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Eggman	It wasn't hard to locate Eggman's homeworld. The guy talks about it enough that, with a little work, tracing his Eggman Empire back to its origin was no problem for the Paladins intelligence network. The world's relatively modern circa early 2000s, too, surprisingly enough - it's got recognizable countries (if...a *bit* off), large-scale cities, trains, cell phones, the works. In fact, if it hadn't been for the weird animal people with funny proportions walking through the metropolis of Station Square it could almost just be a regular Earth.      Speaking of the metropolis of Station Square, it's a little bit...flooded. It's not some kind of big catastrophic flooding, just a light sloshing across the streets, slowly being gulped down by a strained sewer system. But it's the first sign that this isn't just a regular Earth. See, according to Paladins agents, a flying island(!) came down a couple days ago, crashed in an area called 'Mystic Jungle', and the wave it made was so intense it actually reached this heavily-developed coastal city.      Fortunately, getting to the investigation point is real, real easy. Mystic Jungle is just a train-ride away from Station Square. So after a few hours on a train surrounded by furry animal people and regular humans in suits and dresses, the Paladins investigation team arrives at a wooden station on high slats, overlooking a big mountain range that presumably blocks off the jungle. A sprawling lake takes up much of the view towards the mountain. A path leads off to the west through a cave. Past the lake is another cave that presumably leads to the jungle itself. To the right is a tall hill, on which the only real sign of civilization - some sort of odd workshop - rests.      At the bottom of the train station's winding wooden stairs is a blue hedgehog, a red echidna, and a yellow two-tailed fox having an argument. The fox has something glittering clutched in his hands.      "...brought down Angel Island," the echidna shouts, sweeping his hand to the side, "You've got a piece of the Master Emerald right there, so give it to me!"      "Woah, Knux, you got it all wrong!" The blue hedgehog holds up both hands. "This isn't-"      "Save your excuses, Sonic!" The red echidna lunges forward, taking a meaty swing at the blue hedgehog, who, apparently surprised, doesn't dodge. The hit lands with a *thump* and Sonic goes soaring backwards.      Knuckles leaps for him as the yellow fox starts scurrying out of the way, still holding the crystal. The fox stops near the party. "H-hey, you guys...! Could you, um, could you help me out here? Things are getting a little out of hand...!"
Luigi	Eggman's world! Luigi's never actually been. The Olympics have always been in strange, foreign places like... Toh-kyo, or Ri-oh the Jan-ero, or Bei-jing, or sometimes truly alien and inhospitable places like London. The Olympics is never held in places with normal names like Beanbean Kingdom or Mystic Ruins Zone. Luigi checks his go-kart for the trip over. You never know. The presence of (formerly) flying islands, and the mix of species here, doesn't give Luigi too much pause. Honestly, it helps to feel a little bit more like he's at home, especially compared to the one other trip he's been on while he's been out in the Multiverse (wherein the group he was with were treated as celebrities simply for being from beyond the world's borders.) Besides, he's more concerned with making sure he's gotten on the right train for this. It'd be just his luck to end up going in the wrong direction. Arrival! And... oh, there's three familiar faces already. "Heeeeyyy!" calls Luigi, waving, just in time for Knuckles to take a swing and Sonic to go flying. "Imagine running... into... oh..." "..." "We should, uh," Luigi starts heading that way, trying to get between Knuckles and Tails, holding his arms out to the sides protectively. "Hey, aren't you all supposed to be friends?"
Ishirou	"Wait, don't I know you..?" Ishirou says to Tails, having briefly met during Petra's stealing of an emerald a while back.  He can't place the name or the face right away, but he does seem to recognize the fox and is inclined to help him.  Ishirou looks towards the red echidna and the blue hedgehog about to throw down.   "Alright break it up you two. Let's discuss this before throwing punches or... quills at each other.  My name is Ishirou, I'm with the Paladins and what happened?  Can you explain it from the top?  I heard something about bringing down an island, does this have to do with the nearby flooding?" Ishirou looks back and forth between Knuckles and Sonic.  "What is that in your hands?" he asks Tails, giving it a scan.
Lilian Rook	Somehow, Lilian knew it had to be this way.     In the first place, it'd be pretty weird for Eggman to be the one normal human in a world full of talking furry critters. For another, it'd make the furry racism thing have an entirely different subtext, and Lilian may actualy do something drastic if she started seriously and earnestly sympathizing with Eggman. Third, she's pretty sure he'd have relocated to somewhere with normal people (i.e. humans) at the first chance he got if so. Fourth, god do the talking animals whine about their perceived status so much, I mean--!     §No. No you're going to be normal about this. It's another world, with one weird gimmick, like always, and you're not going to think about the ingroup or the outgroup or say anything about cultural consensus or anything like that. You can keep a lid on it and look around for that long. Focus on the flying island. Think about that. It's fantastical and strange. 'Mystic Jungle' is even an interesting name. Normally it'd be something like 'Emerald Forest' for these-- under these circumstances.§     Lilian can act normal around a train station full of animal people. She totally can. Her eyes definitely don't wander around and end up staring a little anyways because come on they're just standing around right next to the normal people! Quicknest didn't really distract her all that much, because everyone was some kind of animal, but they're all mixed in here with no theme or anything! Shouldn't they have separate seating or something? For like, their tails?     §Is this why Petra is such a freak? Or am I only thinking this way because Eggman has underlined it so many times? It's probably just a primed expectation. Having been coached to think of it this way. Yes.§     Lilian takes a deep, steadying breath, fidgeting with her necklace as a stabilizing ritual, and--     §Oh god. The savages are fighting. They couldn't keep it in until the train got here. Do the humans here just have to deal with this all the time?§     Dressed according to her usual milieu, Lilian maneuvers around commuters with the faint sense that she might become instantly diseased if she touches them.     'Hey, aren't you all supposed to be friends?'     "Has that stopped any of the people you know?" Lilian says automatically to Luigi, not thinking as far as the fact that he's new to Sector Zero and may in fact have friends who don't punch each other.     'Alright break it up you two. Let's discuss this before throwing punches or... quills at each other. My name is Ishirou, I'm with the Paladins and what happened?'     "You may resume beating each other when we've asked our questions. Civil disorder is something for the local police to handle." Lilian says, now very interested in examining her nail polish. "You've got either moxie or nerve to be asking strangers to handle this." she says to Tails. "But I agree that I'd rather you two stop." she says to the others, looking up over her nails. "Answer the questions, if you would."     §There. Normal.§
Luigi	> "Has that stopped any of the people you know?" "... Ah." Luigi gives Lilian a sympathetic nod. "Have you considered holding board game nights or setting up a golf league?"
Eggman	None of the regular people seem especially distracted by the animal people, either. That makes it *so* much weirder. It's one thing, yeah, for the animal people to be in their own world, or city, or whatever. But when you've got a guy in a suit reading the newspaper on the train next to an upright raccoon holding onto the pole half-asleep and what looks like a sloth in a little tie sitting next to a woman in a dress things are just...strange.      "Ah, you're Luigi...! Where's Mario? I don't think I've ever seen you two apart!" Tails does not intentionally mean to strike at the knee. He's trying to be nice. "It's, it's complicated..."      It's a Chaos Emerald, Ishirou. You've scanned them before. Infinite power in a singular gem, amplified by powerful emotions, one of the most powerful bullshit artifacts in a world full of bullshit artifacts. Trouble with a capital T. One of Eggman's favorite obsessions.      "We were here to investigate that too," Tails says awkwardly, answering Ishirou and Luigi and Lilian all at the same time, "Or, me and Sonic were, and then...Knuckles showed up. Um, yeah, last time we met, we were friends, but we've definitely had some rough patches..."      "Did you get duped by Eggman again?! -woah!" Sonic yells as Knuckles narrowly whiffs another punch, one that *almost* hits Luigi just by the placement. "You're so dense, Red! Lay off - we've got real trouble here!"      Knuckles pauses mid-swing. "What are you talking about?"      Sonic turns to face Lilian and crosses his arms. "This lady's one of Eggman's friends. Lilian Rook, right?"      "A little bird from G.U.N. warned me," he clearly thinks that's funny and clever, "That you're real close to Eggman's apprentice. And that you're on good terms with that maniac. In fact I hear you went to have dinner with 'em." Wait, who at G.U.N. would possibly know *that*? G.U.N. isn't a Paladins signatory...      Tails, nervously, begins moving behind Sonic as Knuckles cracks his knuckles. "And you show up just after the Master Emerald exploded, huh? After I was attacked from behind. After Angel Island crashed." The echidna takes up a fighting stance.      So does Sonic. Back in Tails's hands, the emerald starts to glow as tensions rise.      Something's definitely wrong here, but neither Sonic nor Knuckles is under mind control or anything. Where did they get that intel?      "Sorry, lady, but I don't take orders from anybody - especially not a friend of Eggman's! Let's take 'em down, Red!"      Knuckles takes a swing at Ishirou. He's strong as hell - strong enough that getting hit by those spiked gloves he calls hands would probably flatten Ishirou, strong enough that just the wind from the punch is strong enough to push people back.      Sonic curls up into a ball and launches himself at Lilian. He is *very* fast. Indeed he may just be the fastest thing alive.      Tails, thankfully, does not launch himself at Luigi, and instead just sort of kicks his feet at the ground helplessly. He's been in this situation way too often. "...are, uh, are you and Daisy doing well?" He asks, awkwardly.      "Golf would be nice, actually," Tails admits as Sonic suddenly diverts himself in mid-air and bounces off the wall to try and strike Lilian in the back.
Ishirou	"What does her relationship with Eggman have to do with anything..." Ishirou says lamely because he doesn't like that one of his friends is so buddy-buddy with Petra and Eggman.  However, Lilian IS a friend, one of the closest things to a member of a family she has, and suddenly...he frowns.  "What is G.U.N. anyway, they're not with us..." Suddenly, Knuckles is swinging at him, he leaps back just narrowly avoiding the blow.  The shockwave catches him and causes him to stumble onto his butt, causing him to scamper backward until he can get back onto his feet.  Taking a breath, he activates RESCUE, transforming into an armor-protective suit, and causes a wave of electromagnetic force to wash back, trying to throw the Echidna away from him so he can speak.   "Besides we're here to /stop/ Eggman.  He's been causing trouble in the Multiverse, such as he MIGHT be a personal friend to Lilian.  She's here because I'm serious about opposing him now, not because we knew about anything he's done... That's why we're asking questions!"
Luigi	> "Ah, you're Luigi...! Where's Mario? I don't think I've ever seen you two apart!" Ow. "He's, ah, holding down the fort back at home." "You know, because - mama miaaaa!" Knuckles takes a swing. Luigi jumps six feet into the air, reflexively, even if it wasn't that close. "Ah - we can all calm down, right? Use our words, not our fists? Or our... spiky knuckles?" he says after he lands. > "Golf would be nice, actually," "Yeah, it would," says Luigi. Oh good, Tails is seeing sense! Oh, but Sonic isn't. And he really can't just stand by, here. Sonic goes to slam into Lilian's back. He doesn't get there, if Luigi has his say. The green hero runs, dives, and rolls up to his feet right behind Lilian, pulling his hammer out as he rises. He holds it two handed, one hand near the head and the other at the base, and holds it out sideways to block with the handle as if it were a quarterstaff. "You can't just talk this one out?" complains Luigi. And then, with Sonic's momentum arrested, he winds up... keeping his feet planted and twisting his upper body around, while shifting his grip on the hammer... ... and then he lets loose, swinging the hammer around in a whirlwind spin to impact Sonic and send him flying!
Lilian Rook	'Ah, you're Luigi...! Where's Mario? I don't think I've ever seen you two apart!'     Lilian dials down her tightly-gripped disaffective distance a notch or two at hearing one of the locals identifying Luigi and knowing some of his background on contact. "That's unusual." she says. 'Especially for fucking animals' pops into her brain in Petra's voice, but goes unsaid. "Are you one of those 'wiki' people? If you want his autograph, you're not doing a great job of it." She adds, looking over to the other two and their fight.     'This lady's one of Eggman's friends. Lilian Rook, right?'     "Dame Commander, Paladins Chevalier." Lilian completes the introductory address on autopilot. What little of her active awareness she extends is towards Tails, so it takes her a while to process the rest. "Hang on, friend? Did he say that?" This is probably the wrong sequence of words, but Lilian is too busy looking politely confused and figuring out the grapevine through Petra to think about that.     "That's surprising. I know that he seems to favour me for some reason, but I assumed that was only for having manners? I'd especially thought that participating in a strategic operation meant to kill him would have disqualified that already . . . No, no, it must have been Petra. That idiot must just desperately want us to get along, despite the obvious reasoning."     Lilian is now infinitely more invested in speculating on who must be peddling the yellow tabloid garbage and which PR agent to call than the part about the Chaos Emerald or the flying island crash. "Hm? G.U.N? Aren't they . . ." She snaps her fingers several times trying to remember. "The military? The united nations sort of one? Goodness, it's been a moment. I should look this up again . . ."     'That you're real close to Eggman's apprentice.'     Halfway through checking her smart device, Lilian freezes still. Forced to think about how anyone could possibly get the idea of 'real close' regarding a girl she slapped across the face in front of a foreign dignitary, her ablative layers of artificial aloofness come apart, and she blurts out "What? Because of the collar? Is this some sort of 'alpha beta headcanon' thing? Gross."     'And you show up just after the Master Emerald exploded, huh?'     "Isn't that the obvious time for someone to come investigating?" she says, looking at Knuckles like she's shocked that he can even speak.     'After I was attacked from behind.'     "My condolences. Go to a police station and report it."     'What does her relationship with Eggman have to do with anything...'     "What--" Lilian twists around to look at Ishirou instantly. "What relationship?! I lost a bet! You were there for it!"     'Sorry, lady, but I don't take orders from anybody - especially not a friend of Eggman's! Let's take 'em down, Red!'     Lilian spins right back, unable to even find the words for a moment. She looks at Sonic and Knuckles squaring up like a dog that'd just meowed.     'He's been causing trouble in the Multiverse, such as he MIGHT be a personal friend to Lilian.'     Lilian pivots back to Ishirou a second time, only looking even more baffled and aghast than before. "He's a personal WHAT?! Since WHEN?!"
Lilian Rook	Staring down 'the fastest thing alive' is not a great time to be completely consumed in frantic theorycrafting slash the feeling of instant betrayal. Before she can even think of 'curling up into a ball' as a potential threat, Sonic has already slammed into Lilian, acrobatically bounced off the wall behind her, and come in for a second pass.     In the middle of furiously deciphering whether Ishirou actually meant what he said or if he was just being snotty, Lilian processess tilted vision, the feeling of her feet leaving the ground, and just after, the explosion of pain in the side of her head. Dizzily registering the stabbing feeling in her neck and the taste of blood in her mouth, Lilian struggles to play mental catchup while Sonic is already coming back, too stunned to think clearly. Hurtling towards the train station wall, Lilian--     §He touched me. That cretinous little bitch-made shit guzzling extra fucking touched me!§     --scrapes sharply to a halt, crouched low from absorbing landing impact and clenching her gauntleted right hand into a fist.     Under any other circumstance, Lilian would throw in behind Luigi's talk-it-out position, given the luxury of smugly evading the idiot heroes until they give up. Here, Lilian rises with dishevelled fury that vastly outstrips anything even remotely called for by the occasion, and pivot steps into striking Sonic with her inner arm instead, driving metal to fur and throwing him at the station floor instead. Her idea of 'talking it out' sounds a lot like "-ing kill you!" at the moment.
Eggman	Ishirou's electromagnetokinesis is strong. Somehow, Knuckles is *stronger*. Ishirou's probably never seen someone, pun intended, *knuckle down* and stand their ground through raw electromagnetic force. When he starts skidding back, he stamps his foot down, hard, and pushes forward. And then another step. And another. Ishirou pushes, and Knuckles pushes back, and Knuckles is *just stronger*. It's *wild*.      Not that it's *effortless*, clearly. The Echidna is gritting his teeth. His dreadlocks (apparently that's what those are!) are fluttering around behind him as if he's being blown in a windstorm. His gums are flapping. His eyes are shut. Every step is difficult.      But he still manages to get to Ishirou and bring his fist around for another thunderous punch. "Sure you are," he grunts, "Asking questions and throwing around orders like you own the place...that's exactly what an Eggman goon would do!"      Tails just kind of sighs. "I'm really sorry about this..." He says to the Paladins as Luigi surges in to protect Lilian. He's just a bit too slow, of course - Sonic's entire powerset is 'go fast', after all, and Sonic gets past him in the first bounce. The second bounce (he always goes for two), though, Luigi's ready for him. He nails the hedgehog-ball directly in the side, knocking him against the wall and away from Lilian - which is probably good for the hedgehog at the moment.      Sonic lands and pulls himself to his feet, hand on his head. "Luigi...man, I can't believe you'd take their side. Did you hear him? She's best friends with Eggman and everything."      He charges in, this time arcing from the side (he can just change his direction in mid-air?!), but Lilian's ready for him. Her elbow pivot-smashes the hedgehog *hard* into the ground, and with the sheer force of the velocity and impact, leaves a *divot* in the earth. Sonic has to struggle to stand up.      Knuckles, meanwhile, whirls to take a swing at Lilian himself, with that ridiculous force of strength behind him. Those knuckles really can shatter robot tanks. That strength is *absurd*. "You really expect us to believe you're innocent?!"      Tails purses his lips. "Something's, uh, definitely wrong, right?" He says to Luigi and Ishirou, shifting on his feet. "G.U.N. doesn't usually care about people like you guys," off-worlders, "And you've never been here before..."      Sonic does manage to get himself up, patting down his chest like he's having trouble breathing. He puts both hands down on the ground, and the earth behind him starts to get dug up as his legs start to spin into what looks like a figure-8.      Luigi's seen Sonic do this before. It's not pretty.      But it does have a windup, at least.      Tails looks at Lilian. "Collar...?" Tails is ten years old. "...why did you put a collar on her?" Tails is ten years old do not answer this question.      "'cause she's the one who's really in charge," Sonic shouts over the thunderous noise of his own speed, "That Petra girl wasn't even sitting on the throne of that Quicknest place! It was her! She's that egghead's *real* apprentice, I bet!"      "Sonic, that doesn't-"      "Just stand back, buddy!"      Tails sighs and skirts backwards a little more. He knows what's about to happen.
Ishirou	"He's not..?  I mean, I am just saying it shouldn't matter especially with you being the heroine you are.  Also, your attempt to kill him before," he says holding his hands up as if trying to avoid getting yelled at some more.  "Maybe I should have led with the last part first instead of the first part..." he says, apologetically to Lilian. "Sorry!" 'Did you hear him? She's best friends with Eggman and everything.' "That's not what I said!  I said the relationship was irrelevant because of the OTHER STUFF...that I failed to say... shit." Not that it was his words specifically that started this, whoever G.U.N. is started this mess and wanted them to get into a fight.  Ishirou's shaken out of his thoughts by Knuckles coming at him despite the electromagnetic force.  He forces the energy down more to try and hold him, but it's not enough.   The punch flies, and Ishirou is immediately zooming out of the way, narrowly avoiding the shockwave this time, and skidding to a stop.  "Something's wrong?  No kidding!" he shouts back to Tails, and then decides that it's time to go all in on support.  His eyes glow as he starts scanning these two.  He picks out strengths and weaknesses, he pulls out whatever he can... And then two OPTIONs pop out, hovering over Lilian and Luigi.  They offer fire support, while also sending the data he acquired to both of his allies.  More than that, he starts aiding their speed and strength, hoping to give them the edge they need against Sonic and Knuckles.
Luigi	> Are you one of those 'wiki' people? "... Wiki people?" Luigi looks confused. "No, that's Tails, he's from around here, not from Wiki." > "Hang on, friend? Did he say that?" Wait, Lilian *is* his friend? ... Are they doing the golf and board game nights already? >"Luigi...man, I can't believe you'd take their side. Did you hear him? She's best friends with Eggman and everything." "Hang on, I'm not on - I'm not on anyone's side!" Beat. "Technically, I mean, I'm- look, I took a job, there's - they're nice people when you get to know them, I'm-" Luigi goes cross-eyed. "Mama mia, I just want everyone to calm down and talk things out!" Sonic's charging up, though. Luigi's seen the end result. It's not pretty. "You're all good people! And we're fighting over, what? I don't even know anymore, you think Miss Rook is *too* much friends with Eggman? I was in doubles tennis with Bowser last tournament, do you think that makes me complicit when he takes over a kingdom or kidnaps a princess?" Sonic's still charging up. Of course. From what Luigi knows of him, he wouldn't be the type to change course easily when he's made a decision. "I hate..." He reaches into his overalls, and pulls out a blue flower. "That we have to fight like this." The blue flower has a cute little pair of eyes in its center. Aww. It's a little less cute when Luigi takes a big bite out of it, and swallows. "But if I have to stop you before people get more hurt... then I'm not going to hold back!" Luigi's clothes flicker, changing color rapidly back and forth before settling on a new color scheme. His overalls change from green to an almost brown shade, and his hat and shirt shift to an icy blue. Luigi plants both feet into the ground, and holds out one hand, palm forward. White-hot fire starts forming in the palm of his hand - no, not fire, the opposite. Ice. A ball of swirling ice and cold, rapidly forming, and rapidly growing. He's relying on Ishirou's targeting data, his own sense of timing, and - really just hoping that his luck has turned around enough. That he can charge this ice fireball enough to stop Sonic in his tracks, and fire it before he has a chance to take off. "So please." He's not shouting. He's not making ultimatums. He's not even quipping. He's pleading. "Just... stop." He fires, the charged ball of ice bouncing along the ground towards Sonic...
Lilian Rook	'I'm really sorry about this...'     "Goodness. Thank you. That makes it all better."     Lilian turns her head aside and spits the blood out of her mouth. Feeling around with her tongue, she confirms that she'd only bitten the inside of her cheek when she'd been struck, and pushes her hair back to check the injury next.     "How do you plan to make up for this?" she snaps, finding the bruise where the spindash deflected from her shoulder and the broken skin near her temple. "Do you have any idea what your friend has done? Do you know who I am?! If you think you can get away with just walking up and assault a Paladin Chevalier with sorry, then--!"     Knuckles is on her immediately, and Sonic had gotten her much better than she'd care to admit; thus Lilian is much more on her guard. She goes from threatening Tails like the evil Heather Lilian of yesteryear, to sharply sidestepping Knuckles' swing with the cool concentration of the modern Lilian, all in the blink of an eye.     Her heel barely lifts from the floor, and suddenly she's stanced sidelong and arching away from the bone-crusing punch, dishevelled hair fluttering out in its wake. Knuckles is much more straightforward; she easily registers him as a Hibikioid-type threat, and reacts accordingly; her left hand darts past her face in counterbalance as her right leg sweep-kicks at his shins during the followthrough of his punch. As he passes by her, Lilian turns in the direction of her sweep, plants her heel, and pivots fully around to pick up speed and deliver a high round kick to the back of his head.     Lilian can obviously tell that she isn't as strong as Knuckles; she doesn't expect him to go down easily; but she's an adequately trained hand to hand fighter, and has more than enough experience with his type to feel confident in saying, "A surprise attack only works once, imbecile. Your attack pattern is so obvious that I could read you in my sleep."     'You really expect us to believe you're innocent?!'     "I expect you to shut up, kneel down, and start desperately apologize for presuming to judge me at all."     'Something's, uh, definitely wrong, right? G.U.N. doesn't usually care about people like you guys,.U.N. doesn't usually care about people like you guys. And you've never been here before...'     That's a very good point, Tails. Lilian would love to address it, but unfortunately, the narrative has already been hard-pivoted by the main hero and instantly derailed it from its expected course. Lilian is far too incensed by inexplicable heinous disrespect to have a talk, and lacking any other context for this unprecedented interaction, she defaults to the only reaction she has fully downloaded; which is violence. Veronica Sawyer doesn't just walk up and punch Heather Chandler in the face and get away with it.     'Collar...? ...why did you put a collar on her?'     'cause she's the one who's really in charge,'     "Do you ever shut up?!" Lilian shouts. Old adrenaline is pumping from a place she'd nearly forgotten, demanding she seize control of the situation until her pulse settles back down; but she doesn't have the same capacity for white-knuckled control that she used to. "I didn't do anything! She's like that! And of course it's all still somehow my fault in the end; like usual!"
Lilian Rook	A better, more controlling filter; one not governed by raw retaliatory anger, would say something other than "God. The gormless furry slob calling himself 'the hero of Quicknest' was exactly the same, too. You're just incapable of comprehending language." As the Options arrive, she brushes the side of her head with her fingers, closes the surface cut with a short flicker of temporal magic, and lets her hair fall back down over the streak of dried blood.     'I hate... That we have to fight like this.'     "We don't." says Lilian. "They can stop at any time."                 -----[stop]-----     Lilian paces forward at Sonic, legs frozen as semivisual streaks in motion, and then breaks into a dead sprint; right past him. Leaping off the ground, she kicks off the train station wall, then a structural support, making a three point turn to build up momentum, and--                 -----[start]-----     Lilian appears right beside Sonic, falling on him from above, and strikes him with an aerial kick from his blind spot that has both the strengthening effect of Ishirou's Option drone and considerable built-up speed behind it. She--                 -----[stop]-----     Hits the floor in motion, rushing ahead of the resulting trajectory, slides so sharply that she touches the floor with her fingertips, and--                 -----[start]-----     --blinks into the way of exactly where he goes rocketing off next, and intercepts him with an aggressive high knee strike, extended all the way up onto her left toe and striking with the metallic surface of the armour she's suddenly wearing from the knee down. And still before anything else can happen--                 -----[stop]-----     Lilian stabilizes herself by grabbing onto Sonic as an inanimate, currently inertialess object, then pushes herself right back to a neutral low stance, from which she reaches out to hover her fingers around Sonic's wrist, lean her weight back, and--                 -----[start]-----     --she snags Sonic by the arm in the middle of an over-the-shoulder judo throw directly into the path of Luigi's icefireball.
Eggman	Ishirou starts analyzing.      It's real easy. Sonic is so monomaniacally focused on Speed and Knuckles is so absurdly focused on Strength that their specialties define them. Their weaknesses are clear.      And then something...weird...happens. Some kind of blue static disrupts the OPTIONs, just for a second. Disrupts the scans, just for a second. At the exact same time Lilian's mystical senses go haywire, just for a second. The source...*might* be the Chaos Emerald? But no, this feels too aimed, too intended, and Tails certainly isn't doing anything. Also, that Emerald is yellow. Nothing blue about it.      And then the blue static vanishes and the sensory overload vanishes and the only thing happening is Sonic's Super-8 Dash and Knuckles gearing up for another big swing and Tails skirting a little further out of the blast radius because he's clearly not a total idiot. He's obviously the brains of the outfit.      Luigi knows damn well that Sonic won't stop. Luigi knows *damn* well what kind of person Sonic is - Sonic's absolutely the sort to trust in the world to come down on his side.      And in this case it *doesn't*, because as Knuckles swings, Lilian brings his ass *down*, and then breaks into her timestop. She whirlwind-kicks Sonic in the head, knee-strikes him in the chest, grabs him, and hurls him into the iceball.      Sonic has no idea what's happening. Shadow hasn't encountered him yet. Chaos Control and Time Stop aren't concepts in Sonic's repetoire. So the only expression on his face is shock as he's completely, efficiently handled by an expert, slammed into a fireball, and goes down hard.      "uuuu," Sonic manages, head spinning. Knuckles pulls himself up to his feet, wiping his lip(?) and spitting to the side like a boxer as he squares up. Apparently there's some technique in this idiot - or some instinctive technique.      Tails runs over to Sonic, kneeling beside him, the Emerald clutched in one hand-                                -----chaos-----                                      Everything stands still. Lilian is the only person who can perceive it. She lives in this place, or something so close to it as to be indistinguishable. She lives in this place where the grass has stopped moving in the middle of the wind, where the ripples on the pond have stopped, where hummingbirds hang motionless, where the colour is dim and washed-out and grey. She lives in this place, and there should be no one else here.      But there is.      A figure, floating in the air on what looks like golden hover-shoes. A staff with a cog is clutched in one hand. A black robe drapes over his form, with gilded accessories and shining blue runes. Three long head-tendrils drape off his obscured head, exactly like Knuckles' dreadlocks, above a pair of glowing blue eyes. An echidna.      Lilian can puzzle out the runes. Technomancy. A machine wizard. The source of the outrageous power she felt for just a brief moment as the OPTIONs were disrupted. As the scan was disrupted. She can puzzle out the runes as he bends over and picks up the Chaos Emerald from Tails' outstretched hand. Then, he simply looks Lilian in the eye, and vanishes in a burst of light and colour that doesn't belong in the world gone still.                              -----control-----                                    Knuckles is the first to notice. He drops stance. "...where'd the emerald go?"      "It's right-"      Tail stops. "What the...what the heck? It was just here!"      Knuckles crosses his arms and looks down at the unconscious Sonic. "I think-"      Tails sighs.      "-we just got duped."      Tails sighs even harder. The burden of being the emotional and intellectual one in this group is immediately apparent.
Eggman	Knuckles scratches the back of his head and looks at Lilian, Ishirou, and Luigi. He shifts on his feet. Then he holds out his hand. "...sorry about that."      "I'm, uh, I'm Knuckles. The Echidna. I-"      "You were looking for a fight with Sonic because you're mad, and you turned on them like a jerk, just like Sonic did because when you get mad *Sonic* gets mad and you both wind each other up and I can't stand it!" Tails stands up and turns to face Lilian and looks up at her, exhausted. "I'm really sorry. About all of this. Sonic's..."      Tails sort of senses that making excuses for Sonic is probably a bad idea. Meanwhile, Knuckles just hoists the blue hedgehog over his shoulder and starts walking towards the workshop on the hill. Tails shuffles a bit. "...if you want, I, uh, I can take care of that head wound in my workshop...I've...got bandages and stuff...um..."      "...please don't be mad at me," says the literal child, looking down, "I'm...not strong enough to stop them when they're like this, or I wouldn't've asked for help, and I knew Luigi and I knew you were probably good people and I'm sure Sonic knew it too and Knuckles is just kind of dumb and his home just crash-landed and..."      Tails takes a deep breath.      "...I'm Tails the Fox. You're really strong and cool. Um...we're pretty sure Eggman's up to something, and...he's probably responsible for the emerald disappearing, somehow, so..."      He claps his hands together like a prayer. "Would you guys be willing to help us put a stop to it? I know I don't have any right to ask but Eggman's really, really awful! He's genuinely horrible! Sonic and Knuckles get so worked up about him because he's done terrible things, and whatever he's got planned is sure to be awful, too! And maybe we can find out who this mysterious G.U.N. contact supposedly is because that doesn't make *any* sense, and sort the whole thing out!"      "...please!"
Ishirou	Ishirou is waiting to see if there is going to be another round, another go-a-round if you will.  He's running numbers and getting ready to feed them to both Lilian and Luigi to lay the two fighters flat before... CHAOS CONTROL Blinking, the emerald is gone and Ishirou has no idea where it went.  Or even that something happened.  He looks around confused, because it's gone... a very powerful magical rock is now gone and they have no idea where it is.   '-we just got duped." "Looks like it... thought it doesn't mean a whole lot when your friends were so eager to throw down without even listening to what was being said..." he starts, but Tails starts his method of trying to defuse the situation.   He sighs and turns towards Lilian, it helps that Knuckles is being a good sport about it and he nods at Knuckles before turning back fully to Lilian.  "I think we should at least forgive Tails and Knuckles." he didn't hear any apology from Sonic.  "Maybe the Hedgehog when he decides to apologize too."
Eggman	"He won't," both Knuckles and Tails say in *perfect time*, because they know Sonic the Hedgehog.
Ishirou	Ishirou sighs, then shrugs. "Then we go on without him?" He says towards Lilian.
Luigi	> "We don't." says Lilian. "They can stop at any time." "... they really can't," says Luigi, under his breath. Sonic gets his ass handed to him. And then the emerald gets yanked. "..." "Oh." Luigi's arm drops to his side. He's still in ice blue, he doesn't... detransform? It seems to not have a time limit, at least. (He'll lose it when he gets on the train home and stubs his toe.) > "He won't," both Knuckles and Tails say in *perfect time*, because they know Sonic the Hedgehog. "He- oh. Yeah." Luigi's on the same page, but Knuckles and Tails have frame advantage. He turns his attention to Tails, and feels the need to speak on his behalf a bit. "Um. From one co-hero, speaking for another..." 'Co-hero' is pronounced like 'sidekick'. "Sometimes people we work with get very headstrong, and it's hard to convince them otherwise." "It's... really tough. They're like... forces of nature. It's hard to get them to slow down, to be careful to not... do sometimes really idiotic things and call them bravery. Sometimes the best we can do is try to keep them alive so they can come home. Or sometimes there's truly nothing we can do, and we can only hope they come home at all." "I'm not asking you to forgive Ma- Sonic. But please take it easy on Tails?" Tails gets a head pat. "Plus, he's... what, nine? Sonic is a lot for a nine year old to handle." For his part, he's already on board with helping Tails. He won't realize till later, that a ten-year-old pushed him into risking his life on yet another adventure he didn't sign up for.
Eggman	"Ten," Tails corrects Luigi helpfully. The unspoken subtext is 'and I'm still smarter than both of them by a mile.'
Lilian Rook	'uuuu'     "That's what I thought." Lilian says. For a moment, all she does is rest her hand on her hip, exhale, and say "Now stay down."     Knuckles contravening her advice draws a flick of her eyes to him, but the face that he takes a stance-- a real one-- and clams up for a second, earns him a "I see. So without that imbecile's freak speed in the picture, it turns out you're the competent one." She tilts her head, starting to consider that weird burst of power she'd sensed. She attempts to run her precognition in parallel with the conversation. "Still, now it's three versus one. You realize that you're totally outclassed, don't you? If you want to make it a duel to settle things fairly, I'll obligte, but--"     Lilian, of course, notices it before anyone else. Her hands drop to her sides, she scans rapidly around her environment, looking this way and that while reaching out with her read of mystical energy, but finds nothing. "Who the hell was that?" she says, warily back to normal. "Blue version of him?" she says, vaguely at Knuckles. "Robes, runes, magic staff?" She knows they didn't see it, or at least she's very sure, but there's a minute chance they might know who they are.     '...sorry about that. I'm, uh, I'm Knuckles. The Echidna. I-'     Lilian looks down at Knuckles' offered hand as if it were reminiscent of some loathsome insect, then says "You missed. So I suppose I can overlook it this time." Probably because Knuckle came out with a bloody lip for his hasty swing. Reluctantly, Lilian extends her hand for a distinctly half-assed shake.     'I'm really sorry. About all of this. Sonic's...'     "Oh Christ." Lilian groans, suddenly realizing the obvious. "Sonic the Hedgehog, right? That's the idiot who always manages to bumble through stopping Eggman's-- ughhhhh."     '...if you want, I, uh, I can take care of that head wound in my workshop...I've...got bandages and stuff...um...please don't be mad at me'     All of the remaining wind is taken out of Lilian's sails. For reasons that escape her, she's always been very bad at being mean to children. They evoke care responses. Mystifying. "I'm not angry with you." Lilian sighs. "And don't worry about it. I can have it fixed up at home." She looks down contemptuously at Sonic. "Frankly I wonder how Eggman loses to someone like that."     '...I'm Tails the Fox. You're really strong and cool. Um...we're pretty sure Eggman's up to something, and...he's probably responsible for the emerald disappearing, somehow, so...'     "That's unfortunately likely." Lilian groans. "And unfortunately, I'm not his apprentice, so I can't just ask him to return it. That was supposed to be the blue bungler's responsibility."     'Would you guys be willing to help us put a stop to it? I know I don't have any right to ask but Eggman's really, really awful! He's genuinely horrible!'     Lilian sensed this was coming. The shadow of dread is overwhelming. "I suppose I'll have to." she says, with the aura of someone knowing she'll regret it. "He's a supervillain, after all. It's my job as a knight."     'And maybe we can find out who this mysterious G.U.N. contact supposedly is because that doesn't make *any* sense, and sort the whole thing out!'     "Now that I'd certainly love to do."     'He won't'     'He won't'     Lilian looks to Ishirou and shrugs.