Chapter 8: The Bluff
The peaceful mountains north of Station Square were known for many scenic overlooks. The most stunning of which was a peak known as Devil's Bluff, so named because of a teenage dare gone horribly wrong that claimed the life of two boys well over a decade ago. Standing at the edge of the overlook with seemingly no regard for the dizzying height was Doctor Eggman, checking his wrist watch impatiently.
"I can't believe it! Where is that tardy hedgehog? It's already 4:01 in the afternoon!" Eggman complained as he stomped his foot in frustration.
"Doctor, doesn't that make Sonic only exactly one minute late? That doesn't seem like much to be upset about," Decoe chimed in from beside Eggman.
"One minute? Sonic is the fastest being in existence and his longtime sidekick's life hangs in the balance of this meeting! One minute late for him might as well be an hour late!" Doctor Eggman continued to grumble.
"Perhaps he has seen through your plan this time and isn't coming at all, Doctor?" Bocoe suggested nervously.
"How dare you suggest that my evil schemes aren't one hundred percent brilliant!" Eggman yelled at his robotic helpers. "There's no way he could have known that I was just bluffing. And besides, even if he suspected a trap, he has no choice but to bring me the emeralds anyway because he cares so much for that furry brat."
"Unless Tails is not the one who is sick," Bocoe pointed out again.
"What do you mean?" Eggman cringed as the unlikely, yet possible alternative presented itself.
"He means that if Tails was not the one who is sick, Sonic would know that your message must have been a fake and may not show up at all!" Decoe presented the worst case scenario.
"True, true. But all the evidence seemed to suggest that Tails was the one whom that medicine Sonic was holding was meant for," Eggman reanalyzed his reasoning to reassure himself that he hadn't made a mistake. "Remember how the X-Tornado wasn't there to help Sonic fight my Egg Tarantula? The only reason Tails wouldn't try to help Sonic must be that he was simply too sick to fly the infernal contraption."
"But, Doctor! What if the X-Tornado was simply too damaged to fly? You did blast it with a Chaos Emerald-powered freeze ray before it crashed into a mountain," Bocoe again questioned his master's logic.
"Hmm... That is plausible, I suppose. But then why would Sonic need that medicine we saw him holding?" Eggman posed the question as he saw a potential flaw in his assumptions that might unravel his entire plan.
"Sonic does like to help anyone in need," Decoe continued speculating. "Like that girl in the wheelchair. Perhaps he was just doing a good deed for someone at random. It may not even be someone Sonic knows that needed the medicine."
"Hmmm… For the first time ever, you two bucket heads may be correct!" Eggman shouted in surprise. The plausible explanation that they had given seemed to make sense. Worst of all, Sonic was never late to a meeting that Eggman had set before, which cast even more doubt on Eggman's original theory. Although he considered it highly improbable that he was wrong, Eggman didn't want to know how much ridicule he would get if his message had been delivered to a perfectly healthy Tails and friends.
"Now what are you doing, Doctor? Checking your watch again?" Decoe asked as the two robotic assistants saw Eggman start fiddling with his wrist device again.
"No! I'm making a call back to my undersea base. Bokkun should have arrived there a while ago, and he can confirm whether or not Tails was actually sick when he delivered my message," Eggman explained.
"Perhaps we should have waited to leave ourselves until Bokkun could give us his report," Bocoe suggested.
"I don't recall programming you two with the ability to give this much sass!" Eggman growled in irritation. "And Bokkun had better not have played that message if Tails was actually healthy, or else I'll...!"
"Wait, Doctor! Look!" Decoe suddenly interrupted as he pointed towards the trail leading up to the top of the bluff where they stood.
"It is Sonic!" Bocoe shouted as all three of them caught a glimpse of a blue streak winding up the mountain trail at high speeds.
"Better late than never! Hurry, you idiots! Hide and get my secret surprise ready!" Eggman spoke in a new tone of urgency.
His robotic assistants quickly obeyed, scrambling up the nearby ridge to the very top of the mountain just a dozen or so feet above the overlook.
Sonic arrived moments later, stopping just a few feet in front of Eggman in a small cloud of dust. His face looked tired even though Eggman knew for a fact that running all the way out here was hardly even a workout for the inexhaustible hedgehog. In his arms he cradled the six Chaos Emeralds that Eggman had anticipated, making the evil genius crack a smile at the sight of so many gathered together. This was almost too easy!
"Ah, there you are, Sonic! You do know that you're late, don't you?" Eggman scolded his tardy opponent as Sonic glared at him angrily. "Why, you look awfully…awful! Is something bothering you, my blue friend?"
"How can you even say that after what you did to Tails, Eggman?!" Sonic spoke in an uncharacteristic rage as he stared down his little brother's would-be murderer.
"I told you, Sonic, that drink was meant for you. If you hadn't left that party early, Tails might never have been in this situation at all," Eggman allowed a large grin to spread across his face. Sonic had unknowingly given him all the confirmation that he needed of Tails' illness. Now with that lingering doubt settled, he could proceed with his plan as intended.
"But you're the one who created the Egg Virus in the first place! And if Tails ends up dying from it, mark my words, Eggman, you will regret it forever!" Sonic shouted back with a very unsettling venom in his voice.
"Now, now, Sonic. There's no need for nasty threats," Eggman replied, unshaken by Sonic's vengeful attitude despite being vulnerable without a giant robot to pilot. "I'm here to keep my part of the bargain, after all. You're lucky I waited around after you decided to show up late. What kept you so long, I wonder?" Eggman decided to satisfy his own curiosity first.
"None of your business, Egghead!" Sonic replied in annoyance.
"Oh? But what if I'm making it my business, hmm? Come now, Sonic. It's not like I'm asking for another Chaos Emerald or anything," Eggman goaded Sonic into sharing the information he wanted.
"I was... gathering up the Emeralds. It took longer than expected," Sonic offered up a half-truth, hoping it might satisfy Eggman so they could get on with this transaction already.
"Ah ha, I see. The others didn't approve of our little trade, did they?" Eggman's evil smirk reached its most sinister as he read through Sonic's lie like an open book. "Still, to steal from your own side... I must say that I approve, Sonic!"
"Shut up, Eggman!" Sonic growled back. It would be so easy. Just one quick dash forward and he could shove Eggman off the bluff before the fat Doctor could even blink. Imagine all the trouble he could prevent, all the lives he could save right here and now with one simple action...
"Very well then, down to brass tacks," Doctor Eggman decided to stop teasing and get back to business. "Your six Chaos Emeralds for Tails' cure. That is what we agreed upon, isn't it?" Eggman stated as he held out his hand, expecting payment.
"We never agreed to anything, Eggman!" Sonic reminded him. "Six Emeralds is a pretty steep price to pay for just one dose of medicine, don't you think?" he tried to bargain with Eggman as a last ditch effort.
"This isn't up for negotiation, Sonic!" Eggman grumbled as his outstretched hand closed into an impatient fist. "Honestly, I can't believe you'd even be trying to haggle with me when the life of your best friend is at stake! Now, hand them over!"
"What if I push you over instead?" Sonic threatened, planting his feet as if he was about to dash forward like he was so tempted to actually do.
"Whooo hoo hoo hooo! A death threat? From Sonic the Hero? My, my... Someone is clearly in a VERY bad mood today!" Eggman just laughed, calling Sonic's bluff with confidence. Eggman then reached into his pocket and pulled out a vial full of a luminous, blue liquid and held it out over the bluff. "If I fall, then this cure goes with me, Sonic. Now let's skip any other unpleasantries and get right to the good part. Give me the Emeralds," Eggman glowered back at Sonic.
Realizing that he had no control over the situation at all and all his desperate options had failed, Sonic was forced to give in to Eggman's demands. "OK, Egghead. You live, but only if Tails lives after I give him that medicine! Now give it here!"
"No no, my impatient blue friend," Eggman replied with a frown back at the irate hedgehog. "I get my Chaos Emeralds first!"
"Fine! Have it your way, Eggman!" Sonic finally gave in. He took a few steps forward until he was in the center between the two of them, then dropped the six glittering Chaos Emeralds on the dusty ground. "Now hand over the goods before it's too late!"
"Just a second, you blue pain-in-the-backside! How do I know that these emeralds aren't fake, like the one you tried to trick me with back on Space Colony Ark?" Eggman interrogated the pleading hedgehog. "You don't get a drop of this antidote until I am convinced that these are the real deal!"
"There's no time for this, Egghead! Tails needs that cure right away or else he may die!" Sonic argued impatiently. But he saw that Eggman was unswayed, and Sonic again had to give in to the evil genius's will. "Fine then, check them yourself!" Sonic shouted as he tossed Eggman the crystal clear Emerald that he had attempted to steal on the mountain a few days ago.
"That's more like it, Sonic! The more you cooperate, the faster Tails will be cured." Eggman caught the Chaos Emerald that Sonic had thrown and proceeded to check it for any imperfections that would betray a clever fake. "Well, well, Sonic! It looks like, if nothing else, you are certainly honest." But just then, loud beeping suddenly came from Eggman's wrist. "Or perhaps not. I told you to come alone, Sonic!" Eggman shouted out, infuriated that someone would intrude now when all these emeralds were just a couple feet from his grasp.
"I did come alone, I swear!" Sonic pleaded to Eggman in confusion. What was going on here? Did someone follow him? Impossible! No one else was fast enough to keep up! But then why was Eggman's device beeping?
Just then, a familiar figure appeared in the distance as it flew towards the bluff at lightning speed. The X-Tornado! But who is flying it? Sonic thought to himself in stunned disbelief. It must be Chuck! But why is he here? If he makes Eggman leave now, I may never get that cure for Tails! Just as Sonic was about to take his chances in stealing the vial from Eggman's hand before he could drop it, a very familiar voice rang out from the approaching X-Tornado.
"Sonic! Sonic! Don't do it, Sonic! I'm not sick anymore, see! The Egg Virus was just a huge lie!" Tails' voice boomed from an exterior loudspeaker linked to his headset.
Sonic's mind went reeling after hearing his little brother's voice. He simply stood there as he took a moment to sort everything out. Tails isn't going to die? Eggman lied? But... then that means I've been tricked! Sonic growled behind barred teeth as he realized his huge mistake. This time he was really going to let Eggman have it! His usual tactics of using giant robots to take over was one thing, but going so low as to invent a fake virus and trying to con the Chaos Emeralds from him? Now that was totally unacceptable!
"Curse that furry yellow freak!" Eggman shouted as he realized that his deception had been ruined. "I thought after the freezing that I gave him, Tails would be in bed for a week at least! Oh well, it's already too late! I already have all the Chaos Emer-WHAT?!" Eggman turned to make a move to snatch up the other five Emeralds, but he was shocked to find them already in the hands of a very angry Sonic.
"Eggman! You are going to pay for this!" Sonic shouted fiercely. "NO ONE threatens my little buddy's life and gets away with it!"
"Oh dear! S-Sonic, now let's be reasonable here! You know that one day we'll all look back at this little prank and have a good laugh..." Eggman stammered as he backpedaled away from the enraged hedgehog. Unfortunately, he could only take a couple steps back before he nearly tripped off the edge of the bluff. Eggman glanced down at the abyss below and then quickly back at Sonic as he realized he was trapped, gulping down a sudden knot in his throat.
"Y-You know what, Sonic? Just to show there's no hard feelings, why don't I just give you this for free?" Eggman spoke as he held up the vial of 'medicine' again and suddenly threw it down at the ground between them.
Sonic lost sight of Eggman as a huge cloud of smoke immediately enveloped the area. He couldn't see a thing as he stood there coughing violently, crouching down to try and get below the smoke to breathe.
Meanwhile, Eggman appeared out of the thick smoke in his hover chair and began to fly away over the bluff. "Decoe! Bocoe! Activate the Quake-O-Matic!" he shouted loudly as he executed his emergency escape.
From its camouflaged position on top of the highest point of Devil's Bluff, a huge, anvil-shaped weight lifted and smashed back into the mountain peak. Its impact caused the ground to shake so violently that Sonic was knocked over onto his face as he held tightly to the five chaos emeralds in his hands. Then Sonic suddenly felt the ground underneath him give way as the edge of the bluff broke off with him on it, falling down the side of the mountain in a shower of boulder-sized rocks towards certain doom. Still blinded by the smokescreen, Sonic couldn't see well enough to escape until he felt nothing left under his feet to leap off of.
At the final second, Sonic remembered the Emeralds that he had miraculously kept hold of and realized his only way to escape the crushing fall. He hadn't tried this since the Space Colony Ark incident, but hopefully he could make it work again. "Chaos Control!" Sonic shouted as the five emeralds he held glowed brightly. Then, Sonic and the Emeralds disappeared in a flash just as the crumbling mountainside collided with the jagged mountain's base in a deafening noise.
"SOOOONIIIIC!" Tails shouted in horror as he saw Devil's Bluff disappear in a landslide of boulders as large as small buildings. He accelerated the X-Tornado to its maximum speed as he dove towards his plummeting friend. I'm not going to make it in time! Even with a Chaos Emerald to power it, the X-Tornado can't fly fast enough to catch Sonic before he's crushed!
"Tails, pull up!" Chuck shouted over Tails' headset from his seat in the rear cockpit. "We can't do anything for Sonic if we crash, too!"
Tails snapped back to his senses and pulled the X-Tornado out of its suicidal dive towards the rockslide. He knew that Chuck was right, but watching Sonic fall to his death was just about more than Tails could bear. As the X-Tornado regained altitude, Tails heard the sound of Devil's Bluff crashing into the valley below. He knew that not even Sonic could have survived being crushed under a crumbling mountain face. Tails could only pray that somehow Sonic had managed to evade the boulders using his trademark speed, but it seemed like a longshot because of just how many rocks were falling with him.
But before the tears could even start forming in his eyes, Tails was suddenly blinded by a flash of light from the nose of the X-Tornado. His hand shot up instantly to shield his eyes, and when the flash was over and Tails moved his hand away again... Standing right outside the cockpit in front of him stood Sonic, sporting a large grin on his face and five Chaos Emeralds in his hands.
"Heya, Tails!" Sonic greeted his relieved brother.
"Sonic!" Tails shouted out as he opened his cockpit, despite the fact that the X-Tornado was in mid-flight. "I thought you were...!"
"Nah! It takes more than a few falling rocks to stop me, bud," Sonic responded in his usual cocky attitude. He carefully walked up to Tails' open cockpit and tossed the five emeralds that he was holding into Tails' lap. "Head's up, Tails! I need you to take care of these for me."
Tails quickly let go of the controls momentarily to catch the emeralds in his lap. "Wait a minute, Sonic!" Tails spoke as he took inventory of the emeralds now in his lap. "Where's the sixth Emerald? You know, the one we found during our ski trip?"
"Eggman still has it. So let's go get it back!" Sonic said before he flashed a "thumb's up" and dashed to the rear of the X-Tornado where Knuckles was also riding on the plane's exterior.
"So, you let Eggman get the emeralds, didn't ya?" Knuckles gruffly spoke to Sonic as the hedgehog took up position next to him at the rear wing.
"Hey, Knuckles! Glad you could make it!" Sonic playfully remarked. He knew that by dodging the echidna's question, he would get to see that comical look of annoyance that only Knuckles could pull off. And Sonic laughed as Knuckles turned his head to give him that exact glare.
"What's so funny? At least I'm not the one that Eggman fooled into handing over six Chaos Emeralds for a fake cure!" Knuckles chided Sonic.
"Egghead only got one, Knucklebrain. If he had gotten all of them, I would have been splattered hedgehog right now. Now what do you say we take out that robot of his before it brings down the entire mountain?" Sonic pointed towards the giant anvil shaped contraption that had caused the collapse that had nearly killed him.
"Fine by me!" Knuckles shouted before leaping from the wing and gliding towards the Quake-O-Matic.
"Tails, you go after Eggman!" Sonic commanded before he jumped off the wing as well and began a mid-air spin dash straight towards the bulky robot. Adding the additional momentum of his fall into his already powerful attack caused Sonic to crash into the top of the giant robot like a blue meteor, buzzsawing his way clean through the foe and emerging out the bottom as flames gouted from the surgical hole through the machine's vital core.
"No fair, Sonic! You were supposed to leave some for me!" Knuckles shouted, observing that Eggman's robot was already out of commission from the single attack.
"Sorry, Knux! You snooze, you lose!" Sonic taunted the annoyed echidna.
"Grrrrrr…" Knuckles growled. "I come all the way out here to help, and I don't even get to punch anything?"
As if on cue, what looked like a hundred hidden hatches all over the destroyed Quake-O-Matic blew open, and a whole army of levitating, robotic drones wielding sledgehammers sped towards Sonic and Knuckles.
"Now that's more like it!" Knuckles shouted as he rushed towards the new foes with a pleased grin.
"A giant anvil, robots with hammers... What's next? Is Eggman gonna swing some huge wrecking ball at me?" Sonic lamented Eggman's typical habit of heavily thematic robot creations. Then he dashed forward to catch up with Knuckles right as the first of the sledgehammer bots reached the duo.
While Knuckles simply took out his first opponents with a strong punch each, Sonic ducked into another spindash and ricocheted through the crowd of robots. He took out a dozen or so this way before stopping in the middle of a tight group of the hammer-wielding foes.
"Hey, you with the hammer!" Sonic taunted the nearest robot by tapping it on its back. Immediately the robot turned around in alarm, reflexively swinging its weapon at Sonic. But Sonic quickly evaded, leaving the blow to instead smash one of the robot's unfortunate comrades instead.
"Oh, too bad! You missed!" Sonic taunted again from the other side of the confused robot. This time it turned and swung its hammer at the same time, but Sonic was still too fast. Another two robots fell to friendly fire as the original one quickly scanned for any sign of its intended target.
"Strike two!" Sonic shouted playfully from behind the robot again. This time another robot charged at Sonic at the same time that the first one turned around for another attempt. Both opponents succeeded in hitting each other with their strong overhead blows as Sonic dodged yet again, resulting in mutual destruction.
"You're out!" Sonic announced with a chuckle as he witnessed the comical end of his unfortunate enemy. He barely managed to duck in time as a mangled body of a robot whizzed by, striking more opponents behind him after narrowly missing Sonic.
"Quit messing around, Sonic! It's going to take all day to beat these guys if you keep playing with them one at a time!" Knuckles complained as he chucked another unfortunate victim back into a group of his robotic counterparts. Another sledgehammer bot took a swing at Knuckles from the side, but Knuckles easily side-stepped it and grabbed the large weapon by its head. Knuckles flashed a grin at the unfortunate robot, before quickly spinning in circles, crashing the robot's torso into all its nearby companions in a wide circle of destruction until Knuckles was left holding just a hammer with only one robotic arm still clamped to it.
Knuckles smirked smugly at Sonic amid the wreckage encompassing him. "Looks like I'm in the lead, Sonic," he boasted.
"Nuh uh, Knucklebrain. I got the big one at the start of the fight, remember?" Sonic replied.
"It still only counts as one," Knuckles countered.
"Oh yeah?" Sonic smirked. "Then how about you help me take a whack at these guys?" Sonic pointed to a line of robots heading straight towards them, then immediately started to charge another spindash.
"Heh, gladly," Knuckles said. He hurried behind Sonic and took aim at the spinning blue ball with his new weapon. "Fore!" he shouted as he struck Sonic with the hammer, sending the blue buzzsaw flying towards and through the row of enemies.
Sonic ricocheted off several more robots after plowing through the initial group, like a blue pinball of mass destruction. It wasn't long before nothing remained of the robotic army except for broken circuitry and scrap metal.
"I guess this means that I win, right?" Sonic announced, dusting off his gloved hands.
"No way! I helped with that last attack, so I get half!" Knuckles objected.
"Whatever," Sonic replied with a grin.
"Doctor Eggman, please wait for us!" Bocoe shouted as Eggman started to retreat.
"Yes, Doctor, let us join you!" Decoe also yelled towards Eggman's flying pod.
"Why aren't you two back there fighting Sonic like I told you to?" Eggman shouted back without even turning around. His two bumbling assistants were running as fast as they could through the rugged terrain below as they begged for their master to pick them up.
"But Doctor, Sonic already destroyed the Quake-O-Matic!" Decoe replied.
"Then that means he is fighting my Sledge-Hog Hammers right now! Why aren't you leading them?" Eggman interrogated his persistent followers.
"Do you really think that those contraptions have a chance at defeating Sonic, Doctor?" Bocoe asked in a skeptical tone.
"Of course not!" Eggman responded. "The Sledge-Hog Hammers were designed as decoys, just in case Sonic defeated my Quake-O-Matic, so that I could escape!"
"You mean that you planned to leave us behind all along?" Decoe spoke with both disbelief and a sense of betrayal.
"Well, when you put it that way, I do suppose it sounds a little heartless," Eggman was forced to admit.
"Doctor, how could you?!" Bocoe yelled at his uncaring master.
"But… I'm evil! You should expect this kind of behavior from an evil genius!" Eggman spoke on his own defense.
"What kind of evil genius would abandon his creations for no reason?" Decoe played the guilt trip tactic.
"Perhaps one that is more evil than he is genius," Bocoe joined in.
"All right, fine, you couple of crank-buckets! Here, climb in quickly!" Eggman said before stopping and tossing a rope ladder down to his robotic assistants.
"I'm not so certain that we even want to, now that we know how expendable you think we are," Bocoe responded while folding his arms.
"Then I'll leave you two to face Sonic alone!" Eggman bellowed. He quickly started to pilot his flying pod away again.
"Wait, Doctor! He didn't mean it! He must be malfunctioning! Please, slow down!" Decoe shouted in a panicked voice as both robots chased after Eggman's chair again. They both leapt as Eggman began flying over the cliff, narrowly grabbing the bottom rung of the trailing rope ladder and holding on for their mechanical lives.
Eggman heard a warning from his dashboard and quickly turned to look over his shoulder at the X-Tornado rapidly approaching from behind. "Gaah! Now you two have done it! You slowed me down long enough to let them catch up! Let's see if our little foxy friend is well enough to hold on to his lunch through this! Afterburners... ON!"
"Wait, Doctoooooooo...!" both of his dangling assistants tried to plead, but their voices were obfuscated by the deafening wind as Eggman's pod accelerated sharply.
"He's trying to get away!" Tails realized as Eggman's vehicle zoomed ahead.
"Not for long, right, Tails?" Chuck's voice spoke through the headset.
"Right, Chuck!" Tails answered as he slammed the throttle forward and the X-Tornado launched ahead in hot pursuit.
It was quickly obvious that Tails' jet was faster than the escaping Egg Pod as they gained quickly on the retreating Doctor. Eggman must have noticed, too, because he suddenly changed tactics and dove for the base of the mountains.
You think you're gonna scare me off with a little low altitude flying, Eggman? Tails thought as he dove after him. Sonic may still be faster, but the X-Tornado and I rule the skies!
"Tails, what are you...?!"
"Just hold on tight, Chuck!" Tails interrupted the elderly man's protest. He remained glued to Eggman's six o-clock as the two craft flew dangerously fast through the mountain valley, skimming the tops of the pine forest.
"Ouch! Ow! D-Doctor Eggman, can you not fly a little bit higher?" Decoe protested. The two unfortunate dangling robots were being bounced wildly off the peaks of passing trees, much to their protest.
"Quit your belly aching, you rust buckets! I happen to know as the one who created you both that you're incapable of feeling any pain!" Eggman shouted right back.
"But we are getting - Oof! - full of dents, Doctor!" Bocoe persisted.
"Just be quiet and let me concentrate!" Eggman growled in annoyance. Tails clearly wasn't shaken by the dangerous altitude, which meant he'd have to try more extreme maneuvers. He piloted his Egg Pod sharply to the left and sped directly towards a sheer cliff face.
"Has Eggman lost his mind?! Tails, at this speed if we keep following him...!" Chuck said in a panic.
"I'm not letting him get away with that Emerald, Chuck!" Tails doggedly insisted, refusing to pull out of the suicidal game of chicken.
"Doctor, look out for that cliff! Cliff! DOCTOR!" Bocoe and Decoe pleaded as the rugged mountainside loomed ever larger. At the last second Eggman finally pulled up and immediately slowed to a stop, causing the rope ladder to swing in a very large arch.
Eggman focused a crosshair on the empty sky ahead of him, directly in the path he would have been traveling moments ago. He gave a toothy sneer as the X-Tornado quickly zoomed directly into his trap, pressing a red button that launched several missiles at his target. "You should have stayed in bed, you foxy fr-AAAAGH!"
"Wow, did we ever get lucky to land on something soft after being flung off that ladder!" Bocoe said in relief.
"Do I look like a landing pad to you?! Get off of me this instant!" Eggman yelled from underneath the two robots.
"Tails, incoming!" Chuck warned as the centripetal force of the X-Tornado's near-vertical ascent crushed him into his seat.
"I see it!" Tails responded, but he was left with very few options. Dodging would be very challenging at this short range, especially with the risk of barrel-rolling into the mountain beside him. They were also too low to try a loop. Tails felt sweat on his brow as he worried that maybe there wasn't anything they could do, but just then he remembered. "Hold on!" he commanded as he pulled a hidden lever.
"I wish you'd stop saying that!" Chuck replied as the X-Tornado started to transform in midair. The back half of the plane split apart and swung forward, large hands emerging from the former engines.
"Battle Armor mode!" Tails announced triumphantly. Out from the wrist of the left arm, a long blade quickly extended. Tails slashed at the oncoming missiles with the large blade, bifurcating each one with expert precision. But even with his keen eye, Tails missed one. As the lone surviving missile screamed towards his cockpit, Tails quickly brought the right arm up to guard. A shield emerged from its wrist, barely getting in place fast enough to block the final missile.
"Hurry up and move over, you nincompoops! I hear my missiles exploding and I want to watch the flaming wreck...age..." Eggman finally got freed from underneath Decoe and Bocoe, only to look up at a giant sword being leveled just a few feet from his head. "T-Tails! Ah ha ha... I-It suddenly occurs to me that I might owe you an apology for all this," Eggman said as he shrank back in his chair.
"You went too far with this one, Eggman!" Tails spoke through an external speaker. "Not only did you really scare me, but you really hurt my friends when you made them have to choose between my life or everyone else's! That's a new low, even for you!"
"W-Why, I don't recall threatening anyone else's life, Tails," Eggman tried to calmly reason with the irate fox in order to save his head. "I merely suggested a trade for the Chaos Emeralds. There was nothing dishonest about that."
"Not dishonest?! Eggman, this whole thing was because of your lie about an Egg Virus that never existed!" Tails protested.
"Well, I, err... umm..." Eggman floundered for any sort of angle he could use to weasel his way out of this predicament. "Fine, you're right, Tails. I'll admit that this time I was a bit more... underhanded than usual. And as a token of good faith, I'll return the Emerald I stole."
"Really? I mean- Yeah, you'd better!" Tails was initially stunned that Eggman would just surrender. "And no tricks this time, Eggman!"
"My dear Tails... I may be evil, but I'm still a big enough man to admit when I've been beaten by a worthy adversary," Eggman promised.
"If Doctor Eggman isn't big enough, then who would be?" Bocoe whispered to Decoe in the back of the Egg Pod.
Eggman grit his teeth in rage as he overheard the insult from behind him, but now wasn't the time to deal with smart-talking robots. "Here you are, Tails. I give you back the Emerald, and we both pretend like this whole Egg Virus scheme never happened. Deal?" Eggman offered as he held out the clear Chaos Emerald.
Tails hesitated. Something about this didn't feel right still. But how else were they going to get the Chaos Emerald back from Eggman? It just felt too easy to simply take it from him willingly, though, even if Tails had Eggman cornered with no other choice.
"Hello? Are you going to take it from me or not?" Eggman chided. "Honestly, you and your friends would never hesitate to steal the Emeralds from me if I found them fair and square, but now I can't even give one away?"
Tails scowled as he maneuvered one of the X-Tornado's hands to grab the Chaos Emerald from Eggman, retracting his weapons in the process.
"Now, I trust you'll hold up to your end of the deal, Tails?" Eggman asked once the Chaos Emerald was returned.
"...Fine. You can go, Eggman," Tails hesitantly agreed.
"I always knew you were an honorable adversary," Eggman said with a toothy grin. His pod quickly started to hover away. "Next time, perhaps I'll go back to offering a fair fight, just for old time's sake," he vowed.
"Do you really mean that, Doctor?" Decoe asked quietly while they escaped.
"About as much as that bogus Emerald I just gave him," Eggman sneered and chuckled as he sped away.
"Great job, Tails! I have to say, I'm impressed with how forceful you were!" Chuck congratulated his partner from his silent observation post in the rear cockpit.
"Oh, sorry, Chuck. I guess I kind of let Eggman get to me a bit this time," Tails quickly apologized.
"Not at all! Tails, I was complimenting you!" Chuck clarified. "You really stood up for yourself and the rest of us. I'm proud of you, and I'm sure Sonic will be too once we show him that Emerald."
"Heh, I guess I did do pretty good this time," Tails nervously admitted. "So let's go show him!"
"Just remember to change the X-Tornado back to its normal form before we try to land," Chuck reminded him with a chuckle.
I'm never going to live that one down, am I? Tails thought to himself, remembering the first time he'd used Battle Armor mode to 'safely' board the Egg Fort.
It was only a few minutes later when Sonic and Knuckles looked up to see the X-Cyclone landing on its two legs at the top of the mountain. No sooner than it touched down, Tails popped the hatch to his cockpit canopy and leapt to the ground. He quickly dashed over to Sonic as he held out the clear Emerald in his hands. "Hey, Sonic! Guess what?" Tails announced with a grin across his face.
"All right, Tails! I knew you could do it!" Sonic stated proudly as he flashed a thumb's up.
"Yep! It was no sweat, Sonic! I even made Eggman apologize for the whole Egg Virus lie, too," Tails blurted out, ecstatic that he had impressed his big brother.
"Not bad, little guy," Knuckles said. "I guess that means now we finally have all seven... Hold on a minute," he paused, taking the Emerald from Tails to inspect it closer.
"What is it, Knuckles?" Tails asked.
Knuckles' reply was to simply crunch the Chaos Emerald in his fist. Everyone gasped as the gem shattered in his hand, shards of the crystal falling to the rocky ground.
"Have you lost your mind, Knuckles?!" Chuck cried out in disbelief. "You just destroyed a Chaos Emerald!"
"Heh, I may be tough, but I'm nowhere near strong enough to even crack a real Chaos Emerald," Knuckles replied as he dusted the shards from his hand.
"But that means..." Sonic realized.
"Eggman gave me a fake Emerald and kept the real one," Tails' face sagged as he realized what a fool he'd been to trust Eggman. "I knew it seemed too easy when he just handed it over like that. I guess he tricked me again." He kicked his foot at the ground in disappointment, scattering a small cloud of dust.
"Don't worry, little bro," Sonic said in a condoling voice, "Everyone makes mistakes. Besides, it's all because of you that Eggman didn't get all six Emeralds from my big screw up."
"Ha! Now Tails got double tricked by Eggman, too! I have vindication!" Knuckles shouted triumphantly.
"Whoa, where'd you learn a word that big, Knucklebrain?" Sonic noted in surprise. "Do you even know what it means?"
"Well, he did use it in a sentence properly, so I guess so," Tails pointed out, equally amazed.
"Of course I do!" Knuckles asserted. "For your information, I happen to have a lot of time to myself while I'm guarding the Master Emerald. That, and a dictionary."
Everyone laughed light-heartedly at Knuckles' confession. "Then I suppose it's time for you to vamoose, isn't it, Knuckles?" Tails said.
"Did you just call me a moose?" Knuckles replied defensively.
"No, no. I said 'vamoose'; it means... Actually, nevermind. You can look it up yourself later," Tails answered.
"I will! And it better not be an insult, or this is the last time I do you any favors!" Knuckles warned. "Later!" he said dismissively before jumping off the cliff and gliding away.
"I guess we can't give Knuckles such a hard time about being tricked all the time now," Sonic admitted.
"About being tricked, Sonic…" Chuck broke in after a slight pause following Sonic's last statement.
"I know, Chuck," Sonic interrupted Chuck's apology. "Go ahead and say 'I told you so.' I deserve it."
"No, Sonic," Chuck quickly corrected. "What I wanted to say is that I am very sorry for anything that I said earlier that may have upset you. I know that you care for Tails more than anybody, and I understand why you stole the Chaos Emeralds. In fact, I almost did exactly what you did myself."
"Hey, don't sweat it, Chuck," Sonic instantly responded. "I wasn't thinking straight, either. And I said a few things I probably shouldn't have, too."
"So, I guess other than Eggman getting away with one of our Chaos Emeralds, everything turned out fine," Tails noted, relieved that his two best friends had made up.
"Better than that, Tails! You are healthy again!" Sonic said as he pumped his fists in joy. "I say that this calls for a party when we get back home!"
"I agree!" Chuck nodded. "As a matter of fact, Ella should already be cooking a celebration dinner as we speak."
"Sounds good to me!" Tails cheered as everyone boarded the X-Cyclone again, and they took off towards Station Square.