Chapter 11 – Living Mountains
For the weary, there was no rest. Knuckles led them on after Xadra' resurrection, to the place where gods once dwelt. Now the earth and sky were dark, though Nature's night was not yet come, for a far more potent night had fallen over the mountain range. They depended on the seven Emeralds for light, and came to rest before the foot of the nearest mountain.
"We have to stop here, or else he'll sense the Emeralds' power. Also, don't use anything magical or otherwise, he can sense those too."
"No problem, Red, lead the way."
"It's so high!" said Hannah, "I'm no mountain cat, either."
"Tough," smirked Sonic, "Or is it too hard for the greatest sorceress of all time?"
"Hold your tongue, or I'll take it out," she growled, and began the trudge upward with a scowl on her face.
No one could see the peak. Thanatos was at the top, and in the valley, struggling with the Master Emerald, his being billowing out over all the mountains as a great thundering and crashing was heard throughout the range. Tails stuck with Sonic at the rear, Kootan walked with Emess and Lazer while Hannah followed just behind Knuckles at the lead. Their footsteps crunched on loose gravel, they clambered over dykes and around fjords. Its gentle slope ended at a sharp incline, and the seven began to climb, but a very indignant voice boomed and shook them off and into a heap.
"WHAT DO YOU WANT?"
"Yep, living mountains," sighed Sonic as he brushed pebbles out of his quills, "You gonna deal with her, Red?"
"It's my job," the echidna shrugged and called the Earth Emerald. He knelt, gripping earth and rocks in his paws, and prayed to the mountain.
"Spirit, grant us safe passage into your valley…"
"AND WHY SHOULD I DO THAT?"
"We wish to stop the god, Thanatos, who now resides within your valley."
"THANATOS IS MY GOD. HE IS ALL!"
"Oh dear," murmured Hannah as an avalanche of rocks tumbled toward them. Knuckles snarled and punched into the side of the mountain, channeling the Earth Emerald's power through him.
"You will let us go! The Walkers demand it!"
A slab of stone burst out of the mountain, forming a canopy over their heads that deflected the avalanche to crash down on either side. The spirit of the mountain became silent, but the cloud of Thanatos grew more violent above.
"We cannot afford to use the Emeralds again," warned Knuckles, "He suspects we are here. One more episode like this will doom us."
"Doom await us all," sighed Hannah and began climbing. The others murmured among themselves and followed.
***
Time passed uncounted. They rested on a flat shelf of rock, fatigue showing in most faces, especially Knuckles who lay flat and stared at the black sky, wishing he could sleep.
"Are we there yet?"
"Shut up, Sonic."
"Go stuff yourself, Lazer."
"Oh great, now I'm thinking about food."
Tails groaned. He was sure it was past dinnertime. Looking up didn't help… Thanatos obscured all. He couldn't tell if they were halfway or quarter way to the top. And there was the climb down to think about. He groaned again.
"We could do it quickly," mused Kootan, "Just use the Emeralds and fly as fast as we can into the valley."
"Do you want to face an army of Elements?" Knuckles yawned. Kootan did not answer.
"Think of the celebration afterward, not the present suffering," Emess suggested. Sonic snorted. Tails groaned louder and held his stomach. Hannah's voice was a whiplash.
"You do that, while we focus on reality. Goddess, to even think we'll succeed is foolishness…"
"Pessimist," accused Sonic. Hannah showed her fangs, snarling. Sonic looked at them with detached amusement.
"Ooh, pearly."
"Goddess," she swore and looked away. Knuckles rolled over and got to his feet with a heavy sigh.
"Come on. Up."
He was in the lead, but now the climb was almost vertical. He punched into the rock, going up, creating holds for the others to climb with.
For an hour, as time is guessed, they ascended and made it to another ledge. There was room enough to sit and rest their limbs. Kootan, the ninja, perched on a nearby rock and rolled pebbles in his paws. Violence began afresh in the darkness above and they dared not climb until the mountain stopped trembling. Sonic cried out suddenly causing everyone to jump.
"Damn! I forgot to tell her!"
"What?" came the collective response.
"That I carved her statue in Marble Gardens! She thought I paid some sculptor to do it!"
"Why are you bothering with that now?" Hannah complained, "You're acting as though you'll see her again!"
He glared at her.
"You pessimistic…"
Kootan stood up, coiled his body and jumped.
What a jump. Lost in the dark for an instant, he fell back down, down, holding a large bundle in his arms. The rock he landed on crumbled but he hopped lightly onto the ledge the others were seated upon. Room was made for the bundle he held.
It was a man. Kootan eyed Emess.
"You know him?"
"No."
The warrior – for a warrior he was – wore a mangled suit of chain mail armour, the metal plates beneath were twisted and warped. His face was bleeding from the eyes, ears, nose and mouth, blood also matting his thick brown hair, moustache and short beard. His blue eyes opened, he was still breathing, barely.
"Who…"
"We are the Seven," Knuckles began, kneeling beside the broken man, "We have come here to defeat Thanatos."
"Him!" the man gasped, "I saw him take the six worlds… I did nothing… but I tried, I tried…"
He coughed, spitting up a gob of blood onto his chest.
"But he beat me… we locked minds, but he is a god, I was no match for…"
He began to cough again, flecks of blood flying. When the fit was over, Sonic spoke up.
"What's your name?"
The man tilted his head toward the voice.
"Sonic?"
"Uh… that's me."
"I'm sorry, Sonic. I should have listened to you… but it's too late…"
"But I never met you before!"
A smile formed on cracked and blistered lips. His voice was very soft now.
"Not here. Another time, another place. My name is…"
He took a breath to reveal his name but stopped halfway through to die. Lazer and Kootan confirmed his passing. Knuckles closed the blue eyes, whose last sight was Sonic leaning toward them.
"He knew you."
"Duh, Red. But I swear I've never seen him before."
"Whatever it was, you should have insisted a little harder," Lazer said, wondering at the mind he had touched so briefly. Sonic sputtered.
"I don't know him! How could I have insisted he shoulda done whatever he shoulda done if I never met the guy!"
"Another time, another place," repeated Kootan, "This is a mystery of magical proportions. I wonder…"
"Let's bury him and get it over with," Hannah interrupted, and began pulling rocks toward the dead warrior. Everyone helped and soon he was entombed in stone. Knuckles intoned the benediction.
"As you have died for Mobius, so you will return to her. Oh planet, accept his body, may his soul rise to the higher life."
They left him there, a warrior buried on the mountainside.
Thanatos smashed into the Master, roaring frustration at its immovable form.
"I know why you have not shattered. Destiny and Fate are within you!"
The male and female deities emerged from the Master and faced him, as one voice, unafraid.
"Please stop this. You are not meant to take our world! Take any other, but spare this one of your hand!"
"Why?" he challenged, "When all other worlds are mine, I would have returned here to claim it as my own."
"Listen to us! You must not carry out your plan. If you stop now, none shall judge you, we will make you our own again."
"HA! Would you have me, the eternal Thanatos, as a subject to your whims?"
"Come home…"
"Go! You are not welcome here, upon MY planet!"
They re-entered the Master, and his will did not prevail against theirs.
***
Wonders did not cease after conquering the peak and starting the long, dreary way down. While Knuckles organized them into a chain-link of held hands (for none could see past the feeble light of their Emerald) Hannah spotted flashes of orange and red on the distant valley floor.
"Any idea what those are?"
"Another warrior, I bet," said Sonic, and the others thought so, too.
They did not have to wait long to see their mystery warrior for the fight and fire were taken uphill, and to the mountain. Darkness among darkness could be seen, swiping at the bright flames that were driven ever backward and upward.
"What? He looks like you, Tails!" cried Knuckles, who was closest to the action.
And their warrior was revealed upon a cliff, fighting against nothing less than an Element.
Red he was, a kitsune with four long tails that flicked furiously as his sword flashed bright crimson. Flames were born from his body, casting blood shadows all across the mountain. As fire, he moved swiftly with the sword he held, dodging great swinging blows from the Element but also returning them with fierce power.
Kootan drew the Water Emerald near and out slid his kodachi blade.
"As he is not one of us, it is more foolish than brave to fight Thanatos alone!"
Lazer held Kootan's shoulder and shook his head at the others. His voice brooked no argument.
"Stay. I will go."
Lazer took to the air and made his presence known to the Element. It looked up, distracted by the new fire, and the mystery warrior left the cliff to drive his bright sword into the Element's shoulder. It roared, tearing at the wound with claws, and one of its terrible fists crashed into the mountain. The cliff gave way, but the mystery warrior was gone, and reappeared nearer Lazer, safe atop a protruding rock.
Then it was Lazer's turn. With the awesome power of R'Thrys, he forged his energies anew.
"Wanrikken style! Split Image Slice!"
He and R'Thrys became many, but the images all soared to the Element, slashing into and bursting out of its grotesque body. It died, screeching impotent curses at its killers until fire silenced it forever.
Red flames faced one another on that mountain, their fires separate and apart. Memory tickled Lazer's mind.
"I know you."
"And I know you, Lazer."
"Firey."
Firey averted his eyes.
"Are you the one I cried for?"
"Are you the one I bled for?"
Firey saw the scar, running from the top of Lazer's right wrist and slanting to the left.
"I didn't see that one."
"It's why I walked away."
"It was your choice."
Awkward silence.
"But all the things I said and did… didn't they mean anything to you?"
"More than you know, Firey. But she and I, we're together."
Firey could not deny the wedding band on Lazer's left paw.
"Then it's over," he said very quietly, purple eyes turned blankly to the ground. Lazer removed both of his gloves and offered them to the four-tailed kitsune.
"Yours."
"They're not enough."
The wedding band was dull gold under the closeness of their natural fires. Lazer dropped his gloves to the ashes and stepped back.
"Where I go, you cannot follow."
Firey knelt, considering the white-blue gloves at his feet.
"You've made them all dirty."
"Goodbye, Firey."
Firey stood with Lazer's gloves, pulling off his own leathery brown ones and tossing them. Lazer caught them frowning.
"Why?"
"I don't want your paws to get cold."
A smile touched that sad face.
"Goodbye, Lazer. My thoughts will always be of what could have been."
A flick of his tails, and he was gone. Lazer tugged on the heavy, warm gloves and sighed. His companions were watching him. He must return, he could not linger and allow memory to distract him.
Kootan hummed and nodded to himself. Emess was his audience.
"It has happened twice today. Something I last saw… four hundred and thirty one years ago. That warrior and Sonic, they do know each other in another place and time. Lazer and that many-tailed one, they have met in this world, but they have also met elsewhere. I cannot perceive any other realities than this one, but by the gods' grace, I am allowed to know this phenomenon when I see it."
"Another life…" said Emess, and was silent, pondering.
