They dragged Tails back to shore. One of them began to perform CPR on him.
Tails coughed up water, and began to blink again.
"So he'll be okay, Jack?" asked the girl.
"I'm not so sure that we're okay. Hell, a blue rat and an orange fox just got plane-wrecked on this island! For all we care, they might not even be real," said one of the men.
"He'll be fine, Kate. We'll just have to take care of him."
Sonic tried standing up, but groaned in pain.
"And what's wrong with the rat?" asked the man.
"I'm pretty sure that's a hedgehog, Sawyer," said the girl.
The other man, which had to have been Jack, waked up to Sonic and looked at his legs. He picked the good one up, then the broken one. Then Sonic began to yelp out.
"He… he's got a broken leg," he declared.
"Took a rocket scientist to figure that out, genius," said Sawyer.
"Shut up and let him do his thing," said Kate.
Tails stood up and looked at the three. "So… you guys are humans?" he asked.
Jack looked back at Tails. "Yeah. We are."
Tails could only nod.
"I think we should bring him back to camp," said a concerned Kate. "You know, so you could treat him. Maybe he could help us get off of this island."
"Sure, trust the little talking animals. They sure as hell won't bite," said Sawyer, with a heavy sarcastic tone.
"Sawyer, make yourself useful and help me bring this one back to camp," said Jack. He pointed at Sonic. Sonic stared at the two men kind of awkwardly, and then shrugged.
"Yeah, yeah," he sighed. "I'll take the rat back to camp."
"Hedgehog," said Sonic, with a bit of exasperation.
"Whatever." He put Sonic's hand on his shoulder, and helped him into the thicket of trees. "You better be right about this, Doc…"
Jack examined Tails. Tails was a little frightened by this.
"So you're a fox," he concluded.
"Y-yeah. Me and Sonic were traveling by plane over to Downunda." He pointed at the wrecked Tornado. "The engine looks like it's shot, so we can't get off of this island, even if I fix it."
"You know how to fix a plane?" asked Kate.
"Yeah, I built that plane."
Jack and Kate looked at each other, then back at Tails.
"What, you don't believe me?" he asked.
"W-We do," said Jack.
"That's impressive. Where do you come from?" asked Kate.
"We're from…" all of a sudden, a huge, thundering noise happened. "What was that?" asked Tails.
"We have to get back to camp, and fast," said Jack. "Follow me. Can you walk?"
Tails began spinning his two tails rapidly, as if they were a propeller, and he began floating.
"Even better," said Kate. "Come on! We don't have time."
The three of them made their way through the jungle. On their way, they bumped into Sawyer. Tails rapidly flew over to Sonic, and then lifted him off of Sawyer's back.
"A flyin' fox. Now I've seen everything," mused Sawyer.
"We have to go!" said a panicked Kate.
"I'm going, freckles," he said, as he ran along with the other two.
Tails paused in mid-air, waiting for the other three to get back ahead of him. When they did, he began to fly again, holding Sonic while in the air.
They arrived at their destination, a hatch. Jack climbed inside, Kate and Sawyer followed. Tails carried Sonic inside as well.
"Put him on this bed." Jack motioned to Sonic, then to the bed. Tails did so right away, placing him on the bed. Sonic was already unconscious – or at least asleep.
"Is he going to be ok?" he asked, with a worried tone.
"He'll be fine. He's in good hands," said Kate, nudging her head towards Jack. "He's a doctor."
"Really? What's your specialty?" asked Tails, excitedly.
"I'm a spinal surgeon," replied Jack. He chuckled a little. "You're pretty smart. How old are you?"
"I'm eight," said Tails.
"Cool. Can it do tricks?" asked Sawyer, again with a sarcastic tone.
"Stop teasing, Sawyer. He might be able to help us get off of this island," said Kate.
"Yeah. Might as well invite the boar and the polar bear over – it's an animal fiesta!"
"I give up," sighed Kate. "So how did your plane crash?"
"Well, these robots began shooting torpedoes at our plane and they shot the engine, so we couldn't control it. We were lucky it landed on this island. But how are we going to get off?"
"Wait," said Jack. "Robots?"
Tails nodded. "Eggman's robots."
"Wait - You didn't answer Kate's question earlier. Where do you come from?" asked Jack.
"We come from Central City. Now, what was that big noise back there?"
Jack and Kate looked at each other again.
"We don't know," said Jack.
"It's the friendly neighborhood monster," said Sawyer. "From what I hear, thing's a big, black blob of something."
"So there are… monsters… on this island?" asked Tails.
"Yeah," said Kate. "But from what we can tell, there's only one."
"That is, if you aren't counting that polar bear that I shot, and that boar who harassed me…"
"He's got a point," said Jack. "It's pretty dangerous out there. But if you stay down here, you should be fine. There's plenty of food, water, a shower, and there's a beach nearby. Locke sometimes goes out to hunt for boar, and he'll bring back some for us to eat."
"None of us have quite gotten used to the boar meat." Kate chuckled a bit as she said this. "But we manage. There's pretty good food down here, crackers, peanut butter," she paused for a moment. "I-if you eat that stuff," she stuttered.
Tails laughed. "Don't worry, I eat what you guys would normally eat. Hamburgers, chili dogs, all that good stuff," he smiled.
"Okay then. Sawyer will stay down here with you while Kate and I go tell the others about you and your friend."
"Sure, stick me down here with the talking fox while you and Kate go out and do each other's hair," said Sawyer.
"Don't worry, we won't be long," said Kate, as she and Jack left.
Tails was staring nonchalantly at his environment.
"Go play dead or something, and stop staring at me," snapped Sawyer.
Tails blinked and turned away.
