Sonic and his friends didn't really know what to expect once entering the Cosmic Interstate, but somehow still found themselves surprised. What they found once the Nautilus made entry into the zone between zones was a definitive night sky with what appeared to be daybreak creeping over it. Besides that, the Interstate appeared to be a near-endless sky with nothing occupying it, with the only exception being what appeared to be the broken remains of pavement of some kind that got cut off right at their beginning with the rest of it they assumed to have been destroyed outright.
"Gonna take a shot in the dark here and guess it's not supposed to look like this," Sonic said, pointing at the broken roads down below the Nautilus.
"The roads of the Cosmic Interstate have seen better days unfortunately. I can only assume Phantom Infinite destroyed them so he could not be easily followed," Guts responded, shaking his head. "It is far from our first concern though. What matters is with the portal and flight capabilities of the Nautilus, we can travel it, meaning we can follow him to whatever universe he goes to,"
"So…how long until we reach SATAM-94?" Tails asked NICOLE.
"Going at this speed consistently, approximatelyyyyy-" NICOLE checked a watch she just materialized on her wrist and looked back and forth between it and her holographic screen. "Five hours from now, meaning we've got plenty of down time. Soooooo…"
NICOLE then formed a holographic accordion "How about a sea shanty to pass the time?" With a gleeful smile, she squeezed the instrument and an almost electronic-sounding whistle echoed through the command center as she began. "Oooooh what do we do with a drunken sail-"
"NO," Omega interrupted.
Having been stopped so abruptly, Nicole pouted a little bit and made her accordion disappear. "Rude,"
"She is right though. It is going to be a while before we arrive so feel free to check out the ship, maybe find somewhere comfortable and consider any strategies you feel might help to fight Phantom Infinite," Guts added, waving his hand. "You're dismissed. When we begin to approach our destination NICOLE will summon you back here,"
Everyone having understood began to leave the command center, only for Guts to put a hand on Eggman's shoulder from behind just as he was beginning to leave. "Just so you know Doctor…there is not a millimeter of this ship that NICOLE can't see. Try anything funny, and you are really not going to like how that ends,"
"I have got my eyes on you mister," NICOLE said as her eyeballs stretched out of her face like a cartoon character's and stared Eggman down intensely.
Neither of them could see it due to his glasses, but Eggman rolled his eyes. "What? You don't trust me?"
"We have seen firsthand the cruelty the various Doctor Eggman's across the multiverse are capable of. And you do not appear to be much different. So until you prove to not be a COMPLETE menace, I would say our distrust is warranted," Guts replied as he let go of Eggman's shoulder. "You're free to leave now,"
Eggman grumbled to himself as he made his way out, cursing Guts. "Mmmph, stupid, judgemental, Oreo-colored…"
Paying no mind to this Guts just turned his chair back toward the main windshield, staring into the Cosmic Interstate's endless sky for a moment before NICOLE spoke up.
"You don't think it might've been a good idea to tell them what SATAM-94 is…y'know…like?" she asked him, her ears drooping a little bit.
Guts frowned. "I'm…working up to it. I just don't know how they're going to take its bleakness is all,"
"Oh, it's sure to upset them, that can't be avoided," NICOLE started. "But going off all the versions of them that we've seen, I feel like they're stronger than you think. In the long run, I think they will be okay,"
Conflicted, Guts closed his eyes and rubbed one of his eyes. "Agh…I'm still not looking forward to this, but you're probably right,"
From the newly formed crew of the Nautilus' exploration of the vessel, it was made abundantly clear to them that NICOLE had greatly anticipated the arrival of new passengers as it looked like she had made extensive renovations to it to accommodate more people. The inside of the former Egg Carrier was nearly unrecognizable from the ones Sonic had seen in the past. A lot of the rooms that looked to have been dedicated to weaponized robot development and storage had been gutted and replaced with things like a video game arcade, an elaborate water park and a food court. If it weren't for the weaponized turrets still on the exterior, the Nautilus could probably have passed for a flying cruise ship on the inside.
After the hell of a day they had had, most everybody decided to make use of the water park to relax for a while so they could think more clearly on their situation. While most everybody was having a good time swimming or sliding down the various yellow water slides, a few sat this one out and just splayed out on the pool chairs around it and decompress that way.
This, of course, included Sonic, whose relationship with water he was determined to keep long-distance if he could help it.
Amy was more than aware of this, but she figured she would at least try to coax him into the pool anyway. She paddled over to the edge of the pool to face him. "Come on Sonic, you're sure you don't wanna come in? The water's great!"
This was followed up with Cream also floating around in the water with her eyes shut and reaching her arms out, playing a game of Marco Polo with Cheese . "Maaaaarco!" she called out.
Cheese meanwhile was sitting in a inner tube floating on the water when he called back "Chaaao!" he then quickly steered his tube just out of Cream's reach as she tried to make a swat at him.
"Oop, almost got him there sweetie," Vanilla giggled.
"Yeah…not a chance Ames," Sonic said, still laying back with his eyes shut. "Glad you're having fun at least though,"
Amy pouted a little bit. "Mmph…one of these days Sonic Hedgehog, I am getting you to go to the beach with me if it's the last thing I do,"
"Ooh sure ya will," Sonic said laughing a little bit to himself before opening one eye and looking over at Tails who was in the chair next to him. "Hey Tails, can I ask ya something?"
Tails turned his head to Sonic. "What about?"
"Just uh-" Sonic sat up in his seat, both his eyes open now with a serious expression. "Not to bring down the mood or anything but…when you first met Guts back home he didn't say anything to you about somebody named 'Sally' did he?"
Tails thought for a moment but shook his head. "No, that name didn't come up…but he DID yell that out when he was wailing on Phantom Infinite,"
"Yeah. And he hasn't talked about it since. Close friend of his Phantom Infinite killed?"
Tails' ears and tails drooped a little bit. "I'm going to go with yes. And you saw how hesitant Guts was to take all of us with him, he's clearly carrying a lot of guilt from what happened,"
Amy, who was still at the edge of the pool, frowned once she'd been reminded of Guts' situation. "How terrible. Infinite really took everything from him, just…for nothing,"
"You may have a hard time reconciling this-" all three of them turned to Shadow, who was leaning against the nearby wall with his arms crossed and had finally spoken up. "But that's the reality of the threat we're dealing with. Going off how this…thing was described, it feels so impersonal to the rest of the multiverse that asking why it causes such wanton destruction is liking asking the same of an Earthquake. Neither has reason,"
"That might be true. Althouuuugh-" Tails added. "We did see he's at least capable of feeling resentment earlier. I guess Guts has been a big enough of a thorn in his side for so long that he learned to feel hatred,"
Shadow nodded. "When the time comes to fight him, use it. He might have some heightened sense of awareness, but his hatred of the panda could be enough to throw him off his guard,"
"Heh," Sonic laughed a little bit. "Here I thought you'd insist on fighting him all by yourself Shadow,"
"What kind of fool do you take me for?" Shadow asked, his eyes narrowing. "Against a universe-level threat like this, all I would be able to do alone is buy you about a minute. And that is being generous,"
"Man," Sonic scratched the back of his head. "That Metal Virus incident reaaaally humbled your butt huh?"
Shadow exhaled deeply in annoyance after turning away from Sonic's gaze. "Mmph. I could have saved us a lot of trouble then if it weren't for that one stupid mistake. I will not make it again, especially with stakes this high,"
Just then, NICOLE's hologram materialized in the pool, only she was no longer dressed in her white navigator uniform, but a blue and white striped swimsuit and sitting in a holographic inner tube. "Hey everybody, hate to interrupt the pool party but I kinda need somethin'"
Shadow, meanwhile, looked at Nicole, baffled. "You're a hologram. What do you even get out of using the pool?"
"Absolutely nothing, but that's beside the point," She replied with a smile waving off his question.
"I…do not understand you," Shadow groaned, rubbing his eyelids with one hand and giving up on getting a real answer.
"Anyhow, kinda need to borrow Tails for a little bit," NICOLE continued, turning her inner tube to face Tails.
"Hm?" Tails slid forward in his chair at attention. "What do ya need?"
"Well, Doctor Eggman and I are working in the lab over on the east side of the ship, we think we might be able to make something that could potentially counteract the Phantom Ruby, and we could use a bit of your technical know-how to get it done,"
"…Really? Eggman wants ME to help?" Tails said with a skeptical look.
"Eheh…well...begrudgingly," NICOLE responded, awkwardly scratching the back of her head. "Matter of fact he seemed like he'd prefer to work alone at first but, ya know…potential destruction of the multiverse including himself is a pretty effective motivator to work as efficiently as possible. That can only be done with more genius heads,"
"Yeah…that checks out," Tails said with a bit of an uncomfortable expression, getting up. "Well, guess I'll see you guys later. Lead the way NICOLE," he said as NICOLE seemingly teleported out of the pool and was back outside of it, once again in her uniform. She then led Tails out of the water park to go meet with Doctor Eggman.
"You know Sonic…" Shadow spoke, bringing Sonic's attention back onto him. "This place that we're going, SATAM-94…you're not the slightest bit concerned that the panda has not told us what to expect?"
"Eeh" Sonic shrugged. "He'll tell us when he's ready. Something about it bugs him so guess he has to work around that first. Not a big deal in my book,"
"I do have to wonder what it is though," Amy added, resting her arms and chin on the side of the pool. "It can't be any worse than what we've dealt with in the past, right?"
"Careful. Those are some famous last words if I've ever heard them," Shadow said with a grim look.
The hours had flown by very quick for the newly-formed crew of the Nautilus. NICOLE had told them five hours but before they knew it, she summoned them back to the command center; indicating that they were approaching the entrance to SATAM-94. When they all filed into the command center, they found Guts in his chair hunched forward, clearly deep in thought.
"Well, somebody's sure looking tense. Can't say I blame you," Rouge said.
Guts did not pay her any mind and instead turned his attention to Tails, NICOLE and Doctor Eggman. "How is progress on your device you three?"
"Well we're making progress-" Tails began optimistically before being interrupted by Eggman.
"But to the surprise of nobody, even between the three of us, creating a device to nullify the power of an inter-dimensional, multiverse-leveling entity is going to take a BIT longer than five hours" Eggman added, his arms crossed and looking more pessimistic of the whole situation.
"Much as I hate agreeing with a Robotnik variant, he's right. Even with all our technical know-how put together, this is a heck of a task. We can only do so much with such little time," Nicole finished, her ears drooping a little bit.
Guts inwardly debated swearing before stopping himself when he remembered there were children present. "Mmph. It can't be helped I suppose. For the moment we're going to just have to face Phantom Infinite without it," Guts then turned his attention to the rest of the crew. "I trust at least the rest of you at least have some strategy in mind?"
"ACCORDING TO PREVIOUS COMBAT DATA GATHERED BY THE BLUE HEDGEHOG AND HIS ALLIES FROM OBSERVING YOUR BATTLE WITH THE ENTITY, HIS BATTLE PROWESS DROPS BY AT MINIMUM 40% AND HIS LIKELIHOOD OF MAKING FATAL ERRORS RISES AT MINIMUM 60% WHEN IN A STATE OF EXTREME AGITATION," Omega said.
"Uuuuuh…" Charmy scratched his head looking totally lost.
"Making him angry throws him off," Espio clarified.
"Ooh…coulda just…said that," Charmy said after his realization.
"I have noticed Phantom Infinite had more emotion than normal when I faced him in your world. You could be onto something, but do you think it will work long-term?" Guts asked.
"Lucky for us he hates your guts and…heh" Sonic smirked. "I'm kind of a professional at driving the bad guys crazy,"
"To that I can attest," Eggman grumbled.
Guts said nothing for a moment before glancing at NICOLE with a slightly nervous look in his eyes. She gave him a reassuring nod which seemed to put him a bit more at ease, and he exhaled. "Alright. Just…before we enter, there's some things about this universe I need to make sure you look out for,"
As if on que, NICOLE brought up a hologram depicting images of bipedal robots with dome-shaped heads, robots that looked similar in nature to vehicles, ones that looked to be just a straight up floating mechanical eyeball, and several others. "Now these kinds of robots here make up the majority of this Robotnik's forces. Pretty standard mechanical mooks, fair game for turning into scrap metal…but…" The holographic image changed to another, this one depicting animals that didn't look all that different to Sonic or his friends, only all of them were robotic in nature without even a hint of emotion on their metal faces. "These kinds are a different story," Guts said, pointing at the hologram, his dour expression indicating to the crew that he had seen many of these before.
"Hm. They're not your typical badniks that's for sure. They look more like Metal Sonic than anything Eggman usually has in his armies," Blaze pointed out.
"Correct Blaze. I can't stress this enough, if you come across any robots in the forms of animals like these in this universe…if you are left with no choice but to engage them, deal with the situation in a humane manner. These are not robots we can just destroy as we please," Guts continued, looking at the robotic animals with sadness permeating his face.
Shadow noticed NICOLE's expression was much of the same as Guts' and though he didn't show it, he was growing increasingly uncomfortable with where this was headed. "Why? What makes these robots so special?"
Guts shut his eyes and took a moment to compose himself. "The universes with the SATAM designations have slight differences between them, but one of their near-universal constants is the unparalleled, needless cruelty of their variants of Dr. Robotnik," he then gestured for NICOLE to move onto the next slide.
NICOLE did so, and the next images she pulled up was some kind of mechanical glass container with a cylindrical shape, seemingly just barely big enough to fit an animal inside with little to no room to move. NICOLE then began her explanation. "The Dr. Robotniks of these universes most of the time already have a powerful stranglehold over the planet from making use of this device; the Roboticizer. Once a machine made with the noble purpose of helping the sick and elderly live longer, it was twisted into a tool for evil by these Robotnik variants,"
Having put the pieces together from how they spoke of these robots thus far along with the name of the device, Silver looked nothing short of mortified. "Do you…mean to tell us that those robots were-"
Guts sighed sadly. "Yes. They were once flesh and blood animals, no different than you and me, now prisoners in their own bodies and forced to serve Robotnik. Any prisoner Robotnik takes adds to the ranks of his robotic forces. You can't destroy them without also destroying the person they once were,"
The room was so tense that one could choke on it. The concept of organic lifeforms being turned into robots wasn't entirely alien to them as they'd experienced such a phenomenon before with the outbreak of Eggman's Metal Virus. But the way Guts and NICOLE made it sound somehow made it infinitely more terrifying. Images of animals taken prisoner being restrained by other robots before being dragged into that terrible mechanical nightmare and having agency over their own bodies being violently stripped from them flashed through Sonic's mind, and his hand formed a fist in barely restrained anger.
Barely able to hold it together herself from this revelation, Amy looked at Sonic with concern all over her face. "S-Sonic?"
"Guess Eggman fighting dirty's pretty common even in different universes." Sonic said in clear displeasure.
Eggman himself didn't pay Sonic's comment any mind, for his thoughts were elsewhere in relation to the Roboticizer. He didn't appear disturbed like most everyone else present, but he clearly was not happy. "Hmm…admittedly I have to commend my variant on the outlandishly evil applications of this device-"
"You freakin' would," Knuckled growled under his breath.
"However…twisted into a tool for evil?" Eggman continued, making the air quote motions with his hands. "You make it sound as if he did not invent this 'Roboticizer',"
"That's because he didn't. The designs were stolen," NICOLE clarified.
Eggman growled in outrage. "Mmmmmph…I can excuse the roboticization but I draw the line at plagiarism. You are telling me my variant could not create something like this himself?! This puts a stain on my genius! I won't have it!" Eggman declared, slamming his fist down on the nearby console.
Shadow meanwhile only shot Guts a look of anger before speaking. "And you didn't think all of this was important enough to tell us earlier?"
Guts returned Shadow's glare with his own. "What would you have had me say? 'Oh, the first world we're going to is one where Eggman's taken it over and turned most organic life into machines,'. Excuse me for not wishing to traumatize a group of mostly teenagers,"
Shadow was quick to comeback. "Now you listen good…I didn't think I had to remind you we've seen our fair share of danger and darkness in the past, but evidently I do. We knew the risks going in. If we are going to be working together, treat us like the allies we are meant to be, not as children that need to be coddled. I would like to imagine you'd have more respect for us than that," Shadow said, his eyes narrowing.
For a few moments, Guts said nothing, seemingly contemplating this, before sighing in resignation. "You're right, you're right. I'm sorry. I will try to be more transparent with worlds we go to in the future,"
"You'd better," Shadow replied.
Feeling bad for him, Cream walked to Guts' side and gave him a pat on the hand. "It's okay, Mr. Guts. I know you were just worried about us. You don't need to be so hard on yourself over it,"
Unable to keep the slight smile from forming on his face, and gave Cream a pat on the head, eliciting a small giggle from the rabbit. Guts glanced up at Vanilla. "You've raised a very kind daughter miss Vanilla,"
"Why thank you, she certainly is something. I've tried my best," Vanilla said with a smile.
The sweet moment was short-lived though, as NICOLE interrupted by teleporting in between the adult rabbit and panda. "Oookie-dokie folks, it's time to make our entrance! We're at SATAM-94's precise location in the Cosmic Interstate so now I just gotta rip open a portal there real quick with our handy-dandy Chaos Console aaaaand-" NICOLE then pointed at the console housing the Chaos Emeralds and snapped her fingers. The lever that operated appeared to pull back on its own as NICOLE operated it remotely. From there it was the same as the last time Guts used it. The ship shook as its front cannon opened up and blasted a portal in front of it, presumably leading to SATAM-94.
"Heh alright guys. This place sounds pretty serious, gonna need you to put on your war faces for this one. Just remember, ya see any robots that look like animals like us, we can't trash em like usual," Sonic said as he started to stretch a bit to warm up. "Goes for you too Omega,"
"ALL EGGMAN UNITS MUST BE ERADICATED!" Omega responded in a tone as close to resembling irritation his voice modulation could manage.
"Ah ah ah, Omega. Technically speaking since this world's Eggman didn't invent this Roboticizer, does that REALLY make them Eggman units? Shouldn't that mean they TECHNICALLY don't count?" Rouge pointed out, slightly chastising the robot.
Omega stayed silent for a moment, contemplating this. "…THERE IS LOGIC IN THIS TECHNICALITY. AMENDING KILL LIST. SAVING, DO NOT TURN OFF POWER,"
"There will be plenty of normal, built-from-scratch robots there for you to just…be yourself on too Omega, I promise," Guts said rolling his eyes before turning his attention back to the windshield, seeing the portal draw closer as the ship inched toward it. "NICOLE, activate the Nautilus' invisibility mode and keep the ship in standby once we get through. If this universe is anything like the others of this designation, I don't anticipate us finding a good place to land,"
"Aye aye captain!" NICOLE saluted as she snapped her fingers toward a set of buttons on the nearby console, causing them to push inward on their own. From there, everybody could hear the cloaking systems kicking in from the loud VWORP sound it made. When they looked through the windshield again, they could see the ship had become completely invisible to the naked eye. No part of the ship was visible anymore from what they could see from inside the command center.
"And here, we, go," NICOLE shouted as she willed the ship forward completely through the portal.
Almost immediately, Sonic and his friends could tell that the air around them had completely changed from that of the Cosmic Interstate. The first thing they noticed was the wretched smell of what they assumed was gasoline fumes and exhaust that leaked into the command center from the outside and they all recoiled in disgust.
"Ack, oh man, that reeks!" Vector loudly complained, coughing a bit and holding his nose to block out the stench.
"Ugh, that's so stinky, what is that?!" Cream also coughed a bit and covered her nose with the collar of her dress, Cheese also covering where his nose would be if he had one with his own stubby hands.
"Take a look," Guts said with a bit of a somber expression as he pointed outside.
Everyone crowded around the windshield to get a good look outside, but the moment they did most of them almost wished they hadn't.
It was just as Guts and NICOLE had said. It was obvious that this world's Robotnik had a stranglehold on the planet just from one look at the city that lied below the vessel. Mile after mile were towering metal monoliths and factories that stood oppressively over everything in the streets below. They knew right away what caused the horrible stench to invade their nostrils when they first came through as well, as said factories were spewing seemingly endless clouds of smoke and fumes into the air. The smog was so thick that the sun could not even break through and the sky had been blackened as if it were nighttime. At the center of the city was a single, egg-shaped tower that dwarved all other structures, no doubt where this world's Dr. Robotnik resided.
Amy was the first to catch her breath. "W-What is this horrible place?" she stammered, distraught at the sight of the nightmarish metal city.
Guts then took his place next to them and just stared outside. "This…is Robotropolis. Robotnik's magnum-opus," Guts said with a hint of bitter sarcasm and visible disgust growing on his face.
Eggman meanwhile, just stared outside lost in thought with a hand on his chin. "Hmm…got to say…not the color scheme I would have chosen. Too much dark grey and blue and just…this place is begging for some red, purple, yellow or SOMETHING!"
"Really? Nothin' else to say about..any of this?" Sonic frustratedly with crossed arms.
Eggman glanced over at Sonic with a raised eyebrow. "What? Did you expect different from me?"
Sonic exhaled in mild anger. "Wishful thinkin', I guess,"
"Like I said there's not many good places to land so I'm going to have to transport you all through the portals I can create with my magical skills. First though, NICOLE I believe you had something to hand off to our new crew?" Guts said, handing the conversation back over to NICOLE.
"Ahah yes!" She squealed as to the surprise of everybody, multiple robotic arms lowered down from the ceiling and clipped wrist-communicator devices identical to the one Guts wore onto all their wrists. "Ordinarily I wouldn't suggest splitting up, but Robotropolis is too dangerous for everyone to navigate it in one group. You'd get spotted too easily and turned into robots before you could say 'oops'. These will help you keep in contact with each other and me. You come across Phantom Infinite, tell everyone else, don't try to fight him alone,"
"Alright, Team Chaotix always sticks together, so Espio and Charmy are with me!" Vector shouted with a smile as the detective team all fist bumped each other.
"Rouge and Omega usually fight alongside me, so I don't see any reason to change that now," Shadow said with the two in question nodding in agreement.
"If it's all the same to the rest of you, I think I'll stay here. I feel like I would just slow the rest of you down. These adventures are just a little bit out of my depth," Vanilla said, a bit sheepishly scratching the back of her head. "Though, I'm sure Cream and Cheese don't feel the same. Mister Guts, could you accompany them and Amy for me please?" she asked, looking up at the panda with a hopeful pair of eyes and a smile.
Despite his efforts, Guts couldn't keep himself from blushing when Vanilla looked at him like that. He quickly cleared his throat to get a hold of himself. MMPHACK…I can do that, yes. You won't have to worry about a thing," he said, a bit embarrassed.
"Someone's gonna have to make sure Eggman doesn't step out of line, so he can come with me and Blaze," Silver said, giving a quick glare at Eggman.
Eggman groaned. "Must I? Frankly I detest the sound of your voice,"
"Yes. And any funny business and you will know how unpleasant a fire on the seat of your pants can be," Blaze said with an intense, fiery glare of her own and one of her hands lighting ablaze.
Eggman gulped a bit. "I will keep that in mind," He said with a certain meekness unbecoming of a mad scientist.
"That just leaves Sonic, Tails and Knuckles," Guts said, looking at the three of them. "While the rest of us are out searching Robotropolis for Phantom Infinite, the three of you need to find this world's Sonic and tell him what's happening. If this universe is anything like the others of this designation, he should be holed up in a hidden village in the forest with a group of Freedom Fighters attempting to take down Robotnik. Just look for the trunk of a felled tree on the south side, it's a secret entrance,"
"Heh, no sweat! When Phantom Infinite's on the receiving end of two Sonic spindashes, he's not gonna stand a chance!" Sonic said giving Guts a thumbs up.
"Alright, lets move, I'm ready and raring to go!" Knuckles added as he pounded his fists together.
Guts nodded and held out his hand staring intensely in front of him. He then began to move it in a clockwise motion, not even blinking as he did it. After a few seconds of repetition of this motion, a yellow, clockwise spinning portal about his size made from yellow energy formed in front of him. Once the portal had been opened, he ceased.
"Hey, that's how you got into my workshop earlier. Sometime I really need to get you to go into detail about how you do that," Tails said, looking around the entire portal.
"The short answer is years of studying," Guts said, moving out of the way to make way for everyone. "Good luck everyone. May we all return safely,"
After the crew all exited the ship through the portal and into the putrid Robotropolis air, Guts used his magic once more to shut it behind him, leaving just Vanilla and NICOLE alone on the Nautilus.
"Oooh you know something?" Vanilla began, an idea seeming to have come to her "I'm sure everybody would appreciate some nice, warm cupcakes when they come back. I think I'll just go on and find my way to the kitchen and-"
"Oh oh, that sounds fun, can I help pleaaaase?~" NICOLE pleaded with a pair of puppy-dog eyes.
"Not that I'm opposed to the help dear," Vanilla started, her voice sounding a bit more on the concerned side. "But don't you have that device to continue working on? You won't be spread too thin?"
NICOLE only giggled. "Oh, I wouldn't worry about that," her hologram then proceeded to duplicate itself and slide to NICOLE's left as if she were a cell undergoing mitosis. Both NICOLE holograms then happily waved at a now somewhat disturbed-looking Vanilla with a startling lack of self-consciousness.
'My goodness,' Vanilla thought to herself. 'What strange company you keep mister Guts,'
PLANET MOBIUS, UNIVERSE DESIGNATION SATAM-94
As the powerful smog of Robotropolis was ever more pungent in smell outside, Sonic wasted no time gathering up Tails and Knuckles and booking it to the Great Forest to find this hidden village Guts spoke of. In start contrast to the dreadful metal city, the forest was calm, serene, and smelled vaguely of maple. It wasn't all too different from what Sonic would find in his own world, which was welcome after seeing what they'd just seen.
As they set out in search of the village, Sonic noticed that Tails was staring downward as they walked. "Hey, Tails. You still with us buddy?" He asked.
Snapping out of it, Tails looked back up. "Hm? Oh…yeah, just…can't help but think,"
Sonic knew Tails well enough to know where his mind was at after everything they'd learned about this world. "Thinkin' about that Robotropolis place huh?"
Tails nodded sadly. "It's just…Eggman has control of most of this world. All those people, turned into robots. They had families and lives of their own and this world's Eggman just ripped them away from them. Like they were just nothing but hunks of biomass to him,"
Sonic frowned. "Yeah, I hear ya, this place is messed up. There's gotta be something we can do about this right?"
"Mm, guys?" Knuckles started, a grim look on his face. "I don't like these people's situation any more than you do, but we've gotta focus on taking down Phantom Infinite. There's not gonna be any robot people to help liberate if we don't,"
Sonic sighed. "Yeah, ya got me there. Still…"
"Hey, hold on. Look," Tails said pointing just ahead of them. Just as the conversation was about to take another dark turn, the trio had come across a felled tree covered from the roots upward in vines. "Could this be it? The secret entrance I mean?"
"It's the only fallen tree I've seen in here so far," Knuckles said, walking up to it and giving the trunk a light tap while being pressed up against it to keep a close ear on it. "I spend a lotta time around trees and they don't usually echo. This thing's hollowed out,"
"So that's gotta be it right?" Sonic asked, absentmindedly grabbing onto a vine hanging from one of the nearby branches. "So how do we-"
Sonic would not be allowed to finish that thought as somehow pulling on that vine triggered a reaction in the tree, causing the front to open like a sliding door, of which it was so dark in the resulting hole that nothing ahead could be seen. This caused Knuckles, who was still pressed up on it, to lose his balance.
"AAAaaaaaa!" Knuckles shouted as he tumbled down the hole in the tree, his voice echoing through it, sounding like he was getting further and further away from them.
"Knuckles!" Tails yelled as he jumped down into the opening after him.
"Guess I got my answer," Sonic shrugged as he also made his way down the hole.
As the three of them made their way down, they found that the entrance fed into a chute carved out of wood filled with all kinds of loops and twists and turns all leading downward at breakneck speed. To the average person this probably would have been nauseating but this was not anything the three of them weren't used to from previous adventures…for Sonic and Tails anyway. Knuckles due to his stumble coming into this was sliding down on his stomach and in visceral pain.
"Woohoo yeah! These guys know how to travel!" Sonic fist pumping the air a bit as he could see light approaching ahead of them. "Heads up guys, looks like this is our stop!"
The three of them were then launched out of the chute out into broad daylight once again, a large hay bale sitting outside the exit cushioning their landing. "Heheh, okay that was kinda fun," Tails chuckled a bit, him and Sonic having landed sitting down while poor Knuckles landed on his belly.
"S-Speak for yourself. Oof," Knuckles groaned, rubbing his now inflamed stomach.
Sonic meanwhile stood up and dusted himself off and tried to decipher where the chute had led them. From the looks of it, it had let them out into a large valley in the Forest that was shielded from any prying eyes on all sides by the trees and cliffsides around it. When he got a better look in the distance, it was clear from the many small buildings and huts in the valley that they'd found the village they were looking for.
"Well, looks like this is the place alright," Sonic mused. "If Guts' intel's good this should be where-"
"SONIC LOOK OUT!" Tails shouted, pointing skyward.
"Huh?" Sonic wouldn't get to finish his sentence as out of nowhere, a figure obscured by the shadows from the leaves descended from the nearby trees and whacked Sonic in the face with something blunt that felt like it was made of metal, knocking him out. The only thing Sonic could decipher before his vision gave out was that the figure in question was vaguely rabbit-shaped.
When Sonic came to, it was to the sound of murmuring from a few feet in front of him that he couldn't quite make out as his hearing had not yet returned to him, though his vision was recovering, everything still looking a bit blurry. "Oogh man," He groaned. "Anybody get the number of the truck that hit me?"
The first thing he noticed, aside from the splitting headache he'd gotten from whatever hit him, was that he was on his stomach facing the ground. The second thing he noticed was that he couldn't move his arms or legs. He turned his head to look behind him and see that he'd been hogtied; all of his limbs being tied together upwards. When he turned his head to his left he could vaguely see Tails and Knuckles in the same position he was in, only with the addition of Tails having his tails tied together. Whatever hit him must have done the same to them not long after he got knocked out.
"Oof…huh?" Tails groaned as he struggled against his own restraints. "Hey, what's going on?"
"Hey, they're coming back online," with Sonic's hearing having returned, he heard a male voice address them. He looked ahead and saw a group of six animals intensely staring them down, most of them appearing to be similar in age to Sonic. The one addressing the group was a Walrus wearing a yellow ballcap positioned sideways and a tool belt across his chest.
Also among them was a female rabbit wearing a purple leotard and eyeshadow to match. The thing most attention-grabbing about her though was the fact that both of her legs and her left arm were robotic. Sonic deduced from the shape of their attacker and how he got knocked out that this must have been the one who ambushed them when they first arrived.
Third was a male coyote with combed blonde hair wearing red boots and some kind of royal guard uniform. Although the coyote was glaring at him with similar intensity to the rest of the group, the front didn't convince Sonic in the slightest judging from the beads of sweat forming on his brow and his shaking legs. He was clearly afraid.
The last three animals were the ones that stood out to him the most though since these three were at the forefront of the whole group. First was a brown female chipmunk wearing a blue vest and matching boots, with her auburn hair reaching slightly downward in her face. Her posture and expression in her eyes told him that she was probably the one in charge around here and that she was very much on the intelligent side. And Sonic would never say this out loud should he face the wrath of Amy's hammer, but he had to admit she was pretty.
Standing behind her, presumably for his own safety, was the shortest and presumably youngest of the group. Going off the multiple tails though, there was no mistaking who it was. This was SATAM-94's variant of Tails. Sonic concluded he was probably similar in age to the one he knew, but from the way he halfway hid behind the chipmunk, it seemed like this one wasn't as seasoned of an adventurer as his was.
Lastly was the one that grabbed Sonic's attention more than any of them, and for good reason. Looking down at him with a displeased expression and crossed arms was SATAM-94's variant of himself. A couple of times in the past, Sonic had come across a past version of himself that was smaller in stature and had a pair of black eyes instead of green. This Sonic looked very similar, but his signature spines were styled more in a mohawk-sort of look.
"But man Sal," the other Sonic spoke, his voice distinctly more high-pitched than Sonic's own and seemingly addressing the chipmunk girl. "Robuttnik must really be getting desperate if he's recycling the ol' robo-fake trick. Guess every masterpiece has to have its cheap copy but...he couldn't even get the eyes right?"
And finally, we are in the multiverse. One thing I felt I should address since I kind of failed to up until this point, the events of Sonic Frontiers don't factor into this story since the idea for it was conceived before that game came out…and I still haven't beaten it, I'm not a fake fan I promise, please don't hurt me lol
I was wracking my brain for a while thinking of a decent way to introduce game Sonic to SATAM Sonic and the Freedom Fighters and ended up deciding on this initial misunderstanding because I just thought it would be the most interesting, and since they've dealt with robotic duplicates before when Robotnik tried that with Sally, and the first conclusion they'd probably come to is that Robotnik's trying that plan again rather than "The multiverse is real". Just my thoughts about it, would love to hear what you have to say about the story so far. As always, thanks for reading