Sonic 1-The Story-Chapter 4

Chapter 4 – LABYRINTH ZONE
     His crimson sneakers landed on the faded, gold stones. It was a mostly even surface, but in some areas ahead it became unruly and rocky; in others there were small and large pits in the ground, some inhabiting spikes and shallow pools of water.
     "What is this place?" Sonic asked aloud. He noticed a sign that was slightly brighter than the ground's color, snapped and unattended. Upon seeing this, he moseyed over to take a look. He wiped off the dirt, dust, and slight muck to reveal a water-damaged wooden sign that read, in faded red letters, LABYRINTH ZONE, which Sonic could barely make out due to the age and damage. "Oh, yeah… I've heard of this place." Sonic cringed and sighed. This was one of the places Sonic had never wanted to go, and only one reason for this, water. Although Sonic was fast on his feet and ready for battle almost anytime, his one, true weakness was that he could not swim.
     The blue hero jogged through a long, narrow, underground hallway-like tunnel. He was seeing gargoyle heads, some of which were spitting fire, more spikes and blocks. Eventually he reached the end of this stretch of land and was at the edge. He looked over it to see a huge waterfall, which led into even more water. Sonic could see more blocks below the surface, coral, platforms, and much more. What surprised Sonic was that even though the water was a green-like color, it was very clear, and he could make out tons of small details below the water. But he didn't take much time to marvel at this, he wanted to get this place over with as soon as he could. He gulped, looked down, and leaped into the waterfall.
     Without any rhyme or reason, Sonic spun about in the water, splashing all over the place. Before he knew it, Sonic was in the air briefly, so he sucked in all the oxygen he could before getting submerged into the water. Sonic could hold his breath for a long time, despite not being able to swim. With a splash, he landed in the water, and slowly sank down to the bottom, where he could walk. Without hesitation, he moved forward slowly, but as fast as he could with the discrepancy of water. A chained-spike ball was in front of him, so he crawled under it, but as he did, a chunk of the ground was breaking apart in front of him, followed by a drill showing itself. Soon enough, Sonic saw the drill was attached to the face of a robot that looked like a little man on wheels.
     "Robotnik's badniks are down here too?!" Sonic thought. Then he noticed the robot rolling towards him, fast, or at least fast by underwater standards, so he leaped up and punched through the torso of the robot. He continued on after that short scuffle, trying to find a relieving exit for this underwater place. He didn't see one, but he did see another robot, one that looked fairly simple. It was an orb with four spike balls surrounding it, which looked to serve both offense and defense purposes. The robot noticed Sonic, and shot a spike ball in his direction, which he dodged. The robot shot the other 3 until he was just a floating sphere, defenseless. Sonic smirked. "You've got one serious battle strategy problem!" He thought as he kicked it into a wall. He saw two spike balls on their chains swinging too close to each other than Sonic wanted. Very tightly, Sonic crawled under one and jumped over the other.
     He jogged over a portion of the floor that seemed a little different to him, but he gave it no attention. This mistake of his was met with the consequence of it breaking underneath his feet a moment after he walked over it. Startled, he reached all around, trying to get a grip on something, anything. His right hand grabbed the ledge of the next part of the ground, he pulled himself up, then looked down to see what was below him. Sonic skipped a heartbeat. It was just a black nothingness of a pit, which seemed utterly endless to him. Thanking his luck, he dashed off.
     Continuing to trudge on, Sonic noticed something, deep inside him. He knew what it was, and he knew it was going to happen. He started to panic. A pain in his chest started to form, very slightly, and he started to have a bit of trouble moving. He was running out of air.
     Sonic looked around, praying that he would see some escape. Looking up, he saw light, so he moved faster than before so he wouldn't drown. More and more air was escaping from his lungs, and he started to panic more. Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed a yellow and pink robot fish swimming by. Swiftly, he hopped onto its back and leaped as high as his legs would let him to reach the surface. With only mere moments left, he splashed out of the water, fell to his knees and crouched on the ground, breathing deeply.
     "That…. That… was… way too… Close for comfort." Sonic barely made out in between breaths. Much like a dog, he shook of the excess water from his blue fur, took off his gloves and rung them out, and then placed them back on. He walked slowly along the narrow passage, trying to regain his breath and overall well-fare. While he wasn't paying attention, a spike jutted up from the ground, only a few inches separating his nose and the spike. He stood there, frozen in shock, but then gathered himself up, waited for the spike to lower again, and ran off.
     Three more of those burrowing badniks jumped up from the ground. However, this time Sonic had expected them because he saw the little drills in the ground ahead of him before reaching the action. He jumped in the air and took out two of them, stretching himself so that he punched through one, and kicked through the other. His feet tapped back onto the ground and he raced at the other one, which he picked up and swung it into the ceiling, which forced the transition of functioning robot into worthless screws, bolts, plates, and circuits upon the robot.
     Continuing to move ahead, he reached another waterfall. Sonic sighed, but he knew it had to be done, so he leaped into the fall to go through another rigorous battle to keep oxygen under the water. The current from the fall continued into a narrow, water filled passage way, so it gave Sonic the illusion of swimming, rather than walking on the floor. He saw two things ahead of him: a bar sticking out from the ceiling, and a spiked wall. His mind clicked with a solution to avoid the spikes, so he grabbed the pole and tried to stay grappled to it, as he was now fighting the current. Stiffly, Sonic maneuvered upwards and then let go of the pole, which made the current carry him right over the spiked wall, and plunged him to another similar section in which he did the same, just moving to the bottom rather than the top. Eventually the harsh current ceased and he was walking slowly under the water, and then noticed a switch and a closed door. Hopeful, he pressed his left foot down on the switch, causing the door to shoot up and reveal another passageway.
Another current came and swept him up. But, to his surprise, Sonic was carried into a shallow pool of water, which made for the total duration underwater much less than the first experience. When he stood up, the water only went up to just past his socks. In front of him was a ledge, so he ran over to it and looked over. It was then when he noticed he was in a large carved out pillar, with water inhabiting the carved out portion. Putting his hands over it, Sonic vaulted off the ledge to land safely on the ground.
     Sonic saw something in the distance, it looked like a man tinkering with a bunch of electronics, and it appeared as if he was attempting to fix something.
     "Come on, we're almost there." A voice said. "C'mon, work…" Sonic couldn't see the man, but he had a bad feeling in his gut that he knew who to expect. Sonic started speeding up as he was nearing the man. "Robotnik!" Sonic yelled.
     The man looked up. "NO!" He shouted. "NO! Not now, it isn't complete!" Robotnik leaped into the pod he had been working on fixing and started to rocket away, although he was much slower than he had been before. Up he went in a vertical maze of jutting stones, spikes, rocks, and gargoyle heads.
     Sonic skid to a halt and looked up. "You can't escape me!" He said, a bit overconfident after beating Robotnik three times prior. He hopped up onto a stone and repeated the process a couple times, getting himself higher and higher in the maze. A spike jutted out from the wall, and with grace, Sonic swung around the pole part of it and launched himself into the air.
     A gargoyle head showed itself and spit out a red-hot fireball. Caught off guard, Sonic stumbled back onto a wide stone. He waited for it to spit out another and then jumped above it, onto the stone it was attached to. With three vigorous stomps to it, the statue head broke off the wall and smashed into bits on a stone below. Sonic looked up, he hadn't forgotten about Robotnik, the reason he was up here in the first place.
     Jumping high up, he kicked the bottom of the pod with both of his feet and sent it into a wall. It continued to hover, carrying the heavy scientist, but now sputtered more than before.
     Eventually, Robotnik and Sonic reached a long stretch seeming to lead to a dead end. On the contrary; two portals opened up in the distance, which Sonic could barely make out some faded-green, metallic scenery. Robotnik sped up his pod and Sonic followed close on his tail. "Robotnik! You're..."
     Robotnik was almost through the portal when he reached out and hit Sonic in the other one, which was the exact one Sonic was deliberately avoiding because he had a feeling that that portal led to another area in the next environment. They both warped away in their separate warp zone portals.
NEXT: CHAPTER 5 – Star Light Zone