Sonic could see Tails' expression turn dark as the two raced to intercept Robotnik's flying city. Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do to eavesdrop on whatever news the kitsune had been given. Instead, the blue hero focused on keeping stable on his Assault GEAR and finding a way to land on the giant speeding landmass that was currently hurtling towards tens of thousands of people. The air was thick with fighting between airships and the remaining Eggman legions, and even the ground below was a battlefield between the enraged enemy and the desperate defenders of Knothole.
"Sonic," Tails finally contacted him, using the radio. It was simply the only means they had to talk at these speeds.
"What's up?"
"We're going in," the fox's voice sounded strained. "This way."
Shooting sharply off to the left, Sonic angled his feet on the GEAR and followed.
Knothole.
Years ago, it had been a tiny village; a few meager huts clustered around a small lake, hidden only by the dappled shade of the great trees that surrounded it. So it had been since Nate Morgan first visited the site and constructed the prototype Ring Generator in one of the sheltered ponds, and since General D'Coolette had organized the construction of the small hidden base there. It was one of almost a hundred that he had proposed be built, should the Kingdom of Acorn fall during the Great War.
They would be a refuge from which to survive, even as the overlanders torn down Mobius' great cities as they had those in the far west. Of this great plan, only a handful of actual Knotholes were constructed before the military coup that deposed the Acorn Dynasty fell like an executioner's axe. It was to the second smallest of the Knotholes that a small band of children not yet in their teens, fleeing the mass roboticization of 3230, finally found a haven. Let by a few weary adults, by 3233 they would become known as the original Freedom Fighters.
Though there were many Knotholes, in many parts of Mobius, only one would officially go by that name. It was The Knothole. It was the legendary hiding place of the Freedom Fighters. In time, after the first fall of Robotropolis and the brief reign of Prince Elias, it became the refuge it was first designed to be, and its population swelled to over two thousand. The very profile of the city changed, as huts gave way to necessary multi-story apartments and houses, leaving only the most senior Freedom Fighters their original dwellings. Dirt was replaced by cobbled stone and concrete block, and for the first time in its history, buildings grew to match the height of the Great Forest's massive oaks and redwoods.
Knothole became a city.
A city still hidden, obscured by a city shield and cloak. No longer could it passively rely on the forest cover and hope to go unseen. It required power, and it required technology… The shield designed and built by a young Miles Prower allowed the city to survive, even thrive, and still go unnoticed. The city grew higher than wider, the better to squeeze into the invisible elevated buddle dome that cloaked it.
Then, one day, that bubble popped.
"Wa - would ya look at that?"
Amy Rose looked at the source of the voice – it was a middle aged mobian, a hedgehog like herself – pointing up at the sky. She was just one in a crowd of civilians that were being herded away from the southern portion of the city. All around her, other mobians gasped and looked upwards as a great dark shade seemed to obscure the normally blue sky. Adjusting her backpack and looking upwards, like all the others, she saw the dark sky start to bubble and distort to the sound of distant thunder.
"By the Source…" "What's happening?" "Some kind of weapon…"
"Keep moving!" A dingo barked the order, and started pushing with the stock of his rifle. "Keep moving!"
"Everything's fine, folks. Don't panic. Just keep moving!" The command came from a new type 'Freedom Fighter,' a mobian feline in the King's formal armed forces (what was left of them anyway) as he started to hurry others along their pre-determined route. High above, the sky began to contort, as if pained. Amy barely heard the footsteps of mobians – several squads of them in combat fatigues of gray and dirty white – running past the crowd at a quick march, heading in the direction she was fleeing from. Their boots made soft thud-thud noises as they moved in near perfect unison.
"Look!" Another mobian civilian pointed upwards. "It's…. It's…"
And then, the sky fizzled away.
What was left was a darker, more sinister blue… Amy quickly realized that this was the real sky, not the illusion created by the inside of the struggling City Cloak. And between the clouds and the earth, small black dots moved at high speed. Still, for a few amazing seconds, it seemed alright… It was then that the first bomb slipped clean through the supposed barrier and leveled a multi-story apartment. Mortar and fire rained down amid a growing cloud of smoke and ash.
"By the Source!" Yet another mobian swore, and held his hand to his head in silent prayer. "Source watch over us…"
"Everybody!" The officer from before yelled at the top of his lungs. "Everything is fine! You will be safe once you get to a designated shelter or transport!"
The crowd began to mill around nervously. Amy felt someone bump against her, and saw it was a young girl, a rabbit only seven or eight years old. She looked up at the pink hedgehog, before breaking eye contact and heading off on her way. For a second, Amy thought to ask where her mother was and if the little girl was lost, but then she remembered… maybe she was already taking part in the fighting to the south.
This was how their childhood had been: they were the refugees of Mobotropolis, Mercia, and dozens of other major cities and countries, but it wasn't how the next generation needed to live, too. For the first time since she had been 'escorted' out of her house and told to leave her things behind, Amy saw the group she was with. The group was almost entirely composed of children. Another mobian guerilla, this one a dark-brown female hedgehog, walked past Amy with a disapproving look.
"How old'r you?" She asked, looking up and down the younger mobian. Amy squirmed under the gaze she was receiving. The other hedgehog's nametag read 'Sergeant C. Danes.'
"Fif… fifteen…" Amy managed, knowing what the other female was going to ask next. Virtually all mobians hit puberty by eleven, came of age around thirteen, were considered fully grown by sixteen, and middle aged by thirty. Their small, fast metabolisms gave them a slightly different view of time and aging than overlanders, who took much longer to mature.
"Fifteen?" The female half-asked, half-said. "What are you doing with these kids? Why aren't you armed? I don't see anything wrong with you."
"I – I…" Amy gulped, and licked her lips. "I'm not a… I mean… I have a Notice of…"
"A Notice of Non-Conscription? Evacuation Priority Alpha?" The female sergeant held out her hand, and Amy reached into her backpack, picking out a small piece of paper. The other mobian snatched it out of Amy's hand, and quickly looked it over, noting the Seal of the Acorns with an undisguised 'hrummf.' Handing it back, she frowned, as if to ask 'who'd you have to sleep with to get that, huh?'
"It seems genuine," she said, walking past the pink hedgehog. "Go on. Get out of here."
"Wait!" Amy found her courage, and grabbed the older female by her shoulder. "Please… have you seen Sonic?"
Somewhere nearby, a soldier raised his voice, "Keep moving! Everyone keep moving!"
"Sonic?" The female Sergeant gave Amy another caustic look. "Sonic the Hedgehog?"
"Yes!" Amy nodded her head vigorously. "He's blue and…"
"I know what he looks like." Sergeant Danes snapped her shoulder out of Amy's fingers. "I heard he was in the city a while ago."
Amy's face brightened. "He was?"
"Yeah. That was maybe a half hour ago? No idea where he is now."
In the distance: "This way!" "You there! Stay with the group! Hey, Sergeant!"
"Now get to your transport, kid." Danes slowly walked away, not sparing Amy another glance. "Or don't."
Amy nodded, trying to keep pace with the crowd.
All around her, the world spun, an endless cacophony of sound and fury. Screaming and yelling and orders and guns… this couldn't be Knothole! Where was Sonic? Where was… Tails…? Or any of their friends? Why was she alone? As dizziness threatened to throw her to the ground, she fell hard against a cold stonewall, grateful for its steadfast nature. Clinging to it, she wandered, trying to escape… to get away…
She found a small plaza, with a small cherry tree and a wood bench.
Literally falling into it, she tried to catch her breath and collect herself. Closing her eyes, she could imagine Sonic or Sally or Bunnie or Tails… or even Mina or Rouge or Knuckles… just walking by, talking and laughing and living… Why was she alone? The last few weeks had been so hard, and she had been so alone…
"Tails… Can't we just be friends? Friends can love each other, too…"
That… those words… that was when it all began. She still remembered seeing the anger and rejection in his eyes, unlike anything she had ever seen before. Tails had been changing, physically, for over a year… but he had always been the same nice young boy. He always smiled. He always helped. He did everything people wanted to, and he did it without complaint. He was happy… or so she had thought. But in that moment, all the built up frustration, all the repressed rage…
Exploded out of him.
He caught her hammer, and used it to knock her to the ground. He'd stormed out before anything else happened, but they'd only talked once in the months after that. He was always working, or busy, or away. Did he hate her now? Amy hoped not. She liked him, even after all that had happened, but she loved Sonic. Why didn't anyone understand that?
Love wasn't something you could explain; it wasn't something you could rationalize.
"He'll never love you… You'll never love me… at least Sonic ends up happy. He is the hero. He deserves a happy ending..."
Amy wiped away a tear, and looked up at the war torn sky.
"Why? Why did things have to happen like this?" She asked, but got no reply from the uncaring world. "If only Sonic were…"
As if to answer her prayer, she saw a familiar outline on a high rooftop. Sitting up, she leaned towards the shadowed figure, and managed to see downward pointing spines, a confident stance… It was a hedgehog, of that there was no doubt, and when he easily jumped from one rooftop to another, Amy's eyes widened in recognition. Standing up, spirits restored by a surge in resolve, she broke into a run.
"Sonic… Sonic…!" She yelled, but knew he'd never hear her. He never did. But when she caught up to him, he'd set everything right. That was how things worked. That was what heroes did.
Above her, the sky thundered.
"There!" Amy rounded a street corner and saw him, waiting for her. She was on the verge of throwing herself into his waiting arms when she noticed something.
"Wait! I know you!" she skidded to a stop. "You're not…!"
Wave the Swallow was as terrified as she had ever been.
Under normal circumstances, she would have been ecstatic to be broken out of prison and given a chance to pick up where she left off in her research. While it was true that she had been given a pretty good deal after her capture - she had the chance to study the Ark of the Cosmos and other Babylonian artifacts, and she'd escaped an appointment with a hangman – she was still technically a prisoner. That would never sit right with her or her fellow Rogues.
When "White" and "Violet" had appeared in her room and set her free, Wave had been shocked but grateful. She knew the two of them from the series of jobs they all pulled off on behalf of "M" and quickly assumed that they were getting the gang back together. Except that White and Violet had no intention of freeing Jet or Storm.
Instead, they had her retrieve the Ark of the Cosmos from the lab and then left to meet up with their mysterious benefactor, "M." M, it turns out, wasn't even Mobian. He was some kind of nightmarish crystalline entity inhabiting a Mobian shell. Wave had never seen or heard of anything like it. Just hearing the thing talk filled her with dread. It was like stone grinding together between the words.
At his request, she had finished assembling and aligning the five pieces of the Ark of the Cosmos. It was built like a puzzle box, and for some reason neither Mephiles nor the other two wanted to touch it before it was assembled. Wave had heard White and Violet muttering something about "Iblis" before in hushed tones. After a while, Wave guessed that they meant the "Flame of Disaster" she had heard a few times before. It was just a stupid superstition. The so called "flames" were just a way primitive people described a font of untapped Chaos Energy.
None of that had been too terrible, looking back on it.
The problem came when "White" used his Chaos Control to take her here. Wave had only a vague idea where she was, but she recognized Eggman Tech when she saw it, and it was bloody well everywhere. It was also nearly unsalvageable. They'd told her to "plug the Ark" into the giant Chaos Siphons built into the room. That hadn't been hard. It was easy to jump start the system, since it had only just recently rebooted into a low power "safe mode" of sorts. It was amazing stuff, really, and Wave could have spent years studying it all!
Except soon after she inserted the Ark into the chamber, "M" began working some kind of crazy chaos magic. Black crystal and twisting, living shadows began to cover the walls. The burned and scarred spherical chamber began to echo with distant sounds: screams, moans, whispers. Source alive, it was eerie. It had gotten to the point where Wave could barely manage to stay in the area.
Then it got worse.
A whole cadre of Tails Dolls appeared, along with a black hedgehog who could only be the infamous "Shadow." Wave had heard about him, and if even half of it was truth, then she was in way over her head. Shadow directed the Dolls to serve "M" who called himself "Mephiles." The crystalline entity then jabbed pieces of himself (itself?) into the misshapen floating Dolls. Almost instantly, the already horrifying patchwork creatures became even more twisted and nightmarish.
They lingered nearby, watching in the dark.
This "Mephiles" meanwhile, continued doing whatever kind of bizarre ritual he had started before, warping and changing the hollow spherical chamber. Wave couldn't even see most of the clean easy lines of Eggman tech anywhere anymore. It had all become merged with eldritch energies, sparkling crystal and twisted shadow. Wave's only consolation was that "Violet" looked about as uneasy with things as the Babylon Rogue was. The feline girl was pacing nervously and worrying her hands together.
There was a flash of light and her partner appeared.
"White" was a hedgehog, maybe an albino even, with like-colored gloves and shoes. He and Violet seemed to have known each other long before they partnered up with the Babylon Rogues. Wave had known them for a while but never really learned much about them. The two always kept to themselves. Violet had been good at keeping some of the other mercs they hired in line, especially Fiona and Nack, but they were still basically a mystery.
White appeared now with someone in his arms: a pink hedgehog girl wearing a red dress. Like Violet, he looked anxious and uncomfortable. His feline partner walked over to him, and checked on the girl in his arms. Mephiles also drifted over, clamping his hands together in approval.
"Yes," he rumbled. "This will serve."
Silver looked down at the unconscious girl. "Are you sure we had to…"
"Are you aware of the story of Tikal? The girl who saved her people from Perfect Chaos?" Mephiles' voice was powerful… and convincing. "An innocent soul is required to calm Iblis as well. Only then will it be safe for me to… destroy her…"
"Iblis is a her?" Blaze asked, eyes wide. "Sure didn't look like one to me."
Mephiles' expressionless face was the perfect mask.
"A pure and loving soul," he repeated. "The girl will not be harmed. She is merely there to sedate Iblis while I do what must be done."
"If you say so," Silver relented, handing the girl over. Mephiles held Amy Rose carefully, staring down at her face as she slept. The white hedgehog had managed to knock her out without hurting her. Without another word, the crystalline entity floated back towards the Eclipse Chamber.
"What are you guys talking about?" Wave finally found the courage to ask. She had been all but ignored for some time now, but told not to leave. "What are you doing here? Hey, you can't just stick someone in that chamber!"
"Mephiles knows what he's doing," Silver replied, though his voice betrayed a hint of doubt.
"You don't know what's at stake," Blaze echoed his concerns. "This is our one chance to save the future. To stop Iblis before it can break free."
"You mean the Ark?" Wave asked, incredulous. "Look, it's just another form of Chaos Emerald. A glorified battery! It isn't alive!"
Blaze shook her head. "That's where you're wrong! In our… where we came from, Iblis managed to escape this 'Ark of the Cosmos' of yours. Silver and I have been fighting it for years... but it was impossible to win. Iblis was too strong. It… it destroyed everything. There was almost no one left! We came here…"
"Back here," Silver clarified, not bothering to hide it any longer.
"We came back here, into the past, to stop Iblis before it can get free. To kill it in its cage!" Blaze's hands curled into fists. "To save our future!"
Wave sighed, falling back against the wall and sliding down to the floor.
"Gods, I'm surrounded by crazy people…"
"I have our third," another voice took that moment to cut in.
The three mobians, two from the future one from the present, turned to see Shadow emerge from out of the creeping darkness around them. The black hedgehog held a captive Rouge by the collar of her ripped cat suit. She appeared to be barely conscious. With a swift throw, he tossed her across the room to land near the edge of the chamber.
Mephiles turned from having just secured Amy in place near the Ark of the Cosmos, deep in the center of the hollow spherical reactor. The ancient entity floated away from her, but Amy remained frozen in midair. Crystalline shackles bound her to the Ark of the Cosmos and the pulsing lights of chaos energy that bubbles around it.
"Use her," Shadow demanded, and two red eyes fell on a nearby Tails Doll. "But first, I have some questions for her. You! Interrogate her, but do not let her die."
"Who is that?" Blaze asked. "What's going on?"
Next to her, Silver glanced over at Rouge with confusion and sympathy.
"Sonic and his cursed sidekick are on their way," Shadow hissed. "They will have the seventh Emerald."
Mephiles hovered in place, neither alarmed nor impressed.
"Silver. Blaze." The entity commanded, "Stop them and bring me that Emerald. As for the Trigger himself, bring him here alive if it is possible. He may know the location of the Burning Key. With that, destroying Iblis would be… such child's play."
"R-right, I guess," Silver replied, hesitating only a half second. Blaze followed him out moments later, heading down a corridor of carved crystal that led back into the Helios superstructure.
"Shadow. Remain here, guard this place," Mephiles then said, when the other two were gone. He pointed at a still shell shocked Wave. "You will also serve."
"Me?" Wave asked, pointing at herself. "Hey! Wait just a second! I think I've done enough to - "
"You have served in life. You will also serve… in death…"
Wave stood, but a second later, thick silver cords wrapped around her waist and arms, immobilizing her. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see one of the Tails Dolls, still lurking in the room's unnatural shadows. It drifted into the light, and Wave could see that the metallic tentacles had emerged from out of the abomination's shoulders. Its pale black button-eyes glinted in the erratic lighting.
Mephiles, for the first time Wave could remember, laughed.
From lower in the heart of the chamber, three large gems rose up. Slowly at first, they began to circle the Ark and Amy in the center of the sphere. Wave struggled to get free, but the Doll's tentacles held her tight as it drifted towards the chamber itself. Six glowing lights began to form in the corners of the hollow sphere, orbiting around the center.
"What are you doing?" Wave screamed as Mephiles hovered closer to her, crystalline growths emerging from between his fingers. "I did everything you wanted! Don't! Don't touch me!"
"Rejoice and be glad… for you have been chosen." The crystalline entity reached for her. "Your soul, with the others, will serve to bind Iblis to me. You will live on within Solaris!"
Wave screamed at Mephiles' touch.
Shadow watched it all, no trace of mercy in his crimson eyes.
"I don't like this," Silver stated the obvious.
"Like I do?" Blaze ran alongside her old friend. They'd gone through so much together, suffered so many losses, so many set-backs, so many defeats…
"I just… did you see that woman?" Silver asked. It was rhetorical, of course. Blaze had seen her, and seen what Shadow had done to her. They had stood by, knowing she was being thrown to those creepy Doll things. This wasn't how Mephiles had described saving the future by protecting the past.
It felt wrong.
"What do you want to do then?" Blaze snapped, just as troubled as he was but less willing to let it affect her. "You want to just go back there, say, 'never mind, we've changed our minds' and… then what?"
Silver grimaced and shook his head.
"That isn't it…"
"Mephiles is the only one who can get us home, what little of it is left," Blaze's voice was bitter and angry. "We vowed to do anything to stop Iblis!"
Silver furrowed his brows together.
"I know," he conceded. "But… do you really think that girl will be ok?"
"Which one?"
"The one I brought in…"
Blaze gritted her teeth in frustration.
"I want to think she will be, but," the feline fire user responded. "But I don't think so. But if it takes one life to save the future, then so be it! That's just how things are sometimes!"
Silver gave her a swift, sad stare. "Blaze…"
Before Blaze could say any more the ceiling above their heads collapsed; only Silver's hasty telekinesis kept them from being buried by falling rubble. Rebar and concrete fell, blocking the way ahead. Another massive explosion overhead shook the walls, causing flakes of broken and shattered concrete to rain down. Nodding to one another, Silver and Blaze jumped up, through the burning hole that had been cut into the level above them, and into one of the city's manufacturing bays.
They arrived in time to see a massive eighty ton Caterkiller badnik shear apart and explode. Ten meter long legs, more centipede than caterpillar-like, pinwheeeled through the air crushing the remains of other robots as they landed. A titanic fabrication machine exploded in concert, devastating and collapsing a nearby wall within the giant chamber. The smoking remains of dozens of badniks and combots, some of the former built and armored to function as walking or crawling tanks and mecha, lay strewn around the bay like broken and crushed toys. A blue and tawny orange blur whipped around one another before landing on top of the smashed behemoth badnik.
Silver and Blaze exchanged looks.
"This is them," the latter said, holding her arms out and igniting her hands, wreathing them in fire. "Hit them hard and fast! You take the Trigger! I'll take the other one!"
"Will do!" Silver shot upwards and reached out with his mind. There was enough rubble and broken machinery here to toss around all day. Seizing a beaten caterkiller's gigantic head section, Silver hurled the ten ton projectile at the two targets. The Trigger, he saw, actually jumped onto the spinning piece of metal before heading right for him.
Silver pushed his hands forward.
A storm of debris swirled up from below in two great waves before crashing together. The Trigger, however, managed to shoot off to the side and out of the way. Silver cursed. The blue hedgehog was fast. Really fast. That alone wouldn't pose a massive problem, but he also had some way of changing direction in midair.
Landing on a metal board that he kept suspended in the air, Silver pulled his arms back, parting the waves of debris to try and zero in on Sonic's location. He just barely caught the moment before a spinning blue ball crashed into the remains of a badnik to Silver's left side. The steel and aluminum construct tore apart as Sonic's bladed spines shredded it like wet tissue paper.
'I can't get hit by that!' Silver thought, reaching out to try and telekinetically grab his opponent. All it needed was a moment to mentally 'latch on' but Sonic instantly zipped off in another direction, and it was all Silver could do to keep pace with his eyes.
Pumping his fists, the pale time traveler threw more and more of the room's larger debris at the speeding, zipping, darting Iblis Trigger. When that failed, he ripped out some of the exposed power cables lying nearby. The blue bands in his gloves glowed hotly as he burned through his own reserves of Chaos Energy, holding nothing back.
This was the Iblis Trigger – the source of Iblis' resurrection!
"You'll pay for what you did to my future!" Silver snarled, telekinetically ripping up some of the smaller fragments and metal detritus around the manufacturing bay. "You do pretty well with big targets! So let's see you handle this!"
A thousand bullet-like shards shot through the air, punching holes in walls and ceilings and blasted machinery as Silver tried to pin down his elusive opponent. Sonic was fast, but he wasn't responding as well to the bullet-spam as he was the giant waves of debris. Silver could feel that he was getting a sense of how Sonic's unusual dodging mechanic worked.
He wasn't so much changing direction, as he was homing in on a target. When Sonic dodged like that, he always hit something and then bounced off. At first, Silver had suspected that the blue hedgehog was somehow jumping from point to point, but that wasn't it. Sonic had to keep physically hitting objects, either in midair or on the ground, and Silver suspected he was only able to "home in" on a new target when he hadn't totally destroyed the one he just hit. In other words: he had to "bounce off" before he could "home in."
"More!" Silver gritted his teeth, focusing all his energy into ripping up more small bits of debris. "I need more!"
Bits of steel.
An overturned bucket of ingots
Glass shards.
A severed robotic hand.
A sharp piece of rebar.
Multiplied a thousand fold. A veritable hailstorm. It would be impossible to avoid, and impossible to completely block. There would be nothing to bounce off of! The Trigger would be pinned down and cut to pieces!
Silver roared and the entire facility shook.
Cloaked in flame, Blaze shot towards her opponent before stopping and spinning, projecting a slicing wave of fire down onto his head. Tails side stepped the attack, flicking another one of his explosive rings into her face. The agile feline twisted and spun away from the resulting explosion, the protective flames around her shooting out to absorb the force and fire of the attack.
The kitsune spun his tails, moving parallel to her own course, a golden nexus of energy forming between his fingers. Blaze raced up the side of a wall and Tails followed, the two unleashing their attacks at the same time. An orange column of flame met a golden lance of light, and the two bent and twisted and entwined. Blaze barely had time to shield her eyes before the ring spear hit her burning aura. It didn't pierce, thankfully, but it did send her flying.
"Damn!" She swore, fire blasting out of her hands and feet to reorient herself before she could hit the ground. A scorched streak of fire shot up in her wake as she slowed, avoiding a painful crash into a pile of broken badniks.
Her opponent was gone.
A flash of movement caught Blaze's eye, and she unleashed a torrent of fire. The spinning two tailed ball disappeared within the fire, and Blaze poured on the juice even as it landed. Metal and plastic nearby melted and dribbled and vaporized. Blaze lowered her hand, searching the now raging fire for any sign of life.
A yellow blast of light rammed into her from behind, sending her rolling and skidding along the factory floor. Once again, her fire aura had protected her from being impaled by the blow, but the physical force of it was tremendous. Worse, the beam was dwelling on her and forcing her along the floor, like a broom pushing a ball of dust. Desperately grabbing hold of a piece of conveyer belt, Blaze flipped up and behind cover. Ducking and running, a series of explosions went off overhead as her opponent tried to flush her out.
'How did I miss before?' Blaze jumped and ignited her aura beneath her feet, the blast of flame propelling her like a rocket. 'I know I hit him! How did he get behind me?'
Blaze flew further back, keeping a safe distance between them. A handful of strange blocks formed in the air and fell to the ground. Blaze had no idea what they did, but her high speed evasive movement and extreme range kept her safe. Holding out her palms, she concentrated, and a dozen tiny pinpricks of orange light formed around her fingers.
"Come on," she whispered. "Close the distance a bit…!"
Sure enough, her opponent took to the air with his twin tails, and shot towards her like a bottle rocket. Blaze smirked, and stopped holding back the balls of fire. Two dozen of them suddenly grew in size and shot out in every direction. Blaze narrowed her eyes at the incoming kitsune, and the balls of fire swept in from every angle – impossible to avoid.
Tails disappeared in the inferno.
"Gotcha!" Blaze cheered, only to gape as a red orb sped through the fire. In less than a second, it hit her. Blacking out for a moment, Blaze saw someone in front of her, tumbling through the air side by side. Her hands pulsed with power, and twin trails of fire engulfed the other body. The two spun wildly in the air as Blaze tried to keep her feet together and maneuver.
Then she hit the ground and arched.
She barely saw him, still in front of her. Before she could hit the ground again, her opponent seized her by her hair and spun, tossing her into a wall. Blaze hit it with her shoulder but had the presence of mind to tuck in her legs and unload another blast of flame into the indistinct red orb that had been manhandling her.
"That won't work," a voice stated, and a gray gloved hand seized her by the left ankle before slamming her into the ground. Blaze quickly lifted a hand to try and fire again, but that same hand grabbed her by the wrist and twisted. The movement ran up her entire arm and Blaze hissed in pain at the stresses suddenly focused on her elbow.
The fire princess pushed past it, past the pain, past the possibility of her enemy breaking her arm at the joint. Blue fire sparked in her captured palm before blasting out like the mouth of a furnace. Her arm twisted again, forcing her face into the ground. A boot pinned her other arm to the side.
"Oh? That last one was hotter than before," the voice observed. "Looks like you can go up to almost one thousand six hundred degrees Kelvin. Impressive."
Something wrapped around her wrists then, pulling them together behind her back. Blaze snorted fire, blasting away dust and bits of debris from where she lay on the floor. The thing around her wrists, it felt like a steel trap, lifted her off the floor. Turning her head, she could see her opponent standing, his hands behind his back. She realized that the thing holding her wrists behind her back, and the thing that had lifted her into her knees, was one of his tails.
The other hovered in front of her, the white tip aimed at her heart.
"I wouldn't try taking off, unless you want to lose your hands," Tails suggested, humorless.
"Damnit! How?" Blaze struggled a bit, but stopped when she felt something cut slightly into her wrists. She could see what he meant: if she tried to take off again, it would tear her hands off at the wrists.
"It was simple enough to adjust a flame shield to counter your abilities," the fox explained, "Now. Where is she? Where is Rouge?"
"Rouge?" Blaze hissed, not knowing what he was talking about.
"She's a bat," he added. "Shadow has her. Now, I don't know why you're working with him and right now I don't care. Where is she?"
"I'm not beaten yet!" Blaze opened her mouth wide, sticking out a small pink tongue. A blue flame instantly formed above it, just in front of her mouth and under her nose. A blast of hot air shot away from the burning blue point, ruffling her hair and his. A bright white light formed within the blue, building up power.
Miles said nothing; he merely held up his right hand.
It was wrapped in golden fire of its own.
"Woah, there!"
A red blur suddenly interposed itself between them, pushing the two apart. Blaze fell back, her hands suddenly free. Igniting her feet, she shot back across the floor a couple meters only to unexpectedly bump into a wall.
A wall that shouldn't have been there.
Blaze blinked: she wasn't even in the manufacturing bay. The walls and architecture looked similar, but…
"Chaos Control?" she asked aloud, and swallowed the burning energy ball she had been forming. Fire still licking up her arms and between her hands, Blaze quickly found the room's door and headed for it. The kitsune must've teleported her here.
"Hey, wait up," the voice from before cut Blaze short. She turned, spun, and instinctively unleashed a tornado of fire at the source of the voice. The red blur from before ducked under the fire and ran up against one of the metal walls.
It was a… echidna?
"Calm down a second!" The girl, who couldn't have been much older than Blaze herself, held up her hands in a placating manner.
"Who are you?" Blaze demanded, powering up her hands. "Where did you take me?"
"A couple hundred feet above where you were fighting," the girl explained. "As for who I am, well, I'm someone you'll want to listen to."
Blaze didn't lower her guard.
"Let me start by showing you this," the echidna girl used e finger to pull down her shirt slightly. Blaze, mystified by the sudden exhibition, quickly saw what the girl meant: there was something in her chest, just above her breasts. The bright ruby red stood out, even against the girl's brick red coloring.
"You know what this is, right?" the girl asked. "It's a Sol Emerald."
Blaze just stood there, stunned.
"How do… how do you…?"
"You have one, too, don't you?" Lara asked. "I know one of you guys has to have it. It's what made it so hard to catch up with you. I ended up trailing the two freaks downstairs."
"I do have a…I mean..." Blaze unconsciously fingered the necklace she wore, where her own Sol Emerald was hidden. "I do have one, yes. I never met anyone else who used Sol Emeralds, besides Silver..."
"Ok," Lara checked to be sure. "You have it, right? Not him?"
"Y-yeah, but," Blaze finally composed herself. "But what's this all about? And who are you, really?"
"I'm Lara-Su," the echidna introduced herself with a broad smile. "And you don't know it, but you're a lot like me! Stay right here. I'm going to get hold of your boyfriend downstairs and we can start sorting this out!"
Lara winked out, Chaos Controlling without further warning.
Blaze huffed; Silver wasn't her boyfriend.
Tails narrowed his eyes at where his opponent should have been,
"Chaos Control?" he wondered, scanning the battle torn factory floor. There was no sign of the troublesome fire flinger or that red blur that had saved her. Under other circumstances, he would probably have conducted a more thorough search, but time was of the essence. Jumping up onto a perch to check on Sonic's fight, Tails saw the blue wonder zipping in loops around the room, up the walls, and even across the ceiling.
A literal firestorm of swirling matter was on his tail. The sheer mass of it was impressive: there had to be at least a hundred tons of random crap being thrown around, and at pretty impressive speeds, too. The source of it all was obviously the static white hedgehog standing on the floating platform. It was actually a good distance to attack Sonic from.
'Not bad. He's figured out Sonic's moves, and the inherent weakness of the homing attack.' Tails watched as Sonic blasted through a swarm of tiny solid missiles. 'He's also found a distance just out of reach of an unassisted jump. By keeping any large pieces of debris away from himself this guy is staying out of range of any of Sonic's normal moves. He can think tactically, but...'
"Sonic!" Tails yelled over the din. "Quite jerking yourself off already! We're on the clock!"
"Right! Right!" Sonic yelled back, obviously enjoying himself immensely.
Silver sneered at being taken lightly.
"You're delusional! I've already won! You can't beat what you can't reach!"
As if to prove his point, he fired another barrage of tiny missiles at the speeding blue hedgehog. Sonic dodged and weaved, running up the wall, puffs of smoke just behind him. A curling trail of broken robot parts nearly cut him off, but there was nothing within it large enough to bounce off of.
"I'll finish this right now!" Silver yelled, and rose up his hands, straining to increase the volume of matter swirling around the room. Four great columns of deadly debris rose up at his command. Blue smoke wafted out from Silver's gloves as he pushed his absolute limit. The columns rose and came together as Sonic reached the top of the wall and started running along the ceiling of the manufacturing bay.
Silver clapped his hands together, and the waves of debris came together like a four fingered fist. Silver's face lit up in triumph, only for Sonic to tear through the cloud of debris a moment later. Too late, the telekinetic realized how Sonic could reach him, despite the range handicap.
"From above?" Silver gasped, jumping off the platform he had been standing on.
Sonic was dropping down from above!
That was how he could get in range! Silver saw Sonic demolish the metal platform, change direction, and then head towards him, in full super spin. Holding out his hands, the pale time traveler focused on the incoming spin attack, trying to deflect or slow it down. Yelling in determination, redoubled his efforts. He could feel it starting to work, but Sonic was too fast, and there wasn't enough time, and he was falling and couldn't stop, and - !
Sonic slammed into the ground amid a cloud of dust and debris.
Silver hit the ground, still yelling.
A second later, he stopped yelling when he noticed nothing was happening. Sonic was gone. The entire room was gone. Lowering his hands and looking around, he saw Blaze watching him with amusement.
"Holy shit that was close!" Silver fell back against the floor, limp and relieved.
"Didn't go well?" Blaze asked, still sounding smug.
Silver raised an eyebrow at her as if to ask, 'and you did better?'
"That was a close one," another girl said, an echidna, walking up from behind Blaze. Silver immediately jumped up onto his feet and started summoning up his power.
"Easy," Blaze said, motioning for him to stop. "Lara here isn't an enemy. She has a Sol Emerald."
"Spoilsport," Lara complained. "I like the look of surprise I get by revealing that secret my way."
"Oh, he'd like that, I'm sure," Blaze noted dryly.
"What now?" Silver asked, completely lost.
"Never mind that!" Blaze quickly decided. She turned and backed off a few feet. "Now that we're both here, what did you want to tell us?"
"Ok," Lara said, pausing a second to collect her thoughts. "Hopefully, with you two gone, Sonic and Miles will head down to the Eclipse Chamber. I assume either of you know how to Chaos Control back in there?"
"Um, I do," Silver said, raising his hand.
"This isn't a school room," Blaze observed. "You don't have to raise your hand."
"Oh, right! Sorry."
"That gives us a little while," Lara continued. "Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but you're both from the future, right? And you went back in time to change the past?"
"Something like that," Silver admitted.
"Almost exactly like that," Blaze said.
"Believe me, I can totally sympathize with that, but you're here to stop some big menace called Iblis that got sealed up like thousands of years ago, right?"
Blaze and Silver both nodded.
"And you did this with the help of a creepy crystal guy named Mephiles, right?"
Again, they nodded.
"Yeah," Lara said, crossing her arms. "Big surprise here: he's the bad guy. You know: the type who uses the two naive heroes to do his dirty work? The type that betrays them at the last second while going 'Bwa-ha-ha-ha! Just As Planned' – that type of bad guy."
Silver held up a finger, indicating he wanted to talk.
"Um, but… Mephiles helped us before. A bunch of times! And…"
"And none of the plans actually helped beat Iblis," Blaze calmly noted. "He did save our lives a few times, but then he said we should give up and go back into the past. And some of the things he's had us do…"
Silver had the presence of mind to look ashamed.
"Dubious morality?" Lara asked. "Hell, I've done some pretty bad things myself for… different reasons, so I won't criticize on account of that. But the way I hear it, Mephiles wants to set Iblis free and merge with it, not destroy it."
"You heard that from who?" Blaze asked. "No one in this time should even know who or what Iblis is!"
"I had a little talk with the guy who sealed Iblis into that Ark thing," Lara admitted, much to the surprise of her two guests. "And yes, before you ask, he is old as dirt and not exactly a saint himself. He was also the jackass who basically created Iblis and her prison."
Silver frowned at that revelation.
"And where is this man?" he asked, obviously intending to make a less than friendly acquaintance.
"He's sitting back while everyone else does his dirty work," Lara replied with an unhappy sigh. "He's that kind of bad guy, too. But he sealed Iblis before and wants it done again."
"This… man… isn't the source of our Sol Emeralds, is he?" Blaze sounded like she was afraid of the answer.
"Thankfully, no."
The two girls sighed in relief.
"We have to go back," Silver spoke up. "We have to confront Mephiles. I'd like to hear him out, but... but if he's been tricking us… then we'll have to stop him!"
"We do," Lara agreed. "But we also have to be careful. That's why I got you two out of there and away from the super smash brothers downstairs. This has to stay between just us time travelers. No one else."
Rouge blinked her eyes and groaned painfully.
"Subject is cognizant," a monotone voice announced. "Drug feed complete."
Rouge groaned, forcing her eyes to focus on where she was.
The Tails Dolls floated, unassisted by rockets, jets, or any other apparatus. They were crude imitations of Miles; with malformed stubby, useless arms, a sagging body and limp legs. A red pin in their foreheads glowed with a demonic inner light. Sharp crystalline growths stuck out from under some of the crude folds and stitches of their bodies, warping what was left of their faces and bodies.
They were all around her.
She was suspended in the air and against the wall by two silver tendrils that snaked around her arms and then down her body and around her thighs. Thankfully her chest was unbound, or Rouge doubted she'd even be able to breathe. The source of the segmented robotic tendrils was slightly below her. One of the Dolls had its back to her, and out of small slits in what would have been its shoulder blades she could see where the tentacles seemed to be housed.
It turned slowly in her direction, dull black doll-eyes looking her over.
Rouge winced at the sight, and bit back a scream.
"Subject: Rouge the Bat," all five of them said in one voice, from all around her. "Identification 591-TYN-6501. Verifying pain threshold."
Rouge struggled against the cords holding her in the air.
"W-what?"
And then, all of creation became a scream.
She writhed in the grip of the metal tentacles, unable to even hold her hands up to her ears to try and blot out the horrific sound. Her nails drew blood as her fists clenched tight. But the scream only got louder – blanketing out all existence in the pain it caused. Rouge's mouth opened in a tortured gasp, but no sound came out. She started to see spots behind her eyelids, and then what felt like a hammer began to pound her skull into sheet metal. Nothing seemed to exist, except the pain, and the scream…
'Stop,' Rouge's battered mind cried. 'stop… please...'
Just then, one of the Tails Dolls pulled Rouge down so her back was no longer against the wall. The screaming ended as abruptly as it began. The Doll shifted its grip to hold her in midair, its limp hovering doll body belying the strength of the tendrils coming out of its back.
"Pain threshold calculated. Beginning audio recording of interrogation."
Its dull black eyes flashed green for an instant, and Rouge felt a tingle run down her body.
"Medical Examination completed. Subject is 'Rouge the Bat,' Regional Underboss. Identification code 591-TYN-6501. Species: Hybrid Trachops Desmodus. Age is nineteen years, seven months, eight days. Weight is 26.4 kilograms."
Rouge smirked. "Twenty four kilos, thank you very much."
"Attempt at misinformation detected," The Doll said, tonelessly. "Initiating Punishment."
Rouge immediately felt pure pain shoot through her entire body. It felt like hundreds of red-hot needles being drawn over her body. Squeezing her eyes shut, and setting her jaw, she held back the instinct to scream. Again and again, pain washed over her, and then…
It was over.
"Punishment was administered for exactly 2.0 seconds," The Doll said, as if nothing unusual had occurred. "Continuing Examination. Subject appears healthy and in excellent physical condition. Medical examination complete. Records filed for later use."
Trying to ignore the lingering pain, Rouge looked around to try and get her bearings. It seemed impossible, but it almost looked like she was back in the Eclipse Chamber. Except that the walls were different, and there was this strange alien looking crystal everywhere. Narrowing her eyes, Rouge tried to get a good look at the inner Eclipse Chamber.
Yes: there it was. It was the Chamber! Someone had reactivated it, but it was obviously still operating improperly. Little popping sparks of chaos energy were floating around but refusing to properly coalesce. Instead, there was some king of device in the center of the chamber, and what looked like… Amy Rose? What was going on?
There were also moving lights orbiting her at different distances.
What looked like six of the lights formed some kind of outer shell or ring, and three on the inside. There were two other figures, too. One looked to be pinned up next to one of the inner lights, and the other seemed to be shooting some kind of energy into him or her. It was causing some kind of beam to shoot out into the center of the Eclipse Chamber, where the device and Amy were.
"Beginning Questioning. Question One," the Doll's voice abruptly changed to a recording; Shadow's voice smoke out of it, "Why did you do it?"
Rouge shook her head.
"Subject is not cooperating. Repeating Question," the Doll's monotone turned back to a recording of Shadow's voice. "Why did you do it?"
Rogue still didn't respond, too confused and disturbed by the unexpected dissonance and the unanswerable nature of the question.
"Initiating Punishment."
For a second time, a tidal wave of pain swept her away. This time, this time Rouge did scream. It seemed to last forever, this time: one endless stream of mind numbing agony. And then, just as soon as it had come, it was gone. The Doll still looked up at her, expressionless.
"Punishment was administered for exactly 3.0 seconds. Repeating Question: Why did you do it?"
"I… I don't know what…"
"Answer is insufficient. Initiating Punishment."
Rouge writhed; her whole body felt like it was going to melt away. No screams escaped her parted lips, only a low gurgle as her throat muscles spasmed wildly. Nothing in her life had ever come close to the all-encompassing anguish that defined her existence at that moment. Worse still, as the pain reached a fever pitch, she found that she couldn't black out, no matter how much she wished she could. It seemed like an eternity before; finally, mercifully, it was all over.
"Punishment was administered for exactly 4.0 seconds. Repeating Question: Why did you do it?"
Rouge's mouth took a few seconds before any real words formed, as small tremors of pain shot through her. "I… I don't know…"
"Answer is insufficient. Initiating…"
"Wait!" She yelped, tears in her eyes. "Shadow, wait, I…! I had to! You'd have killed me! You were going to kill us all!"
The Doll looked at her for a long, terrible second.
"Answer is… sufficient. Processing. New threshold established at 4.0 seconds. Second Question," The Doll continued, without even giving her time to recover. "Do you know that you are going to die here?"
"Oh… no… please…" Rouge begged. "What - what do you want me to say?"
The Doll simply stared at her.
"Subject is not cooperating. Repeating Question." It switched back over to Shadow's voice. "Do you know that you are going to die here?"
"Please… just…"
"Initiating Punish..."
"Yes! Yes I know!"
The Doll paused. It seemed to be looking up, and the red pin on its forehead was glowing. Then it looked straight at her again.
"Answer is sufficient. Processing. Third Question: What is the nature of your relationship with Miles Prower? Why were you working for him? Tell me!"
"W - what? I don't understand!"
"You will answer to the satisfaction of this unit. Failure will result in escalating levels of Punishment." The Doll floated closer. "Repeating Question: What is the nature of your relationship with Miles Prower? Why were you working for him? Tell me!"
"I – he," Rouge stalled, trying to get one of her arms a bit loose. She decided to just tell a mix of truth and lies, anything to buy time. "We worked together before, back at Station Square. We became friends back then, and recently, he contacted me to see if I was interested in helping him out. You know?"
The Doll stared at her with lifeless eyes.
"He wanted my help with some stuff out west, near Casino Night. You know where that is? During the trip, we became close, and he confided in me that he had a plan to end the war. He also promised to make it worth my while. My situation wasn't exactly rosy at the time. GUN was starting to get more xenophobic than usual, and I didn't have a lot of contacts and the Kingdom of Acorn was already pretty suspicious of what I was doing…"
"Detecting obfuscation techniques." The Doll stated, seeing through her attempts to buy time. "Initiating Punishment."
The pain came as fresh and sharp as always, burning like a white light through every pore in her body. It seared through flesh down to bone and then bounced back, worse, on the way out. Over and over and over and over and over.
"Punishment was administered for exactly 4.5 seconds. Request: narrow down answer."
'That was only half a second longer than before?' Rouge wondered, and despaired.
"He's my boss," she answered, telling it what it wanted to know. Or what Shadow wanted to know by proxy. "He told me what to do!"
The doll stared at her intently.
"We're also… together… kind of," she added, hoping it would be enough.
"Answer is sufficient. Processing. New threshold established at 4.5 seconds. Fourth Question," The Doll continued. Rouge suddenly realized, with absolute certainty that this thing wouldn't hesitate to torture her into madness and not even know it.
It switched to Shadow's voice again.
His questions.
"I liked you, Rouge, I really did," the recording rambled. "I told you about Maria. I trusted you. I trusted you and you betrayed me. No, not just me! You betrayed Maria's dream! I can't forgive you! I can't! I can't!"
Shadow's voice cracked as he continued, through proxy, "I thought you understood… I thought you understood me - I mean Maria! Maria trusted you and believed in you and you stabbed her in the back! You stabbed her and betrayed her and hurt her ruined her and ruined everything! You're going to die here! You're going to suffer and die just like Maria did! Maybe then you'll understand, but she still won't forgive you! I won't forgive you! I won't! Maria's forgiveness is too good for you!"
Listening to Shadow rant through the Doll's recording, Rouge felt cold fear meet grim reality. He was insane.
He was completely fucking insane.
"It was a mistake to trust you, I can see that now. I can see it. I do." The recording became slightly more lucid but no less insane. "Maria may pray for you in heaven, but I'll make sure you go to Hell where you belong! You and everyone else! I just want to make sure you know that before you die. Now, tell me, tell me, Rouge! Tell me why: why do you deserve to live! Tell me that!"
The Tails Doll finally finished the recording.
"Am… am I seriously supposed to answer that?" Rouge asked, having just slightly gotten her arm loose; Shadow's lunatic rant had bought her just the time she needed.
The Doll's red pin glowed again, as it shared the information with the other Dolls. They spoke in a robot language a billion times faster than any living creature, sharing information, plans of action, thoughts, responses, schemes… and then deciding on the best one, proceeded to execute those plans. Working her arm down her side, reaching for one hidden pocket in her catsuit, Rouge wondered if she had ever known the fear she felt at that moment. The sheer panic.
There was nothing these things simply would not do to her.
No act they balked at.
"Subject will answer the question as proposed," the Doll demanded. "Failure will result in Punishment."
"Why do I deserve to live, huh?" Rouge asked, slipping the tip of her index finger into the hidden slip. "I'm not sure I know. I've always looked out for myself, so I can't say I deserve to live because of altruism. I don't know if the good I've done outweighs the bad. Maybe I don't deserve to live. Maybe none of us do, Shadow."
The Doll was still watching, recording.
'Just a little closer…!'
"The way I see it, living is better than dying… And I'm pretty greedy, so, really…" Rouge finally felt it between her fingers. "That's all the justification I need!"
Slipping the concealed ring around her finger, she balled her hand into a fist and activated it. A surge of energy flowed up and into her body. A pale glow rippled across her skin. Pushing against the coiled tendrils around her body, Rouge managed to slip her wings out.
The Doll looked at her almost curiously. "Punishment…"
The second Rouge felt the metal tentacles slip and readjust to hold down her flapping wings, she pounced. Whatever mechanism the Doll used to subdue and torture her was no longer effective. Not with the ring active. Not with it providing her near invulnerability!
With every iota of strength in her body, with every fiber of her being, Rouge pulled her hand down, metal climbing claws at full extension, raking the Doll across its face. Instead of fluff coming out of the wounds, however, bits of fur and wires trailed from the wound. Rouge didn't let it deter her, however, and she dug her fingers deep into the Doll's unarmored body, tearing and crushing.
It let out an unearthly scream and started to squirm wildly, the red pin flashing erratically. Finally, Rouge pulled back her hand, taking large chunks of the Doll out with it. Bits of wire, bits of fur, and bits of yellow goo… it trailed down her hand to the wrist, and leaked out onto the floor. The Doll's grip loosened even more, and Rouge finally broke free of the tendrils entirely. With a pitiful half squeal half moan the Tails Doll slumped to the ground.
Then, as she knew it would, the other Dolls unleashed their Sonic Screams.
It hit her like a wall of force but washed over her invulnerable aura. It wouldn't last long. One active, the ring couldn't be turned off. It rapidly consumed Chaos Energy, converting it into a sparkling shield, but Rouge had almost no intrinsic ability to generate Chaos or Ring Energy of her own and Miles had explained that it would only protect her for a few seconds. Standing up, she wished she could have seen a surprised, fearful, or even enraged look on the Dolls. Even now, they were expressionless - lacquer black eyes unblinking and soulless, with no spark of emotion or intelligence.
Whether they stopped screaming or not, the remaining Dolls turned on her, lashing out with their tendrils. Rouge leapt, her battle senses still honed and ready. Thankfully, the metal tentacles weren't very fast, and she ducked and twisted past them before they could wrap around her. A Doll in front of her tried to float away, but Rouge was too quick. Jumping, she spun her foot in a wide arc, cutting the thing in half with her iron edged boot. Before it even hit the ground, she had moved onto the next one, which tried desperately to guard itself with its tendrils.
Rouge somersaulted over its defense, landed behind it, and plunged her clawed hand into its exposed back. There was no armor to it, no real hard plates. No bones or endoskeleton. It writhed like a stuck squid, and Rouge tore it in half just below the shoulder. She turned, just as a tendril wrapped around her leg.
It pulled sharply and she fell, hitting the back of her head on the ground.
She'd barely noticed it, but her invincibility was gone. The two remaining Dolls hit her with another sonic attack. The Scream was deafening, just as before, paralyzing her and tearing her ears apart. But she already knew what to do. Reaching up to her ears, Rouge plugged them with her fingers – initially it did next to nothing to dampen the Scream, but that wasn't what she was doing. With a yowl of pain, nothing compared to what the Dolls had already inflicted on her, Rouge punctured her own eardrums, deafening herself.
Suddenly, there was only soft white noise.
The Dolls drifted back, trying to get away. Rouge snarled savagely, grabbing the half-body of the Doll she had just killed. Flipping it around with all her strength, she tossed it at the others, tangling several attacking tendrils. Using the confusion to her advantage, she kicked free of the loosened grip around her ankle and scrambled along the ground, before jumping and landing on the two remaining Dolls.
Plunging her hands onto the first one she could reach, she tore away at it. Its sole remaining comrade flailed at her with its paralyzing tentacles, forcing Rouge to roll off to the side and jump away. In its pale black eyes, Rouge saw reflected all the suffering she had endured…and all the suffering countless others had endured at the hands of these abominations and the sick madman who invented them. By the time she was done with it, the Tails Doll was an indescribable and unrecognizable pile of fur and yellow dyed connective fluid.
Rouge got to her feet, slowly.
The carnage of the room was mute testament to her accomplishment.
And what she had done… to herself.
Still unable to hear, Rouge never knew he was behind her before it was too late. 'Not again!' she cursed, as he swept her feet out from under her. An unbreakable grip seized her by the throat and slammed her first to the floor, then to the wall, and then back onto the floor. Rolling with the blow and trying to get back on her feet to manage some sort of defense, Rouge shuddered, and saw something sticking out of her chest.
Crystal.
Looking over her shoulder she saw another black hedgehog, one she didn't recognize. Shadow was in front of her, watching, arms crossed. Who was this other monster? Rouge felt herself lift off her feet, but couldn't hear a thing. The other black hedgehog, the crystalline demon, pulled her through the air and towards what she could now see was a… no, not a Chaos Emerald.
A Super Emerald?
"What?" Rouge managed to gasp out. "No…!" She closed her eyes, physically and emotionally beaten. "Someone…"
A blur of movement caught her eye, but she could barely see it.
"Someone…" it hurt to even whisper. "…help…"
The two saw Shadow first; then what lay beyond him.
"Holy!" Sonic hissed, running past the black hedgehog towards where Rouge and Amy and another girl (Sonic barely recognized her – wasn't she one of the Babylon Rogues?) hung suspended in the air. Left behind, Tails stopped, facing the still glaring Shadow. The latter made no move to stop anyone from approaching the inner chamber.
"Wait!" he yelled, sensing something was amiss. "Sonic!"
Sonic the Hedgehog didn't hesitate.
It wasn't in his nature; it wasn't in his blood; it didn't even occur to him half the time. When presented with a cliff or a broken bridge when running down a road, his first impulse was never to find an alternative route. His second impulse was never to even look and see how deep the gorge was, or how wide the ravine, or how treacherous the potential fall. Sonic the Hedgehog did not hesitate. He would jump a dozen pitfalls before even thinking about stopping.
So he jumped.
And Mephiles was waiting for him.
A dark spine of warped crystal, black and blue and amber, shot out from behind the encroaching darkness. Sonic saw it, at the last second, and tried to turn or dodge. The lance entered his chest, punched clean through, and went back out the other side. It happened all in the span of half a second. Then, like molasses, he drifted within the swirling chaotic vortexes of the blighted Eclipse Chamber towards the sole unpaired Super Emerald.
"How wonderful!" Mephiles himself drifted upwards, the crystals sticking out of his husk of a body vibrating in time with his laughter. "The so called Iblis Trigger arrives at last. I knew you would come, and here you are. It can now begin."
The arcane being directed a pulse of energy onto Sonic's body, and a reciprocal beam bounced back out of the Super Emerald nearby. It met two others, one from near Rouge and one from near Wave. Together, they intersected the center of the chamber, bathing it in purple tinted light. Amy Rose hung there, and above her, the Ark of the Cosmos.
And with a tremendous roar, the Dimensional Prison cracked.
"Yes!" Mephiles crooned. "Iblis! My precious Iblis!"
Four glowing red eyes materialized in the air.
"Damnit!" Miles stepped forward, but Shadow cut him off.
"Don't interfere!" the black hedgehog snarled. "Worry about yourself!"
"Is this what you want, Shadow?" the two tailed fox yelled, pointing behind him to the growing nightmare engulfing the Eclipse Chamber.
"Is this what you want Gerald's legacy to be?" he asked. "Look at that thing! Look at it!"
Shadow started to laugh. "You… you have no idea what I want! I am Gerald Robotnik's legacy! Do you see her, back there, do you? Your co-conspirator?"
Miles snarled, bearing his teeth.
"She suffered... She suffered because of you!" Shadow's eyes grew wild and unhinged; black licks of ethereal energy rose up around him, completely out of control. "Now it's your turn to pay for what you did to Maria's dreams! I've sworn it to her!"
"Alright, that's fine by me!" Tails wrapped his namesakes around his torso and clutched his hands to his shoulders. "This close to the end, neither of us has a reason to hold back anymore!"
The kitsune gave a pained wince and lifted his hands.
Four of his fingers came back bloody.
"CHAOS SIPHON!" Tails drew back one leg, widening his stance as a great wind blew away from his frame. Golden lines ran down his arms and legs and melded into the red metal bracing his gloves. With a rush of light and air, red plated metal assembled around the back of his shoulders, centered around two cylindrical protrusions.
"Ring Generators!" The underlying latticework circuitry built into his gloves burned red hot. "Maximum throughput!"
Shadow's own body began to glow white.
"Let's see it! I know you brought it!" he yelled. "I can feel it!"
"You fool!" Tails' grin pulled back his lips, showing a mouthful of sharp teeth. "Where the Hell do you think I'd keep the last Chaos Emerald?" He slammed a fist into his chest. "You want it? Come and Get It."