Work Text:
“Half a cup of molasses…do I even have molasses?” Tails mumbled to himself as he dug through his pantry. “Cinnamon…ginger…nutmeg…baking soda…huh, no molasses. Does it even have to have molasses? Theoretically, wouldn’t it yield the same result if I used half a cup of maple syrup?” He thought about this for a minute. “No…that would be too sweet. But if I were to factor in the sweetness of the maple syrup and take that out of the amount of sugar I’d originally be using…” Tails stopped himself. “...Or maybe I accidentally mistook the molasses for oil and it’s in the garage…or maybe it’s with Belle…”
He went down the hall and knocked on the door of the room Belle was staying in.
“Hey Belle, have you happened to see any molasses around the house?” he asked, startling her.
“Eep! Oh gears and starters,” she mumbled as the sound of parts crashing down could be heard through the door. “Come in,” she said.
Tails opened the door to find Belle on the floor, covered in parts.
“I take it things aren’t going so well with Motobud?” he asked as he helped her up.
“All I need is a central processing piece and I’ll be done, but I can’t seem to fashion one together,” she told him.
Tails frowned for a moment, thinking.
“Would you like to help me bake cookies to take your mind off of it?” he eventually asked.
“Yeah…yeah! That sounds nice. And let me grab your molasses for you. Sorry for taking it, I was just trying to use it to grease Motobud’s joints.”
Belle grabbed the jug of molasses and walked with Tails to the kitchen.
“So, why are you making cookies anyway? Forgive me, but it doesn’t exactly seem like your area of expertise,” she asked as she took off her gloves and washed off her hands.
He reached over her to grab a measuring cup from the cupboard. “Haha! Well, I don’t see why it couldn’t be. Cooking is just math and chemistry, right? But no, I’m just trying something new. It’s Charmy’s birthday and I figured he might like something sweet instead of the usual gadget.”
“Are you sure he wouldn’t prefer a gadget?” Belle asked, confused.
“No, but I wouldn’t want to give Vector any more trouble. The last time I made Charmy something, it uh…didn’t go so well.”
The two worked together on the dough, and were almost done when the phone rang.
“Hi this is Tails! How may I help you?” Tails asked as he answered it.
“Heya Tails. I’m uh…sorry for bugging you, but…uh…” he heard Vector say on the other end.
“Give me the phone,” a distant voice said on the other end. It was Espio. “Hey Tails. Sorry, Vector doesn’t like asking for a favor two times in a row. We’re calling to ask if you, Belle, and Tangle can take on another case for us while we take Charmy to White Park for his birthday.”
“White Park? Isn’t that a little…pricey?” Tails asked.
“Only if you book a room in the chateau. You don’t have to pay to get into anything else, you just have to get in.”
“Well, good luck. What are the details of the case?”
“It was so sweet! We went to that coffee shop down at the corner of Corkscrew and Helical, the one with the little strawberries on the sign y’know? And she got a little strawberry danish and I didn’t even really know what that was but she seemed to really enjoy it and I got a blueberry muffin and the worker lady there asked if I wanted it heated up and I didn’t even know they did that so of course-”
“Tangle, I don’t care what food you two had, how was the date?” Jewel asked with a smile.
“Oh, right! It was positively fantabulous!” Tangle said, throwing her arms in the air. “We-”
Tangle was cut off by the window breaking. She jumped off the desk she was lounging on and prepared to sock whoever dared to mess with her best friend’s museum into next Tuesday. She was ready to find the Babylon Rogues or Rough and Tumble, not…Shadow?
“Shadow? What are you doing here?” she asked.
“Hmph,” he said, darting into the next room over. The next room over where Jewel was keeping a chaos emerald. Oh, chaos.
Tangle raced in after him only to find that he and the chaos emerald were already gone. No footprints, no windows broken; it was like he had just vanished.
That was when there was a knock at the front door of the museum. Tangle ran over and threw it open, only to find Tails and Belle.
“Oh hey guys!” she said, letting out a sigh of relief. “Shadow just broke in and stole a chaos emerald. Do you wanna team up again?”
Tails was a little stunned. “Yeah, actually that’s why we’re here. The Chaotix called in with another case.”
“Awesome! Come on in and give me the deets.” Tangle said before she led them into where she had been lounging with Jewel before Shadow broke in. “So what’s the scoop?” she then asked as she sat herself up on Jewel’s desk.
“Reports have been flowing in from different places that the chaos emeralds they’ve been holding onto have been going missing,” Belle explained.
“Spagonia University, Meropis, The Kingdom of Soleanna, Casinopolis, and now-” Tails added.
“My museum,” Jewel cut him off.
“Well, Jewel and I saw Shadow come in and take the thing, so we already have our culprit. Sure, we don’t know why, but that just sounds like a mystery, not an issue, right?” Tangle said, trying to slice away the tension. “If we can find him, all we have to do is just ask him what he’s doing and bam! Mystery solved!”
“Then we’ll start at Rouge, Omega, and Shadow’s apartment,” Tails suggested.
“Perfect! And then we’ll return all the emeralds back to where they were before. And Jewel? Probably best to stop showcasing emeralds here seeing as it always leads to some sort of trouble,” Tangle said with a wink.
“Are you sure this is the right place? It looks too…normal,” Belle asked when they reached the door to Team Dark’s apartment.
“I’m sure,” Tails said as he reached up and knocked on the door.
Rouge was the one who eventually answered. She was wearing a robe, had curlers in her hair, and bore an expression that suggested she had just woken up (even though it was three in the afternoon). She took one look at the trio and her face cinched up.
“Nope, I’m good. I don’t really feel like any ‘good deeds’ today, thank you,” she said. She was about to close the door when Belle put her foot in the doorway.
“Wait! We’re just here to ask about Shadow. We think he’s been stealing the chaos emeralds from where they’re being stored across the world,” she explained.
“Yep. That definitely sounds like something he’d do. What do you need me for?” Rouge replied.
“We’re just trying to figure out what he’s up to,” Tangle told her.
“Man, I have no idea. We’re friends and all, but he doesn’t tell me everything. I can tell you he isn’t here right now, but that’s about it. You three are acting like detectives so much, I think you should figure out what he’s up to. Now if you excuse me, I’m going back to bed,” Rouge said, going back inside and closing the apartment door behind her, leaving the three outside.
“So…what do we do now?” Tangle asked the group.
“We could pick one of the places that got robbed and go there,” Belle suggested.
Tails nodded. “There’s a train nearby that’s departing for Station Square soon. We could use it to go check out Casinopolis.”
“That sounds awesome!” Tangle shouted. “I’ve never been to a casino before. Maybe I could put my luck to the test…”
“If we do go to Casinopolis though, I’d have to, uh, lay low a little,” Tails said, looking down sheepishly.
“What did you do?” Tangle asked.
“False shuffling, roulette past posting, card counting, dice sliding, card marking; a little bit of everything, really. They don’t…like me.”
“Then we’ll split up like we did last time. You can lay low and ask the patrons if they saw anything while Tangle and I investigate the crime scene, that way you aren’t in plain view of the whole casino,” Belle suggested.
“Well, then let’s go!” Tangle shouted. “I’ve never ridden a train before and I don’t want to miss this one!”
The train ride to Station Square was peaceful. The train line prided itself on sightseeing and the views they could offer, and they delivered. The beautiful beaches by Seaside City, the great forest of Knothole, and even the vast jungle of the Mystic Ruins had the trio captivated at the window the entire time.
The world phased by in waves, environments blending into one another. An ocean off the beach turned into rivers that rushed through trees. Trees that came together to make a forest growing shorter with leaves growing longer for a jungle, with the river that still flowed through it to house a familiar purple friend fishing. Jungle growing more sparse to give way to hills of short and dead grass that gave an opening to a train station.
Tails led Tangle and Belle from the station to where the casino was, and the two marveled at the sight of the lights and display. He led them inside and gestured to the display on top of a platform that was surrounded by slot machines.
“On top of that is where they were showing off the chaos emerald. See what you can find while I talk to people and when you’re done let me know so we can get out of here as soon as possible,” Tails explained.
“Alrighty then. Good luck out there, fox boy,” Tangle said with a smile and a wink as she prepared to slingshot herself and Belle to the platform. “You ready, Belle?”
“S-Sure,” she stammered out before Tangle launched them both with flawless trajectory, flinging them face first into a barrier.
“Yowza, looks like they had a wall of glass to protect the display,” Tangle said, holding her nose in her hands.
Belle was trying to reposition her jaw. “Yeah, I wish we knew that beforehand.”
Light shone up from the bottom of the display, blinding the two.
“Woah, check it out! They must have meant for that to reflect off the emerald but…” Tangle trailed off as she focused on a point on the wall. There was a shifting shadow of a rectangle that kept moving around. She tried to follow it back to the display and found that there was a piece of paper floating around inside the glass. She looked back and saw Belle still putting her jaw back to where it was before (hopefully the hit hadn’t hurt her that bad?).
Tangle circled around the display, looking for the break in the glass where the thief had stolen the emerald, but that was the issue. The glass was completely whole on all sides, not a crack in sight. She pressed her face against the glass in an attempt to read what the paper was, and could only make out a few words: “Menu,” “Chili Dog,” “Ramen,” and “Chicken Cordon Bleu.”
“Hey Belle, there’s a menu in this thing!” she yelled behind her.
“A what?” Belle asked as she finally snapped her jaw back into place.
Tangle gestured for her to come over. “Check it out, the glass isn’t broken at all and there’s a little menu inside.”
“What kind of a place would offer those three things?”
Suddenly, they were interrupted by a loud voice yelling, “Hey! You’re the freak that scammed me out of two hundred!”
“Whoopsydoodles! Time to go!” Tangle said as she spun her tail around like a lasso and threw it a slot machine on the ground. “After you, m’lady,” she then said, gesturing Belle to it.
“A…zipline?” she asked, nervous.
“Yeah!” Tangle said with a cheer.
Belle gulped, held her hat over the zipline, and slid down. When she opened her eyes, she was on the ground and Tangle was standing right next to her. Tails was running towards them.
“Alright where’s the guy?” Tangle asked, bobbing back and forth on her feet. “I’m ready for a good ol’ fashioned casino brawl.”
“No one’s brawling! We need to get out of here now!” Tails yelled as he zoomed over to them. Behind him was a group of very muscular mobians, and they did not look happy.
“Eep!” Belle shouted as one of them threw a poker chip that hit her square in the nose.
Tails grabbed Tangle and Belle and darted out of the casino, just narrowly missing the mob. The three didn’t stop until they were back inside of the train station. Tangle and Tails struggled to catch their breath.
“That…was kinda…cool,” Tangle heaved.
“Maybe for…you. I thought they…were gonna…get me!” Tails yelled. He took a moment to breathe. “Anyway, did you two find anything?”
“Yes, there was a menu inside of the glass,” Belle said.
“Unbroken glass,” Tangle clarified.
“Huh, that’s weird. The people I talked to that were willing to talk said that no one really broke in, but just that the emerald was there one moment and in the blink of an eye it was gone. If the glass was unbroken as well, does that mean it was never really there at all? Or would it…” he caught himself trailing off and threw himself back on track. “Sorry. What was on the menu?”
“Uhhhh…there was a chilidog, and something blue…” Tangle said.
“Chilidog, ramen, and chicken cordon bleu,” Belle corrected.
Tails froze for a moment, looking a little confused. “I…think I might know where we should go next. The chances are unlikely, but I’d say it’s still worth a shot,” he said.
“Where are we going?” Tangle eagerly asked.
“Here it is: the junkyard,” Tails announced to the group.
“Cool!” Tangle said, looking in a pile of scrapped car mirrors. “So what are we even looking for here, anyway?”
“There’s an old train out here somewhere. It’s where the menu was from, and if that was found at the scene, maybe there’s a clue here we can use. It’s a long shot, but-”
“But we wouldn’t be a fabulous detective trio if we didn’t explore every possible clue!” Tangle chimed in.
“Yeah…” Belle agreed, unable to take her eyes off of some scrapped metal with Starline’s logo on it. She shook her head, snapping herself out of it. “Yeah! Let’s get looking.”
The junkyard was so much bigger than the three of them could have expected. Piles of badniks, car parts, and everything in between stacked up so high it looked like they were trying to touch the clouds and beyond. There was enough room between the piles to walk around, but navigating it seemed impossible with the way the sprawled out in every direction.
It was a labyrinth of parts meant to be forgotten, which made it so easy to get lost in.
Tangle was the first to notice that she had been separated from the group. She had been at the front of the three, bouncing around and commenting on a cool butterfly clip she found, or the arms of a motobug, or a fully intact car door with Tails and Belle. When they had stopped responding, she whipped around and saw that they were nowhere to be found.
“Tails! Belle!” she called out, climbing on top of one of the piles to see if she could spot them.
“What’s wrong? Missing your friends?”
Tangle whipped around. She knew that voice.
“Mimic. I should’ve known it was you instead of Shadow. What do you even want with the chaos emeralds anyway?” she asked, sliding down the pile of junk she was on and making her way over to him.
“I wouldn’t get any closer if I were you,” Mimic said, revealing he was holding Whisper behind his back and throwing her forward.
Tangle froze. She could feel her heart stop. The whole time she had been goofing off solving a case, had Whisper been in danger? Could this have been her fault? Whisper’s cloak was torn. Her knee pads were broken. Her wispon was missing. She had a huge gash above her knee. What had happened to her?
“You’ve spent all day recklessly throwing yourself around. One impulsive decision, and you weren’t there for your precious little girlfriend,” Mimic said, digging his heel into Whisper’s back, pushing her into the trash heap.
“But she can handle herself! How did you even…it doesn’t matter. What do you want?” Tangle asked, clutching her fists.
“Meh, just revenge. But rubbing it in felt like a good idea too,” he said with a grin. “I’ve been at this for a while now. This is the kind of revenge I want to sting.”
He pushed Whisper further into the trash heap, and Tangle could see her wince. She needed to do something, but she didn’t want to accidentally provoke Mimic and get Whisper hurt or worse.
She couldn’t do anything.
Belle hadn’t really been paying attention to much of anything as they were navigating throughout the junkyard. Tangle was calling out items she found, and Tails was doing something on his device, but she couldn’t really take her eyes off of all of the broken and discarded badniks they were walking past. Could any of them have been like her or Motobud? Just how many of them were there out here? And this could only have been a fraction of Eggman’s discarded robots. Belle wondered how many he had abandoned across the world.
At one point, she had gotten so lost in her thoughts that it seemed that Tangle had stopped talking. She looked up, and she wasn’t there at all. Neither was Tails. She was alone.
Maybe she wasn’t. She could hear a faint laughter, but it wasn’t from Tails or Tangle. She looked around, but no one was there.
“Awww, look at the little puppet,” a voice heckled. “Are you lost, little puppet? Where’s your strings?”
Belle looked up and saw two figures on one of the junk piles: one tall with spiky hair, and the other…oh. Oh no.
“Where’s your little puppet master?” Surge asked with a toothy grin.
Belle tried to move, but she couldn’t.
Surge slid down the heap, Kit following behind her. Kit wasn’t even walking, he was just letting his water pack carry him around.
Belle couldn’t even force herself to say anything. It was like her whole body was locking up.
“You knew Starline took a chunk of your code and used it to make something. And you had your suspicions, but you haven’t even met me yet,” Surge said, zapping a bit of electricity onto Belle’s shoulder.
“Wh…What do you want?” Belle finally forced herself to ask.
“Oh, nothing really. I just wanted to meet the one responsible for my existence face to face.”
Surge was talking, but Belle wasn’t really paying all that much attention to her. She was more focused on Kit. He was the one who looked like he was being puppeteered around, but maybe that was just how he was designed. Could this really be her fault?
“Hey, pay attention when I’m talking to you, dummy!” Surge shouted, shoving Belle back into a trash heap, where she could feel rusty arms and claws pull her in until she couldn’t see anymore.
When Belle opened her eyes again, she was tied up along with Tangle, who was struggling to get out of her ropes, and Tails, who was just kind of sitting there. He had a sort of blank look to him, but eventually he shook his head and mumbled something to himself.
“Hey, you can come out now! I already know who you are!” he called out.
But the person who walked out of the shadows wasn’t who he was expecting, instead a familiar Quokka who he hadn’t seen in a while.
Tangle leaned over and whispered into Tails’ ear. “How can this guy be a criminal? They look like such a sweetie pie.”
“They’re not,” Tails said.
“A criminal or a sweetie pie?”
“They’re not a criminal! They’re just underpaid.” Tails then turned to face them. “Barry, what are you doing here?”
“Oh! Well one day I came by just to see the ol’ train again, and I found this guy hiding out in here. He said he had lost some stuff, and he’s been paying me to help him get it back! I’m not quite sure why you’re tied up, though. Why are you here? And who are these?”
“We’re the incredibly awesome and epic Weird Tail Trio, and we’re here on behalf of the Chaotix!” Tangle answered.
“What’s that? Is that a gang?!” Barry asked.
“It’s Espio and Vector,” Tails said.
“They’re in a gang?!” Barry asked.
“They’re detectives. We’re here because the chaos emeralds have been going missing,” Belle clarified.
“Oh! Well, we don’t have any here!”
“Who’s we?” Tangle asked.
“Oh, me and I-”
“That’s enough,” a voice called out, followed by another figure walking out of the shadows. Infinite the Jackal.
“Who are you and what’s with the mask?” Tangle asked.
“I am Infinite, and you shall bow before me,” he said.
“Infinite, what do you want with the chaos emeralds?” Tails asked.
“It’s simple: with the power of the chaos emeralds combined with the power of the phantom ruby, I can become even more powerful than I already was. You’ve already seen it, when I used them to bring your own worst fears to life.”
“Oh ok cool,” Tangle said. “When I woke up here I figured it was just a dream or something, but an illusion? That’s just like a dream with a few extra steps.”
“Not just an illusion, but an illusion created by you. All of those thoughts were already inside you, all that did was materialize them. The fear that your recklessness will get people hurt, the fear that there are things that are your fault that you didn’t even know about, and…well…he never could swim, could he?” Infinite said with a wide grin.
Tangle’s smile faded, and a nerve was visibly struck within Tails. “What’s your goal here?” he grit through his teeth.
“To take my revenge on Shadow the Hedgehog, of course. By tricking Barry into framing him-”
“By what?” Barry asked.
“I pummeled Shadow’s public view, and now with all of my newfound power, I can take him down once and for all.”
“Oh please,” Tangle sighed. “You look like the kind of guy that would go down in three hits. How threatening can you really be?”
“Did-did you not see the illusion out there?” Infinite asked, a little stunned.
“Yeah, but it was an illusion, which means it wasn’t real, which means there was nothing to be worried about. You’re little magic tricks aren’t going to work on me and my awesome friends! Get him Belle!” Tangle shouted, and Belle (who had cut through her ropes with the small knife hidden in one of her fingers) pulled on her tail, thrusting herself forward and knocking Infinite onto the floor.
“Alright, now time to get out of here,” Belle said, rushing over to cut Tangle’s ropes. Barry joined in by running over and untying Tails.
When they were both free, Tangle wrapped up Infinite in her tail and everyone grabbed at least one chaos emerald and rushed out of the old abandoned train.
After returning all of the emeralds back to where they were being held and turning Infinite in to Everhold Prison, the four decided to get some frozen yogurt together.
“So who even was that guy?” Tangle asked.
“Just some loser with a vendetta against Shadow,” Tails said.
“Man, I should’ve realized he was tricking me when he asked me to break into a museum. Tails, you know so many weird people,” Barry said, stirring around their frozen yogurt with their spoon.
“It’s no worries! I can help Jewel fix the window and maybe-WAIT MAYBE THAT’S IT!” Tangle yelled, having an epiphany. “If you’re still out of a job, maybe I can talk to Jewel and get you working at the museum! I’m sure she could use a little extra help around there!”
“A museum sounds like a lovely and boring and quiet place to work!” Barry said.
“Hey Belle, how are you feeling after…you know?” Tails whispered to Belle as Barry and Tangle continued talking.
“Oh! Um, that weird guy showed me some fears I didn’t even know I had, but on the bright side I was able to grab the part I needed for Motobud so I’ll be able to fix him soon!” she said, showing off the piece she had been keeping in her overall pocket. “How are you doing?”
Tails wasn’t quite sure how to respond for a moment, but eventually said, “...It was like Tangle said, it was just an illusion, so it doesn’t really matter anymore. I do think I’ll be giving Sonic a call though when we get back.”
And he did. Tangle returned to Spiral Hill with Barry and Jewel was more than happy to have the extra help (even though they had previously stolen from her), Belle was finally able to fix Motobud, Tails hung out with Sonic for the rest of the week, and the Chaotix came back from their birthday celebration with a well resolved case. And for any future cases they needed help with, they knew exactly who to call.