Lethal Mutation

Hello again, all three or four dedicated readers that I know of! Seriously, guys! Almost 100 visitors to this story so far, and only 5 reviews?! Well, at any rate, super-ultra-mega-giga-(you get the picture) thanks to my continuing reviewers Zachary W and Nicend! You guys seriously rock! Also, thanks to the readers who have favorited my story already, but haven't reviewed. Don't be afraid, I won't spike you if you give a lame review, just if you give me none! (If anyone that runs this site reads this, I am not really serious, seriously!) I also want to send out a missing reviewer alert for whoever was my first anonymous reviewer. Come back, mysterious person with sage and wonderful advice!!

Anyways, for all of you people that wanted to know where in the world last chapter's cliffhanger would take this story, I have a surprise for you! On the same note, anyone who is wondering when Knuckles was going to appear in this story is also in for a surprise! But, since I can't satisfy everyone at once, only one group will get their wish in this chapter. Which one will it be? Just read on to find out!

Chapter 4: Just Like Old Times

Angel Island, the same Sunday as last chapter.

I have the best job in the world, he thought to himself. All day long I just stand around doing whatever I please as long as I protect one huge gem that no one could even steal unless they used a forklift to carry it. It seems strange that I had to prove myself to be the toughest echidna in existence just to get such an easy, laid-back job. Knuckles pondered that last thought for a while. Well, actually, I may be the only echidna left in existence! I guess that's the only real problem with my job; there is nobody else to talk to! Even when I do get an unexpected visitor, I have to kick them out to prevent anything from happening to the Master Emerald. This job is very important, and I can't take any chances or the world will be in grave danger. Knuckles just sighed. He had a reputation as the toughest being alive and had a matching personality. The only time he ever showed that the loneliness truly affected him was when he was all alone on his floating island in the sky. Even then, Knuckles' pride would cause him to only utter a single sigh before once again resuming his concrete block of all weak emotions. Then again, Knuckles thought, everybody needs a vacation now and then, even if their job is as easy as mine. I think that a little time off couldn't hurt anything…, but only for one day! His mind had caught his willpower fading and had compromised to allow him only a 24 hour reprieve without a guilty conscience. Only question is, where will I go? As he gazed off into the land below where Angel Island now floated, he remembered the perfect spot.

It sure has been a long time, Knuckles reminisced seeing the rundown streets and street corner vendors of a small Chinese city. This place doesn't seem to have changed a bit, though. As if to prove his point, a gang of very familiar crooks surrounded him as he walked down a shady alley.

"I've been waiting for a long time for you to show up, bub! I'm gonna make you pay for making a fool out of me and escaping with my prisoner and my treasure!" The voice came from an aging, slightly overweight man dressed in a white collared shirt with khaki pants and who wore the stereotypical face of a mob boss. It took a couple of seconds for Knuckles to remember where he had seen this face before.

"Are you still mad about when Hawk and I escaped your prison cell and grabbed the chaos emerald before you could?" Knuckles smiled as he recognized the glare that the older man gave him. "Well, I may still be mad that you locked us up in the first place!" Knuckles said as he folded his arms across his chest defiantly.

"Then I guess it's personal," retorted the familiar boss with a chuckle. "Get him guys! I want him pulverized!"

Ten men rushed at Knuckles all at once. Being a superior fighter to any human, Knuckles assumed a defensive stance and waited for the attackers to get into range, undaunted by the unfair numbers of 10 to 1 odds. Rather than attack, however, Knuckles simply ducked and rolled out of the center of the rapidly closing circle at the last second. All the men collided together in a heap where he had once stood.

"Come on! Don't tell me you've waited all this time for revenge and this is all you got, old man!" taunted Knuckles.

"Quit fooling around and get him!" the aging boss shouted to his men.

Suddenly, Knuckles found himself surrounded again by the men, only this time they had knives drawn. This ought to be fun! Knuckles told himself. A man quickly lunged forward from the circle and slashed his knife at the level of Knuckles' throat. Knuckles easily defeated the strike to his jugular with a quick step backwards and countered by grabbing the assailant's wrist, twisting it over 180 degrees causing the man to lose his grip on his knife, and hurling the man over his shoulder into another attacker behind him. A loud scream from his victim told Knuckles that he was now only outmanned 9 to 1. The pain from that wrist will be unbearable, he assessed. I think I might have actually torn some of the muscles in his arm with that one. He grinned as the other men stared in disbelief at the ease of Knuckles' devastating counter attack. These men are definitely not professionals. I have them spooked!

"Hyaahhhh!" shouted another man as he foolishly announced his attack. Knuckles sidestepped a flurry of stabs to the chest from the man directly to his left, and retaliated with a lightning-fast uppercut that collided with the man's jaw in a sickening sound of bones breaking. The man fell to the street from the one hit KO. Two down, eight to go! Knuckles was enjoying this mockery of a fight so far. If they keep coming one at a time, this will be easy! As if the remaining men could read minds, his assailants closed the circle by taking a couple more steps forward. A quick movement by the man to Knuckles' front-left spurred the echidna into a dodge to the right. The attack was only a feint, however, and the man that Knuckles had now turned his back to took advantage of the distraction. With a swift backhanded slash, the man laid open a large diagonal gash in the echidna's exposed backside from his left shoulder to his right mid-torso.

"Aaaahhhh!!" shouted out Knuckles at the pain of having his back laid open like a cleaned fish. He realized too late that he had seriously underestimated his still eight to one disadvantage, despite his opponents' somewhat lack of skill. Seeing the moment of weakness in the otherwise invincible echidna, all the other men advanced rapidly with their knives slashing. "You think that one cut is enough to stop me?" hollered the enraged Knuckles, "Think again!!" He quickly spun into a red whirlwind of punches, jabs, kicks, and thrusts as the men began their attack as a mob. His aggressive assault beat back several attackers immediately, all of them knocked out cold. Those who escaped his initial punishment were sought out and pummeled mercilessly. One man took a powerful kick full force to the stomach and coughed up blood from a punctured lung. Another unlucky soul was nailed in the hip by a mighty punch and crumpled to the pavement, momentarily paralyzed from the waist down. The two final men were KO'd by Knuckles' smashing their two skulls together with a frightening amount of force. As he looked around at his handiwork, Knuckles saw 10 men all strewn about the alleyway. A few where attempting to limp or crawl away, a couple were still screaming in sheer pain, and the rest were out cold in the middle of the road. Every single one of Knuckles' defeated assailants would need medical attention of some sort, and a few men looked like they would need help fast if they were going to survive. I may have overdone it a little, Knuckles realized as his rage cooled to allow him a twinge of guilt for the brutally mauled bodies all around him.

"No one makes a fool of me!" yelled the elderly boss as he stared slack-jawed at his best men all mutilated in the street. He now held a loaded Magnum in his right hand, which was aimed directly at Knuckles' skull. His finger tightened around the trigger as the older man fantasized about killing the only thing in his entire long reign as gang leader that had ever dared oppose him and won, twice. Then, the elderly man was suddenly thrown to the ground as a heavy object tackled him just as a single shot rang out.

"Urghhh!" he painfully shouted through his barred teeth. The pain from the wound was only intensified by the stinging of the antibacterial rinse that was now being applied to it. Luckily, the large diagonal gash was superficial only and hadn't gone deeper into any muscle tissue. A strip of gauze bandage was fastened to the entire length of the now dressed wound, and Knuckles was allowed to turn back around to face his Good Samaritan. It was none other than the very same person that he had come back to this place to find, Hawk. Hawk was a slightly rotund human with a brown coat and pants that stood about a head taller than Knuckles, which is still fairly short by human standards. His favorite occupation was treasure hunting, and he was the kind of man that could never lie to a friend, of which Knuckles happened to be his best one. "I guess that I owe ya one now, Eh, bud?" Knuckles mentioned to his old buddy.

"No way, Knuckles! You see, now we're even," replied Hawk. He had been the one who had overheard the commotion in the alleyway and had snuck up for a closer look. Hawk had been shocked to see his long-lost friend Knuckles in a fight for his life. Hawk had known that he wasn't a good enough fighter to help his buddy so he had just watched from the shadows, but when the leader of the gang had aimed a gun at Knuckles' head, he had figured that he needed to do something. His flying tackle had knocked the elderly crime boss down and the weapon had fired a split second later, missing Knuckles' skull by mere inches. Disarmed, Hawk had grappled with the man and won. Seconds later, police and paramedics had arrived at the scene and carted away the criminals, most of them in stretchers. Hawk had then led Knuckles to his secret hideaway to talk and see to his injury.

"Well, I guess you're right, Hawk. I had almost nearly forgot about how I saved your life the first time we met," Knuckles thought out loud. He had been searching for a chaos emerald in an old ruin when Hawk had cried out for help. Knuckles had saved Hawk from being squashed by a clichéd falling ceiling booby-trap, and, in return, Hawk had given Knuckles news later that he had found a chaos emerald and wanted to give it to him. However, the same gang boss that had nearly blown Knuckles away today had kidnapped him and Hawk, hoping that they would tell him the location Hawk had hidden the emerald in. After busting out of their dungeon cell, Hawk had led Knuckles to the spot where the emerald was buried in the subway. Eggman's robo-ninja and Rouge the Bat had attempted to steal the emerald once it was uncovered, but Knuckles had defeated the robot with Hawk's help once Rouge had given up and left. "That oversized red jewel caused a lot of trouble for us last time!" Knuckles laughed as Hawk also joined in. To this day, no one knew why the vacant subway station had collapsed except for them, Eggman, and possibly Rouge.

"Actually, I'm glad that you mentioned that, Knuckles," Hawk interrupted their laughter at remembering that intense night of winner-takes-all emerald snatching. That red emerald had changed hands so often that just finding out who had it had been a challenge. Hawk ended up with the emerald in the end which, true to his word, he immediately gave to Knuckles despite its undeniable worth. Now, Hawk held a small burlap bag in his hands and tossed it at Knuckles. Knuckles instinctively caught the parcel and opened the tied off lip of the bag. As he stared into the sack to view its contents, a bright red light escaped into the room from the opened lip of the bag.

"No way! It's the same chaos emerald that you gave to me back when we first met!" exclaimed the dumbfounded Knuckles as he removed the chaos emerald from its concealment inside the sack.

"That's right, Knuckles! I was on another one of my treasure hunts in some ancient ruins far away from here when I found this emerald half buried in mud in the middle of a deep jungle. I realized that something must have scattered the emeralds again and that you would be needing this back someday," Hawk spoke to his best friend. "I want you to have it again."

"I can't just accept this; it's too valuable for you to just give away!" Knuckles replied to Hawk's overwhelming generosity. "Last time I paid for the emerald by saving your life, Hawk, but now that we're even, I have to give you something in return first." He extended his hand with the emerald in his palm to return it to his friend.

"You already have, Knuckles!" Hawk quickly countered, having anticipated such a response from his best friend. "I have been chased and sought after by that gang of crooks ever since the day we escaped their jail cell. Now that you have put them out of business permanently, I can start living my life without checking over my shoulder every two seconds! Plus, you kept your promise to return to see me again someday, even though it must have been hard to leave the Master Emerald and Angel Island unguarded." Knuckles had told Hawk all about his job and where he lived the first time that they had met. "Come on, Knuckles, you deserve it," Hawk finished while shoving Knuckles' hand with the emerald in it away from himself.

Knuckles shifted his gaze from Hawk's sincere smile to the red emerald and back again. Finally, he pocketed the emerald close to his chest in a pouch of skin hidden by his red and white fur. "Thanks, Hawk! You know this means a lot to me," Knuckles broke the silence at last.

"I know," Hawk replied swiftly. "But… If you really want to pay me back for that emerald so badly, maybe you could join me on an adventure sometime? I have just started a new case on the world's oldest map, and you are welcome to come along."

"Why search for a map when you could go looking for treasure?" Knuckles inquisitively asked the excited treasure hunter.

"Because a fellow from a museum in the U.S. says that it might be the link between other old maps and the last know coordinates of the lost island of Meracia," Hawk explained. "I never heard the tales myself, but it is supposedly a highly-advanced civilization that was lost under the sea thousands of years ago. This man wants this map to find the location of the ruins of Meracia, and he is willing to pay any price to get his hands on it. So, do you want to come?"

"Sure, If you don't mind me hangin' around," Knuckles accepted the invitation.

"No problem, Knuckles! I won't be leaving for another week or so, which gives you plenty of time to get ready. Speaking of time, you had better get going, don't you think?" Hawk spoke up, noticing that it was already nightfall.

Oh No, he's right! thought Knuckles as he became aware of the late hour as well. I have been away all day! What if someone has tried to steal the Master Emerald while I was gone? Worry began to show on Knuckles' usually perfectly stalwart face. I need to get back to Angel Island, now! "Sorry that I have to leave so soon, Hawk, but you're right, I need to get goin' right away! Goodbye, friend!" Knuckles said over his shoulder as he left the secret hideaway via the fifth story window in the room. As he glided away, dreadlocks blowing in the night breeze, he heard a voice from the window shout "goodbye" before he was out of earshot.

(note: OK, after reading through this chapter one last time, I thought I might want to say something about the violence. Knuckles is used to fighting robots all the time, not flesh and blood humans, so he probably would mess those guys up like that in reality. And, remember that he felt bad afterwards. Graphic is not my thing, though, so don't worry about too many more brutal fight scenes in the future. This chapter was a huge reason my fanfic was rated Teen.)