Aftermath

A MegaMan X Oneshot

Within the last twenty-four hours, a lot had happened.

First the three of them had been together, and he was laughing and joking the entire way up the elevator in his typical fashion. While the other two never really understood his drive to fight, they respected that he could always smile through them all.

Then they had been separated, and he was forced to go on alone while they were forced to stay behind to permanently deal with their sworn enemy.

Finally, they had been reunited just in time, only to discover it was just the beginning.

When they had lost hope and were ready to give up, he was the one who talked sense into them with only a few words, just enough to give them the strength to continue.

It was after the battle that everything changed. Finally victorious, they were ready to call it the end. He had other things on his mind, though, and it left him vulnerable to one final attack. The hit had been enough to knock him unconscious, but he was fine. He was still alive.

Yet, less than a day later, they were proven wrong. He was not fine. He was no longer alive.

He was dead. Their colleague, their partner, their friend, was dead.

---

By the time X and Zero had been notified, it was too late to see it with their own eyes. When they arrived at the med-bay Axl had been hours earlier his body had already been removed.

But who took him? Why did they take him right away? Why couldn't we see him first?

The nurse on duty could give them no answers, and neither could anyone else. Everywhere the two turned they were greeted with silence, and no one could offer anything more than their sympathies to the grieving friends.

---

A day later, an order went out from the reigning government body.

In light of recent news, the production of copy chips and New Generation Reploids has ceased indefinitely, and the use of copy chips will be terminated as a result.

As soon as the announcement went out through the HQ, both X and Zero headed straight to the same place - Commander Signas' Office. They didn't wait to be let in and barged in on the slightly surprised commander.

"What is the meaning of this?!" Zero shouted out.

"Exactly like it sounds like," Signas started to explain calmly, "The government was concerned that the current situation was brought on by an error in the copy chips and-"

"Like hell there was something wrong with him!" X cut him off. "He's not one of them!"

"I know he was your best friend, and I will give you the time you need to grieve. However, what's been done is done, and there's nothing you could have done to change it. The sooner you finish grieving over him, the better off we'll all be."

"How dare you!" Zero yelled out. "You can't even say his name to our face! You-"

At that moment X firmly grabbed Zero's arm, preventing him from lunging at the Commander. Zero looked back at his friend, and the glare he received let him know it was time to leave, however hard it would be. He shook X off before turning and storming out of the office. X followed shortly after, but not before shooting the commander a dark glare of his own.

---

X had found Zero in the training rooms, watching from the one-way window as Zero took out his rage on the supposed indestructible walls. To his surprise and horror, he had noticed cracks starting to appear in the one spot where Zero's fist had repeatedly pounded against it.

X had just opened the door into the room and already Zero had turned towards him in anger. "Why did you stop me?" He growled.

"Because you were ready to kill him," X responded as he stepped in, the door automatically sliding shut behind him.

"Signas let him die."

"We don't know that for sure."

"How can you say that?" The sound of Zero's fist once again slamming against the crumbling wall resounded in the closed-off room. "You said yourself that he was fine! We both know enough that we would've known if he was worse off! You would've known!"

"Don't you dare blame this on me!" X shot back. "Things happen - we don't know what Lumine did to him!"

The tension and vast range of emotions hung thick in the air between them. The two inseparable friends stared at each other, the silence and their gazes refusing to break for a few moments that took an eternity to pass.

"You're right." Zero was first to break away, turning his eyes towards the wall. "I'm sorry. It wasn't your fault." With a sigh, Zero finally removed his fist from the sizable dent he had created, pieces of the wall falling to the floor. "We don't know what Lumine did, but it shouldn't have been enough to kill him."

"This... this entire thing is just so wrong." X looked down. "Why did this happen to him? He didn't deserve it, not after all he went through to get here."

"This entire thing doesn't make sense. I mean... We both knew he was fine. Could we have really screwed up that bad?"

"No. We know our job too well... We couldn't have."

"So then, what happened? How did he go from being fine to..." Zero found himself struggling to finish his statement. Everything still hadn't settled in for him yet.

"I don't know, Zero. No one's telling us anything."

"Or someone's lying to us."

"You really think someone would lie about something like this? To us?"

"Well, the Commander sure isn't being straight with us."

A scoff escaped from X's lips. "You're going to go back and barge in his office and demand answers?"

"I might." Zero replied flatly.

"I think we might just have to take what we have and listen to him on this one-"

"Are you so loyal to him that you don't even care he's lying to your face?" Zero cut him off mid-sentence. "He knows the truth and is refusing to tell us! We are his best friends, X! We know him better than anyone! Especially Signas! Something happened, and we need to know what it is!"

"We have no proof that he knows anything."

"Then we'll find something. We can do this, we can find out what happened to him."

"Then what?" X shouted. "If he was killed because of the order, that's one thing, but if he died because we missed something, can you live with that guilt?"

"It's better than knowing nothing about his death."

X clenched his fists and turned towards the door. "That's on you then. I want nothing to do with this."

"X-"

"No, I can't live with knowing it might have been my fault he's dead." He stopped for a moment, letting out a sharp exhale. "If you can find proof that Signas is involved, that it had nothing to do with Lumine, then come find me. Until then, you're on your own. I'm sorry."

---

It was a long week for Zero, but on that day he finally had answers, and X needed to know.

---

Signas looked up in surprise at the calm demeanor that X and Zero entered his office.

"You had him killed," X stated.

Signas remained silent, but his attention remained wholly focused on them.

"I confronted Nadia, the nurse assigned to look after him," Zero started, "she told me everything - that his systems started failing and you ordered them not to do anything about it. You killed one of your best hunters."

"He was dead either way," Signas replied coldly, his gaze unwavering.

The two hunters stared at their commander in shock. "W-what?"

"I knew about the order as soon as they started discussing it. It was only a matter of time before they carried it out, and Axl would've been included in it. They don't care that he was "only a prototype" or even that he was a hunter, they only saw him as a threat that needed to be eliminated, just like the rest of the New Gens."

"You knew about it, and you didn't do anything?" X yelled back. "You could've prevented his death!"

"X, do you really believe I have that much power? I did all I could. Now you can either choose to expose me for what I did, or let Axl die a hero's death. The choice is yours."

The two hunters were left in shock, their faces twisted in disbelief over everything they had heard. The two of them shared a glance, and, without any other choice, turned around and left the office without another word.

"I'm sorry, but I did what I had to do."