Recursion Error
Episode 33- Bombs. Lies. More bombs.
By and large, the factory looked about the same as any factory Eggman constructed: a large, industrial complex with giant spires that constantly spewed toxic smog into the air and was devoid of any plant life all around. An absolute blight that polluted the land all around it. Patrols of robots constantly guarded the outside and inside of the factory around the clock, always aware and always searching for any possible threats.
One such robot, a common red Egg Pawn with a lance in hand, had been patrolling the chain-link fence that surrounded the factory's outer perimeter, near a large stack of shipping containers. It had walked past a space between two stacks of containers, but then stopped mid-step when it picked up something odd within its sensors. It planted its feet right onto the ground and, with its lance at the ready, turned to the space between the containers and looked down at the anomaly it detected.
The anomaly had been a box. An ordinary cardboard box.
The Egg Pawn stared motionlessly down at the box for a full ten seconds, and then lifted the point of its lance right back up to the sky as its posture straightened out. It turned its back to the cardboard box, and then began marching away.
It'd only gotten two steps in before the silver blade of a katana burst through its chest.
"Shh shh shhhh... sleep now and dream of electric sheep..." The lights of the Badnik's eyes and mouth went dark as the machine died, its body tilting backwards as all control left it. A pair of blue, spectral arms caught its body right before it hit the ground, and then proceeded to drag its corpse into the hidden space between the shipping containers as the arms' user quickly pulled the katana out from the robot.
Safely hiding the Badik in the hiding spot, Sorun dispelled the Bringer Arms, sheathed Yamato, and then looked out towards the large factory that was right in front of him. The pale teen ran a hand through his chin-length black hair, and then sighed out loud as he looked up at the black smoke being pumped up into the darkened, orange sky. "It's always so jarring going from all the clean air in Knothole to places like this. Surprised I'm not catching anything from all this smog..." he mumbled under his breath as he turned away. "Wouldn't really matter at this point, though, would it?"
From the corner of his eye, he saw a spot of air shimmer against one of the shipping containers. The shimmer soon solidified into the transparent shape of a Mobian, and then color faded in to reveal a purple chameleon Mobian leaning against the container, his eyes trained on Sorun and his arms crossed.
"This is the third factory we've been sent out to bomb this month. Third one," Sorun groused. "Sally doesn't have anywhere better to be sending us?"
A small, playful smirk formed on Espio's mouth. "And here I was thinking you liked seeing Eggman's factories explode."
"Eh, the first time, yeah, but you see on giant factory blow up and you see 'em all blow up. It just lost its charm for me."
"Did somebody call my name?" Both the Mobian and the human turned their heads to the side, where they saw a small bee Mobian fly in from over one of the shipping containers and hover up the ground next to them.
"No, Charmy, nobody called your name," Espio denied with a shake of his head, "but since you're here we'll go over the plan one more time."
"Five mobiums says it's the exact same plan it was all the other times we've done this," Sorun muttered out as he walked into the space between the shipping crates.
Espio's eyes followed the human into the space, and with a sigh he reached down to grasp one of the two satchels slung across his torso. "We're to sneak into Robotnik's factory, where me and Sorun-"
"Sorun and I," Sorun corrected.
"... Sorun and I," Epsio repeated, eyes twitching in the direction the human walked down, "will place these high-yield explosives at strategic points along the factory's interior at locations-"
"Do we seriously have to go over where we're planting the things?" Sorun interrupted, poking his head out from the space he'd walked into to look at Espio. "These factories are all practically built the same. The dang Badnik patrols are practically the same; I memorized all their routes and patterns the second time in when I saw them doing the same thing from the first time." Felt like he was grinding out repeatable side quests in an RPG at this point for the amount of repetition he was suffering through, but he wouldn't complain about his job being made easier for him. He would complain about the tedium, though. Which this kind of mission was slowly becoming: tedious.
Apparently there were so many of these factories that Eggman didn't bother to design every single one personally to meet the specific requirements of that area and its quota of production. Why this was Sorun didn't know, because it seemed like the madman had more time on his hands than he needed. Maybe it was just to make it easier on them so he could stroke his ego further, but whatever the case these factories were all little more than cookie-cutter recreations of a master design with only slight variations between each factory's construction. Same went for the Badniks, too. Always had similar numbers with routes, patterns and the such.
A slight, annoyed glare began to form in Espio's eyes. "Perhaps you would like to take over the mission briefing, Sorun?"
"You know what, maybe I do. You're always the one doing it." Clearing his throat, Sorun briefly stepped out from between the containers while pointing his thumb at himself. "Alright, Espio and I-" he gave the chameleon a look from the side of his eye, making Espio scoff and turn away, "- are gonna go place a bunch of bombs everywhere." He pointed to Charmy. "Meanwhile, Charmy goes and plugs Nicole into the factory's main computer. Like all the last times we did this. Simple enough?"
"Mm-hm!" Unlike Espio, who was scowling off to the side, Charmy was giving Sorun a bubbly nod while bouncing up and down. "I like Sorun's briefing way better than yours, Espio. His isn't boring and it's easy to understand."
"... My briefings aren't boring." An indignant, glum frown formed on Espio's face. "They're cool and professional," he quietly whispered.
Sorun, having heard the horned Mobian's whisper, snorted out a laugh and walked back into the space between the containers. "Keep tellin' yourself that, Espio. We'll head out in a sec, just lemme grab my box here."
As he crouched down in front of the cardboard box, he heard a disgruntled groan from Espio. "That box is not a viable tool for infiltration, Sorun," he heard Espio say from behind him.
"You're just mad because it works so well," Sorun countered as he picked the box up.
"It wouldn't hold up in a forest environment or anywhere else where a box would be out of place," Espio said, his tone slightly challenging.
Box in hand, Sorun turned around, exited the space, and gave the chameleon a look with a quirked eyebrow. "It's a good thing we're carrying this mission out in an industrial environment, then." He nodded his head towards the factory. "Y'know, where things like a box won't be out of place."
"A storage container or metal crate, yes, but I hardly think a cardboard box would be seen as normal in a Badnik factory."
"Nah, it totally works." Sorun flipped the box around to show Espio a crudely-drawn, red Eggman logo on the side of the box. "See, I drew a little Eggman symbol on it with a crayon. The Badniks just walk right past it, I swear."
"..." Taking a glance down at the symbol, Espio released a defeated sigh while reaching up to rub at his eyes. "Whatever works for you, Sorun."
"Ah-huh, yeah." Sending the chameleon a smug look, which the Mobian tried and failed to pretend to ignore which made Sorun's petty glee grow, he began to fold the box into a more compact shape as he turned his head to face Charmy. "You all good, Charmy?"
"Yep, me and Nicole are good to go!" The small Mobian held out Nicole's handheld in his right hand, Sorun's body stiffening at the sight of it. "It should be easy. All I gotta do is swoop in-" Charmy began making exaggerated movements with his arms, "- sneak into the computer room, take out any mean ol' Badniks along the way-"
Sorun silently watched the bee as he continued to bounce all around, now proceeding to flail his arms around wildly while acting out his words. The teen's eyes were drawn towards Charmy's right hand, which was currently clutching Nicole's handheld body. A body that Charmy was rapidly shaking around with his movements. Sorun's facial features began twitching when he saw this, and not even a second later he finally had enough and snatched Nicole out of Charmy's grasp.
"Could you not shake her!?" Sorun angrily growled out, shooting a glare towards Charmy. "She doesn't like being shaken."
"Okay, I won't!" Charmy had flown back a bit while raising his arms up, sending a pout towards Sorun's way all the while. After a bit he began looking between Sorun and the handheld he was holding, causing a thoughtful look to begin to form on the bee's face. "Hm... hey, why don't you just take Nicole instead?"
Sorun was fairly certain his heart skipped a beat there. "Huh?" He felt a sudden weight in his hand, and when he looked down he realized that Charmy had flown over and forcibly handed Sorun Nicole. "H-huh?"
"Yeah, since you keep complaining about all these missions being the same, we'll mix it up a bit!" Charmy proposed, a light smile on his face as he flew next to Espio. "I'm getting tired of doing the same job, too, so me and Espy can go and set all the bombs while you deal with the computers."
"Wait, hold on-" Sorun attempted to argue this new idea, though he was immediately interrupted when Espio handed one of the satchels he had to Charmy.
"Works for me," the chameleon said. Sorun couldn't tell if Espio was truly ignorant of the protest on his face, or if he was just ignoring it to spite Sorun, but either way it seemed his mind was made up. "Keep in contact. We'll meet back here when we're done."
And then, before Sorun could even get another word in edgewise, they were off. Charmy had shrunk down to a mere fraction of his size and carried himself and the satchel full of explosives out of sight. Espio had just turned invisible and disappeared entirely. All that was left was Sorun, holding a folded-up box in one hand and Nicole in the other.
The same Nicole he'd been completely avoiding for some time now. The same Nicole that he could have continued to avoid if he hadn't opened his mouth and put the idea of switching roles for the mission out for Charmy to hear. The one he was currently holding. That Nicole.
"... I really fuckin' hate myself sometimes," Sorun thought to himself as he looked down at the handheld. He was almost tempted to throw the thing out of frustration, but he knew he'd never be able to bring himself to do that. Instead he aired out his frustrations in the form of a heavy sigh, and then tried speaking to the computer. "So, uh... looks like it's just us now, Nicole. Nicole? You there?"
She must have been there; the green screen on the top portion of her handheld was lit up. Even so, at first nothing had happened in response to Sorun's question. And then Sorun felt it- a moderate electrical jolt zapped right into Sorun's hand from the handheld. He felt the electricity jolt through his entire arm, causing Sorun to hiss out in pain and reflexively stiffen his arm before the muscles finally relaxed. He sighed out loud and looked back down at the handheld.
"Yeah, I... I think she might be mad at me." He couldn't think of any other reason why she'd be acting like this. And admittedly he hadn't been expecting any good reaction from her considering the distance he'd put between them, but the thing was he didn't know what to even expect at all. He didn't know what an upset Nicole was like. A serious and focused one, sure. Even a downcast one from that one unsanctioned mission. But an upset Nicole? Specifically one upset at him?
He didn't have a clue. Apparently in involved shocking. And he had to carry her around now in hostile enemy territory.
As if his nerves weren't strained enough.
"What a great day I'm having," Sorun bitterly thought to himself as he began stomping towards the factory.
He knew from the get-go, ever since that heist mission for the second Emerald, that Egg Pawns were laughably easy to sneak past. They all followed the same parameters and fell for the same tricks. They were all uniform in their movements and easy to predict. And the cardboard box practically made him invisible as long as he didn't move in their line of sight.
Seriously, the cardboard box was shockingly effective against sneaking past Badniks. He didn't know what it was about it. Maybe because they didn't pick up as a biological thing from the box for them to analyze with their sensors they didn't register the box as a threat, or maybe the shoddy Eggman symbol he'd drawn on it actually did work, or at least somewhat help. Maybe they were all just idiots, which wouldn't be something he'd expect as he didn't know Eggman to poorly program his own combat AI, but a lot of the logic in this world was wonky, so what did he know? He was still trying to wrap his head around how Espio's shoes and gloves turned invisible with him and how the satchel bag with explosives shrunk with Charmy.
"Maybe it's not that his skin - scales? - turn invisible, but he puts out some kinda short-range invisibility field or something," Sorun thought to himself. He was currently crouched down in his cardboard box, peeking out from the handle slot on the box's side and watching the metal legs of a patrol of Egg Pawns walk right past him. "Just, like, some kinda field that only goes a few millimeters off his skin. That'd explain why his clothes turn invisible, too. So how the hell does Charmy's stuff shrink with him? Is it Chaos energy nonsense? It's probably Chaos energy nonsense."
It made some amount of sense. Apparently every being in this world inherently had some kind of link to the Chaos Force, and he'd already seen people like Sonic with a strong enough link that they had powers. And his own powers proved that abilities powered by Chaos energy did... some pretty weird stuff sometimes. So powers like that weren't completely out there. Not when the Emeralds had given him something like Yamato. Invisibility and shrinking were tame in comparison to that sword.
And yet, somehow, it still managed to freak him out sometimes.
"Alright, they're gone." Once the robots disappeared from sight, he waited for a few seconds until the sound of their footsteps disappeared before he began crouch-walking back up the hallway he'd been hiding in, box still over his form. "I still can't believe how much I'm getting away with this box cheat," Sorun continued to think to himself. "You'd think Eggman would patch this if it really is a programming error, but I don't even think they've caught onto the fact I'm using a damn box to bypass their everything. Maybe it's one of those it's-so-stupidly-obvious-they'd-never-use-it things, so he never bothered. Either way, I ain't complaining." He stopped, and then raised his free hand up to tilt the box upwards slightly so he could look up through the handle slot. "Okay, so left down here should be the control room."
Another perk to all these factories being built to a uniform standard: the layout was often almost, if not completely, the same, so locating noteworthy areas, such as the control room, were trivial as all Sorun had to do was follow the exact same route that had worked for him the last times he'd done this. They even left the door open, too. Not that it would have mattered for him anyways, but it was still nice not to have to bother.
A lot of Eggman's facilities, not just the factories, always had this one central control room, i.e. the room with all the computers connected to the entire factory, all of its systems, and the network. That was apparently a thing: Eggman had his own personal network most if not all of his facilities, structures, and even robots were connected to. Helped with instantaneous messaging, data exchanging, orders, those kinds of things. It was more or less just convenient tool for instant communication that Eggman and all his machines used, though, so they were always less concerned about breaking into the network and more about getting into the local computer's systems to see what was on it.
Usually it wasn't anything good; most of the time it was mundane information, such as orders designated for that specific factory, production numbers and manifests, ect. Sometimes, though, just sometimes, there would be some bit of information there that was usable by the Freedom Fighters, though eight times out of ten it was just locations of interests for other places for them to sabotage. And, as these central computer rooms were still connected to the factory's internal systems, it still helped having control. So they always tried to bring Nicole in on these missions just for her to plug into these central systems, scrub the databanks for any useful information, and then help out with the rest of the mission by messing with the location's systems.
Made sense in hindsight why Sally kept bringing Nicole around with her everywhere.
Crouch-walking into the computer room, Sorun saw the typical sight: long computer console at the front of the room. Lots of monitors on the wall. Two Egg Pawns sitting in chars and manning the computers. He couldn't help but to roll his eyes as he stood up, tossed his cardboard box to the side, and then began approaching the two Egg Pawns.
"Gentlemen," he announced, though before they'd even turned around to Sorun a Summoned Sword had appeared over each of their heads and fell downwards, the blades going right through their heads. The robots went limp and promptly fell out of their chairs, Sorun shaking his head at the sight as he held up the handheld in his grasp. "Alright, Nicole, now we just-"
Zap!
Sorun deeply inhaled as he felt the muscles in his arm briefly spasm again. "... Can you please stop doing that?" He calmly requested, looking down at the handheld. He still received no reply from the AI, but she'd stopped shocking him, so he took that as a sign that he could proceed. So he stepped in front of the computer console, gently set Nicole down on top of it, and after hunting around for a bit found a small cable with an attachment port, which he then plugged into Nicole.
Usually what would happen next was that Nicole's little face icon would appear somewhere on one of the computer monitors as a sign that she'd breached her way into the system and was good to go. That wasn't what happened. What happened was that a few seconds after Sorun plugged the handheld into the computer system a cloud of black and green pixels began to appear and congregate into a shape on the console. And then, before Sorun knew it, Nicole's holo-body just appeared. Sitting there.
If there was one thing that startled Sorun more than the holo-lynx's sudden appearance, it was the body language she was displaying. She was sitting right on the computer console, one leg crossed over the other with her arms crossed over her chest. But what stood out for Sorun was just that look on her face. None of the lynx's features seemed happy, from her mouth being set in a deep frown to her eyes being narrowed in Sorun's direction to even her ears being straightened and folded back in what almost looked like silent anger.
Yeah, no, she was definitely upset at him.
"... Alright, play it cool, Sorun." This was a conversation that could go any way possible, and frankly, Sorun didn't know how he was supposed to start it. He hadn't even expected or prepared for something like this. So he decided to just comment on Nicole's appearance and then play it by ear from there. "Um... are you sure you should be out and about like this without a Power Ring?" Sorun asked, pointing his index finger at Nicole.
"I'm drawing power from the factory's energy reservoir." She even sounded out of the norm. Her tone was mainly neutral with just a hint of something negative behind her words. "Thank you for taking me from Charmy. I know he means well, but he can often be too excitable."
"You're... welcome...?" His hand unconsciously rubbing the back of his head, Sorun began to turn his body away from Nicole. "I think I should go-"
"You've been avoiding me."
"Shieeeet..." Ah, so it was the one thing he'd been fearing. And now that he was looking back halfway at Nicole with one eye, he couldn't help but realize he had no idea what he was supposed to say. "No, I haven't," he tried.
That answer only drew Nicole's face into a deeper scowl. In a flash of pixels a small, hovering green screen appeared right in front of her. As Sorun turned around to fully face Nicole and the screen, he couldn't help but feel his mouth go dry. Because he recognized the image on that green screen as a recording. A recording of him talking to Sally inside of the Freedom HQ.
Sally's recording was the first to speak. "Getting a Chaos Emerald from Eggman is a big accomplishment, so I don't see any reason why you two can't take some time to-"
"Can't," came Sorun's response. The teen couldn't help but wince at how cold and detached his recorded self sounded.
"What?"
"Can't. I'm doing the thing with Shadow right now."
"O... kay, but right after you can-"
"Can't. Shadow, let's go." The video paused there, upon which Sorun looked up from the green screen to Nicole's green, narrowed eyes.
"... Man, I look like such a dick from a third-person perspective," Sorun thought, sighing at the sight of the video as he gave Nicole a half-shrug. "Nicole, look, that was right after the thing with the Emerald. I was tired. I don't see how a one-time-"
Sorun was interrupted when Nicole waved her hand behind the green screen, causing its image to shift and change. The new picture being shown was still of Sorun and Sally, though they were standing in a different location in the HQ. And it was with a sinking feeling that Sorun realized he recognized this recording.
"Hey, Sorun," Sally's recording began, "is everything alright with you?"
"... I suppose so," Sorun's recording answered. "Why do you ask?"
"Well, it's just... Nicole's been asking about you a lot. She says that it's been a week since you've even spoken with her."
"Ah. Yeah. That. I, err... there's just been a lot going on, you know? Haven't really had that much time for anything."
"Really? Doing what?"
"You know. Stuff." Sorun's recording slowly began to turn away from Sally. "I should go."
Sally's recording crossed her arms, and the real Sorun could see even past the green filter on the screen that Sally's face looked skeptical. "You're off-mission right now. What do you have to go do?"
"There's this library book I've been neglecting to return. Now seems like a good time." The recording of Sorun began to walk towards the HQ stairs. "Seeya around, Sally."
The recording ended right there. Sorun continued to stare down at it. He didn't even need to bother to look up. He could almost feel her glaring right at him with that same frown on her face.
"... In my defense, I really did have to return a book that day," Sorun said. "It was that Chao book."
Nicole didn't respond to Sorun at all. She instead just waved her hand behind the screen again as a new recording started.
This recording Sorun remembered all too well. It was of him laying down on the HQ's couch. Behind the couch was Nicole herself, resting her hands on the top of the couch while leaning over its top to look down at Sorun. They were both looking towards each other, Nicole's face questioning while Sorun had worn an empty, tired expression. The Sorun observing the recording remembered that, on the inside, he'd been leagues more anxious than how he'd appeared back then. Much like he felt right now watching these recordings.
"Sorun?" Nicole's recording asked. "May we please talk?"
"We're talkin' right now, Nicole," Sorun's recording dismissively replied.
"That is indeed correct," she said, "but I wished to discuss why it is you've been so withdrawn from me as of late."
"Withdrawn? I haven't been withdrawn from you."
"Then... perhaps you would like to play something with me? Or talk? Sally provided me with a Power Ring, so we have plenty of time." The face on Nicole's recording turned into a hopeful one, and even grew a small smile, which only went to hurt the real Sorun all the more when he heard what his recording said next.
"I would, Nicole, but, uh... can't." And then he just Tricked away. The couch instantly became vacant as Sorun teleported somewhere, the stairs if he remembered correctly, leaving a now downcast Nicole to stare at the empty spot he'd been occupying.
He just plainly hadn't had a good excuse to tell her, so he'd done the next best thing: he ran away. He didn't remember looking back to see Nicole's direction after he left. He'd just focused on getting away from her as quickly as possible, so seeing this recording of her shook something in him. She looked saddened that he'd left so abruptly like that.
Was this why Nicole was doing this? Because she was upset at the callous demeanor he'd grown seemingly out of nowhere? Because she was confused or even worried for him? He didn't know, and every single answer frightened him because here she was directly confronting him over the matter and he had no good answers to give her.
The green window closed and disappeared entirely. Sorun was left feeling extremely awkward and worried for what was to come in a few seconds, and when he looked back up at Nicole who'd re-crossed her arms while still frowning at him, he couldn't help but grimace. "Yeah, I got no excuse for that one," he finally admitted. "Do you record me every single time you're near me?"
"Those were not recordings. They're my memory files. Specifically memory files of you," she corrected. "I've been looking back at them frequently."
"Oh." Sorun blinked in surprise. He didn't know what to think of that. It made sense when he thought about it, but even still he was a bit off-put by it. "... That's kind of creepy, Nicole."
Seeing as that only seemed to make her mood worse, that probably hadn't been the right thing to say. "Do you find it 'creepy' when you look back at your memories of others?"
"I mean, no..." She had him there. He tried as hard as he could, but he couldn't find a good rebuttal to that. So instead, he just sighed out loud and trudged towards one of the previously-occupied chairs. "You got a good point," he conceded, sitting down in the chair and swiveling to Nicole's direction. "I take it you're upset."
"My friend has been actively ignoring and avoiding me at every single turn for reasons only known to him, as he refuses to discuss the matter," she poignantly stated. Her tone of voice caused Sorun to shrink back further into his seat, and he found it increasingly hard to maintain eye contact with her. "I only wish to know why you've adopted this behavior."
Sighing, Sorun leaned back deeper into his seat. "I get where you're coming from Nicole, but is now, right now, this specific time, the best time to be doing this?" he asked, and then gestured towards the door leading into the room. "We-we're in the middle of a Badnik factory. Espio and Charmy are running around planting bombs everywhere! I just- I really don't think this is the best time-"
"Then when is the best time?" Nicole asked, cutting Sorun off mid-sentence. "Every single other time I've tried to gain your attention has proved unsuccessful. The only opportunity I've had to discuss this with you is right now in the middle of a mission."
Sorun gestured his hand towards Nicole and opened his mouth, but when he tried to speak no words would come out. Fact was he just couldn't think of anything to say, and because of this all he managed to do was make a breathy sigh, lower his hand, and turn away from Nicole. The AI saw Sorun's reaction towards her words, her features softening just the slightest amount as her form slumped forwards slightly.
"I've missed our time together." Nicole's words shocked Sorun out of whatever self-absorbed trance he'd been in, causing him to shift his eyes back over to the lynx. "I've missed being with my friend. I... don't like what you've been doing, Sorun."
"You have other friends, you know," Sorun mumbled back.
"Yes, I know. Every single one of the Freedom Fighters is my friend. Sally is an... extraordinarily exceptional friend. But you're my friend, too. I enjoy playing those games with you. I always had an interest in games, but you're the only one I've ever managed to experience fun playing them with." Sorun's hands twitched when he heard that. "I like talking with you. I like that you put so much effort to manifest my Mobian form just so we can interact face-to-face instead of through a screen. And I have been unable to experience any of this because my friend has been acting so erratically."
Him acting erratic with people. It was almost enough to make him laugh. His inconsistency with how he handled his relationships with everybody was practically his own defining trait at this point for how deep he'd gone with it. Nicole had probably been the only person he'd been consistent with at all before he started doing this.
But this wasn't what he wanted. Her just writing him off and moving onto her own devices would have been ideal. Not this. Not her going so far just to ask him why her friend was avoiding him. Which he completely understood- hell, he'd probably do the same thing if he was in her shoes and one of his friends from Earth was acting this way. But he hadn't known she'd go this far. Maybe he was a fool for not seeing it. He didn't know.
"Is it me?" The question caused Sorun's head to snap upwards when he heard Nicole's question. "Did I do something to make you want to avoid me?" Her head dipped down a bit. "Is it... because I'm not real?"
"You are real. We've been over this." Sorun's tone came off as a bit snappish, as, for reasons unknown to him, he became almost angered that she'd insinuate he'd think such a thing. His response made Nicole look back towards him, too, her ears standing straight up in surprise. "You didn't do anything, Nicole. None of this is your fault. It's me. I'm..." Once again he failed to find the right words to say, and threw his hand up in frustration. "I... agh..."
He turned his chair towards the computer console, and then practically slammed his face down on it while also covering the top of his head with his arms. He couldn't even bear to look at her at this point from all the self-pity he was beginning to feel over his own, personal plight.
All he'd wanted to do was create as much distance between himself and Nicole as possible. To make it as easy on Nicole so that when he eventually died it wouldn't be so traumatic for her. And deep down he knew he already screwed this up. Screwed it up the moment he'd come back after leaving Knothole and accepted her as a friend. He'd wanted to try, though. For her sake. Because he felt bad for using her mere existence as a crutch just so he could get through this easier. Because she didn't deserve a friend so messed up in the head Sorun couldn't even tell if he was sane anymore.
He didn't want to keep being her friend because he liked being around her just as much as she apparently liked being around him. And he wasn't an idiot. Even an emotional neanderthal like him could see how he kept reacting whenever he was around her, or whenever he just thought of her. The way he'd lose focus on everything else and the way his heart would speed up. He kept feeling something that was completely foreign to him whenever he was around her, and it scared him. He didn't know what it was and he didn't know what to do with it. He had an inkling to what it was, though. And that just frightened him even more. Somehow almost as much as dying.
And he couldn't tell her this. He couldn't tell anybody this. None of it. Even if he could he wouldn't. They couldn't know he was dying. They'd hold him back. They'd stop him from gaining power. They'd waste so much just to save what little life he had left. So he had to keep it up. He had to keep it up until he died. He had to keep it up until everybody was safe.
He had to lie his ass off just to get out of this situation.
Problem was he didn't know if he could.
"... What the fuck am I supposed to actually say here to get Nicole off my back?" Sorun silently wondered to himself, still buried beneath his arms. "Go with the tired angle? Say all these missions are wearing me out and I just don't have the energy to hang out with her? My deteriorating condition backs it up, but that doesn't work for me in the long game. They might start putting me out on less missions. Can't have that. Say playing all those games with her makes me homesick and I just needed a break? Nah, she'd never go for something like that. She'd read my lie like a book." He searched as deep as he could into his mind for as much information as possible so he could string together some half-believable lie that would appease Nicole and end this conversation without telling her the truth, but try as he might, he couldn't find anything to use. "I got nothing," Sorun realized as his arms slid off his head, allowing him to pick himself back up. "There's nothing I can say to her that won't be detrimental in the long run or that she'd just see through. Nothing but the truth, but that isn't an option."
When he looked back towards Nicole, he completely froze and felt his senses cry out in outrage. It was that look she was giving him. The way her features were married in sadness, just like what he was feeling. The way her ears were completely flattened against her head.
She looked genuinely miserable. Sorun felt even worse for being the one to cause this.
"Damn it all." He had to say something. Anything. He couldn't leave her in a state like this. He just couldn't. "It's a secret," he finally blurted out, and right after saying this he just barely managed to resist the urge to clamp his hands over his mouth.
Nicole's reaction was readily apparent. Her black and brown ears picked up halfway, almost in confusion, and her face matched this in the way she tilted her head to the side in question while her features scrunched in equal confusion. "A secret?" she repeated, almost in disbelief.
"Yeah, a secret," Sorun confirmed with a nod. "You know, like that big secret project you keep working on. Sort of," he continued as he spun his whole body in the direction of the computer console, scarcely believing the own words that seemed to be automatically flying out from his mouth. "Okay, it's not exactly like that, but... it's just something I don't want to talk about, alright?"
"... Nanites."
Of all the words she could have said, Sorun hadn't expected that one. In fact, that specific word was probably at the bottom of the list of words he'd expected her to say. He didn't even know if that word was on the list of possible words, because it was a word so out of the blue he didn't even know what to make of it. So instead, he spun his head just enough to get Nicole into view of one of his eyes while muttering, "Huh-I-what-huh?"
"Nanites," Nicole repeated. "It's a surprise. For the Freedom Fighters, and for everybody else in Knothole. Admittedly it's something that's been ready for quite some time now, though I've lacked an adequate opportunity to finally set the wheels in motion, as it were. I've been going over all of my progress again and again in the meantime just to ensure it goes off without issue while making small tweaks every now and then." She leaned in closer towards Sorun, and he almost fell out of his seat when he saw the tiniest of smirks play on the edges of her mouth. "That is all that I am willing to divulge in the matter of my secret project. And I would sincerely appreciate you not mentioning this to any of the others, especially Sally. As I said, this is meant to be a surprise."
"Fuck, she wasn't supposed to give me any pull and make an excuse for me to spill! What does that even mean anyways!?" He knew what a nanite was from his vast source of fictional knowledge. What he didn't know was how the term "nanite" was pertinent to anything at all, and he didn't think Nicole would tell him. And he wasn't going to go and ask anybody else, either, for fear of breaking the massive amount of trust Nicole was putting on him on the spot. So instead he just silently gulped and asked, "So why... why are you telling me?"
"Because I realize that sometimes we keep secrets from others, and that the reason we keep these things are not always clear. What is clear is that these secrets are often kept for the sake of those we care for, such as with my project and what I assume whatever your secret is," Nicole answered. She slid off of the computer console and stepped in front of Sorun. "Am I incorrect in assuming this?" she asked him as she bent down to grab his arm, and then proceeded to pull him out of the chair to his feet.
Sorun felt his heart racing in his chest for two reasons. First was from the contact Nicole had on his arm, which he ended as soon as he could by gently but quickly pulling his arm from her grasp as soon as he was on his feet. The second reason was because her words resonated deep within him. The act of keeping secrets for the sake of others. He didn't know if that was exactly applicable to him, but it still felt somewhat right somehow. And Nicole understood that about him. It... made him feel warm. And also absolutely terrible knowing he was going to exploit what she just said as a way of getting out of this.
"Holy shit, is this actually happening? Is she giving me an out for free?" That'd be amazing if she was. It would let him circumvent this whole situation without creating a convoluted lie he had to juggle around with all the others. He decided to nod along with Nicole's question. "It's, well... I wouldn't exactly call my secret a surprise, er, well, guess it kinda will be, but... yeah, it's for everybody else's sake." He didn't even have to lie with that one.
Nicole's response was to fold her hands over her midsection and tip her head down slightly. Sorun could have sworn she almost looked relieved to hear him confirm her thoughts. "Then I won't pry into what you've been keeping secret from us."
"Aw, sweet-"
"On two conditions."
"SHIT." Clearing his throat, Sorun hesitantly tilted his head slightly to the side. "Uhhhh... sure. What are they?"
The holo-lynx lifted her head up just enough so that their eyes met. "First, I want you to promise me that at some point you'll tell me just what this secret of yours is. It doesn't have to be a specific date. You can take as much time as you need to tell me. But eventually I wish for you to tell me the truth."
Easy enough, he could just lie and never do it. "That's... okay, I can do that. It'll take a while, though. A long while."
"That's fine," Nicole said. "My second condition is that I want you to stop avoiding me so we can go back to the way things were before you started doing this. And I want to do something with you right after this mission is over."
"Well..." He clicked his teeth and began rubbing at the back of his neck. "Don't agree to it. It undermines the whole reason you did this in the first place. Don't do it." The hand rubbing his neck dropped to his side. "I, er..." His eyes flicked back and forth towards and away from Nicole's. "Don't you fucking do it." He sighed, looked Nicole right in the eyes, and nodded. "We can do that. Of course," he agreed, sighing right after. "Sorun, you fucking coward."
The look that had grown on Nicole's face was a stark contrast to how Sorun was feeling on the inside, even if he managed to keep up a mostly neutral expression on the outside. She was smiling at him, wide and brightly. "Thank you for listening to me, Sorun."
"Yep... yeah! D-don't worry about it, Nicole." A sudden beeping in Sorun's left ear caused his head to perk up, making him hold a hand up to make Nicole pause. "Uhp, hold on. Gettin' call here."
Nicole nodded immediately, turning back towards the computer console while Sorun stepped a few feet away. He held his hand up to his ear, pressing a small button on the ear piece attached to his ear. He heard a small burst of static, and after it ended he heard a high-pitched voice reach his ears.
"Er, guys? Charmy here. What, uh... what am I supposed to do if I run out of explosives to place?" came Charmy's voice from the device in Sorun's ear.
A noticeably deeper voice sounded from the earpiece in response to the bee's question. "I've noticed that I'm short on explosives as well. Would you care to explain, Sorun?"
The human shrugged. "Don't look at me. It was Charmy's turn in the rotation to pack the equipment," he said.
"Charmy?" came Espio's impatient voice.
"Hey, it's not my fault! The list you guys gave me said to pack six explosives in each satchel!"
"... You mean nine, correct?"
"Nine?" There was a pause from the other end of the comm. device. "Ohhh...! I, uh, eh-heh... I think I may have... read that upside-down..."
The loud slap of a hand impacting the owner's face was heard. "Charmy...!"
"It was just one number, Espio!"
"A number that's going to cost us the mission because we don't have the munitions necessary to blow this factory up!"
"Why do I have to deal with this?" Sorun asked himself, having taken his finger off the earpiece so the other two wouldn't hear him. He turned back towards Nicole whose attention had been drawn from the commotion, to which he explained, "Charmy misread something and shorthanded us on bombs. He read the number nine upside-down somehow."
"Yes, he does that sometimes. It's a bad habit of his."
"... Ngh..." He felt a massive throb in his brain when he heard that. He'd actually had to hold a hand to his forehead to soothe himself from the resulting headache. "... Okay, ignoring that, do we have any solutions? Aside from, you know, going all the way back to Knothole to restock." He ground his teeth and looked down at his right hand. "It'd totally be an option if I figured out how Yamato could make portals already..."
"One moment, please." Nicole closed her eyes, and behind her Sorun noticed that some of the computer monitors were beginning to flicker. The teen quirked an eyebrow when he saw this, but seconds later Nicole had opened her eyes back up and then turned towards the screens. "From what data I managed to gather, it seems this factory is primarily a production site for fuel cores used to power his Badniks. I'm displaying the storage depot."
She waved her hand in front of one of the computer monitors, causing it to shift to an image of what looked like the interior of a small warehouse. Sorun leaned in closer, noting that there at one of the ends of the warehouse were shelves containing seemingly hundreds of pallets, each stuffed to the brim in metal cylinders stamped with, as best as he could tell, caution symbols. He hummed in interest, and looked back at Nicole.
"So this is where they store the fuel thingies?" he asked, nodding to the screen.
"That is correct," she answered. "As is the case with most creations of Eggman's, those cores used to power his machines can often be volatile. One exploding is devastating enough, but if an entire storage unit of those cores were to go off at once the damage could prove to be catastrophic." She flashed a small smirk towards Sorun's way. "I would think that destruction of that magnitude would be sufficient in leveling the entire factory."
"Ahhh. Well, I don't have a better idea. We're going with it." He quickly gave Nicole a grateful thumbs-up, and then stepped away from the computer console and turned his back to Nicole too quickly to catch the smile she'd given him. He then put his fingers towards his earpiece and said, "Alright, you two, Nicole's got a plan. Apparently this factory makes whatever Eggman's using to power his robots, and there's a warehouse full of the things. Does anybody have any bombs left?"
"I have some I have yet to place, yes," Espio answered.
Sorun nodded. "Okay, that works. We're gonna use the bombs you have left to set off a chain reaction with all those fuel cores and the bombs we already have planted around. You think you can find the place alright?"
"I'm familiar with the layout of the facility from previous missions, and I seem to recall the general area of where the storage house was. I'll find my way there easily enough."
"Mhm, Charmy, do you think you can go to the control room and get Nicole? I'm gonna go to Espio in the depot."
"Yeah, no sweat!"
"Alright, cool. Espio, hang tight. Charmy, I swear if you shake Nicole again-"
"I'm not gonna! Geez!"
He didn't bother responding to Charmy. He simply removed his fingers from the earpiece and turned back to Nicole, who had been looking towards Sorun expectantly. "Alright, I'm gonna go to the depot place. Charmy'll swing by and get you. I told him not to shake you again, but if he does feel free to zap him a bunch like you did me, I guess." He paused and tilted his head at Nicole. "Why'd you do that, anyways?"
Nicole looked away from Sorun at hearing the question. Her eyes remained on the computer screens, and her left hand rose up to rub at her right arm in an almost nervous manner. "I was upset that you were ignoring me."
"So you couldn't have talked to me about it before you started shocking me?" Sorun incredulously replied.
"... I did what I wanted to. I'm not entirely sure myself why I did it." A blue, floating screen appeared next to her, which Nicole proceeded to tap at.
Sorun breathed out a laugh, rolling his eyes while turning towards his discarded box. "Maybe you're just a big teaser," he jokingly replied as he crouched down to fold the box.
"Teasing," Nicole quietly said, her tapping on the blue window slowing. "Perhaps that's it..."
"What's it?" Sorun asked, turning back towards the lynx.
"Nothing important to the mission," she quickly answered. "Sorun, I'm opening all the doors in your path to the storage depot while closing off all other routes to the patrolling Badniks. You and Espio should encounter relatively little resistance."
He blinked towards her, but then shrugged and tugged his cardboard box under his arm. "Alright. See you in, uh... I don't know, twenty minutes I guess?" Sorun stood up and walked towards the entrance to the control room, putting one foot out before turning to Nicole one last time. He opened his mouth, closed it, then opened it again. "Yeah, seeya."
"Goodbye." Even after Sorun had left she continued to stare at the spot in the doorway he'd been standing. After a few moments passed Nicole blinked, looked down at her feet, and then shifted her attention to the blue screen as she continued to calmly tap on it.
"Oh, you're real smooth at this, Sorun. Real fuckin' smooth."
Anger. Frustration. Hopelessness. The usual suspects for bringing down Sorun's mood. Most of the time, though, he didn't have a face to pin all of this negativity on. And right now he couldn't decide whether he was supposed to put all the blame on Nicole or himself, and after a bit of thinking decided that, no, this was all his fault. Because when was it not?
At the very least, this mission was going better then most others. Nicole had been true to her word and made the way to the storage depot relatively clear for Sorun. In fact, he'd only encountered a single Badnik on his way over there, which had quickly been cut down with Yamato. None of that was the problem, and frankly, he could barely even bring himself to think about the mission right now. Most of his thoughts were currently occupied with Nicole.
"We're right back on square goddamn one here. We were supposed to avoid her, not go right back to where we were." He rounded past a corner, continuing to think to himself while also beginning to cough into his closed fist. "But what was I supposed to do? She had me boxed in, there was nothing I could have said. All things considered I got out of that pretty okay. More than okay, even. She won't worry about the secret I'm keeping, and all I have to do is keep hanging out with her. And that's not so bad, is it? It's not like you can lie to yourself and say you didn't miss her, either.
"And... I like it when she smiles like that. Feels nice."
"Ack, hkc..." He had to stop and lean against a wall as he finished coughing into his hand. He quickly glanced around the hallway's ceiling, feeling a small bit of relief when he saw that there were no cameras watching him, and took a few seconds to let out a few wheezy breaths before pushing himself off the wall. He looked down at the hand he'd coughed on, and then began shaking his head as he wiped the blood he saw off on his pants.
"You're a goddamned fool, Sorun," he thought as he continued walking.
The storage depot was just that: a storage depot. A big warehouse connected to the factory that was mainly full of shelving units. Surprisingly, it was unguarded. At least it was when Sorun had arrived, as he came to the storage depot seeing the bodies of Badniks rent in half from something.
When he looked further towards the back of the warehouse, he saw the cause immediately in a wandering Badnik. One moment it had been walking along on its own, and in the next moment a small, metal object whirled right through the Badnik and caused it to collapse in halves. The object stopped once it lodged itself into a nearby shelf, revealing to be a shuriken. A shuriken that was picked up once its owner materialized right next to it while also reclaiming the lodged weapon in one sooth motion.
It was Espio, then. Sorun liked Espio. He was calm, quiet, didn't speak all that much unless necessary and didn't ambush Sorun out of nowhere to ask him personal questions. Just the opposite, he kept to himself for the most part and on the rare occasion he did speak he usually wasn't too boring to talk with. So Sorun had grown to respect him, both for not being too chatty and for being so efficient at what he did best, which was sneak around and throw sharp metal things. And he always thought ninjas were kind of cool. So by extension Espio was kind of cool to him.
"Geez, how hard is he whipping those things for them to cut through whole robots?" Sorun silently wondered to himself. He watched as the chameleon briefly inspected the shuriken, only to the conceal the weapon in his gloves before turning towards a nearby shelf. Even from here Sorun recognized the massive metal tubes and the caution symbols printed on their sides. "Guess those are the fuel whatevers. Espio beat me to it. Alright, guess I'll go and say hi."
It was just when Espio had crouched down in front of the shelved canisters did Sorun choose to Trick on top of the shelf in a seated position. The chameleon's immediate reaction was to reach into his glove for a shuriken, but right when he pulled it out halfway he stilled upon seeing it was Sorun staring down at him. He sighed, and then replaced the shuriken while crouching back down.
"You would do well not to startle people like that," Espio said, placing the satchel of explosives down on the ground next to him. "I could have accidentally taken your head off right there."
Even knowing it was said as an honest warning still sent a slight chill down Sorun's spine. He tried his best to ignore it. "Oh come on. You're telling me you never messed with anybody with your invisibility?"
"Perhaps on occasion," Espio answered as he reached into the satchel. "Since you're here could you help in arming these bombs?" he asked, pulling out one of the bombs and tossing it up towards Sorun.
The human caught the bomb easily enough, turning the device over in his hand. Bundles of wrapped explosives duct taped together and wired to a remote detonator. Standard homemade bomb. "Yeah, sure," he said, scooting over to a nearby canister and sticking the adhesive back of the bomb onto it. "Okay, so... flip this switch, make sure this wire's connected..." he mumbled under his breath, sticking his tongue out in concentration as he fiddled with the bomb's controls.
He didn't know why, but somehow it felt stranger knowing he could arm live explosives with ease now compared to having powers. Maybe it was because arming a bomb was knowledge he'd earned and now owned after being taught it as compared to just being handed it for "free" by a magic rock. And despite him earning it fairly it was still a skill he never imagined himself ever having in a normal life. Unless he'd ever taken a career in something like demolition. Or terrorism.
And all it took was a bunch of trial and error and blowing Antoine up with paint bombs a lot until he got it right.
"I'm surprised you volunteered to come help me with this," Espio said from below Sorun, the chameleon in the process of arming his own explosive. "I would have thought you'd just let Charmy do this while you took Nicole out of here."
"Yeah, well... to tell you the truth I just needed to get away from Nicole for a bit," Sorun admitted after a long pause.
"I see. I had noticed you've been withdrawn with her as of late-"
"That word again, withdrawn, geez..."
"- and it made me wonder if something happened."
Shaking his head, Sorun flipped the last switch on the bomb to activate the transceiver for the detonator. "Nothing happened. We patched things up, actually," he said, moving back to the edge of the shelf so he could sit down and stare down at Espio. "Yeah, it was... it was this whole stupid thing, don't worry about it."
Espio paused in his work, flashed his yellow eyes up at Sorun, and with a small shrug turned back to his own bomb. "If you say so. Glad to hear you worked through your issues."
"Wouldn't that be the day." Rolling his eyes, Sorun Tricked back down to ground level only to then sit down on a nearby crate. "Guess you could say that. How've you been, Espio?" Sorun suddenly asked. "I guess you must have been away from your own home for a while now being here with the rest of the Chaotix and away from..." Sorun trailed off as his eyebrows scrunched in confusion. "... Hey, where are you from, anyways? I never asked."
"... I'm from a community of chameleons that live up on Angel Island," Espio answered, keeping his spine-lined back to Sorun as he continued arming his bomb.
Sorun hummed in acknowledgement. "Ah, the infamous floating island. Y'know, I've actually heard very little about the place. I thought I heard Knuckles mention once that the echidna live there?"
"They do, but there were others as well. The chameleon community I mentioned was one such group."
"Ah, alright." The human teen nodded in understanding. "So how're they doing?"
"I'm unsure," Espio answered. "Things up on the island have been... difficult."
"So I've heard. What happened up there, anyways?"
"More than I could tell in the time we have," Espio bitterly mumbled to him. "A while back Eggman's forces had... occupied the island for a time. We managed to do what we could, dismantled a prison camp that had been set up, but by then the echidna population had already been decimated." As one hand continued to work on the bomb another hand reached upwards to rub across an exhausted Espio's face. "It doesn't help matters that there's an entire faction of the echidna that are having a civil war amidst each other alongside everything else going on."
Sorun grimaced. Knuckles and Julie-Su had always been tight-lipped on things up on the island, and after hearing that from Espio he could understand why. Their people evidently had problems. The mention of a prison camp alone briefly made his hands shudder in anger. When he heard about the civil war, though, he couldn't help but tilt his head in question.
"What do you mean a civil war?" he asked. "They seriously have the resources to waste time on a civil war with the whole Eggman thing going on?"
"Eggman's presence on the island was completely diminished when we and the Freedom Fighters liberated it from him, and situations on the island were always self-contained up there. And even before Echindaopolis - the city they'd occupied before Eggman came - fell, they had problems with the Dark Legion Knuckles and the rest of us Chaotix always had to deal with."
Sorun slowly nodded in understanding, but then paused halfway. "The Dark Legion? You can't be serio- you are serious my god that sounds lame..."
Espio flipped a final switch on the bomb, arming the receiver, and then turned towards Sorun while still in a crouching position. "They're group of echidna who have a near-radical reverence of technology. You'd be hard-pressed to find a member of the Dark Legion that didn't undergo cybernetic augmentation of some kind, and they often clashed with the rest of the echidna civilization living on Angel Island due to differing beliefs over technology. Current events have made it so the group split off into two factions, a Flame and Frost Legion, and they've been at war with one-another since then. Otherwise they've kept to themselves for the most part."
"This is ridiculous." Sorun found himself pinching the bridge of his nose. "This is- this is actual nonsense I'm hearing. Doesn't even sound real. Dude, what happened up there to make things so dire?"
"As I said. Too much to explain," Espio said. "Between the warring Legions, the faction of dingoes that have been getting into constant skirmishes with the echidna, which is a separate situation entirely, and the loss of their city and massive portion of their population, all coupled with their isolation up on the island, it... things could be better. Much better." He closed his eyes and turned his head to the side. "And so... I'm unsure what became of the chameleon community up there amidst all that chaos, or any of the other Mobian communities that had resided up there for that matter. I don't imagine things ended well. Much was lost in all that fighting."
"Sounds like it." Even by Mobius standards what Sorun was hearing seemed a bit out there. Far outside of the normal brand of weirdness here he was used to dealing with. And it really sounded like there was some history that happened up there; lots and lots of history and fighting that happened way before Sorun ever got here. He was tempted to ask more, but another part of him dreaded hearing exactly how much there was to say on the island. "So the, er, normal echidna. The non-cyborgy ones. They're okay?"
"For however many of them remain, yes," Espio confirmed with a nod. "They've been holed up in a makeshift refugee camp ever since Eggman's occupation ended, though we've been out of touch with them since then. I'm unsure as to what their current state actually is."
"Knuckles doesn't keep in contact?"
"He... had a falling out of sorts. I shouldn't say more." Glancing back at the armed bomb, Espio nodded his head and stood up to his full height. "The bombs are ready to go. We should depart."
"Yeah." Nodding his head, Sorun put his finger up to his earpiece. "Charmy, we're all set. You and Nicole good?"
"We're already outside waiting for you," said Charmy's voice through the earpiece. "Hurry up and get back so we can go home!"
"I'll go extra slow just for you, Charmy." Sorun's finger was removed from the earpiece before he could hear a retort from the bee. He glanced towards Espio, the chameleon nodding back to him before his body phased into invisibility. Sorun stared at the spot the chameleon had been standing in before disappearing, rolled his eyes with a sigh, and then began unfolding his cardboard box once more.
"Any-takers-for-doing-the-honors-no-alright-I'm-hittin'-the-button."
This sentence was said in the same breath that Sorun pulled the detonator he'd been carrying out from his pocket. In the single second he'd blurted it out there was a moment where Charmy had reached for the remote in his hands, but before the bee had even gotten close Sorun's thumb had compressed down on the big, red button in the center of the device.
There was the sound of a small beep!, followed by a little red light on the upper right corner of the detonator lighting up. An instant later the ground beneath the group began to shake, and a large, deafening explosion was heard in the distance. From near the back of the factory they all stared at a large, orange fireball that broke through the roof and shot up towards the sky, the resulting shockwave rattling the entire building before causing it to collapse completely in on itself. Overall, the resulting complete destruction of the factory took less than ten seconds from the start of the explosion.
The ones responsible for this sabotage stood hidden in cover amongst the pile of shipping containers near the outer perimeter of the compound the previously-intact factory had occupied. Sorun and Espio both looked on towards the destruction with mainly impassive looks, while Charmy was pouting towards Sorun with his wings angrily buzzing behind him.
"I wanted to hit the button this time," Charmy grumbled out, crossing his arms and turning away in a small huff. Sorun had glanced back at him, shrugged, and then fully turned his body away from the smoldering remains of the factory.
"Maybe next time, Charmy," the human said. "Next time. Right now I just wanna go back to Knothole and away from here."
"As do we all," Espio agreed. "There were still a small number of Badniks patrolling outside the factory that will be searching the premises. Let's leave now while we're still in the clear."
With that said, Espio spun around and began walking in the opposite direction of the factory, towards where they'd parked the floating saucer vehicle they'd used to come here now hidden in the nearby woods. Charmy floated right behind him, still grumbling under his breath with his head hung low. Sorun stayed where he was, his eyes lingering on the handheld device held in Charmy's hand.
"... Man." He breathed out a small sigh, glancing back at the smoldering remains of the factory before turning back towards Charmy's back, and then looking down at the small computer again. "What... a... day." After turning his head to the side to let out a light cough, he calmly placed his hands into his pockets and began following the others.
Somewhere on the northern continent
"Man... gettin' bored here."
At one point this had been a factory. Before he came it was one of the bigger ones that churned out Badniks by the hundreds an hour, and when he arrived it had been home to thousands of the robots, all of varying size and weaponry.
Now he was surrounded by thousands of robotic corpses, with the factory being reduced to absolute rubble right behind him. In the middle of the graveyard of Badniks, their corpses packed so tightly together the ground was not visible, was a man in a red hood sitting on the corpse of a rather large Badnik. His claymore sword was stabbed right into the body of another robot right in front of him, his hands draped over the cross guard and his fingers tapping against the guard of the sword styled in the shape of a screaming skull.
"Egh... third one in the last hour. Wish the Freedom Fighters would hurry the hell up, but I guess it's good they're going at this pace. And while they're doing their thing I get to go around and hit the really big targets to pressure Eggman." His hooded head turned towards the remains of the destroyed factory. "... Should probably slow down, actually," he muttered to himself. "Can't let Eggman get too suspicious over all his factories blowin' up, and I can't tip the Freedom Fighters off that somebody's going around wrecking his shit. They gotta think everything's on them, and the big guy's gotta think the same."
With a small groan, he sat up from the robot while also pulling the large sword and its notched tip out from the robot's corpse. With one hand, he spun the sword around in a circle in a feat of inhuman strength before finally resting it on his shoulder.
"Pretty soon the tipping point for Eggman will get here, and that should prompt that whole mess to start. 'Til then, I gotta go and get my hands on a present for Eggman. 'Least I gotta get it before Sorun goes and eats it." He began to tip-toe his way down the hill of Badnik corpses, but then stopped midway. "Er, wait, don't I need two?"
Humming, Rubrum dug into the pocket of his cloak before bringing out a small piece of notebook paper. He flipped it over to read the contents written on the front, and then made a small "ah" of understanding. "Ohh, alright, I keep one and- okay, yeah." He pocketed the paper, and then resumed his trek through the graveyard of Badniks.
"A little bit closer," Rubrum mumbled to himself. "Just a little bit closer to the end of all this madness..."
