Before we being the chapter, lets review the title:
Incorporeal-- not composed of matter; having no material existence.
Got the idea...you sure? I know you can see his name being called out to him from his soul-equal.
Aside from trival things, this chapter as being completed is the saddest ones I have written thus far. I'm currently on one that I have been wanting to write for a long time, but...certain obligations are coming up and I have to put it on hold for a freakin month. Doesn't mean I won't write it long hand...just hope I can still read it when I begin the transcription.
Disclamer: I observer the rights of the creators of the original charcters and hold mine as my own in character and not by form. (hey just like the chapter's title)
So we begin. Enjoy and please review.
Incorporeal
By: Mauser
"Allleeuuuuutttiiiaaann..."
Locke's eyes shot opened, but he only saw darkness for an instant. "Who's there?" he asked quickly with a groggy but alert voice. He searched the heavy undergrowth field while he remained still in his thin sleeping bag, being cautious not to attract someone's attention with abrupt movements while trying to find the voice that awakened him He didn't get a response.
"Don't...an...e...ple...I'm...ot..."
It was like a garbled radio transmission. Not in his ears but in his mind. He tried to differentiate between the two voices that he thought he heard, but they were so broken up, they all sounded as one. Fear suddenly gripped him as he looked around his dark blue surroundings, he had no idea where the voices had come from. The woods were deathly quiet, their limbs still without the slightest of movement from the wind. Locke did hear a lone sparrow chirping in the distance, but he was listening intently for something heavier; something stalking him that would bring death. The sun was beginning to show its presence to the new day, but it couldn't come quick enough to ease Locke's frightened self. He hated and feared this time of the morning. The dark blue silhouettes of the trees only created more concealment to a predator that lurked in the shadows. Locke strained his eyes even further as adrenalin seemed to charge his chest with power, paying more attention to his peripheral vision than his forward sight for something that was possibly hunting him in the mist.
When logic found its way up from the pit of his stomach, he remembered what had awakened him , and he realized; "The voice was a girl's. But where did it..." Locke felt his heart begin to choke from the sudden terror and anguish that enveloped him when he realized who the voice was calling to.
Locke crawled out of his sleeping bag and carefully made his way over to Aleutian, stepping over the charred remains of the fire from last night. What he saw in the blue darkness of the morning made him freeze for a moment before common sense told him to move closer. Aleutian was tussling in his bag, looking as if he was trying to stay warm when his whole body was covered by it and his jacket. Then, he started to mumble in his sleep. Locke couldn't understand what he was saying, but he knew it wasn't good.
He stepped closer to his son, touching Aleutian's covered shoulder gently so as not to wake him. "Be gentle, my son. You can fight thro..."
"Aleutian!..." cried out a female voice. Locke fired his hand backwards when the curt voice startled him, but he regained his collective self of the whole matter in an instant.
He watched as Aleutian flinched from his name being cried out to him at that same instant. Locke almost wanted to wake him, but he thought better of it, fearing it might upset everything, leaving Aleutian more bitter, and leaving Locke out in the cold and away from his son's troubled thoughts.
With the reality check now burdening over his mind, Locke took off his left glove from his hand, and placed his fingertips on Aleutian's forehead. Closing his eyes, he floated his senses through the vast traffic of brainwaves, searching for what he was looking for. He found it, and with more concentration being applied with a squint from his eyes, Locke connected...
...The setting sun was overcasted by sick grey clouds that poured rain in buckets, soaking the autumn ground beneath him. But even so, Locke wasn't getting wet. He didn't even feel the heavy rain drops touching his furred skin.
He saw he was still in the woods, but not in the same place where he just left mentally. The trees were different. There were less of them from what he could see, and their leaves had turned golden brown. The air was cool in a dry way, even with the rain coming down around him. With another glance at his new surroundings, he concluded he was on the top of a mountain: rocks, a small incline to his left, and the dry air made it evident.
Locke took a few steps forward before he stopped. He swore to Aurora that he heard voices through the heavy rain. He waited, listening intently over the pounding rain drops on the fallen leaves for what he heard.
There! It wasn't much but it was enough for Locke to gauge where the mumbles were filtering from which was just off to his right. Satisfied, he took off on a slow walk, almost hunching himself lower to the ground so as not to disturb the fallen leaves with his heavy bolt-laced boots.
Carefully navigating around a patch of dogwood trees that looked more like toothpicks, Locke skulked to the edge of a small clearing. When he stopped to gain his bearings, he heard the voices again; a boy and a girl he concluded. Locke observed that they were young, but not childish, just by a quick study of the pitches over the rain. Teens he finally guessed upon closer inspection with the male's voice. They still come out as mumbles over the rain, but Locke was soon going to change that. He carefully took more steps, crossing the clearing with his body slumped low to the ground.
"What could possibly be worse?" came the male's voice, exaggerated and slightly tempered. Locke heard it as he rounded a large oak tree. Being mindful of the leaf littered ground that had softened from the rain, he stood by the tree in a low posture, smiling as he traced the figures of two echidnas; a young girl who looked to be about fifteen, almost sixteen, and a male that looked to be in the same age range. They stood under a large pine tree that was offering some shelter from the elements.
She looked like a drenched rat; her fur and hair were soaked to the point that she would have to brush for an hour to straighten at least her hair out. Her eyes were covered by the ends of her wet hair. Her soaked dread-locks dripping from the tips along with her cute tail. But her smooth face brought a smile and a chuckle from Locke. She was asking for forgiveness in her eyes, but her expression looked as if she was going to cry and throw a fit all in the same span of time. She wore a heavy black jacket that Locke could see was a half size too big for her, draped around her with her hands pulling the ends together from the inside. Her legs were covered by dilapidated rags that had once faintly resembled a purple dress. Her hand-made shoes only fairing a little better.
The boy was looking down from the two inches that separated their height from one another, his face crossed, trying to put forth common sense over naivety:
"I'm cold, I'm wet, and I'm hungry... what could POSSIBLY be worse than this, Emi-La!?"
She widened her blue eyes and looked beside the boy, her face trying to make light of the situation. "Our stuffs wet!" she quickly pointed out as she gazed past the crossed echidna at a pile of gear. "Besides, we've got food, so it's not a total loss."
The boy groaned. "You're impossible! Has anybody ever told you that before!?"
"Well..." she festered, searching his eyes for a counter, "your self-centered who-ever-you-are!" she sniveled. "In fact, what are you doing way out here anyways without the tribe?"
"I've told you; I'm not with the tribe. I live around here." He shook his head with a stiff face then. "Well --two hundred miles from here, at this point.!"
"But you're an echidna! You're not supposed to be out here."
"Aleutian?" Locke asked himself, stunned. He saw that the boy echidna didn't have any scars on his face, nor did he have a stubbed lock. Locke tried to look for the white crest of Aleutian's birthmark as he stood beside the tree, but his chest was covered by a black soaked shirt.
"Hey, last time I checked, you've got the dreads too, babe! And guess what else isn't going to belong here real soon?"
"What!" she quickly jumped.
"Two sick echidnas under a tree!" Aleutian exaggeratedly pointed out to the soaked girl.
Emi-La crossed her arms under the jacket and gave Aleutian a deep stare. "Your impossible!" she seethed.
Locke watched his son return the stare to Emi-La. For a moment, he thought Aleutian was going to continue the fight, but the boy held his silence over the rain. The sun had started to disappear over the grey horizon of dispar, but even so, Locke saw the faces on the two slowly change.
Emi-La was fighting to keep her stern look, but Locke saw her eyes slowly widening. It was a sign, and he wondered if Aleutian caught it.
"She's in love with him," Locke warmly observed after a moment. The look would have been easily missed by others, but Locke could see it plain as day. The slight shift in her eyes and brows was a way for her to say she was sorry.
"She's in love with him!"
Locke closely watch Aleutianed now, wondering still if he noticed Emi-La's sign. The young Guardian –which Locke wondered if Emi-La knew that Aleutian was one– stood there with his palms placed on his hips, still holding his gaze at the flustered girl.
But then his stare began to break away, his face twitching. It started slowly with the corner of his mouth. His lips began to slowly rise up that soon became a smile over time with Aleutian's brows becoming relaxed from their narrowed strain. He started to chuckle as an audible pant, but it soon became more every breath of air. Locke listened with a broad gapping smile as his son was soon overwhelmed by a full laugh that seemed to last for minutes. Emi-La's mouth, he noticed, dropped into a gapping frown from Aleutian's outburst, but it soon became a smile to Locke's amusement.
She slugged Aleutian in his right arm, playfully. "What's so funny?" she asked with a mirth gaze.
"You!" he chuckled out.
"Me!?" she decried, slugging him again. Aleutian just nodded his head over his laughter as he shouldered his blocks from her love taps.
Locke kept his position by the tree, being careful not to move around as he struggled not to loose it all together. Then he watched Emi-La take Aleutian's left hand and held it in her right, gently rubbing her thumb on top of his gloveless hand. It silenced Aleutian dead. Locke kept his eyes intently on Emi-La, seeing that she was fighting with herself to say something to his son. He had a warm feeling at what it was, and he was urging her to say it. He knew it would come, but the waiting and the passion he had for the moment was beckoning him to tell her to say it. He caught himself from stepping forward.
She glided closer to Aleutian, almost touching her chest with his as she let the jacket fall to the wet ground, exposing the rags of a firm dress that she had for clothes. Locke could see his son become ridged as she stood a little on her tip toes.
"It's okay son, it happens to all of us."
Locke waited for the words to filter out from her lips that were perched by Aleutian's ear. He waited for what seemed like an eternity, biting his lip as if he were a nervous wreck. But what she said to Aleutian shocked him; it wasn't what he thought he was going to hear.
But it still had the same effect.
"I feel safe with you, Aleutian. I can't explain it, but I do."
Aleutian looked straight into her blue eyes, his mouth gaping, stunned with not knowing what to do or say. Locke could see this clearly, but he also saw Aleutian start to fight for the words that he needed to say.
"Go on...go on son; tell her that you love her,"Locke said to himself from beside the tree. "You love her...I can see it in your e..."
He heard a twig snap far off to his left. He shuffled lightly to the side of the tree, getting a better look at what disturbed the tranquility of the moment. His senses came alive when he witnessed a dark figure moving casually towards Aleutian and Emi-La. There was something about him that made Locke start to move from the safety of the tree, gauging an intersect point to cut the dark figure off from his son and Emi-La. Four quick steps later made Locke start to run, his fist balling and his face showing resolve as he drew closer to the figure. The thing wore a hat, a big one Locke saw, and a heavy coat that trailed behind him in the rain. Three more hard strides brought the image of a long scar on the snout and two smaller ones behind his right eye.
And then he saw the gun that was held in the right hand of what Locke was sure of to be a monster. He bolted now, his heart pounding as fear gripped his throat after getting a closer look.
Locke glanced off from his target, seeing that Aleutian and Emi-La were still holding each other, not realizing the danger that was moving towards them with eerie calmness. "Look up! Aleutian, look-up!" he yelled out in his head. Locke had totally forgotten where he was and what his real physical self was doing on the other side of the dreamworld. He had kicked himself into high gear to protect his son, and all thoughts were on getting to that...
"...Aleutian!" he realized in utter horror of who the monster really was under the hat. He had gotten so used to seeing Aleutian without the scars –and what Locke could see as being himself– that he had forgotten about the Aleutian that his hand was placed over in reality. The look the boy had under the shadow of the hat was filled with contempt and pain. Locke wanted to question why, but a trembling fear enveloped his senses that shot the thought down while it was being born. It almost made him stop completely. Shaking the terror away, except for the thought of not making it, he pushed harder.
Then his heart sank suddenly; the pistol was starting to elevate--
"ALEUTIAN!"
Locke swore it was him crying out the warning, but it was Emi-La; screaming to his son when she finally saw the terror that was stalking them. Locke saw Aleutian push her aside in a quick motion, but his face was lit up in horror. He had frozen.
"Aleutian, do something...ALEUTIAN!" Locke yelled out in his head. He was counting on his son to hear him subconsciously through his dream, but it wasn't working. Aleutian just stood there, overwhelmed with terror, keeping Emi-La behind him.
Locke wasn't more than ten feet away when the long barreled pistol was squarely leveled at Aleutian's head.
"WAKE UP, ALEUTIAN! You don't have to see this..."
"WAKE UP, SON!" Locke finally shouted out in the dream.
But nothing happened; the ground didn't fade, he didn't fade, and worst of all, the monster of Aleutian was still there...and he just placed his finger on the trigger.
Locke reached out with his right arm, hurling his opened hand towards the black pistol. It seemed that time stood still for him, watching his hand slowly came down on top of the slide, only that he wished he could speed himself up. Then, he felt the cold, wet steel through his gloves when he finally made contact. But he wasn't breathing any easier just yet. In the corner of his left eye, he could see the tendons in Aleutian's fur hand starting to flex his index finger, squeezing the trigger back. With fear instilled in Locke's mind from the image, he felt a terrible shiver come down his body as he pushed the slide back on the weapon...
It worked; the pistol didn't fire! With the understanding of the mechanics of the pistol coming quickly into his stressed mind in a flash, Locke pushed the dimple on the slide catch into the frame of the pistol with his thumb. When the release bar had protruded out just enough on the other side, he hooked his finger under it and pulled it free from the pistol. With the catch totally out of the weapon and somewhere on the leaf littered ground, Locke pulled the slide off cleanly from the weapon; the bullet dropping away from the chamber in the process.
He still kept the slide clutched in his fist as he extended his right arm back behind him. He watched as the Aleutian in the dark coat in front of him turned the disassembled pistol frame towards him, squeezing the trigger to the empty framed pistol. Locke faced his resolve at that instant as he swung his arm around, contacting the back of metal slide on the right side of the echidna's head. The bone crushing sound of his skull signified triumph, while his body crashing to the ground brought justice.
The beast was dead.
Locke starred down for a long moment at the thing that he just defeated. With a heavy sigh coming from his lungs, he threw the remaining piece of the gun at the feet of the slain monster that was his son...so he hoped. He realize the rush he took in when he hit the boy. It felt good in an odd sort of way, but he was certain the Aleutian he'd sent to the ground –and hopefully killed– was not his son. With that thought, he turned around to his true son. He could see Emi-La was still behind Aleutian, holding onto his back as she tried to conceal herself. She soon stepped out from behind him, a relieved and greeting smile being lifted across her face towards Locke.
"So I finally get to meet you," Locke joyfully said to himself.
"You're all safe now. It's all over," came Locke, nodding his head in assurance.
He watched Aleutian, waiting for his reaction from what had transpired. But something was dreadfully wrong; he didn't flinch his deadpan face for what seemed like an eternity. Locke felt the bitter tension replace the dry, humid air as he locked his eyes with his son's.
And then, Aleutian's face went cold: his head lowering ever so slightly down with his blue eyes turning to crimson, burning a murderous path that Locke knew wasn't safe for either of them.
Aleutian pushed his right shoulder forward that crudely released Emi-La's gentle grip. With it, he took a long determined stride, then another. Seeing this, Locke slowly put himself into a passive defensive mode, placing his right foot just a little bit behind his left, and rasing his opened hands just above his waist.
"Son, it's all right. It's over with," Locke pleaded calmly, "you can be yourself again..."
Locke felt pressure on his left boot when Aleutian stepped nose to nose with him. He tried to step back, but his left foot wouldn't move. In that same instant, his son struck both his arms out and pushed his father to the ground.
"ALEUTIAN, NO!" Emi-La screamed with panic.
Locke thought he was going to land on top of the Aleutian that he just slain, but instead, his back impacted the soft, empty wet ground. He glanced over his shoulder in a instant and to his horror, the dark figure was gone, replaced by the fallen leaves where a body should have laid. Snapping his eyes back to the front, his sight was enveloped with Aleutian, his face cringing in anger. The boy threw himself on top of his father, thrusting his right arm at Locke's throat.
Feeling the choking sensation sent Locke into his fight mode in a heartbeat. He grabbed at Aleutian's hand with his right and extended his left hand that impacted the forehead of his enraged son.
Emi-La's crying, screaming voice filtered over through the grunts of the struggling Guardians. "Aleutian, stop this...PLEASE!"
He looked passed his son at that instant. Emi-La was overwhelmed with tears as she struggled to pick herself up to cross the long void that separated them. "ALEUTIAN!" she screamed out again over her thrusting cries, begging him to stop.
Locke snapped his eyes back to Aleutian with a cold stare. "Listen to her, son! Don't go back on your love to her. This is not you...!"
He grunted when he felt the pain of Aleutian's knee press further against his groan. He tried to fight it, but his son increased his grip around his throat, causing him to look for other avenues to win the fight. As he added more pressure to Aleutian's forehead, he saw Emi-La running over to them now, her face painted with sorrow and sadness.
But suddenly the scenery started to change around them; it was fading. Trees started to disappear as others started to reappear in blank spaces, their leaves turning green in an instant. The rain started to tapper off dramatically with some of the heavier drops never touching the ground. Even with all this, Locke still kept his eyes on Emi-La; for her's were on him. As the sky turned from grey to a dark blue, Locke relaxed his resistence to Aleutian's hands. He was mesmerized at Emi-La's face. She was trying to say something and Locke was hoping she would say it soon...she was starting to boil as the world around her started to collapse.
Emi-La looked around her disappearing body, seeing it fade from Aleutian's dream. She brought her blue eyes back up to Locke's, her face mixed with pity, sorrow, and sadness.
"I'm sorry!" she shouted over her weeps. It made Locke relax his grip around Aleutian's hand even further as he stared gapingly at Emi-La, stunned. She was shouting to him...
"I'm sorry!" she screamed out again.
Locke saw her look down at herself once more. Her legs were all but gone, and her bare mid drift was showing the signs of fading away as well. Seeing this, she brought her tearing face up once more. "Help him! Please, help him!" she cried out as a weeping plea.
Lines were starting to appear on Aleutian's face. It was his scars Locke horridly realized; being retraced by an artist with a skilled hand. Then, the tip of a lock on the left side of Aleutian's head started to disappear as his arms started to turn a dark brown from his jacket reappearing.
The last thing Locke witnessed before the dream completely collapsed was Emi-La's chest being erased from existence, bubbling as it faded from his sight. With it went her hands as she gazed horridly at them when the disappeared. Her mouth was quivering all the while her neck faded. She squeezed her eyes shut at that instant, looking up to the heavens in despair as she took in one last deep breath before she vanished from her beloved's dream.
"...ALLEEUUUUUTTIAANNN...!"
Emi-La's blood curtailing scream faded as a ringing sound from Locke's mind, replaced by the still morning silence and the hard grunts from him and his son locked in mortal combat. Aleutian held his left fist up in the air, ready to slam it down on his father's head.
"STAY OUT OF MY HEAD!" shouted the raving echidna at the top of his lungs, expelling tears down his emotionally charged face.
Then, at that passionate moment; he felt ashamed of himself. Letting out a frustrated shrill, he loosened his grip from his father and quickly scrambled away from him. Locke just laid there on the ground, bewildered at what he had just envisioned from the dream.
"I'm not going to!" he finally bellowed out at the back of his son. It made Aleutian snap around in a heartbeat. Locke soon found the immediate courage to gain his footing to stand ready for another fight against the monster that inhabited his son. He was fully prepared to use his ninjutsu training if he had to.
"Stay out of my head, Locke!" Aleutian hammered out through his tears. "I don't want you seeing my thoughts anymore!"
"Why?" retorted Locke, "is there something that you don't want me to see?"
"There's a lot of things that I don't want you to see!" Aleutian cried out in a fit of quivering rage.
Locke bit down in anger from Aleutian's words. "Then how am I supposed to give you sympathy, Aleutian? Huh!? If you're not going to tell me anything about your past –the good or the bad– then how am I going to help you, and bring sympathy for what you have done. You're giving me no choice but to look inside you."
"Locke! What's going on mate?" came Archimedes' voice in Locke's head.
"Shut-up, Archy!" spout back Locke in an instant, giving no care where the Fire Ant was.
He watched Aleutian bring his gaze down to the ground, his eyes glistening from his tears. "I did some things, father," he started out, his voice shaky, "I did some things that I am not proud of, and I wish I could go back and undo them... but I can't."
Locke relaxed his stance when he saw Aleutian's aching heart overcome him.
"Why did you do them?" he asked with a soft but stern voice.
Aleutian placed his right gloved hand on his forehead, wiping his trembling face with it after he tried to sooth his aching head. "Revenge and retribution," he finally wept out.
Locke began to realize what this was all coming to. He remembered what he heard Aleutian say in his forethought from the day before, and it made him ask his next question that he was deathly afraid of what the answer was; more so for Emi-La's sake.
"What three?" It came out like glass shattering in the quietest of libraries.
Aleutian stiffened his face as he swallowed hard. "I..." He stopped himself with the cold thoughts of what he was about to tell. He shook his head at the ground and began to turn around.
Locke wouldn't let it happen; "WHAT THREE!?" he demanded, his posture going stern.
Aleutian stopped halfway as he winced from his father's voice for the first time. He knew he wasn't going to runaway from this. He could try not to think about it now, but the wounds were being reopened. Aleutian knew it was only a matter of time before strong flashbacks would come back from those wounds and Locke would witness them.
"Draven...Mace...Thompson.," Aleutian seethed out slowly after a moments thought.
"He didn't!" screamed out Archimedes' voice in Locke's afterthoughts.
"I think we just established that, old friend."
"Was that what you meant by cleaning the blood from the grooves of your pistol?" Locke asked. Aleutian just coldly nodded his face, his stance stiffened all the while. "So what did they do to deserve our bloodline's resolve?"
Aleutian's gaze went acute with his reply. "They helped set a trap for me and my friends. With it, they killed them along with my Emi-La."
"Who did they help?"
"Robotnick," answered Aleutian, his face eaten with anger. "They betrayed me, my friends, and themselves over money and hollow promises. For it, they deserved to be departed."
"Then why do you feel guilty about it, Aleutian?" Locke waited as he watched his son's expression. He could see that he did know the answer, but he wasn't able to admit it to himself. "Do you even know the answer?" Aleutian shook his head, more out of protest than knowing.
Locke took the chance with that sign. "Because you knew what you were doing was throwing everything away that she worked so hard for. She wanted you to keep your name and blood-right and so she did the dirty work...not you.
And you threw it away!" Locke seethed out in the end.
Aleutian just stood there with his rage mixed with his tears, saying nothing. He knew it all along, he painfully reflected. It was why he had tears mixed with his blood from the opened scar on his snout. His wounds had never fully healed when he killed Mace the Mongoose, and when he faced his anger towards himself at what he had done –and to whom he went back on– he tore open his gaping slash that released his anger in blood. When the tears came, that was when he realized what he had done to his equal...and the thought hurt him even more than the scars.
But it wasn't the total answer as to why Aleutian did it; Locke knew this. Aleutian had cherished what Emi-La had done to keep his honor and name free from the barbarity of what they were asked to do. An equal just wouldn't go back on something like that without a damn good reason.
"I should've let Lopper handle it...like he asked," Aleutian reflected, feeling guilty that he didn't take his teacher's request.
"Then why didn't you?" Locke asked after picking out Aleutian's thought. "Or was it something else that made you lose your way; to go back on her honor?"
Archy stood atop a branch, watching the emotional stand-off between a father and his son. What Locke had asked made him almost turn away. "Don't, Locke. He can't take this..."
"...Good. He needs to break," Locke countered.
"But not like this. It will hurt him and it could alienate him from all of us."
"It's been hurting him, Archimedes. Look at him. He's been carrying the burden of what he never became since the day it was robbed from him. He needs to let go."
Locke threw Archimedes plea of caution to the wind as he took in another hard breath. "What did they really take from you, son?" He paused to let it sink in, stepping forward to await the reaction that he knew was coming. "What did they rob from you that you wanted so bad from that day?" He stopped when he was a mere six inches from his sobbing boy. "What did they take from my son that would have been so precious to him...more so than his Emi-La?"
It all flashed in Aleutian's dreary mind. Emee would be there by his side looking over his shoulder, holding her Guardian as she watched their Guardian sleep in his arms. With that image fresh in his mind, Aleutian then knew why he practically committed cold-blooded murder. They seized his chance of becoming a father with the one he truly loved.
They took away his family as it lay in the womb.
Aleutian turned his head away for an instant, trying to cast his precious thoughts away, never succeeding. When his glistening gaze fell back on his father, Locke was ready for what he knew was going to be the hardest thing Aleutian was about to say. At least he thought he was ready.
"You would've been a Grandfather, dad," Aleutian whimpered out, clinching his fist as he was overcome by his trembling emotions. It still felt like a sledge hammer had pounded home to Locke's heart. "They took it all from me, dad, and I never had a chance to embrace it..." Aleutian's voice trailed off as he realized what he did to his real family. "I wanted to be a father like...like I took from you."
It all became too much for him. He almost buckled under his own emotional weight if it weren't for Locke snatching him before he fell to the ground. And there he stood, holding his son tightly in his arms as he fought off his tears, fearing that he might be robbed of his son.
"What happened, Locke?" asked Archimedes. He was sitting on Locke's shoulder as the two watched Aleutian eat by himself in the clearing, mesmerized by the sweet morning light that grew brighter with each passing minute.
Locke mused at the question but came up with a different answer. "We're not alone in this, Archy."
"What do you mean, mate?"
"Emi-La...she's been calling to him. And this morning she called to me; I know it!"
Achy wanted to turn his head, but he disciplined himself not too, still watching Aleutian's body language. "What!?"
"Her voice awoke me this morning, and she was calling for Aleutian. Archy, her voice is sweeter than wine," Locke gasped in his head.
"I know! She's the reason why he stayed away from us, but she also wanted him to come back to us."
"She still does," Locke countered, "She apologized for him right to me, only pleading that I help him. She misses her lover, Archy; the one she was torn away from. And I think she wants him back more than us."
"So what's the problem. If she can touch him in his dreams, why haven't we seen results?"
Locke mused at Archy's point for a moment. "Because of that monster that's in him, and I've seen it; here in this world and his. I even fought the thing, but I'm afraid I only wounded it."
"And so you've enraged it more, bringing it here to us!" Archy shot back.
Locke shook his head slightly. "No, I broke it here. At least I hope I did."
Archimedes' thoughts went back to when he first met Emi-La. Standing by Aleutian, her beauty casting a glow around him as he listened to Archimedes' message from his father. He's thoughts of her still rang true at that instant of reflection. "She's an angel, Locke. She touched his soul and she is still there for him."
"I know, old friend. And we need to help her succeed. We owe it to her as she owes it to us."
Sally found it easier to fight Robotnick than to battle herself back to sleep. She awoke with a troubled mind that she tried to chase away with a walk. Instead, it only furthered her dilemma: a new cipher to crack, rumors and intelligence reports of the Eggfleet amassing in size, figuring a way to work through the jamming frequencies thanks to Robotnick, and most of all, a certain blue hedgehog was knocking on her heart again. Sonic didn't know it but she felt it. This time though, she was going to keep it a secret from him. It was all still too soon.
Her walk somehow took her to the Command Center. There, she found Rotor and Uncle Chuck slumped over the long console; sleeping. She shook her head at the sight, knowing they had worked all through the night until their exhaustion took over. Sally was about to wake them and send them off to their huts down in the city, but with a quick glance at the clock, she realized that is would only hamper their sleep cycle instead of making it better.
She sighed at the sight before she moved over to the panel, studying printouts and readouts. They didn't even put a dent in the code. She sighed again, knowing how hard they must have worked but bearing no fruit from their labors.
"Nicole," she said drearly, "you still on?"
"Yes, Sally. I'm still working on this, but it isn't going like it should."
Sally felt her eyes start to grow heavy again, but she fought to keep them open. "What's so different about it?"
"There's too much information in the transmission. The original message is shorter than what we have, and finding the right letters and words is near to impossible, even for me."
"But it means that you all have cracked the code itself?" Sally asked, rubbing her drowsy head.
"Not all of it. We managed to break the words down and spell others out, but again, it's the organization of the message that is banal. I'm trying something different with it though. Instead of two dimensional, I'm looking at it in three."
"Say what?"
"I'm breaking it down into shapes, Sally, plus working the trigonometry and calculus in with it. So far I am looking at this in an octagon sphere. Inside and out." Nicole fell silent for a bit, gauging Sally's bewildered reaction with one of her cameras that hovered over the screen. "You don't want to see this. It will make you feel unwell just by the sight of it."
"I think I'm feeling that way just by thinking about it, Nicole," Sally muttered.
If her program would have allowed it, Nicole would have laughed at Sally's quipped remark, but she was a computer after all. However, Nicole did read an ancient book about a computer named Mike who did.
"Any progress with it so far?" asked Sally.
"I think I have one word figured out, Princess: Chameleons."
"Chameleons?" It lifted a little fog from her senses. "You sure?"
Nicole paused, running her calculations faster than most normal beings could. "I'm sure of it Sally. There are no other Mobian species in the message that we have deciphered."
Nicole then changed the subject. "If I may say so, Sally, you need to go on stand-by and recharge."
Sally yawned, musing over the advice of Nicole; it was her way of saying that someone needed to inspect their eyelids for light leaks. "I do, but I don't think I could make it back to the castle."
"Tails and Rotor usually sleep on the briefing tables after a long nights work. You should try it, though I don't condone the lack of back support."
Sally shifted her heavy eyes to the tables. Sleep loomed over her wary mind that made the tables more inviting. Figuring her vest would do for covers, she trudged her way over to the her new bed for the night. When she laid down on the cold tabletop, her auburn hair dangled across her back and down towards the floor, never touching it. She starred hard at Uncle Chuck all the while her mind began to fade into dreams, reminding her of his nephew. With Nicole's processing sounds being a lullaby to Sally, she closed her eyes, only saying her last thought to herself as she fell back to sleep:
"I miss you Sonic..."
Since I've picked up the comics again, I was said to see Sally and Sonic broken up. But when Fionia left, it gave me an avenue to work with for their love. Man so many love stories so little chapters...except the next. Just hope I can edit out and post it soon.