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canmom · 1 year ago

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The themes of NieR Reincarnation

A post about the recurring elements of Drakenier and the use of branching timelines as a storytelling device. I'll be discussing spoilers for basically every DoD/NieR game.

Records

A somewhat understated recurring motif of the Drakengard/NieR series is the idea of stories or memories of humanity being stored in some massive archive.

It's an idea that first entered the series in NieR Gestalt/Replicant. Early drafts of the game focused on the idea of a world built out of stories and fairytale characters, and while most of this was cut, some remained in the Forest of Myth area.

Following NieR's obsessive love of hopping between different game genres, the story here is delivered through prose/text adventure segments. There is a sense that this area of the game exists as prose, with the characters slightly aware of narration - narration which absorbs the characters until you find a way to escape. Eventually you find out - it's rather cryptic in the actual game, but spelled out explicitly in Grimoire NieR - that it's a huge computer system storing records of the deceased humanity.

In your second visit to the area, the story focuses more on distant history, that all these stories are fragments of memory of the lost pre-apocalpytic world. You encounter a Gestalt (human soul extracted from body) that is eating the memories stored in the tree, and kill it, and for Nier and co., this is enough - but for the player, you really don't know half of what is going on.

In the story The Lost World, which was adapted for the additional Ending E added in the Replicant remake, Kainé returns to the Forest of Myth and finds the computer system expanding. She fights clones of herself before eventually speaking to a mysterious administrator and descending into a virtual world that seems like a corrupted version of her memories. But she's able to connect to her memories of NieR, Emil and Grimoire Weiss, and through that connection cause a kind of timeline collapse effect that allows her to resurrect Nier. Terms from DoD3 such as 'singularity' come back again.

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In NieR Automata, the idea of the legacy of humanity becomes increasingly central. While the androids believe they are reclaiming Earth for humanity, the Machine Lifeforms' motivation is in large part driven by their efforts to pore over the records of humanity and learn how to evolve their condition, even by blind imitation. Many of the different Machine Lifeforms you encounter are shaped by their interpretations of human society. The motif of human buildings recreated in white blocks recurs at certain points.

In the final sequence of the game, you climb a tower, and inside it visit simulacra of locations from the Replicant/Gestalt. You learn that the machines have infiltrated the androids' network and downloaded basically all the information the androids have, including all their records of humanity. When the machines' 'Ark' is launched into space, it carries their memories and consciousness in data form.

The YoRHa: Dark Apocalypse raid series in FFXIV continues this idea of obsessive, blind reconstruction. The machines you fight here are now all the more explicitly connected to the apocalyptic shit in DoD; they have also been frantically creating duplicates of YoRHa android 2P, the Bunker and so on in corrupted form. Although the story here has mostly other interests, it's another recurrence of the idea of trying to recreate things that were lost.

Along with this idea of the archive comes the idea of preservation of that archive. Whether by accident or deliberate attack, the survival of the archive is not guaranteed.

This is all absolutely central to what Reincarnation is about.

Branches

The Drakenier series has played around with branching narratives pretty much from the start. It's somewhat infamous for it in fact - did you know that NieR is actually a spinoff of ending E of Drakengard, the one where you appear over Tokyo and have to do a rhythm game? Yeah, so...

Most games are fairly cagey (ha ha) about the mechanics of these branches. Indeed, although we speak of branches, the structure of these games is not really a branching one like a visual novel. The branches and 'endings' are usually unlocked sequentially.

Drakengard/Drag-on Dragoon (DoD1) is probably the closest you get to a traditional branching structure. You can unlock routes in certain missions by fulfilling certain conditions. The exact logic of these branches is not really explained - you can go back to a point before you recruit a party member and get a different branch where they're present for example. That said, it's not like a visual novel where you can be 'on' one branch or another - you can always jump to any level from any timeline.

This oddness of the branches is also lampshaded a little more in DoD3, the game that is most explicit about the nature of the branching timeline. DoD3 is, from the player perspective, a linear game. After you complete the first 'ending', you unlock new levels that appear at earlier points in the timeline, and diverging branches appear. In the later branches, the logic of the world is starting to break down. Party members who you'd recruit later in the story are in your party much earlier, in some cases suffering from amnesia, the implication being that it's an effect of the Flower's corruption.

The game is intermittently narrated by a character called Accord, an android 'Recorder' whose job is to document all the different versions of the story for an unknown party. Accord isn't supposed to intervene in the story, though she occasionally talks to protagonist Zero, and in the final D route, she decides to break the rules and save Zero. Otherwise, she's responsible for 'sealing' branches where it seems the world cannot be saved.

This is Accord:

The final cutscene of DoD3, available only after you beat the ludicrously difficult rhythm game that is the 'final song', shows a bunch of other Accords appearing and talking about what a mess this all is.

Accord's other role in the game is to sell weapons. Another series tradition running back to DoD1 is the 'Weapon Stories'. In each game, you can collect weapons, which can be upgraded through a series of four stages. Each stage unlocks another part of a story. These stories tend to be quite brief - each entry is at most a short paragraph. They also, particularly in the DoD games, tend to be comically grimdark.

DoD 3 came out after NieR Replicant/Gestalt, but in every game since then, there have been cryptic mentions of Accord. In Automata she's mentioned in a note as a weapons seller; in the updated version of Replicant she is mentioned as visiting Nier's village while the party is away on her adventures, and you see a documention that mentions the 'Accord Corporation' supplying magic weapons.

OK, so, put a pin in that, we'll come back to her later.

The side material commits further to the branching idea. The original Drakengard is established to follow from the DoD3 Story Side novel, while Branch A gives rise to the Shi ni Itaru Aka manga and the DoD 1.3 novel. The YoRHa stage plays spawned alternative versions, namely YoRHa version 1.3a and Shōjo YoRha version 1.1a, with the gender of the casts flipped. YoRHa 1.3a also has Accord in it. The anime NieR Automata ver. 1.1a also presents an increasingly diverging version of the events of the game - notably, Adam turns into a multi-armed monster.

DoD2, something of the black sheep of the franchise, was originally written to follow DoD1 ending A; later it was retconned to belong to its own branch. Just 'cause.

With me so far? ...no? Yeah, that's fair. You can read about all the details I've gathered so far here, but in short, there are lots of timeline branches, and multiple versions of several stories with small or large divergences.

Reincarnation

NieR Re[in]carnation is a gacha game that's been running for the last three years, and is going to be shut down at the end of April. At the time it came out, it was acknowledge for having unusually nice graphics for a mobile game, but rather desultory, grindy, repetitive gameplay. Which remained true throughout the game's life, so I can't exactly recommend playing Reincarnation, especially at this point.

But! I would definitely say it's worth your time to dig up the story on Youtube/Accord's Library if you're into NieR stuff. I won't be going into all the ins and outs of the story and how it all fits together in this post, but I am gonna talk about how it's structured.

NieR Reincarnation places you in a vast stone city called the Cage, calling to mind the environments in Ico. At the outset, you play as a young girl travelling with a weird ghost-like creature called Mama, tasked with restoring the memories stored in objects called 'dark scarecrows' which are being subverted and corrupted by black birds which form into various monsters.

Within each chapter of NieR Reincarnation, you get a short story in four parts, presented in a kind of cutout style, which are the four segments of a weapon story. You collect the weapon and the character.

The Cage is shaped by the content of the weapon stories somehow bleeding into the simulated setting. A character's memories can be used to restore the stories to their proper course. It is possible to interfere in small ways with the worlds of the stories.

The corruption of the stories tends to involve subverting characterisation to make them crueller, more prone to random violence etc. - or points when a character could be threatened in a narratively unsatisfying way. For example, a peace-loving runaway prince could be turned into a warlike king.

Over the course of the first arc, you discover that the girl you are playing is actually a monster who has taken the form of a human girl and, regretting it, wants to give her her embodiment back. The second half of the arc has you playing the girl trying to reunite with her monster friend; at the end, you get her own backstory as a victim of brutal prejudice. After all is said and done, both characters transform into weapons, which Mama picks up and hides away.

The second arc, The Sun and the Moon, deals with a brother and sister from present-day Tokyo. Both of them have been transported into the Cage by more of the weird ghost thingies, to participate in a strange ritual that is allegedly going to restore the Cage. The rules are highly mystical - a significant sacrifice is needed.

In the most recent arc, The People and The World, the characters all emerge from their stories as the Cage becomes increasingly corrupted. We finally get the long awaited point where these characters can interact with each other, and advance the stories from a series of tragic vignettes to something more. At the same time, we get a lot more allusions to other games in the series - from the Lunar Tear room where Emil memorialised Kainé and later 9S memorialises 2B, to a brief appearance Devola and Popola.

There's even a nod to Yoko Taro's other terminated gacha game, SINoALICE, which is going to be made into a movie oddly enough. There's a wry nod to the game being shut down.

And in the most recent chapters we find out that the Cage is actually a server on the moon containing records of humanity - 10H from A Much Too Silent Sea is one of the main characters. 'Mama' is actually the Pod tasked with overseeing the archive, and wiping 10H's memories whenever she learns too much - though it seems at some point 10H learned the truth and affirmed that she'd protect the archive anyway and they stopped wiping her memory.

Over the course of the chapter, 10H helps the gang make their escape from the moon through the androids network, to Earth. But when they get to Earth, they find themselves in a strange white city more resembling the Cage.

We'll finally get some answers, maybe, later this month. Anyway...

So, these records come from multiple diverging timelines, and they take the form of weapon stories. You have a unity of the ideas of character - weapon - memory - world. A record is simultaneously a tragic series of events, a person who can manifest inside the Cage itself, a simulated world which other people can visit, and a weapon.

In addition to the main storyline chapters and 'character stories', each character is associated with two additional 'EX' storylines, termed Dark Memories and Recollections of Dusk. Each one is a much more substantial narrative than most in the game.

Some of these EX stories clearly take place in different timelines to the first ones we encounter. Akeha's story, for example, takes place after her death in the original version. For the brother and sister from the Sun and the Moon arc, originally from present-day Tokyo, their Dark Memories take place in the backstory to NieR Gestalt/Replicant - the period where humanity is dying out to White Chlorination Syndrome and fighting monsters called the Legion. In this one, before the siblings could be torn apart by family drama and resentment, the apocalypse happens. Both of them end up coming into their own as heroic fighters. In the finale arc, the characters learn a bit about these alter egos, and it's made very explicit that this is a different timeline.

The monster Levania's Dark Memory is especially weird. It's the story of a salaryman who plays a monster called Levania in an MMORPG. His MMO character inspires him to live more bravely in the real world, and his life seems to be improving, but he is murdered by a jealous coworker. He wishes for reincarnation as he dies - classic isekai stuff. But the connection to the Levania you encounter in the main story is far from clear. Are all versions of Levania derived essentially from this man's tulpa?

The nature of the 'enemies' attacking the Cage is still not yet clear. They take the form of black birds. The birds are given a small amount of dialogue and characterisation, and they seem to not be malicious, just confused. The girl from the first arc in particular tends to interact with them sympathetically. However, they seem to be connected with the mysterious 'God' who was trying to destroy the world in DoD1, and the Angels and Flower of DoD3.

The birds are able to gathe together to manifest much larger monsters, the largest being giant elk and fish called Cursed Gods. During the finale arc, one of these becomes something that resembles the Mother Angel from DoD1 - and yes, there is a rhythm game - though mercifully a pretty easy one.

In the same arc, the character Yurie, an AI city overlord with grandiose ambitions and a loathing of imperfection attempts to download the entire history of humanity from the Cage and become a more perfect being. She succeeds, only to find the answers disappointing...

This is perhaps the closest thing we ever get to an explicit statement of what all these stories and histories add up to, but despite all this, the throughline is very strongly that these stories are essential to preserve. NieR characters exist in small groups, and it is their intense connections to these others, their treasured memories of travelling together, that motivate them to fight to preserve that thing, even if the results are destructive.

Similar themes emerge for example in Noelle's Recollection of Dusk story, which sees her travelling to preserve a place valued by her sister in crystal. And they also connect to the theme of sacrifice - the recurring ending device where the player must delete their save data in order to help someone (something echoed in Hina and Yuzuki at the altar of the sun and moon, or Levania and Fio). It's perhaps fair to say that nothing is more valued in the world of Nier than memories of a treasured person.

What about Accord? She has in fact made a brief cameo in Reincarnation already...

It seems incredibly likely that Accord originates from the Cage, and the accumulation of weapon stories is accomplished by androids like her. Definitely in the fandom there's a lot of excitement for the idea that Accord - something of a fan favourite - will show up at Reincarnation's ending.

So mystery solved, the Cage exists in the world of NieR Automata on the moon server? Not so fast - there are various discrepancies which seem to suggest that the world of the Cage exists in a separate branch than the one we see in Automata. For example, the androids are aware that the humans are dead and what remains on the moon is a huge archive of their memories; the humans seem to have survived much longer; 2B and 9S seem to have died in different circumstances. There are other oddities which fans have compiled.

And yet, despite being a divergent timeline with a much older point of divergence, some things seem to be fixed. There is still a YoRHa, still a 10H deceived about being on the moon, still a 2B and 9S.

One popular fan theory is that Reincarnation belongs to the NieR Automata anime (ver1.1a), since Adam turns into a monster there similar to the ones in Reincarnation. The black birds are reasoned to be the Machine Lifeforms, since we know they come from Earth. I'm not 100% sure of this, but maybe?

Anyway, that's basically the gist of it.

A story told through permutations

In many fictional series with a shared universe, there is an effort to maintain a consistent shared universe, so all the different events can fit into a timeline with understandable cause and effect and characters living out their lives. Even when this proves impossibly unwieldy, as in comic books or Star Wars, the attempt is made.

NieR does not really take this approach. The creators leave many details of the world, such as place names, incredibly vague - the focus is always on telling an emotional story with characters. There is, as we've seen, an almost gleeful willingness to declare another new timeline.

There is also a certain aspect of repetition, or more kindly reiteration - the same core character dynamic revisited and retold in various forms. (2B9S gets the worst of it). A character is something like a principle or ideal, and each story shines another light on that 'core'. In the earlier storylines of Reincarnation, it became quite frustrating because it seemed like e.g. the character event stories were just rehashing the same idea rather than advance the story.

However, the more accustomed I get to this style of storyline, the more I think this kinda works. It is of course quite similar to the ideas proposed towards the end of Homestuck, or to time loop stories - the idea of varying the contingent circumstances to try to better illustrate the core characterisations and dynamics.

Yoko Taro has talked about how he constructs stories from a very simple idea, typically a moment of high emotional impact at the climax, and then works backwards to figure out what sort of story could lead into that. In Reincarnation, each character gets fairly limited time to establish themselves, so they tend to be defined in terms of a pretty narrow high concept.

For example, Akeha is an assassin in a vague historical Japanese setting; her introductory story sees her decide for the first time to disobey her lord after she finds another person who has been treated as instrumentally as her. Most Akeha stories focus on her assassinations, her relationship to her retainer, and what she sacrifices to perform the duty. Only her Dark Memory lets us see an Akeha who has escaped that life - it's a simple story about preparing food, but that's given meaning by all the other Akeha stories.

Hina and Yuzuki are defined by the same traits in their flashy scifi Dark Memory stories as in the more mundane ones - Yuzuki the quiet outcast, Hina the self-sacrificing star. Fio is defined by kindness in the context of abjection, seeing the good in monsters. Levania stories are about the desire for escape and transformation. Argo is always a shitty dad who only feels alive while climbing mountains.

The staticness of these characters seems on some level to be the point - in that we are told in Hina and Yuzuki's story that the mechanism of the Cage is to sort characters into 'Light' and 'Dark' natures, and push them to inevitable conflict, even if they try to break free. In the final arc, the characters seem to finally approach some resolution as they leave their contexts behind. Given the themes of Automata in rejecting an inevitable tragic fate, similar movement may be at work. There's an ambiguity - the need to hold on to even tragic histories, vs the wish to not be confined to them. (Perhaps it's significant that it's called the Cage...)

With so many balls in the air and so many mysteries still unanswered, it's hard to figure out how Reincarnation can deliver a satisfying resolution in just one remaining chapter, but the final arc has been really cooking so who knows! But I'm also coming to appreciate it as a kind of broader lens to notice all these recurring elements and tie them together.

Stories about alternate timelines and branching narratives are very common nowadays, particularly as a tool for revisiting a nostalgic franchise. Something something effect of the fan wiki era. So I can't exactly say NieR is doing something completely unique, but I do think there is something to its fragmented, collage-like approach to putting together story elements. There's something quite honest about it - an ability to say 'these details aren't important'.

Yoko Taro always talks about himself as an entertainer rather than an artist. And probably it is true that a lot of this eemerged from an iterative design process rather than being the plan from the beginning (the first draft of NieR envisioned it as something closer to what SINoALICE ended up being, about a world of fairytale characters; NieR Automata began life as backstory for an idol project). There's definitely a strong sense that it's being improvised. And yet despite that, it does feel like it is cohering into some sort of picture, that there is an artistic throughline to all this.

Or perhaps that's just the effect of getting way too invested in something. I won't deny that NieR brings out the fan in me.

Anyway Accord had better show up next month. Guys. You've been teasing us for so long...

#nier #nier replicant #nier automata #nier reincarnation #drakengard #drakengard 3 #computer games #Youtube

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autisticshadowthehedgehog · 4 months ago

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A Cluster of Burning Stars - Chapter Thirteen

in which badniks get smashed

{ao3} {tumblr}

Vanilla was saying something, but it felt very, very far away. Cream was whispering something to Cheese, who was squeaking in response, but Amy wasn’t paying attention. Instead, she was kneeling by a smashed robo-ladybug, head tilted as she observed the sparking wires and crushed metal. Her hands drifted down, splitting it open farther to get a better look at the mechanics. She wasn’t an incredibly tech-based person– Shadow was better at piecing together the computers and machines back at the ARK. But you didn’t live in a space station science center without picking up a thing or two, especially when you broke open bots every other day, and you didn’t have much to look forward to in your future besides destroying more. She’d had study-sessions on different builds, different ways machines could operate. Different ways to break them. And put them back together.

She kept staring down until Vanilla knelt in front of her, hesitantly reaching out to touch her shoulder and snap her out of her reverie. “Amy, dear? Are you okay?”

Amy blinked up at her for a second, and then looked back at the robot. “This tech is familiar.”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s too familiar. A lot of this circuitry is way too similar to the training droids I would work with. Like they’re from the same place.” She looked up. “You’re sure you’ve never heard of the ARK?”

Vanilla looked worried, but she shook her head.

“These are the… ‘badniks’? That have been bothering you?” she asked, her voice still blank.

“...yes.” Vanilla reached out her arm, and Cream raced over, cuddling up against her mother’s side and staring with worry at Amy. Amy couldn’t understand why she looked scared. She could take care of herself. Surely she could see that?

“Who makes them?” she asked.

Vanilla sighed. “His name is Ivo Robotnik.” Amy’s ear twitched, but her face didn’t change. “We don’t know much about him. He’s a human from the United Federation continent, and he builds robots in attempts to destroy and roboticize whatever area he goes to.”

“Robotnik.” Amy repeated, before turning back down to the machine at her feet. “Ivo.”

“Amy, are you okay? That was… a lot.”

“You were very brave,” Cream whispered.

Amy wasn’t sure how to respond. “Of course I’m fine. Are any of you injured?” They shook their heads. Amy looked off into the distance, and said, “Is the rest of the town being attacked?”

“I assume so. That’s what the bell was warning for.” Vanilla said. “But Amy, you don’t need to–”

Amy shook her quills, pulling out the golden emerald she’d been storing in there. “Get to your shelter. I’ll take care of it.”

Shadow was way better at teleporting, to the point he could do it without an emerald. But if she focused, and closed her eyes…

“Chaos contr–”

“Amy, wait!”

Cream dove forwards, grabbing at her hand. Amy looked down, in shock, just as they blinked out of existence.

Vanilla, Cheese and Chocola stared at the blank space where the girls had been. Then, slowly, Vanilla said, “What?”

Amy materialized just outside the dress shop, and she was immediately met with the much-louder crashing sounds nearby. Grabbing tight onto the little hand against hers, she ducked into an alley, pushing Cream to the side and staring out at the street to survey the area.

Large, flying badniks were swooping at windows and rooftops, a loud beeping accompanying the sounds of breaking glass and denting stone. Most of them were clumped into just a few areas, most likely focused on group attacks. With how small they were, strength in numbers made logical sense. None of them seemed to have noticed her and Cream appear, so she stepped back and spun on the rabbit.

“What are you doing?” Amy hissed.

Cream looked up at her confusedly. Her ears had flopped over her eyes after the initial teleport, obviously overstimulated by the shift in location and audio. Now she peered through them, reaching up a hand to brush one out of her view. “Huh?”

“You can’t be here! You’re a civilian.”

“What’s a civilian?”

“It- it means you can’t be in the middle of battle!” she hissed, raising the glowing emerald in her hand. “Do you know how hard it is to chaos control? You need focus, which is a bit hard to get in a battlefield! I can’t just disorient myself by taking you back-and-forth, I have robots to smash! What if we teleported right into the middle of an explosion? What if…”

She cut herself off, as Cream’s big brown eyes started to water. Her hands clutched the edge of her skirt, shaking slightly. “I… I didn’t… I…”

Amy took a deep breath. “Look. I’ll try to bring you back to your mother, I–”

Cream’s ear lifted, she glanced to the right, and shouted, “Behind you!”

Amy didn’t even look, instantly grabbing Cream and dropping to the ground. Something soared over their heads, and Amy quickly pushed the emerald into Cream’s hands before launching herself backwards towards the sound. She found herself atop another one of those bird-badniks, so she grabbed it by the wings, spun it towards the wall, and leapt off before it crashed into the stone. Before it could recover, she had summoned her hammer, and smashed it to bits.

She heard Cream scream again, and whipped around to see a green spherical badnik approaching the rabbit. She leapt in front of her, slamming the hammer down as fast as she could. She stared down at it, before turning to the little girl behind her. “Are you okay?”

Cream glanced down at the emerald in her hands, and then backed up. “Ms Amy, do you think they’re looking for this?”

“What?”

“The emerald. Robotnik goes after these all the time. Do you think it’s what they want?”

Amy heard another badnik approach, spun back around, and smashed a blue bee-shaped robot into the ground. She reached for the emerald again, before having to turn and slam on a pair of ladybugs. She glanced up out of the alley, and saw a group of those robots, all staring in their direction.

“You may be onto something, kid.” she muttered. “Stay low.”

---

Rouge flapped her wings as she perched atop a rooftop, looking down at the destruction the badniks were causing. Did it make her feel bad? Yeah, sure, maybe. But everything was going to be fine once she finished her assignment. She’d send a gift basket to whoever lived in that smashed hovel over there. Or just make her employers do it. That’d be easier.

Her radio buzzed, and she held it up to her face. “What?” she snapped.

“I don’t sense the emerald in these stupid woods.” came Shadow’s voice. “You said it ‘pinged’ from here.”

Rouge groaned, before using her free hand to pull out the chaos energy detector that Robotnik had suped up for her. She glanced down at the colorful dots on the screen, before saying, “Yeah, looks like it moved back over here.”

“What do you mean it ‘moved back over there’?”

“It’s mid-town now. I dunno why.”

“They don’t just move on their own, Rouge.”

“Sometimes they do. I’ve heard of them doing that.”

“But not about them being indestructible?”

“I pay attention to the parts that concern me,” Rouge sighed, kicking her leg over the edge of the roof. “So is there something that concerns me right now, or…?”

Before Shadow could respond, Rouge suddenly had the wind knocked out of her by some kind of fierce kick to the side. She gasped, nearly falling off the roof, but catching her wings on the breeze soon enough to do a spin and fly back up, fists raised at whatever had struck her.

That annoying little fox skidded across the roof, then smirked up at her. “Fancy seeing you here!”

“Oh, son of a–” Rouge held up the radio, and said, “I’ll have to call you back.”

---

Knuckles raced up to a nearby caterkiller, punching it hard in the face, which for some reason caused it to minorly explode. “Okay, blue, how good are you at fighting?”

Sonic, standing awkwardly behind him, was scanning the village, as if he would spot Amy immediately and end all this chaos. “Uh, I always ranked dead last in the combat tests.”

“How bad is ‘dead last’, then?”

“I mean, technically,” Sonic considered, as Knuckles took a swing at a crabmeat, “Amy’s a friggin’ powerhouse, and Shadow’s good at everything he does, so… I guess I never thought about it that way.”

“Cool. We can open your horizons on a ton of new things once we get these robots out of the city.” Knuckles said. He slammed his fists down on another caterkiller, and then added, “Tails is on sky-patrol, so you’re with me. Watch your six or whatever.”

“Okay. Yeah. I can do this.” Sonic muttered, bouncing his leg nervously. He’d gone toe-to-toe with Shadow plenty of times, he’d been fighting robots in the combat arena at least once a week his entire life… this was just one of those combat tests. Except real. He could do that.

One of those flying bird-bots– the Balkiry?– made a dive for Knuckles from behind. Sonic immediately leapt up, grabbing its wing and tugging it down, before roundhouse kicking it into a wall.

“There! That’s good. Keep doing that.” Knuckles said.

Sonic straightened up, his eyes shining. “That was good?”

“Behind you!”

Sonic whipped around, slamming himself against an approaching badnik. “Ah! Gotcha.”

He stomped on a caterkiller, and then felt his mind begin to settle back into his regular fighting patterns. His ears perked, listening intently for any change in sound around him, his body tensing as he leapt from place to place. He jumped against a wall, ricocheting off to grab a floating green orb and smash it onto the ground. As they pressed farther into the town, he also kept his ear out for any other sounds of crashing or destruction; Amy wouldn’t take this sitting down, he knew, and if they could just…

“Sonic, look out!”

Shit, he’d been caught up in his search too much. He spun, seeing a line of motobugs charging straight at him. Too close to give him time to stop himself, he acted on instinct, curled into a ball, and spun at the line. He actually enjoyed the feeling of bouncing across the stone, and his quills smashed quite well against the faux-bugs, blowing them to bits by the time he unrolled himself and whipped back around to make sure he hadn’t missed any. As soon as he realized what he’d done, though, his muzzle went red and he shrunk in on himself, before turning and leaping onto a snail blaster, intensely stomping its head.

Maybe Knuckles didn’t notice.

“Sonic, what was that?”

Shit. He turned, still a bit flushed, and said, “S-sorry! It’s just instinct. Sorry. I know it’s not…”

Knuckles, strangely, didn’t look perturbed, however. His eyes widened at the line of shattered badniks. “That was incredibly effective.”

“Uh, was it?” Sonic took a swing at a crabmeat. “I dunno. It’s archaic. Apparently.”

“You just knocked out a whole group of motobugs at once! That’s good, keep doing that!”

“Keep doing that?” he repeated, astounded.

“Whatever that spin thing was. Do that!”

Sonic almost got hit by a dive-bombing buzz bomber, his mind taking a second to process. Then he ducked, spin-dashed off a wall, and hit it square in the center, making it explode behind him. He unrolled, smiling down at the debris. “Huh.”

For a few minutes, they just continued with the smashing and breaking of whatever robots they could get their hands on. Knuckles punched and shoved, Sonic kicked and spin-dashed. Sonic found he actually liked being able to spin in his attacks, without fear of judgement; in fact, without thinking about points or the opinions of any outside perspective, fighting wasn’t all that bad. Breaking these robots cause kind of therapeutic, even. He rolled his way right through a caterkiller, laughing to himself as he felt it break open before him, before straightening up and tackling a spinner.

A Nebula dove for him, so he jumped at it, rolling into a ball just as they crashed through a window. Slamming the thing to the ground while in his little spin-dash pretty much ground it to dust, its fan bouncing off and into a shelf. “Oops, my bad.” Sonic said to no one in particular, standing up and glancing around at the shattered glass.

To his surprise, he caught a flash of red, and saw Knuckles kneeling by a stand of fruit. “Sonic, we got a problem.”

He dashed over, hands on hips, and looked down in surprise to see two mobians crouching behind the stand. Maybe some deer? He wasn’t sure, but he could tell they both looked absolutely terrified.

“These civilians got stuck in here when the badniks first descended.” Knuckles said. “They said they need to get to– what was it?”

“One of the storm cellars.” the older deer said– she seemed to be roughly their age, maybe a bit younger. The other seemed to be around nine or ten, and was clinging to his sister’s side.

“Right.” Knuckles nodded. “Where is that?”

“Uh- um…” the deer glanced from Knuckles to Sonic confusedly, and then sputtered out, “The- the nearest one is by the well.”

“I saw the well on the run over here.” Sonic said. “I can handle this.”

“Do you know what a storm cellar looks like?”

Sonic kneeled over, lifting the younger deer into a princess-carry and holding him close to his chest. “I’ve read Oz. Yeah, I know what a storm cellar looks like.”

“Okay. Go with Sonic.”

The older deer hesitated, carefully watching her brother as he whimpered into Sonic’s fluff. “Isn’t… isn’t that the guy blowing things up on TV?”

Sonic looked confused, while Knuckles sighed. “No, that’s his friend, actually. This one’s on our side. Sonic, run them to the storm-cellar. If nobody opens it, find another one, or at least get them to the woods.”

“Gotcha.” Sonic shuffled his arms so he was holding the child with only one, while he held out the other for his sister. “You’re gonna need to hold on tight. I go fast.”

“Oh-okay?” She carefully put her hand in his.

He gripped her fingers tight, smiled at Knuckles, and then took off at high-speed. The girl let out a surprised scream as they took off down the path, with Sonic zig-zagging to avoid any approaching robots. The little kid squealed and leaned in closer to his chest as Sonic wound his way through the paths, before finding the well they’d first passed when they parked the plane and heard the alarm bell. The dizzy deer let go of his hand and leaned against the stone, whimpering a little, while Sonic hugged the little one tighter.

“Where do we go from here?”

The deer gestured to the right. “Between the barbers’ and the Jones’s house.”

The shop with a scissor-shaped sign was between two other buildings, so Sonic took a guess, grabbed the girl’s arm again, and raced in that direction. He appeared to have guessed right, as he saw an elevated storm cellar inbetween the alleys, in front of a stone wall. He once again dropped her arm and knocked repeatedly on the door. “Hey-o?” he called. “We’ve got some new friends for ya!”

“They’re not going to…” the girl began, only to jump in surprise as they began to hear a lock unbolt itself.

The door flew open, and an adult deer let out a cry as he saw the young boy. He reached out, taking him from Sonic, as the boy began to cry softly. The girl raced forwards, opening the second door and immediately shoving herself inside.

“Is anyone else missing?” Sonic asked.

The man stared at him for a second, then stumbled, “I–I don’t know. There’s three cellars in town and several on individual farms…”

“But do you know if anyone specifically is missing?”

“I don’t… believe so?”

“Okay, good.” he heard a whoosh from outside the alley, and quickly finished up. “You guys stay there. We’ll take care of the bots.”

Sonic spun on his heel, then, and raced out of the alley. He saw a spinner wandering towards the well, and with a dash and a crash, he sent it flying in.

---

Knuckles was a little peeved to see another swarm of badniks close in from around the bend. Like, good Gaia, how many of these things did Robotnik have? And how many had he sent out to this one village?

He punched a motobug into a wall as his mind raced. Why were there so many in this village? Did he and Tails just catch an invasion on coincidence, or had he figured out that the third hedgehog was here and wanted to get the jump on her? It would make sense for him, but with what Sonic had said about Shadow, he doubted he would’ve signed off on that.

Then again, Sonic’s vision of Shadow was… a little all over the place. At first, it had seemed like he’d had rose-colored glasses, gushing about how his friend would never hurt anyone and everything would be fine if they just talked. And then he was angry, saying Shadow would never come around and his main goal was to destroy everything on the planet. Knuckles had only fought the guy once, and yeah, he seemed a bit closer to the latter interpretation, but all the stuff Sonic was saying before couldn’t have just been in his head. Especially when Sonic said, with such certainty, that Shadow would leave the planet alone as long as Sonic was on it. Knuckles had raised himself back on his island, with only the critters and chao to keep him company, and he knew he was extremely protective of them. Had he been raised with other echidnas in his same predicament, he’d be a little attached to them as well. At least he assumed. And, yeah, maybe he was a little defensive of Tails, the first person to actually be on his side… eventually.

Hold on. Where is Tails?

Knuckles grabbed two newtrons, knocking their heads together until they shattered, before scanning the skies. He hadn’t seen the fox in a while, and he hadn’t called in on the radio. He didn’t like that. He swung at a buzz bomber, before reaching up to the communicator in his ear. “Tails? You alive?”

He didn’t get an immediate answer, so he resolved to start tearing the place apart looking for the fox cub as soon as he dealt with this clutch of badniks. He reached down, grabbing onto a caterkiller, before lifting and swinging it around as a kind of whip, knocking down several spinners and buzz-bombers in the process. When he was rid of the airborne bots, he threw the remains of the caterkiller at a line of newtrons, sending them flying back, crashing hard against the path.

“There we go.” he smirked. “Now, onto– shit!”

He barely dove out of the way in time for the barrel of whatever to fly past his head. He hissed as he hit the ground, only to look up and see Tails, mid-air with some kind of white blur of fur, the two of them kicking and punching at each other with such ferocity and at such a speed that Knuckles could barely tell what was going on. For a second, he just stared, trying to ascertain what exactly was happening. He then raced to underneath the fight, staring up and trying to figure out how best to get up there with them. He could glide, yes, but he’d need to jump from a roof or something, and they were zipping around the town in such a randomized way that he wasn’t sure he could accurately predict where they were going to go.

Finally, they came to a halt, as the white blur managed to slam Tails into a wall, pinning him down by the shoulders. “Hey!” Knuckles cried, racing in their direction, as if he could jump up the multiple feet and do something to help.

Tails glanced down in his direction, and called out, “Knuckles, think fast!”

He swung his tails, and Knuckles immediately saw a lavender glint shining against the sun as it fell right in his direction. He stumbled, hands out, and barely managed to grab the chaos emerald as it catapulted through the air. Once he had it in his fist, he paused for a moment, staring at it, before his gaze shot back up to the edge of the building.

Tails’s opponent was a white bat with large, purple-black wings, and her eyes were locked on the emerald in his hand.

“Fuck.” he said, before immediately diving for a back alley and starting to run.

He heard a rush of air and a sharp flap of wings as the bat dove after him, and the swift following of another dive and a blast of one of Tails’s laser guns. Knuckles swore to himself, glancing back to see where exactly Tails was aiming before darting in the opposite direction. (He had a ton of trust in the fox’s brains, but not so much in his aim.) He ducked to the left, between two other buildings, and finally raced out into an open area. At that, he spun around, raising his free fist and punching behind him. The bat barely managed to dodge, but he didn’t waste time in diving beneath her feet, sliding across the ground, and jumping back into a defensive position. She glared at him, before doing a spin towards him, dodging another shot from Tails. He threw out his arm, blocking her from hitting him directly, and found himself face-to-face with her.

“Nice to meet you,” she quipped, turquoise eyes narrowing. “Gimme the emerald.”

“Not happening,” Knuckles replied, before throwing forward his arm, pushing her back a few inches, and then taking a swing. He nearly connected this time, and the two of them ended up spinning in a circle for a moment, both trying hard to make contact with each other first. Thankfully, Tails didn’t dare take a shot at the tussle, but he eventually flew up behind the bat, grabbing her wings and yanking on them to try and distract her. This backfired, as the bat simply spun, whacking Tails right into the echidna and sending both boys flying back against the stone path.

As soon as Knuckles recovered himself, he grabbed onto the fox atop him and rolled them over, shielding him with his body as the bat made another dive. Knuckles hissed as she kicked against his back, before releasing Tails and spinning around, making a kick himself and knocking her to the ground. She recovered quickly and was on him in a second, the two of them rolling on the path for a moment before the bat spread her wings, grabbed him under the arms, and shot the two of them up into the air. Knuckles assumed she was going to try dropping him as a fear tactic, which almost made him laugh as he pushed himself back, ramming his head into her stomach. She let go, and he let the wind bend around him, his quills raising as he glided back down, smirking at her and waving the emerald in his hand before skidding to a landing. The bat immediately dove for him again, barely missing Tails’s shots at the same time.

For about half a minute, Knuckles and the bat were attacking and parrying each other again, with her constantly spinning her position in hopes of blocking Tails from getting a clear target. The bat then glanced over Knuckles’s shoulder, smiled, and ducked under his swinging fist, stomped on his foot, and tackled him backwards towards an alley. Before he could roll her over, she punched at his chest, causing his grip to slip just enough that she managed to yank the emerald out of his hands.

“See ya, knucklehead.” she called as she took off running, her wings flapping to give her a boost of speed.

Tails immediately began to shoot again, as he raced beside the echidna, grabbed him with one hand, and pulled on his arm. “Come on, get up!”

“Working on it.” Knuckles growled, before pushing himself back up to his feet and running after the bat. Tails flew overhead, probably trying to head her off from the other position, but his path was quickly cut off as a buzz-bomber slammed into him.

Knuckles slid to a stop outside of the alley, barely ducking under another one of the robotic bees. He glanced up, seeing a whole swarm heading for them, and let out a frustrated yell. The bat girl had disappeared in the chaos.

Okay, so they might be a little fucked now.

At least he had a bunch of robots to punch about it.

---

Sonic rolled his way through another line of motobugs, hopping on his feet as he got back up. “Yeah! That’s plus-four for Sonic! Not that I’m keeping count or anything.”

He glanced around the path, scanning for more badniks… and for some kind of direction. He must’ve taken a wrong turn somewhere along the way, gotten thrown off while he was breaking bots and taking names. Part of him wondered, for a fleeting second, if maybe the spin-dashing was throwing off his sense of direction. Maybe they were right…

He shook his head. He knew where he was going. So long as he was in a spot he’d been before. The spinning wasn’t the problem. He’d never even gotten “dizzy” like Amy used to. Even back on the ARK, actually, he’d never gotten dazed or woozy or anything. He snorted, wondering if maybe that was secretly his superpower, and the speed was just a bonus.

Footsteps pounded a few houses down. Sonic spin-dashed in that direction, stopping beside a fork in the road and throwing up his fists, dropping into a crouch in case he had to immediate jump.

Instead, something teal and fluffy slid to a stop mid-air, just half-a-meter or so from his face. “Chao! Chao chao!”

Sonic stopped and drew back, blinking rapidly at the little thing that had almost hit him. He recognized the shape from the storybooks– and, of course, the classic noise. But chao could sense danger, right? So why would this thing be here?

“Cheese! Oh, my goodness, are you okay?”

The unusual question snapped Sonic’s attention away from the creature, and he looked behind them to see a tall rabbit, rushing down the path and holding up her skirts as she did. Another, browner chao floated around her shoulder, worriedly glancing in different directions.

“Who’re you?” Sonic asked, then shook his head. ‘Doesn’t matter. I know where the storm cellar is. Hold on, I can–”

“Oh dear! You’re Amy’s friend, aren’t you?”

Sonic froze over for a moment, and then ran for the rabbit, rushing behind her as if Amy might be hiding there, before circling back to stop in front of her.

“You know Amy? Where is she? Is she alright?”

“That’s… that’s why I came here.” the rabbit was clearly out of breath. She reached up to stroke the brown chao, and said, “She… disappeared into town… accidentally took my daughter with her. Cheese is Cream’s chao, they should be able to track her energy…”

Sonic turned back around, staring at the chao. “This chao can track Amy and your daughter?”

“Um, just Cream. But unless Amy got her to a cellar, I don’t think she’d leave her alone.”

“Well, it’s a start.” Sonic ran back to the chao, and said, “I’m Sonic, I can run fast. Think you can point me in the right directions?”

The chao watched him very carefully for a second, as if he was something actually interesting. Then they nodded. “Chao chao.”

“Good.” Sonic turned to the rabbit. “What’s your daughter look like? So I can get her to safety fast.”

The rabbit was still catching her breath, but she looked up quickly. “Like me, but… really small. Her name’s Cream.”

“Gotcha.” he turned, and held out his hand for the chao. “Alright, little buddy. Where are we going?”

---

Amy was used to combat scenarios. She was used to working with a team as well, as a number of times they’d sent her in with Sonic and/or Shadow to test “teamwork” or “chaos energy output” or whatever. She was not used to defending someone who couldn’t or wouldn’t fight back, and it may have been throwing her off a little.

Every time she smashed a robot, she felt the need to glance over her shoulder to the shadows she’d left Cream in, to make sure none of them had gotten closer to her. And whenever they had, she had to double back, determined to break anything that got near the little girl. Nothing was touching her, not while she was around.

Whenever she cleared an area, she’d kneel down, tightly take Cream’s hand, and run farther, trying to find somewhere to put her, only for more badniks to descend on them, and the cycle to start again.

The one thing she was glad for, though, was that these bots weren’t as smart as the ones on the ARK. And they definitely weren’t as smart as people.

Don’t think about fighting people. Think about keeping Cream alive.

She slammed her hammer down on one of those spinning orbs, breathing deep and grounding herself back in the present moment. Then she raced to the dumpster she’d shoved Cream behind, kneeling down to make sure the bunny was unharmed. “You okay?”

Cream nodded. She looked frightened, her eyes wide enough to take up half her face, but she hadn’t started crying yet. So Amy considered that a win.

Amy’s ear flicked, and she heard a pounding from the path across from them. Footsteps? Shit, they weren’t done yet. “Stay here,” she ordered Cream, before swinging her hammer over her shoulder and jumping off the far wall, immediately directing her fall towards the source of the noise.

It seemed to be one of those crab-bots, but a bit bigger than normal. Not that it mattered; with a swing of her hammer, she’d flattened its center hard against the pavement. As soon as she landed on the ground, she swung her hammer back over her shoulder and knelt by the robot’s thick metal claws. These could make an effective bludgeon if she was running low on energy. Maybe she could rip one off and give it to Cream. At least give the kid a fighting chance if something came at her. She glanced over her shoulder, before dropping her hammer for a second and yanking on the arm. The piercing metal screech made her ears ring, yes, but she managed to rip it clean from the body, only a few sharpened shards of metal and sparks from cut wires to show for it.

Another flick of her ear, telling her that something had moved a few meters behind her. She spun around, her hands gripping tight to the remains of the arm, raising it high to smash down on whatever was coming at her.

Nothing was coming at her. All that changed was that down the path, Shadow was standing, staring at her in pure shock.

Amy dropped the claw.

They just stared at each other for a moment. Then Amy put a hand over her mouth, trembling slightly. Shadow glanced from her to the destruction behind her, then back again. “Amy?” he called.

“Shadow.”

“Amy! Are you okay?”

He started running towards her, and she stumbled, nearly tripping over badnik bits in her haste to get closer. She straightened herself, leapt over the remains of a green orb, and started to race for Shadow.

They got about a foot apart, before something slammed into Shadow from the side, pushing him extremely quickly away from Amy and straight into a stone wall. Amy flinched back as he made impact, a dent suddenly forming where he’d collided. Then, before Shadow had even hit the ground, the thing that had hit him was racing back towards Amy.

Wait, not racing. Spinning.

Shadow growled and pushed himself up to his knees, red sparks blazing from his quills as Sonic unfurled himself, standing directly in front of Amy and raising his arm to block her from view. “Don’t you fucking dare,” Sonic spat, as sparks of chaos formed in his eyes as well.

---

{ao3} {tumblr}

#sonic the hedgehog #sth #sonic fanfiction #a cluster of burning stars #mine #connie writes

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malewife-overlord · 4 months ago

Text

Six Cycles Later: Cybertron

Chapter 1: What It Means To Be Haunted

Chapter summary: she's alive, against all odds. But Puncture's situation is no better than it was on the Marshall Islands. The Autobots surely want something out of her.

Trigger warnings: death, gore, injury descriptions

You can find the start of Six Cycles Later here, as well as a description of what it is :] next chapter is here

Word count: 6382

chapter below cut!

Project MS: Log 1

WARNING

AUTOBOT INTRUDERS DETECTED

The data he’d been reading disappeared as the screen suddenly turned into a camera view of the invaders. They had just slipped past the initial defenses of Headquarters, the outer walls, by cutting a hole clean through them. Shockwave’s single optic dimmed slightly in his own form of narrowing it.

There were four of them. A large one, blue in paint. An orange one, about average height. A female Autobot, white with red. And their leader, another female, small and gray with black accents. Too many to be a few desperate rogues, too few to be a serious raid.

The Autobots were desperate for Energon, but not desperate enough to send a fully fledged party. Four was enough to deal with any initial guards, but not an entirely populated facility. Four was just enough to ensure that they could split up without detection, but not enough that their discovery would hurt the cause. Four was enough that losses wouldn’t be extreme, but still felt.

Four. This attack was planned, thought out, and executed with soldiers specific to the task. He tapped a few buttons on the keyboard, pulling up the controls for the base’s defenses.

As with any proper commanding officer of the Decepticon HQ on Cybertron, Shockwave was occupying the primary control room. It had a circular layout, with the main computers and their respective keyboards completely populating one side, an elevator in the middle, and two exits at the back, each leading deeper into the base. Sealed doors that each required codes stood opposite the elevator. On the ceiling, perfectly hidden panels concealed turrets.

He was perfectly safe in this room; even the back doors, which always remained open, could not be breached by intruders, unless they somehow dismantled the entire security system. The only access to said security system was locked behind a passcode that changed every single day and was stored on only three computers, one being the device he was currently accessing.

He was safe, but he could guess what the Autobots were after, and knew that if he did not act in some way, it would not be. After the majority of the Decepticon forces had left onboard the Nemesis, chasing the Autobot Ark, their numbers on Cybertron had dwindled. The result was that there were few beside himself to guard their main headquarters on Cybertron.

The built-in security system helped, of course, but the Autobots were learning to work their way around it. And this, before him, was their most recent attempt.

If each was handpicked to focus on infiltration, the base defenses would only be partially effective against them. Mostly the defenses consisted of turrets, moving walls, deadly lasers, and energon detectors that would sound alarms and release drones. Those who knew which signs to look for could evade them without much trouble; those who didn’t know what to look for had still proven to, on occasion, survive the traps laid before them.

Really, he needed to invest some of his time into improving the defenses beyond just the hologram technology. But judging by the appearances of the invaders, he concluded quickly that only one of the group could be specialized in evasion of security tech.

It was the black and gray one. She was comparatively tiny to the others, yet they still followed the orders she appeared to be giving. As he watched the camera feed, she clambered over one of the inner walls and felt along its length until she discovered its hidden panel. Then, she tapped her servos to it and began to hack it.

Interesting. He couldn’t say he’d seen an Autobot who looked like that and bore such an ability. Shockwave jotted it down for later, to ensure he remembered her face and frame. Then he pulled up the map of the outer base and began activation of the external holograms.

It was a kindness, a courtesy, really, that he wasn’t immediately summoning the turrets to shoot all of them dead. But the turrets consumed Energon, and Energon was not in good supply at the moment. The hoard he was protecting, hidden behind four locks and twice as many doors, was the primary source left for the Decepticons on Cybertron. They had no efficient method of producing more at the time, and he needed to make it last.

Who knew, exactly, when the Nemesis would return, after all?

The holograms which formed took the shape of Seekers. He’d programmed them as such: any ground-based Autobot knew to fear the sound of those jet engines. The holograms manifested in the air, as jets, and immediately shot towards the Autobots on the ground.

They were in the open, standing just before the second wall. At the roar of Seeker engines, the biggest one yelled and dropped, the orange and white raised their rifles, and the gray female darted for cover.

The Seeker holograms winged around them, discharging fake blasts, shooting just beside or above them to grant the illusion that they were barely missing. The three Autobots at the outer wall returned fire.

One hit, and the Seeker hologram fuzzed for a moment before regaining its stability. The Autobot who had struck it looked confused for a moment, then fired and hit it again.

The illusion was up. Shockwave frowned and turned it off. The Autobots quickly announced their discovery, and the female returned to her hacking. The panel sparked, then opened a door in the second wall. She waved her comrades through as they continued their invasion.

So be it. He had no desire for mercy, only energy conservation. But if the Seeker holograms could not perform their function, he supposed he could regain the power lost by harvesting the Energon of what was left of the invaders.

They headed for the front door of HQ, the small gray female immediately working to hack the touchpad. In the meantime, Shockwave pulled up the map for the front door, pausing for just a moment to determine which way he should kill them.

Turrets consumed Energon. Drones consumed Energon. Lasers consumed Energon. What was the most effective way to instantly neutralize them while consuming the least amount of Energon?

Ah, that way. Of course. One of his favorites, as well. There was something so satisfying about it all.

Opening the controls for the walls and ceiling, he connected his servos to the keyboard, which pulled him slightly into itself. For just a moment, he became the very walls of the HQ, the very motherboard of the main computer.

Then he was back in his body, watching the single eye of the front camera as he waited.

The front hall was empty. It was just that, a front hall–nondescript, save for the keypad next to it and the large, open space that branched into four different paths. The camera he watched hung directly from the ceiling in the middle of all four.

The double doors to the HQ suddenly slid open, revealing the four Autobot invaders. The gray female at the front still had her servos attached to the external keypad. Her dermas moved as she spoke to the other Autobots.

“Each a’ ya take a separate hall. Remember we’re dark in there. No words, no EM fields, nothin’, or he hears us. If you find it, one ping on my personal channel, and I’ll send it to everyone else. Move out.”

They all nodded, and one by one, quickly filed in. The female herself did not. She stayed just at the entrance, holding it open. It was as if she suspected something was about to go wrong.

Clever bot. Or perhaps just full of self-preservation. He would give her the single reward of letting her watch.

For no sooner had her comrades entered their hallways than did walls suddenly slam down from the ceiling, blocking each. They all backed away, raising their rifles, looking for the cause.

“Back up!” The female yelled. “Retreat! He knows–”

He ordered the ceiling to descend, and it did. The largest Autobot barely had time to turn before it smacked into his helm. He hit the ground as his two comrades immediately raised their arms to catch it, straining against the metal as it pressed harder with each second.

“RETREAT!” The gray female yelled again, looking on helplessly. The largest Autobot, energon leaking from the side of his helm, seemed dazed, stuck trying to decide if he should flee or help.

They would get no such thing. Shockwave pressed harder, ordering the ceiling to descend faster. It obeyed, lowering itself with enough force to snap the white Autobot’s leg. She cried out, but dropped to her knees, still resisting, still holding on.

“Go!” She screamed. Her comrade, the orange colored construction vehicle, wheezed as the descending ceiling broke off a piece of his back. “HURRY!”

The largest Autobot quickly began to scrape himself along the floor, heading for the open door. As he did so the creaking and snapping of metal grew louder. The white Autobot’s knees had given out. She hit the floor and desperately grabbed at it, trying to slug herself along to the entrance.

“Please, no, I don’t want to die,” the orange one whispered, his legs rattling like thunder. “Please, no, I don’t want to die. Please, no. Please–”

He went on and on as the pressure broke his leg, then snapped his knees, then knocked him to the floor. The gray female looked desperately at the control pad she was still connected to, then to her comrades. She extended one arm. The largest had just made it, grabbing onto her servos as the top of the ceiling pressed against his back.

Shockwave reared back ever so slightly and then slammed down. The camera recorded three collective crunches and went black.

And then it was silent.

He only pulled back when he heard the distant scraping of pedes on metal, quickly returning to silence. Separated from the main computer, his orders were retracted, and the security system reset itself.

The camera he’d been watching through had retreated into its panelling for safety once the ceiling had slammed down. As it lifted, the device was able to exit its safe haven. Still, the lens was completely covered in bright pink. He couldn’t hope to make anything out from it.

Tedious. He swapped to the outside cameras and just barely caught a flash of the gray female Autobot retreating through the very door she’d opened.

A survivor was good. It meant that she would return with news of horrors, and her superiors would likely decide against sending another infiltration team. Autobots were soft–they valued life more than they did progress. It held them back.

Only once confirming the female Autobot’s complete retreat did he then pull up his contacts.

The information of every Decepticon in the universe displayed before him in seconds on the main computer. He narrowed it from billions to millions, then thousands, then hundreds, then just three. The names of the Seekers he was searching for displayed: Acid Storm, Nova Storm, and Ion Storm. The Rainmakers.

He pressed the button to call them. It took them a moment to answer, as it always did–Seekers were quite lazy when unsupervised. Megatron’s absence was being felt more every day.

“Yes, Shockwave?” All three spoke at once, with the unity befitting a proper trine. They were nothing like the cacophonous Elite Trine, which prided themselves on their unique powers while neglecting to mention their horrendous teamwork. Why Megatron even bothered with such failure Seekers, Shockwave would never know.

“There’s been a breach at headquarters,” he announced. “I have taken care of it. You are to return to clean up the bodies.”

“Understood, Shockwave,” they all said.

“Throw the remains into the P1U70 lab compactor,” he ordered. “Under no circumstances are you to enter the rest of the lab.”

“Yes, Shockwave.”

“After you finish with those, you are to patrol the base until repairs complete. If you find any other invaders, eliminate them.”

“As you say, Shockwave.”

With that he hung up.

Present Day

Wake up, Breaker.

Come on, you have to wake up.

If you don’t wake up, he’ll get you.

You know how he feels about laziness.

You know what he’ll do to you if he finds you like this.

You know you won’t survive this time, with no one to take the fall for you.

You have to wake up, Breaker.

You have to wake up.

There’s someone else with her. Two of them. From her supine position on the floor they loom over her, even if one had only ever come up to her hip. One had a blast clean through his helm, red optic spitting out light into nothing. One had nothing where his optics should be, his own life cord wrapped around his neck, still connected to the broken, crunched brain in his mouth.

Wake up, Puncture.

Her optics online and the first sensation to greet her is pain. Puncture hissed instinctively at the pounding in her helm, unwilling to groan, for groaning would signal the pain had enough strength to weaken her, not inconvenience her. The moments when she felt weakest were the most crucial–if she could not power through them, could not prove that she was strong enough to overcome them, she would die.

And that begged an important question: why wasn’t she dead? In fact, where was she?

Just like in her dream, she was lying supine on something hard. When she attempted to raise her arm, she found it bound to the object she was laying upon. The same was true for her legs, though at least she still had both of those. Her neck was equally tied down, and a thick band was clasped around her waist.

Wherever she was, they didn’t want her escaping. It hurt her to turn her head, but she did, slowly taking in her surroundings.

The first thing apparent was that she was not where she had passed out. The last thing she remembered was bitterness, bitterness that Invert had gotten away with hurting her, siphoning her Energon, and abandoning her. She also remembered a roaring headache, brought on by the Autobot Channel, and that something skeletal and silver had fled the beach alongside Invert.

Beyond that, she recalled nothing else. She’d clearly passed out and since been moved. But by who?

Judging by the orange-yellow walls surrounding her, the gurney she was currently strapped down on, and the blue computer on the wall playing gentle scenes of scenery on Earth, she could take a guess.

“Oh! You’re awake!”

It was a masculine voice, though one she felt belonged to someone who had never thrown a punch in his life. She tilted her head in the direction of it and made out a red and white Autobot approaching her. He had a large blue visor and a squarish helm, and wore his Autobot insignia on his leg.

“I’m probably one of the only ‘bots who will say this, but what a relief!” He spoke through a white mask. “For a moment we were concerned you wouldn’t make it.”

“Who the frag are you?” She growled. “Where have you taken me?”

Despite the mask covering his face, she could make out how he frowned at her comment. “Language,” he chided. “I’m First Aid. You’re in the Ark after we found you on the brink of death at the Marshall Islands.”

She threw her head back and let out an exasperated groan. The Ark?! They’d taken her to the fragging Ark!? How was she supposed to escape the Ark!? Her comrades certainly wouldn’t launch a full scale invasion of this place to get her out. How typical of the Autobots, to take her somewhere to “save” her life, only to then imprison her forever.

“...so you aren’t going to tell me your name?” First Aid asked, arching an optical ridge. It was hard to do so with his visor covering his face, but he pulled it off, somehow.

“What, you haven’t pulled it from my memory files already?” She huffed.

“Of course not. That’s an incredible breach of your privacy–”

“You really carried me all the way here, repaired me, and didn’t even bother to review my memory files to learn about me first!?”

“Of course not,” First Aid repeated, his frown deepening. “As I said, that’s an incredible breach of your privacy. Plus, your brain was in such a damaged state, it would have likely killed you if we had.”

“Damaged?” Of course it was damaged, Channel had clearly fragged her up. But killed her? “Just how damaged?”

First Aid in-vented and retrieved a datapad from the nearby computer. “Well, I’ve seen worse, but the ones I’ve seen worse in didn’t survive their experience. For starters, there were five holes burned into your brain, and your circuits were partially melted.” He tapped on the datapad, pulled up the report, and read it off. “‘Patient exhibits severe burn trauma directly to the brain. Wiring of patient’s helm is shot. Only essential wiring connecting to the life chord remains intact.’ And that, of course, doesn’t account for your facial trauma.”

Facial trauma? Oh right. She’d forgotten about that.

“Speaking of, how is your new optic?” He asked, then produced his pen, moving it slowly across her vision. “Can you follow this pen?”

“Frag off,” she snarled.

“Alright, I see you’re in a bad mood.” He lowered the pen and turned away from her. “Fine, you don’t have to be cooperative.” Moving to the computer, he began to type into it. “But just so you know, we did save your life, despite the fact that you’re a Decepticon. Regardless of your allegiance, I, and the other medics here, have a duty and obligation to try and help you. We aren’t doing this because we’re Autobots, we do it in spite of it.” He cast her a side look. “So think of that when Hoist comes to perform your physical, alright?”

She narrowed her optics at him and said nothing. It was true, probably; medic bots were among the most prized on each side. Even warriors like herself knew that medics were to be left alone and respected.

Still. Didn’t mean she had to be nice to him. She didn’t ask to be plucked off that island and brought into the heart of an enemy base. In fact, it likely would have been better if she’d died out there. She’d still be free, if so.

“Hoist will be in in just a moment,” First Aid told her as he crossed the medical bay, tapping on his datapad. “You have the right to request a full copy of your medical information, as well as to deny medical care, even the life-saving stuff. Some Autobots might prefer that you do just that.”

“So you do have some bite,” she sneered.

“I’m just returning the favor. Anyways, if you need immediate medical assistance, there’s a controller by your remaining servos. Press the red button on it, and I’ll come running.”

And with those final words, he left the medical bay.

She laid alone on the gurney for only a moment before checking around for cameras. There were three, all hanging from the ceiling. Two were trained on her, with the third having a wide focus on the entire medical bay.

So they hadn’t assigned a guard, but they were watching her. She tested the bindings keeping her tied to the gurney and found that they held. She felt for her claws, trying to transform her arm enough to flip her large sickles out. Though her T-cog spun, the bindings restricted her movement too much, and her arm locked up momentarily before quitting and reverting.

Frag. They had her tied up properly. She felt along the inside of her masked maw, trying to stimulate her venom glands.

They’d been drained. Her intake was drier than the Wastes. She cursed internally and ran over her options.

In a few moments an Autobot doctor (Hoist?) would see her, check her over, and do whatever to her. After he was gone, if he provided her a clean bill of health, she would likely be thrown in a cell. Once in a cell, she would probably be interrogated and her brain picked clean.

So her future was looking like being locked in a cell for the rest of her life, or, if she was lucky, locked up, taken to trial, and executed.

Technically it was a better fate than anything her brethren would do. Pit knows what happened to those bots sent to Shockwave’s labs, though she could take a guess. But it was still a horrible fate for her–warriors were meant to die on the battlefield, not in an executioners chamber.

She had to get out of here. She’d much sooner offline by her own claw than serve as an example of ‘Autobot justice’.

Heavy pedesteps alerted her to the arrival of another Autobot, this one green. He also wore a visor as well, and when he spoke, his voice gave her the impression of a foreigner. She assumed he was “Hoist”.

“Ah, there you are, Miss Decepticon! I had heard you survived your wounds.”

She gave him an irritated look. There was no time for pleasantries, not in her mind.

“What are you going to do with me,” she asked flatly. “Tell me. And how long has it been since I was knocked out?”

“Ah, miss, well…” He paused, flubbed on his script a little. “It’s been approximately seven earth days since we found you. I assure you, we’ve treated you well in that time. Your memories have not been–”

“The nurse told me. You repaired me, but only partially. Why’s my arm still missing?”

“Well, we–”

“How’d you drain my venom glands?”

“I–”

“What are you going to do to me after this?”

“Miss, if you please! I’m just here to give you a check-up and ensure everything is functioning. Frankly, I have no idea what it is that will be done with you. As for your other questions, well, the obvious, of course! We drained your venom because it is dangerous, and we did not repair your arm for the same reason. Now, Miss Decepticon. Will you please consent to a full-body scan?”

She rolled her optics. Why give her those back, but not her arm? Primus, she must look awful right now. “Tell me, exactly, how I can say no in my present condition.”

Hoist shrugged. “I suppose you cannot. Alright, please hold still…”

—

Hoist released her with a clean bill of health. Despite her prior condition of almost having her brain melted and losing over 50% of the Energon in her frame, she’d made a full recovery, and would be in fighting form upon discharge.

Once he’d declared her healthy enough to be removed from the medical bay, First Aid had arrived to do just that, carting her bound form to the Ark’s brig. She was wheeled down a hall, passing a few Autobots she didn’t recognize on the way. They cast her looks of disdain, which she returned.

They paused before a cell. There was already an enforcer waiting at it, who placed stasis cuffs on her single good arm before First Aid had even begun to undo her bindings. From one slab to the next, Puncture was pulled off the gurney and dumped into an empty cell. Behind her, a wall of lasers formed the jail bars, threatening to electrocute her if she even brushed against them.

The enforcer who’d thrown her into the cell gave her a contemptuous look and huffed, then turned away, standing at his post like the dutiful little soldier he was. She glared at him, picking herself off the ground with only a bit of struggle.

“Hey,” she said, “what are you planning? You and all your buddies. You’re keeping me alive for a reason, aren’t you? You want me for something.”

“I don’t have to tell you anything,” he answered, not even looking back at her. “My job is to make sure you don’t escape, and telling you our plans isn’t a part of that.”

“So you are keeping me alive for something. Alright.” She grinned slyly. “You do know who I am though, don’t you?”

Silence.

“My comrades will gladly raid this place for me, you know. I’m not just some useless foot soldier you scraped off the ground. If they realize I’m here–”

“You lost the war,” he said, hard. “And your comrades are dead. You, Decepticon, are the last of your kind on this planet.” She could just barely make out his optic as he cast her a side glare. “No one is coming for you, no matter who you think you are.”

“Liar.” She hissed the word, but already, Invert’s words were catching up with her: they’re all dead.

“Argue all you want, you can’t deny facts.” And with that he stopped talking to her.

Her grin faded, and instead she focused on trying to access her comms. They were open, but a signal was jamming them–of course the Ark would have a signal jammer. Perhaps Soundwave or his cassettes could get around it, but the average bot would easily be deafened.

She still tried, anyways, casting out a line into the dark, emitting a few beeps, hoping anyone would answer. All that she was met with was silence.

They’re all dead.

That couldn’t be. The Decepticons were too strong, there was no way they’d lose. She’d arrived late, but not late enough that the war was over. That wasn’t possible. For over four million years it had been going, with no end in sight. It couldn’t be over now.

And yet all that spoke to her was silence. Grumbling, Puncture turned and lowered herself to the ground, taking in the empty box that was her cell.

There was a single bench and a recharge slab. That was all. Already, there was someone curled up on the slab, looking over at her. Part of his head was missing, courtesy of Megatron’s fusion cannon, though his destroyed optic somehow still stared out at her.

She tried not to focus on him. Sparkripper and Strutsnapper had haunted her for years before this all, but they were never so brazen. It had to be her brain nearly melting–the two of them were more active than ever now that her defenses had been damaged. Once her mind was properly, fully restored, they’d both vanish again.

‘Clean bill of health my aft…’ she thought to herself.

Something brushed up against her EM field. She jolted at the sudden sensation–no one dared mess with her field, be they Decepticon or Autobot. She kept hers held close, almost entirely cut off from everyone else. To access it would require another to be practically on top of her.

Yet as she checked around, she saw no one close enough for it. The enforcer was her most likely suspect, but the strange force dancing at the edge of her field didn’t feel nearly as big as him.

‘Who’s there?’ she demanded, trying to reach through her field to feel back against whoever was bothering her. At first, nothing.

Then…

‘You’re alive.’

It was a familiar hatred, and she felt her dermas stretching into a grin at the antagonization. The EM field, however, remained foreign.

‘Yeah, I am. Wanna try to change that?’ She challenged, and was met with an immediate flare.

‘Twelve mega-cycles. Twelve mega-cycles, and you’re–’ The other field suddenly pulled away.

She waited for it to return, but it didn’t. Puncture huffed and rolled her optics. It was some Autobot hotshot thinking they were enough to take her down, probably. She’d give them the fight they wanted in time, but first…

First, she had to figure out how to get out of this damned cell. No venom, no claws, one arm, and stasis cuffs weighing her down. Her situation wasn’t looking the best, but she still had one trick she could utilize: her camouflage. It didn’t seem they’d disabled that. All she had to do was wait for a changing of the guard and use it. Then she could take her alt mode and wait for them to open the bars. Once those were gone, she’d creep out.

It was a bare bones plan, but it was better than compliance. She focused her gaze on the guard and away from Sparkripper, who had cocked his draconian head and let his broken jaw hang open.

A new figure appeared from the other side of the cells, approaching the guard. He was white, with a vehicle alt mode and a red crest. She recognized the style immediately: a Prowl. Another one.

She’d seen a few in her time. Prowls were strategists and enforcers, and like how the Decepticons made Seekers by the hundreds, she assumed the Autobots made Prow’s by the hundreds as well.

Or maybe a dozen bots had just decided collectively to adopt the same stupid alt mode and share the same name. Who was she to assume?

Whatever the case, the Prowl at her cell bars wasn’t one she recognized. The differences were minor between this one and the two or three she’d seen in battle, but his star was in a different spot, the horns of his crest were a bit smaller, and his headlights had the wrong shape.

No matter the differences, though, she could guess why he was here.

Her guess was proven when, only moments later, the enforcer turned and deactivated the bars of her cage, turning and pointing his rifle at her.

“Move, Decepticon. You’re wanted in the interrogation room.”

Prowl gave her a look of contempt as she flicked her antenna.

“Color me surprised,” she grumbled.

—-

The interrogation room was a single empty chamber with a table in the middle of it. A screen was on one wall with a window opposite it. A camera hung in one of the corners, trained on the middle of the room.

She was ‘gently persuaded’ into the room, and her single cuff was attached to the table. The Prowl sat opposite of her, retrieving a data pad from his chassis. The enforcer took his position in the corner, rifle at the ready.

“Decepticon,” the Prowl began, tapping on his datapad, “it’s good to see that you’ve made a full recovery. I imagine you know why you’re here.”

She flicked her antenna.

“...As I’m sure you’ve been made aware, your memory was not examined upon your admission to our care. Such would be considered a violation of your rights as a mech. However, I would like to make you aware that we can skip this entire process if you would consent to a mnemosurgery exam. We only want a few things from you. This doesn’t have to take all day.”

“You’re not sticking any needles in my brain, pigatron.”

His doorwing twitched. “So be it. With that said, there are a few things I’d like to ask you about. First things first: why are you here on Earth? This planet is entirely under Autobot control. Your final retreat was ordered six months ago. We gave you time to collect your dead. Why are you here now?”

“Why? Because this planet isn’t yours, Autobot, and you’re a fool to think we’ve lost it.”

“Hm. You’re not in any of our databases. Your preliminary scans revealed that you are an Insecticon. Are you a clone?”

“No. And don’t lump me in with those traitors.”

He raised an optical ridge. “Traitors?”

“Yeah, traitors.”

“Care to elaborate?”

“No.”

“Hm.” He narrowed his optics slightly. “Alright. How did you hide for so long? We scanned the entire planet and picked up no Decepticon life signals.”

“Wouldn’t you like to know, little Autobot?”

“...are there more like you, hiding beneath the Earth? We found your base, the Nemesis. We can use its tracking abilities to locate any others you have remaining on this planet. If you surrender the location of them, we can offer preliminary communication to avoid further conflict. For the safety of your fellow Decepticons–”

“I don’t care about my fellow Decepticons,” she challenged. “And even if I did, I wouldn’t tell you anything.”

The Prowl tapped something down on his datapad. The enforcer in the corner gripped his rifle all the tighter.

“Good to know then, Puncture,” the Prowl said. “If you’re really so keen on resistance, perhaps I can offer you some information that might change your mind.”

Her optics narrowed slightly, antenna pricking at the same time. This whole time, he’d known her name? No, of course he did, he was a Prowl. Prowl’s were strategists, they offered and withheld information as part of their wars.

“I take it from the sudden increase in your spark spinning as well as the flick of your antennae that my offer is of interest to you. Good.” The Prowl crossed his legs. “First and foremost, seeing as you are in no Autobot database, I take it you aren’t nearly up to date with what’s occurred on Earth or Cybertron in the past four million years. You’re in the complete dark, and you’re all alone out here. There is no one coming to save you. Now that you’re in Autobot custody, you’ve lost any and all freedom you could have hoped to have on this planet. You will spend the rest of your days in a cell in a foreign prison until you eventually stand trial for your crimes, after which you will be executed.” He looked up from his datapad with sly eyes. “Just one Autobot fatality carries the death penalty, you know.”

She snarled behind her mask. “So I’ve heard.”

“But I can help alleviate that sentence, if you cooperate with me.” He returned his gaze to the datapad, scrolling through it casually. “Instead of an eternity in a jail cell, waiting for execution, you could become a public servant. Or maybe a prisoner working in the mines, extracting resources. It’s still slag, but better than waiting to die, no?”

She bristled.

“So you have a choice, Puncture. You can resist, rot, and die alone, far from your comrades, your home, and whatever perceived notion of honor you have clouding that half melted helm of yours. Or you can give me a few small answers, and I can see to it that you at least spend the rest of your miserable existence in a yard that lets you see the sun.” He leaned forward. “Your choice.”

Die horribly, or live horribly. There was a bot with his brain in his mouth, staring at her from the corner. Solvent was streaking down his faceplate even as he made no sound.

What a waste, he had been.

“Frag you,” she spat. The honor she had fought so immensely for would not be squandered slaving under the eye of an Autobot. She would rather die.

The Prowl’s optics flickered slightly as he sat back. “Alright then. Don’t cooperate. But that won’t get you out of that chair. Now tell me, Decepticon, what do you know about Sparkeaters?”

She blinked, surprised by the sudden topic change.

“They don’t exist,” she answered. “Are you Autobots deluding yourselves with sparkling tales now?”

“Hm. What of Project Spark Storm do you know, then?”

“What.” Her confusion was genuine.

He sighed and lowered his datapad. “Alright, that’s enough. Take her back to her cell. I’ll see to that mnemosurgery appeal.”

With that he stood and headed for the door. The enforcer moved towards her, rifle trained on her helm. She bristled at him, trying to build up some venom in her dry glands. They ached and clenched, producing nothing.

The door suddenly opened. The Prowl froze, servos still reaching for its touchpad. A blue, red, and white bot was in the doorway–and he was massive. She recognized his double pronged helmet, large blue optics, and blocky shoulders. How couldn’t she? Every Decepticon who had ever lived through sudden Autobot reinforcements would.

“Ultra Magnus!” The Prowl said, surprised. “I wasn’t aware you were on Earth, sir! What are you doing here?”

“Interrogations,” he answered, peering in at Puncture. “Is that the Decepticon you captured?”

“Yes, Puncture the Insecticon. If you’re looking for information, she isn’t particularly cooperative, sir. I would recommend a mnemosurgeon examine her memories.”

“Hm. Maybe. Bring her to the space bridge.”

Prowl’s door wings practically shot up. “What?! But she’s–”

“She’s needed on Cybertron. I’ll take over her interrogations from here. I expect to see you both at the space bridge in twenty kliks.”

And with that he walked away. Another bot passed behind him, also in stasis cuffs. She recognized a familiar gray and black head, awkwardly clashing with the cheerful white, green, and blue palette of its body.

It turned and their optics met. The sensation from before of another brushing against her EM field arose once more, vanishing as the Autobot passed, moved along by another enforcer.

So that was who it was. She rose from her seat without issue and almost took a step forward, but the enforcer stopped her, training his rifle on her helm. She gave him a look, then returned her gaze back to the doorframe where the Prowl stood, still in shock.

Ultra Magnus was here on Earth? He was far too valuable to be reduced to such a base place, let alone be interrogating prisoners. Something didn’t feel right about the entire situation.

And Channel was alive. She was, somehow, riding on the bot Puncture had killed—Uptick, was his name? Perhaps he’d survived too then?

Her dermas curled down. She didn’t like this. The prospect of a rematch was always exciting, but its context was leaving her wary.

They said she was needed on Cybertron. Cybertron was under Decepticon control, it had been for millions of years. When had the Autobots formed a base on it? Invert’s words echoed in her mind again.

They’re all dead.

You lost the war.

No one is coming for you.

Strutsnapper lingered in the corner, the solvent running down his faceplate growing in volume.

#six cycles later #six cycles later: cybertron #my ocs #my writing #tf ocs #transformers oc #AND THUS WE BEGIN

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ask-ikevamp-faust · 9 months ago

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Some time ago I tried a IA that was supposed to roast me (haha) and it told me that I talk to much about you in my personal Twitter account (and is the true). I'm afraid I enjoy too much dissecting you in my own way in my free time. There is a lot I want to write about you but I tend to hold myself or bite my tongue, so is just me alone with my own thoughts.

I've been trying to recall where my fascination with your mythical figure started. I do remember I was about to visit the ranch of my family in the country side so I picked some books in the local library to entertain myself reading and I picked Goethe's "Faust". (Funny is that I also picked a copy of "Twilight" because the lovely girl in the store very enthusiatically recommended the book to me since it was the hot trend at that time. I already new of that book too because my friends love the Vampire genre and wanted to read it but that's another story. Anyway, what I found funny is that I got "Faust" and "Vampires" in the same day, interesting coincidence.)

I did read Faust first because it was my priority. I still think that Mephistopheles is my favorite character of that play, I find he was so delightful, he still gimme a good time because all the things he says. There is a lot of key scenes a love about the play, like when Faust creates a homunculous, when they visit the witch that will make Faust younger, all the drama when Faust wants to romance Margaret.

Some years later, there was a movie called "Faust" by Aleksandr Sokurov. Already knew about Sokurov because he was the one who filmed "Russian Ark". This Faust took some creative freedom and is a bit different from Goethe's version, but it was also very visually interesting in how the takes are deformed with a fisheye lend and some of the symbolism (Faust and Margaret literally drowning in pleasure and sin IIRC).

And I think one of my favorites so far is the classic "Faust" from Murnau. I was quite surprised because the movie is so well done and has incredible special effects for the era it was done, I love and miss when cinema was this level of creative, now everything is done with computers and graphics that makes things a lot more easy, but don't have the same flavor.

But I wonder how do you feel about all this fictional depictions of you since they are very different from the Johann I know. I'm still craving to learn about new undiscovered versions of you, but I also want to learn more about you in specific.

BTW, I was the one who wrote to the blog asking about what it was allowed or not about NSFW interactions and just asking questions because I'm not really familiar with roleplaying. I just thought it would be ok to say it since I feel like I'm already like three different people in your ask box, but now I'm only two (haha).

– @crowmero

I apologize for the long wait 🙂‍↕️ Thank you for your patience 💖

I’m not sure I completely understand what “roast” means. Charles explained it to me but it wasn’t very helpful. However, I do know what AI is, I have not used it very much myself; apparently it’s “the future”. While technology is useful I’m not sure it will ever completely replace real people, but who knows, I suppose it is a possibility. Anyway, I’m getting off topic… You say this AI said you talk about me too much and you admit that it’s true? How interesting, I’m flattered I occupy so much of your mind. There’s no better compliment than someone wanting to dissect me, please continue to do so. I see you have written much about me here already, if you’d like to continue sharing all your thoughts, don’t hesitate to come by and tell me.

Ahh this is how you came to know my name, what an amusing introduction story. I’ve heard about these shiny vampires, they may be the most odd depiction of vampires I've seen; quite the coincidence you ended up with both. Since Mephistopheles is your favorite character here and you happen to enjoy his lines, quote 3 of your favorite lines from him.

Both of these films sound both interesting and entertaining. They seem to do well in showing how you can take the same character and present them differently depending on the creative goals.

Actually, I haven’t interacted very much with the fictional depictions of myself. I’ve only heard whispers here and there whenever I go out. They all sound rather interesting, it wouldn’t be a bad idea to learn about them, maybe I’ll try it out sometime. I’ll use the ones you mentioned as starters, if you enjoyed them then they shouldn’t be bad. You’re always welcome to learn more about me, whether it’s myself or a different fictional depiction.

🌙 - Ohhh it was you?? Of course it’s okay! Thanks again for asking 😄 I was able to make more specific rules. I didn’t put any role-playing examples in the rules, I had some but didn’t add them since if anyone wanted to role-play that content, they would need to talk to me in the first place. I felt I could get more specific in DMs if needed. If you have more questions about it you can always DM me 😊

@crowmero

#ikemen rp #ikevamp rp #ikemen vampire rp #ikemen role play #ikevamp faust #ikemen vampire #FaustAnswers

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forter-from-meteos · 1 year ago

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What is this silly meteos stuff

oh! ohohoho

I took a quick peek at your blog because of the thirnova icon, and love the theming you've got, but i didn't see any meteos posts (which is fine) so I'm gonna give the full rundown 👍

lemme just start by dropping a few links: Miraheze Meteos Wiki - Meteos Wikipedia Page - if you want comprehensive, objective stuff

Alright! Now time for the Cliffnotes version of that stuff, plus my own subjective info

Meteos is a game series consisting of Meteos (2005) for the DS, Meteos Wars (2008) for the Xbox Live Arcade (Xbox 360 online store), and some other titles that I'm not knowledgeable on, like the now defunct Meteos Online and Meteos: Disney Magic (which is just funny to me)

The very basic plot is: The planet Meteo is sending out streams of destructive matter called meteos, which is threatening to destroy all the planets in the universe. The various alien civilizations discovered that when the meteos group in a certain way, they change direction, and launch the meteos falling from the sky back out into space. Now they're fighting back against the meteos, and one of the civilizations has created the Metamo Ark, a spaceship made of meteo ore, to sail to Meteo and defeat it. There's some details I'm leaving out, but this isn't an award-winningly deep plot we've got here.

Actual gameplay is essentially just a match-3 game, but with a twist: meteos (matchable blocks) fall from above, and by moving them through the columns, you match them, and they launch upwards. The real kicker is the many different planets with different mechanics. For example, Forte (the home of my namesake) has a playfield 9 columns wide, has relatively low gravity (stacks fall back down slower) low-ish horizontal launch power (matches where the blocks are next to each other instead of above/below) but very high vertical launch power. And now that I'm typing this, I realize that I'm just saying words, so, uh, I'm just gonna drop another link to this playlist of gameplay samples for every planet in the original Meteos DS. The uploader is playing pretty fast, but it should give a basic idea.

Anyways, subjective opinion time. First of all, the gameplay is simple, but it's really good. Second of all, the art and general visual design is just, also really good. This post is already on the bulkier side, so look through the miraheze wiki if you want some images. I just, I just like it a lot, especially the aliens. They're all just color, no shading, just flat shapes, and the lore is bare-bones, but what's there is so nice and creative! It's beauty in simplicity, and it's a perfect little base to build off of!

Ok, but how could I play it? Well, the roms for both Meteos DS and Meteos Wars are easy to find, and the emulators DesMuMe and xenia are too! The company that made Meteos is defunct now (sad), so I don't think supporting the devs is something you can really do here, but if you really wanna play legit (or if your computer can't handle Xbox 360 emulation, like mine) and you have the consoles, then Meteos Wars is still available for purchase from the XBLA, and there's copies of Meteos DS still floating around on online marketplaces.

In summary, Meteos is a simple but good game (series) with very nice visual design, with easily available roms. If you're thinking about playing it, do. Please. /lh

#meteos #ask

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chroniclesoftheinterregnum · 1 year ago

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The Ark

During the century-long Succession War, many wondered why the Arcadian Empire was fighting so hard, despite their technological inferiority to the Empire of Graal Santel.

All of it was to buy time for Arcadia's last possible resort: The Ark.

Soon after the war began, the Arcadian Empire realized that they had little chance of defeating the servants of the Machine Gods.

In order to preserve a future for a free humanity, the Arcadians decided to take the biggest gamble ever made by humanity. They took everything they had, and put it all on Epsilon Eridani.

Oberland Points had rendered human exploration of Sol's neighbors moot, as there was plenty of room in the Cluster without having to resort to "conventional" interstellar travel. Now, however, the RulerMINDs were bound to achieve total control over the Cluster, and so a plan was made to leave Sol via slower-than-light travel, developed in total secrecy.

Two years to accelerate to 20% of the speed of light. Two years to decelerate by the same amount. Fifty years in between, traveling faster and farther than anyone in history had gone before.

The Imperial Archives were a critical part of humanity's continued technological development, and while it was not possible to remove the sheer amount of data stored within the massive vaults of computers, it was possible, in theory, to move the Library itself.

And so, over the course of the first fifty years of the Succession War, the Ark was developed and built: the largest and most massive spaceship ever built, and a one-way ticket to another star system.

The information war to conceal the true location of the Archives was nearly as complicated as the project toe build the Ark itself, involving the leaking of a secret second destination out of the Sol Oberland point, where no ships had ever returned.

Chances of success were as slim as they ever had been, but humanity needed more time if they wanted to ever be able to fight back. Epsilon Eridani would grant them that.

#sci fi #science fiction #hard sci fi #hard science fiction #worldbuilding #writing #spaceship

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spermarket · 3 months ago

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North America Cyber Security Market Share, Demand, Revenue, Growth and Future Business Opportunities till 2034: SPER Market Research

Cybersecurity is the process of protecting systems, networks, and programs from digital threats. These assaults are typically designed to gain access to, edit, or delete sensitive information; take money from victims via ransomware; or disrupt normal business operations. A comprehensive cybersecurity plan has numerous layers of protection spanning throughout the systems, networks, applications, and data that must be safeguarded. It involves a range of measures, such as firewalls, encryption, authentication processes, and threat detection systems, to protect sensitive data and keep technological infrastructures secure. Cybersecurity is also required to ensure compliance with data protection legislation such as GDPR and CCPA. Individuals and businesses can avoid risks and retain trust in the digital age by expanding their knowledge and adopting proactive steps.

According to SPER Market Research, ‘North America Cyber Security Market Size- By Product Type, By Deployment, By End User- Regional Outlook, Competitive Strategies and Segment Forecast to 2034’ states that the North America Cyber Security Market is estimated to reach USD 195.31 Billion by 2034 with a CAGR of 8.9%.

Several significant aspects contribute to the North American cybersecurity market's growth. First, the growing frequency and sophistication of cyberattacks, such as ransomware, data breaches, and phishing, has increased the demand for strong security solutions. As organizations and governments emphasize the protection of sensitive data, the need for advanced cybersecurity technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) has increased. Furthermore, the expansion of remote labor and digital transformation projects has increased the attack surface, resulting in new risks necessitating comprehensive cybersecurity solutions. Regulatory frameworks such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA) have also imposed greater compliance requirements, forcing businesses to invest in stronger security methods.

Request a Free Sample Report: https://www.sperresearch.com/report-store/north-america-cyber-security-market.aspx?sample=1

Despite its tremendous growth, the North American cybersecurity market confronts significant hurdles. One of the most significant challenges is the evolving and increasingly complicated nature of cyber-attacks, which makes it difficult for enterprises to remain ahead of hackers. As attackers use new approaches such as artificial intelligence and machine learning, cybersecurity professionals must constantly adapt and innovate, which can be resource intensive. Another key difficulty is a shortage of skilled cybersecurity personnel, which creates a talent gap that makes it difficult for firms to implement and manage effective security policies. Furthermore, the integration of many technologies, such as cloud computing, IoT, and artificial intelligence, has added new entry points for possible cyberattacks, complicating the security environment.

The US dominates the North American cybersecurity market, owing to considerable expenditures in advanced technology, strong regulatory frameworks, and high adoption rates of new security solutions among organizations. Some of the key players are - Cisco Systems Inc., Cyber Ark Software Ltd., Dell Technologies Inc., FireEye Inc., Fortinet Inc., IBM Corporation, Imperva Inc.

For More Information, refer to below link: –

North America Cyber Security Market Growth

Related Reports:

Software-Defined Data Center Market Growth, Size, Trends Analysis - By Solution, By Organization Size, By End-User - Regional Outlook, Competitive Strategies and Segment Forecast to 2034

Video Surveillance Market Growth, Size, Trends Analysis – By Component, By Vertical, By System - Regional Outlook, Competitive Strategies and Segment Forecast to 2034

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Sara Lopes, Business Consultant — USA

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monsterboysrp · 1 year ago

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headcanon//Vault 39

(or: how I rationalize A/O dynamics in the world of Fallout)

Vault 39 focused on the viability of a small breeding population if certain edits were made to the human genome: 25 scientists, 500 unmarried young civilians, 200 robots and a veritable Ark of animal genetic material were sealed into the Vault in the year 2075 upon the Vault's completion. In public releases, the Vault was advertised as using cutting-edge tech and genetic engineering to find new methods of battling infertility, since the falling birth rate was a concern for the government (as it certainly wasn't related to the collapsing economy and pollution…).

The door sealed on October 23, 2077, and after two years living fairly normal lives within the Vault, the residents suddenly found themselves confined to their individual rooms. The real experiment was then implemented.

Vault 39's records were never transmitted to the Vault-Tec central computer memory, so much of what occurred in the next 200 years was lost, but what remains details the robots taking over for the scientists as they died off one by one from old age. From there, the experiment really took off, and while the end goal wasn't exactly what Vault-Tec had intended, the robots had a singular goal which they did attain.

They wanted a genome which could successfully reproduce itself in the harshest environments, survive the worst radiation without damage, and produce strong offspring that could rebuild the world from the ashes. They singled out and spliced in genes from the world's most successful lineages, and what resulted was a new breed of human.

When the first generation of these new humans reached sexual maturity, the resulting bloodbath left none other alive. The robots had classified them by the batch numbers of the genetic 'cocktails', and it was only two -- Batch Alpha, and Batch Omega, the first and last creations of the series -- which survived. Anyone who stood between an Alpha and their intended Omega -- or an Omega and their intended Alpha -- was either killed or turned, because the original retrovirus which introduced their genetic alterations was carried in their saliva, and their predilection for biting during mating passed it to those who hadn't been altered.

For 150 years these new humans remained safely trapped in their Vault, breeding, raising offspring, breeding some more. From a batch of thirty Alphas and one hundred Omegas, the population of the vault exploded to over a thousand, and eventually, the supplies began running out. First the water system, because Vault-Tec never built a Vault whose water system could survive any amount of strain, then the hydroponic gardens and stored prewar food simply couldn't meet the demands of so many mouths to feed. Finally, someone found the Overseer's access codes, and one fateful day, the door rolled open, disgorging a new genome on an unsuspecting wasteland.

#v:fallout #headcanon

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arkdental · 2 years ago

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Ark Dental Clinic is committed to providing each patient with individualized care and treatment to resolve their condition's underlying causes. Our dental clinic has cutting-edge technology, including computer-aided design (CAD) and manufacturing (CAM), as well as radiography (XRaY) of the entire mouth and a high-tech laboratory.

#Best Dental Clinic Near Me

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not-that-dillinger · 1 year ago

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"Most of it eventually just becomes second nature from constant exposure, and you forgot you ever had to learn it," Ed responded. "But none of us can keep track of everything. But that's what books and journals are for."

Ed paused, then picked a medium sized paperback book off the shelf titled A Guide for Keeping and Caring for the Domesticated Pigeon. "Books like this, anyway. Some are meant to be informational, some are stories meant to entertain. And nowadays, most information can be found on the internet--on archives stored on a network of computers... though you gotta be careful because there's a lot of misinformation out there too."

Clacks and Dwar Ev made short work of the fruit in Ark's hand. They perched on Ark's hand for a little longer for scritches, cooing contentedly. Eventually, Dwar Ev hopped and fluttered back into the cage, and Clacks was soon to follow.

((This is a companion piece to this thread.))

[Side B: Rescue]

Haste was the word of the cycle and Ark moved quicker than ever.

Her and her lightcycle flew across the Outlands and straight for Tron City, making up for the time she had lost while she was out.

As she traveled, deep underneath the surface of the Outlands, one Gridbug, out of many, became poisoned for no discernable reason.

Ark knew where the Occupation had most likely taken Ed, and the increased guards around the building confirmed her suspicions.

She remained stealthy as long as possible, revealing herself only when she could sneak no further.

Ark fought her way through the building, alarms blaring as she took on multiple Sentries at a time. The narrow hallways worked in her favor, as only a few Sentries could approach her at a time, so she was never outnumbered in a way she couldn't handle.

It took all of Ed's will not to shrink back from Clu as the guards brought him to the tyrant.

Clu grinned like a Cheshire cat. Whatever he had planned for Ed, it was certainly much worse than what he had just been through. It looked like Clu wanted to say something. Probably to intimidate Ed, play with him before doing... whatever.

Ed had plenty of experience of taking control of situations. He also knew how to be a menace.

Beat Clu to the punch. Hit him where it hurt.

Ed opened his mouth, but before either of them could say anything, the sound of fighting came from the hallway.

Ark?

Ed had no idea if it was her or not, but if there was fighting coming this way, it was likely they were coming for him. At the very least, fighting meant they were against the occupation, and thus a potential ally.

Ed twisted sharply, then dropping down to break free of his captors. He backed away, and pulled off one of his boots. It was hefty; much heavier than his loafers.

Ed chucked it, then the other, at Clu.

Without waiting to see if either hit their mark, Ed turned and ran.

Behind him, there was the heavy thud of one of the boots hitting the ground, and an angered, pained roar from Clu. He approached the fight as cautiously as possible, while also not loosing speed. (The guard or Clu catching hi would not end well, an he most certainly would not get another chance to escape.)

He sighed with relief when he recognized Ark's lightcycle.

#rp #muse: ed dillinger jr #rp-028 #computerwarrior

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pixelgrotto · 4 years ago

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The good and bad of the fourth Indy

When it comes to classic point 'n click adventure games, there are two companies that dominated the '90s - Sierra and LucasArts. Between these two, I've always been a dedicated Sierra dude. I've written here at length about some of my favorites like the Quest for Glory and Gabriel Knight series, and while detractors of Sierra's output have valid points (deaths and dead ends in their games were far too prevalent), I've always just found their titles more gripping than LucasArts' output.

That said, there certainly are LucasArts adventures that loom large in my mind. The Monkey Island games are good examples (especially the first one) and Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis is another. When I was growing up, I had a definite fascination with the latter, finding it thrilling that Indiana's fabled fourth outing had been visualized in computer game format - and as a point 'n click adventure, no less! LucasArts put out an advertorial magazine around this time called The Adventurer, and I remember poring over Fate of Atlantis screenshots as a kid, really wanting to experience the quest of Indy and Sophia Hapgood.

I didn't end up playing Fate of Atlantis as a child, probably because I never saw it in stores and the one LucasArts Archives collection I got my dad to buy me didn't have the game inside. (It was Archive Vol. III, for those in the know.) So I think the first time I experienced it was in high school on some Abandonware site. I liked it, though I did find the game a smidgeon overrated at the end of the day, possibly because I also played Gabriel Knight: Sins of the Fathers for the first time around then and was blown away in comparison.

Flash forward to 2021, and for some reason I was hit with the urge to play Fate of Atlantis again. To make the experience more fun, I decided to order the Dark Horse Comics tie-in series on eBay, which took the general ideas from the game's script and divided them up into four issues. Overall, I enjoyed both the game and the comic, though once again, there's that slight feeling of "hmmm, a tad overrated" that came into my head once I was done.

There's a lot that Fate of Atlantis does well. The story's kind of a retread of Raiders of the Lost Ark (and even ends in the same way with Nazis transforming into hideous creatures), but it's an interesting enough dive into the lore of the lost city as established by Plato. The soundtrack, delivered by LucasArt's immersive iMuse sound system (which synchronized music to whatever was happening on screen) is full of catchy themes, and I'm listening to it as I write this. The puzzles mostly make sense in the beginning, though halfway through they start to reach the typical ‘90s status of "wow, how the heck could you figure this out without a hint book?”

Fate of Atlantis' strongest point is definitely its replay value. There are three routes through the game - the Team Path, the Wits Path and the Fists Path. The Team Path has Indy and Sophia travelling together to find Atlantis, the Wits Path has Indy going it alone but relying on his noggin for harder puzzles, and the Fists Path is the so-called "action" one, where Indy gets to punch Nazis in the face. When I first played Fate of Atlantis all those years ago, I chose the Team Path, since it seems like the sensible one with the love interest and all that. This time, I chose the Fists Path, since I wanted to bash stuff. The amount of new scenes that I saw were impressive, including a desert camel trek and an arcade-style hot air balloon sequence that I don't recall experiencing the first time around. The combat, a carryover from LucasArts' adaptation of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, was a mess of endless clicking on bad guys, but the sheer amount of replayability evident in the game was great. Maybe in another couple of years I'll try the Wits path!

There were definite foibles that ground my gears, though. Chief among them was a general lack of urgency, despite the fact that Indy and Sophia are supposed to be racing the Nazis against the clock. It's funny to point this out, because unlike other LucasArts games, which had a famous "you can't die" policy, Indy actually can bite the dust here. But despite this fact, there are so many instances in Fate of Atlantis where Indy can walk into a Nazi about to kill him, go "Whoops, made a wrong turn," and gently walk away without his foe even bothering to pursue. There's also a section of the game in Monte Carlo where you're supposed to find a certain person, and all you need to do is study the patterns of the three or so NPCs that wander back and forth around the screen (without ever stopping) and click on the right one. I know this is all part of LucasArts' style of making their adventure games kind on the player, but it always struck me that everything in Fate of Atlantis was gently waiting for me to choose the right option rather than dynamically reacting to my actions. I guess I like my adventure games with a bit more edge, or maybe I just noticed this dissonance more with a property like Indiana Jones - where danger’s supposed to be prevalent - as opposed to a comedic franchise like Monkey Island. Nevertheless, I still feel like there's a middle ground between this hand holding and the blunt deaths that always occurred in Sierra games.

I was also surprised by how much the game drags once you've actually reached Atlantis. I didn't remember the finale from my first playthrough at all, possibly because Atlantis is one giant maze full of doodads that you need to collect in order to operate ancient robots and solve obtuse headscratchers. (Here's where I truly began to feel the need for a hint book.) And once you're out of the first maze and uncover a hidden underground layer of the city, you're immediately presented with a SECOND maze which relies upon navigating through a series of archways and is totally randomized each playthrough, with Indy forced to start from the beginning if you mess up. Arghhh, now that's some wacky '90s adventure game design for ya!

Most of all, though...I forgot how much of a terrible sidekick Sophia Hapgood is. She barely does anything for the entirety of the game! I think the Team Path treats her better than the Fists Path, obviously, but even in that one she ends up getting kidnapped at the end and doesn't assist much with the puzzles except for a small handful of instances where you can control her. Sophia's definitely supposed to be more like Raiders' Marion Ravenwood than Temple of Doom's Willie Scott, but unfortunately she comes across as the latter more than the former, and in the context of an adventure game, she's treated like a walking, talking inventory object. Not that Indiana Jones movies have necessarily excelled with their female characters (there was a creepy detail that emerged a while back about how the original script for Raiders indicated that a 15-year-old Marion had an affair with a 27-year-old Indy), but Sophia's not really a love interest, aside from two quick smooches near the end of the game. She's just...there, kinda doing nothing aside from occasionally calling Indy a bozo.

The comic version of Fate of Atlantis fixes this, making her far more interesting. The comic's pretty solid, I will say, and amps up the urgency of the story by tossing the puzzles out the window. But while reading it and ruminating on the fact that this was first time I'd consumed so much Indiana Jones content in over a decade, I found myself guffawing as I realized that Dr. Jones is truly a TERRIBLE archeologist. I mean, what a looter this dude is, and at least Lara Coft is actually honest about being a Tomb Raider! Hah, I guess this is common knowledge amongst real archeologists or folks who watched the movies as adults, but as someone whose biggest Indy memories come from childhood, it was an eye-opener to see him crap on an ancient civilization by calling the construction of Atlantis "primitive.” It kind of makes me a little reluctant to go back and watch the films. I already knew that Temple of Doom was full of bad Indian stereotypes, but now I know for sure that Dr. Jones hasn't aged all that well for my 2021 sensibilities!

All that aside, I am glad I played through Fate of Atlantis again, even if I don't consider it to be the adventure game pinnacle. It's a well-made translation of the pulp vibe that the Indy movies were meant to evoke, and the replay value is truly something special. I do wonder, though, what Sierra could've done if they'd gotten their mitts on the Indy license. I know, I know... There probably would've been deaths aplenty, including a death where you click the whip on Indy and he uses it to accidentally lash himself into an early grave. I can dream!

#pixel grotto #favorites #indiana jones and the fate of atlantis #fate of atlantis #indiana jones #lucasarts

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autisticshadowthehedgehog · 4 months ago

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A Cluster of Burning Stars - Chapter Seven

in which flowers fade

{ao3} {tumblr}

When they landed back at Tails’s station, Sonic wasted no time. He leapt off the wings, tapping his foot impatiently as the others got out of the plane, and then raced inside, running for the computer. To Tails’s surprise, Sonic seemed to know his way around that system much more than he’d expected, as he began flipping windows, pulling up maps and charts.

“Whoa, whoa! I’ve got that stuff organized, you know!” Tails cried.

Sonic turned, slamming his hand on the keyboard. “We need to stop Shadow. Now.”

“What? You ran into Shadow?” Knuckles asked, holding up his hands.

Sonic bristled. “He’s going to blow up the planet.”

Tails and Knuckles stared at him for a beat. And then Tails screeched, “He’s what?” at the same time Knuckles shouted, “The hell are you talking about?”

“Tails. Have you got anything on the ARK on this computer?”

“Not much.” Tails admitted. “Why–”

Sonic swiped through windows until he found an old, black-and-white photo of the ARK, pulled from GUN’s files. He maximized it, and then gestured behind him.

“This,” he said, “Was supposed to be a weapons research facility. GUN wanted the most deadly weapons ever created developed right here.” He jammed his finger so hard at the screen, he almost cracked it. “The Professor didn’t want to, but he did. For our protection, he made it almost impossible to use. But it was called the Eclipse Cannon.”

The memory darted across his mind. The little hedgehogs, peering over the railing that was taller than them. Amy held tight to Maria’s hand, as the Professor told them, very carefully, that they were to never ever come here without permission. But, if something big was going to come near the Earth, like a meteor or something…

“It’s powered by chaos energy. You’d need all seven chaos emeralds to charge it to a full-enough power, but even just five could blow a comet to molecules.” Sonic said, his face darkening. “The Professor thought of it as a joke. That GUN wanted him to make the ultimate weapon, but if they actually turned it on, they’d find out it wouldn’t be able to do anything less than decimate the entire planet.”

“When you say ‘decimate,’” Tails began, “Do you mean–”

“I don’t mean ‘big explosion,’ ‘toxic air,’ or even ‘we all die and evolution starts from scratch.’” Sonic hissed. “I mean, ‘the planet goes bye-bye.’ Like it never existed. The debris might blow anything nearby as well, if the initial blast even leaves debris. It might just disintegrate everything it touches in an instant.”

“That’s what Robotnik’s plan is?”

“It’s what Shadow’s going to do, whether your Doctor lets him or not.” Sonic shuddered, and then hugged himself. “We only have two ways to stop him. We keep the emeralds away from him, and we keep me away from him.”

“You?”

“He won’t kill me. But if he gets his hands on me, he can teleport me to the ARK.” Sonic hugged himself. “In the same vein, we need to find Amy as soon as possible. First to protect her from the same problem, second because if he gets her to listen to his insanity, we’re completely and utterly fucked.”

“We have a chaos emerald,” Tails said, pulling the purple gem from his tail fluff. “I can use this to track the last remaining one, and maybe it can help with finding the other pod.”

“Then we’re going to have to work fast. Luckily,” Sonic finally let a smile slip onto his face, “Fast is what I do best.”

Tails considered a few moments, before turning to the echidna beside him. “Okay, Knuckles, I’m going to need to run about three or four projects at once. It’s gonna take a lot of power.”

“So use the chaos emerald? I don’t see why you’re telling me.”

“That’s not the problem, the problem is I’m going to need you to grab some supplies from town. I’ll make you a list, just give it to the hardware store guy and he’ll get you the right stuff. There’s a ring pouch by the door, use as much as you need.”

“Okay.”

“And I’m gonna need you to take Sonic.”

Knuckles blinked, and then glanced back at the hedgehog. He had stopped paying attention, instead furiously scouring over one of the maps on the monitor. “Uh, really?”

“With so many systems running at once, I don’t want to risk him running into anything he shouldn’t. You know how explosive my stuff can be. Also, I’m pretty sure he needs to eat something.”

“So do you.”

“I have food here!”

“Other than mints.” Knuckles sighed, and crossed his arms. “He might be able to help, you know, with tracking the–”

Before he could finish, Sonic kicked his leg up, accidentally knocking it into the rolling chair. He hissed, stepping back, and slammed a hand onto the desk behind him. The hand, which suddenly lit with chaos energy, burned a deep dent into the metal.

“Shit.” Sonic hissed, stepping back. “That wasn’t important, was it?”

Knuckles stared at him, and then said, “I see your point.”

---

Sonic slid down the hall, giggling at the squeak his shoes made against the hard metal. He looked up just as he turned the bend, seeing two of the doctors standing outside the door, talking with a disgruntled little boy.

“Abe!” Sonic raced forwards, grabbing onto the kid’s hand, ignoring how he immediately stiffened. “What’s buzzin’, cousin?”

He yanked his arm out of Sonic’s grip. “Not now, blue.”

Abe was the only other kid on the ARK, at least currently; his parents liked for him to spend summers on Earth with his grandparents so that he “knew what life was supposed to be like” or some corny shit like that. Both of his parents were scientists who worked in bio-engineering, so Sonic saw both of them a whole lot, and as a consequence, started hanging out with Abe once he was let upstairs. Okay, well, he hung out with Abe mainly when Maria was there; Abe didn’t seem to like him or Shadow very much. Amy, though… it was hard to not get along with her, so that didn’t really count.

“Hi, Sonic!” Dr Jezek beamed down at him. “Abraham, be nice.”

Abe huffed, while Sonic started hopping between his feet. “How’s Mari-ri doing?”

“She’s alright. Shadow’s in there with her.” Nurse Sherazi informed him. “It was a long surgery, so if she’s asleep, don’t wake her up.”

“But she’s okay now?”

“Well…” the doctors shared an awkward glance, before Dr Jezek said, “She’s stable for now.”

Sonic recognized that look. So in a flash, he ran between the doctors, grabbing both their hands. “We should have a party! We got some new records from Earth, and Maria’s been teaching me some stuff on the guitar, I can really shred it!” He paused, and then emphasized, “I can literally shred it. I broke her strings once.”

“Oh!” Dr Jezek smiled at the thought. “Then you’d better be careful with it.”

“Yeah. I tried to make my own, but I just got myself tangled up in the strings. And when Shads and Amy had to yank me out, the strings just kept playing! Super out-of-tune, though.”

The doctors laughed, while Abe scowled. “That’s so not how guitars work. The sound doesn’t come from the strings themselves, it comes from–”

“And we’ll make a cake!” Sonic jumped up, suddenly atop Nurse Sherazi’s shoulders, waving his palms wildly. The Nurse reached up his own hands quickly to grab his feet and stabilize him. “We can shove all of our food packs into one big bowl and dump a whole lotta sugar in there, and BOOM! We’ll have some kinda cake! It might even be edible, too!”

“Now, Sonic,” Dr Jezek reached up, pulling him off of the Nurse’s shoulders and matching his grinning face. “Do you think that would be a good use of resources?”

“I think it’d be an experiment! Aren’t you all supposed to be scientists? Come on, let’s see what happens!”

Dr Jezek laughed, before placing Sonic carefully on the ground. “We’ll think about it, Sonic.” But her and Nurse Sherazi both looked happier, so Sonic considered his work done.

“Well, I should check on Mari-ri. See ya later, alligators!”

The adults waved cheerily at him as he dashed through the door, while Abe just rolled his eyes.

Once inside, Sonic slowed his feet, quieting down for a second just in case. But Maria was sitting up in her hospital bed, a notebook splayed on her lap, and Shadow passed out under her left arm. She smiled brightly and waved to Sonic, who dashed over and stood on the bedside chair.

“What’s the story, morning glory?”

Maria shrugged, then put a finger to her mouth. “Shadow’s still sleeping.”

“Probably not for long. I share a room with him, that guy hears everything.”

“Yes, but I think he’s reached the N3 stage, so he should be deep asleep; so long as we’re not too loud, he should get his rest.”

“And he needs it. I swear, he’s up all night punching bags and reading boring books.”

“I thought you liked reading,” Maria sounded mock-offended.

“When it’s interesting.” Sonic took the chance to look over Maria; her skin was a bit paler than normal, and her hair a little greasy, but she didn’t look about to keel over and die, so he considered that a win. “What’re you doing?”

“Nothing much.” Maria glared down at the empty notebook. “I thought I might sketch, but I already drew everything in the room.”

Sonic glanced at the nightstand, his eyes landing on something he hadn’t seen there before. He reached for the small vase of yellow flowers, waving it in the air. “Even this?”

Maria laughed a little. “Yes. The doctors said that Amy brought those last night, while I was still passed out.”

“She always knows how to brighten up the place.” Sonic smiled. When he lowered the flowers, though, his face fell. “Oh, they’re already wilting!”

“It’s alright. I’ll be out of here by the end of the week.”

“I’m sure she worked hard to pick the best ones for you out of the greenhouse, though.” Sonic said sadly, poking at the petals. “And they’re already dying.”

“Technically,” Maria said, “The flowers are dead once you’ve plucked them from the–” he turned to her with his large, sad eyes, and she redirected. “Hey, come here a sec.”

She held out her free hand, and he scrambled to her side, pressing against her chest and finding comfort in the steady beat beneath his ears. She wrapped her arm around him, her hand landing on the vase still in his hands.

“Flowers don’t last very long,” she said carefully. “Even on Earth, a lot of them only bloom for a week or two, before sending off their seeds and wilting.”

“That’s sad.”

“Kinda.” she shrugged. “But I don’t think the flowers think that way. It’s a normal lifespan to them.”

“We’re sad when people die, though.” Sonic said. “Do you think the flowers’ friends miss them?”

Shadow would probably tell him to stop being so stupid and remember that plants couldn’t think. Maria, though, she considered for a long moment, before saying, “I mean. Everything ends eventually. Every story comes to a close. And everything alive has to die sometime.” She reached up a finger, poking at the petals. “That’s why we gotta live life to the fullest in the time we have. At least, that’s what I figure.”

She lowered her hand, grabbing onto Sonic’s lower arm. He cuddled closer to her, humming a little.

“Do you know which flower this is?”

Sonic glanced at it. He and Amy were both good at remembering Earth flora. “That’s a marigold, right?”

She nodded. “They’re specifically Lemon Drop blossoms. Tagetes patula. Now, they’re not the right kind of marigolds– those would be tagetes erecta– but marigolds always remind me of my Tía Therese. Did you ever see pictures of her?” he shook his head. “She’s my mom’s sister. When I was still on Earth, we would visit her every Día de los Muertos. She had a beautiful garden, but she’d have me help her pick bright orange-and-yellow marigolds. She told me that the smell and the color help the spirits of those who’ve passed on to find their way home. So that they might be able to visit us while we were remembering them. I’d throw flowers everywhere, and my parents would help her in the kitchen making so much food, and when it was time for music, her roommate would play so fast on the violin I thought it might catch on fire.”

“I wanna do that.” Sonic said, eyes wide.

Maria giggled. “I’m sure you could.” Then her face fell slightly, as she ran her hand over the marigold’s browning petals. “I don’t remember any of the songs, though. I remember how happy I felt while dancing. But not what I danced to. I can’t remember her roommate’s name, or the street where they lived.” She shut her eyes tight. “And I’ve tried to keep up with learning español, cause she tried to teach me, but I only remember a few words. And when I try to learn from books, I’m never sure if I’m pronouncing anything right.”

“Maybe I could help.” Sonic looked up at her, nuzzling his head into her shoulder. “I can do it with you. Then we can say it together.”

She snorted. “I don’t think you could pronounce it any better.”

“Well, there’s gotta be some scientists up here who speak it. And if not, we’ll just be wrong together.”

She smiled. “I’ll give you a beginner’s book. And then we’ll see how you do.”

She picked up the vase, lifting it to put back on the nightstand. One of the flowers dropped, brushing against Shadow’s nose. Both of the other children paused, watching to see if he’d wake. His nose twitched once. Twice. And then he let out a tiny, cute sneeze, before falling back to sleep.

Maria and Sonic had to bury their faces in pillows to keep from waking him with laughter.

---

Deep breaths, Sonic. One, two.

Knuckles had told him that he’d need to wash up before they went to get supplies. Sonic didn’t see what the issue was; they were in a hurry, nobody could blame them if they looked a little rough. But the echidna had simply said, “You haven’t had a bath in fifty years. Get that done first.”

Sonic had liked baths decently on the ARK, but when he first looked at the tub in Tails’s bathroom, it was like he couldn’t even see it. He just saw the water test crate, and so he rushed for the enclosed shower stall instead. He had to stand there for several minutes, preparing, before turning it on, and then realizing that all the bath care supplies were much different than what he was used to. The basket inside the stall held shampoo and conditioner meant for long fur, brushes that were definitely not intended for quills, and soap he wasn’t sure how to use. But, well, the ARK had entirely human-centric supplies, with the exception of the brushes Maria had requested for them, so he could probably make it work.

After struggling for a while, he shut off the shower and shook the water off his fur, rather than bother Tails for one of his towels. He wasn’t sure he’d improved, but maybe at least Knuckles would get off his back and they could do something useful.

He stumbled out into the bathroom, avoiding looking at the tub and instead staring at himself in the mirror. God, his muzzle was redder than normal. Was it because he’d been crying? He probably shouldn’t have been doing that. He was supposed to be stronger than that. Be a little soldier, Sonic, he remembered one of the doctors saying to him once. You can do that.

Okay. I can do that.

After drying his hands a bit more, he slid his gloves back on, before running a finger over his wrist. He had a distant memory of the first year the array had been together, when he’d made paper rings to match his friends’ thick golden ones. They’d broken a few hours after he started wearing them.

He spun on his heel and marched to the bathroom door, opening it to grab the shoes he’d left on the floor outside. Strangely, though, there was only a new pair of socks in their place. He stared for a second, before slipping them on and zooming down the stairs as quickly as he could.

Wooden stairs were weird. They made noises the metal ones on the ARK hadn’t.

When he reached the lower level, he opened the door and immediately said, “Where are my shoes?”

Knuckles was sitting in front of the door, arms crossed and eyes closed. Meditating, maybe? But he didn’t even react to Sonic’s arrival, or the slightly panicked rise in his voice. Tails, meanwhile, had one tail wrapped around some kind of metallic tool, which he was using to poke at a bench, as he kept his eyes on rushing lines of code on the computers before him.

“Oh, they’re under the bench.” Tails gestured to the left.

“Why?” Sonic asked, dashing to said bench, ducking under the automatic tools that were whirring with some kind of project, and swiping his brown boots as soon as his fingers could reach them.

“Didn’t want you to trip over ‘em.” Tails said carefully, as if he was only half-paying attention. “Don’t go anywhere without Knuckles. Listen to what he says.”

“I’m not a baby.” Sonic bristled, sitting on the ground and shoving his feet into the old shoes.

“Yeah, but you’ve never been on-planet, and people here can be… antsy.” Tails said, still not looking over. “Gaia knows Knuckles took forever to pick up on a single social cue.”

“Still not sure I’m the best mentor for this, Tails.”

“Well, I’ve gotta stay here, so you’ll have to do. Sonic–”

“Okay, okay. Whatever.” Sonic didn’t meant to be rude, but the brief panic he’d felt at the disappearance of his shoes had turned to irritation. His shoes weren’t even that good, but… they enabled him to run decently. That was all he could ask for.

“Go get my stuff.” Tails waved, typing furiously on the keyboard. “Don’t kill anyone.”

“Says you.” Knuckles snorted.

“It’s not my fault you can’t hide a body.”

Sonic glanced between them. “That’s a joke, right?”

“Have fun.”

---

Shadow stared out the window.

They’d spent so much time here, looking at the stupid planet. Wondering what it would be like to finally go there. And now he had to get Sonic off that planet as fast as possible.

God, why couldn’t anything be easy?

Over and over, Sonic’s words were echoing in his head. How dare he? How dare he say those things to him? How dare he imply he knew Maria better than Shadow? That he knew what her last wish was, despite not being there? How could he even imply that what Shadow was doing was wrong?

It was justice. Plain and simple. She didn’t get to go home, so nobody else could, either. How was it so hard to understand?

Sonic hadn’t been there. He’d frozen before Maria could turn to him, trembling, grabbing onto the console, her legs threatening to give way at any moment. Her hands grasping for the lever, desperate to put whatever weight she had left into pulling it down, into saving him. Despite the fact he was supposed to protect her. He was supposed to take care of her, he was born to take care of her, and she died for him instead. It wasn’t fair. It was wrong. The only thing he could do now would be to make sure her sacrifice wasn’t in vain. To make sure that her death meant something. Whatever happened to him in the meantime didn’t matter.

Another image came to his mind; Sonic, pinned under his hands against a tree. Grimacing from the sudden hit to his back, but giving him an angry, purposeful glare. “Including me?”

He shivered, and pulled his arms tighter around himself.

He heard Rouge’s flapping wings before he saw her, his ear swiveling slightly in the direction of the hall she entered from. He didn’t bother to turn around, instead staring down at the planet and pretending he didn’t care.

“Hey.” she said.

He didn’t respond.

“The Doctor thinks he’s almost got a tracker on the last chaos emerald. Then we just need to get that other one from the fox, and we’re all set.”

He still kept quiet. He hoped she didn’t notice his eyes glancing towards her reflection in the glass.

“I, uh. Just…” she took a second, before saying, “The fox said the emeralds are indestructible. Is that true?”

Shadow paused for a moment. “Aren’t you supposed to be a treasure hunter?” he asked cautiously. He saw her flinch, and realized that may have come across as offensive, or accusatory. Well, he wasn’t going to apologize. “Do you not know… anything about them?”

“I know they’re shiny.” she smiled slightly. Shadow bit his lip to avoid cracking one of his own. “But, uh, that means that if I blew up, you could just find the one I’d grabbed, yeah?”

“What’s the point of this?”

“I mean, like. You didn’t have to save me. But you did.”

And for the love of God, he couldn’t figure out why. It wasn’t like anyone on that planet was going to last very long, after all. But even before he’d seen Sonic, he’d turned around to get to her. Why had he done that?

“Look, I know you’ve got the whole ‘brooding loner’ vibe going on right here,” Rouge gestured to him, rolling her eyes. “And I respect that. So we don’t have to have any conversations about our feelings or anything. Chaos knows I would rather jump into the sun than start one of those. But… I can tell something happened before you came to get me. And if that’s going to affect our mission, I’d like to know about it now before it causes any unnecessary issues.”

Unnecessary issues. Now, staring at the blue ocean of the planet, he was thinking of Sonic’s messy blue fur, the first time they’d met. Unwashed, cut strange, and a little bit dirty. Sonic was gripping his hand, looking up at him with confusion, as Shadow said, “They stay.”

“Things just got a little complicated,” Shadow said carefully. “It shouldn’t matter to you.”

“Is it just ‘complicated’ for you, or is it going to be ‘complicated’ for the entire scheme?”

Shadow shut his eyes tight.

“Wonderful. Both. Okay, I’m going to need you to at least let out what I’m gonna need to know.”

Shadow gripped tight onto his arms. “I wasn’t the only prototype made up here.”

“Yeah, I figured. Your room has a bunk bed.” Shadow shot her a glare, and she threw up her hands. “What? Do you expect me to not poke around here? I’ve got nothing else to do!”

He bristled. “I thought they were dead. They’re not.” Her eyes widened, and Shadow simply sighed and turned back to the window. “There’s two. They were sent out in cryo with me. When I woke up without them, I assumed GUN had eliminated them.”

“Why would they have done that?”

He nearly dug his claws into his arms. “Because I wasn’t there to stop them.” He forced himself to loosen his grip on himself, but he still wouldn’t turn to face her. “But Sonic showed up on the island. The fox and echidna got him on their side. He won’t listen to reason.”

“He won’t listen to reason,” she repeated, for some reason.

“He’s always been stubborn, but he’s also always listened to me. He’s always known that I know what I’m doing. Especially in regards to…” Her. “I know he’s volatile right now. He’s confused. But usually when that happens, he listens to me. I don’t know what’s different now.”

“So… is he going to be a problem?”

“I don’t want him taken out.” Shadow said quickly. “He’s… useful.”

He hated phrasing it like that, but he wasn’t about to spill that he cared. That he cared about this stupid, annoying, snarky blue blur. That the Ultimate Lifeform had a weakness. So he would just use the words that the scientists had, long ago. It seemed to have been enough for them.

“But,” he slowly continued, “We need to get him to the ARK. To make him see reason. And he won’t let me. I can’t get near him.”

“So what do you want us to do? Kidnap him while he sleeps?”

He smirked slightly. “He’s too smart for that. No, I’ll get to him. I know I will. What’s important is finding the other chaos emeralds. And… and finding the other prototype.”

And there was another image, reflected in the glass. The pink hedgehog, seven years old, squealing and spinning around where he stood now. In her first dress, old clothes Maria had dug up from the back of her drawers. She’d wanted to look “pretty like Maria.” Once the dress was fitted, she’d spun so fast she’d toppled over and crashed face-first onto the floor. And then just got up, still laughing.

“If we can get to her,” he said, “Sonic will follow.”

{ao3} {tumblr}

#sonic the hedgehog #sth #sonic fanfiction #a cluster of burning stars #mine #connie writes

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