"A multitude of rulers is not a good thing. Let there be one ruler, one king."

- Homer, The Iliad

Blaze was sick.

It was the worst possible timing, too. Silver tried to busy himself, stretching his arm and working out the lingering damage from the other day. By himself, the burns would have healed over the course of a few days, but with Blaze's Sol Emerald, he had been able to recover literally overnight. Some of the new patches of skin he'd grown were a bit itchy and still stung, but it was nothing to worry about. He'd come back from far worse, fighting Iblis. Emerging from the bathroom, having washed her face, Blaze's face was serious.

"You ready?" she asked, pointedly trying to keep him from asking her that same thing.

"Blaze," he asked anyway, "Are you ok?"

Heading into her room, she disappeared.

"Blaze?" he asked again.

"I'm fine," she called out, trying to assuage his concerns. "Just had a rough night, I guess. And now, I… I just feel a little sick. Probably ate something bad from the market."

"I actually had a rough night, too," Silver admitted, taking out his shoes and sitting down to put them on. "Dreamed about Iblis…"

"So did I…" Blaze didn't go into any detail, a sure sign that her dream must have been particularly bad. Silver's had been no walk in the park earlier. In his dream, Iblis followed them into the past, destroying everything. In the end, he and Blaze and Mephilies had tried to stop him, but their mysterious ally had disappeared, and Blaze had been burned alive. Silver had tried to keep fighting, but his powers began to fail. He'd awoken just moments before a wave of lava would have swept into him.

His shoes back on, Silver reached over to the table in the middle of the room. Blaze had left the Sol Emerald in here to help him heal. Holding it carefully in his hands, Silver stared into the multi-faceted gemstone. It was more a diamond than an emerald, about fist sized in its normal state, and about as thick as his thumb was long (maybe just a little less). Blaze had only been able to bring the one Sol Emerald back into the past with them, but it would suffice. Mephilies had said they would only need one, anyway.

The giant diamond felt cool in his hands, like a block of ice.

Silver stared deeply into its faceted surface, but saw no reflection. Instead, the void within the Emerald seemed to stare back up and into him. His powers came from chaos energy, just like Blaze's, but he knew so little about it. This was the era of great advances in those strange sciences that delved into the mystery of the Emeralds, but by Silver's time, whatever knowledge the present day geniuses unearthed had been forgotten by the common man. Where did the Sol Emeralds come from? What was their power? Why could some tap into their powers, while so many could not?

"Silver," Blaze said emerging from her room fully dressed. Aside from her normal preference in clothes - the exotic lilac and white combination – she also wore a brown hooded traveling cloak. They had to remain discrete, after all, especially now that the mobian authorities were on to them.

"Here!" he stood up and handed over the Sol Emerald. Blaze took it, and held it up to her throat. She wore a gold necklace, and when close to it, the diamond glowed and vanished. The necklace took on a polished sheen.

Blaze's hand, however, still rested on it.

"Blaze?"

"Mm, its nothing, just…" Blaze's fingers trailed over the metal. "The Emerald feels a little different today."

"It's just a rock," Silver remarked. "It isn't alive."

"I know, but," she fumbled for words. "Sometimes, I swear the energy has moods. Maybe it's just reflecting our own unease back at us."

Silver threw on his own traveling cloak.

"I think I'll actually kind of miss this place," he realized, taking a look around the apartment they had rented in, and lived in, for much of their time in the past. There had been other hide outs, but this one had been the most like an actual home, broken down and troublesome as it was.

Blaze opened the door, for what was likely the last time ever.

"Me, too, Silver."

"Well!" he flipped up the hood on his cloak. "Shall we go change the future?"

Turning off the light as they left, Blaze and Silver headed out.

The two soldiers were not being particularly gentle with their captive. Blindfolded and handcuffed, Scott had long since given up struggling. The morning had started like any other: he had gotten up, listened to the radio while he ate breakfast, and then headed out to catch the shuttle from the residential area where he lived. Except this time, he'd been intercepted on his way to work by two men in uniform. The next thing he knew, they'd put a hood over his head and tied it tight before cuffing him.

He wasn't sure how long ago that had been. Maybe an hour or two. They'd taken him to a facility, where he'd felt someone taking a hand print and a pinprick of blood for a DNA scan. He'd been thrown into holding after that: a stark white cell with no window. Later, the soldiers came for him again, giving him the same treatment. He'd demanded to talk to a lawyer, or to get a chance to call one, but the stony silent troopers hadn't answered.

Scott winced as his hood and blindfolds were suddenly removed, filling his vision with a bright light. Rubbing his eyes with his still cuffed hands, the badger looked up and saw fluorescent lights above him. False walls were propped up behind him, and to his right and left. His view forward, though, helped to identify where he was. It was the wind tunnel in the construction facility near the hangar. A fold out table lay in front of him, and a chair behind.

With a sudden shove, the two soldiers forced him down into the seat.

"That's fine. Leave him be."

Scott recognized the voice instantly. Being where he was, taken here by soldiers, and now him, it had to mean…! The soldiers backed off and left without a word. Scott couldn't see their faces: they had helmets on, with polarized visors drawn down. The badger did see one familiar face, however. Tails walked into view, holding a chair in his hands.

Putting the chair down, the fox sat in it.

"Scott the Badger. With no formal surname or identification prior to de-roboticization, you adopted the breed nomenclature," Tails recited, as if reading, but from memory. "Estimated age: 29 years old. Returned to being full organic on April 18th, 3234. Registered on March, 3234. Citizenship test passed on August fifth, same year. Social ID: 45201-67033. Having retained a degree of your programmed robian knowledge, you entered the engineering program here in Knothole. Graduated in Spring, 3235. Served six months in the MAF Corps of Engineers. Recommended by Rotor for Knothole Land Reclamation Project…"

The kitsune nodded to himself. "On April second of this year, you incurred a substantial debt. According to transactions, you withdrew ninety two percent of your assets, which are now unaccounted for. Did you get in over your head? Bet too much on a hand of Pazzak? Or maybe a Royal Flush that didn't pan out?"

"I…" Scott gulped, composing his answer. "I don't know what you're talking about, sir."

Tails tilted his head, looking at the badger with cold midnight blue eyes.

"My men have already searched your condominium. To me, you're already a dead man, hanging from the gallows. That's how the King deals with traitors, you know." The kitsune fox leaned back in his chair. "Let me assure you: there is nothing you can do, no way to talk your way out of this. Your life is over."

Scott sucked in a breath. "Sir! I…"

"No." Tails held up his hand, cutting the mobian off before he could try and make some excuse. "You life is over, but I am going to give you a choice."

Reaching behind, Tails retrieved a weapon: a handgun. Ejecting the clip, he showed the captive mobian that it was fully loaded. He then pulled back the slide, showing the bullet that was still in the chamber. Tails then flipped it around, and put the gun on the table.

"Your choice is this," the fox said, sounding completely impartial. "You can let the executioner fit you for a knot, or you can go out with some degree of honor. You've chosen how to live; now I'll let you choose how to die."

Thinking it over for only a second, Scott reached across the table and grabbed the weapon. Except instead of taking aim at himself, he directed the barrel at his captor. Tails didn't seem particularly surprised or worried. He even closed his eyes.

"Is that how it is?" he asked, deadpan.

"I had to do it!" Scott yelled, holding the weapon tightly. With his right thumb, he pulled back the trigger. "I owed them so much money! They'd have killed me! Don't move! I know what you can do!"

With a suffering sigh, Tails got up out of the chair.

"I said don't move!" Even without meaning to, his trembling hands squeezed the trigger.

A single shot rang out.

"You should be more careful," Miles Prower observed, half his face obscured by one of his tails. The tail turned from solid to fluffy, and lowered back down to the ground. Across from him, Scott was hunched over, a hole in his forehead leaking blood onto his knees, running rivulets down his legs and feet. Miles inclined his head, face impassive.

Ricochets could be very dangerous.

Walking slowly back to the door, he knocked twice. Stepping out, he saw the two soldiers standing guard. They were from the Department of Emergency Management, and both were mobians Miles had transferred from his own personally trained security forces. Even if his Knothole staff had been infiltrated, Miles knew his personal forces to be ideologically screened for any such motivational failures.

"He was the last of them. How pathetic…" the fox crossed his arms in what could only be called vexation. "Not a single one decided to die with a shred of dignity."

"Sir?" one of the soldiers prompted, waiting for an order.

"Take the bodies to the molecular recycler out back. We'll make some use of them in death, if not in life."

While others saw to it, Miles left the hangar and stood in the early morning light. It felt good: the sunlight. It felt better: getting rid of those informants that had infiltrated his Knothole facilities. The worst of the lot, he had left to choose their own fate. The others, the ones he suspected but had no solid proof of, he would simply fire. That left the three he had uncovered who had dual loyalties, working for him, but reporting secretly to Sally. Those, he would keep and give the mushroom treatment to: he would feed them shit and keep them in the dark.

It was time to bring in some fresh blood, to replace the day's losses. He could see them now, the first vanguards of the final phase of the war. Normally, the morning would find him by the Ring Pool, but this was a special occasion. His Tornado Two Custom lay lazily in the sun, soaking it up. The tinted cockpit would stay cool, but it would provide a symbol for the others to come.

Miles waited, watching the sky.

THE CYCLE OF AGES

CHAPTER SIX:

War Machine (The Wolf and the Sheep)

The Scar.

Formerly the 'Scrap Brain Zone' or simply 'Area 67.' Southeast of the Great Forest and Knothole lay a graveyard of machines and men. Before the Great War, it had been a major military hub and center of industry. When war broke out, it vanished under a plume of atomic fire. Years later, Robotnick had rebuilt and refitted it into a major base of operations, dubbing the complex of great automated factories the Scrap Brain. When Sonic infiltrated the base in an effort to shut it down, a cascade of explosions rocked the facilities, leveling the entire area.

In the present, Area 67 was a desolate landscape of treacherous ruins. Like The Ring, it was one of the frontlines in the war against the Eggman Empire. With the robotic enemy squeezed between the Great Forest to the west and the Marble Zone Mountains to the east, the battle lines ran from the mountains in the east to the Acorn Bay in the south, and from The Ring in the south to Starlight City in the north. Most of the southern operations were conducted by the Freedom Fighters, waging a guerilla war, while the northern front fell to the revitalized and reorganized MAF (Mobian Armed Forces).

Area 67 was a line of fortifications and trenches, supporting the mobian push south and east. It was also the current headquarters of the MAF's Army Group North. Fighting over the last month had recently turned into a standstill, as the Eggman Empire adopted a more defensive attrition based approach to the conflict. Still, it was one of the most heavily defended areas on Mobius.

At 08:40 hours, Mobotropolis Standard Time, several blips appeared on long range theater radar systems. Although the contacts came from the east, the initial intelligence estimate was that it was advance elements of the Eggman Air Armada, most of which had been destroyed in the Battle of Station Square. A series of reconnaissance drones were launched to determine the makeup of the invading fleet, and their projected target.

Jet stood over the briefing table on board the Black Fleet's current flagship, the BBA Port Royale. Not that he really considered it worthy of the title 'flagship.' The Port Royale was a mere Tortuga-class Brigandine, and while it was the most powerful ship in the Black Fleet, it would never have been a match for Admiral Bean's Trinidad-class Battlecruiser, or the old Battlebird Armada command ship, the Havana. But that was the sad state of the fleet, after years of infighting and combat losses (a great many due the actions of a certain two tailed foxboy).

Beside the Babylon Rogue stood an elderly peregrine falcon, a terrible scar running over his face and blotting out one eye. Admiral Tao had been a destroyer captain in the Great War – a profession generally considered to be a death sentence. The old Kingdom used destroyer groups as torpedo fodder, to tie up and encircle human fleets piecemeal. It was fine when it worked, but destroyer and sloop losses had always been disproportionately heavy. In the end, they'd lost the air war anyway. That Tao survived was a credit to his leadership and ability in the field.

When the fleet mutinied against the Kintobor Coup, refusing to turn themselves over for robotic enhancement, they formed the Battlebird Armada. For a time, they had fought to carve out a homeland of their own, among the islands and former trade lanes, however, patriotic attacks against Eggman shipping soon evolved into a broader war of subjugation and conquest against all land dwelling peoples. This had been the dream of the last Great Battlebird, leader of the Armada.

During that time, a young kitsune fox had been found during a raid on the mainland. This boy survived the slave pens, and his mechanical aptitude had been discovered by the Armada's demolitions and explosive expert: then-Colonel Bean. At first, the fox proved to be a valuable asset. He could even fly, and so many began to speculate that he would be the only non-avian to be accepted by the Armada as more than a slave. Bean's crowning achievement, with the boy helping his team, was the Maelstrom: a bomb capable of producing force just short of a tactical nuclear device. However, shortly after the initial test destroyed the village of Santa Christi, Bean's protégé went rogue.

Miles Prower turned against the Armada, and stealing several prototype weapons, he waged a campaign that tore the fleet in half. During the final battle, after the Great Battlebird himself lay defeated, Bean staged a revolt, killing the Battlebird and seizing power. Miles disappeared, and the remaining Armada split into four parts: the first was Bean's White Fleet, which the Babylon Rogues soon joined. The second was the Golden Armada, led by Admiral Hawk, which lost a pivotal battle over the Ginger Islands but remained partly intact. The third fleet, naming themselves the Bloody Robins, was destroyed by a trap set by Eggman Armada. Lastly, the Black Fleet, led by Admiral Tao, turned west and to piracy and smuggling.

Tao narrowed his one good eye at the battlefield laid out before them. An array of holograms projected, displaying topography, enemy instillations, and other targets. Different quadrants and sectors were outlined, as were projections indicating the range of enemy air defenses. Clockwise from Tao, the other captains of the Fleet's ships stood in attendance, their images appearing on screens built into the walls. All of them had smaller but basically identical map rooms on their ships.

"Their defenses are slightly different than what our intelligence indicated," Tao observed, pointing down at an area to outline it in red. "We can affect a breakthrough here, if we can take out these overlapping air defenses…" he pointed at another sector. "This will allow us to land troops and seize the objective, here."

"Jet," Tao addressed the Babylon Rogue, as he highlighted several targets. "Your targets are these mobile SAM sites, and these radar stations. An additional squadron will attack these hardened bunkers, here, and this road. When your objectives are completed, you may engage any further targets of opportunity as you see fit. We will be relying on your Rogues and our air wings to pave the way for our capital ships."

Jet smirked at the challenge. "I'll get it done."

Tao nodded. "We will hold echelon formation until contact with the enemy. We expect the local air forces to consist of no more than four capital-class vessels, all either refits or captured ships. Let the Port Royale take the lead, and strike from the flanks. We've done all this before; we will do so again. That is all."

The screens with the other captains winked out. When they were alone, Tao's one eye turned to the only other mobian present.

"I do hope this enterprise is worth the losses we will take, Babylonian," Tao grumbled.

"Tao, I didn't think you'd be getting nervous this late in the game. Don't you worry…" Jet chuckled in apparent amusement. "Once we have the item, the power and mysteries of Babylon itself will be at our disposal."

Tao saluted. "Fight hard, Wing Commander."

"Well, restraint in battle isn't something I believe in anyway," Jet replied, quickly saluting and exiting the room. When he was gone, Tao's eye turned to the display of the battlefield again.

"The power and the mystery of Babylon… and yet," Tao wondered out loud, stroking his chin. "Did Babylon itself not fall?"

Sally had never seen the Blue Typhoon before.

She knew about it, of course. It was the largest ship in what passed for the Royal Navy; the hull had been a gift from Station Square and Sally's mother, Queen Alicia, had christened it when it was first 'launched' at the converted Oil Ocean Shipyards. Tails had taken it with him to the Battle of Westopolis in Downunda, but it had never come anywhere near Knothole. It was very much one of their trump cards, but Sally had still never actually seen it with her own eyes.

Her surprise had been genuine when she found out that Tails had ordered it into the area to the east, to pick up supplies and transfer military craft. Exactly what military craft, she hadn't even known up until a few minutes ago. These projects had always been Tails' responsibility – she had no experience organizing fighter aircraft much less capital ships or Air Armadas – but it was starting to get annoying, having him pull these big stunts without forewarning.

Looking out the shuttle window, Sally could see the ship itself: it was narrow, with an easily identifiable front and rear section. The latter consisted of the engines, and it was covered with jutting angular armor, giving that area double the normal protection. Five armored corridors and a lattice of metalwork connected the engines to the main body. This section reminder her of the body of a fish, with a gaping maw at the front; a single inner section could be seen, with windows, but dominating most of the visible structure above and below it were armored sections, with no windows, and only red warning lights. The tip of a large cannon assembly could be just barely seen, peeking out from the upper half of the 'fish's mouth,' while both the above and bottom halves supported numerous weapons emplacements. Large stubby wings sprouted from the middle of the ship, halfway to the rear of the forward section.

Her shuttle maneuvered towards one of the open hangers that projected outwards from those slanted stubby wings. This meant that the hangers were perpendicular to the main axis of acceleration of the ship. Closer, she could see a bright light adjacent to the open hangar doors, on the open outside areas created by the slanted shape of the wings. Two point defense turrets swiveled in their mounts, but it was another beam that reached out to touch their ship. The shuttle buckled a bit, but then settled down as it was guided in. A series of landing lights blinked in midair, but were actually suspended by a long thin boom.

Sitting next to her, Sonic was also looking outside the window.

He whistled in obvious appreciation, and spoke up, "Boy, pretty big, huh?"

It was his first time seeing it, too, though Sonic had to have seen dozens of capital-class warships in his time at Station Square. From reports, the human fleet at the time had been quite large – and powerful enough to make offensive strikes against the Eggman Empire as well. The Terran "New Navy" had so badly mauled the Eggman Armada during the final Battle for Station Square that it was still recovering, much to the Kingdom's relief. The modern Royal Navy wasn't even in the same league.

"It is pretty big," Sally agreed, still looking up and down the length of it. She'd read, on paper, that it was some hundred and sixty meters long, and over thirty meters in girth and height. Actually seeing it suspended in the sky, defying gravity, made it seem all the more impressive. She also carefully bit back the initial feeling of awe she felt. This sort of technology had also been what they had fought against for a long time.

Didn't it contravene the natural laws to have such a thing floating in midair?

At the same time, what better way to fight an implacable foe than with his own weapons? Heading off for Station Square, Sally had never imagined that Tails would return so… inspired. Before that, he and Rotor had always seemed content to build some explosives to blow up Robotnick's factories, or to help her hack into this security system or another. The return of her father, though, and the rebuilding of the MAF had changed things. Mobians would be fighting anyway; mobians without super powers, so why shouldn't they do so with the best weapons possible? She had agreed, despite her natural suspicion towards non-Nicole technology.

"I can't believe Tails designed this… thing…" Sally wasn't sure what to call it. She'd heard the pilots refer to the ship as a she. A she! As if it were alive!

"Anything that flies," Sonic replied, falling back into his seat. The shuttle only had room for five, besides the pilot and copilot. Roaring through the sky, Sally had seen other larger shuttles, probably for boarding actions or deploying troops. Then there had been the fighter craft, all of which looked like Tails' Tornado Two. Sally sighed and also leaned back, looking up at the ceiling.

"You ok, Sal?" Sonic had noticed her agitation. "Something wrong?"

"I don't really like flying that much…"

"It's not just that, is it?"

She smiled at him, glad he could tell that much. For some reason, he was being a lot more attentive than usual. He'd even come over to talk the other day and hammer out their misunderstandings about Tempest. The kitsune was just a friend, but it was cute how worked up Sonic had gotten, despite his attempts to hide it. It was unlike Sonic to admit that sort of stuff, so Sally suspected Tails had talked him into it. The two of them shared everything between each other, after all, just like best friends, or even brothers.

"No," she admitted. "It isn't just that. I'm not looking forward to telling Tails he can't take Knothole's Chaos Emerald."

"Ah, don't sweat it!" Sonic declared with a grin. "He'll understand!"

"I don't understand…" Miles said between clenched teeth. "What do you mean, I'll have to launch without it?"

"The Emerald is too important to the city, Tails," Sally put on her authoritative voice. It was the same one she had used in the past to convince him not to go on this or that mission when it was too dangerous, and it had never failed to get across her point. "You designed the shield yourself. I won't risk it."

"That is why we're going to retrieve the other emerald," Miles argued. "The Solid State shield will only be down until we come back. The cloak won't even flicker."

She added a frown, too. "I said no, Tails."

For a few seconds, there was deathly silence on the bridge. Sally remained where she stood, standing next to him; her hands on her hips. Her kitsune protégé sat in the Captain's seat of the bridge, his expression and posture rigid. He closed his eyes for a few seconds, but his face remained expressionless. The rest of the bridge, buried deep within the ship, was completely silent. The Captain's chair was on a raised area, while the other five members of the bridge crew sat in sunken stations around it: two to the left, two to the right, and the helm officer in the front. A vast array of holographic projections and displays mimicked the effect of the bridge being out in the 'open air.'

Miles reached over to a button on his chair.

"Nicole," he said, slowly. "You have the bridge."

Nicole's lynx avatar materialized to his right, appearing full size and almost Sally's height. Sonic nearly jumped, since he had been standing right next to her holographic projector without even realizing it.

Sally's eyes widened in delight. "Nicole! I didn't know you were on board!"

"This ship is sufficiently sophisticated to house a perfect copy of me," Nicole answered with a friendly smile. "Minus certain time encoded memory files, of course. I periodically update myself by contacting the original Nicole. Our memories and persona are only as synchronous as the frequency of my updates."

"Well, you certainly sound like her," Sonic spoke up. "I understood maybe half that."

"Nicole," Miles interrupted, before she could start. "Why don't you explain it to Sonic while you attend to the bridge? Princess Sally, I'd like to continue this conversation in my ready room."

Getting up, he walked off to the left, where a door adjacent to the bridge opened on his approach. Sally followed him inside. His ready room was also obviously his quarters on the ship; walking past a retractable privacy screen, Sally could see a fair sized fold out bed currently mounted and folded up to a recessed space in the wall. The room was trapezoidal, with the western wall being longer than the eastern one (where the bed was folded up). A table along the west wall displayed a handful of artifacts and antique devices, while the rest of it was taken up by a pair of 'windows' that displayed real time images from the outside of the ship. There was a desk near the back, and behind it, the door to what was likely a bathroom. Several other pictures of aircraft and ships were mounted on the slanted southern wall.

"Tails…" she started to say.

"Princess Sally," he said her name with a cold anger that she couldn't ever recall hearing. He turned from where he stood, next to his desk. "I'll ask you to not speak to me so disrespectfully on my ship. I would also appreciate it if you referred to me as Captain Prower. Or simply Captain."

"Captain Prower?" she repeated. It didn't sound right. "Why?"

He ground his teeth together in undisguised aggravation. "A Captain is the ultimate authority on his ship, and I also happen to be the highest ranked political and military officer in this region of the country. While you are the Crown Princess and the head of the Freedom Fighters, you technically have no authority to give me orders when I leave Knothole. Only the King, the current Warmaster (of which there is none), or the Minister of War may do so."

Sally stiffened. "I see."

Miles nodded in apparent satisfaction. "Princess."

"Captain."

She shifted a little uncomfortably, and glanced out the faux window.

"Captain," she began. "Your request to appropriate the Chaos Emerald currently powering the Knothole city shield is denied."

"I've told you," he replied, sounding rather bothered by having to repeat himself. "No harm will come to the city. The cloak worked fine before without an Emerald."

"We'll be vulnerable to attack," Sally countered. "The cloak only keeps us hidden."

"There hasn't been fighting near Knothole for months. Not since we pushed the Eggman back into The Ring, and cut him off at Starlight. Now is the time to push harder," Miles explained, eyes glinting at the prospect. "However, the Blue Typhoon needs a Chaos Emerald to achieve its full power! Once we begin offensive operations, we won't have to worry about Knothole. We'll be taking the fight to the enemy, not vice versa."

"It's a risk I'm not willing to take," Sally said, her stance on the issue unchanged. She could see what he meant, but she couldn't in good conscience weaken their defenses. More people depended on the Knothole city shield than on continued 'offensives.'

Miles frowned at her intransigence. "You're making a mistake. You're being too timid."

"Timid?" Sally snapped. "How dare you! I was fighting Robotnick when you were just a toddler!"

"I've been fighting since I was a toddler!" he snapped right back, taking a bold step towards her. "Where were you on West Island?! Where were you in Downunda? Where were you when Sonic and I stopped Robotnick on Angel Island? Where were you? You were hiding with your tail between your legs!"

She hit him.

Sally regretted it as soon as she realized she'd done it. Her palm quivered in the air, red from the impact. She'd hit him harder in training, even in mock fights, but she'd never hit him; never slapped him; never disciplined him. Tails had never needed to be disciplined. He had always done as he was told, efficiently and to the best of his ability.

"Tails!" she cried, clutching her hand to her chest. "I…"

"I deserved that," he interrupted, holding up his hand. With his other, he experimentally touched his cheek, where he'd been struck. "I was out of line, and spoke without thinking. I see we just have different ways of looking at this issue."

She agreed, but she also wanted to talk about what had just transpired between them. Tails was never hot headed. He always thought things through, and planned ahead. Sometimes those plans went awry, but he never just jumped in. He was so unlike Sonic in that way. That he's lost his cool, and that she'd hit him… it was something she'd never imagined, in all their years together.

"Tails, I shouldn't have… hit you…" she broached an apology. "I'm sorry."

"Didn't I already say I deserved it?" He shrugged. "I'm not concerned about that."

"I am!"

He seemed honestly perplexed. "Why?"

"Because…" She struggled to say it, though she wasn't sure why it didn't come naturally. "You're like family to me. I've known you longer than my real brother… and I love you. I'd never hurt you, Tails."

"I'm not worried about that," his response was simple, and didn't address anything, at least in her view.

"Don't you…?"

"Sally," he used her familiar name, instead of Princess, and she took note of it. His tone of voice softened, though he made no gesture to go along with it. "I'll always hold a place in my heart for you. You and Sonic. But just like I don't mimic everything he does anymore, don't expect me to do the same to you. I am me, and no one else."

"I'm sorry, Captain," she inclined her head. "You'll have to get your Emerald elsewhere."

"Very well…" Miles consented, finally. "However, when I recapture the Egg Carrier, as I've discussed doing, this argument will just come back. And next time, I'll have your father backing me up."

"I'll deal with that when it comes," Sally replied. The issue had only been put off, but at least it was settled for the time being.

"Captain," Nicole's voice came in over the ship's intercom. "We're receiving a message from Army Group North and Supreme Commandant Burke. Shall I patch him through to your ready room?"

"Go ahead, Nicole," Miles said, turning to one of the faux windows, where a sea of clouds had settled in around them. The window immediately turned back into a view screen that switched to displaying a logo of the Kingdom of Acorn. Below the logo, the transmission code, date, and registry were listed.

A second later, the face of a mobian otter appeared, his hair was cropped back and he wore the black and brown colored coat and uniform of a political officer. As the King still had a lingering fear of a coup, he had Secret Service men installed with the authority to nip any potential military revolutions in the bud. For all practical purposes, it was these Commandants who actually ran many of the Kingdom's military forces, rather than his appointed Great War educated Generals and Colonels.

"Undersecretary Prower…" the mobian noticed Sally, and inclined his eyebrow in surprise. "Princess."

"What is the situation, Commandant?" Miles asked, holding his hands behind his lower back.

"We have a bit of a situation developing here." Burke glanced off to his side for a moment. "Several capital-class ships have entered our air space, and just moments ago, they began launching fighter and drone craft. Several of these vessels appear to have once been elements of the Royal Air Force."

"Battlebirds…" Miles growled.

"Battlebirds?" Sally wasn't familiar with the term.

"Remnants of the old RAF. They turned to piracy when Robotnick seized power," Miles answered, quickly filling her in. "I destroyed most of them before I met Sonic."

Sally was left almost speechless by that. "Before you…?"

Miles nodded. "I used some of them when I retook Westopolis and Downunda. But there shouldn't be more than a few scattered ships left. The Babylon Rogues must be with them."

"I suspect they are after the Emerald held in Facility-7," Burke said, sounding slightly worried. "We could use some assistance, and the Typhoon is in the area."

"I'll change course immediately. What ships do you have available for your immediate defense?" Miles asked.

Burke glanced down, at what, they couldn't tell. Probably a report.

"We have…" he read them off, "The Prince Edward, the Prince James, the Prince Emerson, and the Frederick. The Frederick is slightly damaged, but can still fight. Field repairs on the Prince James have been going slowly, and she has only limited maneuverability."

"Hold off on a counterattack as long as you can," Miles replied. "Let them bleed themselves getting to the Facility. I'll be there as soon as possible."

"Very well," the Commandant acknowledged. "Burke out."

The signal terminated, turning back into the logo.

"Nicole!" Miles called, talking as he strode back to the bridge. "Ready all hands, and warm up the engines. We head out in one hundred and twenty seconds. Princess, you have two minutes to get to your shuttle, if you please."

"I'd actually rather stay," Sally said, as the two of them stepped into the bridge itself. "If that's alright with you, Captain?"

"As you prefer." Miles sat down in his chair. Next to him, Nicole turned from her conversation with Sonic, adopting a professional stance. "Helm! Set course to rendezvous with the HMS Frederick and Army Group North. Full speed!"

"Aye, aye, Captain," came the response from the pit.

"Sonic," Miles continued, inclining his head towards the hedgehog. "Care to go hunting with me? First one to pluck one of Jet's feathers wins?"

"Alright… cool!" Sonic snickered, looking forward to an interesting match up. "Count me in!"

Sally gasped as the status of the HMS Prince James turned from orange, to red, to an expanding sphere with a warning label. During the flight to the battlefield, she had familiarized herself with some of the ships involved, in the hopes of playing some role in the upcoming battle. As head of the Freedom Fighters, she was used to giving orders to small units and cells of fighters. The Prince James had a crew of forty six, including marines and air force personnel.

"They aren't just going to let the fleet form up," Miles theorized from his Captain's chair. "Estimated time to arrival?"

"Eleven minutes," came the response from navigation. On the main screen, an image of the HMS Blue Typhoon sped across a topographical map, concentric circles around it representing weapons ranges. To the east, the RAF fleet was moving in their direction, pursued by enemy fighter and drone craft.

"Frederick is reporting damage to their port engines," the Conn officer called over her shoulder. "She won't be able to keep up with the fleet."

"Tails," Sally whispered, leaning close to him. "There are over a hundred mobians aboard that ship…"

"You're right," the kitsune replied, and spoke up, "Order the Prince Emerson to turn about and engage the enemy craft. Relieve the pressure on the Frederick."

Sally watched the screen as one of the smaller ships slowed and began to turn, heading into the bulk of the enemy fighter craft. The Emerson was a captured "Egg Catcher" class Defense Destroyer, designed for anti-fighter duties. It had light armor and a weak passive shield system, and the arrangement of its modular weapons made for a slightly unbalanced firing platform. As fighter defense always took a back seat in the Eggman Armada, which specialized in bombardment and ground assault, this shortcoming was made up for in large numbers. However, in this case, there was only one DD against a swarm of enemy craft.

"Have the Emerson forward all telemetry and battle data to our systems," Miles continued, sounding calm and professional despite the combat occurring miles away. "I was a close look at what we're up against. Nicole?"

Standing to his left, Nicole's holographic avatar blinked. "Receiving. Analysis underway."

"Cross reference with our AWACS. Extrapolate and identify their squadron leaders and their wing commander. Nicole, start launching our fighters and put them in a holding pattern. I want the drones in formation Tango-Delta-Tango up to and until contact with the enemy." Miles rapped his fingers on the arm of his chair. "We haven't seen any missiles yet, so I assume they're trying to conserve them."

Admiral Tao cupped his hands under his chin as he watched the enemy movements on the bridge of the BBA Port Royale. His own shipboard AWACs had detected the Typhoon on an intercept course, and also confirmed that it had a maximum sustainable velocity slightly in excess of the smaller Royale's flank speed. The ship certainly did have a nice set of engines on her, Tao didn't doubt that. Knowing that the enemy fleet would try and regroup around the flagship for a counterattack, Tao had ordered a pursuit to break them up, and harry the fleeting vessels. Ultimately, he hoped to avoid direct combat with his own capital ships. At this point ships too valuable to risk losing; fighters and pilots were replaceable.

The old warrior narrowed his eye as the Prince Emerson made an about face.

"Relay this to Bomber Leader," Tao spoke up, recognizing the feint. "Ignore the Destroyer. Cripple the Frederick and then finish off the Prince Edward. We'll let our drones handle the Emerson."

Far from the help of the Blue Typhoon, the HMS Frederick banked to the right, massive engines flaring as it pushed them to flank speed. Another Eggman airship captured while in drydock, the Frederick had already expended her compliment of drones and conventional fighter craft. It was an old Great War design given only a single post-war refit, and it had a large blind spot in the rear behind the engines, where there was no turret coverage. The Captain tried to compensate by swerving the craft, keeping his pursuers under fire.

While not the most modern or formidable design, the Frederick was still not an opponent to take lightly. Against light craft, her two rapid fire triple 6-inch cannon turrets opened up with exploding shells at a range of more than 30 kilometers, laying down a fearsome barrage. Within thirty miles, her light Pulse Plasma cannons were also capable of targeting and saturating an area with fire, presenting a further hazard to enemy drones and fighters. Like the 6-inchers, they could also be reconfigured for anti-capship operations while in battle. The Frederick also possessed two missile arrays designed to fire early in a battle and overwhelm enemy point defenses.

Zipping through the fire and the flak, a dark tinted aircraft dipped low. Two smaller craft covered for it, escorting it on its left and right, before breaking off and flying upwards. Bright red bolts of plasma tried in vain to pin down the large plane, but it tilted slightly, easily avoiding the shots. Leveling out, and swooping to just the right point behind the fleeing Frederick, the bomber unleashed a pod loaded under its starboard wing. Rocket motors burned, and the pod launched forward. The plane broke hard right.

The elongated hull of the Frederick shuddered as plumes of fire erupted out of its aft section and it began a controlled descent. Secondary explosions tore through its mighty engines, sending debris and bodies flying through the air in its wake. Only the heavily armored and shielded hover-drive survived intact, forcing the vessel to coast in its last direction. It continued to fire for a short while, until the power fluctuations and straining power plant shut those systems down.

It careened towards a brown, dry hill, and crashed, sending dirt and rocks flying.

"Frederick is down. Reporting casualties."

"They bought us enough time…" Miles stood up, staring intently at the screens and displays. "Deploy fighters to guard the Prince Edward, and have her duck under our defense umbrella. It'll be their next target. Order the Prince James along a course: 12,2,19 to 18,4,28. I want her running parallel with us and covering the tops of our heads."

"Range to targets, 200 kilometers!" the tactical officer announced. "Shall we open fire?"

"Right!" Miles sat back down. "Let's make our intentions clear! Fire medium range missiles from tubes six to eighteen – target the Antigua and the Curacao! Nicole, commence electronic jamming."

"Missile launch detected! The Typhoon is firing."

Tao sat still in his chair. He was never the sort to stand of move much; it only distracted from his thinking.

"Their target?" he asked.

"Impossible tell, Admiral!" his conn officer made an exasperated sound from his position on the bridge. The Port Royale used the traditional MAF bridge plan, even though it was a new post-war class of ship, a brigandine, built exclusively by the old Battlebird Armada. Tao's officers were arranged, three by three, to his right and left. This left him with a clear view ahead at the main screen.

"They're scrambling our AWACS," the officer explained, and gave another angry grumble. "Detecting a radio wave carrier virus! We're filtering communications channels!"

Tao's one good eye searched the screen, with the fleet display overhead.

"He's targeting our escorts…" the old warbird hypothesized, and noticed that two of his light capital ships had drifted ahead. "The Antigua and Curacao. Order them back and ready a salvo of our own!"

"They're moving away…" Sally observed, watching the screen. A flurry of missiles, some decoys and some real, had been fired at the enemy fleet. The actual targets, however, seemed to have gotten wise. They were making sharp turns to get back into the interception zone of the Port Royale.

"Nicole…" Tails turned to the AI's mobian avatar. "Status of our electronic attacks?"

The holographic lynx made a frustrated look, the tip of her tongue peeking out as she put some obvious effort into everything she had to handle. The Blue Typhoon was highly automated and relied on her as much or more than any of the organic crew members. In the end, they all needed each other. The ship could not be operated by AI alone.

"I've placed a bug in the Nassau's computer systems," Nicole announced, with a small smile. "But they're on to me. They're shutting down communications and reinforcing their active firewalls."

"And our ECCM?" Miles asked, referring to the ship's electronic counter-countermeasures.

"Nothing I can't handle," Nicole confidently responded.

"We're losing missiles," the tactical officer spoke up. "They're diverting drones."

"Prince Emerson reporting heavy damage! They're asking to withdraw."

"Let them do so," Miles replied. "Let's put up another wave! Six through eighteen again. Staggered fire."

"Aye, sir!"

The kitsune craned his neck, and nodded to himself. It was time. "We're close enough. Begin launching boats. Retake the surface! Redirect drones one through six to provide supporting fire. Tactical, fire on any surface targets in range. Flatten everything."

"Wave!" Jet yelled, impatience causing his voice to strain. "What the Hell are you waiting for?"

"I just need another minute!" the lavender swallow had, as usual, her face up to a computer screen. Her fingers moved a mile a minute over the surface of a flat panel-turned-keyboard.

"We do not have a minute!" He grabbed her arm, and when she tried to shake him off, he pulled harder. Normally, he went along with her and indulged her, so she was unused to him not relenting. Wave turned to him with bright, angry eyes.

"Don't give me that look," he cut her off before she could say anything. "We need to go. Now."

"But there's so much here! I haven't been able to decipher it all!" Wave tried to reach for the computer again. "I just need a little time… Jet! Wait!"

The screen shattered, as a bullet tore through the plasma screen.

"Now come on!" He let go of her arm, and started to run. All around them, other battlebirds were also in a hurry. Some struggled with boxes as they made off with their loot, while other more heavily armored birds watched anxiously, waiting for the mobian counterattack. Jet ran past them, irritated by how little time they'd had to properly loot the facility, even with all the air support they'd managed to get to back them up.

Facility-7 was also larger than they expected. Originally a massive bunker complex built near the end of the Great War. It had been converted and modified more recently. Accessible by only one entrance: the fortified and well defended hangar, it then took a long diagonal shaft to reach the heart of the facility. As expected, it was a sort of research and storage depot, dedicated to the study of Chaos Energy and the Chaos Emeralds in particular. The spot was far enough away from a populated area like Knothole that an experiment gone wrong wouldn't put too many people in danger, and it was close enough to a large military force to allow them to intervene if needed. Luckily, most of the MAF was pointed south, fighting the Eggman's robot hordes.

"Damnit!" a nearby battlebird cursed, standing over a broken wooden crate. He and another bird had been running while carrying it, and had subsequently tripped and dropped their prizes. For a few seconds, they stood over the mess, wondering how (or if) it could be salvaged.

"Forget it!" Jet yelled to them, and motioned for them to keep going. "Just get out of here!"

They exchanged looks and quickly took his advice, running back up to the surface. Jet took a few steps over to the broken cargo crate, and pried away a piece of wood. He revealed a small metallic box with a glassy sheen, sort of like an old style TV monitor. A hologram of a spinning golden ring could be easily seen on the box. Altogether, four had once been in the crate, stacked two by two.

"No time for subtlety…" Jet kicked the first box, hard, splitting the glassy surface open. A wave of golden energy wrapped around his leg, and suffused into his body. Kicking another open, and then the third, Jet reveled in the surge of power. How selfish the fox boy and his King could be, keeping such a treasure all to themselves!

"Jet, are you sure that's safe?" Wave peeked around his shoulder. "I haven't tested…"

Jet's foot stopped just short of opening the fourth Ring Container. Instead, he slid it over to Wave.

"Go on!" he urged. "It actually really good!"

She wavered for a second, but only a second. Kicking it open, she gave a gasp as the energy flowed into her. He hadn't been kidding when he'd said it felt good. They hadn't appreciated the chaos sensitivity they had - until recently they hadn't even known about it! If what Wave felt was anything like he did, then she was probably thinking that she could outrun a speed-type extreme GEAR and out fly any plane in the sky.

"Let's go!" he said, breaking into a run. She followed right behind, and in seconds, they passed the two battlebird pillagers from before. The older birds watched, gobsmacked, as the two Rogues easily outpaced them. Before they knew it, they were in the main hangar, where their planes were already idling and ready to take off. Ahead of them, two shuttles hurried to finish loading, and two other fighter craft started to take off. battlebirds on rapid deployment vehicles rushed in and out of the cavern.

A second later, a flash of light filled the air outside, and a massive explosion the size of a three story building plumed upward. The ground shook slightly, again and again, as Death From Above rained down. Jet didn't worry about Wave; seeing her heading towards her plane, he jumped into the pilot seat of his Ba-190 and prepped it for launch. The forward swept wings shook as the engines turned from idle to hot. There was little room to take off, especially with the runway outside being bombarded, but his plane had STOL capabilities, just like all craft designed to take off and land on flying air carriers.

Blasting off ahead of the waiting shuttles, his "Butcher bird" took off, flying over a still burning crater blown into the runway. To his left, another explosion tore into the ground below, making it all but impossible for the remaining two shuttles to get off the ground. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw Wave taking off, her all-wing experimental Ba-223 "Kite" afterburning and taking to the air. The hangar behind them rocked from another bombardment. High above, just visible against the clouds, Jet could see the source of the attacks: the HMS Blue Typhoon.

Jet smirked, appreciating the timely intervention; deep down, he'd hoped that the foxboy would show up! Jet faced forward and throttled back, pulling up into a climb. On his radar, he could see a real melee twisting and turning around the heavily damaged HMS Prince Emerson.

"We'll see who the better pilot is!" Jet said, and reached over to activate his communications unit. Switching off the normal frequency, and sending on a general channel, he cleared his throat.

"Hey! Kid!" he called, with a laugh in his voice. "Come out and play, why don't ya?! Let's see if you can actually keep up with me this time!"

"Is that…?" Sally asked.

Sitting in his chair, Miles shifted uncomfortably. "That would be me. It seems I'm being called out."