The Warrior of Black Chaos
By: Jon 'Volc' Pereira
Chapter 8: The Rebirth
After about an hour of flight time, the group reached the Mystic Ruins. Searching around the plane's control panel, Tails found the button to open up the cliff-side plane hangar. The Tornado's break pads lowered and easily slid into the mountainside. It scooted slowly onto the hangar's metallic surface. Tails turned on the break and the Tornado stopped in its tracks. With a hiss, the plane's doorway slowly opened.
Sonic was the first to exit. He yawned and stretched his arms. Not paying attention, he missed a stair and stumbled onto the ground. He skipped a step and regained his balance. Tails stepped off the plane and slowly aided Volc to the ground. Volc stepped off the plane gripping Helen's mangled computer. He nearly fell over, if it wasn't for Tails hand being placed firmly on his shoulder. Volc sighed and looked at his amputated right arm. If it wasn't for that, he could have been walking with the cane and holding Helen. Tails looked grimly at Volc's arm. Suddenly, he had an idea. He forced Volc into walking with him into his mech bay where he made the plane's repairs. It wasn't like Volc had much of a choice. He was still too weak to walk on his own.
"Where are we going?" Volc demanded. He wasn't a person to be forced around, but in his condition he had no way to resist.
"I'm going to help you." Tails responded calmly. He sat the boy onto a stool and grabbed a hold of the stump, where his arm was amputated. Volc jumped up and stumbled away.
"You're not going anywhere near my arm!" Volc yelled and flailed. He jerked and threw his body as far away from Tails as he could. Tails sighed and simply walked a small distance to reach him. "Get away from me!"
Tails was holding in his hand a strip of metal and a welding torch. He took another step towards Volc.
"I'm going to help you, man. Please don't act like this." Tails lit the torch and came near Volc, who tensed up and closed his eyes.
"Get away!" Volc reached out his hand. From it extended a large amount of dark energy. It formed into a barrier around Volc and forced Tails away. Tails' jaw dropped. He couldn't believe what he was seeing. Volc opened his eyes. He blinked when he saw that he was being shrouded by the strange energy. He looked at his left hand; it had turned a deep black. He pressed it against his leg, quickly pulling it away when he felt an intense burning feeling. Volc looked down at his right shoulder, he could see a faint outline of his old arm. His eyes widened when he noticed it. After a couple of minutes, the barrier began to fade.
"How in the world did you do that?" Tails exclaimed.
"I have no idea." Volc replied, still startled from the ordeal. He looked down to see that the outline of his arm had not yet faded away. He looked over at Tails. "I need you to do me a favor."
"What's that?"
"I need you to rebuild my arm. At least until it can function well enough for me to take over." Volc declared firmly. You could have easily seen the intensity in his eyes. Tails gulped and looked at his tools. Most of them were very old, and not entirely reliable, but Volc wanted to do this. "I'm not so sure about this" Tails responded wearily.
"Come on, man! Volc shouted. "I need this. Think about it, you'll be making your friend all new again. I will be able to live like I did before the explosion."
"I'm still not so sure, Volc."
"Please, man. I can't live with one arm I just cant. Please, man. I need this." Volc begged. So Tails nodded his head in response and once again grabbed a hold of Volc's right shoulder.
"Well," Tails sighs. "First I'll have to build a frame. Why not go talk to Sonic while I work?"
"Alright then." Volc stood up and looked at Tails. "Thank you, my friend." He turned around and headed into the house.
Volc stepped into the house and took a deep look around. The house looked like it had recently updated. From the doorway, he could see a living room and a hallway leading into a kitchen. The living room was quite large. A sliding glass door opened up to a balcony overlooking a steep cliff and a sparkling blue ocean. In the living room was a staircase leading up to a second floor and the bedrooms. A wide-screen television sat in front of a large black leather couch.
Sonic rested on the couch. He was laid down with his head leaning over one of the couch's arms. One hand was on his knee and the other was on the remote control for the television. Sonic sighed as he flipped on the news. Volc found this the perfect time to step in. He walked into the room and sat in a rocking chair beside the couch.
"What's up, Sonic?"
"Just watching the news."
"Anything new?"
"They're just talking about how Higara seems to be the next big vacation spot. They had opened up a couple hotels in the area. They each had about 75 to 100 people in them." Sonic sighed and continued flipping through the channels. Volc's eyes widened.
If this explosion affected me this way, some of these people must have gotten affected as well. This could be really bad.
Volc closed his eyes to think about what he should do. He couldn't create a cure for it, because he didn't even know what it was himself. He looked over at the plane hangar and waited for Tails, then decided to forget the subject for now. He turned once again to face Sonic.
"This is a nice place you have." Volc said just to start a conversation. Sonic turned to face him.
"Actually, it belongs to Tails. I just live here. We had our house upgraded not too long ago. The mayor of Station Square had it done in thanks for us helping the 'incident' that happened there not too long ago." Sonic responded. Volc remembered that time. It was about a year ago. A strange water-like blue creature somehow harnessed the power of the Chaos Emeralds to morph into a gigantic monster to rampage the city. Sonic also used the emeralds to combat the creature. In a titanic battle, Sonic emerged victorious over the massive beast, but not after the city was near completely destroyed.
Suddenly, Tails called out to Volc from the garage.
"The base is ready, come on out."
Volc sighed and walked into the garage and sat down. Tails was sitting at a workbench with a large metal ring on his hand. On the bench was a complex motherboard. Tails walked over to Volc and placed his hand on his right arm's stump.
"Are you sure you want to do this?"
"Very sure." Volc sighed and let Tails get to work. Tails took the metal ring and placed it on the edge of Volc's stump. Tails closed his eyes and took the motherboard and attached wires to it.
"I'm going to have to attach your arm's nerves to the motherboard so you can move it. This is going to hurt," Tails said calmingly to Volc, biting his lower lip, "A lot". He put on a special set of goggles, which allowed him to zoom in on his work. Taking a wire torch, he slowly attached the nerves to the wires that were connected to the motherboard. Volc bit his lip and tried to hold back tears of pain. He rips his head back and let out a loud scream. Tails sighed and continued work. He didn't like doing this any more than Volc liked it being done. 30 minutes of antagonizing pain went by, it felt like an eternity to both of them. "All right, that's over. No more pain in this operation." Tails sighed in relief.
From the metal ring, Tails began building a metal frame. The frame formed into an iron sort of 'bone' for the arm to use as its main structure. He wrapped wires around the bone and branched it into five fingers, which he connected wires to each one. For motion, he placed hydraulic presses to bend each finger, the elbow, and the wrist. Because of the complexity of the motherboard, the arm could quickly move on command just as a normal arm would. Volc grinned happily at the work Tails had done thus far. Tails then used metal sheets to form into a cover for the mechanics. It seemed to work as a sort of 'skin' as well.
"All done!" Tails sighed, taking a handkerchief from a bench drawer to wipe the sweat from his brow. Volc stared in wonder of his new arm. He was able to move it perfectly; he could feel the electricity surging through it. It gave the same feeling as if he was flexing a muscle. He then looked over at Helen's broken laptop on the bench's counter, then back at his arm. An idea struck him immediately.
"Hey Tails," Volc asked, "What's inside this part of the arm?" Volc used his fingers to draw a box around the mid-forearm. Tails looked at the area, which Volc was asking.
"Nothing really, just the framework."
"Mind if I add something then?"
"Not at all, it's your limb." Volc grabbed the welding torch that Tails had used. He carved a rectangle-shaped opening in the arm and began placing circuits from Helen into the arm. He cut a piece of glass from the frame and placed it as a screen. The holographic generator was placed just below his wrist, and a keyboard was added in for programs for Helen and other such uses. After about an hour of work, Volc had a fully operational computer in his arm. "Amazing work." Tails responded to Volc's work. He gave a jolly smile; then suddenly interrupted by the growling of his stomach. "Um," Tails said blushing "it's been a long day. How about some dinner?"
"That would be wonderful." Volc sighs, and placed his cybernetic hand on his stomach. Tails walked him inside and began cooking. Volc sat down in the chair he was sitting in before. "Hey Sonic, check it out." He grinned and flexed his new arm. Sonic's jaw dropped when he saw the gleaming metal limb.
"Is that what you two have been doing in there for the past three hours?" Sonic questioned.
"Yeah, isn't it beautiful?" Volc responded cheerily, examining Tails' work. He slowly moved each individual finger. Sonic chuckled.
"Yeah, it's nice. Good for you, man."
"Dinner is ready!" Tails called triumphantly from the kitchen. Volc grinned and walked into the kitchen. Only one day had past and he could already move on his own again. Sonic took notice of this.
The kid's got courage, that's for sure.Sonic sighed and stood himself up, dragging his half-asleep body into the kitchen. The kitchen was small. It had white walls and the floor was covered with slick white tiles. An old oven, dishwasher, and sink sat inside a counter that bordered the room. Near the doorway was a refrigerator filled to the brim with food. In the center of the room was a circular wooden table stained a deep, dark brown. On the table were placemats that were topped by large plates. On each plate were two extra-meaty chilidogs. Sonic cheered silently to himself and licked his lips. Tails sat down and directed the other two to their seats.
"So," Tails said to Volc. "How exactly did you do that barrier trick you did?"
"Barrier?" Sonic interrupted. "What are you talking about?"
"I'm not exactly sure how I did it." Volc looked at the ground. "It's new to me. It's not really something I've ever done before. I think the explosion might have had something to do with it."
"Then you need to figure out how you did it." Sonic laughed. "If it was that impressive, you should know how you can do it."
"That's a great idea, Sonic!" Tails replied. "Why don't we try a training exercise after dinner? I'm sure we can figure out how, or at least what it was that you created."
"Yeah, sure, why not?" Volc smiled and took a large bite from his chilidog. "I say bring it on!"
