Nix: Collision

“So, remind me,” I said to Tails as we gathered our items, “how did Robotnik manage to get the Emeralds?”

The yellow, two-tailed fox gave a sigh as he packed up his radar. “He managed to open up the Special Zone and retrieve them while we were all busy holding off an attack on Knothole.”

“He’s gotten smarter.”

“Not really.” Tails looked at me. “I just think he’s gotten… more shrewd.”

He handed me a radio transceiver. I raised an eyebrow. “You do know I can talk to you guys telepathically, right?”

“True,” he responded, “but we can’t do that with each other. And before you say you can open up a psychic link,” he added, cutting off my response, “you need to remember that you can’t fight and ‘talk’ at the same time.”

I sighed. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.” I hooked the transceiver onto my ear and followed Tails out to the others.

Sonic the Hedgehog, Knuckles the Echidna, and Amy Rose were all standing at the edge of the camp, waiting for us. We greeted each other warmly, and Tails handed the receivers over to them. “You each know the plan?”

Sonic nodded. “Yep. We’re going to strike now, and hopefully clear the way for the other Freedom Fighters to attack.” He glanced around. “Though, we seem to be missing someone…”

Suddenly, there was a flash of light, and Shadow the Hedgehog appeared at my side. I couldn’t resist the urge to smirk and elbowed him gently. “What took you so long?”

“Whatever,” he grumbled, crossing his arms. Tails gave him a transceiver, which he immediately placed on his head. “Let’s just get this over with.”

“Alright. Sonic, you and Shadow go on ahead. The rest of us will catch up.” Tails looked at me. “Unless Nix wants to go with them?”

Nix stood next to me in spectral form. “I’m pretty sure Sonic and Shadow can handle themselves nicely,” he responded. The blue hedgehog gave him a thumbs up, while the black hedgehog just smirked. He returned back into my body.

“Hey, Shadow!” Sonic faced the dark hedgehog. “Race you to the base!”

Shadow snorted. “Must everything be a competition to you?” He didn’t protest, however, and the two quickly sped off for the base. I heard the sound of robots being destroyed a few seconds later.

“Well, looks like they’re on the job,” I commented. “Let’s go.”

The others nodded, and we made our way towards Robotnik.

***

Doctor Ivo “Eggman” Robotnik, genius roboticist with an IQ over 300, was appalled.

“All this planning, all this scheming, and already I’m being overrun by that pesky hedgehog and his friends!” he exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air.

“Don’t forget that human feller,” Cubot said. The yellow cube robot placed a finger on his chin. “What was his name? Jarrod? Gerald?”

“It’s Jared,” corrected Orbot, the red ball robot rolling his eyes, “and he’s right; you shouldn’t forget about him.”

“And I haven’t!” Robotnik pressed a button on his Egg Pod, and on the screens they saw several badniks jump out of the walls towards the teen. “Ha! Let’s see how he deals with them!”

Jared raised an arm, bringing his blade up. He swung down, and there was a flash of light, before all the badniks were destroyed from a resulting Chaos Boom.

Robotnik sighed. “Hm. I guess I should have gone for something harder.”

He turned his gaze to another screen, showing Sonic racing away from several Swatbots. Knuckles and Amy were behind him, destroying the Swatbots with ease. Robotnik groaned. “They’ll be here any minute!”

He turned back to an Egg-Robo, who was busy configuring a giant machine. “You! Is it ready yet?”

“Ready and calibrated, Dr. Eggman,” the robot responded.

“It’s Dr. Robotnik,” he growled through gritted teeth, as the robot walked back. He flew over in his Egg Pod, inspecting the machine.

The machine in question had seven ports, one of the seven Chaos Emeralds in each port. A row of tubes were in the back, glowing with stolen Chaos energy. Lightning flew from each emerald, sapping more and more energy. Purple and neon-blue energy arced around the machine, making it groan under the strain.

“Good, good,” Robotnik murmured. “At least that’s going to plan—”

“Uh, Doctor?” Orbot interrupted. “You might want to see this…”

“What is it?” The doctor turned and flew over, inspecting the screen.

“Hey, guys, I think that’s the door!” Sonic said on screen, pointing to a large vault covering.

Shadow teleported over, dropping the remains of a Buzz Bomber. He raised an eyebrow at what Sonic was pointing at. “No, I bet that’s that bathroom.”

“Did…” Jared came over, regarding Shadow with mild amusement. “Did you just use sarcasm?” The hedgehog rolled his eyes.

Tails flew over. “Looks like the door’s password protected,” he said, pointing to a keypad to the side.

“Any idea how long it’ll take?” Knuckles asked as he and Amy arrived.

“Maybe a few minutes.” Tails glanced behind them, where a huge group of robots were approaching. “I’ll need you guys to cover me while I work out the code.”

“Got it,” Jared said, the others nodding their agreement. They turned, and began assaulting the robots.

“Damn it!” Robotnik yelled, slamming his fists at the side of the pod.

“What’s up, Doc?” Cubot asked.

“What’s up is that they’ll be here any minute!”

“Aw, c’mon, Doc, there’s no way that kid could crack it—”

“Fifty percent done!” Tails yelled back to the others.

“... On second thought, maybe he can,” Cubot murmured.

“Not. Helping.” Robotnik growled under his breath. “Blast it all! If I fail one more time—” He shook his head. “I’d better start up the machine.”

He flew the pod over to the machine, and pressed a button. Instantly, the energy syphons picked up their pace, draining the emeralds quickly. He pressed another button, and the machine spat out another bolt of energy. The bolt held in midair for a second, before suddenly vanishing. A second later, a white crack in the air appeared, widening with every second.

Robotnik grinned. “Yes… finally, I’ve done it!” he gloated, laughing maniacally.

***

J

“Got it yet, Tails?” I called over my shoulder as I blasted a Swatbot away.

“Almost done!” he yelled back.

Suddenly, I felt the very fabric of space-time shake. I turned my head to the door, and sensed a rip in the dimensions.

He’s doing it, Nix thought.

“Tails! Get that door opened! Now!” I ordered.

“Got it!” He inputted the code, and the locks released. The door opened slightly, hissing as it slid apart.

“Activating Emergency Lock,” a computer voice said.

I bit back a curse as the door stopped moving. “Shadow!” I commanded. “Blast it!”

He nodded and skated over. He placed his hands on the door. His eyes glowed white as he shouted, “Chaos Blast!”

A fiery explosion erupted from his hands, engulfing the door. The force was enough to drive the robots back.

“It’s open!” he shouted.

We nodded, and before any of the robots could recover, we raced through the crack into Robotnik’s room.

“Hey, Eggman!” Sonic shouted. “We kinda trashed your place! Hope that’s not a problem!”

“Shut it, Sonic!” Eggman shouted back from his pod. “It’s Robotnik! Why don’t you correct your friend, Jared?” He looked at me.

I smirked. “In my universe, we refer to you more as the former than the latter.”

“Grr… that doesn’t matter!” He gestured behind him, where a crack in dimensions could be seen. “I’ve done it! I’ve broken through the universe! Now I can easily pass through it with my robot army, and conquer whatever universe I land in!”

“And what makes you think we’re actually going to let you do that?!” Knuckles yelled.

“Easy!” Robotnik pressed a button, and from the ground rose several Swatbot Mk. II’s. “You’ll be busy dealing with the hired help.”

The Swatbots began shooting at us. I dove to the side, narrowly avoiding a beam, while Sonic jumped and dodged. I lobbed a batarang at one of the bots, hitting it in the chest and causing it to explode.

“You call this the hired help?” Sonic taunted as he Spin Dashed into another bot. “I doubt they’re even paid!”

The doctor didn’t bother to respond, pressing another button. Out of the ground popped out several more bots, and they began shooting various beams and lasers at us.

I glanced up, and saw that the rift was growing bigger. Shadow threw Chaos Spears around us, destroying some of the bots. “Jared!” he yelled. “You have to get him!”

“Right!” I glanced around, seeing that my friends could manage. A Swatbot moved towards me; I sweeped it with my leg, and as it fell, I sliced its top off. I grabbed its head and lightly kicked it, activating a laser beam.

The beam shot out, shooting towards Robotnik. “What in the name of—” He swerved his pod, narrowly dodging the beam as it struck the ceiling.

He glared at me. “You’ll pay for that, Guardian.”

I smirked, before suddenly launching a Chaos Flare at him. He easily dodged the attack. “And just what was that supposed to do—”

“Yah!” I suddenly appeared in front of him, throwing my sword as hard as I could.

“Yipe!” He ducked, the sword just missing his head. He pressed a button, and a mechanical arm shot out of his pod. It knocked me in the gut, sending me flying back into the wall with a grunt.

“Argh… son of a—” I gasped as I looked up.

My sword had its point imbedded in one of the tubes. The energy was quickly leaking out, faster than it should have. Robotnik looked equally shocked, but he turned and glared at me.

“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” he shouted.

“Yeah, not gonna lie. No idea,” I answered, slightly dazed.

The whole room began shaking. We were tossed easily around, and somehow a wind managed to fly by us.

“Jared!” Shadow shouted. “What the hell’s happening?”

“Your Guardian friend, Shadow,” Robotnik responded, “may have just tampered with forces even he cannot handle!”

He pointed to the rift, which had widened immensely. There was another flash of light, and suddenly more white rifts appeared.

“What’s happening?” Shadow asked again.

“Rift in space-time…” I murmured. “Must have… fluctuated… too much energy to control… overload…”

The Chaos Emeralds began tugging at whatever binded them to the ports, ripping apart wires and steel. They began gravitating towards the holes, light flashing off of them.

I suddenly felt myself being tugged. My eyes widened in shock, and I managed to shout in my dazed state, “Grab hold of something!”

The others were beginning to feel the tug as well. Desperately, they grabbed onto whatever they could, whether it was steel beams or the floor itself. Robotnik struggled to fly away from the pull, but his pod could only get so far before he was tugged even closer.

“Boss!” Cubot exclaimed. “This doesn’t look good!”

“I know it doesn’t look good, you nincompoop!” Robotnik shouted back. “And, unfortunately, I can’t seem to do a damn thing about it!”

The machine was slowly being ripped apart, the tubes and cylinders cracking and morphing into misshapen works of metal. More energy cracked out, and more white holes appeared. The pull intensified, and we found ourselves being dragged away from the ground into the air.

“Gragh!” Knuckles grunted. He grabbed Tails and Sonic, desperately trying to not fly away. Amy grabbed me, while I held onto Shadow. “Jared! Any ideas on what to do?!”

“I’m thinking, I’m thinking!” I responded.

“Well, think faster!” Shadow roared.

Before I could respond, a huge support beam began toppling towards us, loosened by the pull. Shadow and Amy saw it coming, and instinctively moved to the side. I managed to roll away, the beam landing next to me with a loud thud.

The force was enough to loosen everyone’s grip. We began gravitating towards the holes. Knuckles tried to grab the ground, but was easily torn away.

“Agh!” he shouted as he was suddenly thrown through a rift.

“Knuckles!” Sonic cried, before he too was pulled away.

Amy and Shadow tried to hold on longer, but were quickly pulled away by the forces, vanishing into the white rifts.

Robotnik’s base began collapsing into the rifts, the metal exterior crunching under the forces at hand. Parts of the ceiling vanished into the rifts, revealing a blue sky above us. The machine roared as it was completely torn apart, its various pieces vanishing into various rifts.

Robotnik shouted something incoherent, probably a curse; then, he too was pulled away, his pod and his robots vanishing into another hole.

“Tails!” I shouted, grabbing the fox. “Hold on!”

“I’m… trying!” he shouted back. His eyes suddenly widened. “Look out!”

I turned my gaze, seeing a large mess of metal flying towards me. Before I could dodge it, it collided with me. I accidentally loosened my grip on Tails, feeling the breath knocked out of me.

“Jared!” he cried, desperately reaching out for me.

It was too late; he was sucked into a rift.

I tried to recover, but was hit in the head by an even more massive hunk of metal. The blow was enough for me to see stars, and I reeled back, flying through the air. Through bleary eyes I saw one final chunk of the base come flying at me. I closed my eyes.

The chunk collided with me, sending me flying through the same rift that Tails had gone through. Whiteness enveloped my vision as I went through.

Nix tried to say something, but his voice became garbled and distorted. It felt like he was being ripped from me; desperately I latched onto his presence, preventing him from being torn away.

Something hit me hard in the back of the head, and I saw darkness at the corners of my vision. Before I blacked out, I had one final thought:

My fault. All my fault.

***

As the energy died down, the Freedom Fighters could only gape in shock. The base had completely vanished, almost as if it was torn completely from the earth. They could see the blue sky, with the sun setting into the afternoon. The vibrant heavens were a stark contrast to the grey land beneath it.

The five that had gone in were gone; none of their bodies could be found. The Fighters could only assume that they had gone wherever the base had; there was no hope of getting them back.

One Freedom Fighter, a purple cat, looked at the sky, worried for her friends. She felt even more concern for a particular hedgehog.

Nix… where have you gone?