A/N: So close to the end; haha, I can almost taste it...

Chapter 23: Calm of Battle

"No way…" Tails gasped under his breath, "What did you guys do to this place? It's trashed!"

"Well, you know how I love parties," smiled Sonic, as he walked forward. The base appeared exactly how Shadow, Knuckles, and he left it: rubble, smoke, pipes, and sparks flying everywhere. All that was missing was a few fires here and there. Grinning, Sonic sardonically added, "Looks even better than before."

"Hah, you keep telling yourself that," the fox grimaced. Kicking a broken chunk of cement, Tails watched it ricochet across the ground.

"Silence!" Shadow hissed as quietly as his temper allowed. He pushed the orange warrior on the shoulder, glaring at him with annoyance. "Eggman is somewhere around here; we can't give away our location. Don't you know anything about espionage at ALL?"

"Wanna make somethin' of it?" The fox scowled, clutching Shadow's shoulder and threatening to punch his jaw. Shaking his head, Shadow merely laughed amusingly.

"Guys…" Amy whispered, "Stop it. Shadow's right. We can't afford to make a mistake now." Frowning, the fox released his grip and continued walking to catch up to Sonic. Amy merely gazed at Tails and suddenly raised her eyebrows in confusion, "Hey… where's Knuckles?"

"Went to check ahead or something," the dark hedgehog shrugged, not particularly caring.

"Do you think it's smart to separate our group?"

"Knuckles can take care of himself. Don't worry about it."

"I dunno…

"So Sonic…" Tails broke the silence, as nonchalantly as possible.

"Hm?"

"Do you even have a plan?"

"Well…do I ever?" The two of them burst into laughter, not that the joke was hilarious or anything. A smile crawled onto Sonic's face upon seeing his brother relax for the first time since he had met the fox in this world. "I always left that up to you."

"Things change, I guess." He sighed, gazing at the ground ahead of him. Knowing how awkward the blue hedgehog must have felt at that point in time, Tails lied, "No big deal."

"Guys!"

The hedgehog and fox quickly looked up to find Knuckles running towards them. His hands were stained with blood. "Oh man, what's wrong?"

Panting, the echidna waited to regain his breath. Upon seeing his arrival, Shadow and Amy quickly caught up. Now huddled in a circle in front of him, the warriors waited for Knuckles to speak.

"Dice… she's injured, badly. Eggman must have got to her first."

"How badly?" Shadow interrupted. The panic was rising in his throat. He could not break his promise, not now.

"Mortally. She can't possible survive this one. When I found her, she was still breathing but barely. Come on, follow me."

"Whoa, wait a second." Tails grabbed the echidna before Knuckles could leave the scene. "She's our enemy. Besides, Eggman could be anywhere. What happened to the whole 'we can't afford another mistake' shtick? It's got to be a trap or something."

"Or maybe she just needs our help?" Amy added, slightly disappointed at Tails' remark.

"Or both."

All five of them suddenly paused, gazing around. "Who said that?"

"Who do you think?" growled the voice. "Why Sonic… I never realized you were such a coward. Hiding for… how many years was it? Over fifteen?"

Clenching his fist and gritting his teeth, Sonic frantically searched around him. The evil and potentially insane scientist was nowhere to be found. "Show yourself!"

Laughter rose amidst the wreckage, echoing loudly. So loudly that the earth beneath them began to shake. Sonic stepped backwards to find himself losing his balance. The ground began to crack and snap like glass, and the warriors were barely able to stand.

"Kn-Knuckles!" Sonic called out, clutching a sheet of metal, which once was the foundation of Robotnik's base. "Lead Amy and Shadow to Dice. You need to get her out of this, and once you do… you and Shadow get back here. Amy, you guard her and don't leave that spot. Tails and I will stall and find Eggman. Got it?"

"Hey, why do I have to stay on the sidelines? I ca—" Amy stopped in mid-sentence as Sonic stared at her, sending a 'not now' message. "R-right," she stuttered, grabbing Knuckles' hand.

The echidna certainly had more balance than she did. "Shadow, come on," Knuckles added over his shoulder as he used his spiked fists to climb up a vertical piece of wreckage. Once at the peak, he made certain Amy was holding on tight and then viciously let go, gliding over the earthquake. Shadow, with his speed, was immediately below them, leaping across the cracks and precipices.

Sonic smiled upon seeing the three of them safely leave the disaster zone. Sprinting in a wide circle to ensure he did not fall into fissures that might unexpectedly appear beneath his feet, the hedgehog still could not find his arch-enemy.

"Eggman, show yourself!" He yelled deafeningly, in order to be heard over his enemy's hysteric laughter.

"Like you failed to do for so long? Who knew that one gun blast would make you such a coward? Oh, Sonic, the hero, the savior. Well look at you now. Pathetic."

"Oh ho! You want to talk pathetic? Let's see… tricking a little girl to do your dirty work and then testing on her with chemicals so that she'd be a perfect slave? Now that's just sick."

"You don't know the half of it," came his voice even louder and shriller than before. The cracked earth began to split by drastic proportions, and Sonic was barely able to escape it.

"Aah!" The blue hedgehog turned his head fast enough to see Tails lose his grip and fall into the darkness. Heart pounding, he leaped across the ever-moving earth to the fox's previous location only to watch his friend plummet farther. Without a second thought, the hero dove after him.

"Grab my hand…" He yelled, looking deep at the fear in Tails' eyes. The fox nodded, extending his arm as far as he could. Sonic followed suit, grazing his friend's fingers. Grimacing, he waved his hand again, this time gripping the fox's wrist for dear life. Despite his shallow breaths, the hedgehog turned to face the precipice and ferociously ran up it. Inching upwards at dreadfully slow pace, Sonic suddenly grew pale, thinking they might not escape the abyss.

However, his stubborn personality would not give in to such doubts, and he began to run harder and faster, dust shooting everywhere. Holding their breath, the two of them at last approached Tails' gun, which was currently jammed into a vertical piece of rock. Snatching it, Sonic looked down to see his friend exhaling erratically.

"Th-thanks," he panted. The hedgehog smiled in return, but their relief was short-lived. Clapping could be heard in the background…

"Well done hedgehog. Let's see how you fair off against this," laughed the voice, as a blue tentacle appeared out of nowhere and wrapped around Sonic's body. It snatched him from the gun he was holding onto, and before Sonic knew it, he was hovering over bottomless hole. Gasping for air, he turned his head far enough to see that Tails was safe, now trying to remove his gun from the precipice.

The hedgehog suddenly yelped in agony as the tentacle slowly crushed him. "This seems familiar, doesn't it? You want me to show myself? Well, here I am!"

Sonic opened one eye, only able to see the color red, and gasped at the sight of the once-human scientist. He... it rather, was enormous, nearly ten stories high. Other than his face, Eggman appeared to be a spitting image of Chaos: the tentacles, the transparent blue skin, and most importantly, the chaos emeralds were inside of him, glowing maliciously.

In a whisper from his lack of air, Sonic gasped, "You didn't…"

After quick gliding, Knuckles was able to find the fallen warrior again. Landing next to her, the echidna eased Amy off his shoulders and then knelt down to Dice's level. Slowly releasing a breath, he broke the silence, "She's still breathing."

Amy's face was overwhelmingly concerned, as she gazed at Dice from head to toe. The warrior lay on her stomach in a pool of blood. All that the pink hedgehog managed to do was gasp and cover her mouth. Taking several breaths to calm herself, Amy sat beside Knuckles.

"What should we do?"

Shadow, moments later, appeared at the scene but stopped dead in his tracks. "No…"

The echidna acknowledged Shadow's existence by nodding, but then quickly returned his attention to Dice. "First, we're going to need fabric or something to wrap her woun—"

"Got it," smiled Amy, as she ripped her pants' leg with happiness. "I was kind of tired of dressing in drag anyway."

Not understanding the joke, Shadow walked to the other side of Dice, frowning. Meanwhile, Knuckles gave off a suppressed chuckle and then placed the fabric on top of Dice's shoulder. "Shadow, I'm going to need you to apply pressure to her shoulder. I'm gonna try and wrap it, but I think we may need to turn her over. That's really risky though, her body might go into shock."

"Do whatever it takes," the dark hedgehog rudely snapped, never removing his eyes from the warrior. Quickly, Shadow pressed both his hands on top of her wound as hard as possible. "This good enough?"

"I think. I've… never done this before." Both Amy and Shadow glared at the echidna with exasperation. "What? Like you know better?" They turned away as Knuckles smiled. As quickly as possible, he tied the fabric around her shoulder. Inhaling nervously, he then gently turned her over.

Seeing how nervous Knuckles appeared, Shadow helped him place Dice on her back. The warrior lay unconscious, her face dirty with blood. "Can't believe she's still breathing."

"Wait, we're not done yet. Apply more pressure on her wound. I need to wrap it more. The blood is seeping through it."

"Right." And so, the procedure continued. Amy ripped more pieces of her pants, handed it to Knuckles, and he in turn wrapped the bandage around her bleeding shoulder. Shadow, meanwhile, applied as much pressure as he could, hoping the flow of blood would cease. All three of them, however, doubted she would recover. After so many years of war, none gave in to foolish optimism.

"What should we do now?"

"Wait, I guess," Knuckles shrugged. "Maybe water would help? Oh, and Sonic said he wanted us to come back and help him," added the echidna, suddenly nervous.

"Knuckles, you go and help him. Amy, you get the water, and I'll stay here."

"You sure?" Amy asked, "I dunno if that's such a good idea…"

"There's no time. Just go," Knuckles answered, as he began to leave, heading back to the battleground. "Once Amy's back though, you should help too Shadow."

"Right."