Funeral For a Son

Between the gaps in the trembling and calloused fingers that cradle his heavy head, Light watches the mob of cowards carry Protoman's scarred helmet -- all that was left of the Man Machine who would have been their savior. As

the crowd marches somberly back -- some to their homes, some to the makeshift grave where Protoman's helmet would remain, all to slavery -- Light notices a tear streaming down the dorsum of his hand and feels a breathtaking weight in his chest. What is this? Frustration? Humiliation? Hatred? Certainly, these are there too. But no, this is more than that. These emotions are his life. He has lived with them for so long that they no longer affect him. Over the years he has learned to fight them, then ignore than, and finally channel them into his work, his creation, his machine, his son.

So that was it. The source of tears and the pain that caused them. This time he had built more than a machine. He had sent more than a robot to battle.

He had sent a man, his own son, to do the impossible, to save those who could not be saved, to die.

There was the hatred again, the rage, welling inside of him. No more, he thought, as he tore down the tools and parts that framed his apartment workshop. Never again. "Mankind deserves the hell that they have brought upon themselves" He smashed and cut, metal against metal, metal against flesh, in an effort to destroy his own means of creation. He allowed the tear to pour from his cheeks and mingle with the blood seeping from the cuts in his torn and battered hands. He had set out to use these hands to destroy his workshop but he now watched as they seemed to be creating of their own accord. Pieces of machine from the floor were seized and fused. They began to take form -- the form of Light's anger, the form of his guilt, the form of his grief, the form of his love, the form of a son.

Years passed. Nothing changed. The human race seemed weary but content to suffer under Dr. Wily and the robot army. In whispers, they still spoke of Protoman. Eventually, Megaman would find out the truth. Dr. Light knew this.

When Megaman was old enough, Light called him into the workshop and began to explain...