Hello! Welcome to Wild Fox! I hope you all enjoy! The second half of this fic was done with beta editing from Singerj199.
Orange leaves brimmed through the trees as the Great Forest fully embraced Fall. Within their cover hid the village of Knothole, its residents enjoying a final week of warmth brought by southern breezes.
"Hey, watch this T2!" Sonic shouted. He dashed up from the table that the freedom fighters were enjoying lunch at, ready to use the fifteen minutes of pent up energy. Sure that the fox was watching, he started his performance. Faster than Tails could see, the hedgehog managed to stack all four of his chilly dogs vertically on his plate, then, with a flick of his wrist, shot the food up into the air, leapt forward, and ate them before they touched the ground. Chilly rained from the sky.
"Whoa! That was so cool!" Tails exclaimed. "Do you think I could do that!?"
Sonic grinned, loving the excitement they shared "Maybe, but you haveta get faster at eating these bad boys first" he playfully winked. No further prompting needed, the young fox whirled back to his own food and scarfed it down so fast that it looked like he'd accidentally eaten parts of his plate too. Lost sauce covered his white muzzle, but he was grinning ear to ear. He was going to be just like his big brother!
"Looking rad!" Sonic praised "One day you might even catch up to the ol' hedgehog"
"Really?" Tails' face shone with delight.
"Yeah bro" The hedgehog affirmed confidently. Remembering something, he eyed over his shoulder. "Now that we're done… you wanna head over to the river, this weather ain't gonna stay around forever." He suggested.
"Yeah!" The fox jumped up. They dashed off without a look back, much to the dismay of anyone trying to get them to clean their plates.
Sally left the area not too long after them. She rolled her eyes at the mess, those two could clean it later. Sonic's rude manners didn't really bother her as much as some of the others, one coyote in particular, and she could let small stuff like this slide. Her friends knew that, though some strangers wondered how they could cooperate as leaders.
There were things he'd do that angered her though, usually risks the hedgehog took while in Robotropolis. Most of it was probably worry, but the stress still existed, especially when his actions affected the other freedom fighters. They had been through some pretty sticky situations because of his ego.
Even worse, on occasion he'd bring Tails to the outskirts of the city. Sally knew that Sonic would protect them, but couldn't he see how dangerous those trips were!?
She sighed, pushing open the door of her hut. Sonic cared for the child too, she couldn't deny that. He was just… Sally stumbled for the right word, overconfident? That was probably it.
Tails was still young enough that he loved any chance to be a part of everything the older teens did. She smiled. He was almost like a son to her and the ground squirrel couldn't imagine her life without him. Only on dreary mornings, after a nightmare about Robotnik, she might. That madman had destroyed so much, yet would still do anything to annihilate their group. The idea of anyone hurting Tails fueled a raging fire in Sally's heart and she worried for the kid's safety while he was on missions. To think that it was only by chance that he'd been found as an infant and raised here at all was almost unfathomable to her.
When he'd first come she and her friends didn't spend much time with him. They were only five or six at the time, and a month-old baby was no fun to play with at all. With a slight grin she remembered how her younger self had been completely convinced that the child was sent from Robotnik to make all the adults stop paying attention to them. How that plan even made sense, the ground squirrel now had no idea. Soon after however, Sally found that she liked taking care of the little fox and dragged the others into helping Rosie whenever they could.
The present had come suddenly, and now Tails was old enough to go on the missions he'd so wanted to for his entire life. Sally still wasn't comfortable with that idea and wanted to distract herself. She plopped down on her chair and pulled out plans for the night's raid.
The group was going to set charges in one of the inner buildings. Hopefully everything would go well, but there was still much that could go terribly wrong that deep into Robotropolis. She desperately hated that her friends had to be in such trouble, and her gut twisted at the thought of putting Tails into it too. No matter what Sonic said about the idea the fox wasn't going tonight.
There would be another mission in a few days, a far less dangerous one to gather supplies from an outset factory, the fox could accompany them then.
Shaking her head back to the present, Sally refocused on the plans for tonight's mission. She needed to make sure everything was in order, a trip to Robotropolis, even the most routine one, could lead to disaster. If there were any loopholes, overlooked pieces, or other ways Robotnik could get the better of them, she needed to know.
After an hour had passed, little changed, so Sally deemed the plan solid and decided to take a break.
"Hey!" A playful voice shouted. An enormous splash soaked the dirt as Sonic jumped out of the river. Sally had chosen to sit far back and watched Tails spin a full shower of water at the hedgehog before promptly flying far out of Sonic's range with a joyed smile. It changed into a fit of laughter as the older mobian got a running jump, grabbed him, and sent them both crashing back down into the water. They continued their play fight for a while before deciding to relax on the shore, taking seats near Sally.
"Sooo…" Sonic started with a much too familiar tone.
Sally's throat tensed for the question, she already knew the general wording to use, but still wished this conversation wouldn't happen, especially not in front of Tails.
The hedgehog continued "You know, it'd be really helpful to have some extra hands on this mission…"
"Sonic." Sally abruptly started, catching a glance at the hopeful fox behind him "We've already talked about this."
"Aw come on Sal, he can take it." Sonic persisted.
"Yeah Aunt Sally!" Tails exclaimed "I beat a whole SWATbot all by myself!"
"You did what!? When!? Sonic, did you-!?" She glared at the hedgehog for an answer, and his expression gave it away before he'd even said anything.
"Hey, don't worry Sal. The ol' hedgehog was there; no way I would've let anything happen. 'Sides" he said, playfully rubbing up Tails bangs. "The little guy had it in the bag."
She pinched her muzzle in frustration as a worry hardened her decision. "No Sonic. We decided this days ago." she watched him start to say something. "And we'll talk about the SWATbot thing later." Ignoring him, she softened her voice and turned to Tails, who looked a whole world less optimistic "I'm sorry sweety, but you're going to need to stay home this time. You can go on the next mission, okay?"
His ears bent down in disappointment as he nodded, not bothering to say anything.
His changed demeanor brought up guilt, but Sally held her position firm. It would be far worse than hurt feelings if something happened to the fox.
Far later into the night Tails snuck up the lookout tower. He had hoped to spy the freedom fighters with his binoculars, but they were far out of range.
They'd said goodbye hours ago, and even after being tucked in by Rosie, Tails couldn't sleep. Had had come up here to see when the freedom fighters were getting back and stared fervently at the far city.
The others were probably there right now, keeping out of sight from the robot swarms, maybe planting bombs in one of Buttnik's factories.
He could do that too! His heart burned, why didn't Aunt Sally trust him!? He had taken a SWATbot down all by himself, a whole SWATbot! Tails had been so sure that after doing something like that he could go on whatever mission that he wanted to. Sonic had gone on solo missions at Tails' age. Solo missions! So why couldn't he go on regular ones? The fox paced anxiously around the platform.
Have I been doing something wrong? He didn't think he was slowing them down or anything, but could that be why Aunt Sally didn't let him go tonight?
No. Sally had said that he couldn't come today before they had even gone on the last one. But maybe… His namesakes began to tick on their own, Silence gnawing at his fears. Eventually it was too much.
Tails leapt off the platform, hoping to distract himself in the forest. Even though it was far past his bedtime, the breezed forest air felt good, and the sound of crickets calmed him. He wouldn't go too far, and anyways, with the freedom fighters out no one would notice if he was in bed a little late.
Tails wandered aimlessly, practicing various tricks as he circled around the trees. It was an activity he did during the day, but somehow seemed cooler when the harsh shadows of night could convince him he was a sneaky ninja.
Time had passed, much more than the fox he watched was probably aware of, but the kid had hardly moved more than a few tens of meters out of the village's sight. The mobian grumbled to himself, he had hoped to be further away by now, but his stupid target apparently decided that regular walks weren't for him. Moonlight shimmered through the forest. It was nearly full, both good and bad for his mission, though he doubted the distracted kit would see him. As the fox flew up another tree, he felt his patience wear. His ears flattened in frustration and he glared in the direction of the village.
Sudden rustling caused him to snap back to his focus. The fox was on the ground, brushing away fallen leaves before trying again. The mobian huffed in frustration. Why couldn't the kid have taken a normal walk through the forest instead of stopping every three seconds!?
With each minute, he was aware that the kid was getting just that much closer to becoming tired and going home. This night had been his best chance at anything since he had found the blasted settlement. No way he was letting it slide.
Too close to or not, something had to happen soon.
Tails circled around at a fallen tree, it had collapsed long ago, but instead of becoming moldy the wood had hardened. Knothole called them stonewood.
This one had caught on other trees during its fall and formed a ramp to the surrounding foliage. He thought it was a perfect place to practice some moves. Tails made his own sound effects as he whooshed up the platform, flew off and slid back down. He felt like some sort of secret spy. No. If he were actually a spy, he'd be allowed to go on missions. Maybe he could pretend to be a skateboarder. The fox had never actually seen someone use one, but Sonic said they were way, way past cool.
A half hour passed, and the fox was starting to feel more wearied than joyed. He studied the tree and suddenly his face split into a wide grin. Maybe he was ready to head home, but he could definitely try something out on the way back. He would make it back to Knothole by flying through the leaves, but how fast? Tails crouched low, twisted his namesakes and made a dash for the ramp. He hopped over the tree's roots, streaked up its side and into the treetops.
He blurred through flora, zooming past two, three, fou- a sharp pain shot up his leg. It threw off his focus. He crashed into the next tree as its branches tore through his fur. The tangle sent him crashing to the hard ground, skidding forward till friction let him stop.
With spinning vision Tails shot his head back up. Quickly registering that there were no signs of robots, he glimpsed at his leg for the initial source of pain. Stuck within his fur laid a shiny needle.
A force plowed into him and they rolled in a frenzy. Tails switching his attention to desperately try and break free from the figure that quickly had him pinned against the rough forest floor.
"Hel!" A firm hand slammed on his muzzle. He tossed in vain to shake it off. Had anybody heard him!? Sonic and the others were still far away. Someone, please… Tails attempted forcefully roll out of his captor's grasp, his heart pounding. Despite the adrenaline, every struggle was getting weaker, harder. What is wrong with me? Why couldn't he take this guy!?
In some stroke of luck, the fox remembered a story Aunt Sally had read him. In it, the hero was able to rescue a kidnapped nobleman after only finding a glove the latter had left behind. I need to do that. The plan swirled in his increasingly incoherent brain.
Tails fought to get one of his hands free, causing the other mobian to tighten their grip. It hurt, but he couldn't give up. He kept trying, quickly realizing that his efforts only caused more strain on his limbs. Fear threatened to overtake his actions as he fought with less and less movement. He needed to escape! The fox rolled and kicked, wait! His feet were free! He concentrated enough of the dread away and pushed one shoe across the other, flinging it into the nearby bracken.
After a quick breath, Tails refocused on freeing himself. His stomach pressed against the dirt, stopped from moving by the heavy knees that dug into his back. Desperately, he twirled his tails and wretched a force that bashed the mobian away, sending the fox into an uncontrollable flight.
He crashed. His breath knocked out as blackness flashed across his vision, yet even before it had fully gone away he had stumbled up in exhaustion. Reinforced pain throbbed through his leg so he yanked the dart out before trying to fly off again. Air zoomed beneath the kit for less than a few seconds before his strength failed. He fell back to the ground. The darkness had grown, fully enveloping his peripherals and snatching away clarity.
He needed to get home... Tails struggled to move forward. He felt the grass against his chest. I'm not standing... The fox couldn't feel his arms, couldn't drag himself up. He barely noticed when a shadow waved over his vision, succumbing to the blackness as some force picked up his form.