Babylon Rogues (Pre-Super Genesis Wave)


 * For the version of this group after the Super Genesis Wave, see Babylon Rogues (Archie).

The Babylon Rogues are a group that appear in the Sonic the Hedgehog comic book series and its spin-offs published by Archie Comics. They are a group of treasure-seeking thieves who use their Extreme Gear skills as an advantage against their enemies. Its members are made up of former members of the Battle Bird Armada. They first caused trouble in Knothole when they went up against Sonic the Hedgehog, Miles "Tails" Prower, and Knuckles the Echidna in a race, which they lost. They were later seen in the vicinity of Cocoa Island, chasing their former allies' damaged fortress as it retreated from the islands, and then joined the hunt for a valuable artifact against Teams Hooligan, Dark, and Rose, but were beaten badly. Following this, the Rogues believed their luck turned had turned around, as they by chance found a valuable clue to discovering the location of their ancestors' long-lost Babylon Garden.

Desertion and early actions
Originally, all members of the Babylon Rogues were part of the Battle Bird Armada, who took their name from previous deserters. Each of the three most famous members of the group left after being imprisoned for various reasons. Wave was a mechanic who worked under Dr. Fukurokov, but crossed him by making unauthorized modifications to his engines. Storm was a soldier with discipline problems that resulted in him assaulting a superior officer. Jet was an ace flyer who eventually angered the Battle Lord by defying him and refusing to help find the Jet for the Armada's conquest.

These separate actions all landed them in the brig together, but they broke out soon after. Eager to get back at the Armada for their treatment, the three of them decided to deny the Armada its destiny by finding the Garden first. Before they could leave though, they were confronted by the Battle Lord's son, Speedy, who tried to keep them from walking out on their commitment. After Speedy found he could not stop them with words or by force, the sixteenth Battlekukku desperately pleaded that he be taken with them, only to be rejected as the now "Babylon Rogues" meant to find a destiny that was theirs alone. The Rogues then stole an old zeppelin and deserted the Armada, becoming a primary target of the Battle Lord ever since then, who believed they were his best lead to finding the Bablylon Garden.

Sometime after they deserted, an Armada soldier named Predator Hawk attacked Speedy out of jealousy of his inherited position, and was imprisoned for his insurrection. Having broken into the Battle Fortress, Wave freed Predator and he joined them, which was ironic as Hawk had hunted the Rogues while serving the Armada. The foursome went on many hunts using their Extreme Gear, sometimes after the Armada, but mostly after treasures, much to Predator's chagrin. At some point Jet and Predator discovered a golden bird idol from some old ruins, and attempted to sell the relic to Mammoth Mogul at a bazaar. Mogul agreed to their "outrageous price," so long as Predator came with him. Dissatisfied with treasure hunts and being led by Jet, who in his opinion was a weak and undeserving leader, Predator happily entered Mogul's service, leaving the Rogues minus one member.

Sonic Riders
The Babylon Rogues became temporarily employed by Dr. Eggman after Jet stole a vapor accelerator from the doctor to boost his Extreme Gear. He was captured and brought before Eggman, who was intrigued by his speed on his Extreme Gear, remarking that Jet was nearly as fast as Sonic the Hedgehog with it. When Jet claimed he heard of the "poseur" and boasted about his own speed, Eggman offered to free Jet if he would in exchange rough up Sonic. Jet agreed, provided he could bring along Wave and Storm. The trio entered the Great Forest not far from Freedom HQ and activated the security system to lure Sonic to them, and attacked him when he arrived. Despite Sonic's speed, being outnumbered and attacked by enemies using Extreme Gear proved too much for him to handle.

After beating up Sonic, they let him return to Freedom HQ, promising to head for his home the day after. The next day, the Rogues were en route to attack Knothole directly, wondering if it was worth it after having so easily defeated Sonic. Much to their shock, Sonic, Tails and Knuckles suddenly intercepted them with their own Extreme Gear. Displeased, Jet then decided wreck Knothole on principle, and the groups confronted each other: Knuckles matching Storm in strength, Tails matching Wave in skill. and Sonic matching Jet in speed. The Freedom Fighters were later informed of this encounter, which apparently ended in victory for the heroes.

Trouble in Paradise
Some time after the race against Sonic and his friends, the Babylon Rogues showed up near Cocoa Island in their zeppelin, apparently planning to attack the Battle Bird Armada. When Wave and Storm made note of the damage to the Armada's fortress, wondering if other rogues were responsible, Jet simply brushed it off, stating that only the rogues could touch the relics of their ancestors, and they were "going to remind their old buddies why that is".

Treasure Team Tango
While Team Hooligan was escaping from a brawl between Team Dark and Team Rose with a Sol Emerald in the Great Forest, Wave's scanners picked up the gem's unusual energy signal. The Rogues followed Team Hooligan in their blimp and began dropping bombs in an attempt to catch their target. Upon succeeding, they traveled down with their Extreme Gear and snatched the gem, only for things to get complicated when Team Hooligan member and former Armada member Bean the Dynamite happily latched onto Jet. Despite this nuisance, the trio managed to escape Nack the Weasel's sniper shots - for the time being.

Team Hooligan pursued the Rogues on the Marvelous Queen, and before the Rogues could make it back to their blimp, one of Nack's shots hit the Sol Emerald itself, causing an unexpected fiery blast that threw the Rogues to the ground. Upon hearing the gem had not been damaged at all once Nack recovered it, Jet and the others flew off as the blimp's auto-pilot dropped its entire bomb payload. However, this plan failed when Bean surprisingly caused all the bombs to detonate prematurely. Eventually, Team Rose and Team Dark arrived, and so the Rogues entered a four-way scramble for the Sol Emerald.

At first the battle was nothing but a hectic riot, and when the Rogues grew tired of brawling and tried to make off with the emerald yet again, it began to jump back and forth between everyone, making for an even more chaotic melee. However the tides turned against them when Teams Rose and Dark began to cooperate, and the GUN commandos ended up being herding the Rogues together with Team Hooligan who were corralled by the girls. Blaze then set off one of Bean's bombs and the resultant explosion was able to take both teams out of the fight in one move.

At the battle's end, Storm had taken the brunt of the blast and was left stunned and smoldering, while shielding Wave who was aghast at their damaged Extreme Gear, and also Jet who attempted to take command of the situation and continue the fight. Wave cut off his orders however, when she decided they were leaving before losing their blimp as well, and grabbed Jet by the head feathers, marching off and angrily ranting about how hard it would be to repair their airboards. A shell-shocked Storm followed them silently, carrying the scorched Extreme Gear in a burnt pile.

Babylon Rising
Sometime afterwards, Storm heard what he thought was a lead to treasure in Soleanna, but when the Rogues investigated this, it turned out to be false as they ended up at the city's library. The failed trip had surprising benefits though, as Wave came across a book written in ancient Babylonian that contained information on the Key to Babylon Garden. The Rogues took the book, and using it as their guide, traveled to the Gigan Mountains where they found the key's resting place in some ruins underground.

As Jet removed the key, he accidentally activated a trap that sealed them in and forced them to confront the key's guardian, Angelus. The Rogues made short work of Angelus once they figured out how to disable it, and then had to flee as the ruins started to collapse. Though they managed to barely escape with their lives, the Rogues found themselves cornered by Speedy and the entire Battle Bird Armada as soon as they reached the surface. Instead of surrendering the key peacefully, they ended the standoff by running right through the Armada in an effort to escape. Easily dodging laser fire from the Battle Birds, the Rogues soon outpaced most of the troopers, leaving only Speedy and Dr. Fukurokov's Pursuit Drones to give chase.

While Wave and Storm dealt with the drones, Speedy went after Jet and was able to wound him. Speedy eventually trapped Jet, but the other Rogues caught up in time to save their leader and had the Battle Kukku at their mercy. Their victory was short-lived though, as the Battle Lord joined the fight and quickly took the Rogues down with little effort, and then leveled death threats against the three. This pressured them into surrendering the key, to which the Rogues were then forced back into the Armada by the Battle Lord (something Speedy strongly disagreed with). The Rogues then listened while the Battle Lord explained he knew how to work the key, watching in awe as he made it produce a map showing Babylon Garden's exact resting place.

Now as reinstated Battle Birds, the Babylon Rogues were given the Gravity Ring and their first assignment by the Battle Lord: disable the shields over the target city of New Mobotropolis, and lure Sonic away from protecting his home. During the Armada's attack, the Rogues distracted Sonic and kept him busy until they saw the Battle Fortress was in position, and then trapped him with the Gravity Ring and flew back as the Fortress destroyed the entire city with its drill beam. Once the Rogues arrived at the gaping hole that the beam created, they continued on down with the intent of still taking the Garden for themselves. Sonic pursued them once he escaped, but after a brief fight they trapped him with the Ring again and entered the ancient structure at the bottom.

Inside, the Rogues made their way to the control center where they put the key's pieces back together, only for it to be taken from them by a robot AI. As the AI explained the key was the Garden's ignition matrix, Sonic burst into the room and took down the Rogues in just seconds while demanding answers. Listening as the robot revealed that Babylon Garden was a spaceship for which it was the autopilot, the Rogues struggled with the realization that they were actually descendants of aliens. The impact of this news was only surpassed by the shock of the autopilot informing them it was returning to its homeworld, which involved activating a wormhole generator that would create a black hole and destroy Mobius.

As the Rogues panickedly went through their options and were left with removing the key, Speedy flew into the control room and knocked them down as well. While Speedy gloated over the Rogues' turn of events, Sonic destroyed the key and was then sucked out a hatch, but not before he threatened to come after all of them if anybody had been hurt in the attack. With the Babylon Garden falling, the Rogues made their own hasty escape and watched as the prize they sought for so long crashed into a mountainside, taking the Battle Fortress down with it. Observing the wreckage for a few moments, the Rogues then rode off as Jet vowed to become the fastest thing in the universe, while Wave tried to contemplate the significance of the information they gained about their heritage.
 * Note: From this point, the Babylon Rogues's history continues from their new lives in the altered timeline.

Trivia

 * Some fans believe the Babylon Rogues to either be members or deserters of the same armada Bean the Dynamite and Predator Hawk worked for. Evidence to support this came in the form of the Armada deserter Bean, when he and his partner Bark stole Extreme Gear from the organization and later accused Predator Hawk of being a deserter as well (which was eventually revealed to be the case, and in fact Predator had actually once been a member of the Rogues). This was later confirmed on the Sonic Universe Blog&mdash;at least in Jet's case&mdash;by writer Ian Flynn, while the membership of the other two was canonically confirmed in Sonic Universe #18 and Sonic Universe #30.
 * Despite their desertion of the Battle Bird Armada, the Babylon Rouges seem to employ certain methods that indicate they acknowledge their history with them, such as their zeppelin's bomb payload.
 * Unlike villains featured in several adaptations that came later&mdash;such as Shade and the Marauders and King Arthur&mdash;the Babylon Rogues were introduced into the actual continuity of the comics in their first appearance.
 * The term "Babylon Rogue" also refers to the loose-knit group of deserters from the Armada, with Jet the Hawk's group being the most prominent of them. Under this broader definition, Bean the Dynamite, Predator Hawk, and possibly Bow Sparrow are Rogues as well.