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"Don't move!" Zero ordered, leveling the buster pistol that he showed up holding perfectly with his target.The target in question? Dark armor with details and motifs that looked like it was ripped straight out of a manga sitting somewhere in Axl's dorm at HQ. Red scarf and probably ninja stars to go with the whole thing too.A stealth armor chip.
And X looked so cool in it.Axl trained his own pistol on the hunter commander, narrowing his eyes as he aimed for a tender, critical point. Just below the chin area where spine connected to skull would be the best bet, but only if X stayed stationary enough. Which, in a fight, wasn't gonna happen.Though X had never looked so happy to be on the other side of a gun."Hands vhere I can see zhem!" Zero commanded from his spot next to Axl. He sounded tense, a slice of his buried German accent blended with his speech. Must've been pissed off by something before X showed up, cause even Axl heard it.Though X wasn't fazed by it at all, and simply raised his hands slowly."Whatever you say, buddy," X basically cooed, and Axl felt his hands begin to shake."Disable the armor chip you have und toss it forevard." The red hunter commanded coldly, and X responded with compliance."Of course," he said, calmly clenching a hand into a fist. A brief show of light signaled the deactivation of the stealth chip and X was then in his simple, blue and white command armor. He made a deliberate show of holding the chip out in his palm before he tossed it in Zeros direction.There was just enough force behind the movement to ensure that the red hunter could catch it with just a swipe of his hand; which he did. After, X returned both arms to a neutral, 'don't shoot me' position, looking Zero and Axl over with quick but concerned eyes.Like he'd been turned back into himself. Axl felt a lump in his throat, and he had to use his off hand to steady his gun. If X was going to start something, if what the guy in the cell block said wasn't true, then Axl couldn't afford to miss."If he tries something, shoot him." Zero muttered to Axl as he holstered his own pistol and marched into X's space.Axl nodded and bit into his lower lip, shifting on the balls of his feet and keeping his pistol level. He rested his finger on the trigger, imagining the little spring and kick that squeezing it would do. He knew his gun; knew that it was no Z-saber or X-buster, but it could still kill a human sized Maverick with just one well placed shot.But X wasn't a Maverick.He might've looked and acted like one not even a day ago, but to Axl, he certainly wasn't one now."It's okay, Axl," X murmured into the silence while Zero patted him down for more chips and inspected the legendary X-buster. "I'm alright... You're alright."No Maverick reassures the ones that hunted them down.A couple of tense moments passed before Zero sighed and stepped back. He looked X over again, circling around him like a suspicious animal, before growling loudly in frustration.
X saw the punch coming and flinched when Zeros fist crashed into his cheek, followed by another one to his gut to make him stagger.Axl swallowed around the frog in his throat and kept his gun trained. He knew that Zero was making sure for himself that what they were seeing was true. Could imagine the confusion and paranoia that Zero probably felt in the face of watching someone he trusted turn into a monster, even if it was only for a few hours.
Axl knew the feeling. Knew that he needed X to actually be here in front of them, and needed him to still be the X that they both trusted, and not an enemy wearing his face.That didn't make the grunt X made with the wind knocked out of him any less painful to hear.The blue reploid backed up a few paces after Zero withdrew his fist, heaving breaths like he was about to throw up. Zero then redrew his own pistol and pressed the barrel to X's chest plate, glaring a fury between blonde bangs that Axl hadn't seen in a long time. Taking that in, X stood taller and met the red hunters glare with a determined gaze of his own."You're not satisfied."It wasn't a question. It was a prompt, and X was good at making people talk with those. Zero briefly glanced at Axl from the corner of his eye, considering a response."I thought I was," the red reploid eventually hissed. "I figured that you had to be alright. The shit got off you. The people holding me were talking about you. About how you were detained. Walking. You were supposed to be fine!""He is fine!" Axl cut in harshly. Zero was being ridiculous. X was right there. He wasn't hurt, wasn't covered in Sand, wasn't Maverick."You're. not. Fine." Zero growled like he was ignoring Axl."You're both right," X murmured before he tilted his head off to the side. "Maybe not in the way you both think. Don't worry, I'm not the one possessed by the Sand... Anymore."Axl blinked and lowered his gun at the same time Zero did, though it was still ready if he might have needed it."You heard the same thing from the guys who broke us out then?" Axl asked, recalling the reploid with the white wolf motif and the dual swords that beat the snot out of his captors."That depends," X replied, reaching up to adjust his helmet at first, before he pulled a strip of paper out from underneath it. "Did he tell you two what year it is?"Zero scrunched his nose in frustrated confusion, but took the strip when X offered it to him."The fuck?" Zero barked, and X frowned at that. "Language." He scolded. Relief hit Axl like a punch to the gut, and he slumped over laughing."Axl?!" X called as he jumped up and ran towards the gunner.
Before X could reach him, Axl raised a fist with his thumb sticking upward."I'm okay," he chuckled. "I'm just glad that you're okay too!"X huffed a smile and offered him a hand once he had his fill. Axl holstered his pistol and let X pull him up onto his feet. They both turned back to Zero, and their smiles fell at his confused expression."X," the red hunter began. "Where did you get this?""What is it?" Axl asked as Zero made his way to where they were standing."It's the front page of today's paper," X elaborated. "I picked it up from a stand on the sidewalk on the way over."At that point, Zero offered the strip to Axl, who took it gingerly. It struck him that it was real, bonafide newspaper material, and that he could ruin the image or text or even tear it if he so much as pinched it too hard. Not at all like the holo-files and the tablets that he was familiar with.
It also struck him that X and Zero both didn't seem very surprised by the fact that it was a fragile piece of paper, as in they'd handled it before. The dinosaurs.Then he actually read what was on the paper.'Daily Bust! Sports and Scandal! A fair to remember!'"Am I missing something?" Axl asked, confused. "Just looks like celebrity gossip. Retro style, but gossip. Smut even""Were you listening, Axl?" Zero groaned. "That's 'today'.""Look at the date." X pointed out.Axl took another look, squinting for the day-month-year number before he found it in the top right corner.'11 September, 20XX' it read. Wait. 11 September, 20XXThat wasn't right. It was June when they got the call to the research center.
June, not September.And the year.
20XX?
No, it was 21XX. And they were closer to 22XX than that. How could this be here?Axl looked up, waiting for the punchline. This had to be a joke.
When neither X nor Zero started laughing about the expression on Axl's face, the gunner found the lump back in his throat."20XX?" He asked, meekly."That's right, Axl," X replied gravely. "We got thrown backwards in time.""Not possible." Zero snapped, sure of it."Think about it," X replied, ticking off his fingers. "Transponders are going haywire, the teleporter grid is down, we can't get into contact with anyone at hunter base, and We," he gestured to the three of them widely. "Us. Three of the most revered, feared, famous, whatever the word is for it! We're on the run from the local police force? It doesn't make sense! Unless-""Unless where we're from, isn't here." Zero finished, pinching the bridge of his nose.Axl felt his heart sink.
It did make sense with that context. Only that context was insane!"So what should we do?!" Axl sputtered."Hunter base doesn't exist here," X stated, furrowing his brows. "We have no base, no navigators, no backup, and no public support.""What about the guys that broke us out?" Axl asked nervously. "The guy in the wolf getup was a dick but he had some sick moves.""Wolf getup?" X snorted before his eyes widened. "Wait, you saw him?""Well, yeah," Axl replied. "Didn't you?"X shook his head. "I was told not to look at my 'rescuer' under threat of death.""The guy who busted into the armored truck I was being held in was a dick too, but I didn't get a chance to see him." Zero added, crossing his arms. "He had a colleague with him, the name I caught was Quint, but I didn't see him either.""And you said it was a 'wolf getup'? Not a Wolf type mechanaloid frame?" X prodded, thumb on his chin."Yeah," Axl supplied. "He had curved blades on his arms and on his legs like tails, these ears on his helmet, and he had this fur collar, I'll never forget it, he kept fidgeting with it.""What about the guy's face kid?" Zero asked, starting to pace over the floor. "Was he humanoid?""Yeah, he was." Then Axl paused. "Um... Well, you guys know that I'm not fantastic with faces, but... I don't really remember anything about his face that stood out. He looked... Normal I guess?"Zero sighed again as he did laps around the empty room, a tick of his that signaled frustration, but not outright anger. In fact, looking at the lines in the red hunters face..."He actually looked kinda like you, Zero."That made the red hunter stop square in his tracks, looking at the gunner like he'd grown a second head. Axl snorted at the expression and pointed to his mouth."You have the same frown." He explained.Zero scoffed and rolled his eyes, going back to his pacing."Either way," X began, arms crossed. "We were all told to meet up here, and that the Sand is still out there, possessing a reploid as we speak. Whatever we need in order to find out who that is should be here; that's what I've been lead to believe." X then dropped his arms to his sides, making fists. "Fan out, there's got to be something here we can use.""This building won't be here forever," Zero chimed in, breaking from his path. "Let's make this quick, before it comes down on us."Axl hopped into action, scouring the dusty floors and corners for anything that looked like a lead or clue or anything that could be useful. He bumped into Zero twice before they found a ladder to the roof. The gunner took point while the red hunter hailed X over to where they were going.There wasn't anyone there when Axl reached the top, but he did see a conspicuous box covered with tape next to the decommissioned stairwell. He gave it a scan, seeing if his copy chip could pick up on anything that could be dangerous; bombs, EMP, a hiding Mettool, the works. When he didn't detect any, he gave his older compatriots a thumbs up before he peeled the tape off the top.
X and Zero peered over his shoulders as he pulled the contents out one by one. First a green baseball cap, a pair of reading glasses, a scrunchie, a large grey jacket, and then a thick manilla folder held together with two massive clips. Axl held on to the clothes and handed the folder to X, who jumped when a gust of wind unceremoniously blew the box over."Might want to take this back under the roof," Zero suggested, frowning as the wind whipped his hair into his face. Axl had almost forgot that Zero showed up without his helmet, and he laughed in his head as a few gold locks flew into his nose and made the red hunter sneeze.Then Axl had a thought."Maybe this is for you." The gunner suggested as he picked the scrunchie out of the bundle of stuff in his arms and offered it to Zero. He took the little stretchy ring and followed X and Axl back down the ladder before pulling his hair back into a half loose bun, as he had too much to thread into a proper ponytail.X picked out a clean section of the floor and gingerly laid out the various newspapers and photos jammed inside the folder. They were clippings of a fair going on over the present week, pictures of the decorations and exhibits, little areas highlighted in yellow and pink about key dates and people present.
As he did so, X looked each article over carefully, humming and clicking his tongue at what he saw.
Maybe a minute of this passed before X halted in his movements. He sat there staring at a printer paper photo that Axl craned his neck to look at, before he felt a horrible revulsion at what he saw.There, smiling and posing for the camera, was a middle aged to older man with a full beard and white hair with a jolly grin standing with his hands on the shoulders of a boy in a red and grey suit. The boy's face was obscured a bit by his hair, but it seemed clear enough from the smile he wore that this was a picture of a father and his son. A massive target reticle was drawn in red marker over the boy's body. Axl almost gagged."This is low, even for the virus," Zero growled from behind X, who himself looked like he was either going to cry or faint. "Even for Sigma...""Even for Lumine," X murmured as he set the photo aside and brought up another that made Axl feel even sicker.There, the second photo, was the same human man, maybe a little older, with two different children; a boy with bright blue eyes and brown hair, and a blonde girl that shared his eyes. Both were smiling much the same way as the boy in the first photo.There was an arrow pointing to the girl in the same bright red marker. It was marked with a hand written message.'MIA' it read.There were other photos of this family inside the folder as well. Different viewpoints and different qualities like different cameras were being used.MIA. The girl with a basket of groceries opening the door with her foot.Target. The boy wearing sunglasses and a yellow scarf as he was walking down a sidewalk alone.MIA. The girl wearing a powder blue dress washing a dog mechanaloid in an aluminum tub with her brother holding the hose nearby.Target. The boy in a red helmet holding a shield in the midst of an exploding sewer or pipe system.MIA. The girl wearing her hair in a braid with an umbrella in one hand, a clutch purse in the other as she was speaking with another boy in a black ball cap and a leather jacket.Then a blurry photo of her piggybacking on the boy in the red while her dog pranced around them.Axl took a step back."It took these kids..." He muttered.Then, before anyone said anything else, X brought out one photo of a stage at the fair that was clipped to a piece of wide ruled notebook paper, and the page to a fashion magazine. On the photo was the same target reticle associated with the boy in red with an arrow pointing in a curve at the stage. Another note was there with the arrow that read 'backstage'."So that's where he's going to be," X murmured as he stifled a sniffle and cleared his throat. He pulled the note and the magazine page off the photo and looked them over.
At seeing the contents, X scrunched his nose and snorted. Zero checked what would warrant the reaction, before barking another "the fuck?""Language," Axl chided before X could, earning him a refreshing look of surprise from the blue Hunter. Zero gave him a scowl as Axl looked over the note.'Camoflauge highly recommended'
And the magazine page showed a blonde haired model wearing the same grey jacket from the box and a green hat scribbled on her head. Next to her was a little smiley face that also looked hand drawn. Her expression was the kind of blue steeled faceless that models tended to have, but the way her hair flew about in the picture was an unmistakable hint.X and Axl both glanced at Zero, who replied with a glare and a firm, "No.""Axl can't stealth you and the shadow armor chip isn't compatible with you, Zero," X practically sang without missing a beat."X." The red hunter warned."Just try it on, Zero," X prompted as he picked up the jacket from where Axl left it on the floor. "I promise you won't look bad.""That's not the issue, X," the red hunter scolded. "I'll have to armor down for what this 'plan' is suggesting. I'd be susceptible to getting hit with the Sand the moment we make contact with the target.""So would anyone else," X countered. "We'll decide what happens next after you Try. It. On. Okay?""Don't like that tone, X." Zero grumbled as he swiped the clothing out of X's hand and armored down to put it on.Axl gave him the bare minimum privacy as he looked down at some of the other photos. A picture of a building with a skull on the front entrance caught his eye. Which already didn't seem normal, but then Axl noticed a set of numbers in latitude and longitude written in silver marker in the corner.
Plugging them into his GPS, the place in the coordinates didn't seem too far. Within driving distance even."This isn't going to work," he heard Zero complain from behind him."Sure it can," X replied. "The glasses should complete it."Axl looked back as Zero was squinting through the reading glasses that sat on his nose. They might've been a little too big for his head, as he immediately needed to push them back up onto his face. Other than that, the jacket and the hat made him seem ordinary enough. Just a guy in glasses and yoga pants in September, apparently.
It was the best cover they could make for him with what they had.It would have to do.Zero had the same thought, sighing as he resigned himself to this role."Where's our entry point?" He said, getting to business and handing X back the armor chip he took."That depends," X began as he re-equipped the black armor that he'd shown up with. "Axl, how good is your sub-tank?""For stealth mode?" Axl replied, letting his trademark confidence back into his voice. "It's ready to go whenever you are.""Good." X breathed behind his ninja mask. "Here's the plan."