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Elder Dolph, being the old wolf that he was, needed a little time to reach one of the lookouts to see what the source of those howls were. Inside, he knew that it was Iblis. As the oldest member of the colony, he had heard those roars more times in his life than anyone else had, possibly combined. He doubted that, should he live to see Iblis' true end, that those snarls would ever leave his mind. That was a scary thought.
The wolf stood at the lookout spot and stared, with as passive a face as he could muster, at the magma monster. Like the other members of the colony, he had believed that it had been destroyed by their weapon. As elder, he should have known that it would never be that simple, but he had hoped…
One of the coyote members rushed up to the lookout spot. "Elder Dolph!"
"I know," Dolph conceded. "It's Iblis."
"What should we do?" the coyote asked. "Our defenses are down and the dome is still open."
"Evacuate," the wolf ordered, turning to leave the dock. "Immediately. Youngest members first."
"Yes sir!" the coyote yelped. He then cried out a gasp. "Elder! The weapon!"
Dolph twisted abruptly to look at the weapon, to the south. He could just see a dark green form moving up the weapon's duct to the control panel. There was no doubt about who that was.
"Daxx, you fool," Dolph whispered to himself, finally moving to leave the lookout to go to the weapon. "Now is not the time to try that again!"
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Daxx left his son in the hands of Polo to try and get the weapon up and running again. His logic: if it worked once, it will work again. He climbed up the weapon to the control panel where he could input the commands. His body was screaming in pain at him, not only from the last use of the weapon when there was an electrical backlash from Iblis' attack, but also from the battle with Polo (where he had been quite beaten up by Polo's unexpected power over water).
He reached the control panel and pushed multiple buttons to make it turn on. Nothing happened. He tried a second time. Again nothing. There was no power in the weapon at all.
"What the—" he said with a scowl, barely keeping himself upright due to the trembling ground. He could see Iblis not far from him, making its way closer and closer. He had to get this weapon working!
Deciding that it was the power source that was the problem, he climbed over the control panel. Sure enough, the indentations where the Chaos Emeralds were supposed to be were empty. Looking around below, he spotted seven gemstones scattered about. Daxx leaped down to grab them, but hesitated. Something was wrong.
These couldn't be the Chaos Emeralds. They did seem to hold the same kind of power (he could feel it through his skin as he held one), but the shape was completely off. Chaos Emeralds, despite their name, were actually cut in a diamond (or brilliant) cut. These gems were cut in the standard emerald cut, which was square in shape with truncated corners. Taking one, Daxx jumped back to the indents and tried to place the gem there. It didn't fit. What had happened?
Then the explanation of exactly what had happened crossed Daxx's mind. When Iblis grabbed the barrel of the weapon and sent a counterattack into it, it had caused a backlash of energy. That backlash must have gone to the power source, to the Chaos Emeralds, and caused a reaction that altered their shape. As figured before, this meant that they wouldn't fit into the slots for the cannon anymore, which meant they couldn't act as the power source. No power source, no power, no cannon.
Daxx threw the gem down in extreme frustration. What was he supposed to do if he couldn't use the weapon?!
"Dad!"
He snapped his head around to see Silver below him, rushing to climb up the weapon's bottom. He was about to order his son back to evacuate when Iblis let out another roar. Daxx turned again to find himself nearly face-to-face with the giant maw of stone and flame, and the heat made him sweat, even more than thought possible. Its blasted Daxx's face and body with a wave of heat and fire. It then lunged out, knocking him and the weapon off from the top. It went crashing to the colony floor below.
Other members screamed in horror as they fled to avoid the falling contraption. Silver jumped out of the way at the last minute. Once the dust settled, the young hedgehog stared at the remains of the weapon for just a moment before rushing to start moving the debris off of his father.
"Dad?! Dad!" he called as he hoisted some of the boulders and metal fragments out of the way. "Can you hear me?!"
"Here, Silver," his father's voice replied. Silver lifted some more of the debris off from where he thought the voice was coming from. After he removed one of the metal beams, his father sprang out from beneath some of the dust and smaller rocks. He gave his son a glare. "What are you doing here?! You should be with Polo and the other evacuees!"
"I wanted to make sure you were safe!"
"My safety is not what you should worry about! Take care of yourself!"
"Dammit, Dad! I can't lose you like I lost Mom!"
Daxx froze at this exclamation. It would seem that more and more often his son would say his thoughts that he, as his father, would never really think about. It was his son's welfare that he thought about, but he never once thought that his son would think about his. It was enlivening, really, to know that his son cared that much despite what Daxx had previously put him through.
These thoughts quickly passed out of his mind though, as another roar ripped through his ears again. Over his shoulder, Daxx saw Iblis rear up, lift its arms and began to form a giant boulder above its head. Once it was about the size of the arena he had fought Polo in, Iblis launched the boulder at the two hedgehogs.
Daxx pushed Silver to the ground and raised his hands to hold the enormous stone up. It froze in midair as his psychokinesis held it in place. His body was protesting in every possible way to tell him to stop what he was doing, but he forced it to keep on. He could not let this boulder hit his son. What might happen to him in the process never even crossed his mind. He kept chanting to himself "Keep it off Silver! Keep it off Silver!" and this was the only motivation his body had at that point.
What neither hedgehog saw was that Iblis was building up another stone of the same size. It threw this one at the static boulder, shattering both of them and showering various rocks and magma onto the two hedgehogs. The moment Daxx felt the stone he was holding shatter, he twisted around and covered Silver's body with his own. The boy gave out a shriek of fright as he and his father were buried, and his vision became nothing but brown and smoking rock.
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It was a few minutes before Silver opened his eyes again. He was surrounded by brown brick, metal and rock, with his father laying half on top of him as protection. He could feel the weight of the wreckage on top of him and his dad. Using his telekinesis, he moved the larger parts off of them and pushed to reach air. Silver shoved one last time with a grunt and rolled his father off of him. He could still see Iblis, but it had moved and was turned away from him.
"Dad, we need to get out of here while Iblis isn't looking," the boy said, shaking his dad on the shoulder. "Dad, we—Dad? Dad?!"
There was no response. Daxx had gone entirely silent, and his skin and fur was colder and clammy. Silver shook him harder, urging him to wake up. The older hedgehog's eyes remained closed. Silver looked down and saw a huge laceration on his abdomen. His vision briefly flashed back to the time he found his mother's body after she had been killed by Iblis. It was almost the same thing.
"Dad! Open your eyes!" Silver screamed, pleading and panic lacing his tone. No…not this again! "Dad! You promised! You promised you wouldn't leave me alone! …You promised…"
As the realization of what happened poured over him, Silver felt something that was different from the time his mother died. Then, he had felt extreme sorrow and hopelessness. Now, however, the only thing he could register was a burning, unspeakable rage through his chest and limbs. Leaving his father to lie in the rubble, Silver slowly stood up and turned to face Iblis, which was looking away from him and blasting fire at some other unlucky people.
"You are dead, Iblis!" he yelled out. And with a leap, he rushed towards Iblis' head.
Iblis turned at his scream, but was not prepared to be shot in the eye with a psychokinetic-powered punch. It let out a roar not of rage but of pain. It was surprising to Silver to hear this colossal creature give out such a sound. It was as if his psychokinesis had a particularly damaging effect on it.
Silver swooped around and gave another punch to the face. It was beginning to hurt his hands, because he was after all punching either solid or molten rock. He didn't notice this at all; Silver was too preoccupied with the anger in his chest. It was blinding, and he soon was punching and kicking wildly at Iblis head. He was doing damage though, so he kept at it.
Eventually, the uppermost part of Iblis' head broke off, almost as the top of his head was actually a helmet that was cracked and knocked away. Wanting to finish the creature off (even if just for the time being) Silver flew up to the top of Iblis' head and slammed his palm onto its top skull. He could feel the hard yet smoldering stone crack and blow apart under his hand. Iblis let out another howl as it seemed to disappear in a blast of fire and smoke.
Silver watched from above as Iblis' remains literally melted into the lava pits below. He then noticed his feet, suspended in midair. …Wait a minute.
He glanced around, taking in the lack of supporting ground beneath his feet. He hadn't noticed before, since he was so focused on getting revenge on Iblis for his father, but he was in fact…flying! Silver didn't even know he was doing it…how was he doing it again? Looking at his hands and skin, he saw that he was gleaming the light blue color that normally surrounded the things he levitated. So he was levitating, rather, because flying was a little different.
What a rush! This was an amazing feeling! Flying! Fine, levitating! It was not enough to drown the anger and grief he was feeling completely, but it made him feel a little better. Silver flipped around a few times, getting accustomed to moving in the air. He found that he required very little concentration to keep himself airborne, which was not entirely astonishing since he was able to do this while he was focused on Iblis. It was the an experience beyond words, with the final thought on Silver's mind being how he could use this ability to fight Iblis in the future.
After a few minutes of getting used to this, he stopped and stared at the lava where Iblis disappeared. There was no doubt in Silver's mind that Iblis was not finished. It would come back, as it always has. It was a stoppable force only temporarily. If something as powerful as that cannon his father and the colony constructed couldn't stop it, what could?
Silver left the area and landed back near the spot where he had left his dad. Blaze was there, waiting for him. Once he was back on the ground, he looked closely at her. The young cat looked mildly dazed to see her best friend flying, but said nothing of it. She was more concerned about how desperately lost Silver looked. Whatever joyful emotions he experienced while levitating swiftly left him, as he recalled the reason he discovered this power to begin with.
"Blaze, my dad…" he gasped, falling to his knees and smashing his fist on the ground. She moved to kneel next to him, and tried to comfort him as he shook with rage. "Blaze, one of these days…one of these days…I'm going to destroy Iblis for good!"
"Silver, your dad…" Blaze said with a shake of her head.
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