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| The Megaman Era; A New Story | |
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| Tweet Topic Started: Oct 31 2007, 02:53 PM (195 Views) | |
| Hardman | Oct 31 2007, 02:53 PM Post #1 |
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That Hard Guy
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28XX "What are we looking for down here?" "What do we ever look for in ruins like this?" "Okay, fine, but what KIND are we looking for? I mean, just so I know, in case I see it before you do." "According to Withers, there's an old Mechaniloid down here. Could be part of something bigger. Withers says he never saw anything like it before." "Wait, WITHERS has never seen anything like it before?" "Exactly! This could be the find of our lives!" "Could be the Blueprint. That'd be awesome, huh, Leo?" Leo smiled involuntarily. His little brother had a habit of being idealistic. "I doubt it, Ren. Nobody knows what the Blueprint is, and I doubt its some old Mechaniloid." Ren kicked an old piece of metal. "You're always raining on my parade." Leo chuckled. "Hey, you never know, though, right? Let's take a look for ourselves. At the very least we'll get to eat tonight." They worked their way down, rappelling down walls of solid stone. This area had obviously been carved out of the mountain with some sort of purpose. Probably some old mining operation, back before ancient Neo Arcadian laws had made these kinds of excavations illegal. "Man, this place is dusty," Ren coughed. "How old do you think this shaft is?" Leo shrugged. "No idea. Maybe it's from before the Rise." Ren considered this as they made their way carefully down. "That'd make this place over 500 years old!" Leo grinned. "Almost 600 years, bro. The Rise of Weil was near the beginning of the 2200's." "Oh yeah." More time passed as they sank into the darkness. Eventually, Leo's feet hit solid ground, and a quick check with his flashlight told him that a massive hallway opened up before him. Ren arrived at his side. "Should we get ready?" Ren asked. "I mean, can't be too careful and all that." Leo nodded, reaching into the single pouch at his side and drawing out a large, ornate metal carving. "You recharged before we left home, right? There's no sunlight down here to keep us going if you didn't." Ren nodded. "Yeah, don't worry about me," he said, drawing a similar carving from his own pouch. Leo looked at his carving, took a deep breath, and slowly breathed out. "Arbalest, Rock ON!" Light engulfed the older of the brothers if only for an instant, and suddenly he was wearing dull green armor, a shoulder mounted cannon obscuring some of his vision on his right side, and his arms slightly heavier for the twin vulcan guns that now rested on his forearms, under his hands. Despite the apprent bulkiness, Leo didn't feel any heavier. Such were the wonders of the technology of the era. "Cipher, Rock ON!" Ren said next to him, and an instant later he wore sea green armor. Less bulkier than Leo's, it gave the impression of speed. Ren twirled a pair of pistols, both humming with energy, and holstered them before checking to make sure his beam knives were where they were supposed to be on his belt. Ren grinned. "That is always SO cool." Leo tried to keep professional, but couldn't help the shiver of excitement that ran down his back. He set his visor into place, the hallway before him lighting up in greenish hues under the night-vision setting. Ren set a similar visor into place, and the two began moving forward carefully. "This place is HUGE," Ren breathed. "What was it for?" Leo made a face his little brother failed to notice. "Couldn't have been a mining operation. This hallway is cut clean. No irregularities. Almost like it was made with a laser." "Hang on," Ren said. "I've got something big... Dead ahead. Do you see it?" Leo looked forward. There was, indeed, something big in front of them. It looked for all the world like a gigantic piston. "Must be some old mining equipment..." Leo said as they got closer. "Can't imagine why it's just here in the middle of nowhwere." "So this is what Withers was talking about?" Ren asked. "That is so lame..." Leo was about to agree when his ears picked up a hum. Something had just turned on. He looked at the big piston. "Ren... what's it doing?" Ren, who'd been complaining too loudly to notice the noise, stopped and looked at the big machine. "Um... I'm not sure..." Near the top of the piston, in a spot that seemed bare before, a giant lid rolled back to reveal a massive eye. The hum of power grew louder. "What in the world?" Leo almost shouted. The thing launched itself into the air. 5 tons of ancient technology, all focused around a singular piston, and more specifically for dropping all of that weight on a target. Ren shouted a word Leo was sure he shouldn't approve of before launching himself backwards, small boosters in his legs flaring with light that blinded them both with their night-vision visors as he sailed backwards. The ground shook as the ancient machine came down. By the time Leo regained his vision, however, it was already squatting low to launch itself again, this time with the eye looking at him. It took to the air, and Leo leapt forward, passing under it as it came closer to the ground. It landed with tremendous force behind him, knocking him off his feet. He scrambled to get back up, and heard his brother shout something barely comprehensible. Something in his brain told him to shut off his night-vision barely a moment before Ren lit his flare. Bright light illuminated the chamber, and now they could see the machine without any filters. It was a rusted red, and it creaked when it turned to look at Ren before launching itslef into the air with a thunderous noise. Ren dashed out of the way, drawing his pistols and loosing a few rounds at the ancient machine. The plasma bullets flashed as they impacted on the thing's hide, but left no visible marks. Leo caught his breath. "This thing is tough for an old machine..." He watched as it turned and flew into the air again, bracing himself for the tremor its landing would bring. "It doesn't seem to have any other weapons than just trying to squash us!" he shouted to his brother, who was running away again. "Fat lotta good that does me!" Ren shouted. "It doesn't NEED any other weapons! How about some help over here?" Leo raised his arms, pulling into the triggers on his vulcans. A flurry of small plasma bullets sailed through the air, raining onto the big piston like so much rain, and about as effective. "The big gun!" Ren shouted as the machine launched into the air again. He made a mad dash away from its landing zone, barely avoiding a somewhat flat death. "USE THE BIG GUN!" "Keep him busy!" Leo shouted back. Ren almost cried. On the back of his armored boots, four heavy spikes sank into the ground, driven through the rock by small engines. Leo crouched low, using his right hand to bring his shoulder-mounted cannon down to aim it. With his left hand, he flicked the sight out, and began to make fine adjustments to his aim as he groped around on his belt for a canister marked 'HEAT' that he placed into the base of the cannon. The machine flew into the air again, barely missing his little brother. "Say cheese," Leo grimaced as he fired the shot. The now empty canister of reactive agent shot out the back of the cannon, burying itself deeply into the floor. The kick of the weapon was absorbed by both Leo's low position and the spikes that held him upright in his legs. The projectile, a blend of both plasma and the reactive high explosive anti tank compund, slammed into and then through the side of the ancient machine. The force of the blow wasn't enough to knock it over; it's base was too large for that, but there was a lot of creaking and tearing metal noise as the HEAT shot blew through vital systems and then out the other side. The hum of power died. The machine stood silent again. Leo stood up, the spikes retracting into his boots. "Well, that was more fun than we bargained for." Ren was breathing heavily. "Some days... not every day. but SOME days... I really HATE being a Megaman." Leo laughed, looking around the hallway now in the bright light of the flare. He noticed a large gate on the wall that had been behind the giant piston machine. "Looks like we hit paydirt." Ren caught his glance and also saw the gate. "Cool. About time I got to do something." He walked over to the gate and put a hand on it. Flickers of light and electricity danced over his hand and the gate. After a few short moments, he took his hand off it, frowning. "What's wrong?" Leo asked. "It isn't even locked," Ren complained. "All this way, that big bodyguard, and now there isn't even a LOCK? What the hell? It's like some idiot WANTED us to come through here." "Or someone," Leo nodded. This was all too strange. "Does this remind you of anything?" "Should it?" Leo thought about it for a moment. "Didn't something like this happen a few years back? One of the Explorer's air ships wasnear the arctic and they found some sort of underwater facility?" "Oh, yeah," Ren said, snapping his fingers. "That old water purification place?" "Yeah, and they said that they found a gate there, no lock, and all that was beyond it was a short hallway and a room." "Did they find anything IN that room?" Ren asked, his sense for treasure and money becoming interested. Leo shook his head. "Not according to the official reports. But there's a rumor I heard that they DID find something, but Babylon confiscated it and swore all of them to secrecy on pain of death." Ren sighed. "Yeah, that sounds like something Babylon would do." Leo smiled. "Well, it can't hurt to look, right? I mean, we've come this far." Ren nodded, pushing the gate open. It opened upwards, ratcheting into the ceiling with a series of clicks. Like Leo had said, there was a short hallway, and another gate at the end. The two walked in silence as they approached the gate, glancing at each other and ready for anything as they opened the second gate. It turns out, however, that they were not ready for anything. Or at least, not for what was beyond the gate. "That's... That's big." Ren said, looking at the hulk in the middle of the room. "Dead?" Leo asked. "After that last thing? Let's hope so." They approached cautiously. It was old, no doubt about it. Hundreds of years had passed since the battle in here had taken place. Small craters still pitted the room, and rubble from shattered boulders lay everywhere. The massive metal thing in the middle was scored with plasma burns, and parts of its arms and legs exhibited explosion damage. The face was blank, eyes dull and lifeless over a peculiar, blocky jaw. "This is no normal Mechaniloid..." Leo breathed. "This guy was something entirely different." Ren was giving the form a more critical look, and his gaze fell on a set of numbers and letters etched onto the back of the head. "Hey, bro? What does DLN-004 mean?" "No clue," Leo admitted. "We should get this thing back to Withers. He'll probably know more than we do." "He usually does," Ren agreed. |
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MM3: Hardman XBOX LIVE: Payer 404 | |
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| Hardman | Oct 31 2007, 11:34 PM Post #2 |
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That Hard Guy
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"Tell me something, my friend... How close are we?" "We have been unable to locate the Blueprint yet, my Lord." "Clues?" "Hope believes he's onto something, but I'm not sure." "What do you mean by 'something'?" The man hesitated, kneeling on the red carpet with his head bowed low to avoid the gaze of the being before him. "I do not quite understand the details, my Lord. Hope can explain his theories better than I. I am, after all, only a reploid." "Yes," the being nodded slowly. "You are not a Megaman, like Hope. Like me." He heaved a sigh, causing the other man to break out in a sweat. "Send for Hope at once. I would like to see him now." "Yes, my Lord," the sweating man said, nodding and bowing as he let himself out of the room. The other man turned back to the window, looking out over the land he ruled. It was not long before a different man, this one much more confident, strolled into the room. Soft features and long, blue hair snapped back into a ponytail gave the handsome impression of a kind man. "My Lord Advent," he nodded, "I am here." "Megaman Hope," the one known as Advent smiled. "My most trusted advisor. My favorite general. Tell me something. You have a good head for numbers. Do you remember, at last count, how many Megamen we know of? How many Megamen exist in the Babylon databases?" Hope cracked a slight smile. An easy challenge. "Sir, at last count, there were 1,734 active Megamen in known space." Advent chuckled. "And of those, how many have sworn complete loyalty to Babylon? To me?" "330," Hope said with a slight nod. Another easy question. "And how many more work for me unwittingly?" "My latest figures put the number at close to a thousand, Lord Advent." The man clapped his hands together. "Wonderful! I do so love to hear those numbers. Once the Blueprint is discovered, of course, they shall all answer to me, but I shall be content with the vast majority for the time being." "Jaspers tells me you wish to hear my theories on the Blueprint, Lord," Hope said, his tone level. Relaxed. "Indeed, Megaman Hope. I wish to hear everything that brilliant mind of yours has concieved." Hope grinned, fully aware that the appeal to his ego was intended. In some ways, Megaman Advent disgusted him with his lack of subtlety, but there was no denying the power the man could weild if he so wished. Power like his only came around every so often, and it was only ever at the disposal of those who would lead. "The technology that our agents confiscated from the Explorers in the arctic is ancient, of course. It predates everything we've ever seen. Aside from a somewhat simplistic appearance, the machine itslef is... poorly kept. It was apparently left there after some sort of battle, and was defeated by a series of brutal electric shocks..." Hope's mind flashed back to when he'd first seen the machine. Dressed in some sort of blue covering that acted as both insulator and armor, much of the internal mechanisms had been fried. "Anything interesting inside of our ancient friend?" Advent probed. Hope knew what he wanted to know. Weapons systems were valuable, especially ancient ones. Ones an enemy might know nothing about. However, honesty forced him to shake his head. "No, my Lord. All I could glean from the burned out internals was some sort of ice weaponry. I set it aside to attempt to rebuild later, but the inside was not what interested me. It was the outside. Something that appeared to be a serial number of some sort." "Anything that might link our lost friend to the Blueprint?" Advent asked, his interest focusing like the edge of a laser blade. Hope tread carefully. Disappointment had a tendancy to make Advent... upset. "My Lord, I feel I must remind you that everything I know about the Blueprint is extrapolation. Merely the logical conversion of prophetic statements to historic correlations." "'It is the origin of everything. The first, the last.'" Advent hissed, quoting a passage of a prophecy etched into the minds of every Megaman the Solar System over. Hope sighed almost imperceptibly. "Yes, my Lord. Taken in full, I believe that the Blueprint is actually the source of the Megamen. Maybe the first Megaman." Advent thought about this. "And this has what to do with the serial number?" Hope's mind hitched in an attempt to change gears the way Advent had. "The serial number on the ancient machine reads 'DLN-005.' Admittedly, this is a different three letter code than the other machine we found in those odd ruins beneath the repliforest outside of the fortress gates. That robot also had a serial number, 'DWN-016', but I'm almost certain there's some sort of connection." Advent's eyes glazed over as Hope spoke. Something about the conversation had been uninteresting to him. When he opened his mouth, Hope stayed silent. "Megamen... we have existed for millenia. The natural evolution of humanity. Time passes, and our numbers grow. And, in order to unite this world, this galaxy, the Megamen must unite under one banner. My banner. But to do that... I must weild the Blueprint. It must be mine." His distance gaze turned hot and angry. "Find it, Hope. Find it before some lucky idiot discovers it. Whatever it takes." Hope merely smiled and stepped calmly from the room, quickening his pace as soon as he was sure he was out of sight. The communicator on his waist rumbled for attention. "Hope," he said shortly, picking it up. "Sir, it's Jaspers," said a somehwat nervous voice on the other end. "One of our agents says he's got something for us." "I'm not in the mood for another wild goose chase, Jaspers. This had better be good," Hope growled, almost able to imagine the shiver the sound sent down Jaspers's spine. "He assures me this is real, sir. He's never been wrong before." "Very well. Prep the transserver. I'll be there in five." |
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MM3: Hardman XBOX LIVE: Payer 404 | |
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2:23 PM Jul 11