Author's Note: Contrary to popular belief, I AM NOT DEAD! YAY FOR ME! Although, I almost seriously injured myself… ski accident. Hit several patches of ice, fell on my knee (Still hurts… WASSUPWITDAT!? Stupid bum knee…) and ended up sliding down most of the run. Almost ended up slamming myself through one o' them 'slow' signs, off a five foot drop, right into a tree. Fortunately I stopped sliding by then. Now, some announcements:
First of all, the inevitable has finally happened, folks. I got flamed by a rabid yaoi fan, or something like it. However, I wasn't kidding with all my warnings… You can see exactly what I did to the misguided bouvine (Yes, I spell 'bovine' in a speshul way too) in the review section. Hehe… I think I went a bit overboard…my personal security staff beat the living crap out of the poor idiot. I knew the first flamer would have to have crap for brains, but it's like its crap for brains has crap for brains! Volunteer Author security… Dude, I didn't think it was physically possible to hurt the a**clown anymore, but you guys found a way…O_O… oh, and there are ALWAYS openings on volunteer author security! Go ahead and pummel the moron, if you haven't already done so!
Second of all, yes old school Sonic fans, Dr. Eggman is Dr. Robotnik. Well, technically speaking, it's the other way around. Dr. Eggman is actually the original Japanese name, and Dr. Robotnik is what American marketers changed it to, as they thought there was no way American audiences would buy a game whose villain was known as Dr. Eggman. Sonic Team got it changed to its original state when Sonic Adventure came out. And, for those of you who don't know, Metal Sonic and Mecha Sonic are two completely different entities. Mecha Sonic is the silver, annoying dude that showed up in Sonic 2's Death Egg zone (where you had NO rings and fought 2 bosses in a row), and Metal Sonic first appeared in Sonic CD. He's the blue one, and he also is in Sonic 3 & Knuckles, Sonic Jam (I think. Don't quote me on that.) and Sonic Adventure 2: Battle. He's also MUCH tougher.
Third, I think I may have spoken too soon on the death of Pokemon. I'm in High School, and Ruby and Sapphire actually garnered an audience here! WASSUPWITDAT? Well, I guess given the fact we can get it for free at EBX for trading in 3 old GBA games, maybe it's not THAT surprising… they're fun games anyways, unless you feel ill at the very mention of Pokemon, in which case I can't blame you. Still, makes you wonder…
Lastly, I'm sorry I took so long with this! You have no clue how many freakin' projects and crap my teachers dumped on us lately! Oh, and it didn't help that I went on vacation to Mammoth (where I got into the aforementioned ski accident) and didn't have access to a computer… I feel guilty. One MORE thing: I would like to offer my condolences to any Houston Rockets or Michael Jordan fans. If you haven't been keeping up, Phoenix clinched the 8th playoff spot in the west, which means the Rockets can't get in. (BOOO! I HATE the Phoenix Suns! There is NO entertainment whatsoever on that team! At least the Rockets have the tall Chinese dude that makes cool commercials and the point guard dude that's like… good. Oh, well, I still hope the Suns beat San Antonio, 'cause I hate them more! Guess why…) As for MJ, the Wizards have lost too many games to make the playoffs now. (BOOO! The Milwaukee Bucks SUCK!) Oh, and Portland Trailblazer fans (If any of you are out there)……………………………………………………shut up. I dun wanna hear it! NBA PLAYOFFS 2003! LOVE IT LIVE!
One MORE thing: Support our troops in Iraq. I don't give a crap if you're against the war, but now that we're in it you HAVE to support our troops! It's our duty as Americans! Or… if you're in Britain, it's your duty to support your troops, I think… I know squat about British politics. And, if you're French… must refrain from making French joke. And you wonder why they changed it from French Fries to Freedom Fries…
ONE MORE THING: I don't usually watch Hockey, but I know enough to know the Detroit Red Wings are good (one of my friends is a HUGE Detroit fan) and being a Southern Californian, the Ducks usually suck. Then, I turn on the Southern California Sports Report to get commentary on the Lakers' first round playoff match, and then:
DUCKS SWEEP RED WINGS 4-0 IN FIRST ROUND
…………………………DUDE……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………WASSUPWITDAT?! Maybe I should watch Hockey more… can a hockey fan PLEASE explain this to me? I'm still befuddled by this. Okay, enough blabber from me, here's the chapter!
Chapter 12: Death Egg Zone
Angel Island began to shake, then they could feel they were moving upwards… past the clouds. After a few seconds, the island stopped shaking.
"This is as high is it can go," said Knuckles.
"All right. You guys wait here, and then I'll be back so we can go back to my workshop and finish my secret project," said Tails. Sonic, Tails, Rikku and Riku then headed back across the crystal bridge and down the elevator to the first room. Riku went over to the save point to replenish their lost HP and MP, then they warped up the teleporter, reboarded the Tornado and took off for the far side of the moon, where the Death Egg hovered in wait.
"There it is," said Sonic, as the massive weapon of mass destruction loomed into their view.
"It's huge…" said Riku.
"Here we go," said Tails.
"Enemy fighters approaching," warned Rikku," It seems like there are a lot more out here."
"Bring 'em on! We're comin' for ya, Eggman!" cried Sonic. Tails accelerated to an attack speed, and open fired the lock-on laser blaster. Sonic took care of the rest. Next, a squadron came up from beneath them, but Riku nailed them all with a Peal of Thunder. After that, a rather large and fast-moving squadron of bombers flew above them, dropping their payloads on the Tornado.
"Ouch," muttered Sonic.
"D**n! These guys are a lot better than the fighters in the canyon," complained Riku.
"Come on! This should pick you up!" encouraged Rikku, using an Al Bhed Potion on them.
"Hang on! I think that's a minefield dead ahead!" exclaimed Tails.
"So shoot 'em!" said Sonic," Or fly over them!"
"There's too many to just fly over and we can't possibly clear a path… err, never mind! Fire Power Laser!" exclaimed Tails. The Tornado ripped a path through the mines and set off a chain reaction with its mighty power laser, destroying several squadrons of enemies in the process. They continued on with minimal resistance, until they neared a field of space debris. When the Tornado attempted to fly through the various junk, small, almost invisible highly powered laser beam turrets fired thin, focused beams of damaging light at them, knocking a good chunk off the Tornado's AP before Sonic and Riku could dispatch them all.
"I don't know how much more of this we can take," warned Tails.
"The Death Egg's right there!" groaned Riku.
"Kick it into high gear, then! Just get us as close as you can to that docking bay, and we'll do the rest!" encouraged Sonic.
"All right, this is it! Here goes!" cried Tails, and they rocketed straight for the massive space station. Enemy squadrons open fired on them, but a few subtle maneuvers from Tails enabled them to dodge the majority of the attacks.
"All right, this is our one shot! We have to jump into that docking bay entrance!" explained Sonic, pointing to a small opening large enough for a small shuttle near the bottom of the Death Egg. Riku unbuckled the bindings holding him to the Tornado's wing, and Rikku got up and balanced near the tail of the plane, all of them preparing leap onto the floating terror. "Now!" yelled Sonic, and they leapt off, falling momentarily, then catching hold of the ledge of the catwalk in the docking bay, and swing up and in.
"That was a close one," said Rikku.
"Don't take it easy yet. That was the easy part," said Sonic. They advanced to the steel door in the back of the hangar, and stepped through it. What they found next was a labyrinth of neon-lit steel structures, pipes, ducts, and fancy machinery spiraling upwards toward the center of the vast ship. Behind them was a giant elevator that seemed to lead to the barracks, Eggman's quarters and laboratory, and the rest of the crew area, but the controls had been deactivated.
"…This…could take a while," said Rikku, staring up into the cavernous pit of machinery.
"I don't know if it's even physically possible for us to make it through that," pondered Riku.
"I've been through here before, so I'd say… you probably can't," said Sonic.
"So, what now?" asked Rikku.
"How about you go," suggested Riku, pointing at Sonic," and get the elevator working so we can catch up."
"Sounds like a plan to me! Don't get too comfortable, I'll have that elevator running in no time!" replied Sonic, and he rushed deeper into the whirling machinery.
"I hope he doesn't take too long," said Rikku.
"Relax. We haven't known each other that long, but Sonic will probably have that thing working in 5 minutes tops," guessed Riku.
"All right, here I go! Just like old times!" cried Sonic, dashing through the metal corridors and emerging on a steel catwalk. Almost immediately, a spiked orb was hurled at the head of the heroic hedgehog. Sonic, being Sonic, jumped over it, then took out the enemy with a swift Homing Attack.
"That thing again? Eggman must be running out of ideas," mused Sonic, racing across the catwalk, through a 360 degree loop that lead up to a higher section, then ran along the walls of an air vent to another level, emerging on a platform overlooking raw electrical currents. Nearby was a rubber-coated tank tread of sorts.
"Aw, man! I remember this thing! I hated this thing!" complained Sonic, but he hopped onto the treads and began to run anyways. The treads moved forward, across the current, but two-miniature missiles came rocketing at Sonic from two discreet holes in the walls. Sonic heard them coming, and barely managed to hop over them. After dodging several rounds of missiles and dropping down a floor, Sonic was again on solid ground. However, before the blue blur could take a breath, a swarm of Darkballs attacked out of nowhere. After getting knocked around a bit, Sonic managed to launch a counter-attack, taking out about half of them with a combo of Homing Attacks, and the other half with a well timed Sonic Wind.
"Man, no one ever cuts us any slack… I wish Tails were here. Or Knuckles. Or Riku. Or Rikku… or even Amy. Stupid heartless," griped Sonic. Luckily for him, there was a save point just on the edge of the structure he stood atop, along with a strange bridge of sorts, which seemingly lead to a dead end. "Why does this look familiar?" Sonic asked himself. He stepped onto the strange bridge. Slowly at first, then faster, the pieces began breaking apart, the ones on the other side going up, towards a high ledge that couldn't be seen from the metal platform, and the ones on Sonic's side beginning to fall. As soon as he realized what was happening, Sonic leapt up the falling surfaces to the other side of the gap, just in the nick of time. Another series of metal platforms cluttered with enemies spanned the gap to the other side again, which Sonic crossed with ease. After another series of air vents, evil conveyor belts and enemies, Sonic finally made it to the top of the elevator, in exactly four minutes and nine seconds.
"Whew, just made it… All right, now, to get this elevator running… dang it, I should've paid more attention when Tails explained that computer. Well, here goes nothing!" said Sonic. He walked up to the fancy-looking over-elaborate elevator control panel, and pushed a few buttons that didn't do anything, a big red button that triggered a 'self-destruct' message, then by sheer dumb luck, a big blue button that deactivated the sequence. "I hate technology!" griped Sonic," Except my CD player! And my video games! Good technology! All right… what buttons haven't I pushed?" Next to the console was a gray box. Sonic opened the box, and saw a bunch of switches; most were flipped to the 'on' position, except one. "Geez, I REALLY wonder what THIS BUTTON does!" remarked Sonic. He flipped the last switch up, and the elevator whirred to life. (A/N: When you add in the time it took Sonic to figure out the elevator controls, Riku's guess was exactly right, now isn't that strange?)
Back at the bottom…
"What's taking so long… man, this is really boring," groaned Rikku.
"What are you talking about? We've only been waiting a little over four and a half minutes," said Riku.
"Really? I thought it was six," replied Rikku. Suddenly, the control panel on the elevator lit up, and there was the sound of a motor starting up from the top of the chamber. "Yay! Sonic got the elevator working!" exclaimed Rikku. She stepped onto the large platform, followed by Riku. She pressed a button, and the elevator began the long climb up… at a painstakingly slow pace. "Gee, for such an advanced base, couldn't that talking egg guy have made the elevators faster?" asked Rikku.
"I guess it's built for carrying heavy delicate machinery, so it goes slower so as not to cause damage, or something," said Riku. Apparently, Sonic noticed the same thing by the slow moving cables at the top, as he had pulled out his favorite pieces of technology: Game Boy Advance SP (With Sonic Advance 2) and his good old CD player. Unfortunately, he didn't notice the silver ball dropping down the elevator, or the loud 'clunk' it made on landing right in the center of the platform.
"Uh… what the heck is that thing?!" asked Rikku. The Metal sphere uncurled itself, revealing several sets of spines, and red, gleaming lifeless eyes.
"I have no idea… it looks like a metal version of Sonic," said Riku tersely.
"Target sighted: Keyblade Master 03 and Al Bhed girl. Will terminate immediately," whirred the metal hedgehog.
"Whatever it is, I don't think he's here to join our party," quivered Rikku.
Boss Fight: Riku and Rikku VS Mecha Sonic (500 HP)
As the fight began, Mecha Sonic just kind of stood there, allowing Riku and Rikku to get some free shots in, until it curled into a spinning orb of metal quills, knocking them away. It rolled across the elevator in an attempt to run down either one of its adversaries, but with a bit of acrobatics, dodge maneuvers and a good amount of sheer dumb luck, they managed to avoid getting hit TOO many times. After he stopped rolling around like a giant spiked pinball, Mecha Sonic again just stood there, menacingly fanning his quills as he planned his next attack, again doing absolutely nothing as Riku and Rikku pummeled the crap out of him. Before long, however, the metal menace launched into another crazy attack sequence, this time ricocheting off the walls, ceiling and floor, getting in quite a few hits on our heroes.
"AGH! I'm getting really fed up with this guy! He's a freakin' tank!" complained Rikku.
"Where the heck is Sonic when you need him?" asked Riku.
"Whatever. This guy is really ticking me off, but I'm not done yet! This should at least keep us alive long enough to find a weakness," said Rikku, using an Al Bhed potion.
"Maybe… electricity?" said Riku, as he narrowly dodged the bouncing ball of metal.
"At this point, I'd try anything," replied Rikku, pulling out some items, "Even that." Riku blasted Mecha Sonic with Peal of Thunder as Rikku mixed for a Lightning Bolt. Their little plan worked better then they thought, as the attacks not only stunned the bucket of bolts, but did at least 100 damage a shot, and that pretty much ended the fight, as they fried Mecha Sonic's circuits, and the annoying chunk of metal began to crackle, spark and finally explode, just as the elevator reached the top floor.
Boss defeated Riku learned *ScanRikku learned *Sidestep
Sonic, hearing the elevator cables stop, put away his stuff and turned around. He saw Riku and Rikku short of breath, and several dent marks in the elevator.
"What the heck happened to you guys?" asked Sonic.
"What the heck were you doing?!" blurted out Riku and Rikku simultaneously.
"Huh? What are you talking about?" asked Sonic.
"We were ambushed!" cried Rikku.
"By a silver, metal hedgehog with red eyes," finished Riku.
"What?! Mecha Sonic? Great, if he's here…" trailed Sonic.
"What? We beat him," said Rikku.
"That's not what I'm worried about. There's another one. A shiny blue one, with the same red, lifeless eyes. He's also much stronger, and much faster. He doesn't stop moving after every attack, he can negate magic attacks, and he can do just about anything I can," said Sonic," He's called Metal Sonic."
"You think he's here?" asked Riku.
"Probably. This is Eggman's most important stronghold, after all. Well, anyways, the primary power core/computer is just beyond this hallway. If we can beat that, it will put this ship in critical condition. We should probably poke around Eggman's lab and see if we can get some useful stuff off him before we blast this place," suggested Sonic.
"Uh… okay," said Riku.
"What do you mean, beat the computer?" asked Rikku.
"You'll see," said Sonic. They stepped through the door at the end of the hall, and found themselves in a gigantic room, with a large pillar in the center. Suddenly, a large, single orange and red eye appeared in the center, and a ring of black metal spheres began to circle the base.
"Oh. That's what you meant," said Rikku.
Boss Fight: Death Egg's Core 900 HP
"So, what do we aim for?" asked Riku.
"Attack the eye, but be careful. Every time you hit it, one of the spheres explodes and sends out a bunch of spikes," advised Sonic, jumping back to avoid the metal balls.
"Okay, that seems easy enough," said Rikku, throwing a grenade at the eye. Sure enough, a sphere exploded, sending out a shockwave of spikes in a star-shaped pattern, which they all managed to narrowly dodge. Next, Riku attacked the eye with a Strike Raid, taking out five of the spheres.
"Uh… Sonic?" asked Rikku," why does it seem like everything we use on this guy causes the same amount of damage?"
"Because they do," replied Sonic," We're almost halfway through!"
"Half way? But the spheres are almost all gone!" pointed out Riku.
"Take a look at its HP bar," said Sonic.
"…What the? It's not even half gone?!" groaned Riku.
"Just watch," said Sonic, taking the core to 450 HP with two Homing Attacks. A wave of spontaneous explosions swept the base and top of the core, but then the section with the eye ripped itself free from its column, and two platforms with spikes on the bottom came up and floated next to the boss.
"What the heck?!" breathed Riku.
"This is where it gets interesting! Distance yourself before you attack! I'll keep him busy!" said Sonic. Riku and Rikku ran back to the edges of the room, and Sonic nailed the core with a Homing Attack, bouncing off so he landed on one of the platforms. As soon as he did, the core went berserk, firing a blue beam from its bottom at the floor, spiraling the platforms at high speed as it swept slowly across the room. Riku nailed the eye with another Strike Raid, doing heavy damage. Rikku hurled a Frag Grenade at the eye. It exploded right on the eye, dealing even more damage. The core was now left with just a bit of HP left on the green bar. Sonic leapt off his safe perch on the platform and finished the core with a Homing Attack. The platforms crumbled, and the giant computer was swept by another round of explosions before dropping to the floor and cracking in half, leaving a sparking mess of circuitry and wires.
"Whoa, that was cool!" said Sonic, sweeping his arm behind him (A/N: Victory pose in SA2. I need to come up with one for Riku… and Kairi, come to think of it… any suggestions?)
Boss defeated (Insert 'Sonic got through Act 1' jingle here)
The trio exited the room through the door in front of them, leading to another hallway. This one had two doors and a large opening that lead to the main hangar.
"Let's check this door first," said Riku, pointing to the door on the right. The door slid open as soon as they stepped near it, revealing a room with a large couch, easy chairs, a TV, a computer, and several hovercraft rocking rides, like those ones in front of a grocery store.
"Okaaaaaaaaaaay… why the heck does a grown man have ROCKING RIDES in his personal quarters?" asked Rikku.
"I don't get it either… He had them in his quarters on board the Egg Carrier too," said Sonic.
"Let's just see if he's got anything we can use," suggested Riku. They then proceeded to thoroughly search Eggman's personal quarters. Rikku found a floppy disc labeled 'Eggman's Journal', and Sonic found a CD with a map of the 'Light Universe' on it.
"I don't think we'll find anything else here, guys," said Rikku.
"Yeah, I think we cleaned this place out," said Sonic, surveying the wreckage. The room looked like a miniature tornado swept through it. Books littered the floor, small statues were overturned, and various knick-knacks were strewn everywhere.
"Maybe we'll find something in the other door," suggested Riku. They exited the room and entered the door across the hall. The first thing they noticed when they entered was a tall glass cylinder, spanning floor to ceiling, containing a blue and silver metallic hedgehog with black empty eyes.
"Is that… Metal Sonic?" gasped Rikku, going into her combat stance. Riku had already drawn his Keyblades and Sonic looked ready to go at any minute.
"Yeah, but… why isn't he moving? Oh… Eggman's probably trying to work on him," said Sonic," But, if he is activated, it's my fight, okay? I'll lure him out and you guys keep searching this place," said Sonic.
"All right, fine. You're the one who's done this before," agreed Riku, putting his Twin Oblivion away. They started looking through the stack of papers and computer stuff to try and find anything they could make use of, when suddenly, Metal Sonic's pupils glowed red, and the glass cylinder began to crack. The mechanical hedgehog stared straight at Sonic, who glared back and went into a combat stance.
"This is my fight, guys. You get off to the side," ordered Sonic. Then the glass completely shattered, and Metal Sonic floated out. Just then, a familiar gleam on a desk caught Riku's eye. He dashed over and grabbed the object.
"Sonic, I don't know how much this will help, but catch!" yelled Riku, and he threw it at Sonic.
"A Chaos Emerald! Thanks, Riku!" replied Sonic.
Attained the power of chaos. Sonic learned *Chaos Control
"Now, Metal Sonic. You wanna piece of me?! Come and get some!" And the heroic blue hedgehog dashed out of the lab, into the hangar, and Metal Sonic followed suit. Upon reaching the hangar, Metal Sonic shifted the gravity to the left side of the hangar, so the left wall was now the floor, and dashed out onto a maintenance path on the outside of the Death Egg, which spiraled up the giant weapon of mass destruction through a series of small trenches in the armor, seeming to go up forever. Sonic quickly gave chase.
"I'll prove that I'm better than any fake hedgehog!" yelled Sonic. Metal Sonic made some kind of menacing whirring sound in retaliation.
S.U.M.E.T.R.H.S. Boss Fight: Sonic VS Metal Sonic 68 HP (?) (A/N: Yes, that's right. 68 HP. Metal Sonic is identical to Sonic, remember? Bosses don't need a ton of HP, or take forever to be hard. Just make them hard to hit, and make their attack strength higher than yours. And, Sonic doesn't know any healing spells, so it's perfectly even.)
Official theme of this fight: 'For True Story' (Sonic VS Shadow Final Music from SA2: Battle)
Sonic and Metal Sonic ran down the path. Sonic took note that the platforms crumbled behind them, the same way they did at ARK when he had fought Shadow. To make matters worse, there were small laser turrets all over the outside of the Death Egg, and they were constantly bombarding the pathway with laser fire, aimed at Sonic. Sonic decided to make the first move and launched a Homing Attack at Metal Sonic. Metal Sonic countered by jumping straight up, negating Sonic's attack, then retaliated by hitting Sonic with a Homing Attack of his own. Then, Sonic noticed there were rings along the path. Rings restored both HP and MP, so this fight could be prolonged for a while with those. Unfortunately, Metal Sonic could also use the power of the rings, so it went against him as well. Sonic decided to try the technique he beat Shadow with. He charged up a spin dash attack, then when the platform started collapsing, he rolled at a high speed straight at Metal Sonic. Metal Sonic heard him coming and did a double jump to dodge the attack.
"Err… I've had ENOUGH! SONIC WIND!" yelled Sonic, launching a Sonic Wind Attack. Metal Sonic came to a complete halt the moment the attack started, and generated a dark purple crystalline shield around itself. The strange barrier completely negated Sonic's attack. "Darn it… he counters my Homing Attack, dodges the Spin Dash, and negates Sonic Wind… what's left?" thought Sonic. Then, an idea began to form in Sonic's head. "All right… c'mon, you worthless pile of scrap!" taunted Sonic. Sonic leapt up, as if to perform a Homing Attack. Metal Sonic went into a jump, expecting a Homing Attack. However, at the last second…
"CHAOS CONTROL!" cried Sonic, and in a flash of light, he warped through time and space to a spot further up on the path. Seeing Metal Sonic still in mid-jump, he took the opportunity to use a Sonic Wind attack, stunning the robot. "I've got you now! You were programmed to defeat my attack style, but your Egghead programmer forgot I could use Chaos Control!" yelled Sonic, and he charged in and nailed Metal Sonic with no less than four Homing Attacks before it could recover. At this point, Sonic was beginning to run low on MP, so he went after the rings so he could use his strategy again. Meanwhile, the lasers were getting a few hits on Sonic, and more of Metal Sonic's Homing Attacks and Spin Dashes were connecting than Sonic would have liked. Slowly but surely, the robot was wearing Sonic down, as they raced along the collapsing speedway. Metal Sonic launched another Homing Attack at Sonic, but Sonic decided to take a page from the robot's book and countered it. The two hedgehogs then tried launching Homing Attacks in a quick succession at the same time, each one trying to break the other's defenses. This ended when a laser got a lucky shot on Sonic, allowing Metal Sonic to combo with Homing Attacks. "Great… no health left," muttered Sonic. One more attack and Sonic was done. "Man, why did I have to be so stubborn? I want an Al Bhed potion…" thought Sonic.
Sonic continued running down the path, trying to grab the rings and dodge the lasers, in addition to fending off Metal Sonic's attacks. Then, Sonic decided to try another attack, this one to finish the battle. Sonic continued running, looking for an opening. Then Metal Sonic jumped and launched into another Homing Attack. "There!" said Sonic, and at the last moment, he leapt up and over Metal Sonic and pushed both of them over the side with a Homing Attack of his own. Then, using the Chaos Control again, Sonic teleported back on to the path. "Time for me to finish this! Sonic Wind!" cried Sonic, and since Metal Sonic was flying back up to the path, he couldn't activate his Chaos Shield, and Sonic sent him plummeting into space, a sparking mess.
"Just made it," breathed Sonic in relief.
Boss Defeated (Barely)
Meanwhile, back in the lab…
"I wonder how Sonic's managing… without our help," said Rikku, as she hacked into Eggman's computer security system.
"Eh… he's saved this world before. I'm sure he's doing fine. I just hope he doesn't have to fight multiple bosses in a row. I just realized, he doesn't know any curative magic," said Riku, rummaging through a folder of various blueprints," By the way, did you get in yet?"
"Almost… all right, I'm in! Let's see what we've got here…" said Rikku.
"Here. Save anything interesting on this, and we can read it later, since we're kinda pressed for time. It's a blank disc I found in Eggman's quarters," said Riku, handing Rikku a CD.
"All righty… Ooooh, this looks interesting," said Rikku, clicking on a file labeled 'Ansem's Report Final Version'. Inside were several folders labeled 1 through 15.
"Ansem's report… I've heard of this before, from King Mickey… Ansem, before he was the controller of the heartless, was a scientist and a King. He did research experiments to find out everything he could about the heartless… but, from what I heard, there were only 13 reports done. King Mickey told me he has 11-13 and Sora has 1-10. But on this copy, there are 15. Maybe he found something else out… save the entire file to the disc," said Riku.
"You got it! One pirated report, comin' right up!" announced Rikku, and she copied the report to the desk. "Ooooh, this looks interesting," said Rikku, this time checking a file labeled 'Eggman and Hazanko's Perfect Android Project'. Inside was a series of documents that seemed to chronicle the process of building the perfect espionage weapon: an android that could blend in a crowd perfectly, could easily slip into and destroy enemy strongholds, and kept all its weapons in an improved 'invisible pocket', much like the ones people in Sonic and Tails's world used to store their items, like computers, Game Boys, CD players, radios, snowboards, skateboards, etc. Rikku saved this file to the disc as well.
"Hey, Rikku, come over here," called Riku from in front of a cylinder of water," Take a look at this." Rikku ejected the CD and slid it into her pouch, then came over to see what Riku was talking about.
"It's a tank of water, on a weird machine. What's the big deal?" asked Rikku.
"I don't know, but I've got a bad feeling about it," said Riku.
"Hey, look!" said Rikku. Lodged in two indents in the desk were two Chaos Emeralds.
"Hmmm… there's something different about them… I don't know what, but there's some kind of dark presence within them. I don't think these are real Chaos Emeralds. And they're not the kind of fakes Tails makes either," observed Riku.
"Hey, what's this?" asked Rikku, picking up a folder next to the cylinder. It was marked the 'Dark Chaos Project'.
"Pack it up and we'll look at it later," advised Riku," maybe we should take those Emeralds with us too."
"All right," replied Rikku, putting the folder away and picking up the two Emeralds. Suddenly, two green, glowing eyes appeared in the tank. Before Riku or Rikku could do anything, the tank cracked open, and they were up to their knees in water.
"How could so much water come from that little cylinder?" asked Rikku," and what the heck were those eyes?" Suddenly, it hit Riku: Dark Chaos project, the glowing green eyes… Eggman had created an artificial, evil version of the powerful, kindhearted water beast they had met back on Angel Island!
"Rikku! We should get out of here! Before…" started Riku. He was interrupted when a pair of watery arms came from nowhere and grabbed the ominous gems from Rikku's hands. The emeralds dissolved in the water, and a blinding flash of light occurred, and then, from the water rose a creature much like Chaos, but a darker color, and bigger arms with some sort of dissolvable armor in them and bigger claws.
Boss Fight: Dark Chaos 2 900 HP
The evil water beast began the fight by again dissolving into and taking control of the water that now flooded the lab. It conjured up a huge wave, and crashed it into the intruders, sending them tumbling back. As the water level returned to normal, Dark Chaos whipped up a water cyclone extending to the ceiling of the room.
"You're done! Peal of-" started Riku.
"STOP! What are you thinking?! WE'RE STANDING IN WATER! WATER CONDUCTS ELECTRICITY!" screamed Rikku," My brother already did that to me before! He tried attacking a water fiend with a thunder attack while I was in the water! I don't wanna go through that again!"
"All right, I'm sorry! I forgot!" groaned Riku. He used Strike Raid on the monster instead, landing the first few hits, until the beast dove back into the water.
"I got an idea! When I say now, jump out of the water!" said Rikku.
"What?" asked Riku nervously.
"NOW!" yelled Rikku, jumping out of the water and mixing to make an Icefall. As Riku jumped out of the water, she hurled the fused item into the water, freezing it over, and dealing damage to Dark Chaos. It didn't hold the water demon for long, as he came bursting out from the ice. Using his water qualities, he stretched out at the pair and lashed at them with his claws.
"Show me your power," challenged Riku, holding one Oblivion in a guard position. Dark Chaos swiped at Riku continually, but the beast couldn't break the Superguard. "Is that it?" asked Riku," My turn!" And he dashed forward and sliced at the creature's head with the other Keyblade, which had been absorbing power from the blows Riku had deflected. Riku followed through with a long combo of Illusion Slash, hitting with almost every blow, finishing it with a Peal of Thunder since the water was frozen over. Rikku then snuck up behind the demon as it lashed at Riku again, and mugged him, taking several water gems. Riku then went in and hit the beast with several combo attacks, and used another Illusion Slash. Rikku ended the fight by hurling a Frag Grenade at the beast.
"Heh, not as tough as you thought you were, eh?" taunted Rikku, shrugging as Dark Chaos collapsed into a useless puddle.
End Boss Fight
"Riku, maybe we should get the heck outta here now," suggested Rikku.
"I'm all for that. We should get to the hangar," replied Riku, and they dashed out of the lab back into the hall, pirated files and stolen goods in hand, and headed for the hangar.
Now, back up on the maintenance path…
Sonic continued to run along the path, noticing the style of the walkway changing from a speedway-like platform to a catwalk with support underneath. When it changed completely, the now-catwalk stopped collapsing as Sonic ran along it, and there weren't any more lasers firing. Then, Sonic saw an open steel domelike structure ahead. As he approached it, he could see a person sitting in it.
"Well, if it isn't my pal Sonic," said the person.
"Eggman!"
exclaimed Sonic, sprinting to get close, coming to a screeching halt. The domelike structure sat right in the
middle of the catwalk, and Eggman could be seen sitting high inside it from the
open side.
"I'm surprised you made it this far. No matter, I can see you're in bad shape from your fight against Metal Sonic. You won't survive this battle. Prepare for your last fight!" exclaimed Eggman. His chair turned around, and the steel door clanged shut. The dome then sank out of the catwalk, and a loud shaking sound, like an Earthquake, and the catwalk began cracking and falling apart again. Sonic ran forward until the catwalk stopped crumbling, then looked back. There was the sound of Earth-shaking footsteps, and Sonic looked back to see a huge robot built in Eggman's likeness, with huge metal hands, a flamethrower nose and laser eyes approaching.
S.U.M.E.T.R.H.S Boss Fight: Egg Mecha 600 HP
(A/N: Under normal circumstances, this boss wouldn't be too hard. Remember though, Sonic has NO MP left, and has somewhere between 1 and 10 HP right now, since he has no curative magic, and there was no save point between the Metal Sonic fight and here, and he couldn't go back since the platform was falling apart behind him. If you want to give yourself a similar challenge, enter the Hades cup with Sora alone, and right before you fight the Behemoth, use all your magic and items, and don't defeat the last enemy of that group until you have 10 or less HP (Just approximate). Then, fight the Behemoth. There ya go.)
Official Theme: Doomsday Approaching (I think that's what it's called… Sonic VS Egg Mecha in Sonic 3 & Knuckles or Knuckles VS Metal Sonic in the same game)
The robot continued to clank closer to Sonic, until it was finally right besides him. The Egg Mecha then followed Sonic with its hands, then tried crushing the heroic hedgehog with its six fingers (three on each hand). Sonic, expecting this, jumped up right before the robot lowered its digits, then hit every finger on the hand with a Chain of Homing Attacks. Next, the Egg Mecha swept the platform with its laser eyes. Sonic managed to avoid it by rolling away from its path. The Egg Mecha continued to attack with its hands, and Sonic continued attacking the fingers. Occasionally, the giant robot would sweep the catwalk with its laser eyes, or send down a cloud of flames with its flamethrower, but Sonic avoided them by Spin Dashing, flipping or jumping away. Eventually, Sonic destroyed the fingers and rendered the hands useless.
"Argh! Annoying hedgehog! This will be the end of you!" ranted Eggman. The Egg Mecha then sank below the catwalk again.
"Is it over? Wait, no, I've seen this before!" exclaimed Sonic, and he slowly ran back along the catwalk, then turned around. Just as he had expected, the Egg Mecha came bursting from beneath the catwalk. Sonic slowly ran back from the approaching steel giant. The Egg Mecha then attacked by blowing clouds of fire at Sonic, which he managed to dodge by leaping over him. "Let me think… what was this guy's weak point?" wondered Sonic, jumping between another eye laser attack. "Oh, I remember! Hit the nose, and it makes the armor plate drop, so then I hit the Master Emerald! All right, here I go!" After the nose blew another cloud of fire, Sonic leapt over it and attacked the nose with a Homing Attack. The armor fell away and revealed the Master Emerald, which began charging energy to fire a powerful beam attack. Sonic walloped away at it with a combination of Homing Attacks. As he rolled under the laser, a thought crossed Sonic's mind: How could the Master Emerald be powering Eggman's robot and on Angel Island at the same time? "Eggman! How did you get the Master Emerald?" yelled Sonic.
"I created a fake one! This emerald has almost the same power out put as the real thing!" replied Eggman.
"Great… no one ever cuts us any slack," griped Sonic. Sonic managed to keep up his attack, dodging every single one of Eggman's attacks, until he finally got enough MP from landing hits to use Sonic Wind. The next chance he got, Sonic unleashed a chain of Homing Attacks followed by a Sonic Wind, which finally knocked the Master Emerald from the chest cavity of the Egg Mecha and sent it collapsing in a ball of flames into the armored hull of the Death Egg, setting off a devastating chain reaction. The very ground Sonic was standing on began to explode. Sonic just grabbed the Emerald and ran from the shockwave. Spying a ramp off to the right, Sonic moved a bit, aimed for the ramp and took a flying leap.
End Boss FightBack in the hangar, Riku and Rikku also abandoned ship, and Sonic could be seen above them falling in a tuck, so as to catch up to them.
"What happened?" asked Riku," and how did you get the Master Emerald here?"
"Not much. I kicked Metal Sonic's metal butt, but he got my HP low, then I had to go against Eggman in his giant robot. It was powered by this fake Master Emerald. I managed to get through that without getting hit, and I took the Emerald after that. The explosion from the Egg Mecha caused a chain reaction, so the Death Egg exploded," explained Sonic.
"So, where do we land?" asked Rikku.
"I don't know," replied Sonic," Hopefully, Tails will come through for us and finished that project thing." Just then, a large blue airship of sorts could be seen, though it was still kind of far away, it was moving toward them fairly quickly. At that point, the ship had obviously seen the exploding Death Egg, which was still falling and exploding behind them, so they still had air. The ship picked up speed quickly, swooped under the exploding ship, and Sonic, Rikku and Riku landed safely on the deck, just in time to see the Death Egg explode in a great spontaneous burst. Debris rained all around them, but they weren't paying any attention: They were watching a small shuttle fly away from the explosion.
"What was that?" asked Riku.
"I'd say it was Eggman… and with a shuttle like that, it means he probably saved a few of his useless rust buckets," griped Sonic.
"By the way, is this Tails's ship or did we just get lucky?" asked Rikku.
"Or unlucky," said Sonic," The layout of this ship looks familiar…" He stepped on a yellow button sticking out of the ground by mistake and a blue monorail came gliding up to them. With a glance at each other and a nod, they hopped in. The monorail then started up again. After a while, it glided to a smooth stop, and they hopped out.
"What took you so long?" greeted Shadow.
"What are you talking about?! I had that thing blown up before you guys got here!" defended Sonic.
"Sonic! You beat him again! I'm so glad you're okay!" came another voice.
"Amy?" said Sonic.
"I knew you would win!" squealed Amy, running up hugging Sonic.
"Amy… I…. Can't breathe!" choked out Sonic, dropping the Master Emerald fake.
"Oh. Sorry," said the pink hedgehog, letting go of Sonic. Rikku and Riku just stared. Nervously.
"Head for the bridge. Tails wants to speak with you three," said Shadow," This layout should seem familiar to you, blue hedgehog. I trust you can find it?"
"Of course I can! Let's go, guys!" said Sonic. He picked up the fake Emerald and led them up a small staircase to a platform. Sonic pressed the button marked 'bridge' and the platform rose from the hallway, into the open and up to a small ledge. They disembarked and entered an automatic sliding door.
"Hey Sonic! What do you think of the Ascalon?" asked Tails.
"Is that what you call this ship?" asked Sonic.
"Yeah. Well, I didn't actually build it from scratch. I used the wreckage from Eggman's old Egg Carrier and built up from there. I made some improvements to it, too," replied Tails.
"You stole Eggman's ship and made it better? I knew you were some kinda genius, but…… DANG," said Sonic.
"Actually, its not even complete yet. We're basically completely unarmed right now because I couldn't get the main cannon running, and I didn't have the time to build cannons," said Tails.
"Oh, well. This ship means I can travel to other worlds now!" said Riku.
"That's right! We should probably decide on a course right now, so I can enter it in the flight computer and show you guys around," said Tails.
"That reminds me," said Rikku, pulling out the CD," this disc has all the information we copied off Eggman's computers. There's a map in there." She handed the disc to Tails, who put it into the computer and opened the map file. They all stared at the map for a minute, then Riku spoke up.
"Traverse Town? That's where Sora probably is… we should try to make our way there eventually," said Riku.
"All right, then. The first world on our way there is called the Lylat System. Well, it's actually a system of worlds, but they're grouped under one Keyhole. The world with a keyhole would be Corneria. Should I enter it in the computer?" asked Tails.
"Yeah, let's head that way," said Riku.
"Oh, and Tails? This Master Emerald I've got here was the power source for Eggman's Egg Mecha. Maybe you can use it?" asked Sonic.
"Hmm… I've already got this ship running on seven fake Emeralds. Three for weapons, three for the engines and one for life support. But… with this, I might be able to get that main cannon powered up into a super weapon! Thanks, Sonic!" said Tails," I'll get to work on it right away!"
Progress Report:
Riku Lv.70 88 HP 9 MP
Rikku Lv.66 75 HP 15 MP
Sonic Lv.70 81 HP 13 MP
Kairi No Change
Yuna No Change
Tidus No Change
Auron No Change
Yami No Change
Sora No change
Donald No change
Goofy No change
Cloud No change
Aerith No change
Squall/Leon No change
Vincent No change
Yuffie No change
Author's note in closing: I'm gonna keep it short and sweet, 'cause I have a Lakers game to watch in a couple hours. WOOOO! GO LAKERS! KOBE4MVP! NOTKG! NBA PLAYOFFS 2003! LOVE IT LIVE! Anyways, next chapter is Sephiroth chapter. Not much fighting, but that's okay. He'll fight a lot more in the last Sephiroth's party only chapter (The Skies of Arcadia one). Okay, I'll shut up now.
*****************************End Chapter 12**************************