Thanks to all you who have reviewed so far, I appreciate it!
English Bloke, yes, I am a Brit! How did you guess? :-)
Chapter 4: WarriorA day later, they were nearing the Great Forest. It could be seen whenever they reached the crest of a hill, bringing a feeling of relief to the three girls and one of foreboding to their guide.
The sky seemed to reflect the mercenary's mood, being a depressingly dull grey. The air felt moist to him- yes, it would rain soon. Annoying as it would be, at least it would divert the girls' attention from him for a while.
Miles was holding up incredibly well. Still not tired, and his knuckles had almost completely healed thanks to another one of Robotnik's... gifts. He did not bother wearing the bandages anymore, because he didn't need them.
In the back of his mind, he knew that his employers were watching him with confusion- he couldn't blame them, to be honest. He'd be freaked if someone like Sonic had pulled the stunts he just had, and he knew that he hadn't even been pushed to his limits yet. It was all thanks to those few months of hell, when he had been 'upgraded', as Robotnik would have said, in numerous ways. Despite how they had preyed on his mind for every moment of his life since then, he had to admit that they had their benefits.
For example, they had allowed him to detect the presence of Amy, Bunnie, and Cream when they were following him back in Chestnut. They had allowed him to slaughter the gang in Oak. And they also allowed him to feel when he was being scanned, which was what had happened about an hour ago.
He was sure of it.
Someone had been watching them, be it with eyes or with radar. Either way, the fact alone that they had been spotted was a cause for concern to him. He could only think of two groups that it could be, and both were as bad as each other- if it were the ruminants of the gang from Oak, then they would have a fight on their hands. If it were scouts from Knothole, then it would be difficult to get his pay whilst avoiding Sonic and Sally.
Not willing to take the chance that they would be hostile, he decided to be prepared for a fight. He needed the money from this job, after all. Plus he had promised to look after Cream.
Not pausing in his fast stride, he reached over his shoulder and into his backpack. He brought out the raincoats from Chestnut, and threw one to each of the girls.
"Here, put these on," he said.
"What, is it going to rain?" Amy asked, looking at the sky with a frown.
"I think so."
"Well aren't you going to put something on?"
"No," he said shortly.
"Well why not?"
"Because I fight better without waterproofs."
There was silence for a moment.
"Miles, what's that supposed 't mean?" Bunnie asked. "Are we gonna be attacked or somethin?"
"I don't know. Something was watching us a while ago, and I don't want to risk being caught off guard by them. Get those blasters of yours ready."
Small droplets of water began to fall from the sky.
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"Miles! Ah think ah know who's watchin' us!"
The rain was by now pouring down in thick and heavy droplets. Clad in the raincoats they had bought from Rodney a few days before, the girls were quite dry- Miles, on the other hand, was soaked, tired, and thoroughly pissed off. He would be wearing his coat of course, were it not for the fact that he was certain that something was watching him in one way or another.
Not with their eyes per se, nothing would be able to see them through this rain without the use of, say, a radar or special camera of some kind. Either way, it was worrying. Gangs from Oak did not have that sort of technology. If someone was watching, then they were going to be pros.
"Who?" he asked with a glance back at Bunnie.
The rabbit smiled under the hood of her raincoat, rolling up one of the sleeves and pointing to an array of lights on one of her suit's forearm gauntlets. Six were brightly lit, clearly visible in the thick and heavy rain- purple, pink, blue, red, white, and yellow.
"So?" he said, wiping water from his eyes. "What are they supposed to mean?"
Bunnie was about to speak again, but was interrupted by a sudden loud squawking from her wrist-mounted radio. A voice burst from the static,
"Bunnie! Are you okay?!"
"Wha, Rotor?" she said, blinking in confusion at both the unexpected voice and the panic that it held. "What's the mattah?"
"Don't worry, we know about the Cyborg! Sonic's on his way, hold on!"
"Wha, what are ya talkin' about?"
"He's coming to you now, I've gotta cut transmission before it picks up on it. Just hold on!"
The speaker abruptly silent, and the girls looked up at their guide. He had turned very pale beneath his fur, and he appeared to be shaking.
"Miles?" Amy said, looking at him carefully. "What's going on?"
He looked away, towards where they were supposed to be going. Suddenly a blue blur approached from that direction, growing closer at an alarming rate. Eyes widening in recognition and disbelief, Miles stood and looked at it dumbly until it rolled into a ball and slammed into his stomach. He flew back with a grunt, sailing clean over the Freedom Fighters and continuing on down a nearby short rocky incline until a tree violently stopped his ride as he smashed into it, splintering it into matchsticks.
He rolled to the floor, too dazed to move. It didn't cross his mind that the blow ought to have killed him.
The rain poured down relentlessly upon the two-tailed fox, staining his jacket brown with mud and blinding him of the immediate area. It took a minute, but eventually his head stopped spinning and he was able to drag himself back to his feet. He staggered for a moment, blinking black spots from his vision as he got his bearings and let out a few of his favourite curses.
By the Walkers, Sonic was here.
"Miles! Miles, are you okay?" a high-pitched voice came from the direction he had come from, soon followed by a panicked and raincoat-clad Cream.
"I'm alright kid," he growled, taking note of a sharp pain on his forehead. He touched his hand to it and brought it away, noticing with a scowl that there was blood on his fingertips.
'Best bud my arse,' he thought darkly in relation to the blue hedgehog. Some friend he was, leaving him to be tortured and forced to live on the streets when he was only twelve-
Abruptly, his thoughts ceased when he smelt something even more alarming. There was the metallic scent of machines in the air, machines he thought he'd never sense again.
'Swatbots?!'
But there was another scent, one he had never picked up before. It hinted at something familiar and comforting, whilst at the same time being utterly terrifying. He was stunned, lost in thought, just like when Sonic had attacked him- and because of that it was almost too late when he realised that a sharp electrical bang signalled that something very bad was about to happen.
He threw himself to the side, jarring his head painfully as he hit the mud once more. His usual response of curses were lost to him when a red laser-like bolt flew through where he had been standing, colliding with the remains of the tree he had partially destroyed. The stump exploded, throwing the remaining fragments all over the place.
Miles wiped the rainwater and blood from his eyes as he leapt to his feet, scanning the area for the threat by making use of his heightened senses. He began to feel slightly ill when he realised that, despite everything, he couldn't find his opponent (or opponents) anywhere.
Lucky for him, that didn't stay an issue for long as a dark shape soon made itself known, walking slowly towards the fox. It moved fluidly, clearly marking it as an organic creature- but that wasn't the whole story. Along the right hand side of it's head was a box-like structure, a tube emerging from the front in the manner of a gun barrel. A pair of tubes came from some device built into it's back, merging into it's arms blocky, gauntlet-like forearms at the elbow. He couldn't see anything else in detail- except that where it's eyes should be were burning red dots in pitch-black sockets.
It could only be a Cyborg. A complete one too, Snyper class if his memory served correctly. The fact alone that it was working indicated to Miles in big, glaring, neon letters that he was at a real disadvantage- he'd thought that the Freedom Fighters had destroyed all of the finished units when they had sacked Robotropolis. If this one had lived through it, then it would be very cunning, quick, smart, and dangerous.
It was a tough challenge, but Miles was able to calmly sum up his opinion on this unfortunate turn of events in one, small, simple word.
"Shit."
He threw himself to the side again, just avoiding another bolt of red energy from the Snyper's head mounted blaster, and as soon as he rolled back to his feet his arms flew out to his sides to allow his claws to extend. A metallic ring signalled their presence to the world.
He was about to move towards the enemy with the intent of eliminating it as quickly as possible when he was stopped in his tracks by an unexpected occurrence. From it's own forearms, positioned so that they would be flat against the back of it's hands extended a pair of foot long sword-like blades. It waved them around, looking for all the world like it was actually holding two swords, moving smoothly into an en-guarde position.
Tails wiped the water from his eyes once more, attempting to see past the almost surreal film-like quality that the rain projected. It was with annoyance that he realised that he was not seeing things, the Snyper had indeed been upgraded- the default model had guns in it's arms, not swords. He knew that this really cut down on his chances- he didn't have a hope at long range, and it was likely that the programming in the computerised portion of the Snyper's brain would include numerous forms of martial arts. All he had was extremely limited Freedom Fighter hand-to-hand combat training, and the experience of fighting against gangs in places like Chestnut.
Not good, but he'd be damned if he was going to let this thing hurt Cream.
He'd heard of the theory that attack was the best form of defence. This seemed as good a time as any to give it a shot.
"Cream!" he yelled, "Run!"
He glanced away from the Snyper to see her run off towards where she had come from, soon disappearing in the rain. He wasted no more time, throwing his weight forward and charging the Cyborg with a roar.
----------
"C'mon, we gotta juice!" Sonic shouted, doing his best to get through to the girls. They were staring at him stupidly, to which he frowned. It was raining after all, a hedgehog couldn't look his best ALL of the time-
"Wait Sonnie, we can't go!" Bunnie spluttered, looking in the direction that he had sent the Cyborg.
"Wha? We have to go now! That thing will be back any minute Bun, and you need to be coverin' me with Sal whilst I kick it's metallic butt!"
"Sonic no," Amy said, franticly looking around and doing her best to ignore how cool the blue hedgehog looked in his Freedom Fighter uniform. "You don't understand, you didn't attack a Cyborg... I don't think you did, anyway. We've got to make sure that he's alright!"
Sonic blinked and was about to ask what she meant when his arm radio burst to life.
"Sonic! Wait, hold position! We've got a situation here, we're coming to you!" came a female voice, one that he would recognise anywhere.
"Sal? What's goin' on?" he said in reply. He was getting frustrated at all of this, because he knew that there was a Cyborg in the area yet everyone was being so slow about reacting to it. Didn't they realise how dangerous those things were? They simply could not waste any time about it. He had a good mind to go and fight it right now-
"Wait, where's Cream?" Amy said, sounding panicked.
"Huh?" Bunnie gasped, looking around. "She wa' with Miles!"
"Oh no," Amy whispered, barely audible through the rain.
Sonic was, by this point, very confused.
"Miles? Who's Miles?"
"Miles! Miles Prower!"
Sonic froze completely. Miles Prower? ...Tails? Tails was here?
Suddenly giddy excitement, he didn't notice the approach of the task force of Freedom Fighters from behind. They had come down in this direction to find Bunnie, Amy and Cream after the radio call yesterday- it had sounded as though they had been attacked, so immediately scouts had been sent to find them. Their scanners had picked up a Cyborg, which was strange as they had supposedly all been destroyed- still, the three girls, though highly trained as two of them were, were no match for such a machine.
Sally had wasted no time, personally leading the task force consisting of three other leaders – Sonic, Antoine and Rotor – plus six young and new Freedom Fighters. They had set up this ambush, and waited.
As soon as Nicole had detected the Cyborg, he had attacked. The girls were here, of course, but he had seen nothing of Tails. The scouts certainly hadn't mentioned him.
"Sonic!" Princess Sally said as she ran up beside the blue hedgehog. She looked much like she always had, wearing as always her favourite blue jacket over the top of her Freedom Fighter uniform. It was common for them to customise their uniforms- he himself had dropped the standard boots in favour of his classic red and white trainers.
"We have to pull back, Nicole's detected two Cyborgs, plus what looks like a division of Swatbots!"
"Huh? Aw jeez, we gotta get movin'! Bun, where's Tails?!"
"Ah dunno-"
"What? Tails?!" Sally said, forgetting about the impending attack of machines for the moment as personal and maternal instincts took over, "What about Tails?!"
Sonic didn't get chance to answer, as a French accented voice interrupted.
"Ma' Princess! L'ook out!
Sonic could see the change in Sally as she switched back to Freedom Fighter mode at Antoine's voice.
"Quick!" she shouted, "Everyone get into cover! Incoming from the west!"
They dived behind nearby rocks as a wave of tracer blaster fire came in, the rest of the task force members fanning out and finding their own forms of cover. They drew their weapons, mainly consisting of blaster rifles, and began to fire back towards where the swatbots were thought to be.
Sonic thought franticly for something to do that would get them out of this, and to find what the deal was with Tails. He'd thought that the kid was dead, but if he was alive... Then he and Sally could be happy again.
He didn't carry a blaster due to his distrust of technology, so he couldn't join the firefight just behind the large rock he was using as cover. If he could flank the machines though, then he could use his spin attack to cut them down...
Yes, that would work. He could do it! After all, he was Sonic the Hedgehog!
"Sal," he said to the leader of Knothole just by his side, "I'm gonna go round 'em! Keep those 'bots busy!"
He got ready to run, not bothering to wait for Sally's confirmation.
"Help!"
He blinked, standing down from his plan of attack at the voice. Looking towards it revealed the little rabbit he knew as Cream, running up from behind the defensive line to him in fear.
"What's wrong?" he shouted above the noise of the blasters and the rain.
"Miles is being attacked by something! You gotta help him, Sonic!"
"Mile- Tails! Where is he?" he said as the faint sound of clashing metal filled the air.
Sonic could see Sally move up to the girl out of the corner of his eye, waiting eagerly for an answer.
"He's down there!" the rabbit said, pointing towards the edge of a rocky incline. The clanging of metal got louder- sounding like swords, Sonic noted in the corner of his mind.
A figure jumped up over the edge of the incline, stumbling as it turned to face away from the Freedom Fighters. It fell onto it's back, raising it's arms above it so that the fists touched. Completing the vertical 'x' shape were what appeared to be a number of claw-like blades protruding from between the figure's knuckles, their chrome surface standing out brightly through the rain.
A second figure jumped up from the incline, landing in a much more skilful manner than the first and bringing down a pair of sword-like blades of it's own. They fell between the first's, stopping at the point where they crossed over with a loud clang.
A battle of power began between the two as Sonic, Sally, and Cream watched in surprise. The figure with the sword-blades was pushing it's weapons down to the other's throat with all of it's strength, whilst the warrior on the floor was doing it's best to keep the enemy away. Desperate, the floored combatant kicked out with it's legs, catching the standing figure off guard and sending it tumbling to the ground.
The figure with the claws pushed away and got to it's feet with notable trouble, wavering as though a little drunk. With it's back to them, it got into a fighting stance, putting it's left arm straight out in front whilst the right came up to protect the face. It was only then that the rain allowed the figure to become fully visible, as it's two wet yet bushy tails waved behind it to assist with balance.
For a moment the commanders of the Knothole Freedom Fighters were stunned into silence. But it didn't last for long.
"Tails? Tails!" Sonic and Sally shouted.
His head whipped around to look at them, water drops flying from his head fur and muzzle as he did so. Blinking to force his eyes to focus, he looked at them blankly. As soon as recognition hit, his blue eyes widened and his jaw fell in what could only be described as fear.
They simply stood and stared at each other.
Suddenly, the other shadow-like creature came up from behind Tails, bringing one of it's blades across in a wide sweeping motion, clearly aimed at taking off the fox's head.
"Look out!" Sally screamed.
Tails instantly turned back towards his opponent and ducked to try to avoid the slash, but he was not quite fast enough to get completely clear. Sonic could only watch as the tip of his right ear was sliced off, and he cringed as the fox cried out in pain.
An explosion came from the other side of their cover, and frantic calls came from Sonic's radio. He was caught off-guard, unsure of what to do- save the Freedom Fighters around them, or save Tails from the shadowy Cyborg.
He looked to Sally for help.
"Take out the Swatbots, I'll help Tails," she said, a look of icy resolve in her eyes.
Sonic nodded, and raced off to deal with the machines.
----------
Miles felt sick.
He knew he should never have taken this job- it was sod's law, the ones that sounded easy were always the hardest. He should have known that this one would go wrong at the last minute, when they were just a few hours away from Knothole.
It had been his plan to wait at the border by the Great Forest, letting the three girls go on to the town to get his money. Then one of them would return, and he would be paid- they could go their separate ways, and he would never have to see them again.
But no, that would be too easy. Not only would he be thrown into mortal combat with a far more capable warrior than he, and not only would this fight happen around a skirmish between Knothole Freedom Fighters and some old swatbots, but he'd have to get – quite literally – thrown at Sonic and Sally.
He couldn't identify the feeling he had when he saw them. He certainly didn't like it, that was for sure; it was like a mixture of raging anger, utter fear, burning jealousy and a powerful need to run away.
Not knowing how to react and what to do about it, he'd hesitated and lost part of his ear as a result. The follow through kick had sent him careering back into the rock that his former parental figures had been using for cover, then to the muddy, rocky ground. He was bleeding, he was stunned, he had a headache. And he felt the most incredible urge to vomit.
The Snyper was charging now, he could see, but not at him. It had apparently forgotten about him, favouring the woman who he had once seen as a mother. She was shooting at it with her blaster, but he knew that she would not hit it- Snypers, whilst not designed for hand-to-hand combat, had enhanced reflexes as a standard instalment. She could fire rounds at it all day, but it would simply dance through the hail of energy and remain unharmed.
Lucky for the princess, he'd been given that modification too.
His hand searched the ground beside him for something of use, and he found it- a stone, fitting neatly into his palm. With incredible speed, he sent the stone flying faster than the eye could see towards the Snyper. Being so set on avoiding Sally's blaster, it didn't see the small projectile and so had no chance to avoid it- the solid orb struck it on the side of the head, causing it to falter.
Miles saw his chance.
Making a great effort, he leapt to his feet and charged, catching the Cyborg with all six of his claws in the chest just a moment before it was going to strike the princess.
The thing stopped, fatally wounded, looking up at the mercenary slowly. It was then that he finally saw it's face, and it's identity.
"...Shadow?" he gasped at the sight of the older yet still familiar black and red hedgehog who, though briefly, had been his friend in the bowls of Robotropolis... Ten years ago.
Despite the fact that the hedgehog had a gun protruding from the side of his head, and that it oddly hadn't fired at him, Miles completely forgot the fact that what had once been a friend was now a Cyborg. He looked at the hedgehog's blank face in horror, quickly retracting his claws back into his arms in the hope that he hadn't killed his friend. Meaningless words of apology came to from his muzzle, but it was all quite pointless... Because the Cyborg was not dead.
It stepped back, as lithe as it had been since the two had begin this battle, snapping the fox back to reality. And as the biomechanical creature continued to look at him with empty eyes, Miles could see the holes he had made sealing themselves, new skin weaving together over them. In less than three seconds, the Snyper had completely healed itself.
Miles stared at it, completely dumfounded. He'd had no idea that some Cyborgs were able to regenerate that fast. The early models, he knew, had no healing capability beyond that of the host species. That had been until Robotnik had begun playing about with genetics- increased muscle mass, faster growth, greater intelligence, the man had done it all until he had come to the issue of altering healing rates. Yes, healing had been a different matter altogether.
He could remember being strapped to the operating table when his transformation had begun. Through the stale air and bite of the leather straps around his wrists and ankles, he could still hear Robotnik taking great pleasure in telling him what exactly he was going to do. The madman had brought up how all of his previous experiments had gone insane when he had increased their metabolism naturally, so he was going to try out something new on him when the time came and he was big enough... the use of machines, housed inside his soon-to-be-replaced bones that would rebuild him, were he to be injured.
Miles knew that he had been lucky- it was that particular 'gift' that had allowed him to escape, but Robotnik must have learnt from his error and improved on the old formula. Shadow had a far superior healing capacity, that much was obvious, so not only was the hedgehog a better fighter than he, he was also nearly impossible to harm.
Yep, his earlier use of profanity was definitely seeming appropriate right about now.
He looked to Sally, who was watching the two warriors with wide, frightened eyes. Just looking at her caused the feelings to rise up within him again, yet he knew what had to be done. She was more important than he was, and she was more deserving of life too.
"Take her," he said with a nod towards Cream, "and run."
Waiting for confirmation was unnecessary- he did not care, because he knew just one thing that might be able to hold his old friend off long enough. It was a rare tactic for him as he disliked the thought of losing control- but if he was going to die, then he'd do it trying to save lives, whoever they belonged to.
He channelled the feelings of fear and jealousy from earlier, combining it with the horror and anger of what had happened to his friend at Robotnik's hand, into a searing, burning hatred. In their cell in Robotropolis, Shadow had made a deal with him- if one of them were to become a Cyborg whilst the other lived, then the survivor would do whatever he could to free the victim from his mechanical bindings.
And that... That was exactly what he would try his best to do.
With a yell of defiance he fell into a berserker state, extending all of his claws and leaping at the Snyper with supernatural speed. The only thing on his mind was the need for blood.
----------
Never before had the Freedom Fighters witnessed such a display of rage and savagery.
Tails threw himself at the Cyborg, showing no regard to his own safety as he hacked and slashed without mercy. It was frightening then, Sally thought, that none of his strikes actually landed on the thing as it danced away from him.
Clearly, he had changed over the last ten years. One did not have to be a genius to work that out, even with the rain partially obscuring her view. The boy she had thought of as her child would never have fought in this manner- she would have thought that he would have developed his skill with computers, or perhaps become a mechanic like Rotor, but the way that he ducked and weaved through the Cyborg's counter strikes with incredible agility screamed that something unnatural had happened to him to make him into this warrior.
She guessed that the knives coming out of his hands had something to do with it.
She watched the two, afraid to fire at the Cyborg in fear of hitting the fox by mistake, as they moved around and out of the cover of the rocks and into the firefight. And yet they kept duelling, appearing to move out of the way of stray blaster bolts before they could hit them.
She hoped and begged that Sonic would soon step in and save the boy, both from the enemy and from himself- the look of rage on his face, sharp teeth bared and cobalt eyes wild, was perhaps the most frightening part of him. But it was not to be, as the hedgehog was busy destroying the humanoid machines.
Besides, he was already too late as the Cyborg made a sudden jab with it's left blade. She gasped as it went clean through the fox, tip protruding out of his back.
Tails howled in pain, falling to the ground with the sword shaped blade still in him.
----------
Pinned to the ground by a foot length of cold steel, Miles felt well and truly screwed. His shoulder where he had been stabbed was throbbing in rhythm with his pulse, which had become incredibly loud to his ears all of a sudden. Fighting his way through the pain with a great effort, he managed to say what seemed so appropriate to them both just as Sally, Bunnie, Rotor, Amy, Antoine, and a number of younger Freedom Fighters came into view at the corner of his eye.
"Y... you were right," he said, coughing up blood and staining his teeth and muzzle crimson. "You said that we would never be free of him, and... you were right. You were right."
He began to giggle hysterically at the sheer lunacy of it all as he let his claws retract; he was about to die at the hands of his half dead friend, he was in this state because of people from Knothole of all places, and it had all been because he'd wanted to leave Chestnut. It seemed like the Walkers themselves wanted him to stay in that filthy town, punishing his defiance with death.
But Shadow did not make to kill him.
Instead, the Snyper brought up a hand and placed the palm over the small, well-hidden circular patch of fake fur above Miles' left eye. He could feel something suddenly poke out of it, punching through the material and into the metal plug socket that it hid.
White-hot pain filled his world and he briefly managed to let out a strangled cry of agony, as his whole brain seemed to be set into a blazing inferno-
And then there was just shadows and silence.
He welcomed the blissful fall into unconsciousness, even though he didn't feel worthy of it.
----------
It's job done, the Snyper leapt away from it's target, merging back into the shadows from whence it came. It left it's prey behind, not dead; no, the plan dictated that it be alive for now. It had been that way for over ten years. It was necessary.
But not for long, the Snyper mused, watching the Freedom Fighters gather around the twitching, incomplete, and imperfect Spyder.
Not for long.
Note:
I get the feeling that some people are going to hate me for how I'm using Shadow, so I'll try to explain my reasoning for it. Firstly, his name and appearance makes him perfect to be the Snyper android (he's dark, shadowy, etc). Second, he's the 'ultimate lifeform', right? This way, he pretty much is an 'ultimate lifeform', even if it means that he has robotic implants to be that way. Finally, he's a baddie in Sonic Adventure (I'll admit I have never played the game, but I have read about it), and in this story, he is a baddie also. I'd say more on that, but it would give away the plot... -_-
Anyway, please let me know your thoughts!