Characters / Mega Man Zero

aka: Mega Man Zero 4

This page deals with the characters from the Mega Man Zero/Rockman Zero series. The series takes place (approximately) 100 years after the Elf Wars that follow the end of the Maverick Wars as detailed in the Mega Man X series and (approximately) 300 years after the original series, and deals with an ongoing conflict between Reploids unfairly labeled as "Mavericks" and the pro-Human global government. Zero is also markedly different from his original identity, as he is trying to remember his identity while also finding a new purpose in his existence.

Warning: This page has unmarked spoilers, especially for antagonists due to their major reveals.

• Antagonists
• Minor Bosses

---

The Protagonist

Zero

I won't hesitate. If an enemy appears in front of me, I will destroy it!

I made a promise to a friend...

Voiced by Yuuto Kazama (Zero series, SNK vs. Capcom), Ryōtarō Okiayu (JP, Onimusha Blade Warriors), Rino Romano (EN, Onimusha Blade Warriors)

The Zero series Backstory ends with the eventual ending of the Mega Man X series. By the time the Zero series starts, both X and Zero are bona fide legends. However, X is nowhere to be seen (for reasons revealed in Zero 2), and Zero is found in an underground laboratory, nonfunctional and lacking in weaponry, memories, or even arms. At first, Zero seems to be a loner, more distant than he ever was in X, but over the course of the series, he comes to define himself as a soldier who fights to protect people he believes in; primarily Ciel, but he also grows to include the rest of the Resistance members and 4's caravan of human refugees.

---

• Adaptational Comic Relief: The Rockman Zero manga makes anyone who's played the games suffer whiplash. Zero goes from being a stoic antihero to a dork who is prone to making a fool of himself.
• Ambidextrous Sprite: Averted in Zero 4; when Zero switches sides while he's hanging from something with his Z-Knuckle, we can see him switching his hand. Played straight almost everywhere else. In fact, during the third swing of the basic triple slash attack, he'll swap which hand holds the Z-Saber. Seems Zero actually IS ambidextrous.
• Amnesiac Dissonance: Zero suffers this in the transition between the X series and this series. While he stays a hero in between both series, his memory was lost during hibernation, including one crucial detail: that the body he was inhabiting was a duplicate. That being said, only a few people at the present knew who he was like; people at large thought he was a legendary hero, which he has to roll with.
• Amnesiac Hero: Starts off with nothing other than vague feelings of what kind of person he is. He even has to be told that his name is Zero, providing brief inner conflict and then Character Development when Weil reveals his body is a copy.
• Amnesiac Resonance: Despite suffering from amnesia, he can instinctively feel that Copy-X is weaker than the real X, after their fight.
• Anti Anti Christ: One of the biggest examples. Just like in the X series, he was made to wreak havoc in the world and destroy civilization, but later he decides to save it instead.
• Anti-Hero: Of the Good Is Not Soft kind; he solves most of his problems by bisecting them, but always to help others. He's not interested in justice or heroics, just upholding Ciel's (and by extension, Dr. Light's) ideals of peace and coexistence between humans and Reploids.
• The Atoner: Basically what he's been doing throughout his entire life. Especially when he finally learns that, even after Sigma's demise, The Virus remained a threat because traces of it remained in his original body, being spread wherever he went.
• Attack Reflector: Aside from the usual Shield Boomerang, the Reflect body chip in the fourth game allows his regular saber to do the same to bullets.
• Awesome, but Impractical: The Proto Form, the reward for beating Zero 2. It not only makes Zero a Glass Cannon, but it disables the upgrades the players have made to their weapons (eg. the Z-saber's combo). Hard Mode forces you to use it.
• Badass Creed: His last speech in the first game — "I'll do what you want... rest for a while. I will handle it, you can count on me. I won't stop! If an enemy appears... I'll terminate it."
• Badass Longrobe: In the Z2 intro. Right after that...
• Bad Butt: One of his very first dialogue lines in 1, while fighting the Golem.
  Zero: "Rats!"
• Bag of Spilling:
  • Zero puts himself to sleep at the end of Mega Man X to fully eliminate The Virus. 100 years later, he is violently woken by a scientist under attack by mooks, so his restoration is incomplete and he needs to remember his previous skills with the weapons.
  • He never gets to relearn to do an air dash.
  • Played literally and justified in the second game. After travelling the wastelands for a year, Zero's weapons are damaged (one, the Triple Rod, was even beyond repair), and when Zero returns to the Resistance base, his weapons are restored (the Triple Rod was replaced), but he has to level them up again.
  • Thankfully averted from Zero 3 onwards. Your weapons already start at full power, saving the tediousness of leveling them up, although your Cyber Elves and chips are gone and the Shield Boomerang and the Rod substitute are not available in the first stage. You also have to relearn the acquired skills.
  • In Zero 4, there is no Shield Boomerang nor Rod.
  • Zero also loses the upgrades he obtains from Cyber-elves and/or chips in between games.
• The Berserker: His Z-Saber encourages you to use this fighting style, dashing forward and getting into the face of the enemy and chopping him half without stopping. If you have good reflexes, it's extremely effective.
• Big Damn Heroes: Subverted twice in the following instances:
  • Zero 2, where he attempts to thwart Elpizo's attempt to destroy X, but he immobilizes Zero and then proceeds to destroy X.
  • Zero 4, where he comes too late to prevent Craft from firing Ragnarok at Neo Arcadia.
  • At the opening of Zero 4, to the Human Caravan.
• Bookends: Zero's final words in Zero 1 and Zero 4 echo each other:
  Zero 1: I'll do what you want... rest for a while. I will handle it, you can count on me. I won't stop! If an enemy appears... I'll terminate it.
  Zero 4: I never cared about justice, and I don't ever recall calling myself a hero. I have always only fought for the people I believe in. I won't hesitate... If an enemy appears, I will destroy it!
• Bottomless Magazines:
  • The Buster Shot is technically a normal gun with a magazine system, except that Zero loads the Z-saber into it, giving it a practically limitless energy source.
  • In the fourth game, many Z-knuckle weapons have unlimited use, while some are limited...unless you equip the A-Filling chip, in which the ammo will refill itself to full after a few seconds as long as you don't outright empty it.
• Bring My Red Jacket: He's all red-themed (when not in the Palette Swap modifications, that is), and we all know his Heroic Sacrifice tendencies. And with the Nintendo Hardness of the game, expect him to die a lot in the stages.
• Broken Ace: Zero may be a badass fighter, but he's plagued with amnesia and bad publicity. All things considered, though, they don't seem to trouble him personally. However...
  • The Ace: Arguably develops back into this in the end, when compared to the other protagonists of the Mega Man series. He was obviously stronger than Classic Mega Man or Volnutt to start with, the ZX protagonists face weaker versions of the Weil Zero killed, and he even surpasses X himself, defeating (with a little help) a threat X and Zero together only barely stopped previously, that had Came Back Strong. And despite all the crap he goes through, he never undergoes any sort of Wangst like X, or his previous self did. All this makes him the greatest hero in the Classic Timeline. It's pretty clear if he were still around after Zero 4, absolutely nothing would've been able to threaten the world. Not bad all things considered, since he was originally supposed to be its destroyer.
• Brought to You by the Letter "S": His Z-Knuckle is a Z-shaped imprint on his palm, in which a special chip is inserted, allowing him to take the enemy's weapons.
• Building Swing: With his Chain Rod in Zero 2.
• The Champion: To the entire Resistance and Ciel especially, Zero is the biggest proponent to their cause. Eventually, this extends to what remains of humanity as well, solely as their greatest defender by series end.
• Character Development: Gets some at the end of Zero 3. After defeating Omega, he comes to terms with his new body and life, wholeheartedly believing he is Zero and becoming more empathetic and emotional.
• Characterization Marches On: Zigzagged; a combination of trauma from the Great Offscreen War and Identity Amnesia makes him The Stoic in the first game, but as the series progresses, he starts to become more and more of a Deadpan Snarker.
• Charged Attack: A series standard. Handwaved by claiming that X installed the technology that controlled his own Arm Cannon to the saber before giving it back to Zero. This explains why the Rods and the Shield Boomerang can charge (they're all variants of the saber), but no such explanation for the Z-Knuckle.
• Chaste Hero: Whether he's this, a Celibate Hero, or simply too stoic to express himself is up in the air.
• Chick Magnet: Aside from the ones in the X series, there's also Ciel, Leviathan, and a random Resistance girl in Z3 all getting attracted to him to differing extents. And he's clueless to them all.
• Combat and Support: The combat to Ciel's support.
• Continuity Nod:
  • Zero's Proto Form is a nod to his infinity plus one armor from X, the Black/Zero Armor, minus the silver hair. In addition, its stats mimic that of the X8 version of the armor. Reversed, because X8 came out after the Proto Form's debut in Z2 and reappearance in Z3.
  • Plus, when Zero died in X5, all X found was his sword. Guess who gave Zero his signature weapon back?
  • Another one of Zero's Forms (see Palette Swap below) is the X form. Guess what color this form is based on, as well as what weapon it specializes in?
  • He claims that he never cared about justice or peace during his "No More Holding Back" Speech at the end of Zero 4, which is what big brother Bass said in Mega Man 2: The Power Fighters. However, while Bass claims that he only fights for himself, Zero says that he fights for the people he believes in.
• Cool Helmet: His iconic red one gets an overhaul from the previous series. It's also the last we saw of him after he destroyed Ragnarok.
• Cool Sword: The Z-Saber gets cooler in this series. Aside from being able to kill a (normal) Golem in one hit, it can also have multiple functions.
• Dash Attack: Unlike in the X series, he has a dashing saber attack by default.
• Deadpan Snarker: Has more moments than people give him credit for. Whenever his opponent gives a Badass Boast, his response in later games is usually along the lines of "Are you done yet?".
  Ciel: Please promise me you'll never do something that crazy again.
  Zero: ...
  Zero: I'll think about it.
• Destroyer Deity: Of a heroic sort. Neo Arcadian propaganda hypes him up as an unfeeling ancient evil the Resistance awakened to lay waste to humanity. Not completely incorrect, given his past. Anubis Necromancess V even refers to him as the "God of Destruction," a title usually reserved for Omega. Taking into account that Omega has Zero's old body and Zero could very well have been as unbelievably strong and crazy as Omega, this is a perfectly reasonable thing to call him.
• Determinator: He fights nonstop between the events of the first and second games. Just in case you were wondering, that's a whole year in-universe of repelling Neo Arcadia's military might by himself.
• Deus Exit Machina: After locating the new body Zero's previously stolen mind has been moved into, X awakens him to help fight the final battle and end the Elf Wars. Zero gets sealed again after that because he is tired of fighting.
• Do Not Run with a Gun: Averted with Zero's Z-Saber and Buster Shot, as combat with these weapons is far more fluid than it is in the previous series. His other weapons downplay it, though; the Rod weapons and the Knuckle force Zero to stand still if he uses them while on the ground, but you can negate this downside by always using them while jumping. The Shield Boomerang on the other hand prevents dashing, but otherwise doesn't hinder Zero's movement.
• Double Jump: Although it was one of Zero's signature abilities from the X series, it doesn't make a return until Z3, and even then, it's not something Zero can learn as an innate skill. You need to equip different items to use the ability.
• Elemental Weapon: Zero can load elemental chips to his weapons, and their charged attacks (as well as some of his EX-skills) become elemental.
• Effective Knockoff: He is revealed to be inhabiting a reproduction of his original body. Despite that, he cares little about it and just proceeds to defeat the one inhabiting his original body, Omega (when no other people have done before). There is some implication that losing his original body wasn't entirely bad; for one, he no longer suffers from the potential of going crazy due to the programming of his original body.
• Empty Shell: Subverted. It's still Zero you're playing as and he has the same sense of justice, but after his resurrection, he has lost his cocky and hotheaded personality and become a complete blank slate. Averted later on, where he ends up developing a new personality, albeit a stoic and standoffish one.
• Evil Knockoff: Interestingly inverted. Technically, Zero is using a knockoff body while Omega is the original Zero's. However, Zero still has his heroic personality as seen in the X series, while Omega's is the original psychotic personality seen back when the Maverick Hunter's first uncovered Wily's old lab and released him.
• Evolving Attack: In the second and third games, Zero's EX Skills have two variants: a normal version, and a slightly improved variant when equipping the right elemental chip.
• Evolving Weapon: In the first two games, using Zero's weapons a set number of times allows him to learn additional skills with them.
• Expository Theme Tune: Clover, from the Idea tracks. It details Zero grappling with his amnesia, and how he's unable to remember the name of a certain flower he held dear but finding a still-blooming clover that he chooses to protect instead.
• Fake Ultimate Hero: Played with throughout the series, ending with a subversion.
• Famed In-Story: He is well-known as a Maverick Hunter even a hundred years after he went missing, and the reactions of who he meets differ depend on which side of the war they're on, with the Resistance and Ciel viewing him as their resurrected savior, and Neo Arcadia viewing him as a Fallen Hero who now works for terrorists.
• Forced to Watch: He catches up to Elpizo while X's body (the seal of the Dark Elf) is still intact. However, Elpizo shoots a beam that paralyzes Zero, leaving the former to destroy X's body while Zero helplessly watches on. Elpizo just rubs it in further after absorbing the Dark Elf's power by "thanking" Zero for waiting.
• Gameplay-Guided Amnesia: He woke up with almost no memory of his past. Since he's been asleep for 100 years, this doesn't make much difference to the plot; the real point is to explain why the "legendary hero" has skill level 1 with his own sword. It also conveniently allows the X games to continue without affecting what Zero should remember later on. Zero 2 and 3 get better mileage out of the amnesia by "revealing" things that happened between the X and Zero series that Zero was actually around for in the past.
• Glass Cannon:
  • Zero is very strong with his weapons, but his health bar always starts small.
  • Zero using his Proto Form and Junk Armor from Zero 2 and 4, respectively, doubles the damage he deals AND receives. Hard Mode will force you to use it, even in 1 and 3.
• Good All Along: A downplayed, and rather interesting variant. While he is unquestionably on the morally right side for most of the game series (Briefly on the wrong, or at least neutral side, given they were led by Elpizo rather than Ciel for a while), he himself never really talks about morality or what is good for most of the series, only ever talking about the morality of others, to the point he comes off as a Nominal Hero at times, something that is even pointed out by the bosses, who see him as a Fallen Hero. However, as the series goes further on, small remarks he makes here and there make it very clear he has a moral compass underneath his stoicism.
• Good Is Not Soft: He's mostly stoic, with some of his quotes implying that, for his quotes of not caring about justice or heroics, that he does have that deep down, but doesn't believe he's the one to follow them. Having said that, he will cut you in half if you get in the way of those he believes in.
• Gosh Dang It to Heck!: "Rats!"
• Guest Fighter: In Onimusha Blade Warriors.
• The Hero Dies: His most likely fate at the end of the series, sacrificing his life to stop Doctor Weil. However, Ciel believes Zero is still alive.
• Heroic Sacrifice: It's Zero. He still can't resist doing this every so often. At the end of the series, he forgoes his chance of escaping the falling space station Ragnarok in order to stop Weil once and for all — and he succeeds. His actions have finally brought peace to the world, after centuries of war. It's also his final one, by the way.
• Hero with Bad Publicity: Neo Arcadia established to its citizens that Zero and La Résistance are nothing but extremists. This is an important plot point in Zero 4, with human refugees not appreciating the helping hand given to them, at least until after halfway through the game; they then realized that Zero was indeed fighting for the greater good of everyone.
• Heroic Self-Deprecation: What he does all the time is just fighting for the people he believe in; he never considers himself a hero.
• Holding Your Shoulder Means Injury: Zero does this when at a critically low level of health. He also does this in the intro stage of the second game regardless of how much health he has, showing the toll one year of non-stop fighting and Walking the Earth has exacted.
• Humans Are Flawed: Played with. In Zero 4, he condemns humans fleeing from Weil's iron fist as cowardly beings who would do nothing about their refugee leader getting kidnapped just to avoid another war. However, he also thinks that, as a machine designed solely to wage war, he cannot change the world, but instead believes in the humans who can. In the end, he believes that Humans Are Bastards, but he also believes that they can change for the better and then change the world. In short, it comes as a Reconstruction.
• Humble Hero: Evident in his "No More Holding Back" Speech. In addition, he doesn't think a battle Reploid like him could change the world; he instead fights for those who he believes are able to do so.
• Iaijutsu Practitioner: Once again, though of a different sort: He doesn't have a sheathe for the Z-Saber like in previous games, so Zero replicates the effect by activating the Z-Saber the instant after he starts swinging.
• I Am Who?: He's lost his memory of the X series — everyone tells him that he's a "legendary Reploid" and he just has to take their word for it. Also see the Locked Out of the Loop entry below.
• Identity Amnesia: At the start of the series, he doesn't seem too sure that he's the legendary Zero everybody thought of him as.
• Immune to Mind Control: He's among the very few that can withstand the Dark Elf's mind control abilities.
• I'm Not a Hero, I'm...: One of his most prominent traits. See also his "No More Holding Back" Speech above.
• Inspirational Martyr: Zero's Heroic Sacrifice at the end of the series inspires the human and reploid sides, and Ciel in particular, to work on the peace that, after so long, has finally been achieved.
• Irony: It is Zero, the creation of Dr. Wily, who finally fulfills the dream of Dr. Light, his creator's nemesis, to bring peace between robots and humans. Mega Man 11 adds an extra layer of irony on top of this with the revelation that Dr. Wily wanted to make heroes of robots before he became consumed by revenge and lost his way. Even though he made Zero purely to fulfill his own petty revenge, he eventually became exactly the kind of hero his old self would've wanted to make.
  • While Zero doesn't consider himself a hero and thinks he's not the right one to actually change the world, his actions in the four games as a member of the Resistence managed to turn the tides against a corrupt government, his speech to the human refugees ended up planting the seeds for the new peace between humans and reploids, him helping Ciel resulted in the development of a better energy system that would end the energy crisis eventually thanks to his protection, and eventually he's the one who finally kills Weil and kickstarts a lasting era of peace. In a way, despite believing he's a Living Weapon not worthy of being the one to change the world, his actions along the ones of his loved ones like X and Ciel ended up changing the world for the better in it's own way.
• Katanas Are Just Better: Averted; in Zero 1 and Zero 2, Zero's Z-saber is roughly shaped like a katana, but this is merely a matter of simplistic sprites. Box art has always depicted it as the triangular shape that has since become synonymous with Zero in this series.
• The Kingslayer: He becomes infamous with this in the third game where he killed Copy-X and then Dr. Weil spreads the word, making things worse for the protagonists. This also gets referenced in the fourth game where the leader of the Caravan has a grudge against "the killer of Master X" (unaware that he's talking to Zero).
• Knight in Sour Armor: As soon as he wakes up, he has to fight a war in a Crapsack World. He also knows that changing the world is difficult, but he still fights for Ciel, who hopes to change the world by solving the energy crisis.
• Kubrick Stare: In almost all of the official arts.
• Laser Blade: Z-Saber, as well as laser spears, bullet-reflector shields that can double as a boomerang, whips, and tonfas.
• Late to the Tragedy: In the second game, arriving at Neo Arcadia only to find every Resistance soldier involved in the Operation Righteous Strike dead (with the exception of one).
• Legendary in the Sequel: Although he only knew glimpses of it from the comments of the people around him. And obviously, by the time ZX rolls around, his achievements have become even more well-known.
• Life Drain: One of his EX-Skills in Zero 2 is this, using the Chain Rod.
• Literal Split Personality: Back in the X series, Zero was always at risk of reverting to his original personality, one intent on fulfilling Wily's goals. With his mind transferred to a new body, he no longer has that issue....however it did leave his old body to the original psychotic personality.
• Locked Out of the Loop:
  • Not only Weil, but also X know about the relationship between Zero and Omega, with X blatantly not telling Zero about it up until Weil himself let the secret out.
  • The Guardians, especially Phantom, are implied to know about it as well, considering they're not at all surprised when they saw two Zeros in the ending, and also knowing which Zero to attack. One of the drama tracks seems to clear it up — Phantom found out in Cyberspace; Leviathan and Fefnir had a Near-Death Experience in which they met Phantom and X. X gave them one final order to stop Omega, presumably giving them a heads up.
• Loud Gulp: He lets out one when he's fighting inside the missile containing Omega and realizing that the missile is about to crash.
• Magikarp Power: Zero's weapons in the first two games apply, as well as the "Mimic elf" in the fourth.
• Meaningful Echo:
  • From the first game, Zero was repeatedly told that "You are Zero". This is a big deal because he had Identity Amnesia. At the end of the third game (after he encounters an issue of what he really is), he says to Ciel "It's just me... I am Zero." It signifies that he has affirmed his identity.
  • Ciel has told Zero a number of times that she "believes in him". In the end, right before his fight with Weil, he tells her "Ciel...Believe in me!" And it's his last words, too.
• Meaningful Name: As well as everything that has been stated about his name in the X series, Zero's name becomes amazingly apt once Dr. Weil attempts to stop Zero from harming him by reminding the Reploid about the laws against hurting a human. Weil forgot about the Zeroth Law...
• Morally Superior Copy: It's revealed that the body he inhabits is a copy. Zero doesn't give a damn about it and cuts down the doppelganger inhabiting his original body without hesitation, deciding that it's the mind that matters, not the body.
• Multiform Balance: the Forms, vaguely. Your starting Normal Form is a Master of None, the Active Form is a Fragile Speedster, the Energy and Power Forms are Mighty Glaciers (the former specializing in defense, the latter offense), the Defense and Erase Forms are Stone Walls, the Proto Form is a Glass Cannon, and Rise and X Forms are Lightning Bruisers. The Ultimate Form is pretty much the Infinity +1 Form.
• Multi-Melee Master: Although he also has a gun.
• Multi-Ranged Master: Can use a gun (several, in fact, in Zero 4) and a Boomerang.
• Musical Nod: Zero's badass leitmotif from Mega Man X comes back in Zero 1's intro.
• The Musketeer: Zero wields the Z-Saber, whose hilt also serves as the magazine for the Buster Shot.
• Mutually Exclusive Power-Ups:
  • Only one of his Buster EX-Skills can be active at a time.
  • In the first through third games, he can only equip one elemental chip at a time. As well, in the third and fourth game, he can only use one head chip, one body chip and one foot chip at a time. This is why the best foot chip in the third game is the one that has most of the other foot chips' powers in one.
  • Also true for Croire: Only one of the seven abilities of each elf type (Nurse, Animal, and Hacker) can be active at a time, although you can use one of each type at the same time. And in Ultimate Mode, this is averted: using the abilities of the higher level also activates the ones in the lower levels.
• My Hero, Zero: Ciel couldn't have said it better herself.
• Never Found the Body: All that remained is a broken helmet, and it's not even stated if they found that either. Inafune once mentioned he was dead and the series was over. However, the Complete Works book states Zero's fate was unknown. However, it's implied that Ciel eventually did find what remained of Zero and created Biometal Model Z from it in the ZX series.
• Nice Guy: A bit hard to notice, and given his stoic behavior you'd be forgiven for thinking he's a Jerk with a Heart of Gold, but it's there. While he isn't sunshine and rainbows, he treats everyone in the resistance with genuine kindness and believes in X and Ciel's causes and ideals, and sacrifices his life even though he easily could've escaped. He also doesn't think himself as worthy to rule due to being a weapon of mass destruction.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: His murder of Copy-X at the end of the first game inadvertently sets things in motion for Big Bad Weil's return. Weil's specialty of DNA resurrection is put to good use when he brings Copy-X back to life under his control in the third game, allowing him to use the Reploid for his own ends and gain control over Neo Arcadia.
• "No More Holding Back" Speech:
  • He has one during the Elf Wars (detailed in drama tracks), aimed at Omega.
  Omega, I finally knew because I fought with myself. What kind of fighting I have done so far? What exactly my hesitation has been so far? Now I can say that my power is not for destruction. It's for my friends; my power is to protect my friends' beliefs! Be gone, my nightmare!
  • In one of the series' most famous examples, his Badass Creed evolves into this:
  "I never cared about justice, and I don't recall ever calling myself a hero. I've always only fought for the people I believe in. I won't hesitate... If an enemy appears in front of me, I will destroy it!"
• No Social Skills: One Lower-Deck Episode highlights how clueless Zero can be in matters outside battle, although knowing him, this is justified.
• Not So Stoic:
  • He has his occasional moments of snapping at others in annoyance and being a Deadpan Snarker, and there's his moment with the missile in Zero 3, but probably one of the only moments in the entire series where his expression visibly changes is when Elpizo destroys X's physical body. The resulting scene graphic shows him scowling in unadulterated anger, and he drops all snark and commentary altogether to kick Elpizo's ass for it.
  • He also appears to have been genuinely shaken by Craft's death, possibly in part because his parting words serve as an Ironic Echo of X's. It rattled him enough that when speaking to Neige, he ends up accepting and agreeing with Neige's belief that even if he's doing it for a good cause, his perpetuating violence makes him much like Weil, requiring Neige to assure him in his actions.
  • At the end of the final game when he knows he's about to be sent on a suicide mission, Zero takes a moment to comfort Ciel in a very rare show of emotion.
  • He does so again in the final encounter, offering some choice last words to Ciel.
  Zero: Ciel... believe in me!
• Number Two: Zero isn't a natural field commander, so he isn't the type to give orders. That being said, within the Resistance, he more or less fills a secondary leadership role under Ciel, since everyone knows to turn to him for crisis scenarios, and while he doesn't give many orders out on the field, he can get Resistance members in over their head to transfer back to base on his urging. About the only time where Ciel takes direct orders from him is when they're together during dangerous operations, as Ciel respects his authority on combat; otherwise, Zero takes orders from Ciel (and, to a lesser extent, Rouge and Joan, as his Mission Control) and more or less comes to the conclusion in the opening of 2 that without Ciel to direct him, he'll simply default to mindlessly destroying Pantheons - good for securing the wastelands and lessening the number annoying the Resistance, certainly, but not exactly useful for making any actual progress on resolving the ongoing conflicts.
• Oblivious to Love: Just like in X8. He doesn't seem to understand that Leviathan is trying to invoke Dating Catwoman and Ciel "believes in" him, though he debatably gets past the last one.
• Oh, Crap!:
  • He had this reaction when faced with the possibility of fighting all three remaining Guardians at the end of Zero 1.
  • Yet another time is when he realizes that he can't stop Omega's missile while riding it. As this means he's about to get hit by an ICBM, he's rather less subtle in this case, giving a Loud Gulp before turning around and spamming his dash.
  • The possibility of facing the Einherjar Warriors all together (which, fortunately, didn't happen) is one of the other few times in the series that Zero had this reaction.
• One Bullet at a Time: 3 bullets, to be exact. Zero can only have three buster shots on screen at a given time. Through different means in each games, the number of shots can be upgraded to 4-5 shots.
• One-Man Army: It's a surprise that La Résistance (mostly made up of civilian Reploids) managed to survive Neo Arcadia's persecution until Ciel found Zero. 2's opening introductory scene explains that he's been fighting off near-constant pursuit of the Neo Arcadian army for a year, and in 3, Copy-X even states that Zero's penchant for being this trope is one of the Resistance's strongest advantages, alongside Ciel's energy source. In Zero 4, it's played very literally; he's the only being in both the Resistance trailer and the Area Zero settlement that pulls any weight in all its battles, even though there's Faucon and perhaps others in the settlement who could fight.
• Overrated and Underleveled: ...but he gets much, much better.
• Palette Swap: Hard and Ultimate Modes clothe Zero in black and deep crimson colors, respectively. The Forms system (and the Body section of its successor, the Customisation Chips) gives him even more colors.
• Parrying Bullets: Several upgrades across the games allow him to block enemy bullets by attacking them with his saber.
• Perpetual Frowner: It takes effort to go four entire games without smiling once.
• Person of Mass Destruction: He was designed to be one, by Dr. Wily. But after his Heel–Face Turn, what he does isn't much different...
• Phrase Catcher: "You are Zero."
• Pietà Plagiarism: In the Zero 1 intro level, Zero and Ciel go through the level until they find a dead end. Then the floor under Ciel crumbles and then she falls down. Zero saves her by doing the pose.
• Pillar of Light: When he's resurrected in the first game, this happens.
• Powers as Programs: In order for Zero to use his EX skills, he must "activate" them on the menu first; the various Buster Shot EX Skills can only be equipped one at a time. A more literal take on this would be the Custom Chips from Zero 3 beyond.
• Power Copying:
  • The EX techs from X4 onwards are back starting in Zero 2, and the Z-knuckle rips weapons off Mooks, although some of them can survive even after the weapon is stolen.
  • Zero 3 also takes it further by having Zero obtain custom chips that grant him innate non-combat abilities from other Bosses. The system was further expanded in the next game, where chips obtained from some enemy parts also grant that mook's innate ability.
• Punched Across the Room: The Recoil Rod's Charged Attack is a powerful thrust attack (aimable forward, downward or upward) that can push most mooks far away backwards (or upwards, or downwards) if it hits. A few minibosses and bosses can also be pushed this way, which will interrupt their actions, notably Deathtanz Mantisk.
• Really 700 Years Old: You'd never know from his looks (what with being ageless and all), but with X being a Cyber Elf now, he's the oldest robot that still functions. He's 200 years old at minimum.
• Red and Black and Evil All Over: Not counting his past in the X series, the populace sees him as the warrior of the Resistance who is a Fallen Hero, and his red and black color scheme seems to reinforce it...of course, the player would know better that he fights for a good cause.
• Red Is Heroic: He's mainly colored red (outside of his special forms at least) and he's the hero of the story.
• Resurrection Sickness: Or as Ciel puts it, "hibernation sickness". It gave him Identity Amnesia.
• Riding the Bomb: In Zero 3, he tries to stop a missile containing Omega from launching into a city block containing the Mother Elf. However, as he approaches the missile, it starts to fly off. Zero's next solution? Jump inside it and then destroy it from within.
• Rolling Attack: An upgrade for your saber attack is making Zero able to do this with the saber, whether in midair or while dashing. Interestingly, you can keep tapping the attack button while he's doing the rolling dash and he'll roll nonstop, provided that he isn't stopped by the terrain or the enemy who doesn't die instantly by the attack (and the attack is actually pretty weak, mind you).
• Rookie Red Ranger: He joins the Resistance at the start of the first game; the Resistance soldiers quickly follow him as their field leader of sorts (Ciel, their actual leader, is an Actual Pacifist).
• Sealed Badass in a Can: At the start of the series, in an abandoned lab.
• Secret Character: In SNK vs. Capcom: SVC Chaos.
• Sean Connery Is About to Shoot You: All the box art features him staring forward and brandishing his sword.
• Series Mascot: Of the non-cute kind, he's a big one for the Mega Man series and Capcom in general.
• Set Bonus: The Junk Armor in Zero 4 will only show its effect (doubling the damage Zero deals and takes) when you equip all three of the separate parts and disable your Elf.
• Shell-Shocked Veteran: Being amnesiac aside, he has seen many tragedies in the past. Now, he seems to care only about missions, and is frequently emotionless.
• Shoot the Dog: In the final battle, Weil boasts how a heroic Reploid like Zero would be incapable of killing a human. This is in spite of Zero calling him a Maverick that needed putting down in the previous game, and how Zero just tried to kill him. Weil just doesn't get it. So Zero gives him his best speech, and does to him what should have been done a century ago.
• Shut Up, Hannibal!:
  • After Weil's gloating in Zero 3:
  Zero: I bet most decent humans wouldn't understand, either. You look like another Maverick, to me. All I gotta do is dispose of you like any other Maverick.
  • His "No More Holding Back" Speech is also used as a response to Weil saying that a "hero, fighting for justice and humanity" like him should not kill a human like Weil.
• Something Else Also Rises: In Zero 3, a female Resistance member gives Zero what awfully sounds like a kiss (*SMOOCH*) as thank you for rescuing her in the previous games. Zero's E-crystal count goes up (complete with a suspicious sound). Made worse by her finishing remark:
  Don't tell Ciel about that, OK? Human girls get angry over little things like that.
• Speed Echoes: Like in the previous series, dashing will create afterimages of him.
• Spin to Deflect Stuff: In the artworks, it's shown that his Shield Boomerang is actually the Z-Saber spinning really fast.
• The Stoic: Oh so much, in stark contrast to his more openly emotional and laid-back portrayal in the X series. Even in the drama tracks (see Lower-Deck Episode below), he can't talk about anything other than things about his missions.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: As a robot, which is a good thing for navigating water levels. Though played with in the submarine mission in the fourth game; due to the stage being so deep in the ocean, he has to find the entry into the submarine under a time limit or he'll be crushed by the oceanic pressure.
• Swiss-Army Weapon:
  • Zero's saber can be a razor shield (doubling as a boomerang), a pogo extending spear, a whip/hookshot, tonfas, and a gun magazine. Really?
  • Zero's Z-knuckle is capable of a lot of things, depending on the weapon it stole.
• Sword and Gun: Zero replaces his old body's Z-Buster with Milan's Buster Shot gun.
• Taking You with Me: Done in the final game; Zero, knowing that he has sacrificed his chance to escape from the Colony Drop, goes on to defeat Weil to ensure that the Ragnarok will explode in space, likely killing himself as well.
• Teleportation Rescue: A few times he has to rescue someone, he'll walk to their location, then gives the rescuee a teleport beacon so the Mission Control can teleport them to the base. Due to the base not being advanced enough for it in the first game, you'll be forced to go through an Escort Mission to rescue characters.
• Three-Strike Combo: The basic skill for the Z-Saber. With the right upgrades, he can modify the third slash into a different slash that fits the situation.
• Took a Level in Badass: Implied to do this each game. Justified, as he is regaining the skills of his past life as well as new abilities, plus likely being upgraded by cyber elves. Notably, the Guardians have three health bars in the first game, two in the second (in their base forms), and aren't even worth a boss fight in the third (except for Phantom, who may be strengthened by cyberspace). Omega, who Zero then easily defeats, easily defeats Leviathan and Fefnir.
• Tuck and Cover: In the first game, he does this to Ciel to cover her from the Golem's blast because she's too weak to move.
• Tyrannicide: Played with when he slayed Copy-X. He's a tyrant to Reploids, but he created an utopia for humans on top of it, and people at large loved him. Played straighter when he slayed Dr. Weil, who ruled Neo Arcadia with an iron fist.
• Uncertain Doom: Though he defeats Dr. Weil at the climax of Zero 4 and stops Ragnarok from decimating Earth, he appears to go down together with the satellite, and all that's left of him is his shattered helmet in an isolated desert. Ciel, however, remains hopeful that he is still alive.
• The Unchosen One: Ciel wakes Zero up amnesiac and he questions whether or not he's really Zero, although saving her leaves the latter more than convinced. He is the consciousness of the X series Zero, but that consciousness was implanted in a replica body. In short, this Zero is no longer Zero by original design in any capacity.
• Underestimating Badassery: Most of the bosses mock Zero's "Legendary Hero" status and the fact that he was out of commission for about 100 years since the X era. How wrong they are.
• Universally Beloved Leader: For the Resistance at least, Zero is considered one of its leaders together alongside Ciel. When Zero is brought to the new base in Zero 2, many soldiers (the ones who formed the original Resistance before Elpizo's group joined up) are shown heading for the infirmary where he was recuperating, shouting his name in joy, to the noticeable discomfort and annoyance of Elpizo. This is justified, since Zero has done a lot for them in the first game alone.
• Utility Weapon: the three Rod weapons all have secondary functions aside from dealing damage: the Triple Rod can be a pogo stick, the Chain Rod is, of course, a Grappling-Hook Pistol, and the Recoil Rod can boost Zero's jump as well as move/destroy certain blocks.
• Walking the Earth:
  • From the end of Zero 1 to the beginning of Zero 2.
  • Key members of the La Résistance join him in Zero 4, although they weren't exactly walking...
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • In Zero 4, Neige and her Caravan call him out on all his and the Resistance's actions throughout the series, up to and including bringing the war to Area Zero, even though Zero and the resistance didn't even go to Area Zero until Weil's troops were already approaching it. Zero later calls the Caravan out for attempting to abandon Neige when she was kidnapped.
  • Notably, they also call him out for killing Copy-X (that was really Weil who caused his death, but Zero was trying to kill him) that allowed Weil to take over Neo Arcadia. In that case, Zero didn't seem to think that part through.
• What the Hell, Player?: In Zero 2, in the intro level, if you just stand on the first screen killing the endless stream of mooks, he'll say "This isn't fun anymore..."
• World's Best Warrior: He's no longer the World's Strongest Man, as that body and all its power has belonged to the Omega persona since he transferred out of it. What defines the Zero of this age is his potent, multifaceted arsenal and his peerless skill in using it to its fullest.
• You Are Too Late: Zero arrives at the final boss barely in time (which is an improvement over his usual tardiness) to stop the destruction of the last good land on Earth...but must sacrifice any chance at escape for himself. Earlier, he had many moments like this, such as when he comes late to stop the missile in the third game or when he comes late to stop Craft from destroying Neo Arcadia with Ragnarok.
• You Shouldn't Know This Already: ALL of Zero's sword skills in this series are adapted from the skills he learned in the X series. Yet, thanks to his amnesia, he has to relearn them again. He also totally forgot techs between each game from Z2 onward.
• You Will Not Evade Me: One of Zero's skills with the Chain Rod is pulling things, including enemies, towards him.
• Zeroth Law Rebellion: Played with copious amounts of irony via Zero's final decision in dealing with Weil. The irony here is twofold: while Zero was NOT designed to be Three Laws-Compliant, yet he CHOOSES to obey them of his free will, and in how Zero's actions are in perfect compliance with law zero. Note: The spirit of Law Zero is a threshold law with a very specific trigger (such as a mass murderer) for it to be appropiate. And for this instance being notable at all is because Weil noted that, being a Reploid hero, Zero should protect humans like Weil, invoking Three Laws-Compliant in the process. Of course, aside from not thinking of himself as a hero to begin with, the Law Zero allowed Zero to kill such a bastard like Weil anyway.

Allies

Ciel

^{Click here to see her appearance in Mega Man X DiVE}

To me, you are Zero.

Voiced by Rie Tanaka

A human scientist looking into more efficient energy sources, particularly Cyber Elves, which she believes will end the war between humans and Reploids. She's also responsible for making Copy-X — whoops. Ciel is the one who initially finds Zero, informs him of his legendary warrior status, and asks him for help fighting the tyranny of Copy-X's Neo Arcadia. After defeating Copy-X, Zero wanders off to do his own thing, but in the end, he realizes that he and Ciel need each other to accomplish their goals.

---

• Actual Pacifist: She's not blind to the need for the Resistance to fight and defend itself, she took a big risk in housing these declared "Mavericks", and she has signed off on missions that involve either guerrilla strikes or flat-out offensives, but she herself hates fighting. Her major plan for the war was to effectively fight a defensive battle saving Reploids and warding off Neo Arcadia while she herself slaved away day in and day out to find an alternative energy source that would solve the energy crisis, which is what created the conflict in the first place. Had Weil not shown up, she might have even succeeded in a non-violent resolution given the open mind Harpuia had towards the Resistance.
• Adaptational Badass: Back in her home series, Ciel's a pacifist who tries to find non-violent solutions and never engages in combat. Not in Mega Man X DiVE, however, as she can fight on par with anyone else.
• Anger Born of Worry: Not anger per se, but she gets into the same situation when Zero performs a very life-risking act, against her orders.
• The Atoner: This is why she formed the La Résistance in the first place, feeling guilty for the creation of the one who would persecute innocent Reploids.
• Badass Pacifist: She never fights, but her accomplishments in other places firmly put her in this place. She uses her bio-augmented smarts to do many things, such as defusing a bomb that's about to hit the Resistance base, hacking into Ragnarok's security systems, and building an almost perfect copy of X. Not to mention having a whole Reploid army, and Zero in particular, under her wing.
• Big Good: As the Rebel Leader whose organization is directly opposed by Neo Arcadia's forces, she's pretty much this. When original X isn't around, anyway.
• Bio-Augmentation: According to the Official Complete Works, she was one of the DNA-altered children that Neo Arcadia made to develop better Reploids. Canonically, this makes Ciel the progenitor to the Humanoids that blur the line between human and Reploid in the ZX series.
• Bodyguard Crush: Possibly the unofficial Love Interest for Zero. It was implicitly stated that she actually had romantic feelings for him. Plus, there's Zero's last words, which drove some fans to such conclusions:
  "Ciel, believe in me!"
• Brooding Boy, Gentle Girl: Zero's the brooding and stoic Amnesiac Anti-Hero who, to him, battle is a second nature. Ciel's the gentle and caring Motherly Scientist who's trying to bring back peace between the two sides of the war.
• Cannot Spit It Out: Both of her Image Songs talk about how much she loves Zero but struggles to confess her feelings.
• Child Prodigy: As a result of being genetically bred to produce better reploids, she stood out as a prodigy, and built a perfect copy of Mega Man X at the age of nine, something that no one in the previous series was able to do. (Pity that she forgot the "30 years of ethical testing" thing...)
• Clingy Jealous Girl: Discussed Trope, in which a Resistance soldier believes that all human females have the tendency to have this personality. If there's any implication, she believes Ciel is one.
• The Cutie: She's a positively adorable Child Prodigy whose sweet, optimistic spirit keeps the Resistance together. It even breaks through to Zero.
• Combat and Support: The support to Zero's combat.
• Damsel in Distress: Played straight in the first (in the intro stage), averted in every other game afterwards.
• Deuteragonist: Even though she's not a playable character, she's the female lead storywise, and her actions towards peace for humans and reploids drive much of the plot.
• Dangerous 16th Birthday: The climax of the story in the third and fourth games both occur when she's 16.
• "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: "Freesia", the vocal version of the Zero 4 theme and also the ending theme, is sung by Rie Tanaka, who plays Ciel.
• Evil Twin: Canon Foreigner Cial in the manga, ruler of Neo Arcadia. Copy-X doesn't properly exist here, only being a Fusion Dance of the four generals.
• Expy:
  • Ciel has a very uncanny similarity, in appearances, background, AND role, to Alia from the X series. Done recursively in Mega Man X8 when Alia gets a makeover to look more like Ciel...as well as other alterations, but that's irrelevant here.
  • As a scientist who strives to achieve peace between humans and robots and whose work left its mark on the future generations, she's also quite similar to Dr. Light.
  • Prairie in ZX is Ciel's expy, and almost definitely a character, probably Alouette, from this series as well.
• A Father to His Men: She is motherly to all of the Resistance.
• Fling a Light into the Future: She was the one who discovered the original Biometal, Model W, and built 6 Biometals based on the legendary heroes to counter it. She left a message for the future people about this threat. Slightly subverted in that the "light" in question isn't necessarily good; Ciel noted that the one with the power of the Biometal can either save the world, or take over it. She hoped that the Biometal will fall into the hands of good to bring and maintain peace.
• Full-Conversion Cyborg: Implied in the Mega Man ZX games. Ciel is stated to have gone missing only a few years prior to first game despite the fact that ZX takes place over two centuries after the Zero series. Her Long-Lived nature is hinted to be the result of becoming a Humanoid not unlike the members of the Sage Trinity in ZX Advent.
• Gadgeteer Genius:
  • She built the first Copy-X at the age of six (or nine). Moreover, she perfectly reproduced the base prototype. By comparison, every Maverick in the previous series came about precisely because they were flawed copies of the original. By the age of 15-16, she's working on free, clean energy for everyone. She was likely also something of a Wrench Wench before she moved on to energy research.
  • She also created an energy system to solve the energy crisis that is not only effective, but just beautiful (take a look at the reactor of the Guardian airship from ZX!), and she made Biometals to match Master Albert's, but also added the dual Mega-Merge feature. It's All There In The Official Complete Works.
• Gameplay Ally Immortality: During the Protection Mission in Zero 2, no matter how much she gets shot by the enemies around you, she won't die, though she'll still react. Getting her hit will only reduce the mission points.
• Genre Blindness: Believes that by developing a new energy source, the CIEL System, she can stop the fighting because everything that started the Reploid oppression is due to a lack of energy. Too bad we only find it out by the start of the third game — that's when Weil appears.
• Greater-Scope Paragon: Not only is Ciel the creator of the six Biometals to directly oppose Model W, but she's also the original leader of the Guardian organization, which acts as a successor to both the Resistance and the Maverick Hunters of the X series.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: She's blonde, kind, innocent, and motherly.
• Image Song: "L'oiseau Du Bonheur" and "Freesia".
• Innocent Blue Eyes: Her clear blue eyes represent her innocence and pacifism.
• It Runs in the Family: Her ancestress is the creator of All-Loving Hero Mother Elf. Ciel's main field of research is into energy involving cyber-elves.
• I Will Wait for You:
  • Here's one example:
    Ciel: I'm happy that I could meet you... If it were not for you, everyone would be gone by now...Promise me that you will come back alive. Even if you cannot destroy Neo Arcadia, I just want you to be able to return safely.
  • At the end of Zero 4, Ciel declares that she "knows" Zero is alive, and she will wait for him to return.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: Later installments treat her connection to Copy-X as common knowledge, even though it's a late-game spoiler in the first game.
• The Leader: Charismatic Type ^note most people agree with her, she's The Heart of La Résistance, and even Neo Arcadia's Government seems to have some respect for her and Levelheaded Type ^note she sometimes tries to prevent Zero from rushing into battle, still tries to maintain open communication channels with Neo Arcadia, and (after Z1) she was almost able to reach a pacific solution with Neo Arcadia's Government (until Weil arrived, that is).
• Leitmotif: "Labo".
• Long-Lived: Looking at the official timeline, Ciel only vanished a few years before the events of ZX, meaning that she was at least over a century old and probably closer to two-hundred at the time given the 200 year time gap between the series. How she survived that long compared to Alouette, who is all but stated to have just upgraded to a new body as Prairie being a human is unclear, but considering the fact the Sage Trinity were also once humans implies that like them she became a Full-Conversion Cyborg.
• The Man Behind the Monsters: The leader of the Resistance Reploids, who are treated as Mavericks. Played with in that the "monsters" here are the good guys.
• Meaningful Name: Her name is French for "sky". And her Resistance members are named after birds.
• Mission Control: Solo during the first game, accompanied by Operators from the second onwards.
• Motherly Scientist: Cares very much about her Resistance members, and Alouette in particular, who considers Ciel her "big sis".
• Ms. Fanservice: Rockman X Over has art of Ciel in a flower-patterned pink two-piece◊, for some reason.
• Nice Girl: She's gentle, kind hearted, and always concerned about the welfare of others.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Ciel managed a perfect recreation of X, something Dr. Cain and the rest of the previous century's scientists never accomplished - but, whether it was due to her young age at the time or from the haste and secrecy involved, this Copy-X lacked an opportunity to undergo extensive morality testing like what Dr. Light put the original through, not to mention the copy simply lacked the experiences, hardships and knowledge that X gained. The result was a Knight Templar of a leader that had none of X's compassion and no solid skills as a ruler, prioritized humans first and foremost akin to a standard robot rather than a reploid, and cast this series into motion. Ciel is fully aware of all of this.
• Nonhuman Sidekick: Has one special Cyber-elf at the beginning of the series, before said elf sacrifices herself to revive Zero.
• Ominous Save Prompt: If Ciel ever asks you if you want to save, something is about to go down (assuming it hasn't already).
• Parental Substitute: She's a mother figure to most of the younger La Résistance members, especially to her future expy Alouette.
• Promoted to Playable: In X DiVE.
• Protection Mission: The second mid-game mission in Zero 2 contains a segment toward the end where Zero must protect Ciel as she disarms a bomb, which takes 90 seconds. The enemies coming after you two are quite weak, but there are a lot of them.
• Pursued Protagonist: At the beginning of the series; awakening Zero turns this into the Damsel in Distress scenario mentioned above.
• Rebel Leader: The founder and head of the Resistance.
• Reed Richards Is Useless: Actually a subplot in the second game, Ciel stepping down from her position as Rebel Leader in order to try to fix the energy crisis that started the war in the first place. Once Elpizo, her replacement, goes off the rails, Ciel returns to her original leadership role while continuing her new research. By Zero 3, she does develop the new energy source, and by the ZX series this breakthrough is central to human and Reploid survival and coexistence.
• Save Point: Her purpose in the game.
• Say My Name: Ciel shouts out Zero's name at least three times. The last time she does it, it's a hopeless bid for Zero to get out of Ragnarok, even though it's probably too late by that time.
• Ship Tease: The game (and supplemental materials) has a lot of this between her and Zero. In particular, "Freesia" (sung by Ciel's own seiyuu) is implied to be Ciel's speech on how she loves Zero.
• Stay in the Kitchen: Twice, Zero refused to allow Ciel to accompany him on a mission. The first time was subverted when they reached a compromise (Ciel's expertise was extremely needed in that scenario) where Zero will use a Transserver to transport her straight to the location. Justified, however, since she is a squishy human while Zero is a literal war machine. She's also a pacifist, meaning she will not fight, making this trope devoid of the usual sexism since any mission Zero goes on will by necessity require violence.
• Team Mom: A kindly leader of the Resistance who cares about the lives of all of the Reploids under her (and not just them too).
• Teen Genius: Oh, yeah. Justified since she was a product of genetic engineering, allowing her to build a perfect copy of X at the age of nine.
• Tender Tears: Spent the entirety of Zero 4's credits crying as Ragnarok dissipates in a shower of debris (with Zero still presumably aboard).
• Token Human: She is the only human in the Resistance.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: She is a girly girl to Neige's tomboy.
• Uncatty Resemblance: Passy, her own Cyber-Elf in the first game, bears quite a resemblance to Ciel herself.
• Uncertain Doom: Overlapping with a downplayed version of Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome. After all the megatons of pure crap she has to endure through the Zero saga, ZX leaves her fate up in the air and suggests Serpent tried to eliminate her, but we don't know what happened or if he was successful because there was no sequel to ZX Advent...
• Unusual Euphemism: Her final line in the series sounds like she means to say something else before a Last-Second Word Swap.
  Ciel: Zero, I... I believe in you!
• Voice with an Internet Connection: In all games, she communicates with Zero during mission openings, and sometimes during a crucial part of a stage.
• Wet Blanket Wife: She's not a wife, but still, she at times reminds Zero that he shouldn't fight too much, out of worry for his safety (and worry that he might be bothered by helping her so much). Zero, knowing himself as a war machine, counters this by saying that he has battled his entire life and doing the dirty work is his reason for living.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: She aspires for humans and Reploids to coexist harmonically, and eschews violence to make her dream become a reality.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: At the beginning of Zero 3, Ciel has finally finished the CIEL System, and has sent her research to Neo Arcadia, possibly opening up a chance for peace talks...and then Weil uses that information to spark another all-out war between the two sides. Weil proposes to combine the C.I.E.L. system with the Dark Elf to generate enough energy at once to solve the crisis. Ciel refuses because she can't trust in the Obviously Evil Mad Scientist to handle the new technology, which is what he was expecting her to say. Copy-X then promptly declares her an extremist trying to create a criminal monopoly on the energy resources and accuses Zero of being the muscle to keep her plan going. Cue three missions to prevent an All Your Base Are Belong to Us.
• You Monster!: She mentions after Zero stops Pegasolta Eclair from pouring acid rain on Area Zero that Weil's whole idea of Operation Ragnarok is so atrocious, she can't believe that he's even human.

Cerveau

The world is too much for Ciel to bear alone...Take good care of her, Zero...

The Resistance engineer. He gives Zero the Shield Boomerang and the Rod of the Week at the beginning of every game, except the fourth where he just gives him the Z-Knuckle. He also stores information disks for the player.

---

• Distressed Dude: Becomes a hostage during the mission to protect the base in Zero 1. Rescuing him is mandatory, because he can operate the lift that will take Zero to Hanumachine, the leader of the raid.
• The Engineer: For the resistance as a whole.
• Expy: His role is essentially succeeded by Fleuve of Mega Man ZX.
• Gadgeteer Genius: He's the one who creates Zero's Shield Boomerang and all the rod-based weapons.
• Get A Hold Of Yourself Man: Although in a subtle context, he performs one to Harpuia, of all people.
  Cerveau: Oh, you're awake. How do you feel?
  Harpuia: Horrible. Just the thought of being helped by you makes me nauseous. Stripped of my position, and driven out of Neo Arcadia. I'm used goods...
  Cerveau: That's not true. You just stood up for your beliefs, just like we do. You've made no mistakes.
  Harpuia: My beliefs...
• Meaningful Name: His name means "brain" in French, fitting for a genius. It's also pronounced like "servo" (only with the accent placed differently), fitting his role as a mechanic and engineer, making it something of a bilingual pun.
• The Medic: Can function as one; he has been shown tending to both Zero and Harpuia.
• Older Sidekick: to Ciel and maybe Zero (sort of), he's almost like a father to them, and acts like one. A Gadgeteer Genius on his own, but he plays second fiddle to Ciel, assisting (but not spearheading) her research.
• See-Thru Specs: Only in Zero 1. Afterwards, it's turned into Opaque Lenses.
• Shipper on Deck: Just look at his quote.
• Smart People Wear Glasses: Looks like a bulkier version of Cyclops' own Cool Shades.

Mega Man X

I'll leave this world to you...

Voiced by Takahiro Mizushima

After fighting Sigma and his many Maverick minions, X finally dispels the Sigma Virus with the Mother Elf, created from his best friend Zero's body and achieves peace between humans and Reploids. However, that peace would be short lived, since a survivor of the Maverick Wars, Dr. Weil, wanted all Reploids to pay for the crimes they've committed as Mavericks, including those who became Maverick of their own free will. Despite X's opposition to his ideas, Weil secretly reprograms the Mother Elf into the Dark Elf and has her make new Mavericks to "prove" that the Maverick issue was still present without the Sigma Virus, causing the Elf Wars, which X reluctantly fights in alongside Zero. Eventually, he uses his body to lock up the Dark Elf, though it causes Neo Arcadia, the utopia he founded, to have a leadership crisis. When a Copy of him created by Ciel starts to execute Reploids to solve the energy crisis, he aids her in the form of a Cyber-Elf and returns the Z-Saber to Zero at the beginning of the first game, then shows up to be the mentor at random times.

---

• Ascend to a Higher Plane of Existence: Twice over. Some time between X and this series, he surrenders his body to act as the seal to the Dark Elf, and he's reduced to an incorporeal cyber-elf form. Then finally, having used up all his energy over the course of Zero 3, he decides to retire to cyberspace.
• Asskicking Leads to Leadership: Not in-series, but his power is fairly well-known and he more or less fought the Elf Wars alone.
• Ball of Light Transformation: By virtue of being a Cyber-Elf, he takes on this form. He can also instead project himself as a holographic image.
• Barrier Maiden:
  • He is the living seal of the Dark Elf.
  • In a literal example that would still qualify, X erects a barrier around the Resistance Base in 3 to protect everyone within from Weil and Omega's Mind Control. He implies that if he had more available power he could push it even farther but his condition leaves that a losing battle.
• Big Damn Heroes: In Zero 3, when Zero and Ciel are trapped between the Mind Controlled Resistance soldiers, all hope seems lost... until X comes from above and promptly disables the mind control of all the people in the whole building.
• Big Good: He was the main force of good as the leader of Neo Arcadia. Afterwards, he's still this, but only to a smaller extent.
• But Now I Must Go: At the end of Zero 3, his Cyber Elf fades out of reality, leaving the rest of the war in Zero's hands.
• Cannot Spit It Out: See Zero's Locked Out of the Loop entry. X almost tells Zero this vital piece of information, but holds himself back instead, only confirming the truth once it has already surfaced.
• Clone Angst: X is by no means fond in the slightest of Copy-X. Justified in that it has nothing to do with him being X's replacement, as that was the intention. Rather, said Copy deciding he would joss everything X had fought and suffered for, for over two centuries, just because he wanted to be the hero.
• Converse with the Unconscious: He does this to Zero in the ending of the first game, after Zero exhausted himself fighting Copy-X, briefly explaining what he was doing during Zero's absence before he decides to "rest" and tells Zero to take care of the world for him. When Zero wakes up after, he does hear X. This also happens in the end of the third game where X, now about to rest permanently in Cyberspace, again tells Zero (who fainted after the final boss fight with Omega) to keep watch on the world for him.
• Despair Event Horizon: It's implied that he got hit with this between his series and this series, specifically in the Elf Wars in which he fought most of it alone. The original concept was that he would lose all hope for human and Reploid coexistence and begin the oppression and genocide of his descendant species, since they were incapable of living peacefully with humanity (this concept became Copy-X later). Fortunately, he's still savvy enough to Take a Third Option, and he chose to seal what caused the war, the Dark Elf. While most of his dialogue as a Cyber-Elf is fairly normal, there are a couple times when he implies his more ruthless side that he's holding back, which is extremely jarring coming from a former Reluctant Warrior and poster android for Incorruptible Pure Pureness. The fact it could break an All-Loving Hero shows how bad things really are.
• Deus Exit Machina: Okay, so his physical body is busy, so no playable X, no Dr. Light capsules, whatever. He should still be able to manifest before his underlings as the acknowledged lord of Neo Arcadia and tell them to cut the crap. Copy-X's presence might have been the problem.
• Energy Being: As a Cyber-Elf, he has no physical form.
• Expy: Has taken over Proto Man's role this time around. By the time the third game rolls around, he, like big brother Blues, is living on borrowed time...and probably gets the most focus he's ever gotten in a storyline. This isn't saying much.
• The Faceless: Zero 2 onwards; prior to that, he's literally, and figuratively, a ball of light. His sprite still has a definite face: It's just his dialogue picture that is only a glowing silhouette.
• Heroic Sacrifice: Him sacrificing his body to seal the Dark Elf, and later sacrificing most of his energy to break the Resistance out of Mass Hypnosis.
• He Who Fights Monsters: His speech at the end of the first game mentions that he no longer cares about the opponents he fought. Ironic and tragic, seeing as he was born and raised with that very quality...Thanks to Executive Meddling^note X originally would become insane due to the stress and become the Knight Templar Big Bad that Zero has to stop; it later is changed to a copy, X actually realized that this was happening to him and took himself out of the fight by using his body to seal the Dark Elf before he could go over the edge.
• Hourglass Plot: During the X series, X was the naive, always unsure Maverick Hunter, with Zero being his mentor in how to fight for both humanity and the Reploids. Come the Zero series, it's X who's now the mentor for Zero to help heal the division between Reploids and humans.
• Immune to Mind Control: He's among the only few that can ignore the Dark Elf's mind control abilities, and can even cure controlled Reploids from it. It's attributed to how the Dark Elf is practically the Maverick/Sigma Virus and X still has his Suffering Circuit.
• Impaled with Extreme Prejudice: His leftover body, anyway, by Elpizo. He does that to open the seal to the Dark Elf.
• It Gets Easier: He implies that he has come through this stage after he lived his life with more and more battles, claiming that he stopped caring about the enemies he fought. But before he went over the edge, he decided to stop and take a rest, prompting him to seal the Dark Elf. Copy X was meant to be the real X who did go over the edge.
• Killed Off for Real: At the end of the third game, his Cyber Elf form has run out of energy and he goes into Cyberspace.
• Last Request: He has one in the end of the third game for Zero.
  X: Can you hear me, Zero? My energy is almost all spent. I can't... stay in this world... much longer. Zero... I want to leave this world in your care. The threat Weil represents has not left this world. I want you... to protect humans and Reploids. Ze...ro... you can do it... you...can...
• Legendary in the Sequel: Most people knew X as their "legendary savior".
• Leitmotif: "Cyberelf".
• Literal Genie: Thirty years of testing assured that he would never attack a human being. Confronted with the monster that is Weil, he takes this to the extreme, ensuring that no death will ever come to put an end to his suffering.
• Living on Borrowed Time: After Elpizo destroys his physical body at the end of 2, X's Cyber Elf form only has what energy it has left to stay manifested in the physical world. By the time of 3 two months later, X is already struggling to hold on, and then he ends up using even more energy to free everyone in the Resistance base from Omega's control and keeping them safe.
• Mr. Exposition: Provides important information that bridges the X and Zero series.
• Our Angels Are Different: A technological, fairy-like ball of light that projects himself with an angelic robe and halo from time to time. He's meant to contrast against Copy X's Ultimate Armor and Seraph form, who takes on a far more grandiose interpretation of an angel with the white and gold color scheme and multiple wings on his body; original X's garb is far more humble by comparison.
• Physical God: Well, virtual, but by the time Zero reawakens, even at 1/5 his former self, it's quite clear that X has effectively become the most powerful character in the series so far. Then again, he did fight a century-spanning war without Zero, with a body made to infinitely evolve.
• Passing the Torch: Since Zero, as of the end of Z3, is the only hero left alive and Weil is still lurking around somewhere, X decided to make it official before "finally retiring to Cyberspace."
• Plotline Death: Seeing as fixing dead robots/Reploids/whatever is entirely workable in-canon, it probably has to do with his desire to finally rest in peace. His body was also blown up in the second game.
• A Protagonist Shall Lead Them: He became the ruler of Neo Arcadia some time between the X and Zero series. But he left his place to make himself the seal for the Dark Elf, and a copy is then made in his stead.
• The Mole: He's technically a member of La Résistance, and, as the original leader of Neo Arcadia, the information he gives is invaluable to the former's cause. That's how much he really hates his clone.
  X: I've cracked the Security system of the Trans Server... now go... terminate that copy of me... terminate with extreme prejudice...
• Rogue Protagonist: Thankfully subverted, because of the Executive Meddling in the X series; he was originally supposed to be the Big Bad, but then a copy took up the role.
• Rule of Symbolism: He "died" to absolve the war between man and Reploid once and for all, continued watching over them as a spirit, reappeared before those who'd followed him in an angelic form complete with halo and cross on his garb, and only acted in protection rather than violence. Let's see you deny that with a straight face.
• Sealed Inside a Person-Shaped Can: He used his body to seal the Dark Elf.
• Spirit Advisor: As he's reduced to a "spirit", there isn't much he could do but advising Zero on doing the right thing. Fridge Brilliance in that he is basically emulating his creator/father figure Dr. Light, who was this to him in the previous series.
• Take Up My Sword: X asks Zero to continue the battle for peace. Taken literally in the first game, where X gives Zero a sword in the first Boss fight, only it was actually Zero's own Z-Saber.
• Virtual Ghost: By virtue of being reduced to a Cyber Elf.

The Resistance

Not just a character, but a whole lot of characters. The characters within La Résistance are worth mentioning enough.

Jaune voiced by Megumi Ogata
Rouge voiced by Yuka Imai
Alouette voiced by Ryō Hirohashi
Milan voiced by Wataru Takagi

• The Alliance: Minor example, used to avert Remember the New Guy?: after the damage done by Neo Arcadia's forces in the first game, the remains of Zero's allies have merged with another Resistance group (or maybe more than one), increasing their numbers drastically. Not that it helps, however, several members from the second group become prominent supporting characters: Bridge Bunnies Rogue and Jaune and Knowledge Broker Hirondelle.
• Base on Wheels: The Resistance trailer in Zero 4, a large box truck with two trailers.
• Big Eater: Hibou consumes E-crystals, possibly the Reploids' equivalent to energy foods, to no end. He is actually a hard worker, though...or at least when he's trying to impress someone, or if the situation is serious.
• Bratty Half-Pint: Subverted with Alouette and Perroquiet. Played straight with Menart.
• Bridge Bunnies: Rouge and Jaune. The Lower-Deck Episode in the third game's soundtrack reveals they are sort of Red Oni, Blue Oni, with Rouge being serious and formal and Jaune being more relaxed^note Which is funny when you consider who voices them. Rouge is the straight-laced one, yet voiced by Leviathan's actress, Yuka Imai. Meanwhile, The very casual and cheerful Jaune is voiced by Harpuia's actress, Megumi Ogata, in one of her rare undeniably feminine roles..
• Catchphrase: Hirondelle always starts his speeches with "Have you heard?"
• Elaborate Underground Base: In Zero 1.
• Empathy Doll Shot: In the first game, the Resistance base is stormed by Neo Arcadian Forces. While the bodies of a few resistance solders are found, if Zero enters the hallway where Alouette is usually found, only the stuffed animal she always clutches will be lying on the ground. Once the threat is taken care of, she reclaims her lost companion.
• The Engineer: Doigt in particular assisted Cerveau in making the Recoil Rod.
• Establishing Character Moment:
  • Some Resistance members' introductory scenes immediately speak of their characters.
  • In the audio drama, Rouge and Jaune immediately showcase their contrasting personalities from the way they greet Alouette.
  Jaune: A-ra, Alouette-chan, come on in!
  Rouge: Alouette-san, you are aware that this area is off-limits for civilians, right?
• Expy: Prairie and Fleuve, for Ciel and Cerveau respectively. It's all but stated Praire is a grown-up Alouette, while Fleuve is implied to be an older Perroquiet.
• Eyes Always Shut: Autruche.
• Family-Unfriendly Death: In the introduction of the first game, several of Ciel's companions were cut in half by several Golems' lasers. Even worse in the original versions◊, with tons of blood spilling out.
• Give Me Your Inventory Item: in Zero 4, Hirondelle will ask for two S-crystals from Zero in exchange for Sub-Tanks.
• Giver of Lame Names: Rouge turns out to be this in one audio drama. When pressed to give a name to the Baby Elves, she seriously proposes Crime and Punishment. This gets her into an argument with the other operator (Jaune) where they accuse each other of being this. In the fourth game, however, if you ask her for the name of the new Cyber-elf, she'll suggest "Variable". While she claimed it to be the first thing that comes to ber head, "variable" is quite an apt word to describe the elf's functions.
• Gratuitous English: The Resistance are called "Resistance", even in Japan.
• Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold: Alouette; she's as sweet and innocent as a Reploid child could be.
• Hello, [Insert Name Here]: The name of Zero 4's cyber-elf, but subverted; the choices are pre-determined, and all you have to do is ask one of the members for it. Plus, due to the theme of the game, Croire (Believe in French) is the default one.
• Hope Bringer: This Resistance was made to consort any runaway Reploids who were awaiting "retirement", as well as helping those in need, regardless of affiliation. However, the group itself is facing extermination from a tyrannical government, so the Rebel Leader decided to find their own Hope Bringer: the legendary Zero.
• Hostage Spirit-Link: In a variant, in the second game, some of the Resistance soldiers are brainwashed to attack you; don't kill them or you lose your mission score. The trick is that, if you really have to hurt them, you can use a weak attack to make them "deactivate" for a moment, allowing you to go past them. Note: attacking them after they reactivate will kill them. They really will die, by the way; if you kill one, they won't show up in the Resistance Base later.
• Iconic Item: The stuffed toy made especially for Alouette by Ciel. She even carries it two hundred years later, as Prairie.
• Irony: In the fourth game, Alouette wonders if the Baby Elves are now playing with their mother. It's heavily implied that that she never knows what actually happened with them.
• I Was Quite a Looker: Andrew; he's supposedly a living Shout-Out to Bicentennial Man.
• Kid Sidekick: Alouette, and, to a lesser extent Perroquiet, serve this role to Ciel.
• Knowledge Broker: Hirondelle.
• La Résistance: They are the last group fighting agaisnt Neo Arcadia.
• Last Bastion: The Resistance functions as this, especially for Reploids.
• Late to the Tragedy: When the Caravan learns of Craft's coup, Ciel immediately sends word back to the main base to mobilize a rescue unit to Neo Arcadia before Craft can destroy it. Unfortunately, the rescuers only arrive once Ragnarok's laser has already struck.
• Lower-Deck Episode: One portion of the drama tracks depict Alouette's interactions with others in the La Résistance Base, and apparently takes place during and after one of Zero's missions in the second game.
• Mayfly–December Romance: Happens to Andrew, an old Reploid who married with a human woman in his backstory.
• The Medic: Rocinolle; if things are beyond her expertise, it's left to Cerveau though.
• Overly Long Gag: When the Resistance members got Brainwashed and Crazy in Zero 3, they deliver this cheesy line:
  Inscribe it upon the world...The name of our ruler...Weil! Weil! Weil! Weil! Weil! Weil! Weil! Weil! Weil!
• Player Headquarters: The Resistance Base in all of its incarnations.
• Put on a Bus: Reversed in the fourth game. It's the main characters who are put on a bus (truck, actually), yet the rest that remained in the base are written off the script (with only Jaune getting some minor lines, and when Neo Arcadia gets shot by Ragnarok, several Resistance soldiers come to aid the civilians).
• Rambling Old Man Monologue: Andrew can lapse into this. Poor Alouette had to listen to his monologues once when all she wanted was to ask him for names for the baby elves.
• Redshirt Army: One wonders how they ever survived without Zero. One interpretation implied throughout 1 is that simply by being red shirts, they posed such little threat that Neo Arcadia has barely bothered dealing with them, only beginning to put effort into an offensive when Zero, a credible threat, shows up. It's unknown if Elpizo's rebel cells are active by this point, but they could have distracted Neo Arcadia, too. Copy X also gives a reason in 3; he's intentionally been holding back because Ciel, their leader, is a human, and he is programmed to put the safety of humans above all other concerns; when he finally decides Ciel is an extremist threat to Neo Arcadia using her pacifism to hide behind sending Zero out on missions against Neo Arcadia as her strong-arm, he already has armies poised to run roughshod over the base.
• Retired Badass: Old Andrew is implied to be a former member of the Repliforce Navy.
• The Revolution Will Not Be Vilified: Most of them are only fighting Neo Arcadia for their own survival. Aside from this, Ciel sees the group as a means to help anyone in need, regardless of affiliation with their enemies or gratitude (Harpuia and the Caravan, respectively).
• Robot Girl: Alouette, Rocinolle, the Bridge Bunnies, and the few female Resistance Soldiers.
• Robotic Spouse: Andrew used to be one for a human woman. He apparently makes himself look older as his spouse ages so she wouldn't feel bad, and after she dies, he keeps his old look as a way to remember her.
• Shipper on Deck: Alouette slightly hints at supporting Zero/Ciel.
• Spell My Name With An S: Despite the katakana reading for the old man Reploid's name being Andoryuu (i.e. "Andrew"), it's officially "Andre".
• Theme Naming:
  • Most of the Reploids are named after birds, in French. To drive the point home, Ciel ("sky") was the one who named them.
  • The Bridge Bunnies Rouge and Jaune are named based on their hair colors/hair accessories instead (Rouge is red, Jaune is yellow). Which makes sense, as they weren't originally under Ciel's command.
• Turned Against Their Masters: Downplayed — The Reploids in the Resistance technically rebelled from the human society in Neo Arcadia, but it's because of the Reploid-cide order of Copy-X (because of the energy crisis, but still). They're rarely hostile, either.
• What the Hell, Player?: Surrendering missions in the first game will lead to a passive-aggressive form of this — namely, epic guilt trips from Ciel and the Resistance members.

Neige

Thus the war of the machines began and humans can only watch...

Voiced by Yūko Gotō

A main character in Zero 4. She is the leader of the La Résistance neutral-analogue Caravan, aspiring to bring all humans out of Neo Arcadia and into New Eden-esque Area Zero. She is in love with Dr. Weil's new second-in-command, Craft, a fact that none of her fellow evacuees know...

• Broken Pedestal: She is this to the Caravan, mostly when her association with Craft is brought into light. She herself experiences this in regards to Craft, wondering how such a honorable soldier would stoop to serving Weil.
• Cannot Spit It Out: None of her fellow Caravan members know of her connection to Craft, and she wasn't ready to tell them yet. As thanks for rescuing them earlier, Neige also promises to keep Zero's identity (and his "involvement" with Copy-X's death) under wraps. All those secrets were revealed later, anyway.
• Chekhov's Gunman: This simple reporter turns out to once have been in a relationship with Craft — and this relationship is part of his motivation.
• Damsel in Distress: Halfway through the game, Craft kidnaps her, and Zero has to rescue her. In a subversion, Craft thinks that he's rescuing her as excuse for the kidnapping, which makes sense, because of Operation Ragnarok.
• Demoted to Extra: Upon the conclusion of Craft's storyline, her role is diminished, and the spotlight returns to Zero and Ciel.
• Face Death with Dignity: When Weil asks her to follow Craft and be under Weil's rule, or be destroyed with Area Zero, Neige defiantly answers that she'd rather laugh at the face of death and face it with dignity than live a living death under him.
• Interspecies Romance: With Craft, in the past.
• Intrepid Reporter: Like most of the inhabitants of Caravan, she doesn't trust Zero, but she does wish to someday interview him regarding his "legendary exploits".
• Irony: Despite being a reporter determined to know and get out the truth, she still believed at least some of the propaganda Neo Arcadia sprouted and assumed the worst of Zero based on it. She notes this after being rescued by Zero and apologizes for said behavior.
• I Should Write a Book About This: Complete Works reveals that post-Zero 4, she published a biography of said exploits.
• Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: Before escaping from prison, she tells Craft that she'd rather die with dignity than live in fear. These words led to Craft taking them to heart and blowing up Neo Arcadia with Ragnarok's cannon with Weil inside it, and indirectly Weil sending Ragnarok into a Colony Drop.
• Previously on…: She is the narrator of the prologue of Zero 4, giving an insight of human opinion of the long-running Robot War.
• Tomboy and Girly Girl: She is a tomboy to Ciel's girly girl.
• What the Hell, Hero?:
  • When she overhears Craft's talk about "doing things for the greater good" after his battle with Zero, she comes in and calls him (and Zero) out on them bringing out trouble to Area Zero and disrupting the peace and that their actions, no matter how noble their goals are, end up causing more harm than good. Though she later thinks of the words she said and apologizes to Zero.
  • Later, when she's in prison, she calls out to Craft on how much he has changed, from once a heroic and honorable warrior to one serving Weil out of desperation. This and her Face Death with Dignity above would later change him again.

The Caravan

A group of humans who escaped Neo Arcadia with Neige and settled in Area Zero. The prolonged Robot Wars have jaded their view of Reploids. Unfortunately for them, Zero's the only one who can stop Operation Ragnarok...

• Bullying a Dragon: Played straight and averted. Considering that they resent Reploids for being warmongers, they spend a lot of time yelling at Zero. Rafale also makes a vow (in Zero's presence) to kill the Reploid who killed X. However, he does not attempt it after realizing who Zero is.
• Children Are Innocent: Initially, Typhon and Brise are the only ones (apart from maybe Neige) who will give Zero the time of day. When Neige is taken by Craft, they're also the only ones who are not only worried about her, but beg Zero to go save her.
• Fantastic Racism: They look down on Reploids because (in their eyes) all they're doing is causing pointless wars and destruction. They're even willing to look down on humans who are sympathetic to Reploids, such as Ciel and Neige once her past with Craft comes out.
• Freudian Excuse: Rafale tells Zero that he hasn't spoken to a Reploid (present company excluded) since his parents died in a Maverick attack. Neige notes that most of them have similar backstories.
• Locked Out of the Loop: Most of them don't seem to realize the Resistance has been a perfectly-justified war of survival against the Neo Arcadian regime and that their "hero X" was in fact a copy that foolishly decided to commit genocide on Reploids to conserve resources for human comfort (and by Zero 3 was fully willing to kill humans too to achieve his goals and spurned a peaceful solution). This can likely be justified by Neo Arcadian propaganda.
• Neutral No Longer: At first, they prefer to stand out of the war between the Resistance and Neo Arcadia. However, over the course of the game, upon seeing that the Resistance's goals were no different from their own (and with the help of Neige being kidnapped), the Caravan finally welcomes their help in fighting off and finally defeating the Neo Arcadian army.
• Reused Character Design: The Caravaners' sprites are recolored versions of members of the Resistance. One notable case is Faucon (who is part of the Resistance group in the same game) and Rafale.
• Theme Naming: Just as most of the Resistance are named after birds, these guys are named after winds.
• Ungrateful Bastard: When their settlement gets razed by the Neo Arcadian troops and Zero comes to rescue them, some of them don't like the rescue that much. Also, despite Neige being one of their major leaders who risked everything to get them to the Settlement, most of them are quick to turn on her once her past with Craft comes to light. This latter point in particular is what causes Zero to give them a What the Hell, Hero? speech.
• Untrusting Community: They get better later on.
• What the Hell, Hero?: Zero really chews them out after they decided to abandon Neige after she is kidnapped by Craft, telling them that they had no reason to leave Neo Arcadia if they were always like that.
• You Are a Credit to Your Race: Rafale suggests that Craft "must've been a good one" for Neige to fall in love with him.