"What's the trouble?" Tails asked. The bat looked at the fox in a questioning way. "Long story... I'll tell you later."
"Well, it all started four days ago when Shadow and I found a chaos emerald." "A chaos emerald?" Rouge nodded. "Shadow took it and the next day he. Well, he transformed into a Monster..." She explained. "What do you mean?" Sonic asked. "You know, a monster; rugged fur, large wings, claws, sharp teeth... I tried telling him he wasn't like that, that he would be alright. I took him to fly with me, and that's when it all went wrong..." Knuckles felt her squeezing his hand pretty hard. "What happened after?" Sonic asked while sitting down. "Shadow's eyes suddenly turned black, and he try... He tried to kill me..." As was telling this she slowly pulled her knees up to her chest, still horrified by the incident. She was used to danger and had been a target many times, but Shadow was like a brother to her and she just couldn't bare the thought of him trying to kill her like he did. "While we were flying, he locked my wings against my body and dived down, trying to slam me to the ground. It's like he's possessed."
The sun was already setting when everyone had calmed down. They were just sitting in the tall grass with the altar standing behind them. It was only then that they paid attention to Knuckles' new looks. "Well, sorry for just noticing but why are you dressed all festive?" Rouge asked. The guardian looked down on himself and noticed he was practically covered with precious metals and gemstones. "Well, I think that like Tails all of this came with the transformation." He explained but they were distracted by the fox who started to shake and moan. "Tails, you ok, buddy?" He suddenly stopped and he just looked out in front of him with a blank expression and half closed eyes. "Tails?" Sonic said while waving his hand in front of him. "The name's Alan, but nice to finally meet you." Tails said while offering his hand. Sonic was freaked out, as were Knuckles and Rouge.
"I'm sorry if my abrupt interruption startled you, but I needed to speak with you." The voice was the same, but the manner of speaking was politer then Tails' normal speech.
"I came to understand that you all have been touched by a spirit?" They all nodded, Rouge included. "Wait, you have an emerald too?"
"It's good to see two of us have already been able to fuse with our hosts." Alan continued. "Fuse with a host? Like a parasite?" Rouge asked slightly disgusted. "Not exactly, you see, we don't need the host to survive, because we've all passed away already. We choose a host that stand closest to the ones we were when we still lived. When the evil that struck us down that day had reappeared in this world we were somehow called back into existence to aid you." Tails' eyes shifted to Knuckles. "You must have fused with the spirit of Fotia. She was a mighty warrior, I trust you are as fierce as she was." Knuckles didn't seem pleased to have fused with a girl spirit. "So that's why you're all dolled up." Sonic Joked. Rouge snickered.
"Can you at least tell me what I fused with, I mean you're a mage and I-" "Am a salamander." The thought of the tiny puddle creature came to their minds and Rouge and Sonic just started laughing. "You appear to have mixed up the amphibian from this world, with a powerful elemental lizard from mine." The two immediately stopped laughing and turned to Knuckles.
"Just hold out your hand, please. Yes, and now try to visualize you are holding a flame." Knuckles really focused and suddenly a flame shot from his palm and rested in his hand.
"Wow, this feels weird..." "You are now able to summon and control fire at your will." The guardian formed a fist, crushing the flame out. He seemed to be glad with his new power.
"You've also mentioned one of your friends turned into a monster?" Alan asked Rouge who nodded at the question. "In that case, Agalma is already one step ahead of us... Your friend must have fused with him, he's a gargoyle spirit, he almost destroyed our world, he's an Evil, murderous, manipulative creature who leaves nothing but destruction and despair in its wake."
"You mean... Shadow is also like that?" Rouge asked carefully. Alan turned to the girl and shook his head. "Agalma looks for the heavyhearted and confused. This fusion was forced, he didn't stand a chance. Listen carefully, you must find the two remaining members of my resistance, and you two should find a way to fuse as soon as possible. There may not be that much time left." He spoke before he stopped controlling Tails.
His eyes widened as Sonic got a hold of his shoulders, keeping him from tipping over. "Well, I guess that explains some things..." He said with a drowsy voice.
"We have to stick together, we spend the night here and go look for the others in the morning." Sonic said.
"Here, on Angel island? No place for a girl like me, but I guess there's no other option." Rouge said while leaning back a little, brushing up to Knuckles.
The next morning the four hero's went over their mission. "Ok, there are two more emeralds out there." Sonic explained. "And someone must have found them by now."
"The two missing emeralds are the aqua, and the green colored ones. And I've noticed a trend, just hold out your emeralds." Knuckles said. "For some reason we all received the emerald matching our fur color." "That isn't true, I have nothing purple on me and still I got the purple one..." Rouge had a point if she got one that didn't match that would mean the 'trend' is a coincidence.
"We can't think of that now." Tails interrupted. "If we rule this out we have nothing to go on. And if you are right then we'll at least know it's not them."
Sonic thought for a moment. "Do we know any green or light blue colored people?"
"I don't know anyone who's blue besides you, Sonic, but I happen to have an old green friend." Knuckles added with a smile on his face. "If you mean that thief ,Jet, then I'm quite concerned about your friend choices." Rouge added. "What? I wouldn't trust that egomaniac to save my life."
"Then who is it, Knuckles?"
