Knuckles Chaotix: Pt 3
"Is everyone all right?" Knuckles looked around the nearly empty metal chamber. His first concern was for the lives of his friends. Seeing that they were all uninjured the echidna breathed a sigh of relief.
"We're all fine here, Knuckles." Relic replied looking around. "But what in the name of the ancient walkers just happened?"
"It was like there was a bunch of voices talkin' in my head." Vector said coldly, shivering at the memory.
"They guided me through a creepy carnival, kept tellin' me that I was worthless."
"I don't like this anymore." Charmy cried, rocking back and forth in a corner. "I wanna go home."
"I was at the carnival too, but you were all making fun of me." Mighty grumbled, grabbing his head with his hands. "The voices in my head, they drove my anger and made me want to hurt everybody."
"So, the malevolent spirits attacked each of us in our own mind, praying upon our individual weaknesses." Espio explained. "For Vector, they attacked his pride and ego. For Charmy, they poisoned his innocence with fear. For Mighty, they preyed upon his rage. And for Knuckles, they tormented him over his low self-esteem and fears of failure."
"But what about Relic?" Knuckles asked. "And how come you were not affected either?"
"I… I… think that is a story best for another time." Relic stuttered, blushing. "But I have no idea why our chameleon friend wasn't affected."
"I am an enlightened shinobi, a silent warrior of the Chun-nin kingdoms." Espio declared assuming his lotus position. "The teachings of Shinsei allow me to detract myself from negative emotions such as fear or anger."
"So, what are we going to do now?" Knuckles asked. "I want these cursed spirits off my island now."
"The spirits desire to move on, but a cursed entity is holding them here." Espio replied. "If we battle and defeat the entity, we will free them."
"Then, what are we waiting for?" Mighty asked, punching the floor. "As an astronomer would say, 'let's get out there and kick some Uranus'."
"Hahahahaha!" An evil laugh filled the room seeming to come from nowhere and everywhere. Suddenly, Charmy rose up and began floating in mid-air.
"Charmy, what's wrong?" Relic asked, putting her hand on the child's shoulder. "Are you alright?" The bee's head spun around 180 degrees, glaring at them with vacant eyes.
"Foolish mortals. You shall not leave this island… alive." A wicked voice stated.
"Witness my ultimate power." Suddenly, gold bracelets appeared on the arms of each of the group. Charmy dropped back to the floor unconscious.
"Wait, what just happened here?" Mighty asked, looking at the gold band around his left arm. "That spook giving us jewelry or something?"
"I don't know what's going on here." Knuckles snarled, running forward. "But I'm going to give that demon a piece of my mind."
"NO, KNUCKLES DON'T!" Espio called out. Without warning, the echidna was pulled backwards by an unseen force from his right wrist, flying straight into Mighty and knocking him over.
"Hey, what did you do that for!?" Mighty snapped angrily.
"Sorry, but it wasn't me." Knuckles replied. "I swear I didn't mean to do that."
"Hmm… it appears that our demon friend has tethered pairs of us together." Espio noted, taking out a handful of mystical dust from his ninja pouch. He held up his hand and blew the dust over the arm bracelets. A blue light appeared between several of the bracelets resembling an elastic cord of rope. "These bands connect us together in pairs of two. One cannot move too far away from his partner without getting pulled back. If we are to escape this nightmare, we must work together in teams."
"I'm up for that, buddy." Vector exclaimed, slapping Espio on the back. "Just as long as I get your share of the… OW!" The croc felt a spasm of pain go through his back.
"Hmm, it seems that whatever one of us feels the other one feels as well." Relic noted, looking down at the bracelet that connected her to Charmy. "We better be very careful while making our way out of here."
"That's easy. You and I will make a great team." Charmy exclaimed, bouncing up and down excitedly. "We'll clean that mean old demon's clock."
"Wait, you mean one of us does, the other is pulled along?" A big grin spread across Mighty's face as he stated. Walking over to Charmy, he pulled out a twenty mobium bill. "Hey kid, I'll give you this if you take your jacket off."
"Excuse me for a minute." Relic snapped a vein bulging out above her twitching eye. "I think I forgot to punch out." Walking straight up to Knuckles, she pulled her fist back and let it fly. "Sorry Knux, I know you'll survive this, while the jerk might not. But I want him to feel it."
"Wait, Relic, what are you…?" POW! The pika hit Knuckles in the jaw, barely fazing him. But Mighty was knocked out cold.
"That's what you get pervert." Relic grumbled adjusting her glasses. "And that's also for the time, I climbed up that ladder at the Emerald Alter and you didn't think I noticed you looking up my skirt."
"Look if the three of you are done with your drama, we gotta get out of here." Vector barked loudly getting everyone back on track.
"You're right, Vector." Knuckles agreed.
"Okay, everybody. Let's get out of here. Stay near your partner and try to avoid anything that this beast throws at us." Nodding their heads in agreement, the Chaotix crew followed Knuckle's charge out of the crypt. Racing across the dark and shadowy surface of the island, they noticed the carnival from their nightmares taking shape once again.
"OH NO, IT'S THAT SCARY DREAM!" Charmy screamed. "WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE!"
"Try to stay calm, Charmy." Relic told him. "It's in your mind and it can't hurt you."
"That's what you think." The booming voice of a figure in the sky declared. "My minions will happily crush you taking the form of old enemies pulled from your own minds." All of a sudden, the entire carnival was filled with badniks. All around them were motorbugs, buzz bombers, rollers, and penguinators.
"Oh shoot, we've never had to face this many badniks before." A worried Vector commented. "I don't know if we can get out of this alive."
"Banish fear out of your mind, friend Vector." Espio stated. "Concentrate only on the task at hand."
"Okay, boys." Mighty declared, balling up his fists. "Let's get 'em." The Chaotix leapt forward punching, spindashing, and kicking the phantom robots in front of them. Badniks roped up in to puffs of smoke as the team crushed them, but for every one they defeated three more appeared to take their place.
"Guys, there's too many of them." Mighty declared. "We can't keep this up forever."
"Wait, I got an idea." Knuckles exclaimed looking at his bracelet. "Let's turn the handicap the demon gave us into an advantage." Reaching over and picking up Mighty, he crunched the surprised armadillo down into a spindash ball.
"Knuckles, what are you doing?" The panicked Mighty asked.
"Get ready for a game of Bungee Ball." Throwing his confused friend out at the enemy, Mighty struck several of the badniks and made them disappear.
"Not a bad idea." Vector grinned. "Hey, Espio. How about a game of Crack the Whip?" Throwing his arm with the ninja attached, Espio was sent hurling straight at a whole horde of buzz bombers.
"Holy Rain of Justice!" Espio yelled triumphantly. "Kunai-No-Justu!" The ninja launched a rain of hundreds of deadly daggers straight at the badniks pushed on by the force of Vector's throw. The deadly missiles thrust all of the buzz bombers in the sky, making them vanish in a giant cloud of smoke.
"Relic look, the penguinators are closing in on the others." Charmy noted. "We gotta do something."
"I've got such the thing, Charms." Relic declared reaching into her pocket on her vest. "I have just the thing from my dig in Sarsaland. The king's princess gave it to me." Charmy nodded and threw up into the air carrying Relic. The pika pulled out a small black cherry bomb with a wind up key on the side. She turned the key until the bomb began to tick and open a pair of small white eyes. "Let's hope this thing, she gave me during the Olympic Games works." She dropped the explosive onto the penguinator. "Babombs away."
The bomb fell straight onto the mechanical birds, exploding with a loud bang and making them vanish in a great flash of light.
"We did it, we cleared the field of all these badniks." Vector pumped his fist. "Yeah."
"Vector? I don't think it's quite over yet." Espio warned. Suddenly, all of the fog and mist formed together into small black prisms. From the darkness emerged one of the creepiest things the group had seen.
"Oh my gosh, is that Tails?" Charmy asked.
"Looks like some kind of freaky doll." Mighty replied.
Slowly, the animated toy began to move towards them and the Chaotix found themselves unable to move.
"I can't do anything." Relic screamed in terror. "It's going to get us."
"This creature has overwhelmed my chi." Espio exclaimed. "I'm powerless to aid us."
"Oh no, we're all gonna die." Charmy shrieked. "Knuckles, you gotta do something!"
Remembering how he had been unable to help his friends before and the terror that this monster had put him through, Knuckles clenched his fist in a blinding rage.
"Tormented our minds, you attacked my home," Suddenly breaking free, Knuckles jumped at the living toy. "BUT YOU WILL NOT HURT MY FRIENDS!" Driving a powerful fist right into the dark prisms, Knuckles shattered it into a thousand pieces. The living toy almost seemed to scream as it was torn apart into a thousand shadowy pieces. Almost instantly, the sky overhead began clear and the carnival vanished. The sun shone down on Angel Island once more.
"Knuckles, you did it." Charmy said.
"Way to go, Knux." Vector roared giving the echidna a thumbs up.
"You were victorious, Knuckles. Well done." Espio bowed to him.
"Knuckles, I can't believe you saved us." Relic ran up and tackled Knuckles to the ground in a great big hug. "Thank you so much."
And on the breath of the wind, the Chaotix could have sworn they heard a hundred voices saying 'Thank you for saving us.'