He had woken up half an hour ago, and carefully climbed down from the diving board. Heavy metal and exposed circuits were not a good combination when it came to water.

Stylus assumed it was late afternoon. The sun was relatively low above the horizon. He was surprised to note that nobody was around to keep an eye on him.

The robot clambered through the hole in the garage, Despite the fluorescent lights, Stylus' visual sensors needed to re-calibrate to the relative darkness. The first thing he saw was a giant jet fighter of some kind. He assumed it was the Tornado some of the others mentioned. It looked pretty aerodynamic, if flashy. The fox was on the other side, performing a maintenance check on the aircraft.

Maybe this Anti-Eggman brigade relished the celebrity lifestyle. Giant, relatively well-secured mansion, private jet planes with supposed combat capability, able to take down giant hostile robots.

It still made Stylus wonder, where the hell was Robotropolis? There's no trace of it left. Zip, zilch, nothing.

Doctor Robotnik would never have let this happen, or at least his nephew would set up some kind of pre-recorded message or something. Or someone entirely different could have done the same, maybe another Stylus trooper who returned and saw the changes emerge, and hid a message for other Stylus troopers.

Unit 25 pulled himself up the stairs using the hand rails. Sonic and Co. were already up there, minus the organic with the weird hair, the fox, and the rabbit.

They noticed Stylus, little more. They already displayed their thanks. Stylus took off the backpack, the pistol, and the sniper rifle. Said pistol was strapped to his side in a similar fashion as the sniper rifle.

He took apart the weapons and stuffed them into his backpack again, followed by the aquamarine and the-

Hang on... the wooden sword was missing. Stylus turned his head to the others.

"Cream and Cheese were interested in it," the pink hedgehog said.

"I guess as long as they don't break it, it's fine," Stylus smiled. After zipping up the backpack, he scooped up all of the spare parts that were left on the table. A shin plate was missing as well. Stylus glanced around and found it on a nearby computer desk. "And this?" Stylus asked to the pink one.

"Ask Tails."

Stylus hummed, then picked up the shin plate and limped back down stairs. He hummed a tune he assumed nobody would know... Wait, he didn't remember when he learned it, or from who.

"Tails, is it?" Stylus asked.

The two-tailed fox looked at Stylus from under the Tornado's hull. "Yeah, that's me."

"Any reason to take my spare parts?"

"It's a material unlike any we use today," Tails replied.

"Well, some can consider me obsolete," Stylus chuckled.

Tails didn't seem to get the joke. He instead continued. "I mean it's a stronger material than what Eggman uses, stronger than what I use."

Stylus' grin faded. What? Did technology go backwards or something? Stylus was made of the same metals and such as any ordinary SWAT Bot. "Can't be much stronger, can it?" He asked.

Tails replied, "Well, it's like the difference between cast iron and steel, if that makes sense... No, that doesn't sound like a good analogy,"

"You mean like different smithery techniques."

"Yeah, kind of like that. There's a country a ways away where they make blades by flattening the piece as much as they can, then fold the piece and hammer it out again, all repeated."

"Yeah, I know that one."

"But the X Tornado's (Stylus gave a weird look, also hidden) hull was made with those techniques, and yet, your spare parts and armour are significantly tougher."

Stylus had no idea what deeper meaning that held. "Listen, I need some tools, need to fix this bad leg."

"Another thing, according to Chris, you took a major beating by the Eggman robot, but you don't have any dents in your armour aside from the damaged leg."

Crap, dents. Stylus forgot to check for dents... Wait, there weren't any dents? He felt a hand around his helmet and chest plate. Indeed, no signs of dents. His lips flattened, unsure of what to say.

Tails poked a thumb toward a nearby workbench. Stylus thanked the fox and limped to said workbench. He sat on a stainless steel stool, detached his leg (via relatively complex measures) and placed the leg on the bench itself. He got to work repairing his leg.

As he picked out a suitable arc welding system, Stylus Manually altered his visual sensors, basically synthesizing a welding mask lens. He then struck the arc and got to work.

He didn't know what Tails was doing, but Stylus was too busy to care. The kid could've been watching, but it didn't really matter. This was a basic fix-up.