Chapter Text
Everywhere one looked, there was nothing but disaster.
What were once tall, proud buildings and skyscrapers bustling with activity, were now either completely torn apart, on their way there, or collapsed over onto various other broken or crippled structures. The streets that once served as invaluable transportation were now desolate and abandoned, with vehicles like cars and trains scattered about as nothing but chunks of wreckage. No longer did thriving trees, flowers, or other plant life decorate the world and contribute to the earth's thriving; instead, they were spread dangerously thin, mostly replaced by concrete, trash, or magma.
The sun struggled to break through this hellscape, as the sky was constantly polluted by heavy clouds of smoke and smog, largely coming from the giant, powerful flames that plagued nearly everything in sight. They lit up the sky even in the darkest of nights and never seemed to go out, fueled by the frequent tornadoes and hurricane-like winds that left the well-being of any creature's home constantly uncertain at best. It was for these reasons that life was oppressively hard to find. All sentient beings tried to avoid being out in the open, lest they find themselves at the mercy of the various dangers that plagued their world.
Many more of these dangers came in the form of "organic" life. At nearly every corner of the planet, what could only be described as demonic worms with claws for heads, made of stone and fire, were bursting out from the crust of the planet. The sharp edges and vice-like grips of these claws made them instantly imposing, despite the fact that the worms ranged in size, from barely surpassing the height of a human to easily towering over a two-story house. At any moment, they could rise up out of nowhere and attack any unlucky soul, destroying their homes or pummeling them potentially to death if they either couldn't flee or couldn't fight back.
They were joined by giant stone golems of fire and rock, and tiny phoenixes that spread fear in the hearts of anyone who saw their majestic yet dangerous fiery wingspans. Also emerging from the earth were long, thin, brownish-orange tendrils, whose lengths could seemingly span up to a mile. They snuck around various corners, forcing every survivor to remain on their guard or else get snatched up, to be either choked out or dragged away to who-knows-where.
It was a nightmare to end all nightmares. A world brought to its knees, teetering on the edge of complete annihilation.
As had been the case for the past 200 years.
And as it had been for the entire life of a certain silver hedgehog, who was currently flying swiftly through it all.
Fittingly, this being's name was Silver. His body, which featured two large quills, a thick tuft of white fur on his chest and back, and white gloves and dark blue boots, was covered in a teal-green glow, signifying the use of his powers. Silver possessed telekinesis, a unique ability that allowed him to lift objects of many shapes and sizes. This included himself, granting him the ability to fly. The young hedgehog believed that he owed a lot to these abilities. He was rather soft-hearted and even naive, having never prided himself on survival instincts or the tougher, grittier mentality that was usually needed to last long in an apocalyptic setting like this.
Those qualities were instead found in the elegant purple feline who was running and leaping across buildings alongside him, leaving little trails of flames in her wake.
Blaze the cat was far and away Silver's most cherished friend and ally, in a world where such things were in increasingly short supply. Her purple cloak, red heeled shoes, and small red gem on her forehead all complimented her natural beauty and power, as well as her refined, dignified personality. She was gifted with great running speed that allowed her to keep up with her flying friend, a byproduct of her own enhanced ability: pyrokinesis. It was a power that contrasted with the level-headed, collected demeanor that Silver always admired and envied, but he believed it fit her so well, and he was often awestruck whenever he saw her so ferociously wielding it.
As they sped through the fallen world, they were intercepted by three firebirds charging towards them. They spread their wings to show off their deadly, menacing flames, before swooping in with screeching battle cries.
As one of them dove towards Blaze, she set her paws aflame and swiped at the winged monster, using a heavy swath of fire to sweep it aside towards Silver. Silver, in response, used his powers to catch the bird and slide him along the ground below. It cried out as it skidded violently, before it crashed into a car in a small but effective explosion. At the same time, he tossed the other two birds Blaze's way, and she performed a spinning tornado kick to send them in an uncontrollable spiral. One of them was shot into the distance to its death, and the other was met by a vertical midair spin by Blaze that slammed her heel into it, sending the pyro avian straight down onto the rooftop with a landing severe enough to incapacitate it.
Despite their differing personalities - Silver's being more open and Blaze's being more reserved - the two of them had forged the strongest of friendships as they lived out their days in this wasteland. First out of necessity to survive, and then gradually out of an unshakeable trust as they learned more about each other and grew closer over time. Silver found inspiration in the feline's headstrong courage, while Blaze felt she could open herself up more to him than anyone else in her life. They were practically inseparable, having seen each other through thick and thin in countless battles and day-to-day struggles.
Most of which were against the foe they were about to confront.
"There he is!" Blaze shouted.
Indeed, in front of the heroes lay the bane of their existences: a fifty-story-tall being made up entirely of magma and rock armor, wielding four hulking arms that could take down a small house with one hit. Giant stone protrusions were adorned on his rock-armored head and jawline, complemented by razor-sharp teeth and beady little green eyes. He had no legs, instead having his torso seemingly embedded into the earth itself, surrounded by a pool of hot liquid magma and lava.
He was, as far as Silver and Blaze knew, what was keeping their world in shambles. The flames, the minions, and the destruction, all came back to him.
Iblis.
Silver's eyes flared with a sickly fury. This being ... they had fought him so many times. Sometimes it was a lost cause and they barely escaped with their lives. Other times they succeeded in neutralizing him temporarily. But never for good. He would always return, as intact and strong as ever, ensuring that the destruction would live on.
Every time this happened, Silver grew more and more determined to make this their final encounter, and more and more disheartened when that proved to not be the case.
This urgency caused him to recklessly charge ahead. He used his telekinesis to levitate numerous pieces of scrap, chunks of concrete, and whatever else he could find, to chuck at the volcanic beast.
Iblis opened his massive jaws and let out a roar that literally shook the ground around him, as if to challenge the little hedgehog to another trivial deathmatch.
"You wanna eat?!" Silver shouted. "Eat this!!"
He pushed his palms out, sending all of the debris flying towards Iblis.
But the demon was unfazed. He caught much of the "ammo" comfortably in his four giant hands. What he couldn't hold with them, he used a large set of mile-long tendrils from the ground to wrap around them, before smashing them back down and destroying whatever may have still been intact below.
Those same tentacles then turned and aimed for him.
"Silver!" Blaze cried from behind.
Silver gasped, keeping himself afloat as he grabbed hold of the tendrils with his powers, creating a green glow around them as well as himself. They thrashed to escape, but he held them steady. But he could only hold on to so many, which meant he was forced to dart and weave in midair when more came about and tried to constrict him. He felt one slip around his ankle and turned to pry it off, needing more energy than one would assume to deal with a coil so slinky-looking. In his distraction, his grasp on the original tentacles slipped, and they charged in to take advantage of the opening, putting him on the defensive as Iblis roared again.
Blaze, meanwhile, leapt from rooftop to rooftop to try and aid her friend in battle. Of course, she didn't go unnoticed by Iblis, who turned his attention and subsequent attacks onto her. His hulking hands reached out to grab the top of one of the tallest buildings still upright. After digging his fingers in, he managed to tear off a massive chunk and fling it straight at the blazing feline. Blaze sprang herself high up into the air and, with a deft twirl, managed to slink her way straight through a narrow window, letting the makeshift projectile fall away and crash behind her. But Iblis was unfazed, tossing more large objects her way, forcing her to scurry from left to right and back again at breakneck speeds to avoid being crushed.
Iblis, with another roar, sent a gargantuan burst of flames from his mouth right at Blaze. But he seemed to have forgotten about the close relationship she had with fire (whether she herself liked that relationship or not). Rather than being harmed at all, the tenacious cat simply made a motion with her arms to scatter the fire around her, parting it like an ocean. Iblis hurled a giant boulder at the girl, but her sleek figure emerged from the flames, she spun herself into a makeshift tornado, and her heel collided with the boulder, shattering it to pieces and landing on another skyscraper.
All while she kept her eyes on Silver, who was slowly being overpowered by the onslaught of tendrils. They were now backed up by Iblis swinging at him directly with his arms when he wasn't focusing on Blaze. Silver flew in between the blows, trying to get closer to the monster. He grunted as the heat and stone just missed him, reaching out to halt one of Iblis's four arms with his powers and freeze the limb in place. He strained and grunted through gritted teeth at the exertion it required to hold such a heavy object, while flying no less!
Of course, the beast swung another arm at him, and Silver was too fatigued by now to dodge it entirely. The giant limb knocked the wind clean out of him, and he was sent hurling away ... or at least he would have been, had two long tentacles not shot out and wrapped around each of his legs above the knees.
"Gaugh!" Silver grunted as he was harshly halted. He barely managed to dislodge the tendrils with his powers, but just as he got them off, more swiftly came up and wound around his wrists. They squeezed aggressively and tugged them in ways that stopped him from properly aiming his powers, which let the other tentacles wrap back around his legs. He focused on trying to free his wrists, which let another pair of tentacles slink around his lean torso. They wound their way up and weaved through the lush fur on his chest, with one of them stopping with a squeeze to his right shoulder.
Silver tried to directly pry one of the coils off his wrist, but this only aggravated the rest into tightening their hold on him. Soon his thighs were lashed together by more coils, which then slithered down to crawl around his boots individually.
Blaze sped herself up even more to help the silver hedgehog. She witnessed her friend wrestle against the coils, slowly being overpowered in their grasps, and it drove her to such intense speeds that her whole body began to catch fire.
But she too found herself in trouble when, right in front of her, a horde of Iblis's lithe tentacles suddenly burst out from the rooftop she'd been dashing across. They'd apparently crawled up the entire building from below to reach her. With a shout of surprise, the female, going too fast to stop in time, ran straight into them. The sea of tentacles practically formed a wall, constantly shifting and changing course to ensnare her. Blaze clawed, flamed, and powered her way through, making it admirably deep as the coils crawled and brushed up against her.
But with the sheer number of them, it of course took little time for one to grab her, with a few of them wrapping around her waist.
As Blaze's momentum was halted, she slipped and collapsed hard into the concrete. The tentacles shot her up into the air as more came to hold her, with two wrapping around her neck. A slightly dazed Blaze shot flurry after flurry of flames at the next incoming coils. She knew they wouldn't burn, but she hoped the force would be enough to keep them at bay. It delayed her fate by a few seconds, with many of the eager tentacles stopping dead in their tracks and retreating as they couldn't push through her power.
But the ones already around the cat jostled her heavily, throwing off her aim. Further, she could only fire in so many directions at once, and a set of lucky tentacles were able to zip their way around her attacks and quickly pin her arms to her sides, stopping the fire. Blaze still fought back, now relying on her legs to shoot fireballs at the snake-like attackers, but she couldn't stop a huge flurry of tendrils from reaching her and coiling her further. They wound across and diagonally around her upper body in a chaotic mess, eventually coating it entirely in a heavy cocoon.
She cried out as the tentacles whipped her forward, beginning to bring both her and her similarly trapped friend to the demon Iblis himself.
Silver's situation was also getting worse. These tentacles were simply too fast and numerous even for his abilities! The tendrils and Silver all glowed green as he pushed himself harder to fight them off, with the coils subsequently resisting his telekinetic grasp on them. He would try and often succeed in undoing a few of his slithering bonds, waving and shoving his arms frantically without a second to rest. But for every one he got off, Iblis sent two more to take their place in an instant! To make it worse, they now had such a firm grip on his body that trying to move or undo them only resulted in him being jostled and shaken about.
Soon his upper arms were locked down against his front by a small set of coils, further restricting his movements and limiting how far he could throw anything. Unable to stop another approaching tendril with his limited aim, Silver resorted to biting down into it, stifling his loud, strenuous grunts. But this backfired when the coil managed to slide through his mouth and wind around his head. More joined in, pinning his heavy quills down against his back and neck, sliding aggressively through his mouth.
"Gumrrgh!!" Silver winced and shouted as the rotten, slightly burning taste of the slithering appendages soured his tongue. His quills ached from the squeeze and his face felt hot as he whimpered through these gagging tentacles. He was further gagged when the coils slid over his mouth, blocking out sound and speech almost entirely. "Mmrmgh!!"
Blaze gasped as she saw this, but it was garbled up when she too was gagged immediately after, as if the tentacles were making sure she couldn't try biting them either. They squeezed her mouth and face tightly and painfully as they wrapped around her head, before weaving their way around her forehead and through the tied plumes of fur on top.
"Mmrhph ... Grrrmph!!" The fiery feline kicked out with her still-free feet, summoning bursts of fire aimed at the coils still yanking her towards Iblis. She twirled and spun around in her bondage to generate sweeping arcs of powerful fire, double-kicks, anything she could manage with just her legs, grunting loudly through the tentacles with each strike. But neither her force nor firepower were enough to loosen their grasp. They only made Iblis yank her much faster, causing her coiled-up head to whip back with a muffled yelp.
The two friends struggled fiercely to escape as the coils tightened around them. Silver's booted lower legs kicked and flailed as they were bound together. In his thrashing and twisting, the hedgehog soon found himself upside down, getting tossed around in a frenzy of random directions as he wrestled with the tendrils, which just kept coming no matter how many he miraculously managed to get off! He grunted through the gagging appendages as his shoulders were further constricted and a heavier layer of coils grasped at his already-covered knees and shins. The burning, squeezing sensations and increasing dizziness interrupted his focus as he tried to use his telekinesis.
Looking over at Blaze, his yellow eyes shined with worry as he saw her similar state. Her face was getting increasingly buried as more and more tentacles came specifically to wrap around her head and gag her. Silver spread his forearms out as best he could to try and get some of the tentacles off of her, but by now the nimble form of her upper half was indistinguishable underneath the multiple layers of coils. Only her nose, eyes, ears, legs, and tail were visible, twisting and bending to no avail. She growled with a burning rage in her eyes, thrusting her body and twisting her head to fight off the mounting pressure that was beginning to feel life-threatening to the poor feline.
"Brmmh!!" Silver tried to call her name, more concerned for her safety than his at this point.
"Mmmn ghmmph!!" Blaze cried back.
Iblis let out another piercingly loud roar. The two fighters squeezed their eyes shut, unable to bring their hands up to their ears to block out the terrible, earth-shattering sound.
Silver looked down and took deep, slow breaths through his nose, his tendril-infested chest fur rising and falling. Though the coils had now slithered down to wrap his forearms and wrists together, he stretched his hands out as far as they could go, ignoring the tiny tips of tentacles that curled around his fingers and knuckles.
With deep determination in his passionate golden eyes, the silver fighter grunted and strained with all his might to lift up any and every object far below on the ground that he passed over. Old street signs, cars, large stones and boulders, anything! Rarely did he ever use his powers on something so far away, and it was greatly sapping his already-waning energy by the second. He even ended up dropping several things due to the constant stifling squeezing that interrupted his efforts, forcing him to find alternatives with grunts of annoyance and fear.
But he was getting desperate and had to do whatever he could!
Blaze watched with concern for her friend, still fighting and kicking against the cocoon. Little tendrils continued to crawl around her, now winding around her tail and one of her legs, making attacking even more difficult as the limb was pulled and squeezed.
"Mmph," she moaned with a wince.
Her flames were beginning to fizzle out; the harsh grasp on her body was weakening her as well. She breathed heavily, loudly panting through her shifting gag. She was starting to feel feint from the constriction as the tentacles still kept piling on.
The independent feline cursed herself for not being able to do anything to save herself or Silver. Blaze had always valued her self-reliance, her capabilities in helping those who were less powerful than her. As such, needing help from others herself never suited her. It made her feel smaller ... more worthless ...
But she had no choice in this case. She could feel herself fading ...
... I'm sorry, Silver ...
Closer they got still. And Silver had more objects in his telekinetic grasp. It was taking its toll, and Silver had to struggle even harder to hold on as the pressure got worse. He too was starting to get buried. His skin was aching, his torso and legs now completely coated in grasping coils, his boots creaking as they cruelly hugged them.
"Mmmhhh ..."
Iblis opened his giant maw wide. Ready to unleash the raging breath of flames that would take Silver out for good.
But the hedgehog made his move in the nick of time.
"HMMMPH!!!"
With a mighty muffled cry, Silver brought all of his collected items together and flung them straight at Iblis's face, giving a telekinesis-charged kick with his bound legs to boot!
The projectiles all hit dead-on. And Iblis flailed mightily upon contact.
The tentacles around Silver immediately went limp, allowing him to fall freely. He gasped as the constriction was alleviated, and with a single telekinetic push, he managed to vault himself safely on a rooftop ... if none too gracefully.
The hedgehog collapsed in utter exhaustion, unable to get any further up than kneeling on all fours. He panted heavily, trying to catch his breath and regain his energy.
He then looked over, hoping to see Blaze also free and finding her own safety.
But instead, he saw her falling, making no attempts to land herself properly. The tentacles were unmoving, but they still heavily bound and gagged her. She could have broken out of them had she had her bearings, but the whole ordeal had still left her dizzy and barely conscious as she fell.
Silver took off, flying through the wind and debris to race towards his friend. He managed to catch up to her quickly, wrapping his arms around the female. He held her close to his chest, making sure the cat he cared so deeply for was safe and secure in his hold as he flew them both away from the chaotic scene.
As the two friends made their way to safely, Iblis was collapsing behind them. The giant pool of lava that had formed at his base was expanding as he sank further and further into it. He reached out futilely with all four arms as his whole body shriveled up and shrank. He roared at yet another defeat at the hands of his two far smaller opponents.
As the last of him melted into the lava, a violent explosion of flames shot out. They further illuminated the moonlit sky and sent formidable shock and heat waves throughout the entire region. After that, the landscape, while still desolate and dangerous, was granted relative calm. Though the effects of Iblis still raged on, their source was out of the picture ... for now.
But Silver paid no mind to that as he landed on the ground with Blaze still securely in his arms.
She'd never looked so helpless than right now, wrapped up in Iblis's slinky yet strong coils. The jarring sight of such a mighty warrior in such a vulnerable state filled him with anxiety. He'd seen her banged up plenty of times before ... but rarely like this.
It frightened the innocent hedgehog.
Finally, the cat began to stir with a light moan.
"Mmmh ..."
Blaze slowly lifted her head up, fighting to regain her faculties.
Doing so was made far easier by the sight that greeted her: the familiar, heroic hedgehog looking down at her, his handsome face filled with the same soft compassion she'd grown so comforted by in their times together. She felt her face heat up, both from the molten tentacles still compressing her head and the embarrassment of being in such a situation ... as well as a third emotion involving Silver that she refused to acknowledge.
With Silver looking similarly flustered, he gently set her down and pulled the still-remaining tendrils off of her. As she finally sat up, he gently brought a gloved hand up to her face, causing the heat in her cheeks to intensify.
"Are you okay?" Silver asked in a quiet, soothing manner, giving the cat a gentle smile.
Blaze couldn't help but lightly smile back, nodding as she put her hand on the one holding her.
"I'm fine ... thank you," she responded, forcing herself to not sound as uncharacteristically shy as she felt inside. This kept the sentiment from sounding sincere on the surface, but Silver knew her well enough to recognize that she meant it deeply.
After he let Blaze go and she got back onto her feet, Silver then turned to look out in the distance, witnessing the explosion of fire that signified Iblis's temporary downfall. Even from here, the sound overpowered all else, roaring and shaking the ground, causing the two heroes to stumble a bit. Silver's gut sank as he saw the fires spread, ensuring that Iblis would get the last laugh as his remaining flames lived on to plague the world.
To many, such a spectacle would seem to indicate that Iblis was down and out for good. But as Silver and Blaze were all too aware, he was only down. They'd subdued him before. Many times, against great odds. And he would always come back in due time, seamlessly continuing his reign of terror.
And Silver and Blaze would fight him again.
And he would fall, only to return.
And so the cycle would continue.
Over and over and over.
Silver felt himself starting to seethe. He and Blaze had gotten so close to their doom this time around. Being so heavily bound and gagged, inches from death ... seeing Blaze in the same state ... Iblis grew more relentless with each encounter, while they remained no closer to finally stopping him for good than their very first fight with him. This cycle would either continue forever ... or it would destroy them.
And they would never bring peace to this world.
With gritted teeth, Silver bitterly growled. "When will this end?"
Blaze looked up at him. That tone in his voice wasn't something she was used to. He was usually a bright and uplifting soul even in the worst of times, so this made her worried. "... Silver?"
Silver jammed the side of his fist into the nearest wall, causing a very rare instance of Blaze getting startled.
"All of this fighting. Back and forth, constantly on the run ... I've had enough of it!" He squeezed the debris that slipped into his hand, crumbling it into even tinier pieces of rubble. Much like what he felt Iblis was doing to him.
It was sometimes hard to take Silver seriously whenever he vented about something, due to his innocent disposition and simplistic, almost childlike outlook on the world. Most people had been broken down by this desolate future. They'd let the many hardships mold them into cold, cutthroat, sometimes even cruel individuals who believed that there was only one rule: survive. Silver, on the other hand, never showed signs of becoming that. He'd always seemed to have this unshakeable sense of hope that, no matter how bad things were, there had to be some way to make everything right.
Now, however, as the hedgehog turned to look at his companion, his eyes were looking darker than she'd ever seen them. His fingers were digging into his palms, so tightly that little sparks of glowing green were emanating around them.
"I just ... I want some way to stop it! To take down Iblis once and for all! I-If we don't then, I ... I-I ..."
He hung his head low, ashamed of his outburst.
Blaze walked up to him, unsure of what to say herself. She didn't wear her heart on her sleeve like he did, nor did she have the same level of faith in the world's salvation. She'd been introverted her entire life, in no small part thanks to the powers bestowed upon her. After all, they were based on fire, creating it and spreading it ... in a world consumed by fire itself. Even as she wielded it to fight back and protect those in need, how could she not resent such a "gift"? How could she not resent her own nature?
She thus taught herself to build a wall of steel around her heart, adapting to the impending doom around her by hardening her soul as much as her body.
It was a testament to Silver's pure, loveable soul that he was the only one to ever slip through that wall ... and that made it all the more concerning to see him look like he was finally about to lose hope.
She couldn't blame him. In fact, she envied how long it had taken him to even reach this point.
The young lad looked at Blaze curiously, expecting her to say something.
She looked down herself, struggling to look at her friend when he was so distressed.
"It's been hard," she began to say. "For all of us."
... And ...? she thought to herself. Can I really not think of anything more? She felt useless in that moment, almost as much as when she'd been in those tentacles' clutches. What was she supposed to say or do to lift Silver's spirits?
What could either of them do?
Just then, the wind began picking up.
The two of them both felt their heads begin to ache. A strange force crept up on them. The sights before their eyes began to look hazy and the slightest bit distorted.
And right above them, a spark of purple suddenly appeared. It grew larger, brighter, and evolved into ... a portal of some kind.
One apparently with its own gravitational pull. Nearby objects, matter, and seemingly the very fabric of the world itself were getting pulled towards the rift and sucked inside.
"B-Blaze- ahh!"
Silver cried out as Blaze was lifted up and brought towards the portal. She tried to flame-charge her way out, but it did no good against the inescapable grasp of its gravity. Silver found himself lifted up as well. He was unable to escape, even when cranking his powers to the max to shoot himself away!
The two shouted as they saw their world fade away right in front of them. Their vision was torn apart by a freakish dilation that scrambled their brains. The vortex consumed them, launching the two best friends away from their homes and to ...
... Somewhere different.
Somewhen different ...