Archie Mega Man Issue 26

Archie Mega Man Issue 26 is the twenty-sixth issue in the Mega Man comic series. It is the seventh part of the Sonic & Mega Man: Worlds Collide crossover event.

Offiicial Solicitation

 * "When Worlds Collide," Part 7 of 12. The historic Sonic the Hedgehog and Mega Man crossover event rolls on! The hunt for the Roboticized Masters continues as Sonic and Mega Man face down Shadow Man and–Shadow Man? Meanwhile, Dr. Eggman and Dr. Wily gloat over the captive Dr. Light. But what is the brilliant, bearded scientist preparing to do? Featuring stunning new cover art from Patrick ‘SPAZ’ Spaziante, and a special throwback variant cover you just can’t miss!

When Worlds Collide - Part Seven: Evening The Odds
Deep inside the Skull Egg Zone, the four heroes–Sonic the Hedgehog, Mega Man, Miles "Tails" Prower, and Rush–explore a forest region of the zone, only to get ambush by a robotic snake. Mega Man is able to destroy it via his Mega Buster, but Sonic, bemused at Mega Man, tells the robot that he has fought a robot snake before. Mega Man then shows off to Sonic that he's faced dozens, but Sonic tells Mega Man it's the quality of the robot, not how much he's faced. Even still, Sonic and Mega Man thank each other for their help whether its facing robots or the deroboticize the Roboticized Masters to save Sonic's missing friends. Suddenly, the heroes are ambushed by a ninja star and a Chaos energy-powered-laser. This turns out to be the works of Shadow Man and Shadow Man, respectively.

While Sonic tells Mega Man to take care of the Robot Master Shadow Man, Mega Man shoots at the Roboticized Master Shadow Man. The two blue heroes argue at each other for attacking the Shadow Man they were supposed to attack, but Tails, who is facing the Robot Master Shadow Man, tells the two that both of the robots are both named Shadow Man and the two heroes begin to fight the Shadow Men. The Robot Master Shadow Man attacks Sonic and Mega Man via ninja stars, but Sonic comments that "whirling blades of doom" got tired back at Scrap Brain Zone. However, Sonic is ambushed by the Roboticized Master Shadow Man via Shadow Man's Master Weapon, the Chaos Cannon. Tails tells Mega Man to take down the Roboticized Master before Sonic dies of suffocation. While Tails and Rush take care of the Robot Master Shadow Man, Mega Man uses the Chroma Camo Master Weapon to avoid the Roboticized Master Shadow Man's Chaos Cannon laser shot, and Mega Man, transforming into his Tails Wind Master Weapon, blows the Roboticized Master away to allow Sonic to breathe and fight once again. Sonic, Tails, and Rush take care of the Robot Master Shadow Man while Mega Man deroboticizes the Roboticized Master Shadow Man back to Shadow the Hedgehog via the Sonic Shot. Mega Man then uses the Chaos Cannon Master Weapon to seal the remaining Shadow Man inside a Chaos-energy-barrier.

With the battle over, Shadow, agitated and humiliated by his roboticization, destroys the remaining Shadow Man in vengeance. Sonic tells Shadow to loosen the anger control, but Shadow tells Sonic not now. Sonic then tells Shadow if he wants to help them on taking down the rest of the Roboticized Masters down, or if he wanted to help the Chaotix and Proto Man sneak in and trash the Wily Egg. Shadow replies neither and he uses Chaos Control to transport himself somewhere else. Suddenly, Sonic and Mega Man are given visible memories of their last "real" lives. Mega Man and Tails tell Sonic about these memory floods coming back to them, as Tails remarks who is Mecha Sally. Sonic then explains that not only has a second Genesis Wave has occurred, but that Dr. Eggman and Dr. Wily have rewrote their worlds, such as changing the past and pushing them to the near-future. Sonic was able to set the world back to normal, but it had major side-effects. Tails then replies that since Shadow used Chaos Control just now, it made a brief glimpse of their worlds at their last moments. Mega Man then replies that it doesn't matter about old nor new worlds, but that they need to stop Eggman and Wily from taking over the universe. Sonic likes Mega Man's idea and the heroes move on forward.

Meanwhile, inside the Wily Egg, Eggman and Wily mock Dr. Light inside a Capsule calling him names such as Santa Claus. However, Orbot comes by to report that both Shadow Men have been destroyed, which ruins the festive mood of the scientists. They walk away to finish their other projects, leaving Dr. Light by himself inside the Capsule. Then, Rouge the Bat then comes by and asks Dr. Light for help. Dr. Light, impressed that she was able to make it through this zone as well as infiltrate the Wily Egg, asks Rouge if she will get him out of the Wily Egg. Rouge replies with a yes and a no, as she needs to get revenge after Copy Robot captured Shadow while they were on a mission for G.U.N. She cannot get the information to crash the data file on the Wily Egg to get payback on Eggman and Wily unless Dr. Light helps her out. Dr. Light agrees with her plan, and begins finding the coordinates on the Wily Egg.

Meanwhile, Sonic tries to get up on several rocks but due to Appearing-Disappearing blocks, it is difficult for him to reach above where the other heroes are at. Suddenly, the heroes are ambushed from behind, and Sonic warns the heroes about Blaze Woman and Silver Man, who are about to attack them. While Mega Man and Rush take care of Silver Man, Sonic and Tails attack Blaze Woman. Mega Man attacks Silver Man with the Sonic Shot and deroboticize's Silver Man back to normal after throwing Rush via Psycho Burst. But, Blaze Woman provides trouble for Sonic and Tails as she uses the Fire Tornado to attack them. Luckily, Silver holds her down while Mega Man deroboticze's Blaze Woman back to normal, as well. Shortly, Tails fixes any damages on Rush and assures Mega Man that T-Pup will be fine. Mega Man, confused who T-Pup is, asks the strange name for his dog, but Tails says that Rush reminds him a lot of T-Pup.

Short Circuits
Bass destroys an unknown object with his Bass Buster, and Omega wastes a city. Then there is a (childishly drawn) picture with a burning house on a rainbow, sad faces of Eggman and Wily, and the two robots holding hands while skipping, with the text: "A MATCH MADE IN CROSSOVER HEAVEN: DESTRUCTION BUDDIES 4 LIFE!"

Trivia

 * The regular cover is a homage to the American promotional artwork for Mega Man 10.
 * The variant cover features 16 bit versions of Mega Man, his dog Rush, Metal Sonic and Dr. Eggman in Stardust Speedway from Sonic the Hedgehog CD.
 * The variant cover was revealed before the actual cover.
 * Also, similar to the previous part, when this issue went into printing, the name of the variant cover was changed from 16-bit Variant to Game Sprite Variant.
 * In second page, Big Snakey's eyes in the bushes resembles Knuckles' eyes in the bushes on the american front cover of Sonic the Hedgehog 3.
 * Technically, this issue marks the first in-canon comic book sighting of Shadow and Blaze since SU #24.
 * Rouge also makes her crossover debut in this issue even though she appeared in covers in the two previous issues of Mega Man.
 * Mecha Sally makes her one-off cameo in Sonic's flashback of his life before the Genesis Wave.
 * Sonic mentions the Egg Viper and Scrap Brain Zone in this issue.
 * Interestingly, Sonic also boasts to Mega Man about "quality over quantity" when comparing Mega Man's defeat of dozens of snakeys to Sonic's defeat of the Egg Viper.  Indeed, many consider the Egg Viper to be one of the hardest bosses in the entire Sonic franchise, made even worse by Dr. Eggman's annoying repetitive taunts throughout the fight (for example, the famous "Get a load of this!").
 * The power core of Shadow's weapon has the logo of Shadow the Hedgehog on it (it is also the only core with a symbol on it).
 * Dr. Eggman refers to Dr. Light as "Santa in a lab coat". Whether or not this means the concept of Santa Claus still exists on Mobius from its early days as planet Earth, or if Eggman's knowledge of the famous holiday icon is simply a bi-product of the Genesis Wave, is unknown.
 * On a related note, the line itself was a reference to Kenji Inafune basing Dr. Light's design on Santa Claus.
 * This issue confirms that the effects of the Genesis Wave can bled worlds other than Mobius Prime and Mega Man's world, (example the Sol Zone).