(Chapter Twenty-six. My summer job kept me away from writing for a little longer than I'd intended. But I'm back, even if writing this was slower than I would have liked.)
"This is the tale of a man who continues to search for his own path, even when betrayed by his destiny.
"Tails is thrown into prison as a war criminal.
"What he finds waiting for him there is a former enemy: Shadow.
"Elsewhere, Silver is informed that the Moon's impact will deal a fatal blow to Möbius.
"Amidst the battle, the Blue Typhoon abandons a great many people as it lifts off.
"But Cosmo, who has become the Anti-Spiral Messenger program, is prevented in her bid to kill Tails by the shocking return of Sally.
"What is her story for these past six years?"
ｿﾞｰｱがいっぱい
"How many were we able to bring aboard?" Silver asked, as steadily as he could.
Blaze brought up a number on her console. "We have confirmation of approximately 530,400 people."
Silver's heart sank. "Less than half of what we'd planned..."
Then every alarm on the Blue Typhoon went off at once.
"Enemies detected!" Helen called out from her terminal. "Two Zoah! Huge ones! And thousands of smaller ones!"
Silver went white. Both of the Zoah behemoths, larger than the Blue Typhoon itself by far, came into view. One had two large horns instead of a head, and the other a flat, pyramid-like head. They had black rings revolving around opposing shoulders.
"This was a trap all along...?" Silver gasped.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX:
You Are Someone Who Ought To Survive
一年前
One year earlier
On South Island...
"C'mon, give it back!" cried the little red echidna, tears on his face red with anger.
"If you don't like it, take it back!" sneered Rutan, who was taller than Knecapeon "Kneecaps" Mace, and therefore assumed that the little echidna was weak. He was currently holding Mace's raggedy old duffel bag just out of his reach, lifting it up whenever he made a leap for it.
"Oop!" Rutan tossed the bag into the air and caught it, for Kneecaps had made a particularly high jump. "You're too slow, Kneecaps!" he said in an obnoxious sing-song tone.
Kneecaps fell to his knees, sobbing.
Then the school bell began to ring, and Rutan bolted, dropping the duffel bag in the process as he yelled, "Wahh, I'm late, I'm late!"
A girl echidna Kneecaps's age walked up to him from behind, sighing.
"You're hopeless, you know that, Mace?" She held out a hand. "Here, let me help you up."
"Thanks, Demi-Na," he said, but before he'd even lifted a hand from the ground...
"Wait."
Both children turned to the voice.
There was a woman in her mid-twenties, part chipmunk and part squirrel by her looks. She had long red hair and glasses, and wore a conservative blue dress suit. Beside her sat a yellow levi-cycle.
"You can get up on your own, right?" she said kindly.
Tentatively, Kneecaps pulled himself up. The lady smiled and patted him on the head.
"That's better... big guy," she said with a gentle smile, before climbing back onto her levi-cycle and gliding past to the school building.
To Demi-Na's dismay - and jealousy? - Kneecaps had not taken his eyes off her the whole time.
Minutes later, they and their fellow students stood outside the school building, facing their old teacher, Hawking The Echidna, in his wheelchair. The lady from before stood beside him.
"Children, I'd like to introduce your new teacher to you," said Hawking softly.
"She's a real babe!" Rutan whispered to Demi-Na. "I heard she's from the mainland!"
"Oh come on!" Demi-Na hissed back. "She isn't even that good-looking!"
Beside her, Kneecaps was starstruck.
"She's our teacher..." he said, as though Christmas had come early.
"My name is Alicia," said the new teacher, her arms and smile wide. "I hope that we all become good friends."
熱砂の荒野を抜けて大グレン団が行くのだ
After the children left for the day, Hawking showed Alicia to her quarters, which were once his when he was teacher. It was a humble cabin next to the schoolhouse.
"I'm sorry about all the clutter," he said, moving a cowboy hat from off a small clock. "It used to be the night guard house, but it's still livable at least."
Alicia swept the room swiftly but thoroughly, and smiled at the elderly echidna as she opened her suitcase.
"Thank you for everything," she said.
Hawking returned the smile feebly, turning his cowboy hat over and over in his hands.
"We call this a school, but I'm the only staffer. Some new blood is a godsend."
"I see."
Hawking squinted. "Still, I can't see why someone as famous as you would come out here to South Island."
Alicia looked away, pulling open the window.
"Are you sure you don't have me mistaken for somebody else?" Alicia said, slightly stiffly. "I'm just Alicia, a new schoolteacher."
Hawking waved a hand apologetically. "Oh, pardon a two-hundred-year-old echidna. We old people tend to blurt things out."
The cries of farewell from the last few straggling students reached Alicia's window, and she waved tenderly after them.
A gentle, almost motherly smile graced her lips.
"Those children are the first to be born on the surface," she said. "I want to make sure that someone is there to watch over them."
Hawking nodded. "Yes. The sun and sky are still new to me, and I do not want these children to have a life without them."
Hawking rolled out a couple minutes later, and Alicia unloaded her materials from her suitcase. Unwrapping a long parcel which she had brought in discreetly, to avoid suspicion, she uncovered a sniper rifle called Nicole.
For Alicia was really Sally of Acorn Village, and she had taken it upon herself to make sure that these children had happy, carefree lives under the sky. It was her way of ensuring that Sonic's dream of the surface being a paradise for all Möbiankind would always come true every day. For she still loved the idiot hedgehog, even though his soul had departed to the hall of heroes.
For the five years since she'd left the nascent Sonic City, she had moved around from schoolhouse to schoolhouse around Möbius, never teaching the children for more than a year each, before moving on. Every time, she'd left when the children puzzled out her true identity as Sally of Acorn Village. She did not want to draw unwanted attention to herself, especially if their parents believed them. Better to clear out early. Sally did not want her contribution to their growing up in this world on the surface to be tainted by their knowing that she helped to make it possible in a very palpable way.
Sally stuffed Nicole into the back of the closet, along with her extra sets of 'Miss Alicia' clothes.
It was a good thing her middle name was not relevant in the logs of history.
リゾートライフのイロハ
Over the months that Sally taught under the alias of Miss Alicia, she had given the children lessons in everything from exercise to singing to mathematics. She made sure to do so with a warm smile the whole time, to endear herself to the children, because children learned best when they were having fun as well.
Within a week, the children all loved their Miss Alicia.
Almost a year after she became the teacher at South Island...
"...until six years ago," Sally recited from her history book, "all Möbiankind lived their entire lives in underground villages, and did not know that the sun or the sky existed. And then, the two who set us all free were Sonic... and Tails."
Sally's eyes flicked down to the photograph of the Great Freedom Fighters, standing before the decapitated Great MetaRex.
There she was. As clear as day. There was no mistaking it.
And if she could see herself in the picture...
"Hey!" Knecapeon hissed to Demi-Na, pointing at his textbook. "It's Miss Alicia!"
Demi-Na narrowed her eyes. "No way, that's not—"
A piece of chalk flew between their heads and left a crack in the wall ten feet behind them. Sweat beaded on their foreheads as they looked at Miss Alicia, tossing another piece of chalk in her free hand.
"No chatting in class," Miss Alicia winked, "Got it?"
A minute later, both Kneecaps and Demi-Na were standing in the hall, each holding a bucket of water.
"How come I'm being punished, too?" Demi-Na muttered, barely heard over the snickers of Rutan and his posse back in the classroom.
The next day...
"Good morning, every—" Kneecaps began, but stopped when he saw Rutan snickering whenever he looked at the board.
Turning, Kneecaps was aghast to see a chalk drawing of him and Demi-Na inside a heart.
"Ignore it," Demi-Na said. "If you let them get to you, it'll only make it worse."
Then Kneecaps noticed Miss Alicia walking in, and frantically began to erase the blatant lie from the board, ignoring Miss Alicia's look of polite puzzlement - and Demi-Na's scowl - as he mumbled to himself over and over, "It's a lie... it's a big, fat lie."
That afternoon, as they were preparing to leave, Kneecaps was horrified to find that his duffel bag was missing. He overturned everything in the classroom looking for it, then ran outside.
And he found it.
Someone had put it at the top of the tree.
"My bag! Who put it up there?" he squealed.
"Oh, c'mon, it's just a stupid bag!" Rutan scoffed. "Get another one!"
Kneecaps faced Rutan, tears streaming from his eyes. "But... that bag belonged to my dead mom. It's all I have to remember her by!"
Demi-Na, who was nearby, let out a soft gasp.
Kneecaps grabbed Rutan by the front of his shirt.
Rutan was glaring at Kneecaps, but there was a little bit of uncertainty as well. "Go get it yourself!"
"No, Mace!" Demi-Na said hastily. "I'll get it for—"
"Fine!" snapped Kneecaps, throwing Rutan to the ground. "I'll go get it myself!"
And, with the entire class watching in rapt terror, Kneecaps began to climb the tree.
Miss Alicia and Hawking were in the teacher's office when Demi-Na ran in.
"Demi-Na?" Miss Alicia said.
"Is something wrong?" asked Hawking.
"Miss Alicia! Mister Hawking! Mace is..."
A minute later, the two teachers were watching as well.
"Knecapeon!" Miss Alicia called out.
"Don't shout," Hawking said lowly. "If he loses his concentration..."
"What's he doing, climbing a tree like that?" Miss Alicia asked. "It's getting dark out."
"That bag is a memento from his mother, Lara-Le," Hawking explained. "She was from Gawain Village on the mainland, but it was destroyed by a horrendous Gizoid of the Helix King's army. She lost her son, Knukalxamac, in the hell that ensued. Fleeing to this island, which was safe from the Helix Empire, she took up with a native man named Wynmacher, but died of illness when Knecapeon was still an infant. Wynmacher himself was killed by a Black Arms three years ago, and young master Mace had to make his way on his own since. I'm afraid that he has never really fit in after all this time."
At that moment, the branch under Kneecaps's right foot gave way, and his grip nearly slipped - Miss Alicia and Hawking and most of the class gasped, but Demi-Na shrieked - but Kneecaps grasped tightly at a thick branch and continued to climb.
A sigh of relief swept the class.
After another minute or so, Kneecaps had reached the topmost branch of the tree, grabbing it off and smiling.
"Got it!"
Then he looked down.
Everyone was like ants at this height.
Kneecaps screamed.
"Don't look down!" shouted Miss Alicia, and Demi-Na had never heard her sounding so forceful before.
Miss Alicia tore the lower half of her dress off, revealing lean, toned legs.
She leapt to the tree, climbing it much faster than Kneecaps did.
Gasps of shock ran like a wave through the crowd of kids.
In no time at all, Miss Alicia was sitting beside Kneecaps on a large branch.
"Miss Alicia..."
"That was crazy, wasn't it?" she smiled at him, putting a hand on his head.
"I know," he hugged the duffel bag closer to his chest, "But Mommy gave me this."
He looked out from the tree, across the waters surrounding the island, the sun setting on his and Miss Alicia's left, the Moon on their right, illuminating the distant silhouette of the Parliament Complex of Sonic City.
"I hate this island," said Kneecaps, "because Mommy isn't here anymore."
Looking down at the young Echidna, Sally saw that his eyes were sparkling with the light from the ocean.
"But... I do think this view is really pretty."
Sally nodded in agreement.
"I saw a view like this once before," she told him. And it was true: when Tails and Sonic had first come to the surface, when Emerl had thrown itself into the clouds in its great burst of Spiral Power. "I was with a boy who was a lot like you."
"Like me?"
"Mm-hmm. And I also made a lot of new friends. We did all kinds of things, working together to create a better tomorrow." Sally looked down at her hands, folded on her lap. "There were some people who died, though."
Kneecaps looked uneasy.
"I think," Sally said softly, "you should hold your mother's memories deep in your heart. Remember her as best as you can."
Cries from below along the general lines of Kneecaps! You okay up there? echoed up from the student body.
"Do you hate the people here?" Sally asked.
Kneecaps smiled, shaking his head.
A couple minutes later, Miss Alicia descended the tree, Kneecaps holding on to her shoulders. As soon as she set him down, Rutan and his posse began to mob Kneecaps.
"That was awesome, man!" Rutan said. "You climbed that huge tree all by yourself! We've gotta call you Mace now! Mace The Tree-Climber!"
Mace The Tree-Climber! cheered the rest of the class.
Except Demi-Na.
She hung her head in shame.
Mace didn't notice. "Th-thank you," he said lowly.
メビウス人殲滅システム
That night, Sally kicked back on her chair, looking over the test papers from that day, pushing the glasses up her nose.
Then her television turned on.
It showed an image of a green-haired woman Sally knew, but with glowing red lines cutting through her skin, a cold-blue fire in her eyes, being projected in front of the Moon.
And she spoke with a cold, robotic voice.
"Hear me, Möbius. We, the race now known only as the Anti-Spiral, have determined that Möbiankind, in achieving capacity for breaching the atmosphere, has reached Spiral Power Danger Level II. We hereby activate the Möbiankind Annihilation System."
Moments later, before Sally had fully processed this information, the television screen shut off.
The tests forgotten, Sally tuned her television into the nearest news channel, to find out what in the world that was about.
An hour or so later, a Breaking News bulletin appeared, regarding an incoming video from their mobile unit. The ensuing video showed Cosmo, atop the Great MetaRex Memorial Complex, and Tails, at its base, cutting back and forth between the two.
"...seven years since you came to the surface," Cosmo said robotically. "Look at how far Möbian civilization has come in that short span of time." Cosmo spread her arms wide, as though indicating a broad change. "Do you not find the speed somewhat suspicious? That is the potential of a Spiral race. Having achieved capacity for sending machinery into orbit, Möbian civilization will advance explosively. They will become a power that will threaten our own. Ergo, we will destroy you before that can happen."
"That's what the Möbiankind Annihilation System is?" Tails shouted, looking angry. "That mecha earlier?"
And one minute after that, Sally's world crashed around her with Cosmo's heartless message:
"In three weeks' time, the Moon will leave its orbit, and impact Möbius. And that will be the end of it."
A week later...
The television was wheeled into the classroom, and the emergency broadcast was shown to the students and Sally. Silver had his hands folded on a 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." He paused to let the words sink in.
"Miss Alicia!" squeaked Demi-Na, clutching at Sally's dress.
She laid a counseling hand on the girl's head.
"Don't worry," she said, "Let's put our faith in the New Government."
Silver continued dispassionately, "...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..."
"What the hell are you people doing?" Sally muttered to herself.
The next week, a week before lunar impact...
"Listen, everyone!" said Hawking as loudly as he could. "A Gizoid-boat will be here shortly to transport us to the mainland, where will we then proceed to our underground shelter. We will stay in there until the Moon's impact has ceased having any effect on Möbius, so make sure you didn't forget anything."
Suddenly, Demi-Na burst into tears.
"Demi-Na!" Mace shouted, reaching out to her.
"Don't touch me! I'm a big, fat liar!" she cried. "I was the one who put your bag up there, Mace! I thought, I'm a really good tree-climber, and I thought if I put your bag up in the tree and blamed Rutan and his friends for it and then went and got it for you..."
"Demi-Na..."
"I didn't know that bag was from your mom, Mace," Demi-Na was almost unintelligible in her grief, "I didn't know how much it meant to you. I can't go with you guys! Mace, I'm sorry...!"
But Mace took her hand anyway, and smiled.
"Let's all run away together, Demi-Na!" he said brightly.
Rutan and his gang cheered.
Demi-Na's tears slowed. "Mace..."
Ring-ring-ring...
Sally looked down at her pocket.
"My phone...? I have a message...?"
Seeing that it was from Silver, Sally excused herself - which she had been meaning to do anyway; she was sure that her presence was needed back in Sonic City - and retreated back to her shed, her home of the last year.
Silver's message was prerecorded, and he looked and sounded quite anxious.
"Sally, I'd like you to come to Sonic City as soon as you hear this message. Please come aboard the Blue Typhoon. The Moon will destroy the surface when it lands. You are someone who ought to survive!
"Please, contact me immediately!"
Those last four words repeated in an endless loop, even as Sally pulled out her rifle Nicole from the closet, pulled off the dust cover, and set it beside the levi-cycle which she had brought inside as well.
Then she tore off her Miss Alicia outfit, revealing a flame-decal bra and blue panties.
Sally pulled on her blue vest and black short-shorts, pulling her long hair into a ponytail.
She removed her glasses.
Miss Alicia was absent today.
Sally of Acorn Village would fill in for now.
"So..." she asked Silver's endlessly repeating plea, "this is what you call 'government', Silver? Give me a break!"
From the outside, it happened suddenly.
Miss Alicia's yellow levi-cycle blasted out of her roof. And Miss Alicia rode astride it. She had a very familiar rifle in her hands, and was wearing a very familiar vest, flame-decal bra, short-shorts, and boots...
Mace pulled out his textbook.
"I knew it!" he said in awe, pointing out Sally of the Great Freedom Fighters. "She's the same as in our textbook!"
The levi-cycle touched down, pointing at Sonic City at the edge of the horizon.
And the students crowded around it.
"Miss Alicia!"
"Sensei!"
"Are you really leaving us, Miss Alicia?"
"I knew it, you really were Sally, Miss Alicia!" Mace said, tears in his eyes. She was like a mother to him, and now she was leaving. It was like losing his mommy all over again.
Sally leaned down, shaking her head. "That's not true. I will always be your teacher, Miss Alicia."
The children cheered.
"That's right! You're South Island's Miss Alicia!"
"Alicia-sensei!'
"Miss Alicia!"
Sally looked up at the dark circle which now took up most of the sky.
"I'll get it back for you, kids," she said seriously. "That blue sky that you children love so much. That my Sonic died for."
The children crowded more tightly around Sally, almost cutting her off from her levi-cycle.
She smiled her Alicia smile again. "When I get back, I'll hand out your report cards, okay?"
She pulled out a small remote-control device from a vest pocket, and clicked it.
Low footsteps rumbled in the distance.
Demi-Na clutched Mace like he was a life-preserver. "I'm not afraid, I'm not afraid..." she squeaked frantically.
In moments, a large silhouetted shape appeared over them. It could have demolished the schoolhouse if its owner pleased.
But Acorn Cannon was a tame Gizoid, and the children recognized it from their history textbooks.
"Waha..." mumbled Mace, in awe.
Mounting her levi-cycle, Sally rode it into the Acorn Cannon's open mouth, securing it under the Acorn Cannon's control seat, took the butterfly controls, and set it to Fly.
Acorn Cannon lifted up from the island and blasted off to Sonic City, the children running along behind it.
"Bye-bye, Miss Alicia!"
"We'll be waiting for you!" Mace called out, "That's a promise!"
Acorn Cannon gave a thumbs-up, and blasted off, leaving a wave behind.
As Sally approached Sonic City, it became very clear that something was very wrong.
Smoke was pouring out of half of its skyscrapers, and the entirety of the Parliament Complex was collapsing upon itself. Those Zoah that she had heard about in the news were buzzing about still, but were reduced to a few dozen by now.
A large needle-like starship, many times larger than the Parliament Complex was, was rising up from a hatch which had opened up, moving half the city aside.
So that's the Blue Typhoon, she thought.
As she flew past it, a familiar red Gizoid flew overhead, shouting out, "GET OUTTA MY WAY!" as it plowed through a Zoah.
Hesitating for only a moment, Sally hailed the King Knuckles.
"Working hard as usual, Knuckles?"
Knuckles looked completely dumbfounded.
"S-Sally? Is that you?"
With no time for preamble, Sally asked, "So, where's Tails?"
"In the Marble Prison, down under the outskirts. He's in solitary—"
Acorn Cannon blasted off, with Sally's last words to Knuckles being, "Then I'll leave our new 'friends' here to you!"
"Hey, get back here!" Knuckles called out to here, even as she moved out of transmission range. "Bitch! You come in from outta nowhere after six years, and take the rescue for yourself?"
The Acorn Cannon found a small but ominous building, just large enough for the elevator that took the incarcerated down to the holding cells below. For Sally's part, it wasn't too difficult to blast her way down into Marble Prison. It was made easier for the fact that the solitary confinement was one of the highest levels of the prison that made Sally feel easier about blasting her way down the elevator shaft.
Slinking the Acorn Cannon through the rafters over the solitary cells, Sally spotted several red flashes.
It was the Anti-Spiral Messenger, once known as Cosmo, assaulting Shadow.
Sally opened Acorn Cannon's mouth, propping Nicole on its lower jaw, as Cosmo turned her red orb of killing energy on Tails. Tails seemed to be back in his 'saving-people' mood. Cosmo's orb of red death glowed still more brightly.
Sally fired, shattering Cosmo's energy ball.
Any necessity of stealth abandoned, Sally took Acorn Cannon's controls, and smashed through lower ceiling over Tails's cell, sending rubble and dust flying down.
By sheer luck, Acorn Cannon's cannon was pointed at Cosmo.
Sally leapt down from her Gizoid's open mouth, and pointed Nicole at the Messenger.
"I don't see you for a while, and you go and turn into a cold, boring bitch..." A smirk crossed her face. "Cosmo."
Cosmo stared back coolly.
"You should know better than anyone that no one can stop Tails. Not when he's like this," Sally said.
"I have no further use for my memories of the past," Cosmo replied. "I am the Messenger program of the Anti-Spiral."
And glowing boxes engulfed Cosmo's form - Sally gasped - and even as Tails angrily shouted, "Wait! Come back!", Cosmo was gone.
Wasting no time, Sally broke open the lock on Tails's cell, smashed his wooden shackles, and stood over the leader of the Great Freedom Fighters.
"So, what?" she asked, smirking. "You were just gonna sit quietly and rot away in here?"
Tails, kneading his wrists, smirked back, "Yeah, that was the plan... Until Cosmo told me that there were still things I needed to do. So, Sal, where've you been all this time?"
"It's a long story, and it can wait," Sally said airily. "But, I got a message from Silver. The surface is gonna be destroyed by the Moon's impact. The underground will be destroyed, too. There's nowhere to run."
"And it sounds like there's an ambush waiting in outer space, too. Our back's against the wall," Tails said, and even as he finished his sentence, the sound of the Blue Typhoon departing Möbius's stratosphere echoed down to them.
Sally nodded at Tails, "But, when it comes to no-win situations like this..."
"Yeah!" Tails ripped off his prison uniform, his New Government undergarments exposed. "It's something the Great Freedom Fighters specialize in!"
A snort came from the corner.
"I see you still have as much spunk as ever, woman," Shadow muttered.
Sally, noticing him for the first time, did a double-take. "Shadow? You... you look terrible with those scars!"
"I'm immortal," Shadow said shortly.
"Sally, your gun?" Tails asked.
Sally handed him her handgun. Tails fired into Shadow's hand and feet shackles, shattering them and blasting holes in his wrists and ankles.
Shadow glowered at Tails even as his wounds sealed up again. "What are you up to?"
Tails stood over the immortal Black Arms.
"You heard the lady," Tails said. "The Great Freedom Fighters are gonna save every living thing on Möbius."
"And tell me, fox boy... How exactly do you plan on doing that?"
"Simple. We stop the Moon."
Shadow narrowed his eyes to slits.
"Are you serious?"
"You of all people should know I'm always serious."
Tails grinned.
"Who the hell do you think I am?"
Shadow stood up, towering over Tails.
"I know exactly who you are. You're the fool fox boy leader of the Great Freedom Fighters."
After a hasty agreement to save their bickering for another time, Tails and Shadow clambered into Acorn Cannon and hung on as Sally guided it back out of the prison.
As soon as Tails set foot down on the grass outside, he saw a glint of green flying towards him.
He caught it.
Opening his hand, it was his Core Drill!
"Your debt to society has been repaid!" said Knuckles, who had tossed it to Tails.
Tails was stunned.
Everyone of the Gizoid pilots, and their Gizoids - apart from Marine and Super Marine, and Elias - were present. Ari stood in front of Eliastriker.
"Guys...?"
Behind Tails, Shadow scowled. "So many familiar and friendly faces..."
Big scratched his head, "Hey, that's..."
Bark barked, "What's he doing here?"
"Right now," Tails said, "We need every good Gizoid pilot we can get."
"Need I remind you, fox boy," Shadow said, "That the entire line of ARK Gizoids have been scrapped? Most of them either by you or the blue hedgehog."
If Tails heard this, he didn't show it.
"So, we're gonna do it?" Knuckles asked.
"Yeah," Tails said, looking up at the Moon. "Unless we stop that thing, Möbius has no future."
"So you know 'bout that? That saves a lot of time," Knuckles then turned to the Great Freedom Fighters. "You hear that, you bozos? We're gonna smash that big fucking ceiling up there!"
A moment of silence...
And the Great Freedom Fighters cheered.
"Chaooo~o!"
Kukku threw himself at Tails's chest, his ball a heart.
"Kukku, you're alright!" Tails beamed.
"Looks like the gang's all here," Sally said.
Kukku turned to Sally, his ball turning into a '!'...
And he stuffed himself into Sally's cleavage.
"Boy, Kukku, you're still as tiny as ever," she said.
Knuckles's eyebrow twitched.
ＢａｆＢａｆ！そんなに燃えるのが…好きかい？
"This is Rotor's going-away present," smiled Lupe, indicating Freedom Emerl. "He pulled some strings and kept it from being scrapped. He's taken the liberty of boosting its levi-pack output as well. Once you're all set, I'll launch you guys into space on that spare Moon Probe Gizoid rocket."
"Lunch?" Big asked.
Shadow looked up at Freedom Emerl with something resembling admiration.
"Still the same brazen look as ever, I see," he growled. "You're persistent, fox boy. You and this Gizoid."
"Care to pilot it, Shadow?" Tails asked.
Shadow's carefully maintained expression of cool apathy fell apart in an instant, his eyes popping.
"What...?"
"Lucus gave you that immortal body to observe the fate of Möbius, right? Well, there's a box seat with your name on it in Freedom's cockpit."
"Freedom Emerl, huh? Even after all the humiliation I have suffered at its hands..." Shadow looked down at his hands, which were trembling in anticipation. "My body is telling me what it wants." He gave Tails a rare smirk. "You're on, fox boy."
"Be careful with her, Shadow," Tails smirked back, "She packs a real punch."
"I know that better than anyone," Shadow replied.
Acorn Cannon stomped up.
"So, are you guys gonna get in Freedom Emerl, or what? We're kind of in a hurry here," Sally asked crossly.
Minutes later, the Moon Probe Gizoid took off, Freedom Emerl flying along side it as it blasted beyond the city's tallest remaining skyscrapers.
The booster rockets disengaged.
"It's falling apart!" shouted Double Bruiser in Big's panicked voice.
"Don't worry!" Lupe broadcast up from her station back on the surface. "Your Gizoids' flying configurations were apparently designed for atmospheric re-entry."
"'Atmosphere'?" Big asked. "Is that a kind of tasty fish?"
Lupe sighed, "Look, it means that your Gizoids can fight in outer space."
"Oh, okay!" Big said.
"We'll do that!" Vector called out.
As the remaining Gizoid pilots gave their calls of assent, Lupe looked up at the rising plume of smoke and said, "We're counting on you guys..."
Inside Acorn Cannon's cockpit, Sally braced herself against the G-forces, looking out to her right...
And saw South Island in the distance.
Her brows furrowed.
"We'll get it back," she muttered to herself, full of determinacy. "A world where kids can live under the sun without a care in the world. Just like you always wanted... Sonic Hedgehog."
お前のＸＸＸで天を衝け！！
"Damn it!" Charmy swore in his Buzz Buzz. "Even with the Spiral Shield Rifles, we aren't even making a dent in these things!"
Cream appeared in his left eye. She looked harried, but determined. "Charmy, calm down! We have to stay focused!"
The battle was not going well at all, as evidenced by the flurry of talk going about the Blue Typhoon's bridge.
"Damage?" Silver asked.
"Severe damage to Block 357," Ash replied. "Now closing bulkheads."
"Fremerald Squadron strength down to 53%!" Helen cried out.
Silver growled, "Damn these monsters!"
"The Moon's rate of descent in increasing!" Blaze shouted. "It will not impact in a week's time, but in..." She gasped sharply. "...in just 20 hours!"
"Hold out, no matter what!" Silver yelled to his crew. "If we lose now, everything that we've done will be—"
The Blue Typhoon shook violently.
"What was that?" Silver asked the Darkoak Head.
"Spiral Power levels falling," it said. "Spiral lifeform readings are rapidly weakening."
Silver leaned in closer to the Darkoak Head. "They're what?"
"The people are worried," Blaze said simply. "They're worried about the battle that's going on outside. No. Not just them. We're worried, too."
Silver was shellshocked.
"It can't be... How could a machine be influenced by a living being's emotions?" Silver felt sapped of willpower, leaning on the Darkoak Head's stand as black despair washed over him. "No... That might be the case... If that's true... then... have I reached the limit?"
Overhead, one of the jumbo Zoah - the one with the pyramid head - raised a glowing blue arm as if to take the Blue Typhoon in its hand, blue lightning bolts crackling between its fingertips...
"DON'T GIVE UP, SILVER!"
As Silver looked up in shock, a green bolt of energy struck the giant Zoah's arm, sending the entire digital mecha tumbling backwards, well out of range of the Blue Typhoon.
Silver had recognized that voice.
But it couldn't be...
"It can't be!" he said, bolting over to the nearest window and peering out at the source of the blast of Spiral Energy.
Two spiral-shaped objects were exiting Möbius's atmosphere. One was the spare Moon Probe Gizoid, with the Great Freedom Fighters' Gizoid brigade latched onto the side.
The other was Freedom Emerl.
But that meant...
Inside Emerl...
"Tails?" Silver shouted in mingled joy and disbelief.
"The instant you give up, it's all over!" said Tails, his image appearing on Blue Typhoon's main monitor. "Don't you remember? This drill..." Freedom Emerl held up its right arm, and the Giga Drill there flashed green. "...is the drill that's gonna pierce the heavens!" Tails addressed a monitor on his side. "Shadow, let's do it to it!"
Shadow's face appeared on the monitor - several people on the bridge cried out in shock. The hedgehog-shaped Black Arms looked testy.
"What? You're giving me orders already?"
"It wasn't an order," Tails smiled. "It was a suggestion."
Shadow smirked, "In which case, I accept your suggestion!"
Freedom Emerl hovered between the Zoah and the Blue Typhoon.
"The Spiral Path, in which the twin roads of native and alien wind and intersect!" Tails shouted.
"Join with yesterday's enemy to smash fate!" Shadow bellowed. "And grab hold of tomorrow's path with your own hands!"
The Great Freedom Fighters' pilots readied themselves for dismount. And battle.
"DESTINY COMBINING!" Tails and Shadow yelled. "FREEDOM EMERL!"
Freedom Emerl began to glow like an emerald sun.
"WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK I AM?" it shouted in Tails and Shadow's voices.
Thousands of Zoah fired at once.
"No you don't! GIGA DRILL..." Tails yelled.
Giga Drills emerged from every point of Freedom Emerl's body, the hero king Gizoid resembling a metallic sea urchin now.
"OVERDRIVE!"
The Anti-Spiral's blasts were absorbed by the Giga Drill Overdrive attack...
And in a flash of green light that could be seen from the surface of Möbius, half of the Zoah disappeared.
つづく
To be continued...
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When Möbiankind is battered into subjugation by absolute despair, it finds a miracle.
And the name of that miracle is Typhoon Freedom Emerl.
Next time on Tengen Toppa Freedom Emerl: "What Have I Been Doing Up To Now?"