All official characters are copyrights of SEGA and Archie Comics. Cody and Lily Griffor, Angel Starfire, Drake the chao, and Comet the chao are copyrighted to me.
Author's Note: This story takes place immediately following "Promises" and is an adaptation of Sonic Adventure 1. I know for a fact that this story is going to be a long one, so bear with me as I work on it. I can't keep to an actual release schedule for chapters, but I'm going to shoot for one a month if I can. So, hope you all enjoy this story and have fun reading it!
Shards of the Past
Chapter 1
The evening sun was beginning its slow decent in the west, bathing the usual azure skies in a golden hue. A lone black armadillo mobian watched the clouds float lazily by as he lay with his back resting against the ruins of an ancient shrine near the eastern edge of Floating Island, his mind wandering a bit as he lay in contentment. The armadillo finally looked back over his shoulders up to the top of the ruins where a massive green gem rested in the center of the shrine at the top of the stone stairs leading up to it, a lone crimson furred echidna standing right next to it, his hands resting on the gem with his eyes closed in concentration.
"You've been up there all day Knuckles. Are you sure you don't want to take a break for a little bit? I mean, you said we'd be there by night and it's pretty much that time," called Mighty to the echidna.
"I guess I can," said Knuckles, breaking from his concentration. He then looked up at the clouds, which had become more ominous looking in the last couple of hours. "Besides, I don't like moving the island through storms when I can avoid it. Too hard to concentrate with all the rain, wind, and lightning."
"I hear you on that," said Mighty, flipping on onto his feet. Here, he got a little nervous. He had remembered how angry Knuckles had been the day he had basically told Sonic and his friends to bite him, but he also knew from watching the echidna that he was somewhat regretful for doing so. "You know, it's been over close to four months since…you know…" Knuckles gaze shifted towards the armadillo.
"Yeah. I know," he said.
"Don't you think it's time to let that go and start anew with them?" asked Mighty. Knuckles gave a long sigh, closing his eyes and shaking his head.
"I don't know. I mean, it's true I owe Sonic a lot. He was the one that got the Master Emerald back from Eggman after all. But what he said to me that day…It's hard to let something like that go," said Knuckles.
"I know it is. But sometimes it's best to leave the past in the past and move on," said Mighty. Knuckles gave another soft sigh, looking back at the Master Emerald as it sat in the middle of the shrine ruins.
"I'll…think about it. But he'll have to be willing to apologize, and I mean sincerely apologize, before I'm willing to forgive him," said Knuckles.
"That's all one can ask for," said Mighty. He then flinched slightly as a fairly loud crack of thunder echoed through the area, signaling that the storm wasn't far off. "I think we should turn in for the night."
"You go ahead. I'll stay and keep an eye on the Master Emerald," said Knuckles.
"You remind me of one of the human postal people I remember hearing being talked about a while back. Through rain, sleet, sun, or snow, they do their job," said Mighty.
"Only my job's a lot more important," said Knuckles.
"True. Well, I'll be in the hut that's just down the path if you need anything," said Mighty before turning and walking down the path that led out of the ruins.
"Okay. See you in the morning then," said Knuckles as he walked to the top of the stairs. Sitting down on the top step, Knuckles lowered his head and closed his eyes, preparing to endure the weather as the first drops of rain started to fall.
Unbeknownst to the two mobians, a large airship had been following the island for the last hour, keeping itself hidden from view using the storm clouds as cover. The airship was bristling with laser cannons and missile launchers, befitting the design of its creator. At the command deck, a short man approached the captain of the vessel.
"Dr. Eggman, sensors indicate that the island has finally stopped moving," said Snively. The command chair situated at the helm of the ship turned to face Snively.
"Finally. Bad enough it took us two days to track down where the blasted island had been moved to, but the island moving made it impossible to begin our task," said Dr. Eggman, stroking his mustache with his left hand. "Is my hovercraft ready to depart?"
"Yes, sir," said Snively. "You'll be happy to know that our radar actually picked up the energy signal of the Master Emerald above ground." At this, the doctor grinned.
"Excellent. That knucklehead echidna's already done the hard part for us then," said Eggman. He then got out of the command chair and walked over to one of the many consoles that were strung about the deck. "Do we have a visual of it yet?"
"I dispatched a spy eye to the area the signal was coming from. It should be in range for a visual by now," said Snively. Eggman punched a few commands into the console and was rewarded as a video monitor lowered out of the ceiling in front of the command chair. The monitor then lit up, a picture showing the ruins of the shrine the Master Emerald was currently resting in, along with Knuckles sitting at the top of the ruins enduring the weather.
"He's guarding it, just as I thought he'd be," said Eggman. "Target the Master Emerald with one of our cannons."
"Sir, I'll ask you one last time. Are you sure you want to release this Chaos creature. You might not be able to control it," said Snively. Eggman turned back to him, clearly displeased with the comment.
"Of course I'm sure. I'll make that creature an offer it can't refuse. Now target it with a cannon this instant!" shouted Eggman, Snively almost jumping out of his skin before running over to one of the consoles. Eggman then turned back to the screen. "Besides, if this creature is really what nearly destroyed the echidna race over five thousand years ago, just imagine what it'll do to Knuckles once its set free. A little payback is never a bad thing."
"We're locked on sir," said Snively, looking up from the weapons console he was situated at.
"Fire," said Eggman, a grin spread ear to ear on his face.
As far as storms go, this one isn't so bad, thought Knuckles to himself as he sat at the top of the shrine's stairs, his eyes closed as he tried to block out the rain and lightning from his mind. Sure, the full force of the storm's fury hadn't reached the island yet, but for now he was content to sit in meditation. Suddenly, a flash of light and the sound like that of a small explosion were seen and heard from just behind Knuckles, causing the echidna to break from his meditation by the sheer proximity of the sound of the blast. Turning his head back to look where the Master Emerald was at, he felt the blood rush out of his head at the sight that now greeted him. Where once the massive emerald had been resting, there was now only a crater of jagged shards remaining.
"What the heck!?" he cried, jumping to his feet. Out of the corner of his eye, he thought he saw a ball of pink light go racing away from the shrine, but paid it no other attention other than the passing glance. "How did this happen?!" As if on cue, Knuckles spotted what appeared to be a small puddle of water off to the side of the remains of the Master Emerald. But what caught his attention was that this puddle of water was staying together in a pool. Suddenly, the water began to rise, morphing into a humanoid shape with two jester-like dreadlocks coming off its head, solid green eyes, and what appeared to be a brain in the middle of its head. The ends of its arms then morphed into hands with three thick fingers.
"You did this, didn't you?" shouted Knuckles angrily, setting himself into an offensive stance to attack. The creature gave no outward sign that it had even heard Knuckles, making the echidna's anger even greater. "I don't know what you are, but you're gonna pay for breaking the Master Emerald!" With that statement, Knuckles charged the creature, swinging his right fist right at the creature. But before the blow could hit, the creature leaped high into the air, dodging the attack. Knuckles looked up to where the creature had jumped to, leaping into the air in pursuit. But before he could close the distance with the creature, it flung one of its arms out, the arm extending as it came towards Knuckles. Not expecting an attack like that, Knuckles didn't have time to put up a defense before the arm slammed into his body, throwing him back to the shrine stairs, sending him tumbling down them before falling in a heap at the bottom of the stairs.
"Hey Knuckles! What's going on?" hollered Mighty as he ran up next to Knuckles as the echidna started to rise back to his feet, the armadillo having been drawn out of the hut down the path by the sound of the explosion. Not even bothering to answer, Knuckles ran back up the stairs to see the creature waiting patiently at the top.
"Fight dirty with me, will ya?" snarled Knuckles, his voice resounding with anger. The creature didn't answer him, but instead started to dissolve back into a puddle of water. As soon as the creature was back into its puddle form, it seeped into the cracks of the stones that compromised the shrine and disappeared. "Hey! Where are you going!?"
"What the heck happened!?" asked Mighty as he reached the top of the shrine, taking in the sight of the small crater of gemstone that remained of the Master Emerald.
"Some creature broke the Master Emerald," said Knuckles, kneeling down and slamming a fist into the stone floor of the shrine, several new cracks jutting out from where his fist had collided. Suddenly, the whole land shook violently, knocking both mobians to the ground.
"What's going on!?" cried Mighty.
"The island's starting to fall!" answered Knuckles. He closed his eyes as he tried to feel out the presence of any pieces of the Master Emerald. It took a couple of seconds, but he suddenly recognized the chaos aura of the Master Emerald all around the shrine. "I can sense there are several shards still around the shrine! Help me find them quick! We've only got a couple minutes before the island falls to the mainland below and if we hit land the island will be destroyed! I have to get the island back out over water before we hit!"
"Don't have to tell me twice," said Mighty as he ran back down the stairs, Knuckles close behind him. The two began scouring the ground around the shrine, both finding shards of the giant gem strewn across the ground.
"That'll have to do. We can't waste any more time looking," said Knuckles after about a minute of looking, running up the shrine's stairs with several chunks of emerald in tow. Mighty grabbed the last shard he saw before heading back up the shrine stairs behind Knuckles. At the top of the shrine, Knuckles flung the shards in his hands into the air and closed his eyes in concentration, the gems stopping to hover over the remains of the Master Emerald. The shards then started to converge with the remains, building upon the remains as Knuckles willed the Master Emerald to repair itself. Mighty then threw his shards over the remains, the same thing happening. By the time the shards had finished, nearly a quarter of the Master Emerald had been restored. Knuckles opened his eyes and looked over what had been restored. "Oh man, I hope this is enough."
Knuckles then placed both hands on the Master Emerald, closing his eyes in concentration again as he tried to will the island to start moving out over the ocean. At first, he couldn't sense the island moving horizontally. Please move, he thought to himself as he concentrated harder. The island suddenly shuddered a little, signaling to Knuckles that the island had started moving towards the ocean. This is gonna be way too close. Nearly a minute ticked by before the island suddenly lurched hard, throwing the two mobians to the ground for the second time in just a few minutes.
"Did we hit the ground or the ocean?" asked Mighty, alarm clearly in his voice. Knuckles smiled as he got back to his feet.
"Well, the island's not falling apart, so my guess is we hit the ocean," he answered. This news caused Mighty to breathe a big sigh of relief.
"So…What now?" asked Mighty. Knuckles sighed, his smile vanishing in an instant. He then closed his eyes as he tried to feel out any traces of the remaining pieces of the Master Emerald. After a nearly half a minute, he opened his eyes back up.
"Well, the good news is that most of the Master Emerald seems to be still on the island, albeit scattered all over the place," said Knuckles.
"And the bad news?" asked Mighty, arching an eyebrow.
"Bad news is that some of the pieces are several miles up the coast of the shore we landed next to. I can't tell how much of it is that way, just that a significant amount of the Master Emerald's chaos aura is radiating to the north about twenty miles or so," said Knuckles.
"I'll bet when the emerald was shattered, those chunks flew off the island while it was still airborne," said Mighty.
"You're probably right," said Knuckles. "Well, first thing's first. I'll start scouring the island for what shards I can find."
"You don't want me to help you?" asked Mighty.
"I need you to watch over what's left of the Master Emerald incase that creature comes back to finish the job," said Knuckles.
"I can do at least that much to help out," said Mighty.
"Well, be ready for extended guard duty cause till I find all the pieces of the Master Emerald, I'm not gonna be able to devote any time to guarding what's left of it," said Knuckles.
"Not a problem," said Mighty, giving a smile.
"Thanks. I'll feel better knowing that you're watching the shrine till I get back," said Knuckles.
"You gonna head out right now to look for the shards?" asked Mighty.
"No time like the present," answered Knuckles as he started walking down the stairs leading up to the top of the shrine.
"You are a postal worker, you know that?" teased Mighty.
"Stop calling me that," said Knuckles.
"Well, too bad Chaos didn't stick around to really give Knuckles a good working over, but I'll still take him knocking that foolish echidna down a peg," said Eggman, finally turning away from the monitor that was displaying what his spy eye was sending back to the Egg Carrier's command deck. He looked over at Snively, who was watching one of the other monitors. "Did you get a lock onto Chaos' bio-signature?"
"I believe so, sir," said Snively, looking up from his monitor. "He's left the island and is headed inland."
"Good. Patch the data into my hovercraft," said Eggman before walking towards the turbo lift at the back of the deck. "Time to go and meet our new comrade in arms."
Near the edge of the coastline that the Floating Island had landed next to, a vast jungle stretched for miles in all directions. Small clearings dotted the landscape and small paths where explorers had made trails were visible from the air. About a quarter mile into the jungle from the coast, a single hut sat in one of the clearings. While nothing to really look at, it housed the only mobian that called the jungle home. A rustle of underbrush at the edge of the clearing caused the few small animals that had been in the clearing to scatter as a large, purple mobian cat exited the foliage, fishing pole and tackle box in one hand, an impressively large fish in the other. As he walked out into the clearing, a rather large frog exited the underbrush and faithfully hopped after the cat.
"I tell you Froggy, I think my lucky charm is getting even luckier," said the cat as he walked up next to the hut. "I haven't caught a fish this big in months. And during a storm no less." The cat sat the fishing pole and tackle box on the ground, then hung the fish by its tail on a good sized hook that was tangling off the roof of the hut. The frog, in the meantime, had wandered over to a puddle of water that had appeared in the clearing and was drinking out of it. But after only its first gulp of the water, the frog leaped back away from the puddle as if taking the drink had hurt it. It then started to quiver almost violently. Suddenly, the puddle started moving across the ground, quickly making an exit from the clearing. By now, the cat had finished his attentions with the fish and he was now rummaging through his tackle box for something. Finding what it was he was looking for, he stood back up and turned around to face the frog. In his hand was none other than the yellow Chaos Emerald.
"You okay Froggy?" asked the cat, noticing that the frog was acting strangely. Suddenly, a small protrusion appeared on the back end of the frog. Then it quickly extended out from the frog before stopping after growing about four inches long. "Hey! How'd you grow a tail little buddy?" The frog then turned to look at the cat, eyeing the gem in his hand. "What's wrong?" Without warning, the frog suddenly started hopping as fast as it could towards the cat, leaping up into the air as it snagged the Chaos Emerald from the cat's hand, swallowing it in a single gulp as it hit the ground. "Hey! Why'd you eat my charm!?" Without a second thought, the frog then started hopping away into the underbrush as fast as it could. "Come back Froggy!" shouted the cat, grabbing his fishing pole before he started to chase after the frog.
"This blasted overgrown jungle is making it hard to track this thing," said Eggman to himself as he flew in his hovercraft just a few yards above the tree line of the thick jungle, watching his onboard instruments carefully. He had been tracking the creature's bio-signature as best he could for the last ten minutes, but the dense foliage below was making it difficult to get a solid lock on its signature. As he flew over a rather large clearing, his scanners finally picked up the bio-signature he had been following. Looking over the side of his hovercraft, he spotted a puddle of water moving swiftly across the clearing. "Gotch'ya." Throwing the hovercraft into a dive, he swooped down right in front of the moving puddle of water, causing it to halt. He then gently lowered the craft to the ground before climbing out. The puddle suddenly started to morph, growing upright until it turned into the creature that had attacked Knuckles back on the Floating Island. The creature then prepared itself to strike.
"Now hold on Chaos," said Eggman, throwing both arms up in a defensive gesture. "I just wanted to discuss a business proposition with you." The creature cocked its head at hearing this, but otherwise remained in its stance. Eggman, now more confident after not being attacked right away, lowered his hands and clasped them behind his back. "I happen to know that you are a creature that seeks destruction and mayhem. I also know that you need the seven Chaos Emeralds to acquire your true, perfect form. I can help you get them." At hearing this, the creature relaxed its stance.
"I know for a fact that six of the seven emeralds are in the near vicinity, separated only by about thirty miles give or take. I also know where the seventh one is at, though getting that one will require a little bit of strategy," said Eggman. "I have just one condition for helping you gather them and that is that you work for me." Eggman waited a few seconds to let his offer sink in before asking the next crucial question. "So, do we have a deal Chaos?" The creature remained frozen for a few seconds, then slowly nodded its head a few times, signaling to Eggman that he was willing to agree to those terms. "Excellent. We'll start immediately tonight by sending you to attack the Station Square district of Emerald City, which is only about twenty miles to the north. With any luck that will flush out the only Chaos Emerald that's not in the area. Once we get that one, we can focus our attention on the other six."
Eggman then turned and climbed back into his hovercraft before taking off and coming to a hover over the creature with it. He then activated a tractor beam that struck the creature, pulling it up into a storage compartment that was attached to the bottom of the hovercraft. The hovercraft then took off like a shot, heading for the city to the north as Eggman's laughter echoed through the air.
It's been quiet…too quiet lately, thought Sonic as he lay on his back on the roof of his hut in Knothole village, sighing as he closed his eyes. It had been only a week since Eggman had abandoned Robotropolis, an act done after Metal Sonic had gone rogue and sabotaged all of Eggman's bases in the north, yet with the peace came a sense of boredom for the spiky blue hedgehog. He wasn't used to things being peaceful. He had only known that in the one year he had lived with the hedgehog he called uncle, Sir Charles Hedgehog, in their little repair shop in Mobotropolis before Eggman had come and took it all away. He frowned as he thought back to that year of his life, wishing he could remember something before meeting his uncle out at the edge of the Great Forest all those years ago. He didn't even remember how he had gotten there or who his parents were. Not a single thing before that day was in his memories.
"Hey Sonic!" called a familiar voice from down below him.
"Yeah Sal?" asked Sonic, not even opening his eyes as his train of thought was broken.
"Just got a call from the mayor of Emerald City. Says he wants to talk to you," said Sally.
"What for?" asked Sonic.
"Not sure. All he said was it was something he wanted to discuss with you," said Sally. Sonic gave a groan before sitting up, looking down at the female ground squirrel as she stood a few feet away from his hut.
"Isn't diplomatic stuff your department?" asked Sonic, trying to get out of the situation. While he liked most of the humans he had met during his travels to the southern continent, the leaders of the cities were a different matter. They all seemed stuck up and stubborn to talk to, or at least that had been his experience the few times he had listened in on one of Sally's conversations with said leaders.
"I've tried to resolve it myself, but he won't share anything of detail with me," said Sally.
"Fine," said Sonic, annoyance laced in his voice. He stood up and jumped down off the roof of his hut, landing next to Sally. The two of them started making their way back to Sally's hut. The village was bustling with mobians and robians carrying tools, wood, and other building supplies as they continued their work on the enormous housing project that was now underway to build the robians a place to stay. Already over forty robians' minds had been freed by Nicole using the program given to them by Metal Sonic. Still, they had a long way to go to free the over six hundred robians that remained.
Even though a way to de-roboticize the robians hadn't been discovered yet, the ones whose minds had been freed had come to terms with their situations rather well, taking it all in stride. As they came up to Sally's hut, Sally stopped and turned to Sonic at the entrance to the hut.
"I know how much you hate dealing with the human leaders, so just get the details and I'll jump in wherever I can to speak for us," said Sally.
"Thanks. No offense to the humans, but they have lousy leaders in my opinion," said Sonic.
"I tend to agree with that statement," said Sally as the two walked into her hut. As they went into her bedroom, Sonic was immediately greeted with a holographic image of a man in his mid-forties with slightly graying brown hair being displayed by a disc similar to the one that they had given to Angel Starfire before she had departed nearly four months ago.
"Hey Mr…uh…" started Sonic, suddenly realizing he hadn't the foggiest idea what the man's name was.
"Pepper. Richard Pepper," said the image, giving a smile. "And I'm guessing your Mr. Hedgehog."
"Call me Sonic please," said Sonic, already annoyed that he had been called by his last name.
"Sonic, then. I was wondering if you could do Emerald City a favor," said Mr. Pepper.
"Give me one good reason why I should help your city. When we asked you for help, on multiple occasions as I recall, you refused us," said Sonic. The man gave a nervous smile.
"You must understand that I was only looking out for the people of this city. If we had aided your cause in any way, that was basically us raising a flag for Dr. Eggman to come and attack us," said Mr. Pepper.
"Okay…I'll give you that one," said Sonic.
"If I may," said Sally, interrupting the conversation. "Dr. Eggman has been neutralized on our continent."
"Has he now?" asked Mr. Pepper, raising an eyebrow in disbelief.
"He has. Since there is no way for him to find out that your sending aid to us anymore, I propose this. Sonic will come down there and help with whatever problem you have, and in exchange…" started Sally.
"Whoa, time-out there Sal," said Sonic, throwing up his hands in a "T" shape. "I ain't agreeing to anything till I know what I'm getting myself into." Sally gave him a sheepish grin, realizing she had overstepped her bounds. She then turned back to the image of Mr. Pepper.
"Yes. Tell us what this problem is first," said Sally.
"Very well," said Mr. Pepper. "For the last three nights, a section of our city called Station Square has come under attack by some kind of…creature."
"What kind of creature?" asked Sonic. Mr. Pepper just closed his eyes and shook his head.
"We're not sure. Eye witnesses say the thing is humanoid in shape and is made of water, but every time our police forces get within a block of where the creature is destroying things, it vanishes without a trace. Quite frankly, we don't know what to do to stop it," said Mr. Pepper.
"And that's where I come in," said Sonic, crossing his arms over his chest.
"Exactly. If you live up to your reputation, this should be a simple matter for you to deal with," said Mr. Pepper.
"Let me talk it over with Sally first," said Sonic, grabbing a surprised Sally's arm and walking her into the next room, out of earshot of the holoprojector. "What do you think?"
"We're already running short on supplies for building the robians their new homes. If you deal with whatever this creature is, I can get him to send us the supplies we need," said Sally. Sonic nodded.
"Sounds good to me. But I want to take Tails with me," said Sonic. Sally frowned at this request.
"Why take him with you?" she asked.
"Sal, the kid's been cooped up here in Knothole for nearly his whole life. I want to get him out, show him other places besides here, met new people. Only other place aside from Robotropolis he's been to in the last two years is Floating Island. Plus, he's never met another human besides Eggman. It'll be good for him to meet some nice humans for a change," said Sonic. Sally sighed, then gave him a stern look.
"Fine. But I'm trusting you to keep him out of trouble," said Sally. Sonic gave a smile at this.
"I can do that much," said Sonic. "So we good then?"
"Yeah. Think so," said Sally. Sonic motioned to her bedroom door.
"Shall we?" asked Sonic, Sally giving a nod as the two turned and walked back into the bedroom and up to the holo of Mr. Pepper. "I'll go, but Sal's got some conditions for this little visit."
"We'll be happy to help however we can if you're willing to come help us," said Mr. Pepper.
"Okay. We have a nice list of supplies that we could use…" said Sally.
"Hey Tails! You in here?" hollered Sonic as he walked up next to the shed that housed the Tornado. Already he noticed that the plane looked different than it was last time he had seen it. Gone was the red paint job and white wings that it had once sported. Now in its place, the entire plane had been painted the same color blue as Sonic was with an orange trim on the wings and a line of orange going down the middle of both sides of the plane's fuselage with a little orange, double tail symbol near the back fin on both sides. He also noticed that it now sported a swivel-mounted laser cannon under the fuselage.
"In the back!" called out Tails' voice.
"Like what you did to the plane," said Sonic as he walked around it towards the back of the shop. Seated at the workbench was Tails, a small, cone shaped object sitting on the workbench in front of him. Various tools were strewn about the bench. "Working on something new?"
"Yeah. I'm not quite done with it yet, though," said Tails as he fiddled with the screwdriver, adjusting something on the device.
"Well, pack it up because you and I are headed south," said Sonic. Tails looked over his shoulder at Sonic, finally taking his eyes off his new toy.
"Really? Where to?" he asked.
"Emerald City," said Sonic.
"A human city? Why there?" asked Tails, his interest finally caught.
"They have a problem they need help with, so I'm gonna go down there and fix it for them. I'm taking you along because it'll be good for you to get out of this village after all this time," said Sonic.
"Alright. But I'm taking this with me. I haven't worked on it for the last two weeks straight to stop now," said Tails, turning back and picking up the object. He then walked over to the Tornado and climbed up on its wing, dropping the device in the pilot's chair.
"So, headed for Emerald City I hear," said a voice from behind the pair. Both turned to see a robian hedgehog standing at the entrance to the shed, a pair of chao hovering near both his shoulders. The one on the left was a deep crimson in color, with three small horns sticking out of his head with a bigger pair of yellow striped brown horns coming out of the top of his forehead, a pair of green antenna that drooped down in front of his eyes, and a pair of reptilian wings topping off his look. The one of the right was a rich violet in color with two, jester-like dreadlocks coming off the back of her head. She had red-tipped, golden feathers for bangs and a pair of wings with the same feathers whose wingspan was easily twice the height of her body.
"You heard right Cody. We are," said Sonic.
"Then I have a favor to ask you then," said Cody, jerking a thumb at both the chao. "Take these two with you." Sonic frowned at the request.
"Why take them?" he asked.
"I'd like you to take them to the Chao Garden in the Emerald's Glow hotel," said Cody.
"Chao Garden?" asked Comet, the violet chao, looking over at Cody curiously.
"Yeah. I think that's where I came from," said Drake, the crimson chao, looking over at Comet.
"It is," said Cody. "And I think it would be good for both of you to be around other chao besides yourselves for a change."
"That sounds nice," said Comet. "I haven't seen another chao other than Drake in the last ten years."
"At least you've seen other ones. You're the only one I've ever seen," said Drake.
"This is exactly why I want you two to go with Sonic and Tails. It'll be good for you to make some new friends," said Cody.
"I think that'll be fine if you two want to come," said Sonic, looking at the two chao.
"I'm game," said Drake.
"So am I," said Comet.
"Then it's settled," said Cody, clasping his hands together. "Have a safe and fun trip you guys."
"Don't know if it'll be fun, but it'll at least take some of the boredom I've been feeling away for a few days," said Sonic.
"Already missing all the action are you?" asked Cody, giving Sonic a smirk.
"I guess so. I just don't like sitting still, that's all," said Sonic. He closed his eyes and crossed his arms over his chest. "This last week has been a total bore. This thing I'm going down south to take care of will be a nice distraction."
"With Eggman gone, this might be the last 'distraction' you get for a while," said Cody.
"Yeah…Still, I doubt we've heard the last of Eggman. Mecha might have crippled his powerbase in the north, but I'll bet my sneakers he'll return someday," said Sonic.
"You think?" asked Tails, a nervous look etching its way onto his face.
"Probably. And if he does, I'll do my best to stop him," said Sonic, giving a small grin at the thought.
"Well, for our sakes I hope he doesn't come back. He's already caused enough damage," said Cody, lowering his head to look at the ground.
"Only time will tell," said Sonic. He then turned to look back at Tails. "So, ready to head out?"
"Yeah. You gonna ride on top like you always do?" asked Tails.
"Wouldn't ride it any other way," said Sonic.
"Well, you might have to at some point in the future," said Tails.
"Why's that?" asked Sonic. Tails gave a big grin at the question.
"That would be giving away the surprise now, wouldn't it?" teased Tails. At hearing this, Sonic just returned the smile.
"I can only imagine what you've cooked up in that head of yours little bro," said Sonic.
"Well, truth is I'm not done modifying the Tornado. I still have a little bit of work to do on it before its totally finished, but I figure I can work on it while we're down south," said Tails.
"Not gonna go into the city with me?" asked Sonic. Tails just shook his head.
"Not till I get the Tornado's modifications finished," said Tails.
"Alright. Just don't spend every waking moment working on it. I know how you get sometimes. I want you to talk to the people there, make some new friends if possible," said Sonic.
"I can do that," said Tails.
"I think this little venture out into the humans' neck of the woods will do you good Tails," said Cody. He then walked up next to the two tailed fox and lowered his head down next to his ear. "Just make sure to keep Sonic out of trouble." Tails just smiled at this.
"I'll try," said Tails. Sonic just shook his head and smiled at hearing Tails response. Cody turned back to the two chao as they hovered near the entrance to the shed.
"And Drake, try to behave," said Cody. Drake's face turned sour at hearing the request. He then pointed at Comet with one of his clawed fingers.
"What about her?" asked the dragon chao.
"I know she'll be good, it's you I'm worried will cause a problem," said Cody.
"When have I ever been a problem?" asked Drake. Cody just smirked at the dragon chao's question.
"Let's see. You want me to go through this week's or last week's list of times you caused a problem for the other villagers?" asked Cody.
"Face it Drake, he's got your number," said Sonic, also remembering the last couple of pranks Drake had tried to pull off, only to have them backfire in grand fashion. Drake's face turned crestfallen.
"Fine. I'll behave," said Drake.
"Good. I'll hold you to that. Sonic will let me know if you don't keep your word," said Cody.
"Oh I'll be sure to share every detail if he acts up, don't you worry," said Sonic.
"Well, I've kept you guys long enough. Happy trails and have a good time," said Cody as he gave a small wave as he walked out of the shed and started down the path leading back to the main area of the village.
"Shall we?" asked Sonic, looking back at Tails.
"Lets," said Tails as he hopped up onto one of the wings and then climbed into the cockpit.