NOTE: The following is based
loosely on characters created by Yuji Naka (Nack, Robotnik, Mecha Sonic, Egg
Bot) of SEGA and are
copyrighted and all that legal stuff . Any and all other characters are my own
creations.
E-mail ~Bloocheez3@aol.com
GROUNDZERO
MOBIUS
Part 1
Prologue:
PLANET ROBOTROPOLIS: A massive ball of twisted metal
and toxic
fumes. Not a single inch of the planet's surface is
visible. Life is outlawed,
happiness is a sin. It’s ruler, Lord Robotnik, holds the entire
planet in his cold,
iron claws.
Once a beautiful world, Robotropolis was known to its
inhabitance as
Mobius. The anthropomorphic Mobians lived in peace
with one another for
centuries, until Dr.
Robotnik took over. Lead by Sonic the
hedgehog, a small
band of freedom fighters
clashed with Robotnik time and time again.
These
conflicts almost always
ended in stalemate.
Finally, one night, Sonic and company had Robotnik
cornered. Knowing
that the end was near, the
sinister scientist made a last ditch effort to win the
war. The explosion that destroyed the city of
Robotropolis shook the ground for
miles around. When the smoke cleared, only Robotnik was
left standing. His
plan had worked, his
personal force field held and he was alive.
Now he and his henchmen rule with total
impunity. Those that were left
alive can not fight. They must hide in the shadows, and hope that
one day a
hero will emerge. Like Sonic twenty years before, someone must
rise up and
fight. But until someone
does, the people of Robotropolis can only wait…and
pray.
Chapter 1
“What do your scanners show Nack?” Robotnik sat in
his throne high in
the Robotropolis Tower,
overlooking the metallic landscape.
“Nothing yet sir,” came in a static muffled voice
over the Vid-Com “Wait,
We’ve got something!” Four red dots bleeped on the tiny scanner’s
screen. “Ok
fellas, we’ve got them now!
Mecha, you go around the right flank. Egg-Bot, you
take the left. I’ll take the
center. Ready, go.”
Mecha, the metal Sonic look-alike, zoomed around the
pile of discarded
robot junk and armed his
palm blasters. “In place.”
“Egg-Bot in position as well.” Egg-Bot resembled Robotnik as he looked
during the Rebellion, but
was less disciplined. “Can’t wait to
fry these rodents!”
“Yes, they won’t even know what hit them!” Cackled
Mecha.
“Cut the banter! Pay attention to the plan.” Snapped
Nack. “Here they
come.”
A family of opossums came crawling out from the
rubbish, right in front of
Mecha’s line of fire.
“Boo!” piped Mecha as his weapons began a high
pitched humming.
Suddenly a shot fired as
Mecha’s right arm was sent flying into the air. “What!?”
“That’s enough out of you.” The voice came from a
figure standing on top
of one of the low metal
buildings. Three sharp spikes of
closely paked quills jutted from the back of the silhouette’s head. A tiny round nose in the front.
“It can’t be!” Shouted Nack. “Shoot him!”
The dim shape jumped down just as a storm of laser
fire rained down on
his previous position. He
fell down under a direction light, revealing himself. The
brown hedgehog’s dingy
trench coat bore the marks of many battles and his hydraulic boots added a few
extra inches to his hight. A metal
clamped belt complete with blaster holster rested against his side. And he had his striped down blaster pointed
at
Egg-Bot. “It can’t be what?” He said as he bombarded
Egg-Bot with electron-
bullets.
“AAGH!” Egg-Bot wailed as he exploded into smoldering
shrapnel.
Nack jumped high into the
air and activated his rocket-boots. “He’s just
one hedgehog! We can take
him!” Nack and Mecha charged at their
assailant.
Just then another figure zipped through the air and
landed a solid punch to
Nack’s jaw.
“Good job Radar! He’ll be eating through a straw for
a while!” Laughed the
hedgehog.
“Thanks.” Radar fluttered down and landed next to his
friend. “So now
what about Mecha, Salvos?”
Salvos scratched his chin. “Hmm, that’s a good question.”
Mecha gained more speed as he approached, but Salvos
and Radar stood their ground.
“Oh now I’ve got it!” announced Salvo. “We…JUMP!”
As Radar soared into the hazy sky, a hydraulic snap\hiss rang out and
Salvos followed, just as
Mecha smashed into the
ground under them.
Nack staggered to his feet. “Feisty bat!” Nack had Radar in his sights and
was about to fire when a
device on his wrist began to beep.
“This isn’t over!”
The rocket jets on his boots
ignited and Nack took off towards the Tower.
“Come on Radar,” Shouted Salvos.
“Follow him!” The two took after Nack.
A wrought iron gate opened just in time for Nack to
enter, and slammed
shut a split second behind
him. Nack pulled out his Vid-Com. “Sir, I have two
rebels on my tail! And they took out Mecha and Egg-Bot!”
Robotnik’s synthetic skin stretched as he grinned
while he watched the
large screen in front of
him. “I see them Nack. Enter bay 12-B. I have a
BuzzBomber squad after them
now.” Robotnik swiveled in his chair to
face
another monitor. “Bomber-one, what is your status?”
The face of an A-class BuzzBomber came on
screen. “This is Bomber-
one. We have the targets in sight.”
“Good, attack with the usual, merciless fashion.”
“We...” The image of the BuzzBomber was replaced by
static.
Robotnik growled. “Bomber-one are you there. Bomber-one, answer me!
ARGH!” Robotnik turned
around again to face a surveillance monitor.
“Lets see
who our guests are. Ah, a bat and a… Hedgehog?” Robotnik’s eyes beamed
red. “Not another one!”
Salvos landed with a thud, his boots crushing some
singed BuzzBomber
parts. “That was easy.” He said looking around.
Radar hovered next to him. “I know, I can’t help but think that was just to
soften us up though.” Said
the bat as he brushed the dust from his shoulders. “I
guess we have to get in
there.” He mumbled, pointing at the four-foot-thick iron
walls of the gate. Salvos walked up and kicked it.
“Right, but I just don’t know how to…” Salvos
squinted and leaned close to
the door. “Hmmm.”
“What is it?” Asked Radar.
“Look, see this?” Salvos tapped a finger on a
particularly corroded section
of the metal barrier. “This is acid oxidation. Only a strong acid could do this.”
“So? Where
are we going to find enough of, what ever that stuff was, to
eat all the way through that
much galvanized iron?”
Salvos turned and grinned. “Look behind you.”
Radar turned and saw a huge
round receptacle. “DANGER: Highly Corrosive
Chemical. Store Only In
Special Container.” Radar said as he
read the lable aloud. “Well, if this is
anything to go by, I’d say this stuff is highly corrosive chemicals.”
They gave each other a smile.
“We’ll go up there,” Salvos said, motioning towards a
near by rooftop.
“From there I can get a good
shot and stay a good distance away.”
Radar nodded.
“Right, better let me check it out first.” In a blink Radar
was above the roof. “All clear.” He said into his transceiver
headset. “But there
are some shadows here that
look like they could hold some surprises.”
Just as soon as soon as the
words had left his mouth, spears of light
lanced out at Radar. He was quick enough to dodge the beams but
he didn’t
know how long he could keep
it up. “Salvos! You’d better get up here!”
Once again Salvos’ boots let out a snap/hiss and he
took to the air. He
landed on the roof just
beside the shadows. With the light
given off by the lasers,
He could see the cannon
turrets that were doing the firing.
“Time to…Yikes!”
One of the turrets spun
around to face him, and fired. Salvos
was sent
sprawling by an explosion at
his feet. He had barley enough time to
spring back
up when another blast shook
him.
“This has gone on for too long!” With but a split second spent on aiming,
he fired his blaster into
the turret’s nozzle. The explosion
caused a chain
reaction, and the other
three cannons were taken out as well.
“Man! You
need to get me a weapon,” gasped Radar.
”I’m just a sitting
duck!” He touched down next to Salvos. “Now we better hurry before Robotnik
sends in the cavalry.”
Salvos walked to the edge of the roof and shot down
at the massive
container of acid. The hole blasted in the side shot acid
straight out, and onto
the barricade. When the supply ran out the two jumped
down. The smell was
painful. It wrenched at
their eyes, stomach, and throat.
“Man this stuff is acrid!” Coughed Radar. “Hope it
did the job.”
They walked up to the spot where most of the caustic
fluid had struck. A
gapping whole had been
melted clean through, and the chemicals had made
their mark on some of the
objects on the other side as well.
“Now that worked out better than I hoped!” Salvos
said cheerfully. They
ran through the new door and
proceeded after Nack.
A hatch slid open and Nack tromped through. “Sir,” he managed through
catching his breath. “Are they still on their way?” He walked up, stood next to
Robotnik and stared at the
monitor with him.
Robotnik’s face tightened. “I don’t understand how they are doing this.
Look, they got through the
outer gate.” He spun around to face
Nack. “Go get
your Swat-Suit. If you fail this time, you’d better hope
they kill you…or I’ll do
worse!”
Nack could take a hint. “Yes sir.” He ran through
another hatch and down
a hall. At the end was a machine. A thick glass tube with electrical conduits
and
other odd looking devices
attached. “Time to gear up!” Nack said,
climbing into the cylinder. With the
push of a button, the tube lit up with white fire and a high pitched zap. When the light died down, Nack was gone and
a tall, metallic killing machine stood in his place. “Heh heh heh…”
The metal floor clanged as Salvos ran. Radar fluttering right behind him. “You
know what Radar?” Salvos
said as they rounded a corner.
“What?”
“I really wish I knew where we were going.” They rounded other corner. Salvos smacked into a hard alloy wall, and
Radar smacked into Salvos.
“Well, well.” Said the wall. “Look what we have here!”
Salvos looked up to find the wall was actually
Nack. “Um, hi. You
the tour guide?”
Nack wasted no words. He reached down, plucked Salvos up, and tossed
him hard into a real wall on
the other side of the room. “I hope
you’ve enjoyed
your selves,” he uttered in
an electronically altered voice. “play time’s over.”
Salvos’ blaster rang out, and the deadly bolts
bounced off Nack’s armor
plated chest. “You coward!” Salvos shouted. “You have
to hide behind that?
Too afraid to face me
without all the hardware?” He got to
his feet and ran at
Nack.
“Oh please! “
Nack swung an armored foot and caught Salvos right in the
chest. “You’re really going to have to do better
than that! Why not get your little
bat buddy to help?”
Salvos looked around. Where was Radar? He was nowhere to be found.
“What have you done with
him?” Said Salvos, wiping a little bit
of blood from his
nose.
Nack laughed.
“I didn’t do anything with him!”
He said. “Maybe he
was smart and got out while
he could.” Nack laughed again.
Then the room was ablaze with electrical flare.
“AARGH!” Nack screamed and dropped to the floor.
Radar hovered with a large live wire in hand leading
from a console
behind him, sparks spewing
from it. “Hope I’m not too late.” He said.
“HA! No, you’re
just in time.” Salvos and Radar
continued down the
corridor.
“Not so fast!” Yelled a scorched Nack. Chunks of his armor fell off as he stumbled
to his feet. “Catch!” Salvos turned around in time to see a razor
sharp disc flying at him.
Time seemed to slow down. The disc sailed at Salvos’ neck.
All he could
do was to turn and
duck. But it was too late. The blade struck him on the side of
his face and gashed into his
left eye. Salvos dropped to the floor,
bleeding.
Nack stood up.
“Man, incomplete pass! HA HA HA!”
Radar grabbed Salvos and pulled him to his feet. “Come on, we’ve got to
get you back home and fix
you up.” He turned and went out the way
they came
in. Out into the dark city and through a maze of
allies. Radar came to a dead
end. “Open up Wedge.”
The wall shifted and slid open to reveal a hidden
base. The room blinked
and buzzed. One wall was
covered with weapons another was monitors, floor to
ceiling. Furniture was scattered here and there. The room spoke.
“So was the mission a success?” It asked.
Radar lowered Salvos down on a mattress and sat next
to him. “It would
have been, if Salvos hadn’t
got injured.”
A small robotic arm extended from the floor and
shined a beam on Salvos.
“Yes, he’s got a cut on the left side of his
face!” Wedge said.
“What? A
‘cut’?” Radar asked sarcastically. “Naw, Nack only tried to give Salv a quick
lobotomy! A ‘cut’, sheesh.” He took off Salvos’ boots and
set them at the end of the
bed. “Stupid computer.” He mumbled
“We’ll have to patch him up than, won’t we?” More robotic arms with
various medical instruments
appeared and began to repair Salvos’ wound.
Radar stood up.
“Don’t worry pal, Wedge’ll fix you up.”
He walked over to
one of the security
screens. “Any more Probe-bots visit
while we were gone,
Wedge?”
“No,” answered Wedge “just a SwatBot. But I took care of him.” A
hatchway on the ceiling
opened and a pile of SwatBot parts fell to the floor. Radar digging through it in a flash. “It was just walking by, but better safe than sorry…well all
done.”
Radar jumped up from the pile of Swat-parts and ran
over to Salvos. “His eye still looks
bad.” He said.
“Yeah, he’ll never see out of it again. How you feel’n?”
Salvos sat up.
“My head is killing me. I’ll
never see out of this eye
again?” He ran his fingers along the stitches on his
face and eye. “How am I
going to fight with only
half a face?”
“Well,” Radar looked at the random spare part in his
hand “We could make a
robotic eye piece. But there’s really no guarantee that it’ll
work.”
Salvos reclined back down. “Anything that’ll let me fight again! Do it.” With
that Radar and Wedge began
work.
Light cut a horizontal line through a wall of black
as Salvos opened his eyes and sat up.
“Hey it worked! I can see. How’d you do it?”
Radar motioned for Salvos to walk to a mirror. “That’s a SwatBot visual
sensor installed. Not very pretty, but does the job.” Radar walked up and stood
next to Salvos. “Wedge connected it to some kind of
nerves. He says you can
do all sorts of things with
that eye just by thinking about it.
Night vision and all sorts of stuff.”
Salvos smiled.
“Wedge is right! I’m seeing with
infrared vision through
this eye! Now ultra-violet,
now contour, now X-ray!” Salvos began
walking
around the room with his
real eye shut. “Wow! I can analyze the computer
systems’ schematics and
stuff! This is great!”
Radar chuckled.
“Looks like Nack’s plan back fired!”
“Hate to interrupt,” Wedge cut in “but you better
cover that up. It’s really
not the most durable piece
of a SwatBot you know.”
“Right.”
Radar ran into his quarters and came out with a shinny, black
metal eye-patch. “This was part of my pirate costume. It’ll protect the eye real
good. And sense it’s
visor-metal, you can see out but no one can see in. It won’t interfere with your sight.”
Salvos took the eye-patch and put it on. “Perfect!
Alright lets go.”
“Go?” Radar
and Wedge asked in unison.
“Yeah,” declared Salvos “They’ll never expect us to
return so soon. Now
is the perfect time to
strike!”
Radar frowned.
“You’re insane! What if one of
us gets hurt beyond
repair?”
“We’ll just have to take that chance.”
“Good job Nack.”
Robotnik said as Nack entered the room.
“I watched
the entire battle. Since you
were successful, I’ll forgive the destruction of your
Swat-suit.”
Nack fell to one knee in front of Robotnik’s
throne. “Thank you sir.” He
stood, “Have Mecha and
Egg-Bot been reassembled yet?”
A door squeaked open and the two Badniks entered the
room. “As you
can see they have been
repaired…with a few modifications.” Robotnik seemed to
be ‘happier’ than
usual. “Men,” He began “the events of
earlier today have
shown to me that we have
been lax in keeping the populous in check…” He
paused for effect, something
he did often. “Therefore, we need to
tighten our
grip. Show the good people who’s boss.” Robotnik
got up and stomped over to a
large window. “Before we only kept the Mobians from
tampering with my
projects. Now I’m declaring this Mobian Hunting
Season! Find each and every
one of them…and destroy
them. All of them!”
Nack cleared his throat. “Sir, if we destroy all of your subjects…who will
you rule over?”
Robotnik’s massive body began to shake. He was laughing. “Ah, Nack. I
can always depend on you if
I want to explain the obvious.” He
lifted his fist and
smashed the huge
window. The shards erupted outward and
down to the streets
below. “Don’t you see? I am no longer happy with just one planet. It’s time I
expanded my vision and
shared it with others.”
“Sir, how are you going to do that?” Nack was obviously enjoying the
notion of interplanetary
conquest.
“With this!”
Robotnik pushed a button on his arm and the planet shook.
On the horizon, an enormous
egg-shaped building rose from the ground.
With
Robotnik’s countenance on
it.
Egg-Bot gasped.
“Is that…”
“The DeathEgg!” Exclaimed Mecha.
“Men,” Robotnik roared “you are witnessing the dawn
of a new era!”
Nack grinned, showing his fangs. “And when will we be undertaking this
new endeavor?” He asked.
Robotnik pushed another button. The floor opened up and an odd craft
rose up on a platform. Then a skylight opened. “This is the Egg Shuttle.”
Robotnik said proudly. “This will take us to the DeathEgg. As soon as we get
there, we will begin the
process of taking off. If all goes well
we should be off
Robotropolis in one
hour.” He got into the shuttle. “Get in all.” The three lackies clambered into the shuttle. With a jolt the shuttle blasted off through
the opening in the ceiling.
Salvos and Radar got off the ground and brushed
themselves off. “That
was weird.” Said Salvos.
“Yeah. Never
had an earthquake on Robotropolis before.” Radar
squinted. “Wait,” he whispered “something isn’t
right.”
“What is…” Salvos’ words were drowned out by the
roaring of hyper
engines. They watched as an egg shaped craft soared
by over head. “Now that
can’t be good.”
End Part 1