Miracle Sonic watched the world from somewhere far above, as if in a dream. The laser had cut straight through the atmosphere and seemingly fired at empty space. At the point targeted by the crimson beam of raw destruction, the fabric of space and time seemed to shatter, leaving behind it a rift through which more of the same green void poured where the hedgehog was floating now. As soon as the pathway opened, the motes of light that now completely covered the surface of the other planet began rising up to meet it in a helix pattern, migrating into the higher plane. Six stars in particular pulsed as brilliantly as neutron stars, hanging in a fixed pattern around the slowly rotating column. The amount of energy being exchanged was too much to try and comprehend so he shut down his senses to avoid getting a headache.
"What is he doing with that laser?" demanded Miracle Sonic, mentally voicing the request with the appropriate amount of urgency. He recognised that the entity (entities?) speaking to him were using the same kind of communication directly into his mind as the source of the visions. They could even be one and the same.
"Only what he has been preordained to do since arriving on this planet," said the voices, "He is opening the way to that which has been cruelly forbidden to us. Only he has the ability to put enough strain on a precise enough point on the Universe to break a hole into a specific dimension."
"You mean, you wanted him to build that thing? But it was Robotnik's... he was going to use it to steal the Time Stones..."
"The invader was insane, he had no real need to come here, he only wished to steal our power and waste it. However, it was only when the invader arrived that we realised the possibility existed to force the Universe into a certain outcome. Only he had the will to come here at all, never mind to change something that was an absolutely inviolate part of the order of space and time. We observed him and took notes, then we realised he intended to do absolutely nothing useful with the things he was trying to steal."
"Why would you want something like that to exist?"
"At first we didn't, we only wanted to note down its existence so we could protect ourselves against it. But then the search went on for another few millennia and we found it. Or, we found the only point at which we could enter it, and saw that it was deliberately sealed off. Not just from us, from everyone in the entire Universe. It was never intended to be found. So, we had to break the rules, as we had discovered it was possible to do."
"What is 'it' that you need to find so badly?"
"The absolute optimal outcome for the entire Universe's fate," said the voices, suddenly sounding more exultant as more individual voices joined the psychic chorus, "The fulfilment of all destiny's objectives."
"A what, now?"
"You, of all people, should be able to see it the clearest. You have been living in the middle of our attempts to replicate it, part by part. You even saw the mechanism when you travelled between parallel worlds."
"I thought that was a mistake."
"We usually leave it locked, but we did not expect the dimension we programmed with the breaking codes to start breaking space and time in the wrong place and leaving holes everywhere. Up until now, it has been an unpredictable force that it took us many years to learn how to control."
"You're talking about the Bad Future? You let it still exist on purpose?"
"We now regret our earlier lapse in safety protocols, we should have strengthened the field separating all possible iterations of the Miracle Planet from each other as well as that separating the planet from the rest of the Universe before attempting to make use of such a dangerous and unstable dimension."
"How many Miracle Planets are there?"
"Now? Just the one designed to replicate the conditions of a certain point in space and time as much as possible, so as to force its existence, and one containing apparatus to break through the barrier that will appear around that point. While the planet was still wandering and obtaining information about all possible scenarios, still thinning them down until only the optimal scenario remained on the Miracle Planet, many billions could exist at once while we watched them play out and decided which one to keep."
"So, the Good Future wasn't anything to do with me after all?"
"Oh, it was. The invader could genuinely have destroyed our project by preventing our planet from moving. You stopped that from happening. We are eternally grateful to you. That is why we have been including you in the project, showing you our latest findings and how you can work with us to bring about the future you would desire the most, and also why we are allowing you to be the only individual, the only consciousness, to be an observer to this true and perfect outcome. Our own existence is... different. We are not capable of being direct observers. We will be content to exist within the Ideal Parallel."
"You never told me anything about this! You just left me trapped here and gave me weird visions!"
"Explaining to you directly what was happening would destroy our results, as the existence of an observer who is aware of what they are attempting to observe would change the nature of what was being observed."
"Then why not let me out? I didn't want to stay!"
"We never lied when we said we couldn't return you. The Miracle Planet's event field is a sealed infinite loop. To allow the rest of the Universe to be changed by our experiments would harm the Universe as much as it would contaminate all our samples. It is equally possible that either sequence of events would overwrite the other. Furthermore, when we do entirely break through into the forbidden sector of space and time, it could cause something catastrophic to happen. We would not wish this to cause a chain reaction that destroys the rest of the Universe."
"That's very considerate of you."
"You do not appear satisfied by something that, by definition, satisfies the achievement criteria for the entire Universe. Have we been lacking in our tutelage? Are you still having difficulty perceiving the Ideal correctly?"
"I can feel that it's there... I wouldn't have believed such a thing really existed if you didn't show me firsthand."
It was true. He hadn't realised it but he felt himself becoming gradually calmer, not the eerie, maddening calm of silence but the one that came of being able to move freely in all directions, as fast and as far as he pleased. The Universe had not stopped, it had completed. The only thing left was to become more at one with the Universe, with himself.
"I just... I don't think it's for me. It's beyond anything I can live in. Not forever."
"The Ideal is not an awareness of a continuous 'forever'. It is more a perception of a single moment."
"Sonic, the real Sonic, already lives for the moment. I can't live in something like this, though. I already haven't been me for a long time."
"Those changes were only as a result of the flux while the criteria were identified and fulfilled. By definition, the Ideal is the absolute culmination of the identity. To fully become oneself is an essential criteria for the final achievement of all life."
"Maybe that's so, but I think I should achieve it the normal way, in my own time, with everyone else."
"Are you aware that the Universe has been barred from reaching such an Ideal? That, here and now is probably your only chance of ever witnessing it?"
"This is your thing. You earned it. Not me. I was only along for the ride," he smiled, "I'm glad I got to hang around to see such an awesome thing about to happen but I can't follow you where you're going. The thing is... you didn't invite my friend. And he's still in a lot of danger. I have to rescue him. That's what I do."
It was difficult to realise he still had a job to do, here where conflict could not exist, without already being finished, where there could not be tasks that had not been finished to satisfaction.
"That is what this is about? You wish for other iterations of you to exist at the same time, even though the rest of the timeline is about to be collapsed into one. And on top of this, you want to be joined by your Doppelgänger from one of the worst possible outcomes of your destiny. Your needs are impossible and incomprehensible."
"I guess that probably means I'm not the kind of hedgehog that can exist in this place you're going to. I never did think I was quite perfect."
"Perfect is not the same as optimal. However, we hope for your sake that a version of you exists in the place we are going to," the voice sounded a little regretful but still chirpy, "Your timeline's iteration of the Miracle Planet is about to disappear, as it will no longer be needed. This is the optimal time for us to return you to the outside Universe. You will not be able to come here again."
"I understand. And I don't want to. I don't want to go back to my own world yet, though."
"The breaker planet is incredibly unstable now. You may not survive attempting to exist there for longer than a few seconds. We will try to keep up the shielding for long enough to give you time to rescue the other."
"Thank you," he said, "Good luck. I know who you really are, by the way."
"You do?" Genuine surprise gave their voices a certain lilt.
"I've met you before. Before any of this. That was a long time ago."