Author's Note: Sorry for taking six months to update this, I just needed time to figure out exactly how to continue it. Hope you also don't mind that I'll experiment with shorter chapters in this story. So, enjoy.

Chapter 2

The robot's shadow continued to come nearer, and its soft hums were becoming more audible as well. For a moment, Tails just stood there, paralyzed by fear again. The only other sound he could hear was his own arrested breathing.

Then, finally, a part of his genius mind that hadn't been frozen up by his nervousness thought of the first best action to take, and practically screamed the idea at the kit: hide!

He obeyed immediately. Tails tore his eyes off where the robot would appear any moment now, and started scanning every possible direction and angle for something to hide behind. The problem was, a basketball court was designed to be a pretty open space – there really wasn't anything here that could obscure him, except maybe the grass he had landed in, but the robotics expert in him warned that the robot could possibly have infrared vision or something similar that could detect him anyway, rendering that cover useless.

No, he needed a solid barrier. As he located the only thing here that could serve that purpose, he quickly darted right over to it. He slid behind just as the robot finally appeared at the court exit.

The robot had a bulky, cuboid shape with its long side up, making it stand at about eight feet tall. It rolled into the area on a pair of treads, though it could also deploy thrusters and wings for flight, as it had done just now. Its visual sensors focused on the plane's crash site, which was fifty feet away, and got up close to it before performing its main objective.

SCANNING…

If the robot were able to feel confusion, now would be the time. It continued scanning for a minute or two, but it still could not detect any sign of this plane's pilot here, whether alive or dead. It did not notice the piece of metal debris behind it that was slowly moving, or rather inching, away towards the courtyard exit.

At least not until it suddenly scraped the tarmac ground with a short but distinctive screech.

As the bot swiveled around to check, Tails picked up the entire scrap of metal and hurled it at the machine out of desperation, before simply running for the exit just ten feet away. He was too worried about his life to chastise himself for his mistake or look back to check whether the debris would slow down the robot. Other than getting a scratch on its front surface, it was not affected.

This model of robot wasn't big enough to carry enough ammo for machine guns or rocket launchers, and so it was equipped with repulsors instead, powered by the same fuel cells used for its propulsion and computer systems. One of them activated, and the bot aimed it straight at the fox, needing only fifty hundred microseconds to acquire its target at this range.

Tails was incredibly lucky to have ducked around the corner to go right just as the first shot was fired. The blast smacked into the wall on his left and tore a large hole through it, and the fox kit couldn't stop himself from yelping in shock from the weapon's effects.

Realizing what could happen next, however, Tails arched his body forwards and sprinted even harder, and sure enough, the thin brick wall between him and the courtyard was blasted down as well, starting with the section behind him, with more follow-up shots that got closer and closer. He was still startled even though he'd expected it, but by then he'd at least already gotten clear of the wall by turning into another alley.

It was all a big mess, he thought. He continued running along the narrow and dark alleyways, not really caring which route he chose, as long as it didn't have more robots. He was afraid that was what he might find out on the streets.

As he did so, Tails found time to think of what went wrong. This was probably just the beginning of everything that was going to happen as a result of his lack of physical activity, the fox kit thought with a mix of fear and shame. If he had just trained himself a bit more like last time, he told himself, he might not have found that metal scrap – he was still sickened by how he had to use a piece of his beloved plane like that – so heavy, and would not have dropped it, therefore alerting the robot.

What else could happen next? The possibilities were endless, and not in a good way. If he were forced to fight any of these robots, could he even survive, much less win? What would happen if he didn't? Especially to the people who lived here? To Sonic?

Sonic! His heart pounded badly upon remembering the hedgehog who could be in as much trouble as he was right now. Tails knew he had to locate him as soon as possible. But how could he even start? If only the device on his wrist weren't disabled, then he'd be able to use the 3D map on it to look for the tallest point in the city, or at least anything tall enough nearby, or possibly even use the radio to contact Sonic, or…

Tails shook his head again. No, he had to do it the old-fashioned way. Or maybe it's the Sonic way? Heh. Glancing behind to make sure the robot was not there, he looked upwards. The robots that had been in the sky earlier weren't there anymore. Had they landed? If so, what were they doing?

Knowing it wasn't possible to find out by staying in these narrow alleys, the fox began spinning his twin tails, and took to the air a second later to get on the roofs of the dilapidated five-story buildings that sandwiched him here. Once again, it occurred to him just how long it had been since he'd actually flown properly like this. He found his movements in midair to be sluggish and clumsy, even though this was supposed to be very simple. I really need to get the hang of this again, he thought, somewhat out of shame, mostly out of fear. Fear that his reduced agility had a real possibility of costing lives.

Landing on the roof, Tails looked up again, now having a much less narrow view of the sky. Again, no sign of the robots – their absence this time promptly caused him to frown.

But as he ran up to the street in front of the building, though, he discovered that there were no sign of people either. The shops below, he noticed, looked like they had been chaotically cleared just scant minutes ago, with overturned tables and chairs. Some of the doors were even still swinging. The cars below mostly had open doors – his first thought was that the drivers had to abandon their vehicles due to their disabled engines...or was it something else?

Immediately his frown turned into a frightful grimace. He could only think of one reason this could have happened, and it wasn't anything good.

Despite the possible doom these disappeared people could be facing, Tails still knew he had to focus on finding Sonic. Only then could he help others. Only then could he defeat the robots and rescue those civilians. He was loathe to do so, and very much wanted to just head directly into the action, but there were just too many doubts about his abilities now. It could very well do more harm than good.

What he had to do first was some reconnaissance. The only method Tails could think of doing it was risky, but he had no other choice. He spun his namesakes and rose into the air again, and kept on going. As he went higher, he began to notice how much effort it was taking, how it seemed like it was going to tire him out quite quickly, especially compared to his pre-hermit performance.

No, he thought with an annoyed shake of his head, it's just your laziness. Get over it. Sure, he needed to practice his flying again when…if he had the chance to do so, but there was no way his stamina could have deteriorated that badly.

Eventually Tails reached a height of a hundred meters or so, which took a few seconds longer than he would have liked. He was getting frustrated at how everything he did in the air was now slower than before, but he had no time to complain about that now – that would, in and of itself, slow him down some more.

He finally glanced downward at Central City to see what was going on. Apart from his tails, he completely froze at what he observed. His earlier suspicions had been confirmed.

From his position, it looked like there were whole groups of civilians that were forced at gunpoint by the robots into large hover transports, to be hauled away as prisoners. There were a lot of civilians, which meant a lot of robots watching over them.

Then there was the final realization of all that he feared the most, to the point where he gasped out loud: was Sonic one of those prisoners?

There was really only one way to find out, was there? He checked the city blocks below more closely this time, trying to see where Sonic had fallen earlier and which direction was it from where Tails had crashed – the latter was easy to tell due to the black smoke still coming out from the slum neighborhood. There was a patch of green in the distance, likely a park, that seemed rather familiar…yes, that was it! It had to be!

Tired of being static (but fortunately not actually tired, at least not yet) the fox began heading towards his destination, which he kept his eyes on. Within a few seconds, he was already moving faster than he had gone in months without the Tornado. Much faster.

Despite the urgency of the situation, Tails couldn't help but welcome the feeling, that of the winds just gushing past him by his sides, the exhilaration, the blurry vision...it even brought back memories of him flying alongside Sonic as they both zoomed across the grassy landscape of Emerald Hill, as the fastest duo on the planet, caring for nothing else in the world…

And it was something that would never happen again if I don't pay attention! Tails almost snapped at himself. He stopped his mind from drifting and put his focus back on the target area, but it was already a few seconds too late.

Tails was able to see the repulsor beam streaking right his way, but not soon enough to avoid it. He didn't even have time to react with fear – he saw it, and it struck him, with else nothing happening in the milliseconds in-between.

The good news was that repulsor beams weren't lasers, and gradually lost kinetic energy over long distances, making them potentially survivable. This one was obviously fired from the ground, which was still nearly a hundred meters below him.

The bad news was that it didn't mean they didn't hurt like a son of a bitch, and that, of course, the ground was still nearly a hundred meters below him. Tails cried out in pain and squeezed his eyes shut as he cradled his burning side, even as he knew that that was a mistake, but he couldn't fight his reflexes. No longer sustaining his flight due to the abrupt attack, it was now his whole body spinning towards the ground instead of only his tails.

Gritting his teeth and doing his best to ignore the burn, the fox re-opened his eyes, and saw with a gulp that he had descended dangerously quickly while he hadn't been looking. The park below was already too close for him to avoid crashing into it. Nevertheless Tails frantically started spinning his namesakes again as fast as they would allow, hoping he could at least soften his fall, just like what happened earlier when the Tornado crashed.

"Ngh!" He crashed onto the top of a grassy slope, having fortunately managed to slow his descent somewhat, and rolled down sideways, which really did not help the wound on his torso. It was hurting too much for him to be able to muster the attention to try and come to a stop.

Several seconds later he finally tumbled out onto a horizontal surface, and came to a slow, but welcome, stop on the concrete. Tails was groggy and in pain, and would have liked to just lie there for a while, to rest. But the thought of Sonic's wellbeing made sure he sat up almost right away.

The fox looked down at his body to examine the source of his agony. The left side of his torso was singed black, it and stung like crazy. Mercifully, he did not gather any more injuries on his bumpy way down here. It was painful, but at least it wasn't crippling.

Tails got to his feet while cringing, wanting to check where exactly he had landed. It was the park, alright, more specifically, a fenced square section of it, a garden with multiple flowerbeds and fountains. There was only one exit, a pair of closed steel gates on the opposite side.

For a moment, the kit was overcome by a wave of déjà vu. This was a just little too familiar.

He felt uncertain as he started walking towards the gates, but at the same time, there was nothing he could do here short of admiring the multicolored flowers, and there was no sign of anyone else here anyw-

Wait a second! Tails turned around, having noticed something a bit…odd about the bed of blue flowers at the end of the yard which had been briefly in the corner of his eye, directly opposite the gates. He changed direction and headed there instead. After taking a few steps, he had a better view of the flowerbed, and…

"Sonic!" The hedgehog was indeed lying there, face down in the flowerbed filled with plants nearly the same color as that of his fur. He was completely motionless, and did not respond to Tails' cry.

Now the fox was filled with a chaotic mix of emotions – surprise that he had landed so close to where Sonic had, relief at having actually found him, worry that he might not be OK, fear of what he himself could do if he wasn't…there was more, he was getting overwhelmed, and the only way to get himself under control was to check on Sonic right now. Even just narrowing down the feelings he had would be a start.

Tails broke into a run. The yard wasn't so big; there were just a few more meters left. He just wanted to try and wake Sonic up, and hug him, even if he didn't hug back…but he never got the chance.

He'd been so focused on the hedgehog that he didn't notice the robot coming down from above until it finally slammed hard onto the tiled ground, right between Tails and Sonic, facing the former, who had come to a shocked stop at the interruption. He barely managed to avoid falling down backwards in horror.

As the bot deployed its treads and undeployed its thruster engines, Tails saw, chillingly, that there was a distinctive scratch mark on its frontal armor, and that its repulsor gun was already deployed and smoking. The same machine from the Tornado crash site that had undoubtedly tracked him down and fired at him earlier was now staring at the small fox with its cold, unmoving visual sensors.

How could I have not noticed all of this? Tails could only think in cold sweat, once again feeling horribly incompetent. If only he had been more alert and careful, and, as much as he hated to admit it, not so single-mindedly focused on Sonic…

The gates behind him were too far away. The fences around him were too tall, the garden too wide open, and there was nothing here he could use as cover this time. And the only person that could effortlessly beat this thing was lying there unconscious.

That was the moment Tails decided that he had had enough.

He was tired of everything going wrong, tired of running away, tired of flying away, tired of being blindsided, tired of being careless, tried of feeling helpless…

It was time for something to go right for a change.

As if on cue, Tails also found himself remembering all those times from before when Sonic had saved his life from danger during combat. Now, the roles were reversed. If he didn't help Sonic, nobody would. Then, just to add to this, there was also a line the hedgehog once quipped that came back to him: if there's no way out, make one yourself!

The fear on Tails' face slowly disappeared, to be replaced by a frown and a glare. "Okay, robot," he said in a tone of barely disguised fury that surprised even himself, "you want a fight? You got one. 'cause one way or another," the fox declared as bravely as possible while bending his knees and swinging his tails out in front of him, dropping into a combat stance he hadn't used for ages, "Sonic and I are getting out of here alive!"