Chapter Twenty

Fiona stared at a stained spot on the cold concrete floor as she sat handcuffed on a steel bench. It was the sort of stare that would give rise to an unnerved feeling if directed toward a person, as though the individual staring was considering slaughtering them brutally. She was practically exuding an aura of bitterness; thoughts of how she had failed to break up Tails and Kaolin danced through her head like a mob of excited ravers, and those ravers were wearing cleats dipped in hydrofluoric acid. As well, the fact that she had been bested by his not-thin wife continued to scorn her. The whole event had been one massive humiliation, offset only by how she had managed to cause them pain.

The two lean pantherine guards didn't seem to pay too much mind to her—they just stood there staring at a wall while awaiting Tails' arrival. Despite avoiding direct eye contact, they were keeping tabs of her movements with their peripheral vision.

They snapped to attention as Tails walked in with Kaolin in tow, and their presence—especially Kaolin's—irritated Fiona further, though her face showed nothing hinting of it. Tails glanced at the crimson vixen with a mien even harder than hers. The chilling look confused her considering how she had helped his mother onto the path of recovery. If anything, he should have at least had a grateful countenance wrapped in a layer of austerity.

The golden-orange fox walked over to the guard who was holding the PDA in question and retrieved it along with a key to Fiona's handcuffs. He examined the sleek, diminutive device with some curiosity before he turned to Kaolin and whispered something into her ear, then walked toward his red feminine subject. "It's time we get started, Fiona."

Fiona thought about responding with a snippy sexual comment again but decided against it. She had a feeling that she would get more than a verbal reprimand since his expression was still as cold as a polar ice field in the winter. It didn't feel right to hold her tongue in such a situation; she would've normally continued in her contumacy with a smile even if it earned a sharp swat to the face, but she figured it was the fact that a cold bottle of beer had been absent from her grasp for almost an hour.

Tails reached behind her and removed the cuffs while Kaolin kept the barrel of her pistol trained on the conniving vixen's forehead. Once the PDA was placed in her grasp, she fixed her eyes on the small screen and started pressing the miniature buttons with her dainty fingers. The commands she entered incited the hologram projector on the top to display an image of her screen into the air above it, and Tails observed the data with intrigue.

"Happy now, Miles?"

"Absolutely."

NICOLE was watching from a surveillance camera and analyzed the information as it was shown. She then used the data to make some adjustments to the security systems and notified Tails of the development shortly thereafter.

Tails showed an almost unnoticeable amount of happiness upon receiving the update, then looked at the vixen again. "Thank you very much, Fiona. We got some holes patched in the systems, so that shouldn't be possible anymore. Now, please hand me the PDA."

Fiona smirked. "Why would I want to do that when the fun is just beginning?"

"What do you mean?"

"You'll find out in about, oh, three seconds."

The ceiling above them exploded, sending all but Fiona and Tails to the floor and causing Kaolin to misfire at a wall. Fiona took that opportunity to shove Tails down and land a swift kick on his face, sending one of his teeth sailing across the room and briefly robbing him of consciousness. A flexible ladder dropped down from the gaping hole in the roof, which Fiona quickly grabbed and rode to the ship above as it brought the ladder back into the fuselage upon detecting her presence. She then jumped into the pilot seat and took off amidst a hailstorm of defensive bullets pelting the dense hull.

Kaolin sat up from the floor with ringing ears and a pounding headache. The shrill noise of the sounding alarms only served to aggravate the latter. If I had just pulled the trigger sooner...

The ashen fox looked at those around her and panicked when she saw her husband's bloodied face and motionless body. She rushed to his side and pressed two fingers against his neck, then gave a sigh of relief when she felt his pulse and moved her face up to his. "Tails...are you okay? Can you hear me?"

Tails lurched his head forward and gave her a kiss on the lips, then slowly opened his eyes to make contact with hers. "I think so. Face kinda hurts, but I feel fine otherwise."

Kaolin smiled, and Tails got to his feet and looked up at the hole in the ceiling. A lot of dust was still floating about and sparks from severed cables could be seen.

"Tails! Kaolin! Anyone! Are you alright?"

The unexpected sound of NICOLE's voice coming in over their comms startled them, and Kaolin plucked hers from her belt and answered first. "We're fine, but it seems Fiona escaped."

"I saw that. I have sent a probe after her, but I think she noticed." A short pause followed. "Probe is down."

Tails spoke up moments later as he rubbed his facial wound. "I think she used her PDA to activate an autodrive on her ship or summon some help that was nearby."

NICOLE attested to his previous guess. "The cameras showed it to be her ship."

Irritated by what he saw as a lack of foresight on his part, he glanced down and sighed. "I shouldn't have let her touch that PDA."

His response prompted Kaolin to look over at him with slight concern. "It wasn't your fault. We were watching her and she still slipped under our radar."

"Yeah, but I still should've seen it coming." He huffed. "Now that psycho is on the loose. I..."

NICOLE suddenly interrupted with an urgent tone to her voice. "Sorry to interrupt, but I have just received word that the mission in Rukzyl-Karagator was a success. I am in the process of analyzing the data they gathered, and once that is done I will be planning a meeting."

Good news was just what they needed.

It didn't take long for NICOLE to go through the information, and a meeting was slated to take place within the hour. In the meantime, the resident factions engaged in internal discussions, and because NICOLE had told them of the meeting's primary subject, began preparing themselves for battle. A successful mission possibly meant that the Xenith production facilities had been found.

Eventually, the time came for the meeting to begin, and the turnout was much higher than the previous one—so much so that they almost held it in a warehouse. To accommodate, they removed the table and chairs, thereby requiring everyone to stand.

Sally stood upon a small crate near a wall and prepared to speak. It was obvious she hadn't been getting enough sleep, apparent in both speech and appearance, and the fact that she had lost two people who she cared for dearly compounded the issue.

"My friends and colleagues, the mission in Rukzyl-Karagator went better than we had hoped. We not only have even more names and locations of various enemies and other threats, we now know of where the Xenith factories are." Sally pressed a button on a small remote which brought up the image of a map on the wall from a projector. She then turned toward it and used a bright laser pointer to guide their eyes to the subject areas. "This is a map of the nations near Rukzyl-Karagator. The one with the facilities lies southwest."

Surprised murmurs were heard amongst the crowd when they saw the laser dot indicating Teminany. The small, once-formidable nation—an ally of Shauland—had been completely obliterated by nuclear strikes. Its surface had been reduced to a wasteland of highly radioactive glass, and the small inland sea bordering it to the south had been contaminated almost to the point of sterilization. Initially thought to be a terrible place to set up such a facility, it made sense because the inhospitality gave an edge of concealment.

"The factories are near the center between two major blast craters, and satellite images show a surprisingly low amount of defenses. I propose a joint strike operation. We would need a large carrier vehicle for the fighters, the fighters themselves, and some larger ships. Now before you question the survivability of the mission, there is another development I must alert you of. Upon inspecting a Xenith26, we found an exploitable flaw that can, in logical theory, render the machine harmless. The casing surrounding its gyroscope is unable to protect against strong gamma radiation. If we can fire a very intense beam of gamma radiation through the many joints and seams in the vehicle, the circuitry associated with the gyroscope will sustain damage and the vehicle will be unable to fly with stability. Unfortunately, the power required is too great for fighters to handle, so augmentations—which we already have the equipment and supplies for—will be for larger vessels only. The fighters will serve primarily as bombers."

The voice of Cedric Fitzhugh, a tan-furred fennec whose stature was overshadowed by most of those around him, quickly stood out from the numerous whispers and mutters. "Cypress Securities International will assist with three combat frigates and whatever fighters we can muster."

Eddy Drasco also voiced his cooperation. "We have one battle-ready cruiser which we are willing to utilize, along with our pilots. I would offer more, but the other cruisers are still undergoing heavy repairs. Actually, that would depend on when this mission is to take place."

Sally nodded. "I was just about to get to that. We are aiming for launch tomorrow afternoon, and the mission itself would begin roughly an hour after that if we are to travel across the northern pole in low orbit. This is assuming our carrier vehicle would be able to travel the seventy-one hundred, fifty-five mile journey in such a manner. Since Teminany is twelve hours ahead of us, the mission would take place early in the morning there."

"Alright, I don't think the others will be ready by then, but we will do what we can."

Numerous other leaders pitched their support, and the pledged fighting force ended up being more than that which was projected necessary to carry out the mission effectively. Everyone left the meeting with a strong sense of anticipation, despite the obvious dangers. All they wanted was to end the immediate threat of Shauland's drones, and when that was accomplished, it would put them one step closer to being victorious.

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Note: Again, I thank you all for taking an interest in my story! I'm going to take a little more time with producing the finale, Chapter Twenty-One; perhaps a couple of weeks or less. Part of that time will be spent polishing the previous chapters. Keep a sharp eye out!

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Canon Sonic characters and places © Sonic Team, Sega
Kaolin, story, and other original content © NuclearCookout