Judgment chapter 4
Tails watched in amusement as Cream made him breakfast. The little rabbit was humming to herself, obviously happy. Tails sighed, opening his laptop. He wanted to look a few things up. The primary reason he did this was to hide his face from Creams. He was starting to seriously consider the possibility that she might like him.
"How do you like you eggs?" Tails looked up, having gotten too absorbed in his work to realize that she was talking to him.
"What?"
"How do you like your eggs?" asked the rabbit once more.
"Oh. I don't care. Just however."
"Ok." Cream went back to her cooking.
Suddenly, Tails found what he was looking for. He'd been typing every possible description of the attack launched by Darius into an internet search engine. He found what he was looking for.
Scathe: an extremely powerful magic attack, identifiable by the characteristic energy triangle, the bolts of pure energy, and the large amount of destruction and damage done to multiple targets. The ability to cast Scathe, as well as all other magical attacks, is extremely rare, and thought to have been non-existent for over 1000 years.
For more information see: Magic
Tails looked at the drawing of the attack. Darius had defiantly used Scathe.
"Here you go." Cream laid a large plate of eggs down in front of Tails, as well as a large glass of orange juice.
"Oh. Thanks." Tails turned off and closed his laptop, then set it in his backpack. He took a large bit of egg. He made an odd/surprised face, scarring Cream. He chewed more slowly, rolling his tongue around though the eggs, his face deep in thought. Cream looked like she might have a heart-attack. Finally Tails swallowed.
"Wow," he said looking her in the eyes. "These are great. Did you mom teach you how to cook these?" Cream went from worried to ecstatically happy. She shook her head, indicating that her mother did teach her. Tails smiled, and continued to eat. It really was good. Cream smiled, and started eating hers. Vanilla was still asleep.
Sonic was eating, though weakly. His left arm was driving him crazy. He hated not being able to move it. Amy was watching him carefully, still concerned. After eating 3 chilidogs (even in this condition, chilidogs where the only thing that he was interested in eating), he finally looked away from his food.
"Hey, Amy?" he said, turning as he spoke.
"Yes, Sonic?"
"What happened back there? I don't remember much." Amy looked at him curiously, wondering why he had no memory of the events. It never occurred to her that he had been knocked out for most of it.
"Well, we were exploring the coliseum when Shadow showed up. Tails said something about something below us. He said that it was big and moving." Amy sat up on the bed, then smoothed some of her quills and moved one out of her eyes. "We went down into a room. All of Tails' equipment quit working. We heard some crashing, then the ceiling caved in, leaving us it what was more or less a pit. A dragon showed up, and you and Shadow tried to fight it. You got hurt, then it left for a minute. It came back, knocking some fox named Darius through the wall. I got knocked out after that, so I have no idea what happened next. You'll have to ask Shadow whenever he comes back. How are you feeling?"
"I've been better, and this cast is driving me crazy. When can I leave?"
"Whenever you like after tomorrow. You need to stay for one more night." Sonic groaned, and laid back down in his bed. It was going to be a long day.
Cream was cleaning up after breakfast. Tails had tired to help, but she told him to get off of his knee. She didn't believe him when he said he was fine. So, he had gone into the living room, and got his laptop back out. However, the battery was too low to do anything. He sighed, and looked around the room, board.
Darius opened his eyes. He was standing on top of a large, ruined statue in the middle of the ruined city that he had been looking at just moments before. The sun was going down, but this didn't make any difference to him. He could see better in the dark than the light anyway.
The ruined city was the remains of a very ancient empire. In the center was a huge, run down castle, surrounded by homes and buildings that got smaller and more run-down the closer they got to the outer wall, which was actually in better shape than the rest of the city. Darius didn't know what had led him here, or just where it was, exactly.
He jumped down, and started walking towards the castle. The streets were impassible in some places, having been left out to the elements for an untold number of years. Darius walked into a skeleton. He looked down at, not disgusted or scarred. It had to have been there for at least 200 years. The wind was picking up, and the blowing was making the place seem even more eerie than normal. Darius took in a deep breath, and proceeded to the castle, not the least bit scarred by the noise.
Suddenly, a wild, lesser-fox jumped out in front of him, snarling. It was down on it's paws, with drool coming out of it's mouth. It probably hadn't eaten in days. Darius just looked at it for a second. Then, he reached into his coat, pulling out a gun. He pointed it at the fox, and pulled the trigger. The sound of the gunshot rang out across the dead city, sending birds flying into the air.
Darius continued on, feeling no guilt for killing the lesser-fox. He had probably done it a favor. He never considered the possibility that it might have kits somewhere. A question struck his mind. Just how did the animals evolve in such different ways. How had foxes evolved from lesser-foxes? A lesser-fox was a wild animal, not civilized at all. They didn't speak a single language, and were one of the few species that had evolved in such a way that part of the species was civilized, and one was wild.
The air was getting cooler as he approached the castle. It carried a bad aura, though this was not enough to discourage Darius. He noticed that the wild animals stop nesting at a certain distance from the castle. They wouldn't get any closer.
"Hm. I wonder why."
He reached the top of the steps, and turned around. The sun was no longer visible over the cliff, though some light could still be seen coming over it. Above, the screeches of lesser-bats could be heard. A pain tore though his chest. This castle had been abandoned, but why?
Having no problems seeing in the pitch-black interior of the castle, he proceeded in. The inside was a mess. A large chandelier, which was probably very impressive when it was new, was laying in thousands of pieces in the floor. The massive doors had manages to stay intact, keeping out much of the outside damage. Darius looked up, and saw the moon rising through the massive window frames, one of which still had some glass in it.
He lowered his gaze to the staircase that led into the upper part of the castle. There were several skeletons laying on and around it. Blood that had been spilled so many years ago had soaked in to some of the wood, giving it an eerie, though interesting look. Rain that had came in through the busted windows had washed most of it away. Above the staircase was a large plaque that was still in good enough condition to read. The language was one that Darius didn't recognize at first. However, it soon came to him.
He was in the Palace of Nabdrodeisiea. Or more specifically, the Nechrol of Nabdrodeisiea. This place had been abandoned over 1000 years ago. How it was still in this condition was beyond him. He laughed, remembering the tail that he had been told regarding it's history.
Several years before, when he was still a young kit, Darius's friend told him the story.
"A long time ago, Nabdrodeisiea was a large, powerful empire. The ruled most of the land on the continent that they were on, though not by force. Most of the countries that had been independent before becoming part of Nabdrodeisiea joined out of free will. Everyone loved the royal family, and were in turn treated very kindly.
The palace was magnificent and huge, bigger than it looked, for it had a massive underground section. Every time there was a need to celebrate, the celebration took place inside the palace's huge inner chamber.
After ruling for over 700 years, a new successor to the throne was chosen. His name was Vayne. At first, Vayne's rule went smoothly. But after a couple of years, the people began to distrust him. He wasn't as nice as his predecessors. Soon, a war erupted with a neighboring empire, a war which Nabdrodeisiea won. However, one war led to another, and soon, the entire planet was involved. But the war wasn't against Nabdrodeisiea, it was against her king, Vayne. The other empires knew that the root of the evil was the king, and focused only on assassinating him. A plan was made.
The countries called for a treaty. The meeting was to be held inside the inner chamber of the palace, where parties were normally held. The Kings of the other countries showed up, knowing that they wouldn't make it back. They intended to overwhelm Vayne and kill him themselves. They were sure that Vayne wouldn't be expecting this. The Kings had a reputation for their lack of violence.
In truth, Vayne hadn't been expecting this. He had other plans. He intended to poison all of them, including himself. He was a maniac.
That didn't happen. On the day of the party, Vayne was found, decapitated, lying in his bed.
The citizens of Nabdrodeisiea attacked the kings, assuming that it was their doing. They had been brainwashed by Vayne's lies, most of which were easy to believe. The Kings locked themselves inside the castle, fighting for their lives, trying to convince the public what was going on. However, no one believed it. In a final desperate act, the kings put all of their power together, each having a Chaos Emerald. Vayne's emerald had been captured and was now in the processing of the six Kings. They attempted to use the ancient art of Chaos Control and teleport out. But Vayne's emerald didn't do what was expected of it.
Vayne's hatred and insanity had soaked into the emerald. Instead of teleporting out, a wave of hatred, confusion, violence, and bloodlust exploded from the room. The results were terrible.
For the next week, people focused on mindless killing, having had all other desire. Mothers killed their children, men their wives. The chaos left no one living within 2000 miles of the castle.
The area where the castle once stood was forbidden, and it's location soon forgotten. To this day, no one knows where it is.
"Except me." said Darius to himself. His memories were coming back to him, things that he had forced himself to forget. Such as the last time he was here.
He shook the memories out of his mind, and went off to the right, and then down into the dungeons.
Shadow awoke, startled. It was raining, and he had fell asleep outside. He stood up, noticing that his Chaos emerald was acting strange. It was the red one that he normally carried around with him because he could draw the most power from it. But now, the emerald seemed to want something. Shadow let it lead him away.
On Angle Island, Knuckles awoke at the sound of an explosion. He opened his eyes seconds before hitting the ground, having been tossed through the air. He stood up, and ran over to the Master Emerald. The explosion seemed to have come from there. Knuckles stopped a few steps away from it. It was glowing and pulsating in a odd manner. It's color had also changed from green to red.
Rouge had been enjoying a nice night flight when she the chaos emeralds in her pocket suddenly let out small waves of energy, blowing her several feet off course. She came to a hover and took out the emeralds. The appeared normal, though there were a bit warm.
Alarms went off when the emerald in Dr.Eggman's holding chamber let out a large shockwave of energy. The doctor ran in, followed by his two robots. The doctor took a look at the power output readings. His emerald had just over doubled it's potential maximum energy output. Eggman smiled and laughed to himself.
"Well, it looks like I won't be needing Shadow's emerald after all."
Outside the hospital, it suddenly began storming furiously. Sonic and Amy looked out of the window, both getting the impression that something was not right. At Vanilla's house, Cream and Tails did the same thing.