Disclaimer: I do not own any of the recognized characters or gameplay patterns within this fanfiction. Sonic the Hedgehog, Tails, Eggman, Blaze, and all related characters of such are owned by SEGA.
Exertion 4.1
Five bags each, Blaze had counted. Each one contained more than enough food or water to get them through a couple of days, until they found another source. It was heavier than she'd thought it would be. She had them bound to her back and shoulders so when she ran, because she would at some point have to run, it would only help her with her acceleration rather than slow her down. Tails, too, had his bags in much the same way. Closer to his lower spine though, so when he flew with his tails he'd be more evenly balanced.
And yet, as they went off the first day, neither of them were running or flying. They kept the Mountain on their right, the earth elemental that inhabited it as far away from them as possible. The sun was to their left, barely starting to turn the sky orange as it went.
They were walking, occasionally jumping around to avoid the more swampy parts of the forest that had developed around them. Tails had always flown through this area, rather than Blaze who had unfortunately crossed it so many times she'd almost memorized where the worst spots were.
It wasn't a true swamp, truth be told. It was a muddy mess, where the soft mud would look solid but swallow in everything that landed on it. Grasses grew on it, and while those were more solid they were still unable to be walked on.
The sun started to rise on their left side, and with its light they could see the outline of the Mountain, and far off in the distance they could see the mountain ranges that they would have to cross. The forest was the most dangerous part at the moment. Most of the wildlife had managed to avoid them so far, or they'd managed to avoid them. But still they heard the sounds far off in the distance, the sounds of cracking branches, the sound of water rushing by that didn't belong to a river or stream.
More than once they came across a long wet line that had almost sheared a tree in half. The further south they went, the more dangerous this world seemed, which was odd considering that north was the leviathan.
Tails stopped again, for the third time that hour, as he hooked up the tablet for another map screen. The first time he'd done it, Blaze had almost gotten annoyed seeing that it took nearly fifteen minutes, but by now the fox had gotten it down to only five. Much more manageable, in Blaze's opinion, considering they were in dangerous territory with no idea what lay out there.
The map was slowly coming along though, Blaze had to admit. It only pinged things in a half mile radius, generally looking for things like elevation or ruins. They hadn't encountered any of the latter yet, but were starting to run into various elevation changes. First it was uphill, then down, followed by a valley...each one encountered with a sea of green and bushes.
Lots of bushes, more than one had grabbed at Blaze's jacket, threatening the rest of it. It was already less than a quarter of what was originally there, and she wasn't comfortable showing her midriff as she was doing now. The small red specks from where various brambles and thorns had ripped into her side proved why. Tails, too, wasn't doing much better, the white fur on his stomach stained with a bit of red already.
It was a good thing that they had decided to make more of that healing paste. They'd need it, by the end of just today, let alone the end of the journey. It would be days, Blaze knew, before they'd make it to the mountains unless they rushed. And in a forest like this, they weren't going to.
But as the trees thinned out, Blaze's hoped came up. "Anything on the map?" she asked as Tails walked alongside her, the tablet busy making another map. Tails had tested out the battery fairly well, although it was still shocking to her that it held up even half as well as it did.
"Clearing ahead," Tails announced as he took a quick look. "We might be able to get a decent run in," he finished. He whirled his tails and let loose through the grove of forest. Blaze blinked, before she rolled her eyes and followed. He wasn't going as fast as she knew he could go, and she was able to keep up at a steady pace without any issues. The trees, despite their size and frequency, were easy to dodge out of the way. It was the small bushes and brambles that threatened them, and they'd spent long enough in the forest to know the warning signs of a large bush reaching out for their blood.
Blaze blinked as suddenly the trees thinned out more, and the dirt and fallen branches that were so common became grasses and clover. The ground was solid, and she had to let her eyes adjust to the influx of light.
It wasn't just a clearing. The forest had officially ended, and the mountains were on the other side of it, a large plains that held flowers and grasses alike. They breezed in the wind lightly, and Blaze felt it brush over her fur easily. Tails stood next to her, staring out at it just the same. It was featureless, with small hills dotting it, but mostly it was just a straight shot without any seeming dangers.
"Race?" Tails smirked. "To the other side?" he suggested. Blaze nodded, and within moments the two of them had taken off. The fires that Blaze used to boost herself would cause problems if her speed wasn't so great, putting out any fire that tried to start.
She was thrilled to be able to run for the first time since the lake. Fully, truly, run. The grasses fell beneath her feet, and she felt the wind on her face caused by both her speed and the heat. The rolling hills were perfect for her to run on, and Tails wasn't much farther behind, him slip streaming into her flames and wake.
The plains were a solid brown, small aspects of green in the grasses stalks, but otherwise taken over by their buds. It looked a bit like wheat, Blaze had thought, but if anything she was more grateful for the opportunity to stretch her legs. The flowers gave it some color, but by the time she noticed it they were already long past.
The hills went up, and down, and more than once she spun around to see Tails doing some fancy trick off of the top of the hills. Despite the weight of their packs, they were still who they were at their heart. Blaze felt her flames grow inside, begging to be used, and she saw no reason she couldn't let go, and go even faster.
The plains flew from under them, stretching on for miles and miles towards the mountains. There was at least sixty or seventy miles of nothing but this grass, and Blaze was not going to let that go to waste. She called on her flames to go faster, to speed up even more, when Tails grabbed at her hands.
"We gotta hurry!" he yelled. Blaze blinked in surprise. Why? She was having a good time, there was no reason to-. She looked behind her, and realized what he was talking about. Somewhere along the plains, there had been creatures there. The one chasing them now looked a giant mole with a drill for a face, its claws thick and gangly, and of course it was nearly six times their size. And it wasn't that fast, but as she looked around she realized there were a lot of them. Surrounding them.
"Of course! I almost forgot where we were for a second!" She yelled sarcastically as she jumped on top of one of the moles that decided to emerge from the ground in front of her. She landed on its head, and avoided the claws that would've raked her if she hadn't jumped off just in time.
The further they went, the more there were. Both Tails and her had to cancel their speed, instead having to focus on their jumps. Except Tails, who could fly, as Blaze really didn't want to be carried above these things. She had to duck and struck out with a lance of flame as the moles jumped above her, landing right behind her. They could jump, too. Right out of the ground. Of course.
Now that they had to slow down, Blaze could see them catching up easy. They were surprisingly fast for their size, each throw of their massive claws ripping and tearing up the earth and pushing them forward tens of feet. Their drill face was capable of pulling them through the dirt with surprising alacrity too. The first one that Blaze had jumped on had a small burn on its forehead, and she knew she'd seen that one several dozen times, just in the first few minutes.
"I think we need to go supersonic!" Tails said, his tails spinning around and leaving gaping wounds in their thick brown fur. He never stopped moving, and neither had she.
"We'll need some free space for that. And I don't see them giving us an inch!" Blaze said aloud. He had a point though. As fast as these creatures were, they weren't supersonic. Could she do it, though?
"Maybe not, but if we build up enough speed early we can try!" Tails answered. The claws on his hands dripped with a small amount of dark red blood as he essentially ripped them into one of the mole things that got a bit too close for comfort.
"I have an idea then," Blaze said, stopping in one place. The mole things directed themselves right towards her, and Tails had already long passed her, although he was turning around in a wide path. They were going faster than they'd thought.
She conjured a single fireball, and then more fireballs, willing the stream of fire that existed within her. She doubted she'd be able to go supersonic after this, and that was the entire point of the plan. But...there was Tails, too. She whipped a column of fire, shooting it around her. The mole things gave a weeping cry as they were burned, some of their fur catching on fire, leaving an acrid smell in the air.
She kept up the column of flame, encircling and enveloping herself and the small mountain in the plains she'd found herself stopped on. She took very careful breaths, in and out. With each outward breath, she pulsed the column out, enveloping more of the mole things as they tried to attack her.
Most of them went underground, putting out the flames she'd manage to catch them in, before she stopped. From uncountable tons to a bare eight. Not too bad, she thought, as she breathed heavy.
Tails came by, and grabbed her hand. She ignored the way it was so warm on her own, and she forced her legs to move to keep up. She was breathing hard, and she could barely feel the embers in her chest. A rhythmic pulsing of fire was challenging, but compared to what she'd done the last couple of weeks, it was more power than it was control. Had she lost her power when she gained control?
Her legs were stiff, and she was barely able to keep up with Tails as he guided her through more of the plains. They moles that were behind them slowly came up out of the ground, weakened by their brief foray with fire. They were blind, Blaze noticed, so they could only feel the heat.
She had to stop from stumbling a bit as Tails suddenly sped up, grabbing her wrists with his hands, his tails whirring incessantly, as he started to carry her above the plains.
"I think they're a lot like the earth elementals at the Mountain. Tremor sense. If we stay up here long enough they should go back down," Tails said.
"Let's hope it's sooner, rather than later," she said quietly, staring at the way she noticed his body was starting to tire out. He was hiding it well, but it wouldn't be long before he tired out completely.
—Side T —
Tails would freely admit that this plan was not well thought out. Admittedly, in his previous experiences, most plans tended to not be well thought out and only fall into the 'we'll make it up as we go' category at right around the halfway mark.
He felt his back muscles start to cramp up, and he realized that he wasn't sure he'd made it to that halfway mark yet.
He was slowly going down, down towards the endless plains underneath him inhabited by mole drills. Mole drillers? Drillers. Drillers would work best for its name. Drillers, elementals, and leviathans. And bears, oh my.
Blaze's stunt of pulsing fire had turned many of them away from the chase. However she was tired and very obviously out of it based on her drooping eyes. She had to be stronger than that, he knew, based on what Sonic had told him. Had something happened to take away most of her fire? Was it a limited resource, and by asking too much of her the last few weeks, had he accidentally just...killed them both?
In true sincerity, he doubted that last one. While her fire was a limited resource at one time, she usually had to recharge a bit. Much like his own experience with some of the Chaos Emeralds. They would drain, and he'd have to wait for them to recharge before he could use them again.
He did wish for rings, again. Something, anything, would be extremely helpful right now.
Although...he did have an idea. With one hand he reached for the bail-bag still tied to his waist, ignoring the pull on his shoulders as Blaze's full weight and weight of the bags pulled on him. She was light, but the bags she was carrying were not. They really should have tested his own weight capacity first.
His hands stumbled upon the electrite, and he felt the sparks jump between the two. They were only ten feet above the ground now, and dropping quick. "Blaze, when we land, don't move. At all," he warned.
She nodded, both of her hands gripped onto his tight. The ground came up, closer and closer, reaching for them, and finally he felt her legs connect to the ground. Weight was lifted off his shoulder and he fell onto the ground with all four arms and legs. He took a deep breath, hearing underneath the same earthly rumble he'd heard before. The one that had warned him of the drillers originally.
He reached back with the hand still on the electrite, and threw it as hard as he could down the hill. He could hear the drillers coming closer and closer. Blaze was stock still, and her ears were turning rapidly. Could she hear the same thing that he did? She might not have before. It was pretty loud in her little fire bubble boost that she made. Fire bubble? He'd have to name it later.
The crystal bounced on the ground, rolling to a stop a few moments later. The drillers turned, he heard, aiming right where it stopped. Closer and closer they went, until they were right underneath it.
For a long moment nothing happened, and Tails felt himself shiver with relief before a massive crash sounded as the drillers had created a sinkhole right where the electrite had landed. "Oh wow..." Tails murmured as he tried to peer his head over the hill without moving his feet.
His ears turned, but it didn't appear as if the drillers could sense them talking. There was no rush as they all came towards them, no inexplicable feeling of doom.
"I think we might be in over our head a bit," Blaze suggested. "I might be able to get up to speed now, though. Once we rest for a second."
Tails looked around. The plains were rather bare, asides from the grasses and small bushes that dotted the landscape. Small trees lay here and there, mostly broken in places. Probably from the drillers. He nodded, and absently rolled one hand into the bags, searching for some water.
He took a few swigs, then turned to Blaze and offered it. She grabbed it with a grateful smile, the rest of it drank. The first few days would be the hardest on their water and food reserves. He took the bag and crumpled it a bit to make it a bit smaller, stuffing it into another bag.
"How long before they start finding us, do you think?" Blaze asked, careful to look over her shoulder but not move her feet. She barely moved at all, and it was only if Tails was paying attention that he could see her breathing.
"Depends on how sensitive they are. They can't be that sensitive, otherwise they'd be going after things like worms or even just the grass. I don't think they're very smart either."
"Or they're playing you."
"Or they're playing me, yeah. That's always a possibility..." Tails murmured. It wouldn't be the first time that one of his assumptions got him in trouble. He remembered the ARK incident where that same trait had ended up spoiling his entire charade.
"Alright. A few minutes and I should be good to go," Blaze said. She gave a few stretches to her arms, despite the weight on her back.
"Why are you so tired? I don't remember you getting that tired from the house."
"Not entirely sure. Could be many things. Dietary issues, lack of rest, or too much power at once. I focused mostly on control rather than power back at the house, and that was the first time I've tried for power in a long while. It could also be that I've been separated from the Sol Emeralds for too long. They always helped augment my pyrokinesis."
"You don't think they've chosen a new Guardian yet, have they?"
"No, I doubt it. The Guardianship is for life. As I'm still alive, ergo, I'm still the Guardian. Most likely Marine or Gardon are guarding them in the literal sense."
"Why don't they just use the Jeweled Sceptre? Isn't it still in the vaults there? To bring us back, I mean."
"It's locked up tight. No one except the King, myself, and Gordon, the vizier, have the keys. And even then, all three keys are needed before the door is unlocked. And even if they did, no one's sure how to use it."
Tails nodded. It was rather frustrating, that they would be here for so long, nearly on day forty now, but they'd have to find their way home another way then. The easy methods were already tried and were found impossible.
"Ready?" he asked after a few minutes. Blaze nodded, and slowly started loosening up the muscles in her legs. Tails did the same, his tails whirling quietly. He was on the low point when one of his tails went and smacked the ground, creating a small divet where it landed. He froze, his ears twitching for any sign of the drillers.
Blaze, too, must have heard his tail hit the ground. "Tails...I'm going to assume we should start running," she said quietly. Tails nodded, his heartbeat accelerating when he heard the quiet drone of the drillers finding their way towards them.
She reached out and grabbed his hand, regardless of how they'd managed to avoid being seen now, as the drone got closer and closer, and more of them started appearing. He noticed her own ears were twitching just as crazy as his undoubtedly were. She could hear it too, especially when it was as quiet as it was.
She bolted forward, boosting instantly across the grassland. Tails kept up, his namesakes going as fast as they could to assist. Right behind them, right where they had stood, the drillers enveloped the ground, and the chase was on again.
Blaze had seemed much more in control this time as she darted forward, her shoes finding easy purchase among the ground. Tails did his best to keep up with her, but as fast as he was he was no match for the woman who was just as fast as Sonic. Her stride slowed down a bit, even though her speed didn't, and Tails prepared himself.
He took a deep breath, and looked behind him. Tens of hundreds of the drillers came from every inch that they had already covered. If Blaze was even a second slower they wouldn't be able to keep up.
He felt Blaze tense in front of him, and he felt the small acceleration end. She was being pushed back by the air. Sound did not like its speed being mocked, but she, much like Sonic, were more than capable of breaking that barrier.
With a sudden rush, he heard nothing. His legs were useless now, hanging in the air. His tails were doing the best they could to assure him he wasn't being a dead weight, but as Blaze rushed past the speed of sound, he saw in the grass the wake of their velocity.
The drillers were left far behind in the dust now, trying but invariably failing to catch up. The silence was deafening, a cacophony of muteness that assaulted Tails' ears. With every step, Blaze got further and further along the plains. Her eyes were lit up gold, the flame inside burning bright. She was enjoying this, Tails knew, in much the same way Sonic always enjoyed his runs.
The grasses waved underneath them, their soft stalks attacking her legs, Tails noticed. There weren't any thistles or anything that could cause harm, he hoped. At least not that he noticed. Blaze's stride changed again, and Tails had the forethought fortunately to hold his ears close to his head as she went under the speed of sound again. The sonic boom tore through them both, leaving echoes of its wake and passing.
She was breathing hard, but she had a large grin on her face. She definitely enjoyed the run.
In front of them lay another forest, this one filled more with larger trees than the last one they'd been in. Not far off were the mountains they'd have to pass before they even hit the desert.
"That was fun," Blaze said simply. "It's getting late though," she said, pointing to the sun in the sky. It was late afternoon, with a few hours left of daylight.
"It's not late. Plenty of time for more walking," Tails said. He kept his ears open for the rumble of the drillers, but the world remained silent. Small chirps from the forest interrupted him, and he blinked.
"Birds," Blaze answered without him asking. "There wasn't much birdsong in the last forest, was there?" she asked.
"No, there wasn't. I wonder if that was because of the elemental's presence. Out here, because of the drillers. Before that, the leviathan. Think this place is any safer?" Tails asked.
"Drillers? One of these days Tails, we will talk about your naming schema," Blaze answered with a smirk. "But it works. I doubt this is any safer though. We've been through the leviathan, the ruins, and now the drillers. And an elemental. I don't think this world is kind."
"What's wrong with my naming?" Tails protested. "There's nothing wrong with how I name things!" he continued. "Miles Electric, the electrite-"
"Yes, Tails," Blaze answered non-committally. He had a feeling she was mocking him, and he gave her an unheated glare. "We should start looking for a place to camp though. The time will fly, and we don't want to be caught out."
Tails nodded. He lifted his nose to the air, sniffing curiously. The smell of acrid air, air that hadn't been circulated in a while assaulted him. An open space, generally, hidden away from the world. "I think I found an old den nearby. We can probably use that if it's big enough," he said. Blaze blinked, but she slowly nodded, motioning for him to lead the way with a gesture of her hand.
His nose led him to a large stump, still covered with small spikes from when the tree it had been attached to had fallen. It was a fox scent, he knew somehow in the back of his brain, but it seemed old. Abandoned.
"We can squeeze in through here," Blaze said, pulling herself through a small hole in the base. It lit up quickly from the inside as she conjured a small fireball. "This will work for now, although it's not as big as I'd like."
"Can't be that small-" Tails said as he burrowed in. The ceiling was about Blaze's head height when she was sitting down, and she had already dropped the supplies she was carrying down in a corner. With Tails' supplies, the end result would be fairly small. "Oh, so it is," he murmured, dropping his gear. He pulled out the Miles Electric and let it do a quick scan as he dropped down next to Blaze. His hip and tails were squished down next to her, no matter how he tried to move them.
"It'll be a squished night it seems," Blaze said gently, curling into a small ball. "Don't stay up too late," she murmured.
Tails felt the gentleness of her fur on his, and he had to stifle a whine. This was not going to be fun, and the morning was definitely not going to be any more fun.
I just wanted a quick word to say thank you to everyone for reading this. It's the start of a long arc, as you can tell by the title. Thanks everyone, and I hope you enjoy it. It's going to be a wild ride. This also marks the spot where this story is officially my longest story on any site, surpassing Chaos Theory in word count. Until Next Time!