Now I'm on a roll. Let's see what Eggman's up to. ^_~*
-Chapter 92: Deception Artists-
Snively met the Twins at the lair's door. "Welcome back," he said with little enthusiasm. He was quickly delighted to see both siblings fully dressed. He spoke lighter. "This is a plesant surprise. Where did you find the money to buy those? Or were they gifts?" He assumed.
Rolph fixed the collar of his shirt while Anne took a picture of him in the light of the open lair entranceway. "We were gifted," he said with a grin.
Anne used her phone and double checked the red eyeliner beneath her eyes. She made sure the light red accent BG added hadn't smudged. "Between our own charming selves, and or pity party, we got all this nice stuff." She tucked the phone into her new black purse with shiney red strap.
They followed him in. Rolph's new boots and Anne's heels clunked or clicked down the hallway behind the short human. The footwear was custom made at Tails and accomidated their gold ankle braclet anchors.
Cameras in the lair picked up the image of the twins and displayed it to a peeping Eggman. The two were similarly dressed in black, suit-like outfits, lined with white, and the occasional silver button or zipper. Their gold braclets stuck out and buckled their long sleve shirts near the penetration points.
The twins were shocked to see the lair was no longer in shambles. Anne gently brushed her brother's arm with her tail. She saw him nod. They kept quiet about it.
"The people in this town are quite generous, despite any overbearing economic issues," Snively said as he walked with his two arms folded behind his back.
"We also got a bit of a therapy session while we were out," Rolph said. "It felt good to talk about some stuff. Got a bunch of paper signing done to make us residents, too. At least we know for sure we're going to be allowed to stay here in the village without being prisoners."
"Therapy?" Snively scoffed but offered acceptance, begrudgingly. "Whatever will help improve your mood and hopefully develop some better habits. Maybe not playing with toys could be your first goal? Seems simple enough."
Anne's cheek twitched in anger.
"Or-or-or," Rolph stammered to avoid an outburst from his sister, "We find better toys that are suitable for adults. Play is an essential part of healing. It triggers endorphins and activates the reward centre of the brain. Remember, we've been basically frozen in time for longer than you've been on this planet; we got catching up to do on what is, and isn't, approriate for people our age."
Anne huffed in frustration.
Snively gave it thought. "I suppose."
After they were past the two lines of secure doors, Anne and Rolph were left to their own devices. They revisited the kitchen on the lowere level where they kept Nominatus hidden. Rolph opened the utensil drawer and fished the virus out.
"It's about time! It was cramped in there. I tried to manuever around to get comfortable and got my horns tangled in a whisk-" His complaint went uncomforted by a faux-mother figure. He noticed the serious look on the twins faces. "Wh-what's the matter?"
The siblings looked at one another and then back to Nominatus. "We both agreed that you look to much like Black Doom for us to be able to trust you," Anne said and took the tiny being from her brother and held him, mid tail.
Rolph poked Nominatus in the head and made him wince. "We know the leader of the Black Arm are after all of us. So how do we know for sure you aren't going to contact him and send a fleet to Mobius to abduct us? Seems like there'd be a lot of benefit to you and not us, in that scenario."
Nominatus struggled uncomfortably. "You can trust me! I don't want to be a prisoner either! The Black Arm will use me as they did in the past to get to Shadow or any of the Robotnik's!"
"What we're saying is that things have changed," Anne Squeezed the virus. "These people are good. They have no intention of harming us."
"Hell, some of them are totally legit in wanting to be friends with us," Rolph said and folded his arms smugly.
"How can you be so sure?! Because they gave you nice things? My dear friends, when I am back up to full power you two will be-" he was cut off.
"We don't want to concer! We want to live," Anne yelled. "When we said we wanted to be in control, we meant 'of our own lives', not the lives of others."
Rolph followed up. "We aren't fucking hypocrites! We only went along with you because we thought there were no other options. Just like last time..." Rolph lifted his black and white eyepatch, the red elastic stretched out and cut into his head quills. He focused his eyes on the being his sister held. He backed away. "I knew I shouldn't have...it's worse than we thought. Dammit...no way, sis," he said and shut his right eye tightly and sealed it with his patch. "Kill it now."
"Wait! NO!" Before Nominatus could protest, the end of Anne's tail stuck him in the neck. From the point of entry, his skin slowly changed from black to green. His markings turned black. His eyes darkened and half shut. When he released one final breath, his body disintagrated to powder and fell to the floor.
Anne stepped away from the dust pile, as to not dirty her new high heeld boots. She brushed any residual mess from her tail. "What was wrong with hi-"
Rolph cut her off with a wrist grab.
She saw what he saw and teared up, "That was almost a huge mistake." She pulled him in for a hug.
"You're telling me," he said and squeezed her tight.
Their embrace broke when none other than Doctor Eggman opened the door.
"Holy hell, do you ever look like Gerald," Rolph stated with a wide eye.
Eggman looked delighted. "You mean my grandfather, Gerald Robotnik?" The two in front of him nodded. He fully walked into the kitchen and saw the applesauce disaster was cleaned, but a new one, of dust, had been created. "Here I thought I was going to have a problem with you two." He kicked at the ashes of his fallen enemy. "Looks like I can trust you after all."
The twins looked sheepish. "Listen, we're sorry for snooping," Rolph said.
"We thought you were going to experiment on us. Nominatus said he could help us escape." Anne followed up and pointed to the pile of green power that no longer posed a threat.
Eggman chuckled. "I have all the technology I need to run this outfit of mine. I don't need to take anything from either of you. You two are meerly guests." He played his 'forgiveness card'. "Here, let me prove how 'okay' I am with you two. Come to my lab," he said and let the two reluctant Black Arm hybrids follow him.
Anne and Rolph felt the world close in around them. They held hands the whole way.
All worries were set aside when Dr. Eggman clipped a small device to their inhibitor rings. One at a time, they unlatched from the anchor and spun freely on their limbs. "There you go. Now you're free to take those rods out and remove the rigns, if you want. I have local anstetic if you need any."
Anne hit the four locations on her and her brother's body that had a titanium rod through it. "Thanks, but I make my own." They each gently twisted the rods from their wrists and ankles with little effort. Their wounds healed instantly.
"Thank you, Doctor," both said.
"We really appreciate it, Doc," Rolph added. "But we gotta leave these rings on. Lest the Black Arm begin screaming in our heads."
"They're a little too 'murdery', and that's coming from me," Anne said and arranged her braclets over her shirt cuffs to look stylish.
"To each his own," Eggman said and turned to get something from a nearby desk. "You're welcome to come and go as you please. Though I'd stay in after dark if I were you; what with the looming threat of ravanous werewolf attacks."
Rolph was instantly mortified as he recalled the attack. "That's right. The blue guy, Sonic, he's a werewolf like Hugh."
Eggman shrugged as he played his best 'convince card'. "I'm not concerned about your older brother. The guy preforms for the circus in this werewolf-tamer, slash, acrobatic act. He's pretty good. I feel like he's got his transformation figured out. This Sonic guy though, I don't know...kind of seems like a loose cannon to me."
Rolph walked closer to the doctor. "D-does he transform at the full moon, or just when he's angry?"
"Both." Eggman played up his best 'worried for the safety of others card'. "I'm afraid the rules for Sonic are different since he has two werewolf forms. He'll transform every night and when he loses his temper." Eggman clicked on a monitor and showcased the two side by side, followed by a few videos his drones took of Sonic, out on the town in his transformed state. "He's shaken down the local fastfood place, he's bailed on his friends while they were supposed to be building a homeless guy a new house for him and his girlfriend; then to top it all off, he comes in for no good reason and destroys my home, looking for heaven knows what. Probably trying to steal from me again."
Anne and Rolph watched edited footage of the attack, clipped together through the various halls. The part where the twins subdued him played.
"Nice shot, sis." He fist bumped with his sister.
"I had a good angle."
"You two are pretty strong, yes, but the thing that's got me worried, is this," he said and rewound to a part that displayed Sonic's glowing green eyes. "This right here is stolen magic I use to power my base," he said and tapped a button on his wrist communicator. The entire wall behind them lifted and displayed a large gemstone. Green in colour, like Sonic's eyes, it hovered and spun on it's metal pedastal. Its energy was syphoned down into a machine for later use.
"I don't just use technology for power, I also use the Master Emerald. It was entrused to me by a nearly extinct Echidna Tribe, its a sacred object I'm sworn to protect. It's what I use to power the whole city and the majority of my base." He siged. "I had to use a lot of my power reserves to repair after the attack. Luckily I was planning on upgrading anyway, so I'm not holding a grudge; but if it happens again though, I don't know what will happen to the city. The Emerald can only produce so much energy at a time. If I deplete it too fast, it'll be destroyed."
In the background, a blurred image of Tails workshop was barely distinguishable on the wall's small monitor. A smashed device with the words 'descrambler 5000' lay in the corner of the room.
Anne touched her brother's arm with her tail once again.
He gave a shallow, frantic nod.
"I had more of these gems once-smaller ones-but they've long since been stolen from me." Eggman sighed yet again. He extended his arm to the rest of his lab full of random equipment and hald finished projects. "You're welcome to mess around in here for something to do. Just, uh, lay off the applesauce, thanks." He walked to the door and the twins nodded and waved distantly. "Ta-ta," he said and the door shut behind him. Neither of them saw his wicked grin as he walked back to an elevator that led to his actual lair below the surface.
Anne and Rolph stood in silence.
"You didn't get a chance to look at him...did you?" She said and brushed his arm with her tail. "Nope, nothing."
"I really...really don't want to see anymore." He covered his eyepatch with a hand.
"Then don't. We don't need all the answers. We can let things happen." She hugged him tightly.
"Okay." Rolph separated from the embrace and looked at the wall where the huge display of Sonic's were'wrath played on a loop. He shuttered. "They've been good to us...but he's fucking terrifying like that. I can't bare to even look at him normally, let alone all the posibilities of how he can shred me into little Black Arm bits."
"You can reform," Anne said dryly.
"Yeah! But it'll still be fuckin painful!" He snapped.
Anne looked hurt.
He pat her shouler. "I'm sorry, Anne. I gotta calm down. Getting pissy isn't going to help."
The two sat cross-legged, back to back on the floor, as they pondered and chatted about their next move.
Unbeknownst to them, Rouge laid silently in the ceiling vents. 'How convenient I heard all that. Sonic was right, comedic timing is the best.' She slinked along through the ventilation system with her retrieved necklace clenched between her teeth, along with an unintentionally pilfered gold chain necklace. 'I'm going to report this to Shadow, talk to the Colonel about a raise, buy a buffer kit to repair the damage that nasty woman inflicted on my poor baby and then finish that lovely romance novel...and maybe some wine.'
Rouge made her way back to Sonic's to deliver the information. A small black, teardrop shaped drone patrolled outside Eggman's lair. It witnessed her fly off into the night. It too left to make a report.
Bom. Bom. BOM! XD