Rockman (Megaman) X: Zero/X

[syvia.livejournal.com]

Title: The Cause and the Carrier
Author/Artist: syvia
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: adult language, mild violence, fluff, angst
Word Count: 2047
Summary: Spanning the years, Sigma has ever been a shadow on their lives. No matter who’s to blame, the cancer must be removed.
Notes: Thanks to technological who gave me feedback on characterization, and dusknobody for giving encouragement. Love ya! :D
Prompt: Rockman X, Zero/X: maverickism - the first person to be infected with a new plague is designated case zero, and that's about their chance of recovery



Sigma came back with the feral Reploid.

He was lucky to have come back at all, really- the damage was extensive and it took Dr. Cain six days to repair him.

Six days that X lingered inside the Med Labs helping out, talking with the technicians and generally being inquisitive. On the Sixth day he went to see their new... acquisition.

He stood just outside the door, one hand wrapped around the frame, tilting his head to peek in just a bit- as if looking with only one eye would make it less prohibited. It wasn't that Dr. Cain had forbidden him to come down here but... well, he'd been in operation long enough to know when he was stepping over the line of 'what he should be doing'.

But he was curious.

Beyond the door lay a vestibule with seats and a wall of plate glass that allowed visitors a view of the room beyond. The glass was said to withstand plasma fire at point blank range. The Reploid- some of the Hunters called him the Red Devil- was sprawled, half in, half out of a regeneration pod. X wondered if he was sleeping.

He entered the vestibule and stood just inside the door, knowing he had no business there and feeling a tremble of nervous excitement in his circuits.

What could make a Reploid go feral? Sigma believed he had some form of disease- Dr. Cain kept him in seclusion for the safety of the compound. They didn't know what he had, but they worried he was contagious. It sounded absurd to X, really- they were Reploids. They could be upset, and they could worry, and get angry- but that was emotion, not infection. They could be damaged or malfunction.

But Reploids didn't get sick.

So what was wrong with this one?

X walked up to the wall and put his face close to it- his helmet crystal bumped the glass and he pulled back, smiling, a little embarrassed. The Reploid on the other side picked up his head and looked around. So he was awake. X watched him blink, focus on the wall- on him.

X waved, grinning tenuously. The red Reploid sat up, rolled his neck. The movement caused his long tail of blond hair to wave from side to side. He looked... confused. Not like he was about to charge the glass or snarl or do... what feral things did.

Dr. Cane had said the Reploid was incurable- that he couldn't be helped. X thought he looked fine. Maybe he would prove the doctor wrong.

"Hello," X called through the glass. "What's your name?"

The other Reploid spoke, but X couldn't hear a thing.

"Hello!" he called louder. "What, is, your, name?"

The other Reploid scrunched his face and got off the pod. He walked up to the glass and spoke again. This time, X could sort of read his lips.

What?

Well, when they made plate glass to withstand plasma, soundproofing was a side-effect. Or maybe the room itself was soundproof. He couldn't open the door... Dr. Cane would be angry with him. Still... the red Reploid seemed perfectly normal. Maybe if the doctor saw him like this, he could come out.

X smiled. "Wait right here," he said, making sure to speak slowly and let his mouth form each word carefully. The other Reploid stared at him for a moment, looked around his little room, and then back at X.

He spoke, lips quirked and a wry tilt to his brows. X couldn't quite read his lips.

"What?"

The blond Reploid shook his head, smirking and rolling his eyes.

Okay, he mouthed, nodding.

X smiled again and ran out the door.

***

"Where does he think I'm gonna go?" Zero muttered to himself.

The blue kid came back shortly, an old human in tow. He spoke rapidly to the old man, nothing Zero could make out, although there was a lot of pointing in his direction and the kid looked excited.

The old man held up a hand- patted the kid's armored shoulder. He subsided, smiling, and the human opened a panel in the wall, then extracted a small black box.

"Can you hear me in there?"

Zero jumped, looked up into the corner of his little room- where the speaker was.

"Oh!" the blue kid's voice was audible in the background, "I didn't know that was there."

Zero smirked. "Yeah, I hear you."

"What's your name?" the kid asked into the speaker. The old man smiled tolerantly and waited.

"Zero," he answered.

"How nice to meet you, Zero. My name is Dr. Cain, and this is X." X nodded, grinning, and the doc's eyes grew more serious.

"Yeah, hi." Zero looked around his little room again. "Anyone mind telling me where I am?"

Cain looked at him curiously. X was close enough to the transceiver that his words carried. "See? He's fine. He hasn't done anything bad since he woke up!" Cain was more careful not to speak where Zero would hear it. Whatever he said, X frowned, but left the room.

Zero decided it couldn't hurt to ask. "What did he mean?"

"Well, to answer your first question, Zero, you are in a scientific facility whose primary function is the repair and creation of Reploids. As to the second- I have a question for you."

"Okay."

"What is the last thing you remember?"

Zero blinked. He opened his mouth. He furrowed his brow, thinking, and closed it again. He felt ready to wince as he spoke, "I remember... waking up, and seeing X just a few minutes ago."

Dr. Cain gave him a neutral look. He said nothing, did not show evidence of displeasure, but Zero had a feeling he didn't exactly like the answer.

“So obviously,” Zero looked around, raised his hands and pushed outward, indicating the walls, “I’m in a small room, and there’s no doorknob.”

Dr. Cain raised an eyebrow. “Another question, if you will.”

“Hell, I’m not going anywhere,” he answered, approaching a wall.

“What do you remember of your life before meeting X?”

Zero examined the rectangular line in the wall beside the window, flattened his palm inside the shape and pressed gently, gauging resistance. He thought about the question.

“Nothing,” he decided.

“You do not sound distressed by the fact.”

Zero shrugged and put a little synthetic muscle behind the push. Maybe he could open it, but, “I’m alive, I’m in working order, and nothing bad has happened yet.” Nothing was wrong except for the fact that he was in a little room and he had no idea why. “So what’s bothering you, Doc?”

The doors opened again. In came X, followed by a Reploid twice his height. Zero sized up the newcomer- the appraising look he received in turn, and the slight smile on the tall guy’s face.

“Zero, this is Commander Sigma,” Cain said.

Zero nodded a greeting. Sigma smirked a little more and Zero wasn’t all that sure he liked it. Something weird about it. He wasn’t sure why.

“You don’t recognize him,” Cain said- knowing it, and again, disappointed by the fact.

Zero shook his head. “I should?”

X didn’t look troubled, like Cain, or amused, like Sigma. He smiled, helpful and encouraging, leaned close to the transceiver. “He’s the one who found you.”

He looked at Sigma again, whose smirk was even smirkier, and Zero definitely didn’t like it.

“Found me where?” he stepped back to look at them all, folded his arms in front of his chest.

“We can discuss such things later.” The tall guy spoke, and Zero didn’t like his voice either.

X was talking to Dr. Cain and Zero couldn’t hear it- Cain had turned off the transceiver. Then Sigma added his opinion and X got excited, smiling and nodding. Finally Cain sighed and depressed the button.

“We’re going to let you out, Zero, but be aware that violent behavior is frowned upon in this building.”

He blinked. They had some reason to think he’d be violent? Where had they found him? “Okay.”

X gave a very wide smile and hurried forward. There was a click, whirring mechanics, then a very thick door opened and X was inside, catching up his hand and shaking enthusiastically.

“Hi!”

Zero found himself grinning again. “Hi.”

Sigma continued to smirk.

***

Sigma continued to smirk.

Zero sneered at him and raised the saber.

“You are the last of the Doctor’s creations. His thriving legacy- where I have the honor to be the first recipient of his gift.”

“More like I’m the last of his insanity and you’re the carrier of his disease.”

“You should speak better of your father, Zero. Iris valued family, didn’t she?”

Sigma continued to smirk as Zero screamed and lunged at him. As he turned and dashed into the room at his back and Zero followed.

He smirked even as Final Weapon exploded all around him.

Later, back at base, Zero said nothing.

X looked at him, eyes earnest, almost shining. “You have to promise me. Zero?”

Zero wouldn’t look at him.

“If I go Maverick,” X said again, insistently, “I need you to promise you’ll retire me.”

“Don’t use that word,” he snapped.

X flinched.

“It’s not like the human thing- you take off for a little country house, sit on the porch and do nothing but drink tea and read the fucking paper,” Zero said, jaw tight. “You get ‘retired’, you die.”

X lowered his head. “I know that.”

“Then say it.”

He sighed, turned and met Zero’s glare head-on. He spoke in a very slow, clear voice.

“If I go Maverick, I want you to kill me.”

Zero glared harder and waited for X to turn away. He wouldn’t.

Finally, Zero couldn’t stand there anymore- turned and walked away, swearing. He couldn't promise. He couldn't because if X ever went Maverick, it would be his fault. He’s the carrier and if X goes Maverick...

Zero won’t live with the guilt.

***

Zero won’t live with the guilt. He was going to let X kill him.

It wasn’t the easiest task he’d ever undertaken.

X staggered back and stared at him, eyes pleading even as he raised the buster again.

“We both knew it would come to this,” Zero forced down the madness enough to speak. “I’m a Maverick, X! I’ve always been this way- Dr. Cain knew it when Sigma brought me to the Hunters. You should’ve killed me then-”

“No. No you aren’t! I didn’t believe it then and I don’t now. You’re stronger than them- stronger than this damn virus!”

He held himself back from charging again, shifting his grasp on the saber’s handle, doing something harmless with it. He wasn’t moving- easy target. Inwardly he cursed X for not taking the opportunity to attack.

“You ever read up on the old plagues, X?” Zero murmured, keeping his eyes on the saber. “First one to be infected is called ‘case zero’. That’s usually their chance of recovery.” He smirked, and he probably looked insane- he sure as hell felt it.

X continued to stare, and not shoot, damnit. His face tightened.

“You are not,” he said clearly and distinctly, “a Maverick.”

“You’d like to believe that,” the evil voice came from behind them, as it so often did.

Sigma.

***

Sigma.

Of course he was behind it. He was always behind it. Why the hell they didn’t just assume it was Sigma every time, he didn’t know.

Now the bastard was monologing. Vile had sealed X into the room below- maybe killed him. No. He didn’t really believe that. Vile had never been that strong. ...No, he had. Once. It didn’t matter! X wasn’t dead.

But he didn’t know where his partner was- the world was going to hell in a hand basket (again), and Sigma was going to fucking monolog at him. If he hadn’t been pissed off before-

“The moment your virus entered my system, the seed had been planted-”

His virus. His systems- part of him. He was a carrier- the original carrier- but he wasn’t the first one who’d fallen prey to infection.

Sigma was already dead- he just didn’t know it yet.

Zero decided to tell him.

This time, it would fucking stick.

Comments

[laryna6.livejournal.com]

Thank you very much for writing this.

[syvia.livejournal.com]

It was my pleasure.