The heart of the sea beat like a metronome, the rhythmic sound of the waves crashing against an intruder in their midst the only sound for miles. In the inky blackness of the night, a black phantom moved swiftly through the water, a long sleek outline against the spray of water on the surface. Above a curve of dark metal, and up past a rise, behind what seemed like a balcony, two sailors watched the approaching shore.

Where a single, small light, flashed briefly.

"To think, that this great ship, the TFS Khedive, should be reduced to the role of a mere smuggling vessel." One of the two adjusted the stylized cap on his head, dipping it slightly to obscure his eyes. It also served to mask most of his face and hair, save for a gray streak behind his ears.

"Sir?" the other asked, with a woman's voice. She, too, wore stylized cap, with a gold seal emblazoned on the front. Her short black hair hung down to her shoulders – a laxness in new military policy that many young female officers preferred, but one that still annoyed some of the 'old dogs' in the establishment.

"The last time this ship… and her captain… sailed these waters, it was to destroy mobian shipping. How ironic, how we've ended up, eh old girl?" The older man patted the rim of metal, and gazed fondly down at the prow of the ship. "Not far from here, in fact, we sent one of their big coal transports to the bottom. Ah, but those were good times for the Federal Undersea Armada!"

"You may still get another crack at them, Captain," the female XO replied, facing out to the shore. "The next war is not far off. We shall crush them."

"I must have said the exact same thing, twenty years ago." The Captain frowned, the wrinkles at the corners of his mouth creasing slightly.

"And we would have won that war," she replied. "If not for the Betrayer."

"And what is to say there won't be another?"

"Another?" The woman bristled. "Another Betrayer? How could that be?"

The Captain sighed. "Old age has taught me not to take anything for granted. But the conflict between ourselves, as human beings, is what makes us great – and what makes us vulnerable. Sometimes I envy the stupid animals we have to deal with. Their lives must be so straightforward… so easy. So simple."

"Respectfully, sir, I can't fathom such an impulse. Better an eternity of torment and conflict as a human being, than a heartbeat spent as a damned furry." The XO narrowed her pretty blue eyes. The hatred in her voice was so youthful, so fresh, that the older man didn't bother with a direct response.

In the distance, the small light flashed again.

"Still… we're rather two faced, aren't we?" The Captain asked, a little suddenly. "Friendship in one hand, a knife in the other?"

"Whatever must be done in the name of victory has a right to be done. No: a responsibility to be done!" The XO paused, but remembered that Captain Caproni had always been quite lenient when it came to speaking freely, when beyond the ears of the rest of the crew. He insisted they use each other as venting boards, both because they were a rather new partnership, and because he thought it made for a better Captain-XO relationship. "Sometimes… sometimes, I read or hear how we deal with them, and wonder if it is wrong to be so dishonest. With them and with ourselves. When Mr. Brin speaks of lasting peace, or even when Captain Florentine did. I suppose it makes a part of me feel uneasy."

"However," she quickly added. "If the mobians are foolish enough to put stock in our words, and not our actions, then they deserve to be deceived. And they deserve to be destroyed! In the past, we may have had the luxury of total honesty, but in these desperate times, we do what we must."

"Right or wrong, it doesn't matter, as long as you taste victory?" The Captain smirked, knowingly. "Don't think that is a new attitude of the modern man… and woman. I can say from experience that it is a belief that has always dwelt in our hearts. What I sometimes worry… is that this Navy, this Army, this beloved civil service, will loose its honor. An honor that is not just a word, not just an anachronism from an era of city states, but an ideal all men strived for. When that ideal is replaced by a cult of victory, or a cult of personality, I have to wonder if the spirit of the corps has become not just lost, but gleefully abandoned."

"Honor." The woman next to him closed her eyes and smiled. "The word refers to both an abstract principle, and a code of conduct. The latter can be rewritten as is convenient, at least. The former can be fixed in retrospect, or through indoctrination. Isn't honor in the eye of the beholder, sir, rather than a universal absolute?"

"It falls to every new generation to decide the path it must take. My generation had its chance… I have no qualms about letting the next do what it will." The Captain folded his arms over his chest. "We'll be ashore soon. Get the men ready to unload the cargo."

"Aye, sir!" The XO saluted, and headed back into the ship. The Captain watched her go, and reflected on his orders.

Of course, by unload the cargo, he actually meant that they would conveniently lose the cargo, which would then be captured by certain anti-royalist parties as contraband. It may have been serving the state, arming mobian rebels in the southern territories, but a smuggler by any other name smelt as bad. Still, the complexities of policy were not his concern. Like any good officer, he simply endeavored to fulfill his orders as well as he could, without outward concern for their greater purpose or meaning.

Not that he particularly trusted the un-elected leadership of either the man known as 'Mastermind,' of which the Captain had both misgivings and suspicions, but he did have trust in his fellow Captain, Aya Florentine. Like himself, she had risen through the ranks, and shown her merit. She was a good soldier, and a good leader, and while technically of the same rank, he had no qualms deferring to her de-facto authority. Aya was an Admiral in all but name. It was a pity there was no Federated Congress to confirm her increase in rank, and make her a formal Admiral, but such were the times. They required one to be flexible.

On shore, a tiny light sparkled, closer now.

"Patience, now," he whispered, to the sea and to the shore. "Soon, you'll have your war. I suspect we all will."


THE CYCLE OF AGES: A NEW WORLD ORDER

CHAPTER FIVE:

Summon Up The Blood


Charmy watched, as the resort communities of Ice Cap Zone passed by, well over a thousand feet below. He could see the fires from the attacks that had crippled the communications and power equipment for the area, cutting short the internationally televised Ice Cap Games. He not only saw, but directed the attack, having given the order to detach and descend a fraction of the expeditionary army for that task.

Now he watched, eyes and face shaded by the elaborate royal helm of Goldenhive. None approached him, though aides stood nearby, ready and eager to make his word into reality. As the few lights in the ground flickered out, he knew, finally, that there was no turning back. The world itself had seen, in real time, the beginning of the Angel Island War.

In the air all around him, and all around the airship from which he commanded, the warriors of the Quaz Xialjyet Alliance flew, in constant air patrols. Most of the army, however, stood in wait aboard the airships. They were rather frail constructions, like high tech zeppelins, reliant on both lighter than air gas, and mechanized propulsions. They were cheap and easily manufactured by the tireless workers of the Hives.

"Sonic…" Charmy whispered the name. He had known from the beginning that the hero of mobius was present and competing down below. The other Princes had not a care for Sonic or anyone else of his sort. The idea of a hero, of a common individual not of royal stock, becoming more than the circumstances surrounding his birth and breeding – it was alien to them. Charmy neither tried to explain it, nor desired to.

He knew what he had to do.

And this, all of this, was part of it.

Ahead, in the great air fleet, he saw other airships, two of which hosted Princes Taji and Ferric. Kenichi had returned south, to launch his attack on the dingo, while Argent had gone north, to set up their perimeter for the coming echidna countermoves. No doubt Argent would advance at his first opportunity to take Echid Saldir. As the leader of the third most powerful colony, Argent would never settle for less, after Kenichi and Charmy had achieved victory and glory in Sandopolis and Angel Lake.

Things were about to get very messy.

"And Sonic… my friend… what will you do? Stay and fight, for the sake of fighting, or return home? I'm sure Sally misses you." Charmy looked back, at the dark ground below where he knew the blue hedgehog was. "No. You'll give chase. It's what you do, isn't it?"

With quiet footsteps, one of his aides approached.

"We are five minutes to launch, your Majesty."

Charmy nodded. "Ready the troops. Prepare the weapons. Let things play out."

"Yes, my lord," the aide turned to go, but hesitated. "My lord?"

"What is it?" Charmy replied, rather crossly.

"My Lord… your former associates. The Chaotix, I believe? What if they are present? Should we give either of the Swarms orders not to harm them?"

Charmy didn't answer immediately. He had considered the possibility, but he was surprised this mere aide had as well. True, his former group was hardly unknown in Goldenhive, but he now wondered if others suspected he had dual loyalties. No doubt they did. That, really, could not be allowed. In the eyes of the Xialjyet, among all the Princes and Breeders, he could allow no shred of his potential disloyalty to become known.

"If the Chaotix take arms against us, they will do so at the cost of their lives." Charmy said, slowly. "That is the way of things. That is the cause of the Quaz Xialjyet, which supercedes all other obligations – friendship camaraderie… even love."

"My Lord." The aide nodded, just once, and left.

"They won't be there, anyway." Charmy said, more to himself than to anyone nearby. "Though… they'll probably hate me like they were."


Sonic watched as the dark large shapes moved away, almost invisible against the night sky. He knew an air fleet when he saw one (and he'd seen more than a few), and cursed his inability to do anything about it, at least at the moment. If Tails had been here… Sonic cut that bit of speculation short. There was no point in dwelling on what could have been, or his shortcomings. Not that he was generally very contemplative to begin with, but it would only serve to slow him down.

And slowing him down was something he just couldn't allow.

As a creature of action, it almost pained him to fall back, and watch to see what happened next. What descended from the sky was not a robotic foe of the type he was used to dealing with. Despite the armor the newcomers wore, they were definitely living beings, and when it came to life, Sonic felt no shame in looking before leaping. Most of his fights had been straightforward things – he disliked politics or complexity, and more often than not simply ignored it.

Sally was more that sort of mobian.

They came in squads of five, all identical to each other. None had any distinctive markings on them, but in each group, one acted in command, and the other four followed quickly. They were not large mobians, only about a meter tall, and from the start they reminded Sonic of Charmy, with his unusual helmet, and patches of organic looking plate armor over the shoulders, midsetion, and thighs. All carried what looked like a misshapen gauntlet on their forearms, but no other ostensible weaponry.

Except their stingers, of course, which Sonic had seen used to good affect.

It was time to move. At least two hundred had fallen upon the resort, perhaps even twice that number. Leaping up, he tucked into a ball, bounced off a wall, and landed on a nearby roof. From a higher vantage point, he could see them moving among the crowd. They weren't attacking, which was a good sign, but they were plainly rounding everyone up, three or four squads of them entering buildings and searching.

Robots they weren't but they were as methodical enough to be close. Jumping to another roof, Sonic looked to the sky, in the direction the air fleet had disappeared. That was the six thousand credit question: where were they headed? And should he follow them, or try and sort things out in the resort first?

The sound of an explosion made the decision for him. Why they this place was being attacked, Sonic didn't know. Hell, he didn't even know who was attacking, for the most part. But until he was given evidence to prove otherwise, he had to default to helping the object of aggression, and not the aggressor.

In a heartbeat, he was moving, far faster than before.

He headed straight for the sounds of the explosion, but didn't hear any other weapons fire. That wasn't too surprising. Energy weapons were generally very quiet, producing more of a hiss than the bang or bark of a projectile weapon. Running along the side of one of the taller resort hotels, he descended and hit the ground, still in stride. Ahead of him, he saw another building, and recognized it immediately.

Resort Security.

Already, the newcomers were buzzing around the building. A breach had already been made in one of the upper levels, and smoke wafted out from the resulting doorway, three stories in the air. Sonic saw a squad of five directly ahead of him, and made the split second decision to superspin. He aimed just to the side, to bowl over and not kill, and rebounded off the first of the soldiers expertly.

It felt strange – not like a robot, and not like any organic target he'd hit before either. It also got the attention of the remaining three, as he slammed into the fourth, sending it flying, and crashing into the snow. The remaining three whirled, and Sonic's feet touched the ground as a cocky smile crossed his features.

"I don't know who you…"

He wasn't given the common courtesy of finishing his sentence. Two of the soldier drones charged, and as they did, Sonic saw a bladed spine rise out from their forearms to curve back just past the elbow. He jumped back and high, following his normal instinct. It proved a potentially costly mistake.

The two soldiers just took to the air, the wings behind their backs becoming an instant blur. In midair, Sonic's maneuverability was severely retarded. It wasn't normally a problem, but he didn't fight maneuverable flying enemies very often. Only Tails came close, and the kitsune fox was still never as maneuverable in the air as he was on land. These weren't just mobians who could also fly – these were flying mobians, perfectly adapted to that role.

The first accelerated beyond the second, and pulled back its left arm, clearly aiming to slash at the blue hedgehog with its forearm spine. The second flew higher, arms in a similar position. Sonic watched them, mentally targeted the one higher up, and spin attacked. From a position mid jump, he could only get one of his signature attacks in at a time, but if he could hit his target, jump off it as it fell, he could manage another by redirecting his momentum. It was a special technique only he and Shadow (that faker) had managed to pull off, using their latent Chaos abilities.

He felt the air around him twist, and solidify behind his feet, allowing him to push off. Neither of his opponents seemed to display shock or surprise by the sudden aerial maneuver, but when Sonic hit his target, something unexpected happened. It hung on to him. Which wasn't supposed to happen. He had hit it hard – not as hard as possible, but still very hard. On impact, he had felt as least three or four ribs break. But instead of being knocked unconscious, the drone soldier reached out, and grabbed big handfuls of Sonic's short blue fur.

Sonic growled softly in annoyance, and tensed his quills. Spurts of blackish blood flew from the assailant's arms where it had been slashed, and a sliced finger flew through the air. Still, it held firm. Looking straight into the creature's face, Sonic saw dull white eyes, tinted only peripherally with brown, and an expressionless face. To the hero's surprise, it… it…

It creeped him out.

"What the hell ARE YOU!" Sonic lashed out, and decked the face, sending it to the side, and spraying spit and small teeth into the cold air. Still, it held onto him, and dragged him down. Worse, as they fell, Sonic saw, out of the corner of his eye, the second one turning around behind him. Sonic pounded on the soldier holding him, breaking its jaw, but it still held, the death grip as strong as ever.

Moments later, Sonic felt something wet on his back, accompanied a millisecond later by a lance of pain. Thankfully, his skin was extremely thick on his back, and his quills and fur had helped mitigate the attack. But it had drawn blood. That, alone, was a rather alien experience, even after all his years of fighting. He'd almost never been actually cut by anything.

The two finally landed, and Sonic immediately twisted, and shifted his center of balance. He managed it just in time, as the forearm spine of the soldier holding onto him blocked the one of its comrade, which descended from above, wings beating like the wind of a hurricane. Sonic struggled, and elbowed the drone, but still it stayed conscious, and still it held onto him. It was strong, too, but not very skilled beyond some natural viciousness and tenacity.

Again, its partner tried to slash at Sonic, and again he maneuvered it so that the other one's spine blocked the strike. He had hoped that the possibility of hurting its comrade would cause the other soldier drone to back off, but it seemed to hardly care in the slightest. It attacked in ever escalating ferocity, pivoted, and stabbed with its stinger, which may as well have been a knife – it was as long as Sonic's hand, from the wrist to the tip of his middle finger.

He was not in an enviable situation, even if he was holding his ground.

"Get away from him!"

It wasn't the voice Sonic expected. He spared a look behind the attacking soldier, who had paused momentarily, wiping the snow from its face. Sonic's would be rescuer was an echidna girl, maybe fourteen years old, in a bright pink and brown ski jacket, and soft fuzzy mittens. For once, Sonic was stunned completely beyond words.

"I said: leave him alone! Go away!" she yelled.

With a huff, the girl bend down, and scooped up twin handfuls of snow. For the first time, the drone soldier spoke, the forearm spines on its arms tensing, and rising slightly up and down.

"Surrender," it hissed that one word, but the tone was high-pitched and almost female. "Do not resist."

The girl raised her hand, snowball included, but never got the chance to throw. A second later, something fast and green hit her, and she fell back without a sound, limp as a rag doll. Sonic's eyes widened at the sight, and with an enraged roar, he backhanded the already broken face of his captor, loudly breaking its neck. Still, even still, the creature's grip remained unbreakable.

Without second thought, the other soldier drone turned back to Sonic, and resumed its attack. But with the other one dead, Sonic found it easy enough to move the body. Timing it perfectly, he lined up the dead drone's wrist with the attacker's forearm spine. It cut through the unarmored wrist cleanly, and Sonic immediately jumped to his feet, and spun the body, ignoring the fountain of black blood that covered half his face. It took three revolutions, but he not only bought himself some space, but also tore off the other hand's grip.

With a loud rip, the dead drone flew through the air and hit the ground, one hand missing, the other with a mass of quills and fur. Sonic winced at the pain in his side, and knew he was probably bleeding there too. This wasn't how things were supposed to have turned out.

Not at all.

He watched the one that had been attacking him, and barely missed being impaled from the side. He dodged the new drone's attack, and countered with an elbow to its face, but then another was on him, and then the one from before. The two he'd hit early on were back on their feet, and probably had been for at least a few seconds. The leader remained uninvolved, and watching dispassionately.

Sonic didn't have to time think about that, or the fact that their leader had been the one to use some strange weapon on that girl. Survival alone was his primary goal. Ducking a swipe, and dropping back to avoid another slash, he saw more movement – multi-colored movement. Other echidnas – three of them, two crouched near where the girl had fallen.

"No!" Sonic yelled. "Run away! RUN! Get out of…" he caught the inside forearm of one of the drones, and used it to block an attack by another. "Get out of here!"

"They killed her!" One of the echidna yelled, tears in his eyes. "You bastards!"

They charged.

With fist and foot, they charged. No: Sonic amended that. One of them had a snowboard, and seemed to plan to use it like a club. It was suicide; they had to realize that. The leader of the drone squad stepped forward, and popped out his forearm blades. Another broke off from the attack on Sonic, and also closed with the three echidnas. Desperately, Sonic countered another slash, and then ducked, and pulled the second drone into the other's attack.

Its head came clean off.

But as it fell, without even thinking about it, Sonic felt one of its blades cut into his leg. It was the worst possible wound, to the worst possible place. His legs were his life… and the skin there was not even a fraction as thick as that on his back. The glancing slash of the drone's spine cut a long red line down Sonic's left thigh and calf. He howled in pain, but kept the presence of mind to hit quick and hard into his remaining opponent. A blow to the jaw, a spray of spit and blood. A hammer blow to the upper arm, just below where it connected to the shoulder, ineffective. Another blow to the face, and Sonic saw his glove and knuckles rip as they hit the edge of the soldier's helmet.

Too long!

He heard a scream behind him.

He was taking too long!

Ducking another desperate slash, he jumped, blinding pain shooting up his leg, and stomped down on the soldier's face, the impact snapping the head far out of position. He landed on both feet, but regretted it, as a small geyser of bright red blood stained the snowy ground, erupting from tensed and damaged mobian muscle. Pushing away the hurt, he turned, and saw another of the echidnas fall.

It had been the one with the snowboard.

He had obviously used it to block one or two attacks, but all for naught. The second drone had moved in, and its arm was at a post strike position, high and in the air. The echidna stood still for a moment , before several of his dreadlock quills fell to the ground. A second later, a spray of blood show out from his neck, and he fell to the ground with a thud. The third, even before seeing this, was running away.

He didn't even get close to escaping.

The leader drone just raised his arm, the one with the strange organic gauntlet. A second later, the same greenish blob as before shot out, without so much as a bang or hiss. It hit the fleeing mobian from behind, and he let out a strangled cry as he fell, clawing at his back. Sonic felt a heavy weight fall on his heart.

He hadn't known any of them, but… but the girl had tried to save him. And the others…. He hadn't been able to save any of them. What were they doing even fighting, if they couldn't defend themselves! Still, facts were facts. He hadn't saved any of them. More likely was that he had killed them, just by starting a fight with the invaders in the first place.

And, Source Alive, his leg and back hurt.

Not just hurt – they Burned!

The two remaining drones turned to face him. The leader made no attempt to use its ranged weapon, instead popping its forearm spines again. This was not good, and even though his layers of ego and bull-headedness, he knew it. He was used to fighting opponents who relied on ranged fighting. That was generally how he handled Eggman's forces. When someone insisted on actual hand to hand, like Knuckles or Metal Sonic, they fought like he himself did.

He was used to treating that kind of fight as the exception, and had underestimated his opponents here in that regard. They were built, first and foremost, for melee, and obviously preferred it. He'd gotten injured, too. He could probably have run for it…

"Heh." Sonic stood, and started to run, towards the two drones. "I would, but it just ain't my style!"

And so he did what he always did, and charged headlong into the fray.


Knuckles stepped through the holographic illusion that divided Hidden Palace from the rest of Angel Island, and led the way to Haven. He'd come this way several times before, and knew which of the threats in the area were real, and which fakes means to scare off the curious or the desperate. Haven's defenses were entirely passive, which was perhaps a naïve move on the part of the Guardianship.

Not that Knckles himself was even supposed to know about it.

His father, Locke, had abandoned him on the island, years ago, and retreated to Haven to join the other former Guardians, each a generation older than the last, save for the gap between Sabre and Sojourner, given the deaths of Athair and Janelle-Li. With the similar passing of Hawking, just a few years ago, that left only Spectre, his son Thunderhawk, and grandson Sojourner, plus Locke and Sabre to make up the current Brotherhood. They were Knuckles' ancestors, one, two, five, six and seven generations removed. All had followed tradition, and left the Floating Island in the care of their heir apparent, while they went on to 'bigger things' – namely sparring with the Dark Legion, keeping the island uninhabited, and occasionally spying on the outside world and the pocket zone of Echidnapolis.

The fact that the ritual abandonment had ruined Knuckles' so called childhood, and that they expected him to similarly fall in line, didn't sit very well with the current Guardian of Angel Island. That, and the general abrasiveness of his ancestors – Spectre's ruthlessness and cold hearted nature, Thunderhawk's crassness and flightiness, Sojourner's whining and weak will, all served to turn Knuckles away from his older relatives. Sabre, the problem solver and leader of the group, had seemed bearable enough, if distant. Locke, at least, he had gradually developed a more positive relationship with, letting the past stay in the past.

However, it wasn't like Knuckles went out of his way to see them.

As he passed through the hidden entrance, and into the open area of Haven, Knuckles looked around, searching for any sign of its residents. None was forthcoming. Which was… odd. As estranged as he was with some of them, someone had always been present to greet him on his infrequent visits to the complex. Now, there was nothing.

Knuckles cupped his hands, and brought them up to his mouth. "Hello? Anybody around?"

Haven's 'hanger' area was large, no doubt built to accommodate larger vessels that would be built as the need arose, and it stretched into the mountain for well over a hundred meters. This part of the complex was built in the old echidna style, like some of the Echidnapolis buildings, like the Grand Conservatory, the Council Chambers, and the numerous Auroriums. Which meant that there was a lot of highly stylized and textured stone edifices, more artistic than functional.

Parked in the great hanger, four hovercraft sat, unmoving.

"It isn't likely anyone's left… so…" Knuckles crossed the open space slowly. "Where are they?"

Coming to one of the doors to the complex proper, Knuckles let a small eyepiece set in the wall scan his face, and walked into the guts of Haven. The lights activated as he approached, the computer system sensing his body heat. It was easy to get lost in the maze of corridors, rooms, labs, and storage spaces, but Knuckles had a fairly good idea of where he was headed. He couldn't have quickly found his way to an Astrophysics Lab, but he knew the way to the heart of Haven – the Master Emerald Chamber. In fact, he used to be able to visit the Emerald without the fuss, but the old mountain tunnel to the Chamber, from the outside, had been sealed for safety purposes.

Which, of course, the Guardians blamed him for.

Yes, he had sort of led Robotnick to the Emeralds holding the island in the air, and yes, he had sort of been unable to stop the same Robotnick from taking them to power the Death Egg. But it wasn't as if the Guardians, then six in number, did anything to intervene. No: they had sat back and watched. Knuckles felt the fur rise on the back of his neck at the thought.

Deeper and deeper into Haven he went, passing empty rooms, and deserted equipment, including one of Haven's automated defense stations. Knuckles walked by the sleek curved energy turrets built into the walls, through a door, and around a corner. He knew this to be the main walkway, which led to the reception area, and then the living quarters of Haven's permanent residents. Access to most of the Haven Complex was via the main lift elevator, which connected the different levels of the structure. Exactly how many meters of rock separated the different levels, Knuckles wasn't sure.

He entered the reception room, but still received no greeting from Haven's Guardians. Silently, he looked around the two-story room, and saw no sign of movement or activity, save the beeping and silent humming of machinery and electronics. The room, like most of Haven, was built in the new-technical style, with flat surfaces, and bright displays over every possible surface. It was ironic that the Dark Legion, too, preferred this type of aesthetic in their workplaces.

Knuckles first impulse was to query the computer, but Haven had no AI. Despite their use, reliance even, on technology, the Guardians also distrusted it. So, long ago, they had decided against the programming and incorporation of AIs in their advanced computer systems, instead using older software interfaces. Ones that, unfortunately, Knuckles was not familiar with.

Still curious about his ancestors' absence, he walked to the large door of the main lift. It led to the bottom sections of Haven, and from there it was only a short walk and another lift down deeper to the Observation Chamber and the Emerald Room. Knuckles pressed a bright button to summon the lift, and the computer made a rude beep in response. Tilting his head to the side, Knuckles pressed again, and for a second time it beeped loudly.

"What the…?" The Guardian looked down at a small screen over the lift controls. Normally, it showed the location of the lift, and the level it was at. Now, i read differently.

LIFT DISABLED

"Lift disabled?" Knuckles asked, and frowned. "How can that be? Come on! Work!"

He pressed again, and got another beep.

LIFT DISABLED

A second later, the text scrolled upwards, and became replaced by:

ERROR – 507920A43CV
INSUFFICIENT POWER
COUPLINGS 12 13 14 15 16
INOPERATIVE

Then, on another screen nearby, against a blue background:

WARNING

PRIMARY POWER – OFFLINE
AUXILIARY POWER – OFFLINE
TERCIARY POWER – ONLINE

MORE

"Wonderful!" Knuckles growled, and tried to pry the doors open. Not only couldn't he get a good grip, or leverage, but the doors were magnetically locked and sealed. They had been designed to hold up against a potential enemy assault, and wouldn't be pulled open so easily. Without demagnetizing the door lock, there was little hope of forcing it open.

Pressing MORE, he received a summary of the Haven Systems.

Primary Systems -

Primary Lift - inactive
Secondary Lift – inactive
Defense Systems – tertiary power
Life Support – tertiary power
General Access – tertiary power only
Lab 1 – inactive
Lab 2 – inactive
Lab 3 – internal power only
Lab 4 – inactive
Lab 5 – internal power
Confinement – internal power only
Reactor Control – tertiary power
Computer Core – internal power only
Security Station 1 – internal power only
Security Station 2 – internal power only
Internal Sensors – inactive
External Sensors - inactive

DETAILED BREAKDOWN – secondary and tertiary systems?

"Great. Just great." Almost everything was off line or running on internal power. Knuckles looked to his left, and saw the door to the living quarters. Curious, and not more than a little concerned, he quickly jogged over. The door opened, and he walked down the long hall that was Haven's Dormitory. A large room near the end, opposite the normal rooms, served as a lounge. There was a medical bay, too, but that was near to the lift, where any patient could be potentially isolated.

Knuckles went to the first door he knew to be occupied, and knocked. It was the closest to the entranceway, and the fourth from that end. Knuckles knew it to belong to Grandfather Sabre. Knuckles knocked again, and a third time, but got no response.

So he opened the door, and it slid aside without fuss.

Sabre's room was empty. The lights turned on as Knuckles entered, and looked around. Sabre's room was fairly Spartan, with few amenities. A dresser, however, had several pictures on open display. Knuckles recognized the common them to them – his grandmother, Jenna-Lu. Most were on their side. One was face down. Deciding to keep looking elsewhere, Knuckles went to the next-door down.

Spectre's room.

The door again opened, but the lights never reached full illumination. This was hardly surprising, given Spectre's personality and temperament. The room was almost completely bare, with no pictures or decorations. No: Knuckles amended that, as he took a closer look. There were small holes in the wall, where a picture had probably once hung, but whatever had been there was now long gone. There was also some broken glass, half cleaned up, and half piled up against the side of a desk. On the desk itself, a computer monitor displayed a screen saver – a mobius strip, with a small blue and green ball rolling around in an endless loop.

Knuckles hesitated, before moving the mouse, and undoing the saver. What replaced it was an unfinished document. Knuckles was about to read it, when he saw several colorful bits of paper in the wastebasket nearby. Scrolling to document upwards a little, he also reached down, and gathered up the bits of thrown out paper. Some of the pieces were just blue and white, and others were brown. Finally, Knuckles saw one with a hand, and another with half a face.

A female's face.

It was one he didn't recognize. Probably Spectre's wife. But why was it torn up?

"Problems continue to plague our computer systems. As usual, Thunderhawk and Sojourner are of little or no help. Sabre has proven useful, as usual, in all matters technical, however he has been unable to permanently fix the damaged systems. This has left him frustrated and irritable, but at least he had not petulantly fled to the confined of his room, like my so-called son. Worse: my grandson has it in his head to pursue the same mad mysticism that the fool Athair left us for. To have begat such children; sometimes I recoil at the thought of them. They weaken the Brotherhood. It was only through my efforts, breaking the back of the Dark Legion in the years before their birth, that they became spoiled in the decades of peace."

It read on:

"Had I to do it again, I would not have killed so many of the enemy. My son and grandson became spoiled and weak, and my great grandchild ended up some sunbaked shaman to a pack of homeless jackals. But I digress."

"In addition to the technical problems now suddenly plaguing Haven (sabotage again, perhaps? But who… who?), there have been reports by some of our more impressionable members of unusual chaos-related activity. Nonsense. They coat their spiritualist idiocy by blaming the Chaos Force. I have seen no such thing in all my time around the Emerald, and seeing to supposedly damaged systems. I have had more dreams about her than usual, but that is hardly the same. The disciple of these youngsters has never been as ironclad as Hawking or Mathias would have wished (rest their souls), but now it has become even worse. Sabre, as soft hearted as he is sometimes, has proven unable to control the others, so perhaps it is time I once again take the place that is righ…"

And stopped.

Knuckles didn't like how that sounded even incomplete as it was, and he tried to reconcile it with his notion of Spectre – the oldest of the Brotherhood. True, Spectre had been stern and cold, but he had never struck Knuckles as particularly power hungry or controlling. Spectre had usually just preferred to handle things himself. He didn't seem to like having to worry about others, even close kin.

There was nothing else in that document, and the others were all password encrypted. Given that, Knuckles surmised that Spectre had definitely been called away from his writing by some emergency. Something related to the complex's technical problems, maybe?

Knuckles tried the next room down, which was actually two from Spectre's. One of the empty rooms had been Hawking's, but all his stuff was now in storage. Rather, the next room belonged to Thunderhawk. However, it was locked. And so was Sojourner's. Only near the end, at Locke's room, did Knuckles find another empty door.

The room was a mess.

Papers, files, bits and pieces of models and assorted constructions, all had been thrown to the floor. It was like a storm had hit his father's normally neat and organized room. On the desk, normally the centerpiece of Locke's life, his computer monitor was smashed in, and lying face up. The computer had also been thrashed, and obviously kicked in several times. Wires were everywhere. And so were pieces of paper.

Lara-Le.

Knuckles saw her again and again. In every torn up picture, she was intact sometimes holding her new baby, Mace. Many of the pictures were new, and the little bits of green highlight and text indicated that they had probably been taken courtesy of the Guardian's electronic spy programs and network. Just as disturbing was the object of rage in every destroyed picture: Lara's new husband, Wynmacher. Knuckles let out a deep breath, and stepped away from the room.

This wasn't right.

This wasn't like his father.

This was all wrong.

As he backed off, he stepped on an intact piece of paper, this one a schematic of the Haven Complex, with some hastily scribbled notes written on it. They highlighted the Master Emerald, and then pointed to several different areas. A lot of it was technical jargon, but it also clearly indicated the two lifts in the complex.

Had Locke sabotaged Haven?

"No…" Knuckles couldn't believe it. Locke had sacrificed everything for the Guardians, and for tradition. Even his own family. Locke turning against Haven, against the Brotherhood of Guardians… it was unfathomable. But looking at the schematic, Knuckles also saw something potentially very useful. In small text was a label for secondary auxiliary power control, located beneath the hanger – in the docking, storage, and maintenance facilities used to recharge the Brotherhood's hovercraft. Locke had it circled in red, but without any other mark. Had it, too, been sabotaged?

There was only one way to find out.

Auxiliary power would restore the lifts, or at least the Primary one. Knuckles resolved himself to getting to the root of the problem, and headed back out of the Dormitory area. Through reception, he headed back down the main hallway, almost to the security stations. There, looking more like a storage locker than anything else, was a stairwell down a level, to the Hanger maintenance section. Easily pulling down the door lever, Knuckles crawled down the access tube. This part of Haven was usually only accessed via doors in the Hanger floor Knuckles had no idea how to unlock. This was in was probably in case of mechanical failure.

It was dark.

And hot.

Dropping to his feet, and letting go of the handholds on the wall, Knuckles looked around and tried to orient himself. This part of Haven was industrial looking – tubes and thick coils of wire, tied tightly together. Some of the pipes were labeled with warnings, including one that mentioned 'explosive.' Not encouraging. Knuckles followed the main passage, towards what he suspected was the area just under the Hanger. It was quiet down in the twisting guts of pipes and machinery, except for the occasional creak of metal or the hiss of steam.

Soon enough, things opened out a bit, and he could see how the pipes and coils headed to the ceiling, to connect up to the Hanger. In a large storage space nearby, through thick glass, he could see missiles, lined up neatly. Those were new, at least to him. Behind another pane of glass, he saw huge yellow drums with pipes and wires leading into them. Striped yellow tape was everywhere, with the words 'caution' emblazoned on almost everything.

He followed the largest wires with his eyes, and soon found a small control station buried amid the rougher, dirtier machinery. Sure enough, it was labeled: "Secondary Auxiliary Power Station," and included a conspicuous jumper switch among with other maintenance related controls. Knuckles flipped back the safety, and pulled down the breaker. After a deep breath, he moved it back into place, and the entire room powered up with a roar and a snarl. Somewhere in the distance, something hummed to life, and something else powered up, and to his right, something started moving back and forth, around and around.

Heading back the way he came, just a few seconds later, the lights flickered.

"What?" Knuckles looked up at one of the small neon blue lights. A second later, it turned red, and then faded, plunging him into near darkness. Still, aside from the lighting, all the previous noises continued as usual, so Knuckles kept going. Behind him, the rhythmic beating of machinery sounded, over and over, and alone in the dark, he felt a chill run down his spine.

Walking forward, faster, Knuckles soon broke into a short run, as a primal need to escape the close confines of his environment seized his heart. Scrambling up the well, and back into the light, Knuckles felt his pounding heart slowly return to normal. Quickly closing the door behind him, and locking it, he silently wondered why he had suddenly gotten spooked. It wasn't like him.

Brushing off the experience as anxiety, he headed back to the lift.

Sure enough, the lights were brighter than before, and the little error message on the lift now read: LIFT OPERATIONAL

It then went on to add:

LEVEL FOUR

Level Four was as far down as it went, probably about ten or twenty stories deep into the mountain rock. Which meant that the last one to use it had gone down, and not up. Knuckles pressed the button to summon the lift, and sure enough, it started to rise. Level Three. A bit of a pause, and then Level Two. The doors opened. There was a level above, the upper Meeting Room. Knuckles intended to check there first, in case any of the internal sensors had recorded something before going offline.

The lift elevator itself was large, and cheerily well lit. It rose up, and in a few seconds stopped at Level One, the highest level of Haven. There, as the door opened, a pair of glowing eyes and a maw of red teeth sent Knuckles back, hard against the rear of the lift. A heartbeat later, the lights came on, bathing the room, and revealing the wicked image to be two large monitors, scrambled with static, and an intermittently illuminated series of panels.

Chuckling to himself, Knuckles shook his head, and entered the meeting room, or Nerve Center, that served as Haven's primary hub of external and internal data. There was another room down deep in Haven, the Control Center, that regulated more technical areas of the complex, built as it was directly over the main computer systems. But the Nerve Center was where the Guardians moitors parts of Mobius, and much of Angel Island and Echidnapolis. There were four stations, each surrounded by monitors and control panels specifically for this purpose.

All were offline, and black.

Only two were operational, and showed only endless black and white static. Which was a little odd, since Knuckles was sure they had been red before the lights came on. He approached the central table, in the middle of the circular room. It had control panels set into it, in front of the six chairs, but none seemed responsive or active, except in some minimal sense. Were the computers malfunctioning? Knuckles turned to the wall, left of the lift door, which should have displayed images of the different areas of Haven itself.

Nothing but static.

"this way…"

Knuckles spun around at the voice, but saw only an empty room. It had been scarcely a whisper, but the he could have sworn that he heard it. Just looking around, hearing only static, Knuckles slowly convinced himself that he had just imagined it. That he had imagined it out of the random hiss of the malfunctioning surveillance systems.

Getting back in the lift, Knuckles pressed the button for the lowest floor. The doors closed, and the elevator immediately began to descend, passing by the Second Level only a few seconds later. The Third Level, however, was not fast forthcoming. Knuckles waited.

And waited.

It seemed to be taking much longer than expected. He looked up at the display over the door, and it showed a "…" indicating that it was between floors. He pressed the button for the Fourth Level, once again. Maybe it had gotten stuck? But, no: that wasn't it. Knuckles could feel it in his body – the sensation of the elevator descending. And descending.

Deeper and deeper, and getting nowhere.

Above Knuckles' head, the lights flickered, and a cold wind blew out of the air conditioning vents. As the lights dimmed, and then died, Knuckles swore he heard an indistinct voice in that sudden wind. Something like "help me" and then "more." No: not more. "mother." He froze up, unmoving, as the wind faded away, but feeling colder than before.

The doors opened.

What floor was this? Knuckles looked up, hoping to see something encouraging, but still the display read: "…" The walls ahead were dark, a poor lighting provided only by flickering electrical lights off to the side. Knuckles pressed the button for the Fourth Level again, and then the one for the Second. Nothing happened.

Finally, he stepped out, and instantly the doors behind him shut like a vise. Knuckles whirled, and tried to open them again, but the second he turned around, he felt eyes watching from the shadows. A half second later, he heard the sound of something moving, scurrying, like wet little feet. He turned, slowly, eyes moving rapidly from side to side.

"Come out!" He barked, but didn't get any closer. "Show yourself!"

Silence.

Knuckles tried to calm himself, and force down his flight response. There was nowhere to run, anyway. He appraised the walls, and saw that they curved. From that, he guessed that he was on the Third Level, the Laboratory Circle. Here, a large half circle spread out from the lift's exit to the left and right. Different rooms and labs splayed out from the half circle corridor. It also meant that, either way he went, he'd leave his back exposed.

Heading in the direction of the noise he was sure he had heard, Knuckles moved slowly. Above him, the lights went from dim, to dead, seemingly at random. A few sparked angrily. Several meters on his way, he heard a ripping sound coming from his right. He turned his head just in time to see one of the air vents shudder. He watched it for several seconds more, but nothing happened. The only sound to be heard was that of his own heavy breathing.

Licking his lips, he kept going.

He passed by the first lab, on his right. The door had: "LAB ONE" creatively etched on it. What went on inside it, Knuckles had no idea. He'd never been in this part of Haven before. He was about to pass it by, when he saw something move, from the left to the right, somewhere in the dark room. A primal sort of anger overcoming his fear, he quickly ordered the door open, and it moved aside with a long hiss.

The half dead lights revealed only a swinging cord, hanging from the ceiling.

It was then that Knuckles realized that he had been holding his breath… and that he still heard breathing. Spinning around, he tried to pinpoint the sound, but it seemed to always be to his left or right, never in front of him. In his desperation, the red echidna tumbled to the side, elbowed a set of beakers and liquids, and sent them crashing to the floor. His gloved hand landed in something soft, and from the splattering sound, wet. He recoiled, not even knowing what it was, and fell back, slipping on the liquid on the floor.

Kicking off, desperate to have his back to something, he hit a shelf full of medical equipment. The breathing seemed to have disappeared, and Knuckles was about to wipe the cold sweat from his brow, when he saw his hands. They were red. Blood red. He gasped, but didn't yell, and looked around for something to wipe it off on. In the darkness, above him, something metallic bent with a whine and a banshee screech.

Slowly, fighting for control, Knuckles got to his feet.

And saw what he had put his hand in.

It looked blue and yellow, but blob like. Almost amorphous. Mostly, now, it was red. Knuckles sniffed his glove, and confirmed the coppery smell of blood. And there was more of it, dark and blackish, on the wall. Some looked like handprints, others strange symbols, smeared on the wall. But among them all, was one long one – long and serpentine, winding up the wall, along the ceiling, twisting and turning. Knuckles felt sick.

For just a moment, he blinked, and then something was on him. He yelled in surprise and fear, and reached up to dislodge it. It was wet and small, but it burned, hot and evil on his left shoulder. He flailed at it frantically, without technique or finesse. Finally, a sound blow splattered it, and it fell to the ground with a screech.

Knuckles had no time to dwell on the victory.

More of them – small, fast creatures – slithered and scuttled out of vents, out of drawers and sudden cracks in the ceiling and in the wall. Dozens. Each little blob seemed different than the one before – some had long fangs and huge gaping mouths, others were covered in eyes. Some had long hairy spider legs, others oozed along on trails of slime. Some had wings, and others claws, and others a frightening array of spikes, spines, tails or stingers. They advanced on him, hissing and spitting and snarling and howling, a tide of chaos and insanity, glowing in the death throes of flickering halogen light.

His mind numb, Knuckles instincts and body still responded. He lashed out, screaming in terror and revulsion, and his fist splattered one of the tiny terrors in a spray of gore. His foot stomped down, crushing a scuttling crablike creature with a resounding crunch. He swung and he kicked and he yelled, but they kept coming, hungry and mad. They tore and bit and swarmed everywhere, until all Knuckles could see was an endless wave of eyes and teeth.

And fire.

Fire?

Something hot and orange splashed across three of the beasts, incinerating them. Something fast and metallic moved, and cleaved two in half. Knuckles kept fighting, killing anything he managed to hit, and more yellow and red fire filled the room. The tiny demons burned, and finally retreated, back into the cracks and dark places that had spawned them.

Knuckles finally looked over his shoulder, and saw the source of his aid.

"You!"

The human smirked, and propped a makeshift spear against his shoulder. Freeing that hand, he ran a finger down the metal implant encircling his left eye. In his other hand he held an aerosol spray can, jury rigged as a flamethrower.

"Nice to see you too," he spoke with a refined, foreign accent. "You didn't think I'm stay copped up forever, did you? Especially when all this is going on."

Hunter didn't offer Knuckles a hand getting back to his feet. Not that Knuckles would have taken it, even if he had. Instead, the human narrowed his eyes at the burning end of the lab.

"In any case: welcome, Knuckles. Welcome to Hell."