Chapter 3: Chaos Control
He prepared everything the machine had in store for its foes. Guns blazing and missiles firing, Mojo 1 had to postpone Metal's resurgence, permanently. If all else failed, a sneaky self-destruct switch timed down to ten seconds would have to do.
Metal couldn't disagree more. While he endured the bullets, which were a mild annoyance that bounced off his chassis like sticks of cold butter, the hedgehog fired the missiles down half-way with a laser. No rubber projectiles could clog his march to victory.
The robot knew he was losing trace of the convoy as well as the fact they'd have to slow down upon entering the city. Plenty of opportunity to catch up, despite whatever Eggman kept spouting at the time. A soldier with a death wish homed in on him, and Metal's immediate objective was to meet that convenient expectation with meticulous punctuality.
As the motorcycle approached the target, Mojo 1 steered it to the side to crash into Metal right in the middle. There was no way the human would escape the hit, Metal thought.
He was wrong. Not only did the GUN agent eject at the last heartbeat, but he also managed to turn on the jetpack to hover a safe distance away while Metal braced for the real impact. The heavy vehicle hit him hard, nearly knocking the robot over. He maintained balance at the cost of a vivid skid mark on the tarmac. Those were the remains of anti-corrosive paint they applied to his soles back in Final Egg.
Angry about the outcome, Sonic's rival gripped the vehicle to rip it apart, only to be surprised by a completed countdown. A blinding light showered his sensors, overshadowing the rest. Whoever was listening to Metal's transmissions could only hear a high-pitched ring. It resonated timelessly as if during a comms test. Little would the listener have known it was the sound of the explosion heard from within the robot's head.
Mojo 1 saw a slouched over figure emerge from the resulting smoke, as battered as the road it stood on. A great black stain covered the deep blue of the hedgehog's front casing, edging over on his quills, one of which was torn off. His back, previously wrecked by the missile strike, looked pristine compared to the wafer-like surface of the façade.
The hostile was obviously powered down: its eyes stopped glowing and the turbine spun only because of the wind, a dull and mournful gust that would pick up only the tiniest particles from the highway. Most of these were the result of GUN's gruelling journey. At this rate, they'd all get medals, a presidential welcome…everything they'd have asked for.
A souvenir would be nice, Mojo 1 thought. None of the agents survived a standoff with Metal Sonic, much less remained physical enough for the medical team to examine the robot's destructive power. A small piece would look great in the corner office he'd get after the mission. Well, not too small. Scientists would want some as well.
Turning the jetpack off, the soldier landed to find the best part. The head looked kind of heavy…too big to fit in a standard rucksack. Oil stains decorated the feet, but an arm, the part up to the elbow would look great. Up close, he couldn't stop appreciating Eggman's attention to detail: every curve and angle could act as a weapon, each finger bent as functionally as a human's own, yet much more resilient, resistant to pain, fire, even time. Despite intense fighting, the claws still gleamed in the sun.
Beautiful weather lulled over the deserted highway with the only bits of cloud hanging above the metropolis in the distance. It was definitely his time to be a hero.
Mojo 1 took his helmet off to inspect the joints. The agent reached for the elbow seal, feeling a nut or a turn valve. Something clicked when he touched the robot, and the human could easily bend the hand outwards as far as he wanted. A creature of flesh would have screamed in terror by now while a machine could ignore being violated so.
It didn't want to, though. Metal's hand snapped all the way back till the claw appeared on the steel shoulder, the agent's grubby paw stuck in-between.
He cried out, brought to his knees to reduce the soaring hurt, to no avail. Metal Sonic now held a firm grip on him, examining the captive.
No, it was the other hand he desired. Metal released the formless mass that used to be a wrist to hang limply and grabbed the other set of organic fingers to meet his accelerating jet engine.
Blood and spittle twitched onto the robot's face. The score was settled; the human posed no threat once turned into a screaming invalid. Still, he did ram a motorcycle into Metal.
The agent was sent flying into the nearest gap in the bridge. Metal resumed calculating his assault on the convoy while performing some interim repairs. A few quill plating pieces on the left side would remain missing for the rest of the mission. Acid cleaning and manual dent reduction could, however, make other parts look brand new. He made sure to keep the scorched blood on the turbine. The convoy deserved having their morale razed to the ground. But first, Metal wanted to get a better look at Mojo 1's helmet. He had a plan brilliant enough to make the squishy creator jiggle in delight.
All engines. Full power.
Eggman would have seconded the notion, but he was busy. GUN's relentless bombardment brought him down from the mountains to a safe haven under the bridge. At least, he thought it was safe before he saw holes popping up randomly, hedgehogs flying out of them.
One such hedgehog landed on his craft, effectively breaking the Chaos shield and soaking up its power. The scientist grumbled sourly as he tried to push the semi-conscious body off. Egg Hornet wasn't built to pick pests off its fuselage and Eggman didn't feel like getting out of his seat.
So, he was stuck.
Completing an artsy manoeuvre was out of the question: the waters looked peaceful enough, but GUN would not have left them unattended. The small aerial vehicle had no sonar equipped, so he preferred a safe and steady approach. Station Square's street layout would hinder the convoy enough for him to regain a confident hawk's eye on the situation.
Which was nigh on impossible while under the bridge with Sonic drooling on his gear. Eggman threw a juice carton at the pest, resulting in barely a twitch from the rodent's side and complete loss of refreshments. He could have detached the seat instead…
As he wiggled his moustache, thinking intensively, a mutilated screamer knocked into his ship, leaving a large red stain over the hornet's attachments. Thankfully, Eggman's personal craft automatically released a protective bubble. It saved the doctor's tidy suit.
The hit shook his creation enough to misplace Sonic into a slow slip along the chassis. He grinned, fists clenched firmly. A few seconds longer and the pest would fall into oblivion along with the GUN agent.
A pair of green eyes stabbed into Eggman's tiny pupils during the cheer. Sonic wasn't aware of his surroundings yet, but the vile man's presence offered enough resolve to bring strength back into his limbs. He struggled to remain on the craft.
In the meantime, Mojo 1 splashed down. He didn't drown thanks to the high-tech suit. An emergency beacon turned on upon impact, alerting the coast guard of trouble beyond usual road rage.
Waters shifted, bursting in tall foamy waves that eclipsed the fallen man's physique before he re-emerged atop all the assistance he could have craved for. A nuclear submarine surfaced to save the injured comrade.
"Oh, crud," Eggman piped, searching for the throttle switch with his eyes.
Sonic was waiting for that. The moment his enemy's attention skipped a beat, Blue Blur reached for the one thing he needed since the fall, Eggman's Chaos Emerald.
The hedgehog nicked it effortlessly despite the man's grubby hands trying to pull it back. Sonic expected hatred to boil the villain's skin red, but all he could see was minute disappointment in the background of opening missile hatches below.
"This is out of your league, hedgehog. But I promise you will live if you return the emerald to me. Now."
He smirked in return, looking at the odds Eggman was up against. Sonic owed him nothing. "Keep promises to yourself, Egghead. Chaos Control!"
A dull echo reached the hedgehog during the warp. Despite being a colossal jerk, Eggman deserved to live through this one. In secret, Sonic hoped to see him again, but not too soon. The circumstances were too grave for games.
Chaos powers brought him atop a skyscraper near the entryway to Station Square. One could see the highway snaking for miles into the distance. Sonic's attention belonged to the convoy, though. It slowed down to a crawl and a laser marker flashed upwards from the capture truck's cabin. What luck!
The hedgehog kneeled down for a swift lunge. For the first time, he was ahead of them. GUN had placed snipers on the rooftops, but he couldn't warp closer so early. A vertical run would have to do.
Sonic let go, bathing in the wind as he fell a hair away from the glass walls. The feeling was exhilarating, adrenaline-pumping, and it was just a taste grown tenfold once his feet started working down the surface. It wasn't a free fall; it was a supersonic fall.
He broke through the bottom exhibition hall, slicing through the mirror panels for a clean spindash on the safe ground below. Having something firm and waterless gave him more confidence, and now he had a shiny edge Metal wouldn't have known about. Oddly enough, he recalled leaving that emerald at Tails' workshop for safekeeping a few days ago.
"You still there, buddy?" he poked the communicator again.
A sniffle was heard on the other side. "Sonic! I thought something happened to you…the line was dead for so long!"
"Guess you still have some bugs to iron out."
"Yeah, sorry about that," he replied in a wheezing voice. "All right, I've managed to catch a glimpse at their route before Eggman locked me out. They are heading for Rail Canyon, but there's a stop marker close to city hall's bell tower."
"Making it easier for us, huh?"
"Sonic, you can't let them reach city hall! You won't believe the machinery that's waiting for them. It's all over the news already!"
Unlike Tails, Sonic knew exactly what machinery waited for them. Eggman had more than one robot on his roster. Still, he couldn't help easing up a bit once out in the street. The locals were used to seeing him around. They waved and cheered him on while getting on with their daily lives. There were few cars, however, and an unusually large number of cops. Temporary stop signs littered the streets, turning some unfortunate drivers back.
"What's up, Tails? Looks like the roads are blocked."
"There's a parade."
"What?"
"It's on TV right now. I'll turn up the volume," Tails said before scuttling to find the remote.
The mayor was making a speech: "The Guardian Units of Nations are here to commemorate the anniversary of our city's liberation from the evil Eggman. For the first time, our peaceful city will see the greatest inventions of mankind created to protect our values from extinction. The men and women behind the arduous task of keeping us safe are here to share the joy of freedom, which-"
Sonic groaned. "I've heard enough, thanks."
A blue streak zipped along the streets outward to where the convoy was regrouping. They were up to pass a set of tunnels before turning to a large roundabout for a mostly straight drive to the square near city hall. The shortest way to Rail Canyon from there was via a high overpass replacing the old dirt road through Bullet Station.
Fighting GUN with all the people in the buildings as well as parade spectators outside was a no-no, so Sonic didn't know how in the world he could rescue Shadow. Still, there had to be a way.
The trucks moved slowly. Their escorts drove in tight defensive formation, which looked uncomfortable for the pilots. Some of the tunnels underneath the buildings must have been deepened to allow the main vehicle to pass, but they had to retract the turret and shielding while constantly stopping to check if the next push was safe.
Sonic noticed the convoy was down to four motorcyclists, spread out in pairs in front of an identical number of heavy transports and a sensor truck cutting the approach to Little Moth on both ends. They saw him, too, but didn't attack.
"Can't we zap him…just a little?" groaned an off-road transport driver.
"Negative, Kat 2. Fail-safe is cancelled if aggressive defence protocols are breached."
"Blah, blah. I'm applying for rear guard when this is over."
"Your call, Kat 2. Mojo team will need fresh blood."
Throughout the conversation, the gun barrels remained pointed at Sonic, who was just standing there, watching. It was the first time he had a chance to see the entire convoy up close.
Shadow was definitely inside the big cistern-thing. Chaos energy coming from it felt stronger than anything he had felt for months, and it reacted to the emerald. Sadly, he couldn't approach the container without an invisible GUN drone pushing him away. Tails would have loved to be with him now. In a way, he was.
"Well, I feel useless," Sonic muttered.
It didn't take long for the fox to reply. "I don't think so. There's a lot of static, but I managed to scan the big truck. It has an armed holographic lock with a frequency of-"
"Tails…"
He sighed. "Umm…it's locked in a way that will squash Shadow unless you use a special electronic key code."
"Sweet! And you buddy o' chum o' genius have the code!"
"No," Tails admitted after a pause, sensing discontent on the receiving end. "But I know it's in the main lorry driver's cabin."
"That's kind of sweet, too."
It would have been very sweet were it possible for him to get near that cabin without having his hand scorched by a drone. Those drones had explosive charges in case of a bigger breach, and Sonic had no intention of causing one in a highly populated city that he saved more times than GUN failed to contain Eggman.
While Sonic paced alongside the convoy, the last remaining rear guard motorcycle with Mojo 3 perched on it consistently kept him at bay, receiving muted applause from his colleagues. Another foe didn't make much of a difference for the hedgehog as long as he held a Chaos Emerald. Hopefully, the energy footprint from the containment vehicle was big enough to cloud GUN's close range sensors. Sonic was unsure if plain hiding the powerful gem was enough for successful infiltration.
Clutching it tight, the hedgehog whispered the words, but only felt an odd vibe coming from the jewel, as if it was being dimmed by another presence. The convoy also felt a sudden dip in power, which shut down Mojo 3's motor. He had to stay behind as the rest moved forward. Whether it was due to the siphons they wielded, the jewel or what was inside the lead truck, he didn't know. Tails couldn't help, either.
The silent standoff kept everyone's teeth gritting, fingers itching above every trigger. They wouldn't get another chance to down Sonic! Just a few shots from the siphon would weaken him enough to be carried by hand into Shadow's mobile prison. GUN could get rid of both unstable variables in one go.
And yet, orders were orders. The teams knew what awaited them in case of failure. Insubordination would have had unimaginable consequences to everyone involved.
Little Moth hoped the hedgehog would simply go away. He had enough tension from coasting the cargo all the way from Mystic Ruins. The pilot remained calm on the outside, though. He needed a steady hand to curve at the roundabout without hitting the fountain in the middle. They could have demolished the fountain since the road was blocked… Well, only some were destined to die perfect.
The thought cheered him up a bit. Hands turned quickly to straighten out after the roundabout. A tidy road with only a minor bend to the right presented itself en route to the mayor's office. Group B of the elite advance team would join them for the next leg of the trip. Till then, they had to crawl to the rendezvous point according to PR department's instructions. Had those bastards been allowed freedom to roam, the vehicles would have paraded in garish paintjobs and flags poked into antenna stalks. They could have done something about the clouds, nonetheless. Little Moth had found the weather fantastic till they entered the city.
He pulled through the last bend, eager to press the accelerator to end the tired pace. Civilian police GUN mocked on a daily basis saluted the convoy ignorantly. Station Square needed to clean up its act: an open maintenance car with cordon posts and red tape spilling out of its rear stood unattended by the street corner. Amateurs…
"Check our six, Mojo 3," Zen said with a hint of worry. "Mojo 3…"
Mojo 3 managed to drive back up, doing as told. A surge of light forced him to swerve away instinctively. The signpost car was chucked forward with great force, hitting Kit 1 and bouncing upwards to be annihilated by defence drones. The convoy could see the culprit by then.
Eggman's forces had fixated a laser cannon into the corner building. Having disposed of the obstacle, it was ready to fire again. This time, at a prime target.