Ch.4: Chaos Storm

In the face of Dark Gaia's montrous form Robotnink experinced an emotion he had never felt before, fear. The dragon's eyes locked in on Robotnink savoring the sciencetists fear.

A few feet away Knuckles knew that he and Sonia should get away while they could, before Dark Gaia remebered they were there. Grabbing the Chaos Emerald Knuckles motioned for Sonia to follow him as he dug a tunnel to the surface.

Sonia grabbed the unconious Sonic and followed Knuckles down the tunnel to safety. Dark Gaia had seen their escape through his periphial vision, but he was not focused on them in that moment but on the threat of Robotnink's invading force.

With one gaint thrust of his powerful black wings the dragon lifted out of the cave and charged towards Robotnink's airships. Sleet and Dingo couldn't have picked a worse time to be on board as Dark Gaia took a deep breath and incinerated all of Robotnink's ships with an ocean of flame.

Robotnink couldn't believe his eyes and decided to retreat before Dark Gaia could come after him next.

" Ah" said Dark Gaia " it feels so good to be free. Now one more piece lies to the puzzle,"

Having said that Dark Gaia took off in the direction Knuckles and Sonia had fled, craving the delicous power of the Chaos Emerald they possessed.

---------------------------------------------

After Knuckles and Sonia were out of the cave it wasn't long until they ran into Queen Alena with Knuckles pet dinosuar, Chomps. When Alena saw the unconious Sonic hunched over Sonia's shoulders her face imediatelly filled up with worry.

"What happened?" she said while nursing Sonic.

" Dark Gaia is back" said Knuckles " and there's no doubt he'll be coming our way soon to grab the Chaos Emerald. I won't be able to hide it from his radar,"

" There has to be some way" said Sonia " can't we lead him on a false scent?"

" It won't be that easy to copy a Chaos Emerald's power or imprision Dark Gaia" said Alena " but if one you can keep him distracted long enough I'll take Sonic and the Emerald to our ship and use my powers to mask the Chaos Emerald's energy as best as I can,"

" I'll go," said Knuckles.

" So will I" said Sonia to Knuckles " you're going to need help facing this Dark Gaia,"

With that settled Queen Alena took the injured Sonic and the Chaos Emerald with her back to their ship while Knuckles, Sonia, and Chomps went to face Dark Gaia. In a few minutes all three of them reached a huge clearing on the side of the island, Dark Gaia saw them and landed.

"Well, well, well" said Dark Gaia " the Guardian at last. Many thanks for breaking the Crystal Mirror, I've been trapped there for ages. Now my sister Light Gaia must be destroyed,"

"Why would you do a horrible thing like that?" said Sonia.

"Oh please" said Dark Gaia " darkness has been suppressed by the light for to long. And with the aid of Chaos all light will be extinquished and Darkness will rise,"

"We're not going to let that happen!" said Knuckles.

"Let's just see you try," said Dark Gaia, and with that the dragon blew a crismon red flame straight at Sonia and Knuckles.

-----------------------------------------

Meanwhile Queen Alena and Chomps made it back to the Sonic Underground's ship with the injuried Sonic and Chaos Emerald in hand. Before focusing her attention on the emerald Queen Alena took care of Sonic's wounds and then tried masking the Chaos Emerald's signal from Dark Gaia.

However, despite her best efforts it was no use, the Chaos Emerald's magic was much stronger than hers which meant that Knuckles only had the power to control it. A great tremor suddenly shook the island awakening Sonic from unconiousness.

"What's happening?" he said confused " what's going on?"

"Dark Gaia is reborn" said Queen Alena " and I can not mask the Emerald's power, which means only Knuckles can?"

"Where is Knuckles?" said Sonic " and where's Sonia?"

"They went to confront Dark Gaia," said Alena.

Sonic didn't need anymore explination and he grabbed his mom and the Chaos Emerald to help Knuckles and Sonia.

By the time the two arrived where Sonia and Knuckles were they could see that the hedgehog and echdina were in a heap of trouble. Handing the Chaos Emerald over to his mom Sonic rushed out to save Knuckles and Sonia from Dark Gaia's fire breath.

But when Dark Gaia suddenly stomped the ground making the earth shoot upwards Knuckles, Sonic, and Sonia were blasted towards the skies with Dark Gaia blowing another red flame at them from below.

Will the Sonic Underground survive Dark Gaia's flame? Find out in the next chapter!