Chapter Text
“Forget it? Forget you! I’m outta here! Come on, buddy. Let’s go find something more fun anywhere else.”
Bean reminisced on his last words to Fang from his tree branch perch. He sighed with content. It was the best decision he’d made in a very long time. Hell, given the way things were going, it was the only good decision he’d made before and after it.
Bean had promised himself and Bark they’d find their own gigs and fun. Bean had found them neither thus far, and it was starting to take a toll on him.
Bark didn’t blame him. He knew he didn’t blame him. But he still felt guilty for essentially turning them both into hobos. Bark had insisted they stay away from dirtier jobs, and Bean respected the desire to make a clean slate. Problem was no one else wanted to let them.
Bean perked up at the sound of heavy footsteps. He turned to see Bark trodding up to his tree.
“Heya buddy boyo!” Bean squawked, “How’d it go?”
Bark just sighed and held up two crumpled wanted posters. Bean sagged and fell out of the tree before his expression changed.
“What is wrong with these people?!” Bean jumped up, “Talk about holding grudges!”
He turned his head and huffed. Bark put a gentle hand on the bird’s shoulder, but it did no good for Bean’s spirits.
“I can’t do this anymore, Bark,” Bean turned back to his only friend, “I’ve got this itch, this rash, this wound I have to heal right now!”
He pulled a bomb out from behind him. “I have to blow something up!”
Bark blinked, then rolled his eyes. Bean had been “clean” for a long while now, and he wondered if that was really the source of all his current anxieties.
“Come on, pal!” Bean said, “Just one little firecracker! It doesn’t have to be much. Heck, I won’t even throw it at someone this time! Just…please!”
Bark crossed his arms and was in the middle of shaking his head when a thought struck him. He tucked the wanted posters in his scarf and beckoned Bean to follow him.
“Really?!” Bean beamed, “Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!”
Bean skipped and leaped after Bark. Eventually Bark stopped and signaled for him to lay low. Bean leapt into the bush Bark was hiding behind and stuck his head out the other side. Down the hill in front of them lay a small Eggman base. All seemed quiet, not even any Badniks patrolling outside. Bean’s beak twisted into a wide smile.
“Bark my friend buddy chum amigo pal,” he said, “You are the smartest genius I ever met.”
Bean shot out of the bush and practically rolled down the hill. Bark rushed after him, already worried the doofus was gonna get himself killed.
**********
“Ugh!” Tangle moaned loudly, “The mission was going so well! What gives?”
Whisper blocked an Egg Pawn’s swing and shot it in the chest. She turned on a dime and blasted another batch behind her. Tangle crushed one in her tail and lobbed it at a swarm of Buzz Bombers.
“I mean, since when has Eggman ever had THIS much defense for a base this small?” Tangle moped.
Whisper shot a sawblade through a Caterkiller’s head, “Must want something here kept safe.”
“Then we’re obviously in the right place!”
Tangle grabbed a Motobug and chucked it at the line of Badniks blocking their way. The girls rushed through only to be stopped by a huge Egg Hammer.
“Crap,” Tangle muttered as Whisper readied her Wispon.
The Super Badnik swung its hammer and batted them into the wall. It then hung back as it watched the hoard of other Badniks close in on them. Whisper coughed and choked as she struggled to get back up. Tangle only just got to her feet when an explosion rang out. From the back of the Badnik line a bomb flew into the middle of the crowd and sent them all flying. Tangle watched in awe like it was a firework display.
“Oh, yeah! This is just what the doctor ordered!”
Tangle turned her head to see a small green bird in a red handkerchief lobbing another bomb at the Badniks. With another explosion, all of the robots were reduced to smithereens. All except the Egg Hammer. It lifted its hammer and charged straight towards the bird, who seemed unbothered.
“Sorry my doctor has better practices than yours,” he rolled his eyes.
Tangle charged to try and save the little bird. The bot swung its hammer down fast, but before the hammer made contact it stopped dead. Tangle’s jaw dropped as she saw a huge polar bear hold the ginormous hammer away from the bird. He grabbed it, pulled it out of the robot’s hands, and swung it right back around into it.
“Ten points for dramatic timing!” the bird gave a thumbs up to the polar bear.
“Who are you guys?!” Tangle blurted out excitedly.
“Oh, my, where are our manners?” the bird scoffed, “I’m Bean the Dynamite! And my blubber buffed friend here is named Bark!”
Bark gave Bean a look that mixed bewilderment with a tinge of anger. Tangle rushed up and shook their hands.
“I’m Tangle the Lemur!” she smiled, “Thank you so much for saving our lives!”
“Eh,” Bean shrugged, “We were just looking for some excitement. Seems like the party was poppin’ before we showed up.”
The trio glanced around at the piles of scrap laying around them.
“It wasn’t that great,” Tangle smirked, “You could say it kinda…bombed.”
Bean’s face grew wide with a smile, while Bark wanted to facepalm.
“Tangle,” Whisper brought her back to attention, “Come on.”
Whisper rushed down the hall. Tangle beckoned for Bean and Bark to follow her.
“Who’s your lady friend?” Bean asked.
“Oh, that’s Whisper!” Tangle replied, “The cutest, sweetest, most wonderful girl in the world!”
“Geez, I didn’t ask for her resume,” Bean chuckled.
Whisper checked every corner of the base before rushing around them, giving the others time to catch up. Eventually she slowed down, so the others did too.
“Seems empty now,” she observed.
“Not surprising,” Tangle said, “I think we took down the whole Egg Army.”
“You could say,” Bean grinned, “He put all his eggs in one basket.”
“Eeyyyyyy!” Tangle and Bean pointed finger guns at each other.
Whisper looked from Bean to Bark, who had his face in his hands. She turned her attention back to the base.
They soon came across a large vault door. Whisper shot a pink buzzsaw at it, but it did no good.
“You two are snooping through Eggy’s stuff?” Bean asked, “Watch’ya lookin for?”
“We’re trying to find-”
“It’s top secret,” Whisper interrupted Tangle.
Everyone looked at Whisper as she tried to input a passcode on a monitor by the door.
“Come on Whisper, they just saved our lives!” Tangle said.
“And I appreciate that,” Whisper turned to Bean and Bark, “Really, I do. But this is a top secret mission. We can’t tell people who we don’t know.”
Bean and Bark perked up at that last part. It had been a very long time since someone didn’t know about their past. Bean looked up at Bark with a big, stupid smile. Bark looked down at his buddy and reciprocated with a grin. Bean jerked his thumb at the vault door and nodded his head towards Bark. Bark watched Whisper fail the passcode a second time and cracked his knuckles.
“Well then,” Bean announced, “May we offer some more services to gain your trust?”
Tangle and Whisper watched as Bark waltzed up to the vault and grabbed the door. He heaved it with all his might. The metallic groan echoed around the entire facility. There was a crack, and then a snap. The hinges of the door creaked as Bark forced the thing open. There was one more metal crack, and Bark pulled the door open.
Tangle was amazed, while Whisper was a little scared.
“Now then,” Bean said to the girls, “Let’s go digging through Eggman’s dirty laundry!”
Bean backflipped through the vault door. He looked around, expecting to see towers of shelves that went on for miles, with tons of papers and blueprints lining them. Instead, the room was no bigger than a supply closet, and had one small shelf lining one of the walls.
“My disappointment is immeasurable,” Bean hung his head, “And my day is ruined.”
Bark put a hand on his shoulder as Whisper inspected one of the boxes on the shelf. She opened it and pulled out a blueprint of something. Bean felt a little better being a teensy bit right.
Whisper brought the blueprint out of the room, since there were no lights in there, and rolled it out on the floor in front of the door. Tangle and Bean looked over her shoulders to see the humongous ship displayed on the paper.
“Is that…a UFO?” Tangle squinted.
“It looks like it,” Bean observed.
The ship was indeed shaped like a flying saucer, like you’d see in an alien movie.
“Maybe his new plan is to probe everyone!” Bean suggested.
Tangle doubled over in laughter as Whisper looked at him with disgust. He just stuck his tongue out at her. She turned back to the blueprint and examined it carefully.
“The dimensions written are gargantuan…” she muttered, “This thing might be as big as the Death Egg.”
“Soooo…This is what you two wanted to find?” Bean asked.
Tangle finally composed herself and looked at Whisper. She just sighed, and nodded at her partner.
“We got some reports about a new flying fortress from Eggman,” Tangle explained, “It seems to deploy small armies of Badniks wherever it goes. We came to this storage facility to try and find any information on it so we can take it down.”
Bark had been standing by the door, listening intently. He glanced back at the box the blueprint had been in and spotted some more sticking out of it. He grabbed one and looked at it.
Bean felt a mitten poke his shoulder. He looked up at Bark, offering him the blueprint he found. Bean took it, and read it like a newspaper.
“Oh now that is interesting,” Bean smirked.
“What is?” Tangle jumped behind Bean.
Bean flipped the blueprint around for the girls to see. It was labeled “Egg Saucer Power Core” and displayed a large, green, cylindrical reactor.
“Eggy’s gonna power his new toy with a very unstable kinda energy,” Bean smiled, then pulled out an unlit bomb, “One twinge of gunpowder comes into contact with this thing and the whole ship’ll be gone in seconds.”
Tangle and Whisper looked from Bean’s bomb to the reactor on the blueprint. Tangle turned to her love with a grin. Whisper considered, then turned to Bean and Bark.
“Why did you two come to save us?” Whisper asked.
“We were bored,” Bean shrugged.
Bark lightly smacked him in the back of the head.
“Alright fine,” Bean muttered, “I wanted to blow something up, and Bark saw this base on his walk. Figured no one would miss this dump if it didn’t exist anymore.”
Whisper nodded, “And why should we take you on this mission with us?”
“Woah! Slow down there, speedster!” Bean put his hands up in mock horror, “We haven’t reached any terms of agreement yet!”
“Well,” Whisper pondered, “If we were to take you, why would you want to help us? What would you seek to get out of it?”
“Gee, is this an interrogation or something?” Bean crossed his arms.
“She’s just…being cautious,” Tangle rubbed Whisper’s shoulder.
“Well, me and my buddy haven’t done much in a good long while,” Bean wrapped his arm around Bark, “It’d be nice for us to go out and wreck some stuff. And whose stuff is better to wreck than Baldy McNosehair’s?”
He looked at Tangle and Whisper, the former having a big grin, the latter seemed unconvinced.
“Plus,” Bean added, “You two seem cool! Me and Bark ain’t too good at making friends, but I like you’z two’z.”
Whisper looked from the bird to the bear, who nodded at her with a determined look. She turned to Tangle, who gave her a similarly determined nod. She glanced down at the blueprints of the huge ship that was looming over the world somewhere. She leaned down and picked it up.
“Let’s go,” she said, rolling up the blueprint.
She started marching away. Bean and Bark looked hopefully at her.
“Um…you mean all of us?” Bean asked hopefully.
Whisper stopped and turned to the bird. She nodded and smirked. Bean and Tangle squealed and jumped up and down together. Bark breathed a sigh of relief and followed Whisper.
**********
Outside the base, Whisper checked the messages she received through her mask.
“The ship was last seen north of Central City,” she said, and directed everyone in the right direction.
“Say…I never asked,” Bean said, “But how come you two know about all this? Does Eggman just share every little detail of his plans online now?”
“Ha!” Tangle laughed, “No but that definitely sounds like something he’d do! No, we’re part of the Diamond Cutters!”
Bean and Bark blinked. Tangle’s excited expression fell a little.
“The Diamond Cutters?” she tried, “The Restoration’s rapid response team?”
“Restoration?” Bean asked, “Like that thing you put on sandwiches?”
“No?” now Tangle was confused, “The Restoration, like…the Resistance during the war?”
Bean looked at Bark, who shrugged at him. Bean relayed the shrug to Tangle.
“You two don’t know about the war?” Tangle gawked, “Like…the one where Eggman locked Sonic in space and took over the world?”
“We fell off the loop-de-loop a while ago,” Bean said, “We were probably trying to find a place to sleep in the woods during all that.”
“You two are homeless?” Whisper finally spoke.
Everyone stopped for a moment.
“…Oops…” Bean blushed, “I don’t think I was supposed to tell you that.”
Bark facepalmed, but then his palm was grabbed and held by Tangle.
“The Restoration is just the place for you two then!” she beamed, “It has its own apartments and an entire community of people wanting to help each other out! You guys can stay there after we blow up Eggface’s ship!”
Bark’s mouth hung open. He turned to Bean, who had a similar expression. They both turned to Whisper, who had a small smile on her face.
“Well,” Bean rubbed the back of his head, “You asked us what we wanted to get out of this, right?
She nodded.
“That will certainly do.”