Some might be asking why the hell I'm remaking this story again, especially considering all the other things I could be writing. In the middle of writing my MLP-S.T.A.L.K.E.R. crossover, I thought up a completely new idea for my old story. I decided to rewrite Tyrant entirely to fit my new idea.

I'm not sure how many people are gonna like it, but I hope you old fans enjoy it nevertheless.

I don't own anything.

...

Tails the Tyrant

"Let's see... Connecting that antimass field generator to those two emeralds should be able to conduct their... No, that wouldn't work..."

The whole workshop echoed with the thwacks of tools and the banging of hammers.

Each Chaos Emerald sat inside a glass tube, connected to the central chamber through a spider's web of tangled wires and tubes. Each tube conducted the pure power of these artifacts. Status screens and monitors relayed countless lines of data. In a glass tube taking up the center of the chamber sat Tails's newest and arguably greatest creation, and his most secret.

He looked at his watch, and yawned, "Nine thirty-six...guess I was working longer than planned." He stretched a little.

The kitsune took a deep breath. Now or never. He wiped the sweat and grime from his brow.

Readings held steady, and everything showed green. He was so close, closer than he had ever been in the past two days of endless tweaking and experimentation. Nothing could stop him now.

A grin appeared along his face. "C'mon, c'mon... yes... yes..."

Everything went according to his design. Chaos energy pulsed and coursed into his machine. Stage one of the activation process had just completed. Now, stage two was left.

"You can do it... Come to papa..."

BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEEEEEEEEEEP! The lights began to flicker and quickly died. The backup generator soon got the lights working, but the machine had shut itself off.

He wanted to scream and curse at the ceiling; why wouldn't this darned thing work? Now Tails had a headache like no tomorrow. Quickly swallowing a handful of pain pills, he began to inspect the couplings.

Tails soon found the problem, and smacked himself upside the head. A power coupling from the blue Chaos Emerald was in the wrong socket.

"No, that's not right! You're getting sloppy, Tails..." He quickly corrected the problem.

The power core lit up like a light bulb and the infinite power of the Chaos Emeralds coursed through it. Tails was so absorbed in the sight that he didn't notice a red exclamation point on the status terminal.

And then, Hell broke loose.

The entire room shook like a fault line. Tools, parts, engines, everything clattered and fell to the floor, strewn about like kids toys. The lights didn't stop flickering.

Tails fell to the floor, struggling to keep his balance. Only panic remained on his mind. This wasn't supposed to happen!

Glass panes shattered, a wave of sharp projectiles raining down. In a bright and dazzling flash, piercing white light began to surround Tails, and he could see blood and open cuts all over his arms.

Over the roaring energy, he heard a familiar recorded voice. "Warning: Hazardous energy signature detected. Emergency systems activated."

The workshop's automated security switched on, but Tails didn't care about that at the moment.

"Shut down..." He muttered, furiously typing commands on the main control console. "Attempting shut down..."

Nothing. It wasn't shutting down. The energy levels continued to rocket upwards. Error message after error message covered the monitors as they shorted out one by one. A blast of steam burst from a nearby pipe, scalding Tails' right leg and making him jump away in shock from the haywire computers.

Then Tails felt himself pinned to the floor by some unseen force. He tried to scream, but every breath sent lances of agony into his ribs. He could not see or feel, but only cover his eyes in terror at the infinite power that he had just unleashed.

Inky blackness overcame him.

...

"Tails? Tails, open the door, it's Amy and Cream! Sonic wanted us to check on you!" called the voice of Amy Rose. The pink hedgehog put her ear up against the door, but didn't hear a response.

Cream tapped on the windows. "I can't see anything." Both of them were getting more worried by the second.

Amy tried again. "Please, you haven't come out of there for days! Open this door!"

Still nothing. Now she was rapidly beginning to lose her patience.

"Tails, if you don't come down here, I swear I'll take my hammer and bust your door in!" She shouted, aggression building through gritted teeth.

"Maybe... maybe he isn't here?" Cream tried to calm her volatile friend. Cheese gave an agreeing "Chao!"

Amy ignored the rabbit. "Alright Tails, I warned you!"

"AMY WAIT, DON'T-"

Cream ducked to the ground as the pink hedgehog slammed the front door in with an expert swing of her mallet. With a final kick, the frame fell off the hinges.

The girls looked in the living room to find a complete mess. It looked like someone had thrown a bomb into it. Shredded paper and debris covered the carpet. The fridge had been wedged open, is contents spilled all over his small kitchen.

"Tails, where are you?" Cream called out to no avail.

Amy readied her hammer, now ready for anything. "Cream, go take a look upstairs. I'll check the workshop."

She could already tell something had happened. Sure enough, the pink hedgehog soon found the stairway leading to the workshop's underground entrance was open. Moving into the underground tunnel at the bottom, Amy found her path blocked by a thick metal vault door blocked their way, a small terminal beside it.

Soon after returning from their war against the Metarex, Tails had installed those blast doors to automatically seal off his workshop in case of an attack or serious emergency. The fact they had been turned on at all meant something was wrong. Very wrong. And the only way to find out what had happened was to get it open somehow. Her mallet definitely wouldn't put a dent in it. She didn't know the password either.

Cream suddenly appeared behind her. "He isn't upstairs, but..."

Amy turned to her. "Go get Sonic and Knuckles, right now. Hurry!"

Without a single word of protest, Cream and Cheese took off. Amy prayed they would get here soon.

...

Knuckles fell to his knees, wheezing and panting. "I can't dig through this... Too strong." He stood up and stretched his aching muscles.

He wasn't the only one searching for a way through the door. "Maybe if you worked those arms of yours a little more..." Rouge snidely remarked while she fiddled with the console next to the door.

"Don't even start, you-"

"Cool it guys." Sonic stopped the inevitable. "Rouge, how's it going?"

"I think I almost... Ouch!" Rouge yelped as a burst of electricity jolted her. She took a deep breath. "No, this thing is unbreakable. Whatever security software Tails has, it's foolproof. I haven't seen a firewall that strong since I hacked into the Pentagon back on Earth."

Amy shook her head. "Tails knew his stuff."

"So you got here first." Shadow had appeared at the foot of the stairwell while the others weren't looking.

"Oh hey Shadow, what are you doing here?" Rouge asked with a smile.

"I sensed the Chaos Emeralds," he answered. Knuckles had, with some pressure from Rouge, offered him a place to live on Angel Island. He agreed, under the condition that he wouldn't steal the Master Emerald.

"Hey Shadow, what about your powers?" Amy suggested.

The black hedgehog shrugged. "What about them?"

"Try using Chaos Spear or something against the door. You might be able to blow through it."

Shadow didn't respond, but he approached anyway. He braced himself in preparation.

"CHAOS SPEAR!" With a swipe of the hand, three yellow bolts of Chaos energy slammed into the obstacle, but his attack fizzled harmlessly against the door.

His old rival whistled. "Looks like you're losing your touch Shads," quipped Sonic.

Shadow glared in return. "Don't call me that."

Knuckles sighed disbelievingly. "Well now what do we do? There's gotta be some way to get in there."

Before anyone could suggest another option, enthusiastic cries of "Chao chao chao chao chao!" echoed off the walls.

"Oh, I think Cheese found something!" Cream nearly jumped for joy as the small blue creature zipped down the stairwell. "What did you find?"

The little Chao handed over a small pot with a tiny sapling growing in it.

Knuckles facepalmed. "You're not helping us right now."

"Wait a second, that's Cosmo's plant." Sonic held up a hand and went around Amy. "Hold on guys, I got an idea. Let me try something with that terminal."

Rouge moved away from it as the hedgehog approached. Enter Password, the screen said.

Sonic slowly typed five letters; "C-O-S-M-O..."

The console turned green. Access Granted. Emergency Lockdown Terminated. Welcome, Miles Prower.

A loud clanging filled the air, followed by a hissing of steam and a great rumble that shook the chamber. As they watched, the massive bolt that held the door shut slid back. A hinge-arm swung down, attaching itself to the door, and with a teeth-hurting squeal, pulled the steel door out and away.

Knuckles rolled his eyes. "Well of course that worked..."

"Cheese, you're a genius!" Cream tightly hugged her life partner.

"Let's find Tails before we start celebrating, Cream." Amy shuffled her way into the corridor beyond. "I got a really bad feeling about this..."