A/N: Hope you all enjoyed your Christmas. I sure as hell did. Now, it's back to the stories.
Before I start, I would like to reply to a review from Dreadwing 216: I'm not making any promises on the violence. I had already planned on making Dark Tails extremely violent and bloodthirsty. So the graphic violence really brings that part out. I'll see if I can tone it down.
Right, on with the story.
"Tails? Hey, buddy, you in there?" Sonic called out as he knocked on the door to Tails' house. He checked his watch and saw that it was just after eight. Tails usually woke up at six. Maybe he was working late at night and decided to sleep in. But then again, what Sonic had for Tails was urgent.
"Knuckles said he wants the Emerald I gave you last night. And it can't wait." Sonic knocked on the door again, louder than before. "Hey, Tails!" Still, no reply. Sonic then took out his phone and dialed Tails' home number. The phone rang until it went to voicemail. Sonic then tried his cell; still there was no answer.
The hedgehog sighed and tried the door. It was unlocked and he ventured inside. The house was always clean and orderly, like a boss' office. Tails always liked to keep it that way.
"Tails! Buddy!" Sonic yelled into the house. The only answers he got were his echoes. He went to the living room and found it empty. However, he did find Tails' phone on the coffee table. The notification light was blinking so Sonic switched it on. The notification was just a missed call. From him. He then glanced around the room and the state of the theatre system caught his eye.
A remote was sticking out of the disc slot.
"What the… Did Tails… throw that?" Sonic asked himself, astonished. He was momentarily hit by a wave of panic, thinking a thief had broken in, grappled with Tails and in the struggle, the remote was flung into the DVD player. Of course that was ruled out since nothing of value was missing and the place had no signs of a struggle. And Tails would not be strong enough to throw like that. So where was that two tailed fox?
Sonic went upstairs to Tails' room, calling his name repeatedly. Still no answer. "Where could he—" then he snapped his fingers in realization. "The workshop!"
The blue hedgehog bolted out the house and headed straight for the workshop. The huge door, which was used to let out the Tornado, was hanging ajar. He pushed it open and peered inside.
The workshop completely contrasted with Tails' house: the floor was littered with various bits of metal, bolts, nuts, screwdrivers, wrenches as well as a few papers. Not to mention it was one short of a two tailed fox.
The sound of his own phone ringing startled Sonic. He recovered and took it out of his pocket. "Hello?"
"What the hell's taking so long?" Came an angry voice. It was Knuckles.
Sonic was confused. "What?"
Knuckles growled at the other end. "Don't tell me you forgot! You said you'd go to Tails' house, get the Emerald and get over here in less than a minute. Now it's been ten and still no Emerald!"
Sonic rolled his eyes at his friends' impatience. A ten minute wait could hardly make anyone lose patience. "No, I'm at Tails' house right now and he is not here."
"What?! How could he not be there? Isn't that where he spends most of his time?" The echidna paused, then spoke again. "Did you check the workshop?"
"What am I, a moron?" Sonic retorted. "I've searched every inch of this place and there's no sign of him."
Knuckles sighed. "Can you at least find the Emerald?"
Sonic wanted to rebuke the echidna for sounding so insensitive. Right now, Tails was nowhere to be found and all Knuckles could think about was the Emerald? But he could not jump to conclusions. Maybe Tails just stepped out to buy a few tools, or maybe he just went to work out. Whatever the reason, Sonic was sure nothing tragic happened to his little bro.
"I can look for it. I'm sure it's around here somewhere." He hung up and ventured into the workshop.
"Whoa, the floor sure is crunchy." Sonic mused out loud as he felt his sneakers crunch on what he assumed were pebbles. "Tails should really sweep this—ow!" He flinched and raised his foot as one particular "pebble" had pierced through his sneaker and scratched his foot. Sonic sat on a chair and inspected the underside of his shoe.
It was not a pebble that was lodged in there. It was broken glass.
Sonic glanced to the floor and his eyes widened. The entire floor was littered with broken glass.
"What the…" He exclaimed and looked up. A section of the workshop's skylight was broken through. That would explain the glass littering the floor.
But there was more. In the lab section of the workshop.
Sonic walked to the lab, where Tails usually did his experiments. There was more broken glass at that side but it could not have come from the skylight for it was only on the workshop's side of the roof and not the lab's.
There was a large machine that occupied one section of the wall, its purpose unknown. Sonic saw that it was still on and went to take a look. The machine looked simple enough: there was a keyboard and a monitor, as well as a lever that had two functions: "enrich" and "siphon". The lever was dropped to the "enrich" function. There was also a large Mobian sized capsule at the far end of the machine. That was where the broken glass came from.
The monitor had three words flashing on the screen: "ENERGY ENRICHMENT COMPLETE."
"Was Tails experimenting with something? Or… someone?" Sonic asked himself. Tails never explained the purpose of this machine. Then again, Tails never explained anything that he did in his lab. He always kept that private. Sonic could just remember that day:
-*- FLASHBACK -*-
"Hey, Tails, we're going to watch that movie that just came out. Wanna come?" Sonic asked as he came charging into the lab. He saw the two tailed fox hunched over some weird looking machine, tightening a nut.
Tails dropped his wrench, startled out of his mind. He recovered when he noticed his friend. "Don't do that! You almost gave me a heart attack!"
Sonic scoffed. "You're sixteen, not sixty. Now come on! The movie starts in an hour!"
Tails picked up his wrench and returned to the machine. "Can't you see I'm busy?"
"I see. What you working on?" Sonic asked, getting closer to the device.
Tails stood up and blocked the way. "This is none of your concern, Sonic!" He wielded the wrench threateningly.
Sonic backed away. "Alright, alright, man. Jeez."
Tails, however, did not stop there. He ushered the hedgehog out. "My experiments are none of your business. So I suggest you get out." he pushed Sonic out the door, then shut and locked it.
"Are you at least coming to the movie?" Sonic hollered.
"NO!"
"Man, what's his problem?" The hedgehog pondered before speeding away.
-O-O-
Of course, Sonic's conclusion then was that Tails was still not over Leena. After she broke up with him, Tails started keeping to himself a lot, always staying in his workshop, refusing to socialize and started doing things by himself. It became rare to see him happy and even rarer to see him with friends.
That was one of the reasons why Sonic did not know the function of the machine. Still, he decided to take a closer look at it.
He noticed a compartment which held something inside. It was something shiny. He ejected it to take a closer look. His eyes widened at what it was.
Sonic took out his phone and dialed Knuckles' number. He picked up after the first ring.
"Well, do you have it?" The echidna asked, getting straight to the point.
Sonic was at a loss of what to say. "Uh… well… let's just say I found an Emerald."
-O-O-
"Um… what exactly are we looking at here?" Knuckles asked with a bemused expression on his face.
"I don't know. Some kind of Chaos Emerald, I think." Sonic replied, throwing his hands in the air.
"Aren't Chaos Emeralds supposed to have color?" Amy asked the rhetorical question.
Knuckles picked up the colorless Emerald and examined it. He then held it in his hand and tried to enclose it with a fist. "No. It's too big to be a Chaos Emerald."
"Then what kind of Emerald is it, Mr. Emerald Master?" Sonic asked in a mocking tone.
Knuckles rolled his eyes but kept his temper. "I don't know. I'll go check it out once I take it to Angel Island."
"You know, the bigger question is: what was Tails doing with that Emerald in the first place?" Amy asked the two.
Sonic shrugged. "I don't know. He had it in this machine which he would not tell me its purpose."
"Well, whatever Emerald it is, all its energy has been drained out. That explains the colorless appearance." Knuckles stated.
"Drained into what, I wonder?" Amy mused, staring out into space.
"Whatever it was that Tails was experimenting on. Or whoever it was." Sonic shuddered at that last part. The very thought of Tails goading someone into being a guinea pig for his experiments made Sonic uncomfortable. But this was Tails he was thinking about. As far as he was concerned, the young fox would never do anything that would question his morality.
"I'm gonna go to Angel Island and have this Emerald analyzed." Knuckles announced and then left the house, which served as their hangout, leaving the two hedgehogs alone.
The silence eventually got awkward. Amy decided to break it. "So, Sonic…"
She did not get far, for Sonic's phone rang. He hastily answered, not bothering to check the caller ID. "Did you find out what Emerald it was, Knucks?"
"Knucks? What are you talking about?" The other voice asked in confusion.
Sonic instantly knew who it was. "Oh, hi, Kevin! Sorry, I thought you were somebody else."
"Yeah, I got that." Kevin chuckled.
Kevin was a detective at the Emerald City Police Department. He was a Mobian wolf and one of the gang's friends who did not partake in their adventures.
"So, what's up?" Asked Sonic.
"Are you closer to a TV?"
"Yeah. Is something wrong?" There was a small flat screen TV in the house and Sonic quickly switched it on.
"You might wanna check the news."
"OK. What channel?"
"Any news channel."
Sonic flipped to the nearest news channel.
"…no one knows who or what did it but the bodies of the notorious murderous gang known as the Midnight Slashers were found dead in an alley, they're bodies savagely mauled."
The screen then changed and displayed photos of the bodies of said gang, probably taken by early risers who had the chance to do so before the police arrived. Amy gasped in shock and covered her mouth while Sonic's eyes widened as he tried not to lose his food. Maybe someone else did.
"Who could have done that?" Amy whispered. She still had not recovered from her shock.
"I don't know." Sonic answered. Then he remembered that he still had Kevin on the line. "So? The Midnight Slashers are dead. Isn't that a good thing?"
"No it's not! That means we have an even more violent murderer out there and it's gonna be my job to bring them in."
"Or maybe it's a vigilante." Sonic lamely threw in.
"Yeah, right. Look, I have to get to work now. I'll get back to you later." Kevin then hung up.
The screen then cut back to the female falcon reporter. "The citizens of Emerald City have had a rather mixed reaction towards the Slashers' deaths."
The shot cut back to the scene of the crime, which now had police tape surrounding the area and police cruisers and news vans all over the place. A few Mobians were getting interviewed, giving out their different reactions to the discovery:
"I don't know if I should be happy that the Midnight Slashers are dead or scared that there's an even nastier killer out there." This from an otter.
"I say they got their just reward! I lost a cousin to those bastards!" A fat bear commented vehemently.
"I don't like it. Whoever did this clearly thinks they're above the law. Leave it to the cops, buddy!" A swallow shook his finger at the camera.
"I just want to say 'thank you' to whoever had the guts to stand up to those ruffians." An elderly stoat said.
-O-O-
Dark Tails watched the news with a satisfied smirk on his face. Watching his murderous exploits displayed for the public to see was an added bonus to his heinous actions, a cherry on top of his ice-cream.
"I don't know if I should be happy that the Midnight Slashers are dead or scared that there's an even nastier killer out there."
Dark Tails smirked. "You should be scared. I'm way worse than any killer you'll ever come across."
"I say they got their just reward! I lost a cousin to those bastards!"
"Really? I might do you a favor and reunite you with him." The dark fox snickered.
"I don't like it. Whoever did this clearly thinks they're above the law. Leave it to the cops, buddy!"
"That's very ungrateful." Dark Tails feigned dejection. He had half a mind to hunt that guy down and snap his neck.
"I just want to say 'thank you' to whoever had the guts to stand up to those ruffians."
That statement made the dark fox laugh. "Trust me, madam. You'll be eating those words."
The dark fox lazily flopped down on the couch. He surveyed the surroundings of the apartment he had just broken into. There were fitness magazines all over the coffee table as well as weights of various sizes in the corner. A treadmill, a punching bag and posters of muscular Mobians completed the room. Clearly the apartment belonged to a gym enthusiast, instructor or someone who just wanted to lose weight.
Of course none of that concerned Dark Tails. He had broken into the apartment for the sole purpose of feeding himself. The freezer was packed with various types of meat, all of which would abate his hunger. The meats were frozen so he heated them up with his energy but scarfed them down raw. He had no interset to cook himself a proper meal.
After last night's killing spree, Dark Tails found himself still craving more. But first, he had a plan of revenge in his mind. All those Mobians who had wronged him in the past had to pay. With their lives.
Dark Tails took a paper and pen and then dug through his memories, remembering their names. "First, I'll start with those three bullies. The lion, Carl Larson. That hyena, Henry Gray. And that otter, William Young."
Dark Tails wrote their names down on the paper. "And let's not forget the rose with thorns." He wrote down the name and encircled it. He grinned at the paper and gazed at it to the point of almost drooling. "That's right, Leena Ashley. When I'm done with those three, I'm coming for you!"
At first her name was something that made his heart skip a beat. Now, it was a name that made him snarl. Just the thought of hearing it fueled his rage. His eyes glowed and a growl issued from his throat. He needed an outlet.
As if his wishes were instantly granted, the door to the apartment swung open and in walked a very muscular tiger. He was wearing a headband, bear muscle, shorts and running sneakers. He also had on a pair of fingerless gloves. He eyed the dark fox in his apartment with malice.
"What the hell are you doing in my apartment?!" He thundered.
Dark Tails did not answer him. He simply folded up the paper of the names and tucked it into his pants pocket. Then he slowly got up and walked towards the tiger
The enraged tiger glanced at the coffee table, where he could see half eaten pieces of meat. "You break into my apartment, mess with my fridge—oh, that's it. You've gotten on my bad side, fox." He reached behind his door and whipped out a wooden baseball bat. "You know what happens to dudes who get on my bad side? They get six weeks of intensive care."
Dark Tails kept on walking towards the tiger, his face expressionless. The tiger was a bit taken aback by his foolish boldness. Did he really think he stood a chance against 220Ibs of raw muscle? He was just going to learn the hard way.
When the fox was close enough, the tiger swung the bat at Dark Tails' head. To his utter surprise, the fox caught it as if it was nothing. Dark Tails then lifted both bat and batter and spun around, making the tiger let go the bat and sent him crashing into a nearby wall. The dark fox then broke the bat in half as if it were a twig and then approached the tiger.
The tiger quickly sprang to his feet and threw a punch. Dark Tails merely caught the fist and squeezed it sharply. The tiger yowled as he felt every bone in his hand break and the pain forced him to his knees. He then felt a hand on his neck hoist him up. Dark Tails raised the tiger as high as his arm could go until he was looking up into his swelling eyes.
"Do you know what happens to dudes who get on my bad side?" Dark Tails asked, trying to be ironic. Except he was nothing but menacing. As was his voice as he finished. "They don't live to tell the tale."
The apartment filled with a sickening crunch as the tiger's neck was shattered.
-O-O-
A/N: Well, this was longer than I expected but I hope you still like it. Please read and enjoy. Next chapter next year.
J.W.H. 10