Chapter 6: Across the Sands
--

Silver was frustrated. Amy and Cream had been dragging Silver everywhere through Soleanna, and he felt not only like a handbag constantly being pulled by these two, but that he was wasting time. Not only should he be looking for the Iblis Trigger, but also for Blaze as well, just to see if she was doing alright. But no, he HAD to be the one dragged along. After spending nearly all day in Soleanna (during which he spoke very little), he found himself in the desert after walking the entire coastline with Amy scoping the landscape and Cream just looking around. Sure, he helped looking for this "Sonic," but he didn't even know what he looked like. He guessed by the name, he must have a neat haircut or something. Every time he thought about that, he would find himself fondling his own forelock and then feeling ridiculous.

"Hmm, that lady back on the beach said he saw Sonic and his friend Tails run this way. I can almost feel he's here! Call it women's intuition..." Amy said.

"You have a Sonic radar, Amy..." Cream said, her child-thinking apparent.

"You might call it that," Amy smiled, and happened to look back at Silver, just as he crossed his eyes and seemed to sigh in exasperation.

"Sorry, Silver, I don't mean to be dragging you all around like this; Sonic doesn't like to stay put so it's hard to find him, but don't you worry! Once we find him and find out what's going on, I help you find whoever you're looking for and won't stop until you find him," Amy said affirmably.

"Us too!" Cream and Cheese said in unison.

Silver relaxed his posture; he felt he really should be so hard on them after all. They're just trying to help him.

"Yeah, I'm sorry myself."

They trudged on through the wasteland, stopping once in a while to keep track to where they were going. During these stops, Silver looked around, and would eventually be distracted by the flora and fauna. He admired the different plants that seemed to grow even without an ounce of water within miles and wondered how they did it. They somehow did it, and he wanted to know. He saw different creatures crawl about the desert sands, searching for a meal and he wondered the same about them. His gaze expanded over the horizons and towards the sun, which was now beginning to climb towards the western sky. He never saw the sun or the sky before. Back in the future, it was all hazed over by dark clouds of ash. There were no plants or animals scurrying about with no worries. He was always worrying, whether if he, Blaze or anyone back there would live to see another day. Here, things were different. He felt he could live her forever...

"Silver, are you all right?"

Silver snapped out of his trance to look at Amy, who looked at him kind of funny.

"Yeah. I'm okay..." Silver looked around again. "Wow, I never thought I'd see anything this beautiful..."

Cream looked confused. "What? You mean this desert? But it's so dry and a lot of things look dead!"

"Yeah, some, but there are a lot that is so alive. Not just here, but back on the beach, and Soleanna. The sky is pretty, the sun is shining, and everyone looks so happy. I wish it was that way where--" Silver caught himself; better not say the future, because these girls wouldn't understand. "--where I come from. It's bad there."

Looking at Amy, Cream and Cheese again, he found that they were of one expression; one head-tilting, cock-eyed, bewildered expression.

"Maybe I shouldn't have brought it up," Silver said, feeling somewhat embarrassed. Why were these two making him feel so awkward?

Suddenly, he felt that this is what his world will look like once he destroys the Iblis Trigger in time. His world would look like this! Beautiful, happy, peaceful... Silver soon felt a new passion to fight for the future fire up in his soul.

"Let's go! I'll help you find who you're looking for! C'mon!" Silver said suddenly, and ran towards what looked like a bunch of ruins of an abandoned city some faraways off.

"Wow, what's got into him?" Amy said, looking after Silver.

"I dunno, but he looks like he's in a hurry now."

"For what? Does the person he is looking for mean that much to him?"

"Maybe it's a girl," Cream suddenly blurted out, then suddenly blushed.

Amy side-eyed Cream and suddenly smiled. "Ooh, a lovebird you think? Ah, I feel like I'm not alone! I'm trying to catch the guy of my dreams, and he's looking for the girl of his dreams! Ooh! It makes me feel so funny inside now I'm trying to help him! I wonder if she's cute..."

"C'mon, Amy, he's getting away!"

"Now, Cream," Amy said. "We shouldn't say anything; we don't want to make him embarrassed now, ok? Promise me you won't tell."

"Cross my heart, hope to die, I won't tell!" Cream said, hand over her heart. Cheese mimicked her mistress. "Cross my heart too!"

"Cross my heart too!" Amy said, and then the three started dashing after Silver. "Hey, Silver! Wait for us!" Amy cried out.

- - - - -

Deep in a secluded room, Elise was trapped. Not just in the room, but in her thoughts. Dr. Kintobor had brought Elise into the desert ruins of her people's past. Elise had never been here before herself, but knew of the ruins well. Her parents, especially her father, had made sure that the culture of the history be taught more then anything else, as culture was crucial for a civilization. What was a monument of the past for her people is now a prison, and she could find no escape. Dr. Kintobor would come back and ask her about the Flames of Disaster. Part of her was furious that he would even think to try to summon the wrath of Solaris, and part of her was beginning to despair. She was powerless now, despite her honor and prestige as a Princess. How would he question her? Would he have the gall to torture her? How would he if he did? She didn't want to endure the thought or the threat of torture, and she knew she must be strong. She must be strong. It was her father's last wish before he died.

"You're a good girl, Elise. Be brave, be strong, and don't cry, no matter what happens."

"Yes, father, I know," Elise said aloud. "I must be a strong leader. I will be brave. I will be strong. I won't cry, no matter what happens."

Elise sat down on the base of a pillar, and kept saying that in her head. Not too far through that, there was a ruckus outside. Looking up, she listened. It was dull at first, but soon grew clearer, and definitely louder. What was that anyway? Suddenly, the left wall burst in, startling Elise for a moment. In soon walked a blue hedgehog wearing red sneakers with white straps, and was followed by a two-tailed fox with white-toed shoes. It was Sonic the Hedgehog! He came to rescue her, as he promised! Elise was overjoyed.

"Mr. Sonic!" the Princess exclaimed.

"Just call me Sonic, ple--" Sonic was cut off as he found Elise had embraced him, obviously relieved to see him at last. Sonic understood this, but he still felt awkward.

Elise, somehow sensing Sonic's awkward-feeling, let go finally, but still on knees to look Sonic in his eyes. Summoning her formal manner once again, she spoke, "I'm sorry, I was just so happy to see you finally. Dr. Kintobor was going to be back any minute."

"Hey, no worries, I always keep my word," Sonic said, flashing his trademark grin.

Elise noticed the odd fox for the first time, and was slightly startled. "Oh! I'm sorry! I didn't see you at all! My name is Elise, Princess Elise. You can just call me Elise."

Tails didn't seem the least bit offended. "That's okay, Elise. I'm Miles Prower, but everyone calls me Tails. I like to be called Tails better..."

Elise noticed that Tails was just a hair embarrassed. Perhaps he never met royalty before?

"Elise, I came to get you out of here, and I plan to do just that. Tails is here to help. Let's go!"

"Sonic! She's a Princess! You can't just tell a Princess what to do!"

"It's all right, Tails. Sonic is just trying to get me out of here safely and as fast as he can." Elise smiled at the young fox, who seemed to shrink further into his fur. Tails was obviously trying to be respectful.

Sonic chuckled. "Well then I'll lead her out like a gentlemen. Elise?"

Elise coughed to hide a laugh. There seems to be no end to the comedy between these two. "Well, all right, Mr. Sonic Hedgehog. Be my escort out of here."

Sonic did a hammed-up bow and took Elise by the hand, and Tails seemed redder and more sullen then ever, and consented to walk behind the two. This comedy of errors continued until they walked outside through the hole that Sonic had created in the wall. Once outside, Tails looked up and saw something none of them wanted to see.

"Sonic! Look!"

Flippant courtesy aside, Sonic and Elise looked to where Tails had pointed and saw one of the biggest robots any of them have ever seen. It had the appearance of a wolf, but with three heads, one bore a massive glowing horn that must've been as long as a flagpole. Each head bore one single glowing red eye and each head had one fixed expression of hunger, and each mouth bore a set of thirty razor-sharp teeth. The body was long and looked built for some heavy battle, and the body itself bore claws that could rip apart any tank.

It was the Cerberus.

"Sonic!" Elise cried out.

"I see it," Sonic said quietly. He had seen big robots, but never THAT big. The only other robots that Sonic met that looked that mean were Metal-Sonic and Robo-Knux.

"I see you've met my newest creation..."

All looked up to see the large craft, bearing Dr. Kintobor, hover downwards towards the earth between the three and the super-sized canine.

"This is my ultimate guard robot, the EG-3000, or the EG-Cerberus! It can take on any attack from anyone, even as strong as the Royal Armed Forces, not to mention, you Sonic the Hedgehog. The Princess is MINE, and will be until I obtain the secret of the Flames of Disaster, and not you or your little fox of a friend can stop me, you hear that!"

"Like heck I will, Eggman!" Sonic called back; he had already decided that "Eggman" was just as fitting an insult to him as the real Eggman. "I don't care who you are, or what army you send; you won't touch a hair on Elise, and she's coming back to Soleanna with us, even if I have to make your pet go through obedience school!"

"Right!" Tails took up a defensive stance beside Sonic, who had positioned himself in front of Elise.

"Hmph, it's your hide then." Kintobor made a small motion with his index finger, and then rose up in his hovercraft. The Cerberus stomped forwards towards the three.

"Tails! Get Elise out of here!" Sonic called.

"But what about you!?" Tails called back.

"I can handle this!" Sonic said. "Get Elise out of here and back to Soleanna! I'll catch up!"

"Ok!"

"Be careful, Sonic!" Elise cried out, just as Tails took her by the hand.

"I will, and you'll see me again, I promise," Sonic said, flashing his grin at Elise.

Tails took Elise by the hand and they ran away from the arena where Sonic stayed behind to face the Cerberus.

"Will be really be alright, Tails?" Elise had to ask, for she was worried.

"Don't worry, he always comes back." Tails looked up to Elise. He's battled bigger things then that, and escaped traps that no one else could've possibly escaped and lived to tell about it."

"He's that amazing then..."

"You bet he is, and he always keeps his promises, no matter what." Tails looked ahead. "Now to help us, I need you to hold onto this." Tails handed Elise a ball shaped object that had one single blinking light.

"Huh? What is it?"

"It's an electromagnetic pulse generator; it'll knock out any robots that try to attack us within a hundred feet. I just need you to hold onto it in case I need to fly you over, 'cause I'll need both hands to hold onto you."

"Oh...okay..." Elise tucked the object into her bosom.

Back in the arena, Sonic and the Cerberus were having a face off, all three eyes of the larger were locked on the smaller, and the hedgehog was using his two eyes to look the unnatural canine up and down.

"Okay, ya young pup, let's get your training on the go! HA!" Sonic went from zero to sixty in a blink, and in the same time, the Cerberus was on his strides.

Snarling like a wolf, his eyes locked on Sonic who raced around the mechanical mutt like a rabbit on the run. This robot was indeed fast on his feet, and Sonic was almost impressed. Great looking or no, this robot had to go down, and Sonic was going to see to it! Cerberus' maws opened and out came a laser barrage, intending to fry Sonic from a hedgehog to a hot dog, but Sonic leapt away from each laser's reach, tossing out a "Is that the best you can do!?".

Sonic charged again, as did Cerberus, the latter intending to chomp down on Sonic's flesh, but Sonic somersaulted right under the teeth-filled mouths just in time. Getting up, he grabbed the Cerberus by its tail and swung up on it. His soaps caught on the rim and he grinded upwards. Sonic soon found that the Cerberus' spine was one whole rail leading up to his center head, bearing the spearhead horn. Impulsively, he grabbed onto the horn.

The Cerberus howled like it was in pain and suddenly rampaged around the arena, knocking over stone pillars to rubble. Sonic yelled as he gripped both hands to the horn. "Whoa, what's going on!? It's gone berserk! WHOA!!" The Cerberus kept howling and snarling as it kept making sharp turn after another. Sonic held on for dear life. He didn't expect this to happen at all. He couldn't hold on for too long and was about to get tossed like a young cowboy riding the big bull at the rodeo. The hedgehog looked up and saw that they were heading right into a high wall at full throttle.

"Yikes!" Sonic kicked off the horn with his feet, throwing him off the giant robot, just as the smashed into the wall with a humongous crash! The wall came crashing down on top of the Cerberus and nearly on Sonic, who darted away from the raining bricks.

Sonic turned around to watch the Cerberus rise slowly from the debris, and both looked just as confused as the other. "What just happened to that mutt?" Sonic thought out loud. He barely touched it and it went psycho. No time to think about that now; the Cerberus was gearing for action; after shaking its three heads out, it sought out Sonic like a foxhound. "You don't give up that easily, huh? Well, you're going to get worse then a headache once I'm done! HA!"

Sonic charged at its head in a ball of spines, aiming for the center, but was whacked away by one of the side heads. Sonic landed on his feet, and just barely had enough to time to sprint away before a giant mouth chomped down where he stood before. Snarling, it charged at Sonic, all mouths open hungrily.

"What is the weakspot on this thing? There has to be one!" Sonic said in his mind. "Maybe there isn't one; maybe I just have to smash it!"

For that, he figured he had to use his Power Ring, tucked away in his glove, but it wasn't as easy as taking it out and using it. He could put it on during a run fur sure, but he needed time to aim; if he missed, he'd go flying out to who knows where, and the last thing he wanted was to have this thing chase after Tails and Elise. They'd be hamburger.

Sonic suddenly got an idea; the horn! It went nuts before when he grabbed a hold of it, why shouldn't it now? The hedgehog suddenly jumped vertically, making a twist, and landing facing right into the Cerberus' center eye. Glaring at Sonic was a maliciously glowing red eye, the size of a big TV. Sonic made an obscene gesture into its face, and then leaped upwards, grabbing the horn.

It didn't quite go according to plan as he expected. Instead of the Cerberus careening around like a driver-less school bus, it stayed firm and shook its three heads violently.

"Ah! Listen to me, you stupid mutt!" Sonic held on with both hands, but it was too much; he was thrown off...

"WHOOOAAAA!!"

...and at such a force that he was thrown clear across the arena and smacked into the opposite wall, knocking the wind out of him with a grunt.

Sonic lay stunned for a little bit, and the Cerberus stood where it stood, "sniffing" the air for Sonic's scent. Sonic after a while managed to get his breath back and gingerly stood up on his feet. "All right, pup, playtime's over!" Sonic bolted at the dog's heads, doing two-hundred. After smacking the dog's heads, he dashed to its back, grinded up its tail and spine and then, with all his limbs (minus his tail, although he would've grabbed on with that if he could), snatched onto the horn.

The dog was shocked! It bolted around the room, skidding around the room, sliding to the ground occasionally but would rise again to stampede about the room. Sonic kept his eyes opened to see where it would end up running to, and just as he planned, it eventually blindsided right into another wall. Sonic just barely avoided the crash and dashed away to the center of the room.

"Well, puppy, it's been fun, but I gotta go. I'll drop ya a ring when I want to play again..." Sonic took out his Power Ring and jammed it onto his finger, just as the Cerberus was getting ready to rise up, and Sonic noticed right away that its horn was broken and no longer glowing.

Sonic went into a spin and felt the energy build-up within his body and launched forward at Mach 5. The ball of spines smashed right through the Cerberus, the wall and ricocheted into the sky. Sonic uncurled just in time to see the EG-3000, or EG-Cerberus yowl one last time, then blow in a fantastic explosion with a thunderous boom!

"That's what I love about my work; the show afterwards is to die for." Sonic chuckled and curled up into a ball of spines, and with a haughty "Ha!" he shot earthwards, thanks to the power of the Power Ring, leaving a trail of blue stars in his wake.

- - - - -

"In the mountains, huh?"

"Affirmative."

Viper was on a comlink conversation with Metal-Sonic, who was just reporting that Dr. Kintobor's base was located in the mountains, making special emphasis on how strong security was. He also stated he made contact with Rouge, and was aiding her in finding an artifact called the Talisman of Darkness.

"Any idea what it is?"

"Negative," said Metal-Sonic through the comlink. "All that we have deduced was that it was an important artifact for a Project Solaris."

By now, Viper had already run into Shadow, and the two were both standing in the shadows of the bell tower, facing the sea. Shadow listened in the conversation, and then spoke, "Mecha, if you find the Talisman, radio in and describe what it looks like. It might be vital to know to battle the Doctor."

"Affirmative."

Viper's gold eyes met Shadow's red ones. "You're thinking what I'm thinking..."

Shadow did not need to respond. Viper was already debriefed about what Shadow found in the Kingdom Archives, about the Essences of Solaris, stored in silver talismans; more importantly that the name of this Talisman coincided with the name of the Essence of Darkness.

"The Doctor has the Talisman of Darkness," Viper began. "He attacked the Princess who had something like a talisman with red light..."

"I would be a fool into not assuming that wasn't one of the Talismans of Solaris, containing the Essence of Fire."

"Exactly." Viper nodded. "The Flames of Solaris. The Essences of Solaris. Seems pretty straightforward to me."

"It's too simple," Shadow suddenly stated. "Anyone would want the Essences for any desire, but Dr. Kintobor is a mechanical genius and was highly respected by his colleagues. He even had recognition by the king and queen of this nation. What would he need the Essences of Solaris for?"

"Metal-Sonic stated that the Talisman of Darkness was used as an important artifact. Now if the Talisman of Darkness contains the Essence of Darkness, the link to its use in the project is a clue."

Shadow nodded. "In order to gain a full understanding, we need to know what Project Solaris encompassed."

Viper sneered. "Good luck with that; anything of that importance they're sure not going to share with a shady bounty hunter and a hedgehog that they have no damn clue who we are or where we came from."

Shadow glanced aside, while Viper was cleaning the barrel of his sniper rifle.

"You thinkin' what I'm thinkin', hedgehog?" Viper said again, a toothy grin slowly etching across his face.

Shadow's eyes met Viper's eyes again, and could see exactly what he was implying.

"I think its time we go up north and pay the doctor a visit." Viper petted his rifle.

Shadow began to grin as well; sometimes he liked what the Overlander thought.

"And I know just what we can use to get up there. We have to hit the mainland; they have a warehouse there, and I spied some land jeeps that should do us just fine."

Shadow hadn't done much exploring, but Viper already seemed to know his way around. Soleanna was split into the Castle Island, which was the older more aged part of the city where the Castle stood on a high hill, and the island was connected by a long bridge to the mainland, where the newer part of the city was growing. It was simply called New Town.

The sun was already creeping towards the western horizon when they have arrived at the set of warehouses. To both the human's and hedgehog's disgust, there were very few guards, so breaking in was too easy. Making little as noise as possible, both cracked the lock of one of the far warehouses and entered the darkness inside.

"There, it's under the tarp." The human motioned with a slight nod towards a dark lump in the darkness. Shadow dared to go close and his feet crackled as he stepped on part of the tarp. Throwing the tarp inside, he saw the biggest and deadliest looking jeep he ever laid eyes on. Shadow smiled. When Viper saw a vehicle he liked, he had a very good reason to. Looking it over, he saw that it was made for humans, and it was armed on both sides with small rocket launchers. In the back trunk, he could see several rounds of spare rocket ammunition, and soon found that was not all they were taking with them as Viper would come up once and a while and throw various weapons and spare ammunition into the trunk as well.

Shadow when he was working for GUN had learned how to operate human-proportioned machinery, so driving something meant for creature nearly twice as tall as he was not an issue for him. Leaping into the driver's seat, he checked out the controls. It was mainly standard, but there was a small radar device. Shadow hoped there was a GPS, but apparently the technology of this world hadn't advanced to the point where satellites were in space. No wonder why Mecha had such a hard time communicating with them without a satellite uplink.

Viper closed the trunk. "There's enough ammunition to punch through the side of a battleship. I have to hand it to these people; they may lack military tact, but they have good tastes in weaponry."

Shadow looked over and saw Viper caressing with great care a large gun. It wasn't his sniper rifle, battle rifle or handgun. It was long and had two barrels, one on top of the other. It appeared to use pellet ammunition and had a pump-action on the barrels. It was a shotgun, and looked like it could inflict devastating damage at close to medium range. Viper always had a soft-spot for shotguns, despite the fact he favored longer-range and more accurate weapons, but the devastation a shotgun could bring in closer combat was satisfying enough for him.

Shadow thought from a great distance that carrying a weapon himself wouldn't be a bad idea either, and stepped out of the cab to find one. He had used guns extensively since the Black Arm invasion, and was always looking out for a weapon that suited his needs better. Usually, it was always a handgun. Shadow soon found a good-sized semi-automatic handgun with six magazines of ammunition, each carrying seven magnum bullets. Weighing the weapon in his hands, he found it to be a good size.

Something however soon got his attention. He was sensing something and it felt very familiar. Several minutes of wandering around feeling for the greatest concentration of this strange aura led him to a hard metal case, heavily decorated with a platinum-colored Crest of Soleanna, am angel-like figure with eagle wings. When he touched it, he felt his skin prickle. It was almost as powerful as a Chaos Emerald. Curiosity demanded that he open the box and he obeyed. A familiar rush of energy blasted through his veins as he laid eyes on the contents: a glowing green gem encased in the wings of a silver talisman.

"Viper, check this out," Shadow said, ushering the bounty hunter closer.

Viper came over to Shadow and studied the new find briefly. "One of the Talismans of Essence. Strange it's here."

"Yes, I believe it's the Talisman of the Earth," Shadow said, but soon looked at the glowing stone and soon realized what he was holding. "Viper...I believe that this is a Chaos Emerald."

Viper looked at Shadow, his face outlined by the glow of the jewel. "If that is true, there is only one way to find out."

Shadow didn't look at Viper, but knew exactly what he meant. "Chaos Control!"Shadow looked around, expecting it to have failed, but to his surprise and pleasure, the world was stone still. Viper was still hunched down to study the gem, frozen in time. "Timestart."

The world escaped from its prison of time and resumed in motion. Viper smiled. "Looks like these Essences aren't anything what they are claimed to be."

Shadow started to think. These talismans ran on the same properties of the Chaos Emeralds. Were they merely the Chaos Emeralds simply trapped within the wings of their respective talismans? Then, Shadow soon had an idea on how to get back where they came from.

"Viper, if we are to ever get back home, we must find the other six Chaos Emeralds and I am certain they are trapped in talismans like this."

"What of the Talisman of Darkness?"

Shadow didn't think that far. If that means what he thought it meant, that means the Black Chaos Emerald had also warped here with the rest. It was the most unstable but the most powerful of the Chaos Emeralds, and in the wrong hands...the most deadly.

"It is imperative to get it out of the hands of Dr. Kintobor."

"Then let's head north."

Soon enough, everything was ready. Viper took the wheel and unloaded the holsters on his back into a space between the trunk and the cab, finding this space was designed to hold extra firearms. Shadow went on foot.

Viper turned on the jeep. "Shadow, take point. We're going out in style."

The problem of getting the war machine out was presented, but Viper seeing no need for a complication and clean solution punched the jeep into high gear, smashing through the garage door of the warehouse. This obviously attracted the attention of the guards, but all they saw was a mad jeep careening at them doing fifty. It smashed through the wire-fence surrounding the warehouses. The guards dove out of the way and before any of them had a chance to recover, the jeep had careened past and heading north towards the mountains. Some fired their firearms after the driver, but to no avail.

First Kintobor crashing the Festival of the Sun, now some loon crashing through the military warehouse with their war jeep in tow. What else could go wrong?

- - - - -

Tails and Elise were going across the desert as fast as they dared to, but received very little trouble. Thanks to Tails pocket-EMP, the robots couldn't come close without coming into magnetic interference, screwing up their systems. Plus, they were under orders not to harm the Princess in any shape or form. Their internal computer ran the risk of harming the Princess if they shot at the fox, and found that the Princess had a high risk of injury if they fired. At an impasse, the computer could not come up with a logical solution to the problem.

The increasing presence of the robots was unnerving to both however. Any second now, Dr. Kintobor would find some way of getting Elise back. The robots could give an alarm and nothing besides the EMP would stop them.

Elise was concerned as well, but was more amazed at how Tails was so quick to think on his feet incase they came across a squad of robots that got in their way, let alone the EMP. Where did these people come from, and were all of them this skilled?

Suddenly, there was a crashing noise from behind, and both the fox and the girl looked back to see a blue ball of spines whizzing through the air with the sound of a buzz-saw, smashing into robots into the ground and bouncing off of them like a pinball. Both watched in fascination as this ball of spines leveled anything it contacted.

Once all the robots were thoroughly thrashed, the ball uncurled into the spiky-haired form of Sonic the Hedgehog and landed right in front of them just a few feet away. Slicking down his spines, he greeted the two with a "I thought you two would be out of here by now..."

"Did you get rid of that giant mech, Sonic?" Tails asked right away.

Sonic brushed the underside of his nose with his index finger. "You betcha! I sent that wimpy pup howling up the wrong tree in a flash." Sonic chuckled in his building cocky mood.

"Sorry it's taking us so long, but there's a lot of robots and we're trying to avoid them."

Sonic looked around. "Where? I don't see any. I see a lot of scrap, but no robots. Seeing mirages, Tails?"

Tails smiled, beginning to blush. Sonic never passed an opportunity to tease him. Elise smiled as well at their play.

Suddenly, Tails ears picked up something and pricked. The fox looked backwards towards the ruins. "Sonic, look!"

Sonic looked to where Tails was pointing, and Elise followed suit. Coming like a cloud of locusts was a swarm of robots.

"No doubt Eggman sent those after me after I made short work of the Cerberus. How long does he plan to keep this up anyway?"

"I have an idea; we'll split up! The robots know that I was with the Princess all the time during the escape so they might think I'm still taking her. That way, you can take the Princess and sneak out!"

Sonic grinned. Tails can come up with some good ideas. "Good idea, but take this." Sonic tossed Tails the talisman with the red gem trapped within its silver wings. Tails was also tossed the EMP that Elise was carrying.

"Your Highness?" Tails asked.

"You might need it more that I do, Tails, and please, call me Elise."

Tails' face felt hot. He still hadn't gotten used to the idea that he was escorting royalty.

"She's got a point, kid," Sonic added in. "You'll be the main target now. This will protect you. Don't worry about us; we'll be fine. You stay low and be careful."

Tails felt that familiar warmth that he felt every time Sonic asked him to do something. Sonic trusted that Tails would do the job, and Tails would not let him down.

"Ok, Sonic. I'll see you later!" Tails took off into the air, but not too far to the ground. He was headed directly towards Soleanna.

"Will he be okay on his own, Sonic?" Elise was truly concerned for the young fox.

"Sure!" Sonic said immediately. "Tails has been my right-hand fox for years and he has never let me down. He'll be just fine."

Elise saw that Sonic had a solid resolution about this and wasn't about to doubt. If only things in the world were that simple, Elise thought.

Sonic picked up Elise in both arms, and Elise on impulse wrapped her arms around Sonic's shoulders.

"Hold tight. I'm going to be booking it pretty hard."

"I will."

Sonic eyed the skies and saw that the robots were drifting in the direction Tails was heading and took off down a course perpendicular to the robot swarm's course. The plan was working. Sonic was going to take the long route and come to Soleanna likely the next day, but as long as Elise was safe, Sonic didn't care.

Elise had for a short while felt safe, but she felt that this was by far the end of it. That worry she felt back in the cave began to grow again. Sonic had saved her, just like he promised, but what about next time? Or the time after that? She suddenly wished she had the faith Sonic had in Tails.