The Crossing Destinies [OPEN Sonic the Hedgehog FF]

Choosing a path (4/11)

 He looked over the edge of the roof, seeing and smelling no guard, so he landed on a small balcony. There was a trailing plant over the wall next to it and it had nice blossom. He smelled it, taking long inhales.

"Do you like climbing roses?" asked him Reagan who was standing in the glass door.

The small demon tensed up, hiding his head a bit. "Roses?"

The man nodded with a smile. "Yes, my ancestors were fascinated with roses and they cultivated several kinds of them. And this is the one that earned us the surname Rose since it was the first kind of wall climbing rose the world had ever witnessed." There was a pride in his voice.

"It smells nice," he admitted. The reddish hedgehog walked to the stone fence looking around. "It's alright," said the demon, "no guards are nearby."

"I see, you can smell them, correct?" The small demon nodded, his eyes were moving widely around, never focusing on one place longer than a second. "Am I making you nervous?"

Eclipse looked at him, silently answering: "A bit."

"Is it because my daughter is your master now and you are worried any mistake towards us will result in a punishment?"

The answer came in a form of head tugged between shoulders. The man knelt, petting the small demon. "It's strange to see a demon to be so anxious, but it's understandable." The brown eyes fell on the collar. "May I touch it?" Instead of a reply, the demonic child stretched its neck.

Two hands examined the smooth surface, not finding a single roughness. "It seems it's made of one piece." He cocked his head to get a better angle. "Do you know what material it is made from?" He put his hands away.

"No, I couldn't even scratch it," he mumbled his eyes wandering inside of the office glancing something interesting.

That didn't escape Reagan's ones. "Do you want to look inside?" He stepped toward the door inviting the other. The small demon slowly entered. The room was quite big, bigger than Amy's room. There was a wide and long carpet under the heavy table having brown and beige flower-like pattern. He as well noticed many bookshelves but the object catching his attention was a big paper picture on the wall.

"It's a nice map, isn't it?" Mr. Rose stood next to it feeling proud.

"A map? What it is?" He was just a few steps away.

"Is this your first time seeing one?" The other pondered about it a bit, before shaking the head and shrugging shoulders. "In short, a map is a drawing showing where important places are." He touched one spot. "Here we are in the Rosemary City." The name of the dot was written in nice flowery text, meaning Eclipse had a harder time to read it. The man continued: "We use maps to navigate in terrain, knowing which way to go to move forward to one's goal."

"But there are so many paths to choose," demurred the small demon. "How do you know which one is the right one?"

"For that, we have a tool know as a compass." He walked to the desk, opened a drawer and brought back a small flat and round object. Inside of it was a long arrow with one tip being red constantly spinning. "The biggest letters stands for north, south, west, and east. These are the four basic cardinal directions."

He then showed him how it works, going into deeper details and showing him what might lies in which direction. The demon child was fascinated by it. Happily trying to find which way is what direction. When he was having the most fun, someone knocked on the door. The small demon bristled, quickly leaving thru the balcony.