seemed proud of the work, and she nodded firmly. Lifting her left hand to her lips, she blew outwards with a hasty puff. Like a wave of ash flying through the air, the scene blew away, leaving only nothingness behind. Once the author stepped through the portal, it disappeared.

That was a world that no longer existed.

"GrimMoody," Roll asked. "Where is this place?"

It was a good question. Their surroundings were completely confusing. It was a lot like the portal, with colors, shapes, and objects swirling around. These swirlings, however, were much slower than the portal's, so the place had an overall less dizzying effect. Roll was very thankful for that. They seemed to be walking on some sort of chainmail platform, one that didn't appear to be held up by anything. Aside from that, there was nothing in the area that seemed at all stable. Faces and people that Roll had known flashed across the room, as well as several unfamiliar ones. It confused and dazzled her, and she found herself staring at it and waiting to see what appeared next.

"This is the inbetween." The author replied. "It is the world that exists only because I cause it to, my little tunnel between my muse and your worlds. All that I imagine starts here as an idea or an object, to be deposited in your world at the time in which I call it. It is a place inhabited only by my imagination."

"Your imagination isn't very complicated." Roll noted as she looked around. "I mean, other than scenes, there's nothing but this walkway, and it's only going in one direction."

"This part isn't formed." GrimMoody replied, a little insulted. "It's made of remnants that I did not include in your adventures for whatever reason. Besides, this is a walkway between worlds, not my imagination itself."

GrimMoody started to walk down the metal pathway, and it took Roll a moment to notice this. It took her a moment to pull her eyes away from a flashing scene of her home laboratory, and she had to hurry a little to catch up.

"What do you mean by remnants?"

"Well, there's things that didn't happen." GrimMoody answered casually. "Then there's things that did happen, and I just didn't mention. Or there's things that couldn't happen, or alternatives to events that occurred."

"Oh, so it's sort of like deleted scenes?"

Grimm seemed proud that the housekeeper-bot understood so quickly. She chirpily grinned. "Good, that's exactly what they are."

\\\\\\\

Author's Notes:

- This right here is what I had planned from the very beginning. All the stuff I wrote even as far back as Okkusenman has been leading up to this moment. And so, that it is the end of Afterlife. Stay tuned for a bit, and you shall see what happens next!

- You know, I'm sort of convinced that there wasn't any need for X to seal off the Dark Elf for so long. I mean, when the Dark Elf gets free in the Zero series, all it does is just turn Elpizo into a cyber elf and then wander off. If Omega hadn't shown up again, then the Dark Elf would have just wandered around like it was doing between Zero 2 and Zero 3. I like to think that the Dark Elf alone is pretty different from the Dark Elf merged with Omega. Omega is clearly in charge when they merge. I dunno.

Well, the logic of the Zero series was a pretty huge failure. I mean, in Zero 1 there was no actual need to fight Copy X. Zero could have just negotiated some sort of peace treaty where they stop fighting until Ciel made the energy source. Defeating Copy X didn't stop the conflict, and it in fact left the humans more vulnerable to Dr. Weil later on. In Zero 2, it's very strange that Ciel would hire a ridiculously militant Elpizo to lead the Resistance when she was so close to creating her energy source. If she wanted peace, that was hardly the way to go. This guy clearly wanted to attack Neo Arcadia from the get go.

In Zero 3, we learn that Dr. Weil and Omega were banished to space. Why weren't they just killed outright? That alone would have stopped a lot of trouble. I know Weil was in this mostly indestructible suit, but apparently other people had been the ones to force that on him, not his own choice. Those peeps are stupid. If you see a megalomaniac, shoot him in the face! That's one of the first rules of liberty. And in the fourth game, if Zero had blown up the Ragnorak space station directly after defeating Craft, then he would have stopped Weil from destroying Neo Arcadia and himself from dying. Come on, people! Logic!

- People have accused me of only understanding and/or liking Mega Man classic, but I do like others. I've seen playthroughs of all the X games as well as the Zero ones, and I really like what the X series did with the gameplay abilities. Out of the three series I'm familiar with, I think X has the most complex and intruiging gameplay dynamics. It was kind of stupid that Sigma kept showing up over and over again, but this didn't hurt the games too much as far as being fun went. The plot, however, did and was too dang emo, but y'know. I actually really like the Zero series for not having the same end boss in every game, and the cyber elf thing was a neat gimmick. This was a good, complex turn, and if the plot hadn't been the most emo bullcrap ever, then it would have been the best plot. They put really good effort into making it a interesting and well written story in the entertainment sense. In one sense I still hate the plot, but it pulls you in nonetheless. It's like a pop song: stupid, but so catchy you end up thinking about it and getting into it at random moments throughout the day.

Mavericks! Aw, just one...

Magestikus

=====Imperial Alchemist

"I'll change you into something better."

Imperial is one of the reploids made with a faulty copy chip, meaning he's got Sigma's data in him. He's a humanoid, and he always wears deep purple robes like a king. He especially enjoys turning people into Mavericks. His attacks include throwing acid, turning the player to stone, and strange electrical beams that weaken your attack power. The player that beats him gets the Alchemy Wand, which enables the player to turn enemies into stone. This can serve as shielding or as a platform to get to other areas.

The name was easy here. Imperial came from "magestic", and alchemy came from "magic" - I got that from the "mage" that is the first part of his name.