Stardown: I read your review after finishing the chapter, but great question! Thanks for that!
By the way, "Chaos" refers to the topic of chaos emeralds, chaos energy, etc, rather than the being from Sonic Adventure unless otherwise stated. You probably knew that, though.
My alarm clock went off, filling the room with it's hateful sound and dragging me from my uncharacteristically restful sleep. Instead of getting up, I decided to lay there and drown my thoughts in the noise. I finally pried my eyes open.
7:04, it read. I kicked off my covers and rolled to the side of the bed, then threw myself off the edge and onto my feet.
"Stop," I ordered. The alarm fell silent. I wiped the sleep from my eyes and let out a big yawn before beginning my morning routine.
x
The words 'Carriston University Chaos Engineering Center' were plastered across the brick facade of the building I worked in. The inside of the building consisted of a small lobby and two splitting hallways lined with labs and classrooms. My lab was at the end of the left hall and was safeguarded by several layers of security. I verified my identity and entered the room to find Carter already sitting at his workdesk. He was staring down at an empty piece of paper with a pencil contemplatively pressed into his cheek.
"Morning," I greeted.
"Hm? Oh, morning…" He dropped the pencil onto the desk and turned to face me. "I was just wondering what we'd be doing today."
I reclined into my own desk. "You say you've spent a lot of time with Chaos Physics recently, but there's nothing to study about it yet because it's such a new subject. So have you written any hypotheses yet?"
He shook his head, averting his eyes. "I don't have nearly as much… first-hand experience and knowledge about Chaos as you do. Like… I've heard of a "Master Emerald," but I have no idea what it is or what it does."
I was a bit disillusioned. I had believed that his enthusiasm towards Chaos Physics research was derived from a desire to test his theories and ideas, but he didn't have any. I had a solution, though. "That's an easy fix! Let's pay Knuckles a visit!"
"Who's Knuckles?" He asked.
"He's the guardian of the Master Emerald. If there's anyone who can tell us everything about it, then it's him. I don't know all that much about it myself, so we can both learn from this."
"That sounds like a good idea… when are we going?"
"Right now. Top priority." I stood up.
"Oh!" He clambered to his feet, and I turned towards the exit. "Shouldn't we take the emerald with us?"
"No. Knuckles and I both have one." He pressed his lips in surprise. "Did you drive here?"
"Er… yeah. Need a lift?"
"Yeah. Let's get going."
x
Carter's car was an old, blue Kuruma with a worn out, leather interior. Despite its disheveled facade, it started without protest. He asked what kind of music I listen to, but I told him that I don't. He hummed and pressed his first preset before putting the car in reverse and navigating out of the parking lot. The music was terrible, in my opinion, but I didn't complain. Instead, I guided him in the right direction at every intersection and turn. We soon reached my street on the outskirts of the city. He turned into my driveway and parked the car. We both got out of the car; I was eager to escape the noise of the music.
"So this is Knuckles's house?" he asked as we approached the door.
"No, this is my house," I answered as I unlocked the door. I opened it to the sound of heavy snoring. Carter had a confused look, but knew better than to make noise. We stepped inside, and I closed the door. On the couch was the sleeping form of Sonic, his head bent at a seemingly uncomfortable angle. Carter raised his eyebrows at the rare sight. I beckoned for him to follow me across the living room. As we passed the couch, I lifted Sonic by the back and knees and shifted him to the left a bit, and his snoring stopped. I unfolded the blanket that was draped on the head of the couch and threw it over him. We continued on into a hallway in the corner of the room. I opened the further of the hallway's only two doors, revealing the hangar to Carter. His eyes widened.
"Planes?" he whispered, entering the room. I nodded and shoot the door behind us. I grabbed two pairs of goggles from the rack next to the door and handed him one.
Deja Vu…
He scrutinized the headwear. "Are we really taking a plane?"
"Heh, when foxes fly," I joked. He breathed a sigh of relief.
"Heh… What are these for, then?" I slipped my goggles on and flew myself into the cockpit of the Tornado 3. He choked on a gasp and gawked at me.
"To keep the wind out of your eyes. C'mon, it'll be fine. This is the most reliable plane you'll ever ride in." He timidly donned the goggles and climbed into the back seat. His thick brown hair sat awkwardly over the top of the goggles and his normally thin cheeks were pressed thick while his round cheekbones were pulled thin.
"Open," I ordered loudly. The hangar door began to open with a muffled mechanical whir. Carter put on a huge grin as we prepared to fly.
x
Angel Island slowly peeked over the horizon like a big earthen sun. I circled the floating isle a few times, then picked a flat, grassy area to land on. The plane shook gently as it decelerated across the bumpy field. Carter cheered and laughed behind me as we came to a stop.
"Haha! That was awesome!"
"Yeah? Well, we'll be doing it pretty often. I think." I unbuckled and tossed my goggles onto the floor. Carter did the same.
"So this is where Knuckles lives? A massive floating island?"
"Mmhm."
"That's amazing… But… How does it have a dessert, snowy mountain, jungle, volcano, and lake at the same time? It's not that big!" I had never considered that before. I mused at the concept for a moment.
"I'm not sure. We should get going, though." He nodded, and I grabbed my notebook.
"Yeah. Let's go!"
x
There was nothing between us and the gargantuan stone temple ahead except distance. That's the main reason I chose the landing spot that I did; I didn't want to pass through any dangerous zones since I was accompanied by Carter. While my eyes were fixed towards the altar ahead, Carter's were darting around, taking in every detail that dared cross our view.
"What's that?" Carter asked, indicating a purple lattice structure that peeked over the trees in the distance.
"Definitely a part of Launch Base Zone."
"Huh… That reminds me…" He jutted his chin forward pensively. "I've always wondered why so many places are called "zones" instead of what they are… Like the plains over in the Midwest: it's got the Great Plain Zone, Orange Mesa Zone, and a few others… Why not just the Great Plains or the Orange Mesas?"
Carter was full of observations and questions, I came to learn. I respected his curiosity.
"I dunno… Probably for organization or something. I guess it makes geography easier if places are divided into hard borders."
"Hm… Makes sense…" He pursed his lips. After a short while of silent strolling, he pointed to the altar. "So is that where the Master Emerald is?"
"Mmhm. That's where Knuckles watches over it twenty-four seven." He hummed his acknowledgement. Our walking pace was much slower than I would like, so I posed Carter with a question: "How fast can you run?"
Carter's eyebrows furrowed. "I dunno… Not fast, though—maybe three or four meters per second."
"Oh…" I wondered if he would be comfortable with me flying him the rest of the way… I really wanted to hurry, so I asked him. "Hey, what if I fly us the rest of the way there?"
"Fly? But the plane's back…" His perplexed look turned to enlightenment. "Oh, right! I forgot about that… Can you carry my weight? I'm sixty kilograms."
Sixty. The exact average for a sixteen years old human boy, if I remembered correctly. "You're less than double Sonic's weight, and I can carry him pretty easily nowadays."
I jumped in the air, twirled my tails behind me, and hovered above Carter. He grabbed my wrists, and I heaved upwards. He was light enough to transport quickly, and I judged his grip to be tight enough to not slip, so I whisked him away at a more enjoyable speed.
x
The length of the trip was cut to only a few minutes. I set Carter down at the bottom of the altar's steps and landed. My tails were burning with exhaustion, so I tasked my hands with rubbing away the soreness. Carter was rolling his shoulders for the same reason. We tacitly agreed to start climbing the steps.
"That wasn't too bad, was it?" I asked. He shook his head.
"Mm-mm. That was fun, just gliding over the ground like that."
"Yeah…" The familiar, almost silent tones of the Master Emerald met my ears, as they had several times before. "We're almost to the top, now. Before we get there, what do you think the Master Emerald looks like?"
Carter tilted his head back and pursed his lips. "Uh… Maybe a huge gem with… all seven of the other emeralds' colours. Yeah—a rainbow emerald about two meters high."
"Hm. Well, we're here!" Carter's eyes widened as we climbed the last few steps. Softly shining in all its awe inspiring splendour sat a great, green gem, upon which slept a burly, bright red echidna.
"Ah…" was all Carter could muster.
"Not quite how you described it… but still pretty cool, eh?" He nodded.
"So that's Knuckles?" He indicated the echidna sleeping on top of the emerald.
"Yeah. Why don't you go wake him up?" He looked at me as if I had grown a third tail. I snickered.
"Wake him up? He looks like he could kill me with a glare…" I laughed as loud as I could, causing Carter to look back and forth between me and Knuckles with a panic stricken look. Knuckles began to stir, just as I had intended.
"He's harmless! Unless you're trying to take the Master Emerald." I approached Knuckles and shook him by the shoulder. After a moment, he groaned.
"What do you want," he grumbled with closed eyes.
"I want the Master Emerald!" I stated in my best Eggman impression. He jumped to his feet with first bawled and violet eyes wide open. He almost immediately relaxed, though.
"Not funny, Tails…" He jumped off of the emerald. "Who's this?"
"Carter Esaminare, my research partner." Carter, who was visibly alert, slowly let his body relax and came forward to join me.
"Hm." He nodded slowly. "What kind of research?"
"Chaos Physics," he answered. Knuckles tilted his head curiously.
"Yeah, we just want to hear everything you know about the Master Emerald and… well, chaos in general." Knuckles flashed a confident grin and sat on the ground.
"Take a seat: this'll take a while." We obliged, and I prepared my notebook for Knuckles's monologue.
x
Knuckles's stories and pieces of wisdom about the Master Emerald and chaos were quite inspiring, but I only took note of the points that I deemed important:
The Master Emerald occasionally speaks to Knuckles.
Knuckles recites a chant to the Master Emerald to either nullify or fill chaos emeralds.Won't work without the chant.
It can warp spacetime unnaturally (I assume), but with limitations. Sonic once used it directly to go super without chaos emeralds. It can be shattered, and the pieces tend to separate when that happens. Apparently, it can restore the universe to a previous state at max power (which can only be achieved under specific circumstances). Can't prove that yet, though.
The Master Emerald is totally unbiased. Chaos energy is used depending on how its wielder feels: love lets you protect, hate lets you destroy, fear lets you escape, etc.
And that's all.
x
It was noon when we arrived back at the lab, where we both collapsed into our rolling chairs. I passed my notes to Carter. He passed them back to me after a moment.
"'Restore the universe to a previous state,'" he quoted. "That's a lot of power, if we can prove it. Did he mention what those 'specific circumstances' for max power were?"
"He didn't say. By the sound of it, he didn't know, either."
"Oh… Well, let's go ahead and make a list of questions, then." I nodded and turned to a new sheet in my notebook. "First of all… Is Knuckles delusional, or is the Master Emerald sentient?"
"It's sentient. A being called Chaos lives inside of it. That's a divine subject, though; I'm not sure why I even wrote it down."
"Huh… Divine… Does it obey the Law of Conservation of Energy?" I smiled and wrote 'LoCoE' at the top of the paper.
"That's a good place to start," I praised. "Now, what else…"
Sorry this took an entire month, but making up fictional physics based on real physics takes some research.
I'm starting a new story—yeah, I know that four is a little too many to have going at once, but this is something I really want to experiment with. It's gonna be called Warfox. Be on the lookout for it!