X's Awakening by VCampan
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
Inky Future [Mega Man X/Splatoon]
- Thread starter Candescence
- Start date
- Crossover
Dr. Light has all those schematics on X's armours. I wonder if he ever thought to squirrel away digital copies of DNA from the lifeforms from his time.
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
That's unlikely at best. Dr. Light didn't have all the armour sets at once, the Second Armour is explicitly an upgraded form of the First Armour, for example. It's more likely that the Light AI has been designing and manufacturing the armour sets over time, incrementing on previous sets and creating new ones to allow X to better adapt to new circumstances, and that's how it is in this timeline. At most, the real Dr. Light may have been working on the First Armour after he finished X's construction and programming, which was probably the most he could do considering how little time he had left.
To that end, he also didn't have time to gather all that DNA data, and he didn't think to do so since the apocalypse likely happened decades after his death. The Capsule AI was dormant for the whole time as well until the Octarians started excavating the lab.
BritishGrenadier
Summon The Elector Counts!
- Location
- Nova Scotia Halifax
Honestly just found this work and I have to say this is one hidden gem! Excellent work
Chapter 15: Hostile Takeover (V)
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
Chapter 15: Hostile Takeover (V)
Orion took slow, deep breaths as he took aim with his Hero Charger Replica. This was just another normal Rainmaker match. Why did he feel so stressed?
It was a match on The Reef. It was mostly even in terms of scores, but the enemy team were ahead and were making a push. Orion was on the level with the goal, covering his team while they tried to stop the push.
The opposing team had a similar set of weapons to his own - a Roller, a Splattershot, Dualies and a Charger. Unfortunately, the guy with the Charger was using an E-Liter 4K, which meant sniper duels with an enemy who could outrange Orion. However, things were made easier by the fact that Axl had decided to make the poor dude's life utterly miserable. He was great at flanking.
The Splattershot user came into Orion's line of fire. He took a deep breath, and focused his aim.
Marie whistled, nodding approvingly as Orion finished quick-sniping the test balloons. "Not bad. You've got talent. Who taught you to snipe like that?"
"Mom. She used to be a pro before she married Dad," Orion said, letting himself take a breath. "Taught me to hold my breath when taking aim and such."
"Seems she knows her stuff," Marie remarked. "You've got a bad habit of overshooting your aim and having to correct your shot, though. That's not a hard one to break, though, you just need to practice stopping your swing at the right time. Alright, from the top again, let's see you beat your time."
He stopped his swing right on target, releasing the trigger. The girl yelped as she was splatted immediately. The guy with the Rainmaker was swiftly rushed down and splatted by Liam and Koji immediately after, since he was alone without backup, with Axl having rushed down the Charger.
"Nice shot, Ori! Koji, grab that Rainmaker and start pushing! I'll cover you! Axl, keep them busy as they respawn!" Liam said over the communicator.
"You got it, Liam! Let's move u-wait, where's their Roller?" Orion could see Axl on the bridge, looking around, and his eyes widened as he saw something. "Ori, behind you!"
Orion spun around, charging up again as he saw the girl with the Dynamo Roller coming up behind him. She had managed to slip past and flank him using the side ramp. His stress peaked as he realised he had made a rookie mistake with using a Charger - tunnel vision.
He didn't have time to properly take aim, she was already raising the Roller to strike. Even with the slow Dynamo strike, he didn't have time to aim or flee in his ink.
Time slowed to a crawl as his mind raced a million miles a minute.
He recalled what Ayane told him. "Dualies roll because it's way easier for that kind of weapon. There's no special trick to it. It's just a matter of practice."
He hadn't practised it at all. But what other option was there? He decided just to do what came naturally to him. He knew how to roll with Dualies, he just needed to apply the same principles here.
Orion kept his weapon straight so it wouldn't touch the ground, and dived to the side, rolling against his shoulder so it would take most of the force. He was clear just as the Roller came down, splashing ink where he had just been, though some of it still got on him, but not enough to take him out.
The roll wasn't perfect. He ended up landing on his side, wincing as he hurt his shoulder - nothing serious, but he'd be sore for a bit. But he refocused his aim on the girl, whose eyes were wide as she stared at him in panic. "What the shell-"
BANG. She was splatted in an instant.
"Holy carp, Ori, what was that?! Are you alright?!" Liam called out.
"I'm okay! Keep going, I'll catch up in a moment!" Orion groaned as he got back up on his feet. His shoulder hurt, but not enough to make it harder for him to aim. As his team pushed, he rushed as quickly as he could to the next vantage point.
❖
Despite the fierce and gruelling battle, Orion's team had managed to barely claim a knockout victory. The relief Orion had felt was utterly palpable.
Still, he was trying to de-stress on a bench back in the lobby as his team celebrated their victory. One step closer to ranking up.
"Hey, you with the Charger!" One of the opposing team members walked up - the double-bun girl who had been using the Dynamo. Orion was about to panic, but what she said next blindsided him completely. "That roll was absolutely sick! How'd you do it with a Charger?"
Orion laughed sheepishly, rubbing his shoulder. "Um… I know someone who can pull it off, she told me it just takes practice. I just did it as a panic move, though, I still kinda hurt my shoulder doing it…"
"Yeah, it's way easier with Dualies because of the small form factor, much easier to move with," the girl nodded in agreement.
That piqued the interest of the team member with the E-Liter. "Maybe I should practice doing it… Then again, probably would be hard with an E-Liter, would be way more cumbersome than with a regular Splat Charger."
"Hey, what can I say, Ori's shy but he definitely knows how to pull his weight in a fight," Liam chuckled, patting Orion on the shoulder.
"I saw that match. Congrats on the victory, fellas!" Ethan came walking up, Roller over his shoulder.
"Thanks, my dude," Liam grinned, as he and Ethan exchanged a high-five.
"Gotta say, Ori, Ayane's gonna be eager to train you when she hears about this. Your shoulder okay?" Ethan asked as he came up to Orion.
"Y-Yeah, should be okay, thanks, Ethan," said Orion with a nod, feeling a small swell of pride from being praised by his senior.
Ethan chuckled, ruffling Orion's hair, "good to hear. You should do some practice on softer terrain before you try rolling with a Charger again, though, don't want to hurt yourself again."
"You mind giving us some pointers on how we did later?" Koji asked.
Ethan nodded, "sure, we'll go over the replays later. But I gotta get to a match. Seeya."
As Ethan walked away, Orion noticed the other team were gawking in shock. Double-Bun turned to him again. "That was Ethan Springs. You know him?!"
"Didn't he imply you guys also know Ayane Higashi?!" Said the other team's Dualies user. "What gives?!"
Orion had never realised how famous Ethan and Ayane were on the ink battle circuit until now. It was actually kinda mind-blowing.
Koji immediately took point explaining. "It's a secret. You'd never believe us even if we told you, anyway."
This explanation held up despite some prodding. The other team gave up, and settled on exchanging Splatnet IDs. Making friends with an opposing team was not what Orion had expected to happen today, but it was nice.
❖
Orion popped out of the manhole at Tentakeel Outpost, right behind his teammates. It was sunset, and the atmosphere was lively - everyone from the Splatoon was here, along with Off The Hook, having a good time. It seems like Artemis' team had a good day when it came to their matches as well.
He caught but nearly fumbled a soda tossed to him by Pearl, who grinned. "And the conquering champions return! That Charger dodge of yours got on the daily highlight reels, Ori!"
"Please don't make a huge deal of it, it was just a fluke and I hurt myself doing it," Orion blushed. "I don't know if I could handle becoming a celebrity overnight."
"I think you're worrying too much, bro," Artemis laughed. "Seriously, settle down and relax."
"It's just a matter of practice. And we'll be doing a lot of it next week," Ayane said, with a smirk that sent shivers down Orion's spine, and yet simultaneously a feeling of pride in him? Ayane could be weird like that. He noticed Ethan give him a reassuring smile.
As Orion got settled down on one of the couches with his teammates, Marina changed the subject, "what's the news on Ahato, by the way?"
"Professor Gaudile says she'll need more time before they can allow visitors, but no complications with the treatment so far," Marie replied.
With that question satisfactorily answered, Liam spoke up, "so are X and Zero are moving into their own place soon?"
"Still got to make some final arrangements, but yeah," Callie said. "Shame, I liked having X around."
Speaking of whom, Orion noticed X was practising some kind of martial arts style against the training dummies. It wasn't anything he had seen before. "Uh… What are you doing, X?"
Zero spoke up first, "he went to give Dr. Light the armour parts back for safekeeping and upgrading, but the doc gave him some martial arts data, saying that 'since his soul is nearly human', he could master it."
"Uh… What does that have to do with anything? It's just martial arts, right?" Koji blinked.
X stopped, turning to everyone else. "Not that simple. It's a style that requires the use of spiritual energy, that only a few people have mastered through intense training. Dr. Light was lucky enough to master it in life, after being taught by a previous user, a former CEO who set up his own dojo after retiring from business. It was originally a martial art rooted as an art of assassination, but became a tool of self-defense. Allow me to demonstrate."
X then turned to the largest dummy, bringing his hands back to his side, cupping them. Everyone was watching with interest, as a blue light briefly formed, and he thrust his palms forward together. "HADOKEN!"
Orion's jaw dropped as an almost spherical wave of blue energy surged forth, slamming into the dummy and bursting it immediately.
It was his sister who spoke her thoughts first. "ANIME IS REAL!"
"What is 'anime'?" Iris asked.
Most of the group stared at Iris in surprise. Hinata remarked, "we are totally binging anime this weekend."
"That is still ridiculously cool, though," Ethan remarked. "You gonna be teaching us how to do that?"
X rubbed his chin, "maybe. You guys all could do with some martial arts experience. It might come in handy."
"No objections from me," Marie remarked. "Still, I imagine it's gonna take a while before any of you can start throwing fireballs."
"Nah, it's gotta be pretty easy! We can use Booya Bombs and stuff, a little thing like that's gotta be easy!" Artemis grinned as she got up, and tried mimicking X's motion. "Ha… DOKEN!"
Nothing happened.
"It's got to be more than just the motion, Artemis," Iris giggled.
X nodded, "you need to reach inside yourself and draw out your spiritual energy. Not a lot of people can do it, especially not that easily. It's the sort of thing that requires practice, and usually formal instruction."
Draw out my spiritual energy, huh? Orion thought to himself, closing his eyes and bringing his hands together, only a few inches apart from each other. He took deep breaths, trying to attune himself to what he felt when X used the Hadoken. Control it. Focus it into a point.
"Uh, hey, you guys seeing what Ori's doin'?" Karlene said.
Orion opened his eyes. There was a glowing, swirling orb of light concentrated between his palms - it was small, but it was something. He took another deep breath. Okay, just let it loose, like a punch…
He thrust his palms forward, away from anyone else. "HADOKEN!"
The aiming wasn't necessary, as it turned out. The resulting surge of energy was only as large as his palm, and only went about a meter before it fizzled out.
It was still more than enough for everyone else to cheer, and he was immediately swarmed by his utterly thrilled friends, especially his sister, who was practically demanding to know how he pulled it off. It was a bit of an ego boost, but Orion still felt pretty astonished that he somehow pulled it off at all.
Dinner ended up being an incredibly lively affair, with all of the junior agents instantly being on board with the idea of learning 'Ansatsuken'…
❖
"Friday night, no more school till Monday!" Liam sighed with relief as the four of them returned to their dorm. "Man am I gonna relish this weekend."
"You still have a bit of homework left over, boss," Koji said. "And don't try to put it off, you hate doing homework on the weekend, remember?"
Liam groaned. "Don't remind me… Alright, fine, let's just get it done."
"Come on, Ori, let's just watch a movie or something while they wrap up homework," Axl chuckled, putting a hand on Orion's shoulder.
"U-Uh, sure," Orion said. The Octoling boy was just so tall compared to him, and even taller than Liam or Koji. Iris was on the tall side as well. Were Octolings all this tall?
They sat together on the couch as Orion began taking a look at what was available.
"You're shaking a bit, still," Axl commented. "You've been kinda doing that between our matches and after them, and it ain't just the shoulder. Are you alright?"
Orion lowered the remote with a sigh, leaning against him. "Sorry, it's just… I feel like my body can't differentiate between the aftermath of a regular ink battle or a mission, and it's still kinda stuck in that mode right now. I'm just used to putting my life on the line enough that I just feel the same kind of stress even when fighting for sport."
Axl nodded. "Yeah, I totally get that feeling. It's just something you gotta get used to, being able to feel the difference between knowing when things are just for fun and when your life is in danger. I'm just more used to that, since I'm a soldier. You've only been doing this agent gig for less than a month."
"Ah. I guess I gotta figure out how to handle that stress in a healthy way, then," Orion frowned.
"You're shaking less, now," Axl said. "I guess being around a friend helps you feel safe?"
Orion realised he was right. Just knowing he was right there through touch was enough to alleviate some of the stress, but not all of it. "It's not quite enough, though…"
"You could sit on my lap. Maybe that'd help? Um… If you're fine with that, of course…" Axl suggested, blushing a little.
That caused Orion to also blush, but after a moment of consideration, despite how nervous the idea made him feel… He shifted over, sitting on Axl's lap. Axl brought his arms around Orion's waist, and that was what finally did the trick.
"Is this better?" Axl asked.
"Um… Yeah, it is," Orion said awkwardly. But he liked this. It just felt… Good. "Let's pick a movie already…"
They went with a simple action flick, and began to settle in, making small talk and commentary as the movie progressed. It was easy for Axl to see over Orion's head, so it wasn't at all a problem for him.
Orion barely even realised how much Axl was cuddling up with him. Having the Octoling boy at his back and being held in his toned arms made Orion feel so… Safe. Like there was nothing in this world that could make him feel afraid or stressed. In general, it just felt… Really nice. If only they could do this forever. But that wasn't possible. For now, though, Orion just enjoyed this feeling.
"Hey, Axl… Are we really gonna have to keep fighting? Surely there aren't a lot of Octarians left still loyal to Octavio," said Orion quietly.
"I wish I could say no, but… They're only gonna get more desperate from here on out, Ori," Axl sighed. "Take it from me, I know. We just gotta keep fighting until we can convince them there's a better way."
Orion wasn't sure how to respond to that. He was right, certainly, but Orion understood how X felt - why couldn't people just get along and be nice to each other?
Axl smiled, holding him closer, "but it'll be okay, even if things seem scary. I've got your back if you've got mine, right? I won't let anything happen to you."
Orion blushed, "thanks, Axl." It was hard to describe how being with Axl like this felt, other than 'good'. And knowing that was enough for him. But he had one more thing to say in return. "And you belong here with us. You earned that right, it wasn't luck or some fluke. I'll keep telling you that as many times as it takes for it to sink in."
Axl's eyes widened momentarily, before he smiled. "Thanks, Ori."
After a while, Liam and Koji joined them on the couch. While there was space for all four of them, Orion being on Axl's lap helped with space. Orion noticed that both of them had smiled at him in a way like they knew something, but he wasn't sure what it was. Not that it mattered. Just being like this and enjoying the night with his friends was all he really wanted right now.
❖
Commander Tartar observed the preparations from above, as the blender was assembled and tested. He had some spare resources Kamabo set aside in a case like this, and nothing would be spared for his revenge.
The Genesis Unit (consisting of Buster Rod G, Mega Water S and Hyper Storm W, based on characters from the Chinese novel Journey to the West) had initially been apprehensive about following his orders, but without Dr. Wily to serve, they ended up falling in line as well.
"Nearly all of the preparations are complete, Commander Tartar," Enker said as he walked up to him. "But I am concerned about the first step of the plan. Even if you do have the body of 'Mega Man V', I'm worried that you may not survive a clash with X. Quint was defeated by Mega Man the first time around, and X is far more powerful than he was."
Tartar chuckled, shaking his head. "Quint was just used as a blunt instrument by Wily without properly taking advantage of what Mega Man's true strengths were. I won't make the same mistake. Besides, I'm not fighting to win. The crux of our strategy will depend on your two teams succeeding in your mission."
"You underestimate us, Tartar. We're not like those meagre Robot Masters who failed to bring down a couple of cephalopods," Enker snorted. "We will get the job done, without question. I can promise you that."
"Then you better be able to back up your promises more readily than those Robot Masters did, because they're now sleeping at the bottom of the ocean," said Tartar as he glanced at Enker. "Triple-check our preparations. I want to make sure absolutely nothing goes wrong outside of our control."
"A prudent decision, Commander. It shall be done," Enker nodded as he walked away.
Tartar nodded, and continued overseeing operations. The time was soon at hand, and that everything would be right again.
This timeline is completely wrong… It has to be corrected.
Tartar blinked. Where did that thought come from? Sure, the notion wasn't wrong, but it's not like the past could be changed. Even Wily couldn't pull that off. He had tried to recreate the Time Skimmer as a special weapon and give it to Quint, but it simply didn't work.
All that could be done was to steer the future in the right direction. And only he knew the right way to do so… No matter how many lives were trampled upon.
Oh, Quint's not totally gone after all. And we have Street Fighter as the Present to Megaman's Future, fun stuff!
I wonder if there's any other Capcom properties still attached after 12,000 years... There's a few Darkstalkers that are immortal enough to still be hanging around in Makai.
I wonder if there's any other Capcom properties still attached after 12,000 years... There's a few Darkstalkers that are immortal enough to still be hanging around in Makai.
Chapter 16: Hostile Takeover (VI)
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
Chapter 16: Hostile Takeover (VI)
It was the afternoon the day after - it had been a fairly quiet Saturday so far. Marie had spent the day with Callie, X, Zero and the other agents, just hanging out with them. It had been a long time since she had spent a whole day with such a large group of friends, but it was super nice. They had even taken the time to do turf war battles together (with X and Zero watching, of course).
Marie and Callie had dropped out of the ink battling early to hang with the two robots at a table outside, though, as they waited for the kids to finally wrap up their fun. Of course, even in casual clothes the Squid Sisters were often easily recognised by passers-by, and both X and Zero were now minor celebrities as well. Zero in particular was charming girls almost effortlessly. Marie figured at this point it had to be that handsome face and the exotic blonde hair. Marie was not so easily impressed, but whatever floated people's boats, she guessed. It certainly floated Callie's.
"Last set, they'll be out in a couple of minutes," X said, checking the time.
"Well, they might keep going longer, who knows," Marie chuckled. "Speaking of time, any ideas what you're gonna be up to, Mr. CEO?"
"Please don't call me that," X sighed.
"Still, most of the threats to Inkopolis are gone, Octavio is locked up and the Octarian Army isn't really a threat anymore," Marie shrugged. "Not a lot of world-saving to do anymore."
Callie chuckled, shaking her head, "cous, don't jinx it."
Zero crossed his arms, "she's got a point, though. What else is there left out there that we can't mop up in five minutes?"
X nodded. "Yeah, I just want to focus on restructuring Kamabo to-" He paused, as he saw something. His eyes widened, as a single word left his lips. "Rock…?"
Marie turned towards where he was looking. She too was flabbergasted by what she saw.
Standing in an alleyway was a human-like teenage boy robot with spiky black hair and blue eyes, wearing a blue and white shirt, brown shorts and orange and white shoes. He turned, and ran away from them, down the alleyway.
"Rock, wait!" X bolted from his seat, chasing after him.
"Ah, damn it… X, think about what you're doing!" Zero grumbled as he got up, chasing after him, "you two stay here, I'll make sure X doesn't do anything stupid!"
Callie blinked, "what the heck is going on here…?! Was that X's older brother?!"
Suddenly, Marie's phone rang. It was Pearl. She looked over at the Inkopolis News studio, seeing Pearl waving to them, and answered, putting her phone on speaker mode. "You saw that too, right?"
"You mean the boy robot who X and Zero just chased after? Yeah, we saw him," Pearl replied.
"He looks like Rock, X's older brother, the original 'Mega Man'," Marie frowned. "Seems awfully convenient…"
"Yeah, that's my thought, too. If someone shows up out of nowhere and starts running away, feels like a big red flag to me," said Marina - apparently Pearl's phone was on speaker as well. "I don't like this at all."
Pearl nodded, "me neither. And two of our biggest powerhouses just took off…"
Marie's eyes widened as she connected the dots. She looked to her cousin. "Callie-"
"Yeah, I'll go warn Gramps," Callie said, getting out of her seat.
"And grab some Hero Weapons. I don't think we'll have time to change into our Hero Suits," Marie said, getting up, "we might have to evacuate the Square."
Callie nodded, dashing off towards the manhole.
"Go meet up with the other agents, we'll get some stuff from Sheldon!" Pearl said, as she and Marina rushed out of the studio.
The mood in the Square was shifting - people were noticing what was going on, and were getting confused. Marie was hoping they'd take the hint and leave, but that was probably too much to ask. It was hard to know for sure exactly what was going to happen, but if something suspect was going to happen, there was a good chance it would involve someone attacking the Square. For what reason, Marie couldn't fathom.
That's when the rest of the agents came out from the lobby, not aware of anything being wrong. A bit sooner than expected, but that meant they might have time. Marie dashed over to them. "We need to go!"
"Marie? What's the rush? Where's X, Zero and Callie?" Artemis blinked. Only Ayane seemed to pick up on Marie's alarm.
Marie frowned, "no time to explain, let's get to-"
That's when six robots teleported in, cutting her off from the group and surrounding them. Immediate alarm spread throughout the Square, and the agents were immediately on their guard, backing up into each other.
The robot with the golden armour and the spear spoke first. "Ladies and gentlemen, I will make this quick. Surrender now and come quietly, and nobody gets hurt."
Marie's eyes widened. They had misjudged what the likely target of the impending attack was. It wasn't the Square, it was the agents.
❖
Despite some twists and turns, X finally managed to catch up with 'Rock' at Inkopolis Plaza, and mostly because Rock stopped there, turning around. "Hello, 'brother'."
"Rock, what's going on? Where have you been? Why NOW?!" X asked, stopping. He wasn't sure what was going on. "Are you even really Rock?"
"Oh, so you weren't so gullible as to believe for sure?" 'Rock' chuckled, a sinister grin crossing his face as a set of green armour appeared on his body, followed by a helmet with a tinted visor and a yellow 'V' on the front.
"I knew it was too good to be true!" Zero snapped, as he caught up, armour forming on his body.
X frowned, his own armour appearing as well. He should've figured there were Wily robots they had missed. "Quint… I should've known it was too good to be true. Where are the other Mega Man Killers?"
"Take a wild guess!" Quint grinned. "I didn't lead you out here just for fun, you know…"
"Son of a… X, there's a teleport blocker, I can't warp out!" Zero grit his teeth. "I'll go back up the agents, you deal with this guy!"
X nodded, "right… Be careful, Zero!"
Zero dashed away, but he was suddenly cut off by Quint's weapon of choice - Sakugarne, which was a mix between a pogo stick and a jackhammer, cracking the pavement in front of him. It moved autonomously, cutting off Zero as he tried to get past it.
"Sorry, but I'm afraid I can't let you do that," Quint chuckled, his left hand forming into a buster. "You can play with Sakugarne for a bit!"
"Are you seriously planning to stop me with a pogo stick?!" Zero asked incredulously, as he drew his beam saber and slashed. However, Sakugarne suddenly reconfigured, transforming into a floating greatsword that blocked the strike. "What?!"
"Not just a pogo stick," Quint taunted. "Also, I have every single bit of weapon data Mega Man ever used. If you want to save those pathetic pieces of seafood you call your 'friends', you better bring me down fast."
That immediately triggered a red flag in X's head, as he formed his own buster. "'Seafood', huh? That sounds awfully familiar. Are you really Quint?"
"Oh, so you finally caught on, X?" 'Quint' grinned maliciously, taking on a battle stance, "I'm taking back what you stole from me! And using the body of your 'brother' as part of my revenge is just the icing on the cake!"
"No way… TARTAR!" X snarled, charging up, "I won't let you get away with this!"
Two charged shots met in the middle, as the battle began.
❖
Orion was having a panic attack.
The group was surrounded, with no weapons, against six robots who looked like they were fully armed and prepared for combat. And was there even an active respawn point around just in case? And why was Marie alone? Where were X, Zero and Callie?
"Who are you guys?!" Artemis snarled, asking the question Orion probably would've if he hadn't been so utterly freaked out.
The golden robot bowed performatively. "Ah, where are my manners? I am Enker of the Mega Man Killers. The red and purple robots are my teammates, Punk and Ballade. And the other three are the Genesis Unit - their leader, Buster Rod G, the brains of the group, Mega Water S, and the brawn, Hyper Storm W."
Buster Rod G was grinning as he stood on his own pole, "that's right! We were created to defeat Mega Man one-on-one, and you guys ain't even half of what he was! So don't do anything stupid, or someone might get hurt."
"I'm hoping they do, though, because it's been so long since I've busted some heads!" Hyper Storm W cackled. Even from a glance Orion could tell he was at least twice the size of any of the other robots, and heavily armoured.
Mega Water S crossed his arms, chiding, "restrain yourself, 'Pigsy'. The boss wants them alive and relatively unscathed."
"Ah, shaddap, 'Sandy', he said it himself, he don't care if the 'seafood' gets roughed up!"
That immediately triggered red flags in Orion's mind, but he put that aside for the time being. They had more immediate problems. He noticed Ethan and Ayane nod to each other, and reached into their pockets.
Ballade sighed, "will you idiots stop bantering?! We need to get this done immediately, we don't have a lot of time before-"
Suddenly, the entire group of Inklings and Octolings were surrounded by bubbles. Orion recognised this special - Bubbler, one of the old specials that had been amongst the set that had been recalled and replaced during the last couple of years. Ethan and Ayane also seemingly pulled out Hero Busters out of thin air, but it didn't take a genius to figure out that they had been keeping them in cans just in case.
"WHAT THE F-" Punk barely had time to react as Ethan blasted him with a volley of energy shots, forcing him back. Ayane knocked Buster Rod G off his perch.
"Well. Aren't you two paranoid?" Enker remarked as he held his spear in front of him, blocking Ethan's charged shot. "This doesn't change much, you're still outgunned! Keep them from escaping!"
"Ori, come on!" Artemis pointed to the manhole, and broke into a sprint. Orion decided it was a good idea to get moving rather than just stand around, and followed her.
However, their path was immediately blocked by Hyper Storm W. "Oh, no you don't!" He began sucking the pair towards him as the Bubbler began to wear off, using some kind of vacuum ability from his mouth. "I've gotcha now!"
Orion had only one option that came to mind right now, and it was risky, but what choice did he have? He focused his energy into his hands, forming a small sphere of ki, and as he got close, he sent it surging out at the robot's face, "HADOKEN!"
That seemed to surprise Hyper Storm W as it struck, briefly stunning him. Artemis jumped on his head, climbing over his body, and Orion followed suit, avoiding the robot's attempts to grab them. "W-what the…?! Did you just slap me with a FIREBALL?!"
"GUYS! Over here!" Callie emerged from the manhole, awkwardly carrying multiple Hero weapons - Dualies, a Charger, a spare Hero Buster and a Hero Blaster. She tossed the last two out into the fray as the siblings dashed over to her, and handed the Dualies to Artemis and the Charger to Orion. "This is all I could carry, sorry!"
"If we had more weapons overall, we might stand a chance…" Orion frowned, turning to the fight. "But right now-"
That's when Pearl and Marina entered the fray, with the former using Enperry Splat Dualies and Marina using a Splat Brella, taking Ballade by surprise. Marie also had a Splat Charger, harassing the robots. Other Inklings and Octolings were on the periphery of the battle, taking shots, while Sheldon was distributing weapons to help deal with the emergency. And Orion figured the cops wouldn't be too far behind, either.
The agents were spreading out and trying to surround the robots instead, which was a complete reversal of their situation only half a minute ago.
"We might actually win this," Artemis grinned. "Let's do this, bro!"
Orion nodded, raising his Charger, his confidence beginning to swell back up, "right!"
❖
X dashed out of the way of incoming chunks of asphalt and concrete as Tartar used Super Arm to rip chunks out of the ground, while X was firing back with Metal Blades. He didn't have the ability to charge his special weapons anymore, but Metal Blade was both effective and oddly cheap in terms of weapon energy use. He was getting glancing blows on Tartar, but glancing blows weren't good enough if he wanted to end this fast.
"Tick-tock, X!" Tartar taunted, activating Time Slow followed by multiple Thunder Beams as he jumped around with increased speed. X grit his teeth as one of the beams struck him, but he thanked his lucky stars that after he handed the armour pasts to Dr. Light, Ciel had integrated the dash boost and other bits of the parts into his standard armour, albeit not quite as effective.
X countered with Gravity Hold, sending Tartar crashing to the ground, and unloaded multiple Napalm Grenades, "time manipulation doesn't help when you can't move!"
Tartar snarled, activating Skull Barrier, which mostly held up against the barrage, but X could tell it exhausted most of his weapon energy for that cell. "You certainly like that combo, don't you? Not that I blame you, it is a clever little trick, immobilising your enemy and then overwhelming them with explosive power. Was the original Mega Man so ruthless, I wonder?"
"You're threatening my friends, Tartar. If blowing you apart means I can help them sooner, as much as I hate to do it, then so be it. Quint's body can be repaired later," X said.
"They're just worthless seafood who you'll easily outlive and forget, why do you waste so much effort trying to protect them?"
"They're sapient people, just because they're not human doesn't make their lives worth less! The Professor wanted you to pass on humanity's knowledge to the next species that came after humans, he wouldn't want you-"
"DON'T YOU DARE SAY THAT!" Tartar howled with rage as he activated his Power Gear, switching to Pharaoh Shot and started forming a massive sphere of solar energy, which easily dwarfed all three robots, and he hurled it at X. "If you so insist, you can join your 'friends' in oblivion!"
Gee, I guess I struck a nerve, X thought to himself as his hands glowed, holding back the massive sphere. He could send it back, but that might result in too much collateral damage, so he decided to sent it flying up into the sky with a punch, where it exploded harmlessly.
In that small time after he punched the sphere, Tartar had charged him, punching him with Super Arm and sending him flying into a wall. He followed up by firing off multiple Crash Bombs, but they were shot down. "What?!"
"Don't forget I'm still here, pal!" Zero grinned, charging Tartar and started slashing at him with his saber, while holding a buster charge.
X got back up as Tartar recalled his sword, blocking Zero's charged shot. X had an idea - he used Gravity Hold again, but this time forcing both Tartar and Sakugarne in place. "Zero! Go!"
"Right!" Zero nodded, dashing away, "be careful, X!"
"No, I won't let you! Sakugarne's anti-gravity systems can handle this!" Tartar groaned, tossing Sakugarne at Zero, but it was knocked down by several ink missiles, and he was forced to block several more with another Skull Barrier, which failed just as the last couple slammed into him. "Tenta Missiles?!"
X blinked as someone landed next to him - an Octoling with a pink and white outfit that looked like a reworked version of the Octoling armour set with more coverage, and the goggles over her forehead rather than over her eyes. While she had blue eyes, her curled hair reminded him of Marina. Then it clicked - he had been told about this girl. "You're Marino, right?"
Marino chuckled, drawing a couple of ink daggers. "Nice to meet you, X. Tartar, is it? I hear you want to hurt my sister's friends. I have a problem with that."
"Another piece of worthless seafood," Tartar snorted, retrieving Sakugarne. "I'll just cut you up and be done with it."
X frowned, aiming his buster, "Marino, this is too dangerous-"
"The police already set up an emergency respawn point. Don't worry about me," Marino said, taking on a battle stance. "Let's take him down."
X fired another charged shot, which Tartar blocked, but this allowed Marino to move in, jumping over him with a somersault as she slashed at him. He tried to turn around to attack her, but that left him vulnerable to being shot in the back.
Tartar snarled, letting go of Sakugarne and letting it slash at Marino, as he fired back at X, "don't think you can get cocky just because you have the numbers advantage!"
"Oh, trust me, we won't," X said as he dashed out of the way.
❖
There were six buster-class weapons in play. Liam sadly did not get one of them. He had to settle for a Splat Roller that had been thrown to him in the confusion.
Right now he was squaring off with Buster Rod G, clashing weapons with him. On one hand, 'Monkey' had a telescopic pole that he used as a weapon, and it could extend to astonishing lengths. On the other hand, even if he blocked one of Liam's attacks, he still got splashed with ink most of the time. On the other other hand, Buster Rod G had greater physical strength, so Liam was mostly just relying on trying to cover him with ink rather than overpower him.
"You're outnumbered and outgunned! Give up!" Liam snapped, as Koji flanked Buster Rod G, firing off shots that the monkey reploid was forced to block by spinning his rod, putting him on the defensive. "The ink's gotta be draining your power, and when the cops come-"
Buster Rod G grinned, taking on a stance on all fours, "oh, it's cute that you guys think you have the upper hand. I thought we wouldn't be getting a good challenge, but now I can cut loose! POWER GEAR!"
"Power wha-"
Suddenly, Buster Rod G pulled out a collection of small balls from a hidden pocket, and blew on them, sending them flying into the air. They transformed into copies of himself, forcing Liam and Koji to back off as the copies attacked.
"That's cheating!" Koji winced, as he started blasting copies, causing them to disintegrate and return to their original forms.
Liam started swinging, looking around at the others. The other robots were also activating their own 'Gears', powering themselves up one way or another - they had been on the back foot previously, but now things were getting hairy.
Enker was completely absorbing ink attacks while striking back with the flat of his spear. This was mainly a problem for Ayane and Iris, who were trying to fight him at medium range with their shooters.
Ballade was outspeeding Pearl and Marina with Speed Gear and knocking them down. "Honestly, I expected more out of you people."
Mega Water S was bowling over Karla and Hinata with water jets, along with other Inklings and Octolings who tried to attack him.
Punk was rolling around with his spikes retracted at shockingly high speeds, bowling over people as he went. He was a problem for everyone, but especially Axl, Ethan and Marie, who were trying to shoot him down while evading him.
And Hyper Storm S… He was still doing the same thing, but with more strength, really. Which was a slightly problem for him since Artemis and Callie were just dancing around him, and Orion was sniping him. This was probably a good thing, really.
However, right now Punk was rolling right towards him, and the clones were still coming, bearing down on him and Koji, with Buster Rod G laughing behind them. He needed to think quickly.
"Alright, 'Punk'… Batter up!" Liam leaped to the side, switching his Roller to vertical mode. As Punk rolled past him, he swung as hard as he could, sending Punk towards Buster Rod G, and bowling over any clones in his way.
The look of terror and panic on the monkey robot's face was utterly satisfying as Punk just crashed right into him, ramming him right into a wall. The clones all disappeared, and considering 'Monkey' wasn't moving, Liam decided he could consider him out of commission, at least for the moment.
"Oh for the love of-STOP FOOLING AROUND, YOU IDIOTS!" Enker snapped.
"GRAH! FINE!" Hyper Storm S leaped into the air, and when he came back down, the other active robots jumped, and the resulting shockwave knocked down everyone else. He looked down at Artemis, who was trying to get back up, and grabbed her in his huge hand, "grahahaha! GOTCHA!"
"LET ME GO!" Artemis snapped, struggling separately in his hand.
Orion's face hardened, and he started firing quicker, trying to free her. "SIS! LET HER GO, YOU-"
Ballade was behind him. Before Liam could call out to warn Orion, the purple robot delivered a quick blow to the head, knocking Orion unconscious. Liam struggled to his feet, prepared to rush him, "ORI!"
"Dude, look out!" Ethan shoved Liam out of the way - Punk had come back around, and slammed into Ethan, sending him sprawling, and also knocked out cold.
Enker had moved in while Iris was down, knocking her out cold as well. When Axl and Ayane tried to help, they were knocked down by Mega Water S' water jets and then knocked out by Ballade as well.
Where the heck are the cops?! Liam thought to himself, and looked down the Square. His eyes widened. The police were currently cut off from the rest of the fight by other robots, simple minions that were weaker than the Robot Masters but still dangerous enough to be wary of. "Oh, crud…"
"You surprised us for a bit, but now you're outmatched!" Hyper Storm S gloated, smacking away Callie as she tried to free Artemis. His eyes suddenly widened, and he shifted his body, as a powerful energy shot ripped off the arm that wasn't holding his captive. "Uh, guys? Zero's here! And he's looking PRETTY NETTLED!"
"'Pretty nettled' is about right," Zero said coldly, walking towards them with his buster extended and his saber in his other hand. "I'm going to enjoy dismantling you one by one."
"Grab the primary targets! I'll hold him off!" Enker ordered, as he rushed at Zero, beginning a sudden duel.
"Pity, I was hoping for more of a fight," Ballade sighed, picking up Axl and Ayane… And teleported out with them.
"Feh," Hyper Storm S snorted, teleporting out with Artemis.
Liam and Koji moved to protect Ethan, but Buster Rod G suddenly landed in front of them, already carrying Iris, and wagged a finger at them before smacking them aside, "I'll admit, you got me good. We'll call it even with that!" He then grabbed Ethan, and teleported out.
"Ugh, that was messy… Talk about having to salvage well-laid plans…" Mega Water S bowled over anyone who tried to protect Orion, picking him up and teleporting out as well.
Enker, who was barely holding his own against Zero, grinned as he watched his comrades teleport out. "Farewell, you traitorous brother of ours. Next time, we'll be the ones taking you apart." He then teleported out, along with the remaining robots.
As silence settled on the Square, and the police rushed the scene to check up on everyone still left, it dawned on Liam how bad things were.
They'd lost. And who knows what they were planning to do with those six…
❖
As X expected, Tartar was completely overwhelmed. Even with Sakugarne, Marino was slowly wearing him down with dagger strikes, and he was forced to protect himself against X's own attacks. If he dodged, Marino would intercept him. If he tried to attack her, he was exposed to X's own attacks.
Soon, he literally had his back against the wall, desperately fending off attacks from both of them. But soon, he formed a Star Crash shield. "Heh. I'll admit, you two really gave me a hard time. But my purpose here is finished."
X's eyes widened. He knew what that likely meant. "No… You don't mean-"
"-relax, 'brother'. Your 'friends' are alive and well… For now," Tartar grinned maliciously. "My people couldn't grab as many of them as I would've liked, but the ones they did grab will suffice." He pulled out a data chip, tossing it to X, who caught it. "Come to these coordinates within the next hour. Alone, and without that fancy armour set of yours. Don't show this information to anyone else. If you don't abide by my demands, well, you'll find them very much liquidated."
X grit his teeth as he processed what Tartar's insane hostage plan was. "You monster…"
"'Monster'? I'm not the one who brought this on himself," Tartar shook his head. "Farewell." And with that, he teleported out.
"That guy sounds like he has a few screws loose… Literally," Marino frowned. "What did he mean by-"
X was already racing towards the Square.
❖
Karlene had held her own against Mega Water S with Hinata's help, but the moment the robots powered up, everything went so, so wrong. First the big pig grabbed Artemis, and then her fellow agents started going down one by one. It was only Zero's intervention that prevented those robots from capturing all of them.
Soon, X returned, and surprisingly, Marino was with him. She saw the realisation of who was missing on his face, and he looked more distraught and horrified than she had ever seen him before.
She felt terrible and angry at herself. For failing to protect her teammates. This was supposed to be a fun weekend, how did it all go so wrong?
"This is bad," Zero frowned. "To think Tartar still had a spare body and more robots in his back pocket…"
"I need to go recharge my energy reserves," X said coldly, his shock turning to a fuming determination. "They want me to be there by myself? Fine. I'll take them all on myself. And if they do anything before their deadline is up… I'll make them regret it."
"X, wait-"
X then teleported out.
Karlene exchanged eye contact with Marie. She was worried too. How bad would this get before things got better… If they did at all?
A/N: Earlier than usual, I know, but it's the holidays (meaning no work) and I really was hankering to get Chapter 17 written for the Patreon. There might be two chapters released this week.
Next chapter is going to involve some... Interesting creative decisions.
I was hoping Zero would Zero Knuckle Sakugarne.
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
Not really a thing he can do, since he doesn't have any of his MMZ weapons.
According to the wiki, Omega had an equivalent, and since Omega was Zero's original body, that would imply Zero would have had it too.
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
Well, that's only based on his ZX art, and likely after decades of incremental upgrades. The shift to the style of body seen in the Zero and ZX series wasn't just a visual design change, it was the result of incremental upgrades and changes, causing armour to get slimmed down, lighter and more like normal clothes, along with new weapons. That's not just speculation, either, Ian Flynn clearly had this in mind when he depicted Dr. Light's vision of the Elf Wars in the final issue of the Archie comics series, for example.
In this case, this is roughly X2/X3 Zero we're talking about, where Serges/Wily had the opportunity to make upgrades to Zero after recovering his body, mainly giving him the saber and other minor improvements, and really didn't have the time nor inclination to give him much else. If Zero had been discovered and woken up without Wily's involvement, it would've been him with his X1 capabilities and without the saber.
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Eh, that's a fair cop. I have the Maverick Hunter's Field Guide and while it does use the Command Mission timeline, the MMZ Zero body and Cyber Elf X are treated as top secret theoretical design concepts.
Chapter 17: Hostile Takeover (VII)
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
A/N: So I may have done something completely insane. You be the judge.
What woke Iris was the sound of someone pounding on glass, along with screaming and a cavalcade of insults and swears in Inkling. Well, she thought they might be swears. She didn't understand half of them.
When she opened her eyes, the source of both sounds became apparent. Artemis was banding on glass, and being the loudest and angriest she had ever seen her. But her expression wasn't of fury. Tears were streaming down her face. She looked terrified, and her terror leaked out into her voice.
Then Iris realised how familiar this small space felt. She got up onto her feet, noting Orion, Axl, Ethan and Ayane still unconscious.
She looked up to see the rotor blades that hung over them, prepared to begin whirling at any moment. The blender itself was just large enough for all six of them.
"Ah, good to see you awake, Test Subject 10,008. It would be most unsatisfying if we got started while you were still out cold."
She was drawn to the voice outside of the blender, standing right there. The base of the blender itself was lowered into the floor, meanwhile they were level with the people standing outside of it. Standing there was a robot with green armour who looked vaguely like X, but he had a helmet that covered his eyes with a tinted visor.
Standing behind him were the Mega Man Killers and the Genesis Unit. He was their leader, surely.
"Who are you?" Iris asked apprehensively.
"Wake up your friends and then we'll see about introductions. Come on, chop chop, time is of the essence here," the robot said, doing a chopping motion on his palm to emphasise.
Iris shook the other four awake in short order. Artemis didn't comply, but considering she was so terrified, Iris couldn't blame her.
As the four awoke, she could see recognition of their situation dawn upon them as they saw their surroundings. Ethan and Ayane both looked grim. Axl was shaken, staring at Iris as if hoping she had an idea. And Orion looked utterly pale.
"Good, all of you ladies and gentlemen are awake. Let's get down to brass tacks, shall we?" The robot grinned. "You ruined my plans before, but now I will relish finishing what I started."
Iris finally connected the dots. "You're… The Telephone. Commander Tartar?!"
"That can't be possible!" Axl gasped, "you're dead! We saw you shut down!"
Tartar laughed, putting a hand over his face as he tilted his head back. "Yes, as much as I'd like to say your belief of my demise was exaggerated, you're quite correct! My main unit perished with the NILS Statue. Fortunately, it had the foresight to create a backup, and stole some of Wily's more advanced robots just in case something went wrong. Also, these fine gentlemen aren't so happy to hear that you killed their creator, so they were happy to help."
"Vengeance is one thing, but blending them alive is something Dr. Wily would never have done, Tartar," Ballade frowned. "I don't like this."
"Yeah, this is… Morbid," Buster Rod G agreed. "Seriously…"
"Well, too bad, as your current master, you don't have a choice, but to go along with it," Tartar chided. "Besides, they'll be the foundation for a brand new humanity. Watching them suffer is just a bonus."
"What about X? Didn't you promise to not blend them until he arrives?" Enker asked.
"I promised no such thing. I just told him I'd do it if he didn't do as I said. I never said I wouldn't do it before he gets here," Tartar laughed, as he pulled out a remote. "Also, don't bother trying to break free, that glass is reinforced, and even if you somehow pulled it off we'd just stuff you in another blender."
"That's just mean, dude… Also completely insane, and that's by Wily standards," Punk winced.
"Oh cod… We're going to die… I didn't even get to say goodbye to Mom and Dad…" Orion said, shaking, looking almost hysterical.
"No, don't think like that!" Axl said. He looked desperate to try and find some measure of hope as Tartar pushed the button. "There's gotta be a way outta this! X is gonna rescue us! Right…?"
Ethan and Ayane both said nothing, exchanging knowing looks.
"Y-Yeah! It's gonna be alright…" Artemis stammered, turning to Iris, forcing a smile, "don't be scared, we'll get outta this somehow!"
Was Iris' terror really that obvious? How could Artemis say that even when she was nearly frozen with fear herself?
As the blades began to whirr, Iris hugged Artemis tightly. The Inkling girl hugged back, sobbing. Iris glanced to the side, seeing Axl comforting Orion.
Ethan and Ayane brought them all together into a big hug as they waited for the end.
X found himself in an abandoned metro tunnel. This was definitely in some part of the Deepsea Metro that he hadn't known about yet. The whole tunnel was pitch black, forcing him to shine a light from his helmet, as he dashed down the tunnel.
He came to a large steel door, which he blasted open with a charged shot. He was well ahead of the deadline, but he couldn't help but worry for his friends. They must be terrified.
He stepped into a huge circular room - likely a repurposed metro track shifting station. He could see a control room on the outside, up and to the left, and machines of various kinds around the outside as well-
X's eyes widened as he saw what was in the middle of the room.
While the base was lowered into a hole in the floor, it was obviously a blender, larger than the ones he had previously seen. Inside the container, was a slurry of ink.
No.
No, no.
No no no no NO
He raced over to it, fearing the absolute worst.
As he put his hands on the glass, his sensors told him the liquid slurry had roughly the body mass of six Inkings and/or Octolings.
Tears streamed down his face. "No… This can't be happening…"
"You know, X, it was almost disappointing. They didn't even scream."
X glanced to the side, seeing Tartar standing there, helmet in his left hand, wearing his brother's face with a sadistic grin. "Oh, cheer up, 'brother'! They're not dead. Then again, mixing them all together like that results in a complete loss of individuality and identity, so they might as well be."
"You… You bastard…"
"But the most satisfying part of this is seeing you suffer over it. How does it feel, X, to know you couldn't save them?" Tartar cackled, throwing back his head and putting his hand over his face, laughing maniacally as the Mega Man Killers and Genesis Unit emerged from the shadows.
"You… Sadistic… Monster…" X grit his teeth, his eyes and fists glowing as his body began to overclock. "You did that to… My friends…"
"And now we're going to tear you apart, pal!" Hyper Storm W gloated, as he tried to suck X towards him.
He did not expect X to punch him in the face and send him flying into a wall.
"I knew this was a bad idea," Enker grumbled.
X turned to Tartar, charging at him with a single-minded fury. "I'LL KILL YOU!"
Artemis felt her mind falling apart and becoming undone as she sank into the inky depths of… Wherever this was.
That was her name, right? She wasn't sure anymore. She wasn't sure of anything.
She was slipping through a haze of dozens of memories. Dad teaching her how to hunt. Mom teaching him how to use a Charger. Going through basic training in Slimeskin Garrison. Mother teaching her how to use a blade. Drill instructors pushing him through basic training. Fighting through Octo Valley to reach the Great Zapfish.
"A…m…s!"
She thought she heard a voice. A familiar voice, but she wasn't sure if it was hers or someone else's.
"Ar…mis!"
It was getting louder and clearer, as if someone was getting closer.
"Artemis! I'm here!"
Wait, now she knew that voice… Iris? Wait, wasn't she Iris? Or was she Artemis?
Her thoughts were broken up by the feeling of a hand gripping her arm, pulling her up.
Artemis gasped as she emerged from a puddle of ink, feeling more solid than before, but at the same time, all of this still felt hazy. Was this a dream?
"Artemis, are you… Oh cod!" Iris gasped, fully pulling her out of the puddle.
"She's still suffering from identity fragmentation and amalgamation," spoke another familiar voice behind her. "She's still at risk of losing her sense of self due to her mind amalgamating with the others, including yours."
"Iris… What's happening…?" Artemis groaned, as she looked down at herself. Her body looked like a patchwork of multiple different people.
"See for yourself," spoke the other female voice, as a mirror appeared to Artemis' left. She looked in the mirror, and gasped. She could recognise her face, but the right side of her head and hair was Ayane's, and she had Orion's hair.
"Artemis, you have to focus! Remember who you really are!" Iris pleaded. Artemis couldn't help but notice that while her body was in a much better condition, she had had patches of the others, including Artemis herself.
Artemis took a deep breath, closing her eyes. That's right, she was Artemis, and nobody else. She was 90% sure of that, now. How could she have forgotten and gotten so… Jumbled up?
She opened her eyes, and her body was looking much better, but still a bit patchy. She could work with that. "Thanks, Iris."
"Thank my other self. She helped me figure myself out," Iris said, nodding to the source of the other female voice.
Artemis turned to the figure, and blinked. She was also Iris, but she looked so… Different. She was wearing a military coat, and had a high ponytail. Her gaze looked more focus, and her bearing was that of a confident officer. She also noticed a tether of light on her that was attached to Iris. It quickly became apparent who this was. "Wait… Colonel?"
"Took you long enough, Artemis," Colonel smiled. "I'm sure Iris would've pulled herself together in time, but fortunately, as a part of her designed for a specific purpose, I was able to maintain my self of self and assist her."
Her first thought: Wow, she was so pretty. Also, second thought: she was HOT.
"Thank you for the complimentary thoughts, Artemis," Colonel smirked. Oh. Right. Their minds were linked. Iris apparently wasn't aware, though, as she just blinked in confusion.
"Thanks, and you're welcome, I guess…" Artemis blushed, and looked around as she stood up. They were in a large, ornate training hall. "Where are we?"
"In general? We think this is our collective consciousness, since all our minds are mixing together. As for this place specifically, well… This is a mental construct of the training hall I used to spar with Mother in when I was a young girl," Iris said, standing up, "Colonel and I formed this to help us keep a hold of who we were."
"Mental… Wait, why aren't we dead?! We got LITERALLY BLENDED ALIVE!" Artemis blinked, turning to her, "what gives?!"
"Didn't you listen to X's explanation of what happened to the people who got blended? We're still alive, just stuck in inky forms," Iris sighed. "We're each losing our sense of self because our minds are blending together. We gotta separate each other mentally."
Artemis recalled X's explanation, and nodded, "right, right, now I remember… Okay, if you can do this… Lessee…"
She focused on home. On the woods where Dad used to take Orion and her on camping trips and hunts.
The world shifted around them, to a verdant forest. The sunlight leaked through the tree canopy above, and Artemis could feel its warmth.
It did not escape her notice that Iris was in complete awe. "Uwwaaaahhh… This is your home?!"
Artemis grinned, "welcome to Spirulida County. And no, not quite, but Dad used to take me and Ori hunting and camping out here."
Iris pouted in the most adorable way, throwing down her arms, "that's not fair, I spent my whole childhood training and you got to have fun in such a beautiful place like this…"
"Well, it wasn't all fun and games, but… When semester break comes around, I'll take you here. We can go camping together," Artemis smiled, taking her hand. "We'll take everyone along. It'll be the best camping trip ever."
Iris sniffed, "y-you promise?"
"I mean… I can't promise that we'll absolutely be able to do it next break," Artemis laughed sheepishly, scratching the back of her head, "but I promise we'll do it at some point!"
Iris smiled, apparently satisfied enough with this. "Thank you."
Colonel cleared her throat, drawing their attention. "As charming as this is, we have more important things to do, like recovering the minds of our comrades."
Iris nodded, "r-right! And a big place like this will help us get closer to them! Now, we just gotta find where we can dive…"
Artemis looked around, and spotted a conspicuous puddle of ink nearby. She pointed, rushing over to it, "is this it?"
"Yes, that should be one of them!" Iris came over as well, "I'll dive and grab them, my tether to Colonel should allow me to find my way back…"
"I am worried about the mental strain, though… Recovering Artemis took a toll on you," Colonel rubbed her chin in thought.
"No, I'll do it. I can handle it, I'm pretty much fresh," Artemis said. "All you need to do is hold on to my legs. I dunno how I know that'll work, just… Trust me!"
Iris nodded, "um, right, just be careful!"
Artemis gave her a thumbs up, and as Iris and Colonel took a hold of her legs, she dived into the puddle.
Once again she found herself in a sea of memories and thoughts, but this time her head was clear, and she kept out outside thoughts. She needed to keep her head in the game and keep herself together.
She saw a shadow below, and she dived, moving as quickly as she could. Much to her surprise, it wasn't just one person - it was both Orion and Axl together, and they looked like they were blending together. "ORI! AXL!"
"Artemis…?" Orion mumbled, his eyes opening, and he looked up at her. "Is that you, sis…?"
"Ori, take my hand!" Artemis called out, as she reached out to him.
Orion looked dazed and hazy, but when she called out to him, he seemed to get a rush of energy, reaching out and taking her hand. Artemis groaned as she started pulling the both of them back up, swimming up towards the surface…
Fortunately, Iris and Colonel knew when she was coming back up, and pulled her out, along with Orion and Axl. Artemis knew none of this was technically real, but she still felt the instinctive need to gasp for air.
"We need to separate them, otherwise their minds will permanently merge," Colonel said, as she and Iris pulled Orion and Axl apart, and Artemis quickly helped. Fortunately, it wasn't a difficult task, and the two mental bodies separated.
Artemis focused on tending to Orion. "Ori, you need to maintain your sense of self! Remember, you're my little brother, not anyone else!"
Orion sat up, and seemed to meditate for a moment, as his form began to stabilise. "Yeah. I know. Thanks, sis. I was just terrified of what was happening, Axl tried to help calm me down, but… It might've only made things worse. He might have the worst of it of all of us."
Artemis looked over to Axl, whose form was mostly in flux, despite Iris' best efforts. "What's going on with him?"
"He's still got a bad case of impostor syndrome, and on top of being a shapeshifter, well, his sense of personal identity isn't solid," Orion frowned, as he got up.
"Bro, you're surprisingly calm considering-"
"Sis. Don't. I'm trying not to think about the fact that we're literally just a vat of ink right now and we literally might not be able to return to normal," said Orion, almost hyperventilating.
Artemis winced. She should've known Orion wasn't taking this as well as he seemed to. "Sorry."
"Ugh… Man, I don't feel so good…" Axl groaned, getting up.
"Axl, are you okay?" Iris asked, looking very concerned for him. "Your sense of self-"
"Don't worry about me," Axl groaned, as his form started stabilising. "I'll figure myself out. We still need to find Ethan and Ayane, right?"
Artemis nodded, "yeah, but who knows where they a-"
Suddenly, the world around them began to shift. They found themselves standing on a spawn point. And the environment around them was oddly familiar.
"Hold up, is this Blackbelly Skatepark?!" Artemis blinked. It looked like it, but… Something off about it gave her pause. It looked similar enough, but the Octarian sky-sphere and the slightly off paint-job indicated it wasn't. "No, wait, it's one of those Octarian replicas…"
"It's Octo Valley's replica of Blackbelly Skatepark that the Octarians used for training," Iris nodded. "Ethan and Ayane went through this area to acquire one of the Zapfish. If I recall correctly… Octavio sent Marino's elite team here to deal with them. Ethan came alone, though…"
"Oh, right, I heard this story… Ethan and Ayane didn't get along all that well at first, and they ended up splitting up to cover more ground, thinking they'd just get in each other's way," Orion frowned, "that turned out to be a bad idea."
Suddenly, a scream of pain and rage echoed through the mental environment, shaking Artemis to her core. She knew that voice, and it broke her heart to hear him in so much pain. "X… He's here… Well, not here here, but…"
"That anguish and fury… I've never heard X so emotionally charged like this," Axl winced.
"He's gonna do something he's gonna regret if we don't do something soon," Orion frowned. "Let's go."
As the team dashed through the ersatz skatepark, they could hear the sounds of battle on the other side, followed by a scream of pain. On the other team's side of the map, they saw Ethan on his back, an Octoling elite pinning him down with her foot and pointing her Octo Shot at him. It was Marino. She cackled as she pushed her foot down on him, "you're cute, but you're still too young to be fighting a war! Where's your partner, eh? Oh, it doesn't matter, when I'm done with you, she's next. Then the Octarians will wage the next Great Turf War, and we'll win this time! Such a shame you won't be here to see it. I'd consider keeping you as a pet, you are rather cute, but orders are orders…"
"Captain Ida, stand down," Colonel said as she stepped forward, an Octo Saber forming in her hand.
That seemed to surprise Marino, as she turned around, "Colonel Mizuno…?!"
Suddenly, a Charger shot ripped through her, splatting her instantly.
"ETHAN!" Ayane called out, as she jumped down from her sniping position, rushing over. "Oh, cod…"
"Damn it… This is nothing like our ink battles… We're just a couple of kids fighting a war. We can't do this," Ethan groaned, sitting up, on the verge of tears.
"Ugh… Ethan, you idiot…" Ayane said, her eyes also swelling with tears.
"Huh?"
"You can't do this alone, you moron!" Ayane sobbed, hugging him. "I can't do this alone, either! We'll just get ourselves killed if we do this by ourselves!"
"Ayane…" Ethan choked up, and hugged back, "I'm sorry… I really am a fool…"
"Guys… You do know this is just a memory, right…?" Artemis asked, wiping a tear from her eye.
Ethan chuckled, looking at her, "aw, come on, don't ruin the moment, Arti… It's kinda something to relive this moment… Uh… What's the word again…?"
Orion suggested, "cathartic?"
"Yeah, that's the word, thanks."
"Well, using our memories to find each other and get our heads back in order was our idea, really," Ayane said, standing up, "we couldn't figure out who was who, so we went with our gut instinct when it came to our roles. Guess it just… Worked out."
"Yeah! Though I'm not sure what's going on or why we aren't dead," Ethan said, also standing up.
"Oh my cod Ethan," Ayane facepalmed. "Seriously?! X told us what happens during the blending process!"
"Oh, right, I remember, sorry," Ethan laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Well, it's a good thing we were able to recover our sense of selves… Aside from maybe Axl. He's still got problems," Iris sighed.
"Look, as long as I know I'm not any of you guys, I should be okay," Axl said. He was still kind of fluctuating, but he was largely stable at this point. In fact, the recognition of who was who cleared everyone's patchiness up.
Orion interjected, "X is out there fighting, and he's blind with rage. If we don't do something, he'll make a mistake, or do something he'll regret!"
Artemis wondered how Orion knew that, but in her mind's eye, she could see hazy fragments of what was happening in the real world.
X caught Buster Rod G's rod, tossing him right into Enker. As Punk rolled at him with his spikes fully extended, he stopped the attack with his bare hands, pulling him out of ball form, and as the Killer stared at him in shock and terror, chokeslammed him into the floor-
"Did you see the steam coming off of him? He's going to burn himself out doing that!" Axl said.
"But we're just a vat of ink mixed together right now! What can we do?!" Iris asked.
Ethan rubbed his chin, "I mean… If we're in a mid-point of transforming, then can't we just change back?"
"Easier said than done, all our body mass is jumbled up. We wouldn't be able to sort each other out in time," Orion frowned. "And even if we did, we're completely unarmed and can't fight those robots…"
Artemis rubbed her chin in thought. She snapped her fingers. "Hey, Axl, could you form weapons using your ability?"
"I mean… I guess, but it'd take quite a bit of ink and strength on my part for them to work…" Axl blinked. "But that wouldn't help any of you…"
"Not if we're all working together."
Orion's eyes widened. "Wait. Sis. You can't seriously be suggesting…"
"Yeah! Nice of you to be on the same page, bro," Artemis giggled as she put an arm around his shoulder, "come on, it'd be SO COOL!"
"I-I mean, I guess it would be," Orion blushed, "and I guess it's theoretically possible… Might be our only shot…"
"What are you two talking about?" Ayane blinked.
"We're gonna save X in style," Artemis grinned.
"Whatever you're thinking of doing, it is going to be a long shot," Colonel warned. "Are you prepared to accept whatever risks there may be?"
Artemis took a deep breath. Sure, she wasn't sure what might happen, but… "Yeah. X has come through for us so many times already in the time we've known him. It's our turn to come through for him this time."
Everyone else nodded in unanimous agreement.
"Listen up, this is what we're gonna do…"
X kicked Ballade right into a wall. Despite transforming into his second form and using his Speed Gear, even Ballade couldn't go fast enough to surprise X, especially not like this.
While the six who kidnapped his friends would suffer next, they were just a distraction right now. What he really wanted was to rip Tartar apart and make him beg for mercy. Not that X would provide any. His pity well was all tapped out.
"Mega Man was never this vicious," Enker groaned as he struggled to get back up.
"Neither Wily or his robots ever did something as monstrous as this, so consider this karma," X replied coldly as he started walking towards Tartar. "Now that your toadies are out of the way…"
Tartar stumbled back, shock and fear etched onto his face. Exactly the reaction X was hoping for. "Wait, stop! I can fix them, I swear!"
"Your word is worthless, Tartar. First promises of a 'promised land', you lie to me about keeping my friends alive and intact, and now when backed into a corner you try to make promises you can't check?" X sneered, as he walked up to him. Tartar tried to strike with Sakugarne, but X just caught the blade. "No more. I'm going to tear out your tongue."
Tartar removed his helmet with his free hand, as he struggled to get Sakugarne out of X's grip, "X, surely you wouldn't hurt your dear brother, would you?"
X froze for a moment… And then his face hardened. "You're not my brother. Considering you took Quint's body… He's probably gone. You're just wearing his face."
Tartar snarled, forming a buster in his free hand, but X grabbed his arm, and ripped it out, causing him to scream in pain. Oh, how delightful to hear that monster suffer. "NO! STOP!"
X permitted himself a grin. "You wanted them to suffer. You wanted me to suffer. Well, then…"
X, with a glowing, sizzling hand, grabbed Tartar's face, and did not let go. Tartar started screaming, struggling uselessly, as the hand burned his face.
"How's it feel, Tartar?! To be served a dose of your own damn medicine?!" X snapped, a laugh escaping from his mouth. "Because as someone who just so smug about an hour ago said - I'm not the one who brought this on himself."
That's when X's body finally couldn't take it anymore, and he found himself unable to move. Not shut down, but for all intents and purposes…
Tartar seemed to realise what happened, as he pushed the hand off his face. "Damn it… You truly are someone I can't underestimate for even a second…" He then punched X with the hand still holding the sword, sending X crashing onto his back a few metres away. "If you hadn't played with your food, you might've actually won…"
X grit his teeth, as his reserve cells kicked in, but the damage to his systems would take a bit of time to repair. He struggled to even lift himself a little bit, as Tartar approached him, sword raised.
Tartar frowned, "farewell, X. I'll make sure you won't see them again, in whatever afterlife you're headed to… If there is any."
X took a deep breath, and muttered, "I'm sorry… Everyone…"
A jet of ink slammed into Tartar's hand, sending the sword flying out of it, clattering to the floor.
They both looked towards the blender. There was a hole in it. And the ink inside was swirling, causing the blender itself to rattle around. A chorus of voices echoed from it. "Don't you dare hurt him."
"What the hell is going on?!" Tartar blurted, eyes widening. "This… This is impossible…"
The vortex of ink surged upwards, before shooting downwards, unleashing an explosion of ink that completely shattered the container, sending chunks of glass flying everywhere.
Where the vortex once was, was a single individual, in a three-point pose, as if having unleashed a Splashdown.
They stood up, revealing themselves to be about eight feet tall. A mess of Inking and Octoling tentacles adorned their head.
Six arms. Six eyes, each with a different colour. Their outfit was a mixture of the two styles of Hero Suit and the Octoling Armour. And they were, well… It was hard to tell their gender, really, since they had characteristics of both sexes, but they were certainly far from svelte, to put it mildly, being muscular, wide-hipped and very well-endowed. All that mass from six people had to go somewhere.
The figure looked them-self over, cracking their neck and all six of their knuckles. They suddenly began speaking as they looked at their hands.
"Oh, hey, it worked. AWESOME! What do we call this, then? Uh… 'Agent 33', maybe?" It was if they were talking to them-self. "Nah, that won't work, especially if we get an actual Agent 33 eventually… Oh, I've got an idea!"
The figure smirked. "How about… Leviathan?"
A/N: No relation to Fairy Leviathan, by the way. I just thought it was a cool and appropriate name. Also, 'Kraken' was taken by the special, so...
So. Normally I would not consider literally pureeing several of my main characters to be a valid narrative decision, unless I wanted to inexplicably turn this into a darkfic. But then I had some thoughts regarding how Kamabo's blending process canonically keeps the victims alive, and considering my own explanations for how that works, well... I realised it was possible for a group of people who had close bonds and strong wills to actually bounce back from that, and potentially go even further beyond.
>Puts the Steven Universe theme on
>Refuses to elaborate further
>Leaves
Chapter 17: Hostile Takeover (VII)
What woke Iris was the sound of someone pounding on glass, along with screaming and a cavalcade of insults and swears in Inkling. Well, she thought they might be swears. She didn't understand half of them.
When she opened her eyes, the source of both sounds became apparent. Artemis was banding on glass, and being the loudest and angriest she had ever seen her. But her expression wasn't of fury. Tears were streaming down her face. She looked terrified, and her terror leaked out into her voice.
Then Iris realised how familiar this small space felt. She got up onto her feet, noting Orion, Axl, Ethan and Ayane still unconscious.
She looked up to see the rotor blades that hung over them, prepared to begin whirling at any moment. The blender itself was just large enough for all six of them.
"Ah, good to see you awake, Test Subject 10,008. It would be most unsatisfying if we got started while you were still out cold."
She was drawn to the voice outside of the blender, standing right there. The base of the blender itself was lowered into the floor, meanwhile they were level with the people standing outside of it. Standing there was a robot with green armour who looked vaguely like X, but he had a helmet that covered his eyes with a tinted visor.
Standing behind him were the Mega Man Killers and the Genesis Unit. He was their leader, surely.
"Who are you?" Iris asked apprehensively.
"Wake up your friends and then we'll see about introductions. Come on, chop chop, time is of the essence here," the robot said, doing a chopping motion on his palm to emphasise.
Iris shook the other four awake in short order. Artemis didn't comply, but considering she was so terrified, Iris couldn't blame her.
As the four awoke, she could see recognition of their situation dawn upon them as they saw their surroundings. Ethan and Ayane both looked grim. Axl was shaken, staring at Iris as if hoping she had an idea. And Orion looked utterly pale.
"Good, all of you ladies and gentlemen are awake. Let's get down to brass tacks, shall we?" The robot grinned. "You ruined my plans before, but now I will relish finishing what I started."
Iris finally connected the dots. "You're… The Telephone. Commander Tartar?!"
"That can't be possible!" Axl gasped, "you're dead! We saw you shut down!"
Tartar laughed, putting a hand over his face as he tilted his head back. "Yes, as much as I'd like to say your belief of my demise was exaggerated, you're quite correct! My main unit perished with the NILS Statue. Fortunately, it had the foresight to create a backup, and stole some of Wily's more advanced robots just in case something went wrong. Also, these fine gentlemen aren't so happy to hear that you killed their creator, so they were happy to help."
"Vengeance is one thing, but blending them alive is something Dr. Wily would never have done, Tartar," Ballade frowned. "I don't like this."
"Yeah, this is… Morbid," Buster Rod G agreed. "Seriously…"
"Well, too bad, as your current master, you don't have a choice, but to go along with it," Tartar chided. "Besides, they'll be the foundation for a brand new humanity. Watching them suffer is just a bonus."
"What about X? Didn't you promise to not blend them until he arrives?" Enker asked.
"I promised no such thing. I just told him I'd do it if he didn't do as I said. I never said I wouldn't do it before he gets here," Tartar laughed, as he pulled out a remote. "Also, don't bother trying to break free, that glass is reinforced, and even if you somehow pulled it off we'd just stuff you in another blender."
"That's just mean, dude… Also completely insane, and that's by Wily standards," Punk winced.
"Oh cod… We're going to die… I didn't even get to say goodbye to Mom and Dad…" Orion said, shaking, looking almost hysterical.
"No, don't think like that!" Axl said. He looked desperate to try and find some measure of hope as Tartar pushed the button. "There's gotta be a way outta this! X is gonna rescue us! Right…?"
Ethan and Ayane both said nothing, exchanging knowing looks.
"Y-Yeah! It's gonna be alright…" Artemis stammered, turning to Iris, forcing a smile, "don't be scared, we'll get outta this somehow!"
Was Iris' terror really that obvious? How could Artemis say that even when she was nearly frozen with fear herself?
As the blades began to whirr, Iris hugged Artemis tightly. The Inkling girl hugged back, sobbing. Iris glanced to the side, seeing Axl comforting Orion.
Ethan and Ayane brought them all together into a big hug as they waited for the end.
❖
X found himself in an abandoned metro tunnel. This was definitely in some part of the Deepsea Metro that he hadn't known about yet. The whole tunnel was pitch black, forcing him to shine a light from his helmet, as he dashed down the tunnel.
He came to a large steel door, which he blasted open with a charged shot. He was well ahead of the deadline, but he couldn't help but worry for his friends. They must be terrified.
He stepped into a huge circular room - likely a repurposed metro track shifting station. He could see a control room on the outside, up and to the left, and machines of various kinds around the outside as well-
X's eyes widened as he saw what was in the middle of the room.
While the base was lowered into a hole in the floor, it was obviously a blender, larger than the ones he had previously seen. Inside the container, was a slurry of ink.
No.
No, no.
No no no no NO
He raced over to it, fearing the absolute worst.
As he put his hands on the glass, his sensors told him the liquid slurry had roughly the body mass of six Inkings and/or Octolings.
Tears streamed down his face. "No… This can't be happening…"
"You know, X, it was almost disappointing. They didn't even scream."
X glanced to the side, seeing Tartar standing there, helmet in his left hand, wearing his brother's face with a sadistic grin. "Oh, cheer up, 'brother'! They're not dead. Then again, mixing them all together like that results in a complete loss of individuality and identity, so they might as well be."
"You… You bastard…"
"But the most satisfying part of this is seeing you suffer over it. How does it feel, X, to know you couldn't save them?" Tartar cackled, throwing back his head and putting his hand over his face, laughing maniacally as the Mega Man Killers and Genesis Unit emerged from the shadows.
"You… Sadistic… Monster…" X grit his teeth, his eyes and fists glowing as his body began to overclock. "You did that to… My friends…"
"And now we're going to tear you apart, pal!" Hyper Storm W gloated, as he tried to suck X towards him.
He did not expect X to punch him in the face and send him flying into a wall.
"I knew this was a bad idea," Enker grumbled.
X turned to Tartar, charging at him with a single-minded fury. "I'LL KILL YOU!"
❖
Artemis felt her mind falling apart and becoming undone as she sank into the inky depths of… Wherever this was.
That was her name, right? She wasn't sure anymore. She wasn't sure of anything.
She was slipping through a haze of dozens of memories. Dad teaching her how to hunt. Mom teaching him how to use a Charger. Going through basic training in Slimeskin Garrison. Mother teaching her how to use a blade. Drill instructors pushing him through basic training. Fighting through Octo Valley to reach the Great Zapfish.
"A…m…s!"
She thought she heard a voice. A familiar voice, but she wasn't sure if it was hers or someone else's.
"Ar…mis!"
It was getting louder and clearer, as if someone was getting closer.
"Artemis! I'm here!"
Wait, now she knew that voice… Iris? Wait, wasn't she Iris? Or was she Artemis?
Her thoughts were broken up by the feeling of a hand gripping her arm, pulling her up.
Artemis gasped as she emerged from a puddle of ink, feeling more solid than before, but at the same time, all of this still felt hazy. Was this a dream?
"Artemis, are you… Oh cod!" Iris gasped, fully pulling her out of the puddle.
"She's still suffering from identity fragmentation and amalgamation," spoke another familiar voice behind her. "She's still at risk of losing her sense of self due to her mind amalgamating with the others, including yours."
"Iris… What's happening…?" Artemis groaned, as she looked down at herself. Her body looked like a patchwork of multiple different people.
"See for yourself," spoke the other female voice, as a mirror appeared to Artemis' left. She looked in the mirror, and gasped. She could recognise her face, but the right side of her head and hair was Ayane's, and she had Orion's hair.
"Artemis, you have to focus! Remember who you really are!" Iris pleaded. Artemis couldn't help but notice that while her body was in a much better condition, she had had patches of the others, including Artemis herself.
Artemis took a deep breath, closing her eyes. That's right, she was Artemis, and nobody else. She was 90% sure of that, now. How could she have forgotten and gotten so… Jumbled up?
She opened her eyes, and her body was looking much better, but still a bit patchy. She could work with that. "Thanks, Iris."
"Thank my other self. She helped me figure myself out," Iris said, nodding to the source of the other female voice.
Artemis turned to the figure, and blinked. She was also Iris, but she looked so… Different. She was wearing a military coat, and had a high ponytail. Her gaze looked more focus, and her bearing was that of a confident officer. She also noticed a tether of light on her that was attached to Iris. It quickly became apparent who this was. "Wait… Colonel?"
"Took you long enough, Artemis," Colonel smiled. "I'm sure Iris would've pulled herself together in time, but fortunately, as a part of her designed for a specific purpose, I was able to maintain my self of self and assist her."
Her first thought: Wow, she was so pretty. Also, second thought: she was HOT.
"Thank you for the complimentary thoughts, Artemis," Colonel smirked. Oh. Right. Their minds were linked. Iris apparently wasn't aware, though, as she just blinked in confusion.
"Thanks, and you're welcome, I guess…" Artemis blushed, and looked around as she stood up. They were in a large, ornate training hall. "Where are we?"
"In general? We think this is our collective consciousness, since all our minds are mixing together. As for this place specifically, well… This is a mental construct of the training hall I used to spar with Mother in when I was a young girl," Iris said, standing up, "Colonel and I formed this to help us keep a hold of who we were."
"Mental… Wait, why aren't we dead?! We got LITERALLY BLENDED ALIVE!" Artemis blinked, turning to her, "what gives?!"
"Didn't you listen to X's explanation of what happened to the people who got blended? We're still alive, just stuck in inky forms," Iris sighed. "We're each losing our sense of self because our minds are blending together. We gotta separate each other mentally."
Artemis recalled X's explanation, and nodded, "right, right, now I remember… Okay, if you can do this… Lessee…"
She focused on home. On the woods where Dad used to take Orion and her on camping trips and hunts.
The world shifted around them, to a verdant forest. The sunlight leaked through the tree canopy above, and Artemis could feel its warmth.
It did not escape her notice that Iris was in complete awe. "Uwwaaaahhh… This is your home?!"
Artemis grinned, "welcome to Spirulida County. And no, not quite, but Dad used to take me and Ori hunting and camping out here."
Iris pouted in the most adorable way, throwing down her arms, "that's not fair, I spent my whole childhood training and you got to have fun in such a beautiful place like this…"
"Well, it wasn't all fun and games, but… When semester break comes around, I'll take you here. We can go camping together," Artemis smiled, taking her hand. "We'll take everyone along. It'll be the best camping trip ever."
Iris sniffed, "y-you promise?"
"I mean… I can't promise that we'll absolutely be able to do it next break," Artemis laughed sheepishly, scratching the back of her head, "but I promise we'll do it at some point!"
Iris smiled, apparently satisfied enough with this. "Thank you."
Colonel cleared her throat, drawing their attention. "As charming as this is, we have more important things to do, like recovering the minds of our comrades."
Iris nodded, "r-right! And a big place like this will help us get closer to them! Now, we just gotta find where we can dive…"
Artemis looked around, and spotted a conspicuous puddle of ink nearby. She pointed, rushing over to it, "is this it?"
"Yes, that should be one of them!" Iris came over as well, "I'll dive and grab them, my tether to Colonel should allow me to find my way back…"
"I am worried about the mental strain, though… Recovering Artemis took a toll on you," Colonel rubbed her chin in thought.
"No, I'll do it. I can handle it, I'm pretty much fresh," Artemis said. "All you need to do is hold on to my legs. I dunno how I know that'll work, just… Trust me!"
Iris nodded, "um, right, just be careful!"
Artemis gave her a thumbs up, and as Iris and Colonel took a hold of her legs, she dived into the puddle.
Once again she found herself in a sea of memories and thoughts, but this time her head was clear, and she kept out outside thoughts. She needed to keep her head in the game and keep herself together.
She saw a shadow below, and she dived, moving as quickly as she could. Much to her surprise, it wasn't just one person - it was both Orion and Axl together, and they looked like they were blending together. "ORI! AXL!"
"Artemis…?" Orion mumbled, his eyes opening, and he looked up at her. "Is that you, sis…?"
"Ori, take my hand!" Artemis called out, as she reached out to him.
Orion looked dazed and hazy, but when she called out to him, he seemed to get a rush of energy, reaching out and taking her hand. Artemis groaned as she started pulling the both of them back up, swimming up towards the surface…
Fortunately, Iris and Colonel knew when she was coming back up, and pulled her out, along with Orion and Axl. Artemis knew none of this was technically real, but she still felt the instinctive need to gasp for air.
"We need to separate them, otherwise their minds will permanently merge," Colonel said, as she and Iris pulled Orion and Axl apart, and Artemis quickly helped. Fortunately, it wasn't a difficult task, and the two mental bodies separated.
Artemis focused on tending to Orion. "Ori, you need to maintain your sense of self! Remember, you're my little brother, not anyone else!"
Orion sat up, and seemed to meditate for a moment, as his form began to stabilise. "Yeah. I know. Thanks, sis. I was just terrified of what was happening, Axl tried to help calm me down, but… It might've only made things worse. He might have the worst of it of all of us."
Artemis looked over to Axl, whose form was mostly in flux, despite Iris' best efforts. "What's going on with him?"
"He's still got a bad case of impostor syndrome, and on top of being a shapeshifter, well, his sense of personal identity isn't solid," Orion frowned, as he got up.
"Bro, you're surprisingly calm considering-"
"Sis. Don't. I'm trying not to think about the fact that we're literally just a vat of ink right now and we literally might not be able to return to normal," said Orion, almost hyperventilating.
Artemis winced. She should've known Orion wasn't taking this as well as he seemed to. "Sorry."
"Ugh… Man, I don't feel so good…" Axl groaned, getting up.
"Axl, are you okay?" Iris asked, looking very concerned for him. "Your sense of self-"
"Don't worry about me," Axl groaned, as his form started stabilising. "I'll figure myself out. We still need to find Ethan and Ayane, right?"
Artemis nodded, "yeah, but who knows where they a-"
Suddenly, the world around them began to shift. They found themselves standing on a spawn point. And the environment around them was oddly familiar.
"Hold up, is this Blackbelly Skatepark?!" Artemis blinked. It looked like it, but… Something off about it gave her pause. It looked similar enough, but the Octarian sky-sphere and the slightly off paint-job indicated it wasn't. "No, wait, it's one of those Octarian replicas…"
"It's Octo Valley's replica of Blackbelly Skatepark that the Octarians used for training," Iris nodded. "Ethan and Ayane went through this area to acquire one of the Zapfish. If I recall correctly… Octavio sent Marino's elite team here to deal with them. Ethan came alone, though…"
"Oh, right, I heard this story… Ethan and Ayane didn't get along all that well at first, and they ended up splitting up to cover more ground, thinking they'd just get in each other's way," Orion frowned, "that turned out to be a bad idea."
Suddenly, a scream of pain and rage echoed through the mental environment, shaking Artemis to her core. She knew that voice, and it broke her heart to hear him in so much pain. "X… He's here… Well, not here here, but…"
"That anguish and fury… I've never heard X so emotionally charged like this," Axl winced.
"He's gonna do something he's gonna regret if we don't do something soon," Orion frowned. "Let's go."
As the team dashed through the ersatz skatepark, they could hear the sounds of battle on the other side, followed by a scream of pain. On the other team's side of the map, they saw Ethan on his back, an Octoling elite pinning him down with her foot and pointing her Octo Shot at him. It was Marino. She cackled as she pushed her foot down on him, "you're cute, but you're still too young to be fighting a war! Where's your partner, eh? Oh, it doesn't matter, when I'm done with you, she's next. Then the Octarians will wage the next Great Turf War, and we'll win this time! Such a shame you won't be here to see it. I'd consider keeping you as a pet, you are rather cute, but orders are orders…"
"Captain Ida, stand down," Colonel said as she stepped forward, an Octo Saber forming in her hand.
That seemed to surprise Marino, as she turned around, "Colonel Mizuno…?!"
Suddenly, a Charger shot ripped through her, splatting her instantly.
"ETHAN!" Ayane called out, as she jumped down from her sniping position, rushing over. "Oh, cod…"
"Damn it… This is nothing like our ink battles… We're just a couple of kids fighting a war. We can't do this," Ethan groaned, sitting up, on the verge of tears.
"Ugh… Ethan, you idiot…" Ayane said, her eyes also swelling with tears.
"Huh?"
"You can't do this alone, you moron!" Ayane sobbed, hugging him. "I can't do this alone, either! We'll just get ourselves killed if we do this by ourselves!"
"Ayane…" Ethan choked up, and hugged back, "I'm sorry… I really am a fool…"
"Guys… You do know this is just a memory, right…?" Artemis asked, wiping a tear from her eye.
Ethan chuckled, looking at her, "aw, come on, don't ruin the moment, Arti… It's kinda something to relive this moment… Uh… What's the word again…?"
Orion suggested, "cathartic?"
"Yeah, that's the word, thanks."
"Well, using our memories to find each other and get our heads back in order was our idea, really," Ayane said, standing up, "we couldn't figure out who was who, so we went with our gut instinct when it came to our roles. Guess it just… Worked out."
"Yeah! Though I'm not sure what's going on or why we aren't dead," Ethan said, also standing up.
"Oh my cod Ethan," Ayane facepalmed. "Seriously?! X told us what happens during the blending process!"
"Oh, right, I remember, sorry," Ethan laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Well, it's a good thing we were able to recover our sense of selves… Aside from maybe Axl. He's still got problems," Iris sighed.
"Look, as long as I know I'm not any of you guys, I should be okay," Axl said. He was still kind of fluctuating, but he was largely stable at this point. In fact, the recognition of who was who cleared everyone's patchiness up.
Orion interjected, "X is out there fighting, and he's blind with rage. If we don't do something, he'll make a mistake, or do something he'll regret!"
Artemis wondered how Orion knew that, but in her mind's eye, she could see hazy fragments of what was happening in the real world.
X caught Buster Rod G's rod, tossing him right into Enker. As Punk rolled at him with his spikes fully extended, he stopped the attack with his bare hands, pulling him out of ball form, and as the Killer stared at him in shock and terror, chokeslammed him into the floor-
"Did you see the steam coming off of him? He's going to burn himself out doing that!" Axl said.
"But we're just a vat of ink mixed together right now! What can we do?!" Iris asked.
Ethan rubbed his chin, "I mean… If we're in a mid-point of transforming, then can't we just change back?"
"Easier said than done, all our body mass is jumbled up. We wouldn't be able to sort each other out in time," Orion frowned. "And even if we did, we're completely unarmed and can't fight those robots…"
Artemis rubbed her chin in thought. She snapped her fingers. "Hey, Axl, could you form weapons using your ability?"
"I mean… I guess, but it'd take quite a bit of ink and strength on my part for them to work…" Axl blinked. "But that wouldn't help any of you…"
"Not if we're all working together."
Orion's eyes widened. "Wait. Sis. You can't seriously be suggesting…"
"Yeah! Nice of you to be on the same page, bro," Artemis giggled as she put an arm around his shoulder, "come on, it'd be SO COOL!"
"I-I mean, I guess it would be," Orion blushed, "and I guess it's theoretically possible… Might be our only shot…"
"What are you two talking about?" Ayane blinked.
"We're gonna save X in style," Artemis grinned.
"Whatever you're thinking of doing, it is going to be a long shot," Colonel warned. "Are you prepared to accept whatever risks there may be?"
Artemis took a deep breath. Sure, she wasn't sure what might happen, but… "Yeah. X has come through for us so many times already in the time we've known him. It's our turn to come through for him this time."
Everyone else nodded in unanimous agreement.
"Listen up, this is what we're gonna do…"
❖
X kicked Ballade right into a wall. Despite transforming into his second form and using his Speed Gear, even Ballade couldn't go fast enough to surprise X, especially not like this.
While the six who kidnapped his friends would suffer next, they were just a distraction right now. What he really wanted was to rip Tartar apart and make him beg for mercy. Not that X would provide any. His pity well was all tapped out.
"Mega Man was never this vicious," Enker groaned as he struggled to get back up.
"Neither Wily or his robots ever did something as monstrous as this, so consider this karma," X replied coldly as he started walking towards Tartar. "Now that your toadies are out of the way…"
Tartar stumbled back, shock and fear etched onto his face. Exactly the reaction X was hoping for. "Wait, stop! I can fix them, I swear!"
"Your word is worthless, Tartar. First promises of a 'promised land', you lie to me about keeping my friends alive and intact, and now when backed into a corner you try to make promises you can't check?" X sneered, as he walked up to him. Tartar tried to strike with Sakugarne, but X just caught the blade. "No more. I'm going to tear out your tongue."
Tartar removed his helmet with his free hand, as he struggled to get Sakugarne out of X's grip, "X, surely you wouldn't hurt your dear brother, would you?"
X froze for a moment… And then his face hardened. "You're not my brother. Considering you took Quint's body… He's probably gone. You're just wearing his face."
Tartar snarled, forming a buster in his free hand, but X grabbed his arm, and ripped it out, causing him to scream in pain. Oh, how delightful to hear that monster suffer. "NO! STOP!"
X permitted himself a grin. "You wanted them to suffer. You wanted me to suffer. Well, then…"
X, with a glowing, sizzling hand, grabbed Tartar's face, and did not let go. Tartar started screaming, struggling uselessly, as the hand burned his face.
"How's it feel, Tartar?! To be served a dose of your own damn medicine?!" X snapped, a laugh escaping from his mouth. "Because as someone who just so smug about an hour ago said - I'm not the one who brought this on himself."
That's when X's body finally couldn't take it anymore, and he found himself unable to move. Not shut down, but for all intents and purposes…
Tartar seemed to realise what happened, as he pushed the hand off his face. "Damn it… You truly are someone I can't underestimate for even a second…" He then punched X with the hand still holding the sword, sending X crashing onto his back a few metres away. "If you hadn't played with your food, you might've actually won…"
X grit his teeth, as his reserve cells kicked in, but the damage to his systems would take a bit of time to repair. He struggled to even lift himself a little bit, as Tartar approached him, sword raised.
Tartar frowned, "farewell, X. I'll make sure you won't see them again, in whatever afterlife you're headed to… If there is any."
X took a deep breath, and muttered, "I'm sorry… Everyone…"
A jet of ink slammed into Tartar's hand, sending the sword flying out of it, clattering to the floor.
They both looked towards the blender. There was a hole in it. And the ink inside was swirling, causing the blender itself to rattle around. A chorus of voices echoed from it. "Don't you dare hurt him."
"What the hell is going on?!" Tartar blurted, eyes widening. "This… This is impossible…"
The vortex of ink surged upwards, before shooting downwards, unleashing an explosion of ink that completely shattered the container, sending chunks of glass flying everywhere.
Where the vortex once was, was a single individual, in a three-point pose, as if having unleashed a Splashdown.
They stood up, revealing themselves to be about eight feet tall. A mess of Inking and Octoling tentacles adorned their head.
Six arms. Six eyes, each with a different colour. Their outfit was a mixture of the two styles of Hero Suit and the Octoling Armour. And they were, well… It was hard to tell their gender, really, since they had characteristics of both sexes, but they were certainly far from svelte, to put it mildly, being muscular, wide-hipped and very well-endowed. All that mass from six people had to go somewhere.
The figure looked them-self over, cracking their neck and all six of their knuckles. They suddenly began speaking as they looked at their hands.
"Oh, hey, it worked. AWESOME! What do we call this, then? Uh… 'Agent 33', maybe?" It was if they were talking to them-self. "Nah, that won't work, especially if we get an actual Agent 33 eventually… Oh, I've got an idea!"
The figure smirked. "How about… Leviathan?"
A/N: No relation to Fairy Leviathan, by the way. I just thought it was a cool and appropriate name. Also, 'Kraken' was taken by the special, so...
So. Normally I would not consider literally pureeing several of my main characters to be a valid narrative decision, unless I wanted to inexplicably turn this into a darkfic. But then I had some thoughts regarding how Kamabo's blending process canonically keeps the victims alive, and considering my own explanations for how that works, well... I realised it was possible for a group of people who had close bonds and strong wills to actually bounce back from that, and potentially go even further beyond.
>Puts the Steven Universe theme on
>Refuses to elaborate further
>Leaves
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It would have been hilarious ironic if, in reference to the fact that they are now the sum of their parts, they called themselves "Agent Sigma".
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- Location
- Sydney, Australia
Okay, the fact that you guys haven't immediately started yelling at me over me actually going through with putting those six through the blending process is probably a good sign that I did something right? I was honestly worried it wouldn't go over well, not gonna lie. Honestly thought people would be more shocked that it actually happened.
X's "I'll kill you" moment is very much inspired by Shulk's similar moment when Metal Face temporarily murders Fiora early on in Xenoblade Chronicles 1, FYI.
Yeah, very few things make X snap like losing his friends - a casualty on the field of battle is one thing, but purposely targeting his friends and putting them through a fate worse than death? Hoooo boy you better believe he wants to make the person responsible suffer.
X's "I'll kill you" moment is very much inspired by Shulk's similar moment when Metal Face temporarily murders Fiora early on in Xenoblade Chronicles 1, FYI.
Okay, that's worth a chuckle. Doesn't quite work, but I get it.
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- Location
- Sydney, Australia
I'll admit I never considered that idea, but at the same time I don't feel it would work, either. When it came to the fusion, I felt the Gem-style fusion worked the best.
Chapter 18: Hostile Takeover (VIII)
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
A/N: We're in the home stretch. I'm gonna be finishing this arc with this chapter, the next and then finally the epilogue. I felt this arc has perhaps dragged on a bit long as it is, and these last two chapters are gonna be a bit chaotic.
Now, if you excuse me, I'm gonna focus my full attention on this weekend's Splatfest. Go Team Sweet! Frye needs this one!
Edit: Also, gonna be up front and say I'm not totally happy with the direction this climax is going for reasons that will be obvious at a certain point in this chapter, but I do hope you folks at least stick with with arc for these last two chapters and the epilogue.
Leviathan stepped off the ruined blender, all eyes on them as they looked towards Tartar. "Surprised, Tartar?"
Tartar just laughed, stepping towards them a few feet, "I can't say I'm not! Completely unexpected, but magnificent, nonetheless! I should've added the control serum to the mix earlier, but I suppose I can work with this."
"You say that like you could control us, Tartar," Leviathan snorted.
One word apparently gave Tartar pause. "I'm sorry, 'Us'? No no no no, that's not possible…"
Leviathan smirked, seeing the confusion on his face. "Hate to break it to you, but yeah, 'us'. This is six minds working together in one body." In truth this was not entirely true. Yes, it was six seperate minds distinct from each other, but they were effectively linked together into one organic neural network as a singular identity. One as many, many as one.
"NO! Mixing you together should've fixed that! Nobody's gone through the process and been able to maintain their sense of self!" Tartar snarled, his composure breaking down.
Leviathan shrugged. "Sorry, but we had other ideas. Was a bit touch and go, but we figured out how to keep our minds separated and regain our sense of identity. If we couldn't, this wouldn't have been possible."
That's it. That look of abject fury on Tartar's face was exactly what they were hoping for. They knew Tartar believed that individuality and free will was something he needed to stamp out. Leviathan laughed, "how's it feel, Tartar? To realise that the ultimate life form you strived to create was only possible because of free will and individual people working together as one?"
"You… YOU DARE MOCK ME?!" Tartar screamed. "ROBOTS! Knock them out and stuff them into another blender, on the double!"
"As you wish," Enker said, as the other robots began to assemble, surrounding Leviathan. "We can take on just one of you…"
"Oh, really now?" Leviathan smirked, as weapons began to form in their hands. "We beg to differ."
On the bottom row of arms, formed a Hero Roller. In the middle, formed two Hero Shots. At the top, formed a Hero Charger. "One against six. We like those odds."
"How about one against a hundred?!" Buster Rod G used his Power Gear to create a dozen clones, which attempted to rush Leviathan, "don't think you can take us all on at once!"
Leviathan chuckled, using the Hero Shots and the Hero Roller to take out incoming clones and splash ink around, as they closed in on the real thing, taking aim with the Charger, firing a shot.
Buster Rod G yelped as he barely dodged the high-pressure shot, and took a swing at them with his elongated pole. However, Leviathan blocked it with the Roller, and locked between the roller and its handle, allowing them to pull Buster Rod G towards them. Before the monkey robot had thought to let go and before he pulled out his buster, Leviathan unloaded into them with the Hero Shots and the Charger before separating the Roller and slamming it into Buster Rod G, smashing his body in half.
"How are they capable of that kind of power?! No, it doesn't matter, we can still win this!" Mega Water S unloaded his water jets, "you're going down!"
Leviathan ducked under the jets with their swim form, zooming over towards him with astonishing speed. Mega Water S tried to backpedal, but Leviathan activated their 'Kraken' mode, becoming larger and launching them-self at Mega Water S, deflecting a harpoon with a spin and ripping right through him in one go with their bladed head, before changing back to normal.
"Lemme show you true power!" Hyper Storm W leaped into the air, but Leviathan jumped as the shockwave hit, dashing right towards him and firing a Charger shot. The shot hit home, slamming into his eye, causing the huge pig to scream as he covered his eye, "MY EYE! Why you little-wait, where did you-"
He couldn't finish his sentence, on account of Leviathan moving into his blind-spot, and cutting off his head with a pure ink-based Octo Saber.
Punk charged at them, launching Screw Crushers as he took on his spiky ball form, "those guys were small time! We'll show you how it's really done!"
Enker tried to rush in with him, "you fool! We need to do this together, otherwise-"
Leviathan forced him to stop and block using their Charger, and dashed around the screws, waiting for Punk to come to them. They dismissed their weapons, stopped Punk's ball form in its tracks with all six arms, and forced it open.
"Oh, not aga-oh no," Punk gasped, right before Leviathan's Ink Saber decapitated him as well, causing him to collapse entirely.
Enker rushed them, spear raised defensively. Leviathan opened fire with their Hero Shots, but he absorbed all of them, unleashing a powerful energy slash that Leviathan barely blocked with the Roller, knocking them back. "I have the ultimate counter to your abilities. Anything you can throw at me, I can merely absorb and send back at you!"
Leviathan begged to differ. Mega Man would've beaten him back in the day somehow. There had to be a logical point where Enker was vulnerable.
They opened fire again as they rushed him, causing Enker to absorb the shots, and he raised his spear again, bringing it down to slash, "didn't you listen?!"
"Oh, we listened, pal," Leviathan remarked, as they countered with the Octo Saber, side-stepping in the process - striking at the precise point where Enker was most likely to be outputting energy rather than absorbing it.
Enker's attack cut into their side, causing them to wince, but the saber cut him in half. The part of them that was Iris immediately thought, why do I keep doing that…?
As he fell to the floor, bisected, Enker gasped, "impossible…"
Leviathan started using ink to heal the wound, and turned to Ballade, who looked rather excited, taking on his masked second form. "Finally, your kind gives me a worthy foe!" He leaped into the air, unleashing a barrage of Ballade Cracker bombs. "Take this!"
Leviathan sighed, forming a large swirling ball of ink and spiritual energy in front of them, which sucked up the incoming bombs. "We're not in the mood for your fight-happy nonsense, Ballade."
That actually surprised Ballade, who was still in the air, "w-what…?!"
Leviathan brought the ball back to their side, charging it up, and launched it with both hands, knowing where Ballade would land, "BOOYA HADOKEN!"
Just as Ballade touched the floor, the 'Booya Hadoken' slammed into him, sending him right into a wall. His cry of pain was cut off as the resulting explosion scattered his parts.
Leviathan turned to Tartar, who had managed to re-attach his arm, and recover Sakugarne. He put his helmet back on as Leviathan rushed him, and raised his sword to block an incoming attack. Leviathan jumped into the air, and came down with a Splashdown punch.
It snapped Sakugarne in half, and sent Tartar flying.
They turned to X, who was still struggling to get back up, and rushed over to him, falling onto one knee, "X! Are you oka-"
X just hugged them, tears streaming down his face as he sobbed, "I'm sorry…" Over and over.
Despite the initial shock, they smiled softly, hugging him back. "It's okay, X. We're here for you."
"No, no, no… I CAN'T LOSE LIKE THIS!" Tartar howled in rage, as he stood up. It was frankly pitiful.
"As much as you want to deny it, Tartar, you've lost," spoke another voice from his mouth. "I'm done watching from the sidelines."
"Quint?! How?!"
"You took over my body, but you didn't properly erase my AI. You keep underestimating people, Tartar. Don't you know who I am? I'm done wallowing about in this wretched timeline. I'm going to fix everything."
"Wait, Quint, that's what I was-"
"No, you were going to make things worse. Farewell," Quint said, and Tartar said no more.
Leviathan stood up, "so what did you do to him?"
"Erased him from my head. I have no need for his mind or memories. It's a fitting end, frankly," Quint shrugged.
"So… I guess we're friends?" Leviathan blinked. No point keeping up the 'we' appearances anymore, if Tartar was gone.
"I guess you can say that, until this timeline is erased," Quint said. "As I said, I'm going to fix everything. Which means going back before humanity blew itself up and then prevent the apocalypse. Simple, really."
X's eyes widened, "is that even possible?!"
"With the advanced Time Skimmer? Yes, it is. I can create time portals, but also do this," Quint said, sending a wave of energy through the room.
Before Leviathan's eyes, all the damage that had been incurred in the room in the last hour repaired itself - the blender came back together like it had never been touched. Sakugarne was completely repaired, along with its owner. And both the Mega Man Killers and the Genesis Unit reassembled, completely whole.
Enker panted, looking himself over, and turning to Enker, "Quint, that weapon… How?! It failed during testing!"
"I fooled Dr. Wily into believing it didn't work, because I didn't want him to have that kind of power, but now that it's necessary, there's no point hiding the truth anymore," Quint sighed, picking up Sakugarne. "I was once Wily's slave, but I am no longer."
Suddenly, the rest of the Splatoon (along with Ciel and Off The Hook) swarmed in, all armed and ready. They were a bit confused by what was going on. Callie blinked, looking over Leviathan, "uh, X, what's going on? Who's this?!"
"Oh, hey guys," Leviathan grinned, "uh… It's us. Long story."
"OH MY COD YOU FUSED! LIKE IN THAT ONE SHOW!" Hinata squealed, hugging them.
"For eel?!" Marie gasped. She then cleared her throat, "um… It's good to see you're okay, agents."
Zero helped X up, "so… Wait, so is that Tartar, or Quint, now?"
"Tartar's dead, Quint took his body back, but now he's planning to go back in time and change things," X groaned.
"Wait, what?! Doesn't he know what a paradox is?!" Koji winced.
"I'm quite aware. And I believe that's something the Time Skimmer can overcome," Quint said, forming a swirling time portal, "don't worry. You won't even feel a thing once oblivion comes." He then disappeared into it.
"Oh, carp… I need to stop him!" Leviathan super-jumped into the portal.
"Hey, wait!" Zero called out, but it was too late - Leviathan had entered the portal, which closed immediately after.
"They're strong enough to take on Quint," X said. Considering what he had seen earlier, there was little doubt about that.
"That's not the problem! Quint's the one with the Time Skimmer!" Zero said. "If they defeat Quint… How are they going to get back?"
X's eyes widened as he realised how correct Zero was. "Oh, crapbaskets."
"Marina, can you figure out the energy signature of that time portal?" Ciel asked, as she worked on repairing X. "We might be able to reverse engineer the Time Skimmer."
Ciel nodded, typing on her laptop, "on it!"
"So… Are we gonna fight those guys?" Karlene asked, gesturing to the other robots.
"I mean… We could, but… Is there even a point?" Mega Water S crossed his arms. "Wily and Tartar are both dead, Quint's taken off… We don't really have a master or a purpose."
Enker nodded, "he has a point."
"Yeah I think I'm done fightin' today," Hyper Storm S grunted.
"I have a lot to think about after what just happened," Ballade crossed his arms.
Marie took X's hand. "I suppose all we can do now is hope they come back… Or hope Marina and Ciel can recreate the Time Skimmer."
X nodded. Come on, guys… We're counting on you.
The time tunnel Leviathan found themselves in was rather psychedelic, but the fact that there was only one way forward meant they just tried to go as fast as they could. They saw Quint up ahead, flying down the tunnel. "Found you!"
"What the… YOU?!" Quint turned around, but before he could act, Leviathan tackled him, sending them right through the tunnel wall.
Arowana Castle was burning.
Captain Craig Cuttlefish of the Squidbeak Splatoon gripped his Bamboozler tight as he stood across from his former friend now turned enemy, Prince Octavio, who wielded an Octobrush. "Tavi, we don't have to do this!"
"Yes, we do! You know this! After taking out my comrades, you think this fight is avoidable, Craig?!" Octavio snapped, with a look of hatred that caused Craig to feel terrible regret. Could this battle have been avoided?
The atmosphere was immediately broken up by a strange portal appearing, from which two figures tumbled out - a strange person in green armour, and a huge… Inkling? Octoling? With six arms?!
Both Craig and Octavio were more than a little flabbergasted as the pair got up. The taller person blinked, "Cap'n Cuttlefish? Octavio?"
"Do… Do I know you?" Craig asked, now even more confused than ever.
"Damn it… 12,000 years is too far in the past to jump in one go with a pursuer… I'll have to jump across timelines while doing it!" The person in the green armour said, as he formed another portal, jumping through it.
"HEY! GET BACK HERE!" The larger person yelled as they dived through as well.
Craig and Octavio just watched as the portal closed, and then looked at each other. Craig laughed sheepishly, "any idea what that was about, Tavi…?"
"I ain't got a freaking clue, man," Octavio groaned. "We gonna fight already, or what…?"
Craig steeled himself once more. "Alright, if you insist…"
It was an event in history that Craig would forget about for about a century…
Mega Man Volnutt just gawked awkwardly as Tron Bonne ranted in the ruins of her newly-destroyed Gustaff, about how Bon was up to the surface with the key.
Small problem was, she was nearly naked, her modesty barely protected by ruined patches of clothing. Tron just blinked. "Wait, why is your face red? Why is everyone looking at me that way?!"
That's when two figures emerged from some kind of portal - the green armoured figure coming out first, while the other larger person who had features of a squid or octopus (or both?!) was chasing after him. The figure took one look at Tron, winced, said something in some language Volnutt didn't understand, and formed some kind of water gun that splattered Tron in ink before they continued their pursuit into another portal, which closed behind them.
"WHAT THE HECK?! That was RUDE!" Tron screamed.
"Actually, Miss Tron, I think they did you a favour," one of her Servbots said. "Because, uh…"
"Your clothes are, um, gone," said the other one.
Tron looked down, and the moment she confirmed that visually, she screamed, scrambling away. "YOU DUMMIES! WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME BEFORE?! RETREAT!"
Volnutt just laughed sheepishly as Tron and the Servbots fled the scene. Still. What was that all about…?
"Mega Man Volnutt. I need your assistance."
Volnutt blinked, turning around, "what the…?"
Somewhere in the Deep Log, RiCO hummed to herself happily as she typed away at the holographic interface. Player had gone to bed for the night, and all the day's Maverick Data had been dealt with. Very much all in a good day's work.
"Yo, RiCO, anything happening tonight?" ViA asked as he came over.
"Nope! Everything's clear, no sign of Maverick Data," RiCO grinned proudly, "tonight is going to be smooth sailing?"
"Oi, don't jinx it…"
"I have this feeling something's about to happen, actually," iCO spoke, sitting at her chair not far off, sipping her tea. "I'm detecting unusual readings. Nothing typical, either."
RiCO blinked, checking as well. "Oh, yeah, you're right, that is rather o-"
Suddenly a portal opened, and two figures barrelled through. One was Quint of all people, who opened up another portal, and shot through. The other was…
Wait. NO WAY.
Before RiCO could fully process this, they went through the other portal in pursuit. RiCO's jaw dropped. "Wha… Was that some kind of Inkling/Octoling fusion from Splatoon?! Why is that data in the Deep Log, that's not even a Capcom game!"
"I don't think that was part of the Deep Log, RiCO… I think that was actual time travel nonsense," ViA groaned, rubbing his temples.
"It appears they are jumping across timelines, yes," iCO mused.
"Ugh, now my head hurts…" RiCO groaned, "should we really wake up Player over this…?!"
Another portal opened, and someone came through. RiCO blinked, recognising him. "Wait, aren't you the protagonist of that one crappy-"
"Have some tact, RiCO," ViA snapped. "But yes… What are you doing here?"
Zero clashed blades with Omega repeatedly as the flames of the wreckage of Omega's larger body burned around them. With the two of them nearly evenly matched, Zero was finding himself fighting one of the hardest battles he had ever fought.
What caused them to separate, however, was some kind of portal opening up, and two people came out. A robot in green armour zoomed over Omega on some kind of pogo stick. He spoke in an unknown language. "<Have fun with that, Leviathan! Enjoy being trapped in another timeline while you fight a god of destruction!>"
Zero would normally not have been able to understand the language. But Ciel had received some kind of unusual translation program days ago from an unknown benefactor. She hadn't been sure what it was supposed to be for, but it wasn't malicious. Had the person who sent it known this would happen?
The other person, some kind of tall multi-armed cephalopod person, attempted to give chase, but they were cut off by Omega, who seemed eager to fight an exotic new opponent, blocking his saber with their own ink-based blade. "<Ugh, Quint! Stop!>"
"<Who are you?>" Zero asked, using the chance to slash at Omega, who jumped back. "<Why are you pursuing that robot?>"
"<He's trying to change my timeline and erase countless lives from history!>" Leviathan replied. "<I need to get to that other portal before it closes!>"
"<Then we'll have to damage Omega enough so he can't follow you,>" Zero said, taking on a battle stance, "<get ready!>"
Leviathan nodded, and charged Omega, clashing blades with him, but surprising him by unloading with two ink-based pistols with two of their other arms. Zero used this chance to dash around to the other side of Omega, slashing at his back. Omega attempted to create an energy shockwave to make them back off, but it was predictable enough for the pair to avoid, and started attacking him relentlessly.
Two people might've been enough for Omega to fight defensively against, but when one of them had six arms and had their hands full with multiple weapons, that was simply another matter entirely. Omega was simply overwhelmed, and while Leviathan was flesh and blood and not an advanced combat robot, they still kept up. When the Dark Elf attempted to move in to heal Omega, Leviathan took notice, and knocked it away with a powerful inky explosive ball.
"This can't be possible… I am the messiah…!" Omega groaned as he was brought to his knees.
Zero cleaved his head from his shoulders with one powerful charged strike. "You are no saviour."
"What?! This is impossible!" Shrieked Dr. Weil furiously. "Omega, defeated by a fake and this… Creature?!"
"<Go,>" Zero nodded to Leviathan. He turned towards the portal that the green robot had disappeared into. Had it closed already…?
However, to his surprise, someone was keeping it open. X in Cyber-Elf form, straining himself. "Hurry! I can't keep it open much longer!"
"<Thank you!>" Leviathan said, as they launched them-self into the portal, and X closed it behind them.
"I just hope we made the right decision in helping them…" Zero frowned.
Geo Stelar winced as he barely evaded the beam fired by one of ClockMan.EXE's warp holes. Even with MegaMan.EXE fighting alongside him, ClockMan was basically cheating non-stop by briefly summoning various adversaries from across time to attack them. But with Harp Note and Roll.EXE frozen in time as part of his 'collection', they had to beat him.
"BWAHAHAHAHAHA! I have complete mastery over time! You cannot possibly beat me!" ClockMan cackled.
MegaMan blinked, "if you have complete mastery over time, why are your two captives moving?"
"What?!" ClockMan turned around. Geo could see it too - both Harp Note and Roll were suddenly moving again. "Is someone interfering with my time control?!"
That's when he was suddenly slammed to the floor by a green NetNavi with… A jackhammer pogo stick? As he launched off him, the Navi said, "get bent, you Time Man knockoff."
"KNOCKOFF?!" ClockMan yelled indignantly, only to get stepped on by another person, this time someone who didn't really look like a NetNavi, but looked like some kind of… Cephalopod person? They seemed to apologise in some weird language as they gave chase, following the Navi through a time portal.
ClockMan groaned as he started getting back up, "oh, that is IT! When I'm done here, I'm chasing you two down and making you pay for-"
Unfortunately for him, Geo and MegaMan had seen their opportunity, and both of them simultaneously slashed him with their strongest swords. "No… This wasn't in my schedule…!" He then was completely deleted.
"Awesome! We won! I have no idea what that was about, but it helped us win, so I'm not gonna complain!" Lan Hikari whooped via his PET.
Geo's immediate concern was Sonia, though, rushing to her side. "Sonia!"
"Aw, Geo, you came to save me!" Sonia giggled. "Thank you. I'm so sorry for causing you so much trouble."
"Roll, are you okay?!" MegaMan said, rushing to check on her.
"Mega? What happened to me?" Roll blinked still reeling from being frozen. "Also, who just ran past?"
"Don't really matter, they're gone and ClockMan's outta the picture," Omega-Xis grunted from Geo's arm cannon head.
"Actually, on the contrary," spoke someone else who emerged from another portal, attracting the attention of all four of them, "your troubles with time-related ne'er-do-wells aren't quite over with yet. I need your help."
Geo blinked. "What the…"
"Hoo, boy, looks like we're in for more trouble," Omega-Xis groaned.
Leviathan landed on snow. They blinked, taking a quick look around. They were in some kind of massive dome, almost akin to the Octarian underground spheres, but… No, nevermind that, where did Quint go?
"HEY! He went thataway!"
Leviathan turned to see an Inkling and an Octoling - oddly enough, both had fuzz on their hair. The Inkling was female, had a pair of locks and a ponytail, and had a Small Fry on her shoulder. The Octoling male had a 'softcurl' hairstyle with his other tentacles being spiky. Both had green eyes and were wearing what Leviathan thought might be Hero Suits, but significantly more advanced. "Who are-"
"Don't ask questions, just go!" Said the Octoling, pointing in the direction of the next portal.
Leviathan nodded, super-jumping into it. They couldn't help but wonder if they had just stumbled into their own future…
Leviathan thought they had finally caught up to Quint when they slammed into a massive wall of ice.
"Too bad, so sad," Quint gloated, as he stepped back towards the other portal, "I've finally figured out a way to get rid of you. You should've stayed back in your time period, being erased would've been painless. Enjoy burning up in orbit."
Leviathan tried to smash through, but by the time they did, Quint had disappeared into the portal, which closed before they could reach it.
Then they realised how thin the air was up here. In fact, it was really difficult to breathe. They looked around, realising they were standing on some kind of space station in orbit… And dropping rapidly.
"You again?!"
Leviathan turned towards the voice who addressed them - it was the slimmer Zero again, currently in pitched battle with some kind of strange robotic construct, with the head of a decrepit old man inside. "Zero?"
"How do you know my-nevermind, that's not important," Zero said in Inkling language again, oddly enough. "We need to take Dr. Weil out within… 100 seconds, I'd wager. He's forcing this station on a collision course with the planet - if we don't stop him, countless people will die. Can you help me?"
The old man yelled something in a language they didn't understand. He looked… Very angry.
Leviathan sighed, and formed their weapons. "Alright. Let's do this!"
Marina nodded, as she finished typing, "okay, it's done! Time Skimmer weapon data replicated! X, you ready?"
"Yeah. Problem is, I have no idea where to go," X frowned, installing the weapon data into his system. "Quint would know, but I don't…"
Then Marina blinked. She showed him the screen. "Someone apparently does…"
The message on-screen read thus: Download the temporal coordinates and use them to find your friends. Once you do, use Time Stopper immediately. Don't worry about Quint. I will make sure he doesn't get to his intended destination. - An Ally
X downloaded the temporal coordinates, made a note of the current 'home' time point, and formed a time portal, dashing in.
Once he emerged on the other side, he saw what was going on, and immediately used Time Stopper. "Leviathan!"
Leviathan turned around, "X?!"
The advice turned out to have been quite pertinent, because right now, they were on an exploding space station, with Leviathan and… Zero? He looked kinda like Zero, but… No, that was for later. X waved, "we have to go, now!"
"What the… X? No matter. Any light in a storm, I suppose…" 'Zero' mused, as both he and Leviathan dashed through the time portal with X, right before the time stop ceased.
They returned to the large room. Leviathan groaned, "he managed to lose me. We're screwed…"
"The person who send us the temporal coordinates said they'll deal with Quint," X said. "Other than that, as long as we still exist, we know Quint hasn't succeeded…"
"I was wondering what was happening," 'Zero' frowned, "you're jumping across time…"
"Actually, based on what Quint was trying to do to lose me? We were jumping across timelines as well," Leviathan sighed.
Suddenly, they were hugged by their fellow junior agents en-masse, who were simply glad to see them alive and well.
Koji chuckled, "you really gotta tell us how you did this! So, uh… You guys gonna split, or…?"
Leviathan laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of their neck, "actually, I have no idea how."
"Oh boy, that's gonna be a problem," Karlene sighed. "Still… 'Leviathan', huh? I guess that works as a name."
The Other Zero noticed Ciel. "Now I know this isn't my timeline… Are you Ciel?"
Ciel blinked, "uh, yes! You know me?"
"Yes, but in my timeline, you're human."
"Oh. Uh… I see," Ciel said, looking very surprised.
"Kinda like the sleeker look, but not a fan of the underpants," Zero remarked.
Pearl looked at them both, and laughed, "dude, have you looked in a mirror lately?! Also, you're one to talk, 'booblights'…"
"They're capacitors! And-" Zero was about to object, but then he looked down. "Well that's egg on my face, then…"
"YOU NEVER NOTICED?!"
Other Zero just glared at them with annoyance. "You cannot be serious. Was I seriously this fashion-obsessed back in my Maverick Hunter days?"
Zero just blinked. "My what now?"
"Definitely another timeline," Other Zero grumbled.
"So… Now there's two Zeroes. So weird," Punk said.
"No kidding," Buster Rod G agreed.
Marie came over, taking X's hand. "I have a feeling this isn't over yet. We should get ready."
X nodded. He could only hope this mystery person would come through for them…
Finally. Quint had gotten away from his irritating pursuer. "Good… Now it's time to fix the timeline-"
"I don't think so."
Quint suddenly collided with a barrier. He groaned, moving back a bit, and saw someone on the other side - a figure who looked a bit like X, but his armour was dark blue, white and black, with two red lines along the front and what looked like white fur around his shoulders. Quint snarled. "Who are you, and why are you getting in my way?!"
"My name is OVER-1. I am a guardian of the time-stream, and what you're planning to do is completely wreck it," the robot replied. "My time travel abilities are much improved over yours, you can't outrun me."
Quint suddenly felt a pull on him. His whole body was glowing. "What did you do to me?"
"That barrier has a second purpose - sending you back to your original timeline and time period," OVER-1 said, arms crossed. "Just give up, Quint. What you're trying to do is only going to do more harm than good. You know what happens in other timelines, you honestly think your 'intended' timeline is any better?"
Before Quint could get a word in, he felt himself being pulled back along the time tunnel. He groaned, launching himself through the wall of the tunnel.
He crashed into an inhospitable desert. When and where didn't matter - he still felt the pull of whatever OVER-1 did to him. And he had no way of counteracting it, all he could do is delay it.
Using the Time Skimmer, he started looking over dozens of visions of different timelines, trying to find a solution. He needed a way out of this.
Then it struck him. OVER-1 was right. What would changing his timeline really accomplish? There would be countless more with similar events, and countless others with far worse.
He laughed at the absurdity of how small his thinking was. He needed to go further. He had to fix every timeline if there was ever going to be hope of everlasting peace anywhere. After all, he had this power. He just needed a way to gain enough power to-
-and then he saw a few things that he realised would solve his dilemma perfectly. Firstly, an alien superweapon with a large, black key as its control unit. And secondly, a version of Sigma who had been manipulating the timestream as well, but for once, wasn't ambitious enough.
Quint grinned as a plan formed in his head.
A/N: I promise I'll try and avoid going this crazy again once this arc is over. The climax didn't quite pan out as well as I envisioned, in my opinion, but I couldn't really think of a better way to handle it without turning into a straight-up anti-climax. Again, I hope you guys stick with it, the arc's almost done.
Now, if you excuse me, I'm gonna focus my full attention on this weekend's Splatfest. Go Team Sweet! Frye needs this one!
Edit: Also, gonna be up front and say I'm not totally happy with the direction this climax is going for reasons that will be obvious at a certain point in this chapter, but I do hope you folks at least stick with with arc for these last two chapters and the epilogue.
Chapter 18: Hostile Takeover (VIII)
Leviathan stepped off the ruined blender, all eyes on them as they looked towards Tartar. "Surprised, Tartar?"
Tartar just laughed, stepping towards them a few feet, "I can't say I'm not! Completely unexpected, but magnificent, nonetheless! I should've added the control serum to the mix earlier, but I suppose I can work with this."
"You say that like you could control us, Tartar," Leviathan snorted.
One word apparently gave Tartar pause. "I'm sorry, 'Us'? No no no no, that's not possible…"
Leviathan smirked, seeing the confusion on his face. "Hate to break it to you, but yeah, 'us'. This is six minds working together in one body." In truth this was not entirely true. Yes, it was six seperate minds distinct from each other, but they were effectively linked together into one organic neural network as a singular identity. One as many, many as one.
"NO! Mixing you together should've fixed that! Nobody's gone through the process and been able to maintain their sense of self!" Tartar snarled, his composure breaking down.
Leviathan shrugged. "Sorry, but we had other ideas. Was a bit touch and go, but we figured out how to keep our minds separated and regain our sense of identity. If we couldn't, this wouldn't have been possible."
That's it. That look of abject fury on Tartar's face was exactly what they were hoping for. They knew Tartar believed that individuality and free will was something he needed to stamp out. Leviathan laughed, "how's it feel, Tartar? To realise that the ultimate life form you strived to create was only possible because of free will and individual people working together as one?"
"You… YOU DARE MOCK ME?!" Tartar screamed. "ROBOTS! Knock them out and stuff them into another blender, on the double!"
"As you wish," Enker said, as the other robots began to assemble, surrounding Leviathan. "We can take on just one of you…"
"Oh, really now?" Leviathan smirked, as weapons began to form in their hands. "We beg to differ."
On the bottom row of arms, formed a Hero Roller. In the middle, formed two Hero Shots. At the top, formed a Hero Charger. "One against six. We like those odds."
"How about one against a hundred?!" Buster Rod G used his Power Gear to create a dozen clones, which attempted to rush Leviathan, "don't think you can take us all on at once!"
Leviathan chuckled, using the Hero Shots and the Hero Roller to take out incoming clones and splash ink around, as they closed in on the real thing, taking aim with the Charger, firing a shot.
Buster Rod G yelped as he barely dodged the high-pressure shot, and took a swing at them with his elongated pole. However, Leviathan blocked it with the Roller, and locked between the roller and its handle, allowing them to pull Buster Rod G towards them. Before the monkey robot had thought to let go and before he pulled out his buster, Leviathan unloaded into them with the Hero Shots and the Charger before separating the Roller and slamming it into Buster Rod G, smashing his body in half.
"How are they capable of that kind of power?! No, it doesn't matter, we can still win this!" Mega Water S unloaded his water jets, "you're going down!"
Leviathan ducked under the jets with their swim form, zooming over towards him with astonishing speed. Mega Water S tried to backpedal, but Leviathan activated their 'Kraken' mode, becoming larger and launching them-self at Mega Water S, deflecting a harpoon with a spin and ripping right through him in one go with their bladed head, before changing back to normal.
"Lemme show you true power!" Hyper Storm W leaped into the air, but Leviathan jumped as the shockwave hit, dashing right towards him and firing a Charger shot. The shot hit home, slamming into his eye, causing the huge pig to scream as he covered his eye, "MY EYE! Why you little-wait, where did you-"
He couldn't finish his sentence, on account of Leviathan moving into his blind-spot, and cutting off his head with a pure ink-based Octo Saber.
Punk charged at them, launching Screw Crushers as he took on his spiky ball form, "those guys were small time! We'll show you how it's really done!"
Enker tried to rush in with him, "you fool! We need to do this together, otherwise-"
Leviathan forced him to stop and block using their Charger, and dashed around the screws, waiting for Punk to come to them. They dismissed their weapons, stopped Punk's ball form in its tracks with all six arms, and forced it open.
"Oh, not aga-oh no," Punk gasped, right before Leviathan's Ink Saber decapitated him as well, causing him to collapse entirely.
Enker rushed them, spear raised defensively. Leviathan opened fire with their Hero Shots, but he absorbed all of them, unleashing a powerful energy slash that Leviathan barely blocked with the Roller, knocking them back. "I have the ultimate counter to your abilities. Anything you can throw at me, I can merely absorb and send back at you!"
Leviathan begged to differ. Mega Man would've beaten him back in the day somehow. There had to be a logical point where Enker was vulnerable.
They opened fire again as they rushed him, causing Enker to absorb the shots, and he raised his spear again, bringing it down to slash, "didn't you listen?!"
"Oh, we listened, pal," Leviathan remarked, as they countered with the Octo Saber, side-stepping in the process - striking at the precise point where Enker was most likely to be outputting energy rather than absorbing it.
Enker's attack cut into their side, causing them to wince, but the saber cut him in half. The part of them that was Iris immediately thought, why do I keep doing that…?
As he fell to the floor, bisected, Enker gasped, "impossible…"
Leviathan started using ink to heal the wound, and turned to Ballade, who looked rather excited, taking on his masked second form. "Finally, your kind gives me a worthy foe!" He leaped into the air, unleashing a barrage of Ballade Cracker bombs. "Take this!"
Leviathan sighed, forming a large swirling ball of ink and spiritual energy in front of them, which sucked up the incoming bombs. "We're not in the mood for your fight-happy nonsense, Ballade."
That actually surprised Ballade, who was still in the air, "w-what…?!"
Leviathan brought the ball back to their side, charging it up, and launched it with both hands, knowing where Ballade would land, "BOOYA HADOKEN!"
Just as Ballade touched the floor, the 'Booya Hadoken' slammed into him, sending him right into a wall. His cry of pain was cut off as the resulting explosion scattered his parts.
Leviathan turned to Tartar, who had managed to re-attach his arm, and recover Sakugarne. He put his helmet back on as Leviathan rushed him, and raised his sword to block an incoming attack. Leviathan jumped into the air, and came down with a Splashdown punch.
It snapped Sakugarne in half, and sent Tartar flying.
They turned to X, who was still struggling to get back up, and rushed over to him, falling onto one knee, "X! Are you oka-"
X just hugged them, tears streaming down his face as he sobbed, "I'm sorry…" Over and over.
Despite the initial shock, they smiled softly, hugging him back. "It's okay, X. We're here for you."
"No, no, no… I CAN'T LOSE LIKE THIS!" Tartar howled in rage, as he stood up. It was frankly pitiful.
"As much as you want to deny it, Tartar, you've lost," spoke another voice from his mouth. "I'm done watching from the sidelines."
"Quint?! How?!"
"You took over my body, but you didn't properly erase my AI. You keep underestimating people, Tartar. Don't you know who I am? I'm done wallowing about in this wretched timeline. I'm going to fix everything."
"Wait, Quint, that's what I was-"
"No, you were going to make things worse. Farewell," Quint said, and Tartar said no more.
Leviathan stood up, "so what did you do to him?"
"Erased him from my head. I have no need for his mind or memories. It's a fitting end, frankly," Quint shrugged.
"So… I guess we're friends?" Leviathan blinked. No point keeping up the 'we' appearances anymore, if Tartar was gone.
"I guess you can say that, until this timeline is erased," Quint said. "As I said, I'm going to fix everything. Which means going back before humanity blew itself up and then prevent the apocalypse. Simple, really."
X's eyes widened, "is that even possible?!"
"With the advanced Time Skimmer? Yes, it is. I can create time portals, but also do this," Quint said, sending a wave of energy through the room.
Before Leviathan's eyes, all the damage that had been incurred in the room in the last hour repaired itself - the blender came back together like it had never been touched. Sakugarne was completely repaired, along with its owner. And both the Mega Man Killers and the Genesis Unit reassembled, completely whole.
Enker panted, looking himself over, and turning to Enker, "Quint, that weapon… How?! It failed during testing!"
"I fooled Dr. Wily into believing it didn't work, because I didn't want him to have that kind of power, but now that it's necessary, there's no point hiding the truth anymore," Quint sighed, picking up Sakugarne. "I was once Wily's slave, but I am no longer."
Suddenly, the rest of the Splatoon (along with Ciel and Off The Hook) swarmed in, all armed and ready. They were a bit confused by what was going on. Callie blinked, looking over Leviathan, "uh, X, what's going on? Who's this?!"
"Oh, hey guys," Leviathan grinned, "uh… It's us. Long story."
"OH MY COD YOU FUSED! LIKE IN THAT ONE SHOW!" Hinata squealed, hugging them.
"For eel?!" Marie gasped. She then cleared her throat, "um… It's good to see you're okay, agents."
Zero helped X up, "so… Wait, so is that Tartar, or Quint, now?"
"Tartar's dead, Quint took his body back, but now he's planning to go back in time and change things," X groaned.
"Wait, what?! Doesn't he know what a paradox is?!" Koji winced.
"I'm quite aware. And I believe that's something the Time Skimmer can overcome," Quint said, forming a swirling time portal, "don't worry. You won't even feel a thing once oblivion comes." He then disappeared into it.
"Oh, carp… I need to stop him!" Leviathan super-jumped into the portal.
❖
"Hey, wait!" Zero called out, but it was too late - Leviathan had entered the portal, which closed immediately after.
"They're strong enough to take on Quint," X said. Considering what he had seen earlier, there was little doubt about that.
"That's not the problem! Quint's the one with the Time Skimmer!" Zero said. "If they defeat Quint… How are they going to get back?"
X's eyes widened as he realised how correct Zero was. "Oh, crapbaskets."
"Marina, can you figure out the energy signature of that time portal?" Ciel asked, as she worked on repairing X. "We might be able to reverse engineer the Time Skimmer."
Ciel nodded, typing on her laptop, "on it!"
"So… Are we gonna fight those guys?" Karlene asked, gesturing to the other robots.
"I mean… We could, but… Is there even a point?" Mega Water S crossed his arms. "Wily and Tartar are both dead, Quint's taken off… We don't really have a master or a purpose."
Enker nodded, "he has a point."
"Yeah I think I'm done fightin' today," Hyper Storm S grunted.
"I have a lot to think about after what just happened," Ballade crossed his arms.
Marie took X's hand. "I suppose all we can do now is hope they come back… Or hope Marina and Ciel can recreate the Time Skimmer."
X nodded. Come on, guys… We're counting on you.
❖
The time tunnel Leviathan found themselves in was rather psychedelic, but the fact that there was only one way forward meant they just tried to go as fast as they could. They saw Quint up ahead, flying down the tunnel. "Found you!"
"What the… YOU?!" Quint turned around, but before he could act, Leviathan tackled him, sending them right through the tunnel wall.
❖
Arowana Castle was burning.
Captain Craig Cuttlefish of the Squidbeak Splatoon gripped his Bamboozler tight as he stood across from his former friend now turned enemy, Prince Octavio, who wielded an Octobrush. "Tavi, we don't have to do this!"
"Yes, we do! You know this! After taking out my comrades, you think this fight is avoidable, Craig?!" Octavio snapped, with a look of hatred that caused Craig to feel terrible regret. Could this battle have been avoided?
The atmosphere was immediately broken up by a strange portal appearing, from which two figures tumbled out - a strange person in green armour, and a huge… Inkling? Octoling? With six arms?!
Both Craig and Octavio were more than a little flabbergasted as the pair got up. The taller person blinked, "Cap'n Cuttlefish? Octavio?"
"Do… Do I know you?" Craig asked, now even more confused than ever.
"Damn it… 12,000 years is too far in the past to jump in one go with a pursuer… I'll have to jump across timelines while doing it!" The person in the green armour said, as he formed another portal, jumping through it.
"HEY! GET BACK HERE!" The larger person yelled as they dived through as well.
Craig and Octavio just watched as the portal closed, and then looked at each other. Craig laughed sheepishly, "any idea what that was about, Tavi…?"
"I ain't got a freaking clue, man," Octavio groaned. "We gonna fight already, or what…?"
Craig steeled himself once more. "Alright, if you insist…"
It was an event in history that Craig would forget about for about a century…
❖
Mega Man Volnutt just gawked awkwardly as Tron Bonne ranted in the ruins of her newly-destroyed Gustaff, about how Bon was up to the surface with the key.
Small problem was, she was nearly naked, her modesty barely protected by ruined patches of clothing. Tron just blinked. "Wait, why is your face red? Why is everyone looking at me that way?!"
That's when two figures emerged from some kind of portal - the green armoured figure coming out first, while the other larger person who had features of a squid or octopus (or both?!) was chasing after him. The figure took one look at Tron, winced, said something in some language Volnutt didn't understand, and formed some kind of water gun that splattered Tron in ink before they continued their pursuit into another portal, which closed behind them.
"WHAT THE HECK?! That was RUDE!" Tron screamed.
"Actually, Miss Tron, I think they did you a favour," one of her Servbots said. "Because, uh…"
"Your clothes are, um, gone," said the other one.
Tron looked down, and the moment she confirmed that visually, she screamed, scrambling away. "YOU DUMMIES! WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME BEFORE?! RETREAT!"
Volnutt just laughed sheepishly as Tron and the Servbots fled the scene. Still. What was that all about…?
"Mega Man Volnutt. I need your assistance."
Volnutt blinked, turning around, "what the…?"
❖
Somewhere in the Deep Log, RiCO hummed to herself happily as she typed away at the holographic interface. Player had gone to bed for the night, and all the day's Maverick Data had been dealt with. Very much all in a good day's work.
"Yo, RiCO, anything happening tonight?" ViA asked as he came over.
"Nope! Everything's clear, no sign of Maverick Data," RiCO grinned proudly, "tonight is going to be smooth sailing?"
"Oi, don't jinx it…"
"I have this feeling something's about to happen, actually," iCO spoke, sitting at her chair not far off, sipping her tea. "I'm detecting unusual readings. Nothing typical, either."
RiCO blinked, checking as well. "Oh, yeah, you're right, that is rather o-"
Suddenly a portal opened, and two figures barrelled through. One was Quint of all people, who opened up another portal, and shot through. The other was…
Wait. NO WAY.
Before RiCO could fully process this, they went through the other portal in pursuit. RiCO's jaw dropped. "Wha… Was that some kind of Inkling/Octoling fusion from Splatoon?! Why is that data in the Deep Log, that's not even a Capcom game!"
"I don't think that was part of the Deep Log, RiCO… I think that was actual time travel nonsense," ViA groaned, rubbing his temples.
"It appears they are jumping across timelines, yes," iCO mused.
"Ugh, now my head hurts…" RiCO groaned, "should we really wake up Player over this…?!"
Another portal opened, and someone came through. RiCO blinked, recognising him. "Wait, aren't you the protagonist of that one crappy-"
"Have some tact, RiCO," ViA snapped. "But yes… What are you doing here?"
❖
Zero clashed blades with Omega repeatedly as the flames of the wreckage of Omega's larger body burned around them. With the two of them nearly evenly matched, Zero was finding himself fighting one of the hardest battles he had ever fought.
What caused them to separate, however, was some kind of portal opening up, and two people came out. A robot in green armour zoomed over Omega on some kind of pogo stick. He spoke in an unknown language. "<Have fun with that, Leviathan! Enjoy being trapped in another timeline while you fight a god of destruction!>"
Zero would normally not have been able to understand the language. But Ciel had received some kind of unusual translation program days ago from an unknown benefactor. She hadn't been sure what it was supposed to be for, but it wasn't malicious. Had the person who sent it known this would happen?
The other person, some kind of tall multi-armed cephalopod person, attempted to give chase, but they were cut off by Omega, who seemed eager to fight an exotic new opponent, blocking his saber with their own ink-based blade. "<Ugh, Quint! Stop!>"
"<Who are you?>" Zero asked, using the chance to slash at Omega, who jumped back. "<Why are you pursuing that robot?>"
"<He's trying to change my timeline and erase countless lives from history!>" Leviathan replied. "<I need to get to that other portal before it closes!>"
"<Then we'll have to damage Omega enough so he can't follow you,>" Zero said, taking on a battle stance, "<get ready!>"
Leviathan nodded, and charged Omega, clashing blades with him, but surprising him by unloading with two ink-based pistols with two of their other arms. Zero used this chance to dash around to the other side of Omega, slashing at his back. Omega attempted to create an energy shockwave to make them back off, but it was predictable enough for the pair to avoid, and started attacking him relentlessly.
Two people might've been enough for Omega to fight defensively against, but when one of them had six arms and had their hands full with multiple weapons, that was simply another matter entirely. Omega was simply overwhelmed, and while Leviathan was flesh and blood and not an advanced combat robot, they still kept up. When the Dark Elf attempted to move in to heal Omega, Leviathan took notice, and knocked it away with a powerful inky explosive ball.
"This can't be possible… I am the messiah…!" Omega groaned as he was brought to his knees.
Zero cleaved his head from his shoulders with one powerful charged strike. "You are no saviour."
"What?! This is impossible!" Shrieked Dr. Weil furiously. "Omega, defeated by a fake and this… Creature?!"
"<Go,>" Zero nodded to Leviathan. He turned towards the portal that the green robot had disappeared into. Had it closed already…?
However, to his surprise, someone was keeping it open. X in Cyber-Elf form, straining himself. "Hurry! I can't keep it open much longer!"
"<Thank you!>" Leviathan said, as they launched them-self into the portal, and X closed it behind them.
"I just hope we made the right decision in helping them…" Zero frowned.
❖
Geo Stelar winced as he barely evaded the beam fired by one of ClockMan.EXE's warp holes. Even with MegaMan.EXE fighting alongside him, ClockMan was basically cheating non-stop by briefly summoning various adversaries from across time to attack them. But with Harp Note and Roll.EXE frozen in time as part of his 'collection', they had to beat him.
"BWAHAHAHAHAHA! I have complete mastery over time! You cannot possibly beat me!" ClockMan cackled.
MegaMan blinked, "if you have complete mastery over time, why are your two captives moving?"
"What?!" ClockMan turned around. Geo could see it too - both Harp Note and Roll were suddenly moving again. "Is someone interfering with my time control?!"
That's when he was suddenly slammed to the floor by a green NetNavi with… A jackhammer pogo stick? As he launched off him, the Navi said, "get bent, you Time Man knockoff."
"KNOCKOFF?!" ClockMan yelled indignantly, only to get stepped on by another person, this time someone who didn't really look like a NetNavi, but looked like some kind of… Cephalopod person? They seemed to apologise in some weird language as they gave chase, following the Navi through a time portal.
ClockMan groaned as he started getting back up, "oh, that is IT! When I'm done here, I'm chasing you two down and making you pay for-"
Unfortunately for him, Geo and MegaMan had seen their opportunity, and both of them simultaneously slashed him with their strongest swords. "No… This wasn't in my schedule…!" He then was completely deleted.
"Awesome! We won! I have no idea what that was about, but it helped us win, so I'm not gonna complain!" Lan Hikari whooped via his PET.
Geo's immediate concern was Sonia, though, rushing to her side. "Sonia!"
"Aw, Geo, you came to save me!" Sonia giggled. "Thank you. I'm so sorry for causing you so much trouble."
"Roll, are you okay?!" MegaMan said, rushing to check on her.
"Mega? What happened to me?" Roll blinked still reeling from being frozen. "Also, who just ran past?"
"Don't really matter, they're gone and ClockMan's outta the picture," Omega-Xis grunted from Geo's arm cannon head.
"Actually, on the contrary," spoke someone else who emerged from another portal, attracting the attention of all four of them, "your troubles with time-related ne'er-do-wells aren't quite over with yet. I need your help."
Geo blinked. "What the…"
"Hoo, boy, looks like we're in for more trouble," Omega-Xis groaned.
❖
Leviathan landed on snow. They blinked, taking a quick look around. They were in some kind of massive dome, almost akin to the Octarian underground spheres, but… No, nevermind that, where did Quint go?
"HEY! He went thataway!"
Leviathan turned to see an Inkling and an Octoling - oddly enough, both had fuzz on their hair. The Inkling was female, had a pair of locks and a ponytail, and had a Small Fry on her shoulder. The Octoling male had a 'softcurl' hairstyle with his other tentacles being spiky. Both had green eyes and were wearing what Leviathan thought might be Hero Suits, but significantly more advanced. "Who are-"
"Don't ask questions, just go!" Said the Octoling, pointing in the direction of the next portal.
Leviathan nodded, super-jumping into it. They couldn't help but wonder if they had just stumbled into their own future…
❖
Leviathan thought they had finally caught up to Quint when they slammed into a massive wall of ice.
"Too bad, so sad," Quint gloated, as he stepped back towards the other portal, "I've finally figured out a way to get rid of you. You should've stayed back in your time period, being erased would've been painless. Enjoy burning up in orbit."
Leviathan tried to smash through, but by the time they did, Quint had disappeared into the portal, which closed before they could reach it.
Then they realised how thin the air was up here. In fact, it was really difficult to breathe. They looked around, realising they were standing on some kind of space station in orbit… And dropping rapidly.
"You again?!"
Leviathan turned towards the voice who addressed them - it was the slimmer Zero again, currently in pitched battle with some kind of strange robotic construct, with the head of a decrepit old man inside. "Zero?"
"How do you know my-nevermind, that's not important," Zero said in Inkling language again, oddly enough. "We need to take Dr. Weil out within… 100 seconds, I'd wager. He's forcing this station on a collision course with the planet - if we don't stop him, countless people will die. Can you help me?"
The old man yelled something in a language they didn't understand. He looked… Very angry.
Leviathan sighed, and formed their weapons. "Alright. Let's do this!"
❖
Marina nodded, as she finished typing, "okay, it's done! Time Skimmer weapon data replicated! X, you ready?"
"Yeah. Problem is, I have no idea where to go," X frowned, installing the weapon data into his system. "Quint would know, but I don't…"
Then Marina blinked. She showed him the screen. "Someone apparently does…"
The message on-screen read thus: Download the temporal coordinates and use them to find your friends. Once you do, use Time Stopper immediately. Don't worry about Quint. I will make sure he doesn't get to his intended destination. - An Ally
X downloaded the temporal coordinates, made a note of the current 'home' time point, and formed a time portal, dashing in.
Once he emerged on the other side, he saw what was going on, and immediately used Time Stopper. "Leviathan!"
Leviathan turned around, "X?!"
The advice turned out to have been quite pertinent, because right now, they were on an exploding space station, with Leviathan and… Zero? He looked kinda like Zero, but… No, that was for later. X waved, "we have to go, now!"
"What the… X? No matter. Any light in a storm, I suppose…" 'Zero' mused, as both he and Leviathan dashed through the time portal with X, right before the time stop ceased.
They returned to the large room. Leviathan groaned, "he managed to lose me. We're screwed…"
"The person who send us the temporal coordinates said they'll deal with Quint," X said. "Other than that, as long as we still exist, we know Quint hasn't succeeded…"
"I was wondering what was happening," 'Zero' frowned, "you're jumping across time…"
"Actually, based on what Quint was trying to do to lose me? We were jumping across timelines as well," Leviathan sighed.
Suddenly, they were hugged by their fellow junior agents en-masse, who were simply glad to see them alive and well.
Koji chuckled, "you really gotta tell us how you did this! So, uh… You guys gonna split, or…?"
Leviathan laughed sheepishly, rubbing the back of their neck, "actually, I have no idea how."
"Oh boy, that's gonna be a problem," Karlene sighed. "Still… 'Leviathan', huh? I guess that works as a name."
The Other Zero noticed Ciel. "Now I know this isn't my timeline… Are you Ciel?"
Ciel blinked, "uh, yes! You know me?"
"Yes, but in my timeline, you're human."
"Oh. Uh… I see," Ciel said, looking very surprised.
"Kinda like the sleeker look, but not a fan of the underpants," Zero remarked.
Pearl looked at them both, and laughed, "dude, have you looked in a mirror lately?! Also, you're one to talk, 'booblights'…"
"They're capacitors! And-" Zero was about to object, but then he looked down. "Well that's egg on my face, then…"
"YOU NEVER NOTICED?!"
Other Zero just glared at them with annoyance. "You cannot be serious. Was I seriously this fashion-obsessed back in my Maverick Hunter days?"
Zero just blinked. "My what now?"
"Definitely another timeline," Other Zero grumbled.
"So… Now there's two Zeroes. So weird," Punk said.
"No kidding," Buster Rod G agreed.
Marie came over, taking X's hand. "I have a feeling this isn't over yet. We should get ready."
X nodded. He could only hope this mystery person would come through for them…
❖
Finally. Quint had gotten away from his irritating pursuer. "Good… Now it's time to fix the timeline-"
"I don't think so."
Quint suddenly collided with a barrier. He groaned, moving back a bit, and saw someone on the other side - a figure who looked a bit like X, but his armour was dark blue, white and black, with two red lines along the front and what looked like white fur around his shoulders. Quint snarled. "Who are you, and why are you getting in my way?!"
"My name is OVER-1. I am a guardian of the time-stream, and what you're planning to do is completely wreck it," the robot replied. "My time travel abilities are much improved over yours, you can't outrun me."
Quint suddenly felt a pull on him. His whole body was glowing. "What did you do to me?"
"That barrier has a second purpose - sending you back to your original timeline and time period," OVER-1 said, arms crossed. "Just give up, Quint. What you're trying to do is only going to do more harm than good. You know what happens in other timelines, you honestly think your 'intended' timeline is any better?"
Before Quint could get a word in, he felt himself being pulled back along the time tunnel. He groaned, launching himself through the wall of the tunnel.
He crashed into an inhospitable desert. When and where didn't matter - he still felt the pull of whatever OVER-1 did to him. And he had no way of counteracting it, all he could do is delay it.
Using the Time Skimmer, he started looking over dozens of visions of different timelines, trying to find a solution. He needed a way out of this.
Then it struck him. OVER-1 was right. What would changing his timeline really accomplish? There would be countless more with similar events, and countless others with far worse.
He laughed at the absurdity of how small his thinking was. He needed to go further. He had to fix every timeline if there was ever going to be hope of everlasting peace anywhere. After all, he had this power. He just needed a way to gain enough power to-
-and then he saw a few things that he realised would solve his dilemma perfectly. Firstly, an alien superweapon with a large, black key as its control unit. And secondly, a version of Sigma who had been manipulating the timestream as well, but for once, wasn't ambitious enough.
Quint grinned as a plan formed in his head.
A/N: I promise I'll try and avoid going this crazy again once this arc is over. The climax didn't quite pan out as well as I envisioned, in my opinion, but I couldn't really think of a better way to handle it without turning into a straight-up anti-climax. Again, I hope you guys stick with it, the arc's almost done.
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Something tells me Quint is not quite done yet.
And OVER-1 was the one who stopped his current attempt. I don't know much about him, but I do know his game was hated to the point Capcom axed the overseas release.
And finally, OTL Zero was brought to Splatoon timeline. Why do I think this is not gonna end well?
Aside from that we've seen 1) Leviathan censoring Volnutt's vision of naked Tron (seriously, I think Volnutt is a pervert deep down), 2) Leviathan helping OTL Zero beat Omega, 3) The X DiVe crew being confused, 4) Yet another timeline and instance of time travel, this time canonical (i think that was from Operation Shooting Star?)
And OVER-1 was the one who stopped his current attempt. I don't know much about him, but I do know his game was hated to the point Capcom axed the overseas release.
And finally, OTL Zero was brought to Splatoon timeline. Why do I think this is not gonna end well?
Aside from that we've seen 1) Leviathan censoring Volnutt's vision of naked Tron (seriously, I think Volnutt is a pervert deep down), 2) Leviathan helping OTL Zero beat Omega, 3) The X DiVe crew being confused, 4) Yet another timeline and instance of time travel, this time canonical (i think that was from Operation Shooting Star?)
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
Fair cop, that's been fixed. Silly me.
X Over is a pretty bad game, frankly. the game mechanics are overly simplistic, and the visuals are really rough. Which is a shame because the designs for OVER-1, his various forms and the other original characters created for the game are really cool. Here I decided to give OVER-1 a more functional backstory and purpose.
And yes, that was indeed Operation Shooting Star. It was a game that ended up being a swan song for both Battle Network and Star Force but never got its due outside of Japan, but using it was a fantastic way to kill two birds with one stone.
Chapter 19: Hostile Takeover (IX)
- Location
- Sydney, Australia
A/N: Once again, I'm not sure if I'm happy with how this climax turned out. It got busy with a lot of characters and man it feels like a messy comic book crisis crossover event, which is appropriate, considering it hijacks another one. But this'll be the end of it, at least, back to relative normality with the epilogue.
Maybe at some point I'll redo this whole climax and drop the whole time travel aspect entirely, but until then this is the best I could do with what I accidentally wrote myself into. I hope you guys have some fun with this dumb climax.
As everyone settled in for a tense wait, Koji couldn't help but stare at Leviathan. That appearance being, uh, wow, aside, he still couldn't believe that six of his friends were all merged into one being like that. His biggest concern was that they might not be able to be split, but there were also psychological factors at play - how would mind melding affect all six of them if they manage to split?
"Stop staring at me, Koji, it's creepy," Leviathan chuckled, snapping him out of his thoughts. "What's up?"
Koji sighed, "sorry, just worried about you. Even if you do manage to find a way to split up, who knows what psychological changes this might cause? It's not like Inklings and Octolings were designed to fuse."
"To be fair, we figured this out because we stopped each other from mind-melding in the first place while blended," Leviathan replied. Upon seeing Koji's horrified expression, they laughed sheepishly, "oh, right, I didn't mention that part, did I?"
"You were WHAT?!" Callie freaked out, dashing over to them, "are you guys seriously okay?! That must've been all kinds of traumatic!"
Koji nodded vigorously in agreement. He was far from the only person here not alarmed by this. "Seriously!"
"Everyone settle down and give them space," Marie said, coming over, no less concerned but still mostly keeping her composure, "but you don't need to keep everything close to your chest if you don't want to."
Leviathan sighed, sitting down, "what happened was pretty scary, not gonna lie. I don't think any of us are gonna forget it. But we can't just mope about it for long."
"I think all things considered, we need to seriously do something about better equipping the Agents," Ciel said. "Between possible unknown threats and potentially the Octarians coming for them for revenge…"
Marie nodded. "Gramps is talking to some government bigwigs about actually funding the New Squidbeak Splatoon. Considering we saved the Great Zapfish twice and then saved all of Inkopolis from both Tartar's cannon and Gamma, guess they've recognised we're worth investing in. This incident probably will spur them to fund some concealed equipment for us."
"Yes, that's what I'm thinking - advanced gear and weapons based on the technology we've gotten from Light and Wily that can be concealed when the agents aren't using them," Ciel nodded back. "So they won't be caught out like that ever again."
"If these young people are inherently putting their lives are risk, it's only right that we provide them the best protection," Dr. Light agreed. They had finally managed to get one of his capsules down here.
Koji really couldn't disagree with any of that. After today's harrowing events that had come out of basically nowhere? He wasn't sure he'd be able to handle walking around without a Hero Suit and a weapon from now on. It was hard not to feel paranoid after something like that.
Suddenly, another time portal opened. Emerging from it was another robot, who had a vague resemblance to X, but the fur lining along his shoulders alone made him distinct. "Hello, everyone. I am OVER-1. I've successfully stopped Quint from reaching his destination, but we need to get ready for when he returns."
"So you're our new ally, then," X nodded. "Are you… A Light robot?"
"I was designed partly by an alternate Dr. Light, yes, in collaboration with Dr. Cossack - my purpose, along with that of my siblings, is to act as a time guardian, to prevent havoc across the timestream like what Quint was attempting to do. Our group is known as the 'Chronos Corps'," OVER-1 nodded. "Fortunately, I've brought backup."
More time portals opened, and several more people emerged. Koji blinked. Three of them looked like variations of Mega Man in some form, accompanied by what he thought might be two female humans with pink outfits. The other three were more distinct, including two female robots and another Zero, but this time with blue armour and he didn't seem to have a mouth.
"Allow me to introduce these first five, don't worry about the language barrier, I've sorted that out - the first three are alternate timeline Mega Men, specifically MegaMan.EXE (given physical form with my assistance) and his operator Lan Hikari, Geo and Omega-Xis, and Mega Man Volnutt. With them are Roll.EXE and her operator Mayl Sakurai, and Harp Note," said OVER-1, gesturing to each one in turn.
"This is so surreal, but if we're saving the time stream, best not think about it too much," said Geo.
"No kidding! Hey everyone, sorry we can't socialise right now, but OVER-1 says we don't have much time," said Lan, who could be seen via some kind of holo-screen over MegaMan.EXE's shoulder.
"As for the other three, these are RiCO, ViA and iCO, administrators of the 'Deep Log' in another timeline."
"I don't know what the heck is going on but I am totally here for it! Hi everyone!" RiCO giggled, with a wave.
"Is this some kind of weird fanfic universe…?" ViA wondered out load… And then he spotted the idols. "Holy crap it's the Squid Sisters and Off The Hook, I'm in heaven."
Groaning, iCO just rolled her eyes. "Good grief… Maybe I shouldn't have agreed to this…"
Koji raised a hand, having noticed something wasn't right about all of this. "Isn't this a bit overkill? Sure, Quint's dangerous, but we don't need this many people!"
"I wish I could agree with you," OVER-1 sighed. "But Quint has gotten desperate, and he's going to do something crazy…"
Sonic the Hedgehog dropped down behind cover as the roar of battle sounded close by. Everyone was putting in their best efforts, but Sigma's new power was just too much.
"We have to do something, or we're all toast," Mega Man frowned as he crouched down next to him. The Sky Patrol had gathered around them as well.
"Well, there's one last trump card we haven't used yet," Sonic grinned, as Tails handed him a black case, which he opened up - six gleaming Chaos Emeralds, ready and waiting. "If only we had the last one-"
"Uh, Sonic? Something's happening!" Sally called out, looking over the rocks.
They all peeked over, as Sigma stood on top of X, fighting off all comers in his new form. "BWAHAHAHAHA! Pathetic! Your limited potential is nothing compared to the new power I have claimed! And I will only grow stronger from here!"
In his arrogance, he hadn't noticed that someone was sneaking up behind him, concealed by some kind of cloaking field. As they got into melee range, that person uncloaked - he looked like Mega Man, but with green armour, and wielded a greatsword that was glowing with yellow energy.
Sigma's cackling ceased when the sword was rammed right through his chest, bursting out the other side. "W-What?! How is this…?!"
"Now I've got your power, Sigma," the green robot smirked. "Thank you for gathering so much of it and then squandering it by letting someone backstab you with a Mirror Buster."
Sigma looked over his shoulder, and his eyes widened. "Y-You?! You shouldn't be-"
The green robot cut him down, splitting him in half. "My designs for this power are much better than what you had in mind for it, I assure you. Farewell, Sigma."
"Is… Is he a friend, or a foe?" Knuckles asked warily. "He just took out Sigma, but he doesn't look friendly…"
"He looks like you, Megs. Any relation?" Sonic asked.
Mega Man shook his head. "No, I've never seen him before. I'm getting this weird sense of deja-vu, but otherwise…"
The green robot turned around, and formed some kind of portal. "Farewell, everyone. Don't worry, when I'm done none of you will remember any of this, because, well, you won't exist."
That immediately triggered alarm bells in Sonic's mind, and he leaped over the rocks he was hiding behind, racing towards the strange robot, "HEY! What's that supposed to mean, you-" He ducked a sword swing narrowly, "WHOA GEEZ!" But then the robot kicked him away.
"I have no incentive to explain to any of you," the robot said, going through the portal before it disappeared.
The world around them began to rumble, as if Sigma's power being removed was causing everything to crumble. Panic was beginning to set in as Sonic got back on his feet. What now?
"Everyone, don't panic!" Someone emerged from another portal, driving some kind of large device into the ground. The device sent out a harmless wave of energy, which seemed to stabilise the world around them. The robot was female, and vaguely looked like X, but Sonic felt like she had her costume done by a fashion designer or something.
X groaned, getting up, "who…?"
The female robot by the device spoke, "my name is OVER-2. I can explain what's going on in a bit, but right now… Sonic the Hedgehog, Mega Man, your assistance is required. And we'll need the Chaos Emeralds as well."
Sonic scratched his head, "looks like this is gonna get even messier…"
"Our final set of guests should be arriving in a moment," Over-1 said, as another portal opened.
Leviathan blinked as eight more people came through. Two of them were X and Zero, but they looked a bit more… Advanced. There was a third robot with spiky hair and twin pistols who looked oddly familiar. And then there was the original Mega Man (accompanied by Rush), and a red robot with a shield, and… Three animal people.
"Allow me to introduce… X, Zero, Axl, Mega Man (and Rush), Proto Man, Sonic the Hedgehog, Miles 'Tails' Prower, and Knuckles the Echidna," OVER-1 said. "And they've brought something that will help us a lot with the imminent battle."
"Yo. Still confused about what's going on, but we know there's a bad guy to beat up, so I'm not gonna sweat it," Sonic chuckled.
"That's the gist of it, pretty much," Proto Man nodded.
"Wait, did you bring them straight out of Worlds Unite?!" RiCO asked, looking baffled. "What did Quint DO?!"
"Oh, so that's that punk's name? He backstabbed Sigma, stole his power and left us to deal with the universe crumbling. So, you know, that's fun," Knuckles said dryly, pounding his fists together.
"He did WHAT?!"
"This is way too confusing," Tails sighed, seeing all the strange people gathered around. Parts of Leviathan could definitely sympathise. "We don't have time to banter!"
Leviathan noticed the two versions of X staring at each other in surprise, with his X also staring at Mega Man, along with the three Zeroes also looking at each other. He came over to Axl, "hey, so he said your name was Axl?"
"Yeah, what about it?" Axl chuckled, extending a hand, "nice to meet you, I guess… Geez, you're huge, what's your deal?"
"Uh, well-"
Suddenly, before they could continue talking, Quint emerged from a time portal. He was absolutely radiating with power. "Ah, I see you gathered the cavalry to face me."
"Quint, stop this! You're going to completely wreck the timeline!" Mega Man called out.
"The timeline is already broken!" Quint snapped. "And I'm the only one who realises that! With the power I've gathered, I'll fix everything, so nobody will have to suffer tragedy ever again!"
"Yep, he's gone off the reservation," Buster Rod G said.
"You've completely lost your mind, Quint," Ballade said. "Looks like we're working with the 'heroes' for once on this one… We can't let you do this."
"'Can't', huh? As if you can stop me now! Because I've acquired something that'll allow me to attain true godhood…"
He snapped his fingers. A larger portal formed, and a huge robotic monster emerged, red and blue with two sets of teeth.
Geo's eyes widened, "Andromeda?!"
Omega-Xis scoffed, "hah! Nice try, but Andromeda ain't gonna work for you unless you have-" Then Quint pulled out a large black key. "-sunnova… Where did you get that?!"
"Does it matter?" Quint smirked, as the monster transformed into a more humanoid form, its outer set of teeth becoming fingers, and a green glassy sphere swirling with energy between its torso and the spike where its legs should've been. "Combined with the power I just acquired from Sigma… Andromeda is the perfect vessel for my ascension to become a god of time!"
Everyone immediately opened fire. But Quint leaped back into the green sphere, disappearing into it as Andromeda fully came to life, radiating with power, and exuding an roar as the world around them transformed, and Andromeda changed into Quint's colours. The walls and ceiling of the room seemed to disappear as the world turned into a psychedelic expanse. "I will erase every single one of you, for I am the lord of time itself!"
"Please tell us you've got a plan to fight that thing!" Koji winced.
Leviathan turned to OVER-1, who was holding some kind of device with seven differently-coloured gemstones added to it. He switched it on, and a wave of golden energy washed over them. "As it happens? Yes, I do."
Leviathan gasped as they felt a surge of power rising through them, turning their body gold. It was happening to everyone else as well, empowering them greatly.
Sonic grinned, floating in the air, "looks like Metal giving us that last Chaos Emerald really helped! Alright, everyone, let's trash this big poser!"
Mega Man suddenly fused with Rush, taking flight with rocket boosters.
As everyone else rushed into battle, they and X (their X, of course) were held back by RiCO and iCO. The former noted, "hold on, we've got something special for the both of you! I didn't think this would work in real space, but thanks to OVER-1's help…"
She typed something into her holographic screen, and X's armour suddenly transformed, gaining something more of a fancier, 'cyberspace' look, with X-shaped beam wings behind him. X blinked, looking at his hands, "what the…"
Doing much the same, iCO did something that also transformed Leviathan's outfit, causing them to gain a full set of armour as well. She noted, "I decided to be nice and give you the 'Hero' armour set. Enjoy."
"DiVE Armour activation successful! We did a good job, right! Go on, praise us!" RiCO grinned.
"Sister, don't make this weird," iCO sighed.
RiCO pouted, "party-pooper… Okay, just go beat him up already, you two!"
X turned to Leviathan, smiling, "this time… We'll be fighting together."
Leviathan grinned back, "you got it. Let's show Quint not to mess with us!"
As Andromeda rained meteors upon the battlefield, Leviathan and X flew right past their comrades unloading everything they had into Andromeda. And indeed the mechanical monstrosity was taking damage as they joined the fray, spraying it with energy and ink, but it seemed to be rapidly regenerating at the same time.
"Oh, great, don't you just hate it when the bad guys can just regenerate?" Sonic groaned, as he and Mega Man flew back over to Leviathan and X. "This guy's gotta have some kind of weakness!"
"It seems rather protective of that glassy sphere Quint jumped into," Mega Man noted, pointing out that the hands were blocking attacks aimed at it.
Leviathan formed an E-Liter, and aimed carefully… And the instant the sphere was in their line of sight, they fired.
The ink broke the sphere, but it almost instantly reformed. "Dangit! That's not gonna work either!"
"No, I think we might have a way," X said. "If we can just tackle Quint out of that thing…"
"Let's try the Super Sonic Shot, then!" Mega Man said.
"Charge-&-Roll, then, X?" Leviathan mused. "Problem is, if the arms block us-"
Volnutt called out, as he and Knuckles grabbed one of the arms, "that we can handle! Everyone, hold down the arms!"
"Bleh… Never thought I'd be workin' with the 'good guys', but here I am…" Hyper Storm S groaned as he grabbed the other arm.
As all of their allies began restraining Andromeda's arms, Leviathan changed to swim form and latched onto X's buster, while Sonic formed a ball in front of Mega Man's.
"Double… Buster… LAUNCH!"
Both Leviathan and Sonic were launched, smashing through the sphere…
X watched as the pair disappeared into the sphere, which reformed instantly. "Guess they're going to fight Quint, then…"
However, Andromeda threw off the people holding back its arms, making an inhuman roar.
"Looks like Andromeda is still moving," Knuckles remarked, "good, I was gonna get bored if we were just gonna wait for those two to beat up Quint!"
"Andromeda is a planet-eating superweapon, it's not going down so easily," Geo warned, as he fired some kind of large cannon that he formed on his buster. "We gotta keep up the attack or we're done for!"
"A planet-eater turned time-eater, huh?" Liam smirked, dodging around Andromeda's laser beams, "no biggie, just our most dangerous enemy yet…"
Tails noted as he jumped over an arm swing, "the Chaos Emeralds provide invulnerability, but it won't last forever! Try not to get hit!"
"Easier said than done, considering all the stuff it's throwing at us, but looks like all of us are pretty good at it by now!" Volnutt remarked, as he strafed around with full-auto buster fire.
"Kinda way more tense when all of reality is at stake, though!" Mayl pointed out, as Roll.EXE gracefully dodged and struck her with her 'antennae'.
"I can try and slow it down!" said Harp Note, deploying a pair of speakers that unleashed strong paraylzing sound waves as she played her guitar, which didn't seem to affect her allies at all. Her performance wasn't simply random notes, but a proper guitar solo.
"Dang, girl, you know how to ROCK!" Pearl grinned.
"That makes it a bit easier! Don't let up for even a second!" MegaMan.EXE declared as he slashed at the superweapon with an energy sword, dodging some meteors, "whoa!"
Proto Man stepped up in front of him, blocking a few meteors with his shield, "if anyone needs to take cover, I've got that sorted."
Lan chuckled, "thanks for the save. Man, you're way nicer than our ProtoMan… Or Chaud, for that matter."
"Now's not the time for talking badly about other people, Lan!" MegaMan.EXE snapped.
"You know, we've seen a lot of crazy events, but this totally takes the cake!" RiCO giggled.
ViA called out, "oi, stop with the meta-commentary and focus!"
iCO sighed, "I just want to be over and done with this already."
Everyone was pressing the offensive. All three Zeroes (and ViA) were working in tandem. Axl was being a showoff. The Agents were coordinating under Callie and Marie's direction. Tails and Knuckles were doing combo attacks. RiCO, iCO and OVER-1 were acting as support.
X suddenly found himself standing by Mega Man and Other X again, as he charged his buster. "All we can do now is hope those two can drag Quint out of there. Until then, we have to keep up the pressure!"
"Then I have to go all out, too!" Other X declared, as he formed some kind of black, gold, purple and blue armour on his body, charging up with his new buster. "What Quint is doing is completely wrong!"
"We have to stop him and show him this isn't the right way!" Mega Man agreed, charging up his own buster.
As all three unleashed their busters on Andromeda, X hoping Leviathan and Sonic were doing okay…
Leviathan and Sonic crashed into a green void, landing on a translucent blue surface that stretched out to infinity.
As they got back up, Leviathan noticed they were no longer 'super'. Same with Sonic, who groaned, "oh, great, we're cut off from the energy of the Chaos Emeralds…"
"Correct. Very clever, trying to get to me directly, but now you have to face me with my new power," Quint said, standing before them in more regal-looking armour, complete with a cape. "And if I recall, Sonic couldn't stand against Sigma when he was using this power…"
"Small problem with that logic," Leviathan interjected, "you're still using a lot of that power to keep Andromeda from being obliterated, aren't you? Our friends are still fighting out there."
That seemed to ignite a metaphorical light bulb in Sonic's head, as he grinned, "oh, yeah, that's right! So we've got a fighting chance against you!"
"All of you have gone mad," Quint said. "I'm trying to fix everything, and you're just standing in my way?!"
"Dude. What you're trying to do ain't 'fixing' anything," Sonic sighed. "Take it from me, your fixation on the past ain't healthy."
Leviathan formed a Charger, Hero Shots and a Roller, "that's right. No matter what, we won't let you erase countless lives from the time stream!"
Quint frowned, forming his greatsword, "was I really this naive, once…? Fine, then. I'll show you how hopeless your efforts really are!"
The pair charged him, as multiple energy copies of Quint on Sakugarne's pogo form were summoned, attempting to crash down on them. But the fair dodged and weaved, smashing through the copies with their weapons and quills respectively.
When they reached Quint, the resulting melee was chaotic and frenzied. Quint had formed a copy to watch his back, and as the two heroes dodged and jumped around him, giving everything their had, he fought back ferociously, blocking and slashing with the sword and firing back with his buster.
The pair backed off briefly to recover. Sonic panted, "he's putting in effort to block our attacks, so that's a good sign…"
"We need to smash through his defences, though… But I've got an idea," Leviathan grinned. "Charge-&-Roll again?"
"I like the way you think," Sonic grinned, as he spun in the air, somehow hovering as he spun as fast as he could, while Leviathan held the Charger right behind him, and charged up multiple times over in terms of pressure.
BANG. Sonic briefly broke the sound barrier as he rocketed towards Quint.
"Not good enough!" Quint batted him back with his sword.
Leviathan responded by forming Rollers with all three rows of arms, and returned the volley.
The blue pinball went back and forth, speeding up, until Quint finally flubbed a swing, causing Sonic to crash right into him, causing Quint to lose his grip on Sakugarne. "NO!"
"Sonic… Booya…" Leviathan brought all six of their hands forward, as Sonic bounced back towards them, and once the blue hedgehog was in position, launched him in an intense surge of ink and energy, "HADOKEN!"
Quint fired a charged shot, but it wasn't enough, as the attack crashed right into him.
Andromeda froze up. It was no longer regenerating.
X looked on in delight and astonishment as the superweapon began to explode and fall apart. Unfortunately, this meant the arena around them was destabilising as well.
OVER-1 seemed to activated some kind of secondary device he had in his possession, "hold on, I'm getting us out of here!"
Everyone found themselves in Tentakeel Outpost, landing right in the area with all the kettles. The Chaos Emerald energy disappeared as OVER-1 deactivated his device.
As Andromeda's body disintegrated, all that was left behind, all down on the ground, was a heavily damaged Quint, as well as Sonic, and…
Artemis. Orion. Iris. Axl. Ayane. Ethan. All of them were alive. The DiVE Armour was gone, and as X noticed, it was gone from his body as well.
"Oh my gosh! They're okay!" Marina squealed, as everyone rushed to them.
Quint suddenly bolted to his feet, stumbling back, "GET AWAY! I don't know how long I can hold him back!"
"Wait… Oh, no!" Other X's eyes widened. "You got infected with the Sigma Virus?!"
"Somehow he managed to infect me despite my precautions," Quint groaned. "Now of all times he decides to try and take control…"
"How bad is this 'Sigma Virus'?" X asked warily.
"Bad enough to cause decades of war and death and destruction," the Sleeker Zero snarled, saber drawn, "we have to-"
"Already covered," OVER-1 said. "I've already set up a wireless and teleportation blocker. Sigma is not going anywhere. As long as nobody touches Quint, he won't be able to jump between bodies."
"Then the only thing there is to do… Is destroy myself. I've already triggered my core to self-destruct," Quint said.
"Oh, you're kidding me…" Artemis groaned, as Marie helped her up. "You don't have to do this!"
"I've already hurt you enough through inaction and my own actions," Quint said. "I shouldn't exist in this timeline, anyway. You were right. I was being a fool for thinking my plan would do more good than harm. Besides… The Time Skimmer shouldn't be allowed to fall into anyone's hands."
"Everyone back off! He's gonna blow any second now!" Proto Man said, as everyone retreated to a safe distance.
"Forming containment barriers," said RiCO, as she and iCO formed two layers of shielding around Quint.
"X… I hope you find the other me, if he's still alive. Farewell… Brother…"
Then he exploded violently.
The shields barely held. And there was nothing left when the dust cleared.
"Yikes… That's… Messed up," Tails winced.
"He made his choice, Tails," Knuckles sighed, putting a hand on the fox's shoulder.
"Is it over? Please tell me it's over. I feel so tired," Ethan sighed.
"Well, those guys aren't fighting us anymore, so I guess it is?" Liam said, gesturing to the Mega Man Killers and the Genesis Unit.
"Oh, thank-"
X immediately rushed over to the six, hugging each of them in turn as he burst into tears. Despite everything, he still felt guilty for what happened. "I'm sorry I couldn't be there for you in time…"
"We already told you, it's okay," Orion smiled, as he and Artemis hugged him back. The other four joined in, despite Ayane's apparent reluctance.
"Aw, that's so sweet," Roll.EXE smiled.
"Should… Should I ask what exactly happened?" Volnutt asked.
"Those six got tossed into a giant blender, and, well, got blended," Enker said.
That caused everyone who hadn't been in the know to recoil in revulsion. Mayl spoke up, "I don't know how they're still alive, but… That definitely sounds like a terrible time all the same."
"No kidding, geez," Volnutt winced.
As the hug got broken off, Axl came up to over Axl, "uh, so… Hey. I'm this timeline's version of you, I guess! Name's Axl."
Other Axl blinked, looked him over, and grinned, "oh, man, I guess I'm super handsome in every timeline!" They fist-bumped as they laughed.
"Oh, good grief," Sleeker Zero sighed, rolling his eyes.
Other Zero seemed to recognise Iris, and turned away. Hinata blinked, "what's his hangup with you, Iris?"
Iris tilted her head quizzically. "Uh… Is there something wrong?"
"Iris? Yeah, that would explain it," Other X sighed. "Our version of Iris… Died in his arms years ago."
"Oh," Iris winced. "Oh dear."
"Alright, everyone, we need to start returning people to their own timelines," OVER-1 said. "Anyone else want to say anything?"
"Yeah… What happened in this timeline?" Mega Man blinked, looking around. "Where are we?"
"Tentakeel Outpost, Octo Canyon, roughly 12,000 years beyond most of your time periods," OVER-1 noted. "A future where humanity blew themselves up in an apocalypse and were replaced by sentient sea creatures, like the Inklings and Octolings here."
Lan winced. "Yikes! Guess we should make sure that never happens in our timelines, then! The apocalypse part, I mean, you Inklings and Octolings are pretty chill in my book."
"Sonia and I are from your future, so I guess that hasn't happened… Yet. We still need to make sure that doesn't happen, though," Geo said.
"Same here," Mega Man nodded, and came over to X, "hey, 'little bro'. I'm guessing I'm missing if this timeline's version of me isn't here?"
"As far as anyone knows, yeah," X sighed.
"Well… I hope you find him," Mega Man smiled.
"Thanks… Bro," X smiled back.
And then mood was immediately ruined by ViA. "Hey, Sonia, big fan of your work - I love your music."
"Aw, thank you!" Harp Note smiled.
ViA then turned to the other idols, "I'm a huge fan of you guys as well! Oh, that gives me an idea - a colaboration concert between Sonia, the Squid Sisters and Off The Hoo-"
"She's gotta go back to her timeline, big guy, that ain't happening, even if that'd be cool," Pearl interjected.
ViA was immediately in a corner, sulking.
"Okay, enough banter, let's go," OVER-1 said. Time portals started forming. "We've got a lot of mess to sort out, and I'd rather not keep the locals waiting waiting for us to leave."
"Well, this was an interesting experience! But I gotta get back to my own adventuring! Seeya, everyone!" Volnutt chuckled, as he dashed through his portal.
"Well, being in the 'real world' for a bit was a novel experience, but I guess it had to come to an end sooner or later," MegaMan.EXE said, as he and Roll.EXE headed to their portal, "farewell, everyone!"
"Who knows, maybe we'll meet again someday? I sure hope so. Sayonara!" Lan said, as they disappeared into the portal.
Geo nodded, as he and Harp Note headed for their portal, "getting back to our time has been long overdue. Good luck, everyone!"
Sonic chuckled, as he started fist-bumping the agents who had made up Leviathan, "gotta say, you guys are pretty cool, and we work well together. Maybe we can team up again sometime!"
Artemis grinned, "and you're pretty fresh. I'd love to!"
Ayane smirked, as she fist-bumped him, "wouldn't mind doing that."
"Take these back to the amalgam world, my sister will handle the rest," OVER-1 said, handing the Chaos Emeralds back to Tails in their case.
"Can do!" Tails said, taking the case, "man, the rest of the Sky Patrol are not gonna believe this… Actually, they probably would. We deal with a lot of weird stuff."
Other X smiled as he and X shook hands, "take care, other me. I hope this world stays a peaceful one… Unlike mine."
"Well, maybe one day you might be able to bring true peace to yours as well," X smiled back.
"I'm sure you can make it happen, X," Dr. Light nodded. "I believe in you, always."
"Dr. Light…" Mega Man frowned, as he looked over the AI copy of his creator. "I guess you're gone in this timeline, huh?"
Light smiled. "Don't worry, my son. Just know that, when my other self's time comes, I'm more than sure he lived a full, wonderful life, because of you and his other creations."
Mega Man smiled, and nodded, "yeah, I will. Thanks, Dr. Light!"
"Just… Make sure she lives, okay?" Other Zero said, clasping hands with X's version of Zero, "I don't want another me with that on their conscience."
"I mean, she's not my girlfriend, but I'll do my best," Zero nodded.
"Guess we gotta get going, we've got a big mess to clean up where we come from," Tails smiled and waved, "bye, everyone!"
"Keep up the good fight, fellas," Knuckles smirked.
Almost all of their group went through the portal… Except Proto Man, who stopped. "This world's version of me is probably already dead, if Dr. Light never repaired his core. So on his behalf… It was good to meet you… Little brother." He then went through.
RiCO smiled. "Well, I'm not sure about half of what just happened, but it was really fun! Oh, by the way…" She generated a floating orb, which entered Ciel's laptop, "this is my data. Please make good use of it!"
Ciel gasped, "oh, goodness, are you sure?! Thank you so much!"
ICO did the same thing. "I suppose I might as well give you mine, as well, otherwise I won't be there to wrangle RiCO when she does something stupid."
"SIS! You're so mean…" RiCO pouted.
"Come on, let's just drag that moron over there back to our timeline already…"
As the trio left, Sleeker Zero turned to OVER-1, "what about me?"
"You're coming with me. I'll handle your time period. The problem is, you were supposed to die when Ragnarok exploded, so that's a headache to resolve… I'll figure something out," OVER-1 sighed. "Come on, let's go… Also, X, I'm going to need you to destroy that Time Skimmer data you have. I've already erased the relevant data on those laptops."
X nodded, as he did as OVER-1 requested. "Done and done. I suppose it's for the best, really."
"Very well… It was an honour fighting alongside all of you," Sleeker Zero nodded, as he followed OVER-1 into a portal. "Farewell."
"Thank you, all of you, for your assistance. The time stream remains stable," OVER-1 said, as he and Sleeker Zero disappeared into the portal.
Silence descended over the Outpost.
"WOOOO! That was stupid, but it was fun!" Hinata giggled.
"So it's finally over," Artemis sighed.
"No, there's one more thing we need to deal with… You jerks," Karlene said, turning to the Wily bots, "you need to make up for wrecking the Square."
"Oh no, here it comes," Buster Rod G groaned.
Mega Water S crossed his arms, "she's right, though, we did do a lot of damage. I suppose it's only right we should clean up and repair the damage we did."
"We are combat robots, but we'll do what we can," Enker nodded. "With Wily, Tartar and Quint all gone… We have no-one to take orders from. No purpose left."
"Then maybe you can find your own purpose. Who knows, you could join the Splatoon or become cops or something," Pearl chuckled.
"That… Might be viable, I suppose. We'll see."
X took a deep breath. Maybe finally they'd have some semblance of peace for longer than a week, now.
"Well, looks like all's well that ends well," RiCO said, back to work in the Deep Log. "But I can't help but think something was missing from all of that."
"That whole thing was a gargantuan mess and you think something was missing?" ViA asked incredulously.
"Yeah, every single Mega Man sub-series was represented in that big fight… Except one."
As she looked up from her tea, iCO asked, "Fully Charged?"
"WHO CARES ABOUT FULLY CHARGED?!" RiCO groaned. "I'm talking about ZX! Where were Vent or Aile or Ashe or Grey?! Did OVER-1 forget about them?"
"I didn't forget," OVER-1 said as he appeared through a portal.
RiCO nearly jumped out of her seat. "GEEZ! Don't scare me like that! Wait, you didn't?"
OVER-1 shook his head. "If I did include them… It would've caused problems in the future of that timeline. It was best I left it be."
RiCO was confused for a moment, before a light bulb went off in her head. "Future of… OOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHH now I get it!"
"So those characters factor into the relative near future of that timeline, then. Interesting," ViA nodded. "I wonder how that'll pan out…"
A/N: Sonic and pals showing up is gonna be a one-time thing, and I only did it because of the Worlds Unite connection. I felt Quint stealing Unite!Sigma's power and then combining it with Andromeda made the most sense in order for him to create a time-controlling superweapon he could take control of himself, and because of that it also made sense that OVER-1 would enlist the help of a select team from that event, along with using the Chaos Emeralds to combat Quint's trump card.
Also, having Leviathan and Sonic take on Unite!Quint by themselves made it so much easier to write a fight scene, and also allowed me to focus on a couple of cool combination attacks. But I also wanted to make the fight short and snappy.
Next chapter is going to be the epilogue to this arc.
Also, I'm heavily considering splitting off future arcs in this fic on Ao3 into a full-blown series, just an FYI. Still on the fence about it, though.
Edit: Ugh, a few errors slipped in somehow, that's embarrassing. At least I caught and fixed them sooner.
Maybe at some point I'll redo this whole climax and drop the whole time travel aspect entirely, but until then this is the best I could do with what I accidentally wrote myself into. I hope you guys have some fun with this dumb climax.
Chapter 19: Hostile Takeover (IX)
As everyone settled in for a tense wait, Koji couldn't help but stare at Leviathan. That appearance being, uh, wow, aside, he still couldn't believe that six of his friends were all merged into one being like that. His biggest concern was that they might not be able to be split, but there were also psychological factors at play - how would mind melding affect all six of them if they manage to split?
"Stop staring at me, Koji, it's creepy," Leviathan chuckled, snapping him out of his thoughts. "What's up?"
Koji sighed, "sorry, just worried about you. Even if you do manage to find a way to split up, who knows what psychological changes this might cause? It's not like Inklings and Octolings were designed to fuse."
"To be fair, we figured this out because we stopped each other from mind-melding in the first place while blended," Leviathan replied. Upon seeing Koji's horrified expression, they laughed sheepishly, "oh, right, I didn't mention that part, did I?"
"You were WHAT?!" Callie freaked out, dashing over to them, "are you guys seriously okay?! That must've been all kinds of traumatic!"
Koji nodded vigorously in agreement. He was far from the only person here not alarmed by this. "Seriously!"
"Everyone settle down and give them space," Marie said, coming over, no less concerned but still mostly keeping her composure, "but you don't need to keep everything close to your chest if you don't want to."
Leviathan sighed, sitting down, "what happened was pretty scary, not gonna lie. I don't think any of us are gonna forget it. But we can't just mope about it for long."
"I think all things considered, we need to seriously do something about better equipping the Agents," Ciel said. "Between possible unknown threats and potentially the Octarians coming for them for revenge…"
Marie nodded. "Gramps is talking to some government bigwigs about actually funding the New Squidbeak Splatoon. Considering we saved the Great Zapfish twice and then saved all of Inkopolis from both Tartar's cannon and Gamma, guess they've recognised we're worth investing in. This incident probably will spur them to fund some concealed equipment for us."
"Yes, that's what I'm thinking - advanced gear and weapons based on the technology we've gotten from Light and Wily that can be concealed when the agents aren't using them," Ciel nodded back. "So they won't be caught out like that ever again."
"If these young people are inherently putting their lives are risk, it's only right that we provide them the best protection," Dr. Light agreed. They had finally managed to get one of his capsules down here.
Koji really couldn't disagree with any of that. After today's harrowing events that had come out of basically nowhere? He wasn't sure he'd be able to handle walking around without a Hero Suit and a weapon from now on. It was hard not to feel paranoid after something like that.
Suddenly, another time portal opened. Emerging from it was another robot, who had a vague resemblance to X, but the fur lining along his shoulders alone made him distinct. "Hello, everyone. I am OVER-1. I've successfully stopped Quint from reaching his destination, but we need to get ready for when he returns."
"So you're our new ally, then," X nodded. "Are you… A Light robot?"
"I was designed partly by an alternate Dr. Light, yes, in collaboration with Dr. Cossack - my purpose, along with that of my siblings, is to act as a time guardian, to prevent havoc across the timestream like what Quint was attempting to do. Our group is known as the 'Chronos Corps'," OVER-1 nodded. "Fortunately, I've brought backup."
More time portals opened, and several more people emerged. Koji blinked. Three of them looked like variations of Mega Man in some form, accompanied by what he thought might be two female humans with pink outfits. The other three were more distinct, including two female robots and another Zero, but this time with blue armour and he didn't seem to have a mouth.
"Allow me to introduce these first five, don't worry about the language barrier, I've sorted that out - the first three are alternate timeline Mega Men, specifically MegaMan.EXE (given physical form with my assistance) and his operator Lan Hikari, Geo and Omega-Xis, and Mega Man Volnutt. With them are Roll.EXE and her operator Mayl Sakurai, and Harp Note," said OVER-1, gesturing to each one in turn.
"This is so surreal, but if we're saving the time stream, best not think about it too much," said Geo.
"No kidding! Hey everyone, sorry we can't socialise right now, but OVER-1 says we don't have much time," said Lan, who could be seen via some kind of holo-screen over MegaMan.EXE's shoulder.
"As for the other three, these are RiCO, ViA and iCO, administrators of the 'Deep Log' in another timeline."
"I don't know what the heck is going on but I am totally here for it! Hi everyone!" RiCO giggled, with a wave.
"Is this some kind of weird fanfic universe…?" ViA wondered out load… And then he spotted the idols. "Holy crap it's the Squid Sisters and Off The Hook, I'm in heaven."
Groaning, iCO just rolled her eyes. "Good grief… Maybe I shouldn't have agreed to this…"
Koji raised a hand, having noticed something wasn't right about all of this. "Isn't this a bit overkill? Sure, Quint's dangerous, but we don't need this many people!"
"I wish I could agree with you," OVER-1 sighed. "But Quint has gotten desperate, and he's going to do something crazy…"
❖
Sonic the Hedgehog dropped down behind cover as the roar of battle sounded close by. Everyone was putting in their best efforts, but Sigma's new power was just too much.
"We have to do something, or we're all toast," Mega Man frowned as he crouched down next to him. The Sky Patrol had gathered around them as well.
"Well, there's one last trump card we haven't used yet," Sonic grinned, as Tails handed him a black case, which he opened up - six gleaming Chaos Emeralds, ready and waiting. "If only we had the last one-"
"Uh, Sonic? Something's happening!" Sally called out, looking over the rocks.
They all peeked over, as Sigma stood on top of X, fighting off all comers in his new form. "BWAHAHAHAHA! Pathetic! Your limited potential is nothing compared to the new power I have claimed! And I will only grow stronger from here!"
In his arrogance, he hadn't noticed that someone was sneaking up behind him, concealed by some kind of cloaking field. As they got into melee range, that person uncloaked - he looked like Mega Man, but with green armour, and wielded a greatsword that was glowing with yellow energy.
Sigma's cackling ceased when the sword was rammed right through his chest, bursting out the other side. "W-What?! How is this…?!"
"Now I've got your power, Sigma," the green robot smirked. "Thank you for gathering so much of it and then squandering it by letting someone backstab you with a Mirror Buster."
Sigma looked over his shoulder, and his eyes widened. "Y-You?! You shouldn't be-"
The green robot cut him down, splitting him in half. "My designs for this power are much better than what you had in mind for it, I assure you. Farewell, Sigma."
"Is… Is he a friend, or a foe?" Knuckles asked warily. "He just took out Sigma, but he doesn't look friendly…"
"He looks like you, Megs. Any relation?" Sonic asked.
Mega Man shook his head. "No, I've never seen him before. I'm getting this weird sense of deja-vu, but otherwise…"
The green robot turned around, and formed some kind of portal. "Farewell, everyone. Don't worry, when I'm done none of you will remember any of this, because, well, you won't exist."
That immediately triggered alarm bells in Sonic's mind, and he leaped over the rocks he was hiding behind, racing towards the strange robot, "HEY! What's that supposed to mean, you-" He ducked a sword swing narrowly, "WHOA GEEZ!" But then the robot kicked him away.
"I have no incentive to explain to any of you," the robot said, going through the portal before it disappeared.
The world around them began to rumble, as if Sigma's power being removed was causing everything to crumble. Panic was beginning to set in as Sonic got back on his feet. What now?
"Everyone, don't panic!" Someone emerged from another portal, driving some kind of large device into the ground. The device sent out a harmless wave of energy, which seemed to stabilise the world around them. The robot was female, and vaguely looked like X, but Sonic felt like she had her costume done by a fashion designer or something.
X groaned, getting up, "who…?"
The female robot by the device spoke, "my name is OVER-2. I can explain what's going on in a bit, but right now… Sonic the Hedgehog, Mega Man, your assistance is required. And we'll need the Chaos Emeralds as well."
Sonic scratched his head, "looks like this is gonna get even messier…"
❖
"Our final set of guests should be arriving in a moment," Over-1 said, as another portal opened.
Leviathan blinked as eight more people came through. Two of them were X and Zero, but they looked a bit more… Advanced. There was a third robot with spiky hair and twin pistols who looked oddly familiar. And then there was the original Mega Man (accompanied by Rush), and a red robot with a shield, and… Three animal people.
"Allow me to introduce… X, Zero, Axl, Mega Man (and Rush), Proto Man, Sonic the Hedgehog, Miles 'Tails' Prower, and Knuckles the Echidna," OVER-1 said. "And they've brought something that will help us a lot with the imminent battle."
"Yo. Still confused about what's going on, but we know there's a bad guy to beat up, so I'm not gonna sweat it," Sonic chuckled.
"That's the gist of it, pretty much," Proto Man nodded.
"Wait, did you bring them straight out of Worlds Unite?!" RiCO asked, looking baffled. "What did Quint DO?!"
"Oh, so that's that punk's name? He backstabbed Sigma, stole his power and left us to deal with the universe crumbling. So, you know, that's fun," Knuckles said dryly, pounding his fists together.
"He did WHAT?!"
"This is way too confusing," Tails sighed, seeing all the strange people gathered around. Parts of Leviathan could definitely sympathise. "We don't have time to banter!"
Leviathan noticed the two versions of X staring at each other in surprise, with his X also staring at Mega Man, along with the three Zeroes also looking at each other. He came over to Axl, "hey, so he said your name was Axl?"
"Yeah, what about it?" Axl chuckled, extending a hand, "nice to meet you, I guess… Geez, you're huge, what's your deal?"
"Uh, well-"
Suddenly, before they could continue talking, Quint emerged from a time portal. He was absolutely radiating with power. "Ah, I see you gathered the cavalry to face me."
"Quint, stop this! You're going to completely wreck the timeline!" Mega Man called out.
"The timeline is already broken!" Quint snapped. "And I'm the only one who realises that! With the power I've gathered, I'll fix everything, so nobody will have to suffer tragedy ever again!"
"Yep, he's gone off the reservation," Buster Rod G said.
"You've completely lost your mind, Quint," Ballade said. "Looks like we're working with the 'heroes' for once on this one… We can't let you do this."
"'Can't', huh? As if you can stop me now! Because I've acquired something that'll allow me to attain true godhood…"
He snapped his fingers. A larger portal formed, and a huge robotic monster emerged, red and blue with two sets of teeth.
Geo's eyes widened, "Andromeda?!"
Omega-Xis scoffed, "hah! Nice try, but Andromeda ain't gonna work for you unless you have-" Then Quint pulled out a large black key. "-sunnova… Where did you get that?!"
"Does it matter?" Quint smirked, as the monster transformed into a more humanoid form, its outer set of teeth becoming fingers, and a green glassy sphere swirling with energy between its torso and the spike where its legs should've been. "Combined with the power I just acquired from Sigma… Andromeda is the perfect vessel for my ascension to become a god of time!"
Everyone immediately opened fire. But Quint leaped back into the green sphere, disappearing into it as Andromeda fully came to life, radiating with power, and exuding an roar as the world around them transformed, and Andromeda changed into Quint's colours. The walls and ceiling of the room seemed to disappear as the world turned into a psychedelic expanse. "I will erase every single one of you, for I am the lord of time itself!"
"Please tell us you've got a plan to fight that thing!" Koji winced.
Leviathan turned to OVER-1, who was holding some kind of device with seven differently-coloured gemstones added to it. He switched it on, and a wave of golden energy washed over them. "As it happens? Yes, I do."
Leviathan gasped as they felt a surge of power rising through them, turning their body gold. It was happening to everyone else as well, empowering them greatly.
Sonic grinned, floating in the air, "looks like Metal giving us that last Chaos Emerald really helped! Alright, everyone, let's trash this big poser!"
Mega Man suddenly fused with Rush, taking flight with rocket boosters.
As everyone else rushed into battle, they and X (their X, of course) were held back by RiCO and iCO. The former noted, "hold on, we've got something special for the both of you! I didn't think this would work in real space, but thanks to OVER-1's help…"
She typed something into her holographic screen, and X's armour suddenly transformed, gaining something more of a fancier, 'cyberspace' look, with X-shaped beam wings behind him. X blinked, looking at his hands, "what the…"
Doing much the same, iCO did something that also transformed Leviathan's outfit, causing them to gain a full set of armour as well. She noted, "I decided to be nice and give you the 'Hero' armour set. Enjoy."
"DiVE Armour activation successful! We did a good job, right! Go on, praise us!" RiCO grinned.
"Sister, don't make this weird," iCO sighed.
RiCO pouted, "party-pooper… Okay, just go beat him up already, you two!"
X turned to Leviathan, smiling, "this time… We'll be fighting together."
Leviathan grinned back, "you got it. Let's show Quint not to mess with us!"
As Andromeda rained meteors upon the battlefield, Leviathan and X flew right past their comrades unloading everything they had into Andromeda. And indeed the mechanical monstrosity was taking damage as they joined the fray, spraying it with energy and ink, but it seemed to be rapidly regenerating at the same time.
"Oh, great, don't you just hate it when the bad guys can just regenerate?" Sonic groaned, as he and Mega Man flew back over to Leviathan and X. "This guy's gotta have some kind of weakness!"
"It seems rather protective of that glassy sphere Quint jumped into," Mega Man noted, pointing out that the hands were blocking attacks aimed at it.
Leviathan formed an E-Liter, and aimed carefully… And the instant the sphere was in their line of sight, they fired.
The ink broke the sphere, but it almost instantly reformed. "Dangit! That's not gonna work either!"
"No, I think we might have a way," X said. "If we can just tackle Quint out of that thing…"
"Let's try the Super Sonic Shot, then!" Mega Man said.
"Charge-&-Roll, then, X?" Leviathan mused. "Problem is, if the arms block us-"
Volnutt called out, as he and Knuckles grabbed one of the arms, "that we can handle! Everyone, hold down the arms!"
"Bleh… Never thought I'd be workin' with the 'good guys', but here I am…" Hyper Storm S groaned as he grabbed the other arm.
As all of their allies began restraining Andromeda's arms, Leviathan changed to swim form and latched onto X's buster, while Sonic formed a ball in front of Mega Man's.
"Double… Buster… LAUNCH!"
Both Leviathan and Sonic were launched, smashing through the sphere…
❖
X watched as the pair disappeared into the sphere, which reformed instantly. "Guess they're going to fight Quint, then…"
However, Andromeda threw off the people holding back its arms, making an inhuman roar.
"Looks like Andromeda is still moving," Knuckles remarked, "good, I was gonna get bored if we were just gonna wait for those two to beat up Quint!"
"Andromeda is a planet-eating superweapon, it's not going down so easily," Geo warned, as he fired some kind of large cannon that he formed on his buster. "We gotta keep up the attack or we're done for!"
"A planet-eater turned time-eater, huh?" Liam smirked, dodging around Andromeda's laser beams, "no biggie, just our most dangerous enemy yet…"
Tails noted as he jumped over an arm swing, "the Chaos Emeralds provide invulnerability, but it won't last forever! Try not to get hit!"
"Easier said than done, considering all the stuff it's throwing at us, but looks like all of us are pretty good at it by now!" Volnutt remarked, as he strafed around with full-auto buster fire.
"Kinda way more tense when all of reality is at stake, though!" Mayl pointed out, as Roll.EXE gracefully dodged and struck her with her 'antennae'.
"I can try and slow it down!" said Harp Note, deploying a pair of speakers that unleashed strong paraylzing sound waves as she played her guitar, which didn't seem to affect her allies at all. Her performance wasn't simply random notes, but a proper guitar solo.
"Dang, girl, you know how to ROCK!" Pearl grinned.
"That makes it a bit easier! Don't let up for even a second!" MegaMan.EXE declared as he slashed at the superweapon with an energy sword, dodging some meteors, "whoa!"
Proto Man stepped up in front of him, blocking a few meteors with his shield, "if anyone needs to take cover, I've got that sorted."
Lan chuckled, "thanks for the save. Man, you're way nicer than our ProtoMan… Or Chaud, for that matter."
"Now's not the time for talking badly about other people, Lan!" MegaMan.EXE snapped.
"You know, we've seen a lot of crazy events, but this totally takes the cake!" RiCO giggled.
ViA called out, "oi, stop with the meta-commentary and focus!"
iCO sighed, "I just want to be over and done with this already."
Everyone was pressing the offensive. All three Zeroes (and ViA) were working in tandem. Axl was being a showoff. The Agents were coordinating under Callie and Marie's direction. Tails and Knuckles were doing combo attacks. RiCO, iCO and OVER-1 were acting as support.
X suddenly found himself standing by Mega Man and Other X again, as he charged his buster. "All we can do now is hope those two can drag Quint out of there. Until then, we have to keep up the pressure!"
"Then I have to go all out, too!" Other X declared, as he formed some kind of black, gold, purple and blue armour on his body, charging up with his new buster. "What Quint is doing is completely wrong!"
"We have to stop him and show him this isn't the right way!" Mega Man agreed, charging up his own buster.
As all three unleashed their busters on Andromeda, X hoping Leviathan and Sonic were doing okay…
❖
Leviathan and Sonic crashed into a green void, landing on a translucent blue surface that stretched out to infinity.
As they got back up, Leviathan noticed they were no longer 'super'. Same with Sonic, who groaned, "oh, great, we're cut off from the energy of the Chaos Emeralds…"
"Correct. Very clever, trying to get to me directly, but now you have to face me with my new power," Quint said, standing before them in more regal-looking armour, complete with a cape. "And if I recall, Sonic couldn't stand against Sigma when he was using this power…"
"Small problem with that logic," Leviathan interjected, "you're still using a lot of that power to keep Andromeda from being obliterated, aren't you? Our friends are still fighting out there."
That seemed to ignite a metaphorical light bulb in Sonic's head, as he grinned, "oh, yeah, that's right! So we've got a fighting chance against you!"
"All of you have gone mad," Quint said. "I'm trying to fix everything, and you're just standing in my way?!"
"Dude. What you're trying to do ain't 'fixing' anything," Sonic sighed. "Take it from me, your fixation on the past ain't healthy."
Leviathan formed a Charger, Hero Shots and a Roller, "that's right. No matter what, we won't let you erase countless lives from the time stream!"
Quint frowned, forming his greatsword, "was I really this naive, once…? Fine, then. I'll show you how hopeless your efforts really are!"
The pair charged him, as multiple energy copies of Quint on Sakugarne's pogo form were summoned, attempting to crash down on them. But the fair dodged and weaved, smashing through the copies with their weapons and quills respectively.
When they reached Quint, the resulting melee was chaotic and frenzied. Quint had formed a copy to watch his back, and as the two heroes dodged and jumped around him, giving everything their had, he fought back ferociously, blocking and slashing with the sword and firing back with his buster.
The pair backed off briefly to recover. Sonic panted, "he's putting in effort to block our attacks, so that's a good sign…"
"We need to smash through his defences, though… But I've got an idea," Leviathan grinned. "Charge-&-Roll again?"
"I like the way you think," Sonic grinned, as he spun in the air, somehow hovering as he spun as fast as he could, while Leviathan held the Charger right behind him, and charged up multiple times over in terms of pressure.
BANG. Sonic briefly broke the sound barrier as he rocketed towards Quint.
"Not good enough!" Quint batted him back with his sword.
Leviathan responded by forming Rollers with all three rows of arms, and returned the volley.
The blue pinball went back and forth, speeding up, until Quint finally flubbed a swing, causing Sonic to crash right into him, causing Quint to lose his grip on Sakugarne. "NO!"
"Sonic… Booya…" Leviathan brought all six of their hands forward, as Sonic bounced back towards them, and once the blue hedgehog was in position, launched him in an intense surge of ink and energy, "HADOKEN!"
Quint fired a charged shot, but it wasn't enough, as the attack crashed right into him.
❖
Andromeda froze up. It was no longer regenerating.
X looked on in delight and astonishment as the superweapon began to explode and fall apart. Unfortunately, this meant the arena around them was destabilising as well.
OVER-1 seemed to activated some kind of secondary device he had in his possession, "hold on, I'm getting us out of here!"
Everyone found themselves in Tentakeel Outpost, landing right in the area with all the kettles. The Chaos Emerald energy disappeared as OVER-1 deactivated his device.
As Andromeda's body disintegrated, all that was left behind, all down on the ground, was a heavily damaged Quint, as well as Sonic, and…
Artemis. Orion. Iris. Axl. Ayane. Ethan. All of them were alive. The DiVE Armour was gone, and as X noticed, it was gone from his body as well.
"Oh my gosh! They're okay!" Marina squealed, as everyone rushed to them.
Quint suddenly bolted to his feet, stumbling back, "GET AWAY! I don't know how long I can hold him back!"
"Wait… Oh, no!" Other X's eyes widened. "You got infected with the Sigma Virus?!"
"Somehow he managed to infect me despite my precautions," Quint groaned. "Now of all times he decides to try and take control…"
"How bad is this 'Sigma Virus'?" X asked warily.
"Bad enough to cause decades of war and death and destruction," the Sleeker Zero snarled, saber drawn, "we have to-"
"Already covered," OVER-1 said. "I've already set up a wireless and teleportation blocker. Sigma is not going anywhere. As long as nobody touches Quint, he won't be able to jump between bodies."
"Then the only thing there is to do… Is destroy myself. I've already triggered my core to self-destruct," Quint said.
"Oh, you're kidding me…" Artemis groaned, as Marie helped her up. "You don't have to do this!"
"I've already hurt you enough through inaction and my own actions," Quint said. "I shouldn't exist in this timeline, anyway. You were right. I was being a fool for thinking my plan would do more good than harm. Besides… The Time Skimmer shouldn't be allowed to fall into anyone's hands."
"Everyone back off! He's gonna blow any second now!" Proto Man said, as everyone retreated to a safe distance.
"Forming containment barriers," said RiCO, as she and iCO formed two layers of shielding around Quint.
"X… I hope you find the other me, if he's still alive. Farewell… Brother…"
Then he exploded violently.
The shields barely held. And there was nothing left when the dust cleared.
"Yikes… That's… Messed up," Tails winced.
"He made his choice, Tails," Knuckles sighed, putting a hand on the fox's shoulder.
"Is it over? Please tell me it's over. I feel so tired," Ethan sighed.
"Well, those guys aren't fighting us anymore, so I guess it is?" Liam said, gesturing to the Mega Man Killers and the Genesis Unit.
"Oh, thank-"
X immediately rushed over to the six, hugging each of them in turn as he burst into tears. Despite everything, he still felt guilty for what happened. "I'm sorry I couldn't be there for you in time…"
"We already told you, it's okay," Orion smiled, as he and Artemis hugged him back. The other four joined in, despite Ayane's apparent reluctance.
"Aw, that's so sweet," Roll.EXE smiled.
"Should… Should I ask what exactly happened?" Volnutt asked.
"Those six got tossed into a giant blender, and, well, got blended," Enker said.
That caused everyone who hadn't been in the know to recoil in revulsion. Mayl spoke up, "I don't know how they're still alive, but… That definitely sounds like a terrible time all the same."
"No kidding, geez," Volnutt winced.
As the hug got broken off, Axl came up to over Axl, "uh, so… Hey. I'm this timeline's version of you, I guess! Name's Axl."
Other Axl blinked, looked him over, and grinned, "oh, man, I guess I'm super handsome in every timeline!" They fist-bumped as they laughed.
"Oh, good grief," Sleeker Zero sighed, rolling his eyes.
Other Zero seemed to recognise Iris, and turned away. Hinata blinked, "what's his hangup with you, Iris?"
Iris tilted her head quizzically. "Uh… Is there something wrong?"
"Iris? Yeah, that would explain it," Other X sighed. "Our version of Iris… Died in his arms years ago."
"Oh," Iris winced. "Oh dear."
"Alright, everyone, we need to start returning people to their own timelines," OVER-1 said. "Anyone else want to say anything?"
"Yeah… What happened in this timeline?" Mega Man blinked, looking around. "Where are we?"
"Tentakeel Outpost, Octo Canyon, roughly 12,000 years beyond most of your time periods," OVER-1 noted. "A future where humanity blew themselves up in an apocalypse and were replaced by sentient sea creatures, like the Inklings and Octolings here."
Lan winced. "Yikes! Guess we should make sure that never happens in our timelines, then! The apocalypse part, I mean, you Inklings and Octolings are pretty chill in my book."
"Sonia and I are from your future, so I guess that hasn't happened… Yet. We still need to make sure that doesn't happen, though," Geo said.
"Same here," Mega Man nodded, and came over to X, "hey, 'little bro'. I'm guessing I'm missing if this timeline's version of me isn't here?"
"As far as anyone knows, yeah," X sighed.
"Well… I hope you find him," Mega Man smiled.
"Thanks… Bro," X smiled back.
And then mood was immediately ruined by ViA. "Hey, Sonia, big fan of your work - I love your music."
"Aw, thank you!" Harp Note smiled.
ViA then turned to the other idols, "I'm a huge fan of you guys as well! Oh, that gives me an idea - a colaboration concert between Sonia, the Squid Sisters and Off The Hoo-"
"She's gotta go back to her timeline, big guy, that ain't happening, even if that'd be cool," Pearl interjected.
ViA was immediately in a corner, sulking.
"Okay, enough banter, let's go," OVER-1 said. Time portals started forming. "We've got a lot of mess to sort out, and I'd rather not keep the locals waiting waiting for us to leave."
"Well, this was an interesting experience! But I gotta get back to my own adventuring! Seeya, everyone!" Volnutt chuckled, as he dashed through his portal.
"Well, being in the 'real world' for a bit was a novel experience, but I guess it had to come to an end sooner or later," MegaMan.EXE said, as he and Roll.EXE headed to their portal, "farewell, everyone!"
"Who knows, maybe we'll meet again someday? I sure hope so. Sayonara!" Lan said, as they disappeared into the portal.
Geo nodded, as he and Harp Note headed for their portal, "getting back to our time has been long overdue. Good luck, everyone!"
Sonic chuckled, as he started fist-bumping the agents who had made up Leviathan, "gotta say, you guys are pretty cool, and we work well together. Maybe we can team up again sometime!"
Artemis grinned, "and you're pretty fresh. I'd love to!"
Ayane smirked, as she fist-bumped him, "wouldn't mind doing that."
"Take these back to the amalgam world, my sister will handle the rest," OVER-1 said, handing the Chaos Emeralds back to Tails in their case.
"Can do!" Tails said, taking the case, "man, the rest of the Sky Patrol are not gonna believe this… Actually, they probably would. We deal with a lot of weird stuff."
Other X smiled as he and X shook hands, "take care, other me. I hope this world stays a peaceful one… Unlike mine."
"Well, maybe one day you might be able to bring true peace to yours as well," X smiled back.
"I'm sure you can make it happen, X," Dr. Light nodded. "I believe in you, always."
"Dr. Light…" Mega Man frowned, as he looked over the AI copy of his creator. "I guess you're gone in this timeline, huh?"
Light smiled. "Don't worry, my son. Just know that, when my other self's time comes, I'm more than sure he lived a full, wonderful life, because of you and his other creations."
Mega Man smiled, and nodded, "yeah, I will. Thanks, Dr. Light!"
"Just… Make sure she lives, okay?" Other Zero said, clasping hands with X's version of Zero, "I don't want another me with that on their conscience."
"I mean, she's not my girlfriend, but I'll do my best," Zero nodded.
"Guess we gotta get going, we've got a big mess to clean up where we come from," Tails smiled and waved, "bye, everyone!"
"Keep up the good fight, fellas," Knuckles smirked.
Almost all of their group went through the portal… Except Proto Man, who stopped. "This world's version of me is probably already dead, if Dr. Light never repaired his core. So on his behalf… It was good to meet you… Little brother." He then went through.
RiCO smiled. "Well, I'm not sure about half of what just happened, but it was really fun! Oh, by the way…" She generated a floating orb, which entered Ciel's laptop, "this is my data. Please make good use of it!"
Ciel gasped, "oh, goodness, are you sure?! Thank you so much!"
ICO did the same thing. "I suppose I might as well give you mine, as well, otherwise I won't be there to wrangle RiCO when she does something stupid."
"SIS! You're so mean…" RiCO pouted.
"Come on, let's just drag that moron over there back to our timeline already…"
As the trio left, Sleeker Zero turned to OVER-1, "what about me?"
"You're coming with me. I'll handle your time period. The problem is, you were supposed to die when Ragnarok exploded, so that's a headache to resolve… I'll figure something out," OVER-1 sighed. "Come on, let's go… Also, X, I'm going to need you to destroy that Time Skimmer data you have. I've already erased the relevant data on those laptops."
X nodded, as he did as OVER-1 requested. "Done and done. I suppose it's for the best, really."
"Very well… It was an honour fighting alongside all of you," Sleeker Zero nodded, as he followed OVER-1 into a portal. "Farewell."
"Thank you, all of you, for your assistance. The time stream remains stable," OVER-1 said, as he and Sleeker Zero disappeared into the portal.
Silence descended over the Outpost.
"WOOOO! That was stupid, but it was fun!" Hinata giggled.
"So it's finally over," Artemis sighed.
"No, there's one more thing we need to deal with… You jerks," Karlene said, turning to the Wily bots, "you need to make up for wrecking the Square."
"Oh no, here it comes," Buster Rod G groaned.
Mega Water S crossed his arms, "she's right, though, we did do a lot of damage. I suppose it's only right we should clean up and repair the damage we did."
"We are combat robots, but we'll do what we can," Enker nodded. "With Wily, Tartar and Quint all gone… We have no-one to take orders from. No purpose left."
"Then maybe you can find your own purpose. Who knows, you could join the Splatoon or become cops or something," Pearl chuckled.
"That… Might be viable, I suppose. We'll see."
X took a deep breath. Maybe finally they'd have some semblance of peace for longer than a week, now.
❖
"Well, looks like all's well that ends well," RiCO said, back to work in the Deep Log. "But I can't help but think something was missing from all of that."
"That whole thing was a gargantuan mess and you think something was missing?" ViA asked incredulously.
"Yeah, every single Mega Man sub-series was represented in that big fight… Except one."
As she looked up from her tea, iCO asked, "Fully Charged?"
"WHO CARES ABOUT FULLY CHARGED?!" RiCO groaned. "I'm talking about ZX! Where were Vent or Aile or Ashe or Grey?! Did OVER-1 forget about them?"
"I didn't forget," OVER-1 said as he appeared through a portal.
RiCO nearly jumped out of her seat. "GEEZ! Don't scare me like that! Wait, you didn't?"
OVER-1 shook his head. "If I did include them… It would've caused problems in the future of that timeline. It was best I left it be."
RiCO was confused for a moment, before a light bulb went off in her head. "Future of… OOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHH now I get it!"
"So those characters factor into the relative near future of that timeline, then. Interesting," ViA nodded. "I wonder how that'll pan out…"
A/N: Sonic and pals showing up is gonna be a one-time thing, and I only did it because of the Worlds Unite connection. I felt Quint stealing Unite!Sigma's power and then combining it with Andromeda made the most sense in order for him to create a time-controlling superweapon he could take control of himself, and because of that it also made sense that OVER-1 would enlist the help of a select team from that event, along with using the Chaos Emeralds to combat Quint's trump card.
Also, having Leviathan and Sonic take on Unite!Quint by themselves made it so much easier to write a fight scene, and also allowed me to focus on a couple of cool combination attacks. But I also wanted to make the fight short and snappy.
Next chapter is going to be the epilogue to this arc.
Also, I'm heavily considering splitting off future arcs in this fic on Ao3 into a full-blown series, just an FYI. Still on the fence about it, though.
Edit: Ugh, a few errors slipped in somehow, that's embarrassing. At least I caught and fixed them sooner.
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