X and Zero continued together along the final path to the core of the ancient base. While a few mechanaloids patrolled the halls, the biggest obstacle was spike-lined walls that made it next to impossible to backtrack, yet provided little to no obstacle in the way of moving forward. At last, the path took a final dip into a chamber with eight teleport pads.
"Well, this is familiar," Zero joked morosely. "So we'll be facing image duplicates of those we all had to..." He decided to not say anymore.
"...no," X stated firmly.
"No?" Zero asked, surprised.
"Each of them...they gave up their lives for this world, and for the people they saved..." X growled out, energy gathering within him. "I will not fight their shades again for Sigma's entertainment!" Leaping down, he placed himself in line with the warp pads. "I WILL NOT HAVE-" he shouted as he unleashed the Nova Strike, turning into a blazing meteor as he smashed through the warp pads on one side, destroying all four of them. "-THEIR MEMORY-" he continued as he dashed back to the center. "-DESECRATED!" With that last shout, another Nova Strike smashed the remaining four warp pads to smithereens.
Zero stared at the wreckage in stunned amazement. "Not that I don't agree with the sentiment, X, but remind me not to piss you off." And here I thought I was the one made to put the fear of a man-made god into the living, he added silently to himself. Then again, he is supposed to be my equal...
X stopped as he caught his breath. "No worries there, Zero," he replied easily. "Saving that for Sigma." As he spoke, a ninth warp pad - gold as compared to the other eight pads' former purple - appeared in the middle of the room. "Looks like he's waiting for us."
"Then let's not keep him waiting long," Zero proclaimed eagerly as they leapt together onto the warp pad.
The warp pad took them to another twisting corridor with automated obstacles they were easily able to smash their way through, using only X's charged plasma blasts and Zero's saber. The last obstacle proved to be a wide pit with a series of disappearing blocks across it. Zero easily crossed over the blocks. X instead decided to put extra energy into his Giga Dash Nova Strike and flew across the wide gap. Once at the other end, they passed through a final door.
Behind the door, Sigma awaited them, his feathered cape flaring around his body as he settled to the ground. He stared between X and Zero, frowning as he saw the sheer power at their command. "This...this cannot be!" he growled out. "This is not what I was told!"
"You were told wrong," Zero replied simply. "You were manipulated specifically to arrange my full restoration. From the day you accepted the guidance of the virus, you were a puppet-"
"No!" Sigma snapped out angrily. "I refuse to accept that! I am no one's puppet! I will show you exactly what I am made of, what I was put on this world to do!" With a roar, he lunged forward.
To X's surprise, Sigma followed a very similar attack pattern to that which he'd used when they'd first fought, dashing back and forth across the room before striking physically or launching spheres of electrical energy. He continued this strategy as X and Zero attacked him from both sides with their busters, wearing him down as they took his measure.
After he'd taken a good amount of damage, he changed tactics, and began warping around the chamber before launching waves of energy at the pair. X dealt with this by Giga Dashing through the energy before shooting or just bodily slamming into Sigma in the Giga Dash. Zero used his saber to slice through the energy wave before firing his buster's blasts.
As his health began to run low, he tried generating his Viral Clouds to protect him, but as soon as the clouds appeared, Zero lifted his hand and sucked the Viral energy into himself, draining a good portion of Sigma's energy in the process. As a result, it was at that point a well timed Giga Dash smashed through Sigma's body, setting it to explode.
The lights immediately went out in the room. "NO!" Sigma roared as his expected secondary battle body came online. "I refuse to be destroyed by you antiques! You are nothing compared to me, nothing! I will be the one to rule this miserable planet! I am the GOD of Reploids!" As he finished speaking, his Battle Body was revealed, a massive blue construction that rose up from one side of the room, reaching with two massive arms towards the pair.
"Then it will be fun killing a God," Zero murmured as he stepped forward. "X, step back. I've got this one."
X looked at his friend, confused, but backed off as instructed.
"Taking turns?" Sigma demanded, roaring with laughter. "This insult will be your last mistake!" The two massive hands reached forward to crush Zero, only to be pushed back by the sheer pressure of the energy he focused into his body as his Ether Aura flared again. "W-what?"
"There was only one mistake here," Zero explained simply as he stepped forward, energy focusing into his buster. "And though I did not make it, the onus of it rests on me. A program meant to serve as part of my systems made a mistake, and all that has happened in this world since is a direct result of that mistake...especially what happened to you, Sigma." He looked up at him. "You were a good Commander once...though it seems that part of you is long lost. I'm sorry that, in my backup state, I treated that, your last fight as yourself, as some cruel joke."
"W-what?" Sigma snapped back angrily. "You think I care about that at all? You think an apology will make a difference here?"
"No, I really don't," Zero answered softly. "To be perfectly honest, nothing can fix what's gone wrong. But not trying would be a far worse wrong. And some things can be corrected." He lifted his buster, pointing it straight at Sigma's massive head. "To start, I can remove the flawed shade of a once great man, before working to rebuild the world."
Sigma laughed again, though there was a tinge of hysterics to the laughter. "You...you think it so simple to kill a God?"
Zero sighed sadly as square focusing panels slid out of his buster as the charge reached full. "Sigma...drop it."
The blast went off, the final form of the Bass Cannon ripping through air and metal with the sound of millions of steel guitars being strummed all at once. The blue white light was the last thing Sigma saw, and the tearing of the air the last thing he heard. The blast continued far beyond Sigma, stretching out in a lance of sound and light that broke the atmosphere and shot into space, not carving an image into the moon only because that celestial body was on the other side of the planet at the time.
Zero sighed as he lowered his buster, the focusing panels sliding back into his arm. "I hope I never have to fire that again," he said to himself as he read the message informing him that his structure had reached its limit of Ether channeling, and would soon revert to his Bassnium power core and the connected settings. Looking up, he saw X hiding behind one of Sigma's defunct arms. "Come on, X!" Zero complained. "Your Ultimate Armor's one of the only things that can handle the Sonic Disruption of my Bass Cannon. Why the heck are you hiding?"
"Not hiding!" X called out unconvincingly. "I was...preparing a sneak attack in case you needed to tag me in!"
Zero chuckled, shaking his head. "Whatever you say, X. Let's get back. The girls are waiting for us."
Chuckling somewhat nervously, X joined Zero in the center of the room. "HQ, two to beam home."
The pair teleported out, with nothing to stop them.