SONIC UNIVERSE TIMELINE:

Echidna fan fiction (unwritten): The first documented echidna history was approximately 4200 years before the current Sonic continuum (I’m calling this "year 0"). Then, the Floating Island didn't float at all; it was an island on Mobius devoid of all peoples except the echidnas, and was called Angel Island. The civilisation then was entirely tribal, with echidnas living a nomadic or settled tribal lifestyle (little farming and no technology). There were six major tribes, all of which inhabited different areas of the island. Each tribe lived in a region where a Chaos Emerald was. The first tribe had the Green Emerald and lived in the Mushroom Hill zone; the second tribe had the Purple Emerald and lived in the Marble Garden zone; the third tribe had the Red Emerald and lived in the Sandopolis zone; the fourth tribe had the Blue Emerald and lived in Hydrocity zone; the fifth tribe had the Sky Blue Emerald and lived in the Icecap zone; and the sixth tribe had the Orange Emerald and lived in the Angel Island zone. None of the tribes had any knowledge of each other's existence, and each derived power from their Chaos Emerald only when they needed to, as their powers then – although small – were unpredictable.

The tribes met up with each other gradually, and by 1046 had formed one nation, but still retained their distinct cultures. They realised that if they used the power of the Chaos Emeralds together rather than separately, the energy became not only more powerful, but more predictable and less chaotic. The tribes then worked together to build the Hidden Palace, a temple inside the long-extinct volcano in the Lava Reef, to house the Chaos Emeralds safely away, and in the same place so their power could be used together. When the emeralds were placed close to each other, a strange thing happened – a seventh, Grey Emerald was created by the other six through combining their energy. This Grey Emerald could control the powers of all the other six.

SEE HERE FOR A PAGE EXPLAINING THE CHAOS EMERALDS IN GREATER DETAIL

As the civilisation developed and grew, more and more was learned about the strange and wonderful powers of the Chaos Emeralds. The most important discovery, and one which dramatically changed the echidna race, was that of Summons. Within each Chaos Emerald resided strange and powerful beings called Summons, which could be called by particular echidnas (called ‘Summoners’) as a kind of living weapon, although they were not used by the peace-loving echidnas for attack.  Little of the documentation regarding Summons survives. All that was still known by Knuckles’ time is that Summoners were almost always female, and that learning the ability to call the Summons took years of dedicated training.  They didn’t even realise that the Summons were derived from the Chaos Emeralds – this fact had been reduced to a fanciful myth, often told to children as bedtime fantasy stories.

The echidnas were a successful and prosperous race, living in harmony with their environment and each other. By 1070 they had extended their boundaries to an area just off the coast of their island, known on Mobius now as the "Aquatic Ruin". In 1337 they also extended to another island inhabited by small birds, which they named "Flickies' Island".

The Drakon Empire's history began at much the same time as the echidnas. They used to live on a largely oceanic planet a short distance from Mobius, but had recently developed technology that allowed them to firstly inhabit dry land, then to travel through a vacuum to any other terrestrial or aquatic environment. The Drakon, unlike the echidnas, were a war-loving civilisation and did not want their might challenged. On discovering Mobius in 2516 they forcibly took over the Aquatic Ruin from the echidnas, causing all echidnas to retreat back to Angel Island, and turned it into an unmanned outpost. They left one of their vacuum transport devices (called a "Mobius Ring" after the place they first discovered using the technology), as a test – if a civilisation ever became advanced enough to use the Mobius Ring, they would be a threat and the Drakon would eradicate them, thereby eliminating any possible rivals to their expansion.

In 2679 two teenage echidnas chanced upon the Mobius Ring whilst exploring the Aquatic Ruin Zone, and they worked out – by accident – how to use it. The Drakon then saw the entire echidna race as a threat, and began to send their forces to the Aquatic Ruin Zone. The build-up was slow because although they could send around 300 Drakon a day through the ring, they needed a force of at least 50,000 to overwhelm the echidnas (who numbered about 100,000), therefore taking 167 days.

The echidnas declared a state of emergency and consulted the Guardian Brotherhood (a group of echidnas in charge of protecting the Chaos Emeralds) for help. The Guardians sent three echidnas to the Emerald Mine in the Sandopolis Zone, and told them to dig up a huge raw Emerald to be fashioned into shape. This "Master Emerald" was given power, and was then linked up with machines to steer and power the Island. They then used the Master Emerald to physically sever the island from the main body of the planet, and to form a protective atmosphere around it. The power of the Master Emerald was enough to float the island into the sky. From this moment onwards, Angel Island was known as the Floating Island, and Angel Island became the name of merely one of its zones.  Since the Drakon had mastered the means to exist on land but not to fly, the echidnas were safe for the foreseeable future. The Master Emerald also caused another phenomenon to occur – the Chaos Emeralds all received more power, grew in size and changed shape in the presence of the Master Emerald. These were sometimes referred to as "Super Emeralds", although tended to still be called Chaos Emeralds.

Between 2679 and around 3600, the echidnas remained in tune with the Chaos Emeralds. However, after around 3600 they began to lose touch with them. Able to use many modern technologies, the echidnas believed themselves to be above the Chaos Emeralds.

In 4120, the Drakon mastered – although very badly – the power of flight. They attacked the Floating Island and a war was unavoidable. As the echidnas had distanced themselves from the Chaos Emeralds, and despite the desperate attempts of a well-meaning scientist from Earth – Dr. Gerald Kintobor – to learn more about the mysterious powers locked within the Chaos Emeralds, they couldn't utilise the Island's Emerald power to defeat the Drakon. As a direct result, many tens of thousands of echidnas were slain in the battles that ensued. Around two thousand individuals escaped, and hid in the Emerald Chamber. The Drakon did not know about the Chaos Emeralds, they were only out to kill the echidnas. So when they thought all the echidnas were dead, they left.

The two thousand survivors saw the distancing of their society from the Chaos Emeralds as a huge mistake – and the cause of their near-destruction – so amidst the slow and painful rebuilding of their once glorious civilisation, they began to prioritise a reconnection with the Chaos Emeralds.

Zachary was born in late 4137.

Artemis was born in mid 4140.

Tiale was born late 4145.

Artemis and Tiale were married in 4168, and ascended the throne by election (after the death of the previous royal couple) in 4170.

Tempest was born in late 4176.

Coral was born in early 4181.

Amethyst was born in mid-late 4182.

Johnny Lightfoot was born in mid-late 4183.

Porker Lewis was born in late 4183.

Escape (my fan fiction): In 4183, Dr. Zachary attempted a coup to overthrow Artemis and Tiale. Then an echidna-wide crisis ensues and the entire race leave the Floating Island, taking the Chaos Emeralds with them to the Special Zone.

Knuckles was born in late 4183.

BEFORE CONTINUING, READ ‘ESCAPE’ OR ELSE THE REST OF THIS WON’T MAKE MUCH SENSE!

The True Guardian grew up in the care of the Guardian Robots, who looked after him only when he really needed them. He quickly gained independence and never saw the Guardian Robots past the age of three. He called himself Knuckles, and instinctively knew to guard the Floating Island and the Master Emerald. He knew that his civilisation had left, and that they would return someday, but he didn't know why they left, where they went or when they would return. His journey from age three to nineteen is one of discovery and learning about his civilisation.

Sonic was born in early 4184.

Espio was born in mid 4184.

Mighty was born in mid 4184.

EXPERIMENTAL STORY (my fanfic): Seth, a highly gifted but psychologically disjointed echidna, was born in late 4184. This short fanfic highlights Seth’s violent and terrifying grip over the echidna race.

Charmy was born in mid-late 4189.

Miles “Tails” Prower was born in early 4190.

STC: Dr. Ovi Kintobor crash-lands on Mobius in 4195.

Kintobor finds six out of the seven Chaos Emeralds in the Special zone and builds a machine called the Retro-Orbital Chaos Compressor (ROCC) – the object of this machine being to trap all the evil energy on Mobius inside the Chaos Emeralds. Soon he meets and befriends Sonic, in late 4197, who helps him try to find the seventh Grey Emerald (for now, nowhere to be found).

The ROCC machine is very unstable without the seventh emerald. It explodes, releasing the evil energy, turning Dr. Ovi Kintobor into the evil Dr. Ivo Robotnik.

Sonic 1: Robotnik tries to take over the planet by turning Mobians into badniks, and also tries to find the Chaos Emeralds. Sonic stops him and finds the six Chaos Emeralds.

Sonic gets blasted by evil chaos energy from the unstable emeralds and turns into Super Sonic for the first time. Emeralds disappear back to the Special Zone.

Work begins again in the Starlight Zone – someone is enlisting hundreds of workers, but no-one knows what is being built. There are also rumours of Mobians disappearing again. The building in the Starlight Zone is finally unveiled…

Sonic 2: …as Robotnik’s new base and ultimate weapon, the Death Egg. Robotnik launches the Death Egg in early 4198 and declares the start of the Robotnik Empire – each zone has 48 hours to declare him Supreme Ruler Of Mobius, and any who don’t will be destroyed by the awesome power of the Death Egg! Simultaneously his army of badniks he has been amassing attacks each of the zones, trying to seize control. Sonic and his new sidekick Tails go up against Robotnik, and Sonic eventually manages to find all 7 Chaos Emeralds, transform into Super Sonic and destroy the Death Egg with minutes to go before firing.

The piece of the Death Egg containing Robotnik crash lands on the Floating Island and Robotnik teams up with Knuckles, laying plans for the construction of a new Death Egg. He goes back down to Mobius and declares himself Ruler Of Mobius anyway. He continues to consolidate his power, building a super badnik processing plant, Veg-O-Fortress, in the crater of Mount Mobius, South Island’s main volcano, in Hill Top Zone, able to ‘process’ Mobians even faster than ever. He continues to scheme.

STC 1 – 20ish (missing out 6 – 8): The Freedom Fighters are born in mid-4198 and strike back against Robotnik.

Sonic CD: Robotnik takes over the Miracle Planet in mid-late 4198 with his most deadly creation, Metallix, the Metal Sonic, and kidnaps Amy Rose, in an attempt find the Time Stones and rule the world. Sonic finds the Time Stones first, and defeats Metallix and Robotnik in a deadly showdown, using the Time Stones to erase from time Robotnik’s damage from the Miracle Planet. As a side issue, he also rescues Amy.

STC 24ish to 40ish: Robotnik does various evil and annoying things. They don’t work.

Sonic Chaos: Robotnik is peeved and finally locates Sonic’s secret base and attacks it in early 4199. The base is destroyed and Robotnik seizes the Chaos Emeralds, using them to power his Portable Doomsday Machine (tm) which he happened to bring along. Sonic manages to stop it and wrenches the sky-blue emerald from it causing it to go bang and sending the emeralds into the Special Zone. With one emerald a-piece (Sonic has the sky-blue one and Robotnik has the red one) Sonic, Tails and Robotnik zip off round the Special Zone in a race to find the Chaos Emeralds. Sonic gets them first and trounces Robotnik.

Sonic Spinball: Very soon after, Sonic has had enough of Robotnik and decides to go on the offensive, targeting Veg-O-Fortress for destruction. Although the attack doesn’t go quite to plan, Sonic still manages to destroy the fortress, knocking it into the volcano, and severely damages Robotnik’s ship as he escapes. Robotnik limps back to the Floating Island, allowing Porker to track him. Sonic prepares to follow him, and takes the Chaos Emeralds as well – he’s not taking any chances…

Sonic 3: Sonic and Tails zip to the Floating Island in early-mid 4199 and are confronted by Knuckles, who steals the Chaos Emeralds, putting them back in the Special Zone. Sonic battles his way through badniks and Knuckles as he tries to stop the new Death Egg from launch (also getting the Chaos Emeralds along the way). He is just too late to stop the launch but grabs aboard, and after a final showdown with Robotnik, turns into Super Sonic and wrecks the engines, causing the Death Egg to crash back onto the Floating Island.

Sonic & Knuckles: The Death Egg is knackered, but Robotnik can re-power it using the Master Emerald, so double-crosses Knuckles, sending an Egg-Robo to tie him up while he homes in on the Emerald chamber. Sonic meanwhile battles his way towards the Death Egg, and eventually comes face to face with Knuckles, who is also fighting the badniks. The inevitable happens and the two fight, and Sonic wins. Robotnik then comes through the roof and grabs the Master Emerald, revealing his true nature to Knuckles and then giving him a second, more lethal shock. Sonic and the wounded Knuckles team up, and Sonic makes it to the Sky Sanctuary just as the Death Egg takes off. A new Metallix turns up to stop him, but Sonic beats him up and he is unceremoniously dropped off the Sanctuary as it begins to disintegrate.

Sonic jumps aboard the Death Egg as it rockets into space, and battles Robotnik as he throws all the powers of the Master Emerald against Sonic, whilst the time ticks down before the Death Egg reaches a position to fire on the Emerald Hill Zone. Sonic wins, and their climactic battle wreaks vast havoc with the Death Egg. Robotnik escapes with the Master Emerald and Sonic turns into Super Sonic and escapes as the Death Egg is destroyed. Rocketing through space, the two fight for possession of the Master Emerald as the fate of Mobius hangs in the balance. Sonic wins, and turns into Hyper Sonic using the Master Emerald. He returns it and the Chaos Emeralds to the Floating Island, preventing it from crashing. After all this excitement and Sonic and Tails have left, Knuckles recovers and then sets about ridding the Floating Island of Robotnik, and getting back those pesky Super Emeralds. Whilst he is out doing this he gets an alarm from the Emerald Chamber, and when he gets back to it he finds the Master Emerald gone. The trail leads to the Metallix that Sonic fought, who survived the fall from Sky Sanctuary and nabbed the Master Emerald for its own insidious purposes. Knuckles fights the Metallix and beats it, but it then uses the Master Emerald to turn into Super Metallix. After a spectacular fight, the Metallix’s Chaos Energy wears off and Knuckles destroys it, being narrowly rescued by Sonic and Tails as Sky Sanctuary finally collapses.

In mid 4199, Sonic meets and teams up with Chaotix – then consisting of Mighty, Charmy and Vector.

STC 52ish to 100: Robotnik returns from space to Mobius where he builds Citadel Robotnik to re-strengthen his loosening grip on the planet.

‘Rivals’ and ‘The Story of Espio’ (My fanfic): With the threat from Robotnik growing again in late 4199, Sonic convinces Knuckles to temporarily join the Freedom Fighters. Sonic then meets Espio, who joins Chaotix to fight Robotnik.

One year on, in late 4200, Espio is ‘killed’ by badniks, and Knuckles returns to the Floating Island after completing the mission he was asked to help with.

AGAIN, YOU MAY WANT TO READ THESE STORIES BEFORE CONTINUING!

STC 52ish to 100: In early 4201, Robotnik turns Shorty the squirrel into Shortfuse the Cybernik, who manages to retain a free mind and rebels.

Directly after the Shortfuse incident, Knuckles meets up with Chaotix again and fights the Brotherhood of Metallix.

Knuckles Chaotix: Robotnik is annoyed that Knuckles and Chaotix are using his Carnival Night Zone for their own profit, and dispatches a Metallix to wreck it. Knuckles and Chaotix stop them.

STC: In early-mid 4201, The Brotherhood of Metallix tries to take over the planet, but are narrowly stopped by Sonic, Chaotix and, rather obliquely, Robotnik.

In mid 4201, Robotnik builds Brutus, who rebels and starts a badnik rebellion against him. Robotnik just manages to destroy Brutus and stop the rebellion, with a bit of help from Sonic.

Directly after this, Dr. Zachary returns to the Floating Island. He lies convincingly, telling Knuckles that his robot is evil and wants to kill him. These lies fool Knuckles into thinking Zachary’s intentions are innocent, and he leads the evil scientist straight to the Chaos Emeralds. His robot destroys the Master Emerald and absorbs the power of all the Chaos Emeralds. Zachary’s true evil ways are revealed when he thinks he has destroyed Knuckles, then gloats aloud that his plan has worked. As Zachary flies off the Island and towards Mobius – his purpose to destroy them as a ‘warm-up’ before taking his revenge on the echidna race – Knuckles manages to decapitate the robot before it has a chance to use the emerald power. But the lack of Master Emerald power causes the Floating Island to hit a mountain range, and in the resultant earthquake, Zachary falls off the Floating Island, along with the robot’s body. Knuckles then takes the decapitated head of the robot and uses it to temporarily power the Floating Island until he can create a new Master Emerald.

Sonic and the evil Super Sonic are split into two different beings.

Shortfuse and Tekno destroy the Chemical Plant Zone, much to Robotnik’s chagrin.

In mid-late 4201, with his empire rapidly going to pieces, Robotnik teams up with Dr. Zachary (who survived his fall but sustained horrific injuries, then was rebuilt by Robotnik) to capture the Emerald Hill folk and turn them into a super computer. Sonic uses the Black Asteroid (Super Sonic trapped inside an asteroid) to destroy the computer and everything electronic on Mobius with the electromagnetic pulse the explosion created, which of course includes almost everything Robotnik possesses. Robotnik’s empire is destroyed almost instantaneously – the Robotnik Empire finally and truly ends.

In late 4201, Robotnik pops up on Flickies’ Island, using his new machine, the Dimension Ring Generator, to nobble the Flickies. Sonic, Tails and Knuckles stop him, rescue the Flickies’ Island Chaos Emeralds which Robotnik is after, and destroys the Dimension Ring Generator. At the end of the encounter a Drakon Prosecutor appears and drags off Robotnik. For several weeks, it seems like Robotnik is gone for good.

Right at the end of 4201, Robotnik is back and drags Sonic off to the planet Drakon with his new Metallix, the Metal Knuckles. With help from Tails, Sonic defeats the Metallix and escapes. The Drakon return Robotnik to Mobius with the proviso: don’t mess around with Dimension Rings again. Robotnik only too happily agrees – he has enough problems with blue hedgehogs without having megalomaniac fish to worry about as well.

In early 4202, a human lands on Mobius searching for the missing Dr. Kintobor. Robotnik intercepts him and persuades him that the furries are rebelling against him, the peace-loving ruler of the planet, and he needs help. In return he will let them colonise Mobius. With the mobians out of the way, Robotnik could find the Chaos Emeralds in peace and rule the planet.

Throughout early 4202, the humans arrive en masse. GUN (the human military organisation) robots and Robotnik’s badniks march side by side across South Island. Sonic and the Freedom Fighters (less Tails and Tekno) go to stem the tide, but are heavily out-numbered. As the machines close in, Tails and Tekno, who have sneaked behind enemy lines during the diversion, manage to hi-jack and tap into the human’s communication network, and broadcast in full the true story of Robotnik’s attempted conquest and enslavement of Mobius. The humans realise they have been duped and turn on Robotnik. Robotnik escapes but his badniks are destroyed. The humans and Mobians sign a peace accord.

After much wrangling, the Mobians let the humans (who can’t easily get back to Earth) have a section of the Emerald Coast to colonise. In return, the humans help the Mobians to clear up Robotnik’s legacy of pollution with their advanced technology. Peace reigns and the Freedom Fighters are disbanded; Porker and Tekno head the Mobian section of the ecological clean-up crew, Johnny becomes the representative for the Mobians to the humans, and Amy buys a flat in the humans’ new Mobian city, Station Square. GUN puts out a warrant for the arrest of Dr. Ivo Robotnik.

It is now mid 4202. Robotnik has gone back to his Egg Fortress in the Special Zone to sulk. With him an outlaw, the boot is now on the other foot. Whilst building his new flying fortress, the Egg Carrier, he decides to make another attempt on the Chaos Emeralds and sends out the newly repaired Knuckles Metallix to steal them. Knuckles finds the Metallix stealing the seven Chaos Emeralds, and a deadly fight ensues, resulting in both the Metallix and the emeralds being knocked off the Floating Island.

Sonic R: Back on Mobius, in mid-late 4202, Sonic sees an advertisement for the new human organised ‘Chaos Grand Prix’ – first prize, the Chaos Emeralds! The humans have found the emeralds and not realising their true power, have put them as the prize for the new race. Sonic sees that Robotnik has also entered (due to a legal loophole, he can’t be arrested until after the races). Sonic, Tails, Amy and, of course, Knuckles enter the race to win the emeralds (they don’t want to tip off the humans of their power) and also to show each other up. ‘Team Robotnik’ (Robotnik, the Knuckles Metallix and a new modified Sonic Metallix, Egg-Robo and the rather disturbing Tails Doll) are doing largely the same and for identical reasons (including showing each other up – it transpires that the new ‘safe’ Metallix personality program has the unfortunate glitch that both Metallixes want to prove their superiority to their ‘inferior’ robotic counterpart, as well as the organic ones they were built to beat). The race is on to get the Chaos Emeralds, and after much high-speed mayhem and high jinx Sonic gets all seven Chaos Emeralds, becomes Super Sonic and wins the tournament. Robotnik complains that Sonic should be disqualified for using illegal stimulants, namely the Chaos Emeralds, but is soon forced to flee as GUN agents move in to arrest him. The Metallixes blame each other for their failure and start knocking six-shillings out of each other before Robotnik deactivates them and escapes. He puts the Sonic Metallix in a pod in the Egg Carrier, pending redesigning. It is unknown what happens to the Knuckles Metallix; in all probability the same is done, but in a room at the opposite end of the Egg Carrier (and quite possibly, bearing in mind the Metallixes’ track record, behind bars and buried in concrete). Back on Mobius, Sonic bequeaths the Chaos Emeralds back to the Floating Island as Mobian heritage.

Sonic Adventure: It is late 4202, and Robotnik is fed up again. He takes the Egg Carrier over the North Sea – where much of the wreckage of the original Death Egg landed – to see what he can salvage. He finds the rather sad remains of the Metal Sonic prototype Silver Sonic, and rebuilds him, placing him in a pod next to his ‘brother’ the Sonic Metallix. But his next find is far more important: ruins from the Sky Sanctuary, which ended up down there at the end of Sonic & Knuckles. Amid these ruins he discovers the legend of Chaos, and although he doesn’t believe all this tosh about Tikal and the Chao, he does know a good monster when he sees one. He quickly builds a device which can unleash Chaos from the Master Emerald, and, confident that he once more will rule the planet, pilots the Egg Carrier towards the Floating Island…

MY COPY OF SONIC ADVENTURE REFUSES TO LOAD!  I COULDN’T COMPLETE IT – ONCE I’VE COMPLETED IT I’LL HAVE THE FULL VERSION OF THIS BIT UP!

Sonic Adventure 2: I HAVE NOT YET COMPLETED SONIC ADVENTURE 2 – ONCE I’VE COMPLETED IT I’LL HAVE THE FULL VERSION OF THIS BIT UP!

UNTITLED STORY (My fanfic): After the events of SA2 have all calmed down, life appears to be returning to normal on Mobius and the Floating Island.  But what about the echidna race in the Special Zone?  Read the prologue to this story here!