The Separation
Water has a way of making everything sound distant, muffled—as if the world is trying to speak through a pillow pressed against your ears.
Locke became aware of this fact gradually, consciousness returning in fragments like pieces of a shattered mirror slowly reassembling. Cold. That was the first sensation. The bone-deep chill of water that had been frozen in darkness for centuries, now flowing through ancient channels never meant to carry life. Then came the sound—not quite silence, but the absence of anything meaningful. Just the endless echo of water against stone, a rhythm so constant it became its own kind of nothingness.
His eyes opened to darkness pierced by veins of bioluminescence. He was lying on a stone platform, water lapping at its edges with a gentleness that belied the violence that had brought him here. Every muscle in his body screamed protest as he pushed himself upright, his jacket heavy with absorbed water, his hair plastered to his forehead in uncomfortable strands.
The Reality Checker on his wrist was flickering—barely functional, its display cracked and waterlogged. But even damaged, it told him what he needed to know: temporal displacement detected, dimensional coherence at forty-one percent and falling, companion signal: out of range.
"Tails," Locke whispered, and his voice echoed strangely in the vast chamber. Nothing. Just his own voice bouncing back to him, a reminder of the echoes of what this place used to be.
He forced himself to his feet, ignoring the protest of muscles pushed beyond their limits. The chamber stretched in all directions—a cathedral of forgotten architecture, columns rising into darkness like the ribs of some massive beast. Everything was covered in that strange, glowing moss, pulsing with light that seemed almost organic, almost alive. The water itself reflected this illumination, turning the entire space into something from a fever dream.
Locke had seen beautiful things in his travels between dimensions—sunsets that painted entire worlds gold, cities that existed in seven dimensions simultaneously. But there was something about this place that transcended beauty and fell into something more profound. This was a tomb. A monument to absence. A place where civilizations had lived and died and been forgotten, their memories preserved only in the moss-covered stones and the endless flow of water.
He was about to call out for Tails again when movement caught his eye. A flash of red, impossibly quick, darting across a platform two levels above. Knuckles.
The name came to Locke without thought, pulled from the knowledge he knew about Sonic's world already. The guardian. The last of his kind.
Something hot and primal surged through Locke's power core—not quite anger, but something adjacent to it. A need for answers. For confrontation. For resolution. A reason to get answers.
He moved before thinking, his transformed body responding with reflexes that still felt foreign. One moment he was standing; the next, he was running, his feet barely touching the slick stone as he launched himself toward a collapsed pillar. His spin jump carried him higher than should have been possible, momentum conserved perfectly as he transitioned into a wall run across a surface covered in dripping vines.
Knuckles was fast—impossibly so, moving through the ruins with the confidence of someone who'd spent a lifetime learning every hidden path, every secret route. He vaulted over gaps that would have swallowed Locke whole without his powers, his powerful arms pulling him up ledges with ease, his instincts guiding him through a maze that shifted with each passing moment as water levels rose and fell according to patterns only the ancient city understood.
But Locke was faster.
The realization struck him mid-leap, as he transitioned from a broken aqueduct to a spinning column with a precision that his old self could never have managed with these weird new abilities.
They raced through corridors that narrowed until Locke had to turn sideways to pass through, across chambers where the ceiling had collapsed entirely, letting in shafts of dim light from somewhere far above. The chase became a kind of dialogue—Knuckles leading with desperate determination, Locke following with relentless pursuit. Neither spoke. Neither needed to. Their movements said everything.
Locke could see the tension in Knuckles's shoulders, the way the echidna kept glancing back with eyes that held more confusion than hostility. This wasn't the behavior of a villain. This was someone caught between impossible choices, trying to protect something he didn't fully understand.
The chase led them upward, through a spiraling series of platforms that rose like the inside of a nautilus shell. Water cascaded down from above, creating curtains they had to push through, the cold shocking Locke's system each time. His breathing had found a rhythm—in through the nose, out through the mouth, timed with his footfalls, maximizing oxygen intake the way Sonic would have done instinctively.
They reached a narrow bridge spanning a chasm so deep Locke couldn't see the bottom. Knuckles was halfway across when he finally turned, fists raised, ready to fight.
But he didn't attack. Instead, he just stood there, backlit by the bioluminescent glow, looking lost. "Why are you chasing me?" Knuckles voice was rough, unused to extended conversation. "What do you want?"
Locke slowed, approaching carefully. "Answers. You opened that trap. You sent us down here. Why?"
"The doctor said—" Knuckles began, then stopped, his expression clouding. "He said you were threats. That you'd destroy the island. That without his technology, everything would..." He trailed off, shaking his head. "It made sense when he said it. But now... I don't know. Nothing feels right anymore."
"Because it isn't right," Locke said gently. "This world is broken, Knuckles. Someone is missing—someone important. And that absence is tearing everything apart."
The echidna's eyes narrowed. "You keep talking about things that don't make sense. There's no one missing. There's just—" Whatever he was about to say was cut off by the sound of stone grinding against stone.
The bridge was collapsing. Knuckles's eyes went wide. He lunged forward, trying to reach solid ground, but the ancient structure was giving way too fast. Locke saw it happening in slow motion—the guardian reaching out, the stones crumbling beneath his feet, the yawning darkness below ready to swallow him whole.
Locke didn't think. He just moved.
His spin dash carried him forward with enough force to crack the remaining stones. He grabbed Knuckles outstretched hand, their fingers locking, the weight nearly pulling Locke over the edge. For one eternal moment, they hung there—guardian and anomaly, suspended between ground and void.
Then the last of the bridge gave way entirely.
They fell together, Knuckles shocked expression inches away from Locke's face. But instead of plummeting into darkness, they hit water—another hidden current, pulling them in opposite directions with violent insistence. Locke felt Knuckles hand slip from his grasp, saw the red echidna tumbling away through blue darkness, heard his own shout distorted by the rushing water.
Then he was alone again, being pulled through channels carved by centuries of erosion, his body bouncing off walls too fast to avoid. The current twisted, turned, branched—and deposited him through a waterfall into a chamber that had no right to exist.
Locke hit the shallow pool hard, rolled to his feet by instinct, and froze. Somewhere far above, echoing through layers of stone and water: "LOCKE!"
But Locke couldn't answer. Because standing before him, rising from the water with mechanical precision, was something that made his transformed abilities seem like parlor tricks.
The Big Shaker had awakened.
The Weight of Isolation
There's a special kind of feeling that comes from fighting alone.
Not the simple solitude of being without company, but the profound isolation of facing something overwhelming without anyone to share the burden. Standing in that chamber, water dripping from his soaked clothes, staring up at the machine that dwarfed him in every dimension, Locke felt that intensity like a physical weight pressing against his power core.
The Big Shaker was a contradiction of engineering—ancient in design but impossibly advanced, its core humming with power that predated Eggman's arrival by centuries yet somehow responsive to his commands. It rose from the pool like a monument to destructive potential, water cascading off its plated hull, its limbs spinning with currents that could pulverize stone. Another one of Eggman's inventions, here to stop Locke again.
Somewhere above this chamber, Eggman's voice crackled through speakers corroded by time and moisture: "You've been quite the pest, haven't you, Locke? But let's see how well you fare without your little fox friend."
The doctor's voice held something Locke hadn't heard before—genuine interest. Not the theatrical villainy of their first encounter, but the clinical curiosity of someone studying an unexpected variable. Locke had become a problem that needed solving, a puzzle piece that didn't fit the expected pattern.
Good. Let him be confused. Confusion was better than complete control. The machine lunged forward, and Locke's moment of philosophical reflection evaporated.
He moved on instinct—spin jump to the left as the Big Shaker's first limb crashed down where he'd been standing, the impact sending a shockwave through the water that nearly knocked him off his feet. The limb spun, generating whirlpools that pulled at him with surprising force, trying to drag him into the grinding currents.
Locke pushed off a submerged pillar, his transformed reflexes calculating trajectories without conscious thought. The chamber was a death trap—every surface slick with centuries of moisture, every shadow hiding jagged debris, every sound echoing to the point of disorientation. And in the center of it all, the Big Shaker spun with mechanical precision, its movements following patterns that seemed random but held a terrible logic.
He attacked—a classic spin dash aimed at the machine's rotating arm. Metal met enhanced force with a clang that reverberated through Locke's entire skeleton. He bounced off, barely managed to land properly, his teeth rattling from the impact.
"Damn," he gasped, circling the machine warily. The realization hit him like cold water: his chaotic powers weren't just diminished—they were essentially gone. What he had now was speed, momentum, precision. Sonic's toolkit. But Sonic would have known how to use these abilities instinctively, built on years of experience. Locke was learning in real-time, under the worst possible circumstances at that.
The Big Shaker rotated, its core humming with increasing intensity. Warning signs Locke had learned to recognize from dismantling Eggman's previous machine. It was building to something—a special attack, a devastating maneuver designed to end the fight in one overwhelming display of force.
Locke couldn't let it reach that point.
He ran—not away, but in a circle around the machine, building speed with each revolution. The water became a blur beneath his feet. The chamber walls streaked past in bands of blue and green. He could feel the momentum accumulating, his body becoming a living projectile, every step adding to the kinetic energy he was storing.
The Big Shaker launched its attack—massive whirlpools erupting from its spinning limbs, creating a spiraling barrier that turned the entire chamber into a washing machine of deadly force. Locke saw Tails in his mind—the fox's brilliant tactical mind analyzing patterns, finding weaknesses in designs that seemed perfect. What would he look for?
The answer came as Locke completed another circuit: timing. The whirlpools pulsed with rhythm, expanding and contracting according to the machine's rotation speed. Between pulses, there were gaps—fractions of a second where the currents weakened, where the barrier became penetrable.
Locke waited for the moment, his enhanced reflexes tracking the pattern—three rotations, four, five—there!
He launched himself upward in a wind-pushed spin jump, the last remnant of his elemental abilities giving him just enough lift to clear the barrier. For one perfect moment, he was airborne, suspended above the machine, looking down at its exposed core through the gap in its plating.
Time seemed to slow. Locke could see everything with crystal clarity—the welding marks on the hull, the energy conduits pulsing with stolen power, the exact point where ancient technology interfaced with modern machinery. He could see the weakness, the design flaw that Eggman hadn't noticed or hadn't cared to fix.
The core was protected by a ring of specialized robotic components—defensive systems that would activate the moment the central power source was threatened. But those systems were connected by wiring visible through the gaps in the armor, old cables that carried signals at the speed of electricity, which meant they could be interrupted.
Locke angled his spin dash mid-air, adjusting his trajectory with micro-movements that his old body could never have managed. He struck the first wire cluster, severed it with the precision of a surgeon's scalpel, bounced off a support strut, and hit the second cluster before the machine could react.
The Big Shaker's movements stuttered, confused by the sudden disconnect between core commands and limb responses. Its rotation became erratic, the deadly precision giving way to mechanical spasms.
Locke landed badly—his angle wrong, his momentum carrying him into a collision with a collapsed column that drove the air from his lungs. Pain exploded through his ribs, sharp and immediate, the kind that made breathing difficult and thinking harder. He rolled away just as a spinning limb crashed down where he'd fallen, missing him by centimeters.
"Get up," he told himself through gritted teeth. "Get up get up get up—"
The machine was recovering faster than he'd hoped. Its backup systems engaging, rerouting power through redundant channels. In seconds, it would be fully operational again.
Locke forced himself to his feet, his vision swimming with pain and exhaustion. Every part of him wanted to stop, to rest, to acknowledge that he'd pushed this transformed energy beyond its limits. But stopping meant dying, and dying meant Tails would be alone in this broken world, searching for a companion who'd failed him.
No. Not acceptable.
He charged the Big Shaker head-on, no longer bothering with strategy or finesse. This had become something more primal—a test of will against machine, determination against programming. His spin dash cut through pooled water, sending spray flying. He hit the remaining wire clusters one after another, each impact sending shockwaves of pain through his already battered body.
The machine's core was exposed now, its protective systems disabled, its armor breached. But it was still functional, still capable of crushing him with a single well-placed strike.
Locke climbed—using the machine's own body as a pathway, his hands finding purchase on plates slick with water and oil, his feet pushing off support struts that groaned under sudden stress. The Big Shaker thrashed, trying to dislodge him, but he held on with a grip born of desperation.
At the top of the machine, balanced precariously on its central housing, Locke could see the core through a cracked viewport—a sphere of pulsing energy.
He thought of Tails, somewhere in these ruins, searching. He thought of Sonic, erased from existence by consequences Locke still didn't fully understand. He thought of Knuckles, confused and betrayed by forces beyond his comprehension. He thought of all the people in all the worlds he'd visited who'd trusted him to make things right, to fix what was broken, to bridge the gaps between realities.
This was what it meant to be the anomaly. To exist between states, to carry the weight of multiple worlds on your shoulders.
Locke raised both fists above his head, gathering every last bit of momentum, every particle of kinetic energy his transformed body could generate. The wind responded—not with the chaotic fury of his old powers, but with something gentler, more focused. A breeze that felt like encouragement, like partnership, like the friend he'd lost somewhere in these flooded halls.
He brought his fists down with all the force his breaking body could muster.
The core shattered.
The Big Shaker's death was not quiet. It convulsed, systems overloading in cascade failures that rippled through its structure like dominoes falling. Electricity arced between components, water flashed to steam, metal groaned under stresses it was never designed to withstand. Locke barely managed to leap clear before the entire machine collapsed inward, imploding with enough force to crack the chamber floor.
He landed in shallow water, immediately dropping to one knee, his body finally acknowledging the damage it had sustained. Blood mixed with water—his blood, from cuts he hadn't noticed accumulating during the fight. His ribs burned with every breath. His hands shook with exhaustion.
But he was alive.
The chamber fell silent except for the eternal drip of water and the crackling of electrical fires slowly extinguishing themselves in the moisture. Steam rose from the destroyed machine, creating patterns in the air that almost looked like faces, like ghosts.
Far above, broadcast through speakers Locke could no longer see, Eggman's voice carried a new quality—respect, grudging and unwilling, but unmistakable: "So he's not just some nobody..."
Locke tried to stand and failed. His legs simply refused the command, muscles pushed too far beyond their limits. He remained on one knee, head bowed, trying to remember how to breathe without pain.
"Tails," he whispered to the empty chamber. "Hang on. I'm coming."
The words felt hollow, a promise made to someone who couldn't hear him, across a distance measured in more than meters. But saying them mattered. Promises mattered. Even—especially—when you weren't sure you could keep them.
Somewhere in the labyrinthine passages of Hydro City, water continued its eternal flow. Currents twisted and turned according to patterns established before the island had risen from the sea, before echidnas had built their civilization, before the concept of guardians had meaning. The water was patient. The water remembered everything. And the water carried more than just sediment and ancient debris.
It carried sound—voices echoing through stone, distorted but persistent. A fox calling out for a friend. An echidna reconsidering everything he'd been told a little bit. A doctor watching monitors with increasing fascination after fleeing like a coward.
Locke finally managed to stand. His legs protested but obeyed. Blood still dripped from cuts that needed attention he couldn't provide. His Reality Checker was completely dead now, its screen dark, its functions terminated. But he didn't need it to tell him what he already knew:
The dimensional coherence was still falling. Reality was still unraveling. And somewhere in this broken world, pieces were moving into configurations that would determine everything.
He stumbled toward the shattered doorway at the far end of the chamber, each step a negotiation with a body that wanted nothing more than to collapse. But stopping wasn't an option. It had never been an option.
"Tails," he said again, and this time his voice carried further, echoing through passages that led deeper into mysteries he couldn't yet comprehend. "Hang on. We'll reunite. We'll take care of all this."
The promise sounded more confident than he felt. But sometimes confidence was just another form of faith—belief in outcomes you couldn't guarantee, trust in bonds not yet fully formed, hope in the face of systematic impossibility.
Locke walked forward, leaving bloody footprints in the shallow water, heading toward destinations he couldn't map and futures he couldn't predict.
Behind him, the ruins of the Big Shaker sparked and smoked. Above him, layers of ancient city pressed down with the weight of forgotten history. Around him, water flowed in channels carved by time's patient hand.
And somewhere—everywhere—a blue hedgehog who'd never existed continued his ghost run through a world that had forgotten him, getting closer with every moment, pressing against the membrane of reality like a memory trying to remember itself.
The water would carry them all forward. The water always did.
TO BE CONTINUED...