Chaos Born

Jules and Aleena's Story

A flash of orange... of pink... a touch of grey-blue... a smattering of white cloud... Every sunset was a painting.

On a calm evening, it evoked peace and serenity.

This was not a calm evening.

Julius Hedgehog hissed as a thorn bush scratched his face but he paid it no further mind as he thundered on, beating the ground as he ran, desperately wishing that he could be faster. He could feel the vibrations as, somewhere far behind him, a hoard of robots were invading towards his village.

Entering the village, he called out to his neighbors to hide their families, to keep hidden, to make a run for their bomb shelters. They weren't prepared for an onslaught such as this.

He wound his way around the cottages until he made a bee-line for the cottage underneath the maple tree - his home.

His wife, radiant in the early stages of pregnancy, was waiting at the door, a shawl wrapped around her shoulders.

"Julius!" she cried as her husband barrelled through the door and slammed it shut behind him, already hurrying to put up blackouts in their windows and yanking the curtains closed.

"Don't worry, love, keep calm," he soothed, lighting candles and taking Aleena into his arms, moving her away towards the easy chair, trying to keep her as comfortable as possible, "I'm here," he told her gently, stroking her quills, "I've got you."

Aleena was terrified. Word had reached them that a legion of metal monstrocities had beseiged them, surrounding the village territory, and yet that had still left them no time to flee.

"...The babies..." Aleena gulped, holding her stomach protectively where her three unborn hoglets were safely growing. The embryos were still very small, hardly the size of a sunflower seed, she had been told.

They were fragile. She couldn't bear it if anything happened for her to miscarry.

"Just breathe," her husband continued to comfort her, "I won't let anyone put a finger on you."

"Who is it?" she asked, dreading the answer.

Jules face clouded. "It's a Robotnik."

Aleena felt her quills prickle. 

"Why haven't they all been caught?" she moaned, burying her face in Jules' fur.

The light blue hedgehog shrugged.

 "The brothers are tricky," he reasoned, "One of them's a doctor, remember? And he's the one attacking."

The Robotnik family were a plague and Dr Ivo Robotnik was the most ferocious cancer cell of the whole lot.

"What do we do, Jules?" Aleena said, her voice quivering from nerves. She was grateful for Jules' strong presence as he held her although even she could tell that he was frightened.

"It's going to be okay," he told her, "But we have to get out of here."

Aleena reached into the folds of her shawl. When she drew her hand back, the area glowed with a mesmerising deep blue shine.

"They're here for the Chaos Emerald, aren't they?" she swallowed, her pupils dilating at the presence of her family heirloom.

"Can't imagine Dr Robotnik would be here about some forgotten monarchy," Jules hummed, touching the emerald gently, "It has to be the Chaos Emerald. We have to get it someplace safe." He looked up and moved to hide the emerald back in his wife's shawl. "If they've found a way of tracking the energy signature, then the only place we can try is Angel Island."