Chapter 2: Crimson Glow

At Eggman's base (Early Evening)...

The pink hedgehog awoke in a strange room. There were white walls with white tiling on the floor. Everywhere she looked, there was nothing but white.

"Where am I," Amy asked, expecting a reply.

There was no noise to be heard.

"Am I really in Eggman's base? He usually puts me in a clear glass case with a couple of holes so I could breathe. This time, I'm in an empty room," she said to herself.

Amy tried to find a door but everything was just pure white. Even if she found the door, that is most likely camouflaged by the walls, it would be locked. When she was just about to give up, the hedgehog had an idea. A hammer appeared in her hand. She gripped it as tight as she could and pounded the walls with all of the strength she had.

"There's no point in trying to use that hammer to break out of here. My robots recorded your data which allowed me to know how durable I should make the lab's walls. Pretty ingenious, don't you think," he asked through the hidden intercom.

"Eggman, where am I," Amy asked while trying to once again find the exit.

"I just told you. It is one of my many laboratories. You're a very fortunate little rodent. You may be the only person to witness my latest masterpiece."

"This doesn't look like a lab. Shouldn't there be beakers or metal pieces all over the place," she asked before a part of the wall budged.

It was the door, but it was locked to her dismay.

"That may be true in that little fox's lab but you're talking to the genius who took over most of the world. No, this room is very special. This new laboratory is actual divided into many different parts. The room you are currently in is one of those pieces. Unfortunately for you, this sector is called 'Death'," Eggman said before he started his ridiculous evil laugh that slowly became a violent cough.

Amy felt a chill up her spine as she heard the moniker that Eggman gave to this room.

"Why is it called that," she reluctantly asked while holding her hammer even tighter.

"Death is such an interesting word. It can be used in so many instances and yet people usually think of their deceased family members or friends. The term can mean more than that. The death of an idea, civilization, tradition, or ego is what I think of when I hear that word."

"Are you going to kill me," Amy asked while her heart started to beat faster.

After Amy asked the question that filled her body with dread, Eggman stopped the transmission.

At the Mystic Ruins...

The former Resistance operative was in a hammock, relaxing from their hike. The sunset was breath taking. They felt the beautiful view made travelling through the swamp and getting attacked by tons of mosquitoes almost worth it. A subtle breeze blew through their soft yellow fur. They slowly took of their hat to reveal a pair of fox ears. The fox looked around to see if anyone was watching. When the nameless agent thought the coast was clear, they started to change out of their plain red shirt and jeans and into a comfortable pair of red pajamas. After that, they fixed their bangs and put their cap back on to continue to hide their face.

The fox decided to take a little nap and started to dream about their last day of being a part of the Resistance.

A few months ago...

Sonic and the 'rookie' said their farewells before heading out to different directions. While the fox ran, they saw a twinkle in the sky. It was heading in the direction of Mystic Ruins.

Present Night...

Sonic unlocked the door and walked into Tails' home. He was surprised to see him still working on the Tornado's wing.

"Hey, Tails. I'm back," the hedgehog said before sparks started to fly out of the wing.

"Darn it," Tails shouted as the wing started to fall.

Tails jumped off of his scissor lift before the wing collapsed. The irate fox then used his tails to slowly descend. When he landed, Tails looked at the source of his anger.

"I can't do anything right," Tails said with frustration and tears coming out of his eyes.

Sonic felt bad for his friend. He went over to try to put his hand on his little buddy's shoulder but Tails jumped back.

"No. I don't deserve it."

"Tails, just calm down."

"I'm so useless."

"You're not useless, Tails. You have invented so many wonderful things that helped us take down Eggman," the hedgehog said, trying to cheer him up.

"I crashed the Tornado a bunch of times, made a device to communicate with the wisps only for it to finally work correctly when we didn't need it anymore, almost ruined our plan to put a fake emerald into the Eclipse Cannon when I was gullible enough to tell Eggman it wasn't real, and didn't help the Resistance when they really needed it!"

"Tails..."

"Just admit it, Sonic. I'm a useless member of Team Sonic and when I actually try to do something, I just make things more difficult," Tails shouted with fury and a face Sonic has never seen him make before.

Tails ran out of his workshop and flew away. Sonic ran out too and saw that Tails was really high in the air. There was no way he could reach him.

"Tails," he yelled.

The fox didn't respond or even bother turning around. The cobalt hedgehog was about to run after him until Cream landed right in front of him.

"Cream, you shouldn't be out this late," Sonic said while he watched Tails fly further away.

"But Mr. Sonic, Amy is missing," Cream said with urgency.

At the Mystic Ruins...

The fox finally woke up from their nap and changed back into their normal clothes. They continued to hike until they finally found the source of the strange light. It was the yellow Chaos Emerald that was about to fall off of the cliff. The curious fox picked it up and stared at its beautiful glow. Little did they know, the Emerald's light attracted more than just them.

"I see you did the work for me," a familiar voice said with a chuckle.

The fox slowly turned around to see their worst nightmare. Infinite was hovering above the ground with two mechanical sentries awaiting his command. The jackal saw them pulling out a lightning wispon. They were trembling in fear as his icy glare seemed to pierce their very soul.

"What's wrong? Did you think I would just disappear as if I was just a bad dream? Sonic isn't here to protect you now," he said to the fox frozen in fear.

"The weakling is terrified even though I didn't do anything yet. Too bad they're in the way," Infinite thought with a chilling smile hidden behind his mask.

Infinite's target finally built up the courage to pull the trigger on their weapon. The lightning connected but the jackal wasn't fazed at all. Infinite started to get bored with his fear-ridden toy.

"Last time we were in this position was when I killed your fellow squad members. After I did that, I offered you a deal. I let you run away and then you teamed up with the blue rat to defeat me," Infinite said while he clenched his fists, "But this time, I'm not going to make the same mistake."

He gave the sentries a cue to shoot to kill. The one on the left shot the wispon in their target's hands, immediately destroying it and freeing the electricity that was condensed inside of it. An electric charge traveled up the fox's arm and then to their entire body. Infinite wanted to hear their scream but was disappointed when he remembered the fox being mute from last time. This upset him a little but seeing the pain shown by their facial expressions and odd body movements was enough to please him. The pain the fox was feeling was indescribable. Their eyes were open wide and they would have been screaming in pain if their vocal cords actually worked properly.

Infinite commanded the sentry on the right to end his enemy. The mechanical soldier fired a very lethal beam of light made out of pure Chaos energy. The blast pierced the fox's chest. Their body, now on the verge of shutting down, staggered backwards off of the cliff. On the brink of death, they held onto the Emerald with what was left of their strength. The brilliant glow of the yellow Chaos Emerald illuminated all of the blood droplets and burnt fur. As the world started to fade to black, the Emerald's current owner made their death wish through their final thought. Their body hit the ground a second after they were no longer conscious.

The mercenary jumped off the cliff and gently descended thanks to his hover ability along with his sentries. Infinite looked at the corpse with a feeling of accomplishment. He grabbed the glowing gem and wiped the blood off with his glove. His communicator sounded off. He pressed the "Accept Call" button while looking at his old adversary.

"Hello, doctor," Infinite said while he was still paying attention to the body.

"How is your search for the fourth Chaos Emerald going," Eggman asked, hoping it went well since his plans usually blow up in his face.

"It went better than even I expected," Infinite replied before showing Eggman the Emerald and the corpse.

The sight of the lifeless body caused Eggman to almost fall out of his chair.

"I see you are actually worth the money I'm paying you. Now, you need to come back to the Metropolis base with the Chaos Emerald...and the body," Eggman said with a sinister smile, "I have big plans for both of them."

In the future...

(Dreams of an Absolution/Sonic the Hedgehog 2006)

Silver finally collected the last Emerald. While he thinks it is bothersome to collect them everytime he visits or helps his friends in the past, he was happy to aid the Resistance. The sun shined and everyone seemed happy. Children were playing while the adults talked about various topics, most of them light.

"This is why I help Sonic with the fight against Eggman. Everyone is way more optimistic in this future," Silver thought with pride.

Then he thought about his best friend, Blaze.

"I wonder if she is okay. I haven't heard from her in a while. I tried to contact her when the Resistance started enlisting but she said that she was battling Eggman Nega with Marine. I know she said she could handle herself but I'm a little worried," the silver hedgehog thought as he looked at his reflection in one of the Emeralds' facets.

Silver decided to travel to the Sol Dimension. It would be easy since he has all seven Emeralds but he remembered to be careful since Sol and Chaos are unstable when they are in the same dimension.

He closed his eyes and began to concentrate. The seven Chaos swiftly responded to Silver and started to whirl around him. The hedgehog was eventually engulfed in a really bright light.

When the light disappeared, he was in the Sol Dimension. Silver slowly opened his eyes and saw Blaze smiling as she bought food from a nearby vendor.

(Blaze's Event/Sonic Rush)

The cat thanked the merchant and continued her stroll with an apple and a small bag of snacks tied around her wrist until she heard a familiar voice.

"Hey, Blaze. Did you defeat Eggman Nega," Silver asked as he waved with a smile.

"Of course I did. It was easy as usual," Blaze said before taking a bite out of her apple.

"I wish I was there to see it. I haven't seen you in action for a while."

"You should have seen Marine. She has really stepped up her game lately."

"That sounds awesome! Where is she anyway?"

"I'm not sure. She said something about exploring and searching for pirate treasure."

After a few minutes of talking about random topics, Blaze asked about what happened in the past in the Chaos Dimension.

"So there was this guy named Infinite. He had something called the Phantom Ruby and used it to alter people's reality."

"Could you describe how he looked?"

"He had black and white fur. His face was covered by a weird looking mask. But the first thing you would notice about him is the Phantom Ruby prototype in his chest," Silver said while doing his best to inform Blaze on the new villain they may have to face again someday.

"That is really interesting. What about Sonic? Didn't Eggman capture him?"

"He was but a rookie managed to escort him out of the prison hall near the Death Egg."

"Hold on, you guys let a rookie rescue Sonic? That's really hard to believe."

"It was Knuckles' idea since everyone was busy trying to retake the ninety-nine percent of the world that Eggman conquered."

"Knuckles led the charge. KNUCKLES! He's the type of guy who would fall for anything. Who would let him lead," Blaze asked while thinking about Knuckles leading an entire army.

"No one was really against it since he was the last one anybody could count on from Team Sonic. Everyone wanted it to be Tails but he lost it after we all thought that Sonic died," Silver explained.

"Wow. So many things happened while I was fighting Nega."

"It's okay, Blaze. Everyone understood. You have an entire kingdom to take care of on your own. It must be hard."

"It was a bigger hassle before I met Sonic. He told me to believe in myself and my friends as well. If Eggman executed him, he would have me to deal with," Blaze said as her body started to emmit flames.

Silver wanted to say something uplifting so Blaze didn't burn down her own kingdom before his stomach growled. Blaze slowly calmed down and started worrying about her friend.

"Did you eat anything, Silver?"

"I stopped eating when I started hunting for all of the Emeralds...again."

"I told you about doing that to yourself. I know you want to keep everyone safe but you have to care about your needs too. Now, c'mon. I know a really good restaurant in the area," Blaze said as she held Silver's hand and ran with him.

While Silver and Blaze ran through the town, the hedgehog felt something off. He knew his body was used to feeling distortions but most of them felt small and relatively harmless. This one wasn't very big either but it still gave off warning signs. Since the distortion was tiny, he decided to tell Blaze after both of them had a decent meal. His stomach growled again as he thought of all the tasty food that awaited him.

Present Night on Angel Island...

Knuckles returned with a crate full of punching bags and groceries.

"That was the weirdest trip to the store I ever had. The manager saw me and was really scared for some reason. He was mumbling something that sounded like big fists over and over. Long story short, he gave me everything I wanted to buy at half-price. Moral of the story: big fists give you huge discounts...for some reason," Knuckles thought as he headed closer to the Master Emerald.

He dropped the crate when he heard sobbing. Knuckles also noticed the robot Tails gave him was disarmed.

"Alright, I know you're here," Knuckles said as he prepared his fists, "Come out and fight me, Rouge."

Instead of a bat, he saw a two-tailed fox come out from behind the huge jewel. Tails was sniffing as tears were all over his face.

"What are you doing here, Tails? And why are you crying," Knuckles asked as Tails tried to wipe his tears with his arms.

"I-I realized that I was just a nuisance to you guys so I...flew away from Central City and came here to be alone."

"Okay, I understand why but how did you get up here? It seems like you would get tired before you could manage to see the top of the island."

"I came across that problem years ago so I made a portable teleporter and designed it to warp to Chaos Emerald and Master Emerald locations. It has a few kinks so we still have to hunt for Emeralds the old fashioned way," Tails explained as he pulled out something that looked like the fake emerald Sonic used to sabotage the Eclipse Cannon with a hidden interface that only Tails and Eggman could figure out how to use.

Knuckles was glad that Tails stopped crying while he was explaining how he managed to get here. Then Tails started to cry again. Knuckles sighed. After thinking his situation over for a few minutes, he had an idea.

"So you feel useless too. I'll train you if you think you can handle it," Knuckles said, hoping it would work.

"Do you think I'll be useful if I learned how to fight properly," the fox asked while wiping away his tears again.

"Yeah. Just please stop crying," Knuckles said with a smile.

"Okay but how do we start?"

"Maybe we should focus on that tomorrow," the red echidna said with a yawn.

Knuckles quickly fell asleep while Tails was still thinking about all of the mistakes he made throughout the years.

"I promise to be better...even if I have to get hurt in the process...I will do this for the sake of the world...and you, Sonic," Tails quietly said with a tear rolling down his cheek.