CHAPTER 33: Down With the Sickness

Tails stared out through the window as Amy drove the car, thinking to himself. He thought about all the times he and others had helped Sonic defeat Eggman, trying to think who could have been connected to the doctor who would want Sonic and his friends dead. Amy looked over and saw Tails with his head pressed against the glass.

"You alright?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm okay," Tails said without moving. "I just can't figure out who would be behind this, that's all. Eggman's gone, and the only one who I can think of that would continue trying to kill Sonic and the rest of us is Metal Sonic. But we took him out years ago. I asked Shadow a couple months later what he and that robot Omega had done with him, and he told me that he'd decided to let Omega take him somewhere and rip him apart in peace."

"You think Metal Sonic escaped first, and went into hiding or something?" Amy asked.

"I doubt it," Tails said. "He was down for the count. There was no way he could have fought off Omega. I got a pretty good look at him. He wasn't as advanced as Metal Sonic, but he was certainly more powerful anyway. No, Metal Sonic couldn't have escaped unless somsone helped him. But who would? Eggman was on the run, from what Shadow said. He told me I should've seen the look on his face. Apparently it was priceless."

"We'll figure this thing out, I'm sure of it," Amy said. "I hope this time we'll be able to REALLY learn something from the robot."

"You guys been here long?" Tails asked as he got out of the car. Knuckles, Rouge and Sonic had let themselves into Tails's "garage" using Sonic's spare key.

"Not really," Sonic said. "Just long enough to stop aching. Dragging that thing down here was no easy thing. Cabs and buses wouldn't let us bring it along, so we couldn't get a ride. We had to do it on foot. Normally it wouldn't be anything for me, but normally I'm not helping to lug a smashed-up robot around."

"Wow," Tails said. "Rouge, I thought you had a car. Why couldn't you take a cab and go get it?"

"It's been in the shop for a while," Rouge said. "I got in an accident. Thing had to be towed out. Least the cop said it wasn't my fault."

"You could've just asked me to fix it," Tails said. "I could've done it quicker, cheaper, and better, I guarantee."

"I know," Rouge said. "It's just that we hadn't seen each other for a little while, and I didn't want it to seem like I'd broken the ice just for a favor."

"Oh," Tails said. Looking at the robot, he added, "I see the explosive inside that thing went off already. That's good, because I didn't feel like having a screwdriver nearly blasted through my head." Everyone had a small laugh out of that one. Tails skipped the coveralls and grimy gloves, and just grabbed some tools to open the robot up with and check out its insides.

"I'm no expert," Knuckles said, "but I'd say there's going to be very little left to check out. Between me smashing it up and having that bomb go off, it'd be a miracle if anything inside that thing was intact."

"With any luck, the memory chip will be intact," Tails said. "It'll make things a whole lot easier if it is." He took a look at the shotgun and grenade launcher. "I wonder if we can get the brand name of that shotgun and have someone check into their sales records. If it was bought, they'll have to have a name, and we can check that out. If the grenade launcher actually has a brand name, we can check that too."

"Unless it was stolen," Rouge said. "If I wanted to stay anonymous but get my hands on a gun, I'd steal it. Saves a lot of time, money, and unnecessary paperwork."

"I can imagine," Amy said.

"I'm gonna need my grinder," Tails said. "Gonna need to cut this thing open. Sonic, would you grab it out of that box you're sitting on?"

"Sure," Sonic said. He stood up, opened the box he'd been sitting on, and pulled out a handheld grinder. He tossed it to Tails, then sat back down.

"Thanks," Tails said. "Least you guys left this thing next to an electrical outlet." He plugged the grinder in, then hit the button to make sure it was working.

"I think I should probably step outside," Rouge suddenly said, stepping toward the door. "My ears are kind of sensitive, you know." Tails gave her a minute to step outside and get away from the storage unit, then he fired up the grinder and proceeded to cut open the robot's head with it. Sparks flew everywhere during this, but he managed not to get any in his eyes.

"You can come back in now," Tails called out. Looking into the robot's open head, he added, "Man, this thing is TRASHED. If I didn't know better, I'd swear you crushed it in a hydraulic press or something."

"Well, I had to stop it," Knuckles said. "I was gonna punch its head completely off, but I didn't feel like having to dive off the island to go find it."

"Good point," Tails said. He pushed aside some wires, searching. There was a capacitor, more wires, some device he'd never seen before, and a chip- an intact chip. "YES! I think this is the memory chip! We may be able to get some answers from it!"

"I dunno," Rouge said, kneeling down beside Tails. "That thing looks pretty advanced. Doesn't look like any ordinary scanners or anything could access that. I'd expect to find the rightkind of chip drivefor that in two places: a computer hacker's garage, and a government facility."

"You're a computer hacker," Amy said. "Or at least, used to be. Don't you have anything-"

"No," Rouge said. "I used to, but that was before I got tired of doing the government's dirty work for them. They may be able to get their hands on as many of them as they want, but they STILL don't let their agents keep that stuff when they resign or get fired."

"Ouch," Tails said. "They don't trust you anymore?"

"Guess not," Rouge said. "I'd probably have to go back to work for them to gain access to what I'd need."

"Well, I'll hang on to the chip, and if you have any other ideas, let me know," Tails said. "You quit that job for a reason, and I'm not sure I'd feel too good about it if you had to go back just for this."

"Does your school have a computer club?" Rouge asked.

"No," Tails said. "The irony of that is, we have a football team, a baseball team, a track team, a debate team, a volleyball team, a softball team, and a boxing team."

"Boxing?" Knuckles asked.

"You'd go far," Sonic said.

"Well, this was a new thing just announced this week," Tails said. "I can only guess who's going to make it in. My guess is, everyone who's got their sights set on making my life hell for the rest of the year. They were bad before, all I need is for them to be able to punch harder and more accurately." Amy laughed a little.

"Men, ALWAYS doing things the hard way," she said. "You realize that it's perfectly legitimate to kick them in the balls, right?"

"I was thinking of carrying a 2x4 to school with me every morning until somebody noticed the problem and handled it," Tails said. "Problem is, I can't find any 2x4s."

"I hate to interrupt, but aren't we here about the hunk of junk on the ground?" Sonic cut in.

"Sorry, got off track," Tails said. "Why'd you ask, Rouge? Thinking that someone in a computer club was likely to be a hacker of some kind?"

"Pretty much, yeah," Rouge said. "Well, that leaves me fresh out of ideas."

"Wait a second, what's this thing?" Sonic knelt down and poked a small glass tube inside the robot's torso. He tried to pull it out, but it was too slick- his gloves slid right off. Tails pulled of one of his gloves, reached down, and pulled on the tube. He had to grip it a little tighter than he liked, but he got it out.

"Don't know," he said. "Looks like- ow!" The glass had broken in his hand, and cut open one of his fingers. Inside the tube was a light green gelatinous substance, which covered the cut finger when Tails pulled it away.

"Yuck," Amy said. "Looks like snot."

"Feels like Jell-O," Tails said, wiping the stuff off on his glove. He got up and went to find some electrical tape to wrap around his finger. "Wonder what that stuff is."

"Doesn't look like anything I've ever seen," Rouge said. She gave it a small sniff, then turned her head just in time not to sneeze on it. "That smells like shit."

"It's really cold, too," Tails said. "Wonder why it's contained in such thin glass, and what it was doing in that robot. I wonder..." His voice trailed off.

"What?" Sonic asked. Tails just stood where he was and didn't say anything.

"Tails?" Amy asked. Tails finally blinked a few times and shook his head.

"Is it me, or did it just get really hot in here?" he asked, just before he fell forward. Sonic and Rouge caught him mid-fall and turned him over on his back.

"Tails, are you alright!?" Rouge shouted. Tails didn't respond. His breathing began to speed up greatly, and his head slumped backward.

"What's the nearest hospital!?" Knuckles asked in a calm but urgent voice.

"Main Street Hospital!" Rouge said back.

"Amy, call ahead!" Sonic ordered. "Tell them to be watching for me! I'm getting Tails down there!" Quickly, Sonic picked Tails up and ran from the storage unit as Amy pulled her cell phone out of her purse.

"How is he?" Sonic asked the doctor. Several hours after Tails had first collapsed, the doctor had finally come out of the ER to inform Sonic, Rouge, Knuckles, and Amy of Tails's condition.

"He's stable, but he's in pretty bad shape nonetheless," replied the doctor, a gray squirrel in a white coat. "He's running a fever of 106. If he hits 108, he'll die. Now the problem is, we can't identify the pathogen. We tested the sample you brought with you, and confirmed that it's a virus, but like I said, we don't know which. A vaccine at this point won't help, as vaccines work by introducing a weakened version of the virus into the body. This causes the immune system to create antibodies in response to the 'invasion,' which in turn results in immunity to the real thing. The only thing we can really do at this point is to watch him, keep him comfortable, and see if he can fight off the infection. As much as I hate to say it, he's been given a minimal chance of survival. I'm sorry."

"The virus must have been placed near the bomb so that it would be spread in the explosion and infect anyone nearby," Rouge said. "Guess the bomb just didn't touch the glass tube. God, I can't believe I didn't realize what that was right away..."

"How long after contact with the gel did he collapse?" the doctor asked.

"Maybe twenty, thirty seconds," Sonic said.

"That's very disturbing news," the doctor said. "A virus that spreads and begins causing damage that quickly is very dangerous. What's more is we don't know how many ways it can be spread. Could be through contact with infected substances, could be ingested, could be inhaled, all number of ways."

"I sniffed the gel, but I haven't collapsed," Rouge said.

"But you sneezed right after that," Knuckles said. "It probably didn't make it into your body."

"He has a point," the doctor said. "Which brings me to my next point. I'm sorry to tell you this, but collapsed or not, we're going to have to run some tests on all of you to ensure that you haven't been infected, especially the ones who had the closest contact after the first infection. There are cases where one person is more susceptible to certain illnesses than others. Your friend may be one of those cases. If you have been infected, the lot of you would essentially be walking virus breeding grounds. If the virus truly is air communicable, contact with any of you would be highly dangerous."

"Alright," Rouge said with a sigh. "I had planned to go pick up my car tomorrow, but I suppose it can wait."

"I was going to stay here anyway," Sonic said. "I'm not leaving Tails."

"Guess I'll have to call in and tell my employees not to open tomorrow," Amy said.

"If you've got cable TV, I ain't got any complaints," Knuckles said. "But what about you, doc? Won't they have to test you, too, since you've been in contact with us?"

"More than likely, yes," the doctor said. "If you'll all follow me, please, we can get you in and out of here quicker."

Doesn't Tails just have all the luck? Don't worry though, for all of you who think I'm going to wind up killing him before this is over, things will get better. Just, not right off the bat. As always, review away. By the way, am I really THAT good? I know I'm the oddball who actually pays attention in English class, but still...