Chapter 9
Tails used to believe that nothing was worse than death. But he had forgotten, that there was something worse than death, much worse. And that was simply to witness it, without being able to stop it from happening.
How many times had that occurred today? One too many.
He noticed Sonic's corpse, and even in death, the hedgehog was free. Free to roam the clouds of heaven, to run in the realm of the dead.
Perhaps it would not be too bad to join him, should that happen to him himself.
The task that Tails had set himself out to do required supreme skill in physics, mechanics, and most importantly, a bit of luck with calculations. Because the tiniest margin of error could make everything go wrong.
Or, more wrong than it was already.
Corpses lay all over the complex of Bronx's soldiers, but Tails knew that Bronx's men outnumbered him to countless hundreds to one. They were probably debating on who should take over for Bronx. But if his plan went right, they would all either die or be captured.
He had remembered seeing the item in the jail room. Tails could imagine what it was used for, simply as a threat, because Bronx himself wouldn't dare to use it.
He entered the terrifying room, more terrifying now that he had escaped the torturous room than before. He saw Knuckle's own body, lying on the ground, and Rouge's. Perhaps in death, love would be together…
He looked at a far right corner, and there it was. A missile. A dangerously powerful missile. Tails had a feeling that it had a nuclear warhead on it, a weak but still devastating one.
Here was where luck came to play. If the missile was more powerful than he thought, the entire city would be destroyed, hundreds of innocents would die from the explosion, and hundreds more from radiation.
Tails could not calculate its vertical distance, and he could only help that its timer still functioned properly.
Using everything he knew, he quickly calculated and checked his calculations. It would likely launch out of the door, and many of Bronx's soldiers would die before they would know it even was launched… Tails did not like the idea of killing them, but he knew it was justified by his friend's death.
After calculating the velocity, acceleration, and force correctly, he knew he had everything he needed but the time.
Which he was about to set…
"There's an intruder!" Tails heard someone shout. Three guards were pointing blasters at him. Darn! The timer was already starting, and it wouldn't be enough time for him to get out. But then again, he was about to get shot anyway. Tails quickly backed behind the missile. Might as well have them destroy the missile now."
"You're right." Some said from behind them. The guards turned around, but only to be thrown backwards toward the wall. All three were unconscious.
The "Intruder" was a black hedgehog, its eye narrowed as he scanned the room.
"Tails?" It said to him.
"Shadow?" Tails said surprisingly. "Shadow! You've got to get out of here!"
"What? Why?"
"The missile! I've timed it to go off and destroy the complex, but the time's preset, I can't change it."
The hedgehog said nothing for several seconds, and Tails looked at the time slowly lower from four minutes to three.
"Then you must leave then."
"I don't have enough time, though!"
"Then I'll buy you the time. I'll delay the missile's explosion." Shadow said defiantly. Tails was shocked and awed.
"But then…"
"Then, you shall be free from the curse of the star-crossed."
"What? You knew, too?" Tails said, surprised.
"I didn't know soon enough, it seems. But go! There is no more time!"
With a single look back, Tails ran as fast as he could, disregarding any care of silence. Stealth would kill him, but it seemed speed might as well.
In a matter of seconds, Tails realized he had gone the wrong way.
He panicked. It was too late to turn back; he would have to hope this lead to a different exit…
"Hey, over here, friend!"
The voice sounded odd to him, and he didn't know whether to trust anything in the dark path. But what other choice was there?
He followed the voice, and was surprised to see that it was the tiger, Rosalinda. How long had she been under here? Wait, how did she even get there? Wait, what was she doing here?
"This is an odd place, don't you think?" She asked him. "I always wondered where this led. Do you live here?"
"What, no!" Tails said. "Rosalinda, this is a sewer! But there's no time to explain that, we got to get out of here, the place is about to explode!"
Tails did not like the sound he thought he heard. For the first time, Rosalinda did not say something, but nodded. "Follow me; I'll get you to an exit in time!"
She ran through the halls swiftly, and Tails had found hope in his heart once more. But the feeling of heat did not happen, nor did the sounds of explosions and screams.
Rosalinda climbed up a ladder leading to the exit. The light! "Come on, slowpoke!" She called down to him. To her, this was just another adventure.
Tails quickly climbed out of the hole, and sealed the entrance. But he had a bad feeling that would hardly help.
"Get as far away as you can!" He shouted to her.
But they had hardly ran a step when everything seemed to go up into flames. The entrance's seal flew off into the air, the rocks around it fell down into the depths. And when Tails looked at the city, looming so far away…
The city was in ruins. His world was in ruins. And his heart was broken within the wreckage.
A/N: There's one last thing for this story. Just one last thing… (The city, the city, the… no!)
