Sonic Chaos & Knuckles (Season Two)

by sleepfiction

With the threat of Perfect Chaos on the horizon, Sonic and his friends race to retrieve the seven chaos emeralds, and the shards of the Master Emerald, to imprison the god once more. Teaming up with shady organization G.U.N., and an echidna who is way too into his job, Team Sonic will face enemies new and old in order to save the world from a very watery death. (Read Season One!)

1. The Last Resort

Saxophone played softly from the speakers next to the stage. The stage lights flashed and changed colors to match with the tone of the song.

It was late, the last weekday before the weekend. There weren't as many people inside of the karaoke bar as you'd think there would be, especially at the end of the work week. A few people were in booths, some at tables, chatting and mostly ignoring who was on stage.

Hips swayed gently to the music. The cord to the microphone was wrapped around one of the singer's hands, the other holding the mic up to his mouth.

"Time can never mend… the thoughtless murmurs… of a good friend…"

Sonic sang into the mic softly, still swaying on the stage as everyone chattered amongst themselves. He looked pretty tired, and his clothes were a bit disheveled.

Behind the nearby drink bar, another hedgehog quickly made up beverages for the people sitting at the counter, sliding them out as orders came in.

His name tag read "Silver."

"Orange cream soda, order up." Silver said, sliding the drink down the bar. He used his psychokinesis to slide it into the patrons hand.

He returned to craft another drink, pouring everything into the shaker quickly to catch up with the customers demands.

"I'm never gonna dance again, guilty feet have got no rhythm… though it's easy to pretend, I know you're not a fool…"

As Sonic lamented some more onstage, the door to the karaoke bar opened up, a figure stepping inside. He wore an aviator jacket, pinkish orange shaded goggles and had two tails.

Tails walked up to the side of the bar, watching Sonic belt his heart out onstage.

Silver noticed Tails and scooted over, still making drinks.

"Thanks for coming."

"Thanks for calling." Tails replied. "Geez, Sonic's really got some pipes on him…"

"He's been doing this for five hours. Make him stop."

Tails blinked in surprise.

"...has he-"

"He's been doing this song the whole time, yeah."

"Don't people like this song though?"

"I mean yeah, but it gets old after a while." Silver replied. "Like imagine you're at a salt and pepper diner, and some dude plays a song twenty times in a row, with a different pop song mixed in for good measure. People would be angry!"

"...that's awfully specific, are you referencing something?"

"Just get him down!"

The fox sighed, walking past the bar as Silver slid another drink to a customer. He saw the blue hedgehog singing his lungs out as the lights all slowly turned to focus on him.

It had been about a week and a half since the Holy Summit accident. To be honest, Tails took it pretty well.

Amy was still missing, having been kidnapped by Chaos (aka Bud the chao), the actual primordial god of water. They disappeared in a flash of green, leaving Sonic and Tails to pick up the pieces.

With the reawakening of Chaos, the god was bound to flood the world in his anger, destroying all of mankind (and Mobiankind) as they knew it. When that happens, Sonic is foretold to face off against Chaos… and lose badly, apparently.

Sonic wasn't taking it all too well.

Tails saw his best friend, on his knees and holding the microphone with both hands.

"Now that you're gone… is what I did so wrong? So wro-oooong, that you had to leave me aloooo-oo-oooone?"

He really did have a nice singing voice. Maybe Sonic should've been part of a band instead of doing superhero stuff…

A few people clapped as Sonic finished his set. Tails walked up, taking the hedgehog's arm and leading him away from the stage. More people clapped at that.

A large purple cat and a frog in his hand took the stage next. The music started playing after a moment, a funky tune with guitar.

"...don't go breaking my heart," Big sang into the mic. He held the mic to Froggy next.

The frog ribbited.

Silver, behind the bar, sighed loudly and held his head in his hands. He had enough of this when Big was his boss at FrogMart.

Tails led Sonic to a booth, sitting down across from him. The hedgehog was slumped forwards a little bit, running his hand over his quills.

"Was that… was that Silver behind the drinks bar? Is there anywhere that dude doesn't work?"

"I dunno." Tails replied. "Maybe it's like a Dave situation and he works like a hundred at a time."

"You think he can clone himself?"

"...no. But he has telekinesis, so… yeah."

When a server came by, Tails put in an order for two shirley temples for the pair to share.

Sonic kept his head down, staring over at Big and Froggy's duet on stage. He tapped the table quickly, not paying attention to anything around him.

"I haven't seen you in a few days, Sonic."

The blue hedgehog's attention snapped back to the fox sitting across from him. Tails was resting his cheek on his hand.

"...I've been busy."

"Busy, eh?"

"Yeah. Doing some… things."

"Like what?"

"Well… saved a… a pet… platypus… from a tree."

"A platypus from a tree."

"...yes."

Tails hummed, looking him up and down.

"...you haven't been binge eating chilidogs, have you?"

"Whaaaaat? No."

The fox recoiled, waving his hand in front of his face.

"Ugh. I can smell it on your breath, Sonic."

"Okay, okay! I've been binge eating. You happy?"

"Not recently, no."

"Yeah… yeah, me neither."

It was silent for a moment.

"I'm sorry." Sonic replied. "I don't know. Ever since Amy's been gone, it's all been a haze of chilidogs, and karaoke, and running."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Like, last night, I saw a dude get slapped in the face with a basket of chili fries, in the middle of my song. Just like… randomly, getting slapped with fries." The hedgehog said. "I had no reaction! I didn't even laugh! I think that stuff with Chaos broke my insides emotionally…"

"Oh come on Sonic. That can't be true."

"The psyche is a weird thing, Tails. Strange stuff happens to it all the time."

The drinks were set in front of them. Big finished his song, but changed the machine to give him an encore.

"You just need the routine back in your life to feel normal again. Get back on your feet, do some yoga, read a mommy blog, something."

"You really think that could fix this?"

"Not overnight. But I'm sure it will improve you." Tails replied. "Besides, I got the plane up and running! Finally! So that means we're one step closer to going out and finding Amy!"

Sonic perked up a bit. He looked into his drink, seeing the cherries dance around in the soda and grenadine.

"...and closer to me getting beaten to a pulp."

It was quiet again after that. Sonic and Tails drank their mocktails quietly, taking turns watching Big continue his song with Froggy.

Tails was thinking about what Sonic had said. It was very true: Amy's return would probably kick off the next five adventure plot points leading up to Perfect Chaos' inception.

The thought terrified him. Sonic, dead? And according to the vision, him crying over his dead body? That was a little too much to handle for him personally.

He wasn't good with… emotion. Extreme emotion he could do, but the subtleties of emotion of different varying levels escaped him. Plus he was like, thirteen, having to take care of a (now apparently) emotionally stunted nineteen year old who he's been best friends with for almost six years.

The best thing he could think of was using the extreme emotion reaction to his advantage. Stir up so many emotional feelings into Sonic that it'll kickstart him once again.

But what could help with that? He's just one fox.

Tails continued to watch the duet on stage, Big dancing with his pollywog pal happily as he sang.

---

"Agent Topaz. Agent Alba."

"Commander Tower."

Topaz nodded firmly to her commanding officer.

"Abey, how's it going, old timer?"

Rouge was less formal.

Commander Abraham Tower had been in the Guardian Units of Nations for about forty years. His hair was a stark white on his head, face clean shaven as always, dressed in freshly ironed clothes and wore a stone face like he invented it.

The only drastically noticeable trait was his heterochromia. One eye was brown, one was green.

He sat at his desk and watched the partners sit across from him. Topaz nudged Rouge a bit harshly, making the bat grunt in displeasure.

Commander Tower looked over at Rouge for her impertinence, before taking a deep breath to continue.

"It's come to my attention that you want to dispense a task force to Station Square." He said.

"Yes. With information we've gathered on work done in the city, we believe that a catastrophic event will be taking place there soon." Topaz said.

Rouge hummed and got on her phone. Topaz was better at this kind of thing anyway.

"Agent, with all due respect, I don't send task forces out to cities based on the hunch of a low-ranking member of this agency."

"...that's supposed to be respectful?" Rouge asked, tilting her phone to look at the Commander.

"What my partner means to say," Topaz interjected. "Is that the evidence we've acquired points towards the use of the artifacts known as the 'chaos emeralds' towards destroying Station Square, and probably everything as we know it."

"A chaos emerald." The Commander said, looking to Topaz again. "We have one of those in our possession, don't we?"

"We do." Topaz nodded quickly. "The task force would have the main goal of retrieving the chaos emeralds to place under our protection."

"People died for those emeralds, Topaz."

"I understand that, sir."

The Commander was quiet before looking at Rouge.

"Agent Alba. What's your opinion on this matter?"

The bat perked up, looking to Topaz before looking at Commander Tower. She slowly put her phone away.

"...I think we've been waiting a month or two for nothing. We put in the time, we give you everything, yet we request a world-saving mission and… you hesitate. Like a coward."

Topaz grabbed Rouge's arm.

"Commander, may I please have a word with my partner here for a moment?" The woman asked.

"Permission granted."

Topaz turned around, bringing Rouge with her so the two women were close together.

"What are you doing?" Topaz murmured to her.

"This guy waited a month to tell us anything. Those guys probably executed Julian's plan right now."

"He is your superior! You need to show him respect!"

"Respect? The dude sits around all day and does paperwork. What earns my respect, the risks of getting carpal tunnel at like, age one hundred?"

The two continued to bicker with one another quietly, their backs turned to the Commander. The older man watched them for a moment before turning his attention to the file provided.

He'd only heard of what Topaz and Rouge wanted to do, nothing about what was in their classified notes. The file had been gathering dust in his office for a while now, even used as a paperweight at one point.

With the agents arguing silently, it was a suitable time to finally look through what this fuss was about.

The Commander flipped through the notes taken by Agent Topaz during the incident listed as "time fries," including the inciting incident involving supposed psychic-power-inducing french fries.

His eyes scanned over the notes. It reached the bottom, where a few pictures, printed from the security camera lapel pin they provided to agents, were paper clipped at.

Slipping them out slowly to make sure they weren't damaged, he paged through the pictures. He saw the outside of the building, the inside, an attack from Ivo J. Robotnik, and a purple light shining through smoke- the chaos emerald.

Uninteresting.

Commander Tower got to the last picture. It was of Sonic the Hedgehog, his sidekick Tails, and personal psychic Amy Rose. They were with two chao and a rabbit girl, but Tower didn't care much for them.

There was a rush in his ears as he saw the hedgehog standing and waving towards the camera. His head pounded, the arguing between the ladies completely drowned out in his head.

He had heard rumors of a hero hedgehog in the city. Tower didn't want to hear it. The less he knew about any form of anthropomorphic hedgehog, the better.

But there he was. And he had a chaos emerald.

His eyes snapped up to his agents.

"Agent Topaz."

The blonde woman quickly turned to look at her superior, straightening herself up. Rouge turned over slower, crossing her legs with a sigh.

"Yes, Commander?"

"Could you please let Rouge and I have a moment alone?"

"...sir, I must…"

"Now, Topaz."

The woman looked over at Rouge before standing up, slowly walking out of the office and firmly closing the door behind her.

"What's wrong, Abe? Afraid you'll miss the early bird special today? Want to reprimand me real quick?"

"That's assuming there's something embarrassing with getting up early, or spending money. Remind me, how old are you again?"

The bat huffed.

"...Agent Alba, you've helped out this agency numerous times ever since you joined it." The Commander stood up. "You've excelled in your skills as a personal thief, and huntress. You've even provided us with our chaos emerald, the first in it's septuplet."

"Yeah, I know. Where's this going?"

"You know these Mobians, don't you?" Commander Tower asked. He held up the photo with Sonic and his friends standing in it.

Rouge looked over the photo, feeling her heart beat quicker.

"Yes. I lived with them for the first half of my life. Why do you ask?"

"They're the ones in possession of that chaos emerald." Tower replied. "They have a gem of power in their possession."

"Get to it, Abraham."

"I'm going to send out the task force to retrieve that emerald."

"Oh! Wow, thank you so much, Abey."

"But that's not the only thing I want you to do."

"...okay?"

"I want you to incapacitate and retrieve these three subjects." Commander Tower replied. "The transitive creations of Gerald Robotnik. You bring them to us."

"...what's in it for me?"

The Commander looked her up and down for a moment. He turned, moving to a bookshelf at the end of the room.

Reaching up, he pulled a certain book on the shelf. "The Tragedies in Remedies: The Destruction and Casualties of The Space Station ARK, by Dillon Pickle Jr."

The bookshelf, a false one, split down the middle and opened like a double door. Inside the wall was the door to a safe, however, a variety of contraptions were all around it.

Commander Tower scanned his hand. Then his retinas. He pricked a finger on a pin then let a device extract saliva from his cheek.

Finally, he leaned into a microphone to speak.

"Diablon."

With that, the safe door popped open. He swung the door open wider, reaching inside to retrieve the beautiful red emerald within.

The red chaos emerald. Taken by Rouge so long ago, and stored in a personal safe by Commander Tower, apparently. The bat saw a few more things inside, but the safe and bookshelf closed as her superior walked away.

Tower tossed the gem to Rouge, who quickly caught it.

"I know you have a personal collection in your room." He said to her simply. "You retrieve those three and bring them to GUN, and you can keep that emerald in your possession unless we face a lockdown."

The bat stared at the emerald in her hand. It was… beautiful. It had been so long since she saw it up close. The radiant power of the emerald glowed in her wide pupils, staring down at the glimmering power of the vermillion gem.

"...they won't go quietly. You do realize that." Rouge said to her superior, breaking away from the beauty of the emerald.

"I do." Commander Tower replied. "I expect you to take care of it, no matter the cost. Don't let me down, Alba."

When Rouge tried putting the gem back, Tower stopped her from doing so.

"Keep it. Let it remind you what you're fighting for… and assist you in your fight against that hedgehog."

With that, Tower turned to look out of his office window in silence. Rouge looked at her emerald once more, before silently slipping it in the bag she had around her thigh.

The bat turned and walked from the office, closing the door behind her. Topaz quickly walked up to her to speak.

"What did he say?"

Rouge looked at the ground for a moment, thinking about what Tower said. Bring in those heroes… no matter the cost. The ones she grew up with.

She blinked, but looked up at her partner with a grin.

"We're going to Station Square!"

---

Steam was wiped from a mirror in a foggy bathroom.

With tired eyes, Sonic looked at himself in the mirror. He took a long, hot shower. Hot enough that his skin was tingling after it was done.

He figured that a shower would be best in replacement for a bath. The hedgehog was deathly afraid of falling asleep in a bath and drowning himself.

There were a lot of things he was afraid of.

Sonic sighed. He reached over to a brush and started working on his quills, getting them settled as he stared at himself in the mirror.

It was long overdue that he got bathed. He was finally back home after the chilidog and karaoke bender that had Tails worried sick about him. He never intended to make his friend worry so much.

Then again, he never intended for Amy to be taken by Chaos either.

Sonic shook his head. Not only to knock the thought from his head, but to whip off any of the water from his quills. His quills set in their normal place, a few large spikes on the back of his head.

He brushed down his arms next.

It was difficult not to blame himself for what happened with Bud. He had no idea if they were even close to finding out where that floating island was… but it didn't really matter now, did it?

After brushing off his legs, he was ready to face the day.

The hedgehog trudged out of the bathroom slowly, only in his underwear for the moment as he made his way to his own bedroom.

Black track pants, gray shirt, red track jacket, gold gloves. The usual outfit he went outside in. Looking in the mirror, he double checked that his quills looked at least mostly decent.

Sonic took a deep breath.

Stepping out of his bedroom, the walk down the hallway was unfamiliar to him- mostly because it had been a while since he was in the apartment.

His sock-clad feet made his steps silent. He got into the living room area, looking over at the couch and recliner in the room.

Amy's bag was still sitting on the coffee table.

Though he was headed to the kitchen, the hedgehog hesitated when he saw the purse. Sonic slowly walked back around the couch and sat on it, looking over Amy's hammer bag.

The cracks from their first encounter with Metal Sonic were still there, just faded. Tails had done a pretty good job repairing it.

He zipped open the bag, seeing everything that Amy had left behind. Her wallet, her phone, even her tarot cards were still in the bag.

Sonic pulled out a card. The hanged man. He knew it had some kind of significance to the deck, but he didn't remember exactly what it was.

The hedgehog sighed and tossed the card back into the bag. He didn't have time to ask Amy what it meant, she was gone.

Feeling a wave of sadness wash over him, he laid back down on the couch, turning into it so he faced the back cushions.

Tails watched from the kitchen, sighing. He took a sip from his soda.

"That's the furthest he's gotten all day. That's a start." The fox murmured. He walked over to the living room, looking at the depressed hedgehog.

It was a pitiful sight, really. But Tails wasn't feeling sorry for the hedgehog, just really really bad.

He rubbed Sonic's arm reassuringly.

"Hey. You want some dinner?"

"Chilidogs…" Sonic replied, voice muffled by the couch.

"You can't have chilidogs, Sonic, you've eaten too many. You need something healthier. How about pizza?"

After a moment, the hedgehog grunted again in agreement.

Tails smiled, patting his arm a few times before pulling away in full. His tails spun idly, the fox walking away to head to the front door.

"I'll be back in a bit. Just try to sit up, at least. Alright?"

Sonic grumbled in reply.

After leaving, Tails made sure to lock the door behind him just in case. He let out a sigh in the hall, walking away from the apartment solemnly.

As the fox flew away from the apartment, he neglected to notice a van and car pulling around the corner to follow him.

Blissfully unaware he was being tailed, the flight to Station Square Diner was pretty nice. Though the restaurant was only a few minutes away, any flight Tails took was enjoyable.

Landing gracefully on the front steps, Tails walked inside to greet the Dave standing at the front counter.

"Hey Dave, long time no see." Tails said to him. "Give me two large pizzas. One cheese, one pepperoni."

"That'll be $26.89 sir." The Diner Dave replied. Tails tapped his ring card, paying for the purchase before waiting at the counter in silence.

Tails took out his phone. Funny enough, the hashtag "#WhereAreYouSonic" was trending online. A smaller, yet still trending topic of "Ivo Robotnik" was there too.

The fox was amused at some of the theories people had to where the blue hedgehog had disappeared to. It ranged from clones, to alternate universes, to being killed by Ivo. Someone even suggested (ironically, Tails hoped) that Sonic was really thrown into a different time period and had to find his way home.

Like that would ever happen.

He heard some people come in. A variety of couples and groups all came in around the same time, one after another. That was a little strange.

Tails stayed on his phone, hearing the groups sit down at different spots around the diner.

They weren't really talking about anything. The fox's increased hearing didn't pick up anything of value being said by these people. It was almost like they were just talking to talk to each other.

He paused his scrolling as he felt a sudden shift in mood around him. There were eyes watching him from somewhere in the diner.

The fox looked to one of the booths, seeing a patron in it acting as if he were looking somewhere else quickly. The guy did it quickly, but Tails knew what he saw.

Turning around again, he noticed a group at a booth nearby suddenly start laughing with one another as if one of them said a joke as soon as the fox turned.

One of them looked at Tails from the corner of their eye.

The sound of pizza boxes plopping down on the counter behind him made Tails' concentration break. The fox turned to see Dave sliding them across the counter.

"Here you go, Tails. Have a nice day."

"Thanks."

Tails took the boxes, carrying them out quickly as he still felt eyes on him the entire time.

The bell above the door rang as he left. As he got a few yards away from the door, he heard the bell ring loudly once more. Footsteps gained on him from behind- though not so quickly to raise suspicion. Though that was useless as Tails was already suspicious.

He walked a block before heading down a random alleyway between two buildings. There were fire escapes above, and a few dumpsters around.

The footsteps were right behind him.

A hand grabbed Tails' shoulder.

"Hey—"

Tails grabbed the fingers of the unknown hand. Spinning quickly, he pushed the fingers up and bent them backwards, making the man cry out in pain.

The man had a mask in his hand. Similar to one of those face masks doctors use to give patients an anaesthetic.

When the man swung the mask arm, Tails quickly ducked under it. Putting the pizza boxes on his tails, the fox rushed forwards and pushed the man backwards, causing the attacker to tumble back.

Tails used his tails to toss the pizza boxes in the air, letting them both land neatly on one of the nearby fire escapes. The fox leapt forwards, landing on top of the man and grabbing his arms.

The man tried struggling, but Tails activated his Vulcan Cannon, slamming the weapon into his face to disrupt his defense. The fox forced the mask over the man's mouth, forcing him to breathe in the gas from it.

After a second the man was unconscious. Anaesthetic, he knew it. The guy was clearly meant to knock him out while his guard was down.

Suddenly, a black van skidded to a stop in front of the alley's entrance. The side door opened, the plain dressed patrons of the diner piling out, now wearing bulletproof vests with the GUN logo on it.

"Go! Go! Go! Neutralize the target!"

Tails didn't hesitate. He pointed the cannon and launched an energy ball from it.

The agents all managed to dodge it, except for one- the last one in the group. The ball hit the agent's chest, the concussive force blasting him back and slamming him into the inside wall of the van, knocking him out.

An agent pointed a strange gun at Tails, firing a small white dot that landed on the Vulcan Cannon. The dot let off electricity, which deactivated the nanite cannon, forcing it to retract into its bracelet form.

That was the same prototype Topaz used during the Time Fries incident. Looks like it got to the field stage.

It didn't matter. It's been a long time since the Hooligans encounter. Tails had a few tricks up his sleeve to use while he got the cannon up and running again.

He tried doing some special sequences into the bracelet to make the cannon react. As he did, he ducked another swing, spinning to let his tails trip up the agent beside him.

As another agent tried to punch Tails, the fox moved his arm up quickly to block the swing, kicking his midsection to make the attacker stumble back.

An agent kicked towards Tails, but the fox caught her leg, wrapping his arm around her calf. His tails spun to life behind him, launching himself and the woman forwards.

The agent knocked into other agents behind her, before being pushed into the van, knocking her into the vehicle's wall and knocking her out.

As one of the agents tried getting up, Tails punched him across the face, knocking him back onto the ground.

One of the other agents grabbed one of his tails. Big mistake, those things carry people like Sonic every day. With a spin, Tails swung the agent into a few others, knocking them around.

With the tails still on his mind, Tails got a running start before spinning around again. He kept the spin going, even moving to his hand to spin his body continuously across the alleyway.

The tails hit the agents and scattered them, knocking them into the walls, with one of them slamming into a dumpster. Tails pushed off his hand, performing a flip before landing on his feet, sticking the landing.

He tapped the right sequence into his bracelet, the cannon coming back to life and reforming around Tails' hand. The fox turned and fired a dummy ring from it.

It ricocheted off of one of the agent's foreheads, then off one of their faces, before reaching the agent who was right next to the dumpster.

She grabbed it before it could hit her. The agent threw it into the dumpster she was beside, slamming the lid down with it.

Tails thought for a second before activating the tether. The energy beam formed through the dumpster itself, the ring caught inside and connecting the fox with the trash.

Whipping it around, Tails let the dumpster slide down the alleyway and disabled the tether. The agents all ran, but had nowhere to go, the dumpster slamming them into the van they came in and taking them all down.

After retrieving his pizza, Tails ran the other way to exit the other end of the alleyway.

Before he could, a black car sped into it, skidding to a halt in front of the fox. The headlights were blinding, forcing Tails to stop in his tracks to block them out.

The car shut off. A bat and a woman with a short haircut stepped out, walking to the front of the car.

"Hello, Mister Prower." Agent Topaz said.

"Agent Topaz! You're looking, uh… as intimidating as ever."

"…thank you." Topaz replied simply.

"Are you not even going to acknowledge me, Tails?" Rouge asked, crossing her arms with a smile.

"Why should I? You left Sonic and I behind at the compound. You didn't even try to intervene when Miss Aleena got killed." The fox replied. "You ran away because you felt nobody loved you. I knew it was a matter of time before you came back for some kind of dumb retribution."

Rouge frowned.

"We believe you have something that doesn't belong to you." Topaz continued. She pulled out a picture, showing the shining purple glow of Team Sonic's chaos emerald in the smoke of the partially destroyed fry restaurant.

"The chaos emerald doesn't belong to GUN either." Tails quickly retorted. "You'd be stealing from the thief."

"You'd know plenty of that from your first encounter with your chao, wouldn't you?" Topaz asked calmly.

Tails had no rebuttal.

"We have no reason to fight. We just need the emerald and keep you as far from Ivo Robotnik as possible." Rouge said.

"Why? Because of Chaos?"

"Yes." Topaz replied to him.

"You're too late. Chaos has already claimed Bud and started his transformation."

"Which is all the more reason for you to give that chaos emerald to us." Rouge said.

"Fat chance. If you all collect the emeralds, what's to say Chaos wouldn't just invade where you are and take them all?"

"We could ask you the same thing, pipsqueak." Rouge replied. "Sonic may be fast, but not enough to evade something like that."

"Then we should work together. Split the emeralds up evenly so they won't be found right away."

"We'll split up alright. You and your friends in jail cells, and the emeralds located far, far away from here." Topaz said. "…where is Sonic, anyways?"

Tails sighed.

"Follow me."

---

Rouge was eating a slice of pizza as the three entered Sonic's apartment again. It's not like a hedgehog and a fox would finish up all of it anyways.

The apartment was smaller than what the agents expected for someone of Sonic's fame. Even if it was fairly local, his notoriety should've been enough to get something a little more… grand.

The bat finished her slice of pepperoni, looking around the kitchen in silence. It was relatively untouched, but the coffee machine had clearly been used recently.

As Topaz trailed through the front half of the apartment, she came across a small plush hedgehog doll. It was pink, had a blue top and a golden skirt. It was clearly designed after Amy.

The agent picked it up, looking it over quietly. After a second, the blonde woman set the doll back down.

Tails marched over to the couch in the apartments living room. He gestured to the couch itself, letting the women walk around it to look down at the person laying in it.

Laying face down was Sonic. He wasn't moving, clearly sleeping or just wallowing in self-loathing. Rouge and Topaz stood awkwardly, looking down at the sad hedgehog.

"How long has he been like this?"

"Almost two weeks now." Tails said to Topaz. "Ever since Amy was taken, he's been so upset because he wasn't fast enough to help."

"Little miss Rosy was taken? By who? A blind man looking for love?" Rouge mused.

"By Chaos." Tails replied. "It's like I said. Bud became Chaos. Amy tried appealing to him but was taken by the guy. They disappeared to somewhere unknown… we haven't been able to find her."

"Well it was dumb of her to think you could appeal to something that thinks of itself as a god." Rouge rolled her eyes. "We'll probably find her."

As she spoke, Topaz went on her phone to message something to somebody. Rouge leaned her foot over to nudge Sonic, who grunted in response.

"We'll have to find a way for him to talk when we bring him back." Topaz said, putting her phone away. She crouched next to Sonic. "Sonny Charles Hedgehog, you're being detained by the Guardian Units of Nations."

Tails and Rouge snorted at Sonic's middle name.

The blue hedgehog didn't reply, staying still on the couch and not moving at the agent's words. Topaz shook Sonic, making him grunt again.

"Hellooooo? Anyone in there?" Rouge knocked on the back of Sonic's head. The hedgehog grunted again. "It's Rouge? The bat? My last name is Alba now. I haven't seen you in five years? This is a seriously emotionally impactful reunion?"

Sonic didn't respond, or care.

"Man, he's really down in the dumps."

"We still need to take him into custody." Topaz said.

"You can't. If you get rid of him, who knows what will happen to Station Square?"

"Most likely no destruction. Ivo Robotnik clearly reacts to anything Sonic does." The woman said to Tails. "If he's detained, Ivo won't act. No Chaos."

"He's not going to cooperate if Amy isn't back." Tails said.

"He can reunite with her in our holding cells. It's our orders to take you in. Nothing personal… kid."

Rouge quickly elbowed Topaz. The woman looked down at her partner, who nodded towards the kitchen with her head.

"What?"

"Come… to the kitchen… with me!" Rouge whisper-yelled.

"Why?"

The bat huffed and rolled her eyes. She grabbed Topaz's arm and pulled her away, leading her to the kitchen.

Rouge stopped at a far corner of the kitchen, looking to make sure Tails wasn't snooping in on their conversation.

"What are you doing?" Topaz asked first.

"Performing a power play." Rouge replied. "Let's not take them into custody just yet."

"It's our primary objective to bring those three into custody."

"Yes! Three. Three of them." Rouge replied. "We don't take them into custody. We bring Sonic back to his normal personality, and they practically lead us to Rosy. We get all three at once."

"Rouge…"

"Trust me on this, girlfriend." The bat replied. "All three, we get the drop on them, and we get a nice big thumbs up from Tower."

Topaz eyed Rouge for a moment, clearly conflicted. After a moment, she sighed.

"Alright, fine." Topaz said.

Rouge took her partner's arm and escorted her back with a smile.

"We're gonna help you get Sonic up and running!" She said.

Tails blinked.

"…I didn't ask you to."

"Too bad! We're helping anyway!"

---

The waters around Angel Island were still. Noises of the animals who managed to migrate to the island echoed throughout the trees.

The rushing sound of a waterfall crashing down into a small pond of water made up the noise on the west side of the island. The chao that were playing in their garden couldn't hear anything other than that.

The community of chao were blissfully unaware of what was going on. They were given fruits by their guardians like normal, played together and just generally had fun.

One chao was not playing, however, enjoying some grapes at the edge of the garden's lake. He was referred to as a "moon chao," as his evolution took place during a full moon, which gave him a unique appearance, mixing that with a smile of razor sharp teeth.

Unknown to everyone, Sonic had named this moon chao Maurice in a dream.

Maurice the chao was enjoying some grapes by the lake of the garden. He was eating his sadness away, much like how his friends (named Thorn and Pedal in that same dream) were trying to keep their minds off of their missing friend.

Their chao friend (Bud) had been missing for a few months. It was dwelling on everyone's minds, and worried people to no end. Though the chao had no real concept of the dangers Chaos posed to the world, they knew their friend was missing.

Munching on a few more grapes, Maurice was very intensely eating his feelings. He missed Bud, he was the perfect addition to their little quartet. The little group of friends was Bud's getaway from being the worshipped "vessel" for Chaos.

It was worrying to know he was out there somewhere, doing who knows what.

As he tried grabbing another grape, the moon chao fumbled and accidentally dropped the vine of grapes into the clear lake.

Maurice watched the grapevine float away. His prickly emotion indicator became less spiky, almost completely smooth as disappointment hit his face.

He sighed.

After a second, the grapevine came back, nudging against the moon chao as if someone pushed it back towards him.

Maurice's head tilted as he looked at the floating grapes. He reached over, picking it up with hoth of his nubs and pulling it back to his side. As he did, the chao saw something shining in the water.

The ball of light in the water shimmered brightly. After a second, a small whirlpool formed above the light, before a wiggling pole of liquid started rising above it.

The water shaped itself into a figure with emerald green eyes and a ball of light in his head, looking down at Maurice.

Chaos has arrived again.

Maurice blinked, tilting his head in curiosity, looking over the creature. It was as if he knew what it was, but hadn't seen it in quite a while.

Ever silent, Chaos looked at Maurice, tilting his head as if to mimic the chao. He looked around, seeing the other awestruck chao who were staring at him.

The god slowly moved his hand around, twirling it and creating a small whirlpool of green energy. After a moment, he tossed it into the air.

The green energy hit the clouds above. After a moment, it started to snow. A gift from Chaos to his descendants.

Seeing the snow falling around them, the chao all cheered happily at the cool snowflakes on the hot summer day.

In a chorus of voices, the chao in the garden sang something together, similar to the singing done when Bud was there a while ago.

Chaos watched the chao sing for him, the snowflakes dissolving and adding to the water of his body. The green eyes reflected the various chao cheering.

In the distance, a light shimmered into his view. A red and purple light, shining brightly on the horizon, somewhere miles away. He could just barely make out the view of land from where Angel Island was in the ocean.

His head tilted. The emeralds, his emeralds, were calling out to him.

With the sound of almost feral yelling above, Chaos knew someone was trying to get the jump on him. Turning quickly, he saw a figure dropping down from the top of the waterfall.

Chaos quickly rushed forwards. His body liquified completely, becoming a wave of water that splashed against the chao, pushing his children further inland to keep them safe from the attacker.

As the assaulter splashed into the lake, Chaos reformed himself on land, snow still falling around them.

It was a badger, a female one. After a second, an armadillo splashed down beside her, with a flying squirrel joining on the other side of the badger after a moment.

"You're not supposed to announce your arrival. That's why it's called a surprise attack!" The flying squirrel said.

"It's a force of habit!" The badger replied.

"It doesn't matter. Detain Chaos at all costs!"

The badger was the first to attack, clutching a large wooden branch akin to a club. She swung wildly at the god, Chaos strafing backwards and pushing his children back with him.

Chaos reached out, extending his arm and pushing back a few chao to get them out of the fighting area (the splash zone, if you will) before moving out of the way of a downward swing.

Though she delivered another swing, the branch club passed right through Chaos with ease, as he was made of water.

Freezing his fist, the god punched the badger back- however, as she tumbled, the badger managed to roll to her hands and feet.

Without even moving his body, the snow in the air suddenly formed into a large arm made of snowflakes, whipping around and attempting to hit the badger, who narrowly dodged it.

Charging forwards, she swung the club again, hitting Chaos' midsection. However, the god closed his body around the branch, keeping it there.

The badger tugged to try and get it out, but found she was unable to. Chaos stared her down with blank green eyes, before the light in his head brightened, delivering rainbow colored electricity down and onto the branch.

The club was turned into a group of butterflies, which all scattered and flew away.

The snow arm reached around and grabbed the badger by her collar, pulling back and flinging her into a tree, incapacitating her for the moment.

Another arm formed in the watery body of Chaos, pushing a few chao aside before extending out to hit another attacker that was circling around him.

The armadillo stepped out of the way of the fist, the punch finding its mark in a nearby tree.

"You should not be fighting. Your fury is overtaking you again." The armadillo said as the fist was retracted. "Stop this madness."

The god didn't understand, or care, what the armadillo was saying. Chaos rushed forwards to deliver another swing to the guardian.

The armadillo quickly shuffled a few chao out of the way before dodging a hit. When another swing came around, the armadillo actually blocked it, firmly shoving the god away from him.

Curling into a ball, the armadillo used this form to roll around, directing the chao away before unfurling and running in the opposite direction, past Chaos.

The snow arm came down to smash the armadillo, who held his hands up and caught the attack. His fingers dug into the ice cold frost as he held the arm back.

The badger was back up, snapping off a few branches and forming a makeshift boomerang. She threw it as hard as she could, but watched as Chaos simply fired a bolt of energy at it, turning it into… a pile of spaghetti noodles?

Seeing the badger attempting to charge again, Chaos saw that the two guardians were directly in line far ahead of him.

He stomped his foot down in front of him. Blue energy rippled across the ground, before tearing the earth apart below it, creating a crevice that the badger and armadillo fell into together.

It wasn't deep, so it wouldn't kill them. Just stop them for the moment.

Suddenly, a sudden powerful gust of wind hit the god, making his water body ripple with its strength.

At the top of the waterfall stood the flying squirrel from earlier- however, standing with him was the figure of a red echidna, with white markings on his body. Chaos recognized the markings as those of the Knuckles Tribe.

The memories of that tribe made his body boil.

This fight wasn't to destroy him, or even to detain him. It was a diversion for them to lead the echidna back here to find a way to trap him.

The flying squirrel glided down to help his friends trapped in the ravine. With the powerful gust of wind through the echidna's dreads, the red guardian glided down towards the god.

Turning his head around completely, Chaos saw the glimmering light of the chaos emeralds in the distance once more. To obtain their power and protect his children, he'd have to retrieve them.

Before Knuckles could land near him, Chaos jumped away, changing to his liquid form again, soaring over the chao and through the woods before landing in the water.

Knuckles was at the shore first, followed by his fellow guardians. Together, they watched Chaos' ball of light shoot through the water, headed to the land that was far in the distance.

It was silent as they watched. After a minute, Knuckles turned and walked away from the oceanside.

"I'll check the shrine just in case. You all make sure the chao aren't harmed." The echidna said.

The flying squirrel nodded firmly at Knuckles while he walked away. The sound of chewing and slurping filled their ears, and they spotted the badger eating the spaghetti noodles from the ground.

The flying squirrel went to her, putting her arm down.

"Sticks, stop. Those were on the grass."

"They taste really good though! You wanna try, Ray?"

"I'll pass on your offer."

The armadillo watched the two, before looking back into the horizon, seeing the ball of light travel towards the land in the distance.

Whatever it was headed towards, the armadillo hoped that the Hedgehog of Chaos was ready to be called to action.

---

Sonic was watching videos online. He was currently knee-deep in car crash compilations, watching one after another while laying in solitude.

The couch was flat now, the hedgehog laying across it while rolled in a blanket like a burrito. He had changed the couch to bed mode accidentally while trying to get up from it. After it switched to a bed, he decided to just lay down again.

Tails came in, tossing his bag onto the counter in the kitchen before walking over to Sonic.

"Sonic!"

"Hey, Tails. Did you know this thing could turn into a bed?" Sonic asked, semi-tiredly.

"It's a futon, Sonic. You were literally told that when we bought it."

"Why didn't you all remind me?"

"We thought you just liked it like that."

The hedgehog huffed before playing his videos again. Tails quickly went to the balcony, opening the windows to expose light into the room.

"Sonic, you gotta look outside! There's this half pipe set up across the street and people are performing super cool tricks on it!"

Sonic didn't move.

"That's really awesome, buddy." He didn't look up from his videos.

Tails opened the door and stepped onto the balcony, looking back inside to keep speaking to his friend.

"It's totally cool! You should really get in on this!"

"I dunno. Maybe." Sonic shrugged, still watching his videos.

The fox huffed. He walked out onto the balcony, bringing a walkie talkie to his mouth and speaking into it as he looked across the street.

"He doesn't seem into it." Tails said. "Try pulling off some tricks or something. That might get his attention."

Standing together on one end of the half pipe, Rouge and Topaz were both decked out in skater gear, with a helmet, elbow and knee pads to boot. They both had skateboards in their hands.

"10-4." Rouge said into her own walkie. She attached it to her belt. Topaz huffed.

"Do we really have to do this? These distressed jeans are making me look like something straight out of my old high school years."

"Ew. I hate that I can relate to that." Rouge shuddered. "Let's just get this over with so Sonic can lead us to Rosy, and we can get out of here for good."

"Agreed."

Rouge started skating down the half pipe, doing a trick as she skated off the other side of it.

"You can't just be a normal office worker, you're going to be working for GUN for the foreseeable future." Topaz said, mimicking a voice as she put on her helmet strap. "Stupid stepmom. I'd rather have an office job than have to do this…"

Topaz huffed before dropping in on the half pipe, skating around and performing a shove-it as she shot off the other side.

"Wow, those girls can really skate." Tails murmured. He looked back to the hedgehog. "Sonic! These tricks are crazy!"

Sonic has now changed to watching skateboarding fails on his phone.

"Yeah, sounds awesome man." He replied.

Tails huffed. He went over to Sonic, taking his phone and tossing it into the hallway nearby.

"Hey!"

"Get up, c'mon."

Grabbing Sonic by his jacket, Tails yanked him along to try and get him off of the futon, pulling him off slightly.

The hedgehog resisted the best way he could. He went limp.

"Hey! Don't you go corpse on me!" Tails said. He pulled harder, trying to drag the hedgehog over to the balcony.

On the outside, Rouge and Topaz were stopped again, looking up at the empty balcony. Rouge could hear the commotion inside but didn't exactly know what was going on.

"What's happening up there?" Topaz asked.

"Something stupid, probably." The bat grumbled.

Hearing a bustling below, the women looked down to see a gaggle of skaters all convening at the bottom of the half pipe.

"Hey! What're you doing down there?" Rouge yelled.

"It's a half pipe, dude! We're gonna drop in and do some tricks!" A skater yelled.

"Maybe this'll help Sonic get back on his feet?" Topaz suggested. "What could go wrong?"

A skater that dropped in came up next to Topaz, putting his skateboard under his arm to grin at the blonde.

"Hey." He said.

Topaz ignored him.

"Hey, I'm talking to you. How long have you been skating?"

"Two minutes."

"I mean like overall."

"Just stop talking to me."

"C'mon, I wanna show you a cool trick I learned."

"How old are you?"

"Seventeen."

Topaz shoved the skater back down the half pipe.

"Must be into cougars." Rouge hummed.

"How old do you think I am?" Topaz asked her.

"Whoa, calm down, girlfriend. Don't burn me at the stake." The bat said. She quickly eyed Topaz as if expecting her to have a reaction to confirm her age.

Topaz shoved her down the half pipe next.

As Rouge slid on her pads, she heard the sounds of sirens fill her ears once she got to the bottom of the pipe.

Policemen pulled up to the curb, clearly intent on investigating this mysterious half pipe.

The skaters didn't like this.

"Cheese it!" One of them yelled.

The variously aged skaters all ran for their lives. One of the cop cars pulled away to follow some of them, while the other cop furiously put crime tape around the scene.

Rouge flew upwards, grabbing Topaz with her legs around the woman's midsection, gliding out of the area.

Tails finally got Sonic to the balcony, presenting the sight in front of him.

The half pipe shut down, and nobody skating on it.

Sonic looked at the sight, then hummed. As he turned around, he reached up and patted Tails on the head.

"Looks cool, dude."

With that, the hedgehog went inside. Tails leaned on the railing, sighing as Rouge gracefully landed with Topaz on the balcony alongside him.

Rouge, in frustration, snapped her skateboard across her knee and threw it out from the balcony.

"We probably should've looked up if it was legal to just set up a random half pipe somewhere." Topaz said.

"What else but extreme adrenaline could get Sonic back on his feet?" Tails thought aloud.

"We could push you in front of a bus."

"Rouge!" Topaz elbowed the bat.

"I'm just saying. Sonic and Tails are attached to the hip. Always have been. If we put Tails in trouble, Sonic is bound to stop moping around."

"I'm not putting a teenager in danger. Not even if we have to take him into custody. Doing something like that would be the last resort."

Tails rolled his eyes. He looked inside of the apartment, seeing Sonic laying on his back and watching videos on his phone again.

"I don't even get how he can be like this." Rouge rolled her hand. "His little stalker's in danger, the world's in danger, and he's just crying about it? Some hero."

"It's just a mountain of things." Tails replied, finally turning from Sonic. "Amy, and Chaos, and Ivo, and him supposedly being beaten to a pulp by the god. He feels useless… the tides have really turned considering Amy's felt the same way before."

"What did you do to help Amy get back on her feet?" Topaz asked.

"She made herself feel useful. Hm…" Tails' tails turned in thought. "Sonic feels like he isn't fast enough to save anybody. What if we give him a reason to be fast and save somebody?"

"Like push you in front of a bus?"

"No. No!" Tails scoffed at Rouge's suggestion. "We stage a fake crime. Put Sonic right in front of it and act like he's the only one who could stop it."

"In this city? A cop would be on us in a second. You saw the stuff that happened with the half pipe." Topaz replied.

"Then we'll do it where there isn't any police… at my workshop! We'll set everything up and I'll lure Sonic there myself. It's a no brainer! No last resort needed."

Topaz thought for a second before nodding.

Rouge had her hand by her leg, pressing against her bag and feeling the chaos emerald that was inside. She still had it on her during this entire fiasco, and not even Topaz knew she had it.

Tower was right. It did remind her of what she's doing this mission for. The second these guys are taken into custody, the sooner she gets to keep one of the most powerful and beautiful gems in the world.

She looked over at Sonic lounging on the couch. It was a pitiful sight, and a far cry from the young man she knew five years ago.

The bat had to admit. She kinda missed the gusto.

Rouge finally looked back at Tails.

"Let's do it."

---

Sonic was hanging by his hands, holding onto Tails as the fox flew him above the forest of the Mystic Ruins.

They didn't really have a car to get to Tails' workshop, and Sonic didn't really want to run, so the next best option was for Tails to fly them there.

He was finally torn away from his phone to see something at Tails' workshop. The fox seemed fairly excited about whatever was down there, and even Sonic in such a depressed state couldn't say no to something his best friend was happy about.

At least he still looked relatively nice. His quills were kinda crazy because of him laying on the couch all day… he also had Amy's bag around him, wanting to keep it with him just in case.

Sonic's feet hit the ground first, walking a bit as they stepped onto the plateau near Tails' workshop. Being here always gave him the heebie jeebies, especially ever since he was thrown into the water by Fang… man, that felt like a long time ago. Shorter than a year, longer than a month… maybe like, a season ago?

Tails floated down beside him, gripping onto the straps of his backpack as he walked alongside him.

"I hope the Tornado II will impress you. I have a mech mode for it, but it's not perfect. I plan on making a similar mech, but purely made to become an attack mech. Like, it'll have a plane mode… maybe even a cart mode or something. But the design for it would purely be an attack mech."

"Yeah?"

"Oh yeah. I can't really call it the Tornado III though… Maybe something similar, since it's an offshoot."

"How about the Cyclone?"

"Oh! That's an awesome name for it!"

The hedgehog felt himself brighten a tad at that. He had to admit, getting outside, walking around, getting some fresh air. It was actually improving his mood again. He knew what he did was a little unfair to Tails, since the fox only wanted to help.

But actually getting up and working again… reminded Sonic of how he failed.

With that stark reminder, Sonic looked down at Amy's bag, feeling sadness swell inside of him again.

He sighed, still walking along with Tails. As they were walking, Sonic noticed there was someone in a dress up ahead, with an umbrella covering the back of their head.

"Looks like we're close to the workshop. I hope nothing weird happens!" Tails said, fairly loudly.

"Dude, why are you yelling?"

Suddenly, the umbrella person turned. It was a bat, with ivory white fur, wearing a large dress with the aforementioned umbrella resting on her shoulder. She had a fairly large purse hanging on her hand as she strolled across the plateau.

Sonic thought she looked familiar.

"My, my!" The disguised Rouge said in a fake accent. "It's so hot here on this lovely summer day! And this purse is so, so heavy from all the money that's inside of it! I sure hope nobody would try to…"

She paused, before looking into her purse for a second. Tails had taped part of her script into there.

"...seize my purse and use the money for their own unknown reasons!"

Suddenly, from nowhere, another person came onto the scene. She was a human, tall, wearing a black beanie over her short blond hair. She had on a black and white striped shirt, and black pants. She looked like a thief from some kind of fast food burger chain.

"Stop it right there, ma'am!" Topaz the thief said. She was not a good actor. She snatched the purse. "I'll be taking that!"

"Eeeek!" Rouge said, but clearly was trying not to laugh. "Help! Help me! This roughian has stolen my purse from me! Whatever will I do? This dress is too restrictive for me to apprehend her!"

"Sonic! That lady is stealing that other lady's purse!" Tails said to the hedgehog. "You have to stop the bad guy!"

Sonic looked at Tails, then at the thief, then back at Tails.

"...she's not even trying to get away."

Topaz was lightly jogging away, slowing to look back at Rouge, and at Sonic, before jogging again.

"Sonic, you have to speed over there and get her purse back!"

"Why can't you do it? Why aren't you doing anything?" Sonic asked Tails.

"Well… I can't really save the day without you, Sonic!"

"That's a lie."

"No it isn't! I'm not strong without you!"

"You literally told me about the plane-mech combo you made on the way here."

"Well…"

"And you helped defeat the Hooligans, and wiped the floor with Fang."

"But-"

"Not even mentioning the numerous inventions you've made in the last year alone."

"Yeah, but-"

"You're more than capable of taking down a thief by yourself, Tails."

"Just stop the burglar already!"

Sonic huffed. He took off Amy's bag, swinging it over his head before throwing it at the thief. It hit Topaz's back, making the woman fly forwards and hit the ground, tossing the purse as she fell forwards.

The purse returned to Rouge with ease, landing in her hands. She looked at Tails, flabbergasted.

The hedgehog walked over and picked up Amy's bag, putting it back around his body before walking up the stairs to the workshop and going to the door.

"I'll be in here for your surprise after you've called the police."

With that, Sonic went inside the workshop.

Tails walked up beside Rouge, joined by Topaz a second later.

"Well that was a real bust." Rouge said. She unzipped her dress from the front, the entire costume just an elaborate piece, revealing her GUN uniform underneath with a coat too big for her. She tossed away the costume, the purse and the umbrella.

Topaz took off her beanie, tossing that away as well. Rouge tossed her the big coat with the GUN logo on it, which was meant for the blonde woman to wear over the striped shirt after everything was done.

"I looked absolutely ridiculous." Topaz complained, zipping up the coat. "Man, I wish I had finished college… did I do well, though? I did theater in high school."

"Don't ask me, girlfriend. All I want to remember from that is you eating dirt from a bag hitting you."

The woman frowned at her partner's comment.

"He even complained about saving someone!" Tails said, frustrated. "I don't get it. I just don't get it."

"You did say he had a lot of stress going on."

"This isn't stress, this is just fear." The fox said to Topaz. "I think he's afraid of losing someone again, so he's angrily rejecting everything. He's not doing anything necessarily bad, but… he's… basically becoming Ivo."

It was silent between them. Tails stared at the door to his workshop silently, as the ladies looked at each other during the small moment of peace.

As they were looking at one another, Topaz noticed something on Rouge's leg.

"...Rouge, why is your thigh bag glowing?"

The bat blinked before looking down, twisting her body slightly to look at the bag on her leg. From the flap of the black bag, she could see that a red glow was shining brightly through it. They couldn't see the gem through the leather of the bag, but the light was enough to shine through the material.

Rouge dug into her thigh bag and pulled out her chaos emerald, looking over the crimson gem as it continued to shine incredibly brightly.

"A chaos emerald?! You've had that this whole time?!" Tails exclaimed.

"Rouge, you little… thief!" Topaz said. "What are you doing? Why is it glowing like that?"

"I don't know! This is the first time this has ever happened!" The bat replied. "And by the way, I was given this thing! I didn't steal it! For once!"

Tails turned to look at the workshop again just in case. He noticed that from the opening of the hangar, the purple glow of his own chaos emerald shined, probably from its place at the front of the Tornado II.

"Uh… I don't think it's just her." He said.

Suddenly, there was a light rumbling from the ground below them. Before any of them could really question it, a big watery hand came from the edge of the cliff, coming down and slamming into the ground, as if someone had climbed the side of the plateau.

Chaos pulled himself onto dry land, standing slowly. His green eyes pierced into the souls of those standing before him, tilting his head slightly in curiosity.

"Holy-!" Topaz yelled.

"Chaos…" Tails said.

Rouge looked between Chaos, then her gem, before quickly slipping it into her thigh bag.

"How is he here?" She asked.

"The chaos emeralds." The fox replied. "He must be here because two chaos emeralds are in proximity of one another."

"Make that three."

A voice from above interrupted their confrontation. A gray hovercraft, with a black round bottom, floating over the trio. Turning as it continued to hover around, the figure presented himself and the green emerald in his hand.

Ivo was back. He had on a new jumpsuit, gray and black, and a pair of red-tinted goggles as opposed to the blue ones he used to wear. He was holding a chaos emerald, the appropriately colored green one. Like the others, it shined brightly with a verdant glow.

"Ivo!" Tails said.

The Vulcan Cannon on his hand activated. From the inside of her jacket, Topaz pulled out a long looking object that unfolded with a swing, creating a black and silver rifle with a green end. She pulled some kind of canister from her pocket and shoved it into the rifle.

"You had a laser rifle this whole time?" Rouge asked her. "Why didn't Tower give me one?"

"You called him Abey."

Chaos looked away from the trio to look up at the green glowing gem above him. Ivo had his hovercraft stationed just above the watery god creature, the gem dangerously held over his body.

"Get away from him, Ivo!" Tails yelled. "You don't know what you're doing!"

"I know enough. Either I receive this world on a silver platter, or Chaos destroys everything. It's as simple as that." Robotnik replied. "It would be a shame for the world to be flooded with a hero that's afraid of water."

"You're bluffing." Rouge replied. "You wouldn't actually destroy the world, you need it to fulfill your own self-gratifying obsession. You'd rather hold infinite power by a string than actually destroy anything. Chaos is just a bargaining chip to you."

"Maybe so. But with the chaos emeralds, he'd become powerful enough to destroy all who stand in my way."

Chaos' attention was snapped back to the front of him as he realized that Tails was moving away from the group. The fox slowly walked to the water god, looking up at him and reaching to his face slowly.

"Tails…" Rouge said.

"Bud. Bud, I know you're in there." Tails said. "Amy got to you. I know I can… wherever you are in there, you have to keep Ivo from manipulating you. We're your friends."

The blank emerald eyes of Chaos stared into Tails hauntingly. As Tails reached his face, the god tilted his head into it, familiar with the fox from his vessel's experience.

"Don't do this. Chaos, let Bud go." Tails said. "Your vengeance isn't worth destroying everything. It's been so long… it's time to let go."

From above, Ivo watched the scene unfold, the green emerald still in his hand. He looked it over- he had retrieved it from Holoska in the weeks after his encounter on the Holy Summit. He needed a little vacation after that fight with Sonic…

Tails' words echoed in his head. It felt like the fox wasn't just talking to Chaos.

That just made Ivo angrier.

The green emerald fell from Ivo's fingers, dropping down and landing directly into Chaos' head with a small splash, the ball of light in his head accompanied by the glowing green emerald.

Chaos let out an ear-piercing screech, his body twisting as rainbow electricity sizzled through him from the emerald. Tails fell back in shock, pulled away quickly by Topaz, who aimed her rifle at the transforming water god.

The emerald shot through Chaos' body, down his right arm and into his hand. Ice formed, cracking through his arm and forming something akin to bones in his body, the ice creating beams up his right arm, cradling the emerald in a fork on his hand that split the ice into two spikes, making up the "fingers" on his hand.

The green emerald glowed anew. Chaos-1 looked at his new arm, tilting his head again. He had some of his power back, and it tasted good. He needed… more.

His eyes flicked to the red glow from Rouge's thigh bag.

"Whoops. Butterfingers." Ivo said. He let his Egg-o-Matic strafe back, putting his hands behind his back to survey the scenario at hand.

Chaos-1 shot his non-icey hand towards Rouge, past the others to reach the emerald in her bag. Rouge quickly turned and sent a kick into the arm, disrupting the arm in a giant splash of water from the strength of her leg.

Topaz aimed and fired at Chaos-1, shooting rounds of green lasers into the frost bones that made up the god's arm. As the being looked at her, the blonde ran to circle him, wanting to make it harder to properly aim at her.

While he was distracted, a few energy balls fired at Chaos-1's face. It was Tails, who was flying in the opposite direction of Topaz to distract him from multiple angles.

"Bud, if you feel this, I'm sorry!" The fox yelled.

Chaos-1 lifted the watery hand, swinging his arm and detaching his hand, creating a flying projectile of water at Tails. The flying fox was hit, forced to stabilize himself in the air for a moment.

Part of his arm cracked from Topaz's rounds. His head turned around fully, staring down at the blonde agent as she continued firing.

With him distracted, Rouge rushed forwards, spreading her wings out and gliding forwards. Her phalanges sliced through the legs of Chaos-1 as she flew through them, grabbing Topaz and flying her away from the area as the god toppled over with a splash.

Rouge glided around with Topaz, landing back on the plateau as Tails centered himself.

From a form of a giant puddle, Chaos regrew himself. A version of Chaos-0 with the green gem in the center of his chest came out first, rising into the air and raising his arms. From the puddle, a variety of Chaos-0s came out, a small battalion of clones to fight the trio.

"So glad this is my saturday." Topaz reloaded the laser rifle.

The Chaoses (Chaosi? Chaospeople?) rushed in to fight the group. Sticking together, the trio fought back individually, facing their own small group of watery adversaries.

Rouge destroyed one of the Chaos-0s with a kick, spraying water everywhere. Regardless, she continued, using her wing's phalanx to slice through the body of another one, kicking back to knock the bottom half of the water person from under him.

With purple energy glowing from her mouth, Rouge let out a sonic screech- perfected by this time around, as she knew how to properly use it. Circles of purple energy came out in shockwaves, hitting the Chaos-0s and making them explode.

After ducking a swing from a different Chaos-0, she pushed up on one hand, kicking both her feet into his chest, knocking him clear off of the plateau with the power of her legs.

Nearby Topaz shot multiple rounds from her rifle into one of the Chaos-0s, tearing holes into it one at a time before it fell apart, bursting as it hit the ground. She aimed another shot and fired, the round piercing through three in a row and breaking two of them apart.

The third, still intact, rushed forwards and struggled with Topaz, hanging onto the rifle and trying to pull it away from her. The agent pulled the rifle to try and get it back, but found that the Chaos-0's grip was just too strong.

Suddenly, from the hands of the clone, rainbow electricity sizzled across the rifle. Topaz let go just in time before the energy could hit her, but it consumed the rifle and turned it into… rings?

As the golden rings bounced on the ground, Topaz reached behind her, grabbing something that was hidden in a secret pocket on her back thigh. She slapped on a bracelet on each wrist quickly, the wristbands sizzling loudly before creating an arch of red energy over her knuckles. The devices were referred to as "hammer gloves," and Topaz didn't get why, as they weren't even gloves at all.

The blonde punched through the Chaos-0, destroying it as she did. She blocked a swing from another clone, uppercutting that Chaos-0 and splitting it apart with the red energy knuckle dusters. As another one rushed to her, Topaz kicked it back, sending it tumbling.

Before the Chaos-0 could get back up, Tails destroyed it with an energy ball. He fired a few more into various reforming Chaos-0s, wanting to disrupt the process of regeneration as much as he possibly could. These clones were tiresome. He didn't know how long the group could keep this up.

He fired a dummy ring, it getting lodged in the body of a Chaos-0. Activating the tether, Tails whipped the clone into another one, causing both of them to burst in a giant splash of water.

Tails swung the tether around like a flail, hitting one, two Chaos-0 clones and causing them to burst instantly. Spotting a few reforming themselves nearby, Tails got a running start before performing another rapid tail attack, spinning around with the tether for good measure. He twisted down to his hands, mimicking a move Sonic did in his breakdancing phase to destroy a few Chaos clones in his path.

The fox whipped his ring tether around again, flinging it at the "main" Chaos, the one in the air with the emerald in the center of his watery chest. Before the ring could hit him, Chaos-1 grabbed it with a hand, holding it still as he stared Tails down.

Though he tried to hold his ground, Chaos-1 yanked Tails from the ground and to him, grabbing the fox by his chest with his free hand. The other Chaos clones immediately retreated, going into the main Chaos' body to form the hulking form of the true Chaos-1, the ice reforming in the arm that had the emerald in it, which was now grabbing Tails, keeping only the fox's head free.

With his water hand, Chaos-1 held up the dummy ring. The rainbow energy sizzled across it before it turned into a fish, flopping in Chaos-1's grip before the god tossed it over his shoulder, sending it into the water beside the Mystic Ruins.

Rouge and Topaz watched Tails struggle, in too much shock to actually do anything.

Tails saw the menacing form of Chaos tower over him. He was stuck, and had no tricks up his sleeve.

Well… he did have one.

"SONIC!"

---

Sonic was sitting in Tails' desk chair, resting his head on the workbench. He saw the Dream-Caster still on the table from their adventure just a few weeks ago. It was so surreal to think about it now, all things considered… It was the marking of the end.

He sighed, looking down at Amy's bag again. Sonic rummaged inside of it, pulling out the tarot card he had found earlier- the hanged man.

It was a faceless man, hung upside down by his right foot on a post, hands behind his back and left leg bent, folding behind the leg that was still in the air. The visual was always fairly haunting, and weird, and honestly? He wasn't a fan of this card.

Sonic remembered what Amy told him about it- it meant sacrifice. Much like the sacrifice of Amy to Chaos, and soon, the sacrifice of Sonic at the hands of the being.

It hung in his chest like a bat (no offense to Rouge). He was terrified of what would happen if he kickstarted this prophecy thing… he was so unsure of the future, and someone he could trust to help guide him through it was gone. He loved Tails, but he didn't want to force that on one of his closest friends, not even mentioning that the fox was only a teenager.

Amy was better at directing emotion. What was he good at? Running fast?

Yet he wasn't fast enough to save his best friend.

His attention was turned away from the card as he realized there was a purple glow across the room. Sonic put the hanged man away, turning in his chair to look at the Tornado II.

Since he finally got a hang of what to do to turn chaos energy into clean energy, Tails finally created the engine of the Tornado II with the emerald inside of it. However, the emerald was simply lodged in the front of the plane, smack dab in the center of the airscrew at the front.

As he stepped in front of it, he could see his reflection in the glowing gem. He looked… better, but not quite like himself anymore.

"Man… what happened to me?"

"You gave up, that's what happened."

Sonic blinked. His reflection just talked back to him.

"Excuse me? Did you just talk?"

"No. You're talking simultaneously to fill both roles."

"What? No I'm not. Yes you are." Sonic said. He became aware of what was going on. "...I'm going freaking nuts!"

"It doesn't matter. You have to get out there and find Amy." His reflection said.

Sonic groaned, rubbing his face.

"Oh man, now I'm giving myself a pep talk. We've truly reached peak meta."

"Stop evading what I'm saying. I'm only telling you this because you know it's the truth." His mauve reflection said. "You have to find Amy."

"What do you think I've been doing?"

"Absolutely nothing? Watching car crash compilations and going to karaoke bars?"

"...touche." Sonic rubbed the back of his neck.

"Look… I know you're scared. Every bit of you is scared." His reflection said. "You don't want to end up the bloody mess you saw in that dream Tikal gave you, and you're afraid your friends are going to be killed without you there to help them."

"Thanks for the reminder."

"But my point is… you gotta at least try." The reflection said. "Despite everything that happened, all the 'failures' you've endured, you're still surrounded by people who are willing to help you."

Sonic crossed his arms and shrugged.

"I guess…"

"Tails, Rouge, even Agent Topaz is here to help you. Not to mention that you have Chaotix, Vanilla, Cream, that cat princess from the other zone. Maybe even Silver if you ask nicely."

"I just don't get how I'm supposed to stop him. Stop Chaos."

"You don't have to stop him." The reflection replied. "You just have to make him stop himself."

"What?"

"Tikal said it was his anger that's flooding the Earth. If you mend his angered soul, he won't ever want to destroy everything again."

"How the heck am I supposed to do that?"

"Show him the harm he's doing. Fight him if you have to, but… open your heart."

Sonic blinked, suddenly seeing his reflection for what it is again. He touched his own face, brushing back his quills and shaking his head. His quills finally perfectly reformed into the spikes on his head. Though the bags under his eyes were still there, he looked… better.

He looked normal again.

"SONIC!"

The hedgehog's attention was turned away from the purple emerald, whipping around to look at the door. He looked down at Amy's bag one more time, gripping the strap tightly, before rushing forwards and getting through the door.

Immediately spotting Tails in the grasp of the mutated Chaos, Sonic leapt forwards, delivering a homing attack right to the arm of ice. The ice shattered instantly, and the hedgehog grabbed Tails, landing with the fox in his arms.

"Tails!" He said. "Are you alright?"

"I'm okay. I'm alright." Tails nodded.

From afar, Rouge chuckled a bit.

"The last resort." She mused.

Sonic put his partner down, turning to look back at Chaos-1, who was slowly reforming his broken arm. His attention also went to look at Ivo in his hovercraft.

"Egghead! Long time no see." He said. Sonic felt electricity in his soul- it really felt like he was back to normal. "Nice look. Guessing you took a trip to that one store for emo teens? What's it called, uh… lukewarm topic?"

Ivo didn't reply, glowering down at Sonic. The hedgehog kept the staring contest for a moment before looking back at Chaos-1, who was staring down at him.

"Look, Bud, I don't really know if you're in there or not… but if you are, we'll get you out. I promise." Sonic said. "But that means I gotta hurt you. It's gonna suck… but the only way to reach catharsis is to experience a little pain first."

Chaos-1 lifted its ice hand slowly, swinging it down to try and crush Sonic.

The hedgehog zipped out of the way, burning out a spindash and sending himself rolling through one of the watery legs of the god, making him unbalanced.

As Sonic came to a halt, he grabbed the end of Amy's bag strap, whipping it out and putting the bag into its hammer mode. He gripped it with both hands and spun, hitting Chaos-1 in his back, making him fall forwards.

Sonic rushed forwards, slamming the hammer into the ground and using it to flip into the air- a classic move he's seen Amy done a dozen times. As he flipped through the air, he brought the hammer down and slammed it directly into the water creature's back, making the god burst and practically explode.

The water immediately reformed into two separate, snake-like trails of water in the air. At the front of one of these hose-like formations was the light ball from Chaos' head, and in the front of the other was the green chaos emerald.

Flipping the hammer back into bag mode, Sonic zipped away and around the plateau, followed closely by the water formations snaking behind him in close pursuit.

He passed Tails, and leapt over the two GUN agents. Rouge and Topaz had to duck to evade the water that was coming their way, watching the hedgehog continue his run.

As he reached the workshop, he kicked off part of the stairs and ran up the side of the small shack. He got to the top edge of the wall before kicking off, flipping into the air again and boosting away from the workshop- headed straight towards Ivo.

Before he could hit the hovercraft, Sonic curled into a ball, boosting downwards into a drop dash, coming to a sudden stop on the plateau. The water didn't turn in time, colliding with Ivo's hovercraft and causing the doctor to have to grab onto his vehicle for stability.

"Gah! You blasted rodent!" He yelled. Sonic waved at him.

Chaos-1 reformed in the air in front of Ivo's hovercraft. His body bubbled for a moment with green energy, before spikes of ice fired from his body, directly down towards Sonic and his friends. Though the others quickly moved for cover, Sonic didn't.

Blue electricity sizzled between his quills. Before the first spike could even touch him, time slowed down to a standstill, as the hedgehog moved his body so fast that everyone else was moving at a snail's pace.

He flicked the ice spike from in front of his nose, before cracking his knuckles.

Sonic used one of the spikes as a step, pushing up into the air from that alone. He stepped on multiple spikes, even going in a corkscrew as he had to run upside down for a moment. Eventually, he pushed himself off of the final spike, curling into a ball and boosting forwards.

His homing attack passed through his ice hand, dislodging the green chaos emerald and destroying his ice hand. As he passed through the body of Chaos-1, he found his secondary mark- Ivo's hovercraft, which he rebounded off of.

Chaos exploded. Ivo was rocked violently from Sonic's attack, having to stabilize himself again.

Sonic landed gracefully on the ground, joined soon by the others at his side.

The green chaos emerald bounced on the ground nearby. Chaos, as a puddle, quickly made his way towards the gem to reclaim it. Though Sonic tried rushing to it, Ivo fired a laser that disrupted his path, making the hedgehog trip and land on his face.

The puddle made it to the gem, surrounding it with water. Though Chaos started reforming again, another laser was fired from Ivo, one that immediately turned the water to ice, trapping the green chaos emerald within it. Ivo got to Chaos' frozen form while the others tended to Sonic.

"Now, once Chaos is in my possession, finding the other emeralds will be easy as pie!" Ivo said.

"As if." Rouge said. "You're not getting away from this. You have nowhere to go."

Ivo turned to look at the others, before pressing a button on his watch.

"...don't I?"

After a moment, a shadow came across the entire plateau. The heroes looked up at the sky, finding the sun was blocked out by a giant aircraft under the clouds.

It was a giant airship, almost like a helicarrier. It was painted red, gold and gray, with the insignia of Ivo's face on the bottom of it painted in black. The size of it took the group by surprise- it was certainly bigger than anything the doctor had built before.

"I'm happy to see you like my Fleet Carrier." Ivo said. "I'd tell you all about it, or even destroy your pathetic workshop, but… I have better things to do. Emeralds to collect and the like."

From the bottom of the carrier, a green beam of energy fired down, illuminating Ivo and the frozen Chaos in a green light. Ivo waved to Sonic specifically before him, the frozen god, the chaos emerald and even some of the dirt in the area disappeared, the beam shutting off.

After a second, there was a loud boom as the sound barrier was broken, and the carrier was gone in a flash of blue energy.

Sonic grunted as he got up, looking at where the Fleet Carrier once was.

"Big deal. I broke the sound barrier when I was seventeen." He rolled his eyes.

Tails hugged him tightly. Sonic hugged him back, chuckling, before looking at Rouge.

"...Rouge. When did you get here?"

The bat scoffed and rolled her eyes.

"Good to see you too." The hedgehog continued, before letting Tails pull away from him.

"I'm happy you're alright!" Tails said. "I didn't think anything would get you out of that funk."

"Just goes to show you, next time, let me shove you in front of a bus." The bat shrugged.

Sonic noticed the dimming red glow from Rouge's thigh bag, but didn't audibly comment on it.

"We have to go find Amy." Sonic said. "Whatever the cost, let's find her."

"Yeah! I've been trying my best to, but I have no leads on it. I can't seem to find Amy."

"Found Amy." Topaz said right as Tails was finished, looking at her phone.

The three mobians looked at her, all surprised.

"What?" Sonic asked.

"I found her."

"How?"

"Well, when you mentioned Chaos, I thought… Chaos. Like the emeralds. So I called in a favor to my boys at GUN to look at all the chaos energy signatures since the incident on the Holy Summit." She showed the photo on her phone, showing green lines all coming to one spot in the ocean, forming a glowing oblong circle on water. "Most of them all come back to this location, which I thought was weird, so I asked for a satellite image. Come to find out…"

She swiped the phone, showing an image of that same area, but revealing there was an island there that wasn't in the ocean before.

"Voila. Whatever this island is, that's where Chaos has visited multiple times. If Amy isn't there, I'm sure we'll find whatever answers we're looking for at that location."

"Holy crap! I wish I had a satellite!" Tails exclaimed.

"We gotta get out there! Amy could be in trouble!"

"Nope."

Topaz slapped cuffs on the pair, connecting Sonic and Tails' wrists together. The pair looked at the blonde woman, utterly shocked.

"What are you doing?!"

"Taking you in. Our directive was to apprehend you two and Amy. Now that we have a lead on where she is… we don't really need you running around anymore. Don't try to run, those cuffs are designed to shock you if you move too much."

Sonic looked at the cuffs, then at Rouge. The bat suddenly felt a twinge in her chest, looking away quickly.

"I'll call Tower." Topaz said to Rouge. "We'll get these two into custody and retrieve Amy next. After that, you'll finally have that emerald all to yourself, right?"

"...yeah."

Topaz pulled out her phone, walking away and typing in the number to call Commander Tower.

Rouge didn't look at Sonic and Tails. She couldn't, she felt that… twinge again. What was wrong with her? Why did she suddenly feel upset that these two were cuffed and about to be sent away? She didn't care on the ride here.

She felt the chaos emerald in her thigh bag. It was hers, all hers. She finally got one of those fancy gems she was told about all the time, the one reason she decided to take this assignment in the first place.

The bat looked at Sonic, who was staring at the ground.

Damn it.

Looking back to make sure Topaz was distracted, Rouge moved forwards and unlocked the cuffs quickly, freeing the two of them.

"Huh? Rouge, what're you…?"

"Tails, go start that fancy plane." Rouge interrupted Sonic. She looked at him next. "Sonic, I need you to push me to the ground."

"What?"

"Do it. Push me to the ground and run, now. Don't question it, just do it!"

After a moment of hesitation, Sonic shoved Rouge, making her stumble back and hit the ground hard.

With a tap on the Miles Electric from Tails, the Tornado II roared to life, catching Topaz's attention again. Tails and Sonic ran to the landing strip in front of the hangar, jumping onto the plane as it picked up speed. Tails grabbed the controls and sent the Tornado II into the air, flying away quickly.

Topaz ran up, stopping as she reached where Rouge was. She looked at the bat.

"What happened?"

"They pushed me to the ground."

"And you just… let them."

"Hey, we were told to get the three of them. Unlike you, I want to get them all at once."

The blonde stared at her partner quietly. She shook her head slowly before turning and walking away, leaving Rouge to get to her feet by herself.

The bat looked into the sky, seeing the Tornado II fade into the distance, before slowly turning and running to catch up with Topaz again, feeling her chaos emerald jiggle inside of her bag.

---

It would take an hour or two to reach the mysterious island that Amy may or may not be at. An hour and a half in, Sonic was fidgety.

The space he was sitting in was small. Cramped, even. He was glad they were away from the tight grasp of GUN, but was it worth it at this point?

Honestly, he kinda wanted to see if he could stand on the top of the upper wing. The plane, designed like a biplane, had two wings. One of them was situated directly over Tails' head.

He looked over his friends, shoulder, seeing him follow the coordinates to the strange island on the Miles Electric. He did his best to find the exact area that island might be.

Tails noticed Sonic was looking, making the hedgehog try and act natural.

"…I'm surprised you don't know how to fly with all the times you've helped me out, Sonic." Tails said.

"Hey, I probably can. I just like leaving it to you. I know how much you love flying and stuff."

"Yeah, maybe a bit."

"I know you'll always be there to catch me when I fall."

The fox nodded, looking ahead to the skies in front of them again. Sonic tapped his leg, sighing.

"…I'm sorry about all the stuff that happened."

"You were upset, Sonic."

"Still. I shouldn't have let it bench me for so long… I feel bad for being a nuisance."

"You weren't a nuisance. We all get upset sometimes. I know I was just as upset as you after what happened with Amy."

"What got you better, then?"

Tails was quiet for a moment, before putting his plane on autopilot. He pivoted his chair around, going face to face with Sonic.

"I don't really have… a family. Like parents, or a sibling or something. All I've ever really had was you guys, and the people at Aleena's compound." Tails said. "So when I think about moments where I'd need an adult to help, I think back to all the stuff that happened at the compound for some guidance."

Sonic nodded.

"The more I thought, I… I realized that Aleena had to get through the death of some of her friends. The fear of losing you. I'm sure it didn't really take her a day, but she had friends there to help her." The fox continued. "I knew that happened to you too. Like mother like son… and I also knew that you always helped me back on my feet, too."

"So you helped me back on mine."

"I knew I had to. I'm still upset and worried about Amy, but… I wanted to help you so we can find a way to save her together." Tails said. "I dunno, maybe it's weird to understand. I wanted to help you so you could help yourself, in a way."

Sonic smiled a bit and nodded.

"…you're great, Tails. In your own, special Tails way."

"Thanks, Sonic."

The hedgehog looked up at the top wing, feeling a renewed burst of energy somewhere inside of him.

"…you think I could stand up on the wing?"

"What?"

"Stand up on the wing. You think I could do it?"

"…if I kept it steady, I'm sure."

Tails turned back around, taking control of the plane again after putting it on manual. The fox kept his eye on Sonic during flight to make sure he didn't fall.

Sonic grabbed the top wing of the plane. He slowly stood up, stepping up on the seat, then the body of the plane, before getting up on the wing.

He slowly stood again, feeling steady of fighting against the wind blowing against them. It was almost like running, without all the running.

A smile stretched across his face.

He felt a rush of adrenaline hit his body as the plane soared through the air with Sonic on top of it. He didn't dare look down, not at the water, only focusing on the world ahead.

It was awesome.

They soared through a cloud, letting Sonic feel the droplets of water on his face. He closed his eyes for a moment, before feeling the fresh air of high altitude as they broke free from the cloud.

Opening his eyes, he saw an island in the ocean ahead of them. It was large, full of trees, with a mountain or two on it. There was even a section with… a pyramid? What was that about?

He saw some kind of shrine in the distance, with a green glow coming from it.

"That must be the island!" Sonic shouted.

"Descending." Tails said back.

The plane soared down, headed towards the island at a steady pace. Underneath the body, the planes belly opened up, the landing gear unfolding to hang down below.

"Where are you going to land?"

"We'll figure something out. I'll fly over the island a bit to find something." Tails replied.

They got over the island, soaring over the trees as Sonic smiled at the land below. They were so much closer to finally finding Amy.

Suddenly, the plane rocked violently with a loud crash from below.

"Uh… Tails? Was that turbulence?"

"At this height? No! Something hit the plane!"

Sonic moved to the side of the wing, dropping down to the bottom wing and holding onto the pole that separated them. He crouched down, looking under the plane.

The figure of a red echidna was on the bottom of the aircraft. His head turned, purple eyes looking at Sonic, before the echidna punched up into the plane, directly into the engine.

"What the—?"

Sonic was interrupted by the sound of beeping, Tails' controls beeping with the threat of imminent crashing. The hedgehog leaned up to look at the fox.

"We're going down!"

The hedgehog looked below the plane again, but discovered the echidna was gone.

Sonic tried grabbing onto his old seat, but discovered the tops of the trees were now whipping the bottom of the plane, leaving Sonic gripping onto the wings as they went down.

As the plane disappeared into the ocean of trees, all Sonic heard was Tails' voice.

"BRACE FOR IMPACT!"

---

The GUN team known as "Task Force Bravo" was sent out to the lower part of the United Federation to retrieve an artifact of unknown power.

The energy signature matched the power of the chaos emeralds, but seemed much smaller in size. It wasn't known what exactly it was, but seven operatives were out at night to discover what it was.

It was very dark outside.

"Everyone turn on your lights." The leader spoke. "Be sure to keep them all at all times, they're fairly fragile but very bright. It's the device on your vests."

Turning their lights on, the seven agents were out into the night, the leader using a device on his wrist to determine where they were going.

The area was completely abandoned, in a field at night. The only thing that could harm them was the wildlife, but luckily they all had repellent on them.

It was an easy in and out job. The six were only there for backup and security purposes.

As the device detected they were getting closer, the leader noticed a pale green glow was illuminating an area nearby. He kept out the device just in case.

Soon enough, it led him right to the source of the glow, and the chaos energy. It was some kind of green gem shard, a big one at that, sticking out from the ground like it landed there after being flung from somewhere.

The leader switched his device off.

"What is that thing?" An agent asked.

"Is it a piece of one of the chaos emeralds?" Another inquired.

"It's too big for that." The leader replied. "This is something entirely different. I'm just not sure what it is."

He looked back at his agents.

"One of you head back to get a containment bag and some tongs. Once we bring it back to headquarters we can do a… proper… scan."

There were only five lights.

"…did one of you already head back?"

"We're all supposed to be here and accounted for."

"Did one of you not turn on your light? Maybe not bring one?"

"We all turned them on sir. We're all supposed to be here."

It was silent as the leader looked between the lights, feeling sweat gather on his head, before he looked back down at the shard in the ground.

"Sir, I—"

The light on the agent's chest suddenly went out. Suddenly gone from sight, the agent screamed as she was pulled from the area, the only indication was her fading voice.

They all put their laser rifles up, staying together in a group as they looked around the area.

"Bravo to base! You need t—"

That agent was suddenly pulled away as well, his light disappearing. Three were left in the group now, alongside the leader.

One of the other agents fired his rifle in that direction, but his gun was suddenly snapped in half by someone unseen. A punch was delivered into his stomach, before his light was smashed, and he was flung somewhere in the distance, passing over the light of the shard.

The leader quickly ran to the glowing shard. The other two agents attempted to follow, but one of their lights suddenly went out as it was smashed.

The dark agent fired wildly in fear, accidentally hitting her fellow agent in the shoulder. The illuminated agent was suddenly pushed forwards, smashing into the other agent and smashing his light last.

Both of the agents' screams faded as they were pulled off somewhere into the sky.

The leader pointed his rifle in various directions, trying to find any source of the attacker from the light of the glowing gem shard.

"Who's there? Show yourself now!"

It was silent. He kept his eye down the sight, looking around, only hearing the sounds of nocturnal animals making noise in the fields.

As he strained his hearing, the leader could suddenly hear something rushing in his ears. It sounded like… thrusters.

Something sliced the back of the leader's leg, making him yell in pain and go into a kneel. There was a hit delivered to the leader's face, knocking him onto his back.

The shard was picked up from the ground, the mysterious figure having his back to the downed leader.

"Who… who are you?" The leader asked.

The figure paused, before turning.

It looked like a hedgehog, but… shiny. Navy metal glimmered in the light of the shard, with five spikes poking from the back of his head, all accented with silver marks.

From the light of the gem shard, it could be seen that the strange robotic creature was shrouded in a large, black trench coat, hanging down around his feet and even billowing like a cape, almost.

Glowing red eyes pierced down into the leader's soul.

"I am… Neo Metal Sonic."

As the robot spoke, it seemed like two voices spoke at once- a normal voice, and a deep robotic one, creating a voice that was unified into one being.

Neo Metal flipped the shard in his hand, so the jagged edge was facing upwards. He brought his arm up, before slicing downwards to the leader.

As the robot destroyed the leader's light, the man's scream echoed all throughout the field, with the chilling silence of nature only heard afterward, nobody for miles around to hear it.

UP NEXT: Tougher Than Leather!