Good day to you all, (man I feel so nervous).

Sorry, first Sonic story jitters, hehe.

At any rate, just a few things I wanted to say here in the authors note to avoid any confusion. First of, this is predominantly a Satam based fic (though a few characters from the comics and the games will make appearances). There are a few changes that I have made, though. First off, the Freedom Fighters operate like you would expect a group of guerilla soldiers to, they have weapons, they have armor, they have light assault craft for hit and run convoy raids. Also, there will be major AU things present later that stem heavily from Star Wars and Halo, (mainly dealing with how certain characters are present, the Great War, and Sonic's origins).

As a further heads up, there will be some graphic material later (think Saving Private Ryan and you'll have a good idea).

I also want to extend my thanks to Farr2rich, The Outcasts, and to bringonthethunder of DA. Also, thank you MaRaMa-TSG of DA for allowing me to use your Robotnik design, which can be found here (you'll need to remove the spaces because of the weird formatting won't allow for linking)

http/www. deviantart. com/ deviation/ 27885030/

Finally, I have a minor request. Satam was the cartoon that I grew up with, and I am well aware that Satam fans are part of a very small minority here, and I am also aware of the treamtent that the Satam cast receives from some… indivduals. Thus, I must ask something of you: no character bashing in your reviews, no 'OMG Sally sucks' and things like that, please, I am begging you.

Many thanks for those of you who leave polite and constructive reviews.

To any and all lawyers reading this: I hereby swear upon my immortal soul that I have no delusion as to who owns what about this fic, to don't try and sue me.

That said, I hope those of you reading it enjoy it. (bows)


Ghosts of the Past

Usual Day on the Job

The young ground squirrel knelt in the shadows of a ruined building, leaning back against the wall, the rhythmic stomping of a Swat Bot patrol growing louder as it drew nearer to her position. She blinked a bit of sweat out of her eyes, and licked her suddenly dry lips, hoping that she was concealed enough that they wouldn't notice her, though the blackish blue color of her Zeo Matrix produced Nagai combat armor would certainly help, while the gray colored ferrosteel plates on her chest and her shoulders would probably look like debris if they decided to take a closer look at her.

She sent out a silent thank you to whoever had thought the suit up, wherever that person might be. Zeo Matrix had been one of several mega corps involved in heavy arms manufacturing prior to the Great War, before said war wiped those corporations off of the map, and suits like the one she wore had traditionally been produced for elite covert ops units, where stealth and agility were the primary concerns. Since the coup, though, Nagai combat suits had been rather hard to come by, as the local overlord had little need of armor for his mechanized soldiers. This suit and a few others had turned up when one of their recon missions had resulted in them finding an old supply cache that the Overlander bombing raids had apparently missed.

The clankers drew closer, yanking her back to reality, and she squeezed back a little further. She didn't fear the mechanical troopers, as they weren't exactly the brightest things on Mobius, and even if they did spot her, the customized DC-19 plasma rifle that she held in her hands would take care of them. However, shooting them would very likely result in raising the alarm around the city, and this mission would require stealth right now, as opposed to charging in, blasters firing at anything mechanized.

The noise reached a crescendo and the girl made doubly certain that she was out of sight.

Much to her relief, there was no pause in their marching, and shortly enough, the sounds grew fainter. She sighed, and then tapped the boom mike that she was wearing, which was connected to a red, semitransparent visor that came down from her helmet.

"Everyone report in, what's your status?" she said, her voice just above a whisper.

"We're here, Sally-girl," came the voice of her best friend, Bunnie, "Twain and I are doing fine, or would be, if he wasn't as nervous as a junebug in a hen house."

"What are you to be expecting?" came the French accented voice of Antoine D'Coolette, laced with its usual amount of uneasiness. "We are soon to be up to our ears in Swat Bots, and I do not fancy getting shot, especially with all of these explodables on my back."

"Mate, do us a favor, and can it!" Geoffrey St. John growled, and Sally held little doubt that the skunk was rubbing his forehead in irritation, annoyed that he had once again been paired up with 'rank amateurs' as he put it.

"All of you, quiet!" she said into the mike, her voice carrying the quiet authority of one who knew exactly what she was doing. She then looked into the lower right corner of the visor that she was wearing, watching the clock tick down on the Heads Up Display. "Everyone prepare to move out on my mark."

Five seconds passed, and the countdown timer hit zero, the signal for everyone to carry out their important roles. After all, on a mission like this, everything had to go off without a hitch, or they were all going to get hurt.

"Mark!" she said, and she dashed out of the alley, the armored vest she wore over her combat suit flying out behind her like a short cloak.

A hundred yards ahead of her, she saw an ever familiar blue and black blur that approached the checkpoint guards. Sonic was once again playing the role of bait, as the Swatbots, and almost every other mechanical entity in the city, were programmed to drop what they were doing and go after him in the event that he was spotted. Not exactly the best thing to have your guards do, especially if they were watching over something vital, but Sally wasn't complaining.

"Yo, chrome domes!" she heard him call out in a cocky 'I'm the best and I know it' manner, while flicking an imaginary piece of lint off of his own Nagai armor, exactly identical to her own, save that he didn't wear a helmet. "You guys looking for me?"

"Hedgehog alert! Priority one!" the droids said, leveling their wrist mounted blasters and letting fly at the rodent.

"I'll take that as a yes," Sonic responded, before tearing off in the other direction.

As they always did, the large guard bots tore off after him, despite the fact that they had no hope of keeping up with him on foot. However, central command would doubtlessly be alerted to his presence as well, and Robotnik, with his single minded obsession towards capturing him, would send his most deadly instrument after the hedgehog. This would keep said instrument occupied and unable to cause trouble with the rest of the strike force.

Her plasma rifle held in her hands, Princess Sally Acorn raced through the check point and kept heading towards her destination: a large building approximately half a kilometer south west of her position. It was one of Robotnik's Swat Bot production factories, and she hoped that by taking it off line, that it would open up a hole in his defenses that would leave him vulnerable to more attacks.

It took her less than a minute to go the distance, but to her dismay, she noticed that there will still some bots that were guarding the factory. Either Sonic hadn't swung by this area yet, or the resident despot had manually overrode their priority commands, which meant that he might finally be starting to wise up about their game plan.

She let out a quiet curse as they turned their red tinted photoceptors on her, and raised their integrated blasters to try and cut her down. A quick head count of them gave her four opponents, and her cunning mind quickly formed a battle plan as crimson energy bolts zinged above her head.

The ground squirrel threw herself forward with a slight leftward angle, pitching herself into a roll that threw their aim off. As she came up, she placed her right foot forward, putting herself into a kneeling position as two more shots crackled over her head. She squeezed the plasma rifle's trigger, and a trio of blue colored energy bolts was spat out of the barrel. A sharp, staccato crack accompanied them, followed swiftly by the satisfying sound of a Swat Bot falling backwards and impacting upon the ground.

Its partner redirected its aim, its crosshairs set right upon the heart of the princess. However, before it could fire, Sally sent another three shot burst its way, and the plasma bolts nailed it right in its visual systems, all but ripping the head apart.

More shots came as the other pair tried to gun her down, but she quickly rolled to one side and ducked into an alleyway, smirking slightly as she heard the stamping noise that the three hundred pound machines always made when they ran. So predictable, and so stupid as well. She wondered why Robotnik had never bothered to upgrade their AI to something better, as he certainly had the means to do so. Still, his loss was their gain, and in the risky business of guerilla warfare, Sally would take any advantage that she could get her hands on.

She quickly reached down and thumbed a switch that was right above her Deecee's trigger area, switching the firing mode from burst to fully automatic, and then moved it over to she held it only with her left hand. With her right, she reached over her back, and drew her family's ancestral longsword.

The Sword of Acorns, as it was termed, was a very unique blade. The weapon itself was made of a strange mineral known as cortosis. It was a rare substance, but when found in large enough amounts to make something, it was truly miraculous. It was lightweight, and when forged into a blade, was sharp enough to tear through almost anything that could be brought to bear against it. It even possessed the strange ability to deflect plasma and energy fire back at the one who was doing the shooting. When crafted into armor, it encased its wearer in something that was nearly indestructible, able to resist everything from energy bolts to flamethrowers and even corrosive acids.

Thus, her two foes were about to find themselves at a very severe disadvantage.

Just as the two mechanized guards were about the turn the corner, she leapt out, unloading her Deecee into the torso of the first one. At full auto, the rifle was capable of unleashing an impressive fifteen rounds a second, and the Swatbot quickly found itself turned into swiss cheese, its vision going dark even as its primitive computer brain attempted to figure out what had just happened to it.

Its partner didn't fare much better, as, caught off guard by the sudden aggressiveness of the target, it stood stock still as Sally lashed out with her blade. There was a metallic shrieking sound that split the air, and the bot fell over backwards, its legs severed at the kneecaps. Not wasting a single second, the princess got up and slammed the sword into the battery of the robotic guard. It gave a quiet, electronic moan, and the light in its photocheptor went out.

She glanced down at the mission clock on her HUD, and discovered that they were two minutes into the mission.

"Sally here, where are you guys?" she hissed into her comm. link, looking around while sparing a glance at the charge counter for her plasma rifle's power pack, before opting to reload.

"Coming, mai' princess." Antoine replied, his tone rather apologetic.

A moment later, two soldiers emerged from an alleyway. The first was a rabbit, heavily built and wearing what at first glance would have passed for full body covering, heavy ferrosteel battle armor. However, closer inspection of the Mobian revealed that the armor in fact only covered her torso and right arm. The remaining limbs were composed of metal and circuitry, as opposed to flesh and blood, the result of Julian's dreaded roboticizer.

Right behind her was a coyote, who was clad in a lighter version of Bunnie's armor. He stared around nervously, clutching at a submachine gun, while a saber dangled from his waist.

"Glad you two made it alright. Geoff, where are you?" she inquired, hoping that the man hadn't gotten himself into trouble.

"Right here, luv," The resistance fighter said, emerging form the shadows of another building, waving his right arm, upon which was a wrist mounted bowcaster.

Sally rolled her eyes behind her visor. By the Goddess, she hated it when he called her that.

"Sonic?" she spoke into the mike, not at all surprised when she got an immediate response.

"Still cruising through the streets, trying to find something other than the regular clankers." He said, sounding very bored with his assignment at the current moment. "So far no sign of…" he paused for a second, and Sally could have sworn she heard the grin come over his face. "Scratch that, Sal, here comes my evil twin now."

"Be careful." She warned him, well aware of just how dangerous his nemesis could be.

"Don't worry bout a thing, I got it all under control," He replied, confidence brimming in his voice. "With that little surprise you and Rote cooked up for me, I'll dust Mecha in one minute, two tops."

A few seconds later, he gave out a taunt to his mechanical double, and Sally knew that he chase was on. She felt a moment of concern come over her, a pang of fear that something bad might befall the hedgehog, but she quickly brushed it off, knowing that there was nothing that she could do except play out her part in this raid. She calmly put her sword back in its scabbard, and slung her plasma rifle over her shoulder, before reaching down and pulling out her personal computer, Nicole, from the strap on her thigh.

Nicole represented the absolute pinnacle of Mobian computer technology. While lacking in the personality department, and having a tendency to ramble on in long, extremely complicated sentences, she was an AI construct of the highest caliber, capable of doing everything from hacking to decoding to giving you what you needed to know about a certain native life form. Needless to say, she was quite a handy little thing, and had saved their lives more than once.

Taking out a link up cord, Sally quickly hooked the computer up to the security panel of the factory door. Nicole knew what to do, and cracking the encryption protocols took her all of four seconds. As the doors slowly slid open, the group quickly readied their weapons, just in case an ambush force lay inside of the facility.

However, no ambush party was to be found, and they quickly stepped inside and began to head for the primary control room and other such vital areas.

Sonic heard Mecha before he saw him, as the mechanized copy of himself was the only other thing besides himself in this Goddess forsaken wasteland that could make that strange sonic boom when he moved at full speed. He let Sally know about his progress and then waited for the inevitable arrival of his foe.

Having long ago left the other units in the dust, the blue furred hedgehog merely leaned against one of the buildings, whistling a small tune to himself and idly gazing at his gloves.

About two seconds later, his nemesis became visible. Though he would never mention it, there was something about seeing the android that always creeped him out. It was just how he looked, so much like himself, but devoid of anything resembling true life and the emotions that he so highly valued.

It was how he'd imagined he would look if he ever got tossed into the roboticizer… like a darker side of himself, the potential evil that lurked within his soul if the big round guy ever managed to capture him.

He quickly shook such thoughts from his head, knowing that he would need everything in his arsenal to be able to best his 'dark side,' and that concentration would be among one of those things.

"Jeez, took you long enough, Mecha." he quipped, pretending to look at his watch. "I swear you get slower every time Buttnik sends you out here to try to haul me in."

The red eyes of the android glowed a shade brighter upon hearing the insult, and he clenched his clawed hands into fists.

"Keep talking, meat bag," Mecha snarled, his voice also disturbingly like Sonic's, save for the electronic distortion that was in it, "it'll make it all the sweeter when I do grab you!"

"You say that every single time the two of us square off against each other, and I have yet to see it happen," The organic hedgehog replied, a smirk upon his face. "So why don't we just quit talking and cut to the chase, mmh?"

Without waiting for an answer, the resistance soldier bolted, kicking up a plume of dust and debris behind him. For a few milliseconds, this sudden departure caught Mecha off guard, but he quickly revved up his afterburners and shot off after Sonic, his eyes blazing as he flexed his talons, remembering that Robotnik had requested that the miserable hedgehog was to be captured by any means necessary. While that did not allow for Mecha to use his onboard weaponry, it would certainly allow for some degree of physical pain and suffering, and his processor enjoyed the idea of taking his pound of flesh before handing his foe over to his master.

Shooting out of the alley way and onto one of the main streets, the android caught sight of his fleeing nemesis, and he kicked his thrusters up as high as they could go, determined to catch up to Sonic and make him pay for the insults that he had suffered at his hands.

However, wanting something such as that to happen, and actually managing to catch an anomaly like Sonic, were two entirely different matters, and try as he might, the android found that he could only gain distance slowly, his organic counterpart gradually getting closer as they raced around the city.

Sonic merely smirked once again, and had to resist the urge to laugh, lest Mecha get the notion that he was indeed up to something. This was all going so smoothly, and if his luck held out, he'd be back up with Sal and the others inside of five minutes.

Out of the corner of his eye, the hedgehog noticed that there was a spy eye surveillance camera following him as best it could, watching the action, and he knew that Robotnik must have been watching.

"Hey, Buttnik!" he called out, knowing how much the taunting nickname enraged the overlord. "Enjoying the race? Hope you haven't placed your bets on tinny back there." He remarked, and gestured in Mecha's direction.

With his enhanced auditory receptors, the android heard the insult, and felt his rage double. With a mechanical scream that would have made most quiver in fear, he willed himself to move faster, never once pausing to think that he might be walking right into a trap.

From the central control room of Robotroplis, two figures were busy watching the action. One hovered back in the shadows, clad in somber gray, a thin, small and frail looking man who probably had less than twelve hairs upon his head, and a nose that looked like it would have been more appropriate on a person twice his size.

The other, was virtually the polar opposite of the first. He sat in a massive command chair, around which several keyboards and control panels were stationed. The man himself was no less imposing, being every bit of six and a half feet tall, and looking as if he weighed the better part of two hundred kilos. However, beneath that bulk lurked quite a bit of muscle, as anyone unfortunate enough to have drawn his ire while standing too close could inform you.

Complimenting this already sinister appearance was the man's attire, which was mostly a jumpsuit the color of fresh blood, with two armored shoulder pauldrons, each having a pair of triangular parts stacked on top of each other and connected by a rising metal brace that ran from his chest to the bottom of his shoulder blades, made him seem larger than he already was. There was also a long cape attached to the back, which came down to about his calves when he stood.

Julian Ivo Kintobor, or Robotnik, as he called himself, watched with crimson eyes as Mecha tailed his organic nemesis, all the while rubbing his left arm. This limb was mechanical, a painful reminder of one of his encounters with a certain blue furred Mobian. An evil grin was upon his face as he watched what he was certain was to be the miserable rodent's final run.

Sonic might not have been calling the shots for the Freedom Fighters, but Robotnik knew enough of their organization to realize that if he were to go down, it would be not only a tremendous tactical victory for himself, but a psychological one as well. The miserable rodent was a hero to his comrades, and it was often times from him that they drew the strength to keep on going in a seemingly hopeless war. That was also to say nothing of the times that Sonic had personally humiliated him and he had thus whished to see him turned into a mindless robot if for no other reason than to avenge those insults.

The other person present was the overlord's nephew and right hand man, Jonathan Kintobor, or Snivley, as Robotnik, and just about everyone else derisively referred to him as. Despite the apparent glamour that one would expect from such a position, the little man's lot in life was not something one would readily envy, as he was overworked, underappreciated, and had this tendency to become his uncle's punching bag when things went wrong.

Which is exactly what Snively was expecting to happen here today. Despite more than seven years of battling the blue speed demon, Robotnik had never learned to face facts that were blatantly obvious to his second in command. For starters, Julian had always insisted upon taking Sonic alive, whereas his nephew would have just as soon blasted him and be done with it. Secondly he observed, as Sonic led Mecha on a wild goose chase, his uncle never got it through his bullet shaped head that the rodent always played the role of decoy.

Something was rotten in Topeka.

Still, he kept his mouth shut, as he took what grim pleasure he could from his miserable existence watching his obese uncle trip over himself, and each time the Freedom Fighters bested Julian, it brought his own dream closer to being realized: the time when Robotnik would eventually be cast down and he could ascend to the throne. Then, those miserable little furballs would learn who the real genius was.

A feral scream from Mecha caused him to return his attention to the monitor, and he noticed what had happened. Sonic had stopped abruptly, and the android had shot past him, nearly crashing into a wall. The droid turned around, and Snively knew that had it been possible, the mechanized version of the hedgehog would have been foaming at the mouth. He never could understand why that thing would let Sonic get to him like that.

Anger clouded the mind more times than not, his own beatings at his uncle's hands could attest to that.

Sonic, ever one to rub it in, took the opportunity to give Mecha a mocking salute, and it was all he could do not to laugh out loud as the machine once again screamed in rage, before racing off after his organic counterpart.

The little man didn't know exactly what was about to happen, but he knew that the android was about to run headlong into a trap.

He sighed quietly, lest he attract Julian's attention. Why did it seem that there were days that he was the only one who used his head around this place?

"Come on, Mecha, is that the best you can do?" Sonic called out as he looked over his shoulder at the rampaging android. "You're slipping up, old buddy, might wanna drop by the repair shop sometime, ya know what I mean?"

He was laughing on the inside, getting his robotic double all worked up with these little taunts. Inwardly he mused over a sudden bit of curiosity that he had, wondering why in the world Buttnik, with all of his professed genius, could create a nigh perfect replication of himself, but couldn't bother to make it immune to such immature taunting that was causing the droid to become careless and sloppy. Even as impatient and reckless as he could be at times, Sonic was well aware of the fact that if he had ever gotten as hotheaded as Mecha was getting right now, that Sal would have broken one of Bunnie's jujitsu quarterstaffs over his head.

Oh well, yet another reason why that over glorified pack of silicon chips was absolutely no match for the original.

He hung a left turn when he reached an intersection, placing him on a route that would take him back towards the factory that Sally was trying to turn into a crater. The android that was on his tail was slowly gaining on him, and Sonic knew that the chase had gone on long enough. It was time to put an end to this little game of cat and mouse and rejoin the others.

He pivoted about suddenly, racing straight at a rather tall building, before leaping up at the last possible second. He hit the wall, and kept running up it, the extreme speeds that he was capable of reaching enabling him to overpower gravity. His foe was right behind him, just as he had hoped. Upon reaching the top, Sonic quickly bolted towards the edge, and then turned to face his nemesis, who had just cleared the edge as well, and was now dashing at him, talons extended and gleaming in what little moonlight was able to filter down through the smog.

"Got you!" Mecha screamed in triumph, a wicked grin upon his metallic visage. However, that smirk quickly turned to a frown of confusion as his organic counterpart smiled a crooked smile, reaching back into his backpack and drawing something from within it.

At first, the android believed that it was a power ring, and braced himself, his processor brain trying to figure out the best course of attack should Sonic decide to play his trump card. However, that was not to be the case, as the resistance soldier instead yanked out a small, gray disc like object. Without any further warning, he chucked it at the charging bot.

Mecha realized on an instinctive level that to come into contact with that thing, whatever it was, would not be in his best interests, and so he tried to evade. However, he was moving too fast, and had too little warning to be able to successfully dodge it. The disc hit him dead center in his chest, and stuck fast. He knew a moment of confusion, before something that he could only later recall as a blinding agony began to shoot through him.

He didn't know that what Sonic had hit him with was a short range EMP mine, a nasty little device that Rotor and Sally had constructed back in Knothole for just such a purpose. Upon activation, the mine would send out high powered electromagnetic pulses within a five to six foot radius. These pulses were harmless to a living organism, but did nearly irreparable damage to most any form of circuitry caught in the blast.

And Mecha was one big walking pile of circuits.

Blinded by his agony, the machine slowed down, but not enough to avoid what was coming. Perhaps it was for the best that he wasn't truly aware of what was going on, as he would have been humiliated beyond words at the sight of Sonic, who was imitating a bull fighter, swishing a make believe cape back and forth as he charged past, and clean off the roof of the facility that they were on.

Laughing like a school boy, Sonic waved as Mecha found himself in gravity's tyrannical hold, and the hedgehog couldn't hold back a mocking wince as he saw his nemesis hit the ground a few seconds later, broken and still sparking as wires and circuits shorted out. He then looked back over his shoulder, a cocky grin still upon his face as he noticed that the spy eye watched the whole thing. He suddenly had the hilarious mental image of old bullet head turning purple with impotent rage, and he decided to try to add further insult to injury.

"Well," he remarked, glancing down into the alley, some ten stories below, "I sure hope the warranty on him is still good."

He took just enough time to buzz saw his way through the observation probe, before he once again was dashing through the ruined city, this time heading for the factory.

In the distance, the resistance soldier thought that he could hear a scream of anger and denial, and once more chuckled to himself as he shook his head.

Goddess, how he loved his job.

Things had been quiet thus far, but Sally knew that there had to be security bots around here somewhere. Much as she hated to admit it, Robotnik wasn't stupid enough to leave a factory without guards on the inside as well as the outside.

Sure enough, her gut instinct proved to be right once again, as a group of about six Swat Bots came out and attempted to ambush them in a narrow hallway. Fortunately for herself and the others, there were a couple of small alcoves that they were able to duck into.

However, not before Sally took a round in the stomach, between the solid plates of the armor. Fortunately, despite the underweave's simple, cloth like appearance, the Nagai armor that she wore was up to the task, and the only thing that she felt was a slight tingling sensation as the suit absorbed and dispersed the energy behind the bolt.

Geoffrey also took a couple of hits before he could get himself out of the way, though his ferrosteel combat suit was also up to the task of keeping him protected.

Bunnie, her reflexes honed by years of arduous martial arts training, faired a little better, throwing Antoine into one of the alcoves, and promptly diving on top of him. This was not merely because of the feelings the two of them shared, but also due to the fact that her boyfriend had about fifteen kilos of high yield charges strapped to his back, and if those took fire…well, at least they wouldn't have to worry about whether they whished to be buried or cremated.

Sally looked across the narrow hallway to where Geoffrey was, and gave him a quick nod as they silently agreed on what they should do.

The two of them leaned out at about the same time, and fired their weapons. Sally's Deecee dropped one bot, a trio of large holes appearing in it. There was another cracking sound an instant later, and Geoff once again proved how adept he was with his bowcaster.

The weapon itself was a rather strange and exotic one, but it got the job done. Styled after the crossbow of the ancient days of warfare, the bowcaster used a coil of polarizing magnets to throw out a small particle charge at extremely high velocity, and was fired by holding the wrist at a certain angle and then applying pressure to a trigger held in the palm of the hand.

Between that and her plasma rifle, they quickly brought down the half dozen Swatbots that were trying to hold them off.

More came after that though, and Sally muttered a quiet oath. Dumb as these clankers were, they possessed a single minded determination to carry out their tasks, and were also not programmed to know fear or have any thoughts of self preservation should things get rough. This made them tenacious foes when engaging large numbers of them, which was a scenario that the princess and her forces tried to avoid at all costs.

However, they were about to receive some backup.

She heard the noise, a faint rumbling with a high pitched shriek thrown in as well, and she smiled in a grim fashion, knowing that the bots that had shown up to replace the ones they'd destroyed were about to be heading straight for the recycling bin. A blue and black blur shot past a moment later, and she stuck her head out just in time to see Sonic curl up and leap up to the head level of the first Swat Bot. The mechanized guard realized what was about to happen, but had no chance to react as Sonic's spines, razor edged when he stiffened them, bisected its metal cranium. It collapsed to the ground, twitching as it went offline for good.

The blue furred hedgehog wasted not time in taking its closest comrade out while he was at it, bouncing off of the metal floor of the hallway and nailing it right through its torso. It emitted an electronic death wail as Sonic emerged from the other side, where he uncurled and landed on his feet.

He stayed there just long enough to change his angle of attack, before leaping up once again and curling up, this time at a more horizontal angle. This resulted in lucky bot number three being cleanly decapitated even as it tried to sight him up.

Sally just smirked and rolled her eyes as he managed to demolish the remaining five in less than as many seconds.

The hedgehog stood up as he finished, looking around to admire his handiwork, before shaking his quills out and looking back to the others.

"You guys planning on leaving me out of a perfectly good scrap?" he asked, cocking an eyebrow at Sally.

"Show off," Geoffrey muttered, frowning at the other resistance soldier.

"Hey, when you're as good as I am, you don't need to show off," Sonic replied with a cocky grin, which faded quickly as he saw the slight bit of discoloration on Sally's armor from where she had been shot.

"You okay, Sal?" he asked, the usual tone gone from his voice, replaced by a large amount of concern.

"I'm fine. What about Mecha?" the princess asked, hoping that their little plan had worked.

Relieved that she was okay, his usual demeanor quickly returned.

"You might say he's not all together these days," Sonic remarked in an offhand manner, shrugging while he was at it.

"So the EMP mine worked?" she said, eager to know if all the time that had been put into constructing that thing had been worth it.

"Like a charm, Sal." Was the response that she got.

"Let us just be moving along please?" Came Antoine's voice, slightly muffled due to the fact that his girlfriend was still covering him up. "I would be liking it very much to get these demonstration charges off my back!"

"That's 'demolitions' charges, Ant." The hedgehog said with a mirth filled laugh.

"That is what I was to be saying, no?" the coyote responded as Bunnie got up and helped him to his feet.

"Sonic, take the point," Sally said, wanting to get back on track, accentuating the order with a rapid hand gesture. "Bunnie, keep Antoine covered and Geoff, you help her out."

There was a round of nodding as they headed off towards their goal.

Reaching into the pack that was on the coyote's back, Sally withdrew another demo pack charge and placed it on the central control panel of the command room.

They had brought a grand total of about thirty of the charges, and were in the process of placing them at strategic points within the factory. Sonic was getting some of the more outlying ones, and as she looked out through the observation window, she could see him running around down below, ducking between the assembly lines and ensuring that the factory's destruction would be complete and total.

They had to work fast, though, as it wouldn't take long for Robotnik to catch on to what they were up to. For this purpose, she had Nicole plugged into one of the central computer mainframes of the factory, which was interconnected with all of the others in the city, from which the AI was monitoring the enemy battle net for anything pertaining to their little activity.

It was a very good thing that she did something like that, as about thirty seconds after she'd placed the charge on the control panel, Nicole began to warble, and all eyes were on her in an instant.

"Nicole, what's wrong?" the princess inquired, fishing out another demo pack from the pack Antoine had.

"I have detected battle net traffic pertaining to this Swatbot factory," the small computer replied, her primary screen flashing and showing a holographic display of all the chatter upon it. "I believe that the enemy has both discerned our location and have realized our purpose for being in this place."

"So the jig's up then?" St. John asked, looking up from his work.

"Seems like it," Sally told him, before looking back out where Sonic was running along a wall, heading for a computer module on the second tier that was a failsafe backup station in the event of the primary control being knocked out.

"Sonic!" she said, her voice loud in hopes of grabbing his attention over the noise he made while he raced around. "We've got to go; I think Robotnik's figured out what we're up to!"

"Read you loud and clear, Sal, He remarked, not at all worried. "Just let me get this last charge placed and I'll be back over there with you guys.

A half second later, he reached the control module, and quickly placed his final demo pack.

He never really understood much about high tech machinery, too many working parts for his liking, but there was something that he simply found amazing about these little charges that Rotor kept churning out. They were pretty small rectangular objects, weighing little more than a pound, and weren't much bigger than the palm of his hand. However, inside such a tiny package was enough explosive material to reduce a small building to a smoldering ruin (as the poor walrus had found out the hard way when his first attempts at making them had gone slightly awry).

He pressed the red arming sequencer button and stepped back. The charge was set for remote detonation now, so that they wouldn't have any timers to worry about or things of that nature.

"Charge set," He remarked, smiling at the thought of the destruction that he was about to unleash.

"Then let's get out of here," Sally responded over the comm. link.

"Taxi's on its way, Sal," the hedgehog told her, revving up and shooting back towards the central control chamber.

Once he had arrived, it took only a moment for everyone to form a chain and grab a hold of him. He quickly broke out into a run and then they were gone, a faint rumble, some trashed Swatbots, and thirty nasty little surprises being the only things that they left in their wake.

As soon as they were clear, Sally reached into her utility belt, and drew out the remote control for the demo charges. She used her thumb to depress the two buttons on the top of the device, and then pulled the trigger on it.

For a brief instant, night became day as the massive factory became something that could only be compared to a small nova, and gave off a shockwave so great that it nearly blew Sonic off of his feet.

As it was, it was felt even back at the central command chamber.

Robotnik cocked an eyebrow and screamed a curse as the building rumbled and nearly knocked him from his command chair. Snively, however, merely groaned, as he had a good notion that he knew what had happened. That miserable hedgehog and his comrades had just blown something up, something big or close by the feel of it. Knowing that something was up, he'd quietly ordered the Swatbots to head to certain key locations, lest his uncle, furious over what had happened to Mecha, use it as a reason to hurt him. But it looked as if he hadn't done it fast enough.

"Snively, get a spy eye to look around, find out what the hell that blast was!" his uncle shouted, spittle flying from his mouth and his eyes having a dangerous, even more psychotic than normal look to them.

"Y-yes sir." The little man muttered, quietly praying that he would be able to walk out of this one with no injuries this time… or at least with all of his ribs intact.

His hands racing over the keyboard of a control panel, he searched around until he was able to find a probe that still worked properly, as it seemed as though the shockwave had knocked a good number of them out. Once he finally did have one, he quickly had the thing pivot around.

Four seconds later, it discovered the source of the blast, and Snively felt himself go a few shades paler than he normally was.

Swatbot factory number three had officially been reduced to rubble, and his uncle, already infuriated by the fact that he would have to put Mecha back together for the umpteenth time, went ballistic.

Or at least, he was about to, as Snively could hear his labored breathing, and turning around, saw his eyes glowing like coals while his robotic left arm closed around the arm rest of his chair with such force that he could actually see the metal start to buckle under the pressure.

"Snively…" Julian growled, his tone lace with an explosive rage that threatened to boil over at any second.

"Sir?" he said, and he felt sweat begin to run down his head, and he couldn't hold back a gulp.

"If you value your ability to breath, you will leave this room now!" the overlord of Mobius roared, slamming both of his fists down onto the arm rests of his chair.

Snively took off like a bullet from a gun, but he still wasn't fast enough. As he tore past his uncle, Robotnik lashed out, backhanding him and sending him careening towards the door. The door, while motion activated when not under emergency conditions, did not open fast enough, and the poor overlander smashed into it with a loud thud. Adding to the pain that he was feeling was the fact that his 'beloved' uncle had popped him with his cybernetic limb, and judging by the pain in his chest, had bruised a rib or two while he was at it.

As the door finally opened, Snively crawled out as fast as he could manage. Blood starting to leak into his left eye and he realized that his impact against the door had given him a large gash upon his forehead.

"I hate my life," he muttered, coughing painfully as he continued to try to flee the vicinity of Julian's wrath.

Silently, though, he swore that when the time came, that he would achieve the power that should have rightfully have been his.

From behind, even through the six inch thick ferrosteel that the command room door had been constructed from, he could hear a roared phrase that he had heard all too often of late.

"I hate that hedgehog!"


Well, there's chapter one down, about fourteen or so more to go. I sincerely hope that this has proven itself worthy your time, and that it isn't as horrible as I think it is. With any luck, I've portrayed the cast as they should have been, and not the bastardized versions from the newer comics that some of you might be familiar with.

That said, any advice, comments, constructive criticism (please, I really need to improve!), or ideas on weapons and the like that you would like to see are more than welcome. But, as stated above, please, no bashing the characters. Feel free to flame me and my inability to write (and any OCs that may show up) but please leave the canon cast out of it.

Thanks once again for your time, and I hope you have a great day.