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Title: Mega Man X6: False Awakening
Chapter: Stage 05 "I'm attuned to the fashions of the time."
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"X, you are now in the Central Museum," Alia reported. It sounded like an obvious thing, but X was glad for the confirmation. For a moment, he had wondered if the transfer had been thrown off by the Nightmare.
"Its appearance has completely changed," he observed. Not only had all the posters become completely distorted and the hallways cast with a strange blue-violet glow, rain was falling from thin air near the ceiling. "It's dead quiet," despite the rain. "I wonder what other Nightmares are waiting up ahead..."
It wasn't a pleasant thought.
It didn't take long to find the next Nightmare either. The way forward was soon blocked by what appeared to be a semi-transparent stack of carved animal heads, like something out of the ancient cultures exhibit of the Museum.
"A totem pole?" X muttered, hefting his Buster in case it suddenly came to life.
"I can't detect any sign of it," Alia said, frustration clear in her voice. "I can see it from the video feed, but all other sensors are showing nothing there. It must be the work of the Nightmare."
There wasn't anything else to do. The mysterious apparition was blocking the path, and there was no way he could squeeze past it. Slowly, X began to approach the totem pole. He couldn't say he was surprised when, the instance his hand came into contact with it, reality suddenly seemed to shift sideways. For a moment, he felt like he was in two places at once. When everything finally restabilized, his surroundings had completely changed.
To one side, a wall of screens suddenly activated, showing what looked like an exhibit from the dinosaur section. X looked up at it. "Is this one of the exhibit halls?" he wondered. There was no response. "Alia? Hm? Alia! ...Am I out of transmission range? Where am I anyway?"
He turned away from the screen, looking instead across the large empty chamber he had ended up in. In the fuzzy shadows, he could just make out Nightmares rising out of the floor and walls, stretching out their chain-like tentacles ominously.
X opened fire, circling as he strafed at the Nightmares. The screen behind him flickered, changing picture, and unidentifiable pieces of rubble were suddenly launched out of the shadows at him.
As he dodged the sudden barrage of debris, X caught a glimpse of something that looked like the totem pole that had sent him here. But he could see that it was solid now. It glowed faintly as the giant screen flickered again.
X's eyes narrowed. That was the source of this, he was sure. Breaking away, he ran toward it while the Nightmares returned fire with blue-red energy orbs.
X aimed his charged Buster and fired. The shot ripped away much of the totem pole's outer armor, leaving behind gaping eye sockets and a leering toothless grin. X didn't let up, keeping a steady barrage, some of it hitting and knocking away Nightmares instead, until he was in close range. The moment the totem pole came into reach, he shifted to the Saber and slashed.
As the totem pole disintegrate, X felt the same shifting and splitting sensation again. Straightening, he found himself back in the main part of the Museum. Rain again pounded against his armor, and X spared a moment to hope it didn't have some kind of deterioration effect.
The hallway he been taken to was strangely empty. The lettering on the wall read "B-1".
"That's right, the Museum goes underground," X muttered to himself, remembering Alia's briefing. The Navigator herself appeared to still be out of contact, as static came across the comm line. "That's how it stayed this intact despite Eurasia's crash. I probably need to keep heading down."
Uneasy in the strange silence, X headed slowly toward the down ramp. He tried to tell himself that he just wanted to make sure that he didn't slip on the rain-drenched floor, but the truth was the atmosphere was starting to bother him.
Barely a level down, another half-transparent totem pole blocked the way.
"Here we go again," X sighed, reaching out resignedly.
He had to pass through the strange Nightmare alternate areas three more times before he arrived at E level. It was with a great deal of relief that he noticed the lettering on the wall that indicated the "Main Hall" was ahead.
"What's the point of the Nightmares transforming the Museum into something so different?" he wondered in frustration.
The hallway opened up into a large circular chamber, like an auditorium. Large screens showing different exhibits lined the walls, and the domed ceiling showed a slowly rotating star map. A large hologram display occupied the center of the auditorium floor, one level down from where X had entered.
Approaching the edge of the ramp, X paused. Someone was already inside the Main Hall. Two figures faced each other on the lower level. One, crouched close to the floor, was clearly Scaravich, though quite a bit more battered than the image Alia had presented during her briefing.
"This is horrible!" the investigator moaned. "Why do I have to face someone like you?"
His opponent remained mostly obscured, his dark color scheme almost hidden in the half-gloom of the hall, but his voice was instantly recognizable to X, as was his lilting manner of speech. "Be a smart Reploid and give me the information on the Nightmares," Dynamo drawled, hefting his arm cannon threateningly.
"I'd rather just kill you!" Scaravich exclaimed, suddenly lunging for the mercenary. Dynamo took a step back, unable to fire his gun at such close range, then, in a smooth move that X had seen in their own fight, drew his saber and spun it in front of him as a shield. Knocked away, Scaravich tried to scramble back, but Dynamo followed after him relentlessly, jumping up and bringing his saber down in powerful strike that easily cleaved the investigator in two.
X started forward, but it was already too late. As Scaravich was obliterated, a Nightmare Soul rose out of his remains, and Dynamo unhesitatingly reached for it. It flowed into him seamlessly, though a shudder ran through the mercenary's form.
"So this is the power of the Nightmare..." Dynamo muttered to himself, flexing his hand. "With this, I can-"
Without warning, he cut himself off and grabbed for his saber, bring the weapon up just in time as the entire area was plunged deeper into the Nightmare phenomenon. Like a bolt from the blue, a familiar violet-red apparition materialized, already mid-swing.
Dynamo slid back as his own saber clashed with that of the Zero Nightmare, its unnatural strength making the mercenary's arms tremble. There was no time for him to even let off a quip as the Nightmare attacked again and again, sending a storm of energy blades flying.
Though he was certainly skilled, Dynamo was quickly becoming overwhelmed. Just as his defense faltered and the apparition moved in for the kill, a charged shot tore between them, and both combatants turned to look at X as he jumped from the upper level to the ground floor.
"Hey, you!" he barked, glaring at the Nightmare. "Quit messing around!"
Oddly still, the Zero Nightmare met his gaze. X started in surprise as it spoke, its voice resonating oddly, but almost entirely within the normal range of his sensors. "I'm not messing around..." it said, though the words still ran together and the movements of its mouth didn't match the sound. "I don't know what's happening."
Thrown off balance, X drew back a little. "Who are you?" he asked instead, keeping his Buster pointed at the Nightmare. "I won't let anyone stop me."
The Zero Nightmare's expression became a faint frown as it began to flicker again. "Don't you know who I am?..." it wondered, vanishing from sight for a long moment, then reappearing again, only to suddenly fade out completely.
"...Well, that was certainly mysterious," Dynamo commented, breaking the silence that had fallen over the chamber. Apparently recovered from his short battle, he came up behind X and smirked at the Hunter.
"So you're still alive, Dynamo?" X noted coldly, easily turning to point his Buster at the mercenary instead.
"Sorry if I made you worry," Dynamo replied with a quirk of his lips. "But you know what they say, 'Discretion is the better part of valor.' With Sigma gone, I've decided to take control of my own destiny using the Nightmare! I'm attuned to the fashions of the time, you see..."
"Is Sigma really gone?" X wondered. If anyone would know, it was Dynamo, who had been follower of Sigma despite apparently remaining free of the Virus.
"Yeah," Dynamo remarked wistfully. "Even Sigma had his limits, you know, and he overreached, spreading himself all over the world and Eurasia, and then crashing down like that. Sure, his Virus is still around, but it's too all over the place for Sigma's mind to pull itself back together out of it. He aimed for the stars... Or should I say, he aimed for Zero."
His expression and tone were suddenly serious as he turned to X. "I thought it seemed like a waste, but now we have the Nightmares and that impostor of Zero... Have you figured it out, the mystery of the Nightmare?" he asked, still teasing, but with a sharp edge that made X glare.
'Again, dragging Zero into this,' X thought furiously. To Dynamo, he only said, "Stay away from the Nightmares. It's too dangerous."
Dynamo winked, all good cheer again. "That's why they're worth checking out! Later, X!" He laughed and, before X could stop him, disappeared in a beam of light, the Nightmare phenomenon having cleared up enough to allow a transfer out.
For a moment, X simply glared at the place Dynamo had stood. It seemed almost impossible to imagine, the idea that Sigma... might really be gone...
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Notes: It's lonely without Alia! (:( )
Man, this chapter is so boring. But, hey, we're half-way through! Only five more chapters left. (And possibly a bonus "Stage 00" chapter to clear up the mess I made of X5's endings.)
Also, I hope you like talking heads, 'cause guess what we'll be doing next chapter? That's right. Exposiiiiition! Capcom Science! Cyber voodoo! All the good stuff.
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