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Most people regarded abandoned factory complexes as both unsafe and unsightly. Those formerly operated by Dr. Eggman were considered extra -unsafe and dreadfully -unsightly. The gray Rat currently infiltrating one such factory, Tres, did understand these sentiments. Even so, she disregarded them.
That was why she’d infiltrated an old factory complex that inconspicuously resided in the rural regions of the western continent. Near the end of its operational days it had been a part of Dr. Eggman’s production lines, from before he’d been thoroughly rebuked for his ever expanding scope of evil deeds. Luckily, all signs pointed to this site having been marked as a total loss. Meaning no badniks would be found guarding it in secret. Probably.
Though the only armor her purple and black ‘scouting uniform’ provided were elbow & knee pads, Tres figured she was equipped enough for any surprises. She was too preoccupied questioning the state of this place to worry now. “Who destroyed this place? And what was interesting enough to be a target?”
The ceiling responded with an eerie yet calming creek. Beams of yellow sunlight piercing it illuminated the interior, allowing the walls to present several inane statements via scattered graffiti with impressive typography.
To find answers she took to eagerly scurrying across the factory. It wasn’t hard to find the obvious target, despite how ‘well hidden’ it was behind a massive curtain. Imposing and complex, a once automated fabrication machine sat dead silent. The components for batteries, those that’d be charged by living animals, sat on the outgoing conveyor belt. Its days of dreadful production now over, it had become merely a canvas for ambitious graffiti.
Letting out a squeak of joy, Tres scampered all over the machine. The design was flashier than the other deceptively mundane machines and was left surprisingly intact. Aside from the precise gash torn through the middle, damage that was subtle yet catastrophic.
“ Probably not Sonic’s doing then, huh nightmare machine?” said Tres as she climbed up and peered into the gash.
Tres let herself drop headfirst into the metal wound. She’d often been told cautionary tales of critters much like her getting ‘roboticized’ in such acts of reckless curiosity. But she had yet to see evidence of robotization being real.
What evidence she did find in here was that the damage was more extensive than the single visible gash. Several more components were missing, leaving behind only imaginary dotted lines of empty space. Sniffing around, she found a slight scent of smoke, but no debris from the missing parts.
“ Must’ve been a looter, huh? Poor machine can’t catch a break.”
After squeezing out of the machine and wiping metal dust off of her whiskers, Tres meandered toward the shipping docks. However an echoing noise, the tapping of metal on concrete, stopped her. She tensed up, then dived behind the nearest wooden crate. Tilting her head to get a better sense of what her ears were picking up confirmed they were… footsteps? Yes, steel & leather pacing a circle on the floor.
Peaking over the crate, she saw a Bearded Vulture who was probably not a badnik. His feathers were light red with stripes of black. His fashion was dark and sharp, in the literal sense, and his gloves & boots were adorned with white spikes. Overall, Tres was pretty sure this was all for style, not an indication of actual danger.
She must’ve sighed in relief though, because the Bearded Vulture’s head snapped around, training blood red eyes on her. Within them silver irises dilated, almost like cameras adjusting focus. Then with one step he turned his body to catch up with his head to face her.
“ Are.. are you a badnik?” asked Tres, letting her tail sway to ease her nerves.
“ Hah! If I am what I eat,” said the Bearded Vulture, a slight rasp accompanying the lower notes of his voice.
“...What? You eat badniks?”
The Bearded Vulture chuckled, betraying a strength to his breath despite the oddities of his voice. Given a moment, Tres couldn’t help but notice the messy pile of machine parts on a pallet next to him.
“ Almost mistook ya for a badnik yerself,” said Marrow, stepping one of his boots into Tres’ line of sight. It was fit to leave his talons exposed, each glistening with a steel sheen. “Y’know how jumpy folks can be when they have loot to guard.”
“ Oh, you’re a looter then?” asked Tres.
“ I am Marrow,” said Marrow, tilting his head down, casting his face in a more threatening light. “ D’you feel inclined to conflict with looters?”
“ No, it’s just…” Tres stepped into the open, getting a better glimpse at some of the material in Marrow’s stash. Missing components to the battery fabricator were among them, alongside rare and valuable alloys. “What’re you gonna even do with that stuff? Trying to build your own badniks?”
“ Heh, I’m just taking a few trinkets home. Not like the Doctor needs ‘em.”
“ Sure you’re not gonna take them to a scrap pawnshop?”
Marrow tilted his head up to a less threatening angle, smirking as he hooked a small cylinder from the stash to his talons and lifted it into view. It cast a soft light blue light onto his face. “D’you know how great this stuff is for decorating a lair?”
“ Decorating? I’m pretty sure that’s radioactive…”
“ Better than a cheap LED. Helps vet my guests too!”
Tres made no effort to hide the incredulity she felt at that statement. The smell of this Vulture’s obnoxiousness was bothersome enough to upset her nose. Wait, personality isn’t actually a scent, what was that smell? Her eyes trailed back down to the stash that Marrow had looted, where she started to recognize components similar to those on old industrial generators. Looking up, she saw a gray haze spreading along the ceiling from a hallway leading deeper into the factory.
“ Oh no ,” said Tres.
“ Eh?” replied Marrow.
Ignoring him, Tres dashed down that corridor into a sturdy room. A lake of gray smoke covered the ceiling, flowing in opaque rivers toward the rest of the factory. The source was a large ovular machine covered in wires, pipes, and red blinking lights. At its front was a large control panel, torn open with loose wires and computer chips strewn on the ground. Smoke gushed out of every crease in the generator with a threatening hiss.
“ Did you break the generator?!” yelled Tres as she dashed back out to the floor where Marrow waited.
“ Yeah, it’s not like this place oughta be powered anymore,” said Marrow.
Tres pointed at the smoke flowing along the ceiling behind her, having so many ideas for how to call him a moron that they formed a traffic jam on her tongue, leaving her frantically squeaking in admonishment.
“ Oh, a fire! How fun! Guess I’ll be going then.”
“ No! We can’t-It’s too dangerous to leave alone!!”
“ Ma’am, no one works here anymore and I’m sure the locales will enjoy the light show.”
“Do you have ANY IDEA how flammable some of the chemicals in here are?! It’ll burn down the woods outside too!! Maybe even spread to town!”
“ They can move.”
Tres’ arms dropped, “Okay-Just… Can you tell me where the fire suppression interface is? That’s obviously not working either!”
“ Uh…” Marrow glanced at his stash of loot then back up to Tres, “No.”
Unwilling to spend time arguing, Tres huffed and ran back to the generator room. The thickening haze of smoke made it difficult and painful to navigate the area in search of the fire suppression system. Despite the tears forming in her eyes, she found a control pump at the back of the room behind the burning generator. This was frankly an unsafe place for it to be.
Even more unsafe was the fact that the control valves were rusty, as water had been leaking here for some time. Even if she could turn them, it’d just douse the generator in water, which would definitely make things worse. Luckily she recognized this design from other facilities, it was meant to mix water with a formula that’d form a fire suffocating foam. Which is why it was even more frustrating that the formula canister was gone.
Tres did not consider herself a petty person. However at this point, she decided to make the fire Marrow’s problem. She found him whistling a high-pitched jingle, pushing his stash toward an exit with an old pallet jack. Before he could react, she pounced onto his stash of stolen parts. Unable to find the canister, she took what seemed most valuable, a computer core from the fabricator.
“ Wha-HEY!” shouted Marrow with frankly unearned indignation.
“Oh, I just thought this’d be great for the bonfire.” Tres paused to take several fast breaths, but stayed ready on her legs. “Unless you got something else in there you think would match well with a metal fire?”
Marrow took a step toward her, so Tres bounded backward away from him. Holding eye contact despite the intensity of his glare, she increased her pace as he did. Soon they were both in a full sprint, until Tres heard a familiar hiss. Skidding to a stop, she turned and threw the core atop the generator.
Marrow let out a painful but not particularly threatening high-pitched scream, before shooting Tres a sharp glare and leaving. Within seconds he returned and threw a large canister at her.
“ Oof !” Tres caught it, but it was hefty, “I knew you had a good eye for what all this stuff was.”
Marrow just pouted, so Tres held her breath and ran around the generator to the control pump again. It was not difficult for her to attach the canister. What was difficult was turning the rusty valve that’d manually activate the sprinklers. It refused to budge even as she wrapped her arms & tail around it, pulling with her full weight. Until suddenly it did budge, with a loud clang.
The sudden loosening of the valve sent Tres to the ground. She looked up to see Marrow pecking the Valve the rest of the way open. Then, all she saw was a shower of soapy foam that blanketed her vision.
“ Thanks,” said Tres, before letting out a cough.
“ Waste of perfectly good Flame-X,” replied Marrow.
Whatever Flame-X was, it worked remarkably fast to suffocate the fire inside the generator. It also left the whole factory complex looking like it’d experienced an indoor blizzard. It was a total mess, but it was a contained mess.
Whether or not it was Sonic himself who destroyed the nefarious operations in this factory, that evidently hadn’t ended the danger it posed. Disarming lingering threats was not what Tres got into these kinds of explorations for. She’d happily just stroll through abandoned bases & factories as if they were museums. But, it was undeniable that many of them were hazardous.
While that bearded Vulture, Marrow, had a selfish first-impression, he was rather cool headed in an emergency. So she asked if he’d like to work together, to explore more sights and disarm them of danger so no one had to fear them anymore. As he fished his prized computer core from under some foam and faced the sunset outside, he smiled and gave a simple reply.
“ No.”
“ ...What if I let you loot them?”
“ Eeeeeh, yeah, alright.” Marrow put up his index feather, “IF, you help carry my stuff out of here.”
“ Deal!”