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Super Sonic was flattened against Eggman’s busted vehicle as they flew through the… the… whatever it was that was between dimensions. The only light in the void of darkness came from him, Eggman’s busted vehicle, and the suspended glowing spheres that contained entire multiverses.
“Eggman! Cut it out, ya nut! You're... gonna... mess... me... up!” Sonic shouted as he tried to maintain his grip on the elusive sphere flying in front of him that contained the sum of their multiverse.
“If I can’t have the universe my way, then you won't have it at all!” Eggman screamed. Sonic strained his arm out to reach the sphere, just a little closer, then he’d fix it, he’d fix everything, just like always. Finally Sonic seized the glowing orb.
“Aw man... it’s this or nothing... Chaos Control!” Sonic shouted performing the action,
“No you don’t! FIRE!” Eggman screamed. A beam shot from Eggman’s pod. It hit the sphere dead on, which made it promptly sputter, and explode.
“That… that doesn’t look right...” Eggman muttered with wide eyes,
“Oh, for the love of… Eggman, what did you do?! What did you...?!” Sonic screamed.
The shockwave blew backward across the two lifelong enemies. Sonic watched as the tell-tale white energy of the genesis wave began to overtake his body. Whatever happened next, the blast meant that reality had survived, right? Otherwise why would there be a blast at all? He could feel his mind slipping into unconsciousness, and he longed to embrace it.
Super Sonic’s glowing red eyes snapped open, crackling with electricity. No, he would see this through. Whatever the Doc had just done, it couldn’t be good; no telling what the universe he woke up in might be like.
Through sheer will, Sonic forced the white energy off him. Clenching his hands around the invisible forces he commanded, he willed the white energy into a concentrated, sparking sphere before him. As he did this, what looked like tiny shards of mirror flew towards him from all sides. Barely keeping his focus, Sonic watched as the shards each found a separate place on the sparking white orb he’d amassed before him.
As the literal pieces fell into place, Sonic gave a grim smile as he knew his power was waning. As the last shard fell into place, another shockwave flew through the void. For a brief moment, Sonic’s vision was overtaken by hundreds of flashing images. He saw himself, hundreds of versions of himself, and hundreds of versions of Eggman, performing some variation of the task he’d just accomplished.
One Super Sonic and Eggman merely shut their eyes as the white blast overtook them.
Another two could only watch in horror as something the current Sonic couldn’t see caused a rare look of pure terror to fill the mad doctor’s and that Sonic’s eyes.
Another held a scenario where rather than launch their respective blasts, the two merely ended up crashing into the glowing sphere of their multiverse and vanishing from sight.
And so many more.
The Hero of Mobius couldn’t tell whether the images were flashes of what could’ve happened, whether they were other versions of himself across time playing out a similar battle, or merely delusions of his own mind. It ultimately didn’t matter though, for the images were gone just as quickly as they arrived.
Focusing on his current reality, Sonic barely maintained a hold on his super form as he scrutinized the glowing sphere. No more shards were flying in, so why didn’t the orb feel complete? Rotating the sphere, Sonic found the problem, two gaps in the otherwise fully golden surface.
The Super hedgehog frantically looked around the void between multiverses but saw not even a twinkle to indicate the missing pieces. “No! I’m so close! Where are they!?” he demanded from the void.
Suddenly a tiny spark of energy flew out of the gap in the golden sphere’s surface. The spark lanced out in a short, smooth loop before lightly shocking Sonic’s chest, “Guess that answers that,” Sonic said, almost coming to tears, “Glad to know I’m a critical part of the universe.”
He quickly refocused on the other gap in the sphere’s surface. “Now how about you…” another spark lanced out of the second gap, this one traveled in wild, zigzagging patterns, looking almost jagged and broken as it moved, like a crack forming in glass. It flew past Sonic and eventually found its mark, in the shattered remains of Eggman’s pod.
The Hero of Mobius grit his teeth as his eyes gave a burst of red sparks.
“Of course,” the quiet hiss of the golden hedgehog reverberated around the empty void, oozing with hatred for the monster that had almost stranded them there. Sonic reigned in his fury, and instead focused on his spite to make him see things through.
Flying over to the vehicle, Sonic saw the comatose form of the warlord of Mobius, floating unconsciously, and completely at his mercy. Wrenching the limp figure out of the ruined pod, Sonic held the vile man by the throat. The hedgehog didn’t need the faint pulse to tell him the doctor was alive, his current powers granted him that fact.
Oh how easy it would be, the hedgehog thought ruthlessly. All the misery, all the pain, and he could end it right now. Long gone was any shred of mercy or confliction about finally slaying the monster and being rid of it once and for all.
Another jagged spark of energy lanced out of the sphere and shocked Eggman, though the doctor still remained unconscious. Sonic’s eye twitched at the seeming mockery of his desire as he screamed into the infinite void.
To heck with what the universe wanted! What about what was right!? What about what was just!? And he KNEW it was just! Just this once why couldn’t he have things as HE wanted!?
“If I can’t have the universe my way, then you won't have it at all!"
Sonic grit his teeth, then let out a deep breath. Shifting his grip to the doctor’s shirt collar, he held the despot to his face.
“You're stupid lucky the universe needs you to be alive, otherwise I’d leave you to rot in this void!” Sonic hissed, “But this is the last time I let you off the hook Doc! Once things are back to where we left off, and I make sure Sally and everyone else are okay, I’m coming for you.”
“I’ve chased you across the planet, time, space, universes, and multiverses! But each time I’ve reached the finish line, I’ve hesitated… but no more. It’s time for our last race Doc, and this time, I’m crossing that finish line, and never, looking, back.”
With his proclamation finished, Sonic heaved the mad doctor by the shirt collar and threw him against the glowing sphere. In an instant Eggman’s form vanished from sight, absorbed into the glowing orb. As the flash made by the doctor’s disappearance dissipated, so did the gap in the surface of the orb. Now only one sliver needed to be restored.
“Everyone, I’m coming home.” Sonic whispered, as he finally released his all but depleted super form, and let the white light overtake him.
“Sonic! Sonic are you okay!?” The hedgehog’s eyes snapped open. He jostled away from Amy supporting him and frantically looked around. He was in the Death Egg, with Amy, Tails, Silver, the arctic freedom fighters and…
“Sally!” Sonic sped over to her comatose robian body.
“All I did was try to shut her off I swear!” Silver pleaded, backing away from the robian.
“I know, I was just worried things might’ve… changed.” Amy, Tails, and the Arctic freedom fighters stared with disturbed confusion, while Silver’s eyes widened in recognition.
“Wait, so the white flash…?” Tails began,
“It was a time shift,” Silver confirmed. The white furred hedgehog suddenly spoke with more authority, “Did you take part in changing the timeline?”
“I was putting it back the way it was. I thought maybe you would remember since you’ve done this before,” Sonic answered, surprised by Silver’s sudden seriousness.
“Guys!” Everyone turned to Guntiver, who was staring down the hallway where the Egg Swats had come from.
“What’s wrong!? Are there more…?” Tails fell silent. A dark silhouette loomed at the other end of the hallway leading toward the Death Egg’s command center; glowing red eyes scowled at the assembled freedom fighters, and razor point fingers glistened in the darkness.
“Metal Sonic!” Just as the metallic hedgehog sped toward the group, Tails launched into a spin dash and smashed the door controls. The door slammed shut, locking itself tight just before the badnik could reach them.
“Silver, protect Sally!” Sonic ordered as he planted himself between the door and the others. “No Bass to pick up your slack this time Metal.”
At the same moment that Sonic had snapped back to consciousness, so did Eggman. “Why isn’t the dimensional gateway opening! What happened to the genesis wave!”
“I… I don’t know boss, all readouts were stable just a moment ago,” Orbot reluctantly reported.
“Well then run them again! We don’t have much time before… what in blazes!?” Eggman stopped his tirade upon seeing Metal Sonic.
“What are you doing here!? I sent you to coordinate with Albert and Bass! Why are you…”
“Sir… Metal has been present the whole time,” Orbot stated. Eggman began to breathe heavily with his eyes twitching beneath his glasses.
“Chaos… chaos is the constant… did he do it again? Then why don’t I remember…!?” Suddenly a warning light flashed from Orbot’s console.
“Mecha Sally is disabled sir, and all Egg Swats engaging the two freedom fighter groups have been destroyed.
“It be over! Abandon ship me hearties!” Cubot flailed his arms in panic.
“NO! I will not lose again!” with manic eyes, Eggman turned towards Metal Sonic,
“I don’t care how you’re here, get down there and retrieve Mecha Sally! At the very least it will give us a bargaining chip. Now move!” Metal didn’t need telling twice as he eagerly flew down the corresponding hallway, ready to do battle with his loathsome copy.
“Sonic, we’ve got Sally, we should leave!” Tails said.
“No, this ends today!” Sonic ground out. The door Tails had just shut began to rattle with repeated metallic blows. Dents began to show themselves along the outline of the doorway and systematically travelled along its outline.
“He’s weakening the frame. He’ll be able to kick it down soon!” Tails reported. Sonic grit his teeth and ignored the fox.
“Sonic we’re all tired, and Augustus is hurt! We have Sally, let’s go!” Amy shouted.
Sonic glared at the door holding back Metal. Just beyond, a mere sprint down the hallway, was Eggman. He could end it, end it all. Finally put an end to this pointless, endless suffering and…! Sonic turned to the exhausted and pleading faces of the other freedom fighters, then to the comatose Mecha Sally, who, if reawakened, would remain under Eggman’s control. Sonic clenched his fists and kicked the ground. Finally, he let out a sigh,
“Fine, let’s move!” he relented. Tails and Amy smiled. “Tails, what’s the best way out of here?”
The two groups made their way out of the Death Egg without much trouble as they’d already cleared through most of its forces. Along the way, Tails repeated his door locking trick several more times to keep Metal Sonic from reaching them. Once outside, the arctic freedom fighters led them to a nearby ice cavern network that would take them out of Eggman’s territory. Once inside, they promptly destroyed the cave entrance behind them, completing their escape.
“You sure Augustus will be alright?” Amy asked as Tails hooked Mecha Sally up to the Tornado to keep her in stasis.
“I’ll be fine, I’ve taken worse,” Augustus quipped, though he winced as he moved.
“We’ll take care of him, but right now the best way you can help is to leave,” Guntiver said. Amy frowned at the wolf and was about to retort when Sonic tapped her on the shoulder,
“He means to take the heat off them Ames,” Sonic added, “Priority one hedgehog and roboticized princess, remember?” Sonic pointed back and forth between himself and Mecha Sally. Amy took on an embarrassed expression,
“Oh… right.”
Team Fighters and Silver were soon on the Tornado, with Sally safely locked down. “Let’s move it team!” Sonic shouted as Tails kicked the plane into gear. The two groups waved to each other as the Tornado took to the air.
“We’re at top speed,” Tails reported once they’d reached their max height. Everyone heaved a sigh. “Now what happened with that genesis wave? That’s what it was right?” Tails asked after a pause.
“Yeah, what happened with the time shift?” Silver added. All eyes were on Sonic. A tired smile tugged at the side of his mouth,
“Eggman tried to rewrite reality again, so I kicked his butt like always,” Sonic answered casually.
“Rewrite reality?”
“Again!?” Sonic stifled a laugh seeing the distraught looks on his friends faces.
“It’s fine guys, I set everything back like it was. No biggie.”
“No biggie!” Tails sputtered.
“I… you… but it was just a flash of light?!” Amy stammered.
“That’s how it felt to us,” Silver explained, “But to Sonic, it was… how long was it for you?” Silver asked. Sonic drummed his fingers,
“Not sure, time was screwy in the Doc’s alternate zone.”
“Alternate zone!?” Tails and Amy shouted. Sonic’s expression became weary as the thought of explaining everything and all the battles he’d just been through tired him.
“Whatever it is, I’m guessing it’s a long story, and… at least for Sonic… I’m guessing it means he’s just been through several fights in a row,” Silver said. Sonic looked to Silver with an expression equal parts shock and thankfulness.
“You can sleep on the way, if you need to,” Tails offered. Sonic cast a worried look back at Mecha Sally.
“We’ll wake you if we need you,” Amy promised, placing a worried hand on the blue hedgehog’s shoulder. Sonic wearily nodded. Tails tossed him a magnet bracelet from the glove compartment of the Tornado, which Sonic used to latch himself to where he sat on the wing of the plane.
Just before laying down, he turned to the comatose robian attached to the plane, “If you can hear us Sal, you’ll be home soon, I promise.” With that, Sonic laid down and shut his eyes.
“I’m afraid we’ve lost them boss. The scanners lost track once they entered the ice cavern. Metal Sonic is burrowing through the tunnel as we speak though so… uh, boss?” Orbot trailed off.
Eggman was clutching his head and bent over.
“You doing all right there cap’n?” Cubot asked, “having a little bout of insanity? Why not have a rip-roaring rant? That always seems to clear your…”
“Raaaaagh!” Eggman kicked Cubot halfway across the room. Leaning on one of the smashed control panels of the Death Egg the doctor’s mind raced. It was coming back, all of it.
The Genesis Wave hadn’t malfunctioned, it had worked! He’d met up with Wily. They’d pooled their respective geniuses. They had created an entire pocket universe! They had all but won! And finally, on the cusp of bending reality to his will with the Super Genesis Wave, that blasted, insufferable, wretched hedgehog had torn it all down, AGAIN!
Eggman breathed heavily as the memories stabilized in his mind. “The chaos… the chaos is the constant…! Wretched blue-gold vermin! Hate that hedgehog…!”
“Everything… alright boss?” Orbot asked. Eggman was on the verge of a screaming retort when the last memory fell into place. The glowing vortex, the shattered reality, and… being left adrift in the void.
The memory was faint, due to him being only semi-conscious at the time, before blacking out entirely. But he remembered… a golden light. Eggman stroked his chin, lapsing into quiet thought.
“He saved me,” Eggman muttered more to himself than his lackeys. For once the two mechanical minions were wise enough to remain silent.
“He could’ve left me there. I know he wanted to, so why?” A mad gleam came into the doctor’s eyes as a toothy smile spread across his face. “Because he needed me,” Eggman supplied with a quiet chuckle.
The laugh soon grew louder.
“Ah HA, HA HA, HA HA HA! That little rodent couldn’t restore his precious universe without ME in it!” The doctor clutched the sides of his head as his laugh grew deranged, “No doubt the same reason the Zone Cops haven’t tried to haul me away, not that they could! Oh what delicious irony! This changes everything! Ah HA HA HA!”
“Well… you certainly seem in better spirits boss,” Orbot commented.
“Indeed! And all it took was a near death experience and shredding the fabric of reality!” Eggman replied, stroking his moustache.
“I thought fate had conspired against me by sending the agent of chaos to halt my domination, but I was only half right!” a delighted fit of chuckling escaped the doctor before he continued, “No, the universe isn’t engineering my defeat, it merely wants the game to continue! Ho ho ho ho!”
Eggman resumed his seat in the Death Egg’s command room. Though he was surrounded by screens displaying the many needed repairs and destroyed systems to his flying battle station, the doctor paid them no mind as he grinned from ear-to-ear. “Very well then, the universe wants the contest to continue? Then I am happy to oblige.”
Eggman flipped several switches on his throne before leaping off again and beckoning his two henchmen to follow.
“Come along dunce buckets!” Eggman commanded, “Once Metal Sonic has reached the end of the cavern, I’ll calculate their flight path back to New Mobotropolis. In the meantime, we ready the Egg Stache Flyer! Sonic doesn’t get to save the world and his precious princess in a single stroke.”
“As you command, oh bulbous one, but… even at top speed, the Stache Flyer won’t be able to catch the Tornado,” Orbot responded.
“I’m aware, but we should end up close enough to New Mobotropolis to deploy the left-over forces in the Stache Flyer from our attack on G.U.N. as back-up for Metal Sonic.”
“Sir, our current forces are less than half of the last invasion attempt of New Mobotropolis, and Team Freedom repelled those.”
“I’m aware!” Eggman swung a backhand at Orbot, which the robot barely dodged, “They will merely be a distraction,” Eggman clasped his hands behind his back as he walked, “While Metal Sonic reclaims Mecha Sally.”
“And… what about the city shield, sir, with the loss of operation deadly cuddles?” Orbot cringed, waiting for another attempted smack for bringing up the doll’s discovery and subsequent destruction at the hands of Team Freedom, but the doctor only stroked his chin,
“Open a channel with Metal Sonic, I should have just the thing to give him an edge.”