Violet Dreams
Chapter 15: Dying World, Part 1
"All they that take the sword, shall perish with the sword."
Location: Death Egg IV
Wheezing in between breaths Sonic rounded a corner, and continued down the long, narrow tunnel headed towards the heart of the space vessel. Never had he felt this much pain running before. The blue hero slowed down and groaned as he clutched his abdomen, the bandages crumpling from his movement. After shaking his head, and catching his breath through the pain, Sonic continued down the corridor, blocking out the pain in his body. He didn't have time to worry about things like a little cut on his stomach, or anything like that. All he knew was the fact that he had to stop Eggman no matter what. Approaching an upwards slant in the pathway, Sonic picked up speed, despite his body's displeasure, and burst into the upper most level of the Death Egg.
"Where are ya' Eggman!" Sonic called.
A loud cackle filled the quiet air of the Death Egg, as the sounds of machines clanking together muffled out the laughter. The blue hero craned his head upwards just in time to catch a glimpse of a navy blue streak of light descending upon him, allowing him no time to react, and resulting in a collision. Debris rained down over the small cloud of smoke cloaking the point of impact, as the metal in the room began to glow a very faint turquoise color. Gigantic arcs of powerful electricity jumped out of the ground, creating a storm of light across the sleek metal surface. A spiraling mass of blue energy, encased with white ribbons of light suddenly erupted from the veil of dust, taking a figure with it. The mass suddenly expanded, and swirled about before dispersing, and launching the unknown figure into the far wall of the cavern-like room of the Death Egg.
Sonic grunted in pain, and sunk to his knee while clutching his right arm. His emerald greens darted up towards the high powered collection of electricity dancing in front of his face, and quickly brought his left arm up to grapple the wrist of his attacker just before the mass of energy collided with his face. Using whatever amount of power he had left, Sonic heaved the figure off the ground, and flipped on top of them. Curling into a powerful spin dash, and launching into the sky, Sonic twirled around in mid air moments before a flash of black energy collided with his chest, driving him upwards in the blink of an eye directly into the wall.
"Heh." the blue hero smirked weakly, "I shoulda guessed it woulda been you."
Though mechanical, Sonic could feel the undying rage behind the crimson eyes leering before him. "My orders are to keep you here as long as possible," Metal explained. "But, I assure you, today is the day I finally end your existence, hedgehog." The blue doppelganger finished venomously.
Grunting with desperation, the blue hedgehog quickly swung his right arm upwards in an impressive right hook, knocking Metal away through the air. Ignoring the seething pain in his abdomen, Sonic pushed away from the wall with a mighty push, and summoned to life in his palm a swirling and streaming ball of blue and white energy just in time to smash it into the mechanical warrior's chest plate.
"Sonic Wind!"
The orb of energy then spun outwards like a star exploding in space, and with its redirection of power, shot Metal Sonic down to the ground like a bullet. Using his high powered thrusters, Metal Sonic easily swerved away from the ground just before impact and back towards Sonic like a missile. Using the velocity of his fall, the blue hero curled into ball form and shot downwards like a bullet, avoiding Metal Sonic mid-air, and rebounding off the ground to slide towards the opposite end of the baseball diamond sized arena.
"Geez, you're serious this time, eh Metal head?"
"You haven't clue, hedgehog!" Metal roared. "I've waited all my life for this single moment! I'm going to become the one, true Sonic!"
Performing a backflip just in time to avoid a electrically charged claw, Sonic laughed and dashed towards Metal. "You're becoming predictable dude!"
Using the taunt as extra motivation to kill, Metal Sonic quickly gathered up a flowing orb of dancing electricity in his claw and propelled itself at Sonic. Using the speed of his thrusters, and stream-line body, Metal Sonic quickly thrust his attack forward, driving his claw into the real Sonic's chest. A dancing display of sparks jumped and fluttered away from the blue hedgehog, as the crack of thunder echoed through the arena as Sonic bounced across the floor. Allowing no time for recovery, Metal Sonic pursued his target, and with precise aim took hold of Sonic's ankle, and with lightning fast reflexes, the navy fighter twirled around and threw the blue hero hurtling into the ceiling.
"Total Annihilation!" Metal sneered, as a vicious glow surrounded his body.
Then, faster than the eye could see, a brilliant flash of white light erupted from Metal's body, colliding with Sonic, and creating an impressive hole in the arena-styled room. Sparks danced across the entire perimeter of the battle area, causing the metals that made up the walls to glow blue. Then, Sonic smacked to the ground in a steaming heap, his gloves and shoes burnt along the edges, while cuts littered his body – some minor and some more serious.
Stalking over to the battered body of his rival, Metal Sonic flexed his steel claws, triggering another surge of electricity to dance up his right arm. With a sudden flash of purple light outlining his figure, Metal Sonic reappeared over top of Sonic, and grappled the hedgehogs throat with his left claw, and hoisted the hero up into the air. Earning nothing other than a smirk filled with stone-cold determination, Sonic snapped his head forwards, knocking his look-alike backwards, and allowing himself to spin dash into Metal Sonic like a rocket.
A cocoon of cerulean light wrapped around the two fighters, as Sonic accelerated them both through a heavy-duty blast door and into a corridor made of specially engineered glass. Sonic kicked away from the dangerous doppelganger and rolled across the transparent floor, and quickly jumped back to his feet, only to slide backwards slightly. Laughing in amusement, Metal Sonic picked himself up from the ground slowly, while electrical energy began to dance along his entire figure.
"I've never thought to ask ya', bolt-brains," Sonic called out suddenly. "But why do you listen to that fat, old man?"
Metal's violent red eyes, though artificial, suddenly wavered for a moment, as if in thought. "I don't."
Within another afterimage of purple light, Metal Sonic reappeared in front of Sonic, delivering a bone-crushing punch to Sonic, which sent the blue hero rolling across the glass flooring. A flash of turquoise energy lit up the narrow corridor, and Metal Sonic zipped towards the blue hedgehog like a bullet. However, Sonic quickly spun up into a spin dash, and fired off a powerful torrent of blue energy, which smashed into his look-alike, throwing Metal to the left, in turn creating small cracks in the glass hall. Wasting no time, and despite the overwhelming pain affecting his top performance, Sonic conjured up another twirling orb of violent energy, only this time allowing it to flatten out into a disk shape in his palm. Sonic swung his arm out, and hurled the condensed mass of blue light into Metal's left side, creating a harsh sawing sound as it sawed its way through the titanium exterior.
The powerful razor of light spun outwards, and away from Metal, only to collide with the glass corridor, creating additional cracks in its interior. Sonic yelled, and quickly smashed a chaos-energy infused fist into Metal's core area. Sliding back slightly from the punch, the blue doppelganger quickly took hold of each of Sonic's wrists, and ignited his thrusters to full capacity, launching them both through to the next area of the Death Egg. A violent explosion rocked the North Hangar as the blast door broke into two from the impact of the two high speed fighters. Smoke and flames curled along the ground as Sonic rolled and slid out of the debris, his right hand already glowing with an intense blue light, ready to attack.
Flying from the smoke right behind Sonic, Metal charged ahead with his claw reeled back and charged with another dancing mass of electricity. Grabbing hold of one of the overhanging chains, Sonic kicked off the ground, and towards a robotic crane, his right hand beginning to give off powerful ribbons of light as he swung around the head of the machinery and back towards Metal at an even faster pace. Using his advanced targeting system, Metal veered upwards a split second before Sonic thrust his arm forwards to attack. From the palm of Sonic's hand, a powerful blast of blue energy swirled upwards like a tornado, and then shot outwards into a double helix, carrying Metal Sonic up with it. Landing softly on the ground, and jumping upwards in a burst of light, Sonic spun into a ball, and collided with Metal Sonic, creating a powerful boom.
"You're truly persistent," Metal snarled.
Sonic quickly unleashed a whirlwind from his spindash, creating distance between him and his look-alike. "What can I say, I don't like people copyin' me!"
"Tell me, hedgehog," Metal questioned, as his left arm hung limp and sparks jumped from a hole in his chest. "How do you expect to stop me, and then go and put an end to that grotesque old man as well? You may be fast, but not that fast."
"Whose to say I've even went all out yet, Metal-head?" Sonic asked with a weak grin. "Shit, this could be bad. I'm running out of energy, and these injuries from last time haven't healed up yet." Sonic thought.
"I have you backed up into a corner this time, Sonic," the blue look-alike chuckled. "After today, I'll start my reign as king in a worldwide monarch, and be dubbed the one and only Sonic. However, I will admit you've put up a great feat to stand against me for so long."
"Look's like someone's counting their chickens before they hatch, Metal," Sonic sniggered. "Let's not get too cocky, cause as long as my heart is a'beating and my lungs pumping, I'll be around to kick your ass up and down any place we meet!"
"Then it seems as though I'll have to rip your heart out today!"
Meanwhile
Location: Central Computer, Death Egg IV
Delivering a mighty punch, Knuckles blew open the final door keeping him and Tails from the main computer, and also, from shutting down the entire base. Tails panted and quickly slid to a stop and dropped to his knees in order to peel off a panel guarding an assortment of wiring for the main computer system of the Death Egg. Knuckles glanced wearily at the doorway, and then back towards Tails, unsure of why they had made a detour all the way here when they were supposed to be rescuing Mighty.
"So what exactly did we come here for, Tails?" Knuckles urged, as a swarm of Egg Pawns flooded the room. "Cause we got company!"
"Just hold them off for me, Knux!" Tails pleaded, and quickly plugged in his Mobile Computer into the system. "If I can track down where Eggman is keep the Chaos Emeralds, we could be at a serious advantage in this fight. I just know Eggman has them up here!"
With a roaring ball of fire lurching away from Knuckles' fist, the crimson guardian swirled around with his hand tightly grasped around the sword of one pawn, effectively ripping its arm off. The guardian then smashed the weapon he had just obtained through the chests of two more pawns, skewering them and pushing them off the edge of the walkway and into the dark abyss of the Death Egg. Heaving one final pawn of his head, and throwing it into a wall, Knuckles grasped an entire panel of metal from the circular walls of the Computer room, and mended it to the doorway with diligent use of his Fire Dunk.
"Hurry up, Tails," the scarlet echidna grumbled. "I'm starting to get a really weird feeling about this place!"
"Just a second," Tails muttered as his eyes scanned the screen in front of him. "I just have to reroute past the central firewalls...decrypt the master files...and I'm in!" He exclaimed excitedly.
"I don't know what that meant, but hurry!"
"I got it!" the young fox chirped. "I knew this couldn't be the central command for everything onboard. I'm getting readings from thirteen different energy sources from the core information processing computer. If I'm right, we just have to retrace our steps back to the observatory, and then head down the laboratory corridor! There should be an elevator down there that'll take us straight to the Emeralds!"
"Then let's get going!"
Location: Data Runway, Death Egg IV
A blinding flash of white electricity flashed down the dark tunnel, causing the millions of small green lights to flicker. Sonic picked up speed, his feet beginning to blur into a mixture of red, blue and white as he quickly lurched to the right to avoid a burst of electricity from behind him. He had no idea how long this tunnel was, but something told him it led right to Eggman. However, the problem now was trying to get right of Metal Sonic before he was fried hedgehog.
Sonic quickly accelerated, and spun around the tube-shaped tunnel, creating a spiraling trail of blue light in order to blind Metal Sonic. The blue hero quickly spun around, and jumped back up the pathway in order to smash an already charged Sonic Wind into Metal's torso at point blank. Chunks of the doppelgangers armor slid off of his exterior, and bounced down the dark abyss of the runway, as Sonic twirled around once more and sped up, only to have Metal activate his thrusters and come up beside the blue hero. The tunnel quickly swerved to the right, allowing Sonic to run in a loop around Metal and effectively block a powerful swipe from his look-alike. Then the tunnel lit up with a bright white energy again, as Metal unleashed a beam of condensed electrical energy at the blue hero. Sonic yelped in pain as the beam impacted his lower back, sending him into an uncontrolled tumble down the tunnel.
Suddenly, the long, enclosed runway shifted to a section of glass, showing that they were now suspended out in space, away from the massive space station. Sonic rolled along the slippery interior of the tunnel, and bounced back to his feet, beginning to run backwards to allow himself adequate time to avoid any attack Metal launched. However, the navy doppelganger quickly electrified his claws, and sped up in a flash of purple light, and unleashed a vicious mass of dancing energy into Sonic. The blue hero quickly spun into a ball form, as the electricity slithered across his figure, and disappeared, forcing him to unravel from his spin dash and fall to the ground.
Sonic's body lurched and tweaked from the massive amount of electricity in his body. The blue hero groaned, and scraped at the glass tunnel around him, watching as Metal screeched to a stop beside him. Using the superhuman strength gifted to him from his mechanical build, Metal kicked the blue hero further down the runway, causing the blue hero to become airborn as the tube-like tunnel turned into a vertical drop back to the Death Egg. Metal swerved down the tube with utmost accuracy, and continued his pursuit of Sonic, oblivious to the fact that the blue hero had finally recovered, and already spun into another spindash. Firing off another vicious blast of electricity down the dark tunnel, Metal Sonic sped up, in hopes of reaching the blue hero before exiting the runway. However, using his already increasing speed, Sonic spun around within the tube, creating a whirlwind within it, resulting in a powerful vacuum, which launched the blue hero upwards at his opponent.
"Now I got ya'!"
Using the speed boost from his whirlwind, Sonic smashed himself into Metal head on, pushing the mechanical atrocity back up the tunnel. Sonic then quickly spun out of his ball form and twirled his body over top of the stunned Metal, allowing himself to grasp hold of the doppelganger's arms, and tug them behind his rival's back. Green lights flashed past the two fighters like stars, when suddenly everything flashed to white, and opened up into a large, white, rectangular room.
Within a streak of blue, Sonic slammed his look-alike into the white flooring below, creating a cloud of dust, as rock jumped upwards from the collision. Sonic flipped away from Metal, and landed on the rock flooring, only to collapse to his knees panting.
"I gotta finish this soon..." Sonic murmured, and looked around. "Where am I?"
Blue arcs of electricity jumped and flickered across the stone flooring, as small pebbles began to levitate in the air from the intense electrical energy began to increase. Weak green eyes flickered back towards the spot where he had left Metal, finding that the blue robot had recovered from all the damage he had delivered. The blue hero groaned in frustrated and placed a hand on his knee in order to push himself back to his feet. The blue hero rotated his right arm, then pointed towards his doppelganger, who had now taken position on top of an upturned chunk of rock about twenty feet high.
"Y'know, that ain't fair, dude!" Sonic called out. "You shouldn't be able to heal yourself like that if I can't! Gotta fight fair, y'know?"
"Rules do not exist within the confines of war."
"Yeah, but do you really wanna kill me when I'm not at the top of my game?" Sonic laughed weakly. "Or could you take pride in knowing you killed your nemesis when he was half-beaten already? Doesn't seem like much of a victory to me, man."
"Don't blame games with me, hedgehog," Metal snarled, as electricity began to crackle around his body, and down the rock he stood on. "I picked up the power of the Chaos Emerald on you at the start. I know full well Knuckles has already trained you to use the powers of the gems to heal any damage."
Sonic snickered, and while shutting his eyes the blue hedgehog applauded. "You really have gotten better, eh Metal-head?" he exclaimed. "But that's just the artificial Emerald Tails whipped awhile back! But I guess since the cat's outta the bag, I have to fight full out, eh?"
"Terror is all the doings of peace, just without the sugarcoating." ~ Boltstryke, King of the Azure Skies, _DateUnknown
Authors Note~ told ya' the next chapter would be out quick! :D We're entering the finale now, everyone! Leave your theories tips and comments in a review