"Now then, where’s the generator?" Zero asked in an authoritative manner.

"Well, this is just a wild guess, but perhaps if we follow the corridor marked To Generator, we’ll reach it eventually," X suggested.

As the three of them headed towards the corridor, a stampede of droids rushed out towards them. These were easily disposed off, and Zero was wondering about the point of wasting all that metal on suicidal droids when he noticed that they were merely a distraction. Vile had somehow manoeuvred himself between the corridor and the Hunters (and one Undecided).

"Excellent," Zero said, and would probably have cracked his knuckles, except for the fact that it was a rather silly thing to do when one was a reploid.

"Better make it quick," X said. "The generator could be fixed any time soon. Once the forcefields are up, who knows what the Mavericks will do to the poor, innocent, helpless civilians on this peaceful island." If there was one thing X was good at, it was being a righteous defender of humanity.

A faint humming sound arose from some place down the corridor.

"The generator’s running!" Theta exclaimed. "We’ve got to stop it now. There’s no time to dilly-dally with the likes of our Star Wars fan over here." Vile, who was far from cultured in cinema classics, failed to acknowledge the snide remark.

Zero’s face fell (figuratively, of course). "But couldn’t we just make Vile’s existence a little more painful first?" he asked. "I mean, that could be the...washing machine humming or something."

"Zero, I’ve worked on generators for years. Do you think I wouldn’t know the difference between a washing machine humming and a generator humming? For that matter, I can tell the distinct difference between the buzzing of a normal television and a wide-screen television."

Even Vile was impressed by that.

All this time the four were chatting away instead of perhaps blasting each other into very small pieces, the Mavericks were charging into the city. With the forcefields up, the attack had begun. X was so frustrated he almost swore. Here we are, in the same dome as the central generator, a few steps away from the thing, a few shots away from killing all the forcefields and defeating the Mavericks, and all we have done is chat with Vile. X’s arm console blinked to life.

The face of some anonymous Hunter popped up. "They’ve begun the offensive, sir. The ground is fairly open and flat, but they’re headed towards the city really fast. What formation should be adopt?"

Without hesitating, X quietly ordered, "echelon form. Place the strongest in front."
After a few seconds, the anonymous Hunter replied, "what’s echelon form?"
X was a little surprised the anonymous Hunter did not recognise this classic military formation, but without missing a beat, he answered, "delta formation."

"...I’m sorry, but is that like..."
"A triangle," X said, trying to control himself.
"Which way is it pointing?"
"WITH THE POINT TOWARDS THE ENEMY!" yelled into his console which quickly blinked off.

When X looked up again, he saw that Theta, Zero, and Vile were giving him an odd look. "I’m terribly sorry, that...was a...new recruit," X said lamely.

"Now may we beat each other up?" Vile said, sounding slightly impatient.

"X, Zero, could you take care of him? I’ve got a generator to deal with," Theta said.

"What?" Vile exclaimed, indignant that he was being snubbed in favour of a generator, "do you think I’ll just let you through...uggh!"

Vile’s last remark was in response to an unexpected body check by Zero which left Vile sprawled on the ground and squashed by Zero’s weight. Theta deftly ran past Vile’s crushed body towards the generator. For a short moment Zero was torn between destroying a terrible villain and going after an emotionally (and possibly psychologically) unbalanced but pretty girl. There actually wasn't much of a mental or moral struggle.

After stepping on Vile a few more times, Zero dashed after Theta, leaving Vile bruised in both body and ego.

Vile got up slowly and looked at X, as though expecting him to just stroll past anytime. Instead, X charged up his arm cannon.

"Don’t worry, Vile," X said. "I still respect your position as a villain...if only a figurehead of a villain. As such, I’ll still undergo the traditional annihilation of the villain."

"Um...you’ll be sorry you ever messed with Vile," Vile replied, trying to regain his composure.

"Vile, you don’t seem like yourself today. Is something wrong? I mean, I wouldn’t want to blow you into bite-sized bits if you weren’t in your top condition," said X, who was always a little too honourable for his own good.

"Nonsense, I’m feeling fine, which is more that you can say after I'm through with you," Vile replied. He strode boldly towards X, and nearly tripped on a dead droid.

"Well, if you insist," X said. He casually aimed his arm cannon at Vile’s head. "Duck," he ordered, and promptly fired a shot at Vile’s stomach. He was mildly amused. "You’d be surprised how many times that trick has worked."

"Ugg," Vile commented, testing the integrity of his stomach with one hand. He couldn’t believe that he had actually ducked instead of dodged. How dare X exploit instinctive reflexes like that? Vile thought bitterly. Nonetheless, he mentally added this trick to his inventory of sneaky attacks.

Vile dashed around X, unleashing a stream of shots from his shoulder cannon. Unfortunately for Vile, X had learned from his battle with Theta. Rather than go on the defence, as he did with Theta, X simply suffered a few hits to various non-vital parts of his body and dashed up to Vile. This change in strategy was unexpected, and Vile soon found himself looking down X’s cannon.

Vile quickly slipped down and tripped X. Though X quickly rolled away, he was still treated to a few shots from Vile. Vile continued to shoot madly in X’s general direction, oblivious of the damage he was doing to his own base. X, seeing that Vile had gone temporarily berserk, decided that it was pointless to fight him for the moment, so he jumped onto a wall and climbed it.

Vile, noting X’s gravity-defying hops against the wall, aimed upwards. In fact, Vile would have shot madly at X, were it not for the fact that X was directly beside a neat-looking little box that was labelled: Danger Do Not Shoot At This Box. Vile didn’t recall seeing this label before, but decided that it was better to be safe than sorry. In his split-second of hesitation, X launched himself from the wall and landed his not-exactly-weightless frame on top of Vile.

X glanced at the label and smiled. He knew his little shopping spree at that cheap joke store would pay off someday.

Vile was severely irritated that X was sitting on top of him, but he was a little too squashed to shoot him. Before Vile could throw X off himself, X had jumped away and dashed after Zero.

Onwards to Chapter Ninteen
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