Ch 18: Island of Frozen Time
The Tornado 3 is going at full power. Tails and May are just watching the world go by. They are getting near the huge oceanic whirlpool. Shadow is still on the tail of the jet, just standing there. It is a moonlit night without a cloud in sight, even if there was it would just be a blur as they went by. They are going just under the speed of sound. Tails pulls out of turbo speed and slowly goes back to the normal speed.
"Why are we slowing down?" said May.
"I ran out of turbo fuel. Plus, the place is right in front of us." Tails pointed to a large island with white ruins all over it. As they approached, the jet suddenly went out. "That can't be good. We don't have enough space for emergency mode. We'll have to go aquatic." There was just enough power to transform into the sub. "Shadow, jump off." They dove very hard into the water. It went under pretty far too. Tails pushes another button and foot pedals come out of the floor. "Start pedaling May, we must work together." Tails is making the lower propeller go, and May is making the rear one move. They slowly rise and are going pretty slow. They start to stop and go backwards. "Uh-oh the WHIRLPOOL!" They start pedaling faster, but its no use. "SHADOW, HELP!"
"I'll be right there." Shadow runs across the water and jumps on the sub. "Move over." Shadow gets in the front seat and pedals. He is going super fast. The sub is just stopped between the two motions. "Tails, if I go any faster, the thing will break. Think of something!"
"Guys, we don't have much time!" Yelled May. Tails suddenly opened the hood of the engine area. He pulled out a chaos emerald.
"Shadow, use this fake emerald to get us out of here." Shadow took the emerald and held it up.
"Chaos Control!" Energy is surrounding them all. Then time stops. "We don't have much time to move, I feel the energy leaving me already." Shadow pedals fast again. They are finally moving forward at a good speed(about 45 mph) and leaving the whirlpool behind. The island is just up ahead when they come out of chaos control. They make landfall at a stony beach. "I really hate the ocean. You could've told me about that fake emerald a long time ago."
"Sorry about that, I just never thought about it. Besides, we gotta get the light shard and end this chaos now!" Tails walked off the front of his plane and landed on the beach. "I wish I knew what happened to the tornado 3. Nevermind, lets go." Tails looked around his surroundings. The whole island seemed very quiet, like there wasn't any animals in the forest. In front of him was a huge forest with tall trees. They were all pine trees. To the right of him, there is an old looking lighthouse made of stone. It is out on a small peninsula sticking out from the island. To the left there is a ruined city. All the buildings are huge and white. Strangely, there are no plants growing on them. Tails looked at the water, It was not even moving at all. He stepped in the water and made a splash. It just stayed up in the air. It was moving, but not enough to notice unless you focused on it. "That is just plain weird."
"What is?" Shadow came over to him.
"This whole island is stuck in a time freeze."
"So that's why the plane stopped and went down to sea." Shadow walked down the beach a few feet. Tails headed back to the plane.
"C'mon May, let's go to where Shadow is...May?...HEY! If you don't wanna go just say so, but please don't ignore me, okay?" Tails is looking at the back of her. "FINE, don't talk to me, I'm gone!"
"What's up?" Shadow commented.
"It's May, she won't even apologize for ignoring me. Girls are so confusing, I don't even know what I did."
"Maybe she'll talk to me and I can tell you what you did wrong." Shadow ran over to the plane and started talking to her. After a while he slapped her.
"What the hell are you doing! I thought you were going to talk to her, not beat her up!" Tails is really mad at him. He walked over to May.
"Are you okay, did he hurt you?" There was no answer still.
"Tails?" Asked Shadow.
"What! Can't you see that you traumatized her!"
"I barely touched her cheek. I must tell you something. She is stuck in the time freeze. I think only we are immune to it's effects.
"How come she wasn't before." Tails is confused.
"It probably works the same as chaos control. Just hold her hand for a minute." Shadow stood back and watched.
Tails grabbed her hand. "Oh, where did you go..How did you get here...You were just over there-" Tails hugged her tightly. "Tails...I...can't...breath."
"Sorry, um, yeah. May, you were trapped in a time freeze. The only way for you to not be affected is for me or Shadow to make some kind of physical contact with you."
"Heehee...Now you'll have to hold my hand." Tails led her off the plane. He is slightly blushing.
"Shadow, not one word from you." Tails saw that Shadow was smiling funny. They all headed for the deserted ruins. The ruins look like they used to be a town of some kind. It looked roman from the tall white pedestals. The town is very old and dusty, but there is no sign of any aging. It all looks new and unbroken. "Wait a minute, Shh!" They took cover behind a building. "Isn't that one of the grand cross warriors?"
"Yeah, it is. I think it is Bruiser. He shouldn't be much of a problem though. He is all buff and no brains. He is also incredibly slow. But don't get too cocky. If he manages to get a hold of you, he could break you in half." Shadow is looking around the corner.
"Are we in danger Tails?" May has a concerned look on her. Tails shook his head.
"C'mon, lets go." Shadow jumps around the corner and lands on Bruiser's head but then jumps off. He does nothing. "What is wrong with you. Hmmpth...Pathetic! Wait, he's stuck in the time freeze. HEY GUYS, we can just go now."
"Oh okay." said Tails. As Tails passed Bruiser, he kicked his leg and made the guy fall over. He looks like a fallen statue. "Heheheh..."
Up ahead is a huge building that looks like a temple of some sort. The front of it looks triangular with a small square opening right in the middle. There are no stairs, ledges, or any way to get up to it. The doorway is up at least 80 feet. "This can't be the only way in, can it?"
"Lemme scan it first, Shadow." Tails grabbed May's right arm and fiddled around with the watch. A holographic 3D map appeared over the face of the watch. The overall compound was enormous and goes a few levels under ground. "Wow, this place is huge. This door is the only entrance and there is a long hallway that goes to a huge vertical shaft. It appears to be very hard to enter this building, but there is no other way out that I can see."
"One problem, how the heck are all three of us going to get in?" May asked as she looked up at the door. In a split second Shadow jumped at the wall and ran up it to the door. "What about me?"
"I'll carry you up." Tails put his arms around her and lifted off the ground. They gradually got up to where Shadow was. He already went ahead. "That worked well. I didn't even break a sweat. Wonder where Shadow went?"
Shadow was in a big circular room that has a hexagon shaped hole in the middle. It went down farther than the eye could see. He tossed a pebble in the hole. Ten seconds later he heard an echo. "That's a long way down."
Tails and May finally reach the room. "Hey Shadow, find anything?" Tails looks at the huge hole. "Holy fruits, that's a big hole. How do you think we should get down there."
"I sense great danger down there, I think May should stay here, It's safer." Shadow looked down the hole with his arms crossed. "I'm not trying to be mean or anything, but she can slow us down if you have to keep contact with her."
"I see your point. May? Do you have any problems with our decision?" Tails was looking at her face.
"How long will you be gone?" Said May.
"That's the good thing, the time freeze will make you think it only took a few seconds for us to return. If were not back in 3 minutes, yell for my name." Tails was about to let go of her arm when she kissed him. Then he let go of her hand. She looked frozen but her arm was moving super slow down to her side. "I promise I will come back."
"Good, lets go. You can just air lift me down the shaft." Shadow waited until Tails was flying before he grabbed onto his hand. They were halfway down the shaft when a huge sound of shifting stone was heard from above. "That sound can't be good, I recommend you to go faster."
Tails stopped moving his tails for a moment and they were in a freefall. Right before they were going to hit the bottom he spun his tails horizontally and the flew into the next room through the doorway. A second later a huge boom came from the shaft they were just in. It sounded like a boulder just crashed on the floor of the shaft. Shadow and Tails hit the wall opposite the doorway. "Are you okay, Sonic?"
"You must have really hit your head, I'm Shadow remember, Shaa-Dow not Saa-nik." Tails is still on the floor. "Lets just hope this trap can't reset itself, or were stuck down here."
"I never want to do that again!" Tails brushed himself off and looked around. They were in a huge room with many doors, 9 to be exact. Each door had an elemental symbol on it that represented each shard that Tails has. The wall that they had crashed into was, in fact, a door itself. It has 7 torches above it in an arch. The symbol on the door looked like a bright orb that shined. "This room is amazing." Tails touched the light door. The door started to glow and then an orange ball of light shot out of it. The orb went into the center of the room. It formed into a ghostly fox. It was the same fox that taught Tails about elemental fusion. 'I see you have the shards, young hero.'
"It's using telepathy. Have you seen this thing before?" Shadow is looking intently on the spirit.
'I do use telepathy and yes I have met the hero before. I know why your here. To obtain the light crystal so you can restore peace to your friend and this world. But I must warn you. If your friend here does anything to help you through the trials, he will surely die. It is my duty as protector of the light shard to make sure you are really the chosen one. Do not worry because if you really are the chosen, you will definitely succeed. Do you wish to proceed?'
"Yes." Said Tails firmly. The spirit came closer to him.
'Before I depart, I must teach you two things. The 30 seconds of power you get from a shard can also be focused in you hand. If you concentrate it in your hand it will be used as a projectile. You can also use all the shards at once to become temporarily invincible. Best of luck in the trials.' The spirit vanished in a flash.
"I guess I will stay here then. Maybe I'll train or something." Shadow went over to the light door and sat in a meditation position.
"Bye then." Tails went over to the first door on the right of the light door. It has a flame symbol on it. Tails pushed on it, but nothing happened. "Hmm...what to do what to do? I got it Firefuse." His sword lit up in flames. Tails took a swing at the door and nothing happened still. He put his hand out in front of him and focused the energy into it. The flames left the sword and turned into red light around Tails' glove. Once he stopped focusing a fireball shot from his hand. It hit the door and the symbol started to glow red and the door slid up. Tails ran through the door and came across a strange looking room. There is a lone walkway going across a pool of water. "This is the trial of flame? Piece of cake."
He was about to step on the walkway when it vanished. He tapped his foot where the walkway was and it was still there but invisible. "This might be harder than it looks," said Tails.