The first thing she noticed after the jump was the cold, a freezing wave hit her body leaving her shocked. Before she could start trembling from the cold Julie-su realized that she was floating. Her heart stopped beating for a second. There was nothing she could see, just an endless darkness. She wanted to scream but could not do it.
Her lungs hurt her while trying to breathe when there was no air to inhale. Panic invaded her, stopping her from thinking clearly. It was just like her nightmares. There was nothing there that she could use to save herself. There was no one to save her. She was utterly alone and helpless. She was going to die.
Tears fell down her cheeks, her chest and diaphragm were exploding with pain.
"This is it," she thought hopeless, regretful. "I failed".
By reflex she touched her neck and realized that her hands had inflated, and also her feet felt tight in her boots.
The echidna suddenly felt her head light, her eyes were closing. She fought against it but failed.
"I'm sorry Knuckles," was her last thought before passing out.
Julie-su woke up agitated, her last moments were fresh in her mind. Had it been a nightmare? She wondered. She coughed hard; her lungs still hurt. Definitely not a nightmare, the pain was there, she almost died, then what happened? Who rescued her?
There was so much light in the place. Through her lashes she realized that she was in a small metallic room. She was laying down on a hard stretcher, wrapped in several blankets. Next to her, screens were showing her vitals.
Her eyes got used to the artificial light when she heard a door swished open.
"It's good to see you awake" a familiar voice said at the door.
Julie-su's heart flipped up with happiness, she could never forget that voice, not even in a thousand years. Her eyes watered when she looked at him. Standing at the door was a red echidna smiling with a half-moon adorning his chest. She choked down a sob.
Knuckles hurried up to her side, panicking at her reaction. "Are you feeling alright? Why are you cry…" the red echidna didn't finish his sentence, he was interrupted. The pink echidna had grabbed him by the arm and kissed him hard.
Julie-su had been so desperate to return home, desperate enough to risk her life to see him again, to return to him.
It was a long kiss, one that Julie-su did not want to end, but she needed to tell him how much she had missed him.
Julie-su opened her eyes after ending the kiss and was surprised to see Knuckles flustered. She had never seen him so red in her life. An uncomfortable feeling settled down in her stomach.
Was it too much? She wondered and waited for him to say something. Why was he reacting in that way? He stood there in silence and appeared to get redder by the second.
Maybe something changed while she was away. Her nervousness was replaced with dread.
The door was opened again and this time it was Sonic who appeared.
"Hey, look who woke up, space lady, what happened to you? Why were you floating in the middle of space? It must be an interesting story," the blue hedgehog asked in a too lightly manner.
It struck odd to Julie-su that she was being called "lady". She did not answer and looked at Knuckles again. The pink echidna noticed that his eyes were different, instead of deep purple they were blue, blue like a deep lake. Realization came to her like a bullet and she could have smacked herself for her impulsiveness. It was her turn to get red.
This was not "her" Knuckles.
She had not returned home yet.
"Again, I'm sorry for, for… THAT," Julie-su said for the fifth time. She was standing up, warming up her arms and stretching her legs.
"Don't worry about it, I understand," this Knuckles said trying to sound cool, but his cheeks were still tinted with faint red.
"Yeah! No big deal, miss, it was probably his first kiss ever, but everything is cool now," Sonic said to further embarrass Knuckles, and he succeeded since Knuckles angrily closed his arms in his chest looking away from them, and then his face was flustered again.
At the door a small two-tailed yellow fox appeared and a human kid of brown hair, both of them were excited.
"We found it," this Tails exclaimed and flew next to Julie-su to show her what they had retrieved outside the spaceship.
The fox extended his hand to Julie-su, showing a silver-thick ring about the size of his palm. Julie-su recognized it and being grateful with this universe and her luck she grabbed it.
"This is the ring," she simply said.
"I still can't believe that you used it to transport yourself from another dimension! Just using the ring!" Exclaimed the human boy and continued rambling. "Sonic, can you imagine it? We could use it and I could visit you anytime and…" he stopped suddenly, realizing what he was saying and the reality of their situation.
Sonic just nodded to Kris, understanding the same that, firstly, the ring was not theirs to use. Secondly, the echidna needed the ring more than them. Julie-su had told them about what happened to her people, and her, with the Thrash guy.
Julie-su at first had tensed at that, that ring was her way home, she would never give it away, at least not voluntarily, just over her dead body. However, she decided to let the kid's comment go. "He's just a kid," she thought, "he is not dangerous".
"I'm not even sure if it still works," Julie-su said out loud and sighed, she was sure it was the same ring she used for the jump, but it lacked the shine from before the jump.
"I can run some scans to it, but I don't know what I should be looking for," said Tails. Julie-su stood quite for a moment, thinking about what she knew of the ring and her general knowledge of dimensional traveling. It was fortunate that she had asked Finitevus the fundamentals and principles of the ring and that he had responded to all her questions.
Finitevus.
When she almost died, she thought that it had been Finitevus' fault, that he on purpose made the ring to be her doom. She was not so sure about that anymore, maybe he had made a mistake, or the objective, with the available material and technology, was beyond his capabilities in the other dimension. On the other hand, maybe he had sent her to the wrong dimension on purpose to stall her while he did villainy to their people.
She closed her fists in a very short moment of fury. She could not trust Finitevus to be unsupervised for too long while she's away. Determined to make the ring functional again she told Tails that there were a few things they could analyze about the ring and started to recite a list of equipment they would need to make the scans.
It surprised Julie-su that Tails actually had everything they needed on the ship. Together they began with the tests and scans. Sonic eventually got bored and left, while Kris was trying to write down every single word that came out of Julie-su, for later of course. Knuckles stood close but didn't say anything to contribute. He just stared at Julie-su the whole time.
Julie-su did not take offense to that, she knew her looks were unusual. The silver rings in her right arm and electronic prosthetic spike were not just for fashion. They had a purpose while she was in the Dark Legion, they were not pretty but had their perks for emergencies, but he didn't know that.
Tails later noticed Knuckles' staring and explained to Julie-su that she's probably the first echidna that he's seen in his life, that was not dead.
The pink echidna could not help but feel pity for the Knuckles of this universe, not everyone could have the same luck as her Knuckles had, yes, he lived many years in utter loneliness but eventually found his people and was part of the community, at least for a while.
Julie-su just felt more determined to make the ring work again, she was going to return everyone to Knuckles, he was not going to be alone again.
According to the final readings the ring was fine, but it lacked energy to work. How was she going to get enough energy for an interdimensional jump in the middle of space? It had not been easy the last time finding a source of energy and it had been a very dangerous situation.
"Where am I going to get enough power to get this thing working? " Murmured Julie-su to herself, unconsciously biting her thumb.
Tails looked at Knuckles with a question written in his face. Before Tails could even ask, Knuckles said to Julie-su "You could use the Master Emerald to charge your ring."
Julie-su took a moment to process that comment.
"The Master Emerald? It's here on the ship? Not on Earth?" Asked Julie-su, hope starting to pump up her heart.
"We took the Master Emerald to power up the Blue Typhoon, this ship, we can redirect its power to the ring to fill it up, we have enough reserve to do it for a short period of time," explained Tails to Julie-su.
The pink echidna looked at Knuckles again, she knew what a big favor it was for Knuckles to let her use the Master Emerald for her to return home. She wanted to hug him but considering their previous incident she didn't know how he was going to react to another… physical encounter. Instead, she smiled at him and took her hands to her heart, as the traditional echidna way to show gratitude.
"Thank you Knuckles."
It was amazing how fast Tails and Kris worked to make the preparations for the charge of the ring. They did not let Julie-su help, their excuse was that she still needed to rest after almost dying in space.
Now, they were all in the Master Emerald chamber. Tails and Kris pushed some buttons and Knuckles was in position, they gave him his cue and Knuckles extended his arms into the air.
"The servers are the seven Chaos. Chaos is power… Power is enriched by the heart. Master Emerald, lend us your power to help our new friend return to her home!" Knuckles exclaimed with his arms still in the air. The Master Emerald glowed more with each word pronounced by Knuckles, until it finally filled the whole room with its light. Julie-su could have sworn she heard Sonic saying "Show-off," but was not sure.
For a couple of seconds, she could not see a thing.
Then the Master Emerald stopped illuminating the whole room and returned to her normal glow.
Julie-su went over with Tails to check the signature of the ring on his screens and it seemed it was charged and stable.
With a smile she walked over to the ring and took it out of the improvised charging machine that Kris and Tails pulled off. The ring was shining again, just like before her jump to this universe. It looked even brighter.
She held it close to her heart and again thanked Tails, Kris, Sonic, and Knuckles for their help. Tails asked her if that was enough, that if she needed she could make more scans to the ring, to which Julie-su told him that it must be enough for now, she didn't have a lot of time and her people were in danger every minute she took longer to find their home.
"I hope… I hope you find who you are looking for, and good luck," Knuckles said while extending his hand, somewhat awkwardly but endearing, to Julie-su. She shaked his hand gently and said goodbye to him and wished him good luck as well with their current mission.
She looked at the ring in her hand and breathed way to use a dimensional ring it's very simple. Think of the place you want to go, throw the ring and the ring will open a portal to that place.
It didn't work the first time and she didn't know why. The ring seemed to be perfect in the scans, it looked like any other she used in the past. As she thought, it could be either a trap from Finitevus or an honest mistake on his part.
She couldn't waste more time, she needed to try, for her people and her Knuckles.
Julie-su closed her eyes and thought of Angel Island, her majestic home floating proud and high in the blue sky, accompanied with many clouds.
She already jumped into the unknown once, she could do it again.
Julie-su with the image of Angel Island in her head threw the ring and it opened a portal. Without a second thought she ran and jumped to it, not knowing it was just the beginning to her journey back home.
"I'm coming home, Knuckles."
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Author's note
It's been a while since I wrote something, and for some reason I can only come up with long stories but don't have the time to write them.
This is a one-shot, but could easily be the first chapter of Julie's adventure if I ever decide to write the whole thing.
Julie-su used to be in the Archie comics and, years later, I still can not accept the fact that she's no longer part of them. So I have this story of Julie-su returning home, to her Knuckles. Tell me if you would like the rest of the story (wink, wink).
