Chapter 108: Mind
"Now, let's see," Sonny said to himself as he traversed the planet known as Sweet Mountain for its hills made of cake, candy-cane rails, hamburger towers, donut loops, and popcorn that cluttered the ground like snow. "If I were an alien in need of rescue, where would I be?"
"Attention, visitors!" Eggman's voice boomed. "If you come across any aliens along the way, please do not feed them, pet them, or try to rescue them."
"Aw, man," Sonny said shaking his head mockingly.
Then he came to a giant structure that was white and square-shaped that had a fence made of pure electricity on top of it. Curious, Sonny approached the structure when a giant boat made of candy suddenly appeared in front of him with a small robot on it wearing a purple overcoat and matching pirate hat. It pointed its lollipop staff at Sonny and said, "Turn back now, or face the consequences."
"But I came all this way," Sonny responded. "Can't I have a little peek?"
In response, the ship tossed a large cannonball-shaped object at Sonny. Fortunately, he managed to dodge it before the object exploded upon impact.
"So we're going to do this the hard way, then," Sonny said and transformed into Sonic. "Let's dance!"
As the ship tossed more cannonballs into the air, Sonic managed to leap onboard and pull a switch which caused the ship to start sinking. Sonic managed to get off on time, then the pirate robot followed. He sent some of his lackeys after Sonic, who turned to a nearby Wisp that had a yellow triangular body, a single red eye, and tentacle-like arms. The two merged bodies, and Sonic was transformed into a yellow drill-shaped object that immediately burrowed underneath the cake-layered crust. The lackeys followed him by transforming into drills themselves and after Sonic managed to destroy them underground he came up beneath the pirate robot and knocked him off his feet from underneath a couple of times before the robot went flying and exploded on the sinking ship. Once that happened, the electrical fence dissipated and Sonic changed back into Sonny once the Yellow Wisp left his body.
"Sonny," Miles said with Yacker following behind him.
"Hey, Miles," Sonny said. "You just missed the best robot beating ever."
"Oh, well I managed to get more information from Yacker," Miles responded. "It turns out that he actually met Sonic and Tails when they were alive and actually helped them stop Eggman from using this device he made that was powered by the Hyper-go-on energy that's inside Wisps."
"So what exactly is Hyper-go-on energy? Some kind of battery that powers the Wisps or something?"
"No, it's their life-force but it makes them extremely powerful which you get a taste of every time they merge with your body."
To this, Yacker nodded.
"Then if Eggman's capturing these Wisps for their Hyper-go-on energy, that means he's actually killing them," Sonny realized.
Yacker shook his head and made a series of nervous gestures.
"Yacker says that Eggman doesn't kill the Wisps he drains Hyper-go-on energy from," Miles said looking at his PAD. "Instead, he replaces them with a substitute energy that turns the Wisps into…negative versions of themselves."
"Hmm, well I'm going to free more Wisps while you ponder that," Sonny said and took off.
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On the next planet known as Starlight Carnival, Sonny found himself not on a physical planet but a densely packed fleet of ships floating through space in a cloud of purple cosmic dust. Miles followed right behind and after battling several robots and freeing more Wisps, the two boys came to a structure that was similar to the one Sonny found on Sweet Mountain.
"Do you know what these things are?" Sonny asked pointing at the structure.
"Yeah, Yacker says that they're generators that Eggman made to keep the Wisp planets tethered to the park itself," Miles responded. "So if we deactivate them, we'll free the Wisp planets from Eggman's grasp."
"Sounds like a plan to me," Sonny said and was about to approach the generator when Eggman suddenly appeared from behind it in his Egg Mobile.
"Sonny, look out!" Miles said and pushed Sonny out of the way as Eggman fired a bright purple laser from a laser-cannon that was strapped to the Egg Mobile.
As Sonny was knocked out of the way, Miles was hit by the laser which zapped him and knocked him out cold.
"Miles!" Sonny exclaimed and ran over to him.
But to his surprise, Miles got back up but his face was expressionless.
"Um, Miles?" Sonny said waving a hand in front of him. "Hello? Buddy?"
"Ho-ho-ho!" Eggman chuckled. "He's my buddy now!"
"What did you do to him?" Sonny shouted pointing at Eggman.
"Oh, nothing, just zapped him with a mind control beam powered by the Hyper-go-on energy I collected from the Wisps," Eggman said frankly. "So to get to me, you'll have to go through your best friend."
Angered, Sonny tried to attack Eggman but he kept being blocked by Miles as the laser beam that came from the cannon seemed to follow his every movement as well.
"Well, this turned out better than I expected, and I only used a small prototype to pull this off," Eggman said musingly. "The only way to make this better is if I made you two fight!"
Upon hearing this, Miles started to walk slowly toward Sonny with a mean look on his face.
"You don't want to do this, Miles!" Sonny said backing away. "Come on, snap out of it! You survived becoming a cyborg slave to the Zeti! This is nothing compared to that!"
For a moment, Miles faltered as he shifted between himself and Tails before collapsing into Sonny's arms.
"Are you okay?" Sonny asked as Miles regained consciousness.
"What happened?" Miles asked wearily. "And why do I feel so tingly?"
"Lousy cheap alien energy!" Eggman said slamming his fist on the control panel. "Must've run out of juice, but I'll be back for more and in the meantime here's a private tour guide to help you navigate through the park."
As Eggman took off, a large neon-colored blimp appeared right next to Sonny and Miles.
"Some tour guide this turned out to be," Sonny said and transformed into Sonic as the blimp flew off down a starry lane that appeared right underneath Sonic's feet as he ran.
The blimp in turn shot several blasts of lasers at Sonic but he managed to dodge them and rammed into the blimp's cannons with his Homing Attack which completely demolished them. As the ship fell apart several containers with Wisps fell out of it. Among them, Sonic found the Cyan Wisp and used it to become the Cyan Laser which shot right through the blimp and caused it to explode behind him. Then he retraced his steps back to the generator which shut down immediately upon his arrival.
"What did you think of the tour guide?" Miles asked mockingly as Sonic changed back into Sonny once the Cyan Wisp left his body.
"The guide was lousy, but the tour was amazing," Sonny said and noticed Yacker. "So any luck trying to see if Yacker knows where the satellites are?"
"Well, I drew a picture of a satellite for him but he doesn't seem to know where they are," Miles said wearily. "He only knows that Eggman is using generators to keep the Wisp planets attached to the park while capturing any Wisps that try to escape him to drain them of Hyper-go-on energy to—
"Power a mind control device," Sonny interrupted which made Miles flinch. "You were brainwashed when Eggman spewed it to me."
"Oh, I see," Miles replied. "Now as for this substitute energy that Eggman's feeding the Wisps that he does capture so they don't die is a mystery to Yacker, but he describes it as being dark and evil."
"Dark and evil?" Sonny thought long and hard about it until he remembered something that made him shiver suddenly.
"What's wrong, Sonny?" Miles asked.
"Nothing, just a slight chill," Sonny said dismissively. "Um, so how many generators are there?"
"Yacker says there's five."
"Two have already been decimated by Sonic, so that means there are three left."
"Exactly, and I found maps that'll take us to the three remaining planets that have these generators."
"Then what are we waiting for? Let's go and take out those generators so we can free aliens and hopefully find those satellites!" Sonny said and took off while Miles followed alongside Yacker.
To be continued…