As Silver's feet landed on the rooftop, he took in the design of the crashed helicopter in detail for the first time. A standard consisting of a large capital G surrounded by a circular formation of white stars and twin olive branches was emblazoned cross the crumpled fuselage; he immediately recognized it as the standard of the Guardian Units of Nations even though the organization no longer existed in his own time. The acrid stink of something else that no longer existed in his time hit his nostrils as he approached the downed aircraft, and he recognized that too.
"We need to get them out of there before the fuel tanks go up."
"Don't worry," Blaze told him. "I don't just create flames…"
With an effortless gesture from the cat, the burgeoning fire dissipated into a few wispy streaks of smoke.
"...I control them."
A little theatrical, perhaps, but the threat had been made safe and that was what mattered. Even after all this time, Silver was still a little in awe of how easily Blaze commanded her powers. Had the situation not been so dire, he probably would have been as giddy as Cream. Instead, he simply gave an approving nod.
"Nice."
"The pilots?"
Silver peered through the translucent dome of the cockpit. Both members of the flight team were adult humans, one male and one female, both wearing identical grey fatigues. The man turned his head to look at the hedgehog while the woman was simply slumped forward over the controls, her chest rising and falling in shallow breaths.
"They're alive, but one of them's unconscious." He palmed the glass, giving the conscious human what he hoped was a reassuring smile and raising his voice just in case the other one could hear him. "Don't worry, we're gonna get you guys out of there!"
Climbing off the crushed nose of the chopper, he concentrated, forming the shape of it in his mind and imagining the position of the pilots relative to the cage of machinery that surrounded them. Turquoise light emanated from his palms, enveloping the aircraft; there a rumbling creak of tearing metal, followed by a series of metallic plinks as the welded plates and bolted struts of the cockpit popped and ripped free of their housing.
Silver lowered his hands, and as the light faded the already-wrecked canopy dropped onto the rooftop with a tremendous crash. The upper half of the pilot's face was covered by a visored helmet, but his mouth hung slightly open in astonishment for a few seconds. Although she didn't show it, Blaze was almost as impressed by the display as Silver had been with her own demonstration.
"Oh man, it's good to see you two," the pilot groaned, his tone equal parts pain and relief.
"It's good to see you too," Silver replied, and meant it. "Can you move?"
The pilot shook his head, the movement sending a rivulet of sweat trickling down his cheek. "I think my leg might be broken. My back feels kinda weird too. Is Baker alright?"
"Your co-pilot? She's breathing, just unconscious."
"Should we move her?"
"We can't very well just leave her there. Can you use your powers to lift her out?"
Silver nodded slowly. "I'll try."
"Alright, just be careful. Watch her head."
"I know, I know."
Blaze looped the male pilot's arm around her shoulders as Silver cupped his hands in the air, molding a protective bubble around Baker's limp body and gently hoisting her out of the chopper.
"Easy, easy-"
"I know, I've got it."
The male pilot wore a tab on the breast pocket of his fatigues that identified him as POTTO, as well as a rank slide that meant nothing to Silver. Apparently the same couldn't be said of Blaze, for she murmured, "It's alright, Lieutenant, I've got you."
The man winced, sucking air through his teeth, but his own pain was forgotten as quickly as it had made itself known as Silver gently lowered his co-pilot onto the rooftop next to him. He unfastened the chin strap of his helmet and pulled it off, revealing that his dark hair had been shaved almost down to the scalp in a military-style buzz cut.
"You guys got a medic? Where's the rest of your squad?"
Silver and Blaze shared a glance, mirroring one another's confusion.
"...What do you mean?"
Lieutenant Potto frowned. "The rescue team? You guys heard our mayday call, right?"
Silver's heart sank as realization dawned.
"We thought you were supposed to be the ones doing the rescuing."
Potto grimaced, giving an apologetic shake of his head. "We were just on our way back from a routine training exercise when we saw Angel Island drop out of the sky. We put out a call when we saw what was going on down here but there's been no response from HQ."
Blaze furrowed her brow as she considered the implications of this. "Your communications equipment is offline?"
"Maybe something's blocking the signal?" Silver ventured, after a grim nod of confirmation from the pilot.
"Maybe," the pilot replied. "I don't know. We figured it might just be atmospheric interference, but now I'm not so sure."
"Seems like whoever shot you guys down doesn't want anyone interfering in...whatever it is they're trying to do here," Silver ventured, indicating their surroundings with a vague, sweeping gesture.
"We didn't even get a missile lock warning," the human muttered, casting a glance at the ugly mechanical wound where the chopper's missing tail rotor should have been. "Did you get a look at whoever clipped us?"
"No. We saw the shot, just not where it came from."
"At least you made it onto the rooftop," Silver chimed in, always wanting to see the glass as half-full. "That was lucky."
Potto shook his head. "Nah, luck had nothing to do with it. I thought we were gonna end up in the drink for sure, but Baker managed to steer us down here even though the stick was fighting her every inch of the way." There was a note of unmistakable fondness in the human's voice as he spoke, and his gaze settled on his unconscious co-pilot with a mixture of gratitude and concern.
"So the military has no idea what's happening here," Blaze intoned. It was more of a statement than a question, a spoken confirmation of what they'd all been expecting, but fervently hoping they were wrong about.
"We didn't get kind of SitRep about what's going on here. Hell, there's been no radio traffic at all. I don't even know if our mayday call went through."
"Which means there's nobody else coming to help."
"If the same thing is happening in Central City or Westopolis then G.U.N. probably already has its hands full," the pilot reasoned, echoing what Vector had said earlier. "For all we know, it might not even be just the United Federation that's affected."
For some reason, Silver found his thoughts drawn to the city-state of Soleanna. Between the surrounding oceans and the canals veining through its opulent landscape, the self-styled City of Water's title seemed a cruel irony now; it was likely faring just as poorly as coastal Station Square, and despite maintaining diplomatic relations with the United Federation it was a sovereign nation, and thus didn't benefit from G.U.N.'s protection.
Abruptly, the hedgehog found himself wondering not just why, but also how he knew all of this. The thoughts seemed to have entered his mind without consulting his memories first, and the source of the knowledge sat uncomfortably in his consciousness like a gaping hole left by a freshly-extracted tooth.
Some distance away, Vector paced about the rooftop as Cream hugged Cheese to her chest like a teddy bear, as much to comfort the little creature as to make herself feel better. She wanted to go home, and judging by Vector's expression he felt the same way.
The crocodile caught her eye as she studied his features, and rearranged his expression into a somewhat lopsided smile. "You okay, kid? How you holding up?"
"I miss my mom," Cream admitted, not seeing any point in lying. Vector was a detective, after all. He'd probably be able to tell if she was lying, and saying that she was okay wouldn't have been the exact truth.
"She's probably worried sick about you," Vector remarked, dismayed to find that it didn't seem as comforting when spoken aloud as it had it in his head.
Cream nodded sadly. "I know. I hope our friends are okay, too."
"Blaze and Silver can handle themselves," Vector told her, hoping that the statement sounded reassuring rather than dismissive of her worries. He was so used to Charmy picking holes in everything he said, making fun of every verbal misstep and slip of the tongue that Cream's politeness was almost jarring. "They'll be fine."
"Not just Blaze and Mr. Silver," Cream said, a flicker of embarrassment crossing her features as she clarified, "I mean- I'm glad they're here, really I am. I just wish Mr. Sonic and Miss Amy were here too."
Vector had to concede that both he and Cream knew a lot of the same people, although he didn't know if he'd stretch to calling Amy Rose a friend. He got on well enough with Sonic, but Rose was kind of a pushy broad, never afraid to make her opinions known and quick to elect herself leader of any given group. She was also kind of scary when she was angry- not that he'd never tell her that to her face. He found Blaze's pious attitude somewhat abrasive, but at least she'd not yet threatened to flatten him with a giant mallet.
"Hey, you know what Sonic's like. Wherever he is, he's gotta be helping folks that need help the most. Amy's probably doing the same. We can take care of ourselves the way a lotta people can't."
Cream gave a thoughtful nod, a small smile forming as she extrapolated the thinly-veiled compliment from Vector's words. "I suppose you're right."
Vector matched her smile, but a scant second later he saw the rabbit's features light up with surprise as she stared at something behind him.
"Mr. Vector, look!"
Vector didn't know quite what to expect, but what Cream was pointing at didn't number in even the top fifty list of things his mind could have conjured up if he'd tried to guess.
The ship was charting a course through the flooded streets, carried by the tides that lapped at the brickwork a few feet below the rooftops. The roads alone were large enough to accommodate trucks, but with even the sidewalks submerged the vessel had no problem navigating between the blocky stumps of architecture protruding from the waves, cutting near-silently through the water and easily ploughing through the bobbing debris that had been swept up in its path.
The ship itself was a curiosity against the already bizarre landscape of the flooded city, but as its outline drew nearer its presence became stranger still. Though it was clearly modeled on the old-fashioned sailing ships of antiquity, as near as Vector could tell its construction consisted almost entirely of metal. The bowsprit ended in a sharp point that contrasted with the shiny smoothness of the hull, the shrouds and rigging fashioned from lengths of thick, black cable stretched taut between the masts. Even the sails were constructed of some kind of thin, flexible alloy rather than cloth or canvas; a honeycomb pattern of lights shifted and undulated across the surface, which, upon closer inspection, appeared to incorporate a sheen of aluminosilicate panelling.
The overall design of the ship was both sleek and brutalist, graceful and utilitarian, an anachronistic blend of antiquity and futurism bearing a single vanity- a black flag emblazoned with a stylized skull and crossbones- and even that relic of times past hadn't escaped the melding untouched. As it drew it closer, Vector noticed that the skull's jawline was squared, its mouth a thin line bearing only two blocky teeth instead of the grinning rictus one would expect from a skull, and rather than the archetypal crossbones resembling a pair of overlaid femurs, the cross was in fact composed of two open-ended wrenches, with the U shape of the grip standing in for the rounded bulbs of the evenly-sized bones commonly found in a pirate flag.
At a glance, one could be forgiven for jumping to the conclusion that the vessel was one of Dr. Eggman's creations. The marriage of advanced technology and childish imagery was typical of the Doctor; even his lowliest foot soldiers were mechanical marvels, generally patterned after stylized versions of the hapless animals contained within them, and he'd once commanded a fleet of airships that had been designed to resemble fish, apparently for no reason other than to satisfy his apparent obsession with parodying the organic life he held in such contempt. Pirates were generally the subject of juvenile fantasy in the same way that cowboys, knights, and other historical archetypes that had long since been romanticized by pop culture were, and the modified Jolly Roger seemed like the sort of thing that Eggman would find terribly amusing to attach to a warship that had itself been modeled on an outdated design.
However, Vector's keen eye alerted his detective's instincts to several key clues to the contrary, casting doubt upon the idea as soon as it had entered his mind. The design of the Jolly Roger was telling, for although it did seem like the sort of affectation one would expect from Eggman, Vector knew that the man was an egotist above all else. He branded all of his property with the emblem of his self-styled Empire, from supply crates to trains to the very war machines he used to expand the reaches of his territory; were he to fly any sort of standard, Vector couldn't see him passing up on the opportunity to substitute the skull for a stylized logo of his own grinning, mustachioed face.
The other thing about the ship's design that struck him as distinctly un-Eggman-like was the gunmetal hue of the hull. Though its surfaces were spotless and shiny, Vector knew that Eggman's childish sensibilities would have demanded a bright palette of fiery reds and oranges, or at the very least some kind of highlight. Black and grey were acceptable in moderation, but his Badniks' ranks were uniformly decked with bright colors, from the lowliest, mass-produced cannon fodder of Crabmeats, Egg Pawns and Moto Bugs to the crown jewels of his armies; Sonic's robot doppelgänger in its varied and numerous forms, the towering battlesuit he'd narcissistically modeled on himself, even that creepy robot that Shadow was always hanging around with. His fleets, bases and vehicles followed the same standard. The seat of his Empire was a giant amusement park, a nauseating love letter to his unchecked ego written in towering monuments of red, orange, purple and chrome.
The ship's design didn't so much scream efficiency as coldly exude it, bearing purposefully through the waters in a way that put Vector in mind of a shark. The skull and crossbones, long associated with the danger of death even since the decline of what most people imagine when the word pirate is mentioned (along with illegally downloading stuff on the internet, he guessed) only served to reinforce that.
Cream apparently had no such reservations. Her face was a picture of giddy astonishment, regarding the approaching vessel as though it was a thing of serendipity rather than heralding danger.
"It's a pirate ship!" she squealed, perhaps thinking that Vector hadn't drawn that conclusion for himself. "A real pirate ship! Wow!"
Seeing the childish delight on her face made Vector almost feel guilty about his own trepidation until he caught Cheese's eye. The Chao didn't appear to share Cream's enthusiasm. In fact, he looked more than a little nervous.
"I got a bad feeling about this," the crocodile rumbled, to which Cheese made a murmuring noise that presumably indicated agreement.
Cream was still beaming as she tore her eyes away from the pirate ship to face Vector.
"Oh, I'm sure it's alright, Mr. Vector! They're probably here to help!"
Vector grimaced. The naivety of the poor kid's assumption wasn't really her fault. It had doubtless been colored by exposure to cartoons and storybooks where pirates were portrayed as dashing and lovable rogues who hunted for buried treasure, sang shanties about bottles of rum and carried around parrots on their shoulders.
"Cream, I really don't think-"
He cut himself off as a thought that had been sitting uncomfortably in the back of its mind bobbed suddenly to the surface like an ice cube dropped to the bottom of a glass of water, bringing with it a hideous chill that crawled down his spine until it had settled at the tip of his tail. He recalled the moments before the chopper had been shot down, how he and Cream had been signaling the aircraft before the projectiles had smashed into its tail rotor and sent it plummeting to the rooftops below.
The missiles had been round, black, shiny orbs. It seemed ludicrously obvious in retrospect, but there was only one kind of weapon that he could think of that dispensed projectiles of that type. He hadn't even considered it at the time because it was such an anachronism, but now-
"Over here! We're over here!"
Vector's jaw dropped open in horror as Cream scampered to the edge of the building, fanning her arms as she had earlier upon seeing him do the same.
"Cream!" he thundered. "Cut that out!"
The little rabbit jumped, and shock was quickly replaced by hurt and confusion as she gazed up at him, her bottom lip trembling. Even Cheese looked dismayed by the unnecessary harshness of his tone, and for a moment he felt awful. He was so used to scolding Charmy for his bratty antics that he hadn't even considered how Cream, spoiled sweet little princess that she was, would react to being yelled at. He doubted her mom had ever raised her voice at her for the duration of her life thus far, or that she ever would.
Before he could even begin to formulate an apology, the ship drew up to the edge of the rooftop.
"Get away from the edge!" Vector cried, his tone no longer that of an angry parent but still urgent and commanding. "Get back!"
Cream didn't protest. She was at Vector's side in an instant with Cheese flanking her, her tiny companion apparently trusting the enormous crocodile to make up the other half of a defensive perimeter around her.
There was a clank of metal on stone as a walkway extended from the deck of the ship, bridging the gap to the roof and allowing the crew to disembark. Vector had been expecting robots, but this day continued to defy whatever cynicism he could muster; just when he thought he'd seen all it had to offer, it sprung some new strangeness on him.
The robots were all humanoid, though of varying shapes and sizes, but united by theming that was as subtle as a punch in the face. Many wore angular, tricorn-style hats of molded metal, though at least one had a bandana fastened around his head, from which cables trailed like dreadlocks. A number also sported earrings, despite having no ears to speak of, the hoops simply dangling from bolts or rivets set in the sides of their heads.
Their faces were uniformly skull-like, with glowing LED eyes, beards of stamped sheet metal that had plainly been bolted or welded in place, and a number of them also sported eye patches. Though practically all of their number carried swords, there were as many hook hands present as peg legs, though upon closer inspection these appeared to have been cast from brass or chrome instead of wood. At least one had an arm that ended in a wide-mouthed cannon like a blunderbuss in place of a hook or sword.
Someone had clearly put a lot of thought into these robots' construction, and for a moment Vector found himself wondering if he'd been too quick to discount Eggman deviating from his usual sensibilities.
"Avast, ye land-lubbers!" one of the robots proclaimed, the digitized growl of its voice accented by a brogue so preposterously thick that Vector almost couldn't distinguish the words. "Stand and deliver, or ye best be makin' space in yer schedules fer supper with Ol' Hob!"
Cream blinked. "I beg your pardon?"
"Whatever booty ye have, hand it over!" another robot demanded. Vector was almost tempted to laugh until it produced a sword from a scabbard on its belt and waved it in their direction. "Either yer valuables be forfeit, or yer lives be! Walk away with yer purses lightened and yer heads intact, or not at all! The choice be yours!"
Cream turned to Vector with a lopsided frown, as though she was uncertain whether the whole thing was a joke. In fairness, Vector couldn't really blame her.
"Mr. Vector, I think these gentlemen mean to rob us."
"Yeah, I think you're right."
"What should we do?"
"Still yer tongues! There'll be no parlay on the matter!"
"Aye! We gave ye fair warning, now yield yer booty!"
Cream wrung her hands while Cheese positioned himself before her, glaring at the mechanical brigands as though daring any one of them to take a step forward. Vector sighed, rolling his shoulders like a boxer preparing for a bout.
"Buddy, you could not have picked a worse day to try and rob the wrong people."
"Oh, aye?" the closest one sneered, its glowing red eyes drifting between his two most expensive possessions- his trademark gold chains and his prized headphones. "Those trappings 'round yer neck look heavy, so they do. Ye ought to consider yerself fortunate that they won't be weighing ye down when we cast ye to the depths!"
Vector was about to point out that the water in the street below was only about six or seven feet high, thus making the "depths" a little moot, when one of the robots cast a jerk of its chin at Cream.
"What should we do about the little 'un?"
The one who'd just taunted Vector rubbed contemplatively at the metal divots of its beard. "Dunno. 'Tis sort of cute. And we could do with a new mascot, don't ye think?"
There were a few whirring murmurs of assent from the crew.
"Always fancied a parrot for me shoulder, personally," one remarked blithely.
"That bow tie'll have to go, mind," another intoned. "Mayhap we could sort 'im out with a wee hat."
There were more noises of assent, punctuated by a few growls of Arrr! in typical- or rather, stereo typical- pirate fashion. Cream grabbed Cheese out of the air before her and holding him protectively away from the rabble's malevolent gazes as he wriggled in her grip, like a loosened cork ready to be popped from a wine bottle.
"You're not having Cheese!" she told them, apparently oblivious to the rage contorting the Chao's cutesy features.
"I was actually talking about the rabbit," one of the robots clarified. The others ignored him.
"Plenty of hide on the big 'un, lads! We'll have ourselves a set of new leather coin purses 'afore the 'morrow, ready to be filled with all the riches this world has waiting to be plundered!"
"And what of the little 'un?"
The sneer of the ringleader's skull-like faceplate seemed to intensify. "If not a mascot, I reckon the lassie might do for a nice new pair of carpet slippers."
"There b'aint any carpet aboard the ship," one of the other robots pointed out. "'Tis all metal."
"Some fuzzy mittens, then!" the ringleader snapped, clearly irritated at the threat being undermined but quickly regaining composure. "No prey, no pay! Carve 'em to the brisket, me hearties!"
Vector bared his teeth in a vicious snarl, audibly cracking his knuckles. "You're gonna have to go through me if you wanna get to them, you lousy-"
Before Vector could even finish the sentence, the ringleader's head exploded in a shower of shrapnel. Exposed wires protruding from the stump of the robot's neck sparked and fizzled, and it pitched forward onto the rooftop with a clang as its legs buckled beneath it.
As the smoke cleared, Vector saw Cheese hovering in the spot that had previously been occupied by the pirate's head. The hat that had previously been bolted to its cranium was now perched on his own, and although it was a little too big for him he looked very pleased with himself.
The other members of the rabble hesitated, unsure of how to react to this new development. Taking this as a cue, Vector seized the robot nearest to him and bit it in half.
"What was that?"
At the crash site, Blaze's head whipped around at the sound of commotion in the distance, angry shouts and metallic clanking and clashing punctuated by a sharp thunderclap of noise.
"Was that a gunshot?" Lieutenant Potto hazarded, his tone making the question somewhat rhetorical.
Blaze's eyes widened in alarm. "Cream!"
There was a high-pitched shriek that was far too coarse and grating to have come from the rabbit, followed by a splash as something heavy landed in the water below. The commotion intensified, the shouts taking on a note of what sounded more like panic to Silver's ear than the initial braying of an angry mob. Blaze's flames sprung to life once again, lifting her a few feet off the ground.
"Woah, woah, wait! What are you doing?!"
"Stay here!" Blaze ordered.
Before Silver could protest any further, she flung herself forward like a comet, a trail of blistering flames streaming through the air in her wake as she disappeared behind an adjacent building.
"Oh, come on!" the hedgehog groaned.
Some rescue squad , Potto thought bitterly. He pulled his service pistol from the holster on his tactical vest and racked the slide; he didn't have a clue what was happening over there, but he knew what a fight sounded like.
Vector had one of the robots in his jaws and was shaking it like a dog with a new chew toy, letting it fly from his grip like a bowling ball and catching a group of fleeing pirates with the crumpled remains of their compatriot; the one that he'd bitten in half was frantically trying to drag itself after them. Cream hovered above the fracas as Cheese rocketed back and forth like a pinball, smashing into faces and torsos and gracefully weaving around swords and hook hands swung in his direction like a particularly persistent fly evading a clumsy swatter. He'd already hit one with enough force to knock it off the rooftop and sent it plunging into the water below, screaming all the way down.
"Go get 'em, Cheese!"
"Teach them some manners!"
"Back to the ship!" one of the robots cried, heaving himself out from beneath the chewed-up bulk of another that Vector had flung at him. "Make ready to cast off!"
"There be only two of these land-lubbers!" another one protested, dithering by the gangplank, reluctant to retreat but equally unwilling to be the first one back into the fray. "We can take 'em!"
"Did ye not see what happened to Jack Spanner and Ol' Davey Ironsides?" another one spluttered, its damaged vocal components making the syllables fizzle with static. "I'd sooner take me chances with The Cap'n!"
"Yeah, that's right!" Vector roared as they scrambled for the gangplank. "You better run!"
"Serves you right for trying to take things that aren't yours!" Cream added chidingly.
The assertion was enough to goad one of the pirates into reacting. The robot spun on its heel, the blunderbuss that stood in for its right audibly cocking as the weapon's flared muzzle swung upwards.
"I'll not be spoken to like that by some mere chit of a girl!"
Cream looked scandalized. "Excuse me, but there's really no need for that kind of language!"
Vector was just preparing to yell a warning when the cannon barked, but the shot went wide as Cheese hurtled into the robot's armored chestplate, staggering it. A split-second later, Cream dropped out of the sky and landed on the dome of its head in a maneuver that was half a kick and half a stomp, crushing its metal cranium so badly that it probably wouldn't meet the minimum height requirement for a rollercoaster.
"Your mother ought to wash your mouth out with soap!" she scolded the crippled robot as it hobbled frantically after its fellows. "You're a disgrace to pirates everywhere!"
"Nice one, kid!"
Cream matched Vector's grin, but their elation was short-lived as Cheese's round little face popped out of the crater he'd pounded into the robot's torso, swiveling back and forth like a groundhog emerging from its burrow. He seemed a little disoriented as he surveyed his surroundings, as though the impact had dazed him; before he could get his bearings, one of the pirates snatched him up in its wickedly sharp metal claws. With no way to build momentum the Chao could do naught but wriggle in the cruel metal grip.
"Got the blighter!" the robot crowed, holding Cheese aloft to triumphant cheers from all the others except for the one whose torso it had plucked Cheese out of.
"Let him go!" Cream cried, scampering to the edge of the rooftop and launching herself into the air to pursue the ship as it began to cast off. "You let him go right now!"
"Cream, no!" Vector yelled.
The rabbit paid him no heed, so distraught by be prospect of losing her friend again that she could think of nothing but getting him back. Her legs kicked out at the grasping arms and leering faces of the pirates as they thronged on the deck below her, the swiping edges and stabbing points of their swords keeping her at bay until one of them managed to grab her by the ankle and dragged her out of the sky. Cheese squealed as Cream thrashed and wriggled ineffectually in her captor's grip, and Vector could only watch in horror as the ship's outline disappeared behind the adjacent buildings. The distance to it had grown too far for him to even think of attempting to jump it, and even a swimmer as strong as he was would never stand a chance of catching up to the vessel, to say nothing of boarding it.
Of all the days not to have Charmy around, he found himself thinking, and bitter fury quickly gave way to dread as he wondered just how the hell he was going to explain to her mom that he'd let her little girl get kidnapped by pirates.
The pirates that had survived the onslaught of Cheese's homing attacks and Vector's jaws were celebrating the spoils of their somewhat pyrrhic victory with a chorus of coarse, synthesized laughter that grated on Cream's sensitive ears. Cheese was silent, but his eyes were fixed on hers as though silently imploring her not to cry, and so she did as she was bade. Her expression was one of quiet defiance as one of the robots crouched to bring its own skull-like face level with hers; its head bore a dent that must have come from either Cream or Cheese, and one of its arms had been rent to a mangled stump by Vector's powerful teeth.
"Now, missy," the robot sneered. "What do ye suppose we're to do about ye?"
"Let go of Cheese!" Cream raged, looking pointedly past the robot who was addressing her and fixing her gaze on one who'd snatched the Chao. "You're holding him all wrong! His wings are very delicate- you're going to hurt him if you hold him like that!"
"She's got a mouth on her, has this 'un," one of the others observed.
The robot crouching in front of Cream gave a tinny chuckle. "Calm yerself, lass. We don't mean to do our new mascot any harm after we've gone to all the trouble of acquiring him."
"He's not your mascot!" Cream snapped. "He's my friend, and you kidnapped him! Let us go right now, or I'll-"
"Ye'll do what, pray tell?" the pirate growled. Cheese was still thrashing vainly in his captor's grip, the other pirates jeering at the spectacle.
Somehow, Cream found that Cheese's defiance emboldened her in turn. She reminded herself once more that she was a big girl, and she had to be brave, no matter what, for Cheese's sake as well as her own.
"It's alright, Cheese." She finally locked eyes with the robot in front of her. "You know, our friends are going to come for us, and when they do you're going to be sorry."
"There b'aint nobody comin' for ye, missy. Not yer crocodile friend, nor anyone else. Between yerself, yer little pet and us, there be naught but the seas and the gangplank."
Dimly, Cream realized that the pirates couldn't know about Blaze and Silver, and the thought gave her another small measure of determination.
"I'm not afraid of you," she retorted, eliciting a fair bit of nasty snickering from the onlookers.
"Well, mayhap ye ought to be," the robot replied.
"You're the ones who ought to be afraid, pirate scum!"
Blaze's voice rang out from the heavens as if she'd been summoned to Cream by sheer strength of prayer, descending in a cone of blistering flame that sent the robots in her landing zone scattering like roaches in the glow of a kitchen light. Cream squinted, the intensity of the light temporarily dazzling her; when she found she could open her eyes again the cat was stood in the center of the deck, her clenched fists surrounded by miniature fireballs that streaked like comets as she swung them upwards to ward off the robots that dared venture too close.
"I told you so," Cream said loftily.
"Cream, are you and Cheese alright?" Blaze asked. "Are you hurt?" The cat's tone was as taut as a violin string, but there was a note of unmistakable concern in her words.
"We're fine, Blaze!" Cream piped, adding, "But thank you for asking!"
"That be liable to change if ye make any sudden movements!" one of the robots snapped, amid a metallic cacophony of guns being cocked and swords being drawn. Cream saw the merest flicker of worry widen Blaze's eyes for a moment, but as she surveyed her surroundings her expression became stony and impassive. By contrast, the way the robots around her were shifting and exchanging looks made them look distinctly nervous, as though they could sense what she was capable of.
"If any of you scum harm one hair on her head," she announced, addressing everyone in earshot in a voice that sent chills down Cream's spine, "I give you my word that I will melt this ship and everyone on it into a giant ashtray."
"Let's not be hasty now, Princess!" one pirate barked back. "The wee lass is unhurt, but if ye do anything stupid then whatever happens to her be on yer own head!"
"That wee lass is the only thing standing between you and the full extent of my power," Blaze replied sharply. "Let her go, unharmed , or you'll soon find out what the heat of a thousand suns feels like when it's localized to five foot square radius and you're standing in the center of it."
The threat was enough to give the pirates pause, but the one who was holding on to Cheese eventually replied, "And what makes ye think ye be in a position to bargain when we be the ones holding yer little friends prisoner?"
"Because if you let them go, you'll have me as a prisoner instead." She paused for a few moments to let the words sink in before continuing. "Think about it. I'm a princess; royalty holds considerably more value as a bargaining chip than a little girl and her pet, wouldn't you say?"
There was silence for a few seconds as the offer was considered.
"P'raps we'd better ask The Captain," one of the robots rumbled, earning nothing more than a few slow nods in response. It seemed the suggestion was akin to invoking the name of some wrathful deity, necessitating reverence where uproar might be interpreted as a sign of disrespect.
"Perhaps if your so-called Captain is bold enough to show his face then we can negotiate the terms of a surrender," Blaze posited, taking note of how the pirates exchanged nervous looks as she added, "Or is he that much of a coward that he's content to send his lackeys after children but the prospect of negotiating face to face scares him?"
The question sent a ripple through the crowd, servos whirring and metal scraping as the pirates reacted with something like incredulity.
"Brazen of ye to talk of The Cap'n that way, wench."
Blaze folded her arms. "Please. Do you really think I'm scared of Dr. Nega, much less his underlings?"
Silence descended again, but rather than fear there was an air of what seemed to be palpable confusion among the pirates.
"...Nega?"
"There's no need to feign ignorance. I know the man, and this entire situation has his thumbprint all over it. I also know that he's loathe to get his hands dirty, which means Captain Whisker is running things in his absence. Where is he now? Skulking below decks like a rat, I suppose?"
"Wrong on both counts, Princess."
The voice seemed to come from everywhere at once, projected from a source even Cream's acute hearing couldn't pinpoint. Blaze's head whipped around, eyes scanning for movement as the ranks of the pirates stood to rigid attention, as straight-backed as the royal guards of her homeworld.
"My patience is wearing thin, pirate. Stop hiding and step out of the shadows, or I'll smoke you out!"
"Well, beggin' yer pardon for havin' kept ye waitin', Yer Majesty, but fret not. I'll be with ye momentarily."
The voice had a hollow, echoey quality to it that suggested it was being relayed through some kind of loudspeaker system, but while it embodied the same pirate brogue that Blaze would have expected from Captain Whisker, it didn't have the same growly, blustery quality to it. Each syllable was precise and measured, not quite devoid of emotion but with a coldness that seemed deliberate rather than an unintentional side effect of a computer system simulating a person's speech.
Towards the bow of the ship, there was a sudden flurry of movement as the ranks of the pirates parted.
"Look alive, ye swabs!" one of the robots barked. "Cap'n on the deck!"
"As ye were, me hearties."
The second voice was that of the speaker who had addressed Blaze over the loudspeaker system, retaining the hollow, echoey quality it had given off before. It belonged to another robot, and unlike the roughly human-like designs of the other pirates it was clearly modeled on a Mobian and of what Blaze took to be roughly average height and build. It even wore clothes- or at least, a series of metal furnishings painted to give the impression of clothing- a black coat with proud golden epaulettes and a trim of shiny gold, a belt with a rectangular buckle, and even a peg leg cast from brass or some other brownish metal. Its hands were similarly colored, as if to resemble leather gloves, but while its left hand bore five clawed fingers ending in wickedly sharp points, a wide-mouthed cannon with a vicious-looking bayonet stood in for a right hand. The only thing it wore that wasn't metal was a ragged sheet of blue fabric draped about its neck and shoulders, billowing in the wind like a cape- an unusual affectation, but no less so than its other accoutrements.
Atop the robot's head was a dome of black armor plating fashioned into the shape of a tricorn hat, fastened in place by thick steel bolts. One of its eyes was covered by a trapezoid steel plate in the manner of an eye patch, while the other was simply an ovoid red light glowing in the middle of a screen of black glass. Its lower jaw bore a plate resembling the same kind of stylized skull emblazoned across the ship's standard, and a glint of its original electric blue coating was visible in the unarmored portions of its head and ellipsoid torso.
It took Cream a moment, but the robot's silhouette took on a horrible familiarity as she mentally stripped away the pirate-themed trappings, and found that what lay beneath was a nightmare made manifest, a sickening parody of someone especially dear to her heart.
"Metal Sonic?!" she gasped, the words escaping from her mouth in a breathless, involuntary exclamation that was just loud enough to get the robot's attention. Its expressionless visage treated her to a piercing stare, giving a somewhat thoughtful nod as it did so.
"Aye," the robot replied. "I did go by that name once, 'tis true, but no longer. So long as ye be a guest on me ship, ye'll address me as Captain Metal...or not at all."
The robot paced over to Cream, angling the point of the bayonet demonstratively towards her throat. Blaze stiffened; seeing that it had her attention, the robot finally addressed her in person.
"Now, Princess...I believe ye were saying something about a surrender."