FicWad

The six foxes looked out to where the Forest ended, staring at the city of Robotropolis with horrified eyes. It was impossibly large and threatening and seeing it in the distance from the borders of trees turned it into a distant overseer, a big brother observing from above.

"Nintex!" Cohae yelled. "You did that on purpose!"

Nintex frantically looked at his hand-drawn map on the scrap of paper that was now starting to fall apart from overuse. "No!" he yelled, shocked and annoyed. "Can't! East! Impossible!"

"Small," Ryan said warningly.

"Can't!" Nintex yelled, tearing the little scrap of paper apart in his franticness. He swore. "Help!"

"Shh!" Anthony hissed.

"Why?" Cohae asked.

"'Cause this isn't our territory," Anthony whispered. "I know you guys are comforted by metalcity out there, but Robotnik's power extends well beyond the borders. If he owns this area, and he might well do, we mustn't attract the bots."

"I didn't see any bots," Cohae challenged, narrowing his one good eye.

"Neither did I," Anthony said. "Which is exactly what that madman'd want if he were here. So for heck's sake shut up."

"You don't know anything about Robotnik's powers," Ryan said.

"We all don't," Nintex said.

"Quiet," Cohae hissed, and Nintex glowered but silenced himself. "Cyrus, what's wrong?"

Cyrus blinked his tears away. "Uh, sorry guys. I know this is uncharacteristic of me n' all; you might think so but I actually really don't want to die. I'm so scared I really would rather be in Elsu's domain right now. Get a load of this; I'm so scared I'm crying."

He dabbed his eyes and then poked Nintex's forehead with the same finger.

"This way is south, right?" Phil said. "Metalcity is south of the forest. Kyu Shena is east, so let's go along the border, right? Stick to the trees and travel that way and at least we'll be going in the right direction."

"Inside," Nintex said.

"Well, inside or outside," Cohae said. "But sticking on the border just exposes us to both threats. Inside or outside?"

They turned in unison to the Forest, staring into the depths and gauging their own fear. Then, still as one, they turned to look at Robotropolis.

"Inside," Nintex said.

"Inside," Cohae agreed. "Robotnik can't see us inside."

"I heard his real name was Eggman," Phil said.

"Whatever," Cohae said. "Right now, whatever his real name is, he can see us. We really do not want to know if he cares about us or not. Come on, people. Let's follow the border from inside it."

"Let's go," Nintex said. Cohae elbowed him quiet.


Sonic fell through the air uncontrollably, throwing his arms around and trying to grab for nonexistent hand-holds. He was twisting wildly, trying not to feel too sick at the sight of the rapidly revolving horizon. He could see the missile, too: it was falling faster than him, and he tried to focus on its descent. It hit a building below him and halted. There was no explosion.

It wouldn't have taken Pegasus out anyway, Sonic realised. Somehow the thought did not surprise him. Someone had known he was coming.

The freefall was impossible to stop, but Sonic still retained a certain amount of control, and he managed to pull himself into a skydiving position. He laughed despite himself. The dull metal was almost entirely below him, except for the tall, round central control tower, which ended in a point-tip just below. Maybe he could land on that.

But it felt like it was getting further away. He was falling very rapidly, and at this rate he wouldn't be able to reach the tower until he was half-way down. And by then he wouldn't want to touch anything solid.

Then he noticed the hovercraft. They had returned to their orderly rows, and were speeding in a line underneath him. They were on level with the top of the tower. If he could manoeuvre himself underneath them, then maybe someone would catch him by accident.

Sonic swum through the air, trying to keep himself on top of the line. "Oh man," he muttered, "this had really better work-!"

And then he hit. It wasn't painful as such, but a forcefield caught him from below and yanked him to the side. For the second time in just a few minutes he was crashing through glass. Unable to think he merely rolled over, gasping for air.

He was inside the tower. He had fallen in from outside, and he could see the hovercraft queue speeding along, through a smashed window. He was bleeding from the wrists, but he didn't know if this was from the crash or from the flimsy sheets of metal that had tied his hands to the missile.

A robot grabbed him by the shoulders and tossed him across the room, and he hit the far metal wall with an echoing thud. He could see his aggressor, but the robot had pinned his arms to the wall before Sonic managed to recognise the face.

"Uncle Chuck?"

"Six months!" Sir Charles hissed. "Six months to survive and he lost it in days!"

"Uncle Chuck!"

Sir Charles blinked, shook his head and realised what he was doing. His grip relaxed, letting Sonic slide to the floor. "Oh man," Sonic said with his eyes closed. "Unc', what's wrong?"

"I'm homeless, Sonic," Sir Charles said, and clattered to the floor with his back to the adjacent wall. "They've found me."

Sonic could think of nothing to say to that, because in truth he was quite glad if Robotnik had figured his uncle's role out.

"I've got no idea what to do, Sonny-boy," Sir Charles continued. "I can't stay here in Robotropolis. I can't live in any of the Freedom Fighter cities either; nobody accepts robots which are entirely roboticized. I don't know what to do."

"Live with us," Sonic said, which seemed the most obvious thing to say.

"Sonic. How much electricity does Knothole get? A generator can power Rotor and Tails' tools maybe, but it's nowhere near enough for me. I hear they ration it out?"

Sonic looked around him. "I don't understand," he said. "How can Robotnik know about you? You're always super-careful about what you do here."

"I am, Sonic," Sir Charles replied, with a slight edge to his voice. "But you aren't."

"I..." Sonic had no idea what to say to that.

Sir Charles looked up to the panel on the wall above his head. He reached out as far as he could be bothered to, tapping a command in. A digital voice sounded throughout the chamber.

"Accessing..." said the voice. "Priority one file access, permission granted, by authorization of Doctor Robotnik."

"He has a sense of humour," Sir Charles said. "He doesn't mind me knowing that he's going to kill me."

"Audio," said the voice. And then there was the slight hiss of a microphone recording, and Sonic's own voice came through the speaker.

"Sal! What's up?"

"You are, and so am I," said the voice of Sally through the microphone. Sonic's eyes were wide. "We're going out to Robotropolis, Sonic Hedgehog."

A clatter, followed by Sonic's voice again: "Really? We're after that satellite, right?"

"Yeah. We need to destroy it ASAP. Fancy a visit to Sir Charles?"

"Uncle Chuck? Why?"

"I'm mentioned throughout," Sir Charles said, pausing the recording. "Robotnik has all sorts of links to me through this, but he caught other stuff. Listen, Sonic." He tapped a button and a different voice sounded.

"Yeah, that's why all the food is gone from the community hut, isn't it?" said the recorded Tails. "I don't know what happened. First we overslept - because story time didn't really work - then we started talking, and we sort of forgot to eat."

"C'mon, Tails -"

Sir Charles paused the recording again. "See?" he said. "He has all kinds of stuff. Stuff that doesn't have any relevance. It's all still there, archived. It's not often that Robotnik gets recordings from inside Knothole. He's kept these under lock and key."

Sonic was staring into space. "It was Nintex," he groaned. "He must have listened in. Do you have him anywhere in there?"

"Hold on," said Sir Charles, trying to find the right place.

"What's the matter, Sal?"

"Nicole. She keeps telling me there's a fault in operations. I think she needs a new processor unit."

"No, this isn't right. Wait, go forward." Sir Charles was talking to himself.

"Once upon a time, the end."

"Not that short, but still short. And it isn't obvious, either."

"Is this him?" Sir Charles asked.

Sonic nodded. "That stupid twit; I'll get him for this."

"I slowly came across the bridge with my love," the recording continued. "She smiled sweetly -"

"Locked Together," Sonic said. "Stop it."

"Wait," Sir Charles said. "This is odd, this thing."

"His story?" Sonic asked. "Yeah, but that - wait, you think it might be a message?"

"I don't know what it is, but it's in a separate file. Robotnik sure noticed it."

There was a long silence. "What are you going to do?" Sonic asked.

Sir Charles was deep in thought, and Sonic suddenly realized that something had occurred to him. "Yes," he said. His mouth was breaking open into a grin. "Yes, I know what to do."

"Well, what?"

"I'm going to go with Nintex."

"What?"

"Think about it," Sir Charles said, and he was standing up. Sonic lifted himself to his feet, in time to see Sir Charles put onto one of the many screens an image of Nintex. He was standing inside the room with his five roboticized companions, and shaking the bars outside one of them. It was staring at him without moving. Nintex was frozen in an expression of horror and disbelief.

"This photograph was taken moments after he entered the room." Sir Charles said. "He had come into Robotropolis after these five, and arrived too late. This fox identified itself as Cohae before the roboticization was complete."

"Okay," said Sonic. "But what does this have to do with you?"

"Well," Sir Charles replied. "This is another photograph taken sixty seconds later." And he put it on the screen.

Cohae had not moved at all, except perhaps a slight tilt of the head. But Nintex had changed completely. His agonized expression had been replaced by one of realization, and surprise, and happiness.

"Look at the robot," Sir Charles said. "Between the two photos it doesn't move at all. Believe it or not, that's not standard protocol when an intruder is standing a few feet away from you."

"I'll bet," Sonic said, all too aware of the robots' reactions to him.

"My guess is that he knew this fox beforehand, and recognized that the personality that he had known was still there. If he's right, and I don't know if he is, but if he is right, then he'll be desperate to release his foxes and cure them somehow."

"What are you getting at?" Sonic asked.

"Think about it, Sonic. If he wants his friends' personalities back, then I'm exactly what he's looking for! A robot that's been rescued by his friend - nephew - and restored to the original personality set. That's what he wants to do for them! So if I can manage to convince him that I'm here to do the same for his friends -"

"Wait," Sonic said, suddenly realising. "So you're saying that instead of spying for Robotnik, you're going to spy for Nintex?"

"Exactly!" Sir Charles said. "If he's still transmitting to Robotnik, then I'm sure to catch it. I don't expect it to take more than a couple of days, and in the meantime all I do is tell him the truth. Bring the guys home and try to talk them out of it. That's what you did for me."

"Well, that's all great and all and I'm sure you'll catch him at it, but what do we do? Robotnik knows where Knothole is, doesn't he?"

"Yes," Sir Charles said. "I don't even know if he needs the tracking signal anymore. If I were you, I'd forget about Pegasus and everything. Move Knothole."

"Move Knothole?"

"Save the people first," Sir Charles said. "If you have time to come back for stuff, then do so. But be careful - if Nintex has planted a tracking signal somewhere, you might take it with you by accident."

"Right," Sonic said. "Now let's go."

"What?"

"You think I'm letting Robotnik catch you?" Sonic said. "If the spying on him is over, it's over. We'll go to your hideout and pick up your stuff if we can, and then we'll go!"

Sir Charles laughed. "I don't have anything there I'd want to take," he said.

"Then it's settled," Sonic finished. "C'mon."