The Battle of Soleanna

[Dr. Robotnik]

((Just so you know, this event should be visible to anyone who happens to be in Soleanna right now. So, your characters should react to it, even if they're not in this topic.))

Today, a storm front approached Soleanna from over the ocean. It seemed like a symbolic foreshadowing of what was about to befall the city. As a matter of fact, as the storm got closer, citizens in the streets would start to hear the sounds of jet engines, laser fire, and explosions from inside the cloud. Bright flashes of light went off from behind the fog, with their origins hidden from view. But it definitely wasn't lightning.

Then, like a shark emerging from the ocean, the nose of Robotnik's Egg Carrier poked out of the storm cloud. Soon afterwards, it was followed by the other four air ships in his fleet, along with the buzzing cloud of swat pods escorting the bigger craft.

As they came into view, Robotnik smiled and picked up a microphone, before he moved to stand in front of a camera. Outside the ship, a giant holographic image appeared in the sky, showing Robotnik making his broadcast. The good doctor put on his best smile as he spoke. He almost looked as fat and jolly as Santa Claus.

"Greetings to the citizens of the city-state of Soleanna! I am Dr. Robotnik, ruler of the greatest empire on the face of this planet. I would love it if your fine community would join it. I do not ask much of you. Just submit to my authority, and you and your city will not be harmed. Your lives will not be any different tomorrow than they are today."

The cheerful mood began to cool a bit on Robotnik's face, as the smile faded somewhat. Still, he tried to maintain the jolly disposition.

"Please, do not make the mistake of opposing me. I have a great army under my command, and I know that it far outmatches your own. I may be under attack right now from some blasted freedom fighters, but they are misguided and delusional if they think they can stop me. I shall crush them soon, and it will be the same for you if you resist me. Fighting me will only result in needless destruction and death, and you will still end up under my rule anyway.

"In any case, I wish to meet with your leader...Princess Elise...to arrange for the terms of our annexation treaty. Please, do not make me have her sign it under gunpoint. It would be a terrible start for your first days as part of the Robotnik Empire. You have one hour to comply, before I open fire."

Robotnik switched off the broadcast at that point, and resumed his spot on the bridge of the Egg Carrier. Now, to wait for their response. Soleanna was peace-loving, so Robotnik had hopes they'd just surrender instead of resisting. But you never knew...these freedom fighters might embolden them to fight back.

The doctor gave a little sigh. This made for a terrible first impression. Originally he'd wanted ten ships here, not just five, and he certainly didn't want to be under attack as he requested the other side surrender. It didn't make him look as strong as he wanted to look.

Either way, he'd remember to start issuing propaganda casting the freedom fighters as the real bad guys, once he took over Soleanna. If any battle broke out here, it'd be laid out at their feet, because they were the ones who would give Soleanna the foolish hope of fighting back...

[Tech Rathgen]

I park my police car and listen to the speech. This doesn't look like a peaceful gesture and I know this isn't someone I'd trust to bring in the goods. I step outside of my police car and hide behind the glass. If this guy is legit then he won't fire. I watch this war up above in charismatic weariness.

I know something will happen. As he speaks, I reach down for my MK90 Laser and grip it tight. I watch the ships and wait for any sign of hostility.

[Princess Elise]

Elise and General Macall were still together at Soleanna's military base when Robotnik's fleet arrived, though by then they had moved to a private room while the military forces moved out and began to take up positions around the city. Despite the amount of nervousness many of the city's citizens likely felt, there was a surprising appearance of calm throughout Soleanna. The people had to know that they really had no where to go, so they could only hope and pray that the attack could be defended. When the fleet arrived and Robotnik made his statement, many of the citizens, despite Robotnik's dismissive statement about the freedom fighters, gained a feeling of hope seeing such a small force standing up to the huge fleet. Back at the base, Elise and Macall watched Robotnik's statement together.

Macall turned to look at Elise after the statement ended. "If he's giving us an hour to respond, I think it would be wise to use that time to position the troops. Now that we know which way he's coming from, we can focus our forces on that side of the city. Even if this man decides to go back on his word and waive the one hour cease fire, we should be able to make some adjustments in what little time we have."

Princess Elise nodded in agreement with Macall after listening to all that he had to say. "Do it. I will return to the palace and wait to contact this man when the time comes. Send me a signal if you are able to make your troop placement adjustments before the hour is up. Farewell, may Solaris watch over us all." With that, Elise would leave the room and head back to her boat, taking it back to the palace, this time with a small military escort, along with her usual guards with her on the ship.

[Dulcy]

Dulcy was sure to use her advantage of being more nimble than the SWAT pods to it's fullest, avoiding making herself an easy target as laser fire lit up the sky like a fireworks display. She also made sure to keep her distance from Tails as he began firing away with that machine gun. "Hold on Chadin!" She cried back to the deer as she spotted the out of control pod hurtling toward her. She quickly tucked in her wings and went swiftly into a dive while the pod went soaring over Chadin's head. She then spread her wings again and flew in fast toward more pods. Though these were trained on her already and shooting back, so she moved evasively as she continued toward them and shot out fire breath at their weapons. A view of Soleanna had opened up now, but Dulcy was too caught up in the air battle to even notice, that is until the hologram of Robotnik appeared and his voice boomed. She gazed over the city, looking a little distracted, though she was still keeping one eye on the chaos around her, perhaps not terribly focused on that though for the moment. "Wow, and I thought Mobotropolis was beautiful."

[Falina]

Falina quickly follows after Giichi as he moves to the docking bay's exit. She noticed that he seemed to know his way around, which gave her a feeling of relief. When they came to the intersection and found themselves under fire, she ducked into the alcove right along with Giichi, looking at him as she tried to decide what they could do from here, her tail twitching again. As he asked about claustrophobia and the idea of traveling via the ventilation system, she shook her head. "No, though the idea of crawling around in air ducts doesn't exactly sound appealing, if it keeps us from being shot at, sounds good to me."

[Chadin]

"DULCY!!!!" I wailed in a mix of fear and urgency as I held on for dear life to Dulcy's harness as the wounded swat pod soared over my head. "Jeez, I don't think I'm ever going to get used to that!" I groan meekly as I fight off the urge to find out what I had for lunch.

Quote:"Wow, and I thought Mobitropolis was beautiful."

I had never seen a city before, aside from Robotropolis that is. My whole life I've only ever known the scenic, pristine beauties of the wild. But this... this was something else entirely. It was as if the stars had been laid out in a vast, cryptic symbol across a vast swath of land. This place held a beauty all its own apart from my beloved wilderness.

No matter what, I was determined to ensure that Robotnik did not spoil this place too with his foul presence. "The only city I've ever seen before is Robotropolis, but this place... this is something else... Dulcy, we CANNOT let Robotnik do to this place what he did to Mobotropolis."

"WHOAH!!" A laser blast streaking narrowly past my left cheek quite effectively broke me from my reverie as my head snapped around angrily towards the offending swat pod. A new feeling swelled up inside me. Before I was willing to fight merely for the opportunity to thwart Dr. Robotnik's plans... but now, after seeing what is at stake, I had a whole new drive within me that could not be stopped.

The pod was closing in from a roughly seven o'clock position. My crossbow snapped up to my shoulder and I squeezed off another round, aimed straight for the pilot's head.

[Shadow]

From atop one of the highest rooftops in the city, a cloaked figure watched and listened to Robotnik's proclamation. His long crimson cloak billowed in the wind, revealing the armor-clad body of a black hedgehog, his face still hidden in the folds of his hood. In the dark obscurity within, his mouth set into a grim frown. Unlike the citizenry, he felt not a beat of fear at the thought of the invasion, at the sight of the five ships advancing on the horizon, or at the innumerable swarms of swat pods. Nor did he bother with hope that the so-called Freedom Fighters would defeat the Doctor themselves. Such tasks could not be diverted to lesser forces: he'd made that mistake once before. If anyone was going to defeat Robotnik, it had to be him. "Doctor," he said in a husky growl to nobody but himself, "you've gone too far this time. Your time has come. The Crimson Knight has come for you!"

With that the Crimson Knight leaped from the rooftop, propelled further by a blast of air from the soles of his shoes, setting him up to leap from rooftop to rooftop towards the ever-encroaching fleet and it's egg-shaped leader.

[Tails]

Tails listens to the speech and laughs very hard. "Do you honestly think that they'll believe you? Jeez, you're dumb to think that. I can't wait until they see you for the scoundrel that you are."

He manuevers his way through the swat pods and heads toward the massive ships.

[Rock]

'Who is this fool...' The wolf said, beginning to look around, looking at the fleets of "clunkers" and such, misguiding his body language with small nods of his head. "I see, so he wants these people to come into his ways and "join him", interesting proposal from an egg-shaped human..." He said to himself sighing, his hands smoothed over his weapon.

'Lets see how these humans react to the fact that they are staring down a man who has a fleet of ships and massive weapons...' He tapped his feet against the ground, watching to see what reaction would come, his eyes waded open, as he began to hear more voices, and with more waiting came the final say, an explosion came from the air, the skies riddled with bullets from one lone plane, his eyesight would allow him to see what it was, a Fox.

"I see, so that's how it is?" Beginning to see the people run away from the explosions, thinking the egg would attack, Rock would start to hear a scream, a large mechanical contraption came towards a lone family with their daughter starting to scream loudly.


"Elica!" Said the one parent whose daughter began to be attacked with a large beam firing it through his darkened eyes, the contraption had almost succeeded within its task.

Once more a tap would come, holding the human in his hands, he would place her down, the monster turning to both of them, however, within what would only seem like a second, would a slice through its body come, Rock's blade outstretched as the electricity would brim and the monster would fall apart. "..."

"Thank you!!!" Said the two parents, however Rock said nothing and only waved his hand for them to go somewhere else.

'That was only one, it fired some type of strange beams from its eyes... incredible.' He sheathed his sword and leaped towards a umbrella post and landed on a roof beginning to cut through another one of these robots, his body moving forward for another stroke, taking on three with two strokes. 'Not very hard to kill however...'

[Dr. Robotnik]

There hadn't been a lot for Robotnik to do, once he'd sicced his forces on the freedom fighters and issued his ultimatum.

Hmm...maybe I should prepare for a possible attack while I'm waiting.

He flashed his teeth in a grin. "Egg Ship 1 and Egg Ship 5, go to the jungle behind Soleanna. Prepare to release your ground troops from there."[/i]

I'll attack from both land and sea, so they have nowhere to run.

Egg Ship 1 and 5 split off from the main battle formation to circle around Soleanna, from both directions. They trained their weapons on the city, but did not fire. While Robotnik had said he wouldn't fire for an hour, he did not say he wouldn't fortify his position.

Just a second ago, Robotnik picked up two radar blips from his forces in the city. That got his attention.

What the...? Why are two of my swatbots in the city? I haven't released any yet...how did they get down there? Agh...I suppose I should check the programming on the ships again. They released two of the shock troops way earlier than they should have. I just hope that Elise doesn't think I'm breaking my agreement here...

---

As Tails came in range of the main battle formation, he would notice that the swat pods were falling back. In just a second, he'd find out why they'd done that.

The Tornado would probably be emitting all kinds of warning bells and buzzes by now. The air ships had acquired missile lock. Small plumes of smoke appeared on Egg Ships 2 and 4, as a quartet of missiles streaked towards him. When he got closer, the laser cannons would open fire too.

---

Dulcy managed to burn up the weapons of two swat pods successfully. They retreated back to their respective air ships for repairs. Chadin's shot was too low to hit the swatbot in the head, but he did manage to hit a small fire extinguisher on the wall behind the bot. Now the inside of its windshield was splattered with white, blinding the bot. It almost looked comical. One second, a black cockpit...the next, solid white. The pod flew off into the distance harmlessly. Covered in fire retardant, the bot would have sighed if it could, before it started looking for something to clean up the mess.

By this time, the swatpods seemed to realize they couldn't win in close range combat. Dulcy would notice they spread out more, tried to keep their distance, and fired at longer range. A group was now moving to form up behind her.