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Ch. 6
The two mobians remained facing each other in the dingy natural cell staring at each other’s markings. The male was more confused by this newfound fact than the female cat in front of him. She was gaping at his hand; dumbstruck and shocked by the simplistic golden ring design that was permanently embedded into his fur. Thousands of different explanations raced through her skull, desperately trying to calm down their creator, but each theory had a noticeable flaw. The only people alive who knew of the skin painting were the rest of the girls, who never told a soul, or showed their marking. Their old leader, bless his soul, the albino cat decreed silently, had suggested the idea as a simple way of identifying himself or herself to be the true one, instead a fake that the wicked Doctor had tried to create. The remaining four had agreed to the plan, and so the plan was carried out. All of them had decided to make the location of the ring be the right palm, except for the lynx and the echidna. For them, they placed the sacred symbol on their right shoulder. Even though their leader had died in a raid that had gone horribly wrong, the rag-tag bunch had managed to retrieve the body of their fallen leader on the way out of the base. Reminding herself of those facts, she swiftly turned back on her heels and retreated towards the door. Unknown by her, the newly physically challenged lynx had been watching the whole event, and chose to open the door before the mismatched colored cat had reached the door. Not even peeking a glance back at the captive hedgehog, Sydney darted out the door, and less than a second later, the door slid swiftly behind her to a closed position. Still not quite sure why a simplistic ring tattoo would cause such a reaction, even if it was slightly peculiar, without much effort Shadow freed himself of his restraints, picked up his soaking glove, and paced over to the opposite side, leaning against the natural wall. Slowly he closed his eyes while crossing his arms to their signature position and waited patiently for the some-what rash woman to return once again.
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“So, Sydney, did he give you the answers you wanted?” If the skeptic cat was not so shell-shocked at the moment, she would had thrown a sassy and or sarcastic remark right back at the ebony-haired lynx in front of her. However, the events that took place in the supposed General’s holding cell still baffled her. The absurd story the crimson striped hedgehog had woven was too out there to be even remotely possible. The strange thing that she started to realize was that his story was the only theory that made sense. And not only did it make sense to the partially snowy cat, the more she thought about it, the more it seemed that was the only explanation for what was going on. That alone also bothered her to no end. For almost all of her life, she grew up loathing the Robotnik Empire, or anyone apart of it. For what they did to her parents, and all of her friends who fought along side her…her captain, who brought her in after she was orphaned…and now here was practically his royal nuisance’s right-hand-man on a platter for her to easily kill, and she was listening to him. She BELIEVED him. She didn’t care even if his story was right. All she knew for certain was everyone else believed this elaborate lie, so she had to be at the least, an inside skeptic.

She hadn’t noticed but by this point, Izumi had pulled out the petit echidna and was now struggling to retrieve the optimistic fox. ‘Wait, what’s wrong with her?’ Coming back into the present moment, still partially distracted, the azure-haired feline sauntered over to the cluster of girls standing in the doorway of the ivory hedgehog’s cell. Apparently the sun-kissed fox did not understand that when the others said the interrogation was over, it was over. “Ha! Do you honestly want me to believe that your two hedgehog buddies are not A. dead and B. one of the generals to the largest corporal power in all of Mobius’ history?” Sydney had noticed, just like her prisoner, her friend’s questions were annoying the extremely light hedgehog. A logical guess would be that the reason why he was irritated was she had repeated her questions several times now. “Yes, I do because we come from a different timeline where Sonic isn’t dead, and Shadow is a good guy! Well, I mean he doesn’t work for Eggman. He can kind of me a real jerk sometimes, and a little bit rude, but his intentions are good!” Clearly grasping at straws now, trying to find anyway to prolong this investigation into the booted hedgehog’s words, the blue-eyed fox proclaimed, “See? He just said Shadow isn’t a good guy! Let me at him a little longer! I promise I can crack him!” Under his breath, just loud enough that if you strained to hear him you could make out his words, or if you had impeccable hearing, he stated flatly, “Hate to say it, but it seems your pretty cracked yourself there, honey.” Unfortunately for the hedgehog, he spoke loud enough that the fox in question heard his statement loud and clear. “WHAT DID YOU SAY TO ME, POT HEAD??” Finally deciding she had seen enough, the lynx wrapped her functioning arm around her enraged fox’s waist, and successfully managed to lift her off of her feet. “Okay Rin, I think you’ve had enough fun for today.” Although she was not amused by her new predicament, the now not so cheery fox did not put up a fight. All she did as defiance was screech out to the now confused male, “What is love!?” Not sure why that question would be even remotely important, he replied confused, “ Love is and intense emotion that is felt between two living creatures? I don’t know!” She only nodded as her teammate lifted her out of the room as she mulled over the ivory hedgehog’s answer. As all of the females filed out, the booted captive thought to himself, slightly ticked off, ‘Pothead? Real original. If you want to really make someone mad don’t go for the obvious smart one!”

As the door closed behind them the first one to bring up the question of the hour was the handicapped lynx. “What was that whole thing with love about?” A smile stretched across the fox’s muzzle, impressed by her own genius idea. “Robots can’t understand love, if they tried to they would short-circuit! He didn’t, so he’s not a robot.” All the other females stared at the overjoyed fox, wondering why she was so proud of that dumb question. “So, who believes them?” the lynx once again breaking the silence. All four looked around at each other and at the floor anxiously. Sick of the ominous feeling in the air, the smallest of the four piped up. “I believe them. It’s almost hard not to. All four of them having the same exact story? Even in the greatest lies there would be a slight difference.” “I agree with Yumi. No lie is perfect, only truth can be completely perfect.” “I agree, Zum!” The fox turned, seeing her naturally obsidian fingers pointing accusingly towards the fox. “Then why were you giving him such a hard time if you already felt that way?” “Well, how often is it that we get to yell at people? I say when you get the chance, go full out!” A death glare was shot by the furred-eared creature towards the other long-eared mobian. Completely disregarding the bickering females, the non-eared child asked the snowy-eared feline (why am I distinguishing them by their ears?? XD) one of life’s simple-but-hard questions; “What do you think?” the cerulean-haired female still wasn’t one hundred percent sure, however all of her allies said yes, and she wasn’t fully on the ‘no’ side. “I mean, I think so…yes. I believe they are telling the truth.” Letting a faint smile crack onto her face, the blinded echidna turned her back towards her teammates and went backed to the room with the now seriously frightened human. Before it was the adrenaline talking, but now that Hope fully and lucidly understood her situation, she wasn’t sacred for only her life, but the lives of her new furry friends, especially the General Shadow look-a-like-not-really-because-they’re-kind-of-the-same-person. Seeing that their meeting was over, the two females had stopped quarreling and turned towards the albino cat for the answer. Already knowing what their question, the feline responded without anyone asking, “ Let them out. Let’s pretend to trust them. Tell them only what they need to know. Any questions even remotely close to our secrets shut it down. And most importantly,” she now rotated her hips so she was slightly facing the other two, “Don’t let you guard down.” And with her warning, the snowy cat strutted over to her project’s holding room, not bothering to close the door behind her, just like Yumi when she left the group. Once the other two had left, both the lynx and the fox faced each other, nodded at the other, and then resided to entering their prisoner’s rooms.
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When the young echidna entered the hindering room, she was surprised to not be able to hear the human at all. “Where…” If she had ears like the rest of her companions, they would have perked up at the slight shift of weight from the blonde human’s feet. Yumi realized that the naïve child thought she could sneak out of the room since she left the door open. Her small smile appeared on her face for only a second, and then returned to their natural, indifferent position. ‘She thinks she can escape? Rookie mistake.’ Turning on a dime, the rosy echidna shot forward, latching her hand onto the escapee’s arm. “Here I am, coming in here to see if I can trust you enough to let you out, and now you’re trying to take advantage of the fact that I’m blind? That’s not very nice of you.” Realizing her extreme error Hope cursed under her breath. ‘Of course she’s not completely clueless Hope, she lead you and everyone else through the forest back to her own house. If she were completely unable to interact the world around her, she wouldn’t have been that far out in the woods! Stupid. Stupid! Why was I so stupid?’

“It doesn’t matter, I suppose. Your story checks out amongst the others, and I’m guessing it was your instincts telling you to run. I don’t really blame you, I would try to run too.” After a long sigh, the petit echidna turned towards the door and walked out leaving the confused human behind. “Wait, so your just…letting me go?” She turned her head to her newly liberated captive. “Well, someone catches on fast. Follow me.” Relieved that this whole mess was over, the aqua-eyed girl happily followed her some-what-not-really ally. If only she knew that now she was fully involved in this whole mess. Who knows if she had the chance to, if she would crawl back into her small hole house, and try to block herself off from the rest of the world?
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When the fox, who he personally thought was insane and more annoying than Big the Cat himself, returned Silver immediately dropped the stalagmite piece he had broken off with his psychokinetic powers and was now using to cut his restraints. Luckily for him, the still cheery fox missed him drop his escape tool, so he avoided hearing an earful of complaints and yelling. What scared him was when the sunny fox pulled out a box knife. The combination of her face and the possibly deadly weapon reminded him a lot of the sakura hedgie, Amy Rose. When she would get mad, she would pull her hammer out of thin air and would proceed to aim her attack on her prey, who was often Sonic and the red companion of Sonic, Knuckles the Echidna. Unfortunately, he has had a few hits from her hammer, and when she stalks over to her frightened target, hammer raised and her lips revealing a very irritated smile…well let’s just say you don’t get up for a while. “Umm, what are you doing with that?” By this time she had just reached the place where Silver was tied up, and he was not thrilled. “Hmm, I don’t know…maybe this?” Without any warning, she struck her right hand down; her target was slightly above the hedgehog’s golden left-hand cuff. “Wait-wait-wait-wait-WAIT-WAIT!” Out of instinct, the ivory male cut off his vision by quickly closing his eyelids. The sound of the knife hitting its initial target rang out, short and bluntly. However, the ivory hedgehog felt no pain. Slowly, he peered out from under his eyelids, first the right lid, then the left. What he saw was that the cutting tool actually cut the ropes that restrained his left arm, not the outcome he had feared. “Wait what? You don’t want to be freed? Alright then stay caught, I don’t mind.” Not sure if this was a trick or not, he carefully undid the rest of his restraints while never looking away from the fox above him. Once he completed his task, Silver slowly rose to a standing position, and followed silently, but alert as Rin tempted him to trail behind her as they stalked to the main vicinity in the Freedom Fighter’s compound.
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Swinging open the metallic door, the snowy neko* cast her gaze onto where she suspected the non-general would still be sitting in his chair. Once she got a solid look at the alloy-made chair, she realized the hedgehog was in fact, not in her line of sight. Now on high alert in fear of an attack, or of her ex-suspect escaping, Sydney placed her head on a swivel. “Hmph, someone is clearly paranoid.” Standing just slightly off to the side of the place in which she entered, the obsidian male spoke up, his intimidating blood-red eyes pierced right at her. Glad she knew where the possibly hostile attacker was, the cerulean-haired cat slightly let down her guard, but made sure the male couldn’t see that fact. “Lucky for you, I had a change of heart. I guess your story isn’t too far-fetched.” “I’m assuming that’s your way of admitting you were wrong and that you’re sorry? If that’s so, then apology accepted. Now, mind giving me my Chaos Emerald back?” Not amused by the sarcastic remark, her eyelids drooped slightly, to avoid showing too much irritation. “You didn’t let me finish. I don’t think you’re General Shadow, but I don’t fully trust you either.” Strolling slowly towards Shadow, the cat continued, “And if rumors are true about those gems’ power, there’s no way I’m just going to give them to you. Maybe if you prove yourself…” “You expect to train me, as if I were some pet?” Now standing parallel from each other, the female in the doorframe, she turned and winked while saying in a hushed voice, “ I suggest you start jumping, Shady.” And with that, while leaving the hedgehog in her dust, the female continued on her path, her blue-tipped tail flicking in her wake. After regaining his composure, the crimson-striped turned the corner, following behind the sassy cat.
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Back in the common room, where the ebony male had been knocked unconscious, everyone was sitting or standing and accounted for, except for the robust lynx and the blue blur. The space itself was filled with an eerie, awkward silence. Rin, who was sitting, stared at Silver, who stood upright. The ivory male felt slightly uncomfortable, so he threw his gaze upon the snowy cat at the far side of the room, near the makeshift kitchen. She personally didn’t notice the glances from the similar colored mobian, for she was still deep in thought over the newcomers’ situation. Without her conscious decision, she looked off into space in the general direction of Shadow, who sat on the couch that he had sat on earlier that day. Since the golden fox was also seated on the fairly small couch, the obsidian male offered the petite human his lap, for her to sit on. She thought of saying no at first, but at this point, she found out that she could care less. While her mobian cushion was glancing around, trying to notice the smallest details, presumably trying to find other secret entrances to the Freedom Fighter HQ, Hope was still suspiciously eyeing the echidna near the house’s main entrance. As for Yumi, well wherever she looked, she wouldn’t see like the others in the room would. The lack of noise continued on for about another minute, until the voice of Sonic came floating through from the back of the house. Everyone turned their head towards the chatter, save the rosy echidna and the ebony male, who only darted his eyes over towards the sound.

“Wait, so are there other secrets in here? Can I check them out? Or maybe I can go for a run. You have to admit it’s pretty cramped in here. Plus, running is waay cooler than just sitting around doing nothing. I’m pretty sure…” Even though the duo way still a slight ways off, it was hard not to hear the boastful cerulean hedgehog. Luckily for the striped one, toning out his companion’s constant chatter had become near child’s play to him. On occasion he had even found himself missing Sonic telling him the plan of attack on an Eggman base several times due to that little habit. Underneath the obsidian’s skull, his mind turned, as it contemplated nothing that was of true importance. The only subject that came to mind was the situation of the timeline that he and the two other hedgehogs had arrived from. ‘After we resolve what is happening here, we would most likely need to gather the remaining four emeralds and travel back to the day where Sonic and I first met. The only problem is, once that is solved, how do we get back to our own time? What if we chose an event we believed changed our future, but in reality did nothing, and then miss our chance to fix it all? Is there even a guarantee that our timeline will be perfectly restored? And what is going on in our timeline? Has it been erased, or is everyone frozen, because time has ceased? *sigh*, There’s too many questions right now. However, the way I see it is the other two won’t even consider these possibilities. Well, I know Sonic most certainly won’t…’ What drew the dark hedgehog out from the recesses of his mind was the yelp that escaped the blue blur’s lips as the right fist of the disfigured lynx came crashing into the male’s skull, leaving a comically-shaped, red bump on the back of his head. Turning to the group, the female lynx asked the question on everyone’s mind, “So, what are we going to do now?” Nobody raised his or her opinion, because no one truly had an idea.
“We could let them join us!” the young and partially naïve fox piped up. “Rin!” “What, Syd, what’s wrong? You said it yourself that we need all of the help that we can get! Now four people come in, and just because one of them looks sort-of like our enemy, you’re saying no?” At this point, an accusing finger was thrown across the room to the darker male, cast by the lighter female. “Sort-of looks like? Rin! They’re a perfect match! I don’t think he is the general, but that doesn’t mean he just gets a get out of jail-free pass. It also means I’m not just going to full-out trust him with my life!” During this time, Shadow had thought about if pairing their band of four with these Freedom Fighters would be a wise decision in the long run, and after a moment his choice seemed obvious. “I can not stop this feeling that your prejudiced is completely towards me.” “Wow, no sh*t.” A slight gasp was uttered as the well-shaped lynx spat out of shock, “Sydney!” The situation was handled with the obsidian calmly raising his right hand “No, it’s understandable.” Once the snowy cat scoffed, Shadow continued. “ I see why there would be some doubt about if I can be trusted or not. The only thing I ask is if it is only me you do not trust.” Six sets of eyes now joined the crimson eyes that peered to the cerulean-haired feline. “To be honest, it’s really just you and blue-y over there that bother me.” A respectfully deserved ‘hey’ was shot across the space. “But, maybe if… Oh, I don’t know, proved yourselves…” Starting to get annoyed by the sly tactics of the neko, the ultimate life form rose to his feet, after placing the human girl where he was sitting. His eyelids were close to making his eyes look like slits, and his eyebrows dipped in slightly further than before. As the conversation had droned on, the area seemed to have gotten colder to the others, and now by the staring contest between the two debaters, the room reminded the Mobian hero of the Ice Cap Zone. ‘Jeez,’ he thought bitterly, ‘ Isn’t there a fireplace in this shack?’ Back to the actually verbal conversation, the ebony hedgehog, slightly seething at this point, whispered, “ What do you want from us?” Taking notice to the loss in the male sarcastic and at some points stoic behavior, she couldn’t help but let a smirk dance onto her face. “There is an operations base about 50 miles north of here. You and your blue friend go in there, hack your way into the mainframe, upload a little file to the mainframe, and escape in under an hour, then I’ll change my mind.” Now eager to place his two cents in on the conversation, the ivory hedgehog asked, “Well, what are me and Hope supposed to do? And hate to tell you, but Sonic and Shadow aren’t going to run an errand for you just because you asked nicely. At least, not Shadow anyway.” “ Isn’t it obvious, you two will be staying here with us, and will not be able to leave until they return.” Now, it was the fairly quiet echidna who spoke up. “Sydney, the only reason why we held them prisoner is because we thought they were part of the Eggman Empire. Holding them now would make us no better than them.” Irritated that her own team was not behind her idea, the multi-colored cat’s temper was starting to flare up. “Yumi! That’s the only way there going to do it! Otherwise they’re just going to run off and will never be heard from again. This way, they’ll have to do it.” The striped hedgehog was about to lash back with a few words of his own, but the blue blur stepped in. “ Look lady, we want to help in anyway we can. If this is the only way you can trust us, then I’m on board with it. Just don’t try anything funny with them, alright?” As a sign of peace, Sonic let out one of his signature thumbs-up-with-a-smirk out, hoping it would ease the mood. “Fine. Here, this is the file.” Going up to the couch were Hope was sitting, the cat ripped of the cushion and reached inside only to pull out a thin box. Inside the box was an old, but look functional thumb-drive. As the blue blur was about to step outside, he reached out his arm to receive the oncoming projectile. Once it was caught, he turned over his shoulder, calling, “Come on Shad, let’s go!” Rin, who had blinked during his statement, opened her eyes to find no trace of him at all. To put it simply, her mind couldn’t comprehend. Right before, the crimson-striped hedgehog had shot daggers from his eyes towards the cat, and with the same burst of speed as the last one to leave, Shadow was gone from sight. The only evidence of either being in their base was the gust of wind felt just after they sprinted off.
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Sonic enjoyed the peace and lively sense he got whenever he went running. When he did go at a speed he didn’t consider to be a snail’s pace, it was really only him who could maintain the speed, and in some cases, even reach it. The only exception was with the hedgehog that skated along-side him now, but most of the time it was while they were fighting Eggman, or if Sonic challenged him to a race, (which he always won, according to him. If Shadow did win, it was because he cheated by using Chaos Control.) So running for him way the perfect time to just forget everything and enjoy the world. However, even he, who was always upbeat, was struggling to enjoy the scenery. All that was around was rocks, some dried up grass, dirt, dead trees, and ash. Lots and lots of ash, which created a slightly dark puff cloud trailing behind him. Wondering if he could tell what his former rival was thinking about, the mobian hero dared to sneak a glace at Shadow’s face. Just as he was about to, the ebony male snapped his head towards the blue, and asked, “Why are we doing this? I understand that we should be allied with them, but why are we going to do a base raid for them?” Leaping over the occasional rock that crossed his path, the hero just shrugged. To be honest, he really didn’t know. It’s not like Silver and Hope were in danger. He knew Silver could break himself and Hope out at anytime, it seemed almost like he was compelled to go on the raid. “I dunno, I figure that this is a pretty easy task, and this way we could step out and talk about if we want to stay with them or walk away without them hanging over us. What ever we decide we’ll tell Silv and Hope and go from there. Why, do you not trust them or something?” A small, annoyed sigh slipped from the ultimate life form’s lips. ‘I thought it was obvious, Sonic.’ “I don’t trust them, maybe I will later on, if we stay with them. Trust isn’t something you can gain by being with someone for only an hour, Sonic. Don’t tell me you do?” The obsidian leapt over a boulder that was in their path, while the blue blur catapulted off of the inanimate object. “Yeah, I do! I mean, the cat’s a bit annoying but so is Knuckles. The fox reminds me of Amy, and the lynx is pretty much like Blaze. I trust all of them! Oh, and you and that echidna girl? A prefect match!” “I fail to see any resemblance to her.” To a stranger, nothing had changed in the striped male’s tone or facial expression. But being around Shadow for as long as he had, Sonic knew he got under his fur. “Oh reeeeaaly? She never talks, has no emotion, and when she does talk it’s usually some end-of-the-world mumbo-jumbo!” Shutting his scarlet eyes off to the world and clenching his hand into a fist, the ebony hedgehog’s voice began to seep with the slightest tang of anger. “It seems to me that you have no idea what you’re-” “Oh, hey! I think that’s it!”

As his eyes once again took in the world around him, the Ultimate Life Form had figured the hero to be correct. As the both over looked the scene below them from the top of this cliff over looking the flood valley in front of them, they could see their intended target. The base itself was not very large, due to their encounters with the emperor’s previous headquarters or subsections, but if it were compared to a regular building, the compound was massive. Surrounding the base from all sides was a wall that reached the same height as the structure, which from a quick analysis of Shadow was close to ten stories tall. At designated points were guard towers, which seemed redundant since there were no openings for people to travel through. The only way to get above the wall seemed to be either to fly over the wall, or to hopefully gain enough momentum to sprint up the side of it. ‘Or you could scale the wall with a grappling hook, I suppose, but with the guards…smart, Doctor. You really seem to be on your game. This may actually be a challenge.’ After thinking over his options, the ebony male was about to propose his plan of attack to his partner, when he saw that the blue blur was gone. “*Sigh* Why do I even bother? He never thinks anything through. I swear, one day he’s going to get himself killed.” He stepped towards the edge of the ledge, bent his knees, and sprung himself forward. As he fell, he quickly rolled up into the same ball used for his homing attack. Losing space between him and the ground, the ball began to spin, and once impact was made, the spinning ball shot forward towards the wall. It was at this point the crimson-streaked spike ball caught up with the azure spike ball, and both were just mere seconds away from the on-coming behemoth of a wall. Gaining momentum, the two started to leave streaks of their designated colors behind them as the darted up the vertical structure. Reaching the top, the hedgehogs decided to split up, each of them taking one the near-by guard stations. Each tower held a single robot, about half the size of the invaders. Their design was simple. Each appeared to be a sphere, with two varying colors, stubby, cylinder arms, and round hands. Their eyes were shaped to appear as the heads of flashlights, and they shined just like them. Wasting no time, each hedgehog, still in rolled-up form, smashed into the top of their enemy, and then dashed off to their main target, the base.

The base itself was dome-shaped, with no windows at all. The only features on the structure could be seen up close. The outer layer was completely metal alloys, so at some sections were torched and mended together, to get that spherical shape. The entrance on the south side of the first floor was set in by about 10 feet. Upon arrival, both males unrolled, and the ebony one placed a hand up as if to say, ‘wait.’ A nod was exchanged as a response, and so the striped hedgehog walked to the door, trying to convince whoever might be watching him from the camera, placed just above the intended entrance, that he belonged there. Just on his right, there was a simple nine-key lock system. With a stroke of his hand, his gloved fingers danced over the keys, stroking the keys with confidence. The only code Dr. Eggman had ever used for small, outpost bases were the exact buttons that were being hit. After the seven-digit code was entered, a once yellow light over the large, metal, double doors turned red. A frown seeped onto the tan muzzle. ‘Great, so he finally got a clue. Took him long enough.’ Fortunately for the G.U.N. agent, there was a universal code for all digital locks. The only problem was, five minutes after the code was entered, it alerts all other locks to automatically lock-down. The way to turn off the lock is by a key, which no doubt the plump man had the only copy, or by voice command, if the lock also had a voice-recognition option. The key would have been the only way out, because there was no speaker below the keypad. ‘It is just Sonic and me, we could get out in plenty of time, as long as the Doctor did not also change his whole computer lay-out.’ “Pssst! Shadow, psst! Are you done yet?” The blue blur had peered his head around the corner, for when the obsidian went ahead to the door, he assumed the role of lookout. Reaching back behind his head as if to scratch one of his itchy, raised-up quills, the hedgehog in front of Sonic raised one finger as the rest mimicked a scratching motion. ‘Oh, real mature Shadow. And you say Silver is the childish one.’ Taking a second to recall if he remembered the correct order, the ultimate life form stabbed the keys: 97236681452. What the camera picked up next was the supposed General Shadow walk briskly through and into the compound. What it didn’t catch was the burst of wind that passed through the door just before the high-ranked commander.

The inside wasn’t anything the two males hadn’t expected. Everything around them was metal. The floors, the ceiling, the walls, the doors, all of them were some variation of a metal. The only thing in sight that wasn’t metallic was the florescent over-head cylinder lights, and the idle red panic lights on the wall, ready to alert everyone inside of any intruders. Despite their job, no alarm rang out through the halls about the two hedgehogs that now ran through the base, in search of the computer room. “Hey Shadow, so what are we going to do once we find the computer room?” If their adventure had been like a Japanese anime, there would have been several #-like marks pounding on his forehead. “Do not. EVER. Say that again.” “Sa-say what? All I said was-” “Drop it.” “But I-” “DROP IT!” By now Sonic was cowering, afraid a Chaos Blast would soon be in is future. There are two people Sonic knew that when they were mad, if you wanted to live, you should stay away. One was the hedgehog in front of him; the other was the hedgie in love with him. He expected to not only be physically beat up, but be dealt some damage verbally as well. But the abuse never reached the cerulean hedgehog. In fact, it never left the furious male. All he heard was the same words just heard in a decreasing volume, and getting less enunciated. The two stood frozen in silence, as the echo had finally died out. Suddenly, muffled stomps as if from mechs were heard down the hallway. Cursing under his breath, the now calmer and annoyed hedgehog said, “Damn it. So much for stealth.” At that moment, he felt his arm being pulled in the opposite direction, and upon looking in the direction, he found out that the hero was blindly leading the pair down the corridors. “Nice going, Mr. spy-guy! Now what?” Ripping his arm back from the blue blur’s grip he replied calmly, “It’s simple. Our new plan is the old plan. Except now you’re going to have to be looking out for any robots.” “What?? No! I hate lookout! You do it! It’s your fault were in this mess! And what was that little out break about anyway?” “Two words Sonic; Team Chaotix.” The questioner’s face went blank as he processed the information given to him. “Oooooohh….” “Now do you understand?” “Yeah, trust me I do. Try baby-sitting Charmy Bee for an hour.” “Wait, you actually said yes to them?” “Well, more like Espio snuck up behind be and strapped a sling around me and then ran off. I open it up, and there’s the little fart himself. Why, did they ask you?” “Yes, and then I proceeded to Chaos Blast Vector. Needless to say, he got the message.”

Rounding the corner, there was a single door on the left, with a print recognition lock. Slipping off his left glove, finger by finger, the ultimate life form placed his palm against the screen. After a laser swept over the gloveless hand, and once completed, the door swished open. The space that was now revealed to the duo was a simple layout, with no lights at all in the room. The only object throwing shadows was the massive screen that lay straight ahead. Below was a simple but large keyboard, with the keys ranging from English letters to Japanese characters. Several hard drives sat along the walls. “Whoa, talk about trying to set a mood! What does he think, he’s going to scare off people with some creepy lighting? La-ame. How long do you think it’s going to take?” Approaching the computer, the ebony male punctured a key, which resulted in password box popping up. Without wasting anytime, he typed in the standard Eggman password, but it was not the one they needed. ‘Sh*t, he changed this too? Damn it! We don’t have anytime for this! We only have 2 minutes…’ “Hey, Sha-dow! You in there? What are you waiting for?” During his thought session, the blue blur had walked up behind him and started to poke him on the back. “Sonic, what do you think the password is?” A blue eyebrow was raised. “What do I think it is? Umm, aren’t you the master hacker? You figure it out!” “First of all, I am not a master. Rouge is the main hacker on my team, not me. Now we don’t have time to be fighting, so what do you think it is?” At this point the cerulean hedgehog had moved over to one of the hard drive, looking for a USB slot to insert the thumb drive the snowy cat had given to him. “What’s the big deal Shadow? Just try some random words out!” “We don’t have time to, because we have less than two minutes to upload the software, so what do you think it is?” “Oh, I dunno, maybe…wait, WHAT?? Why do we-” The striped male swung his head back, and placed a now gloved left hand to his muzzle. “Shh! Do you want us to get caught? So what? What do you think?” Now slightly panicked, the hero began to spitball some hopefully helpful ideas. “Ummm, umm… What about a family member?” “He’s a sociopath, Sonic. Even if he did have any living family, he would not care for them, or make them their password. What else?” “Favorite food?” “Too obvious.” “Favorite color?” “Same thing.” “His birth date?” “Really Sonic? He wouldn’t pick some thing too common, but he wouldn’t pick something too difficult.” “What about one of his old names?” “Wait, do you mean Ivo Robotnik?” “Yeah, I mean most people don’t remember him as Robotnik… hey Shadow, what are you thinking?” “…There’s no ‘C’ in Robotnik, right?” “Yeah…why?” Turning back toward the screen, fingers flew as the corresponding letters popped up on the screen, and then were replaced with a * symbol. “K-I-N-B-O-T-O-R. Kintobor.” After hitting the enter key, a monotone AI voice responded with a simple, “Access granted.” Once hearing that, the hero shoved in the USB, which Shadow then opened and dragged onto the desktop. After uploading the software, the two had 30 seconds to make their sneaky escape. Things seemed to be turning around, until they realized that by neglecting his lookout duties, the mechs were only a few feet away from the now alarmed hedgehogs.

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Description
Ch. 6
The two mobians remained facing each other in the dingy natural cell staring at each other’s markings. The male was more confused by this newfound fact than the female cat in front of him. She was gaping at his hand; dumbstruck and shocked by the simplistic golden ring design that was permanently embedded into his fur. Thousands of different explanations raced through her skull, desperately trying to calm down their creator, but each theory had a noticeable flaw. The only people alive who knew of the skin painting were the rest of the girls, who never told a soul, or showed their marking. Their old leader, bless his soul, the albino cat decreed silently, had suggested the idea as a simple way of identifying himself or herself to be the true one, instead a fake that the wicked Doctor had tried to create. The remaining four had agreed to the plan, and so the plan was carried out. All of them had decided to make the location of the ring be the right palm, except for the lynx and the echidna. For them, they placed the sacred symbol on their right shoulder. Even though their leader had died in a raid that had gone horribly wrong, the rag-tag bunch had managed to retrieve the body of their fallen leader on the way out of the base. Reminding herself of those facts, she swiftly turned back on her heels and retreated towards the door. Unknown by her, the newly physically challenged lynx had been watching the whole event, and chose to open the door before the mismatched colored cat had reached the door. Not even peeking a glance back at the captive hedgehog, Sydney darted out the door, and less than a second later, the door slid swiftly behind her to a closed position. Still not quite sure why a simplistic ring tattoo would cause such a reaction, even if it was slightly peculiar, without much effort Shadow freed himself of his restraints, picked up his soaking glove, and paced over to the opposite side, leaning against the natural wall. Slowly he closed his eyes while crossing his arms to their signature position and waited patiently for the some-what rash woman to return once again.
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“So, Sydney, did he give you the answers you wanted?” If the skeptic cat was not so shell-shocked at the moment, she would had thrown a sassy and or sarcastic remark right back at the ebony-haired lynx in front of her. However, the events that took place in the supposed General’s holding cell still baffled her. The absurd story the crimson striped hedgehog had woven was too out there to be even remotely possible. The strange thing that she started to realize was that his story was the only theory that made sense. And not only did it make sense to the partially snowy cat, the more she thought about it, the more it seemed that was the only explanation for what was going on. That alone also bothered her to no end. For almost all of her life, she grew up loathing the Robotnik Empire, or anyone apart of it. For what they did to her parents, and all of her friends who fought along side her…her captain, who brought her in after she was orphaned…and now here was practically his royal nuisance’s right-hand-man on a platter for her to easily kill, and she was listening to him. She BELIEVED him. She didn’t care even if his story was right. All she knew for certain was everyone else believed this elaborate lie, so she had to be at the least, an inside skeptic.

She hadn’t noticed but by this point, Izumi had pulled out the petit echidna and was now struggling to retrieve the optimistic fox. ‘Wait, what’s wrong with her?’ Coming back into the present moment, still partially distracted, the azure-haired feline sauntered over to the cluster of girls standing in the doorway of the ivory hedgehog’s cell. Apparently the sun-kissed fox did not understand that when the others said the interrogation was over, it was over. “Ha! Do you honestly want me to believe that your two hedgehog buddies are not A. dead and B. one of the generals to the largest corporal power in all of Mobius’ history?” Sydney had noticed, just like her prisoner, her friend’s questions were annoying the extremely light hedgehog. A logical guess would be that the reason why he was irritated was she had repeated her questions several times now. “Yes, I do because we come from a different timeline where Sonic isn’t dead, and Shadow is a good guy! Well, I mean he doesn’t work for Eggman. He can kind of me a real jerk sometimes, and a little bit rude, but his intentions are good!” Clearly grasping at straws now, trying to find anyway to prolong this investigation into the booted hedgehog’s words, the blue-eyed fox proclaimed, “See? He just said Shadow isn’t a good guy! Let me at him a little longer! I promise I can crack him!” Under his breath, just loud enough that if you strained to hear him you could make out his words, or if you had impeccable hearing, he stated flatly, “Hate to say it, but it seems your pretty cracked yourself there, honey.” Unfortunately for the hedgehog, he spoke loud enough that the fox in question heard his statement loud and clear. “WHAT DID YOU SAY TO ME, POT HEAD??” Finally deciding she had seen enough, the lynx wrapped her functioning arm around her enraged fox’s waist, and successfully managed to lift her off of her feet. “Okay Rin, I think you’ve had enough fun for today.” Although she was not amused by her new predicament, the now not so cheery fox did not put up a fight. All she did as defiance was screech out to the now confused male, “What is love!?” Not sure why that question would be even remotely important, he replied confused, “ Love is and intense emotion that is felt between two living creatures? I don’t know!” She only nodded as her teammate lifted her out of the room as she mulled over the ivory hedgehog’s answer. As all of the females filed out, the booted captive thought to himself, slightly ticked off, ‘Pothead? Real original. If you want to really make someone mad don’t go for the obvious smart one!”

As the door closed behind them the first one to bring up the question of the hour was the handicapped lynx. “What was that whole thing with love about?” A smile stretched across the fox’s muzzle, impressed by her own genius idea. “Robots can’t understand love, if they tried to they would short-circuit! He didn’t, so he’s not a robot.” All the other females stared at the overjoyed fox, wondering why she was so proud of that dumb question. “So, who believes them?” the lynx once again breaking the silence. All four looked around at each other and at the floor anxiously. Sick of the ominous feeling in the air, the smallest of the four piped up. “I believe them. It’s almost hard not to. All four of them having the same exact story? Even in the greatest lies there would be a slight difference.” “I agree with Yumi. No lie is perfect, only truth can be completely perfect.” “I agree, Zum!” The fox turned, seeing her naturally obsidian fingers pointing accusingly towards the fox. “Then why were you giving him such a hard time if you already felt that way?” “Well, how often is it that we get to yell at people? I say when you get the chance, go full out!” A death glare was shot by the furred-eared creature towards the other long-eared mobian. Completely disregarding the bickering females, the non-eared child asked the snowy-eared feline (why am I distinguishing them by their ears?? XD) one of life’s simple-but-hard questions; “What do you think?” the cerulean-haired female still wasn’t one hundred percent sure, however all of her allies said yes, and she wasn’t fully on the ‘no’ side. “I mean, I think so…yes. I believe they are telling the truth.” Letting a faint smile crack onto her face, the blinded echidna turned her back towards her teammates and went backed to the room with the now seriously frightened human. Before it was the adrenaline talking, but now that Hope fully and lucidly understood her situation, she wasn’t sacred for only her life, but the lives of her new furry friends, especially the General Shadow look-a-like-not-really-because-they’re-kind-of-the-same-person. Seeing that their meeting was over, the two females had stopped quarreling and turned towards the albino cat for the answer. Already knowing what their question, the feline responded without anyone asking, “ Let them out. Let’s pretend to trust them. Tell them only what they need to know. Any questions even remotely close to our secrets shut it down. And most importantly,” she now rotated her hips so she was slightly facing the other two, “Don’t let you guard down.” And with her warning, the snowy cat strutted over to her project’s holding room, not bothering to close the door behind her, just like Yumi when she left the group. Once the other two had left, both the lynx and the fox faced each other, nodded at the other, and then resided to entering their prisoner’s rooms.
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When the young echidna entered the hindering room, she was surprised to not be able to hear the human at all. “Where…” If she had ears like the rest of her companions, they would have perked up at the slight shift of weight from the blonde human’s feet. Yumi realized that the naïve child thought she could sneak out of the room since she left the door open. Her small smile appeared on her face for only a second, and then returned to their natural, indifferent position. ‘She thinks she can escape? Rookie mistake.’ Turning on a dime, the rosy echidna shot forward, latching her hand onto the escapee’s arm. “Here I am, coming in here to see if I can trust you enough to let you out, and now you’re trying to take advantage of the fact that I’m blind? That’s not very nice of you.” Realizing her extreme error Hope cursed under her breath. ‘Of course she’s not completely clueless Hope, she lead you and everyone else through the forest back to her own house. If she were completely unable to interact the world around her, she wouldn’t have been that far out in the woods! Stupid. Stupid! Why was I so stupid?’

“It doesn’t matter, I suppose. Your story checks out amongst the others, and I’m guessing it was your instincts telling you to run. I don’t really blame you, I would try to run too.” After a long sigh, the petit echidna turned towards the door and walked out leaving the confused human behind. “Wait, so your just…letting me go?” She turned her head to her newly liberated captive. “Well, someone catches on fast. Follow me.” Relieved that this whole mess was over, the aqua-eyed girl happily followed her some-what-not-really ally. If only she knew that now she was fully involved in this whole mess. Who knows if she had the chance to, if she would crawl back into her small hole house, and try to block herself off from the rest of the world?
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When the fox, who he personally thought was insane and more annoying than Big the Cat himself, returned Silver immediately dropped the stalagmite piece he had broken off with his psychokinetic powers and was now using to cut his restraints. Luckily for him, the still cheery fox missed him drop his escape tool, so he avoided hearing an earful of complaints and yelling. What scared him was when the sunny fox pulled out a box knife. The combination of her face and the possibly deadly weapon reminded him a lot of the sakura hedgie, Amy Rose. When she would get mad, she would pull her hammer out of thin air and would proceed to aim her attack on her prey, who was often Sonic and the red companion of Sonic, Knuckles the Echidna. Unfortunately, he has had a few hits from her hammer, and when she stalks over to her frightened target, hammer raised and her lips revealing a very irritated smile…well let’s just say you don’t get up for a while. “Umm, what are you doing with that?” By this time she had just reached the place where Silver was tied up, and he was not thrilled. “Hmm, I don’t know…maybe this?” Without any warning, she struck her right hand down; her target was slightly above the hedgehog’s golden left-hand cuff. “Wait-wait-wait-wait-WAIT-WAIT!” Out of instinct, the ivory male cut off his vision by quickly closing his eyelids. The sound of the knife hitting its initial target rang out, short and bluntly. However, the ivory hedgehog felt no pain. Slowly, he peered out from under his eyelids, first the right lid, then the left. What he saw was that the cutting tool actually cut the ropes that restrained his left arm, not the outcome he had feared. “Wait what? You don’t want to be freed? Alright then stay caught, I don’t mind.” Not sure if this was a trick or not, he carefully undid the rest of his restraints while never looking away from the fox above him. Once he completed his task, Silver slowly rose to a standing position, and followed silently, but alert as Rin tempted him to trail behind her as they stalked to the main vicinity in the Freedom Fighter’s compound.
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Swinging open the metallic door, the snowy neko* cast her gaze onto where she suspected the non-general would still be sitting in his chair. Once she got a solid look at the alloy-made chair, she realized the hedgehog was in fact, not in her line of sight. Now on high alert in fear of an attack, or of her ex-suspect escaping, Sydney placed her head on a swivel. “Hmph, someone is clearly paranoid.” Standing just slightly off to the side of the place in which she entered, the obsidian male spoke up, his intimidating blood-red eyes pierced right at her. Glad she knew where the possibly hostile attacker was, the cerulean-haired cat slightly let down her guard, but made sure the male couldn’t see that fact. “Lucky for you, I had a change of heart. I guess your story isn’t too far-fetched.” “I’m assuming that’s your way of admitting you were wrong and that you’re sorry? If that’s so, then apology accepted. Now, mind giving me my Chaos Emerald back?” Not amused by the sarcastic remark, her eyelids drooped slightly, to avoid showing too much irritation. “You didn’t let me finish. I don’t think you’re General Shadow, but I don’t fully trust you either.” Strolling slowly towards Shadow, the cat continued, “And if rumors are true about those gems’ power, there’s no way I’m just going to give them to you. Maybe if you prove yourself…” “You expect to train me, as if I were some pet?” Now standing parallel from each other, the female in the doorframe, she turned and winked while saying in a hushed voice, “ I suggest you start jumping, Shady.” And with that, while leaving the hedgehog in her dust, the female continued on her path, her blue-tipped tail flicking in her wake. After regaining his composure, the crimson-striped turned the corner, following behind the sassy cat.
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Back in the common room, where the ebony male had been knocked unconscious, everyone was sitting or standing and accounted for, except for the robust lynx and the blue blur. The space itself was filled with an eerie, awkward silence. Rin, who was sitting, stared at Silver, who stood upright. The ivory male felt slightly uncomfortable, so he threw his gaze upon the snowy cat at the far side of the room, near the makeshift kitchen. She personally didn’t notice the glances from the similar colored mobian, for she was still deep in thought over the newcomers’ situation. Without her conscious decision, she looked off into space in the general direction of Shadow, who sat on the couch that he had sat on earlier that day. Since the golden fox was also seated on the fairly small couch, the obsidian male offered the petite human his lap, for her to sit on. She thought of saying no at first, but at this point, she found out that she could care less. While her mobian cushion was glancing around, trying to notice the smallest details, presumably trying to find other secret entrances to the Freedom Fighter HQ, Hope was still suspiciously eyeing the echidna near the house’s main entrance. As for Yumi, well wherever she looked, she wouldn’t see like the others in the room would. The lack of noise continued on for about another minute, until the voice of Sonic came floating through from the back of the house. Everyone turned their head towards the chatter, save the rosy echidna and the ebony male, who only darted his eyes over towards the sound.

“Wait, so are there other secrets in here? Can I check them out? Or maybe I can go for a run. You have to admit it’s pretty cramped in here. Plus, running is waay cooler than just sitting around doing nothing. I’m pretty sure…” Even though the duo way still a slight ways off, it was hard not to hear the boastful cerulean hedgehog. Luckily for the striped one, toning out his companion’s constant chatter had become near child’s play to him. On occasion he had even found himself missing Sonic telling him the plan of attack on an Eggman base several times due to that little habit. Underneath the obsidian’s skull, his mind turned, as it contemplated nothing that was of true importance. The only subject that came to mind was the situation of the timeline that he and the two other hedgehogs had arrived from. ‘After we resolve what is happening here, we would most likely need to gather the remaining four emeralds and travel back to the day where Sonic and I first met. The only problem is, once that is solved, how do we get back to our own time? What if we chose an event we believed changed our future, but in reality did nothing, and then miss our chance to fix it all? Is there even a guarantee that our timeline will be perfectly restored? And what is going on in our timeline? Has it been erased, or is everyone frozen, because time has ceased? *sigh*, There’s too many questions right now. However, the way I see it is the other two won’t even consider these possibilities. Well, I know Sonic most certainly won’t…’ What drew the dark hedgehog out from the recesses of his mind was the yelp that escaped the blue blur’s lips as the right fist of the disfigured lynx came crashing into the male’s skull, leaving a comically-shaped, red bump on the back of his head. Turning to the group, the female lynx asked the question on everyone’s mind, “So, what are we going to do now?” Nobody raised his or her opinion, because no one truly had an idea.
“We could let them join us!” the young and partially naïve fox piped up. “Rin!” “What, Syd, what’s wrong? You said it yourself that we need all of the help that we can get! Now four people come in, and just because one of them looks sort-of like our enemy, you’re saying no?” At this point, an accusing finger was thrown across the room to the darker male, cast by the lighter female. “Sort-of looks like? Rin! They’re a perfect match! I don’t think he is the general, but that doesn’t mean he just gets a get out of jail-free pass. It also means I’m not just going to full-out trust him with my life!” During this time, Shadow had thought about if pairing their band of four with these Freedom Fighters would be a wise decision in the long run, and after a moment his choice seemed obvious. “I can not stop this feeling that your prejudiced is completely towards me.” “Wow, no sh*t.” A slight gasp was uttered as the well-shaped lynx spat out of shock, “Sydney!” The situation was handled with the obsidian calmly raising his right hand “No, it’s understandable.” Once the snowy cat scoffed, Shadow continued. “ I see why there would be some doubt about if I can be trusted or not. The only thing I ask is if it is only me you do not trust.” Six sets of eyes now joined the crimson eyes that peered to the cerulean-haired feline. “To be honest, it’s really just you and blue-y over there that bother me.” A respectfully deserved ‘hey’ was shot across the space. “But, maybe if… Oh, I don’t know, proved yourselves…” Starting to get annoyed by the sly tactics of the neko, the ultimate life form rose to his feet, after placing the human girl where he was sitting. His eyelids were close to making his eyes look like slits, and his eyebrows dipped in slightly further than before. As the conversation had droned on, the area seemed to have gotten colder to the others, and now by the staring contest between the two debaters, the room reminded the Mobian hero of the Ice Cap Zone. ‘Jeez,’ he thought bitterly, ‘ Isn’t there a fireplace in this shack?’ Back to the actually verbal conversation, the ebony hedgehog, slightly seething at this point, whispered, “ What do you want from us?” Taking notice to the loss in the male sarcastic and at some points stoic behavior, she couldn’t help but let a smirk dance onto her face. “There is an operations base about 50 miles north of here. You and your blue friend go in there, hack your way into the mainframe, upload a little file to the mainframe, and escape in under an hour, then I’ll change my mind.” Now eager to place his two cents in on the conversation, the ivory hedgehog asked, “Well, what are me and Hope supposed to do? And hate to tell you, but Sonic and Shadow aren’t going to run an errand for you just because you asked nicely. At least, not Shadow anyway.” “ Isn’t it obvious, you two will be staying here with us, and will not be able to leave until they return.” Now, it was the fairly quiet echidna who spoke up. “Sydney, the only reason why we held them prisoner is because we thought they were part of the Eggman Empire. Holding them now would make us no better than them.” Irritated that her own team was not behind her idea, the multi-colored cat’s temper was starting to flare up. “Yumi! That’s the only way there going to do it! Otherwise they’re just going to run off and will never be heard from again. This way, they’ll have to do it.” The striped hedgehog was about to lash back with a few words of his own, but the blue blur stepped in. “ Look lady, we want to help in anyway we can. If this is the only way you can trust us, then I’m on board with it. Just don’t try anything funny with them, alright?” As a sign of peace, Sonic let out one of his signature thumbs-up-with-a-smirk out, hoping it would ease the mood. “Fine. Here, this is the file.” Going up to the couch were Hope was sitting, the cat ripped of the cushion and reached inside only to pull out a thin box. Inside the box was an old, but look functional thumb-drive. As the blue blur was about to step outside, he reached out his arm to receive the oncoming projectile. Once it was caught, he turned over his shoulder, calling, “Come on Shad, let’s go!” Rin, who had blinked during his statement, opened her eyes to find no trace of him at all. To put it simply, her mind couldn’t comprehend. Right before, the crimson-striped hedgehog had shot daggers from his eyes towards the cat, and with the same burst of speed as the last one to leave, Shadow was gone from sight. The only evidence of either being in their base was the gust of wind felt just after they sprinted off.
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Sonic enjoyed the peace and lively sense he got whenever he went running. When he did go at a speed he didn’t consider to be a snail’s pace, it was really only him who could maintain the speed, and in some cases, even reach it. The only exception was with the hedgehog that skated along-side him now, but most of the time it was while they were fighting Eggman, or if Sonic challenged him to a race, (which he always won, according to him. If Shadow did win, it was because he cheated by using Chaos Control.) So running for him way the perfect time to just forget everything and enjoy the world. However, even he, who was always upbeat, was struggling to enjoy the scenery. All that was around was rocks, some dried up grass, dirt, dead trees, and ash. Lots and lots of ash, which created a slightly dark puff cloud trailing behind him. Wondering if he could tell what his former rival was thinking about, the mobian hero dared to sneak a glace at Shadow’s face. Just as he was about to, the ebony male snapped his head towards the blue, and asked, “Why are we doing this? I understand that we should be allied with them, but why are we going to do a base raid for them?” Leaping over the occasional rock that crossed his path, the hero just shrugged. To be honest, he really didn’t know. It’s not like Silver and Hope were in danger. He knew Silver could break himself and Hope out at anytime, it seemed almost like he was compelled to go on the raid. “I dunno, I figure that this is a pretty easy task, and this way we could step out and talk about if we want to stay with them or walk away without them hanging over us. What ever we decide we’ll tell Silv and Hope and go from there. Why, do you not trust them or something?” A small, annoyed sigh slipped from the ultimate life form’s lips. ‘I thought it was obvious, Sonic.’ “I don’t trust them, maybe I will later on, if we stay with them. Trust isn’t something you can gain by being with someone for only an hour, Sonic. Don’t tell me you do?” The obsidian leapt over a boulder that was in their path, while the blue blur catapulted off of the inanimate object. “Yeah, I do! I mean, the cat’s a bit annoying but so is Knuckles. The fox reminds me of Amy, and the lynx is pretty much like Blaze. I trust all of them! Oh, and you and that echidna girl? A prefect match!” “I fail to see any resemblance to her.” To a stranger, nothing had changed in the striped male’s tone or facial expression. But being around Shadow for as long as he had, Sonic knew he got under his fur. “Oh reeeeaaly? She never talks, has no emotion, and when she does talk it’s usually some end-of-the-world mumbo-jumbo!” Shutting his scarlet eyes off to the world and clenching his hand into a fist, the ebony hedgehog’s voice began to seep with the slightest tang of anger. “It seems to me that you have no idea what you’re-” “Oh, hey! I think that’s it!”

As his eyes once again took in the world around him, the Ultimate Life Form had figured the hero to be correct. As the both over looked the scene below them from the top of this cliff over looking the flood valley in front of them, they could see their intended target. The base itself was not very large, due to their encounters with the emperor’s previous headquarters or subsections, but if it were compared to a regular building, the compound was massive. Surrounding the base from all sides was a wall that reached the same height as the structure, which from a quick analysis of Shadow was close to ten stories tall. At designated points were guard towers, which seemed redundant since there were no openings for people to travel through. The only way to get above the wall seemed to be either to fly over the wall, or to hopefully gain enough momentum to sprint up the side of it. ‘Or you could scale the wall with a grappling hook, I suppose, but with the guards…smart, Doctor. You really seem to be on your game. This may actually be a challenge.’ After thinking over his options, the ebony male was about to propose his plan of attack to his partner, when he saw that the blue blur was gone. “*Sigh* Why do I even bother? He never thinks anything through. I swear, one day he’s going to get himself killed.” He stepped towards the edge of the ledge, bent his knees, and sprung himself forward. As he fell, he quickly rolled up into the same ball used for his homing attack. Losing space between him and the ground, the ball began to spin, and once impact was made, the spinning ball shot forward towards the wall. It was at this point the crimson-streaked spike ball caught up with the azure spike ball, and both were just mere seconds away from the on-coming behemoth of a wall. Gaining momentum, the two started to leave streaks of their designated colors behind them as the darted up the vertical structure. Reaching the top, the hedgehogs decided to split up, each of them taking one the near-by guard stations. Each tower held a single robot, about half the size of the invaders. Their design was simple. Each appeared to be a sphere, with two varying colors, stubby, cylinder arms, and round hands. Their eyes were shaped to appear as the heads of flashlights, and they shined just like them. Wasting no time, each hedgehog, still in rolled-up form, smashed into the top of their enemy, and then dashed off to their main target, the base.

The base itself was dome-shaped, with no windows at all. The only features on the structure could be seen up close. The outer layer was completely metal alloys, so at some sections were torched and mended together, to get that spherical shape. The entrance on the south side of the first floor was set in by about 10 feet. Upon arrival, both males unrolled, and the ebony one placed a hand up as if to say, ‘wait.’ A nod was exchanged as a response, and so the striped hedgehog walked to the door, trying to convince whoever might be watching him from the camera, placed just above the intended entrance, that he belonged there. Just on his right, there was a simple nine-key lock system. With a stroke of his hand, his gloved fingers danced over the keys, stroking the keys with confidence. The only code Dr. Eggman had ever used for small, outpost bases were the exact buttons that were being hit. After the seven-digit code was entered, a once yellow light over the large, metal, double doors turned red. A frown seeped onto the tan muzzle. ‘Great, so he finally got a clue. Took him long enough.’ Fortunately for the G.U.N. agent, there was a universal code for all digital locks. The only problem was, five minutes after the code was entered, it alerts all other locks to automatically lock-down. The way to turn off the lock is by a key, which no doubt the plump man had the only copy, or by voice command, if the lock also had a voice-recognition option. The key would have been the only way out, because there was no speaker below the keypad. ‘It is just Sonic and me, we could get out in plenty of time, as long as the Doctor did not also change his whole computer lay-out.’ “Pssst! Shadow, psst! Are you done yet?” The blue blur had peered his head around the corner, for when the obsidian went ahead to the door, he assumed the role of lookout. Reaching back behind his head as if to scratch one of his itchy, raised-up quills, the hedgehog in front of Sonic raised one finger as the rest mimicked a scratching motion. ‘Oh, real mature Shadow. And you say Silver is the childish one.’ Taking a second to recall if he remembered the correct order, the ultimate life form stabbed the keys: 97236681452. What the camera picked up next was the supposed General Shadow walk briskly through and into the compound. What it didn’t catch was the burst of wind that passed through the door just before the high-ranked commander.

The inside wasn’t anything the two males hadn’t expected. Everything around them was metal. The floors, the ceiling, the walls, the doors, all of them were some variation of a metal. The only thing in sight that wasn’t metallic was the florescent over-head cylinder lights, and the idle red panic lights on the wall, ready to alert everyone inside of any intruders. Despite their job, no alarm rang out through the halls about the two hedgehogs that now ran through the base, in search of the computer room. “Hey Shadow, so what are we going to do once we find the computer room?” If their adventure had been like a Japanese anime, there would have been several #-like marks pounding on his forehead. “Do not. EVER. Say that again.” “Sa-say what? All I said was-” “Drop it.” “But I-” “DROP IT!” By now Sonic was cowering, afraid a Chaos Blast would soon be in is future. There are two people Sonic knew that when they were mad, if you wanted to live, you should stay away. One was the hedgehog in front of him; the other was the hedgie in love with him. He expected to not only be physically beat up, but be dealt some damage verbally as well. But the abuse never reached the cerulean hedgehog. In fact, it never left the furious male. All he heard was the same words just heard in a decreasing volume, and getting less enunciated. The two stood frozen in silence, as the echo had finally died out. Suddenly, muffled stomps as if from mechs were heard down the hallway. Cursing under his breath, the now calmer and annoyed hedgehog said, “Damn it. So much for stealth.” At that moment, he felt his arm being pulled in the opposite direction, and upon looking in the direction, he found out that the hero was blindly leading the pair down the corridors. “Nice going, Mr. spy-guy! Now what?” Ripping his arm back from the blue blur’s grip he replied calmly, “It’s simple. Our new plan is the old plan. Except now you’re going to have to be looking out for any robots.” “What?? No! I hate lookout! You do it! It’s your fault were in this mess! And what was that little out break about anyway?” “Two words Sonic; Team Chaotix.” The questioner’s face went blank as he processed the information given to him. “Oooooohh….” “Now do you understand?” “Yeah, trust me I do. Try baby-sitting Charmy Bee for an hour.” “Wait, you actually said yes to them?” “Well, more like Espio snuck up behind be and strapped a sling around me and then ran off. I open it up, and there’s the little fart himself. Why, did they ask you?” “Yes, and then I proceeded to Chaos Blast Vector. Needless to say, he got the message.”

Rounding the corner, there was a single door on the left, with a print recognition lock. Slipping off his left glove, finger by finger, the ultimate life form placed his palm against the screen. After a laser swept over the gloveless hand, and once completed, the door swished open. The space that was now revealed to the duo was a simple layout, with no lights at all in the room. The only object throwing shadows was the massive screen that lay straight ahead. Below was a simple but large keyboard, with the keys ranging from English letters to Japanese characters. Several hard drives sat along the walls. “Whoa, talk about trying to set a mood! What does he think, he’s going to scare off people with some creepy lighting? La-ame. How long do you think it’s going to take?” Approaching the computer, the ebony male punctured a key, which resulted in password box popping up. Without wasting anytime, he typed in the standard Eggman password, but it was not the one they needed. ‘Sh*t, he changed this too? Damn it! We don’t have anytime for this! We only have 2 minutes…’ “Hey, Sha-dow! You in there? What are you waiting for?” During his thought session, the blue blur had walked up behind him and started to poke him on the back. “Sonic, what do you think the password is?” A blue eyebrow was raised. “What do I think it is? Umm, aren’t you the master hacker? You figure it out!” “First of all, I am not a master. Rouge is the main hacker on my team, not me. Now we don’t have time to be fighting, so what do you think it is?” At this point the cerulean hedgehog had moved over to one of the hard drive, looking for a USB slot to insert the thumb drive the snowy cat had given to him. “What’s the big deal Shadow? Just try some random words out!” “We don’t have time to, because we have less than two minutes to upload the software, so what do you think it is?” “Oh, I dunno, maybe…wait, WHAT?? Why do we-” The striped male swung his head back, and placed a now gloved left hand to his muzzle. “Shh! Do you want us to get caught? So what? What do you think?” Now slightly panicked, the hero began to spitball some hopefully helpful ideas. “Ummm, umm… What about a family member?” “He’s a sociopath, Sonic. Even if he did have any living family, he would not care for them, or make them their password. What else?” “Favorite food?” “Too obvious.” “Favorite color?” “Same thing.” “His birth date?” “Really Sonic? He wouldn’t pick some thing too common, but he wouldn’t pick something too difficult.” “What about one of his old names?” “Wait, do you mean Ivo Robotnik?” “Yeah, I mean most people don’t remember him as Robotnik… hey Shadow, what are you thinking?” “…There’s no ‘C’ in Robotnik, right?” “Yeah…why?” Turning back toward the screen, fingers flew as the corresponding letters popped up on the screen, and then were replaced with a * symbol. “K-I-N-B-O-T-O-R. Kintobor.” After hitting the enter key, a monotone AI voice responded with a simple, “Access granted.” Once hearing that, the hero shoved in the USB, which Shadow then opened and dragged onto the desktop. After uploading the software, the two had 30 seconds to make their sneaky escape. Things seemed to be turning around, until they realized that by neglecting his lookout duties, the mechs were only a few feet away from the now alarmed hedgehogs.

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