Author's
notes: Okay second chapter for you. A whole 1 review? Is my story
that bad or is it cos you're not sure how it's going? I want your
opinions good and bad. Simple as that guys and girls. Oh well. Same
as always, don't own any of the Sonic characters. However, I do own
Mania, Lana and Tilani. So there.
Sorry this is a repost because
of errors in the story which I've only just noticed. Only subtle ones
but they needed to be changed. Sorry. ((On an extra note, thanks for
my second and third review, just to let you know Shadow's past, or
future depends at whose point of view you take, unfolds later.
Okay?))
Enjoy
Edit: I edited this chapter a while back and thought I'd put it up, obviously not and so finally here it is. Good news though, thanks to unknown circumstances my muse has returned and so future chapters should start to emerge from the depths of my brain once again. So, keep half an eye out.
And please review
Chid
"Okay kid, what's the deal?" Sonic asked when he stopped in the alley. Though there was no green hedgehog anymore. Sonic frowned and looked and then started to walk down the alley looking around. "Okay kid where have ya gone?" Sonic asked loudly.
"If you're looking for Mania, he's slipped away, but what about you? He said your name is Sonic." Sonic looked up to find where the distinctly female voice was coming from. "Can you live up to the reputation that hedgehog left behind, can you save the world? Or will you be like the rest, wimps?" Sonic located the source of the voice; they were standing on a fire escape looking down at him. Sonic raised an eyebrow.
"Just tell me where's Tails." Sonic said, looking around the rest of the alley in case and then waved one of his hands in general, "Cos Tails is the one who gives me straight answers."
"Miles Prower?" the female asked pausing to think and then continued. "No one knows where. Look, just follow me and lets get you underground." She jumped off of the fire escape and landed a few feet from Sonic, he took a look at her. She was a female hedgehog, aqua in colour and wearing one of the grey suits that the other hedgehog had. She walked down the alley away from him and Sonic followed, silently and in thought, for a change. They got to a turning point and she led Sonic to the right and then at the next two she took lefts. She paused in the middle of an alleyway, crouched down in the middle of it and pulled away a piece of wet and half rotten cardboard box and just slid out of sight. "Come on already. Squads'll be all over the place soon." Sonic shrugged and stepped over to see a hole. He jumped down it without a second thought.
"What about Knuckles?" Sonic asked as he looked at the girl.
"Location unknown." Sonic looked troubled, his friends were missing and the world had gone crazy. Only one of his best friends was left, was he too missing?
"What about Shadow?" The aqua hedgehog stopped and looked at Sonic then started to lead again the way through the sewers. Sonic was curious, "What's happened to Shadow? Or Amy, Amy Rose?" He asked suddenly remembering about the pink hedgehog that always seemed to follow him around relentlessly.
"Amy Rose was roboticised 15 years ago. And no one in the Freedom Fighters mentions the traitors name." The aqua hedgehog said coldly, Sonic raised his hands in defeat although he was certainly perplexed. She paused at a grating and knocked on the bars three times before jumping over the sewers river and knocking five times on the grating there.
"What is going on here Lana? Who is this blue hedgehog?" A cold but distinctly different female voice came from another grate a little further on.
"Peace Tilani. He says his name is Sonic so I thought that I'd better hand him in before the emperor catches wind of him and freaks out." Lana said back walking over to the grate and pulling it away to reveal a tall black-cloaked figure that seemed to blend into the darkness of the background, Sonic squinted at her and saw that she wore a veil under the hood. This confused him.
"Why
are you covered like that? Even humans didn't cover that much. And
what's with the grey suits?" Both girls turned and looked at him,
glaring. He took a step back in defeat and muttered that girls were
twitchy as the two started to chatter.
Sonic shook his head at the
two and wondered once again about his friends.
"You want to take him to see Rouge!" The one called Tilani shouted and Sonic looked over at them.
"You guys know Rouge? How is she?" He asked simply. He never thought about Rouge the jewel-thieving bat. The two once again looked at him. Lana raised an eyebrow at Tilani and she sighed and muttered something and walked off down the large pipe.
"Come on Sonic, it's not much further until the base." Lana stepped into the pipe and held the grating back for Sonic.
Sonic didn't really pay attention to where they were going, he kept trying to get answers from the two girls but they kept on telling him to hush up or that they wouldn't tell him anything. Sonic would have protested but there was information to be had where they were going and it was when they were almost there before he realised that he didn't have a clue where he was so if they walked off he would be lost.
Tilani disappeared suddenly but Lana kept on leading the way. She did however stop in front of a ladder that didn't look stable but it held Lana as she climbed up and pushed something out of the way letting a beam of artificial light shine down right into Sonic's eyes which had just gotten used to the dim light. He covered them and kept blinking until he could take it and looked up to see Lana's face looking down at him.
"Here Sonic, end of the line." She said and he climbed up the ladder carefully and looked at where it had lead him.
It looked like a square room but it had wood all around, floor ceiling and walls. Except for a metal door, camera and a small set of holes in the wall near the door.
"Where are we?" He asked looking around for any signs of something he might recognise.
"The Freedom Fighters headquarters." Lana said softly. She pulled the ladder into the room and then closed the flap over the hole and placed the ladder to the side. Lana walked up to the metal door and something clicked, she held it open and waved for Sonic to go through, he did so and heard his shoes hit metal. This room was the same as the one before except that the walls were all metal like the floor and ceiling. There was another identical door on the other side and a couple of cameras scanning the room pointed themselves at him. Sonic's eyes looked from one to the other. This was unsettling.
Lana closed the door behind her as she stepped inside and the door locked itself. They waited for a minute or two, Sonic was about to ask when the door in front of them clicked and clunked before opening and in stepped a tall bat clad in exactly the same outfit Sonic had seen her in when they'd first met Shadow. The only noticeable differences were bags under her eyes and a few grey hairs.
"Okay Lana, what's this all about? Tilani said that you've got another hedgehog whose name is ..." She'd been looking at Lana until then, she turned her head and looked at the blue hedgehog who was grinning. "Sonic." She said breathing out in shock.
"Hey Rouge. What is going on here?" He asked. Rouge just stared for the grand total of 5 seconds before her face paled and she started shouting at Lana.
"What in the world have you done Lana?! I always told you that one-day Robotnik would create a hedgehog clone of Sonic, that he'd use to infiltrate our base and finally finish us off. Haven't you listened to a word I've ever said?" Rouge turned back to Sonic and pulled some kind of gun from a holster Sonic couldn't see and aimed it at his head. "Give me one good reason that you're the real Sonic." She said giving him a chance. Sonic knew that he was fast but at this distance he was far too close for him to move out of the way of a bullet. He thought quickly and shrugged.
"Well when we were in the Ark after all of that stuff you and Knuckles chatted and you were flirting. As you were after I defeated Metallix." Sonic said coolly and looked at Rouge. Her eyes were showing uncertainty with a hint of hope. "You guys gonna stop messing around and date or what?" To this Rouge lowered her gun.
"No. He has someone else. He has for the last 12 years." Sonic looked confused at that. Knuckles didn't have a girlfriend; he had a pole too far up his butt for one, and for 12 years? No that didn't make any sense at all.
"Look Rouge, what's going on here? I go for a couple of weeks and the worlds gone crazy! Even Eggman can't have done all that pollution in that time!" Rouge now looked baffled as she put away her gun and looked at Sonic carefully before shouting for someone to open the door.
"Lana get something to eat, find Mania and I want you both back on the surface and keeping an eye on the alleys. Sonic you're coming with me; lets get you to the gym. I'll explain as best I can there whilst you have a medical." She started off through the door. Sonic rolled his eyes, this was getting annoying and he was still as clueless as he had been when he'd landed flat on his face. Sonic jogged over to Rouge and walked just behind her as she lead the way through metal corridors.
"You see..."
