Chapter 10- A Bat's Tale

Rouge still felt the slight pain on her backside where Shadow had slammed her into the tree. She knew she should have said something sooner but she wanted to make sure it was them before approaching them. Rouge waiting carefully while both boys stared at the jewel in her hand, processing this new piece of information. Once she had waited long enough she spoke up, "NOW that we got that settled…" Rouge placed the emerald back into her pocket, "what are you guys doing here? Oh wait, let me guess… you're trying to find a way into Eggman's base, Right?" Which she knew was correct, if they had heard the news, they would be there for only one reason… Dr. Eggman.

"Hmph." Shadow crossed both his arms, Rouge could tell he was in no mood to play, which was what it more fun. "IF you already know, then why do you even bother asking?" Rouge shrugged her shoulders.

"I just like hearing that I'm right of course." Rouge quickly turned to Omega, who just stood there not saying anything. "I was surprised that was you Omega at first but then even if you changed your appearance, you still act the same as ever." Omega didn't show any reaction, typical. But Rouge didn't mind, Omega was Omega and he was still a friend. Shadow spoke drawing her attention away from Omega.

"What are you doing here, Rouge?" Rouge didn't feel like giving up the game.

"Some friends of mine wanted me to stop by and see what Eggman's plans are…" It was the truth, or part of the truth, while she did count Topaz as a friend, the rest of the G.U.N's staff can be a little stuffy at times. But what can you expect from a group of government agents. Shadow continued to stare at Rouge.

"Alright, if you what you say is true then you wouldn't mind helping us get in." By the tone of Shadow's tone, she could tell they already knew how they were going to get in.

"Just lead the way." Rouge smiled at Shadow. Both Shadow and Omega walked off while Rouge followed. They lead her quite aways till they were at the edge of a cliff.

'A cliff, huh?' Rouge thought to herself. She took a good look at her surroundings. She guessed that it was a long way down. "Alright boys…" She glanced at them. "I can get the two of you across this, no problem." Shadow was taken aback little.

"And how are you going to do that?" He waited for her answer. Rouge smiled. She pulled out the emerald she had shown them earlier.

"…With this of course." Rouge let them take a good look at it once again. The emerald shined brightly in her hand as if it was smiling itself; fore they shared the same secret. Rouge then took the emerald in both of her hands and walked towards to the edge of the cliff. "Alright boys, are you ready for this?" She waited till the confusion cleared off both boys' faces. Once they had nodded in agreement. Rouge stared back into the gap. 'Alright, here we go.' Rouge took a deep breath and started to focus. Rouge could feel the energy escaping the emerald and surrounding her, engulfing her. Her body felt hot, but that was a sign it was working. Her back started to burn, which started to make it hard for her to focus, but she didn't dare stop. She had to do this. Rouge continued to focus. It was then that pain erupted from Rouge's back as she felt bone penetrated her skin. Rouge could feel the sweat beads on her forehead, but she kept going. It was only when she felt the energy slip back into the chaos emerald that she was finally able to relax and collapsed on the ground. Omega ran up to her.

"Are you alright?" Rouge nodded and gave Omega a weak smile.

"Yeah, just give me a minute to catch my breath." Rouge could hear Shadow behind her,

"How did you do that?" Rouge smiled once again. She looked back at Shadow who had a somewhat confused look to his face. She glanced back. She knew what Shadow was seeing, and she was happy it had worked a second time. She knew that she had a pair of black wings on her back, her lovely bat- wings.

"It's thanks to the Chaos Emerald here. I think if I wasn't holding on to it when Dr. Eggman's little light show went off, I wouldn't have been able to get my wings back." Sure it was a lot of pain, but it was worth it. After all flying was freedom, her freedom. Rouge cleared her throat. "Well boys…" Rouge stood up and dusted herself off. "…I think it is time we pay Eggman a visit, don't you?" Shadow nodded.

"Agreed." While Omega turn to face the base.

"Affirmative." Shadow joined them at the edge.

"Alright, well then I think the best thing to do is for Omega to give us a running jump start." Shadow looked up towards Omega. Omega nodded in agreement. It was Rouge's turn to speak.

"Then you boys hold on tight don't let go." Rouge jumped up in the air while the boys got in their team's fly formation*. Omega who was on the bottom prepared to jump. He took a deep breath in and made sure he was a good distance from the edge, he started with a jog then broke out in a full on run. Being the power house of the group meant he had a lot more strength then the other two combined. It was up to him to make this jump and tried to get as much distance as he could. When Omega sense the edge was coming, he braced himself and jumped as hard as he could. Omega got to about 1/3 the distance from the jump but it wasn't enough to make it all the way, like he had calculated. It was up to Rouge now.

Rouge was impressed Omega had gotten them this far just from jumping but if he could have made it from just jumping then they wouldn't have needed her. Rouge felt the wind as they were started to fall. Rouge took a deep breath of her own and spread out her wings. It took only seconds from the wind to fill her wings and for the updraft to send them up a few meters. Once the updraft had did its job, Rouge pushed her wings down… then up… then down… she repeated this motion until they were half way across the canyon. "What would you boys do without me?" Rouge could feel the wind in her hair and how she missed it. She loved this feeling; you never know what you'll miss till it's gone. That's why still being able to use her wings like this, she knew she was lucky. Rouge saw the other side was coming up fast just like the strain of carrying the extra weight. Her stamina was draining pretty fast as well. "Almost there…" Rouge was thankfully when the ground appeared to be under Omega's feet. She waited till both boys were on the ground safe from the danger from falling. Rouge landed herself. "Well that wasn't hard…" Shadow replied.

"Indeed." Omega locked on to a door that appeared to be a side entrance.

"We can enter though here, all I need to do is enter the access code." They waited till Omega was done. The watched as the red light on the keypad turned green. "We can enter now. But we still must watch out for Eggman's robots." The irony there was that Omega used to be one of Dr. Eggman's robots as well. As the door clicked open, the team prepared to enter the base.

On the other side of Eggman's base…

Sonic stood facing towards the direction of Dr. Eggman's base. Behind him were Knuckles and Tails. Which he was happy to have, he knew the two of them would have his back if needed. Sonic spoke up to the two. "Alright guys, are you ready to give it to Eggman?" Knuckles pounded his left hand with his right.

"It's time to put Eggman in his place." Tails nodded.

"Let's go!" With Sonic in the lead, started walking forward.

"Alright let's go knock on the front door."