In the light of the full moon Part 1: Project Crescent

By: DarcNiGHT

Sonic and Robotnik and whoever else I mention Óof SEGA Kytan and M.A.X. Óof Samual Turner

~I wonder if there is a full moon tonight~

This thought crossed his mind as he slowly padded down the long hallway, his long tail weaving out behind him, twitching in tune with the flickering lights overhead, the gauntlet on his left arm reflecting the fluorescent light. While the power gem in it seemed to capture the tiny bit of light and appeared to glow in the dim hall.

He couldn't tell because he had snuck into Robotropolis during the day and waited until night to find his way into this building, even when the sun had set he could not tell because of the giant buildings surrounding him and the permanent smog cloud hovering above the city.

This was only one thought of many going through his head as he tried to move silently down the hall, but to his sensitive ears every footstep was like a Swatbot stomping on sheetmetal. He had already disabled every security system he had found on his way in that wasn't already busted, but you never could let your guard down where Dr. Robotnik was concerned.

He listened as hard as he could for any sounds of an alarm going off or guards' coming to get him, but this was a decrepit old building in the ghetto part of the city so the odds of that were very slim. Still he was not going to take any chances. But all he heard was the buzzing of what was left of the hallway lights, his own footsteps, and the quiet hum that M.A.X. made as he followed. A sound that only he or somebody with hearing as good as his could even notice.

"Are you sure that this is the right floor?" he asked for the 5th time.

"Yes, I am positive" M.A.X. responded "This is where the readings are coming from. Are you sure that you disabled any security systems that are still working in this building?"

"Yeah I'm sure," he said back "........... Almost sure" he mumbled looking away.

"What do you mean 'almost'? For all you know this place could be surrounded by Swatbots, Combots, and who-knows what else just waiting for the signal to storm in and get us, turning us into a couple of mindless robots who only live for their bidding..."

He rolled his eyes and just ignored his companion as he had done many times before when M.A.X. rambled on like this. And for the umpteenth time he wondered if he was like this just by a glitch that made his personality (at least the over-protective part) so much like hers, or had she made him this paranoid and over-protective on purpose because of his job as a treasure hunter. Though what they were doing now could be treasure hunting it was more commonly referred to as Theft (same as treasure hunting but people are apt to shoot at you more). He hated to do this, almost as much as when he had to resort to bounty hunting to make some money, but this was Dr. Robotnik so...who cared.

Looking over at M.A.X. as he continued to rant and rave loudly enough to alert anybody who might be looking for him he thought about whether it was programming or a glitch that made him like this.

Probably the former.

M.A.X. was made especially for him. He was designed to help him on his treasure hunting adventures where the land and the natives might be less then friendly. His name stood for:

Multi sensory

All terrain

eXplorer

(Though sometimes he thought the X could stand for eXperimental seeing as how M.A.X. had gotten him into as many scrapes as he has gotten him out of)

He shook himself out of his reminiscing. They had a job to do, hopefully their prize was on this floor and all of the security was offline.

After returning M.A.X.'s attention to the job at hand they both returned to their exploration of this floor, creeping down the hall and looking into each room to see if there was anything in any of them. Mostly there were just offices or dusty, empty laboratories. A quick look at these and they moved on. Then they found it.

It was the last room on the floor (don't you hate it when that happens), through a large security door labeled: Project Crescent, it took him about 35 seconds to disable the lock, which meant it was pretty good, and they were in.

It was a large room, obviously the main room on this floor. Along the left wall, was a bank of computers, most of which were off at the moment, but some still had some blinking lights and a few flickering displays active. Along the right wall was an observation room with windows designed for people to observe any tests that were going on in the main room safely, it was empty. The far wall was a bank of large windows showing the horizon of the city clouded in pollution, with small pieces of the night sky poking through the gray haze here and there.

But even the depressing view or the opportunity to see if the moon was full or not could distract them from the centerpiece of the room. Sitting on a pedestal 3-4 ft. tall right in the middle of the room, with a spotlight shining on it was a large rifle like gun. Upon closer inspection he saw that it wasn't sitting on the pedestal, it was connected to it. And the pedestal itself was connected to the bank of computers by a bundle of black cords snaking across the cold metallic floor. (Cold metallic with a darc blue/black color theme seemed to be the favored architecture in Robotropolis)

M.A.X. went to the computers and started to make a connection with them to find out what this weapon was. While our hero (what, haven't you figured out that this guy is the hero of the story yet?) took a closer look at the pedestal to see if what he thought was there was actually there. After a few rare quiet minutes on both of their parts M.A.X. came back to the pedestal and reported his findings.

"This was a project personally led by Robotnik to develop a weapon that could finally take care of the local rebellion group led by one: Sally Acorn" M.A.X. reported

"I think ive heard of her" was the response as he continued his inspection of the topic of conversation. "She was the daughter of the last king, after Robotnik's takeover she escaped and now leads the main Freedom Fighter group in this area. She must be a real pain in the doctor's side to make him focus his attention on a weapon just to get rid of her and her squad."

"Actually, in the reports from what I can tell, she is not the focus of this project. Robotnik rants and raves about some guy named 'Sonic' and how he would love to 'take care of him once and for all', this weapon was mainly designed to take care of this hedgehog from what I can tell" M.A.X. informed him.

"Huh, really? Never heard of the guy. Oh well not my problem" was the response "So what does this thing do anyway?"

"Well it is kind of imaginative. Its purpose is to hyper energize all of the cells in the body then instruct them to basically pull a 180 on the evolutionary line. Essentially de-evolving any sentient creature to a non-sentient level making them a threat no longer."

"Oooo, nasty" he said "I'm glad I'm not this Sonic guy."

M.A.X. said: "It wouldn't matter if you were, the project was taking too long to get all the bugs out, and Robotnik was spending too much time and resources on it, so it was shut down."

"Well that's good, but just incase he ever wants to do it again I say we do our good deed for the year."

"And just what do you mean by that?" M.A.X. wondered.

"What I mean is: you download all the research and info about this thing then delete everything on the computers, and ill grab the prototype." he answered.

"Good idea but what exactly do you plan to do with it once you get it out of here? Sell it?"

"No way, too dangerous if it ever was perfected. I say we take it to that freedom fighter group that the files talked about, what do you think?"

"I like, I like" the robot said "But doesn't this mean that we get no profit and that this was all a charity mission or something. I mean, what do we get out of it?"

"this!" he answered pulling out the power source for the gun.

In his gloved hand he held a power gem almost glowing blue. Similar to the one in his gauntlet, except this one they would sell. And get some serious money for too; they wouldn't have to resort to anything like this for a long time. They stood there staring at the little shiny pebble in triumph……… For about 3 seconds, that's when the gun came online. Small lights along the side and a LCD screen blinked on then the gun itself went off hitting him in the chest with a neon green beam that did...nothing, then shutting down after using all its available power. Apparently this failed prototype was hooked up to the security system itself, a security system that he failed to notice and disarm apparently. Because this same security system chose this moment to go off.

The lights that still worked went red and, after another 10 seconds the alarms stopped, that was a good thing. Then the door slammed shut and locked again while a series of electric blue force fields snapped up over the door and all of the windows, that was a bad thing. He stuffed the gun and the energy pack with the power gem in it into his bag and slung it over his shoulder, while M.A.X. scanned the room looking for a way out.

"Anything?" he asked getting a little nervous as a computer voice came on and basically informed them that they had about one minute before a bunch of explosives went off and made their day a lot worse then it already had been.

"Nothing........ Nothing.......... Nothing.........wait...YES! I've got it." M.A.X. exclaimed. "The force field covering the second window from the right is malfunctioning. If we can disrupt it then we can exit the room"

"Good idea, except for one thing. We are about 15 stories above the ground and I forgot my parachute"

"Actually we are 17 stories up, but that is not the point. In about 20 seconds being in here is not going to be much safer than being out there." he rebuked.

"Good point"

So while M.A.X. kept an eye on the time, he looked for a way to disrupt that annoying little force field. Then he found it, a solid metal chair in the corner. He picked it up and with a little trouble hurled it at the window that M.A.X. indicated as hard as he could. It smashed through the glass and hit the field.

BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZT! Energy crackled around the chair partially melting it in points. Then the field shorted out and the chair fell back into the room smoking and bounced off the windowsill.

"Is it gone?" He asked.

"Yes" was the reply.

"Then lets do the same"

"Good idea, we only have five seconds"

He ran at the windowsill, hopped on the chair to the sill and leaped out the window as far as he could with his companion right in front of him. He went up and out about 12 feet and hovered in the air in a Wile E. Coyote moment with his arms stretched out at his sides for half a second. During which the lab was destroyed behind him in a very impressive explosion lighting up the surrounding buildings in the night.

He was safe from the blast but not from the pieces of what used to be a lab that were flying at him at the moment. One nice big piece of window frame smacked him right in the back of the head. He had enough time to look up and finally see the moon. It was full.

His last thought before he passed out was:

~Hey a full moon, I love the full moon~

Then he fell.