Unusual Encounters:

Chapter Seventeen: Rouge and Fang/Nack

Suggested by a guest and That Speedhunter

Ten minutes. By the looks of it, whoever her fellow rival thief was, they had a ten minute lead on her. Darn it. There was no way she could catch up to them, even by flight. She would just have to hope that they were going to have trouble finding the exact location. No doubt, they probably didn't have as good locational sense as her.

She used the wind to drift quicker than she could herself, and she kept a keen eye trained below in case her tracker was slow today. In case they happened to cross paths before getting to the caverns.

It wasn't long before she spotted some people that her device had not picked up on. From what she could see, it was a tall, off-white polar bear, trudging along through the thick forest below. She smirked, knowing that he probably wished he had her wings right about now. Beside this polar bear, there was a small, green duck, hopping along over-enthusiastically. She knew by the looks of them exactly what that meant. Her competition had left them behind, no question about it. And that meant there was only one person it could be. She cursed under her breath and focused straight ahead.

When she finally found the cave within sight, she wasted no time in landing onto the mossy jungle floor below. She knew her device would lose its signal after she entered the cavern, but by the looks of it her rival was already somewhere deep within it. How lovely. She folded up her small device and stuck it in her jumpsuit. There was no point in wasting time now.

She followed after him.

Another hook was pushed into the crevice of the rock face, and Fang pulled onto the rope to make sure it stayed that way. He hoisted himself up afterwards, boots meeting rocks and gloves holding on tightly to the rope above. This was, unfortunately, one of his disadvantages as a weasel. Not nearly enough climbing ability as he would like to have. He muttered a curse and worked his way to the top. At long last. It felt like time was wasted every time he had to climb up somewhere, but he knew that there were several more climbing places up ahead.

He pulled his rope back up and coiled it around his left arm, hustling forward the moment he did. It was pitch dark yet again, so he turned the light on his helmet up a notch.

It was so satisfying, in multiple ways, to finally escape the stupidity of his "companions". Finally, adventure out on his own, like the treasure hunter he knew he had much more potential for. He breathed in the freezing cave air, and decided that it was the smell of a well-deserved break. It was the smell of discovery and independence.

Then he heard a thud, somewhere within the same cavern. He stopped in his tracks for a moment, trying to decide what it sounded most like. It could have been some sort of stalactite, falling down from the ceiling above, but he had his doubts. There was a presence to this noise. He cursed again, breaking into the most silent dash he could manage. Whether there was someone there or not, it wasn't worth the risk of finding it out. Whatever sort of treasure lied in this cave, it was his and his alone. He gritted his teeth, pushing himself faster. Of course someone had to interrupt his peaceful raid.

Rouge stood silent for a few moments after her little mishap- her heel accidentally catching on a crevice, causing her to lose balance long enough for her to fall. She would have been embarrassed had anyone else been there. But that's what laying off on treasure hunting for so long does to someone. She only hoped that Nack didn't hear her. Maybe his ears weren't as good as hers. Maybe.

But he had a head-start, and she was going to have to think of a way to outsmart him to get there. That was her only shot.

She flew up towards the caverns' ceiling, searching for signs of a tunnel of sorts, perhaps dug by another bat, through the soil and rock. She managed to find a way through the stalactites, a small path-like tunnel that had seen much wear. It was worth a try though, and she pushed her way into it, ignoring the grime that threatened to coat her. If she could find her way through this, that treasure was as good as hers.

Things were finally getting close. He could see the crevice in the wall, directly over a pool of water that had been built up over time. It was rather large at this point, but Fang paid no mind to that. He dove into the murky cave water like it was his own bathtub. He was a great swimmer, anyways, and what could some dirty water do to him?

He latched onto the surrounding wall as well as he could, and that's where he had an issue. His gloves were slick from the water, and as such he could barely hang onto the rocks. Why didn't he think of this? Angrily, he tore off his gloves and used his claws to grasp the stones. Planting his slippery boots as best he could (there was no way he was leaving them behind), he forced his way up the wall. He nearly collapsed when he reached the foothold in the crevice. Right here. He just had to dig into it, and if there was any truth to the stories, the treasure would be there. And he had reason to believe it was true.

He used his left hand to dig out the soil, and yelped when his claw struck something more solid than he had planned. He quickly remembered to be quiet and muttered a complaint against himself. Of course. He must have hit the chest itself.

He worked his way around the chest, doing his best not to let it drop into the water below. He had no way of telling how deep it was, so he'd take no chances.

Sweating, shivering slightly, he at last clasped the chest in the hand he wasn't using to hold onto the wall with. Though, the crevice was so tight, his boots probably would have been able to stand there securely themselves. He groaned with strain and suppressed triumph. Now just to work his way carefully back down.

"Thanks for the jewels." A voice, close-by and not bothering to be soft-spoken, echoed around the cave chamber, startling Fang half to death.

The chest was snatched by someone above, and Fang looked up to see Rouge burrowing back into her ceiling-tunnel, treasure chest in her hands. He growled after her, swearing and cursing his heaviest. He pulled himself up from the crevice, nearly falling into the water below. Without hesitation, he followed her into the tunnel.

He would have shot after her too, if it wasn't for the fact that, if he hit her, he wouldn't be able to climb over her body to find his way out of the tunnel. He hardly knew the directions that the tunnel would take, but he still crawled at full speed, fury taking him over.

As soon as he came to the end of it, he saw that the only way back down onto the cavern floor was a rather large, looming distance of freefall. Of course, treasure hunters know what is important in any sort of possible fatality situation. You never let a rival get away with treasure that belongs to you.

He leapt down, eyes still looking about keenly for the sight of anything breathing. As he landed feet-first, he called out, not even skipping a beat," If I were you, I'd give it up right now." He pulled back on his gun to load it as he took off running towards the entrance and exit of the cave.

Rouge, meanwhile, had taken the treasure chest as far from that cave as she could in such a short time. Though her breathing was now heavy from the chase, she was well adapted to keeping it quiet by now. She also had the peace of mind that she had already formulated her escape plan, should this have happened, beforehand.

She opened the chest, once she stopped flying at a safe enough distance, despite the shake in her hands. The treasure wasn't a disappointment; it sparkled and gleamed with blue, gold and green in ways that almost could have impressed her, had she less experience with treasures. She grinned at the perceived cunningness of her plan.

Bean and Bark, finally close to the location of their leader, felt suddenly ominous of the area. Bean mentioned this several times, but Bark simply shrugged it off. Though the duck could tell that Bark was more alert now than before.

Suddenly, they found out why. A treasure chest came flying out of a nearby tree, nearly knocking Bark in the head if he hadn't been already suspicious. Bean ran over to it instantly, unafraid of whatever happened to be inside. Which turned out to be nothing.

"Well, that was sort of anti-clima-"

Rouge, following suit after the chest, appeared soon after, interrupting his statement. "Ugghhh, all that for this?" She kicked the chest further from Bean's view. "I guess not all legendary treasures are to be trusted after all."

"Treasure? So...you were after the same ol' myth as Fang, eh?" Bean laughed as if it was the funniest joke on the planet. "Wait 'till I see his face when I tell him it was fake! He'll- he'll have to trust me from now on. Ha! I told him- I told him...and you beat him to it!" Another fit of laughter took him over after that, and he could no longer form coherent words.

Bark just crossed his arms and shook his head despairingly.

"Well, I'll just leave this for you two to show him then. I'm sure he'll have more use of it than me." The treasure hunter huffed and flew away in a hurry.

What they didn't know was that the compartments in her clothes were full of the gems that were supposedly nonexistent.

Fang came back in a frenzy as wild as the one Rouge left in, gun aiming recklessly, teeth grinding against each other. "You! You guys! Have you seen that little- that little- that-" The anger in his voice made it hard for him to form words coherently. "Ugh, where is she?!"

"Ya just missed her. But guess what we got…" Bean held the treasure chest up, holding in laughter, still.

Fang's eyes had never looked so pleased towards Bean before. Bean would have felt bad about joking with it had he actually cared much about anything.

"You guys found it…" He took it into his hands, slowly, dropping his gun back onto his belt. He opened it slowly.

"Well, I mean, we-"

He was disastrously interrupted. Bark stepped back in caution.

"And you had the nerve to take it from me..." Fang growled. "What? Got it back from Rouge and cowarded down to hide it for yourself? What did you-"

"Well yeah, we got it back from Rouge, but it was empty. She was really mad, herself. I told you, the legendary treasures were just a myt-"

"I KNOW they were in there! It was heavier before! What did you all do with them?" He brought his gun back out, slowly, so he could draw the tension.

Bean hid behind Bark, and Bark- poor Bark- he was probably the only one who could've explained enough to calm anyone down. But it was too late for that.

They ran for their lives.

A/N: Hopefully you weren't expecting too much of a face-to-face kind of thing. I got carried away with this treasure-hunting race instead, as a plot.

I might write a continuation oneshot from this, where Fang/Nack hunts down Rouge with a revenge plot, if anyone else cares much for it.

Also, in my uncertainty with the weasel's name, as you can see, I made some characters refer to him as one name, and some refer to him as the other. I guess it depends on the person's relation to Fang/Nack.