Finally! The moment you've been waiting for, the real start to this story! Not only will the mysterious figure from Chapter 1 be revealed, but the true adventure starts here and with one mystery solved two more take its place...you'll see what I mean!
Enjoy! Oh, I might as well say it here, I do not own Sonic or any of the other official characters, they are all owned by SEGA. I only own Dusk.
Chapter 6 The Metallic Threat
It was a bright sunny day at Central City, the kind of day where it seemed like nothing could go wrong. Sonic, Amy, Tails, and Cosmo were leisurely strolling along through the streets enjoying the sunshine and the peace that Dusk had brought, joking and laughing about the events of yesterday. Their lungs breathed in the reasonably clean city air and each member of the two couples was walking hand in hand. Today was going to be a great day...oh no it wasn't.
In an instant the sky was overcast with gray ominous clouds, and a wind blew into their faces with an almost cruel bitterness in it. Before any of the four could comment on the weather's mood swing, a large crowd of screaming people charges past in the street as an explosion rocks the ground from further on ahead. Sonic quickly took off for it, Amy followed closely on her skates, and she was followed by Tails, flying along with Cosmo in his arms.
The site of the explosion showed strong evidence of the power of the blast, there were a few cars lying on their sides, a few streetlights were knocked over, the windows in the buildings were shattered, and in the middle of the road was a large crater. All of this was mostly unnoticed however, since standing in the crater was a figure that none of them wanted to see.
He looked different from the last time he was dealt with, but only slightly so. His shoes were deep red and had a little curl down near the toe part and over his legs from ankle to knee was a thick cylinder of blue metal. The rest of the leg was a metal pole, which linked into his waist underneath a belt with sharp metal spikes on it. His chest was a compact jet-turbine painted yellow on the inside and blue on the outside, and over his shoulders was two pitch-black shoulder-pads, each ending in a sharp point. The upper part of each arm was another metal pole, which connects the rest of the arm, a boxy piece of blue metal with white markings and hand also made of metal with fingers ending in a sharp point, to the shoulders. His head was similar in shape to a mobian hedgehog's, but again it was made out of metal, only his quills were incredibly long and each had a white stripe centered on it. Inside of the bottomless black of his eyes were two glowing orange pupils and this robot stood slightly taller than Sonic...
...Metal Sonic was back.
"Well Sonic, it certainly has been a long time, hasn't it?" Metal asks in a mocking tone, his deep electronic voice carrying over strong hints of malice.
"Not long enough in my opinion." Sonic growls at his robot double, clenching his fists tightly.
"Come now Sonic, don't tell me you're not happy to see the original."
"You are not the real Sonic!" Amy corrects while forming a hammer in her hand, "No matter what you believe, you're the copy."
Metal shoots her a toxic glare. "I'd keep quiet if I were you." he coldly says, "I don't need a pathetic copy to keep me safe."
"I can keep myself safe!" Amy retorts, "You're the one who should be worried!"
"Perhaps a little pain will teach you to keep your mouth shut!" Metal yells, just before firing a laser out of his left palm at Amy. The burning hot light cut across Amy's left shoulder and burned the hedgehog girl, but it was more of a warning shot since it just grazed her. Despite the near-miss, it still stung...it stung a LOT, and Amy quickly fell to her knees with a gasp of pain as she clasped a hand to her shoulder.
"You leave her alone!" Sonic yells as he ran right up to Metal and slugged the robot in the gut, throwing it several feet backwards.
"What is this?" Metal asks as he got up, "You've never shown concern for the pink hedgehog before."
Sonic growls at the robot before curling into a ball and flying towards him in a Spin Dash. Metal saw this coming and stopped Sonic's attack with one hand before punching the live hedgehog hard enough to throw him into the second floor of a nearby building.
Before Metal could lunge after Sonic, he was tackled by a high-speed fox and knocked several feet away. Although he did his best, Tails just wasn't strong enough to do anything to Metal Sonic beyond angering him...and Metal removed the pest by swiftly backhanding him with enough force to throw Tails roughly ten feet away.
Cosmo was tending to Amy when Tails suddenly landed nearby. Knowing they'd need help, Amy pulled her cell phone out of her pocket and handed it to Cosmo. "Here, call everyone else and tell them to get here NOW!" Amy instructs while getting up.
"Where are you going?" Cosmo asks.
"I'm going to help my boyfriend." Amy sternly says before taking off towards the violent robot. Cosmo watches her pink friend for a second before hurrying over to Tails and dialing the rest of the crew.
Meanwhile, Metal had leapt into the building that he threw Sonic into, had landed several more attacks on the blue hedgehog, and now had the real Sonic by the arm. "Relax Sonic...I'm just going to draw your pain out for as long as possible." Metal hisses into Sonic's ear before twisting his arm behind his back and causing the blue hedgehog to yell out in pain.
"Let go of him!" Amy shrieks as she leapt up to their floor, ran up, and bashed Metal in the head, forcing him to release Sonic.
The blue hedgehog fell to his knees, gasping from the pain still lingering in his arm, while Amy proceeded to continually bash at Metal with her hammer, enraged at what the robot did to her Sonic. Finally getting fed up with her, Metal blocked her latest swing with one arm and swung the other to land a hard blow into her gut, knocking the wind out of Amy and causing her to crumple to the ground.
"Away!" he yells while kicking Amy hard enough to throw her from the building, with Sonic following suit barely a second later. Both flesh hedgehogs hit the ground with a loud thud while Metal jumped after them, landing perfectly a few feet from them. "Any last words?" Metal mockingly asks as he approached the two.
"Get away from my friends!" yells a voice off to Metal's right, and upon turning he saw one pissed off echidna riding towards him on a runaway Ex-Gear bike, standing on the bike's hood. Before the robot could react, Knuckles' spiky fist connected with Metal's head and tossed the robot away from the injured hedgehogs.
Shortly after he got up from being slugged, Metal was slammed into the ground again, this time by Rouge's Screw Kick from behind. Now he was mad, and Metal managed to reach behind him, grab Rouge by the leg and toss her at Knuckles, causing the two to crash and stop their assault.
Again, before he could do anything, Shade suddenly teleported in front of him fully clad in her armor, extended her Leech Blade, and drove it into Metal's side. Before she could siphon away any energy, Metal grabbed her wrist, yanked the blade from him, then threw her at the rest of the crowd.
"Pathetic!" Metal exclaims, "None of you can defeat me! I'm unstoppable!"
Not one to take arrogance lightly, Shade forces herself to her feet and charges head-on at Metal. The robot almost sighs as he gets ready to counter this attack, but then Shade vanishes before she reaches him. Before Metal knew what was going on, Shade reappeared behind him and drove the Leech Blade into his back, turning the robot's movements sluggish as its power gets drawn away.
"Guys! Now!" Shade yells, but the only one who was able to respond was Knuckles, Metal Sonic had twisted Rouge's ankle when he grabbed her. The red echidna pulled himself out from under Rouge, and charged straight towards Metal before slugging the robot in the face.
Metal counters by blasting Knuckles with a laser pulse from his right hand, then triggers his turbine to burn Shade and force her to back off. Both echidnas regroup before charging Metal again, this time combining their strength. Once again Shade teleports with her Warp Belt, only this time she takes Knuckles with her. Together the two reappear at some random point next to Metal, slug the robot with a double punch, then teleport again before he could counter.
Their tactic doesn't last though, on the third jump Metal was able to hit Shade's belt with a laser pulse and disable it, then roundhouse kick the two away. The two land in a heap on the street, Knuckles atop Shade, and this time Metal blasts them with a laser shot, causing an explosion that throws the two into the third floor of a nearby office building.
"Oh come now, you can't possibly hope to beat me!" Metal exclaims, loud enough for all of the mobians to hear. "I'm more powerful than you could imagine and I've memorized all of Eggman's data files on each of you! I know your every move and strategy, you've lost!"
"Prove it!" yells another voice, but instead of seeing someone approach, Metal was suddenly lifted up into the air by some invisible force. He was only able to get enough time to see Silver and Blaze standing on a wrecked car before getting flung into a streetlight. From there he got smashed into the ground, then lifted and ground against a building, then finally smashed into the ground again before a car was dropped on him.
Silver and Blaze were about to celebrate when a laser beam blew the car off of Metal, then a second shot out of the dust cloud and burned Silver's side. With a gasp of pain, Silver dropped the Sol Emerald in his hand and fell to his knees, clutching his side with his eyes scrunched shut from the pain.
Blaze growls at the robot before scooping up the emerald and charging him in a fireball. Metal was able to dodge Blaze's charge, but the cat quickly stopped, broke her fire shield up into about ten fireballs then chucked them at Metal. Thanks to some quick movements and a few laser pulses, Metal was able to dodge all of the fireballs, but was quickly struck from the side with a fiery kick.
Metal skids on the ground a little before aiming and firing another laser shot. Blaze quickly puts up another fire shield and, due to the heat, the laser blast gets diffused around her. Upon dropping the shield, Blaze quickly taunts with, "Heat refracts light." before charging at him again.
"But heat doesn't effect mass!" Metal counters before slugging through Blaze's fire shield and connecting with her face, a blow strong enough to make her back away. To keep his edge going, Metal flies up to Blaze, slugs her in the gut, then knees her in the jaw before laser blasting her into a car.
While getting beaten, Blaze had dropped the Sol Emerald at Metal's feet, and now that the cat was out of the way, Metal smugly grabs the emerald and gazes at his light-blue victory spoils. "Yet another emerald for my collection. I'll thank you, by ending you."
"Back off!" yells yet another voice. Before Metal could blink, Shadow appeared about two feet from him, then Spin Dashed into the robot, sending it flying several feet back.
"Ah, Shadow the Hedgehog. I was wondering when you'd show yourself." Metal hisses while stashing the Sol Emerald in his quills.
Shadow leers at the robot before shouting out, "Chaos...Punishment!" and disappearing in a Chaos Control flash. Over the next minute, Shadow quickly repeats a cycle of appear next to Metal Sonic, attack, disappear, repeat. Once those sixty seconds are up, Shadow reappears for good...but using all of those Chaos Controls in such a short time has taken its toll and left Shadow panting hard.
What was worse was that Metal had barely any damage to show for all of Shadow's hard work, maybe a few dents and scratches here and there, but that was it. "Surprised?" Metal asks in a laugh, "I've rebuilt myself with a new alloy in my metallic armor. Not only is my skin tougher, but I'm also running off a Chaos Emerald."
His turbine roars before Metal flies towards Shadow and slugs the Ultimate Life Form in the face, throwing him several feet away. Shadow lands on the pavement, wincing from the stinging sensation on his face and the scrapes to his back the rough surface made. He tries to lift himself up, but Metal's foot comes down on his chest and keeps him down. "I had hoped you would be more of a challenge. Guess you aren't the Ultimate Life-Form after all." Metal says in a tone of mock sympathy.
The robot aims his palm at Shadow's face, "I do wish I had made Sonic my first kill, but you'll do."
Before either Metal or Shadow could react, a large black mass shoots out of Shadow's shadow and slugs Metal in the face, scratching the glass over his eyes and forcing the robot to back away. "You keep away from Shadow!" Dusk yells as she lands between Shadow and Metal, her eyes glinting with anger.
"You...you are that Dusk girl I've seen on the news." Metal mumbles as his eyes self-repair. "I know of your story, and I've read through all of the highly-detailed files Eggman kept on you. You're at an even bigger disadvantage than the others."
"Why do you think I brought along a friend?" Dusk asks before whistling then leaping away. Out of nowhere, a compact missile blasts Metal in the side. Metal turns to where the shot came from, but gets forced backward as his person gets pelted with the shots of a gatling gun.
While the evil robot is forced away from Shadow, another figure stomps out of a nearby alley. This one was quite tall, he had to have been at least six-and-a-half, seven feet tall. He was also very buff with large arms and a large torso with wide shoulders. His legs were kinda small, but they definitely held him up with ease. His head was also small, all that could be seen was two piercing red eyes glaring out. His normal hands, two large steel-gray hands with sharp clawed fingers, were replaced by gatling guns and those were currently a blur as they shot at Metal. His whole metal body was painted in black, red, and gold, jutting out of his back was a couple small rocket engines, and painted onto his left shoulder was a red omega symbol.
E-123 Omega continued to blast away at Metal Sonic as Dusk knelt down next to Shadow. "Hey big guy, you okay?" she softly asks, concerned about the little blood trickling out of a wound near Shadow's temple.
"Nothing I won't recover from." Shadow replies, "Where'd you find Omega?"
"Bumped into him while I was skating here." Dusk replies, "He doesn't seem to trust me, but came along when I said you'd need help."
"Omega just needs a little time to get used to you that's all." Shadow replies. "He'll warm up."
Just after Shadow said that, the two head Metal Sonic yell, "Die Omega!" and turned just in time to see Metal fire off a laser beam that shot straight through Omega's torso.
"Omega!" Shadow yells as his robotic friend falls to ground, his glowing red eyes fading to a cold gray. The umber hedgehog snarls as he gets up, then detaches both of his wrist limiters. With a flash of light, his body begins to glow with crimson red chaos energy, and in an instant he flies towards Metal and slams the robot with a fist.
The instant the robot hits the ground, Shadow's above him and smashing downward, curled up into a ball and spinning at supersonic speeds. Despite the near-critical situation he's in, Metal is able to aim his palm at and blast Shadow from him. They scuffle over the next minutes with Chaos Spears and laser blasts going in every direction, before Metal manages to land a fist to Shadow's gut, then chop down on the umber hedgehog's back, hitting a nerve that effectively knocks out Shadow.
Like what's happened before, Metal was attacked again before he could finish off Shadow, this time by an enraged purple hedgehog. Dusk had rammed Metal so hard that she managed to jostle free the Sol Emerald sitting in the robot's quills. Metal landed on the ground as the light-blue jewel clattered to Dusk's feet.
"You annoying pest." Metal hisses, "Why is it you care about the Ultimate Life-Form so much?"
"He's a friend, and I protect my friends." Dusk replies while picking up the Sol Emerald and squeezing it, getting its energies to flow through her, "Didn't I hear something about you having an emerald? Well now its mine against yours."
"I doubt you'll live long enough to use it!" Metal yells, charging at Dusk who leaps away and dodges.
Knowing she'll need both hands, Dusk slips the jewel down her top into a secure, though somewhat embarrassing place on her upper body, then dodges another charge from the robot. Once Metal passes, Dusk pulls a tentacle out of his shadow and bashes the robot in the back with it. Metal turns around, only to get hit in the side with the same shadow-mass, but it vanishes before he could blast it.
Turning back toward Dusk, Metal saw that she had used the Sol Emerald's power to make herself a shadow-hammer, which was currently resting in her right hand. Interestingly, this weapon resembled Amy's hammers quite closely, if one ignored the fact that Dusk's was created out of the shadow in her hand.
Metal didn't really have that much time to analyze Dusk's new toy, since she quickly charged at him, swinging the hammer wildly in all directions. He dodged most of her assault, but was tossed into a truck when she increased the handle length and caught him off guard. Metal pulled himself out of the truck with just enough time to block another swing of the hammer, then he brought his other hand around for a slash.
In an instant Dusk changed the hammer into a sword and used its broadside to block Metal's slash. Once she was sure it was blocked, Dusk brought the sword around to slash back at Metal, but the robot had jumped away. Dusk charges towards Metal, changes her sword back into a hammer, then brought it down from above, aiming to squash Metal's head. Metal swung his left hand up to block the swing and it worked, but the force crunched the armor in his arm and caused a sickening grinding sound to ring out.
Metal could feel that Dusk was putting some serious force into crushing him with the hammer, and since the blow had managed to weaken some of the internal mechanics of his left arm, he had to use his right one to help keep the hammer up in the air. While fighting with Dusk, Metal's eyes were trained on her hammer, but after a few seconds, they drifted down to Dusk's chest. There, glowing with a sky-blue light, was the Sol Emerald, peeking out from between her breasts...if only he could get it back, then he'd...
Metal's thought was cut off when Dusk yells, "You pervert!" after noticing where his eyes were looking. She jerks her hammer out of Metal's grip then swings it around and slams it into his side with one smooth move. Dusk quickly changed her hammer into a sword then charged and swung at Metal, aiming to take his head off.
She was just about to succeed in her efforts, but Metal was able to move at the last second, meaning instead of his head, Dusk slashed of the lower half of Metal's right arm. The robot yells out before blasting Dusk away with his good arm.
The robot hisses at all of them as his damaged arm sparks and leaks fluid onto the ground. As much as he and his anger wanted to annihilate all of them, the ten or so warnings blinking in his field of view told him that retreat was the only option. "I'll let you all live for today, but know this sonic heroes. Already my plan is in motion and its only a matter of time before you all go down." he announces before blasting at the ground with his good hand, kicking up a smokescreen that blinds their view for a minute.
By the time it settled, Metal Sonic was gone, separated arm and all.
Dusk groans as she gets up, then walks over to her other friends. "Nice job Dusk, you didn't beat Metal but you at least made him retreat." Sonic comments. The blue hedgehog was sitting up against a car, breathing heavily from the severe blows he took.
"Yea, I didn't think my sis could pull it off, but you managed to hurt Metal both physically and mentally." Amy adds from her position beside Sonic, "Bet that was quite a wound to his pride."
"Serves him right." Dusk snorts, "How dare he peek down my top. Creepy metallic pervert." she adds in a mutter.
Silver grunts as he struggles to stand up, "You know he wanted the emerald, not your body."
"Still doesn't give him the right to violate a lady's privacy." Dusk replies, crossing her arms and glancing away. Upon noticing Blaze nearby, Dusk quickly says, "Oh! Blaze! You'll probably want your emerald back."
"No Dusk." Blaze says, holding up a hand to stop the hedge-girl, "Keep it. With an enemy like Metal Sonic around, we'll need to use the emeralds, not lock them away."
"Blaze is right, but if Metal was running off of one, he's probably got more," Rouge adds.
From off to the group's left, the friends can hear Shadow and Tails talking. The two were over by Omega, and seemed to be discussing his repair. About twenty seconds after the muffled conversation reaches their ears, the two mobians return to their friends.
"How is he?" Dusk asks.
"He's powered down, but repairable." Shadow replies, "Metal was only able to blast through a main power cable, not anything more serious." He lets out a quiet sigh of relief, "Tails should be able to get Omega up and running again in a few days."
"Once I get back to my workshop, I'll return in the X-Hurricane to pick up Omega." Tails adds, then winks at the group, "Don't worry at all, he'll be good as new before you realize it."
"Alright Tails, thanks." Rouge says, the other friend of the robot, "But we'll need you with us to figure out how we'll counter-attack."
"Counter-attack?" Shade repeats, "You can't be serious Rouge. None of you are in any sort of condition for an adventure."
"If I had enough Chaos Emeralds, I can heal all of us," Shadow states, "I've got one."
"And there's two locked up in the GUN vaults." Rouge adds.
"Three will be enough."
"Alright, we'll also have to use our two Sol Emeralds wisely." Blaze adds. Everyone murmurs some sort off agreement at this. "Everyone meet at my palace as soon as you can. Rouge, get the emeralds from the GUN vaults, Shadow bring yours. You all can rest up there as well before we go."
"Thanks Blaze." Sonic says before he gets up. "Come on Tails, I'll give you a lift back to your home."
Tails nods before allowing Sonic to lift him up then take off, leaving behind a blue streak as he goes. Shortly after Sonic goes, Amy leaves with Cosmo in her arms. Rouge limps into a nearby alley and disappears from view for a few seconds before rushing back out on her board and leaving. Knuckles struggles over to where his crashed bike was, tugs it out of the rubble, then gets on before driving back to the group. He allows Shade to climb on behind him before leaving as well. The last two to leave were Blaze, on foot, and Silver, also on foot but at a slightly slower pace than his girlfriend.
Dusk glances over towards Shadow and notices that he was looking back at Omega's body. "Shadow?" she asks, resting a hand on his shoulder.
"I'm fine Dusk." he replies.
"You don't sound fine."
Shadow sighs, his girlfriend had called his bluff, "I'm just frustrated with myself. I let myself get weakened so much that I couldn't protect a friend...its my fault Omega was blasted."
"Come on, don't blame yourself."
"Why not?" Shadow angrily asks.
"Whether you were hurt or not, there wouldn't have been anyway to keep Metal Sonic from shooting him." Dusk sighs, "And if Omega was awake, would he want you beating yourself up or helping everyone else stop Metal?"
"You've got a point."
"Course I do." Dusk says, "Now lets go get your Chaos Emerald." She then leans against Shadow in a teasing way that showed off her Sol Emerald. "Maybe that little jewel will get to join his buddy," she slyly says, winking her eyelashes against Shadow's cheek.
Shadow only mumbles while his cheeks begin to glow. Dusk stays there for a few seconds before laughing and pulling away. "Come on! That emerald won't get itself!" she says, grabbing Shadow's hand and tugging him along.
Several thousand miles away, in a decrepit old Eggman base stashed in the deepest part of a forest, with hole-filled ceilings that allowed the sunlight to enter at odd angles and various vines, creepers, and trees growing out of the ground, Metal Sonic struggled down a hallway towards the repair bay, cursing that purple hedgehog for being able to inflict so much damage on him. Eventually the robot hedgehog got into the repair bay and laid down on a table, resting his arm on a nearby desk.
The repair bay was a pretty large room, inhabited by a metal table with several drawers of tools and spare parts nearby. Where the ceiling light was is now a large hole up to the sky with the sun providing the light now. Several vines were hanging from the ceiling and some of the floor was ripped up by the roots of a tree growing in a nearby room.
A couple footsteps are heard before a tutting sound. "Sonic...how did you let yourself get into this condition." a voice asked.
"Don't lecture me, just get onto the repairs." Metal Sonic snaps at the voice.
The voice sighs before collecting several tools and going to work on Metal's body. Metal simply lies there will allowing the repairs to go on...pondering this little defeat. He brushes it aside though, there wouldn't be anyway Sonic or his friends would survive this plan of his.
"Give me a progress report on the others." Metal demands.
"The others are roughly seventy-five to eighty percent finished." the voice replied while beginning to reconnect the wires in Metal's arm. "Their basic structures are more or less finished, all that's left is to give them their unique abilities and finish the programming."
"Good. Are you almost done?"
"A few more minutes."
"Alright...what about the re-activated Eggbots?"
"Total conversion of Eggman's stored army has been completed while you were playing." the voice replies, "All of the grunts are ready for your command...although some of the larger machines are lagging slightly behind. They should be finished by nightfall though."
"Meh, fine. I'll need those robots to keep my copy occupied while our friends are finished. That blue fool is probably planning a counter-attack by now." Metal grumbles.
"Guess its a good thing he doesn't know the location of our base." The voice mutters, now replacing the damaged panels on Metal's other arm.
"True, but I'll need the resources in several of Eggman's other bases to assure my victory."
"Sonic?" The voice asks, turning away from its work.
"Once one of our friends is done, send them to me. I'll need them to spread out to the bases my forces will re-activate and oversee reconstruction."
"Understood." The voice says before going back to work.
What a fool Eggman was to leave all of these robots in his bases. He's practically handing me an army and with him in jail, I don't have to worry about him interfering. Metal thought to himself, Enjoy your life while you can Sonic...soon I'm going to end yours and all of your friends.
"Finished Sonic." The voice announces as its owner backs away.
Metal sat up and tested his arms, finding them to be good as new. "Excellent work. Now go and supervise the remainder of the construction process. I have an army to command." he orders while getting off the table and walking away.
His repairer watches him walk away before turning to leave through another door. However...in that process, part of it enters the sunlight that was leaking down from above...revealing a quick glimpse of golden-yellow metal before it vanishes into the shadowy depths of the base.
Finally a battle! I've been waiting for this chapter since the story started! Hope it didn't disappoint! Get ready for one big adventure ahead, and I can guarantee plenty of trouble along the way. One last thing, my avatar picture has changed to be a picture of Dusk, so if any of you are still a little foggy on her looks, just swing by my profile page to see her.