Kj: Thanks :) As for the rest of it...(laughs) C'mon, you don't really expect me to answer that question now, do you:P You do? Okay...I'll tell you this much; no, Sonic and Tails' mothers won't be putting in an appearance, since they're both dead (yes, dead for real) ;)

Moonpaw7: Heh, thanks, glad you liked it :D (Tails: Well...I'll do my best but I wouldn't hold out a lot of hope)

Riven K. Daniel: Thanks, glad you enjoyed it

Awdures: (grins) Yeah, well, I do tend to update at night a lot :P And thanks ;)

Matri90: Thanks

FriedBrickWall: Yep, and glad you liked it :P (Sonic: It is not a date. It is a simple few hours out, that's all!)

SaffraEchidna: (bows) Your wish is my command. At least, it is all the time it coincides with what I was gonna do anyway :P And thanks; I'm glad you liked it :D

Asher Tye: Heh, you're absolutely right; Bait did prove pretty useful in Caves ;) As for Espio...well, he's still on tenterhooks about his brother's reappearance. He blames Knuckles and Tails for it, but since they're not around he's shifted the blame onto Sonic ;)

PyroHedgehog4Ever: You're right, there's plenty more Sonic and Bait in the works ;) But not until after this chapter :P

Guardian's Log no. 11487

I'm...I...well, there are no words for how I feel right now. I don't get it, plain and simple. I know my mother died when I was six, and I know because I damn well buried her! I don't know...hell, I don't know what I do know anymore.

--Knuckles the Echidna

Dear Diary

Wow, Knux's mother's alive! Weird; I thought she was dead. And just for the record, Knux, I know you like me more than you do that dumb ol' Master Emerald, despite what you said!

--Tails

"Your what?" Tails' jaw dropped and he stared at Knuckles. "You told me your mother died right next to you!"

"She did! At least...I thought she did..." Knuckles' voice trailed off in confusion and he glanced at Lara-Le, who was unconscious on his bed. With the state of her injuries that was hardly surprising, the echidna thought grimly. He hadn't thought anyone could be in worse shape than Tails, but he was wavering on that.

"So what happened?" Tails asked, studying Lara-Le curiously; he'd never seen a female echidna before.

"How the hell should I know?"

"You gotta talk to me about your mum's death, Knux, 'cause if you don't how'm I s'posed to help you figure this out?"

"I'm not the one who needs to talk about things," Knuckles said pointedly, and turned to go.

With surprising agility for someone with Tails' injuries, the fox darted in front of him and stood in the door, arms out to the side.

"Yes you are. You can yelp 'bout what's good for me and what's not—"

"That reminds me; your bandages need changing."

Tails shook his head. "Uh uh! Don't try and change the subject like that, Knux, 'cause it's not gonna work! Maybe you missed something when she died, something I can find."

"It's not going to help, Tails!"

Tails snorted. "Yeah, right. You're jus' scared to think about it. C'mon kid, talk to me," he added in a not too bad imitation of the echidna. Knuckles glowered at him and Tails returned the scowl. "Knux, you still might've made a mistake. You were younger'n me when she died, right?"

"Yeah. I was also younger than you when I buried her in Sandopolis, so unless she's learned to breathe sand, there is no way at all that she could be here."

"Yeah?" Tails scrambled clumsily up to sit on Knuckles' table, swinging his legs. "So what did happen? You've never said, not really."

"Hmm." Knuckles put one finger to his lips in an absurd parody of deep thinking. "Could that possibly be because I don't like to talk about it!" He practically snarled the last words at Tails, who knew the echidna too well and didn't even blink.

"I don't like to have a broken tail, but I still put up with it," Tails said reasonably. "C'mon Knux, tell me what happened."

The echidna shot him a killing look, then dropped into a chair.

"Not much to tell," Tails heard him mutter. "I was six years old and living with Lara-Le in a cave in the Red Mountain Zone. When my shift at the Master Emerald finished, she came to take me home and I thought that was odd at the time; usually I made my own way back. It was cold, so I remember snuggling into her body, much like you insist on doing to me every chance you get."

"I do not!" Tails said indignantly. "Only when...well, if it's cold it makes sense to snuggle up together and if I get a nightmare, I...well, I...I know how bad it can be so I occasionally snuggle into you just in case you get one an' get all scared and junk. 'Cause, you know, nightmares can be catching. An' anyway, what happened next?"

Knuckles shrugged. "Something woke me the next morning. I've no idea what it was, but I remember trying to wake Lara-Le to ask or tell her about it, but she wouldn't wake up." He shifted, remembering the perplexity he'd felt as a puggle at this development. "I kept shaking her, but she wouldn't wake up." Knuckles looked away. "She wouldn't wake up," he repeated very quietly.

"So what happened?" Tails asked, after Knuckles had been silent for a few minutes.

The echidna shot him a startled glance – he'd all but forgotten Tails was there – then shrugged. "I panicked. I ran out the cave and into the Marble Garden Zone. I didn't go back home for at least six months."

"Huh? How come?"

"I...wanted to give it time," Knuckles said with unusual evasiveness. Something flickered in his eyes, some darker memory and he looked away again. "I buried Lara-Le in Sandopolis, like I said. I couldn't have been mistaken. It was her bones I buried."

"Then what's she doing here?" Tails said.

"I don't know!" Knuckles roared. "I don't know, alright, so quit asking me!"

Tails waited until the echoes had died away before protesting, "It's a fair enough question, Knucklehead! You don't have to yell at me."

"My mother has just come back from the dead and you expect me to be calm and collected?"

"Nuh uh. But you don't have to take it out on me. I'da thought you'd be pleased to see your mum again," Tails added. "I would be mine."

"You don't even remember her," Knuckles retorted, with far more emphasis than tact.

"I don't care! Knux, your mum's come back to you after you thought she was dead! You know how many little kids out there would love something like that?"

The echidna shot Tails a cold look. "I'm hardly a little kid, Tails."

"Then don't act like one," Tails retorted, then prudently stepped out of arm's range. "Why aren't you at least a little pleased?"

Knuckles shot him a look. "Why weren't you pleased when I told you Sonic didn't die in that accident after all, that he was alive and I knew where to find him?"

"Because I thought he was dead! I'd only jus' gotten used to that idea when you threw a curveball at me!"

"May I have some water?" Lara-Le's voice rose up behind them, cracked and dusty.

"For your information, Tails, that came as just as much of a surprise to me as it did you! At least you had some warning before you went in there; I just came face to face with Sonic and had to deal with it there and then! To be honest I barely knew him; Robotnik tortured him so badly he was beyond recognition. Or had you forgotten that little fact?"

"May I please have some water?"

Tails folded his arms squarely, then wished he hadn't as pain shot through his injured wrist.

"No, Knux, I hadn't forgotten that little fact. And I've never forgotten the little fact that when we found him again, Sonic pretty much spat in my face and told me to take a long walk off a short pier and take you with me!"

"Yeah, okay, the guy was a jerk. I'm just saying that—"

A high-pitched shattering whistle cut Knuckles off and he looked around, startled, to where Lara-Le was lying, two fingers still in her mouth.

Tails' jaw dropped. "Wow!" He looked at Knuckles. "Can't you teach me to whistle like that?"

"No, you're noisy enough already," Knuckles told him in an aside, then returned his attention to Lara-Le. "So...you're awake?"

Lara-Le smiled weakly at him. "Hello squid."

Knuckles rubbed the back of his neck while Tails howled with laughter in the background.

"Uh, Lara-Le, about that nickname..."

Tails, who was busy trying to pour out water with his uninjured hand and stop laughing at the same time (and failing spectacularly on both counts) glanced around at Lara-Le.

"Did Knuckles really eat too many lactoberries one time?"

"Tails!" Knuckles hissed.

"What? You said I could ask your mother if I ever met her."

"No," Lara-Le said, straight-faced. "He did it three times before he learned his lesson."

"I did not!"

"Didn't do it three times or didn't learn your lesson?" Tails dared to ask, then ducked the not quite friendly swipe the echidna took at him.

"So – not that I'm not happy to see you – why are you here?" Knuckles said flatly, taking the water from Tails and giving it to Lara-Le. "I thought you were dead. You decide to pop back here for a cup of ectoplasm?"

Lara-Le drank thirstily and lowered the mug enough to say, "Don't you take that haughty tone with me, Knuckles! You're not too big for another trip into a pricklebush!"

"You want a drink of water as well, kid?" Knuckles asked Tails, a little too politely.

The fox nodded vigorously, not trusting himself to speak; he didn't think he could open his mouth or even take his hand away from it without shrieking with laughter. He couldn't remember anyone daring to speak to Knuckles in such a tone.

"Yeah. I'll, uh, I'll go outside and, um, I'll just..." He turned and practically bolted, crashing through the door. A few seconds later, they heard his howls of laughter coming from outside.

"Who's your little friend?" Lara-Le asked.

"What? Oh. Tails. He's a good kid really."

The other echidna smiled up at him. "Just like you were, Knuckles."

Knuckles coughed, uneasy. Echidnas weren't great ones for compliments; in fact, there was an echidna superstition which said complimenting a child to his or her face was at least as unlucky as breaking a mirror.

Besides, memory was giving him the sneaking suspicion that this particular compliment wasn't exactly true. Mobians – even echidnas – had never heard of Dennis the Menace, otherwise Knuckles might have compared his own behaviour to that of the comic book character. As it was, all he could think of to say was, "You're too kind."

Lara-Le's smile became sad. "So formal. Don't you even remember your own mother, Knuckles?"

"Yeah, I remember," Knuckles said flatly. "I remember you supposedly dying right next to me. I remember burying you in Sandopolis as well, so would you mind telling me exactly what you think you're doing not being dead?"

Lara-Le looked away. "Robotnik came for the Master Emerald."

Knuckles squirmed. "That old story. Lara-Le, I know I made a mistake but jeez, that's no reason to come haunt me about it."

"I'm not talking about what happened with you and Sonic – yes, I know about that – I'm talking about what happened that night. I defended the Master Emerald, but Robotnik still captured me and replaced me with a bot so you wouldn't notice anything."

"Pretty fast worker, huh?" Knuckles said flatly.

"I think he'd been planning this for a while. He had the bot all ready, I know that much." Lara-Le shook her head. "After a while he replaced it with an echidna skeleton; a real one. I don't know who you really buried in Sandopolis, Knuckles, but it wasn't me. I escaped Robotnik's fortress when it was destroyed and I've been trying to reach you ever since."

"You took your time." Jeez, what was wrong with him? Knuckles wondered furiously. Tails was right; there were thousands of people who'd love to be in his position right now and he couldn't do anything except be ungrateful.

But damn, did his mother really expect to pick up where she'd left off after all those years?

"I'm going to go check on Tails," he said abruptly, whirled and strode out the door.

He'd been walking for about fifteen minutes, trying to make sense of things when a familiar tan and white figure scrambled out of the bushes and fell into step beside him.

"Hiya—"

"Don't," Knuckles warned, seeing the S start to form on Tails' lips.

"—Knux," Tails said, with an aggrieved look which said that this was what he'd meant to say all along. "How's she doing?"

"Alright under the circumstances."

There was an awkward silence. Knuckles could see that Tails was bursting with curiosity, but kept quiet. Too much had happened, too much in too little time, and he needed to come to terms with everything himself.

"Knux?" Tails said suddenly.

"Yeah...?"

"Why's she call you squid?"

"I don't know," Knuckles said testily. "Why don't you ask her? Didn't anyone ever give you nicknames when you were younger?"

Tails glanced away, ears drooping. "Sure they did. They used to give me nicknames like freak and loser. Mostly freak though; they liked that one. An' it makes a kinda sense, Knux; how many kids like me do you know?"

"What, kids with two tails, kids who are mechanical geniuses or just kids that bug the hell outta me?" Knuckles sniped. He regretted it instantly as he saw Tails' ears droop further. "Hey kid, I'm sorry. I didn't mean that last one."

"You didn't have to take me, Knux."

"What the hell else was I supposed to do, leave you?"

"I thought..." Tails' voice petered out. "I thought that maybe...maybe you wanted to."

Knuckles allowed the barest hint of a grin – just enough for Tails to notice – to appear on his face. "Wanted to? Wanted to bring along someone who has to dismantle everything he gets his hands on? Wanted to bring along someone who snores like a pneumatic drill? Wanted to bring along someone who keeps asking me embarrassing questions about the facts of life?"

Tails giggled. "Yeah, Knux." He shook his head. "Pumping it in?" he asked, still grinning broadly. Knuckles raised an eye ridge.

"I suppose you found out the rest of those facts down in the tunnels, huh?"

The fox dropped his eyes. "Yeah. Max told me. Wish we coulda got him out too."

Knuckles took a long deep breath. He'd always held that he never felt sorry for anything beyond his control, viewing it as useless and weak, but he did feel a slight pang of regret that he'd never be able to meet this Max.

"You can't save everyone, kid."

"I know. But you're gonna save the other echidna, right? An' you saved that iguana." Tails leaned down to pull a cratt off a nearby bush and bit into it, relishing the sticky sweetness of the violet fruit.

Knuckles looked away irritably. "Yeah, well...the kid helped me out. I owed him something."

"Yeff...well..." Tails tried unsuccessfully to free his mouth – the inside of a cratt fruit had a consistency much like runny toffee – and settled for prising his jaw open instead, "...y'r jft fay'ng zat 'cauf..." He broke off, used his fingers to scrape cratt goo off his teeth and tried again. "You're just saying that 'cause you gotta be the big tough echidna warrior type guy an' so you can't admit to ever doing anything nice for anyone else 'cause that's not what big tough echidna warrior type guys do." Tails paused for breath, bit hard into the side of his cratt fruit and yelped in dismay as the insides squirted out the other end, spattering his fur.

Knuckles rolled his eyes. "Oh great. Nice going. Can't you ever eat cleanly?"

"Not cratts," Tails said very reasonably, "'cause when you bite in at the top it all squirts out the bottom."

"Yeah, I noticed." Knuckles tried to clean some of the gunk off his boot, failing miserably. "Why don't you just squirt the syrup over pancakes or waffles like a regular kid?"

"'Cause I'm not just a regular kid!" Tails retorted. "Anyway, they usually put lemon in the cratt syrup!"

"Yeah. That's because it's too damn sweet to have straight unless they're apparently like you and have no tastebuds. Oh...here." The echidna grabbed a handful of stream sponges and tried unsuccessfully to scrub the goo out of Tails' fur, finally giving up. "Jeez. Tails, get up to the hot springs and don't come down until you're your regular colour again."

Tails looked at him as though he'd sprouted an extra head. "And leave you alone with your mum? Are you crazy?"

"What do you think she's gonna do, kid? Since you ask, yes, I do want you to leave us alone for a couple minutes and you might as well use those minutes to clean yourself up. Get to the hot springs now or I'll carry you and dunk you in."

Tails hesitated, wondering whether it was worth arguing with Knuckles, then remembered what had happened the last time he'd tried that and gave in. Maybe if he scrubbed himself really hard...well, it would hurt his ribs and back, but it would also mean that he could get back to Knuckles that bit faster. Things looked like becoming very interesting, and Tails didn't want to miss them.

He broke into a run.

Okay...maybe not much of a cliffhanger but I promise that'll change very soon ;) If you read, please review!