Thanks for the response so far. I never expected to get a review on the first chapter - especially not such a nice one :D. I hope I can keep things up :).

Chapter 2: Miles Apart (I)

Twelve.

Sonic dug his feet into the weather-worn rock. Twelve more steps and he'd reach the ledge at just the right speed to sprint up a slanted stone wall. His shoes had already torn through the moss there several times before, leaving a dirt path to the top.

The wind rushed into his side as he rocketed off its edge and through a series of v-shaped crags, squinting at the flicker of sunrays. Beneath him was the only reason he'd taken the slower route through the small mountain range that belonged to the island: a slope.

The narrow ramp was easy to miss, but this time he was coming down perfectly.

Gravity could be such a slowpoke.

He curled up and landed on the narrow path, muscles tensed to catch the impact with his quills. Three rollovers and he'd reach the edge feet forward, ready to propel himself off at the peak of momentum.

There!

He soared across the treetops, the tips of his shoes barely grazing the topmost leaves when he passed a small hole in the tree's crown. It was a nice reminder of his last attempt when he'd come in too low and entangled himself, crashing through without even managing to catch a twig to break his fall. No idea why this lonesome island didn't even have one ring he could use to cushion his stunts. It was only half as fun this way.

Sonic braced himself for the impact into an old, gnarly tree that towered above the rest. His hands slammed into one of its branches, sending twigs and leaves into a rattle. Even without picking up a ring, his body could endure quite the beating. It was mostly the stuff he ran into that made things difficult. Most of the time he was pretty good at flash-judging the stability of an obstacle, but he still had no idea how his insurance hadn't already put him as a high risk client…

Sonic flung himself off the branch and skidded to a halt on sandy earth only to pick up the pace again and head straight back into the mountains where the Star Post was. So far, the old thing hadn't done what he wanted it to, but whenever he came near—and he'd gone there countless times during the past couple of days—at least something did happen.

As soon as he'd reached the plateau the feeling was there again—like cold fingers reaching deep into his head. There was nothing he could do to keep his vision from blacking out when it happened; all he could do was watch the image of an island appear. An instant later he floated above it, just far enough to see it in full, and he had no doubt he was looking at exactly the island he'd ended up on. After a while he began to feel in control, as if he could simply make his virtual self fly across the ocean and look for other places, but whenever he tried, strange symbols apeeared at the corner of his vision and the image distorted like a broken screen. Then it ended.

Sonic blinked. If any of this was supposed to tell him something, it was doing a pretty shitty job. The only thing that felt like progress was that he didn't feel nauseous anymore when it happened.

He took a few steps towards the Star Post and closed his hand firmly around one of the cool metal bars that made up the bottom cage. He braced himself and spun it with all he had, then almost recoiled from the sheer force with which the cage had decidedly not moved. Sonic idly shook his throbbing wrist.

All he really had on Star Posts was comic book knowledge—some nonsense about chosen ones, or stories about the far past when everyone could just use those things like stepping throgh a doorway. They never mentioned anything about weird visions, or nausea.

Then again, he might've just been reading the wrong comic books.

At least there was one thing they seemed to agree on: spinning the cage was supposed to gear the Post up and open the portal. In there you'd think of the place you wanted to go (something he hadn't done exactly…) and it'd take you there. That much had happened, as far as he could tell. Only at that point the cage had started spinning on its own for whatever reason.

Sonic took a breath and let the air out again in a rush. He just had to get lucky again. Piece of cake.

#

He returned to the beach and flopped down in the shade of a tree, staring at the rolling waves.

It had been one week. One frickin' week of doing virtually nothing. The island was the epitome of boredom. There wasn't even anything that could be considered dangerous—aside from the stuff he was doing to himself, anyway.

For lack of a better idea he'd kindled a fire on one of the flat top cliffs, tending to it a couple of times during the day. It was probably only visible at night, but he hadn't really come up with another way of drawing attention, yet. All the wood and stones he found lying around the island were too bleak to stand out against the sand, so drawing or writing stuff was out of the option. Plus, he'd spent four days recovering from stomach cramps and other… 'pleasantries', after stuffing himself with pretty much anything the island had to offer, so his mind hadn't exactly been on the resourceful end. Apparently even his stomach of steel wasn't strong enough to deal with alien foodstuffs.

Hey, he was an expert eater, not an expert at food.

A gleaming dot in the sky pulled him out of his thoughts and he sat up straight, squinting his eyes. In the distance, a tiny something moved on a steady path from east to west. He'd seen it before. Normally, he would've easily recognized it as a plane. But for all he knew he wasn't on Mobius anymore and he had no idea whether planes even existed here. Now that he saw it for the second time, he wasn't so doubtful anymore.

His ears perked up when they picked up a low drone. It was faint, but definitely not part of the islands' usual ambient noise. Maybe the plane was closer than it appeared? Sonic was on his feet in an instant. He needed to rekindle the fire. Or throw something to draw attention or whatever. Man, couldn't he at least have found a washed up rag or anything to wave around?

Sonic sped along his trail back into the woods then up the cliff where he kept the fire going. He grabbed one of the smoldering logs, stirring up the embers and blowing in some air to relight the fire, tendrils of smoke rising into the air. He could probably get the stuff to smoke some more. Maybe with a bunch of leaves or pieces of damp wood…? Sonic spun, ready to zip back into the woods, then almost tripped over his own feet. The noise that had gradually gotten even louder, hadn't come from the speck in the sky. It came from a small, white and orange waterplane that had almost reached the island, still dropping down steadily. Sonic felt a chill.

If Miles had been here he probably would've chewed his ears off by now at how much the plane looked like the ones from home. He would've known every similarity and every difference even from a distance, and Sonic knew this would've been one of the moments when he'd really been able to appreciate his friend's ramblings. But Miles wasn't here, and Sonic was glad all the same that he hadn't dragged anyone else with him when he'd jumped into the portal.

He shook himself out of his daze and leaped off the ledge, grinding down the rock face and dashing through the woods again. When he reached the beach, the plane had almost passed the island and was flying close to the waters, engines roaring. Sonic chased after it along the shore, only to watch the thing fly past when he reached the island's edge.

The plane was heading for the other isle, already disappearing behind whatever greenery was growing there. A few moments later the noise of its engine subsided and his ears filled with the steady sound of the sea.

It was significantly less comforting.

Sonic let himself slump into the sand with a groan. This was it? A plane turned up and then it had the nerve to land on the only other island around? Just perfect.

Crossing the water was the one single thing he'd wanted to avoid. Water was fine and all—like, for showers, or for drinking—but screw him if anyone decided to dunk him in it. He could deal with if it were only a moment of shock, but most of the time his entire body froze up and his mind went blank with it.

Sonic grumbled.

He got to his feet again and squinted at the opposing shore. The islands weren't that far apart around here—200 paces at best—and the water looked mostly shallow with a bunch of sandbars shining beneath the surface. He could try and wade through—he wasn't going to funk out if he took it slow. But if he lost his footing on the way it wasn't going to do him much good since he couldn't frickin' swim.

Sonic began pacing, feeling his fists clench. He had no idea how much time he had to get across before the plane left again, but it probably wasn't enough to try and build a raft from logs he had to… chew off or something because he didn't have any frickin' tools around either. Wading through was probably his only sane option. Better get it over with.

Sonic crouched and began unstrapping his shoes, scanning the water for a path. It almost shone from within in a clear, crystal blue; its smooth, quiet surface probably making it perfect for… whatever sorts of water sports he was constantly missing out on.

…Wait.

That surface was smooth.

There were small swirls here and there, but nothing really major.

Could he just run across if he went fast enough?

He'd always wanted to try. He'd just never had a decent opportunity or simply didn't want to deal with ending up in water. Now it seemed to be the only way of potentially not ending up drenched and on the verge of a panic attack.

…Man, at some point he really had to get over this nonsense. Surfing looked like way too much fun to miss out on. Or water skiing. Or cliff jumping. Why couldn't rings keep you from drowning, huh? Sonic scrunched up his nose.

He strapped his shoes back on and got up, hopping on his toes. Every now and then small waves met in tiny swirls, but he could probably skip those. As long as he didn't try to take sharp turns or side steps, he was going to be fine.

…Probably.

Sonic took a deep breath then backed up the little space he had on this side of the beach and got into a sloppy sprinter stance.

"Here goes nothing."

He hammered his feet into the sand, then hard onto the water's surface, hoping for the tension to keep him afloat. In an instant, he was about one third on his way towards the other shore, which was a pretty good sign that things were working. Also, he was now one third away from the shore he'd come from, which meant that things had better not stop working anytime soon.

Sonic smacked his soles into the water like a maniac, arms swinging hard to keep his momentum going. The drops of water he kicked off of his shoes began creeping into the fabric, weighing him down, and the bounce he got out of his arms became even more important. Only halfway to go. Sonic gritted his teeth.

Ahead, the water didn't play along, small waves closing in on his path like two land masses during an earthquake. He forced his already heavy legs to take steeper steps, trying to ascend with the rising surface.

If he ever got out of this, it was time for doing chin-ups. Daily.

The two waves collided, briefly breaking the water's tension, and Sonic's foot got caught in a swirl and was yanked behind. He drove his other leg in front of him but only managed to run his knee into the water.

"No-no-NO-NO—"

The moment his face hit the surface his body went rigid, drifting off sideways and bumping into a pile of sa—

#

Sonic awoke with a gasp, scrambling onto all fours. Every ounce of water he'd taken in instantly decided to leave his body the same way it had apparently entered—only not as gracefully…

By the time he was done coughing up saltwater and back on his back, his lungs and throat were sore and his limbs felt like jelly. If that stupid plane now decided to make a stop at the other island, it could go where the frickin' rings were.

He sat up abruptly, glancing around. How long had it been? It still looked like afternoon and the air was filled with all sorts of nature noises. The sea between the two islands rose and fell as if nothing had happened.

Sonic dragged himself to his feet and took a few probing steps. His shoes and clothes were covered in sand and only dried halfway, and he pulled a few leathery strands of algae out from between his quills. He couldn't have been out for too long, but it might've been enough for a plane to start and to get out of his sight again.

He gave his still numb muscles a stretch and began a jog along the shoreline. This island didn't seen much different from the one he'd come from—forest and beach as far as he could see—but if the plane was still here, it had to be around somewhere, and that thought alone already made the place a thousand times better than the one he'd vegetated on for the past week.

He was halfway around the island when it came into view. The waterplane had docked at the inside of an L-shaped wooden jetty reaching a fair way out into the water. A single crate sat on the planks in front of the plane, but there was nothing and no one else otherwise.

Some way up the beach to the left, a stony path lead to a plant-lined patio that belonged to a single-story house with a warm orange tiled roof. Its whitewashed walls made the place look even more pristine than it already was.

"No way…" There was a whole frickin' house? And he was on the other side longing for a toothbrush…

Sonic shook his head and stepped closer. Someone had left the house's doors and windows wide open, and the island's constant breeze tugged at their curtains. He skipped up the patio, ready to take a step inside, but then stopped in front of the open doorway where a prattling bead curtain obscured his view.

The place was huge.

It didn't take up too much space in width—nothing unusual anyway—, but something told him that even East Islands' reptiles wouldn't feel comfortable with that kind of headroom. The door looked twice his height.

Sonic carefully pushed the curtain aside, peeking into a wide room then ultimately stepping inside. It had a leather lounge to the left and some sort of kitchen area to the far right with a dining table in front. Ahead, a wide corridor lead past two doors left and right, then opened up into another large room with a fluffy white rag. Along the way someone had left a bunch of open boxes and bags that looked like they'd been placed there just recently. Everything was gigantic.

...For supposedly being on an alien planet, though, stuff looked pretty normal. It was more like entering a bad movie set.

Was that a fridge back there?

Someone started whistling. Sonic spun just in time to see a shape pass behind the curtain of one of the windows, probably heading for the front entrance. He cringed.

That thing had been tall. Sonic hadn't seen a ledge running along the outside of the house, so apparently there was a reason for this place having a door taller than a garage gate.

The figure passed another window on its way, looking like it had arms the size of pillars. It was probably about to enter any moment now.

"Oh, come on," Sonic muttered. He'd just found a house. He hadn't planned on ruining it by being discovered by some kind of supersized alien croc before getting to check things out. Maybe the place even had a shower.

The steps reached the door and Sonic zipped further inside, past the hallway and into the other wide room that it connected to. Specs of dust swirled up from the thick rug and gleamed in the rays of light coming through a glass terrace door at the very back. To Sonic's left stood a massive bed beneath small, round window, and to his right seemed to be some sort of study. Everything looked so frickin' pristine, it made him feel ten times greasier than he probably was. The idea of even setting a foot onto that rug seemed blasphemous.

The bead curtain rattled and Sonic reflexively slipped out of sight, now poised between the bedside and what appeared to be a giant wardrobe with a shiny white front. He heard someone enter the house on squeaky shoes, pause for a moment, then rummage in one of the bags before whistling their way further towards the bedroom. Sonic itched to get a look at whatever was coming, but if he showed himself now, they'd probably both just freak out or something. He'd rather know how those guys looked before saying hello. Now he just had to get to a decent vantage point…

Sonic glanced around. There was the patio door, alright, but he had no idea how it opened and breaking it probably wasn't going to earn him any alien approval points. The bed was monstrous but definitely didn't have enough space underneath, and the wardrobe—

Sonic ground his teeth.

Well, it'd do for now.

He pulled one of the doors open and climbed into an empty compartment. When he closed the door, he was left with a narrow gap to peek through. A moment later, someone stepped into view and paused in the middle of the room as if they'd picked up a scent.

Sonic's skin grew cold.

He'd expected some kind of reptile—or whatever other species that tended to be a lot taller than him—but that thing…

It was tall—definitely tall enough to fit the room they were in. The head was almost comically small, and the eyes were so tiny Sonic couldn't even make out their color. Where it didn't wear clothes (and that multicolored shirt was plain ridiculous), its tan skin was covered with a flimsy coat of hair, with only the head apparently growing hair (fur?) in abundance, the entire mass of it being tied together at the back of its neck. But—

That thing didn't look sci-fi movie weird. It didn't even look fantasy monster weird. It looked normal. And looking normal was clearly infinitely worse than any alien with eight limbs covered in glowy parts could've been at this point.

It looked real.

Apparently, the bizarre reality of Sonic being stuck alone on an alien planet had only waited for this exact moment to hit him square in the gut.

Sonic swallowed past a suddenly dry throat.

Up until now he'd still kinda managed to convince himself that he'd maybe just ended up at a really remote location on Mobius, but seeing this guy…

It was a guy, wasn't it?

It was probably the least important question right now, but anything that got his head out of this frickin' situation was a good thing.

…Only now he also thought that alien guy's general physique looked kinda familiar. How'd that make sense?

Right. The Star Post. If Sonic took away the hair and put some fat on alien guy's ribs, he could almost pass for the shape Sonic had seen in that one, colorless Star Post vision.

He shifted to get a better look through the gap.

Alien guy had gone to open the large glass doors, letting a breeze in, then he took what looked like a bunch of magazines from the bag he'd brought. He rounded the bed and placed them on a nightstand like some sort of hotel staff, then disappeared from Sonic's view. Sonic strained his ears.

A moment later, alien guy passed right in front of Sonic's door crack and Sonic flinched so hard he almost bumped his elbow into the wood.

The guy paused. His tall shape shifted behind the crack. Something pressed and rubbed against the door from the outside, making it creak, then alien guy seemed to leave again. A moment later he apparently opened one of the other compartments and began putting stuff inside, quietly whistling again.

Sonic got into a more comfortable position, relaxing somewhat. This wasn't so bad, actually.

…Not the wardrobe part. But the fact that there was a chance those guys had a sort-of connection to the thing that brought him here. Couldn't hurt to ask if they knew how he could make that Star Post take him home again.

Sonic pushed the door open and stepped out in the most dignified manner one could step out of a wardrobe, then threw the guy a two fingered salute. "Hey! Sorry for dropping in like this. Any chance you know how that Star Post works over on the other isle?"

Alien guy stared, frozen in place. The stack of folded linen he had in his arm dropped to the ground in perfect slow motion, and his eyes went wide enough to become about almost normal-sized. They were blue, actually.

Sonic grimaced, thumbing at the wardrobe. "Yeaah, I know. Didn't plan on hiding in there…"

»Shit…« The guy's eyes darted across the room as if looking for something to grab. When he came out empty he put the palms of his hands forward, apparently trying to look harmless. »Don't move, okay? Don't move…« He spoke slowly, soothingly.

Unfortunately, everything he spoke was also complete gibberish.

If he hadn't been towering over Sonic like a frickin' mammoth, his act of appearing harmless could've almost been successful, though. But Sonic wouldn't be surprised if the other was actually just waiting for the right moment to lunge.

»Greg?« Alien guy shouted, making Sonic flinch. »Get your ass in here, right now!«

Some other male voice replied from outside, and Sonic reflexively looked into the direction the voice was coming from. Alien guy took his chance to jump for one of the dropped linen and threw it above Sonic's head like a dragnet.

Sonic slipped away from beneath the floating blanket almost as an afterthought. He rolled sideways across the bed's mattress and flipped to a stand on the other side of the bed, leaving a couple of streaks on the pristine sheet.

…So much for trying not to touch anything in here.

Alien guy had jumped after the sheet, now holding a vaguely Sonic-sized piece of fabric in his arms that slowly deflated.

"…Really?" Sonic said, raising an eye-ridge and gesturing at the fallen blanket.

The guy stared at Sonic, back to the fallen piece of fabric then back at Sonic. He began climbing to his feet, looking more confused than determined.

At the front, the bead curtain rattled again, the guy's friend apparently coming through. Sonic frowned. If the other guy was also going into catch-first-ask-later mode, Sonic really didn't want to deal with both of them at once—not until he had an idea of how strong those guys were, anyway, or, whether they had any powers to boot. Better let everyone cool off for a bit, then give communication another try.

Sonic dashed through the now open patio door and into the woods behind the house before the second guy came into view.

#

Sonic perched in the branches of a nearby tree, watching the guy in the colored shirt pace up and down the patio below. His friend (another male apparently) still stood in the shaded doorframe, fanning himself with a cap. This one's hair had decided to grow in his face instead of the top of his head, and Sonic couldn't help but also compare him to the strange Star Post image. Even if the beard was nowhere near as bushy as the one he'd seen, it was still enough to assure him he'd really seen the shape of one of those a week ago. It was enough to pile up a number of pretty odd implications in his head.

Were the Star Posts maybe not a Mobius-thing after all? What if those guys were really the ones who'd always known how to use them. Or maybe there'd even already been contact and he never knew?

Sonic edged forward and strained his ears, trying to listen in on their exchange. He hadn't understood a thing when they'd talked before, but maybe he just had to pay a little more attention. He'd been in tons of different language Zones before and usually picked up a thing or two while he was at it (even if it was rarely more than learning how to find the next spot to eat, but hey…)

Their language sounded kinda brash and loud, but otherwise pretty orderly. It also didn't seem to have any weird noises like some of the eastern lizard dialects. He could probably mimic those guys pretty easily.

…Not that it would do him any good. He still didn't understand a thing they said.

Sonic crept back again and leaned against the tree's trunk while the two guys below kept discussing. Shirt gestured pretty much everywhere while the one with the cap just seemed confused, shrugging occasionally and not talking much. It almost looked as if shirt guy was trying to describe Sonic with his gestures, which seemed kind of weird all of a sudden. Those guys did look somewhat odd to him, too, alright, but Sonic had seen enough different species to shrug it off for the most part. Shirt's freak-out level was a bit over the top.

…Unless they for some reason weren't used to seeing other species or just didn't hang out with them. That would be annoying. Especially if he couldn't just go up and talk to them.

Sonic groaned and bumped his head against the trunk again. Both guy's heads snapped up at the noise, Shirt immediately pointing and Cap staring with his mouth dropping open. Sonic startled out of his branch and hopped to the ground through the branches of a bunch of other trees, taking off across the island.

At least he hadn't ended up in some kind of alien stone age…