Some Planning

"... and then Eggman saved my butt by blowing it's head off after nearly hitting my torso. The end."

"Gee, direct much Eggman?"

"He was strangling Sonic, what else did you expect me to do?"

"Rush it and cave its head in with your mighty fist, maybe?"

"Har har har, knuckle boy. Just because it was in the heat of the moment doesn't mean I'd resorted automatically to melee when I had guns on hand-"

"That's enough!"

After taking our little confrontation with 'Metal Sonic' and leaving Vector and Espio at the hospital, Charmy staying with them, me and Sonic returned to Restoration HQ. Amy, Tails and Knuckles (who had received a message midway to Angel Island and begrudgingly decided to come back here) were already there, alongside Vanilla, Cream and Cheese. We told them of

And yes, Vanilla did not care at all that her car had been trashed, only that I had burned my exposed arm when I rescued those people.

"Eggman, I know you want to show people that you became good and be a hero, but you need to be more careful." She said as she applied that thingy people use to treat burns. Yes, I don't know how it's called, never got burned.

"Welp, look at the bright side, now you know why the Badniks have been getting organized."

"Yeah, because they're directed by someone with your intellect and Sonic's abilites and stamina." Tails said.

"Wait..." Sonic said as he looked at me. "Eggman, I know you said you don't remember much of your past, and after our run-in with Metal Sonic I'm now sure you're honest, but maybe you could remember some of your old plans?"

I shook my head. "Nope, sorry kid." I could, of course, tell him of the Metal Virus, but I had forgot if Eggman had created it before becoming Mister Tinker or after having his memories restored. Yet. "'Course, there may be something in my old bases, records for possible plans and such. If I could remember where they are at all that's it."

"I know the location of one!" Tails chimed. "It's not that far either, just thirty miles southward!"

"I'll pull out the call to the rest of the Resistance." Amy said. "Hopefully with all of us looking, we can find out what's going on before the sitation worsens!

"Okay, we've got a plan, and a place to look." Knuckles said. "But what if it's not abandoned?"

"Knuckles." I said, prompting the echidna to look at me. I raised my good arm and flexed it. "Look at THIS." Then, I pulled out my revolver. "And THIS. Plus, Sonic is Sonic, you think a bunch of tin cans are a danger."

"Well, depends on the model of tin can. Some can get big." Knuckles pointed out.

"That's what the rifle is for!"

"Oh no!" Vanilla chided as she tried to hold me down, without success (mostly because I was still sitting). "You're not going anywhere, not with that arm."

"Oh, c'mon Miss Vanilla, what could be worse than the Fastest Thing Alive and the Smartest Engineer Out There fighting together to reach?" Sonic said.

He jinxed us

..........

"C'mon man, step it up!" Sonic exclaimed as we dodged lasers sent our way by Badniks guarding the corridors we were running through.

It turned out, the place was indeed defended, and heavily so Knuckles had decided to stay a bit longer on Resistance HQ, in case Metal Sonic decided to attack it directly.

"A bit difficult trying to catch up the Tastest Thing Alive when you're the Smartest Engineer Out There and the Thing is way faster than you, don't ya think?!" I screamed as I sprinted after him, shooting or punching any Badnik that got too close for comfort, while also trying to get through the doors before the closed on me, or on top of men. I mean, I could had always just forced my way through, but then Sonic would had gone further inside without me, and I'm fast, but not that fast.

"'Tastest'?!"

"Just shut up and keep running!" I replied as I fired on a flying robot.

The last door was closing, but just as did something red, glowing and spindly got between it and the floor and kept it open, althought it was obvious by the cracks it showed that it wouldn't last longer. That, plus the faint shot I heard, meant that were weren't alone in the base.

But at the moment I didn't care, the door to the deepest part of the base, the one where we might discover secret plans, was still open, and that was all that mattered to us.

"Phew, that was close!" He said as he stood up, before I pointed behind him.

"And that one's big." I said as the robot floated towards us, the same model of the flying Badniks we fought except just a bit smaller than me.

However, before we could fight it, the robot was suddenly covered in a light green aura and slammed to the ground several times over. ¿And guess who did that?

A white-furred, yellow-eyed hedgehog hovering in the air and covered in a green aura, who was glaring at me as he approached us.

No idea who the hell was this guy.

"Sonic, who this."

"Silver, psychic hedgehog from a future in which you won and your descendant keep it going, came to the past to fix it." He told me before turning towards him. "Silver, Eggman's good now."

"And I'm here for-wait, what?" He began to say before he became confused by Sonic's response.

"Yeah, forgot some things, had a epiphany, decided to become good." I replied with a nod. "I'm also an engineer now, scientists are kinda limited and most are crazy, which I no longer am."

"Nevermind, what did you do?!" Silver said as he pointed an accusatory finger at me.

"What the heck are you talking..." I began to say before remembering what Sonic just told me: time-travelling hedgehog. "Uh."

Sonic sighed, already guessing what was the problem. "Figures."

"Lemme guess." I deadpanned. "I end up becoming a villain again and doing something worse, no? What, robotize everyone or something?"

"Not at all!" Silver said as he stopped hovering and searched on his belt, taking out a suspiciously advanced-looking photography. Why I called it advanced? Because it wasn't a physical picture, but a hologram. "As a matter of fact, is the contrary! Look here!"

I expected it to show an industrial wasteland, dark, covered in black smoke, and being nothing but factories churning out robots made by slaves in assembling lines.

Instead, the picture it showed us portrayed a futuristic, sprawling metropolis from street view, showing... It was simply too awesome for me to explain, so I'll make it simple, basically a combination of the New York from The Fifth Element (not as alien as Coruscant) and Mass Effect.

And right in the middle of the street was a metallic statue of current me with a toothy smile... with statues of Vanilla, Cream and Cheese standing alongside it, with smiles just as wide as mine. Below the statues, and readabable despite its size, was a plaque that read:

'Doctor Ivo 'Eggman' Robotnik, Founder Father and 1st President of the Mobian Union, standing with his adopted family'​

I was too, absentmindedly taking the hologram from Silver's grasp and inspecting it more closely.

"And this is bad becaaause...?" Sonic asked his friend from the future.

"Well... when you think about it it's not bad at all." Silver sheepishly admitted before shaking his head." But still! This is Eggman we're talking about! It could be a brainwashed society for all we know!"

"News for you Silver, Eggman has turned over a new leaf and nearly died for it. Of course, we already told you that. Heck, you're a psychic, read his mind to see it!"

While the two hedgehogs discussed, I was staring at the hologram showing a statue of me... and my 'adopted' family.

Okay...

What in the FUCKING SAM HILL will I do!? And how and when did I end up 'adopting' Vanilla and Cream as my family?! I mean, I HAD been living and eating with them for more a month, but still!

Too busy I was ranting mentally, and the hedgehogs to embroiled on their conversation, that we didn't realize I had a sniper aiming at the top head until it was too late...

...for the sniper to realize that her peashooter wouldn't do jack shit to me thanks to having a thick skull (product of years worth of concussions) and the hard hat, that's it.