SONIC THE HEDGEHOG - CHAPTER II
South Island only had one town on it now, in the portion of the moving island the locals referred to as the stern of the island. But there were two places on the starboard and port sides that showed other towns had been on the island in the past. Both places were reduced to ruin, one in better shape than the other, but neither suitable for habitation anymore. No one remembered who built them or when, there were no records of the society and if it weren't for the ruins no one would know such a society had ever existed in the first place.
"Have you ever been here before?" Miss Wing asked her companion Arthur.
"No, my family and I never get closer to the bow than Spring Yard. We've probably gone camping once in the last few years. We just prefer to be at home."
"Luckily for you I come here all the time." Miss Wing said as she climbed up a stone pillar.
At the moment the mongoose and hedgehog were at a place on South Island referred to as the Marble Ruins, thanks to the stone ruins scattered around. It was on the upper starboard side of the island, between the central mountain peak and the shoreline. There were pillars and archways scattered about, a paved road that was long overgrown, and underground chambers with undeciphered hieroglyphs on the walls.
"I don't see any robots around here." Arthur said, looking around.
"I bet if there are any here, they're underground, looking for something." Miss Wing thought out loud.
"Like what?"
"I don't know, but who wouldn't come here and think there's something to find around here?"
"Is it wise to stop them?" Arthur asked. "I mean, let's say you're right and there are robots down there looking for something. They're not hurting anyone and probably won't as long as they're ignored. Therefore, wouldn't the best thing to do be to leave them alone and make sure there aren't other problems that could be… out here?"
Miss Wing looked at the mongoose in confusion and surprise before an idea came to her. "You're claustrophobic, aren't you?"
"What? No, I just… really don't like being underground. It's like being buried alive." Arthur confessed.
"Then I'll go explore the underground parts and you can search up here for any problems." Miss Wing suggested.
"But what if we need to get in touch with each other?" Arthur pointed out.
Cell phones weren't exactly a thing on South Island. No one had any need for one since most people spoke in person or with their home computers. As far as Arthur knew, this was a major reason why no one had been able to contact the outside world during the initial invasion. Their home was surprisingly cut off from the rest of the world, and right now that was a bad thing.
Miss Wing reached into a backpack she had brought with her and took out two walkie-talkies. "Here, I've field tested these before so I know they work underground. Press the red button to send a message and the green to hear from the other. The yellow light will go off if I'm trying to contact you, that's when to press the green."
She handed one to him who accepted, still looking uncomfortable, but he said nothing and she went through an archway carved into a hillside, descending down some stairs. Left alone, Arthur decided his best bet was to take the high ground and look from there.
Said high ground looked like a stone tower that made him think someone tried to build a lighthouse but forgot those were supposed to be by the sea. At least it still looked structurally sound with an open door, so Arthur went inside. A spiral staircase was built into the side which he ascended, though it was much more rickety than he was comfortable with.
'Better I do this than Mina.' Arthur reassured himself, not wanting his daughter to be in danger. He didn't like how Nicky was putting himself in danger either, but with his parents gone he understood the boy's desire to take action.
Arthur Bollers was not a man who took risks, or at least not the kind that came close to life or death. He was a businessman, he owned the city's strip mall and entertainment center, making him essentially the most important man in town who wasn't part of the local government. The shops, the restaurants, the theater, the arcade, he owned them all, and he made risks based on keeping them going so people never got bored. The closest to a dangerous risk was what to do when someone decided to commit a crime, which was rare but not unheard of.
Here though, he was genuinely risking his life all to keep his family safe from a terrorist. He was scared, he'd have to be crazy not to be, but he was a father and so he had to be strong for his family. He wanted to be a man that his daughter could feel safe around, and he couldn't be that if he let her go into battle. He had to get this maniac out of his home so Mina could come back.
Arthur got to the top where he came to an open room with five windowless openings. He checked through each one to see anything that stood out.
A blast in the hillside certainly counted as that.
"Oh no! If that keeps up, she might get crushed in a cave-in!" Arthur exclaimed, grasping for his walkie talkie. "Miss Wing, this is Arthur! There are explosions on the ground above you! Get back to the surface!"
The only response he got was static.
With a mixture of a sigh and a moan, Arthur hurried back down the lighthouse.
Miss Wing, or Laura if you were her friend, did not choose this entry by accident. She had gone exploring the ruins before and knew this particular way into them well. She knew the best places to step and where to bend lower, as well as where the staircase led to. And when she got to the bottom and turned on her flashlight, she knew what was supposed to be visible.
What she got was two mechanical bats hanging from the ceiling as if keeping guard. As soon as the light shined on them they dropped down and flew at her, each preparing some kind of small firearm to attack her with.
Thinking and acting quickly, she was a hedgehog after all, Miss Wing did a jump and kicked the two winged drones away into a wall. They crashed and broke, apparently more fragile than they looked.
"Someone is down here, and I think they don't want company." She thought out loud, seeing no other reason to post sentries in here. Unless the robots just hid during the day like real bats, but the roboticizer was on the other side of the island so this was out of their way. There really was no reason for any to be here unless they were looking for something. But what?
The room she was in was some kind of entrance hall with three doorways that led to more underground passages. The left one was a dead end thanks to a cave-in long ago, and the right one led to an empty room with a stone table like some kind of meeting room, so the center one was the only one that went anywhere worth exploring. So she went down those stairs.
Going down deeper, the first thing she noticed was that it was uncharacteristically hot. Most people assumed being underground was cold, and yes at times it was, but the walls often made for a good insulator and so it didn't stay cold. But this was too warm to be normal. At the base, she found her answer.
The stairs were supposed to end at a hallway that went left and right only, with a paved stone floor that had seen better days. This was still the case, but the floor was covered in red goo that seemed to be luminescent. To her, it looked like the river of slime seen in Ghostbusters 2 except bright red, that combined with the heat coming from it almost made her wonder if this was actually lava.
'Wait, real magma is too dangerous to be this close to. This must be some kind of synthetic version, and I know for a fact it's not supposed to be here. Which means one thing..' She thought, wiping some sweat off her forehead. 'Whatever came here does not want me going any further. So either they're paranoid… or they actually found something.'
From what she recalled of this place, the slime wasn't too deep, but she wasn't eager to come into contact with it. And there were no footholds to use to get around it. Sure, the smart thing to do would be to turn around and get out of here, but she knew there was something down these halls and it had to be discovered.
From the right she saw something swimming in the slime. The light showed it to be two mechanical turtles pushing something like a minecart, with something inside she couldn't at the moment identify. They took no notice of her and continued towards the left.
'This might be my only chance.' She thought, timing a jump into the cart. The turtles continued to ignore her. Inside she saw a metallic cylinder the size of a toaster, sort of like an extra large battery without being a car battery. What it was for she could only guess, but for now she waited to see where these turtles were taking it.
The journey was slow and took several turns as well as going deeper down at one point. Miss Wing tried to mentally track it, but she didn't have a perfect memory of the ruins and so quickly got lost. Getting out of here was not going to be easy.
There was a sudden loud sound like an explosion down the hall with the cart shaking and rocks falling from the ceiling, one hitting her on the head. She winced and hissed in pain, rubbing her scalp, but the turtle robots paid the whole thing no mind.
Looking ahead she saw lights down the tunnel, like lanterns or mining lamps. From there she heard drilling and clanging sounds, like someone trying to dig through stone.
The hot slime came to a stop against a stone ledge just at the entry to a large chamber. There were several lanterns so it was bright enough to see, and Miss Wing could see some robots drilling into the wall tearing away the bricks while others were moving away the debris.
"This would be so much better if that buckethead Grounder was here instead of me." A tall robot chicken groaned, standing off to the side looking impatient. The minecart caught his eye. "Ah, good, it's here."
The chicken walked up to the minecart, prompting Miss Wing to duck inside and press herself against the side. She pushed the cylinder to the other side, hoping he wouldn't notice her if that was what he wanted.
"This should help… who are you?" The chicken said, reaching for the cylinder but noticing the hedgehog teacher huddled away.
Taking the opportunity, Miss Wing jumped out of the cart, inadvertently hitting the chicken under his beak. He fumbled back and lost his footing while she got out and away from the slime.
"How many times am I going to hit my head today?" Miss Wing grumbled, rubbing her scalp again. The drill robots surrounded her with their drills whirling, ready to attack.
The chicken robot got to his feet, grumbling and glaring. "What are you doing here? Do you know who you're messing with? I'm Model S6-1 Scratch, general of Dr. Robotnik's armada! Did you really think coming here was a good idea?"
"What are you even looking for?" Miss Wing asked.
"Buried emer… wait, why should I tell you? Capture her so we can roboticize her later!"
The drill robots ambushed Miss Wing who had no idea what to do next. Then there was a rumbling sound which made the robots stop and look up. Miss Wing and Scratch did too as the roof cracked and the stone began to slowly give way.
"Dammit I forgot! We're using bombs from the surface to dig too!" Scratch exclaimed in a panic, looking for shelter. The drill robots merely got by the wall and waited. Miss Wing dove back into the minecart and covered herself, starting to think she should have brought a helmet with her.
The ceiling gave way and crumbled apart, the chunks falling into the chamber. The cave-in was loud and dangerous, multiple drill robots were completely crushed, and part of the floor gave way under the weight and collapsed too into a sinkhole underneath. Scratch happened to be in that area and fell in too, yelling and flailing while doing so. The red slime poured into it, having a new direction to go, and slowly began to fill it up.
Dust filled the air, making it hard to see or breathe. Miss Wing coughed several times and wiped her eyes, and when she could see it was clear that the sky was now exposed. The chamber she was in must have been about twenty feet underground, so getting out wasn't impossible. The problem was what would be waiting for her when she got there.
"Ahahaha! I found it! A chaos emerald!" Scratch shouted triumphantly from below. "Wait, no! It's so small! Did it break? Oh the doctor's going to turn me into a toaster if I broke it!"
"Miss Wing!" A shout came from above ground.
"Mr Bollers?!" Miss Wing called back.
Arthur poked his head over the edge. "Good, you're here! I've been trying to contact you but the walkie talkies weren't working! This is a dangerous place to be in!"
"Yeah I kind of figured that out! Is there a rope or anything up there I can use to get out?!"
"There's a cable up here hooked up to a generator. I'll see if I can use that."
"No! Don't you dare touch that!" Scratch shouted, trying to climb back up into the room he had been in. He couldn't do it while holding the emerald he found, so he had to put it in his beak.
Up above ground, Arthur rushed to the generator and pulled at the cable. He had no idea what the generator was there to power up in the first place, but the cable was needed so nothing else mattered. When he got there though, he found what the cable was connected to, hidden behind the top of a half-buried marble pillar. It was some kind of vehicle that sort of looked like a helicopter without spinning blades. In fact he saw no means of locomotion on it whatsoever, so why was it being charged up in the first place? Didn't matter, Arthur unhooked the cable and dragged it over to the hole.
"Here you go." He said, lowering the cable into the pit.
Behind him, the vehicle's engine hummed to life and the craft rose into the air. Had Arthur been aware, he would have known it was just like the one Robotnik had used to get around. This one however moved as if on autopilot and flew past him, going down the pit.
"What was that?" Both Arthur and Miss Wing said as it passed them.
"Alright, my ticket out of here!" Scratch exclaimed, jumping into the hovercraft and zooming up to be more level with the two mobians. At this point Miss Wing was nearly halfway up the cable.
"Aha! Thought you had seen the last of me did you?" Scratch taunted. "Try this on for size!"
He pushed a button, making a cannon emerge from the base of the hovercraft that aimed at the two. He then pressed another button and the cannon shot out a ball of fire.
Miss Wing shrieked and let go for a moment, regrabbing the cable after a second, but she dropped down enough that the fireball missed her. Arthur began pulling up the cord as fast as he could. Scratch shot another fireball that just barely missed Miss Wing but did set the bottom of her dress on fire. Arthur pulled her up onto the ground and Miss Wing rolled around to put out the flames. It worked, though her dress was now several inches shorter on one side and her right leg was burned, making it hard for her to stand now.
Scratch brought the hovercraft up above ground too. "You can't outrun me now!" He shot off another fireball which set the grass on fire, limiting their options on where to run, before pushing the button again. Only nothing happened, prompting him to repeatedly press it. "Crap, why does this thing take so long to recharge between shots?"
Having this one brief moment, Arthur looked for anything he could use to fight back with. All he saw were rocks and the generator and cable. Having no better idea, Arthur took a decent sized rock and hurled it at the robotic chicken. By sheer luck more than anything, the rock got stuck in the beak and basically gagged him like an apple in a roasted pig's mouth.
Scratch yelled out muffled cries as he tried to get the rock out of his mouth, but it was proving stubborn. At the same time the fire spread, so Arthur and Miss Wing chose to run off rather than keep fighting. It hurt for Miss Wing to run, but it surely would hurt her more not to.
"We need to get back to the meeting spot." Arthur claimed.
"You'll get no argument out of me." Miss Wing agreed, the two moving to get away from the marble ruins.
Nicky found himself falling through some weird space that was filled with random colors everywhere along with blocks and orbs. His first thought was he was using a warp ring again, but instead of being pulled forward he was falling down. When he hit an orb he was immediately propelled away from it towards a block, which made him slow down enough to grab and use as a foothold.
"What is going on?" He asked.
"This is your first trial young one." Someone spoke before a figure began to shimmer into view before him out of the random colors. It soon resembled a human adult man, only he was upside down and wore clothes that looked a hundred years outdated.
"What am I supposed to do here? I'm getting a headache just looking at this place." Nicky argued.
"Hi, you can call me Cal. Reach the goal without touching any stars. Do so and you win and advance to the next trial. Fail and you'll be sent… somewhere." The upside down man said with a shrug before shimmering out of existence.
Before Nicky could object, the block he was on vanished making him fall again. He hit an orb that bounced him towards more blocks, though there was something that looked like a six-pointed star close to them. He skidded to avoid touching the star, feeling the blocks shrink under him.
"Gotta think fast." Nicky said to himself, looking around for anything that stood out. All he saw were more blocks, orbs, stars, and swirling psychedelic colors. Before the blocks disappeared he jumped off towards the nearest set, missing them. This place seemed to be affecting his depth perception. He rebounded off another orb and nearly got sent to a star, avoiding it just by flattening his body as much as possible. He passed the star and hit another orb, ricocheting him upwards.
"What's that?" Nicky thought, briefly seeing something different below him. He was spinning so he couldn't get a good look at it, but his gut told him that whatever it was, that was his goal. So he tried to make himself go towards that goal, but he was midair so all he could do was obey momentum and gravity.
So he continued to fall and rebound all over the place, trying to control his direction as best he could while avoiding those stars. It was proving to be difficult and disorienting, but in the process he got a better view of the goal. It looked like another of those big chaos emeralds, this one being red. He made a jump for it and missed, landing below it. Too far down to simply jump back up and get it easily.
"Sheesh how the heck am I supposed to win this? I'm like a living pinball here, I can barely control where I'm going anymore." Nicky complained, jumping from block to block now.
"Sounds like someone isn't trying hard enough." Cal's voice was heard, sounding as if he was right behind Nicky.
"Trying hard enough?" Nicky repeated, confused, while jumping to an orb to get to some new blocks. But he could tell he was starting to run out of footholds in this place. "Does this guy think I can fly or something?"
"Have you ever tried?" Cal taunted.
Nicky maneuvered into a lucky position, right in front of him was the red emerald, albeit surrounded by four stars. There was a single block in front of it with two orbs on either side, but the gap between him and the block was too much and he had no other way to get there. He either had to find some unlikely way up to improve his chances, or make a long jump and hope for the best.
Having no time to think it over, Nicky went for the long shot and made the long jump. He tried harder than any time he had to make long jumps in gym class, but he lacked a running start and clearly was not going to make it to the block.
'I can't fail here!' Nicky thought, being desperate and running in midair. To his surprise, he actually regained momentum and was propelled forward, landing on the block.
'What the heck? Did I just… jump in the air?' He thought, not understanding what just happened. But then he saw the red emerald and narrowed his eyes. What he did no longer mattered, he jumped for the big gem and pivoted in the air to avoid the stars, hands grasping the jewel triumphantly.
"Way to go young one. Good luck in the next test." Cal praised.
"Can't I rest firs-?" Nicky started to ask, only for everything to go white.