‹ prev: preamble • up: pierce the sky • next: omake ›
As she was drowsily making her way to bed, Tails was startled by the sound of someone hammering on the doorbell. Tails opened the front door of her apartment to see Eggman standing outside. Nonchalantly, he pointed his thumb toward the hovercraft bobbing and sputtering just behind him and spoke:
“Get in, loser. Burger Shop’s twenty nuggets for twenty rings deal is back. Let’s go.”
“Eggman…” Tails sighed, “look, I know this is about something else. Besides, their 20 for 20’s been going on for months now.”
Eggman stamped his foot impatiently.
“Alright, I can take a hint.” She turned her head aside. “Hey Amy? Eggman’s here, and he wants me to go with him.”
“Really? What does he want this time?” Amy called out from a distance.
“I don’t know. But I don’t think this is one that I can turn down.”
“Fine. But I might not be awake when you get back.”
She turned back to Eggman. “Do you mind if I tuck her in and give her a goodnight kiss before we go?”
“By all means, go ahead.”
Tails skipped down a side hallway and disappeared into a semi-lit room. Faint sweet murmurings could be heard in the distance until the sound of Eggman loudly clearing his throat broke through.
“Alright, I’m coming, OK?”
Tails reemerged from the apartment and locked the door behind her just as Eggman was climbing back into his hovercraft. She hopped in beside Eggman as it lifted off toward the sky.
The two of them silently flew towards the city, the craft’s nose pointed toward the Burger Shop sign glowing in the distance. With Eggman focused dead ahead and Tails’ eyes lazily glancing over the side, they passed over streams and bridges, grazing the roofs of one-story houses and dodging trees though the sparsely-populated plains. As they neared the city, he raised their trajectory so that they were flying overtop the highway leading into the main strip, the glow of streetlights acting as ersatz guardrails, until their destination was soon enough right below them, and then, behind them.
“Um, I think you just passed it,” Tails hesitantly said.
“Did you really think I flew all the way out here just to make a fast food run!?”
“Yes…” she replied, her lip curling.
“No you didn’t.”
Tails started to sniffle, trying to force a tear out of the corner of her eye.
“Alright, fine,” Eggman relented. He jerked the controls with all his strength, sending the hovercraft spiraling downward into the empty drive-thru lane before coming to an abrupt halt in front of the speaker.
“Just give me the 20 for 20,” Eggman yelled.
Above the clouds – above the city lights stippling out into the horizon – Tails was busy stuffing her mouth with nuggets.
“Youf know, you can haff some of these if you want,” she said, muffled.
“It’s… it’s quite alright.”
“So, the pink-haired girl,” Eggman began, breaking the silence.
“Mmf?” Tails responded, mouth full with two nuggets at once. “Fyou meam, Amy?”
“Right, yes, her,” Eggman replied, almost dismissively. “I take it you two are… together now?”
She cleared her throat, then spoke: “Yeah. Amy and I have been dating for almost a year now.”
“Ah, so you’re both still in the honeymoon phase, then.”
“Well, we’ve known each other for years, so I can’t say it feels like that. If anything, it reminds me of the days when we used to work together at top secret location, planning operations and just hanging out with each other.”
“You can say it was your workshop.”
“It was a top secret location.”
“I bombed that workshop!”
“I know,” she said, pouting. “I wish you didn’t.”
“Well I wish you hadn’t blown up my Death Egg, among numerous other casualties.”
“I think that one’s on you, since you named it the ‘Death Egg’ in the first place.”
“…you have a point,” Eggman sheepishly admitted.
“But anyway, you were talking about when you two worked together.”
“Yeah, it’s—” Tails reminisced, “Looking back, those times that I spent just being around her were some of the best I ever had.
“It’s hard to remember anything that happened back then, though, because they weren’t especially memorable. I only remember the serenity I felt back then, and even now I still feel that when I’m with her.”
The words poured out of Tails’ mouth: “She’ll look at me and I’ll get kinda nervous because she’s so cute, but then she smiles at me and I feel perfectly at ease. Then, when she puts her hand on me, it just erases all the thoughts that were crashing about in my head…
“I don’t think we saw each other as anything more than friends, back then, but it felt really nice to look over and see her doing her own thing. I can’t explain why.”
“Companionship,” Eggman observed.
“Huh?” Tails replied, scrounging around in the fast food bag for any remaining nuggets. “I guess so, yeah.”
“A desire to have someone, or failing that, to have someone.”
“What are you getting at?”
“Perhaps I find it funny that you would end up with her, since I remember that you used to have high standards about what you wanted out of a partner. And now, well…”
“ ‘Well,’ what? What about her?” Tails growled, a hint of anger in her voice.
“Well,” Eggman paused, “I was going to say that she’s hardly the brightest girl I’ve met.”
“Hey, you’d be surprised. She’s pretty quick-thinking.”
“And how often does this become relevant?”
“Pretty often, I think. Her intelligence is just of a different type.”
“Fair,” he said, scratching his chin, “but she doesn’t really understand you. We both know this.”
“Nobody does. And I’ve made peace with that.”
“Nobody? Why, I’m surprised that you don’t see us as one and the same. We’re fellow inventors, aren’t we?”
“I’ve put that life behind me. It was just something to keep my mind occupied as a kid.”
“You were good at it, though.”
“Perhaps, but I never had the aptitude that others had. Your work has always been far more technically impressive.”
“Only because I’ve persisted at it for years! Putting my nose to the grindstone – setback after setback – in pursuit of realizing my visions. You used to be like that too; I saw it.”
“Let me ask you something, and I want you to answer honestly.” Eggman turned toward Tails, his arm resting on the dashboard.
“Shoot.”
“When you finally decided to quit, did you only quit because it got too hard for you?”
“I saw the complexity of other people’s work and decided I’d never be able to reach that point,” Tails muttered.
“Because you didn’t immediately understand how they worked?”
“Uhm.”
“Nobody becomes a master engineer from the first day. We take these things one step at a time.”
“Sure.”
“But did you even take the next step? Or did you tap out before you could have your knowledge of your intellectual limitations confirmed?”
She paused. Eggman bitterly laughed to himself.
“Oh, you fool. You’re certainly intelligent – knowing my luck, you’re likely far more intelligent than I – but that doesn’t stop you from being a fool.
“You can write your bad poetry and hole yourself up in a quiet house with a girl who will never understand that poetry, and perhaps there you can find happiness. But I know that you want more.”
“How do you know my poetry is bad, anyway?” Tails responded, slightly worried.
“I don’t. I might be wrong, and you might have the potential to do great work. Seeing as I’m also a connoisseur of the arts, if you’re willing, perhaps you could lend me one of your manuscripts so that I might offer a fair critique?”
Tails subtly bristled.
“Ah…” Eggman responded, shaking his head, “that’s how I know.”
“It’s only because I don’t trust you.”
“Why should that matter? I’m just giving feedback on a poem, not threatening your life, right? The most that I could do is share a bad opinion, right? So what is there to be worried about?”
“But in a way… it does threaten my life.”
“It threatens your ego. That’s different.”
Eggman continued. “Listen. I’ve been brought low many, many times. By a blue farm animal too, of all things. I have no right to have an ego anymore. But unlike you, that hasn’t stopped me from dusting myself off and trying again.”
“Unlike you, I managed to develop self-composure.
“And what has that gotten you? Think about it. Think about where you are in life. Was this really where you wanted to be?”
Tails looked pained.
“For the past decade, the only one who has been stopping you is yourself!”
“But what else should I have done?” she blurted out. “I mean, you seem to know the answer to that – to what I ‘should’ be doing.”
“I don’t, but it doesn’t take a genius to see the look on your face right now and know that you aren’t content with where you are.”
“I’m not… but I don’t know how to fix it. Things used to be so much simpler.”
“I’d hardly call what you were making to be ‘simple,’ though.”
“No, I mean it’s more like, Sonic would come to me with a problem – usually one that you were causing – and I would help him with it.”
“And I would reformulate my strategy and try again, is that right?”
“Right, and then the cycle would continue.”
“One that was miserable for both of us—”
“But one in which I had a place.”
“But either way, those times are behind us – or rather I should say, those times are behind me, as it seems that I was motivating your actions the whole time by giving you an adversary to fight.”
“Hey, it wasn’t just you that we fought against; it was just, um, actually mostly you, now that I think about it,” Tails replied, her voice trailing off.
“And I’m flattered, really, to have played such a pivotal role in your life.”
“I wouldn’t consider that something to be proud of…”
“Still, I get the impression that you’re now waiting for someone else to take the initiative here. Because it seems to me that back then you were reliant on Sonic to give you that something to live for – much like that girl who was obsessed with him.”
“Don’t talk about A—”
“Really, you and her aren’t too different in that regard. You both were constantly following behind him, as if at his command. The key difference, though, is that in time she managed to find her own path forward in life. But what about you?
“I guess, um, I’m still working on it.” She started clutching her stomach.
“Are you really?”
“I thought that this would make me happy, and it does – don’t get me wrong – yet I still feel so, so…”
“You look unwell.”
“I probably shouldn’t have eaten all 20…”
“Still,” Tails said, righting herself, “I’m assuming that you didn’t fly out here just to talk about my home life.”
“Not particularly, no.”
“Then why did you?”
“Would you believe me if I said I just wanted to stop in and see how you were doing?”
“No, I can’t, sorry.”
“Understandable; I suppose I can’t hide the fact that I arrived with an ulterior motive.”
“Then out with it, Eggs.”
“I can’t believe this girl… I fly her out, pay for her meal, and this is how she treats me?” Eggman remarked, rolling his eyes.
Tails glared at him.
“Fine, fine. Truthfully, I flew you out here to offer you a deal, though as we’ve been talking, I’ve decided that I’d rather make it an ultimatum. I’m sure you remember how I gifted you a stake in my company, right?”
The color drained from Tails’ face. “…so you remembered…” she muttered.
“Have you been able to put it to good use since then?”
“It helps me get by.”
“And nothing more?”
“Not really; that’s sufficient to meet my needs.”
“Right, as I expected: you haven’t done much with it at all. So then, I present you with three options:
“The first is that you come back on at Eggman Industries, which is what I flew here to try to sell you on. We’d all be happy to have you rejoin us,” Eggman said, feigning a welcoming smile. “Of course, I don’t foresee you accepting, but it won’t stop me from trying.”
“I’ve noticed that you’re persistent, yes.”
“The second is that I’d want you to draft an action plan for what you really want to do with your life, and I’ll work alongside you to make that a reality. You wanna be a writer, or a poet? By all means, go ahead. Throw yourself into your vocation entirely. Let it consume you.”
“I don’t know if I have it in me to become a real poet, though. It’s just something to help me pass the time.”
“And yet it’s your primary way of passing the time; you know, most people opt for TV or video games to fill that need. Don’t you think the fact that you’ve always chosen creative pursuits instead says something about you?”
“A desire to understand myself?”
“Then take up journaling, and save yourself the headache of translating your emotions into an artistic work.”
“I can’t do that… I don’t know how to explain it, but my mind needs something to chew on, or else it goes batty.”
“Then take up crossword puzzles, if you need the headache too. The point is, I gave you those shares so you could have the freedom to put yourself out there in the world, not so you could hide away from it. So pick a direction and stick with it to the bitter end, and I’ll do what I can to back you up.
“Lastly, if you’ve decided that you’d rather have nothing to do with me any longer, I’ll buy back your stake in the company. You’ll get a flat sum in return, but nothing more. And then you’ll never have to deal with me again.”
“I highly doubt that.”
“Perhaps so, but in any case, I’ll never bother you personally again.”
“And what if I choose neither?” Tails asked. “Legally speaking, there is nothing you could do to invalidate the shares I have.”
“But you only have stake in Eggman Industries, not Eggman Enterprises, nor Robotnik Holdings, nor Kabushiki-kaisha Egguman Kougyou, nor—”
“OK, OK, I get it. Though why do you have so many companies?”
“A necessary precaution in my line of work,” he flatly replied.
“Uh-huh.”
“It would be quite inconvenient, but in time I could reallocate my own assets to slowly attenuate the size of the pie that you have a slice of until you’re left with a pittance.”
“That’s cruel.”
“I really don’t think it is, mon ami. Watching you languish in stasis – when I know that you are capable of so much more, and deep down you know it too – that strikes me as a far crueler fate.
“But like I said, if that’s what you want, then sell them back, take the lump sum, and invest it somewhere else. It’s not like there’s anything uniquely special about the shares in my company compared to any other’s. The only thing you’d lose in exchange is someone to take you on midnight food runs. But I assume you have the pink one to go with you now.”
“Her name is Amy!”
“Why me?” Tails asked.
“Hm?”
“Why do you care so much about what I do with my life? Like, I know you’d rather see Sonic dead, you can’t even remember Amy’s name, you probably only cared about Knuckles – or Blaze or Rouge or any of the others – to the extent that they helped you get closer to the emeralds—”
“Guilty as charged.”
“I just get the impression that you see them all as either tools to get what you want or obstacles in the way of getting what you want.”
“You’re not incorrect.”
“I seem to be different, though. You could’ve captured me, you could’ve enslaved me, you could’ve bombed my home like you did my workshop…”
“You’re still bitter about that, huh?” he muttered.
“But instead you keep pestering me with projects that you want to work on together. You gifted me a stake in your company that pays out dividends! So why? Why would you go through all this effort?”
“Because I believe in you, you imbecile!”
“Huh, really?”
“Yes! Can’t you see that I might actually care about you, fox boy!?”
Tails winced.
“…my apologies. Fox girl?”
“I think? I guess…”
“Fox pup?”
Tears began to well in Tails’ eyes.
“Ah, it seems that one’s no good either.”
“No, that one just… hit me in a way I wasn’t expecting, you know?”
Eggman looked over to see Tails balled up with her arms wrapped around her knees, rocking back and forth. Hesitantly, he placed his hand on Tails’ back.
“I, um… I understand. You’ve been through a lot, you know?”
“Mhm…”
“Or rather, I put you through a lot, and I guess I still am. I should’ve taken that into account.”
Tails yawned and wiped her eyes. “I guess it couldn’t be helped.”
“Perhaps. With my offer,” Eggman paused, “I considered this to be my way of trying to make it up to you, even if I don’t know how to.”
“I don’t know how either…”
“True; it’s hard to solve a problem like this if you don’t know what the problem is. But I have hope in you – that you can pull through this – and at the very least I hope you can accept that.”
“I hope so too…”
“I may be getting sentimental with age; I don’t know. But when I saw the machines that you had pieced together to oppose me, even then I recognized that I was up against someone truly unique, with a skill that I couldn’t just mechanically replicate. I knew that you were working with only a fraction of the resources that I had at my disposal, and yet it was always still enough to thwart me.
“I worried about the power you might’ve been able to wield if you had more than scraps to work with, or if you kept developing your skills at the alarming rate that you were, or both. I worried about how far you might’ve gone if there was nothing in your way to stop you. I needn’t have been worried though, heh, since you seemed to have done a fine enough job at hamstringing yourself.
“Or actually, maybe I can take credit for overcoming this threat as well, since you managed to use my investment and squander it away toward a quiet, private life… If I had known that it would take so little to keep you out of my hair, then I would have paid you off much sooner!
“But on the other hand, if I truly cared about seeing you reach your full potential, then perhaps it would’ve been better to keep you hungry, to keep you fighting for your life. I truly wonder what power I could’ve unleashed had I kept the pressure on for longer…
“We’re all moved by different levers: some flowers grow best with plenty of water and rich soil, others thrive in harsh climates. For me, I saw that my ambitions only grew with the resources I attained, pursuing grander and grander visions until I was constructing my own planets! And I wanted to give you a taste of that. I would’ve figured that, with the freedom to pursue your own ambitions and a rose to call your own, then you would bloom into something tremendous. But you’re not me, I realize, and though I only wanted to help you, I never quite knew how to get through to you. Even now, I don’t know how to get through to you… Is any of this getting through to you?”
Eggman looked over to see Tails curled up on the seat of his hovercraft, fast asleep.
“Ah, I was hoping my little pep talk would’ve had more of an effect than this… Let’s get you home, alright?”
In the dead of night, Eggman’s hovercraft quietly descended to a standstill just outside Tails and Amy’s apartment, and Tails blearily hopped out. She took a few seconds to allow herself to wake up, and then shambled toward the door.
“Thanks for, uh, for the nuggets.”
“Don’t mention it.”
As she unlocked the door and began to open it, she stopped with her hand on the knob, hesitating. She turned back towards Eggman:
“By the way, I’ve decided to go by Skylar now.”
“I heard.”
“Tails is still fine, though.” She paused. “Just thought I’d let you know.”
“I remember that it took me a moment to realize why you chose that name, when I first heard it.”
“…guess I just wanted to have a name that finally makes sense, for once.”
“It fits you better, yes.”
The two remained silent as Skylar stood in the threshold of the doorway.
“I think I better get to bed. It’s pretty late.”
As she turned to close the door behind her, Eggman remarked:
“It’s a beautiful name.”