Chapter 2: Realization of a Dream II
After about an hour of flying in the jet at its top speed, the team begins to approach Ring Mountain. It's just like Sonic described it. The place is located in a desert surrounded by sand as far as the eye can see with a cloudless sky. No trees are in sight. In the middle of this is a huge, gold structure that protrudes from the ground into the sky. Only half of this huge ring is visible. The other half is buried in the sand below. Tails hands over the piloting to Knuckles while the rest of them decide to jump from off the left wing of the jet. If you played Sonic Heroes, then picture Tails, Sonic and Espio and the flight formation in that order. Knuckles brings the jet closer to the ring-shaped mountain. Once close enough, Tails takes off with Sonic and Espio under him. Tails is able to hold out long enough for them to land on the top of the ring. The top surface is surprisingly flat as if a walkway was put here on purpose. From here there is a great view of the landscape with a very gentle wind blowing.
"Wow, look at the view," Sonic exclaims.
"So, how do we activate this," Tails asks Espio.
"You guys have to fall in the middle," Espio explains. "It sounds weird I know, but the Rings of Fate are required to awaken this ring. The ring should float out of the ground and expose its whole self. We should be able to talk to it from there."
"Skydiving," Sonic says. "Alright, let's do it, Tails."
Sonic jumps off of the ring with Tails simply falling right behind him. Sonic is in a face first position with his eyes wide open enjoying every minute of it while Tails is screaming and waving his arms around frantically with his tails wafting behind him. Once they reach the middle, they stop falling and began to float. The ground starts to shake and gradually breaks into two then separates further to reveal the bottom half of the ring. The giant ring rockets into the air straight into the sunlight. Sonic is enjoying this exhilarating experience while Tails is still screaming. Espio is just trying to stay on top of the ring which is not proving to be an easy task. The ring stops floating once it passes the clouds, but it does not exit the atmosphere. Sonic and Tails are now floating in the middle of the ring and looking up with their backs turned to the ground. The ring then flattens out and forms sort of a mouth. Espio eventually falls off of the top of the ring and ends up floating with Sonic and Tails in the middle. The ring now speaks.
"For releasing me from the prison in the sand, you now get three wishes," the ring says.
"See, I told you it would help," Espio says. "What are you guys gonna wish for?"
"Can you tell us the location of the Key of Fate," Sonic asks.
"The Key of Fate lies within space. You need the Chaos Rings to find the Key of Fate," the rings says. "Two wishes remaining."
"Where can we find the Chaos Rings," Tails asks.
"The Chaos Rings are in space as well. I shall transfer the coordinates to first one into your head. The first one will help you find the rest. One wish remaining," the ring says.
"That's basically all we need to know. I can do some modifications to the jet that will enable it to get into space and I know where to find the first one," Tails explains.
"Maybe we could wish for the ring to put us back down," Sonic implies.
"He's right," Espio agrees.
"Oh, right," Tails says. "We want to go back down now."
"Your wish is my command," the ring says. "Before I send you back, I think I should say that current leader of the rings is the yellow one." The ring sends them back using teleportation after it says that.
Sonic, Tails, and Espio ends up in the jet. It's the exact place that Tails was thinking of when he made the wish and the ring got it right without him saying it.
"This is weird. Tails is the leader according to the huge ring person," Sonic says. "Now I'm even more confused as to who did this to us since it's supposed to be a loved one according to Espio."
"Uh, you don't think it could be," Espio guesses.
"Impossible for it to be who you are thinking about," Sonic says. "She's dead, remember? Tails, got any input on this?"
"I don't know," Tails says. "I never had anyone like that after, well you know."
"Well then, we will find out eventually on our quest for the Chaos Rings. We shouldn't worry about it too much right now," Sonic explains. "We should just go home and try to figure things out from there."
After a few hours of flying, they reach Tails' place once more. All of them jump out of the jet. Since the leader of the rings have now been found out, Sonic and Tails try to figure out how to separate since neither Knuckles or Espio remembers how to pull it off. First thing they try is to run apart, but that ends with the star band pulling them back towards each other. Their heads collide and they fall to the ground. Tails comes up with another idea. He orders his partner to roll into a ball. Tails picks him up and throws him as hard as possible. Sonic rockets into the air hoping that the star band will give way, but it doesn't and he ends up hitting the ground again. Sonic is seriously angry. He then tries to pull the ring off of his wrist and he succeeded.
"All that for nothing," Sonic says while rubbing his head. "Anyway, how long do we have until the effect wears off?"
"One day I think," Espio explains. "After that, the closest person to Tails will become his partner or anyone who chooses to put on the other ring. Also, you can't go too far from him until the day is up or you will be forcibly rejoined."
"No problem. I'll just take my usual spot right there," Sonic says. He walks towards the tree on his right. Once under it, he sits down with his head against the tree and begins to relax.
"I'll get started with the modifications to the jet. Maybe I could make it bigger and adjust it for space travel within a day, but I have to work for a solid 24 hours in order to pull it off. I'll get straight to work," Tails says. He hops into his jet and flies it around back into the waterfall that's located on the side of the cliff where his workshop is located. The tree that Sonic is resting under is the only tree in front of Tails' workshop. He will stay here until Tails finishes. Knuckles decides to wait as well since he doesn't have anything better to do. He takes a seat on the other side of the tree. Espio went back to where he previously was since he helped them out already and he's not needed anymore. A few minutes later after Espio leaves, Sonic begins to drift off into sleep when he hears someone call out his name. He stands up and looks to his left to see Cream standing there with a worried look on her face. She's panting as if she's been running around all day.
"Cream, what's up," Sonic asks.
"I have been looking for you all day," Cream says. "I been wanted to tell you that Eggman captured my mother this morning."
"Really," Sonic screams. "Are you sure?"
"Yeah, he took her to his home," Cream answers.
"Uh oh," Knuckles says. Both Sonic and him falls into a short state of silence.
"Uh oh what," Cream asks.
"Uh, I don't know how to say this," Sonic begins to hesitate with his speech. "You see, when we got to Eggman's place this morning we found Shadow there and the place was destroyed with no one in sight. He admitted to blowing up the place in order to go after Eggman and he succeeded. So, what I'm trying to say is that Vanilla is..."
Cream already began crying once Sonic made it halfway through his speech since she knew the outcome. "Now I lost both my mother and Cheese as well," Cream says as she wipes tears from her eyes.
"You lost Cheese too," Knuckles asks. "Was he with your mother as well?"
"No, I just haven't seen him since this morning," Cream says. "On my search for Sonic I kept a look out for him too. Now what will I do? I can't stay at home by myself."
"Hm, I pretty sure that Amy wouldn't mind taking you in," Knuckles says. "If we could catch up with her and explain the situation then maybe Amy would let you stay with her."
"You guys don't have to go looking for her. She's been helping me out my search too. I'll call her through my watch," Cream says. Her mind finally connects and she sees her error. "I can't believe I forgot about these watches that Tails made for us awhile back for communication. If only I had thought about that sooner..."
"Don't worried about it. You forgot because you panicked," Sonic explains. "It happens from time to time, even to me. Anyway, call Amy and tell her to meet us here. We have to tell you guys something."
After a few minutes, Amy arrives with Cheese who she found not too long ago. Sonic and Knuckles brings them up to speed on the current events.
"At this moment, Tails is prepping the jet for space travel. He's stuck to the Rings of Fate," Sonic explains. "We don't know how this happened or who did it, but we plan to find out and free him from them."
"We need to find the five Chaos Rings which will in turn help us find the key and also help find out who did this to Tails," Knuckles explains. "Sonic was the first one stuck to him but they are able to separate for a day. This is good because Tails needs to work on the jet. That's what's going on so far."
"Oh, poor Tails," Cream says with her head down.
"Why would someone do this to him," Amy asks.
"I don't know, but Knuckles and I are going to space with Tails in order to help him crack this mystery and get rid of the Rings of Fate," Sonic says. "Whoever did this to him needs to be taught a lesson." Knuckles agrees with Sonic.
"Can I go too," Amy asks.
"I knew that coming," Knuckles says. "That's all up to Tails. We can't answer for him."
"You know he will say yes anyway," Sonic says. "We can't bother Tails right now and you guys can't get near him. He needs to finish within the 24 hour period before the Rings of Fate bind the closest person to him or the previous partner which is me. We should stay outside of his workshop for now and wait until he finishes." He takes a seat back in his original spot. Amy and Cream goes to Amy's place in order to prepare for the space trip.
"It looks like Amy isn't mad at you anymore," Knuckles says as he takes a seat.
"That's good," Sonic says. "She didn't cling onto me either. Maybe she's over it."
"I guess so," Knuckles says. He stares up into the leaves in on the tree. He then pulls out the Master Emerald and begins to inspect it. "That reminds me, what will we do about the Chaos Emeralds?"
Sonic pulls out the blue Chaos Emerald he had with him. He begins to toss it and the air and catch it repeatedly. "We'll find them when we get back. Since Eggman is gone now, no one will be around to compete with us for them. There's no rush. I only need one anyway."
"You're right," Knuckles agrees. "I have been thinking about something this whole time. Don't you think that killing Eggman would make our lives so much easier. I mean, he's usually the source of all our problems. With him out of the way we could live in peace and relax all of the time. The emeralds would never get stolen. No one would be captured. No world domination. It would just be peaceful."
Sonic thinks for a minute. He continues tossing the Chaos Emerald. "I see it like this. Without Eggman around it could get a little boring, right? Even though I generally don't like Eggman, I'm not the type to hold a grudge. Also, Eggman has helped us out many times in the past. He's not out to kill us, he's just trying to take over the world. I normally stop him and clean up his mess, and that's the cycle of things between us. I've come to think of Eggman as more a friendly rival over the years instead of a mortal enemy. That's why I wanted to avenge Eggman when I found out he was dead and that's probably why Tails wanted to help too."
"I see what you mean, but Eggman usually hurts us more than he helps us," Knuckles says. "Well, there's no use in worrying about it now. I guess I'll take a nap."
"Same here," Sonic says. "It'll help time move along quicker."
So, now it's confirmed that space travel is imminent. The next chapter marks the beginning of the Chaos Ring hunt with the first planet that shall be visited and the reason why the Rings of Fate has been bestowed upon Tails.
Next Chapter: Meta Junglira