"Shit!" Eggman roared as he painfully massaged his shoulder. "Beaten yet again by that blasted rodent! And I thought for sure this time around was finally the one! How wrong I was!"
From his perch on his swivel chair, Eggman turned and slammed the dashboard in front of him. The lights flickered on and illuminated the large, circular room with a coldly dim light. The cold metal floor reflected the soft, blue light from the serene ocean view coming through the window. Fish paused as they were darting past to look at the silly fat man in his conniption.
"I've got to start over." Eggman wheeled his chair over to a monitor towards the back of the room. He pulled out the keyboard from its drawer and start typing away furiously. "I wonder if I can connect back to Chemical Plant from here and pull up some of my old files. I should be able to get some ideas from there. Yes! I'll access all of my old files from everywhere and use them to brainstorm! At least one of them must've had Sonic in my grasp for a while. Orbot! Help me run the data over to my main console!"
Eggman shifted from station to station in the room. Dials and monitors clicked and whirred with life. Data salvaged from all over transferred themselves into Eggman's main console at the center of the room.
"Yes, yes!" Eggman howled with glee. "With all of this, surely.. Surely I'll be able to win this time! All of my humiliation and defeats will be returned a thousand and one fold!"
"That's what you said last time, Doctor," Orbot pointed out. "Except this time, you have a slight-"
"Silence!" Eggman shrieked. "Get back to work you useless bucket of bolts!"
"Yes sir," Orbot capitulated. "Oh, Doctor. A strange file has been transferred over to the Eggboat Computer. Shall I delete it?"
"Open it!"
"That's not really recommended, Doc-"
Eggman missed as he threw an empty bucket at Orbot. "I said open it!"
"Y-yes sir…"
Orbot made the mistake of opening the file, hence shutting down all the computers in the room.
"Now look what you did!" Eggman roared.
Orbot silently muttered something Eggman couldn't quite make out. He didn't have time to dwell on it, however. The room filled itself with a brilliant bright light and a voice could be heard.
"Chemical Plant report. Log date, 6-66," the soft, sweet, mid-ranged voice belonged to a middle-aged fox who oddly looked alot like Sonic's fox friend, Tails. "There seems to be a disruption going on in the computers. I am able to record this on the only working one. I wonder how long it will last."
"Great!" yelled Eggman. "Now the Eggboat computer is encrypted with malware!"
"Along with the computers not working properly," the fox continued, "some of our workers seems to be disappearing. In fact, Maribel and Renko had disappeared just this morning around 0600 hours. Now it's just down to me and Peter. Thank God I am stuck with someone who has medical training."
"I could try to free the computer, Doctor," Orbot offered.
"The experimental subject seems to acting quite strangely," the fox said.
"No," said Eggman. "Let it play, this is... most intriguing."
"Though we cannot see into the subject's tank," the fox said, "we hear a constant knocking every hour or so. It is always the same pattern, like some sort of morse code. However, we are unable to decipher it. The pattern goes as follows: dash dot dash dash dash, dash dash dash dash, dot dot dot dash. Peter is busy looking through all of his-
"Peter? Peter?! Oh no, Peter's gone! I'm the only one left. Before I leave, I will say this-"
The video was cut off by a static accompanied by a shrill screech.
"What?!" Eggman screamed. "What happened? Try to get that video back! And run a test on that morse code while you're at it. I've never heard a pattern like that in my life!"
Orbot tried his best to get the message back, but he only accomplished in getting the computers back to normal and running their previous tasks. "Uhh Doctor? The file seemed to have deleted itself."
"What?" Eggman asked. "No matter, I'll just retrieve the one piece we have from your memory data."
"Doctor,"
"What now, Orbot?"
"I...can't remember the contents of the file," Orbot said, his voice full of worry.
"What?!" Eggman burst. "What do you mean by you 'can't remember the contents of the file!?'"
"I-it...seemed to have deleted itself from my memory as well…"
"Argh! What about you, Cu-" Eggman started. "Where's Cubot?!"
At that moment, Cubot's decapitated head landed at Eggman's feet.
"What?" Eggman yelled.
Eggman took a look around the room. His eyes stopped at the doorway.
Infinite was there. Rapidly phasing in and out of reality.
"I-Infinite?" Eggman's voice wavered with horror and shock mixed together. Has the jackal come back to get revenge for his betrayal? No, he can't do much like how he is now, so is he here for a second chance?
Infinite staggered forward slowly. Eventually, he fell face-down at Eggman's feet. The Phantom Ruby attached to his chest shattered and Infinite's existence stopped oscillating. His mask fell off as he struggled to get up.
"Infinite!" Eggman exclaimed tepidly. "I'm so glad you're ok! Here, let me help you."
Eggman cautiously outstretched he arm to help Infinite, but the weakened jackal swiped his arm away, causing Infinite to collapse back onto the floor. "Save your lies," Infinite struggled to get up again, but this time he made it up on his own. "After my fall, did you come and help me? No. You perfected the Phantom Ruby and used it. Too bad you failed!"
"Infinite no that's-" Eggman started.
"I've lost everything! Everything's been stripped from me from the moment I met you! My pride, my squad, my power… It's all gone, damn it! All because of you and your obsession with that blue rat! I might be able to leave here without any damage done, but she's not here to comfort me! She's not here to make me see sense! I can't believe I was so blinded by power that I didn't listen to her. She obliged to me anyways, and got killed because of it! She did nothing wrong, yet that black one sent her falling to her doom! All because of you, you bastard!" Infinite stood for a moment, panting after his speech.
"Infinite, I'm sure I can-" Eggman tried again.
"Lie to me again?! Make me your pet?!" Infinite roared. "My only wish now is to kill that infernal hedgehog and you!" Infinite lunged at Eggman, claws outstretched for the jugular.
Eggman outstretched his arm in an attempt to keep Infinite away from him. He was successful, but the blood-thirsty jackal eventually started flailing his arms around, severely scratching Eggman in the process.
Seeing that Eggman was wounded by his flailing, Infinite jumped onto Eggman's arms and lunged for Eggman's face. He held Eggman's head with both of his hands, his claws barely scratching the bone of the Doctor's skull. Eggman felt the jackal's heavy, revenge-crazed breaths as Infinite's face came very, very close to his own.
"Listen to me, Fat One," Infinite growled. "Look deep into my eyes. See the rage I hold. Feel the rage I hold. Hold onto to it for dear life, because that is the last thing you will ever see. I am going to kill you and then…"
Eggman stopped listening to Infinite's words. He became too focused on Infinite's glowing red eyes. The eyes drew him in deeper and deeper. Infinite's voice became muffled. Eggman slowly lost his peripheral vision. Soon, he couldn't see anything clearly except Infinite. He couldn't hear anything clearly except Infinite.
Eggman blacked out.
"...after which I will shove it down his throat and watch him choke and die! And then- hey! Are you even listening to me?!" Infinite withdrew his claws from Eggman's head and slapped him so hard that Infinite jumped up with a sharp yip as Eggman's unconscious body slumped sideways to the floor.
"...Is he dead?" Orbot asked.
"Don't get your hopes up." Infinite growled as he licked the blood off his claws. "The old fool only fainted from a loss of blood. Which, I might add, makes me rethink wanting to bite his arms off and eat them."
"Are you going to kill him now?" Orbot asked worriedly.
"No. I'm going to wait for him to wake up so that way I can tell him the updated version of my plan. Hey, do hedgehogs taste any good?"
"Why are you so adamant on eating them?" Orbot asked.
"Because I effing feel like it!" Infinite bayed. "Now get me some rope so I can tie him up."
"No," said Orbot imperiously. "I will not take part in your plans. As mean as he is, Eggman is still my creator and master! I will not-"
"Ok geez pipe down." Infinite said, clearly annoyed. "Don't make me smash your head in. But what do you expect me to do? Say 'Hey Eggman! Get up and tie yourself to a chair so that I can kill you slowly?'"
At that moment, Eggman darted up. Infinite watched in confusion as Eggman got up and headed towards the entrance for the main room.
"Hold it!" Infinite barked.
Eggman halted.
"Face me,"
Eggman slowly turned around, his face completely expressionless.
"Tell me how amazing I am!" Orbot cried.
Eggman stared at Infinite.
"Sit," Infinite commanded.
Eggman plopped down on the floor.
"He's… under my control…?" Infinite realized. He's under my control! He's under my control!"
Even if he was in a submarine under the water, Infinite's howling laughter could still be barely heard very faintly.