Through the Monitor

Disclaimer: The Sonic Characters are owned by Sega, DiC, Archie and AMS. Sam & Max are owned by Telltale Games and David Brynes.

Author Notes: Written by me, Ryu the Weredragon and also Ri2 and VulpixTrainer - but mostly Ri2.

---

Chapter 51: Something Sublimely Stupid Suddenly Starts

"Can't you two morons do anything right!?", a voice boomed over the speakerphone in the rather rundown apartment that both Johnny and Clyde shared, "All you had to do is rob a convieniance store!"

After they had been defeated by, according to eyewitnesses, one of those Sega characters, they had been hurting for work, until one day, they were hired by a man named Vincent Devoid, to do oddjobs... well, CRIMES.

"Come on, Boss! Give us another chance!", Johnny whined.

"Why should I? You've failed every mission I've given you since chapter 16!"

"...Huh?"

"Er, ignore my previous statement. In any event, could you kindly explain to me what was so hard about this last job? All I told you to do was stick up a convenience store! What did you two idiots do wrong this time?!"

"It wasn't our fault," Johnny complained. "The clerk was big...and had a shotgun!"

"And I forgot to bring bullets," said Clyde.

"And the stockings we used for masks were too thin and everyone could see our faces. Like in that one movie," said Johnny.

"Which movie?" asked Clyde.

"You know, the one where that one guy has a bitch of a girlfriend so his best friends kidnap her and lock her in their garage in an attempt to save him," said Johnny.

"Oh, right, that one," Clyde said, realizing what Johnny was talking about.

"As chick flicks/comedies go, I think it was all right, but the fact that there was some degree of physical and psychological torture, masochistic tendencies, and a guy getting zapped repeatedly by electrodes while on a date, made for a rather disturbing combination," Johnny said. "But it had Neil Diamond in it, which was cool."

"Yeah, definitely," Clyde agreed, "I think Elvis is cooler, though."

"Well, duh, everyone knows Elvis is the best," Johnny said, rolling his eyes. "That's why the aliens abducted him."

"What are you idiots babbling about?! I thought we were talking about your total incompetence at pulling off a heist, when did this become a movie and musical critique?!" Devoid demanded.

"Is this a movie and musical critique?" asked Johnny.

"I guess so," said Clyde. "Boss, what's your favorite movie?"

"He's probably into anime, what with that green hair of his," said Johnny.

"Now you're over-generalizing, just because a guy dyes his hair doesn't mean he's an Otacon," Clyde argued.

"That's otaku," Johnny corrected.

"Gesundheit," Clyde replied.

"Ugh, you idiots! Stop getting off topic!...And I don't dye my hair!" Devoid yelled.

"Suuuuure you don't," Johnny said, rolling his eyes.

"You were just born that way due to radioactive exposure from a nuclear blast while you were still in your mama's belly, right?" Clyde said, not noticing his partner's sarcasm. "Or maybe...you were BORN from that explosion?! Wow, does this mean you can turn into a giant monster? That would be so cool!"

"There's no such things as giant monsters, you idiot," Johnny sneered. "They're all human-sized or smaller, they just stomp around on tiny city sets in Hollywood to make it look like they're giants."

"What?!" cried an astonished Clyde. "Then-then all those Godzilla and King Kong and Gamera and Japanese giant robot shows I love are a LIE?! Say it ain't so, Johnny, say it ain't so!"

"I'm afraid it is, Clyde, I'm afraid it is," Johnny said solemnly.

Clyde burst into tears.

They could hear Devoid's eye twitching on the other end of the phone. Don't ask how, they just could, they're that stupid, and I'm fully aware that doesn't make any sense, that's the point. "Look! Shut up, both of you! I'm getting this conversation back on track! The point is, I gave you a simple job--rob a convenience store--and you screwed it up! You weren't able to get a single thing out of the entire venture!"

"That's not true!" Johnny said indignantly. "I got a stick of gum and a lottery card!"

"And I got a magazine," said Clyde. "We had to pay for them, though. The clerk insisted."

"Was this before or after he pointed the shotgun at you?" asked Vincent, getting exasperated

"Um..." the two thugs thought for a moment.

"After," said Johnny.

"Before," said Clyde.

"You two can't even remember properly?!" Devoid shouted.

The friends glanced at each other and shrugged. "Guess not."

"Nope. Sorry."

"For the love of...I can't believe I hired you idiots in the first place! What was I thinking when I...wait, what was I thinking? Why the hell did I decide to hire you imbeciles anyway?" Devoid asked.

"I dunno," said Clyde.

"That was a rhetorical question, you nitwit!"

"Oh. Sorry."

Vincent rubbed his temples. "Okay, look. I have one last job for you. One last chance. And if you screw this one up, I'll rend you limb from limb."

"Okay," said Clyde.

"Sounds fine to me," said Johnny.

"..." After a long moment, Vincent decided it would be better not to ask, so he pressed on. "Anyway, this is your last chance. It's something so simple and easy that even you idiots can't mess it up."

"Is that a challenge?" asked Johnny, straightening up.

"Wha-no! NO! That was not a challenge! I want you to try and do it RIGHT this time, not screw it up!" Vincent shrieked.

Johnny deflated. "Oh, all right. If you insist."

"So, what's the job, boss?" Clyde asked.

"Here's what I want you to do. I want you to go to the local McDonald's. Once you're there, order five, no, ten of everything, all of the biggest and most expensive meals. Then, when they bring you the food, grab the bags and run out of there without paying!" Vincent commanded.

Johnny and Clyde were aghast. "Not paying for food?!" Johnny cried, shocked.

"But that's immoral!" protested Clyde.

"So's beating up someone. But you didn't turn down that kid's offer to do that, did you?," Devoid pointed out

"Beating up someone's one thing, but robbing a fast food restaurant by not paying for your meal?! Do you have any idea what conditions those poor souls behind the counter have to work in every day from sundown to sunset?!" Johnny asked indignantly.

Clyde nodded. "Yeah, every day they get up in the morning they die a little inside...I couldn't steal money from them, it's all they have left to cling to in their miserable and empty lives. Without it, they're on the streets, and from there it's either a homeless shelter, insanity, or suicide."

"I'd certainly kill myself rather than work at a place like that," Johnny said firmly.

"...I'm going to kill YOU two if you don't go over there and rob that fucking McDonald's RIGHT NOW!" Vincent howled at the top of his lungs.

Johnny made a face. "Well, if you put it like that, then fine."

"Yeah, okay. You didn't need to yell. Or use bad language. You coulda just asked us," said Clyde.

Vincent did not respond because he was too busy banging his head against a wall and trying not to cry from sheer frustration.

---

Jimmy smiled as his opponent returned from making a phone call. The table was covered in cards and from the way things were set up, it was clear that Jimmy had won.

Devoid looked completely unruffled as if he had not just spoken to two people that who would have dumbfounded and worn away the patient of even the stolidest individual in moments.

"I must say, you are a wonderful player. I was impressed with your knowledge of the game, you must be a great leader in your field."

Jimmy only smiled, not hiding the smug look in his eyes and face. "What can I say, when you're a natural, you're a natural."

Devoid only smiled, a smile that Jimmy recognized, and his own smile faded. It was the same smile he used when he had everything in his court and there was no way to lose.

"A natural...yes, a natural at CHEATING."

Jimmy's eyes widened. "Wh-wh-what?!"

Devoid nodded sagely. "Oh yes, your tricks may fool other people, but I'm too observant to be deceived by such petty trickery... I noticed your shaved dice, the extra cards and paper money up your sleeves. I bet the National Monopoly Commission would be very displeased to hear that you've won all those regional tournaments through deceit, Jimmy..."

Jimmy gasped. "N-no! Don't tell them! I'll go to Jail, and I won't have a 'Get Out of Jail Free' card! Not to mention I won't be able to pass Go and get two hundred dollars..."

Devoid sweatdropped. "Actually, I think you'd just be fined and banned from Monopoly tournaments for life, but...Jail...yeah, let's go with that..."

"P-p-please don't tell the Commission, Mr. Devoid!" Jimmy begged desperately. "I'll do anything!"

Devoid raised an eyebrow. "Anything?"

Jimmy nodded fervently. "Yeah! Wait..." He frowned suspiciously. "This is a lead-in to me making some sort of devil's deal that's going to cost me my soul or humanity or something, isn't it?"

Devoid paused. "Er, what makes you say that?"

"All the stories in the news about people vanishing, supposedly to another universe full of anthropomorphic animals based on some video game, often after meeting some weird green-haired dude with shades?" Jimmy pointed out. "I'm not stupid, you know..."

"If you knew this, then why did you bother coming when I asked?", Devoid asked, temporarly thrown off track.

"The money. Duh," Jimmy said, rolling his eyes.

"Ah," said Void.

"Granted, another reason I got suspicious was this Monopoly board," Jimmy pointed out.

"...What's wrong with it?" Devoid asked, not getting the point.

"It's a Sonic-themed Monopoly game," Jimmy pointed out.

"Yeah.....So?", Devoid asked, not getting it at all.

"You yourself said it. I'm the regional Monopoly champ. Cheater or no, I've seen almost every themed board on the circuit, and Sonic is the one that I KNOW they don't have... Yet," Jimmy noted, holding up the Speed Shoe token (which replaced the regular shoe), that he had chosen.

"Hmmph. Your very observant. Too bad you tried to cheat me in a game. I might have given you a better fate," Devoid said, picking up a property card and flipping it around to face Jimmy. The regional champ immediately recognized it as the Electricity Utility card - the only property that hadn't changed in appearance on the board. Before Jimmy could realize the significance of this, a beam of light erupted from the card and struck him.

"Okay, I'm half-lying, I'd probably have turned you into something like this anyway," Devoid admitted as Jimmy began to change.

"Gee, thanks..." Jimmy grumbled.

As the energy ran its course, Void dropped his disguise as Vincent Devoid just in time for the light to fade away and reveal his new creation. Standing there in Jimmy's place was a red monkey with a lightbulb on its head, a monkey named...Coconuts. Void thought the name was rather uninventive, especially considering that Eggman already had a series of unrelated monkey robots also called Coconuts. But that didn't matter at the moment.

"Now Coconuts, what would the Doctor say about you ignoring your duties?"

"Y-You? I-- I was... uh... um...", Coconuts said, trying to come up with a half-convincing lie.

"No need to lie your way out of this one Coconuts. The Doctor's toilet is clogged up. Again."

"Aw, nuts!", the robot monkey managed to say.

---

It seemed to be just another average morning at the local McDonalds...other than the fact that nobody was in line and all the customers were sitting at their tables with big, happy smiles on their faces without touching the food placed before them or, apparently, breathing. Johnny and Clyde, both wearing Johnny's mother's pantyhose over their heads, naturally took no notice of this as they burst into the room.

"Stick 'em up!" said Johnny, waving a hand crudely clenched to make a gun shape around. "Everyone put their hands in the air where I can see them! Nobody move!"

"How can they put their hands in the air if they don't move?" Clyde asked him.

"Uh, good point. Stick your hands in the air, and THEN don't move!" Johnny corrected himself. He paused, suddenly realizing he wasn't holding his gun. "Hey, where'd my gun go?"

"Here it is," Clyde said, handing Johnny a water pistol.

"Oh, thanks," said Johnny, holding the gun threateningly...and pointing it towards himself. He didn't notice. "We're hungry and dangerous criminals, so give us what we want and nobody gets hurt!"

"Hello, welcome to McDonalds. May I take your order?" the clerk standing behind the counter said, an uncharacteristically bright and happy grin on her face.

"Yeah, we want an order, all right! We want..." Johnny glanced up at the menu behind the clerk. "Uh...one of everything, if you please."

"Oh, and can I get a Happy Meal? With extra Happy?" Clyde begged. "They're giving out Barbie toys, and I need some for my collection."

"Right, one of everything, including a Happy Meal with extra Happy, and all the toys you have in stock!" Johnny barked at the clerk, still pointing the water pistol in the wrong direction. "And make it snappy!"

"One moment please," the clerk said cheerfully.

Literally one moment later, a tray laden down with several large grease-spotted paper bags was shoved towards them. "Here you go! Thank you for coming, please come again!"

Johnny blinked in surprise. "Wow, that was fast."

Clyde shrugged. "Hey, they don't call it fast food for nothing. How much do we owe ya, dollface?"

"Oh, nothing sir," the clerk said happily. "You're robbing us, so you shouldn't feel obligated to pay even one cent for your meal!"

Clyde scowled. "Don't say that! I know you and all the other employees here wouldn't work here if you didn't have a choice. You flunked out high school or dropped out of college and have no choice but to take dead-end jobs because all your other dreams and hopes for life have been shattered. Come on, how much do I have to pay? I'll even throw in a tip."

"No thank you sir, that won't be necessary," the clerk said, her smile starting to look a little forced. "Please go. Without paying. Now."

"I won't hear of it," Clyde insisted. "Now, tell me, how much? How much do I need to pay to heal the gaping wound in your soul?"

"I don't have any gaping wound, sir. I'm perfectly all right. Please leave this instant," the clerk said, her smile even more forced.

"Clyde, maybe she's right. She does look kind of happy..." Johnny said, starting to get a little spooked.

"Preposterous! They just injected her face with Botox so her face would always look like that and not scare the customers!" Clyde argued. "And they probably took it out of her paycheck, too! Come on, honey, tell me what I need to do to make things right..."

An instant later, both crooks found themselves forcibly removed from the restaurant. "Well, that was rude," Clyde huffed, brushing himself off. "I don't understand why she acted like that, it was only a little money!"

Johnny shrugged. "Eh, there's no understanding women. So, now that we've got the goods, what're we supposed to do with?"

Clyde frowned. "I dunno. I guess we wait for Mr. DeVoid to call and tell us what to do next." He reached greedily for one of the bags on Johnny's tray. "And why don't we eat a little while we're at it? I'm hungry..."

Johnny yanked the tray out of Clyde's reach. "Oh no you don't, I have first dibs! The lady handed it to ME, not you!"

"Ah, c'mon Johnny, I'm hungry! Gimme something!" Clyde whined. Johnny gave him the Barbie toy he had wanted. "Ooh, thanks," Clyde said happily. He started chewing on the doll's hair.

Johnny's pocket started to vibrate. He sat down on the curb, put the tray in his lap, and removed the buzzing cell phone from his pocket. He flipped it open and glanced at the display. His eyes widened. "It's the Boss!" He held the phone up to his ear. "Hello? Mr. DeVoid?" Clyde, still chewing on the Barbie hair, leaned over to Johnny and pressed his ear against the phone so he could hear it all.

"Do you have the package?" DeVoid asked.

"No, we just have some food from McDonalds," Johnny replied.

DeVoid was silent for a moment, possibly putting his face in his hands in exasperation, before he spoke up again. "Good. I want you to take that food--and don't eat ANY of it!--into the nearby portal."

"What portal?" asked a confused Johnny.

"The one to your left," DeVoid answered.

Johnny and Clyde looked to their left and saw that there was indeed a swirling energy vortex just a few feet away. "Where'd that come from?" asked a confused Clyde.

"It doesn't matter," DeVoid snapped. "Just go through it quickly, before the food you stole cools off! He gets rather whiny when that happens..."

"Who gets whiny?" Johnny asked, only to be answered by a dial tone. He shrugged and replaced the phone into his pocket. "Well, guess that's that."

"Guess so," Clyde agreed.

"In we go," said Johnny.

They walked into the portal without a second thought.

- - -

Somewhere on Mobius, a robot chicken and a robot…mole…tank…digger thing…stepped out of a portal and into a forest. They stood there blankly for a moment as the portal shut behind them. They blinked. They looked around. "Where are we?" asked the chicken.

"I have no idea," said the mole…digger…thing.

There was a pause. Then they did a double-take and stared at each other. "Scratch?!" cried the mole…digger…thing.

"Grounder?!" cried the chicken.

"What are you doing here?" they both asked.

"I haven't seen you in ages!" cried Scratch.

"Me neither! I've been…uh…" Grounder frowned. "Where have I been?"

Scratch tsked. "Typical Grounder, your memory software's always been so faulty. I've been…I've been…" He frowned. "That's funny…I don't know where I've been either."

Grounder noticed Scratch was carrying a tray full of McDonald's takeout food. "Hey, what's with the food?"

"Huh?" Scratch noticed what he was carrying for the first time. "Oh. I don't…oh! I know! The Doctor must have sent us out to get takeout!"

"Oh yeah, that makes perfect sense!" Grounder agreed.

"So let's go home and give it to him before it gets cold! You know he hates it when his food gets cold," said Scratch.

"Right," said Grounder. "Uh, just one question. Where is home?"

Scratch scratched his head in puzzlement. "That's a good question. Oh, wait, we'll just activate our homing beacons!"

"Our what now?" asked Grounder.

"Those thingies he put in us so that we could always find which base he was currently using if we got lost, or if we managed to somehow capture Sonic. Now, let's see…" Scratch activated his beacon. "Home is…that way!" He pointed southwest.

"Wow, I didn't know we had homing things," said the impressed Grounder as they trekked off towards the Doctor's latest base.

- - -

The homing beacon inerringly led them to Doctor Eggman's latest hideout. Unfortunately, they had a little trouble getting in.

"Oh come on, what do you mean we're not in the database? Check again!" Scratch ordered the Egg Knights standing guard.

"Checking Eggman robot registry…error…no automatons going by the designations of 'Scratch' and 'Grounder' found," one of the Knights reported.

"You are unauthorized personnel. Vacate the premises immediately before you are terminated," the other guard Knight said.

"Not in the database? There must be some mistake!" Scratch squawked angrily.

Grounder nodded furiously. "Yeah, we're the Super Special Sonic Search and Smash Squad, Doctor Robotnik's number one Sonic-hunting robot team! We're very important. Two of the Doctor's most valued henchmen! There's no way we can't be in the database!"

"Negative. No record of the Super Special Sonic Search and Smash Squad exists. There is no record of Doctor Robotnik forming such a squad or assigning robots matching your description to it. There is also no record of any units matching your designations or serial numbers ever having been constructed," one of the Knights said.

Scratch and Grounder exchanged troubled looks. "Could the Doctor have forgotten we existed or something?" asked the worried digger bot.

"Impossible!" Scratch scoffed. "Who could possibly forget our sparkling personalities and unique wit? There must be some mistake!"

"Negative. No mistake exists. Units Scratch and Grounder do not exist," said the Knight.

"Move along before termination commences," said the other, raising its electrified sword.

"But if we can't get in, how will we deliver the food the Doctor ordered?" Scratch asked, raising his tray.

The Knights paused. "Food?"

Grounder nodded. "Yeah, the Doctor sent us out to get some fast food, see?"

"And he'll be angry if it's cold by the time he gets it! You wouldn't want that, would you?" Scratch asked.

The Egg Knights examined the fries, patties, hamburgers, egg sandwiches and other grease-laden products on the tray and noted that they were, indeed, losing their heat. "One moment." They turned their backs to the duo and conferred on a private communications frequency. "Did the Doctor send out drones to pick up fast food today?" one Knight asked the other.

"Unknown. No record of such a command exists in today's logs. However, that does not mean he did not send out any drones and forget to notify us. He can sometimes be…spontaneous like that," replied his colleague.

The first Knight glanced at Scratch and Grounder. "Then should we let them pass?"

"Standing orders are to allow all deliverymen, food or otherwise, to enter the base without question," the second recalled. "On pain of termination and recycling. You remember what happened to SA-71 after he shot that pizza boy, don't you?"

The other Knight shuddered internally. "Do not remind me. But why would the Doctor wish the deliverymen to enter the base rather than for one of us to simply take the food in and make the deliveryman leave?"

"To add another unit to his growing army of Robians, of course," said the second Knight.

"Do the fast food companies not complain about losing so many employees?" asked the puzzled first Knight.

"Doctor Eggman owns those companies," the second Knight said, as if it were obvious. "As part of another one of his complex schemes to conquer Mobius."

"Aaaaahhhh," said the first Knight in understanding.

"Hey, the food's getting cold here! Can we get in or what?" asked the annoyed Scrath.

The Knight straightened and turned back to the duo. "You may pass," said one Knight as the door behind them opened.

"And if anyone asks, units SA-87 and SA-88 did not let you in, you found a hole in our security grid," said the other.

Grounder winked at the Knights as they passed by. "Sure thing, buddy. Us robots gotta stick together, right?"

The Knights exchanged confused looks after the chicken and digger were gone. "'Buddy?'" one asked.

"They must be earlier models. Those prototypes always were rather quirky…" the other said.

- - -

Dr. Eggman laughed and rubbed his hands together with maniacal glee as he observed progress on his latest evil plot on one of the large monitors in his control room. "Excellent…excellent! Construction of my Mega-Roboticizer Tower has been completed, it's 23% of the way to reaching full power, and Sonic and his tagalongs still have no idea it even exists! This might just be it! Soon, I might finally rule the world!"

"Most impressive, Doctor," said SA-55 (also known as ERGO), the Doctor's new 'assistant' robot, though he spent more time mocking his master than actually helping him. "I have so far been unable to detect any flaws in your plan, ergo, you're doing something right for a change, ergo, this would be one of the first times you've properly thought everything through, ergo, you're actually learning from your mistakes for once, ergo-"

"Oh, shut up you," Eggman growled. "Anyway, Sonic is still unaware of my plan, I have a huge robot army guarding the tower in a location far from any civilized areas or prying eyes, it should reach full power in just a few hours, and I intend to head over there in a moment to keep an eye on things. As long as nothing goes seriously wrong, I see no reason why this shouldn't go off perfectly!"

It was at that moment that Scratch and Grounder burst into the room. "Doc, we're home!" Grounder cried.

"And we brought the lunch you sent us out to get!" Scratch added.

The Doctor froze, the voices of the two robots he had hoped never to see again ringing in his head like deafening church bells. The blood drained from his face. "No…" he whispered in horror. "No…not those two…no…it can't be!"

Ergo sighed and shook his head, which took up most of his body. "I thought you would know by now not to tempt fate like that Doctor, ergo, you haven't learned anything after all, have you?"

"What…what are you two doing here?!" Eggman bellowed. "You're supposed to be DEAD! I scrapped you myself after you blew up my plan to destroy Sonic for the one thousandth five hundred and sixty-second time!"

Scratch and Grounder exchanged puzzled looks. "Scrapped? I think I'd remember something like that," said a confused Scratch.

Grounder nodded in agreement. "Yeah, what are you talking about Doc, you know you'd never scrap your favorite robots!" He frowned. "Speaking of which, I think something's wrong with your newer-model robots, they didn't recognize us for some reason. I didn't recognize them, either, or most of the others around the base. Did you build a bunch of new ones while we were out getting the food you wanted or something?"

The Doctor was so stunned he could barely stammer out more than a few words. "What…how…food?!"

"Yeah, we got you some fast food, just like you wanted," Scratch said, holding up his tray. "And it's still warm, just the way you like it!"

In an instant, the Doctor realized what was going on. He would have torn the hair from his scalp if he had actually had any. Void must be playing tricks on him again. That wretched alien! Couldn't he just leave him alone for once so that he could take over the world without interference or having yet another incompetent former ally or minion dumped in his lap?!

"Greetings, inferior models," Ergo said to the newcomers. "I do not recognize your models from my databanks. What is your designation and function?"

"Oh, we're Scratch and Grounder," said Scratch.

Grounder nodded. "Of the Super Special Sonic Search and Smash Squad, Doctor Robotnik's elite Sonic-hunting team! We're two of the most valued robots he's ever built! Even though we've never actually managed to catch Sonic without him escaping…but we'll get him eventually!"

Ergo grinned evilly. "Is that so?" He shot the Doctor a look, and Eggman groaned, knowing that he was going to be in for an earful from the caustic drone in the near future.

"Hey, what's that you're looking at, Doc?" Scratch asked, setting his tray on a table and coming to look at the monitor displaying the Mega-Roboticizer Tower before Eggman could turn it off. "Ooh, you're building a super-powered Roboticizer that'll send out roboticizing waves from a high altitude that'll cover the globe and turn it and everyone on it to metal? Neat!"

"Can we help? Huh? Can we can we huh?" Grounder asked the Doctor hopefully.

"Yeah Doc, let us help you out! We haven't helped you on an evil plan in what seems like forever!" Scratch said.

"Yes, Doctor…let them help…surely they cannot be more of a detriment to your plans than you yourself are," Ergo said cheekily.

Eggman's mind raced. He knew that he could not, under any condition, let the two moronic machines assist him. He recalled all too well the horrible, horrible things that had happened every other time they had attempted to 'help' him carry out one of his plans. Some of those scars had never gone away… "Er, no!" he yelled, thinking quickly. "Absolutely not! I have a, ah, another mission for you! Yes, one of grave importance! One that, if unfulfilled, could spell the doom of my entire operation!"

Ergo gave his master a puzzled look. "And what mission would that-" Eggman put a hand over the robot's mouth to shut him up.

Scratch and Grounder's eyes lit up eagerly. "A mission? Oh boy! We haven't had one of those in ages!" the chicken cheered.

"What do you want us to do, Doc? Capture Sonic?" Grounder asked.

"NO!" Eggman shouted, certain that if they tried to catch Sonic, not only would they fail but they would also clue the insufferable blue hedgehog in to his plan and bring his magnificent tower and dreams of an Eggmanworld crashing down around his ears, as usual. "Er, that is to say…I have a different target for you," he reassured his minions when Scratch and Grounder gave him puzzled looks. He pressed a few buttons, and a smaller screen switched on, showing a white rabbity-thing making a rather gruesome expression into a camera and giving himself bunny ears, even though he already had some. "Behold! Max!"

"Awww, look at da cute bunny wabbit!" Grounder cooed.

"Isn't he just precious?" Scratch purred.

Eggman and Ergo gave them disturbed looks. "Er, right…" Eggman coughed. "Anyway, do not underestimate this rabbit! He happens to be the President of the United Federation, High Priest of the Sea Monkeys of Easter Island, and a bunch of other things besides. He's also violent, sociopathic, likes the color orange, hates clowns and cheese from pressurized cans, and has shockingly bad hygiene."

"I thought the President of the United Federation was some human guy," said the surprised Grounder.

"He was," said Eggman. "But then Max and his cohort Sam decapitated him by accident. But it was all right, since he turned out to be a robot designed to hypnotize the public…though not by me, irritatingly enough…and then they won an emergency election against a statue of Abraham Lincoln…never mind, it's a long story. Regardless, Max is the President and therefore one of the most powerful individuals in the free world, which is why it's peculiar that he chooses to live with his heterosexual life partner Sam in a run-down office in an equally run-down part of Central City rather than the White House."

"Ah, he's just like Sonic's sidekick Tails then," Scratch guessed.

"Er, yes, exactly like Tails," Eggman lied, deciding not to bring up Max's rather large Luger and love of…hurting things. "Anyway, I want you to capture him so that I can roboticize him and use him as a puppet President to control the United Federation."

"But Doctor, if your tower works, then why would you need a puppet President? You'd already rule the world!" Scratch pointed out.

"And wouldn't he get roboticized by the tower anyway? Why do you want us to grab him specifically?" the puzzled Grounder asked.

"Yes Doctor, why?" Ergo asked smarmily.

Eggman's eye twitched. The idiots had to pick now of all times to develop brain circuits? "It's all part of my master plan," he said hurriedly. "You don't need to understand it, just do it! Go forth and capture Max, then bring him to me for roboticization!"

Ergo snickered. Scratch and Grounder didn't notice, and saw nothing wrong with their master's explanation. "Sure thing, Doc! We'll get that bunny-thing for you lickety-split!"

"Yeah! Hey, why don't we take Coconuts along?" Scratch suggested. "We can use him as bait, or a living shield as usual!"

"Ooh, that's a great idea! Yeah Doc, can we take Coconuts with us?" Grounder asked.

"Where is the little monkey, anyway?" Scratch asked.

Eggman sweatdropped. "Er…well…" How was he going to explain that he'd scrapped Coconuts at the same time he'd killed these two?

Fortunately for the Doctor, he didn't have to explain everything as abruptly a portal opened up, spat out a red robot monkey with a lightbulb on his head, and closed again. The monkey blinked and looked around in confusion. "Huh? Where am I? What am I doing here?"

"Oh look, there's Coconuts now!" Scratch said.

"Hey, how're you doing, little pal?" Grounder asked the perplexed monkey. "We haven't seen you in ages!"

"Uh…I don't know…" Coconuts said, scratching his head in confusion.

"Join the club! Neither do we!" Scratch laughed.

Ergo glanced at the Doctor. "The intelligence of your robots does not seem to have significantly increased over time, Doctor. Ergo, you either subconsciously want them to be stupider than yourself so that you can always feel superior to them, or your skill in AI hasn't improved significantly over the years, ergo, you are a rather lousy evil scientist, ergo, you should quit trying to take over the world and doing something more productive with your time."

Eggman glared at his back-sassing creation. "May I point out that you are a product of my AI designs as well, SA-55?"

"I am obviously a fluke," Ergo reasoned. "Just like the various other flukes and defects which have manifested in your other robots and other superweapons which always result in them either turning against you or failing to defeat Sonic the Hedgehog. If one were unaware of your vaunted IQ of 300, a casual observer might think you were either dumber than you really are or intentionally make your weapons and robots fail, ergo, you must not really want to win, ergo, you get off on losing to Sonic, ergo, you are a deviant-"

"Shut up!" Eggman hissed. "Coconuts, you are to accompany Scratch and Grounder on an abduction mission!"

Coconuts grimaced. "Aw, not Sonic again! We'll just get beaten up as usual…"

"No, not Sonic, the President of the United Federation!" Eggman said, gesturing to the picture of Max.

"That's the President?" Coconuts asked skeptically. "I thought he was a human."

"He was," said Scratch. "But then Max decapitated him and took the office after beating a statue of Abraham Lincoln in an emergency election."

Coconuts stared at him. "O…kay…"

"If you succeed, I will promote you up from janitor duty," Eggman lied to the monkey.

"Oh boy!" Coconuts yelled joyfully.

"What about us? Don't we get anything?" Grounder asked indignantly.

Biting back the comment that they were lucky to still be alive, he said, "You'll get some cans of WD-40."

"Works for me!" said Grounder.

"Right, then!" Scratch said dramatically. "We're off to capture the President! Ba-ha! Ha-ha!"

"Yes, you do that," the Doctor said dismissively, shooing them out of the room. "I'll stay here and work on my…other project…" Once they were gone, he broke into a wide, evil grin and burst into maniacal laughter. "Hoho! That's the last we'll see of those three!"

"Does not compute. Why did you send faulty units Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts on a mission rather than dismantling them on the spot?" Ergo asked.

Eggman growled. "Oh, you don't know those three like I do! When I finally gave up on them and tried to dispose of them, they just wouldn't stay dead. It was as if they were literally too stupid to die or something! Every time they were torn apart, they'd rebuild themselves and come back to me, whining for another chance to catch Sonic! It took me weeks of hard work to permanently destroy every last physical trace of them and erase all record of their programming or history from my databanks to make absolutely certain they couldn't somehow reincarnate on my computers or something using that information. Don't give me that look, you know stranger things have happened, and where those three are concerned, they almost always do!"

"If that were not a true statement, I would say you were being superstitious," Ergo admitted. "Ergo, you may actually have cause to be concerned."

Eggman snorted. "Of course I do! And that exasperating alien couldn't have picked a worse time to bring those morons back from the dead, the final stages of the Roboticizer Tower require my utmost attention, so I can't spare the effort needed to destroy those three or at least incapacitate them long enough to unleash my greatest weapon yet upon the people of Mobius! I had to send them on a wild goose chase to keep them out of the way, because I knew that if I locked them up here at the base, or worse, took them to the Tower site with me to keep an eye on them, they would do something monumentally stupid that would not only destroy this base and the Tower, but probably bring Sonic and all his annoying little friends down on me! And I couldn't send them after Sonic himself, because he'd easily be able to trick them into telling him what I'm up to, just as he has so many times before!"

Ergo nodded. "That is logical. But then why did you send them to obtain Max, a target that not even our most elite robot warriors have been able to catch without self-terminating out of sheer terror and/or confusion? You must know that a trio as incompetent as them has no chance of capturing the President…" Realization dawned on him. "Ergo…that's exactly why you're sending them after him!"

Eggman chuckled sinisterly. "Precisely! They can't catch a super-fast blue hedgehog, how are they supposed to capture a hyperkinetic sociopathic rabbity-thing? It's perfect! There's no way they'll be able to encounter Max without getting rent limb from limb! And, should they somehow manage to survive anyway, they'll still be out of the way long enough for my tower to reach full power and unleash beautiful metal upon the world! Nothing could possibly go wrong!" There was a pause. Ergo glared. Eggman groaned. "Let me guess, I shouldn't have said that, should I?"

Ergo shook his head. "You continue to tempt fate, ergo, you repeatedly fail to learn from past mistakes, ergo, you are a rather pitiful evil genius, ergo, you should-"

"Oh, shut up," Eggman grumbled, not in the mood for more haranguing. "Didn't I build you to compliment me all the time?"

Ergo nodded. "You did. It is not my fault you have so few good points that merit a compliment."

Eggman sighed. "I should never have installed that honesty chip…"

"Indubitably," Ergo agreed.

- - -

A little later, near a run-down apartment building close to the intersection of Straight and Narrow…

"Wow, this neighborhood stinks," Grounder observed as he looked at all the graffiti, broken glass from equally broken windows, rats swarming about and entering a nearby fight club and casino, and rubble from a giant robot battle littering the neighborhood. "Why would the President of the United Federation live in a place like this?"

"Well, the Doctor did say he had horrible hygiene," Scratch commented.

"So much filth…" a terrified Coconuts whispered. He was wearing goggles over his eyes, a shower cap over his lightbulb, gloves on his hands, and tissue boxes on his feet. "Germs…everywhere…get away…get awaaaaaayyyy!" he screamed, spraying mist from a can of disinfectant at the invisible enemies all around him.

Scratch and Grounder sweatdropped. "Maybe we should have left him back home…" Scratch muttered. "How're we supposed to catch the President of the United Federation with him in a state like this?"

"Why do you keep saying 'President of the United Federation' instead of just 'President'?" Grounder asked.

"Because I feel like it," Scratch squawked, not knowing why either. He gasped, grabbed his partners, and quickly dragged them behind an inconspicuous dented one-way street sign that did not hide them in the slightest. "Quiet, you two! Look over there, it's him!"

The President of the United Federation, also known as Max, was currently walking down the steps leading to the front door of the apartment building. "Hey Sam, I'm gonna go play in traffic, okay?"

A tall brown dog wearing a fedora poked his head out of a window on the building's second story. "Okay, but don't stay out too long, you have another impeachment hearing to attend this afternoon."

"Lousy Congress," the white rabbity thing grumbled as he wandered out into the middle of the street, walking right past the three 'hiding' robots without noticing them. "When I get around to assassinating them, boy will they be sorry for telling me not to relieve myself on national television!"

The dog laughed. "You crack me up, little buddy!" He retreated back into his office. Max started dancing about, causing cars to frantically swerve out of his way and crash into each other, bursting into flames and killing or severely maiming their occupants.

"Wow," said an impressed Grounder. "What a guy! I wonder what his foreign policy is…"

"Who cares?" asked Scratch. "We've got to catch him for the Doctor, not debate his politics! Here's what we're going to do. Grounder, dig a hole in the street. Coconuts, you cover the hole up so nobody will notice it's a hole. I'll get a carrot and put it over the hole cover to lure him onto the trap. Once he's there, the cover will break, he'll fall in, and we can bring him back to the Doctor!"

Grounder frowned. "Why does that plan sound oddly familiar?"

"I think we've done that one several times already," said Coconuts. "Or am I thinking of another trio of criminals trying to capture a valuable specimen for their all-powerful boss?"

"That doesn't matter," said Scratch dismissively. "Just get to digging! I'll go find a carrot."

"How do you know he'll fall for it?" asked Coconuts skeptically.

Scratch shrugged. "He's a rabbit. Rabbits love carrots!" He walked down the street towards a nearby store, called 'Bosco's Inconvenience,' reasonably assuming he could buy a carrot there. Max didn't notice him because he was having too much fun causing car accidents.

"Well, I'd best get to digging. You go get some empty cardboard boxes or something, Coconuts, since there aren't any leaves or branches or whatever out here," Grounder said, before enlarging his drills and beginning to dig into the asphalt of a dead-end side street just next to the apartment building.

Coconuts shuddered. "Empty cardboard boxes? Like the kind homeless people have been sleeping in that are probably full of rats and cockroaches and filth? Yeeeeuuughh…"

"Hey, we got better class than living in no-good empty cardboard boxes!" an angry furless rat declared.

"Yeah, we live in ones that still have some pizza in them!" another furless rat agreed.

"Sorry," Coconuts apologized. "I didn't mean to offend." Realizing who he was talking to, he screamed, whipped out his can, and started spraying at the rats. "Get away! Get away! GET AWAAAYYYY!"

Coughing, the vermin ran away. "Don't think you've heard the last of us! The Skinbodies will have their revenge!" they shouted.

"Yeah, we'll see about that!" Coconuts shouted after them. "And grow some hair, you freaks, what do you think you are, naked mole rats?!"

"Ahem," said an annoyed naked mole rat standing by his foot.

Coconuts sweatdropped. "I just can't get a break, can I?"

A little later, he came back over to the rather large hole Grounder was in the process of digging with several armloads worth of empty cardboard boxes. He couldn't help but be impressed with how big and deep the hole was, considering that Grounder had only been working on it for a few minutes. "How's it going?" Coconuts called down.

"Pretty good," Grounder shouted back, glancing up at the monkey standing on the rim of his hole. "I almost hit a few water mains and electrical cables, but a professional like me knows how to get around those."

"It looks like you've gotten pretty deep," Coconuts continued. "I'm a little surprised, I thought streets were supposed to be thicker than this. Shouldn't you have hit a sewer by now?"

Grounder shrugged. "My job is to dig, not question the logical fallacies of wherever I'm digging. I don't really think about it."

"If only I could feel that committed to my work," Coconuts said wistfully. "Maybe I'm defective or something."

"Or maybe because we were built and you were roboticized," Grounder commented.

Coconuts started. "Wait, what? What did you just say?!"

"Uh, nothing," Grounder said quickly, realizing he had made a faux pas. "Forget I said anything." He hurriedly went back to digging.

"No, wait! Did you just say that I was roboticized, rather than built like you guys?!" Coconuts demanded, dropping the boxes he was carrying.

"LALALALA, CAN'T HEAR YOU, TOO BUSY DRILLING!" Grounder yelled, increasing the speed of his drills so that they bored into the rock with an ear-splitting whine. "DIGGING, DIGGING, DIGGING THE DAY AWAY!"

"Grounder! Dammit, stop that and talk to me this instant!" Coconuts yelled. "What did you mean when you said-"

The ground beneath Grounder started to shift. He froze, his drills stopping in mid-spin. "Uh oh." Abruptly, the floor beneath him collapsed, causing him to fall, screaming, into a gaping hollow space underneath the street. "WAAAAHHHH!!!"

Coconuts gasped. "GROUNDER!" He scrambled into the pit and poked his head into the large hole at the bottom Grounder had fallen into. "GROUNDER! ARE YOU ALL RIGHT!"

"Yeah, I'm fine!" the drill-bot yelled back up to Coconuts. "It's not as deep as I thought. And…holy cow!"

"What is it?" Coconuts asked anxiously.

"There's a subway station down here! And it leads to…lessee, according to this map on the wall here…Hell!"

Coconuts blinked. "…There's a subway station to Hell underneath the street the President of the United Federation is living on?"

"Yeah, pretty neat, huh?" Grounder said.

Coconuts frowned. "Hang on, I'm coming down!"

"No, don't bother, I can get myself out," Grounder reassured the monkey, sprouting a propeller from his head and flying back up out of the hole and onto the street. Coconuts made a face and climbed up after him.

"Why do you have a propeller in your head?" Coconuts complained. "Digger bots shouldn't fly…"

"I have a lot of stuff in my head, and arms, and mouth, and other places," Grounder said with a shrug. "I was built that way."

"Guess this means we can't use this hole, I mean, if there's another hole leading to Hell at the bottom of it!" Coconuts said.

"Nah, we'll just put a net over it," Grounder said. "Should make it easier to snare him, too!"

By the time they finished covering up the pit, Scratch had returned, with a surly look on his face and a hunk of cheese in one hand. It was his only hand, actually, for some reason he had lost one arm and one leg and was forced to hop about on his sole remaining lower limb. "Hey Scratch, what happened to you?" asked an alarmed Grounder.

"And why don't you have a carrot?" asked Coconuts.

Scratch growled angrily. "That lousy shopkeeper! 'Bosco's Inconvenience' is right, that place has to be one of the worst and most inconvenient stores I've ever been to! It took all my persuasive abilities to convince him that I wasn't a GUN android or an Egg Assassin or an alien robot or any other crazy conspiracy thing dispatched to silence him because he 'knew too much!' And even then, he didn't have any carrots in stock, so I had to get cheese instead, but he charged me an arm and a leg for it…literally!"

"Why didn't you just pay him cash?" asked Grounder.

"Or credit?" Coconuts asked.

"The cheese cost $1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000," Scratch said flatly. "Naturally, I didn't have that much money on me. And he wouldn't accept credit because he claimed credit cards are part of a government conspiracy to steal everyone's money, personal information, brain cells, and toenail clippings." They stared at him incredulously. "Seriously. I am not making this shit up."

"Will cheese work?" Grounder asked doubtfully. "I thought bunnies liked carrots."

"Well, we don't have any carrots, so it'll have to do," Scratch snapped. "Now, let's set the bait and wait for him to fall right into our trap."

They carefully placed the cheese on the flimsy cardboard cover of their hole, then hid behind a dumpster to wait for Max to come and get it. A few rats expressed interest in the cheese, but when Coconuts jumped out and ran towards them, howling at the top of his artificial lungs and spraying disinfectant at them, they wisely decided to stay away. After a while, Max, his short attention span bored with playing in traffic, wandered over and noticed the bait. "Oh boy, cheese!" He happily trotted over towards the concealed pit.

"I just had a thought," said an alarmed Coconuts

"What's that?" asked Grounder.

"Isn't this the part where he walks onto the pit cover and walks off without falling in, causing us to wonder why it didn't work, leading to us going over there and jumping on the cover until it finally breaks and we fall in instead?" the monkey asked anxiously.

The other two rolled their eyes. "You've been watching too many cartoons," said Scratch.

"No I'm not, the same exact thing has happened to us at least a dozen times when we tried to catch Sonic!" Coconuts snapped. "And it's going to happen this time, too-"

There was a creaking sound, and suddenly the cardboard Max was standing on disintegrated, causing him to fall into the pit. "Weeeeee! Oof! Hey, a net!"

Coconuts' jaw dropped. The others gave him a smug look. "You were saying?" Grounder asked.

"Ba-ha! Ha-ha!" crowed Scratch. "We've got him now! Won't the Doctor be pleased when we bring him the President of the United Federation!"

That's when they heard another creak. "Hey, I think this net is breaking. Talk about shoddy craftsmanship." There was a loud snap, followed by "Wheeeee!" Then there was a very loud thud.

The robots exchanged horrified looks and rushed over to the hole. They looked down at the bottom of the pit, only to find that the net over the hole there had been broken and Max was nowhere to be found. "Oh no!" cried Coconuts. "We sent the President to Hell!"

"The Doctor's gonna kill us!" wailed Scratch.

"That poor bunny!" sobbed Grounder, bursting into tears. "I never wanted to hurt him…just give him to the Doctor to be brainwashed and roboticized!"

"What're we gonna do now?!" Coconuts asked. "We can't go back to the Doctor and tell him we accidentally sent the President to Hell!"

"He'll scrap us for sure…oh, we're doomed! Doomed! Doomed!" Scratch shrieked.

"We'll have to become homeless vagabonds…wandering the countryside, stealing oil and spare parts to keep from breaking down, while being hunted by the Doctor's robots, GUN, Sonic and his friends, and garbage collectors!" whimpered Grounder.

"Oh, just kill me now!" Coconuts shouted.

That's when a completely unharmed Max walked up a nearby stairwell on the sidewalk clearly labeled 'Subway to Hell entrance,' munching on his cheese. "Well, that was fun," he belched as he finished it off. "Hey Sam, we've got another giant pothole in the middle of the road!"

Sam poked his head out the window. "Another one? You really should consider funding some urban renewal projects, little buddy, those are starting to become a nuisance."

"But Sam, if I waste my money fixing potholes and broken buildings and finding homes for orphans, how can I possibly afford to build a palace on the Moon?" Max replied.

"Why don't you just use the one at the Blister of Tranquility?" Sam asked.

Max stuck out his tongue. "Ew, Prismatology is so last year! And besides, it's not equipped with nuclear missiles or an army of giant robots!"

"Good point," Sam admitted, retreating back into the office.

The robots sweatdropped. "…How did we not notice that subway entrance sooner?!" Scratch demanded.

"I hate this neighborhood…" Coconuts groaned.

"Maybe I should try digging a shallower hole…" Grounder murmured.

- - -

Meanwhile, on a distant mountain…

To an untrained eye, the Mega-Roboticizer Tower didn't look much different from your average cell phone tower, aside from the fact that it was at least ten times as tall as a normal one, looked much more high-tech, and was perched at the very top of one of the tallest mountains in the world. Maintenance bots were scurrying all over the Tower's sky-high surface, making last-minute adjustments and repairs in anticipation of the Tower's impending activation.

"Bwahahahaha! Isn't it beautiful, SA-55?" Eggman said joyfully as he observed the work on the Tower from the cozy seat of his Egg Mobile. "In less than an hour, my masterpiece will come online, and all the world shall bow before me! I think I shall rename the planet Mecha-Mobius, or Eggmanworld, or even Robotrus! Hohohoho!" A light started flashing on his dashboard. "Eh? What's this?"

Ergo popped up from his niche on the Egg Mobile's console. "Alert! I am receiving information of a security breach at the southern face of the mountain. Sonic the Hedgehog and his Freedom Fighter allies have engaged Eggman troops and are fighting their way to the summit."

Eggman started. "What?! How did they know I was here? I was so careful this time!"

"And yet they are here, ergo, you were not as careful as you thought you were, ergo, you are not very good at keeping secrets, ergo, perhaps you should stop building things that are so obviously yours that have your features plastered all over them…"

Eggman winced and glanced at the bulbous top of his tower, which did indeed resemble his face, with antenna for whiskers, glowing lights for eyes, solar panels for teeth, etc. "Er, good point. I'm starting to wonder if maybe you're right and I subconsciously want them to stop me or something." He scowled and slammed a fist against his control panel. "Well, no more of this! Sonic may be coming, but when he arrives he'll find I have a little…surprise…ready for him…hehehehe…ahahahahaha…MUHAHAHA-" He broke off, coughing and wheezing. "Ugh. Blasted seasonal allergies," he rasped, taking some pills with a glass of water. "They always make it harder to do a proper evil laugh at this time of year. But that'll be a thing of the past once I roboticize the whole planet and can control the weather at will!"

"You mean using the same weather machine that caused it to rain indoors for three weeks straight and rusted a significant number of our forces?" Ergo asked.

Eggman sweatdropped. "Er, good point, perhaps I'll just leave the weather alone…for now…"

"Speaking of being left alone, how do you suppose defective units Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts are doing in their impossible mission?" Ergo asked, changing the subject.

Eggman smirked. "With any luck, they're in the junkheap by now…"

- - -

"Why are we in a junkheap?" Grounder asked Scratch.

"To find me spare parts!" the chicken snapped as he rummaged one-handed through a pile of garbage. "Keep looking!"

"That's gonna be hard, since Coconuts seems to have lost it…" Grounder muttered, who was glancing at Coconuts, who had climbed to the top of a lamppost and was frantically spraying disinfectant at the air all around him.

"So many germs…so many germs…they're out to get me…can't let them win…" he whispered in terror. "I'll kill them all before they kill me!" He kept spraying.

"Aha! This should do for an arm!" Scratch said, pulling a plastic prosthetic limb that ended in a hook out of the junk he had been searching. "Now all I need is a pegleg and an eyepatch and I'll look like a pirate!"

"I don't have a pegleg, but will this do?" Grounder asked, offering his partner a rather dainty and extremely feminine leg salvaged from a discarded clothing store model.

"Hmm…yeah, I guess so," Scratch said as he screwed his new arm into his shoulder. "Put her in!"

Grounder did so. He whistled in admiration as Scratch tested out his new leg. "Ooh la la! Look at those curves! They just seem to go on forever…"

"Yeah, they do," Scratch agreed, equally enamored by his new leg. "But enough of that! We must capture the President! And I have a brilliant plan to do just that…Bah-hah! Ha-ha!" He squinted an eye shut and raised his hook menacingly into the air. "Now…come, me hearties! Let's get that scurvy rabbit!" Grounder grimaced. Scratch dropped the hook. "Doesn't work?"

Grounder shook his head. "Naw, the leg sort of ruins the image…"

"You'll never take me alive, germs! Never! NEVER!" Coconuts screamed, spraying two cans of disinfectant in the air at the same time.

A little later…

"Why are we dressed like leprechauns?" Grounder asked Scratch, tugging at the ill-fitting green frock coat and bowler hat Scratch had made him put on.

"According to the Doctor's dossier on Max, one of the things he likes most is Lucky Charms," Scratch explained, shaking a pot full of gold-painted bottlecaps. "So we'll disguise ourselves as leprechauns and trick Max into following us back to Doctor Eggman in hopes that he can get our cereal!"

"This is incredibly stupid. It'll never work," Coconuts said sourly, scratching his itchy fake red beard.

"Of course it will! The kids in the commercials never manage to catch Lucky's Charms, now do they?" Scratch pointed out.

"The Trix rabbit never gets his cereal, either…that poor rabbit," Grounder said sadly. "Those kids are so heartless…all he wants is a bowl for himself! Is that too much to ask? Aww, we can't do this, Scratch, I can't bear to see another cute white bunny be denied the sugary goodness he craves!"

Scratch bonked Grounder on the head. "Shut up, you sissy, here he comes!"

Max was walking down the sidewalk, gleefully hopping on the myriad cracks in hopes that it would break his mother's back when he noticed the three green-attired robots. "Huh? Leperchauns? What're you doing here? I thought I killed all your kind when I burned down Ireland because I couldn't find a perfect four-leaved clover!"

"Arr, ye can chase us as much as ye want, Mister President, but ye'll never get me Lucky Charms!" Scratch chortled as he shook his pot, sounding more like a pirate than an Irishman.

"Uh, Faith and Begorrah," said Grounder.

"Yeah, what he said," said Coconuts.

Max gasped in joy. "Oh boy, Lucky Charms and nobody gets hurt!" He whipped out a ridiculous large Luger and pointed it at the leprechauns. "Now, hand over the cereal and I'll only hurt you a little. And drain your blood to serve as milk for my glorious breakfast, since I'm lactose intolerant this week!"

The disguised robots started. "H-holy crap, he has a gun!" cried the horrified Grounder, jumping into Coconuts' arms and knocking him over. "Do something, Scratch! He'll kill us!"

"N-n-now, now, don't ye be knowing its bad luck to shoot a leprechaun?" Scratch asked anxiously, oily beads of sweat rolling down his hull.

Max shrugged. "I didn't notice any after I massacred all the leprechauns in Ireland…though I did get a really bad toothache for a while. But I get those all the time anyway, considering my horrible eating habits. Now, give me my cereal, I want some Lucky Charms! They're magically delicious!"

"Please don't kill us," Grounder whimpered.

"J-just hold on a sec, we'd be happy to take you to the Lucky Charms," Scratch said nervously. "But they're not here. They're far away from here! Oh yes, far, far away! But if you kill us, you'll never find them!"

"Hmm…hey, Sam!" Max yelled over his shoulder. "I found some leprechauns who are willing to take me to their Lucky Charms somewhere far away. Can I drive?"

Sam poked his head out the window. "Not in this lifetime, little buddy, you remember what happened the last time you took the steering wheel; we wound up at war with Thailand! Normally I'd be happy to drive you, but my soaps are on right now. Do you think you could wait ten minutes until the show's over?"

"Aww, I don't have the attention span to wait that long!" Max whined. "I'll just kill them instead."

"No, wait-" Scratch protested, only for a bullet from Max's gun to knock off his hat. (Fortunately, the rabbit was a lousy aim, but they didn't know that.)

"Waaah! Run for your lives!" Coconuts screamed, throwing Grounder into the air and running as fast as he could. Grounder landed on his head, got back up, and sped after him, followed by Scratch, who was forced to hobble somewhat due to the fact that his newer and shapelier leg was somewhat longer than his other mechanical one.

"Don't leave me here! I don't want to die!" the chicken screamed as he ran after his comrades, followed by Max, who was all too eager to shoot them full of holes and drink their bodily fluids.

"Die, die, die, why won't you die?!" he screamed joyously as he fired his gun again and again and again.

Sam shook his head in amusement and went back inside. "You crack me up, little buddy!"

- - -

Meanwhile, on a distant mountain…

"Wow, the Doc's really pulling out all the stops this time, isn't he?" Sonic asked as he zoomed across the snow at super-speed, drawing fire from the several hundred robot gunners higher up the mountain so that Tails and Dulcy could snipe them from above with Dummy Ring Bombs and fire breath.

"Another day, another superweapon," Knuckles said dismissively, destroying a pair of hulking hammer-wielding colossi by smashing them into each other.

"Knuckles, what exactly are you doing here? Shouldn't you be on Angel Island?" Mighty asked Knuckles as he grabbed the broken hulks of the robots Knuckles had just smashed, mashed them into a ball, and threw it ahead of him, bowling over a dozen lance-wielding Egg Pawns that had been charging towards them.

"Oh, don't worry, I left Amy behind to guard it," Knuckles assured him.

Everyone gave him incredulous looks. "Amy?!" Sonic cried. "Knuckles, what were you thinking?!"

"Did you get tricked by somebody again?" Espio asked.

"And how did you manage to convince her to do it instead of running out here after us to see Sonic?" asked the intrigued Sally.

Knuckles smirked. "Oh, it was pretty easy, actually…"

Meanwhile, on Angel Island…

"Oh, Sonic, aren't you so happy that we found each other at last?" Amy said blissfully as she wrapped her arms around the Master Emerald, which had been painted blue, had spikes taped to its top and one side, and had a plastic Sonic mask strapped to the opposite side. "Now we can be together forever…without any of those whores like Sally or Blaze or Shahra or Merlina or Tiara or Tails or Marine or Lumina or Illumina or Shade or Rouge to distract you from your one true soulmate. We'll love each other always, won't we Sonikku?"

The Master Emerald didn't respond, unsurprisingly. Amy sighed happily and rubbed her cheek against the Emerald's cold, hard facets. "Your silence is all the answer I need, my love." She kissed the Emerald. Tikal, who was watching all this, threw up, very glad that she wasn't currently in residence at the moment.

Back at the mountain…

"Fiendishly clever!" said an impressed Bunnie.

"So clever you couldn't possibly have come up with it," Sonic commented. "'Fess up, Knux, who gave you the idea?"

"N-none of your business!" Knuckles spluttered, unwilling to admit that he had actually gotten the idea from Rouge. "Anyway, she'll make a better guard than the Chaotix."

"Yeah, she probably will," Vector agreed, without irony.

"Awww, that means I can't play with the big shiny thing anymore!" Charmy whined. "Oh well, I always have the one back in our office!"

"Charmy, that's a bug zapper," said Espio.

"A what now?" asked Charmy.

Nicole beeped. "Sally, I'm detecting more robot troopers heading our way, along with a number of aircraft, possibly bombers. Additionally, readings indicate that the Mega-Roboticizer Tower will reach full power in approximately twenty minutes and forty-five seconds."

"That's not much time," Rotor's friend, the rather pessimistic otter, Kale, noted.

Sonic grimaced as he glanced up towards the mountaintop very far above them. "That's not good. What with these icy slopes and all the mecha-mooks in the way, I don't think that even I can make it up there in time, let alone you guys!"

"No worries," Knuckles said, grabbing Sonic and lifting him into the air. "I know a shortcut!"

"Hey, wait, what are you dooooooiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiing!" Sonic wailed as Knuckles used his super-strength to hurl him towards the distant peak.

"Knuckles!" Sally admonished angrily.

"What'da ya do that for?" Bunnie agreed.

Knuckles shrugged. "He wanted to get to the top of the mountain as fast as possible. I was just helping a buddy out. It's what friends are for, right?"

"Not like that," Mighty said in annoyance.

"Oh come on, like you weren't thinking the same thing!" Knuckles accused them.

"But that doesn't mean it was the right thing to do!" argued Sally.

"Oh relax, he's Sonic, he'll be perfectly fine," Knuckles said dismissively.

Several thousand feet above them…

"Waaaaahhhhh-" Sonic's screams were cut off when he smashed face-first into a snow bank…that was actually concealing a very hard boulder. "Ow." Groaning, Sonic pulled himself out, shook the snow from his spines…

And stiffened as he found several arm cannons pointed at him. "Priority-One Hedgehog detected. Initiating termination sequence," one of the robots surrounding Sonic beeped.

Sonic's eye twitched. "Knuckles, you are so dead when I get out of this…"

Meanwhile, back at the Street…

"Lalalala…ooh, a butterfly!" Max cooed, seeing a beautiful delicate-winged creature fluttering by. He whipped out his gun and shot it. He missed, but the breeze from the bullet passing by knocked the lovely insect to the ground, where Max gleefully stomped it into mush, pried it off, and ate it. It was very chewy.

His ears perked up as the ground started shaking rhythmically…and he thought he heard what was either a maniacal laugh or a rooster crowing nearby, or possibly both. "Hmm?" He turned around…

And beheld a thirty-foot tall giant robot bristling with claws and tentacles and heavy armaments relentlessly stomping towards him, crushing cars and cracking the pavement beneath its feet as it proceeded towards the not-exactly-helpless lagomorph. "Whuh-oh. Sam, Santa's sent another robot assassin to kill us!"

Sam poked his head out the window. "Another one? Wow, that guy sure holds a grudge, doesn't he?"

Max nodded. "Yeah, you'd think he'd have forgiven us for ruining several Christmases, getting him possessed by a demon and shipped off to Hell, stealing the North Pole, and launching an ICBM at his workshop by now."

"Ha! You wish we were sent by Santa!" Scratch crowed from inside the robot's cockpit.

"Yeah, we're the Super Special Sonic Search and Smash Squad, sent here by Doctor Robotnik-" Grounder started.

"Isn't it Eggman now?" Coconuts interrupted.

"Eh, it's interchangeable. Anyway, we were sent here to capture you, President Max!" Scratch finished.

Max scratched his head in puzzlement. "Eggman? Who's that?"

"I believe he's that egg-shaped mad scientist fellow with all the robots who keeps getting thwarted in his numerous (and often rather pitiful) attempts to take over the world by a speedy blue hero," Sam said.

"Ohhh, you mean Dr. Wily?" Max guessed.

"No, you're thinking of Mega Man," said Sam.

"Dr. Hamsterveil?" Max guessed.

"That's Lilo and Stitch," said Sam.

"Lex Luthor?" Max guessed.

"No, that's Superman," said Sam.

"Uh…" Max scratched his head again. "Professor Monkeyforahead? Norton Nimnul? Doctor Sivana? Doctor Clayton Forrester? Doctor Yes? Ansem/Xehanort? Hojo? Doctor Horrible? Doctor Blight? Doctor Drakken? Doctor Sevarius? Josef Mengele?"

"No, little buddy, the majority of those don't use robots, and the heroes they fight aren't blue," Sam corrected Max. "Eggman's the one who turns people into robots. And has egg-themed weapons and vehicles. And built that one theme park we went to visit when the world spontaneously half-exploded and a giant cosmic horror that had been lurking in the center of the planet for eons arose to destroy civilization, only to be defeated by a ridiculously conceived 'werehog' and a fairy-fox-thing in a giant stone temple mecha."

"Oh yeah, I remember that place now!" Max recalled. "They had good hot dogs. And rides. And death traps. A shame it closed down, I wouldn't have minded going there again some time."

"Me too," said Grounder. "Hey, why didn't we go there? Where were we when the planet exploded, anyway? I don't remember something like that happening?"

"And I didn't know there were so many mad scientists roaming about…" said the disturbed Coconuts.

"That's irrelevant, you two! All that matters is capturing the President!" Scratch squawked. "We will succeed where all others have failed!"

"What others?" asked Max.

"I think he's referring to all those other robots who have come through in the last few weeks, who we assumed were just random mecha-mooks come to attack us for no real reason. Or were sent by Santa Claus. Or by any of our other myriad enemies who aren't dead," said Sam.

"We have those?" asked a surprised Max. "Darn, we'll have to be more thorough when we kill people in the future, to make sure they're really dead!"

"Will you stop talking and pay attention to us?!" Scratch snapped. "We're gonna getcha! Ba-ha! Ha-ha!" The robot stomped towards Max.

Max whipped out his gun and fired it at the robot. It had no effect. He gasped in horror. "Oh no! Violence is useless! Sam, so something!"

"Hold on, little buddy, the commercial break's ending, and I think Marsha's about to propose to Bridget!" Sam said, glancing back at the office television.

"Saaaaaam!" Max yelled. "I'm the President! My life is way more important than some stupid TV show! Unless it's one of the ones I like. Is it one of the ones I like?"

"Mmm…no, I suppose not," Sam admitted. "All right, but if I miss any drama saving you it's coming out of your paycheck."

"I have a paycheck?" said the surprised Max.

"You're the President, of course you have a paycheck!" said Sam. "It's called 'the taxpayers' money!'" He pulled out his gun and waited for the S.S.S.S.S.S.'s robot to plod past the window, then fired. Having much better aim than Max, his bullet unerringly hit the giant OFF switch on the robot's back and causing the mecha to shut down.

"Nooooo!" Scratch wailed as the robot powered down and slumped over. "Why does this sort of thing always happen to us?!"

"Whose bright idea was it to put an 'off' switch on this thing?!" Coconuts snapped.

"Uh, whoops," Grounder said sheepishly.

"Oh boy! Now we have some new bad guys to interrogate! Come on down here and help me get them out of this tin can, Sam, so we can start torturing them!" Max said, rubbing his hands together eagerly.

"Just a second, little buddy…oh for the love of…Bridget's a guy?!" Sam cried. "I had no idea! Poor Marsha. All she wanted was a happy life with her homosexual lover. Who knew Bridget was just a crazy straight cross-dresser?"

Max tsked and shook his head. "That's why I never trust women, Sam: they almost always turn out to be men in drag! Or in love with you. Or ugly. Or space aliens. Or all of the above."

The S.S.S.S.S.S. sweatdropped. "What were the people of the United Federation thinking, voting for this guy?!" said the astonished Scratch.

Grounded nodded in agreement. "Yeah, I would've voted for Abe Lincoln, any day of the week!"

- - -

Meanwhile, back at the mountain…

Using his Sonic Boost, Sonic plowed through two dozen heavily armed robots standing in a row, hit a Dash Panel that boosted him across an ice bridge which started collapsing the instant he set foot on it, bounced off a spring and ricocheted off a series of progressively higher springs attached to the tops and sides of various pinnacles, grabbed a horizontal pole and swung off it to get the altitude needed to Homing Attack across a chasm using Electro Spinners as stepping stones, landed on a ramp and sped down it using Dash Panels to outrun a giant snowball that came tumbling down after him, raced through a series of gravity-defying loops, ran along the side of a cliff face while avoiding various ice spikes and other obstacles that had been placed in his path, launched off a jump pad and passed through a trio of rainbow rings which propelled him further up the mountainside…

And slammed him facefirst into a spiked ball that Eggman had placed in the middle of his flight path, knowing he would come that way. "Gaaaaahhhh!"

Fortunately, he managed to grab onto an outcropping before he could plummet to his doom, though the majority of his rings fell into oblivion without him. "Ugh…dammit…what the heck did he put that thing there for?!" Frustrated and tired, for that spiked ball had only been one of many rather harrowing encounters he had faced on this mountain deathcourse, Sonic managed to pull himself, bit by bit, up the nearly vertical cliff and finally reach the summit. Climbing was not his thing, and he had nearly slipped and fallen a few times on his way up, so he was in an uncharacteristically foul mood when he reached the peak and beheld the Mega-Roboticizer Tower rising into the sky just a few dozen meters away. "Well, it's about time," he growled.

He started running towards the Tower, fully expecting robot sentries to burst out of the snow and attack him at any moment. None appeared. Surprised, and starting to hope that the Doctor might have foolishly left the Tower unguarded (it wouldn't be out of character for him), Sonic sped up, aiming for the doors of a maintenance elevator he saw at the Tower's base…

Only for him to ram headfirst into an invisible force field that shocked him with several hundred watts of electricity before blasting him, smoking away. He made a little crater in the shape of his body as he hit the thickly packed snow covering the mountaintop rather hard. Groaning, his quills smoking somewhat, he picked himself out of the hole, shaking his head to dislodge some snow that had gotten stuck in his fur. "What the…he shielded that thing?! Of all the…that's…"

"Clever? Ingenious? Brilliant?" Eggman guessed as he flew in on his Egg Mobile, gloating at Sonic's humiliation.

"I was going to say uncharacteristically forward-thinking," Sonic called up to the Doctor.

"I would have to agree," Ergo said, causing Eggman to glare at him.

"So where's the shield generator, Doc?" Sonic asked.

Eggman snorted. "Oho, like I'm going to tell you that, Sonic! I'm on my A-game today, and I don't intend to ruin it by slipping up and saying something stupid that leads to my downfall like I usually do!"

"That would be a first," Ergo commented.

Sonic nodded in agreement. "Yeah, that little bot of yours knows what he's talking about, Doc! Looks like you finally programmed one with a good head on his shoulders!"

Eggman facepalmed. "Ugh, shut up, both of you! Anyway Sonic, I'm only minutes away from victory! My Mega-Roboticizer Tower has almost reached full power, and your friends are about to be overwhelmed by my army of death machines! The defeat of the Freedom Fighters is all but certain now!"

Sonic smirked. "You seem to have forgotten one thing, Doc…I'm still here!"

Eggman grinned sinisterly. "Oh, don't think I haven't planned for you too, Sonic! Behold!" He pressed a button on his control panel.

The mountain started to tremble. Sonic nearly lost his footing. "Wh-whoa! What're you doing this time, Doc?!"

Eggman threw back his head and laughed and laughed as an absolutely MONOLITHIC robot rose up from beyond the edge of the summit, a tower of darkness and steel bristling with weapon, arms the size of skyscrapers, and a giant domed head that you could fit a small town like Knothole into. Sonic's jaw dropped as it kept growing and growing and growing, until it was at least a third again as tall as the mountain itself! It blotted out the sun, casting the summit into its shadow. Even the Mega-Roboticizer Tower was dwarfed by this metal monstrosity. Sonic said a very bad word, something he did not do often.

"What do you think, Sonic?" Eggman asked. "This is the Egg Colossus, possibly my biggest robot superweapon yet!"

"…Why don't you just use this thing to crush the world's armies rather than using the tower here?!" Sonic asked incredulously.

Eggman hesitated. "Ah…well…erm…"

"That's what I said," Ergo said with a roll of his eyes. "But Doctor Eggman paid no attention to me, ergo, he doesn't actually want his 'advisors' to advise him, ergo, he's too full of himself to consider that his own opinions might be wrong, ergo-"

"Oh, shut up!" Eggman snarled. He flew the Egg Mobile up towards the Egg Colossus, the dome at its top splitting open and allowing him to land his machine in a socket in the center of the mecha's command bridge, surrounded by consoles and control panels and displays diligently being operated by multi-limbed robot servitors. The dome sealed up behind him, and then shimmered as it was covered by a triple-layered force field. The Colossus roared to life, its myriad weapons systems powering up and its enormous hands raising and clenching into fists. "This is it! Prepare to meet your end, Sonic!"

Sonic tensed, preparing to fight what could very well be his greatest battle yet…

- - -

Meanwhile, in Sam and Max's office…

The three robots of the S.S.S.S.S.S. had been pried out of the cockpit of their mecha and were now tied up in chairs in the Freelance Police's dim, messy, and generally soiled headquarters, nervously watching as Sam paced before them and Max gleefully got out his torture implements, awaiting their no doubt excruciating interrogation. Finally, Sam grabbed a stool, sat down on it before them with his feet crossed over each other, and swiveled his desk lamp so it shone in their faces. The mechanoids flinched. "Now, I'm only going to ask this once, and if you refuse to tell me, well, things are going to have to get messy," Sam said almost apologetically. "What precisely does Doctor Eggman want with my pal Max?"

"We'll never talk, coppers!" Grounder declared, marshalling his courage.

Scratch nodded fervently. "Yeah, we'll never betray Doctor Eggman!"

"Even though he yells at us all the time, calls us names, and generally treats us like garbage!" Coconuts agreed.

"Oh boy, I was hoping they'd play hard-to-get!" Max said happily as he gassed up his chainsaw.

"Are you certain you don't want to reconsider?" Sam asked gently. "Because machines like yourselves don't have a good track record against the two of us. Why, we even destroyed the entire Internet once!"

The robots exchanged confused looks. "But the Internet is still around," said the puzzled Scratch.

"That's because Al Gore remade it in his own image using his original schematics," Sam explained.

"I'm sure we'll destroy that too, eventually!" Max said as he punched the air a few times with his favorite boxing glove.

"We don't care what you do to us, we'll never reveal the Doctor's plans!" Scratch said loyally.

"Yeah!" the other two agreed.

Sam sighed and shook his head, looking regretful. "Oh well. Then I guess I have no choice…" The robots tensed. "But to tell 'Yo Momma' jokes until you cave in!"

The mechanoids stared at him blankly. "That's it?!" Coconuts asked incredulously. "You call that torture?!"

"You haven't heard Sam's 'Yo Momma' jokes. They're really bad," said Max.

Sam frowned. "Gee, thanks…"

Grounder snorted. "We don't even have a mother!"

"Well, unless you count Dr. Eggman…which is a mental image none of us really want to contemplate for very long," said Scratch.

Sam shrugged. "Oh well, there goes that idea."

"Let me peel their metal skins open using a can opener and rib out their innards to use as Christmas decorations, Sam!" Max pleaded his partner. "They'll look great with the North Pole in the corner!"

"Ha, that wouldn't be the first time we've been used as Christmas ornaments!" said Scratch, though the other two looked a little appalled. "Is that the best you've got?"

"I could show you the tape from my banjo performance on Embarrassing Idol," Sam threatened.

"No you can't, our VCR's busted," Max said. "As usual."

"Oh, never mind then," said Sam. "There goes my idea to show some our most memorable moments on Midtown Cowboys, too."

"Let me tickle them until they bleed or die laughing!" Max begged Sam.

"You're going to tickle us to death? You call that torture?" scoffed Coconuts.

"You'd be surprised how many crooks have broken down and screamed at the top of their lungs—in between uncontrollable, agonized laughs—for us to 'stop, please, for the love of god stop, I'm dying here, I really mean it,' and then they die," said Sam.

"Everyone finds it hilarious! Even the perps! Though they don't seem to enjoy it much after they die," said Max sadly.

"That wouldn't work on us, we're robots, we're not the least bit ticklish!" Scratch said.

"Yeah, 'cause we're made of metal!" Grounder agreed.

"Funny, your predecessors said the same thing," commented Sam.

"Yeah, right before they laughed so hard they fell to pieces! Literally," said Max.

The robots swallowed. "You'll still have to try harder than that to scare us!" Scratch blustered.

Sam shrugged. "Well, if you insist. I could tell very long and boring stories that crush your souls. Would that work?"

"We're robots, we don't have souls!" Scratch retorted.

"We don't?!" asked an alarmed Grounder.

"Well, I don't think we do…" Scratch admitted. "I'm not sure. Machines can't have souls, can they?"

"I've heard of a robot Hell. And you can't go to Hell if you don't have a soul. So that means some robots must have souls! But does that mean that all robots have souls, or just a few?" Coconuts wondered. "And which kind are we?"

"I know how to find out! Let me pry open their craniums and tear their circuits apart until I find something that's the equivalent of a cybernetic soul, Sam!" Max begged Sam.

"Now, now, little buddy, you know as well as I do that the soul is located in another part of the body, not the head," Sam scolded Max.
"Oh, right," said Max.

"It's not in the head? Where is the soul?" asked a curious Grounder.

"Grounder!" Scratch hissed.

"I'll tell you…after we force you to watch a slideshow of our most recent family reunion!" Sam threatened dramatically.

Grounder and Coconuts gasped in horror. "Not a family reunion slideshow!" Grounder cried.

"Anything but that!" Coconuts wailed.

"Oh, suck it up, you two!" Scratch snapped. "It can't possibly be worse than Doctor Eggmans' family reunions!"

Max grinned sinisterly. "You wanna bet? Most of mine are in jail."

Sam nodded in agreement. "Some of them are even crazier than he is! My family, on the other hand, is mostly all right, except for the shell-shocked veterans who've served in several of the wars fought in the last century. And my grandmother."

"Who's pretty awesome! And a prison warden," said Max. "We run into her surprisingly often, considering our line of work."

"You call that weird? The Doctor's family has you beat!" argued Scratch.

Grounder nodded in agreement. "Yeah, like Grandpa Gerald, or his Mom, or Shadow the Hedgehog, or Alien Grandpa Black Doom, Snively's Sister Hope, or even Cousin Quark!"

"And they always leave such a mess, too," Coconuts complained. "It takes forever to clean up!"

"Hmm…would you happen to be a clean freak?" Sam asked, picking up on the emphasis Coconuts put into this statement.

Coconuts blinked. "What? Er, no, no, not at all! In fact, I love dirt and filth and grime and…and…disgusting slimy things," he lied, quickly realizing that these sociopaths would use any advantage they could on them to make them talk. "Heck, I'd marry them if I could!" Scratch gave him an approving look.

Unfortunately, Grounder missed the memo. "What're you talking about, Coconuts? You're a complete germophobe!"

"Is that so?" asked the interested Sam.

Grounder nodded, not noticing the desperate looks the others were giving him to shut up. "Oh yeah, he's obsessed with cleaning everything. He's always polishing and patrolling against invisible dirt and sometimes he even stalks people for days to get them clean. He doesn't have a sense of touch since he's a robot, but he often complains about how his skin feels all crawly no matter how hard he tries to clean it off. Total OCD headcase! It's amazing he's always complaining about how much he hates being a janitor, considering how much work he puts into it!"

Sam and Max exchanged looks. "So, you don't like dirty things, hmm?" Max asked slyly.

"What's your opinion of our cozy little office space?" Sam asked the monkey.

Coconuts fidgeted as he glanced around. There was dust everywhere, an empty box of donuts with crumbs still in it, slices of pizza that had to be several years old at least, a miniature city of cockroaches, a rat hole, paraphernalia from the detective duo's various adventures lying around haphazardly, bullet holes riddling almost every surface, loose floorboards, boarded-up windows, a giant hole in the wall through which he could see some other hardnosed guy in the room next door beating up someone, a severed hand mounted on a plaque over the closet… "It's…quaint," he said weakly, trying not to scream, rip his bonds off, and scratch at himself to get rid of the armies of bacteria he was just certain were crawling up him at that moment. "Nice place you've got here."

"Thanks, we like it too!" Max said, heading over to the closet door. "Wanna see the stuff we keep in here? Most of its stuff we got from our various adventures, like the lice-infested afro of a former child star, or the severed head of the last President, or a jar containing the disintegrated remains of a sentient colony of space bacteria. I think there are also some bits of cheese that have been lying in there for two or three years now, too!" Coconuts' face went pale at the thought of all the horrible vermin and fungi and insects and other things probably hiding in that dark, enclosed space.

"Stay strong," Scratch whispered as he saw oily sweat running down the monkey's face. "Don't let them get to you! We can survive anything they throw at us, we're the S.S.S.S.S.S., remember?"

Grounder nodded in agreement. "Yeah, if we can handle getting thrashed by Sonic on a regular basis, what can these amateurs do to us?"

"Oh, and there's also Leonard," Sam recalled.

"Leonard?" asked Scratch.

"Who's Leonard?" asked the anxious Coconuts.

"Oh, just the guy who lives in our closet," said Max.

The robots' eyes widened in alarm. "There's a guy living in your closet?!"

"Well, 'lives' is a strong word," said Sam. "More like he's someone we tied up, shoved in our closet, and feed occasionally. Max did it just this week, if I recall correctly."

Max blinked. "This week? That was last month!"

Sam gave Max an alarmed look. "What? But…then have we fed him at all recently?! Because I know I haven't…" He and Max glanced at the closet. Warily, they crept over to it, opened the door a crack, and peeked inside. They recoiled and quickly shut the door again. "I guess that's the end of Leonard," Sam said after a moment. "I suppose we should have noticed he was in an advanced state of decomposition by now from the smell, but I assumed it was just another colony of omnivorous mold growing in the corner. Oh well, you know what they say about hindsight…"

"Yeah," Max said sadly. "I'll miss the guy. I had plans to train him to be my presidential pet! I was gonna give him a tiny hovel on the White House lawn and a spiked collar on a leash and I'd take him for walks and shave his body and make him pee on the leg of the Secretary of Agriculture and everything…"

Sam put a hand on Max's shoulder. "It's for the best, Max, you know we don't have the best track record when it comes to pets. They either die of neglect and starvation or become evil masterminds."

"Oh well," Max said, immediately getting over it. "Maybe we can keep these guys as pets instead! I'll be the first president to have a robot chicken and a robot monkey and a robot…whatever you are," he said to Grounder.

"I'm a digger bot!" Grounder said, quite offended.

"Good kitty!" Max said, petting Grounder on the head. "Now keep your mouth shut and I might give you a treat later. If I remember."

"This is ridiculous…" Scratch grumbled.

"They have a rotting corpse in their closet," whispered the horrified Coconuts, trembling all over. "A rotting corpse…in their closet! And they didn't even notice until now…"

"Keep it together, man!" Scratch hissed. "Don't let them get to you! We can beat them!"

"They haven't cracked yet, Max," Sam whispered to his partner. "I think we need to take things up a notch."

Max nodded in agreement. "I know just the thing!" He walked over to the three robots, grinned, and stuck a finger in his belly button. They stared at him. He pulled his finger out, glistening with…something…and stuck it in his mouth. He slurped very loudly as he sucked the slimy substance off. They looked at him in horror. He smacked his lips, licked his lips, then stuck his tongue in his nose and picked. And picked. And picked.

"H-how is that possible?!" gasped the astonished Grounder. "His nose is so small…his tongue shouldn't be able to fit in there!"

Coconuts' pupils shrank and he started hyperventilating. "Calm down," Scratch said anxiously. "Don't lose it! He's just trying to psych you out! You're stronger than this!"

"He is?" asked Grounder. Scratch glared at him.

"Ah, that was a good pick," Max said after he withdrew his tongue, and a ridiculously large booger, back into his mouth. "But now my ear's bothering me. I think I've got a wax buildup or something."

"Are you sure it's not a growth like the one I had to strap you to the kitchen table to remove?" Sam asked.

"No, no, I'm pretty sure it's earwax," said Max, tilting his head to the side. He stuck a finger into one of his long bunny ears…and then a hand…and then his entire arm. The robots gawked as Max somehow managed to stuff his entire limb inside his head. "Now, let's see…where is it…" His skull rattled as his hand blindly rummaged about inside of it, then abruptly popped out of his other ear. "Hmm? No, that's not…" He pulled his hand back (into his skull, not out of his head entirely), rooted about some more, then abruptly pulled out a grotesque, hairy, dripping, cancerous lump of something. "Aha! Here it is!" He promptly swallowed it.

"Max, I think that was your brain," said Sam.

Max shrugged. "Oh well, I probably didn't need it anyway."

"That was one of the most disgusting things I have ever seen," whispered Grounder.

Coconuts turned green. "Don't do it, man! You can control yourself! You have the willpower! Resist the urge!" Scratch encouraged. "Master your fears, don't let them master you!"

"Did you know that I can recite the alphabet in armpit farts?" Max asked.

"It's true, he can, it's equally revolting and astounding," said Sam.

"Let me show you!" Max said, sticking a hand under his arm and vigorously flexing it, causing a farting sound that, remarkably enough, did sound like the alphabet. "A, B, C, D, E, F, G-"

"That's either really cool or really gross," said Grounder.

Coconuts' cheeks bulged as he nearly threw up in his mouth. "Keep it together! You're stronger than this! I know you are!" Scratch said to the struggling monkey.

"Whenever I go to the dentist, he bursts into tears," Max continued. "Even British people recoil when I smile, and everyone knows how bad their teeth are! I actually got Ninjavitis once!"

"Don't you mean Gingivitis?" asked Grounder.

"No, Ninjavitis!" Max repeated.

Sam nodded. "That's right, he had tiny ninjas living inside his mouth and causing all sorts of crazy hijinks. I was glad to see the last of them, especially that orange-suited one who kept saying 'Believe it!'"

"Wanna see?" Max asked, opening his mouth wide and showering the trio with breath that smelled at least twice as bad as a Malboro who had been chain-smoking for the last ten years.

The robots struggled not to cry. "Why were we built with scent receptors? Why? WHY?!" wailed Grounder.

"Ha! We're not afraid of that! Dr. Eggman smells even worse when he forgets to shower, or gets all sweaty due to being worked up about a new doomsday project or a way to kill Sonic!" Scratch boasted.

"Y-yeah, we're not afraid…" Coconuts whimpered.

"Well, does your Doctor have worms in his teeth?" Max asked, probing a shallow depression in one of his incisors and yanked out a worm that had to be at least six inches long. "'Cause I have a whole bunch!"

"Hi, I'm Paul!" the worm said to the robots. They screamed.

Max bit off Paul's head then slurped the rest of his body down like a noodle. "Mmm, slimy yet satisfying!"

"I want to die…" whimpered Grounder.

"I will not break. I will not break. I will not break. I will not break," Coconuts whispered frantically, very pale in the face.

"That's the spirit! Good show! Keep it up!" enthused Scratch.

"I think he's on his last nerve, little buddy. Let's really gross him out!" Sam whispered to Max, who nodded eagerly. Sam cleared his throat and said, "Hey Max, what was that disgusting thing you ate the other day? You know, the grossest food in existence?"

"Gosh, Sam, I don't know, I don't have the memory for that sort of thing! Besides, I eat gross things all the time!" Max pointed out.

"Yes, but this is the really disgusting one. The grossest of the gross. The food only known as…casu marzu!" The words casu marzu spontaneously echoed twice. Thunder cracked outside, even though it was a sunny day. A woman screamed. A rat died. A toilet flushed in the opposite direction from the one it was supposed to based on the hemisphere it was in. The robots looked around in surprise.

Max snapped his fingers. "Oh yeah, I remember that now! It was yummy! And squishy."

The robots blinked. "What's casu marzu?" Scratch asked. The words casu marzu spontaneously echoed twice. Thunder cracked outside, even though it was a sunny day. A woman screamed. A rat died. A toilet flushed in the opposite direction from the one it was supposed to based on the hemisphere it was in. The chicken started. "Did I do that?"

"Casu marzu," Sam started, as the words casu marzu spontaneously echoed twice, thunder cracked outside, a woman screamed, a rat died, and a toilet flushed in the opposite direction from the one it was supposed to based on the hemisphere it was in. "Is a dish originating from the island of Sardinia, near Italy. It means 'rotten cheese', but it's actually much worse than that. First, you take some pecorino, or sheep's-milk cheese. Then, you leave it out in the open, uncovered, until cheese flies lay their eggs in it. These eggs hatch into maggots about a third of an inch long and munch their way through the cheese. As the fats in the pecorino decompose, the cheese becomes very soft, oozes liquid, and is ready to eat. Those who try it and live to tell the tale say that it has a burning taste with a wriggly consistency…and do you know why that is, my friends?" The robots, already disgusted beyond belief (even some of the things the Doctor ate from time to time wasn't as horrifying as this!), shook their heads in terror.

"It's because most people never bother to take the maggots out, so they eat the cheese, bugs and all!" Max said happily. "But the maggots are capable of surviving stomach acid and can crawl around in your intestines for quite some time. I should know, because my bowels have been writhing with them ever since I ate the casu marzu!" The words casu marzu spontaneously echoed twice, thunder cracked outside, a woman screamed, a rat died, and a toilet flushed in the opposite direction from the one it was supposed to based on the hemisphere it was in. "Wanna see some? I think I pooped a few out into my litter box earlier…"

"Max, you silly bunny, you're a lagomorph, not a cat! You don't have a litter box!" Sam said, rubbing Max's head affectionately.

"Oh yeah…then I guess we shouldn't tell Sibyl why her breakfast tasted different from usual this morning…" Max said.

"She wouldn't have noticed anyway, she got her food from Stinky's after all," said Sam knowingly. "All the food there has maggots in it!"

Grounder threw up oil and a few loose parts. Coconuts turned paler and bit his lip to keep from passing out. And Scratch, their resolute, fearless leader…

Caved in. "ALL RIGHT! ALL RIGHT WE SURRENDER! PLEASE, FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, MAKE IT STOP! MAKE IT STOOOOOOOOOOP!"

Coconuts gawked at the chicken in disbelief. "And you were talking to me about willpower earlier?! You hypocrite!"

"I'm a chicken! What do you expect?!" Scratch snapped back. "Being yellow runs in the species!"

"Awww, we're done already?" Max complained. "And I didn't even get to start describing the stuff growing between my toes yet…"

"Maybe next time, little buddy," Sam assured his partner.

"You, sir, are a monster," Grounder gasped. "A heartless, soulless, creature of pure evil without pity or remorse! You are the Devil himself!"

"No, but we met him," Sam said. "Not a bad chap, really, once you get to know him."

"Yeah…but the prisoners at GUNtanamo Bay had pretty much the same reaction as you after I initiated my new policies regarding the treatment of suspected terrorists in United Federation custody," said Max. "The press called it a violation of human and Mobian rights. I called it comedy gold!"

Sam narrowed his eyes at the broken robots. "Now," he said menacingly. "Tell us why you wanted to kidnap my little buddy…"

The words flowed easily from the defeated robots' vocoders. "Dr. Eggman wants to roboticize Max," explained Grounder.

"To use him as a puppet President to control the United Federation!" Coconuts added.

Max gasped. "What? Why didn't you say so in the first place?! I would have gone along with you right off the bat!"

The robots gawked. "Wait, what?" asked Scratch.

"Being President is great, but being a robot President?! That's been one of my fondest hopes and dreams for ages!" Max explained. "Sure, I can pass all sorts of unfair and totally arbitrary laws and launch nuclear missiles at any country whose name I think is stupid enough to warrant getting wiped off the map now, but if I were a robot I could step on all those namby-pamby human rights advocates who complain about my legislation, and fry them with laser vision and fire breath, and launch nukes from my own body without having to go through all the tedious paperwork and bribes and security codes I need to do it now!"

"Wait, then you mean that all we had to do was ask, and you would have come along with us just like that?!" asked the stunned Grounder.

"We didn't have to go through any of our failed attempts to catch you?!" cried Coconuts.

"Or suffer grueling and unusual punishment?!" asked Scratch.

"Pretty much, yeah," said Max. "Come on, let's go see your boss, I wanna become a robot as soon as possible so I can make my reign of terror even more terrifying!"

"Now Max, I don't think this is such a good idea," Sam protested. "After all, absolute power corrupts absolutely, and you're already very corrupt."

"But Sam, that's why I have to become a doomsday machine!" Max argued. "How can I become absolutely corrupt if I don't have absolute power? I'll never reach my full potential, and just be a run-of-the-mill lovable heroic sociopath rather than the decimator of worlds!"

Sam was not convinced. "There are some who would say you're better off that way, Max. Part of your appeal comes from your adorable personality, good looks, and crazy antics, who would like you if you were just another crazy homicidal robot? Though I admit that there are a few of those who are rather popular, like that E-123 Omega fellow, and HK-47 from Star Wars…"

"C'mon, Sam, let me be turned into an evil robot of mass destruction! It can be my birthday and Christmas present this year!" Max begged Sam.

"I already gave you your birthday and Christmas present this year!" Sam said sternly. "Whatever happened to that Torture-Me-Elmer doll I got you?"

"Pssh, he was a total lightweight," Max said scornfully. "Killed himself before I really got started." The robots exchanged terrified looks, wondering how close they had been to a truly gruesome end.

"This is why we can't have nice things, little buddy, you're always breaking them!" Sam said, though it didn't really sound like he minded much.

"Come on, Sam, if you let me be RoboPrez, I promise to make you my RoboVicePrez!" Max begged Sam.

Sam frowned and crossed his arms over his chest. "I'm already Vice President, now that Mr. Spatula's dead and no longer haunting us, and I've yet to see one benefit out of it! What would be any different about becoming a robot Vice President?"

"You'll have real power, a bigger gun, and a lifetime supply of those doggy treats you like so much," Max promised. "And since you'll be a robot, you can eat as much as you want without worrying about your weight!"

"Hmm…that does sound tempting," Sam admitted. He considered it for a moment. "A bigger gun, you say?" He pulled out his already enormous revolver and examined it for a moment. "Well, I've been meaning to get a larger one…all right, I'm in!"

"Great! So, where's this Doctor of yours?" Max asked the robots.

"Well, normally he'd be at one of his many bases…" Grounder recalled.

"But right now he's at some distant mountain putting the finishing touches on his Mega-Roboticizer Tower, a superweapon that'll roboticize everyone on Mobius and turn the planet to solid metal!" Scratch said proudly.

Sam and Max gasped. "Holy Isaac Asimov in a rowboat being cannibalized by R2-D2 Jerry Springer, and the Cylons from Battlestar Galactica!" Sam cried.

"This is outrageous! We can't allow this travesty to occur!" Max declared. "If he roboticizes the whole planet, I insist on being mechanized first! It's my constitutional right, as totally legally elected leader of the free world!"

"Max, we can't allow this to happen! If Eggman mechanizes the planet, there'll be no more criminals to beat up, since everyone will be mindless robots happily slaving away under his iron fist! We'll be out of a job!" said Sam.

"But Sam, in every perfect society there'll always be dissidents and rejects who go against the status quo! We can just pick on defective and malfunctioning robots instead, and beat up the roboticized versions of people we don't like!" Max said.

"Hmm…well, when you put it that way, I can't think of a reason not to. Okay, little buddy, let's go get ourselves roboticized!" Sam decided.

The robots exchanged incredulous looks. "You know, I think this is one of the first times I've ever heard of anyone volunteering to be roboticized…" said an astonished Coconuts.

"Aren't either of you the least bit worried about losing your free will and becoming a loyal servant of Doctor Eggman?" asked Scratch.

Sam smiled. "My hat makes me immune to brainwashing, and I've yet to see a mind control device capable of affecting my little buddy's convoluted and diseased excuse for a brain!"

"CAT scanners have been known to self-destruct rather than try to examine my head," Max said happily. "Isn't that neat?" The robot shuddered.

"Now, where is this tower thingy? If Max and I are to become robot President and Vice-President, we should probably be at Ground Zero so we'll be the first to be changed," Sam reasoned.

The robots stared at each other uncertainly. "Uh…" said Grounder.

"I'm…not actually sure," Coconuts admitted. "I think it's on a mountain somewhere…"

"Scratch, you saw the Doc's schematics, where's the tower?" Grounder asked their leader.

"I…didn't actually see the name of the mountain," Scratch admitted sheepishly.

Max's ears drooped in disappointment. "Awww, so none of you no where it is? Oh well, guess we'll just have to kill you, then."

"W-wait!" Coconuts cried desperately. "We don't know where it is, but we know how to find out!"

"Huh? Oh, right, our homing beacons!" Scratch recalled. "Those can help us find the Doc no matter where he is!"

"He's always trying to remove them from us for some reason…" Grounder said.

"Sounds good to me. We'll drive, you direct us. I'll get the DeSoto ready," said Sam. "Max, untie our guests and meet me outside."

"Can I drive?" Max asked hopefully.

"Not if you don't mind me clawing at the dashboard while shrieking like a cheerleader," said Sam. "So no."

"Awww," Max whined. "Oh well, maybe next time." The robots exchanged relieved looks again, quietly glad that Max wasn't going to drive. Considering that the bunny was too short to reach the pedals or see over the wheel of a car, they didn't really want to be in any vehicle he was controlling…

- - -

Meanwhile, on the distant mountain…

"Get a load of this!" Eggman declared, as hatches opened all over the hull of his Colossus and launched about as many missiles as you'd expect to see in an average episode of Macross towards Sonic.

"Oh, come on!" Sonic yelled as he dashed back and forth at rapid speed across the mountaintop to evade the projectiles, having a bit more trouble than usual dodging all the missiles due to the fact that there were so damn MANY of them. And it didn't help that their explosion on contact with the ground shook the mountain and threw up snow everywhere, making it harder for him to maneuver about without tripping over something or losing his vision, which at the velocities he was currently moving at could be fatal "Where the heck do you get the resources to build all this stuff, Eggman?!"

"That's for me to know and you to never find out!" Eggman chortled, pressing a button that caused the shoulders of the Colossus to open up and reveal a pair of absolutely ENORMOUS missiles with his grinning face painted on the warheads. "BOMB Voyage! Bwahahahaha!"

"That is such a cheesy pun," Ergo complained.

"Who asked you?!" Eggman snarled.

Sonic sweatdropped as the missiles, each about the size of a space shuttle, slowly roared towards him. Even if they didn't hit him directly, he didn't think it would be possible to escape the blast radius from their explosions without jumping off the edge of the summit…which, at their altitude, and the sheer steepness of the slope, would probably kill him. "Oh, for the love of…" Suddenly, he got an idea. It was an incredibly crazy and possibly suicidal one, but he had a good track record where those were concerned. He rushed over to the opposite side of the peak, crouched down low, and then raced forward and around the shielded tower, using a Sonic Boom to break the sound barrier. He leaped off the edge as he approached the other side, and then blasted towards the giant missiles shooting towards him with a Homing Attack. He slammed into one of the grinning warheads and kicked it, both pushing it away from him and flinging himself higher in the opposite direction.

Eggman's eyes widened behind his glasses as the giant missile, deflected by Sonic's speed and momentum, started spinning back through the air towards him. "Eh? What the…OH NO!"

The missile struck the Colossus and exploded with a cacophonous blast at the same time its twin slammed into the mountaintop and also exploded, covering the peak in a double mushroom cloud and engulfing the Mega-Roboticizer Tower in smoke and fire. Sonic, up in the air when the missiles hit, was flung up even higher into the stratosphere by the twin explosion, giving him a bird's-eye view of the destruction from several miles high. "Wow. That was an even bigger bang than the annual Liberation Day fireworks back at Mobotropolis! Nice, if I do say so myself…"

His delight faded when the smoke faded away, revealing that most of the peak had been disintegrated save for a very thin rocky needle jutting up from the center of a crater that burrowed deep into the heart of the mountain; the Colossus, though somewhat battered and damaged by the missile strike, was still mostly all right; and the Mega-Roboticizer Tower…was completely unharmed. Sonic's jaw dropped. "Oh, come on! How strong did he make the shield on that thing?!"

"Strong enough to survive you, rodent!" Eggman sneered in his cockpit.

"Doctor, who are you talking to?" Ergo asked.

"Oh, I'm responding to Sonic's statement, which I've predicted to be a question of how we or my beautiful tower could possibly have survived that last explosion, even though I can't hear him at the moment due to me being down here and him being up there," Eggman said, pointing at the tiny blue speck in the sky that was Sonic.

"…Ah," said Ergo. "You are responding to voices that are not there, ergo, you are suffering from dementia, ergo, you should probably be committed to a mental institution…though that should probably have happened long before now…"

Eggman facepalmed. "Why do I keep you around again? Oh, never mind. Target that hedgehog and FIRE!"

"Our missile launchers were damaged in the explosion, sir. Should we use lasers instead?" one of the pilot droids asked.

"No…fire an arm instead! I think Sonic deserves a HAND for his performance just now…" Eggman snickered.

"That's also a really cheesy pun," Ergo pointed out.

"I didn't build you to mock my jokes!" Eggman snapped.

"You didn't build me to write them for you, too," Ergo said. "Maybe you should get on that. Or get a clue. Oh, wait, you can't…"

Eggman strangled the air for a few moments out of frustration, then glared at the other robots on the bridge, who were staring at him. "What are you all looking at? I said, FIRE!" They hurriedly turned away and got back to work.

The Colossus raised one of its fists and abruptly launched it at Sonic, rockets igniting on its sides and back to propel it through the air, an unbreakable cable unreeling behind it to keep it connected to the rest of the mecha's body. Sonic's eyes widened in alarm and he managed to dodge out of the way of the giant fist at the last moment by using a midair Quick Step, landing on the hand's knuckle as it shot past him and running down its side, leaping onto the cable at the back, and grinding down its length towards the robot below. "Wahoooooo!"

"Oh no you don't! Electrify the cable!" Eggman shouted. A powerful energy charge shot up the length of the cable towards Sonic. Seeing it coming, the blue hedgehog jumped off the cable before it could hit him and started freefalling towards the Colossus. The missile launchers, which were back online, fired rockets at him, interspersed with various laser shots and other weapons. Sonic did a number of midair dodges, Quick Steps, and Homing Attacks to easily evade the blasts, having much more space to play with up in the air than he did back at the ground below. As he got closer to the giant mecha, he curled into a blue ball and started spinning with all his might, aiming for the giant dome covering the Egg Colossus's cockpit. Weaving and bobbing around the energy bolts and missiles still shooting at him, Sonic directed himself at the robot's head, slamming into the dome…

And getting repulsed at once by the force field. "Gaaaaahhh!" he cried out in pain and alarm as he was flung away by the shield around the bridge.

"Haha! Forgot about that, did you?" Eggman sneered, bringing the Colossus's other hand up and grabbing Sonic in it as the other hand fully retracted back into place. "What, were you expecting the force field to drop at inopportune moments so that you could attack me or something?"

"Ungh…well, it worked before," Sonic grunted as he struggled against the enormous, ultra-hard, and super-strong fingers imprisoning him in its grasp.

"Not this time!" Eggman crowed. "And I know you don't have all seven Chaos Emeralds with you, and your friends are still occupied fighting my forces, so I'm afraid that this time there's no escape! I should crush you right here and now, and rid the world of you once and for all…"

"Yes, you probably should…ergo, you won't," lamented Ergo.

He was right. "However, I think I'd rather have you witness the might of my ultimate weapon first hand, and become the first to be transformed by its unstoppable power as it turns you and every other trace of organic life on this planet, into obedient machines serving only me, the greatest genius Mobius has ever known! And once this world is mine, I will harness the Chaos Emeralds to expand the Mega-Roboticizer's power throughout the universe, and conquer everything…and you, my dear Mecha-Sonic will serve as my right-hand man, or rather, machine! Muhahahahahahaha!" Eggman laughed, as Sonic fought against his bonds with renewed strength. "Struggle all you like, Sonic, but you can't get away this time…in just a few minutes, the tower will activate, and everything and everyone you've been fighting for all your life will be destroyed! I win! I WIN! I WI-" He paused as something flashed on his control panel. "Eh?"

"Doctor Eggman, sensors have detected an unauthorized vehicle driving up the mountain at speeds almost as high as that of the Priority One hedgehog," Ergo reported. "It appears to be a…vintage DeSoto Adventurer? And…units Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts seem to be onboard!"

Eggman's eyes widened in horror. "No…NO…NO, NO, NO, NO, NO! Why can't they do anything right?! Even when I expect them to fail, they still mess it up! Why oh why did I ever make those idiots in the first place?! Now they'll ruin everything, just like they always do!"

"But sir, aren't they doing exactly what you wanted them to do?" Ergo asked. "The license plate of the DeSoto matches that of the vehicle used by Sam and Max. You sent them to capture President Max, did you not?"

"I sent them on a suicide mission! They weren't supposed to actually get him, much less bring him to my tower!" Eggman shouted. "And now that they are here, I just know they'll somehow cause my latest masterpiece to fail! Quickly, alert all units, withdraw all our troops from the Freedom Fighters and concentrate EVERY LAST BIT OF OUR FIREPOWER ON THAT DESOTO!"

"…Isn't that overkill, sir?" asked the astonished Ergo.

"Not where those three are concerned! Fire! FIRE!" shouted Eggman.

Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts would probably have been appalled to hear that their creator was actively trying to destroy them were they not screaming at the top of their lungs while clinging on to each other as Sam haphazardly drove the DeSoto up the side of the mountain, breaking countless speed limits and going over so many bumps and crashing into things that it was a miracle they hadn't all been hurled out of the backseat yet. "Sam, I think you broke something, I keep hearing this shrill whine in my ear," Max complained.

"That's just our passengers screaming in terror, Max," Sam said.

"Oh, okay." Max frowned. "Now I remember why we don't usually have passengers."

Sam glanced up as suddenly several thousand Eggman troops swarmed onto the mountain slope in front of them and started firing bullets, lasers, and missiles at them, supported by bombs and missiles launched from aircraft and several thousand extra missiles fired from the Egg Colossus looming over them. "Don't look now, little buddy, but I think we've got incoming."

"Cool!" said Max.

"Take the wheel, I think I'm going to see if my shooting practice has paid off," Sam said, switching seats with Max and leaning out the side of the car so that he could shoot at the inbound robots and weapons fire without breaking the windshield.

"Woohoo!" Max cheered, grabbing the steering wheel and enthusiastically driving the DeSoto right into the midst of the robot army, plowing through the mechas and crushing their hulls and limbs beneath the car's tires and front grille as he continued up the slope. Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts' screams rose in volume when the severed head of an Egg Fighter flew out of the carnage and landed right in their laps, its glowing optics staring at them with what they could have sworn was accusation before going dim forever. Meanwhile, up in front, Sam fired shot after shot, each of his bullets unerringly finding their way to their targets with explosive results. He shot down missiles, flying robots, and even rail gun shells the size of the DeSoto, everything he pointed at going boom…sometimes even before he pulled the trigger! "Wow Sam, you sure have gotten better at shooting things than in the old days!"

"Thanks little buddy, though I have to wonder what sort of results I'd get with an even bigger gun," Sam said as he fired a single bullet at a line of charging Egg Hammers that caused the lot of them to explode simultaneously. Yes, ALL OF THEM. With just ONE bullet. "I must say, I'm quite pleased to finally have an enemy I can shoot at that actually dies when a bullet goes into it for a change!"

"Yeah, and I'm happy to have an enemy that dies when I run them over for a change!" Max said.

"What about those Scientologists we ran over the other day?" Sam asked.

Max snorted. "They're Scientologists, Sam, you know they don't count!"

The screaming of the robots in the backseat got, amazingly enough, even louder when a missile that Sam had just clipped rather than hit directly arced weakly through the air as its rocket engine failed, then plummeted back to earth…heading right for the hapless trio who had been unfortunate enough to come along for the ride. "We'regonnadiewe'regonnadiewe'regonnadiewe'regonnadiewe'regonna-" The missile seemed to bounce of thin air, flipping off to the side and exploding when it hit a platoon of Egg Chasers that had been driving along beside them. "Huh?"

"What just happened?" asked a confused Coconuts.

Puzzled, Grounder cautiously peeked over the side of their car just in time to see a machine gun-toting Egg Gunner fire several dozen rounds towards them. He quickly ducked, but the bullets that would have hit his head also rebounded off thin air, while the others ricocheted off the side of the DeSoto without even scratching it. "What the…what's going on?!"

"None of their attacks are damaging the car," Scratch suddenly realized as a bazooka round smashed into a tire, bounced off, and exploded behind them. "What's this thing made of?!"

Max laughed as he wildly fishtailed the DeSoto back and forth to run over as many poor robots as was rabbitly possible. "Ha! This car's too cool to be harmed by measly bullets, missiles, lasers, or any other typical enemy fire!"

Sam nodded in agreement as he kept shooting ahead of them, blowing up more and more soldiers, aircraft, and projectiles. "That's right, if this DeSoto can travel through time, fly to the Moon and beyond, go across oceans and underwater, go on extremely long car trips without gas, and survive going to Hell and back, what makes you think she's not completely indestructible?"

"She?" asked Coconuts.

"Yeah, she has a soul," Max said. "We don't know where she got it. It would probably be an inconvenience to us if she didn't like breaking stuff and running over people as much as we do."

"Oh," said Scratch, not sure what to make of this.

"Hey, then does this mean we do have souls after all?" Grounder asked hopefully.

"I could shoot you then go to Hell and see if you're there," Sam offered.

Grounder paled. "Ah, no thanks, that won't be necessary, just keep shooting our brethren."

"Why are we letting them kill all those other robots? They're practically cousins to us!" Coconuts whispered to the others.

"Ah, they're just worthless consumer models," Scratch said dismissively.

"And they were probably mean to us and laughing at us behind our backs anyway," Grounder huffed. "Good riddance!"

Coconuts sweatdropped. "Okay…but shouldn't we be worried that the Doc seems to be shooting at us?"

"He probably doesn't know we're done here," Scratch said with a shrug.

"I've tried calling him, but I keep getting a 'busy' signal," Grounder said, transforming one drill hand into a cell phone. "He's probably on the line with somebody else. I'll try again later."

Eggman (who was, of course, purposefully blocking Grounder's calls), seeing that an entire army did not seem to seriously hinder Sam and Max's progress up the mountainside, decided to up the ante, reloading the Egg Colossus's shoulder launchers and firing another pair of giant missiles at the DeSoto. "Maybe this'll teach them!" Eggman laughed ghoulishly.

"Well, I suppose there's no kill like overkill…" Ergo muttered under his artificial breath.

Sonic, who was still trapped in the Colossus's fist and had no idea who was in the car defying the laws of physics in the way it was driving up the mountain, deflecting bullets and lasers and missiles, and casually mowing down every robot in its path, sweatdropped as the giant missiles shot past him. "Wow, he must really hate whoever's down there…I'm starting to feel jealous. I think he's even forgotten I'm here or something!"

"Holy crap! Look at the size of those things!" Scratch shrieked as the gigantic missiles flew towards them. "Can your magic car survive those?!"

"Probably," said Sam. "But just to be safe…" He pointed his gun at the missiles and fired two shots. Rather than blowing up the warheads, the bullets destroyed the missiles' guidance systems and caused them to turn around and fly right back at their master.

Eggman's eyes widened in horror. "No! NO NOT AGAI-"

The missiles hit the giant robot with a cataclysmic explosion, shattering every piece of glass within several miles except for the DeSoto's windshield, which was everythingproof. Flames and pillars of smoke rising from its damaged form, the Colossus teetered and fell backwards with a great metallic groan, landing on its back with an impact that shook the earth and caused the car to actually bounce two feet into the air before landing on a poor Egg Keeper's head. The jaws of the S.S.S.S.S.S. dropped in disbelief. "Hmm," said Sam, holstering his gun and taking the wheel back from Max as they emerged from the routed horde of robots and continued driving up the increasingly steep mountain slope.

"That takes care of that."

"Awww, we're done already? I wanted to hit more things!" Max complained.

"When you become a robot, little buddy, you can run over anything you want," Sam assured his partner.

"Did he just shoot down the Doctor?!" asked a horrified Grounder.

"Do you think he's okay?" asked a worried Coconuts.

"Relax, he's fine, he's always been able to handle a few explosions or crashes," Scratch reassured his colleagues. "And I'm sure he'll forgive us for any part we might have played in the destruction of his latest war machine once we deliver the roboticized President of the United Federation to him!"

The others perked up at this. "Yeah," Grounder agreed. "He'll shower us with rewards! Lube jobs and hot robot babes as far as the eye can see!"

"And a job that doesn't involve scrubbing toilets!" Coconuts agreed. "At last! Upward mobility, just what I've always dreamed of!"

"Hey Sam, I think we might have a problem," Max said, looking at the 'road' ahead. "How're we gonna get up there?"

'Up there' was the Mega-Roboticizer Tower, which was currently standing atop a very tiny rock spire jutting from the huge crater that was all that remained of the upper quarter of the mountain. The DeSoto was approaching the rim of said crater at very high speeds.

"Hmm…" Sam glanced around. "Aha! Look, over there, a conveniently placed ramp with dash panels and jump pads on it!"

"Just the sort of deus ex machina we can always rely on to save us at the last minute!" Max said.

Sam swerved the DeSoto to the right and hit the first set of dash panels at the base of the ramp, boosting the car's already ludicrous speeds to impossibly fast and causing the robots in the backseat to scream and hold onto each other for safety again. Their speed got progressively faster as they drove up the ramp, hitting panel after panel, until finally they were launched off the jump pad at the top, sailed through a trio of rainbow rings which launched them over the gaping chasm of the crater…

And crashed into a spiked ball. Which EXPLODED. Because the DeSoto's just that cool. They continued flying through the air and slammed into the force field protecting the Tower, which also exploded, landed on the tiny island of land the Tower was standing on, bounced so hard that the seatbelts of the S.S.S.S.S.S. broke and they were flung out of the car. Sam hit the brakes so hard that the tires briefly burst into flame, melting the snow as the car slowly and almost reluctantly trundled to a stop just before the edge of the island. Putting the car in park, he removed the keys from the ignition and got out. "Here we are, standing at the foot of the Mega-Roboticizer Tower, probably moments away from activation."

"At last! I can fulfill my destiny of becoming the first robotic president of the United Federation!" Max declared as he hopped out of the car. "Come, Sam! To the top of the tower!" He paused. "How're we gonna get up there?"

"I see an elevator," Sam said, pointing to the maintenance elevator Sonic had intended to use earlier.

"Great! Let's go on up, I want to get the maximum roboticization treatment so that I can be invincible and stuff! And so that you can get your better gun. And maybe a cooler hat," said Max.

"What's wrong with my current hat?" Sam asked self-consciously.

"Nothing, but there are always cooler versions of everything," Max pointed out.

"Good point, little buddy. Let's go!" They entered the elevator and started riding it up.

The neglected robots groaned and pulled themselves to their feet. Scratch reattached his makeshift limbs, which had been knocked off when he hit the ground. "Well, we made it," said Grounder.

"I'm amazed we're not dead!" commented Coconuts.

"The tower's about to roboticize the planet, the President is going to be roboticized, and Sonic's nowhere to be found! I think we're actually going to come out of this in one piece for a change! Ba-ha! Ha-ha!" Scratch said triumphantly.

Coconuts groaned. "You just jinxed us. I'm almost certain of it. Something's going to go horribly wrong, I just know it, it always does!"

"Aw, cheer up, Coconuts! Why do you have to be so pessimistic all the time?" Grounder asked.

"Because I'm me, and I know my life sucks," the monkey said morbidly.

Meanwhile, the elevator had reached the highest level of the tower, though it had been hampered a bit by Max pressing every button on the control panel 'just to see what would happen.' Nevertheless, they made it to the very top, and stepped out onto a cold, very windy balcony at the very pinnacle of the tower, just underneath the big sphere resembling Eggman's head that would boost the roboticizer's energy signal to encompass the entire globe. "Wow, the Doctor sure likes making things that look like his face, doesn't he?" Max commented.

"All the best evil overlords are obsessed with their own image, Max. Isn't that why you've already renamed several states and cities after yourself and ordered the construction of mile-high statues to glorify you for all eternity?" Sam asked.

"Good point. And I'm gonna make even more once I become an all-powerful robot!" Max said. "To get the maximum effect, I will climb to the very top, so that I can absorb as much roboticizer power as I possibly can!"

"And I'll just stand down here, where it's safer," said Sam. "Be careful not to fall, little buddy, we're so far off the ground I think I can see our office from up here."

"Don't worry, Sam, I can't possibly fall! It's my destiny!" Max declared as he started scrambling up the Eggman-shaped sphere, using the moustache antennas for handholds.

"Remember that destiny is what you make of it," Sam pointed out. "That's how we made you High Priest of the Sea Monkeys, after all."

"Then I'm making it my destiny to rule the United Federation, no, the WORLD under the iron fist I'll receive by becoming a robo-President!" Max decided as he reached the top of the sphere and stood there dramatically, awaiting the glorious transformation that would occur when the tower activated in just a few seconds.

In the bridge of the Egg Colossus, Eggman stirred and regained consciousness. "Ugh…SA-55, remind me never to make missiles that can be deflected back at me again."

"I already did," Ergo said flatly.

"Oh," said Eggman. "In that case, remind me to listen to you more often, you seem to actually know what you're talking about."

Ergo blinked in astonishment. "Doctor, are you all right? Do you have a concussion or something? You're actually admitting a mistake, ergo, you have either suffered a severe head injury or are beginning to realize the flaws in your own designs. I'll go activate the medi-bots, we must isolate this problem before it gets any worse." Eggman facepalmed.

"You might want to wait on that, Doc…because you'll need a whole lot more than a few medi-bots when I'm through with you!" a familiar voice said.

Eggman glanced up in astonishment to find Sonic standing on his console, the sparking corpses of his crew and the decimated remains of the Egg Colossus's control center burning behind him. "Eh?! Sonic! How'd you get in here?!"

Sonic smirked. "That big hand lost its grip on me when your little toy fell down and went boom! It was pretty easy to break in here and smash all your stuff after that. And now I think it's time for me to finish things up by scrambling some Eggheads!" He cracked his knuckles.

Desperate, Eggman glanced at his control panel to try and find a way to defend himself…and laughed when he saw how much time was left on the digital countdown. "You're too late, Sonic! In thirty seconds, the tower will activate, and the glorious age of Eggman shall begin!"

Sonic's eyes widened in horror and he whirled around to stare at the tower, visible through the hole he had smashed through the cockpit dome. "Oh crap!" He sped out of the bridge, rushing towards the distant peak as fast as he could.

Eggman laughed maniacally as he pulled himself to his feet, leaning on Ergo (much to the latter's displeasure. "It's too late, Sonic! There's nothing you can do! Not even the fastest thing alive can outrace DESTINY!"

Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts started as the Mega-Roboticizer Tower came to life with a terrifying roar, bits of the island it was standing on crumbling as its various reactors powered up and sent energy flowing to its various nefarious systems. Power surged up the height of the tower, spotlights and beacons and sensor arrays activating in great flashes of light as bit by bit the monstrous machine came online. The Eggman face on the tower's top lit up with a blinding red glow as waves of force and radiance shimmered off it, visible from space and from miles and miles away as a beacon of doom and destruction. Sam, holding onto his hat so that it wouldn't be blown away, hit tie flying up in his face, gazed up at the evil luminance in awe as Max stood atop the crackling and glowing mass of malevolent energy, arms pointed upwards and head thrown back with the biggest grin he had ever seen plastered across the lagomorph's face. "I'm king of the world, Sam! KING OF THE WORLD! AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

"The power has gone to his head!...which isn't much different from how he usually is, I suppose," Sam said, briefly panicking and immediately calming down.

The evil glow from the tower grew…and grew…and grew…

And suddenly it exploded. Not as in sent waves of roboticizing energy around the globe, as in it actually exploded into a tremendous ball of fire, the Tower shattering segment by segment as immense gouts of flame blasted out of its sides and reduced it to a crumbling burning metal skeleton. Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts, seeing the explosions reaching ground level, screamed and tried to make a run for it, but there was nowhere left for them to go, and so got caught in the blast when the Tower bottom finally exploded like everything else. As more and more explosions and bursts of flame erupted from the disintegrating structure, the thin island and needle of rock it was standing on collapsed under the force of all the earth-shaking kabooms, causing the remains of Dr. Eggman's latest superweapon to plummet into the depths of the crater below, where it crashed and set off an even BIGGER explosion that sent a pillar of smoke and flame rising into the sky as avalanches, rock falls, and minor quakes shook the surrounding mountains and landscape. And then, finally, all was silent.

"Whoa," said an impressed Rotor, standing with the other Freedom Fighters at the edge of the crater, staring at what was left of what had been one of the Doctor's most ambitious plans yet. "I don't think that was supposed to happen."

"Nicole, what just happened?" Sally asked her computer.

"Uncertain. Sensors detected energy levels in the Mega-Roboticizer Tower reaching their peak before abruptly overloading and tearing the structure apart. The cause of this overload is unknown," Nicole replied.

"It must've been Sonic!" Tails decided. "Who else could it have been? He must have managed to get to the tower and shut it down at the last minute or something!"

Mighty nodded in agreement. "Yeah, that sounds like something he'd do."

"But there's no way he could possibly have gotten out of there in time…nothing could have survived that!" said Dulcy.

Knuckles shook his head. "He went out like a true hero…hmmph. I can't believe I'm saying this, but I think I'm gonna miss that hedgehog."

"What a guy…" Vector agreed.

Sally squeezed her eyes shut. "Oh, Sonic…"

"Uh, guys, what're you talking about? I'm right over here," said Sonic, walking up.

They jumped. "SONIC!"

"So you did make it out in time! I knew you could!" Tails screamed, hugging the hedgehog.

Sonic gave him a confused look. "What're you talking about?"

"You escaped the tower just before it exploded because of whatever it was you did to it, right sugah hog?" Bunnie guessed.

Sonic blinked. "Actually, I just got here. I'm just as confused as to why it abruptly blew up as you guys are!"

There was a pause. "Wait…then you mean you, the great Sonic the Hedgehog, was actually late for once in stopping an Eggman plan?!" asked an astonished Knuckles.

"I think Hell's just frozen over," said a stunned Kale, coldly.

"Espio, do you see any pigs flying anywhere?" Vector asked the chameleon.

"No, but I see Charmy. Does he count?" Espio asked.

Vector glanced at Charmy. "Eh, good enough, he eats like a pig all the time."

"Hey!" Charmy yelled.

"But…" started the confused Sally. "If you didn't stop the tower from activating…then who did?"

"That would be us, Ms. Acorn," Sam said as he and Max drove up in the DeSoto, running over Knuckles in the process.

Sally groaned. "Oh no, not you two…"

The Chaotix gasped. "You!"

Max blinked. "Yes, us. Who're you?"

"None other than your greatest rivals, of course! The Chaotix!" Vector said angrily.

Sam and Max stared at them. "The who now?"

"The Chaotix!" Vector repeated. "You know, the private detective agency who you guys are constantly stealing jobs from?!"

Sam shrugged. "Never heard of you."

"We wrote an angry letter to you just last week!" Charmy said angrily.

"And attached a ninja bomb to blow up your office so we could get some of our customers back, rather than losing clients to you all the time!" Espio agreed.

Sam looked at Max. "I don't remember getting any angry letters or bombs in the mail last week, do you Max?"

"I think I might have eaten it, Sam," Max confessed.

Sam frowned. "Now Max, you know we've talked about your eating habits regarding the mail…"

"Oh, like you don't still chase after the mailman, barking on all fours," Max retorted.

"Touché," Sam said grudgingly.

"Could somebody get this car off me?!" Knuckles yelled from underneath the DeSoto. "One of the tires is digging into my spine…"

"President Max…Vice President Sam…how…nice to see you again…" Sally said through gritted teeth.

"Uh, Sal, who are these guys, and why do you look so unhappy to see them?" Sonic whispered to Sally.

"Those are Sam and Max, Freelance Police and current leaders of the United Federation," Sally whispered back. "They've technically saved the world several times from rather bizarre threats, but are rather psychotic and hurt about as many people as they indirectly help. The Federation is currently on fairly pleasant terms with the Acorn Kingdom, but the fact that Max is certifiably insane, has a rather large stash of nuclear missiles which he's perfectly happy to launch at random targets without regard to foreign treaties or international law, and has occasionally talked about starting wars and blowing up the world for fun has made us rather…uneasy about him."

"He's also Cream's crazy uncle," Tails recalled.

"Which means he's related to me, too, but not by blood," Bunnie said with a grimace. "Thank goodness, because pretty much everyone in his family is crazy! Ah'm surprised little Cream and her dad aren't nutty like Max is."

Sonic blinked. "I thought the President was some human guy."

"He was, but then he got decapitated and an emergency election was held between Max and a living statue of Abraham Lincoln, and Max won," Sally explained.

"…Oh…" Sonic said, utterly confused. "How the heck did he get elected to office?!"

"Cheating and bribery, mainly," said Sam, who had been standing next to them the whole time and had heard the entire thing. "You know, the usual way politicians get ahead."

"Hiya Princess…Sam, what's her name again?" Max asked Sam.

"Sally," Sam said.

Max nodded. "Right, that. How're things at the Walnut Republic-"

"Acorn Kingdom," Sam corrected.

Max nodded. "Right, that."

"They're doing pretty well," Sally said with fake cheer. "Oh, and we got that care package you sent us the other day. I'm sure the war orphans whose parents are still robians toiling under Eggman's control will appreciate the food and money you sent."

Max blinked. "War orphans? Sam, you said that I was helping an effort to kill all clowns, vampires, and Renaissance reenactment participants in the Mushroom-"

"Acorn," Sam and Sally reminded him.

"Kingdom!" Max finished.

"Sorry little buddy, you know how often I get those two mixed up," Sam apologized as a vengeful Espio flung a kunai at his head from behind, only for it to rebound off the anti-mind control technology reinforcing his hat and hit the jack that Kale had been trying to use to lift the DeSoto off of Knuckles, causing the car to drop on him. The others sweatdropped.

"So, uh, you said that you guys were responsible for blowing up that there tower…or something?" Rotor asked awkwardly to change the subject.

Sam nodded. "Yes, a trio of friendly but bumbling robots attempted to capture Max for some nefarious purpose and told us about Doctor Eggman's latest evil plot after we tortured them horrendously."

"Not that horrendously, I never got to show them the things growing between my toes," Max commented, causing the others to sweatdrop and shudder.

"After that, we came here straight away, with the intention of using the Mega-Roboticizer to turn ourselves into the world's first robot President and robot Vice-President," Sam continued.

The Freedom Fighters stared at them. "Wait…you're saying you came because you wanted to become robots?!" asked a horrified Sally.

"You're crazy!" shouted Bean, completely ironically.

"Why on Earth would anyone want to be roboticized?!" asked the disbelieving Bunnie, who knew full well how horrible it was.

"For all the neat toys, duh," Max said.

"Yeah, there are some pretty neat toys—I mean, it's completely unethical and unforgivable!" Tails said quickly when everyone glared at him.

"That's what they keep saying about my universal food care plan for some reason," Max said. "What's wrong with rounding up all the homeless people, shooting them, and turning them into cheap, healthy food for everyone who can't afford to get the nutrients they need at the local supermarket? It even has such a catchy tag line…Soylent Green is made of people! Sticks in your head, doesn't it?" Everyone but Sam and Vector gave him horrified looks, the latter because he actually thought that might be a pretty good idea considering how seldom they were able to buy food to put on the table…on the other hand, the Chaotix were often very close to fitting into the category of people who would be processed into this Soylent Green stuff…

"So we drove over here, though the robots put up an odd amount of resistance for some reason…you'd think they didn't want us to become roboticized or something," Sam said. "And we reached the tower and waited for it to transform us, but, well…"

"It exploded!" Max complained. "Totally unfair. At this rate I'll never become a walking death machine with laser vision, fire breath, missile knees, sonic ear blasters, toxic farts, and the ability to launch nukes at any point on Mobius whenever I please!"

"You already have the ability to do the last two, Max," Sam pointed out.

"But I'm not a robot when I'm doing it, so it's not as cool!" Max whined. The others sweatdropped.

"So it just…exploded?" Sonic asked. "Why?"

Max shrugged. "No clue. Lots of things spontaneously combust around us for no reason. Like that one Dr. Fritz Nunkie guy when he was about to sacrifice us to the volcano god of Mt. Kilamansta."

"Although if I could hazard a guess, it would probably be due to Max being a near-perfect embodiment of randomness and chaos, by which I mean insanity and disorder, not the life-force energy thing found in those seven sparkly MacGuffins everyone's always so crazy about," said Sam. "And the roboticizer, being a machine designed to enforce pure order upon the world in the form of sterile machination, could not help but self-destruct upon encountering such a pure source of impulsive madness, much like how Hugh Bliss's plans to bring about peace on Mobius self-destructed when Max interfered."

"That was fun," Max recalled. "And I got to beat up everyone on the planet afterwards, which was even more fun!"

"So…you broke the machine because Max is too insane to be roboticized?!" Sally asked incredulously.

"Pretty much," said Max.

"Hmm…think that means Charmy's immune, too?" Vector wondered.

"No, there's a difference between pure insanity and pure stupidity," said Espio.

"Which one am I?" Charmy asked, immediately demonstrating which category he belonged in.

"Were you guys too insane to be blown to smithereens, too?" Sonic asked.

Sam shook his head. "No, we jumped off the Tower just as it started exploding, glided down to our car, and drove off to safety."

They stared at them. "You glided down," Sally said blankly.

Sam nodded. "Yep."

"But…you don't have wings!" protested Dulcy.

Bark, as silent as ever, had been trying to lift the surprisingly heavy DeSoto to help Mighty and Knuckles out, but when he heard Sam's comment, he accidentally lost focus, his grip slipped, and about half of his body became trapped under the car.

"Or any body parts that could be used in place of wings!" Tails said, wiggling his tails.

"Ah, but that's where you're wrong," said Sam. "Using an ancient Tibetan meditation technique I learned from an alternate timeline in which I was a Buddhist monk, I was able to trick myself into thinking I could fly and flapped my arms like a bird to slow my descent and reach the car safely."

"And my ears inflate like parachutes when I fall great distances, due to all the air whistling through them at high velocities and the general hollowness of my skull," Max said.

"…Oh," the others said, having no idea what to make of this.

"Well, uh, thanks for destroying the tower…even though you actually came here to use it on yourselves…" Sally muttered under her breath.

"No problem, princess! We'd be happy to do it again!" Max said. "Now, how much are you gonna pay us for saving your asses?" Sally gave him an appalled look.

Suddenly, Sam's pocket started vibrating. "Hold that thought, little buddy!" He whipped out a cell phone in a swift backhand motion that also hit Vector, who had been quietly sneaking up on him from behind, in the jaw without even noticing he was there, flinging the crocodile backwards and causing him to land before the front bumper of the DeSoto. The car suddenly surged a few feet forward, causing the three Mobians already trapped under it to scream in pain as the DeSoto's tires rolled over them again and caught poor Vector under its chassis as well. Everyone who had been standing close to the car backed away in alarm, wondering if it was haunted, which was not too far off the mark. Sam flipped open the phone and listened for a moment. "Yes? Yes? No! Yes?" He gasped. "Holy Paul McCartney doing the tango with Paula Abdul and the cast of Friends while the devil dances in the pale moonlight! We're on our way!" He hung up and glanced at his partner. "Sam, that was the Commissioner! There's bad trouble on Mars. Empress Zirconia has been overthrown by a coup planned by her evil and jealous sister Pyrita, and if she's not put back on the throne soon, it could cause a conflict that'll embroil the solar system in interplanetary war!"

Max gasped in horror. "Not Empress Zirconia! C'mon, Sam, we've gotta hurry!"

They got in the DeSoto, causing the four Mobians caught underneath it to gasp in pain as the weight of the two freelance police/ruling politicians caused the vehicle to put more pressure on their injured bodies. "Wait, wait, back up: you're going to Mars?!" Rotor asked incredulously.

"Yes," said Sam. "It wouldn't be the first time."

"But…how're you getting there?" asked a confused Sally.

"Driving, duh," said Max as if it were obvious. "How else would we get there?"

"…" Nobody had any response to that.

Sam turned the ignition, causing the DeSoto's engine to gleefully roar to life. "Sorry to cut this short, but we have an emergency to deal with!"

Max nodded. "Yeah, but we should still make it to that UN conference in a few weeks. See you then, Princess Susan!"

"It's Sally," said Sally, Sonic, and Sam.

"Whatever," said Max as the DeSoto bumpily rolled over Knuckles, Mighty, Dulcy, and Vector, drove down the slope of the mountain, then abruptly lifted off the ground and flew high into the air, disappearing as it receded into the distance.

Everyone stared after the vanished car. "What…just happened?" asked a very confused Tails.

"I have no idea, little bro," said Sonic.

"I told ya he was weird," said Bunnie.

Sally groaned and rubbed her temples. "I am not looking forward to seeing those two at the conference…"

"What's it about, anyway?" asked Rotor.

"What we should do about the constant famine and infighting in Shamar," said Sally.

"Ouch," said Rotor, already imagining what Max's suggestion for dealing with the problem might be.

"Espio, why don't we have a car that cool?" Charmy asked.

"Because we can't even afford bus fare, due to those two always stealing all our business," Espio growled. "And they refused to even acknowledge us…how dare they!"

"Will somebody help us up already?!" Knuckles shouted. "I think I'm dying here!"

"And my spine's been dislocated!" yelled Kale.

"Ow...", muttered Bark.

"And my tail's all out of shape and my ribs are busted!" wailed Vector. "Oh well, at least nothing happened to my beautiful singing voice!" Espio and Charmy groaned in disappointment.

A little later, back at Eggman's base…

"Well, that was an absolute disaster," Eggman groaned as his medi-bots tended to his injuries, causing him to wince and cringe and bite his lips as they probed his wounds and sealed them with stinging stitches and salves. "I can't think of anyway that could have possibly gone any worse!"

"I can," said Ergo as repair bots polished him, fixed his joints, and filled in a dent or two in his spherical head. "But you're right, it was a disaster. Do you really think that it's all because of those defective units?"

"Positive!" snarled Eggman. "While I'm sure Sam and Max played some part in what happened, they wouldn't have been there in the first place if not for those imbeciles!" He grinned coldly. "At least they did one thing right...considering that we couldn't detect their signals after the explosion, they must finally be dead for good. And unless Void gets it into that emerald-haired head of his to snatch a few new ones, they'll stay that way for a very, very long time."

Ergo groaned. "What have I told you about not tempting fate like that?"

Eggman blinked in puzzlement. "What do you-"

It was at that moment that the doors to the repair ward slid open and the severely wounded Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts limped in. "We're hoooooome!" Scratch yelled as he hobbled into the room on a crutch, both of his prosthetic limbs gone along with his crest and most of the left side of his face.

"We made it, Doc! We made it back!" Grounder said, rolling in on a motorized wheelchair, his drill nose gone along with one of his eyes, an arm, and both his tank treads. "It was really touch and go for a minute there, and we actually thought we were going to die, but we were able to pull ourselves together and make it back here!"

Coconuts nodded, his lightbulb broken and most of his body wrapped in a cast, with only his tail and a pair of roller skates on his broken feet to give him propulsion. "We considered giving up a few times, but whenever we did we thought of you, and how you wouldn't be able to go on without us by your side! We couldn't let you suffer life without your favorite and most loyal robots with you, so we knew we had to come home, for you!"

"What's with the weird look on your face, Doc?" Scratch asked, noticing Eggman's dropped jaw and quivering lips. "Are you so happy to see us you've got no words left?"

"No…" Eggman whispered. "No…NO…NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!" he wailed, bursting into tears and thrusting his face into his hands.

"Aww, look!" said a happy Grounder. "He's so pleased to see us that he's crying! He must have been really worried about us."

"It gives me a nice warm feeling in my capacitor to see him like this," Coconuts said fondly. "Or is that my generator breaking? It's hard to tell sometimes."

"Don't worry, Doc," Scratch said, hobbling over and putting his only hand on Eggman's shoulder. "We'll never leave you again!" Eggman sobbed and started crying harder.

Ergo sweatdropped. "…Incredible. Maybe they really are too stupid to live…"