Launch Base Zone - Infiltration

[Jijeka-Te]

Being left out of the action for the moment, Ji and Anu stood back.

(Anu) "Your Highness, what happened to you? After that gong rang out, it was like you were possessed!"
(Ji) "I'm not sure myself... I remember the gong, and then... all of a sudden, I thought I was back home..."
(Anu) "...directing the defense against the Parthian invasion. You were rather showy about it."

[Gail Strafer]

The SWATbot headed towards Sonic was too busy fleeing Espio's attack to realize it was headed straight to its doom. Sonic's roundhouse kick smoothly connected to its side, sending it spinning sideways. It crash-landed rather heavily onto the ground, stirring up some dust.

---

Meanwhile, the other SWATbots fled to hide behind cover. They maneuvered so as to keep Espio and Sonic on the same flank. This served to keep both targets in view, in addition to allowing them to concentrate their laser blasts without any risk of friendly fire.

But the SWATbot watching Sonic didn't fare too well, as the shuriken cleanly piereced the back of its neck. The point of the blade extended all the way through to the other side. It started to raise its hands up to pull the shuriken back out, but the weapon appeared to have severed its "spinal cord", so to speak. It locked into that position, and then toppled over as if it were a mannequin rather than an animate robot.

Espio's other target fared much better, as it had the chameleon in its sights and was able to duck underneath the attack in time. The bot followed up by wildly spraying laser blasts from its arm cannon, as it rushed to join its comrades behind cover.

By this point most of the SWATbots were hiding behind boxes, random debris, old concrete barriers left from the first base's construction, and whatever else happened to be handy to use for cover. They would open fire with reckless abandon from their concealed positions.

However, one took a laser blast neatly in the shoulder, and then the upper chest when it temporarily paused in confusion from the hit. If Sonic and Espio turned around, they would see Gail sitting there at the hole, laying off potshots with his arm laser gun at the targets. But before they could return fire, Gail would duck back into the building.

If Jii and Anu were paying attention to Gail, they'd see him sprinting down the hallway. He'd been hiding in this building long enough to know there was a second hole in the wall further down. He planned to use that to flank behind the entrenched SWATbots to help out.

[Sonic]

Sonic would gracefully dodge all of the shots coming at him in various ways. All the while, he looked fairly bored as he looked at the battle-scene. They might have not looked like any robots from Robotnik that he’d ever seen, but they certainly acted like it. He even felt bad for the metal creations, since they obvious stood no chance; for him at least. Slow, stupid, and a lack of creativity. He could say they fit in pre-tty well with there creator.

“Come oonnnn!” Sonic let out, as he landed on the ground from a summersault. “Give me some kind of challenge!!”

Sonic had found the next target. If there’s one thing that he’d learn throughout the years that anything not bolted to the ground reacted quite nicely thanks to ‘physics’. He ran towards the Swatbots behind the boxes, side-stepping to dodge anymore shots. And it didn’t take too long for him to get close enough before he went into a Sonic Spindash with an extra boost; heading straight for the crates. He was hoping that he either went through them and send debris flying into the robots; or if they were too solid he was hoping to knock them into the robots.

[Moves used: Sonic Spindash/Boost]

[Espio]

The chameleon soon noticed things wern't quite going his way as they finally took to cover. At this rate he would be out in the open alone, and vurnable to attack. He stayed low, rolling to the right to avoid the incoming laser fire and take cover behind one of the concrete barriers himself, facing the swatbots. While their fire was somewhat random, he preferred not to take the chance one of them could land a lucky hit. He went flat on the ground, taking a moment to blend in with the ground.

While Sonic could brazenly rush in wherever he pleased, Espio preferred to take a more cautious route after his initial strike if he lost momentum in the battle. He knew he had supporting fire, but would rather not keep himself out in the open; not where there were so many wonderful angles to attack from. He reached into his invisipack, feeling around for just a second before he pulled out what appeared to be a grey ball with a fuse lit to it. He quickly struck the tip against his right arm bracer to light it, flinging it out to the left to set up a misleading smokescreen as if he was going to move in that direction under the cover of it. He was careful to avoid the possibility of it clouding up his ally's points of view. And with Sonic's charge straight into their position, it would make his setup to get out from his barricade all the easier.

[Jijeka-Te]

Ji and Anu looked up at Gail as he passed. Deciding it was best to follow if the guy with the guns decided to run down the hall, they did so slowly, taking care not to get in his way.

(Ji) "It must've been the gong that triggered it. I can't think of that sound without associating it with that day."
(Anu) "It must be a very strong and painful memory if you became as buried in it as you were."
(Ji) "..."

[Gail Strafer]

Sonic cleanly smashed right through the crate one poor SWATbot was hiding behind, and then he left a hole in the SWATbot behind that. Other bots got covered in splinters as he flew on through, briefly keeping them from reacquiring their blue target.

Then there was a soft little boom as the smoke grenade went off, hiding Espio from view. However, the SWATbots who had turned to fire again at Espio merely responded by switching on infrared, so that they could locate the chameleon again if he decided to use it for cover.

---

Gail continued to trudge down the hall and finally reached the hole he was after. As he turned the corner though and looked outside, the wolf gave a sigh. It looked like Sonic and Espio pretty much had things under control.

However, all of that would end up being moot in a second. Loud klaxons from alarms began echoing away from the factory ship. Gail could hear some sort of alarm announcement, but it was difficult to make out from all the sound. However, what DID catch his attention was a loud crunching sound coming from the bottom of the ship. Suddenly, what looked like molten lava began leaking out from the bottom of the craft, and it was slowly moving straight towards the fight.

"Jeez-laweez! What just happened in there?! Is that LAVA?!"

Whatever it was, it was steadily moving towards them. Gail sure didn't want to stick around. He could feel the heat from here. Turning to Jii and Anu, he mumbled a bit under his breath, since this turn of events had rather surprised and frightenedh im.

"I think...we should run!"

Gail took off at a sprint in Sonic's direction away from the molten metal, firing at what SWATbots were leftover as he went. He managed to take out one, which somewhat helped in dwindling their numbers.

[Sonic]

As his spindash would stop, he’d stand straight back up, as he did two sonic round-house kicks at the remaining SWATbots behind him.

As he’d land from it and hear the alarms blazing.

“Look’s like –someone- got him. Oh Eggman, you and you’re load-barring fights…” He’d look over in the direction he remembered seeing Espio. “Alright, come on guys! You know, with the amount of times I’ve had to run people out of situations, you’d think I just make a traveling service out of it….”

He tapped his foot impatiently as he waited for everyone to run over to him. He was used to it by now, but it didn’t mean he wasn’t going to make jokes about it.

[Espio]

Espio quicky rolled out from the cover on the opposite side of the smokescreen with the intent of climbing a nearby tower to throw shurikens from his planned vantage point. That...was until he noticed the bottom of the lead ship belching lava out towards the battlefield as the alarms rang out. "That...can't be good.", he muttered to himself. Just what happened in there?

This was a situation in Espio's mind that would warrent friend and foe alike would be attempting to flee from the approaching doom, including the chameleon himself who was now making a mad dash towards Sonic's location. He proceeded to pull a bomb shuriken out of his left leg bracer mid stride to chuck it over one of the swatbot's makeshift barricades facing him. He didn't care if it actually damaged any of them; he needed a distraction to get himself, and the others out of the area. He figured Sonic wouldn't be able to carry everyone out to saftey, finally seeing the group of three emerging from the building. Two of them had a most intriguing type of clothing.

"Allow me to offer my services...", Espio said with a courteous bow to the group. He held his arms out, keeping a watchful eye on the encroaching lava flow. "One of you, climb aboard quickly!", he shouted, moreso commanded. If he could help it; he wouldn't be sticking around in this area any longer than he had to now. Facing a batallion of swatbots was one thing; fleeing from a creeping lava plume was another.

[Jijeka-Te]

Again, if the guy with the guns decides it's time to run, you should probably do the same. Ji and Anu both fled, then took to the sky as soon as they were outside. (They declined both Sonic's and Espio's invitations; they were capable of escaping without them.)

[Gail Strafer]

Between everyone's attacks, all of the SWATbots were either dead or fleeing the molten metal just like the good guys. Sonic's kicks easily put his two targets down, while two other SWATbots got blasted over their barricade by Espio's bomb shuriken. They were no longer a factor.

As Gail dashed towards Sonic with his arm stretched out, he had mixed feelings. On one hand, he was getting to be rescued by one of the greatest heroes the world had ever known. On the other hand, he hated having to get someone else to help him out of this situation again. Again, it made him feel like a weakling. Alas, it was either that or get melted down by the metal heading their way.

As he took Sonic's hand, he couldn't help but look sheepish about his insults earlier.

"Sorry I called you an old man..."

He bowed his head, looking extremely regretfully at his feet. He decided to avert his eyes to see where Jii and Anu were, but it looked like they'd taken care of escaping the area just fine.

As they watched, they'd see a SWATpod taking off from the top floors of the factory ship. Immediately thereafter, the factory ship itself began leaning over to one side...straight towards them. If they didn't move fast, they would be crushed beneath the hundreds of thousands of tons of metal bearing straight towards them. Gail gazed both in awe and fear at the massive structure teetering overhead.

"Sonic...I think it's time we skedaddled!"