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"The Space Between" - Mega Man short oneshot fanfic

By: Jixie Fandom: Mega Man Classic [gen] Words: 2652 Rating: G BassBlues Week 2025: December 4th - Swap

-A/N: Finally! The long awaited sequel of "Too Close For Comfort", my [also gen/platonic] BassRock 2022 entry for September 7th - Distance that no one asked for. (I recommend reading that first but it's not required.)

Proto Man woke to the sound of deep, crushing grief.

"No, no, no, NO! Again!? Why? WHY!?"

It was the best he'd ever felt in his life. He felt amazing, actually. Better than normal. Better than new.

He opened his eyes and sat up. Bass was sitting next to him, curled up a little and shaking from a combination of rage and distress, having already been through this once before. Proto Man was new to the whole 'cheesy 50's scifi B-movie brain swapping plot', but he'd heard all about it (at length) from his brother, who'd been one of the previous victims.

"What did I do to deserve this!?"

"What haven't you done?" he replied as he stood. It was very weird seeing himself-- Bass, in his body-- sitting there. As for being in Bass's body… damn. 'Proto' Man was indeed a prototype, so aside from the obvious strength and power, he now found himself running on new hardware with the current industry standards that had been set after he was built. He'd never had to parse through this much feedback, and it was a little overwhelming, almost sensory overload.

Even so, there was that obvious strength and power, and boy did it feel good. This was the complete opposite of his normal state of chronic pain and fatigue. It was such an improvement that he didn't even notice that he was out of calibration.

They had to fix this eventually, he knew that. But maybe they didn't have to be in too big of a hurry.

Proto Man offered a hand (Bass's hand) and hauled Bass up.

"Huh."

"What?"

Bass tilted his head (Proto Man's head) slightly. "Are your eyes red?"

"Well, I'm in your body, so I'm inclined to think maybe your eyes are red."

"Last time-- sheesh, I can't believe I'm saying that. 'Last time'. Ugh. Last time my eyes were blue and Mega Dweeb's were red. So if my eyes are still red, then… so are yours. Right?"

"Or the mad scientist who did this changed something different with her process, and our eye color no longer reflects our IC chips."

He looked at Proto Man suspiciously and then shrugged.

They were not in a warehouse or garage or bunker, this was an actual, proper villain lair. One that clearly didn't belong to amateur roboticist and hack hacker Hedy Masterson. One that was unfinished and hopefully abandoned by its true owner.

Not only were their teleporters disabled, there was a signal-blocking shield over the fortress. With Proto Man's talent for going wherever he wanted whenever he wanted to, she wasn't taking any chances.

It turned out to be overkill. A lot of his ability to work around barriers, crack invisible shields, worm into spaces that were off-limits, were things he'd added and tinkered with over years (or a direct result of his previous-generation hardware, effortlessly slipping past defenses that weren't designed to be backwards compatible.) All things now currently in Bass's possession.

All… except his shield.

He already knew, having heard Rock's version of this little twisted adventure, that their armor and accessory recall didn't work the same. But even if it did, Bass (and therefore Proto Man in Bass's body) did not have the signature code to collect his shield.

Proto Man (therefore Bass in Proto Man's body), however, did.

Wow this was confusing.

"Can you recall my shield?"

"I don't need your stupid shield, wusspants."

Before responding, Proto Man gave Bass a firm shove, sending him sprawling. He spent a few moments on the floor, wincing and groaning.

"What the HELL, dude!? Why are you so weak?"

"First of all, yes you do. Second, it has a standard fixed teleporter built into it. You know the kind Wily uses in his lab, not the dinky portable ones that we have internally?"

"…the kind that can warp you to the moon?" Bass asked as he sat up.

"Yep." Proto Man flicked his fingers at chest height. "Bloop." Then repeated the gesture up above his head. "Moon."

After getting back on his feet, Bass held out his hand, and… nothing. He frowned a little as he focused. It didn't work. "Hang on, I got it." No, he didn't. "Wait. Wait."

Still nothing.

Bass stomped his foot in frustration.

"Okay, it's no big deal. We'll just have to find a traditional exit."

He pushed past Proto Man and stormed down the hall. Realizing that there was a very real chance Bass would destroy his (Proto Man's) body and himself (Bass) all in one fell swoop, Proto Man scrambled after him.

"I'm gonna KILL that b--"

"We're not killing anyone."

"Try and stop me, loser."

Proto Man tackled him and held him in an arm lock long enough for Bass to scream at him before tapping out.

---

This time "Doctor" (Certified Pharmacy Technician) Masterson had a video screen. The camera was angled upwards in an extraordinarily unflattering angle, its hi-def lens focusing on the patchy hairs scattered across her chin. She grimaced when she saw herself and started adjusting the camera.

"Hang-- hang on. Hmmmph. Stupid-- thingy--"

Bass raised a cannon to shoot the monitor but Proto Man reached out and pushed his arm down before he could, then leaned over to whisper to him. "Just let me cook, okay?"

"Why are you so weak?" It wasn't even meant as an insult, Bass was genuinely confused about how Proto Man managed to exist like this.

"There we go! As I was saying--"

"You hadn't said anything yet."

"AS I WAS SAYING. Look, I'm so over Megass. I mean-- no, it's still my favorite, but I've come to accept that as much as I cherish 'foe yay'… the real world just doesn't work like that. So." She cracked her knuckles. "I'm on Team Probass now."

"How does that one sound even worse?" Bass muttered under his breath. "Who the hell comes up with the names for these things?"

Proto Man squared up, arms crossed, eyebrow cocked.

"Oof, you're really into that stuff? Well I guess if this forced body modification is the kind of thing you get up to, I shouldn't be surprised that you like problematic ships."

"What."

"…You do know we're brothers, right?" This was not true, but he sold it expertly, throwing an arm around Bass's shoulders. The Wily 'bot immediately tried to squirm out from under him, but Proto Man hooked his arm-- Bass's arm-- around his neck and firmly planted a hand on his chest-- Proto Man's chest.

Rock was right, this whole body swap thing was absolutely confounding.

Masterson pursed her lips, fighting back a frown.

"You're lying."

"Would I lie?"

"Y-yes?"

"Okay, would I lie about something like this?"

"Yes! You're trying to gaslight me. You are DLN-000, a Dr. Light model, and he's SWN-001, a Dr. Wily special." By this point she was scowling. "You guys aren't related at all!"

"Not only did Dr. Wily have a hand in my creation… the fact that I'm registered as a DLN and not a LWN, so he never got any credit, was one of the things that started to sour their relationship."

There was one brief moment where Masterson brightened-- Ah-ha! A morsel of backstory, a hint to the cause of the hotly debated Wily-Light divorce. They would eat this up on the webforums-- but then she resumed her sullen look.

"It makes us half-brothers. Tell her, Bass." Proto Man gave him a nudge. In response, Bass raised his cannon again to shoot at the monitor, and Proto Man quickly pinned him with his free arm.

Masterson studied them over the camera feed, then let out a loud groan. She buried her fingers in her hair, pawing at her scalp briefly before giving in and grabbing fistfuls of hair to pull. It was not enough. She started pounding her fist on the table. "DAMN IT! DAMN IT!!" Then she stopped, getting control of herself just long enough to shut off the feed.

The moment the screen went blank, Bass tried his hardest to shove Proto Man away. The fact of the matter was that in Proto Man's body, he simply did not have the strength to break free from… well, himself. It wasn't just alarming, it was starting to stress him out.

"The hell are you talking about!? We're not related, stupid Light 'bot--"

"Shhhhhhhhhhhhh." Finally he released him. "Just trust the process, will you?"

"How!? I understood maybe-- MAYBE-- twenty percent of whatever that crazy broad was blathering about. And you just happen to speak nerd? That means is that you're as much of a dorkwad as her and the rest of those internet shut-ins, and you expect me to trust you with my life?"

Proto Man snorted in amusement. "You don't need to understand, all that matters is she believes it. But even if she doesn't, you're not in any danger. You think I'd let anything happen to you," he paused like he was finished, but then continued, "while you're in my body?"

"I'd rather die than live like this."

That would've easily started a fight with Mega Man, but Proto Man had an unusually high tolerance for this sort of lousy, mean-spirited behavior from Bass.

It did earn him a good bonk on the head, however.

…only he was in a weaker, less reinforced chassis. Bass yelped and clutched his head in pain. "HEY! You jerkhole!"

He hadn't meant to hit that hard, and looked a little sheepish, not used to having this kind of strength (or needing to account for it when affectionately hitting someone who was now weaker than himself for a change.) For a moment Proto Man considered apologizing, but ultimately decided against it. This was probably a good life lesson for Bass. Character building.

The screen blinked back on.

"Fine. FINE. The shield's down and your teleporters working, get the heck outta here."

Bass immediately warped away.

They hadn't had a chance to discuss who they could trust to switch their IC chips back, or agree where to have it done. Normally Proto Man could track anyone (especially someone like Bass, since Wily made no attempt to hide his Robot Master's teleportation signatures), but he was not in his own body. Without access to any of his mods, homebrew upgrades, custom utilities, code signature database… actually, he wasn't entirely sure if Bass's teleporter even worked the same way as his own and there was only one way to find out.

Might as well start at Big Eddies.

---

"YO!"

Dr. Cossack nearly fell out of his chair in surprise.

"Blues?"

There'd been no whistle announcing his arrival. The stance was wrong, the expression was wrong, the energy with which he carried himself was wrong. Was it a Copy robot? Had Dr. Wily rebuilt Dark Man?

"I'm not Proto Dork, I'm Bass. Some wacko swapped our IC chips."

Honestly? That was even weirder than he could've imagined. They'd only met once, and there had been a lot going on at the time, so neither of them had left much impression on the other. Dr. Cossack blinked in surprise, but quickly recovered. "Ah. Well, certainly I don't mind restoring you, but I would need both--"

"That's not why I'm here. He's in my body and doesn't have his shield, and I jumped a few random locations first to throw off the trail, which'll buy you a little time. But that guy's like a freakin' bloodhound, so not much. I figure you got, what, an hour or two?"

"To…?"

"To fix this ding-dong's busted core, duh."

"That. That's… hm, it would be a violation…"

At which point Bass pointed at his chest with his thumb. "I'm! In! This! Body! So for now that makes it mine and I want it fixed. And don't talk to me about 'violations' because some wacko switched our IC chips and it ain't even the first time this crap happened to me!"

Dr. Cossack hesitated.

"With the instability in his core, he might not-- you might not-- survive having it replaced. Especially if I'm rushing."

"Hold up, is THAT why he's so chicken about it?"

"I believe he views the decision as a deeply personal matter of self-determination."

"Tch! How stupid can you get? Whatever. If it goes bad then it's not my problem anymore, and that wimp gets the biggest upgrade a robot could dream of." Then he clapped his hands. "Clock's ticking, Russki! Chop chop!"

---

Bass had some trouble figuring out how Blues organized his ancillary data, as well as some of his very non-traditional 'do it yourself' mods, but was able to quickly track down Proto Man (or, more accurately, Bass's own body).

Proto Man, as it happened, had no luck at all. Ironically he'd even stopped at the Cossack Citadel, but Kalinka genuinely had no idea where Bass (in Proto Man's body) was. He was a little concerned by how trusting she'd been, taking his word at face value, in a world of robot clones and Copy 'bots.

At a loss, he'd gone to one of his usual moody, broody sightseeing spots to contemplate life. He almost startled when Bass teleported in next to him-- how was this body weirdly numb and hypersensitive at the same time?

"Sooooooo… do I even want to know what you got up to while running around as me?"

He leaned back and smirked. "Playing the best prank ever on your consumer-grade brother. Don't worry, I didn't hurt him… much. He figured out it was me anyway, since this happened to him last time."

"You do know what this means, don't you?" Proto Man broke into a smug grin. "It's not Mega Man fans. It's your fans."

"Ugh!"

"Did you have any idea where you want to get switched back?"

Bass shrugged.

"Auto did fine last time, but I'm still not sure I trust that guy. How about the lady, Dr. Whatsherface?"

"Dr. Lalinde?"

"Yeah. Wait, no." Bass snapped his fingers. "The commie that worked with Wily that one time. That guy."

Proto Man gave him a dirty look. "Dr. Cossack didn't work with Dr. Wily, he was blackmailed when--"

"His name's seriously 'Cossack'? Like the Russian Cossacks? I always thought you guys were making fun of him."

"Just stop talking," he said, grabbing Bass by the scarf before teleporting them both.

---

He ended up taking them to Geoworks Industries, where they were restored to their rightful places.

Afterwards, Proto Man knew that there hadn't been enough time for Dr. Lalinde to repair his core while returning their IC chips. He was furious. Bass had no right. It was a violation. But he kept his anger in check, because Proto Man also had a pretty good idea of what kind of trouble Bass could've gotten into… and what it meant that he'd chosen to take that opportunity to help him instead, even if it was misguided, inappropriate, massively overstepping.

"Blues," Dr. Lalinde started, "I didn't--"

"No, it's okay. I know." He sat up. "Is it safe?"

"I'd like to run some tests, but everything looked clean, and we didn't get any unstable power readings from the monitor." It was clear from the way she said it that 'clean' didn't just refer to the quality of the repairs: she meant it didn't look like Wily's handiwork.

"Thanks," he said as he got down from the work bench.

"You're welcome, sucker!" said Bass, offering a playful salute, knowing that Proto Man was talking to Lalinde and not him. "Adios!"

"Wait."

For whatever reason Bass actually listened, and waited. They looked at each other, hesitant, something unspoken hanging in the space between them.

"You know Masterson's going to stick you in Roll's body next."

Bass's eyes widened and he opened his mouth to say something, but Proto Man recalled his shield and teleported while he still had the last word.