Good morrow everyone!
Hope the weather's nice because over here it's pouring hehe. If anything the rain is better in a sense that I can stay in, chillax, watch movies or Youtube videos or play games all day hehe. Great to have it on a weekend when I don't work but for those that do work on weekends, you make us proud and are honorable. For the others bums, keep being bums lol. Aside from that here's another chapter and hope you enjoy! ^u^
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters or locations. They belong to Sega.
Chapter 27: Land of Ancients
"It's up to me to find the missing pieces… won't be easy… guess I'd better start looking anywhere I can."
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"Where in the world am I?... something about it is familiar…"
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A bright light instantly appeared above the vast blue sky, disappearing just as fast.
A certain red echidna falling towards the earth at fast speeds while wailing a bit trying to steady himself.
'Damnit! Let's try this!'
Knuckles rolled into a ball and spindashed in the air using the momentum to slow his fall with upward current underneath him. Once he no longer flailed in the air Knuckles uncurled himself and made several frontflips, his hands and feet catching grass underneath and panting for breath.
"Man… hah… what the… hah… heck was that?" he let out still looking at the ground, raising an eyebrow upon seeing that he was no longer traveling through the unknown dimension. "Looks like I am back? But…" raising his head did Knuckles look around, gasping in surprise.
Vast green valleys stretched as far as the eye can see, lush grass flowing through the wind with patches of flowers scattered about. Several small cliffs and trees were presented in such a way that no sentient beings have ever touched them, their pristine appearance looking so pure. Seagulls flew in the air letting out happy cries as they soared upon the almost never-ending vale of life with small clouds traveling in the sky. A sunny day greeted Knuckles as his eyes continued to look around, widening further upon seeing more than just the beautiful grace of nature presented to him. Apparently he was most likely not the only sentient being present on the land.
"Just… what is that?" he whispered. His gaze fell to an incredibly large floating structure that was shaped like an emerald in the distance, its black reflective surface with purple energy lines shown. Knuckles was amazed at such a thing, never seeing anything like it.
"It looks like the Paradox Prism did send me to another dimension. I have never seen this place." Knuckles continued to look around, astounded by the incredible scenery. "I feel more at peace… more in tune with nature than I've ever been on Angel Island."
His eyes widened however.
"The crystal!" he said before looking around frantically, sighing in relief after once he located the Paradox Prism nestled a few feet away from him. Heading towards it he reached out it but then stopped a few inches.
"Eggman said that if I touch it, it'll react and most likely send me through that rift again." Knuckles muttered and reached into one of the pockets in his pants. "Luckily Egghead knew what he was doing." he finished taking out a bite-sized cubed shape device. Pointing towards the multi-colored gem the device activated and a beam resonated off that encompassed the prism in a green glow, slowly dematerializing it until it was no longer present on the ground.
Knuckles raised himself up and grinned looking at it. "Just like that it'll be safe. When I do need it all he said was to press the button on it." he stated before putting the device in his pocket. Once that was done he looked ahead towards the large emerald structure. "Alright let's get a move on. The sooner I can find the first Time Stone the better."
The red echidna readied himself and in a small burst took off towards his destination.
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"Woah, this is something."
Knuckles traveled three miles and met an interesting encounter.
This encounter happened to be in the form of several Chaos-like beings wandering around within a small town made of stone-like temples. If anything, to the red echidna they looked almost like the ruins back in his former home.
'So these are the Ancients that Eggman talked about. To think they really look like Chaos… did he originally come from these people?' he thought upon looking at them from a distance hidden behind a nice-sized boulder. Crystal blue beings walked peacefully within the town, their tall forms slender and thin with two tentacle like appendages running down behind their head with a smaller sharp one going above their head. Green glowing eyes were another prominent thing among them and just like the water mutant he encountered long ago, they shared the same claw-like fingers and toes except these looked more elegant compared to Chaos. Instead of a violent and war-like personality, they seemed as if they were down to earth and docile given how Knuckles saw two of them nuzzle each other. One was taller than the other and had broader shoulders while the smaller one did not have that feature and was more feminine looking, indicating that one was male and the other female.
"Incredible, Chaos is nothing compared to these Ancients. They are so… peaceful, I can sense that they show no harm." Knuckles whispered. "Not only that but it looks like what Egghead said is true, I can see the same stone thing inside their chests." he stated, his violet eyes gazing at the small orb inside of them.
A smile formed on his face. "So these were the true inheritors of the Chaos Emeralds. I wonder how they all became extinct? Did something like the catastrophe three thousand years ago happen to them as well?"
Knuckles was so deep in thought to not sense an incoming attack behind him.
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POW!
The red echidna countered with a punch of his own stopping the sharp strike from hitting him. Knuckles teleported several feet away and assumed a battle stance, expression angry. "Alright who do you think you-?" his voice left him upon seeing his opponent.
A large white robot with black and red details levitated in front of him that possessed blade-like arms. The head consists of stacked bar formations and a set of wings were shown on its back. The overall body had edged symmetry with its legs narrowing down to tips and a very thin waist with sharp shoulders that extended up and outward. A tiny red dot was seen under its head, observing Knuckles silently to which the latter raised his fists.
"Whatever you are, get ready for a fight." Knuckles was the first to charge teleporting in various directions while running closer to his target. Appearing behind the unknown adversary he threw a chi-imbued punch.
Very quickly however the robotic being turned and blocked it with its arms. The force caused it to float back with a shockwave emitted from Knuckles' strike, a red shield present in front of it.
The former emerald guardian lowered his hands letting out a small breath. "You're pretty quick but that was just a warmup." he said before disappearing again.
SMASH!
And delivering an overhead kick to the white mech's head. Knuckles then followed suit with a knee towards its face as the robot was slow to react. The echidna unleashed a flurry of punches and kicks throughout its body causing it to wobble and lower itself to the ground. Heavy impacts vibrated the air around them with the metallic surface of the robot beginning to dent heavily.
"Take this!" Knuckles formed a blue energy ball within his hand and thrusted it into the robot.
"CHAOS PULSE!"
BOOM!
A large explosion was released creating smoke and dust to fly into the air. The earth trembled from the attack but was not enough to cause cracks.
The robot was sent flying out of the plume and stopped barely keeping itself upright. The mechanical being's body was heavily damage and not a moment too soon did Knuckles rush out the smoke and prepared another energy attack, a grin present on his face.
Beep.
Upon doing a sound the robot got into a battle stance with its red 'eye' glowing brighter appearing to charge its own attack.
And suddenly it released said attack in a red stream of energy heading towards Knuckles.
"Crap!" the red echidna dodged to the side narrowly escaping the laser, his violet eyes momentarily looking at it.
Big mistake.
"GAH!"
Knuckles was struck by a heavy blow from the robot's bladed arms and sent back flying. Recovering quickly he backflipped several times gaining some distance and landed back on his feet. Growling he looked at his opponent with fierce eyes.
His orbs widening upon seeing that instead of one… there were multiple of them.
"Clones?... Damnit looks like I'll have to take it up a notch." Knuckles cracked his knuckles and began utilizing chaos energy, his crimson fur beginning to glow a bright red aura with lightning crackling around him. His violet eyes turned a glowing red with fierce determination.
"Let's end this quickly." and just from that he vanished once again.
POW!
An insanely fast red streak tore through all the doppelgangers as they disappeared from view. Knuckles took them out before they gave him a hard time and once he did that he quickly looked to where the original may be.
Instantly dodging a lightning-fast strike from above as the robot's arm dug into the earth creating a hard quake and sending rubble into the air.
Knuckles barrel rolled above the ground and using the momentum gained he moved himself and threw an overhead kick, successfully hitting the robot's head dead on.
Just as it finished charging its laser attack and firing.
"ACK!" Knuckles crossed his arms and felt the intense heat upon them, flying backwards away from his foe. Skidding onto the floor the red echidna slowly uncovered himself, smoke rising from his arms with a bit of fur singed. "Shake it off Knuckles, you've been through worse."
Eyeing the robot from several feet away he then smirked. "Enough playing around."
Immediately spindashing Knuckles bolted in a sonic boom and used Chaos Control.
POW!
Colliding with the torso of the robot and coming out the other side. Uncurling himself Knuckles looked back and noticed the gaping hole within its chest. With a smirk the red echidna saw the robot begin to tremble violently and as with most mechs that are heavily damaged.
BOOM!
They blow up and release a blast. Luckily this one was a bit on the small side and covered minimal area, a dust cloud rising into the sky.
Knuckles got back to his feet and walked over to the remains scattered about rotating his arm. "Good warmup. Looks like it isn't all peaceful here as I thought…" he muttered. Suddenly his eyes widened upon seeing the remains beginning to disintegrate. "Woah, that's something. Don't tell me this is the Phantom Ruby… but even then I don't sense its energy so could it be-?"
"Dace ka pula?"
His voice stopped once again upon hearing an unknown voice.
It sounded alien-like and Knuckles did not understand it at all.
Slowly turning around, he was met with a familiar water mutant. Though it wasn't Chaos.
It was a small child-like looking Ancient a bit taller than Knuckles, staring at him curiously with innocent glowing green eyes and displaying a Koko within its chest.
"Opo te inace?" it spoke once again, its voice resonating as if it talked only in the red echidna's head. Knuckles was stunned and couldn't say anything.
Eventually to simply giving a wave.
"Trepe ha manecto irale." another voice made itself known, though it sounded deeper than the child Ancient. Knuckles broke his stare and shifted his eyes to behind it.
A taller Ancient with broad sharp shoulders walked towards them and reeled back as if in surprise. It wasn't alone as another smaller one walked near it with an arm around the taller one's own.
Knuckles still didn't know what to do but did the same gesture with his hand.
"Uhh… hi?" his voice found itself once again.
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"These readings are off the charts!" Tails gasped seeing a large monitor in front of him. A graph was shown which had a huge spike in data was presented and the yellow fox was astounded. "Whatever happened there must've caused a huge energy surge."
"What's going on Tails?" the rough voice of Vector made itself known as the green crocodile entered the two-tailed kitsune's laboratory followed by Espio and Charmy.
"Did you find Knuckles?" the purple chameleon asked.
"Man Knux is sure hard to find, but we can't give up! We are the world's greatest detectives!" the small bee cheered.
Tails shook his head. "Not yet Espio and as for you Vector, I have detected a large concentration of abnormal energy that occurred in the icy region of Holoska."
"Hey I think Sonic said something about that! I think they were heading to that place to look for Eggman or something?" Vector explained.
"Correct as Sonic informed me of it when he woke up. Looks like Knuckles did go there and may have managed to make contact with Egghead, but the huge energy readings didn't give off the same type of energy found in the Chaos Emeralds or Phantom Ruby. It seems as if this energy is something completely new…"
"Well can we still find any traces of it?" Espio said. Once again Tails shook his head frowning. "Unfortunately the readings became zero after the spike. It's basically like the energy appeared for a brief moment then vanished into thin air."
"Man all this stuff sure is making my brain hurt. Why can't they make it easy and just tell us where Knuckles is!" Charmy complained.
"Shut it you brat this is serious! Even if we tried Knuckles is very good at concealing his tracks but at least we have a lead!" the green crocodile barked back.
Tails sighed. "Well I'll see if we can arrange a trip to Holoska once the others recovered. Not sure when that'll-."
"Let us go Tails." the chameleon spoke. "The others have done so much and risked themselves to find our friend. Let us go find him."
"Yeah! Knuckles is our bud and I'm up for adventure!" Charmy cheered flying around in happiness. Vector groaned shaking his head. "Well we may not be as strong as the others but that doesn't mean we're second rate. And yeah… we'll go find them, he's our friend even if he doesn't want to see it that way."
The yellow fox smiled. "Thanks you guys. Get ready then because you'll be leaving tomorrow."
"Not a problem Tails!" Vector said with a thumbs up.
Espio smiled. "I will be prepared upon the sun's first glance."
Charmy grinned widely. "Alright time for some action!"
The doors to the lab slid open.
Revealing a familiar orange echidna.
Tails saw her and raised an eyebrow. "Oh hey Tikal? Do you need anything?"
Tikal looked down nervously on her part. "U-Um… do you mind if I can come along as well?"
The yellow fox was about to say something but Vector beat it to him. "Sure you can lil lady! I bet Knuckles will be ecstatic seeing another one of his kind!"
"Vector… they already met." Espio informed. Vector simply laughed nervously rubbing his head. "Oh didn't know that haha! Well still you can come."
"Neat! More people the better!" Charmy said.
Tikal smiled and looked to Tails who gave a sigh. "Well alright Tikal you can go as well. Though I do want to ask… where did you find the gem?"
The echidna princess knew of what he spoke and answered. "An old man within a ruined building gave it to me before he passed. It was unfortunate but he said it held of very high importance."
"I see… okay then that's all I need to know. Remember everyone get yourselves ready bright and early tomorrow." Tails said.
"Copy that!" Vector and the rest of the Chaotix soon left with Tikal giving a bow and leaving afterward.
Tails turned back to his monitor and pulled up a tab.
"Sonic… I see you weren't bluffing. To think you knew of this and not tell me…"
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"The Time Stones do exist."
End of Chapter 27
You have reached the end!
Of another chapter hehe. Nope we're not even close to the actual end as there is more to come!
Looks like Knuckles did land in a new dimension and has met the Ancients. Will they help him on his quest for the Time Stones or will they not fully trust him?
And looks like the Chaotix stepped up for Sonic and the others, taking their place to find the red echidna. Will they succeed or will they fail?
Tune in next time! ouo/