Chapter 36

The sun began to near the horizon behind them. At the same time, a large object neared the horizon in front of them. This was good, as they were nearing their goal. Nack checked his fuel gauge. Just enough to get there. As they got even closer to it, Jet could pick out familiar details. The walls, the tower (albeit with a chunk missing), the central palace was only just visible.

"Aaah…" He sighed warmly. "Babylon garden…"

"Don't get too comfortable." Shadow gave him a shove. "Don't get all sentimental when we get in there, we need to use you as a map."

"Fine," He grumbled.

Gaining entrance was not a problem; the entire floating island was on its side in the middle of the desert, meaning they could just ride on. They stopped in the middle of the central plaza.

"Just as well," Nack tapped the gauge. "Out of gas," He unceremoniously dumped the bike on its side. He stumbled slightly. "Whoa… incline."

"Yeah, be careful with that." Wave added casually.

"Hey, what's up with Shadow?" Shadow had fallen to his knees and was seemingly unresponsive. Jet poked him.

"Don't… poke… me…" He seethed. Jet took a step back.

"What's up? D'you wanna hand or something?" Suddenly, Shadow disappeared from sight, but a trail of glowing yellow betrayed his path. It led away from them, up to the edge of the square, and then back down. Wave turned around to see Shadow behind her, breathing heavily and quickly, and he appeared to be slightly blurred. Um… Shadow? What's happened to you?" He didn't respond. He moved his head with rapid, jerky movements. Suddenly, he vanished again, only to reappear sprawled on the ground about twenty yards up from them. The blur had vanished and he was moving normally. He picked himself up off the floor.

"Ugh… what just happened?"

"We were kinda hoping that you could tell us,"

"Well… it's like, all of a sudden, there was something gripping inside me, and then, when it let go, everything had a kind of… yellow… screen on it, or something, and you guys were all moving really slowly. It must have been like that for, what, five, maybe ten minutes?"

"Really? To us it was only 30 seconds."

"Ah." Nack looked like he had come up with something. "I think you might have encountered another one of your powers,"

"The first one being?"

"Well… not only surviving the T stuff, but coming out with a new weapon at your disposal. Now you can bend time aswell."

"Cool. I think I also got a hint as to where we need to go."

"Oh yeah? Where?" Jet asked impatiently.

"Down. It's somewhere down below, way below. It was like a secret tunnel, or something."

"Right. Unless they've redesigned the place since I was last here, we have to go through the palace to the public baths, where we can get access to the maintenance tunnels. There we should be able to get anywhere." Jet listed methodically.

"Well? What are we waiting for?" Wave jumped onto her board and through the west doorway, the wooden doors themselves lying in pieces along the wall. Jet followed, and Shadow soon joined them. Nack was left standing there.

"I have got to get me one of those things," He said as he ran after them. He skidded to a halt as something caught his eye. "He-lo…" He walked into a room that said 'Extreme Gear'.

"Try to keep up, Shads," Jet teased as he rounded another corner.

"Try not to piss me off enough that I use your neck as a grappling hook," He retorted.

"Guys… how long have we been at this?" Wave asked, concerned. Shadow looked at his watch.

"According to this it's still 5:30. Frigging slow watch…"

"No, your watch is right, it's just that we've gone east three or four time zones, so it's later here."

"Still, we should probably stop racing and start finding a way down?"

"But racing is fun!" Jet complained.

"The woman said STOP RACING!" Shadow yelled as he kicked Jet from his board. Jet flew a few metres before landing on the ground hard. He skidded about a hundred metres before stopping at a rock. He was bleeding from his beak. Wave stopped next to Jet and had a look at him. As soon as she was sure that he was okay, she turned back to Shadow, who had stopped fifty metres behind them.

"Shadow, what the fuck? What was all that about? You could have kicked him into a torch, or something sharp, you could have killed him!"

"I apologise for nothing!" He called back.

"Bastard…"

"Oy, what happened to him?" Nack stopped next to Jet and Wave on an airbike."

"Where'd you find that?"

"Just lying around." He hopped off. "I believe we have some places to be?"

"So who wants to drag Jet?"

"I call not it!" Shadow said playfully as he ran up to join them.

"If anything, you deserve to carry him because you nearly killed him!"

"You're going to trust him to the guy with a weed-whacker for an arm?"

"Good point."

"Strap him on his board and tow the board."

"Hmm. Good idea, Nack. Shadow, go find his board."

Shadow grumbled as he walked away.