The boy didn't move a muscle. Parts of his shirt and jeans had small rips in them, visible patches of skin had bruises on them, and his whole body was covered in dirt and sand. He didn't even make a sound as the girls looked over his form.
"I don't mean to be indelicate here," said Robotnik. "But someone should get some ice; keep the body fresh."
No one else made a move. No one, not even from the distant crowd, took their eyes off the kid lying in the street. Rainbow Dash felt Twilight's hand rest on her shoulder. Applejack slowly took her hat off and held it close to her chest. A whimpering Pinkie hugged a silent Sunset. Rarity had both hands drawn to her mouth. And Fluttershy looked like she was about to look away at any second. Another brief moment of silence passed before the doctor took an annoyed breath.
"Come on, he's just a silly little kid," he groaned in disbelief. "He wasn't even meant to be here, in this city! Just… why? Why would you throw everything out the window and put yourselves in harm's way… for a kid you don't even know?!"
Each of the Mane Seven locked eyes with each other. Unspoken words traveled between them: words that shared the same purpose. Twilight's eyes narrowed… and with an adjustment of her glasses, she stood and turned to face the doctor.
"You're wrong," she said defiantly. "We know everything about this kid. A kid who was driven by his reasons to come here for the sake of his home. A kid who's not afraid to express himself… and a kid who wouldn't have gotten this far if it wasn't for us."
"At first glance…" Applejack joined in. "The little rascal is stubborn like a mule. But it's that same stubbornness that gets him through everything he's caught up in. The little smooth-talking, wisecracking fella can improvise his way outta anything… and I do mean anything."
"But below that radical-like behavior," continued Rarity. "...is a free soul. Someone who wishes to do whatever his mind can set on. Someone who won't allow anyone to push him around like he's a helpless child who's reliant on only others. I can tell you this: the only person he is reliant on is himself. And it's that self-confidence that keeps him running. Er, in a spiritual sense."
"Which is something you, for all your brainpower, know nothing about," declared Sunset. "During our little struggle back there, I tapped into your memories. I saw how you were out on your own and what caused you to despise family. Your dedication to technology drove you to appreciate nuts and bolts more than hearts and souls. Y'know, from one smart mind from another, it's easy to think your intelligence leads you to believe that everyone else is as dumb as a rock. But add a little experience and moments to remember by into the mix… and you'll see everyone in a different light."
"We didn't know what to think of him when we first met him," added Fluttershy with a hint of determination in her usually-quiet voice. "But once we spent time with him, he turned out to be kind and selfless: the complete opposite of what you are. He's open-hearted, you seal yourself away. He relies on people, you rely on scary robots. And from what I think, I think you hate him because he's all the youth and joy you've never had in your life. And I'll never forget him in a hundred years, just like the rest of my friends!"
"And you say he's the one being selfish?!" cried a distraught Pinkie. "Please! I'd like to bet you hardly have any friends at all! You're surrounded by heartless machines all the time, and you've become just as heartless as them!"
Rainbow Dash looked to her feet, where a blue glow called to her. She bent over, picking up the Gem of Miracles and watching it shine in her hand. She caught her own reflection in it… a reflection she imagined to be that of her new fellow speedster.
"When I first met that boy in my friend's barn," she began in a sad tone. "Somehow, I knew he was different. But I see now that in the last few days… he's kinda like me in a lot of ways. And not just in terms of magical abilities. We had common interests, enjoyed the same things, even had tons of fun together. But just like me, he also… yearns for friendship. He'd been alone for years. He was scared, even. He was so desperate for a friend, he'd do anything it takes to keep them safe. And today, that's what he did."
Rainbow Dash lowered the jewel, turning her magenta eyes to Robotnik with a stoic and fierce expression. "That kid knows more about being human than you ever did, or ever will," she spoke loudly. "Canterlot City is his home, just like the one he came from! His name was Sonic, he was the most awesome, way-past-cool guy I ever met, and he! Was our! Friend! My friend!"
KRABOOOOOM!
A sound like thunder rocked the street, lighting up everything around in gleaming blue light. The girls whirled around to where the boy rested… only to find a bright light in his place. Arcs of sapphire electricity trickled across the surface of the road. Large bolts came down from the sky as if from the clouds themselves.
Rainbow Dash threw a hand in front of her face, tucking the glowing jewel in her pocket. The rest of the girls locked their eyes on the blue light before them, watching the lightning spray out in all directions. Rainbow felt her own eyes grow wide in amazement and wonder.
A spinning blue ball launched into the air, whirling quicker than the fastest soccer ball Rainbow could remember kicking. It resembled a sapphire meteorite ablaze with white light, falling right back down to the road below… and connecting with another boom. A small blue pulse flew out from the impact, and a figure with blue hair alight with lightning stood in a triumphant landing pose with one hand touching the ground and the other in a balled fist enveloped in electricity.
Slowly, the figure rose up to a standing position. Blue lightning flickered off his freshly-healed body, erasing any traces of injury. Lightning ran up his legs and sprawled from his fists as if he was wielding two whips of electricity. He raised his head, flashing open eyes that sparkled with bright sparkling blue instead of emerald green.
And one of those eyes- upon glancing at Rainbow Dash- winked with a coy smirk.
The athlete couldn't help but smile in relief. But the moment had to wait, as the boy gestured to behind her with just his eyes. Rainbow Dash picked up the memo instantly. "Oh. Right. He's all yours, blue!" she cheered enthusiastically.
"Give him what for, sugar cube!" called Applejack. The girls ran from the road to the sidewalk, joining the amazed crowd. "Get back! Everyone, get back!" Twilight announced, waving for the people to do so. Rainbow Dash let out an excited laugh as she turned behind her. "Oh, this is gonna be SO awesome!"
With them out of harm's way, Sonic turned to the stunned scientist in his experimental hovercraft. "I think you have something that belongs to me." He clenched his fist with bared teeth… and lightning shot out from it, striking the hovercraft in a fraction of a second. It struck the front of the cockpit and both hover rings, sending an alarm blaring in Robotnik's ears. The scientist struggled to maintain control of the ship, his eyes catching a glimpse of the hair's case cracking.
Sonic grunted, drawing his fist backward. The hovercraft moaned in pain when the lightning retracted, drawing it all back to the turbo-charged teen. The boy breathed in, feeling fully refreshed.
But Robotnik was glancing at a screen flashing a warning. "Energy levels dropping?!" he gasped. "What did you just do?!"
"You're wrong about this stuff being natural, doc," began Sonic. "When I was just a little kid, a magical geode transferred its energy into my body, making me who I am now. And ever since, I've been using it to run. Run from both people who'd want it for themselves and run from whatever I feared. But not this time."
"What are you talking about? What is that?!"
"This is my power, a gift rightfully bestowed upon me," answered Sonic boldly. "And I'm not using it to run away anymore! I'm using it to protect. My. Friends!"
From the crowd, Twilight gasped. "He… he conquered his fear of loneliness! Our words gave him new magic! The magic of-"
"Yeahyeahyeah! Zip it!" Rainbow interrupted with a raised finger. "Here comes the good part!" She smiled like a fangirl.
Robotnik coldly lowered his goggles across his face and pressed something on his control panel. His cockpit closed up and his craft rose into the air with a high-pitched whine. The vehicle opened up hidden panels, revealing a massive payload of heat-seeking missiles. Lasers lit up and darted along the ground, pointing themselves at several different positions on Sonic's unfazed body. The boy in blue lowered himself to the ground, placing his knuckles on the road and placing his left foot behind his right. He looked right at the craft with burning blue eyes dotted with an electric surge, waiting for just the right moment.
The missiles flew right for Sonic like a flock of pigeons going for a dropped piece of bread. The boy narrowed his eyes… and took off in a blue flash.
He dodged and zipped past missiles at breathtaking velocity, which missed by meters. They couldn't recalibrate their courses quickly enough, resulting in them exploding against the surface of the road and buildings alike. Balling up, the boy knocked some away and slid under another. He sprang back up, jumping to the side of a building and leaping right off.
His spinning body connected with the craft in a metal-crunching slam, leaving a dent behind when he ricocheted away. Landing on a car, Sonic jumped off the vehicle to land another hit on Robotnik's craft. After another successful strike, he swung off a lamppost and landed a third blow.
Again and again, Sonic slammed himself into Robotnik's hovercraft, cracking the glass and making the mad genius flinch with each hit. To the adrenaline-fueled awe of Rainbow Dash, Sonic moved so fast he appeared to be hitting Robotnik from everywhere at once, even from the nearby intersection.
"This is so INTENSE!"
Sonic bounced upward after another strike dented the aircraft's nose, landing right on top of the cockpit and startling the scientist inside. From inside the cockpit, Robotnik sneered at Sonic. "Now you've done it!" he screamed.
"Looks like you bit off more than you can chew, huh, doc?"
"Shut up! Just shut up, you stupid, blasted, fidgety, horrid little runt! I will have that gem, even if I have to blow you off the map! Do you hear me?! I will permanently erase you from this city!"
"Well, guess what, Eggman!" Sonic shot back. "I'm not leaving Canterlot City!" He jumped off in a backflip. "YOU are!" Instead of moving for a final blow, he turned his eyes to the crowd.
Particularly, to one rainbow-haired girl who froze up in shock. "Wh-what?"
"Go on! Be my guest!" Sonic said, gesturing to his discarded ring bag. Realizing what he was referring to, all of the air in Rainbow's lungs rushed out. "Really?"
Sonic just smiled. "Really."
"Oh, wow!" Rainbow snatched up the bag, took out a ring, and ran down the sidewalk. "Okay… be cool. Be cool. Focus." She took in a deep breath, calmed herself… and in a movement similar to a baseball pitcher, she threw the ring with all her might behind Robotnik's craft. The golden decoration expanded in size, the sound it made reverberating Rainbow's ears.
Sonic smiled again… and ran off in the other direction. Ten blocks away, he looped back around shot right for a steaming-mad Robotnik.
"NO!" he screamed, pushing the badly-damaged craft to its limit. "I WILL NOT LOSE TO A BOY!"
The blue streak raced through the roads of Canterlot City, moving fast enough to generate a blue pulse that burst outward in a sonic boom. The wave washed over everything and everyone, nearly blowing the crowd off their feet. As Sonic and Robotnik's craft drew closer and closer to each other… a high-pitched whine came from the boy's curled-up form.
VREEEEEEEE!
Sonic vanished inside a spinning ball of blue, ramming full-force into the hovercraft. The vehicle bent out of shape, the glass in the cockpit shattered, and the two hover rings shorted out and got blown off the main chassis.
And Robotnik screamed, a sound that echoed as what remained of his hovercraft flew through the ring and into the sky above a tree-filled jungle. The ring shrank and closed up, leaving only a dinging sound behind when it winked out of existence.
Sonic backflipped through the air, leaving a trail of lightning behind. He touched down gracefully in a manner resembling the finish to an acrobat's routine. He stood up straight, his hair dimmed away and the lightning surrounding his body vanished. His bright blue eyes swapped back to their normal green shade, resulting in the living battery his magic transformed him into powering down.
"Wow!" he chuckled, wiping at his shoulder. "That was cathartic! Woo… spending too much time around a genius will boost your vocab, huh?"
The crowd burst into applause; something that took Sonic completely by surprise. The Mane Seven ran up to him, giving the boy their own congratulations. Pinkie tackled him into a huge hug, Rainbow ruffled up his hair, Sunset and Twilight patted him on the back, Applejack crossed her arms with a smile, and Rarity and Fluttershy held back with smiles of their own.
"It's official, blue," Rainbow told him while he gently pushed Pinkie away. "You and I? We're going places."
"Totally!"
"Oh, hey. Got something that belongs to you."
"Thank you very much."
Rainbow moved to place the ring pouch in Sonic's open palm… only for Sunset to grab the athlete's wrist and turn to the boy with a look. "No more pushing people off of buildings, got it?"
Sonic shrugged. "You know I can't promise that."
The girls laughed while Rainbow returned the ring pouch. A smile crept across her face and she held up a hand. And at the sight of it, Sonic's face lit up and he gasped.
Laughing in joy and excitement, he ran around in circles and jumped, giving the multi-colored-haired girl a high-five. When he landed… he stared at his palm, thinking back to the soccer field when he was all alone. He looked back to the girls, comparing that time to now.
He had to admit… now was better.
"Thank you…" he said happily. "All of you."
"Heh. Like I said… we got this."
"Yeah… we do."
"Hey, Dash?" Twilight asked while the crowd behind them began to disperse and move away from the street. "Where… did you send him to?"
Rainbow just stretched her fingers. "Oh, just a faraway lush jungle that he won't be finding his way out of for a while. No biggie."
"This calls for a celebration party!" cheered Pinkie.
"Yeah, I think that's the last we'll see of that guy for a little while," added Sunset. "Now, who's up for some… some…"
"What is it?" Twilight asked, looking to what made Sunset pause. Soon, her own face lit up in awe. Curious, Sonic turned behind him. And there, lying in the middle of the road, were six glowing gemstones. Each of them emitted a different light: red, green, white, yellow, violet, and turquoise.
Sonic gasped in surprise. "The… the Seven Gems of Miracles? Eggman had them all this time?!"
"They must have fallen from his craft!" Twilight realized. "Was he using them as a power source like your magic? Or was he just collecting them?"
"Maybe that's why he wanted this one so badly," noted Rainbow, taking out the shining blue jewel from her pocket. "He needed the last piece of the puzzle."
Sonic scooped up the other six gems in his arms, looking at them proudly. "Nabbing them all in one go… what better way is there to end a hunt than that?" While he held the shining jewels, Sonic felt something… odd inside him. Something warm. Something satisfying. Something great. Something amazing, even.
"Alright… that just leaves one more thing for me to do," the blue boy said. "I need to use these to fix my home… but the question is, how?"
Before someone could offer an idea, Sonic noticed the light on the road starting to dim. Looking up, he saw the sky grow dark with black clouds. Ominous, familiar, black clouds.
"Um, looks like that party will have to wait, Pinkie Pie!" Rainbow Dash spoke up. The rest of the girls had their eyes to the sky in both fear and confusion. Sonic never kept his own eyes off them, catching glimpses of flashing bolts of purple lightning.
"Oh, no…" he muttered, getting a sense of deja vu all over again. "It's… it's just like the village! And that must mean-"
"At long, long last," spoke a booming thunder-like voice from within the clouds. "We meet again… Sonic, is it?" Two bright purple eyes broke through the darkness. "I've been desperate to feed off your magic for so long, and that little boost you experienced back there was enough for me to home in. Ah… I see you have gathered some more for me."
"You won't have them!" Sonic shouted, dropping the jewels and getting into a fighting pose. "I may not have stopped you on South Island, but I will stop you here… whoever you are!"
"Foolish child. You can only beat the averages so long before they beat you. Robotnik was a cakewalk, whereas I am the force you cannot run from, no matter where you go. Your magic cannot save you… because all those who have eluded or confronted the Man of Shadows…"
A figure cloaked in blackness floated down from the clouds, purple eyes gazing at the boy. Purple waves of dark magic radiated off his form. And violet lightning traced between his outstretched fingers.
"...have been consumed."
"He's… real?" gasped Twilight in horror. Confused, Sonic turned to look at her. "Wait, you know this guy?"
"Only in legends," Twilight answered. "His name's Stygian. He's descended from a great band of heroes that began to fade away into myth. Throughout his life, he was friendless, alone, and mocked everywhere he went. Any statement he made about his identity was shot down, and over time he grew overwhelmed with emotions like anger, hate, and despair. According to what I've heard, he discovered a crystal holding great magic, kind of what happened to you. But this crystal held terrible dark magic that transformed him, turning him into what he is now."
"It appears my reputation holds firm, Miss Sparkle," the figure spoke. "And yes, there is some truth to those myths. I enacted my vengeance on all who wronged me, draining them of their magic. But when I did so, I grew amazed and powerful. And so I went on, sustenance sustaining me for years. As for what you hold within you, Sonic… it could withstand me for at least a thousand more."
"Forget it, Mister Black!" snapped the blue boy. "As long as I have the Seven Gems of Miracles with me, your little blight is done for!"
"Seven Gems of Miracles?" the Man of Shadows repeated with an amused chuckle. "What a foolish name your people granted to them! I assure you, Sonic… they are not the tools you wish them to be."
"Yeah, right! Once I kick your dark and ugly butt, I'm gonna wish everything away!"
"Oh, my naive boy…" laughed Stygian. "You don't know, do you? The gems were never intended to grant wishes with the power they wield. If one were to successfully unlock them… they'd be doomed to destruction by a greater force even they couldn't endure. What's believed to be healed only results in getting furtherly harmed. What is thought to bring life only brings death. The first users of these jewels found out the hard way. They feared the seven gemstones… and gave them a different name. Now… surrender the Chaos Emeralds."