Author's note:

Hello to all of you! This chapter is the last one for this story and therefore I want to use this little note to say thanks to all of you for reading. A bigbig THANKS goes to all reviewers who took their time to give me critique, praise, hints, their opinion, and here and there put up the one or other helpful sign to prevent me from getting lost in the jungle of English language.
As this is the final chapter, I'd of course still appreciate feedback, on the chapter or the complete story…
Then I guess I just say I hope you had as much fun reading as I had writing. Maybe see you next story. For now, have a nice time with the final chapter ,-)

Speedy

Refuge

The sky above was slowly turning purple and the sun was nearing the horizon.

Sonic shifted to look past Knuckles' head, trying to get a view on the nearest land and guess the distance. It was closing in, but a lot slower than the hedgehog would appreciate. His shoulder was starting to hurt again from having to hold on to Knuckles all the time and his ankle did anyway.

Neither of the two friends had been speaking in the last half an hour. Sonic was feeling outright exhausted and he knew Knuckles was tiring, too. His movements had been a lot smoother some time ago.

The blue hedgehog paddled his left foot again, trying to ease his weight for Knuckles, although he had no idea how.

When Knuckles' feet finally touched solid ground, the echidna was more than relieved to be able to stop swimming. He stood in the chest-high water and felt Sonic letting go of his shoulders.

"So, you see: we made it," Knuckles smiled at the hedgehog.

"Was about time. Thank you Knux." Sonic grinned, at least as relieved as Knuckles was. He made a step forwards and almost collapsed into the water when pain flashed through his foot. "Ouch!"

Knuckles' hands caught Sonic again, pulling the hedgehog's right arm around his shoulders to steady him. "Your foot's not good, is it?", Knuckles asked unnecessarily as he walked the last meters out of the water.

"No." Sonic gritted his teeth. "Didn't like running that much I guess."

Knuckles helped Sonic over to a rock that seemed a good size to sit on. "Let me have a look."

Sonic sat down heavily, then gasped in pain when Knuckles grabbed his hurt foot.

The echidna pulled off the wet shoe and examined Sonic's ankle. "Can you move it?"

Sonic gave a half nod. "I could run on it, remember?"

"Vaguely." Knuckles felt over the ankle while moving it a bit. Sonic winced. "Sorry. – It is swollen a lot and starts getting blue of the bruises. You'll have some fun with it the next week."

Sonic grimaced when Knuckles finally let go. "Thanks for the motivation. You really know how to cheer a guy up."

Knuckles shrugged, ignoring Sonic's retort completely. "I'm afraid we have no bandages for it. Ice would be good too."

Sonic looked up at him. "I don't think that cooling will be a problem. We already encountered the nights out here."

Knuckles nodded. And they were both soaking wet. And they were sitting on rock and sand in the middle of nowhere. Not even something to light a fire. Nor anything to eat.

In short form, they were in some really bad mess.

Sonic put his shoe back on, then both of them stared out over the lake, reflecting on the latest events.

"What do you think happened to them?", Sonic's question broke the silence.

"The water filled the tunnel systems. As the texts on that wall said, the Diamond Globe destroyed itself and its temple. The only way out of there was the one we took. And since we saw none of them swimming… I also doubt that any other people would have been fast enough to make it out," Knuckles gave back emotionless. He was unable to feel any pity for the turtles. It felt almost good to know they were… The echidna shook his head against himself, drops of water flying from his wet spines. This was no honorable way of thinking.

Sonic nodded, looking out over the new lake. It seemed like it had been there for eternity, nothing indicated that only two hours ago it had been a desert basin of rock and dry sand.

"I didn't actually do a good job at securing the Diamond Globe…" Knuckles said quietly after a moment of silence. "Do you think I kept it?"

"Your promise? I think so. He wanted you to make sure it won't be getting in the wrong hands. When he asked you for your help, he gave you not only the description of the way here; you were the only person told that code. He gave you the code it needs to destroy the Diamond Globe, right?" Sonic looked out at the lake. "Now it's buried under a huge lake. Nobody will ever find it. And since there is no longer a thing to manipulate the subterranean water out here, the lake will stay where it is. That's what the texts in that chamber said, isn't it?"

Knuckles nodded slowly. "Yeah. All the water that was kept out of the tunnels and the basin by the Diamond Globe now went back where it naturally belongs."

"Maybe he wanted you to destroy it all along." Sonic glanced up at Knuckles.

"We'll never know," Knuckles mumbled. For several minutes he just looked silently out over the water, turning black with falling darkness. A cold breeze blew through Knuckles' fur. "We can't stay here," the red echidna noticed.

"I know." Sonic nodded, but looked hesitantly at his foot.

"Come on. I'll help you." Knuckles struck his hand out at Sonic and pulled the hedgehog to his feet, then ducked under his shoulder to take some of his weight again.

Slowly they started walking into the night's desert without having any idea where they went.

And Sonic didn't really care. He was tired, the increasing cold of the night was creeping into his wet fur, his head still hurt, his foot felt like every step stabbed a dagger into the ankle and the not small amount of bruises and scrapes he had gained in the last days didn't improve the situation. And he was dying of hunger. Right now he would have eaten almost anything. But as it seemed, nothing in reach happened to be on even that long list.

Knuckles threw a side-glance at the blue hedgehog as they walked for minutes in silence, somehow both of them too exhausted to talk. Sonic was limping badly now and Knuckles could see the pain scrunching up his face even in the dim light of the now rising moon. "How's you foot?", the echidna started.

"It's nothing, don't worry," Sonic gave back, giving his best to hide another wince.

"I've seen a nothing before and it doesn't look like that. How about I carry you for a while?"

Sonic frowned. "You're as tired as I am," he contradicted, "I can deal with it."

Knuckles shook his head. "You're slowing us down. Really Sonic, this doesn't help us. You are in pain and in that pace we'll never get out of this desert."

Sonic looked up at him finally. "That's the first time someone tells the fastest thing alive he's slowing the pace."

"So that's it? Pride?" Knuckles smirked. He knew that feeling himself, very well he did. "I won't tell anybody. It doesn't count, you're injured."

Sonic considered that for a moment. "Okay," he finally gave in, his piercing foot deciding over his head. "And you're sure you can carry me around here?"

"I carry the Master Emerald. You weigh nothing, Sonic." Knuckles let go of his grip around Sonic's shoulders and turned his back to the hedgehog. "Get on."

"This is the first time I'm riding piggy-back with someone," the hedgehog noticed with a small, embarrassed grin when Knuckles started walking again.

"Don't worry. We won't let this become a habit," Knuckles replied dryly.

Sonic lifted his head when a small sound drilled itself into his half dozing mind. Two pointy ears twitched. "Knuckles?"

The echidna nearly winced at the sudden word. Nobody had been talking in the last half an hour, and the way Sonic had been getting heavier on his back showed Knuckles that the hedgehog had been struggling to stay awake. "What's up?"

"I guess I heard something."

Knuckles stopped walking and listened. "What?"

"Dunno." Sonic closed his eyes as he strained his sharp ears. "There…. Wheels?"

"Wheels? Really? So we are coming to a road?"

"Too small sound," Sonic contradicted. "Must be a lone car or something."

"Think we can catch it?"

Sonic grimaced. "You? Maybe. I? Certainly not."

"Okay, um, then so you want me to try? And you wait here?", Knuckles suggested as Sonic slid off his back.

Sonic nodded, balancing on his good foot. "We need some help, Knux. Go."

The echidna nodded back and turned around to run towards the source of the sound. He tried to listen well enough to calculate where it would be in a few minutes while he ran.

Only one minute later, Knuckles spotted two small pinpricks of light somewhere out in the plain on his left. Nearly at the same time, his feet hit some kind of bumpy road or course. Considering that the car should come this way, Knuckles stopped.

He didn't need to wait for long. A dusty pickup slowly ambled along the tiny road; when the light hit the echidna, the car was stopped. Knuckles jogged over to its side, feeling himself tense a little, not knowing if he would get help or hostility. He was suspicious by nature anyway. Something that maybe had come with being a guardian for his entire life.

A suricate leaned out of the window, if it had no glass or was simply open all the time was impossible to tell. The face of the owner showed a slightly greying fur; he obviously wasn't the youngest. Brown and friendly eyes looked the echidna up and down with a mixture of surprise and curiosity.

"Good evening, Mister," Knuckles began.

"Good evening," the suricate replied and a second face appeared in the window, one of a female. "Hello," she said cheerily.

"What are you doing out here? This is no good place to stay at," the man continued speaking, once again looking Knuckles over. "Do you need help?"

Knuckles nodded wearily, somehow glad that they offered it and so he didn't have to ask. It always made him feel uncomfortable, although he knew Sonic was right and they quite certainly needed it.

"Did you get lost?", the woman asked curiously.

"Eh … Not really." Knuckles tilted his head. He pointed out to where he had left Sonic. "I'm not alone. I got a friend out there who's injured."

"Oh dear", the female suricate hissed.

"Okay, Annie," the man addressed her, "I guess these boys need some help." He turned back to Knuckles. "If you like, we take you to our farm."

"We have some guest rooms to rent for holiday visitors, but at the moment this isn't the season and we have no guests," the woman added eagerly as if she'd been just waiting to tell Knuckels about that.

Bewildered the echidna looked between the two in the vehicle. He didn't really know what to say to this. He had not expected such an open offer for help. Either the people living on the lonely farms out here were friendly by nature or he had got a lucky shot. "Err … thanks."

"Oh, don't mind, we're always...", the woman started, but couldn't get far with the flow of words before she was interrupted.

"Quit chattering and hand me the blanket underneath the seat," the suricate teased his – wife, Knuckles supposed. "We can talk later." He pointed at the echidna. "He's cold and his friend will be too."

Still somewhat dumbfounded Knuckles just stood and watched as the two suricates got out of their car. The man was a bit shorter than he was. Now he pulled off his jacket and wrapped it around Knuckles' shoulders without bothering to consult him about that. The woman, a slightly round figure wearing a colorful dress, stepped up to them and handed the man something wooly.

"Come on and let's get your friend," the male suricate suggested.

Knuckles nodded and led him back the way he had come. "Thanks a lot," he said finally regaining his speech. "You can say we are kinda in trouble."

"No problem; I've been living out here my entire life and was taught that we need to help each other here." The elder smiled, broad and friendly. "My name's Frank and my wife's called Annie."

Knuckles hesitantly held out his hand at the suricate. "I'm Knuckles, Knuckles the Echidna. Nice to meet you."

Frank shook his hand and smiled.

Knuckles pointed forwards. "And that's Sonic."

The hedgehog was sitting on a big rock, looking at them in the bright moonlight. "Hi," he said simply; he was shivering by now, sitting still he had gotten really cold.

"Hello." The man leaned down and put the blanket he had brought around the hedgehog. "Can you walk?"

Sonic grimaced. "Not really. I got a sort of bad foot..."

"Okay." Frank helped Knuckles pulling Sonic up and they stepped to his sides, so that he could lean onto them and take the weight off his injured foot. Then they slowly walked back to the road.

After Sonic had been introduced to the two suricates, Annie smiled at him and Knuckles. "I'm afraid you have to ride the loading space. But it's not too far, and once we're home I'll make you some nice warm tea and a good meal. And we got enough place for you to stay at for the night."

Sonic grinned wearily. "Sounds like heaven to me."

And it really felt like heaven too. Twenty minutes later Sonic and Knuckles were sitting on a couch in a living room, the warmth of the house finally drying the last dampness out of their furs. The house was simple, but Sonic had absolutely no eyes for the furniture. He had only eyes for one thing. A big plate full of warm, tasty food in front of him. And as through a miracle, it was filling itself ever and ever again until he was all filled up and sank against the back of the sofa, hand resting over his finally - after days of what seemed to have been constant growling to him - satisfied stomach.

Annie smiled at the two guests, apparently happy about the healthy appetite both of them showed. "The two of you must have been half starved," she smiled when she removed the dishes.

"How long have you been out there?", her husband demanded curiously.

"About three days," Knuckles answered, leaning back slowly, beginning to feel a little at ease here.

"But pretty exiting days," Sonic added.

The suricate looked at him. "Yes, you kinda look like if you've been through some sort of adventure."

Knuckles nodded. "You can say so, yes."

"But you can tell us later. If you want to." The female interrupted Frank before he could ask for any details. "It's after midnight. And our guests here are looking tired."

Sonic couldn't help it but nod. He was more than looking forward to a place to sleep at, no matter what kind of place. He would have taken almost every spot, even the bathtub or something. As long as nobody got the idea to fill it with water of course. He had really had enough of the terrible wet stuff for quite a while.

Knuckles stood up too, steadying his friend again when they followed their hostess out of the living room. She led them up a stairway and opened the first door of a corridor, directing them into a small room with two beds, a small skylight that offered a glimpse at the starry sky, and a door that led to a bathroom.

The hedgehog sat down on one of the beds as soon as he was given the chance. The suricate looked at him briefly, then pointed to the bathroom. "In the cupboard there should be a first-aid-kit," she said. Then she continued telling them what she could get if it was needed. After five minutes Knuckles finally closed the door behind her after she had wished them goodnight.

Sonic flopped onto the bed. "Man, I thought she was going to talk for the rest of the night." The hedgehog scooted up on the bed until his head sank into a deep pillow. Sonic sighed as he lay flat on his back, spread-eagled. "I needed that," he declared almost dreamily.

Knuckles looked down on him. "I could say the idea doesn't sound bad," he admitted. "But before we both drop off here, we have to do something for that foot of yours. And some of these scratches don't look too well either if you ask me."

Regretting deeply having to interrupt the relaxation just starting to be enjoyable, Sonic half sat up and pulled off his gloves, socks and shoes, all of them still damp. He dropped them to the floor and sank back into the bed, not really caring about anything at all anymore by now. Not even about his throbbing foot. "Knux?", he asked at the sound of water from the bathroom to where the echidna had just disappeared. "What are you doing?"

Knuckles walked back into the room and sat down on the edge of the bed aside of Sonic's feet. "Drenching these bandages."

Sonic frowned. "What for?"

"Firstly: Cooling. Secondly: Wet bandages tighten on drying." Knuckles grabbed Sonic's hurt foot and the hedgehog winced. "Hold still."

Sonic gritted his teeth while Knuckles wrapped up his ankle. When the echidna finally put the foot down after what felt like days, Sonic relaxed with a sigh of relief and closed his eyes; his tired body melting into the bed.

Not seeming to notice, Knuckles grabbed his right arm, eying the deep scrapes and dried trails of blood on it. "Have you ever been thinking about your speed being too fast for your own well-being?"

"Huh?", Sonic wondered, one eye half opening again.

"When you scraped along that wall, you ripped off half of your skin and burned what's left of it." Knuckles reached for a wet tissue to clean the injury.

"Ouch," Sonic muttered, groggily squinting up at the echidna. "Watch it, Knucklehead."

Knuckles shrugged, for once able to ignore the insult. "I can let you do this yourself, but the way you look at me right now makes me think you'd rather fall asleep in the progress than getting yourself patched up properly."

"Hm." Sonic shut his eyes again with a grunt, missing on Knuckles' grin. He didn't really notice how Knuckles started wrapping another bandage around the now once again bleeding arm.

"So, ready," Knuckles said after a minute and laid the first-aid stuff down on a small table. The rest was only minor scratches and could do without patching up. When the expected sarcastic comment about sadistic echidnas failed to appear, he looked down on Sonic. The hedgehog's head was softly tilted against the pillow and the way he lay completely relaxed showed he was already fast asleep.

Knuckles sighed. "Great. Having you falling asleep on me is really beginning to become a routine." He reached for one of the blankets, unceremoniously throwing it over the snoozing hedgehog. "That spiky idiot is lucky I can understand him," the echidna muttered, switched off the lights in the room, seized a blanket for himself and fell backwards into the second bed. He took a long deep breath and slowly released it again, letting out the pressure of the last weeks, feeling both his body and mind finally relax. He knew he would lose a fight against tiredness as fast as Sonic had, but Knuckles didn't plan on fighting. He just closed his eyes, knowing that sleep wouldn't need to work hard to pull him into its grip.

"And there we were, behind us a wall of terribly sharp spikes, crystal daggers, all of them just waiting to stab us like marshmallows on sticks to burn in the desert sun. And from ahead, the storm was getting ever stronger and stronger…" Sonic stopped speaking, looking at his listeners, enjoying the increasing suspense.

The two suricates and Tails stared at Sonic breathlessly, unable to take their eyes off the blue hedgehog sitting on one of the chairs, his injured foot resting on a soft cushion on a second.

"And? What did you do, Sonic?" Tails glanced from Sonic to Knuckles, slumped leisurely into his chair; the echidna of course knew the story already. "Knuckles? Say something! Sonic is killing us!"

Knuckles chuckled and shook his head. "I'm no storyteller. I leave that kind of fun to Sonic."

Sonic inclined his head at the echidna. "Very much thanks." He grinned.

"Soooniiic!" Tails leaned from his chair and extended a hand in the direction of Sonic's bandaged ankle, playfully trying his best faking a threatening look. "Tell us what happened or…"

"Tails!" The female suricate shook her head at the newest guest.

Sonic laughed. "Okay, okay, I surrender to the forces of violent oppression!" Grinning broadly, the blue hedgehog continued retelling their desert adventure.

It was late afternoon. Sonic and Knuckles had slept till after midday and then they had called Tails on the radio set in the Tornado. Now all of them were sitting together with their hosts on the small veranda of the house, eating a tasty and fresh cake, enjoying themselves and Sonic was retelling the events of the last days.

After a while Annie stood up to remove the used dishes. Sonic had just reached the point when he and Knuckles met the turtles a second time. "And then they shot us with arrows and sedated us. When we woke up in a cell, we had a terrible headache and then they wanted to put a death penalty on us for knowing about their secrets and –"

"Hold on!" Frank stood up and gave Sonic a wink. "Give us a rest! I need a drink on such a story!" He helped his wife with the dishes, then turned to the three guests. "Can I get you some more juice or something?"

"Sounds great!", Sonic replied and the two others nodded agreeing.

The three friends remained alone on the veranda. "Next time I'm coming with you!", Tails declared.

Sonic nodded. "Okay, deal."

"What do we do now that this adventure is over?", Tails asked.

Knuckles tilted his head. "I gotta go back to Angel Island. I have –"

"We know," Sonic and Tails interrupted him in unison, "an Emerald to guard!"

Knuckles stared into their grinning faces. "Um… you say it…"

"Oh, come on Knux! We had such a nice adventure. And we did great." Sonic grinned. "Come on, how about a little holiday. You deserve it after all that. You can't just always work."

"Yeah, everybody needs a day or two off sometimes," Tails added, smiling at Knuckles.

"I don't know if I…"

Sonic sighed and turned to the fox. "Tails? Did the Master Emerald look as if it planned to get stolen in the next days?"

"Nope! The Emerald is absolutely safe. Nobody's on the Island and it floats securely above the ocean. No enemies around. No thieves. And no monsters!" Tails counted the non-existing threats to the big gem up on his fingers.

Sonic grinned satisfied, turning back to the red echidna. "See? Perfect conditions for a small vacation. Come on, it will be fun! Just the three of us, we can do whatever we want!"

Knuckles looked at the others, at Sonic's typical cheerful grin, Tails' blue pleading eyes and the playfully twirling tails, and felt his resistance melting away. It couldn't hurt if he hung out with them for a little while now, could it? "Okay, a few days," the echidna gave in.

Tails and Sonic exchanged a high-five.

"But just if one thing is clear," Knuckles continued.

"What?" Sonic casually ran his fingers through his quills.

"We make holidays, with stuff that is fun. And we don't do any of these neck-break things Sonic usually wastes his free time on. I won't do any bungee-jumping or skydiving or anything else as insane. I risked my neck enough recently. And unlike you, I got a responsibility."

Sonic gave Knuckles a friendly thud. "I know. You got an Emerald to guard." The hedgehog grinned as he lifted one hand. "Okay, I swear here and at that very moment that we will do only things all of us consider as fun, that I won't feed you any chili dogs and that we won't endanger your Emerald."

Knuckles nodded. "Deal."

"Intentionally," Sonic added and had to duck quickly when Knuckles sent a punch at him.