Mist stared at his old friend, how could he not...he then saw why, Knuckles had known him before he was Mist, his fur had changed colour, he had once been white but the chaos energy seeping into him during his imprisonment had changed his fur green.
"No, you don't know me guardian, but I know you" he said, true enough, Knuckles didn't know Mist, he only knew who Mist had once been.
Knuckles frowned; he thought this echidna seemed familiar somehow, but this echidna was still around, he hadn't disappeared like the others, "So, who are you?" he asked "and where have you been these past six or so years?"
Six years, thought Mist, I was in there for six years? He turned to Knuckles, "My name is Mist, and I have been imprisoned in an ancient tomb for the past years" had he been imprisoned? He remembered breaking out of the pod; he was probably placed in a spare pod after he rescued Knuckles. A question formed, "Knuckles? Oh sorry, Guardian. What happened to the Emeralds? And where is the Master Emerald?"
"Mist eh? Well we decided the Emeralds weren't safe here so they were moved to a place no one could get to without my say so" Knuckles told him, deciding to widen the teleport field to include the newcomer, this Mist character
Mist nodded, that made sense, but, "Where are the others?" he asked
Knuckles looked taken aback, his eyes wide, "Y...you don't know?" Mist shook his head, "They're gone, all of them. I found a few bodies but the rest just disappeared" he said, adding, "I'm sorry" when he saw Mist's reaction to the news
Mist sat back heavily, gone, all gone, his father, any other friends he had, gone.
Knuckles walked over to the sitting echidna and made sure he was within the radius shown on his watch display, "Lets go Mist" he said
Mist looked up, "Where?" he asked
"To the Master Emerald" replied Knuckles, pressing the button, a few seconds later they were aboard space colony ARK, in the Shrine room to be exact.
Mist stared around, one minute he had been sitting on the path, then he was sitting on cold metal, looking at the shrine, he turned and saw a window. Walking over he saw the planet below, "We're in space?" he said in a voice that was barely a whisper
Knuckles nodded as he walked over to Mist, "The Master Emerald is this way," he said, taking Mist by the arm and leading him over to the main shrine, to where the Master Emerald sat.
Mist followed Knuckles in a daze then began to feel a familiar pain in his head, it grew more painful the closer he got to the Master Emerald, suddenly he was no longer in Knuckles' grip but dashing over to the Emerald, he stopped infront of it, the pain in his head beginning to become unbearable, he reached out a hand...and gave a scream that could have shattered glass, the lenses on his sunglasses actually did shatter, all the blood vessels in his eyes burst, blood began to flow from his nose and his ears and his memory began to return as a series of still images.
He was being carried down a corridor. He was in a room with a metal table. He was manacled to the table. A needle was in his arm. Something was on his face, he couldn't see it but he could feel it around the sides of his eyes. Then pain, terrible pain from above and below each eye. He passed out and came to not into the real world, but into a nightmare of a flashback.
Flashback
He was theirs; the device on his head rendered his former personality useless, just a voice, a murmur in the back of his skull. To keep him contained they had clothed him in body armour made of a foreign metal from their Homeworld, he had ankle and wristbands of the same metal but not the power to remove them.
He was overseeing the capture of subjects for his master's experiments, those captured were brought before him, if they looked right then he nodded, if not they were taken away. His fur had turned green from the energies he was being exposed to, the metals in his armour seemed to absorb and reflect the chaos energy of the shard around his neck, hidden under his body armour.
His masters had decided to invade the floating island, lots of subjects there, subjects like him, hardy, resilient, and easily controlled.
He had changed into his mist form, the armour restricting him somewhat, as he inspected those brought forward for experimentation.
He kept nodding or shaking his head with each subject before a certain one was brought before him, a purple echidna, a female purple echidna. The voice of the original personality was screaming a name, Miira. The mist grinned; his old personality seemed to have an attachment to this one, he was about to shake his head when the old personality gave him the mental equivalent of a sucker punch, 'knocking out' the mist's personality.
The mist snapped back to a green echidna that fell to the floor and reverted back to a white echidna, Mist.
"Miira, run, go, save yourself, I...aaaaaaahh!" Mist yelled, trying to save her, but the device attached to his head sparked and Mist's personality was slammed back into his head. He became green once more and then became the mist creature.
Try as he might The mist couldn't shake his head and condemn this 'Miira' to death, so he reluctantly nodded, and felt a pressure in his head lessen, the original personality was content, if Miira wasn't dead then she could be rescued.
The mist moved onwards on the island, leaving fighters to the grunts that followed him. He walked towards a place of great power, maybe if he could gain that power he could break the chains that bound him to his masters, maybe he could be free himself and become their master, he laughed a little at this and continued towards the power.
When he got there he found himself standing in the centre of a ring of seven pillars, each pillar topped by a gem of a different colour. The mist was standing in a basin of some sort; he could feel that the gems were giving off the energy.
He absorbed a little of this power and smiled, this would work and his bonds would finally be broken. Motion disrupted his concentration, it was two echidnas, older ones than the specimens he had collected, one was jade green with a bandolier of knifes around him and the other was red with a silver crescent mark on his chest.
They started towards him and the jade green one threw a knife, it passed straight through The mist, raising a smile on The mist's face.
"You pathetic creature, did you really think that would even faze me? Behold my powers," He yelled at them, beginning to laugh as he absorbed the chaos emerald's power, his form deteriorating, becoming less humanoid and more a swirling maelstrom of mist and energy.
The bands around his ankles and wrists snapped off and The mist's laugh became crazed, he was almost free. The body armour didn't snap, it melted, becoming a silver band, binding the whirling column of energy. With a roar of frustration The mist drew yet more power from the emeralds, his laugh becoming steadily more insane as the column grew in both size and power.
Suddenly the band snapped and the energy exploded outwards with one last cry, "FREEEEEEEEEEEEEE!"
The control device attached to Mist's head disintegrated and The mist's personality ceased to exist, the green hue leaving his fur. No longer driven by conscious thought the energy pulse rippled outward, shaking the floating island to its very foundations. The guardian and his bodyguard, Koran, were flung against the building they had sealed both Knuckles and the Master Emerald in. The Hydrocity system sprung leaks and began to flood. Pyramids in Sandopolis sunk into the ground. The giant mushrooms on mushroom hill toppled over. The Marblecity shattered and fell apart, sinking into ruins. The pulse even caught the sky sanctuary, shaking its structure loose, the integrity beginning to fail.In the epicentre of the blast lay a white echidna with blood red eyes. Mist got up off the floor and looked around him, he saw a figure lying slumped against the building, it was a jade green echidna, it was his father.
"Dad? Dad are you alright?" he called as he ran towards the limp form of his father
"Kiraol, is that...you?" the echidna whispered
"Yes father, its me. It'll be alright"
"No, my time...has come. Take my knifes...avenge us...avenge us all" The echidna's eyes began to glaze over "I can see...your mother"
Mist, AKA Kiraol took the bandolier from his father's body, drawing his father's favourite knife he pressed it into his father's hand, which closed tightly around it. Koran smiled at his son and closed his eyes, exhaling one last time.
Kiraol stared at his father's dead body, wet patches began to form, they were his tears, he wept for his father, as he had wept for his mother. He lay his father down and walked over to the other body, the guardian's body. The guardian looked at Kiraol and said just three words, "Protect...my...son" then he too died.
End Flashback
Mist, now Kiraol, awoke in a pool of his own blood, tears flowing from his bloodshot eyes, he remembered, oh god, now he remembered. It was his fault, it was entirely his fault.
"I...it was me. I did it. Oh god I destroyed our people" he said, eyes wide, hands clutching his head "It was my fault! It was all my fault!"
The next thing he knew he was on the other side of the room, two big gashes down the side of his face. Knuckles had punched him hard, his spikes tearing the flesh. Kiraol looked up and saw Knuckles' face, livid with anger, "You! You destroyed our people?! Why? How? Answer me!" yelled knuckles, dashing across and punching Mist again.
Kiraol picked himself up off the floor and reached into the backpack, drawing out the emerald. He had betrayed his people, he had betrayed the guardian, he had even betrayed his father, but none of that compared to the guilt he felt when he realised he had betrayed Miira.
He said nothing, he just clutched the emerald and in a flash, he was gone.
He reappeared back in the tomb, outside the chamber containing the pods. He didn't go in; instead he dashed off down the corridor, deeper that the explorers had gone. He ran until he reached a door, and he destroyed it completely, the chaos energies tearing the door apart at a molecular level.
He had entered the containment room, he had never been allowed down here when he was under control, but he knew this is where all the 'specimens' were kept.
He looked a the tubes, some held hideously distorted figures that Kiraol knew would be better off where they were, others held perfect creatures, perfect except for the flat line on their lifesign monitors. Some tubes held live ones; it was these that Kiraol opened, releasing the creatures contained within.
He got to the last two, one held a red hedgehog with orange streaks in his spines, he was alive and Kiraol released him, the other tube contained a female, purple, echidna.
"Miira" he breathed, checking the lifesign monitor, a beat, she was alive.
He drained the cylinder of liquid and removed the breather, she coughed up some of the liquid, and he hit the release button. Nothing happened.
He hit it again, and again, and again...nothing.
Miira was awake now, and she could see Kiraol, he drained the green from his fur, forcing it back into the shard of emerald and became white once again. He placed one hand against the glass tube; she pressed her hand against his, on her side of the glass.
"Kir, I knew you'd save me" she said, then realised something was wrong, her air was running out, and the chamber wasn't opening!
"Kir! Help!" she yelled, sinking to her knees
Kiraol slashed at the tank again and again, scratching it, scraping it, cracking it. He shoulder barged the weak part and burst into the prison, slicing up his arms in the process. He grabbed Miira and pulled her out of the tank.
"Thank you...Kir" she gasped as she filled her lungs with air, then kissed him on the cheek.
Kiraol gathered the others around and pulled out the chaos emerald. With Miira holding onto his arm Kiraol began to access the chaos power to teleport them out of here, but at the same time he was trying his utmost to remain solid. He had betrayed them as a creature of mist, if they realised it was him they would flee. He couldn't do it, he didn't have the power in this form, he sighed and said a silent sorry to those around him. He let his restraint go and snapped into his mist form, he had enough power now and he warped all of them away before they could run.