Legal Stuff: I don't own any of the characters in this work except the ones I created myself and I'm not making any profit off this. Please don't hurt me!

Well, with that out of the way, welcome to my first fanfic. It's set in a fusion of sorts between the SatAM cartoon and the Sonic the Hedgehog comics. Enjoy!

And while this story focuses on Snively, he is far from the only important character.

Warning: Rating is subject to change.

Review please!

Charles Hedgehog was finishing up his report when he heard someone banging on his door. "That's odd," he thought, "No Freedom Fighters were supposed to be active in the city today…" Tapping a button on his computer, he brought up the spycam he had set up outside his disguised bunker. The image was fuzzy at first, but slowly it resolved into a short, pale figure carrying a bundle of cloth. "Snively!" the roboticized mobian exclaimed. He began pacing as he thought. "How could he have found this place? I know I covered my tracks thoroughly. Well, let's see… he appears to be alone, but he could be hiding a weapon." He reached into his supply closet and pulled out a small blaster he had stolen as a precaution. "It's not much if he has a platoon of swatbots hidden in the garbage or something, but it's better than nothing. I'd better go see what he wants."

Steeling himself, Charles opened the bunker door and pointed his weapon at Snively. He was about to demand what Robotnik's lackey was doing here when the sight of him stopped him short. There was a dead look in the overlander's eyes, like he had just given up. There was a massive bruise on his cheek. His clothes were dirty and torn. And the bundle he was carrying was dripping blood.

"Why don't you uh… come inside?" Charles said, lowering the blaster. Snively slowly nodded and trudged through the door. Charles closed it and directed the overlander to his chair. He sunk into it and sat there for about a minute in silence, cradling the bundle in his lap.

"I can't do this anymore," Snively muttered.

"What?" Charles asked, wondering what on Mobius was going on.

"All of this," he replied. "I came to Mobotropolis to escape all the mockery and abuse of my fellow overlanders, and what do I find? My uncle is the worst of them all. And I thought I could live with it, since with that ruthless bastard leading the mobian armies, to go back was certain death. But no, every day is worse. I've lost track of all the times I've had my bones broken in Robotnik's fits of anger. I can't count how many people I've murdered and roboticized because he would have killed me otherwise. But today was… horrible."

"What happened?" Charles asked, knowing this was important. It seemed like Snively was tottering over the brink here. If he could be convinced to change sides, the amount of information he could bring over could change the course of their war against Robotnik.

"Today, the swatbots captured a group of kids. No, not the Freedom Fighters," Snively said, seeing the look of growing horror on Charles' face. "It was a ragtag bunch living out in the wastelands. I have no idea how they managed to survive out there so long. The oldest couldn't have been more than fifteen. The swatbots marched them all in to the roboticization chamber where Robotnik and myself were waiting. That cruel bastard… he forced the youngest to go first, just so the oldest one, a rabbit girl, would have to watch as all the kids she'd taken care of were turned into mindless automatons, while he mocked her all the while. Just as it was her turn to be transformed, she thrust the small bundle of cloth she'd been carrying at me. I caught it reflexively. It was warm. I opened it and inside was a small sleeping rabbit girl, barely a year old." Snively stopped here a moment.

A chill went through Charles' circuits as he realized just what the bundle sitting in Snively's lap was. Slowly, he motioned for Snively to continue.

"By this point the glass of the roboticizer had slid down, deafening the older girl's cries, but I could read her lips. She was begging me to save her sister, like I even could. Robotnik had been distracted by the roboticization process, but now he noticed me examining the bundle and demanded to know what was going on. I hid the child behind me and exclaimed that nothing was going on. He stomped over and slapped me, hard, with his robotic arm. I fell to the ground, dropping the child, who woke up and began to cry. 'Ooh, what have here?' Robotnik said, roughly grabbing her. 'Nothing but a bit of trash it seems.' Then he threw her into the nearest garbage chute. He kicked me and said, 'That'll teach you to try to hide things from me. Now get out.' I scrambled to my feet and ran. I knew the schedule of the garbage drones. I doubted the baby was still alive, but if I could intercept the drone at the dump, at least I could give it a decent burial. I signaled a nearby hoverpod to take me to the dump. It did, but when I got there all I saw was garbage drones dumping and organizing trash. Standing there, I realized how stupid I had been. There were hundreds of drones constantly going back and forth in Robotropolis, moving around the trash. But then I heard it, the weak cries of the baby. She was nearby! I quickly began to dig with my bare hands."

Here he looked at his scratched fingers, as if noticing them for the first time. "The girl had somehow survived the long drop down the chute and the trip to the dump, but she wouldn't be alive for much longer. A thin spike of metal had pierced her belly as she fell out of the garbage chute. Blood was dripping out, and I didn't know the first thing about medicine. I'd always left all my injuries to the medbots. I couldn't do anything for her, so I cradled her in my hands as she slowly died. I… I didn't know what to do."

Sensing that Snively's story was finished, Charles asked, "How did you find me here?"

"I've known about this place for months. I never saw a reason to tell that fat bastard about it. Maybe I was saving the information for when Robotnik finally lost it and I needed something to save my life. I don't know," he replied.

Snively closed his eyes. Charles waited for him to continue. After a minute, he realized that Snively was asleep. "Ah, he must have been exhausted," he thought. The robotic hedgehog stepped over and picked the corpse of the dead child up. He gently laid her out on his worktable. Then he stepped over to his computer where he had been composing his report to the Freedom Fighters in Knothole and began to quietly type…