Nine seconds.

Miles swung his stick again, the crackling flames illuminating glittering precious metals and ancient hieroglyphs.

Nine seconds before he could swing again, while keeping whatever intangible power source topped up. The less he'd used, the faster it recovered.

Seven point eight one seconds in the dark.

Any less, and he wouldn't feel that telltale feeling of fullness.

Any longer, and he'd lose his absolute fuzzknuckles down here.

It had seemed the perfect plan. Wander into the dark spooky pyramid that had been buried under magically disappearing sand. Get out of the storm, get away from the sand horrors and spitters, wander alone in the dark listening to the rustling whispers of the restless dead.

Okay, maybe not the perfect plan.

Miles swung. The corridor had expanded to an ornate chamber, ancient vases and stone slabs stretching into the dark, dim flame reflecting off a thousand surfaces.

Wow, Knuckles would love it down here. Researching ancient civilisations was one of the few things the pair did together since he'd cut off his training regimen. No point in learning martial arts when Sonic wanted other, better, people doing the fighting.

The Echnida's ability to punch hard enough to create fire wouldn't have been unappreciated either. Miles sighed as the light winked out again, the horrors of his imagination worse than any tentacled fiend that reality could conjure.

Pyramids were burial chambers, after all. And of the things that terrified Miles worst of all, Ghosts were a proud number three.

Miles inched forward, threading his way between stone slabs that housed reaching arms to drag him into nothing - at least in his mind. Creeping over tumbling coins and gilded treasure that would have wowed a few of his more materially minded frie- associates, but to him were closer to an alarm bell, signalling his presence with one false step.

A dry, rattling chuckle jolted its way up Miles' spine. He shivered, the fur on his tails fluffing out so much as to send a metal container clattering over. He bumped into something solid.

Miles swung. Flames illuminated the gloom. He'd bumped into a supply chest, the same style as the one he'd found before but golden yellow. He swung again, clicking open the lid…

And again.

Dirt.

A cube of soil the size of his head, showing no sign of crumbling. Miles lifted it in his hands, eyebrow raised.

Whatever. Science could wait. He slipped it into his hammerspace and swung again, illuminating a pile of over a dozen slender poles the length of his arm and tipped with a crusty residue. More metal bars as well? He snatched them both, thinking vaguely of his failing "ammo" as he swung again and again. Rope? Always useful. Even for him. Miles coiled it up, peeking to make sure the chest was empty before the dim sparklight died once more.

The jolting laugh echoed again through the dark. Miles swung. Too early, nothing. He swung twice more in his haste before the stick finally reset, light illuminating a humanoid shadow at the far side of the chamber, facing away from him.

"Uh… Hello?"

Sweet Yamaguchi he hated himself for calling out.

The sparks faded as the figure began to turn towards him.

"Are you the caretaker?"

He swung again. The figure had covered half the distance between them, face covered in shifting shadows by the tumbling light source that flew over its shoulder, He could hear liquid spattering across the stone floor.

Ninth shot. Miles flinched at the realisation. One left. Who -probably what- ever it was it was going to have a nice long uninterrupted chat with him in the dark.

Extending one of the poles in front of him, Miles swung his final tiny, sparks mercifully catching against the pole and causing it to blaze up into a crackling flame, igniting his surroundings in the slightly more permanent glow of torchlight.

And the figure's horrible face, inches from his own. A sideways opening mouth gaped between hollow sockets, chattering in vile laughter, viscous green spittle trickling down its chin as it leaned down towards him. Miles fell backwards with a startled yell, coins shifting beneath him. A droplet of spit landed on his fur, igniting into a blazing green flame.

"Agh!" Miles batted at it as he scrabbled back, hissing in pain, but only succeeded in spreading it to his hand.

The creature laughed again, looming down over him, its massive human size enormous compared to his own, admittedly tiny, frame. From the shadows where Miles had come, two figures shuffled silently from the shadows, necrotic black flesh peeking from between loosely wrapped bandages grey with filth and age.

Whimpering with pain, Miles twisted, keeping his tails high and clear from his burning limbs as he pounced on all fours onto the closest mummy. The green flame spread across its papyrus dry body from one hand while the flame from his torch spread down from the other. He vaulted off without stopping, his own skin blackening as he drove a burning fist into the crotch of the second mummy, sending it tumbling over, folded at the waist.

Solid. Not ghosts.

He'd have been relieved in other circumstances.

The sideways monster laughed again, leaping all the way up to the ceiling to clear the stone slabs dividing them, but Miles was on all fours, already swinging. His tails struck dry, papery flesh with the same force he would use to destroy a metal tank. Half the monster tumbled to the ground, flesh hissing and bubbling against metal until nothing remained. The rest followed suit a few moments later on the far end of the hall.

The flames on Miles' hand and leg finally dimmed, whatever accelerant had been in the monster's venom now consumed, and the flames guttered out a few moments later. Miles quickly brushed the still glowing cinders of his fur away. The motion exposed raw, seeping flesh where there had once been fur and fabric. Stomach roiling at the sight and smell, Miles clutched stone to steady himself...

A rasping moan broke through the pain. Adrenaline brought his mind back on track. Three more mummies crept into the light of his torch as the two he'd burned staggered back to their feet, still smouldering, their footsteps eerily silent as they stalked towards him once more, moaning softly.

Shaking his head with a grimace, Miles limped deeper into the pyramid.


Sonic and Tails had it easy.

Knuckles stood at the "front" of his island, staring up at the Lost Hex with his arms folded against the bitter, and growing, chill.

Ever since he'd first met them, it had been the two of them together, an unstoppable force that time and time again had served to take on anything, even him, and come out on top.

But Knuckles had something neither of them had.

That was high enough now, he could feel the soft strain of the Master Emerald from its altar as it held the floating island high above the clouds with its power.

Knuckles leapt into space, gliding on a cushion of frigid air down towards the closest archipelago.

He had lived through the war without them. He was rough, tough and independent. Unlike Tails, he'd never let Sonic's apparent death stop him from doing what needed to be done. Unlike Sonic, he'd already been forced to learn how to make do without Tails' genius before.

Well, he hadn't exactly been winning. Nobody had. Eggman's genius was overwhelming, his minions endless, his general unstoppable. The resistance had spent the entire time fighting just to stay alive, the last fraction of a fraction of all the mobian territories that remained free. It was a miracle Eggman's forces never found their last stronghold.

Knuckles slammed into stone and dirt, knuckle spikes slicing easily into the solid surface to allow him to climb up to the island's surface. Peculiar red vines and grass pulled at his gloves and boots, like tiny tentacles latching onto him as soon as he climbed close enough only to lose their tenuous grip the moment he moved.

This wasn't normal. Even so far as the Lost Hex wasn't normal, even by his standards. With his attunement to the Master Emerald and chaos as finely honed as it was, he could feel the distortion in this place, even worse than it had been in the Green Hills. It was as though the land was alive… and hungry.

For what he wasn't sure. Maybe him. Maybe everything.

A low burbling cry sounded from below. Knuckles glanced down to see a fleshy mound - no, a spider, easily three times his size, oddly mammalian bones jutting from its rubbery pink flesh. Viciously barbed limbs sliced chunks from the earth as it crawled towards him.

"No way!"

Knuckles climbed faster, tearing through vines in his haste. Crimson liquid trickled from the broken leaves, splashing his cheeks.

The spider was gaining on him, and faster than he could climb. Dig into the wall? Could it follow? Its crimson legs sliced into stone as easily as his knuckles did, after all.

Jagged mandibles snapped at his legs. The arachnid's entire body wobbled as it let out another distorted shriek.

"It's over..."

Eight milky white eyes reflected his boots, jaws opening wide enough to wrap around him head to toe.

"For you!"

Knuckles leapt backwards off the sheer surface as the spider snapped down, catching the wind to twist over on himself midair before gliding into the spider's back at full speed. The impact crushed its abdomen, and the spider's fleshy body lost cohesion, tearing apart under its own weight to tumble into the endless void below.

"Augh! That's disgusting." Knuckles flicked a chunk of the creature's vertebrae out off his spines with a scowl.

Fighting robots was way less messy.

Still, almost to the top now. He kept climbing, the now slippery surface still no match for his spurs. Luckily he made it to the top without seeing any more spiders.

Wasn't this supposed to be the Silent Forest zone? Well, plenty of trees, but… It was supposed to be green and swampy, right? Not red leafed trees with ashen bark. What liquid remained was thin and tinged a dull reddish pink, dotted with blood red thorns jutting from the banks and the writhing red "grass" that strained towards him. There was no sign of the zone's original wildlife.

Smelled like blood.

Well. Might be him though, still covered in spider gunk.

Movement caught Knuckles' eye, a crimson red shape floated from behind the vines, three orange eyes glancing too and fro as it drifted, little tentacles wiggling beneath its spiky head.

He breathed in relief. Just a wisp.

Wisps were an altogether more benevolent alien invader than the Black Doom. Sonic and Tails had managed to communicate with and befriend them on an earlier adventure, and a population had followed them home. They were powerful but passive, and usually willing to lend that power to a good cause.

They also had a language. Before his disappearance, Tails had left him with a cipher back when Sonic had been captured so that the resistance forces could negotiate with wisps for assistance, nesting in capsules ready to be used in Wispon weaponry.

Would… sorta been useful if he'd held onto that.

Whatever, wisps understood normal words even if they couldn't speak them. Maybe.

"Hey!" Knuckles waved a hand.

The wisp froze above a pool of vile liquid, wide eyed staring at him.

"Uh, yeah, I'm a friend of Sonic and Tails? You know 'em? Looking for the little orange guy. You seen him around?"

The wisp hissed, the entire top of its head flipping open to reveal far, far too many teeth, before zipping away into the undergrowth. Knuckles rubbed his head with a frown. Wisps normally didn't even have a mouth. That? That was weird.

"I love it!"

The nasally cry of joy echoed out through the trees. A voice Knuckles only vaguely knew, mostly from Sonic's second hand account of his time on the island.

"Zor." He punched the air, friction warming his arms before stomping forward, crushing thorns beneath the soles of his boots as he approached the source of the noise.

The scrawniest of the zeti, still strong - by Sonic's standards - with weird evil zeti magic stuff and a twisted, gloomy at odds with what he was saying. He could beat the Penders out of him and get some- There!

Knuckles leapt over a wall of thorns, landing into a combat stance on the other side with a thump.

"Alright, Zeti! Tell me where you- oh no!"