Chapter 10

Nokia sat at her desk, flustered on all that was happening. First Maria's disappearance and now the whereabouts of Shadow coming up sparse as if he had up and left. It felt like this was the beginning of an endless week.

"Um, excuse me Lt. Saunders?" squeaked a voice. A young girl with short red hair had opened Nokia's office door.

"Oh, Allison please, you do not need to be so formal.," Nokia groaned. "Is there something that you need to tell me?"

OH, uh yes ma'am...oh I mean sorry ma'am, um...we...we still don't know the location of The Ultimate Lifeform known as Shadow the Hedgehog...b-but we will keep our search up for him."

"Great...is that all you had to tell me Allison?"

"Oh um...n-n-no ma'am," Allison stuttered, "We had reports that the mad Doctor, Ivo Robotnik had invaded Station Square but has been pushed back by the blue Mobian hedgehog known as Sonic."

"Well that's one thing that we don't have to deal with..."

"Not exactly ma'am. You see...he um...he kidnapped and pink Mobian hedgehog as well as a human girl that's description is a match to Miss Maria," Allison looked down at her boot as she stammered her last sentence out. Nokia looked up at her as she rose from her desk.

"Does the commander know?"

"No ma'am," Allison said, a bit more confident this time. Nokia grabbed her shoulders and Allison looked up at her.

"Do you know Dr. Robotnik's location?" Nokia asked. Allison gave a small smile as those two words fell out of her mouth.

"Yes ma'am."

-XXX-

From the time that they had left the prisoner's cell chamber, it had 20 minutes of nonstop questions that Orbbot did not want to answer.

"What's that?!" Maria yelled over the noise of whirling and robotic clanging.

"That," Sighed the robot, "is what is called The Roboticizer. In short terms: woodland critter goes in, robot comes out."

"That's horrible..." Maria stated, watching as a small grey rabbit fell onto a converter belt. The creature was propelled forward to a massive mechanical box that popped out as a robotic ladybug.

"And that is what we call a Motobug. This was please," irately chimed Orbbot, pushing Maria along.

-XXX-

Amy sighed, pulling her knees up to her chest. Since Maria had left, all she could do is wait for her return.

"She said, she'll be back for me" Amy thought, tears welling in her eyes as she thought that she had made another mistake on not going with Orbbot. The sounds of loud clanking from the air vents soon quickly turned her thoughts up to it, as voices started to come through.

"Ow! Sonic you're on my tail!"

"Well I wouldn't be if Knucklehead didn't come with us!"

"What was that 'hog?"

"We are in an air vent! This is not the time to-WAHH!"

And with that sound, the air vent lid fell open and out fell the three members of Team Sonic on to the floor.

"Guys!" Amy yelled, still holding back tear that quickly changed from tears of sadness to tears of happiness, knowing that she was getting rescued.

"Amy!" the three yelled back as they rushed to get back onto their feet. The door that was across the room shifted open to reveal Rouge.

"You guys know I had a keycard right?" she asked, walking over to Amy's cell and opening it.

"Well it would've been nice to be TOLD that in the first place," Knuckles scoffed. Rouge rolled her eyes at him.

"Well you didn't ask."

"Okay, this is great and all but we need to get back to the matter at hand," Tails exclaimed before another fight broke out, "Where's Maria?"

"She went with Orbot to see Eggman," Amy answered, "Wait, how do you all know she's Maria?"

"Note from Shadow, and before you ask I don't know where he is," Rouge replied.

"Master Emerald," exclaimed Knuckles.

"Confession," Sonic shrugged.

"I'm sorry?" Did you say confession?" Rouge asked, glaring at the blue hedgehog in question.

" That's beside the point," he said, trying to get back to the task at hand, "we need to go and get her so we can get out of here."

"Well you're the fastest out of us all and it would be easier with one going then all five us," Tails said, still studying the situation, "Sonic would be able to get there in no time flat, grab Maria and get out."

"Well that sounds like a plan," Rouge agreed, "We'll make sure we're clear so you two have an easier time getting out." Sonic nodded with a smile.

"Right! Sounds like a game plan," he exclaimed as the five of them started walking over to the door, "I'm counting on you guys!" And with that he started his way left towards the stairs to Eggman. Amy watched until he was out of sight.

"Please be careful," she muttered to herself.

"Amy come on! We need to get out of here," Tails shouted, snapping her attention back to the matter at hand.

"Uh... yeah right," she said and joined the others to start their way right down towards the outdoors

-XXX-

"You know, I think the air vent was faster," Knuckles complained as the four of them finally reached the doors.

"Oh would you stop," Rouge groaned as she activated the door to open , "It was only 5 flights, and I think we got down in rec-"

Her sentence was cut short when the door opened revealing four military soldiers, guns at the ready.

"NOW," screamed one of them and shots wear fired. Tails Knuckles Amy and Rouge all trying get out of the way but it wasn't enough. They were all hit.

"But not by bullets," Rouge thought to herself. She could hear Knuckles trying to reassure Tails who was in a state of sheer panic, muttering to himself that he was going to die. Amy was softly sobbing behind her. Rouge looked down at her leg where she was hit seeing a big dart sticking out of it, the feeling of sleepiness slowly started to take over.

"It's darts," she said, fighting every urge to not lose consciousness, "they used a tranquilizer gun...to..."

Rouge never finished what she was saying . She had drifted off. It wasn't long before all four of them were out cold. One by one they were loaded into an armored vehicle. One of the soldiers got on to a phone.

"Lt. Saunders," he spoke formally, "We have been able to secure the fox and echidna. The pink hedgehog and Agent Rouge were also secured with them. "

"Figures," Nokia sighed on the other end of the phone, "Rouge is most likely the last one to have contact with Shadow in the last 24 to 48 hours so she'll have to go up as well, same with the other three. Any sight of the Target?"

"No ma'am. Blue hedgehog isn't accounted for either. "

"Right," another sigh from Nokia's end, trying to reconfigure the plan at hand, trying to find a different solution but none were coming.

"Go in. Get the hedgehog and the target by any means. Arrest Robotnik , it's probably for the better to do it so we don't have him interfering with this too."

"Roger that Lieutenant," the soldier said. He looked over to his fellow comrades and nodded. The three closest to the building started their way in as the one on the phone stayed behind to guard the special cargo.

-XXX-

"Finally," Orbot groaned. It had been an eventful trip back up to his creator's room of evil doings, "Here we are. The doctor is going to just LOVE playing 20 questions with you."

The little robot floated over to the door controls, typed in sort of code and the door slowly shuffled open. Maria quickly went inside the room. The room was dimly lit and the sounds of whirling and screeching sounds of machines working over time. In the center of the room stood a man, a man that left Maria in shocked. It was not the round shape of the man's body, that did resemble that of an egg. Oh no. It was the mustache that came out widely from the man's face, the dark glass that covered his eyes, an almost uncanny resemblance of her grandfather.

"Well it's nice of you to finally show up," he sneered as he walked up to the two of them, pausing only when he noticed it was only two. He looked over to the little robot.

"Where's the hedgehog?" he asked. Orbot just shrugged.

"She didn't want to come."

"I'm sorry...but who are you?" Maria asked.

"Oh where are my manners," the robot said in a rather bored tone, " this gentleman here is the great scientist, Dr. Ivo Robotnik, though most call him Eggman more these days."

"Ivo...Robotnik," Maria repeated, her eyes narrowed. She knew that she had heard the name Ivo before but was coming with blanks on who had said it.

"...your grandfather," Maria started, trying to get a clearer picture on the situation, "his name wasn't Gerald Robotnik, was it?"

"PROFESSOR Gerald Robotnik to you," Eggman sneered at her, coming to a realization that there was something off about this girl, "Why do YOU know his name girl? He would not be taught about in your schools after the ARK mishap that tried to destroy the planet."

"He LOVED this planet!" Maria retorted, her anger starting to get the best of her, "He would've never harmed anyone on this planet." Eggman just smirked at her.

"Really? So his plan to drive the ARK down into the Earth was an act of love and not a revenge plan to wipe off humanity because of his precious granddaughter died?"

"I DIDN'T DIE!"

"Excuse me?" Eggman said quietly, now studying the girl, "what do you mean by you didn't die?"

"Oh..." Maria stammered, "I...um...uh..."

She didn't finish. The door opened and within seconds the blue hedgehog was in between her and the doctor.

"Leave her alone Eggman," Sonic growled.

"I have too many questions for your request to leave her alone now hedgehog," Eggman retorted back, "What do you mean when you said you didn't die girl?"

"I'm not answering that to you," Maria spoke, her voice barely above a whisper. She was terrified on what would happened if he found out. The door opened again with no knowledge of it . Everyone was too focused on the situation at hand that when the darts were fired and hit their respected targets was when reality came snapping back full force.

"Ow," Maria shrieked as the impacted happened. She looked over towards Sonic to see him trying to rip the dart out of his left shoulder but to no avail. Her vision started to blur, she could feel someone picking her up and tried to get a look at them...

But everything went black.

-XXX-

The three soldiers loaded up Maria and Sonic with the others and Eggman into a different vehicle. The soldier that had been waiting grabbed the phone and made a call once again.

"Yes?" came the voice from the other end.

"Lt. Saunders," the soldier spoke, "Mission was a success."

"Thank goodness," Nokia sighed at the other end of the phone, "Load them all up."

"...all of them?" the soldier questioned.

"Yes. All. If they've been helping Maria the whole time then they all need to go with her until we get the Ultimate Lifeform back in our care. The four of them plus Agent Rouge made their choices. As for Robotnik we'll bring him the prison."

"But...Lt..."

"The safest place for Maria right now is the Space Colony ARK and not on Earth. Do I make myself clear?" The soldier hesitated, feeling like this was wrong in so many ways but did not want to disobey orders.

"Yes ma'am. Crystal." he said, hanging up the phone. He turned to his fellow comrades.

"Alright. Let's get them up."

-XXX-

AN: Life is a rough time. Inspiration has been seriously lacking, but I want to see this through to completion. Thanks for reading. Hoping to get more out way sooner than it took for this one.