(Chapter Twenty-three...
I never really liked this episode of the series. So, I'm getting it out of the way in one shot.)
"This is the tale of a man who continues to search for his own path, even when betrayed by his destiny.
"The war between the Spiral races and the Anti-Spiral was the root cause of everything.
"In order to exterminate all Möbiankind, in which Spiral Power lies dormant, the Anti-Spiral sent the Moon plummeting towards Möbius.
"It was Tails and his fellow Freedom Fighters who triggered this calamity.
"Will their struggle for freedom lead to Möbiankind's downfall?
"Having lost Cosmo, Tails is shackled by the handcuffs of despair."
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE:
We Will Survive, By Any Means Necessary
"Tails was arrested?" Vector, Mighty, and Espio shouted indignantly as Vector slammed his glass of beer on the wooden bar table.
"Yeah," Elias muttered, brushing some flecks of beer out of his hair. "And they're gonna hold a trial for him in a week."
Vector growled in frustration, slamming a fist on the table. "Silver's gone nuts!"
"Do they really think it's Tails's fault that this is happening?" Knuckles asked, his arms folded sulkily.
"I don't know," replied Elias. "But we do know that the rioters calmed down a little when Tails was taken into custody."
"Even so," Espio chimed in, "It is because of Tails's actions that Möbians were able to live on the surface."
"That's right!" Mighty added. "So we really owe him a lot for doing that for us! How could Silver and the others forg—"
A beer glass smashed into their table from an irate human at a table not too far from them.
"We owe him?" he shouted drunkenly. "It's his fault that the Moon's gonna fall on our heads!"
"Don't you damn government people have more important things to do than drink?" yelled an armadillo-like Black Arms from another table, hurling his beer bottle at the New Government officials. It shattered against the table, sending alcohol and glass flying in every direction.
Vector, Mighty, and Espio stood up, ready to start a bar brawl, Big and Bark joining them —
"No!"
It was Knuckles.
"Let them be," he said. "Bear with it."
His companions relaxed a little, but by no means were they assured that bottles and fists would not fly.
"This'll settle down soon..." Knuckles gave Elias a slightly hopeful look. "...Right?"
"I'm not so sure," Elias said, hanging his head. "You heard them out there on the way here, didn't you? 'It's all Tails's fault!' 'He's the one who brought this down on us!' 'Give us Tails!' 'Tails should pay for this!' Don't you think that that's similar to how we were when we took down the Helix King?"
"No way! Are you trying to say that Tails is like Lucus Darkoak to them? That can't be true!"
"Unfortunately, think of it from their perspective, Knuckles. The Helix King was a horrible man, don't get me wrong, but he was the lesser of two evils, really, holding back the greater evil from harming us Möbians from complete annihilation."
"But... That shouldn't be an excuse to lock him up!"
"Maybe not. But, as far as Silver is concerned, calming the people down is top priority."
絶望の手錠
"Silver... why?" Tails asked through gritted teeth, not even bothering to struggle against the cuffs around his wrists. It would be futile, with two troopers aiming machine guns at his back. But did they need to handcuff Kukku too?
Silver did not face Tails as he spoke. He had divested Tails of his Core Drill the moment his cuffs were on.
"Our defeat of Lucus Darkoak is what set this catastrophe in motion. The Great Freedom Fighters are to blame for the Moon falling towards us. The citizens' anger is being directed at the New Government. Your conversation with Cosmo was broadcast live across the world. Everyone on Möbius now knows that the Moon will collide with the planet in three weeks' time. Your reckless fight earlier was also seen by all of Sonic City. I can no longer protect you."
"Protect me?"
"In their eyes, you and Sonic are now no different from Darkoak. In order to placate them, we would punish you in the same manner. Exactly as we could not restrain ourselves from doing seven years ago."
Anger boiled in Tails's chest.
"Placate them? And what happens after you put me down? How will you stop the Moon falling?"
"I do not need to tell a convict of my plans to save the people," Silver said coldly. "This is your cell. Please wait in here until your trial."
"Trial?"
"We are a nation of laws now, Miles. Questions of war responsibility will be handled in your trial."
Silver turned his back on Tails.
"I have nothing further to say."
Tails bolted up to Silver.
"Wait!"
But the door had already shut in Tails's face.
Tails yelled at the door, "THIS IS EXACTLY HOW YOUR DAD DID THINGS BACK AT GALAHAD VILLAGE, SILVER! YOU AREN'T ANY DIFFERENT!" and Kukku shook a ball-shaped fist at the door, his ball turning into a spiral.
Silver, freezing momentarily at Tails's words, turned to the two troopers who escorted him.
"I will return to my office now," he said. "At ease, men."
They saluted, and departed.
In five minutes' time, he stood outside his office door, and was greeted by Blaze.
"Silver— I mean, Chief Adviser, I hope there was no trouble in escorting... the prisoner... to his waiting cell?"
"No," Silver said calmly. "I was blunt, but tactful."
Blaze looked down at Silver's shoes. "Did you tell him that this isn't... a coup d'état?"
Silver lowered his gaze. "I was unable to secure a moment alone with him. My guards were persistent. If I lose face around anyone, they will be crying for my blood next."
"I see..."
"Tails is safer out of the public's reach. Who knows what a vigilante would do to him if he...?"
"But where you're sending him is..."
"Only until we have avoided the Möbiankind Annihilation System. Then, Blaze, we will issue Tails a full pardon."
"And if we don't avoid it?"
Silver's answer was silence.
"I have important paperwork, Blaze," Silver lied. "If you'll excuse me."
"Yes, sir," Blaze bowed aside, and Silver stepped into his office.
Silver stepped up to his desk, stared down at the plaque there that read 'CHIEF ADVISER SILVER', discarded in favor of one which read 'NEW SUPREME COMMANDER SILVER'...
And burst into tears, hands grasping the edge of the table for support.
Blaze, lingering outside the door, heard these sobs, and gasped silently.
She knew what he was going through to put their Great Freedom Fighters leader through this.
暴動
"So it's true? They arrested Tails?"
"Marine, don't shout," Elias said hurriedly. "But yes, it happened last night just after the battles ended."
"Why? That's so bloody messed up! Silver's become a right old fruit loop!"
Meg, who was weaning Alexis onto a baby bottle, gave the orange raccoon girl a sharp glance.
"Marine, please keep it down. Allie is still easily frightened."
"Oops," Marine smiled nervously.
"Still," Elias said. "What Silver said does make a bit of sense. But locking Tails up may only be a temporary solution."
Marine lounged over one of the couches. "That Silver bloke may have it up here—" Marine tapped her forehead. "—but he's short in here." She tapped her heart. "What does Blaze see in 'im?"
"It's one thing to talk like that in here," Elias warned, "But don't let the people out there hear you talking like that." He cast a cautious look out the window; even in this suburban area, an occasional protestor strode by carrying a sign bearing some declamation against the New Government. "You never know what will set people off these days."
モリー
Molly supposed her headstrong demeanor was part of the reason why she was chosen to be a Fremerald pilot. That, and her friends Charmy and Cream had become the Captains of the Fremerald Squadron, so she had a bit more of an easy way in than most. Not to say that she got in on connections alone; Molly supposed she was a good pilot.
And right now she was in a meeting with Director Rotor in the Science Bureau, along with Charmy and Cream.
"So, what you have, Director?" she asked, folding her arms.
"Just Rotor is fine," Rotor said from his console, not looking up.
"Okay, Rotor," Molly smiled, uncrossing her arms, "What are the details of that enemy mecha?"
Rotor stopped typing, saved his work, and pulled up a computer simulation of the Anti-Spiral's vanguard mecha, showing blocky Fremerald models around it, each with a Fremerald Rifle in hand.
"From what we can tell, the Zoah's AT Field can be breached by using the Giga Drill to reflect its beam back at it," Rotor said. "The real problem is, how do we keep its body from exploding and causing so much collateral damage?"
"It is a tricky enemy," Cream added.
Rotor nodded in agreement.
"What I don't get is how come Freedom Emerl is superior to the Fremeralds?" Charmy snapped. "It's unfair for the prototype to be more powerful than the production line."
"I wish I knew," Rotor shrugged. "There must be something we missed in the Freedom Emerl research. That, and there weren't enough materials to generate a true Emerl replica."
"So, what do you think is gonna happen with Tails?" asked Chris, descending on a chair mounted on a robot arm.
"You mean his arrest?" Rotor asked.
Bean popped in, the robotic arm holding his chair moving erratically with his quirky hand movements.
"Arrest?" Bean quacked. "Is he gonna be executed?"
"Don't say that, Bean!" Charmy said hotly.
"I think Silver may have something up his sleeve," Rotor said, poring over his Zoah data again. "Anyway, our task at hand is to develop new weapons to combat the Anti-Spiral mechas."
"Looks like it's more all-nighters, then," Chris said wearily.
Rotor turned to Bean, holding out a thin slice of data-lined emerald. "Bean, turn this report in to Silver."
"You got it!"
Bean slammed a fist on his control pad...
And Rotor's chair spun like crazy.
"Wh-wh-wh-what... a-a-a-are... y-y-y-you... d-d-d-doing?" Rotor stuttered as he spun.
It stopped abruptly, Rotor's eyes spinning.
"I said, 'Turn in this report', not 'Turn me'," Rotor said dizzily.
And inspiration struck.
"Wait... Turning..." Rotor beamed. "That's it! Bean, do that again!"
"You got it!"
And Rotor's chair spun like crazy.
Again.
"I said, not me!" Rotor shouted.
Bean just laughed.
ブルータイフーン
"We've completed our survey of underground cities," Ash said to the Darkoak Head. "There are 91 cities scattered about the world that are 1000 or more meters underground; these geofronts are far enough underground and shielded heavily enough, we presume, to survive the lunar impact. They are capable of holding a collective total of 1,920,000 people."
The Darkoak Head nodded, affirming Ash's statement.
"That's wonderful news," said Blaze, a relieved smile appearing on her face. "That's more than we expected."
Silver said, "I guess we owe a debt of gratitude to the Möbians of the past who built these cities at the height of their civilizations."
"Still," Ash added, "Those Möbians were no match for Darkoak, who was himself no match for the Anti-Spiral."
"It doesn't matter," Silver said strongly. "We will survive, by any means necessary."
"That leaves 1,080,000 people," Blaze said.
"The citizens of Sonic City will be especially difficult, it seems," Silver noted.
"In my old life," said the Darkoak Head, "I brought this to the planet, in the event that this would happen."
A holographic projector at the base of the bio-computer's nutrient tube, showing the three New Government officials what the Darkoak Head was talking about.
They gasped.
"W-where is it, Darkoak?" Silver asked.
"At Level EE, below Sonic City's Parliament Complex," it said simply.
Minutes later, Silver, Blaze, and Ash were taking the elevator down to Level EE. It was far lower than the elevator was supposed to go, but evidently the LDH bio-computer sent a signal to the elevator's AI system, telling it that Lucus Darkoak wanted to descend to that level.
The walls on all sides of the elevator turned to glass, and they entered an impossibly large hangar, which contained before them, an impossibly large ship, shaped like a drill, but with no grooves down its length, predominantly white, with yellow and blue highlights.
"Amazing...!" Blaze breathed. "That has to be larger than the Parliament Complex!"
"Naturally, the Helix King would have kept this card up his sleeve," Silver stated levelly. "This is Möbiankind's last hope!"
裁判
The gavel came down.
"I will now hand down the sentence," Silver said, giving Tails - at the defendant's plinth - a dispassionate gaze. "The defendant, Miles 'Tails' Prower, is guilty of instigating a war against the Anti-Spiral, and is hereby sentenced... to death."
The Great Freedom Fighters - gathered in the stands behind Tails - rose in outrage.
"No way!" Knuckles shouted.
"Get real!" Vector called out.
"How is that a fair verdict?" yelled Ari.
"This doesn't make any sense!" Mighty bellowed.
Knuckles cast a glance around the court room.
"First of all, it was crazy to make Big act as Tails's defense attorney—" Knuckles pointed at the large purple cat in a large black suit, looking quite perplexed about his position. "—and Ash was the prosecutor—" Knuckles pointed at the mongoose, looking somewhat smug in his white suit (Blaze, beside him, tried to look as insignificant as she could). "—and you were the judge!" Knuckles pointed at Silver. "You never had any intention of giving Tails a fair trial! It only started ten minutes ago!"
Silver banged the gavel.
"I will have order in the court, Legal Affairs Bureau Chief Knuckles," Silver replied coolly. "If no one is held responsible for the Anti-Spiral's declaration of war, the public will not be satisfied. Who should we hold responsible, if not Supreme Commander Prower? He is the one who ended the Helix King's life, loosing the floodgates of the Anti-Spiral's wrath."
"But that's no reason to execute him!"
"This may quiet the unrest for now, Silver," Elias said, "But what about later? What about the falling Moon? It's been a week and already the Moon is getting bigger in the sky!"
"An evacuation plan is already underway," Silver answered. "In order to survive, we must quiet down this unrest by whatever means available, and then take calm, swift action."
From his stand, Ash stood and nodded, "Yes, and with Chief Adviser Silver— no, with New Supreme Commander Silver at the heart of this plan."
Murmurs broke out throughout the court room.
"New Supreme Commander...?" growled Knuckles. "Is this some kinda coup d'état, Silver?"
"This is nothing of the sort," was Silver's reply. "The Chief Adviser is next in the line of succession behind the Supreme Commander by law, and the moment he was found guilty of war crimes, I succeeded him..."
But Tails had long since lost his attention for these proceedings.
He was to be executed. When, he did not know. Where, he did not know. How, he did not know.
But he wasn't needed anymore.
He'd never felt more helpless.
Sonic... he thought, staring into a light in the ceiling. If you were in my shoes... what would you do...?
Tails swung his head down to stare at his feet...
And stopped midway.
An array of red, green, and pink data lines was glowing in front of him. The cold blue eyes bored into his own.
"Cosmo...?"
Shouts of surprise shot across the room like firecrackers.
"When did she get here?"
"What the...?"
"How did she...?"
Cosmo - floating before Tails's plinth - tilted her dark head slightly, so that her voice would carry through the rest of the room.
"What we Anti-Spiral seek for you Spiral races is absolute despair," she said in her robotic tone. "There is not an iota of hope for you, Spiral race."
"What are you saying, Cosmo?" Tails shouted, slamming his fists into the railing separating him from his once-fiancée. "What do you mean, absolute despair? Why are you doing this?"
Cosmo did not answer, but floated towards Tails, her arms lifting up like a sleepwalker, her hands slowly gliding into place on either side of Tails's face, clasping his head between her hands. For a wild moment, Tails thought she was going to kiss him...
She stopped until her eyes, like blue lights on a computer bank, filled his entire forward vision.
"For the next two weeks, meet your end in suffering as you cling desperately to life."
Trying to avoid such an intense gaze, Tails's eyes drifted to the right, towards Cosmo's left hand, the hand where she had put on her engagement ring in her last moments as herself...
And it was still there.
But, Tails thought, Why wasn't that broken down when she became a program? Why is she keeping it on? Hope sprang in Tails's heart. Unless she's...
He turned his gaze back to Cosmo, but a digital window opened behind her, and she slowly pulled back and retreated into it.
"No! Cosmo, don't go!"
But the moment the digital window closed, alarms and klaxons blared throughout the court room and the surrounding Parliament Complex.
Silver pulled out a cell phone, "Helen! What's the situation?"
"I'm picking up a Zoah above the planned shelter area of Acorn," said Helen's voice over the PA system into the court room - Elias clenched his fist over the railing. "It's much larger than any we've seen before!"
The Blue monday e"r"ectrical parade
A digital window opened up over Acorn Village, far from Sonic City.
Descending from it was a Zoah, but it had no horns on what passed for a head (which was itself very flat and disc-like), and the lower half of its body was a rack from which dozens of normal-sized Zoah were hanging.
"Th-this is Acohn Village!" cried out Bunnie into her mic. "We got ahh-selves a big ol' Zoah clustah comin' down on us...!"
Blue lightning crackled around the Zoah Steed...
And Acorn Village vanished in a crack of thunder.
眠れペースで
The recording of Acorn Village's last cry for help had reached the court room where Miles "Tails" Prower had just received his sentence.
Elias fought back tears as he realized that his home village was gone.
"The Zoah have apparently begun moving towards Sonic City," Ash said dispassionately.
"This trial is over!" Silver said shortly. "To the Operations Room!"
He turned to leave.
"Silver!" came a shout from the defendant's plinth. Every eye turned on it, and Silver half-turned to face Tails there.
Tails gave Silver a look of fierce determination.
"Let me pilot Freedom Emerl!"
"What...?"
"Freedom Emerl is our only way of fighting them!"
"So," Ash quipped, "You hope to overturn your sentence by indulging in your heroism?"
"That's not it at all, you!" Tails snapped. "I just want to protect the city!"
"Even so, you are a convicted criminal, a condemned man," Silver said. "How do we know you will not attempt to escape in Freedom Emerl?"
Knuckles stood again, "Silver, you son of a bitch!"
"Then wire me up with a bomb!" Tails shouted. "If I look like I'm gonna run, you can push the button!"
Every Great Freedom Fighter present gave Tails a look of shock and awe; did he really want to go that far to pilot Freedom Emerl?
Silver and Tails continued to attempt to stare the other down. And just as Silver began to open his mouth—
His cell phone rang.
"New Supreme Commander Silver," he answered. "...It's done? ...Good. Dispatch them." A hint of a smile appeared on Silver's face. "Very good, Director Rotor. Bye."
He closed his cell phone.
"What was that?" Tails asked.
"Freedom Emerl has been made obsolete," Silver said shortly, holding up Tails's Core Drill. "It will be dismantled. We don't need you anymore."
For a moment, Knuckles thought that Tails was going to insist that he pilot Freedom Emerl, and that he would not rest until Silver acquiesced...
So he was surprised when Tails nodded slowly and said, "I understand."
Silver addressed the two troopers behind him.
"Take him away."
燃えてばかりでいいのかい?
"Alright, you Zoah bastards!" Charmy shouted. "We're gonna show you what the Fremeralds can really do!"
Each Fremerald carried a weapon, but these were markedly different from their guns and blades. Cream's Fremerald, Cheese, carried a missile launcher decorated with spiral lines down its barrel. Charmy's, Buzz Buzz, carried a spiral-decorated rifle, as did Molly's Fremerald, Cascade, as well as the two other Fremeralds.
"Let's go! Tornado Formation!" Charmy ordered.
The Fremeralds broke their flying formation as they met the Zoah Steed some distance between the Capital and the remains of Acorn Village, spiralling around Cream's Gizoid as they flew to meet the enemy Zoah.
"Spiral Bomber, fire!" Cream shouted, the spiral markings on her missile launcher glowing as a blue blast of energy tore towards the Anti-Spiral mecha.
The many normal-sized Zoah began to break free.
"Oh no you don't!" Charmy yelled. "Erect the Tornado Shield!"
The four spiralling Fremeralds fired their Tornado rifles simultaneously, the blue rays of energy twisting around each other as they lanced towards the Zoah.
The Spiral Bomber struck first.
The Zoah Steed began to transform into polygons.
The Tornado Shield struck next, trapping the normal-sized Zoah.
The Zoah Steed burst apart, the polygonal shards of explosive energy colliding with the walls of the Tornado Shield, causing all the regular Zoah to self-destruct as well.
Not a single explosive charge struck the landscape.
In the Science Bureau, Chris was beside himself.
"You did it, Rotor!" he said brightly.
"Making it in time is part of the job, Chris," Rotor said sagely. "Now, we gotta refine it so that the Tornado Shield fires from the same armament as the Spiral Bomber..."
ブルータイフーン
Television screens all around Möbius showed the same image of the Great Freedom Fighters emblem bearing the message: 'WE INTERRUPT THIS BROADCAST FOR AN IMPORTANT MESSAGE', followed by a blonde-haired human woman saying, "Stand by for an urgent message from the government. I repeat, stand by for an urgent message from the government."
(Sound-only devices played the sound of this message only.)
A silver hedgehog appeared on every television on the planet, his hands folded on his desk.
"My fellow Möbians. I am New Supreme Commander Silver, and I bear ill tidings... and words of hope. The surface will be severely damaged by an attack involving dropping the Moon, carried out by unknown enemies calling themselves the Anti-Spiral. In response, the New Government pressed charges against ex-Supreme Commander Miles 'Tails' Prower. As a result of his trial today, he was sentenced to death."
Cheers erupted all about Möbius at Silver's words, and he paused for a period of time he felt appropriate to allow people to let their feelings loose. He did not betray any emotion at Tails's situation, but continued after about ten seconds.
"To protect its citizens from the impending lunar impact, the government will carry out a large-scale evacuation plan. Citizens will be evacuated to 91 giant underground shelters around the world. Residents in the Sonic City area, which has no shelter, will temporarily leave the stratosphere in the Superdreadnought Star Meta-Gizoid." Silver's brows furrowed. "And this is that Star Meta-Gizoid: The Blue Typhoon!"
Silver's image was replaced with that of a large starship, long and white, with blue and yellow accents.
ブルータイフーン
Blue Typhoon
Around Möbius, murmurs of assent and awe rumbled.
After five seconds of the Blue Typhoon's image, Silver's returned.
"Have faith in the New Government! We will not be defeated by the Anti-Spiral!" Silver held up a fist. "We will survive, no matter what!"
Three million Möbians across the world erupted in cheers. In Sonic City's central square - which had since been cleared of the debris of Sonic's statue - certain voices stood out, many chanting Silver's name.
"YES!"
"This will keep us alive!"
"We're gonna survive!"
Silver felt a bizarre mixture of elation and guilt. He so wanted to be able to save these people, but he did not want to have sent Tails away out of sight, in the hopes that the people would not try to put him down personally.
It wasn't the best place to hide Tails away, but it was safer than most places.
When this is all over, Silver thought, I will apologize profusely to Tails for my recent actions...
ラップは漢の魂…だった…よな…
Tails did not resist the removal of his New Government outfits, nor did he put up a fight when he was herded into a cargo elevator at the edge of Sonic City with other, similarly convicted criminals.
Nor when the other convicts began to deliberate bump their elbows into his sides roughly, or when they "accidentally" stepped on his feet or his tails.
He wasn't needed anymore.
He'd done his part.
Now it was Silver's turn to save Möbius.
The cargo elevator rumbled to life, taking him down...
マイルス "テイルス" パウアー元総司令
Former Supreme Commander Miles "Tails" Prower,
超弩級戦犯により
by reason of major war crimes,
死刑
is sentenced to death
The elevator took Tails down into a subterranean prison constructed mostly from purple stone.
Tails, who once aimed for the heavens, was now being forced back underground.
刑の執行までマーブル刑務所に収監。
To be held in Marble Prison until sentence carried out.
After being strip-searched, deloused, and debriefed, Tails was led to his cell, and the guard unlocked it. Evidently, he was sympathetic to Tails's plight, because he did not manhandle Tails's wrists as he undid Tails's handcuffs, nor did he roughly shove Tails in as he had the other prisoners in Tails's group.
Tails looked up at the ceiling, and sighed deeply.
"Well, well... Look who we have here..."
Tails's breath caught in his chest. It couldn't be... Not in the cell next to his... The odds were so great...
But there was no mistaking that black fur, with red stripes, or those blood-colored eyes, or that derisive tone...
"Welcome to Marble Prison... 'Supreme Commander'," sneered Shadow.
つづく
To be continued...
次回予告
Next Episode Preview
Even hope will change to despair in an instant.
The best option quickly unravels and becomes the worst possible choice.
But I will still make that decision.
And then, they will...
Next time on Tengen Toppa Freedom Emerl: "How Far Does God Intend to Test Us?".