Chapter 2

They hid behind a small ridge of rocks. Sonic peeked an eye around the side. It was a fairly small camp. Eggman was clearly underestimating the forces. But small as it was, there was only five of them and at least fifty in the camp. Sonic grabbed the radio from Tails' pack and said into it:

"Put Shadow on standby"

Tails took a small round metal object and pressed a button on it. He threw it into the centre of the camp. A guard turned to inspect it. Tails counted with his fingers. Three, two, one…

With a colossal noise and a fireball to match, the small metal ball exploded, sending the inspecting guard high into the air. He fell to the ground in a charred heap. With this distraction, Sonic, Knuckles and Amy leapt over the rocks. Tails and Julie provided covering fire.

With her sword in one hand and a long hammer in the other, Amy sliced open a tent. A robot repair tent. She quickly laid waste to the damaged automatons, as all the engineers had since fled the tent. Knuckles broke into the main barracks tent. He found himself faced with twenty odd soldiers scrambling for their guns. He picked up a bed – a cheap, light, military issue bed – and hurled it at someone. He went to the nearest soldier. He pulled the gun, which pulled the soldier with it. Using him as a human shield, advanced to the next one.

He threw the body into one soldier, shot him, and took his gun. With the two butts, he fought through three more. Sonic burst through the back of the tent, causing panic and confusion. A cowardly soldier leapt out the side of the tent. He promptly got hit by a shot from Julie's blaster.

Knuckles used the distraction to get the drop on two more guards: As the befuddled soldiers turned once again, Sonic put bullets in four of them. Knuckles was now close enough to the last seven to deal with them personally. He punched one in the stomach and kneed him in the face. He kicked off the bed and handed over another, and landed on the shoulders of a third. In a reverse suplex, he flipped him over and landed on his head. Sonic hit one with the butt of his gun and kicked him into a wooden side table. He shot another in the stomach and used his crumpling body to as a stepping stone to the next one. He put a bullet in the top of his head. Knuckles tackled one more into a wooden table. It broke and stuck a wooden stake through the unfortunate soldier. Both Sonic and Knuckles cast a steely gaze towards the last remaining soldier. He dropped his gun and ran away screaming. He fell to his knees as he was hit by one of Tails' rifle rounds.

Amy slipped unnoticed into the second tent. A kitchen. Nobody was around. She explored a little. Six armoured guards burst in, yelling things like, "Drop your weapons!" "Down on the ground!" "Put your hands where I can see them!" She paused. She tightened her grip on her sword and hammer. "Shit! Shoot her! Shoot her! Shoot her!"

She ducked. Two of the guards shot each other. She knocked the guns away from the others with her hammer. She let it fly into the face of one of them. She stuck her sword into another. She pulled it up so that it cut half of him in half. Her face was sprayed with blood. She pushed him away with the sword still in him. She pulled the quarterstaff from her back and swung it into the head of one of the soldiers. With the other end, she winded the other and brought it up into his face. She spun the staff around and hit them both in the head at the same time. She brought the staff up and pushed it down on both their heads, knocking them both to the ground. She slid back into its holder on her back. She slowly took the hammer and sword, cleaned the blood off them, and put them back on her back.

Back behind the rock, returning fire had become thin. Tails and Julie decided to venture forth. Tails stashed his rifle in favour of a shotgun. Cautiously moving forward, the camp appeared to be deserted. They joined back up with Sonic & Knuckles. Amy appeared through the tent's cloth doors. Her face was soaked in blood.

"Oh my God! What happened to you?"

"It got a little messy," she said in a somewhat blasé manner.

"You don't fucking well say," Tails added.

Suddenly Julie's eyes rolled, and she slowly fell to her knees. Knuckles stared in horror at her as blood seeped from her mouth. As she fell to the ground, he saw a soldier laying on the ground a few metres away holding a smoking gun. A smile crept across his face, and then he went limp, dead.

Knuckles immediately dropped to inspect Julie. There was a gaping bullet wound in her back. He held back a tear.

"Julie…"

"Knuckles, I…" She struggled.

"Yes?" He answered in desperation.

"I… I l… love… y…" She said all she could before she let out her last breath. Knuckles collapsed his head into her chest.

"I love you too, Julie…" He whispered. He began crying into her chest.

Sonic let up a flare.