Finally, I can update! I'm sorry for the long wait, I had a lot to do with university. Anyway, please enjoy!

WARNING!

You know, what this means. If you didn't read the marked part in The Island, then please don't do it here.

END OF WARNING!


8: How to become evil – the story of Jester Perringten

"LEAVE ME ALONE ALREADY!," Amy screamed at the startled male, who had approached her and was now quickly retreating. He was the maybe 30th hedgehog already in the last minute, who had approached her. These vultures.

No, not vultures. Vultures wanted to get their own gain and pleasure out of someone else's misery. These people here were angels. They wanted to help her. But she didn't WANT help! She wanted to hate the world for ultimately stealing Sonic from her!

She had so hoped, that her dream would come true. She had thought of course, that Sonic being an uke would be the end of her marriage-plans already. But then, he had started to avoid Shadow's touch and she had seen this as a hint of faith – until she had to realize, that Sonic had avoided her, and everyone else, too.

Looking up the matter in a library, she had found a book, that had said, that ukes would act like that, when they were about to change their taste in partners from male to female.

Not knowing, that this had been pure nonsense, she had started to flirt with Sonic at as many occasions as possible and had been hanging around him more to try and get this avoiding to stop, to get him to see her as the potential mate she wanted to be for him. Instead, he had run from her more often than when he hadn't been aware of him being an uke.

Finally figuring, that Sonic needed help to see her as his true mate, she had made her way over to the Uke Shelter to try and find someone to explain this switching of preferences to her.

And there, she had even met Sonic! She had seen it as a good sign, thought, that he wanted to help himself. That he had wanted to help the two of them to have finally a relationship – and Rio's explanation about ukes dating females had only given her more hope and determination. That Kylie had crushed mercilessly.

If what she said was true – and Kylie had been always honest so far – then she would never marry Sonic.

All of her dreams, that she had had for years, after being saved by Sonic for the first time and after watching this movie with human actors, who had married with a romantic wedding, had just crumbled to dust.

No white dress, no white roses, no white doves, no blue furred groom in a suit, standing there in front of the altar, waiting for her to step up to him at sunset, clothed in a white, beautiful dress. No Happy End.

It wasn't fair. Why did this have to happen to her? Did she do something wrong to deserve such a fate?

"If it isn't Pinky.," a dark voice said and Amy sighed. Number 31 just had to be someone she knew personally, hadn't she?

She raised her head. "Scythe, I don't-" She interrupted herself, when she looked up and saw more than just the green furred hedgette in front of her. She paled and tried to scramble back, but her way was blocked by hard wood – she had forgotten, that she had sat down under a tree somewhere, when her lungs had protested against the combination of running and sobbing.

"Is something the matter?," the older hedgette asked. "B-b-b-," she stuttered, her tongue failing her.

"What? Pinky, what's wrong with you?" Scythe raised a brow, not at all concerned by her growing fear. She couldn't imagine, just what the heck was so scary, she couldn't feel any threat.

"B-BEHIND YOU!," Amy screamed, screwing her eyes shut and pointing towards something behind the other girl.

"Hm?" Confused, Scythe turned halfway around – to see her reflection in the pupil of a yellow eye, that looked big enough to be a mirror.

It belonged to a giant wolf with gray fur. It was big enough for Scythe to fit effortlessly under it. Its paws were so large, that one could crush a dozen hedgehogs under it in one go.

Scythe quickly recovered from her small surprise and crossed her arms. If it weren't for Amy's fear, the pinkette would have noticed, that no one else was scared by the beast, neither the ukes, nor the children passing by.

"Okay, Curi, that's enough. Back to your normal size.," Scythe ordered. The wolf obeyed, shrinking in mere seconds to the size Amy had seen the wolf in first, in Kylie's office, as if letting air out of a balloon, his skin, fur, fangs and claws changing their size and volume, too.

"B-but...how?," she asked, perplexed. "Curi is kind of a shapeshifter, but instead of changing his form, he can only change his size."

"But why did he scare me like that?," Amy asked, still pressing herself against the tree bark, not trusting him not to attack her again.

"He didn't intend to. He often runs around here, when I don't take him with me and when he spots a crying uke or child, he feels the intensity of their grief and changes his size accordingly."

Earning even more confusion from the younger, Scythe added, "Curi learned quickly, that many ukes and children feel better by cuddling him, so he provides enough space for cuddling, according to the amount of sadness."

"Oh." Reluctantly, Amy relaxed. Curi yawned, before shrinking further, until he looked like the miniature figurine of a wolf. Barking – which Amy barely heard – he stood on his hind legs in front of her, begging.

"Er..." Slowly, Amy knelt down in front of him and placed her hand with its back on the ground next to the tiny wolf, allowing the animal to jump on it, nuzzling her thumb like a cat. It was such a sweet gesture, that Amy cooed.

"Now, care to explain, why Curi felt the need to get THIS big?," Scythe asked, sitting opposite of her and starting to polish the blade of her scythe with some random rag. The tip pointed thankfully around and behind her.

Amy bit her lip, but the small weight on her hand, that she held against her chest, was strangely calming and she finally took a deep breath, sharing her misery.

Her words jumbled over each other and she started to cry somewhere in the middle, but Scythe listened quietly and never interrupted her even once.

She had stopped polishing by the time Amy had finished and was pressing Curi to her cheek, who got wet and wetter by her still flowing tears.

Scythe grimaced at his unamused look he shot her. He hated bathing. A thick, pearly tear splashed on his head, while she watched, drenching him. Oh, she was so buying him a steak for dinner for this...

"Okay, let me get this straight – you believed, that you could date this blue hero Sonic?," she finally asked, trying to process the whiny speech from before.

"Uhuh.," Amy sobbed and more tears flowed down her cheeks. Curi rather changed to the size of a medium plushie, so he wouldn't be drenched to the bone completely. Amy didn't even notice, that she was now holding a bigger creature. If anything, she clung tighter to him.

"Er...wasn't it kinda clear, that you can't, when this fat guy with the egg fetish revealed him to be an uke?," Scythe asked confused. "Y-yeah, but I read in a book, that ukes can change their preferences!," Amy wailed.

Scythe blinked, frowning for a minute in thought. "I'm for sure not reading very often, but that sounds like total nonsense.," she finally stated.

Amy only nodded and hugged the poor Curi tightly. Yeah, by now, she had figured that, too.

Scythe winced for her pet, that was still drenched in tears. He had so earned a second steak already, maximum size...

"Why do you even want to be with him? I mean, if you're so interested in a relationship, won't another male do?," the greenette asked slowly. "Marrying Sonic is everyone's dream!," Amy was convinced.

Scythe blinked. Oh. She was REALLY convinced, as if it was a law, or something like that. Even now, when apparently every door to him was closed and sealed, she kept her vision alive. If that went on, she would stay single forever, refusing every partner just because they weren't her – unreachable – type. And honestly, she didn't deserve this.

"Pinky, listen up: not EVERYONE dreams of marrying a hero – and not only, because marriage isn't exactly the mobians' way. Some people – also females – like it to be independent."

Amy blinked at her, confused. "That means, that we don't sit around and wait for a hero to come and save our asses, we rescue ourselves out of the misery.," Scythe explained exasperated, since the girl was truly not understanding her. Chaos, she was so naive!

"But-!," Amy immediately wanted to contradict, but Scythe was fed up by now and cut her off. "Do you want to be a damsel in distress for forever? A weak little girl, later a woman, who needs everyone's help?," she asked bluntly.

Amy bit her lip. Well, if she formulated it like that... "But...how can I change that?," she asked weakly.

"Come." At once, Scythe stood up, shouldering her weapon. "I'll show you, how to be tough. They will speak out the name Pinky with fear!"

"Er...m-my name's Amy, Amy Rose – and I don't think, that I want to be feared.," Amy slowly said, feeling a little scared by now, looking up at her.

Scythe rolled her eyes. "I exaggerated, Pinky, calm down. I'll show you how to be tough on the outside, to get a hard-, well, harder shell than your present one, but also, how to stay soft on the inside."

"Skitie! Skitie!," a loud voice suddenly shouted and the two girls turned around to see a small dog mobian boy running towards them. He couldn't be older than two years, his golden fur crusted with dried mud in patches.

Stumbling a little, he stopped in front of the hedgette, who went on one knee to not tower over him, her scythe placed on the ground with the blade pointing away, so that it wouldn't harm the boy under any circumstances.

"Look, I made skitie!," he exclaimed happily, showing her a stick, on that had been pierced a clumsily cut leaf, that now hung in the top part. It looked – with a lot of fantasy – indeed like a scythe.

"Wow." Scythe took the small crafted thing carefully, looking at it with professionalism. "Looks almost like mine, great job.," she praised and gently petted his head, giving the stick back.

The boy beamed. "I'll be skitie, too!," he explained, waving his 'weapon' so wildly, that it was a miracle, that the leaf didn't fall off. "Great, I'll wait for you, then. When you're old enough, we'll battle, okay?," Scythe promised. The boy squealed, hugged her and ran off with an excited "BYE!".

Amy stared at Scythe, who watched the retreating boy with fond amusement. "I thought, that you weren't so good in comforting and being nice!," she wondered, remembering her talk with Silver.

"I'm not good in comforting my friends, meaning people around my age. It gets harder and harder for me to be all nice the older my acquaintances get. I trust the older ones to just be mature and not to dissolve because of some tiny little incident, or because I'm a little rougher towards them – and when they have an actual reason to be sad or down, I honestly have nothing better to offer than 'it'll get better'. Children, however, deserve kindness and I give it to them."

Noticing Amy's confused glare, she shrugged. "I'm a very complicated person. Come on, let's do something against the broken heart." Still a little unsure, Amy followed the older deeper in the outer territory of the ukes.


"You know, why Perringten built the Island, correct?," Shadow asked immediately after Kylie's declaration.

The woman wasn't even surprised for a second. "Mephiles told you, didn't he?," she asked right back, apparently already knowing the answer. Shadow nodded.

"Before we come to that, I would rather hear about Hope first. You said, that you don't want to talk about it, as long, as Tails and Amy are there.," Sonic piped up, looking at Kylie with one eye, the other half of his face still buried in Shadow's fur.

Kylie chuckled. "You're showing the typical behavior of an Alpha. They always care about the young the most.," she grinned.

Sonic just shrugged. It was just, that it was strange and he wanted answers. Hope's age wasn't the reason for his curiosity...was it?

Kylie became serious again. "Tell me, Sonic, did you have the feeling to recognize little Hope?," she asked.

Sonic blinked. How did she...? "Yes, I just can't figure out from where.," he admitted. "I thought so. No wonder, that you don't recognize her. She had been the baby John rescued from the Island, the one, that you and I took care of."

This statement actually had Sonic turn around to her, sitting on Shadow's lap, as if he was a chair. His brain was working in overdrive. Yes, the girl's fur color fitted the one of the baby he remembered, but... "But this girl is at least six years old! The baby would be two years old now – if even!," he argued.

"I reassure you, that Hope is two years old, she just doesn't look, or act her age." "But... how?," Sonic asked.

"Hope is a rare case, she inherited the abilities of both her parents equally. Only about 5% of all children born in a decade do that, all others have either none, only one, or one with the second in a rudimentary state, the true potential forever dormant in them.

Hope's mother had had an unique, very rare form of Chaos Energy, that is far more potential and stronger than even an Alpha's, yet, he wasn't one. This special Chaos Energy is created out of the normal one and allows a faster development of the body and mind. Her father, instead, is an energy sponge, he can absorb limitless amounts of Chaos Energy."

Shadow frowned at that. "The rings she is wearing – they are like mine, correct?," he asked.

"I...guess so. I honestly have no idea, technology isn't my forte. Ask John, he helped constructing them.," Kylie explained.

"You talked about the father, as if he was still alive – shouldn't he have her, then?," Rouge wondered.

Kylie sighed and shook her head. "Hope was conceived by rape and under the influence of drugs, the father doesn't remember the whole act. Also, semes and ukes were almost all strictly separated, the father had had never the chance to bond with the child."

"Bond?," Sonic asked. Kylie smiled. "Yes, it's actually the greatest thing about pregnancy. Parents create a bond with the children, while they are still growing inside the mother, and also shortly after birth. Caressing the belly, pressing against a kick or hit, talking with the little one... All these are ways to form a bond between parents and children.

The most important time to bond, however, is during the first two weeks after birth, at least for mobians. The parents will lock the scents of their newly born young in their systems, which allows them to recognize them everywhere as theirs. Even when their instincts take over, they will immediately recognize their young and never hurt them. The same goes for the pups, they will only during those two weeks have a chance to bond with their parents. If the family misses this time window, then a bond isn't easily formed, if at all. Nowadays, without colonies to take care of the children at all, missing out these weeks is fatal, especially for the pups.

Hope and her father never had this opportunity, so it would have been dangerous for her to stay with him. He had never the chance to develop father feelings and it was very likely, that he never would. In the worst case, Hope could have suffered from child abuse, because her father would have been completely at a loss of how to handle her. This was only the second reason, though, why I adopted her. The main reason was the reaction her abilities caused.

After I left the jail and...had a few rough patches of my own..." She rather formulated her divorce like that, not keen on having to explain it twice in one day, "...I wondered about the little baby I took care of on the Island, I wanted to know, how she was. It took me a good month, but I found her eventually in an orphanage. There, she had been isolated already in fear, that she could harm someone else, which just broke my heart.

A few days before, she had accidentally absorbed the energy of three other children playing with her and that had caused them to faint, while Hope had grown a few centimeters and had become more intelligent. The people responsible for the orphanage couldn't explain this at all and in the fear, that it could happen again, they had locked her alone in a small room, getting only in contact with her, when she was fed. One of the people there even suggested to get her to a scientist, to get examined.," she growled.

"Wow, I'm surprised you didn't kill him.," Rouge commented. "Believe me, I was tempted. They almost kissed my feet, when I told them, that I would take her.," Kylie huffed, frowning angrily.

"Weren't you worried about your own children? That they could faint, too?," Sonic wondered. It wasn't like her to risk her children's well-being...

"Of course I was, especially, when I felt faint myself after meeting her for the first time, but by the time all the formal stuff was through and I had built a fragile bond of trust with a two years old looking Hope, I had met John again and he had promised to think about a solution. At first, I let only Alex interact with her, figuring, that he could take her energy absorption easier, should it happen, and as soon, as I was sure, that she wouldn't absorb the energy of us anymore, she also met Vanessa."

"I get, that your son likes her, but don't you think, that he went a little overboard with protecting her?," Shadow growled, still a little miffed of how the young man had threatened and caught him off guard so easily.

Kylie smiled sadly. "Alex didn't protect her, he tried to protect you. I admit, though, that he had a very harsh way to do that and I apologize in his stead." "Protect me? From what?," Shadow asked, completely confused at hearing that.

As if on cue, Mist appeared again, sitting on the edge of Kylie's desk, several staples just resting in his body. He didn't look at anyone, just at his knees, his remaining ear pressed to his skull.

"He protected you from him, from Mist.," Kylie explained, gesturing to him. "If he hadn't protected you, then he would have probably killed you." Shadow looked at the ghost and then at the woman.

"A ghost. And kill me? How? And more importantly – why?" "Mother instinct. You made his daughter cry."

"Mother...? Mist is?," Sonic asked, flabbergasted, staring between Kylie and the ghost, who seemed even sadder than before. He remembered Mist's expression while talking with Hope and she had apparently no idea, who he was. He was a friend to her, nothing more. On the other hand, she was probably not ready to hear the truth, yet.

"Yes. Mist gave birth to Hope shortly before he died. He was the one pointing out her presence to John and Mephiles – although Mephiles understood that easier, than John.," Kylie added, remembering the stories of the two, especially, how Mist had screamed at Mephiles, which only he had been able to hear, when he had talked about destroying the whole floor – which would have, by consequence, killed little Hope, too.

When Mephiles had dug a hole in the funnel leading to the machine all pups had gotten thrown into, he had found the already decaying Mist.

The male had become too weak for Jester's and Stance's standards and been disposed together with his young. His body had been holding him in the funnel by using his untrimmed claws and sharp back quills, hanging between two segments, his three pups on his lap. They had stayed there, Mist too weak to move and free them for days, until he had eventually starved to death.

His limp body had continued to stay there, but thanks to the decaying, he had been about to slip further down, probably completely.

It had been pure luck, that no more people had gotten thrown down on him, the additional weight would have been their doom.

Only one of the little ones on his lap had had still a heartbeat, when the dark seme had found them.

Even though she had been barely alive back then, just an inch away from death, from joining her mother and siblings, Mist had always shadowed her, had always hoped for her to survive.

That was the reason for her name, Hope. Of course, Kylie had asked him for his opinion, when it had come to naming her. Since she had been so young, it had been easy to change her previous name, that the people in the hospital, where she had spent a whole month, had given her, without confusing her too much.

"I would still like to know, how this Mist would try to kill me.," Shadow reminded. At once, Mist whipped around to him, staring at him with so much venom, as if he wanted to kill him with that.

A dark, silvery energy started to surround him, actually causing the files around him to flutter lightly, as if touched by a gust of wind. There even appeared the slightest of cuts on the carton tops of the files and on the desk, too.

"Mist has, as I already said, an unusual Chaos Energy and it works even after death. From what I know from Mephiles, that's not usual. If anything, it's unique. He can form his Chaos Energy to objects, for example weapons, that pass the borders between life and death. I'm pretty sure, that he could decapitate you, if he wanted it. It was pretty hard to calm him down, but he understood finally, that you didn't mean to make Hope cry.," Kylie explained, adding the last part by stressing every word and with a glare towards Mist, who just looked away, crossed his arms and disappeared once more, his energy disappearing together with him, the files stopping the fluttering.

Shadow had crossed his arms, too, effectively pressing Sonic behind them closer to himself. "It's true, huh? You thought, that I had something in mind for Hope other than just raising her."

"You said yourself, that she is a rare case.," Shadow reminded. "True, but I didn't adopt her, because I wanted to gain something out of her. As a fact, all people in the orphanage were confused, or even scared by her abilities and they didn't try to get close to her, they isolated her systematically. I just felt so sorry for her, she didn't ask for all of that, after all. To make it worse, John calculated, that without those rings, she would age far faster than she did until then. In less than 5 years, she could already be 80."

"And if she loses those rings?," Sonic asked. "She can't. Those things have almost the same tiny robots Perringten once used in them, just more harmless, and they keep the rings always to Hope's body, as if she had swallowed a magnet."

"And they are working?," Sonic continued to ask, not sure, if John had been able to access the girl's true capabilities. From what he remembered of his boyfriend's tales, Shadow's creator had needed a good while to invent and perfect those rings he wore.

"Perfectly. In fact, lately, Hope's energy levels are evened out even better for some reason. It might be, that her body has matured already enough to handle the energy absorption mostly, but I'll be careful still. Maybe one day, she won't need those rings anymore. Until she is old enough, she'll keep them on." Sonic nodded in thought.

"Any more questions concerning my daughter?," Kylie asked. "How do you plan on raising her?," Knuckles asked back. "You are a human and she's a mobian, after all. There will be things you can't explain to her."

Kylie sighed and looked to the echidna with a lazy smirk. "Knuckles, I can barely talk normally with Hope without at least one uke trying to lecture me about not calling her a mobian, since I am a human and that would 'totally confuse her', to not give her this or that to eat and so on. The second she'll ask me something I can't answer, someone will immediately be there to explain everything she wants to know about. For now, I'm absolutely capable of raising her without any help."

Her glare was daring the echidna to contradict her – and he wisely just nodded in acceptance.

"You wanted to talk about the Island.," Shadow reminded her, his arms around Sonic's waist and his chin on his shoulder, while the hero was comfortably leaning against him, his quills pressed down to not harm him.

"True. You could probably already imagine, that something as complex as the Island wasn't just built on a whim. To explain Perringten's motives, though, I first need to go back in time, to a certain day about 2000 years in the past.

Back then, when industry had been just beginning*, there lived Alister Perringten, an ancestor of Jester Perringten. Alister had been rich, too, and his favorite thing to do after work was talking with his best friend over pretty much every topic there was. One evening, however, the two were having a huge argument. It became so bad, that they separated and never became friends again. Alister was from this day on determined to show his new enemy, that he was right and the other not."

"What does this have to do with the Island?," Sonic asked confused. "Alister Perringten and his friend weren't having an argument over something trivial. They were talking about how they could conquer the world."

Noticing the dropped jaws, Kylie added, "It had been a simple, meaningless conversation at first, just a mental experiment, no plan, or anything – but their ideas clashed so badly, that they couldn't find an even ground and they refused to compromise. In the end, they wanted to prove to the other, that they were right, it became a bet – and they both wanted to win it. Alister was convinced, that he would win this bet with his former friend, because he had found something interesting, only a few weeks prior."

Kylie paused, grabbed a key hidden under a file and audibly unlocked and opened her top drawer. She pulled out a handful of photos and gave them to Sonic, who was the closest. He took them and looked at pictures of what seemed to be stone reliefs. He frowned at the photos, while going through them. Somehow, he had the feeling, that he had seen this style before somewhere...

"That's echidna-art!," Knuckles exclaimed loudly and far closer to him, than in the last few weeks, which let him jerk and almost caused him to let the pictures fall.

Shadow tightened his grip in reassurance, nuzzling his neck. He could imagine, that Sonic needed a day or two to get used to the closeness again. He felt tempted to teach the echidna a lesson for scaring his love, but after Sonic's latest display of anger, he rather let it be...for now.

The echidna took the pictures from Sonic and looked them through rapidly, before piercing Kylie with a glare. "How did this human come to art, that is only to be found on Angel Island!?," he hissed, as if he blamed her.

"Not only there, you obviously forgot, that Angel Island had once been connected with the ground we all walk on. When it had lifted off, a lot of the echidnas' temples and shrines had been left behind. While most of them got simply destroyed over time, Alister Perringten had the luck to find these reliefs in a hidden temple. He let his men bring all of the reliefs and treasures he found there to his home and his family kept them hidden, until John found them after he left the jail."

"I want them.," Knuckles growled. "Of course, anytime, they belong to your people after all. We keep them here, so whenever you can bring Angel Island closer, or ask Mighty for help, you can simply tell Mali to show you the storage room, where they are. You have my permission already."

"And why didn't you just inform me right away?," Knuckles asked irritated. "I didn't know, that they had been made by echidnas, art in general isn't something I had had ever an interest in. Besides, Alister – and his descendants – weren't really interested in where it came from and didn't document it. I only found out, because Mighty found one of the pictures last week by accident and asked me about it. He recognized the style from previous visits on Angel Island and wanted to bring the objects all over to you as soon as he has the time.," Kylie explained.

Knuckles huffed. "Fine. So, what's so special about those reliefs?," he asked, giving the pictures back.

"These pictures," Kylie lined the photos up on her desk, leaning them against several file staples, so the mobians could see all of them effortlessly, "depict the creation of the seven Chaos Emeralds."

Keeping this new bit of information in mind, Sonic looked at the pictures once more. The reliefs were withered, so it was hard to make out real patterns – the distance did actually help, as he noticed quickly.

On one of the pictures, that showed the whole relief, he could see a circle of seven small circles, that almost looked like balls, or bubbles, with a bigger circle of seven mobians – the tails, that they obviously had, revealed, that they weren't humans – forming around them.

Right next to the picture was another one, that looked almost like the first, but in the bubbles were now very familiar shapes – the Chaos Emeralds. Those two reliefs looked together like the shortest comic ever.

"Are this...hedgehogs?," Knuckles asked slowly, incredulously. Sonic blinked and looked at the pictures again. Really, those seven mobians looked, as if they had head quills... "Indeed they are. These seven legendary hedgehogs created once the Chaos Emeralds out of their own souls.," Kylie explained.

Sonic looked up. "Their souls? How?" "I have honestly no idea, nobody could find out, how they did that, yet, or how they even survived that. It is so far only rather safe to say, that they did indeed use their souls, there are several independent documentations from witnesses, that Alister had collected over years, and also legends about that, all of those always putting hedgehogs in the heroes' place."

"You think, that they survived without their souls?," Shadow asked. He didn't necessarily believe, that there was something like 'souls', but he could imagine nonetheless, that losing your soul wasn't exactly healthy.

"Look at this relief here." Kylie pointed at another picture. Knuckles' jaw dropped open, when he realized, what he saw there.

There were seven hedgehogs, the exact same ones as on the other two reliefs, Sonic realized, and numerous echidnas facing them. One of the hedgehogs seemed to balance the seven Chaos Emeralds, stapled on the bottom one on his right hand, apparently giving them to the echidnas, who already had their arms outstretched to receive them. And above them was a bigger stone – the Master Emerald.

"This can't be true! Why should the hedgehogs give the stones to the echidnas!?," the guardian raged.

So far, he – and pretty much everyone else – had assumed, that the Chaos Emeralds and the Master had been created by his people somehow, since they had protected them for so long. Why should they protect the treasure of someone else?

"Under this picture had been found a sentence in an old writing. It means, 'To repay our debt'. Since the echidnas made these reliefs, they apparently were the ones, who needed to make something up to the hedgehogs. And to do that, they were given the Emeralds. It was actually a great idea, to be honest. Echidnas are perfect guardians, they guarded their territories like no one in comparison. Most other species, also hedgehogs, didn't care that much about their territory, only about their colonies' members. They would have left the Chaos Emeralds behind without thinking about it.," Kylie replied.

She left out the part of numerous scientists suggesting, that the echidnas had almost died out because of this trait – fighting wasn't always an option, but fleeing wasn't one for echidnas at all. Fight or die, that was their way.

Sonic turned around to Knuckles to see his eyelid twitch...or rather spasm. He bit his tongue, so he wouldn't laugh at him. He still remembered, how the echidna had at first refused to leave Angel Island for even a second, after they had met and had wanted to do something with him, and how much of a fit he had had, when Sonic had for the time used – and more importantly, lost – the Chaos Emeralds. The pure idea of letting something as powerful simply fall in someone's hands, without putting up much of a fight, was giving him almost a heart attack.

Knuckles was quick to shove away the images Kylie's words had caused and to focus back on the present. "What did my people do?," he asked slowly.

"I have absolutely no idea. Neither the echidnas, nor the hedgehogs ever documented it, not even giving hints. I'm trying to research it, but it's a slow process. Whatever had happened, it had been about 3000 years ago, so reliable sources are rare."

Knuckles narrowed his eyes. When he thought back to his childhood, to the very few memories he had about his father, he saw a – back then – huge, faceless echidna with gray stripes in his fur, standing next to him, in the light of the Master Emerald and he heard his dark, raspy voice, saying, "It is our kind's duty to protect the Emeralds, we can't ever let anything distract us.".

He also remembered, how he himself had asked carefully, "Why do we have to protect those stones?". The answer, "It's our duty, that's why.," had made perfectly sense to his three year old self.

By now, he had asked himself a million times already – before and after meeting Sonic and Tails – why he of all people had to do this.

After his father had disappeared and most likely died – he had never found his body, but with living on a flying island, there wasn't much fantasy necessary to imagine, why – he had seen guarding the stones as his sacred duty, inherited from his father, which had made him often proud.

But during storms, freezing cold winters or searing hot summers (he hadn't known for a long time, how he could move the island at will, so he had been a helpless play ball to the wind and weather) he would have loved to just jump off the stupid landmass and look for another home. But he had stayed.

Even though he now had enough friends to have the feeling, that he wouldn't be homeless for even a second, if he left Angel Island, he was still bound to this place. It seemed to be true, echidnas were perfect guardians, they would never leave, what they protected. "If you find some clues about this incident, tell me.," he eventually said, silently. "I will.," Kylie nodded.

"What did this Alister think he had found with that? These antique pictures meant nothing, they could have depict a fairy tale, if even!," Shadow argued, unintentionally giving Knuckles' brain a distraction.

"Alister was convinced, that it had to be important – the temple had been hidden, as I already said, and been protected by deathtraps, in that died several of his men. Neither he, nor I, were believing, that they did that for something of no importance. This temple was keeping a secret – and Alister managed to unveil at least a part of it. He managed to find a special, unique symbol in each of the depicted hedgehogs, that indicated their gender."

Sonic looked at the pictures again and found one dark spot in each painted hedgehog, that he had confused with shadows due to the light in the room the reliefs had been photographed in, or maybe even badly made belly buttons.

But upon closer inspection, they looked like small smudges, as if from mud being thrown at the relief, or something like that. However, they seemed to have a certain, repeating pattern, that looked like a rolled up snake, or maybe rather a tadpole, with the thick head going over in the short, bent in half tail. Also, all of those symbols were in their stomachs, never in another place.

"Mobians rarely used symbols to indicate the gender, since the people finding the pictures eras later would still know, who was portrayed, male, or female. I guess, it became only necessary, when the females looked barely different to the other sex.," Kylie rolled her eyes inwardly, while she said that, knowing full well, that this hadn't been a problem for humans at all, only because the females had been seen as housewives and mothers and nothing more and therefore didn't need to be portrayed.

"The symbols Alister found were compatible with other symbols he had previously found in other reliefs from the echidnas, but at first, he didn't understand, what he saw there. The hedgehogs were without a doubt male, yet, the symbols indicated, that they were carrying, like females.," she added.

"They were ukes.," Sonic understood. "Exactly. There didn't exist a term just then, but Alister, who had come to the same conclusion eventually, started immediately his research and found those terms, that he used from this day on."

"So seven ukes created the Chaos Emeralds. Why would this Alister still be interested in hedgehogs then? They had done the deed, so they weren't of any use anymore, or am I mistaken?," Rouge asked.

"You are mistaken, but I had thought that at first, too. It's hard to notice, looking at those pictures alone, but those seven Emeralds are depicted in a different size during their creation, than the ones in the relief, that shows, how the hedgehogs give them to the echidnas. There, they are smaller.," Kylie explained, pointing to the two pictures she meant.

All four mobians had the words 'over-sized Chaos Emeralds' suddenly in their minds upon hearing that.

"How?," Knuckles asked the question, that went around his head since Shy's strange explanation. "I have absolutely no idea, but it is only logical to assume, that the hedgehogs, who created them, have something to do with that. That means, that they most likely separated a part of the original Chaos Emeralds somehow, and, according to Alister Perringten, absorbed those again. It's a logical thought process, if you ask me, since there are only 7 and not 14 Chaos Emeralds, or seven as powerful objects somewhere – and believe me, Alister checked this thoroughly.

It's impossible to say, when or why the hedgehogs separated the Chaos Emeralds into two, or why they left out the Master Emerald, but it is quite safe to say, that no one else could have done this, just them as the creators. And as they were ukes, it was quite logical, that they gave these special energies they reabsorbed to their young, just like their abilities – together with the fur color, that apparently always depicted the matching Chaos Emerald."

"Because they were ukes?," Sonic repeated, confused. He believed that with the fur – his had always looked like the darker blue Chaos Emerald when it glowed, but he had never assumed, that it had a meaning.

"Sonic, ukes and females carry their young for months inside them. It's impossible for the babies to NOT inherit a lot from the mother, that goes beyond the DNA alone.," Kylie explained.

Sonic blinked. "...Oh...," he muttered, although he was not really getting, what she meant. In fact, he had not the slightest clue, what she meant.

"Let me get this straight then: this Alister thought, that out there were seven hedgehogs with half an Emerald in them each? Did he want to bring them together with the Chaos Emeralds and rule the world?," the blue hero rather asked. Alister and Eggman would have been great friends, they had apparently the same screws loose.

"Exactly, yes. Many humans back then had been arrogant enough to think, that mobians were only slightly more intelligent animals, and just needed the right 'training' to obey the humans. Don't forget, that mobians have only since about 1000 years the status of equals to humans. Before, you had been seen as animals mostly.

Anyway, Alister was obsessed with finding out about those seven hedgehogs' whereabouts until the day he died. In his last will, he gave the task to his only son, promising him the other half of his wealth, that apparently a never named trusted person kept hidden and would give to him, should he succeed in finding and controlling them. Since greed had always been a weakness of the Perringtens, his son did, what his father had asked of him and gave the task to his own son, when his time had come and so on."

"So the Island-mess is just the result out of inherited obsession based on a few slabs of stone?," Rouge asked with a raised brow.

Kylie shook her head. "That's not all, no. You can already guess, that this weird family tradition of the Perringtens will end with John, however, it would have already ended a generation earlier. The reason for Jester Perringten to walk the same way as so many ancestors of his had already, for leaving the shadows, in that his family had operated for centuries, and risking all they had worked for with an institution like the Island, had been love."


It became silent, while the four mobians tried to process her words. This monster – and love!?

Seeing, that her friends were quite overwhelmed by what she had just told them, Kylie went to explain the sad and twisted story of Jester Perringten:

"Jester Perringten grew up like pretty much every rich child – neglected by his parents. Unlike his two slightly older sisters, who were triplets with him and who were spoiled rotten by their mother, he was barely spoken to, or even greeted. Since Jester was rather introverted, he didn't mind too much, that his only friend and contact had been the family butler Damius. His father, Jared Perringten, had always worked, since Jester could remember and his mother, Melanie, had always tried to gain her husbands attention, if only for a second, but was usually denied. What of attention she was denied, she gave to her daughters, Jessie and Jazmin. And Jester usually just sat in the kitchen with Damius, spending his days there.

One day, everything changed, when the 15-year old Jester Perringten came home from school to hear, that his whole family had died in a terrible fire in one of their beach houses. As the police quickly found out, Melanie had lured her husband and daughters there to kill them and then burned herself alive in the house, together with the bodies."

Earning shocked stares and gasps, Kylie continued, "In a letter, that Melanie had deposited in her desk at their regular home, before she had done this, she had justified her doing by saying, that Jared had punished her for years with denying her attention because of Jester.

In fact, several witnesses explained later, that Jared had become cold as ice the second he had learned of the third child's sex. Before, he had been loving and attentive, had cared for his pregnant wife like others would for their sick children, had declared his love to her after every ultrasound, just because the doctor had assumed, that there were three girls growing. This happens from time to time, sometimes, the children are turned away during the ultrasound and the doctors can only guess the sex by the general stature. And Jester had been always rather delicate.

Learning, that he had a male descendant meant for Jared, that one day, Jester would inherit the chance to earn the money Alister had once promised, to rule the world and to win the age-old bet – and that probably without even trying, just by using his father's hard researched results. Since Jared had always been someone, who got, what he wanted, he had thrown himself into work, before the triplets had even left the hospital, to beat his own, clueless son.

In the process of his hard work, he left Melanie behind, who couldn't understand his changed attitude towards her. She rather quickly connected the dots to realize, that the thought of having three daughters had never upset Jared, until one of the girls had turned out to be male. She avoided and ignored Jester in hopes of getting back in Jared's good graces, but since the Perringtens tended to see females as mere tools to create a new heir of their task, Jared had ignored her from this day on, she had done her part in his opinion. I guess, he even started to hate her for giving him a son, before he had been ready for one.

Melanie, who had really loved Jared, couldn't stand the sudden distance and finally snapped, which caused her to kill almost her whole family. Since Jared hadn't known of his untimely death, he hadn't even prepared a letter or note for Jester to know of his 'heritage' and for a few years it seemed, as if the obsession of the Perringtens would end exactly there.

Damius, the butler, adopted Jester, so nothing much would change for him and until he went to university, his life was a quiet and modest one. Although he had billions to spend, he barely bought himself a bar of chocolate, when he didn't need it desperately.

During his first day on his elite university then, he met her, Joanna. She hadn't been rich, which would have been necessary for her to attend this certain university, but she had been so talented, that she had gotten a scholarship. Joanna had been a confident, friendly and beautiful young woman, for whom Jester fell on first sight. And she apparently fell, too, because she agreed to date him, when he asked."

"How do you know all of those details?," Knuckles asked, crept out by her detailed knowledge, that let it sound, as if she was knowing his family.

"I read all of Jester's diaries – with John's permission, of course. He himself couldn't stand it, to be so close to his father again, but I was curious.

Anyway, for a few months, Jester and Joanna were on cloud 9, until one day, Joanna collapsed out of nowhere, blood streaming out of her ears, eyes, nose and mouth without an outer reason. As the young couple had to learn, Joanna was sick. She had a rare disease, that not even a handful other people had. An illness, that would cause her a huge amount of pain in the close future – and a far too early death. Her body was slowly dying, the cells stopping to function one by one. There was no cure known to stop this process, only to slow it down a bit.

She needed to cancel her studying and to take great amounts of painkillers to survive the days and nights. At one point in the close future, she would have been confined to a hospital bed, because her body would fail her and then she would need help with breathing and keeping her heartbeat up. Not to mention, that her limbs would be the first things to decay and one day needed to be amputated. All in all, their careless times were over, they had stepped right into hell.

Jester, feeling desperate for the first time in his life, canceled his studying as well and traveled the whole world, he paid dozens of doctors to find a cure, to save Joanna, but to no avail.

During those three painful years, when he went from doctor to doctor, from an 'I can't help her, I'm sorry' to the next, he learned two valuable lessons: One, not everything could be bought with money and two, people do everything you want, when you put the right amount of money in their hands.

He was desperate, so desperate, that he, in a fit of blind rage, destroyed several rooms in the mansion he lived in. This way, he accidentally found Jared's secret, the secret room, in that the Perringtens kept all of their research results. He quickly understood, what he had found there and, that he could use it to hopefully save Joanna and like his father before, he spent most of his days with researching and only one each week with her, hellbent on saving her life.

Then, however, Joanna did something, that Jester could never forgive her. She became pregnant."

"What was wrong with that?," Sonic asked, confused. "Pregnancy always puts a strain on the body. For healthy people, it's little to nothing, they are back on their feet in no time after giving birth, for very ill people, however, it's a strain, that usually causes the illness to get worse. Not to mention, that it was pure luck, that John didn't contract the same disease from his mother.

With her pregnancy, Joanna had shortened her life dramatically, the doctors gave her after the birth only a few more years at best, far less, than she had had before.

Jester saw this as betrayal, he had thought, that Joanna had egoistically shortened their time together by keeping silent about not taking contraceptives, just to become a mother, which had been always a dream of her. He saw his only son as Joanna's murderer and couldn't feel anything, but hatred towards him."

"Wait, if I got that correctly, Jester Perringten had been in his forties, when he built the Island, but from what I heard, he looked far older!," Rouge asked, astounded. She had never met the man face to face, but Shadow had been really descriptive, so she had a certain picture of him in her head.

"The Perringtens had tried a lot to understand the hedgehogs' secret, one of them even tried to create pseudo-Chaos Emeralds, just to understand, how they got created, so he could maybe repeat the process. I don't know, what exactly he did, but he managed to create indeed seven crystals, that had, however, no Chaos Energy in them. Since he failed, the Perringten in question had destroyed all descriptions of how he did that. The stones, however, still remained until now and the energy they gave out wasn't exactly healthy.

They caused Jester – and many others before him – to lose more and more of their life force the longer they stayed in their vicinity, which caused them to age far faster than normal. That's why Jester looked with less than 50 years like 80, or even 90. I'm pretty sure, that you, Fleetway and Mephiles don't like to hear it, but with killing Jester, you only sped up, what would have happened in mere months anyway.," Kylie told Shadow, turning to him.

The seme sneered angrily. He would have loved to take more of his life away. Now, he almost wished he would be revived by one of Mephiles' people, just so he could kill him again.

"What happened to those stones?," Sonic asked, not liking, that they could possibly still be here, close to countless innocents.

"Mephiles took them to safety...or well, that was, what he told me. He looked rather excited to have them.," Kylie explained, leaving out the part, where Mephiles had cleaned her and John off the negative energy, which had felt, as if he had poured something oily on them – and it had taken them a few days to get rid of the feeling.

"Did he really think, that he could save his mate with that?," Knuckles asked with a raised brow. He knew from a description he had found once, that it was possible to revive the dead with the Chaos Emeralds – when the death had been recent.

If his math was correct, then Perringten had waited more than 10 years after Joanna's death, until he had started the Island-project and that would have been far too late for the Chaos Emeralds, that could guide a lost soul back to the body not later than a month after death – given, that the body wasn't decayed at all, AND, that the death hadn't been natural. It was hard to say, if a disease counted as 'natural'. Even if it didn't, it would have been too late anyway to revive her. Although...it would have been too late for the regular Chaos Emeralds. For the over-sized ones, it was maybe possible...

"He was absolutely convinced and determined. Trying to find a cure for Joanna fruitlessly for so long had driven Jester slowly but surely into insanity and it got only worse, when Joanna had died four years after John's birth. It's almost ironic, but thanks to the pregnancy, her disease worked differently to some parts so, that she could keep her limbs.

Jester stole her body from the graveyard and hid it in a secret lair, frozen, so he could revive it one day. He had actually believed, that he had been pretty close to his goal, shortly, before it all ended."

"Why? As far as I remember, he had only three of seven hedgehogs!," Sonic pointed out. Had there somewhere been the other four?

"True, but the two hedgehogs he needed were there, meaning you and Scourge.," Kylie replied.

Sonic frowned. He had already assumed, that he had been one of those two – but why Scourge?

Kylie seemed to guess his train of thought, because she went to explain, "One of Jester's ancestors kinda stole a few figurines off Angel Island once..."

"WHAT!?," Knuckles all but screamed, interrupting her. "Well, aviation did already exist, so...yeah...," Kylie ended lamely.

"And what did the guardian do in the meantime?," the echidna asked with a growl. "Well, I guess, that he did nothing – the ancestor of Perringten had sent experts, who stole it, before he noticed it. If it's any consolation, I think, that the guardian had been pretty inexperienced.," Kylie soothed.

Knuckles grumbled almost inaudibly, knowing, that inexperience hadn't been the reason. Being in the clouds had given most guardians a sense of false security – they had become lazy.

He would never admit it openly, but he had been on the verge of becoming such a guardian, too – just before Eggman, and a little later Sonic and Tails, had landed on his island. This little incident had been enough to remind him, that slacking wasn't an option.

"As I was trying to say, those figurines are out of wood and depict the seven legendary hedgehogs. Although their colors had been withered by time, Jester's ancestor managed to find microscopic traces of the flowers and herbs, that had been used to paint them and could therefore say, which figurine belonged to which hedgehog and, which powers had been associated with them...or better, with the Chaos powers in them."

"You mean, something else, than my speed?," Sonic asked with a raised brow. Kylie nodded. "Yes. What you think you have as powers is nothing in comparison to what you could do, if you were aware of it.

That's the way for all Alphas and Betas in this world and also for quite a few Gammas, but unlike those seven hedgehogs, they just have a stronger form of their usual powers. These power boosts are sealed and are only meant as a last resource, a last way out, meant for dire emergencies only. Once this seal is broken, the mobian has free access to these powers – and usually full control.

So yes, there are other abilities slumbering under this blue fur.," Kylie summed it up, earning an odd look from Shadow, who was apparently contemplating, if she had just tried to flirt with his mate.

"So, which powers had Perringten been interested in?," Sonic asked, unaware of the silent exchange of his boyfriend and friend.

Kylie averted her eyes from Shadow and opened her drawer, pulling out a wooden figurine, about as long as her hand. "This here is the figurine of the green furred uke."

"Is there anything you don't have in your desk?," Sonic asked, grinning, and took the figurine from her, to examine it closer. He felt Rouge and Knuckles looking over his shoulder, from that Shadow already had a great view.

The figurine depicted a male hedgehog with long, flowing quills, that looked, as if they were pushed to the side by a stronger breeze. He held out both hands, as if he wanted the viewer to take, what he had there. In his left hand was something like a small amount of dirt, out of that peeked a plant with two leaves, like all plants had, that had just left their seeds and the earth they had been planted in. In his other hand was a round object, like a crystal ball, in that had been carved something, that had a chubby body and short, also chubby limbs. A thin line led from its middle away, seemingly deeper into the ball, ending nowhere.

"What's this thing in the ball?," he couldn't help, but ask. "That's an embryo." "Er..." "A still developing baby, long before it's born. This ball is meant to be a womb.," Kylie explained.

"Interesting. How did they even know, how an embryo looked like? They didn't have an ultrasound, did they?," Rouge wondered, admiring the details of the wooden womb's 'decoration'.

"Who knows? Maybe the artist had witnessed an early birth, or a stillbirth. Or the egg shells of echidna-eggs have a thin enough texture, that allowed an x-ray by holding it up in the sun.

Anyway, this is the God of Fertility. According to legend, he can revive the dead and decide, if someone becomes fertile, or barren."

"And that's Scourge?," Shadow asked with a raised brow. Although murder hadn't been one of Scourge's crimes, yet, life and fertility were two of the last words he would EVER connect with him.

"Yes. In fact, Scourge has already figured out, how he can turn himself barren." "He did?," Sonic asked, surprised. "Well, Perringten had a hard time with getting him pregnant – and it wasn't because of the lack of tries. Ukes are usually very fertile, so it was rather obvious, that there was something wrong. Starting from Scourge, Perringten managed to identify you and Silver as two more descendants of the legendary hedgehogs.," Kylie explained.

"Ah." Feeling a lot more questions come up, Sonic decided for the most important one, "So, how does my figurine look like?"

The human woman averted her eyes and started to play with her hair, displaying her nervousness. "That's...a little complicated, I'm afraid."

"Why?" "Don't get a shock, okay?," Kylie replied and fished something out of her drawer, showing it to the mobians.

Sonic gasped. In her hand was the figurine of a hedgehog with short head quills. Its arms were outstretched to the side, at least, that's what he presumed – both its arms has been broken off close to the shoulders. "Who did that?," Shadow asked with a dark voice. This looked pretty much like a doing out of hatred and he intended to gather as much information as possible about the person responsible.

"The echidnas, I guess, since the Perringten had found it like that and it is unharmed otherwise."

Really, the figurine looked – besides this little fact – great. If it had lost its arms by accident, it would have scratches, dents or something like that on its wood.

"But why?," Sonic asked, leaning forwards to take the piece of wood to look at it closer, like with the first, that he placed on the desk in the meantime.

"My guess is, that the echidnas and hedgehogs both agreed to keep the abilities of the Alpha a secret. Well, two of them, that is. The third had been detected."

"Really? Where?," Sonic asked, turning the figurine in all directions, trying to find, what she meant, but he came up empty-handed.

"Hold on." At once, Knuckles grabbed the wooden figure out of his brother-like friend's hands and turned its back to him, so that he could see it. "Is that meant seriously!?," he asked, looking at Kylie.

He held the figurine low enough for Sonic to see something carved into the back, that he had held at first for pattern to imitate back quills. Now, it rather looked like some kind of letters, that he had never seen before, though.

"Why? Does this word mean something to you?," Kylie asked curiously. "Of course. It pretty much labels this uke here as God of Everything. It even puts Chaos, who is seen as the origin of all life and deities, on the second place.," Knuckles mumbled, thoughtfully. "That's amazing! How do you know that? The Perringtens – and me – tried forever to find something out about this language and the meaning of those words!," Kylie gaped.

"I'm not surprised, this is the language of echidna Guardians. Only the guardians and their apprentices were allowed to learn it. I learned it, when I was five – I would recognize it everywhere."

"Why did the guardians have their own language?," Sonic asked with a cocked to the side head.

This was the first time he had heard of that, but he wasn't surprised: Knuckles wasn't exactly someone, who happily talked about his kind, unlike so many mobians liked to do it, especially about their strengths.

"Distrust, I guess. They didn't want to share their secrets with anyone else." "The names on the figurines are secrets? Why?," Kylie wondered.

"One of the lessons you have to learn as a guardian is, that knowledge in the wrong hands can become a catastrophe. It's better to have too many secrets, than to have too less.," Knuckles replied and it sounded, as if he was reciting something he had once learned.

"I see. Of course, that makes sense. Would it be too much to ask you to translate the other five?," Kylie asked carefully.

"I can try. Is it right to assume, that you only guessed so far?" "Yeah. And I have honestly no better ideas, than the Perringtens had over time.," Kylie replied, rummaging through the drawer and pulling out the remaining five figurines, placing them in front of her and looking on them in concentration.

"Here, that's the silver-white one.," Kylie explained, giving him one of a hedgehog, that had a similar quill style to Silver, but there were just four quills – and they were far shorter, looking more like a crown.

He performed a slight bow at the waist and held his hands with the hand plate up next to his body, an arc out of the same wood leading from one hand over the hedgehog's head to the other.

Sonic was close enough to see different shapes carved in the arc – tiny people, animals and trees, but all looking, as if they were caught in a tornado, thrown around in it.

"Hm..." Knuckles looked in concentration at the carved word. "That's a tough one. Basically, it means 'God of Destruction', but I can think of at least three other worlds to formulate 'Destruction' – and this one wouldn't be among them. It's too soft."

"Too soft?," Kylie repeated, confused. "Yeah, you would use this, when someone breaks an insignificant plate, for example. That's not, what I would have used to describe someone, who can destroy the world."

"Hm... does this really indicate the whole world, though?," Kylie asked. "What do you mean?," Knuckles asked, looking up.

"Maybe...it means a colony. This might mean, that this uke could destroy a colony, not the whole world.," Kylie suggested.

Knuckles looked down on the figurine. "It still doesn't seem right. I can try to research the exact meaning of the word, I still have a few books hidden in the temple."

"Of course, and you can of course take the figurines, they belong rightfully to you. Here, that is the cyan colored one."

Kylie gave him the figurine of a hedgehog with medium long head quills, who stood straight and held out his right hand, all fingers spread apart, as if he wanted to stop a driving car. His left hand hung simply down next to his body. Unlike the others so far, there was no object or decoration added.

Knuckles frowned at the figurine's back for a few minutes. "This means: God of Immortality and Invincibility.," he finally declared.

Shadow raised a brow and looked at the figurine. "Doesn't look like me.," he grumbled, earning a soft jab in the side from Sonic. "Don't disturb him, I want to hear that!," he hissed under his breath, continuing to listen with interest.

Taking the next one, the formerly red painted figurine, Knuckles frowned at it, before taking the one of the green hedgehog and holding its back next to the other one.

"Strange, both words mean 'life', but there seems to be a difference... Guess, I need to research that, too."

He carefully put the figurines down, lining them up at the edge of Kylie's desk, before taking the next one, that had been, according to Kylie, purple once.

The hedgehog, with quills, that reached his heels, balanced what looked like an egg on his right hand and a small skull on his left hand. Knuckles looked at the figurine for a long while, before he shook his head. "No chance. I recognize the words, but I don't remember the meaning.," he gave up and took the last one, that had to be the yellow one.

Unlike almost all the other hedgehogs before, this one didn't stand straight, but bent over, had his arms raised and his fingertips pointed downwards. He looked like a marionette player, without the strings and puppet. "This could mean...God of Control, but I'm not sure.," Knuckles explained and placed the figurine to its brothers. "Thanks for trying. Tell me, when you find something else out.," Kylie smiled. Knuckles nodded and he and Rouge returned to their seats.

"So, what is this 'third power' on my figurine you mentioned before?," Sonic asked the question, that had bothered him for a while now.

"On this figurine's stomach had been found traces of the other colors used for the figurines, but only on this one, situated as some kind of belt around his complete waist. The Perringtens and I assume, that it means, that you as the Alpha have the power to copy the powers of the others."

Sonic grimaced. "I prefer my speed.," he declared, as if he was declining an offer. "Nobody said, that you have to – it's just something you are probably able to do.," Kylie grinned soothingly.

"Was this the reason, why Perringten was after Scourge and me the most?," the blue hero asked. The human nodded. "Then why didn't he just show us the woman and somehow tried to force us to revive her, instead of keeping us locked up and trying to get our semes to rape us?," Sonic asked confused.

Kylie sighed. "Two reasons. One, you can only activate these powers, when you feel completely cornered – and this can backfire quickly – and two, shortly before you three got locked up in this cell with the cushions, there happened something, that let Jester lose the last remains of his sanity. The machine, that kept Joanna's body frozen, malfunctioned and broke. And since nobody was constantly there and the surroundings had been warm and humid, her flesh decayed quickly and by the time he had sent someone to check on her body, it had been already too late, she had been too far gone, it was impossible for the Chaos Emeralds to do anything now."

"Then why didn't he just let us go?," Rouge asked. "He had gone too far already, he couldn't go back – and after he had slipped into insanity completely, he just wanted to destroy the world, to punish it for taking his wife away from him – and if I got his last entries right, he wanted to build a new world with your help, one, in that no illnesses exist. And he had already three hedgehogs, with that he could succeed...well, six, if you count the semes in."

"I still don't get, why he wanted us pregnant so badly.," Sonic muttered, more to himself, than to Kylie, but she answered anyway.

"Jester had two plans. For one, your offspring would have inherited the Chaos Energy and if he took the pups early enough, he could raise them as his little private army."

Sonic jumped, when he heard a feral growl suddenly behind him, that sounded, as if he sat on the lap of a lion, and not his boyfriend's. He turned halfway around to see Shadow's eyes only slits, the red looking pretty much ablaze.

"Shadow, I was kidding.," he heard Kylie say and as if a switch had been flipped, he calmed down completely at once.

Looking over to Kylie, Sonic saw her smiling at him. "Don't worry, I expected that. All semes react like that, when you picture them a possible fate for their young. The fierceness of his reaction actually indicates, that he'll be a good and protective – maybe a little overprotective at times – father one day." Sonic just nodded, while Shadow huffed and nuzzled Sonic in apology for scaring him.

"Jester's Plan B had been to use your mother instinct against you." "My mother instinct?," Sonic repeated confused. "Yeah. A mother would do everything for his or her young."

Seeing the metaphorical question marks over the blue furred male's head, Kylie thought about a way to explain it differently. "Okay, imagine, that Eggman had kidnapped Tails."

"My buddy would greet me at the front door, because there is no way, that Eggman could keep him contained for longer than two seconds.," Sonic smirked, barely letting Kylie end, before he answered.

Kylie facepalmed. "Why am I not surprised?," she muttered, before looking at him again. "Imagine, that Tails got kidnapped by Eggman and has NO way of escaping himself. What would you do?," she rephrased her question.

Sonic shrugged. "Infiltrate his current base, destroy his robots, search the base, free Tails, destroy the base, and eat a chilidog at home to celebrate.," he listed easily. "Would you jump heedlessly into danger?" "If necessary."

Knuckles behind him rolled his eyes. 'Necessary' had a broad spectrum, but it was rather slim in Sonic's case – the idiot jumped into pretty much every danger, if it was necessary in his book, or not.

"Despite your worry for Tails, you would still keep it cool, right?" "I guess so. It wouldn't be my first fight with Eggman and when Tails would just be bored, not injured or ill, or anything, then I don't need to panic, or worry.," Sonic replied thoughtfully. Tails was too clever to fall into Eggman's hands just like that, so thinking about it in a 'what if'-scenario was rather difficult.

"The way you just pictured for me diverts COMPLETELY from how you would act, if it was one of your pups in Eggman's claws. You would immediately ask, what he wants from you and do then exactly that."

Sonic blinked at her, confusion written all over his face. "...Why? What's the difference between a pup of mine and Tails? He's my little bro!," he argued.

"Even if he was your twin brother, nobody could ever mean as much to you, as your young. You probably can't understand this, yet, but carrying those little ones under your heart for months, to be the first one they love, to have them completely dependent on you for a while, to see them grow out from under your protective wing, is an absolutely unique feeling, that you can't replace. You would do anything to protect those little ones, no matter, how old they are."

"Are you implying, that we need to watch those brats, until they are fully matured, unless we want to risk him losing to Eggman – or someone else for that matter?," Knuckles asked, flabbergasted.

Kylie grinned at him. "No. Don't worry, it's not as bad. It's true, that Sonic's mother instinct will always try to conquer his mind, but he has reason, too – and will always try to find another way, besides submission. And if he doesn't see a way out, that's not too bad. You obviously forget, that there are always two parents, not just one. And semes are wired differently, than ukes. Although they would never endanger their young, they don't submit easily – if at all. If Eggman ever got one finger on one of Shadow's young, he'd lose his whole arm. So don't worry, the two will be just fine."

Sonic sighed silently in relief and leaned back. He had actually become quite worried by Kylie's words, but her explanation had calmed him down again. There was no way, that Shadow would let Eggman – or someone else for that matter – have power over his mate.

"Speaking of the plans of humans – what was with this strange experiment, that Perringten put us through? Why did Silver and Mephiles just sleep, and why did Sonic get sick?," Shadow asked, taking a chance to finally understand this as one of the last riddles concerning this horrible place, but not talking about Scourge's traumatic experience in front of the others, which got him a reward in the form of Sonic nuzzling him lovingly.

"I didn't understand this at first, too. Apparently, Perringten let Stance give you different concentrations of the drug. In your case, Sonic, it was a small dose of a drug based on Shadow's blood."

Sonic blinked. "Why did I get sick because of Shadow?," the hedgehog asked, confused. "The concentration was the problem. It was high enough for your body to register, that there is something, but not strong enough to identify it. The result: it saw the drugs as a threat and tried to remove them."

"And Silver?" "The drug was based on Mephiles' blood and had a medium concentration, it gave them both the feeling of safety. For Silver, it was like taking a sleeping pill – and since Mephiles hadn't slept in days and the room smelt like him only, without any disturbances, his instincts urged him to rest while he could. In Scourge's case, they got Fleetway's drug in the highest concentration possible, it forced him into submission and well, you know the rest." Sonic nodded in thought.

"What I still don't understand – how did the Perringtens keep the uke-thing a secret all this time? There had to be some pregnant ukes over the last 2000 years, didn't this become public?," Rouge rephrased her question from earlier.

Kylie stared at her, before sighing and leaning back. "This were other times, Rouge. If there was a male pregnant, he had to fear to be closed out by society, so most kept it a secret, just like their ancestors had. Some could depend on their fathers, that were in reality their mothers in secret, to help them, others were so scared of rejection by everyone, that they let dubious 'doctors' perform abortions, which most of the time ended deadly, or turned them barren.

As for why it never became public – the Perringtens had a lot of influence. If you wanted to publish the smallest article, they had to allow that. They had hundreds of people all over the world scanning every little article manually for the information of pregnant males. If they found such, the current Perringten would be informed and the person wanting to publish it as well as his or her sources – literature or a living creature alike – searched out and the future publishers bribed to keep their mouths shut. If they refused, they would 'die in an accident' the day after."

"They killed them?" "And those, who investigated too much. The Perringtens had enough men under them, who would commit a genocide for the right price. The pregnant hedgehogs disappeared 'mysteriously' the same day to who-knew-where."

"Then what about this radio report, that started this whole mess?," Knuckles wondered. "Without it, we wouldn't have been in this trouble to begin with!"

"Well, this system of informing them about everything going on in the world, that the Perringtens had integrated, stopped with Jared's death. He had instructed his men to not inform Jester, under any circumstances. Since he never took that back – and the monthly payments still came – everyone kept their mouths shut.

Therefore, Jester heard very late about this scientist, who had found something out about ukes in an old temple – probably from the echidnas. It was Bryan, who hoped for an extra payment, who told him. He found the scientist and just killed him, but then he realized, that the man had already hinted in the radio, that he had an important 'announcement concerning hedgehogs'."

Sonic remembered faintly, that this had been the reason, why Tails had been so keen on listening to this report. There had been probably much more people interested in this report, so just pretending, as if they misunderstood something hadn't been an option – and telling them, that the man had died, would have spread rumors and probably led someone else to the truth. In a twisted way, Jester's plan had been the best bet.

"To prevent the people from getting suspicious, Jester pretended to be the scientist and used the report to lure people into his Uke Institute."

"But why? Why did he capture all of those hedgehogs, when he was only after seven?," Sonic asked, trembling a bit, which let Shadow hug him a little tighter in comfort. He had seen almost the same hell as Sonic, so he could understand his feelings. There had been so many hedgehogs, who could have been spared from all the suffering.

"Well, Jester had a problem there." Kylie pulled out something, that looked like a big, less handy version of Tails' Miles Electric, a screen surrounded by lots of buttons.

"This is the machine, that Jared had built to try and find the seven hedgehogs. It is meant to pick up on your unique Chaos Energy and to alert him, when he would be close to you. It has a scale of green, yellow and red for on the point of, close to and away from the goal. Although Jester looked up and down all of Mobius, he only found three hedgehogs, meaning you, who were in the green sector of the scale. Most were in the red part and only a good quarter in the yellow sector.

Jester thought, that the remaining four had just not been born, so he kidnapped the hedgehogs, that were in the yellow sector and forced them to breed to hopefully get a pup, whose blood test would cause a reaction. Newborns don't give out Chaos Energy until a few weeks after their birth, it can be detected in a drop of their blood, though.," she explained right away, seeing the question in Sonic's eyes.

"Did this actually work?," Rouge asked confused. "No. You can't breed Chaos Powers, but Jester's mind had been too far gone to realize this."

"Then why didn't he find those four? What do Sonic and the other two have, that the other four don't?," Shadow asked, diverting his attention between Kylie and Sonic, who was suddenly tense.

"My guess is, that the three somehow managed to lose the seals over their Chaos Powers without breaking them, so that they constantly give out a small amount of this strong Chaos Energy."

Knuckles frowned. "Now, that you mention it, a while after I met Sonic and Tails, maybe a year or two, Sonic's Chaos Energy seemed suddenly stronger than usual to me, when they visited me. I'm used to it by now.," he mused.

"Really? Sonic, do you remember anything out of the ordinary around- Sonic?," Kylie interrupted herself, when she noticed her friend's strange posture.

He trembled worse now, a shadow over his face. "What happened to the pups?," the hedgehog asked, sounding thoughtful, his glare gone off the side, as if he was looking at something, but besides the room's corner, there was nothing interesting.

The other three looked at Kylie, who was rather pale now and looked down on her lap, where her hands seemed to rest. "Please don't ask me that.," she whispered with a trembling voice.

Sonic's ear twitched and he looked up and at her. "Why?," he asked, confused. "Some questions are better left unanswered.," Kylie mumbled, looking away and brushing her hair back, her hands shaking in the process.

"But I want to know.," Sonic insisted. "Why is Hope the only pup from the Island? What is with the others?"

"You want to know? Fine. Don't tell me, that I didn't warn you.," Kylie grumbled and bent to the side.

Sonic expected her to pull something out of her drawer again, but instead, she placed something on the desk, that looked like her plastic dustbin. Confused, Sonic looked at her, but Kylie kept her gaze downwards.

WARNING!

"Remember number 300?," she started, her voice void of any emotion. Not waiting for an answer, she already continued, "He was an artificial creature, created out of organic material, that the nanobots torturing me, John and all other employees during his fight formed to cells. And he got the organic material by cutting everyone he saw as useless in tiny pieces, until they were a fluid. That included dead employees, ukes, semes – and the pups, that didn't have his desired Chaos Energy signature."

END OF WARNING!

Now Sonic knew, what the purpose of the dustbin was. Kylie hadn't even ended, when he had already jumped out of Shadow's arms, grabbed the container and emptied his stomach content in it. She had been right, some questions were better unanswered.

Calming down after a few minutes, the hero looked up to see, that the others weren't better off.

Rouge had a green hue in her face, Knuckles had lost all color and Shadow was staring into space, obviously fighting to collect himself. Sonic definitely didn't blame the seme for being this upset.

Feeling a little better, he lowered the dustbin next to the desk, made a quick run to the only bathroom he knew, to wash out his mouth, return and to stumble over to his chair to sit on it next to his boyfriend, so that he could calm down in peace.

"I'm sorry I asked.," he eventually mumbled, which at least woke Shadow up. He was quick to pull his boyfriend on his lap, hugging him to comfort him, which worked, if Sonic's weak chuckle and grateful nuzzling was anything to go by.

"I'm not sure, if I want to know, what this monster had in store for us.," Rouge mumbled, her voice a little shaky, her posture tense.

"I don't think, that he would have killed you.," Kylie replied, her own voice rather quiet, as if she didn't want to startle someone.

"You were valuable for him. You, because he knew of your connection to Shadow, Amy and Tails because of their importance for Sonic, Blaze for Silver's feelings for her and Knuckles, because he's an echidna, who could answer probably some questions Perringten had. He wouldn't have killed you, at least not anytime soon."

"And what about the other hedgehogs' relatives? Don't tell me, that we forgot them in the Uke Institute.," Rouge asked, having calmed down, thanks to the change of topic.

The boys were also listening in their talk, using it to distract themselves from the terrifying truth.

"We didn't. There weren't any, besides you. Most of the hedgehogs had been homeless, like Silver and Scourge, and had no relatives. And only the fewest of them had similar strong protective feelings towards someone else, as Blaze has towards Silver. Those, who had actually family, were either declared dead by a paid doctor after a staged accident, or the relatives themselves were paid – which thankfully didn't work this often, it gives me hope for the peoples' sanity and honor. For some, it was enough to tell them, that their relatives were ukes, even when they were semes, to have the family cut all contacts. When you five arrived, Bryan could imagine, that you wouldn't give up this fast, so locking you up had been the best alternative to that time." The mobians nodded in thought.

"Sonic, do you remember something out of the ordinary around the time Knuckles mentioned?," Kylie asked, hoping to not upset Sonic's stomach again.

"Hm..." Sonic had heard the question, of course, he just had had other things in mind, so he needed to think a bit.

Eventually, he shrugged. "No, nothing. We hadn't visited Knux in a while, which wasn't so unusual, and during this time, we had saved the world a few times from Eggman, I had some spontaneous solo-missions..."

"'Spontaneous solo-missions'?," Kylie repeated confused. "Yeah, you know, when I see someone needing help during one of my runs. Fires with people still in the buildings, thieves in the act, parents calling for their just lost children, kittens in trees – something like that." Sonic shrugged. It was no big deal, really. With his speed, things like these took less time than retying shoes. "There was definitely nothing different, not at all.," he ended his report.

"Hm, that doesn't help us solve this mystery. From what I know, you and Scourge never met – and Silver never left that side alley, before he got kidnapped. I just can't imagine a single thing, that you three have in common, that might cause you to loose those seals of yours. I don't get, what might have happened."

"Maybe this strange Energy-finder is broken. I could show it to Tails, he'll probably know, what it does in detail in a mere second.," Sonic suggested, already imagining Tails' happy face upon a quick challenge.

Kylie grimaced. "I don't know, Sonic.," she replied. "This thing here is pretty good secured and I'm sure, that it was Jester's doing, not Jared's. Not even Jester's usual password works, he has protected it with a different one. When John tried it, it actually gave him an electric shock."

"Usual password?" "All important rooms and files on the Island had been protected by the same password, the date, when Jester and Joanna first met."

"Then my little buddy might need half an hour more.," Sonic shrugged. Kylie rolled her eyes.

"Fine, take it – but warn Tails, before you give it to him.," she grumbled, pushing the thing towards the figurines, so Sonic could easily reach it.

"Now, is there anything else you two wanted to ask? Otherwise, I would like to talk with Sonic and Shadow alone about some private things.," she continued towards Knuckles and Rouge.

Shadow tensed a little hearing that. She didn't want to talk about Sonic's immortality, did she!? Only the woman knew about this fact...

"Actually, I do have a question. I...just don't want to talk in front of everyone.," Knuckles explained reluctantly.

"Why? We're friends!," Sonic argued, turning to him, but Knuckles' expression was as usual unreadable. It was his 'Don't ask me, I won't answer'-face, so Sonic didn't even try. He had tried it often enough in the past.

"That's no problem. Mephiles!," Kylie called. Said male appeared easily in the middle of the room.

"Agent Shadow isn't even a whole day here and you are already calling me like a dog.," he complained, although he seemed to tease...in his very own, strange way.

Kylie chuckled, seeming to understand the comment as mere teasing as well. "Sorry, I'll let you back to Silver in a minute. Would you create one of those soundproof rooms around me and Knuckles?"

"If that's all.," the dark being shrugged and snapped his fingers. Instantly, a kind of gray curtain, from the ceiling to the ground, surrounded Kylie and her desk, distorting their features.

"Echidna, are you stupid?," Mephiles' question let them jerk their attention back to him. He stared at the red furred male. "Would you move it already? I have a mate to return to!," the male hissed and Knuckles' chair moved up – with the echidna on it, who clung to it in surprise – and raced over to Kylie, to deposit its passenger on the woman's lap and to return to its original place, standing there innocently.

Whatever happened between the two afterwards was obscured by the suddenly not translucent anymore curtain.

"Hm, I get, why you are befriended with him, you are apparently on the same intellectual level.," Mephiles commented, which let Shadow just shrug. He was positive, that without Sonic close by, they'd be already redecorating Kylie's office... and several other rooms. "You were talking about this earlier, correct?," he rather asked. "Indeed I was.," Mephiles replied calmly, watching the gray curtain, as if he could see through it, not needing to think for even a second about what he meant.

"So you believe this?," Shadow continued to ask. Mephiles chuckled. "'Believe'?," he repeated, amused by the choice of words. "Believing is for the weak, who need a reason to stand up in the mornings. No, I know, that my Silver is one of those legendary hedgehogs and I also know, that your boyfriend is one, too."

Shadow stared from him to Sonic and back. "How?," he asked. It didn't sound, as if Kylie had told him about it... "Yeah, I'd like to know that, too.," Sonic piped up.

Mephiles smirked. "Allow me to show you, then." At once, his shadow stretched out, crawling along the floor, up the walls and along the ceiling in less than a second, drowning out most of the light.

In the strange twilight, Shadow noticed a red energy, surrounding his whole body. It seemed to flicker, like a fire in a storm, just without the heat. Looking over to Rouge and Mephiles, he saw, that it was the same for them, but the colors were different. Rouge had a dark purple one, that moved in gentle waves over her body and Mephiles one, that had the same color as his stripes and danced over his dark fur like a fire in a windless night.

Noticing a brightness from something in front of him, Shadow turned his head and his jaw just dropped.

Sonic stood in front of him, having slipped off his lap unnoticed, and stared down on himself in wonder. While the three other ones were merely glowing, like dying embers, Sonic was shining like a little sun, white-golden energy surrounding him in a thick, shining layer, here and there interrupted by a speck of blue energy, appearing and disappearing like dolphins breaking the golden ocean's surface to breathe, before diving again.

"This blue energy." Mephiles had gone closer to Sonic and taken off one of his gloves, swiping along Sonic's arm without touching him, catching a tiny flame of the blue energy on his index finger's claw, where it danced like a fire.

"This is the energy you have been born with. This white one, however, is of a purity, that a mortal creature is normally unable to reach. Yet, I saw this energy already three times.," he explained, the energy getting extinguished by a small bit of darkness, that came out of his fingertip and pretty much swallowed the small bit effortlessly. "That better wasn't vital for him!," Shadow snarled.

Mephiles rolled his eyes. "Don't be ridiculous. Mobians and humans alike are always producing Chaos Energy. It would be more dangerous to do that to you, since your body struggles to keep your Chaos Energy around you.," he muttered.

"How come, that we see this now? What did you do?," Sonic asked confused. "I brought you in my mind.," Mephiles shrugged, as if it was completely natural. "Really? Does it cause you a headache, if I stamp on the ground?," Shadow asked, annoyed. "Since this is a mere illusion, no. But I like, how you think.," Mephiles smirked.

His ear twitched and he turned back to the dark veil, snapping his fingers, which caused it, and the illusion, to shatter like glass. Before all remains had disappeared, Knuckles already fell to the ground, apparently having tried to break through the veil.

"What took you so long?," he snarled, stood up and dusted himself off, small remains of the shards falling off him and disintegrating into dust before reaching the ground. "I was distracted. Was this all, or am I needed still?," Mephiles asked towards Kylie.

"You know, I always wondered, how Perringten could get you and Shadow. If sedation would have worked on you, then Towers would have decorated his office with those sedation darts.," Rouge mentioned.

"Perringten's men didn't use sedation, although it worked like it. They used a poison cocktail on the semes.," Kylie explained, dusting off her desk.

"WHAT!?," Sonic and Rouge exclaimed in horror. "Don't worry, they had always the antidote with them. Sedatives don't work on semes, at least not for longer than a few minutes. Their metabolisms quickly turn into overdrive and dissolve the fluid, easy as that. With a mixture out of poisons, however, it's different. Once poisoned, the semes immediately fall into a deep sleep, stopping all other functions to try and metabolize the poison, so that it doesn't harm them.," Kylie explained, ending her small task.

"They just fall over, where they stand? Even if they are close to an edge, or in the water?," Rouge asked, incredulously.

"Well, I never said, that it was the best invention of nature. It sadly happens all the time, that semes starve to death or drown, while they try to heal themselves from poisoning. Anyway, the poisoning kept them in a very deep sleep, that lasted, until they got the antidote, or until they had metabolized everything, which usually took hours to days.," the woman replied.

"So all those darts...," Shadow mumbled in horror, with Mephiles looking worried, too. They both knew, that the ukes got sedated with darts on Paradise, unlike the semes. How much poison had coursed through their veins?

"No need to get worried. This poisoning was ONLY for capturing you semes. Don't forget the collars you wore. They weakened you enough for the sedation to work longer."

"Can't say, that these collars worked on Silver. He could read my thoughts just fine all the time.," Mephiles huffed, actually mildly embarrassed, that those things had a bigger impact on him, than on his mate.

Kylie shrugged. "Perringten didn't care about that THAT much. Those collars they wore in the cell with the cushions had only the function to weaken them – the rest did the drug for Sonic. Since he was the Alpha and quickly established himself as such, Jester could bet, that they wouldn't initiate an escape." Shadow believed to feel Sonic's heartbeat quicken at that, but maybe he was just seeing things.

"If you don't need me anymore." Not waiting for a reply, Mephiles vanished as easily as he had come.

"One last question, before Knuckie and I hit it – who was the other?," Rouge asked, looking at Kylie expectantly, while Knuckles next to her turned beet-red upon hearing the nickname.

The woman blinked. "The other?," she repeated, clearly not understanding, who she meant.

"You know, the one, who Alister had a fight with." "Oh...," Kylie made, before she shrugged. "I have no idea. Alister started writing diaries after this night...or he burned all of the old ones. The only information he gives about the other are linked with profanities. According to those, he's fat, an alcoholic, had several STDs and so on – and it's probably all not true, just proof of his hatred. I can only tell you for sure, that he was probably as rich as Alister to that time, since he would have been below his standards otherwise. However, that was the case for several families, that maybe don't even exist anymore, or are now totally poor. I have no idea, what became of him, but I can try to find more out."

"Would be better. I mean, this guy had apparently the same god-complex as this Alister, I highly doubt, that he just made this bet and let it be afterwards.," Rouge explained, while Knuckles carefully collected in the wooden figurines. "I see... Of course, you're right. I try to find out more.," Kylie promised thoughtfully.

"Do you have the measurements of the reliefs? I would like to know, how much space they'll need.," Knuckles asked, looking at the still lined-up pictures.

"You can just look at them yourself. Ask Mali, she'll show you, where they are. This way, you can test out their weight, too and see, how good you can carry them.," the woman offered. "Thanks."

Knuckles was just reaching for the last figurine, when suddenly the whole room shook, so hard, that it fell over. Instinctively, Sonic jumped up, ready for a fight.

Shadow, Rouge and Knuckles were copying him, too used to Eggman's giant robots attacking to just ignore it. The only one, who was strangely unaffected, was Kylie, who just sighed in exasperation.

"You might want to keep away from the door.," the woman grumbled, annoyed and not even a bit concerned or scared, although files were slipping left and right off her desk and hitting the ground.

"Kylie, what's going on!?," Sonic asked, noticing the quakes getting stronger and having an almost regular pattern to themselves.

Before she could answer, the door got thrown open and a gasping John stood in the frame. "I swear, I had the best intentions!," he quickly explained, before coming in, throwing the door shut, crossing the room and pretty much diving to hide under her desk the moment Kylie stood up.

Just a second later, the door got thrown out of its hinges, flying towards Kylie, who was the only one not running to dodge the large projectile, that was accompanied by a shout of "WHERE IS HE!?".


*= I figured, that Sonic's not only living in a different dimension and on another planet, but also in another time, meaning in the future - so, yeah, the beginning of industry had been longer ago, than in our case.

Thanks for reading! I sadly can't say, when I will be able to upload the next chapter, as I'm still very stressed, but you know, that I work on it as much as I can every day :).

Bye and have a nice weekend!