“Are you sure you want to do this, Axl?”
“Totally,” Axl said, tugging at the collar of his grey vest and rolling his eyes when X frowned worriedly and reached over to help him adjust his clothes. “I love public speaking, I’m an expert at it. It’s my favorite.”
“Relax, kiddo,” Zero said, reaching over to ruffle the redhead’s hair and grinning when Axl ducked away. “It’s an announcement, not an interrogation with the press. You’ll be fine.”
“Don’t touch my hair,” Axl said with a huff. “It took me ages to get it to stop sticking up. Cut me some slack, I’ve never done this before . . .”
“Axl, breathe,” X said, placing his hands on the gunner’s shoulders and shaking his head gently. “You’re overthinking this. Again.”
“I’m prone to that,” Axl said with a weak grin. “You know me.”
“We know,” X and Zero replied in unison. “Zero was too,” X added with a smile in the blond’s direction. “He used to need notecards.”
Zero crossed his arms, feigning a look of hurt that made both X and Axl giggle quietly. “That was a long time ago,” he grumbled.
“Last chance to back out, Axl,” X said as the event coordinator signaled for them to take their seats.
The gunner shook his head, straightening up and fixing his vest one more time. “Nope,” he declared. “I’d never forgive myself if I chickened out at the last second. There’s . . . there’s something I really need people to hear me say.”
“All right,” X said with a nod and a warm smile. “Let’s get to business then.”
Axl followed the senior Hunters’ lead, matching their demeanor as they calmly took their seats next to the podium. The sight of the teeming crowd of reporters and special guests sent a chill down his spine, but he hid it well (or at least he thought so), keeping a neutral expression and watching X and Zero for cues out of the corner of his eye.
He managed to stay still and keep himself from fidgeting, listening to X’s formal announcement of an existing cure, observing in awe the way the Lightbot allowed the crowd their time to be noisy and excited before quieting them with a simple gesture of his hand. Zero’s portion of the announcement was much shorter and more concise, reiterating a few of X’s points and thanking the Hunters’ research and development division for their hard work over what felt like an eternity by this point.
Zero settled back in his seat, and X nodded for Axl to take his place. Swallowing the veritable army of butterflies bouncing against the walls of his artificial stomach, Axl slowly got to his feet and moved to stand behind the podium, squinting as his eyes adjusted to the glare of far too many lights and flashbulbs pointed at him.
Right. Breathe. Breathing was good.
“Um . . . good morning, everyone,” he started, clearing his throat as he felt his voice tighten. “I’m . . . I’m Axl, an S-class Hunter of . . . of the 17th Elite unit. I’ve only been around since the Seventh Uprising, so I’m not quite the creaky old veteran that those two over there are . . .”
He nodded his head toward X and Zero as he spoke, and a grin twitched at his lips when he was met with a few amused murmurs from his audience. “But . . . I’ve still seen a lot of people come and go,” Axl went on. “And . . . just like every Hunter, I’ve lost a lot of close friends. Some of them . . .” He swallowed, pausing for a few moments to give himself time to collect his thoughts so that he wouldn’t start rambling. “Many of them were lost in the line of fire, protecting others. And . . . countless others fell to the virus itself.
“It’s . . . always the hardest thing for all of us, when we come across an infected unit,” he continued after another brief pause. “Knowing that . . . there’s nothing we can do to truly save them, and . . . that a quick, merciful end is the best we can give. As Hunters, it’s up to us to protect people from Mavericks, and . . . and it pains all of us when pulling the trigger is our only option. Sometimes . . .”
Again, he paused, a wry, tired smile tugging at his features. “Sometimes I think even I have trouble defining what a Maverick is any more. It really has become a mess lately. But I think . . .”
One more brief pause, and this time when he spoke again, his voice was stronger, his tone holding far more confidence. “I hope that with this, there will come a day soon when we’ll no longer need to authorize the use of lethal force within the Hunters.”
The crowd broke into a startled chorus of questions, but Axl simply dipped his head and thanked them for their time, relieved to settle back into his seat and listen to the event organizer go through the closing speech. “Not half bad for my first public speech, right guys?” he said once they had been dismissed backstage.
This time he didn’t duck away when Zero reached over to ruffle his hair, merely grinning and tipping his head up proudly. “You did fine,” X said with a soft smile. “It gets easier to ignore all the stares the more times you do it.”
“You sure are gonna stir things up if you keep saying things like that to the press though,” Zero pointed out with a faint semblance of a smirk.
“Like what?” Axl said, tipping his head and feigning innocence. “You guys being old and creaky? I was just telling the truth.”
“Don’t push your luck,” X said, unable to hide a grin of his own as Zero grabbed Axl in a headlock in spite of the gunner’s yelp of protest. “Come on you two, can’t you save it for HQ?”
“He started it!” Axl whined. “Now my hair’s all a mess and my vest is wrinkled and you’re not helping X c’mon!”
“Payback’s a cruel mistress when you insult your elders, isn’t it?” X said, his eyes gleaming with mischief. “As long as we’re all dressed up, why don’t we stop somewhere for dinner on the way back?”
“Date night!” Axl hummed cheerily, finally managing to wiggle his way free of Zero’s hold. “Sounds like a plan to me, wrinkled vest or not. C’mon let’s go celebrate before some nosy reporter jumps us from behind and starts pestering us about our romantic lives, yeah?”
