Disclaimer: Sega/Sonic Team owns Sonic the Hedgehog (characters, series, and concepts).
Author Notes: This an old oneshot I had on my DeviantArt account. I wiped off some of the dust, polished it up a bit, and decided to put it here. Also, don't ask. My muses are strange like that.
Business and Pleasure
"Alright, my checkpoint should be here somewhere." The voice of a purple chameleon said to himself as he crawled through an air duct. Moving a few more feet, he saw faint rays of silver light in the distance, "There."
In the blink of an eye, Espio dived out of the air duct and landed perfectly on the metallic ground. "Infiltration successful." He announced as he looked around the area. This part of the factory was full of cranes, boilers, conveyor belts, and other working machinery. "Just this last room before the vault, and then I'll have acquired the Chaos Emerald." He said as his gold eyes looked around to find the best path that would allow him to get by most easily.
It was rather dark, but Espio the Chameleon expected so. When he started his mission, it was sunset. This worked to see his advantage because, in the event any of the factory workers were around, he could use the shadows – along with his invisibility – to hide him. Those were just two of his options. As a ninja, Espio was a master at the art of infiltration and stealth.
The purple reptile scaled the wall quickly and jumped off, landing with perfect balance onto a moving conveyor belt that had automated hooks hauling crates of items. Due to his high position, he immediately saw the door to the vault on the other side. "Hm. I'll make this quick." Espio muttered as he leapt off the conveyor belt and onto a nearby pipeline. Even the low amount of surface area was no issue as Espio ran down at it respectably high speeds, adequately combining agility and balance like a ninja was supposed to.
In probably record time, Espio made it to the other side and jumped off, again landing perfectly in front of the door. As an extra precaution, Espio suddenly turned invisible before opening the door so as to not get caught if there were any cameras or people lurking behind the door.
Espio entered the vault room and, sure enough, there were four cameras each located at each corner of the room. Espio was glad that he rendered himself hidden. Otherwise, he would have been caught and failed the mission. Removing four shuriken off of his cuffs, he threw one each at the lens of the cameras. With perfect accuracy, the ninja stars stabbed the lens of the quartet of cameras.
"Now the rest is easy." The purple chameleon proclaimed as he turned visible again and approached the vault itself. "Alright, let's see if this thing that Vector gave me works." He removed a neon blue card out of the cuff of his right glove and held it up to the identifier on the vault. It instantly worked as the large silver vault began to open up.
Espio waited patiently until the substantially sized metal door opened fully to reveal the cyan Chaos Emerald on a stand. There was system of wiring spiraling down the shaft. If Vector was correct, the factory was feeding off the energy of the Chaos Emerald to properly conduct business. Espio wanted to know why the factory heads needed it when others performed excellently without a mythical gem as the power source. He had more questions, but he had a mission to do. He approached it and held the emerald in his hand. "Mission accomplished. Time to take my leave."
Repeating the same process he used to break into the factory, Espio exited it and was now walking down the trail back home. "Hopefully Vector and Charmy are done arguing with each other…"
The main reason why Espio undertook this mission alone was to get away from Charmy and Vector, his other two friends and cohorts in the Chaotix Detective Agency. An adult crocodile getting on the nerves of a child bee was not a good combination. It was annoying in Espio's opinion, so he opted to accept the next mission assigned to them and got out of there. By now, Espio was inwardly calm. He just didn't like how ditzy the group was, especially with a ninja like him. The Chaotix Detective Agency was supposed to be all business, and ninjas knew nothing more than that and discipline.
He stopped, and his gold eyes looked up to the grayish, starry sky. It appeared rain clouds were going to form any minute. "Hm. I should pick up my pace. Vector and Charmy are probably wondering where I am."
"Why don't you stick around some more, handsome?"
At the sound of the rather sultry, feminine voice, Espio put his senses on high alert. "Reveal yourself." He ordered calmly. From out of the trees, a white bat whooshed out and floated high above the guarded purple chameleon. "Hey there." She greeted, "That's a pretty gem you have there."
Espio remained placid in expression. He had only seen this woman a couple of times in his life, and all of said times she was with Shadow the Hedgehog or the E-series robot. Now that he thought about it, Team Chaotix had actually battled her team on one occasion due to a misunderstanding. "And what if it is, Rouge?" He interrogated, "I'm on important duty."
Rogue the Bat smiled and descended closer to the ground, "Well, no need to get pushy. I happen to be the client that called your agency. I'm just here to pick up what belongs to me."
He wouldn't believe that for a second. Espio knew that Rouge was a devious person who had an odd soft spot for anything shiny and beautiful. Well, that tidbit of information he acquired from his old cohort Knuckles. Regardless, he also aware that she was a spy that worked for G.U.N. under a high-ranking officer who happened to be a former employee of the Chaotix.
"Prove it." Espio demanded simply.
"Well, we're in the middle in the forest, so that eliminates all complex means of proving my case," Rogue countered while her feet hit the ground, "So, I'm afraid you'll just have to take my word for it."
"No proof, no deliverance." Espio said sternly, "Now, if you'll excuse me, I must head back to my headquarters." With that, and allowing the white bat no further assertions, he ran off down the trail. Rouge narrowed her blue irefully before spreading her wings and dashing off into the night sky.
Espio steadily sprinted down the road, his purple and black shoes kicking up dirt along the way. He maintained this pace in order to lessen the duration of his return trip. "At this rate, this won't take but a couple minutes."
Suddenly, his instincts were put on alert again as he sensed something approaching.
Swiftly, the ninja jumped to the side to avoid what seemed to be purple tarot cards stabbing into the soil. After he landed, he saw Rouge descending toward him. "You just don't know when to surrender, do you?" Espio questioned.
"I'm telling you, I called you guys down," Rouge insisted, but her lips curled into a smirk, "But I guess I can play with you for a while. It would make the accomplishment of getting that radiant beauty all the sweeter."
Ninja vs. Spy. What an interesting prospect.
"Hmph." Espio huffed indifferently as he stowed away the Chaos Emerald, "Then bring it on." The purple chameleon then jumped into the forest, activating his specie's characteristic ability to blend into the environment. This was as good as invisibility; no regular creature would be able to locate him.
"Hide-and-seek. My favorite game." Rouge smirked before flying into the forest, her ultra-sensitive ears doing her dirty work. It was a good thing that Rouge, as a bat, was no regular creature.
"OK, she can't catch me while I'm invisible. So I might as well head on out." Espio thought as he stealthily moved about the forest. As long as he didn't get splashed by water, smeared in mud, or something similar, nothing would compromise his invisibility. So, he thought Rouge would never be able to find him.
Emphasis on 'thought.'
All of a sudden, here came Rouge from behind a tree. She was already performing her trademark Screw Kick attack, heading straight for the invisible chameleon in the form of an all-piercing, whirring spear. "What the-?!" Espio was directly hit by the attack and was sent skidding back. Because he sustained damage, his concentration was broken, removing his invisibility.
"A neat little trick." Rouge commented as she hovered in the air, her wings flapping lightly, "Sight is one thing, but hearing is another." On cue, her prominent ears twitched.
Espio mentally slapped himself; he had forgotten bats had supersensitive hearing. He couldn't hide the soft patting of his footsteps on the lush, grassy ground. "Hmph. Not bad." Espio remarked as he stood up, making sure the Chaos Emerald was still in his possession, which it was.
"Honestly, can we just skip all this?" Rouge asked, moving closer to the chameleon, "I swear I'm telling you the truth."
Espio absentmindedly backed up only to hit the trunk of a tree. Of course, Espio never considered himself a trapped rat. He merely wanted distance from the white bat. However, it appeared he wasn't in any real danger, seeing as he no longer sensed her competitive spirit.
"Sorry, ma'am," Espio said coolly, "I'm on strict business. If you truly are our client, I'll return this to you when I receive confirmation from my boss."
With swiftness Espio didn't think she had, Rouge flew over to Espio and captured the lips of the purple chameleon with her own. The reptilian male was in very much shock, unsure of what to do in this situation. No amount of training specialized for ninjas could have prepared him for this. He was frozen, and his brain stopped working as it tried to comprehend this one simple action, this one thing extremely foreign to his type.
Rouge broke the kiss and looked at the speechless Espio while smiling, "That won't be necessary." With that, she flew off into the hand, and Espio saw the telltale cyan glow in her hand.
Never mind that the crafty agent stole his first kiss – Espio never showed that much regard to romance in general – she just escaped with the Chaos Emerald. Closing his eyes as a headache threatened to appear, Espio released a heavy, sustained sigh, "Great...What am I going to tell Vector…?"
Finally, the Chaotix Detective Agency was in sight, sitting in the middle of the quiet woods. With a small yawn, Espio reentered the home base for Team Chaotix. Sure, it was simply a rinky-dink shack consisting a large main room, a bathroom, and a back room, but it was home, and he certainly needed some time to rest. His headache had appeared full blast.
"Hey, Espio, you're back! You're back!" Charmy exclaimed happily, floating around the purple chameleon's head in circles. Espio did not bother following the bee's flight pattern. He didn't want his eyes to hurt as much as his head.
"Job well done, Espio." Vector complimented as he stood from his desk.
"Hm?" That caught Espio's attention as he stared long and hard at the large crocodile, "What are you talking about?"
"For delivering the Chaos Emerald to our client." Vector explained, approaching the purple reptile. Of course, he was wary of Espio's perplexed tone and expression. It was strange, considering that Espio should have known.
"Yeah! You saved us the trouble of calling the person and having to hunt her down!" Charmy piped in.
Because Espio was smart, it didn't take him long to put two and two together. "So she wasn't lying…" Espio thought. To think, all that extra energy had been wasted because he was suspicious. The realization provided many elucidations to the strange encounter with Rouge, and there was one in particular he hated the most.
For the first time in his life, Espio the Chameleon had mixed business with pleasure, and he was definitely going to approach the one who broke his streak.