The Speedster Coven
(The Owl House X Sonic the hedgehog)
Chapter 5: Home Bound
True Luz opened her eyes to find herself in a sort of dream state. The floor beneath her was watery, yet completely solid.
"Where am I?" She asked, continuing to walk around in this bizarre place. Memories from events in her life, line the walls of her place. When she walked far enough, she noticed her corrupted counterpart in the distance, just standing still.
"You!" True Luz yells. As she runs towards Corrupted Luz, she notices True Luz. True Luz tries to punch Corrupted Luz, but Corrupted Luz puts chains around True Luz, and pulls her to the ground.
"Ah..." Corrupted Luz says, she turns to fully face True Luz. "You've finally decided to wake up, you took longer than I expected."
"What are you doing with my body!?" True Luz furiously asks Corrupted Luz. She struggles as the chains hold her down. "And why are you doing this to me!?"
Corrupted Luz chuckles, "Feeble minded human, you did this to yourself."
Luz's eyes widen for a second, before she goes back to being angry. "What are you talking about? You're the one who trapped me in the back of my own head!"
Corrupted Luz shushed True Luz before continuing, "And you're the one who released me onto yourself, despite the warnings you received." Corrupted Luz walks around True Luz as she reprimands her. "That blue carpet told you not to, that stubby little demon told you not to, and that old mountain crag probably would've advised you against it, if she bothered to care enough." True Luz bites the leg of Corrupted Luz, who proceeds to kick her in the face. Luz picks herself up furiously.
"How dare you talk about my friends like that!" True Luz shouts angrily.
Corrupted Luz keeps a distance from herself and True Luz, and just shrugs. "Oh please!" She replies. "You barely knew the hedgehog for half of a day. And the old witch and demon are just pushovers. And don't get me started on your classmates."
True Luz starts to get more visibly agitated, and grunts.
Corrupted Luz continues, "Compared to the great magical feats you're capable of, your classmates' magic would barely count as magic tricks back in Connecticut. That overrated gardener, Mr. Party Tricks, and especially that accursed girlfriend of yours, do nothing but hold you back."
True Luz lunges at Corrupted Luz, and tries to claw at her. But the chains make it so that True Luz barely misses Corrupted Luz.
"Enough dilly-dallying!" Corrupted Luz yells, she lifts the chains up so that the tip of True Luz's feet can barely make contact with the ground. "I kept you here because I think we can benefit both of each other."
"Oh yeah," True Luz says sarcastically, "You're really selling this pitch!"
Corrupted Luz gets angry for a second, but holds it back. She leans into True Luz's ear, and whispers. "Think about it, Human, if you go back home, you'll go back to being a lonely weirdo not even a mother can love. But if you join me and gather the emeralds…" Corrupted Luz walks in back in front of True Luz. "We can be gods!"
Corrupted Luz sits down on the floor, and sighs.
"Look Human, if you follow my every will, you can achieve anything you desire with those emeralds." Corrupted Luz gets off the ground and holds her hand towards True Luz.
"Now, will you join me?"
True Luz slaps her hand, "I would never join you!"
Corrupted Luz walks away and plops back on the grounds, she rests her chin in her hand. "Oh well, suit yourself." Corrupted Luz says before snapping her fingers.
The chains wrap violently around True Luz's body, and the floor beneath her loses solidity. She falls through the floor, as if it were the ocean. True Luz tries to scream, but she only lets out air bubbles. True Luz struggles to free the chains, but the chains refuse to budge. True Luz let's out more air bubbles as she falls further into this dark sea. Eventually, True Luz stopped struggling, and passed out.
Luz wakes up in the real world, still corrupted by the emerald. She is located somewhere in the cold mountains of the Boiling Isles.
"Nothing like a good rest!" She says, she stretches and stands up. "But now I really should get back to business".
Luz starts her journey down the mountain, "Now I really should find another map" she says, clutching the emerald in hand.
"I know where you can get a map!" A familiar voice shouts from the distance. Luz turns around, and sees that the voice belongs to Sonic the Hedgehog. Sonic runs through the mountains, and makes an abrupt stop about five feet away from Luz, getting snow all over her cloak.
Luz shakes off the snow, "You!" She shouts.
"Well, well, well…" Sonic says, "It's been a while, but looks like I finally caught up to you."
Luz grunts and clenches her fists, but let's out a sigh and relaxes, "You know what? I'm just not going to deal with you today." She holds out the emerald and disappears from the mountains.
Luz appears in the marketplace; it is a calm morning. "Ah, finally," Luz says, she breathes in, "I can get that map.". As she walks away, she hears a familiar voice say, "Nice morning, isn't it?"
Luz turns around and sees Sonic right next to her, reading the morning paper.
"Y-you, I uh, ugh!", is all Luz can stammer out before pulling out her emerald and disappearing into the pine forest.
Luz appears in the forests and she seems tired. "I think he should be gone" she says, she sits down and sighs. "Besides, this place has a nice view."
"Yeah, especially from the tree tops!" Sonic says while clinging from said treetops.
Luz looks at Sonic with mild disappointment, holds up the emerald, and teleports away.
Luz arrives back at the mountains from where she started, she stands angrily.
"You can come out from wherever you are, Hedgehog! I know you're there!" Luz yells out, echoing across the mountains.
Sonic appears from underneath some snow, he shivers slightly. "Well, I guess it was fun while it lasted." Sonic remarked, he looked slightly disappointed.
Luz turns towards Sonic furiously, "First you got an emerald, then my snails, then my location! What else could you have?"
"Well…" Sonic nervously responded, holding his newly acquired yellow emerald.
Luz's anger quickly skyrocketed the longer she looked at Sonic's emerald, she felt like tearing Sonic apart right then and there.
"If you keep catching up to me," Luz yelled out, the corrupted emerald gives off a dark aura, "I guess we just have to finish it!"
Sonic chuckles, "But didn't that not go so well the la-" Sonic is interrupted by a chunk of ice hitting him in the face, knocking him to the ground. He gets up, covered in snow, and his nose starts to bleed, but he wipes up the blood and snow. "So, I guess SOMEONE doesn't like quips." he says annoyed, he stretches out his legs to prepare for running.
Luz launches an avalanche of icicles towards Sonic, Sonic quickly runs away from them as they cover his tracks. Sonic Tries to jump at Luz for a straightforward attack, but Luz decides to try out a new attack
"Try this one out, hedgehog!" Luz rips small chunks of the mountain out and hits Sonic with pieces, knocking him back down to the snowy terrain.
Sonic gets up, but his eyes widen when he sees Luz launching even bigger pieces of rock at him.
Sonic smirks, "I see you like to show off new tricks, so let me repay the favor.".
Sonic jumps on the rocks as Luz launches them at him, until he gets close to her. He kicks three smaller rocks towards Luz, but she uses a fire glyph to destroy the rocks, reducing them to a mildly inconvenient dust. What isn't mildly inconvenient to Luz however, is Sonic performing a homing attack from behind the rocks, knocking Luz to the ground. As Luz lays practically motionless on the ground, Sonic slowly walks towards her, holding his two
emeralds.
"This fight was fun while it lasted," Sonic said, pointing the two emeralds at Luz, "But I think it's time to go home. The emeralds start to glow, but Luz doesn't struggle to get up, instead just lying there. "But it's time for this edgy reboot to be canned." Sonic yells, the emeralds let out two beams of light towards Luz. But just as the lights were about to hit Luz, she disappeared.
Sonic's mood quickly turns from confident to nervous, his pupils dart all over the place. Luz teleports behind him, "SURPRISE!" is what she says before unleashing a beam of fire. Sonic backflips just in time to not get directly hit, the beam singes the tips of Sonic's back quills.
"You didn't think it would be THAT easy, did you?" Luz mockingly states, she pauses for a second, letting out slight giggles before breaking into full manic laughter. "NOW BURN RODENT!".
Hundreds of fireballs fall from the sky, seeming to color it a vibrant scarlet red. Sonic quickly runs around to form a vortex of snow, which diminishes some fireballs, before stomping on the ground and throwing the snow towards Luz. Luz stops the snow with a ring of fire, but doesn't anticipate Sonic's spin dash. Sonic knocks Luz back, before he proceeds to deliver some additional homing attack, and finishes with a downward kick. Luz lies in the snow, but Sonic doesn't hesitate to pull out the emeralds, and reattempt the un-corruption process.
Before Sonic can say yet another one liner, Luz uses an ice glyph to launch Sonic into the air, before striking him with lighting magic.
Sonic was crouched on the ground, trying to get up, but the exhaustion was too much, and he slumped back on the cold and snowy ground.
Luz points the emerald at Sonic, she stares at the slumped hedgehog emotionless, not even an ounce of sympathy in her eyes. The emerald's orange glow is contrasted with a writhing dark aura. "I guess this is Game Over, hedgehog," Luz states with pride, "and something tells me you're out of continues."
Sonic clutches the emeralds as Luz shoots a beam of fire at him, but instead of engulfing him, the flames are absorbed into the emerald.
Sonic stands defiantly, a fiery aura surrounding him, walking towards Luz as she walks back.
"NO! THIS CAN'T BE!" she yells, distressed. Luz launches several beams of fire at Sonic, but he quickly teleports around them, Luz hurls icicles from above Sonic, but they melt and evaporate as they approach Sonic. Luz tries to use lighting to stop him, which works for a second, but then Sonic holds his arms apart, and Luz is knocked back to the ground.
"Enough!" Sonic Shouts, he launches a beam of energy at Luz's hand, which causes her to drop the emerald. Luz goes to pick it up, but Sonic unleashes his fiery aura, which traps Luz in place.
"Stupid hedgehog!" Luz shouts, tears in her eyes, "why must you ruin everything, why go through hell, and back, just to help out a brat would even heed your words in the first place!"
Sonic lets out a few gentle bits of laughter, "because, it's not only to stop whatever you may be, but because I see great potential in Luz" Sonic holds out both emeralds and points them at Luz, "Now time to go, fast!" Light shoots from the emeralds and engulfs Luz, the orange emerald circles around her. The emerald seemingly loses all of its dark energy, and the darkness bursts from Luz, returning her to her normal, non-edgy attire. Luz floats down to the ground unconscious, the emerald floats down too. Both of Sonic's emeralds stop glowing, and Sonic falls to his knees.
Sonic weakly chuckles as reminisces on the battle he had. "Heh, you really did a number on me, 'human'. But hey, at least that proves my statement about your potential correct. Maybe you can help me look for the other emeralds when you get up." Sonic faints and falls limp on the ground.
Corrupted Luz wakes up in the dream state, she gets up and starts to panic.
"No, this can't be happening!" she shouts while pacing back and forth. "I can't lose this control, especially not to-" Corrupted Luz is interrupted by the shaking of the ground, she looks at the ground, and out bursts True Luz, surrounded in a green, yellow, and orange aura.
"Hey," True Luz says casually, "I think it's time to get off this ride."
Corrupted Luz tries to summon chains, but is unsuccessful.
"Oh, I see what you're trying to do," True Luz says, "let me try,". True Luz snaps her fingers, and Corrupted Luz is wrapped in duct tape in the branding of some sort of anime. Despite its cheap appearance, it's actually seemingly unbreakable, as Corrupted Luz demonstrates by struggling. Corrupted Luz is then sat on a bean bag chair with a seat belt on it.
"You, I can't lose to you!" Corrupted Luz yells, struggling to get off the bean bag chair. "You're just throwing away everything I worked for! Don't you want power?"
True Luz faced Corrupted Luz and said, "No, thanks, I just want my body back."
True Luz opened her arms wide, then everything went light.
Luz woke up in the real world, this time back to her normal self. "Corporeal realm, how I missed you." She speaks. She looks around and realizes that she is lost in the mountains, and Sonic is unconscious.
"Oh shoot!" she says to herself, she tries to shake Sonic awake, but he stays unconscious.
"What am I going to do! How am I supposed to get out of here!" Luz eyes the orange emerald, laying ominously on the ground. She picks up the emerald and stares longingly at it.
"I guess I have no choice, huh?"
Luz puts Sonic's emeralds back in his satchel, and puts him over her shoulder. She lifts the orange emerald, and shouts "Chaos Control!" Teleporting her and Sonic out of there.
Luz and Sonic land in the pine forest, which leads into the owl house. Luz has her eyes closed and is holding her breath. She opens her eyes and she gasps in awe. "Whoa, I didn't think I would actually be able to do it". Luz starts hyping herself up in excitement, pumping her fists in the air and breaking into a crude and childish dance.
Sonic wakes up and sees Luz's antics, he coughs, making Luz turn around, and cease her victory lap.
"I see you're finally back to your normal self, Luz." said Sonic, "but I'm glad we made it"
Luz smiles and walks toward Sonic, "Thanks for helping out, and sorry, about everything." her shoulders slump down.
Sonic shrugs and gives a reassuring smile, "Hey now, all that matters is that things are back to normal. Now we can focus on getting the emeralds, especially since we already got two more,"
Luz makes a sudden realization, "Oh, speaking of the emeralds," Luz pulls out the orange emerald and throws it at Sonic, "Here you go!"
Sonic holds the emerald in his hands, he stares at it, and then at Luz, who is waiting patiently. "No, thanks," Sonic replies, he throws the emerald at Luz, "you keep it for now,".
"Wow, really?" Luz replies, she gets visibly giddy.
"Sure," Sonic says, "I'll just teach you how to utilize the emeralds better."
Sonic looks up, and sees the sun starting to set from the tree tops.
"Would you look at that," Sonic says, he turns to face Luz, "Looks like we should get home, King and Eda probably miss you." Luz nods, so the two of them head back to the owl house.
Sonic and Luz approach the front of the Owl House, "Wow, we're really here." Luz says.
Sonic eyes Luz's emerald, and notices a dark spot, for some reason, a chill runs down his spine.
"Hey, can I see the emerald for a sec.," said Sonic
"Sure" replied Luz
Sonic tries to rub off the dark spot, but it doesn't budge, like it's a part of the emerald. It shifts around the emerald, and Sonic realizes that it is a tiny bit of the dark energy that's still left in the emerald. Sonic's palms get sweaty, and his eyes widen. "Eh, It's probably fine." Sonic muttered to himself, a slight nervousness present in his voice.
"What's wrong Sonic?" Luz kindly asked.
"N-Nothing…" Sonic stammered in reply, I just noticed it was a bit dirty," Sonic passes the emerald back to Luz.
"So are we just going to stand around or…" Sonic said to Luz.
Luz snaps back to reality, "Oh yeah... well, let's go home then, shall we."
Luz walks in front of the door to the owl house and knocks on it, Hooty awakens from his place on the door and stares at Luz
"Luz?" He speaks. Eda opens the door before Hooty can say anything.
"What's going on-" Eda notices Luz, and starts to tear up, "kid?"
"Hey." Is all that Luz can muster up, Eda hugs Luz tightly. King wakes up from his nap on the floor and sees Luz.
"Luz!" He shouts as he runs towards her and hugs her. "You're never allowed to leave again!" Luz laughs.
Sonic looks on at the reunion, "Well, looks like I better leave you guys to your reunion." Sonic tries to walk away, but Hooty blocks his path. "Hey, you have got to join in too!" Hooty says, he pushes sonic towards everyone.
Luz, King, and Eda hug Sonic, but they soon discover the downside of trying to hug a hedgehog. They pull away from Sonic and start to pull out quills.
"Why do you hedgehog creatures have to be so spiky?" Eda says, annoyed, she pulls out at quill.
"That's just how us hedgehogs are!" Sonic says jokingly, his expression becomes sincerer, ", but thanks for being so hospitable towards me. At least things are back to normal, right, Hooty?
"Oh Sonic," Hooty chuckles, his voice deepens, "This isn't merely the end, it is but the beginning." Everyone looks at Hooty disturbed, Hooty starts to gag, before spitting a bug on Sonic's fur.
"Whoops, I choked on another bug," Hooty says.
"Wow, Hooty, you're a riot!" Luz says. She along with King, Eda, and Hooty break into canned laughter, Sonic joins in with an awkward laugh, his face still looking horrified, "ha ha... I think I'm going to be sick…"
Meanwhile, in Sonic's world, Eggman is back in his lab, working on his invention.
"That blasted Sonic…" Eggman mumbles to himself while he is at work on his creation. "I made a whole plan that RELIED on him barging in and making a mess of everything, AND HE STILL FOILS IT!" Eggman slams his fists on his desks, but takes a second to make some calming breaths. "Whew, I really shouldn't lose my temper like that," Eggman chuckles to himself, "Especially since Sonic isn't around to stop me."
Eggman adjusts a few more components to his device, he puts his tools down. "Now let's test this puppy out."
The invention is a glove-like device with a screen on the forearm, a compartment for the insertion of materials, and a beacon for summoning the portal. Eggman puts on the glove and grabs a vial labeled dust sample, filled with dust particles from the Boiling Isles. Eggman puts the vial in the insertion compartment, and the screen shows a series of numbers increasing and decreasing, before they get to the right string of numbers, and the screen turns green. Eggman opens his palm and points his arm out in the open space in his laboratory.
"Now there's just one thing left to do." Eggman threw out a dark beam from his palm, it made a cut in the very fabric of the world. The cut opened up, the outline was dark and pulsating. The portal showed the interior of a castle, lined with status and some guards who clearly aren't paying attention.
"Ah, the perfect place for me to set up my plans for Eggman land 2.0, right, minions?"
The eyes of many of Eggman's badniks light up the room, the sound of mechanical wiring fills the ambiance."
"Watch out Sonic," Eggman says as he rises in his newly repaired Egg Walker, he puts on his goggles, "Your maker has arrived!"
End of Chapter Five