Chapter 8
Sonia arrives in the kitchen for breakfast the next morning, looking excited as she goes over and hugs a startled Manic.
"I see your relationship status changed on MobiusNet," she says, thrilled. She always scrolls through social media on her cell before getting up. "I'm so happy for you! The profile photo of you and Star is so cute."
Manic feels a little embarrassed, "thanks, sis."
Sonic doesn't share his sister's enthusiasm hearing about Manic's new relationship.
"Seems kinda pointless to me," he says, feeling a little moody over it. "She'll be leaving Robotropolis soon. She never stays here for more than a few days."
"What?!" Manic looks shocked and upset at hearing this and wonders if it's true, or if Sonic's just winding him up.
Sonia looks upset as well, "oh, that's a shame." She liked having a female friend around and feels disappointed.
"What do mean she's leaving?" Manic demands to Sonic.
"She lives at Sanctuary, bro. Didn't she tell you?"
"No…" he wonders why that never came up.
All he knew about her was that she was staying at her friend's flat, but he can't remember her saying anything about how long she would be there. He had just assumed she lived around Robotropolis.
"That's weird," replies Sonic, wondering why Star hasn't said about it.
"I'm sure she would tell you," Sonia says, feeling sorry for Manic. "Maybe she's not had time? You've only seen each other twice since you met."
"I guess…" he feels troubled and really wants to talk to Star about it.
He sends her a quick text on his cell: 'Morning, you wanna hang out today? xxxxx'
She replies back almost straight away, 'Morning handsome : ) I'm helping out with Trevor all day. Maybe tonight? : ) xxxxx'
'Okay. Text me when you're home later and we'll make plans : ) xxxxx'
"I just thought she'd tell me something like that. It would totally suck if she has to leave," Manic says sadly, eating his remaining toast.
"No time to cry over it," Sonic teases. "We've got work to do."
"Just talk to her about it later, okay?" Sonia advises him. "I'm sure you'll get it sorted out. Come on, this work should take your mind off it."
"What are we doing?" he asks, trying to stop thinking of Star and getting focused on whatever mission they're about to do.
"Cyrus thinks Buttnik is planning something, so we need to hack into his computers and find out what it is," Sonic tells him. "And I know just the hedgehog whose ace at hacking."
Sonic shoves the laptop across to Manic, who sighs, "fine, I'll do it."
Manic gets to work, hacking into Robotnik's computers through the wifi to check for anything suspicious that's saved. He gets through all the password protected systems and folders, but it takes a lot of hacking and concentration.
"There are heaps of documents stored in here," he tells Sonia, once he's got into a folder that looks promising. "It's gonna take all day to read 'em all."
"If there's anything that looks important, send it over to me and I'll read through them," Sonia replies helpfully, opening her purple laptop. "That way you can carry on searching and it will save us time."
"'Kay," he replies and sends a few documents he's found over to Sonia's laptop.
"This way we have our own copy to show Cyrus and the others if we need to," Sonia tells them.
Sonic sits eating a chilidog he's just microwaved. Sonia gives his chosen breakfast a disapproving look and wishes her brother would eat something normal like toast or cereal. She eats her healthy granola bar and gets busy on her laptop.
"Are you helping at all, Sonic?" Sonia asks him, a little irritated by him just sitting there.
Sonic finishes eating and swallows, "yeah, I'm waiting until Manic starts getting a headache over all this coding, then I'll take over while he rests."
Sonia sighs, "fine. You can watch our cells until then in case an emergency call comes through. Also, could you be a sweetie and bring me some pineapple juice please?"
"Sure."
"Hey bro, if you're gonna be our secretary you should put on a girls wig and something slutty," Manic jokes, looking away from his screen to smirk at Sonic.
"Very funny," Sonic replies and shakes his head, going to get Sonia's drink from the fridge.
He's relieved to be doing anything else apart from hacking. He finds it really boring and complicated and usually lets either Manic or Sonia do it instead. He's also not that good with hacking, but will never admit to it because of his pride.
He gives Sonia her drink then sits beside Manic, looking at the screen as he works, "you found anything?"
"Maybe. Sonia's still checkin' through 'em."
"Cool. You want some music to help keep you awake?"
"No music," Sonia tells him. "I'm trying to concentrate reading this."
"Aww…okay," Sonic props his arm up on the table and rests his head in his palm, falling asleep as they take another hour working.
"Done!" Manic finally announces and Sonic jumps awake, startled.
"Way to go, bro!" he says sleepily and gives him a high five.
Sonia frowns at her laptop screen, still reading a document she has open, "I need to ask Cyrus to check this one out…"
"You need me to take it?" Sonic offers.
"No, it's okay. I've got a few questions I want to ask him."
She shuts her laptop and carefully packs it up into her rose print design laptop bag.
"Be careful, sis," Manic says, hoping she won't be attacked by SWAT bots on the way, especially with the important information stored on her laptop.
"Don't worry, I've sent copies over to Cyrus already. I'll be fine," she replies. "I'll see you guys later."
"Text me when you're there," Manic calls after her.
One of their rules is if they go out alone, they have to send a text saying they have arrived safe; just to make sure they aren't in trouble or captured on the way. Sonic usually forgets or doesn't bother to do it, but Sonia and Manic stick to it.
"I've no idea how you can do all that hacking, Manic. It's sooo boring."
"I know, but it's gotta be done," agrees Manic. "Wanna have some fun and prank Buttnik?"
"'Course I do," Sonic grins excitedly.
"Watch this," Manic types in some code on the computer screen. "I'm gonna make our new music video play over his personal computer."
Sonic laughs, "I'd love to see his face when that comes on."
"We can," Manic smirks and turns on the webcam belonging to that computer.
They see a webcam image appear of Robotnik, working on the computer with a concentrated frown.
"Urghh, he looks even uglier plastered on your laptop screen," Sonic remarks. "He can't see us, right?"
"No, it's just his webcam that's on. Mine's off and he doesn't even know we're watching."
Manic finishes what he's typing and Sonic watches in anticipation as their music starts playing on the webcam image.
Robotnik looks furious at hearing it, "What is this?!" He yells out, confused as to why a music video is suddenly playing and tries to figure out what's causing it.
Manic and Sonic laugh as they watch him failing to close the music video or find the source of it. Robotnik gets even more frustrated and angry.
"Stop playing that infernal racket, you stupid hunk of junk!" Robotnik shouts at the computer.
Sonic and Manic laugh harder.
Eventually Robotnik loses him temper, grabs the computer monitor and throws it down to the floor. The webcam image blacks out and closes down.
"He totally freaked," Sonic laughs, struggling to breath.
"And now he's destroyed his own computer," Manic says, still laughing too.
"It's a shame it cut off, it was just getting good."
"It's not over, bro," Manic grins. "I'm gonna make it play over every single computer in that building nonstop. He'll probably trash 'em all by tonight."
Sonic grins at the thought, tempted to go over to Robotnik's building and watch the chaos happening in person.
