With the door relieved of duty by Coop's det-cord, the group was able to enter freely. Really freely.

The interior was barren. The entry area led to stairs, which were empty; from there, they found their way into a corridor flanked by robots that did... absolutely nothing. There were Egg Pawns everywhere, but they seemed kind of distant, even disinterested, like they didn't even have the notion to attack the entering group. They were completely passive and just sort of swayed and looked about like bored children. There were even turrets mounted all over the place that didn't move or fire.

The doors readily slid open wherever the group went, and they were able to advance all the way to the center of the ship without hindrance. The questions that had to be ringing in everyone's mind were: Where is Seven? Is he already here?

One more door left to travel through. It slid open as they approached. The inside was dark compared to the rest of the halls, and because of the difference in light, it was hard to grasp the scale of the room, or exactly what was inside. It was definitely where they were going, though.

Geoff was quick to dart into the base the moment the door was opened for them, silently glad Coop's demolition skills this time around weren't presented as... extravagant as they usually were. Now, though, he at least could find some temporary safety inside, even though he expected a dozen or so robot's weapons to be pointed right at his chest the minute he entered.

However, that, surprisingly, was not the case, the hedgehog only finding the bare room and stairs before him. Before he could even take a couple of steps though, Ace came barreling in. Geoff's eyes snapped over to the feline, walking over and offering an open hand.

"C'mon. That was the easy part, I bet," he said in a tone that seemed to express he wasn't too eager for charging onward, but they were already past the point of no return.

He took note of Ace's condition a moment later.

"Guess I'm the lucky one, eh?" He almost sounded a bit sympathetic.


Boom, boom, boom.

Three of the copter-bots that had wandered on up to pursue the group on the catwalks quickly found their ends as Shadow picked them off from a distance, his energy weapon glowing with each shot. Despite his former impatience, it appeared he'd taken defensive duty to clear the area and to allow the others to catch up and get inside. His hard gaze kept darting to the final stragglers, however, before he finally turned on a heel and entered the base as well.

Inside, he looked about to those sitting about, tending to injuries or otherwise.

"Let's move," he said gruffly, striding forward before running up the stairs.

Coop approached the entrance to the dark room, but hung around in the door frame cautiously—choosing to remain outside the perimeter and gaze inward than to storm on in to uncertain doom and a hostile environment. He looked jumpily back out into the hall. He gazed suspiciously one of the apathetic sentries, then stalked back to examine one of them.

He tapped it on the eye.

He grabbed it and forcibly tried to pry an arm off.

The bulky Egg Pawn seemingly "winced" at the eye-poke. Then, when Coop started trying to wrench its arm off, it... well, fought back.

Actually, while it pulled and struggled and struck at Coop, every Egg Pawn in the hall went to jump him, too, hurling their near-compact-car-weight bodies at him with abandon. They may not have had any targets set as hostile, but they were smart enough to not just stand around while being assaulted.

Unrelated to this, the entire ship began to roar and rumble. The lights dimmed, red emergency lights came on and a klaxon blared. A synthesized voice announcement followed.

"Orbital launch procedure engaged. Prepare for immediate departure."

It didn't feel like they were going anywhere just yet, but if the announcement was any indication... well, they were definitely going to go somewhere, and soon. Meanwhile, within the room ahead (the one Coop had hesitated to enter in order to first molest inactive guard robots) there arose the distant, inarticulate sound of shouting, like a scuffle had just begun. There were some sounds of equipment breaking and falling over, a few shots fired, and then silence again.

"Easy for you to say," Ace wheezed out to the hedgehog (the green one, obviously, he still wasn't keen on Shadow). Still, he pushed himself off his knee and gathered his surroundings for the advance. A quick headcount revealed that everyone was indeed present. Perhaps if it was a torsocount, he'd have sooner noticed...

"...Where's Coop?"

He took a peek into the room ahead.

"Coop, what the hell are you do--"

"..."

"Coo-oop!"

"Orbital launch procedure engaged. Prepare for immediate departure."

"Crap," he swore, and slid himself through the doorway-- putting distance between himself and the entryway, but far out of reach for the robo-dogpile crowding the eagle's backside. "Coop, we don't have time for this!" he shouted over the noise. "Just leave 'em alone for now!" Ace didn't make any moves to help him out directly, 'cause, hey, he didn't wanna get involved in all that! Coop was a big boy. And Big was a big... Big.

The next room was shaped like a great, fat horseshoe. At its center—the inner apex of the "horseshoe"—was a slightly raised semi-circular platform. A bank of monitors displayed various things, alternatively solid colors, static, and raw data, uninterpretable. A light had come to life, dead center, illuminating a huge, Eggman-scaled command chair. Next to it laid its owner, motionless, belly-up on the floor, arms and legs sprawled. In front of it was Seven.

His long coat flowed with an air of excessive, pompous self-importance as he strode to the chair. He turned, faced the ruckus occurring just beyond the entryway door with a look of indifference from behind his chic, black shades, and gently seated himself in Eggman's throne.

"Cancel orbital launch," he ordered flatly.

"Error—authorization required," replied the computer.

"Execute 'Seventh Son,'" said the purplish-haired boy with a horrible little smile creeping into his adolescent voice.

There came a loud buzzing noise. Suddenly, a different synthesized voice replaced the previous, this one soft and feminine.

"Override. Database error: Missing tables. User biometrics tables null. Calibrating biometric analysis interface. Please stand by."

"It's not like they're going stop messing with him," stated Geoff behind Ace.

Having found that the cat's attention elsewhere, the hedgehog didn't have much choice but to follow him along to where the next scuffle in the line of many scuffles was occurring. He could at least be thankful (or at least think that for the others) that this band of robots didn't have sets of blades, the only thing that really been much of an immediate danger outside. The ominous announcement of an incoming launch, however, didn't settle well with Geoff, looking at the hall ahead with a look of clear distress.

"We don't have time for this."

And so he charged forward, already bearing crystal, intending to at least assist with the opening the over sized eagle and cat were attempting to make.


Up ahead, Shadow was at full sprint towards the clog of metal, bird, and feline in the hall. As he approached the first of the Pawns awaiting him, it appeared he was ready to tear right through it like the numerous others from before. His expression showed some slight concentration as he—

zzZSShoof

Disappeared. There had a brief millisecond of green light being swallowed inward before he simply vanished.

Except it returned, bursting outward as the hedgehog reappeared on the other side of the sentries.

Without even a glance back to what he somehow avoided, Shadow continued onward into the next room. His red eyes were pinpointed onto the raised platform ahead, finding the boy with a glance that was similar to one studying a target.

The hedgehog was silent as he moved, the only sound being the light ssshh, ssshh, ssshh of his shoes. Even as he leaped into the air towards the platform there was a barely sound, not even an uttered grunt from the sudden liftoff. There were no heroic announcements or any other sort of exclamations needed from him, it seemed, though it appeared he had every intent to dive onto the boy and finish the job as quickly as possible.

Shadow, unlike Geoff, Mako, Ace, and the others, had not experienced the pleasure of Seven's company enough to know how he operated. While the others learned in the past that the brat was always prepared for direct attacks, this was Shadow's educational moment.

An explosion rocked the room from Shadow's right side the instant he entered the chamber. A claymore-like directional explosive, puttied to the inside of the doorframe, was triggered by the hedgehog when he passed through its invisible laser tripwire. His raw speed in passing by the blast would make it quite a bit less harmful than if he had just walked up to it, but it still wouldn't be likely to give him a completely free pass on what was basically almost a pound of RDX going off mere feet from his head.

Seven grinned and reached into his coat for his next implement of mischief. The computer meanwhile continued preparing.

The blast, with its close proximity, indeed managed to knock him aside. Actually, not necessarily aside, but more like tumbling across the room for a few yards due to his foolhardy beliefs that a mere child wouldn't have much in store for him.

Shadow nearly growled as he scrambled back onto his feet, the right portion of his head, once again, singed. His movements were a bit unbalanced for a moment as he tried to recover, the explosion having taken its due toll on him. Immortal ultimate life form or not, it didn't mean he was invincible.

It was only a matter of time before he managed to stand sturdy.

This was the second time the black hedgehog had been caught off guard in the last day or so, and his composure was suffering from it. His already permanent cross expression was now tightened into one of much stronger indignation. Yet, he didn't let this morph into a headstrong charge, but instead seemed to form a slight wariness, however minor, in his actions. This wasn't his playing field and he clearly seemed to understand that now as he let his eyes rove around in haste. If there were more dangers to find, he would have to search more carefully.

There was only so much time, though.

With a burst of acceleration, Shadow took off at an angle as if having some intention on the other side of the room.

Suddenly, he flashed out of existence much like before, promptly reappearing in the air only a few yards behind the platform and, more importantly, Seven. With a slice of his arm, a torrent of green-yellow energy ripped a jagged path through the air straight towards the purple haired boy, spreading out in a horizontal wave.

While Shadow collected his wits, Seven's hand came out of his coat with an odd little device, not unlike the handheld computers other members of the group had been sent to plant. While the hedgehog set up for his attack, the boy pressed a few keys; after it was all said and done, Shadow's blast struck the huge, metal-backed chair from behind and partially dismantled it from the floor, sending it toppling forward. The way it eclipsed Seven with its extreme size left it hard to tell what even happened to him when it fell face-down on the floor, but closer examination was made difficult when all the lights in the room went out completely. Only the light from the monitors remained, and they only offered glare and static, casting long, hazy shadows around the immediate control area and a bluish sheen across the shiny metal floor while otherwise leaving the farther fringes of the room nearly pitch-black.

Seven's voice came from one end of the chamber. (For the sake of simplicity, if the group entered through the "south" door, his voice came from the west wall.)

"I'm starting to get the feeling you don't trust me," he quipped, tongue-in-cheek. "I thought we all agreed we wanted Eggman gone!"