Sonic and the Power of the Chaos Emeralds

Catching up with Sonic

“Sonic!! What are you doing here?”

That’s right. The fastest thing alive just swooped in through the door like a blue blur carrying a trail of dust behind him. And because the floors here are always cleaned every hour, and still wet, he slid right into the carts against the wall sending boxes all over the floor. The crash woke up Emily from a deep sleep. In the darkness, she had to squint her eyes to see. From the shadow, a shape started to become clear. She didn’t believe it at first. Sonic the Hedgehog. Here, sitting in front of her. And she laughed because Sonic was twisted and turned upside-down on top of a pile of boxes. His red shoes stuck up in the air and his spines cut into some of the cardboard.

“Hi, What's up?!” Sonic spoke quickly as he jumped up out of the mess he made with the cardboard still stuck on his back. He shook his head and dusted himself off. Emily watched without saying anything. Sonic took a look around him. Then he did a spin-dash, and everything looked spotless again. Sonic was gone once he cleaned up the mess,  just as fast as he showed up. The corner appeared as though Sonic had never been there. Or maybe he was never really there to begin with. Emily couldn’t be sure after waking up from a dream. Yet, there was a breeze in the room and no one had left the windows open. Her heart raced while she tried to go back to sleep, but one eye stayed open looking for Sonic, and the smile on her face wouldn’t go away.

Not long after Sonic left, a racket came from the hallway outside Emily's room. A constant clank, like the sound of heavy boots stomping with each step. Then a deep voice announced, "Checking every room." It sounded like it was speaking to someone, but there were only one set of steps. Perhaps, someone was sitting at the desk down the hall. As the sound came closer, stopping every now and then, Emily pretended to be asleep. She heard her door open, then close, but she never looked up to see who was there. The sound came and went, and Emily wondered what it was. She never heard anyone walk so loudly before, so maybe it was something else. It must have been coming from something this person was carrying. But now, there was no way she was going back to sleep. There was too much going on.

After a while, Emily decided she would go look for Sonic. She didn’t know how much time had passed, maybe ten minutes or maybe an hour. Either way, Sonic was probably long gone by now. It would only take him a couple of seconds to get out of the building. Still, she was going to look for him, just in case.

Emily rolled out of bed. Her gown snagged on a hook and pulled her back down. She untangled herself and rolled over again. It simply didn’t work as well as sonic speeding down a hill wrapped up in the shape of a ball. This time she almost crashed onto the floor. She had to be careful not to make much noise or someone might come in to look for her. Emily put on a pair of pink slippers and slip-slopped toward the door.

The door from room 4B creaked open. Half a face peered out into the hallway. The lights stayed on all night so Emily had to make sure no one was walking down the hallway or sitting at the desk. It wouldn’t have been so difficult to get out if this was a boarding school. That would have been like passing through the Chemical Plant Zone. Not level one, which would be home, but not much harder. This place, however, would take some skill to escape. At least this wasn't a pyramid haunted by the ghosts of dead pharaohs, although this place could certainly be haunted by ghosts too. Now, Emily was thankful the lights stayed on.

Emily heard two voices talking in the hallway. The voices were coming closer, and Emily was about to jump back into bed when they stopped getting closer. “Go check on room 3B. The girl in 4B is usually fast asleep right now. She needs her rest.”

“Ok. I’ll be back in a moment.”

With that, Emily could hear a door swing open while one set of feet marched away with shoes clacking on the ground. But this would give Emily her chance. The stairwell was right around the corner and no one would be watching right now. So she tip-toed into the hallway, looking both ways to make sure no one was coming. Then she glided along the floor, and pushed through the door to the stairwell.

Up or down. She was already on one of the upper floors, but not the top floor. The top floor reminded Emily of the Sky Sanctuary Zone. It was pleasant up there unlike everywhere else. All the other floors weren’t so nice. In fact, most of them looked the same. Row after row of dreary hallways, one after another, like an endless mine. That said, she would be going up. Hopefully Sonic didn’t go below thinking there would be badniks downstairs. Then again, it wouldn't surprise her if there were badniks in the basement. That place was creepy. She went down there on a tour once and there were all these strange machines. In any case, the basement was much further away.

Since she was sleepy, Emily held onto the railing as she hobbled up the stairs. It was more work than her body was used to, but the thought of finding Sonic at the top tapping his feet kept her going up the three remaining levels. Each level before the Sky Sanctuary was worse. Out of the 12 floors, the eleventh floor was the absolute worst. She remembered a group of people crying when someone was sent to the eleventh floor. Emily called it the Death Egg Zone. The odd thing is that the eleventh floor actually reached higher than the 12th floor. That’s because the 12th floor went in a circle around an empty center. In that center, the 11th floor rose up towards space. Well, not towards space, but the ceiling was really high.

Emily felt soothed once she passed the 11th floor, even though she knew she wouldn’t be going there anytime soon. She crept up the last portion of the stairs carefully, even though almost everyone preferred to use the elevator, especially at this hour. It probably didn't even matter if someone saw her, unless they recognized her. The only people who might recognize her though rarely come up to the top floor.

The 12th floor is lined all around by large, rectangular windows. You can look out and see the city unfolding below. At this time, the starlight speckled the sky. Inside, there were benches and small trees about every twenty feet. The whole floor was encircled this way. No dreary rooms here. Nothing to fear. And it was completely empty too, although a few people usually lurked around early in the morning.

Just when she began to relax, Emily felt something tap her shoulder. When she turned around her heart dropped. She came face to face with a swat-bot, one of Robotnik’s maniacal minions. There were three more right behind it. No wonder no one was walking around on this floor.

The bot pointed at the door. It obviously wanted her to leave, but she shook her head. “Sonic must be here somewhere,” she told herself. There wasn’t any doubt about it, but would he know she was in trouble? The bot started pushing Emily toward the door. However, she slipped away from its grasp and started running to the corner. There wasn’t anywhere else to go, but if she could buy some time, maybe Sonic would show up. When she was about to turn right, a Caterkiller crawled into her path. Emily tripped and landed on the floor where the swat-bots caught up.

“Intruder alert. Protocol Red. Terminate.”

A red light flashed inside the swat-bot’s helmet as it pointed its weapon at Emily. She closed her eyes, squeezing them shut as tightly as she could. And she held herself the way she used to hold her teddy bear. This would be it. Game over.

To Be Continued