Chapter Sixteen

Epilogue

It had only been a single day and yet it felt like they had all passed out and slept for a full year. After the fiasco in Station Square, no one could blame them, though plenty of people had a lot of questions. Even the people involved had a lot of questions. The first thing that the Hooligans and Mina Mongoose had done upon awaking was sit around Nack's hospital bed, piecing each of their story parts together. It was bizarre, sitting down with her kidnappers in such a friendly way. Then again, the entire incident—being dubbed the Mina Mongoose Affair by the news stations—had been a bizarre event for them all.

And it was only so long before Sonic and Tails showed up with questions of their own, interrupting their strange reverie.

"Tails has caught me a bit up on some of the facts of the case." Sonic stated; the fox behind him waved, face a bit red in embarrassment. "And on, er, my mistake."

"Anyone could've made that mistake, Sonic, don't apologize. The important thing is that it turned out alright." Mina said comfortingly, rising up to stand aside her Freedom Fighter friends. Nack snorted but didn't bother to argue. He was foolhardy but even the weasel knew that it was unlikely to do him any good to raise any qualms with the blue hedgehog right now. Not with his arm in a sling and his body covered in bruises and patched up cuts.

"Yeah. I, eh…" Sonic turned to the three outlaws sitting idly around the hospital bed, an unreadable expression on his face as he scratched the side of his head. The hedgehog looked down for a moment, then the side, then back to them with a bitten lip. "Can't believe I'm saying this…"

"If it's a soppy thank you speech, I'd kinda rather you not anyways." Nack said dryly. "I got a reputation to uphold and some doctors might say I'm allergic to thank yous that don't come with a stack of cash. Save it for the little bastard over there, he's the one who busted us from the joint to do any of it in the first place."

"Yeah, I heard about that…" Sonic fixed Tails with his best reprimanding glare—it was ineffective, as the fox simply gave his teammate a nervous shrug and a helpless smile. It was fairly difficult for Sonic to stay angry with the young fox boy; sometimes, Nack almost had the faintest idea that the brat's more rebellious and risky nature came from hanging out with the blue hedgehog. He supposed the pain in the ass 'hero' saw himself in the kid…or at the very least, a responsibility over Tails.

Nack's ears twitched slightly.

A responsibility…

"I have a question." He interrupted Mina and Sonic's chit chat; they looked at him curiously. "Where IS Stella? You took her after Thaddeus and Vanessa were taken into custody. So where is she, hotshot?"

To the weasel's surprise, Sonic let out a loud laugh. Behind him, Tails' ears flopped downwards and a look of sheer irritation crossed his young features. Nack exchanged a glance with his two teammates and then locked eyes with Mina. She shrugged hopelessly, mouthing that she didn't know. She had gone straight to the hospital with Nack, Bean, and Bark to be checked for non-existent injuries—the capybara had not allowed a single injury to come to his star player. But she had also not seen Stella either, who had been taken aside to Sonic as the Hooligans had been loaded up in ambulances. At the time Nack couldn't protest, since it was at least better than the young vixen being in the care of the cultists.

Right now, with the hedgehog's loud laughter echoing off the walls, he wasn't sure if that had been a great idea or a terrible one.

"That kid is a firecracker, I have to say. She's been asking about all of you guys non-stop. But don't worry, she's fine. We really shouldn't give her back to you, honestly…" Sonic cast a glance over the bedridden criminals. "…but Tails told me about the deal that you all made with him. ALL of you free to go if you helped, and…well, it drives me nuts and if it were up to me you wouldn't get it. But I think that little girl would kick more people in the shin if it WASN'T honored."

"Hopefully YOUR shin next time." Tails muttered morosely.

"Aw, buddy, just kick her back."

"I can't kick a girl!"

"You can if she can kick hard."

"That's not…!" Tails' fur stood on end, but he quickly calmed himself. "She's waiting outside of the hospital for you guys. When you're ready to go, she is too. But we DID contact her guardian first to make sure she wasn't kidnapped too."

"He gave Tails quite a talking to, too." Sonic snickered. The fox seemed to practically wilt on the spot.

"Yeah, everyone in that family seems to love giving me a piece of their mind. The further from that girl I am, the better, I swear." Tails muttered. "I do her and her friends a favor and she repays me by kicking me in the shin, then I get lectured by that guy from the Frost Manor…geez."

"Yeah, she's bad with strangers." Nack chuckled.

"She could've at least said thank you."

"I'll have her send you a letter express mail. Glitter and all. Will that shut you up?" Nack grinned; Tails grimaced. "Aw, come on, kid, you're too easy. You're a pain in my butt but for what it's worth, ya did help me out this time. Thanks or whatever."

"I guess we'll all just have to settle it next time we meet." Sonic joked, but the weasel could see the glint in the hedgehog's eyes. The Hooligans and the Freedom Fighters were very rarely on the same side and at the end of the day they both always knew that they'd meet again on bad circumstances. For once seeing that victorious glint in his opponent's eye didn't irritate Nack—it was almost quaint seeing that no matter how much changed, these two hero-types would never change.

"I guess we didn't see anything here, did we, Sonic?"

"Eh, well, maybe we didn't for the next few days." The hedgehog whistled in return, turned his back to them. Tails followed on his heels, casting a small glance back at the four people behind him.

Hero-types.

Never changed, never stopped being pains in the butt.

They sure had a way of lighting up a room, he had to admit that. With their awkward apologies and thank yous out of the way, the room had drifted back into uncomfortable silence. Only Bean's babbling to himself (masked as 'conversation' with Bark) broke up the quiet of the afternoon hospital room. The melodic sounds of birdsong could be heard in far distance, as could the rumble of city life far below them. Nack found himself staring at the off white wall, making purposely pointless observations about the texture and color. It was a hell of a lot better than focusing on the pop star that hadn't left with her friends.

"Hey, ain't you going with Sonic?"

Nack groaned. Leave it to Bean to have no tact.

Mina didn't reply at first, her light green eyes staring out the window at the silhouettes of skyscrapers against the bright afternoon sky. One finger loosely and absentmindedly played with a lock of purple hair hanging limply by her cream colored fur. She had not yet had an opportunity to change out of the tight black dress for the concert; her free hand was gripping nervously at the around pinched fabric as the woman stumbled for a thought.

"Ah, well, soon, for sure." Mina blathered. "I-I mean, I just…I wanted to say, first, I mean, before…I mean…oh, this isn't easy."

"I ain't paying you no hurt feelings fee, if that's what's going on here, Popcorn." Nack snapped out thoughtlessly; the glare that fixed on him almost made him regret it as the pop star stomped her foot abrasively.

"That's not what I'm trying to say, you absolute nitwit!" She snapped, cheeks flushing in irritation and embarrassment. Her form loosened slightly, arm rubbing carefully against her shoulder. "What I mean to say is…thank you. You didn't need to come back but you did. You could've just taken Stella and split…I mean, I know Tails had a deal with you but it would've been easy to just forget about me and dump it all. Or even just run away and forget about it for good. But you didn't, so…thanks."

Absolute, deafening silence overtook the room as Nack stared at the popstar as if she was from outer space. Her form stiffened, cheeked puffing up at the disbelieving stare. "It doesn't mean I'm forgiving you for kidnapping me, though! This whole thing could've been avoided if you hadn't of done that in the first place. But you did save me, and, I mean…all of you kind of gave me a bit of hope in a bad situation."

"She's off her nutter." Bean commented. Bark smacked the bird on the back of the head; he just bounced back up giggling unintelligibly.

"This your way of saying we're even, Popstar?" Nack asked with a slight grin. She crossed her arms with a huff.

"On a bigger scale? No way. But for this case….? Yeah, I guess I'll strike it off your record. For NOW."

With that, she turned on her heels to march pridefully out of the room. It masked a slight smile on her face, and allowed her to not catch the amused looks that were plastered onto the faces of each and every Hooligan in that hospital room. In a way, Mina Mongoose couldn't help but feel like she had almost—KINDA—learned something from the experience. The Hooligans had little morals but they weren't pure evil, not like Eggman was.

It was weird, she thought as she caught the small white fox kit in a hug on the way out of the hospital. Almost as if she was experiencing the feeling of enjoying the presence of people who weren't quite good but definitely weren't absolute evil. As long as she kept her head then she could stand both aside and against them. And right now, after everything that had happened, she damn well knew she had the wear-with-all to do whatever she wanted and go wherever her heart took her.

She cast one final glance at the hospital as she finally strutted back onto the streets, knowing that if the Hooligans were ready for the future than she was too.