"I just thought of something!" Charmy piped up.

That's a first, Espio thought while smirking at him. In light Dilek's story, she had agreed to guide them to the outskirts of the Mearyn territory, although, as with many decisions she made it seemed, had done so with an uneasy mind. Due to her anxious and uncertain nature, Espio sensed that there were perhaps more key details to her story than she was telling, but he wasn't about to press her for more information. She was the only one of the three of them who knew the way through these mountains safely to the other side, and her help was more than welcome.

"What's that?" Espio said nonchalantly as he and Dilek shifted their way hastily over a large group of jagged rocks. She was a few feet ahead of him leading the way, and seemed almost as unfocused on Charmy as he was.

"If Espio hadn't have broken that cable you had, what were you gonna do? Hold us ransom?" he asked Dilek, hovering over to her. She turned around to him with an expression of regret.

"I was going to contain both of you until I at least found out what you were. After Espio broke the cable, I assumed you were hostile, so I tried to flee…to no avail," Dilek ended, sounding a bit disappointed in herself. She turned around and kept walking through the progressively narrowing valley filled with tons of coarse rocks and sediment.

"Guess we gave you a run for your money, huh?" Charmy beamed as he circled around her while turning himself in a cylindrical motion.

"Well…you're the first ones to detect me without actually seeing or hearing me first, so I suppose you did," Dilek grudgingly admitted. "Although I think if Espio hadn't have been there, you wouldn't have stood a chance."

"Ha! Nothing gets by me! I'm always as alert as-" Charmy was interrupted by being tackled to the ground by Espio, while Dilek ran close to the area where Charmy had been hovering.

"Hey, what'd you do that for?" Charmy protested as they both got up again. Espio motioned over to Dilek, who was gently prodding a very thin wire shining in the sunlight and examining it closely. Following the sunlight gleam, Espio's eyes followed it to a steep tributary canyon off to the side of the valley. The wire had been cleverly wrapped around a mass of unconsolidated gravels and boulders, with the other end being tied around a large, deeply rooted tree on the opposite end of the valley.

"I don't know about you guys, but I don't want my grave to be in a landslide," Dilek commented as she carefully walked under the wire.

"Always alert, right Charmy?" Espio mocked him in a low tone.

"Oh very funny, Espio," Charmy snapped. "It's so thin, it's not my fault I didn't know it was there. Who would put something like that out here, anyway?" Dilek continued to study the wire while Espio walked over to her.

"This wire was crafted from a metal whose deposits are only found in these mountains," she stated while running her forefinger along the wire's edge. "I'd say the Goribes placed it here…they've been just as cautious as the Mearynites ever since they've been at war with them."

"And how long has this war been taking place?" Espio asked.

"Decades. Mostly over territorial and resource disputes," Dilek replied. "I used to think the Goribes were responsible for the war, but I'm starting to see that Mearyn's government shares just as much of the blame."

"Well if Eggman is controlling Mearyn's government, things are only going to get worse," Espio noted. "Eggman is power hungry and ruthless but he's also very deceptive. If he wanted to just take over Mearyn, it doesn't make sense for him to bring Rouge here because his plans would just end up getting foiled as usual. He's got to have some ulterior motive."

"And you style yourself a master of deceptive tactics?" Dilek questioned with a slight tone of disbelief. Espio gazed at her for a few seconds and curled his mouth.

"I do well for myself," he said, looking a bit intrigued but also irritated by what Dilek had asked.

"These Goribe guys seem like tough bunch," Charmy speculated, breaking the fixed stare Espio and Dilek held on each other. "Managing an entire civilization in mountain caves, springing clever traps, being able to go to war for years…who knew squirrels had in 'em?"

The sun had already disappeared behind the rounded, vegetation covered mountain summits, and Dilek suggested that they try to at least get out of the valley before it became completely dark. By the night fell, the valley was behind and below them, with a labyrinth of mountainous terrain ahead. The path Dilek was leading them was quite steep and thickly covered by forest, but she insisted on its travel due to it lying in an area where the Goribes rarely ventured. They eventually decided to stop for the night in a small clearing near a ravine. Charmy had excitedly collected some firewood upon their arrival, and Dilek had used friction between two hard stones to ignite a flame. Charmy and Espio had lain down on one side of the fire, while leaned back against a lone tree on the opposite side. While Charmy had fallen asleep reasonably quickly, the chameleon and the echidna of the trio stayed awake for some time after watching the flames crackle and spark. Dilek had a piece of kindling in her hand which she swaying slowly over the fire with and entranced look in her eyes. Espio's mind raced as he watched the thin dead branch move back and forth, and he found himself speaking one of his questions out loud.

"How do these seers have foresight?" he suddenly asked. He hadn't been looking at Dilek when he spoke, and had largely been talking to himself, but Dilek answered nonetheless.

"You came into this world from yours by some sort of energy transfer," she disclosed. "I'm not sure what that type of metaphysical laws that energy follows in your world or what it is referred to there, but certain echidnas of this world are born with certain sensitivities to that metaphysical power. To have this sort of sixth sense isn't very common in our race, but it allows the individual who has it to possess distinctive supernatural abilities. One of these abilities is having a notable degree of foresight. That one is probably the most frequently occurring, but it's not the only one ever witnessed."

"What other abilities have been observed?"

"The ability to heal oneself from physical injuries at an accelerated rate has been seen multiple times, and there has been enhanced strength, speed or reflexes recorded as well. There was also one case where telepathy was seen," Dilek concluded with a bit of a shudder.

"Hm," Espio pondered. Because Knuckles is an echidna, would he have some sort of supernatural ability he didn't know about in this world? he thought. Mulling this idea over, he turned onto his back and looked up at the sparkling night sky while he heard Dilek rustling quietly as she leaned against the tree further in a sleeping position. He nights here were even more silent than back home, and if it hadn't have been for the fire, the cold, still air surely would have made sleep impossible. He looked over at Dilek and saw that she had turned on her side and was curled up in a fetal position against the twisted tree trunk. Her dreadlocks had hidden her face completely and her small body frame rose and fell with every soft breath she took.

"Night," Espio whispered before closing his eyes and letting sleep take him over.

The next day was marked by low lying clouds and thick fog cover, conditions which Espio normally relished in because it made things that much easier to be undetectable to his enemies. However, because of the narrowly missed landslide yesterday and the unfamiliarity of these mountain passes, he made sure both he and Charmy stayed close to Dilek while keeping all his senses sharply on alert. As they made their way through the thick deciduous, vine covered vegetation, Espio could hear a very faint drumming sound far off in the distance. Because the visibility was so poor, it was difficult to pinpoint exactly which direction the sound was coming from.

"It's them, isn't it? The Goribes?" Charmy queried in a voice surprisingly quiet for him. Dilek glanced around looking fearfully agitated.

"We should move quicker," she said plainly. "And very stealthily." Charmy and Espio both nodded before following her quickened pace over the lush and rocky landscape. They travelled for a few more hours with respective ease before coming to a standstill. In front of them was another ravine, even smaller than the one they had slept near last night. The opposite facing cliff's outline could be seen through the dense fog, and it was prominently taller than where they stood now.

"When I pass through here back to the Kalock Forest, I can just jump across. But if I'm going the other way, I have to go around for miles," Dilek explained. "The cliff on the other side is incredibly steep. It would be very unlikely for me to find any sort of a foothold."

"What's on the route you normally take?" Espio asked her. She looked nervously down the path Espio was referring to, seeing that it quickly faded from vision under the opaque haze.

"It's an easy route to take, it just takes much longer…and it ventures very close to the core of the Goribe territory," she contemplated.

"Let me check the cliff and the jumping distance out," Charmy offered. Before Espio or Dilek could make another suggestion, the eager bee was off. He was gone for about a minute before he came back into view.

"It's not too wide. You could zoom across easily, Espio! And the cliff is pretty steep but it's got a straight edge, you'd be able to climb it without a problem!" With that, he flew out of view again, leaving Espio and Dilek dumbstruck. "Come on!" his voice called from the other side.

"He knows I can't scale vertical surfaces, right?" Dilek scowled.

"Charmy is a little impulsive," Espio said with a small grin. "But I think he knows a way to get us both across." He walked out to the edge of the ravine, and looked at the shadow of the other side, gaining a sense of the jumping distance. He crouched down and turned his head to the side, speaking to Dilek. "Climb on my back," he instructed. Dilek gaped at him incredulously.

"…excuse me?" she continued to stare in shock.

"I'll be able to attach my hands and feet to the cliff on the other side, and then I'll be able to get us both up," Espio reasoned. "Come on, you said we have to move quickly." Dilek looked apprehensive, but sighed after a few seconds, knowing Espio's suggestion was the most logical one.

"You had better be right about this," she threatened as she held onto his shoulders.

"Hold on," Espio told her as he bent his knees down. He sprung into the air horizontally in an extremely fast movement, and Dilek's hands clung onto him tighter. He heard her give out an anxious whimper, which he couldn't help but laugh at in his mind. No sooner than 3 seconds after launching off the cliff's edge had Espio felt his fingers and feet adhere to the opposite side of the ravine. He immediately began to climb up the cliff, and he could feel Dilek shaking as she held onto him as if she was never going to let go.

"You all right?" he inquired, smiling just ever so slightly.

"I-I'm not good with extreme heights," Dilek stuttered, clearly trying to mask her fear. Espio reached the top of the steep wall of rock in about half a minute where Charmy was sitting, waiting for them and looking bored.

"About time!" he chuckled, standing up. "Let's go! We gotta keep moving!" Dilek jumped off Espio's back and turned to him.

"Thanks," she said a bit awkwardly. Espio just nodded.

"When do you think we'll be out of the mountains now?" he asked.

"With any luck, by this time tomorrow," she said hopefully.

Dilek's estimation encouraged them to cover a large area in a short amount of time. By evening the fog had lifted and foothills leading into an arid environment were visible distantly. They had decided to rest up for the day, and Dilek had gone to search for firewood in the thinning, sun soaked woods. Espio sat himself on a large boulder, while Charmy seemed to be making all sorts of odd pictures with pebbles on the ground.

"I don't think we should let her go off by herself," Charmy stated. "She might not come back."

"I think we can trust her. She's lead us this far," Espio said with his eyes closed. "Besides, if she does decide to up and leave, we can find our way out from here anyway." He sounded uncaring as to Dilek's whereabouts and what she was doing; although in truth he hoped that she was being careful wherever she was.

"Yea, I guess we could," Charmy agreed. "Still, she was pretty helpful to have around." Espio murmured in concurrence.

A few seconds later, Espio's eyes opened as he heard a twig snap several yards away. He jumped off the boulder and drew out his knives while Charmy began to hover in the air, looking around nervously. Suddenly, several patches of loosely packed soil in between the trees sprang up to reveal a horde of squirrels dressed in darkly colored clothing. They all moved in slowly on Espio and Charmy, who looked around in all directions to quickly realize that they had been surrounded.

"Oh, hell," Espio muttered.

Author's note: Thanks for the reviews :) Unfortunately, I don't think the I will be able to update for a little while as the next couple of weeks are quite busy for me, but I promise the updates will come! Also, tell me what you guys think of the fan characters in a review if you can :D