Disclaimer:
See chapter one Author's Note:
For anyone who was wondering where I came up with the names Shatarah, Goweh and Felika, this is where:
"Shatarah" comes from the Arabic word "shatrah," which means "clever." "Goweh," comes from the Arabic word "gooweh," which means "strong." "Felika" came from where I kept spelling "Felicia" "Felica," so I decided to change the c to a k and just leave it like that.
Also, I AM aware that Chaos Five never appeared in the games because Chaos Four was fed two Emeralds at once, but I made up m own sort of description for him.
Also, I've already been put on three alerts lists because of this story, so thank you all very much!
Without further ado, Chapter Two.
Chapter Two: Ancient History and a Baffling Mystery
Knuckles stared up at the seven brightly-colored gems hovering above the Master Emerald. He remembered how he felt when he saw them for the first time. He was ten years old at the time, and they amazed and excited him all at once. Over time, they had become a common sight for him, and just yesterday he had seen them as "nothing special." Now, they were his destiny.
"Well?" said Knuckles, turning towards Shatarah. The old echidna let out a sigh.
"Knuckles," he said. "We thought it would be best if you didn't know until you actually became the Guardian. We didn't want you to have the burden of that responsibility yet."
"How is that 'best'?" said Knuckles. "You had two choices. Go ahead and give me my training and my lessons and take away my childhood, but at least tell me why. Or, don't tell me. Keep it a secret from me. Yeah, and let me grow up wondering why my fa-," Knuckles paused before he continued. "Let me grow up wondering why my life is so different, then suddenly rip me away from my family a isolate me up here with a rock. Yeah, great plan! You tell me, Master, which one sounds more appealing to you?"
"I am truly very sorry," said Shatarah. Knuckles sat down on the top step of the staircase.
"I know," said Knuckles. "And I'm not mad. It just would have made things easier to know that all of that abu…uh, stuff was for a reason."
Shatarah sat down next to Knuckles.
"Why don't we just forget about your lessons for today?" he said. Knuckles thought for a moment.
"Can…can I stay here anyway?" he asked. "I don't want to go home." Shatarah looked at him.
"Of course you can stay here," he said.
"Thank you," said Knuckles. Then he stood and walked over to the other side of the Emerald and looked out over the Ruins. Shatarah came and stood next to him.
"It was beautiful when it was still a city," he said. Knuckles nodded. He thought it was STILL beautiful. The Ruins had always mesmerized him.
"Why did you choose me?" he asked. Shatarah started to answer, but suddenly he and Knuckles heard someone running up the steps towards them. Knuckles turned around and saw a pink hedgehog girl in a red and white mini dress and similarly colored boots.
"Amy!" said Knuckles. He ran over to her and saw that she was crying.
"What's wrong?" he asked.
"Sally!" said Amy as she sobbed.
"Who's Sally?" asked Shatarah as he walked around the Master Emerald towards the two children.
"Sally is a princess," said Knuckles. "And this hedgehog guy I know, Sonic, is in love with her. But Amy here is in love with Sonic."
"Oh, I see," said Shatarah. "Matters of the heart."
"Uh huh," said Knuckles. He put his hands on Amy's shoulders and sat her down on the steps.
"Now," he said, "what about Sally?" Amy pushed away her tears and spoke as calmly as she could.
"Sally came to visit Sonic," she began. "Now it's impossible to separate the two of them. What's more, she doesn't know when she's leaving , and until then she's staying at my house!" Amy began to cry again.
"Ok," said Knuckles, "just calm down."
"I can't!" said Amy. "Not only does Sally come to stay until who-knows-when, but she has the apathy to ask if she can stay with me!" Shatarah snickered, and Knuckles tried hard not to laugh.
"Um, Amy," he said, unable to hide his amusement. "I think that the word you're looking for is 'audacity'."
"It's not funny!" said Amy, still crying.
In his head, Knuckles laughed hysterically and said "yes it is," but outside, he suppressed his laughter, gave Amy a hug, and said "I know it's not."
"It'll be alright," he added.
"But Knuckles," said Amy, "how could someone be so mean?" Knuckles looked at her.
"Does Sally even know that you like Sonic?" he asked. Amy looked down.
"Ah ha," said Knuckles. Amy glanced up at him.
"That makes things a little different, doesn't it?" Knuckles continued.
"What do I do?" asked Amy.
"Why don't you give Sally a chance?" said Knuckles. "She's really not that bad."
"But Knuckles I-" Amy started, but Knuckles placed his finger over her mouth.
"Shhhh." he said. Amy reached up and took Knuckles' hand in hers. It made him feel a bit awkward, but she was upset, so he was willing to do whatever it took to cheer her up.
"I suppose I could try to give her a chance," said Amy. Knuckles smiled. Amy smiled back.
"You'll make a good husband someday," she said. Knuckles blushed, again feeling very awkward. Then Amy turned and looked at the Master Emerald.
"What's this?" she asked as she scampered over to it and began inspecting the base.
"That's the Master Emerald," said Knuckles, confused by Amy's question.
"No, not THAT," said Amy. "This." she pointed to a series of seven pictures around the base of the Emerald. Knuckles knelt down next to her and looked at them.
"It's a story," he said.
"A story about what?" asked Amy.
"We don't know for sure," said Shatarah. Knuckles and Amy turned around.
"We've never found any scrolls to tell us what happened in that era," Shatarah continued, "but rumor has it that the story is about a Princess."
"Will you tell it to us?" asked Amy.
Shatarah knelt down next to the children and pointed at the first picture. In it, flames where everywhere, and an echidna princess was lying on the ground near what looked like the Emerald's staircase.
"There was a battle," said Shatarah. "And the Princess was injured." he moved to a picture of an echidna warrior helping the Princess up.
"An echidna Warrior came to her rescue," said Shatarah. "Perhaps he was her body-guard." The children followed Shatarah as he move around the Emerald to a picture f the Princess and the Warrior looking up towards the Emerald.
"The trouble was at the Emerald," Shatarah continued. "The Princess knew what had be done." He moved around to a picture of the Princess running towards the Emerald's staircase.
"She knew that she could top the battle," said Shatarah. He moved around to a picture of two hands, one holding the wrist of the other.
"The Warrior thought it was too dangerous," said Shatarah. He moved to a picture of the two echidnas looking at each other. "But for some reason or another, he let her go." Knuckles and Amy Looked at the last picture. In it, the echidna Warrior stood alone.
"What happened to the Princess?" asked Amy.
"No one knows for sure," said Shatarah. "We may never know. All we have to tell us about that era are these pictures and the ones in the Temple.
"There are more pictures?" said Amy excitedly as she stood up.
"Oh yeah," said Knuckles. "The Temple walls are coved with them."
"Can we go and see them?" asked Amy.
"Of course," said Shatarah. "Follow me." He led the children down the steps and along the path to the Temple on the other side of the Ruins.
The Temple was huge, and mostly in tact, although there were several holes in the ceiling, and the entire roof on the far side of the Temple was gone. Below the far wall of the Temple was a pool of water, and in the wall above the pool was several cracks and holes. A picture covering the entire far wall of the Temple depicted a huge liquid monster that looked something like a dinosaur destroying an echidna village. Amy let out a yelp when she saw it. Knuckles and Shatarah turned and looked at her.
"What is that thing?" asked Amy. Shatarah turned towards the picture.
"It is believed that he was the first guardian of the Master Emerald," he said. "The echidnas angered him and he sought to destroy them. At least, that's what I gathered from the pictures." Knuckles looked around. Amy was gone.
"Where's Amy?" he said. The two echidnas looked around the room and spotted Amy staring at the pictures on the eastern wall of the Temple. The pictures on that wall were the same ones that were around the base of the Master Emerald, but this time Amy spotted a couple of startling details that she hadn't noticed before.
"Knuckles," she said. "This echidna looks an awful lot like you."
"Echidnas often look a lot alike," said Knuckles.
"But look," said Amy. "He's got a crescent shape on his chest, just like you!"
"Huh?" said Knuckles. He and Shatarah walked over and stood next to Amy.
"He does have a birthmark like mine," said Knuckles. "That's really weird." He tried to think of an explanation for the strange coincidence.
"It's probably one of my ancestors," he said. "It couldn't possibly be me." He turned towards the door. It the sun as starting to set.
"Maybe we should go home now," he said. He headed for the door, when suddenly Amy spotted another eerie detail.
"Look at the shoes!" she said. Knuckles spun around and looked back at the pictures. The echidna Princess was wearing sandals, but the Warrior was wearing shoes that looked oddly like the ones that Knuckles was wearing: red and yellow stripes, and much to modern for the era depicted in the pictures.
"Ok," said Knuckles. "Now I'm freaked out. How is that even possible?"
"Maybe it IS you," said Amy.
"I think I'd remember something like that," said Knuckles.
"Unless it hasn't happened yet," said Amy.
"Impossible," said Knuckles. "Echidnas have flashbacks and nightmares, not visions and dreams." Knuckles spoke from experience. Every time he hit himself or heard two objects hit each other, he had flashbacks. As far as nightmares, well, he hadn't had a good dream since the eve of his tenth birthday. Every night, he would dream about his first day of training. It was brutal, far too brutal for a ten-year-old. He could still feel the pain of the first-
"What if it happened in the past already, but not in the future?" said Amy.
"Huh?" said Knuckles as his thoughts were interrupted.
"If in the future you go into the past," said Amy, "and this event has already happened, then this IS you because you go into the past in the future." Knuckles looked at Amy with confusion.
"Huh?"
Amy rolled her eyes and pointed to the pictures on the wall.
"Look," she said, a bit agitated. "This event has OBVIOUSLY already happened. And yes, it happened thousands of years ago, before you were even THOUGHT of. But if, in the future, you are somehow transported to the past, then that means that you've already been there. And if you've already been there, then couldn't that be you?" Knuckles looked at Amy. Oddly enough, his confusion was gone. However, it had been replaced by disbelief.
"Time-travel?" he said.
"Well, why not?" Amy replied. "It would put you there at that time."
"Time-travel isn't possible," said Knuckles.
"You sound so sure," said Shatarah. Amy and Knuckles turned around.
"Well, it's not," said Knuckles. "Is it?" Shatarah turned towards Knuckles.
"Stop thinking like an adult," he said, "and think like the child that you are."
Knuckles thought back to his early childhood, back to when he HAD a childhood. He did, at one point, believe in time travel. But years of abuse can change a person, and Knuckles hadn't believed in anything for a long time. He turned and looked at the pictures.
"It's not possible," he said. "And that's NOT me." He turned back towards the door.
"This place is starting to creep me out," he said. "Come on, Amy. I'll take you home." Amy followed, but turned back to look towards Shatarah.
"Knuckles," said Amy, jogging a bit to catch up to the young echidna boy. "I REALLY think that it's you in those pictures!"
"No," said Knuckles, "It's n-"
Knuckles was interrupted by a loud noise and a bright light that lit up the evening sky.
"What was that?!" cried Amy as she grabbed Knuckles' arm. Knuckles put his free arm around Amy and turned towards Shatarah wit ha puzzled expression.
"The Emerald!" said Shatarah. Suddenly, there was a whirring noise over the far side of the Temple. Knuckles looked in that direction to see some kind of liquid pouring into the pool through one of the holes in the wall above it. Then, to his horror, he saw the seven Chaos Emeralds drop from the sky into the pool. The water began to make a gurgling sound and Amy buried her face in Knuckles' shoulder and began to cry.
"Don't worry," said Knuckles. "I won't let anything bad happen to you."
Suddenly, out of the pool rose the creature depicted in the picture on the Temple's far wall. Amy screamed in horror.
"Knuckles!" yelled Shatarah as he turned and prepared to fight the monster. "Get Amy out of here! I'll take car of this!"
Knuckles grabbed Amy's hand and ran for the door. He could hear the battle between his Master and the Creature going on behind him.
THWACK!
Knuckles flashed back to his first day of training. It was his tenth birthday, and Goweh had hit him in the left eye. He had hit him much too hard, too, as Knuckles had had a twitch in that eye every since that day.
Suddenly, Knuckles heard two thuds and flashed back to the first time he was hit wit ha staff. Goweh had knocked him to the ground, and Knuckles had started to cry.
"STOP CRYING!" Goweh had yelled. "IT SHOWS WEAKNESS!"
Suddenly, Amy screamed, shaking Knuckles out of his flashback.
"Knuckles, look!" Amy cried. Knuckles turned to see Shatarah lying on the ground next to the door.
"Master Shatarah!" yelled Knuckles as he ran to his teacher's side. He rolled Shatarah over on his back.
"The Emeralds…" said Shatarah weakly. "Get…the Emeralds."
Knuckles turned towards the Creature to see that it had all seven Chaos Emeralds inside of it. The Creature roared, and Knuckles looked at Amy.
"Stay here," he said. Then he stood up and ran towards the far end of the Temple.
He glided over the pool, clung to the wall, and climbed it until he was level with the Creature's head. The Creature roared again.
Knuckles took a deep breath. He jumped towards the Creature, hoping to inflict some damage. But to his dismay, he went right through the strange beast, crashing to the floor.
"Drat!" said Knuckles as he stood back up. "If I go right through it, then how am I supposed to-" then he had an idea. Again, he scaled the Temple wall, but this time he aimed for the Emeralds. When he jumped through the Creature this time, he managed to grab two of the Emeralds. Not only did this reduce the Creature's size, but it also changed it's shape from that resembling a dinosaur to what resembled a mutated dolphin.
"It's getting it's power from the Emeralds," said Knuckles. He turned towards Amy and Shatarah.
"AMY!" he yelled. Amy looked up.
"CATCH!" yelled Knuckles. He threw the Emeralds towards Amy. She ran towards the Emeralds-and so did the Creature!
"On second thought, don't catch!" Knuckles yelled. Amy ran back to Shatarah, who was still lying on the ground.
Knuckles positioned himself and prepared to jump. He may have been on the ground, but the Creature was a lot smaller now, so he could still get a good shot at the Emeralds. He jumped through the Creature and grabbed three more Emeralds, again shrinking the Creature and changing it's shape to look a bit like a human with claws.
Knuckles threw the Emeralds as far away as he could. When the Creature went after them, Knuckles jumped through it and grabbed the last two Emeralds.
Knuckles stood up and turned around to see that the Creature was still standing, but again it had gotten smaller. It's shape, however, hadn't changed that much. It's arms were shorter and it was standing straighter, but it didn't really look much different.
Again, Knuckles threw the Emeralds as far away from the Creature as he could and jumped through it again, hoping to destroy it. When Knuckles stood and turned around, the Creature was still standing there.
"What ARE you?" asked Knuckles. The Creature seemed to glare at Knuckles, then spoke in what sounded like a hiss and a growl at the same time.
"I am Chaos," he said. Then he turned towards the Emeralds.
"Dot it," said Knuckles, "and I'll just beat you again!"
Suddenly, there was a loud whirring outside. Chaos gave Knuckles another glare, then left the Temple through the hole he had entered by.
Knuckles ran back over to Amy and Shatarah.
"Master!" he said.
"Knuckles," said Shatarah weakly. "Have faith,"
"Have faith?" said Knuckles. "What do you mean?"
"Faith like Amy's," said Shatarah. "Believe."
With that, the old echidna laid his head back and breathed his last. Amy began to cry again. Knuckles helped her to her feet and held her trembling body in his arms.
"Is he d-d-d…" Amy started. Knuckles placed his hand on the back of her head. He closed his eyes and remembered the day that Shatarah had made Knuckles believe that there was more and that death was nothing to fear.
"No," he said quietly. "He just went home."
