Legal stuff: This story is adapted from the computer game Timelapse by
GTE Entertaiment and based on characters created by SEGA. Knuckles the
Echidna, Espio the Chameleon, Vector the Crocodile, Mighty the
Armadillo, Charmy Bee, and Julie-Su are created and owned by SEGA. Lez,
Penny, Missan, Boona, and Randi are created and ownedby me. You can use
them in your own stories, but I'd appreciate it if you'd ask me first.
If you want to use May, send an email to maymay8@hotmail.com. Author
can be reached for comment at randiradio@rocketmail.com.

NOTE: This story was written purely for entertaiment and is NOT
intended as a walkthrough for the computer game. It was ADAPTED from
the computer game, which means I've added, changed, and left out
certain things. It does, however, contain many spoilers, so if you're
still trying to get through Timelapse and want to finish it all by
yourself with no hints or spoilers, stop reading here! ;)

Time setting: Imaginary (doesn't follow any specific continuanty)

TIMELAPSE
Part 1: Floating Island

Chapter 1
        It wasn't a day that anyone thought unusual. It was a 
Wednseday. Floating Island had had a small attack by Robotnik's bat 
bots, which the Chaotix had cleared up in just a few minutes. Penny 
and Mighty had gone rock climbing. Knuckles had checked on the 
Chaos Emerald. It was three in the afternoon and Vector was on his 
way to Espio's.
        He certainly wasn't expecting the wolf that dropped out of the 
sky.
        It was a blue-furred female wolf, with black chin-length hair 
and huge, dark brown eyes. The eyes were absolutly beautiful, with 
thick dark lashes, like someone of ancient Egypt. Her clothing didn't 
seem Mobian-flared pants, a striped sweater, and thick-soled shoes. 
She had a silver chain with a dolphin pendant around her neck. 
Vector knew the second she dropped out of the vortex in the sky and 
fell into the nearby lake, that she was not a regular Mobian wolf.
        "Who are you?" Vector demanded as she climbed out of the 
lake.
        "There's no time to explain," she said urgently, shaking the 
water off her body. "Your world is in danger, and so is mine. My 
friend is trapped in a time gate, and I need your help! Yours and the 
rest of the Chaotix's"
        "Whoa, whoa!" said Vector. "I don't understand! Why are we in 
danger? What's your world? How do you know about the Chaotix? 
What do you mean your friend is trapped in a time gate? Who are 
you anyway?"
        The wolf blew her hair out of her face in impatience. "My name 
is May. I used to be a human of Earth, before Atlantis resurfaced and 
the Atlanteans did this to me. The Atlantean ship here will resurface 
too, and so will ships on other planets. The Atlanteans will take over 
the universe if we don't do something now!"
        Vector snorted. "May, Atlantis is a just a myth."
        "It's not a myth!" May shouted. "It's as real as anything! And 
here, on Mobius, is the mothership. We have to send it back to the 
Atlantis homeworld or destroy it before it's too late!"
        "Look, I don't know," Vector said. "It doesn't sound easy-or 
believable-so-"
        "Please," May interrupted. "I really need your help."
        Vector glanced into those beautiful Egyptian eyes. As 
unbelievable as her story sounded, something in May's eyes told 
Vector that she was telling the truth. "Okay," Vector said. "I'll 
introduce you to the Chaotix."

Chapter 2
        "That's bull," Mighty said. "Atlantis is a myth."
        "Actually, no," said Penny, a psychic dalmatian dog from Maple 
City. "Fifty years ago, scientists discovered a city on the ocean
floor."
        "Fifty years ago?" Espio repeated. "Then how come nothing's 
been done about it yet?"
        "The dome around it couldn't be penetrated," Penny explained. 
"And besides, who had time for science what with the nuclear war 
and the Great War and Robotnik's takeover and all?"
        "See?" said May. "There you have it! The really is an Atlantean 
ship here!"
        "This is making some sense," said Boona, a jungle cat who was 
the son of two refugees of the nuclear war thirty years ago. "But I 
don't understand what the big deal is. Why don't we just leave it at 
the bottom of the ocean?"
        "Weren't you paying attention, Boona?" demanded Missan, a cat 
from Northern Mobius and Espio's girlfriend. "It's the mothership! If 
it resurfaces, the Atlanteans could take over the universe!"
        "This does make sense," said Charmy Bee. "But where's the 
timegate? How do we find it?"
        "First we have to find the moai," May replied.
        "The what?" Knuckles asked.
        May gave Knuckles a strange look. "You're the guardian of this 
island and you don't even know that there's a moai here?"
        Knuckles bristled. "I don't even know what a moai is! So sue 
me!"
        May pulled a postcard out of her back pocket. It showed a large 
stone head on Easter Island on Earth. She flashed it in front of 
Knuckes' face, saying "THIS is a moai!"
        Lez, a free-will robot who had been thrown out by Robotnik 
and later recovered by the Chaotix, made a sarcastic-sounding 
electronic noise. "That statue's been done by an Earth civilisation,"
he 
said. "There's nothing like that on Mobius."
        May glared at the robot. "What do you know?!" she retorted 
angirly.
        "I know more than you, that's a guarantee," Lez shot back. His 
angry eyes locked with May's.
        "Whoa!" said Julie-Su. "Don't fight! And May's right. There is a 
moai statue here."
        Everyone turned to stare at Julie-Su. "Where?!" May demanded.
        "How come I didn't know about it?" asked Knuckles.
        "You'll see when I show you," replied Julie-Su.

Chapter 3
        The moai turned out to be right at the edge of the Ice Cap zone.
        "No wonder I didn't know about this," Knuckles said. "No one 
ever comes here."
        "Okay," said Mighty. "Now that we're here, what do we do?"
        "There's nothing here but a statue," muttered Lez.
        "No," Penny said, closing her eyes. "I sense something."
        May ignored them all. She just walked around the statue trying 
to find out the connection between it and the unknown timegate. At 
the back of the big head, she spied a strange ancient glyph, raised in 
the stone. Curious, she pressed on it, and it sank into the stone. As
it 
did so, a large rectangular area underneath her began to cave in. May 
jumped to the side to avoid falling into the resulting hole. Looking 
into the dark rectangular hole, May saw a flight of steps leading into 
a dark cave.
        Penny rubbed her temples. "There's something down there," 
she said. "I can feel it."
        "Let's go then," Espio said, advancing toward the dark stairs.
        "I don't know," Knuckles mumbled. "There's no light down 
there."
        "Then stay," May told him. "I just needed your help finding this 
statue." She made her way slowly down the steps.
        "Wait," Knuckles said. "You can't go there alone." He went down 
the stairs after May and the Chaotix follwed.
        Enough light shone through the hole above them for everyone 
to climb down the safely, but as soon as the last person stepped 
down from the last stair to the cave's floor, a loud slam was heard 
from above them, and the cave was in total darkness.
        Everyone gasped and spun aroun, but the cave was now too 
dark to see anything. "Oh my gosh!" Penny wailed. "It must have 
been a trap!" A sudden silence filled the cave. Nothing was heard but 
the sound of water dripping from the cave ceiling.
        Then suddenly a voice was heard. It said, "Forbidden darkness 
holds a timeless light."
        Julie-Su screamed. So did Vector, Missan, and Boona. Lez made 
an electronic wail. "Was that you, May?" Mighty demanded.
        "No!" May gasped. "I don't know what that was!"
        The aura in the cave was now a mixture of considerable panic, 
complete confusion, and fear. The stunned silence swept into the 
cave again, broken by a few frightened whimpers.
        "I knew coming down here was a mistake," Knuckles said 
shakily.
        Lez suddenly realised something, and whacked himself on the 
head for not having thought about it before. The lights in his optical 
sensors flickered on-white, because he was scared-and dimly lit the 
cave.
        Everyone let out a sigh of relief. "Thanks, Lez," Knuckles said. 
"Now we can get to the bottom of this."
        Lez looked around the cave, shining his light on the rock cave 
walls, the damp rock floor, and-hanging on a hook from the ceiling-a 
strange blue sphere.
        "Hey-that might be a light!" Boona exclaimed. He ran over to it 
and examined it. It was made of thick blue glass, and there was a 
circular hole in one side. Inside the hole, Boona could see something 
that looked like a lantern's mantle. He took some matches from his 
sneaker roll and, crossing his fingers, lit the mantle. A very bright 
blue flame grew in the spherical lantern, bright enough to illuminate 
the whole cave.
        The area they were standing in turned out to be quite small, 
but with many passages leading in all directions. The whole cave was 
made of pink limestone that shone with blue and silver crystals. 
Around the cave, May and the Chaotix saw some evidence of 
geothermal activity and carvings made by an ancient civilisation, 
long forgotten. Looking up at the stairs they came down from, they 
saw that the stairs simply ended at with the limestone ceiling.
        "There's no way out," said Vector. "We're stuck down here."
        "What about the tunnels?" asked Espio. "They've got to lead to 
something."
        "They've got to," said Knuckles. "Which way?" he asked Penny.
        Penny pointed to one of the tunnels. "That way," she said.
        After about fifteen minutes of wandering through twisting 
passages with the glass lantern, May and the Chaotix found 
themselves in a large, open area of the cave made entirerly of 
turquoise crystal. There were moais and and ancient glyphs of all 
sorts, plus large crystal stalagtites and stalagmites everywhere. May 
and the Chaotix found themselves standing in a few centimeters of 
water that dripped with an echoing sound from the cave ceiling. The 
cavern was completely lit by several lanterns identical to the one 
they had taken with them.
        Nobody spoke. They only surveyed the room, intrigued by the 
moais. There was one head sitting on the floor, wiht a carved bowl on 
a rock shelf sitting beside it. Just beyond that were three moais with 
bodies. Their arms were outstretched and each shoulder had a glyph 
painted on it. On one wall was a stone face with large staring eyes. On 
another was a a ghostly face, a Makemake, carved into the wall, with 
large red eyes.
        By his feet, Mighty noticed a stone tablet, covered with glyphs. 
He picked it up and looked at it, running his hand over the carved 
glyphs.
        "What's that?" Charmy asked, looking over Mighty's shoulder.
        Mighty replied, "I'm not sure."
        May said, "It looks like a rongorongo board."
        "A what?" asked Vector.
        "A rongorongo board," May replied. "They were made by the 
Easter Islanders on Earth."
        Mighty turned it over in his hands and decided to hang on to it.
        Knuckles walked to the center of the cavern and looked around. 
"Looks like it's a dead end," he said. "Now what?"
        "There!" Penny exclaimed, running to the Makemake. She 
touched the face, saying, "There's something behind this."
        May pounded the face, kicked it, threw herself against it, to no 
avail. But she did notice a hollow sound coming from behind the wall. 
"Penny's right," she said. "There's definatly something back there."
        "Stand back," said Lez, holding out his hand, his palm facing the 
wall. A laser blast shot out of his open palm and hit the wall. But, as 
if the Makemake had a shield, the blast didn't leave a scratch and 
served only to shake the whole cave and make a tremendous noise. 
Everybody dropped to the ground in case the blast bounced back, 
which fortunately it didn't.
        "Knock it off, Lez! You're going to kill us all!" May yelled at Lez.
        "I'd like to see you do anything better!" Lez shot back, getting 
up off the floor.
        Missan got up and yelled, "Lay off, you two! That's not going to 
accomplish anything!"
        "Yeah, tell that to your armed assain 'droid!" May yelled back.
        Lez's eye flickered to red. "I'm not-" he started to say, before 
Penny interrupted with "Shut up! All of you!"
        Charmy flew up to the cave ceiling. "Yeah, stop it," he said. "I 
think this is some kind of test, and we've got to work together if 
we're going to pass it."
        Vector snapped his fingers. "A test! That's right! Guys, we've 
been so stupid! To get to the other side of the wall we need logic, not 
violence."
        Lez and May exchanged brief glances. Lez's eyes faded back 
into blue, as they normally were. May gave him a nod and a quick 
smile. Peace was established for now.

Chapter 4
        "All right, then," Knuckles said. "The puzzle and the solution are 
definatly in this room. The question is, where?"
        "Let's take a closer look at these moais," Missan suggested. "I 
think the answer might be in them." She kneeled down in front of 
the head sitting on the floor, and touched the face's closed eyes, the 
large nose, the lips. She saw that the bowl on the rock next to it was 
filled with cold water. As she ran her hand over the face, she thought 
she felt it growing warm.
        "Watch out, Missan!" Espio shouted. Missan quickly pulled her 
hand away from the moai, seeing that it had begun to glow with heat. 
She got to her feet and ran to join the rest of the Chaotix just in
time 
to get out of the way of the moai's lava tounge! As the mouth opened, 
letting the thick lava flow out, the eyes also began to open. It was a 
truly remarkable sight. The lava flowed out to the point where the 
Chaotix were thinking about leaving the cave, and stopped there. 
Then, before the Chaotix's facinated eyes, a symbol appeared in each 
of the crystaline eyes, and a small face rose from the lava. Finally, 
the transformation came to a stop.
        The Chaotix stared, bewildered. Vector gave an impressed 
whistle.
        Then May brightened. "Look over there," she said, with a touch 
of exitment in her voice. She pointed to the three stautes holding out 
their hands. "Those moais sure seem like they want something in 
their hands, don't they?"
        "Yes," Knuckles said in agreement. "But how do we get a head 
made of lava over there?"
        "I know!" Missan exclaimed, remembering the bowl of water. 
She ran back to the head and poured a small amount of water on the 
lava face. It instantly cooled and hardened into stone, fizzing as 
steam escaped from the lava. When the steam cleared, Missan picked 
up the head, now completely cool and hard. Immedeatly, to Missan's 
surprise, another identical head rose from the lava tounge. But, to 
everyone's dissapointment, when Missan placed the stone head on 
one of the hands, it crumbled into sand. The aura of exitment turned 
into despair.
        "Maybe we're not putting it on the right hand," said Julie-Su.
        "That could be true," said Lez. "Look. There are glyphs on the 
shoulders. Maybe one corresponds with something...like maybe the 
symbol in the statue's eyes?"
        Suddenly Mighty, who had been quiet the whole time, gasped 
as he remembered the rongorongo board, which he still held in his 
hand. Most of the glyphs on the board were in the familier style that 
were painted all over the cave. Taking another look at it, Mighty saw 
that the six glyphs painted on the statues' shoulders were also 
carved in the rongorongo. But next to each of those six glyphs was an 
unfamilier glyph. They were all different, but they all shared a style-
they were drawn as simple shapes accompanied by a dot or two. 
And, next to one of the glyphs shown on one of the statues' 
shoulders, was the glyph in the other head's eyes!
        "I've got it!" Mighty yelled, his voice echoing through the cave. 
"I've figured it out!"
        Everyone rushed over to look at the rongorongo board. Mighty 
pointed out the six glyph pairs, and explained how Lez was probably 
right about the corresponding glyphs. "I think we have to put that 
stone head on the hand with the glyph that looks like a mask," said 
Mighty, pointing to that pair of glyphs on the rongorongo.
        "It just might work," Missan said excitedly. She ran over to the 
lava-tounged moai, cooled off the small head, and placed it on the 
hand that Mighty instructed her to. It stayed put. Everyone cheered.
        "But what about these other heads?" Boona asked when the 
cheering died down. "We have five more glyphs to match. But there's 
only one head."
        Espio walked over to the lava-tounged moai and pressed on 
one of the eyes. Both eyes rotated, revealing another glyph. In 
addition to the new glyph, the head on the lava tounge shifted its 
shape, forming a new head.
        Boona grinned. "Excellent!" he said.

Chapter 5
        Repeating the proccesses of cooling the heads, placing them on 
the hands, and rotating the eyes several times, the Chaotix thought 
they had passed their test. But much more lay ahead.
        They all held their breathes as Missan placed the sixth stone on 
the sixth hand. The second Missan took her hands off the head, a gust 
of wind blew through the cave, followed by a strange electronic 
sound, like a spaceship.
        The sound and the wind faded away after a few seconds, 
leaving the Chaotix puzzled. Hadn't they solved the puzzle, they 
thought. What happens now?
        "Look!" Penny yelled. She pointed to the Makemake, whose red 
eyes were now glowing.
        May exclaimed, "That must mean we've unlocked it! W can 
probably go through now!" May touched her hand to the Makemake, 
and what happened to it was more remarkable than all the things 
that happened in the cave. May backed away quickly as the space 
were the Makemake was carved began to swirl and dissolve into an 
open portal leading into a room more beautiful and amazing than the 
Floating Island's chaos chamber.
        Everyone gasped as they looked inside. The whole room was 
made out of some kind of alien material, like marble combined with 
glass and flowing water, for the solid material seemed to be flowing. 
In the center of the room was a circle of gleaming gold pillars that 
bent and met near the middle, forming a single pillar in the center of 
the circle. That pillar was split in the center, with neon blue lights 
encircling the two parts. In the empty space in the middle of the 
pillar, a sphere, some kind of orb, appearing to be made of the same 
material as the rest of the room, was suspended in mid air.
        "That's the time gate," May whispered. "We found it!" She and 
the Chaotix ran toward the gold pillars, were they saw that the 
center pillar was actually some kind of control panel. On both the top 
and the bottom halves were five buttons with symbols on them,. the 
same on both the top and the bottoms control panels. On the outer 
four were a scarab, a bee, a lizard, and a jellyfish, and on the middle 
button were two dolphins.
        "So what do we do now?" Charmy asked May.
        "I-I don't know," May said softly. "All I know is that we had to 
find this."
        Suddenly a face began to appear in the swirling orb. Like a 
faulty television, the image flashed a few times before it was clear.
It 
was the face of a female cat. She had pale blue fur and huge Egyptian 
eyes like May, but her long hair was bright blue and cut in layers 
with thick bangs. She wore a white shirt and silver dolphin earrings, 
and her whiskers were pink and seemed to glow from time to time.
        The cat said with a smile, "Thank god, you've come at last!"
        "Randi!" May exclaimed.
        "You're the one trapped in the timegate?" Vector asked.
        "Yes," said Randi. "I'm Randi Radio. I'm trapped inside this 
timeless dimension!"
        "That was you taunting us in the cave, wasn't it?" Espio asked, 
reconizing the voice.
        Randi nodded. "Yes. I was trying to prepare you. What you did 
in this cave is just an example of what you'll have to face if you're 
going to defeat the Atlanteans."
        "But what do we do?" May asked. "How do we get to Atlantis? 
How do we save you?"
        "You have to travel through the ancient worlds of Egypt, Maya, 
and Anazasi, and pass some very difficult tests," Randi said. "When 
you do it, you'll be able to go to Atlantis."
        "Egypt, Maya, and Anazasi? But those are Earth civiliazations!" 
May sounded horribly confused.
        "No. These civilisations are all Atlantean," Randi explained. 
"Wherever the Atlanteans have an outpost ship, these civilisations 
exist. Here on Mobius, there are treasures hidden in these ancient 
worlds that hold the key to defeating the Atlanteans. And you guys 
have to find them.
        "Don't send too many of you through the timegate. Too many 
might overload the timegate, and then we're all doomed. Once you're 
in the ancient worlds, I won't be able to help you as I did here. But 
don't worry, you won't be entirly on your own. You should send at 
least two of you instead of one, in case something happens. There's 
strength in numbers. You'll be transported to the date just after the 
civilisations were lost. It will be dangerous, but if you succeed, it
will 
help everyone.
        "Do your best to reach me. You'll come to believe the 
unbelievable. Not just about the ancients, but about the very nature 
of mankind." Randi paused.
        "I'll go," Lez volounteered. "I could even go by myself."
        "Are you sure, Lez?" Knuckes asked.
        "It would be better if I went," replied Lez. "I'm only a robot. I 
have to take the risk. It's in my programming."
        "Okay...," Knuckles said slowly. "But you can't go by yourself. 
Who else is going to go?"
        "Well," May said reluctanly as she glanced at Lez. "I guess I 
should go. It's my duty."
        "Wait, May," Randi spoke up. "You should stay. If the others 
fail, we might still have a chance against the Atlanteans because you 
have some knowledge about them and Atlantis."
        "Then I'll go," said Espio.
        "Espio, you can't," Missan said.
        "Lez and I are a good team," said Espio. "Don't you remeber how 
we foiled Robotnik's plan at Kadus City?"
        Lez nodded in agreement. "I think we can pull this off 
together," he said.
        "So is it settled?" Randi asked from the orb. "Espio and Lez?"
        "Seems like it," Knuckles replied.
        Vector sighed. "Well, we'll miss you two."
        "No you won't," Randi told Vector. "If everything goes right, all 
three of us will be transported back to the same time as Espio and 
Lez left. It would be as if they were never gone.
        "So are you ready?" Randi asked. "The sooner you leave, the 
better."
        Espio and Lez exchanged quick glances, then nodded.
        "Go to Egypt first. That's the button with the scarab on it. To 
use the timegate, press a button, the place both your hands on the 
orb. You don't have to bring anything with you. I'll be waiting for 
you at the next timegate. I wish you the best of luck." With that, 
Randi's face disappeared.
        "All right," said May. "Let's get this show on the road."
        Espio embraced Missan and gave her a soft kiss. "You won't 
miss me," he said. "But I'll miss you."
        "Ready?" asked Boona, pressing the scarab button. The orb 
began to electrify and glow bright magenta. Espio and Lez nodded.
        "Good luck, you guys," said Julie-Su.
        Espio and Lez said goodbye to May and the Chaotix, then 
walked forward and placed their hands on the orb.
        The electricity from the orb could be seen transferring to Lez 
and Espio, encricling them, consuming them. Then, as if they were 
holograms, they began to flicker. Just occasionally at first, then more 
and more frequently. And then, with one final flicker, they were 
gone.

END OF PART ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And send me comments! Please please please +997 pleases!!!! My e-mail
addy is randiradio@rocketmail.com