“Did you read all of these files?!!”

Eh?!!

Oh, it looks like I’d fallen asleep (again, very comfortable couch - Knucks didn’t know what he was missing), and it seemed like I wasn’t the only one, judging by Rouge’s unusually disheveled appearance and general ‘what the heck is going on and where am I?’ look she had on her now (guess she really had been working hard to get all of those files).

Both of us turned our attention to Tails, who had obviously been the one to wake us and was looking at Rouge with quite a bit of anger, fear, and disgust. To be honest, he looked as if he was a little bit out of his mind, which, you know, might be a possibility. It seemed our spontaneous nap had taken, oh, about four hours, during which I doubted my friend had slept a wink on top of an already long and eventful evening. The kid was up way past his bedtime and could almost definitely benefit from some serious shuteye….And, seriously, if I knew how bad these files were going to be, I’d probably have warned him off (not exactly kid appropriate reading, even for my little super genius friend).

Meanwhile, having finally pulled herself together after her rude awakening, my bat friend returned a very patronizing smile.

“Of course I did, pint-size. This lady does her homework. Maybe I might have…skimmed…some of the…less interesting…ones, a bit, but I know what I’m giving you and I’ve verified the authenticity of them all.”

Ouch, Rouge, that attitude is not going to win you any points with my little buddy, particularly with him in what I assumed was a less than stable mental state (seriously, as disturbing as all this was and as fascinating as the technical side of those files probably was for him, the kid really needed to get some recharge in). Unsurprisingly, it seemed Tails hadn’t felt his point had been made.

“Including the ones about the cannon?!!”

I could tell both of us were wondering just what had gotten into my fox friend, though, now that he mentioned it, I did remember one of the, more technical, files in Rouge’s dossier concerned some kind of experimental orbital defense cannon. I think it was referred to as the ‘Eclipse’ something or other, and was apparently envisioned as a protection against large objects threatening the planet from outer space. I think I remember the file said it had been decommissioned though. But, why that out of all the files suddenly had so much of his interest and concern, I couldn’t understand.

Meanwhile, Rouge’s condescension towards my friend didn’t drop a bit, if anything, it only increased.

“Of course, fox boy, some kind of big laser gun they were trying to build in case Earth was about to be struck by some big asteroid. Seems like a bit too much worrying if you ask me. We certainly have enough problems to worry about on the planet itself. Besides, they could never give it a real test run, even before the whole station was shut down, because those idiot scientists planned to have it run off of Chaos energy. And, as I think you know, the best sources of that are a bit hard to find, though of course, not for me.”

I think the self-satisfied glow from her evident pride in her jewel-thieving abilities was probably about enough to blind my two-tailed friend right now. Eh, what can you say, she does have a talent for locating them (at least when they are already in someone else’s possession).

“So, unsurprisingly, it was only just another government waste of taxpayer money and some more space trash to clutter up our atmosphere. So, still not seeing your problem here, two-tails.”

My friend gave her a look of exasperation and then hit a command to bring up the file on what I could now see was actually called the “Eclipse Cannon.”

“3 × 1032 Joules.”

Rouge’s face was very clearly asking what this had to do with anything.

“3 × 1032 Joules. When sufficiently powered, the Eclipse Cannon should be able to produce a beam equivalent in power to the energy output of Earth’s sun over the course of about nine days.”

Rouge’s mouth made an “O” in response. I was pretty surprised myself. That did seem like…a lot.

“Well, okay, that is a bit more impressive than I thought, but still not seeing the point here, fox boy. Though I admit, I’m actually kind of glad now the ‘batteries’ for this little toy are hard to come by. Even if it was just meant to be used in case of some big old space rock, it would be a bit uncomfortable to have something hanging above us with that kind of power, if it even would have worked that is. ”

Tails gave us both a worried look.

“It would definitely have worked. I’ve checked the equations; they're brilliant. Dr. Gerald Robotnik…” I think we all felt a moment of discomfort at the name, or at least the last name. “...He was clearly the most intelligent human I’ve ever heard of, not even Eggman comes close. With the system Dr. Gerald designed, each successive Chaos Emerald added to the cannon’s powering matrix would have substantially increased the energy output of the cannon until it could power a beam of, at least, 3 × 1032 Joules. Though, the reset time on the cannon after being fired at anywhere near its full capacity would have been significant, possibly as long as a day or two.”

Rouge and I exchanged a glance. The thought of a weapon with that much power, even if it had only been intended for use on asteroids, wasn’t exactly comforting. Still, that perhaps was the one silver lining of this whole horrible tale: The ARK station was basically abandoned space trash now, and this (extremely unsettling) weapon had never been fully completed or implemented. And, like Rouge had said, getting the Chaos Emeralds needed to make it a real threat would have been quite the chore. We’d all had enough experience with the difficulties involved in that, Rouge’s semi-justified bragging aside.

I decided to say as much and maybe settle my clearly overwrought friend down a little.

“Well, buddy, I can see how something like that might not make you very comfortable. I, for one, agree with Rouge that I’m glad they never got it in operation, but it really doesn’t seem to be something we need to worry about. It’s next to impossible for anyone to gather all seven Chaos Emeralds, and even just a few takes a lot of work, despite how oddly frequently it seems to happen around us…” Never really been sure what that is all about. “...and I think I even remember something about some super secret security codes being required on top of all that to even allow the cannon to fire.”

Honestly, I’m glad someone had the idea to add that feature, problems of powering it aside. Imagine just being able to push a button and release that kind of potential devastation….Not Cool….

Still, from the look Tails was giving me, he didn’t appear to have been as reassured as I’d hoped he’d be.

“Five. Five encrypted security passcodes entrusted separately only to the custody of five of the highest level G.U.N. officials at the time. All five were expected to transmit their codes to the Eclipse Cannon’s central control unit each time it was intended to be used or the firing protocols wouldn’t activate, and you couldn’t even charge it beyond an extremely minimum threshold without them. Any attempt to bypass this requirement would just end in failure. It was the only way they would entrust the ARK researchers with the project.”

If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.

Well, see, at least that part made sense.

“The reports indicate that, with the decommissioning of the project and the station, the passcodes were still to be retained on five secure servers in separate G.U.N. bases in case the project ever needed to be restarted.”

Well, again, at least some reasonable precautions were taken, though I kind of wished they would just have dismantled the whole thing, rather than, as Rouge said, leaving it “hanging” over us. Meanwhile, my friend turned back to the computer and typed in some commands. The image of the “Eclipse Cannon” was replaced with what looked to be a large map. Five places were highlighted, though two of them were marked in red.

I began to feel unsettled (well, more unsettled, since ‘unsettled’ just seemed to describe pretty much my whole night really).

“Based on the additional G.U.N. records I’ve been able to access, the locations of the secure servers are almost certainly within these five bases.”

And, I didn’t have to be a Tails-level genius to recognize the significance of the two bases marked in red. Though, I felt I had to ask anyway.

“And those two…?”

I really didn’t want to hear his answer. For a moment, Tails finally truly showed some of the exhaustion he must have been feeling.

“Yeah, they are the two bases Shade’s already raided….It could be a coincidence….”

Yeah, I don’t think any of us were naive enough to believe that and I didn’t think it was worth pretending.

“No, you’re probably right in what you’re thinking, Tails. There’s almost no chance that this means anything other than that she is after the activation codes. It wouldn’t make sense to think anything else, or at least, it’s not a risk we can take. But, still, to really make use of it, she would also need, what, at least four, five, Chaos Emeralds before it’s more of a problem than the things Eggman seems to like to pop out on a regular basis? Tell me, buddy, how many would we need to secure to make sure this is not such a big deal?”

It might sound a bit cavalier, but the “Egg” dude does seem to churn out another ‘death’ ray or its equivalent on the regular. While he hadn’t yet produced anything that had power comparable to the energy output of Earth’s sun (over nine days!), we had plenty of experience with these types of things, and it seemed like as long as we could make sure there were enough Chaos Emeralds kept in places Shade would have a lot of trouble getting to, this didn’t seem too far out from what we’d already dealt with (way too many times).

Tails wouldn’t reply to me for a moment before he said something I almost couldn’t believe.

“Sonic, I think as long as she has the activation codes, she probably only needs one.”

“What?!!” It seemed this was a bit much for Rouge, who’d just loudly reentered the conversation.

“Your big brain finally cook after staring at the computer screen for too long, fox boy? I may not have quite your fascination with all things ‘tech-y’ and ‘science-y’ but even I can tell from the reports that one Chaos Emerald is barely enough to even get the cannon to fire. The techs recommended three as the bare minimum and that, even then, the output would be so reduced from peak capacity as to make it almost not worth it.”

Wow, it looks like Rouge had actually read and understood the reports a lot more than she had let on earlier….Eh, it’s Rouge….Shouldn’t really be surprised about that.

However, Tails didn’t immediately react, at least not to her implied insults; he just turned back to his monitor and began scanning through some more files, pausing at one, and then enlarging it enough to make it visible for both of us to see. When Tails didn’t say anything further, Rouge (and I) reluctantly began to read it.

XXXX-04-16

I do not know why I did not think of it as a solution before, but then we are discovering new things about Shade’s ability to manipulate Chaos energy almost every day. Still, if true, the possibility seems too wondrous to believe. That, as a result of her unique physiology, she could, at least temporarily, magnify the energy output and properties of even a single Chaos Emerald to mimic that of multiple, perhaps even a theoretical seven! Astounding. This might be just the solution we were looking for to solve the terribly impractical energy demands of the E. Cannon. How I could design a project that required that much energy to function, I cannot now understand. Though, much more testing will be needed to ensure Shade could do this safely. I suspect the process could be extremely taxing on her body, possibly even fatal if she were to actually try for the theoretical maximum, and I would not want to allow for even the slightest possibility of her being harmed. Still, the possibility this presents is so very encouraging. To think that, one day, Shade could be the key figure in protecting the Earth from disaster. I will have to be sure to share my conclusion with her and Maria as soon as I can. I know they will be so pleased. In fact, I think this might just be the perfect birthday surprise for Maria and Shade. I cannot wait to tell them.

Nobody said anything for a while.

“It’s an excerpt from Dr. Gerald’s private research diary. I found a copy of it hidden on a G.U.N. server. Honestly, I’m not sure how it ended up there, because it doesn’t seem like even G.U.N. knew it was there, at least not anymore.”

Tails paused for a moment before continuing.

“...He, ah, mentions a lot of other theories and projects in it that aren’t really relevant right now…but he also talks a lot about his granddaughter, Maria…and Shade…as you can see. It seems like they were all, ah, very close…even like a kind of family, the three of them. Despite being mainly for reflecting on his research and experiments, the diary was, well, a lot more personal than anything else I found in the other files.”

Ouch, now I think I see that I was right about why Tails might be so out of sorts, and it wasn’t just because he’d been the first to realize how much of a danger the cannon apparently now posed. The little dude is only twelve. At twenty-two myself, I’m still struggling with all the things I’ve seen and read, and I hadn’t even previously seen this ‘diary’ he’d somehow dug up on top of Rouge’s other files.

I gave my friend a sad smile in return.

“Yeah, Tails, I think they probably were.”

There had been enough in the files Rouge provided, even without the diary, that I thought I had a pretty good idea of just what Dr. Gerald Robotnik and his granddaughter had meant to Shade, and how they’d seen her in return. Thinking back to my earlier encounter with her, even I couldn’t help but agree now, that, yeah, G.U.N. had done…‘more than enough’. But still….

“I really hate to have to say it…but even knowing all of this…we’re still going to have to stop her. We can’t let her get her hands on a weapon like this, or Eggman.” Because there was that too.

Whatever plans Shade had, I was sure Eggman had his own, and those, at least, I knew would never be good….Not unfortunately that it was looking too bright either for our new troubled hedgehog acquaintance….What could she possibly want with a weapon with potentially that much power?….I really couldn’t think of any good things.

Tails gave me a complicated look in return. Yeah, sorry you have to get involved in all this grownup stuff, buddy.

“No…I guess you’re right, Sonic….It’s alright that I feel bad for her though, isn’t it?”

See, I told you he was a good kid. Smiling, though with a bit more actual happiness in it now, I didn’t hesitate to reply.

“Not at all, buddy. I do too, and if we can find any way to help her, that doesn’t put a lot of people at risk, we’re definitely going to do it and, hopefully, get her out of Eggman’s clutches as soon as we can. I mean even I would be a bit upset if the first thing I saw was his ugly mug after a fifty year nap.”

I was more than a bit relieved when that got a giggle out of Tails, and it seemed he lost some of his earlier melancholy and worry.

“No doubt, Sonic!! I’ll see if I can figure out which of the remaining bases she is probably going to hit next. Then we’ll stop her and help her!”

And, with that, he turned his full attention back to the workstation, whizzing through files again at hedgehog speed. Yeah, he’s a good kid. Still, seeing that Rouge, who’d been quiet since her initial outburst and Tails’ subsequent revelation, was giving me a meaningful look, I decided that maybe it was time to get a bit of fresh air. It seemed we had something to talk about…that the kid didn’t need to hear.