Sonic the Hedgehog leaned back against the wall of the elevator, unsure of what to make of the music he was listening to currently.

"Big Iron, Big Iron!

When he tried to match the Ranger with

the big iron on his hip.

Big Iron on his hiiiiiippp…"

"Ah this song's a real classic, it is!" Buddy said cheerfully. "Heard it a lot growing up on the farm."

"You're a farmer?" Sonic asked. This wasn't the first time he'd been escorted around G.U.N. HQ by the coyote, but he still didn't really know much about him.

"Yes, siree- er, I mean, uh, yes sir!" Buddy rubbed the back of his neck, embarrassed. "Yes sir, I'm a farm boy. I grew up in the countryside, and my parents are a bit traditional and all that. I uh, er, umm… I try not to let that show, though. Ma and Pa- I mean, mom and dad- they say it's not really… professional sounding, the way I usually talk."

"Hey, it's all good. I don't mind your accent or anything."

"Hehe, thank you sir, but I gotta stay professional here at work, you know?"

"Fair enough, I guess. Anything exciting going on in your life?"

"Not much, I reckon- er, suppose. Well, er, actually a lady friend moved onto the farm recently and is helping out my folks run things there."

"Lady friend? What, is she your girlfriend?"

"No, nothing like that! …Though, I suppose she could be, someday."

Sonic smiled and shook his head. He didn't quite understand, but he figured it was best not to push the subject. The door soon opened, stopping at a floor he'd only been on twice prior. Buddy turned to him and said, "Well, this is the stop! Sorry I can't accompany you any further, sir."

"Don't worry about it," Sonic replied. "I know you don't have the clearance for this level and I don't want you to get in trouble."

"Right. Have a good day, sir!"

"You too, Bud!"

Sonic walked out of the elevator, the door closing behind him soon after. He looked around the sterile, wide hallway as he walked towards the room at the far end. In his right, he noticed a large window where a few scientists seemed to be studying something. Some kind of floating, white card, rotating in the air slowly, trapped behind a glass tube. The leader of the scientists seemed to be a man in a lab coat with green safety goggles strapped to his forehead.

As the room left his sight, he turned his attention to the left, only to see what seemed to be an interrogation room of some kind. A sharply dressed Asian man took a seat across from a man in a unique outfit, to say the least. He wore a breathing mask of some sort, his face almost obscured by his long dreadlocks. His hands were cuffed together, resting on the table in front of him. Sonic assumed that they must have searched him for whatever he had hiding in that large duster jacket he wore. As he walked past them, he couldn't help but notice the weird pattern, almost like a flag, across the back of his duster. The man looked over his shoulder, locking eyes with Sonic. Although he knew he probably couldn't see him through the most likely one-way glass, the sudden eye contact still bothered him enough to pick up his pace and stop looking around.

Entering the room at the end of the hall, he looked around. Four holographic displays surrounded a giant, electronic table in the middle. Screens and computers surrounded the walls, file cabinets and shredders in the back corner of the room. One of the holograms sprang to life, a message reading "Connecting to ARK…" displaying, before it was replaced by a humanoid figure. The image of a young girl with long, shoulder-length white hair appeared on the screen, her black dress covered in a moving, glitchy, blue-green light. Occasionally, her dress would flicker to white and red.

"Sage?" Sonic asked, almost in awe.

"Not quite," the girl replied. "Unfortunately, Sage's data module was stolen from G.U.N.'s storage eight years ago. I am based on a previous back-up of her data, though father altered my personality matrix and dataset to make me my own, separate entity."

"I see. So then, you are…?"

"You may call me Cleric, younger sister to Sage."

Sonic smiled. "Nice to meet you, Cleric! Glad you're on our side." He looked over at the other holograms. "Where's your dad, anyways?"

"Father will be here in a moment, he is currently getting his blood drawn for testing. Where is the Commander and agent Shadow?"

"They'll be here soon, I bet."

In the elevator, Commander Tower and Shadow stood in silence. Painful, awkward silence. "How was your weekend, agent?" Tower asked finally.

"I helped Knuckles fix his farm up," Shadow replied.

"I see. I take it there's… no hard feelings then?"

"No, we're cool. We actually have a lot in common. We're hitting the bar after work."

"I see. That's good to hear."

And with that, the silence was back. The only noise was the soft hum of the elevator. And the music of course.

"Oh don't you dare hold back,

Just keep your eyes on me,

I said 'you're holding back,'

She said 'shut up and dance with me!'

This woman is my destiny,

I said, ooo-ooo,

Shut up and dance with me!"

"…Agent," Tower said, clearly uncomfortable, "why is the music in this elevator not playing the standardized elevator music?"

Shadow blinked. "Pardon?"

"The music. It's playing a random playlist of songs, none of which are the standardized elevator music."

"Wh- it's always done this. This specific elevator has always been like that."

Tower turned to look at the agent beside him. "What?"

Shadow matches his gaze. "It's always been like this, have you just now noticed?"

"Who approved this?"

"I thought you did!"

"I did not."

"Then who…?"

The elevator doors opened. "Let's put a pin in this for now," Tower said, shaking his head. Shadow shrugged and the two left the elevator. As the two of them walked down the hall Shadow, couldn't help but notice the two men in the interrogation room.

"Who's the guy in the duster?" he asked.

"We don't know," Tower replied. "Said he was a courier and a herald, whatever the hell that means."

"Who's the guy talking to him? I haven't seen him before."

"That's classified."

"Ok whatever he's doing is classified, but what's his name? In case I run into him in the halls or something."

"You won't, but, sure. He's Detective Yu."

"Detective… Yu? Interesting name."

"Something tells me it's intentional."

The two entered the door at the end of the hall together, drawing the attention of Sonic and Cleric.

"Took you two long enough!" Sonic said with a grin.

"Indeed," Cleric added. "The two of you are approximately five minutes and forty-two seconds late to this meeting."

"I was on my lunch break," Shadow explained.

"And he wasn't going to leave it early, no matter what I said," Tower muttered with frustration. He glanced over at the hologram displays. "Where's Robotnik?"

"He's getting his blood drawn," Cleric said. "He should be back shortly- oh!" She turned her head to the side, a warm smile on her face, and continued speaking to someone the rest of them couldn't hear or see. "Hello, father. How were the tests? …I see. I suppose that's to be expected. Do not lose hope, these things take time. …Yes, I'm there right now. The others are waiting for you. …Yes, just stand there- No, no, the other one… Yes, that's right." She turned her attention to the group once more. "Father will connect here shortly."

The hologram module next to her soon crackled to life, displaying the same "Connecting to ARK…" message before cutting to a full-body hologram of Dr. Eggman himself. After a moment, he asked, "Do they see me?"

"We can see and hear you, Egghead," Sonic said.

"Oh! I'm sorry, this is my first time interacting with proper technology in ten years."

"Wonder why that could be."

"Yes, well. Let's just get on with the meeting."

"According to leftover memory data remnants from my big sister, this type of exchange between you two would have lasted a lot longer under normal circumstances," Cleric noted.

"Yeah," Sonic agreed. "I guess those days are more or less over now, huh?"

"We'll have plenty more times to argue," Eggman said with a smile, "but for now we have to focus on the task at hand. Commander?"

"Right," Tower muttered as he dimmed the lights and turned on a projector with a remote. A PowerPoint presentation was displayed on the projector screen, with the title "THE FIVE YEAR PREPARATION PLAN" in center of the screen. "Let's take this from the top, to refresh ourselves," Tower said as he stood next to the projector. The screen flickered and moved onto a new slide, displaying a photo of Alan Jobs. "Two months ago, Sonic here was patrolling station square and noticed a man about to attack an office building. When he swooped in to put a stop to it, he realized the man in question was a missing person he was searching for- one Alan Jobs. Only…" The screen changed again, displaying Jobs, unconscious in suspended animation and almost naked, his body partially metal. "As you can see, Alan wasn't his usual self. In fact, he'd been equipped with highly advanced cybernetics."

"Hrmm… whoever did that to him clearly repurposed my technology," Eggman noted, "but now that I'm seeing it in… almost person, it's clear it wasn't just anyone."

"Correct," Cleric added. "I may be able to explain… Commander, can you show the close-ups?"

"Of course," Tower said with a nod.

The slide transitioned to a few close up photos of where Alan's augmentations connected to his body. Several parts seemed to almost flow organically into his flesh- almost as if the metal were weaved into it, or as if the mechanical parts grew out of his body. "Alan Jobs was augmented with cybernetic enhancements almost exclusively on his upper torso," Cleric explained. "His wrists were fitted with a compressed, high-power flamethrower on each arm. According to biological scans, the tubing for them runs through his arms and connects to the plates on his back. These plates seem to enhance his strength and offer a support structure for his body to handle the machinery. While we can't confirm, we speculate that his spinal cord may have been reinforced with other augmentations to compensate for these drastic changes to his biology."

"And you can't confirm that because…?" Sonic asked, arms crossed, foot tapping impatiently.

"Because Commander Tower here has repeatedly denied my requests to perform a vivisection."

Sonic stopped tapping his foot. "Oh."

"And I'm not having him executed just so you can dissect his corpse for research," Tower added, glaring at the A.I.

"I might have put too much emphasis on 'interest in biology' when making her new personality matrix," Eggman mumbled, clearly a bit uncomfortable.

"Moving on," Cleric stated, "there are two panels on his shoulder blades that appear to be able to open up at will. These are storage racks for fuel canisters for his flamethrowers. This shows that he cannot generate his own fuel source and needs to swap them out. Because of this glaring design flaw, it's likely he would've been upgraded had his 'mission' as he puts it not gone south. None of that is the most interesting part, however. Look closer at the way his flesh meets the metal. Some parts of it seem to transition seamlessly between the two, don't they? According to my records, a similar effect was caused by-"

"The metal virus," Sonic said, a good deal of seriousness suddenly added to his tone. "Yeah, I know that all too well."

"Did quite a number on you back in the day," Eggman said with a smirk. The smirk faded when he caught the hedgehog's glare. "Just, you know, making an observation. …That wasn't my idea, by the way, it was that two-timing platypus'."

"Dr. Starline, you mean?" Tower asked. "Any chance he's behind this?"

"No." The doctor's face grew grim. "It can't be him. I made sure of that myself."

"Gaia, that's dark…" Sonic muttered.

"Regardless," Cleric said, drawing their attention back to her, "it is quite clear that whoever performed this operation had access to a strand of the metal virus at least, though it was likely heavily modified and utilized in controlled amounts. It's intriguing that whoever did this chose not to fully transform him. It's as if they wanted to keep the flesh part intact…"

"You don't think… the other two have been modified like this as well, do you?" Sonic asked softly.

"N-now hold on!" Eggman said quickly. "We have no confirmation that Martha Gates and Daniel Musk are involved in this, that's just speculation at this stage!"

"Unfortunately, that's not true, Doctor," Tower said as he switched to a new slide that displayed the news article Silver had given Sonic and comparison shots between the three missing people and the three figures in the photo. "Thanks to this article given to use by Silver and the information shared with us by Time Walker, we can safely confirm all three missing persons are involved. In another timeline, it seems as though you put a stop to whatever was forming here, Doctor."

"Well, I certainly had a knack for squashing rebellions in my empire now, didn't I?" The old Doctor couldn't help but smirk as he noted the headline on the paper.

"You didn't stop Starline," Sonic said with a smirk. "Or Neo Metal Sonic. Or-"

"Ok so I failed a few times to stop a rebellion, we don't need to stress the details."

Cleric giggled. "There's the bickering I'd expected."

"Focus, people," Tower ordered, annoyed. "We need to organize a plan of action here. Thankfully, we already have a few plans of action. Using a contact of ours, we're going to build a mobile base of operations that can house a whole army fleet."

"How are you doing that?" Sonic asked.

"Like I said- through one of our contacts."

"Classified, huh?"

"Yes. Even given the situation, we can't reveal too much of operations. Especially to a wildcard like you."

"And I'm a wildcard because…?"

"Sonic, we're talking about you, here," Eggman chimed in. "You know that right?"

"Fair enough… continue."

"Like I said," Tower sighed, "we're working on the construction of a high-flying mobile base of operations capable of housing an army. On top of this, we're keeping a 24/7 satellite view on all know former Eggman Empire bases to see who's repurposing his old tech and where they're taking it."

"I've got access to the feed here on the ARK," Eggman added. "Cleric can help monitor the cameras, she's got an eye for detail."

"Anything I can do?" Sonic asked, feeling out of place.

"Of course, your role in this might be the most vital," Tower replied. "We need you to make sure your friends are prepared, but you can't tell them what's coming. This is a top secret operation."

"Why can't I tell them? How are they supposed to be prepared if I can't tell them what's on the horizon?"

"Because we still don't know what exactly is on the horizon, and that means we don't know how much our enemy knows. If we get your friends worked up about this, then the enemy will realize we're onto them. We need to be careful and play our cards close to our chest."

"Fine, but I don't like it."

"You don't have to like it, you just have to follow orders."

The hedgehog rolled his eyes. "Now where have I heard that before?"

Tower slammed his hands on the table in frustration. "This isn't a game, Sonic. If you're working with G.U.N., you're following my orders."

"Last time we worked together, I seem to recall it was us calling the shots."

"You were with the Resistance when we took Robotnik here down for good. The Resistance had everything we didn't- entry points, plans, back-up plans, intel, schematics, floor plans, inside agents, everything we couldn't pull off. The Resistance- not you- held all the cards. After Eggman was locked up and his remnants taken care of, the Resistance fell apart. There was nothing left to resist. Now G.U.N. is holding the cards. You follow my orders, or you leave."

The room was quiet, the tension so thick you could cut it.

"Fine," Sonic said finally, "as long as you know that I firmly believe some rules are meant to be broken."

"Fine," Tower replied coldly, "we'll just have to keep an extra eye on you."

Eggman cleared his throat. "Are we going to bring up the stone, or…"

Cleric shot him a dirty look. "Father, that was supposed to be classified."

"What stone?" Sonic asked, crossing his arms. "Well, Commander? I'm waitiiiiing…"

Tower held his head and groaned. "Alright, about two weeks ago one of our field agents went missing. We sent a recovery team to his last known location and he was… Well, dead would be putting it lightly. They were surrounded by what was left of him." He turned around to a desk and pulled out a box and piece of paper. "These were nearby. The letter is addressed to you, Sonic."

Tower set the box and letter on the table and slid them over to the hedgehog. Curious, he picked up the paper, the words on the note written in a dark crimson ink. The letter read:

"Dear my beloved fRienD SONIC THE HEDGEHOG,

I have been TRYING to reach you, but unfortunately my bOsss won't let me! How very RUDE! Well, I've managed to give you this lovely little stone, here. It's a piece of something important from a place you will NEVER get to visit! I hope you F-" part of the text was scratched out here, "DIE from happiness! No need to thank me…

After all, what are friends for?"

"Okayyy…" Sonic muttered. "I have no clue who wrote this, but I will say whoever they are, they're a real edge lord for using this dark red ink."

"Oh, no, that's blood," said Shadow.

"Say what now?"

"Yeah, no that agent we found in pieces? His blood was used to write that letter."

"EWW!" The blue hedgehog threw the letter on the floor and rubbed his hands on his shirt. "Why the hell didn't you tell me that sooner?!"

"I thought it was obvious."

"Well clearly it wasn't obvious to me!"

"Hey, why do you even have this stuff in here? Shouldn't it be in a lock-up somewhere?"

"It was supposed to be transferred to the lab for testing, but they're busy with something, so it's in here instead."

"Sometimes I wonder how your organization hasn't crumbled with the amount of internal struggles you all have," Eggman muttered.

"So you don't know what the stone is?" Tower asked.

"Well I never said that," Sonic replied, crossing his arms. "I haven't even looked at it. It's in this box right?"

"Yeah, just… be careful with it. That thing's highly unstable."

"Careful's my middle name!"

"That's a bold-faced lie," Shadow grumbled.

Ignoring him, Sonic opened the box. Inside, a black, oval stone rested on purple padding. A strange, malicious aura radiated from it, bits of blindingly white electricity crackling from it occasionally. The stone fascinated Sonic in a way he hadn't expected it to. It was mesmerizing to him, something that Tower and Shadow immediately found odd, as it didn't have that effect on either of them. Without realizing it, Sonic reached out to the stone. Realizing what he was doing all too late, Commander Tower yelled, "No, don't-!"

But it was too late.

Sonic had grasped the stone and a crackling of white energy surged throughout his body, with Sonic's screams of horror following not too long after.

An orange fox sat in his office swivel chair, allowing his tie to loosen up as he kicked his feet up on his desk and sipped from his coffee. "Multiverse's Okayest Alert Manager," the mug in his hand read. He took a deep breath, then let out a sigh of relaxation as his twin tails brushed the ground lightly. The only real thing of note on his outfit had to be the logo on his shirt's pocket protector, a big "PS" with a fox tail flanking both sides of it.

As he took another sip from his coffee, a light on his monitor began flashing, accompanied by a loud, frantic beeping. Far too used to this alert, he glanced over at his monitor nonchalantly, before spitting his coffee out as he realized what he was looking at.

Immediately, he put his legs down, pulled his chair in and set his coffee off to the side. "Oh shit, that's not good," he said, worried. As he read through some data points and pinpointed the source of the issue, he finally pulled up the video feed of it. His eyes widened. "Oh, that's really, really not good." Reaching across the desk for his headset, he kept his eyes glued to the screen so he could thoroughly monitor the situation. Once he finally got it on his head, he immediately started using the headset's radio. "Commander Ziles?" he asked in a rushed, panicked tone. "Commander Ziles, do you read me?!"

"Loud and clear, cadet," a gruff voice on the radio responded. "Calm down and tell me the issue."

"Y-yes, sir! We… we've got a massive BW-Energy spike surge in sector Primus! It's at G.U.N. HQ as usual, sir, but this- this is off the charts!"

"Damn it, I told those morons to stop messing with that stuff! Put it on my screen, cadet."

"Y-yes, sir!"

In his office, Commander Ziles watched as one of his monitors lit up with footage of the anomaly. There, on his screen, from a hacked G.U.N. HQ security camera, a scene unlike anything he could've predicted unfolded. Sonic the Hedgehog lay on the ground, his eyes rolled into the back of his head, foam spewing from his mouth, white crackles of energy emanating from his spasming body. In his left hand he held something with an iron grip as Shadow the Hedgehog tried to pry it out, G.U.N. Commander J. Tower hid behind a file cabinet, and two holograms barely in the camera's view watched from a distance. Ziles watched the feed in awe for a moment, before quickly turning to frustration. "Damn it," he groaned. "I told them to stop messing with that crap. They don't know what they're doing."

He was about to close the video feed when he spotted something- a letter, from the looks of it. Curious, he leaned closer to the monitor. He could barely make out the words on the paper, but he could tell it was almost finger-painted with blood- and that line at the bottom of the page caused his eyes to widen. "What are friends for…" he read aloud in awe. In one swift motion, he stood from his chair, grabbing a walkie-talkie off his desk and holding to his mouth. "ALPHA SQUADRON, COME IN! THIS IS COMMANDER ZILES, OVER!"

"Alpha Squadron leader to Commander Ziles, loud and clear, over."

"Dispatch your whole unit to Sector Primus. The Priority Threat was there recently, follow his trail and get him in the cells as soon as possible. Do I make myself clear, over?"

"The Priority Threat?! We've finally located him?! Yes sir, we're on our way, over!"

"Good luck, Alpha Squadron. You're certainly going to need it. Over and out."

Commander Ziles grinned for the first time in ages. "We got you now, you slippery bastard," he whispered to himself. "You finally made a mistake."

Sonic flew through an ethereal space, his brain long since having left his body behind. The colors flew past, almost blinding him, accompanied by thousands of voices spewing thousands of quotes and images of events and moments from histories he'd never known. He tried his best to reduce the overstimulation by focusing on individual events at a time.

A little girl, dressed like a cowboy, stuck her thumb out, horror on her face. "Is it your thumb, or mine?" she asked, fear in her voice. A man similarly dressed to her turned around, horror also on his face. That was when Sonic realized what they were seeing- several atomic blasts going off all over a large city.

A group of kids hung out in a tree house, laughing and drinking a warm beer can stashed in there by some teenagers. None of them were anywhere near the age to drink, but all they did was take little sips from it anyways. Suddenly, a loud metal screeching rang out, silencing them all. After a moment, one of the boys asked, "What was that?"

"Borasca," the girl replied in a hushed whisper.

"Borasca? What happens there?"

"Bad things," another guy responded grimly.

"You see them too, don't you old friend?" A sinister voice asked calmly.

A giant, silver robot rest his foot on the defeated body of a mechanical, robot bull. "Once again, the day is saved thanks to… the Silver Shell!"

A robot girl looked at him with adoration. "Wow… what a dreamboat!"

An army of beetle robots stood before a man covered in black oil, surrounded by the ruins of a decayed future. He stood before them, samurai sword in hand, glaring down the whole army. Around him, the sliced, sparking remains of the dozens of beetle robots he had already slashed to pieces. One of the robots took a single step back. The man narrowed his eyes into a fiercer glare than before. "No," he said calmly. "There is no escape."

"I do as well," the voice continued. "It's so much more than I could ever see through the methods I used before… all thanks to this card in my hand."

An aging man walked through a hallway of infinite realities not too dissimilar from the one the hedgehog found see himself hurtling through now. Guided by a swirling stone in his hand as he walked against the harsh, roaring winds, he searched in desperation. "Are you there?!" he yelled over the winds, the desperation on his face even more present in his voice. "Please, tell me! Are you there?! Please, give me a sign!"

A large man with a helmet made from bones towered over the body of a strong yet bloodied and bruised old man. Surrounding them, corpses of other strong people lay strew about the base of the temple stairs. As the large man grew closer, the other man clutched an amulet tight in his hand. Looking to the sky, his eyes shown a glowing white. With the strength only a dying man could muster, he croaked out, "He… must… win!"

"You see," the voice said, a sinister edge creeping into his voice, "my goal has always been to remove you from every reality out there. So imagine my joy when I discovered realities where you didn't exist to begin with! Surely, the secret to being eternally rid of you would lie there… all I had to do was take the title of 'herald' and go about my day."

A boy around middle school age and a high school girl hung out by a riverbed beneath a highway. The girl, previously practice swinging the red toy bat in her hands, turned to the boy. "Hmm…?" She muttered. "Tao-kun, what are you doing?"

"Homework," the boy replied, not really paying attention.

"Then why don't you do it at home?"

"It's not cool."

"You can do my homework too if you want, huh?"

Two men and a woman stood in the rain on a dark night, illuminated by the neon signs of the city around them. One man, on the verge of death, stood there, dazed a little, allowing the droplets of rain to wash down his face and bare chest. "I've seen things…" he muttered. "Terrible things. Wonderful things. Things you could only dream of." He looked to the sky solemnly. "All of these memories… will be lost, in the sands… of time… like tears… in the rain." He hung his head. "It's time to die."

"Now that I'm looking at you, on this plane… I feel almost bad for you. Almost. But then again, you seem to be in a lot of pain right now, experiencing all these moments across space and time, across realities you've never and will never know. I suppose I can put you of your misery. After all…"

Sonic shut his eyes. He couldn't handle it. The sights. The sounds. The way it all felt. None of it was real. It couldn't be. But somehow he just knew, deep down somewhere, that it was. This was painfully, unforgiving real. He opened his eyes, only to see a light at the end of the tunnel. At the end of it, a long shadowy figure, reaching out to him. The outline of a fox, though unusually thin and tall. What stuck out to him most of all, however, were the purple crosses that acted as the iris of his eyes.

"What are friends fo-"

In an instant, everything went pitch black. There was nothing, and he was alone. After a few minutes, little white shooting stars began to float through the space around him. After what felt Ike hours, the image of pale skinned, green-eyed man in a business suit began to fade into his vision. "Rise and shine, Mr. Hedgehog," the man said calmly. "Rise and… shine. It seems as though one of my, ah, new employer's… heralds, as he calls them, has, ah, gone rogue. Rest assured, this will be… corrected. We would like to apologize for this… inconvenience. Your associates are worried about you, Mr. Hedgehog. That stone was not intended for your hands, you see. No one… untrained for its, ah, potential could hold it. Rest assured you will be in good health when you, ah, awaken. Speaking of which… now is a good time to do just that. So, wake up, Mr. Hedgehog. Wake up, and face the sunshine."

"…nic! Sonic! Wake up!" Shadow shook the other hedgehog, trying to reawaken him from his stupor.

"Ugh…" Sonic groaned, coming to his senses. "Where… where am I? What am I? Is any of this even real?"

"He's talking crazy!" Eggman's hologram yelled out from across the room. "Slap some sense into him!"

A loud smack echoed throughout the room as Shadow slapped Sonic across the face as hard as he could.

"OWW!" Sonic screamed, rubbing the side of his face. "What the hell is wrong with you?!"

Shadow pointed to Eggman. "He told me to do it."

"I was speaking metaphorically!" Eggman defended.

"Sonic, do you have a history seizures?" Cleric asked.

The blue hedgehog turned his attention to her. "What? No, why?"

"As soon as you touched the stone, you started screaming and fell into an epileptic fit," Commander Tower explained. "A really nasty one, too. You were foaming at the mouth and everything."

"It may have been funny in any other context," Eggman mumbled. When met with the dirty looks from the other three men and the questioning gaze of his daughter, he quickly added, "I said it may be! I didn't say it was!"

"If this is your first seizure, then it is good for you to prepare for the future," Cleric began, snapping Sonic's attention to her. "Notable symptoms for this unfortunate health-complicating event may include but are not limited to: temporary confusion, sudden staring spells, stiff muscles, uncontrollable jerking movements of the arms and legs, a sudden loss of consciousness and abnormal psychological phenomena such as sudden and intense fear, anxiety and/or Deja Vu."

"Thanks…?" Sonic replied nervously. He turned to her father. "You really need to tone down that biology interest. Or at least talk to her about the appropriate times to bring out that knowledge."

"Noted," the doctor replied. "But enough about that. What the hell happened to you? You grabbed the stone, went into a seizure and when Shadow finally got you to let go of it, there was nothing in your hand to begin with!"

Sonic thought for a moment. "I… I'm not too sure what happened. I felt a sudden… urge to just, you know, touch it. I saw a bunch of weird, strange stuff, but also a lot of mundane moments? It's all so fuzzy now."

"Can you recall anything in particular?" Commander Tower asked.

"Umm… I saw some kids in a treehouse… a guy with a samurai sword fighting robots… some guy talking about rain… that's about it. …Oh! I vaguely remember a guy in a business suit, I think."

"…Interesting. And the stone is gone completely?"

"Yeah, couldn't find it anywhere," Shadow said grimly.

"I see. Judging from the reaction to that stone, I'm guessing we'll be getting a visit from the Society soon."

"Society?" Sonic asked, raising an eyebrow. "What society?"

"Yeah, what society?" Shadow added, crossing his arms.

"Forget it," Tower said dismissively. "I'm just thinking out loud."

"So are we done here then?" Eggman asked. "I'd like to get back to my work. And maybe fine tune my daughter's personality matrix…"

"I suppose I could move on to closing statements," Tower said with a sigh. "We didn't really establish as much as I'd wanted, but I guess it's my fault for even mentioning that stone to begin with. Let's go over what everyone must continue to do before the next time we reconvene. Robotnik, Cleric, I want both of you to continue researching where your technology has ended up. If we can find out where the tech is going, we can find out who wants it the most- and that might bring us closer to reuniting you with Sage."

"Then research that we shall," Robotnik replied. "Shouldn't be too hard as long as we can access the satellites onboard ARK."

"It would be great to finally meet my older sister for the first time," Cleric added, smiling softly. "I'll do the best I can."

Tower turned to Shadow. "Agent, I want you to investigate the missing people. I want to know where they were last seen, who they last spoke to, where they were going, psychological profiles, the whole works."

"You can pull from what I've managed to gather, but it's not much," Sonic added.

"Sounds good to me," Shadow replied. "I'll do what I can."

Finally, Tower looked to Sonic. "As for you? I want you to get your friends ready, but do it discreetly. Reach out to old pals you haven't seen in ages if need be. Just make sure everyone is ready, got it?"

Sonic nodded solemnly. "I'll do what I can, but it's not gonna be easy. Though… maybe there are some people I can reach out to. I just hope things go well… not all of them are on the best terms with me ever since the Resistance fell apart."

"Just do what you can."

A walkie-talkie on Tower's belt crackled to life. "K-1 to High Command, permission to join War Council?"

Tower pulled the communication device off his belt and was about to speak into it, but paused. After some thought, he replied, "High Command to K-1, stand by."

"Copy that, over and out."

"What's that about?" Sonic asked.

"Yeah, who's K-1?" Shadow added. "I've never heard of them before."

"Of course you haven't," Tower replied. "K-1 is apart of deep, undercover team that very few people even know about. A unique, elite team whose members are classified to almost everyone in G.U.N. except myself."

"Why would you need such a team anyways?" Sonic questioned. "What's the point?"

"There are several reasons why having this team is necessary. We need people who can act as spies. People who keep tabs on the general public. People with lives who have something to protect. People who would be willing to tell a lie to save the world if need be. We don't know who the next big threat will be, so we need to have eyes and ears everywhere."

"Hmm… not sure I like what you're implying here."

"You don't have to, you just have to understand where I'm coming from."

"I do, I just… whatever. Who's K-1, anyways?"

Tower smirked. "You'll have to see that to believe it." He held the walkie-talkie to his mouth and said, "High Command to K-1, you may enter."

"Roger that, see you inside," the voice on the other side of the connection said.

The door opened, and a wolf in standard G.U.N. tactical gear stepped through, his helmet covering most of his face. As soon as the door closed, he pulled his helmet off. "No way," Sonic breathed.

"YOU!" Eggman yelled, pointing at the wolf. "I REMEMBER YOU!"

"Well, shit," Shadow mumbled. "Didn't think I'd see him ever again."

"You're no rookie anymore, that's for sure," Sonic said with a smile as the wolf put on a pair of thick-rimmed glasses.

"It's good to finally see you again after all these years, Sonic," the wolf said with a smile. "You may not remember, by name's Gadget. You never stopped being an inspiration to me. After we parted ways, I went searching for ways I could be useful. Turns out, I'm quite good at the whole 'stealthy infiltration' thing, so i was recruited to assemble a taskforce by Commander Tower himself. Speaking of which, let me re-introduce myself."

Gadget stood tall and proud, his smile giving way to one of serious focus. "I am K-1, leader of the deep undercover operative taskforce K-9. Any and all references to the group are to be restricted to here, in the War Council. No other member of my squadron will be exposed. I alone will take the risk of allowing you four to know my identity." He smiled again. "It's an honor to work with you again, Sonic. Let's save the world again."

A lemur kissed her girlfriend, a shy wolf, as she handed her a glass of lemonade. "Love you, dear," she said cheerfully.

"Love you too," the wolf whispered back, a bright smile on her face.

"Almost forgot, a letter came in the mail for you!" The lemur handed a red envelope to her. "I'll be inside studying for my exam tomorrow. Let me know if you need something, ok?"

"Alright. Thank you."

"Any time."

As soon as her love was out of sight, the wolf looked grimly at the envelope. That unique shade of red, she knew it well. No return address either. Carefully, she opened it up. A folded, clean sheet of paper was inside. Opening it up, she saw no greeting but rather the cold, printed words in the middle of the page.

"Protocol Zero is now active. Remain on standby. We are going to war.

Regards,

Master of Disguise"

She let out a sigh of exhaustion. "No matter how much time passes, I can't escape combat," she whispered to herself solemnly.

"Hey, hun?" her girlfriend yelled out. "You should check your email."

A beetle closed up the museum she ran before heading to her office for some paperwork. Taking a seat in her chair, she took a moment to stretch her arms before hunching over her desk. Scrolling through her emails, one caught her eye. It was from someone who hadn't reached out to her in ages, none other than Sonic the Hedgehog himself. Curious, she immediately opened up the email. It read as follows:

"Hey Jewel, sorry 4 not reaching out sooner. Hope you been well. Listen, something is going on. I'm not allowed to disclose it, but I need help. You need to get the resistance back to gather or somethin. Please keep this a secret, K? This is much bigger than anything we've done before. I trust you.

Stay safe, Sonic."

Jewel stared at the screen for a moment, utterly baffled, both at what the email had said and the senders half-hearted attempt at not falling into casual shorthand text slang while discussing such a serious matter. She held her head in her hands and let out a groan of frustration. Such little to go off. What the heck was she supposed to do? The answer to that was obvious: the one thing she could do.

Quickly composing herself and a new email, she sent out a simple message to three other recipients: "Meet at the old HQ on Friday at 8:00 PM. This is urgent. I'll explain in person."

"Dear!"

"Friends…"

"Remember."

"…Belle."

The words slipped from the four of their mouths with ease. The secret passcode to the old resistance bunker, one word given to each of the four members of the Diamond Cutters. "Dear" for Tangle, who always called her love that. "Friends" for Whisper, who would be long dead without them. "Remember" for Jewel, who spent much of her time cataloging history and keeping memory of the past alive. "Belle" for Lanolin, who watched the robot's life extinguish from her eyes as her wooden body burned in her arms all those years ago. Just hours later, they'd take down her father. The father that didn't love her. She died thinking she still had a chance to amend that.

The four of them watched as the door slowly opened up, the lights inside automatically turning on. Everything was covered in dust and grime, which made sense given the years of neglect. As the quartet walked down the halls in silence, they couldn't help but look around. Whisper stared at the discarded Wispons that lay on the shelves and floor. Tangle couldn't help but feel sad as she looked over the empty common rooms. Jewel floated softly above the ground, wary of the disrepair that defense systems and lighting had fallen to. Lanolin pushed on, trying to bury the memory that been invoked by uttering that poor girl's name. When the four of them finally reached the command the center, they all stood around an old holographic display table.

"It's… good to see you all again," Jewel said finally. "Tangle, Whisper, I hear you two have a house together on the beachside? Lanolin, you're living back home in Riverside now, right?"

"Please, spare us the small talk," Lanolin said coldly. "Just get to the point. Why are we here?"

The beetle frowned. The strong, joyful sheep she once knew had clearly changed a lot in the last eight years since the Resistance fully collapsed. With a sigh, she continued, "Straight to the point, then. Early this week, Sonic reached out to me for the first time in ages. He… told me that they were dealing with something. Something big, but classified. He's… working directly with G.U.N. right now."

"With G.U.N.?" Whisper asked in a hushed tone. "Do we have any idea what's going on?"

"Admittedly, not much. All I know for sure is that something is going to happen in five years- and that we have to operate in the shadows. Someone else also told me that a future version of Silver showed up a few months back to warn Sonic about this in person."

"Who told you that?" Tangle asked.

"…Well, Silver, of course. I guess he's already working with Sonic."

"So let me get this straight," Lanolin said, anger in her voice. "You have no idea what's going on. Sonic is being vague and not telling you anything. Silver has some idea, but he won't talk to us even if he could tell us. On top of all that, we have to report directly to G.U.N.! Do you seriously expect to reform the resistance like this?! This is how we fell apart to begin with! No idea what we were doing, everyone keeping secrets, no one communicating- I'm not reliving that, got it?"

"Well, she has a point," Tangle agreed. "I know all the secrecy started because Whisper and I were nervous about, well… you know, but in a way we did set the trend of keeping secrets and telling lies to keep them hidden." She looked to her partner for support. The wolf hung her head in shame.

"It's understandable why you two kept your relationship secret," Jewel said softly. "Especially after Charmy explained why Mighty had left the Chaotix so long ago. You don't need to blame yourselves for the secrets. They came from our lack of communication. We all played a part in that." She shot a look at Lanolin. "Even you. We have to acknowledge what we did wrong before we can mend our bonds."

The sheep hung her head. "You're right. I should've communicated how seeing that… had affected me. I just, what was I supposed to do? The wood burned so hot, the metal itself started to melt. The burns I got holding her… I didn't feel them then, but I feel them every day now."

"You have us, we're here for you."

"You weren't there for me then. I wasn't there for you either."

"Then we all gotta start being there for each other."

The four of them looked towards the doorway the voice had come from. There, with his hands in his pockets, looking awkward as hell, stood Silver the Hedgehog. "Assuming you guys are… open to having a fifth member again, that is," he muttered softly. The four women stood, baffled. They looked to each other, all varying states of uneasy.

"Take your place at the table," Jewel said finally. "We'll decide what to do with you over the course of the meeting."

"Believe me, this wasn't my idea," the hedgehog replied as he stood between Tangle and Lanolin. "Sonic's the one who convinced me to show up here."

"The incident with Duo- Mimic," Lanolin began, "that was-"

Silver held up his hand. "Save it. That's all in the past now. I don't hold anything against you guys. That was all over ten years ago."

"Then… why are you here?" Whisper asked, softly as ever.

"Sonic has his hands tied. Me? I'm a time traveler, no one can tie me down. Which means G.U.N. can't stop me from telling you guys what's really going on here- as long as you agree to keep quiet about it. Can't make too much noise about what's going on."

"So, you'll tell us what G.U.N. won't tell us, as long as we don't tell anyone else?" Lanolin clarified, crossing her arms. "And in return you want… what?"

"Nothing," Silver replied. "This is above wants or needs. I don't care if you guys want me to rejoin the Diamond Cutters or not. Hell, you can throw me in the resistance as the lowest-ranking foot soldier, I don't care. This is war we're preparing for. A version of me from the future came back in time to warn of us something."

The girls looked to him with confusion.

"A version of you…" Whisper began.

"…From the future?" Tangle finished.

Silver nodded. "Yeah… we got a lot to talk about. Do you trust me?"

The quarter looked to each other, then back to him.

"Of course we trust you," Tangle said with a smile, resting her hand on his shoulder.

Whisper smiled. "Yes, we do," she agreed.

"I've got no reason not to," Jewel said with a smile. "What about you?"

Everyone turned to Lanolin. After a bit of silence, she shook her head. "No," she said simply.

Silver looked to the ground, defeated. "I understand," he muttered softly.

"I can't trust someone who hasn't rejoined the Diamond Cutters yet."

The hedgehog looked up. "What?"

Lanolin grinned. "We'll have to add another word to the passcode and all, but… I think if you're gonna be at this table, you should be on the team. Don't you guys agree?"

The other three nodded along in agreement. Silver smiled, relief washing over him.

"Welcome back, old friend," Lanolin said to him. "No… hard feelings right?"

"Of course not," Silver replied.

"Hey, that should be his passcode!" Tangle yelled excitedly. "You know, 'old'! Since he's technically so much older than us, being from the future and all!"

"Tangle…" Whisper murmured, embarrassed.

"No, no," Jewel said, stepping in, "I think like that. 'Dear old friends, remember Belle.' It's got a real nice to ring to it, don't you think?"

Silver shrugged. "I guess can't argue with that."

The quintet laughed. For the first time in ages, they began to realize what they missed most- their friendship. Something that would be needed in the near future.

A blue fox opened the door to his apartment, slinging his bag off his shoulder and dropping it on the floor. "I'm back!" he yelled out as he shut the door behind him. "I'm gonna assume that you don't have some guy or girl over because you didn't text me to stay out of the house for a while."

"Oh please, when do I do that to you?" a woman's voice called back.

The fox placed a bagel in the toaster. "Literally last week."

"Whatever…"

The fox chuckled as he waited for his lunch to finish cooking. A green tenrec entered the room, grinning at her roommate. "Soooo how'd classes go, college boy?" she asked.

"Keep calling me that, and I'll start calling you 'big sis' in public again," the fox warned. "But yeah, they went great! The professor says I understand hydroelectricity very well for someone with no background in the field. Even said I might get a good internship working at the dam at this rate!"

"Well I guess being surrounded by water and electricity your whole life gives you an advantage in this field, huh? That and, well the whole water-controlling thing."

"Yeah, I tend to keep that on the down low these days."

Pulling his bagel from the toaster, he glanced over at a letter on the counter. "To Mr. Kitsunami and Ms. Surge," was written in cursive in the middle of the envelope, no return address seemed to be written on it. Kit picked it up, eyeing it curiously. "Hey, Surge?" he asked. "What's this letter about?"

"Oh, that came in earlier," she explained, pulling the cream cheese out of the fridge for him. "It was addressed to both of us, so I thought it was best to wait until you got here to open it."

"Oh, alright." He took the cream cheese from her and grabbed a butter knife to start spreading it on his bagel. "Well, feel free to open it up then."

"You got it!"

Surge picked up the envelope and opened it, reading the message inside to herself. Her grin soon shifted to a look of confusion, then shock. Kit took a bite out of his bagel, then covered his mouth and asked, "What's up?"

Without a word, she handed him the letter. Pulling his glasses out of his pocket, he wiped them off then put them on.

"Dear old friends,

We hope that you have been well over the past decade of peace. Eight years ago, we crumbled. Without an enemy, we began to turn on each other and eventually disbanded as a result. Today, we are here to tell you we've returned, and a new evil is on the horizon- one that may be worse than Eggman ever was.

We would like to welcome you back to the Resistance, in order to help us prepare in secret while we await this new evil's arrival. Separate, we are weak. Together, we are strong. Together, we all can resist the villainy of the world and make it better, one day at a time. If you are interested in rejoining, please return to HQ. The location hasn't changed.

Incinerate or otherwise destroy this letter after you are done with it.

Best of luck to you,

-The Resistance"

Kit slowly set down the letter, staring into the distance. "Is… is this legit?" he asked softly.

"That's Jewel's signature at the bottom, isn't it?" Surge replied.

"Well… what do you think?"

"I don't know. What do you want to do? And don't say whatever I wanna do. Think about it."

"I don't need to think about it. If they want our help, I'm in."

Surge smiled. "I was thinking the same thing."

Kit smiled back, nodding softly. The two grabbed each other's hands and pulled each other in for a bro hug. "Ready to be heroes again?" Surge asked.

"As long as you keep smiling like that when you save people."

The tenrec blushed a little. "You're a big silly guy, you know?"

"Whatever you say, sis. Now about that letter…"

"On it." Without warning, she tore the letter into four pieces then threw them in her mouth, chewed them up a bit, then swallowed.

Kit blinked twice, glanced at where the letter was, then slowly turned his head to look at her. "Surge, what the hell is wrong with you?"

"It said to destroy it," the tenrec said with a shrug. "I figured my stomach acid might be a good way to do that. We've got, like, super cyborg stomachs or something, right?"

Kit dropped his head to his hands. "Ok," was all he could mutter out.

She watched as the machine flew over her lands, not sure of what to think of it. It had been forever since a machine was on the archipelago and the last time one was here, nothing good came of it. Unless you count the friendships. Those were good memories. The friends that helped her believe in herself, especially… what was her name? Amy Rose. Gaia, it had been a long time. She and her friends helped her defeat the Black Dragon.

As the machine floated over, a hatch from the bottom of it opened and an envelope fell out, floating down to the island below. Swiftly, the lizard girl ran through the jungle, following the letter. With a quick, precise shot, she threw a spear in the air, catching the corner of the envelope as the spear stuck into a tree. After climbing said tree, she pulled the spear out and caught the envelope, then took a seat on a nearby branch. "To Ms. Trip," the envelope was addressed.

Trip the Sungazer lifted her helmet up to better read the words before her. Carefully, she opened the letter and read its contents. The Resistance? They were back, and preparing for something? The last time she'd left the archipelago was when the Resistance reached out to her ten years ago to put Eggman's reign of terror to an end for good. She'd heard through the grapevine they fell apart not long after. What could they need her for now?

Hours later, when the sun went down, she sat beside a campfire. After some hesitation, she did as the letter had commanded, casting it away into the flames. As she watched it burn, she thought for a while about what the letter said. Setting her helmet aside, she lay down on the cold sand, staring up at the stars. She inhaled, then exhaled slowly.

How would she even contact them, anyways? Of course she was joining, but seriously, how was she going to tell them that? At that moment, a spotlight blinded her. Raising her hands to shield herself, she watched as the flying machine from earlier descended, sitting down next to her. Sitting up, she examined it. It was a drone of some kind, a rusted and old yellow one at that. She saw the faded word "RESISTANCE" on the side next to a camera lens focused on her. After a bit, she smiled and gave a thumbs up. The drone seemed to mimic a nodding motion, then flew off.

Trip sat up, watching it vanish into the moonlight with a smile.q

The drone didn't get far into the jungle before it was completely destroyed. A boomerang flew through the air and damaged its propeller. The resulting crash into the ground damaged it beyond repair, the camera lens utterly crushed. From the shadows, a badger woman dressed in rags slowly watched. She knew the government had been spying on her. How else did they know where she was ten years ago, when they had asked her to fight Eggman alongside them? She'd long since gone off the grid since then, no one knew where she was.

As she carefully approached the wreckage, she caught the boomerang that came back to her. She stomped the lens on the camera a few more times, just to make sure it couldn't spy on her. Picking through the wreckage, she searched for anything she could use as further evidence. A data chip filled with her personal information. Footage of her whereabouts. Anything that could prove the government was spying on her. Instead, all she found was a now creased and crumpled envelope. In the middle of it was written, "To Miss Sticks."

Curious, Sticks carefully opened it up and pulled out the letter inside. No doubt the government was trying to taunt her. If she was lucky, they were probably trying to buy her silence, an offer she would obviously refuse. As she read through the letter, she became confused, then annoyed. Great, the government had tried to impersonate the Resistance, no doubt in a feeble attempt to get her to leave her home base. She had to hand it to them, it was almost convincing. Almost. Just as she was about to discard the letter until she caught some spots where ink seemed to bleed through from the other side of the page. Flipping it over, she read a message written in sharpie:

"Sticks- this is real. The government isn't trying to trick you, we really are bringing the resistance back to prepare for an unknown threat. We could use your help. Please stop listening to InfoWars and meddling with that OS some mentally ill religious guy made and attend a meeting or two.

Regards, Silver.

Oh, also, 'the eagles couldn't have flown to Mordor, read the book for once you uncultured swines.'"

It was real. That really was Silver writing that, he used their secret code phrase and everything. She looked over the wreckage again, spotting the faint "RESISTANCE" on the side. "Oops," she muttered. Quickly, she picked up the remains of the drone and held the letter in her mouth before running off back to her burrow. Once inside, she began writing a letter of acceptance, then tied it to the foot of her pet Flicky.

"Ok Freedom, this is what you were trained to do," she whispered enthusiastically. "The Resistance is back! Revolution is upon us! Go now, and deliver my letter to the HQ! Fly high, soldier!" The flicky gave her a salute, then flew out of the burrow. As soon as it was gone, she ran to a trunk and began to search around for equipment. Within minutes, she had four boomerangs on her belt, two ammo sashes around her torso, a homemade double-barrel pipe shotgun in her hand, and an infantry helmet with "Born to Deconstruct" written on the side next to a doodle of an Eggpawn's head and two wrenches behind it, mimicking a skull and crossbones. Last time she'd suited up like this, she was storming Eggman's base as the leader of her own squad of Resistance soldiers ten years back.

Lighting up a big cigar, she smirked as she put it to her lips. "Time to kick some ass," she said joyfully.

A koala guard walked into the throne room, stopping at the steps and taking a bow. "I apologize for the interruption, Princess," he spoke calmly, "but a letter has arrived from Sonic's world for you."

"At ease, soldier," the princess commanded. "I was simply texting Marine, no need to be so formal. Let me see this letter."

The koala guard blushed from embarrassment. "O-of course, your highness…" He stepped up to her throne and handed over the envelope. It had no return address, but in the middle was written, "To Princess Blaze."

After a bit of reading, she smiled for a brief moment, then snapped her fingers, setting the letter aflame with her pyrokinesis. She stood up, then announced, "I'm afraid I must retire to my study for a moment. A matter of utmost urgency has come up, and I must write a letter to Sonic's world. Please do not disturb me."

"Y-yes, princess!" The guard said. "Understood, ma'am!"

As she walked to her study, Blaze thought about what the letter had said. Though she didn't know it, this one was completely different from the others. Rather than a copy and paste mass alert, she had been given a unique message from her oldest friend aside from Marine, Silver. It was a short, but simple message:

"Hey, it's been a while, hasn't it? Or… has it? Time travel is confusing even to me sometimes. Yeah, it's Silver, by the way. How've you been? Well I hope. I'm doing ok, still got that LARP group I meet up with every month. I wish I were writing this to you under happier circumstances, but…

Blaze, the Resistance is back. I'd like you to join it if you can. We're preparing for something big. War is on the horizon, but I don't know against what. Not yet at least. I just wanted to let you know- a future version of me I haven't met is involved somehow. Might be something of importance.

Miss you,

-Silver.

P.S.: We have to keep this all on the downlow for now, so please burn the letter."

As she walked into her study and locked the door behind her, Blaze thought about her response and what precisely it would entail. What provisions could she provide? Would they need naval training? What even is happening? She never stopped training, of course. She's brought peace to her world long ago and helped do the same to Sonic's World ten years ago. Now, she was ready to do it all again- and soon, she'd he a Queen with the power to aid more than she could before.

"Good to see ya, warden!" a G.U.N. soldier said as he shook an aging dog's hand. "As requested, we've sent the prisoner in question to the interrogation room. He's waiting for you."

"Yes, very good," Gregory muttered, stroking his beard. "Forgive me, I'm a little tired. Went to a wedding a few weeks back and my sleep schedule still hasn't quite adjusted."

"I'll have someone send you a cup of coffee. They'll meet you there. Two sugars, no cream, correct?"

"Correct. Thank you, soldier. Enjoy your day."

Gregory walked down the halls, passing by several cells. Every prisoner seemed to either pipe down or cower as he walked past. All except for one, who was doing pushups. Gregory stopped for a moment to see who had such an unusual lack of reaction. Bark the Polar Bear, alone in his cell, grunted as he did perfect, precise push-ups. Upon feeling the watching eyes of the warden on him, he froze, glancing up and meeting his gaze. The bear's eyes formed a gaze so cold, it was as if they manifested the frozen tundras he was born in.

Gregory didn't respect most of the inmates in the prison. Very few made it to G.U.N.'s maximum security prison complex near their own HQ while still retaining some inclination they would be willing to reform. Bark was the exception in that respect. The mute bear seemed like he could've been a noble hero or at least an upstanding member of society had he not fallen in with the wrong crowd. Perhaps he still could be. No matter how the old dog felt about him however, it was clear that Bark only cared about one thing from him. "Yes, a new letter has come in," Gregory said finally. "It will be delivered to you at dinner time." Bark grinned, blushing slightly. He sat up, then did some motions with his hands. After a moment, Gregory realized he was expressing his thanks in sign language. "No problem," he replied. "Take care, young man." With that, he continued on his walk.

As he walked past the cells and down a flight of stairs, he tried to prepare himself for the annoying conversation he was going to have with the prisoner he was on his way to interrogate. This particular prisoner had been known for his uncooperative nature and refusal to listen to anything that didn't meet his standard of need. Reaching the bottom of the stairs, he turned the corner, only to see a familiar coyote waiting outside the interrogation room, coffee cup in hand. Catching his eye, Buddy turned to him with warm smile. "Howdy, Grego-" he began, before clearing his throat. "Er, good morning, warden. I haven't seen you since Eric and Jackie's wedding. How have you been?"

The old dog shook his head and smiled. "Don't need to be so formal, Bud. I'm doing just fine, though staying up that late really messed with my sleep schedule. How about you?"

"Aw shucks, you know I'm on cloud nine, to be honest with ya. Oh, this is yours, by the way." He handed the coffee to Gregory, who took it and instantly gulped down a good sip of it.

"Ah, nice and piping hot. Like that girl I hear ya got now," he nudged the coyote playfully.

"N-now ya know she's just a friend," Buddy defended, blushing slightly.

Gregory let out a hearty chuckle. "I'm just teasing ya, Bud. They got you being a coffee boy today, or were you just the first guard to get told to make the big scary warden a cup of joe?"

"Oh, actually I'm helping ya out today."

The old dog raised an eyebrow. "Helping me? How so?"

"Well, I came in ready to do my allotted tasks, but Tower called me into his office. Now, I was worried I was being reprimanded for forgetting to scrape out all the ice from the freezers in the break room again, but instead he told me he'd cleared my day's tasks and assigned me to be the 'good cop' to your 'bad cop' during this here negotiation, as it were."

"Hmm…" Gregory looked at Buddy, then through the one-way window at the prisoner in question, then back to him. Remembering something the coyote had told him about his history with the prisoner in question, an idea began to form in his mind, and he couldn't help but smirk. "Well, far be it from me to question the Commander's judgement. Now, here's what I got in mind…"

A few minutes later, Gregory and Buddy entered the interrogation room, taking their seats across from the prisoner as the door shut itself behind them. The prisoner looked up and smirked, his fang hanging out of his lips. "Hello, warden," he said coldly. "Brought a lackey with ya this time, huh?"

"Shut up, Fang," Gregory hissed. "Or are you still going by Knack again?"

"Whatever you wanna call yourself is fine by me," Buddy chimed.

Fang put his feet up on the table and kicked back. "I don't know," he sneered. "Maybe I'll be Jet the Jerboa again for a while. He never got a high bounty, after all. What the hell did you drag me in here for anyways?"

"Well ya see Fang, or Knack, or Jet or whatever you prefer," Buddy began, "we were hoping you'd be willing to give us a hand here. We'll help you out in return, see?"

"Fang is fine. Why would I want to help you? What are you gonna keep me out of jail, or something like that?"

"You have several connections in the arms trafficking business," Gregory explained. "We want you to work for us so we have a lead on where the supply is moving."

Fang burst out in laughter. "Work for you?! You want me to become a sellout to the feds?! What a joke!"

"Alright, settle down," Buddy said. "We're working on something real important here. Lots of nice people might get hurt. We need a guy on the inside, and you'd be a big help."

Fang sighed, then turned to Buddy, shaking his head. "Look, you don't get this because you're obviously some stupid backwater hick trying to act like a civilized city boy…"

Buddy's ear twitched. "I beg your pardon?"

"…but here's how this goes. You sit there and bark orders at me, I say no, you get all pissy and storm off, and then you come back later and do the same thing all over again until I bust outta this joint. The only difference is that they decided to waste my time on a country hick moron. Yeah, you can try and hide that stupid accent, but I gotcha clocked from the moment you opened your stupid trap." Buddy stayed silent, staring daggers into the criminal. Fang turned to Gregory, dismissing the coyote entirely. "You really thought this idiot yokel would be able to sweet talk me into becoming a narc, warden? You must be kidding! Am I getting pranked here?! I mean seriously, what's this idiot gonna do, tell me stories about how kind his ma and pa are and how I should learn from them? I bet his stupid parents already got one foot in the grave!"

Gregory glanced over at the coyote. The fury in his eyes was the fiercest he'd ever seen it. With a smirk, he stood up, putting his hand on the boy's shoulder. "Well, I gotta go grab something," he said. "Keep an eye on Fang the Sniper here, will ya Bud?"

"Oh, I'll watch him, I reckon," the coyote replied in a hushed tone.

Fang's howling laughter died down. Something wasn't right. He watched the warden exit the door, noting the smirk on the old dog's lips.

"So ya like guns, do ya Fang?" Buddy said coldly as soon as the door shot behind him. He wasn't even bothering to mask his accent anymore.

"…What of it?" Fang asked cautiously.

"Well as you guessed, I'm a farm boy. Now what ya might nota guessed is my pa is a big fan of them 'stand your ground laws.' Yessir, he's a real gun nut, I'd go so far as to say. Well one day, when I was… I reckon eight years old, he took me to the field out back where he set up a shooting range. Now he wanted me to learn self defense, so he'd bought me my own Red Ryder BB gun to practice with."

"Are you going anywhere with this or are you just yapping that country boy slack jaw of yo-"

"You sit your ass down and shut the hell up when I'm talking, you mangy son of a bitch." The sudden tonal shift and venom in his words came as a gut punch to Fang. Smiling at his shocked expression, Buddy continued. "Now as I was saying, he got me a Red Ryder BB gun. Now he had me practice on the scarecrows and the old moonshine bottles, but when I was around 12 or so he came up to me and he went and said me, 'son, it's time ya learn to defend yourself and those ya care about.' So he handed me his old lever action rifle and taught me how to shoot it properly. Mighty big difference in the recoil, but I got the hang of it after a bit. Well, he starts printing off some mugshots he pulled from the internet and putting them on dummies. He says to me, 'son these are bad folks, they come to your house, you tell them to leave. They don't leave, you shoot. You gotta keep your family safe.' Now, he had his heart in the right place, but seeing those scary faces put the fear of God in me. I was having night terrors something fierce. In fact, I had this recurring dream of a hotshot, money-grubbing weasel or jerboa or something coming into my house and harming ma and pa. So I went and did some training. Now let me tell ya…"

Buddy leaned in, the dim light causing shadows to form in his face, enhancing the grim and threatening look in his eyes. "I've gotten reeeeal good at putting bullets in the pretty little head of yours, Fang," he said in a cold, hushed tone. "I wonder what would happen if you said that stuff to me again, outside these walls you're trapped in."

At that moment, Gregory returned to the room. Before he could even get a word in, Fang immediately stood up and yelled at him, "You want me to be a narc?! I'll be a narc! I'll do whatever you want, just get me the hell away from this psycho!"

"Psycho?" Gregory scoffed, shaking his head. "Buddy's the sweetest guy I know. What are you on about Fang?"

"Aw, he's just scared of the idea of farm life," Buddy said, grinning. "Don't worry, we ain't gonna make ya work in the field, Fangy! You just do what we tell ya and you'll be fine!"

"R-right…" Fang muttered, falling back into his chair, realizing he'd just been outplayed. "Can I… umm… make a request?" Buddy shot a glare at him. "I-I don't expect you to say yes to it, heh…"

"Speak," Gregory commanded.

"I… I'd like my crew on this. They're the closest I've got to family, you know? I don't want them to think I've just betrayed them without… good… reason, I guess."

"I'll speak to Bark, but I'll have to reach out to Pickman Asylum and arrange a meeting with Bean."

"Thanks…"

"Alright, I'll let Buddy escort you to your cell."

"What?! No, wait-!"

But Gregory was already out the door, and he was left alone with the coyote once again. Tugging nervously at his collar and avoiding eye contact, he mumbled, "Umm… sorry about everything I said earlier."

"Just learn to be a bit kinder and nothing will happen to ya," Buddy said cheerfully.

Fang gulped. "R-right…"

Author's note: Next chapter will be up shortly.