HELLO READERS, I'M BACK WITH ANOTHER STORY. I DECIDED TO TRY SOME NEW THINGS WITH THIS ONE SO LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK AND ENJOY

Chapter One

Knuckles found himself in the Sol dimension after being dragged into another one of Eggman's schemes. This time, the doctor rigged an elaborate cage for the Master Emerald and "coeirced" the echidna into stealing advanced technology from unknown territory. Knuckles completed the task and carried the tech to the rendezvous point just after lunchtime, which impressed his nemesis.

The echidna put the heavy load on the ground and wiped sweat from his brow. "Alright fat man, here's your crap now beam me home!"

For a few moments, he only heard birds chirping in the nearby forest. After shouting at the blue sky, a warp ring appeared high above him, and Eggman flew his mobile through. The sunlight reflected off of the rounded glass cover that protected the pilot. Eggman made sure not to get within Knuckles' range and hovered in one spot.

"Most impressive!" The doctor sarcastically spouted through a loud speaker. "I ought to clone you, Knuckles. You're not as useless as I thought."

The echidna spit on the ground and crossed his arms. "Yeah, yeah, just take the damn bag and get me outta here!.."

A metallic arm extended from the mobile and lowered to pick up the gear bag. "Yes, of course. You've upheld your end of the bargain so now it's my turn-"

Swiftly, Knuckles sprung off the dirt path, grasped the arm and pulled himself up. The doctor's robotic voice yelped as the mobile was torn into and brought down to the ground. This action closed the warp ring and shrunk it down in size. Knuckles caught the ring while keeping eye contact with the artificial yellow eyes inside the machine.

"Bokkun." The echidna said while dismantling the machine.

"Bo-who? No idea who you're talking about!" The robot said as he frantically tried escaping.

He was grasped by the throat, pulled from the wires and slammed against a tree. Bokkun reached for an explosive device but his wrist was caught and disarmed.

"Damn it! How did you know it was me?!"

"You're too predictable, messenger bot."

"Don't call me that, I'm nobody's messenger!"

Knuckles shook his head. "Sure pal. Hey Eggman, I know you can hear me! You made a big mistake sending your servant!"

After a few moments of waiting for a response, Bokkun finally spoke into the communicator. "Um sir? I've been caught BUT it wasn't my fault! I-I need help, your lordship!"

Inside his base on Mobius, the real Dr. Eggman cleared his throat while watching the live feed through Bokkun's chest cam. "Incompetent little IMBECILE!"

"Sir, I'm sorry!"

Knuckles showed off the warp ring before speaking. "I'm on my way home so you'd better take that cage down right now, doc! Release the emerald or I'm breaking your tech and launching this ass kisser into the atmosphere!"

"Alright, let's not be rash here! There's no need to destroy anything, Knuckles. Just drop everything off and I won't bother you any further. I promise!"

Bokkun sighed in relief. "Oh, sir, I knew I was your favorite-"

"Be QUIET messenger bot! I should leave you there for failing me once again!"

Bokkun gasped and his eyes started to water. "You don't mean that, sir...! I'm-"

Knuckles kept his grasp of the bot while he reached over to pick up the gear bag. He thought about what Eggman just said and pondered what he meant. "Wait, fail you? How?...was the plan to ditch me here?!"

"Knuckles, just relax, okay, I'm deactivating the cage, just please bring that tech back and we can talk this out!"

"Hm, this stuff must be really important, eh doc?"

An unknown voice then spoke up. "It sure is. Drop it, intruder."

Knuckles spun around to face this third party, and he faintly recognized him.

"Antoine?"

The yellow-haired coyote pointed a large broadsword at him and chuckled. "Where've you been, slick? I done changed my name to PATCH!"

Knuckles shook his head. "Right, parallel universe. My bad."

Eggman looked on through the chest cam as an army of guards climbed the grassy hillside behind Patch. "Grab the tech and get outta there NOW!"

Bokkun quickly armed a bomb while Knuckles flipped the warp ring into the air. "Yep, on it."

An electric barb was shot into Knuckles' chest which knocked him down, and the warp ring shrunk once again. Patch caught it on the edge of his broadsword, and his army ran to subdue the echidna.

"Inter dimensional travel? This is quite the catch."

As Knuckles ripped the barb from his chest, Bokkun made sure to look him in the eyes as he tossed the bomb his way.

Eat this one, jackass!

His spiked gloves barely shielded his face from the explosion and the blast pushed everyone backward. Knuckles flipped down the hillside, while Bokkun used this momentum to propel himself toward the gear bag.

Eggman cheered him on. "YES BOKKUN! Now grab the warp ring and get-"

Patch stepped on the messenger bot's hands and trapped him before he could escape with the bag.

"..back here."

Eggman snarled and banged a fist on his desk, while his servant exhaled aloud.

"I tried, Doctor. I really tried that time..!"

"...yes, I know. Good effort." Eggman said. He reached for an inhaler as he began coughing erratically.

A guard took the bag away and Patch lifted Bokkun into the air so that he could look into the camera. "This one is going straight to the big house, and your mercenary will be joining him shortly. Whoever you are, consider this a warning."

"The doctor will come for me, just you wait!"

Eggman ended the live feed, which got a laugh from the coyote. Patch tossed Bokkun at his guards and said, "Now then. Bring me his buddy."

"He's not my buddy, he's a big, dumb, rude jerk!"

"Uh huh, whatever."

A few guards took the short bot into custody atop of the hill and the rest began their search for Knuckles. He'd managed to glide over a valley and make it most of the way down toward a nearby village, though his gloves were burnt and he was slightly injured.

"You're kidding me right now..." He said to himself. "Eggman, I'm going to kick your ass if I make it out of this!"

Knuckles rolled as he landed and sprinted through a field. He searched for a hiding spot as he entered the village but he had a feeling the locals would just point him out to the guards, anyway. Escaping the vicinity was his only option.

He cursed upon finding no vehicles in the first parking lot and moved on. Underground garage was the same and the final bus had already left for the big city.

"Come on, does EVERYBODY ride share out here?! There's gotta be something!"

The locals were begining to take notice of the large echidna running through their streets. Knuckles saw the first fleet of guards approaching so he pushed past a small group and booted it to an empty train station.

"Let's see if I still have it."

He got a running start, hopped off the platform and connected the groove of his hiking boots to a rail.

"Ha-HA YES! Whose the jackass now!"

The echidna shifted his weight forward to get more momentum and he sped down the line mere seconds before Patch's guards reached the station. He rode the rails through the countryside, occasionally jumping between them to avoid oncoming trains. Once he felt he had enough of a lead on his pursuers, Knuckles caught up to a locomotive on an adjacent track and climbed aboard. He slid open a side door and sat inside, glad to finally get a break.

His ten minute nap turned into an hour and he'd lost track of which zone he was in. The afternoon sun was starting to set but until night fell, Knuckles could still be easily picked up by facial recognition cameras around the city. Once the train slowed while entering this city, Knuckles hopped off and stayed clear of main intersections.

He passed the big "Welcome to" sign and exhaled. "Music City. I haven't been here in forever." He was hardly familiar with the location but had a general idea of the layout so he continued forward. With no way of calling his friends for help, the echidna had to come up with a plan on the fly or end up with Eggman's messenger bot.

Patch had Bokkun hooked up to his research laboratory and "tests" conducted on the black bot for information, while he attempted to contact his Superior to inform him of the situation. After a tense phone call, the stylishly dressed commander returned to the lab for an update.

"You get anything?"

"Nothing but sensory readings and encrypted codes," a technician replied.

"Are you kidding me, what's the problem?"

"Whoever built this model knows their stuff."

Bokkun laughed while hanging upside down. "You're never gonna crack the doctor's code, fellas, he's the smartest man in the galaxy!"

Patch scoffed at this and walked inside the testing room to look him in the eyes. "And just who is this doctor you keep bringing up?"

"Why, that would be Ivo Robotnik, the one and only! He'll have this world around his finger by morning!"

"You must be new here, bud, but 'round these parts, Emperor Nega is the boss of bosses."

The messenger bot fidgeted as electrical currents went through his interface and then responded with, "No records on any 'Nega' guy but if he's the boss of this place then what does that make you? Bus boy keeping the shop clean?"

"How the hell does a faulty vacuum manage to troll me? Did your doctor give you free will or something?"

"You could call him, I'm sure he would be happy to explain."

"Great idea. Get your Robotnik on the line and we can get to the bottom of things."

Bokkun grinned and pointed at the chest mounted camera. "Just tap the button second to the left."

"This one?"

A high pitched beep sounded but nothing else happened upon clicking the button.

"Oops my bad, everything's inverted here. It's the one on the right. (beep) There ya go."

Eggman was pacing around his laboratory when his desktop alerted him to an incoming call. "About time!"

"Yeah, you're telling me."

"The camera is inverted-"

"Yeah, I've got your messenger strung up at the moment."

"I'm fine sir!"

"I see. Who am I speaking with?"

"Commander of operations Patch D'coolette. You must be Robotnik."

"That would indeed be me."

"Cool, do you want to explain why you sent two Mobians to steal technology from my dimension?"

Eggman cleared his throat before answering. "Yes, well.. I was supposed to parley with Emperor Nega but it appears he couldn't be reached.."

"I just got off the phone with him. And you're correct, he's in the middle of an expedition. But that doesn't explain the theft."

"Well honestly I needed the equipment urgently but my work requires me to stay here. I instructed the echidna to meet with counsel but he must've acted on his own volition while down there."

Patch frowned once he detected the lie. "Riiiight, he decided to go rogue and steal my property."

Eggman smirked and nodded his head. "Yes, that's EXACTLY what happened here! An unfortunate misunderstanding."

"Alright, so I'm going to go ahead and deposit the technology back into the armory,"

"But, if I could just interject-"

"Then I'm going to have your mercenary executed and have my technicians reprogram this defective servant to it's original settings."

Bokkun's eyes widened. "Uh oh, that's not good."

"...and you can come here to parley with the Emperor like a man if you need the tech so urgently. Got all that? Great."

The doctor thought of a response and said, "I think I will wait until someone with REAL authority contacts me. Good day."

"Uh sir? What about me? Sir?!"

"You know the drill, messenger bot. The cycle doesn't change."

The live feed ended and Patch stared at his reflection on the black screen. "Seems like your precious doctor couldn't give less of a shit about you. His own creation tossed in the bin. It stings, doesn't it?"

"Well, seeing as you armed this explosive, maybe you could tell me."

Patch was caught off guard when the black screen shot out of Bokkun's chest and detonated. He smashed through a pane of glass and the restraints around the bot's limbs were broken, allowing him to make a run for the closest exit.

He slapped his chest to activate a phone call and ran through the halls. "We've got another sucker, doc! 100 points!"

Eggman grinned while downloading the blueprint of Nega's palace to his desktop. "Of course. Head to the left and stay low. There's backup on route so have more charges ready."

Patch pulled himself to his feet and declined aid. "Just find the little shit."

As he got his barrings back, he spotted a small locket on the ground so he walked over to pick it up.

Eggman guided Bokkun through each level of the imperial palace but he wasn't going to get through the lobby. "You're going to have fly out of there at this point."

"That's a negative, jet systems are compromised!"

"Looks like you're jumping. Enter the next room."

He was directed on to a balcony on the fortieth floor. The black bot cautiously climbed over the railing and shimmied over an arch that overlooked a man made waterfall.

"Sir, you're positive this is the only way out? This is pretty high!"

"It's this way or in back in the lab you just came from. Report back soon."

The call ended, a gust of hot wind nearly knocked him off balance and now it was time to act.

"Here goes nothing."

The guards were oblivious to Bokkun's swan dive and didn't hear the water crash at the bottom. Patch held an ice pack to his charred face while staring at the picture inside Bokkun's locket.

"We need to round up these cockroaches before the Emperor returns."

"I'll expand our efforts into every neighboring city and township."

"You do that. And bring me O'nux."