Chapter Text
Eggman stared at the destroyed room. He wasn't angry, or surprised, or any other emotion he'd normally felt. This one was new to him.
He was disappointed.
The surgery, at least, had been a success. Replacing the cat's heart with the Red Chaos Emerald was probably the one time he succeeded with an invention that had almost nothing to do with machinery.
But instead of being mentally lost and just wanting somewhere to belong--as Eggman expected--he panicked, blew up the room, and ran off as fast as he could.
Eggman sighed. It would take him a long time to get this room fixed...
But that's why he had robots.
He turned to Orbot and Cubot. "Get the cleaning robots and get this room fixed up."
The two robots left. Eggman turned back towards the destruction, folding his arms across his chest. After a few moments, he pulled a lever on the wall next to the doorway, and the middle of the floor opened up. A vat with a figure inside rose up, and he walked up to it.
"Yeesh, this thing is dusty..." Eggman said, brushing some of the dust off the glass with his hand and peered inside.
At this time, Orbot and Cubot returned with cleaning robots.
"Boss?" Orbot said.
"Scan the experiment after dusting the rest of the vat off." Eggman ordered. "I need to know if he's still growing as planned."
While Cubot dusted the vat off, Orbot activated his internal scanner and examined the life form inside the vat. "Progress is continuing apace, Boss. He should be ready to be released tomorrow."
Eggman nodded. "Good. Tomorrow morning, sever the accelerated aging. We don't need him becoming as old as I am in a week's time."
Orbot nodded, as he and Cubot resumed cleaning the destroyed room with the cleaning robots.
Eggman smiled. "Once you're ready, we'll be able to finally enact my plan. It's only a matter of time..."
Sonic finished munching on a chili dog atop one of the hills in Splash Hill. The waves in the distance made for good background noise. Sonic felt like he could fall asleep here.
He then heard a pair of familiar hover shoes approaching, and looked at the new arrival. "Shadow? What's going on?"
"A cat has shown up by the name of 'Vira'. He claims to have a Chaos Emerald embedded inside his body." Shadow explained.
Sonic gave a double-take. "Excuse me?"
"You heard me correctly." Shadow said. "Come on."
Sonic licked the chili sauce off his fingers, and he and Shadow took off. They arrived at the scene, finding the cat curled up under a tree with Tails and Amy calmly talking to him.
"Has he said anything about the Doctor's plan since I left?" Shadow asked.
Tails shook his head. "Just the bare minimum. Something about an armada, but I can't get anything beyond that."
Shadow closed his eyes. "An armada... Whenever I hear that word in conversation, it's usually associated with a fleet of ships in outer space."
"I don't think Eggman's plans have ever been primarily in outer space like that." Sonic noted. "What do you think his goal is this time?"
"Omega is finding out as we speak." Shadow said. "Though I don't expect him to find too much, since he isn't built for stealth."
As if on cue, Shadow's comms went off.
"This is E-123 Omega." they heard. "Large air fleet sighted taking off from Scrap Brain area. Estimated amount of ships is tens of thousands."
"Tens of thousands?!" Tails remarked. "How long has he been planning this?!"
"Omega, do you know of how long this had remained under the radar?" Shadow asked.
"Negative." Omega said. "Time of preparation unknown."
Sonic rolled his eyes. "Well, that's helpful. He said it's in Scrap Brain, right?"
Shadow nodded.
"Then let's go! We can't let this armada plan of his get off the ground."
"But what about him?" Amy asked, gesturing to the scared feline.
Sonic paused for a moment, before coming up to the feline. "You okay, buddy?"
The feline slowly raised his head, looked Sonic in the eye, and got up and ran.
In his wake, he left a very confused Sonic.
"Uh...you guys go ahead. I'll catch up later." Sonic said. "Think you can spearhead the assault, Tails?"
Tails nodded after a moment. "I'll do it. Good luck, Sonic!"
"You too, Tails!" Sonic said, giving a thumbs-up before taking off after the feline.
Sonic ran through Splash Hill, following a trail of red footsteps. As he started to catch up to the feline, he saw him glow red before firing a Chaos Spear at him.
"WHOA!" Sonic shouted as he narrowly dodged the spear. "What's with that?!"
"I won't let you hurt me!" the feline shouted back. "I won't let you go Super!"
Sonic was confused. "What does going Super have to do with this?!"
"Keep away from me!" the feline shouted before running faster. Sonic kept up the pace, dodging and weaving through the feline's Chaos attacks as the two raced through Splash Hill. Despite the Chaos Emerald in the feline's chest, Sonic was eventually able to catch up to him, and the long chase came to an end.
"I won't go Super, whoever you are." Sonic reassured. "I promise."
The feline seemed hesitant to believe him. "Okay... There's just...a very particular reason why I won't let you go Super. Why I can't let you."
"That being?"
"It'll kill me."
Sonic raised an eyebrow. "Run that by me again."
"If you go Super, the Chaos Emerald inside of me will react accordingly. My body can't handle its full power. I'll be eviscerated." the feline explained. "I don't want to be violently torn apart against my own will..."
"How DO you have a Chaos Emerald inside you?" Sonic asked. "What'd you do, eat it?"
"Ew, no." the feline quickly responded. "It was...it was actually Robotnik."
Sonic fell dead silent for a few moments. "Wait... Eggman is behind you having a Chaos Emerald in your chest?"
The feline nodded, and Sonic's expression darkened.
"That is low..." Sonic said. "He abused you, gave you power you can't even use the full potential of, and for what? To use you as a weapon?"
"That's my best guess."
Sonic pounded his palm. "C'mon. Let's go smash Eggman's base REAL GOOD this time. What's your name, by the way?"
"I'm Vira."
"Glad to meet you! Now let's go!"
Sonic and Vira took off to catch up to Tails's assault team.