Hello, I'm PSIBoy and I'm attempting my first Sonic fanfiction. Any kind of constructive criticism is welcome and is greatly appreciated. This is inspired by a match in multiplayer Sonic Adventure 2 Battle that I played recently. I hope you enjoy this oneshot.
Disclaimer: I do not own Sonic the Hedgehog or any kind of company out there.
"Ah, ah… ACHOO!" Sonic sneezed. Tails sighed as he sat by his big brother's bed, not as worried about his condition as he was making it worse by running which usually helps him relax, but not in this case.
"Ah man, I wish I could go for a run right about now," Sonic groaned.
"Don't worry Sonic, you'll be able to run when you get better in a few days," Tails reassured him.
"That's forever!"
"Well then, this'll help you practice patience!" Tails said, trying to explode a silver lining to Sonic when he remembered something. "Ah, right. The mailman should've dropped of the mail by now. I'll get your mail for you," he offered. "You need the rest if you want to recover faster."
Sonic sighed. "Right," he mumbled, not too enthusiastic about not even being capable of completing simple chores.
Shortly after he fetched the mail, Tails reentered Sonic's house with a stack of letters. He began shifting through them.
"Let's see… fangirl, fangirl, ceremony, business offer, dare from Shadow, a letter from Eggman, fangirl, Amy-" he stopped dead when he registered that Eggman had mailed him. Setting down the remaining envelopes, he reached over and gently pulled out Eggman's envelope and carefully opened it.
It stated the following.
Hello there, Sonic. I hope you're having a bad day because with this letter it's about to make it even worse! I have seen fit to establish my next project onboard the ARK, remember that? I'm sure you do. Anyway, my next world domination scheme is being cooked onboard that old Space Colony using my grandfather's tech and formulas. The only way you can stop me is if you come and defeat me. Which would be impossible. Ohohohohoho!
From, Doctor Eggman.
Tails got up without a word and walked into Sonic's room.
"Hey Tails, so what's up?" Sonic asked, noticing Tails' apprehension.
"You have a letter from Eggman daring you to stop his plan on the ARK."
"Oh," Sonic replied nonchalantly. A few seconds passed before his eyes widened and sitting bolt upright. "Oh! He's back, again. We'd better stop him!"
"Sonic, you're in no condition to fight right now," Tails replied, pushing the hyperactive hedgehog back down onto the sheets. "I'll go. My inventions can wait a little longer."
"Tails, are you sure you can do this?" Sonic asked, concerned for the safety his best friend.
Tails sighed. Sonic knew he would be able to take care of himself: He was just so overprotective sometimes. He would just have to nag him for a bit.
"Of course, I can handle him with the Cyclone," Tails replied. "I've upgraded and refined it while I was making repairs from when it was shot down during the incident with the Black Arms. It can handle any one of Eggman's robots."
Sonic looked thoughtful for a moment, recalling the times the Cyclone came in handy and how he defeated Eggman with it on one occasion. Sonic smiled and nodded, happy with his response. "Good. And give Eggy my regards."
Tails chuckled a little at Sonic's request. Oh he would do that for sure.
Using the new teleporter in his lab, Tails was easily able to warp up to the ARK in no time at all. It was just as he remembered it: Dark, dusty, worn down… yeah. Fifty years of neglect would do that to pretty much anything. The real technological marvel of the ARK in his opinion was not the experiments that went on in it, but rather the fact that humans had gotten such a massive object like this up in space, complete with artificial gravity that can be changed with a flick of a switch as well as plenty of oxygen to breathe.
Still, the setting was… unsettling, though it wasn't as frightening as lightning in his opinion. His hands were gripping the controls of the Cyclone so hard his knuckles were turning white (not that anyone could see under his gloves), as his anticipation was running high. In fact, he was paying no mind to the steady clangs the Cyclone's steps would make as it 'walked'. It was at least ten minutes since he started searching, with no trace. For all he knew, Eggman could be plotting a trap. Suddenly, he wished Sonic was with him; he was confident and calm in the face of danger like this as evidenced by his joking around, though he knew when to take things seriously as well.
It was at this very moment that a certain someone's voice cackled through his radio. Dr. Robotnick, who was forever doomed by his arch-nemesis to be known as Eggman, must've found a way to connect to his radio.
"Oh, so it's Tails coming after me, not the hedgehog," Eggman sneered. "Tell me; is Sonic too afraid to fight me that he sent you up here to deal with me?"
Tails' eyes narrowed in response. "Two things," he replied. "One: He has a more important issue to take care of-"
"WHAT!?" Eggman roared. "What do you mean he's too busy to come after me!" he ranted. "I am his arch-nemesis! I am the one who will destroy him one day! I am going to conquer the world, so HOW COULD HE IGNORE ME!?"
"But he sends his regards," Tails finished his statement. "And two, I beat you before on this very same vessel, and I can do it again!" Tails pointed out.
"Maybe, but you got lucky that time," Eggman waved off the counter. "My Egg Walker has seen a massive overhaul recently. Now it can fire Power Lasers once every thirty seconds!"
"What? No way!" Tails gasped at the statistic. There was no way that was possible! The Power Laser was supposed to be extremely potent, yet it would take a long time to charge. There was no way he'd have that kind of capability!
Eggman cackled again. "This is a nice change of pace indeed," he said once he calmed down. "I intended this to take on Sonic, but I think a little payback for that one time should serve as a nice shakedown cruise. Now I shall dispose of you as a test run and then blast Sonic into smithereens!"
Tails knew this was going to be an uphill battle. In his previous encounter with Eggman on the ARK, one hit from his Power Laser could severely damage his Cyclone and the only three reasons he won was because he couldn't use it very often, he himself could use it as well, and he was infuriated by Sonic's supposed death. Now with rapid-fire capabilities beyond the Cyclone's, how was he going to go about this?
Tails figured hit and run attacks would have to do. In the darkness of the ARK, if Eggman was indeed in this sector, it would work thanks to the maze-like interior and the lack of lighting.
Tails fired up the radar he recently installed as one of the upgrades. No good, all the sound waves were just bouncing off of walls- wait, there. A small blob just northwest of his position! That had to be Eggman.
Tails set the Cyclone on a course towards his big brother's arch-nemesis, trying to devise strategies through his various calculations.
However, he came upon Eggman's position all too soon. However, Eggman only replied with shots from his volcan cannon, not any sort of photon blast.
'So that's a drawback of his modification,' Tails mused. 'If I can snipe him from a distance, I might have a chance after all.' With this thought in mind, Tails backed up as he opened fire with both volcan cannon rounds and guided photon lasers while Eggman could only fire his volcan cannon. Slowly but surely, as the Cyclone ducked left and right, only receiving minimal damage from the few volcan cannon rounds that found it, the Cyclone's combined laser and cannon was making it difficult for Eggman. He would pilot his walker to avoid the laser and he would blunder into a stray volcan cannon round. He would evade the volcan cannon, and he would get the laser.
It wasn't long before Eggman was fed up.
"You're no match, Tails!" Eggman suddenly shouted as rainbow energy began to build up along a side cannon that just appeared. Knowing it was going to be his Power Laser, Tails quickly brought his cyclone behind a wall and ran for it.
Seconds later, the very wall he was behind initially crumbled under the force of the pinkish-blue laser, and proceeded to decimate the next few walls. After the smoke cleared, the anamorphic fox heard Eggman curse.
"Darn, he was smart enough not to get caught in that," Eggman swore. But then he grinned. "But that will just make destroying him even more fun. Witness the power of my Power Laser! Muahahahahaha!" he cackled once again.
With that, he fired again, his wrath this time directed at a random wall, which disintegrated under his fearsome power. Tails quickly deduced three possibilities: he didn't have radar, it wasn't functioning, or he did and simply shot the wall just because.
No matter his reasoning, he was about to pay the price for his actions. Tails circled around the wall between him and Eggman and came up on his rear. Of course, he quickly took aim and opened fire.
"What?" Eggman gasped as he whipped his Egg Walker around. "You cheater!" he roared. "You can't do that!"
"All's fair in love and war, Eggman," Tails replied as he was chipping away, though he was again forced to duck behind the maze of walls when Eggman again fired Power Laser at him. 'Man, if this keeps up he'll destroy both of us since the vacuum of space will drag both of us out!'
Instead of charging around to Eggman's rear like last time (which is what Eggman expected), Tails came out head-on which took Eggman off-guard and giving him an opportunity to pepper his Egg Walker with relentless fire.
"Grr… Stay still so I can blast you!" Eggman barked.
"No can do, Eggman," Tails laughed. "Also, you seem to have forgotten one thing about the Cyclone."
"And what would that be, Tails?" Eggman asked as he was readying another shot of Power Laser. He regretted his words when a single cannon that Eggman knew all too well emerged from the Cyclone's nose. Tails smirked.
"You forgot that I can use Power Laser too."
With that, he pressed the trigger as Eggman pushed his. Both cannons radiated a blueish-purple hue as they charged up their shots. Then they fired, meeting exactly halfway between both mechs.
The resulting energy collision caused a massive explosion that deafened Tails' ears as they registered the sounds. Then, the shockwave from the blast hit that flung the Cyclone back, though Tails managed to use the rocket boosters to keep it upright. He checked for damages.
The damage from the shockwave alone was very extensive. Sparks were flying off of the Cyclone from all over the mech and some smoke was rising from around the volcan cannon. They Cyclone's mobility also seemed to be hampered. Tails frowned, since his best advantage against Eggman during the ARK incident was now gone. At least Eggman should be worse off, but he wouldn't be able to continue the fight for much longer.
It seemed to take an eternity for the smoke to clear. The anticipation of what happened to Eggman was so great that he couldn't tear his eyes away from forward. Fortunately, this gave his ears some time to recover from the ringing, though it wasn't completely eliminated.
Eventually, the smoke cleared, revealing an Egg Walker keeled forward onto the ground, smoking and sparkling. Evidently, the damage it had sustained was too great, and Eggman pounding on the controls in an awfully mature tantrum didn't help matters on his end.
"Blast!" he shouted. "Every time I work out a new scheme to destroy you and Sonic, it doesn't work! You and your pesky crew always figure out a way to dismantle my schemes!" But then Eggman smirked. "Well, no matter. I'll be back, and next time I will dismantle your Cyclone piece by piece!" With that, he jumped out of his Egg Walker as he called his personal Egg Mobile to lift him away.
Tails would've pursued, but the damage was too extensive on the Cyclone. There was no way it was going to catch up to Eggman.
For now, Tails was simply satisfied with stopping Eggman's plan (whatever it was: He was starting to think it was just to lure Sonic up into a confrontation) and began to head back to the teleporter room so that he could repair the Cyclone at his workshop.
"Wow, that's pretty impressive Tails," Sonic complemented when he heard what happened.
"Ah, it's no big deal," Tails shrugged. "It's nothing you couldn't do yourself."
"Yeah, I could, but you totally outfoxed him Tails," Sonic retorted. "I would've just used my speed to run circles around him, but you didn't have that ability. No, instead you used what you had and won, like I would."
"Hehe, thanks," Tails said, blushing a little at the compliment. "No doubt Eggman wants his revenge: I'll have some tinkering to do with the Cyclone after you get better."
"Don't worry, I'm just fine," Sonic sprang up. "I'll just go for a run to prove- ACHOO!" Tails sighed. He didn't know whether fighting Eggman was worse than taking care of a Sonic with the common cold.
Well, that's that. I hope you enjoyed this. Remember, I would appreciate any constructive criticism you can offer me. Whether you do or not, I simply wish you all a good day!