Chapter 3: Reuniting With Friends

The three people landed on the sand and looked around, wondering where they were.

"Ugh ... what happened?" another orange fox asked as he rubbed his head in pain.

A red echidna had his head stuck in the sand and pulled it out and growled. "I don't know, but whoever brought us will pay!" His fist connected with his open palm.

"Hey, Knux," Sonic said. "What's up?"

The said echidna's name whirled around along with the two tailed fox and the black and red hedgehog, who stared in shock at Sonic and Ali Baba.

"Sonic!" the fox exclaimed, joy in his voice as he ran up to him. "Where have you been?"

"I've been here trying to save this world," the genie said.

They looked at Sonic in confusion. The fox stopped in front of Sonic and looked him up and down; the genie was still in his Darkspine form, "Why do you look ... different?"

"I'm a genie," he said. "I was defeated by the villain of this world, Erazor Djinn, and he transformed me into a genie. Unfortunately, I'm in this form permanently and can never leave this world."

The fox stared at Sonic in shock as tears appeared in his eyes, "N...No..."

"You are WHAT now?!" Knuckles exclaimed, shock on his face too.

"A genie, eh?" Shadow asked. "Interesting."

Sonic sighed and nodded. Tails shook his head and looked down, tears beginning to fall from his eyes and Sonic noticed. "S...So, you can't ... go home?"

The genie shook his head. "No...I cannot."

"So, y...you'll have ... to stay ... h...here?" Tails asked as more tears fell down his cheeks. Sonic was beginning to feel guilty for making his little brother upset like this.

"Yes...I am sorry, Tails."

Tails continued to cry and he tried wiping his eyes.

Knuckles was still a little shocked. "So, you can't leave here. Are you sure?" The genie nodded. Knuckles folded his arms, scoffing, "I find that hard to believe."

Sonic glared at him.

"Well, you are a Faker, Sonic," Shadow said.

Sonic folded his arms, glaring at Shadow as well. He didn't like being a genie, so they had no right to start teasing him about it."I don't want to be a genie but I have no choice."

Tails looked back up at Sonic, "But if you stay here ... what will I do? I can't think of living in the workshop alone."

Sonic sighed. "I...I don't know, Tails."

Tails' tears came back and fell down his cheeks once more and Sonic bent down in front of him. He didn't like it when people cried, especially those he cared for.

"Tails...don't cry. Maybe I can find a way to make it so you can all live here with me."

Tails looked at Sonic and shook his head, "W...We can't, remember, Eggman is always on the loose? We gotta ... stop him if you're ... here." Sonic looked at Tails and put his hand on Tails' shoulder, only for it to go through him. Sonic's eyes widened. He looked at his hand as he brought it up to his view. It was transparent; his entire body was transparent. Sonic gasped in shock and lowered his head in disappointment. Tails' noticed Sonic's sudden change in attitude and looked at him, "Sonic? What's wrong?" Tails went to touch Sonic only for his hand to go through Sonic. His eyes widened at this discovery.

"We...we can't touch each other," he said. Suddenly he started floating and saw his two legs had merged into a ghost-like tail.

Tails looked down, "I thought...genies could." The tears began to come back, thinking he was losing his big brother.

Sonic looked down in shame and shook his head.

The fox's tails drooped and he walked away, sniffling. Sonic watched Tails in shock and tried to go after him, heard Knuckles say, "Sonic, leave him. He just needs to process all this." Sonic looked down, feeling guilty for hurting his little brother.

The genie looked disappointed as well and vanished back into his lamp.

Shadow and Knuckles stared in shock at this and then turned their attention to the other orange fox, Ali Baba. "Who are you, exactly?" Knuckles asked, pointing at him.

"My name is Ali Baba. I know I look a lot like your friend over there." He pointed at Tails, who was sitting in the sand, drawing. "When Sonic first met me he mistook me for him. I'm guessing since we're from different worlds I'm like a ... counterpart of him."

They nodded.

"Are there any other counterparts of us in this world?" Shadow asked him.

Ali Baba nodded, "The only one I can think of between you two is ... you." He pointed at Knuckles. "Your counterparts name is Sinbad."

Knuckles' eyes widened and he looked interested.

"He likes sailing, he has quite a short temper, but if you don't get on his bad side you can get along fine with him," Ali Baba explained to Knuckles.

Knuckles smirked. That sounded like him all right, except for the sailing part.

"So what does Sonic do now that he is a genie? Doesn't he have a master?" Shadow asked.

Ali Baba nodded at this. "Yea, he does. I am." They were quite shocked at this news. "I found his lamp in the sand, half covered and tripped over it. Once I got up I picked it up and rubbed the sand off. I didn't even know it was a genie's lamp until Sonic came out."

Shadow nodded, and Tails walked over to him. He wanted to know what kind of master Ali Baba would be to Sonic.

"Your name is ... Ali Baba, right?" Tails asked, pointing at him.

The other fox nodded. "Yes."

"I just ... wanna know ... how will you ... treat, Sonic?" Tails asked, looking down.

Ali Baba was taken aback by this question though he would've expected it sooner or later seeing as they hardly knew him and didn't know what his personality was.

"I'll treat him like I would anyone ... with utter kindness and I won't treat him any differently than when I first met him."

Tails nodded, satisfied with Ali Baba's answer.

Knuckles looked at where they were, finagling realizing it. "We're in a desert. And I'm starting to sweat and get hot. Where's the closest city?"

Ali Baba pointed in the distance and Knuckles' jaw dropped. "Sandopolis is that way. That's the closest city."

"WE CAN"T WALK THAT FAR!" Knuckles exclaimed.

Ali Baba thought about it. He looked at the lamp, thinking. "Maybe..." He rubbed it and the end began to glow.

A few seconds later, Sonic came out. "Yes?" He asked. "What is it?"

Ali Baba thought about it. "I know you'rr new at this, but we need a carpet to get to Sandopolis to get out of this heat. I also don't really know what your limited to doing."

Sonic nodded and closed his eyes, concentrating. A few minutes later, a magic carpet appeared and floated beside them. Sonic stared at it in shock and looked at Ali Baba, who was also looking at the carpet. "It worked this time. Nice job, Sonic."

The design of the carpet was blue with little ruffles around it. It was a gold twirl-like 'S' in the middle of other gold twirls around the 'S', it was like the design on Sonic's lamp. Everyone got on with Sonic and the carpet flew off, heading to Sandopolis.