Manic broke through the doors at about the same time that the machine malfunctioned. The bright lights flashed red, and grew more numerous, shooting out the sides of the machine. The noise became shriller too, and louder. It was utter chaos inside the room, and as Manic ran over and grabbed the metal edges of the machine, it finally shut down. With the energy off, it was easy for Manic to slide the metal wall down.
The yellow fox grinned at him when the wall came down, and gave Manic a thumbs up. "Thanks for the distraction Chia! You take out those 'bots, I'll get the door!"
Manic stood, slightly dumbfounded, as the fox ran towards the doors at the other side of the room. A few laser fires near his head brought him back into reality, and he turned to face the two SWATbots still in the room. He ran up to the two SWATbots and leaped into the air, kicking the first one in the chest. He pushed off and landed on his hands, flipping backwards to stand and face the other. He ducked a second before a laser passed over where his head had just been, and jumped back into the air as the robots fist passed under him, trying to trip him.
"Got it!" The boys voice from the doorway distracted Manic for a second, and he was hit in the side.
"Hey!" He shouted as he stood up.
"Sorry!" Tails called as he saw he had distracted him and gotten him hit. He ran over and grabbed the SWATbots arm with the laser rifle, so that it couldn't fire while Manic was standing up. Manic jumped up and landed on the SWATbots head, and pounded it with his drumsticks until sparks flew and the robot shut down.
"Score!" The kid yelled, high-fiving Manic.
They both rushed to the door that the fox had opened, and bolted into the hallway.
"Nice going, kid!" Manic shouted.
"The name's Tails!"
"Manic."
"I know!" The fox laughed as they ran, at Manics confused face.
More serious now, Manic shouted back to Tails "We've only got three minutes to get out of here!"
"Why? What happens then?"
"The building blows up! We had a timer set."
"Oooohh. We can't make it out in time."
"...What?!"
"Don't worry!" They were still running side by side, Manic following Tails, who seemed to know where he was going. "I know where we can go!" The fox suddenly took a sharp right, and brought them to a hallway that seemed to end in a dead end.
"Now what? We've got little less than a minute left."
A panel slid out of the wall, and the fox stared pressing the buttons on it furiously. "Now?"
"30 seconds."
"There." He pulled away as a door slid open. "Get in!" He and Manic both jumped inside the dark doorway, and the door slid shut behind them. At the same time, they felt the building shudder as the explosions went off. It was then that Manic noticed there was no floor.
"Ah!" He called out as he felt himself fall downwards, but then something grabbed his wrists and he stopped moving. "Tails? That you?"
"Yeah, don't worry, I've got you."
"Alright. I'm not going to ask."
It was still pitch black, so neither one of them could see what was going on.
It was then that Manic finally remembered his sibs. "Sonia's gonna be an-gry." He muttered, then flicked on his headset.
_ _ _ _ _
Sonic stopped his pacing to look at his watch. "Five, four, three, two, one."
As he spoke, he and his sister shielded their eyes to block out the light from the flames in the city below.
"Ok." Sonic said. "Not cool. Where is he Sonia? I told you that I should have gone in and gotten him!"
Sonia was looking uncomfortable, and glared slightly at her brother.
"Hellooo? Anybody home?" Sonia jumped at Manic's voice.
"Manic! Sonic, come here!"
She threw Sonic the headset he had thrown on the ground earlier, and he caught it and put it on. "Manic, you cool?"
"You know it." They both laughed.
"Guys, this is not the time for jokes!" Sonia yelled, making both hedgehogs jump.
"Who said I was joking?" Manic asked, faking offended.
"Seriously, what happened back there? Where are you?"
"It's cool guys. Me and Tails are underground now."
"Tails?"
"The kid. We're fine. We're in the city's maintenance tunnels, we'll be on our way back in a few minutes."
"Good, we'll be waiting." Sonia responded.
_ _ _ _ _
"Oooh, can I talk to them? I wanna talk to Sonic! Can I? Huh?"
"Uh, maybe later." Manic said, putting his headset away. "They're already gone. Come one, we need to find our way out."
"Alright." Tails looked a little disappointed.
"Come on." Manic urged. "We've got to get going. I know a route to get us outside the city." He started off, walking through the tunnels, which he knew off by heart, with Tails following close behind.
Tails walked behind Manic, thinking about what a great day he'd had. Yeah, that's right, after being attacked, separated from his own freedom fighter group, caught and kidnapped by Robotnik, and nearly robotisized, he though it had been a nice day. After all, he was with Manic, and about to meet up with the rest of the Underground. That was cool. Plus, he'd gotten to destroy two SWATbots, a hover-unit, and a robotisizer all by himself.
Tails was brought of of his thoughts when he heard a sound. It was faint, somewhere between buzzing and humming. He pricked his ears forwards to try and hear better, which Manic seemed to notice.
"What's up T2?"
"I think I heard something."
"I can't hear anything."
"I have more sensitive ears than you."
Manic nodded, this being a good enough answer for him, when Tails suddenly yelled, "Get down!"
He finally recognized the sound a second too late, as the engine of a "silenced" hover-unit. Just as he and Manic ducked, the ships spotlight fell over the two.
_ _ _ _ _
"Hedgehog?"
Robotnik was holding Tails upside down by his tails in one of his hands, and Manic by his vest in the other. Tails was looking dizzy, probably from all the blood rushing to his head, and Manic was glaring at Robotnik with his arms crossed.
"Yeah, I am. At least I was the last time I checked.
Robotnik didn't seem to like Manic's sense of humour.
"What are you doing here?"
"What do you think? Blowing stuff up, breaking things, the usual." Manic answered casually. He reached for his medallion, ready to call out his drum kit, when Robotnik dropped Tails and used the hand that had been holding him up to grab Manic's medallion and rip it off of him.
"Hey!" Manic tried to grab his medallion back, but just swung around a bit and flailed. "Give that back!"
"You want it? Come and get it." Robotnik said dropping Manic and walking away.
Manic was still standing up when he felt something hit him in the back. He cried out as he fell to the floor again, when he glimpsed Tails out of the corner of his eye. Tails was also beginning to stand up, when he got hit in his arm by an orange laser beam. As Tails fell back down, Manic realized that this was probably what had just happened to him.
Manic tried to stand and reach Robotnik who was standing, just a few feet away, but only managed to stumble a few feet and fall again with a slight moan. He felt the SWATbot from before, which had shot him and Tails, grab him from behind, with no regard to his back wound.
"Heeeey!" Manic tried to swat the robot away, but the movement hurt his back too much, so he ended up just hanging there awkwardly.