Evil Overlords Have Feelings Too
by Jenifer Irwin

Part 3

"Hahaaa! I won again! Well, sort of," Robotnik said as he rode along in the pod on the Steel Snake's back. Arashi, sitting next to him, smirked slightly. "Well, he probably lost a lot more valuable equipment than you did, so I'd say you won."

"Plus, I've got the Chaos Emeralds... I really could have used these BEFORE I took over the world. Urh. Now, the only problem left is finding a suitable place to rebuild a base..."

Arashi smiled slightly and turned to pet the chao that were sitting behind the seats. The little creatures were so cute, especially Devlin the Devil Chao. For all his diabolical appearance, he was still just an innocent little baby-like creature, toddling around looking for food.

I'm really proud of him, Arashi thought as she glanced up at Robotnik briefly. And really glad that I met him. Life has never been so fun and adventurous. Plus, I never thought I would get to witness him personally ending Sonic's life. With me having betrayed Sonic! Hah! Ah, my hero...

He had been concentrating on flying the Steel Snake, whose movement was controlled by his mind alone, when he glanced casually at Arashi. The look on her face, it was... AUGH.

The ship lurched to the side, rocking violently, a manifestation of the doctor's inner reaction. Four chao were thrown into the wall and Arashi gasped as she was jerked sideways in her restraining harness. Robotnik quickly stared straight ahead again, bringing the ship under control.

Great. Just great, Robotnik thought to himself. Somehow I knew this was going to happen. I think it was there from the start. But I definitely knew when she darn near kissed me back there at the ruins of the base... I'm too fat, too ugly to be attractive, right!? Well, like I told Takar... just being diabolical has a certain charm to it... but I can't let feelings get in the way of my work.

He glanced carefully over at her so she didn't notice. She was too busy calming the chao down.

...can I?

He shook his head suddenly at his own thought, then masked the apparently reasonless motion by sneezing violently. Arashi looked up, blinking. "Getting a cold?" she asked, snickering slightly.

"Nah," Robotnik replied. "Dust in my nose." He sniffed slightly. No way. I can't let people know I have too many feelings. Just isn't me. I have to keep that nasty, heartless image that Sega gave me. Right?

He was approaching a city. Glad of this, he growled to himself as he struggled with his thoughts, and blew up the nearest building. Arashi glanced at the cloud of dust that resulted, metal flying everywhere, and wondered what he was doing.

"Yes! Boom! Explosions! Scrap metal! I am evil! Verrrry evil!" Robotnik seemed almost in his own little world as he continued to shoot rockets into buildings, watching with a strange glee as they exploded all over the place.

"I'm hungry," he said suddenly after about 6 places exploded, and descended towards the streets. The Steel Snake weaved its way through the city, frightening people in their cars and causing sirens to blare. The police didn't dare touch him, though--after all, he was Emperor Ivo Robotnik.

Hearing the sirens, a McDonald's employee glanced out a window, just as the wall opposite of that window burst in, bricks collapsing to the ground and dust flying up as a giant, silvery, robotic snake slithered in through the huge hole.

Workers and customers alike screamed and trembled, some frozen, some running out of the restaurant and away. The pod flipped open and Ivo Robotnik vaulted out, dropping to the ground, Arashi Codiv jumping out with four chao in her arms.

"Aherm, twenty Big Macs, twenty super-size fries, a large Dr Pepper, a large Mountain Dew, and four happy meals with small Dr Peppers, for here. And, of course, free," Robotnik said. He casually drew his laser gun, holding it down at his side as he shifted his weight to one leg, fist on hip.

"U-uhh... s-sir, w-we don't s-serve those d-drinks..."

Robotnik pondered. "Now let's see, I forgot how to work the safety on this..." He fiddled with the laser gun, one finger precariously gripping the trigger.

The cashier gulped loudly and said, "Uh, I'll... be right back, I'm going to go rob another restaurant and bring you your drinks! Very quickly!" He ran away with speed that could impress even Sonic. Adrenaline can do funny things to people.

The fear-inspiring customers took a seat at a large booth, waiting for their food. It was delivered to them quickly.

The chao were given their happy meals, and the 20 pairs of big macs and fries sat on the table before Arashi and Robotnik. He gestured to them, saying, "Take what you can eat." She moved just one big mac and fries over. Gladly, Robotnik took the rest, scarfing it all down with disturbing ferocity.

By the time Arashi was finished with her food, Robotnik was too. Which was frightening, considering he was eating 19 times more than she was. Customers and employees stared, jaws dropping. Robotnik looked up, acting quite annoyed, though he loved the attention. "What? I'm having LUNCH, for crying out loud." He brandished the laser gun, practically giggling inwardly as he watched them all force themselves to pretend to be overly interested in something else. Even after they all looked away, the tension in the air was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

The chao were playing happily with the toys they got from their happy meals when one of them broke. Balor, the one who had the broken toy, started to cry. Robotnik grinned across the table at Arashi and got up, approaching the cashiers, who went pale and started trembling in fear. Oh, how he loved having that effect on people. It gave him chills. He leaned casually on one of the registers and said, "You know what to do, right?"

With quick, frantic movements, the cashier produced every toy they had in the restaurant, shoving them all across the counter. Robotnik gestured to the four chao to come over, and they skipped over gleefully, picking out the toys they wanted. He snickered to himself and grinned over at Arashi.

Arashi had to do a double-take. The grin was almost... goofy. Like a teenager who just thoroughly impressed his girlfriend and is practically intoxicated from the victory. She gave him a slightly bizarre look, and he realized...

Gaahhhh! What am I doing!? Coughing suddenly, Robotnik resumed his gruff, nasty demeanor and gestured with the laser gun at the toys. "Yeah, that's it, take lots of'em," he said to the chao.

Getting a power high, Robotnik decided to terrorize more people as he ambled from table to table, looking down at the trembling customers who sat in booths or chairs. He snarled unexpectedly at a little boy, sending him running away crying in fear. Another person had to give up all of his money or be shot. Arashi noticed there were police cars sitting outside, but the policemen stood next to their cars, looking just as scared as everyone else.

Everybody knew. Everybody knew that this was Emperor Robotnik. Everybody knew that you do not mess with Emperor Robotnik.

Dozens of people trembled in his presence as he demanded money from random people. Nobody was hurt, but lots of people went broke that day. Robotnik smiled pleasantly and approached the Steel Snake as Arashi gathered up the four chao and hopped in. Turning back to the crowd, Robotnik silently slid a plate back on the laser gun, exposing the battery chamber.

Nothing was in it. He had held them all at gunpoint, threatening and robbing them, with an unloaded gun. When they all realized this, he could see the disbelief and despair on their faces, and he laughed maniacally before hopping into the Steel Snake and heading out.

Arashi grinned as they flew above the city and eventually away from it, just cruising along. There was no real direction to their travel, because Robotnik couldn't stop laughing. His laugh wasn't the severely masculine, deep, diabolical one that he usually used, it was an almost drunk half-giggle. He was completely high to the point of insanity on ego and power, and loving every second of it. It was infectious; soon, Arashi joined in the laughter.

Ah, yes, nothing like a couple of mad scientists laughing crazily as they soar over the plains on a beautiful Saturday afternoon.

Very suddenly, Robotnik stopped laughing, his jaw dropping as he stared straight ahead at something in the distance. Arashi looked at him in alarm, following his gaze. What was... oh, no... something racing through the high grasses with such speeds as to set them on fire... something spiky... something blue...

**

(30 minutes ago, in Takar's secret Earth-based lab)

"Yes... yes, that's it... Right... go on, computer, you can figure this out, I know you can..." Takar urged the supercomputer on as it crunched numbers, furiously scanning the ash samples for data. He watched the screen hopefully, desperately.

"YES! YES! I LOVE you, computer! I love you, Windows XP! You're so good to me! Well, usually!" The DNA data for both Sonic and Tails was coming up, clear as day, no pieces missing. Takar grinned evilly. "Time to give you two a bit of a boost."

The alien walked up to the strange device that he had created, which had a large door on one side and a funnel on the other. He cut his finger slightly, squeezing a few drops of purple blood into the funnel, and sealed the wound with his regenerative powers. Sitting back down at the computer, he typed a few things in at a furious pace, watching as some diagrams and 3-D renditions of Sonic and Tails changed and shifted. Tails became a bit leaner, Sonic a bit taller. Sonic's eyes glowed an even more vibrant green than they did before, almost a glow-in-the-dark quality coming to them, and Tails' blue eyes started glowing oddly too. A few checks over the data, and Takar saved his file. He clicked the 'compile and run' button, then sat back and waited.

The big device with the door churned and shuddered, and after about 5 minutes, Sonic spilled out of the door, looking quite surprised. Tails soon followed while the hedgehog was still trying to accustom himself to being alive again.

"What the heck!?" were Sonic's first words. He glanced up to see Takar and the lab, becoming alarmed for a moment. Then he realized that this was probably someone from the same band of aliens that brought him back to life from a corpse with a resurrection beam before.

"Welcome back to life," Takar said, grinning. "I'm Takar, Ykrian Leader. Would you like to get back at Robotnik? I've... enhanced you two a bit. I'm sure once you go out and start doing things, you'll find out what I mean." He leaned back in his chair, smiling smugly and quite willing to allow Sonic and Tails do all the dirty work for him.

Sonic stood up, panting slightly, and glanced at Tails. "Hey, you shrunk. And you lost weight."

"I think you grew, Sonic..."

The two glanced at each other uncertainly, noting the odd quality of their eyes and the slight change in physical appearance. Suddenly, Sonic remembered his main goal and said, "Time to go kick some butt! Thanks, green dude!" With that, he raced towards the door, Tails on his heels.

"Wait!" Takar yelled.

Sonic stopped and turned towards him, raising an eyebrow.

"Dr. Robotnik has all seven chaos emeralds... so watch out."

"Okay, Tails," Sonic said, turning to the fox. "You find a way to build another Tornado, and wait here. I'll get the chaos emeralds away from Eggman, and then I'll come back so we can power the new ship. You don't mind if Tails uses some spare parts of yours for it, do you, Takar?"

"Anything... and I mean anything, to rid the world of Ivo Robotnik."

Tails nodded, then happily ran over to a pile of stuff to start his building.

Feeling a little different, thus slightly unsure of himself, Sonic emerged from the underground lab and jogged in place for a moment. He started to run at about 20 miles an hour. He gradually picked up speed, arms and legs moving quickly as he became more accustomed to his form. Within moments he was moving faster than the speed of sound.

It didn't seem like it, though. He wasn't having to strain like he used to to do this. Quirking his mouth slightly in thought, he decided to really open up and give it everything he had.

With reflexes even faster before and a strange hyper-awareness to any obstacles that he had to clear, Sonic blazed through a forest, literally running across the surface of a large lake, sending a huge column of water rising up behind him. He began to feel out of control as no matter hard he tried to exhaust himself, he just kept accelerating. The skin on his face was pulled on by the air that rushed past him, pulling the corners of his mouth back. His legs were moving so fast that their entire range of motion was like a solid entity. Instead of jumping that next log, he ran right into it, his legs sawing it in half like a knife through warm butter.

Forgetting the fact that he might be out of control, Sonic just watched the scenery blur past him, exhilarated. He had never experienced speed like this before, even in his super and hyper forms. And he wasn't even breathing hard. Occasionally, he squinted at something in the distance, and found that his vision 'zoomed in' on it, but his hearing and sense of touch slightly diminished when that occurred. When he stopped squinting, everything went back to normal. Listening closely to the wind, the sound was amplified as his sight dimmed slightly... odd...

Sawing through a boulder and a few more logs, Sonic suddenly blazed out onto a plain, setting the grasses on fire as he moved over them like a bolt of lightning. Accelerating with every step, he continued on.

When he saw the Steel Snake, he gasped, and jerked his feet out in front of him to bring himself to a stop, creating some long ruts in the ground, but he managed. He looked up to see Robotnik lean out of the side of the pod, aiming a laser gun at his head. I am NOT going to die a THIRD time like this! It is just getting old for both me AND the readers! Sonic screamed to himself. He tried to dodge, but the laser caught him in the head anyway, searing through it. Oddly enough, he felt the pain. He was still alive. How!?

However, he tried to make it look like it did work, and slumped to the ground, limp. Oh, it hurt. It hurt bad. But he had to stay still and expressionless.

Robotnik stopped the Snake nearby and jumped out, carefully approaching the hedgehog with laser gun drawn. He noticed Sonic was, at the least, unconscious, and watched him carefully for a moment. He wasn't breathing, either.

Lifting one of Sonic's wrists, Robotnik felt carefully for a pulse. There was none.

Laughing, Robotnik yelled to Arashi, "Again, the hedgehog falls to my laser!" He pulled Sonic out of the ground and threw him in the cargo bay of the Steel Snake, then hopped into the pod and flew off.

Inside the cargo bay, Sonic lay wondering. He really could play dead. His heart and breathing stopped just as he thought it would be nice for them to do so, when Robotnik approached him. Takar really did infuse him with some interesting new abilities, including the night vision that he was experiencing right now. He glanced around inside the dark compartment, jaw dropping when his eyes landed on the seven chaos emeralds, all in a plastic grocery bag, along with a supply of rings.

Robotnik snickered to himself as he drove along, giving Arashi a smug glance now and then. This continued for a few minutes until he seemed to feel something... a large amount of energy... and the cargo door burst open as Super Sonic flew out of it, cackling.

"What the!? You're DEAD, Sonic! This is impossible!" Robotnik yelled in surprise, watching as the golden hedgehog soared through the air briefly, then started trying to smash the Snake's jets off. Quickly, the jets retracted into the snake's body, as did the pod, and it just coiled up tightly like an armadillo and hovered there in the air with gravity reversal energy, all the attacks bouncing off the high-quality rubber-steel. This continued for quite a while as Sonic's urge to break something stayed with him, but eventually he came to his senses and realized it wasn't going to work.

Dropping to the ground, he sped off back towards where Takar's lab was.

Robotnik and Arashi remained concealed in the snake's back, with the evil genius using the senses of the snake to realize that Sonic had run away. As the jets and the pod re-emerged from the giant serpentine robot, the occupants were startled to see and hear the entire world shake violently for a moment, and a brilliant blast of multicolored energy emitted from somewhere in the distance.

Looking up, the Steel Snake trained its advanced sensors in on a small object that was flying through the air. It was the blue chaos emerald! The pod lid flipped open and Robotnik quickly pulled off his racing harness, standing up and watching the emerald intently. As it neared, he maneuvered the Snake into position, then raised a hand slowly--catching the emerald expertly in a baseball glove.

Sitting down, he wondered how this could have happened. Arashi asked, "Where did you get the glove?"

"Oh, don't worry about the technicalities, this is a cartoon, after all," Robotnik said, then flipped down the pod lid, put his harness back on and headed in the direction that Sonic ran.

Finding Sonic was easy--his speed had burned a path of charred grass through the plain, and eventually into a deep forest, out onto another plain where trees dotted the landscape. At a certain point, near an oddly-placed arrangement of boulders, giant ruts had been carved into the earth by two high-speed feet, then the grass was pressed flat by what had to have been high-speed winds from something. About 2 miles away from the ruts in the same direction that they were traveling, there was Sonic... wrapped around a tree and quite dead.

Robotnik laughed so hard that he had to land the Snake to keep from crashing it.

**

It took all of Robotnik and Arashi's strength to pull Sonic off of the tree. Robotnik eventually deduced, from the length of the ruts and the fact that a trapdoor was smack dab in the middle of the boulder arrangement, that Sonic had tried to stop near the boulders but couldn't. He must have run out of rings by that point, and reverted to his true form, with his enhanced speed, plus the augmentation to it from his hyper form, not allowing him to stop quite like he predicted. When he tried to stop, he must have caused the ruts, then knowing that wasn't going to do it, he accidentally flailed in such a way as to catch air, then have a fatal meeting with the kindly tree that managed to help him stop. The impact sent the emeralds flying, and judging from the speed of the blue one, they flew pretty far.

How can you get that much information out of some burnt grass, ruts, flat grass, and a dead hedgehog stuck to a tree? Well, give me a break, Robotnik's IQ is 600 for crying out loud, he must know SOMETHING about forensic science.

**

In Takar's secret lab, Tails and the Ykrian leader wondered what the heck had caused the earth to shake like it did. Tails decided to investigate, and made his way to the surface, immediately noticing the ruts in the ground. As he was looking around, something slammed into his head. Hard. Everything went black.

A few minutes later, noticing that Tails was gone longer than he said he would be, Takar went to the surface as well, finding the two-tailed fox collapsed on the ground next to a red chaos emerald. Judging from where the wound was and where the emerald was, it must have fallen from the sky and struck him.

The alien leader dragged Tails into the lab, taking the chaos emerald with them, and put it in the Tornado II, which was the original purpose of collecting at least one of the emeralds. He tested out the vehicle briefly, making sure it worked, and then set to reviving Tails.

**

Robotnik pondered. I wonder where would be a place that's nice and secure, but looks good too... and is quiet, and where nobody would think to go... He pulled something resembling a permanently fixed laptop out of a panel in front of him, tapping a few things on the keys and searching for something.

"Let's see, now, I could program it to use its sensors to..." Typing furiously as his idea formulated, he finished the code in just a few minutes as the Steel Snake hovered in the air. Arashi watched, knowing exactly what he was doing as she saw the code fly across the screen, and soon the Snake was moving again, probing with its senses as it searched.

The pod on the Snake's back sank down into its body and steel plates moved to cover it up, concealing the pod entirely. Robotnik flicked on a light, and inside of the Snake, the environment was almost surreal. A constant, vibrating hum permeated the air, but it was otherwise silent.

"Don't want the force of dirt pressing against this thing to snap it off or pop it open," he explained, concentrating. Pulling a small container of something out of a glove compartment, he handed it to Arashi. "Drink that. It'll help you keep from throwing up." He handed four smaller containers to the chao as well, then drank one of his own. Arashi looked at him dubiously. "You're not going to do what you did when we were fighting the UFOs, are you?"

"Gonna do worse," he said matter-of-factly, waiting a few moments for whatever the liquid was to kick in. Everybody got an odd tingling in their stomach, and Robotnik pulled several straps out of the seats and walls. He strapped the chao firmly to the back wall, telling them not to worry as he looked at the wide-eyed, confused expressions, then secured Arashi's head to the back of her seat with a strap around her forehead. Pulling a last strap around his own head, he took a deep breath and started concentrating again.

A rabbit screeched and leaped away as a giant metal thing slammed into the ground nearby. The Steel Snake's nose penetrated several feet into the earth, and it pushed downward as its entire body started to spin madly, drilling through the ground. It disappeared within seconds, leaving the rabbit dashing frantically over rumbling grasses.

Inside the pod, it was utter chaos. All six occupants were screaming, perhaps in fear, perhaps in confusion, perhaps just for the heck of it, as the Snake spun on its axis at blurring speeds, the centrifugal force seeming to try to pull everyone in all directions at once.

"AAAaaAAAaaaaAAAAaaaaAAAAAAAGHHHHH!" Robotnik had rather underestimated the power of the Steel Snake, and he was screaming the loudest, being the only one that finally, truly understood just how powerful it could be. Down, down the Snake went, drilling over 1000 feet into the ground, before it finally exited in a giant underground cavern, above a huge lake. Another 3000 or so feet it fell, until it splashed into the water, sinking to the bottom.

It took several moments for the two to come to their senses as they sat there blinking, and finally, Robotnik looked over at Arashi. "That was COOL," was all he could say.

The Steel Snake slithered out of the water and came to rest coiled up nearby. The pod rose out of its back and Robotnik grinned slightly as he and Arashi got out. Looking over at her, he knew he'd picked the right place. She stared around in awe, practically staggering, as she looked at the interior of the cavern.

Thousands upon thousands, even millions, of tiny gems were encrusted on the walls, covering them, sparkling brilliantly. Every turn of the head produced a new look to them as some light that shined down through the hole in the ceiling reflected off the lake, bouncing dim light onto the crystals and giving it a surreal atmosphere.

"Wow... wow," Arashi said, blinking.

While he couldn't reciprocate on the occasions that she hugged him, Robotnik could at least build his next base in the most beautiful cavern in the world to make her happy. He glanced around, quite impressed with it himself, and thought about how exactly he was going to design the new base.

Airborne, underwater, affixed to the walls or ceiling? Maybe even the floor? Perhaps a base that ran a ring around the lake on the floor? There were so many possibilities. But it had to be secure, not easy to access the inside, and big.

Though, why keep everything in one building and risk it all being destroyed at once again in the event that someone started blowing up his stuff? He decided on a central control point--built in the center of the lake with bridges on all four sides to lead to its shores--and various bunkers in the water and around the lake. There would be underwater tunnels to lead from one building to the other.

Now, where to get the materials.

"Arashi, can I have your backpack?"

**

Using the materials that he could find within the unknown recesses of Arashi's backpack (women can put lots of stuff in their chosen containers), Robotnik began to build. Arashi sat on a boulder near the edge of the lake, watching in blatant admiration along with the four chao as Ivo walked across and climbed on beams, every movement easy, flawless and familiar to him as he worked on the huge central building. It took shape into a giant fortress of steel, running underwater where the doctor used an oxygen tank to sustain himself while he built down there. The bridges were placed, and more bunkers scattered about, and finally, after 12 straight hours of work, it was all finished. A giant, transparent, protective dome was placed around the entire area, and the hole that had been created by the Steel Snake was turned into a metal shaft with dozens of doors so that getting through it would be difficult for any outsider. Lights were installed in a ring at the edges of the cavern to make seeing easier, and the place was, all in all, awesome.

Total, the base had 250 rooms, with reinforced steel walls 10 feet thick. Most of the rooms would never be seen again, but it's pretty cool to be able to say you've got them. Probably only the kitchen, living room, lab, bedrooms, bathrooms and bunkers would ever really be used.

Walking up to Arashi and flipping a wrench in one hand, backpack in the other, Robotnik gestured grandly. "Behold, the new Robotnik Fortress! Muahahaha!" He grinned, handing the backpack to her, and she jumped up from the rock. "Let's go in!"

The Steel Snake followed the humans and chao into the base, settling down in its new lab. Robotnik showed Arashi around to all the new and improved stuff... more candy dispensers on the walls, an endless supply of Mountain Dew for her and Dr Pepper for him, a bigger refrigerator, automatically flushing toilets, beds with ALL of the neat features you see on commercials for really good ones, the works.

When the tour was done, the two went into the lab. Robotnik opened the cargo hold on the Steel Snake and pulled out a very dead Sonic.

"There's only one way I'm going to be able to keep you from coming back to life, or being brought back to life by aliens, or whatnot, Sonic..."

Arashi watched in disbelief as Robotnik carried Sonic out of the lab and headed to the kitchen. She followed along, confused, wondering what crazy thing he was going to do next. Once in the kitchen, Robotnik stuffed Sonic into the funnel of the new microwave-pill-maker thing he made. Turning it on, he watched the machine groan and shake, churning as it processed the hedgehog into a small blue pill that clattered into the change-slot-like compartment.

Robotnik picked up the pill, grinning evilly.

"You're not gonna," Arashi said, disbelievingly, as the doctor picked up a glass of water.

"And why not?" he asked, popping the pill in his mouth and washing it down in a single gulp of water.

Arashi couldn't help but start laughing hysterically. "Hahahaha! Haha! I never thought I'd see you EAT Sonic!" She fell against a wall, laughing.

"Mmh. Tastes like chicken," Robotnik joked, staring at the ceiling in a moment of thought. He set the glass of water down, knowing that there was no way Sonic could be brought back to life unless he himself were captured or killed before his body absorbed the pill's contents. He decided to stay in the base for a while so it could do just that. After a few hours, they would go out to find the other chaos emeralds.

**

Robotnik was performing some upgrades on the Steel Snake, making it faster and with bigger rockets. Arashi sat nearby, petting the chao that sat in her lap as she watched the mad scientist work.

"The energy that these chaos emeralds give off can help me locate the other ones as long as I have this one," Robotnik explained. He held up the brilliant gem, which sparkled blue in the light of the room. Even though it was blue--and most blue things reminded him of his adversary--it was a thing of wonder and beauty. Becoming distracted, the doctor stared into its depths for quite some time, mesmerized.

I never noticed how beautiful these were, he thought to himself. In fact, I never really did notice any beauty in life until...

Snapping back to reality, he glanced over at Arashi for a split second, then turned back to his work. Noticing the glance, Arashi grinned slightly, then set the chao aside and stood up, wandering over to Robotnik and watching what he was doing for several minutes. The jets were getting an upgrade, and he worked on each of them in turn. He was quite aware of her watching him the entire time, but didn't really make moves to acknowledge it.

Deciding to take a small break, Robotnik wandered over to one of the many wall-refrigerators in the base, pulling out two cans--one of Dr Pepper and one of Mountain Dew--handing the second to Arashi. Snapping the Dr Pepper open, he started to take a drink.

This was the second she'd been waiting for.

"So, when should we get married?" Arashi asked abruptly.

Though all she was doing was trying to get a funny reaction from him in the first place, Arashi realized she shouldn't have stood in front of him. He twitched suddenly, making a shocked *snrk* sound, then choked violently on his Dr Pepper and ended up spitting it all over her, dropping the can too. As he leaned against the wall coughing and gasping for breath, Arashi practically fell down laughing.

"That... wasn't funny," Robotnik said as he pointed at her, trying to catch his breath, but he couldn't help but grin in amusement. "Not funny at all..." He started laughing.

I've really got to find a way to get back at her with some pranks of my own, Robotnik thought to himself as he passed by her, giving her a slightly mischievous grin. As he went back to work on the Steel Snake, a cleaning robot automatically came out and mopped the Dr Pepper off the floor, disposing of the can as well, and Arashi headed for the shower room.

As he worked, Robotnik started humming his theme song. A few bolts here, a plate there... "I love playin' this game by my rules... I will con-quer the world with mah tools..." By now, he'd left humming for singing the song. A few new circuit boards placed in the pod for homing missiles... "I am the en-em-y! I will succeed! My missions, yeah, I muu-ust complete! My name is Eggman, don't forget mah name--if ya ask me again, I'll show you the same!" It was pretty funny for him use a socket wrench as a microphone.

Especially to Arashi, who started applauding, grinning in amusement.

Startled, Robotnik whirled around. "Wha!?" Then he turned a deep shade of red. She'd seen the whole thing, hadn't she?

"Uh... hrph... you shower fast," he muttered, coughing, and went soberly back to work.

One thing was for sure, there was rarely a dull moment since she showed up in his base for the first time. He thought back to when she wasn't there, when he was awfully lonely... Even raising chao just didn't do enough for him, and before he'd started doing that, he was incredibly lonely. It would have been bad form to go out searching for someone, though. Evil Overlords just don't do that, unless they do it in such a way as to strike terror into their target, but he did that to everyone else already, so what would be the point?

The point is... I have too many feelings! "Argh!" Robotnik pounded on the side of the Steel Snake with his the heels of his hands suddenly, looking frustrated, as if trying to compose himself. Arashi glanced over, taking a sip of Mountain Dew. "Something wrong?"

"Nothing. My Carpal Tunnel Syndrome is acting up again," he lied, then walked away from the Snake and sat down at a lab control panel several feet away, sighing.

Poor guy, Arashi thought as she looked at him. He's got real problems dealing with his emotions. She sighed and walked over to Robotnik.

"Ivo, this is the price you pay for wanting more publicity," she said as she walked up behind him, putting her hands on his shoulders. "You wanted them to see the real Ivo Robotnik, right? Well, you're not letting them the way you're going!"

Robotnik sighed in resignation. "Could you bring me a Dr Pepper, please?"

"Sure thing," Arashi said, smiling slightly, and went over to the soda machine in the wall.

**

"Alright," Robotnik said, flipping a wrench in his hand triumphantly, "It's finished! And now we can track down the rest of the chaos emeralds!" He jumped into the seat, followed by Arashi, and they took off out of the underground cavern at a blistering speed. When the resulting g-forces crushed the two to the point that Arashi appeared to lose all physical hints of being female and Robotnik became thin, he realized that was a little too much speed at once, and slowed the craft down. All went back to normal, but both riders' ribcages felt awful sore.

Surprisingly, the nearest source of chaos energy didn't seem to be very far away. The Steel Snake soared through the air easily, towards Takar's secret lab. Robotnik hadn't investigated it when he first saw it because he wanted to get rid of Sonic completely first.

As the two world leaders headed over the forest, they saw something in the distance as they heard propellers spinning...

**

Tails was still a little dizzy, but he'd be alright in an hour or two. Takar seemed to dote over him like a loving parent would a child, getting him food and water immediately as he woke up, and making him as comfortable as possible. Obviously, the alien wanted to keep his anti-Robotnik weapons in as good of shape as he could.

As soon as Tails was feeling his best, he hopped in his new ship and headed out, thanking Takar for his help. He started getting readings from another emerald as soon as he scanned for them... and it was quite nearby.

"Tornado transformation!" the fox yelled in such a corny manner as his vehicle went from ground to air, turning into a biplane, and he headed off in the direction of where the readings were coming from.

Almost as soon as he got out over the forest, he saw the glint of sunlight off of something shiny...

**

"TAILS!" Robotnik yelled, cackling briefly. "How nice of you to come right to me!" The Steel Snake sped up, heading towards the biplane at incredible speed. As Tails realized what it was that was coming into view, his ears pressed flat against his head in fear, remembering what that thing did to him... He decided he was going to need Takar's help, and turned around to get out of there, but the plane wasn't fast enough.

The Steel Snake quickly came up beside the biplane, grabbing it with a strong robotic arm that extended out from behind a scale-plate. The pod lid flipped open, and Robotnik leaned out, grinning. "So nice of you to deliver the chaos emerald to me, Tails," he said, brandishing his laser gun.

Tails had to get out of there. In a desperate attempt to make it away from the mad scientist, he quickly turned the biplane, sending it slamming into the side of the Snake as he snatched the chaos emerald out of the Tornado and jumped out, sending his two tails into motion as they started to carry him away.

An idea flashed into Robotnik's head as he trained the laser sights on Tails. No, this is getting old. I think I'll try something a little different...

Arashi blinked as Robotnik tore the racing harness off, leaping out of the ship and using the biplane (which hadn't hurt the Snake at all) as a stepping stone, sailing through the air for a moment before he grabbed onto Tails' arms and kept a tight grip, hanging on. The fox screamed in fear, trying to shake Robotnik off of him, but he couldn't. The weight dragged him out of the sky, quite fast, and no matter how fast his tails went, he couldn't keep himself aloft. Robotnik wasn't doing anything but hanging there laughing cruelly.

Tails became so tired in his desperation that Robotnik could literally steer him, like a parachute, as they headed toward the ground quickly. The Steel Snake stayed hovering in the air, just as it was programmed to do if he leapt out, and Arashi watched, laughing, as he steered Tails towards a large tree.

Tails thought Sonic was heavy, but he didn't know heavy until he was forced to try to lug Robotnik through the sky. Nearly losing consciousness from the effort, the fox was helpless as his passenger pulled him down, slamming him into a tree headfirst at about 30 miles an hour. *THUNK!* Then they both smashed through several branches and fell into a bush, obliterating it. The force of the fall knocked Robotnik out cold, but Tails wasn't as fortunate--the mad scientist had fallen right on top of him, killing him instantly.

Though it was a bad fall for Robotnik too, he came to a couple of minutes later with no serious injuries and a great amount of amusement. It was worth it.

Taking the chaos emerald off Tails' corpse, the mad scientist summoned the Steel Snake and rode off into the distance towards his base, he and Arashi laughing maniacally the entire time.

**

"CRAP!"

Takar had seen the whole thing. He watched as the ships collided, as the Tornado eventually dove into the trees in a blazing spiral, as Robotnik had dragged Tails into the forest. He had seen the Steel Snake dive, then appear again, a fox tail stuck in the door of the cargo hold as the giant flexible ship flew away.

"Arrrghhh! I HATE you, Ivo Robotnik!" Takar snarled and stomped down into his lab. "I'm supposed to be superior to these humans! Yet they seem to thwart me at every turn! Why?! Whyyyyyy!??" The alien leader sat down in his chair and started to cry. See, Robotnik isn't the only Evil Overlord with feelings.

He started to plot, trying to figure out how to handle this situation. Pulling up the file for Sonic's DNA, he used a super-advanced satellite-like device to pinpoint the location of that DNA structure.

When a 3-D model of Robotnik flashed up on the screen, Takar promptly fainted.

**

"I wonder what fox seasoning tastes like on pizza," Robotnik said, crushing the orange pill up and tossing it over a slice. "On a side note, I think that Pill-Maker 3000 is the best thing I ever made." He gulped down the slice of pizza, grinning as he savored his victory, and stopped to take a drink of Dr Pepper after finishing.

Arashi could just see it. Ivo had consumed Sonic and Tails by turning them into pills--was he going to eat every enemy he ever made from this point on? Certainly a sure-fire way of getting rid of someone, though. She took a drink herself and reached for the last piece of pizza, just as Robotnik did, his gloved hand landing on hers.

Oh, god, one of these corny scenes again? Make it stop!

The two looked across the table at each other, eyes locking. A hint of nervousness immediately hung in the air as both lost words, even breath... Two hearts skipped a beat as they realized...

"Crap, we're out of pizza!" they both exclaimed in unison, and started hunting through Arashi's backpack for more.

**

"Alright, fat guy, I've got a little something up my sleeve that I've been waiting to use until just this sort of situation," Takar said, pulling out a device with a fake chaos emerald in it. He tapped a few things on the buttons, then grinned as he found the locations of all the other chaos emeralds using the fake one like a radar. With a super-fast pod similar to Robotnik's infamous escape pod, the Ykrian leader zoomed out into the sky, towards a plains area in the northwest, where the cyan emerald was.

He had to face many dangers to get all the emeralds. By the time he had them all, he had gotten half-mauled by a lion, fell off a bridge and slammed over some sharp rocks in rapids, was nearly crushed by a giant towering plateau that fell down when he extracted the purple emerald from a crack in it, and had to evade fire from military jets after stealing the grey one from the Pentagon. He'd dealt with all of that, there was no way the yellow emerald was going to pose a more dangerous situation than what he already faced...

And it didn't. It was lying out in the middle of a field, harmlessly, and he walked right up and plucked it from the ground with an insane grin. He had the five remaining chaos emeralds... now he could--

A passenger airliner that was flying overhead malfunctioned, and a giant block of frozen sewage waste fell out, slamming directly into Takar and knocking him out.

**

A few hours later, Robotnik was walking about the base collecting rings that seemed to pop up from time to time. Why were rings just lying about everywhere in the universe? Good question. No matter where you went--be it through the city, through a forest, underwater, even out in space--there were usually rings close at hand. It was strange.

A loud rumbling was heard as the entire base shook for a moment, and an earsplitting explosion blew the central building apart, sending twisted metal flying outwards at blistering speeds. Some pieces embedded themselves in the gem-encrusted walls, things even exploding as they impacted. Robotnik felt a searing heat blow him out of the base, sending him into the water since he was in the part of the base that was submerged. He thrashed to the surface, gasping for air, trying to reorient himself as he looked up at his obliterated base.

Realization flashed into his head. Arashi! She had been in there! Quickly, Robotnik pulled himself out of the water, calculating where she would be from what he observed of where pieces had been flying. Since she was in the living room, she would probably be in the northwestern part of the cave, by that huge pile of destruction...

Racing over to the pile of twisted metal, he saw the couch, overturned, half of it destroyed. Pinned under it from the waist down was Arashi, sprawled on her back.

"Arashi!" Robotnik yelled worriedly as he rushed to her, pulling the couch off of her. Gashes covered her body, and shards of metal were imbedded deep in her sides. Kneeling down next to her, he pulled her up into a half-sitting position, wincing when she cried out in pain.

Grabbing the front of his coat, she gasped weakly for breath. "What... h-h..."
"I don't know! Hang on, I'm going to go get medical supplies," he said, trying to keep his voice from shaking as he glanced over the serious wounds. As he moved to dash away, she tightened her grip on him.
"No... I... I'll be dead by the time you... get back," she wheezed painfully, eyes shut tightly. "Stay here... please... don't let me die... alone..."
Robotnik felt something icy grip his heart as he stared down at her in disbelief. "You can't be serious," he whispered shakily.
"I've never... been so serious," she replied, a pained sound escaping her as it felt like daggers were stabbing her lungs with every breath. Robotnik tried his best to keep her still as he held her tightly in his arms.

Pain made her take sharp breaths, and sharp breaths only produced more pain. Arashi weakened rapidly, Ivo staring down at her helplessly, not knowing what to do. After only about thirty seconds, she slowly became heavier in his arms, her head falling back as she mumbled something with her dying breath.

"...crap, I forgot to check my email..."

For what seemed like an eternity, Robotnik remained there, sobbing uncharacteristically in despair against Arashi's lifeless shoulder. Was this what it was like... to have feelings? To love somebody? Indeed, the highs were high, but the lows were unbearable...

Suddenly, a voice from nearby grabbed his attention. "How touching," came the fairly bored-sounding British accent.

The heartbroken scientist looked up to find Takar hovering in midair, smiling cruelly, his form glowing a neon green. Somehow, with only 5 chaos emeralds, he was in his Super Form. "You," Robotnik snarled, letting Arashi slump to the ground as he stood up. "You blew up my base! You destroyed everything! YOU KILLED ARASHI!"

"Your point?" the Ykrian leader asked, examining his nails briefly.

"I... HAVE HAD... ENOUGH OF YOU!" Robotnik screamed madly, his voice enraged and seemingly in physical pain for some reason. It sounded rather unnatural, causing Takar to glance up, quirking a brow. His expression went from triumphantly bored to slightly alarmed as the human started to glow a faint crimson.

Robotnik groaned in agony, both mental and physical, reeling and holding his head. His uncontrollable rage was taking over every fiber of his being, and everything was in pain. All he could see was red, even when he closed his eyes, and eventually he fell to his knees with a scream as his hands exploded, instantly replaced by robotic ones. Searing, sharp pain traveled up his arms, only to leave immediately as cold steel and oil replaced flesh and blood. His form changed and shifted, growing rapidly, and normal teeth were shoved out of their sockets as needle-sharp, steel teeth moved to replace them. The rest of his body changed, steel replacing everything, a sputtering aura of electricity crackling around him. Finally, he stopped screaming as his clothing seemed to stick to him, tightening until it became one with him, the design becoming etched into his metal skin.

Ultra Robotnik stood up slowly, training a stare of the greatest hate imaginable on his enemy, who was moving backwards in fear, sweat flying off his head.

"H-h-how did you change with only two emeralds!?" the alien asked, terrified.
"I was wondering something similar about you, lime boy," Ultra Robotnik replied, his voice filled with enough hate to vaporize any normal man.
"The Ykrians... we can change with only 5, because we're more in tune with chaos than you humans... but... Oh, why did I bring those two back to life!? I had no idea they were just pieces of you! THAT must be how you defeat me!"
"Pieces of me?!" the robot asked. "I ate them, you fool."

Oh, god, this is worse than I thought, Takar thought to himself, suddenly very, very afraid. He really means business... And Sonic and Tails... I gave them some of my blood... that's how he managed to do it...

Even Ultra Robotnik cringed at Takar's girlish screech of terror, but didn't wait long before he leapt at the alien, bent on revenge.

Takar skidded hard across the sandy ground as the giant robot smashed into him, much like he did the first time they met. Only this time, there were no guards around to pull the hulking pile of metal off of him, and the beating started. Over and over, fists pounded into Takar's face, smashing it in, and while it regenerated every time, it certainly wasn't a pleasant experience.

After about 30 punches to the face, Takar managed to throw Ultra Robotnik off of him and the two circled around each other, snarling. There is more than one type of snarl, however, and while Ultra Robotnik's was aggressive and nasty, Takar's was the sort that you'd see on a trapped, frightened animal.

Leaping forward, the alien slammed a foot into Ultra Robotnik's midsection, hoping to pierce the armor with brute force. Instead, he received a broken ankle, and as he was falling to the ground, the raging mad scientist grabbed him by the legs. Takar flailed helplessly for a moment, wondering why Robotnik wasn't doing anything, until he felt a dozen cold, needle-like objects sink into his leg.

"AAAAGH! HE'S GONNA EAT MEEEE! NOOOOoOooOOooOOO!" the alien screamed in terror, managing to flail enough to get out of the robot's grip, his wounds healing immediately. Then he decided that he was not going to lose.

Leaping into the air, the alien fired a giant beam of chaos energy at Ultra Robotnik, who dodged it easily and leapt forward with a vicious punch to the gut. Takar went flying backwards, wind milling his arms as he splashed violently into the lake, and the robot was heading right for him.

Giant barrels of some sort of gun replaced Robotnik's hands as he splashed into the water, firing homing torpedoes at Takar as he headed for him. The alien detonated the torpedoes prematurely with another beam of some sort, blowing them up in the robot's face, and one of his sensors was damaged along with his steel mustache, half of which got ripped off in the explosion.

Temporarily stunned by the blast as he put most of his system resources into trying to repair the sensor, Ultra Robotnik was pelted with chunks of giant stones that ripped themselves out of the walls and floor of the lake, slamming into him and tossing him around. He decided he could still win with only one sensor, realizing that more important things were getting damaged, and rocketed towards Takar, ramming him with a headbutt that would have instantly killed a normal person. Distracted due to the blow, Takar stopped with the onslaught of boulders.

The fight raged on with neither really winning, and suddenly Takar burst out of the water, followed close by Robotnik. The alien grinned down at his pursuer.

"Instead of killing you, I think I'll make it so that there is no hope of you ever seeing Arashi again," Takar said.
"What do you mean?" Ultra Robotnik asked, growling.
"I mean I have a life-restoring device back at the lab... but I'm going to go destroy it," he said, cackling. "My race is the only one that can build these, using ancient talismans that are all gone save for one, Roboboy! And heck if I'm going to let you have any chance of accessing it!" The alien cackled madly, bursting through the shaft that he'd managed to open up, heading for the surface.

Ultra Robotnik smirked and... doubled over in pain as electricity crackled around him. Crap! His teleportation mechanisms had been damaged!

The race was on.

**

Takar ran along, arms and legs pumping furiously, towards his base. Looking behind himself, he saw the ponderous machine clanking along slowly and laughed. "Piece of cake!" the alien thought to himself, and faced forward again, grinning evilly.

Finally, Ultra Robotnik's jets had warmed up, and he shot forward, hovering over the ground slightly, seeming to slide on jets on the bottom of his feet as he moved as if rollerblading. The scene was hauntingly familiar, somehow. He started to catch up to Takar, who was too caught up in his supposed victory to be paying attention. Though the alien's speed remained pretty much constant, the robot's jets became stronger every moment, propelling him forward at well over Mach 3.

Takar screeched as he felt metallic fingers clamp on the back of his neck. Running faster than the speed of sound didn't allow him to hear Ultra Robotnik closing in on him, and he was suddenly flung backwards several dozen feet, slamming into the ground hard and sliding painfully for quite a distance, getting a severe case of road rash. The robot continued forward with grim determination, setting grass ablaze as he sliced through it.

Soon he was in the forest, completely ignoring trees as he ran right through them, leaving perfect cookie-cutter cutouts of himself in them, the huge chunks of busted-out wood clattering to the ground. His speed was up to Mach 4.

A brilliant light burst out in front of him about a half of a mile, and Takar ran out of it, leaping over a few logs and boulders. Chaos control, the robot thought to himself, snarling. He sliced right through the boulders and logs in his efforts to catch up with the alien, who was quickly gaining speed in desperation. Having reached his top speed, Ultra Robotnik was unable to catch up with the alien, who had been propelled to his top speed quickly by the Chaos Control, before they got to the plains. He could see the boulder arrangement with the trapdoors now, and thought all hope was lost... Arashi...

That's when Takar suddenly reverted to normal form, seeming to have run out of rings. He panicked, screaming, and tried to stop, his feet slamming into the very ruts that Sonic created not too long ago. Then he tripped at the end of the long ruts in the ground and flailed out of control, screeching as he went flying off into the distance.

A parachute, like those on drag racers, burst out of Ultra Robotnik's back as he activated his reverse jets, the parachute helping to bring him to a stop much easier than the unfortunate alien who, by the time the robot had stopped, caused the entire world to shake yet again by wrapping himself around that same tree that Sonic met his end with.

Such a nice tree, helping to stop people all the time...

Just as Ultra Robotnik came to a stop, chunks of metal began to fall off of him, revealing his normal self underneath. He stumbled towards the trapdoor in the ground, various pieces of steel bouncing to the ground behind him, and when he had finally reverted completely to his normal self, he collapsed into the dust, exhausted, his hand on the trapdoor handle.

**

When he woke up, it was late at night. Robotnik had a fitful sleep, with dreams of Arashi's death and related events replaying over and over in his mind, one nasty one in particular involving Takar winning the race and destroying the device.

Slowly opening his eyes, the doctor spotted one of the chaos emeralds nearby. He felt weak as he reached over and picked it up with a shaking hand, tucking it in his pocket, and had to put some effort into pulling the trapdoor open. Once he got himself down into the lab, he saw the various devices--a high-tech computer, a large cabinet-like contraption, and some kind of sliding door at the back. For now, since it looked big enough to hold one or two people, his interests lay with the cabinet, and he sat down at the computer chair, fishing through a drawer for any sort of instruction manuals.

Surprised that Takar learned from his mistakes with the Windows 98 book and apparently had organized his earth base, Robotnik pulled out the manual for the computer/cabinet combination, titled, "Life Box Instruction Manual." He flipped through it a couple pages, finding that there were only a few pages to the actual manual--most of the thick book was simply rewrites in Ykrian, English, Chinese, Greek, French, Spanish, German...

The instructions read...

Using the Life Box is a simple process. Place any DNA remnants of a person in through the cabinet doors and close the doors, then add whatever mutation agents you would like to the mixture by dropping them in the funnel on the side of the Life Box. Once you are done, run C:\DNA.EXE and make sure the being has changed as you wish. Then click the 'compile and run' button and wait. They should exit the cabinet shortly. To check what mutations a given agent will provide, just click on 'Mutations?' in the toolbar. It is possible to check your own DNA structure and distinct traits you have by stepping in the Life Box and pressing the 'scan' button on the keypad in there. Remain calm and still as the white beam moves over you, and when the green light on the keypad begins blinking, you can exit the Box and examine your file on the computer. You can also mutate yourself by adding the desired agents to the funnel, then stepping into the Box and pressing the 'Mutate' button. A gas will start to fill the Box--do not panic, its function is to put you to sleep. Trust us, if you attempted to change your DNA structure with the Box whilst still awake, you would seriously regret it after you recovered from the extreme pain. We are not responsible for any nasty things you end up doing to yourself with this. Just ask yourself how far you trust Windows XP to handle the files, and act accordingly.

Robotnik looked at the computer and the Life Box. I trust Windows XP about as far as I can throw the planet, but it's my only chance.

He investigated the sliding door, finding that it contained a hangar of sorts with a UFO in it. He walked under the small craft, which closely resembled the pod on the Steel Snake's back, and glanced up into the interior. Black leather, a nice control panel, a giant laser gun, a CD player... a pretty nice little vehicle all around. He pulled himself up into the cockpit and closed the door, examining the controls. There weren't very many, so they wouldn't be too hard to figure out.

Pressing one button caused the laser beam to fire, blowing out half the wall. Robotnik jumped, then snickered to himself. "That was kind of cool," he mumbled idly, then tried another button. The hangar door above him opened. Must be the garage door opener! A few more buttons, and after smashing into the walls by putting it in the wrong gear, he was up and flying through the air. The ship was absolutely silent as it sped along towards his underground base.

Robotnik was grim, trying not to get his hopes up, not knowing if the Life Box would really work as he brought the Steel Snake over from a pile of rubble. Miraculously it had survived the explosion, and he ditched the alien's pod for his own vehicle, strapping Arashi's lifeless body into the passenger seat. Then he began the trip back to the alien's base.

**

The Life Box thrummed quietly as Robotnik clicked the 'compile and run' button. He watched the box hopefully for a moment, then turned his attention back to Arashi's file. It was rather interesting to see various traits of a person... like high intellect, mechanical aptitude, mathematical aptitude, excellent sense of humor, tendency towards evil, great kisser-- what the!?

Thinking back, the doctor realized the computer was right, at least. A few seconds later, the Life Box stopped humming and the doors flew open, Arashi stumbling out, every wound healed.

Robotnik sat, immobilized with shock. It worked. Something vitally important actually WORKED in Windows. Holy crap on a stick.

The first amazed word out of Arashi's mouth: "COOL!"

As the two looked at each other, Robotnik leapt out of his chair in slow motion. The few steps across the room to each other seemed to take forever, with a field of tall grass and sunshine as the background for the clip... Ah, yes, another corny reunion. At least they didn't yell pet names for each other. Evil Overlords, Even Those Who Have Been Thrown Way Out Of Character By Fanfic Authors With Strange Ideas, don't do pet names.

We can only hope, anyway.