I own none of the Sonic Characters! Everyone except Justin is owned by SEGA and Sonic Team. Justin is owned by me though! (Hugs him)
Chapter 7
"Knuckles come in Knuckles," Sonic said into his communicator. "Knuckles? Is there something wrong? Knuckles? Knuckles?!"
All he got as a response was static. Sonic rushed over to Shadow and Amy who had just retrieved the Chaos Emerald.
"Guys, I think something's happened to Knuckles," Sonic told them, "He's not answering his communicator. Do you think he's hurt?"
"I highly doubt it," Shadow said.
"I think we should go check just in case. This could be serious," Sonic said.
"Fine," Shadow sighed.
As they headed out of the museum, Sonic called Tails over his communicator.
"Hey Tails?"
"Yeah?" Tails answered.
"We've retrieved the emerald, but we can't get Knuckles to come in. We're going to go find him and see what's up," Sonic told him.
"Okay. I haven't been able to get through to him as well," Tails replied.
Sonic signed off. Amy had a worried face on. Sonic noticed and walked up to her.
"Amy? You look like something's troubling you. Anything up?" Sonic asked.
"I'm just wondering why Knuckles hasn't answered at all. What if he's seriously hurt?" she told him.
"If he is, I'm sure it's nothing. It takes a lot to bring him down," Sonic said.
"Yeah, but Rouge hasn't called at all either. If something was wrong with Knuckles she would've told us! I think something bad has happened," Amy said.
Sonic thought that over for a moment. His grew wide as he looked at Amy. "You're right Amy. I'll run on ahead. Shadow, go on and take the emerald back to Tails. I'll get over there as soon as I find Knuckles," Sonic said.
"I want to come with you Sonic," Amy said. "You might need help getting Knuckles over to Tails' if he's hurt."
"Okay Amy. Let's go."
Sonic and Amy ran off as Shadow Chaos Controlled back to Tails'. Sonic and Amy were almost to Station Square when they saw a figure of red lying on the ground.
"Knuckles!" Amy gasped as she ran over to him.
Sonic ran up behind her and knelt down beside the unconscious echidna.
"Is he okay?" Amy asked, her voice filled with worry.
Sonic spotted a needle in Knuckles' neck. Sonic slowly pulled it out and held it up for Amy to see.
"He's been shot with a tranquilizer gun. I bet I know by whom," Sonic said.
They stopped talking when they heard a grunt come from Knuckles. Sonic and Amy looked down at him and smiled when they saw him twitch. Knuckles soon opened his eyes and looked up at Sonic.
"Sonic?" he asked in a whisper. "What happened?"
"We were kinda hoping you could tell us that. Apparently you were shot with a tranquilizer, but that's all we know," Sonic told him.
"Knuckles, do you know where Rouge and Justin are?" Amy asked.
Knuckles' eyes widened as everything flooded back to him. He let out a low menacing growl.
"Eggman!" he yelled as he stood up quickly. "Eggman has Rouge and Justin! He took them after knocking me out! I have to go help them," he declared, beginning to walk off.
"Woah wait up Knuckles. We're gonna come with you. Let's go back to Tails' so we can discuss a game plan. It won't take long. It's better to have an idea of what we're doing before barging in on something," Sonic explained.
"Fine, but this better be quick," Knuckles muttered. "Who knows what Eggman could be doing to them."
---
They were being forced down a dark hallway. There were jail cells on both sides and the placed reeked of stale milk and fish. One robot was pushing Rouge down the hallway and another had a gun aimed at her back. She was struggling to break free of the robots, but they continued to hold a strong grip. Justin was being carried by a robot. He was quaking with fear and continuously whimpering.
The robots came to a halt at the end of the hall. One opened up the cell and shoved Rouge into it and the other threw Justin into it. The three robots locked the cell before walking back down the hallway. Rouge ran up to the cell door and yanked on the bars, trying to shake the door off its hinges, but they wouldn't budge. She sighed in defeat and turned back around to face Justin who was crying silently over in the corner.
Rouge walked over to him and sat down next to him. Justin crawled over to her and into her lap, before wrapping his arms around her and hiding his face in her chest.
"I'm scared Mommy," he whispered.
Rouge hugged him back and tried to calm him down. "I know you are, just try and be strong. Knuckles wouldn't want you to be afraid," she said.
'But Daddy isn't here," Justin said. He squeezed Rouge tighter. "What's going to happen to us?" he asked.
Rouge glanced down at him. "I-I don't know, but Knuckles will come help us. I know he will. He has before."
"But, what if this time's different?" Justin asked her. "He got hurt. What if he's not okay?"
"Don't think like that," Rouge told him. "If anyone tries to do anything to you while we're here, they'll have to go through me first," Rouge said, her eyes narrowing to slits. "I have no idea what Eggman is planning this time, but I know it's not good."
Justin only snuggled closer to Rouge and whispered, "Help us Daddy."
---
Back at Tails' house, Knuckles had just finished telling Sonic, Shadow, Amy, Tails, Silver and Blaze about his encounter with Eggman. Everyone could clearly tell that the fact Eggman had taken Justin and Rouge bothered Knuckles. His head was in his hands and he was muttering incoherently; probably cussing himself out. Amy tried cheering Knuckles up.
"C'mon Knuckles, it's not entirely your fault," she said. "You couldn't have done anything to stop him."
"Yes I could have. I could've fought back, but I didn't. You're wrong Amy, it is all my fault," Knuckles replied. "I'm supposed to be a father in the future and as it stands now, I'm turning out to be a pretty bad one!"
"Don't say that Knuckles!" Amy snapped at him. "You will be a good father! You're doing a great job of it right now! Things just happen sometimes that you can't do anything about," she said. "So stop dissing yourself and let's go help them!"
Knuckles only stared up at Amy and blink, surprised from her outburst. Sonic walked up behind Amy.
"She's right man," he said. "I mean, you did all you could. It's not like you just sat back and watched. We've discussed a plan so let's go put it into action."
"You did what you thought was right by trying to send them to safety. Even though they still ended up getting captured, faker's right when he said you tried your best," Shadow added.
"You tried Knuckles," Tails piped up.
Silver and Blaze nodded their heads in agreement to everyone's comments.
Knuckles let everything sink in before letting out a sigh. He knew deep down, that this wasn't his fault and he was ready to let that be the answer.
"You guys are right. I shouldn't put all this pressure on myself. C'mon, let's go. I want to teach that Egghead a lesson he won't forget," he said. "And I swear if he's harmed one hair on their heads I'll make sure that I send him back to where he came from!" Fire burned in Knuckles' eyes as he finished.
A smile flickered across Sonic's face as the old Knuckles returned. The group then set off to Eggman's newest base which was in the mountains. Upon arrival, everyone looked around for some kind of entrance, but couldn't find anything but a keypad.
"Weird," Silver said. "There's a keypad, but no door."
"Great, now how do we get in?" Blaze asked.
Tails thought a moment before turning to Knuckles and asking, "Knuckles, did you give Rouge her communicator?"
Knuckles was already one step ahead of him and speaking into his communicator. "Rouge, Rouge. Can you hear me?"
---
"Rouge? Rouge? Please come in!"
Rouge slowly opened her eyes and looked around her. She could've sworn she just heard Knuckles, but no one was around except Justin who was sound asleep in her lap.
"Rouge! Please answer me!"
Rouge's ears twitched as she heard his voice again. She looked down at her communicator and saw it was blinking rapidly. She almost screamed in joy when she realized he was okay. She carefully took her arms out of Justin's grasp without waking him and raised the communicator to her mouth.
"I'm here! Knuckles is that you?" she asked.
"Rouge! Thank God, you're alright!" Knuckles exclaimed. "Where are you? You're okay aren't you? Has Eggman touched you? Is Justin alright?" he asked very quickly.
Rouge couldn't help but giggle before replying, "Knuckles calm down, we're both fine. Justin's right here perfectly safe. He's asleep right now, but not hurt in any way. Where are you?" she asked.
"We're right outside the base, but we can't find a way in. Do you remember how Eggman took you inside?" Knuckles asked.
"Look on the wall. There should be a keypad somewhere," Rouge told him.
"Yeah we've seen that, but there's no door," Knuckles said.
"There is a door, it's just hidden," she replied.
"Oh. Did you see what the password is?"
"Uh, 3020106 I think," she said.
"Okay." Knuckles turned to Tails. "Tails, go punch in 3020106 in that keypad," he ordered. Tails nodded and ran over to it.
"Okay, we've got the door open," Knuckles said. "Where are you guys located?"
"Once you enter, take the hallway on your left. We're in the last cell on your left," she said. She then fell silent for a moment before speaking up again. "But, be careful Knuckles. I have no idea where Eggman is or what's he planning."
"Okay, I will be. We're going in," with that, he signed off and took off into the building.
Inside, Rouge carefully shook Justin to wake him. When all she got was a moan in response, she lowered her mouth to Justin's ear and whispered, "Justin wake up. Daddy's on his way."
---
Knuckles ran down the dusty hallway. He could hear the noise of everyone's footsteps behind him, but he didn't care. The only thing that was on his mind was getting to Rouge and Justin to ensure they were safe. He screeched to a stop at the end of the hallway and looked over to his left. He smiled when he saw them in front of him, completely unharmed just like Rouge had said.
"Daddy! You're here!" Justin exclaimed, running up to the bars.
Knuckles bent down in front of him and smiled. "Hey they kiddo, ready to get out of here?" he asked.
Justin nodded. "Yep!"
"Okay then, stand back," Knuckles told him.
Justin ran back over to Rouge. Knuckles took hold of two of the bars and began to pry them apart. Slowly, but surely, the bars inched apart until there was a big enough space for both Justin and Rouge to squeeze through. Knuckles hadn't even let go of the bars when Justin ran and jumped into his arms. He wrapped his arms around Knuckles' neck and gave him one of his biggest hugs.
"Daddy!" he squealed once more. "I knew you'd come get us and guess what else? Guess!" he yelled.
"What?"
"I wasn't scared one bit!"
Knuckles arched an eyebrow at him. "Oh really?" He saw Rouge roll her eyes and Knuckles chuckled. "Looks like your mother begs to differ."
"Well, I wasn't scared that much," he admitted.
Knuckles shook his head and Justin walked over to Sonic to try and get him to believe he wasn't scared. Rouge walked up to Knuckles.
"Thanks for saving us," she said.
"Don't mention it. It's not like I was gonna let Eggman get away with this," Knuckles replied.
Rouge smiled at him and Knuckles smiled back. They spent a moment looking into each other's eyes until Sonic cleared his throat loudly to get their attention.
"I don't really want to ruin the moment, but shouldn't we be going?" he asked.
Knuckles and Rouge blushed as they turned back towards the group.
"Right, let's go!" Knuckles exclaimed.
"The only place you all will be going is to fill up all these cells," a voice said.
Everyone turned around to find Eggman floating in front of them in his Hover Car with over three dozen robots behind him. He had a wide grin on his face as he stared at the group.
"No, you all won't be going anywhere. My robots will make sure of that."
Gasp! Cliffy! Knuckles is reunited with Justin and Rouge, but now they have to defeat Eggman before they can leave! Oooh, big fight scene next chapter! This chapter was posted sooner then expected thanks to my Study Hall period. I had no homework amazingly today so I had the whole period to write. Now I have to go study for two quizzes I have tomorrow… Ick, stupid school.
