Amy dodges the bullet and does a barrel roll to the left behind a plant, trying to catch her breath while Ailio reloads his gun. The two chose the hallways to be the setting for their fight, but Amy found herself in an unpleasant situation since her body was still recovering, and Ailio was forcing her to stay mobile with his threatening shooting accuracy. Amy snaps her fingers and summons her bow and arrows, and kneels on one knee-taking aim at Ailio. She pulls back the arrow and measures the distance between them with full concentration in her eyes, and then fires the arrow; the arrow released and fired at a sharp speed-piercing through the air as it made its way to Ailio. Ailio stares down the arrow and loads his gun, then he times the speed of the arrow and dodges the fast projectile, quickly sprinting for Amy with his gun locked-and-loaded.
Amy didn't faze, instead she summoned her hammer and charged at Ailio with full resolve; Ailio could immediately feel the intensity of the fight begin to grow, and he instantly avoided the head-on battle with Amy, deciding to shift to the left and fire a couple rounds at her; Amy shifted her glare to Ailio's direction and batted away the bullets with ease, resting her hammer on her shoulder right afterwards with an intimidating glare.
Cream, Mr. Rose, and the others had arrived at one of the hallways that connected to where Amy and Ailio were, viewing the fight between the two; Cream was itching to aid her best friend, feeling anxious after seeing the close-calls Amy had with Ailio in the encounter. Mr. Rose halts her, explaining that Amy appears to be handling herself given her style of fighting.
"Ailio was it…? Look here, if you're going to fight-bring it on!"-pointing her hammer in his direction- "I've got a father to rescue!"
Ailio laughed, "To think you were poisoned just a few minutes ago…and here you are battling in top form; you're an incredible breed."
Cream clenched the corner of the wall, "That scumbag…don't talk about Amy like that!"
Mr. Rose placed a hand on her shoulder, "I understand how much you must care for my daughter, but please…you must not make any hasty decisions."
"We can't just sit here and do nothing though…we are trying to escape." Arnold said.
"How about we make the escape by setting up a diversion." Bunnie added.
"Yeah…Yeah! Mr. Rose and I could grab his attention and you guys make an escape. Search throughout anywhere for a secret exit; since the whole place is in disarray right now, it's best to avoid the entrance."
Mr. Rose nodded, "I can accept that…but we'll need to time it properly."
They all focused their attention back to the fight before them; Amy puts up her guard and prepares for Ailio's shooting, going into intense focus-studying his gun. Ailio fires a round and goes mobile, moving counter-clockwise after each bullet fired; Amy stood in the same position, batting away each bullet at a faster reaction time each time. Ailio smirked as he recognized the plan Amy was looking to execute, she's waiting until I get within range for her to either use that hammer directly or to shift to arrows and catch me at point blank range…Ailio wall jumps and shoots in mid-air, forcing Amy to roll out the way and evade the bullets; Amy falls into his trap. Ailio lands and sprints over to Amy before she can recover and kicks the hammer out her hand; Amy stumbles and fumbles her bow and arrow after summoning them as a last attempt to defend herself. Ailio stands over her, pointing his gun at her forehead.
"You got a lot of fight…but you are years away, kid. Say your last words…" He said, cocking his gun and ready to fire to end it all.
Amy could only stare at death as she peered into the darkness of the inner barrels of the gun, and the only thought she had in her mind was what would happen to everyone if she died right there, would they miss her? Would they cry? Tears began to appear as her eyes wavered with tears beginning to run.
"I'm sorry Cream…Lily…Dad…Sonic…everyone…!"
She closed her eyes, and then heard a loud gunshot; her body trembled, but she soon realized that she hadn't been hit. When she opened her eyes, she saw Ailio's hand was across the room with blood splattered across the floor, Ailio kneeling on the floor in agony, and to her right, she saw Cream holding a gun, and saw her father-along with other people.
"Cream…!? Dad…!?"
Cream rushed over and crashed into Amy's open arms, Mr. Rose stared down Ailio as he made his way to his daughter, and Bunnie and company made their escape. Amy was stunned by the sudden turn of events, but not as stunned as Ailio, who could only stare at his hand that was no longer connected to his body.
"Well you sure got me good if you were able to blast my hand that far…" he began laughing; Cream quickly pointed her gun at him, but he waved it away-"I know when I've lost…go on, Redd is in the central room; go down this hall and take a left, right, right, left and you should arrive at a big room where he awaits…" he motioned, stopping the bleeding by tearing off his arm sleeve and wrapping it around his wrist.
Amy, Cream, and Mr. Rose heeded him and decided to split from Bunnie and the others; Amy, Cream, and Mr. Rose were set to finally face the big boss himself, Redd Mamba. Back in the main lobby, Lily had her sword ready as she measured her two opponents, and then she swiftly began her attack-disappearing in the blink of an eye; Sera and Penny were shocked by her incredible speed, but their instincts kicked in at the last moment when their bodies sensed an intense bloodlust from behind; Lily was right behind then and in position to brutally stab them right above the waist. Sera and Penny jump back and breathe heavily, realizing just how close they were to getting a mortal wound, Lily's glint sharpened as she peered at them with a scary smile.
"What's wrong, did I frighten you?" she mocked while twirling her blade, keeping her eyes on the two girls.
The twins sweat, "You only surprised us…don't expect the same opportunity to occur!"
Sera leaned over to Penny, "We have the numbers advantage…we'll corner her with a pincer attack and force her to submit to defeat."
Penny nodded, "It's best to heed the boss and not commit any murder…"
Lily noticed the sudden change in the girl's attitude when they focused their look on her, baring their weapons for her to see; Penny had a Morningstar while Sera pulled a book from out her pocket. No longer did she have the edge like just now, Penny and Sera took a hard stomp forward, and had a terrifying smirk on their faces as they held their weapons up; Lily could sense a shift about to occur unless she did something soon, but when she finally pieced her plan together, the twins had already surrounded her and were ready to strike!
"Fazohra Diest Numera!" Sera chanted, shooting wind from her hand and blowing Lily into the air; Penny leaped and took a huge swing with her Morningstar; Lily blocks the attack while upside down in mid-air and uses the momentum to push-off and gain some ground against the duo, knocking down the chandelier while doing so.
Lily looks at her blade before readjusting her grip to a direction where the tip faced away from her instead of towards her. Her confidence returned after seeing the failed attempt by the twins, "Come on!" she yelled in a battle hungry tone, approaching the girls.
She charged at the twins and forced them into close-quarter combat without them getting the chance to retaliate, the girls could only dodge as Lily's ferocious attacks came closer to direct hits. But Lily makes one misstep as Sera quickly kicks the rug and makes Lily slip. Lily's sword flies in the air and lands erect in the floor right behind her; Lily looks back at her weapon, realizing without the sword she's at a huge disadvantage. Sera and Penny use the opportunity to get some cheap shots on Lily, kicking her in the gut repeatedly, and then Sera uses her magic to launch Lily into the air; Penny continues the attack by stabbing Lily with the morning star in the same spot where she'd been kicked. It's a critical hit! Lily coughs up blood immediately and drops to the floor after taking such a blow.
"You bastards really do play dirty…" Lily mumbled with blood dripping from her mouth, looking for the right opportunity to grab her sword and retaliate; the twins close in and leap at her for the finishing attack, but a flying shield sends them flying in the other direction; the shield then circled to its owner, Richard, who arrived at the right moment to save Lily.
"My lady!" Richard called.
"I'm fine…just back me up for a little…" Lily staggered.
"Of course. I should inform you that we are currently winning the battle outside, so our escape route is secured."
Lily makes a break for her sword while Richard shields her, Lily kicks her sword up and catches it, throwing it in the girl's direction; the twins split and avoid Lily's sword, but get shot by some strange bullet from out of nowhere, dropping their weapons on the spot and falling to the floor.
"I-I can't feel my body!" Sera panicked.
"Same here…!" Penny struggled.
"That's because you've been hit with my stun gun!" Tails said, entering from the front doors. "My stun gun numbs your body for about six hours…you guys have no choice but to admit defeat."
Lily fell to her knees in disappointment and shock, "I wasn't…I wasn't able to do anything…I failed…"-blood floods from her mouth as she tries to keep it all from pouring out-"I'm a failure…"-Richard quickly came to her aid, and so did Tails.
"Don't say such a thing Lady Rose…You fought valiantly in the small frame that was given."-He helps her up-"I believe you're suffering internal bleeding, or something is damaged on the inside…"-he hands her a handkerchief-"My lady we must depart soon for a hospital!"
"N-no…I must accept my fate for my poor performance and stay here."
"That's a load of crap!" Tails interrupted, handcuffing the twins to a chair and then approaching Lily- "You were double teamed and took a cheap-shot…your efforts were admirable as they were, but I definitely saw some talent…you just need to trust your strength more and never falter!"
Lily understood the message and swiftly changed her attitude, "If it took a confidence booster from you, then I definitely need to toughen up…thank you, Tails. Surprisingly, you have a way with words. Thank you…"
Tails blushed, "Oh no…you just remind me of a friend who was having the same kind of issue…she wasn't sure what he potential could be because she never tried to improve, she always gave up too early, and she never tried to fight through her issues…"
"Oh? Did… they ever improve…?"-she winces in pain as her gut begins to sharply jab every time she spoke.
"I haven't gotten the chance to ask…"
Back in the room where Sonic and Lycoris were battling, the fight intensified. Vines continue to slither around and follow Sonic as he dashes around the room, assessing a strategy for fighting Lycoris. Sonic suddenly halts, and then homing attacks a pair of vines that lunge in his direction, opening up and ready to shoot out poison. The vines repel and the poison splatters in Lycoris' direction, but luckily for Lycoris he created an iron-strong grass barrier to block the poison; the poison drops to the floor and immediately melts the floor.
"What the heck!? It can melt now!?" Sonic yelled in disbelief; Lycoris snickered.
"My poison can become acidic once I entered combat for a certain period of time; right now we've been fighting for nearly five minutes!"
Sonic cautiously observes his surroundings, "So you can control plants, root them underground and allow them to control at will, shoot out harmful poison…and now that same poison can turn into an acid? Talk about overpowered!"
"There's a reason I've been hailed the saint with the greatest potential in history…I have no limits!"
Sonic glanced over at the fire place to his left, "But fire can burn down plants…"
"Such simple thinking will get you nowhere!"-Holding up a hand, creating a ton of seeds-"time for this fight to blow up!"
He throws out a green seed-which closely reached Sonic; Sonic observed the seed. He noticed that it began to blink red, and then he realized what was before him. He Jumped back just in time to avoid the small detonation. Lycoris began throwing out more of the seed bombs, forcing Sonic to move at his command.
"They detonate at my command! So don't think your attack from earlier will work!"
"Tch…!" Sonic sounded in frustration, running out of options as he felt the advantage favor Lycoris. As confirmation from the amount of long range attacks this guy has in his arsenal, I'm very sure he must not be a big fan of close combat…every chance I get to pounce, this guy has some defensive strategy to thwart it. Sonic continues to run, gradually increasing his speed as the explosions seeds come closer-I didn't want to go any faster than I am now because it'd be too reckless to do this indoors, but I guess it's time to step it up!
Lycoris aims at Sonic and fires more seed bombs at Sonic, but this time they looked purple instead of green, "Have fun with explosive poison seed bombs!"
Sonic spin dashed up the wall and then homing attack the wall, grabbing one of the larger frames on the wall and using it as a shield from the explosion of poison gas. Sonic disappeared in the gas of poison smoke; Lycoris began laughing at his successful victory.
Lycoris stared at the flowing purple smoke, "You fought hard, Sonic; it seems it's only right that I share something with you as a reward for such an entertaining fight."-All of his vines settled down and formed a chair- "A fun fact to know about me: I never met my parents-they abandoned me at birth. The earliest memory I have is of the don; he took me in and raised me as one of his own…"-he balled his hand into a fist- "I'm grateful to him for his kindness, thanks to him I have become quite powerful. The don has a vision for the future of this world, and he has blessed me with the opportunity of becoming the catalyst for that plan…"-he sorted his thoughts for a moment as his mind rushed through all of his future plans- "I'm going to be the flag bearer of a new era that will arrive, I'll be the one who helps usher in change in this country…no, change in this world! Once I've completed my mission on Gordana, I'll pursue my next assignment in changing this world-starting with the United Federation!"-he waits for the smoke to settle, but notices it still hasn't disappeared-but it isn't a worry to him, he's confident that Sonic must be dying- "Strange, isn't it? I'm helping in planning to overthrow the same people I represent? The truth is…the United Federation is corrupt! The government is behind most of the problems that are happening worldwide; they're responsible for the sudden rise of all these nations divisive and militaristic nature, they're responsible for the different alliances that have been created. The twelve saints that serve as the figures of peace and justice are just some powerful figure-heads that all have their own selfish reasons for staying a saint; to be honest, only myself and my senior who ranks at number three in the order are the sensible ones; the rest are too caught up in their own desires to realize who they're serving."-he becomes suspicious of the purple smoke that still dances-"actually, they're even responsible for the event that happened a couple years ago-I believe it was the destruction of some city…"-he narrows his eyes, expecting a response; it was regarded as a notorious event, mainly since Sonic and friends took action to stop Dr. Eggman's attacks and failed in keeping the citizens safe. Sonic and the others received a bad reputation for it-nearly even exiled from the U.F.
The smoke dissolves, but no hedgehog is seen. Lycoris believes Sonic might have evaporated with the poison, since his poison was quite capable after all. He closed his eyes with a smirk and then had a smug look as he stared at the spot where he defeated "the Blue Blur"
"To think I would see your demise before you even grew out your potential…such a shame! I lied earlier when I said I hadn't heard of you before…truth there is that you're very well known. We know of your efforts with G.U.N. and we know about your failed efforts; in a sense, you were blacklisted by the government-not wanted, but blacklisted. No matter where you went in the country, you weren't safe. It was the reason why you disbanded your team and went separate ways, huh? And then you somehow reunited with them and decided to come here and fight us? I guess I'll get a promotion in rank thanks to my disposal of you…sayonara, hedgehog!"
A blue streak and strong wind brushed past Lycoris, and before he could fully catch a glimpse of the phenomenon that had just occurred, he felt a heavy punch connect with his gut. Suddenly, that blue streak broke through the sound barrier-ripping the paint of the wall as it sped around the room and knocking over every piece of furniture. Lycoris was stunned, feeling a sudden fear unlike ever before as he heard a strange sound, one that sounded like a charging sound; A blue ball appeared before him!
"S-S-S-Sonic!?"
The ball began spinning even faster, "You're too slow!"
The blue ball zipped and connected with Lycoris, ricocheting and performing a dozen homing attacks-landing critical hits on the snake! Sonic breaks out of ball form performs a barrage of melee attacks, forcing Lycoris closer to the edge of the of opened window. Sonic halts as he realizes what would happen if he performed yet another hit, and instead grabs Lycoris and throws him back into the middle of the room; Lycoris had bruises and cuts everywhere from the rapid amount of attacks he just received.
"You're lucky that I'm not the killing type…" Sonic said in a stern voice, glaring at Lycoris.
"Why have you spared me…? I tried to kill you!"
Sonic looked out the window to view the calm blue sky, "You remind me of another saint I fought in the past, you're just misunderstood. You mean to do the right thing, but in the wrong way"-to himself-"You're just like Roque."
"No…I think we are the same, Sonic."
"Oh? How so?"
"Well, we both believe in what we're fighting for. We refuse to back down to anyone no matter how big and intimidating they may seem, and I know I might be making a stretch here, but I'm willing to talk; I'll tell you everything…"
And so, Lycoris spoke. He informed Sonic on all twelve of the saints, detailing the abilities and behaviors of them all. He even gave more intel about Spade, revealing that Spade was an outlaw regarded as one of the "big four" who had Ice powers.
"That's all I can possibly share…I unfortunately don't know of his whereabouts, but if he's looking for you, and you're looking for him, then your paths shall cross."
Sonic nodded and then exited, leaving Lycoris to be alone and accept his total defeat. Once Sonic disappears from Lycoris' sights, he slams his fist on the floor in frustration. Self-loathing and regret consume him, as he recalled the reason why he was defeated so easily.
"I guess it's that painfully obvious…I can't take a hit. No matter how much I tried in perfecting my defenses, they truly mean nothing once they're penetrated. I can't take down the United Federation if I can't even stop their primary target!"-he looks over at the door where Sonic left from- "Watch your back, Sonic. Your battle with the government has just started!"
Sonic runs through the halls as he searches for Redd Mamba's room, "I got all the information I wanted and then some! Also, I got to learn about the true intentions and history of the United Federation that had been bothering me for the past two years… but I guess I should've asked for the whereabouts of his boss…nah, never mind. Everyone has their pride…but the U.F. huh? To think I'll be picking a fight with the country that basically runs the world. Well, bring it on! This is war!"