The X-Tornado tore through the sky like a piercing hot knife through butter as it headed towards Robotnik. "Rouge!" Sonic called through the turbulence. "Are we getting close yet!?"

"Yes!"

"Then how come we can't se it yet!?"

"It has a cloaking device!"

"Aww damnit! How are we gonna catch what we can't see!?"

"No worries!!" Tails called as he pushed a button and a red scanner shot from the tip of the plane and scanned the entire area in front of them. Before long, a ship closely resembling a larger version of the Eggcarrier instantly appeared in the sky! "Got you!!!" Tails called.

"Yohohoho!!!" A voice called through his intercom. "You never cease to amaze me Tails!"

"Robotnik!!!" Everyone shouted.

"That's right, but it's too late, none of you will be able to stop me!"

"You won't be saying that after we kick your ass!" Sonic yelled.

"Fine, challenge me if you dare!"

"You'd better believe it!"

"Then say hello to my defense system!" Robotnik shouted. At that moment, thousands of hatches open from all around the floating headquarters and began firing millions of red lasers.
"Everyone hold ONNNNN!!!!" Tails shouted as he began whipping the X-Tornado in many directions, barrel-rolling, nose-diving, quark screwing, doing whatever it took to keep away of fire and stay alive. Within minutes Tails was closing in and was getting ready to return fire. But then suddenly, a huge electrical current expanded from the floating headquarters and the jet suddenly malfunctioned causing everyone to free fall from the sky.

"Tails, what happened!!!?" Sonic shouted.

"An EMP!!! I've lost all control!!!"

"What!!?" Knuckles shouted. "Don't you have a backup system or something!!?"

"That got shut off too!!!"

'No!' Rudolph thought as he hung to his seat for his life. 'Sonic… Tikal… everyone…'

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!" Robotnik laughed from within his control center.

"Hmm I would love to just see them fall to their deaths, but I'm not going to take that chance this time." Then the mad scientist grinned as he slammed his fist on a button. Sonic and his friends turned to the floating base and saw the front hatch open to relive an extremely large cannon that was charging for an attack.

"AH SONIC!!!" Tails called in fright.

"It's preparing an attack!!!"

"But we can't get away!!!" Rouge shouted.

No… my friends…

"This is IT!!!"

"FIRE!!!!" Robotnik shouted as his cannon fired it's huge, life shredding beam at Sonic and his friends.

"I WON'T LET THIS HAPPEN!!!!" Rudolph shouted as his eyes begun to glow green and everyone suddenly disappeared as the X-Tornado blew to pieces on impact of the beam. Soon the smoke cleared and Robotnik watched as pieces of the jet fell from the sky.

"YES!!!! YES!!!!!!!!!!!!! I did it!!!!" Robotnik shouted with triumph. "Now then… princess… since your so-called friends are no longer in my way… how about we get started on that ceremony… shall we…?"

"Whoa!!!" Sonic shouted as everyone stood up and saw that they were on some kind of metal surface but also still in the air. "What the hell was THAT?"

"Teleportation." Rudolph said quietly with everyone turning to him.

"You did that?" Shadow asked.

"Yes."

"So you used Chaos Control." Knuckles asked.

"No. I literally deatomized all of our bodies and reatomized them here. Complete teleportation." Rudolph said as he turned to a large door.

"Where are we?" Blaze asked.

"On his aircraft." Rudolph said as he pulled open the door allowing the others to go inside. Inside, the team walked into a room with three different doors on each wall.

"Ok…" Sonic said to himself. "I guess we're gonna have to split up." Then Sonic turned to his friends. "Ok here's the plan-"

"Whoa!!" Shadow interrupted. "YOU have a plan? I'm shocked."

Blaze turned to Shadow with a glare, "This isn't the time."

"Ok… We're gonna have to split up so… Knuckles, Rouge, since you two are pretty good treasure hunters, you guys take the door to the left.

Knuckles and Rouge looked at each other then sighed. "Fine, I'll deal with Knuckles."

"The feeling's mutual." Knuckles huffed.

"Ok… then team two will be… Shadow and Blaze, take the right."

Both Blaze and Shadow stared at Sonic, "Are you sure Sonic." Blaze asked with confusion.

"Yeah, you guys are pretty fast and you can watch each other's back."

Blaze couldn't help but smile, "Alright."

"And that leaves me, Tails and Rudy… HEY! Where is that guy anyway!?" Sonic asked as everyone quickly took a look around.

"I think he bailed." Tails said as he shrugged his shoulders.

"Can't he sense the Chaoskey?" Knuckles asked as he looked around.

"Damn, I forgot he could sense that damn key." Sonic said as smacked his head. "Well he could have at least said something."

"Oh well," Rouge interrupted. "Let's just stick to the plan."

"You're right." Sonic said. "Alright, you guys ready?" Sonic asked receiving a nod.

"Oh wait, I got something here." Tails said as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a couple of nickel sized earpieces. "Here, we can use this to keep in touch."

"Always thinking ahead, eh buddy?" Sonic grinned.

"Just thought they would come in handy." Tails said with a smile as everyone put their pieces in.

"We should get going." Knuckles said. "Tikal's still in danger, you know?"

"Right." Sonic said seriously with everyone following suit. Then everyone turned to the respective exits. "See ya guys." Sonic grinned then everyone took off.

"So Tails," Sonic begun as the two ran through the hall, "Do you have some kind of tracking device that we could use to find Rudy's key?"

"Sorry Sonic, but my radar was destroyed along with the X-Tornado."

"Oh well." Sonic sighed.

"So Blaze," Shadow begun as he and Blaze ran through the hall, "Sonic… he's cool with us… with me… right?"

Blaze smiled, "I believe so."

"Good."

"You see Sonic as your bestfriend, don't you?" there was a pause before Shadow nodded his head. "I thought so."

"Whatever you do, don't tell him that."

"Fine, but like Sonic would say, you owe me."

Shadow huffed with a smile, "Fine."

"So where to batgirl?" Knuckles grunted.

"How should I know Knucklehead!?" Rouge yelled.

"You said you found this place, you didn't even bother at take a look inside?"

"No!"

"Figures."

"What was that!!?" Rouge said as she pushed Knuckles into a crate of boxes that tipped over and broke causing the alarm to go off. "Great!!! Look what you just did!!!"

"ME!!! You're the bitch who pushed me into the boxes!!!"

"What did you say!!!?" Rouge shouted as she grabbed Knuckles by his shirt. But then, the two looked down the hallway and saw hundreds of eggpawns rushing in their direction carrying spears and laser guns.

"HEY!!!" Sonic shouted over the transmitters. "Who set off the goddamn alarm system!!?"

Knuckles put his hand to his ear, "Blame the batgirl."

"Why you!"

"Rouge calm down!!!" Shadow shouted as he and Blaze leapt into the air and Blaze shot a fireball at the oncoming group.

"S-sorry." Rouge said as he flew into the air to avoid an oncoming attack with Knuckles charging into the robot horde. "Are you ok?"

"We're fine, but a little busy with Robotnik's little drones." Shadow simply said as he shot a Chaos Spear at a group of eggpawns.

"Yeah!" Sonic yelled as he and Tails spin attacked through a flock of robots, "You're not the only one!"

"What are we going to do?" Tails asked as he flew into the air and kicked Sonic into a line of eggpawns. "Should we re group?"

"No." Shadow said after he homing attacked a few robots. "If we're all together, then they have us right where they want us."

"So we're just going to stick with the original plan?" Knuckles asked as he punched the ground sending a shockwave destroying many eggpawns.

"That's the plan." Sonic said as he charged through more robots.

Rudolph dashed through the maze of hallways making his way to the center. 'This way!' He thought as he made a left, 'Tikal… please hang on! I'm coming! I won't let that crazed man hurt you.' But then after he turned the corner, he looked down the hallway and saw hundreds of eggpawns waiting for him. "Get out of my way!" Rudolph shouted causing the eggpawns to instantly jump on top of him, engulfing his body in machinery. But then the eggpawns were suddenly destroyed in a green light as Rudolph walked out of the pile. Rudolph slowly walked up to a very large steel door and his eyes widened. "The Chaoskey…"

"Hey, did you guys feel that?" Knuckles asked over the transmitter.

"Feel what?" The running Sonic asked.

"That… I know where Rudolph is!!" Knuckles shouted.

"Where Knuckles!?" Tails asked as he and Sonic ran from their robotic pursuers.

"He's close to Blaze and Shadow!"

"He is?" Shadow asked.

Blaze trusted her arms forward and a large fireball began to form in her hands. "If he's close, then we have no time to waste. Let's hurry and find him quickly." Then Blaze shot off the fireball that literally took up the entire hallway and as it flew down the hallway, it incinerated every robot in its path. Once the fireball disintegrated, Blaze and Shadow ran down the hallway.

"Alright Tails," Sonic called to his friend with a grin, "Whadda say we ditch these guys?"

"All for it Sonic." Tails called back with a smile.

Sonic then jumped into the air with a back flipped, "Up, over, and STREAKING!!!!" Sonic shouted as he landed and both he and Tails took off down the hallway, breaking the sound barrier, knocking all the robots behind them down.

"OK THAT"S IT!!!!" Knuckles shouted as he held up his right fist and used his left hand to hold his shoulder. Then suddenly, yellow electricity began surging from his right fist. "THUNDER ARROW!!!" Knuckles shouted as he thrust his fist forward sending a lightning bolt flying down the hallway annihilating everything in its path. After the devastation, Rouge simply came down from within the air.

"Wow Knuckles."

Knuckles just brushed the smoke off his clothes and grinned. "Yeah well, you know."

"You could have done that so much sooner!" Rouge shouted in his face.

"Well you were NO HELP!!!!" Knuckles shouted back.

"Will you two focus!!!?" Sonic shouted over the transmitter, "We still have a job to do!"

"When did you get so serious!?" Rouge asked.

"Tikal could die! We need to hurry!" instantly, Knuckles and Rouge dashed down the hallway as fast as they could.