4.
Glass splintered the window he slammed into. Shock doubled the rattle in his frame when someone else crashed into him.
"Get off me!" He shoved the sentry aside and leapt to his feet, which knocked over a bucket of mops and sent ammonia dribbling through gummed crevices in the tile floor. Electricity flickered in and out from a blown florescent panel in the ceiling, and a steel door before them held a sign stamped in yellow-black stripes. MAINTENANCE.
"What in… " He snapped his head up. "That thing induced Chaos Control again. Where did it go?"
"Consul, I don't detect any vital signs in this area."
"Nor I."
"Are you telling me it blew itself up? Is that what you're saying?" He tore off his helm and crushed it between his hands. "Damn it! This wasn't supposed to be some wild goose chase!"
"Please, don't be angry—"
"Oh, indeed. Tell me to heel. See how well that fares for you." Contempt glittered in his pale eyes. "Just look at the wonders it did for Teukros."
"He didn't have the—"
"I know!" He hurled his helm at the wall and hooded his face with both hands, taking a moment to collect his breath. His ribs ached, and already he felt thoroughly battered. Teukros had always protected him in situations like this, even when it became clear he no longer needed such help.
A threat nearly unraveled them today and he didn't reciprocate that trust, didn't protect him as he was supposed to. His words to Teukros instead oozed anger and fear instead of comfort…
"Consul," said the sentry. "If I may offer a suggestion?"
He said nothing.
"What about gas? Certainly they can't escape inhalants."
"Hmph." He pinched his lips together. "Right now I'd sooner trust a child with a bomb." With a terse sigh, he trudged across the room and picked up his helm, dusting off its coating of glass. "Gas is only a stopgap measure at best, much too unreliable. We need to force them on a path toward us while making them think they're doing it of their own accord. We need to cut off pipelines."
"Can we afford that kind of waste? …The Doctor will be immensely unhappy if we touch the coolants."
"Which is why we're not going to do it, are we?" A sharp slap upside the head corrected the sentry. "I'm talking about staunching the outflow. Separating the recyclers from the distribution centers so they don't— For heaven's sake, why am I even talking to you about this? Where's Teukros when you need him?"
The guard spoke up then, brave soul. "Dry them out, you mean."
"That's the general idea, very good," said the Consul. "Make them seek fresh water where we want them to." He paused from refitting his helm when a stray glimmer caught his eye.
That creature's precious Chaos Emerald was wedged inside a gap, in a sealed hatch in the floor beneath a sparking circuit breaker which led to an underground electrical closet. An electric bolt skittered across the glass.
He shouldered his way between the others. "Move aside or get fried." Grabbing a broom from a nearby supply cart, he stuck the plastic handle under the jamb, the heavy door straining under his efforts.
He ground his teeth together and pushed against the sheer resistance, now magnified by his compromised armor. Come on, you stupid thing, do your duty and move. He snatched the Emerald before the handle snapped off completely, which it did just as the cover slammed shut, revealing in its brief flash someone trapped inside.
The bat.
He narrowed his eyes. Why hadn't her vitals registered? Perhaps their monitors needed finetuning, but given that she was lying so close to exposed circuitry, there was a possibility, however slight—
He whirled around. "What are you waiting for, a song and dance? Check to see if she's still breathing!"
They froze until he made a lunge, which moved their feet. Those he managed to snatch seldom liked the experience.
It took four of them to pry open the same hatch and two more to extract her. Once she was dragged out and laid on the floor, the guard placed two fingers against her carotid and delivered a curt diagnosis. "Simple unconsciousness."
He exhaled somewhat. So there was a pulse; didn't mean they were in the clear. As much as he tried to convince himself it was the bat's fault for stepping in his way, he couldn't help but feel responsible. Despite the reckless choices of that thing she called a friend, she couldn't control where she wound up, and, if he'd suffered the misfortune of landing a few mere feet away, he could have laid there in her stead… Even Teukros, perhaps.
"Is that all? How very silly of me to worry," said the Consul, placing the Emerald over his heart with a note of sour cheer. "Gods know nothing unfortunate has ever happened to an unconscious person. But just because you survived this long with your brain pickling in a jar doesn't mean others can." The sentry snickered until he shut them up with a death glare. "I suppose we've got to get her detained before she rouses." He rubbed his shoulder where she'd kicked him, still a bit sore. Shame that power had to be put to waste defending something utterly unworthy of such protection.
(Stop it with the sentiment, you fool. Teukros is fine. Focus.)
"And the hedgehog?" the sentry asked. Behind him, the guard swept another supply cart clean to form a temporary gurney for the bat.
"What about it?"
"It could be a problem if it's wandering the premises."
"It's not going to," he replied testily, tossing the broom's severed half to the floor. "Without the Emerald, it won't have the energy. I doubt it will even be able to walk."
(Don't sound so certain.
You know that thing could draw power from you
and it will not stop
until you are all like)
"Teukros?" asked the sentry.
He stiffened. "All the Doctor wanted was for us to implant the killcode into the Gizoid. The rest was optional. Judging by how you all reacted, I'd say his reasoning was apt. This was an absolute disaster."
"His reserves may not last—"
"What a coincidence! Neither do your silences." Go ahead, laugh. He could use the distraction. "He'll be fine until nightfall, if you're so worried about it. Now does anyone else have any more brilliant gems to add, or can we move this along?" he asked impatiently, turning to the guard as he finished his work. "Provided your friends don't fail the simple task of locking up a warm body, you can take the Emerald to the dispersion chamber and make sure it's secured. Today's nonsense is not going to happen again, do you—"
The unit who had taken the Emerald pointed at him. "Consul?"
Indignation flared inside him as he cocked back one fist… Followed by something more sinister when he realized one of the pauldrons connected to the energy converter embedded between his shoulderblades had dislodged.
He jerked his arm once, twice. It moved loosely; its lower point had stabbed inwards where that Black Arms creature had blown him into the wall, puncturing the orb nestled within. As a result, the fuel's liquid leaked out at a slow bleed.
They watched in tandem as one droplet glided down his elbow, heedless, and hissed on the floor.
"Consul," the guard said again, "are you—"
"Fine." He staunched more from following by clamping a fist around his arm, and cocked his head. "Happy?"
Water dripped.
Shade's consciousness shivered alive the precise moment an icy plunge stabbed her cheek. The droplet trickled a path inside the grooves of her armor, chilling the flesh it contacted.
She looked down amidst a tinkling of cables. Her helm sat on the floor below her, surrounded by a pool of water fed by a neglected pipe leak. As she reached toward it, she realized metal restraints kept her bolted to the wall. Gripping her fists tight, she bucked her arms against them, until—
"Wake up, straggler."
The restraints unhooked from their sockets, leaving her to sprawl to her knees.
A Nocturnus stood before her, trailed by a caravan of solemn souls. Smoke and dried oil caked their armor. One of them carried an Emerald and averted his gaze as soon as he detected her stare.
Their leader was young, even younger than she to be delivering orders. To her growing curiosity, he also clutched his left arm as if it were broken. When he bent down and picked up her helm, she saw the four circles on his own, the largest in the center bisected, indicating his station; which station? It was like a strange language, uncannily similar to her own, but garbled enough that it might as well have been foreign.
He threw her helm at her. "Listen here. Whatever foolishness you may believe, your allotment doesn't renew through osmosis. Get your tail to a working station before any more idiocy breaks out today."
He then grunted slightly, gripped his arm with a little more force and lumbered to one side, as if a weight on his opposite shoulder leaned him askew and made him tilt in a drunken sort of way. Apparently he wasn't fond of the sensation, for he barked at the others to keep up or be left behind.
Shade couldn't help but bristle at the irreverence. Did they all speak like this? Or did they do it when they thought none of higher rank monitored their every word?
Whoever she'd become in this current life, she didn't know. What she did know was that Procurator Shade would not have consented to be addressed in such a manner. She of the Nocturnus, second to the Imperator himself, would have renewed his dim understanding of the pecking order, not for sake of her own pride, but so everything once more became painfully clear.
She noted something else. The leader shrugged off help and departed without the rest of his caravan. An odd substance trickled down the back of his arm onto the metal walkway, its trail sporadic and jagged like blood.
Once they disappeared, she took the time to gain more insight on her surroundings. An intricate network of pipes and fans sprouted from the ceiling, whirring together in some sort of industrial labyrinth.
With bated breath she walked toward the viewing window and beheld the ancient altar of Chaos. Though she'd never seen it before, even she knew something about it had been leeched, gone awry. Its battered pillars stood within a pool of silver liquid that encompassed the entire floor, contact with which was circumvented via catwalks and sliding platforms.
Mirror-like, the pool showed green at its rippling edges, warping the reflections of the Nocturnus who passed it by. Cables floated atop the surface as they cascaded down the altar's watery steps, their thick rubber sheaths seeming to pulse slightly to her.
The Master Emerald sat in its center, the source of the green fuel. Was it a trick of the senses, or did the Emerald's glow throb weakly, almost anemically? Something within it had faded, for its light struggled to maintain even a feeble hold on the room, as more soldiers garbed in strange armor swarmed around it like worker ants.
"It's this way."
"What is?"
"The refueling station," the soldier said, the one who'd averted himself. "This one doesn't function as well as it used to." The Emerald burned bright in his hand, a small sun of its own. Its glow pulsed softly in time with the Master Emerald's, its inner core dimming and flaring as if called to join the host's mysterious synchronicity. "Provided you haven't already exceeded your allotment, of course."
Shade deliberated her choices, scant though they were.
"Yes, er. I must be more lost than I believed." Locking her helm into place, she decided to follow along. Going undetected as an infiltrator was better than being exposed from undue pride, and truth be told she hadn't the slightest idea where to begin searching for the others. The Emerald would serve her no purpose in this quest, but judging from the ruthless way the Doctor so attempted to drain its controller, she supposed it also had to be kept from his grasp. "Would you mind leading me there?"
Time did not favor her now. Her warp belt had to hold out until she finished her business here. Maybe this refueling station would aid her in that regard. She had to grasp that hope, cling tight.
The soldier gave a solemn nod. When he turned and began down the corridor, she noticed a physical oddity of which she neglected comment: a curved tail.
They began up an ascending walkway that thick glass bordered on the right when her escort stopped. He stared at the Master Emerald for what seemed a bit too long, deliberating something. Whatever occurred to him must not have been a terribly pressing matter, however, for he went on carrying the smaller Emerald without another word.
As they traversed this strange habitat the Doctor had built, she reflected upon the name the leader had sneered at her. Straggler. An insult reserved for incompetent fools, called out in passing and probably wouldn't be given another thought. It was most likely already forgotten.
All anyone had in this world was their name. By rescinding hers, she'd abandoned her place at Ix's side. Try as she might to deny it, some piece of her had been lost back at Nocturne. She could not respond to it, would not respond, had shed it and cast it aside and was now insubstantial in its absence. Given the current state of the world, it probably didn't matter.
Did it?
Shade discarded that thought as they crossed the long shadows cast by the pillars above them. Several doors admitted them through a tangle of labs.
In one particularly cold room, frost crunched their steps. Here stasis tubes contained robots shaped like hedgehogs in various stages of evolution, each incarnation more virulent than the last, growing away from its organic base toward more snarling, belligerent designs. Looking at them, she couldn't help but think the Doctor's hatred of Sonic had grown into something more sinister than a mere rivalry as he once claimed.
Motion stirred underneath the floor's frosty tiles. Though blurred, she caught someone pushing a gurney atop which lay a white shape… Rouge? On another, a red splash, Knuckles. They disappeared around a corner, behind a heavily fortified door where two guards stood posted.
Shade waited until the soldier ahead of her busied himself entering a door code to strike. He reacted more quickly than she anticipated, however, and tried to roll her off his back.
Bucking him, she clamped her legs around his waist and drove her weight down on him, which shoved him against the glass and knocked the Emerald from his hand.
She nailed her elbow into the vulnerable plane between his shoulderblades, took his own leech blade as it arced out and held it tight against his throat.
"Don't—"
"Then don't give me a reason to," Shade said. "Who do you work for? Are you a defector?" And when he didn't answer: "Where are they taking them?"
She didn't know what kind of response she expected. Instinctive hostility, maybe. The ferocious calm he exhibited under the light's humming edge as it approached him reminded her of Sonic, who could have been anywhere now in this factory. Anywhere in this forsaken city. She pressed harder.
The soldier squirmed a little from the extra application, but otherwise remained impassive. "Unfortunately," he managed, "I wouldn't know any of that."
"Why not?"
"Because I can only tell you one thing," he said. "My name."
She hesitated. An error under other circumstances her lord would have berated her for.
But…
She was nameless, wasn't she? Compared to him, without power or leverage to gain an advantage in this situation. The maxims and the customs, the war protocols, they no longer applied here in the Doctor's world, under the protection of false Nocturnus. She may have had no name among her own people, but neither did they.
Shade relented her hold just enough to allow the unknown soldier purchase, figuring she could stamp him down if he threatened combat. She wasn't prepared for what actually happened: he instead lifted his helm to reveal a chameleon's somber face. In his reflection drawn over cracked glass, his eyes glowed the same sun yellow as the Emerald on the floor.
"My name," he said, "is Espio."