Chapter 8: More Questions
Eggman had watched both of the ongoing fights in two small screens that displayed the point of views of both Metal Sonic and Metal Shadow, all the while hovering high above the city, well beyond safe from the sidelines of the fight. He watched these fights with rabid interests, still sure that his robots could possibly win now that each fight had escalated into an impending power clash.
"Those hedgehogs can put up quite the fight," he said to himself. "Even with that, they still won't come out victors if they tried to outpower the might of my perfect machines." With none of their other friends to distract him, he could keep the transmissions from his machines perfectly. He continued to look at the screens with baited interests, seeing that the two hedgehogs were speeding towards his robots with their signature speed. "This is it!" he exclaimed confidently.
Right before the hedgehogs clashed with his robots, his transmission was cut off by some random electrical surge. "What! How could this be?! I've checked just about everything. There should be no interference whatsoever!" As he looked up from the two screens, he finally noticed that he was being surrounded by a pink mist as he floated in the shadow of one of the tall buildings.
(Meanwhile with Nikki)
Nikki spin dashed forward while Metal Sonic propelled himself at his target, both at full speed. While Metal Sonic propelled himself, there was a sudden cut-off with his transmission between him, his master, and his companion. With this sudden interference, he slightly powered down his propellers while Nikki continued to spin dash at full speed.
During this brief moment of hesitation, Nikki was able to spin dash straight through Metal Sonic's chest, effectively destroying his power source. She landed on the other side, uncurled from her ball, and turned her head back. In a few seconds, the robot finally fell forward.
"You put up a good fight," Nikki said "but no knockoff can ever beat the original." At this, Metal Sonic's glowing red eyes finally dimmed down to an empty black.
Nikki looked forward again and sighed. "Man that was exhausting. I sure hope my clothes didn't get too ruined." She then thought back to what she said, slightly worried about making such a girly comment. She immediately realized that she was still in the desperate situation of trying to switch back to her original gender and hoped this would be solved soon.
(Meanwhile with Nights)
Nights was just about to deliver her punch when Metal Shadow's transmission was cut-off. This caused him to hesitate slightly before he could fire his built up energy. By this time, Nights' glowing red fist collided with Metal Shadow's glowing yellow chest.
"Chaos blast!" The punch gave off an explosion that was infused with Nights' chaos blast as well as Metal Shadow's unfired energy blast. This single explosion was more massive than any other explosion during the fight and gave off a blinding red glow to the whole area.
When the large explosion finally cleared,Metal Shadow's body was nowhere to be found. After about three seconds, large scraps of metal began to crash to the ground around Nights. She looked up and caught the robot's head before it hit the ground. She looked into it's eyes with a steely stare.
"No matter what you do, you'll never be more than a cheap imitation," she said in a hushed voice. She then dropped the head as Metal Shadow's eyes went from a glowing orange to an empty static.
She then turned around and started walking to where the fight had originally started. "Boy, I sure hope I don't have to pay these people insurance," she said as she looked around at the damage. It sure would be a good thing to turn back into boys, that way people would only be looking for the crazy chick who had messed up their property.
…...
It only took about a minute and a half for Nikki and Nights to run back to their starting point. They walked side by side as they walked towards their girlfriends.
"So" Nights said "I guess your fight went well?"
"Yeah," Nikki stated casually. "I guess you took care of that faker of yours?"
"Destroyed him," Nights said with a sinister undertone.
They both finally reached Amy and Nebula, but before they could tend to them, Eggman hovered in in front of them with a red and frustrated face. "You! I don't know how you did it, but if you hadn't used that pink mist of yours, you wouldn't be alive right now!"
At the mention of the pink mist, Nikki and Nights' eyes widened, but before they could ask any questions Eggman turned around and hovered away. "This isn't the last of me! I'll be back with even greater weapons!"
"Do you think we should follow him?" Nikki asked.
"..No…." Nights responded. "It'll just be the same routine as usual. Besides, we gotta get the girls to a hospital," she stated as she picked up Nebula bridal style.
Nikki nodded and picked up Amy in the same fashion. "Try not to run too fast. We can't have them waking up when we still look like this." Nights nodded at this and the two were off to the nearest hospital
Little did the two know was that Amy had slightly opened her eyes and caught a slightly blurred image of the hedgehog that was holding her and the hedgehog that was next to her. Though her vision was blurred and she couldn't quite make out the conversation, a single thought flashed in her head. 'I…. I remember these two.' She couldn't process this thought any further before she drifted back into unconsciousness.
…
Nikki and Nights had dropped off the two girls at the hospital in no more than five minutes.
"Oh my gosh, what happened to them?" a nurse asked as she took them in.
"They were near the explosion that happened uptown," Nikki responded.
"Oh dear, I heard about that happening. Do you know these girls?" The nurse asked.
"They're… very close friends of ours," Nikki answered.
The nurse nodded her head. "Well don't you worry. We'll take very good care of them."
It had almost been twenty minutes since then. Nikki and Nights had been waiting outside in the hallway. Nikki was sitting down, tapping her foot at a fast pace while Nights stood up against a wall and had her arms crossed, completely silent the whole time. As it turned out, Amy and Nebula had only received minor head trauma. Their wounds were all dressed up now and they would be released within a few hours once they had been prescribed medication. Even with this relieving news, there still stood an uncomfortable silence between the two, both worried of what may come next.
Nikki spoke up, finally breaking the silence. "Sha…. Nights, do you think we should stay here? If we do, how do we explain this to them?"
Nights continued to remain silent, clearly unsure of what to do herself. There was still a possibility that if they lied about their identities, the girls might still buy it. Even if that were to happen, could she really lie to Nebula for that long? Nebula had known Shadow better than nearly anybody else. Would lying to her work? If it didn't work, should they just run out of here? But she couldn't just leave them here could she?
'Dammit. This day has been just one big clusterfu...' Before she could finish her own thoughts, the lights in the hallway had immediately gone out. The power seemed to be out throughout the whole building because doctors and nurses were screaming at eachother to use a back up generator to power their machines.
Nikki quickly stood up and looked down both ends of the hallway. "It's gotta be that mist again. Does it have a bone to pick with us or something?"
Nights had her back against Nikki's, both looking down each end of the hallway. A thought finally occurred to her that made her heart skip a beat. "The air vents!"
As she looked up, she saw that a pink mist had begun to seep through an air vent directly above them. In fact, it had begun to seep through multiple vents throughout the hallway, all equally spaced to properly cool the building. In practically no time at all, the entire hall was filled a pink, almost glowing mist.
The two hedgehogs were now coughing and gasping, both suddenly finding it difficult to breath. Nikki coughed and fought back any tears in her now stinging eyes. She closed her eyes and suddenly saw an image flash before her eyes. When she opened her eyes, the image had disappeared and she felt a pounding pain in her head. She grasped her hands around the side of her head and closed her eyes again. The image reappeared, this time far clearer than before. She saw that it was a small lake that was glowing in the moonlight. It was completely circular, surrounded by rocks and large trees that hid it's lake seemed to originate from a small stream of water that trickled down from a natural inclination made of some smooth slanted rocks. The moon was almost full right above it, casting it's hypnotising glow. The lake reflected the moon's image, seeming to give off it's own pink glow.
The pain in Nikki's head finally subsided and the image began to blur. Nikki, still on her knees, opened her eyes to be greeted by the fluorescent lighting of the hospital hallway. Nights had already stood up behind her and dusted off her pants.
"Well…. That thing doesn't seem to like the light," Nights said. "I guess that explains the blackout and why we haven't seen it since…. Hey, are you alright?"
Nikki simply stayed sitting down on her knees for five more seconds before she finally looked back at Nights and spoke with wide eyes.
"I know exactly where to go."
AN: Oh how the questions keep piling up! It looks like Nikki finally has a clue of where the investigation was going. We'll finally get some answers in the next chapter.
