Chapter Text
The late afternoon sun beat down on Knuckles as he and his brothers headed northwest. For Sonic’s sake, they had begun their quest to find the smaller superior hedgehog. Whenever the echidna patrolled the house each night, he would commonly find his hedgehog brother up on the roof, speaking to the stars.
Knuckles understood, more than Sonic realized, how grief could take over in the strangest ways. The echidna often found himself greeting the sun as it cast its first honey glow over the forest each morning. Just as he did with his father before the attack.
Though he couldn’t understand his brother’s mourning, he also didn’t question it. Knuckles and Tails had no idea what happened between the hedgehogs, but they saw the aftermath. Right before the cannon fired, twin binary stars trailing golden flames were seen racing each other across the sky. Both radiating the Master Emerald’s energy.
Knuckles would not forgive Sonic for forcefully breaking their pact. Not until they found the missing Chaos emeralds. But that didn’t mean he wouldn’t support his brother on this mission.
As they ran, or used a jet pack in Tails’ case, Knuckles’ amethyst gaze rested near constantly on Sonic in between steps. Even after their leader’s speech about teamwork, the echidna still half expected his brother to bolt as soon as they got outside.
Thankfully, Knuckles had been proven wrong when Sonic waited for them before silently taking the lead. The echidna bristled at the thought of his brother’s uncharacteristic silence. However, he didn’t complain when they set out at a pace about half the hedgehog's true speed. Knuckles cycling his natural Chaos energy to keep up, Tails bringing up the rear using his own invention.
As they crossed the marker for three hundred miles, Knuckles quickly realized where they were actually headed. Past rolling hills and wide lakes, they headed straight into a mountainous range.
Though the superior hedgehog’s directions were incredibly vague, Sonic instinctively led them towards the sight of a collapsed mountaintop. After all, if their quest included finding Shadow, it only made sense to go back to where they first found him after he disappeared from Tokyo.
They stopped in the middle of the crater caused by Shadow’s own black hole. As they looked around at the wreckage, Knuckles reminded himself why he was here. For his brother.
“Well, this looks the exact same as the last thousand times I’ve been here! Completely destroyed!” Sonic yelled into the open air, kicking the dirt.
“Is this where you’ve been running off to every time you step outside?” Tails piped up, grabbing out his Chaos tracker from his bag.
Sonic wilted, nervously avoiding both his brothers’ eyes. “Well, maybe, I guess. I- I didn’t really know what else to do.”
“You suffer in this hedgehog’s stead, brother. An honorable tribute for a fallen enemy.” Knuckles rumbled, carefully scanning the dirt for any signs of an underground entrance.
Sonic rubbed his arm, staring at the ground but not really looking at anything.
“Yeah sure, Knux. Whatever you say.”
After a few minutes of tense silence, a familiar chirping sound echoed across the sunken mountain. The little fox cheered, spinning his tails together, briefly hovering over the other two. Sonic latched onto the enthusiasm, taking it as a good sign.
“What is it? Did ya find something, buddy?” The hedgehog quickly ran over, looking over Tails’ shoulder at the beeping tracker.
Knuckles lumbered over as well, reading the scrawled blue script across the tiny screen.
Chaos Energy signature locked
Knuckles grinned. They had a lead.
“Excellent work, fox! Now lead us to where the more impressive hedgehog resides so we might rescue him!” Knuckles banged a fist to his chest.
“Awesome job, little buddy! I knew you could figure it out!” Sonic smiled.
Tails ducked his head, still unused to his tech being praised. Following the tracker’s signal, he traced it over to a small dirt swept area. No matter how many times he tried recalibrating it, the device wouldn’t point anywhere else.
Tails groaned, smacking his hand against the side of his instrument. “Great. I don’t know what’s wrong with this thing now. I swear it was just working! There’s nothing here! I know we’re supposed to find him somewhere underground but according to my scans, there’s no structure here at all!”
Sonic put a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t worry, Tails. I’m sure there’s something here.”
Knuckles stepped closer, crouching down to feel the earth. Even through his thick glove, a very faint pulse of energy came from the exact spot Tails’ scanner pointed. Concentrating harder, his suspicions were confirmed. A slowed heartbeat followed the energy’s rhythm right below where they stood.
“Ah-hah!” Knuckles exclaimed. “I have found the more impressive hedgehog!”
“Wait, what?”
“Really? Where?”
Without another word, Knuckles slammed his fist down hard. Where they expected to hear the sound of crumbling dirt, a metallic clang reverberated through the air. Sonic and Tails immediately folded their ears down, gloves reaching up to helplessly block out the noise.
“Knux! Give us a warning next time! That hurts!”
“Good thing I packed my ear plugs!” Tails shuffling through his backpack.
However, Knuckles overestimated the durability of the metal beneath. His spined fist cut clean through the steel, causing the structure to bow in and break apart. The three Mobians didn’t have time to react when the floor caved and a pit of darkness enveloped them.
“Tails! Knuckles!” Sonic screamed, floundering in free fall.
“Sonic!” Tails yelled, scrambling to grab Sonic’s hand.
The blue hedgehog frantically grabbed hold of his little brother, seizing his glove tightly when the fox flew upwards to break their fall. With the dying pillar of light around them, Sonic briefly saw Knuckles glide down to perch on a little platform. Tails set them down next to where the echidna landed, but Sonic kept his hand hostage in a death grip.
“Phew! Thanks for the warning, Knucklehead!” He deepened his voice in an imitation. “Maybe a ‘Hey guys I’m gonna break the fragile, already broken ground beneath us. Sound good? Great!’ But no! We didn’t get any of that!” Sonic’s voice echoed off the walls of their enclosure.
“I apologize, hedgehog. I did not expect this to happen.” Knuckles reached a hand out to rest on Sonic’s shoulder. “But you need not take your anger out on the fox.”
“What are you talking about?” Sonic growled back.
“Sonic!” Tails yelped, his hand starting to hurt when Sonic squeezed it harder.
Sonic instantly dropped Tails’ glove as though it burned him. In the soft lighting, the fox saw him wince a little, putting his hands out in surrender.
“Aw jeez! Sorry, Tails. Didn’t realize I was hurting you there. I was just- I’m sorry.”
The kit chuckled a bit, cradling the pulsing hand with his other. “That’s alright. Not as bad as Knuckles during movie night.”
The echidna snarled, biting back whatever response he had to look around instead.
“I cannot see anything! What manner of metal trap have we fallen into, fox?”
“Uh- let me grab my stuff so I can start scoping around.” Tails said, putting his backpack down on the platform.
Sonic looked up at the hole in the ceiling. He estimated the drop to be about six of him stacked on top of each other. Even still, soft golden rays broke through a small portion of darkness to help illuminate their surroundings.
“Jeez Knux, I know you have bad eyesight, but even I can tell we’re in a giant circle room!”
Knuckles bared his teeth, positioning himself to roughly where he thought Sonic’s voice came from. “Quiet, hedgehog! I am a mighty warrior with toughened nerves of muscle! The dark may be my greatest enemy but it will never surpass my excellent senses!”
Tails finally snatched a flashlight out of his pack. Switching it on, his brothers were able to follow his lead and grabbed their own lights out.
“Remember what Maddie said? Echidnas have little to no night vision, Sonic! That’s why he’s much more sensitive with his nose than we are.”
“The fox is correct! I am far superior in different ways!”
Sonic waved his hand at them. “Yeah yeah. Whatever you say.”
With three beams of light added to the small hole of sunlight leaking from above, Tails deduced they were in a chamber of sorts. A very large, circular room with a track running along the length of its walls.
“Okay. Definitely don’t like the scary dark cave. At least I had comic books in mine! Where even are we?” Sonic shuddered.
Knuckles hummed. “I am unsure but the more impressive hedgehog was here.”
“Wait, seriously? Is he close?”
Knuckles didn’t answer right away, sniffing the air first. “No. Not anymore. His Chaos is potent, yet has grown stale.”
Sonic threw his hands up. “Well that doesn’t make any sense! You just said he’s close!”
Tails tapped a few buttons on his tracker. “No no, he’s technically right. The energy in this room is Shadow’s but it’s almost- dull? It’s like this room was specifically made to contain Chaos energy but hasn’t been used in a long time.”
Sonic looked around at what he realized was a racing track encircling them. “Okay? So he used to run along this track I guess? How exactly does that help us find him?”
Tails jumped a little when his screen popped up with a tiny blueprint. “It looks like we’re in some sort of underground base. It must’ve survived somehow when Shadow took out the top half with his black hole. This is incredible! It’s massive!”
Sonic groaned, slumping forward. “Wonderful. Now we have to navigate a maze? I’m getting pretty tired of those.”
Knuckles closed his eyes, quickly dispersing the rusted Chaos energy in the air except for one frayed thread. Locking onto it, he opened his eyes and bellowed.
“Fear not! I have caught the more impressive hedgehog’s trail! He will not escape this time!”
Ignoring Sonic’s facepalm, Knuckles raised his fists and dug into the side of the wall. His brothers jumped back in surprise but quickly followed the echidna as he hollowed out a tunnel for them. They both tried to avoid flying rocks until Knuckles broke through to another room.
The area they arrived in was much smaller than the last. Sonic mentally thanked Maddie for packing flashlights with extra batteries. Tails led the group in front, another gadget of his mapping out the way ahead. Sonic stayed in the middle, watching his little brother’s back with Knuckles carefully stalking after them.
As they continued navigating their way through the base, each hallway got darker as they went past dozens of closed doors.
Sonic whined, his ears folding back. “Seriously, why does this guy choose the creepiest places to brood in?”
They had gone past three more plain chambers devoid of any equipment. Tails opened his mouth to say something back when suddenly, his sneaker slipped through the floor.
“Whoa!” Tails shrieked in surprise.
“Tails!” Sonic rapidly grabbed his brother's hand.
The fox quickly used his tails to fly up and regain his balance. After he settled back on solid ground, Sonic let go and Tails puffed out a deep breath. Sonic and Knuckles both crouched into defensive postures on high alert.
“I’m okay! I’m okay.” Tails reassured them both, running a hand down his arm to smoothen his raised amber coat.
“What just happened! The floor was just there!” Sonic yelled, pushing a small pebble towards where Tails stepped.
All three watched the rock disappear into the otherwise ordinary looking ground. They watched the floor glitch briefly, an illusion being broken by the disruption before a looming edge appeared. Glancing over, the small rock sailed down into a great sinkhole. Sonic counted to at least twenty seconds before they finally heard it crash to the bottom.
“Oh great. That’s just great! So not only do we get to worry about scary dark hallways, but now there’s also death traps in our way!” Sonic shouted.
“Hedgehog. Lower your voice. We do not know what else may linger here.” Knuckles hissed.
The young fox’s tails fluffed up behind him, his fur raising at the implication. “I’ll-uh - I’ll fly us over and then calibrate my device to scan for any abnormalities.”
“A wise move, fox.” Knuckles nodded.
After Tails flew them both over the collapsed section of flooring, they continued very carefully into the bunker. They moved through rooms containing illusory walls and robots programmed to fight anything breathing. Once they barely escaped a hallway filled with anesthetic darts shooting from the ceiling, Sonic had hit his breaking point.
His Chaos energy crackled and sparked, eyes and quills glowing a sharp lapis blue.
“I swear! Once we find Shadow, he’s gonna be in for a fight! This is just ridiculous! Like, I get it! He wants to be left alone, but how did he even get in here if he’s already hurt! No one’s that invincible!”
“Hedgehog, you misunderstand the purpose of this facility.” Knuckles drew Sonic’s ire.
“What does that mean!”
“These traps do not keep invaders out.”
“Huh? But that doesn’t make any sense! What else can traps do? That’s kinda their thing!”
“No, he’s right, Sonic. According to my scans, they’ve grown increasingly more frequent and more debilitating the further we go in. When the scientists who constructed this place were designing it, they didn’t have any need to keep people out. It’s already underground and incredibly difficult to find. It’s almost like they built it to-uh -”
Tails ducked his head, unable to meet Sonic’s eyes. The hedgehog huffed, picturing a full bucket of water being thrown over his energy until it fizzled out. Once his power dimmed, he turned back to the youngest.
“Just tell me, little buddy. What’d they design this place for?”
“Well it’s a- I guess you could label it as-um.”
At Tails’ stuttering, Knuckles piped up instead, his mouth pulled into a thin line. “This fortress prevents escape, hedgehog. Sealing of the natural Chaos is required when caging something very dangerous.”
Sonic’s ears pinned back. Cobalt quills rose as he finally understood what his brothers meant.
“Oh.”
This base had been specifically created to be a prison for Shadow.