History WhatAnIdiot / MegaManX

** Colonel's What an Idiot moment is, for the most part, because of a What an Idiot moment itself. Before ''X4'', the government wanted to replicate the success of the Maverick Hunters and create a warrior as powerful as he was compassionate, just like X. Unfortunately, they were unable to achieve their goal, and were forced to spit the program they'd made into what became Colonel and Iris, the former a proud and honorable warrior, the latter his compassionate and sensitive sister.\\

'''You'd Expect''': They'd remember X himself went through 30 years of testing and that being careless with the design and conditioning of the artificial brains of reploids resulted in the original Mavericks, (notably the psychotic and murderous Vile, who nearly killed two of their best!) so they would put them through extensive therapy and analysis, making certain to teach Colonel that there is a time when pride must be discarded for what's right, and to teach Iris how to deal with emotional trauma and inner pain, helping them overcome their greatest potential weaknesses.\\

'''You'd expect''': The researchers would be happy to work with a hypercompetent prodigy and would do everything they could to help him and learn from him.\\
'''Instead''': They jealously orders him to weaken his creations in order to "correct" the issue. Predictably, he refuses.\\

'''Instead''': None of this takes place, Gate eventually goes Maverick thanks to Zero's remains post-''X5'', and brings all his creations back with the help of an evil scientist who may be a vessel of Dr. Wily. [[spoiler:[[VideoGame/MegaManZero And a century later]], the replica versions of X and Zero that do get built come out as AxCrazy minions of a new sociopathic MadScientist.]]

'''You'd ''then'' expect''': '''1)''' The government to recover the remains of Gate's Reploids since it is possible that Gate or some other highly-competent engineer could rebuild them and they want to be the ones facilitating and supervising that process should it ever take place. '''2)''' Alia to get the Maverick Hunters to investigate this team almost as soon as she joins them so their crimes could be discovered and the proper authorities could forced them to disband for blatantly sabotaging a potential major breakthrough over petty politics, then to conduct a search for Gate. '''3)''' Depending on the state he's in when they find him, either the Hunters and the government would destroy Gate and his Reploids' remains respectively or the Hunters would ask him to head up a new science team with their resources and supervision and the government would turn over the remains so he could rebuild them.\\
'''Instead''': The government does neither and Gate brings all his creations back once he goes Maverick. [[spoiler:[[VideoGame/MegaManZero And a century later]], the replica versions of X and Zero that do get built come out as AxCrazy minions of a sociopathic MadScientist.]]

'''You'd ''then'' expect''': The remains of Gate's reploids would be recovered and fully destroyed since it is possible that Gate could rebuild them. Better yet, this research team would be investigated for its blatant sabotage of a potential breakthrough that could've brought the proper authorities closer to understanding or even being able to successfully replicate X and Zero.\\

** '''You'd expect''': The researchers would be happy to work with a hypercompetent prodigy and would do everything they could to help him and learn from him.\\
** '''Instead''': They jealously ordered him to weaken his creations in order to "correct" the issue. Predictably, he refused.\\
** '''You'd then expect''': For either Alia or Gate himself to suggest, and then work on, tweaking the analysis programs so his Reploids could be studied anyway in an effort to put the rest of the team at ease.\\
** '''Instead''': No such thing occurred, and Alia would forcibly drawn into the team's conspiracy to destroy Gate's Reploids.
** '''You'd ''then'' expect''': The remains of Gate's reploids would be recovered and fully destroyed since it is possible that Gate could rebuild them. Better yet, this research team would be investigated for its blatant sabotage of a potential breakthrough that could've brought the proper authorities closer to understanding or even being able to successfully replicate X and Zero.

* Also ''[[VideoGame/MegaManX6 X6]]'' it's revealed that the Maverick bosses were innocent reploids that were manipulated and killed because they were too advanced to be fully analyzed. Their creator, Gate, was ordered to weaken them to correct this, but refused.\\
'''You'd expect''': The remains of Gate's reploids would be recovered and fully destroyed since it is possible that Gate could resurrect them.\\
'''Instead''': The government does neither and Gate brings all his creations back once he goes Maverick.

'''Instead''': They decide not to bother, and immediately assign them to positions where they're directly involved in the Maverick Wars, Iris as a Navigator for the Maverick Hunters, and Colonel as the Colonel of the Repliforce.[[labelnote:Also]]Bonus points for Colonel [[WhoNamesTheirKidDude actually being his name]], as though he has [[MarriedToTheJob no identity whatsoever beyond his rank]] Double bonus points for placing him underneath a General with the exact same problem.[[/labelnote]] When Colonel is informed that the government thinks he's a Maverick, he's shocked at first, yet after hearing he'll be brought to HQ and simply questioned (notably after disarming, which he views as a blow to his honor), he loses it, and rebels, and whenever seen, comes off as almost delusional in his statements, insisting war is the only choice. He adamantly refuses to listen to reason, and in the end, is killed in a duel with Zero. Iris, after hearing the news, has a complete mental breakdown. She uses her brother's chip to turn into a mech-like form to kill Zero, but the stress of the adaptation and the fight proves fatal, leading her to die in Zero's arms.

'''You'd expect''': The remains of Gate's reploids would be recovered and fully destroyed since it is possible that Gate could resurrect them. Alternatively, kill Gate so he can't do something like this again.\\

* Also ''[[VideoGame/MegaManX6 X6]]'' it's revealed that the Maverick bosses were innocent reploids that were manipulated and killed because they were too advanced to be fully analyzed. Their creator, Gate, was ordered to weaken them to correct this, but refused\\
'''You'd expect''': The remains of Gate's reploids would be recovered and fully destroyed since it is possible that Gate could resurrect them. Alternatively, kill Gate so he can't do something like this again.

'''Instead''': Lifesaver goes behind Signas' back and tells his suspicions to X, Zero's best friend, accusing Zero of being dangerous and points out that Zero is unaffected in an area brimming with TheVirus. The resulting concern and mistrust between the two friends causes them to fight and nearly get killed by the BigBad when he takes them by surprise. Lifesaver unsurprisingly hasn't been seen in the games ever since.

'''You'd expect''': Dr. Cain to make sure that the Reploids were as safe as possible by ''not'' doing things like giving them special powers or built-in weapons, making them massive, and keeping them humanoid. Ideally, they'd be issued weapons as needed from the government, and be given select tools and powers for the job at hand as opposed to constant access to such power. Since they're obviously supposed to be people, they should look like people so humans would be easily able to accept them as people, and they wouldn't feel so separate from humans with their radically different physiologies, as opposed to huge animal forms that would only serve to make a bigger gap between both species, instilling fear, jealousy, mistrust, etc. In case of emergencies, he could also make special electrical weaponry designed to shut down their brains temporarily, essentially a high-tech tranquilizer for mechanical organisms, or magnetic-powered weaponry that would stop them from moving, or perhaps some kind of remote device that would activate via satellite, for exactly the same purpose, as Reploids would be naturally harder to take down than a human would.\\

** While Colonel definitely takes the cake in idiocy, Zero's handling of the situation isn't exactly graceful. He's just saved Colonel's sister, and received his thanks, but the situation does look pretty bad, and his superiors have already been suspicious of the Repliforce for some time. However, there's nothing out-of-the-ordinary about Colonel's behavior, he seems perfectly calm and rational.\\
'''You'd expect''': He'd recognize, at the very least, Colonel himself seems to think he's innocent, and he probably shouldn't say anything that could set him off, and would assure Colonel that while it seems unlikely he was involved in the attack, he and his men were still found with weapons on the scene, and as a member of the primary anti-Maverick force in the world it's his duty to make sure.\\

** '''The result''': Colonel flies off the handle, insisting war would be preferable to the shame of accusations and surrender, and teleports back to General and prepares for war.

'''Instead''': They decide not to bother, and immediately assign them to positions where they're directly involved in the Maverick Wars, Iris as a Navigator for the Maverick Hunters, and Colonel as the Colonel of the Repliforce.[[labelnote:Also]]Bonus points for Colonel [[WhoNamesTheirKidDude actually being his name]], as though he has [[MarriedToTheJob no identity whatsoever beyond his rank]] Double bonus points for placing him underneath a General with the exact same problem.[[/labelnote]] When Colonel is informed that his superiors, the government, think he's a Maverick, he's shocked at first, yet after hearing he'll be brought to HQ and simply questioned (notably after disarming, which he views as a blow to his honor), he suddenly becomes furious and rebels, and whenever seen, comes off as almost delusional in his statements, insisting war is the only choice. He adamantly refuses to listen to reason, and in the end, is killed in a duel with Zero. Iris, after hearing the news, has a complete mental breakdown. She uses her brother's chip to turn into a mech-like form to kill Zero, but the stress of the adaptation and the fight proves fatal, leading her to die in Zero's arms.

'''Instead''': Iris has free reign to go as she pleases, and no one knew she was gone until after her brother died.\\

** Iris' death isn't as tragic when you remember that Zero led his own unit at the time.

'''Instead''': They decide not to bother, and immediately assign them to positions where they're directly involved in the Maverick Wars, Iris as a Navigator for the Maverick Hunters, and Colonel as the Colonel of the Repliforce.[[labelnote:Also]]Bonus points for Colonel [[WhoNamesTheirKidDude actually being his name]], as though he has [[MarriedToTheJob no identity whatsoever beyond his rank]] Double bonus points for placing him underneath a General with the exact same problem.[[/labelnote]] When Colonel is informed that his superiors, the government, think he's a Maverick, he's shocked at first, yet after hearing he'll be brought to HQ and simply questioned (notably after disarming, which he views as a blow to his honor), he suddenly becomes furious and rebels, and whenever seen, comes off as almost delusional in his statements, insisting war is the only choice. He adamantly refuses to listen to reason, and in the end, is killed in a duel with Zero. Iris, after hearing the news, has a complete mental breakdown. She uses her brother's chip to turn into a mech-like form to kill Zero, but the stress of the adaptation and the fight proves fatal leading her to die in Zero's arms.

'''Instead:''' Not only are we NOT told that all of the copy chip Reploids are destroyed, but people are so obsessed with building their ungodly space towers that they eventually put research into these chips BACK UP in spite of the warnings from people who pay attention to history. If ''[[VideoGame/MegaManXCommandMission Command Mission]]'' is anything to go by, they basically ASKED for Colonel Redips.

* Going further is the world's reaction to the New-Gen Reploid incident. After the incident, the government shuts down all copy chip research because it's pretty obvious those chips are hell in micro form.\\

* Going further is the world's reaction to this incident. After the incident, the government shuts down all copy chip research because it's pretty obvious those chips are hell in micro form.\\

'''You'd Expect''': They'd remember X himself went through 30 years of testing and that being careless with the design and conditioning of the artificial brains of reploids resulted in the original Mavericks, [[/labelnote:Notably]]the psychotic and murderous Vile, who nearly killed two of their best![[/labelnote]] so they would put them through extensive therapy and analysis, making certain to teach Colonel that there is a time when pride must be discarded for what's right, and to teach Iris how to deal with emotional trauma and inner pain, helping them overcome their greatest potential weaknesses.\\
'''Instead''': They decide not to bother, and immediately assign them to positions where they're directly involved in the Maverick Wars, Iris as a Navigator for the Maverick Hunters, and Colonel as the Colonel of the Repliforce.[[labelnote:Also]]Bonus points for Colonel [[WhoNamesTheirKidDude actually being his name]], as though he has [[MarriedToTheJob no identity whatsoever beyond his rank]] Double bonus points for placing him underneath a General with the exact same problem.[[/labelnote]] When Colonel is informed that his superiors, the government, think he's a Maverick, he's shocked at first, yet after hearing he'll be brought to HQ and simply questioned (notably after disarming, which he views as a blow to his honor), suddenly becomes furious and rebels, and whenever seen, he comes off as almost delusional in his statements, insisting war is the only choice. He adamantly refuses to listen to reason, and in the end, is killed in a duel with Zero. Iris, after hearing the news, has a complete mental breakdown, uses her brother's chip to turn into a mech-like form to kill Zero, her body rejecting it throughout the battle, and she dies in Zero's arms.

'''You'd Expect''': They'd remember X himself went through 30 years of testing and that being careless with the design and conditioning of the artificial brains of reploids resulted in the original Mavericks, and notably the psychotic and murderous Vile, so they would put them through extensive therapy and analysis, making certain to teach Colonel that there is a time when pride must be discarded for what's right, and to teach Iris how to deal with emotional trauma and inner pain, helping them overcome their greatest potential weaknesses.\\

'''In Addition''': Nobody thinks to start installing actual security measures into Reploids until ''[[VideoGame/MegaManX8 X8]]''. They attempt this by using copy chips -- chips that contain DNA data of hundreds of existing Reploids -- that can change a Reploid's DNA and grant them immunity to the Sigma Virus. But nobody bothered to check what ''kinds'' of data were encoded in them, so it wasn't until the events of the game that they found the chips had copies of Sigma's DNA data -- which is the virus causing Reploids to go Maverick -- installed. Which not only allows them to go Maverick at will,[[note]]not just in the sense of making Maverick decisions resulting from circuit breaks, abstract reasoning, misinterpretation of duty, etc., as all Reploids technically can do as they have free will, but in a sense akin to ''turning off their conscience at will, effectively becoming [[TheSociopath Reploid sociopaths]]'',[[/note]] but to ''steal the identity of '''anyone they damn well please.'''''

* In the [=OVA=] included with the first game's [[VideoGameRemake remake]], ''[[VideoGame/MegaManMaverickHunterX Maverick Hunter X]]'', ''The Day of Sigma'', X and Zero are investigating a string of mysterious incidents that are flaring across the city, including someone breaking a dangerous Maverick out of jail. Since Zero observes that the guards were defeated by a Reploid with very high combat abilities, he suspects that their commander Sigma must be behind it because he's one of the few Reploids with specs that high and he suspiciously cannot be contacted.\\
'''You'd Expect''': For Zero to tell X about his suspicions, just in case he's right and Sigma tries to back-stab them while they're trying to find the truth. Especially when he says he, 'has a bad feeling about this'.\\
'''Instead''': Zero says ''nothing'' to his friend, meaning that while he was ready for Sigma to betray them, X wasn't, and he was used as a hostage against X while his partner froze in hesitation and confusion. A few minutes later, both he and X are badly wounded, and Abel City has been blasted with missiles.
* From the above two games: Vile has captured X using his Ride Armor, and a previously incapacitated Zero leaps onto the back the Armor, where Vile can't aim any attacks at all. There's no indication that Vile can't be shot directly, the original game uses GameplayAndStorySegregation to prevent any easy headshots while the remake has Vile just grab X, preventing the fight altogether.\\

'''Instead''': Zero says ''nothing'' to his friend, meaning that while he was ready for Sigma to betray them, X wasn't, and he was used as a hostage against X while his partner froze in hesitation and confusion. A few minutes later, both he and X are badly wounded, and Abel City has been blasted with missiles. \\
'''To be fair''': X is a worrywart person and Zero knows well of it. What Zero had is just suspicions, it'd be logical to not tell X yet until he can confirm it because otherwise X would be bothered by it (especially by the thought of ''your own superior'' doing all those things).

'''Instead''': Zero says ''nothing'' to his friend, meaning that while he was ready for Sigma to betray them, X wasn't, and he was used as a hostage against X while his partner froze in hesitation and confusion. A few minutes later, both he and X are badly wounded, and Abel City has been blasted with missiles.

* In VideoGameRemake ''[[VideoGame/MegaManMaverickHunterX Maverick Hunter X]]'', X and Zero are investigating a string of mysterious incidents that are flaring across the city, including someone breaking a dangerous Maverick out of jail. Since Zero observes that the guards were defeated by a Reploid with very high combat abilities, he suspects that their commander Sigma must be behind it because he's one of the few Reploids with specs that high and he suspiciously cannot be contacted.\\

'''Instead''': They decide not to bother, and immediately assign them to positions where they're directly involved in the Maverick Wars, Iris as a Navigator for the Maverick Hunters, and Colonel as the Colonel of the Repliforce.[[labelnote:Also]]Bonus points for Colonel [[WhoNamesTheirKidDude actually being his name]], as though he has [[MarriedToTheJob no identity whatsoever beyond his rank]].[[/labelnote]] When Colonel is informed that his superiors, the government, think he's a Maverick, he's shocked at first, yet after hearing he'll be brought to HQ and simply questioned (notably after disarming, which he views as a blow to his honor), suddenly becomes furious and rebels, and whenever seen, he comes off as almost delusional in his statements, insisting war is the only choice. He adamantly refuses to listen to reason, and in the end, is killed in a duel with Zero. Iris, after hearing the news, has a complete mental breakdown, uses her brother's chip to turn into a mech-like form to kill Zero, her body rejecting it throughout the battle, and she dies in Zero's arms.

'''You'd expect''': Dr. Cain to make sure that the Reploids were as safe as possible by ''not'' doing things like giving them special powers or built-in weapons, making them massive, and keeping them humanoid. Ideally, they'd be issued weapons as needed from the government, and be given select tools and powers for the job at hand as opposed to constant access to such power. Since they're obviously supposed to be people, they should look like people so humans would be easily able to accept them as people, and they wouldn't feel so separate from humans with their radically different physiologies, as opposed to huge animal forms that would only serve to make a bigger gap between both species, instilling fear, jealousy, mistrust, etc. In case of emergencies, he could also make special electrical weaponry designed to shut them down their brains temporarily, essentially a high-tech tranquilizer for mechanical organisms, or magnetic-powered weaponry that would stop them from moving, or perhaps some kind of remote device that would activate via satellite, for exactly the same purpose, as Reploids would be naturally harder to take down than a human would.\\

'''In Addition''': Nobody thinks to start installing actual security measures into Reploids until ''[[VideoGame/MegaManX8 X8]]''. They attempt this by using copy chips - chips that contain DNA data of hundreds of existing Reploids - that can change a Reploid's DNA and grant them immunity to the Sigma Virus. But nobody bothered to check what ''kinds'' of data were encoded in them, so it wasn't until the events of the game that they found the chips had copies of Sigma's DNA data--which is the virus causing Reploids to go Maverick--installed. Which not only allows them to go Maverick at will,[[note]]not just in the sense of making Maverick decisions resulting from circuit breaks, abstract reasoning, misinterpretation of duty, etc., as all Reploids technically can do as they have free will, but in a sense akin to ''turning off their conscience at will, effectively becoming [[TheSociopath Reploid sociopaths]]'',[[/note]] but to ''steal the identity of '''anyone they damn well please.'''''

* In ''[[VideoGame/MegaManX2 X2]]'' X has to fight the X-Hunters to reclaim Zero's parts, except the control chip which the Maverick Hunters already have. Having Zero on either side is showed being very important. Canon dictates that there was a black-painted copy of Zero in the villains' possession.\\

'''You'd expect:''' Colonel to immediately disarm and come in for questioning, both in a show of good faith for the victims and to clear Repliforce's name. Or, if he believed that he/Repliforce would be unfairly treated for whatever reason (feels there's too much anti-Reploid prejudice, suspects there might be a frame job with too many people in the right places, believes that in the panic they might just get blamed anyway, etc), clearly mention that as a reason for refusing.\\

** Colonel's What an Idiot moment is, for the most part because of a What an Idiot moment itself. Before ''X4'', the government wanted to replicate the success of the Maverick Hunters and create a warrior as powerful as he was compassionate, just like X. Unfortunately, they were unable to achieve their goal, and were forced to spit the program they'd made into what became Colonel and Iris, the former a proud and honorable warrior, the latter his compassionate and sensitive sister.\\
'''You'd Expect''': They'd remember X himself went through 30 years of testing and that being careless with the design and conditioning of the artificial brains of reploids resulted in the original Mavericks, and notably the psychotic and murderous Vile, so they would put them through extensive therapy and analysis, making certain to teach Colonel that there is a time when pride must be discarded for what's right, and to teach Iris how to deal with emotional trauma, and inner pain, helping them overcome their greatest potential weaknesses.\\
'''Instead''': They decide not to bother, and immediately assign them to positions where they're directly involved in the Maverick Wars, Iris as a Navigator for the Maverick Hunters, and Colonel as the Colonel of the Repliforce.[[labelnote:Also]]Bonus points for Colonel [[WhoNamesTheirKidDude actually being his name]], as though he has [[MarriedToTheJob no identity whatsoever beyond his rank]].[[/labelnote]] When Colonel is informed that his superiors, the government, think he's a Maverick, he's shocked at first, yet after hearing he'll be brought to HQ and simply questioned,(notably after disarming, which he views as a blow to his honor) suddenly becomes furious and rebels, and whenever seen, he comes off as almost delusional in his statements, insisting war is the only choice. He adamantly refuses to listen to reason, and in the end, is killed in a duel with Zero. Iris, after hearing the news, has a complete mental breakdown, uses her brother's chip to turn into a mech-like form to kill Zero, her body rejecting it throughout the battle, and she dies in Zero's arms.
** ''X4'' reveals Sigma and Zero fought when Sigma was a Maverick Hunter. At the time, Zero was an unidentified Maverick berserker who killed a whole hunter unit, and Sigma stepped in personally to take him out. They begin fighting, Sigma has his beam saber and Zero, for whatever reason, isn't using his Z-Buster and dash boots and runs like idiot intending to beat Sigma to death.\\
'''You'd expect''': Sigma, whose sole purpose at this point is to take out Mavericks as quickly as possible, immediately use his saber and chop his target into two or more pieces, winning in a SingleStrokeBattle.\\

* In [[[[VideoGame/MegaManX1 the first game]], Dr. Cain uses Dr. Light's designs for X to create Reploids. These robots are missing design elements that Dr. Cain couldn't understand and haven't gone through the testing period X did to ensure his safety.\\

* In the first game, Dr. Cain uses Dr. Light's designs for X to create Reploids. These robots are missing design elements that Dr. Cain couldn't understand and haven't gone through the testing period X did to ensure his safety.\\

'''In Addition''': Nobody thinks to start installing actual security measures into Reploids until X8. They attempt this by using copy chips - chips that contain DNA data of hundreds of existing Reploids - that can change a Reploid's DNA and grant them immunity to the Sigma Virus. But nobody bothered to check what ''kinds'' of data were encoded in them, so it wasn't until the events of the game that they found the chips had copies of Sigma's DNA data--which is the virus causing Reploids to go Maverick--installed. Which not only allows them to go Maverick at will,[[note]]not just in the sense of making Maverick decisions resulting from circuit breaks, abstract reasoning, misinterpretation of duty, etc., as all Reploids technically can do as they have free will, but in a sense akin to ''turning off their conscience at will, effectively becoming [[TheSociopath Reploid sociopaths]]'',[[/note]] but to ''steal the identity of '''anyone they damn well please.'''''

* In ''[[VideoGameRemake Maverick Hunter X]]'', X and Zero are investigating a string of mysterious incidents that are flaring across the city, including someone breaking a dangerous Maverick out of jail. Since Zero observes that the guards were defeated by a Reploid with very high combat abilities, he suspects that their commander Sigma must be behind it because he's one of the few Reploids with specs that high and he suspiciously cannot be contacted.\\

* From the above two games: Vile has captured X using his Ride Armor, and a previously incapacitated Zero leaps onto the back the Armor, where Vile can't aim any attacks at all. There's no indication that Vile can't be shot directly, the original game uses GamePlayAndStorySegregation to prevent any easy headshots while the remake has Vile just grab X, preventing the fight altogether.\\

* In ''X2 X'' has to fight the X-Hunters to reclaim Zero's parts, except the control chip which the Maverick Hunters already have. Having Zero on either side is showed being very important. Canon dictates that there was a black-painted copy of Zero in the villains' possession.\\

* ''X4'':

* Also in ''X5'', Lifesaver discovers ominous data that implies that Zero is heavily linked to TheVirus somehow, since it increases his power output instead of hurting him. He reports this to Commander Signas, who wisely decides to keep this top secret for now and not to act rashly.\\

'''You'd expect''' Colonel to immediately disarm and come in for questioning, both in a show of good faith for the victims and to clear Repliforce's name. Or, if he believed that he/Repliforce would be unfairly treated for whatever reason (feels there's too much anti-Reploid prejudice, suspects there might be a frame job with too many people in the right places, believes that in the panic they might just get blamed anyway, etc), clearly mention that as a reason for refusing.\\
'''Instead''' He declares that laying down his sword would be [[HonorBeforeReason dishonorable]] and leaves the scene, causing all of Repliforce to be declared Mavericks and start a massive war.\\
'''Even Worse''' To draw the Maverick Hunters away from Repliforce, Jet Stingray attacks and destroys a city, meaning they've now committed an act on the scale they were improperly declared Mavericks for in the first place.

-->'''Zero''': They suspect you've become a Maverick.\\
'''Colonel''': What!?\\
'''Zero''':Disarm and come with me to HQ.\\
'''The result''': Colonel flies off the handle, insisting war would be preferable to the shame of accusations and surrender, and teleports back to General and prepares for war.

** Colonel's What An Idiot moment is, for the most part because of a What An Idiot moment itself. Before X4, the government wanted to replicate the success of the Maverick Hunters and create a warrior as powerful as he was compassionate, just like X. Unfortunately, they were unable to achieve their goal, and were forced to spit the program they'd made into what became Colonel and Iris, the former a proud and honorable warrior, the latter his compassionate and sensitive sister.\\

'''Instead''': They decide not to bother, and immediately assign them to positions where they're directly involved in the Maverick Wars, Iris as a Navigator for the Maverick Hunters, and Colonel as the Colonel of the Repliforce. When Colonel is informed that his superiors, the government, think he's a Maverick, he's shocked at first, yet after hearing he'll be brought to HQ and simply questioned,(notably after disarming, which he views as a blow to his honor) suddenly becomes furious and rebels, and whenever seen, he comes off as almost delusional in his statements, insisting war is the only choice. He adamantly refuses to listen to reason, and in the end, is killed in a duel with Zero. Iris, after hearing the news, has a complete mental breakdown, uses her brother's chip to turn into a mech-like form to kill Zero, her body rejecting it throughout the battle, and she dies in Zero's arms.