PoC: I own no material except for the mildly inventive plot. And I while I do find this scuffle amusing I do think you two have a story to comment on.
Silver: He kicks cats!
Metal: He's easy to trick!
PoC: Neither of which I find surprising in the least. Now would be it too much to ask for some relative commentary for a change?
Silver: Gee I uh…don't know where THAT came from but… Let's see I was about…five or something when it happened so I don't recall any details, and I don't remember being raised by any blood-tied family or nothing so…
Metal: *Smacks the pigment-less hedgehog* Moron! He meant 'relative' as in related to the story! THIS story!
Silver: *Thinks too hard* Well since it's about Sonic characters that makes sense, but I don't see what this story has to do with my relatives exactly. Unless you've got a weird back-story that somehow sheds rational light on my *proceeds to ramble on*
PoC: There you have it folks, yet another therapeutic explanation by Dr. Silv.
Metal: *Applauds slowly*
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Suffering the Children
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Speedy crisscrossing on a rocket propelled crab, the type of thing you remember to forget the next time you swap school-ditching tales with your best friends. Being young didn't stop Amy from grasping the sort of madness she was in for when she chose to take up this pointless premonition-chasing, alongside a girl she hardly knew no less. So far her quest had intensified her fear of the said visions up the yin-yang, adding to some inexplicable guilt over being unable to alter their course. But hey, why be down-mouthed about it? After all, what could be more fun than seeing your nightmares play out in person?
Here she was, whining about her circumstances again, but realistically, acting out a panned out ploy of self-reassurance, like she had with Maria countless times, was not going to be enough to keep her doubts at bay forever. Truthfully, she had meant every single confidant word when she said it. Only now had she begun to appreciate the gravity of their scary situation.
What in the world were they thinking? What so a couple of kids heading towards a hellish hotspot of nightmares come true is suddenly a good thing? Even if they arrive in time to witness her terrors made real, they might be getting right in the middle of a sensitive situation best handled by the 'adults'. It went without saying that children, well-intentioned or not, had a tendency to become the staple hostages for any evil-doers that would likely be on-site. Such a fantastic idea…
Without warning, Maria snapped a few switches and gizmos, causing their ship to power down with a mechanical sigh. Before the hedgehog girl could voice her concern, Maria leaned over the ship's edge and asked "Amy…do you know anyone that has a tusk affixed above their nose, a wrist encircled by jagged objects, and a cochlea-shaped rear appendage?"
English Maria, speak English. Technical language barriers aside, the young hedgehog did try to make sense of the blond girl's curious description. Facial profiles of the oddest people flashed through her head, but none came close to whatever Maria's quirky imagination had conceived. Asking her to clarify did add 'purple-skinned' and 'golden-eyed' to the mix, uselessly compounding Amy's headache as a side-effect. So far they had an 'alleged' sighting of a single-tusked, yellow-eyed, purple beast with thorny wrists and a…co-clear, whatever that is, tail. Long-term sanity must not run strong in the Robotnik family.
"Oh shoot, duck!" Maria leveled her shout down to a harsh whisper, having accidently attracted the mystery mobian's unwanted attention. At her command the two scared girls hunkered low into their conspicuous vehicle. Amy wondered what good this laughable attempt at concealment would do, seeing as how no fool could miss the looming crab-like monstrosity they rode in. She stood partially corrected when the ship apparently vanished while still remaining in a 'material' state. Obviously a member of the Robotnik clan would be smart enough to have a cloaking device handy. But how clever would this tact be if the purple fellow had already noticed them?
Who cares for fright when you have terror gripping you by the arm…literally. Seized by a heart-stopping ambush, Amy lost her ability to adequately fight back. Maria either made matters slightly better or terribly worse, depending on the perspective, when she activated or sicced her 'pet' on their, as of yet identity-less, attacker. The purple person was soon pinned to the ground by an invisible pincer, but remained otherwise unharmed. Amy let out several staggered breaths in response to Maria's 'are you okay' and 'did he hurt you' sort of inquires.
Having dispensed with her friend's checkup, the blond girl knelt down to get a better look at their assailant. There was no doubt that this fellow, chameleon to be exact, was of the lethal kind, owing to his small arsenal of every sharp tool imaginable. Amy meanwhile inspected his ugly mug, anticipating a sick grin or some other vile expression to be plastered on his scaly face. She instead found him to be actually, barring his strain from being brutishly held down, quite handsome and noble-looking, for a nasty kidnapping reptile of course. Moreover he seemed to be in shock and mild dismay, almost as though he regretted his recent sneak attack. The little hedgehog tried to get such a silly notion out of her head, but she couldn't fully ignore the strong gleam of honesty that shone in his reptilian eyes. Had their rough encounter really been an innocent mistake?
Amy came to her senses, shaking off any thoughts of going soft on this bad guy. They hadn't come this close to Maria's home to allow some cold-blooded monster to get the jump on them. Resting assured of her stand, Amy put on her 'sour-lemon' look and said "Okay tough guy, just what kind of awful things are you up to? Didn't your mother ever teach you to keep your hands to yourself?"
The lizard gasped loudly while attempting to pry the still-invisible claw off his painfully compressed lungs. Maria, Heaven help her gentle heart, couldn't bear seeing the violet mobian suffer, so she ordered her creation to loosen it's hold enough to give the poor prisoner air. Coughing aggressively at first, the chameleon ended the fit by inhaling audibly. Unfortunately, he still hadn't enough breath to explain himself before the three heard a rustling in the nearby greenery.
"Espio!" a lively shout rang out with startling clarity, tipping off the stranger's identity to a very devoted, if now a bit star-struck, Amy. No one else had such a spunky, cocky, and, at least nowadays, MANLY voice like that! Withholding her urges became increasingly torturous when the big blue hedgehog himself came into view. He hadn't noticed her yet, evidently too vigilant in his search for this 'Espio' person. Well if her idol was seeking out a friend, how could she NOT offer all the help she could? Before that though, would it be sooo wrong to introduce herself using the element of surprise? Nonsense, as any sensible guy would simply love being ambushed by one of his adoring fans.
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*Between Amy's crosshairs…or 'With Sonic'*
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It wasn't like his ninja partner to wander off without prior warning. In fact, it was Espio that decided staying together should be one of the 'golden rules' of their journey, so then where the heck had he gotten off to? Shortly after checking Robotnik's downed mobile, Sonic had lost himself in his important phone call to Amethyst, noticing only after hanging up that Espio was long gone. He had enough sense to make the brief trek back to camp to ask Shadow and Rouge to join the search. The darker hedgehog, however, was quick to remind him that if they all got lost no one would be around to signal and meet up with Vector, should he show up. The annoyed cobalt hero couldn't help but feel a bit like the company babysitter, as supposedly only he was fit to track down anyone that got captured, imprisoned, lost. Etc.
Heading back into the forested zone, he paused again by the ship's remains. If this was a trap, made the lurker that bumped off big Robo, it most definitely was not of the subtle sort. Sonic let his emerald eyes trace the ground for any hint of Espio's trail. Feeling like he'd been drawn right into a Thriller Action/Horror film, the blur swore he could see eyes flickering at him within the densely covered woods. Each closer inspection turned out to only be a trick of light made by the new shreds of sun piercing past the trees. After a few of these incidents had passed, he had about convinced himself that nothing was wrong, when the sound of quivering leaves caused his pointed ears to twitch. No wind that he knew of was capable of such selective disturbance. No, he was certainly being followed by someone…or something.
Now was not the time to be dreaming up random mythical creatures or nonsense. Sonic bravely moved to follow the noise's source, knowing that it just might lead him to the person/thing that had snagged his lizard pal. Stepping cautiously around a few brittle twigs, the hedgehog pulled a few branches aside to reveal…
"SOOOONIC!" the monster screamed in it's horrifying, youthful voice. Temporarily stunned by the beast's dreaded 'fan-squeal', the pink-quilled demon launched a vicious hug attack against the helpless hero. Restrained and captured in her clutches, the fallen hedgehog champion sighed and admitted his pitiful defeat.
"Amy…what are you doing all the way out here?" Sonic rightly asked, vaguely recalling that this Amy had parents that would be worried sick about her. His question went unanswered as the little hedge-girl was busily tightening her death-grip on him. Oddly though, something didn't feel right about her reaction to seeing him. Her previous shout sounded more desperate and relieved than just merely happy to see him, plus her hug felt like the kind her other self would give him when she thought he had died.
Patting her head comfortingly, Sonic spoke again "Amy, you can tell me what's going on later, okay? But right now I need to know something." Her pink face looked up and nodded. Sonic strove to not notice how needy she looked while he asked "Have you seen a purple lizard guy that's about yea tall, and has a silly yellow horn where his nose should be?"
If her bulged eyes and wide open mouth didn't let the cat out of the bag, her pointing and wordless babbling was doubtlessly doing the trick. Sonic hurried to discover what had left Amy so incoherent, missing entirely her explosions of suppressed laughter.
Tearing open the place his admirer had emerged from led him to truly ridiculous sight: Espio, the self-proclaimed fearsome assassin, a title Sonic more and more began to question, lay effortlessly subdued by an easily recognizable blond haired girl he'd met a decent time ago. Losing what little respect he had for the tough-talking ninja, Sonic covered his chuckles with one hand while waving the scene off with the other.
Espio, in pseudo-psychic moment, understood just what the otherworldly hedgehog was thinking, and naturally worked quickly to deny it "Sonic! I'm not being-I didn't get-She wasn't able to-THIS IS NOT WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE!" sadly his prideful preservation failed to convince anyone of anything. Worse yet, he was promptly forgotten when Maria rushed forward to cheerily greet Sonic.
The three shared a good-natured reunion until tough but necessary questions arose regarding what had happened since their last meeting. Sonic had hoped the routine of breaking rough news had ended with Amethyst, but now it seemed his crew was in for a whole myriad of rugged revelations. Maria too was reluctant to expose all that she knew right away, leading Sonic to make a suggestion.
"Since you guys are here I think we all better head back to camp. We'll talk once everyone's together, cool with you guys?" The two girls found no argument with his plan; however, Sonic had a sudden cluster of realizations hit him at once. What did this Maria know about Shadow, and how would she react to seeing him? Does she know what happened to her cousin? What would either of them think of Tails being captured? Things were getting out of control as is without these two showing up out of nowhere, now Sonic felt his crew had become even more vulnerable.
"I really hope this doesn't end with more victims for that hazy psycho." he mused and led the pair by a route separate from the smoking wreckage. They were going to have to take this thing in baby-steps to avoid a needless panic. All he could do for now was get them back safely, and pray that the rest blows over smoothly.
"Okay well that's great! FINE! I'll just lie here until you're finished! IT'S NOT LIKE I'M UNCOMFORTABLE OR ANYTHING!" hollered out a still-captive Espio.
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*Elsewhere*
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What a…beautiful place. Could this be where he thought? No it had to be, not another single place on the islands ever shined as brilliantly as this lake. But how did he get here? Hadn't he been somewhere gloomy and decaying? But then if he had, why couldn't he remember it?
"A dream?" Tails wondered, veritably confused by what he was seeing. Not that the real location was any less wonderful than the genuine article, but it seemed too magnificent to be real. The sky and trees glowed with an ethereal light, leaving all but the most pronounced details, such as the nearby Ivory Mountains, lost in a misty blur. Assuming this was a dream, it had to be the best one he'd ever had, for the sweet floral gusts of wind alone were enough to ease him to the core.
"Alright this is just strange. What-" he halted his 'thinking out loud' when he saw her, him, no them. There stood his companions, Sonic and Amethyst, looking over the lake's edge. What really caught his eye was not the pair, but specifically Sonic. Here he looked shorter, stouter, and 'bluer' if that was the word. Come to think of it, when had he not appeared this way? Tails disturbingly found his memory to be as foggy as his surroundings.
The fox ignored this and headed right for the two. Even as he ran up they turned to meet him face-to-face, both smiling, though in a way that did not rub him as friendly. Puzzled by why either would send him mixed messages, he called out for them. To his surprise his voice failed to carry, as if it had been swallowed into the open air. Struggling to regain his missing vocals, Tails saw his 'friends' smile more broadly, seemingly amused by his misfortune.
"You have no control. Your body has become his plaything." The vulpine cringed at their happy, distorted tone and voices "You needn't feel lonely, for soon your friends will be his as well."
He no way of knowing what they, whoever these creepy imposters were, meant by that. None of it mattered anyway, as the scenery, along with their phony grins, was suctioned into the background in a physics-bending manner. Total darkness lasted all but a second before 'reality' gradually sharpened around him, until he could almost see where he had been flung to. This new place was a sort of silvery-blue facility with an industrial undertone, but had no indication of heavy machinery or technology. Tails' fuzzy thoughts barely could make out any refined details; still, he thought he caught a glimpse of a person in red kept behind a secure structure. Hoping to get a closer view was useless as his body didn't seem to heed him.
"I'm completely…numb. Why can't I feel anything?" His concerns mounted when his head turned involuntarily towards a figure that, while he couldn't match a single name to it's hazy face, made him boil with hatred. The person then walked/floated nearer, near enough to make Tails' fur stand on end.
"Welcome to your new home, my puppet."
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*With Sonic's team*
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Too late to back out? He'd hoped not, for Sonic had no bright method in mind to make the dreaded introductions less of an emotional train-wreck. For this reason he vowed when he got back home to put a major lockdown on all tears and sad faces. This world had offered enough angst to merit a life of anti-suicide classes and, part of which he was still considering, intense psychotherapy. Joking about the future professional help or not, the hero wasn't sure he wanted to go through with this plan if it meant another delay before they could rescue Tails. He knew they had problems, heck they all did, but right now his friend was suffering terribly while they wasted precious time being weepy and whiny. Unable to go through with any further hold-ups, Sonic spun a one-hundred eighty to make his point, but discovered both his loyal fan and the 'undead' Robotnik girl to be missing. The blur amped up to his high-alert mode, fearing they had been whisked away under his very nose, until he heard a meek nearby voice speak.
"S-Shadow?" Uh-oh, that tore it for sure. However unlikely it was, Maria had somehow snuck out of his sight, probably during his deep focus on personal matters, and into Shadow's presence. Knowing he no longer had power over the scenario, Sonic resigned himself to watching how the soap opera would unfold. Much to his curiosity, when the hero did finally find them, the duo were locked in a tear-free embrace while adorning small but heartfelt smiles (seeing Shadow smiling was going to be his nightmare fuel for years to come).
Sonic watched his black and crimson counterpart rejuvenate spiritually as he said "Maria, my dear sister. I guess I caused you a great deal of pain in my absence. Will you ever forgive me for my recklessness?" For a millisecond, the hero saw a little bit of 'real Shadow' in that last sentence, causing him to wonder if these two had more in common than he at first thought.
Maria moved to point harshly at Shadow, much like how one would reprimand a disobedient child "Listen up, I don't mind you being as happy as you like, but I'll not have this despairing over something you think you did wrong, to me or anyone else. Right now I'm just overjoyed to see you safe and sound." After saying this, she hugged her 'brother' once again. Sonic watched in awe as the tiny bit of darkness Shadow had melted away, leaving behind a much kinder and wiser looking hedgehog in its stead. So if Maria was alive in his world, would his Shadow have become like this Shadow?
Letting go of each other, Maria felt compelled to tease "But just so you know, I WILL spend here to eternity scolding you for being the careless, blockheaded, rodent sibling you are." Shadow's chest rose and fell rapidly, showing Sonic twice in a row that the faker, despite his consistent brooding, was indeed capable of laughter.
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End of Chapter Thirty-four
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So my delay was extended, but then so was the length ). There's little for me to say this chapter, so I'll get right to the point to avoid making you guys wait any longer.
DanceDream: No worries at all. Feeling bad is half the POINT of reading this story! Mwahahaha! No I have been on the depressive side of things too long. I'm glad I could make you week then :). I actually felt the same way the time you asked for my prayers and I hadn't updated. I felt so bad that I tried to get the chap up sooner to reply (but, true to form, ended up being a day late :( ). Thank you again for your unwavering support :D
Ghostkid33: Ugh tell me about it. I'm getting killed for time too and just in the school shtuff. I couldn't leave him out forever so I used to Tikal to push his arse back in, old person style (okay sorry if that sounded wrong -_-')! Amethyst is as tough as the stone she's named after (right that sounded strange too, didn't it XD). I really want to get this meeting up shtuff over and done with soon, but I can't bring myself to rush it.
Serenity: I know you support me even when you haven't time to comment. Sorry for delaying Rise as long as I have. I assure you that I haven't given up on it, not by a long shot.
Infamousplot: Though slightly unrelated, your comments on my other story were most uplifting (in fact they were part of the reason I got back to work), so I thank for them. I have no doubt you will catch up soon enough, and I'm still looking forward to your projects as they arise.
Kindra Mckleen: If you add up the fact that Knuckles, somewhere along the way, did something bad to Rouge and resorted to deeds that Vector and co. didn't approve of, you can see why Tikal is punishing him. Another connection comes from this chapter actually when you consider that Shadow and the other Shadow have something of a tie (hint hint XD).
knight of the windZ10Z: Yes I actually hinted to my planned epilogue with that ending line (tell this to no one XD). Knuckles is riding the neutral rail right now, and will be for the most part (a guy like him can never be truly 'good'). No Tikal is anything but evil, thankfully. Sonic grows as he goes XD. And joy of all! Shadow got himself some dialogue! *Shoots off confetti popper*
Sierra Zanimalini14: If not for the action then for the drama of the matter (not that I have a taste for MELOdrama [emphasis on the 'melo']). Final battles occurring in approximately four chapters to possible six! And with the Pen's inconsistency you can be sure of nothing! XD Ah it is what it is. Oh and I know I have a story of yours to read DX! I can't expect respect if I don't offer it in return.
Super Shadix 520: It's been rough wrapping all this up and I know some inconsistencies are inevitable, given my still highly imperfect skill-level. I wish I had more time to plan all this out, but can't ask for what I don't have sadly :(. Heh, but you know I'll compensate somewhere and act nothing's wrong XD.
Sparkling-nexis137: Hey hey, you KNOW all my characters are mucho bi-polar (sorry if I offend anyone with that joke) XD. I don't know why but I told myself I had to include her somewhere in this story when I began it. I also wanted Knuckles to have a chance at redemption for his crappy attitude (I like the echidna guy too much for that XD).
prowerboy: I like full-circle events, even I don't do it flawlessly. I want the story to have some good lasting value to the people that read my stuff. I'm really flattered that you hold me in high regard. It convinces me that I've taken a firm step towards accomplishing my goal or being a decent writer, so thank you again :).
draco'sfairmaiden: Thank you. I wanted to her to add something productive to the plot, besides the typical "I need time to recover and cry about it first". Not that I have the time for that anyway XD!
Cut Productions: You had to wait a while I know, but this should be enough to make up for lost time, or so I hope anyway XD. Glad to know you people still follow this :)
DarkTailzFox: Here I am at last! It took time, but I have arrived better late than never! Hopefully I haven't lost anything in my absence.
Corian: Thanks! Any support is extremely helpful to me.
Killingkathy2?: Sans the question mark, did I get your name right or did I foul it up somehow? I don't know if you commented last chap, but I'm still eagerly awaiting your feedback on this one :)
No line on the horizon: I'd like to know what you think of this chapter as well. The action portions are at a low still, but you and others know that's how my story goes. Hope you find this chapter more appealing than the last!
Until next time!