Land of the Sky: Pt 5
"Gee, Tails. I think we went a little overboard on Miss Sarah." Cream suggested. "I mean, she did kind of deserved it a little and all. But I think we might have been just a little too hard on her, maybe."
The five of them were preparing to return to the surface, assisted by Saffron's colony. Charmy oversaw the other bees loading up luggage and souvenirs acquired during the past few days.
"I know we were a bit harsh, Miss Cream; but even you have to admit, she had it coming." Ray commented. "I've never seen a young lady so spoiled and selfish in my entire life, and believe me with the kinds of nobility and rich I meet through my wife's line of work… that's saying a lot."
"Still I'm really sorry things escalated to the level they did, even though Saffron here was totally justified in what she had her swarm do." Tails replied. "I'm going to go over and apologize for what we did to her on what was supposed to be the most special night of her life."
"I think I'll go with you." Saffron agreed, ordering her swarm to continue their preparations. "I can't believe I lost my temper like that back there. Even if I've dropped the hippie act, a princess cannot behave like a child in those kind of situations."
"I think we should all go over and apologize. Even if it was her fault, we should have had the maturity to stand up and walk away instead of getting even." Ray agreed. "We've got what we came for in the form of the re-charged emerald, so I think trying to make amends would be a decent way to wrap up everything up here."
"Well, I don't think we should apologize at all." Charmy snapped, crossing his arms angrily. "We didn't do anything to make her act so mean, why should we be the ones to apologize when she acted like a brat?"
"Oh Charmy, such a naïve little insect." Cream chided him, patting him on the head. "You're too little to understand how these things work and why we have to go apologize to Sarah and her father."
"Saffron's the same age as me and she agrees we should apologize." Charmy protested. "Why does she agree with you?"
"Because Saffron's a princess and they are raised to understand grown-up decisions." Ray added, scratching his nose. "But believe me, a princess can act like an immature brat to get her way when she wants to, believe me I know it personally."
"Anyway, you be a dear and stay here with the swarm, Charmy." Saffron instructed him. "I'll go with the others to apologize to Miss Sarah."
The four mobians left Sky's End and made their way back to the presidential house. Tails was just knocking on the door, when he heard a lot of screaming and shouting coming from the upstairs bedroom.
"HEY, PUT ME DOWN YOU CREEPS!" Sarah's voice called out from above. "DON'T YOU THREE EVEN THINK ABOUT TOUCHING ME!"
"Oh, we are going to touch you all right." A familiar voice clucked. "We're going to take you back to Dr. Robotnik and get our old jobs back. Haha, haha."
"Wait…" Tails' eyes narrowed. "I know that laugh." An egg mobile exploded out of the upper floor of the estate. In it rode, the badniks: Scratch, Grounder, and Coconuts. The two animal looking robots held Sarah down while the mutated driller piloted the goofy-looking aircraft away.
"Yeah, yeah. You're coming with us, Princess." Coconuts added. "And there is not a thing that blue pest can do about it all the way up here. Yeah, yeah."
"PUT ME DOWN THIS INSTANT!" Sarah cried out. "HELP! SOMEBODY, HELP ME!"
"Oh dear, isn't that Dr. Eggman's S6 squad?" Cream asked, in shock. "It looks like they're taking Miss Sarah away."
"Great, they're probably kidnapping her for a ransom." Ray growled. "Either that or Eggman want to force the president to surrender to him."
"We've got to rescue her." Saffron added as the four took to the sky. "We can't just let that rotund omelet carry off the princess of Sky World."
"Uh Saffron…" Tails corrected. "She's the daughter of an elected official. That hardly makes her a princess."
"Eh, you say tomato. I say tomoto." She answered. "We'd still better get after her before those badniks get her down to the land of darkness."
"The Land of Darkness?" Tails asked in confusion. "What's that?"
"Eh… it's what we Sky People call the surface." Ray replied with a shrug. "Doesn't make any sense, either." The four quickly chased after the fleeing robots soaring down through the clouds towards the blackened skies over the Metropolis Zone.
Tails noticed several small objects moving towards them at an incredible speed and squinted to see what he was looking at.
"Hey guys," the fox told his friends. "I think I see a flock of birds up there."
"Uh Tails, I don't think those are a flock of birds." Cream replied.
"Really?" Tails asked again, putting his hand above his eyes. "Cause I think I see a whole flock of over three hundred of them."
"Tails, she's right. That's no flock of birds." Ray added as he motioned for the others to fly in combat formation. "That's an entire swarm of flight-capable badniks." The four mobians braced themselves as an entire swarm of the evil robots engulfed them in the skies over Eggman's fortress city.
Several buzz bomber dove at the heroes. Their stingers at the ready as they prepared to knock the mobians out of the sky.
"Tails, what do we do?" Saffron asked in a panic. "We can't spindash them up here or we'll stop flying and lose altitude."
"Don't worry, princess. I know of another technique we can use that Sonic taught me." Tails replied. "It's called the Homing Attack." He turned his head to the others. "Follow my lead, everyone." Tails curled up into a ball and targeted the nearest buzz bomber. Hitting the badnik with a speedy attack, he smashed the small robot wide open freeing the scared flicky inside. The fox, then, bounced from badnik to badnik with a soccer ball, smashing buzz bombers and clucks.
"Hey, he really is kicking their booty." Cream added, curling up into a sphere and bouncing towards one of the insects. "Let's mess these badniks up real good." It was like a giant pinball game in the sky with mobians bouncing all around through the air. They smashed badnik after badnik clearing the skies over the Metropolis Zone of the evil robots.
"Hey, what about those funny red floating orbs with the spiked balls circling around them?" Ray asked. "They're too dangerous to attack head on. What should we do?"
"Don't worry about them." Tails reassured him. "They can't attack once they lose all of their spikes. Besides, they can only fly in one direction and keep going indefinitely."
"Wow, that's one heck of a design flaw." Ray chuckled. "So, if they keep going and don't run out of power. Do they eventually end up right back where they started after circling the globe?"
"Nope, after a few miles, they stop following the curvature of Mobius and head off into space." Tails chuckled. "You won't believe the deep space transmissions we gotten from the Bem complaining about us littering their oceans with angry red balls with eyes."
After clearing the skies of all the terrible badniks, Tails and the others caught up with the fleeing Egg Mobile but what they found when they arrived was… certainly not what they had been expecting.
"Hahaha, greetings foolish furballs. I see you have fallen right into my trap." Sarah laughed like a cartoon villain, standing on top of the Egg Mobile. "Now, I will give you the chance to surrender before my three lackies and I blow you clean out of the sky."
"Sarah? What's going on? Why aren't you tied up anymore?" Tails asked in shock, as they flew closer to the Egg Mobile. "Why are you threatening us and why are you wearing a skimpy wedding dress?" The crazed teenager in the wedding gown shook her fist at them.
"Boys, get the guns ready." She stated. "Let's shoot these hairballs down."
"Got it, boss." Grounder added, pulling a lever. "Those fuzballs won't know what hit them."
"I'll shoot them first." Scratch declared. "That'll show Miss Sarah and the doctor that I'm the best."
"Would you two stop your yappin'?" Coconuts shrieked wildly. "We're all trying to do this, so the doctor will love us more."
The three badniks continued to fire on the flying Mobians endlessly. Tails and his companions spun and dodged out of the way of flying missiles and lazer blasts, hoping desperately to avoid getting hit.
"So this is what it's all about?" Cream asked. "You're in love with Eggman and this whole thing was an elaborate trap to capture us for him?"
"I wasn't going to at first, but after that stupid two-tailed fox ruined everything. I just had to make all of you pay." Sarah smiled evily as Ray shot past the Egg Mobile with a heat-seeker in hot pursuit. "I've always loved Robotnik, the hero who stood against the evil Sonic the Hedgehog. He's hated because he's a rebel that nobody else understands. But he will understand me because he has my angst towards the world."
"Girlfriend, you are seriously whacked out if you think Eggman would give a flying fig about you." Saffron replied, shaking her head sadly as a lazer shot grazed her long hair. "Robotnik only cares about himself and you're a fool if you think otherwise."
"You're lying. My dear Eggy will notice me and the badniks." Sarah cried out, looking upon the entire group with contempt. "He may not have noticed me yet, but he will pay attention when I take all of you out of the picture."
"Yeah, and he'll love me the most for killing Sonic's little buddy." Scratch declared, pointing a wing at his chest.
"No, he won't. He'll care about me more." Grounder protested. "He knows I've always worked the hardest to get rid of Sonic."
"Would you two stop your fighting?" Coconuts shrieked again. "You're giving me a headache."
The flying mobians continued to avoid the shots from the Egg Mobile when one nearly caught Tails and sent him flying straight towards the Egg Mobile… and right into Sarah's bosom.
"TAILS!" Ray screamed out, angry at the little sidekick. "Even if she is a villain, I never thought you'd stoop that low." Tails pulled away, an embarrassed look on his face.
"I'm so sorry." Miles replied, quickly zipped away from an extremely angry Sarah.
"Don't just sit there drooling, you dumb bots." The angry catgirl shrieked. "Eliminate them."
The four mobians were nearly exhausted from dodging the constant shots and blasts, when a missile finally struck Ray. Cream and Tails managed to catch him as he fell, but this lined all three up perfectly for a shot from Sarah.
"End of the road, you filthy fuzzballs." The angry catgirl declared. It was just then that Sarah heard the faint sound of a loud buzzing in her ear.
"Hey, you guys hear something?" Scratch asked, looking around. "It sounds like it might be the engine."
"Ah no, we just gave that thing a tune-up before we came up here." Grounder replied. "But it does sound like it's getting closer."
"Uh oh, I got a bad feeling about this, guys." Coconuts warned nervously, as the buzzing sound came right on top of them. "I don't really think it was such a good idea to make a deal with this crazy cat lady."
"What? How dare you…?" Sarah started. She never got the chance to finish. A whole swarm of bees descended on the Egg Mobile causing Sarah to fly into a panic. She began jerking the controls around causing the vehicle to fly about wildly.
"Miss Sarah, please stop." Scratch pleaded.
"Oh no, I'm allergic." Sarah cried. "Get 'em off me." Get 'em off me." The Egg Mobile was sent spinning around dumping the four villians out of the cockpit and sending them tumbling through the clouds towards the Metropolis Zone below them.
"Yay, we made it in time." Charmy exclaimed, bouncing around the sky, happily. "Saffron, are you alright?"
"I'm okay, Charms." The princess replied, as Charmy engulfed her in a hug. "But I don't think those poor badniks and the spoiled brat will be okay.
"Those four wanted to get back to Robotnik, so bad that they would risk their own lives to take us out." Ray looked down at the bleak landscape of Eggman's territory below. "Well, now they've gone to be with the doctor. They're his problem, now."
"Hey Tails, I'm glad you're okay and all." Cream asked, looking around. "But I wanted to ask you. What happened to the recharged emerald, you were carrying?"
"Huh? What are you talking about?" Tails looked and noticed the emerald was gone. "Oh no, I must have dropped it when we were flying over Chun-nin. The five mobians flew back towards the Land of the Sky uncertain on how to recover the lost emerald and how to diplomatically smooth over the loss of the president's daughter.