Day 275, 3237
It was a bright and sunny morning on the planet Mobius. Sonic the Hedgehog went through his morning routine of brushing his teeth and straightening his quills at super speed. He took a look in the mirror and began inspecting himself. Ever since the roboticization of his siblings many months prior, Sonic had been waging a campaign against Robotnik's army.
It turned out that Little Planet was only a prelude to what Robotnik had in store. Only a day after Sonia and Manic were roboticized, Robotnik sent an army of Badniks down to Mobius with the mission of capturing and roboticizing everything in sight. Robotnik had apparently retired the Swatbots, and the various freedom fighter cells across Mobius had been forced to come together to take on this new threat.
Unfortunately, thanks to all his new technology, Robotnik had finally managed to locate Sanctuary and had burned the entire forest down. But thankfully, Sonic had been able to grab all of the inhabitants of Sanctuary and used a teleporter created by one of the scientists to teleport to the floating island, where Knuckles reluctantly agreed to let them use it as a new Sanctuary. And so, the floating island eventually became the new headquarters of the resistance.
However, this war had changed Sonic both mentally and physically. Due to hedgehog puberty, he was slightly taller than he had been during the days of the Sonic Underground, and his features had grown sharper as well. In addition, he had cut his quills so that they were now somewhat short compared to what they had been before. But he liked the look.
His voice was now also different, a bit deeper and more mature sounding, but still with that cocky, youthful spark.
(Basically his design is OVA Sonic but with the same fur color as modern Sonic. And he's voiced by Martin Burke)
After Sonic finished his morning stretches and chowed down on a delicious Chilli dog, he raced off into the distance. His speed had increased too due to all the training he had gotten in from fighting badniks on his own. He came up on Mushroom hill, bouncing across all of the giant mushrooms. He especially enjoyed this part. He ran across the natural loop de loops on the island and bounced around on the springs that had been placed in the area.
The young hedgehog eventually arrived at the resistance base, which was a hastily built stronghold near the waterfall that led to the island's chaos emerald. Standing in front of the base was Knuckles, looking as stern as ever. He and Sonic still weren't quite on the best terms. After Sonic had told him about the fates of Sonia and Manic, Knuckles had told him to leave the island and appeared extremely angry, especially about Sonia.
After a few moments of awkward science, Sonic broke it by asking the guardian,
"Ummm…hey Knucks. What's up?"
Knuckles stayed silent, so Sonic asked him,
"Any updates on the ground?"
After a few moments of silence, Knuckles opened the door and told Sonic,
"Follow me."
The 2 entered into Resistance HQ, which was a small, dingy, but somewhat cozy base where freedom fighters talked about battle strategy, did training, and generally passed the time. In the center of the room was the second chaos emerald, which oddly had seemed to turn from green to light blue once it arrived on the floating island. If all else failed, the chaos emeralds were their last hope. Knuckles sternly told Sonic,
"Our spies have received word of a new Robotnik base in the Gaia archipelago. An entire island he's converted into his own personal playground. None of our men have been able to get through so far, but that's where you come in. I want you to go in there and blow it up. Leave nothing left."
"Wow, Knuckles. For someone who's lived almost completely alone on an island his entire life and didn't want us all to be here, you sure have taken to leadership well."
"...I'm going to consult my great grandfather. By the way, I know of your unauthorized trips to the surface. What's that about?"
Sonic frowned and replied,
"Sigh, you got me. I just wanted to blow off some steam and…try to look for mom."
"Sonic, we've been over this. The council of four is already defunct, so there's a very high chance that Aleena is already dead!"
"She's the only family I have left, Knuckles! I'm going to find her! No matter what it takes…"
Knuckles sighed, and after a few moments of silence, he turned his back to Sonic and sternly told him,
"I expect you back here on Floating island in the next 10 hours."
Sonic then decided to tell Knuckles something that had been irking him ever since the floating island had been made the resistance's headquarters. The hedgehog said to the Echidna,
"That's something I wanted to talk about. I think "floating island" is a pretty boring name for an island, right? And since this place has been our base for months, we should probably give it a better name."
Knuckles was perplexed by this statement, turning back to face Sonic and replying,
"That seems…rather unnecessary. But alright. What's your idea?"
Sonic replied,
"Well, do you have any important relatives you can name it after?"
Knuckles thought for a moment and then replied,
"Well, there is my Grandmother. Her name was Angel-La…"
"So Angel Island?"
After a few moments, Knuckles actually smiled and replied,
"Yeah…that has a good ring to it."
Knuckles then handed Sonic a piece of paper, telling him,
"These are the coordinates of Robotnik's new base. Good luck."
"...Heh. As if I'll need it!"
Sonic flashed his trademark cocky grin and then zoomed out of the resistance headquarters, leaving a trail of dust behind which caused Knuckles to cough. He sighed at Sonic's impetuousness, but internally hoped he would be ok. He was the closest thing to a friend he had left after all.
Sonic eventually reached the teleporter they used to travel to the ground and typed in the coordinates of Robotnik's new island base on it. However, he decided to place his coordinates some distance away from it so he could make a flashy entrance. Once he was ready, he stepped in the portal and was whisked away in a green flash.
He then reappeared in the exact coordinates he had typed in, and after looking around, he shot off towards the island. However, as he was running, he noticed 2 mobians running away from a giant tank vehicle that was being piloted by none other than Dr Robotnik. One of the mobians was an armadillo with black fur and red armor, and the other was a yellow flying squirrel.
Never one to leave an innocent behind, Sonic zoomed forward to save them. However, Robotnik saw this and remarked,
"Ah, Sonic! I wasn't expecting to see you again so soon! But do you really think that you'll be able to save my prisoners so easily?!"
Robotnik then shot a stun blast at Sonic which tracked the hedgehog like a heat seeking missile until he was eventually hit, being knocked out and then captured along with the other two, being driven to a large tower. Once Sonic awoke, he saw that he was in a prison cell with the two mobians. Robotnik laughed at them over the monitor and told them,
"The punishment for escaping…..IS DEATH!!!"
Robotnik pressed a button in front of him, and the walls of the 3 mobian's cell grew spikes and began to close in. Sonic turned around and saw this, then looking at the 2 mobians in the cage with him and telling them,
"Looks like we don't have time for introductions! Let's blast this thing wide open!"
The 2 other mobians nodded, and Sonic then began using his supersonic spin attack on the bars. Now that he thought about it, he really needed to come up with a more catchy name for that attack. Thoughts for later. As Sonic was attacking the bars, the armadillo simply ripped them open with his bare hands.
Sonic was left shocked by this and then ran through the opening that had been created, telling him,
"Whoa, your one mighty armadillo, dude!"
As he and his flying squirrel friend ran out to the balcony with Sonic, the armadillo finally spoke and told Sonic,
"Well, that is my name."
The flying squirrel then pitched in by saying,
"And I'm Ray the flying Squirrel!"
Sonic chucked and replied,
"Pleased to meet you both! I'm Sonic! Sonic the Hedgehog!"
However, Robotnik's voice then suddenly came over the loudspeaker once again. The evil doctor yelled,
"You fools should have kept running! I wonder, will you be able to escape Robotnik's island of traps?!"
Robotnik then pressed another button on the console he was monitoring the 3 mobians on, and all of a sudden a huge waterspout shot through the balcony they were standing on and blasted Sonic, Mighty and Ray into the air. They flew further and further into the air until eventually, they fell down right on top of a platform made of rock within a volcano.
Robotnik then yelled from the loudspeaker,
"Prepare yourself for the terrors of this island!"
The platform was suddenly destroyed by a burst of flame in the form of pillars, blasting the 3 mobians onto a strip of land in front of them. Sonic got up and told Mighty and Ray,
"You two stay behind me! This isn't my first time dealing with Robotnik!"
A giant boulder then fell down behind them, and they began running down the slope as the boulder followed after them. Mighty and Ray tried to keep up with Sonic, but they lagged behind just barely. Realizing that they would likely be run over, Sonic grabbed Mighty and Ray's hands and briefly activated his maximum speed, leaping off the strip of land and landing on a giant seesaw.
Sonic landed gracefully, only to be sent flying once again when the boulder impacted the other side of the seesaw and was sent flying into the remains of another platform. The 3 mobians struggled for a bit before prying themselves free, and as they leaped onto another strip of land, Sonic told Mighty and Ray,
"Let's keep going, guys! We aren't out of the oven yet!"
Ray and Mighty nodded, and as a burst of fire shot out behind them, the 3 new friends ran across a treadmill that slowly opened the gate in front of them, and they managed to do so before rushing forward, jumping over the various pits that had spires of fire bursting out of them. They eventually found a wooden bridge which led to a dead end. A terrified Ray yelled,
"What do we do now?!"
Mighty looked down and raised his fists, then bringing them down and causing the half of the bridge from which they had entered to become disconnected, falling down with the 3 barely holding on. Once they collided into the side of a brick wall, they quickly climbed up the bridge and began running across a rock pathway, with spires of flame occasionally shooting out of the ground.
However, despite this they were able to ultimately escape through a door, clearing the volcanic vault. Meanwhile in the island's main tower, Robotnik, who was observing the 3 mobians on a giant screen, slammed his fist into the monitor in rage. The doctor screamed,
"They escaped?! How?!"
A distorted voice then asked Robotnik from a communicator on the console,
"What is the situation, Robotnik?"
"Grahhh, the hedgehog and my prisoners survived the volcanic vault! They seem to be heading to Icy Isle now."
"Hmmm...make sure they go no further, Doctor."
"Alright…I'll call you back when the job is done."
Robotnik turned off communications and leaned back in his chair. Sonic was proving just as troublesome as he expected, and he hadn't expected to encounter him until the final push. But it would be no problem. Sonic and the other two who Robotnik had scheduled for robotization would not be leaving the island alive…