[Coda]

Oh. I never posted the last chapter I wrote on Sufficient Velocity over here. Someone posted on that thread after it had been idle for over a year, so it got my attention. ^^()

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SUBJECT: Press Release - Mega Man Addresses the Robot Master Controversy
AUTHOR: Rock [DLN-001]
DATE: September 25, 20XX
FORMAT: Video + annotations

Rock stands a couple steps behind a lectern, looking nervous as cameras flash from all over. He's wearing a business suit instead of his Mega Man armor or his usual civilian t-shirt, but his blue-black hair is still in its naturally unruly style. As he consults his notes, an annotation window opens to the side of the video projection to display the material he had prepared for this presentation, marked up with comments from the public relations team at Light Labs. He doesn't actually need the notes, of course; he has the script stored in his memory banks. But having a physical object seems to be helping him center his thoughts and calm his nerves.

The murmuring in the audience dies down as he steps up to the microphone and sets down his notes.

"Thank you all for coming. I've prepared a statement that I want to share with you all. Given the state of current events, I thought it would be better if I presented it myself instead of publishing it as a document or having a Light Labs spokesperson read it." He pauses for a moment, giving the crowd a moment to focus their attention.

"I know that people are worried about the possibility of Robot Masters infiltrating society. I have to admit my own role in that. It's true that I spoke to a Robot Master; I'll lay that rumor to rest right now. And I know better than anyone how much damage Dr. Wily did in his past attacks.

"But the public response to this concern bothers me. I mean, I'm a Robot Master. And I could understand if people were afraid of me." He forms a buster with his right arm as a demonstration, then dismisses it. "I... I know I could be dangerous. But the robots that have been on the receiving end of the recent hate? They're innocent. They're trying to be useful. They're doing their jobs. They don't deserve to be pushed out because someone thinks they might be one of Wily's war machines."

Rock pauses for effect, taking a look around the room. When he starts speaking again, his tone is pleading.

"So please... I ask you all, everyone out there... Judge robots fairly. We're part of this society, too."

He lowers his eyes. After a moment, the assembled journalists realize that he's done talking, and the room explodes with questions.

Rock shakes his head and raises his hand for a moment of quiet. "Sorry, I don't think I can answer any questions right now. You can send them to Light Labs and we'll try to get back to you." He hesitates uncertainly, then collects his notes and walks off the stage as the storm of questions heedlessly resumes.

---

But since I'm thinking about this again, I might as well infodump some of my worldbuilding notes for anyone still reading. They're not really spoilers anymore, are they?

The mk.III Robot Masters were developed with the lessons from the mk.II ones in mind. Their primary AIs aren't evolved specifically to channel any of the lights, but there's a secondary subordinate system in each one that's evolved to be optimized around at least one color of light. Part of Wily's goal in having the mk.III RMs interacting with the world in a civilian context is to provide real-world training data to the light-based AIs. Wily has also put a backdoor in these secondary AIs; they're still fully sentient, so it's not possible to fully override them without taking direct control over the hardware, but they're more or less brainwashed into considering Wily's instructions as if they were the Word of God. There IS a third-level fallback in place that forces the system to reboot into non-Robot Master software, because Wily is (quite sensibly) worried about the possibility of disobedience.

The secondary AIs are meant to be passive until remotely activated. They're battle programs, intended to be kept separate from the infiltration programs in the primary AI. Despite Wily's best attempts, though, the firewall isn't perfect, and the light-powered AIs are able to exert some level of influence even in their passive state. This freaks out Needle Man in particular, and Shadow Man finds it very unsettling.

The AI light colors: (somewhat tentative)
Needle Man - Red
Shadow Man - Yellow
Snake Man - Indigo
Magnet Man - Orange
Spark Man - Red
Gemini Man - Yellow
Top Man - Orange
Hard Man - Green

So when eight powerful war machines suddenly activate in civilian areas after Dr. Light had been preaching tolerance and optimism, the public backlash against Robot Masters redoubles and trust in Light Labs fractures. This, combined with his inability to support Rock's tenuous emotional state, breaks Thomas's heart. The despair causes his blue light equipment to fail on him as well. In the depths of this depression, helpless and being told from all sides how wrong he is, Light decides that he's no longer fit to decide what's best for humanity.

So he decides to swear off emotional light technology, and even emotional AIs.

And so he decides that since he isn't fit to make decisions anymore, he'll build a robot to make decisions for him. Pure logic and reason. A rational machine that can't be led astray by fickle emotion. One that can transcend his own biases and failures, that can search every possibility to find the optimal answer. No limits, nothing that would create a blind spot. A robot that can guide the world to the everlasting peace that he has failed to achieve by himself.

He builds Gamma.

Gamma simulates hundreds of thousands of futures, discarding the ones that descend into ongoing fighting and iterating on the ones that reduce the amount of suffering in the long run. Eventually, Gamma's calculations return a result: in 100% of simulated scenarios, humans are instrumental in the failure to maintain peace. Futures that contain fewer humans are more successful. Therefore, to ensure everlasting peace, it should minimize the number of humans.

And Dr. Light intentionally didn't build in an override, because he didn't trust himself to have the wisdom to know when to use it or not.



The aftermath of Gamma was going to be the end of the story, although I had a few scenes in mind for later in the timeline. One idea I had was that Duo would be a member of the Green Lantern Corps, coming to investigate the unexpected rise in emotional light signatures detected in a backwater, podunk, non-spacefaring world in the middle of nowhere. I was never completely certain this was a good idea to make canon, but it was interesting enough to think about.