Chapter Four – Escape

The Palace was blockaded. There was no way in or out. Not for anyone or anything, and that included communications. Sonic was by the front door, checking out the force field left by Rogue Squadron. Rotor was with him. For Sonic's plan to work, he had check if the force field extended beyond the floor into the ground. It seemed unlikely. The force field seemed extend upwards around the Palace like a dome. But how far down did it go? Rotor examined it with every device he had to try and gage it's strength but got nothing. Sonic was getting impatient. This whole scene reminded Sonic of the number of times they had worked together at Knothole over the years, and despite everything, nothing really had changed.

Knothole. Sonic's memories of the place were incredibly hit and miss. He remembered people, names and faces, sure, but any specifics of anything that happened there, no chance. But this did have some familiarity to it. But Rotor was getting frustrated.

"Nothing!" He spat. "Why can't you just kick the dam thing?" He growled. Sonic sighed.

'Why not?' He thought. He did exactly that.

He grabbed his cloak and moved it to the side slightly. He then extremely fast, span round and karate kicked the force field. He kicked it so hard that it caused the entire Palace it surrounded to shake, quite violently. But the force field remained intact.

Sally, Bunnie and few others came running up, but Rotor got in there first.

"Sorry everyone!" He admitted. "My fault!" He defended. They all rolled their eyes and left. They were used to Rotor doing things like this, especially with the number of explosions coming from his workshop. Sonic raised an eyebrow, but Rotor rounded on him.

"Please." He begged. "Don't do that again!" He growled. Sonic held his hands up and nodded. But Rotor stared at him.

"How strong are you?" He asked. But Sonic shifted.

"You know me, Rotor, I'm all about speed, not strength." He stammered.

Rotor swore at Sonic. He knew he was lying. To kick a force field hard enough to make the building it surrounds violently shake, that takes some serious strength. Plus he said he was robotised from the inside-out. To have bones made of metal, and not just any metal. Adamantium. The strongest metal in the world. Rotor didn't think it possible to robotise metal that hard, but with Sonic's freakish roboticisation, absolutely made anything possible. It meant that the muscles surrounding those bones, must be unbelievingly strong. He looked up at Blue Blur.

"Sonic?!" He pressed. The Blue Hedgehog shifted again, he always was rubbish at lying.

"Alright. I can lift a couple of tonnes." He admitted. Rotor raised an eyebrow.

"Wow!" he said. But Sonic snapped, it was all just too much.

"Look, I didn't ask for any of this." He spat. "I was supposed to die that day!" He was breathing heavily, a slight growl on his voice. "Because that is what the hero does. He goes in, take out the bad guy and dies, leaving peace and propensity." He paused and sighed. He looked at Rotor. "I'd prepared for it, you know. In fact, I'd spent months preparing for it." He shifted again. "I didn't tell anyone. I couldn't. I didn't have the heart. To know that I would win the final fight but not walk away." He said, hanging his head. Rotor stared at him.

"A suicide mission?" He questioned. "You knew?" He added. Sonic cocked his head. "Yeah, I knew, or at least, I had a hunch." He said. Rotor was stunned.

"And you went anyway!" He gasped. But Sonic rolled his eyes.

"Well yeah!" He spat. "Because that's what the hero does." He sighed again.

Sonic looked down and found Rotor with both his hands around his middle. Sonic was so tall and Rotor so small, that the Walrus only came up to his whist.

"Thank you." He whispered, seemingly forgiving him for earlier misdemeanour's. Sonic looked down at him. He thought. It was friends like this that gave he the reason to fight. It was his pleasure. He had the power and he was going to use them to help.

Rotor hugged Sonic as tightly as he could. He has no idea that being the hero got to him so badly. Then he felt something under Sonic's cloak. Something weird sticking out of his back. Sonic must have known because he pushed Rotor away very quickly.

"Come on. We aren't going to get out this way and I'm sure the force field doesn't extend down into the ground, so we should be able to get out through the basement." He said quite abruptly.

Rotor watched him as he left for the Great Hall. He was still hiding something. Rotor didn't blame him after everything he had been through. He was surprised by how Sonic's mind was still in one piece. If it had been him, he would have cracked long before now. But then again, he's not the hero.

Sonic is. That was when Rotor decided, there and then, that not matter what Sonic was hiding. What he feared to show. He would be by his side, whatever happen. Loyalty to the end. It was then that Rotor realised something.

But the Palace doesn't have a basement!

He raced into the Great Hall to find Sonic examining the walls, slowly working his way round, looking for something. He asked was was going on, but no one had a clue. Sally stood there with her arms folded, looking unimpressed again. Rotor seemed to be the only one with the guts to go up and ask Sonic. In his new form, he could be quite scary and very intimidating.

"Sonic?" He stammered. The Blue Blur answered, but didn't look up.

"Yes." He hissed. Rotor frowned.

"What are you looking for?" He asked. "If its the access point for the basement then your out of luck. The Palace doesn't have one." He shrugged. Sonic smirked, giving Rotor a sideways look.

"Oh, yes it does!" He leered and then he stopped. "Got it!" He added as he found the point on the wall he was looking for, it was just behind Rotor. The whole of the Palace's Great Hall, floors, walls and ceiling were made of metal, just like Snively's old headquarters. Sonic looked at Rotor, a mischievous smirk on his face.

"Duck!" He said and he swung at him. Rotor ducked and saw with nothing more then a glance, three foot long knives sticking out of Sonic's knuckles, his fist clenched. They sliced into the metallic wall like butter and damaged a control panel that seemed to be hiding inside it.

Rotor stared at Sonic's hand has he pulled the knives out of the wall. They then retracted back into his hand and it heeled instantly as if they were never even there.

Now Rotor was really scared. Loyalty to the end. Right? The more he found out about Sonic, the more dangerous he became. He looked around. A few others had seen and now they were frightened too. But Rotor tried to process it. He got thinking.

'Eighty percent internally robotised, a hundred percent mutant'. He thought. That was what Sonic had said and was exactly what Rotor saw. It was the two beautifully combined. He has the knives built into his arms, three of them. Rotor suspected that he had a further three in the other arm. When they came out, his body could instantly heel any damage. Spontaneous Regeneration. Mutation at its very best. Sonic has said he was nearly 'indestructible'. This ability to heel would do it. But then really Rotor shuddered. The pain Sonic must have gone through to get these abilities. He dreaded to think. Sonic had mentioned it earlier. He sighed. Thinking about it, his old friend didn't seem so scary. He was trying to survive, just like everyone else.

After a few seconds, the floor of the Great Hall begin to shake and a large circular hole opened up in the floor, about five metres across, and the sections lowered down into the floor, creating a spiral staircase. All of a sudden there was a large clunking sound, as most of the steps fell away and crashed into the dark depths below, leaving only a handful behind. Rotor stared.

'So the Palace didn't have a basement but the old headquarters did. Sonic must have remembered from the war.' he thought. He was seriously impressed. All of a sudden, Sonic ran at full speed at one of the broken steps and dived through the hole. He seemed to grab something. He then through out his other hand backwards and grabbed the ledge. Leaving him dangling. Rotor was just about to run over to help, when he realised that Sonic didn't need it. He used his incredible strength to easily pull himself up and whatever he went for. Rotor wondered what, but quickly got his answer. The thing was a battered, badly rusted body of a Hedgehog. Uncle Chuck.

Sonic heaved. The whole escapade seemed to take out of him a bit.

"I told you he was down there!" He perked up, but then frowned. "I just wasn't expected there." He frowned. They all stared at Uncle Chuck's body. It was in a really bad way, and quite gruesome. Rotor ran back to his workshop and grabbed a blanket. He wrapped up the metallic corpse. He looked at Sonic.

"What are you going to do with it?" He asked. Sonic smiled.

"Take it back and let Uncle Chuck decide, I suppose." He sighed. "He'll properly have it buried. He doesn't need it anymore." He was happy to have found it. He walked towards the broken spiral staircase and looked through the holes.

"That's a long way down." He said aloud. They all looked at him. Everything was very badly rusted. They wouldn't be using those stairs to get to the basement.

Plan B.

Did Sonic have one? No. He had to think of one, fast. As far as he knew this was the only way to the basement. He only remembered it because it was how Snively entered into the final fight. He was certain there was others, but didn't really have the time to search. He was now somewhat keen to get out of the Palace. This was for two reasons. One, the Great Hall was bringing back too many memories, and two, today was the longest he has stayed indoors for months, and nowadays, he really didn't like it.

Down was the only way.

On further inspection of the hole, he could see that the path down was relatively clear. He realised that with a rope and torches, he could lower everyone down through there. That is, if anyone had a rope? Rotor did. The Walrus had everything. They attached one end of the rope to one of the large pillars and throw the other end down the hole. There was a mild clunk at it hit the bottom.

But who was going first? Rotor offered but Sonic beat him to it.

With an extremely large smirk, and he grabbed his cloak and pulled it extremely close around him and jumped feet first straight into and down the hole. No rope, nothing.

"Bye!" He grinned, and prompting disappeared into the darkness.

Sonic!

Then there was a very loud clunk. Rotor swore and panicked, grabbing the rope before anyone else and started lowering himself down, a torch in his pocket. Sonic was crazy.

That was nothing new, he always was. But this was different. He had only just found his best friend, he didn't want to loose him again.

"Sonic!" He bellowed into the darkness.

No answer. He lowered himself further. He bellowed again. Still nothing.

Rotor was now fearing a Sonic-shaped pile of goo at the bottom of the rope. He raced down the rope, but Rotor had seriously underestimated the idiot Blue Blur.

"Sonic!" He screamed. An unimpressed voice replied.

"Ow! Easy Rotor, please don't shout down my ear." He spat.

It was said idiot, sounding like nothing has happened. Rotor could have thumped him at that moment, for making him so worried. Rotor growled at him. It was pitch black, he couldn't see a thing. Sonic sighed.

"You about six feet from the floor and I can see a path out." He said brightly.

Sonic could see! Of course, he could see.

Further painful enhancements, supposed Rotor. Though he figured this one might be an roboticiser enhancement rather then a mutant one. He hit the floor and fumbled around for his torch. It's bright light filled the area causing them both to squint. Rotor looked around. Sonic was right, there was indeed a path out. He stared at his annoying friend. He looked unscathed. Rotor looked up. Sonic must have dropped forty feet and had landed perfectly, just like earlier from the Palace ceiling.

Rotor raised an eyebrow. Now that was impressive. It looked like Sonic's new abilities and powers were expanding every second and as far was Rotor was concerned, Sonic could keep them.

He had earned them. He'd suffered enough for them. He looked up again, and gave the all clear. Then saw the others slowly making their way down the rope.

Rotor pointed the torch at Sonic.

"Well, go on, then." He spat.

Sorry but the indestructible idiot was going first. Rotor was very annoyed at Sonic for the wind up, and indicated with his torch. If there were any booby traps down here leftover from the war, then Sonic can deal with them. Thank you very much.

He wasn't going to argue. Sonic could see that his little joke, may have gone a bit to far, and he deserved that.

As he pressed forwards. He had a problem. He had no knowledge of this area, only of its existence but he had no idea where the path would lead. But he wasn't going to admit that as he ducked and dived past broken metallic doors and walls, to get through as he was so much larger then everyone else. He did have one hunch, a hope, in fact, about where they might end up. In fact, he was banking on it. Somewhere he had strong memories of.

The Catacombs.

The Catacombs were a large and extensive series of naturally occurring tunnels and caverns that existed directly under Mobotropolis. Several of the buildings could have their foundations seen here. The Freedom Fighters used them a great deal in the war again Robotnik, but not so much against Snively. His fights were more tactical and less gorilla warfare.

In the end, they found no booby traps and came out into a large cavern, right in the middle of the Catacomb network.

He had done it.

But to everyone's surprise, they were surrounded by houses, and people. The whole cavern was lit up, revealing a village. In fact, numerous villages in different caverns. There were entire communities down here and from the look on Sally and Bunnie's faces, they had no idea that they were even down here.

Sonic and Sally, as the two most recognisable of the visiter's, found themselves immediately surrounded by people. Sally had got nothing and Sonic wasn't sure what to do either.

Looking around, Sonic could see that these people have not faired much better then those on the surface. There were people everywhere and there must have been thousands down here. But why here? Fleeing. Almost certainly. But from what? The War? Possibly, but that didn't explain the last six years. Did the Roque Squadron's grip on Sally extend this far?

But there was one thing for certain, many of these people did not look like they would survive the upcoming Winter. Sonic had to do something. Being head and shoulders taller then everyone else there, it didn't take long for everyone to notice and soon all eyes were on him. Again. Silence fell. Sonic was ripping his quills out.

'Not again!' He thought. He had had enough of uncomfortable silences. It was at times like this he really hated being famous.

Thankfully, someone broke the silence.

"Back from the dead, I see!" The voice had such a cold leer, that they all turned round.

It was Lupe. The Leader of the Wolf-Pack and an ex-Freedom Fighter. Sally and Bunnie gasped as she was long believed to be dead as well, Sonic however wasn't that surprised.

She looked graceful and exactly the same as she did six years ago, except in age. Lupe, a wolf with grey and white fur and deep blue eyes, with thick black hair (in the shape of a mo-hawk). Her hair was tied in a ponytail that ran down her back. She also had a black tail with a grey tip and a scar under her left eye. She wore a light blue bodysuit with a golden clasp around her neck, golden arm and wrist bracelets and black sandals strapped around her legs. She is also significantly taller then most but was no where near Sonic's new height. He still towered over her. He could tell from the way she was looking at him, she didn't believe.

'Under the circumstances.' Sonic thought. 'I don't blame you.' He admitted.

A lot had changed and Sonic could tell from Lupe demeanour, she was very defensive. She rounded on Sally.

"You've got some nerve showing your face here." She spat. Sally was confused.

"What are you talking about?" She asked. She had no idea. Lupe was unimpressed.

"What do you mean. You banished us down here when we came to you for help." She growled. Lupe almost shouted at Sally, but Bunnie cut across.

"It wasn't her. She had been brainwashed by Geoffrey St. John." She stammered.

Lupe stopped and stared at Bunnie. She found this really hard to believe but didn't get the chance to answer.

All of a sudden, the entire cavern began to violently shake. Boulders were fall from the ceiling and people panicked.

Then Sonic's radio sparked into life. Rather loudly. He wore it on his belt. It had been silent until now.

"Hell...lord...bombed...!" The voice stammered. The signal was incredible broken.

"...lo...ship?..." It said again, desperate to get though.

"Rogue...Palace!" It finally rang out, and fell silent.

The signal was extremely sketchy but enough information got through for Sonic to figure out what was happening. It also meant that they were close enough to an exit to the Catacombs for the communications signal to get through.

Rogue Squadron was bombing the Palace.

Sonic guessed they had gotten bored of waiting. He gave an immediate response though his radio, immediately switching into hero mode.

"Take them out." He said firmly. "Code red. Code red!" He growled.

He said this with the voice of a general. Sonic had spent his entire life fighting wars. He was a professional soldier.

There was a short silence followed by a "Roger...!" down the radio. They had gotten the message as Sonic could just start to hear the faint sound of laser fire in the distance as someone began defending the Palace.

He caught at glimpse of Lupe staring at him. There must have something in Sonic's voice at got to her but the meeting was short lived as he Catacombs was still violently shaking. Someone shouted.

"SONIC!" They screamed.

It was Rotor.

He was near an archway between two large caverns. It was collapsing. A large, long, narrow boulder from the ceiling of the arch was falling. There people were still trying to get through. If it fell, people could be killed and the archway would be blocked. Sonic saw all of this and moved, very fast. So fast, that no one saw him.

The archway boulder fell just as Sonic arrived beneath it. It caught it. It was heavy, very heavy.

"Come on, Big Guy!" Rotor urged, as Sonic used every ounce of strength he had to lift the boulder up on one side, above his head to create a path beneath. This boulder was way more then a couple of tonnes in weight and Rotor knew it. He urged Sonic again and again, and as soon he saw a clear plan beneath, he dived for it and guided the trapped people, the other side through it to safety.

Sonic was shaking, badly. He had to lock his metallic Adamantium bones together just to maintain the strength. It was painful. He had never lifted anything so heavy in his life. He was always about speed not strength. His new life had changed everything. He kept his ears open for the signal from Rotor. Listening out for an 'All Clear!'. When received, he quickly moved, allowing the boulder to hit the ground with a bang.

He collapsed to his knees, panting heavily. Rotor was immediately by his side, and Sonic found a glass of water being pressed into his hands. An unknown voice spoke kindly.

"Here. Drink this." They said, the other side of him. kindly gesturing.

Sonic looked up. It was Lupe. She was smiling at him. She had seen everything, and now believed.

"That was some serious strength." She asked. "Where did it come from?" She frowned. Sonic didn't want to answer, but thankfully Rotor did for him.

"That's a long story." He gestured, and indicated that now was definitely NOT the time.

The Catacombs finally stopped shaking and settled. Buzzing from Sonic's radio indicated this mission was accomplished. Sky Patrol, the people on other end of Sonic's radio, were on their way, having successfully defended the Palace. He put his head in his hands. Sonic was still in a great deal of pain, still shaking. Pulling his, now battered black cloak, around himself, he blanked everything out.

Quiet... It had been some time since Sonic and just sat in peace, but it was very short lived, as someone annoyingly broke the silence.

"Hey, Big Guy!" They giggled.

Sonic opened his eyes, finding himself staring into one very large eyeball, close to his nose. It made him jump. He instantly knew who it was.

"Charlie!" He growled.

The chestnut Hedgehog giggled inanely. It was Charlie. The leader of the Sky Patrol. The Aerial Battle team of the Mutant Movement and Sonic's right-hand Hedgehog. The only other one on Mobius apart from the great Blue Blur himself. The was wearing a jet black flight suit, brazened with the double-M symbol of the Mutant Movement. His helmet was on the floor beside him and his singular eye was staring up at Sonic with both admiration and mischief. His quills a large mangled mess down his back and what looked liked large dragonfly-style wings coming out of each shoulder. Definitely a Mutant, he was about the same height as Lupe and the last thing anyone expected to see in the Catacombs.

The Hedgehog population on Mobius had been declining for years, even before the wars against Robotnik and Snively. But now they were considered in many areas of Mobius, extinct. Hedgehogs were picky Mobians and needed very specific circumstances for them to successfully breed. But with the changing landscape of Mobius, this was proving harder and harder and as a result, the Hedgehog population plummeted. By the time Robotnik took over in thirteen years ago, there were just a handful of them left. By the end, Sonic believed himself to be the last of his kind.

Or so he thought.

He was surprised to wake from his five year coma to find Charlie, at Mutant Hedgehog, sat beside him. Apparently, he pulled him out of Snively's headquarters, and had been by his side all this time. Quite a brave thing to do. But what was he doing there? Charlie was devoted to Sonic, whether the Blue Blur wanted him or not. Having a 'cling-on' had taken some getting used to, with Sonic making him do some pretty unpleasant jobs at first, but he was always back for more, and now Sonic was glad he was here.

Nobody believed that they would ever seen another Hedgehog again apart from Sonic, they were that rare. Charlie stunned everyone. He just ignored them.

"Come on, Big Guy! On your feet." He said, cheerily, staring at Sonic.

Charlie took some getting used to especially with only one eye. But there was one thing for certain, you could never win a staring match against him. Having only one eye didn't inhibit Charlie, in fact he was the best pilot in the Mutant Movement.

Sonic got to his feet. He looked at Charlie and realised that the Hedgehog had tracked him through the Catacombs using Sonic's radio, which meant that he knew the way out.

"Yeah." He replied when asked, but he then looked extremely worried, looking around. The Catacomb was full of people. He looked extremely worried.

"But we have a bigger problem. It just started snowing." He paused, gulping.

"Winter's here."