Chapter 3: Double Action

The sun shone through the small window directly into Alan's eyes. He got up slowly, feeling well rested. The clock on the wall showed that it was eight, which was actually rather late by Alan's standards, but then again, he didn't have to – and couldn't – go to work today. He wondered how things were going at the field office without him. He hoped his absence and no doubt disputed fate would not impact their performance.

Even more so, he hoped it didn't impact the lives of his wife and daughter, at least not too much. The last thing he remembered saying to them was that he would be coming home late. He wasn't sure whether to laugh at that now.

Well, sitting around here won't make you get home earlier, he told himself. Adjusting his watch to fit local time, Alan opened the door and got out. He was not going to pretend this was a vacation.

The living room was empty, and the doors to both Sonic and Tails' bedrooms were open, showing that they weren't there. Just to be sure, Alan checked Tails' room, specifically, the door that lead to his underground airstrip. Going down the steps behind it, he saw that the plane was there, but Tails wasn't.

Alan stared at the sleek blue and orange jet in awe for a while, but then headed back upstairs, not really feeling like examining a complex machine he wouldn't understand in the morning. He went into the bathroom to wash his face and gargle. After that, he entered the kitchen, hoping there was something for breakfast, and that it wasn't just chili dogs again. There was some toast and milk on the table. Alan noticed there were some dishes to be washed in the sink, so this likely was for him. Before that, he made sure to take his already dried shirt in the laundry corner and put it on.

Where did they go? Alan didn't have much idea about the duo's morning habits. As he sat down to eat however, he got his answer. It came in the form of a paper note on the desk next to the toast, on which a barely legible message that had been obviously written in haste could be read.

Hey Alan Robotnik attacking nearby town please don't come Sonic 7.50

Doherty stopped to ponder the significance of this, the fact that it had been written in the same Latin alphabet like on Earth not occurring to him. He checked the time again. Five past eight. It was instantly clear that this was actually a good opportunity.

Alan had no idea who Robotnik was or how he looked like. And now, Robotnik was in action somewhere out there. Shifting his mindset into that of an FBI Special Agent, he saw that this was good way to get a good look at the suspect and his modus operandi, and that Sonic's note had merely been a tip-off.

And besides, there was else nothing to do here. Yeah, I'm going out all right. He consumed his breakfast rapidly before dumping the plate and cup into the sink. Entering the living room, Alan suddenly stopped as he glanced at his equipment on the floor. Should he arm himself in full, just in case? Or maybe be a bit more discreet? There was another practical concern too, namely, that wearing body armor would slow him down.

Eventually Doherty decided to strike a balance between the two. He picked up the thigh holster for his pistol together with the pouch for its magazines and put them on. The carbine and armor weren't going to be necessary unless he stumbled into another misanthropic village. No, he was going to keep his distance this time.

He exited the house before the next question hit him, which almost made him slap his own head: how exactly was he going to find out where Sonic had headed to? The hedgehog hadn't really left any directions, nor had he intended to.

Hold it. There was something he could try. He remembered that the ground in front of the house was soft enough to leave footprints. He first scanned the steps leading to the entrance, then at its base, and…bingo.

Sure enough, there were shoeprints that came out of it, turned left, and the gaps between each step seemed to grow larger into the distance, on the road through the woods. There were the shoeprints of only one person, which made sense – judging by Tails' demonstration yesterday, the fox would likely have to fly in order to keep up.

The only thing left was how far away exactly this town was. Alan recalled how the jet was still in the airstrip, and he guessed that it was generally used only if something was happening far away enough that even Sonic and Tails' own tremendous speeds weren't sufficient to reach it in time. Unfortunately he had no idea how often or rarely that happened – their definition of 'nearby' was still very likely to be different from his.

But then Alan thought about the only alternative option he had. Nope, still going out. Regardless of the distance, Alan was going to follow the trail. Worst case scenario, he'd just treat it as a morning jog, which was part of his ordinary routine anyway. Best case scenario, he'd get to observe what he wanted to observe. He just hoped that whatever happened, Sonic wouldn't be too annoyed with him.

"You'll never beat me this time, Sonic!" boomed the loudspeaker from the rapidly moving black hoverbot. A TV screen on the robot showed a confident-looking Doctor Robotnik.

"That's getting so old, Eggman, why don't you, like, invent a one-liner generator or something?" an equally confident Sonic who was moving even more rapidly simply taunted at the pursuing robot behind him. Tails, who was flying on the hedgehog's upper right, said nothing, preferring to leave the smartass comments to his friend.

"We'll see how many jokes you can make about my name once I have finally achieved my victory, over you and everyone else," the doctor resolutely declared in response.

The hoverbot, shaped like a smaller jump-jet, had arrived in town alongside nineteen others of its kind earlier, in the middle of the town square. Through its loudspeaker, Robotnik had demanded, as was typical of him, for the small town to surrender to him or be obliterated by the robots' powerful missile systems. Fortunately Sonic and Tails had arrived before the locals were forced to make a decision.

Not wanting to battle the robots in such a packed urban area, the duo were now baiting them away to a wide open area in which they could fight more effectively, and the only place that fit here was a patch of grass between some buildings and the woods. It wasn't very big, but still much better than needing to battle them on the narrow streets, which heavily limited the amount of run-up Sonic needed to build momentum and therefore perform his signature 'spindash' attack on them. It consisted of him running at full speed, rolling into a spin, and sharpening his quills as he tore straight into the enemy.

And as Sonic reached the open space, he performed exactly that by running up a tree some fifty meters ahead and bouncing backwards straight towards the robot that had transmitted Robotnik's message earlier. The living buzzsaw tore through the machine with ease, causing it to fall to the ground in several pieces. Sonic quickly ceased spinning, allowing him to aim his legs at a building opposite the tree, and rebound himself off it and land back onto the ground properly. Just after that, he ran towards the tree and repeated the procedure to a second robot before more came.

Meanwhile, Tails remained in the air, observing the other incoming robots and thinking quickly what to do. When it came to fighting Robotnik, the fox usually did so in his jet plane, high in the sky, and Sonic, ever the daredevil, would actually stand on one of the wings, wait for a chance to spindash the flying robots, do so, and land back on the plane. Up there, the pair's record was without peer, one that earned Robotnik's jealousy.

However, this engagement was happening near an urban area, and not to mention Tails simply didn't have the resources to make enough munitions for his aircraft. He would have to do it the old-fashioned way like Sonic, which did not happen often.

Luckily he wasn't completely powerless in this respect – he had suspected, and proved, some time ago that if he flew into a robot with his tails spinning fast and sharp enough, he could rip through it too, emulating Sonic's own move. It made sense, as Eggman's bots were designed for agility, which meant forgoing heavy armor – good enough against defenseless town folk, not so much against two mobians also known for outstanding agility.

But Tails had never done so before without Sonic himself, who remained faster than he was, and probably always would be so. He reminded himself that they really weren't so different from the robots in that speed was the only thing keeping them and others safe. What if one day-

"Tails, look out!" Sonic shouted as he interrupted the fox's thoughts while bouncing off another incoming robot. He looked to his left and saw a single missile coming in fast. As he gasped, his reflexes kicked in as he flew backwards slightly, letting the missile pass just inches in front of him, over the forest. Robotnik's tracking systems still needed work, it seemed.

Berating himself for letting himself get distracted by his thoughts in the middle of combat – in other words, un-Sonic behavior - Tails scowled. Focused now and still hovering, he moved even further backwards and higher, making sure of the location of all of the robots that have come.

Most of them were focused on Sonic, who was mostly running and jumping in circles around the bots to gain speed before spindashing or just colliding into them one at a time, whilst dodging the exploding missiles. This wasn't as efficient as in a straight line though, as he needed to hit them more than once to destroy them, though there were too many of them to do that trick again. The nice thing about being able to fly, Tails knew, was that he himself could get as much run-up as he wanted in the air.

Tails dodged more missiles launched his way, less afraid now that he knew they tracked so poorly. He saw that they came from one robot that was now the same height above the ground as he was, and that it was moving towards him at the same speed as his own. Not wanting to get too far away from the scene, and deciding the distance was enough, he quickly came up with an idea. Tails came to an abrupt stop in the air, swung his spinning tails forwards, shut his eyes and hoped for the best.

It was immediately clear that the robot's braking system was just as effective as its target tracking as it slammed straight into the spinning blades of doom and disintegrated. Tails opened his eyes. He almost thought about how it hadn't really hurt, but he saw on the ground more pressing matters at hand.

Sonic had just tripped over. He'd knocked out every other bot so far, but somehow, someway, one of them managed to make the fastest thing alive lose his balance as he was running and roll on the ground, not of his volition, and lie face down. The number of times he ever fell over in his life, Sonic could count on one hand. He had no time to feel humiliated now though, as he scrambled to get back up before the same robot that had tripped him and two others above him could launch a missile from just ten feet away…

This must be it, Doherty thought as he came to the town next to the forest, after having seen rising smoke and missiles in the air earlier, not to mention hearing distant explosions, which had caused him to leave the road and continue through the woods. He had been running for fifteen minutes, and he was quite grateful it wasn't any further.

Alan moved among the trees as his slowed down to observe the action before him. It was a grass field, which would be empty if not for the holes left behind by explosions and piles of smoking debris on it. More debris was being created as Sonic the Hedgehog crashed his way through a robot, which as far as Alan could tell before its destruction resembled a smaller Harrier jump-jet. So this is what they do for a living. Impressive, but Robotnik did not seem to be around here anywhere. Neither was Tails, for that matter.

As the show continued, Sonic seemed to leap upwards into the air, ready to smack into a bot that was hovering high, but another suddenly jerked underneath Sonic's path from the side, hitting the hedgehog's foot and causing him to fall over. Sonic was scrambling to get up, but Alan could see the same robot that ruined his jump opening up a launch tube, ready to fire a missile.

A reflex to help those in danger caused Alan to reach for his Smith & Wesson, even though he knew, rationally, that there was nothing he could do with a mere pistol from this distance. As the weapon was raised and ready to fire though, it became unnecessary. Tails the fox flew in at that point, from the upper left, at a speed almost matching Sonic's, and smashed straight into the back of the bot almost about to kill Sonic. Alan noticed that the fox was flying sideways as he did so, his spinning tails looking quite similar to Sonic's own way of attacking just now. Perhaps he did so to avoid detonating the robot's missiles loaded in its sides, which seemed to work, as the machine collapsed into half, but didn't blow up. Tails' flight path continued as he veered upwards and back to smash into two more bots. While upside down, too.

As Doherty holstered his gun, he saw a damaged but still functional hoverbot loomed over the two mobians as Sonic got up and Tails landed next to him, after looping around a bit to reorient himself. The bot did not seem able to fight anymore, though it was still capable of something else. A TV screen on it came online, and it was aimed straight at Sonic and Tails. It was at just the right angle to let Alan see its display clearly, while it most likely wouldn't be able to see him.

"So…" a man's voice boomed from the speakers as a mustached face filled the screen. "It looks like I have underestimated you here. No matter," he dismissed with a wave as he grinned, "I can do this over and over again…if I had to." Alan realized that could only be one person.

"Didn't know you were so self-deprecating, Doc, saying you can fail over and over again?" Sonic shot back, though there wasn't any triumph in his voice – the battle had been way too easy to make him feel satisfied.

"Like I said, if I had to. As it is, however, you both have proved most useful to me." This was when Doherty heard something to his right. He turned to see another badly damaged hoverbot which had been knocked into the trees by Sonic earlier, about thirty feet away. The robot, which was faced towards Sonic's back and no longer hovering, appeared to be slowly opening up its missile launch tubes…

"So, thanks a lot, and farewell! Hehehehe…" As Robotnik began cackling, Alan knew exactly what was going to happen, and the reflex kicked in once more. Hiding behind a tree, he took out his pistol again, aimed straight at the robot, or more specifically one of the large holes on it that exposed its internals, and opened fire, repeatedly squeezing the trigger as fast as the mechanism allowed. Thank God for double-action triggers!

Sonic and Tails were both startled by the noise that came from within the trees and turned to face it, but before they could react further, an explosion went off in front of them, causing them to quickly shield their faces. Fortunately, it was far away enough that only a minimal amount of debris reached the two, much of it being blocked by the trees.

"What the…?" Robotnik was aghast as he saw his plan go up in flames, quite literally. The TV screen speakers were not sensitive enough to pick up the gunshots, whose noise level was meager compared to that of the explosion, leading to Robotnik making a wrong, hurried guess about how it could have happened.

Sonic could barely make out the outline of what used to be a hoverbot, and immediately understood. "Well Eggman, I guess I was right about you just now, wasn't I?" His grin could have dwarfed the moon.

"Grgh! You haven't seen the last of me, Sonic! Not even close! Don't say I didn't warn you!" Robotnik proclaimed as the hoverbot began rising higher in the air, preparing to go back to wherever it was launched from. However, the damage it sustained caused it to do so very, very slowly. Seeing his chance, Sonic leaped and ran straight up the wall of the three-storey building, and as he reached the top, launched and spun himself straight upwards and destroying the final bot in the area. He softened his fall by landing and bouncing off the edge of the building and back onto the ground, in front of a smiling Tails.

"We did it," the fox said excitedly as he high-fived Sonic. "That was great, Sonic!"

"Hey, you did pretty nicely too," Sonic replied, and he meant it. "Especially that dive-bomb technique just now, you saved my hide there. Thanks."

"Only because you saved mine before that," Tails pointed out. He was still a bit annoyed by that, though he decided his performance that followed made up for it. It had gone far better than he expected. I can do anything with Sonic beside me. "Thanks, though."

"No prob. That was way too easy though. I mean, I think we've had training even harder than that…" Sonic would have continued his diatribe about how pathetic Robotnik's 'attack' was, but he remembered that noise before the explosion in the woods. "Hey, Tails, what was that sound in there? Before the thing blew up." He pointed towards roughly where it came from.

"Not sure. Let's check it out," Tails said, feeling suspicious as well, as both of them began walking towards the trees. They were startled slightly to hear some rustling, causing them to get into their combat-ready stances, before a very familiar figure suddenly came out from behind a tree and showed itself.

"Alan?" They both exclaimed in unison. "What're you doing here?"

The FBI agent sighed. "Well, if you were both going to leave me alone at home, at least give me something to do, right?" The pistol in his hand had its slide locked back, showing it was out of ammo.

"But what about…" Sonic started, but then he heard a commotion behind him. The townsfolk were already coming out of hiding to see the aftermath of the incident. "Yeah, uh, we better get out of here first. Best not to let anyone see you, Alan. And the locals can thank us later, Tails."

"Okay," Tails simply said in return. Not that he really felt like facing the locals anyway. It seemed so wrong, he thought, to be more nervous in the company of ordinary people rather than deadly robots.

"Right, let's move." Sonic moved past Alan and Tails and motioned for them to follow. "Let's get back onto the road."

As they began trekking through the trees, Tails couldn't help but think about what Robotnik had said earlier. How exactly had they helped him? It sure wasn't to collect combat data, not with those outdated hoverbots…

"So, that was Robotnik," Alan stated as they walked along the same road he had used earlier.

"Yep. Now you know who he is," Sonic nonchalantly said.

"Not really, but it's a start." He was quite satisfied by the way it had gone, including how he managed to see the guy's face as well being completely convinced of his (attempted) crimes. The only thing he didn't get was a photo, though there had been no time to get his cell phone out. The mobian internet was probably full of them anyway.

All sorts of questions were floating around in Alan's head about Robotnik now. Who was this person? What was he doing here? How did he come here? Everything about him screamed mysterious. Alan wasn't even sure he wanted to go back to Earth without finding out more about this guy first. That just seemed irresponsible.

"Hey, that was you just now, right? Those were gunshots, you shot that robot that almost shot us."

Alan was shaken out of his thoughts. "Yeah. I saw Robotnik laughing and the robot trying to go out in glory. Did the only thing I could think of."

"Well, thanks I guess," Sonic replied, wondering if he could have dodged the missile if it really were fired at him from behind. "Sorry I left you at home with nothing to do. We were kind of in a rush, though luckily you disregarded my note earlier. That's a bit like me, really. Just ask Tails."

"Yeah," the fox chimed in. "Sonic's a bit stubborn sometimes, but I trust him to do what's right. He's never let me down there, right Sonic?"

"I do my best not to, bro." The hedgehog gave a thumbs up gesture. "Anyway, enough bro talk. Hey Alan, you're still wondering about that Chaos Emerald, right?"

A pause. "Well, yeah. It can take me back, right?"

It was Tails who answered. "Well, yeah, but not by itself. We'll have to bring it to Knuckles. He'll know what to do."

"I don't want to sound like I'm rushing, or hate being here or something, but when could we meet him?"

"Later today. None of us have that much to do. Though I just hope he won't be too surprised, you know, when he sees you, us, and the emerald you got. He doesn't exactly get visitors."

"You can't contact him about it?"

"Not really," Sonic came in, "Guy's even less interested in technology than I am. Now that's saying something." He chuckled.

"That said, though, he did accept us putting a distress alert signal on his island like the one in the town just now, just in case," Tails said. "I get the alerts on my wrist computer right here." He moved the cuff of his left glove slightly to reveal a device that was hidden there and started looking through it. "But yeah, other than that, it's really a one-way street. He doesn't like being bothered-" Tails saw something on the small screen that made him stop talking and moving completely. His expression froze.

"Tails, bro? What is it?"

"It's…Knuckles. He sent out a distress signal just now. I was too deep into fighting to notice it. This could only mean one thing."

"The attack we fought off was just a distraction!" Sonic was both alarmed and annoyed. "So that's what he meant by us helping him. Credit where it's due, Eggy's actually pulled off something unexpected."

"It's like he only ever attacked singular places just to make us unprepared for this." Tails mentioned, panicking. In front of them, Tails' house was now in plain view. "Either way, we're here. We've gotta move now!"

"Wait, why go back inside? To use the plane?" Alan asked as he followed them to the front steps.

"Yeah. No one can get there on foot, not even me. Hurry," Sonic pressed as he entered the door first, followed by Tails and Alan last. As the two mobians went into Tails' room to get to the airfield access, Alan remembered to take the depleted Chaos Emerald out from the pouch on the floor.

Less than a minute later, they were all in the underground airfield. Tails, already in the plane's cockpit, hurriedly checked the jet's systems to make sure of its condition. He was glad he already fine-tuned the rest of the plane yesterday, saving him some time. Meanwhile, Alan looked around the aircraft's exterior. It was hard to describe, as it had elements from just about every fighter and strike aircraft he knew on Earth.

"Alright, one-hundred percent operational! Alan, come on up, behind me."

On the floor, Doherty stared at the back seat in bewilderment. "You sure I can fit in that? What about Sonic?"

"Oh, don't worry about me," Sonic assured, "I don't need to sit inside. I'll show you." As Alan glanced at Sonic and then at the plane to imagine how that was even possible, Tails pressed a button in his space, causing the rear seat to move backwards slightly.

"Okay, that's the most space I can make back there, but it should be enough." Taking Tails' word for it, Doherty climbed up the ladder into the back seat. It was rather cramped, about as comfortable as the smallest car seat he ever sat in. Then again, given mobian sizes, it was remarkable that he could make the comparison at all. Alan quickly put on the seatbelts.

"Watch your head," Tails said as he pressed a switch to close up the canopy. Alan lowered himself onto his thighs as much as he could to avoid being knocked by the lowering glass above him. When he sat back, he found he had to slide his butt forwards to be able to sit up straight, which required him to raise his knees somewhat.

Tails turned his head to see Sonic already in position outside, and they exchanged A-OK gestures. Alan turned as well to see that the hedgehog was casually leaning against one of the vertical stabilizers, in the same way one normally did at the beach. Alan had no comments.

"Alright, just opening the gates ahead," Tails said, flipping a remote switch. The entire chamber suddenly brightened up in white lights, and in the distance, sunlight was let in as the steel doors opened. All of this momentarily blinded Alan and made him shield his eyes, whereas the two mobians weren't fazed at all.

"Engines starting…" On cue, the two powerful thrusters came to life. Judging by how audible they still were inside the canopy even with sound insulation, Alan wondered how Sonic could even stand it as the hedgehog remained in his relaxing pose.

"Oh yeah, Alan, give me that Emerald, please?" Tails asked. Alan held it over the front seat for Tails after it had been in his hand the whole time. He was glad to do so. The thing was taking up precious space. The fox took it and placed into a storage compartment under the seat. "Alright, takeoff time!" He adjusted his controls, and the aircraft finally started moving, almost knocking Alan on the back of his head as he was thrown backwards, though his hand was quick to press against the glass behind.

Alan had never been in a supersonic plane before, and was worried that he could unexpectedly throw up with all the thrust he was feeling. Tails, apparently sensing his concern, said, "Don't worry, I won't exceed the speed of sound…even though it would be nice if we could."

"How'd you know about me?"As Doherty asked that, he turned to see that Sonic hadn't moved an inch.

"You didn't really seem like a pilot to me, the way you reacted and all."

"Yeah, good observation." Alan looked out to see they were now flying over a large green forest, with a river running through it. There were small mountains in the distance. It occurred to him that this was the first time he was seeing Mobius from above. As the flight stabilized, he decided there wasn't much he could do other than admire the view. But there was one more thing…"Excuse me?"

"Yeah?"

"You still haven't told me the name of your plane."

Tails smiled. "Hope you enjoy your flight aboard the Tornado."