Chapter Text
“Team Dark isn’t exactly in ideal shape for a mission which you’re making seem like this big of a deal,” Shadow grumbled, slumping further forward in his seat in the briefing room. “With Omega out of commission for the foreseeable future, our team comp is out of balance.”
“On the contrary, this is a perfectly timed mission – it is far more diplomatic than Omega would ever accept in the first place, and you are the only team G.U.N has that is uniquely suited for attending an event like this on our behalf,” Commander Tower smiled, a little stiffer than he usually was.
“What on Earth are you suggesting?” Shadow snipped. He was in no mood to play games with their handlers – that was Rouge’s job, and Rouge was looking particularly off ever since this briefing had started.
“I think Agent Rouge already knows,” Tower said, inclining his head towards her meaningfully.
Shadow looked at Rouge, who looked down at the ground.
“Well, one of you has to tell me,” Shadow growled.
“Agent Rouge, shall I? Or would you prefer to?”
“Knock yourself out,” Rouge mumbled.
“Agent Shadow, what do you know about the Kingdom of Acorn?”
Shadow shrugged, still tense from whatever was making Rouge act so oddly.
“The largest majority or exclusively Mobian nation on Earth. Located on the continent of Mobius. Primarily known for intensely isolationist and allegedly anti-human policies. Last established its current borders following an extensive war with human colonies attempting to establish a presence on the continent. Since the war, they have experienced multiple dramatic political upheavals, including a multi-year period where Dr. Ivo Robotnik held military control of the entire continent. System of government has undergone several recent drastic reforms from absolute monarchy to a tricameral legislature, considered a high risk for political instability. A number of Mobians currently residing in, employed by, or otherwise subject to the attention of the United Federation are expatriates, including Agent Rouge, Amy Rose the Hedgehog, Miles Prower, and Sonic the Hedgehog.” Shadow closed his eyes and recited dutifully.
Rouge glanced at him and then quickly looked away, like she wanted to correct him about something, but wouldn’t in front of Tower.
“A very adequate summary,” Tower said, his voice almost as clipped as Rouge’s had been.
“I would presume that Rouge would have more to say,” Shadow said, starting to feel nervous, although he didn’t know why, yet. “Given that she lived there for years, and I have never been.”
“Indeed,” Tower said. “So what Rouge already knows is that the Kingdom of Acorn has recently begun the process of calling a number of those better-known expatriates home to celebrate a royal wedding. One I presume that she has already been invited to.”
“I think there might be… someone else, that would want to take Shadow as their plus one,” Rouge piped up suddenly. Shadow almost glowered at her for bringing them dangerously close to revealing Shadow’s recent… closer relationship to one Sonic the Hedgehog, given that he didn’t think she could have been referring to anyone else. He only restrained himself because of how weird this interaction had been so far.
“The particulars of that aren’t my concern,” Tower said, “it doesn’t matter how Shadow is able to attend, I need G.U.N to have – if not a voice, than at least one set of eyes on these proceedings. The Kingdom of Acorn, ever since it spat out Ivo Robotnik, has been a wild source of unpredictable threats and forces which have the potential-” he held up a placating hand as Rouge seemed to begin to snap at him, “the potential to be major concerns for the rest of the world’s population. We need to establish some sort of presence in the Kingdom, if not publicly, than surreptitiously. And sending our two Mobian agents – one of whom is the daughter of two relatively well-known aristocrats-”
“When you hired me, we agreed I wouldn’t be required to act against my family,” Rouge burst out.
“And no one is requiring you to,” Tower replied, his voice smooth but his offense clearly slightly exaggerated to prove a point. “We simply want G.U.N to be able to serve all nations, and doing that requires us to do what is possible for us to learn more about and establish further connections with some government who have previously been… avoidant of our efforts at cooperation.”
Tower was clearly expecting Rouge to object further, but she just sat back in her chair, chewing at her lower lip.
“You’ll depart for Acorn in three weeks time. I don’t expect you’ll have any active assignments between now and then – you are correct in that until Agent E-123 Omega is again fully operational, your team is at a distinct disadvantage for most of our operations. For the remaining three weeks, I am prepared to pay you both full time, I won’t just sign off on whatever you put on your timesheets, I will personally fill your timesheets myself, if over the course of the next three weeks of full time employment, you both just finish your annual performance evaluations.”
“No,” Shadow said immediately.
“You are required to do this!”
“Should have made it a better form,” Rouge agreed, smiling sweetly. “I’m not going back on that online portal.”
“Are you going to explain at all why you were acting so oddly during that meeting?” Shadow asked, as soon as they were out of Tower’s line of sight, strolling back towards Rouge’s cubicle.
Instead of responding, Rouge took a gilded piece of cardstock from her desk and handed it to Shadow. It was a wedding invitation.
The Royal Republic of Acorn cordially invites you to the wedding of Her Royal Highness, daughter of King Maximillian the Determined and Queen Consort Alicia, Leader and Founder of the Knothole Freedom Fighters, Princess Sally Acorn the Cunning, to Her Grace, the Duchess of Evrale, daughter of the honorable Sir Jonas of the Dannig Freedom Riders and Duchess Yvala Lockeran; Lucella Lockeran the Gallant.
“It’s… a lot of small things. I don’t like Tower flaunting that he knows about my family. I don’t like mixing work with the inevitable family drama this is going to ignite. And…” Rouge took the invitation back from Shadow and placed it back on her desk. “I don’t know, I feel weird about this being your first experience of Mobius.”
“So this is a Mobians versus humans thing again?” Shadow rolled his eyes. He considered most of the tensions between Mobians and humans to be obnoxious and overwhelmingly shallow, but he had learned not to say as much around “other” Mobians, because they would just insist that he didn’t understand, given that he had been raised exclusively by and around humans.
“Only in the sense that you’re a Mobian, and you don’t have the context for this that anyone else would have,” Rouge insisted. “Speaking of,” she continued, reaching swiftly into a lower drawer in her desk and pulling out a medium-sized, hardcover book. She held it out to him. “If we’re going to Mobius, you should have some idea of some of the ramifications going on there. This will be a better source than I will, and I know Hope will wanna talk to you once we get there, too.”
Shadow raised an eyebrow at her.
“You’re giving me assigned reading?” he asked.
“Oh, come on,” Rouge whined. After a few more moments, she added, “I’ll do your damn performance evaluation.”
“That’s a little more like it,” Shadow almost smiled, taking the book, An Overlander’s Introduction to the History of Acorn, by Hope Kintobor, and tucking it under his arm.
“The things I do because I care about you,” Rouge muttered. “In that case, I’ll need your login information.”
“You’re a world-class super-spy,” Shadow pointed out.
“And if I have to put any effort whatsoever into getting access to this account, your performance evaluation for this year is gonna include your entire personal search history, camera roll, and all three of your War Thunder forum accounts.”
“My login is just my employee ID,” Shadow rolled his eyes.
“And the password?”
Shadow blinked at her. “My employee ID with an exclamation point at the end.”
“Shadow, you work for an international military intelligence agency-”
On names, voices, and the purpose of this book:
Most who only know what is “common knowledge” about the Kingdom of Acorn would imagine that my writing this book – and my efforts to research it – would not be popular with many citizens of this infamously insular kingdom. Many humans – ( or “ O verlanders” as we continue to be called by nearly all of the residents of this kingdom ) – are turned away completely, sometimes violently, from even the most sincere efforts to document the kingdom, its past, and its present. That is why, despite my inherently limited perspective , I feel obliged to provide what information I can about this Kingdom and its citizens, who have nurtured and protected me for so many years .
I write under the name Hope Kintobor, which is also the name I use on a daily basis here in the Kingdom of Acorn. Many are quick to point out that this is hardly a useful disguise of my name at birth: Hope Robotnik. It is not my intention to hide that I was born a Robotnik, and what that means, especially to the citizens of a nation that lived in terror and oppression for years under that name. It is hardly a name that allows me to live a “normal” life, regardless of the direction of spelling. But I am one of fewer than a hundred “Overlanders” living on Mobius, anyway. I rarely meet anyone who doesn’t know who I am. I use the name Kintobor to convey that I neither embrace the vile legacy of my more famous ancestors, nor do I seek to hide my connection to them from those who would feel most threatened or betrayed to discover it after they had placed their trust in me.
I must, of course, emphasize that my experience of these events and the kingdom overall are very much colored by my status as an Overlander. I was a very young child during the final years of the “Great War” between many of the local Mobian kingdoms and the Overlander colonists, which were immensely traumatic to the many Mobians who were active combatants in those days. I had a much kinder experience of many of the Overlanders – including my father, Colin Robotnik, and even my uncle, Ivo Robotnik – than they would have.
Finally, I must address how I will ensure the protection and safety of those that have sheltered me and share their stories with me. The war may be over – and I truly believe the worst of the conflicts between Mobians and Overlanders is, as well – but the tensions between humans (whether they are called Overlanders or not) and Mobians are hardly a thing of the past. The security and privacy of those who have been touched by it must be respected. There are parts of this story that I must obscure or leave out. Nevertheless, I write this book because I firmly believe there is real, valuable information about the Kingdom of Acorn and the lives of these Mobians that humans living elsewhere truly deserve to know and learn from.
The names of many individual Mobians have been redacted from this narrative. Names and identifying information are generally only used for those who either held a formal position and acted in an official capacity – so their identity would be common knowledge, such as members of the royal family, or they have since become publicly known figures outside of the Kingdom of Acorn. The latter exception, of course, exists primarily for three people: Sonic the Hedgehog, Tails the Fox (who is technically still known under a pseudonym), and Amy Rose the Hedgehog. I must confess that I am eternally relieved to be excused, by his own permission, from anonymizing Sonic and his role in these events – he is a rather distinctive character. Note that, in keeping with existing Mobian conventions for naming, even figures with known last names will usually be referred to by subspecies demonyms such as “the Hedgehog” or “the Fox.”
I must sincerely thank the royal family, who permitted me to stay as a ward of the kingdom all those years ago, the Freedom Fighters, from saving me from the fate that befell the rest of my family, and all of those that I was able to consult in preparing this narrative.
Sincerely,
Hope Kintober
Shadow froze for a moment before turning the page. Another Robotnik. The Professor’s great-granddaughter, who knew Sonic at a very young age. Who lived in this mythical, supposedly all-Mobian kingdom, for all these years.
How was he supposed to feel about that? Why wouldn’t Sonic have ever mentioned that?
He turned the page.
Chapter 1: The Overlanders
Overlander (though many Mobians here use that term simply to refer to the human species) is a term used for a group of human colonists who first attempted to settle the resource rich Southwestern continent approximately one hundred and thirty years ago. This land was, at the time, occupied by about a dozen different kingdoms, all Mobian in population. These kingdoms have had a long history of fighting amongst themselves. While most sources will report that they were all absolute monarchies (hence referring to them all as “kingdoms”) there was variety amongst their numbers, as exemplified by the wolf packs and other nomadic or semi-nomadic…
Shadow skimmed absently, flipping ahead several pages. This was interesting to him, certainly, but the promise that this would prove relevant to the specific mission at hand, not to mention Sonic, had him impatient. He would read the rest of these details later.
A message arrived from Sonic. Shadow glared suspiciously at his communicator.
It was an invitation to come over to the fox’s place for “dinner,” (Shadow used that word to describe Sonic’s cooking with the greatest possible contempt) and “catch up” with them. Shadow wondered if this was to pitch him attending this royal wedding as Sonic’s guest, like Rouge seemed to believe he would want Shadow to.
Shadow promised to be there, and slammed the book shut. Maybe Sonic would want to tell his new boyfriend the details himself.
“The pizza’s great tonight,” his new “boyfriend” (Shadow was certainly happy they had stopped dancing around each other’s feelings and inhibitions, but for some reason, he was still flinching whenever he was referred to by the word) Sonic the Hedgehog said meaningfully. “You sure you don’t want any?”
He grabbed the takeout box, which he had laid reverently on the couch between himself and his foster brother, Miles “Tails” Prower, so that the grease would soak through the cardboard and get all over the couch, and proffered it in Shadow’s direction.
“I’m fine.”
“Suit yourself. Anyway, I wanted to let you know, my ex is getting married in like three weeks back home in Acorn, and Tails and I are gonna go, and I want you to come with-”
Shadow choked on his own spit.
“’your ex’??”
Sonic gave him a puzzled look.
“Yeah? Is that a problem?”
“Is ‘your ex’ who’s getting married in three weeks in Acorn a member of a royal family?!?”
“Oh! Yeah, Princess Sally! You heard about it already?”
“Rouge mentioned it,” Shadow said, hopefully not giving away too much.
“Aw, sick, she’s going, right?”
“Yes,” Shadow said, “but she seemed… weird about it, if that makes any sense.”
“Hmm, yeah,” Sonic said, a serious grimace on his face that looked patently absurd.
“She mentioned that you might have… history? I presume the fact that you dated the princess?”
“I think technically we were engaged for a few months? I don’t know, I was dead and in space for a year and it threw my sense of the whole timeline waaayyy off.”
“I don’t know how I would even begin to process that sentence-”
“Literally you did basically the exact same thing, if you think about it, ‘cept the engagement part. But yeah, there’s… other stuff…” Sonic trailed off, turning to glance at Tails, and the two shared a frustratingly opaque moment of serious eye contact. “It was, you know, a full couple years, ahaha. I kinda left a lot of it behind, and a lot of that stuff isn’t… it’s not me anymore, you know? So I never know how to bring up now that I don’t live there anymore, you know, with…” Sonic trailed off. “Boyfriends.”
“I was made in a tube and then frozen for fifty years. I have no idea what a normal background is for a… boyfriend,” Shadow insisted, echoing Sonic’s awkward final phrasing.
“Then let’s pretend this is normal,” Sonic smiled. “There’s, like, a book on the history of Acorn-”
“This?” Shadow held up the book Rouge had handed him, a little unable to fully believe that this was how Sonic would choose to have him learn about this.
“That Hope’s book? Yeah,” Sonic looked relieved.
“Wasn’t aware you could read,” Shadow muttered, falling back on old habits of insulting because he felt so out of depth in a conversation like this one.
“Yeah, it’s useful when Tails goes to sleep and I have to play story games on mute,” Sonic said, without a trace of irony.
“So you just want me to… read this? Instead of you explaining anything?”
“Ideally,” Sonic said cheerfully. “But first, are you coming to the wedding? I have to be honest, bringing you is a big part of my whole plan to prove to Sally that I won this breakup.”
“Yes, I will come to the wedding, and are you trying to ‘win’ a breakup where your ex is a princess marrying a duchess?”
“Well, sure, but I’m the one dating the Ultimate Lifeform, aren’t I?” Sonic grinned cheesily. Shadow felt his face grow very slightly warm, and then felt overwhelmingly angry at himself for that reaction. “And I can finally introduce you to my parents and everything.”
“Your what?!”
Sonic lifted another slice of pizza to his mouth. “Yeah, my dad, my step-mom, and my Uncle Chuck. My parents. My brother and sister might even both be in town, if Sal’s really inviting everyone, and, I mean, she invited Knuckles-”
“You have parents?!?”
“’Course I’ve got parents,” Sonic insisted. “We can’t all have been made in fancy test tubes.”
“And they’re… alive?”
Sonic took another bite of pizza, looking contemplative. “Complicated question,” he said casually, “but definitely more ‘yes’ than ‘no,’ you feel?”
Of course he didn’t ‘feel,’ but what was he supposed to say to that?
Technically, once Shadow thought about it, he couldn’t claim that Sonic had never mentioned having parents to him, even if he had never told Shadow about them, for all intents and purposes. He’d mentioned a “stepmom” exactly twice.
The first time had been before they had starting “dating,” when he amused himself by interrupting Shadow’s attempts at martial weapons training. Shadow had given Sonic a wooden practice blade and challenged him in hopes that he would be able to just hit Sonic quickly and harshly enough that the blue hedgehog would get discouraged and leave. Sonic had upsettingly proven shockingly competent at basic bladework, and even had some specific pointers for how some of Shadow’s training materials were designed for human body proportions rather than Mobian ones. Even now, but especially before they were “dating,” Shadow hated when Sonic was right about things. But when Shadow had argued that Sonic needed to use an actual parry-6 if he was going to parry, not just yelling ‘whirlpool-strike!’ and waving his sword around like a lunatic, Sonic had rolled his eyes and told him “you sound like my stepmom” in a clearly derisive tone. Shadow hadn’t known what a “stepmom” was, and mostly just assumed that Sonic was doing his usual bit of namedropping increasingly improbable people.
The second and last time, as far as Shadow could remember, was barely two weeks ago, when Sonic had declared that he was showing Shadow “Top Ten Secret Laundry Hacks Big Stepmother Doesn’t Want You to Know” and had fished a pair of old gloves out of his “hamper” (a cardboard box), made a big show of smelling them, and then put them back on.
“His parents are alive,” piped up Tails, who had been suspiciously quiet up to that point. “I’ve met them. They’re nice, they’ll like you.”
That certainly seemed like a pair of contradictory assertions to Shadow, not to mention a very bold claim to make about… all of him.
“Gimme more pizza,” Tails demanded, elbowing Sonic and interrupting Shadow’s quiet spiraling.
“Jeez, you’re a black hole for food lately. This that ‘puberty’ they kept warning me about?”
“It better be,” Tails replied darkly, his mouth full.