Hello! This is an AU where Robotnik steals the Master Emerald and no one except Knuckles was there to stop him.
This is meant to be an ongoing story, but I'm experimenting so I'll be able to gauge interest based on readers. If you want to see more, please comment or favorite the story so I get your feedback!
Enjoy the story!
Angel island was once a beautiful, peaceful, natural paradise. It flowed with sparkling waterfalls, hills and mountains characterized its surface, jungles and forests sprawled out for miles. It existed tranquilly above the clouds for decades, the Master Emerald kept safe from the greedy clutches of the people of Mobius… But this did not last forever. One day the evil Dr. Ivo Robotnik discovered the island and its emerald and attempted to steal it- but the guardian shattered its pieces to prevent it from being used for evil. This worked only partially, for the evil Doctor collected the majority of the pieces and used those shards to power his machines and overtake the entirety of Angel island.
Even as the island began to sink to the ground, the wicked Robotnik solved the problem not by surrendering the emerald back to the guardian… but by building a massive flying system within the island to keep it afloat.
Now the island, gutted and filled with machinery, was built upon with large metal structures, factories, buildings creating a city. It billowed smoke and smog, filling the sky above it with black clouds. Many people lived in this city now, the remnants of its old peaceful scenery only contained in small parks and on the very outskirts of the city, if foliage looking more and more sickly as the weeks went by.
The city was called Eggland, which was an awful name, but not unexpected from its overlord and creator Dr. Ivo (eggman) Robotnik.
Knuckles, the old guardian of the Master Emerald, lived in this city as well, living in a dingy, sparsely decorate office which served as the place he worked.
What was his work? Well, Knuckles was now a detective. He had not given up looking for the Emerald shards, but he found that he had to adjust to living in an urban society, where money was not only a luxury, it was a necessity. He took to Detective work because it made it easier to get information, make friends, find his shards and take them back right from under Robotniks nose.
He had acquired 4 so far and was on track for another one, his sparse office riddled with tackboards containing all the leads he had for finding shards. In the middle of his office was a desk with a chair, covered in papers and cups, he had no bedroom in this office, so that desk is often where he laid his head to sleep each night.
Knuckles worked day and night, helping locals with their woes, opposing Robotnik's Regime in ways that wouldn't bring too much notice to him, defending the weak and downtrodden… But he found this to be a difficult and heart aching task. Robotnik had gained the upper hand so quickly that by the time Knuckles could try and do anything about it he was outgunned.
Knuckles was now sitting in his office chair, flipping through his schedule, planning his day. He had his legs propped up on the desk, a fedora on his head, and a white tie around his neck- dressed for business, so to speak.
He wasn't expecting any visitors for at least another hour, so when he heard the delicate knock on the door, and the figure of a woman standing in his doorway he quickly turned his attentions toward the visitor to assess what sort of visit this was going to be.
She was a bat, voluptuous and dressed in a black pencil skirt with a slit that went right up to the middle of her thigh, a fuchsia blouse, with only a few of its buttons actually buttoned, and a pair of white boots that went up to her knees. In her gloved hands she held an umbrella, and her face was partially obscured by it. "Are you Detective Knuckles?" She asked, her voice was supple, smooth and intoxicating. Knuckles straightened up like he had been prodded with a hot iron.
"Y… Yeah, thats me. What can I help you with?" Knuckles asked, looking around to see if a second chair had materialized for her to sit on. It seemed not.
The woman put on a seductive grin, stepping inside from the rain and bumping the door closed with her hip. "Well, Detective, I've got a little problem that I need you to solve. I think you're the only one up to the task." As she spoke she strode confidently to his desk and perched upon its surface, closing her umbrella. Knuckles was paying a little too much attention to this woman's curves than he normally did, clearing his throat when they caught eachothers eyes.
"Oh- oh. Yeah- who told you about me?" Knuckles said, clumsily. The bat woman hummed thoughtfully, sliding a hand into her boot.
"Oh, a friend of a friend. They said you take these-" From her boot she pulled a master emerald shard. "-As payment?" Her smile was coy to the point of being suspicious, but Knuckles didn't appear to notice, his gaze fixated on the shard.
The Echidna's eyes darted from the shard to the woman, a determined expression crossing his face. "You heard right. What's your name and what's your problem?" He asked, a smile now on his face- looks like a shard came and found him this time.
Rouge tucked the shard back in her boot and turned her head away, that coy expression still stuck on her face. "My name is Rouge the bat and… Well, it all has to do with this troublemaking blue hedgehog."