"Up on the Roof" A work of Sonic the Hedgehog fanfiction, by Glazius Falconar And they call him legal man... This story is copyright ((c)) 1998 by the author, Glazius Falconar, a.k.a. Paul Arezina. You can't make changes to it without getting my approval, and it would be nice to get a note beforehand if you plan to post this. Sonic the Hedgehog and all characters from the Archie comic book and Saturday morning cartoon that bear his name are copyright SEGA, DiC, and/or Archie Comic Publications. And the song "Up on the Roof" was originally written by Gerry Goffin and Carole King, but has been perhaps most prominently performed by James Taylor. If you've never heard it... listen to it. If you have, that will help immensely. And you can't charge money for the express purpose of viewing this without the permission of all the interested parties. Translation: Ask SEGA. Good luck. My email's at the end if you have comments. Author's Note: This just came to me after I heard "Up on the Roof" one too many times. It's a sort of combination story and music video. This, if you will, is a Saturday morning variant on "Brave New World". The music cues are in square brackets. **** Victory. The word had never seemed so hollow to Princess Sally as it did now. The Freedom Fighters had finally done it, finally beaten Robotnik and Snively... and what did they have to show for it? THIS is what they had to show for it, thought Sally, as she walked through the ruined palace that had once been her home. Blaster marks appeared at irregular intervals on the walls... she swore she could still smell the burnt plaster that was the only legacy of the battle the Royal Guard had fought to protect this place. The throne room... indeed, all the rooms of the palace... were destroyed almost beyond hope. Paintings had been slashed to ribbons, vases and statues upended and shattered... it was as though Robotnik wanted no beauty to survive in "his" city. She realized that her wanderings through the halls had taken her to her old room. She had to fight an immense battle against her fears to open the scorched wooden door, but curiosity won out over cowardice. As the door creaked open... Sally wished it hadn't. "Devastated" would put it lightly. Robotnik had left nothing in a state even remotely resembling intact. Her bed was smashed to splinters, her bookcases upended, pages ripped from the books they contained... Robotnik must have gotten some strange satisfaction by destroying her home... he could not destroy her. Sally knelt to examine the remains of what had been her childhood... wait! Something was still intact. She gently eased a broken table aside... and there she was. Clarice. Sally didn't know why she had taken a liking to the plush dragon... when she was younger, Clarice seemed almost big enough to go riding on... but that was a child's dream. The stuffed toy was only as long as her arm now... Sally reached for the toy, brushing aside the ashes which seemed to form a protective circle around it... and gasped as she gently lifted one of Clarice's cloth wings. There was a blaster hole... clean through the dragon... right where its heart would have been. That was it. That was all she could take. Sally tried to hold back the tears... but she couldn't. Robotnik had destroyed everything and nothing was left, nothing... nothing at all... No. No. Robotnik was dead; she wouldn't let him ruin her life now. She needed somewhere to go, somewhere to collect her thoughts, somewhere... She knew where. Sally rushed out of the room, down the hallway... and found a heap of rubble blocking the staircase. No. Not blocking... but it certainly seemed that way. There was an opening at the top... and, after a few minutes of climbing and a slight cloud of dust, she was through it, running up the spiraling staircase to... The balcony. Her father had always brought her up here... so many times... She sat down on the edge, feet dangling out over the ruined courtyard below, and began remembering... [Here the song starts, after a brief guitar intro. When this old world starts getting me down, And people are just too much for me to face I climb way up to the top of the stairs, And all my cares, they drift right into space.] She didn't remember much of her childhood. What little she could recall... happened on this balcony. She was a few months old, if that... when her father and mother had taken her here for the first time. The cold night air had been an unexpected change from the warmth of the palace, but it was not entirely unwelcome. She was a bit young yet, to understand the sky and the stars... but she could understand her parents' faces perfectly. [On the roof, it's peaceful as can be. And there the world below, it don't bother me... no, no, no, no...] Sally could remember her mother's face, almost beaming with love, as the Queen held her daughter close to ward off the chills of the night. And her father, tall and strong and confident, arm draped protectively around the Queen's shoulders as he smiled up at the night sky... But that was not to be... [So when I come home, feeling tired and beat, I got to go up where the air is fresh and sweet.] It had been a month since the Queen had passed away. She had simply gone to sleep one night and never awoken again... Sally's birth had been harder than the Queen wished to admit to, and left a slow wound which never quite healed. The Queen's life was slowly draining away, but she, determined not to let anyone worry about her, had put up a facade of good spirits. But now, she paid a terrible price for her deception... Sally could remember her father's face the morning it had happened. She had never seen such fear as when her mother wouldn't awaken... or such sorrow as when her father was told why. The palace's brilliantly colored tapestries and pennants disappeared in favor of the black of mourning, and there were no signs that it would ever return to its former splendor. She had gone to her father, who had hardly moved from the bed where her mother died, and tugged at the end of the black strip of cloth all those in the palace wore to mourn the Queen. She remembered almost dragging him through the palace halls, up the stairway, and onto the balcony... [I'm far away from the hustle and crowds, And all that rat race story, down in the streets...] They had stood there for what seemed like days, Sally holding her father's huge hand in her two small ones, looking out at the stars and the lights of Mobotropolis. She hoped that it would make him happy again... but he only grew sadder as time passed, remembering all the nights he and his wife spent out here... and how they could never do it again. Tears began to form in his eyes, and he turned away... And she, with all the restraint of a child, had decided that the black cloth was too close and unwrapped it... and the wind caught hold of it and flung it over the courtyard. Her father had spun around, eyes wide with shock, and tried to chase down the cloth, as he did when she unraveled it inside the palace. He barely managed to keep his balance as he realized he was about to leap off the balcony into the courtyard below... and that he was about to kill himself to keep the memory of his wife's death alive. He gave a long, slow sigh... and turned to his daughter and smiled, faintly. The black cloth was off his head in a second, and it joined Sally's in an intricate dance on the wind to the ground below. King Acorn smiled as he took his daughter's hand and led her back inside. The black cloths were gone the next day. [On the roof, it's the only place I know - Look at the city, baby - And you just have to wish to make it so, Let's go... Up on my roof.] But that had changed. Just when things were finally becoming peaceful again... Robotnik had come. And, in the space of an hour, he had undone years upon years of work... and left a Princess without a palace, and without a father... But she had fought. For ten years, she had studied, and trained, and planned, and fought... and she had won. The Freedom Fighters had won. She remembered the huge column of flame that had, for a few exhilarating moments, taken the place of Robotnik's Doomsday Project... and blushed as she recalled the source of the fireworks which had capped the celebration afterwards. [And at night the stars, they put on a show for free... And darling you can share, share it all with me...] She gazed skyward, remembering that night... and gasped in amazement. The smog was gone... gone entirely. Snively HAD kept his word, she thought, as she gazed up at the stars. Robotnik's nephew had tried to follow in his uncle's footsteps... but, unlike Robotnik, he was no sadist. And, for some as yet unknown reason, he could no longer stand to destroy Mobius. He had offered his assistance in undoing everything his uncle had done, and Sally had eagerly accepted it. For one brief moment, Sally thought that everything had finally worked out... [I keep on telling you that Right smack dab in the middle of town, I found a paradise that's just about trouble proof, I know now...] And then reality hit. Hard. King Acorn was still trapped in the Void, all but a few Mobians were still slaves, willing to do whatever Robotnik told them - not as though he could tell them anything - and ten years of Robotnik's pollution had ruined most of the planet. Those were problems she had no idea how to even begin to solve... She felt the tears coming. And this time... she did not hold them back. [And if this old world starts getting you down,] She felt a hand on her shoulder, and turned... to see Sonic, covered in dust, looking down at her. "You okay, Sal?" It was obvious that he had drilled through the rubble which still blocked the stairway... to be with her. Why? "A little dusty, aren't you, Sonic?" [There's room enough for two...] "Yeah. Buttnik really did a number on this place, didn't... he..." Sonic trailed off as he noticed the tears in his Princess's eyes. After a few awkward moments of silence, he spoke again. "You miss it too, huh?" She looked at him quizzically. He sighed. "Uncle Chuck always brought me up here 'cause it had the best view... and 'cause both of us liked watchin' the stars at night." Her eyes widened a bit. "And I saw you up here... and I thought maybe you shouldn't be alone." The smile on Sonic's face was different from his usual arrogant smirk, a difference which gladdened the Princess to no end. "So... can I join ya?" [Up on my roof.] Sally nodded, and Sonic vaulted down onto the shallow ridge of stone. They both sat for - minutes? hours? - looking up at the stars. Sally wasn't sure how their hands had met, but she was glad it had happened. Glad that she wasn't the only one who had memories of this place. Glad... to have found a friend. [Up on my roof, up on my roof... You got to climb on up, bring it on up, c'mon up, c'mon up...] Neo Mobotropolis was a beautiful sight. Many said it exceeded the glory of its predecessor city, when in reality, it matched it splendor for splendor. It had taken years of work, and tons of stone and metal, but Robotnik's legacy was finally no more. The palace was the only thing that had changed, and that only slightly. So slightly that the change could not be seen at all... unless you stood in the center of the courtyard and looked up to the walls above. A simple railing had been built around one of the over-hanging platforms. Ordinary stone, ordinary metal... nothing at all was special about this one position for it to be so protected. Except... Every night, without fail, a strange procession would wend its way through the palace halls, up a spiral staircase, and outside. Tonight was no exception. [Drop what you're doing tonight and climb up the stairs with me and see me...] Sonia was a bit young yet to understand what was going on. She could only feel the cold air whistling through her quills and smell the clean air of the outside. Sally smiled as she held the child close, remembering a certain queen who had done the same for a certain princess all those years ago. She felt a hand on her shoulder... Sonic had never been much for regalia, preferring a simple soldier's uniform to the regal robes of a King. He was dressed simply now as well, his arm wrapped around his wife as the trio - different from that of twenty-five years ago, but no less happy - took in the night. [We got the stars up above us, and the city lights below...] Sally had never told Sonic about the despair she had felt when she poked through the ruins... or when she realized that, even if Robotnik was gone, there was still much too much that needed to be done. She wasn't sure that she wouldn't have jumped that night... and she had always remembered how a simple act of friendship had wiped all thoughts of such an action from her mind. They had won. Snively had called in a week ago to report that the weather patterns had been normal for the past year, and that the seedlings in the Great Forest were finally taking hold. Robotnik was gone. More importantly... more importantly, everything was right again. Sally looked up at the stars, felt Sonic pull her a little closer, and smiled. Everything had turned out all right after all. [Up on my roof... up on my roof.] Two figures watched from the archway. One should have been an automaton for the past fourteen years. The other should have been a crystal statue for the past twelve. Perhaps fortunately for them, they had children who cared enough about them to see that no such thing would happen. But more fortunately... more fortunately, it had worked. Sir Charles and Chancellor Acorn looked at the couple on the balcony, then at each other, and smiled. Their nights on the balcony had not been spent in vain. -END-