"R.O.R. - Robotnik’s Obedient Robots"

A work of Sonic the Hedgehog "Fan-faction" by Glazius Falconar

I wish I could dispense with the legalese, but I can’t…

This story is copyright (©) 1997 by its author, Glazius Falconar (aka Paul Arezina). The original characters, situations, and theories portrayed in this story are also copyright (©) 1997 by the author. The situations and characters portrayed in the Sonic the Hedgehog Saturday morning cartoon series and/or the Archie Sonic the Hedgehog comic book are copyright SEGA, DiC, and or Archie Comic Publications, and are used without permission. The situations and characters originally developed in Dan Drazen’s epic fan fiction series "Bloodlines" (specifically, Princess Sandy Acorn, the Desert Nomads, and the theory of gradual contamination of a roboticized body) are copyright Dan Drazen and are used without permission. The title comes from a Czech play called "R.U.R. - Rossum’s Universal Robots", written by Josef Capek. (Interesting side note: the play introduced the word "robot" to the English language.) The concept of the World Wide Web is copyright Herbert George Wells, in his "Men Like Gods". Read it sometime. This last part is thanks to Mastermind: You can’t change the text in this story or charge others money to read it without my expressed written permission. If you would like to do either of the above, think there is something wrong with this story, would care to exercise your right to flame (though be warned, you will receive 1000 copies of said flame), or just need an excuse to e-mail somebody, my e-mail is at the end.

I had been back at my base in the "Great Forest", as the native sapients called it, for only a few hours, when Mark trilled.

"Compilation complete, Glazius. Displaying schematics…"

I mentally complemented myself on telling Mark to scan the remains of those strange robots that "Sonic", the supersonic hedgehog who "greeted" me, had shredded. I assumed that "Robotnik", whoever he was, would send only his best forces to take a beast as powerful as that "dragon" seemed to be into custody. I breathed a sigh of relief when I saw that the robots were of a rather primitive design. After seeing "Nicole", a hand-held computer with capabilities similar to Mark’s, in action, I began to wonder if this planet might have evolved far enough to detect and repel offworld intruders. Judging by the technology I’d seen Robotnik using, in both the base which contained the dragon and the robotic convoy, it hadn’t. But how, then, to explain "Nicole"? A question for another time… right now, I had to focus on gleaning what information I could from the schematics.

As I looked them over, I reflected on the development of robotics on Avis Prime. Our scientists had shunted fairly early into the development of robotic limbs for heavy lifting, precision movement, and such. A robot duplicate of any Avian was out of the question: it needed sensors which could assemble a full three-dimensional picture of the world and give it information on how to navigate in all three dimensions. That sort of technology wasn’t available or even feasible to early roboticists, and the bias remained almost to the present day. The bulk of Avis Prime was organic, with robotics only coming into play to replace badly damaged limbs or joints or do jobs which required strength or dexterity beyond that of an ordinary Avian. Apparently, the situation on Mobius Prime was a bit different, to say the least…

Mark had picked up four types of units in the convoy. One was obviously a transport vessel, with some simple magnetic restraints for the "dragon". Another seemed to be an augmented version of a Terran "hovercraft"; the fan blade underneath was a bit more powerful, enabling actual flight. It was outfitted with fixed-wavelength energy blasters and what seemed to be a cargo hold, and was designed to be piloted from inside, apparently by those mechanical bipeds.

The other two types of units were apparently self-contained, with rudimentary AI’s. One was a robot plane, outfitted with energy blasters similar to the hovercraft’s and jet engines. According to what little of an internal database it had, it was called a "StealthBot" and was designed for rapid flight, strafing, and the occasional bombing run. It was keyed to follow orders from only a few voiceprints, one of which was probably Robotnik’s.

The final type, the mechanical bipeds, was the most interesting. They had remarkably advanced AI’s, considering the rather primitive shells they were encased in. There were several different subroutines, including one for piloting a "hover unit"; must be one of those pumped-up hovercrafts. I looked over some of the files Mark had been able to reconstruct; these "SWATbots", as the guerillas had called them, were programmed to be killing machines. That’s probably what they would be, against anything but a supersonic hedgehog…

One of the files caught my eye… a database of Mobian laws? Why would a robot soldier need one of those? Unless… I looked through the rest of the files and found a street map of "Mobotropolis" and a few other programs clearly designed to assist all sapients, not just the SWATbots’ commander. That confirmed my suspicions. These robots had originally served a peaceful purpose, probably acting as law enforcement officers of some sort… until Robotnik and whoever was working with him took over. Judging from the huge size of the database of Mobian criminals, the robots had been reprogrammed to recognize everyone, other than their masters, as a mass murderer or something equally serious. They were quite possibly authorized to use deadly force in extreme cases, but the presence of any organic being became an extreme case. I looked through one of the databases and, sure enough, the hedgehog was listed as Public Enemy Number One. Another name, Princess Sally Alicia Acorn, caught my eye. I looked over the dossier and, sure enough, she was the "Sal" who had helped the hedgehog free the dragon. Not exactly a typical role for a princess…

Huh? I had reached the middle of the list and noticed something. Next to almost all the names on this portion of the list was an addendum of some sort, but Mark couldn’t translate it from Mobian to Avian. "Mark, what’s wrong?"

"Translation database does not include this Mobian word."

A new word… well, it had been fifty years. "Okay, Mark, what might it mean?"

"Processing… closest analogue in Avian language is ‘mechanized’."

"Mechanized…" a strange status for a sapient. Perhaps there were mechanical prisons of some sort… but the only way to find out was to head to "Robotropolis"… a perfect bastardization (if there can be such a thing) of "Mobotropolis", that mechanical city’s true name. That was out of the question for now… too much potential for violating the Prime Law. I’d see if I could get answers some other way.

A question nagged at my brain: who was ruling this polluted sector of the planet, anyway? Something else I couldn’t figure out without heading for Robotropolis… unless… of course! If every organic being was listed as a criminal of some sort, the only ones who wouldn’t be were those who were in power. It should be a simple matter of comparing the database of criminals against the database of all citizens. "Mark, cross-reference database of Mobian criminals from most recent database of Mobian citizens, as gleaned from destroyed robots."

"Processing, Glazius… List compiled."

"Okay, Mark. Remove from that list all those Mobians classified as deceased or with unknown whereabouts, and display the results." No sense in worrying about the dead ruling a planet…

"Processing, Glazius… Displaying list…"

Only two names? Two sapients had managed to do all this? A Dr. Julian Robotnik and a Snively Robotnik were the only records Mark displayed… probably father and son or some such. "Mark, visual display."

"Complying, Glazius…"

I got a good look at the supreme overlords of Mobius Prime’s Northern Continent… and laughed my beak off. A more comical pair I’d never seen. Then the seriousness of the situation kicked in, but I was barely able to keep from laughing out loud as I pondered… apparently, a behemoth with a flaring orange mustache and a gut the size of a boulder, and a midget with a long nose, had managed to overthrow what passed for a Mobian government. How did they manage? How could they… I got my answer. Looking over Julian Robotnik’s dossier, I saw that he was listed as War Minister, and current military governor of Mobius. Apparently, he was the one responsible for altering the robots’ programming and placing the Northern Continent under martial law. I could see it happening…

There had been a war of some sort (why have a War Minister if there is no war?) in which these robot soldiers had played a pivotal role. The Robotniks had probably designed the SWATbots for combat, explaining a few things about their design. The arm-mounted lasers, for example, and a remarkably comprehensive nanite repair system. The nanites could even reattach a leg or arm if need be. Probably saved a bundle on rebuilding; just piece together a robot and let the nanites do the rest…

Anyway, the robot soldiers played a pivotal role in the war, and once a peace had been reached, they were redesigned to help the citizenry. But the War Minister was a bit discontented with the peace; they usually are, from what I’d gleaned from my studies. He wanted the power he’d held on the battlefield; in peacetime he was little more than a functionary. So, he made sure that some of the combat subroutines and the voice recognition stayed intact when the robots were converted from soldier to helper. From there, it was a relatively simple matter of tweaking the criminal database and placing Mobius Prime under martial law. The rest would come naturally… the citizens were unprepared to defend themselves against an assault by their own police force.

But that just explained why Julian Robotnik was in power. It didn’t explain the miasma of pollution suffusing the city or what he had done with the "criminals" he’d captured. Keeping prisoners does get rather expensive, and I rather doubted that he’d had everyone killed… though you never know… but what did that strange "mechanized" label mean? Not dead, certainly… that would translate clearly… but what…

Mark trilled. "Incoming lifeform."

"What is it, Mark?"

"It appears to be an avian-insect crossbreed."

Hmm… the messenger beast. "What’s its heading, Mark?"

"It appears to be heading towards the location known as ‘Knothole’."

Good. Another chance to drop in on the hedgehog and his associates. And now that I had a database of the Mobian "criminals"… "Mark, save gleaned criminal database."

"Saving database, Glazius… saved. Database ready for access."

Excellent! Now I could identify everyone. It’s a bit better to be able to put names to things. Gives you a sense you’re dealing with sapients and not lifeless abstractions. But I’d best be on my way. "Mark, guide me to this ‘Knothole’. Once we’re there, stop time and pass us through the canopy of limbs."

"Affirmative, Glazius." A green arrow appeared before me, and I took off full speed to the base. Nothing occupied my thoughts this trip, so I simply took in the scenery. The forest was lush and green and the air was fairly fresh and wonderfully clear. It made a wonderful contrast to that polluted city. Yes, I definitely hoped that the "Freedom Fighters", as the guerillas called themselves, were able to overthrow Julian Robotnik, though the odds against it were…

I felt a strange tingle. Looking around, I saw that Mark had placed my timestream in retrograde translation. I activated my air generator and dove for the canopy of limbs which covered the base. Although I knew that my wavefunction would slide harmlessly through theirs, some ancient reflex still prompted my to shut my eyes. I opened them a bit earlier this time, and was able to pull up well short of the ground. I realized belatedly that my psychic cloak wasn’t in place… hope no one had seen me… "Mark, activate psychic cloak and restart time."

"Cloaking… activating concurrence module…"

The camp below came… well… somewhat alive. The sun had just risen, after all, and no sapient was up yet. Funny… I thought guerillas would be more rigorously trained than that… I heard a buzzing behind me, and quickly ascended a few feet to let the messenger beast pass underneath. It flew over to the window of one of the huts and trilled a few times. A very sleepy Princess Sally (Mark silently confirmed the name) staggered to the beast and clumsily removed the parchment from the cylinder on its back. Having done its duty, the beast buzzed off, probably back to whoever the guerillas’ contact was. I was more interested in the beast’s message than its point of origin, however.

The hedgehog, Sonic, came running up to the hut, leaving a small cloud of dust to herald his arrival. Not running, actually; I knew that the hedgehog moved in large part by warping spacetime, but the terms for conventional movement leaped into my head first. The hedgehog spoke…

"What did Uncle Chuck have to say, Sal?"

For answer, the Princess crumpled the paper into a ball and flung it to the ground outside her hut. The hedgehog, puzzled, bent to retrieve the message as the squirrel stormed to the inner reaches of her hut. He had begun to unfold it when another sleepy voice sounded from across the base.

"Sugar-hog? What the hoo-ha was Sally-girl so mad about?"

I was startled to hear the clanking of metallic feet. Had the base been discovered? If so, no one was in a position to escape… I turned to face the voice…

And found myself staring at… a rabbit? Not just any rabbit, a rabbit with metal legs and a metal arm! The planet’s technology hadn’t developed far enough to produce such finely articulated robot limbs, certainly not without a massive CPU to control their movements. Another interesting development… "Mark, stop time and run an analysis of those metal limbs."

"Activating retrograde translation module… performing scan… performing higher-resolution scan… checking data filters…"

"Mark, don’t bother. Nothing is logical on this crazy planet. Just tell me what your scan picked up."

"Affirmative, Glazius… Scan reveals cellular infrastructure in robotic limbs. Such biotechnology is inconceivable at this stage in the planet’s development."

"Agreed, Mark." But then, warp drive wasn’t feasible "at this stage in the planet’s development" either, and yet there was one creature I know of who had somehow developed a natural warp ability. Perhaps another natural mechanism was at work here… let’s see…

Well, why not start with what I already knew? "Mark, you remember the pattern of cobalt, nickel, and titanium deposits on this planet?"

"Affirmative, Glazius. Said metals are spread abnormally thinly over the entire surface of the planet."

"Right. Now, Mark, assemble a list of all the metals which are so distributed and check that list against the composition of those robotic limbs."

"Complying, Glazius… Robotic limbs are composed of a titanium alloy, with a small amount of cobalt and nickel and trace amounts of other metals. All are distributed in said abnormal pattern."

Okay… so what did that tell me? Since the hedgehog was able to… no… it couldn’t be! Stop telling yourself that, Glazius; everything’s possible, right? But this certainly bordered on the impossible. Those robotic limbs weren’t really robotic!

I had no idea why or even how it had happened, but somehow, all the macromolecules in that rabbit’s legs and left arm had acquired an immense negative charge, one too great to be stabilized by organic cations. So, just like the hedgehog’s quills, they drew metal out of the ground by sheer electric force, binding the metallic cations into their natural cellular structure. And the negative charge had to be several orders of magnitude greater than the hedgehog’s… because enough metal was drawn in to set up a primitive metallic bonding network and give those limbs the appearance of being metallic.

But what other effects would it have? Well, cellular processes would essentially grind to a halt, save for muscle contraction; the metal ions would just provide too much interference. But the muscles would be greatly strengthened by the added load capacity of the titanium alloy, in both muscle fibers and bones. The ATP needed to provide force for muscle contraction would just have to be synthesized in the rest of the body, and the commands for muscle contraction would travel down an organic-metallic hybrid nervous system. The robotic arm was essentially a greatly improved version of its cellular counterpart, able to lift more weight for longer and respond to commands faster, all while using a slightly smaller amount of organic fuel.

Or was it an improvement? All cellular processes ground to a halt, including self-repair… I rather doubt any enzymes could recognize cellular structures or even function effectively with all that metal. If a bone broke (not likely, with that titanium-alloy structure) or a nerve was moved slightly out of place, it would have to be physically repaired. Cell growth and division was out of the question; essentially, the robotic limbs were in stasis, but the environment wasn’t. DNA self-repair was almost non-existent, and with that prevalent pollution, cells, robotic or not, would be exposed to a remarkably large number of "hits"; chemicals and such which could damage the DNA. And with no way to repair it… repair it… hmm… "Mark, are any nanites present in the subject’s bloodstream?"

"Affirmative, Glazius. Nanites are present in quantities similar to those seen in the mechanical bipeds."

Okay… now this made a sort of sense. Nanite self-repair would take care of most minor damage, like breaks in DNA and the like; the nanites would just have to have a good idea of what the genetic material was supposed to look like, and they’d fix most problems with the nucleotides just floating around. Hmm… it was also possible that the nanites could disassemble old cells and construct new ones; they were metallic, after all… which would prevent the problem of metal ions from dead cells floating through the bloodstream and causing obscene amounts of damage. Major damage, like a broken bone or nerve out of place, would still need to be physically repaired, but the nanites could and did take the place of the body’s cellular repair system. It was as though robotics were simply overlaid on an organic… wait a minute… now I understood what that strange label meant! "Mechanized", as Mark translated it, meant that an organic body had been converted, completely or partially, to a strange organometallic hybrid. But what kind of holding cell could contain such a creature? Maybe a really big electromagnet… but I’d have to go to "Robotropolis" to see for myself.

I prepared to take off when my curiosity got the better of me. What was in that note? "Mark, restart time."

"Activating concurrence module, Glazius…"

The hedgehog picked up the parchment and started smoothing it out. "I don’t know, Bunnie."

"Bunnie"? "Mark, display appropriate dossier from criminal database."

"Accessing database, Glazius…"

"Bunnie Rabbot…" I bet she got teased a lot when she was young… that name just seemed to invite it. The hedgehog began looking over the parchment.

"Oh man… yes I do… Buttnik roboticized six more Mobians while Sal and me were out savin’ the dragon… Uncle Chuck wants me to come get the details." The hedgehog re-crumpled the paper and spiked it to the ground again. "Man! I don’t believe him! He knows I can’t be in two places at once, but why’s he have to keep takin’ advantage like that?!"

"Roboticized"… so that was their term for it. Well… now I knew why Julian Robotnik had been such a successful War Minister… he could take advantage of opportunities as they presented themselves. He hadn’t planned to capture the dragon, obviously, but he certainly used that windfall to his advantage. I had to admire his skill… in a rather detached sort of way. The rabbit put her organic arm around the hedgehog’s shoulder.

"Don’t you worry none ‘bout it, sugar-hog. Ain’t nothin’ you coulda done ta stop it anyway."

"Yeah, I know, Bunnie, but it still ticks me off… Buttnik gets six more slaves, and I coulda been there to stop it."

"Slaves"? I’d have to see how he managed to control one of those metal-augmented Mobians…

"Yeah, but if you did, the dragon woulda been…"

"You’re right, Bunnie. One less dragon to worry about fightin’ against. Man, how come you can always see the bright side of stuff?"

For answer, the rabbit smiled. "Sugar-hog, after havin’ to live through this" - gesturing to her robotic limbs - "ain’t nothin’ can get me down!"

The hedgehog smiled. "Yeah. Now let’s go see if we can cheer Sal up…"

They both headed toward Sally’s hut. Hmmm… definitely not your average group of guerillas. They seemed more like a family than anything else….

Then, something they said hit me. Robotnik had "roboticized" six Mobians? Great! Well… not for the Freedom Fighters, or for the fate of the planet, but it did give me an opportunity. I’d get a chance to see how that organometallic overlay was created… and how Julian Robotnik managed to control those who were changed. Perhaps the hedgehog couldn’t be in two places at once, but with the Professor’s device, I certainly could be… wait a minute, how was that possible? My mind reeled at the endless opportunity for paradox that traveling back in time a few hours could create. What if I met myself? Would the universe explode? I’d hate to take the blame for that… Then I remembered the Professor’s lectures.

It was a bit vague to me, but what the TST did was shift my entire timestream relative to the rest of the universe. If I went back in time two hours, I wouldn’t meet myself because the "me" who existed two hours ago would also be shifted back two hours… and it wouldn’t affect any of my memories because they were only being formed by my current consciousness. I’d have to ask the Professor for a clearer explanation… but wait a minute! I was on Mobius Prime to explain its artifacts (which were turning out to be a lot more numerous than I’d anticipated…). If I spent all my time worrying about how my own technology worked, how far would I get? Not very… I’d better just trust the Professor’s word on this one. "Mark, secure my psychic cloak, teleport me to the Robotropolis city limits, and take me back in time to… 1130 hours today, as this planet measures time."

"Processing requests, Glazius…"

Within microseconds, I was standing on the outskirts of that awful city. By the position of the sun, I could tell that it was earlier in the day. Fortunately, the electronic wizardry that Mark worked to allow me to see while time was stopped didn’t include converting the local odors. I activated my air generator, breathed in the fresh, clean air it gave off, and began winging my way to a point fairly high above the city. After all, I’d need to locate those prisoners in order to see them being roboticized. When I was up high enough… "Mark, search the city for a group of six organic lifeforms, probably being escorted by those ‘SWATbots’. Guide me to them once you’ve found them."

"Affirmative, Glazius…"

A red arrow appeared, guiding me to a huge ovoid structure at the center of the city. Probably Command Central, or whatever the Mobian term for it was… Fortunately, the door hadn’t closed behind that strange entourage yet, and I was able to make my way to a central room. The linearity of it all disgusted me; anybody who could manage to best the robot guards would have easy access to this chamber. But then, the War Minister probably saw his own robots as being nigh-invulnerable. I began micro-fluttering near the ceiling, and had a good look at the Mobians who had been captured…

I couldn’t see much of them except for their cloaks. They looked to have been designed for camouflage; desert terrain most likely. The thick cloth swathing their bodies was further proof that they had definitely come from a desert region; though my feathers were angled in such a way as to deflect sand, and my eyes had a small membrane to protect them from swirling sand, these sapients had neither adaptation. And with even a small bit of fur, sand becomes a major problem… but enough of that. I’d have to watch a holo-movie again, or at least something like one… "Mark, remember the procedure you used to enable me to view events in a non-native timestream?"

"Affirmative, Glazius. Parameters for incremental translation and buffering of aural input are recorded in memory."

"Good, Mark. Let’s do that again, but be ready to stop at a moment’s notice. I may want a closer look at some things."

"Affirmative, Glazius. Beginning sequence…"

The scene began to move, jerkily at first, then more rapidly. The six prisoners stood, restrained by the robot guards, as Julian Robotnik made his way into the room. "Well, well… what do we have here? Nomads? Hmm… nomads… Hands out, all of you!"

Probably to make sure they didn’t have energy blasters or something concealed in those cloaks. One figure seemed a bit hesitant to comply with Robotnik’s request. He made a brief gesture with… a mechanical arm? Had he tested his device on himself first? The robots behind the hesitant figure grabbed its arms and forced them from the confinement of its cloak. What in Almighty’s name… another mechanical-armed figure? Robotnik’s eyes flashed… red?… and he flung back the hood on the figure’s cloak. I gasped in shock, thankful no one could hear me; the cloaked figure looked exactly like Princess Sally!

"So, Sandy… we meet again. How’s your mother, hmm?"

"You… you know as well as I do that she’s dead. You killed her." Her tone sounded as though she were trying to hold back tears. It was working… so far…

"My dear child, whatever gave you that idea? The Queen was a perfect test subject for my little machine here…" and he gestured toward an apparatus which I assumed was responsible for roboticizing Mobians.

Wait a minute… the Queen? No such figure existed in Mark’s Mobian databases, criminal or otherwise. No Princess Sandy (if the Queen were her mother…) was registered either…

"Her untimely death was an… unfortunate side effect of the process."

"You monster! You killed her deliberately and tried to do the same to me!"

Ah… it became somewhat clear. "Mark, stop time, and scan ‘Sandy’ for presence of nanites."

"Ceasing incremental translation… scanning… no nanites detected, Glazius." Either the initial machine’s design hadn’t included nanites, or Robotnik actually enjoyed seeing an innocent die a living death. From what I’d seen of him, both were just as likely… without a nanite repair system, the body would fall victim to DNA damage and metal ion waste products, as I’d reasoned earlier. He’d probably abducted the Queen and the Princess (Sally’s twin sister, unless I miss my guess… the facial features were too similar to think otherwise) under the pretense of protecting them from whatever war was going on. They were later reported to die a tragic death as a result of some battle or other, and vanished from Mobian records. Robotnik then had a couple of subjects to test his machine on, and no one would be the wiser. But for that to work… he’d been plotting to take over Mobius before the war had ended. Someone like that shows up in every planet’s history; with luck, it only happens once. Just my luck to arrive when it was happening… I sighed, and realized that the scene was still frozen. "Mark, restart time."

"Resuming incremental translation…"

Robotnik waved a dismissing arm at the robots holding Sandy. "Throw her into the roboticizer. She’ll be much more pliant when her conversion is finished." He muttered to himself… "Now if only I could catch that rabbit…"

He must be talking about Bunnie. Somehow, the process had been interrupted (deliberately or not) for the both of them. If he did have some way of taking control of a fully roboticized Mobian, I can see how he would dislike only partially roboticized ones… part of the power of a roboticized body, with none of the restrictions he could impose.

Sandy was placed in a cylindrical chamber, and a glass tube slowly descended. Her efforts to break it did no good, not even when she used her robotic hand… must be some quartz derivative, probably interspersed with diamond… the two covalent networks could interlock rather well. Some sort of beam shot down from the ceiling, and… she smiled? Probably endorphins or some such (I imagine the process could be rather painful), but only one way to know… "Mark, stop time!"

"Affirmative, Glazius…"

"Two questions, Mark. What is that beam doing, and is anything being injected into Sandy’s body?"

"Analyzing beam… it appears to be a rather primitive version of an Avis Prime brain-scanner, using a simple magnetic field to chart electrical discharges in the brain, and possibly throughout the body."

"You mean like neurons firing?"

"Affirmative… scanning body for foreign substances… presence confirmed… a modified hypodermic needle is protruding several millimeters from the floor of the chamber. It appears to be injecting nanites into the subject’s bloodstream, but no other chemicals are detected."

Now I knew why she was smiling. The nanites would repair her damaged DNA and use the metal ion metabolite products already in her body to make a few new cells. She wouldn’t be dying… but what good would that do, if she were under Robotnik’s control? Unless… she really could break that glass, but that would take… "Mark, scan subject’s body for presence of diamonds or materials whose hardness falls within 10% of diamond’s."

"Scanning, Glazius… Subject appears to have crystalline structures, which are diamond-cobalt integrates, housed in the fingers of her robotic hand."

Hmm… this was going to get interesting. I decided to sit back and enjoy the show. "Mark, continue."

"Resuming incremental translation…"

Those strange diamond-like crystals emerged from her robotic hand like claws on a Terran lion. She quickly made two intersecting slashes in the tube, then smashed their intersection with a robotic fist. The tube shattered, and she leaped through the hole just as another beam fired from the chamber’s ceiling. "Mark, stop time! What’s that beam?"

"Ceasing incremental translation… analyzing beam…. Beam appears to be forcing electron capture by the molecules on the chamber floor."

I imagined it could do the same to a sapient body… it made sense now. That beam would simply force every molecule in a sapient’s body to carry a negative charge of sufficient magnitude to pull metal from the surrounding area. That’s how "roboticization", for lack of a better term, was carried out. But how did Robotnik bring roboticized Mobians under his control? I had the strange feeling I wouldn’t get the answer from watching this scene unfold any further. However, it wasn’t likely that I would get another chance as good as this one for a while, if the Freedom Fighters had their way. "Mark, resume."

"Resuming incremental translation…"

Sandy touched down, a bit lower to the ground than I’d expected. She’d jumped less than a wingspan… then, as if on cue, the other five "nomads" (as Robotnik had called them) flung their robot guards over Sandy’s head at the machine. The maneuver was very similar to one in Terran judo, and had the net effect of destroying the machine, or at least rendering it inoperable for a while. A good thing, too, for the beam was still creating negative ions from the molecules on the chamber floor. A little longer and… who knows what could have happened. As it was, Robotropolis merely gained a few more liters of ozone as the negative charge dissipated rather harmlessly into the surrounding atmosphere.

Sandy charged her former guards and quickly cut them in two with a quick swipe of her diamond-enhanced robotic hand. They seemed surprisingly weak against physical attack… probably a result of the war. You don’t expect sword-wielding sapients and blaster-wielding sapients in the same army, after all; I imagined that the war was fought largely with lasers, so there was no need for close-range combat. Hence the robots’ current weakness in hand-to-hand combat, such as it was.

Robotnik seemed a bit overwhelmed by the display of pyrotechnics caused by his destroyed robots and roboticizer, but he quickly recovered as Sandy and her nomad friends edged toward him. "Now, now… no need for anything rash… can’t we… talk this over?" He backed away as fast as his mass would allow.

"The time for talk is long past, Julian." Sandy’s eyes narrowed. "Now you will pay for what you did to Mother."

Robotnik looked genuinely afraid as he bumped into a wall. He quickly cast about for something that would save him… and mashed his organic fist against a button on a nearby console. "Security! Security!" he yelled as metal plates slowly descended to cover the doors. Probably a safety feature, in case the beam was left on too long with no sapient in the chamber. Red strobe lights began flashing, and I imagined that klaxons were blaring as well. Mark only translated speech, so I couldn’t make out other sounds.

Sandy looked a bit startled, and motioned for her friends to leave. She began sprinting out, but then turned. "We’ll meet again, Julian." She then ran toward the door, barely making it under upright.

I dove under it just before it slammed shut to seal the chamber… then realized I could have had Mark pass me through the door easily. Ever the adventurous, eh, Glazius?… then I began to think… the air was still crackling with negative charge. In such an environment, Mark might not work properly… and an eternity spent stuck in a steel safety door did not appeal to me. As the last of the nomads made it safely out of the building, I thought about what had happened. "Mark, stop time." No sense worrying about avoiding the onrushing security platoons…

Well, I’d seen how the roboticizer worked… sort of… but I had yet to see a fully roboticized Mobian or the processes that Robotnik used to control one. But another question nagged at my brain; who was this mysterious "Uncle Chuck" who communicated with the Freedom Fighters? He had been exactly right in the first communiqué I’d seen but almost completely wrong in his second, and such inconsistency was not desirable for a reliable source, as the Freedom Fighters apparently trusted him to be. As other questions about him occupied my thoughts, I realized that I had a means of finding him. The hedgehog was supposed to meet him today; I’d just need to tag along, psychic cloak in place. "Mark, shift me back to my native timestream and teleport me to… a wingspan below the apex of the tree limbs covering Knothole."

"Complying, Glazius…"

I found myself back at Knothole. Directly below me, Sonic, Bunnie, and Sally were seated on a hollow log, laughing at some joke I’d missed the punchline to. Apparently, it hadn’t taken Bunnie all that long to cheer Sally up again. Sonic stood, waved to the others, formed a warp bubble around his legs, and headed for wherever Uncle Chuck was. "Mark, track hedgehog. When he stops, stop time, and restart it once I reach his location."

"Affirmative, Glazius…" Mark’s blue holographic arrow appeared, guiding me towards the hedgehog. I checked my psychic cloak, and dove through the hole in the foliage that the hedgehog had run through. It was only a few seconds before I lost visual contact; the forest was rather thick, after all, but from what I could see of the horizon, he was headed straight for Robotropolis! Suddenly, the world froze. "Mark, locate hedgehog."

"Hedgehog is currently twenty wingspans within Robotropolis city limits."

So "Uncle Chuck", whoever he was, was an inside agent. He probably intercepted communications, incoming and outgoing, and gleaned what information he could from them. That explained why he had been so accurate… and why his last message had been inaccurate; the last transmissions from those robots, before they were destroyed, were that six Mobians had been taken to the roboticizer. Drawing what conclusions he could from that transmission, he could only reason that six more roboticizations had taken place. It made sense… but why would there be further details?

The world suddenly restarted, and I noted that I had rather blindly flown over the hedgehog. I circled back. The hedgehog rapped on a pipe sticking out of a nearby wall, and a nearby pile of garbage… opened up? Excellent camouflage, I must say… this "Uncle Chuck" was probably responsible for designing Knothole and using that messenger beast as well. The hedgehog walked inside the room behind the garbage heap. I flew in behind him, just as the door closed. I micro-fluttered near the ceiling, out of habit, and looked down… what the!?

A robotic hedgehog was advancing toward Sonic, arms outstretched as if to capture him! He clasped them around Sonic, and the organic hedgehog… returned the gesture? What in the…?

The two hedgehogs separated. "Good to see you again, Sonic. Thanks for coming on such short notice," said the metallic one.

"No prob, Unc. You know I’m always glad to see you again."

The robotic hedgehog was Sonic’s uncle? Well, he was definitely not being controlled by Robotnik… perhaps he’d loosed his shackles, as it were, some time past. "Mark, stop time, and scan the robotic hedgehog. Look for any internal structures not present in Sonic."

"Activating TST… scanning, Glazius… several aberrant internal structures detected. Several LED’s are detected around the inside of the subject’s corneas, and a metallic structure of unknown function is detected at the base of the brainstem. Said structure has several metallic neurons extending from it; they appear to be artificially constructed."

The LED’s were probably low-energy enough that they could be powered by ordinary neural impulses, and were aimed away from the cornea so they wouldn’t interfere with normal vision. That explained why Robotnik’s eyes glowed red as well… he’d probably used himself as a test subject. But what could that structure by the brainstem be… brainstem… brain… "Mark, where do the artificial neurons go?"

"Scanning, Glazius… Neurons appear to connect to existing neurons which control the activity of skeletal muscles, and several smooth muscles."

So Robotnik had literally hot-wired a roboticized body… I imagined that the nanites were responsible for the construction of both structures, probably from a few excess metal ions here and there. In an organic body, both structures would be essentially inactive; the LED’s, which I suspected were run from the structure near the brainstem, wouldn’t have a high enough voltage to work, and the artificial neurons would be quickly rejected by the organic neurons’ defense mechanisms. But how did Robotnik know where to connect those artificial neurons in the first place?

The answer came to me as I remembered the function of the roboticizer’s first beam: he didn’t. Not initially, at any rate. It was ingenious, really… the beam took an instantaneous picture of its target’s nervous system. Since I imagined that most Mobians knew about the roboticizer’s function, its subject would be terrified of the prospect of becoming Robotnik’s servant. The adrenaline would rush, and the entire body would go into a state of autonomic arousal. Hence the electrical activity. The nanites would construct that strange structure… hmm, need a name for it… the "slave module"… a bit of a pun, but it will work… and send artificial neurons to attach to all nerves except those which were firing. The slave module would send a large (comparatively) discharge down all the neurons, and, aided by an external viewer, it would learn which neurons controlled which muscles. The reason for the scan was obvious; a large enough discharge to a system already in autonomic arousal could easily explode the heart or rupture the diaphragm or any one of a spectrum of dire and lethal consequences. And the "slave module" would do no good connected to the autonomic nervous system; it had to hook into skeletal muscle to be effective. But how would that establish control? "Mark, are any neurons severed in the robotic hedgehog?"

"Negative, Glazius. All neurons are still intact."

Hmm… if the neurons were still intact (severed neurons don’t regenerate easily) then there must be another way… of course! An organic brain would send signals of some particular voltage; it would still do so when it was metallic. The slave module just needed to use a slightly stronger voltage, and the body would obey its commands in preference to those coming from the organometallic brain. It must be an awful feeling… to see and know that you were helping someone you loathed. The cerebrum and higher thought processes were left essentially undamaged, so the sapient remained painfully aware of its predicament. But how had the robotic hedgehog managed to break free of Robotnik’s control? The slave module was still intact, and still firing signals. For that matter, what happened to the first subject roboticized? He wouldn’t feel any fear unless Robotnik explained the process to him in all its gory detail, something I doubt he’d take the time to do. And how the heck had the roboticizer been developed in the first place? Science may occasionally take great leaps, but not this great. With nothing better to do, I decided to keep listening… "Mark, restart time."

"Activating concurrence module…"

Sonic opened his mouth as if to say something, but his robotic uncle raised a hand. "Before you say anything, Sonic, I want to let you know that I wasn’t entirely truthful; I just wanted to prepare you for the worst."

"The worst?"

Hmm… it seemed that "Uncle Chuck" also orchestrated a few missions of his own.

"Yes, Sonic. Some time ago, I contacted…"

"Why not let me tell him?" said a voice from the corner of the room. A figure dressed in nomad garb stepped from the shadows; I could see that it was Sandy as her face was illuminated by the flickering light overhead.

"Sandy? Unc, what’s she doing here?"

"Buying you and your group of Freedom Fighters some much-needed time, Sonic Hedgehog," she cut in before the robotic hedgehog could say a word. "I think it was successful, Sir Charles. It went off without a hitch."

"Excellent work, Sandy. Now, if you please…"

Sandy nodded and extended an arm. Charles Hedgehog (I took it that the name was hereditary) produced a rather large hypodermic syringe from somewhere, heated it in a flame, and plunged it into Sandy’s arm. He withdrew a few dozen cc’s of blood, then pulled the needle out and placed it in a scanning device of some sort. The device hummed to life. Sir Charles then looked at a readout on a nearby monitor, nodded, and placed the syringe into some sort of access port in his neck. He injected a few cc’s into himself, and replaced the syringe in its stand. "I could swear that I feel them working already."

"Feel what working, Unc? What did you just do?"

"I forgot that you weren’t in on this, Sonic. For that matter, neither was anyone back at Knothole. I didn’t want to get your hopes up. Now, I know you don’t take well to scientific jargon, so I’ll try and make this as simple as I can. You remember how you snapped me free of Robotnik’s control the first time?"

"Yeah, Unc. I used a Power Ring on you."

"Right… well, I remember feeling a huge rush of energy, and then it was though a great weight had been lifted from me. My body was mine to control again! And, some time later, an equally abrupt change happened. Suddenly, Robotnik was back in control again, and I had no idea why or how. But I found that I was able to think, and think I did, while my body did Robotnik’s dirty work. That Power Ring overloaded something inside me - I could almost feel the explosion - but something had repaired it… what?"

The nanites, of course. I could see how the immense surge of energy a Power Ring provided could easily knock out the wiring in the purely metallic parts of a roboticized body. The slave module and LED’s would be so much scrap metal… until the nanites stepped in and restored them to full functioning. I still didn’t know how he broke free of Robotnik’s control, though…

"That’s when I realized what Julian had done. I remembered commending him for installing a nanite self-repair system in the robot soldiers we used to fight the Great War; saved a lot on raw materials and time spent building new soldiers. Somehow, he had found a way to put nanites inside a roboticized body, to repair any damage that it incurred."

"Hang on, Unc! If that’s true, how come you’re in control of yourself now?"

Just what I wanted to ask…

"I gave that a lot of thought too, Sonic. Then I remembered some of the features I’d included in the roboticizer. Remember, I designed it to help old folks like me keep living, so I had to put in a few modifications."

He’d invented the roboticizer? Hmm… if he knew what I thought he knew, its development wasn’t such a mystery after all. If he studied his nephew at all (and what good scientist wouldn’t, with a puzzle like that blazing speed?) he would know about the metal-protein interaction which made his quills blue. From there, it was a simple matter of coming up with a way to induce the state present in his nephew’s quill proteins into a full sapient body. And with a noble goal like his in mind, he’d keep working at it…. I also realized a way around that "first Mobian roboticized" problem; if Robotnik had chosen Sir Charles as his first subject, the inventor of the roboticizer would certainly be a bit apprehensive about being subjected to his own machine. From then on, it was just a matter of word of mouth before everyone feared the roboticizer… an elegant solution to a rather tricky problem.

"One of those modifications was designed to help people who’d sustained nerve damage. A large enough charge would just jump the small gaps created when nerves broke or were displaced, so I designed the roboticizer to allow for an increased voltage in the brain or anywhere else it was needed. And when I was on the brink of handing you over to Robotnik… something just snapped. I must have activated it unconsciously, but the juice in my brain just went up a notch and overcame whatever signals Robotnik sent to me. Since then, I’ve been in perfect… well, near-perfect, anyway… control of myself."

Mark silently verified the hedgehog’s story. His brain was putting out a voltage many times greater than a standard neural impulse, easily overriding the signals Robotnik’s slave module sent out. But how was it able? I knew that the sodium-potassium pump could be stepped up by some enzymatic mechanism, but where would he get the ATP required to run them? Digestion was out of the question for a metallic body; the digestive enzymes would be coated in metal and largely useless. "Mark, stop time, and perform a cellular-level scan on Sir Charles, emphasis on mitochondria or their equivalents in the Mobian body."

"Scanning, Glazius… intense charge difference detected between mitochondrial membranes. Magnitude suggests external source."

Of course! Fledgling! All that’s needed to produce ATP is a charge gradient; I imagine Robotnik would probably envision roboticized Mobians as needing "recharging", much as his robots did. Little did he know what a recharge was actually doing: suffusing the mitochondria with enough negative charge to produce ATP in relative abundance. Yet another example of an erroneous approach having its intended effect. "Mark, restart time."

"Activating concurrence module…"

Sonic scratched his head. "Yeah… I understand… kinda… but if you’ve got those nano-thingies in your body, Unc, why’d you say that you were dying?"

"I was, Sonic, I was. My own blood samples revealed moderate levels of metal ion contamination, with all indications that the level was rising. But… do you remember the blood samples I took from each of you?"

The organic hedgehog laughed. "Yeah. Ant fainted dead away!"

"Ant"? Mark couldn’t find the name in a quick search of the database; I’d have to do an exhaustive one later.

Sir Charles smiled. "I remember that, too. But what interested me more was Bunnie’s sample. There were almost no metal ions in her blood; there should have at least been a few. Then I had a good look at her nanites, and compared hers to mine. As I’d thought, Robotnik had updated the design considerably since he first roboticized me; Bunnie’s nanites were much more efficient than mine. And it’s been a few years since she was roboticized; I checked Robotnik’s current database and, sure enough, the nanites he currently uses in the roboticizer are even more advanced than Bunnie’s. Judging from their design, they should be more than capable of repairing the damage that any roboticized Mobian has suffered, and keeping them in near-perfect health… until we can get the de-roboticizer perfected."

"De-roboticizer"? Hmm… a beam which would ionize the molecules which electron capture had been forced on, causing the metal ions to just fall away. The artificial structures would be completely inactive in an organic body; such a process would truly undo the effects of the roboticizer. Such a thing was possible, but it would have to be meticulously accurate, or the process had a small chance of reversing itself. A few cells with a strong enough negative charge could set up dipoles, causing a chain reaction which would ultimately culminate in a blinding flash as metal ions rushed back in to re-stabilize negative charges. An impressive visual effect, but some very unimpressive results… as far as the Freedom Fighters were concerned. Sir Charles continued his story.

"But I couldn’t get to the nanites through any normal means. Robotnik has the room below the roboticizer, where they’re constructed, guarded by three squadrons of SWATbots, and keyed to his voiceprint and retinal pattern. It would be a tragedy… at least for him… if someone were to change the nanites’ programming, hence the tight security. I was a bit stymied on what to do… and then I remembered Sandy…"

The Princess in nomad garb, who had remained silent through Sir Charles’s discourse, suddenly spoke up. "Sir Charles contacted me one day. He had a plan to get those nanites into my body and stop the damage Robotnik set in motion, and quite possibly help out all the other Mobians who suffer, as I do… well, did… because of what Robotnik did to them."

The robotic hedgehog nodded. "You see, Princess Sally’s blood type marked her as a universal donor, one whose blood can be used by everyone without fear of an immune reaction taking place. Since Sandy was her twin sister…"

"We just needed to get the nanites into my bloodstream; from there, a blood sample with only a few nanites could be distributed to anyone who needed it. But to do that, I first had to get them there… which meant entering the roboticizer chamber…"

"That’s where I helped Sandy out, Sonic. I managed to sneak off with a few of Robotnik’s industrial diamonds; the ones he uses to cut steel and other hard materials. Diamonds are the hardest things on Mobius, you know. I modified Sandy’s robotic hand slightly…" at which Sandy showed her diamond-cobalt "claws"… "so that it could easily slice through the glass Robotnik uses to seal the roboticizer chamber. After the nanites were in her bloodstream…"

"It was a simple matter of putting this ‘monster hand’ to good use. I took five of the best Nomad fighters with me… after they heard what they could be doing to Robotnik, I had to fight off the volunteers… and wandered about near a patrol route. We put up only a token resistance, and were taken to Robotropolis. Robotnik threw me into the roboticizer first - as I knew he would - and once I broke out, the fighters took action. We caught Robotnik completely off guard. He probably doesn’t even know why I bothered to be captured in the first place."

Sonic just shook his head in amazement. "Wow, Unc… I never knew you could come up with such a Way Past Cool plan! But why didn’t you tell Sal and the others about it?"

"As I said earlier, Sonic, I didn’t want to get your hopes up. If this failed - and you don’t know how hard I hoped it would not - the others would be crushed. If they tried to help out, by causing a diversion or breaking in and rescuing Sandy, Robotnik might think that we had planned it for a reason. He might even go so far as to deactivate all the nanites, assuming he figured out what the plan was. As it is, it’s just another maddeningly successful escape attempt by ‘that cursed Princess’, eh Sandy?"

Sandy laughed. "I imagine that he’s referring to me in much less glowing terms about now."

Sir Charles looked startled. "Which reminds me…." He turned to a terminal and began typing madly away. "…there."

Sonic and Sandy both looked puzzled. Sir Charles turned, to see them both staring at him blankly. "I just told Robotnik’s inventory computer that the tube which was currently in place had a minor structural flaw… just where the videotape shows you smashing through it, Sandy. Assuming we have to rescue someone from the roboticizer again, it won’t be any harder."

Sonic smiled. "Way past, Unc."

His robotic uncle nodded. "Well, there’s nothing else to do here… and I’ll be missed in about 5 minutes. You two had better be going." Both turned to leave.

"Wait, Sonic!" Sir Charles withdrew a few cc’s of blood from the larger sample and placed the syringe he used in a padded case. "Give this to Bunnie. Tell her it’s… a present from her Uncle Chuck. I’ll cultivate the nanites, and give some of the older worker-bots injections when I can. Now you and Sally don’t have to worry about anyone dying on you… at least, none of us robotic folks. And Sandy… thank you very much for your help. You’ll be returning to the Nomads?"

She nodded. "It’s my home, Sir Charles, or at least what passes for it. If something should happen to Knothole and Sally… someone has to be around to rule Mobius."

"I understand, Sandy. And please, call me Uncle Chuck." He embraced the two other Mobians; one fully organic, the other partially so. He then opened the garbage-camouflaged door, and turned to enter a maze of ductwork, probably to go back to whatever task Robotnik was ordering him to perform.

"Goodbye… Uncle Chuck."

"’Bye, Unc."

With that, the room emptied. I flew out the door, easily clearing it before it closed.

The hedgehog turned to Mobius’s other princess. "Need a lift home, Sandy?"

"No, thank you, Sonic. I can manage." With that, Sandy sprinted off through Robotropolis. I could barely see through the smog that she was joined by five other cloaked figures, and they all made their way towards the northern boundary of the city. For his part, Sonic formed the warp bubble around his legs and took off for the Great Forest. I winged my way silently back to my base, mulling over what I had just seen.

It appeared that the Freedom Fighters weren’t in such dire straits as I’d originally thought. They had a reliable contact on the "inside", as it were, and had some powerful allies. Of course, with that partially robotic rabbit, they were fairly powerful themselves. This guerilla warfare had a slight chance of succeeding; it seldom, if ever, works to topple the government it opposes. Things were looking somewhat up for Mobius.

They were looking up for me, too. I had managed to explain two Mobian enigmas, at least to my own satisfaction; Sonic Hedgehog’s incredible speed and how that strange machine known as the roboticizer functioned. But there were many others to cover… so many problems, so little time… which should I tackle next? I yawned and realized belatedly that it had been a while since I grabbed some decent sleep. My mind wouldn’t do much good if it wasn’t fully alert, so I decided to take a well-deserved rest. I settled down on my roost and drifted off to sleep, a thousand questions whirling through my brain.

The end… or is it? For this story, yes. For the series… it ain’t even close.

Questions? Comments? E-mail me at [email protected].