Paladin could hardly believe what he was hearing, but Hephaestus had made himself quite clear. The enigmatic mechanoid now had the measure of the Hunters Organization, and the results emboldened him.
Titan had already departed, accompanied by a full detachment of Caretaker's 'toy soldiers', thirty deceased humans linked now to Titan's communications system. They would arrive in Minneapolis's downtown area, dropping from above into the heart of the newly remodeled Target Field in the middle of a baseball game.
Minnesota was home to a full compliment of Hunters, five Class C Hunters commanded by a lone Class B Hunter by the name of Aquanis. Their operations center was directly down the street from the stadium; Titan would face them down before all of the humans could be killed.
Paladin had known that this assault was in the master's plan, but originally, Shinobi was going to accompany Titan and keep hidden, ambushing the Hunters when they showed up to take on Titan and the soldiers. Hephaestus no longer felt Shinobi was necessary.
Despite the master's assurances, Paladin feared they were sending Titan to his death. He wasn't alone in this thought, either. He sat across the table from Orbous in the war room, both mechanoids lost in thought.
"X will now be ready for another attack," Orbous hissed. "It is too soon. The master should abort this mission."
"I agree, but we both now know he will not," Paladin replied. "He is confident in Titan's skill."
"Shinobi's part in the plan was logical, perfect in fact. It played to his skills. Now where has the master sent him?"
"With Poseidon, to one of the old Wily compounds," Paladin said. "He said there was a capsule there that he wanted to recover." Orbous tapped the table impatiently. "Any word from Titan?"
"He's maintaining comms silence," Orbous groused. "Not wise at all. I have no eyes onboard, so I have no idea how far away they are yet." Paladin rose, pacing the room's length. "Then again, with heightened security around the major metropolitan areas, perhaps the silence is best for now."
Paladin continued pacing up and down the room. "Something is wrong here. The master would not change his plans on a mere whim. There must be something very special about that pod they're after. I wish the master had told me more about it." Orbous grunted, pushing a small button on the table. A panel slid open in front of him, and a holographic display lit up before him as he typed away at the unveiled keyboard in the tabletop.
"Do you remember which compound it was?"
"The fifth one," Paladin said. "If you find anything of interest, contact me." Orbous just grunted again, his attention fixed on the computer now. Paladin strode out of the war room, into the silent antechamber.
He found himself wondering if all of his new master's plans might be as doomed as the exploits of his creator, Dr. Wily.
The bomb bay doors began to open on their hydraulic arms, the riptide of cool air rushing in over Titan. His mind was clear as he surveyed the zombie-like troopers Caretaker had crafted. Unlike his ally Paladin, Titan had no qualms with humans being used in such a fashion. They were already dead, and if they hadn't been, who cared? Humans were weak, pathetic things, after all.
There had only ever been three humans whom Titan respected; Dr. Light, Dr. Wily, and Rock, known better as Megaman. Titan knew what had happened to that young man, though, and he actually felt a small amount of pity for Rock. He'd been a boy in a metal suit once, nothing more. By the time the Wily campaigns were over, Rock was more machine than human.
A timer went off in Titan's head, and he stomped up to the edge of the bay doors. "Ten seconds," he said aloud, counting down in his head. Savage glee and anticipation coursed through his system. When he reached the end of his countdown, he launched himself out, the troopers following right behind.
A symphony of destruction was about to begin.
See this now, friends, and see it well. Shy not away, for though what you are about to witness is obscene, it is necessary. See Shinobi cleave an armed human guard's head in half, one of his vibro-knives slicing clean through the top of the head and out of the neck, the face sliding wetly off as the body catches up a moment later, slumping forward. Listen to the splatter as Poseidon's fist barrels out through the other human's stomach, having worked a course through his back, intestines flopping to the ground. The last word this man speaks is the name of his only child.
See them very well.
Watch as the ninja mechanoid throws a set of keys, pilfered from his victim's pocket, to his larger comrade. There will be no more death here this afternoon, as these ruins have long ago been declared without value. Take what measure of comfort you can knowing that the victims here number only two.
Poseidon uses one of the keys on a nearby console to deactivate the force dome barring their entry into the ruins of Wily's fifth compound. The ancient engines powering the dome will never kick on again.
The mechanoid servants of Hephaestus stalk through the wreckage. They move swiftly, locating the capsule in less than thirty minutes. It is a curious thing, this pod. There's room enough for a reploid inside, but the only thing visible through the translucent green glass is a mechanical arm.
Both mechanoids are familiar with the arm, and they flinch at the sight of it. They each grab an end of the capsule, and carry it back to the featureless black van they arrived in. Setting it in the back, they then clamber up into the cab of the vehicle, driving slowly to the hidden transporter pad they arrived at when coming to the island.
In a flash of light, they are gone. The corpses they left in their wake will not be discovered for three days.
When the emergency comms line started to chime, X clicked a button and immediately brought the link online. "X here," he said quickly. The reploid facing him was a tiger-like man, his blue optics flashing.
"Major Trislash, Minneapolis Center, Midwest Ops," the other officer replied. He was calm, collected, a veteran of the Hunters Organization. "We have Maverick activity, Target Field. I've sent three of my men. The other two and myself will join them shortly."
"Visual feeds?"
"I have two running. There's one enormous bot commanding drones like the ones in your all-points report from New York City. Full-scale assault. One of my men just went down under the big man's fists. Sir, he really does look like a serious customer. I believe we can handle him, though."
"Negative," X barked at the major. "You will not engage! I'm coming to you now! Be ready for me in two minutes with your other officers."
Less than a minute later, X rushed into the main transport chamber, rattling off his desired coordinates. The pad energized, hurling him in the blink of an eye halfway across the country to downtown Minneapolis. As he rematerialized, he found himself looking at major Triclaw, who had donned his exo-chassis armor and a gatling laser to attach to one of the shoulder brackets.
A veteran who knows how to prepare himself, X thought. Thank Light! "Sit-rep," X said, letting Triclaw lead the way towards the entrance of the operations building.
"Most of the humans are dead or escaped, but the big man is holding about fifty people hostage, demanding X be brought to him."
"Hostages? That's unusual."
"I think Skyblaze managed to wound this guy before he was slagged, put a crimp in his plans. Most of the drones are down, too. Sir, if all four of us storm the stadium, this guy won't stand a chance."
"Neither will the hostages."
"Acceptable losses," Triclaw said flatly. X grabbed the slightly larger reploid by the shoulder, spun him around, and punched him square in the side of the face. Triclaw went down in a heap, his two subordinates training their own wrist cannons on X as he took a ready stance. Triclaw held up a hand to his men, who lowered their weapons slowly. "I deserved that," Triclaw said, rubbing his face as he stood. "I apologize, commander. I shouldn't let myself think like that."
"You're damned right you shouldn't," X shouted. "The next time I hear or see you blatantly disregard human safety, I'll have you discharged from the Hunters and branded a Maverick! Am I understood?!"
"Yes, sir," Triclaw and his two men said in unison. Triclaw started to walk alongside X again, heading for the exit. "The big man calls himself Titan. The last thing we got from my live feed before he destroyed it was him saying 'Tell X to come to Titan, to meet his doom'. Whoever he is, he's not in any of the database archives we've got access to."
"Possibly a Sigma loyalist we missed before," X said, pushing open the doors leading to the street. The nearby roads had already been cordoned off by human police, a good sign. The people of Minneapolis seemed to have their act together. "Give me a display of the video."
Triclaw's left optic flashed orange, projecting a recorded segment of the live feed he'd watched minutes earlier. In the middle of the ravaged field towered a huge yellow and black mechanoid, modeled after a giant of Greek mythos. The name certainly made sense. The bot lobbed grenades from a wrist-mounted cannon and hurled slabs of earth and stones to kill stragglers. X watched him scoop up one of Triclaw's men and rip the reploid apart with his bare hands.
From above, a winged Hunter, the phoenix-like Skyblaze, tore down into Titan, blasting the giant with several Hellfire missiles before peppering him with small arms bullets from a rifle mounted on his back. Swooping down, Skyblaze got too close, and Titan punched his fist through Skyblaze's chest, tearing out all manner of circuits, wires and his main life tank.
After that, though, Titan's other arm hung dead at his side. X could just make out a ragged gap in Titan's left shoulder on the video playback. "End the feed," he ordered. Triclaw took a step back, standing at the ready. "Okay, here's how we're going to play this," he said quietly.
Titan tried once again to lift his left arm, and was rewarded with a twitch in one finger and sparks belching out of the wound. The miserable bird had landed a solid salvo, wounding Titan before he could even square off against X. This mission had already taken a step in the wrong direction. What was worse, when he tried to activate the single-unit teleporter device he'd been given by master Hephaestus, he discovered that one of the bird's bullets had hit it, rendering his escape impossible. Titan would have to fight his way clear of Minneapolis, or highjack the nearest available teleporter down the street at the local Hunter Operations Center.
The confidence he'd felt when dropping from the plane had taken a huge hit. He wasn't sure now whether or not he really wanted to fight X. A voice coming from a megaphone behind him drew Titan around. "Titan," the voice called. The huge mechanoid used his optic scan, and found himself looking at a bulky, tiger-man reploid decked out in a crimson transteel hauberk, a gatling laser mounted to the shoulder. His right hand held a megaphone at his side, long gleaming claws jutting from the fingertips of his left hand. Flanking him were two more Hunters, both reminiscent of images Titan had seen of Drill Man, one orange and the other a mix of black and red.
"Where is X," Titan bellowed, the human hostages cowering behind him, backed by the four remaining drone soldiers.
"A message has been sent to him," the tiger-man replied through the megaphone. "He will come if you let the hostages go."
"I refuse," Titan barked back immediately. His left shoulder sparked again, to his dismay. My bargaining position is not so good right now, he thought. "X comes, or they all die!"
"If you want a fight, I'll take you on," the reploid called, shushing his subordinates as they began to object. Titan felt something stir in his mind. This reploid was wearing exo-armor; did that mean the Hunter was afraid? Perhaps Titan could handle this one without trouble. Perhaps this is all that remains, he thought. I might have already slain the best their ops center here had!
Confidence renewed, Titan took a lumbering step toward the armored reploid.
"Very well then, little man! Let's see what you're made of!"
X had hoped this gamble would pay off, and thus far, it had. The Tunnel Brothers, the pair of Hunters who had remained with Triclaw at the ops center for X's arrival, had even added in their own tweak to the plan, which they took to as soon as Triclaw shushed them.
They had fallen back into the shadows of a dugout as soon as they'd played their part. Using their programmed abilities, both Hunters plowed through the dugout wall with the drills on their heads, burrowing under the field. When they were behind the humans and drones, they would quietly unearth themselves and lead the humans away.
X waited with his cannon set to sniper mode, one eye trained on a locked target, the other on Triclaw and Titan. Situated behind the scoreboard, he was hidden perfectly. As soon as Titan swung a wild haymaker punch that Triclaw jumped over, X fired at the first drone.
It went down like a sack of hammers. On the field, Triclaw was backing away and firing his gatling laser at Titan. A translucent energy shield flickered around the bigger bot as it kicked out at Triclaw, who moved much too fast to be caught by the attack.
X quickly dispatched the other three drones with small sniper shots, making his way quickly down off of the scoreboard, into the seats. Racing down the steps leading to the edge of the field, he saw that a few humans had noticed the dead drones, and they were spreading the word quietly to the others.
By the time X got down onto the field proper, Titan had managed to land a solid punch to Triclaw, who was thrown back by the blow. His exo-armor was cracked from the lone strike, but the tiger-like reploid was instantly back on his feet.
X saw the ground behind the humans tumble open, the Tunnel Brothers quickly and quietly leading them away from the pitched battle. X ran toward them, charging his Mega Buster Cannon.
A mistake.
The energy output fluctuations from his charging cannon caught the attention of the giant mechanoid, who bellowed with rage as the humans followed the Tunnel Brothers out of the stadium. Behind Titan, Triclaw took the distraction and buried his claws several inches into Titan's thick armor chassis. Titan looked down at Triclaw and grabbed him by the leg, crushing it into a metal lump. Triclaw hollered, and a moment later was thrown into a low wall of the field, his claws bent from being dislodged so hastily.
X took aim at Titan from twenty yards away, his targeting system locking on as the giant stampeded towards him. He fired the charged shot. In a flash the shot struck, pummeling Titan back onto the ground, leaving a furrow in his wake.
X began charging another shot, but Titan was not only large and strong, he was durable. X could see that his charged shot had only done moderate damage to the enormous bot. He fired again as Titan came back at him, but the lumbering behemoth managed to sidestep the blast, just barely.
Titan launched a scooping kick, catching X up under his slightly protruding chest plate. The force of the impact knocked him skyward, tumbling back down ten yards back. As he groaned and rose to his feet, Titan threw another haymaker, this time landing the blow.
Rockets burst in X's head as he fell to the side. Reacting out of instinct, he raised his arm and fired the charged shot.
Titan's turn for a mistake, having stepped right into the blast while readying himself to stomp the smaller mechanoid. Titan's right leg and part of his belly vaporized in sparks and charred scrap, and he toppled over right next to X.
The two combatants lay perpendicular to one another, each taking a moment to let their mind go blank, just long enough to consider the damage. X rolled over and stuttered upright, and just as he was about to level his cannon for another shot, Triclaw landed on Titan's chest, claws flashing down. There was a scrape, an ozone scent, and then a grunt as major Triclaw used his battered claws to saw through Titan's neck and spine cable.
The major kicked the severed head aside and collapsed atop his felled opponent. X let himself drop to his knees in relief.
Elsewhere, far away but watching the spectacle, Hephaestus punched his hand through a viewscreen monitor.
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