Look out! You're going to crash! Aah!

[imgonnaflyhigh]

There was a blue and yellow biplane flying over the city. Well, flying was a rather strong word. It was smoking and stuttering, until finally its trajectory tilted downward, and finally crashed into the remains of the campus. Fortunately, the pilot was unharmed. At least everything but his pride was unharmed.

If you ventured towards the crash site, you would surely find a teenage orange fox examining the wreckage, trying to figure out what part of his great design could have crapped out overhead.

Comments

[monotreme_101]

"Geeze..." came a familiar voice from not far away. "I was going to try and catch your plane but it was coming down way faster than I could get here."

Probably not the smartest course of action, catching a falling plane, but Knuckles would have tried anyway.

"Glad you didn't break your little neck."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"Not on purpose, I assure you," Tails replied, rubbing the back of his head.

...Wow, he got taller.

"Not exactly little anymore," he commented. "But thanks. I finally managed to track you and Sonic here!"

[monotreme_101]

"....waddaya mean finally. You were here just a couple weeks ago."

Oh wait hold up.

"Unless that You wasn't the same You that You are. That.... happens here. Uh. How long you been lookin'?"

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"...I think I can safely say I have no idea what you're talking about," Tails quickly replied. "I've been trying to track you two down for days now. My usual instruments haven't been working, some kind of interference. But I got a brief reading, and followed it here! But as soon as I got over the city, something started messing with the Tornado's systems, and, well, boom!"

[monotreme_101]

"Soooo... when was the last time you saw me and what were we doin'?" Knuckles asked.

[imgonnaflyhigh]

Tails tapped his chin. "Well... We were at this restaurant, and Sonic was trying to hide out, because Amy apparently started reading bridal magazines and got a little overzealous," he explained. "Things got a little crazy after that."

[monotreme_101]

"Huh. OK. What about the last thing we did to mess up one of Eggman's plans."

He didn't remember that particular incident but that didn't mean much - Amy was always being weird about 'relationship' stuff and Sonic was always hiding from her so it could have been any time.

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"That'd probably be back at the Lost Hex, when Sonic and I went to stop him and the Deadly Six," Tails replied. "Why? What's the last thing YOU remember?"

[monotreme_101]

"Wait, you guys found The Lost Hex!?" Knuckles replied. He'd assumed it was just a legend! Then again, most people thought the same thing about Angel Island.

"The last time we messed with Eggy was after Sonic's Birthday party. With the Time Eater. For me, anyhow."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"Yeah, I thought it was just a legend too, but weirder things have happened to us, I guess," Tails said with a chuckle.

"Really? That was a while ago..."

[monotreme_101]

"Makes sense. I've been here like... a year? Ish? I dunno. A while." Knuckles replied with a shrug. "Sonic's been here longer than me, though."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"A year?? It hasn't been THAT long," Tails said scratching his head. "What are you doing here anyway? And what the heck happened around here?" he asked, gesturing to the rubble and debris.

[monotreme_101]

"It has been for me. If you think THAT'S crazy though? I've been here before. Except it was a Me from a different time line. He was here for like five years and wound up gettin' married."

Crazy!

"Eh. I got sent here by the Master Emerald. It wanted me here for some reason. Then recently we had a giant monster - like, this thing the size of a mountain - storm on through. It busted everything."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"...What?!"

What.

"That's... What?!"

Tails had a little trouble believing what was going on here. Was he being punked?

"Am I being punked or something?"

[monotreme_101]

"Heh. YOU feel like you're bein' punked? Imagine how I felt when I got here and people I never met are all walkin' up to me like 'Hey, Knuckles! How's the Wife? You having fun in Skyrim? Any kids on the way?' and I'm pretty much like Uuuhhh..."

He shrugged.

"Anyway, you were here for a while. Were kinda interested in Wave the Swallow. You were older, too.... Come to think of it, you were a little taller. A bit buffer. Man this place is weird."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"I was WHAT?!" he asked incredulously.

[monotreme_101]

"A little buffer. You know. A little more filled out. Not so pudgy and soft looking. Extra height probably helped. Don't worry - now that you're here, we can work on that."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"I... really don't think exercise is going to fix this problem," Tails replied.

[monotreme_101]

"...you take that back."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"I mean the bigger problem! Like being stuck here, my plane crashing, and all that!" Tails tried to object. But his fate was sealed.

He was going to lift, and Knuckles was going to make him.

[monotreme_101]

"That's a problem? You can fix your plane, being here is great, and we can make you a little buffer. Getting taller will take some time, but that's fine."

A pause.

"...oh. Well. I mean, there's that whole 'Moon is going to crash into us' thing. You, uh, didn't happen to bring seven chaos emeralds with you, did you?"

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"No, I kinda wasn't expecting to show up in the middle of the end of the world," Tails retorted. Clearly some of Sonic's snark was rubbing off on him.

[monotreme_101]

"Well, Tails, you should always be prepared." Knuckles advised him.

"Anyway, there's a lot of people with plans on how to fix things. I'm sure you can help out. We have one chaos emerald so, if there's a machine you can build powered by just one that can Chaos Control the moon away or shove it back into orbit or blow it up... I mean, there's a niche for you."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"Okay, next time I crash my plane in a strange city, I'll remember to bring the Chaos Emeralds with me just in case the moon is about to land on us," he replied, totally showing how much Sonic's influence has stunted his emotional growth.

[monotreme_101]

"Good. Glad to hear it." Knuckles replied, not entirely sure if Tails was taking this as seriously as he should be.

[imgonnaflyhigh]

Of course he was taking this seriously. Couldn't you see his serious expression?

"I guess I'd better get to work," he said. "How long do we have until the moon hits?" With the sarcasm out of the way, Tails was ready to do his part, as he always was when the going got tough.

[monotreme_101]

"Well, this one Scientist called Gordon figured out we had about a month. But that was like... two and a half weeks ago."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"What?!" Tails said in shock and horror.

[monotreme_101]

"So we have like a week and a half or so left."

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"T-then I've gotta get going!" he declared, running off in the direction he hoped was the right one. Time to start panicking.

[yournewcaptain]

"OI!! Tails, is that you, mate?!" Marine hollered as she ran at full speed in his direction, wrench in hand. She'd been too distracted by her good ol' friend to remember to put it down. "Did you just crash yer plane?!"

[imgonnaflyhigh]

Oh. Oh no. Girl from another dimension he might have sort of possibly had a thing for shut up don't say anything. Okay. What would Sonic do? Run away. Just. Play it cool.

"Oh, Marine! What are you doing here? I was just having a little bit of engine trouble! Nothing I can't handle!" Tails said, trying to sound confident and collected, extending his arm to lean against the side of his crashed plane.

Only he missed, and ended up falling over.

[babylonbadass]

Jet found himself in the looming shadow of Tails' plummeting vehicle. He scrambled out of its way just in time to watch it (and unfortunately HEAR IT) crash right behind him. Dang, sucker was LOUD...

He pulled himself to his feet and threw his map on the ground in a huff. "Hey!! Brat! You almost turned me into Thanksgiving dinner! What's the deal crashing right on top of me?!" He stomped over to the kid without bothering to check if he was all right.

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"J-Jet! I'm sorry, I didn't know you were there!" Tails quickly apologized, pulling himself out of the wreckage. "...Wait, what ARE you doing here?" he asked.

[babylonbadass]

"I'm looking for Wave! I found another treasure and need her help getting to it. Mmm, it could be worth millions..."

He almost slipped into another glorious daydream about mountains of riches but stopped himself when he realized he could be accidentally inviting the kid to be competition.

"I mean, it's not... It's a... Don't try to steal it from me!! I found it first!"

[imgonnaflyhigh]

"Wave is here too?!"

Tails shook his head. "I'm not interested in treasure!" he protested. "I'm trying to find Sonic!"