"Damn drones." huffed Rouge angrily, kicking one of the exploded drones near the destroyed satellite tower.
"Rouge!" shouted Knuckles up to the wreckage with the rest of the team following behind "What happened here?"
"Drones downed one of our satellite towers. We can't get into contact with anyone and our radars got completely destroyed." explained Rouge.
"That must why we lost the signal. " said Mighty.
"Is there any way to fix it?" asked Tails.
"There's a way, but it would take forever and we don't have the necessary tools to do it with. " answered Rouge.
"Unless..." said Knuckles, thinking of an idea.
"Unless?" asked Rouge, raising an eyebrow.
"Unless we head south towards the desert."
"South?" asked Ray, confused "What's south?"
"On one of our previous missions we were sent into the desert to storm a base belonging to Robotnik, just south from here." Knuckles explained.
"I remember that." said Vector "That was when we lost Foxtrot."
Tails looked at the ground, thinking of his cousin, thinking of the day he heard about his cousin's death. He knew that when he joined the army he wasn't doing it for himself, he was doing it for Foxtrot. Tails felt his heart sink, finally realizing what Vector has been trying to tell him. He no longer wanted to this for Foxtrot, or even for himself, the world depended on them.
"I'll go with you!"
Tails and the others turned towards where the voice came from.
"Cosmo?" whispered Tails.
"Cosmo. This is too dangerous..." said Knuckles, before being cut off by Cosmo.
"You'll need someone out there to tend to your wounds in case you were to get caught in any scrapes."
"She's right." said Rouge.
"I know." said Knuckles "Alright you can come along."
"And I'm coming too." said Nicole, walking up behind Cosmo.
"Alright." said Knuckles.
"So am I." said Bean from the back of the jeep.
"No Bean, you're staying here." ordered Knuckles.
"But... but..."
"He's right Bean." said Tails "You're injured. You should stay here and take time to heal."
"Alright." said Bean, feeling defeated "Alright. Just do me one favor."
"What's that?" asked Espio.
"Make sure Bark makes it back alive." answered Bean, a lone tear wandering down his beak just of the thought of being away from his longtime best friend for so long.
"We will." promised Tails, seeing some of himself in Bean.
"Then that settles it." said Knuckles "We set out tonight."
Meanwhile...
"80%. "