FicWad

PROJECT MOBITROPOLIS
S Peter Davis

All characters (C) SEGA, Archie and SP Davis 2004.
Used without permission
To contact the author; trojan_masters@hotmail.com

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Monday: Business as Usual, An Interlude

The last week of Mobitropolis as it had been known for over two millennia began without a statement of finality, without any celebration or mourning. Plenty of /morning/, however, a soft and warm dawn light washing the gritty darkness from the stone and concrete, not a sad process but a familiar one. Things went on much as they always did in Mobitropolis, for nobody knew any different. The future of the city stretched forward in their minds for almost an eternity, much as it stretched back into the past. Fate rarely offers warning when it is about to change something, for best or, regretfully, for worst.

The clock struck the hour of eight in the morning before activity truly peaked in the city of Mobitropolis. To be sure, the merchants began setting up their wares at seven, and some residents were set in their morning walk by the stroke of six, but the lazy city didn't stretch its arms and greet the day until those eight chimes, and it was okay now, because Mobitropolis was safe in the hands of the fearless and cold regulators; they, who never slept, patrolled every street just as heavily at midnight as at the busiest hours of the day.
Being that Mobitropolis was not a virgin to progress so much as chaste to it, the cautious reintroduction of technology into the city quickly resurrected many modern ideas lost to the people since the end of the Android Wars. Something called a cinema now opened at nine o'clock in the downtown arcade (and another was being built uptown), after somebody had the bright idea of taking filmed footage and playing it back publically on a very large screen. Refridgeration had always been a legal technology, but it wasn't until the recent loosening of robotics laws that such processes could be combined with the lost art of mass-production, to create such luxuries as something called fast food, and even more impressive, supermarkets. Mass-production had flooded Mobitropolis with goods, potentially more than it could consume, and there was an explosion of new industries embracing the gift of heavy machinery to create a ceaseless supply of junk food, magazines, household products and cigarettes. These were all sent to rendezvous at the half-dozen or so major supermarkets now operative in the commercial district, to be sold off systematically to anxious and relieved mobians from every suburb from inland to the coast. The supermarkets also opened at nine.
Ten o'clock saw a flood of excited children from every street, bouncing and chattering on their way to school. The sun was high in the sky by now, and the air carried the mirth and untainted joy of thousands of mobian youths of every race, playing kickball and frisbee and handball and hopscotch. Rollerblades and skateboards made the footpaths an obstacle course for adults. It didn't take too long for this to calm down as the bells rang and classes began. The most expensive of the schools had recently introduced a small number of computers for student access, albeit primitive ones. Restrictions were still heavy handed when it came to computer technology for the public, but when the laws began to loosen, the first to benefit were educational facilities.
The sun reached the epoch of its journey and at last began to descend. School ran from ten to four as always, and then the morning began to reflect itself onto the afternoon as children ran and skipped and played their way back home again. Shadows grew long and faded as the day wore on.
If there was one thing different about the city today it was this: A mural of graffiti, haphazardly sprawled across the stone palace walls, having appeared overnight and now visible in the sunlight. Red paint was used, and although the text was rushed and scribbled, it was legible.

"MOBITROPOLIS WORKERS UNION DEMANDS: NO MORE ROBOTS!!!"

Some would say that the ancient city deserved a warning, but others would insist that business as usual was fitting, that anything less simply wouldn't be Mobitropolis. Either way, the clock was ticking.


CHEMICAL PLANT

Waking up in a strange place was nothing new to the blue hedgehog who now called himself Sonic; certainly a strange place usually entailed a new dumpster in a fresh alley, but this was the first time he had woken up on the street of a busy city as Sonic, and although it was only a word it felt like the entire world had started to spin in a whole new direction. One day's journey to the north had brought the hedgehog to the familiar streets of Station Square, an oddly named city very much like Mobitropolis, to which Sonic (or Blue, as he had been known) and his friends had made numerous pilgrimages. Not for the change of atmosphere, but for the revinue - Station Square was a big gambling town, and pockets burst at the seams on every corner. An almost unavoidable consequence was an inflated criminal element.
Sonic let his eyes adjust to the light as he lay in an almost-empty metal garbage dumpster. As he began to yawn, a passer-by threw an unfinished milkshake on top of him, which burst over his head in a sticky raspberry-flavoured shower. "Hey!" he shouted, spluttering. New city, business as usual.
Station Square, in a time long passed, was nothing but a large encampment for tin miners out of Mobitropolis, a settlement nested in a shallow square-shaped valley walled in by rocky hills. A number of Mobitropolis' struggling entertainment businesses (both legitimate and shady) saw benefits to operating within the mining settlement, as it was barely regulated and the workers were eager to consume any form of leisure, especially those which dealt with the betting of money. Eventually, as all things evolve, Station Square became a city in its own right, self-sustaining even after the mines were depleted, but some traditions stayed the same. There was still barely any law and plenty of betting.
Night time within the Station Square city limits was a thing to behold, a glowing jungle of neon vines and artificial beasts, a gigantic statue in the likeness of a golden-maned lion bellowed its fearsome but impotent roar over the herd of people grazing the electronic poker machines, roulette wheels and card tables in Casinopolis, the Station Square casino district. Like mindless zephyr, mobians came from all around to partake in the temporary pleasures of greed and drink, whacked out of their gourd on mega mack and the thrill of the game, almost completely indifferent to the almost inevitable and considerable financial losses which awaited them come morning and sanity.
For the daytime was indeed a more sane and secure environment, almost a different city really, after the bars were closed down ('time, gentlemen, please', the barkeeper would say, and the drunken flies would be unleashed time and time again upon the sober world), after the throbbing beat of the clubs was silenced and the roulette balls stopped dead in their orbit. Only then could the rational eye truly see this city for what it was, because it was in the daytime that the wheel of fortune was just a wheel, the slot machine was just a box, and His Royal Majesty the King of Hearts was nothing but a face on a scrap of card, his reign over the kingdom of wallets at an end. The rational eye could see this, and take mere note of it until sundown when the whole machine started up all over again.
As Sonic groomed the sticky raspberry mess out of his spines, he noticed the city around him, but things different to what he usually noticed. This was a mission of justice rather than deceit, and somehow this concept seemed more fitting to him, more comfortable. One thing that interested him was the way Station Square had embraced technology on a much wider scale than Mobitropolis. It seemed, almost disturbingly, to have ravaged the post-prohibition society, consumed it, and practically vomited out a neon sea of modernism. Cars rushed past him on sealed roads of bitumen and tar, cloaked by the shadows of high-rise commercial buildings and apartments, monoliths to the modern era. It was hot, the sun straining itself to be the one true hand of nature in this cacophony of furious modernisation. Station Square was hungry for the future.
As he walked, Sonic contemplated his mission. A jewel, apparently hidden amongst this new age capitalist citadel of concrete and steel, a jewel of fantastic power, one seventh of the future of Mobitropolis. He stopped in the street, just in the niche of an alley so as to avoid being in the way, and opened the backpack that Kethriel had given to him. He felt inside, digging past the burgandy silk bag (its contents were hard and warm, he noticed) and some unappetising starchy bread to a soft furry pouch that Sonic had found was full of money. Not a fortune, but enough to last a while if he was careful with it. He certainly wouldn't be gambling it away.
"I'd keep that under wraps if I were you," came a voice from the shadows. Surprised, the hedgehog turned around to see a concealed stranger digging through a garbage can in the dark of the alleyway. "Sorry?" Sonic asked.
"That cash," the voice replied, "Don't let anybody see that you have it. People just take things here. Stupid." Sonic could see two eyes glowing of their own accord in the darkness. It was the voice of a child with the tone of an adult, an adolescent matured too early by the harsh streets.
"Oh, right," he said, indeed feeling stupid, and hid the money in the pouch. The stranger came more closely into view - a fox child. But something was very strange about him, for there were two dirty orange tails dragging behind him, not just one.
"I've seen you," Sonic began, wracked with de'ja'vu, "Somewhere... I'm sure of it. Those tails..."
"Spare some of that change for a hungry mutant, can you?" the kid asked. Sonic became flushed suddenly and turned away a little, thinking up excuses. This money was for his mission, and there was precious little of it. "Fine," the kid spat, "Sod off then, hedgehog. Outta my way."
A sudden pang of guilt ripped through Sonic's heart. Less than a week off the streets, was he already forgetting what it was like?
"Hey, here," he said, offering a ten-dollar note, "Here, get something to eat."
"Bah, keep it," the kid replied, "Just remember, this is Nails Gang territory. I'd move on pretty quick if I were you, brainless."
He moved quickly on, looking into every garbage can he found along the street. Pedestrians looked at him, some repulsed but others pitiful. The fox didn't look at any of them.
"Nails Gang," Sonic said to himself, "That's bad news. I need to find this chemical place before it gets dark."

King Acorn sat alone in his grand hall as the sun filtered through from outside. He watched it illuminate the archaeic designs on the wall, and the sublime way it lit up the colourful plated glass windows. The king looked up when the heavy doors swung open and somebody else stepped into the hall - it was Packbell, the Defense Minister, out of uniform but nevertheless dressed as formal as one would while walking about the royal palace.
"Your Majesty," he said, bowing low, "Forgive me, I didn't realise you were here."
"It is no bother," the monarch replied, "Come, speak to me a while."
Packbell approached the throne, walking past the empty desks reserved for the absent parliament. Later, this hall would be full of bickering politicians. In the silence it could scarcely be conceived, but with a healthy imagination the faint echo of a billion raised voices from a million meetings could be heard. Packbell looked over the front desks and the ready plaques that announced the title of each minister portfolio: Education, Science, Social Security, Foreign Affairs, Business, Defense, Arts, Medicine. He lingered for a moment at his own desk, and then sat down at it.
"I was admiring the sunrise," the king admitted, "It is easy to forget the simple pleasures, sometimes. Especially in times like these. Easy to forget the feel of the sun on your skin, or the smell of a flower."
"It is truly a beautiful sight, Majesty," Packbell replied.
Acorn sat up in his throne, an instinctually regal pose. "It was never something I anticipated," he said, "But I am in the autumn of my life. My time is coming to a close, Packbell. There is so much that I never achieved with my position, so much I wished to do for my people, and already the time has come to choose my successor and begin to create a new ruler for this old kingdom. It is a difficult choice."
"Difficult," Packbell echoed, "Forgive me, I do not understand."
The king sighed a little, not a frustrated sound so much as an indication of weariness. "I have never been close to my son," he admitted, "Always so dedicated to tradition, Martin has been. I feel sometimes that he has lost touch with the people. He loves the media, loves to show the less privelaged citizens the life they cannot have. He lacks the dedication to the people that my daughter has. I fear sometimes that he almost despises the working class." The old monarch looked down at his hands, wrinkled and ancient. "So many long years in this world, one wish that was never granted to me was the joy of a worthy and favourable son to call my heir. Packbell, you and I have had so many long conversations in this hall, although we have not known each other for so very long, I can almost say that you are the closest thing to a son I have ever known. If it were possible, I would be tempted to hand the kingdom over to you and be done with it."
"You are far too kind, Majesty," Packbell replied, "I'm sure that you will make the best choice for your kingdom, and in any event I'm sure that either of your children would make a better ruler than I could ever hope to be. They come from the best stock, after all."
"Flattery will get you everywhere, my boy," the king smiled, "Thank you for being a good friend to an ageing figurehead. It makes my later years bearable."

Acornex Chemical was a huge conglomerate that supplied refined products of various kinds to most of the kingdom, and many foreign nations as well. Sonic was awed by the scale of it. A very sterile looking concrete and metal building with light-blue walls and 'caution' signs posted everywhere, the chemical plant cropped up in the centre of the Station Square industrial district, mismatched among rows of dirty and old smoke-stained factories and warehouses.
The first thing that came to Sonic's mind when he approached the plant was that it was very similar to the engineering level of the palace basement back in Mobitropolis. Little robots were swarming everywhere, doing all kinds of odd jobs, from loading and unloading tanks of chemicals on and off trucks, to cleaning and sweeping, to what seemed like just milling about. Sonic wondered idly how many jobs were lost to these mindless workers, these unquestioning drones who could work a twenty-four hour shift and never ask for a cent. And he wondered how much better off the company was since the new technology's implementation.
Oddly, the illusion was broken by two uniformed security guards who wandered past, reminding Sonic which city he was actually in. Despite the government's new policies regarding law enforcement back in Mobitropolis, the city of Station Square was still regulated by living and breathing mobians. There wasn't a SWAT-bot to be seen, much to Sonic's relief, as the Station Square police had always been significantly easier to dodge than any robot.
The hedgehog approached the building with caution, keeping in the back of his mind the fact that he had no idea what he was going to do when he got there, where he was going to enter or where he was going to go once he did. These concerns were bubbling to the surface when a hand touched his shoulder from behind.
Fear shot through him, and he stopped dead in his tracks.
"Are you a part of the tour group?" a voice asked.
Puzzled, Sonic turned around to see an attractive lady squirrel in a suit standing behind him. She smiled sweetly, and so, nervous, he smiled back at her.
"Uh. Sure."
"Great!" she exclaimed, "But this is the loading bay area. Nothing interesting to see around here, that's for sure. The group just headed off a moment ago, around that corner. You can catch up with them, you won't have missed much."
"Thanks," Sonic replied, blushing slightly. He took off towards where he had been directed. A large door led into the plant from a side entrance, with a sign beside it listing tour operation times. He could hear voices, nearby but fading, coming from just inside, so he stepped into the brightly lit corridor beyond.

"Acornex Chemical supplies ten thousand megalitres every day of refined polyethyl-tetrate, or PET as it's known around these parts, to every city on the continent. PET is a super vital constituant of thousands of useful products, including many plastics, paints, cleaning products, fuels and dyes. As you probably already know, it's also the active ingredient in all of your favourite malcoholic beverages, many of which are also mixed and packaged right here. If you wish, you may sample a variety of Acornex refreshments later on in the tour, including our new flavour, Acornex Dry."
The tour guide, a very smartly dressed lady fox with a very artificial smile, winked on cue and moved the group onward. Sonic trailed behind and poked his head about to see past the other tourists, for he was shorter than most of them and wanted to undertake his mission of espionage without seeming too suspicious about things. He had no idea what he was looking for, and realised that he was half expecting a glowing jewel to just drop from the sky into his outstretched arms. It became obvious, however, that such an important and secret object as the Chaos Emerald was unlikely to appear on the free daily tour of the plant.
The inside of Acornex Chemical, or at least the parts of it that the public were allowed to see, was spotless and efficient, a corporate mascot for the future. The walls were painted with soft colours and implanted with large windows through which the group could see the inner machinations of the plant. The machines in here weren't like those in the Iron Ward, not clunky and faceless industrial monoliths dripping grease. Through these windows, Sonic could see a happy little work environment where pink and blue robots suited in fibreglass twittered around, turning knobs and pulling levers. The highlight of the tour for many was when they entered the packaging room and met one of the robots first-hand. A tall, blue plastic fellow greeted them and had a short choreographed conversation with the tour guide. Sonic, unlike the others, was far from impressed by the display, having seen more than enough robots in his lifetime and few of them so polite. The robot allowed a very excited girl to shake his hand-hook, and then he said a few robotic words about workplace health and safety. The hedgehog wasn't particularly interested, instead he looked about for any clues about his mission. All he saw were two fairly large and brightly painted cylinders tended to by more friendly robots. A sign let him know that the cylinders were refining tubes.
After that was the last stretch of the short tour, and the guide thoughtfully reminded them that a souvenier from the gift shop is the best way to remember the Acornex Chemical experience. Sonic was somewhat pessimistic about the idea that there was a Chaos Emerald on sale there.
The tour corridor ended after one last window, which Sonic almost didn't look through. When he glanced upwards, however, and through to the brightly coloured working floor below, something gleamed in the corner of his eye. He slowed down without stopping, trying to see properly. An ajar door down below allowed a mostly obscured view of another room, and inside this other room was some kind of glass tube with something glowing brightly in the centre. It was only visible for a moment before the angle drove it out of sight. A sign over the door warned that the room was ABSOLUTELY NO ENTRY.
No time to check it out, though, before the group was ushered into the gift shop. Sonic, stunned by the actualisation of his mission, was yanked back into capitalist reality when he was confronted by dozens of cardboard boxes full of buttons and figurines of characatured blue and pink Acornex robots. Bumper stickers declared "I saw the future at Acornex Chemical, Station Square." Shelves were lined with plush robot-toys and tiny souvenier malcohol liquour bottles. Sonic pretended to shuffle through the merchandise as his mind raced, thinking about ways he could ditch the tour before he found himself stuck outside again without an excuse to return. Behind a row of shelving, he shuffled through boxes of tacky nick-nacks. He picked up a keyring with a cartoon robot waving at him with its hook, standing above the Acornex logo. It was semi-translucent, and Sonic held it up to one of the lights in the ceiling, but as he did he noticed that one of the ceiling panels was slightly ajar, offering him a glimpse into the dark beyond. At that point, he heard the tour instructor ushering the group out. He looked around quickly and saw a door in the corner of the shop labelled staff only. The hedgehog, adrenaline activating his signature speed, pulled it open and ducked inside. It was dark inside, and he almost tripped on a cluster of things with wooden poles attached. Brooms and dusters - apparently he had stumbled into a storeroom. He waited with his ear to the door to hear if anybody had noticed his bizarre actions, but all of the talking subsided and eventually stopped as the rest of the tour group left the building.
Sonic slowly stepped out from the storeroom and observed the open panel above. He looked around to see whether he could be seen from the front desk, but his presence was obscured by a towering set of shelves, as long as he was careful to stay behind them. Regardless, it was necessary for him to climb the shelves in order to reach the hole. Sonic tested the shelf for his weight, and when he was satisfied he began to climb. Slowly at first, then with more confidence. Suddenly he put his foot on a box of keyrings and dragged it off its shelf. With another almost primal display of instinctual speed, he caught it again with his toes and dragged it back. A single keyring fell out and clattered onto the floor, and Sonic froze, splayed out on the shelves, silently listening with closed eyes and gritted teeth for the army of police swarming in to stop him. Nothing, though. He heard somebody behind the counter messing around with the cash register. Choking back a sigh, the hedgehog continued to scale upward. He reached the thin square panel and carefully pushed it the rest of the way open, trying to align the sounds of his movement with the sounds of the storekeeper's own meddlings. At last Sonic had a hole wide enough for him to climb inside, and he pushed off from the shelf to drag himself inside. This time, he did take a box with him. His backpack bumped off a box of Acornex buttons, and the dozens of plastic circles fell to the ground in a cacophony. Sonic swore under his breath and pulled himself all the way inside the ceiling, replaced the panel behind him and waited. He heard the sounds of the shopkeeper coming towards him, and thought for a moment that he was caught for sure. He would be hauled away to prison and never complete his mission, and the Freedom Fighters would forever remember him a failure.
A moment of agonizing silence. Then, the sound of the buttons being scooped up and returned to their box. Sonic almost cried out in relief when the presence returned from whence it came. He began to shuffle slowly through the mess of wires and cobwebs that composed this dark area beyond the usual tour route.

The darkness was all enveloping. It felt as if he were drowning in it. The air was thick with black. He felt suspended, as if in outer space. Gravity was a vague concept of which he was only mildly aware. Sonic knew he was drugged before he even knew what drugs were.
He was running, now. He wasn't running toward something, or away from something, but simply running. Not moving even an inch, but running. Prodded with something hot, his pained scream. Two snakes coiled around each other in a deadly embrace. A red snake and a blue one. They hissed at him and then attacked.
Sonic woke up with a start, yelping into the darkness. But there were no snakes here, just a musty smell and some kind of metal grating under his body. He remembered what had happened, he'd fallen asleep in the ceiling of the chemical plant as he waited for the situation to change, but unfortunately it remained the same. The room below him was protected by two SWAT-bots, which was strange given that SWATs were rarely seen outside of Mobitropolis. It was understandable, because the room contained one of Prince Martin's prized emeralds, a small but intricately shaped red gem that glowed, remarkably, with its own light. It was like magic, but it wasn't magic, just a science that Sonic didn't understand. It may as well have been magic, so much about this entire affair seemed to defy reality. He could see all of this through gaps in the barred ceiling below him.
So close and yet so far, Sonic backed away and began to crawl back to where he had entered. It was time to initiate a new strategy, although he wasn't sure what it could be. His thoughts were accompanied by the sound of running water from somewhere below. He looked down to find that he was now crawling over a fast-flowing stream; not water at all, but a deep blue liquid of some kind. Sonic recognised it as mega mack, the pure spirit not yet filtered into a consumable form. This river of malcohol would eventually be mixed, bottled and showered over an army of overexcited gamblers in Casinopolis, all anxious for some kind of quick rush. The heart and soul of Station Square's success was right here.
As he pondered this, Sonic neglected to notice that he was crawling over a loose grate. Before he could stop himself, the weight of his body pushed it open, hurling him towards the river of blue. At the last moment and with a barking shout, he grabbed onto the swinging grate with one hand. There he hung, grasping with reckless abandon at the bars above with his other hand, but his weight displaced in such a way that he couldn't reach it. To climb back up, he would need to jettison the backpack that Kethriel had given him. It was too heavy for such acrobatics. Its contents were too important, though, so he decided with a tightness within that the only way to go was down. He took in a breath and let go of the grate, and after a short drop he was drenched in undiluted mega mack. It assaulted his senses immediately, the stinging odour and the tingling on his skin. As he was taken by the heavy flow of it, he went under several times, gulping it and coughing it out again. The liquid tasted of strong, stale whisky and hot ashes. It burned his eyes until he was unable to open them, and so the path before him became a mystery.
The river flowed into a narrowing tube, and Sonic was suddenly terrified that it would shrink to a point where he would block it and drown in the stuff. This fear subsided when the tube opened up and he found himself dumped from a great height into a gigantic vat of mega mack below him. Time suspended for a moment as he fell, but Sonic was too shocked to take much notice of where he was, suffice to say that it was a huge and daunting place. Then with a mighty splash, nevertheless inaudible against the roaring of the liquid falls around him, he was submerged again. Flailing, trying not to exhale, he struggled to the surface. The flat, pounding beat of the falls turned to a sharp booming again as he bobbed above the liquid and gasped for breath and waded. Luckily enough, mega mack was heavier than water, and despite his carriage his body tended upwards without much effort.
Now, Sonic had a chance to look about. What he saw shocked him, for no part of this gigantic operation had been a part of the grand tour. Gone were the toylike pink and blue robots smartly milling about and carrying out their spritely duties. Sonic was swimming in a pool of blue liquid barely short of a lake, and around it were dozens of giant, ugly and cumbersome brown mechs, mechanical ogres thundering about the place, lifting barrels and working machinery. Machines like monsters of ancient legend towered above everything, sprouting pipes like branches and steam flowing like dragon's smoke from unseen vents. On the tour, Sonic had seen something that he had been told were refining tubes, but it had only been a ruse to save face for the public eye. The real refinery was here, and two blackened iron tubes rose from the centre of the liquid pool like monoliths and attached to a giant metal cuccoon suspended above. Sonic realised warily that the liquid was actually flowing towards these tubes, their vacuum threatening to pull him under and suck him into the refining tank. He swam to the edge and pulled himself over the side onto dry land.
Sonic coughed up a mouthful of mega mack and vaguely worried that he may have been poisoned by the stuff. He sat up, and his drenched backpack felt twice as heavy as usual. "Great," he said aloud. Much of his supplies would be ruined.
Voices. His ears pricked up as he heard somebody coming towards him. Looking around, he saw no clear path of escape, and so before he knew what he was doing, he was back in the lake of malcohol and wading under the lip of the side of it, hoping to be out of sight. The voices continued moving closer until the figures stopped right above him. Sonic choked on his breath and closed his eyes, a silent prayer that they would leave him in peace.

The foreman, a thin and timid weasil, was ignorant of the proper behaviour in the presence of royalty, and it irritated the prince to no end to communicate with somebody whose respect was so lacking. Nevertheless, it was necessary on occasion to speak to the unwashed masses in order to get anything done. Necessary, at least for the time being. It remained that fear was not respect, but it seemed it was as good as would be achieved.
Prince Martin scowled as he gazed over the lake of blue spirits, the substance referred to colloquially as mega mack. The stench of it offended his senses. The foreman beside him breathed heavily, pausing occasionally to clear his throat.
"I have a quota to fill," the prince said, "That's all there is to it. I must say that I'm reaching the end of my tether. You've been employed for a certain purpose. If you cannot fulfil that purpose then obviously I need to employ somebody different."
"Demand has been high this quarter," the foreman replied, "If we don't provide for our customers, then they'll go somewhere else. I don't know what you need all of this excess product for, but it's killing us trying to produce it on top of our usual output."
"This is my company," the prince said, "All of this, this all belongs to me. I own the largest malcohol refinery in the known world. That means that if I want a large amount of malcohol, I should be able to get it. It's just common sense. If there's a problem with that, then you need to rectify that problem."
The prince held up something and admired it in the dim industrial lighting. It was not difficult to see, for it produced its own light, a red glow, deep like hellfire. It reflected in the prince's dark eyes.
"I think that this is my favourite," he said softly, and he appeared to be talking more to the emerald than to the foreman. "You and your brothers are going to create for me the greatest kingdom ever conceived by this planet of filth. And I think that I will have you embedded into my crown. Yes. That is, if this fool can see fit to do his job properly."
He put the emerald away and instead pulled out a small gold cigarette case. He flipped it open and withdrew a single white rod, lighting it with a golden lighter in the shape of a dragon.
"Excuse me, sir," the foreman ventured, "I'm afraid you can't smoke in here. The chemical, it's very flammable, you see."
The prince dragged on the cigarette unfazed, held it in for a moment and then released it in two short puffs. Then, he turned with one quick motion and extinguished it on the sleeve of the foreman's overalls.
"You have until the end of the week," he said, "to fill my quota. This is not negotiable. I don't care what has to be done. Fire somebody. Keep them on their toes."
"There's nobody left to fire!" the foreman replied, "We're almost fully staffed by robots, now."
"Then rust some damned gaskets," the prince replied. "I don't know. That's the worst problem with robots, I suppose. You just can't inspire fear in them."
With a final glance over the chemical pool, he walked on. The foreman sighed and walked in the other direction.

Sonic felt as if his heart might escape his chest by way of his throat and leap into the pool, such was his fear of being caught by the prince in his own chemical plant without so much as a single emerald to make his adventure worthwhile. But there was a certain sense of exhilaration present in the experience, something that made him want to stay and eavesdrop some more. He climbed from the pool and watched the prince walk, daintily but with great purpose, towards a doorway leading to a hall.
He had the emerald. The prince was holding the glowing red object in his own hands, and Sonic knew that it was probably the only chance he had to swipe it before it was put back into the heavily secured case. To steal from a prince, a pickpocket's dream.
He followed Prince Martin into the halls of the chemical plant, feet treading softly so as not to make a sound. He wasn't sure where he was being led, so he kept to the shadows as much as possible in case a troupe of SWAT-bots came marching around the corner, or even police. He realised, though, with a certain sense of dread, that he would probably be caught in such a situation anyway. It's not like there was anywhere to go.
The prince opened another door and began to ascend a stairwell. Sonic followed him into an industrial scaffolding that overlooked a flowing river of mega mack. The liquid poured into a tube similar to the one Sonic had fallen into. Martin stopped and leaned on the handrail, peering downward into the river. The lighting was poor, and it was getting dark outside. Shadows began to flow over the metal bars and criss-cross the walls like a postmodern artwork. The scaffolding crossed with others, and Sonic climbed off onto another footbridge below, so that he was concealed directly underneath the prince, cloaked in the shadows.
The prince withdrew his cigarettes again and lit one, sucking deep the thick intoxicating smoke before breathing it out through his nose. He watched the river of liquid. Sonic watched him watching it. The prince wore a long overcoat, but one of its pockets glowed with a distinct redness, especially visible in the dim light.
Sonic moved his foot and kicked something by accident. He stopped. The prince jerked his head, eyes narrowed. The hedgehog below him retracted, shrank back into himself, heart beating powerfully. He feared the sound of his heart might give him away.
The prince, his mark, resumed smoking and held his head in an open hand, breathing weakly in the near-silence. He was alert, though, his attention wandering. Sonic wasn't confident, and confidence was a commodity he desperately needed at the moment.
Slowly, delicately, he slipped his backpack off his shoulders and lay it down. He was about to make his move, for better or worse, when his foot again kicked something loose below him. The prince spun around, head darting back and forth. Sonic froze. He looked down and saw a lone bolt sitting on the metal scaffolding, under his foot.
"Who's there?" the prince demanded of the darkness. There was no reply but for the flowing of the liquid below. Sonic knew suddenly what his only chance was to be, and it was certainly a risk. In the heat of the tension, he picked up the bolt and cast it away with a hard over-arm pitch. The heavy metal object clanged on beams and machinery until it dropped into the malcohol stream in a punctuated final plop.
Now, it was freeze time. The prince's attention was focused, sharp and static, his eyes betraying his fear. The Crown Prince, travelling alone through dark corridors in a foreign land, open from all angles to any kind of attack. His breath was ragged, harsh. He was about to cast away his cigarette and run, when at the last moment he realised that the liquid below was flammable, and he caught himself, not without swearing loudly and freezing still, so still that he didn't notice the hand in his pocket.
"Who is it?" he demanded again. The silence was his reply. The stream below reflected the light so that it shimmered and blinked across his face.
"Bloody robots." He dropped his cigarette onto the scaffolding beneath his feet and stomped it out, resting his forehead in both of his hands. Instinctively he reached into his pocket, frowning when he grasped only air.

Sonic couldn't find his way out, which was the most frightening thing. He was deep inside the heart of the plant, and it must have been underground because he had been descending forever. Clamoring down a flight of stairs, he found himself in a deep set of catacombs lined with tubes, each aflow with blue liquid. After running up and down for what must have been a quarter hour, he stopped to catch his breath and look around.
The Chaos Emerald was warm in his hand, and his gaze shifted down to it. Only a small thing. It glowed radiant with an eerie red light that seemed to flicker very slightly, to dim and brighten. It was a natural light, nothing created by the deity hand of science, but it had also been intricately shaped by hand into a design perfect for reflecting its own light and radiating it outward. It had been shaped crudely, not with any modern tool, but with great care and much love. What was more, the object was hard like diamond. Perfecting this shape by hand must have taken years. Perfecting it seven times, probably decades. Sonic couldn't imagine having so much dedication to such a small thing.
"So all this mess is about you," he said. "I think I'm kinda disappointed." He realised that he was talking to the emerald, just as the prince had been. He supposed that counted for something.
Descending another flight of stairs, he found himself on a balcony, overlooking another very vast area. Below, he noticed what must have been scores, dozens, perhaps even hundreds of clunky, dumb-looking robots. They were very active, loading barrels atop each other, categorising and shifting them. Thousands of barrels.
"What are they doing down here?" he asked himself. The loading bays were upstairs, near ground level. He had seen them - products moved upwards, towards the surface, as they neared completion. This appeared to be some kind of alternative storage. What for? He remembered the prince and the foreman discussing something over the mega mack pool, the prince had spoken of some kind of quota for a large amount of malcohol he required for some reason. There certainly was a large amount being moved in this area, thousands of gallons. Sonic wasn't sure he wanted to know the reason for it.
Something cold dripped on the hedgehog from above, and he looked up. A ladder beside him led upwards for quite a distance, toward a small circle of light. Happy to travel up rather than down for once, he tested the ladder for strength and then climbed it.

Station Square came alive at night, and now it was waking from its daytime slumber as dusk allowed passage for the black wraith of darkness to take hold. Neon would rule this city soon. In the street, a small round hole-cover was lifted with a great effort, and a blue hedgehog climbed out of it, to the idle interest of a number of onlookers.
Sonic replaced the cover behind him, hugging his sore arms to his body, and looked towards the setting sun. He walked over to the growing shadows of an alleyway nearby and sat down against the wall, removing his backpack and cradling it between his knees.
He looked at the emerald again before setting it down on the pavement. Its light pulsed, offering no suggestions about how to proceed. He unzipped his pack and rifled through it. As he feared, his unscheduled swim in the chemical river had turned all of his food to a kind of homogenous porridge-like mush that caked over everything else. He upsided the bag and tipped its contents onto the concrete. His map was crumpled and saturated, the ink running slightly. It was still readable with some effort. Everything was covered in an unappetising gray slop.
"Excellent," he said to himself. He spent a while cleaning everything as best he could, until his aching muscles and tired eyes began to find the growing darkness irresistable. Packing his bag again, complete with the red emerald, he ventured deeper into the alley to find an inconspicuous and dark place to rest.
He dreamed about snakes again, that night. For some reason, snakes had always been a part of his dreams. Slithering through his mind, bringing with them fragments of memory and nightmare of a time long past. Red and blue snakes, hissing like demons in the dark.
Sonic didn't know for how long he slept. It was at best an uncomfortable doze on the cold, hard street of the city. After only a short time running snake-dreams through his mind, he was awoken by some kind of frenzied activity. Not quite awake, he crawled in the darkness towards the sound. His hand fell upon something on the pavement - feeling it a little, he identified it as a small cooking-pot, not unlike the one Kethriel had put in his pack. A short ways ahead was a soggy book of matches, something made of cloth, a wet sheet of paper, a silk bag with something hard inside...
Sonic's panic was intense when he realised what was happening, the knowledge pulling him back into reality. Somebody was rifling through his bag, throwing things about. He couldn't see who it was, but he groped towards the sound.
Suddenly a burst of red light illuminated the situation. The thief pulled the Chaos Emerald out of the backpack, betraying his own face in the process. It was the two-tailed street-fox, baring an expression of awe and wonder as he held the emerald in the dark.
"Drop it!" Sonic demanded. The fox saw him and fled immediately, throwing the pack to the ground and taking off with his glowing prize. The hedgehog persued, leaving the alley behind and finding the glowing lights of a fully-awakened Station Square.
The fox was a fast runner, but not as fast as Sonic. He knew his ability, and with his head down he realised that potential, working his legs at full sprint. The wind rushed past him as if he were running through a typhoon, and he tackled the fox, who yelped as he went down. The emerald rolled down the street, and both thieves wrestled each other as they grappled for it. Sonic had it, but the fox wrenched it away and kicked him in the face. They ran again. Sonic caught up with the fox a second time, but this time the fox jumped over him as he approached. Jumped... and never came down.
The hedgehog looked around for a few moments, bewildered, but then he heard somebody blowing a raspberry in his direction. He looked, remarkably, upwards to see that the fox was above him still. But how? He was spinning his two tails like rotor blades, and through some miracle of physics they were keeping him in the air. Nothing quite like flight, but he hovered for long enough to defy the hedgehog, whose super speed provided him no ability to take to the skies. The two-tailed fox hop-flew for quite a distance, until Sonic lost hope of catching him. The hedgehog, with a grunt of frustration, ran back to the alley to collect his things, then ran through the city following, as best as he could manage, the bright red glow of the twice-stolen emerald.