Things are going to get a little more heated now, with Eggman pushing the rules to their limits.
Disclaimer: is there any way in doing this story WITHOUT having to put this in every chapter? I don't own Sonic, Tails or related characters – copyright Sega and Sonic Team. Amadeus and Rosemary are copyright Archie comics. Artemis, this story and any other OC characters I may add are mine.
Got really annoyed with editing this in the document manager. Things kept screwing up so I needed to restart over and over again. DX
Chapter 6: Eggman's last straw
'Arty, come and get your lunch!'
Rosemary was in the kitchen and had just finished preparing her youngest son's lunch as the toddler walked in.
'Lunch!' Artemis exclaimed as he jumped up and down excitedly for his plate. Rosemary chuckled and handed him his plate before taking her own and heading into the living room.
Mother and son sat alone eating their lunches. Artemis sat on the floor watching the television as usual. This show had something to do with teaching small children sums. The question was a typical 'what does two plus two equal?' Rosemary awaited the half-expected question from Artemis that soon came.
'Mummy, what does it mean?' Rosemary smiled and walked over to her son. She knew full well that he was a visual learner and preferred to learn things by counting objects rather than numbers.
'If I have two apples here, and two apples here' she placed two groups of two sliced pieces of apple on either side of her plate, 'how many is there?'
'Four!' Artemis responded quickly. Despite not being able to put two and two together very well, putting it at this point of view seemed to work like a wind-up key for a grandfather clock for Artemis.
Rosemary helped Artemis with the maths as they slowly ate their lunches, leaving some apple slices for the counting. All of a sudden, a loud, ear splitting ringing could be heard from seemingly every direction possible. Rosemary blocked Artemis' ears instinctively and covered her own with her other arm. The windows soon shattered into pieces, spraying all over the lounge. Rosemary covered her son, even though the glass did not even get close to them. The ringing abruptly stopped and Rosemary looked around at the missing windows to find a large robot with twin cannons and speakers – the E-72, closely followed by Eggman in his usual Eggpod.
'Aah, Mrs. Prower I presume. Pleasant day, isn't it?' Rosemary, ignoring the taunting, said nothing and held the scared Artemis close to her chest, determined to keep him safe, even if it cost her dearly. 'Hand over the child, or there will be consequences, and believe me, those consequences will get me the child whether you like it or not.' Rosemary was startled. I don't know what you want with my son, but to go as far as killing me for him – 'Oh dont worry, I won't kill you. Looking at you're expression, I presume that's what you thought I'd meant. No, you'll just be out cold for a couple of hours. But either way, the child is mine!'
Despite how passive Rosemary seemed, she was defiant and refused to give up without a fight. 'Go ahead, just try to take Artemis from me!' she retorted with absolute rage, teeth bared as Artemis continued to sob silently into his mother's arms.
'Very well... E-72, shock her.' At these words, a turret popped out from under the E-72 and took aim at Rosemary, who had now fully covered her son to protect him with all her will. A stream of electricity struck Rosemary like a small bolt of lightning. The electrical surges knocked her out instantly and she toppled over, leaving the scared Artemis free for the taking. The front of the E-72 opened up to reveal a small cannon that would fire a laser net to secure its net fired at Artemis, entangling the small cub inside it and drew the writhing, screaming and crying fox in. As it brought him in, the cannon moved itself upwards to reveal a sort of tunnel that lead to the rear container of the E-72. Artemis was brought through before the cannon lowered itself back down to close the tunnel and its protective outer casing closed up. Artemis now lay, immobile but concious, crying like there was no tomorrow. The sound-proof glass made his screams for his mother and father unhearable as the E-72, accompanied by Eggman, flew off to the East, away from the desolated house where the unconcious Rosemary still lay.
I wonder what he'll build...
Amadeus was thinking of what had just happened between him and his son as he headed off home, seeing that he had no more classes to teach until the last period. He turned the corner into his street. From the angle that he was at, he could not see the windows of his living room. Even if he could see them, they wouldn't be there anyway. Turning into his drive, he locked the car doors and headed inside the house.
'Honey, I'm home!' he called out as he always did. After a few short moments, Amadeus was startled because there was no response. He checked the kitchen, which still showed signs that a lunch had been made. Something's wrong... she usually cleans up afterwards... Amadeus walked into the living room and received the shock of his life.
Glass lay strewn across the living room carpet. Rosemary lay unconcious among it. 'Rose!' Amadeus hurried over to his wife's side and tried to wake her up. 'Rose! Rose!' Thinking frantically, he ran over to the phone. He was just about to phone the police and the ambulance service when a voice from behind caught him off guard.
'Amadeus... he... took Artemis...' Rosemary had just come round and tried to sit up. Amadeus ran to her side and tried to help her to her feet.
'Who? Who did?'
'Eggman...' Amadeus' heart froze at these words. He sat his wife on the couch before hurrying back to the phone.
Tails sat at home repairing some of the broken objects. Right now, he was concentrating on the telivision, which seemed to be proving the easiest of them since it was the only one that had anything to do with technology. He was also pleased that he was finally able to use the new equipment that Sonic had got him for his birthday. He was halfway through fixing the screen when the phone rang. Bewildered on who the mystery caller was, Tails set everything on the table and headed over to the phone.
'Hello?'
'Tails! Something's happened! We need you over here as fast as you can! Hurry!' Amadeus' voice sounded panicky and alerted Tails right away.
'Ok! I'll be over there as soon I can!' Tails set the phone down and headed towards the hangar as Sonic came downstairs.
'Whoa, what's the rush bro?'
'Sonic, something's happened! I don't know what, but my dad said it's urgent! We need to get there now!' Sonic nodded and followed Tails into the hangar as he raced towards the X-Tornado.
Tails spun his tails and flew right in to the cockpit while Sonic jumped on to the wing. The cockpit closed as Tails hurriedly put his safey harness on and switched on the engines at the same time. He pressed a button which opened the hangar doors and the artificial palm trees parted to allow space. The engines powered up and Tails thrusted the joysticks forward and the X-Tornado quickly began to accelerate. Deploying the stabiliser wings, Tails then pulled backwards on one joystick to lift off after he had gained enough speed. Quickly swivelling round to face the city, Tails put the engines at their top speed, breaking the sound barrier. This caused water vapour to compress at the nose and engines of the high-speed jet and they quickly dispersed as the sonic boom soon followed. Tails blasted across Angel Falls at a speed to rival Sonic's towards Sapphire City. He didn't know what had happened, but for someone to sound so frantic must have meant that something bad has happened.
In under just three minutes, Tails began to slow down as he approached Sapphire City. He quickly spotted out his father's house and dived down for a landing. Pulling up at the last second, he quickly switched to the X-Cyclone and landed on the road. He didn't even bother to wait for all of the systems to shut down properly when he jumped out of the cockpit and ran towards the house, Sonic in quick pursuit. Rushing inside the house and in to the living room, the duo found the scattered glass across the floor, as well as a crying Rosemary and an equally upset Amadeus.
'What happened?' Sonic exclaimed.
'Eggman... Took Artemis...' Rosemary managed to say between sobs.
'Why would he do such a thing?' Sonic said with a shake of the head as a response from Amadeus.
Tails, however wasn't listening. Eggman... what are you thinking? If you harm him...! Tails' face subtly changed into anger again. This time, you've gone too far Eggman! This time, I'm not holding back!
'Mommy! Daddy!' Artemis continued his ever lasting screaming and crying as the E-72 dumped the glass container in a large machine that had four pillars of metal that bent inwards halfway up. Artemis was curled up in a tight ball, with his tails wrapped over his head. One was covering his eyes to stop the tears, and the spot that concealed them was now very damp and the fur flattened down. I'm glad that thing is sound proof Eggman thought to himself.
'Decoe, Bocoe, switch on the machine!' Egmman waited patiently for the whirring to begin. It didn't come however. Curious, he looked round to the control panel to see what they were up to. He couldn't tell as the robots had long since departed. Eggman growled before pressing a button next to a microphone that would call out through the entire base.
'Decoe, Bocoe! Get down here immediately!'
'No Doctor!' Came an immediate response from Bocoe from the speakers. 'We're having nothing to do with this!' Eggman grumbled before turning to the console and switching on the machine. As expected, it began to give off the whirring sound that he had expected a few moments ago. After a few seconds, streams of data began to come up on screen, and a simplified version on the screen next to it. The machine was measuring Artemis' brainwaves of everything he was thinking. Soon, when he's calmed down, I'll have him copy some movements and analyse his brainwaves and create a new robot. In the mean time, I'll start to work on building it.
Artemis stopped screaming, but carried on crying. Scared and lonely, not knowing where he was and too young to know what fighting back even meant, the poor cub lay in silence as the sobs quietened down. Artemis sniffed as he began to get a runny nose.
Sonic, Tails, Amadeus and Rosemary sat in Tails' workshop. They had returned so that Tails could collect anything they might find handy and then form a plan of how to save Artemis. Rosemary had stopped her crying, but she still seemed too upset to talk. Tails was just inserting both of their chaos emeralds into the X-Tornado to give it as much power as possible while Amadeus and Sonic climbed into the cockpits.
'We'll be safe Rose, and we'll bring back Artemis. Don't worry,' Amadeus called out to his distraught wife. She briefly nodded as she waved to them as Tails accelerated out of the hangar. They already knew the location of Eggman's base having seen it when passing by one time.
Tails waited for the fake palm trees to part before blasting down the runway and pulling up. He then turned and accelerated to full speed towards the East as the sun began to set in the West behind them. Tails' pent up rage wasn't showing on any part of his body, but angry thoughts streamed through his mind. The charges he was to set were meant to only blow up Eggman's mainframe and vital parts of the base to cause a distraction for Sonic to escape. But Tails had something more sinister in mind.
The X-Tornado soared through the desert, invisible by the darkened sky. Tails only just made out Eggman's base. He swiftly landed five hundred metres from the base, being cautious of any anti-air turrets. As Tails and Sonic exited, Amadeus climbed in to the cockpit and strapped himself in. He was to fly off as soon as they returned for a swift escape. Sonic ran towards the base, tailed by Tails who was propelling himself with his tails.
A robot patrolling the perimeter turned a corner just as the duo reached the base. Tails grabbed Sonic under the arms and spun his tails to fly them up and over the large wall and into the base. As soon as they landed, they split apart. Sonic was to find Artemis and Tails was to set the explosives.
Tails slipped into an open door unnoticed. He checked round the nearest corner to check nothing was heading his way. Spotting a door, he rushed over to it. The door slid open as he approached and he found himself in a repair room. Luckily, it was unnocupied and Tails quickly found a terminal on the wall. Giving a second check that no one was coming his way, Tails opened up the terminal and began to hack into the mainframe.
Sonic rushed through a series of hallways. As he turned a corner, he quickly found himself stopping right behind a security guard. Sonic backed away slowly, trying not to make any sound whatsoever and hid behind the corner he had just come by. After a few seconds, the robot continued its route through the maze of corridors and Sonic slipped away behind it into another corridor and carried on looking for something that suggested the whereabouts of Artemis. After a few more corridors and another close encounter, Sonic found a room with a sign above it saying 'holding cells'. Smiling at his success, Sonic checked nothing was able to see him before slipping into the automated door.
Tails was now looking at a three dimensional map of the base. The first thing he looked for was where Artemis was. After half a minute of scanning the whole map, he soon found the room – just a few away from the one he was in now. Tails made his mind, sure that it would take Sonic far too long to get here himself, seeing that he was somehwere on the other side of the base. Tails plotted his route and switched the terminal off before taking out an explosive from a small poutch slung around his neck and placing it next to the terminal and setting it to full power. You'll pay Eggman...
Sonic found the holding cells completely empty. He must have him somewhere else. Sonic slipped back out and went to continue his search. Inconveniently, Eggman came round the corner in his Eggpod. Both of them leaped in shock before Eggman quickly pressed a button to alert the base while Sonic quickly came to his senses.
'Where is he Eggman?!' Sonic shouted as the klaxons began to blast.
'You mean the fox? He's safe, so don't you worry about him. I would be more worried about yourself.' That being said, security robots came around the corner, their built-in weapons primed. Sonic looked around for an escape as Eggman backed away to get out of the heat. Sonic looked up to find a vent above the robots and quickly decided on his escape plan. He ran at the robots as they started firing. Jumping up, he landed on top of one and started bouncing from one to the other as their weapons blazed, sometimes hitting each other in the confusion. Sonic jumped up one final time and smashed through the vent before crawling as fast as he could in one direction.
Tails reached the door of where Artemis was confined to. He quickly used the code he had acquired from the terminal to access the door. He found himself in a large circular room with a large container surrounded by four pillars bent over in the middle. One side of the room was lined by a series of computers, one streaming information on screen at an alarming rate. Tails ran over to the container to find a ball of fur lying inside. He pulled out a glass cutter and cut a large hole in the side.
'Artemis!' Tails called out and a worried and still sobbing face popped up from the fur.
'Tails!' Artemis called out, his expression changing into one of joy as he recognised his big bother's face. Tails smiled as he ran inside the container to pick up the distraught cub. At that moment, the klaxons began to blast. Damnit Sonic, what did you do?! Immediately, a large metal dome closed around the cell and everything went black. Artemis let out a small whimper just as the cell felt like it was moving downwards. Tails couldn't think of a way out and he didn't have any spare charges to help him out of here. Tails patiently waited while Artemis clung on to his neck tightly. The moving feeling suddenly stopped and Tails waited for something to happen.
Sonic crawled through on hands and knees looking for Eggman. Now that he knows what I want, he'll probably move him somewhere. Sonic had no luck on finding the doctor but kept on trying. I hope Tails is ok. Sonic carried on looking. No doubt there would be some robots in the vents pretty soon, so Sonic prepared to go into a spin dash incase he needed to.
The metal doors slid down to reveal a second, larger domed room. The klaxons could be heard through the walls, but it seemed they had not been placed in here. Tails looked around for an exit. The hole they had come through had been sealed and there was no door in sight to get through. Looks like I've got no choice...
'Artemis, you stay in here while I do something, okay?' Artemis nodded and Tails set him down. He took out a second explosive and flew up to the sealed hole. He attatched the explosive to the metal doors blocking the whole, judged its thicknes and set it to just the right power. He flew back down and into the container and held Artemis incase the cub got scared by the explosion. Tails took out the detonator, se it to the right charge and pressed the button. A large BOOM sounded above as a flaming ball of fire spurted out from the explosion. A few chunks of metal fell on top of the container, but none of them being large enough to shatter it. Surprisingly, Artemis hadn't been scared at all, but watched the fire from the explosion as it cleared out with interest and awe. Tails didn't think much of it and concentrated more on getting the cub out. He slund him onto his back and said 'hold on tight!'
'Okay,' Artemis said in a hushed voice as Tails stepped back out of the container and flew back up towards the gaping hole in the roof.
Sonic raced through the corridors as more robots pursued him. Typically, they couldn't keep up and soon lost track of Sonic. Sonic stopped to see if there was any way in finding out where he was, or how to get to Artemis. Then he heard a soft, barely audible boom sound through the base. He guessed on its direction and rushed in that direction, hoping something hadn't happened to Tails. He rounded two corners and came face to face with a few robots, which he swiftly spin dashed through and carried on towards the sound of the explosion. Sonic soon found himself stopping infront a doorway which its sign said 'testing lab'. The door was still open which revealed Sonic the contents of the cilindrical room with the analysing computers. Smoke issued from a hole in the ground, but was quickly propelled away by a flying Tails.
'Sonic! I found him!' Tails exclaimed at the bewildered hedgehog as Artemis waved to him.
'Well done bro! Now let's get outta here!' the trio rushed off with Artemis clinging on to Tails. 'Wait Sonic, there's something I gotta do first. I haven't planted the charges yet.'
'There's no time bro, and that was only meant to be a distraction, there's no point now.' But Tails was having none of it and was already heading to an elevator that he knew lead directly to the mainframe from looking at the map. Sonic quickly ran in as the door closed and the three of them headed down.
The mainframe's room was a large one that took up several floors. It was what looked like a nearly bottomless pit downwards. The mainframe was suspended on a platform supported by large metal beams and could only be reached by a bridge. Tails ran across the bridge towards the mainframe with Artemis still hanging on. Sonic waited at the door incase anything tried to enter. Tails planted the charges on four generators and a large computer that stored everything that was on Eggman's database.
'Okay Sonic, lets go!' Tails shouted as he ran back across the bridge. Just then, an explosion sounded above. All three looked up to see what had happened to find a large scorpion-shaped robot fly in, closely accompanied by Eggman. The robot had engines on the bottom to keep it in the air as it flew down level with the trio. Where the stinger of a scorpion would be, there was a large laser cannon. It also had a series of metal cubes connected with joints to mimick the arching movement of a scorpion. The cannon ontop was shaped like a stinger aswell. The pincers were actually large, thick rods with high voltages of electricity flowing through them (the whirring of which could be heard) and a joint in the middle. It had eight cameras on the same parts of the body where a normal scorpion would have its eyes, giving it 360 degrees of vision.
'Don't think you'll be getting away that easily Sonic!' Called out Eggman from above the contraption. 'Egg-Scorpion, fire!' He added on. The stinger arched over the top of the robot and located Sonic immediately. The cannon began to charge. Sonic got ready to dodge its attack. The blast forced the cannon backwards a tiny bit as the cannon fired. Sonic quick-stepped to the left and began to run towards it. He jumped at the edge of the bridge and went into a spin dash towards the cannon, but one of the electrical rods stricked at him and blocked him. Shocking Sonic, it blasted him backwards and he landed on his feet on the bridge.
Tails set Artemis down somewhere safe behind a generator and out of harms way as they watched the ongoing battle. Sonic tried to land on top again by swerving around the rods. This time it worked as they jabbed left, right and center to hit the spinning hedgehog, but always missing and they couldn't reach far enough behind to reach the back when he landed on it. Eggman chuckled as he had seen this flaw beforehand and had a little extra on the stinger. As Sonic ran towards it, the cannon quickly swooped down at lightning speed. Sonic hadn't expected this and it caught him off guard. He managed to swerve away just enough to avoid the full collision, but the shockwave the cannon set off afterwards blasted him back off the back of the Egg-Scorpion. Sonic landed on the side of the bridge and scrambled back up, looking at the bottomless pit below.
Tails saw his chance. Filled with rage from Eggman's deeds, he stopped thinking straight. All he wanted to do was land as much pain as he could create on every part of Eggman. Tails ran off the bridge and began to fly. The Egg-Scorpion spotted his movements with one of the side cameras and spun around to face him. 'Tails, what are you doing?!' Sonic called out, but Tails wasn't listening. He dodged the onslaught of quick jabs from the pincers and landed on the back of the scorpion Like it did with Sonic, the rear mounted cannon went down to jab him with the shockwave. He's nowhere near as fast as Sonic, he won't be able to dodge that! Eggman thought to himself, glad that atleast one of them would be no more hassle.
Then Eggman took in a great gasp, aswell as Sonic. With lightning speed, faster than the stinger coming down, Tails dodged to the right. The cannon withdrew at equal speed as Tails ran towards it. It jabbed out again and again. Every single time, Tails moved faster than was normal for him, or even anyone else in the room (including Sonic), and dodged the pulses with ease. Sonic watched in awe as the fox made the continuous dashing movements towards the root of the cannon. No longer able to point down far enough to reach Tails, it had no choice but to sit and watch, with no mechanisms in place to stop such an attack, since Eggman hadn't intended on this. Tails ran up the long stinger-shaped joints and towards the cannon. Nearly upside down due to the arching, Tails kicked out with as much force as he could on the cannon, spinning round in a summersault as he did so. The cannon was kicked off with ease, like a child kicking an inflatable ball. The now useless cannon flew to the other side of the room before bouncing off the wall and falling down the pit. Tails landed on his feet ontop of the robot where it could no longer get him and instead merely floated – Eggman had not counted on such an event to happen. Tails stood up slowly, his face contorted with rage as he looked up at Eggman. Eggman hastily jumped in fright and attempted to fly out the room, but Tails wouldn't let him get away that easily. Spinning his tails, he flew up with considerable speed and kicked out at the retreating Eggpod. The kick, although it didn't look very powerful, forced a large dent into the side, blasting Eggman throught the hole in the roof that was previously made by the robot and into the night sky, out of sight. The robot hastily retreated after its master.
Tails landed safely down on the bridge. He breathed heavily as he slowly calmed down. Sonic approached him carefully, thinking that the fox might turn on him, and with the amount of power he had just excerted with ease, it wouldn't be wise to upset him further.
'Tails?' Sonic called out looking thoroughly concerned. Tails looked around, face still contorted with rage. 'Tails? Are you okay?' Tails still breathed heavily as he calmed down. He gazed in to Sonic's green eyes for a few moments as his mind began to think again. Then the realisation of what he did came flooding into him and Tails immediately went wide-eyed and fell to his knees.
'What... What's happened to me?' Tails said as he looked at his hands before fallinghis head into them. Sonic had no idea what was going on, or what to say. Tails stayed on the ground, thinking of what had just happened and wondering how he had done it and what had made him lose control.
Artemis crawled over to his elder brother. 'Tails?' He said as he reached him. Tails looks round to see the young face of Artemis and remembered why he was here. He stood up and walked over to Artemis and picked him up and placed him on his back again. 'Let's go...' Tails said in a sorrowful voice. Sonic nodded and headed out, followed by a gloomy Tails. Artemis, although oblivious as to what was wrong, knew that something was and kept quiet.
Amadeus waited patiently for them to arrive. I hope they're ok. He watched the base, wondering when there would be any explosions. But there were none. He sighed and rested his head on his hand. Then in the distance, he seen something rushing towards him from the base. He quickly grabbed the binoculars from their holster and looked through them towards the fast moving object. It turned out to be Sonic and Tails, with Artemis on his back. Amadeus smiled as he replaced the binoculars and switched on the engines. Sonic and Tails slowed down to a stop next to the fighter as the engines began to roar. Tails flew in the pilot's seat and set Artemis on his father's lap, while Sonic climbed into the rear cockpit.
'Well done! Both of you! And thank you for saving Artemis!' Amadeus said to the other two whom didn't respond. What's gotten in to them? He wondered. Tails closed both cockpits and strapped himself in. Before he set off however, he took out a detonator from the pouch still around his neck. He set it to set off all of the eplosives. This is what happens Eggman... Tails thought as he pressed the trigger. He looked around at the base, where a large mushroom-cloud fire ball erupted from it, spreading across the entire base. A second later, the sound of the explosion hit them. The shockwave hit the X-Tornado causing it to vibrate. Sonic hadn't intended on this amount of explosive power to be used and wondered what had gotten in to the normally passive fox. The fire continued to rise over the base, as explosions continued throughout and equipment was blown to pieces. The base soon lay in ruins as the X-Tornado took off and headed back to Angel Falls.
Tails was still shaking from left over adrenaline as he landed in his hangar. Not a single word had been spoken throughout the trip except Artemis once complaining that he was hungry and Amadeus had promised him he would feed him when they returned. Tails still couldn't think properly and the recent events streamed through his mind as he switched off the egnines and opened the cockpits. Amadeus climbed out with Artemis as Rosemary rushed forward to hug them. Tails gloomily climbed out as Sonic came over to the reunion.
'Thank you Sonic! Thank you Tails!' Rosemary cried out as she pulled hem into the group hug.
'Really! It was... nothing!' Sonic managed to say as the hug restricted him from being able to breathe properly. Rosemary released them and Sonic and Tails gasped in air. After catching his breath,Tails didn't talk and headed upstairs with his head down. Everyone watched him, wondering what was going on. When Tails left, silence fell over everyone in the hangar. After a few moments, it was broken by a complaining Artemis who wanted to eat.
Tails walked heavy footed into his room and fell face first into his pillow. What have I done? And how did I do it? Tails pondered on this new-found strength and speed. The speed I dodged at – I think it was just as fast as Sonic! Maybe faster! As Tails continued to try to figure out what he had done and how he had done it, Sonic walked in.
'Tails?' Sonic said with the same concerned voice as he had earlier. Tails raised his face from the pillow to look round. His expression was one of fear and confusion. Sonic sat down next to him as Tails sat up, but didn't dare look him in the eye and instead looked at his feet in shame. 'Are you okay Tails?' Sonic asked. Tails merely shook his head, unable to talk but not tearing his eyes from his feet. 'What happened back there?' Sonic knew it was incredible of what the fox had succeeded, but he also knew that it wasn't normally possible for him to move so fast, or excert enough strength in his legs to send Eggman in to the Stratosphere. What concerned him most was Tails' aggression that followed. It was unnatural for Tails. Sonic remembered someone on Earth calling Tails a pacifist, but that no longer seemed to apply.
'It might be that thing that attacked me. Do you think it's possessing me, Sonic?' This sounded far fetched to both of them, but Tails had concluded as the only possible answer, even if it was illogical. However, it did help explain his unnatural speed and aggression. Sonic didn't say anything. He didn't know what to say. Tails continued to stare at his feet. If it has taken over him, how can we stop it? And how do we know for sure? Tails fell back into his pillow and rolled over onto his face again. Sonic understood that the fox wanted to be left alone for a while and departed.
Eggman flew over the desert as the Eggpod's auto pilot carried him to his backup base. The large dent in the side had caused several systems to malfunction, such as the communications link, stopping him from calling Bocoe or Decoe as they had fled to the base after refusing to help Eggman. The Egg-Scorpion followed lazily behind. The tail hung limply as the robot had disabled it in order to stop wasting energy to the severed wires. Smoke still rose in the distance in the direction of the base. Instead of being angry, Eggman was somewhat disturbed and scared. Since when has Tails been able to hit that hard, or run that fast? Eggman had no idea on where this excessive power came from, but he was sure it couldn't be good. It was as if the anger inside Tails became energy, changing him physically. The idea made Eggman remember when Sonic had gone berzerk after seeing what one of the Metarex captains had done to two of Sonic's friends, how it seemed that Sonic had forgotten himself and the amount of aggression that the hedgehog excerted on the test robots he was forced to fight. The very thought of the same thing happening to Tails on a much larger scale was almost unthinkable, especially for someone with a personality like Tails'.
A cloud of sand streamed towards Eggman from the direction he was headed at an alarming speed. Sonic! What do you want now?! The speed made it seem it was Sonic moving towards him. Then another thought struck. What if it's Tails coming back to finish what he started? Eggman immediately became nervous and scared as the object continued to soar towards him. It would be pointless running from the innevitable and going upwards wouldn't help if it was Tails. He would only fly up towards him. The Egg-Scorpion was next to useless without its cannon. Eggman merely waited, preparing himself for the worst.
'Eggman!' came out a much deeper voice as the object grew within earshot. Huh? Eggman though to himself. He pressed a zoom-in button on his goggles, to reveal the object was none other than Shadow. How did he...? Hmm... 'Aah, Shadow! I see you've finally woken up,' Eggman said as Shadow slowed to a hault.
'Enough of the talk doctor, I need more information on your grandfather,' Shadow said, trying to get straight to the point.
'I see someone's trying to find out about his past again. You'll get it if you help me defeat a... how should I say it...? improved opponent.' Shadow deciphered the message as being an enemy, most likely Sonic, who has improved his abilities greatly. However, Shadow wasn't going to be used this time. Instead he turned his back and took out the white chaos emerald. 'Have it your way doctor. I'm not going to be a puppet this time. Chaos-!'
'No, Shadow! Wait! Please! Atleast take me back to my base, this thing is moving slower than ever because of the damage and I can't find any other way.'
'If you give me information first.' Eggman thought this over for a moment and then made a decision.
'Alright, you have a deal. Now take me back to my base!' Eggman ordered. Shadow, however, stood his ground. 'Give me the information first. I know what you're like doctor and I won't be fooled.' Eggman groaned. 'Fine. Tell me what you want to know and I'll see if I can find it.' Eggman had a database in the backup base that was wirelessly connected to the mainframe, so any information it stored was also sent to the database. This database is also wirelessly connected to the Eggpod, so Eggman could access anything, anywhere.
'I want to know if the doctor left any notes about a meteor.' Eggman smiled. He knew exactly what the hedgehog was talking about. He had viewed the file once before, but never fully understood what it was talking about. He quickly located the file, deployed a floating screen that opened up and started to play the video.
Gerald Robotnik's head came up immediately and he begun to talk as soon as it started to play.
'I have recently discovered a meteor that is heading for Mobius. It will land in -' the video skipped to a later part in the video. It had clearly been edited. '- I have found that the ancient civilisation called the Sanerians discovered such a meteor before. After researching this just before I was no longer able to access Mobius, I am convinced that a temple holds the secrets.' A map shown up, showing the location of the temple, which sat on the border of the desert they were in now. 'I was able to do some research on this temple when Mobius was available to me. Apparently, some of the text left on the walls describe such a meteor. This was only recognised by the pictures. The text has never been interpreted due to its complexity and its meaning has therefore been lost to us.' The screen remained on the map for a few seconds before blacking out.
'I've tried finding out things about this base, but their language was too complex to decipher, leaving me unable to find anything else out,' Eggman said as the screen closed up and retreated back into the Eggpod. Shadow turned right to head towards the temple.
'Shadow, you're forgetting our deal.' Shadow remembered what he had promised for the information. He walked up to the Eggpod (which connected itself to the Egg-Scorpion) put his hand on the front and prepared for a Chaos Control. They blinked out in a flash of blue light and the desert lay a barren, lifeless wasteland.