Here it is...and the last update for a long while, I'm afraid. Hope you enjoy the little story/qoute at the top. Best to remember it. If you don't know the meaning...look it up. A shoe company is named after the word the runner speaks. "Nike" for short.
Disclaimer...I observe the rights of the orginial creaters of the fandom.
Enjoy!
He was glistening in the open court, his tan skin lathered with sweat as he found the last bit of endurance to inch towards the sitting king. Breathing hard, his lungs shaking as he did, his feet aching over his sandals. It was there that he fought to take in his last breath of air...
"Nenikékamen!" he said with gapping smile.
(We are victorious!)
And there, he collapsed where he stood...dead! –Pheidippides and the run from Marathon to Athens.
Soul-Touch
By: Mauser
Rude awakenings were becoming the norm for Snively. Most of the time he was practically thrown out of bed by his cloned uncle. However, this morning didn't see a boot or a rough knock from Eggman; instead, an alarm.
Torturous as it was, he powered himself to get passed the obnoxious waling sound, get dressed, and scramble towards his console. Arriving, he switched on his triple LCD monitors and focused on the incoming information that had triggered the alarms. An overhead shot from a permanently fixed satellite over the Kingdom of Merica made what little looming sleep Snively had expunge from his mind. Wreckage and burning fires glimmered like a star on the screen at first, but with a rotation of a dial, Snively brought the image closer to the ground.
Slain Eggbots projected to his pupils over the fires and floodlights, knocking all notions of an easy mop up operation in Deer Wood Forest to the four winds.
"SNIVELY!"
Gathering his collective self that was jolted from his sub-conscious, thanks to his Uncle's booming voice, Snively finally found it in him to reply. "We have a problem; possibly a big one," he said over the com-link.
"What is it!?"
Snively held a short pause as he conceived a reply that wouldn't get him yelled at further. "Mercias's resistence fighters have raided a supply point in Deer Wood Forest..."
"...So! Have you checked video feeds from the attack yet? Do I have to think of everything!"
Snively grumbled under his breath as he searched the data links for what he was looking for. There; it was only one, but he hoped it would ease his master's mind. Activating the link, he saw it was from a lone Eggbot, facing South, Snively guessed. All of a sudden the image went green for an instant, exposing two characters in the tint of the night-vision that was partially defeated from the ambient glow of the floodlights. Snively could see the figure on the right was a hedgehog; Rob-O the Hedg, he realized after seeing the hood and the bow cocked back, ready to let an arrow fly. Tracing the arrow over to the left, what he observed next made him flex his head back in puzzlement.
"What is an echidna doing there!?" But then he sleuthed over the echidna's pose, noticing that he was brandishing a stout little carbine towards Rob-O. It made Snively question if he was friend or foe. Then came a struggle, the echidna evading the arrow and hurling himself on top of Rob-O. For an instant, Snively saw the hint of the metallic replacement dreads on the echinda as he smiled inwardly at what he hoped was the other menacing hedgehog's death.
Rob-O was as much a thorn in Eggman's side as Sonic; just only on a different hemisphere.
His pupils felt as if they were burnt out of existence from the sudden whiteout on the screen. Then the screen went black, producing an error code only moments later. Reaching back to his keyboard, Snively replayed the video, but this time he slowed it down and override the night-vision sequence. Even so, the image still blinded him. What looked to be the hillside exploding from a bomb intrigued him at first, but with the purple dot that followed up a split second later engulfing his screen before it went black again, Snively leaned himself back in his chair while trying to fathom what he had observed.
Reaching back to the com-button, he pressed it; "Master, are you by a monitor?"
"Yes! Send me something!"
"Well, at least I'm not the only who hates mornings!" Making sure he wasn't going to send any of his programs to Eggman by accident --including that of the new Com-Bots-- he opened the files to the videos, sent them, and waited intently as he mused over his observations.
"...Purple fire? Hmm, looked like a plasma round...but larger. And that flash..." Glancing back to the overhead image again, he retraced the transport that was split in two. Zooming in with a twist of the dial, he further inspected the sides that he could see. Not believing his eyes, he shook his head and reaffirmed his sight back to the screen; the back half of the transport was crushed inwards, like a kid had thrown a heavy ball at a hover-car door and dented it.
It didn't make sense to him; Rob-O didn't have any weapons of that magnitude.
"...but I think that echidna has something to do with it."
The com-link finally chattered. "Snively, send a patrol and search the surrounding area. Something's afoot! Order for stun mode for the echidnas; they looked awfully familiar and I want to know why they are there!"
"Very well, Doctor. Consider it done," Snively said in an obeying voice, though his mind wanted to reach out to the other end and slap him.
With the orders sent, he relaxed a bit before he checked the status of "his" project. Everything seemed to be in order: his key elements were cooperating to their forced tasks, the bots were being switched online and receiving the last component, and to his satisfaction, everything was on schedule.
The last thing he needed to do was to create the orders and program for the bots. Realizing he was now the only flesh and blood being awake in New Robotropolis, he opened a handful of files on two separate screens...and began to work out the orders for his bots.
He only hoped that the morning's set-back would remain in Mercia.
"We can't waste anymore time...we need to move, Field Marshal!"
Stenson nodded at Ell-Tee and picked his rifle off the ground. It was still warm and breathing out thin traces of smoke. "Mr. Hedgehog; since this is your theater of operations, what is the response time for a counter-attack?"
Rob-O rested himself with his bow while standing. "Mere minutes if we don't make haste. They mostly come from the north."
An affirming nod. "Ell-Tee; take point! Craig!?"
"Present and accounted for, Mr. Stenson."
Stenson crossed his face in annoyance, "That's Field Marshal! Doesn't any of you pacifist bunch ever listen?" He smiled inwards when he observed Craig and the rest of the Centurions sulking at his comment. Stenson's show of force towards Eggman's machines along with Rob-O's temperament to Yanar had become a lesson to all of them: inaction brings on more problems and alienates you from your friends.
"Take the rear and help anyone who is struggling. What's your ammo count?"
Craig along with Oscar and the rest fiddled with pouches on their belts. "Four cells left!" Craig confirmed with everyone else coming likewise or close to that number.
"Friend?" Stenson glanced over to Rob-O. "Thou art has been kind to my merry bunch, but I must decline your offering of sanctuary. We can travel our separate way if you don't mind?"
"I'm not giving you an option! We are going to take you south and then we will leave you there." Stenson began to see Rob-O's eyes turn to liquid. "Before you go off on me, arrow boy, you have to understand my interest in you..."
"...Can we talk on the way?" blurted out Yanar.
Stenson nodded. "Good observation, Mr. Ambassador! There actually might be some hope with you after all. Craig, you ready!?"
"Yes, Field Marshal!"
Stenson threw the scornful comment aside. "Good, lets go!"
With Ell-Tell leading the way, his auto-cannon ready to hose the surrounding area in front of him at the drop of a hat, Stenson resumed his observations to Rob-O:
"I have interests in Albion that concerns you and your fighters..."
"...Me!? Why should I sacrifice my people for your interests in Albion? They've done nothing for us!"
"But I have, sir, and I hope that puts me on a different plain than Gala-Na and Yanar!" Stenson turned his head slightly behind him, seeing Yanar trailing to his right and rounding a tree. "I've brought people here to seek sanctuary from the wars on Angel Island..."
"...Angel Island is at war?" came Mari-An, stepping past Rob-O to Stenson's right. "What about the Guardians? Is Knuckles helping?"
"Yes, but he is with this Sonic the Hedgehog and the Kingdom of Acorn fighting on the front lines in this mess. But he was also the one who sent me here."
"Why?" asked Rob-O, pushing his feelings of not wanting to assist this echidna aside. Rob-O still admired Knuckles for what he did over two years ago.
"He's a Guardian...he looks after his people when he isn't concentrated on the Emerald or US!"
Rob-O and Mari-An wanted to stop dead in their tracks, but the threat of reprisal made them kept their pace with the tall echidna. "What do you mean by US?"asked Mari-An.
Stenson glanced back behind him. Finding that no one was lagging behind and Vickers wasn't an earshot away, he adjusted his rifle on his shoulder along with his feelings, and said:
"Let me warn you about my brethren..."
"Ehhhhnnnn..."
Being mindful of the injured girl in his arms, Wesson did his best to slow himself to an easy stop. With every hundred yards he crossed in the forest, his surroundings were becoming less vague. Breathing hard from his efforts to keep pace with himself, he lowered Nata-Le gently to the soft ground and took a quick glance over her injured body. She was becoming more of a mess within each passing mile, and the last fifty yards produced the first moan of the trek. What he saw now made him worry. Shivers started to replace her sanity, leaving Wesson with the thought that she might not make it.
Everything he had bolted from his senses when she looked up at him, her purple sad eyes meeting his. "I don't wanna die..."
Wesson felt something tighten in his heart. He tried to shun it away and replace it with something sinister, but he couldn't muster the freewill to achieve the mind-set. With his breathing somewhat normal, he beamed a long stare filled with sorrow back to her, and did his best to domesticate his dark voice. "Stay with me...please. We shouldn't be too far."
As much as he tried to shower his voice with sympathy, it still came out harsh and demonic. At that moment, he was glad that he had ripped the heart out of the dingo who almost crushed his larynx some months back. The dog's face was priceless in Wesson's mind when he showed the still beating heart to him just before the spark of life left his eyes. It was why he wore a glove over his robotic hand; to keep the blood from trickling into the joints of his fingers.
But even with that flashback salivating in his mind, it still didn't prepare his emotions for what Nata-Le did to him next!
"I want my mom..." she whimpered at first with her voice trailing from her tremors. Wesson kept what was left of his eyes pinned down at her glistening jades.
"...I want my MOM!"
Her scream filed off what callouses he had left on his heart. "Calm down, please..." He barely choked it out, stopping himself short when his voice sounded something on the lines of normalcy.
"...you can get us both killed..." His reply sounded stubborn in a sorrowful way; never once had his ears heard something like that come from him.
"...I want to go home," Natal-Le whimpered to him; her eyes locked onto his, opening her soul to his heart.
"No! Not me..." It started out as a blur; something that he had never experienced outside of physical pain that seemed to be lost in his soul. He never felt it come across his snout until it passed over the edge of his metal plates and barreled across the last patch of skin on his face. "...not me!?"
It was a lone tear.
Picking her head up from the ground and holding her within his arms, Wesson kept her close to his chest. He remembered seeing this done by couples when he sat amongst them in the Hidden Palace Zone, holding each other as if their love would shield them from harm. Never understanding it, he ranked this show of affection to something along the lines of giving in to defeat, figuring it would never challenge a blaster head-on in a face-to-face fight.
But with every hard shunt of breaths from her chokes that echoed in his chest, he saw it differently in the shadowed moon light of the forest canopy...and it scared him beyond all measure. Granted it strengthened his conscious to stand to his feet with her locked in his arms, but he was scared of the feeling it produced inside him.
"I will get you home," he decried to her, "you have my word." His voice was stiff again, resolve floating over his emotionally charged face as he continued to stare upon her.
Taking the initial steps that propelled him forward, he took one last look at the young girl in his arms. Her eyes were still trained on him the whole time...and it was at that moment that he knew his worst fear in his life had come true.
He was soul-touched.
Rob-O still couldn't believe his pointed ears even after they traveled a mile that seemed to help Stenson's words soak in. Mari-An and the wolf with the crossbow, who Yanar learned his name was Dirk, kept silent the whole mile which Stenson figured they were pondering their reservations with him. He couldn't blame them.
"So, you are telling me that my merry band should be 'on edge' sort to speak when your followers come a knocking?" asked Rob-O.
Stenson kept his eyes forward towards Ell-Tee, anticipating a hand signal that he hoped would never come. "At the very least, sir. I honestly don't know what the future holds for us: we could mend our ways with the Guardians, or we could keep going right back at each other's throats when the Island is purged of its enemies. I just only hope one of my compatriots keeps his loud mouth closed to keep this place a secret."
Dirk brought his thoughts to the conversation, keeping his steel crafted crossbow trained to the left flank under his arm the whole time. "But you are asking us to help you...why? You seem to have everything under control."
Rob-O picked up from there; "Yes, you can help us. Your weapons have demonstrated that we can beat back these machines and seize the day for the Kingdom and for Deer Wood."
Stenson sighed. "I'm sorry, but my duties lie elsewhere. In fact, I get to learn how to tap dance when I get back home. My superior is going to want to know everything that has transpired, and why I have twelve unoptanium rounds missing. Sugarcoating doesn't fall within our standards, I'm afraid." Stenson paused for a brief second, wondering if he should let the chips lay where the fall. "And you are going to need an army, which you don't have."
"What do you mean don't?" quickly shot back Rob-O, "we have enough here to do what's needed. You saw how we helped you take down those machines."
Stenson sighed again; the hedgehog didn't have a good grasp of military tactics. "Rob-O; don't take this hard but all you're doing is prolonging the inevitable. My kind is about to slump that low if we don't get past our differences in a hurry. Like I said, you need an army which you don't have. But..." Stenson turned his crude diminutive stare towards Yanar; "I think I know someone who does. Problem is, they leave it dormant."
"But will they help?" asked Mari-An, "After all, we haven't heard from them in long time."
Yanar swallowed hard before he countered. "And like wise, Milady. I'm sure if you hadd come to us and asked, the council could have made a decision of some-sort. All we needed was evidence..."
"...Evidence, you say!?" spot back Rob-O. Stenson was right on his heals. "What more evidence do you want..."
"...I'm sure they heard the screams?" coldly added Stenson. "Oh yes, I remember...you look to keep your peace anyway you can. That was what you and Gala-Na said to me...right?"
Yanar felt the weight of everyone's stare resting on him. "Yes...you are correct, Field Marshal," he answered with a defeated tone.
"And this is why I need your assistance, Rob-O," said Stenson. "I need you to hold true to your duties as Sentry for Albion with what you have left. Hopefully something by then can be worked out with the Council and chiropractor!"
Yanar snorted at the comment; "What do you mean chiropractor, Mr. Stenson?"
Looking over his right shoulder, he smirked at the Ambassador. "Well someone has to give you a backbone! It could be me..."
"...or that young man," finished Mari-An.
A quick hop over a downed tree saw the completion of another mile...or so he guessed. Wesson usually carried a strand of beads with him that he used to count his paces and miles as he navigated through the country. Dingo country he might add. But with his arms occupied with a bundled and shivering girl, plus with his beads back on Angel Island, it was pure dead-reckoning.
Darting through a clearing as fast as he could move with his burning legs, he began to smell the salty air of the sea. Sprinting forward for another few yards, it became pronounced, igniting what energy he had left to keep going.
"Almost there..."
He glanced down at Nata-Le, her face expressionless inside the jacket that she was wrapped in. "Ma'am?"
"Yes..." she fought to say.
Wesson felt the weakness of his emotions coming back. "We're almost there. Maybe another mile or so," he said over his hard panting breaths from the long run.
"I–I don't think I can...make...it?"
"Oh yes you can! Don't give up on me now, trooper. I've gone this far with you, and you can return the favor just by staying alive!" Wesson's mind began to race, finding ways to keep her conscious for the last leg of the journey. "What's your name?"
"Na–Nata-Leee..."
"Alright...Nata-Le, my name is Wesson. Can you say Wesson?" He swung left around a tree and shot through another clearing, keeping his senses attuned over his emotions.
"Wes–Wesson..."
"Good, Nata-Le...do you have parents?" He throttled faster now; the trees were becoming less in numbers.
"Yess..."
"Roger that...are they still around?"
"Yes..."
Wesson smiled for a brief instance, jumping over another log that he remembered belonged there. "You've got a notch in your rifle over me...mine are dead. Can you name them?"
"Yesss..." She paused for a moment; it made Wesson look at her for a bit as he pressed on. "Ames is...my father." Her voice was starting to grow weaker. "...my mom is...is Car-Leee..."
There, Wesson caught sight of the twinkle of stars through the trees just above the horizon. "You're about to see her soon enough! Just hang in..."
She was motionless in his arms. "Nata-Le!?" he shouted. She didn't move or speak; not even a whimper.
Scrambling to a dead halt, Wesson brought her to the ground as gently as he could. "Nata-Le; speak to me, trooper!" Nothing except for his hard breathing. "NATA-LE!"
Pulling the jacket down from her injured left arm, he winced when he saw the purple ooze of her life's elixir draining from her arm. "Oh, crap!" He quickly shook her again, attempting to arouse her but to no avail. She was out. Fearing she might have died in his arms, he pushed two fingers on the side of her neck. Her pulse was there, but very weak.
Picking her up for what he hoped was the last time, he charge forward to the stars. Everything he had left went to his legs. He could feel the surg of energy being pumped from his heart to them, making him cast long strides that seemed to never end.
A quick dart pass a tree found him in the open field, racing towards the sea as if there was no tomorrow for either of them. At this point, he prayed to Aurora that nothing would cut him down. He'd traveled this far over his own aching feet that if he were killed, he swore he would personally slap the Goddess with what energy he had left when he reached the afterlife.
The sight of the bluff's edge made him breathe a little easier in his head. Breathing naturally was a totally different story. Scaling down the sandy cliff proved to be easier than he thought. Somehow, he believed the stars were aligned in his favor that night. So far he dodged getting plastered to the four winds from the Field Marshal's rifle, dodged an arrow, and now, the path he was trudging down at a feverish rate was the same he used to climb up from the beach. And that he was about to touch down on...
"AAHHHHH!"
Pain shot to his brain as his right leg caved under the weight and strain from his harsh trek. He succeeded in not falling on top of Nata-Le but only at the expense of ripping the muscle in his thigh even further. He screamed once more with his raspy voice grunting from the pain as he held Nata-Le over his chest. Breathing harder, more so from the torn muscle, he cocked his head up and gazed at the empty horizon of the sea that was inverted from his position on the beach. He knew Albion was there, he knew he was that much closer to it, even though he couldn't see the invisable city.
He just needed to have faith. Not from the Goddess above, he protested –she was of no help to him anymore– but faith in himself to get the mission done. His mission!
Picking himself off the ground with the unconscious girl wrapped within his arms, he staggered to his feet. Agony gripped his brain as he put weight on his right leg. Doing his best to push it aside, he stepped with his left, feeling the muscle in his right tearing open even further. He swore under his breath as he moved his heavy leg across the sand; he was that much closer.
"I'M NOT GOING TO FAIL!" he screamed out, pushing his thoughts to his legs to keep moving.
The calm shoreline lapped over the soles of his weathered boots. Grunting from another spike of pain from his injured leg, he powered on, limping as he tried to run across the water. He tried not to think that his painful dash was going to be for nothing as he stared down on the emptiness of the sea. Wesson believed it was there...he had to. She depended on him to have that faith.
Another slop from the water below him triggered more pain. He barely collapsed to the watered-ground as he felt his leg start to give way.
"I'M NOT GOING TO FAIL!" he shouted over the pain and the splashes from his limping footsteps. With his right leg connecting to the ground again, it shot more protests of pain to the deepest portions of his skull, only grunting his reply as he glanced down at the girl in his arms. Her expressionless face sealed the deal:
"I'm not going to fail you! I will not let myself do that!"
It was then that the last spark of his resolve--of his warrior soul–came up from the depths of his heart and demanded that his legs to work; to push farther than they have ever gone before. He hissed when he breathed in, screaming as he exhaled; calling on everything he had left to win the fight against time and Death. Hoping that Journey's End was only a painful step away...
...Ground suddenly appeared below his feet. He wanted to collapse right there and then, but the sight of the stone hedges that marked the entrance to Albion told him no. He wanted to keep going...needed to keep going.
It was her soul-touch that kept him going.
Pushing forward up the stone hill, he could see the outskirts of the beautiful white city...
"HALT RIGHT THERE!" ordered a male voice to his right.
Wesson ignored it, only slowing himself to a trickled shuffle.
"WE SAID HALT OR WE WILL OPEN FIRE!"
With all his energy spent, he collapsed to his knees, holding Nata-Le across his tired arms as if offering her to Aurora in defeat. And there, he cried out what he thought was his last breath:
"MEDIC!"
A male Centurion lifted himself up from the cover of a large boulder and grabbed a quick glance at the "thing" slumped down in front of them. The sight of Wesson hunched on his knees with Nata-Le curled up in his arms snapped his next order like a flip of a switch; "MEDIC TO THE FRONT, NOW!"
Shouldering his weapon behind his back, he, along with three more echidna's clad in the blue, quickly tackled the short range to Wesson. Picking Nata-Le from his arms, they helped him up from the damp rocky surface. His breathing was shallow and wheezy as he forced himself to stay conscious as he was taken by the arms.
A few yards later saw an ambulance at the ready by a hastily made outpost. And there, he saw Gala-Na with her aids and a handful of guards by her side:
"What happened?" she curtly asked, striding up to him with her aids trying their best to follow her.
Wesson forced his arms away from the Centurions as he locked every aching muscle to a halt. He breathed in deep as Gala-Na stopped right in front of him. "We..." He swallowed to clear is throat, bringing out his dark, gritty voice to the forefront; "We deprived the enemy of their binary lives and the supplies needed for the fat Overlander's war effort."
"Has anti-shock been administered to her?" asked Jessie-Ca to Gala-Na's right.
"Yes, ma'am," Wesson replied exhausted.
"But to what effect has this brought to us. A wounded girl...possibly dead..."
"...Councilwomen?" Wesson said, cutting her off.
"What!?" Wesson could see she was trying to smile under her agitation with him. This is where he liked politicians; they never knew what was coming.
"I bring a message from a Mari-An. Do you know her, Councilwoman?" He his body began to waver over his burning limbs.
"I do," she finally smiled.
"Then you should understand this as well as I do, then." And with that, Wesson brought his left arm back just enough to give the force that he figured matched that of Mari-An's, and connected his open hand on the right side of Gala-Na's face. She screamed as he fell to the rocky ground, her aids scrambling to help her as the Centurions took their own action and brought their blaster rifles up at Wesson's chest.
"Permission to FIRE!" hollered the brown Centurion in front of Wesson. He could tell the man used to much gel in his slicked, black hair.
"NO!" cried out Gala-Na from the ground. "Stay your weapons...please."
Wesson saw her right hand was still trying to caress her face from Mari-An's message. He stood there, trying to muster the best of an attention stance that his aching body would allow. It wasn't long before Gala-Na was ushered off the ground with help from her aids. To Wesson's surprise, she still had the strength to approach him.
The two locked eyes for a moment, guessing only at what the other was thinking.
"Is the message received clearly...or do you need me to elaborate?" asked Wesson, playing his voice where he wanted it. He could see it was driving the point home.
Gala-Na finally answered after a moments pause, her expression one of loathing. "Clearly understood, Mr. Wesson."
Giving out one last smirk towards her tempered face, he figured he could have the last word in the whole matter; "That's Sergeant Wesson, ma'am." And with that, he collapsed to the ground at her feet...out cold from exhaustion.
Please tell me how you feel about all this. I really want input on this. Again...thanks for reading. See you all when I get the next chapters up.