Chapter 4: interludes and beginnings

Tails Got up from his chair taking off the headset. Moving around the counter he began pouring the soup cups. He heard the door close, he looked up watching her walk in wrapped in an old purple bath robe she must have found. She was holding a pile of wet cloths and had her bag slung over her shoulder. "You wouldn't happen to have a heater would you?" She asked. "Something to dry my cloths?"

He nodded and pointed to the corner of the living room. "There's a portable heater in the corner." He watched as she set it up and. "Hey I've got someone for you to meet."

She looked up from what she was doing. "Oh? Who is it?" She moved to lay out her cloths on the arm of the couch. Angling the space heater towards their direction.

Tails unplugged the headset causing the speaker to click on. Getting out of the chair he motioned her to come over. "I'd like you to meet the commander of the freedom fighters, Sally Acorn."

Alyx hesitantly walked over and he handed her a cup of soup. She nodded mouthing thank you and sat down letting the warm cup cool. Looking at the computer she could see the visage of an adult Mobian on the other side, maybe a different subspecies or race? She didn't know much about Mobian physiology yet. "Hello Ma'am. My name is Alyx." She greeted nodding her head.

Tails moved to the couch behind pulling a book from under it sitting down he began to read an ear twitching their direction.

The figure on the monitor smiled. "My name is Sally, I hear you're interested in joining my freedom fighters."

Alyx nodded. "If I can offer help then I want to." She replied.

Sally leaned back in her chair resting her chin in her knuckle. "good, you also claim to be a realm-walker is that right?"

Alyx paused thinking on the word. "What?"

Tails cut in. "She means you come from Robotniks world."

Alyx nodded to him. "Yea, just haven't heard of a realm-walker though."

Sally sighed. "There are rumors and legends of realm walkers. Robotnik and Snivly are the most recent that we know of. Odd to have a Mobian realm-walker. Do you know how you got back?"

Alyx sagged a bit in her seat. "No ma'am, at least not the specifics of how it works." Her hands gripped the edge of the stool between her legs. "A strange man brought me here to help stop Dr. Kintober."

Sally frowned. "Its been a long time since he's gone by that name. He goes by Robotnik now." Sally looked up meeting her gaze. "The man who brought you, was it another human?"

Alyx winced. "Maybe?" She sucked in air between her teeth. "I don't think so… actually I don't know what he is but he doesn't act human..."

Sally started tapping a finger against the arm rest. "Enlighten me, how are humans supposed to act?" Her eyebrow rose.

Alyx paused. "Well kind of like how you and I are acting right now." She shrugged. "At least the decent ones I suppose." Then shook her head. "I don't think I explained that guy very well. Its like he's an alien in a skin suit. His native accent is something other then... people? Human or Mobian? I don't know… " She met Sally's gaze. "I just know that Robotnik wasn't supposed to cause all this damage and in whatever way I'm supposed to help."

Sally leaned into the computer desk folding her hands. "I'm going to be forward with you Alyx. There are some legends of fur-less creatures like humans in the past. My father…" She paused. "Eagerly sought out Robotnik based off of legends of prosperity and golden ages of advancement… His technology may have ended the great war but the tip of the Speer was then pointed at us..."

Alyx paused. "From my own experience… I think you got a bad apple, please don't judge us all based on what he's done..." She replied.

There was a pregnant pause and Sally continued. "Look, even if you were there... You are from Mobius…" She sighed resting her fingers on her temple. "Its like your defending them..."

Alyx looked down. "I'm not defending Robotnik…" She sighed. "Besides I love my Dad... He taught me a good relationship takes truth…" She met Sallys gaze. "that's why I'm telling you guys this to begin with…"

Sally took a deep breath. "Prove to me your a daughter of Mobius."

Alyx nodded. "I want to prove it to you, I want to fight." she puffed up. "If I can I want to prove not all humans aren't like him!"

A sly smile crossed Sally's face. "Maybe there are some decent humans after all…" She mumbled. Leaning back she continued. "Your going to be on probation for a good while. All refugees who are brought to Knothole are placed under restriction for a time." She leaned into her cheek, tilting her head back in question. "So Alyx, What is you're world like, what do you do?"

Alyx straitened up. "The world I come from is similar to the one here. There are cities, trees, mountains and oceans. The humans of my world also fight for freedom against the Combine Empire similar to how you fight Robotnik." She leaned back slouching, a goofy grin on her face. "I'm usually a scout… but in my free time I like to fix stuff and tinker."

Sally looked passed Alyx noticing tails in the backdrop on the couch, an ear pointed in their direction flicking every once in a while. She grinned until she realized the first part she said and felt unsettled. "What are you 16? You look a bit young to be a field scout."

Alyx looked confused. "If it matters, I'm 19. What does age have to do with it if your at war?"

Tails ear flicked in the background as he turned the page of his book.

Sally bristled a bit. "We have suffered too much loss to carelessly throw away life now. Too many of our freedom fighters have been captured and Roboticized."

"Whats that... Roboticized?" Alyx asked.

It dawned on Sally, this girl really wasn't from around here... "The roboticizer is a machine that turns people into metal slaves..." She paused. "It's extremely difficult to break the mind control and we still don't have a way of reversing the transformation..."

Alyx's mind raced as her eyes popped. "Wait… like flesh to metal? How is that possible!? How would that even work!?"

Sally sighed. "We think it has something to do with nanites but you can ask some of the scientists trying to reverse the process if you want more information." She thought for a second. "You said you tinkered and fixed stuff? We might have a use for that. I've also heard you are quite the inventor."

Alyx blew on the hot cup cooling it down. "That's just something I do in my free time. Most of my expertise is scout work but sometimes in that kind of work you are stationed in the same place for months. You end up reading and tinkering in your free time." She took a bite of her soup and her eyes lit up her ears perking. "This is really good."

Both sally and tails looked at her weird with the change in subject. Tails closed his book with a snap. "Its just some old stale noodles and broth..."

She looked over to him. "Its got actual flavor! It tastes like meat! Most of what we eat is water flavored calorie supplements and nutrient paste!

Sally butted back in trying to keep from giggling. "Lets try and stay on subject."

Alyx turned back to her excited. "Sorry its just usually we save this kind of stuff for special occasions! Canned food is rare, they confiscate it!"

Sally paused a confused look on her face. "Right…" She had a thought. "You were raised by humans right?" She perked up.

Alyx nodded as she chowed down on the stale noodles. "Yea?" She managed her mouth full.

"Do you know human technology? Like their computers?" Sally asked?

Alyx nodded vigorously. "Oh yea! I know DOS and the Unix in general. My dad minored in computer science and programming! He was a lead sys-admin for Black Mesa! When we weren't running from Civil Protection..." She smiled. "Daddy daughter time was playing games on computers and then learning how they worked. The Combine might have integrated a lot of their technology on Earth but they still rely on a lot of human machines and infrastructure. Dad's the expert on combine computers though, I only just started experimenting with those." She said between mouthfuls. "I'm getting better at those though." She slurped. "Regular computers are easy."

Sally nodded getting excited. "I want to invite you to stay in one of our holdout settlements, Knothole. Tails can bring you, we'll have to take some standard security measures though." Sally leaned back in her chair. "I'd like to have you talk to our electronic warfare team." She looked at her adoptive son. "Tails, I'm tasking you with being her chaperone once you two are back."

He nodded. "Alright." He replied straining a smile. "We can leave in the morning."

Sally smirked looking back to Alyx. "Would this be acceptable?"

Alyx nodded looking over her shoulder smiling at Tails. "I don't see why not."

Sally looked at them both. "I don't think I should need to tell you to be discrete. Don't expose yourselves unless its absolutely necessary." She looked at the young woman. "It was nice meeting you Alyx. If you serve the fight well then you can have a place in my kingdom." She looked back to her adoptive son. "Stay safe Miles, I love you." And she ended the call.

Alyx swiveled the chair looking at Tails who was now stretching out on the couch. "High up on the commanders list? And whats with the kingdom talk?"

Tails blushed under his fur. "Sally's like my mom, she found me right after the Coup." He sighed. "To answer your second question, her dad was the king."

Alyx raised an eyebrow. "So... she is a princess?"

Tails laid back on the couch resting his eyes. "Yep princess Sally Acorn."

"Huh." She mumbled. Getting up from the computer stool she moved to sit at the coffee table across from him. Pulling her bag over she started to dig through it. "I get that, My dad's a leading head in the human resistance." She pulled out the combine pulse weapon.

Tails paused eyeing the strange object. "Is that a lasgun?"

She pulled the mutitool from her bag and activated the hologram interface. "Lazgun?" She held her tool over the gun as it projected a holographic interface.

"Laser projectile weapon, like a blaster? Energy weapon?" He nervously chuckled his ears perking.

"I guess." She started manipulating the holographic interface in front of her. "I'm hoping its more usable then the weapons I had." She noticed his nervousness. "You ok?"

"I… I just didn't realize you had something like that." There was more silence between them as she started working on the gun. He had a thought though. "What was it like getting shot? You implied you've been shot more then once..."

She stopped her examination of the interface and looked over to him. "It's…" She paused. "It's different almost every time." She sighed looking back to the hologram. "That last time it was like a bad burn." She paused listing off on her fingers. "Sometimes its like someone chucking a rock at you, sometimes its like a hot poker, there's been times where its like a intense pinch." She huffed. "And sometimes you don't even notice, that's close to what happened today. When you don't realize how bad it is and your just bleeding... that's when its the worst." She sighed pinching the bridge of her nose "I didn't realize light could do that, that's why I didn't take it seriously... it just felt like a burn."

His head rolled back on the pillow as he stared up at the popcorn ceiling above them. He yawned and scratched his chin as his eyes returned to watching her work. "so what are you doing?" He asked.

"This gun has a genetic lockout." She replied. "I'm trying to see if there's a way to completely bypass it or add another user." She swiped through screen after screen poking pieces with the multi tool.

His eyes tried to follow her quick movements. "Is that a Combine weapon?" He looked at the multitool. " The holoprojector looks good, no flicker in it." his eyes started to get droopy as the latent warmth from the heater in the corner started to get him drowsy.

She nodded. "If we are going out tomorrow id rather have something better."

He yawned. "Your a scout right? We can sneak. All this rains going to flood the tunnels we took tonight anyways with acidic fumes."

She chuckled. "I'm a scout in plain sight. If your in an area your not supposed to be in its really difficult to hide from the combine." She looked over to him and gave him a goofy grin. "I can hide in a crowd or more recently run and gun through condemned infrastructure.

He sweat dropped. "Uhh."

She turned back to her work. "Pshhh! we did fineee a few hours ago." She got a smug grin. "That's neat your cloak can block their sensors, is it infrared absorbing paint?" She grinned. "Hey, If all goes to plan you'll guide us and if things get hairy I can defend us!" The interface shrank and big spear with nodes appeared. "And this is what I was looking for, the bypass lock." She stuck out her tong biting it playfully. "Don't know zip bout their data encryption but bashing locks and changing basic code? I can do that!"

He watched her start to link different nodes around each other. "So that kind of looks like a game, how is that hacking?"

She shrugged. "It kind of is a game. Think of these like those relays from the door earlier. Right now if the registered user is not present it wont actuate." She moved a node. "Now both conditions unlock the firing mechanism." She scoffed. "Gene editing required? Yea right Russel..." She huffed under her breath. The guns functions lit up and she pressed the eject. The half used antimatter cartridge popped out and she pulled the trigger dry firing the weapon. Picking up the half used cartridge she fed it back into the mechanism and it re-situated. "Perfect." She tossed the locked gun back in her bag.

He yawned again."I think its about time for bed." looking at his watch. "Its around 2200 hours." He stretched. "I'll take the couch. There's a bedroom across from the restroom."

She smiled yawning as well. "I think your right." Going over she checked her cloths to see if they had dried. They needed more time. She slung her bag and went to the bedroom to sleep.

Tails watched her go and crawled up on the arm of the couch to the light switch turning it off. Dropping back onto the couch he listened to the soft blow of the heater in the corner he drifted to sleep.

It was raining, the sky was dark and full of soot. The rain collected in muddy pools on the roof. Time began to slow and the rain stopped. As it hovered in the air a door opened showing white on the other side. The G-man stepped out dusting his suit jacket with his hand. The shutter closed behind him and he walked to the roofs edge. Looking over the dark city he frowned. In the distance he could see the industrial district with search lights scouring the area. He took a deep breath and turned around walking back to where the door had been. As he left the spot a faded form shimmered as if splitting from him. The form faded in and out materializing a being two feet shorter then him. As he turned around there was another being there staring at him. A Scruffy middle aged Mobian wolf in the same suit holding his hands at his side.

The man sighed and waved his hand. "The connection has been cut. we will return but it is... difficult to stay linked? Across this threshold..."

The middle aged wolf nodded. "we understand." He stretched his neck rubbing a soar spot. "Its been a looong time since this form has been taken. Any particular reason we are being left like thisssss?"

The older man nodded. "There is a good chance the doctor will catch us on surveillance. There is only sooooo muchhhh that can be done to..." He chuckled. "hide ourselves?" He cleared his throat handing the Mobian his briefcase. "We understand how disssssorientating the seperrrration can be. It will passss in time. Your assignment is to observe the girl. I will be in contact periodically but as you are aware… We have agreed to abide by… restrictions..."

The wolf leveled his flat eyes to the G-man as he accepted the briefcase. "We understand and anticipate… rejoining… the others…"

The man smiled. "It is good to remember that there may be difference in space or flesh but there is no difference betweeeen us."

The wolf nodded. "Have a pleasant journey back. May the rest of the dreamers guide your sight."

The G-man pulled a letter from his suits inner pocket examining it. "You as well. In the meantime... I have a letter to delivvvver to Mr. Vance."

The wolf tilted his head. "Are you going to give him a crystal of the void?"

The man met the wolfs eyes. "A perfect specimen has not been chosen yet. We must chooose carefully to ensure another resonance cascade does not happen."

Nodding the wolf walked away from the edge. "I will keep an eye on the girl and make sure she stays on the path." The Mobian walked from the scene fading into air.

The man put the letter back in his pocket. "Unforeseen consequences indeed…" A white door opened in front of him and he left.

*CRACK*

Thunder clapped in the background as the empty rooftop resumed being hammered by the rain.

The small man was pacing back and forth. "That signal protocol was from Earth." He mumbled to himself. "That was too perfect to be a fluke." He moved to the console calling the ground forces. "Have you found anything yet?"

"NEGATIVE SIR. NO PHYSICAL TRACE." The swatbot commander replied.

He got up starting to breath harder his head started feeling light. "WHY CAN'T YOU TIN CANS COMPLETE THE SIMPLEST OF TASKS!" He swung the chair into a monitor.

*KABOOM*

The cathode ray tube imploded as it's vacuum was lost spraying glass shards everywhere. He was seething his whole body shaking. He may have been short compared to other humans for his age but his temper could surely match.

"SNIVLY!" A deep baritone voice boomed. "What on Earth was that!" He heard the heavy metal stomping approach him.

He froze starting to sweat as a sinking cold feeling overtook him. He shouldn't have done that, he really shouldn't have done that. He gulped, "In the control room Dr. Robotnik sir..." His nasally voice yelled out. He began wringing his hands nervously. The clanking got louder and the enormous man enter the chamber.

"Here I am out for a midnight stroll and I hear you of doing who knows what. What happened?!" Robotnik snapped. The mans red optics zeroed in on the broken monitor. He clenched his teeth and stared down the his nephew who was starting to shake. "WHAT DID YOU DO?!"

"I'm sorry sir I'll make sure its replaced!" He shook.

Robotnik lunged forward pulling the small man up by his neck. "I give you food, shelter and a place in my home. What gives you the right to break my equipment!" He screamed in the writhing mans face.

"IT WAS A MISTAKE SIR! I FOUND AN ANOMALY BUT THE SWATBOTS FAILED TO TRACK THE SOURCE! I'M SORRY I LET MY TEMPER GET OUT OF CONTROL!" He squealed as he dangled trying to pry the mans metal grip from his throat.

He was thrown to the floor. "What do you mean an anomaly!" Robotnik raged.

Snivly got up on his knees coughing from the close encounter. "A signal that could have only originated from Earth."

Robotnik froze. "That's impossible." He cooled off. "Walk with me worm! and get that monitor fixed!" He grit.

Colin got to his feet grabbing his data-pad, Darting forward to match his uncles long stride he started furiously typing into it. "The lot of monitors will be replaced by tomorrow. It was time we upgraded them anyways, they were starting to show some bad burn in." He swallowed regaining his composure. "I'm sorry sir, its just those infernal swatbots, if you would just let me migrate their AI-" A cold steel hand smacked him hard on the back of the head. He stumbled forward and face planted on the metal floor tile.

"The swatbots are fine. I will not have your AI creations running a muck in My empire!" He barked roughly picking the man up by his scruff and shoved him to his feet. "If you have any improvements to be made submit them to me and I will read them myself!" He growled. "Come, lets go check this anomaly. Since you see fit to litter my control room with broken glass we will take a look in the radio tower." They made their way to the elevator as it opened. "Operator! pull the log for today. All signals." He turned to Colin. "What Sector Snivly?"

He hated that infernal nickname. "Sector 8 the old industrial district." He directed to the computer.

"Of coarse! DR. ROBOTNIK." An off beat chipper voice came over the intercom. "Report will be available on your arrival!"

"Good..." Robotnik grumbled. The elevator arrived and the two men stepped in. "As long as I'm up at this hour, How goes the new Zone development?"

The elevator started climbing. Colin cleared his throat bringing up the information on his data-pad. "Good Dr. Robotnik. Worker bot productivity is at full capacity. There will be a fully functioning fuel refinery in the great desert in two months, we are on schedule." He moved to the next page. "We need to build another four datacenters if we are going to keep redundancy under the new protocol."

The large man grumbled. "Step up our efforts to repair the damaged worker bots." He sighed. "Its not like we are finding to many more Mobian settlements in droves anymore. We may have to design a swatbot worker variant soon." He frowned. "I want the datacenters started on next." He glared at Colin. "add half of the returning worker bots to the auxiliary unit to repair any damage caused by the rodents."

Colin sighed a defeated look on his face. "Yes sir…"

The door opened to the com tower and they stepped out. Robotnik made his way to his control chair getting into the dark green metal chair. "Operator, Report!"

"Yes Sir!" The AI chirped. "309 signals found, 287 of which are scheduled! Out of the remaining 22 signals, 21 most likely ambient radiation. 1 PAL video signal of unknown origin captured! Alert! Full signal not captured. General area marked in SECTOR 8 INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX. Would you like me to play partial capture DR. ROBOTNIK?"

The doctors face was shocked. "Play it on the main screen…" He breathed. A choppy black and white video played, the angle and stabilization was terrible but he could see one of the infernal rodents at the end shout down the person. He saw them take the headset off looking at it and the audio and video cut. Robotnik accessed the video controls rewinding to pause on the Mobian's face.

"Sir…" Colin breathed. "How would they have the equipment and knowledge or need to transmit a signal standard from Earth?"

He squinted at the girls face on the paused video and sighed. "I don't know but obviously its not on purpose. If they are trying to send me a message they've failed miserably." He grumbled. "Operator! Send a survey team to sweep for gravimetric signatures!"The large man got up walking over to the balcony. "Send a transport to the com tower as well."

"Deploying now!" The cheery AI replied.

Colin followed in toe. "Sir your thinking there could have been another teleportation too?"

He glared down at his nephew. "However that rodent got that radio, there is a chance it may be from Earth. If it is are we might be able to capture the latent warp zone signature."

They walked out on the balcony dock. "We may be able to go home?" Colin breathed.

"I never said that." The large man quipped as he watched the transport speed towards them. "You remember Black Mesa, there may not be an Earth worth going to go back to. Somethings happened here though and it doesn't smell right..."

Colin frowned gritting his teeth. "This is exactly what I was hoping for now you tell me we might not be able to go back!"

Robotnik turned on the little man. "Don't make this difficult! You know its more complicated then that." The transport arrived opening its door. He stared down the short man. "You and I don't have to like each other at all but I do plan on keeping my word to my sister. I'm not going to let you run off a cliff like a lemming!" He turned back marching into the transport.

Colin rubbed one of his eyes with a palm as he followed. The rage and depression was exhausting. He wished his mother hadn't have died in that gas leak at Aperture. That place would have been so much better but it was so painful to think about. He sighed sitting in one of the transporter seats as the hoverpads took flight bringing them to oversee the survey team in sector 8. The ride was quiet, Colin was nervously wrapping his hands. As the thing landed the doctor got up and he followed. As he stood he got a head rush and stumbled forward catching himself on the wall.

Robotnik frowned glaring down at him. "Whats wrong with you?"

Pinching the bridge of his nose and running the other hand through his non existent hair he got up and continued out the door. "The med-bot seems to think low blood pressure. It could be environment or diet related."

Robotnik clicked his tong in annoyance. "You know we can selectively roboticize your organs."

The two of the made their way into the junkyard a drone covering them from the building acid rain. "I'd prefer to try medication first…" They began their walk over to the acting commander swatbot III. "How are you sir?"

Robotnik face soured even more. "Don't ask."

The swatbot swiveled and saluted. "ROBOTNIK SIR! WE HAVE NOT BEEN ABLE TO LOCATE THE CAUSE OF THE SIGNAL!"

"And likely you wont. That was hours ago. They are most likely long gone. You will move all extra patrols north towards the great forest. No doubt those freedom fighters are trying to rescue this rodent." He sneered. "This is worth catching, I want us to try and intercept their escape to that blasted forest camp." He sighed, "I want an update from the survey team, this is the origin of the signal correct?"

The swatbot confirmed. "CORRECT, WE RECEIVED A DISTRESS CALL FROM AN OLD MARK II UNIT WHO SEEMS TO HAVE MADE CONTACT."

"Lets go see while we wait for the survey teams results." They made their way over to a crumpled swatbot. its head was blown apart and it was severed at the torso. The right arm mangled and half gone as well.

Colin knelt down looking at the metal. Picking at it he pulled out an embedded pellet. "Is this buckshot?"

"Let me see." Robotnik grumbled. Colin held out his hand letting the doctor pick up the pellet. The heavyset man let his optics scan it. "It's lead shot alright." He grit.

Colin faced his uncle. "Mobians don't use chemically propelled ballistics!"

"Don't you think I know that!" Robotnik snapped.

Colin got a curious look. "How is that possible? Unless..."

The Swatbot captain walked up to them interrupting Colin's train of thought. "SIR THE SURVEY TEAM JUST COMPLETED. FULL REPORT BEING GENERATED AS WE SPEAK. SURVEY DRONE TEAM SEEMS TO THING THERE WAS A CLASS 4 WARP ZONE PRESENT."

Robotnik looked shocked. "Class 4? Through the void?!" He brought up his wrist communicator. "Operator I want you to deliver something from the void project to my location." He barked, "There's going to be a pice of equipment there that should hold the rift open long enough to study, Codename Doorstop."

Colin looked at his uncle in confusion. "The void sir?"

The obese man started to make his way back to the ship. "Look up Xen in the Earth-side archive, the void is a subset of it. I've been able to open a pocket of it but it seems the void itself is segmented by nature..." He grumbled, "If this part of the void links back to Xen then we might be able to manufacture a way back to Earth. I've been wanting some closure on what happened..." Colin caught up and they both re-entered the transport.

Colin brought his finger to his chin in thought. "I think I remember reading mentions of the Void in the Mobian archives."

They got seated back on the transport as it started to warm up. The hovercraft lifted as it started towards the palace. "Yes, the rodents have dabbled in teleportation technology. As Xen is adjacent to Earth the Void is adjacent to Mobius." He snickered, "They tried to send prisoners there thinking it was a kinder alternative to capital punishment apparently. That machine was so unstable I had to re-design half of it."

They approached the old palace passed the control tower. It dawned on Colin. "So you have been working on teleportation?"

Robotnik laughed. "I mastered teleportation to the void a long time ago, the problem is going where you want through the void." A nasty grin formed on his face. "Where do you think I sent our dear King Nigel?"

Collin's Eyes widened. "Oh." He mumbled, "I thought you killed him..."

The transport landed and Robotnik exited. "Make sure those monitors are all upgraded by tomorrow morning Snivly!" He chuckled darkly. he paused looking back to the dwarf and wagged his finger. "Temper temper my dear boy. You remind me of myself when I was your age." He turned and entered the palace.

Colin watched him leave and entered back into the transport. He frowned, He didn't want to be like his uncle. He sighed, "Temper temper indeed uncle Julian..." He decided he would oversee the repair in the control room and sleep this all off come morning.

Eli woke up at his desk. Turning on the lamp he pinched the bridge of his nose. It had been a couple of months since Alyx had disappeared. Focusing his eyes he turned on his monitor. His login was full of dots, he had fallen asleep on the keyboard again. It was 3 in the morning. He got up moving to the kitchen. Putting a kettle on he pulled out an old can of coffee. Usually reserving it for special occasions he just needed the comfort right now. He missed his daughter. After escaping the Black Mesa incident he couldn't lose her again... He sighed. He'd find her, He had to...

He made his way back to his desk with his drink. Sitting down at the table he pulled a picture from his wallet. He looked at the only pictures he had of his family, a recent Polaroid of his daughter with her pet Dog and a picture of the three of them together before Black Mesa. His wife smiling and her infant hand reaching for his finger. A pang formed in his heart, it was difficult to look at that picture...

He put the photos back in their safe place and noticed an envelope on his keyboard. He froze reaching for his gun and looked around the room, no one else should have been here. Heart beating he hobbled through his small apartment looking for signs of life. Giving up he headed back to the desk and picked up the letter. It had his name on it. He glanced down and noticed it had been covering a cyan crystal that seemed to glow.

Hesitantly he picked it up and dropped it as his fingers tingled with the energy. It clattered off his desk to the ground. His heart raced as he backed up from the gemstone, It was a crystal from Xen! Looking at the letter he fumbled to open it. Almost Ripping the contents, it contained a bundle of old paperwork and a simple message.

He read the letter. "Your debt is due, find her and the debt is paid. Use the crystal's signature to find her. Resurrect the teleporter." It wasn't signed.

He grabbed the bundle of papers starting to leaf through them. There was a Lambda symbol on the cover! It was the hard copy equations for the Xen teleporter project! He quickly hobbled back to the kitchen grabbing an empty can and some aluminum foil. Moving back to the den he scooped up the crystal storing it the best he could.

He was terrified... but he had a plan now! He paused remembering the strange man who had saved him and gave him his daughter back at Black Mesa. It had to have been him in the Vault! A mix of feelings flooded his mind. Excitement and relief turned into indignation. "I don't know what game your playing now..." He mumbled under his breath. "Give her back just to take her away?" He sighed sitting back in his chair resting his face in his palms. Silent tears escaped his eyes and he wiped them away on his sleeve. He steeled his expression and began logging into his computer. "Don't worry baby girl, Daddies going to find you." He choked, then grit his teeth, "No matter how many suits he has to strangle!" He started writing his proposal to Isaac and Russel asking for their help to resurrect the teleporter.

Chapter 4 end

Authors notes: another chapter this time from a few characters perspectives. There are fan characters in this but the point is to round out the future world and not to be insert Mary Sues. I really am trying to think of ways of making the characters more realistic with flaws. antagonists are easy but protagonists are hard. Alyx hasn't been around people her own age so she is probably going to be kinda awkward around teens and young adults, she also is afraid of things like the dark but forces herself at her own detriment to press forward. we will see how long that lasts. Sally I can imagine being slightly neurotic with all that pressure of being thrown into the position of commander and the future Queen. Tails has been wanting to grow up quick for a while and idolizes Sonics physical abilities. he wants his own physical actions to prove his worth. I've noticed a trap with techy people, a lot of it is easy once you learn it and you can some raise their expectations of others in a pompous way and some value it way lower then what the skill actually is because its "so easy" tails I think leans on the devaluing of his self worth side. Dr Robotnik and Colin have been so easy to write. Just toxic family relationship that Colin wants out of but Julian feels obligated towards. I've also set up a timeline integrating the two timelines. Is not perfect but for a AU spin off crossover I'm surprised I was able to get dates to line up so well. I may post it in another authors notes way later on but right now its full of spoilers. I've been thinking what constitutes whats M vs T and may change this later. If people have input on this maybe let me know. Constructive reviews are appreciated but not required. If something is wrong how can I improve if I don't know? Thanks for reading.

Traveler out!