L A S T O N E

I mean it this time...

(also, make sure you read the A/N at the end)

Disclaimer: I only own Kate. The rest belongs to Sonic Team @SEGA

Anyway, enjoy :)

Suddenly, she was awake.

It was like someone had chucked an ice cold pitcher of water directly into her face. She came to with her mouth gaping wide like a fish, and wasted no time in taking deep gulps of air to recover from the shock.

It wasn't cold water that had woken her up, but the icy air, so unbelievable freezing that it hurt just taking one little breathful of it. The ground was rock solid, and was only slightly warmed by her body heat.

Kate groaned as the entirety of her body throbbed in one mass ache. She could tell immediately that something was wrong even without opening her eyes. Her ears instinctively pricked around curiously as she lay there, listening for any voices that would offer a clue to her whereabouts. There was nothing. Wherever she was, it was eerily quiet.

With her ears offering absolutely no help at all, she reluctantly began an attempt to open her eyes. They stung, and somehow the simple movement of her eyelids managed to create a dull pounding in her head. Nevertheless, she was able to get them open to finally see where she was.

The sight was odd, at it prompted Kate to begin to sit up to get a better look. As she rose, she scanned her new, slightly fuzzy surroundings. Her face immediately contorted into a frown at the sight.

Everything was grey. Absolutely everything. The only difference was that the rock hard ground was a tiny bit lighter than the stormy sky (or what she could only assume was the sky in this strange place). At first, she had a crazy thought that she had somehow gone colour blind. However, a quick glance at the bright blue patch on her tail disputed that theory. From what Kate could see, the place appeared to be barren. Just an endless see of miserable greyness.

Besides it odd appearance, the whole place felt…wrong….if that was even possible. There was something fundamentally unsettling about the place that had nothing to do with its look. Whatever it was, wherever it was…Kate was certain that this was not where she was supposed to be. And from the looks of things, she was stuck there.

"Uh-oh…"

Her breath rose in a mist, and her head snapped around frantically, looking for something, anything that could help her figure a way out. Panic began to rise up within her, and she started to will herself to wake up from her nightmare. Unfortunately, no such relief came.

She took steady, calming breaths to clear her head. This did little to help, but she somehow started to think more clearly. She sat cross legged on the grey ground, taking a moment to think. Then, in a moment of sudden inspiration, she stared down at the life monitor Tails had given her. In times of emergency, it doubled up as a communicator.

However, her hope plummeted the second she laid her eyes on the device.

The little red light was no longer flashing due to the large crack that was zig-zagging through it like a tiny bolt of lightning. She lifted it up to her face to examine it closer. The crack ran very deep. Within it, Kate could see tiny wires which had been completely cut in half. From the look of it, the thing was completely inoperable. She hit a few times to see if that would jumpstart it somehow (despite the cut wires). The thing then completley snapped away from her wrist, with the two halves clattering to the ground. She chuckled bitterly as her hand dropped down to the ground.

"Pfft, "indestructible", my arse…"

Abandoning the monitor as a lost cause, Kate instead scrambled to her feet. There was a weight on her back. Somehow, her bag had managed to stay on her back through whatever craziness had resulted with her landing in that awful grey place. She didn't remember much about her transition following her stepping into the Star Post. All she knew is that the vortex was swirling around for far too long and that she somehow knew that something wasn't right.

She stared around again, trying to find something on the horizon, like a structure, a person, anything. There was nothing. She was completely and utterly alone in this unknown wasteland. The panic began to set back in, her breaths becoming shorter and shallower.

"Hello?" she yelled, ears perked for a reply " Hello? Is anyone out there?"

The only reply was the echo of her voice, which was odd, as there didn't appear to be anything nearby which could cause such an echo. She shouted again, and again, and again until she was out of breath and could shout no more. She let out a quiet whimper as the sheer direness of her situation reared its ugly head.

Then there was another problem.

The pain in Kate's chest from inhaling the freezing air had not eased like it usually would. It stabbed into her, making each inhalation almost crippling. The shouting had also contributed to a choking cough that made her double over as it racked through her body. She eventually composed herself, and then frowned. Looking around her, temporarily lost in a state of curiosity, she took a normal breath (or as normal as she could given her panicked state).

The pain shot through her again, as did a second, more serious round of loud coughs. As the coughs soon calmed down into small splutters and her eyes began to stream, she realised what was wrong.

It was the air.

Whatever it was, it wasn't good. With each breath she took, the pain worsened, and an annoying, itchy feeling had began in her throat. Her vision was slightly blurred, and something told her that it wasn't her watery eyes that were causing it.

Rapidly, she yanked up the collar of her jacket, forcing it up to cover her entire muzzle.

The panic had gone, replaced by a feeling of utter fear and dread. She was lost. Completely lost in a dark, empty place with what now appeared to be a toxic atmosphere. What had happened in between Mobius and the Sol Dimension to land her here? Where was here? How would she ever get back? She knew that Celestials had the ability to travel between worlds and dimensions, but she had absolutely no idea how to do it or if she had actually inherited the ability in the first place.

Kate began to walk forwards, keeping one hand firmly clasped on the collar her her jacket. Her eyes didn't rest for even a second as they darted around rapidly, desperate to find a way out of that place which was making her more terrified by the second.

She yelled out again, although this time it was very muffled. Rolling her eyes, she briefly lowered her jacket down. It wasn't the best idea, she knew that, but if there was someone out there (although, she seriously doubted that this was the case), she had to be loud enough for them to hear her.

"Hello? Please, is anyone there? I need he-!"

She was cut off as another violent coughing fit racked through her, almost making her stumble and fall. The collar returned to her muzzle in a heartbeat as Kate continued to stagger forwards.

*shortly*

Kate knew she would die there.

Well, she didn't know for certain. No one ever does. But she had that overwhelming feeling of dread and hopelessness, the feeling that one gets when the odds are almost completely stacked against them and there appears to be little to no way of escape.

She had been inhaling whatever was in the atmosphere for far too long. The first few minutes she had spent trying to bring herself together had been costly. The toxic air had seeped into her, invading every muscle, sapping her strength massively. Her lungs refused to take any more of the stuff in, and she found herself gasping like a fish out water.

Everything was wavy and blurry in front of her. Instead of being a straight line, the grey horizon moved around like waves atop of the ocean, sending Kate into horrific dizziness bordering on pure nausea. Her vision almost became a spiral of greyness, and nothing seemed to relieve it.

The bag, packed only with a few sets of clothes and essentials, felt like a boulder was strapped to her back. It constantly shifted with her clumsy movement, and with each shift, it brought her closer to toppling over to the ground. Her fumbled mind told her that couldn't happen. If she fell, it was unlikely she would be able to rise again. So, her irrational mindset that was present at that moment found only one solution.

The hand that had been holding up the jacket's collar had long since abandoned it's task, so the bag of rocks was easy to slip off. Kate heard a dull thud as it hit the ground behind her, but she couldn't care less.

The weight on her back didn't go.

This was it. This was the end. She couldn't fight it any longer. Whatever this place was, it had won. Her mind began to wander again, which turned about to be incredibly easy as she could no longer think coherently.

Just her luck. Just her luck for this to happen. Of course the Star Post would malfunction! Of course the supposedly indestructible life monitor would break! Of course she would land in an obviously poisonous atmosphere! Why? Because nothing was allowed to go right in her life. Every time, whatever the worst scenario was, it would happen. She had never had a very external locus, but she recently couldn't help believing that external forces were controlling her life and punishing her for something that she couldn't remember.

Her legs were buckling underneath her, and her head was throbbing. Her breathing was becoming shorter by the second, and she began to sway dangerously. She halted in a meagre attempt to steady herself. Of course, it didn't work.

Her vision was going dark, and she fell to her knees as they gave way. She had to try one more time. So, she took the deepest breath she could, threw her head back, and bellowed out into the greyness.

"Help me!"

Then everything stopped as she fell forwards, finally succumbing. Her head hit the ground hard and everything went dark.

Yes, I know, very short. But hey! This story is over now!

So, I need to explain what will be happening now. The next three stories that I do will be...

*drumroll*

...crossovers.

Yup, I'm diving into that dark, dark world. There will be one Doctor Who one, and then two Avengers. If you don't know those universes, I really am sorry but I'vealreadyplannedthemso...

They will lend context to what is happening in the story after, which will return to the Sonic universe. So, it will be like this:

1.The wolf

2. Returned Foe

3. The end of days

4.Return from the Darkness

5. We have hope

--D.W crossover

--Avengers crossover

--Avengers crossover 2

6. I don't have a name yet lol

Confusing? Yeah don't worry about it, I'm confused too. Hopefully it will all make sense in time.

Oh, also, I have big A-level exams coming up in May and, obviously, I will prioritise them, so the uploads might be delayed.

Anyway, I'm done with my waffling.

I hope you enjoyed We Have Hope!

Don't be afraid to drop that review!

~W.O.T~