A/N: Uhm... Yeah. Chapter's been on my harddrive for about a year. Completely forgot to update. Sorry about that.

Chapter 6: Teddy

"So…," X began. "Let me get this straight… Alia refused us access to the Hunter HQ, and, instead, programmed the teleporter to drop us off at the North Pole, before she cut all channels of our communicators?"

"If you hadn't guessed already from the sheer amount of snow here, along with the odd silence when we try to get into contact with someone, then, yes, that's pretty much what happened," Zero replied, brushing a stray snowflake off his shoulder and gave a light shrug. "It'd seem that she's yet to forgive us for our little joke."

"Really?" the other reploid sarcastically asked, and lifted a boot from the snow. "I'd never have guessed that that was why she chased me through the entire HQ, or why we're standing in several feet of snow, or why she decided that we shouldn't be able to communicate with anyone, or even why there's a polar bear heading towards us."

Indeed, a great white bear was, clearly curious, heading towards the two hunters and obviously not quite understanding what it was looking at. It sniffed at Zero – who completely ignored the massive creature – before it, playfully, swatted the red reploid with a large paw. Had he been a human, he would most likely have been tossed into the air, and he would definitely have been seriously injured by the swat. However, as it was, the reploid barely moved from the blow, and, instead, fixed the bear with his most annoyed glare.

"I'm not in the mood, Teddy. Beat it," he growled with a dismissing wave of his hand.

Making a sound that was something between a playful growl and an annoyed grumble over being ignored, the polar bear rose onto its hind legs, placed both paws on Zero's shoulders, and gave a mighty shove with its full weight. Not even artificial muscles could withstand this, and X suddenly wished he knew how to disable his laughing mechanism while Zero began spitting both snow and curses at the bear – now sitting on his back and happily licking his helmet.

"If you as much as think about mentioning this to anyone, I swear I'll sell you to a car factory," the red reploid snarled at his comrade, although the only result was that X toppled forward into the snow, laughing so hard that he feared for a moment his systems would explode as a result. The bear, unaffected, continued its throughout cleaning of Zero's helmet.

Hours later, the scenery had still not changed. Snow and ice stretched for as far as an artificial eye could see, and it was only their built-in GPS – thankfully something that Alia had not disabled; yet – that let them know that they were not walking in circles.

Somewhere behind them, a red spot in the middle of all the white marked the place where the polar bear – still following the two reploids– had captured, slain and following devoured a small seal. Needless to say, Zero had instantly taking a liking the bear, and, even before X managed to voice his protest, promptly stated that they should take it back to the Headquarters and keep it as a pet. Despite being an animal, the bear had apparently understood, and now Theodore, as Zero affectionately had named their furry friend – although X had pointed out that it was a female – dutifully followed the red reploid like a puppy following its mother.

"How do you propose that we get away from this place?" X asked, glancing backwards at his two companions. "Knowing Alia, she's completely smashed our communicators, which will mean that it will take some time before they get them back up and running, get a lock on us and get the teleporters up and working. And I do know that this cold won't be all that good on our systems, if we should be lying too long in the snow."

"I don't know about you, but my energy cells can last five or six days at their current level," Zero's muffled reply came from somewhere beneath Theodore's fur, as the bear had – in a sudden fit of love – wrapped the red reploid in a great hug. "And we're about eight days away from the nearest port. From there, though, it should only be a few days before we're back at HQ."

"You forget one thing," X replied with a sigh, running a hand over his helmet. "My energy cells won't last much longer than yours, and, thus, none of us have enough energy to make it to the coast… And unless Douglas gets the teleporter up and running within five days…"

"Pish posh," the other replied, waving a hand in the air. "We'll just try and digest things to extract energy – humans do that all the time. Besides, we can preserve energy by avoiding to move too much, and we can last those eight days it'll take, if we don't encounter one of the many maverick bases you've smashed over the years."

X stopped dead in his tracks and turned to look at the red reploid. "What did you say?"

"We have to preserve energy?" Zero asked after a moment of thinking. "Or that we can try to eat things?"

"Not that," the blue reploid said with a laugh, shaking his head. "Maverick bases! Even if it's been years since those were destroyed, there's bound to be some energy capsules left – and with those, we can easily last all the time we need, and we might even be lucky enough to find a working radio so we can contact the Headquarters and tell them of our predicament!"

"You forget one thing," Zero drawled and managed to give one of his patented 'you're a complete moron' looks, despite Theodore's attempts to wrestle him to the ground. "Alia usually answers incoming calls. She'd just say that we're phone salesmen and cut us off before we manage to do more than introduce ourselves."

"Which is why we'll make a distress call!" X grinned, already all but bouncing through the snow towards the coordinates of the nearest maverick base he had cleaned out a few years ago. "All of the Hunters hear a distress call, and someone is bound to notice it – in particular as we're far from those who grew most insane from the lack of activity!"

Zero stood for a moment, looking after his friend who continued to bounce through the snow, before turning his gaze to the bear beside him.

"You know, Theodore. I'm quite certain that X has finally managed to go utterly mad," the red reploid said, and convinced himself that the bear was nodding in agreement.

Regardless of what they had mostly believed, the old Maverick Base that had once belonged to Frost Walrus was still fairly intact, and after having made their way through the initial defence systems – which, unfortunately, were still working – the two friends found themselves within one of the many control rooms that filled the base. To their surprise, most of the systems and panels were still working, and electricity was functioning without fail.

"This is odd. I thought this place had been completely destroyed, or, at least, destroyed enough that it couldn't produce electricity for itself any more," X said with a frown, watching a bar on a screen monitoring the flow of some under-ice current.

"Apparently, you weren't as throughout as you thought," Zero replied with a shrug and trotted off down a random corridor, the doors opening before him as if the place was still inhabited. "We could make a base of our own here, you know. If we didn't know about it, then I doubt anyone else in the HQ knows that it's still functioning, and then we'd have our own place to hide when Alia throws a fit."

"Just find the energy capsules before you start designing the curtains," X sighed, though a smile tugged at his lips.

He knew that he had been the one who had been most optimistic about finding the base in a somewhat intact state; however, it had immediately been Zero who had held the highest hopes for what they could find. 'Maybe even a stray maverick or three that we can stomp!'. Theodore had followed her master, and while she had appeared outmost surprised by the many blinking apparatuses, she quickly discovered that although some old, broken reploids may have looked like fish, none of them were edible…

Running his hand over one of the consoles, X cleaned a few years worth of snow off its surface, and blinked in surprise when he noticed that it was nothing less than the control system for the base's heaters. Making a brief calculation, estimating the overall consistency of the ice, the heat that would be generated, the age and disuse of the system, he ended up with shrugging and turning the heater up to half power, figuring that someone would have been clever enough to ensure that the heat could not be high enough to melt the ice that made up the base.

Turning, he continued to scrape ice off the many consoles, and, soon, had restored most of the control panels to a state where it was possible to figure out mostly which controlled what within the base. At the same time, noises from down the corridors told of Zero's exploits when it came to exploring the base, and a snort and growl told that Theodore was doing what she could to help her master.

"Hey! X, check this out!" the reploid in question called, and, turning his head from the apparent nuclear control console, the blue hunter spotted his friend standing in the doorframe, grinning like a maniac while juggling a round, metal object. "You're up for a game of dodgeball?"

"I'd suggest that you'll be careful with that," X replied, turning his eyes back to the screen. Barely seconds later, a tiny tick from the round object signalled that it had gone off, and then Zero found his hair singed by the small explosion that followed.

"You could have said that earlier," the red reploid grumbled, plunging his hand into a pile of snow to prevent the resulting fire from causing too much damage to his systems.

"It's more fun to watch you mess up," the other replied, barely managing to hide his grin and putting up a mask of indifference.