In this issue’s backup story, Locke is here in the ruins of the echidna homeland of Albion, listening to Gala-Na’s Fallout audio log about our favorite echidna edgelord’s origin story
So yeah, remember aaaaallll the way back in Sonic #94, when I said that the random Albion echidna who got blasted with chaos energy when they tried to drain Chaos Knuckles would end up being real important? Well, here’s where Ian establishes that that guy turned into Bollers’ Dr. Finitevus! As always, Ian is great at tying together random little long-forgotten plot threads in unexpected ways to create a more cohesive story
It’s also kind of interesting how Finitevus is believed by the other echidnas to be like the karmic opposite to Knuckles, the fabled savior, especially since Finitevus was introduced in opposition to that very myth back in the Return to Angel Island arc. I do wish Finitevus perhaps had a bit more nuance in this arc instead of just wanting to burn everything to the ground, but eh. He’s a fun villain, and this arc has been more about Knucklejak anyway
Shortly after his former colleagues tried to have him "euthanized,” Finitevus escaped, then lead Eggman’s forces back to Albion, where they blew it to smithereens and stuck everyone in the Egg Grapes. Oops! Sucks for them, huh. Gala-Na and her crew always sucked pretty hard, though, so I can’t say I’m gonna miss ‘em
Knuckles did send all of the surviving echidnas back to Albion last issue, though, so Remington and the others are just hanging out in the rubble
Writer: Ian Flynn
Pencils: Tracy Yardley!
Colors: Jason Jensen
The familiar face of Knuckles addresses the Freedom Fighters and Chaotix as Enerjak, inviting them to follow him so he can lead them into a peaceful, happy new world free of technology. Sure, the whole "no more pain and suffering" thing sounds great, but Nicole rightfully points out that it was technology that allowed her to become a living being, and Julie-Su reminds him of how badly things went before when he had access to this much power, begging him to come back to her. Enerjak merely frowns in disappointment and informs them that he'll demonstrate his power to all of them to prove he's in the right.
So do you guys remember how, during the original M25YL arc, we learned that nearly everything in that future came about because Knuckles once again went all Chaos-y, and tried to "remake Mobius as he saw fit," which included forcibly taking away Julie-Su's cybernetics? And how for some unfathomable reason, after all that, she elected to stay with him and didn't seem to harbor him any ill will for essentially forcing his own bodily ideals onto her without her consent, literally changing parts of her body against her will? Yeah, this is precisely why I have such a problem with Kenders having made that the backstory for future Knuckles. Despite her distaste for the Legion, Julie-Su clearly has no intention of getting rid of her cybernetic parts, and in fact rather likes them. Here in this situation, she's rather traumatized by Enerjak's attempt to "liberate" her from her cybernetics, and has to be handed off to Mighty so Sonic can continue the fight against Enerjak. Before the fight can go much further, with Sonic calling Enerjak by all sorts of mocking puns on his name, none other than Shadow enters the fray! Turns out he's working for G.U.N. now, and is the agent that Rouge sent to help out. Enerjak is enraged as Sonic jumps back into the fight, calling him by yet another mocking nickname.
This page is one of my prime examples for exactly why I love Ian's writing of Sonic so much. Shadow begins unleashing ridiculous amounts of Chaos energy, making Nicole struggle to hold all the nanites in place so the city doesn't get destroyed by the raw power, and she points out worriedly that since she doesn't have enough power to maintain the energy shield, they're wide open for an attack from Eggman. Her fears aren't unfounded, either - at that exact moment, Eggman is watching the proceedings while Snively works on an "improvement" to his last few remaining Egg Grapes, surprised to see Shadow there. Apparently, it wasn't Enerjak scrambling New Mobotropolis' communications after all - it was Eggman, deliberately trying to make it seem like everyone has abandoned the fight for freedom and having outright lied to Sonic during the attack on Knothole about the world turning their backs on the Freedom Fighters. I mean, granted, we kind of knew that wasn't true already, considering the group we know as "the Freedom Fighters" are just the Knothole (now New Mobotropolis) chapter. As Eggman launches his fleet towards the city, Shadow continues his fight against Enerjak, but even his substantial fighting ability isn't enough to take him down. Somewhere along the line, Enerjak's helmet is knocked off, and Sonic is surprised and disturbed to see that Enerjak is in fact Knuckles, not having realized such until now. Despite his misgivings, he and the rest of the Freedom Fighters and Chaotix charge forward to take on Enerjak as one, but Enerjak, thoroughly angered by now, merely freezes everyone in place effortlessly with Chaos energy.
Oh boy, one of those "we must burn this world to make room for the new order" types! Sonic calls out to Enerjak, trying to reach the true Knuckles within, but Enerjak coldly insists there's nothing anyone can do to make him change his mind. However, Eggman would like to contest that statement! He shows up in his Egg Fleet and overwhelms Enerjak's attempt to resist with an extra-strong teleportation beam, taking him directly to the center of the Egg Grapes for energy extraction. Eggman, projecting a hologram of himself onto the ground, cheerfully reminds Sonic of their "deal," and is unfazed when Sonic angrily tells him that kidnapping Knuckles wasn't supposed to be part of that deal. As the Egg Fleet leaves the city, Sonic tries to rally everyone for a rescue plan, but Sally heads him off, saying that as much as they don't want to leave Knuckles in the hands of Eggman, rescuing him would only unleash Enerjak onto the world again. Before Sonic and Julie-Su can argue the point, a warp ring portal suddenly opens up and a hand drags the two of them through it, depositing them onto Angel Island with no warning.
Well, I suppose Locke isn't the worst person to be kidnapped by. He informs them that after Enerjak's last rampage, he and the rest of the Brotherhood designed a weapon to be used against him should he ever return. Sonic is eager to go get this weapon to turn Knuckles back to normal, but Locke clarifies - this is a killing weapon. If they use it, Knuckles won't survive the process. And he intends to use it anyway. …I take it back, there are definitely better people to be kidnapped by than Locke.
Albion's Shameful Secret
Writer: Ian Flynn
Pencils: Tracy Yardley!
Colors: Jason Jensen
So, how did Locke find out about what was going on? Well, if his island suddenly blowing up wasn't enough of a clue, turns out he was visiting Albion not long ago, only to find it a ruined, abandoned wasteland. There, he watched a video recording by none other than Gala-Na, who explained the true nature of Finitevus. Once upon a time, he was an ordinary, promising young scientist within the city, and in fact was the one who came up with the technical side of the plan to contain Green Knuckles' power a year ago. He was the one in the suit that the Chaos Syphon was connected to, and received the full brunt of the energy wave that Knuckles unleashed that day.
Why am I not surprised that Gala-Na of all people would scoff at such a thing? Extremist one moment, slothful the next. Finitevus started going power-mad and using dark energies in his experiments, and eventually was deemed so dangerous that Gala-Na called for his execution. Goddamn, woman, you'd think she'd have learned from the last time she tried to "neutralize" someone imbued with insane amounts of power without their consent! Predictably, Finitevus escaped, and when he returned he had the entire Egg Fleet behind him, having betrayed Albion's location to Eggman. This is where the recording ends, as Gala-Na recorded her spiel during the invasion, and ended the video by begging whoever might find her message not to repeat her mistakes as her people were captured and killed around her. Great, even more systematic erasure of Kenders' echidna-related worldbuilding by Ian! Seriously, Ian, I know Kenders was kind of a dick, but you could at the very least not kill off 99% of the entire echidna population in the process of fixing his mistakes.
Well, good to know that the various ex-Legionnaires and Echidnaopolis refugees have come together, and that Remington is back in his right mind! And looks like Gala-Na is gone for good. Normally I might have said "good riddance," but the Egg Grapes are a torture I wouldn't wish on anyone, so, uh… bye then, I guess? Sorry, Gala-Na, but I really just can't bring myself to care that much about you.
So a few people have brought up a bit of exposition from Mobius: 25 Years Later that the Enerjak Reborn seems to be playing around with. I had forgotten all about this, but this is really interesting!
So according to M25YL, at some point Eggman stole the Master Emerald, which made Knuckles go sicko mode and turn back into Chaos Knuckles arbitrarily. He then killed Robotnik, “remade Mobius as he thought it should be,” and apparently got rid of Julie-Su’s cybernetics. In M25YL, no one seems to think anything of it. They’re all living in a peaceful utopian future, so it’s implied to have been the right call. It’s a good thing that Knuckles had and used this power. He singlehandedly saved the world!
While the timeline has diverged from the one depicted in M25YL, similar events are occurring now in Ian’s run. Knuckles is back to being a walking Chaos Emerald (albeit in a different form) and he’s trying to use that power to bend the world to his whims. This is the fate that Penders had in store for the character. Even him trying to remove Julie-Su’s cybernetics is there. Except, this time? These actions are presented as villainous. Knuckles isn’t being heralded as a savior, he’s an authoritarian demigod and his friends are all scared shitless of him. Knuckles having this power is a bad thing
It took so little effort to turn Ken’s planned arc for Knuckles and turn it into something sinister. I love this
Sonic’s been saving up all these jabs at Enerjak’s name since the ‘90s
Anyway, Shadow is here! And he’s apparently started working for GUN off-screen, bringing him more in line with where the character was in the games in 2007. We’re gonna get a LOT more story content with Shadow working for GUN down the line, so look forward to that
Also, look, he did the thing. Enjoy this nourishment, Shadow stans
I love that everyone in the cast roll call is distraught over Knuckles’ heel turn except for Sonic, who’s ready to beat his ass
We pick things up directly where the previous issue left off! Knuckles has been manipulated into becoming the new Enerjak by Dr. Finitevus. After forcing his will upon the inhabitants of Angel Island, he’s now here to do the same to New Mobotropolis
There was some question of just how far Knuckles would go last issue. All of his actions, while cruel and authoritarian, were things that even the regular Archie Knuckles would probably consider justified. But here we see that he’s very much a radical traditionalist, wanting to forcibly rid the Freedom Fighters of their technology. (Nicole takes issue with this, of course, because she is technology.) He even tries to take away Julie-Su’s cybernetics! Jesus Christ!! As we saw last issue, all of the Legionnaires were totally fine when Knuckles did the same to them, so it’s not like he’s gonna hurt Julie-Su... but she sure doesn’t know that. Knuckles isn’t interested in talking things out with anyone, not even his friends. He just thinks he needs to bend everyone to his will to save them. Actually, when he put it like that, his behavior sure is starting to sound familiar. Wonder where he got it from...
Again, I totally buy this turn for Knuckles. This is the ultimate repercussion of the messiah complex Locke instilled in him. Add on to this the fact that all of his greatest enemies are radically pro-technology, the fact that he already blew one chance at godlike power, and Locke raising him on bogus fairy tales about his noble ancestors destroying their home city and abandoning all their technology so as to not stray too far from God’s light, and yeah. This all tracks
But then Sonic drops in to save the day! Of course, he misses the big reveal and the ensuing little villain speech, so it’s gonna take him a little bit to realize who Enerjak is. But that’s okay. I’m sure Ian was consciously trying to make up for the fact that Sonic had never once faced Enerjak in the long history of this series instead of jumping straight into framing it as a Sonic vs. Knuckles fight, which longtime readers have seen plenty of
Sonic (and everyone reading this) knew Eggman would betray the heroes from the start, but this is, uh. Particularly bad for the good guys. Credit where credit’s due, though, it’s a VERY smart move on Eggman’s part
This is also a thing Ian’s always been good at in his writing. While it’s fun to have original villains in the comics, they never completely steal the spotlight from Eggman. Ol’ Ivo’s always nearby with a few tricks up his sleeve to remind us who the real main threat is
(If you’re wondering how the Egg Fleet’s shots are getting through New Mobotropolis’s defenses: Nicole said earlier that it was taking all over her power just to prevent the collateral damage from Shadow and Knuckles’ fight from ravaging the city)
