In Green Hill Zone, laughter could be heard as a dust cloud passed by. "Can't catch me, Shads!" Sonic laughed as Shadow stumbled after his foot caught on a medium rock sticking out of the ground. Shadow merely huffed and managed to catch up to the blue hedgehog.
About 13 seconds later, they reached the finish line and their race ended in a tie. "Woo! Man, that was a great race, huh Shads?" Sonic sighed as he lied down on the ground. Just then, their communicators vibrated as the head of a young fox appeared on their screens. "Sonic! Shadow! We need you!" Tails said.
"Is Egghead at it again?" Sonic asked as he sat up, "Yes, and he found a Chaos Emerald, but he has us trapped in his base" the young fox said as a map appeared on the screen showing the two hedgehogs where to go. "Alright! We're coming!" the blue hedgehog said as he took off with Shadow following at his heels.
As they arrived at the base, alarms went off as robots swarmed the duo, but Sonic and Shadow took care of them with ease. After the robots were gone and the animals inside were free, they followed the signal to a nearby room, where Tails and Amy were waiting for them. "Where's the emerald?" Sonic asked, as he walked over to the younger mobians. "Over there." Tails said, pointing to a glass case surrounding the emerald.
"Alright, this should be easy." Sonic smirked as he revved up in a spin-dash and smashed the glass. Just then, the base began to shake and debris fell to the floor. "It's a trap!" Tails exclaimed as he and the other covered their heads with their hands. "Where's a way out?" Amy shouted over the rumbling. "Over there!" Shadow shouted, pointing to an open doorway ahead just of them.
They were about to go through, when Sonic yelled "Tails!" and pushed the young fox out of the way of a large chunk of the ceiling as it came crashing down so it fell on top of him instead of his adopted brother. "SONIC!" Tails cried out as Shadow pulled him away, "It's too late for him, and we need to get out of here before the same happens to us." the black hedgehog told him as he dragged the sobbing fox away.
Elsewhere, there was a conversation going on between two beings. "Do you think Sonic and Iris are going to be alright?" a femaine voice asked a green wolf. "Do not worry, Gold. They have been through worse. But just to be on the safe side, we will follow their comrades to aid them if they need it.".
"I hope you're right, Celadon."
And with that, the beings departed from the room that they occupied.
Back with the heroes, after they got out, both Amy and Tails were in tears while Rouge -who had just barely arrived- was doing her best to calm them down. After a while, they all agreed to head to Vanilla's house to recover and tell everyone the bad news. Or, they would've, if Tails hadn't insisted on digging through the debris to look for Sonic, that is.
After a few minutes of digging, Shadow had to pull Tails away, while Rouge tried to further comfort the fox. But little did they know, while Tails was digging through the debris, two blobs -one blue and the other orange- had made their way over to the fox and attached themselves to one of his tail tips.
XXX
"What's the matter, Tails?" Vanilla asked when she saw the fox's face as they walked into the house. "It's...hard to explain." Rouge sighed, "I'll explain." Shadow said as they all took a seat at a nearby couch.
"Where's Sonic?" Knuckles asked when he realized that the blue hedgehog wasn't present. "That's why we're here…" Amy said, tears in her eyes.
XXX
"This is what happens when you're not careful, Sonic." Knuckles sighed after the explanation, as Cream came close to tears. "So, now what?" Rouge asked.
"We teach Eggman a lesson…" Shadow growled, looking at the door. "Shadow, wait." Rouge said, "I won't let you go alone." she growled, thinking of how they'd never would've made it if it weren't for the blue hedgehog's positivity and determination. "Tails, where's Eggman's base?" Knuckles asked, standing up from his seat and walking over to Shadow.
After looking at the Miles Electric for a minute, Tails pinpointed the location of Eggman's base, pointed them in the right direction and decided to come along as well, because Sonic was practically a big brother to him.
Meanwhile, a silent conversation was taking place between the two blobs on one of the young fox's tails. "They sound determined to avenge you, Sonic." said the orange blob to the blue blob, "Heh, you know him, Iris. We practically raised him, so why wouldn't he?" the blue blob responded.
"Remind me why we didn't use the communicator to tell them that we were fine?"
"Because, one, its battery is dead. And two, if we didn't have the ability to turn into formless blobs, we would've been crushed and wouldn't have survived. The gang don't know that. We'll reform when the time comes."
And with that, their conversation ended.
Back with the gang, they had just arrived at Eggman's base.* "Where's the dang entrance?" Shadow growled as he looked at the metal wall that stood before them. "Let me handle it." Knuckles said as he pulled back his fist and with a loud clang!, the wall busted open, revealing a large chamber.
Just like last time, alarms went off, and badniks began to swarm into the room.
The battle was quick, but too easy. What was the doctor planning?
Just then, walls slammed down, separating the mobians from each other, and Dr. Eggman's voice could be heard from nearby speakers. "Well, well, well. Look who came to avenge their blue friend! I suggest that you say your prayers, because this day might just be your last! Ho ho ho!". And with that, the message ended.
With Tails, he was talking into his communicator, but it proved futile, as the signal was blocked. "Guess I'm on my own." he sighed as he went forward. But as he took a few steps, a giant robot fell and he gasped.
With Amy and Rouge, they were attacking the walls with all their might, but to no avail. The wall was too tough. "Great, now what?" Amy groaned. Just then a giant robot not too different from the one Tails had dropped down. Amy and Rouge got into position and started to fight the mechanical behemoth.
With Knuckles and Shadow, they groaned as they sat up after being knocked back from the force of the slam from the walls. "This is what we get for jumping into danger without a second thought like Sonic." Knuckles growled. "Shut up." Shadow said, starting a quarrel between the two that was quickly ended by the arrival of yet another giant robot similar to the other two.
Back with Tails, he was fighting with all his might, and giving it his all. However this had barely made a dent in the robot, and he was knocked into a wall by the robot's metal arm. Just then, he noticed something about his tails, despite the threat in the same room as him. His tip wasn't supposed to be blue! And was his tail always such a deep color of orange? But that wasn't important right now. He had to focus on the task at hand!
But after a few minutes of fighting, the young fox was leaning against a wall, exhausted, and the robot didn't have so much as a few scratches. The robot beeped in victory, and raised its arm to strike down the fox. Tails quickly put a tail up, even though he knew that the action would be useless, and expected the blow to come down and flatten him into a pancake.
But strangely, the blow never came, so he looked up, and gaped at what he saw. The strange colors on his tail had expanded outwards and formed a shield that was holding back the arm! The young fox rolled out of the way as the colors reattached themselves to his tail until he stood back up.
"What the-?" was all he could get out before the arm came crashing back down, but this time, someone pushed him away. Wait. Wasn't he alone when the walls closed him off from the others? He looked up and almost had to resist the urge to cry and hug his rescuer. It was Sonic! He was alive! But, something was different about him. He was almost entirely blue! His mussel, arms, underbelly, and inner ears were all blue. The only parts that weren't blue were his pupils, irises, and nose.
The hedgehog let out a feral snarl at the robot and spin-dashed into the arm, burying himself into it and coming out the other side. The robot, however, wasn't gonna be distracted from its prey so easily and fired an energy ball at Tails.
But just before the ball hit him, Sonic yelled, "Iris! Get Tails out of the way!" but for some reason, all Tails heard was an animal-like cry, and almost immediately, Tails felt something cover his entire bottom half and for a second, it seemed like his legs had minds of their own as they moved their owner to the side as the energy ball hit the spot Tails was milliseconds ago.
It all happened so fast, and when the fox looked down, he saw an orange substance climb down his legs as it released its hold on him and formed into a pure-orange cicada. It turned to him, and in a femanie voice, told him, "I know this is probably confusing, but just hang in there. Me and Sonic will handle the robot. We'll explain afterwards.", and with that, it sat Tails down in a nearby corner and flew over to where Sonic was trying to attack the robot on its abdomen to help him, leaving the young fox bewildered.
To be continued…
A/N: Sorry if this chapter seems rushed, I was really excited to write Tails's battle scene and Sonic's return. Now we get to see one of Sonic's latex buddies (Iris) in her own form instead of acting as Sonic's skin! If the battle scene was too confusing, just let me know and I'll see what I can do to make it less confusing. Kittygamer, out! And as always, please review!
*At this point in writing this chapter, I had just realized that I didn't plan or even know what to have the group do once they got to the base. Were they gonna harm/kill the doctor, or just take his emeralds? Message to you readers who haven't already written some kind of story; writing a story is harder and takes way more time and thought than it looks.
