Tails and Felix flew swiftly through Game Central back into the Sonic the Hedgehog portal. Upon reaching Green Hill Zone, Tails grew tired since he was only programmed for limited flight.
"I...gotta...land." He rasped.
Tails gently lowered Felix to the ground before stopping his tails and plopping to the ground.
"*pant* Sorry, Felix. *pant* I can't fly any further." He panted.
Felix reached his hand to grab Tails and lifted him to his feet.
"No worries, Tails, but we need to move quickly. We don't have much time." Felix noted.
"I don't know how we'll make it to the code room in time. It's a long way to the elevator and, even then, the ride up could take a lot of time."
"Jiminy jaminy. What are we going to do?"
"Something the matter, Tails?" A voice asked.
Tails turned his head toward the source of the voice and found a black hedgehog with red markings on his quills, arms, and legs wearing air skates.
"Shadow!"
"I heard you were in a rush. Need me to lend a hand?" He asked in his usual low tone.
"Well, we need to get to Tropical Resort fast." Tails explained.
"That's no problem for me. I'll warp you there. Get close to me."
Tails and Felix walked and stood by Shadow's sides. Shadow pulled out a shining green gem full of unlimited energy.
"Lucky for you guys, I earned this emerald earlier today." He said smugly.
He lifted the emerald high to the sky.
"CHAOS CONTROL!"
Time and space was twisted and warped as the three were instantly teleported to the Tropical Resort in front of the space elevator.
"Come on!" Tails urged.
The trio raced across the neon-lit paradise back to Flash's house. They entered his room and saw that everything in it was completely gone. No bed. No posters. No drawer. Not even a painted wall. It was a blank white door to the code room was still intact with a large Sega Genesis controller embedded in it.
"What happened in here? Where did everything go?" Felix asked.
Tails walked up to the door and tried to open it, but it wouldn't budge.
"Locked. Just like Sonic said." Tails said.
"How are we going to reach the code?" Felix wondered.
"It seems to me that the controller is the key to unlocking the door, but only with the right code." Shadow said.
"But the code can be anything."
The three stood in silence, thinking about possible solutions. Felix tapped his toes with his arms crossed until he remembered something.
"I think I have something. In Vanellope's game, Sugar Rush, there was a vault door, locked with a controller, that also lead to the game's code room. I recall the code so it might work here."
"I guess it's worth a try." Tails said.
Felix inputted the code as he remembered.
"Up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, Start." He mumbled.
Nothing.
"Darn."
"Is there any code native to this game?" Shadow asked.
"Sonic's first game had one. I believe it was..."
Tails inputted the code.
"Up, C, down, C, left, C, right, C, Start."
Nothing.
"We're losing time!" Felix panicked.
"Think, think, think. What are we missing?" Tails thought as he paced through the empty room.
"What are we going to do? What are we going to do?" Felix repeated as he jumped around, worrying.
"We can stop panicking for a start." Shadow said with his arms crossed in a relaxed tone.
"...a start. A start. A START! I've got it!" Tails had a revelation.
"Up, C, down, C, left, C, right, C, hold A, Start!"
The sound of a ring being collected was heard and the door was opened.
Sonic homing attacked Nega, but Nega grabbed him and drove him into the ground. Ralph charged toward Nega like an angry bull and punched him away from him. Nega retaliated quickly and flew back toward Ralph, punching him with the same amount of force. Ralph rolled backwards until he slammed against a boulder.
"Is that the best you guys can do? What a bore!" Nega mocked.
Sonic revved upon place and charged up power until he was covered in pure energy. He let it loose and flew all around Nega.
"Hey! What's the big idea?" Nega shouted, unable to keep up with Sonic's speed.
"You might be all big and bad, but you can never keep up with me." Sonic boasted.
He came up from behind Nega, curled into a ball, and ground into his back, pushing him to the ground. Strands of binary escaped from Nega's body and scrambled to their programmed homes. Some of the ground that dissolved from Nega's cube attack had regenerated. Sonic jumped up and performed a bounce attack to slam on Nega, but Nega punched Sonic as he was coming down. Sonic landed a few feet away on his feet.
"That's it, you little pest! I'm done toying with you!" Nega yelled.
HOVER!
Nega transformed into a purple hovercraft and floated toward Sonic. Sonic bursted out laughing.
"Done toying with me? What a joke!" He snickered.
He jumped up and launched a homing attack on Nega, but before he landed a hit on him he stopped in midair, mere inches from Nega.
"Oh really?"
"Hey! I...can't...move." Sonic struggled.
"The Nega Hover gives me telekinetic powers. As Silver the Hedgehog would say, 'It's no use!'"
Sonic fought to break free from Nega's telekinetic grasp, but nothing worked. Nega slammed Sonic all over the ground and threw him forcefully into the tower wall. The tower was greatly damaged and bits of 1s and 0s dripped from the damaged spot.
"Sonic!" Ralph yelled in concern.
He sprinted toward Nega, jumped, and wound up to punch him, but Nega grabbed him with his powers and hammered his body into the tower's weak point. The tower rumbled and binary broke loose from the weak spot until the tower crumbled and dissolved into code as it fell. Nega assimilated with the pure code, his strength soaring to new heights. Sonic intervened and launched a homing attack on Nega. However, his efforts proved useless as Nega grabbed him.
"You know what they say, Sonic. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice..."
He felt himself getting squeezed, as if Nega is trying to crush him. The pressure was slowly but surely growing.
"Ngh...AAHHH!" Sonic shouted.
"...not likely."
"...Sonic..." Ralph said, hoarsely, unable to lift himself from the ground.
"...S-Stop..." Sonic groaned.
"I'll stop alright. After you're nothing but code!"
The code room was unlocked, revealing the network of code that keeps the game in order. Each block glowing, sharing information through a highway of wires.
"C'mon, Felix. Grab on." Tails said, reaching his hand out.
"Alright." Felix said, taking his hand.
Tails spun his tails and flew into the room, carrying Felix, looking for what they need to find.
"We need to find the code for the Special Stages." Tails informed.
"Let's see...Eggmobile...Central City...Nega Flash...Wait! Tails! Look here!"
Felix pointed toward a single block belonging to the virus they are fighting against. Tails maneuvered himself to fly toward it. Felix let go of Tails' grasp to examine the code. He tapped on the block three times to open the binary that programmed Nega.
"Physics...Personality...Textures... ... ?" Tails read, confused by the two texture files.
"Two textures? Again? But I thought he split from Flash." Felix said.
Tails opened both files. The file showed Nega Flash's texture. Purple fur, black chest mark, purple and black shoes, nothing they haven't already seen. The file showed something completely different. It was Flash. At least, it looked like Flash. He had completely white fur, from head to toe. His eyes were crystal blue instead of golden amber. His shoes were also white.
"What? Why is there another texture of Flash in Nega's code?" Felix asked.
"It's a real mystery. I'm starting to think that there is more to Nega than just being a virus."
Tails continued scrolling down and found a section of the code called "Other." In it was random binary that didn't make sense.
"What's this? I can't read this code." Tails stated.
"Me neither."
The binary began writing itself. New 1s and 0s were being integrated into Nega's code.
"I've never seen anything like this." Felix said.
"What if this new code is the code of the things that Nega absorbed?" Tails suggested.
"If that's true, then he's absorbing something right now. We have to do act now."
Felix looked at Nega's code and had an idea.
"Hey! We have access to his code. Why don't we just deactivate him?"
Tails thought for a moment, scratching his head.
"Though that would be the easiest solution, we can't." Tails said.
"Why not?" Felix asked.
"If we do deactivate him, the code that Nega absorbed will be deactivated too, and without that code, the games that he stole it from will be unplugged for sure. We need to take the code back to where it belongs." Tails explained.
"If you guys are done chit-chatting, get a move on with what you need to do!" Shadow shouted from the door.
"He's right, Felix. Let's keep looking."
Tails closed Nega's code and pulled Felix off to find the code they need to find.
"G.U.N. Truck...Motobugs...Shadow the Hedgehog. Oh! Hey Shadow!" Tails called.
"What is it, Tails?" Shadow answered.
"Do you mind if we borrow your Chaos Emerald?"
"Not at all. Let me get it."
"No need for that."
Tails tapped Shadow's code twice and the code of everything he had was shown. Among the Fire Bracelet, Air Skates, and dozens of rings on his person was the code of the Chaos Emerald, a small green tile with an image of a green emerald. Tails gently and carefully extracted the code from Shadow. Shadow, at the same time, pulled out the Emerald and held it in his hand, but suddenly, it disappeared into blue static and binary.
"Hey! What gives!?" Shadow yelled.
"Sorry, Shadow!" Tails giggled as he continued through the network.
"Here are the Special Stages, Tails!" Felix called from in front of another code block.
Felix tapped twice on the code and revealed the other six Emeralds. Felix extracted them from the Stages and joined up with Tails.
"Okay. We have all the Emeralds. Now we find Sonic's code." Felix said.
"Right."
The two flew around the weightless space looking for Sonic's code until they found it.
"He's over here, Felix!" Tails informed.
Both friends opened his code and carefully placed each Emerald into Sonic's possession.
Sonic could feel his source code being crushed by Nega's grip and was crackling into blue pixels. He would soon break into code and become absorbed by him.
"Heh...I guess it's game over for me..." Sonic thought.
"Any last words, rat?" Nega asked.
Sonic suddenly felt a surge a familiar energy course through him. He felt the Chaos Emeralds flicker and spark into physical form.
"Yeah...I've got something I wanna say."
With his newfound energy, Sonic was able to break free of Nega's telekinesis.
"What!? How did you...?" Nega exclaimed in surprise.
Sonic levitated up to Nega's level.
"I'm no rat, Nega."
Seven glowing Emeralds appeared around Sonic, granting him incredible power.
"I'm a hedgehog!"
Sonic's fur turned from blue into a burning golden color and his eyes from emerald green into a bright ruby red. Surrounding him was a blinding and burning golden aura.
"Ready for round two?"