An allosaur stood in the darkness on one foot, dozing, watching the nearby shield through half-lidded eyes.
A crunch of footsteps on leaves drew his attention. He turned his head, putting down his relaxed foot. Then he snorted and leaped backwards, growling. Standing before him was a demon raptor. Its eyes flamed blue, and the ground burned beneath it.
"The shield will fall," said the raptor demon in a hollow voice. "Do not enter the city. Do not attack the kitsunes. Or I will know, and I will find you."
"I won't attack anything!" whined the allosaur. "Leave me alone! I won't hurt a thing! Go away! Go away!"
The demon raptor faded into the darkness. The allosaur turned its back to the shield and stood trembling all over. If the shield fell, it didn't want to know about it.
Knuckles and Zephyer had rounded up Talon and Silver, the chao Zinc and Chimera, and baby Simoon, and hurried them all through Knuckles's escape tunnel, to the hidden teleporter. There they warped to Knothole village.
They had arranged for the kids to stay with a hedgehog named Serena in case of an attack. They apologized for waking her up in the middle of the night, but Serena assured them that she didn't mind. "I kind of thought you'd get hit at night anyway," she said as she ushered them into her hut. "I have sleeping bags all ready for you."
Sure enough, in a corner of her small living room were two sleeping bags, and a folded blanket that made a small bed for the chao. Zinc was barely awake, and Chimera was still asleep. Knuckles deposited them both in the bed. Talon and Silver sat on their sleeping bags, but they were wide awake with adrenaline.
Zephyer handed Simoon to Serena, along with a carry bag the size of a garbage can, loaded with baby paraphernalia. As she instructed Serena about how many times to feed Simoon, and how to prepare bottles for him, Talon and Silver watched Knuckles sneak out the door. "I knew he'd do that," said Talon very quietly.
"Good thing we're smarter," whispered Silver.
Zephyer finished her instructions and departed. A few minutes later the door opened and she was back, teeth clenched and eyes smoldering. "Knuckles already left, and he took the teleporter on this side back with him!"
"He doesn't want you in the fight, huh?" said Serena, who was placidly rocking the baby to sleep.
"He needs me!" snarled Zephyer. "It takes both Guardians to operate island defense and fight at the same time!" At this point she glanced at Talon and Silver, who both wore a smug grin. "What are you grinning about?"
"We knew he'd strand everybody here," said Silver.
"So we brought an extra teleporter with us," said Talon.
"Great," said Zephyer. "Where is it?"
Silver held up a finger. "One condition. We let you use it if you let us go back with you."
Zephyer folded her arms. "Over my dead body."
Talon laid down and stretched out on his sleeping bag. "Sure is comfortable here."
Zephyer's eyes narrowed. "Since when do either of you have the nerve to play hardball like this?"
"We fought the Black Arms," said Silver. "We want to help fight the bad foxes!"
There was a long silence. Zephyer noticed that Serena was laughing silently until tears streamed down her face.
"Fine," said Zephyer. "But both of you are staying in Hidden Palace with me."
Silver and Talon popped to their feet at once. "Great!" said Silver. He waved a hand, and the teleporter flicked into sight out of a wall cabinet, supported by his telekinesis. It was a flat blue crystal lens the size of a dinner plate, equipped with three sharp arms that planted into the ground to hold it in place.
"You're not using that thing in here," said Serena.
"Right," said Zephyer. "Outside, you two."
Talon and Silver grabbed the teleporter and ran out the door, looking as if Zephyer had just offered to take them to an amusement park. "Bye," she said to Serena, and followed them.
"Good luck," said Serena. "You'll need it to manage those two."
Sonic marched through the kitsune palace with his hands tied behind his back, and Frost's hand on his neck, under his quills. The kitsunes had not been happy to see that he had been untied, and had been prepared to kill him from a distance with chaos energy, until Sonic promised to come quietly. Frost had tied his wrists so tightly that Sonic had lost the feeling in his hands.
Tails had not returned with the chaos emerald. Sonic assumed that he was still looking for it, and hoped that he hadn't been caught in the process. But he found it reassuring that nobody mentioned Tails. Thorn struck him as the type to gloat if she had anything to hold over his head. As it was, she said in a conversational tone, "I hear you're uncomfortable with the Chaos Rift, Sonic."
Sonic's spirits rose at once. He tried to look frightened. "I can't even get close enough to look in. It burns that bad."
Thorn exchanged glances with her companions, some of whom smiled, showing their teeth. "Good, good. It will make your execution that much more interesting."
They marched him upstairs, out of the palace, and out into the warm night air. Sonic dragged his feet. "Please don't take me to the Rift. Just stick me with a needle and get it over with!"
"Move along, you," said Frost, squeezing Sonic's neck until he nearly shut off Sonic's breath. "I'd rather not kill you on the way there."
Sonic sped up for a few yards, then again dropped to a shuffle. "I don't want to die," he sniffled.
"Then you shouldn't have come here," said Thorn. "Not so cocky now, are you?"
Sonic kept his eyes on the ground, trying to look terrified and not laugh out loud.
They took him through the city and through the northern section, to the edge of the Chaos Rift. In the dark, the trench glowed a dim red, with additional light streaming from the yellow conduits. Sonic felt its power beating on his face, and adrenaline washed through him. He might as well play the charade to the end.
He screamed and struggled, nearly breaking Frost's hold. "No! No! Don't make me!"
The kitsunes closed in around Sonic, grabbing his arms and legs, and cursing as his spines gashed their hands. He teetered on the brink of the Rift, wondering if they really could restrain him if he fought his hardest--then they overbalanced him and sent him toppling into the Rift.
Sonic landed on his knees, scratching them badly, and fell forward on his face, unable to catch himself with his bound hands. He took the annoyance of his hurt knees and used it to fuel his acting, screaming in pain and writhing on the glowing ground.
Lying on the ground exposed his entire body to the chaos radiation. Within seconds Sonic felt the power building inside of him, flowing through his cells, empowering him. As his blue quills turned gold, he tore the ropes holding his hands and rubbed his wrists. The pain faded from his wrists and knees. He floated erect, and looked up at the kitsunes. Their mouths had dropped open in horror, especially Thorn's and Frost's.
"Gotcha," said Super Sonic.
Outside the shield, Carya and Slasher moved as fast as they could, speaking to every carnivore they could find, scaring them into submission. They had traveled halfway around the shield when they hit a snag.
Carya's chaos charge wore off. His smoldering eyes faded back to blue, and his feet cooled off. When Slasher told him this, he cursed in the raptor tongue. "What do we do now?"
"Let's go back and charge you again," said Slasher.
"There's no time!" exclaimed Carya, whipping his tail back and forth. "The army will already be moving!"
"Yes," said Slasher, looking thoughtful. "What if we took the rest of the allosaurs into the city to attack only the army?"
"The kitsunes would slaughter them," said Carya, head and tail drooping. "I can't be responsible for that."
"Kantrez called them his men," said Slasher. "Is he a general or something?"
Carya looked at her in silence a moment, waging some inner debate. He turned and gazed off into the darkness a moment, then slowly turned to face her again. "He's the king."
"You're kidding," said Slasher, eyes widening.
"No," said Carya. "The usurpers were trying to kill him when I rescued him. The army would probably obey him, if they knew who he was."
"All right then, I have a plan," said Slasher.
Tails pulled a blue crystal connector out of its socket and inspected it closely. Then he carefully inserted it into a different socket, and checked the large window in the bomb's side. Some of the glowing conduits had gone dark. He pulled out a green connector and set it beside the blue one. Some conduits re-lit, while others faded. "It's like a puzzle," he muttered.
Dusk still stood against the door, hands spread across it, as if holding back an ocean. All Tails could see of her was her white muzzle and the reflection in her eyes as she watched him. "Are you okay?" he asked her.
"Yes," she said softly. "They're not trying to get in anymore."
"I wonder why," Tails muttered, rearranging the connectors.
Suddenly there was a muffled thud, the sound conducted to them through the stone walls and floor. The palace shook in a deep rumble like an earthquake. Tails and Dusk looked at each other. "What was that?" they both breathed.
There was a long silence. Tails worked as fast as he could, trying different combinations, even pulling all the connectors free. But no, some of them had to be connected to darken certain parts of the bomb's conduits. Dusk watched him without speaking.
Running footsteps in the hall outside. Dusk braced herself against the door and bared her teeth. "Open!" shrieked a female voice, and light streamed in around the door frame. A second later there was the whump of an explosion, and air and dust burst in around the door. But the door held.
Outside the female voice screamed, "I don't believe it!"
"It's Thorn," whispered Dusk.
Tails flattened his ears on concentration and focused on the connectors. He had to turn this bomb off before Thorn caved in the entire wall.
Sonic was having a great time.
The super-charge from the Rift didn't last very long, so he had to stay near it and keep recharging himself. Aside from that, it felt wonderful to be Super again.
He flew straight up into the air and divebombed the foxes on the edge of the Rift. They screamed and dropped flat. Everyone but Frost, who jumped into the Rift. Sonic hovered over him and watched as the fox's blue fur turned golden, as well. Then Frost leaped into the air and flew up on level with Sonic. "You idiot," said Frost quietly. "We can all energize." He thrust out both hands and blasted Sonic with a fireball.
Sonic hovered in place and let it wash over him. As it faded away, he laughed. "I'm invincible, moron! Sonic wind!" Sonic summoned a powerful dustdevil from nowhere that caught Frost and whirled him away across the city. Sonic dove back to street level to look for Thorn, but she was nowhere to be seen.
"Coward," Sonic muttered. He glanced up and saw Frost flying back toward him like a glowing yellow rocket. Sonic met him in a midair spindash, which knocked Frost through a nearby building and smashed him into the city's shield. To Sonic's surprise, Frost stuck to the shield, the yellow glow bleeding out of his body. As he darkened, he slid down the shield and fell thirty feet onto concrete. Sonic winced. Frost struggled to rise, then sank to the ground and lay still.
Sonic zipped over and checked to see if the kitsune was dead. Frost was still breathing, but one of his arms was broken. "That's what you get for trying to kill me," said Sonic.
A surge of chaos power washed over him, brightening Sonic's glow and ruffling his spines. He looked around, expecting to see Thorn working some strange wizardry. It wasn't until a cool, fresh breeze struck him that he realized what had happened. The shield had disappeared.
A second later there was a thunderous crash that shook the city and rattled the walls. Sonic shot a hundred feet straight up to see what had happened.
The sphere that had formed the apex of the shield had fallen. It had been made of solid crystal, and it landed on part of the palace, collapsing roofs and crushing walls and rooms to powder. The crystal sphere cracked, but did not shatter. Sonic heard screams and shouts in the distance. He whistled softly and hoped Thorn had been standing under the sphere when it fell.
Then he heard screams of a different sort from a different direction. Sonic turned to see people running along a street on the east side. Behind them stalked the massive shapes of dinosaurs. "Aw heck," said Sonic, and flew toward them.
A pack of carnivorous dinosaurs were pacing through the city, led by a single velociraptor, his black skin and white scars visible even at that distance. Occasionally he barked in the dinosaur language, and some of the allosaurs trumpeted in reply. Not all of the invaders were allosaurs, Sonic noticed. There were many smaller varieties, mostly on two legs, with thin legs and snake-like necks. Somehow Carya had made them stay together, and not run off into the city to eat random kitsunes.
Then Sonic saw the army encampment, and realized where the dinosaurs were headed.
Carya had run the remaining distance around the shield, barking, "Shield breach at north end! Shield breach at north end!" The observers in the woods who heard him immediately moved north. These were the dinosaurs Carya had not yet frightened into ignoring the city, and it was a good thing, because the plan had changed.
When Carya judged that he had traveled far enough, he spun around and ran back to the north end, tail high and stiff, neck extended, feet a blur. But it was a long way, and when he finally arrived at the Chaos Rift, he was so winded that he had to sit down.
The carnivores were milling around, bumping their snouts into the shield. "Where's the breach?" a small, fanged dinosaur asked Carya.
Carya lifted a hand and motioned for him to wait until he could breathe. The others turned to watch him, and stood in silence.
When Carya's lungs stopped hurting, he stood up and shook himself. Then he threw back his head and screamed. It was closer to a whistle than a scream, an earsplitting, high-pitched sound that carried up over the shield.
Slasher stood on the sphere at the top of the shield with Kantrez. As the whistle reached their ears, she said, "He's ready."
Kantrez knelt and placed his hands on the sphere. There was a flicker of light from his hands that traveled down into the crystal. Kantrez stood up and climbed onto Slasher's back, and she launched herself into the air just as the shield vanished. The sphere dropped away below them and crashed into the palace. Kantrez looked back with remorse, but Slasher was gliding in a circle, waiting for the right moment to make her appearance.
As Carya led his army through the kitsune city, he had to keep barking commands at them to keep them in line. The smell of kitsunes was so thick and strong that it made them crazy. The allosaurs were drooling, and the small dinosaurs ran back and forth, snouts to the ground, trilling in excitement at the freshness of the scents.
"No hunting! Not yet!" Carya bellowed at them. To his amazement, they obeyed him.
As they moved on, Carya glimpsed Slasher high above them, wings outstretched. A warm feeling swelled inside of him at the sight; that was his female up there. Then he reminded himself that she did not belong to him at all, and tried to bring himself back to earth. But the sight of her flying ... actually flying, injured wing or not ... it made him so powerfully fond of her that he didn't know how to cope with the feeling.
Then something else flew across the sky, a being that glowed gold. It swooped toward him, and Sonic's voice yelled, "Hey Carya!"
"Sonic?" said Carya, nostrils flaring. The smell was Sonic, but he also smelled like the air during a thunderstorm.
"Yeah, I got a Chaos charge for the moment," said Sonic, hovering twenty feet overhead. "What's with the dinos?"
"We're distracting the kitsune army," said Carya.
"Awesome, I'll help!" said Sonic, and flew on ahead.
When Carya and his pack reached the fence that surrounded the kitsune army, he found that Sonic had pulled it down. He was flying around and around the park area, yelling insults at the foxes.
The foxes had taken up positions in the cover of trees and fence posts, their crystal weapons aimed at Sonic, and the oncoming dinosaurs. The sight of so much firepower was daunting, but Carya marched on. As he looked at the army, he realized that there were fewer foxes here than he remembered. How many had already gone through the portal? It shimmered at their backs, still showing the darkened landscape beyond.
As he reached the fallen fence, Carya barked, "Halt!" All the carnivores stopped behind him.
There was an ominous silence. The dinosaurs and kitsunes stared at each other. Even Sonic stopped circling and watched from overhead.
Then a voice called, "Stand down!"
The heads of the dinosaurs jerked up, and all the kitsune weapons whipped up toward the sky. Slasher was floating downward on feathered wings, and the kitsune on her back sat tall and visible. Both sides watched speechlessly as she glided down and finally landed on the grass between the armies. She folded her wings, and Kantrez dismounted. He walked a few steps away and stood looking at the kitsune army.
Slowly their weapons sank toward the ground, and whispers reached Carya's ears.
"Kantrez!"
"It's the king!"
"I thought he was dead!"
"Where's Thorn?"
"It's Kantrez!"
"I have returned," said Kantrez. "Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated. Now, you have two choices. You can accept me as your rightful ruler and Lord of this city ... or you can remain loyal to the Empress. If you remain loyal to her, I am afraid the consequences will be dire. I have an additional army, you see." He motioned to the silent dinosaurs.
Three kitsunes stepped forward. They all had black fur and armor, but they lay down their weapons and walked forward empty-handed.
"Sir," said one, "I am Soot, regiment Lieutenant." He dropped to one knee before Kantrez, and his companions did the same. "We return to your service, Lord."
One of his companions roared to the troops, "Any of you dogs want to keep fighting for Thorn?"
"No sir!" the army bellowed as one.
"Good," said Kantrez. He beckoned to Carya and Slasher, who moved forward. Kantrez, although still ragged and dirty looking, now stood with his head up and shoulders straight. He looked like the kitsune Lord, even with only one tail. "Now, we have a problem," he said in a low voice to the three commanders and two dinosaurs. "The other three squadrons have already passed through the portal in an attempt to invade the Floating Island. Lieutenant, did they detonate the chaos bombs?"
"No sir," said Soot. "Something went wrong, and Thorn went herself to see to detonating them. She told us to wait twenty minutes. The bombs did not go off, so we began the invasion as scheduled. We are the reserve."
"Thorn is in the palace," said Kantrez. He looked at Slasher and Carya. "Can you take her alive?"
"We can try," said Slasher, glancing at Carya. He nodded.
"She must be taken alive," said Kantrez. "If you cannot achieve that, then withdraw and I will see to it later. Right now, a battle is being waged against the innocent, and I must stop it."
"What about them?" said Slasher, gesturing to the dinosaurs.
Kantrez walked toward them fearlessly, and the carnivores watched him in astonishment. No kitsune was crazy enough to approach a dinosaur. Yet Kantrez did. "Friends," he said, "my people have mistreated your people for too many years. Let this be the beginning of a new era, and fight alongside us."
A dinosaur slightly smaller than an allosaur stepped forward. He had a long, alligator-like snout and huge curved claws on his forepaws. "We came here to eat kitsunes. Who are we to fight now?"
"Kitsunes," said Kantrez grimly. "Thorn was not the only one responsible for my humiliation. But you must only attack those whom I tell you. No one else."
The dinosaurs growled to each other, then the spokesman said, "Agreed."
Kantrez turned back to Soot. "Can you withdraw the rest of the army?"
Soot looked toward the portal, biting his lip. "Not easily."
Kantrez looked at Slasher and Carya. "Find Thorn. Quickly."
As Carya and Slasher sprinted toward the palace, Sonic swooped down. "Hey, I can help. That portal goes to the Floating Island?"
"Yes," said Kantrez, looking Sonic up and down. "With an aura like yours, you may stay supercharged for hours more."
"Here's hoping," said Sonic, and rocketed toward the portal.
Knuckles stood on a rock on the side of one of the Floating Island's mountains. His sword was stained, and he had a cut on his forehead that kept dripping blood in his eyes. Filling the sky and teeming around him were kitsunes, all trying to kill him.
He had returned to the island just as the full-scale invasion began. Their portal opened at the far southern edge of the island, and they hustled through and immediately established a small base, with extra weapons and a barricade of rocks.
But the kitsunes did not stay there long. Knuckles activated his Chaos Engines, and teleported to his battleground of choice, a steep, rocky mountainside with a small cave for cover. The engines powered an array of chaos emitters that he had placed all around the mountain. These emitters formed a vast, rippling, transparent whirlpool over the mountain, sucking in any person unfortunate enough to try using chaos energy.
The kitsunes had armbands or belts of chaos crystal. They activated these to achieve a super form. But no sooner did their fur glow than the vortex yanked them across the island and hurled them at Knuckles, who awaited them with a green sword made of chaos crystal.
Knuckles also wore a suit of ancient echidna armor, set with green crystal. The sword was a dangerous, mind-consuming artifact that Sonic had discovered years ago, and given to Knuckles for safekeeping. Knuckles only used it in emergencies, because the sword seized the mind and turned the user into a killing machine. But in this situation, that was a good thing.
The kitsunes took their weapons with them as the vortex scooped them up, and as they fell toward the Guardian, they rained blasts of chaos energy down on him. Knuckles retreated to the cave, but the shockwaves of the blasts burned his exposed fur and skin. The armor absorbed the rest and glowed neon green, and green fire danced along the Emerald Sword's blade. The kitsunes landed outside and peered into the cave. It was the last thing they ever did.
"Chaos BLAST!"
The explosion killed or injured every kitsune in three hundred yards, but it also caused a landslide that covered the cave. Knuckles floated above the mountainside, empowered by the kitsunes' own weapons, and grumbled. He didn't have the time to clear out the cave again at the moment.
But even with his prodigious power and psychic sword, Knuckles was still outnumbered a five hundred to one. He fought and fought until sweat ran off him, and yet the kitsunes kept coming. His vortex worked too well: it pulled far too many of the enemy to him at once. Eventually he would tire, and they would overwhelm him with sheer numbers.
Zephyer, Talon and Silver watched all this from Hidden Palace. The Master Emerald could find and show them the Guardian. Their view of Knuckles's surroundings was limited, but they could see him fighting and growing tired.
Zephyer stood with her clenched fists resting on the sofa-sized gem. "It's time now," she whispered.
Talon backed away. Silver had only come as far as the doorway into Hidden Palace, because the Master Emerald's power hurt his head. He ducked outside.
Zephyer leaned over the Master Emerald, staring into its glowing heart. "Master Emerald, activate island defense."
The Master Emerald flashed yellow. It glowed for a second, then released a shockwave of energy that exploded through the room and vanished into the walls. It didn't affect Zephyer, and passed over Talon like a warm breeze, but Silver dropped to the floor, holding his head.
The shockwave traveled through miles of solid rock, emerging from the island's surface at last and sweeping outward. As it struck the kitsunes, it swallowed the energy from their crystal weapons, leaving them dull and dark. The kitsunes themselves collapsed to the ground, clutching their heads and chests as the power went through them like knives.
It hit Knuckles like a tidal wave. His exhaustion and pain vanished, and his red fur ignited with orange light. But as he floated off the ground, he heard his chaos engines screech to a halt as the power overloaded them. Knuckles knew exactly what had happened. "Dang it Zephyer, I didn't want Island Defense activated!" He glanced down at his glowing fur, then looked at the sky. "I've got to increase the capacity on those engines," he muttered to himself, watching the vortex collapse in on itself and disappear.
He kicked off the ground and soared up into the air, twirling the Emerald Sword from hand to hand. It left trails of green light in the darkness. He leaned forward and stretched out his arms as if gliding, and swooped across the sky like a swallow. Below him, the kitsunes lay on the ground, moaning. Not one of them could rise. Interesting. Island defense had never done that before.
Knuckles arrived at the kitsunes' portal at the edge of the island. It was an open door in the air, with golden sparkles at the edges. The pulse of power had not affected it, probably because it was powered from the other side. A single figure sat on the ground in front of it. Knuckles switched the sword to his right hand and descended, ready for a fight.
The figure called, "Hey Knux, nice sword. The armor looks kind of girly on you, though."
Knuckles checked in midair, grinning. "Hey, Sonic. Where'd you come from?"
"The kitsune city," said Sonic, jerking a thumb over his shoulder at the portal. "I was going after the kitsunes as Super Sonic, but right as I stepped through, there was this massive power blast. It sucked me dry."
"Island defense. Did it hurt you?" asked Knuckles.
"Not really," said Sonic. "Kind of surprised me, seeing as I was ten feet above the ground at the time."
"Seems to have hurt the kitsunes pretty bad," said Knuckles, motioning northward with his sword.
"Well duh," said Sonic. "It's island DEFENSE." He scrambled to his feet and said, "Just a second." He stuck his head through the portal and called, "It's okay, the Guardian already won."
"Already won?" yelled someone Knuckles couldn't see. "He killed all of them?"
Knuckles landed beside Sonic and peered through the portal. He saw the black kitsune who had escaped him earlier, flanked by two other black foxes, and a ragged-looking gray one. Knuckles pointed at Soot. "You." They glared daggers at each other.
Soot strode forward. "Did you slaughter my men, echidna?"
"I should have," said Knuckles. "I killed the ones who tried to kill me. The rest are incapacitated." He held up his sword in a defensive stance, and Soot stopped just out of reach.
"Soot," said the gray kitsune quietly. "There's no need. We'll use the Summoner to retrieve them."
"Good," said Knuckles. "I want them off my island. You come get the dead ones, too."
"Of course," said the gray kitsune. "Please accept my deepest, humblest apologies, Guardian. There has been a ... change of management recently. We will not trouble you again." He sounded sincerely sorry, and grieved. Knuckles studied him, fixing his face in his mind. "Who are you?"
"I am Lord Magnifikantrez," said the kitsune. "When I have settled matters here, I will make restitution for the damage my people have done."
"Don't worry about that," said Knuckles. "I just want to be left alone."
Kantrez nodded. "Perfectly understandable." He turned to Soot. "Take some men and run the Summoner."
Sonic stepped back through the portal and waved at Knuckles from the other side. "I still have to kick some butt out here, Knux. See you later."
"Later," said Knuckles, and leaped into the air. He was going to keep an eye on the fallen kitsunes until their brethren summoned them home. He didn't know how long the Master Emerald's stunning effect lasted.
"I got it!"
The chaos bomb's conduits darkened completely. Tails had finally found the correct combination on the control panel. "Yes!" said Tails, punching a fist in the air. He moved to the second, smaller bomb and opened its panels.
"Please hurry," said Dusk in a small voice.
It had been quiet out in the hallway for some time. After the initial attack, Thorn seemed to have left. But Dusk had not left the door, and kept her palms placed flat on its metal surface.
"Is Thorn out there?" asked Tails over his shoulder.
Dusk nodded. "She's being very quiet. I think she's listening. She's going to do something bad."
Tails was looking as Dusk. Thus he saw the wall around the door explode inward, blowing the door, and Dusk, across the room. Dusk hit the far wall, then the door collided with her. "Dusk!" Tails cried, leaping to his feet.
Thorn stood in the doorway, slowly lowering her arms. All nine of her tails were fanned out around her, their tips glowing. Tails barely glanced at her; his attention was on that door, now a twisted wreck, as it fell away from the wall. It revealed Dusk, now pressed against the wall, now sliding down it in a heap.
Tails ran to her and knelt over her. She looked up at him and opened her mouth, but could not speak. There was blood on her lips, but he could not tell where it came from. As she sank down, Tails caught her and eased her to the floor. "You'll be okay, Dusk," he said over and over. "It'll be okay. We'll get help, you'll be okay." The blood pounded in his ears as fear tore at him. Was she dying? He couldn't tell. She just kept staring at him, mouth open.
"What did you do to my bombs?" snarled Thorn's voice.
Tails looked up. Thorn had detoured from her march into the room to look at the chaos bombs and their open panels. She glared at Tails and pointed at the large one, which was dead and dark.
Hatred exploded inside of Tails. Thorn had just crushed this child, and all she cared about was a bomb that let her kill even more people! He rose to his feet, hands curling into fists. "I defused it," he snarled, trying to keep the tremble out of his voice. "Apparently knowing about machines isn't that useless."
"You?" said Thorn, staring at him. "It took my most skilled engineers to construct this, and a two-tailed brat with no powers was able to destroy it?"
Tails envisioned himself burying his fist into her snout and strode toward her, clenching his right hand a little tighter.
"I don't think so," said Thorn, and flicked a ball of energy at Tails. It hit him in the chest. For a moment all he saw was darkness and circling stars--then he awoke on the floor, trying to gasp air into his lungs.
"Pathetic," said Thorn, standing over him. Her right hand blazed with a handful of sparkling energy, and Tails felt the power radiating off it. He didn't know what that power would do, but he didn't want to find out. With the speed he had learned from Sonic, Tails tumbled sideways, into her legs, grabbed her nearest tail, and bit it.
Thorn screamed and kicked at him, but Tails arched out of the way and regained his feet as she whirled to face him. They faced each other, panting, each loathing the other.
"You're hard to kill," said Thorn softly. She flung her handful of power at Tails. He ducked behind the chaos bombs as the energy melted a hole through the far wall.
Tails circled the bombs, keeping them between him and Thorn. She didn't dare throw energy at him for fear of hitting the bombs, for the smaller two were still active. "Too bad you don't know how to turn them off yourself," said Tails. "And who built them, again? Guess what--everything in those bombs was based on regular mechanical engineering."
"Machines should have killed you," snarled Thorn. "Robotnik had enough of them. When he conquered Mobitropolis, you should have died, like your father. I never wanted a child, and you only had two tails. Two! You disgraced me from birth, Miles, and you continue to disgrace me."
The room seemed to spin, the continents moved, the planet wobbled in its orbit. Tails stopped, staring at her, trying to understand what she had just said as his brain rejected the apparent meaning over and over. "Wait. You mean you're--"
"What do you think I'm saying, genius?" said Thorn, moving around the bombs toward him. "I am Rosemary Prower, now known as Thorn."
Tails woke up enough to keep moving away from her. "You're my mother?"
"If you can call it that," said Thorn. "You are a failure as a kitsune. Machines! All you can do is build machines! No son of mine can be such an utter failure. So I'm going to erase you from existence." The tips of her tails began to glow again.
Thorn was his mother. The knowledge sat on him like a ton of bricks. Tails wished that he had never found out, or that she had died in the coup. Anything but this cruel vixen stalking him, who cared about nothing but dominating and destroying others.
And she was wrong. He did have a power. Tails hadn't thought about it since he arrived. But Dusk had taught him to create illusions, and that, in combination with his own ability ...
Thorn summoned a huge red ball of energy that filled both hands. She raised it above her head and flung it at Tails.
It struck the floor where Tails stood and exploded in tongues of red and orange flame that licked around the room and went out, leaving a blackened, melted spot in the stone floor. Tails was gone.
Thorn dusted off her hands. Had she bothered to look up, she might not have felt so satisfied. Tails had wrapped an imperfect invisibility around himself, spun his tails, and helicoptered straight up to the ceiling. A narrow ledge ran around the walls two feet from the ceiling, and he stood on this, pressed flat to the wall, holding onto his illusion fiercely.
From where he stood, he could see out the hole that had been the door. As Thorn turned to leave and froze, Tails saw what she saw, and had to struggle to keep from laughing out loud.
Waiting for Thorn were two raptors. One was brown with tawny feathered wings, and the other was black with white scars.
"No," said Thorn faintly, shrinking back toward the bombs. "The shield keeps you out."
"The shield has fallen," said Slasher, pacing forward with Carya at her side.
Carya said, "Kantrez has returned to power. Surrender, please."
"Yes, do," said Slasher. "I don't want to have to kill anyone tonight."
Thorn whirled and fumbled with one of the smaller bombs, but her ignorance of machines hit her hard. She had no idea how to activate it. In desperation she summoned a handful of fire and threw it at the raptors.
Carya lunged forward and took the blast on his scarred chest. Instead of the power hurting him, his scars absorbed it. His blue eyes began to smoke.
Thorn screamed. She danced around the bombs, reached the far side, and sprinted for the doorway. Carya followed, but Slasher remained behind. She sniffed the air, peering around the room, then hurried to the wreckage of the door and stooped over Dusk.
"Slasher!" Tails called, jumping down from the ledge.
She lifted her head and smiled. "I knew you were here somewhere. Who is this?"
"It's Dusk," said Tails, looking sorrowfully down at the small black cub. Dusk's eyes were open and glazed, moving from Slasher to Tails to Slasher again. She did not seem afraid, only curious.
"Thorn crushed her with the door," said Tails. "She's hurt."
Slasher sniffed Dusk all over. "She's stunned, certainly, but I don't think she's hurt that badly. Dusk, can you stand?"
Dusk nodded and climbed shakily to her feet, holding Slasher's proffered claw. "Where do you hurt?" Slasher asked.
Dusk pointed to her face and the back of her head.
"Possibly a concussion," said Slasher. "We'll have someone look at you when this is over. I'm supposed to help catch Thorn. Tails, can you get her out of here?"
"Sure," said Tails. "As long as we don't run into Thorn."
Slasher looked thoughtful. "Maybe you'd both better sick with me until we catch her."
Tails picked up the chaos emerald from the rubble, where it had fallen, put a hand under Dusk's elbow for support, and they followed Slasher out of the room.
"Have you seen Sonic?" asked Tails.
"Yes," said Slasher. "He's flying around as Super Sonic, causing havoc and mayhem."
"Oh good," said Tails with relief. "I was afraid they wouldn't throw him in the Rift."
"What were those crystal things in that room?" Slasher asked as they trotted down the hall.
"Chaos bombs," said Tails. "I only had time to defuse the big one, but I can do the rest no problem."
"Hmm," said Slasher. "We'd better not let Thorn get back here. She'd figure out how to set them off eventually."
"Maybe," said Tails scornfully. "She hates machines. Did you know that she's my mother?"
Slasher turned and stared at him with both eyes. "Please say you're joking."
"I'm not," said Tails. "I only hope that she was. And as much as she went on about how much of a failure I am, somehow I don't think she was kidding."
Slasher sighed. "Well, we've been instructed not to kill her by Kantrez--he's like the king--"
"The Lord?" asked Tails. "You found him?"
"Yes," said Slasher. "That black raptor who was with me--Carya--he rescued him when Thorn tried to kill him."
"Wow," said Tails, and thought of that white, nine-tailed kitsune in the bubble in the throne room. She must be the Lady.
They neared the area of the palace near the throne room, and heard thuds, crashes, grunts, and occasional shouts from Thorn. Slasher moved ahead of Tails and Dusk. Dusk walked all right, but said nothing, and watched everything with a bemused expression.
Slasher reached a doorway and peered through. She crouched, tail quivering, then dashed down the hall to another doorway and charged through. At the same time, Carya flew through the nearby doorway, crashed into the wall and landed on his side, where he lay, stunned.
Tails threw an illusion on Carya, but instead of painting Carya like part of the wall, idiotically he projected the first thing that came to mind: a banana.
Carya vanished, and in his place lay a perfect, yellow banana. Dusk giggled and Tails blushed under his fur. Of all the stupid things--
But it was enough. Thorn had been stalking after Carya to finish him off, and when he 'transformed', she stopped in astonishment at the sheer stupidity of the illusion. It gave Slasher enough time to attack her from behind.
