Less than 2 weeks after Team Skyline recruited their forth member Marcus, they stayed together in the Raccoon's large house on the edge of town, given to him by his now deceased uncle. The team strives to stay at their level of strength and team work, however, after the clash with the biggest underground gang leader, crime has been put to an all time low, making no need for the team to come out and help.
The police still label the team as Just Another Gang but everyone knows them as the vigilantes against gang violence. Tails and Cream's relationship is still going strong, Espio sticks to his drinking and Marcus is slowly starting to learn how to be a Team player
Being the biggest and strongest member, Marcus takes care of the heavy lifting and close combat part of the action.
But now, it's slow going for Skyline and they're patiently wait for a sign of danger in the city of Two Gates.
Marcus POV
When the guys asked me to join the team, I was thinking of telling them no, probably because I'm used to doing things alone. After my older brother was killed, I slowly distanced myself from the gang life. I started lifting weights and I got jacked in no time. Soon, every street gang wanted me to be their back up, and even my brother was starting to get intimidated.
Team work isn't one of my strengths. Rushing in and swinging at everyone around is more like it. For awhile I was stuck thinking the days of loyalty were gone and everyone just wanted to make a quick buck, until Tails and Cream saved me from my old street gang. They showed me what true loyalty is, and now I'm on the "good" side, at least that's how I see it. I could care less about money or running the city, I have friends who actually give a shit about me, and will stand up against asshole mob bosses. That's why I joined Skyline.
Tails, Cream and Marcus sit in the living room of the Raccoon's house watching the News on a giant flat screen TV mounted on the wall. No stories catch their attention, and just like everyday they wait for a report of any crime going on, but nothing is announced.
Espio stands in the backyard practicing various high spinning kick on tree branches, making a mess of wood and leaves around the yard. Tails joins the chameleon outside, flies into the air and sits on the highest branch on the tree. The sun goes down, ending another uneventful day. Espio puts on his over-the-shoulder strap bag and stuffs it full of liquor bottles.
"I'm going to the bar, call me if theres-" Espio hesitates "If theres ANY sign of trouble, doubt it but whatever.."
Tails sighs and nods, still gazing at the sun set over the ocean. Espio makes his way into town via the highway and bike trails. Marcus' house is in a very secluded area from the city, and hard to find if no one has ever been to the place. Cream leaves Marcus in the living room and he shuts off his TV.
Loud rock music plays throughout the second level bar Espio is at, he sits at the window looking out at the rainy city streets. The door opens and everyone standing in the way backs up one by one. Espio doesn't notice a thing as he's sipping on a drink and eating a cheese burger from the bar's grill. He does see someone point to him out of the corner of his eye, but he remains calm. He hears a few girls say his name, and loud footsteps draw closer to him. This figure stops right beside his chair, and Espio takes one last drink of his beer then sets the bottle down.
"So who's looking for me this time?" Espio asks, still looking at the bottle
"One of your old buddies, dude" It's a familiar voice
Back at the house, Marcus turns on his stereo and an alternative rock station comes on. Tails sits at a large dining room table with a deck of cards and Marcus sits down. Cream sits in her room watching a smaller flat screen TV with her pet Chao Cheese at her side. The fox shuffles the deck of cards and throws Marcus his deck. The two sit opposite from each other playing 21. Half way through their game the back gate opens, which gets their attention because everyone enters through the front. Tails and Marcus get to the back door and shine a flash light
"Don't shoot, guys. I brought a guest" Espio says as he walks to the patio
Later that night, everyone is seated in the dining room at the table, catching up with the blue hedgehog. Sonic declines to have a few beers, and reveals why he came to see Team Skyline.
"So, there's a bit of a problem going on back home, guys. Eggman has no clue where the chaos emeralds are, and neither did we.. but after some thought, we knew where they all went" Sonic coughs
"You sick?" Espio asks
"Just a bit. Guys, I'm gonna be straight forward with you.. I came here because I need the chaos emeralds back"
Tails and Espio look at each other, not saying a word. Cream waits for someone to answer, but no one says a word. Sonic chuckles to himself, then coughs
"I know what it's like having the power of the chaos emeralds, it's awesome, not gonna lie. But you guys don't need them to be a great team. I'm not saying this just cause I need the emeralds, I mean this. The emeralds only give out so much power to the ones using them before it stops working. Eggman's got something big going on and I have to stop him, but I need the chaos emeralds"
After about a minute of hesitation, Tails sighs and stands up.
"Alright man. they're in the basement" Tails signals Sonic to follow
The two go to the basement, leaving Cream, Marcus and Espio upstairs. Tails turns on a light and starts the conversation
"So, how's everyone doing down there?" Tails goes down the wooden staircase first
"Everyone's fine. We miss you guys back home, it'd be cool to have a visit sometime" Sonic follows down the steps
"Sometime, Sonic" The fox opens a crate and pulls out a bag with all seven chaos emeralds inside "Things here haven't been to eventful so maybe soon"
"Criminals come and go. I'm sure you guys are gonna get some action sometime" Sonic takes the bag
The two make their way upstairs and back into the dining room. After another hour of talking, Sonic decides to get going. Just as he opens the front door, Tails stops Sonic
"How'd you know where to find us?"
"Heard Espio was a drinker so I went to the biggest bar in town. And you guys made the front page of the paper last week" Sonic replies
Tails grins, and the two fist bump then Sonic takes off. Tails closes the door, and sits down with everyone
"So what now?" Marcus asks
"What do mean?" Tails asks
"I think he means now that we don't have the emeralds, what do we do now?" Espio adds
"We keep going, like Sonic said. We don't need them to be a Team" Cream says
"Yeah, well they made things a lot easier" The raccoon replies
"Being a team was never gonna be easy. And now we really need to work together and fight harder to keep going" Tails says
Espio leaves first, then Marcus heads to his room, leaving Tails and Cream in the dining room. Right around midnight, they start to head up to bed, until the News reports a bank machine theft, car thefts, arson, and assault on a police officer, each one has gang members involved. Tails is the first to hear it, then runs to the TV to see the news
"Guys! we're back in business!" Tails calls to his friends.
Cream comes downstairs and joins Tails first while Espio and Marcus complain about being woken but soon make their way to the living room
"Alright guys, We each take one of the four crimes. Espio, you got the car jackers, Cream you take the arsonists, Marcus, get the kids who took the bank machine and I'll take the ones who jumped the cop. Lets move!"
The team races to the city where sirens from every corner are going off and cars are zooming through the streets. Cream sees smoke rising from the far north end so she splits from the group. Espio and Marcus go opposite ways and Tails goes into the sky.
Tails lands on the 30th floor of a skyscraper and looks on at the neon city. Espio sees cops chasing two muscle cars so he races after them. Cream gets to the burning building and hears terrified screams inside the building so she goes in. Marcus spots a bank machine being dragged on the road by a blue truck. Tails looks down and sees an ambulance and paramedics putting a cop inside. Tails looks all around that area and sees 5 gang members running a few blocks away. The fox jumps off the skyscraper and hovers above the gang. He lands in front of them and they all stop.
Cream kicks a door down and covers her mouth with her jacket as she runs in and grabs two young hedgehogs. She flies out of the building and down to the ground and the kids run to their mother. Marcus follows the truck until it stops at an underground parking garage. He catches up and just before the garage door shuts, he lifts it up and gets inside. The driver runs at him with a wrench but Marcus takes him out fast. The raccoon drags the bank machine outside to the side walk and runs into the shadows as cops surround the garage.
One of the stolen muscle cars splits up from the other and ditches the cops, but Espio is right on his tail. It stops to blend in with normal traffic, so Espio rushes up and pulls the driver out. pedestrians pull out their phones and start videoing the incident, and Espio knocks out the driver. He takes off, and police get to the muscle car and arrest the driver. Tails stands in front of 5 gang members in all black and red colours
"Think you're tough, jumping on a cop when he's not looking?" Tails asks, irritating the street gang "Jump me"
Tails gets ready to fight, and the gang circles him. The fox flies up just as a thug tries to attack him from behind, and he picks up the smallest member. He throws this kid 15 feet away and makes it 4 on 1. He knows he doesn't stand a chance trying to fight their way, so he out smarts the gang. Tails dodges punches and tires them out, waiting for the right time to strike. The gang stops abruptly and runs away
"Ha, didn't think so!" Tails yells to them.
Tails could feel someone behind him, so he turns around. He sees a male fox who looks identical to him, but with a scar on his left cheek and different clothes. The two stare at each other, then the mysterious fox speaks
"What's up, Prower" This fox says in a deep voice
"What is this, halloween?" Tails says sarcastically
"Not tonight, that's not for another 4 months"
"Then what's with the look? You look a little bit like a certain handsome Fox I know"
"You turned into such a cocky prick, Prower. I'm not trying to be anything like your dumbass"
"Harsh, man. You're hurting my feelings" Tails keeps his eye on this fox "You got a name, or should I call you Generic fox No.1?"
"My name is Miles. And I'm not trying to hurt your feelings"
Miles punches Tails in the face, knocking him back "Lets see what you got!"
Tails goes for a kick but it's blocked and he takes several punches. He backs up and tries to punch at the other fox but his hand is caught and he takes 3 kicks to the gut, which drops him to one knee. Miles lifts his leg up and drops it, connecting an axe kick to Tails head, then kicks him in the face one more time.
Tails is laid out, bleeding from his nose as Miles wipes blood from his steel toed boot
"After all these years, you're still a bitch!" Miles taunts, kicking at the downed Fox
Tails gets to one knee and holds onto Miles' jacket to slowly get up. Miles puts his hand around Tails' throat and starts to choke him. Tails struggles, punching at the fox, but Miles doesn't let up. The street gang comes back and circle around the two foxes. Tails eyes start to turn red from getting strangled and he gets light headed. He continues to punch at this evil fox but having no luck breaking his grip.
With every punch, Miles' grip gets tighter and stronger, almost like an anaconda. Tails grip goes limp and his vision gets blurry, then he starts to black out. The last thing he sees is Miles start laughing then one last punch.
Tails starts to dream
He sees events from years ago, a battle with Team Dark comes up and Tails is watching himself flying around Shadow. Sonic fights the black hedgehog and Knuckles calls out to Tails. The battle starts to fade out, except Tails who is left in a white area.
This is all just a dream, Prower, Tails tries to tell himself
The fox is interrupted as he sees Eggman inside a massive robot shooting missiles at Team Sonic, then the group smashes into the robot and destroy it.
Come on, Wake up Prower! Tails tries his best to wake himself up, but he's stuck in dreamland.
Another fade out, this time Tails ends up in a field of half dead plants and the sun shining bright. He can almost feel how hot the weather is as he moves through the field. Tails pushes plants out of his way, then he hears a loud buzzing sound, but he doesn't know where it's coming from. An airplane appears in the sky and it comes closer, almost making contact with the field. Two giant gun barrels appear from the wings and start shooting at Tails.
The fox is hit, and falls to the ground. He tries to get up, but he is stepped on and sees Miles above him. Tails' anger spikes but he can't get up. Miles spits on the ground beside Tails' head.
Suddenly the sound of a clock tower bell Is heard and the sky turns to an apocalyptic Red setting. Miles kicks Tails in the ribs, and the fox can feel them crack from the impact. Miles stands back and he pours some kind of liquid on him then walks away.
Tails tries to make himself believe this is only a dream, but at this point he feels everything that happens to him. Tails is confused and scared, so he tries to fight through the pain and he gets up. He slips on his side, and his bullet wounds bleed out more. He groans in pain, but gets up again. He turns around to see Miles pointing a shotgun at him. Tails gets a whiff of the liquid on him, and realizes it's gasoline. He can only think of one thing
Why are you doing this?
But before he can open his mouth, Miles pulls the trigger and Tails is lit on fire. The flames intensify and he tries to roll around to put them out. Miles gets into the airplane and flies off as the entire field catches fire. The pain goes away as Tails closes his eyes and everything turns black.
This was all a dream, or a big nightmare.
The fox is woken up, lying on a couch. He starts breathing heavily and falls to the floor, unable to control his breathing. Cream and Marcus try to calm him down, but Tails is too paranoid and frightened. Finally Cream grabs him by the shoulders and assures him everything is alright. Tails can hardly make out the voices, to him they sound distorted and demonic.
He slows his heart rate and rests his head on the couch. Marcus helps him back up on the couch and Cream stays with him for the rest of the night.
Marcus stands on the patio next to Espio and the two lean on the railing, looking out at the ocean
"Jesus, he was pretty terrified" Marcus says
"I know. He was like that when I got to him. Whoever that was that did this, he looked just like Tails, but more scarred up" Espio replies
"Does he have a brother he pissed off?"
"Not that I know of. Couldn't have been his dad, either…"
"How do you know?"
"His dad is dead. Besides, what kind of Father would do that to their kid?"
The two get quiet and try to think of who this was. Tails slowly starts to go back to sleep, Cream holds an ice pack to his forehead and puts a blanket over him.
The next morning Marcus starts making breakfast; eggs, bacon and toast. Cream helps him and Espio watches over Tails, and the news. A reporter talks about the attack on Tails the night before which "left him in a coma"
Espio shuts off the TV and throws the remote on the couch
"Coma, my ass. These guys can't report for shit.."
Just then, Tails opens his eyes and sits up
"Hey guys, He's up"
Cream is the first to run into the living room and hug Tails. The fox groans in pain so she lets go. Tails looks around the room and coughs. His vision is still a bit off, but he is in better condition. No one says a word, and Tails stands up. he walks around the room, checking his body for marks, or bullet wounds in case his dreams were real. He lifts his shirt, only to find dried blood on his fur.
He comes back to the living room, opens his mouth to speak, but he doesn't say a thing. He looks around one more time, then looks at Espio
"What happened to me?" Tails asks, hearing his own voice sound distorted
"Who ever kicked your ass must've really went all out on ya, man. You were so terrified, you were acting like you were possessed or something" Espio answers
"If you saw what I saw, you would be too.."
"What did you see?" Cream asks
"Some scary stuff, I can't even explain it. Just.. just trust me, you don't wanna know"
"Do you know who this was? Cause this guy looked just like you"
"Said his name was Miles. He kicked my ass big time"
"I know, you looked dead when I saw you. Your eyes were wide open and red, and blood was coming from your nose"
"This guys' good, I'll tell ya that. I hit him once when he was choking me and it didn't do shit.."
"This guy almost killed you. He put you right to sleep"
"I'm gonna go shower, I gotta get this blood off me.."
Tails takes off his shirt and goes to the washroom. Cream, Marcus and Espio look at each other but say nothing. Now they really have to be careful next time they go out if they see this guy.