| “ | No one can tune a Gear the way I can! | „ |
| ~ Wave the Swallow, Sonic Riders |
| “ | You think you could win with that board? | „ |
| ~ Wave's catchphrase before race start. |
Wave the Swallow is an anti-heroine and on & off villainess from the Sonic the Hedgehog series. She is an anthropomorphic swallow who resembles a swallow-tailed kite and is the technical and mechanical expert of the current generation of Babylon Rogues. She is the daughter of the tech expert of the previous generation of Babylon Rogues, which she takes after, and takes care of her groups' customized Extreme Gears. Her rivals are Tails, Cream, Rouge and Charmy.
She serves as one of the (former) three secondary antagonists of Sonic Riders, and one of the three tetartagonists/anti-heroes of Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity and Sonic Free Riders.
Because of her knowledge on Extreme Gear, Wave is brimming with self-confidence and can be a bit of a trash-talker and highly critical of others' work with Extreme Gear. She hates thick-headed or stupid people and she tends to give advice only she can understand. Regardless, Wave is level-headed and serves as the voice of reason in the Babylon Rogues, though she is often mistreated by the other members.
Despite being a villain, she can be heroic such as teaming up with Sonic and friends to defeat the villains.
She is voiced by Chie Nakamura in the Japanese version, and formerly by Bella Hudson who also voiced Blaze the Cat and now by Kate Higgins in the English version, both who also voice Sakura Haruno.
Appearance
Wave is an anthropomorphic swallow with light purple and dark feathers that cover her body and head. Her hair is styled like a pair of long braids. She has a curved beak, cobalt eyes and two tail feathers. For attire, she wears white gloves with golden bracelets and red lining, a white tube top and white flare-designed trousers. She also wears red boots with white accents, a necklace with a red utility gem and gold glasses.
Personality
Because of her knowledge, Wave is brimming with self-confidence. She is very arrogant about her expertise at Extreme Gear, certain that no one can match her in this field. She is a super-achiever and holds very high standards for how Extreme Gear should be and never hesitates to dismiss others' Extreme Gear as 'junk'. She takes great pride in her skills and is passionate about her profession, becoming indignant when someone insults or blames her work for their own failures. She has a keen eye for detail, takes notice of everything, and hates thick-headed and stupid people. Also, she tends to give advice using terminology understandable to only herself and not others. Naturally, this causes tension and frustration between her and others like Jet.
Wave often refuses to admit others' talents with Extreme Gear mechanics due to her dislike of anyone who could rival her. She often hold back on her compliments and will either continue to dismiss or deny that the person has any skill at all to cover up any sense of generous gesture she may hold. In the cases she does give compliments, she will disguise them as insults. It is only in the rarest of cases that Wave gives well-meant compliments.
While generally fun-loving like the rest of the Babylon Rogues, Wave is very level-headed and serves as the voice of reason amongst her group, often lecturing Jet and Storm of their responsibilities. Because of her teammates' unreliability, Wave believes that she has to take charge of the team if anything is to get done. She is very serious on a job, staying dedicated to the task at hand and insists on no lack of dedication from her companions. When things do not go as planned, however, she tends to get impatient. Also, she can be quite stubborn and obstinated when making a decision.
Wave is usually rude, and has a sly attitude and snide sense humor. Being the most outgoing of the Babylon Rogues, Wave has no problem insulting others and mocking their Extreme Gear. She will also take compliments or conversations from others and twist them around so that she can throw them back at others as a snide comment. Wave also finds amusement in insulting and degrading her opponents' skills during races.
When it comes to accomplishing her teams' goal, Wave is perfectly willing to cheat in official competitions, such as sabotaging Sonic's Extreme Gear in Sonic Riders and Sonic Free Riders, even without Jet knowing it. Likewise, she will gladly take whatever beneficial chance that might present itself, such as taking the Key to Babylon Garden on behalf of Jet when Sonic returned it despite Jet refusing to accept it.
Wave also has a great deal of greedy love for money and treasure, and her primary motive in life is to acquire as much wealth as possible. This was her sole reason for willingly competing in the World Grand Prix in Sonic Riders and Sonic Free Riders.
History
Early life
Wave was born into the Babylon clan of thieves known as the Babylon Rogues. She is a descendant of the Babylonians, an alien race that stranded on earth in ancient times and became a legendary band of thieves which continued their legacy of thieving for generations.
During her early life, Wave was raised and given her skills by her father. At some point, she became a member of the Babylon Rogues and was joined by Jet the Hawk and Storm the Albatross. Together, the three of them formed the newest generation of Babylon Rogues and continued their clan's legacy of theft, with Wave serving as the team's technological genius and Extreme Gear mechanic.
During her career as a member Babylon Rogues, Wave and her team engaged in several of unknown criminal activities and managed to build up an infamous reputation.
Sonic Riders
In Sonic Riders, Wave and Storm found Dr. Eggman arriving on their airship with a proposition for Jet. When the two brought the news to Jet, she noticed Jet's Key to Babylon Garden, which could reveal Babylon Garden and its hidden treasure, but Storm kept her from it. Eggman then arrived and revealed the Key to Babylon Garden could reveal Babylon Garden if they collected the seven Chaos Emeralds, though he warned Sonic the Hedgehog would get in their way. Wanting their ancestors' treasure, the Babylon Rogues agreed to work with Eggman.
As their plan, the doctor hosted the EX World Grand Prix, where the contestants had to pay an entry free of one Chaos Emerald, and the winner got to claim all seven. Wave and her team then only had to win the competition. Traveling to Future City, Wave and her team stole a Chaos Emerald as an entry feed. While fleeing, Wave caught Storm when he was hit by Knuckles and got away.
Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity
In Sonic Riders: Zero Gravity, a few months after the World Grand Prix, Wave and her team were on a treasure hunt to Gigan Rocks to find an Ark of the Cosmos, an engine unit for Babylon Garden. After getting the Ark of the Cosmos, Wave tried to make a wish on a shooting star despite being ridiculed by Storm. However, some falling meteors created tremors that activated the ruins' trap, causing some boulders to drop down on them. However, Wave and her team were saved when Jet used the Ark of the Cosmos.
Back on the their airship, Wave began analyzing the Ark of the Cosmos and told Jet about her finds. Having also read some Babylonian scrolls that there were five Arks of the Cosmos, Wave was ready to build a radar to find them when Storm came with a news report saying that a SCR-GP stole an Ark of the Cosmos from the Megalo City Museum, promoting the team to head for Megalo Station.
Arriving in Monopole, Wave and Storm followed Jet and the robot with the Ark of the Cosmos to a dome, There, Wave saw Sonic, Knuckles, Tails, and Amy were there, and that they had the Ark of the Cosmos they were looking for. Overhearing the group planned to go to MeteorTech, Wave, Jet and Storm went ahead to gather information. Arriving at MeteorTech, Wave helped Jet repel the security robots with the Ark of the Cosmos and reunited with Sonic's group, with Wave greeting Tails. When more security robots showed up though, Sonic and his friends left, with Wave and Jet chasing after them.
When they got to the control room, Wave and the others found Dr. Eggman, who owned MeteorTech. Under persuasion, the doctor revealed that the MeteorTech mother computer had an Ark of the Cosmos, and that the robots that were currently on a global rampage were collecting more Arks of the Cosmos which was due to the Arks of the Cosmos' influence. Wave and the others then noticed that both Amy and Storm were gone and saw on monitor images that Storm and SCR-HD were chasing Amy.
Returning to the Babylon Rogues' airship, Wave worked on deciphering some ancient Babylonian texts until Storm returned with two Arks of the Cosmos. Wave told her team that she had discovered in the ancient texts that the Arks of the Cosmos were severed from Babylon Garden's engine because they almost triggered a "lightless black," something she had no idea about what was. No sooner though, Wave and the others discovered that two of their Arks of the Cosmos had been stolen by Eggman, who planned to use them to take control of the world's robots and conquer the world. Wasting no time, the Babylon Rogues followed Eggman.
Arriving at the Crimson Tower, Wave and her team met Sonic and his friends, and Wave explained to them about the Crimson Tower. She and her team then raced against Sonic and his friends to Eggman with the Arks of the Cosmos at stake.
At the end of the race, which ended with a tie, Eggman and the global robot rampage were stopped. When Babylon Garden appeared due to all Arks of the Cosmos being present and Sonic handed over his, Wave prepared to head to Babylon Garden with her team and the Arks of the Cosmos. However, she was attacked by SCR-HD, who stole all the Arks of the Cosmos from her and took them to Babylon Garden. This transformed Babylon Garden into Astral Babylon and created a black hole, the "lightless black", which would consume the planet. After figuring out a plan to stop the black hole, Wave and her team followed Team Sonic to Astral Babylon, where they faced and defeated Master Core: ABIS, saving the world. With everything over, Wave asked Jet if he was okay with the truth about their ancestry. Hearing that Jet was content with it, Wave took her leave with her team.
Sonic Free Riders
In Sonic Free Riders, Wave and the Babylon Rogues entered the newest World Grand Prix hosted by Dr. Eggman as Team Babylon to seek fame. When Omochao had an interview with the team, Wave was inpatient to get the cash prize, though she agreed with Jet that she should pity their first opponents.
In the first round, Team Babylon faced Team Dark, who Wave advised to ignore after they trash-talked them. Between the races, Wave tried to defend Jet when Rouge rebuked his complements and had to deal with Storm arguing with E-10000B which she thought was a pointless endeavor. After they beat Team Dark, Wave remained confident her team would win the Grand Prix.
In their next race, Team Babylon faced Team Rose. As Team Babylon won over their opponents again and again, Wave taunted Vector with how he had to deal with his annoying team-mates.
After defeating Team Rose, Team Babylon advanced to the finals with Team Heroes, though Wave was confident Team Heroes could not win with Tails's Extreme Gear. During the face-off, Wave secretly sabotaged Team Heroes' Extreme Gear with Storm. Before the final race against Team Heroes, Wave taunted Tails and assured Jet they would win, which made Jet suspicious that she had cheated, but Wave played innocent. After the race, Jet accused Wave for Team Heroes' mechanical issues during the race, but Wave denied it. Regardless, Jet ensured Team Babylon's victory in a rematch, and Wave praised Jet for his victory. As Team Babylon was hailed as winners, Wave taunted Tails about not expecting to match her in Extreme Gear expertise, but still encouraged him.
As the Grand Prix continued, Team Babylon lost a few times too, with Wave being confident before the race, only to be in disbelief (once even in denial) when beaten. After the tournament was over, Wave and the other teams went to the awards ceremony to collect their prizes but Eggman made all of the competitors race against his "ultimate Gear-jockey robot". After winning the race, Eggman revealed that he used the World Grand Prix to gather the riders' racing data with his E-10000 robots to create the ultimate Extreme Gear which he could use for his own agenda. Eggman then challenged Wave and the others to a race, but lost, and Wave mocked the doctor's inability to determine the problem, before dismissing Storm's suggestion to take the racing data, finding it useless. Metal Sonic then revealed himself as the one controlling E-10000B and passing fake data to Eggman, while taking the real data himself in an effort to beat Sonic on Extreme Gear.
Wave and the others then saw Sonic and Metal Sonic square off in a rival race to the finish, with Sonic winning. As the World Grand Prix came to a close and it was revealed the prizes were fake, Wave was upset about leaving the competition empty-handed since it would kill the Babylon Rogues' reputation.
Heroic Acts
- She teams up with Sonic and friends to defeat the Babylon Guardian.
- She teams up with Sonic and friends to defeat Master Core: ABIS.
- She teams up with Sonic and friends to defeat Dr. Eggman and Metal Sonic.
Trivia
- Wave is the only female member of the Babylon Rogues.
- Even though her 2D art shows her hair with a dark part, this is nowhere to be found in her 3D art, but it can be seen in her Sonic Free Riders artwork.
- An odd trait that Wave has is her curved beak. However, her species have straight beaks.
- Her beak also has nostrils in her 2D artwork, as is the case for Jet and Storm.
- When Wave is scolding Jet about his responsibilities in Sonic Riders, she starts speaking quickly, to the comical point where her speech is sped up. When the scene is slowed down, it is revealed that she is speaking with her Japanese voice in the English version.
- Both her English and Japanese voice actresses play Sakura Haruno in Naruto and Naruto Shippuden as of 2010.
- Wave seems to be more loyal to Jet in Sonic Free Riders than in the first and second Riders games, possibly due to the fact that Jet has noticeably matured.
- Wave makes a cameo appearance in Speed Highway in Sonic Generations.
- Wave is shown to be very competitive and can't stand losing almost as much as Jet. Unlike Jet, however, she usually makes use of some sort of dirty trick to sabotage Sonic and his friends.
- On Wave's Sonic Riders series 2D artwork the flames on her wrist are dark purple however on her Sonic Channel and 3D artwork the flames are pink or lavender.
