Blue, Red and Purple
By LazerTH
Disclaimer: Only Lazer T.H. and Rebecca Coriander belong to me. Other characters are either of my imagination or owned by Sega.
Author's Note:
This is part 2 of the sequel to Brothers of the Rainbow. The previous story was "Mrs. Sally Hedgehog" in which Sonic and Sally were wed, and my SIFF characters Lazer and Rebecca were pledged to marry. This fiction is different to its predecessor, so kick back, relax, and prepare for some serious action.
***
The return trip to Great Forest was becoming turbulent. The sky had a very black look and the sea was lost in fog.
"Tails, I hope you're not heading into a storm," yelled Sonic over the roaring wind. He and his wife Sally were standing atop the Tornado's wing, due to lack of seating (the pilot and their luggage had filled the only two seats available).
"No way. The barometer says nothing about it. It's just a rain cloud."
It was not.
"Tails!" Sally shouted. She was clinging to Sonic. There was sleet now; icicles began to form on their furs.
"Don't worry, Aunty! It's gonna be alright!"
The biplane charged onward through the icy skies. By now, even Tails would have admitted they were flying in a full-blown storm. The wind tore through his hair as ice began to creep over his pilot's goggles.
"I'll try to fly above it," Tails said, and pulled down the wheel. The Tornado climbed upward at a sharp forty-five degree angle.
"Hey!" Sonic and Sally complained. They were hanging onto the ice-caked wing by their paws.
"Sorry," Tails grunted, pulling back the wheel with all the muscle he could muster. Soon they would be flying above the clouds where there was only sunlight and calm breezes.
"You OK?" Sonic asked, hanging onto dear life by his fingers.
Sally turned her head, blinking water out of her eyes.
"For now! Are you freezing? I can't feel my paws."
"We'll both be ice cubes, unless we get outta this," Sonic said in a louder voice. Tails took the hint and tried a bit harder. He forced the Tornado into an almost vertical climb.
"Hang on!"
"Do we have a choice?" they hollered. One of Sally's paws gave up that moment, swinging free. Sally shrieked.
"Sal!" her husband yelled. She weakened, and soon both paws were grasping air. Sonic could see Sally falling, falling to the dark waves, and falling to inexorable death.
"No!"
His paw shot out and clamped onto her wrist. Her eyes met his in the strain of that moment, as she waved back and forth in the violent gale and his other paw threatened to lose its grip on the wing.
"I'll never let go," he promised. With a prodigious effort he swung his wife upward, and she had enough sense to hook her arm over the ice-coated wing.
"Sal! We'll always be together!" Sonic shouted above the storm. She was surprised to find a grin on his face. He let go of her wrist and held her hand. They bent their heads, while sleet and wind slashed through their fur. The Tornado broke through the clouds, and leveled its flight path. The couple groggily stood up, soaked to the bone, their teeth chattering. The sun beamed brightly upon them as the warm air kissed their faces. Ice melted from the Tornado and its passengers.
"Tails, you do anything that stupid again and I'll take away your pilot's license."
"That's okay, Sonic," Tails grinned, "I don't have one."
The Tornado glided through the clouds to friendlier skies.
***
Lazer sensed the sniper before the trigger was even pulled. Raising his fist, a bolt of Chaos Emerald energy flared into existence and exploded three stories above the parade. The crowd screamed and scrambled for cover, wondering what the hell was going on. Not wasting time the red hedgehog took to the air and landed inside the small apartment. The sniper, clad in black, was covered in dust. His AK-47 rifle was damaged but he pulled a submachine gun from his belt and fired. The bullets never hit Lazer.
"You fool," the red hedgehog thundered, and reached behind his back. The blue-white katana glittered in the flame of Chaos energy surrounding his body. The black-clad sniper ran for the door but a slash to the head ended his escape.
I'm not paid enough for this…
He slumped to the floor, still alive. Lazer returned the katana to its sheath.
"The mayor is hated," he muttered, and exited through the window.
***
The news of the attempted assassination reached Knothole first, since Lazer had been dismissed from his duties that day and told Sonic. The blue hedgehog was wrapped in a blanket and had a hot water bottle on his head. It was winter in Knothole.
"Why'd anyone want to kill the mayor?"
"There are elite groups that disagree with the mayor's idea for expansion. They do not think that Robotropolis should ever be reclaimed."
"Why? I was the one who suggested that the Freedom Fighter City should grow over Robotropolis."
"Then you are partly to blame. Many people died in Robotropolis. These elite groups don't want their children to grow up on such a bloody land."
"It's just sentimental? Great Destiny, I'll never understand how some people's minds work."
"That sniper was thinking of murder. I'm sure I could've picked up his thoughts from a mile away."
"Being the mayor's bodyguard was a perfect fit, eh, samurai boy?"
Lazer glowered at him.
"Go back to your wife. She's missing you even now."
"Hey!" Sonic yelled. Lazer walked away. "You bastard! Stay out of her head!"
Sonic went back to Sally right away. As a gesture of goodwill, Rotor, Tails and many other Knothole folk had pitched in to build the newlyweds their very own house. It was near to the palace gates, so that Sally could visit her family (and Sonic's in-laws could keep an eye on him). Sonic approached their double-decker home and swung the door open.
"Hi, honey," sang Sally when he entered. She, too, was dressed in a blanket and hot water bottle. She put down the book she was reading and got up from the desk, to hug him, to hold him. "What news?"
"Someone tried to kill the mayor. Good thing Lazer's his bodyguard, I couldn't think of anyone more suited for the job."
"That's fine, but I'm glad you're my bodyguard," she cooed.
"I bet. What're you reading?"
"The Joys of Marriage. The book said nothing about living with a supersonic husband, though."
"That's because I am the One and Only Blue Wonder."
"And what am I?"
"Perfect," he said sincerely.
***
Kazuo sipped the scalding tea. He sat upon his knees on the forest floor with the kettle beside him. A raspberry-purple rabbit with a violet ponytail, his gray kimono and sheathed katana betrayed his samurai spirit. For years he had been a Freedom Fighter, training Rebecca Coriander to improve her karate. The tip of his left ear was missing, lost in a fight years past. His narrow amber eyes considered the curling steam rising before his face. In it he saw his only student with that boy, Lazer. He had been surprised that such a hedgehog wielded a katana and practiced a style called "Wanrikken". Maybe he would teach that boy a thing or two when it came to true mastery of kendo. Placing the cup on the grass Kazuo picked up his sword. How would he teach Lazer? The sword flashed outward, blue-white against the green forest, and returned to its sheath in the blink of an eye. Kazuo sat on his knees and refilled the cup.
A tree groaned and slid off its severed stump.
"I will teach him," Kazuo promised, while fresh steam billowed over his face.
***
"How was work?"
"Just an attempt on my boss's life. I can't believe this happened during my first week!"
"I thought samurais work for no one?"
"I pray that my late sensei forgives me."
Lazer and his fiancée Rebecca constructed paper collages by the Lake of Rings. His primary job was to protect the Lake, but, faced with the prospect of marriage, Lazer was forced to find paying work.
"You're using too much glue. It makes the paper mushy."
"You are wise, master," he replied, mimicking what one of her dojo students had said earlier today. Although he wore 'V'-shaped fur on his head, her forehead fur was curved into a gentle semi-circle. Genetics was to blame.
"What are you making, anyway?"
"You."
She peered at his work.
"My eyes do not take up three quarters of my face."
"They don't? Strange. They're all I seem to notice."
Whether an insult or compliment, Rebecca did not know; Lazer's face could be as expressionless as slate when he wanted it to be.
"Um, Lazer?"
"Yes."
"When…"
"Do you think our wedding should be? Hmm."
Silence.
"There is this beautiful place of worship in the city. The House of Destiny, they called it. The mayor goes there."
"I was thinking more along the lines of a quiet wedding."
The church in Cridon base, they both thought. It was in that place of worship that Rebecca had prayed half a decade for Lazer' safety. It was where Lazer had learned the hymn, which engaged them.
"Your church, then."
"Yeah, I thought so."
An awkward silence ensued.
"Oh," Rebecca said, and jumped to her feet, "I can't do this anymore!"
"What?"
"The collage. I can't concentrate."
"Aw, siddown, Becky," he taunted.
"I hate that name! That's what my Dad calls me!"
"Come on, Becky. Finish the…"
He paused to block the ax-kick to his head. He sprung to his feet and laughed at her.
"You need to be disciplined, Becky."
"Don't call me that!"
They began a comprehensive demonstration of the martial arts.
***
Thousands of tubes and wires formed a network around Robotnik's body, inserted into his flesh. Where his nervous system began and the wiring ended was impossible to tell. The supercomputer, his life support, monitored every heartbeat, every laboured breath. He was in a state of stupor, his senses dulled by the large amounts of painkillers in his bloodstream.
Never before or since had the scientist been this close to death.
"Are we feeling better today, Sir?"
His nephew Snively had entered, holding a large test tube containing orange fluid.
"Breakfast?" Robotnik thought. His thoughts ran into the supercomputer, which manifested them via loudspeakers in the room. They blared whenever he was in need. "Yes, wait a moment."
The short hook-nosed man placed the test tube within an alcove built into the computer. A tube descended into the orange substance and sucked, transporting it directly into Robotnik's arteries.
"The arena has been completed, Sir. Shall the second phase be carried out?"
"Yes. Vengeance will be mine."
"Of course," Snively murmured while leaving the room. Every time he looked at the wretched form of his uncle, memories haunted him.
Three weeks ago his uncle had teleported into the underground base, vomiting blood at an alarming rate. Snively was not prepared for the dreadfulness of that day. The readout of the medical computer had been ghastly: In each arm, seven bone fractures. All twelve ribs were broken. The spinal column had snapped in six places, with the spinal chord being ruptured in three. Both lungs were punctured and hemorrhaging. The worst injury was to his stomach (possibly the largest organ he had, Snively thought). It had exploded within his body. The stomach acid had damaged several major organs (liver, kidneys, pancreas- all were partially dissolved) and poisoned his blood stream with its undigested contents.
Snively had taken immediate and decisive action. The supercomputer and at least ten thousand servo units went to work, probing the almost dead scientist, assessing the extreme injuries. They had stabilized him, removed toxins, re-constructed organs and bones, along with hundreds upon hundreds of other surgical procedures. The computer gave Robotnik a 0.3% possibility of survival at first, but Robotnik refused to die. Undaunted ambition, a fierce thirst for revenge or an overpowering need to live, Snively did not know how, but Robotnik had beaten the odds. His chance for survival was now 42%.
"Carry out phase two," he reminded himself.