Knuckles sat down on a large rock to try and grasp what had happened. In a few seconds, the landscape of the island's edge had drastically changed. With the change had arrived the first echidna besides himself he'd ever been aware of. And yet she had no idea that the island was a floating island; she seemed from another time and place entirely.
This was not making sense, Knuckles thought grimly. He had no explanation for it. He was too far away to ask the Master's guidance, as well. Then what could be done? He turned to the direction the echidna—Myla, she'd said—had fled. He set out to follow.
He breathed deeply, drinking in the air, focusing his mind, then threw himself into the air. Over time, he'd learned to channel the power of the Emerald enough for him to achieve a modest altitude, though he did slowly fall. Now, Knuckles thought as he skimmed over the surface of the jungle, where could she have gone?
He heard a scream. Since he knew of no other animals that made such a sound, he traveled in that direction. His control gave out; he fell to a light landing on the jungle floor. As soon as his feet hit ground, he ran towards the scream.
As he ran, he noticed an abrupt shift in the jungle's tone. It turned from the run-down, overgrown jungle to the more familiar lush, full-bodied jungle he knew. He couldn't explain the shift, so it amplified his anxiety.
He soon found the echidna girl, quaking in fear before a medium-sized snake. The snake's fangs, together wider than the girl's arm, were bare before her. The snake's eyes blazed in all their hypnotic glory.
Knuckles disturbed the impending feast. He exploded onto the scene with a mighty leap. Without a second thought he clubbed the snake's head with both hands, stunning it. The head of the snake whipped back, looking for what had caused the disruption. It gathered its several echidna-lengths behind it as it looked around. Then the snake's eyes fell on Knuckles, and all confidence in its bulk vanished. The snake turned tail and slithered into the jungle with nary a hiss. Knuckles noted with satisfaction that, despite its length, the snake took only five seconds to disappear from sight.
Knuckles observed the girl about to collapse and very thoughtfully pulled up an old log for her to fall onto. He even made sure the log was only partially rotted. Yet when she did collapse onto the log, she fell off of it and turned angrily to Knuckles. At least, he thought it was anger; she shifted emotions so quickly he was having a hard time keeping track.
"Thanks a lot! That hurt!"
Knuckles was dismayed. He thought that "Thanks" was a positive, but her tone held something that sounded like scorn. Her second statement made him understand that she wasn't thanking him at all. There was a word for saying something you do not mean. He couldn't think of what the word was. Sarcasm? No, that was not it…
She continued, forcing him to pay attention to the current situation. "I mean, I'm happy you saved me from that snake and all, but you could have helped me calm down!"
He shook his head helplessly. "Your words come too quickly," he said plaintively.
She sighed as if in pity. Knuckles hated pity. "I'm sorry," she said. "I'm just completely lost," she said, getting louder, "and I don't know what I'm doing here! I mean, what is 'here'?"
Was it not "where is here?", Knuckles though curiously. This level of conversation was poor. Unfortunately, there was no alternative. What could Knuckles get out of this, despite all the limitations?
For now, he knew, he had to try to maintain the rapport. "This is the Floating Island," he said simply. "It has been, it is, and it shall be," he said, conjugating the verb with difficulty.
"Since when?" she asked.
Not enough, Knuckles thought. "Since when… has it been what?"
"A floating island!"
Knuckles found the perfect word. "Always," he said happily. "Always."
"How did I get here?"
Knuckles struggled to answer. It took him several seconds before he came up with, "I do not know. I closed my eyes, and when I opened them you were there."
She threw up her hands. As Knuckles understood it, that was not a good gesture. "Just perfect! I don't know where I am and how I got here. How am I supposed to get back?"
Knuckles broke the statements down into chunks. The first statement seemed another non-truth; Knuckles hesitantly decided that "sarcasm" was indeed the proper word for such a thing. The second statement was a little fast, but he reasoned she was stating the situation. The third was an obvious query, but he couldn't understand what she meant by "back". He knew she meant back to somewhere, but where else was there? If he didn't know where she was from, how could he help her?
He couldn't really articulate this to her, so he instead said, "I do not know."
If her reaction was any indication, she was upset with that answer. She started talking very quickly, using words that Knuckles couldn't understand, like "home" and "Council" and "scientists" and something about "hover" something-or-other. She concluded with a statement she spoke so strongly that it must have been a curse or oath of some kind. Knuckles swallowed uncomfortably.
She turned to him, as if expecting a response. She prompted, "Well?"
He puzzled over the word, finally brightening his face and responding, "Yes, very!"
She ran away from him a second time.