New Beginnings

Chapter 3 - Fear and Anger

This had been a horrible idea, Silver snarled mentally at Espio as he stood in the kitchen. No matter how much he bristled his quills or growled or let his powers shimmer Vector refused to be intimidated by him, sipping a strong-smelling liquid from a container while looking at a collection of black-and-white papers and not paying attention to his opponent in the slightest. While at first he had been terrified that the crocodile was going to strike the moment Espio left the room to pluck Charmy out of bed he now was more angry about not being taken seriously. In the back of his mind a little voice told him to accept his defeat, grab whatever food he could find and make his escape, but the largest part of his being was ready to fight for it instead.

"Don't knock over my coffee, kid," the gruff voice sounded from behind the papers, and Silver perked up his ears. A reaction! Punching at the papers again with his powers Silver flinched as they got pulled down unexpectedly and Vector's non-amused face came into view, though the hedgehog refused to back down. "I ain't planning on hurtin' ya, you know. You don't need to be so on edge all the time," the crocodile sighed as he put down the things he was holding on the table. Silver's growls only intensified with the movement.

Whatever else Vector had wanted to say got interrupted by Charmy catapulting himself into the room, Espio darting behind him to catch the chairs the bee knocked over in his enthusiasm. "Good morning, hello! What a beautiful day!" the youngest member of the Chaotix hollered as the oldest could barely dodge out of his haphazard flight path. Stopping right in front of Silver's face with barely a fist of space between them he enthusiastically buzzed about as Silver flinched, Vector entirely forgotten for the moment. "Good morning, Silver!"

"Good... morning?" the hedgehog stammered in return, stopping himself from scrambling back and potentially upsetting Charmy. He didn't really know what a morning was; in his city the sky had been covered with dark thunderclouds and soot, rendering it impossible to see everything that was above it. The wildest rumours were passed around in the ruins where he lived: some said that there was a whole other world up there, others proclaimed it was only a void of nothing. He himself had loved the first theory, hoping that there was at least one place untouched by calamity where people could live in peace. He had never been able to fly high enough to get up there though: the soot rendered him unable to breathe and the thunder that cackled around him scared him half to death, not to mention the Ifrit that patrolled above the city, always hungry for a hedgehog to snack on. The closest he had come to the proposed other world was Onyx Island, which miraculously had been spared the most damage by the fire demon. He wasn't sure why, and he had refused to stay on the floating miracle; the people in the city needed him, and he feared luring the Ifrit to this one safe haven, so he had returned to the misery that was the ground with hope in his heart and his head held high.

When he had seen the sky in full the first time he travelled to the past he had been awed to his very core, only managing to tear his eyes away through reprimanding himself about his mission. When it was so dark he couldn't see anything on the ground it contained a white shimmering rock plus thousands of glowing pinpricks that surrounded it, and when the sky was light blue there was a glowing orb present instead that changed colour from red to almost white to red again, shrouded by fluffy clouds that were coloured white to grey instead of the frightening black they had been in the city. On his last adventure, when the orb had disappeared at the edge of the sky and the pinpricks of light had arrived as everything got darker around him Espio had made him sit down and told him to rest, despite his objections that they had to keep going. His friend had refused to budge so he had stayed awake the entire time instead, staring at the beautiful image that stretched out all above him and waiting patiently for the orb to come back as the chameleon sat beside him with his legs folded and eyes closed.

The orb was present today as well, he had seen its warm light come through the window as he had woken up. That had been just before Espio had whisked him downstairs to drop him right in front of the crocodile's maw, everything going too quickly for him to process what was happening exactly until the moment he had found himself in the middle of trouble. Said crocodile clambered up from the ground where he had fallen in the chaos of Charmy entering, muttering something under his breath that Silver could not make out. The bee zipped away from the psychic again and began to buzz around his superior's head, clamouring for 'breakfast' while Vector just groaned. Espio gestured for Silver to sit down on a chair at the table, and after some hesitation he slunk closer and placed himself, not taking his eyes of the two others present for a second. He didn't even have the mind to hiss at Espio or sent a betrayed look his way for leaving him to fend for himself, although even Silver had to admit his friend had come back for him.