I can't tell you how grateful I was for Luktani's overlooking of the leftover power in the Chaos Emeralds. The second they had gotten near me, I had absorbed the positive energies. It took a while, since it had to heal me completely before it could become useful, which is why I wasn't at my full power: a lot was used to get me into fighting condition again.

Still, I didn't hesitate when it came to attacking Luktani, who had the entire dark side of the emeralds. I used the power to form two spheres of energy around my hands, their golden color blinding to the ones below. Luktani had formed two spheres of the same kind, except dark in color. We clashed midair, the dark spheres ripping by me and my light spheres tearing by her. Yeah, we both missed by a mile. I don't know how, but we did.

I landed on the opposite side. Technically, when I had the positive energies, I could levitate, but I didn't want to waste what power I had on that. I could fight just as well and still allow gravity to do its work. It was easier if I didn't have to fight against it. Luktani, however, stayed in the air. Out of nowhere, she formed two curved rings. Half of the ring was a blade, the other half a handle. I recognized them as Nocturnus weapons. Okay, bad replicas of Nocturnus weapons, since these weren't made of metal, but of the same dark matter the spheres were.

I noticed one thing was changing about her: her eyes. Now, instead of being white and pupil-less, they had two narrow, ice blue slits. At least I wasn't the only one wasting power. She snarled and shot down towards me, swinging one arm after another. I leaned back and grimaced as one of them sliced through the air just under my neck. Too close. I formed another sphere, but not before she managed a hit with one of the blades.

It sliced across my upper arm, but the wound immediately disappeared. It didn't hurt, but I felt my energy drain slightly. I'd have to watch it. I leapt backwards and threw the sphere, and it grazed her right shoulder. She then shot towards me, extending her arms out with two spheres around each fist. She was using them way too often, and they drain more power than you'd expect. I watched her eyes widen when her power drained enough for her to lose altitude. I smirked. "You're not used to this, are you, cat?"

She snarled. "Shut up, hedgehog!" She swung a fist at my head, but I ducked and leapt backwards again. Before I knew it, she had thrown another ball of energy at me. Did she not learn at all? Instead of dodging this one, I extended my right hand and caught it. The dark energy from it shot into my body, causing a pain somewhat like electrocution, but it was short and quickly absorbed. My head was pounding with the force of channeling both light and dark energies, and I quickly transformed the sphere into positive power. The headache immediately disappeared, and I breathed a short sigh of relief.

Then, I leapt high into the air and threw the sphere downwards, curving my body with the shot to make sure it hit its mark. Luktani smirked. I knew what she was going to try and do: catch the sphere. The second her right hand touched the sphere though, I saw the power counteract to the dark energies. She screamed with rage and agony as the extreme energy of the light sphere shattered the bones in her hand, the sphere itself left to dissipate.

I saw tears playing in the corners of her eyes from the extremity of the pain. "H-how did you d-do that?" she growled, clutching her right hand with her left. I landed directly in front of her, glancing at the hand. Even the positive powers of the emeralds couldn't heal that to working condition.

"I can channel both sides of the emeralds. One at a time, obviously, but my body has the ability to channel both. So I can take whatever energy you send at me, so long as I catch it right, and transform it into the current energy I'm using. You, apparently, can't channel the positive energy… so… you pretty much just destroyed your hand."

She clenched her teeth and inhaled sharply through them. "Th-thanks, C-captian Obvious. I hadn't noticed."

"You're welcome, Lieutenant Sarcasm," I chirped. "Now, I think I can heal your hand. It won't work normally, but it won't hurt anymore. However, if I do, you have to promise to leave. Forever. And if I find out you're within one hundred miles of Future or Metal City ever again, I will kill you."

"F-fine… just fix it!" she shrieked. I stepped forward and gently touched the shattered hand, a green sphere of energy appearing around both of us. "W-wait, I c-can't channel light energy… w-will that kill me?"

"No. Healing powers are neutral, but only usable by the one channeling the light energy. Now can I work, please?"

She was silent, and I moved the sphere around her hand, watching as it healed. I could tell it was working, because Luktani's fierce expression of agony faded. The hand itself was crooked and didn't bend well, but it wasn't shattered anymore. However, the use of neutral energy drained both of us of our respective abilities, and I noticed the black emeralds in the corner regain their colors. She glared at me, but smiled nonetheless.

"I'm gone." Using the rest of her power before it faded completely, she teleported out. I blinked once, feeling my quills return to their normal position. Immediately I was knocked to the floor, my backspines pressed tightly against the rock. The first thing that crossed my mind was that Luktani hadn't left, but when I looked up I saw, not the chocolate brown lynx, but a crimson echidna. With a grunt I struggled to wiggle free of his foot, which was pressed tightly against my chest, but it only caused him to put more weight on it.

"Knuckles? What the heck?!" I snapped, glaring into his amethyst eyes.

He glared back, pressing his foot down harder and resting his arm on his knee. "You stole her from me."

Struggling to breathe, I barely managed to snap back at him. "Who? What?! Knux…" I gasped at this point. He was strong. "I have no clue… what you're talking about!"

He snarled at me, his eyes cold and heartless. "You never really loved her. You turned your back on her over and over again. I love her. I deserve her. I didn't run from her."

Suddenly, it hit me. He was talking about Amy. I didn't say anything, but instead focused on pushing his foot off my chest. Talking required breathing, and I couldn't do that at the time. He released me, only to grab my neck and jerk me up to eye level with him. It should probably be noted that Knuckles is a bit taller than me, so "eye level" was off the ground.

"You don't deserve her at all, Sonic! And I'm willing to fight to the death to have her!"

I glared at him, although inside, I was slightly nervous. The transformation to Super and back is very taxing, and I really wasn't too eager to jump into something so fast. "Knux… you wouldn't do that…"

"Try me."

"Fine." I swung a leg around and kicked him behind the knee, causing him to release his grip on me as he fell to the ground. Gasping for air and leaping to the side at the same time, I prepared to fight again. To tell the truth, I was exhausted and really didn't feel like I could battle again. But here he was, demanding it. So I lowered into a defensive crouch and waited for whatever came next.