Hop To It - Eclipse 6

[Shadow]

Shadow knew how to use the Chaos Emerald. It almost felt like the knowledge was built-in, it was so intuitive, but he’d also read the theory surrounding it, when he was younger. It had been part of his education.

But he had never done so before the Doctor freed him. And while it was intuitive, it wasn’t easy. He was already figuring out how to do it better, but he suspected that jumping straight to teleportation had been a mistake, much less doing it three times in quick succession. Shadow was tired, which was a new and unpleasant experience. Next time, he’d do better. Be more efficient. He’d be ready.

Next time wasn’t very helpful right now though, because he was being chased.

Some rabbit. Shadow knew that his kind of people came in all shapes and sizes, but he’d still sort of expected more hedgehogs in the back of his mind. Like his lookalike back there, the loudmouth who’d unwittingly taken the heat for him.

Shadow hadn’t gone as far as he expected with that last teleport, and he’d had to pause to catch his breath when that rabbit person came out of nowhere and started chasing him. The exact reason why was irrelevant; he had to shake him. Unfortunately, that wasn’t as easy as it sounded.

The road he was running along now was much more in line with what he’d expected a road to be, but that didn’t mean he knew where he was going. His previous home was much smaller, and laid out in a much more orderly fashion. This city was open enough to disorient and convoluted enough to misdirect. If he could just find a long enough straightaway Shadow could leave this interloper in the dust, but he was tired and lost. If his Air Shoes weren’t designed to minimize effort, he’d have been caught already.

It didn’t help that the rabbit was not bound to the ground as Shadow currently was. Looking over his shoulder, he saw them leaping about like a… well, like a rabbit, he supposed. The thing he was doing with those rings that allowed him to change direction in midair was even worse; no matter what twist and turn Shadow took, he couldn’t shake him. And he couldn’t juke him either, because he was impossible to predict! If Shadow didn’t know better, he’d think this guy was throwing himself randomly and hoping for the best.

Which would be infuriating if true.

“Tch.”

Uh oh. That last turn put him on a long straight road, but it was uphill, which his shoes were bad at. The ARK had very few slopes to practice with, and Shadow felt himself slowing down.

Nothing for it. It would delay his rendezvous with the Doctor, but if it got whoever this was off his back--

Shadow jumped from the road to a car, and from there he backflipped over and away. While in the air, he caught a glimpse of the rabbit shooting past him, reacting slowly to his change of direction.

When he was on the ground again, he took a combat stance while the rabbit found his footing. The other person landed clumsily. “I don’t know who you are, but I’m tired of this game,” Shadow said, clenching his fist. “Take this!”

The rabbit held up his hands. “Whoa, hold on. Listen, I don’t want to fight.”

Shadow’s eyes narrowed. “Too bad.” He charged forward, curling into a ball and flexing his quills for maximum puncture.

It was always hard to tell exactly where he was going when rolling like this, but he had a means of sensing his surroundings, one related to his Chaos powers he presumed. He saw the rabbit try to dodge and shifted course accordingly.

The rabbit frowned and flexed his hand. Those damn rings on his arm chimed and lashed out like a serpent, catching Shadow off guard and punching him in the face.

“Oh, yikes. Sorry about that.” He ducked as Shadow stumbled and bounced on the sloped ground, ending up sailing over him. “Or maybe I’m not, since I’m pretty sure you’re the one framing Sonic for crimes.”

Shadow landed on his feet and sneered. “It’s not my fault humans can’t tell us apart. Maybe this ‘Sonic’ should have known better than to copy me.”

The rabbit looked incredulous. “Whomst the frick are you, exactly?” He pulled yet another set of rings from his vest pocket and started floating them between his fingers before making a gesture.

Shadow observed the phenomenon stoically. It wasn’t something he’d seen before, or heard of, but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered but his mission, and this nobody was interfering with it. He held out the Chaos Emerald. “Disappear!”

A spear of pure energy lanced out; unlike the teleport or time stop techniques, this barely required thought. He was able to use Chaos Spears even without an Emerald. With one? It barely required thought. And much less strenuous on his body, too.

The rabbit cringed away and held the rings out in front of him. Shadow smirked; as if such a pitiful attempt at a shield could possibly--

The spear hit the middlemost ring and the energy became trapped in the center of it. Shadow hid his shock, and was gratified to see that the rabbit looked just as surprised.

He dropped the ring from his levitation, and it exploded when it hit the ground, knocking both of them off their feet. It was bright and loud, and Shadow distantly considered that this was going to attract attention.

“Wow, no idea how that happened,” the rabbit said, far too casually for Shadow’s liking. “I wonder if it would have worked if it hadn’t been spinning.”

“Spinning?” he asked before he could stop himself.

“Like this.”

A ring between his hands spun up faster and faster, until a tiny whine filled the air. Then the rabbit let it go, and when it hit the ground it sped towards Shadow like a runaway tire. He spread his legs to let it pass beneath him, and then he heard a crunchy metal sound behind him; the ring hit a car and shredded the bumper.

“Okay, that works a little too well. Note to self: Rev-Up Rings for robots only.”

Shadow growled. “Are you mocking me?!”

“Hm?” The rabbit blinked. “Oh, no, sorry. I’m extremely stressed and using humor to distract myself. Can we stop fighting now?”

“I’m not going to just lower my guard!” Shadow dashed at him a second time, anger making him faster.The rabbit started to gesture, but he was too slow and Shadow hit him in the chest. The rabbit wheezed and fell over, his body reflexively curling around Shadow’s form before the hedgehog sprang off of him, prying off the grasping hands in the process. “Hmph. Pathetic.”

The rabbit groaned. “Cleanup on aisle 4…”

“Wait!”

He scowled. Now what? Who else was coming to interfere? Shadow heard tiny rotor sounds and turned, expecting one of those G.U.N. Beetle drones. Instead, he was slightly perplexed to find a small, toylike robot flying towards them.

“Why are we fighting? I thought we were only asking questions!” it asked, raising its voice to the limits of its speaker, from the sound of the crackle.

“I’m not interested in answering questions. Begone!” Shadow pointed at the robot. “Chaos--huh?”

Where was the Emerald? Where was it?!

His senses flared, and Shadow swiftly looked around to see the rabbit, holding the green gem. “Impossible.” Inexcusable.

He stalked forward, shoving the little robot out of the air when it tried to intercept him all while ignoring its protests. He was going to take what was rightfully his, for only HE knew the true purpose of Chaos.

He grabbed the Rabbit’s shoulder and tried to pull him down to his level.

He offered no resistance and sank to his knees.

Shadow grabbed the Emerald in the rabbit’s hands and pulled. It did not move. He pulled again, and nothing. He tried to pry up the individual fingers, and they might as well have been carved from stone for all the good it did.

Frustrated, Shadow looked up at the rabbit’s face--and jerked back, because his eyes were glowing brightly.

He felt it now. Chaos was flowing through the rabbit’s body, primarily through his head, while his eyes were fixed on the Emerald. “What in the world…?”

The little robot settled down on the rabbit’s head. “Something unusual is happening. I wonder what it is?”

He decided he hated this robot. “Don’t you have anything useful to say?”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

He growled and made to swipe at it, when the rabbit grunted and stood up.

“Useless.” He sighed and rubbed his neck. “Although, maybe not. Here you go, Shadow.”

He dropped the Emerald in Shadow’s hands, which was enough of a surprise that he nearly fumbled it. “What?” Wait. “I didn’t tell you my name.”

“Eh.” The rabbit waved vaguely towards the gemstone. “Fair’s fair. I’m Heyu the Hare.” He rubbed his temple with a groan. “I needed to borrow your Emerald, but I’m good now.”

“You’re just going to give it back to him?” the little robot asked, disbelieving.

“You’re still here?”

Shadow’s brow furrowed. “You’re strange.”

“You’re the one who was born in space, buddy.” He said it casually, as if it were common knowledge despite Shadow knowing it wasn’t. “What a waste of time this was.” He--Heyu looked off into the night sky, staring at nothing.

Shadow hesitated. He had thoroughly lost his grip on the situation. “Aren’t you--”

A tinny ringing filled the air, and Heyu held up a finger. “Excuse me, I have to take this.” He pulled a small device from a pouch on his belt and opened it, putting it to his ear. “Hello? …Really. No, I don’t think I’m surprised. Thank Detective McGruff for me, seriously. Do you know where that four-wheeler she made got to? Oh, that’s not far. Thanks. …No, I think I know what I’m doing next. Yeah, love you too.” He closed the device with a snap, and let out a deep, heartfelt sigh that seemed to uncoil every muscle in his body. By the end of it, he looked like he wanted to collapse. “Of course. I should have guessed. Shadow?”

The hedgehog blinked.

“If you see a white mouse girl when you get back to Robotnik’s base, keep something in mind for me.”

His eyes narrowed. “...What?”

Heyu smiled cheerfully. “If I find out she got hurt because of you, there will be consequences.”

Shadow met the hare’s eyes and shuddered. That smile paired with the eyes still slightly glowing was unnerving.

“I don’t understand what’s happening,” the little robot complained.

“Off you trot, kid,” Heyu said, turning. “I suspect we’ll meet again soon.”

With that said, he jumped over the roof of the nearest building, the little robot flying after with an exasperated call.

Shadow stared down at the green Emerald, then shook his head harshly. He turned and continued on his way out of the city. He’d need a rest before he could attempt to teleport to the ARK.

That was by far the strangest person he’d ever met. And it might not be a long list of people, but it included three Robotniks and an entire population of scientists willing to live on an experimental satellite, so that was saying something.

The Emerald pulsed in his hand. Maybe that whole scene had just put him off balance, because if he didn’t know any better he’d have said it felt like it was laughing.

----------------------------

[G.U.N.]

Something was rotten about this case.

Captain Juliet Palisade watched Sonic the Hedgehog--renowned hero, most successful foe of Doctor Ivo ‘Eggman’ Robotnik, and reported free spirit--being loaded onto an aerial prison transport for the second time that day, bound in so many restraints you’d think he was the freaking Hulk.

It didn’t sit right with her. That crazy hare was willing to vouch for his character, and if Sonic really was still a minor like he’d implied… sending him to Prison Island would have been excessive even if he wasn’t. And if she was totally honest with herself, it didn’t make sense for him to pull this off so suddenly.

Orders were orders, but these orders felt wrong.

As the helicopter took off, Julie fretted to herself, not allowing her worry to show on her face.

It was a short drive back to the G.U.N. Central Station. Not the official Headquarters, that was elsewhere, but the Station was an ancillary building existing for the support of G.U.N.’s activity in the City. It was where the President’s Secret Service were trained, where robotic drones were serviced between missions, and where soldiers slept and ate while on duty, awaiting deployment.

“Trench.” She entered the telecommunications room and called out for her comms officer.

He looked up, raising his headset slightly. “Captain?”

“Contact Captains Punji and Bunker and wire the call to my office. I need to speak with them.”

“Yes, Captain.”

Her office in the station was spartan, as she was rarely in it. The only decoration was a picture frame on her desk, which still contained the stock photo it came with; she’d meant to replace it with one of her sister, but as stated she was never here, and always busy, so it never happened.

She stared intently at the watermarked photo of a golden retriever trying to snap at a dandelion puff, until her desk phone rang.

“Captain Palisade reporting in.”

“Captain Bunker reporting.”

“...”

“Captain Punji? Are you there Spike?”

“...Sorry, this is Private House? The Captain ordered me to accept the call and then he ran off.”

Palisade repressed a groan. Bunker, less composed than her, laughed out loud.

“Let me guess, still fighting a losing battle against Eggman?”

“I… wouldn’t say that, sir.”

“I bet you wouldn’t.”

“Private House, place the phone down on the table and retrieve your captain. This is an important call,” Palisade ordered.

“Y-yes, Captain.” There was a light thunk as he did so, and Palisade sighed.

“So what’s this call about, Julie?” Bunker asked. “I was just about to shove off for the night.”

She hesitated. “...I have concerns about our orders. It feels incorrect.”

“...Julie, it’s not our job to question the orders. We get the mission, and then we direct the soldiers and the drones in the field to complete those missions. You heard what the Major said, Commander Tower wants Sonic captured.”

“I know, and I have, but--”

“You did? Good job then. My boys let him get away, but in all fairness no one expected him to throw himself out a helicopter like that.”

“It doesn’t feel right,” she admitted. “When you take Sonic’s history into account it doesn’t add up. Furthermore, we didn’t find the Chaos Emerald on his person. Either of them. And the idea that he would kidnap a child out of nowhere--”

“Hey, that fox kid of his had to come from somewhere.”

“Buster, this isn’t the time to be making jokes,” she said coldly.

“Who’s joking? I’m not saying that’s what happened, but Tower has to want Sonic captured for a reason.”

“...During the initial failure to recontain Sonic, a civilian I have a passing familiarity with got caught up in the Megaliner’s pursuit and was nearly injured. He vouched for Sonic’s character, and pointed out to me that Robotnik has a history of making Sonic lookalike robots.”

“You think Sonic is being framed?” Bunker asked, turning serious. “I’ll admit, that would be something. Except that we got our orders before the bank theft was reported.”

“And isn’t that suspicious in and of itself?” Palisade pointed out. “Even if it wasn’t a robot, the civilian pointed out that there are other hedgehogs in the world, and none of our footage shows off the face.”

“You might have a point. Perhaps we should seek clarification with the Major.”

“It would ease my mind if we did.” Palisade tucked the receiver into the crook of her neck and turned to her computer, bringing up the mission briefing they’d been sent.

Retrieve Sonic at all cost, hers said. Sonic the Hedgehog is a dangerous renegade who poses a danger to Federation stability and needs to be brought under G.U.N. control.

The document was signed by Commander Tower… but curiously, she only now noticed, the last person to edit it was Major Citadel. But Roark’s signature wasn’t anywhere on the briefing.

“...I’ll admit,” Bunker said at length, finally showing concern in his voice, “It was odd that the Major insisted on his own men doing the retrieving. I didn’t enjoy being relegated to just providing the prison transport.”

Palisade’s eyes narrowed. She was having dangerous thoughts. “Buster, something fishy is going on here. I think--”

“Hello? Hi, I’m back.”

“Private?” Palisade blinked. “Where’s Spike. I mean, Captain Punji?”

“He flipped me off and told me to say that whatever was going on you two could handle it on your own. His exact words, ma’am, n-not mine.”

Palisade sighed. That was annoying. All three captains having concerns would have been more compelling than two. “So unprofessional.”

“He’s still freaking out over that mouse girl, a-and trying to stop her from getting to the pyramid.”

“...Mouse girl?” Palisade brought up the missing person report from earlier, the one allegedly stolen by Sonic. “Can you describe her to me?”

“Huh? Oh, uh… White, with a pink dress. It’s hard to tell, because that big warmech of hers gets in the way, but I think the dress is kinda raggedy? We lost visual contact with her half an hour ago, and Captain Punji’s freaking out about it.”

That matched the familiar image on her screen. And while the ‘warmech’ was alarming, it also fit with the mechanical expertise Julie remembered her having back at the Egg Carrier. “Thank you for that information, I’ll pass her location along to the police.”

“You know who she is?” House asked, surprised. “Can you give me something to tell the captain, cuz I’m worried he’s gonna try and hurt her.”

“She’s fought Eggman forces before, it will probably be fine,” Palisade assured him. “We hired her a few months ago alongside another expert to deal with one of his crashed ships.”

The relief that flowed from the phone was palpable. “So like, she’s a contractor we hired? Man, I need to tell him right away!”

“You do that,” Bunker said. “And don’t worry about Punji, he always gets like this with Eggman. Eventually he’ll run out of drones and sound the retreat like he always does. Be thankful he’s stopped sending actual soldiers against the badniks.”

“...W-why, what happened?”

“There’s a reason we offer such good health insurance.”

“Buster,” Palisade said warningly.

House went on, saying, “Only, this is my first deployment, and I wasn’t expecting to be answering directly to the captain, or that he’d be so…”

“He is so, isn’t he?” Palisade agreed. “What’s your first name, soldier?”

“Alfred, ma’am.”

“Maybe you’d be a better fit in my division, Alfred. We work with civilians more often, and tend to act as clean-up after disasters, or assisting local police wherever we’re deployed. Maybe we can see about getting you transferred.”

“That’d be--really? Oh, thank you captain! I need to get out this desert or I’ll--”

“THANK you, Private, that’ll be all,” Bunker said, though he sounded amused. “Since it looks like we’re not getting Punji on call, you can go ahead and get back to your post. Dismissed.”

“Yessir, thank you sir.” The phone clicked.

“Buster,” Julie said seriously, “My men have been tracking Sonic for the past ten hours, ever since yours lost him, right up until the point we caught him. He has not left the city once.”

“So for this mouse of yours to be in Sand Ocean after getting snatched, Sonic can’t be responsible,” Buster finished grimly.

This time both of them sighed. “...I’ll start writing my review request.”

“Right. Let me know when you’re ready to submit it. I want answers now too. Signing off.”

She hung up the phone and pressed the button to let Trench know the line was cleared. Then she got to writing.

This current campaign smelled rotten, and she was getting to the bottom of it. A sentiment that only grew exacerbated when a few moments later she received a report that someone matching Sonic’s description had been seen in Central City fighting an unknown rabbit Mobian, despite no report from the prison transport that he’d escaped…

------------------------------

[Humi]

The Y-Naught was incredible and super fun, but it was a hunk of junk. Most of the things Humi put together were hunks of junk, because who knew if she was going to want to make something else later? For big projects like Iota, she went the extra mile to make sure everything fit together just right and that the final product looked good, but a lot of the time she ended up using her projects for spare parts on another project, so she didn’t bother.

She was definitely going to try and make the Y-Naught into a proper gadget later, but right now there wasn’t time anyway.

Every step it threatened to fall apart, and the current gun she was using shook the entire frame when it fired. She heard a screw fall onto the stone beneath her and ducked down to replace it, using her tail and one foot to keep the mech going. When she popped back up, she had to slam on the brakes to keep from walking into a wall--that would have done some damage.

Badniks and G.U.N. drones were all over the place. Humi didn’t like G.U.N., but she knew Eggman was the real bad guy, so she wasn’t going out of their way to destroy the drones; only if they came after her. As a result, the Y-Naught had changed drastically from how it started. The mostly-black had been replaced with a patchwork of orange from the Kikis, purple from the Spinners, and red from the Gamma-clones that Humi tried not to look directly at because shooting those made her feel bad. Stupid Eggman, didn’t he know Gamma was on their side now?

Actually, did he? It would be very funny if he didn’t, hehehe.

The flamethrower ran out of fuel, so she traded it for an entire Gohla that she’d jury-rigged to throw fireballs! They exploded now.

“Why are you hitting yourself? Haha!” She punched a Kiki with another Kiki’s arm and it flew over a low wall.

This was fun. So fun she almost forgot what she was doing here; the robots in the Final Egg had either all been destroyed or got smart enough to run away when they showed up to salvage, because for a while before they went to Central City the only ones they’d been able to find were the increasingly-rare freight drones, and those were too dumb to even know they were being attacked!

Eventually, though, the ranks of robots came to an end as she finally reached the Pyramid. Humi scanned over the statues with Eggman’s goofy grin and mustache crudely chiseled over them. She climbed out of the Y-Naught and pulled a can of spray paint out of her pocket.

“Hehehe… Much better.” She stepped back to admire her work before moving on.

There was a great big stretch of stone leading up to a big and important-looking door, flanked by ever bigger statues, but Humi ignored that. Going in through the front door sounded like a good way to get got; she was under no illusions that if she tried to go up against the actual Eggman, she wouldn’t do as well as against his robots. Maybe someday.

No, instead she remembered how things went last time Eggman was up to no good! Sneaking into the backrooms and wrecking up the place!

…Humi briefly felt a pang of regret that Heyu wasn’t here. It didn’t feel as fun without him. Or Iota. But it wasn’t her fault she got snatched, and if she tried to get back to the city, it would be time wasted! She wanted her Emerald back before Eggman did something nasty with it!

Humi walked her mech a full circuit around the pyramid at a light clip, eyeing it up and down. If Eggman was using this base, there had to be air vents somewhere.

Idly, Humi noted that the G.U.N. robots weren’t attacking her anymore. There were still some around, but when they weren’t fighting badniks they were just quietly watching her. It was kind of creepy.

Her examination revealed three entrances separate from the big main one, but they were all locked down tight. There were a few outer buildings that she could have gotten into, but she didn’t want to bother. They might be connected to the main pyramid underground, but that would be stupid.

The Y-Naught jumped, nearly as high as Heyu could, and Humi landed on the side of the pyramid. The mech’s left leg tried to grip the brickwork and failed, but the right managed to latch on and she righted the vehicle in short order.

It was hard to tell in the dark of the night, but she was certain that she spotted a discoloration in the bricks. The Y-Naught didn’t currently have any graspers… so she just dropped a grenade and jumped away.

After it went off, she went back to observe the damage. A layer of brickwork had been blasted away, and Humi grinned at the metal panels underneath. A large vent was uncovered, and the explosion had already knocked the vent cover loose. She pried it the rest of the way off and looked closer.

Oh yeah. She could fit in there easily.

Taking a minute to break the Y-Naught down and store the pieces in her pockets, Humi made her way inside. Mecha Sonic wouldn’t know what hit him.

“Ready or not, here I come!~”