Chapter 19: Bargain

"M-Metal?" Amy muttered as the tip of his nose touched the tip of hers.

She dropped one of his hands to place her hand on his chest, but as she did so, she found herself leaning in closer to him. She took a breath and closed her eyes, leaning in further still.

"Amy!"

Amy cried out in alarm as a firm hand grabbed her arm and tore her hand from Metal's chest. She staggered around, finding herself facing Rouge.

"The mayor's aide thinks that "Thistle" here is one of your business partners," Rouge told her.

"Oh, now I get why the mayor referred to him as "one of my partners"..." Amy muttered.

"So at least wait until the ride home to make kissy faces with him," Rouge added.

"I wasn't..." Amy began.

"Oh Amy..." Rouge said, shaking her head.

"Okay, I was..." Amy quietly admitted.

Amy sighed and turned back to Metal, the look on his face almost seeming to say that he would be quite happy for her to move right back in to the position Rouge had just pulled her out of.

"Let's go home," she said to him.

He nodded and, still holding his hand, Amy led him across the dance-floor. She intended to go outside and then ask him to carry her home, but by the time they had reached the street outside, Sonic was walking beside Amy and Knuckles was walking beside Metal.

"This party gets boring after the awards have been given out," Sonic commented.

"Yeah, I'm tired, let's go home," Knuckles agreed.

"I think Tails is out back with Cream," Amy said. "So I don't think you guys can leave just yet."

"I already told him to bring the car around," Sonic replied.

Amy sighed, but decided to be polite and let Tails drive her home in the car he was so proud of having made. When he pulled up alongside them and hung out the window with a brilliant smile on his face, she knew she had made the right decision. Knuckles and Sonic sat on one side of the cab again, and Amy and Metal sat on the other. Amy never let go of Metal's hand, and she was pleased when he kept hold of her hand too: she hoped it meant that he was finally confident enough to hold her hand, after his earlier concerns about hurting her with his robotic hands.

On the drive back to Amy's house, Sonic teased Knuckles about his dance with Rouge. Amy remained silent, occasionally glancing over at Metal, who would return her look, with that small smile he seemed to be wearing more and more. Set against Sonic's teasing and Knuckles's increasing lack of patience with it, the thought of going home with Metal and relaxing in silence seemed doubly welcoming.

"Hey Amy?"

Amy looked about herself.

"Tails?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm talking to you through the intercom," Tails replied.

He was hidden from their view in the front of the limousine, but his voice did have that slightly tinny quality of a voice broadcasting through a speaker.

"I'm approaching your house, but... Something weird is happening." Tails continued.

"Weird?" Amy repeated. "Weird how?"

"Well, there's a taxi sitting outside your house," Tails replied.

Amy frowned, and even Sonic and Knuckles stopped bickering to look confused along with her.

"Pulling up now," Tails said, as the vehicle slowed to a halt. "Someone's getting out of the cab..."

Amy dropped Metal's hand and threw open the door, stepping out and starting towards her front door. On her way there, she was joined by another figure, and, when she saw a friendly, familiar face smiling at her, she sighed with relief.

"Oh, Vanilla," she said. "Sorry, when Tails said there was a taxi outside my house, I didn't know what to think!"

"Sorry to startle you, Amy," Vanilla replied. "We just came to pick up Cream."

Amy frowned.

"Cream's not here," she said.

"She's not in the car with you and your friends?" Vanilla asked, her smile vanishing.

"No!" Amy replied, concern starting to grow in her gut. "The last time I saw her, she was... She was with Tails!"

Amy turned to Tails as he approached, along with Sonic, Knuckles and Metal.

"Tails, where's Cream?" Amy asked him.

"She was in the city hall garden," Tails replied. "We went out to look at fireflies and she wanted to stay out there, even after I told her I was going back inside."

"I'm so sorry Amy, I thought she was with you!" Vanilla said. "Oh dear, we must have left her there! I hope she's not worried!"

"She's probably still out in the garden hunting fireflies or moths," Amy replied.

"We should get back to her," Vanilla said. "I'm sorry to have worried you."

"It's no problem, Vanilla," Amy assured her. "I hope poor Cream isn't wandering around the dance-floor looking for us all!"

Vanilla and Amy laughed softly, but Amy stopped with a jolt when her communicator began ringing in her purse.

"That's probably her now," she said as she opened her purse. "Calling to see where we all got to!"

Amy retrieved her communicator and smiled.

"Yeah, it's Cream!" she said.

"Oh, what a relief!" Vanilla said.

Amy opened up her communicator and took a breath to greet her friend: but her breath stilled in her lungs at the sight that greeted her.

"I'm so sorry," Cream said in a shaky voice.

Amy felt her blood turn cold in her veins as she looked down at Cream's tear-stained face looking out from the communicator at her.

"I'm so sorry, Amy!" she sobbed.

"Amy?" a gruff voice responded. "Stupid girl, I told you to call Sonic, not Amy!"

"Eggman?" Sonic said, moving over to stand beside Amy, facing the communicator, as the same moment the screen whipped away from Cream's crying face to reveal Eggman's face.

"Ah, there you are, Sonic," he said. "I've tried to reason with you, but – and I really shouldn't be surprised by this – apparently you don't listen to reason. So now I've taken something of yours. And I won't be returning it until you return what you took from me."

"Eggman, you let her go!" Sonic said, taking the communicator from Amy's hands.

"I'll let her go if you return Metal Sonic to me before sunrise."

Amy looked about herself desperately, and when Tails told her it was midnight, she hardly felt any better about Eggman's demand.

"Return Metal Sonic to me before sunrise, Sonic, or else," Eggman said.

"Or else what, Eggface?" Sonic asked.

"Or else I'll kill the girl and take another of your friends, and you'll have until sunrise of the following day to give me back my robot," Eggman replied. "And the cycle will repeat until you return to me what is rightfully my property."

"Metal is not your property!" Amy shouted.

"Sunrise, Sonic," Eggman said. "I'm not fooling around any more."

"This is low even for you," Sonic began. "Cream has nothing to do with this, just let her–"

Sonic stopped as the communicator screen went dark.

"He hung up," Sonic said, closing the communicator and passing it back to Amy. "But you all heard what he said. We need to move out, and we need to go right now if we're gonna get to Eggman's base and free Cream before sunrise. Amy, Knuckles, you two go in the Tornado with Tails. Metal, me and you will go ahead. We're the fastest, we'll get there first and find a way in."

"Uh, Sonic?" Knuckles said.

"What?" Sonic asked him.

"Metal's gone."

"What?" Amy yelped, looking about herself desperately.

"He ran off the second Eggman said he was holding Cream as ransom for him," Tails added.

"And you let him go?" Amy wailed. "Tails! You know what'll happen if Metal goes back to Eggman!"

"Amy!" Sonic said, grabbing her arm. "Metal knows what'll happen to him if he goes back too. He can handle himself. You go with Tails in the Tornado, me and Knuckles will run on ahead."

Amy turned to him, her breathing ragged, her eyes blurring with tears.

"Amy, you need to focus," Sonic told her. "Think about Cream."

"I am!" Amy wailed.

"Oh please hurry!" Vanilla begged. "Please don't let that awful man hurt my little girl!"

"We won't, I promise," Sonic told her. "Are you ready Amy?"

Amy nodded, though she hardly felt ready for anything. Sonic nodded at Knuckles, and the two took off running.

"Come on Amy, let's go to the hanger and get the Tornado!" Tails said to Amy.

Amy nodded and followed him back to his custom-made car, sitting into the front passenger seat. As the drove away, she looked over at him.

"Tails?" she said. "What if...?"

"We can't think about that, Amy," Tails replied. "Sonic's right, Metal can handle himself, you've seen how strong he is."

"But I also saw how bad that wound on his back was the first night I found him!" Amy pointed out.

"Eggman's robots did that to him!"

"I know, Amy."

"And what if Eggman gets impatient and hurts Cream? Or worse?"

"Amy, you need to focus."

Amy clenched her fists and swallowed hard, trying to push down her emotions. However, try as she might, she couldn't get past the memory of Metal signing to Tails that if Eggman ever tired of him, he would simply kill him.

Amy leapt out of the Tornado before it had even come to a complete stop. Tails was not far behind her, and together they took a moment to survey the scene around them. They had landed a short way from Eggman's lair, in the middle of what appeared to be a recently-fought battle.

"I guess this was where Sonic and Knuckles met resistance on their way in," Tails concluded.

Amy summoned her hammer, and together she and Tails crossed the landscape of broken machinery towards Eggman's base. As they walked, Tails removed his dinner jacket and tie, holding them for a while before apparently deciding there was no way practical way to salvage them, at which point he tossed them aside. He unbuttoned his shirt and rolled up the sleeves and nodded at Amy. She nodded back, though she had no such way to make any of her clothing any more practical. It was not the first time she had been forced to fight in evening-wear – it was not even the first time she had been forced to fight during or immediately after the annual gala – but it was still never something she relished, as clothing that looked good often wasn't as practical and functional.

"It's too quiet," Tails commented, as though he needed to break the silence to ease his own apprehension about it.

He started to speculate that Eggman had retreated into his lair, but a faint swishing sound reached Amy's ears and she threw herself over him.

"Get down!" she cried as she flattened him to the ground.

He grunted as he hit the ground but didn't complain: even when he caught sight of what it was Amy had heard.

"Cream!" Amy cried, leaping up as Cream lowered Knuckles to the ground beside her.

"Amy!"

Cream flew at Amy, who caught her in a hug, squeezing her until she complained about it.

"I'm so glad you're okay!" Amy said as she held her friend at arms' length. "You are okay, right?"

Cream nodded.

"I'm so sorry I let Eggman take me," she said.

"Don't be silly, we know you didn't let him take you!" Amy immediately replied.

"How did he get you?" Tails asked. "I was out in that garden with you and I didn't see any sign of him out there."

"After you went back inside, I walked around a little longer," Cream explained. "And I saw a little kitty, it looked like it was stuck in the weeds, and…"

Cream held out one hand to reveal a set of puncture wounds.

"Let me guess, it had metal teeth?" Amy asked.

Cream nodded.

"Amy, there's something else," she said.

"What is it?" Amy asked.

"It's Mister Metal," Cream replied. "He came here, and Eggman said he would let me go because he had Metal. But…"

"It's okay, Sonic went back inside to look for him," Knuckles assured her.

"Where is he?" Amy asked Knuckles. "Where is Metal?"

"I don't know," Knuckles replied. "I didn't see him."

"He was on a table and he wasn't moving."

Amy turned to Cream.

"I'm so sorry Amy, it's all my fault!" Cream cried. "I didn't want Mister Metal to come here, I knew something bad would happen to him, that was why I called you instead of Mister Sonic, I knew you would understand."

Amy turned to Tails.

"Eggman wanted Metal back," he said. "I don't think he would… Hurt him."

"Metal said he would just kill him and build a new Metal Sonic," Amy quietly reminded him.

Tails turned to Cream.

"Do you remember which part of the lair you were in?" he asked her.

She nodded.

"I punched a hole in the roof so we could get her out," Knuckles offered, pointing at a caved in section of roof.

"Okay, I'm going up there," Tails said, lifting up into a hover.

"I'm coming with you," Amy said, grabbing one of his wrists.

"I think you should stay here," Tails told her. "To help Knuckles."

Amy started to ask him what he meant, but when he turned his head, she followed the direction of his gaze and noticed the wave of robots approaching them.

"I'll go with him, Amy."

Amy turned to Cream.

"I'll be okay," Cream insisted as she took to the air at Tails's side. "And Mister Metal put himself in danger to save me, I owe him my help."

"Okay, but please be careful," Amy replied.

Amy watched her two airborne friends go before turning to Knuckles. He smacked one fist into the open palm of his other hand and nodded at her. She raised her hammer and nodded back, and together they charged to meet Eggman's robots head-on. Together, Amy and Knuckles smashed the robots one by one, only pausing when they reached the point where no opponents were readily to hand: the smaller robots had retreated and one large robot was approaching. As Amy tried to guess where its weak spot might be, where best to aim her hammer, she noticed something in the sky that finally calmed the raw tension in her chest: Tails was flying towards them carrying Metal. He released Metal over the large robot, and Metal landed on its head. He raised a hand up above his head and punched downwards, sparks flying out as his metal hand punched through the giant robot's head. Tails landed beside Amy and Knuckles and shrugged.

"He knows where all the kill switches are," he said.

"That doesn't look like a kill switch to me," Knuckles muttered.

Amy winced as Metal stood up again, hauling zapping, smoking cables and wires out of the robot's head. When he tore them apart, the hum of the robot's engines silenced and he finally hopped his way down its stilled body. He kicked aside a motobug that rolled towards him and continued bashing his way through the others.

"He's okay," Amy said with a sigh. "I'm so glad he's okay. But… Where are Cream and Sonic?"

Amy, Knuckles and Tails looked about themselves, but saw no trace of their friends. Amy started to fight her way towards Metal, hoping that he would be able to help her find them, but she stopped partway there at the sound of Sonic yelling out in a desperate voice she rarely heard him use.

"Let me go, Cream! Get out of the way!"

Amy looked up, holding her breath as Sonic tore himself out of Cream's grip and plummeted down from the great height in the sky she had been carrying him. Cream yelped and began zig-zagging through the air as some sort of smart missile pursued her, matching her every move and inching closer to her with every passing second. Tails rocketed up into the sky and shot after her. When she heard a splash and saw a jet of water rise into the air, Amy didn't know if she felt better or worse.

"Sonic landed in the water!" she cried. "He can't swim!"

"I'm on it!" Knuckles said, running in the direction of the splash.

Amy followed him, smashing away any robots that tried to pursue him. She had a horrible feeling, one she rarely got in a battle when Sonic was present, a feeling of dread, of something much more sinister going on or about to happen. She tried to see if Tails had caught Cream or if Knuckles had gotten Sonic to safety, but she had lost sight of all of them, and as more time passed, she became more and more worried, her aim and the strength behind her blows starting to falter.

"Amy."

Amy gasped at the sound of Sonic saying her name. She looked about herself, but couldn't see him anywhere. She tried to tell herself that she must have imagined it, tried to ignore the nagging idea that she was hearing his voice because he was dying, and that he was reaching out to her on a spiritual level in his final moments.

"Amy, get back!"

Amy didn't hesitate in leaping back, and she was shortly glad she did as a laser-beam blasted a crater into the ground she had been standing on moments before. As a shadow fell over her, she looked up, her eyes turning harsh as the Eggmobile slowly lowered down in front of her.

"Well, well, if it isn't my new least favourite hedgehog, Miss Amy Rose," Eggman greeted her, leering over the side of his vehicle of choice at her.

Amy bared her teeth and raised her hammer.

"You're becoming more trouble to me than Sonic," Eggman told her. "Maybe it's time I did something about that."

He yelped as the Eggmobile suddenly jerked over to one side, tilting him away from Amy. He clung on desperately, turning his attention to what had caused the problem: Metal had gripped his right hand into the bodywork of the Eggmobile and placed his feet flat against the side of it, pulling it over. He reached his free hand towards Eggman, his eyes ablaze: but he halted and his eyes faded instantly when Eggman held up a piece of paper in front of him.

"This is what you want, isn't it?" Eggman asked him.

Metal's free hand fluttered in the air, metallic fingers fidgeting that way they did when he was unsure of something.

"That brash red idiot interrupted me before I got the chance to tell you that I can make this happen for you," Eggman continued. "All you have to do is come with me."

"Metal…?" Amy said softly.

"Stay out of this, you!" Eggman shouted at her.

Her jaw fell open when Metal leapt up and into the Eggmobile at Eggman's side.

"That's what I thought you'd say," Eggman said to him with a grin.

Amy watched in abject horror as they rose up into the sky together and then sped off towards Eggman's lair. She started to run after them, but stopped when she heard Cream's voice crying out. She turned her attention to see her friend flying back and forth over the water a short distance away, calling out for Sonic. Amy stowed her hammer and raced over to the water's edge, arriving there as Knuckles surfaced nearby, looking about himself.

"Where's Sonic?" Amy asked him.

"I don't know, I've looked all over," Knuckles replied.

"Well keep looking!" Amy snapped at him.

He nodded and started swimming back out into the centre of the lake. Cream landed near Amy, doubling over and grasping her knees as she tried to catch her breath.

"Cream, are you okay?" Amy asked her.

"I haven't seen him, Amy!" she answered breathlessly. "I flew around the whole lake, but I didn't see anything!"

Amy started to remove her shoes, ignoring Cream when she asked her what she was doing. Once she had them both off, she reached up her back, feeling for the zip of her dress with shaking hands. Before she found her goal, the surface of the water nearby broke abruptly and a drenched, bedraggled figure surfaced, grabbing at the rocks by the water's edge as he coughed up a mouthful of water. Amy quickly hurried over and dropped to her knees, grabbing his arms and hauling him out of the water. He rose to his feet, staggered a few steps and then turned to go back into the water.

"Tails, wait!" Amy said, grabbing her arms under his as he wilted.

"I didn't see him," Tails replied as he gasped for air. "I have to go back."

"No, you stay here and rest with Cream," Amy said, lowering him into a seated position on the rocks. "Knuckles and I will find him."

Amy reached up her back and unzipped her dress, pausing again as Knuckles burst out of the water. He looked around them all before settling on Amy and solemnly shaking his head.

"I'm coming in," she said.

She made to take her dress off but again stopped short as a burst of water shot up from the shore of the lake, splatting down indiscriminately over Cream, Tails, Knuckles and even Amy herself. She shook it off, watching in awe as a metallic hand grabbed the point of one of the rocks at the shore and Metal nimbly leapt up out of the water, rising to his feet before lifting Sonic from his shoulder. He threw him down hard onto his back, and when he arched his back upon impact, a jet of water flying out of his mouth, Amy screamed. Metal lowered himself to one knee at Sonic's side and thumped the side of one fist into the centre of Sonic's chest, and again he coughed up a jet of water. Metal then roughly hauled Sonic into a sitting position and thumped his fist into Sonic's back. Sonic coughed out more water, doubling over and coughing a few times more, before groaning and touching his hands to his face.

"What did you do that for?" Amy yelled at Metal as she dropped to her knees at Sonic's side. "Are you okay, Sonic?"

Sonic groaned again and nodded.

"Why were you do rough with him?" Amy yelled at Metal. "You could have broken his back, what is wrong with you?"

Metal stood over her, looking down at her impassively, his arms limp at his sides, his eyes flat.

"Oh, Sonic, are you okay?" she said, turning her attention to Sonic. "I was so worried about you, I thought you'd drowned!"

"I'm fine," Sonic replied in a ragged voice.

Amy threw her arms around him, holding him until he complained that she was hurting him. She then held him at arms' length, finding Tails was knelt down at his other side.

"Sonic, how do you feel?" Tails asked him.

Sonic nodded, but he looked confused.

"What is it?" Amy asked him.

"I've nearly drowned a few times before," he began.

"Yeah, we know!" Knuckles said.

His smile vanished when Amy shot him a harsh glare.

"But usually after, I can still feel the water inside me when I try to breathe," Sonic continued.

"Metal got it all out of you," Tails told him.

"Metal almost killed Sonic!" Amy snapped.

"No, Metal saved Sonic's life," Tails corrected her. "He went in the water, he pulled Sonic out, and he got all the water out of his lungs."

"He threw him on the ground!"

"And that got most of the water out."

"Then he punched him in the stomach and in the back!"

"And did you notice after he did that that Sonic started breathing on his own again?"

Amy's face slowly fell. Sonic smiled, touching a hand tentatively to his chest.

"I think I'm gonna have a few bruises, but I guess this means old Metal really was my best friend this whole time!" he said.

"He was helping…?" Amy began.

"Yeah," Tails said, nodding his head.

"And it saved…?"

Tails nodded again.

"Oh Metal, I'm so sorry I yelled at you."

Amy turned to address Metal, but failed to locate him. She looked all around before turning to Cream expectantly.

"When you hugged Mister Sonic, Mister Metal ran away," she explained.

"Oh no!" Amy said, rising to her feet. "Which way did he go?"

"Why?" Sonic asked as he accepted Tails's help to stand up.

"Because I have to go after him and apologise!" Amy replied. "I thought he chose to go back with Eggman! And I thought he was hurting you! And I yelled at him!"

Sonic put a hand on her shoulder.

"You came here for a reason, remember Amy?" he said.

She frowned.

"You came here to get Cream back," he reminded her. "And her mom is waiting for her. You have to take Cream home. Go in the Tornado with Tails."

"Cream, you know how to fly the Tornado, right?" Tails said to Cream. "You fly it home, take Sonic with you, he needs the rest. Knuckles and Amy, you go too. I'll meet you back there later. I'm going to find Metal."

"I'm coming with you, Tails," Amy immediately responded.

"Me too!" Cream added.

"No, you have to go home, Cream," Sonic insisted. "Your mom is really worried about you. Look."

Sonic pointed at the horizon, where the sun was already half-risen.

"Go home," he insisted. "It's been a long night, just go home. All of you."

The others all looked around each other.

"Amy, take Cream home, Tails, Knuckles, go get some rest," Sonic added.

"And what are you gonna do, Sonic?" Knuckles asked him.

"I'm gonna go find Metal," Sonic replied.

"You need rest more than any of us!" Amy scolded him.

"Maybe, but I'm also the one person who has the best chance of guessing what's going through Metal's mind right now and also where he probably went."

Amy sighed.

"You cannot read Metal's mind, Sonic," she said snippily. "If anyone knows him well, it's me!"

"Actually, it's me," Tails said. "I've known him longer."

"No you haven't!" Sonic and Amy said in unison.

"I'm the one who found him when he started changing," Tails said. "I'm the one who spoke to him. I'm the one who taught him sign language. I'm the one who knows how much he's struggling with everything he's feeling."

"…What?" Amy echoed.

"I don't care, I'm the one who's gonna go find him," Sonic said. "You four go home. I'll see you all back there soon enough."

"Sonic, if you don't bring Metal back with you," Tails began.

"Tails buddy, I promise you, I won't come back without him, okay?" Sonic assured him.

Tails looked reluctant, but eventually nodded his head.

"Okay, Sonic," he agreed. "But be careful. Eggman isn't far, and we all know he wants Metal back."

"Eggman's no match for one Sonic, he wouldn't dare fight two at once," Sonic confidently replied.

Tails nodded and pointed towards the Tornado, in the distance. Knuckles took Cream's hand, and the three of them started towards Tails's plane. Amy lingered back, but Sonic waved her away.

"I got this, Ames," he said. "Go. We'll be back before you know it."

Amy sighed and nodded her head, before turning to follow after the others. As she caught up to them, she looked back over her shoulder to wave goodbye to Sonic, but he had already disappeared, a faint line of dust the only indication of which way he had gone.

Next Chapter: Sonic does indeed know exactly where to find Metal, and when he does, he find him to be a bit despondent, and only really manages to get a rise out of him when he discovers Metal has been keeping something Amy gave to him a long time ago. Metal isn't happy when Sonic takes it, and a fight ensues. Meanwhile, Amy reunites Cream with her mother and Vector, and, just when she feels completely lost, she receives an offer of solace from an unexpected source. Chapter 20: Talk