"Good evening, ladies and gentlemen."

Eggman's mechanical voice crackled over the speakers of every badnik, drowning out the screams of startled humans with sheer numbers.

"This is your doctor speaking. I'm afraid I can't be there in person right now, but don't worry! So long as you cooperate fully then you will remain unharmed."

Laughter buzzed over a dozen different speakers at once as badniks burst in through the other entrances to the dining hall, shoving hotel staff before them. Gunfire exploded across the room, provoking a fresh chorus of screams as broken lighting tumbled from the ceiling. The room fell into darkness.

"At least until my minions blow this building sky high!" The laughter doubled in volume.

"What do we do, Tails?" Amy pulled back under the tablecloth with a frown. "There's so many of them."

"They're probably here for the emerald. The president may have been a diversion… Or a two pronged attack." Tails tapped at his computer screen with increasing speed. "Penders. Looks like he's set up the same smoke screen as in Mystic Jungle, I can't reach Sonic."

A fresh scream broke the darkness. Amy poked her nose out to spy ghostly figures phasing through the walls. Guests scrambled towards the far side of the room, trampling over each other in their haste to escape, herded into an area with no exits.

"W-we have to help these people." Tails pressed up behind her. She could feel him trembling. "If I… I act as bait for the g-g-ghosts then you can break through the badniks and g-get them out of here."

Amy glanced at him, his eyes darting from place to place, fists and teeth clenched. Even though he was terrified, even though he had long since retired from the fighting...

Badniks tramped across the room, kicking over tables methodically one after the other as they went.

"Hey, Tails?" She whispered into his ear.

"Yeah?"

She smiled at him, pulling her hammer into her hand and ruffling his fluffy head.

"I'll be fine. Be sure to call Sonic, alright?"

"Whah?" He tilted an ear.

Amy lunged upwards, knocking the table aside as she swung, connecting with the little fox like a golf ball. He soared out through a window with a surprised yell. Amy spun with a pirouette, evening dress spilling out around her, raising her voice above the clamour of the hall.

"Have no fear! Amy Rose is here!"

He'd be fine. Amy dashed forward as bullets shredded the tables behind her, the juice they'd been drinking spattering the carpet. A blunt impact like that was nothing. He'd fly to a safe distance, call Sonic… She landed her hammer into the abdomen of the closest egg pawn sending it smashing into the bot behind it. Both exploded as she let the impact carry her backwards, twisting in the air towards the giant ice sculpture. She slammed hammer first into its base. A chunk of ice intercepted a rocket, exploding into molten shards.

He'd be safe.

"Too slow, junk for brains!" She slammed the platform at her feet with her hammer, launching herself into the air as the statue began to topple over with a groan.

He was important after all.

And she could at least buy him time to get away.

The statue crashed to the floor, smashing a badnik beneath it. Amy hopped off at the last moment, grabbing the chaos emerald mid fall before she slammed into another badnik. Stay clear of the ghosts, they were slow, better they were coming at her than the humans-

A bullet caught her in the gut, knocking her flat on the floor in a shower of rings. She rolled as more projectiles tore into the spot where she'd been laying, fabric - hopefully not her dress - erupted into the sky.

Wait. Amy scrambled into a ring, smashing a table up into a makeshift barricade as she passed. Ghostly claws drifted straight through it. She'd been shot in the dress already. Darn it.

She smashed down another pawn, flipping backwards to hammer down on the next. How many was that? Still too many left. Ghosts were closing in now.

Well, she hadn't really expected to win. Even if Sonic would have trashed this many badniks already and still had time for a one liner. But she could buy time. Be big, be noticeable. And maybe she could make it. There weren't that many badniks. She could handle them if she was careful. Amy smashed another table across the room to shatter against one, messing up its aim. Bullets ripped through the wall beside her.

Keep going. Amy leapt, hammering the wall to fly over a pair of ghosts and crash down on the shooter. It exploded around her.

That's right. She wasn't just some helpless little baseline girl who could only wait to get kidnapped. She was Amy Rose, Sonic's girlfriend, and she was more than a match for some ghosts and badniks. And Sonic would finally love her and a blinding blast of plasma roared across the room. Amy stumbled backwards, barely evading it as it tore through the dining hall leaving small fires blazing in its wake.

A metal claw impaled her face. Amy yelled in pain and surprise, bouncing through ash and splinters before smashing through a table, spilling its contents across the carpet.

Metal Sonic clinked to the floor of now bare stone, red eyes tracking her as she bounced up again, shaking stroganoff from her spines with a snarl.

"This. Was. A. Rental!" She charged, crushing a badnik with her backswing before following through towards the robotic parody of her hero.

"Well if it isn't Amy Rose." Eggman's voice came from all around her.

Metal slapped her strike aside with a lightning quick counter, palm smashing into her chest.

Of course. Amy slipped her hammer away before she could land on it, rolling to a halt as she struck the ground. She'd faced it with her friends before, but Metal Sonic was designed to face off against Sonic himself, it was stronger than all these other badniks combined.

"So nice of you to join us." A gun barrel dug into her spines. "Drop the hammer, girl, and hand over my emerald."

Amy grunted. Ghosts and badniks converged on her from every direction but one, and that one was even worse.

She extended her hand with a huff, dropping her hammer to her side.

Piko.

The chaos emerald clattered beside it a moment later.

"You're never going to get away with this, Eggman! Sonic will come and save us!"

Central City was only a few hundred miles from here. Five minutes would be enough for him. He'd be here at any moment. Assuming he thought she was important enough to leave Shadow to save the president alone... Or important enough to hold off stopping for a chilli dog first.

"Oh, I'm counting on it. I'd been planning on using the hostages as bait anyway. With you here, it's only a matter of time before that hedgehog's mine!"

A metal claw snapped shut on the back of her neck, hauling her effortlessly off the floor. Amy squirmed at that familiar grip, kicking uselessly as it telescoped out its other claw to pluck the chaos emerald from the smouldering carpet before dragging her backwards through the room. Amy twisted as best she could to see a ticking metal cylinder bigger than she was was being set up on the same stand the ice sculpture had been standing on.

"A bomb. Seriously?"

"Don't knock the classics." Eggman snapped. "Now if you'll excuse me, I think I see the blue menace now. Rest assured I'll be sure to let him know all about you before our battle."

"Wait, so you're setting up a trap assuming you're going to lose?" Amy stared half-lidded at the nearest badnik. "That's just lame."

"...Reduce the timer by two minutes and kill the other hostages."

"No!"

The cylinder behind Amy clanked loudly, a mechanical hum building up within. She gritted her teeth as metal hands slammed her against the bomb with intentional brutality, silvery cords binding her to it. She strained with all her might to break free as multiple badniks redirected their guns towards the huddled crowd of frightened humans.

A familiar car burst in through a window, transforming into a hulking mecha mid-flight. Twin-linked vulcan cannons' deafening rumble drowned out all other noise, tearing apart badniks with mechanical accuracy.

"Tails!" Amy flinched as electrical flares indiscriminately sprayed across the room, flooding its shadowy interior with blinding light.

A metal claw coiled around her throat. Amy glanced up to see Metal's glowing red eyes glaring down at her, tightening its grip around her neck. The Vortex stumbled as badniks flooded in through the entrance, guns blazing, bullets sparking off the mech's armoured exterior.

A fist slammed into Metal Sonic's stomach, sending it crashing through a table in a spot of poetic justice. Amy gasped in pain and surprise, clutching where claws had scraped free of her throat. Tails straightened, shaking his hand with a wince as he turned to face her, a crackling beam knife slicing her bonds apart with a single flick of his wrist.

"Are you okay?" He smiled, holding his hand out to her as she stared at him in open mouthed surprise.

"I- uh-" Wasn't he supposed to be in the Vortex? Her stammering was cut short by Metal's scorching counterattack. Rings tumbled out of Tails and into her.

"Save the hostages!" was the last thing she heard as he was dragged away, already exchanging blows with the mighty blue hedgebot.

Amy shook her head to clear it, slipping her real hammer from hammerspace as she charged into the fray once more.