The four cyborgs turned out to only have two things in common. First, they were all from Miami. Second, they'd all been abducted in their sleep. Beyond that, nothing bound them to one another before their transformations at the hands of a mechanoid they called Caretaker.
Each had awoken alone in an otherworldly operations theater, chained to a surgical bed. Tubes and machines were hooked into them, and searing pain tore like a wild buffalo through their bodies. Eventually, a bot hewn in the form of a shambling metal ghoul or zombie came in, smiling through rotted human lips glued to his face, arms swathed in gauze bandages.
This apparition greeted them, told them each that they were going to be one of his new 'toys', and oh weren't they going to have fun? Saying he'd live up to his name, Caretaker, he taken care of the humans and made them better, stronger, more like himself.
X didn't need to hear them out, but he listened as he recorded video of the underside of the prison execution table. He was so engrossed with the tale that he didn't notice when one of the males sprinted toward the shed entryway and stomped on something.
The woman, Patricia, stopped speaking, and X finally looked away from the table. One of the men, a tall, gangly fellow with half of his skull showing, plated in metal with a baleful red optic where an eye had been, was holding something in his hand. To X, it looked like a mechanical dragonfly.
"May I see that," he asked, reaching out for it. The young cyborg handed it over, then stood awkwardly with his companions. X turned the crushed metal bug this way and that, casting a careful eye upon it. "I'm going to take this with me," he pronounced, standing on trembling legs. "The four of you should get out of here, and get to the local authorities. They can help you."
Without waiting for a response, X used his transport return program, blissfully undamaged in the beating he'd taken, disappearing in a streak of hazy blue light.
Orbous hadn't before sought out the master's attention individually, mainly as a result of never being given cause to panic. When he burst into the war room, the crimson and red mechanoid turned from his maps on the holoscreen wall and gave him a curious look. "Orbous?"
"They spotted the tracking camera drone," Orbous hissed. "One of the hybrids stepped on it before I could order it away."
"These things happen," Hephaestus said with a shrug.
"He'll be far more watchful now," Orbous said. "And he may have the transmissions analyzed."
"Let him," said the master distantly. "The type of signal used is ancient by reploids' standards. He'll never know what to look for." Orbous deigned not to say anything more. If the master were half as clever as Orbous thought him to be, then what he'd claimed was of course true. X would not find out how to read the transmissions. "Orbous, he has just over three days to find this Manor. He has no time to waste."
Orbous considered this, mentally accepting the master's assessment. Frustrating though it was to lose one of his precious cameras, Orbous conceded that nothing could be done for it.
He left his master in peace, then.
The mechanic shook his head, surveying the damage done to X this time. Whoever the commander of the Hunters was fighting, they were clearly tough as nails. He'd been hearing recently about the attacks around the country, the death of dozens of Hunters in battle. Whoever the Mavericks were this time around, they knew how to fight like demons.
He began by plugging X's cerebral processor into his system. Using access panels on X's arms, legs, and chest, he opened the reploid up. The internal damage was just as bad. He looked over to his dog, a heavy Labrodore laying on a doggie bed near his desk.
"We might be here a while, Roger," he said, turning then to his tools.
"That one's easy," Megaman said to X as they strolled through a simulated city park. "'Lost in the mane of the one-eyed horse', it's a reference to Four-One, the first cybernetically enhanced horse allowed to compete in racing competitions. There's a statue of it in Central Park, New York City."
"I'm not looking forward to going back there any time soon," X murmured. "I haven't got much choice, though. I have one stop to make before I head there, though. It's on the way to HQ."
"Marlow?"
"Yes. I want his take on this mechanical bug one of the cyborgs spotted and flattened. I think it may have been a surveillance unit or something similar."
"Can't identify it?"
"No, but I have my suspicions. You can access my visual records, right?"
"Your mechanic locked off most of your system for the time being," Megaman said. "No worries, he does this all of the time. For a small shop, the man knows how to do his thing." Megaman led X onto a narrow side track through the woods. "I imagine Marlow will be able to help."
"Yeah. You know, I didn't like him when I first met him. Now, I would almost consider him a friend."
"You share a common trauma, a common enemy," Megaman said. "And you both cling to the past, in different ways."
"How do you mean?"
"Well, for Marlow it's history, outdated technology, antique furniture, and the like. For you it's the Sigma and Wily campaigns, and human wars. I've seen your research runs in your spare time, you know. You are a warrior at heart."
"What's wrong with being a soldier?" Megaman stopped walking then, and waggled a finger at X.
"I didn't say soldier, I said warrior. There is a distinct difference." X just rolled one finger forward in a 'go on' gesture. "A warrior waits with building anticipation for battle. Without the threat or promise of conflict, when they are surrounded by peace, they get bored. The worst ones go looking for a fight."
"And a soldier?"
"A soldier goes about the business mostly of keeping the peace, serving their citizenry, and generally keeping order in place in times of peace. They are efficient, and in times of war, they prepare not in the excitement of battle, but in the hope of returning to peace. There are other distinctions, but the most important one comes to this; warriors seek war when at peace, and soldiers seek peace when at war."
As X continued his walk with Megaman in cyberspace, he pondered the theory. After a while, he concluded that he was in fact a warrior, who wanted to be a soldier.
X's left leg shook nervously as he looked around to see if he was being watched. After dropping off the mechanical bug at Marlow's, he'd taken the teleporter on his building's rooftop to Central Park. X could walk up to the statue easily enough, but it stood on a pedestal five feet high. He'd never see the top of its head from the ground.
With the recent attacks, every human in New York City would be jumpy at the sight of a mechanoid, be they reploid or otherwise. He even noticed that there were no maintenance bots around as the sun began to climb towards its usual 9 am mark.
He would stick out like a zebra in a family portrait if anyone cared to look his way.
X activated the thrusters in his boots, inching his way upward slowly, still sweeping the area visually for trouble. He had to be wary of anymore traps surrounding Hephaestus's clues. He could ill afford another lengthy repair; time was running out to find the Wily Manor.
When he could finally see the top of the statue horse's head, X saw that a small datapad had been fixed there with a velcro pad. He snatched it up and turned off his thrusters, landing with a clank.
X touched the screen, which sprang to life, showing a simple word message. 'Go to Halif's Meats on 42nd Street. Ask for Georgie. Then ask Georgie for his number. When you have done this, hit the orange 'next' button. Not too early; these messages will permanently delete when you hit 'next'.
X didn't want to be in New York, but it seemed he had no choice.
It had taken an hour to get to the butcher shop by way of avoiding major throngs of people. It was the Big Apple; most folks went unseen all the time, but he was the only reploid around.
Weaving in and out of alleys and side streets, X brushed through an open doorway into Halif's Meats. Behind the counter stood a sweaty, rotund man of middling age, the stains of blood on his white apron stabbing his vision.
"Excuse me, I'm looking for Georgie," X asked hesitantly. The man rammed his cleaver into a cutting board and walked through a rubber curtain, sputtering curses in Polish as he went. A minute later, a man looking similar enough to be the shopkeep's brother emerged, wearing similar garb.
"Yes, whatchou want, robot," the man groused.
"I have been instructed to ask for your number," X said slowly. The human blanched, taking a step back and looking around nervously.
"Nine," said Georgie. "Now go away, no more robots! Georgie never want to see robot in here again!" X left, pulling up the datapad after memorizing the first number.
He hit the next button, and read the second prompt. 'Go to Lightning Comics on 19th Street and find out which issue number of Ogos they will not sell.' X groaned aloud. He didn't have time for this scavenger hunt!
Yet as he ran along the sidewalks towards 19th Street, he realized something. Both clues thus far had been numbers. Hephaestus might be giving him coordinates!
It was nearly four in the afternoon when X got to the fifth direction. 'Now head to Detroit, and find the number marked on the desk of the city's head civil engineer.' X could have screamed.
He had either a latitude or a longitude now, but this game was taking too long. He had just over two days to get all of the remaining numbers, and he would only have access to some of them at limited times, he suspected.
Even using teleporter technology, he couldn't hope to get to a government employee's desk before business hours ended. Using the return device and then the teleporter to go to Detroit would take at least five minutes, at which point he'd have to find out where the head engineer was for Detroit. He didn't know how long that would take, but even if he got the location quickly, he'd never catch the man in time to see his office or the desk in question.
Unless, of course, he broke in. He would have no legal excuse for such action; by keeping the Hunters' Organization entirely out of the loop, he'd robbed himself of a possibly very useful tool.
What to do? And nothing said that the rest of the numbers would all be in Detroit, either. There might be only one or two. Then what?
X didn't know. He would have to break the law this late afternoon, it seemed, if he wanted to find out.
"He'll never get the rest of the numbers in time," Paladin said evenly. He had managed to completely control his emotions for the last few hours, though terror edged close, a snarling, snapping beast that ranged close to the campfire at which sat his logical mind. The fire burned brightest when in his lord's presence, as he was now, the two mechanoids enjoying more wine.
"He may surprise us yet," Hephaestus replied. He sloshed his wine a little. "You may wonder why we never get drunk, no matter how much of this stuff we ingest."
"The thought had crossed my mind."
"Our brains aren't organic, for one thing," the crimson and white mechanoid said. "Secondly, the way in which our artificial stomachs process bio-organic material is not the same as a human. Our units break every last particle down, transforming everything into storable, usable energy. The only waste we emit is a trace amount of carbons through our back vents."
"Curious, and most efficient, master. One would think the humans could benefit from such technology."
"Oh, indeed they would," said Hephaestus. "They would require a host of other minor enhancements and replacements, but they and the world they live in would be far better off for the change. If done at the peak of adolescence, they would practically save their entire species."
Paladin mused on that for a few minutes, not wanting to spoil his master's good humour. He then cleared his throat (an unnecessary but common enough habit) and leaned forward in his seat, saying, "How many will die if he doesn't arrive in time?"
"My estimates come out to around 348 million people, in the initial blasts," Hephaestus said, not looking at Paladin. "Within six months, an additional 217 million due to radiation sickness and other acute complications."
Silence reigned for several long minutes. "Staggering," Paladin finally whispered.
"Yes. A quarter of the world's total population at present. Make no mistake about it, my friend, I will not launch the missiles unless he's late. But the moment time expires, I let Hell take root. Justice must never be hesitant."
The two sat and drank their wine then, letting their banter turn to the casual and mundane. Yet not once during their talk did Paladin let the beast of terror draw closer to the fire. It lurked instead just beyond, close enough to be heard, but far enough to be unseen.
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