Chapter 10: Darkside Reflection
They took the chance of chaos control to get off the train and found themselves surrounded by machinery, giant coils that would dwarf even a human, glowing circuits and coils, pistons…
"Sonic… what is this?" Chip flew up, moving toward one of the coils.
"Don't touch it unless you have to. This… it looks like the machinery inside the ARK. I wish Tails were here to help."
"What's it for?"
"From what I can tell, Eggman wants to do something to Light Gaia. To make him stronger, or to break him up and use him for energy. Either is bad for us, I think."
"But I thought you guys were friends?" Chip flew over to Sonic, who was looking around the computers.
"I think we are. But… I can't take a chance of Eggman exploiting him like he tried to exploited you."
Sonic jumped into the air, curling into a ball, spinning. He came down on the device with a crash, and Chip clapped. Then he stood.
"Whatever Egghead is planning… He's not going to do it now."
"Hooray! Thanks for protecting me from Light Gaia, Sonic."
As Chip flew off toward the exit sign, Sonic reached into the rubble and pulled out a packet of freeze dried food, murmuring, "Sorry Chip, but I can't trust you just yet."
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It seemed like they wandered the corridors for hours, looking for clues and looking for water. Looking for things that weren't there, in the ghost town of an array, walking across the covered walkways between the mirrored panels. They hid their eyes from the sun, Sonic shielding Chip with his arms, his body, even as it came from all sides.
"Sonic, look!" Chip cried suddenly.
He glanced up, ahead, as a little dark spot moved through a corridor across from them. Suddenly the post at the corner of the hexagon erupted into a brilliant violet glow.
"That's the emerald. He's putting the emeralds at the corners, and one at the center… He's going to power this array with them." Sonic turned around, seeing a blue glow behind. He looked across the divide of the array, seeing all the colors…
"What's it going to do?"
"Oh, you'll see that soon enough," came a voice over the PA.
A dark form came hurtling at them from down the corridor. Chip tried to fly away, but Sonic grabbed him by the tail and pulled him close, standing his ground. The figure rolled into view, wheels on four legs at the corners of rectangular body, cold green. Sonic recognized the design from that robot Eggman had been driving around the Black Comet, insect-like bent legs with wheels at the bottom, though this time all the bends went in the same direction. The top was not rounded for his pod, as the old robot had been, but a rounded rectangle, more like the body of a horse or a tiger. More familiar, though, was the shape nestled atop the rectangle, narrow legs sticking out the side, a wide, round body sitting atop, the green generator center hidden inside the car, just a little glow seeping out. A great revolving gun hung on one arm, a claw sat on the other, clutching a little blur of pink about the waist. Sonic only had seconds to recognize the Egg Dragoon's design before he realized Amy was clutched in its claw.
"Amy!" Sonic cried, reaching out to her. He was surprised to see her hand go into her blouse.
"I'm surprised at you, Sonic" Eggman taunted, face barely visible inside the tinted cockpit atop the robot. "Don't you want to see Chip restored to rights? The real one, not that fake in your arms. All you did together, all you stand for…"
"Eggman," Sonic spat, "You haven't got a clue what I stand for, and you never have."
"No, I see perfectly well that you stand for getting rid of me, no matter how I might have reformed." Sonic thought he saw Eggman cross his arms inside the cockpit.
There was a sudden thud, and a cry of "Oops!" He glanced up at Amy, who was reaching toward the floor. "My water bottle!" He locked eyes with her, and saw no fear in her green eyes; she instead smiled, giving a little nod. He thought he heard a clanking sound as well, but he dismissed it as a quirk of yet another robot.
Sonic realized as the bottle rolled to his feet that he hadn't had a drop to drink since they left planet. Of course Amy would pack water, too afraid of Eggman poisoning their food here. He snapped it up and drank it, trying to ignore the artificial sweetner and strawberry flavor.
"…Amy, where were you keeping that water bottle?" Eggman boggled.
"In my blouse. Come on, you made Cream search me, you think she'd look there?"
Eggman chuckled, beaming. "I can't even blame her for that one. Ever the polite child, isn't she?"
"Eggman, don't try to be friendly right now. It's creepy after what you did." Amy's face was contorted in horror, and Sonic was tempted to ask, but there was no time.
"What I did? I can't b-"
"Look Eggman," Sonic interrupted, "maybe you have changed. But you're still sneaking around, not telling anyone what you're up to." Sonic took a last drink and cast aside the empty bottle. "If I knew what you were trying to do to my friends—both of them, Dark and Light Gaia—I might not be trying to get in here and thwart you at every turn."
"Trying being the key word there," snickered the old man.
"You notice I left your little pylon things alone down there. I'll listen." Sonic crossed his arms.
"But… you smashed that machine?" Chip looked up at Sonic, puzzled.
"It was a vending machine for workers, Chip. I didn't want to break anything until I knew what it did."
"Why did you lie to me?" Chip flew up in his face, blazing. He slapped Sonic with a tiny claw; Sonic felt a sting as the claws hit him.
"Pot-kettle, Chip. Shut up a minute and let the madman talk." He gently pushed the fairy out of his way. His face was turned toward Eggman, visible in the Egg Dragoon-like upper body's cockpit, but his eyes were on Amy, squirming in its arms underneath, hanging near the Egg Dealer-like wheel apparatus.
"It's very clear that Dark Gaia is a threat to everything we stand for, everything we are. How better to ensure that no one fails to stop it again than to empower Light Gaia. With unfiltered, reflected sunlight, the source of Light Gaia's power, he will become unstoppable, protecting our world forever from your little demonic friend." Eggman gestured to his right and Sonic followed, glancing down into the center of the Reflector. There, bathing in the glow of the white emerald, stood a great creature, mauve and white, with a green glow. Great insect wings, like a butterfly's, glistened in the reflected sunlight, seeming to dance in it, spinning slowly, great claws in the air. Sonic felt his knees buckle.
"Chip."
As if hearing him, the creature turned to face the walkway on the perimeter, looking with great green eyes. Two on his face, and a closed one on his chest, where the green bauble now on Sonic's wrist had once been. He waved a claw, revealing another slit in the palm of his hand…
"Chip!"
"Oh look, he's happy to see you. You two will have to get caught up after the procedure. I brought some freeze dried ice cream for the occasion. Now, will you help me dispatch Dark Gaia so we can start the homecoming?"
Sonic looked at the smaller, dark Chip, "He's my friend, Eggman. No one is going to defeat him but me."
"Isn't she your friend?" He gave Amy a squeeze, causing her to scream.
Sonic frowned, grunting.
"It's ok, Sonic. If he hurts me, his death warrant is signed!" Amy cried. "I'll die if it means getting rid of him."
"What a betrayal, Amy. Glad I saw it coming. For a moment I almost thought you were my friend." Eggman pulled her up to his face, peering at her like a child conversing with a doll.
"I was, until you kidnapped me and killed Knuckles! Jerk!" Sonic couldn't see her face, but he heard a spitting sound, and the sound of windshield wipers. He tried to dismiss it, tried to convince himself it was part of the charade. They wanted everyone to think Knuckles was dead, right? "What kind of friend uses you as a hostage?"
"You thwarted my plans!"
"I'd thwart Sonic's if they were wrong, too."
Sonic leaned over. "Chip, can you summon the temples like your brother?" He's not dead, he's not dead, he's…
"Not without breaking open the glass. All the air would rush out, we'd die!"
Eggman continued his argument with her. "I'm so tired of all of you, espousing these values of friendship and then ignoring them. You're hypocrites, all of you! Even Sonic, flouting his own ideals. And especially that terrorist Knuckles!"
"Giving someone a chance to redeem themselves is flouting ideals? How many times did he let you live?"
"I got away! Each time!
"He let you! Every time but the last."
"Which so-called hero are you talking about, Amy? Sonic didn't know what he was doing!" Eggman hissed. "Now, Knuckles, there's someone who knows how to deal with the enemy. Too bad he's so gullible. Really thought that was me. Hrmph."
"What?" Sonic asked, puzzling, feeling a chill. Not again. No, it's not true, it can't be true, it.
"Oh, you aren't questioning why I'm still alive here? When he was sent to assassinate me?" There was a pause as Sonic fought not to scream, everything out of focus. "Oh, Sonic didn't know what Knuckles was doing? That's kind of rich. Babying him now, like some kind of broken hero..."
"What? That's what he was doing?" Sonic growled. "Amy, I thought he was just blowing up a power plant!"
"It was his idea!" She shouted.
"And he paid for it with his life. His little teleport device malfunctioned; he overestimated Tails' hacking." Eggman sneered. "A fitting death for a traitor."
Sonic could feel everything in him, Dark and Light and Sonic, calling for vengeance. He could see what he thought must have been the last look on Knuckles' face in his eyes, he could feel his eyes tearing up. He was just about to leap for the cockpit when Amy said something that took his breath away.
"Ivo, think for a moment. Who do you think gave him the bomb?"
Sonic snapped out of his rage, suddenly finding himself staring at Amy.
"You don't mean…"
"It wasn't me, but it was one of ours. Do you think he's the only one? We knew you would take Tails or me hostage to manipulate Sonic, because you always do." Amy scoffed. "You're so predictable, even Knuckles was starting to see it. It was Charmy's idea, to give Tails and me the last of Jet's—of Bean's— bombs. Even a fool like Charmy knows what you do."
Eggman sputtered inside the machine, shaking. "You can't mean—"
"And you grabbed me by the waist, and you left my arms open, so I could gesture when I begged Sonic to save me, the way I would have ten years ago. Flail my arms around like I do, for the drama. You always bought into the stupid drama." Amy laughed openly, throwing her head back as she reached into her blouse. Her laughter shook the arm, making it creak wildly. "Oh Ivo, all these years you've stayed the same, but we've changed."
"I'll crush you!" He roared.
"And my dying twitch will detonate it, and we'll all die together, tyrant and traitor." She pulled the bomb out in full view.
"You wouldn't kill Sonic!"
"He can take care of himself," she shouted, not even looking at him, face turned to the robot.
Sonic was just about to try and chaos control her out of Eggman's grasp when there was a shudder, a crash, and a scream. The Egg Dragoon's arm fell from the robot, Amy screaming. Tails, missing a few chunks of fur, and Knuckles, singed black from head to toe, hung from the arm socket, waving with hands clutched around screwdrivers and ratchets. Tails fumbled for a tighter grip, while Knuckles gave the robot's body a kick, grinning. Amy disappeared from the arm's clutches, reappearing a moment later with Shadow, covered in flaking blue paint.
Sonic was entirely unsurprised when, a moment later, Eggman turned the Egg Shedu around and disappeared down a corridor.
He happened to know exactly what to do.
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Sonic raced, as fast as his feet could carry him and still keep pace. He wasn't as fast as he used to be, but neither was Eggman's robot.
He had done enough reading in his ten years' solitude, and in the cargo holds of the Tempest, to know this one was called the Egg Shedu. It made sense; the Dragoon rode on some kind of horse-like bottom; a Shedu was an old Centaur-like creature. Now that he knew that Knuckles, Amy, Tails, and both Chips were safe, he felt comfortable enough to muse about Eggman's tastes as he chased down the enemy. It felt almost like old times, until he thought back to Empire City-to Ivopolis, to Eggmanland. To the people living in fear, cameras everywhere, a city once bright darkened by that monster. It wasn't fun and games, not anymore.
So as they passed under the next emerald, he leapt into the air, using Chaos Control to boost his jump, to land on the Shedu's back. There he found Tails and Knuckles, trying desperately to both avoid the flailing of the gun arm and disassemble the Gaia Generator powering the thing.
"How did he make these security measures? This thing is impenetrable!" Tails gulped.
"It's the new one! The one he was showing off before all this went down!" Knuckles growled, punching it. "It's this bar! What kind of metal did he use?"
"If I were the werehog," Sonic started, before the arm knocked him away. He tumbled, rolled to the floor and tried to pick up speed.
So he started running again, this time finding Chip at his side.
"How did you catch up to me?" Sonic panted.
"I'm drawn to that generator. I can resist going in, because I'm the real deal but..."
"We can't get to it," Sonic panted. "There's a bar."
"You've gotta try. Here... I think I can help you..."
Chip grabbed Sonic's shoulders and shuddered through the air. He felt the familiar change come over him, that cold pain in the pit of his stomach, the ache as his arms loosened. He reached up, grabbing the rear of the centaur robot and climbing on as it teetered unevenly on the corner. He scurried over to the others as the feeling returned, his arms reverting to normal, gloveless. Chip wavered, and Sonic caught him carefully with one last stretch.
"I can't reach!" Tails shouted, his namesakes twitching angrily.
"You have longer arms than me!" Knuckles shouted.
"Let me at it." Sonic rushed over, handing Chip off to the blackened Echidna. Tails handed him a screwdriver, and pointed to the screws on the side of the bar protecting the generator. Sonic tried to reach in to it, but he found his arms just a bit too short.
"Chip! Can you give me another stretch!"
He gagged as the claw touched him, as the feeling came over him again. He pushed his arms down, down, feeling them stretch out, his fingers shaking as his claws grew. He gripped the screwdriver tightly, turning, turning, feeling another emerald pass overhead. Turn turn turn, that bolt out, he moved over to the next.
"I can't hold this up much longer, Sonic! The essence I'm pouring into you is getting sucked into the generator!"
"Hurry, Sonic!"
Sonic, hand shaking, tried to match the screwdriver head to the large screw, trying to get it to go in. It slipped once, twice, before finally making contact. He turned his hand as fast as he could go, turning, turning, until finally the screw popped out and the bar fell away. He pulled back from the casing, and was knocked from the back again by the Lancer's gun arm. This time, it fired at him, and he scrambled to get out of the way. As he backed into a corner, and the bullets came straight at him, he looked up at the sky, hoping for a miracle... and his whole being was enveloped with green. He glanced out the window, to see the strange creature in the center looking at him, with smiling eyes on a mouthless face. He put a hand on the glass before standing up and going after his friends.
Another emerald passed before he was able to get back on top. Now Knuckles and Tails were bashing away at the reactor, Tails using a long-handled ratchet and reeling as the red-purple miasma surrounded him. The monster robot was slowly losing speed as Eggman screamed from within, "No, no!" Inside the body Sonic could hear the popping of a release, a scraping as it caught somewhere. Sonic was about to deliver one last blow to the device when a loud roar interrupted him. He felt himself starting to move before a green glow blinded him, and he found himself, little Chip, Tails, and Knuckles floating in a warm space. As the green glow around them dimmed he could see broken safety glass floating in the low lunar gravity, the smoking remains of the Egg Shedu rolling down the corridor, the violet emerald glistening where they had started, the tower on which it rested unharmed. Tiny forms of pink and black waved to them from one of the hexagon's spokes, leading into the center of the array. Sonic quickly surmised that the array had airlocks, and he tried to start a Chaos Control. Shadow finished it for him, and he washed up in the corridor at their feet. He began to laugh.
"Man!" he panted. "Never thought... I'd be... the wrench!"
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They all raced toward the hexagon's center along a corner spoke, toward the glowing light of the white emerald. As they approached, rainbows of light danced from the prismatic emerald.
"What was that explosion?" Sonic asked. "I didn't know Gaia Generators did that!"
"It wasn't the suppressor, Sonic!" Amy chided, keeping up far closer than Sonic remembered. "It was the bomb Jet gave me! Shadow threw it!"
"I could never have hit it if you guys hadn't slowed it down," added the hedgehog. "How?"
"It was the new suppressor," Knuckles explained, trailing last. "The one he was showing off right before. Sonic managed to open it with a screwdriver!"
"Open?"
"There was a bar across it, we couldn't break."
Shadow looked away.
Sonic held Chip—the Dark Chip—close to his chest. The little creature seemed drained, oblivious as they ran. A cloud of raspberry light followed them, outside the safety glass over the walkway, little motes of color attacking every seam, every bend, trying to get home. Sonic wondered what would happen if the Dark Gaia essence never made its destination.
Finally they arrived at the grand center chamber beneath the prismatic light of the white emerald, sunlight filtering through in every color. Light Gaia lumbered over them, awkwardly, playfully, with smiling eyes and no mouth. In some ways he looked so much like he did—mauve and white furry body, big ears and fluffy tail—that it brought a tear to Sonic's eye. But his tiny hands were great claws now, dotted with solid closed eyes at the palms, and where once he'd worn that green bauble around his neck, there was now a great eye, closed, watering. Sonic noticed two slits across Gaia's knees, and he wondered if they might be eyes, too.
Amy raced over to Light Gaia's leg and hugged it, wrapping her arms as far as she could, throwing herself. "Chip! I missed you! How have you been?"
Sonic could only watch as a great claw reached down and lifted Amy into the air. He felt his heart pounding, confused. Should he hug Chip too? Should he try to get Amy out of the creature's clutches. She looked the same from here, alien claw wrapped around her waist, as she had when Eggman held her hostage. But she seemed so happy, smiling, as the creature pressed her tightly against its furry chest. Then he sat her down, gently on her feet, like a child righting a doll and hoping it might stand. He knelt on his strange-slitted satyr's knes, holding out a claw. The depression where his mouth should have been didn't move, but still Sonic heard him speak.
"Why are you holding him?"
"He saved my life. What, no greeting?"
"I'm glad to see you, Sonic." The creature reached out with the back of his claw, running a knuckle the size of Sonic's own fist down the side of his face. "But I can't focus very well until my mission is complete. Not with the enemy right in front of me like this." He paused, and then added. "I can't afford to get distracted, like I did last time."
Sonic twitched, trying not to put that thought together.
"Sonic, we have to destroy Dark Gaia this time."
Sonic caught a glimpse of Shadow moving at the corner of his eye, but ignored it. "Chip," he said, walking forward himself, putting one arm around the creature's great leg as he cradled its tiny opposite in the other arm. "Eggman is stopped. I think I've gotten Dark Gaia around to my side. Why can't you guys just go back to sleep?"
Dark Gaia stirred in his arms, little claws becoming fist.
"He won't let go. Even semi-conscious, stripped of all that Gaia force, he'll still oppose me."
"I can't," moaned the little creature.
"And neither can I. It's who we are, this fight."
"I see," Sonic said with a frown, taking his arm off Light Gaia's leg. He put a hand on Light Gaia's neck, and shifted his arm to cover the other side. "Dark Gaia… I'm sorry I have to do this." He pressed with both hands, pushing hard, digging into the soft tissue with his fingertips while supporting the fairy's spine with his body.
Dark Gaia let out a horrible scream and begged, "No, please Sonic!" before he passed out with a shuddering breath. Sonic passed a hand under his nose, feeling for breath, to reassure himself that the poor thin was still alive.
"Now we bury both of you, and life goes on."
Light Gaia shook his great head. "It doesn't work that way. He's only defeated because all of his Gaia force is stuck outside—so is some of mine. As soon as he gets his Gaia Force back he'll attack again. Besides, I have work to do. To get rid of the night…"
Amy took a step forward, gesturing wildly. "You can't get rid of the night! People need it to sleep! We need night and day."
"But you can sleep during the day!" Chirped the giant in their minds. "And there are so many scary, bad things at night! And plants can't grow, and you can't see, and people hit stuff with their cars in the dark…"
"It's a part of life. Dark, Light, night and day. We need both to make it make sense!"
Light Gaia laughed. "Amy… My destiny is to bring Light to the Earth, to strip away the darkness." Light Gaia looked up, into the sun, spreading his arms wide. "Now that Eggman is gone, I just have to complete myself and take his ship back there."
Sonic shook his head. "Chip, think about this!"
"I'm sorry, Sonic. It will only hurt for a moment."
The mirrors shifted, and at the same moment, the burning intensified, like all the hope and life were being sucked out of him. Sonic collapsed, screaming, and gripped at nothing, trying to hold on to every mote of light, every bit of goodness and daytime. As the last ball of green light left him, he collapsed, world wavering around him.
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It happened so fast, Amy had barely had time to grab him by the shoulders and drag him out of Light Gaia's shadow and the intense beam of the moving array. A rush of green light flew out of Sonic and he screamed; another orb of the same color flooded in another corridor. After that came the red miasma that had followed them. The green soaked into Light Gaia; the red into Dark, who was now being carried out of the way by Knuckles.
The moving of the array intensified the sunlight, burning, and the emerald overhead exploded into a rainbow overtop Light Gaia. He let out out a great, alien roar as thin arms shot out of his sides, spraying red blood onto the glass dome. Amy looked back to see the slits on his knees, his chest, his hands, open into green eyes. A horn, swirled like Narwhal, erupted Light Gaia's head. After a moment his whole form seemed to solidify, to darken, and then faded into solid, white light, traced and swirled with green, dotted with chartreuse eyes.
"Behold, Perfect Light Gaia!" He announced himself. "I will shelter the earth for millions of years, bringing peace and justice, hope!"
Little Dark Gaia, in Knuckles' arms, closed his eyes.
"Chip!" Amy stopped, shouting. "How did you get that Gaia Force in here?"
"Oh, I had Shadow open an airlock for me? Why? Is it Dark Gaia you're worried about? I can take care of him, just leave him here with me; with this sunlight even all that Gaia Force won't help him." The green eyes turned up a little, as if to smile.
"You… can't honestly…" Sonic gasped, and yet the white creature, already far away, seemed to hear.
"Think it'll work? Come on, Sonic, we've done greater together. I'll take the train back to the ship, and go back to Earth, and I'll get rid of war and politics and all the bad stuff. And I'll get rid of all the evil people. And people will be so happy, they'll give me money and I can buy them all ice cream!"
"Chip," Knuckles scolded. "We just want life to go back to normal." Knuckles approached, handing off Dark Gaia to Tails.
"But normal is bad!" The white giant stomped, huffily. "You're always fighting, and people do bad things! Like unleash my brother ten years early just so they can use him for power."
There was a great crash, and Amy looked straight up, toward the sound. A Gaia temple, dripping with soil, was tapping on the glass, trying to break through.
"See? He's trying to stop me with those temples. Sonic, you should have let me have him!"
"I need to go check on Shadow," Amy stammered "Tails, Knuckles, please get Sonic out of the way of this grudge match. I just remembered something."
She ran, thinking of Pickle's last words to her.
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They ran.
Sonic clung tightly, hands digging into the burnt flesh of his Knuckles' shoulders and chest like knives. Far off, Knuckles could see a little ball of violet dodging orbs of white light from the creature Light Gaia had become. Its pairs of wings—six, eight—glistened in the amplified sunlight, glowing green. It reminded him of the way light glistened through Chaos.
They went the same way Amy had, and after a while they heard her shouting "Open open, open!" As they came upon the control room, full of computers and terminals, buttons and levers, an array of space suits and oxygen tanks along one wall, they felt a seal click shut behind them, and an awful roar shuddered through the floor.
Knuckles looked back; the little purple blur flew out of the central chamber, and Light Gaia clung desperately to walls with spread arms, pressing itself into place.
"No! That's not what I meant!" Amy shouted, swearing at the airlock with words Knuckles didn't even know existed.
They looked and saw her, weeping over the console, and unconscious Shadow by her side. Knuckles felt a strange energy and a shudder from the hedgehog on his back. Dark Gaia appeared beside them with a desperate gasp.
"Sonic! My hero!" Amy exclaimed.
"Help me get some rings." He stood, smoothing his spines. "These kids need a time out."
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Light Gaia lumbered down the corridor, teetering with the new weight. Tails could only watch from afar, safe within the furthest leg of the array, inside the control room. He pressed buttrons furiously on the console, trying to vent air to every section except this and the adjoining. Far off, racing through empty corridors he could see Shadow scavenging the array and its machinery for power rings. Knuckles was behind Tails, on the portable radio Eggman had left here, trying to prepare the colony for the potential arrival of Light Gaia if they failed.
Knuckles handed Tails a space suit, but as Tails put it on, he froze in place. The seven chaos emeralds all began to glow brightly, circling, leaving their towers to gather in vented corridor. With a flash, a golden star lifted itself into the airless sky.
"Chip, " came Sonic's voice over the PA system. "I don't know if you can hear me, given the vacuum."
"This moon was once a part of the earth you tread," came the reply, echoing in their heads.
"Chip. Light Gaia. Eternal daylight isn't healthy. People exist for both day and night, it'll mess up their bodies. People will get sick and go crazy."
"How can you want the night? Without sunlight? Without justice? Where things are hidden."
"You possess people, and make them do crazy things," Sonic recounted. "Like Shadow, trying to kill me."
"You aren't perfect, Sonic. I didn't want him to kill you but… you haven't been very responsible. I can't blame him for wanting justice."
The little golden light blazed in a way Tails didn't expect. And yet he could hear it coming, feel it coming too… He hurriedly put on the rest of his space suit, unsure of what was to come.
"I didn't ask you to save me, Light Gaia," Sonic roared. "You did, and that's fine, but don't you dare go acting like I owe you something!" Sonic flew up into the creature's face, inches from his eyes. Tail was behind Sonic, and far too far away to see his face, but in his minds eye he could see the fury in Sonic's now-red eyes.
"I was distracted,"
"You made a choice, Chip. A choice there's nothing wrong with, but people weren't going to be happy with either of the choices you could have made. Let me die, or save the world." He paused a moment, and Tails could hear him breathing deep through the microphone in his mouthpiece. "You can make a choice now—back down and put the Earth how it was before Eggman started this stupid mess, or fight me for the chance to make your little screwed up Utopia.
"You would do this, Sonic? You'd be the villain, stopping Good?"
"Light is not Good, and Good is not wanting to rip my guts out by night and my heart out by day. I'm doing this for me, for my piece of mind and my life." Another breath. "You're great, Chip—one of the best friends I ever had, but only in small doses. All light or all dark will just destroy my way of life—our way of life. And if you think we won't fight for the world we want, you're mistaken."
The next thing Tails Knew, there was an impact, and he was being sucked out a hole as safety glass rained down. As he switched on the oxygen in his space suit, Sonic, a great golden hedgehog, grabbed him and flew him into an airlock, and closed the seal. Tails took care of the rest.
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"I can't believe you'd betray me like this! After all we've been through!"
Light Gaia threw another ball of Light at Sonic, who dodged nimbly in the vaccum, flying on currents of chaos. He could see Sonic adjust his mouthpiece, the source of his taunts; Light Gaia absently considered trying to rupture the tanks of oxygen on Sonic's back, but decided not to. Sonic deserved a chance to explain himself, after all.
"I want my mental health back!" the hedgehog screamed. "I want to sleep again and get all these ancient voices out of my head! So give it up!"
"Never! I should have known you'd betray me!" The ancient being felt tears slipping down his face, his stomach, his fingers and legs. "Dark Gaia had you from the start!"
Sonic flew up, close, into his face, face twisted up, eyes shining red. "Didn't you tell me I was too strong to lose myself? That you had nothing to do with why I was still me?"
"I… I was wrong."
Sonic sneered. "Yeah, you were wrong about who I am, not about my strength!" Suddenly, Sonic was hurtling toward him. He tried to bat him away, but missed, only to feel a terrible, searing piercing, a release of pressure, as part of his world went black. Light Gaia looked at his hand, watching green and white fluid leak out of the eye socket there with three of his remaining eyes.
"Sonic! You traitor!" He swatted Sonic through another glass enclosure, venting the air again, hoping to stop Shadow from finding all those rings. If he could just get Sonic to run out of rings, he wouldn't have to kill him…
To his surprise, Sonic didn't rise right away. He almost choked, thoughts of Sonic's lifeless body frightening him, when finally Sonic rose. Gone was the golden glow, though, and now there was a white streak across Sonic's head, a strange raspberry cloud about him that Light Gaia suspected only he could see.
"Dark Gaia?" Pondered the giant
"What do you think, Light Chip?" Answered the hedgehog, staring with blank, white eyes. "Your brother's got taste. Brought one of my darkest dreams to life."
Before Light could speak, another eye went black, this one on a knee.
"Sonic!"
And his other knee.
"I can't lose myself to Dark Gaia, so he can lend me all he wants! Works well, we're real compatible for some reason." Something in the back of Light's mind, something old and forgotten, noticed some discomfort in Sonic's taunt, but ignored it.
"Why are you on his side? This is his fault to begin with!"
"I'm on my side, Chip!" Sonic flew into his hand, piercing another eye.
He slapped at the little blue hedgehog, trying to rake him with a claw, but he slipped between Light Gaia's fingers like a shadow. Sonic flew into the left eye on his face, screaming, and he was too stunned to stop him from getting the right, stripping him of binocular vision. Light Gaia closed the eye over his heart tightly for a moment, in fear.
"What?"
"I like you, Chip, but I won't let you break my world. You can take another try in a couple million years."
Light Gaia sneered. "You'll just fail again! Just like before."
The edge went off Sonic's warped, dark voice; he spoke softly. "Life goes on, Chip. But today, it goes on my terms."
Sonic flew for Light's chest, and he covered his last eye protectively with cupped, bleeding, unseeing hands. There was a strange force, like the space around his hands being turned inside out and suddenly there were dark spines touching the soft side of his fingers. In the dim light of his own emissions, he could see Sonic fly straight toward him, frowning.
Light Gaia saw nothing else; his chest erupted in pain and he collapsed.
hr
He started to call the pieces of himself out of Sonic as Light Gaia fell. He started to reassemble, to reach out, spreading his violet darkness over the globe behind, below them.
He felt something wrap around his throat, pulling hard. He opened his eyes, all of them, the other five dotting the great horns that stuck off the side of his head, trying to see who was responsible, gasping fruitlessly.
"Oh no you don't, you little traitor!" She screeched, pulling harder. "We're sick of you both, and at least your big brother was honest!"
As the last bits of Gaia Force from Sonic flowed into him, as his five hidden eyes opened all the way, a red figure and yellow one appeared before him, the echidna and the fox. With extended fingers, one red and one white-gloved, he went down to five eyes, then three, then two, and a pink finger sunk itself into the last in the center of his face.
He supposed he couldn't blame them; they knew what they wanted. At least it wasn't Sonic doing the deed. With his last moment of consciousness, he thought, Remember me, Sonic. Carry my memory always.