Chapter 18: Refraction
The damn crystal wall dragged on endlessly in both directions. When he looked back it was exactly the same as looking forwards. Nothing changed. Not at all.
Sonic had tried running again, racing along that green solid barrier he couldn't get through. It didn't help. No matter how fast and long he ran, he didn't seem to make progress. Had he been lost before, now he was stuck as well. Caught in a cage he couldn't even see, without bars to try smashing.
When hours of running didn't help him at all, growing desperation got Sonic to try breaking out again, spin dashing himself into the wall repeatedly. Like the first time, it was fruitless.
Now he lay on his side on the floor in front of the wall, numbly gazing at it. He had exhausted himself and was beginning to think it didn't matter what he tried to escape from this crazy place.
I'm stuck. No matter what I try, I don't get any closer to getting out of here.
The wall blurred again, the green melting away to reveal the image of what looked like one of Eggman's mad research labs. In the middle of it, something that could be a large force field of sorts concealed something that was glowing in blindingly bright light. Next to it, on a board with control screens, emergency alerts flashed 'OVERLOAD' in neon letters. For a moment, Sonic could see a figure next to the force field, then it too was glowing in blinding brightness, then the whole image blew up, the shards of it scattering against what looked like the other side of the mysterious wall.
For a moment Sonic stared, then nothing happened, and the hedgehog was about to turn away when a new image flashed up, this time showing a mountain slope covered in snow.
Sonic groaned and rolled over, facing away from it. The weird reflections had shown him various seemingly random things, rarely even something he remembered seeing before. But the picture of a beautiful mountain zone, probably with people skiing and having a blast wasn't what he wanted to see right now.
'Cause if this keeps up I'm not skiing anywhere again. I'm a prisoner in a freaked-out place and I don't even know how I got here.
Maybe he'd never see his friends again. Or the outside world. The real world, with normal sky and sun and trees and…
Sonic swallowed dryly, the uncomfortable lump back in his throat. What if I never get out?
He blinked slowly. He'd never thought he'd think like that…
It's impossible. Knuckles shook his head to himself for the hundredth time. It just can't be. No-one can be inside the Master Emerald. How would you even get there? No, you just can't be inside the Master Emerald, no way.
But… Tikal was inside there. And Chaos, too.
Knuckles groaned. He'd been to the point already, several times even. He knew that Tikal, an Emerald priestess from a far past, had in an act of desperation sealed herself along with the water creature Chaos into the Master Emerald. She had thought it the only way to stop Chaos' mad anger from destroying the world.
But Sonic is not like her. How could he seal himself into the Master? And why would he do that?
The echidna shook his head. Sonic had done many mad things in the time Knuckles knew him, but nothing that mad. The only person mad enough to do something like that would be Dr. Eggman or someone of his mindset.
What if Eggman or someone else sealed Sonic into the Mater Emerald? Again, Knuckles shook his head. Would Eggman even know how to do something like that? Aside of a few attempts years ago, he hardly bothered with the Master and preferred taking the Chaos Emeralds for his crazed schemes.
But the idea wouldn't leave the echidna alone again. The Chaos Emerald had revealed it. What if the Master's message, one it kept trying to communicate to Knuckles in various ways for almost a week, what if this message really was 'Sonic is inside the Master Emerald'?
What was he going to do now? If Sonic really was inside the Emerald, purely hypothetically speaking… could his presence be the reason for the Master's energy feeling different, which led to Knuckles himself feeling odd… and maybe having enough troublesome influence that Knuckles had had such problems understanding the Emerald's message?
He can't be inside the Emerald. He just can't. Knuckles looked up at the Master Emerald's shining form. What if he is? The image from the vision came back to Knuckles, the image of Sonic standing there, desperately trying to get through that wall. Desperately trying to get out?
Knuckles shook himself. He had to get him out if he really was in there. He was his friend! And even if he weren't… He was the guardian. Could he leave someone inside his Emerald if they were stuck there?
The guardian's job was to protect the Master Emerald and the Chaos Emeralds from harm and abuse, but it was also to prevent that the Emeralds didn't cause harm themselves. Would Sonic be harmed by being trapped inside the Master? Knuckles grimaced unhappily. He'd not looked exactly content with his situation, had he?
Unsurely the guardian looked at the Master Emerald. But how am I to get him out? I can't just break the Master! Knuckles sank down on the stairs, head in his hands. He didn't know what to do at all.
He didn't know when he'd fallen asleep. Actually, he only realized that he must have fallen asleep in the first place when he awoke curled up on the hard ground, stiff and aching and still tired.
Sonic groaned, sitting up just because the floor was uncomfortable to lie on. He rubbed his eyes and righted his quills carefully, stretching a little but not really motivated to stand up and go anywhere. It was not that he really could go anywhere. At least, he'd failed to arrive anywhere yet.
Yesterday's desperation had lifted only slightly and Sonic sat and just stared blankly at the green wall before him. He hated that thing…
As if it felt irritated by his disliking for it, the green stirred again and shifted away like it used to when it was about to show one of its randomly spouted image sequences. Sonic didn't look away this time, he just hugged his knees to his chest and rested his chin on them, gazing at the forming picture.
A second later, a red echidna was staring back at him. The green tint had not disappeared entirely this time, just turned almost transparent. Behind it, the echidna stood with his arms folded on his chest, a thoughtful frown on his face. And he was still looking right at him.
"Knuckles? Hey, Knuckles!" Sonic stood and waved his arms. Could he see him? "Knux!"
The echidna, his red fur looking odd through the green layer between them, leaned closer still frowning and now squinted his eyes as if searching for something too small or too far away to see properly.
"Knuckles?" Sonic hurried up directly to the crystal wall, leaning his hands against it and moving his face so close to it his nose all but pressed against the cool surface. "Knuckles, I'm stuck here!"
His friend was still looking straight at him. His lips moved, but Sonic couldn't hear anything of what he was saying. The echidna reached out a hand and the flat palm of his large hand brushed against what looked like the other side of the glass. For another second he looked right at Sonic, then he retracted his hand and turned away.
"No, don't go!" Sonic pounded his fists against the wall. "KNUCKLES!"
The guardian faltered, turned back around, looked at him again.
Sonic stared back for just a moment. He can hear me. I don't know where I am or where he is, but he can hear me. "Knuckles, listen. I'm caught in some really weird place and I can't get out!"
Knuckles tilted his head, again reaching out for the wall, but his image was blurring away, the colors fading into the default green.
"No! He could hear me! Give me back that – hole! You… damn… stupid… crazy… wall…"
The wall didn't listen and already the picture of his friend had vanished completely. Sonic let his forehead drop against the cool surface. No. "He could have helped me maybe. Why do you hate me, wall?"
The wall was silent and Sonic closed his eyes. I'm screwed…
The afternoon sun was reflecting in the Master Emerald's glazing facets. Knuckles stood up; he'd sat in front of it on the hard stone so long he felt stiff all over. Hours had passed, he'd meditated and thought and stared into the Master's green glow.
He was still staring at it now, but the anxiety had driven him to his feet. What am I gonna do? Please, Master Emerald, Controller of Chaos, tell me what I'm supposed to do now…
The large gemstone sparkled in the sunlight. Knuckles rested his palm against it, wincing as his hand felt still sore, and sighed. Please….
The Emerald's glow increased in intensity and Knuckles felt gentle warmth at his hand and the sting the Chaos Emerald had left there faded into a soft and familiar feeling that spread from his hand to his entire body. A strange calm washed over the echidna for a moment, then the picture of Sonic and the wall flashed before him again.
"You… really want me to do it…?"
The Emerald's light had reduced to its idle glowing and the sensation it had cast over him was gone. Knuckles looked at it for a long moment, the memory of the vision and dreams clear in his mind. He went through his thoughts again, everything he'd gone over in the past hours.
I have to do it… I have to save Sonic and I have to save the Master Emerald. Knuckles fisted his hand. If he was right, both of them were in risk.
For almost a minute the red echidna stood gazing at his reflection in the Master Emerald, then he became suddenly aware of his fisted hand. Unsurely he looked at it. Can I really do that, just because I think Sonic's in it?
The Emerald's energy gave another pulse that echoed in Knuckles' ears and he harshly realized how off-tune it sounded. "I'll do it," he said, more to himself than the Emerald. He needed to hear the decision to be sure of it. "I'll do it," he repeated, more firmly this time.
He flexed his fingers. Prepared to do it, to break the Emerald. Now. But ... what if this was wrong? What if he was doing the wrong thing, what if he didn't understand the message correctly?
Long minutes passed and Knuckles went through everything again, everything that had happened since he'd come back to the floating island. How he'd thought he was sick, how he'd zoned out, how the Master's energy felt different and wrong, the nightmares he'd had, what the Chaos Emerald had shown him.
Again, he looked at the Master Emerald, at his clenched fist, at the Emerald. He drew a slow breath. He'd made his decision, hadn't he?
For a second the guardian closed his eyes and something akin to a prayer flashed through his mind. Please, let this be the right thing to do. What'd he do if he broke the Master because of a phantasm…?
No. What would be if he wasn't falling for something like a hallucination was worse than a broken gemstone, no matter how powerful and sacred. He was the guardian. And the guardian's job was to not only protect the Emeralds from abuse. It was rather, in the original idea, about protecting people by protecting the Emeralds. But the Emeralds could not be put above people. Never. That wasn't the idea. It had never been.
Knuckles nodded to himself, doubt pushed aside. He tightened his fist a little more, exhaled, and punched.
