Lava Reef Zone

[Dr. Robotnik]

Rampage's voice came in over the radio.

"Yo, Robotnik, this is Rampage. I just took down some no-class chump over here, but no sign of any other serious threats so far. What's the situation over by you?"

At the mention of "no sign of any other serious threat", Rampage would hear a low guttural, growling sound on the other end of his radio. Robotnik pretty much sounded just like a very angry, very hungry hibernating bear someone had accidentally woken up. When Robo finally got control of himself, he spoke in a muttering manner.

"The diversion totally failed. Sonic's already at the camp with a friend or two, all because of two bumbling idiot thieves I hired to gather intel for me. But that's in the past. You should get back to the camp to deal with the intruders intruders. The secrecy of our operation's been compromised."

And with that, he hung up. Still seething, he turned his attention back to the task at hand. Down, down, and down he went into the tunnels, deeper under Angel Island. Before long, the temperature gauge started shooting through the roof. He could visibly see the air starting to shimmer, and the walls appeared to be glowing.

After turning another corner, the doctor would see a large lava flow pouring down a waterfall into a big pool. Lava streams crisscrossed the area, with more of the stuff constantly falling down from the ceiling. According to his intel, this would be the place he'd find the most shards.

Not wasting any more time, Robotnik flicked on a small, portable emerald detector in the cockpit, and charged for the nearest wall that got a strong signal. The drills on the front of the tank roared to life, and quickly made short work of the stones and rocks in front of him. He was already getting deep inside the wall.

[Rose Fox]

[“Dr. Robotnik!”]

Rose wasn’t much of a happy camper either. The bot she had control of had stupidly been destroyed while she was checking up on the beaches region of the island. She had alerted the security of the Launch Base Zone to be on the look-out for the two hedgehogs; hoping to keep them distracted before she could get Rampage there. But at least there was one good thing out of this. The plan the mutant guy gave actually worked. She was sure that with the deal that he made with Sonic that he would keep his end of the bargain; to his disdain, of course. And since that meant Sonic couldn’t touch anything that was made by Robotnik, she was sure that the Doctor’s mood would change.


[“That Tatsuhiro-guy plan worked! He made Sonic agree to some stupid agreement that says he won’t touch anything you’ve made; and won the match extremely quick. So we won’t have much trouble unless the blue idiot gets a brain and decided to not keep promises…”]

Rose sounded only a little bit happy though; like she didn’t have time to celebrate that something had actually gone right. And really she didn’t. Sonic and Alpha were still over in Launch Base Zone- and to make things worse there were people now on the island; people she didn’t recognize.

[“-But we have more possible threats now; a group just got onto the island. There seems to be two lizards, a deer with a cross-bow, a wolf, a cat, some human guy and-”]

She paused, not knowing what to say. There was something else; but….it couldn’t be….

[“- and Chaos?!...no. wait…something’s not right…Doctor, would you like me to forward the image to you?”]

[Rampage]

Rampage's demeanor was far from elated as he steadily piloted his hovercraft through the newly constructed tunnel to reach Robotnik. After the woefully disappointing fight with that idiotic rabbit, Rampage had been looking forward to big fight with Sonic the Hedgehog himself. Of course, he wasn't aware of what exactly happened yet, all he did know was that there was no sign of any fight going on when he did reach the Launch Base Zone. And now he was flying into the centre of an active volcano.... and his ship doesn't have air conditioning. NOT a happy badger.

"YO! EGG-BOSS. What the -bleep- is going on around here?!" Rampage growled over his radio, paying no heed to the word 'tactful', when he came into view of Robotnik's tank digging away. "One minute it's get back here pronto, the next nadda! What the heck happened t' Sonic!!"

[Dr. Robotnik]

[You know, Chadin, I meant "follow along" with the conversation over the radio, not literally follow Robotnik down below XD]

Robotnik blinked a few times, surprised at the news that Sonic had been defeated by Tatsu.

"You...you can't be serious?" he stuttered, holding the radio in his hand.

He actually stopped the drill for a moment just to make sure he'd heard Rose's words correctly. It was just one unthinkable event after another today. Little did he know he was about to get another one of those.

At first it didn't sound like any big deal. Just another random group of heroes showing up to ruin his fun. Didn't the citizens of this world ever get tired of following him around like fleas on a dog? But then Rose said Chaos, and once again he couldn't help but stop to listen more.

"Sure...show me..." he stammered.

CHAOS is aligned with them?! Oh, I know from personal experience that's not good for ANYONE, not even the heroes. Chaos is only on the side of Chaos. He must NOT get anywhere near the emerald shards and--

The image popped up. A strange water creature stood on the beach in the midst of the vigilantes. It had the same coloration and eyes as Chaos, but otherwise it didn't look like him at all. The doctor tilted his head to the side, honestly not sure what he was looking at. Then he remembered. They were on the Ark. But how on earth did the heroes have one of these things? The Artificial Chaos or whatever it was called?

"Rose, I want you to find out everything you can about that thing. It's called Artificial Chaos. I need to know how the heroes have one of them on their side."

Before he could focus more on that though, Rampage interrupted. How he'd made it down here so quickly, Robotnik had no clue.

"You won't believe this Rampage, but Sonic's actually been defeated for once. I cannot believe it. That creepy lizard man came through! They just fought over by this camp. After Tatsu won, he made Sonic promise not to attack anything I've built. Still though, there's another set of heroes who've just arrived at the beach if you want more target practice. In the meantime, I must continue digging."

[Rose Fox]

[“Right, I’ll start looking up information as I can. I’ve already sent Tatsu up to the beach. I’ll continue to watch that situation and inform you as it goes.”]

She signed off the channel, beginning to do a bit of research and monitor the beach situation.

[Sonic]

[From Launch Base Zone]

Sonic occasionally peeked out of the bucket of his dumptruck bot, trying to get a feel for what was going on here. The deeper the tunnel went, the hotter it got. He visibly started sweating and brushing aside the sweat beads. This was starting to feel awfully familiar to him, and the hedgehog had an idea of where he was about to end up.

Sure enough, he eventually came into view of a large torrent of lava cascading down deep into the recesses of the cavern, with bots milling all around and drilling for more ore. However, Sonic recalled his promise and knew he could not attack them. So that meant the only one he could go after would be the fat man himself. And with how hands on the doctor liked to be, he figured the doc would be close by.

The hedgehog's eyes continued to scan, looking for a machine with Robo's traditional egg pod cockpit.

[Rampage]

Unfortunately Sonic would not be able to see Robotnik's ship anywhere, but he would see Rampage's ship flying above the line of dump-truck vehicles that Sonic was riding on as he was making his way back towards the exit.

Inside the hovercraft, Rampage was still in a mighty foul mood. But that mood changed rapidly when he thought he caught a glimpse of a familiar shade of blue in the bucket of one of the dump trucks. If the hover craft had been a standard ground vehicle you would have heard the tires squealing as Rampage slammed on the brakes (as it were and spun it around to take a closer look. This time Sonic would notice Rampage's ship coming right for him so if he wanted to hide, now would be the time.

[sorry for the delay, been rather distracted lately.]

[Sonic]

[Sorry man...didn't realize you'd posted, and then when I did it got ridiculous for a few days.]

Sonic ducked low when he saw the flying ship passing overhead. But then he realized it had stopped. Not a good thing when he couldn't attack robots. However, he caught a glimpse of a rather psycho-looking badger flying it. The frown turned upside down at this realization. It had a living pilot, so it was fair game as far as his promise was concerned.

So instead of hiding, Sonic actually leaped triumphantly out of the dump truck and stood proudly on the ground facing the flying machine.

"Hey, Mr. Badger. Want to dance?"

[Rampage]

Rampage grinned in delight. Only his real face could actually move, so all he could manage was a rather disturbing looking half grin. "I thought you'd never ask." Squeezing the trigger of his hovercraft's cannon, he fired a sizzling energy shot straight for Sonic, heedless of the possibility he might destroy the dump-truck he was standing on.

[Sonic]

Sonic smoothly backflipped out of the way of the shot, doing a couple more flips along the ground just for show. In the meantime, the energy cannon shot hit the dumptruck bot cleanly, blowing it up and bringing the convoy of other truck bots to a screeching halt. They struggled to get around the destroyed vehicle.

The hedgehog grinned at the havoc he'd caused without even having to attack anything.

"Man...with enemies like you, who needs friends?"

Sonic took a moment to look for something else to jump in front of, and it looked like he'd found it. After a moment of zipping along, he jumped in front of a structurally-significant rock column, holding up a ceiling where some mining bots were working. The hog waved his hands around, trying to bait Rampage in taking another shot.

"Care to try your luck again, my friend? Hit the hedgehog, win a prize!"

Of course, he doubted Rampage would fall for the same trick twice in a row, but found it to be good fun to do this nonetheless.