5: Grizzly Encounters
Colonel decided to go after the focusing crystal himself, having previously made purchases from Grizzly Slash for Repliforce. He knew how to approach the arms dealer in order to get the best deals. Not only that, he could carry a great deal of credit chips on his person without compromising armor or maneuverability. With how long he'd had the Hikari Antibody installed, he also had the best chance of keeping control of himself if he became exposed to the Viral Energy, which was why it was himself, X, Zero, and CiCi on these missions.
As Colonel beamed onto the back of a long truck convoy, he glanced around at the dark, rocky terrain, overshadowed by the purple clouds of Viral Energy blanketing the sky. He frowned, putting his hand to his head. "HQ, this is Colonel. Why have I not been teleported straight to Grizzly Slash's warehouse?"
"Sorry brother!" Iris replied quickly, sounding somewhat distracted. "There is a great deal of Maverick activity in the area, and it's confusing the signals. You'll need to stop the trucks' rampage in order to get into the warehouse safely."
"Understood!" Colonel replied, leaping into action. Drawing his beam saber, he immediately began to dash from linked truck to linked truck. The mechanloids running amok aboard the trucks fell to a single swipe of his saber, barely slowing him down. At the front of the first set of linked trucks, the drive car had run amok, the blue power core in the front pulsing with the haywire energies.
"Ground Crush!" Colonel proclaimed, leaping into the air to slam his saber full force into the power core, splitting it in two. As the linked trucks began to explode, Colonel leapt to the next set.
The next truck had a rogue taxi on board, which took two swipes of Colonel's saber to fall. Another Ground Crush split that truck's energy core, allowing Colonel to dash ahead. The same with the truck following it.
The next truck was much larger, several levels of platforms to clamber around on, lined with spikes in several places. Ignoring most of the side paths, Colonel dashed through, cutting his way past the enemies as his dash thrusters kept him going for the full time, enabling him to clear the wide gap to the lead truck of that convoy in one leap.
When he destroyed the truck, however, the next truck convoy began to explode as well, forcing him to keep moving as fast as he could. He cleared through the next two truck convoys with dashing jumps, pausing only long enough to grab one of the newest generation sub-tanks, which was sitting at the front of the last exploding truck.
When he got to the front of the next truck, however, he was forced to leap for safety as another truck slammed into the front of it. After escaping the head on collision, he landed in the caverns that led to Grizzly Slash's secret warehouse. He was about to continue, but paused as one of his new pieces of equipment began to beep.
Prometheus had informed the Maverick Hunters when he'd dropped off the tech he'd brought for Octavia that there would likely be Light Capsules with new tech for X scattered about near where they needed to go for the tech to upgrade the Enigma or the shuttle. Since there wasn't time to have X go to every area, Prometheus had provided a mobile data storage unit to Colonel, so that the Light Capsules would respond to him and let him download the armor programs. He only provided the one, as the Capsules already would respond to X, Zero, or CiCi...though he didn't know why they responded to CiCi.
For Colonel's assistance, the device also alerted him to when he was near a Light Capsule, allowing him to locate them easier. The beeping signaled him to the Capsule directly above him, which opened when it recognized his access codes.
"X, these are...you aren't X," Light finished, staring at Colonel. "Where did you get those access codes?"
"Prometheus gave me a device to collect armor programs for X," Colonel replied, holding out the device. "He said it had the proper access codes hard coded into it."
The hologram stared at the device for a time, then sighed ruefully. "I understand the urgency that makes this necessary...but he could at least have stopped by personally to tell me he was handing out access codes!" Shaking its head, the Light hologram locked eyes on the device. "At least it's efficiently designed..."
With that said, the capsule downloaded the program into the device directly, the energy shooting into the device from the red focus crystals at the top of the capsule. "This program is the leg part for the Falcon Armor," the hologram explained. "I have created two armor sets this time for X, and it is my hope they will aid him through these troubling times. Tell X that all four program parts for either armor will need to be acquired in order for the armor to be activated."
"Understood sir!" Colonel replied, saluting as he put the device away.
With that, the hologram shut down. Colonel then returned to the narrow pathways, making his way through to Grizzly Slash's office, a large cave within the caverns.
As was his preference, Grizzly Slash dropped down from the ceiling. "It's been a while, Colonel..." he growled out, his voice deep and raspy, clenching his jaws as though struggling to control himself.
"Are you alright, Grizzly?" Colonel asked worriedly. "You seem unwell."
"I've...I've been infected..." Grizzly growled out. "...badly..."
"But...but there were no Virus Clouds in the area!" Colonel insisted. "I didn't even need the Virus Buster!"
"That's because...I absorbed them all..." Grizzly managed to say through his clenched teeth, his eyes narrowed to slits. "There were...many innocent...Reploids in the area. I helped them...evacuate to the...shelter down below. I shielded them...with my body. I'm...not going to...keep control...for much longer..."
Colonel closed his eyes. "...I understand, old friend," he murmured softly. "Smokey would be proud of you."
Grizzly Slash chuckled. "That old fool...he believed in me right to the end didn't he?" He opened his eyes, revealing solid red pupils surrounded by violet corneas, an abnormal coloration for him. "You need the...focusing crystal. The Virus...it tried to make me...smash it. It's...in the main...warehouse. Please...before you take it...put me offline...before I hurt...anyone..."
Colonel nodded, extending his beam saber. "...understood," he stated firmly.
Grizzly Slash managed one last smile...and then his will failed him. His eyes flashed completely violet as the virus claimed him, and then turned blood red. With a bestial roar, he began his attack, leaping towards Colonel while swinging his clawed gauntlet arm.
Colonel quickly dashed backwards, his saber at his side as he charged energy into it. He'd developed a new technique during his sparring sessions with Zero, and he felt it would be best to use it here. He just needed to charge enough energy into his saber, and he'd be able to finish Grizzly off painlessly with one blow.
Grizzly lunged forward again, and Colonel dashed around to behind him. He could tell the virus didn't have complete control of Grizzly Slash, as he wasn't using his full arsenal. A few more evasions and he'd have enough energy.
Once his blade was fully charged, he waited for Grizzly to lunge towards him again...and he lunged in. "Zantetsuken!" he roared, sweeping his sword out as he dashed by.
When he landed on the other side, he heard Grizzly chuckle. "You...you've gotten better..." Grizzly muttered, his eyes once more back to normal. "I...didn't have to...hold it back so much..."
"...Grizzly..."
"Sorry I...wasn't man enough...for Iris..." Grizzly's whole body sparked. "Is...is she happy?"
Colonel nodded. "She is. Zero's made her very happy."
"Wish I'd...known she'd got someone..." Grizzly barked out. "Would have...Scott Pilgrimed that...pretty boy..." Finding the notion hilarious, Grizzly began to laugh.
That laughter was the last sound he made as his shattered plasma core erupted, leaving him a smoky ruin. His weapons program downloaded into Colonel's hard drive, a last gift to an old friend.
Colonel took off his hat, placing it over his metaphorical heart as was the human military custom. "...rest well, my friend," he murmured, before dashing into the warehouse for the focusing crystal.
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Well, that's depressing.
Scott Pilgrim reference? Nice. Especially with Zero (Scott has a 0 shirt after all)
Does that mean she's got 7 (evil) ex's?
dang... Iris, how may exes did you have?
Only YOU can prevent Virus Outbreaks.
Okay, first, Iris reminds me of Fragtrap with all the shit she can do, just not as buggy. And second, NO BEAR-WE-DON'T-ACTUALLY-CARE-ABOUT!!! HE DIED!!!
NOOOOOOOO!!!
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In the chapter "Less Important Battles", Iris stated that Zero was the 37th time Colonel had challenged the guy she was interested in to 'protect' her.
...so, 36.
I'm sorry, he went down way too quick to be giddeon.
7002528 that'd make an interesting crossover game.
Zero Wily vs the Exes of Eyes
Scott Pilgrim reference ftw
Jeez, this is actually getting emotional. Also, I like how not just X and Zero are going. Really shows how much things have changed.
7002793 i noticed that, but i was like
quickmeme.com/img/6c/6cc57fa21d2021aad62f15f291bb703b15b7b946bc075b210164d87a05bf97db.jpg
Another enjoyable chapter. Well done.
I've figured it out...but I'm not even going to type it in a spoiler.
Was there ever an actual explanation given for why seemingly civilian-function mechanloids like trucks and taxies were sporting spikes and blades to attack with?
I don't recall seeing one, nor do I know if it was explained elsewhere, but I think I've come up with a fairly good idea of how could realistically happen: Nanomachines.
And because this has turned into such a sizable wall of text, I'm going to leave it as its own thing and make separate comments for any other relevant thoughts I may have, so you can feel free to skip the entire thing if you don't really care about the wild mass guessing of someone whose outside knowledge of the Mega Man universe amounts to "that episode of Death Battle where he got wasted by Astro Boy." That goes double for if the whole thing turns out to be wrong on some fundamental level.
Still here? Good, now where was I?
In a futuristic society like this one, where a vast majority of the work force is made up of both sentient and non-sentient machines, it would make a great deal of sense to have at some point developed a mass-producible form of automated self-repair function. One of the easier ways to accomplish this would be by integrating nanobots into each machine's systems with the purpose of fixing minor dents and dings, wear and tear, similar to how organic bodies repair themselves. It wouldn't regrow missing limbs or even fix anything that outright broke, so they'd still need replacements in storage, but it would dramatically decrease other maintenance needs under normal conditions. And as part of this system, each machine, meaning both reploids and mechanloids, would need small (relative to the size of the machine) reserves of raw materials for the nanobots to use to replace what goes missing from cracks, scrapes, and general erosion (reploids might think of refilling these reserves like eating or taking vitamins, though mechanloids would give it the same regard your car has for an oil change).
Anyway, these repair systems go unnoticed 99% of the time, doing their bit to keep the wheels of this 22nd-century society pleasantly greased. That other 1% is what happens when a mindless mechanloid is exposed to some form of "Maverick" processes, whether from direct viral corruption, or due to a Maverick reploid passing its madness down to all of the mechanloids under its control. How it happens is irrelevant; when a mechanloid goes Maverick, its nanomachines go on the warpath, using up all of its reserve materials over the course of several minutes to make it the best rampaging engine of destruction they can.
The effect isn't very noticeable in smaller mech's that have less material to work with, just some basic reinforcements to the chassis and whatever boosts they can manage to anything that could be used as a weapon, but most mech's bigger than a toaster could hesitantly be considered combat-capable if they were being pitted against normal human soldiers or standard mass-produced combat mechanloids instead of veteran super-badasses like X and Colonel, and some of the hardier models with dedicated combat systems might manage to be a threat even to them in sufficient numbers.
On larger machines, however, the changes wrought by Maverick corruption can become somewhat more pronounced. Larger transport mechanloids like the trucks in this chapter might have a block of reserve metal the size of a small person or even larger, and there's no real point in putting too much of that into structural strength since it's already a freaking truck. So what does it do with the leftovers? Well, since it doesn't have any weapons besides its... truckness, it starts making some: spikes, blades, and pointy bits like something out of Mad Max, all the better to rend and tear with or turn into deadly shrapnel upon its inevitable, explosive destruction.
Because Mechanloids aren't really smart enough to make anything more intricate than that, even with sufficient resources, they'd probably just keep getting spikier from there as they get bigger, though a controlling reploid could conceivably override their systems to produce the "saw-taxies" I remember from an earlier chapter, assuming said reploid is both sane enough to think of it and Maverick enough to want to.
tl;dr: Nanomachines, bruh.
Fun fact about my previous word-wall: because of the way the word "mechanloid" looks, my brain kept trying to spell it as "mechalanoid." I had to actually look back at the story to get it right the first time, and I just copy-pasted it in whenever I needed it after that, including right here.
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Sounds like some sort of super-hard-core endurance run of a mod.
It also sounds really awesome, working your way up through the excess of exes, from weaselly little smooth-talkers up through big, though, and genuinely cool guys like Grizzly Slash here, and eventually facing the final boss, the Guardian of the Girl, the military-badass-slash-overprotective-big-brother Colonel.
Dang, Zero lucked out. He doesn't have to deal with Iris' 36 evil exes. That would be much even for him.
You mean gather several of Iris's Ex-boyfriends who Colonel hadn't already slaughtered for being evil or hurting her and having them challenge Zero one by one???? That... would make an awesome game. I'm sorry Grizzly had to die, I like what we've seen of him and wish he could have survived.
he roared,sweeping his
1. Just forgot your spacing.
7003119 I like it, that makes sense. Of course, I have the exact same level of outside knowledge of the Mega Man universe, so my approval isn't all it could be.
Grizzly Slash, you have earned this.
gifdivision.com/uploads/4/6/0/3/46032175/037_-_fklf9.gif
7003119
I agree.
Drexelian Nanomachines with Orion's Arm Universe blight corrupted sophoncy virus satisfactorily covers all the bases.
7003119
That's a rather reasonable hypothesis. I've seen nanotech used for self-repair in another fanfiction, this one strictly Mega Man, Rockman: the Robot War. I really like your idea of a machine's rouge personality coming up with the best idea it can for weaponizing itself. It makes an awful lot of sense. I can even envision a truck thinking to itself, "Oi, screw all these peoples! I'm gonna screw 'em all! What's the most dangerous thing... Well, those spike strips can tear me treads up somthin' awful... Roight! Spikes, everywhere! Ha! That'll show the wankers!"
I didn't know Griz that long... but he will be in Colonel's hard drive and core.
I just realized, what if absorbing a Master Weapon was like DBZ Abridged Piccolo absorbing Nail? Now I'm thinking of a similar scenario where Mega Man is Nail and X is Piccolo, arguing about Minesweep in X's head.
7003119 That makes complete sense! otherwise, how would the robots that noone ever maintains keep going? Also, if they have spare materials, couldn't a maverick mech' process resources from their surroundings to increase their lethality even more if they weren't attacked and shut down after a very short time like always happens in the game? I figure that an intelligent and hostile maverick reploid could then potentially function like one of the monsters from Evolve, avoiding capture and consuming other machines for spare parts, while steadily making itself larger, stronger, and deadlier.
I spent the last 3 days reading this, and I have to say your doing a damn good job on it. I look forward to more soon!
Okay, with things so serious, couldn't they just explain the new virus as nanites?
7006994 ...Ands then when X needs another boost in power, Megs is gonna need to shift the Pool Table.
the colonel is a badass! never would have guessed!
GRIZZLY!!!!! YOU WERE THE COOLEST!!!
You know, something I've noticed... Unless a lot of the references made by various characters are things that were developed after "The End" (because AU and all that jazz) it would seem that a Lot of fictional material somehow inexplicably survived what pretty much amounted to a technological apocalypse, considering that Vinyl's ultimate revenge for Rock and Kalinka's death's wiped out just about every machine and database in the world that wasn't either disconnected from the global network or specifically fire-walled against The End Virus...
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That's because most of the tech is derived from X and Zero, developed based on their schematics after activation. Gates himself openly admitted that he is a fan of before-End scientists and developed the persona's of his Reploids the same way Light and Wily did so in WWW. If you pay close enough attention, you'll notice all technological development in this time period pretty much come from either the work of Light or the work of Wily and Vinyl. The rest is natural human (and Reploid now) innovation picking up the slack.
While Vinyl was very much unhappy with Light for his fuck up, she wasn't going to kill what amounted to his unborn son out of petty small time revenge, especially since Octavia was in there with him. She firewalled X's capsule and the AI network that X would in time come to rely on. The same is true for Project Revelation, or Zero. Him and all of his stuff is firewalled against The End Virus. This is also the case for Prometheus and a few other robots that survived the initial backlash of the The End.
Essentially, if it was built by the Light family or the Wily family, it survived The End Virus.
RIP grizzly
a grizzly fate for a true protector, even as an arms dealer, he had the heart of a hero...
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A pun....really? Okay Sans