Junking the Junkyard
Sonic, Crash, and the gang, made it to the shrine of the Master Emerald, home of Knuckles the Echidna. Sonic was first to reach the top, being fastest and all, then waited for the others to catch up. Then, from behind the Master Emerald, came the words, "I thought I told you to STAY AWAY FROM THE… oh, hey Sonic." Knuckles appeared from behind the overgrown jewel, and dropped his brass knuckles. "Sorry, thought you were Rouge… again." Aku-Aku, Tails, Crash, and Amy (in that order) had then reached the top. "Is this your friend in which you spoke of, Sonic?" asked the mask.
"Yup, this is…" Sonic was interrupted by Knuckles, who said, "Woah! A talking, floating mask! That's not something you see every day."
"Greetings, Knuckles. My name is Aku-Aku. The orange bandicoot you see before you is Crash Bandicoot, and we are both from another dimension." explained the mask with zen in his voice.
"Well, that explains you, then." said Knuckles.
"Hey Knux, we're having a little Egg and Brain trouble. See, this other guy from Crash's dimension is here to help Egghead take over. Wanna help?" asked Sonic. Right before Knuckles could say anything, an airship with the Eggman logo on it descended to the shrine. The intercom started up, and before an announcement was officially made, a small amount of chatter could be heard saying, "I thought we were going to the Scrapyard!" from Cortex.
"First we have this stop!" replied Eggman. He then cleared his throat and spoke through the mic, "Hello, Hedgehog and posse! If you don't mind, we'll be taking that emerald!" Before Sonic, Knuckles, Crash, or any of the others did anything, a swift metal claw grabbed the Master Emerald from its resting place, and quickly reeled it into the airship, closing the hatch. Eggman then spoke, "Thank you for your time. Now we are off to the Scrapyard. OHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHO *cough-cough*" The intercom was shut down, and the blimp made towards the junkyard in a quick manner.
Knuckles then finally responded to Sonic, "I guess I have no choice, now." Then the team of now six followed the ship.
After an hour-long chase, the team finally made it to the junkyard, and saw Cortex, Eggman, and four automatons loading metal and electrical parts. "Yo Egghead, redecorating your lab?" shouted Sonic.
Eggman quickly took notice and said, "Hmph! I thought we left you lot back at that ancient pile of rocks. No matter, I'll just have my faithful robots trample you!" Eggman flipped a switch, and ten automatons, made from junkyard scrap, appeared from random piles of trash all around. "Farewell Cretins, we have some big plans with this scrap e obtained." shouted Cortex, then he and Eggman both loaded onto the ship, and headed to their second-to-last stop, back at the lab.
The automatons were closing in on the group, when Crash walked up to one nonchalantly, and did a tornado spin to its body, instantly shattering it. All he did after that was laugh. "These machines appear to be very fragile, due to their random structures." said Aku-Aku.
"Then let's kill em!" proclaimed Sonic. He then took out two without even trying. Amy pulled out her Piko-Piko Hammer, and smashed two more. Knuckles boxed out four of them, and Aku-Aku shot a nullifying laser from his eyes, and the final bot had immediately shut down. "What was the point of just sending us weak robots to fight?" asked Knuckles.
"He was trying to distract us from finding them." replied Tails.
"Yeah, but can't we just follow their blimp, again?" asked Amy, stowing her hammer away.
"Do you even see them anywhere?" Aku-Aku said, backing up Tails.
Crash and Sonic both looked around, and the mask was right, Eggman and Cortex had gotten out of sight. "Where could they have gone?" asked Sonic.
"Only one place I can think of… Eggman's new laboratory." replied Tails, then the gang began making for where Tails had said the lab's coordinates were.