Sonic Hazard: Chapter 3

Double the Trouble: Let there be Rein (pt.2)

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Time: 48:01pm (20:01pm (8:01pm)

Place: G.U.N. stronghold

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The fire wasn't spreading any further?! It had contained itself over the western point of the ARK and seemed to not tread any closer. Sonic was bewildered to discover this. Maybe the bomb in the necklace was weaker than anticipated, maybe it wasn't the bomb at all... Sonic's suspicions became accurate when he overheard someone shout:

"Something's shooting from out of the structure!"

Sonic's head bolted up with a speed rivaling his sprinting. His eyes bulged from what he saw. Tails and Sophia... were both alive! "YEH! Little buddy!" he cheered but soon caught on to something. "Huh? Is Sophia... flying?

Flares were shooting from the bottoms of Sophia's green shoes; with her newfound strength, she was able to cradle Tails over her right shoulder while her left hand was clinging tightly to Tails' Cyclone. It was as if Sophia were a jet as she soared higher and faster into the air, leaving a stream of smoke behind her.

Tails was astounded to see himself moving so quickly in the sky thanks to the pale green hedgehog. "Sophia—how?!"

"Rocket Footwear. A piece of my memory returned to me, Dr. Gerald had equipped me with this gear in order for me to investigate space whenever he wanted me to." Sophia's eyes shone, her necklace on her neck, ringside facing forward. She had a duty to maintain. Ever since she heard Tails call to her she knew she couldn't give up. But it didn't sound like Tails that called to her at all... it seemed like another voice but very familiar to her.

"Well that's a good thing, so much I still don't understand about you like your overwhelming strength and other abilities, there is always room to learn more about a person... but what started the fire down there? And why are we still flying higher?" Tails inquired.

"We're being followed by the one who started the fire." Sophia said sharply as she quickly jerked her body downwards. A shuriken on purple fire swirled pass where Sophia's form had been. It shot up into the air, going on for miles.

"Who is it! Do you know this—" Tails found Sophia and himself hurling towards the ground in an instant. Sophia could barely keep herself floating up in one spot as her shoes expelled more flame in order for her to stop falling. Whatever it was, whoever it was, it was unbelievably strong.

As soon as Sophia came to a halt, a blow to the face quickly struck her. Her grip loosened on Tails' Cyclone as it zoomed to the ground. Sophia tightened her hold on Tails as she rushed after his invention, trying to get away from her attacker at all costs.

Just before Tails' walker clashed with the snow, Sophia caught it just in time, inches from the ground. She sat it down and placed Tails inside. But just before she could get the two-tailed fox fully out of her protection, another flaming shuriken came at her. This time, impelling itself right into her left shoulder. The female hedgehog was slung back and hit the snow with her back.

"Sophia!" Tails screamed and then realized a blurry figure was coming at her from the sky. "Sophia, watch out!" he warned her.

Sophia, through the pain of her injury, rolled over to her side just in time to miss a kick to the stomach. The snow on the floor now being disturbed from its place was now swooping up in air after the mighty impact from the kick.

"Who is that?" Tails whispered as his ears pressed down against his skull.

The snow fell back down to the ground and onto the pursuer's form as well. The attacker turned towards Sophia like a stiff robot as mechanical noises were heard emitting from inside her. Yes, this creature, this cyborg, was in fact a female and also resembled a wombat animal. A black veil covered her face and her ears were just about invisible. Below her neck was a mechanical torso with a sort of top shaped like a black star covering it. Below her abdomen was brown furry legs hardly seen because of her thigh-high black boots while her arms had belts of shurikens latched to them. Strapped to her back was a mechanical pack with a wire exiting the top and joining with the back of her head.

"Regenerated Entity Influenced Narcoleptic... R.E.I.N.!" Sophia tried to bring herself up from off the ground but almost fell back to it—the electricity from her wound pulsed out of it for a second. "Good evening, sister. Haven't seen you for a good fifty years... Too bad it couldn't have been longer." The hedgehog began to wobble in her place.

"Sister?" Tails gasped.

"Sentinel Omnipotent Perfected Harpy Insipid Arcanum... Sophia—Sophia—Sophia—Sophia—Sophia—Sophia..." Rein said it as if her voice box got stuck.

"That data chip of yours is pretty outdated. Malfunctioning isn't it. Not everything of Dr. Gerald's is meant to last forever." Sophia scooted back a bit.

"You—You plan to do what... Sophia—Sophia—Sophia.?" Rein said in that monotone voice of hers as she came forward.

"Destroy malfunctioning equipment of the great Dr. Gerald!" The fire from Sophia's shoes melted the snow as she bolted right for Rein's abdomen. But unfortunately, the attack proved to be ineffective.

"You d-d-don't understa—stand, I'm more machine than you'll ever be." Rein was holding Sophia back by her right shoulder. She then proceeded to placing her free hand onto her shuriken embedded into her sister's left shoulder and pushing it in further.

"I feel... PAIN! GAH!" Sophia's eyes bulged from the excruciating pain exerted onto her.

"Cursed with emotions, pi—pity." Rein said dully as she shoved the shuriken in some more.

The screams the fox boy's friend was too much to bear any longer. "No! Stop!" Tails hit a button on his control panel as missiles began to fire off at Rein. The wombat let go of Sophia and jumped in the air. She brought her arms out as wings spread from them. Rein then swooped down at Tails' Cyclone and rushed passed it so fast it was about to topple over.

"AH!" Tails was about to abandon his machine before it hit the ground until Sophia came at its side and held it up.

"Eminence, you must go now." Sophia pleaded, pushing the Cyclone back on its feet.

"Sophia, no, I can't leave you." Tails hit the counsel.

"Your mission is done with, we stopped the bomb and saved your friend. Let me handle the rest—"

"AH! Sophia! She's coming back!" Tails warned her as he pointed to the sky.

Rein had flown pretty high into the air and was now hurling back at the two with a tremendous velocity. She reached her left hand for the sheath on her right hip and brought out a scimitar! The blade was aimed for either Sophia or Tails. Sophia couldn't retreat from Tails' side or Rein would go right for him seeing he is an innocent victim that shot at her. Sophia had to fight no matter what.

With Rein closing in, Sophia did what she had to do and jumped at Rein—not knowing she wouldn't have had to.

Rein was knocked to the ground by a powerful chain-saw spin by Sonic the Hedgehog!

"Sonic!" Tails whooped thrilled.

"The one and only." He said very presumptuously as he struck a pose. "Sorry it took so long, had to get pass a lot of dawdling bystanders back there."

"Ass—Assistance of the inferior one shall be abolished!" Rein exclaimed while shooting off five blazing shurikens at Sonic.

"Oooh, you said the big bad 'A' word." Sonic dodged them easily and went for his opponent and leaped for her.

Rein threw a punch for him but Sonic disappeared in thin air and soon reappeared behind her. He kicked her with both of his feet Rein plummeted to the floor while Sonic somersaulted in air until he got back to the ground. He didn't let his guard down as he sprinted towards her and began punching her virtually a hundred times as she tried to stand up.

"You know, normally I don't hit girls, but you are a machine so this is an EXCEPTION!" Sonic relieved Rein from the punches he gave her on her back and then swept the ground from under her. On her back, Sonic believed she would be an easy target. He brought his right leg up and was about to bring it crashing down on her chest when Rein brought her own legs up to Sonic's chest and knocked him back. She flipped from off the ground and faced her new enemy. Sonic stood up and faced her.

"I'm not going to go easy on you!" Sonic ran for her.

"Neither am I-I-I!" Rein ran for him.

Both fighters clashed together and proceeded to battle.

"Eminence are you injured?" Sophia asked Tails as she helped him out of his Cyclone.

"I will be when I figure a few things out. But right now we need to get out of here." Tails admonished feeling a little queasy.

"Rein needs to be stopped, we must destroy her or at least put her back into her chronological sleep." Sophia informed her "master".

"We can think of a way of doing that after we escape from the authorities!" Tails told her as he looked passed her. Helicopters and more soldiers were heading right for the battleground.

"Sonic! Let the policeman distract her, we need to get back to my workshop!" Tails called out to Sonic.

Sonic ducked from Rein's blade, "How are we suppose to get out of here so fast—that walker of yours isn't that fast and we ARE in Russia."

All of a sudden, on cue with Sonic's words. A loud buzzing sound came from above. "Sonikku!"

"What? Amy!" Sonic glanced up while jumping away from Rein's scimitar.

"She's actually piloting the Tornado 2!" Tails said flabbergasted.

The plane hovered over Tails as Amy threw down a ladder and three sets of rope that could be tied around Tails' Cyclone.

"All right! Way to go, Amy! Sophia help me out here." Tails began tying one of the ropes to his walker.

"How do I tie this?" Sophia was holding the ladder instead of the other two ropes.

"Oh Sophia..." Tails sighed.

It wasn't long until the Tornado 2 lifted Tails' Cyclone into the air and Tails was now in control of the plane. Sophia was back to hanging off the side of the plane's back fin. "Sonic, hurry up!" the soldiers were getting closer as the lights from the helicopters shone down on them.

"Don't have to tell me twice." Sonic looked back at Rein. "Nice meeting ya', hope my sudden departure doesn't change anything we have between us. Don't call me, I'll call you." Sonic then executed his huge tornado attack as he circled around Rein and the approaching soldiers.

The wind swirl got bigger as some of the soldiers were engulfed along with Rein. Sonic made his escape as the Tornado 2 took off for home.

"Quickly men! This is our chance!" The general from before that shot himself was back with his arm in a sling and shoulder bandaged up. He began fumbling with his gun trying to cope it in his injured hand. "Okay, ready, aim—"

"Sir, your gun is pointing at your uh, "lower region"!" the smart aleck soldier from before warned him a little too late as the gun shot off.

"GAH!"

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Time: 50:22pm (22:22pm (10:22pm)

Place: Tails' workshop

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"GAH!" Sophia winced in pain while Tails used tongs to rip Rein's shuriken from out of the green hedgehog's shoulder.

"Please answer me something... who the HELL was that!" Sonic's ears and eyebrows were twitching simultaneously while an aggravated visage crossed his face. "I could have handled that robot back there, we didn't have to leave so soon. Who knows where it is now, probably causing more havoc. Drats!" the blue hedgehog curled his left hand into a fist and pounded it into his right palm.

"Sophia are you all right now?" Tails asked the female as he began to bandage up her wound. "I thought you were a robot, I didn't think you were something so "real" like us. You don't bleed however, but you do experience every emotion we would."

Sophia nodded. "As long as my injury is contained and sealed off, it will heal much faster. I was created in a test tube, the one you found me in of course, Eminence. My exterior is that of a real creature, but my interior is of an automaton. Nanobots inside me fix any malfunction or injury I should experience."

"But your emotions... why do you have them if on the inside you are a robot?" Tails questioned. "Could it be that Dr. Gerald had created a data chip in your head to act like a human brain that makes you endure real feelings?"

Sophia's eyelids grew heavy, she could hardly come to face Tails now. Only part of her remembered certain facts about herself when her necklace was placed back on her. Bits and pieces were still unknown to her but one vital speck of information hung around in her head—the necklace had something to do with it all. Was it the necklace that made her emotions stronger? And then there was something about each side of the necklace. What was her memories trying to unravel? What was so different about each side of her Light-Heart Foot Necklace?

"OHMIGOSH! Look!" Amy shrieked from below the three. She was standing on the lower deck of the workshop next to the television set. "The news is talking about that robot girl."

Sonic was first from the upper deck to get to the bottom. He simply jumped off the rail and came to a halt next to the younger, pink hedgehog.

"Earlier this evening, G.U.N.'s second stronghold had been broken into once again various intruders caught on G.U.N.'s security surveillance systems." Three blurry pictures popped up on screen and hid the anchorman. One seeming to look like Sonic, but all you could really see was a blue swirl looping around many of the authorities. The next was possibly Tails and Sophia but only a fragment of them—only Sophia's ear and Tails two tails were seen due to his walker's blinding cannon blasting at a security door. The last was clearly Rein seen setting fires in the cargo area with the skinny scientist from before lying dead.

"Why is the news always on at the right time." Sonic remarked.

"—Prior to the attacks, a terrible fire broke out and demolished most of the Bernoulli Space Colony and G.U.N.'s fortress, causing millions in property damage. The starters of the fire were seen fleeing the crime through air and were almost apprehended if it wasn't for the surprising cooperation of the world's once trusted hero, Sonic the Hedgehog."

"NANI!" Sonic's mouth dropped to the floor.

"—Now arrest warrants are out on the hedgehog and anyone else who aids him. Once within the hands of the proper authorities, Sonic will surely be held for trial. He is now a wanted criminal, dead or alive. Of course, I myself never really thought of Earth being in safe hands with a blue rodent wandering around. He was never a hero in my book that's for sure. Now, enough about my opinion, here's "Talk Girl" live at G.U.N.'s stronghold with the high points of our broadcast."

Talk Girl now took over the rest of the screen. She had a very childish smile to go with her pink suit and blonde shoulder length hair. She began to report her story as her eyes remained closed tightly. "Thanks, Bob, here is where policeman and firemen have been entering and exiting every now and then with terrible injured bystanders, many of which—"

"Blue rodent! Never a hero!" Sonic was about to ram headfirst into the television set if it wasn't for the quick actions of Tails. The fox had dove in from the upper deck and was holding his friend back. Steam came out of Sonic's ears as his eyes boiled red. "I bet he would love to know what I think of him in MY book!"

"Sonic calm down." Tails coaxed, his feet digging into the ground while he slid forward. Sonic was trying his hardest just to get to the t.v. "Don't take it out on my television! It's already worse off!" the fox pleaded.

Sonic soon stopped when he heard Talk Girl report something else quite more interesting to him. "Here we have someone who has came in contact with one of the intruders. He claims it was his fellow colleague's fault that the fire broke out because it was he who released one of Dr. Gerald's nefarious creations. This scientist remarkably has only walked away with one mere scratch on his brow when the stronghold was being evacuated. Sir, do you have anything to say after witnessing all of this?" Talk Girl titled her mic over to the one in question.

It was the burly scientist from before! He had lived, miraculously, after his encounter with Rein and only the despicable, skinny scientist was repaid for his evil ways. The portly physician opened his mouth and said, "Hn."

Silence.

"Ah, eheheheh, strong words from such a strong person, very handsome as well. It would be a miracle if such a marvelous being such as yourself weren't tied down. Ehehehe." Talk Girl flirted and giggled hysterically but soon realized she was still on the air. "Ahem. Following the evacuation, and then the departure of the magnificent Sonic the Hedgehog, sorry Bob, he is a hero in my book nonetheless, one of the suspects was within G.U.N.'s clutches, though only for a few minutes. The creature broke away from the authorities and proceeded to attacking the ARK for at least half an hour. She then took off in air and evaded all of G.U.N.'s air force. Her whereabouts are unknown. I shall keep you guys updated on this story as I interview our star witness some more, hehe. Back to you Bob."

"Ah yes, great broadcast Talk Girl. G.U.N. has decided to rebuild from the ashes and the search for the perpetrators is underway, stay tuned for—"

"Well, at least someone's on my side." Sonic huffed.

"You don't think that robot is going to find us and come here, do you?" Amy said with a shaky voice and puffy eyes fixed on Sonic.

"No way, we tied her up with those military tycoons to take care of. And as fast as the Tornado was going, there was no way she could match that speed." Sonic scoffed and itched his cheek with his right hand.

"And if she does?" Tails grumbled.

"Then we'll fight!" Sonic cheered and shot a fist into the air.

"Unacceptable. I will fight." Sophia said sharply. She was walking down the stairs very slowly.

"Oh yeh, you did so wonderfully out there today. I didn't see any reason for me to step in and save your butt!" Sonic taunted sarcastically.

The green hedgehog let Sonic's words slide. Her memory was finally making sense. After wondering and pondering for so long about the things her mind was telling her after her necklace was placed on her neck, she finally knew what each side meant. But was she willing to take the risk and do what she was planning. She joined the rest of the group.

"Sophia..." Tails murmured.

"Rein's eyes were made with Light-Heart Foot crystal. The unfinished way they were crafted is why she wears a black veil." Sophia started.

"Nice history lesson." Sonic yawned.

Sophia overlooked it. "Light-Heart Foot crystal pulsates with each other, which is why I was able to locate her and which is why she will be able to locate us!"

"Oh no!" Amy held her hands to her face as she looked on horrified.

"This is not good at all, we are going to have to leave now!" Tails declared getting very edgy.

"Go where? If this is true, wherever we go that robot girl will just find us again! We have to fight!" Sonic demanded with clenched fists.

"Rein isn't something to underestimate, she is jealous of me, which makes me her target. Let me handle her. We are rivals in battle. I'm the only one that can handle her, like I did before." Sophia held her head down.

"Sibling rivalry..." Tails whispered.

"If you haven't noticed, Sonic isn't someone to underestimate either." Amy praised her idol.

"Just what are we suppose to do then? Sit back and watch. No deal." Sonic crossed his arms.

Sophia shook her head. "You remember the other faint pulsing I received earlier..." the group nodded. "Something more deadly is located wherever it is. Knuckles is going to need help. You must go to him. You will all be safer away from Rein. I've seen what you can do, Sonic, your skills are needed in Antarctica."

Sonic stood in silence for a while before saying, "... What the heck are you planning to do? You tried already and you really didn't last long."

"That's where this comes in." Sophia cupped her necklace. "With the ring side facing forward I am the way I am now. Compassionate, aid to Eminence. But if chain side faces forward, I know I can become a stronger fighter. Or something else... more vile."

"Sophia, no." Tails admonished. "Let me study it first, there's no way Rein can make it here now right? Just give me an hour—AH!"

All of a sudden, something came shooting through the wall of Tails' workshop and slammed right into the upper deck. A purple flaming shuriken! Rein had found them.

"Looks like Rein doesn't have any respect for after hour visits. YOU'RE DISTURBING THE PEACE!" Sonic directed his shout at the attack outside.

"No more time, you must go now, Eminence." Sophia pleaded as three more flaming shurikens breached the walls and began to set the upper floor on fire. "Get to your plane, I will hold her off. No matter what happens I will not harm you Eminence. As long as you are away I won't go after you if worse comes to worse. Please go now... I don't know what will happen now..." and with those last words, Sophia gripped her necklace and spun it around, the chain side facing forward. A dark flashing light engulfed the female hedgehog's form and she was no longer the same being they once knew.

"Sophia!" Tails screamed. He felt Sonic grab him by the waist as he slung Amy over his shoulders.

Sonic looked back behind him at Sophia. No turning back now. A smug little smirk crossed his face as he leaped in the air. "No time to dress warmly I guess, time to put it into high gear!"

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To be continued...?