Dante put his plan into action. He slowly made his way through the halls lined with Badniks. He had his list and he checked it off as he walked past.

"Eggrobos. Check. Balkiry. Check. Crabmeat. Check..." with each Badnik he passed, his wishlist grew smaller and smaller. Soon, he had amassed a sizeable invasion force. And now, to find all of his vehicle assets...

"Already heading out, I see," said the familiar voice of Sin. The bear walked towards Dante.

"And where are you attacking first?" Sin asked.

"Angel Island. I've decided to capture the Emerald first and destroy Knuckles. What about you?" Dante asked.

"I'm going to head for Chemical Plant and Oil Ocean. Capturing ourselves oil refineries will improve the Badniks," Sin explained. They nodded and separated.

An hour later

"All Badniks report in. Is everything loaded?" Dante barked.

"Aye Captain Sellis. Everything is loaded par your request. The dropship Anubis is ready for liftoff." The Eggrobo saluted as he met the devil.

"Good." Dante announced. He opened a radio channel and announced his intentions.

"Dr. Robotnik, sir. This is Captain Dante Sellis reporting in. The dropship Anubis is now departing. Our Destination is Angel Island. We will not only capture the emerald and destroy the Echidna, but we will secure the Island itself and establish a base there."

"Excellent. Good plan, Dante. Bring back any prisoners," the doctor said on the other line.

At that, He sat back in his seat and motioned to the two Eggrobos at the controls to take off.

"Angel Island, Here I come…"

The Bay of the Eggcarrier opened up. Soaring through the air on a glowing blast of jets, the shuttle-like dropship burned for the outline of a distant slice of earth floating in the sunrise.

Count Sin, along with an army of E-1000's, was on his own Egg Carrier.

"Robotnik, we are currently on our way to our next destination, Chemical Plant Zone. It has long since been abandoned, and G.U.N has made a base there to manufacture the oil. We will capture G.U.N's command posts, eliminate their first army, and continue on to Oil Ocean Zone from there," explained Count Sin into a speaker.

"Good. Make sure no one survives," Robotnik ordered before signing off.

"It's my specialty," Sin said eerily. A few minutes later, they landed in their destination. It had hundreds of factories that helped produce the oil. Suddenly, G.U.N soldiers started shooting at the Egg Carrier. Count Sin and all of his E-1000's departed the ship and started shooting.

"Objectives are clear: Take re control of Chemical Plant Zone, and eliminate G.U.N." repeated Count Sin

"Captain, we're oversea. Setting course for Angel Island. We should be there within the hour." The Eggrobo stood up from his seat.

"Good. I'm going to go take one last look at the vehicles in the bay. Remain on the alert. I don't want to be taken by surprise," Dante said, unfastening his safety restraints.

"Aye sir." Suddenly, the ship tilted back, as if some kind of weight was trying to hold it down.

"What the…" Dante started.

"Captain Sellis, wait. Scanners have picked up a small object hanging onto the ship." The Eggrobo unit sat back down at the radar.

"Wait, what? How can something small be this heavy?" The devil walked over to the radar.

"Seems like it's a person. He appears to be hanging on by..." the Eggrobo started. Dante interrupted.

"A fishing rod…" the devil pressed a button and a monitor turned on. He set it for rear view.

"Oh no…" Dante groaned. Sure enough, Big the Cat had hooked his line onto the Anubis.

"What shall we do?" the Eggrobo asked. Dante thought for a moment.

"Lose him. We can't risk any hitch-hikers."

"Aye sir." The Eggrobo sat back down in his seat. "You may want to buckle up." The pilot Badnik hit a warning siren and pressed the throttle foreword. The ship lurched ahead, accelerating at a considerable rate.

"Breaking contact with target in three...two..." suddenly, the ship made a violent stop and became vertical. The Badniks that did not buckle up fell onto the ceiling/floor.

"Now what!" Dante yelled. He was becoming extremely annoyed.

"Sir, the ship seems to be weighed down by the target," the Eggrobo replied. Dante growled.

"Crazy fat son of a…activate maximum turbo!" the captain yelled. The Badnik nodded and pressed some buttons. The ship then shut down for a minute, everything turned off. The ship started to sink into the ocean due to the weight. But then, in a powerful burst of speed, the Anubis blasted out and shook their intruder off into the waters below.

"Finally," the Tasmanian devil sighed. He just hoped no damage came to the ship.

"Hey! What kind of pilot are you?" yelled the voice of Blaze. The Red hedgehog walked over, rubbing his head.

"Sorry about the shake we gave you earlier. Had to throw a hanger-on," Dante replied. The G.U.N soldier screamed in agony as Count Sin sliced his body in half with his

Razor sharp gold sword. At this point in the battle, guns were not needed for him. He issued a message through his communicator to all his robots.

"E-1000's. Prepare to launch Chaos Grenades on my command. Blast each G.U.N command base, but do not hit the factories." ordered Count sin. The Chaos Grenades were a new weapon with Chaos Emerald energy infused. They could destroy just about anything.

"I will be detonating their command base. Do not follow me, as I wish to go alone. I should take only 3 minutes," said Count Sin. He quickly ran inside, where half an army's worth of G.U.N soldiers were waiting for him in front of the command central. . They started shooting, but Count Sin's shield blocked every single bullet. He ran up to them, but he was quickly surrounded by at least 20 soldiers.

"Drop your weapon, or we will shoot." ordered one of them. Count Sin did not follow it, as he pulled out a gold dagger and stabbed him in the chest. Count Sin jumped up to heights unknown, then came back down, pile driving his sword into the wounded soldier's head and body. Before the other soldiers could react, Count Sin spun around, decapitating the other 19 soldiers. He then threw a powerful grenade down on the floor hard, and the whole place exploded in a fiery array of flames, reaching above the clouds in the sky.

"Like I said. My specialty," he repeated.

Above a blanket of clouds, the image of a floating city came into view. High above the white oceanless sands of Angel Island, the ancient ruins hovered. Dante was awestruck.

"Sky Sanctuary..." He thought out loud. In the distance, windmills churned under the force of the winds of stratosphere.

"Actually sir, that's Sky Canyon. We're almost to the main island. Where will we be landing, sir?" The Eggrobo spun his head to the Devil. Dante seemed to be entranced. "Sir?"

"O-oh. Land in the ruins of Launch Base Zone. We'll rebuild it and use it as our base of operations."

"Aye sir." The Eggrobo said. A few minutes later, they were already near Launch Base.

"Balkiries, 094 and 095, prepare to deploy and recon the area. Give us a tactical feed. I want to know if the Launch Base is hot or not," Dante ordered. Two Badniks nodded.

Outside, the bay doors opened. A pair of what could only be described as a mix of birds and fighter jets blasted through the sky on thrusters, breaking into an elegant glide down below the cloudline. They swooped low over the ground, seeking out any targets and feeding video images of the base back to the dropship. Below, the Launch Base Zone sat untouched. It seemed that the Island's guardian hadn't even been back to the old spaceport since the days of the Death Egg. The leading Balkiry turned left. Its wingmate followed in a long, lazy arc, keeping up with the leader. They reported in.

"Base looks all clear." The leader said. "Feel free to la--" In a grinding crunch of metal, the leading Balkiry was torn from the sky.

"Hazard Alert! Hostile Detected!" The second Balkiry punched its afterburners and resumed broadcasting video. It's long metallic beak opened. Within it's mouth, three cylindrical gun barrels poked out. It circled around to scan for its target. Nothing. It switched its scanners to FLIR. The landscape became an odd wash of black and white splotches. But something stood out.

"Target confirmed." The outline of a horned figure stood out from the rest of the landscape. Dragonfire spouted from the Balkiry's beak as it unloaded 20mm rounds from it's mouth. Sparks traced a line along the ground towards the figure, which leapt out of the way with the elegance of a ninja. The figure found no use in cloaking himself anymore. He let the violet color of his skin flush back into his flesh. Espio the Chameleon reached back into his pocket and drew three gleaming black shurikans, preparing to hurl them at the Badnik. The Balkiry swooped around again. It locked its machine gun onto the chameleon. Determination poured through its circuits as it vowed to bring justice to its fallen wingmate.