Prologue
After years of running, hiding and fighting against the robotic forces of the tyrannical Doctor Julian Robotnik, the Freedom Fighters had finally defeated him. The central Command Tower of Robotopolis lay in ruins, the Swatbots shut down, and the workerbots, once Mobians themselves, remained - for the moment - deactivated.
The mysterious thing, however, was that no trace of either Robotnik's body, nor that of his oppressed nephew Snively, were ever found. Still, the now liberated Mobians spent the next three weeks scouting the ruined city, until Snively was found, very much alive. The Swatbots and workerbots were reactivated, under his command, and it looked like yet another reign of terror was about to set in. This was until yet another surprise. The 'dead' doctor Robotnik returned, though certainly without his former power: The tyrant had been practically reduced to the servant of the wizard Naugus!
The wizard had somehow escaped the crystalline prison known as the Void, and had found a way to repel the 'allergy' that caused people to turn to crystal once back in the real world. The freedom fighters were at first happy for this; Naugus had tried to defeat Robotnik before, and now both the doctor and would-be tyrant Snively were at his mercy, and the wizard had even brought back the King Acorn who had been banished to the Void shortly before Naugus had. Tears of happiness were shed when his power reached a peak, and with the blink of an eye, he made an impossible dream come true. Naugus deroboticised all of the workerbots, though there was a limit to this: The partially roboticized would be turned back with horrible mutations where the metal and flesh had joined. But these Mobians, while sorrowful, were at least grateful for the effort and accepted their fate as cyborgs.
A few more weeks passed, and a plan to rebuild the old city of Mobotropolis over the ruins and derelict buildings of Robotropolis. Naugus was celebrated as a hero, so surely he was a good guy, right?
Wrong.
It seemed so at first. He was approachable by the freedom fighters, and was even civil to some degree, if rather cold. But it all started to fall apart quite quickly.
It started when he refused to release the King. Princess Sally had tried reasoning, but nothing worked. Naugus's power grew, and with it his dark intentions. He became more and more unreasonable, until one day, in an amazing display of power, the wizard reduced the whole city to rubble and flatlands. The corrupted wizard imprisoned all Mobians within the grounds and surrounding area, and made them slaves, unwilling to leave them as robots - he knew little about electronics, and Robotnik could easily tamper with them. These slaves he put to work building a mysterious city over the ruins of Robotropolis for reasons known only to himself. They were ill-fed and worked all day on the building sites, with only a few hours sleep each night in several cells. And so, Naugus imposed a new tyrannic era, much worse than the previous. The diminished freedom fighters retreated to the still-secret haven of Knothole, minus many of their leaders.
Thus begins the new Season, the Season of the Third War.
Princess Sally Acorn was a lot thinner than before, as were the Mobians around her. She had lost a lot of weight from extensive work and lack of good food, her paws were callused from hard work, and her muscles were now strong and wiry. She wiped sweat from her brow and lifted a heavy stone block, carrying it over to a pile of similar stones. All around her, other Mobians were doing similar things; digging, bricklaying and carrying materials here and there. Mobotopolis was indeed being rebuilt...but not for them. Now slaves to Naugus along with most of the old population, they built to his specifications, or they paid the price.
Sally was weak from months of this building on little food. She tripped and fell, the stone block falling at the feet of a familiar figure. Robotnik was still very much the prisoner-servant of Naugus, though he had at least managed to secure a position as slavemaster of sorts. Though the doctor doubted that he would earn the wizard's trust, he could at least try, and this was one small step towards another backstabbing. Even recently, Naugus had permitted him control over a small number of Swatbots to control the slaves with. They were nowhere near strong enough to overpower the mighty magician after all.
The tyrant turned slavemaster doctor, being a human, towered over most of the other Mobians by almost twice their height. Sally was no exception, and looked up at his face, which was today covered in brown feathers, with a red comb. It seems that Naugus had chosen a chicken's head for the doctor today, and the result would have been quite hysterical, had the squirrel been not so weary.
"Fallen again, Princess?" the doctor chided, amid a small series of clucks and clacks of his beak, "You've been doing that a lot lately. You won't last much longer."
The captured freedom fighter tried to pick herself up, but a heavy boot descended between her shoulder blades. "Perhaps I should put you out of your misery now..."
The reply was quiet, and unenthusiastic. "You know you can't do that...Remember what happened last time you killed..."
The doctor nodded his feathery head and allowed the ground squirrel to stand. Naugus certainly didn't take to having perfectly good slaves killed for no reason, and the penalty would be much, much worse if he killed the princess, of all Mobians. Still, psychological damage seemed okay, as long as the wizard didn't find out.
"Any escape attempts lately?"
This question was thinly veiled in casual curiosity. Sally's only response was a twitch in her eyes, now looking at the dusty ground.
"No word from Knothole?"
Another, more visible twitch. The princess tried to keep calm and rational, just as she had been before this nightmare began.
"Face it, they've gone. Your precious hedgehog has either given up on you, or died."
"He hasn't!" Sally practically screamed, looking up at the transformed doctor with a look of hate that she would have previously thought impossible for her to make. She actually looked about to spring at Robotnik, but his steel arm collided with the side of her head, and she toppled to the ground, stunned. The fat doctor looked ready to aim another blow to her temple, when another Mobian arrived at a run, screeching to a kneeling halt by her side and grazing his knees raw in the process.
"You leave her alone!" the blue-skinned walrus known as Rotor ordered, pointing a paw accusingly at Robotnik, who simply sniggered and clucked. He raised his steel arm, about to strike the walrus, but it was intercepted by another metal limb with a loud clang. He let out a half growl, half cluck of rage as his eyes met those of a certain cyborg rabbit known as Bunnie, her legs and left arm having both been roboticized some time before. The two glared at each other as they engaged in a battle of robotic strength, Robotnik reaching to strike Sally and Rotor, and his opponent trying to force the arm away with her own. The surrounding slaves fell so silent as they watched that the sound of the servos straining against each other could be heard. After a minute of this, with no quarter given each way, there was a spark, and the rabbit's arm snapped back, to the sound of failing hydraulics. Robotnik gave a grin of triumph, but it was short lived, as the rabbit's equally robotic legs delt him a swift blow to the shin that made him double over in surprise. A second high kick to his rotund stomach, and the doctor was felled, winded. His opponent stood over him, the weight of the now broken cybernetic arm causing her to lean to the side. She breathed heavily with exertion and pain as the broken arm wrenched on the mesh of metal and flesh that formed her shoulder.
"Get...ya'll away from Sally-girl..." she ordered in her southern accent, and so angry was she that she didn't even include a 'sugah'. Robotnik, gasping for air, sat up and glared daggers at her, which had little effect, what with his current head.
"You...You'll pay for this, Rabbot!"
Bunnie gave him another sharp kick, and he in return gave a yell of pain. Where were the swatbots when he needed them? With a last glare, Robotnik picked himself up, dusted himself off and turned to go with what was left of his dignity. He turned to the silent staring Mobians, yelling.
"What are you staring at? Get back to work!"
A flurry of activity followed as the emaciated slaves turned to carry on with the building. Bunnie finally succumbed to fatigue and the weight of her non-functional arm, falling to her knees, her organic paw trying to lift the chunk of metal to relieve the pressure on her shoulder. Rotor and Sally joined her, looking concerned. The walrus bade her to lay back, and when she did so, it was clear why she could barely stand under the weight; being the strongest of the slaves, she had been ordered to do the heaviest work, and a lot of it. She was very thin, more so than the Princess. Still, she offered a reassuring smile to Sally and Rotor as the latter tried to inspect her cybernetic arm, though without any tools, he couldn't even open the steel coverplate. Sally meanwhile was apologising profusely to her friend.
"Oh Bunnie, I'm so sorry! I just...This is my fault..."
Bunnie gave the squirrel's paw a comforting pat.
"Not at all, Sally-girl. Ah've seen what thayt monster does to ya. He needs takin' down a bit."
The resourceful Rotor, meanwhile, had used the corner of a metal bricklaying trowel as a makeshift screwdriver, and was busy prying the screws loose from the coverplate. When that was done, he removed it, and peered at the various hydraulics inside.
"Ah, this right here's the problem." he observed, pointing with a claw to a twisted cylinder, "The strain broke one of the servos. It's just like pulling a muscle."
"Can ya fix it, sugah?" Bunnie's voice wasn't very hopeful, as after all, they hand no tools save for trowels, shovels and stones.
"Maybe," answered Rotor, scratching his ear, "Of course it wouldn't be as good as new though. Problem is, it'll take time even more so 'cause of our work shifts. You'll have to disconnect it."
Bunnie gave a sad nod, and released the catch. The arm fell to the ground, revealing the socket on her shoulder, a grotesque mesh of tissue and steel. Rotor picked up the detached limb and nodded. "I'll go and hide this 'til it's time to go back to the cells."
This was met by a protest from the Rabbot. "Aw, ya shouldn't do thayt when ya'll should be sleepin', sugah..."
"No, really, it's okay. Quicker I get it done, the better." Rotor reassured her. The better, of course, because it's not good to only have one arm when Robotnik is seeking revenge on you. Bunnie simply nodded, sitting up, and Rotor gave a final weak smile, before leaving. Sally helped Bunnie to her metal feet, and frowned despite herself. "You should stay with Rotor and I now, at least until your arm is fixed."
But Bunnie wouldn't hear of it. "Naw...Ah don't wanna get in ya way, sweetie..."
Sally got the message, however - Bunnie didn't want to admit defeat to Robotnik. Reluctantly, the princess nodded. "Okay, but please take care."
The rabbit's long velvet ears waved back and forth as she nodded, trying to sound carefree.
"Of course, Sally-girl. Don' worry." she smiled, and gave Sally a quick sisterly hug, before heading back to her workplace. Once she had gone, Sally's initial hopeless manner returned. Maybe Robotnik was right...Maybe Sonic was dead. No word had been heard from him or the others in almost three months.
Princess Sally wept bitter tears as her callused, bruised paws returned to their work.
Naugus had found an ideal way to take care of the 'meddling hedgehog'. The reason that there had been no word from him was because he had been totally bedridden since his last attempt to get into the city eleven weeks ago.
Naugus had broken his legs in several places.
Never before had Sonic seemed so pathetic, so worthless. Without his legs, what would he be? The breaks were very bad, and none of the remaining freedom fighters had any medical knowledge beyond basic bandaging. It looked like he would never walk again, but help had arrived in the very unlikely form of Robotnik's runaway nephew, Snively, who had learned many medical skills for his uncle's plan to fit into Mobotropolis before taking it over all those years ago. Following many pleas of truce and redemption, he had reset the broken bones and splinted them securely, and now it seemed that they may be healed enough to walk on again.
The other remaining major freedom fighters, only Tails the fox and Antoine the coyote, watched as Snively removed the heavy splints. Sonic was obviously happy about this, though there was a hint of new-found seriousness in his manner.
"Never thought I'd end up thankin' you, Sniv-man."
The blue hedgehog promptly tried to turn and stand...but he ended up falling right onto the floor. Snively shook his head with a look that screamed 'stupid hedgehog'.
"No, you can't start rushing around just like that. Your legs practically need to learn to walk again."
Sonic obviously didn't like this news. "You never said anything about learnin' to walk again!"
"Well you never asked." Snively smirked.
"...Will I run again?"
Snively nodded. "Not for a while, though. You can't put too much strain on your bones until they've properly healed."
"Don't worry, you'll get better soon, Sonic." said Tails, the young double-tailed fox encouraging his hero. Antoine, on the other hand, had other ideas.
"Hmph, I should say it would serv-e you right, it would indeede. A fu-el's move, just rushing in lik-e that."
"Can it, Ant." was the hedgehog's reply. "At least I tried something instead of hidin' in the forest."
Sonic's rather cold comment was enough to cause the coyote to retreat out of the hut and join the other nine freedom fighters outside. Sonic, and everyone else, had been very edgy and rather short tempered since Naugus's takeover. He begin bending his knees slowly.
"You might be able to walk properly in a couple of days, knowing your speed, hedgehog." Snively estimated, "Maybe even be able to run, but only at a regular pace. No power rings for a while."
The human evidently didn't seem too displeased at this news, unlike Sonic, who clenched a gloved paw.
"But we've waited a mondo long time already! We've gotta try another rescue attempt."
"You mean like last time? You'll end up with no legs at all."
Sonic of course wouldn't admit it, but the defected Snively was probably right. "So you got a better idea?"
He hadn't, but Snively put on his best sneaky grin anyways. Best to put on a show.
"I might have, hedgehog, I might have."
Bunnie was tired. She had worked all day with one arm, and admirably, she had finished quite a lot of her shift, and now, a few hours after dark, it was time to sleep.
She was one of the last Mobians to make her way back to her sanctioned cell - conveniently, all freedom fighters were kept seperate - and there were only a few other slaves around, and a couple of Swatbots to make sure they didn't try to hide or anything similarly untoward. Both of the rabbit's ears drooped forward wearily, her steel hindpaws thumping the dusty ground with soft thuds as she rounded a corner, and a couple of slaves faintly heard a surprised cry. They weren't about to risk harm to find out what it was, though, and continued to their cells.
A sizable bump was raising on Bunnie's head, the rabbit felled upon the ground. Sand caked her sweat-beaded fur where she had fallen, her strong legs pinned by two Swatbots to keep her from kicking at the still chicken-headed Robotnik, who stood over her.
"You made a grave mistake today, Rabbot." he hissed, managing to sound manacing despite the various quiet clucks he made. Bunnie tried to sit up, her legs struggling against the superior strength of the Swatbots.
"Get ya'll offa me, ya bullies!" she demanded. Robotnik's reply followed his steel hand closing around her throat. "In time."
He pushed her head back with such force that it collided with the ground, half dazing her. Robotnik smirked, and proceeded to walk in a circle around the restrained lapine, hands behind his back.
"I've made a small observation during recent times...In the past, I made it my ambition to roboticize you and all of your...friends." a pause. "Now, don't misinterpret my words, rabbit; if I had the chance to so now, I still would roboticize you. Having all of your minds trapped forever would be a dream come true..."
"So what's new, ya crazy..."
"Silence!" the doctor admonished, giving a painful kick to her shoulder socket that caused Bunnie to cry out. "Don't interupt.
"What's 'new'...is that while I would still be happy to imprison you so, I had underestimated the...satisfaction...that physical torture can give."
His metal fingers tightened around her sensitive ears, and while Bunnie tried to stay quiet, she couldn't keep from letting out a sharp yelp.
"You see," he continued, "being a scientist, I focus on the mind. You called me a sadist and...you were correct, I know that now, even though at the time I disbelieved it. But now I know I am, and now I know that that was my mistake. So many opportunities had I to kill you...but no!" Bunnie nearly screamed as the metal hand wrenched on her ears. "I had to catch you, mock you. But now I know that I went about it wrong. I should have defeated you, and then gloated. Mark my words that now I know this...I'll see to Naugus, and then to you."
The long-winded professor released the lapine's sore ears.
"But nevertheless... even though my course is clear, I still hate you. And after all, I'm still a sadist, aren't I?"
He nodded to the Swatbots, who took all but a moment to forcibly disconnect Bunnie's cybernetic legs and dropped them beside her, after which he gave the badly maimed rabbit a heavy kick in the side.
"That's for kicking me." he told her as the Swatbots, at his orders, engaged in the sickening sight of beating the defenceless rabbit, her yells and screams mixing with the thuds from each strike, and now Robotnik showed his true colours.
So consumed had he been with the desire to see the freedom fighters roboticised, that he hadn't realised that he was just a sadist masquerading as a scientist, but the way he stood back and giggled at the beating clearly showed that he had lost his mind, to some degree at least. And of course...the way he had freely admitted that he was sadistic practically showed it. He lived now not to rule over his enemies, but to make them suffer, and now he had the clear insight needed to do so.
When Bunnie, bruised and battered, came a fraction to unconciousness, Robotnik bade the Swatbots stop.
"That's enough. Take her back...she needs sleep for work tomorrow." The doctor liked the idea of a heavy work shift while aching all over. He basically tittered as the rabbit was dragged away by her ears, the agony finally pulling the beaten Mobian into blissful blackness. Robotnik tapped his beak thoughtfully.
"How very entertaining...They should misbehave more often."