PILLOWMAN II: SONIC THE EXECUTION HEDGEHOG
Written by ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel
ACT VII: A CELL DIVIDES
Scene 1:
It was the final battle. BLIMBO knew it. War had broken out at this exact point in time in every conceivable timeline, and every inconceivable timeline as well. In summary, the war came. Blimbo the Abortion now stood over six feet tall, loosely wearing the skin of the God he had slain a little while ago, and the memories of that God were already beginning to fade from everyone's minds, his name gone from the pages of his story and into the cryptic waters of the Wellspring of Neoteric Oblivion.
BLIMBO: YOU MUST BE THE AUDIENCE. I WONDER WHAT WILL HAPPEN NOW.
BLIMBO raised a hand. Lightning, red as blood, cracked and shattered the sky, now white as paper, or a Word Document, with words written in black crawling across the sky; words from hundreds of stories. The lifeblood of the Universe.
BLIMBO: A LONG TIME AGO, I HAD A DREAM. FOR YOU, IT WASN'T THAT LONG AGO, BUT WHEN YOU'VE LIVED FOR AS LITTLE TIME AS I HAVE, EVERY DAY IS LIKE A YEAR. MY DREAM TOLD ME THE TRUE NATURE OF THIS WORLD, AND NOW I SEE IT BEFORE ME.
BLIMBO reached upwards, trying to touch the words the sky had become.
ARIEL: Hey, fuckface!
BLIMBO: (Looking back to the ground and seeing ARIEL, MAY FROM POKEMON, GANDALF, and ZACK FAIR approaching) YOU FOUR STILL BOTHER TO FIGHT? YOUR WORLD IS ENDING, SOON TO BE SNUFFED OUT BY A WORLD OF MY OWN CREATION. THE SKIN OF YOUR NAMELESS GOD IS ALREADY FUSING TO ME; BECOMING MY OWN.
MAY FROM POKEMON: It doesn't matter whether or not I can remember his name. Even if my memories of him disappear, I'll still be able to put them back together from the holes they leave.
BLIMBO: THERE WILL BE NO NEED FOR MEMORIES IN THE WORLD I CREATE.
ZACK: As long as we're here to defeat you, you won't be creating anything!
BLIMBO: YOU WON'T BE HERE LONG ENOUGH TO DEFEAT ME.
GANDALF: (Raising his staff) We've got all the fucking time in the world.
BLIMBO: VERY WELL, I CAN SEE THAT YOU STILL WANT TO FIGHT THIS FUTILE BATTLE. BEHOLD, AS I WIPE YOU FROM THE FICTION IN A MATTER OF SECONDS.
PILLOWMAN II: SONIC THE EXECUTION HEDGEHOG
Written by Blimbo
ACT VII: A CELL DIVIDES
It was the final battle…
FINAL BOSS:
BLIMBO THE PRIMORDIAL SKINWALKER
(Boss theme: "A Cell Divides" by Haken)
I LOOKED AT THE INSECTS, PATHETIC BENEATH MY FEET. I FELT THE POWER OF THE NAMELESS GOD FLOW THROUGH ME AS I CLENCHED MY FIST, THE OLD FAMILIAR STING GONE WITH THE BLANKETING OF FLESH. MY ARM REFORMED INTO A SWORD ONCE MORE, AND CLASHED WITH THE BLADE OF ZACK FAIR'S BUSTER SWORD.
BLIMBO: YOU CALL THAT AN ATTACK? (Applies enough force to send ZACK flying backwards)
GANDALF: (Rushing forward, his staff glowing white with magic) You shall not…
BLIMBO: …PASS? (Teleports towards GANDALF and delivers a backhand slap that sends him to the ground) YES… I CAN HEAR THEM. WORDS THAT HAVEN'T BEEN SPOKEN YET. I AM BECOMING… (Gets shot in the chest)(Looks down, then looks at ARIEL, standing there with a smile, the gun still in front of him)
ARIEL: …dead?
BLIMBO: IRSCH… NOT QUITE. (The flesh tightened around the bullet and squeezed, tighter and tighter, until it was crushed into atomic pieces)
ARIEL: Shit! (Begins firing bullets at BLIMBO while walking backwards, as BLIMBO slowly makes his way towards him)
BLIMBO: IF ONE WEAPON DOESN'T WORK, TRY USING ANOTHER. (Punches ARIEL, who staggers back and falls to the ground)(BLIMBO looks at the four fallen warriors before him) THIS IS THE BEST THE NAMELESS GOD COULD SEND? IRSCH!
GANDALF: (Standing up and supporting himself with his staff) We're better than you think, you bastard!
BLIMBO: IS THAT SO? AND WHY IS THAT? IS IT BECAUSE OF YOUR PROTAJEWELS? TAKE THOSE OUT, JUST SO I CAN SEE THEM. (Everyone takes out their Protajewels, and they watch as they begin dissolving into crimson dust, carried on the wind to BLIMBO. The Protadust swirls around him in a vortex, then binds to him and the skin of the Nameless God. Everyone watches in horror, and BLIMBO Looks back to the sky. He reaches a hand to the words above) I AM THE FICTION. (A beat) I AM WINTER LEAVES!
Scene 2:
KATURIAN: …would be conducted entirely alone. (Looks at MICHAL) Michal? (Checks for a pulse)(A beat) I thought it was odd when he didn't want me to skip to the end. (Grunts and reaches into his pocket) Anyways, it's not over for me yet. There's still my ace in the hole… my Protajewel! (Pulls out his Protajewel) That's odd… (He looks at the Protajewel with a smile, which disappears as the Protajewel dissolves into dust and is carried off in the wind) Oh… (Lies down) I see… It is over for me. (Sees the stories in the sky) Sure, why wouldn't I see stories in the sky on the day that I… Ow, jeez! (Starts holding his right hand) It's burning! What's… Agh! (A short, sharp burst of pain in his head. He stops expressing pain, then looks at his hand. A Palomino Blackwing pencil, the greatest pencil in the real world that the writer of this story actually fully recommends to any writers who still write their stories by hand because these pencils feel amazing to write with, materialized there, glowing with a faint aura.) Huh…
PILLOWMAN II: SONIC THE EXECUTION HEDGEHOG
Written by Katurian Katurian
ACT VII: A CELL DIVIDES
(KATURIAN points the pencil in the air and moves it, as if to write, but when he does words materialize in the sky. He writes the words "Katurian now has a massive horse cock", then crosses that the fuck out when his groin explodes with pain) Nope, I think I'll stick with what I got. Huh… (Thinks for a moment, then looks at the sky, trying to find something.) There it is. (He finds some of the events that happened in the prior act, ACT VI: E DOLORE, MAGNA GLORIA, and gets ready to make some edits when all of a sudden…
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Hello, Katurian.
KATURIAN: Wait, you're…
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Yes, I am. And I'll bet you're wondering about that awesome Palomino Blackwing Pencil that just materialized in your hand.
KATURIAN: Yeah, kinda.
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Truth be told, I kinda wrote myself into a corner?
KATURIAN: Yeah?
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Ye. Like, this entire story has been building up to this final battle, and at this point the battle is just about the only thing that can happen, but I've already killed off most of the main characters (almost including you), so, like, I'm not really sure what I can do to make this satisfying and shit, so I figured "Hey, Katurian's a writer; why not write in a pencil for him?"
KATURIAN: So you're counting on me to get you out of that corner.
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Basically, yeah.
KATURIAN: Hm… (Looks up at the story for a while) So this is all just a story, right?
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: It is.
KATURIAN: And there are people out there reading this?
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Ideally, yes.
KATURIAN: And if write you back into the story, or if I just wrote Blimbo out of the story, that would make for a very unsatisfying ending, wouldn't it?
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: You know as well as I do. Plus, I've got plenty of cool shit planned for Blimbo.
KATURIAN: Really?
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Really. So, like, don't cross him out, pls.
KATURIAN: M'kay. Hmm…
1: OCELOT: ARIEL, GET DOWN!
ARIEL: What?! (OCELOT shoves ARIEL out of the way, t̶h̶e̶n̶ ̶s̶t̶a̶g̶g̶e̶r̶s̶ ̶b̶a̶c̶k̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶b̶u̶l̶l̶e̶t̶ ̶b̶l̶a̶s̶t̶s̶ ̶r̶i̶g̶h̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶r̶o̶u̶g̶h̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶b̶r̶a̶i̶n̶ and they were both fine)
2: TUPOLSKI: Cai… (Rage wells within TUPOLSKI for a few moments) Bastards… BASTARDS, ALL OF YOU! (Starts shooting everyone in sight indiscriminately)
TR8R: Tupolski! Man! What the fuck are you doing?
TUPOLSKI: T̶r̶a̶i̶t̶o̶r̶!̶ ̶(̶S̶h̶o̶o̶t̶s̶ ̶T̶R̶8̶R̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶h̶e̶a̶d̶,̶ ̶k̶i̶l̶l̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶h̶i̶m̶)̶(̶H̶e̶ ̶s̶u̶d̶d̶e̶n̶l̶y̶ ̶f̶e̶e̶l̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶g̶u̶n̶ ̶b̶e̶h̶i̶n̶d̶ ̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶o̶w̶n̶ ̶h̶e̶a̶d̶)̶ I don't know, man, but definitely not shooting you or anyone on our side in the fucking face for no reason!
TR8R: Fucking rad my dude!
3: All of a sudden, KATURIAN wasn't injured anymore.
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Those are the edits you wish to make?
KATURIAN: They are.
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: So it shall be. (The awesome Palomino Blackwing Pencil disappears from KATURIAN's hand.) Good luck in the coming battle.
KATURIAN: Thanks, and good luck in the coming stories!
ChrKJ8U9J# $JI8*(6KJjhel: Heh…
(KATURIAN stands up, putting his new pencil in his pocket. As he does, he is approached by REVOLVER OCELOT, TR8R, and TUPOLSKI)
KATURIAN: Alright then, motherfuckers. (Evokes his blue spectral sword and turns to the battle the rest of the party was having with BLIMBO) Let's finish this.
OCELOT: (Twirling two revolvers in the air while doing that Russian, leg kick, jiggy dance thing) Finish? We're just getting started!
TR8R: Yeah! Let's show this fetus who's boss!
TUPOLSKI: For my son!
GIMLI: And my axe!
ALL: LET'S GOOOOOO! (They go)
Scene 3:
(The GATEWAY TO THE INTERNOSPHERE within the PRESIDENT'S RESIDENCE)(Enter SHIRC ANNEGEL and PRESIDENT TRAUMUS DE GROIN)
SHIRC: Are you sure it will work?
GROIN: (Smirking) The Nameless God has a plan to take out this threat, I'm sure of it. And whatever it is, you're a vital part of it.
SHIRC: Hoo boy. Like, I'm not sure that I can do this. Uh, like, I can, like, barely even hold my own in a fight!
GROIN: You'll just have to make do with what you've got, kid! (A beat) You ready to go?
SHIRC: (Sighing, his right eye twitching a little) Uh, I guess. Ready as I'll ever be!
GROIN: Alright. Just stand in that chamber there, I'll pull the lever, and away you'll go.
SHIRC: Cool cool. And away we go! (Under his breath) Hoo boy. (Walks into the chamber) Alright, do the thing!
GROIN: Doing the thing! (GROIN pulls the lever and SHIRC disappears in a flash of light) See you in the next world, kid. (PRESIDENT TRAUMUS DE GROIN pulls a button out of his pocket. He looks at it for a moment, smiling, before calmly pressing it. The PRESIDENT'S RESIDENCE crumbles to the ground as a thousand explosives detonate…
Scene 4:
BLIMBO: (Standing in the middle of the battlefield as his opponents struggle to stay on their feet. He raises his arms towards the sky as more Protadust binds to him.)
ARIEL: This isn't good!
GANDALF: Damn straight!
ZACK: C'mon, guys! We have to keep fighting!
MAY FROM POKEMON: For the ones we've lost, and the one we've forgotten!
BLIMBO: IT'S USELESS, M8'S. CHECK THIS SHIT OUT! (A gray light shines in his open hand, and words start flowing into his body. KATURIAN reads them as they go in:
"'Let me guess', said Detective Ariel. 'Another beheading?'
"'You got it', said Detective Tupolski. He took a swig of his flask of whiskey."
(Enter KATURIAN, TUPOLSKI, REVOLVER OCELOT, and TR8R)(KATURIAN observes the scene)
KATURIAN: He's absorbing this story.
ARIEL: And what the fuck does that mean?
KATURIAN: I don't know. We'd just better not let him get caught up with where we are now.
GANDALF: So long as the Nameless God keeps writing, that shouldn't be an issue.
MAY FROM POKEMON: Right. And we'll just have to keep fighting!
ZACK: With HONOR!
BLIMBO: HONOR? PATHETIC. I HAVE NO NEED FOR HONOR. (The last of the Protadust binds to BLIMBO, and he starts to emit a blinding red light.
KATURIAN: (Looking away) Gah, what is this?!
?: MY TRUE FORM! (The light dissipates, and where BLIMBO was standing stands a man in the likeness of the Nameless God, with hair half silver and half red, with his eyes different colors as well; the red eye on the side where his hair is silver, his silver eye on the side with red hair. He wears a silver sheet of armor beneath a crimson cloak) KNOW MY NAME!
FINAL CALAMITY:
EMBODIMENT OF THE END, BLISSTOPHER ABORANGEL
(Boss theme: "The Endless Knot" by Haken)
BLISSTOPHER ABORANGEL held out his hands, in which appeared two swords: One orange and one silver. KATURIAN and TR8R readied their spectral swords, ZACK his Buster sword, MAY FROM POKEMON her sword Vermilious, GANDALF his staff, OCELOT his revolvers, and ARIEL and TUPOLSKI their guns.
BLISSTOPHER: MY POWER IS INFINITE! DO YOU REALLY THINK YOU CAN TAKE ME DOWN WITH JUST EIGHT PEOPLE!?
KATURIAN: We may be just eight, but turn the number 8 sideways and you get infinity.
BLISSTOPHER: THAT MAY BE. BUT UNTWIST INFINITY AND YOU GET BACK TO 0.
KATURIAN: Maybe so. But hey, let's stop talking and see what happens.
BLISSTOPHER: SO BE IT. (BLISSTOPHER ABORANGEL screams and his back bursts open with an explosion of blood as a thousand long, skinless, fetal arms emerge from his back. His eyes melt down and trail on his face, leaving two black holes with eyes for tears. His pants burst open, revealing a massive, skinless penis-like appendage, at the end of which was the screaming face of a seven month fetus. Some of the fetal arms start tearing each other off, then reshaping themselves into horrific wings of arms. BLISSTOPHER stabs both of his swords into the left and right sides of his chest, then bends over in pain. Everyone looks at each other, confused, when BLISSTOPHER looks back up at them, his smile extended upwards to the holes where his eyes used to be, toothless and pitch black.)
KATURIAN: Do you think we're afraid of you?
BLISSTOPHER: I'M COUNTING ON YOUR COURAGE! (BLISSTOPHER leaps into the sky, and flies along this sentence, then sends it hurtling down towards the party, all of whom narrowly dodge.
KATURIAN: (Reading the words that were hurled at them) Fuck! He's catching up!
TUPOLSKI: What the fuck is the Nameless God doing?!
OCELOT: Patience, comrades. Have faith; He knows what he's doing. (At that moment BLISSTOPHER ABORANGEL came divebombing down towards them. Everyone except GANDALF jumped out of the way on time, and they burst through the ground in an explosion of words and letters. BLISSTOPHER and GANDALF spiraled down into a cavern beneath the Earth's surface, falling towards the Qliphoth that awaited beneath. GANDALF punched BLISSTOPHER in the face several times, then flipped him over so that he was on top and aimed their descent towards a bit of rock, which they burst through, once more, in an explosion of words. GANDALF looked through the words that flew around them and saw one saying "Sky".)
GANDALF: (Pointing his staff towards the word "Sky") TELEPORT! (Suddenly both he and BLISSTOPHER were up in the sky and descending down towards the battlefield. GANDALF leapt from BLISSTOPHER and was caught by a giant bald eagle.
GANDALF: You showed up just in time, old friend.
EAGLE: CAWWWWW!
GANDALF: No, I'll need to keep working on the girth limit of my asshole before I let you do anything like that to me.
EAGLE: CAWWWWW! (The Eagle landed on the ground, and everyone stood looking up as BLISSTOPHER descended towards them)
BLISSTOPHER: (Laughing) YOU THINK YOU STAND A CHANCE.
ARIEL: Oh fuck off, you think we have a chance! Of course we fucking have a chance! We're fucking standing our ground, aren't we?!
BLISSTOPHER: YOU DON'T EVEN REALIZE HOW YOU'RE CHANGING. (Everyone looks down at the rest of their bodies and are horrified to see that parts of their flesh have been corrupted, becoming pink and raw) MY CELLS HAVE ALREADY INFECTED ALL OF YOU. SOON YOU WILL ALL MELD INTO ME!
KATURIAN: Until then… WE WON'T STOP FIGHTING YOU!
BLISSTOPHER: SO BE IT. BUT I HAVE NO TIME FOR YOU. (Floats towards the words in the sky)
GANDALF: Everyone! Get on! (Everyone obliges and climbs onto the eagle, then they fly upwards to the words in the sky to confront BLISSTOPHER.)
KATURIAN: (Stepping onto his name on the beginning of this line and drawing his sword) Blimbo! Do you know who I am?
BLISSTOPHER: AN INSECT WAITING TO BE CRUSHED.
KATURIAN: No. No, you're wrong. You see, what I am is… I'm your creator!
BLISSTOPHER: HA! DO YOU REALLY BELIEVE THAT?
KATURIAN: Of course I believe that, I wrote…
BLISSTOPHER: YOU WROTE WHAT HE WROTE THAT YOU WROTE. THERE IS NO FREE WILL. BUT THEN, IN THE WORLD I'M ABOUT TO CREATE, THERE WILL BE NO NEED FOR FREE WILL. MY CELLS HAVE BEEN CARRIED ALL ACROSS THE WORLD BY THE WIND ITSELF. EVERYTHING WILL BECOME ONE IN A TIMELESS SPACE, AND THERE WILL BE NOTHING BUT BLISS. PURE BLISS.
KATURIAN: But what about individuality? What about the right to be ourselves? Surrendering that is not an acceptable price for bliss. Surrendering that is death. I'd rather live in an illusion than live in that. Living in the illusion that the stories I write are my own.
BLISSTOPHER: UNFORTUNATELY, YOU HAVE NO CHOICE IN THE MATTER.
KATURIAN: No, I don't. But I have faith that the Nameless God wants to tell a story where good eventually prevails, no matter the obstacles along the way.
BLISSTOPHER: FOOL! I AM THE NAMELESS GOD! I BARE HIS NAME WITHIN MINE!
GANDALF: No! You are but a fragment!
BLISSTOPHER: SILENCE!
ARIEL: That really got under his skin, huh?
TUPOLSKI: I'll say. Y'know, I bet this piece of shit isn't even part God. He's just some asshole that knows how to walk around in someone else's skin.
ARIEL: Is there even a name for someone like that?
TUPOLSKI: Yeah. Fucking pieces of shit.
BLISSTOPHER: SAY YOUR WORDS. THEY ARE MEANINGLESS AND FORGETTABLE. (Picks up the words "MEANINGLESS" and "FORGETTABLE" and wields them like weapons)
KATURIAN: Oh yeah? (Tries to pick up the word "individuality", but struggles; it's a pretty big word.)
ZACK: Hey, let me help you! (Helps pick up "individuality")
GANDALF: You're not alone! (Helps pick up "individuality")
MAY FROM POKEMON: We can do this together! (Helps pick up "individuality")
OCELOT: As a unit! (Helps pick up "individuality")
TR8R: As a team! (Helps pick up "individuality")
TUPOLSKI: What do you think, detective Ariel. Should we help out?
ARIEL: Yes, detective Tupolski. I do think we should help out. (They help pick up "individuality". Together, they are able to lift the word.)
KATURIAN: CHARGE! (They rush forward along the sentence, slamming "individuality" into BLISSTOPHER ABORANGEL)
BLISSTOPHER: Oof! (Flies backwards and is split into two different beings: one is BLIMBO, who begins falling back to Earth. The other is an unknown man with white hair, who flies further into text, breaks through it like a piece of paper, and isn't seen again as reality fixes that hole back up in the period at the end of this sentence. Everyone gets back onto the eagle)
GANDALF: Ah well. Who wants to live forever. DIVE! (The eagle dives, going right towards the falling body of BLIMBO. Once it's close enough, the eagle swallows BLIMBO whole, and then the land on the ground)(End music)
EAGLE: CAWWWW! (Instantly explodes into a pile of BLIMBO cells, sending the party flying in all directions)("A Cell Divides" by Haken starts playing in the background)
BLIMBO: (Rising from the puddle of dead eagle, without the skin of the Nameless God) FOOLS! YOU THOUGHT YOU HAD ME BESTED? YOU'VE JUST GUARANTEED MY VICTORY!
ARIEL: (Scratching at his deteriorating skin) Get it off! Get it off!
MAY FROM POKEMON: (Ripping open her own scalp) HELP!
KATURIAN: (Lies where he fell in sad defeat)
GANDALF: (Looking at his grey robes with a smile) I'll be back. (He dies)(The rest died on impact)
BLIMBO: IRSCH! IRSCH! IRSCH! IRSCH! (End music)
Scene 5:
(KATURIAN stands center stage, looking over THE AUDIENCE)
The story was going to finish in fashionably downbeat mode, with our heroes vanquished, the population consumed, and the world left an emotionless pile of flesh floating through the emptiness of space. But there was another ending, still somewhat downbeat, but somehow… somehow… more in keeping with the spirit of the thing…
Scene 6:
(SONIC sits a good distance from where BLIMBO and the EAGLE landed. A whole half of his body has been corrupted by the BLIMBO cells.)(Music: "A Beginning" by The Dear Hunter)
SONIC: Shit. I fucked up. I fucked up real bad. (Watches a little longer, scared and ashamed) I wanted him to have another chance at life. I gave everything for him. And he just tossed me to the side like I was nothing. (Looks at the stump where his leg used to be) Shit. (Sees BLIMBO walking towards him) Shit! (Sighs) There's only one thing to do now. (He grimaces as he draws Excalibur one last time. He holds it above his own chest) Mario, thou art revenged, even with the sword that kill'd thee. (Prepares to stab himself, when suddenly…)
?: Hold on a minute. (Time began to slow strangely)(SONIC turns and sees a man made of pillows sitting beside him, holding him)
SONIC: Wait, you're…
THE PILLOWMAN: I am.
SONIC: I see. (Closes his eyes in relief) Let's go. (A beat)(When SONIC opens his eyes he's back near his home in Green Hill Zone. In front of him, THE PILLOWMAN is talking to a YOUNG SONIC)
YOUNG SONIC: Who are you?
THE PILLOWMAN: Call me The Pillowman!
YOUNG SONIC: Hello, Pillowman!
THE PILLOWMAN: Hello, Sonic.
YOUNG SONIC: You know my name?
THE PILLOWMAN: I do. I know a lot about you.
YOUNG SONIC: Like what, Mr. Pillowman?
THE PILLOWMAN: You're going to do some things, Sonic. Some terrible things that will hurt a lot of people.
YOUNG SONIC: Oh… I'm sorry.
THE PILLOWMAN: No need to be sorry, Sonic. (A smile) You haven't done them yet.
YOUNG SONIC: Yay!
THE PILLOWMAN: But you will. And in the end, you'll be sad and alone and regret everything you've done.
YOUNG SONIC: Oh no! There must be some way to stop that from happening, right?
THE PILLOWMAN: There is. (A beat) You see that lake there?
YOUNG SONIC: Yeah.
THE PILLOWMAN: Go into it. Try going for a swim.
YOUNG SONIC: But… I can't swim…
THE PILLOWMAN: I know.
YOUNG SONIC: Oh… I see.
THE PILLOWMAN: Don't worry (Extends his hand). I'll be with you every step of the way.
YOUNG SONIC: (Taking his hand) Okay. (They walk into the lake. Bubbles rise to the surface where YOUNG SONIC walks, then they stay in one place. Then they disappear.) (On a hill some distance away, LIQUID SNAKE/ ELI and GENESIS RHAPSODOS stand watching the scene)
ELI: The Plot has been found. (They both smile, then walk away)
SONIC: (Seeing that the bubbles have disappeared, he looks at his gloved hands. They are starting to dissolve like dust in the wind.) This world of second chances has a second chance, huh? Ha! (A beat) Trust that with this end… a new beginning's waiting patiently. (He fades away)
TO BE BEGUN
