Alternate Ending! For those of you who didn't like the other one.
Egg Carrier, present
I have fooled them all.
Pathetic little cretins.
As if a mere troupe of forest creatures could outsmart me.
I even fooled you.
You thought you were getting an inside look when you started reading this, didn't you? A little bit of insight into Dr Eggman's head, his past? Some of you were even laughing at me, weren't you, chortling to yourselves and saying that it served me right.
You have seen only what I have allowed you to see.
You all thought I was broken. Lost. Ready to throw in the towel. Prepared to bow my head in defeat to Sonic the Hedgehog and His Fan Club.
All of this has been building to the climax of my most brilliant plan ever.
Thanks to Miles, every flaw in every machine my father ever built has been removed. They are faster. Stronger. The programs are more advanced than my father could ever have written in his time.
This time, I CANNOT lose!
It is mathematically impossible!
I descend upon Emerald Hill with my new and improved arsenal. Not only will I rid myself of Sonic, but I will also once and for all prove to everyone that I am better than everyone else.
Including my father, who is currently cursing me in the holding cells of the Egg Carrier.
Thought he was dead, didn't you?
Don't be silly.
Why wouldn't I want my father to witness that which he could never do himself?
It is the ultimate revenge.
Emerald Hill Zone, present
I have them this time! There is no escape. They don't know I'm here. They don't know what Miles has done.
Maybe I should sneak up on them more often.
The only indication of my arrival is the thunderous roar of many repulsors whining, bringing my many machines to ground in front of the little village they've made for themselves. After a few moments Sonic appears, rubbing his eyes. He must have been snoozing outside again. Once again I wonder how such a lazy little creature has been able to stop me time and again.
"Wha's goin' on?" he mumbles. Miles runs out of his workshop down the hill and stops next to Sonic, who is still blinking away the sleep.
"I am going to defeat you, once and for all!" I tell him, and this time I really don't see how he is going to stop me. I have taken every measure to make my new fleet of machines invincible. He can try, but he will not be able to destroy them all.
"What? Again?" says Sonic. "How many times have you done that now?"
"This time it's true!" I say. "Just ask your little buddy there."
Miles is staring at the army with his wide blue eyes. He hasn't yet realized what's going on.
"You know that Tails paid me a little visit, a short while ago?" I ask Sonic, knowing full well that he kept it a secret for fear of angering his friend.
Sonic blinks slowly and looks at Miles.
"You were visiting Dr. Eggman?"
"Well I-I thought he might be lonely-"
"Lonely? You thought Dr. Eggman might be lonely? Are you crazy? Tails, what did you do?" Sonic shouts. He knows that he can beat me, but there is no way he can best Miles.
"I just-I thought-"
"He pointed out all of my design flaws," I say matter-of-factly. "He told me why I lost, and how I lost. He corrected all of my, for lack of a better word, failures."
Sonic's fists are clenched and he is not looking at Miles. He is angrier than I have ever seen him. Interesting. I wonder who he will incur his wrath upon.
"Sonic, I'm sorry," Miles says, reaching for Sonic's arm, but Sonic pulls away violently.
"Go away, Tails. Just go away," he says in a dead voice.
"But don't you need my help?"
"I'd say you helped enough already," says Sonic, and he glares up at me with flaming emerald eyes. But I have nothing to fear this time. I am invincible.
And he is alone. Knuckles is not here. Amy is not appearing. Shadow has vanished from the face of the planet.
And he has already refused his friend's help.
I have him all to myself.
Oh, how I have waited for this!
I don't even need to activate the other machines. This new machine will do just fine. "Shall we begin?" I ask him.
He glowers at me, and I look at Miles one more time, to see his reaction to Sonic's rage, and I see what I have been trying to orchestrate for lo these many years.
The innocence is gone.
I laugh and reach out to crush Sonic. He is faster than I anticipated-but no matter, this is my most impressive armour to date. He comes at me and doesn't even make a dent.
His rage turns to shock.
Never before has this happened to him. Never before has he come at me and had nothing happen. He has damaged nothing. A first.
I wait for him to tire himself out as he throws himself at me repeatedly, as usual, going for all the regular weak spots, but finding no hole, no opening, no cracks or fissures for him to take advantage of. There is nothing.
"Would you like to give up?" I ask him. He has injured his arm somehow.
"Would you?" he growls, but it is unconvincing. He has been demoralized by what he sees as Miles' betrayal. Until he gets over what Miles has done, he has no will.
I will not allow him to get over it.
I am able to take him by surprise, somehow, and I flatten him to the ground at long last. Once he loses the use of his legs, I will easily destroy him.
He of course makes an admittedly valiant effort to stop me, but he has been so thouroughly weakened it really is no contest. I lift him off the ground and raise him in front of me.
"Any last words?" I ask.
He spits on my viewscreen. His face is a mask of hatred. "Bring it on," he says.
I begin to slowly crush him in the grip of my robotic hand. He can't hide the fact that he is in terrible pain. I know he is. I know the forces being applied on him, and I know he cannot withstand them for long. In a few moments his bones will begin to crack...
"SONIC!" yells Miles, and both of us turn our heads to see him running full pelt back up the hill, with a bag in his hand. I really doubt whatever he has in the bag is going to affect the outcome of my little exercise, so I return my attention to squashing the hedgehog like the insect he is. Out of the corner of my eye I see Miles throw the bag at Sonic, but Sonic is trying very hard not to cry out in pain and I don't think he will pay very much notice to it.
He does. Out of the bag comes a handful of objects. They merge into a circle and rotate around the beleaguered forest creature. The Chaos Emeralds?
How is that possible?
I have five of them!
I back away as Sonic transforms into his Super form, knowing that no armour in the world is going to stop him. Sonic rubs at his arms and kicks in my viewscreen with those enormous red sneakers of his.
"Y'know the thing about Tails?" he says, standing in front of me. "He always comes through."
He comes closer. I'm not sure how I'm going to get out of this one.
Then he backs off, leaving the machine, and he calls, "Run away, Eggman. Run away. Now you know. No matter what you do, no matter who you manage to enlist, you can't win. You can't. Now I've got to go clean up your mess. Again."
And he vanishes, off to destroy my legions of hard work.
But I will escape.
To fight another day.
I will come up with another plan, a better one.
Egg Carrier, present
The Chaos Emeralds are where I left them.
All five of them.
What happened?
In rage I smash one of my control panels. It doesn't make sense! How did he defeat me? How?
I sit down.
I calm myself.
And I begin to plot my revenge.
EPILOGUE
Emerald Hill Zone, present
After he destroys all of the machines, Sonic lands in front of Tails, who is digging through the machinery and making sure it is disabled. When the power of the Emeralds wears off Sonic is left nearly beaten. He aches all over and he wants to go back to sleep. He is pretty sure that Eggman succeeded in cracking his arms.
"Tails," he says.
Tails stops what he is doing.
"Yeah?"
Sonic says nothing. He has to think of what to say. His head hurts. But he saw the innocence die in his brother, and no matter what happened, he didn't deserve that.
"Are you lonely?"
Tails doesn't answer.
"Do I spend too much time on my own?"
Tails is very still. "Do you think I'm ignoring you?"
Tails says nothing.
"Did you think that, if you helped him, Eggman would be your friend? Were you looking for someone like you to hang out with?"
"Yes," says Tails. "Yes, to all of it."
"I'm not mad," says Sonic. "We all make mistakes. You were trying to do the right thing, for yourself for once. But you could've told me."
"Sorry," says Tails. "I didn't...I didn't want to bother you."
Sonic sees they have a problem and he knows he has to fix it, or lose Tails forever.
"You never do," he says, and he gives Tails a hug for the first time in who knows how long.
"Those aren't real, are they," says Sonic, gesturing at the gems on the ground.
"No," says Tails. "They're fake. I made them."
"Good job, buddy," says Sonic, and he gathers them up and hands them to Tails, who is beaming. "Thanks, Sonic!" he says, and Sonic is relieved. He hates it when Tails is upset.
"C'mon," Sonic says. "I've got a nap to finish."
And as they head for the house, Sonic makes a promise to himself.
He let Eggman go this time.
But he still has to pay for what he has done.
He almost corrupted Tails.
And that is unacceptable.
"One day I will defeat you...once and for all."