MariaRose13: Thank you! I do plan on showing what Sonic has to do about this mess. Happy writing to you, too!
Sorry it's been so long—I'm only beginning to write this three weeks after the last chapter… Summer assignments have been pretty tedious this year.
Sorry to those who are more a Chaos Regeneration fan, but Warfox is a lot more popular right now. I'll still be working on it, but not quite as quickly.
One last thought: I might have hinted at this before, but FFN isn't the first website I've written on, and Sonic isn't the first fandom I've written for. What would you think of me rewriting (since my writing has improved since then) and transferring my stories to a separate FFN account? It'll be called The_Other_Leolu or something like that, but I'll update you when it's created. Perhaps someone has a suggestion for its name? If so, PM me or something. I hope this idea appeals to you all, though.
Enjoy!
"This is it, Ace. Deliver a hard hit to Berlin, and you might just turn the tide of the war," said Chief Dill. I nodded and climbed into the Tornado's cockpit. "One more thing before you leave. As you may have heard, the Nazis took Paris a few days ago. If you're able to, perhaps pay them a visit."
This was new to me. "Okay, uh… Where's Paris? And Berlin?"
"You don't know where they are? Do you have a world map?"
"Not a postanc—er, current map." He reached into his pocket and revealed a small, heavily folded piece of paper. He handed it up to me.
"Here. You can find them on that map. I've got a few of them, so don't worry about returning it." He saluted, and I mirrored the gesture with a quick thanks, then closed the blast shield. I unfolded the paper, revealing an excessively large world map. The reverse side was a map of Europe. I spotted the general direction of Berlin and folded the map back up. I started the plane and took off towards Berlin.
x
After eight minutes at Mach six, I spotted Berlin. I circled above the city, but didn't attack. I intended to keep neutral in this war and minimize damage on either side, so destroying the city wasn't on my agenda. From here I considered my options. I could go to the neutral country of Switzerland, but it was far too close to the war. Furthermore, I didn't even know what language was spoken in Switzerland. My second option was Japan. Although it was a belligerent nation, I was never told of any first world country that wasn't in the war other than the US and Switzerland. The US, however, didn't sound like a country I would want to risk flying over during wartime. Since I had a basic understanding of the conventions of Japanese and a small vocabulary to work with, I figured that I could become fluent in the language within a few months of arrival.
So it was decided: I'd make my way in Japan. In order to prevent anyone from predicting my destination, I descended to an altitude of three hundred meters and made off on a path perpendicular to the southern border of Poland. As Berlin disappeared over the horizon, I delighted in knowing that I would never be asked to attack another city again. Not by Britain, at least.
x
I spent several minutes tracing the border of Poland before deciding that I was safe from detection. I was about to turn northeast towards Japan, but a strange structure somehow caught my eye. I recorded my coordinates for future reference and dropped below the sound barrier to get a better look at it. It was what seemed to be an oddly built village: it had high walls, long buildings arranged in blocks, and patches of unbuilt dirt. As my curiosity drew me ever closer, more details came to light. People were milling around in slow, orderly lines. Suddenly, a line of smoke appeared and dissipated in the empty plot of land. I slowed to minimum speed, dropped to one hundred meters, and booted up my aerial view cameras. I focused in on the source of the smoke and found a company of uniformed men with rifles leading along a row of disheveled prisoners. I should have known what was happening, but I didn't: the excitement of my escape was still on my mind. Men, women, and children struggled against their captors as the soldiers lined their prisoners against the edge of a trench and leveled their rifles. My gut wrenched as smoke exploded from each of the guns' barrels, and the bodies fell into the trench. Only then did I notice that countless bodies were already piled up in the ditch.
The horrific scene made my head spin, and I began to lose my grip on both myself and my plane. I felt excruciatingly nauseous for the first time in my life and fumbled for the autopilot button. Once autopilot took control, I keeled over, shaking. I asked my racing mind what I could do, but to no avail. My plane had no function that could pick off specific targets on the ground without harming its surroundings. I had never had a use for any such thing. I shivered and shuddered at the thought of being unable to do anything. I had to tell the allies… I could only speak English, but I couldn't return to the UK after deserting them. None of the allies were a viable option, so who could I possibly tell?
The US, of course! They were avid seekers of liberty, as I was told, and a vicious military power. Better yet, they spoke English! I made a sharp turn west and made off at full speed.
x
My path to the US would cut right through the UK, but I didn't care anymore. I was too fast for anyone in this outdated world to stop me. Just as I passed over the German border, though, a transmission arrived.
"Did everything go well, Prower?" I balked. Did they not know I had barely stopped at Berlin before passing it? "We lost your signal just as you entered Germany."
I couldn't muster a sigh of relief, but I was glad that I still had Britain's trust. I canceled my path to the US.
"Not really," I answered. My stomach tightened again. "I found a…"
"You found what?" the voice asked after a moment.
"I didn't get to attack Berlin, but I saw something that… I need to talk to the Chief about…"
"Understood. The Chief is on his way to the London HQ, so you can meet him there."
"Got it…"
x
I landed at the headquarters in London, just as I had been instructed. The Chief was already there, waiting for me.
"That's the fastest damn attack I've ever seen!" He greeted with a laugh as I opened the blast shield. He stopped when I looked at him, though. "Are… you alright?"
I jumped to the ground, but didn't look up at him. "I, uh… I had a navigational error and ended up in Poland… When I was there, I found a…"
The memory churned my stomach. "It was some sort of camp, but… it wasn't for war prisoners. There were women and children, too, and… they were just killing them…"
I had begun to shake again, so I got a grip on myself and looked up at the Chief. He didn't seem very phased by the information. "So he's started killing them en masse, huh…"
I flinched. "What?"
"Hitler's always blamed the Jews for Germany's economic problems, but I didn't expect him to start executing them this early…" He never broke face. His lack of reaction caused something inside my to snap.
"That doesn't even bother you?" He stopped me short.
"Yes, that bothers me. It's infuriating, actually. But there's nothing we can do about it."
"Nothing? Why not send a fleet full of ground troops? If we have enough men, we can save them without a fight!" He shook his head.
"We can't do that in their territory. The Luftwaffe would be on our tail in minutes."
"I can take care of that! I did during last week's battle!"
"That's different. There were only a hundred planes then. In enemy airspace, there could be countless ones."
"Well… I could only take out half of them because my plane's not designed for intense dogfighting! If I could use a… a workshop or something, I could improve it!"
"That won't be necessary. You'll be doing quick raids from now on. You'll be in and out before they even know you're there." I bawled my fists and shook my head, but I had nothing left to argue. I turned and leapt into the cockpit again. He tried to stop me, but I was already closing the blast shield. He was yelling at me, but I couldn't hear him through the glass and over the muffled roaring of the engine. I took off west, towards the US again.
x-x-x
LO50 40 GOVT = LONDON 17 6 8A
PRESIDENT FRANKLIN DELENO ROOSEVELT =
1600 PENNSYLVANIA AVENUE NW, WASHINGTON, DC 20500 =
THE CHIEF OF GENERAL STAFF OF THE BRITISH ARMY URGENTLY INFORMS YOU THAT AN UNSCHEDULED FLIGHT MAY ENTER AMERICAN AIRSPACE VERY SOON. THE PILOT'S NAME IS MILES "TAILS" PROWER. HE IS NOT HOSTILE, BUT CAN BECOME DANGEROUS IF THREATENED. WE REQUEST THAT YOU WELCOME HIM OPENLY, BUT THAT ONLY TRUSTED HIGH RANKING OFFICIALS SEE HIM. FINALLY, WE REQUEST THAT YOU WILL ALLOW HIM TO USE AN AEROSPACE LABORATORY. THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT WILL PAY ANY EXPENSES ASSOCIATED WITH LABORATORY USAGE AND HOUSING. WE EXTEND OUR BEST WISHES TO THE UNITED STATES DURING THESE TIMES OF WAR =
= CHIEF OF GENERAL STAFF SIR JOHN DILL =
In case I haven't mentioned it before, x-x-x is a PoV change.
Now, about that second account. I've already created it (TheOtherLeolu), but I'm still open to suggestions for its name. I'll begin rewriting my old stories and posting them immediately. Head on over if you're interested, and I'll see you there!