Splash Woman's fingers gripped the handle of her trident with dark anxiety. Normally the sound of the waves hitting the rocks was a peaceful one, and nothing pleased her better than to sit on her boulder and watch to make sure the passing vessels avoided the rocks and went through the more peaceful waters to Monstropolis' docks. Today it just wasn't working. Splash Woman found herself gripping her trident too tight. Annoyed in her thoughts, she smacked the water with her tail. Peering at her mermaid fin, she sneered and smacked harder.

It was Zero. She'd never been able to walk, and now the most powerful and dangerous robot known to man was loose somewhere in Monstropolis. And she was stuck here. At the very least she was tempted to call up Mega Man and have him take her power so that he would be stronger against Zero. But alas, bothering him was out of the question, and she couldn't go on land without a special vehicle - not exactly ideal for fighting. For the first time in her life she was annoyed with Dr. Light for the way he had designed her.

The waters stirred. Splash Woman was only alert momentarily. She knew the sound of the robotic engines that carried this robot to her. She made her guess, and was correct: Dive Man. The grey Cossack-bot showed up only at rare occasions on her shore, as he had his business on the other side of the world. Normally his presense would at least bring up a smile, but today Splash Woman found it hard to settle down. As much as she told herself that Zero wasn't the only threat in the world and someone would have to be watching the waters, it still wasn't fair that she had to sit this one out.

Dive Man emerged from the water. Splash Woman did smile, but this one was a little awkward and she found herself lifting a hand to cover it. Poor Dive Man would have to traverse the entire Atlantic to see her, and for some reason no one could explain, he got seasick. It wasn't as bad for Dive Man now as it was years ago, but with having to swim so far the merrow-bot could swear that Dive Man's orange face was looking a little green.

"Hello, Dive Man." Splash Woman's voice sounded like song, and immediately produced a calming effect in the Cossack-bot. "It's good to see you again."

"I thought I'd come and see you while I had the chance." Dive Man replied, already starting to look better. "I admit I wanted to hear you sing, but you were slapping the water with your tail again. You only do that when you're upset."

Splash Woman grinned sheepishly, and would have blushed if she could. Instead she laid her trident on the rock beside her as she answered. "You know me that well, huh?"

"Sure do." Dive Man sat down beside her. "So tell me, what's the matter?"

"Oh, nothing I have control over." Splash Woman sighed. "I just...I can't fight Zero. I know Mega Man is strong and nothing has ever beaten him before, it's just that...I want to fight too! It drives me out of my mind that I can't be there. I've talked to Light Laboratories, and apparently the recently defeated Wily-bots are going to be pardoned if they fight Zero. It's just not fair. I've been a good robot all..well, most of my life, and the short time I wasn't was Dr. Wily's fault."

"It's not like you to be so jealous." Dive Man said "You do such good work at the pier. There hasn't been a single drowning incident in the past five years due to you. We've all got our part to play in the world, and while it's not as glorious for some of us as it is for others, everyone's important."

"I know, I know." Splash Woman felt like shoving Dive Man into the water for being so completely cheesy. "But...I can't help but feel that I should be there."

"Don't worry yourself about it. That's just your overactive sense of justice acting up. It's really admirable of you to feel that way-"

"Shhht! Listen!"

Splash Woman suddenly snatched up her trident again, clutching it with feriocity as she listened. There was that sound again. She wanted desperately to deny what that sound was, but talented ears such as hers knew what she was hearing. She guessed correctly the more common visitor to her rocky shore. As he rose out of the water, Splash Woman made sure that her crystal trident was pointed right at him.

"Ahoy, love!" Pirate Man said, coming out of the water and gently bowing to Splash Woman. "I was travelling the seas as normal, coming this way to hear a sea shanty from my sweet Splash Woman. Only t'wasn't song I heard, but the angered blows of your tail on the water. What troubles you, love? Oh, wait, Dive Man, o' course." Pirate Man glared in the Cossack-bot's direction. "Allow me to rid you of his nuisance."

"You're the one who should leave." Dive Man insisted, his look no less ugly. "Splash Woman doesn't like hanging around criminals like you. Stop bothering her."

"Will both of you stop?" Splash Woman tried not to roll her eyes. She had to keep a watch out for Pirate Man. "We're robots, and you're making this sound like some sort of demented love triangle! I'd much rather be fighting Zero than dealing with the two of you right now."

Splash Woman huffed in annoyance. She hunched over, and with a sight she lay her trident across her knee, still aimed mostly in the Wily-bot's direction. There was no telling what the thief-bot would do. She just didn't feel like putting up with her two admirers today.

"Ah ha!" Pirate Man said, nodding his head and lifting his claw to his chin knowingly. "So it's that that upsets ye? Well, love, I'll do the best I can to remedy your ailment. I myself shall go to Monstropolis and fight Zero in your stead. In the name of Splash Woman an' her fine beauty, I'll destroy 'im!"

"No! You can't do that!" Dive Man stood on his feet, readying his torpedoes in anger. "I was going to fight for her!"

"Ha, ha, argh! We'll I've said it first, so I'll be fightin' in her name." A haughty Pirate Man taunted. "Too slow, you land-lubbing sea slug!"

"That doesn't make sense! How is a sea slug 'land-lubbing'?"

"Easy! It goes on the shore and dies!" Pirate Man growled. "And now step aside. I'll be fightin' for my lady Splash, and you can go bring your seasick carcass back to Russia!"

Pirate Man's claw snapped dangerously, and his other arm pointed right at Dive Man. The Cossack-bot wasn't going to be caught off guard. Already he was preparing to fire his homing torpedoes, and if it weren't for the sudden appearance of the crystal trident, a battle would begin. As it was, Splash Woman's intrusion interrupted their preparations, and they both looked at her, desperate for an answer. Which one would represent the merrow in Monstropolis?

"Neither of you can fight for me if you kill each other." Splash Woman insisted, glaring at them both. "So just-"

"She's right!" Dive Man really didn't mean to interrupt, but he couldn't help himself. Frowning, he turned back to Pirate Man. "Alright, here's the deal. We don't bother each other in any way until Zero is dead. Agreed?"

"Agreed!" Pirate Man grinned gladly. "Aye, that I'll do. After all, the robots that fight Zero gain a pardon from their crimes, and once I'm free of that, perhaps my lady will sing for me all the more often, and point her spear at me less."

"No!" Dive Man was immediately horrified. "Okay, if I'm the one that defeats Zero, you have to stay away from her!"

"Not agreed! Argh, ha ha!" Pirate Man roared with merriment. "I'll see ye in Monstropolis, Dive Man! May the best pirate win! Arr hargh!"

"No, wait!"

Both robots teleported out, and Splash Woman sat there stunned. She lay her trident aside again, then promptly facepalmed.

"Man-bots!" she fussed, slapping her tail against the water.

-t-

Things were tense at Light Laboratories. Auto was plenty nervous, and now that shipping was getting back in order he had several parts and supplies headed for the lab. He was getting way to antsy waiting for them to come. Already he'd filled one of the side A.I. labs with as many E tanks and energy/weapons pellets as he could to be as prepared as possible for any outcome. Zero was on the loose, and he wanted to be ready.

There was only one problem. Nobody knew where Zero was. The teleport coordinates provided by Crystal Bot were clearly for the center of Monstropolis, but absolutely nothing had happened since Zero got loose. There was neither hide nor hair of him. Granted, this gave Mega Man time to prepare, but it was all the more worrisome not knowing where Zero was, or even worse, not knowing what he was doing during this time. Clearly Wily had put a lot of planning into this. Nor could he be questioned: the very night Zero was found, Wily fell into a coma.

Keeping security at the highest levels helped Mega Man occupy the time. He already had three separate force shields that blocked out all teleportation - even Crystal Bot's teleporters - and allowed in only robots with specific security codes. As much as Dr. Light wanted his home free of excessive weaponry, Auto couldn't help installing some autocannons. And for good measure, Auto got out his handy dandy bazooka, which hung over his back even as he worked at the lab's computers to secure them against viruses. With Zero on the loose, he wouldn't take any risks.

A blue teleport beam landed in the lab, and a cheery Mega Man rematerialized inside the building. "Alright, Auto, we've been approved to use the detector spikes that Bass was using in Russia. I need as many as you've got!"

"Great! Crystal Bot was just helping me bring some to the lab." Auto exclaimed. "I just knew that they would approve! Didn't I tell you?"

"You sure did." Mega Man grinned. "Hey, teleport out all the ones you have in here. I'll go help Crystal Bot bring in more of them."

"Good, go hurry her up." Auto shook a finger. "That girl-bot is taking forever!"

"Probably she's trying hard to make sure she's got everything she needs for Bass." Mega Man said. "Besides, she doesn't know how the store room is kept."

The supply room wasn't that far, so as Mega Man walked over to it he found himself starting to worry a little. Was his store room really that disorganized? Roll did a good job keeping the place in order...but of course the way she'd been acting lately, who knew? Mega Man tried to remember if she had organized the room in the past few months. He didn't remember. This annoyed him more than ever. He spent so much time out of the lab that he hardly knew what was taking place inside it anymore. Guilt began to get at him. He was supposed to be taking care of his family, and he hadn't as much as seen Roll in the past two days. There was just so much going on.

I'm definitely getting some time off after all this is over. I need to spend more time with Roll. Mega Man decided as he opened the store room door. She's got to...oh no...

Roll obviously hadn't cleaned up the store room in the recent past, though he couldn't imagine why the room would be in such a horrible mess. The metal shelves, which had actually been screwed into both the ceiling and the floor were now scattered across the room, smashed at every angle. Navigating that room was difficult even for a robot. And that wasn't even counting all of the materials that had been on the shelves. Replacement parts were everywhere, ripped apart and smashed. Shredded wire covered everything, as well as splatters of the robot-grade A-paint. They owned several gallons of the stuff - that much was obvious from the paint splashed everywhere over the walls and torn apart materials. Under all that mess, the floor was unseeable.

A shimmer. Mega Man glanced to the side; Crystal Bot was not stealthy. To be fair, she was at least a little bit less shiny than normal. The A-paint had splashed on her too, and now she stood there watching Mega Man with wide, expressionless eyes, looking a fair mess with all the red spatters on her armor.

"Crystal!" Mega Man exclaimed. "Wow, you scared me! What happened here? Are you alright?"

"Yes, Mega. I'm fine." she said, blinking once. "I'm great. Better than ever, you might say."

"Then...how did all this happen...?" a confused Rock guestured over at the mess.

"I did all this, duh. What, are you stupid or something?" she rolled her eyes. "And now, good buddy, we have talking to do."

Crystal Bot pulled a pink crystal out of her hood, the largest pink crystal Mega Man had ever seen. Without warning she jumped at him, charging with the crystal pointing straight for him. Mega Man hopped back with his lightning instincts, instantly activating his ultra armor. He still shivered. There was little his ultra armor could do against Crystal Bot's instant death spike. Though she had to stand still for it to be instant death, the pink crystal in Crystal Bot's firm grip was dangerous nonetheless. Mega Man glanced for only one second back at the door. Crystal Bot was in between him and escape. He couldn't get past her without risking being fried to death.

Seeing his worry, Crystal Bot only grinned the harder. "Now, Rock, old buddy, old pal, you're going to be telling me exactly where your little brother Mega Man X is. You're going to tell me all of the codes for me to get through his security. If you don't, then I destroy you and take the information from your fried brain. I know how to recover information from crystal spike burned CPUs, Mega. There's no point in resisting me. Just save me some time and make this simple, okay?"

"Bass didn't tell you?" This at least was a relief to Mega Man. "Oh, good."

The relief disappeared at once when he saw Crystal's happy and rather demented grin. She delightedly squealed, laughing with a deep, nasty sound. "Stupid Bass knows? Great! It's so easy for his cute little technician to rip it out of his head that way! Ugh, I'll have to pretend to be his happy little servant again, but at least I'll get what I need." Crystal Bot returned her deadly red eyes to Rock, and he shuddered. "Now I just have to kill you."

" - Auto! Crystal Bot's gone crazy! You've got to- - "

There was no time to send transmissions. As little as he wanted to be fighting Crystal Bot, Mega Man had to jump out of the way or suffer the death spike consequences. For good measure, Crystal Bot tugged at one of the heavy shelving units (this one was still fresh with yellow paint) and hurled it at the door.

"That won't do much good..." Mega Man said, trying not to fall over. Being forced to stand on a pile of metal debris wasn't easy to balance on even for a robot. "They can still teleport in."

"Wow, you really do think I'm utterly stupid." Crystal Bot scowled dangerously, coming all the closer with her energy crystal. She hardly even seemed to notice the difficulty of climbing over boxes of wiring and keyboards. "I've only been working alongside Auto all day long, installing some brand new teleporter security protocols - all to keep you pesky good guys out. I let you in to get what I need to find Mega Man X, but you won't be getting out again." Here her frown turned over and ended up being all the more freaky for it. "Plus it'll be plenty easy for Lord Zero to come and fetch me."

Mega Man gasped in horror as the demented girl-bot's disgusting laughs echoed throughout the room. "That's right, Mega buddy. Lord Zero is going to come and tear this place apart bit by bit, not stopping his search until your next generation robot is destroyed! Zero is the true robot! All of you inferior models just get in the way. Did you check out that data that Algorhythm Man showed you? Not one digit of those statistics is a lie! Lord Zero is the greatest robot that ever operated!"

"Please, Crystal, I don't want to fight you!" Mega Man exclaimed. "Please tell me what happened to you!"

"What happened to me? Aw, still so cute and sweet as you're about to die, aren't you? Nothing happened. I'm simply liberated from all the rules of you pathetic do-gooders and the stupidity of...ugh...'Forte-kun'! I'll kill him soon. For now, it'll be you!"

"I see how it is..." Mega Man said with genuine sadness. "I'm sorry, Crystal Bot."

Rock immediately snapped his foot up, kicking at a pail of blue paint. The precise kick sent the paint at the exact right angle to splatter all over Crystal Bot's face. The pail itself smacked her as well, and Crystal Bot almost roared as she drew an arm across her eyes. She wiped them off right in time to see the fully charged buster shot careening toward her.

"Gaaah!"

Crystal Bot smacked backwards into the way, more angry than ever. Before Mega Man could fire off more plasma at her she jumped into the air, casting her crystal eye. It bounced around the room, and one impacted into Mega Man's armor and sent him to the floor. Worse yet, this distraction brought Crystal Bot even closer. Her energy crystal was in hand, ready to shock him. She smacked him across the face with it, ending his attempt to rise from the rubble.

Then she stopped, one foot on Mega Man's chest and the energy crystal's point touching him right between the eyes. Latent energy started to form around it, and it pulsed with a growing electrical light - and pain. Mega Man's ultra armor could only resist so much before his systems started wavering and losing control. And the energy spike was only getting more powerful.

I can't use the epic win on her without killing me, so here goes!

Switching off the ultra armor (and subsequently being punished by an even worse wave of pain), Mega Man equipped the power bullet and fired it off. Immediately the spike energy stopped, and Mega Man was able to swing around and kick Crystal Bot's legs out from under her. He snatched the crystal from her hands and tossed it away, aiming his buster at her face.

"Stand down!" he ordered.

Crystal Bot refused. She in turn tried to kick out his legs, but the attempt was pathetic. The Toad Man disease was starting to take hold, and Crystal Bot's battle A.I. began to fail her, and it wasn't even very good in the first place. That didn't stop Crystal Bot from trying as hard as she could to continue the fight, but the best she could do was get up. Every punch was blocked or dodged, and every kick was meaningless. She was fighting Mega Man, after all. Yet no matter how many times he blocked her attacks or fired his buster at her, she didn't give up. With increasing fury she just kept on going, even though her strength was readily decreasing, and her armor just couldn't withstand the onslaught. Her left elbow was jammed, stuck at an angle that did her no good for offense or defense. And yet she still kept hitting away, for all the good it did.

"Why can't I kill you?" she shrieked.

The question was never answered. With one more strike of the fully charged buster, Crystal Bot collapsed into the piles of now junk, laying still. Mega Man took in a deep breath, lowering his smoking buster. He sagged a bit, running a hand over his face. This kind of security breach totally caught him off guard. Crystal Bot was a trusted technician, and that meant she had access...

" - Auto! - " Mega Man sent a hasty transmission. " - Drop what you're doing immediately and check on everything Crystal Bot did to our security systems! - "

" - I'm way ahead of you, Rock! - " Auto replied. " - I managed to get your transmission earlier and I've been working on it since then. That's the good news. The bad news is...well, I've got a lot of work to do. I think she's been corrupted for a long period of time. Basically everything I let her work on is malfunctioning. - "

" - Reset the security codes for teleportation. - " Rock said. " - She said something about a 'Lord Zero', and I'm sure she intended to send the codes to him. I can only hope she already hasn't...oh no! Roll! - "

Mega Man immediately cut off the teleportation. How many rooms had Crystal Bot torn up since she was here, and was one of them his sister's? Mega Man immediately went for the door, pulling the shelving unit out of the way as if it were no more than a stick. He began to run down the halls, and with horror he found that each new door he opened was filled with the wrecked contents of whatever used to be inside. Two more storage rooms were trashed, as was the lounge.

Roll's room is next... he worried, starting to get frantic. Please no, not her...

Mega Man opened his sister's door with horror. This room outdid all the others. For the other rooms, Crystal Bot seemed content to tear up whatever loose items where there. Here, she had punched through every wall, and thrown a dresser clear through the left one. Through the mirror as well, as the shards of glittering glass proved. The bed was now no longer recognisable, other than one of the metal supports being half-jammed into the right wall. Everything from Roll's closet was torn to bits. The shredded red cloth scattered everywhere gave the room an eerie sense of spilled blood.

"Roll...please not Roll!"

From the way the room was torn up, Mega Man feared that he would find his sister in the same state. He dug through the rubble, hoping desperately that his fear was wrong. He was so afraid that he could hardly look.

"Rock, what's going on?"

The fearful voice snapped Mega Man out of it, and he his wide eyes stared out the door. There was Roll, staring at her room with all the horror she possessed. She clutched at her purse in revulsion, thinking of all the lovely dresses she owned that were now all ruined. There wasn't much time to mourn the loss. Mega Man practically teleported to her, grabbing her arm as if to make sure she was real.

"Please tell me you're okay!"

"I'm fine. I just went out for a walk..." Roll glanced at her room. "I didn't want to tell you because I thought you would say no."

"I would've." Mega Man hugged her tightly, shaking. "Good job."

Mega Man's frantic hugging was actually doing a better job scaring Roll than seeing her room torn up. She held him a moment to make him feel better, but after that she just had to pull away. It was starting to freak her out.

"Tell me what happened." she asked. "Who did this?"

"It was Crystal Bot. She's got some sort of virus, and she's been messing with our security protocols, as well as tearing up the lab." Mega Man sighed and looked further on down the hall. "I haven't searched the whole lab yet, but I took Crystal Bot out of commission."

"I...I'll try to clean things up." Roll offered. "Don't worry about it."

"I'd like you to come with me to the lab first. I want you to stay by me until we know that the anti-enemy teleportation field is back online and with secure encryptment."

Roll nodded, affording herself one last glance into her room with a heavy sigh. As silly as it was, she was more annoyed than scared. These were her clothes! As long as she was safe Roll felt that she could worry about her possessions. So that's what she did as she followed her worried brother, matching his sharp pace as they went over to the main lab.

"Ah, Rock, it's worse than I imagined!" Auto exclaimed as he heard the door open. He could barely turn away from the screen long enough to see who entered. "Crystal Bot set a lock on the anti-teleport coding! I can't switch the numbers! If Zero finds out the right teleport sequence, he can teleport in! I can fix this, but it's going to be a few minutes."

Mega Man nodded, firmly biting his lip. In a world of fighter-bots, each minute was an eternity. He rushed right over beside Auto and started typing away at the computer. He checked the computer for any transmission emerging from the house in the past half-hour. Much to his horror, a transmission was going out, completely unencrypted. It was the teleport codes to get into Light Laboratories.

"Gah! She's still sending the codes!" Mega Man's fingers banged on the keyboard even faster. "Where is that coming from?"

"Rock!" Roll cried out.

The intruder had been hoping that Mega Man would be distracted by his work, but he was the hero of Monstropolis, and Crystal Bot was shiny. Not even Roll was fooled by the would-be attacker sneaking up on her. However, the evilly grinning tech-bot was still only a few feet behind Roll, swinging her pink energy crystal with threat. It was clear to all the robots that the transmission was coming directly from her.

"Still so gullible, aren't you, Mega?" She grinned all the more, then let her eyes wander to Roll. "So, who's faster? You or me? Little Roll isn't immune to death spikes either."

"But we are!"

Out of nowhere Wood Man showed up. On instinct Crystal Bot lit up her death spike energy, but Wood Man was a fellow Wily-bot and he simply charged and knocked the crystal out of her hand. Gemini Man jumped out from behind Wood Man at the same time and jumped on the other side of Crystal Bot. Both robots snatched up her arms, allowing Ice Man to emerge and try to shut Crystal Bot down.

She kicked his leg. "Stay away from me! What's wrong with you? We serve Wily!"

"Shaddup!" Wood Man hissed. "Hurry up and get her, Icey."

"Then keep her still already!" the Team 1 robot hissed back. "Sheesh..."

Gemini and Wood Man shoved Crystal Bot downwards to keep her from having room to kick. Ice Man flipped her switch at the neck, and that ended Crystal Bot's struggles. She slumped down, and the two Wily-bots beside her hauled her over to the nearest repair table and started strapping her in.

"Ah, good, that cut off the transmission. If we're lucky, Zero won't hear it in time." Auto kept up his work, and the keystrokes continued sounding even as he spoke. "In just five minutes more we'll be safe!"

"In the meantime, you can figure out what's wrong with her." Ice Man waved Rock over. "Come and see. Wily's robots are able to go in a safe mode where they're not activated, but they're not fully shut down either. You should be able to examine the virus in this mode."

"Great! Thanks! But, uh," Mega Man looked up at the three Wily-bots. "So why are you guys helping?"

"Auto showed us what happened at the secret lab." Wood Man growled. "Poor Elec Man...Nitro Man was a great fighter too! They were our friends and loyal to Wily! What did they get? Destroyed! Wily was the only one who programmed Zero...he did this! So I'm not going to the robot museum for his sake."

"Yeah!" Gemini Man chimed in. "They're just going to have to wait before they get my handsome faces trapped in that old museum! You're witness! Wily betrayed us first!"

"Wonderful!" Mega Man exclaimed. "Have your powers been restored yet?"

"No." Gemini Man almost whimpered, folding his arms and having the most dignified pout you'd ever see. "I haven't seen my wonderful clone for almost a day! My poor baby!"

"All of us downstairs take your deal, Mega." Wood Man said, still looking at the blue bomber with suspicious eyes. "You said we had a day and it's only been fifteen hours."

"I'm not going back on my word." Rock promised. "Ice Man, hurry and get the others. I'll de-install the power repressing software in your heads here. It won't take long. Though I'm afraid we don't have much time before something happens..."

-t-

Bass had been through Monstropolis three times already. The first time he tried to avoid Team 6, but since none of the other places he searched held any sign of Zero, for the second round Bass ignored them and looked absolutely everywhere. And then for good measure he looked again. For the moment he and Treble were now atop Kauffman Tower, trying to figure out where to go next. As much as everyone claimed Zero was somewhere in Monstropolis, the dark robot was running out of patience.

"He's a super destructive robot out to kill everyone and yet we haven't seen any sign of him?" Bass growled. "What the hell is that?"

To be fair, there had been one sign: Crystal Bot. Bass swore. Only a moment ago Auto had sent him a message that Crystal Bot was on the fritz. He mentioned something about a virus, but since he was frantically trying to undo the damage the tech-bot did to the computers in the lab, Auto didn't clarify. Bass knew what this could mean. He gritted his fangs, angry. Why in the world did Crystal Bot have to listen to Wily and go to the secret lab in the first place?

"Treble, I swear I'm going to do something about that girl, even if I have to reprogram her." he hissed at his likewise annoyed wolf. "She keeps getting herself into these situations!"

" - Beep-beep-beep. Beep. Beep. Beep-beep... - "

"Huh, what?" Bass turned around, glaring behind himself but seeing nothing but an empty rooftop and the elevator that led down into the businesses of Kauffman Tower. "That transmission isn't coming from far away."

Wherever it was coming from, it wasn't the top of Kauffman Tower. Bass lifted his ready buster and walked around the large roof, but there weren't any places for a robot to hide. He himself would be fairly obvious to anyone looking up. As he walked, he listened to the strange beeping wavelength, and the more he listened, the more his eyebrows pursed together.

"Morse code? Who uses that these days?"

Bass attempted to clarify the Morse code in his head, but an even worse transmission permeated the air, obvious in its lack of encryption. Bass already knew the security codes to Light Laboratories, and it shocked him to hear that this was coming through all the regular radio channels, clear as day.

"What the hell?" Bass snarled. "Oh crap, we've gotta find Zero!"

The dark robot immediately turned northwest, the direction of the laboratory. He immediately choked. There behind him was another robot. He crouched on the edge of the roof, himself looking over his shoulder in the general direction of the lab. A nasty grin grew on his face as this robot, none other than Zero, slowly turned his head toward Bass, his evil eye gleaming with violence. Zero's left hand extended, and out came a green saber, extended from the plasma hilt Zero held in his hand.

"Treble!" Bass hissed. "Warn me when someone's on my back..."

Forte wasn't that upset. He matched Zero's grin, showing his fangs. This was the fight he was looking forward to. He'd been anticipating it for months, ever since he left his creator. Best of all, Zero was right here, activated, and apparently more interested in fighting Bass than getting to the labs. This fact barely registered to Bass, who of assumed Zero was as eager to fight him as vice versa.

The assumption was correct. Zero stepped down from his hunched position on the edge of the tower, standing to his full height. He was at least two feet taller than Bass, but this didn't affect the dark robot. He fought plenty of robots greater in size, daunted by none of them. Already Bass was formulating strategies in his mind. He didn't know how high Zero could jump, but the wingless robot surely couldn't fly. Bass didn't detect any gravity alternators.

"Treble!" Bass called out again. "We've got to merge!"

No response. Not so much as the sound of one of Treble's claws scratching against the roof. Zero started walking closer, slowly as if to taunt him, and Bass took a few steps back.

"Treble!" he snarled. "Hurry it up already!"

Nothing. Zero was getting too close for comfort, and that meant there wouldn't be any time to merge anyway. Bass just growled (what was wrong with all of his assistants today?) and activated his double busters.

"Eat plasma, little Sis!"

The air filled with volleys of Bass' plasma, clouding his view of his enemy with their bright flares. Bass grinned. There was no way in the world Zero would be able to dodge these. Of course, dodging wasn't exactly what Zero had in mind. Before Bass could see what was going on, two vrrnnn vrrrnnns sounded, and suddenly all of the plasma was heading the other direction.

"What?" a stunned Bass was quick to double jump over the flying plasma. "You can't do that!"

Apparently he could. Bass tried not to let this distract him too long, and as he jumped in the air he started planning how he was going to land and make Zero suffer for his insolent self-defense. But as he looked over to his enemy, he found himself face to face with Zero.

I should have known he could double-jump too!

Too late. A flash of green, and Zero slashed Bass in the chest. Bass collapsed, hitting the roof with a thud as he landed on his side. His head smacked into something metal. It was Treble. From where Bass landed it was easy to see his wolf's fate. Treble lay on his paws, his doggy eyes wide open - and his cranium the same. The hole in Treble's head still smoked from where Zero's sword plunged into his CPU.

"Treble!" Bass cried out. Only a moment later the despair in his face turned to hate. "Oh, that's it! You're gonna die!"

Bass barely had time to say this before Zero returned, ready to make his fate the same as his dog's. Bass was quick enough to roll under Zero's legs, then once he was clear turn and fire off a new volley at Zero's back. It didn't do too much besides getting carbon stains on Zero's armor. Instead of trying to get away, Zero flipped around, snarling as his saber blocked further shots and sent them right back at their source. How dare this fin-headed robot resist his fate! Zero dashed forward and kicked Bass smack in the chest, hitting Bass in the area already damaged by Zero's saber. Bass' armor bent inward, starting to crush vital systems. Forte barely managed to keep to his feet. The green slash of doom flicked twice more, literally de-arming Forte.

What happened next, Bass never really knew. All he saw was that green flash and the horrible, hateful grin of Dr. Wily's masterpiece. Then the world cut off like television set, instantly black and its images gone. The chunks of Bass collapsed to the ground with three thuds, and the green swirl of the rushing saber slashed around one more time, slashing down to reduce Bass' remains to nothing.

"Leave him alone!"

It was the first time in Zero's short life that he heard that voice, but he knew who it was. He knew that voice above all others, and as the cry sounded out behind him, Zero snapped around, saber in hand to face his greatest enemy: Mega Man, the blue bomber, the invincible robot. The swirling pulse of a fully charged buster shot greeted Zero with a smack in the chest, making him fall back and trip over one of Bass' legs.

Zero was up only seconds later, swinging his saber at the pellets Mega Man fired at him. He charged at the bomber, who desperately fired back as quickly as he could. Zero dashed, closing in on Mega Man with every piece of his will intent on slicing the hero in half. Only he'd misjudged the bomber. Mega Man rolled under Zero's swinging arm and ran for Bass' remains. Dub the spider-bot was already there, holding Bass' arms and legs in his limbs. Mega Man grabbed Bass' torso.

"Go, Dub, go!" Mega Man cried out.

Both robots teleported away before Wily's masterpiece could do anything about it. The blue and green teleport beams streaked up into the air, disappearing from the tower. Zero's eyes widened. Angrily he activated his teleporter, trying to get to Light Laboratories. His teleportation circuits cried out with a squeal: Auto had had enough time to get the lab's security shields back up.

Zero's lips pulled apart in a painful scowl. A cold cry from him echoed in the air. It was only at that moment that Zero found himself surrounded by Heat, Wood, Spark, and Magnet Man, each with their weapon pointed at him, shivering at Zero's terrifying howl.

"Steady!" Wood Man pounded on his chest. "Attack! Don't let him get out of here alive!"

But for the first time ever, Wood Man wasn't so sure of himself, and he found himself wondering how a wooden robot could possibly complete with a sword-robot (and wished he'd been doing so much sooner). Wood Man didn't have long to contemplate this. Zero closed in.

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Author's Notes:

- Lol, poor Bass. Got pwned by your little 'sis'. I've actually been looking forward to writing this moment. Mwahahaha!

- I've said this before, but I'll just go ahead and remind you that a robot's teleportation abilities are only able to bear a little more mass than the actual robot themselves. It's very difficult to teleport from one place to another and it takes a good deal of power that has to take time to recharge. This is why (1) a robot can't teleport too often in battle and use that as a strategy and (2) a robot cannot teleport another robot with them. A robot can teleport something smaller, like maybe a gun or a robot arm or something like that (assuming it's nonliving), but an attempt to go beyond the teleportation limits results in desyncing and cancellation of the teleport. Therefore Mega Man can't teleport Bass' remains to the lab by himself. Dub is a smaller robot and thus better able to teleport. Crystal Bot is working on improving teleporters to carry more mass. She did succeed at this during the alternate timeline, as I wrote in WGT, but has not at this point completed that technology.

- So what dictates immunity to death spikes, you ask? Well, Dr. Wily had ways of making his robots invulnerable to the spikes, mainly by making them run on the same level of energy. Unfortunately, this means that his robots aren't as powerful as a result. Also unfortunately (for him), Wily didn't realize until several of his teams had been built that this was a strong reason why Mega Man could beat them. Mega was just too strong a robot for death spikes to have no result on him. Some of Wily's later robots are vulnerable to death spikes, however, and later on both Elec Man, Shadow Man, and some other robots Wily liked were increased in power until they were at risk. Teams 8 and 10 were built vulnerable to the spikes automatically. 9 was also vulnerable, but that's mainly because Dr. Light was never quite sure what makes robots not vulnerable - it's more complicated than simple lack of power.

...Okay, fine, it's because death spikes never bothered the robot masters in the games.

Death spikes can be powered by any source. Because of his technician's specialty, Bass has built-in spike protection against energy crystal death spikes. The crystals in his arms absorb most of the energy, and if Bass hits a crystal spike, he'll take some damage, but also fill his double-buster weapon energy to completely full. Notedly, the less power that's in his double busters the more damage they'll absorb. If I was making this into a game, this would totally go into the gameplay. Why can't I program...?

Character profiles!

=====Evil Zero

"Heh."

Good point: powerful

Bad point: he's friggin' evil! What more do you want?

Likes: destruction

Dislikes: mercy

We get to see hints of what Zero would be like evil at two points in the X series: the cutscene in X4 where Sigma explains where he came from, and the alternate Sigma Castle 1 in X5 that shows Zero becoming evil and explaining this to X. The X5 scene I consider a little less relevant to my portrayal here, as that Zero was worked on by the X series Dr. Cain and given more emotions. That Zero also has a deep friendship with X. Neither things have happened here, so I'm sticking more by the X4 scene, where we get to see Zero in his most original form: totally powerful, and totally Wily. Notice that evil Zero is more powerful than good Zero, namely because as an evil robot he's accessing the powers his evil creator gave him. Because of his kindness, good Zero refuses to go to that point and sacrifice his sanity for power.

Evil Zero isn't a talkative guy. He was not programmed the same as many other robots. He doesn't have any need for friendship, and he's happiest when he's destroying things. He doesn't necessarily enjoy death itself or explosions themselves, or even the experience of having a fun challenger. He just takes joy in turning things to rubble. There's nothing artistic or emotional about it. It's a lot similar to a child's need to crash into some blocks and make them fall down even though another child spent the last ten minutes trying to make it look like a castle.

In his earliest form, Zero was an upgrade for Bass. After the events of MM7, Wily planned to upgrade Bass with powerful weaponry, and this included a plasma sword. The evil energy crashing into his island interrupted his plans, so he ended up trying one more time to take over the world. Bass failed to kill Mega Man during that time, and so afterwards Dr. Wily was more bitter about his dark creation. He still tried to upgrade Bass, but he kept having "good" ideas of how to make Bass more powerful and yet more submissive. Eventually he figured it was a better idea to just scrap Bass and go for an even better robot.

King was the first result of this idea. The trouble was, during this time robots were very two-dimensional. They could either be intelligent and have a mind of their own, or they could be submissive. Hence Bass' rebellion and King's conspiracy. Wily was having a very hard time trying to make a robot that was both smart but not a smart alec; someone that he could bend to his shallow will without incurring a loss of intelligence. In this sense Zero is a technological breakthrough. He's able to think about complex strategies but he's not capable of reasoning out why in the world he likes destruction so much. He has great capacity for battles, but no capacity for morality, planning for the future, or any form of constructive activity.

Dr. Wily mused to himself that the problem with Bass was his basis on Mega Man's designs. As powerful as Mega Man is, he was always designed to be a lab-bot. His heroism only came from circumstance. Proto Man, on the other hand, was originally designed to fight and keep the peace so that large-scale wars would never happen (this is also the main subconscious reason why Proto Man despises upgrades - he's afraid he'll get too powerful and do something bad to the world). Thus Zero became to be based loosely on Proto Man. Zero's name comes from Proto Man's serial number DRN-000, as well as the idea that Wily is wiping the record clean and starting from zero: not only would none of his goofy Wily-numbers exist and prove that Wily was a crackpot, but all of the robots in the world would be destroyed, leaving Zero as the new prototype for all future robots. A neo-Proto Man, if you will.

So yeah, evil Zero doesn't have much personality. He just likes destroyin' stuff. He is generally always in a mood of moderate happiness that is heightened only by fighting, and he has no serious dislikes - not even Light-bots irk him. The only thing that gets him down is a weapon failure or an enemy escaping. I put "mercy" because it's something completely out of evil Zero's character that he hates the very thought of letting an enemy get away.

Only his like and dislike get any extreme reactions out of Zero. He lacks certain hardware for a normal set of emotional A.I., and what he does have is strictly dampened by Dr. Wily's programmed in failsafes. Wily impaired his emotion, and the only thing Zero is can do to be happy is destroy things. He literally cannot experience happiness, or much of anything else, outside of this. Destroying X, Mega Man, and Bass result in the strongest bursts of happiness inside Zero. As you might assume, yes, Burner Man's A.I. did serve as an emotional basis to a certain extent.

This is more of a side note, but some people have brought to my attention that Zero was supposed to have taken Sigma's saber at the end of X1, and wasn't built to have one. I disagree with this, mainly because I like the saber and I wanted it to be around in my storyline. My canon is that Zero was given a saber by Wily, as confirmed by a certain Bass ending in Mega Man: The Power Fighters. This sword went with Zero into the future, but it was broken by one of the Maverick Hunters that fought Zero before he could be brought down by Sigma. He took Sigma's sword later on because it was stronger. That's my story, and I'm stickin' to it. Huh. If you recall the Zero origin cutscene in X4, you notice that Sigma doesn't have his saber. Did he get one later?