Badniks!

<div id="i4c-draggable-container" style="position: fixed; z-index: 1499; width: 0px; height: 0px;"><div data-reactroot="" class="resolved" style="all: initial;"></div></div>When I came back to the village, I found out that the situation was even worse than I thought.

The Chaotix (well, Vector and Espio; Charmy was annoying), Rouge and Gemerl were good fighters, I couldn't argue with that, but they were only five against, what, a hundred Badniks, many of whom could fly and attack from the sky? And Gemerl couldn't use his rockets if he didn't want to damage the village. At least the team was also helping the villagers get inside their homes.

Still, that didn't change the fact that the robots were attacking the place I had been calling home for an entire month, whose inhabitants, after fearing and distrusting me for my past, eagerly accepted me after I proved myself.

But why? Why were they attacking Floral Forest? Thte Chaotix had told me that after 'my' previous defeat, many Badniks had remained operational, although with greatly dimished effectiveness and coordinative capacity, until a bit more than they day I came, when they suddenly became much more organised, as if someone was directing them. That meant that they were being controlled by someone capable of turning the remaining robots into a force to reckon with, at least if you're not a certain blue hedgehog or any of his named friends that aren't children.

Did whoever was now directing them try to obtain a wind turbine and reverse-engineer it? There were other, much more efficient yet dangerous power sources out there. Were they planning on capturing and using the mass driver cannon? As a delivery tool it wasn't that good, but if repurposed as a weapon, only missiles could surpass it in effectiveness, and even then, missiles could be intercepted. 'course, the cannon was unmobile, but they might just had wanted to copy it's mechanisms somehow. The hovercars? Many of them could fly anyway.

Because of me?

I had to shake those thoughts from my mind, had to fight with head unclouded if I didn't want to get my other arm broken, or worse.

Worst of all, though, was that the Badniks were targeting the wind turbines AND any hovercar they could see. The same that not only costed me a lot of time and materials to build, but also were the reason people here liked me and gave me a chance. And now my new life was being destroyed by my figurative past.

I WOULD turn those things into (also figurative) ammunition for the mass driver!

"AHA!" I heard Vector's nasally voice scream triumphantly behind me, not having to turn to know that the irated reptile was stomping towards me . "I knew we shouldn't had trusted you!"

Fortunately, Espio, who was fighting the Badniks with his agility and kunai, and Charmy, who distracted them so either Vector and Espio could destroy them, were not stupid enough to assume things without solid proof, especially given that I was fighting the Badniks too. Didn't stop me from grabbing the accussing crocodile by the chain on his neck when he got close to me.

"Do I look like I remotely enjoy seeing my home and my work being destroyed by tin can soldiers, lizard boy!?" I screamed at the pointing reptilian. "And for the record, THEY ALSO ATTACKED ME!"

"Oh, right..." Vector ooed sheepishly before nonchalantly tail-slapping a motobug away. "When you say it like that, it makes sense... Why is your arm broken? And where's Sonic?"

"I've no time to chide an alligator for being stupid and unassuming! Just scrap 'em before they destroy the town!" I screamed at him before letting him go and returning to my one-man robot apocalypse, stomping, kicking, headbutting and punching with my good arm any robot that was close enough and lunging at the rest. You know, I don't know why did Eggman design them like that, like goofy animals or cliche clunky robots in the case of the Eggbots. I mean, sure, many Eggbots used guns (not laser guns that fired laser 'bolts, actual, bullet-spewing machine guns that spent cartridges), but they simply looked stupid to me. Why was Eggman obsessed with egg-shaped machines instead of, dunno, a tripod with a genuine laser beam and gas bombs, or a sectopod-like walker that... Nevermind, no more digressing for now. Yes, I said a one-man. Gemerl was breaking enemy robots left and right, the Chaotix were at scrapping them too, and Rouge was channeling her inner Chun-Li, but I was utterly and completely PISSED.

No matter how big they were, how fast they could run/fly, or how many came at me, I destroyed any stupid enough to face me directly, but had to restrain myself, else the critters powering them would have been turned to paste. It made me feel good, protecting my home and my work, but the numbers made me wonder, just how many Badniks did Eggman have? How many factories that put small animals into robots?

My line of thought and robot-wrecking was interrupted by a familiar female voice screaming.

"Cream!"

It was Vanilla and Cream (and Cheese), who for some reason were not hiding at their house. I had no time to ponder on that, because there was an Eggbot standing right in front of Vanilla. It wasn't that intimidating, I was taller than it by a head, but compared to your averave, 1 meter tall mobian, it was titanic.

And it was aiming a gatling gun right at them.

"VANILLA! CREAM!" I screamed as I forced my way towards them.

I still remember perfectly what happened next: the older rabbit staring at her incoming death like a deer staring at the headlights of a car coming from the darkness, and yet somehow still putting herself between the killbot and her daughter: me running at full speed towards them, the gun starting to rotate, gunfire, a sudden, sharp pain erupting in my chest, being sent flying backwards, blood coming from my chest...

Have any of you been shoot before? If so, you know just how much does being shot point-blank with a machine gun HURT.

"EGGMAN!" Vanilla screamed as I was thrown backwards by the force of the bullets. I grunted in pain and spat a glob of blood, but that didn't stop me from running back towards the Eggbot and punching it's head off. Without hurting the terrified pig that jumped out, of course.

"Eggman!" Vanilla exclaimed in horror as she saw the bullet holes in my chest, blood coming out from them. "You've been shot!"

"Nah, it's nothing I can't handle." I said, trying to calm the rabbits down. "Say, do you have alcohol or something for the wounds?"

"Stay here, I'll go for the first aid kit! Cream, Cheese, stay with him!" She said before running towards her house. I smiled before coughing blood.

Thing was, it wasn't nothing I couldn't handle. How did bullets accomplish what punches strong enough to annihilate reinforced steel didn't!? Yes, those bullets were more like 20mm shells or bigger, the barrels nearly touched my chest, and many DID flatten, but still, how!? In the games Sonic could survive a few shots just fine! Granted those were games, but still...

"Eggman." Screamed a voice as Sonic appeared in front of him. "You've been shot by an Eggbot!"

"I'm fine."

"No, you're not fine!"

"How does it feel to be attacked by your own creations?" Said another voice behind me. I knew who it was, that stupid living weapon that should have stayed knocked out, and I wasn't in the mood to even look at him. Didn't stop me from humouring him because, frankly, I couldn't stand him having the first and last word.

"Last time I checked, the only dangers a wind turbine poses are when the wind is strong or the generator electrocutes someone." I retorted with a grunt. I only considered 'creations' those I made with my hands, not through an assembly line. Hell, I'm pretty sure Eggman's most powerful creations and vehicles that weren't the Death Egg, like Metal Sonic, were build by him on a workbench. As far as I cared, I didn't make these things, not caring that 'my' factories had manufactured them. "As for hovercars, don't jump in front of one that is being driven."

"That's for cars too."

"Yeah, but hovercars can fly faster than a car can be driven and the impact... Why in Sam's Hill am I discussing driving conventions with you while I'm bleeding to death!? We have to take out the robots!" I exclaimed before spitting a glob of blood.

"WE will take care of the Badniks!" Sonic said, trying to make me sit. "You get to cover with the others, you're bleeding like a, heck, I don't know, but you're bleeding!"

"It's bleeding like a stuck pig, and I'm not hiding anywhere! This is my home, and I won't let these trash cans destroy it!"

"Wait a minute." Said Charmy. "These are your robots, right? As in youjustbuiltthemandthereforeareyourcreations!" He frantically said when I glared at him.

"Yeah? Can't remember making them, but I suppose. What does that have to do with anything?" I said, panting. It was getting harder and harder to breathe.

"What does... They never attacked you before, and definitely didn't make you bleed!" Sonic screamed at me, gesturing at my wounds. "Well, not directly, and one time it was because of the Deadly Six controlling them, but still, you can't fight like that!"

"Sonic , I've been shot, SHOT, in the chest, by one of my so-called creations. Even before that, they didn't stop when they charged at me the moment they saw me coming."

"Yeah, but that was because you were wrecking them first, right?" Charmy said. "Besides, you don't really look like, well, you, with all those muscles and that beard, and no googles."

"Uh, now that you said that..."

"Guys... I don't feel... very good..."

And with that I blacked out. The last thing I saw was Vanilla running frantically at me and screaming my name.

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