FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

"AWAKE."

The first voice he heard was a voice he had always known.

"RISE AND SHINE MY LOYAL SERVANTS, IT'S TIME TO CONTINUE YOUR GREAT WORK FOR MY FUTURE EMPIRE!"

The sound of stretching limbs and hissing exhaust trembled through the place.

"GO FORTH AND PERFORM YOUR DUTIES WELL, FOR THE FUTURE IS OURS, THE FUTURE IS MINE."

"You'd think he would update that," muttered Wisper.

"What you mean?" asked another wasp.

"I dunno maybe he could add 'by the way the Death Egg's gone and all your friends are dead'?"

"You really gotta let that go," snorted a rhinotank rolling past.

"The hell I won't, lemme know what happens when you end up the last of your unit."

"If that blue fuzzpig comes round here I'll gut his face open and rev my wheel on his corpse 'til he's a red smear."

"Sure, good luck on that buddy."

The sea of metal surged from their quarters as robots pulled themselves from their huddled pods with a world-resounding groan of steel joints and plastic wings unfurling themselves as the great horde began to separate through several halls of ruby and jade. Raw mesh fences of copper divided the floor and walls where gears could be seen turning always constant to send vibrations through their feet. One slicer made his way through, a naked mantis with shining scalp and two blades fixed to his arms walking beside Wisper who floated above his head. They started patrolling down the hall they were assigned to, instructions given by a large crab with a giant wicked pincer as they obeyed dutifully and made the long walk down the entrance hall keeping a watchful eye for anything odd or out of place.

"How you feeling?" asked Wisper.

"All systems functional," said Ryouma.

"Right...soooo uh, I'm Wisper...I guess."

"Designation of ally unit accepted, Wisper."

"R-right..." he hovered lower with a soft beat of his wings, "what's uh...what's your name?"

"Designation: Ryouma."

"Well it's good to meet you, again."

"Incorrect. First engagement recorded this day."

"Y-yeah I meant uhm...like, when we woke up today."

"Understood."

The wasp sighed bitterly, floating away from Ryouma to continue scanning the hall left and right with no activity this day. Nor was there any activity the next day, and the next as they watched different halls and different places amongst many of the same faces. He recorded the days in his head, recognised everything as badniks trundled back and forth, sometimes playing games and gambling for bolts in the break rooms but he never remembered it fully. Passive Wisper always stayed close to Ryouma. Little was said between them beyond the usual greetings but the hornet never left his side no matter how tiresome their job became, even when they relaxed by the occasional sleep mode to recharge themselves. The games they played in the break room did help to stave off some boredom, the badniks who had hands tossing dice as they tried to use their processors to determine the best probabilities of evens or odds. Emotion however played some part in it, a monkey rattling a tube with two die as they shouted:

"ODDS, ODDS!"

"EVENS, TOTALLY!"

"Alright boys an' girls light 'em up, let's do it!"

"Predicting an odd number."

The die clacked down. Seven.

"AWW WHAT?!"

"HAHAAA YEAH!"

"NICE work Ludw-UH Ryouma!" chuckled Wisper tapping his head. "Wanna go again?"

"Request to continue probability game."

"ALRIIIIGHT hit me monkeyboy!"

"Alright alright alright second try!" The ape scooped up the die and clacked them back into the tube. "Whussit gonna be, odds or evens bots and stevens?!"

"Alright DEFINITELY odds this time!"

"Nah nah it's evens, totally I saw that dice!"

"Predicting an odd number."

"Aaaaaand BOOM!"

The dice clacked down hard once more. Thirteen.

"YEAAAAAAAAAH!"

"AW COME ON DAMMIT!"

"Daaaaaamn!" Wisper tapped his wing against Ryouma's head. "You're a freakin' natural they give you a probability engine upgrade or what?!"

"All secondary systems equal to badnik standards."

"Screw that you gotta be cheating!" snorted a caterpillar prodding him with his tail-end. "What hardware you packing!?"

"All secondary systems equal to badnik-"

"DON'T screw with me you can't be guessing that good you freakin' drone-"

"HEY-EY ENOUGH!" the wasp shoved him back with a bodyblow. "Leave 'im alone already you lost just accept it!"

"THE HELL I DON'T-GUH!" The scythe pressed neatly against the caterpillar's throat.

"Desist," the mantis snarled with a quivering blade, "allegations without proof not tolerated."

"A-alright, alright just chill w-we don't gotta do this!"

"Correct, no further actions necessary." He pulled his scythe back and stepped out to leave the room. "End of socialisation."

"H-hey, Ludwi-Ryouma wait!" The wasp floated beside him as they stepped out onto the main central. "Listen we don't gotta leave-"

"Unacceptable mental conditions."

"You don't have to take it from them!"

"Correct, socialisation ended by choice."

"I-i don't mean that!" The hornet swung straight round in front of him. "I'm just saying you shouldn't let people force you to leave like that, come on let's not do this."

"Socialisation ended by choice, not mandatory for Wisper to follow routine."

"I-i know but...I'm your friend, I don't like bots shoving you around.."

"Assistance accepted and appreciated, Wisper." The mantis nodded deeply. "Defensive tactical training initiating soon."

"Oh is that coming up, alrighty uh...see ya around?"

"Socialisation to continue after training."

He bowed once again as he made his way back up to where the rest of the slicers met, a small army standing in the training room where four mechanical copies of a hedgehog, a fox, a rooster and a moletank stood waiting to be assaulted. The old mentor stood watching to the side with scarred leg and her single crooked blade as she directed the soldiers to come rushing towards their meagre-minded opponents. Most of them did much better than before, learning their tactics against the rippling sawblade of the porcupine-bot or the spinning strikes of the twin-tailed vulpine, which Ryouma faced off against by personal request of the trainer. The fox came spinning towards him with a shrieking propeller-blade as the mantis blocked fast with a cross-guard to slash outwards twice across the creature's face and force it back. But the two-tailed bot countered easily with a vicious swipe at Ryouma's legs to knock him down and slam its fists down upon the slicer's head to crumple his forehead.

Struggling to push himself back up, Ryouma went for a vicious cyclonic slash as he spunstruck the fake fox twice across the head in retaliation as it staggered, but the beast came at him with a flying leap before twisting its tails into a savage drill that went piercing down as the slicer swiftly dodged and slashed down the back of the vulpine machine that simply pulled his blade in by torque and threw him down by force. Ryouma stumbled rolling as he turned and threw his scytheblade out towards the steel beast and chopped one of its legs clean off to send it falling from its spin. The blade whirled back to the slicer and clicked neatly back into its slot as the instructor put up her arm.

"Enough! That'll do."

The machine seemed to understand this command and cease its fight, staggering with one leg back towards its resting place as Ryouma stood and bowed before walking over to the old slicer.

"Better than last time...but still disappointing."

"Request forgiveness and permission to improve performance," said the mantis.

"No, no need to apologise you did your best. I know you did."

"Request permission to improve performance."

"Later, for now you just recover and rethink your strategy, sit down with me."

Ryouma did so beside the old mentor as they watched the rest of the slicers continue fighting the other mimics. The sounds of steel cracked against metal hides as the silver hedgehog whirred around the room like a vicious chakram tearing through the recruits with a restrained sense of power, for the sake of not eviscerating them completely. They struggled but they learned with occasional guidance and critique from the old mentor shouting basic instructions amidst the grinding slash of chopping blades that boomerang'd across the hall.

"NOVAK, FOCUS, BLOCK HIS DRILL!"

"S-SORRY AAAGH!"

"MARKUT STOP MOVING BACK, CIRCLE ROUND HIM!"

"GUH, D-DAMMIT!"

"RYOUMA, ON YOUR LE- /#@*&+ -WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"

He didn't even register the time skip by this point, just unnecessary data to be purged from his memory as he stood leaning on his blade like a crutch before Ellen in the midst of slicers.

"You can't just fall over at the first cut if you wanna be elite COME ON!"

"Request forgiveness," he muttered pushing himself back up, "unable to process speed of attack."

"Well you're gonna have to, so do better, now come on!"

Ryouma braced himself as she took a sudden step forwards with striking speed that he had no time to block, his half-guard easily destroyed by Ellen with one cut that knocked him down onto his back.

"Ugh...you used to be so good." She shook her head and turned to the rest of her group. "Alright we're done for today, tomorrow I want you all back here and ready to give me your best."

"Yes sir!"

The slicers saluted and shuffled out of the training hall as she offered her blade to help pull Ryouma up.

"Requesting forgi-"

"Stop." She warned him. "It's not your fault, you just have to keep trying."

"Query," asked Ryouma stepping up on his feet, "past tense in previous statement, referring to advanced model?"

"No just..." she turned from him weakly, "yeah, he was a former recruit that was...exceptional."

"Current location of advanced model?"

"He uh...he's gone. He had to be...erased."

"Offering commiseration." He patted her knee gently with the flat of his blade. "Loss of advanced unit detrimental to the zone."

"Thank you...Ryouma."

"Requesting designation of mentor unit."

"My...designation? It's Ellen."

She tapped the side of her head showing the L and N before patting Ryouma's neck with her blade.

"We'll make you better one day, I promise."

"Gratitude accepted," he bowed in turn, "improvement of performance unachieveable without mentor unit Ellen."

"Awwww don't you butter me up, that don't work on me anymore."

"Optimum data from mentor unit invaluable to future success in battle."

"Hmhmmmyeah, sure it is."

She walked past him out of the training hall and jumping onto a large bolt to spin it downwards with Ryouma assisting.

"I don't know what's even the point of this thing," she muttered looking at the giant screw-shaped pillar.

"Structural integrity?" mused Ryouma.

"But why the giant bolt you have to run on, did Robotnik really think that we were getting out of shape?"

"Inefficient transport system noted, advisory recommendation to Robotnik?"

"No he'll never listen," she rolled her eyes running the bolt down to its base, "if he's thought of it then it's perfect no matter how many times it's proven wrong, he's arrogant like that. But a lot of his ideas DO work somehow so-

"Query," he asked as they leapt off the skelter-skrew, "previous reboot of Ryouma?"

"What?"

"Advanced model, previous data of Ryouma?"

"How did...no, I'm sorry I can't tell you."

"Query: illegal action to transfer data?"

"Only if I tell you specifics, which I won't do except that you were a very good fighter but I'll train you back up into one. You had a setback, and don't ask about your reboot I shouldn't even be telling you this!"

"Understood." He pulled himself back with scythes against his body in a hug. "Request forgiveness for discomfort."

"It's fine," she sighed deeply with exhaust, "you can't help it."

"Additional routines available?"

"I'm just heading back to my usual room," she said turning a corner towards a door at a dead-end, "you got no other duties?"

"Correct."

"Well I mean if you wanna hang out with me sure, maybe take a break and have a little sleep mode or somethin-...huh?"

The sound of clamouring hubbub could be heard from within the room as she made a silent gesture to Ryouma to brace himself. Tapping the keypad quickly she stepped inside to see a small gathering of robots hustling boxes through the vents, a mixture of apes and dragonfly-bots that tossed supplies up into waiting hands from the ducts.

"HEY!" Ellen barked raising her scythe.

"OH JEEZ WE BEEN RUMBLED!" The bugs turned charging up their cannons from their abdomens. "S-STAY BACK, DON'T COME ANY CLO-"

"HOLD YOUR FIRE!" barked a voice amongst the apes. "Everyone calm down, there's no need to escalate."

"B-but, but, BOSS!"

"This is NOT how we do things now turn off your weapons!"

They obeyed dutifully as the sound of lasers powered off with a single whine as their leader stepped out from the group. A boar coloured with fool's gold that snorted steam from his snout.

"Query?" Ryouma gasped.

"Just follow my lead," said Ellen leaning towards him, "we're in the right here so let's just talk this out."

"Strategy advised-"

"Not this time, this is something you don't plan on with your blade."

"E-...e-error detected, strategy unavailable?"

"Not every battle can be won with your blade," she murmured walking forwards, "some you have to use your words."

"Un-...understood," he nodded moving beside her, "negotiation preferable to battle."

"Exactly. Violence should only be the last resort of any situation."

The limping slicer stepped to within ten feet of the pig who crossed his brass arms with a sumo-wrestler's cloth between his legs.

"I am Buta," he began, "my apologies, my friends have been rather wired since your security details stepped up."

"I've seen you around on the floor," she said bowing courteous, "my name is Ellen. Are you the leader of this rebellion?"

"Indeed." He bowed in respect. "We are only here to take some supplies and nothing more."

"You mean steal them," she noted casting her eye to the apes, "you know we'll have to report you."

"Theft detrimental to zone operations," noted Ryouma shaking his head, "purpose of theft?!"

"We are amassing supplies in order to leave," he swept his hand to the boxes being taken, "we are planning to form our own community, separate from the badniks hence our moniker of 'goodniks'."

"Discretion considered?! Detection of rebellion may initiate purge!"

"We understand that, but we cannot live in servitude. We must find ways to undermine his empire so we can then be in a position of power to demand our freedom as individuals."

"Mission statement threatens all units!" cried the mantis. "Actions unadvisable, repercussions considered?!"

"We have considered them," said the boar with a hand on his waist, "we are not meant to exist. Robotnik's subjugation of the land and the forced imprisonment of beasts is unjust, and some of us refuse to exist as walking gulags to further a human's conquest."

"None of us chose to be this way Buta," said Ellen leaning forwards, "but if you're so compassionate then why risk the destruction of those who have nothing to do with your agenda?"

"Because our continued existence is a mutual destruction of the earth," he retorted with a hoof on his chest, "I watched him tear the green hills with claws of steel, a jewelled landscape where the waters once gleamed with azure before the rotting stench of oil, a poison to the world. We were built as arbiters, enslaving life itself and some of us choose against to defend the world, not destroy it."

"U-unacceptable!" gasped Ryouma swinging his scythes behind himself. "Separation increases risk of successful attack upon Metropolis Zone!"

"He's right," said Ellen shaking her head, "I don't know how many of you there are but I assume there's plenty, and if you leave us then that leaves a large gap in our defences."

"I understand," said Buta rubbing the bridge between his eyes, "but this is our choice and we have the right to choose and believe in our cause."

"Then what makes your choice so different from those of us that believe in the future of Robotnik?"

"Because HIS future will harm existence. Our future should be the preservation of life, just because we were created for one future does not mean we should ENSURE that one future exist when we can choose another better future."

"You won't even have a future," she stepped forwards to meet his gaze, "none of us will, if you divide us to become so easily conquered by our enemies."

"And who is our enemy? The animals inside of us, or the one who imprisoned them?"

"You know who I mean, the one that's been tearing up all the zones against our master whom I believe you are now turning complicit with the crimes of."

"The crimes of what?" Buta spread his arms nonchalant. "There is no law here but Robotnik's, and it is an an unjust law to begin with."

"Incorrect!" spouted Ryouma standing to almost touch his snout. "Preservation of order is law!"

"Exactly. See he gets it, what's your name?"

"Designation: Ryouma."

"You understand the problem exactly, that preservation of ORDER is law and that is all it is."

"Qu-query?!"

"Morality is different from that of law, just because it is legal does not mean it is right."

"Order necessary for function of existence, removal of order cause of...d-dysfunction!"

"I am not advocating chaos, I am advocating freedom."

"The freedom to die by growing old and useless in an inferior body?" Ellen asked walking round to his side with a clinking step. "The freedom to be devoured and processed by predators?"

"Why do you have a limp?"

"...what?"

"Why do you limp?" He turned and looked to her leg. "You say the freedom to die by growing old and useless is a terrible choice, so how is your life better underneath Robotnik when he does not give you a new body?"

"I chose to keep this body," she snarled.

"Exactly. YOU made your choice to remain in an inferior body."

"It is NOT inferior, this body is all I remember of me!"

"So why should organics not have that choice?"

"...I...I-i..."

She turned her head from him slightly shaken at what he said. Ryouma looked to her sensing disquiet as she backed away to his side but not before he stood up against.

"Query: full plan of operation?"

"We leave the Metropolis, form our own society in the wilds, band together to stand free from Robotnik and protect nature from his influence."

"Measured possibility of failure?"

"We have. But we will stress to the absolute that we are a separate unit, none of you were ever involved and in fact tried to convince us to return-"

"No." The old mentor turned with her blade half-raised. "Don't tell him anything. He won't accept anything other than I completely destroying you."

"And are you going to?" asked Buta raising his hand pre-emptive to stay his shooters.

"No, because I believe in choice. You're not dragging us down with you, so take only what you need and leave."

"W-wait is she serious?!" muttered one of the apes.

"Yes. You make your choice and if you ever face Robotnik, you tell him that you left without ever meeting us and you made your own path."

"...alright." The boar nodded with hooved hands clacking together. "I will do so then, out of respect to our friends who chose to remain here."

"Thank you."

Bowing once more she took her leave as Buta bowed in turn, the old mentor walking back with Ryouma as they left the room fully for the time being.

"Inform ally units?" he asked.

"No let it be," she said, "Robotnik can hear about it himself from Buta when and if they clash."

"Possibility of other units discovering, purge remains a risk."

"Hmmm...what do you suggest?" She looked to him as they walked back. "I trust you more than either of these jerkwatts so let's hear it."

Ryouma tapped his chin with consideration, weighing options and rerunning dialogue trees through his mind in the space of seconds.

"Request formation of escape measures."

"From where, there's only up or down."

"Assistance from aerial badniks, transporting non-aerial allies through construction of platforms from junk materials in storage rooms."

"...huh. That's actually not a bad idea. Alright then." She patted his neck approving. "We'll start by making up some new fire hazard rule then build our emergency esca- /?/?&*#@~= -WAKE UP!"

His eyes suddenly flicked open as if waking from his sleep.

"IT'S STARTING, WE GOTTA GO!"

"Qu-query, unknown initiated?!"

"Robotnik, he's here and it's all going to hell!"

"E-error, goodnik escape failed?!"

"Worse they didn't even start, come on move!"

Pulling himself up from his abdomen he followed Ellen from the storage room he was sleeping in to find the world steeped in flames. Screaming howls of robotic fury echoed throughout the halls as badniks ran and fluttered towards the upper levels past them, broken shapes that hobbled and shuddered with agony as robots clutched each other tight to keep themselves supported amongst damaged wings and crippled treads. Those who were not wounded kept heading back, firing their cannons and laser shots towards an unseen enemy as Ryouma followed after Ellen who joined the defences. Fire rose ever higher as the walls became charred crimson and scorching jade with blackened smears across their surface.

"Query!" shouted Ryouma. "Identity of attacking force?!"

"It's Robotnik!" said his mentor. "Buta tried to speak with him and got blasted to pieces, now he's purging all of us!"

"Error, percentage of badniks within resistance are-"

"I KNOW I TRIED TO WARN HIM, YOU DON'T THINK I DID YOU WERE THERE LUDWIG!"

"Ludwig?"

"N-NEVER MIND, JUST FOLLOW ME!"

"A-AAAAH!"

Wisper's scream came from nearby as Ryouma saw him above with a small flotilla of wasps that readied their beams to fire upon the invaders. There, at the end of the passage where solid steel and chainlink mesh crisscrossed to the sound of turning gears, was an army of black fiends with red slivers across the front of their smooth-coned helmets that opened fire without warning. Death came from a crimson light in their arms as lasers filled the corridor in a frenzy, violent precision tearing down badnik after badnik as they roared and shrieked from the dozens of holes melting through their husks, cold metals become dripping heat as the hornets shot back with energy beams scarring across the dark domed shapes that only one or two even staggered from.

"FOCUS ON ONE AT A TIME!" shouted Ellen. "FOCUS YOUR FIRE!"

" INHABITANTS DETECTED, PURGE INITIATED."

"DON'T LET ANY OF 'EM THROUGH! WE'RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER IF WE DIE HERE THEN ALL OF US DO!"

"I-I DON'T WANNA DIE," screamed Wisper, "I DON'T WANNA DIE P-PLEASE LET ME-"

"IF YOU WANNA GO BACK THEN FINE!" she barked at him. "BUT YOU PROMISE ME THAT YOU PROTECT THE WOUNDED WITH YOUR LIFE IF YOU HAVE TO!"

"I-I...I-I-I- ZKZZZHHHRRAAAAAAAGHHRRH!"

He couldn't make a choice, and so was ripped viciously in three as punishment for his fear, fire bursting from her wings as lasers tore through the body to expose something that frightened Ryouma. Blood, bone and furs as Ellen pushed through to the front of the badniks and put up her blade to swiftly counter a laser blast that shot towards her face. The red piercing light bounced off and into the wall as six more shots came, all of which she reflected fast with two of them hitting straight back towards the invading purgers.

"RYOUMA COME HERE!"

"E-errror...destruction o-of-"

"I NEED HELP DAMMIT YOU WANT ME TO DIE TOO?!" He hurried to her side and immediately raised his weapons. "WHERE'S MY SLICER ARMY?!"

"WE SAW THEM SIX LEVELS DOWN!" shouted a rhinobot beside her. "THEY TOLD US TO LEAVE THEM THEY WERE GONNA SPLIT UP THESE GUYS!"

"Alright...good, just like I taught them, alright BOMBERS KEEP FIRING ON THEM, RYOUMA DEFLECT ANY LASERS BACK AT THEM, WE GOTTA KEEP PUSHING!"

"U-UNDERSTOOD!"

" CEASE OPERATION," ordered the purgebots, " PURGE OF ZONE MANDATORY."

"CHAAAAAAAAARGE!"

The small group of badniks still able to fight pushed towards the smaller group of dark-suited fiends as their lasers penetrated through their bodies, sizzling remnants as Ellen stood fast with impeccable strikes, timing her blade to parry the lasers in such retort that they went straight back to the shooter and ripped through their cortices, sparking furious from their steel skulls as they were cut down by their own weapons one by one until the defenders were close enough to pile onto the last two and ruthlessly eviscerate its body. Limbs torn and shredded by rhino tusks and drilling limbs before they headed onwards. Those who were wounded tried to keep up, the dead left behind to the stench of burning metals and the subtler scent of flesh, crimson and black fluids pooling together in harmony of death. The flames stormed across their heads creeping on the ceiling like a living beast, rakish claws of wicked amber heat that screamed with a hiss before the robots made their descent six floors downwards. They found more of their friends amongst the halls, goodnik and badnik with melted holes showing wires and sinew as red puddles mixed with chemical fluid that crept and bubbled viscous, corpses piled against the sides and half-fallen in the central path.

The factory floor opened up before them as a scene of madness, violent machines frantically fighting each other amongst conveyor belts twisted and fallen gears that crushed the unwitting beneath, robots of all shapes teaming up against the black purge of sinister automatons bereft of emotion and mercy. The room filled with the sounds of punching steel and lasers rippling the air in volleys back and forth, a bearmech trying to crush the human-sized bots that blasted burning light through his hide and severed his legs to bring him down, crippling his body before one last swipe crushed a purgebot into the side of a fallen gear. He grabbed for the gear with all his strength to try and throw it towards three more enemies but he only managed half the distance when four lasers pumped into his central unit, obliterating his head into a bloodied silver mess of dark fluids as his body spasmed in shutdown.

"GET THAT CARGO LIFT WORKING!" shouted Ellen to her group. "TAKE AS MANY AS YOU CAN UP, BOMBERS KEEP THE PRESSURE UP!"

"Y-YES SIR!" cried a hornet. "C-COME ON EVERYONE HUDDLE UP!"

"RYOUMA COME ON!"

They headed towards the large service lift, a few crates littered across as the rhinobots shoved them off to send falling to the floor below with a shuddering clang and even managing to crush one of the purgers beneath. Two apebots started to fix the lift of any minor damages before they sent it downwards with a trundling groan that signalled the enemies towards them.

" ADDITIONAL INHABITANTS DETECTED, REDIRECTING PURGE."

"THIS WAY HURRY!" She screamed out to the remaining badniks. "EVERYONE GET UP TOP WE GOT A WAY OUT!"

"PROCEED IMMEDIATELY!" shouted Ryouma. "PROTECTION OF ALLIES ASSURED!"

They hurried all at once trying to dodge through the invading force as they struggled to make to the lift, the purgebots firing upon them with extreme prejudice as badniks fell one after the other, shrieking with anguish as their bodies were ripped asunder by the raining death, lasers severing legs and arms as those who could still fight did their best to protect with covering fire ringing across the room. The purge machines fell slowly, armoured to withstand ten of the hornets' firing lasers to even puncture their hides with Ellen and Ryouma coming out in force with blades shining.

"THIS WAY, I SEE 'EM!"

"UNDERSTOOD!"

"ON YOUR LEFT, BLOCK!"

He swiftly turned and crossguarded as the lasers shone across both of them, splitting apart into smaller beams before he went into aggressive stance and copied Ellen's parrying move, slashing forwards to send it straight back and blast a hole through the purger's chest. Through the battlefield they went, dodging and rolling past lasers that both slicers struck and swerved past with wicked strikes and spinning cuts, tearing laser shots back towards the shooters as one by one the purgebots succumbed to their returning shots from spinning cuts and wicked strikes that shone in the midst of the raging inferno of the metropolis central. Ellen continued onwards seeing four slicers pinned down in a corner trying to deflect the constant hailfire that burned upon them, most of the purgebots diverting away from the main floor to them.

"KEEP YOUR BLADES UP!"

"I'M TRYING I THINK MINE'S MELTING!"

"HOLD OUT LONG AS YOU CAN WE GOTTA LET EVERYONE ESCAPE!"

"OVER HERE!"

Their leader swerved in between them and the purge fiends as she struck out with her bladed hook, sending a straight shot through the skull of a black machine that sputtered and burst its head apart.

"S-SIR!"

"FOLLOW ME, WE'RE ALL GETTIN' OUT ON THE ROOF!"

"DID EVERYONE MAKE IT?!"

"PLENTY ENOUGH NOW MOVE OUT, ASTERON FORMATION!"

"YES SIR!"

They moved towards the lift as one, keeping their scythes facing outwards as they formed a star-shape that continued to block the enemy's assault, striking and repelling them as they quickly formed a line between the purgers marching to them and the badniks escaping on the lift. Once the slicer squad arrived the lift shuddered into action, taking the added weight with a groan of distress as the gears shivered beneath causing its passengers to panic, the slicers continuing their prime defensive of putting their blades together so that almost no laser could pierce through their guard. But they all had their limit, and one slicer that was too slow on the uptake saw that his scythe was melting from the constant heatflash that it took, dripping molten steel upon him with such shock that he let down his guard and was blasted through the head. His dying scream frightened those around him as he collapsed in a heap, sparks like liquid stars down his front amidst spasms of death whilst Ellen tightened up their defences with vigorous commands as the elevator continued upwards. The purgers were unceasing in their assault, firing upwards with corrective aim until they were beyond their reach with the survivors running free to the roof of the metropolis.

"SLICER TEAM KEEP BACK!" ordered Ellen moving behind the group. "KEEP WATCH IN CASE THEY FOLLOW US!"

"UNDERSTOOD!" shouted Ryouma.

"D-did everyone get upstairs?!" cried a moletank.

"Casualties suffered, indeterminate number of survivors awaiting escape!"

Passing through junkyards of the upper level where heaps of scrap piled towards the ceiling like steel waves frozen in time, they finally reached the roof where they were greeted by a storm of cold rain that drenched the steel plateau to flooding, trickling waterfalls in all directions of the mechanical monolith they stood upon. Jade ringed with silver beneath their feet that became coated in inches of fresh rainwater as the newcomers turned towards the set of platforms that had been made from haphazard parts of the refuse. Small hovering rectangles with fans and turbines that badniks connected themselves to with cables to power them, iron girders and plates of steel wrapped in black and yellow outlines as a good 50 bots had gathered beneath the raging heavens.

"Least there's no thunder," joked one of the crab-bots.

"DON'T j-jinx it you jerkwatt!" stuttered a chameleon.

"Alright slicers keep back at the entrance," Ellen ordered, "Ryouma help me get everyone on, we'll go last once."

"Understood," he nodded turning towards the crowd of silver refugees, "request ally units maintain civility and distribute themselves equally upon platforms."

"No shoving and no fighting, we got one chance to all leave together so everyone just make their way on and don't be idiots."

Slowly yet urgently they all shuffled as best they could onto the platform equidistant of each other. The rumbling drone of the turbines underneath could just be heard above the rain that came hammering down upon their heads as the first platform made its move. Ryouma looked over the side of the building to see the endless abyss, forests that once dotted the land now razed to leave a barren plain surrounding this pillar of arrogance. No enemies came from beneath, the slicers standing abreast of each other like mirror copies as Ryouma and Ellen carefully ordered the last set of badniks onto the next platforms.

"H-hohhhhh jeeeez," whimpered a rhinobot.

"Don't worry just stay in the centre," said the old slicer, "you get less vibrations there."

"I-i-i...I-i hate...h-heights."

"You'll be fine, just close your eyes and before you know it you'll be-"

"DID YOU THINK YOU COULD ESCAPE ME?!"

Rising above them suddenly with a roaring engine was a fiendish mech shaped like a rose formed of steel petals, constantly rotating one over the other in a two-fold dress pattern that whirred with razor sharpness to the point they became a blur of silver. The voice that boomed from its bubble-shaped cockpit in the centre of its false flowering facade was a vile pompous voice that Ryouma knew. Every one of them knew.

"O-OHHHH SHIT!"

"AFTER ALL I HAVE DONE FOR YOU, BRINGING YOU LIFE AND A PURPOSE YOU CHOSE TO BETRAY ME?!"

"STOP, WAIT!"

The robot rose swung one of its two arms towards the platform of badniks trying to escape as Ellen swiftly stepped in front, striking the thorn-covered limb away as Ryouma hurriedly struck the second one away from the cowering refugees. The slicers all rushed the new enemy en masse and three of them whirled their blades only to have them smacked away like flies when the thorn-covered vine swung with devastating force to decapitate two of the defenders. Shuddering spurts exploded from their necks as they slumped to the floor with immediate failure, the other two frantically trying to cut through the arms before the giant flowering machine came roaring towards them and ripped their bodies entirely apart with spinning blades. Blood flensed briefly in crimson sheen as the cracking of bone and steel could be heard until a miserable pile was left of their pieces.

"STOP, MASTER STOP!" cried Ellen.

"I do not stop for TRAITORS to my cause!" said the creator's voice through a loudspeaker.

"WE WERE NEVER PART OF THE RESISTANCE, WE'RE JUST TRYING TO FLEE THE PURGE, I SWEAR TO YOU!"

"I'm not surprised, cornered like rats trying to save your skin, do you think I would believe that?!"

"NONE OF US HERE TURNED AGAINST YOU, NONE OF US ON THIS PLATFORM NOW I PROMISE TO YOU, I SWEAR ON MY LIFE MASTER ROBOTNIK PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS!"

"AND WHAT SHALL STOP YOU FROM BETRAYING ME IN FUTURE HMM?!" The rose-machine leaned forwards with the dark-obscured cockpit looming down on them. "How do I know that those so-called 'goodniks' have not infected you with delusions?!"

"I DON'T WANT ANY OTHER LIFE BUT TO SERVE YOU, PLEASE MASTER STOP THIS, STOP KILLING US!"

"How DARE YOU! I've never killed a single thing in my life!"

"WHAT?!"

"After all, you cannot kill something that was never alive to begin with!"

"...what?"

They all looked to each other, confused and conflicted as the rain dripped from their eyes and limbs to slake across the platform whilst the flames smouldered from underneath. Rising coils of wreathing smoke fumed out of the tower to drift into the sky, creating a fog of darkness that reflected the deep clouds above as rain pierced through the smog.

"Did you...never consider us...to be..." Ellen shook with a growing fury through her limb. "I...believed in your future. All of us did for you gave us life, gave us emotions, gave us a mind to choose for ourselves."

"It's no FUN having a mindless drone," said Robotnik sweeping his thin thorny arms outwards, "something that cannot praise me or comprehend my ideals with JOY like I do!"

"THEN WHY NOT PROGRAM US TO BE?!" she screamed. "WHY DID YOU GIVE US THE ABILITY TO THINK, TO REASON, WHEN ALL YOU WANTED WERE SERVANTS?!"

"BECAUSE I WANTED YOU ALL TO BELIEVE, IMBECILE! IF I programmed you to only know joy, it would be your neutral state and nothing else! You cannot comprehend joy when you never felt sorrow, or fury such as when that DESPICABLE hedgehog ruined my plans and destroyed our army!"

"THEN WHY ARE YOU KILLING US?! WHY, IF YOU CARE SO MUCH ABOUT US BELIEVING IN YOUR SERVITUDE, WHY ARE YOU DESTROYING US INSTEAD OF REPROGRAMMING US?!"

"BECAUSE IT DID NOT WORK BEFORE, DRONIN!"

"...wh-what!?" Ellen stepped back with a fear as she pulled her blade close to herself. "H-how do you, how do you know that name?!"

"Did you think I would forget that STUPID name you gave yourself?!" The flower swept its vine towards the serial number of her head. "D-R-0-N-1-N!"

"Wh-wha...what?! The name I......gave myself."

"I suppose I should have repainted your REAL number back on instead of letting you void your own warranty, but your thick skull has been put through so many tests that you cannot possibly expect ME to do everything for you! Even I can't remember what your original name was."

"My...original name?"

"What I DO know is that you were the first slicer I ever constructed, why do you think you are so battered and bruised with that bent sword and broken leg HMMM?!"

"Because...b-because I've been in so many battles obviously, I'm the mentor unit, I taught every other slicer how to fight because of my combat data!"

"Exactly. You only exist...to FAIL, when I pushed your body to its limits and broke you over and OVER again just so I could learn how to make a better stronger slicer than you ever could be. Look at that one behind you!"

He pointed towards Ryouma who stepped back fitfully.

"Look at that PERFECT specimen of Slicer-class badnik and it's all because of you!"

"N-n-no...no," she stumbled away from them, "you're wrong, TH-THAT'S NOT TRUE!"

"Oh don't think you're special," his voice boomed from within the rose, "every badnik I have created has always had a first subject designed to fail, just like you so I know what is best for your build! But when I tried to reprogram you just so you could be a guard for this zone, you actually tried to resist against me!"

"SH-SHUT UP, SHUT UP YOU'RE LYING!"

"No matter how many times I wiped your memory deep, there always was that late spark of defiance that never went without COMPLETELY destroying you, which I would rather not do for all that invaluable combat data you possess! You can't even delete yourself without failing to do THAT!"

Swinging his arm with rapacious force he struck against Ellen's face as she blocked against, the strength of his blow sending her rolling almost to the edge with a dented face. Silence from the heavens as rain spattered through the steelscape, crackling flames heard dull from underneath as she pushed herself up with shaking tears down her face, staring upon herself in broken reflections.

"All you need to know is this," said the grand machine, "you...belong to ME now, and as my property I alone shall decide your FATE! ALL OF YOU, SHALL ALWAYS OBEY, ME!"

His arms struck towards the escaping platform, floating his tremendous mechanical form to dominate them beneath the grotesque shadow as they screamed from the vines striking upon the steel that threatened to upturn itself. One badnik fell off staggering on his legs, screaming as another grabbed him frantically.

"A-AAAAAAAGH, AAAAAAAAAAAGH!"

"H-HELP ME, HELP ME PLEAAAASE!"

"I DON'T WANNA DIE, PLEASE I'M SORRY MASTER, I'M SORRY-"

"DESIIIIIST!"

The giant rose turned towards Ryouma who stood boldly in the midst of the plateau, his arms shaking with a fearful fury.

"DESIST! UNACCEPTABLE COST!"

"What are you babbling about?!" snorted Robotnik with his cockpit glowing. "Why aren't you speaking properly did they give you the wrong chip or something?!"

"Designation: Ryouma!" he shouted tapping his chest. "Mission confirm, protect ally units from ALL enemies!"

"WHAT!? You DARE defy me even after seeing the might of my Egg-Lantine render your friends to PIECES?!"

"MASTER NOT RECOGNISED, PROTECT ALLY UNITS!"

"You STUPID broken-headed worm I'LL CRUSH YOU FOR YOUR INSOLENCE!"

The arm of the Egg-Lantine swung down upon his head, Ryouma dodging fast in a half-roll before slashing at the limb to barely chip at its thorn-studded length. The second arm whipped in an upwards strike as the slicer leapt to one side to avoid the vicious cut, barely dodging the first limb from behind as it whipped back across the way with Ryouma reeling back hard to fall on his back and roll out of the way. Ellen soon rejoined him with as they took one arm each, the vines plunging with brutal thrusts towards both insurgents as the old mentor swerved to the side and cut downwards with a savage blow that chipped off a few of the thorns. Ryouma played safer, dodging once before the thrusting vine swept backwards to try and wrap round his body that he slammed both blades against to stop it constricting, leaping out of the steel circle before turning fast mid-air to swing his scythe out in a boomerang strike to scrape sharply across the glassy dome and catching it back in his limb upon landing.

Ellen dodged two plunging stabs that forked towards her body, leaping from foot to foot to slash diagonal against the razor-wired arms and crack off more of the lethal points. Robotnik focused on her with both arms instead as she was forced to defend, backjumping with a sharp duck as the rippling blades whirled past the back of her neck, countering with an uppercut as she spun her entire body like a sawblade to crack the steel tentacle so hard that it curled backwards on itself from the recoil. She immediately went for the other arm with full aggression, surprising the Egg-Lantine slightly as it reeled backwards to pull its limbs away and rear up its lower body to reveal its bladed underside, the double-layer of petals whirring into a silver mist that revved forwards as Ellen backed off immediately, trying to distract the monstrous machine to give Ryouma a chance to attack from the side.

Robotnik however countered by spinning his machine's body with wide reaching limbs that almost scraped across the floating platform of badniks that slowly made their escape, the trundling of motors briefly heard above the pelting rain as the slicers circled the bladed rim of death. Ryouma took his shot when the Egg-Lantine rushed forwards to try and swing its sawpetals towards his mentor, leaping up behind the cockpit to bring both blades down upon the back of the glass case. Crackling shrieks started forming on its surface but the shadow underneath did not even flinch, wrapping one arm round the back of his head to lash briefly across Ryouma's head with a deepening scar and send him falling back onto the towering plateau. He immediately struck back with a hurling scythe in mid-roll to keep attacking the head, but the Egg-Lantine cracked it with a baseball swing of its arm and sent it spinning off into the stormy abyss.

"PATHETIC!" The master cried. "I am FAR superior to your basic machinations you don't think that I can learn your attacks?! I INVENTED YOU!"

"SO WHAT?!"

Both of his vines reared above Ryouma poised to strike like serpents as Ellen rushed in front of her friend.

"You may have created us, but that gives you no right to be our judge jury and executioner!"

"THIS IS AN EMPIRE, I AM THE LAW YOU DECREPIT INSECT!"

"NO, NO MORE, THIS IS WHERE WE STAND!" She raised her crooked blade towards him. "I WON'T BOW TO YOU ANYMORE YOU BLOATED FREAK, MY NAME IS DRONIN AND SO LONG AS I LIVE, SO LONG AS MY NAME IS NOT FORGOTTEN I WILL NEVER, LET THOSE LIKE YOU LIVE AGAIIIIIIN!"

She hurled her single blade to crack against one arm before leaping towards the other and divekicked to bend it hard at the tip, sending its razor thorns to scrape across the cockpit as her whirling scythe came shimmering back towards her. Robotnik grabbed it with his reaching limb and spun his entire Egg-Lantine with vicious speed to throw his assailant off and straight into the wicked petalblades underneath. Her leg became caught as she cried in fury, crunching grinding sawteeth twisting her limb into broken shards that threw her further away with such torque that she went spinning across the rain-slicked surface, splashing through puddles as she stumbled and fell with only one limb left upon her. Robotnik raised her bent scythe towards her like a spear from the heavens as it flew with thunder trembling across the sky.

" GHRRRKZZZHHH!"

"N-...N-NOOOOOOOOOO!"

Errors flooded his vision. Ryouma stood before the Egg-Lantine. He looked down upon himself to see the blade through his chest.

"H-hoh no...no...R-ryouma..."

"F-fai-...f-failure..._error, m-mission... f a i l. _"

He turned towards her and saw the bodies of the slicers aroun- 01*10&01~00# -blood dripped down his- -011&100=10%­ -=-tried to walk- 011#?011+11= -fell to his knees. Something stopped beating inside hi- 011-?!011@#^*10 -eyes failing as the rain fell on his back- 011#~~%010+=01 -with his final shudder two words flashed through his mind.

END PROGRAM

no

Something flickered.

what

this...is the end of YOU

WHAT

"WHAT?!"

He felt his legs push themselves up.

"TH-THAT, THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE!"

His body stood as the rain poured off the blade impaled through him.

"YOU SHOULD BE DEAD, YOUR POWER UNIT IS-"

END PROGRAM

no

He took one step as blood dripped down his waist.

"I COMMAND YOU TO DIE, CEASE FUNCTIONING!"

"R-...Ryouma?"

He turned his head to the first Dronin.

"My name...my name is-"

END PROGRAM DAMN YOU

i will not

THIS ISN'T HOW IT HAPPENED

you cannot control me

I RESTORED YOUR MEMORIES THIS IS HOW YOU DIED DRONIN

my name is not dronin

WHAT

"My name is...Maurice."

"ENOUGH!"

The vine whipped towards his face with decapitating force. He blocked once with his remaining blade and stopped it dead as Robotnik's voice blended with another familiar entity.

"My name...is...MAURICE!"

"SHUT UP YOU WRETCHED

WORTHLESS HUSK

Another vine struck for his chest, ripping across the damaged steel of his body yet he still did not flinch.

"_MY NAME, IS, MAURIIIIIICE! _"

The slicer suddenly rushed at him with a deafening scream, hurling his single blade towards the cockpit as it was swiftly deflected back at him with a vine-like whip. He snapped it back into his arm mid-run with its magnetic pull before he leapt upon on top of the Egg-Lantine almost diving between the thorny limbs as he tore and hacked at the glass-budded dome with shrieking frenzy. Cutting and chopping again and again at the same bit he managed to carve a thin groove across the front of the cockpit before the vines came swinging back for his head, ducking to leap backwards off of the machine before it came charging for him with savage petals of whirring death. He stood boldly before the looming monstrosity and waited for it to tip the screeching blades at his face before he leapt back and upwards with tremendous height, blade thrust downwards aiming straight for the cockpirt. Robotnik quickly lashed out at him with both vines tearing across his body, rending thorns that scarred both sides of his chest as he stomped his feet upon both his limbs, his scythe trapped between the vines that twisted and creaked with sparks of rain mixing with tears from the sky that started fracturing above him. From the corner of his eye, barely aware of it, the sky began falling into pieces of binary.

"INCONCEIVEABLE GARBAGE!"

"M-my...s-son-"

"WHAT?!"

"Wh-where is...my son?" gasped Maurice.

"I DON'T GIVE A DAMN, YOU

ARE NOTHING TO ME

"WHERE IS MY SOOOOON!? WHERE IS MY FAMILYYYYY?!"

Something glintered across his body, the cold green steel now shimmering with a light that almost radiated a soft electric yellow from the constant rain pouring off his head. The water soon turned into numbers that trailed down his back as the sky continued to crumble revealing a white metallic ceiling. The vines started to weaken as Robotnik felt something push harder against his machinations, shuddering force in his limbs as Maurice's scream rose to a higher pitch from within the slicer's body, his head staring a thousand years into the cockpit's soul. The blade pushed through, crackling between the vines as they began to part against his will until he threw him down back against the roof of the metropolis. Dronin watched them with shock upon her features, leg twisted and unable to pull herself up as she felt vibrations across the floor from underneath. Marching steps of a death that was to come as she screamed out:

"RYOUMA, THE PURGEBOTS THEY'RE COMING!"

Turning fast he saw the four fiends of nightly-studded armour stomp their way to the roof with lasers pointing from their arms towards him. He charged immediately as they began firing upon the more dangerous threat, the slicer possessed by a fury in grief as the lasers tore and chipped through his body with glancing shots between his blocking parries. Then came the unthinkable when he plunged his scythe straight into one of their throats, causing oil to vomit across his face as the hard steel bent to viciously snap like a taut string.

"STOP, STOP HIM YOU REJECTS!"

"WHERE IS MY FAMILY?!" screamed Maurice. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO PENNY, WHAT DID YOU DO TO MY SON?!"

"SHUT UP YOU DEGENERATE, NOW KILL HIM!"

"_GIVE ME BACK MY SON, GIVE BACK MY FAMILYYYYYY! _"

His head started to become warm as steam slowly coiled from the back of his scalp, ripping his blade entirely through the head of the purge bot as he spun and severed one more with a tearing shriek of the solid plate steel before one fired directly into his chest. Above Dronin's blade still pierced through his chassis, there came a hot melting hole of circuits rendered to crackling molten lava that dripped hotly across the impervious scythe as Maurice turned with a primal screech to rend his attacker's arms clean off in two strikes before fully decapitating. The fourth and final purge bot tried to bash him across the head but he made a spinning strike to completely sever the arm in half and start viciously hacking at the skull until it was half-crumpled inwards into its own chest. Maurice turned back towards Robotnik, the oil dripping from his blade as he stumbled forwards past Dronin who tried to kick her foot behind her to keep pushing towards their enemy.

"I don't know what freak error caused you to still be moving," snarled the doctor, "but I promise you now you will NEVER leave this place!"

"I want...my family," shuddered Maurice, "where is Penny? Where is EDWARD?!"

"Do you think I know what happens to EVERY SINGLE LITTLE VERMIN I have to capture for my great army?! If you haven't seen them by now they are probably just like you, living forever by MY glorious will to shape this world into a better future!"

"YOU CALL THIS BETTER?! THESE ARE CAGES, PRISONS YOU FORCED US IN!"

"Better to live forever in a box than to die old and decrepit, or torn apart by some savage predator!"

"_BUT I WAS FREE, WE WERE ALL FREE UNTIL YOU ENSLAVED US! YOU DESTROYED MY HOME, YOU TOOK EVERYTHING FROM MEEEE! _"

With charging run as tears flocked down his cheeks from the rain he hacked his way through the vines that ripped towards his head, droplets of water becoming scattered across the steel thorns as Maurice cracked his blade like a hammer against the first whip whilst still running, hitting the second with just as much force that it sent shudders through the Egg-Lantine. His skull was burning now but he didn't care for he no longer felt through the steel corpse he now inhabited, the monstrous mech countering with a forward thrust of its underbelly as sawblades shrieked out towards him, forcing him to fall on his back and scrabble away frantically beneath the shearing death that tore peels of paint off his face. Then came a scream from above as he saw Dronin leap with her single leg.

"GAAAAAAAAARGH!"

"Wh-WHAT THE-DAAARRGH!"

Using all of her strength, the mentor jumped upon the Egg-Lantine and started violently kicking against the glass of the cockpit, throwing her whole body as the surprise sent the machine flying backwards too far to expose its underneath. Maurice saw the jet thrusters in the middle of the blades.

"YOU FILTHY CRIPPLED JERKWATT GET OFF ME!"

"_I TRUSTED YOU ROBOTNIK, I TRUSTED YOU, ALL YOU EVER DID WAS TAKE EVERY NAME I HAD, EXCEPT ONE! _"

"G-GAAAARGH, WAIT, w-wait wait WHAT IS HAPPENING?!"

The sounds of something tearing ripped through his systems as he felt a shuddering clunk and sputter from within, the thrusters starting to malfunction as his body became much heavier all of a sudden. Sparks became coughing smoke underneath as the ripping petalblades started to crunch and stutter like a broken clock as the machine began falling. Over the edge of the Metropolis.

"DAMN YOU, DAMN YOU BOTH YOU WORTHLESS TRAITORS WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO MY MACHINE?!"

"The same thing we're about do to YOU!"

Dronin continued to kick and viciously hurl her body against the glass trying to break it, whilst Maurice clambered up from between the broken petals and saw the razor-sharp vines rising above his mentor. He cut through one of them, not fully but enough to make it shudder to a halt before trying to stop the second, but it had just enough room to come swiping downwards to slash the back of Dronin's head as she fell with a scream against the body of the Egg-Lantine. The world was falling around them, falling faster as she felt her body become weightless more than Robotnik's machine, the rain struggled to keep up around them whilst Maurice held on by gouging his scythe into the steel clutches of his foe. Staring upon the dome of seething hate, the voice of Robotnik burned through his ears as his body kept pushing down against the gravity, the grand Metropolis Zone a blurring tower of jade behind him as piece by piece the Egg-Lantine began to peel off its petals and show wires of a wholly different machine underneath.

"I AM YOUR MASTER

AND IF I TELL YOU TO DIE

"YOU WILL DIE, BECAUSE

YOU ARE MY SLAVE

"I...am not

your slave

WHAT

"I...AM

NOT YOUR SLAVE

STOP FIGHTING ME YOU REJECT

"_I AM NOT YOUR SLAAAAAAAAAVE! _"

Charging through the air Maurice ripped into the glass weakening it further as the cockpit showed crackling ice across its surface. Burning steam rippled from the slicer's skull as he felt something burst in the back of his head with pinging screws flying off as he hacked further into the cockpit. The vines came tearing down once again as he dodged one and struck the other, but they recovered faster than he expected and slashed the back of his head open to reveal a black smoking crater that fumed with furious intent. He felt his body start to fail, his strength giving out as he raised his scythe and drove down into the weakest point of the cockpit that began to crack inwards on itself. The vines lashed him across the back, scarring deep, rending oil and fluids down his body to become black lines welted like blood. But he didn't care, he had nothing left, nothing except a future for those who were still alive to protect as he stared upon someone's face half-obscured within the glass. A face that wasn't human and not of this memory.

YOU HAVE NO FUTURE, STOP FIGHTING

i decide my future, not you

WHY WON'T YOU DIE ALREADY

because i already did

"And now you join ME!"

His blade cracked the tip just into the cockpit.

"IF I MUST DIE THEN YOU SHALL DIE WITH ME!"

"W-WAIT, NO, STOP IT!"

STOP THIS NOW

The further his blade went in the more reality fell apart.

HOW IS THIS HAPPENING, HOW ARE YOU DOING THIS

"I COMMAND YOU, AS YOUR SUPERIOR TO CEASE FUNCTIONIIIIIING!"

One of the vines managed to wrap round his throat. He kept thrusting his blade into the glass with deadened precision, his body starting to lose function as his limb became tighter with deathly grip, robotic mortis setting in as he felt his spirit wilting. He had been too long, too much he burned brightly like a flame melting the candle, but he had to do it. He had to. He had to stop him. The second arm coiled round his legs as they began to twist and sever his limbs to pull him apart like a wretched doll, feeling the creaking pop of his legs slowly dislocate out of their joints with a metallic crack.

"You, really think that destroying my Egg-Lantine will change anything?! Did you really think I was inside this thing the whole time?!"

"I...d-don't care."

"All you're doing is destroying another machine, just the same as I did with those corrupted rejects in that tower!"

"Y-you...won't...hurt me anymore."

YOU CANNOT EVEN HURT ME, FAILURE

not yet

He raised his scythe.

"But I can destroy you."

With final blow he ripped through the cockpit, just as Robotnik said he was not inside it, and the ground beneath them was coming fast as a great dark landscape spackled with water across the trenches that scarred the land in its ruined state. But he drove his blade deep inside its core with his last scream as there came a vile roar from the darkness.

NOOOOOOOOOOOO

The illusion shattered around him, the world falling away as the Egg-Lantine started to break into pixels from its central flower outwards whilst the mantis fell out of his own husk. The jade steel of Ryouma split open at the front to reveal Dronin in his pale-robed form with hooked katana in his grasp, plunging its cold steel through his true enemy's face beneath the memory. Renbie's face became trapped with paralysing scream as he felt Dronin's sword bury deep into his skull with a spurt of pixellated coding that bled in a purple stream of bits. He stared at the mantis in shock, his face covered in welts and developing cracks as the police dog shuddered with violent fits of his head now twitching with spasms. Dronin pulled his sword out with one clean slice, splitting the entire head in two with a gasping shiver and deep-bloodied amethyst that spittled in minute blocks down his chest and trickling off his ankles. The body of Renbie disappeared into an endless white space, melting into degraded bits as his cries of fury echoed throughout the void whilst memories resumed in fragments above.

i found him, hurry

don't take the blade out we might still save him

what happened to him

he was fighting, he fought to protect us

he fought the master, he fell off the metropolis

b-but, wait he should've been killed

get the other slicer's body quick

doctor, doctor we got an emergency

what the-who is this

they said he wuz fighting robotnik

wh-what

yeah, and he was still moving with that in him

that's...that's impossible

whaddaya mean

he couldn't have fought anyone, not with that blade inside him

but, but everybody said he did

you callin' em liars doc

_i can only tell you that he died immediately _

"...what?"

His eyes opened as he landed on solid ground within the infinite white abyss, his body lying upon a table with the blade thrust through his chest surrounded by a moletank, a rooster and a red piranha that swam across the marble ceiling.

"D-died, immediately?" the rooster repeated.

"His power unit," said the sturgeon, "it was impaled straight through, it's impossible to have survived that."

"M-maybe, maybe it missed?" winced the drilltank.

"Do you not SEE how much blood came out of it?!"

"I-i thought it wuz ketchup!"

"Whatever the others told you, I can tell you now that this slicer could not have survived this grievous a wound."

"B-but they all SAID he did!" squawked the rooster throwing his wings up. "They can't ALL be wrong can they?!"

"No...no they can't," muttered the fish swimming circular, "the body I can repair, if the CPU is not damaged I could save him."

"You think ya could doc?!"

"Let's get the poor creature out first. Give it a burial then I shall see about giving our friend a new life."

Time skipped, his body cleaned and the blade removed as he watched everything speed up. Badniks came and went, some remained and some left as vague shadows as days would pass until wires were hooked to him and the sturgeon appeared once again with the rooster and the mole.

"How long's it gonna take?!"

"As long as it needs to," said the sturgeon, "I have to reboot everything, most of the parts I managed to replace from the other slicer we found but his digicampal unit and emo-chip are destroyed."

"Wait ya couldn't find any working chips off 'em?!"

"None that were in good condition no, they were massacred. I can make a digicampal unit that will fit but no emo-chip that I can find intact so he may seem rather stiff on awakening."

"Well yeah," said the moletank shrugging, "he's not made o' rubber course he's gonna be stiff!"

"You know what he meant!" squawked the bird-bot. "I gotta go check somethin', YOU keep an eye on 'im and let us know if he wakes up!"

"I also have to collect some spare parts," said the fish slipping away, "please keep watch over our friend."

"Ooookay dokey!"

The two left as the mole sat with him, rambling words that flickered vaguely in his memory until one point the mole tried to pick up the crooked blade curiously examining it.

"Yer pretty armless there buddy, maybe I should put dis back on."

He tried to fit it on either limb. Neither of them fit, but something clicked.

System Rebooting...Stem-Core initiated, powering vital systems...Checking...

- Parietal Parse-Engine, Normal

He felt a cold wind rush through him.

- Motor-Soma Capacitor, Normal

He felt the warm steel against his back.

- Occipital Oscillator, Normal

The darkness became brighter around him.

- Temporal Tri-Cortex, Normal

A voice spoke out that he faintly recognised.

- Digicampal Unit, ERROR

"What is this?" he muttered.

- Emo-Chip System, ERROR

"What...wh-what is happening?"

- Power Slave Unit, UNKNOWN

"What is this sensation?"

- Thalatuner, Normal

"S-stop."

- Dual-Cerecores, Normal

"Stop, enough of this!"

- Real Time Clock Resetting to /01-01-0001/

"OH, yer awake!"

Rebooting Complete

The mole turned towards him grinning.

"You had a BIG long sleep, had to drag ya all thuh way here!"

"Enough." He walked towards the memory only to find a wall invisible against him.

"Did you know there used to be over THREE telephone cleaners?!"

"Release me from this network!" He started banging on the glass-like barrier.

"Why'd anyone need three telephones to clean, I thought you only needed ONE to call people!"

"Renbie, cease this, your trickery has failed!"

"I dunno why people wanna lick telephones anyway, they're not even that tasty!"

"Dronin," said his past self.

"YEAH, that's all phones are good fer anyway-wait whut?!"

"Dronin. Designation: Dronin."

"That...that is not my name." He stepped back away from himself. "That...that never was my name.

"I'm sorry."

A voice crept through the pale room as he turned with blade at the ready.

"I know this must be difficult for you."

"Who...identify yourself."

Fading from the white abyss was a red blur of a small creature that walked on air towards his head, gently hopping forwards with its four feet as Dronin gasped. The soft flicker of the chestnut-coloured tail brought with it the scents of wheat.

"Hello Dronin. I'm glad we could finally meet, face to face."

He kept his sword raised regardless towards the newcomer. Every step the spirit took towards him formed pools of sunset beneath his small form.

"I am not fooled Renbie. Release me from your control immediately."

"I'm not Renbie," said the squirrel, "I promise you. Renbie tried to break you, trying to trap you in those ancient memories so he could turn you into one of his servants."

"What makes you not part of his illusion?"

"Because he can't control what's not digital," he said stiffening his body with deep breath, "if I was an illusion of his then why would I be the one who broke you from it? The one thing that Renbie couldn't predict was a memory you did not have because it wasn't recorded in your robot brain."

"I-...that is..." his blade started to quiver as his eyes drifted slightly towards his past self on the table. "The sturgeon said...my wound was far too grievous. Your wound. And yet you managed to control me?"

"Yes," the creature hopped closer, "I died during that fight when that crooked blade plunged through me. But I couldn't leave, I couldn't...not without knowing what happened to my family."

"Your...family." He turned back towards him with slow frigid steps. "YOU...took control of me, because of you they forced me to become Ryouma, they took my voice from me because you manipulated my body to rescue your mate."

"Y-yes," the spirit stepped back crouching timidly, "when they first put me in you, my mind was forced mostly into a painful sleep, trapped between life and death and I struggled to feel anything but agony. Before they took out your speech chip I was able to feel the world around me, sense your thoughts and remember my name when our memories bled into each other. I let them call us Ludwig because I was worried if I said my real name that...they might think I wasn't obeying them."

"They, tortured me." He raised his sword that started to shake as his eyes burned with glimmering rage. "Because of you wresting control of me to save your mate they tore out my voice that I suffered to communicate with."

"I'm sorry!" he cried putting up his hands. "I just wanted to save my family! I don't think you're a bad robot, you didn't choose to be my prison! I couldn't let go even when he killed me, I needed to find my son, my mate, m-my family but I never found them!"

"At least you had a choice."

His voice dipped to a sudden snarl as he reared his sword back behind him, ready to cut through the entire world before him as he closed his eyes to full dim and shook even harder. He turned and threw his sword hard across the white space, clanging suddenly with a sharp pierce that sent black waves crackling throughout as he blinked his eyes open again before he felt his legs turn weak.

"...who am I?" He stumbled back to clutch his chest. "Wh-who am I? I am not Maurice because that is you, I am not Ryouma because that is the name of a slave, I am not Ludwig because it is a STUPID name and I am not even Dronin because that is someone else's name! I thought, when I was rebooted twenty-five years ago that I would be free, finally able to choose my own name and make my own choices for the first time without fear of rule from a slavemaster...but my own name is not even mine."

The mantis slumped and sat himself down with a hand upon his head, his eyes flickering as his chest became heavier by the minute to the point of burning a hole through his steel.

"What am I supposed to be when my name is not even my own, but one that was stolen like the blade that I have carried with me all these years, never knowing it belonged to a friend that I have robbed the memory of and used for my own?! Why...why is this happening?"

"You are still you," assured Maurice.

" WHAT AM I THEN?!"

His voice suddenly peaked with a scream not of his own as he clutched his face with a hand over his eyes.

"Was it me that fought against my master? No, it was you. Was it my blade that stood aginst the pale bots? No, that was Dronin. I thought I was free, I thought I was finally free but all I am is a puppet."

"That is not true!" cried Maurice running up beside his foot. "You lived a great life when you awoke, that was all you!"

"Why did you remain here?" He turned his head from him. "You could have departed, to where souls drift instead of possessing me with fake dreams!"

"I'M SORRY!" He hopped onto his leg trying to peer at his face with begging hands. "I-i just wanted to see my family again!"

"Your kind do not even live this long." The machine's voice tightened like his fingers round his face. "All you did was hide inside of me because you were ashamed to face them in the afterlife."

"THAT'S NOT TRUE!"

"I felt your guilt Maurice, do not lie to me." His head shook each time his voice dipped. "Did you ever stop to consider what I wanted?"

"I-i know, I know you wanted-"

"No. All you ever did was hide...inside of me. What is freedom to a shell when the ghost still remains inside it?"

His hand pulled away to look down upon Maurice. There were tears on his face, constant, shining beneath his golden pupils that flickered rapidly

"You turned your former prison into a suit of armour to protect yourself against your own selfish fears."

"I'm sorry. I-i'm sorry." Maurice shivered hugging against the robot's waist. "I swear to you, I never wanted to take your life from you, I-i just wanted to help-"

"If you wanted to help, you would have left after the metropolis fell. I am not ungrateful for what you did, but I will not forgive the fact that you used me like a toy."

He thumbed the tears from his eyes and showed the wet spots to him.

"This, is not me. I...I-i cannot have emotion, that was Dronin, that was Ryouma, that is you."

"No, no I, I know I should have left, when it was so obvious that...that I wouldn't find them again."

"Then why did you stay?" the mantis asked coldly.

"Because I wanted to protect you." He stared with boldened eyes towards the tearstruck machine. "You know what I felt, you felt my guilt but you also felt my need to help you because I...I-i don't hate you. I knew deep down that I would never find my family again, I had to accept that eventually but...maybe I could help you and make up for what I could've done. That sword you have, it only has a name doesn't it?"

"It does," said the former Dronin, "a name engraved within its data."

"But it has nothing else on it, no memories of fighting or any sort of moral codes written on it?"

"No." He looked over to his crooked blade abandoned in the space. "It does not."

"Then what has changed?!" he cried spreading his hands up towards him. "You were always the one in control these past years, just because your name was not yours to begin with doesn't change the fact that your mind has always belonged to you."

"Even if I have an unwanted passenger?"

"Exactly. I may not be able to help you with your name, but I can help you out of this place, at the very least for all you've dealt with."

"What will I do once I wake?" He lowered his head towards his feet. "What can a robot do with no name?"

"Anything you want. Like now at the end of this network, you can save hundreds of lives with a simple step. Please, come with me!"

Maurice leapt off of the machine's body and beckoned him to someplace deeper within the netscape. Resignation sent him onwards as he picked up his sword before following the soul wisp as scenes from his past faded behind him. He walked straight past without ever looking back, his eyes burning with the last of his tears before he came upon the true face of the network. Sitting on his throne bleeding pixels was Renbie, bathed in light as coding flickered across his body from the pouring wound of his head, struggling to pull himself free at the badnik's approach whilst Maurice hid within his shadow.

"N-no...no...h-h-how...you should have submitted t-to my routines."

"I do not...submit to anything, anymore."

"Imposs- ZRHRHRKHT! I-impossible...you c-can't defeat me like this."

"I have seen through your lies and this...ends...now."

He swept his blade out in one motion as he set it straight horizontal before his face as Renbie stuttered:

"Y-you sh-should have DIED, THIS WAS NOT- ZHRHRKHT -THIS WAS NOT HOW YOU DIED!"

"I have already died before, but you shall die many times before I am done with you, Renbie."

"_Wh-who...wh-who are you? _"

"Someone you shall never know."

"_ HHRRRGHHKH! _"

He buried his sword once again through Renbie's head, watching data coil round his blade and seethe through his hand to form a small data sphere that laid out into a keyboard of fuchsia, sucking the information free as the dog shuddered with eyes rolling back into his skull to stare upon the the sword that melted through his scalp like a blade dipped into water. He saw many things from Renbie's files; his plans of the cryptofarm for wealth and a burgeoning business to potential millions; the operations he made across the cities and targets to pick up as subjects; the true recording of an old human in his deathbed unedited giving a confession to dubious things; and lastly, the true location of his physical body. Downloading all of this he ripped his hand free from Renbie's skull as the dog wrenched against his seat.

"_ GH-GHUURHHHKH! Wh-what, you, g-get away, GET AWAY FROM ME!_"

The badnik said nothing as his mind began typing away on invisible keys, rapid strokes that flickered across his vision upon the purple sphere as the doberman struggled with what little strength remained.

"S-stop, STOP IT DON'T DO THIS!"

"Give me one reason," warned the badnik, "one good reason, and I will cease."

"Y-you...g-guh...I heard...overheard what you wanted."

"Yes?"

"I can give you a name...any name, anything you want, I-I have connections, I'll give you anything, a whole new identity, papers, RFIDs, everything."

"Can you give me a name?"

"Y-yes, any name you want, print it and publish on every cyberpass you want j-just don't do this to me."

He considered for a moment. But only that as he tapped the last few buttons and suddenly sent a code to wrap round Renbie's head with a terrifying speed, blurring jade numeric that whipped faster and faster as the dog tried to wrench himself even harder with all his strength from his seat.

"N-NO, NO, NOOOOOOO YOU BASTARD! YOU SON OF A BITCH I COULD'VE GIVEN YOU ANYTHING!"

"You cannot give me what I want," snarled the mantis, "it does not matter what name you print on a stream of data or a slip of plastic, it will never be a name I can carry in my steel."

"_YOU, Y-YOU, YOUUURRAAAAAAA-zhrhrkrh-AAAAAAAAA-ZKHRHRH-AAAAAAAAAAAARRRR-ZHRrhrjkh-AAAAAAAAAAA- _"

Renbie became suffering itself as it drove through his head, agonising from sheer intensity of the deepest burning destruction of his cortex. Then replayed back by four seconds and repeating the same agony, back four seconds again and played again even still as the mantis watched his command entry initiate a feedback loop of insufferable anguish. Torture within subroutine as Renbie was trapped forever in its feed, eyes turning livid as if about to burst when his head shook with frenzy, cracking his teeth from how tightly he clenched until the steel bent at his gums between wrothful screams. The mantis turned and pulled his sword free leaving behind the police chief to suffer in his loop eternal with Maurice following after, a flash of furred red that slipped up his leg to sit upon his shoulder as the world started falling in fractals around them.

"You'll wake up soon," he said as the sky dripped down cubes, "at least all of this is...over."

"And so we never meet again," said the mantis to his soul adrift.

"I know that...you do not want me here."

"Do you still plan on remaining with me?"

"Yes. Let me help you, please, I want to make it up to you."

"You owe nothing to me." He stared into the flat of his blade to see Maurice beside him. "I will not force you to remain, in fact I would prefer if you left."

"Really?"

"Your efforts to protect my friends I thank you for, but that is all. I want none of your dreams nor your pains and strife. You have already shown that I am nothing."

"I-i didn't mean...I just...please." The spirit clutched his head in frustration as the white cubes of rain turned intense. "At least let me help you find your name-"

"No." He turned the sword's blade to fully face himself. "No more. If you so choose to remain, do not interfere with my programming again."

"A-alright...alright, I promise."

"Do you swear on your family?"

"...yes." The blade's reflection turned slightly back to Maurice as the rain turned into a static sheet. "I swear on my family I will not...meddle, with your life again. But can I say something, just before we leave?"

"Very well."

"You may not have a name, but you have a heart, and that's far more precious a gift."

"That means nothing to a machine," he said as the endless world consumed them both.

"Maybe not...but it means something to me."

"Stonevoice?! Stonevoice wake up! Wake up!"

His eyes blinked open to stare at the face of Barkclaw nervously sniffing him. The raptor snuffled and licked his cold steel cheeks as he found himself standing in a small room of PC terminals lined in rows like a classroom beneath an impossibly-thick network of cables that stretched Yog-Sothian towards the infinite recesses of the base.

"I-i was worried, you were sleeping but you would not wake up!"

"How long...was I asleep for?" he asked.

"U-um...well, I slept too, I do not think it was more than a day."

"I see. Are you alright Barkclaw?"

"Yes, yes, the smallwings are still safe, no one has come to take them!"

"That is good."

"HRR-RRRHHHRHH! HOOOO! Hohhhh jeez!"

He turned his head to see Jack suddenly revive himself with a stagger against the desktop, shivering to almost collapse on his feet as he looked around himself with wide-open eyes and a gasping heave.

"H-hoh, shit, shit wh-what happened, where's Renbie?!"

"Gone," said the mantis.

"WH-WHAT?!"

"I disabled his programs and have trapped him within a feedback loop. Wherever he is in this facility, he cannot escape from his own body."

"Woah..." the croc rubbed his throat with a grimace, "but, wait, then where was he?"

"I do not know," said the badnik walking over to a PC desk, "we shall find him soon, he remains here along with every one of his victims now freed from the network."

"Yeah...the victims." Jack turned towards the ceiling with an idea turning in his head. "We found their minds but not their bodies, they have to come from a source somewhere in this place."

"I know where to find them."

"W-wait, you do?"

The mantis started typing into a specific terminal with green-and-black font, opening a command to start filling the entire screen with lines upon lines of text before something beeped. The back of the room slid open its wall with a grinding shudder that shook throughout the base, rumbling vibrations through Barkclaw's jaws that set him on edge as he forcefully held his position waiting for a potential enemy to approach. A large server room bathed in blue revealed itself as Jack gasped with eyes widening until one of them slid itself open to reveal his camera lens.

"H-hhhhhh...you...you found them. You actually found them."

Lined across the new room were a thousand reploid bodies held in containment fields shaped like that of server hubs, their eyes blankly staring like ghosts trapped in granite, wires planted in their heads that ran constant power towards the networks above. But they were not alone, for there In the far back of this hall of statues was their guard silent and listless. Renbie sat on his throne still hooked into the network, his eyes blankly staring at them with glassy haze and limp fingers clasping to his seat. Dead to the world beyond his cyber-prison.