Why did I agree to this again? - RP

[dr_rock_light]

Why did I agree to this again Rock thought as he dodged around a blast of Maverick fire. He didn't know why he had agreed to leave the R&D department and play at being Megaman. Especially since it was one thing to go on missions occasionally, and another thing to go all Megaman and fight to save the world. That was X's job now.

But X was hurt, and they had needed some extra firepower. As well as someone who knew something about older model mavericks, which from the reports this was. And Roll was navigating Spider while the kid was off doing bounty hunter stuff or pretending that he wasn't heroic and not a good guy and stuff. Which meant Rock was left to Alia's tender mercies.

"Are there any other nasty missile wielding 'bots I should know about? Or spike pits? Or cliffs up ahead?" Rock asked tiredly.

He had learned to listen to his navigators after Roll had neglected to tell him about a spike pit a couple of times.

Comments

[0perator]

"I'm reading massive power generation up ahead. Be ready for electrified floor panels or laser emplacements. Or both, this place does seem to reek of overkill," Alia said. "I'm having a little trouble breaking the encryption on enemy communications. It looks like they're using a rotating key... so we're going to be stuck with long-range scans for a bit longer."

[dr_rock_light]

"This seriously is beginning to remind me of one of Dr. Wily's Master levels. If I see Gutsman or Tenguman or Topman, I'm done," Rock said, making a face. "Seriously, why couldn't you guys send in Zero or Axl for this one?"

He checked the power level on his blaster. Going into a maverick filled arcade with shields was much preferable to this. Some days he thought he might be getting too old for this big damn hero stuff. At least the big obvious displays of it.

Rehab was dangerous in a completely different way after all.

[0perator]

"Zero and Axl are on sites two and three, Megaman," Alia said pointedly. "Quit your bitching. Sonics detect large open area ahead. Watch out for spikes. You'll probably have to do some platforming."

[dr_rock_light]

"At least you're telling me about the spikes," Rock said, shaking his head. "All right. I'm going. Keep me informed."

Rock headed in. Keeping an eye out for spikes, electrified floor panels, and/or laser emplacements. Because with his luck, it would be all of the above.

[0perator]

"Have fun with the electrified platforming over the spikes with the laser emplacements, then," Alia said cheerfully. "Ping me if you need more analysis. I'm going to try and get these comms hacked."

[dr_rock_light]

"Why did I agree to leave the labs today?" Rock asked. "This is a mess. I guess you can't, oh I don't know, deactivate the electrified platforms while you're hacking the comms?"

He had some weapons if she couldn't. He was Megaman after all.

[0perator]

"You want an idea who the boss of this area is, or do you want to avoid some jumping? Make up your mind!"

It was on her list of things to do, really, but deactivating the traps would have to wait until she was into the system regardless.

[dr_rock_light]

"I can handle it. You get me an idea of what I'm up against. Please."

Being polite to your operator usually helped him to avoid getting sent into a pit of electrified spikes. Over lava. No, he still hadn't forgiven Roll for that one.

As it was he headed into the land of electrified platforming. At least his armor was insulated and he was quick enough to get through the jumping and didn't get shocked.

[0perator]

Without the witty banter Alia was free to concentrate on breaking the encryption keys. A lot of the comms chatter she got was in code, naturally, but at her age there wasn't a lot by way of codewords she hadn't heard.

"Be advised that upcoming boss is electric-based, possibly with an area-effect weapon."

[dr_rock_light]

"It better not be Elec Man, or Clown Man, or Sheep Man, or Spark Man, or Plug Man, or any other electricity themed Robot Master or I am done, Alia. You guys can send in Signas or something and I can go home," Rock said, once he was done navigating electric platforms and on solid ground again.

Seriously this was getting ridiculous.

[0perator]

"Why in the hell did they make a clown themed robot master?"

Alia was working on cracking the firewall on the security system as she talked. Taking out the traps would make the mission easier, after all, and electric-type bosses could be some of the worst.

[dr_rock_light]

"I don't know. Dr. Wily was pretty crazy by the Eighth Wily War. It wasn't like he ever actually answered any questions," Rock said, shrugging. "He had extendable segmented arms."

Really, Clown Man had been one of Dr. Wily's more memorable Robot Masters.

[0perator]

"Somebody obviously stayed up too late watching It," Alia said. She frowned again as she scrolled through the hacked data.

"Hang on. I'm getting cameras online."

[dr_rock_light]

"I don't think Dr. Wily ever slept. Forte said he was always awake. Always."

Rock had slowly been moving closer towards the boss area. But he stopped when Alia made that declaration. "What do you have for me, Alia?"

[0perator]

"That explains so much," Alia said, though whether in response to Forte's claim or the cameras it was hard to tell. She sounded distracted.

"There's an ambush point ahead of you. Three Mavericks. I'm working on deactivating the floor traps they have set up."

[dr_rock_light]

"Three against one? Hardly seems fair. Any specs on them?" Rock asked. "Big, little, do they combine into a voltron like death machine?"

At least he wouldn't have floor traps to deal with right now.

[0perator]

"Medium infantry. I'm not hearing any backchatter about combined forms, but be careful. You never know."

[dr_rock_light]

Rock sighed. "There had better be cake when I get back to base Alia. A chocolate one. With decorations or something on it."

He shifted, about to go in. "Are the traps disarmed? Is it safe to proceed?"

[0perator]

"Do I look like the commissary?"

Alia rapidly input commands and flicked them through the ether to the Maverick base. "Traps disarmed. I will be jamming enemy comms and sensors in the vicinity when you proceed. On your mark."

[dr_rock_light]

"No. But you can tell the R&D staff it's a request from their boss," Rock snarked.

Then he settled. "I'm going in. Hopefully it won't be anything too crazy."

[0perator]

"Acknowledged. See you on the other side."

Alia didn't chatter with operatives who were engaged with Mavericks outside of an emergency, after all. And she'd need to keep an eye on the jamming, see what other surprises were in store at the base while Rock finished fighting his way to the boss.

[dr_rock_light]

Rock went in. Fighting his way through the ambush point. It wasn't much of an ambush, since he'd known about them and Alia had disarmed the traps. However, one of them was using mettaurs as bombs, which was always fun.

When he finished dealing with the mavericks, he went over to examine them, and got back into radio contact with Alia.

"Alia. Transmitting data. These are factory bots. But all the factories in the area have been shut down for decades. I'm looking for serials."

[0perator]

"Pulling warehousing data now," Alia said, calling up databases of all known reploid warehousing sites to match the serials against. If Sigma was raiding the newly-constructed being held in stasis, this was going to be a world of hurt.

[dr_rock_light]

Rock found some serials, "That's not possible," he muttered over the open comm channel. "These bots have DCN serial numbers."

[0perator]

"I thought the Cossack numbers were all accounted for!"

[dr_rock_light]

"So did I! That's why this shouldn't be possible! These don't look like any Cossack model I've ever seen! That's why they weren't pinging any of the old databases. The way they were behaving in the fight, they're smarter than Masters. So I have no clue how they're here. I mean, one was using mets as bombs, which isn't unusual, but still--"

It was a Cossack thing to do. And Rock frowned, as he looked over the mavericks for any other markings, or anything else he could use find. "Transmitting the Serials. See if they match anything in the database."

[0perator]

"Will do," Alia said, chewing her lip as she began the search routine. Cossack numbers. It was possible... The Cossacks had survived as a family of roboticists for a number of decades, the name and serial convention finally dying out with Dr. Cain.

Wait. Now that was a possibility. Dr. Cain had stopped using the DCN designation when the first Maverick uprising started, but that didn't necessarily preclude Cain Labs from picking it up again.

"Got it. They match a serial batch from Cain Labs circa the fourth Sigma Event. Not Repliforce models, but it looks here like they were designed to mesh with Repliforce if needed."

[dr_rock_light]

"All this time later, and we're still cleaning up after the Repliforce mess. Thanks Dr. Cain," Rock said, frowning. "Cain Labs, huh? Okay. So what are they doing here? The scanners you gave me aren't picking up the Virus."

Which meant that Sigma might not be involved in this. Or if he was, he was playing the puppetmaster as he had during the Repliforce incident. And if that was the case, Rock was going to shove his blaster down Sigma's throat and blast him and not stop. Ever.

[0perator]

"So what, they're doing it for the glory of Repliforce?" Alia said, snorting. "He probably didn't need to infect them. You know how stupid the babies can be when they're first turned on."

[dr_rock_light]

"But where were they being stored?" Rock asked. "Nearby, I'm guessing?"

"And I still have to deal with the boss of this place, don't I? These guys were just a shiny distraction. And hoping to ambush me."

[0perator]

"Confirmed. I'm sending you coordinates of the storage facility.

"Be careful. If the boss is also a Cossack Number he's probably going to be a tough nut to crack."

[dr_rock_light]

"If the boss is also a Cossack number, then I'm going to be having a long talk with Sigma when I find him. Involving my blaster and his face," Rock growled.

He sighed as he started proceeding forward again. "I'll be careful. But I doubt it'll have a Cossack number. Dr. Cossack didn't make any electric themed robots. Unless we're talking Cain Labs making them... then we'll see."

[0perator]

"I could get behind that," Alia said.

"I can cross-check but according to X at least the records are pretty spotty from around Dr. Cain's death. There was an attempt at dissolving the company at the same time the government wanted to gain control of the assembly plants. There could be hundreds of Cain Numbers unaccounted for."

[dr_rock_light]

Rock swore colorfully. "Well... we'll see. Hopefully Sigma didn't manage to unearth one of Doc Wily's old fortresses. Then this could really get messy."

The last thing he needed was to fight a virus riddled Robot Master. Sigma would think it was hysterical. But Rock would not.

[0perator]

"Why? Can't you navigate all of them with your eyes closed and both hands behind your back? Or was that one of your little old fart exaggerations?" Alia said, though she started cross-referencing the area with past owners just to see. History had unearthed a whole list of dummy corporations and false identities that Wily had used to do business under. Who knew what could be hiding in the basement?

[dr_rock_light]

"Sure. Dealing with Masters is one thing. Dealing with virus-ridden Masters is a completely different ballgame. No one has seen it, and none of the sims agree on how something with code that old would react to the virus," Rock said, making a face at the thought.

"Besides, knowing Sigma, he probably would unearth like an entire goony bot army and infect those with the virus too just for fun. Oh boy, maverick mettaurs and baton-tons. Just what I wanted to spend my day with."