Chapter 16 – Spirit and Starlight
Robotnik had clearly not been expecting Sonic's arrival. The human crouched near a crystal formation with some kind of welding tool and a bunch of sample vials, his hovering vehicle not far off. No bots around. No sign of readied weapons or traps.
Just Robotnik.
Hedgehog stared at human. Human stared back, looking very much like a walrus that had been slapped upside the head with a fish.
And then Robotnik bolted.
"Hey!" Sonic shouted as the surprisingly nimble human jumped into the mech like his hindquarters were on fire. Sonic started forward, but he'd been caught on the back foot, and Robotnik pulled the mech up and out of immediate reach before the hedgehog recovered enough to jump at him.
How on Mobius could someone that resembled an egg on legs move that quickly?
Sonic scrambled onto the first of several ledges in the wall, intent on following the human and smashing his mech. Again. Maybe jumping on Robotnik's head for good measure. "Get back here!"
"I think not, rodent!" Robotnik called down as he ascended up through a rough shaft in the stone.
"Hedgehog!"
"Don't care!"
Something bounced down the shaft. Sonic dodged it easily, pressing himself against the uneven blocks that formed his makeshift ladder. The object clattered down to the floor below.
And beeped.
Sonic spared a glance.
The object was a small, round sphere, sporting fins like a cartoonish mustache, two disks like the lenses of spectacles, and the outline of a toothy grin that flashed red in time with the beeping. Robotnik's face.
"You have got to be kidding me," Sonic muttered, moments before the beeping stopped, and the sphere exploded.
It was relatively small, as explosions went. Not that Sonic had experience with anything beyond the fireworks his uncle's village fired off at the turn of each new year, but this was comparable to those displays. It didn't even reach far enough up the shaft to singe Sonic's quills, though it shook the walls enough that he nearly lost his grip, and had to jam his hand into the mouth of one of the owl carvings to maintain his hold.
"Hah! You missed!" he shouted up the shaft at Robotnik.
A gurgling noise from below blew the steam from his bravado.
Sonic had escaped the little bomb unscathed, but the wall below had not, and now it gushed water out into the passage. Water that quickly filled the space and began rising. Because of course it was.
He took a moment to bang his forehead against the wall in frustration, and then started climbing. "No fair!" he shouted at the human's retreating machine.
His only answer was a mad cackle above.
Sonic muttered invectives and vague threats under his breath as he tried to keep ahead of the rising water. The stone beneath his gloves was slick with damp and patches of algae, and the ledges almost too narrow for even a toe-hold, threatening to drop him back in the drink with one careless slip-up. Somehow, though, he managed, even when the owl carvings gave way to more plasma-spitting boar heads and barbed spear traps. He fixated on the fleeing shape of Dr. Robotnik and fantasies of giving the human a solid dunking just to see if he could swim. Though with Sonic's luck, the mad doctor would probably just bob along like a cork with minimal effort.
Speaking of Sonic's luck, that was about the point when the water, previously lapping at his heels like an overeager pup, caught up with a gushing burble and swamped him. He sucked in a quick, slightly frantic lungful of air before the water closed over his head, and added an unvoiced curse for how his movements slowed down substantially with the water resistance.
And, of course, there were no air bubbles in the shaft.
Great.
He pushed on, forced his attention to focus like a laser just on gaining ground. No slips, no falling. No second chances here. Every jump needed to be precise or he'd never get out of there before drowning.
Even so, by the time he hauled himself out of the water at the top of the shaft, into a larger and blessedly flood-free chamber, his arms and torso sported a couple new scratches from close shaves with the spear traps, and he'd burned his left knee by getting too close to one of the boar heads. His ears rang from holding his breath too long, and everything shook from cold and exhaustion as the water slowly dripped from his fur. He forced himself to his feet by sheer willpower alone, and glared at Robotnik, who hovered not far off with a stupefied look on his face, jaw dropped.
Sonic forced himself to grin and rub nonchalantly at his nose, trying to hide how his arms quivered. He probably would've fallen over if there'd been a stiff breeze in the caves. If Robotnik actually put up a fight, Sonic was certain to lose.
Instead, Robotnik took one look at the defiant hedgehog and decided to turn tail and run.
Sonic put on a good show of chasing him, of course—no sense in giving away how burnt out he was—but his shaky legs got the best of him, and the mad doctor's mech quickly disappeared into the shadowy tunnels of the labyrinth, leaving Sonic alone again. Good riddance. He was far too tired to actually fight, and in fact flopped onto the floor as his legs finally gave out. Hopefully no bots would find him before he could get some rest.
Just a little rest...
He jerked awake. Had he fallen asleep right there on the cold floor? It felt like no time had passed at all, not helped by being in a cave lit only by glowing crystals, but his stiff limbs and growling stomach said otherwise. Sitting up proved rather difficult. It took him three tries just to roll onto his side, and another two to get his hands under himself and get vertical, only to sway slightly where he sat from wooziness.
Yeah, probably best I didn't actually fight him.
A thorough pep talk to his legs later, followed by an amount of swearing that would probably have gotten him grounded for a month if his uncle had heard, and Sonic was once more stumbling along the same tunnel Robotnik had fled down. He didn't exactly relish the idea of running into the interloper before he'd had a good meal and, if he was lucky, a better sleep in a real bed, but it was also the most likely way to actually find the exit to the aptly-named labyrinth. After all, Robotnik had entered the caves somehow, and it almost certainly wasn't the same way Sonic had gotten in.
Sure enough, after he'd warmed up his legs enough to push his pace up to a light jog—for him—he caught a good sniff of the smell of rain on dirt that danced down the tunnel on a playful breeze. Not long after, he could see a change in the light up ahead as the crystals petered out and everything took on a cool bluish cast. Cracks in the ceiling let in dangling roots and vines, and soon Sonic was running through beams of moonlight toward a clearly visible cave opening.
He sped up.
The cave opened out onto a slope up on the side of the island's central mountain range, and Sonic burst out of the cave entrance to skid to a stop in a small copse of trees where the ground steepened into a sharp drop. Luckily Robotnik hadn't thought to station bots outside the cave—or send them inside to look for him—though now that he'd gotten his blood pumping, Sonic was in the mood to trash some metal mooks again.
Instead, he had a lovely view of a sweeping mountain valley, bathed in moonlight that cast everything in tones of silver and blue, and a breathtaking blanket of stars sparkling in the cloudless sky. A stream burbled over a stony bed somewhere nearby, and the world smelled of fresh rain. The ground was wet too, the grass a bit slick, the earth slightly spongy.
Given how things had gone the last time he'd been out in the rain on this island, Sonic wasn't sure whether or not he should be grateful he'd been in the labyrinth when it passed over.
But that didn't matter now. What did matter was what sat in the valley below.
Shadows of structures. Lights that mirrored the stars above, sparse though they were.
The island's city.
—
The city was really more of a large town, to be honest.
Sonic approached it cautiously. Sally hadn't said if the villagers were the receptive kind or more like her brother, and he didn't want to risk the latter. Plus Robotnik had built his base on the literal edge of the city, according to Sally, which meant this was likely to be the most heavily patrolled part of the island. The last thing Sonic needed was to be caught and stuffed into a bot.
If nothing else, it would be inconvenient for however long it took him to bust back out.
But this was definitely the island's city. More than a few buildings were partially torn down or built over with sheets of metal and scaffolding, but the ones that were still intact enough to hold people were constructed of bricks in warm earth tones, with tiled roofs and walls in slightly uneven angles. The streets between were cobbled and meandered in lopsided directions, and lampposts stood at intervals holding carved wooden lanterns that sat dark. Green spaces and grassy commons would be abundant, Sonic knew. Everything had an organic, flowing feel, blending with nature even as it rose above it. Natural. Comforting.
And someone—no need to guess who—had taken it upon themselves to build sterile metal and concrete structures on top of them in rigid order. The new construction dwarfed the Mobian city, shadowing it beneath imposing bulk, not unlike the remains of the village back in the scrap yard. Thoroughfares of swooping girders and swaths of pavement soared over everything.
All of it cold and unwelcoming.
Though those roads certainly looked like they'd be fun to run on...
Sonic shook his head and dragged his attention back down to the Mobian city. It sat quiet and mostly dark. Only a few lights glimmered in windows here and there, scattered and sparse. Most of the people would likely be asleep, given the late hour. What few were up were, unfortunately, probably not going to be all that welcome to a random hedgehog wandering into town.
He caught a glimpse of a plaque bolted up on one of the brick walls. It featured his face, crudely drawn and colored with angry eyes and sharp teeth, along with the word "WARNING" in large letters and a promise of an unspecified reward for turning him in.
Yeah, the villagers weren't going to be very welcoming with signs like that hanging around.
Instead, Sonic trotted quietly through the streets, feet splashing where the rain had collected in grimy puddles, heading for higher ground so he could get his bearings. He felt more than saw eyes on him as he passed the darkened homes and businesses, caught glimpses of shadows passing in the windows, and tried not to feel too much an outsider in a haunted ghost town. It didn't work so well. This was definitely not his home, and both he and the Mobians who did live here knew it.
But home or not, he could still try to help. This wasn't right.
If he just knew what he could do to help.
Sonic found a series of ramps and stairs that led upward, and started hopping up them.
Really, what could he do? He was just one single, thirteen-year-old hedgehog, after all. Beating up bots and hitting a hover mech was one thing. Undoing all the industrialized changes to the island? Freeing whole villages of prisoners? Actually kicking one dastardly and unfortunately well-supplied human off the island? Most, if not all, of that was probably out of his depth, and if he wasn't careful, would likely result in worse injury than he'd already sustained.
How many times had he already nearly died?
Would someone tell his uncle if something happened to him, or would Uncle Chuck be left in his workshop, waiting, always wondering if Sonic had abandoned him?
Sonic shuddered at the thought.
A platform elevator on one wall carried him higher, out of the sleeping city below and into the network of open roads and buildings under construction above, and Sonic had to whistle at the impressive view before him despite the circumstances. This high up, the trees nestled among the brick buildings below barely peeked above the scaffolding, closer in appearance to leafy shrubs if one didn't look too closely. Streetlights glowed a warm amber with an electric hum and the occasional crackle of energy, and everything felt open. Beyond the arcs and loops of the highways, the shadows of buildings loomed, all straight lines and blue-lit windows, silhouetted against the star-dusted sky.
If it weren't for being built on the backbone of an oppressed Mobian settlement, it would almost be beautiful. Still was, in a way.
But like a moldy cheese, it all had a rotten underbelly that ruined the effect.
Sonic sighed. This wasn't quite the adventure he'd thought of when he set out from home.
"It is what it is, I guess," he mused, and stretched his legs.
There was a road to run, after all, with no bot patrols in sight, and even if his adventure had more near-death experiences and attempted heroism in it than he'd intended or anticipated, he could still have fun too.
And what better way to do recon than at top speed?
He hopped a little in place to loosen up, then crouched, took a deep breath, and took off.
The road made for excellent running. Nicely paved and free of obstructions and trip hazards, with banked turns and even occasional loops—why, Sonic couldn't tell, nor did he care—he was able to relax and really push his limits to the test. Wind whistled past his ears, goading him on. His heart drummed in his chest. His feet splashed on the wet ground. Every step was freedom.
He rolled into a ball on the next downward slope, picking up speed and blitzing through two loops and off a ramp to hang briefly in the air, among the stars. Like he could fly. The city—both organic and sterile—sprawled beneath him in a webwork of lines and lights and growth like a woven net.
And from this high vantage point he could see an area of concentrated light. High activity.
Trouble.
He should have been apprehensive about it. Cautious. Wary. Even a little scared.
Just a kid, after all.
But as he dropped back to the road, connected pavement with sneakers and rolled back into his headlong run, the only thing he felt was excitement. It probably said something deep and concerning about his psyche.
He didn't care.
The road flew by beneath his feet. Scaffolding and blockades sped past in a blur. Gaps in the road broke up the run, but only barely as he leaped them, his momentum carrying him across in graceful, speedy arcs. He wished someone could time him, clock his speed for him. Surely he'd set a new record.
Unfortunately the run could only last so long. He reached the end of the road, marked by a cluster of black and yellow barricades and orange cones, on top of a boxy building that overlooked the well-lit area. He skidded to a stop that sent up a small spray of water, and leaned out to size up the situation, gauge what he'd be facing if he jumped down there.
It looked like a holding pen of some sort. Wire fencing bounded a small courtyard of sheets of metal bolted together, and Mobians milled about inside. A row of capsules waited at the far side for fresh occupants, and floating orb-shaped bots surrounded by spike balls patrolled the perimeter of the fencing. Bright floodlights illuminated everything, bleeding light into the surroundings and blotting out the stars. Sonic had a pretty good idea what the capsules were meant for, and also a pretty good idea that he wasn't going to just run past when he could do something about it. No one was getting stuffed inside a bot on his watch. Even if it meant breaking cover and making a spectacle of himself.
For lack of a better way down, Sonic sized up the terrain below, and then jumped.
The first bot cushioned his landing well enough, crumpling beneath his spiky quills and dropping to the ground. Everyone in the holding area, bot and Mobian alike, stared as Sonic righted himself and immediately went after his next target, cutting down another orb before rolling into a ball to hit the fencing like a buzzsaw. The metal links didn't stand a chance, and in no time he'd cut a ragged door in the perimeter and was waving urgently at the nearest Mobians. "Come on!" he called. "Exit's this way!"
Some of the Mobians hesitated, but a few others, many of them younger, recovered quickly and started toward the new gap in the fence. One of the bots squawked in protest, and several rushed at Sonic while the rest started frantically herding prisoners toward the capsules. Sonic ducked past the first bot and tried to hit the next with his quills, only to get knocked aside by one of the spike balls, digging into his arm and drawing blood. He grunted at the jab of pain, but gritted his teeth against it, and jumped at the orb bot again. It split down the middle and fell to the ground in two pieces, spilling out the Mobian inside.
Sonic didn't even wait to get a good look at who he'd freed, running at the next bot, hoping everyone else was taking the very obvious hint to get out of there while they could.
The first of the capsules clanked shut. Some kind of drone lifted from the ground and latched onto the top, and hauled it into the sky.
Sonic cut down another bot, taking another hit for his troubles. The orbs kept their spike balls close, too close for comfort. He'd have to find a different angle, a different approach, or he was going to be full of holes before he'd even finished them off.
Another capsule closed. The sound echoed in his ears.
More people taken.
He growled in frustration, grabbed a spike ball from one of the fallen orb bots, and whipped it around like a fastball at the next orb. It sailed wide, but the orb ducked reflexively, momentarily derailed from its attack, and the next spike ball Sonic threw connected solidly in the bot's face plate. It reeled backward, and Sonic took the opening and knocked it out of the sky as well.
Third capsule.
He pushed himself harder, further, throwing himself recklessly against the remaining bots. Blood oozed from the myriad cuts on his arms, his torso, his legs, streamed from a gash across his forehead. The sting was an afterthought to the desperation to save as many as he could. To not fail.
Had to prove himself.
Prove it to himself.
Do everything he could to succeed.
The last bot fell. He stood, panting, amid the crumpled wreckage, as the Mobians he'd freed from the holding pens helped the people who'd been trapped inside to hobble away, giving the blue hedgehog a wide, wary berth.
Only three capsules had been taken. That was still three capsules' worth of people he'd failed.
No time to stay. He had to help. Had to push on.
One of the freed prisoners raised a hand as if to stop him. To speak.
He didn't stay to listen.