Preparations for Halloween were nearly complete at the two Fortresses. Appropriate decorations were placed everywhere, from jack-o-lanterns to witches to skeletons, all robots built to entertain and playfully terrify. Wily and Cossack had worked together to prepare anything, as this was the first time Wily felt it was safe enough for Vinyl to actually go Trick-or-Treating, and he wanted to make her first real Halloween memorable.
Everyone was done up in costumes to enhance the experience, even the Robot Masters. Wily himself had dressed up as Albert Einstein, though that mostly involved using tape to comb his sideburns over the top of his head. Mikhail had dressed up as a vampire, though his fangs kept falling out and his cape was red rather than the traditional black. Kalinka was dressed up as Dr. Frankenstein, complete with a robot monster she'd built herself.
The Robot Masters glanced around at each other's costumes, Air Man's being the most confusing, as he was only holding a sign that read 'I want to have your babies!' "Umm..." Forte began.
"Given the design of my body, I don't have many options as far as costumes," Air Man explained. "So I'm 'your biggest fan'."
The other Robot Masters groaned, save Skull Man, who giggled like crazy. Skull Man himself was wearing a white eyepatch over one eye that blended with the white bone of his skull head, and a black trench-coat. "Not bad," he joked.
"And...you are?" Air Man inquired.
"My other self, sorta," Skull Man replied.(1)
Everyone stared at him, not really getting it. Crash Man shrugged, fixing his own costume, which was a riot of plaid, polka dots, stripes, and tie dye.
"And who are you supposed to be?" Skull Man asked him. "A fashion mistake?"
"Close," Crash Man replied. "I'm Clash Man." That elicited a giggle from Skull Man and eye rolls from most of the others.
Wood Man had dressed up as a giant caterpillar, and for some reason whenever he spoke, the smoke from his hookah took shape in the air coming out of his mouth in the shape of his words. No one was quite sure how he managed it, and weren't entirely sure they wanted to know. Shadow Man had dressed up as a red and black hedgehog, claiming he was, "Shadow, man." He seemed overly fond of the joke.
Forte's own costume had been chosen carefully. He'd recently gotten into a sci-fi/western anime focused on the plight of two brothers. While he wanted to dress as the badass one, he was supposed to be a good big brother to Vinyl, and the one he'd thought of dressing as was anything but a good brother. As such, he'd taped a broom head to his hair and was wearing a red trench-coat and black gloves and boots. However, he was determined not to say the classic lines of the character he was dressed as...unless Vinyl begged him. He knew he was powerless against that.
At that point, Vinyl raced out in her own costume. She was dressed in blue armor and helmet that made her costume obvious. She grinned up at everyone.
"Mega Man?" Crash Man asked worriedly. "But...we don't want to beat you up..."
"Not Mega Man!" Vinyl spat derisively. She then struck what she imagined was a dramatic - but was really adorable - pose. "I'm Mega Mare!"
That brought chuckles from all the Robot Masters, and Wily who'd stepped in. Forte knelt down beside Vinyl. "So...are you ready for-"
Vinyl gasped happily. "Say it!" she pleaded.
Forte went pale. "Aw, come on!" Seeing Vinyl's begging expression, he groaned. "Fine...this world-"
"With feeling!" Vinyl urged.
Rolling his eyes, Forte struck a pose. "This world!" he barked out. "This world is made of..." Lifting his hand up with his fingers in a V, he thrust outward, crossing his fingers as he did so. "Love and Peace!" As Vinyl giggled and clapped, he groaned. "Why didn't I dress as the crazy one?"
"Pretty sure you did," Shadow Man teased.
"So, are you ready for Halloween, Vinyl?" Albert asked, kneeling down beside her.
"Uh...no," Vinyl replied. "I mean, I dressed up like everyone...but what happens now?"
"Now you go trick-or-treating," Crash Man explained. "You take your bag for candy, and then you go from house to house ringing doorbells, and-"
"What houses?" Vinyl asked, gesturing outside.
Glancing out the door, Forte took note that the only other residence for miles was Cossack Castle. "Huh. Hadn't thought about that."
"I did," Mikhail spoke up, lifting out two modified busters. "This is how I do Halloween for Kalinka. All the robots in the Fortress have been redesigned to drop candy when shot. So Kalinka and Vinyl can race through the now Halloween decorated castle blasting robots and collecting the candy they drop."(2)
Vinyl gasped happily as she took her buster, racing after Kalinka into Cossack Castle. Albert smiled. "Thanks, Mikhail. But isn't that...expensive?"
"Not really," Mikhail replied. "The busters are designed only to cause the robots to enter a shut down mode that makes them eject candy. And the candy's all healthy, too-"
There was a loud crash from Cossack Castle, and a large hole erupted in one outer wall as a massive blast of energy erupted with a Bzzzowwwnnnn!
"In that case, we should have taken away the Mark 2 Wub Gun," Forte pointed out with a chuckle. Mikhail fainted dead away.
(1) Rather meta and obscure, but Skull Man is dressed as W.D. Gaster, who - in Undertale - is speculated to have been Sans and Papyrus' father.
(2) I think this would make an adorable ROM hack.
'Beat then Treat', or 'SHOOT ME IN THE FACE!'
Wood Man is that caterpillar from Alice In Wonderland!!
Is it just me, or does Forte remind anyone else of the pink mystic power ranger with that pose?
I spotted the adorable fan art on the fic's cover. So nice!
Funny how Forte is Vash the Stampede. Air Man has the best costume.
Costume ideas were great, my favorites being Skull Man as W.D. Gaster, Air Man as 'Biggest Fan' and Forte as Vash. Fitting Forte chose Vash as his costume, Vash is undoubtedly, one oft he nicest gunmen in fiction ^w^. Perhaps Forte might take up wielding guns like Revolver Ocelot, since Wily doesn't want Vinyl building busters and weapon upgrades into him. Maybe a pair of Six shooters that auto-reload and fire armor-piercing shots?
Also good idea for Halloween, blasting robots harmlessly to get candy. Now that sounds like a fun halloween, like combining Time Crisis and trick or treating.
W.D. Gaster?
Beware of the man that speaks in hands...
Okay, Cossack made Halloween 10 times more awesome.
memestorage.com/_nw/20/02384240.jpg
Hmm... so he meant "My other self, sort of" as in his father (actually, I recall a certain fanfiction that said Gaster was Sans' brother. Then again, headcanons never shoot in the same direction, so it doesn't really make a difference)?... That's kind of a weird way to phrase it. I thought he was talking about some incarnation of Anakin Skywalker, what with him saying that he was "sort of" his "other self" (which would be Darth Vader). Oh well, I guess this just further proves I suck at guessing things that aren't terribly important.
Well too bad, it's a .exe game... sorta... not really.
At least it's got ponies in it (And it's fairly inventive for a Mega Man fan game).
Bomb after bomb after bomb.
6669253
This needs to be a thing.
6669261
I was thinking Viewtiful Joe.
There are loads of theories on Gaster. Being Sans and Papyrus' father, a third skeleton brother, and even having been split into the brothers when he fell into the CORE.
"Something about being made out of living energy...cosmic phenomena...I-I drink a lot of milk."
-Oozi Hobo's quadgun.
Another enjoyable chapter. Good job.
I personally think Forte chose the best costume. Then again, I am a sucker for a good old bit of Vash the Stampede.
Is it wrong that those costume jokes had me giggling like crazy?
TRIGUN CROSSOVER!
6670435 No. It'd be even more wrong if you didn't laugh. They were that bad and funny!
6669383, 6669261
You would both be incorrect.
The costume already made it clear, but the pose is very definitively The Humanoid Typhoon, Vash the Stampede, the 60 billion double dollar bounty, as is the catch phrase.
6670625
...I much prefer the Japanese voices...
6670629
There. The english one showed up first in my search, so...
surprised no one else has noticed this should be "you take your bag for candy" underlined the correction
Otherwise though another great chapter keep it up Tatsurou
6669353 Can confirm. I beat it.
Still,
SansSkull Man should have spoken in Wingdings. IF YOU'RE GONNA GO GASTER, GO ALL THE WAY!6671010 I thought he would've said something along the lines of
Clash Man and Vash were my favorites.
HHmmmmmmmm...
For some reason, Forte's costume sounds curiously familiar...
....
...
..oh well.
Ahh, gotta love Vash.
6670629
So, did Shadow Man dress up as Shadow the Hedgehog or his Shadow Man counterpart?
vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/sonic/images/b/b6/Shadow_Men.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20150612152341
Anyway, cool idea having Shadow Man dress as Shadow (Man/the Hedgehog)!
Somehow, I knew that Shadow Man would dress up as Shadow the Hedgehog. Weird.
6670435 No. If it is, I'm wrong alongside you. Either way, you're not alone.
Utterly adorable!
Two things, Tatsurou: one, does Shadow Man know that Shadow the Hedgehog killed him during the Worlds Collide incident? And two, are you doing the comics, or just the original games and various interludes?
6675771
No idea what you're talking about.
And just the main games and original interlude chapters.
6675776 In the comics, Sonic the Hedgehog and Mega Man teamed up to take down their respective enemies after a... "minor" misunderstanding. Wily had turned most of Sonic's allies into Robot Masters, and after freeing Shadow the Hedgehog, said Shadow proceeded to obliterate Shadow Man (can't remember the reason). Just FYI. Also, Worlds Collide had no aftereffects on Mega Man's world.
6677234
sorry, allow me to elaborate: I've never heard of Undertale.
6677621
Ah.
Awesome game for PC download. Look it up.
6677782
Ah. Okay.
6675806
Wat?
Where do I find these comics!?
At first, I was thought Forte was dressed as Edward Elric. Was that an intentional misdirection?
6680199 http://en.sonicscanf.org/comics/archie/ Starts with Mega Man #24, then Sonic universe #51, then Sonic the hedgehog #248 and then cycles between those 3 comics in that order
6682494 he said Sci-fi/Western how can that not be trigun?
6682494 Doubtful, given that Alphonse could never be claimed as the more badass of the two, any more than Ed could be claimed as the good brother of the two, being that they're both strongly good aligned.
Also the fact that Ed's hair is usually impeccably groomed into a long ponytail, instead of a bush-top, and the gloves of a State Alchemist are white, not black. And Fullmetal Alchemist is a Fantasy/Western, not a Sci-fi/western, since Alchemy is closer to magic than science.
Vash and Knives on the other hand have very clearly opposed good/evil alignments, respectively, Vash is absolutely far more goofy than Knives, and Vash's hair has quite often been compared to a broom. Oh, and Vash is the younger brother, compared to the older Ed.
The only similarities are the blonde hair and red coat, and the 'western'-esque portion of the setting.
I know what show that is!
...or not. But still, I think I've narrowed the field down to three.
And there goes Outlaw Star.
...and there goes Cowboy Bebop.
Good luck with that.
---
Just because the evil brother is nihilistic and omnicidal doesn't mean that he is the crazy one. Good guys can be crazy too.
Aww man, I thought for certain Forte dressed up as Dante. "I was the one who was supposed to fill your dark soul with lighhhtttt!!!"
7027967 Just get him to have white hair, eat pizza in the most obsurd sitting positions and have him say jackpot after winning in a battle and he would be Dante.
7016470 you forgot Trigun
7716487
No, I simply left it unspoken.
I'm surprised Crash Man didn't dress up as Mash Man or one of their other 'ash friends.
At first I didn’t know who he was then he said it
I don't get it. Who did Forte dress up as?
9282178
Vash the stampede from Trigun
7584411
Two...
Boooo.
Now that's a reference, dayum.