Sonic's Story

"The far future?" Tails repeated with huge eyes. Shadow nodded while Rouge hummed her confirmation. "But…but how?"

"I know how we've arrived," Shadow said, eyeballing Sonic, "but I imagine your story is just as interesting."

Sonic relayed to Shadow what happened when they tried to reclaim Elise, and Shadow relayed his facts about his mysterious encounter. "That doesn't make sense," Tails said at the end. "We're still missing something, a big part of all of this."

The five sapients mulled this over until Rouge snapped her fingers. "Solaris, that's the common factor. You said the Doctor's machine was called the Solaris Prototype, and Shadow and I were handling a piece of it, the Scepter."

"So the thing that came from the Scepter was Solaris?" Sonic asked.

"I don't believe so. This creature felt…odd," Shadow said, and left it at that. Something told Sonic not to press and so he didn't.

"Whatever the case of how we all got here, how do we get back?" Knuckles growled and slammed his fist into the nearby wall, causing the entire structure to shudder. Rouge sighed and fluttered her wings to hover closer to him.

"Easy there, Knuckie. Don't want to bring the whole thing down on our heads, do you?" She rested a gloved hand on his shoulder and gave him a look that must have been more meaningful than it seemed, because it even soothed Knuckles' choleric temper. He let out a huff and crossed his arms tightly. "As for how we're getting back… Tails, honey, do you have any idea?"

"Err…" He blushed a little under the adults' sudden scrutiny as he pulled out his Miles Electric. "I should forewarn you, I had no idea time travel was even possible for all this, so anything I say is just postulation. But…I believe a good place to start would be with the Chaos Emeralds." He was flitting through programs as he spoke, his eyes rapidly darting across the screen. "That's what Eggman used to send us here, and I can track them much easier than the Scepter of Darkness. I wouldn't say they'd solve all our problems, but we can go from there?"

"Good idea, buddy," Sonic beamed. "There's not much we can't solve without a few Emeralds, right?"

Tails nodded and glanced at the screen again. It beeped as, presumably, it located some Emeralds. "Alright, so…so, I have the white Emerald to the southwest of here, and the red Emerald to the north. Both paths go around the city and we'll converge at the same point in the end."

"We'll take the south," Shadow said without preamble, reaching into his quills and pulling out three small devices that he tossed over to the other three. Catching the one sent in his direction, Sonic released it was an earpiece communicator. "We're in unfamiliar territory," he said by way of an explanation. "If anything major happens, alert us." With that, he shouldered past Sonic to one of the many large holes in the wall.

"Don't be late, Shads," Sonic teased, sticking the device in his right ear. Shadow snorted without turning.

"Same to you." He raced off and disappeared into the bright lights beyond. Rouge gave him an apologetic smile before giving chase.

"They have that handled," Tails murmured, pocketing the Miles Electric. "Our way should be through the building."

He led them down the hall they entered through, and Sonic couldn't help noticing how decrepit everything looked—which made perfect sense if they were indeed in the far future. Just…time travel? They could slow time nearly to a crawl with the Chaos Emeralds, true, so it did make some sense they could speed it up as well, but according to Shadow, they had travelled four hundred years. Insane…yet still somewhat believable with what Sonic's been dealing with since he was thirteen.

Tails suddenly stopped, ears twitching, and held out an arm to keep Sonic from progressing. Knuckles, who was bringing up the rear, folded his arms and raised a curious eyebrow. "There's someone ahead," he whispered, blue eyes like lamps in the dim light. He pointed at a rusted doorway where broken hinges hung with no door. The three of them approached cautiously before peeking inside.

The room had several dented metal crates that either had ajar lids or were missing the lids entirely. Though the ink across the fronts was long faded, the faint impressions seemed to be Eggman's bold mug. Some kind of storage room then, Sonic thought, looking over to the side. A shadow was nestled between two stacks, a torn piece of fabric draped across their body. When Sonic risked taking a few closer steps, he could see a head of dirtied white quills. No, it can't be…that white hedgehog?

"Is it just me, Sonic," Knuckles whispered, "or does that look like your new best friend?"

Sonic gave Knuckles a dry look before really processing what he said. At that exact moment, the hedgehog fidgeted in his sleep, kicking the makeshift blanket down to his hips. Sonic sucked in a breath when his face was revealed. "It is!" That white ear flicked and Tails clapped a hand over Sonic's mouth.

"So then he's from the future? But how did he get into our time?"

Once more, an answer came conveniently after the question. An orange halo of light surrounded the white hedgehog, growing in intensity until it almost looked like a mini maelstrom of fire. The brightness increased until the three of them were forced to look away, and when the light faded, they saw the hedgehog had disappeared.

"That answers that," Knuckles said.

"That fire…are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Tails blushed a little when the hedgehog and echidna gave him a look that clearly said No. "Iblis, the flame monster—that's part of Solaris. And Solaris was released once in the past…"

"Seems like everything's coming back to Solaris now," Sonic muttered.

There wasn't much left to say as they crossed through what remained of Eggman's base and into the sunlight. Well, sunlight was a gross overstatement: there was light, but it all came from flames. What had once been Eggman's White Acropolis, a snowy wasteland, had been covered in skyscrapers and streets sometime in the last four hundred years…and sometime after, the whole place had been razed by fire that still burned on the husks of buildings and twisted remains of cars.

"No… Is this what happens to the future?" Tails whispered, ears flat against his head. Sonic rested a hand on his shoulder and shook his head.

"It's not what happens, not as long as I have a say." Though Tails nodded, mollified, Sonic couldn't help remembering Silver's words: In the near future, his actions will cause the devastation of my world. He couldn't have. How could he have? He who dedicated his life to protecting nature and the freedom of Earth's creatures, causing this mass worldwide destruction? He smiled at Tails while he anguished inside.

"Tails," Knuckles spoke up, "where is your Miles Electric pointing to?"

Tails pulled out the device and a frown appeared on his face. "There's a lot of electromagnetic interference out here, but the Emerald is for sure there." He pointed straight ahead, past slopes made of toppled skyscrapers, twists of smoldering steel girders, overturned shells of cars, and into the path of a haphazard volcano made from asphalt. Of course, the path was also riddled with massive lava-born monsters. Sonic nudged Knuckles with his elbow.

"Last one to the Emerald has to replace the oil in the Tornado?" he grinned. It was a very down-and-dirty task (and one of the few things Sonic's speed couldn't help with) that Tails insisted they rotate doing, since all of them used the Tornado. Before Knuckles could respond Sonic had already taken off.

"Sorry, Knuckles, but oil takes forever to clean out of my fur." Tails smiled apologetically before taking to the skies. Knuckles rolled his eyes and chased behind the blue hedgehog.

Sonic raced down the sharp slope of the nearest skyscraper before inspiration struck. Spotting a dented-up highway sign nearby, he leapt onto an overturned bus, using it as a springboard to launch himself into the metal sheet feetfirst. His momentum snapped it from the steel beam and carried him back to the skyscraper; the metal glided across the surface like butter, not quite as fast as running but ten times more fun.

"Whoa!" Sonic swerved into an impromptu corkscrew as the path directly ahead exploded in a shower of smoldering glass and steel. Glancing over his shoulder, he could make out a molten worm protruding from the fallen building, eight feet tall or so. "How many of those are out here?" he wondered aloud, lowering himself as he approached a ramp of fallen signs. He kicked off at the land second, gaining a couple dozen feet of air over the last remnants of the building. After a bit of a gap there was a twisted street, and plenty more volcano worms lay in wait. He grinned as he hit the asphalt.

He corkscrewed around the closest worm and finished with a homing attack in its open maw. The intense heat sizzled his skin beneath his fur but lasted about a second anyway. He continued in his downward slide and noticed large flaming birds flocking overhead. Right about then, one left the formation to dive bomb him. Sonic kicked off the street with his impromptu snowboard, clearing the birds head by a good few feet, and landed on the barrier on the edge of the street. Sparks flew from the contact of metal on metal and sank into the abyss below.

The birds made it their mission to try and tackle him odd his impromptu grind rail at every turn. Sonic, who was semi-professional at bashing baddies at this point (who was he kidding? He could win an award show, "Most Eggs Cracked This Season") could do it one handed, while doing a handstand, and no handed with only his quills. For the last one however, he underestimated how hot these things could get, and though the monster exploded into cinders, he could feel the beginnings of an icy-hot pain trickling down his back.

He leapt from the edge of the railing just as a flaming worm nipped at him. Though he sailed above its head, it had another trick up its sleeve: it spat a massive fireball that homed in on him. He kicked the highway sign into its path, absorbing the brunt of the impact and leaving onto a blast of hot air and mildly annoying cinders in its wake.

He twirled in midair to land at a run on a half-crumpled building, lithely hopping between its skeleton of support beams until he reached an upward curve of dark rock and a set of speed ramps. They launched him a couple hundred feet into the air where he suddenly realized how dense the atmosphere was with ash and smoke. Looking out on the landscape beyond, he could only see the remnants of fiery destruction—and not yet one living body. On the flip side, he hasn't seen a dead body yet either. Gritting his teeth as Silver's words bounced in his brain, Sonic turned and braced himself for impact on a grind rail.

"Who's the slow one here again?" Sonic turned in surprise to see Knuckles at the rail parallel to his, a smug smile on his face. Though his arms were held out to maintain his balance; he hadn't the same practice with rails as Sonic, as he typically glided wherever he needed to go.

"Seems you're tired already, since you ain't flying," Sonic responded, an easy grin slipping onto his face. "I, on the other hand, have plenty of energy to spare."

"Hmph." Knuckles snorted and looked forward at the graveyard of a city. "It's this air. This whole world. The Emeralds are here but weaker—less Chaos to draw upon. I can't even sense the Master Emerald at all. Not to mention the enemies, which are quite a step up from punching robot faces." He jerked his thumb to his chest, where his crest was completely charred black. Sonic's brow furrowed at the sight.

"Knux—"

"Look out!" He pointed over Sonic's shoulder and Sonic turned to see another volcano bird diving towards him. He pushed off the rail and into a homing attack, making sure to keep his body tucked in as tightly as possible to avoid burning his face off. He didn't anticipate its friend slamming into him before he could even uncurl; the impact knocked him off course and he would've went plummeting to the sea of lava below if Knuckles hadn't jumped to grab his tail.

"Hey—ow!" Sonic complained as Knuckles hit the grind rail he had just occupied, not before making a fist-sized hole in the bird's chest. His glove was a little sootier but didn't sustain any serious burns. Knuckles tossed Sonic in the air, allowing him to regain his footing and land just a bit shakily on a nearby rail. "That hurt, Knucklehead!"

Knuckles picked at his ear idly. "Sorry, must have some ash in my ears. That didn't sound like Thanks for saving my tail, Knuckles. Would've fallen to my death without you."

"My tail is the issue, but yeah. Thank you."

Knuckles' rail curved around and into a standing skyscraper; Sonic's angled upwards into a trail of burning birds. He jumped from the metal and into a series of homing attacks, slowly heading downwards until he could skid across a little strip of highway. There was another trail of airborne monsters leading down into the awning of a shop and a spring. He spun into the air and landed on another street with a spring—this time guarded by a worm twice the size of the others, and if the heat waves radiating from it were anything to go by, it was twice as hot. He suspected trying to maneuver around it would still result in the world's worst sunburn.

"Hey, ugly," Sonic said, fists on his hips. The worm looked up (so to speak) and began drooling lava that disintegrated the asphalt below. "Yeah, you. Mind steppin' away for a minute?"

It's response? Hawking a giant flaming spitball at Sonic. He dove behind a cluster of concrete chunks to avoid the impact and splatter. Sonic launched a particularly large chunk into the air and, with a well place roundhouse kick, sent it towards the worm, landing a clean hit in its open mouth. It seemed to gag for a moment as the concrete took a while to break down. Sonic curled into a ball and revved himself on the street before launching into a high curve, sailing over its head and into the spring.

More buildings, more grind rails, more disembodied highways, yadda yadda yadda; the monotony was broken when a spring took him to a massive loop-de-loop street (who even built streets like that?) which ended in a speed ramp that launched him at a mostly horizontal angle. Parallel to him, a skyscraper's dirtied windows exploded in a shower of glass. He raised his arms to protect his face but received multiple small lacerations anyway. He sailed through the uncomfortably warm air until the mess of streets below turned to massive chunks like little islands, and they were merely…floating?

No, they're not floating… He blinked when he realized they were being funneled by a massive gout of wind, which he felt the full force of seconds later. His leisurely flight was thrown off-kilter and he flailed before landing on a piece of an intersection. It took all he had to stand upright, so he didn't—he ran in the direction of the wind, which happened to be across the islands and past a fresh horde of monsters.

"Sonic, do you see this?" Tails' excited voice, nearly trilling to be heard over the screaming wind, surprised Sonic, nearly causing him to stumble over his next jump. He quickly caught himself atop a rusting streetlamp and watched Tails fiddle with his Miles Electric, wobbling in midair with the gusting currents. "The convection at work here is astronomical! There's so much hot air being produced below it's like a hurricane!"

"Where's the air coming from?" Then he glanced down and immediately had an answer to his question. This part of the city was the living embodiment of Tails' favorite childhood game, The Floor is Lava. (And he was great at it too…not in the least because he could fly. It also came in pretty handy when Sonic was on a vacation/honeymoon/kidnapping excursion with Amy and the so-called Witchcart lackies thought they could step in unhindered.)

"—physiology of these birds are unlike anything we have in our time period!" He was still speaking and playing around with his device. "They resemble the Accipitridae family, although they don't have the hooked bill or the cere, but it's hard to tell what with them being on fire and al—whoa!"

"Tails!" He was yanked from his hovering position by a sudden surge in wind pressure and was sent flying down the trail of floating streets. Sonic spotted a spring nearby and used it to launch himself ahead, bouncing off any floating debris in his reach. He noticed from the corner of his peripheral, the Iblis birds moved from their stationary positions and shifted to pursuit of Tails. He gritted his teeth and threw himself down into one final spring with as much force as he could muster. Sonic went soaring at a forty-five degree angle, sailing over the creatures' heads and a few feet ahead of Tails. Catching the small fox under his arm, he continued a rapid sprint across a length of burning street. "You alright there, buddy?"

"I'm a little well done," he said with wide eyes. His tails were puffed up like cotton candy. Sonic glanced over his shoulder and his eyes narrowed.

"Those birds are about to cook both our gooses." Sonic didn't realize how many monsters had gathered until they were hot on their tails (quite literally) in a maelstrom of fire like a massive hot tornado. Objects scattered on the street were getting tossed out of their way, and as he quickly realized, out of their way meant in his and Tails' faces. "That tornado's carrying a car!"

He couldn't afford to look backwards anymore as the street suddenly became wrought with so much debris, it took all his attention not to crash into anything. At one point there were even giant worms popping up from the asphalt, and one cropped up inches from his face. He threw Tails in the air and managed to curl up halfway before making contact. Good news, his speed allowed him to go straight through its abdomen like tissue paper; bad news, only some of the damage was on his spines, most of it laying on the side of his face and arms. The burn was unlike anything he'd ever experienced before but he had no time to wallow, he simply kept moving.

"Sonic!" Sonic's eyes went up to Tails in the sky, where he pointed to a skyscraper some dozen feet away and to their left. It was hard to discern through the muggy atmosphere, but there was definitely an aqua glow from a hole in the window. Sonic juked to the side to use a car as an impromptu springboard. His sneakers left massive dents in the side as he launched himself up and through the high windows, using his hands to shield his face from the explosion of glass. There, underneath a torn and half-melted couch, the glow was as bright as the sun. He used a spindash to knock the furniture out of the way and grab the Emerald in the same movement, settling it deep in his quills for safe measure. A spring nearby took him through several holes in the floors above and to the empty roof, where he watched the flaming birds disassemble, flutter a bit, then eventually go their separate ways.

"Well, here it is," Sonic said as Tails made his way up, showing him the Emerald. "D'ya think there are any more out there?"

"It should be a little easier to track them now that I have a signature to match it to." He checked his Miles Electric and frowned. "Yeah, there's definitely one where Shadow, Rouge, and Knuckles were headed…"

"That's great!"

"And that's there." He pointed to their west where, with their new vantage point, they were able to see a collection of lava as big as the Pacific Ocean nestled up around a whole volcano. Sonic smiled past the unease worming (no pun intended) in his chest.

"They got it handled. Knux's as tough as a boulder…his head at least. And Shadow's taken a beating before."

"I guess you're right…" His frowned deepened, then his face turned determined. "Let's go. We can at least watch their backs." Sonic grinned and looked towards the heart of this mess.

"That, we can do."

Shadow's Story

Shadow faced the volcano as he did any other challenges: head on without looking backwards.

Good thing he did so, because as soon as he crossed a narrow bridge of stone leading from the wrecked city, the whole thing crumpled like the Jenga tower game he played with Maria. Rouge slowed to a stop next to him, her wings beating at the stale air and making it nearly breathable.

"Sonic and Knuckie will have trouble crossing that," she murmured. Shadow had to grudgingly agree; though Knuckles could glide (at a downward slope) and Sonic's strong legs could leap great distances, this was a hundred-something-foot trek across molten red lava. He doubted either would take the risk, and though he would be loath to admit it, he would not want them to.

"Hang back," he told her. "If they stuck together, they will be fine. However, if they split up—as I expect they would have—Sonic and Knuckles will be faster to arrive. You can help them cross the gap that much quicker."

Rouge pursed her lips as a large magma bubble popped, leaving sizzling remains on the blackened stone path. "I'm just as worried about you in this place, Honey. Being lava-proof is not one of your resume points."

"I've endured reentering the Earth's atmosphere," he pointed out. She still didn't seem convinced and he sighed. Part of his wanting her to stay was for her sake as well; he had needed to cover her a few times on their slog through the city, and he suspected her head injury was worse than she let on. If she, Chaos forbid, fumbled over a lava pit, better Tails or even Knuckles be there to catch her. He didn't voice those concerns, expecting her not to receive them too well. "Rouge. I can take care of myself fine. Help our friends."

She opened her mouth presumably to complain again, then a bit of blood trickled down her eyebrow. She wiped it away and stared at the red stain on her hand with a bit of confusion. Though she still looked very disgruntled, she folded her arms across her chest and turned away. "Make sure you get out of there in one piece, alright?" she said, her eyes shining like jewels in the smoky night.

"Of course."

He nodded and raced towards the glowing volcano.

A stretch of blackened igneous rock seemed to trail on for infinity, past speed pads and several molten worms that popped from its dirt with only seconds to spare in dodging. The road curved and weaved around stalagmites stabbing from the ground like spears before arching up into several ramps, sending Shadow high into the ash-riddled sky. To his left, an unfettered view of the dripping volcano lay, belching smoke every couple of seconds.

The crust's energy is out of control… Is it because of the Chaos Emeralds? he thought as he landed on another long road, speeding down the steep curve and into a wide loop-de-loop. As the volcano belched much more loudly, several flaming projectiles shot from its maw and began crashing into the path around him.

At one point, a particularly large molten boulder crashed down centimeters into his path; with no other chose, he dove to the side and to the sea of lava below. He barely had time to think about his choice before landing hard on a rocky island no more than five feet across. The proximity to the lava made the tips of his fur feel like lit cigarettes. Gritting his teeth, Shadow looked to see a spring at the northern tip and hit it with all his force.

That spring took him up to half a bridge of stone where a speed ramp lay at the end. He curled into a ball to lessen the sting of the heat as he fell to another low platform and landed in a run; good thing he did so, because the platform twisted into the wall with only a few speed pads to keep the pace up. At the end of the path, an electric cage covered a spring with two lupine magma monsters serving as guards. He doubted the trap had been serviced in the last few centuries and would peter out on its own, but those monsters had to be dealt with immediately.

He circled around the leftmost creature and dodged its flaming claw swipe to deliver a roundhouse kick to its center. It was sent flying into its companion, taking both of them over the edge and into the lava pool below. As he expected, the cage fizzled out, but as he went to run over, he noticed his shoe was sparking as well. At a glance he noticed the metal along the side was red hot and slightly distorted.

I do not know how well Professor Gerald crafted these shoes for these sorts of unnatural temperatures. I have to be careful.

Shadow jumped on the spring and landed on a much higher platform where several monsters lay in wait, all apparently protecting a bejeweled door. One Chaos Blast and nothing but ash remained. As he hit the ground, the door creaked and slid open with a puff of dust and soot. There was a lengthy cavern peppered with large purple crystals that cast an eerie glow in the otherwise darkness. Several flaming birds were lined up over the pit below and Shadow cracked his knuckles.

"Get out of my way, or you're toast!"

He homed in on their burning forms and eliminated them in a flurry of quills. The other end of the cavern gaped out onto a field of tall igneous towers positioned over a waterfall and sea of lava. He leapt nimbly across their unsteady surfaces, aided by a few springs, and ascended to the top of the waterwall, where several creatures were waiting on even more treacherous moving platforms. In fact, the closest bird shot a fireball at him, throwing his jump off balance and changing his trajectory to the lava below. He fired a blast of energy from his shoes that pushed him forward just enough to grab the lip of a rock island. He swung his legs into a backwards somersault to land on the simmering surface.

Chaos Spears added a ghastly red glow to the orange lava's as Shadow blasted his way through the horde of burning beasts. At the end of the short canal was another drop leading to a series of stone pillars leading down to one last bridge. Shadow leapt forward, balanced nimbly on the closest pillar, then—aided by a gout of Chaos energy—launched himself forward at top speed. He landed at the very edge of the bridge with a bit of a stumble, silently thankful nobody was there to witness it.

The end of the bridge held a spring which took him high into the air, so high that he was able to breathe fully without the acrid constriction of smoke in his lungs. His jump reached its arc and he began plummeting—right towards the volcano. The air was so thickly dense around it that he broke into a coughing fit immediately, leaving him vulnerable to crash through a small break in the roughly hewn stone. He fell through the air for a few seconds before landing hard on a warm stone platform. The heat from the lava below burned his face and he backed away from it.

The lava beyond was interspersed with large igneous platforms that wobbled with its motion; beyond that was a tall waterfall of magma that Shadow could not see beyond, not even with the copious amount of light (and heat) from the molten rock. Between him and that wall were hordes of monsters. Gathering his energy, he released another Chaos Blast—his final one, he supposed, as after all was said and done, he had to take a knee to catch his breath. At least until he found the Chaos Emerald.

He bounced between the platforms until he hit a spring that took him over the falling lava and onto a long thin bridge. He skated across the length and dodged stray splashes from the gushes of lava beyond all the way to the end, where a higher platform revealed a series of stone towers spread across the ocean of lava.

"Gee, you should really slow down once in a while."

Shadow turned to the side to see Rouge descending from an opening set high in the wall. A fresh piece of gauze was taped to her head and she seemed in much better spirits than before. "Did you meet up with Sonic and his team?"

"Mhm. Big Blue told us to separate when the way became a little too treacherous for our delicate feet, and from there Knuckie was more content to scale the walls and search for the Emerald that way. Committed, he is. And the little guy's watching out for him and keeping track of any sudden lava geysers, so he says. Me, I just have a sixth sense for jewels—I thought I was already on the fast track to that baby until I saw you."

"Hmph. Your timing is good anyhow."

"I see," she hummed, looking at the high platforms. She linked her arm with Shadow's and flapped her wings a couple of times. "The Chaos Emerald's just beyond this place."

She took Shadow up and over the lava, and though she had to rest a couple of times with his weight—So, she's not fully healed after all—they made it to one last door, which groaned open at her touch. Beyond was a wide cavern littered with stalagmites, and at the very center was the green Chaos Emerald.

"Hey, guys!" Tails' voice echoed across the chamber as he descended from a crack in the wall, Knuckles right behind him. Both were ashy and a bit puffed up but otherwise unharmed.

"Did I miss anything?" Sonic came dashing from the far wall and skidded to a stop, sneakers throwing up pebbles from the friction. His fur was charred fairly badly in most places and he seemed to have a nasty wound or two, but nothing so bad as to reduce his grin.

"You're late," Shadow pointed out. Sonic chuckled and laced his fingers behind his head.

"Some of us don't get to zap everything with our magical Chaos powers. Speaking of Chaos—" He turned to the Emerald, however Rouge was already on it.

"What a beautiful gem," she murmured, floating up with extended hands. Shadow shuddered as a sudden chill raced down his spine. Though the room was well lit, the shadows seemed a bit too malevolent…

"Don't touch it!" he called, but it was too late. Flames gushed from the ground and Rouge cried as she fell back. Knuckles was closest to catch her, preventing her from cracking her skull on the hard ground.

The fire twisted and coiled in the air until it formed a massive serpent-like creature with massive mandibles and horns, punctuated by a large green eye in the center of its "face." It roared at the sight of them, bursting the wall in several spots and bringing in numerous streams of magma to the already sweltering room.

"That can't be—Iblis?" Rouge said, pressing her ears down against the noise. Tails shook his head.

"According to ancient records, the Flames of Disaster could split across great distances and take several forms. This must be just a piece of it."

"Just a piece, huh?" Sonic took a confident stance as the noise died down. "Didn't even think we were worth the real deal?"

"This is no joke, hedgehog," Shadow warned, cocking his fists. "Iblis razed this land. We must be on our guard."

"Yeah, yeah." Sonic's grin didn't wane as he bounced on his heels. "Let's do this!"

Silver's Story

Shadow the Hedgehog: lean, mean, and one hard-kicking machine. He kicked how Silver imagined Mammoth Mogul would, if he ever had to fight the wizened old mastodon hand-to-hand. Thankfully the opportunity never arose, but Silver had had quite a few front-row seats to seeing Mammoth stomp the odd Iblis Worm, and it did not look pleasant.

Silver, on the other hand, was most likely nursing a concussion, already winded from running through droves of robots, and was Absolutely Over This. "I don't suppose we can. Ya know. Talk this out? Over lunch?"

Shadow's response was another Chaos Spear to the face. Silver threw up a hasty energy shield that wobbled out of existence half a second later. "I don't want to fight you!" he shouted, one hand going up to the side of his head. Shadow's eyes narrowed a fraction as Chaos energy blazed around his fists and feet. In one move he was gliding across the grass, and Silver barely had time to raise his arm before he found himself tossed headfirst into a stack of crates. A worryingly large bruise was forming in the upper right side of his abdomen.

Okay, obviously, that guy wants a fight. I have to defend myself… Energy sparked in and out of existence around his gloves as he forced himself to his knees. He could hear Shadow coming around again and, with a swipe of his hand, send the collection of crates flying at his eleven-o'-clock. They exploded into wood shrapnel against the hard dirt; a dark form leapt over the collision and flew towards him in a sphere of raised quills.

Silver maintained another shield that spiraled with cracks on impact. Every second he held Shadow at bay drained energy reserves he didn't know he had. He gritted his teeth so hard he could hear his jaw straining. Silver crooked his pinky finger, taking hold of a small rock and lobbing it at the spinning body. To his extreme relief, he got in a lucky shot to Shadow's head, knocking him to the ground. Then again, Silver's arms felt like wet noodles. How in the world am I going to fight this guy?

Shadow didn't spend a nanosecond on the ground before lunging at Silver again, foot swinging out in a roundhouse kick. Silver threw himself to the ground and inadvertently kicked Shadow's other leg, causing him to stumble over Silver's body. Silver took the second's reprieve to roll to his feet and release a crescent shockwave of energy. Shadow, to his amazement, dodged only by the skin of his nose, getting a few quills sheared off before he launched another Chaos Spear. Silver managed to throw a barrel into its path that ended up being surprisingly heavy. As he realized a second later, it was full of water that vaporized into a blinding mist.

Gotta run! He turned and used a sputtering bit of psychokinesis to propel himself forward as he ran. His plan was…to get over the train tracks and maybe Shadow would be intimidated? He wasn't even thinking so far. He was scared if he hung around too long, he'd be ground into a skid mark.

He detected movement and dragged the earth around him into a spherical shield. A Chaos Spear hit the surface so hard he was launched forward and into one of the storage crates on the conveyer belt. The shield protected him from the impact against the metal but he went flying and landed bodily in the grass beyond. He forced his eyes open to see Shadow launching himself over the wreckage and grabbed hold of the debris with both fists. "Take this!" he cried as he compressed the metal bits into a restraint around the black hedgehog's body. He fell to the ground heavily with a pained grunt. Silver was panting as he dragged himself to his hands and knees, but he couldn't rise further without a dagger of pain slicing through his skull.

"Chaos Blast!" Shadow's body flashed red before a burst of Chaos energy reduced his metal restraints to twisted bits. Silver's fists clenched and sputtered with bursts of energy.

"Y-You…!"

"Don't bother," Shadow said calmly, dusting smoldering bits from his coat. His eyes turned to Silver with not an inch of give to them, making Silver pause. "You may have a better handle on Chaos energy than most, Sonic included, but you can't best me. Especially not with this." Shadow drew the green Chaos Emerald from his quills, the glow lighting the space between them. Silver sneered down at the ground.

"I won't give up! I can't! It all depends on me. My future…and now making things right," he muttered. He raised his voice again as he got to his feet, and this time his energy remained a constant stream, burning around him like blue fire. "I can't lose! Not when I'm so close!" He made to leap at Shadow in one last ditch effort, fist cocked for a punch. Then Shadow lifted the Emerald until it caught the sun's glare.

"Chaos Control!"

The world spun and inverted around Silver making him feel the worse case of vertigo in existence. Though his fist was still moving forward, it felt like he was trekking through mud. Shadow, however, was unaffected, and simply walked around Silver to deal one of his patented roundhouse kicks to the back of his head. Silver hit the ground in slow motion but the pain was real time.

"Fighting me is futile. I am the Ultimate Lifeform," Shadow said, looming over Silver like, well, a shadow. Silver groaned as he pushed himself to his feet, body feeling like one massive bruise. His headache was reaching universal proportions and he was certain in the next second his brain would dribble through his ears. He blinked blurring eyes at Shadow to see him raising the green Chaos Emerald again, most likely in preparation for his finishing blow. Silver had no clever moves left, just the last smidges of energy.

This—has—to work!

When he saw Shadow's lips moving he thrust both hands out and seized the Emerald with his psychic energy. Shadow's arm jerked but he kept his grip, eyes narrowing at Silver. Silver fought to pull the Emerald from his fingers, so hard that Silver fell to one knee and black spots swelled in his vision, but the glow around his hands never faltered. He had to catch Sonic, and if Shadow was in the way, then, well—well—he couldn't let that happen. He had already caused so much trouble and in the name of the bad guy! Silver wasn't a bad guy, far from it; all he wanted to do was stop Iblis from ever existing, and if helping Sonic was the key, he'd take down a hundred "Ultimate Lifeforms" standing in his way.

He didn't realize it before, but the Emerald had begun sparking bluish-white energy, increasing incrementally the longer he held on. Eventually it exploded into white light and he and Shadow both reared back as it hit the ground, the light coalescing into a swirling white…portal? "Is this…a Chaos Control?" Shadow muttered to himself. Silver's skin crawled as he stared at the portal.

"This is how I got here!" he exclaimed, earning Shadow's attention. He flushed slightly as he continued, "Well, not exactly this way, but something similar. A portal like this, I mean."

"I've never seen this reaction from the Emeralds. It must be from…" He looked purposefully at Silver's hands and he flushed deeper. Shadow looked at the Emerald which seemed a bit dimmer in the morning light. "Your Chaos energy is unpredictable, charged by another energy I do not recognize. That must be what caused this reaction."

Perhaps because he was touched by Solaris when he was brought to this time? Then again, he never even heard of Chaos Control until this moment—maybe he always had this ability. Whatever the case—

"This portal could take me home!" Silver exclaimed, tripping over his feet as he rushed forward. A hand clamped around his wrist.

"Wait! You don't know when this portal will lead!" But it was too late: they were both caught in the portal's gravity. Silver was lifted off his feet and the small amount of energy left at his disposal was not enough to keep them grounded. They were taken into the portal and stretched as thin as a rubber band. Silver closed his eyes against the dizzying light and nauseating pain of the experience, but it stopped altogether a few seconds later. Right when he was about to cry.

"You," Shadow's voice came from above his head, "are not very bright, are you?"

"I've been told," Silver mumbled, rubbing his eyes until a metal floor swirled into view. He raised his head to see tall metal walls surrounding them with red lights winking every few seconds. Shadow's arms were folded as he glared down the hall. Silver detected an odd mechanical humming from that direction and groaned as he pushed himself to his feet. His hands flickered but it was unlikely he could use his powers for a while yet, not until his brain resolidified. "Where…are we?"

"Kingdom Valley." Shadow's answer came after a moment of fiddling with his watch, though his brows were furrowed in confusion. "If this is accurate, then we must have travelled to before the tragedy, at least ten years ago."

"Great. So I'm even further away from my time." Silver pouted, then Shadow's sudden glare in his direction earned a startled yelp.

"We wouldn't be here at all if not for your impudence." Shadow's fist clenched and Silver feared he was preparing to rearrange his face, then he released the tension with a sigh. "However, at this point infighting will get us nowhere. We have to find a way back to…my time."

"And then what!?" he exclaimed, rounding on Shadow. "I'm not from your time! I've been doing everything to get back home!"

Shadow's eyes, which had widened fractionally at the outburst, suddenly narrowed. The cool anger had left his voice to make way for indifference. "I'd think my time is preferrable. I've been to yours," Silver gasped, "I've seen the hellscape you're calling a home. Why would you want to go back?"

"…It's not just some hellscape," Silver muttered, clenching and unclenching his fists. "Mammoth Mogul—he's my mentor, he took me in when my parents were…ya know, barbecued…and he trained me so I wouldn't be defenceless. Edmund's a grouchy old man but he's been sorting the last of us survivors long as I can remember." He turned away and squeezed his eyes shut. "Maybe the future's not the best…but the people I've met, I would never change that. Your world is great, it's amazing, it's everything I could never imagine a world without Iblis is like…but it's not mine." Silver took a deep breath and met Shadow's eyes, cyan on crimson. "That's what I'm fighting for still."

Shadow was silent and unblinking for a long while before eventually giving a little "hmph" that sounded—if Silver strained his ears—a smidge impressed. "Then you should know better than to follow the Doctor."

"I figured that out…a little too late, I guess. I was calling out to Sonic to, ya know, apologize," he mumbled with flat ears, "and help get the princess back cuz it's my fault she was taken at all, but then you come in with your flying judo kicks and all." Shadow, to his credit, seemed completely unrepentant.

"We cannot change our choices now. What matters is getting out. The Chaos Emerald won't help us since we left it in the present. Our only option is going forward."

"Looking to the fut—oh, you meant literally," he said when Shadow started clomping ahead. Silver flushed to the roots of his quills as he jogged behind. "Yeah. I knew that."

Shadow had the grace to maintain a reasonably speedy pace that Silver only moderately struggled to keep up with. The sounds ahead grew in clarity until Silver could make out whole sentences.

"The electromagnetic pulse has just been generated! Injecting a decompression agent…no, it's not working!"

"My Lord, we must take shelter!"

"Why, Solaris, do you refuse to listen to my voice!?"

Shadow and Silver exchanged a glance—Solaris?—before a massive explosion occurred ahead, bringing about a wave of heat and dust that nearly knocked them off their feet—well, Silver at least. He mustered the energy to create a barrier repelling the worse of the impact. Shadow barely waited until the shield dispelled before gunning it forward; Silver, this time, managed to keep up with a bit of psychic help.

The room ahead was a lab in shambles. They entered through a smashed window and found several human bodies scattered on the ground surrounding a device with smoking computers and a broken tube. Blazing orange fire radiated from the center of the tube and Silver gritted his teeth at the familiar sensation of heat prickling at his skin. "Iblis," he growled.

"And Mephiles," Shadow added, pointing ahead. Silver saw a trail of purplish-black…shadows? Shadow-looking things crawling away from the scene and towards an open door. Meanwhile, the Flames of Disaster coalesced into a ball and began circling the room, blackening the people's clothes when it came a little too close.

"Get away from them!" Pain forgotten, Silver leapt down into the room and captured the primal Iblis in a ball of energy. He could feel the heat even through his mind and the muscles in his arm strained as he fought to keep it contained. Shadow made quick work of checking all the humans before stopping at a form in fancy-looking robes.

"They're alright, only unconscious. However, the king seemed to have been standing too close; he's badly burned." He rolled the man over and Silver saw a gross amount of skin literally melting from his face and arms where the cloth was burned through. He began to avert his eyes…then he noticed what the king was holding. Or rather, who.

"Is that…the princess?" he asked. True, she looked quite a bit younger, but the face and hair were definitely the same. And she was holding an odd stone device. Shadow's lip curled into a frown.

"Why would the king bring her here?" he muttered. Silver began to answer before Iblis suddenly flared. His shield dissipated into sparks and he hit the ground as the ball of fire suddenly shot towards the princess. In a flash Shadow had picked up both her and her father and moved up towards the window. He looked at the device in her hands and his eyes narrowed.

"Silver, take this from her!"

"R-Right!" He grabbed it psychically and suddenly Iblis was far more interested in him. He tried to restrain it again but it was definitely angry and broke free in seconds.

"I'll track down Mephiles," Shadow said, setting the princess and king down in safety. "You deal with the Flames of Disaster."

"Yeah, sure," he said, watching Shadow head in the shadow's direction while Iblis's fire grew in intensity. He gripped the device tighter. "Easy."

Author's Note - In case anybody is confused about the timeline progression, it's a bit difficult to manage since the characters rarely operate in the same place at the same time. In this case, the "present" is actually the "future," and Sonic and Shadow's stories are taking place at the current moment. By next chapter Sonic's story will be the "present," although Shadow and Silver's stories take place in the "past," aka ten years before the start of the story.