Chapter 14: Egg Launcher
The Red Guardian and his Ninja companion stepped back as the massive gray and red machine with 8 arms, each arm with a large powerful cannon attached. Robotnik grinned as he looked at the 2 slowly creeping back.
" …DIE!" Robotnik roared as he opened fire.
The barrel of the cannons rotated rapidly unleashing a flurry of glowing bolts, Knuckles and Espio dove to opposite sides as the bullets hit the platform leaving smoldering holes behind, Knuckles scowled and gritted his teeth as he whipped out his gun, he glared at the massive hovering machine that lowered itself onto the platform and began to run from left to right, firing a endless stream of bolts at the two, Knuckles hide behind the statue and listened in terror as the bolts began to wear the statue away, the sound of rock crumbling and hitting the floor was far from what Knuckles wanted to hear, Espio cloaked and dashed behind the craft and planted a small device on the craft, he dashed off and ducked as the device exploded sending the craft rolling towards Knuckles' statue, Knuckles dove out of the way a watched as the craft rolled off the platform with Robotnik screaming at the top of his lungs.
"What the hell did you do?" Knuckles screamed.
"My emergency diffusion grenade." Espio cackled.
"Ha! Ha! Ha!" Robotnik laughed as the craft rose back up the small targeting reticules completely ruined. Robotnik scowled and aimed at his enemies, "Very impressive, now I can't auto-target you. It makes no difference. Even with diffused trackers I can STILL destroy YOU!
The craft rose up and began to hover around the platform firing small spurts all around the platform, Knuckles and Espio rolled and flipped around to dodge the blasts. Knuckles rolled and stop and fired his gun, the two shots soared through the air and hit the torso each shot sending a surge of volts through the craft, Knuckles cussed as his pounded his fist on the ground, the rain began to fall even harder as the craft opened fire once again, Knuckles and Espio rolled out the way and jumped on the wall behind the platform and sprung up into the air, Knuckles fired about a dozen shots as he backflipped through the air, the red bolts streaked by him leaving red trails behind them, Espio somersaulted through the air and threw his shuriken at the machine, it soared through the air and landed inside the barrel of one of the arms, the arm exploded violently sending metal fragments flying all over the platform, Knuckles dove around to dodge to deadly debris. Robotnik roared as the damaged arm sent a surge through the craft; the small reddish glow on it has faded.
"…that glow. Knuckles open fire!" Espio commanded.
"Don't tell me what to do!" Knuckles roared back.
Knuckles loaded his weapon and emptied the clip into the machine. Each shot hit with stunning accuracy and began to wear at the machines armor, Knuckles continued to unload on the massive craft, Robotnik roared as the craft began to spin out of control and crashed into the platform, the platform shattered to pieces and sent Knuckles and Espio plummeting, they looked down in fear to see Robotnik's machine aiming at them, the remaining arms waved around firing bolts everywhere, Knuckles roared as he loaded another clip and fired at Robotnik, every shot blowing off a small piece of its armament, Espio grabbed hold of a piece of debris and clung to it as he aimed another shuriken, Knuckles weaved through the storm of bolts dodging the flaming orange bolt and moving through the red trails they left behind. To their surprise another platform was down below, Knuckles grinned as he held the trigger allowing a single shot to charge, he hovered to the left and grabbed a hold of a single metal fragment falling down with them and fired at Robotnik's machine, the shot hit the upper cockpit sending the craft spinning around like a top as Espio threw his shuriken, he smiled as it entered another gun barrel, the arm exploded as the craft continued to spin around viciously, Knuckles grabbed Espio and clung to the wall of the tower as Robotnik's machine and the debris crashed down to gray platform below, the two slide down the wall and grinned as Robotnik's dented craft began to hover around. Robotnik roared as the gun barrels transform and fired a storm of small missiles, Knuckles dove out of the way and was hurled into the wall by the shockwave from the missiles exploding on the platform, each blast making a large hole in the already dented platform. Espio curled up and hurled himself at the machine but was easily batted away by the arms, Knuckles ran from statue to statue as every statue he took cover behind was blown to bits by Robotnik's missiles. Knuckles returned fire as he weaved through the statues and rolled for cover, Espio threw another shuriken and looked on in shock and Robotnik shot it out of the air. Espio scowled and leapt up on a single missile and kicked it from the rear causing it to flip over and head back at Robotnik.
"Fools you cannot…OH NOOOOO!" Robotnik screamed as he noticed the rocket coming right at him.
The missile nailed the machine square in the torso, blasting a massive hole in it, the wires and circuitry dangled out as the heavy machine flipped over while struggling to remain airborne.
"GRRRAAAHHH! DAMMMIT!" Robotnik screamed as he struggled to control the craft.
"That did it." Espio said cockily.
"Think again!" Knuckles grunted raining on Espio's parade.
"I'll GET YOU AHAHAHAHA!" Robotnik laughed in an almost desperate yet insane tone of voice.
Robotnik laughed insanely as he fired 1 massive missile at the platform, the platform exploded into thousands of pieces, sending Knuckles and Espio falling yet again, Robotnik dove down after them this time the gun barrels shot out small shells at the two, each shell opened and 4 blades began to spin around turning them into deadly high speed buzz saws! Knuckles and Espio gasped as they saw the flurry of saw like projectiles raining down towards them, Espio rolled in midair to get behind Knuckles, Knuckles gritted his teeth and fired at every shell coming towards him, Robotnik roared in anger and this time the 6 remaining arms each fired a mixture of all three ammo types, Espio flipped over Knuckles and hurled two Shurikens at the machine as he grabbed Knuckles' leg and swung back behind him for cover. The silver blades weaved through the storm of various projectiles and landed smack inside the circuitry, a massive surge of energy began to flow out of four of the arms, Robotnik screamed as the four arms exploded. The screamed quickly turned into a laugh as the damaged arms shattered and sent a rain of shrapnel down on Knuckles and Espio, Knuckles threw his arms forward and began to glide around in various directions to dodge the deadly machinery. Robotnik scowled and had the machine shoulder tackle Knuckles sending them both down to the next platform. Robotnik grinned as the last two arms pointed down at them and began to drop large shells to the platform, Knuckles and Espio rolled out the way as the shells exploded sending electric shockwaves across the platform. Knuckles gritted his teeth and fired a continuous stream of shots at the craft, Robotnik grunted as every shot that landed slightly knocked the craft off balance. Robotnik began to hover around faster than Knuckles' shots could reach him. Knuckles' temper flared as he heard the empty click of his gun.
"HAHAHAHAHA! NOW YOU ARE DONE! I'VE BEEN WAITING ALONG TIME FOR THIS!" Robotnik shouted insanely.
"SHUT UP! I'M GOING TO SEND YOU HELL MYSELF!" Knuckles roared furiously.
Knuckles ran past Espio shoving him to the ground and smashed his fists into the wall of the tower each fist made a massive hole as Knuckles climbed up faster than Robotnik was able to lock on to him with, Knuckles sprung off the wall and drove his fist into the glass of the cockpit, Robotnik screamed as the glass shards flew around, Knuckles grabbed Robotnik by the throat and smiled as he curled his right arm back, he gave Robotnik a single punch shattering Robotnik's nose, Knuckles then jumped above the craft and put his fists together and SLAMMED their combined might down on the craft, the craft was a blur as it crashed through the last platform and down to the city, Robotnik ejected in his Egg Mobile. He clutched his nose and looked down as the craft exploded sending a massive wave of flames across and down various streets incinerating hundreds of people. Robotnik glared at Knuckles in rage.
"Your powers can't protect you forever Knuckles! I GAVE you all that new power! YOU BELONG TO ME! SOON I WILL TAKE BACK WHAT IS MINE! WE WILL MEET AGAIN KNUCKLES! AHOHOHOHOHO!" Robotnik laughed as he sped away quickly leaving Knuckles and Espio on the crumbling platform.
"Yeah…we WILL meet again…and next time. I will hold your heart in my hands." Knuckles growled.
"Knuckles lets go before the platform gives out!" Espio said tugging on Knuckles' arm.
Knuckles nodded as the two ran off the platform and dove down to the city below, Knuckles revived his glide and gritted his teeth as Espio grabbed and clung on Knuckles'dreads.