A/N: When I first started writing Chaos on Earth, I hadn't even seen the Metarex Saga yet. I just watched the first 46 episodes and then stopped. Why? It was simply because I didn't want to get to the part where Sonic and his friends had to eventually go home. I know it sounds selfish, especially in hindsight, but 17-year-old me couldn't be bothered to keep going. In fact, I actually had serious plans to take Chaos on Earth down its own separate path once I got that far. I was going to have the heroes be cloned so they could be on Earth and Mobius at the same time. In fact, the story started to show signs of getting to that point up until I revised it between 2019 and 2021.

But then I found out through the Sonic Wiki, DeviantArt, and various fanfics how incredible the Metarex Saga was, and I found that I really wanted to rewrite the episodes, which gave me the push I needed to see the rest of the series. Several revisions later, and my story was back on track to being a faithful and proper rewrite of Sonic X. Looking back, I can't imagine it being any other way.

I've been waiting a super long time for this rewrite, and I honestly didn't think I would have it in me to get this far. In fact, I couldn't have done it without the support of all my readers, so I wanna thank you guys for encouraging me to keep going!

Also, for anyone who hasn't been up to date with my announcement or hasn't read Chris Thorndyke Whumptober 2024, I wanna address the elephant in the room for a moment before we start. Where was I this past month? Why didn't I start this story on November 7 like I promised? It's because I wasn't counting on dealing with burnout from Whumptober, and I need a break to refresh my creative juices. I had fun with Whumptober, but maybe 31 prompts might be a bit too much for me to do at the moment. I wasn't planning on needing a break either, but it turned out that I really needed one. Fortunately, my break was a lot shorter than I anticipated, so now I'm back to full-time writing at my own pace!

Furthermore, the reason I'm making this story separate from Chaos on Earth is because the Metarex Saga is largely regarded as Series 2, whereas all of Sonic X Seasons 1 and 2 are regarded as Series 1. Besides, this story doesn't exactly take place on Earth, so I can't call it Chaos on "Earth" XD

One more thing before we start, I'll be replying to all the reviews I got after I posted the last chapter of Chaos on Earth.

Disclaimer: I do not own any elements in this story except for my own characters. Sonic the Hedgehog is owned by SEGA, who does not endorse or affiliate itself with this work of fiction. Real world locations and organizations are used fictitiously.

Without further ado, let's move on to the reviews and what matters most: the story!

10 Reviews

Monster King

Here is the next chapter!

danielman21

I think you'll like Cosmo in this story ;)

Guest

I'm excited to show you guys everyone's reactions to seeing Chris again too!

soberan123

That's true, Sonic doesn't tell the humans everything about Eggman since they don't want to scare them, but they do tell what they feel the humans need to know, unless they're asked more specific questions.

Eggman does indeed have a number of lands under his control on Mobius, although his domain is much smaller now than it was during the Phantom War.

gregorian12

1. While I was aware that Vector, Espio, and Charmy were the main members of the Chaotix in all continuities, I kinda assumed that many of the fan communities made Ray into a member of the Chaotix, or at least a temporary member due to his prominence in the pre-SGW comics. But since I haven't had him or Mighty physically appear yet, I have room to retcon it a bit. Maybe they met the Chaotix a long time back, but at the same time, I could come up with a reason why they haven't appeared in the Modern era.

2. It makes me so happy that Abraham Tower's name is officially canon! :D

3. Oh, that would be WAY cool! :D A lot can happen during a timeskip!

Super duper waffles

The Society being on Mobius... now THAT would be an interesting concept to explore in a separate fanfic!

1. The Society only managed to hijack six of the over 200 Valkyries that were produced during the time Sonic was on Earth, but after a thorough investigation, the Valkyries were allowed to continue being used by the military.

2. They had various other GUN robots that are listed on the wiki, although the ones I mentioned were just the ones I could name off the top of my head.

3. I haven't really thought of what Watcher's upbringing was like, but I will say that he was pretty used to getting his own way.

4. Soon after Alcatraz closed, the United States government realized how effective a prison island was, and they saw the need for one to house the most heinous criminals. After a lot of back-and-forth discussion and disagreements, they were able to propose a prison island located in Lake Superior, and it would be run by both the USA and Canada. The Superior Correction Facility has been deemed far more effective than Alcatraz, if a bit controversial. On a side note, the SCF is very similar to Prison Island on Mobius (which has since been rebuilt since Sonic Adventure 2), except it's located in cold waters and is much farther from land than Prison Island.

5. After Perfect Chaos destroyed parts of Station Square, ration boxes were set up at not only Thorndyke Mansion, but also at several other mansions and nearly every school and park in the city and the surrounding metropolitan areas.

6. Remerson honored not only Sonic and all of his friends after they left, but also Chris and Chuck Thorndyke, Topaz, and Sam Speed.

7. Not only did they try, but they successfully recruited the Chaotix in several cases, although Vector tended to think that the SSPD's way of doing things was a bit complicated compared to how he solved cases back home.

8. I'll be going off the Great War which lasted from 3220 to 3225 in the Archie continuity according to the Sonic Wiki, or in or before 3224 in SatAM, although its length is subject to change. Several years passed between then and the Phantom War, although the characters (mysteriously) don't show any visible sign of aging much. At this point in the story, nearly two years have passed since the Phantom War, so I would estimate that the current year is somewhere between 3235 and 3240, although I'm not sure yet what year specifically it is.

brunopunck49 (aka Asriel)

It felt weird for me not to write Chris saying "Don't miss it" either! But fear not, narrator Chris will make a comeback in this story!

You're very welcome! It's always a joy for me to see genuinely incredible reviews like yours, and it's honestly very humbling and heartwarming to see how much people love my story. I'm very happy to see you enjoyed it thoroughly :)

Chris has always been my number one change I made to Sonic X when writing this story, and now it feels like he's become a completely new and different character. In fact, he has actually become my comfort character by now.

CreativeKitty975

...You just blew my mind.

I didn't even realize that! Six years have passed in universe, AND it's been six years since I started my Sonic X rewrite! I feel like I've aged six years along with Chris!

I can't wait for the reunion too! Sonic and friends are gonna be so happy to see Chris again! :D

I'm already there too, I can't see Sonic X the same way either without thinking of this story. And I'm very happy to see that you enjoyed my story this much!

Here is the long-awaited Metarex Saga!

Adtedt

Absolutely, Cream is a must in the Metarex Saga!

MountainKing2401

With all the craziness and randomness that happens in Walmart on a regular basis, why wait until it's finished being built? Let's start early! XD

Chapter 60
Episode 53
Mobius Lost

The space above Mobius – Sonic's POV

Clenching my fists, I propelled myself forward and effortlessly smashed through the large platoon of robotic creatures that were in my way. Lasers and heat-guided missiles flew all around me, but not a single one made contact with my glowing yellow form as I flew through Mobius' upper atmosphere.

However, there was something different about the robots I was fighting. They didn't look like Eggman's usual style at all. If anything, they looked more exotic in a way, more… alien.

… Definitely alien, now that I thought about it.

I glanced back at the aliens as roughly thirty of them swarmed toward me at once in organized platoons, but I smirked as I blasted my way through them. They exploded on impact, sending beige and gray scraps of metal flying in all directions. I looked around to see that in the five minutes I had been fighting the invading robot army, there was now a ton of debris floating around the planet. Even if it was now cluttering the upper atmosphere, it would eventually fall and burn. I didn't like the idea of making space junk, but I didn't have much of a choice.

But as I looked off to my right, I realized that the last five minutes were only a distraction. I was wasting my time, because I could see a much bigger threat flying down toward the planet below me. It was the same threat I first laid eyes on the moment I escaped Mobius' lower atmosphere.

The longer the fight dragged on, the more I realized I may have underestimated the threat I was up against. I may have destroyed most of the individual robot units, but that still left the dozen or so battleships behind them, all of which were aiming their guns at me. All of them were bland in appearance compared to the Egg Fleet, and to confirm my earlier suspicions, none of them featured the signature emblem of Eggman's grinning face anywhere.

They all started pounding me with turbolasers, and while I was able to hold my own against them, the force they were hitting me with was so strong that I didn't know how much of it I could take, even in my super form. In fact, I was starting to feel exhausted.

So what brought all of this on? Well… let's back it up a bit.

What must have been only ten minutes ago, I was out on a run through Green Hill, frequently glancing up at the sky most of the time. A meteor shower was due to happen tonight, and since I always loved experiencing new things, I knew I couldn't pass up that opportunity.

However, I sneezed, and not because of the pollen. Besides, it was approaching autumn, so it was too late in the year for it. Only then did I realize that something was happening somewhere, but I didn't know what. My Sonic Sense was right roughly 80% of the time.

But when I stopped and looked up at the sky, I could tell something was wrong. It was roughly the same sensation I had when the Black Arms were invading Mobius. Assuming it was the Black Arms coming back for revenge, or even the Zeti, I turned around and made a beeline for Tails' workshop.

"Yo, Tails!" I called upon racing through the door to his spacious workshop. "You in here, buddy?"

But I was greeted by silence, and it dawned on me that of course he wouldn't be in there. I had almost forgotten that Tails was in another part of Green Hill, getting ready to record a video of the meteor shower we were due to have tonight.

I quickly spotted the hexagonal stabilizer that Tails had installed along the left wall, and resting within were all seven Chaos Emeralds. He had built it to be nearly identical to the one Chuck had set up in his workshop. This new one was even more durable than the last one, and Tails built it to withstand explosions and meltdowns, which was how it was currently able to house all seven Chaos Emeralds together without them scattering.

In the darkness, I fumbled for the switch to the stabilizer. Even though I had left the door open, I could barely see where the switch was. The Emeralds were providing a dim glow which was just enough for me to see where I was looking. Fortunately, I had been in Tails' workshop enough times to know where pretty much everything was.

The latch was small, but I managed to find and disengage it in the dark. The door slid up into the machine, and I reached inside and, closing my eyes, I felt the power of the Emeralds consume and surround me. The whole workshop was lit up in a brilliant yellow glow as the Emeralds surrounded me at an incredible speed, and in the seconds that followed, I had transformed into Super Sonic.

Once my transformation was complete, I blasted back through the open door and flew straight through the atmosphere into space, where I encountered the mysterious aliens for the first time.

I could only wish they were the Black Arms.

The aliens I was fighting now looked nothing like them. They were metallic in design, and their group leader, who was now flying down toward the planet, was a figure in deep purple armor. He had a singular green eye and a golden sword in his hands.

"As I expected, you are the Warrior of Light," he spoke as I caught up to him. His voice was deep and mechanically enhanced, as if it was run through several filters and a vocoder. He kind of reminded me of Darth Vader from the Star Wars movies back on Earth.

"I must be famous where you come from," I said, flying in front of him and cutting him off. He came to a complete stop as we hovered thousands of miles above the surface of Mobius.

"Your legend has indeed spread throughout the universe," the warrior continued. "You are the one who can control the seven lights. However, only we can draw out their true power. As such, you will now surrender them to me."

I crossed my arms. "I don't give them out to people I don't know," I told him. "Besides, who are you, anyway?"

"That is of no concern to you," the warrior spoke in an indifferent tone as he stared impassively across the vast landscape of Mobius below us.

"I think it is," I told him firmly. "Because this is my planet and I won't let you touch it."

"I don't intend to 'touch it', as you ignorantly put it," the alien leader told me, and I could sense the hatred in his voice. "I intend to purify it."

I smirked. "I like it the way it is, thanks."

He silently contemplated my words as he glanced over the planet one last time, before he raised his hand and pressed what looked like a small switch on the side of his helmet.

"Destroy Sonic," he ordered in an even tone. "Leave no trace of his existence."

I looked up to see the battleships training their guns on me, and turned to fully face them.

"I don't wanna have to do this," I said aloud as I flew straight toward them, "but you're not leaving me with much of a choice here."

Like a golden comet, I soared through ship after ship and robot after robot. If I had looked behind me, I would have seen the tremendous explosions of the destroyers and cruisers as their debris floated in my wake. Of course, being as high up as I was, I couldn't hear any of them, and I still had no idea what kind of science allowed me and my adversary to hear each other in space.

"You are just like all the other fauna I've vanquished – unrepentantly violent in nature," he spoke.

"Hey, I'm not violent just for kicks," I told him as I passed through the reactor of another warship, destroying it on the spot. "I fight to protect what's important to me, and I don't know about you, but this planet and everyone on it are pretty important if you ask me."

"You missed my point entirely," the alien warlord said as he turned to face me.

Gritting my teeth, I flew directly toward him, only for him to hold his sword up in a defensive position. I positioned my fists out in front of me, expecting to pierce through it like a toothpick, but instead, I harmlessly bounced off and started to float away.

"And you're further proving my point as we speak," he continued.

"Man… How did you–"

But I never got to finish my sentence. The few remaining ships opened fire on me, and my instincts kicked in and sensed the lasers a split second before they reached me. But even the heightened instinct that came with my super form didn't seem to be enough, because the lasers were flying everywhere, and some of them were even arcing in my general direction, even though they should have been ordinary lasers like the ones Eggman used.

I was hit with several lasers, and to my shock, they actually hurt. The ones from the larger gray cruisers hurt more than the ones from the smaller brown destroyers. They were probably some kind of… ion cannon, was it? That's what Tails would probably say. The lasers were so powerful that I felt like they could disintegrate me instantly if it weren't for the protection that my super form granted me.

"Those who oppose their destiny will be destroyed!" my opponent declared.

"And what is my destiny supposed to be, huh?" I asked him, turning to face him once again.

"Much like the rest of the universe, Mobius and all its inhabitants will enter a state of tranquility and order," he explained.

I shrugged. "I'll take a rain check on that," I told him, my expression stern. "Reschedule for never?"

Without waiting for a response, I charged at him and delivered hit after hit. It didn't matter that he was blocking my every punch with his sword. I wasn't going to let him win, and even if I couldn't win either, I was going to show him what I stood for.

"You're wrong," I told him. "I don't need a destiny. I'm Sonic the Hedgehog, I'm free like the wind, and I wouldn't have it any other way." I stopped my relentless flurry and flew a few feet back. "I guess my legend got lost in translation, huh?"

My opponent floated there as he pondered my words. I looked up at him, realizing he was pretty tall, slightly taller than Chris's uncle Sam Speed, but his armor made him look bulkier.

"Even the wind knows to submit to destiny," he said before raising his sword up and swinging it at me. I backed up, but he was shockingly faster and dealt some damage to my right side. The force threw me backwards and into the path of the nearby fleet. When I glanced down at my side where he slashed at me, my eyes narrowed. There was a red line through my fur, which was starting to become stained.

I was bleeding in my super form.

I looked up just in time to see the fleet opening fire on me just as I expected, but this time, I flew backwards away from the lasers, keeping a close eye on their trajectory. They were all getting uncomfortably close to me, but I noticed that they were being dissipated in the atmosphere, so to my relief, none of them were destroying anything on Mobius.

The laser fire was so thick and spread out that I had a very hard time getting close to the ships. But I had to do something to prevent them from getting any closer to the planet. I didn't know how he intended to "purify" a planet that was already very pure… well, except for Eggman's influence, that is.

Taking a deep breath, I flew at roughly twelve times the speed of sound toward the ships, narrowly dodging the lasers by just a few inches, and reached out and touched the hull of one of the ships. Chaos energy spread out from my hand, and in seconds, it engulfed the ship, resulting in the ship imploding. All of its debris stayed in one general cluster, floating harmlessly in space.

Now that it was destroyed, I flew through the other ships, creating gaping holes that depressurized them. I didn't know if the alien robots relied on oxygen to survive, but I wasn't thinking about that now.

However, I didn't realize I had gotten carried away until I felt several sharp slashes in my back and sides. I looked back to see my opponent holding his sword in an attack position. Any open wounds I had were instantly closed up by the Chaos energy within me.

"You have yet to lay a finger on me," he told me. "You would be wise to surrender the Chaos Emeralds to me immediately."

"What are you talking about?" I responded, turning to face him. "I destroyed all your ships."

"You are more arrogant than what I have heard about you in the legends," he said impassively. "Regardless, you're pushing your luck. It's a wonder you haven't been completely annihilated by the ion cannons by now."

I sighed. My opponent had a point; even though the ion cannons didn't kill me or knock me out of my super form, they did greatly weaken me, and I wasn't sure how much longer I could hold my own against the alien warlord.

"You know what?" I said, backing up a few feet. "You're right. I can't win against you, but that doesn't mean you will either."

I closed my eyes and concentrated. I felt my power leaving me as I called the seven Emeralds out from within me, and they orbited me slowly for a few seconds. I had never had to do anything before like what I was doing now, but my opponent left me with no choice.

"Chaos Control!"

The Emeralds immediately dispersed, shooting out as seven different-colored streaks across the galaxy. In the blink of an eye, they were out of sight.

Now that I no longer had the influence of the Chaos Emeralds, all my strength gave out at once, and my fur gradually shifted back to its usual blue hue as I gave in to Mobius' gravity field. I slowly lost consciousness as I plummeted back toward the planet below.

The space above Mobius – Third-person POV

The alien warlord watched Sonic fall for a moment, and when he was nothing more than a blue speck in the distance, he turned around and looked back at the carnage the hedgehog had left in his wake.

He raised his hand to the small concealed button on the side of his helmet and spoke.

"Uncloak the Rafflesia."

In the moments that followed, the space in a section that was completely unoccupied by debris began to warp and ripple, and a massive spaceship started to materialize. When it was fully visible a few seconds later, the warlord flew toward it and located an airlock in the side of the ship, which automatically opened for him as he approached.

He let out a sigh once he touched down inside the ship, and the airlock closed behind him. He was not the biggest fan of hand-to-hand combat in deep space, even though he had upgraded his armor enough times over the years to support it without any trouble. He preferred to let his army take care of things for him.

There was a hiss of steam as the chamber was repressurized, and the second door opened in front of him. He stepped inside his flagship and made his way up to the bridge. Several robotic alien troops inside saluted as he walked past.

Two minutes later, he stepped onto the bridge, which was occupied by even more robots. The doors to the bridge closed behind him, and his tattered cape flowed behind him as he sat down in his command chair. He looked down at his arms and chest, where he had taken a few blows by Sonic's Emerald-powered form.

"I cannot risk another direct confrontation like that," he said as red sparks leaped from his upper right arm. "You all saw how he destroyed most of the fleet. Still, he has been neutralized as I have planned. In the end, he was nothing more than a legend."

He turned to the pilots at the front of the bridge.

"Jump to hyperspace and return to the Corridor," he directed.

Even though there was no motion in space, the two-mile-long flagship gradually turned around with the aid of its many thrusters. The warlord pressed a few buttons on the console attached to his chair, activating a grid of holo-screens that hovered in place in front of him. He then tapped a button on one of the floating screens that read "Station Prime" in his native language.

"This is a class one broadcast to be directed to all Metarex divisions in the universe," he spoke. "This is a direct message from Supreme Commander Dark Oak. The Warrior of Light has scattered the seven Chaos Emeralds across the Mobius System, and perhaps beyond. All available forces are to locate and gather them and then return them to Station Prime immediately. Use any means necessary to retrieve them."

Once he ended his broadcast, Dark Oak tapped another button to end it, then navigated through the holo-menus until he spotted his next contact.

"Carrer," he spoke. "I assign you the personal task of carrying out phase two. Capture the Planet Egg of Mobius and begin the seed."

Looking ahead, he saw on the radar at the front of the bridge that the ship had fully turned around. He held on to his seat as the Rafflesia blasted off into hyperspace, stars whipping past the front windshield as Dark Oak made his way back to the Corridor.

Green Hill – Third-person POV

It could not have been a better night for Tails, Amy, and Cream to gather together on one of Green Hill Zone's many beautiful rolling hills. There was not a cloud in the sky, and to top it all off, they were enjoying a late-night picnic with food lovingly put together by Cream's mom, Vanilla.

"Any minute now…" Tails said in anticipation as he glanced down from his telescope at the Miles Electric that was lying on the picnic blanket next to him. It was open to a program run by the Mobian Space Industry to track the approaching meteor shower.

"Do you see them?" Cream asked, leaning closer to Tails as she glanced up at the star-specked sky above them.

"Um…" Tails looked through his telescope again. "Not yet. It won't be too much longer, though."

"Is Sonic still joining us?" Amy asked, glancing out across the hills behind them.

"Yeah, don't worry about him," Tails assured her, still peeking through the telescope. "Besides, we got all this good food, and I know Sonic, he never misses a chili dog."

"That is so true," Amy said with a giggle.

The three of them, along with Cheese and Chocola, spent the next minute in silent anticipation as they admired the night sky above them. It was like they could see forever into space. There were very few lights around them, except for the soft glow of Tails' custom-made tablet and the radiant glow of the half-destroyed moon, which was the direct result of an ultimatum issued by Doctor Eggman many years ago.

"It's not every day we get to see the Petrid meteor shower," Tails quietly said, breaking the silence. "I did some research on it earlier, and we only get to see it once every five hundred years." He reached for his sandwich and picked it up. "We're really lucky to be out here seeing this."

"We are," Cream said, before glancing up at Cheese, who was resting on her head between her ears, and at Chocola, who was leaning against the picnic basket in the middle of the blanket. "Cheese, Chocola, we should see who can count the most shooting stars!"

"Chao chao!" Chocola replied, before letting out a quiet yawn.

Cream sat up straighter. "Oh, I got a better idea!" she realized. "We can all make a wish on the shooting stars!"

Amy let out a soft gasp of delight. "Yes, a hundred percent yes!" she said. "We have to do that!"

"Mmhmm!" Cream said, getting more excited about it now. "Mr. Chris told us about that, do you remember?"

"Oh yeah!" Tails said as it all came back to him. "I almost forgot all about that."

"When he was all alone and he didn't have any friends," Cream explained, looking at Tails, "he said he wished on a shooting star so he could have some friends, and that was the same night we all got sent to Earth."

"That's right, Cream," Amy agreed. "And I also remember he was really nervous telling us about it because he thought it was just a little kid thing, and he didn't know if it was real or not." She glanced up at the sky. "But still, that's proof that dreams do come true!"

"If you ask me, I always thought it was just a superstition," Tails said with a shrug as he continued to look through the telescope. "Maybe there's more to it than I thought… But still…"

"Y'know, Chris would have loved to be here to see this," Amy commented before taking a bite of her turkey sandwich.

"I miss him…" Cream added, and Cheese and Chocola chirped their own sentiments. "I wonder if he's doing okay?"

She closed her eyes, thinking for a moment. At that exact moment, a bright streak of light flashed across the sky. It was brief, but not unnoticed by Tails and Amy.

"It's starting!" Amy exclaimed in child-like wonder, pointing up.

"Okay, I'm starting the recording!" Tails announced. He quickly switched his Miles Electric to camera mode and held it up to the sky as he started recording the magnificent event that was now unfolding in the heavens above them. Dozens, perhaps hundreds of shooting stars blasted through the sky in rapid succession, ensuring there would be enough wishes for every child on Mobius that night.

The three Mobians and two Chao watched in awe for about a minute before Amy spoke.

"How long did they say this is gonna last?" she asked, not taking her eyes off the sky for a moment.

Tails thought for a moment. "According to the Space Industry, it could last as long as two hours," he quietly replied.

"Whoa…" Cream breathed in amazement.

"That's a long time…" Amy seconded.

"That's why everyone's looking forward to this tonight," Tails replied, before his attention was diverted to one star in particular that seemed to break formation.

"Wait, what's that one doing…?" he asked aloud under his breath. He looked up to see that its forward speed was starting to slow down, and from his perspective, it was getting bigger. He blinked in surprise. "Guys, I think one of them is coming straight for us!"

"It's coming!" Cream echoed.

"Everyone get down!" Amy ordered.

The five of them immediately got down and lay there on their stomachs, glancing nervously up at the star as it got closer and closer to the planet at an alarming speed. Tails' heart beat faster as he realized it was not only heading toward Mobius, but it was traveling directly toward their general location.

He debated running, but as he continued watching it, he judged that its trajectory would gradually take it over them, although it would land somewhere in Green Hill Zone. Sure enough, the object silently passed several hundred feet above them. As it did, it briefly glowed brighter than the sun, making the three kids yelp in surprise. Tails realized what was about to happen.

"Cover your ea–"

The order barely escaped Tails when there came a familiar deafening boom from all around them, one which they all recognized as the sound barrier being broken. Not even a few seconds later, there was a massive explosion in the distance. Cream let out a startled yelp, and she along with the rest of her friends instantly thrusts their hands over their ears. When they looked up a moment later, they saw smoke rising in the far distance.

"What was that…?" Cream asked, sounding a bit scared.

"Come on!" Amy urged everyone as she scrambled to her feet and ran in the direction of the smoke plume. Their picnic and video were quickly forgotten as everyone else got up and either ran or flew after Amy.

"Are there gonna be more shooting stars crashing…?" Cream warily asked.

Tails quickly glanced up at the meteor shower as he flew forward, before looking back ahead of him.

"I don't think so," he replied, slowing down a little to give Cream and her Chao enough time to catch up. "Most of the time, space debris burns up in the atmosphere, but for some reason, this one didn't."

"So it's not a shooting star?" Cream asked.

"No, whatever this is is way too small," Tails said, "because I'm looking at the smoke over there and how relatively small it is–"

Suddenly a robot shot out of the nearby forest in clear view of the party. Tails' heart leaped in his chest, and was immediately alert at first, but he relaxed when he saw who it was.

"Gemerl!" Cream called out to him as he hovered in the air ahead of them.

"I am relieved that all of you are unharmed," the robot responded. "I detected an explosion in the distance and did not know if you were involved."

"We're okay," Cream assured him with a wave of her hand.

"Chao chao!" Cheese and Chocola responded from either side of the small bunny.

"We don't know what happened, but I wanna find out," Tails added.

Gemerl flew high into the area, before glancing around for a few moments. Before the others could start wondering what he was up to, he returned to them.

"I am not detecting any radiation in the area," he reported.

"I didn't think of that, that's a good call!" Tails responded in amazement. "So that makes my theory even more credible that this was not an asteroid."

"So what could it be, then?" Amy asked, looking at Tails.

"It could be anything, really," Tails responded as he flew even faster, his twin namesakes rotating behind him at incredible speeds.

Roughly three minutes later, the party of six reached the site of the smoke. They saw that there was a massive gaping crater in the ground, roughly forty feet in diameter. There was too much smoke emanating from the center for any of them to see what had landed there.

Tails squinted at the smoke, trying not to cough since he was in close proximity to it. However, Amy beat him to it.

"Guys..." she exclaimed. "You're not gonna believe this, I think it's a spaceship!"

"Wait, what?! Really?!" Tails added in shock. He flew down the side of the crater toward the ship, which was now easier to see now that the smoke was starting to clear up. Making sure he had a proper footing, he landed next to it and looked back as the rest of his friends caught up to him.

"Is there anyone inside?" Cream asked as she glanced over the surface of the ship.

"There's only one way to find out," Tails said. He reached his hand out to the ship, but quickly pulled it back and took a step back as he felt that the outer surface of the ship was still hot to the touch. "But how are we gonna get it open? I don't see a seal anywhere."

"I will attempt to open it," Gemerl volunteered as he stepped forward.

The others took a few steps back and watched as the robot felt around the hull of the ship for a door. Once he was satisfied that he found what appeared to be a seal that Tails had missed, he started to work on prying it open. In the meantime, Tails walked around the ship, observing the ship and its unusual structural makeup.

"This kind of construction is definitely not of this world…" he mused aloud as he made it to the back of the ship. "And it doesn't look like it has a very strong engine either. It was probably made for a single flight… kind of like an escape pod…" He tapped his chin in thought, his eyes widening at his own discovery. "This could be worse than I thought…"

"Are you almost done, Gemerl?" Amy asked. She wasn't impatient, but she was heavily anticipating what she could see inside the ship.

"The hull integrity is considerably strong, but I am making progress," Gemerl responded.

"You can do it, Gemerl!" Cream cheered as she joined her robotic friend.

"Please stand back; danger levels are unknown," Gemerl cautioned.

"Oops, sorry," the rabbit quietly apologized as she took a few steps back and joined Amy. She didn't once take her eyes off of her robot guardian as he continued his work.

It took Gemerl another minute before he finally stopped cutting through the ship's canopy with his finger-mounted lasers. Once he finished, he used his brute strength to lift it off the ship and gently set it on the ground.

"Airbags…" Amy quietly summarized what she saw. Sure enough, several airbags were deployed inside the ship's cockpit. It was practically a field of white inside; there were so many airbags that they couldn't see who was sitting in the cockpit.

Tails, however, didn't seem to notice what was going on until he became aware of the commotion on the other side of the ship. He quickly ran around the side of the ship and joined his friends, and he saw that Amy was already starting to move the airbags aside.

"Careful…" Cream said apprehensively, standing back.

"See anythi–"

Tails was interrupted when Amy suddenly let out a gasp and took a few steps back.

"What is it?" he cautiously asked, looking in the direction of the cockpit.

"Someone's in there…!" Amy quickly said.

Cream cautiously approached the cockpit and caught a glimpse of the figure who was inside, and Tails did the same.

"H-Hello…?" Cream spoke up. However, there was no answer from the ship's sole occupant.

Tails scanned the figure inside. It looked like a young girl, but she looked like she was neither human nor Mobian. In fact, she looked like she was some kind of plant species. He leaned across the cockpit and reached over to unstrap her safety harness.

"She's unconscious…" Tails summarized what was otherwise an obvious statement.

"I'll give her mouth-to-mouth!" Amy volunteered as she stepped forward.

"Wait, hold on," Tails told her before feeling her pulse. He gave a satisfied relief. "She's still breathing, she's just… unconscious."

"Is she going to be okay…?" Cream asked as she peered down at the alien inside. Everyone's worry was visible on the rabbit's face.

"She doesn't look like she's hurt anywhere…" Tails noted in relief, before glancing around inside the ship. "And I don't see anyone else inside, so I think I can confirm this ship is a one-seater."

"She looks like she's just a kid…" Amy said in sympathy as she pushed the rest of the airbags away.

"Mhmm…" Cream agreed. "She must have been very scared coming here…"

"Okay," Amy announced as she carefully lifted the girl out of the ship, which had now cooled down considerably. "Cream's house is the closest one to here, so we're gonna take her there and make sure she gets the care she needs."

"Okay!" Cream responded as she flapped her ears and lifted herself off the ground. "I'll go tell Mama!"

She took off in the direction of her house, followed closely behind by Cheese, Chocola, and Gemerl. Making sure she had a good hold of the alien girl, Amy cradled her in her arms as she climbed up the side of the crater. Fortunately, it wasn't too steep for her, so she was able to make it to the top with little difficulty.

Tails took one last look back at the spacecraft before flying after his friends. There were many thoughts running through his brain, each one trying to make sense of the situation he now found himself in.

The girl was definitely not from any part of Mobius he had been to, and he was fairly sure she wasn't from Earth either. This head to mean she came from space somewhere. But more importantly, she looked weak and fragile. It was likely from her rough entry into Mobius' atmosphere.

He took a deep breath and let it out, before shaking his head. The more he kept getting closer to answers, the more questions his mind kept coming up with.

Eggman's base – Sonic's POV

The first thing that met my eyes the moment I opened them was an incredibly bright light above me that forced me to close them again. I let out a groan and tried to turn onto my side, but pain racked my body, and I clenched my teeth. It felt like I was sore all over, but the real pain I had was that I didn't know how I got there.

"So you're finally awake, rodent," I heard a familiar gravelly voice say from nearby.

I tried to push myself up into a sitting position, but the pain suddenly flared up again, and I was forced to lie back down. I turned my head to the right to see Eggman sitting in a chair near me.

"Eggman…?" I spoke, feeling more alert now. "What happened?"

"Don't you remember?" Eggman asked, glancing down at me through his glasses.

"N-Not… really, no…"

"That's a shame," Eggman said. "My robots found you lying on the beach during a routine patrol. Looking at you now, you must have been out for roughly an hour. But more importantly… what happened to you? You look like you took quite a beating."

I heard the soft sound of a thrust booster from nearby, and looked up to see Bokkun flying toward me with a mug of cocoa. It wasn't every day that Eggman was ever this hospitable to me, but seeing that I had been out cold on his turf and Eggman wasn't responsible, it probably wasn't all that surprising. After all, Eggman wanted to be the only one to do me in.

"Well, I'll be honest with ya, Doc, I don't know what happened to me either," I said as I accepted the mug and took a hesitant sip. The cocoa was surprisingly good, but I had to admit, it wasn't as good as the cocoa that Vanilla always made on cold winter days.

"Whoever you dealt with, I won't let anyone else but myself be the one to get rid of you in the end," Eggman vowed. "Your demise will be on my terms alone, but I'm sure you already know that."

And then I suddenly remembered that we were having a meteor shower tonight. There were some other important details too, but I was sure I would remember them along the way sooner or later.

"Good talk, but I gotta juice!" I declared, vaulting myself off the bed and onto my feet, all the while trying to ignore the searing pain that flowed through my body. "I'm not about to wait another five hundred years for the meteor shower!"

"Sonic, wait!" Eggman called after me, but I did not wait. I fled through the halls of Eggman's newly-constructed base, running as fast as my pain-limited body would allow me.

As I made a sharp right turn and tore through the next corridor, several gates started closing ahead of me. I could tell Eggman was trying to contain me by force, but I didn't want to miss the shooting stars. Besides, I promised my friends I would join them when they started, and I didn't want to let them down for anything in the world.

The gates were too slow, although they were closing at the last second, which confirmed I wasn't at my peak performance. In fact, I noticed I had a slight limp as I ran. I was more hurt than I let on around Eggman.

My memories of what I was doing before I passed out were quickly coming back as I finally made it back outside. I couldn't help but think about what happened between me and the robot overlord I was fighting earlier. I couldn't believe I had met an opponent who was able to fight me in my super form to a standstill like that. Not even The End held that title. In fact, it was the first time I had been forced to retreat while I was still in my super form.

I didn't know if he was still up there, but since I had destroyed his entire army, I highly doubted it. Regardless, I still had a bad feeling about everything that happened, and possibly everything that was going to happen in the future.

Cream's house – Third-person POV

The plant-like alien girl's eyes slowly fluttered open, and she strained to adjust to her surroundings. Wherever she was now felt a lot different and much warmer than the inside of the cramped pod she had spent the last several weeks in.

The first thing she noticed wasn't any detail of the new place she was in, but the fact that tears were pricking her eyes. Was she… crying…? She had every reason to cry right now; she had been through a lot, from the crash to everything else that happened before.

"She's awake," she heard a soft child-like voice announce from somewhere close to her.

Taking a moment to glance around, she saw that she was inside a small, cozy house. Or so she assumed this is what a house looked like, considering she lived practically all of her short life in space. But when she saw the four fauna-like creatures looking down at her in concern, a sudden chill ran through her spine, and her heart skipped a beat. She felt uneasy all of a sudden, and her nerves were up. She wasn't safe.

"Lie back down," the tallest, motherly rabbit-like fauna instructed her when she realized she was already starting to sit up in bed. "You're still hurt. Cream told me you crashed in a spaceship."

The girl gave her a blank stare as she sat there. She didn't know how to respond. She was too nervous to say anything in return.

"Don't push yourself too hard," the second fauna said. "You're super lucky you made it here in one piece." This fauna was not related to the motherly fauna or who she assumed was her daughter, but she seemed to be more hedgehog-like and was wearing a red dress and boots.

"Are you from another planet?" the smaller rabbit asked her, her eyes full of curiosity.

The girl looked down, averting her gaze, hands gripping the blanket covering her with both hands, before she slowly nodded. Out of the corner of her eye, the rabbit and hedgehog fauna glanced at each other before their gaze returned to the girl.

"Awww, please don't cry…" the rabbit tried to comfort her. "Everything is going to be okay."

But the girl didn't know what to say. She wished it could be okay. She wished she could sink into their comfort, but it all felt wrong to her. She was so uneasy about everything, she was surrounded by fauna, and yet… they weren't rough on her or trying to kill her like all the stories her shipmates and family told her about. But she still felt like a prisoner all the same.

Is this all a trick…? I don't know what to do…

"Just take it nice and slow," the hedgehog gently told her as she leaned against the wall near the window. Judging by the lack of light coming in from outside, she could only assume it was nighttime.

"I'll go make some soup for you," the motherly fauna volunteered. "Will that be all right?"

The girl hesitated for a moment before nodding her head slightly.

"All right, dear," the fauna said as she slipped out of the room. "The rest of you make sure to give her plenty of space if she needs it," she told the others.

"We will, Mama!" her daughter called after her. She promptly turned her attention back to the girl. "So what's your name? If you're okay telling us."

The girl opened her mouth to answer, but she paused mid-thought. If the fauna really were her enemies and she gave them her name, they could use that information against her somehow, and who knew what kind of harm and damage would come to her if she played into an enemy's hands like that? She already had enough stress on her mind as it was.

"I… can't…" she finally said, speaking aloud for the first time since she woke up.

The room was silent, and the small rabbit tilted her head in confusion.

"Your name is Icant?" she asked at last.

The girl thought she was a bit naive. In fact, her response would have been cute if it weren't for her own wariness and ingrained fear of fauna. Instead, she shook her head.

"I… don't know if I can tell you…" she clarified. "I'm sorry."

"Why not?" the last fauna in the room asked her. He was the only boy in the room, and he appeared to be fox-like and between the ages of the other two fauna with him.

It was a genuine question that the girl now found herself asking, but she didn't have a solid answer herself yet, so the only thing she could do was stall for time. However, they all seemed too nice to be treating her poorly like she heard fauna doing to flora species such as herself. Not once did they ever belittle her for being an inferior species.

"I-I hope I'm not saying too much," she spoke from her heart, "but I heard there's someone on this planet named Sonic the Hedgehog." She looked up at the others with an earnest expression. "I have to see him and tell him something important before it's too late."

"Oh yeah, we know Sonic!" the fox piped up with a bright expression. "He's out and about right now, but all of us are friends with him, so you can tell us about it instead if you're okay with it."

"Yeah, and then we can pass it on to Sonic when he comes back!" the hedgehog added.

Just like that, the girl felt like she played into their hands. Sonic wasn't there for her to talk to, and-

She gasped inwardly.

Am I on the wrong planet…? Did… Did I talk too much…?

"I'm sorry…" she said at last, looking down again. "I'm… not comfortable right now."

"Why not…?" the hedgehog asked with a slight pout. She seemed a little off-put by the girl's continued stubbornness.

"It's… complicated," the girl stated simply.

"First off… how do you know about Sonic?" the hedgehog asked, crossing her arms. Another genuine question that she couldn't answer without giving her potential captors too much information. So the girl chose not to answer. She was afraid, and she desperately needed help from Sonic and Sonic alone.

"Hey Amy, let's not rush her," the fox gently told the hedgehog. "She's still probably feeling traumatized from the crash after all."

The hedgehog girl sighed. "You're right, Tails," she said, before looking back at the girl. "Any time you want to talk, we'll be here to listen, okay?"

However, the more she thought about it, and the more she looked at them, the more she realized the fauna she was in the company of were more than likely the same species as Sonic. She knew what he looked like from memory, and from the many books and holo-journals she studied in her classes. Cobalt-blue fur, emerald-green eyes, and well-kept quills. White gloves and red sneakers that supplied an incredible resistance to friction. He was the fastest known creature in the galaxy, and there was no monster who was too strong for him. He came and went as he pleased and lived life freely to the fullest.

Perhaps there was some credibility to them being Sonic's friends after all.

She sat up, fresh new determination in her eyes. She was ready to slip out of bed when the fox held out a gloved hand to stop her. All of them were wearing gloves, now that she looked at them more closely.

"Just relax," he told her as gently as he could. "Sonic will be back soon."

"Oh, I just realized, we never introduced ourselves!" the hedgehog said out of nowhere, before turning to the plant girl who was sitting back in bed. "I'm Amy Rose."

"My name is Miles Prower, but everyone calls me Tails," the fox introduced himself.

"And my name is Cream," the rabbit spoke. "And these are my Chao friends. The blue one here is Cheese, and the brown one who's sleeping over there is Chocola. Say hi, Cheese!"

The blue Chao perked up and floated toward the plant girl, but not too close.

"Chao chao!" he squeaked.

A small smile looked like it was about to form on the girl's face, but it didn't fully break through. However, an astute Amy noticed it; it was definitely progress if anything.

The girl looked at the Chao that was hovering in the air near the foot of her bed. It was a blue blob-like creature with stubby limbs and a yellow ball floating above its head, She had to admit it was adorable, and the red bow tie it wore only added to its charm.

"And this is my guardian robot friend Gemerl," Cream said, turning to the robot that was silently standing in the corner of the room. Somehow the girl didn't notice it before.

"I am pleased to make your acquaintance," Gemerl said. He definitely sounded like a robot, but unlike most other robots the girl heard before, it wasn't entirely monotone, and in fact, there was a hint of personality in his voice.

The girl glanced at Chocola on the other side of the room, back to Cheese.

"Did you say they're called Chao?" she asked. "A-Are they a type of pet?"

She felt herself warming up to them a bit, but she was upset at herself. She was sounding nervous again. Even though she still wasn't ready to tell them anything yet, she could at least start to adjust to her surroundings.

"Well… some people think they're pets," Cream explained, "but they're a lot more than that. They are very good friends, and they can sense people's feelings too. Like they can be happy when you're happy, and they're sad when you're sad." She smiled as she sat down on the edge of the bed, and Cheese fluttered down into her lap. "Chocola is my mommy's Chao, and she likes to sleep a lot, but she never misses a single meal." She glanced down at Cheese. "And Cheese is my very own Chao friend! I remember when my mommy took me to the Chao garden to help me pick out a Chao, but we think that Cheese picked me instead!" She giggled as she gently petted Cheese.

The girl didn't say anything, but she sat there listening in fascination.

"You know a lot about Chao," she said at last.

"Mm-hmm!" Cream said enthusiastically. "Mommy and I read a lot of books about them before we went to the Chao Garden, and she used to go there all the time before I was born." She glanced at the girl, gently cradling Cheese in her arms, before holding him out to her. "Would you like to hold Cheese? He's very gentle."

The girl was just about to reply when Cheese suddenly leaped out of Cream's arms and into the air, trying to say something that no one seemed to be able to understand. At the exact same time, Chocola woke up and joined Cheese at the window. Both Chao seemed to be panicked about something.

"Whoa whoa, what's going on?!" Tails exclaimed, suddenly feeling flustered.

"I don't know!" Cream said as she leaped up and tried to peer out the window.

The girl slipped out of bed, limping as she made it to the window. It was then that everyone became aware of the sound of low rumbling, not unlike all the times where a jet plane flew overheard or GUN was orchestrating war games. But this time it felt different.

She strained to see out the window. She didn't have a good view of the landscape since it was dark out, but the rumbling was slowly getting louder.

"What is it?" Amy asked. "I don't see anything."

"Me neither," Tails said. "Is it– Is it Eggman?"

As if to answer the fox, the clouds in that part of the sky parted, rolling back like a scroll and giving way to what appeared to be a dark, robotic figure that slowly descended from the sky in the distance. No one could judge how big it was, but it was massive for a robot.

However, as soon as the girl saw it, her breathing quickened at an alarming rate, and her heart started beating faster. Before everyone realized it, she was deep in the throes of a panic attack.

"Are you okay?" Cream asked in concern.

The girl wanted to respond badly, but her panic attack was making it difficult for her to speak without stuttering. She suddenly felt like she wasn't safe.

"Th-Th-They're... h-h-here…"

"You know what that is?" Amy asked in surprise and worry.

"M-M-M-Metarex…"

"Oh honey, you shouldn't be up and about yet!" came Vanilla's voice as she stepped back into the room with a bowl of chicken noodle soup. It was a wonder she hadn't thought much about the rumbling sound until she saw what everyone else was looking at.

She set the bowl on the nearby table and glanced out the window, getting a clear view of the enormous robotic figure in the distance.

"Is that another one of Dr. Eggman's robots?" she asked. "What is he doing this late at night?"

The more Tails looked at the robot, the more determined he became. Only a few seconds passed before he turned and ran from the room.

"Tails? Where are you going?" Cream called after him.

"I'm getting the Tornado!" Tails called back, before the front door slammed shut behind him.

The plant girl's eyes went wide in shock and terror. "T-T-Tornado?! Wh-Where?!"

Cream would have giggled at the girl's innocent confusion if it weren't for the fact that it actually made her panic attack worse.

"No, no, it's not a real tornado!" she explained, trying to maintain a straight face. "That's the name of Tails' plane."

"Oh…" The girl suddenly felt foolish. Of course it couldn't have been a real tornado. In her panic, she misheard what the fox had said on his way out of the house.

But on the bright side, her panic attack had subsided enough for her to be cooperative, so she allowed Vanilla to guide her back onto the bed. She sat down on the edge of the bed as the motherly rabbit gently rubbed her back to try to help her to calm down.

"Are you hurt anywhere?" Vanilla asked after a few moments.

"I-I…" She paused to think for a moment. "I feel a strange pain in my left leg… and my head is still hurting, b-but I th-think I'll be okay." Her voice was still very shaky, and she wanted to try not to talk too much if possible.

"I'm going with Tails!" Amy called as she too ran out of the room.

"Me too!" Cream added as she followed Amy, and Cheese, Chocola, and Gemerl joined them.

"I know you're in a hurry, but please try not to slam the–"

Slam!

"…door…" Vanilla was a second too late. The house was quiet and empty, except for the continuous low rumble from outside, and now it was just her and the girl in Vanilla's room.

"Everything will be okay, dear," Vanilla consoled her as she continued to rub her back. "Sonic will be here very soon to hear what you have to say to him."

The girl's breathing was still labored, and even though she was surrounded by people who were caring for her, they were still fauna. And to make matters worse, her worst nightmare had made it to this planet too.

Angel Island – Third-person POV

Knuckles' slumber was disrupted by the sound of a low rumble that came from seemingly everywhere. Usually his nights were peaceful, giving him enough time to think and have a clear mind, but realizing that this night was gradually becoming anything but, he immediately became alert.

He sat up before leaping off the top of the Master Emerald. The echidna quickly glided down the steps of the Master Emerald shrine before he touched down. His eyes frantically scanned the skies around him for any sign of what could be making the jet-like rumble that filled his ears.

His first thoughts went to Eggman. There was a chance that he was taking the Egg Carrier to Angel Island so he could confiscate the Master Emerald for another one of his nefarious schemes. But the sky looked seemingly empty except for the occasional clouds, and he didn't see any of the doctor's usual fanfare of Badniks either.

Feeling a bit annoyed that he couldn't see what was making such a large noise, he ran through the surrounding forest before scaling the trees, trying to find the highest point he could while still remaining in close proximity to the Master Emerald in case something happened to it.

Now that he reached the top of one of the tallest palm trees in the immediate area, he glanced around, trying to pinpoint which direction the sound was coming in. It was a little tricky for him to cling to the very top of the tree with one hand while trying to look in every direction he could. However, almost a minute later, he spotted something in the distance, something that the noise seemed to be coming from.

As he watched the entity slowly descend from the heavens toward the forest of the mainland below, he gritted his teeth. It looked like one of the Titans. He was immediately alert. While it didn't seem to pose an immediate threat to the Master Emerald or Angel Island itself, he still considered it a threat regardless. And even if it wasn't causing any harm to anything that he could see, it was definitely a threat to his sleep.

He pushed himself off the tree trunk and glided from treetop to treetop, trying to get a better view of the Titan. But as he got closer, he realized it wasn't a Titan. In fact, it appeared to be purely robotic, as evidenced by the singular red glowing eye that pierced the night.

And then it spoke in a surprisingly loud, sharp, and grated voice.

"COMMENCING PHASE ONE. BEGIN PLANET EGG EXCAVATION PROCESS."

Before Knuckles could react, the pair of horns on the robot's head began to glow a shade of bright red, and Knuckles was forced to squint as red lightning streaked across the entire forest below, tearing up the underbrush and destroying everything in sight. The echidna could hear panicked animal noises as flocks of Flickies and other previously sleeping Mobini were forced to flee for their lives.

The only thing louder than the low rumble of the robot's jet engines was the thunderous sizzling of the red lightning that was generated by the robot's horns. The night was lit up further by an orange glow that rose up from the Jungle Zone directly beneath Angel Island.

The forest was on fire.

Knuckles knew he couldn't just stand there and watch any longer. Even though the Master Emerald itself wasn't in any momentary danger, he couldn't sit on the sidelines and watch the destruction of the planet below him.

Gritting his teeth, he broke into a swift glide as he prioritized getting off the island as fast as he could. Since he knew it like the back of his spiked glove, it only took him three agonizing minutes to make it off the edge. Every second that passed meant that more of the forest was being upheaved.

After several seconds of diving straight down, he spread his arms forward and glided toward the robot. He may have underestimated its size, because the tops of the trees only came up to its chest.

With a growl, he attempted to land a punch on its upper left leg. Absolutely no damage was done, and as the echidna reeled back, he saw that it didn't even leave a dent either. To add insult to injury, the robot noticed and swatted him away with a swift movement of its left hand before it returned to its task.

Knuckles glanced down to see that he was falling toward the thickest part of the flames. He turned himself around in the air and regained control of his motion soon enough to glide to safety. He sped between treetops, telling himself not to stay for too long because the trees' integrity was likely compromised by the fire, not to mention the danger of the lightning bolts that the robot was still firing.

One such bolt sped past his head and landed in the forest, vaporizing a tree with frightening speed. He was shocked by how hot it felt, and it was only several feet away from him. When he looked back, there was absolutely nothing left where the tree once stood. It was completely gone.

This was not ordinary lightning, and it quickly became apparent that this wasn't an ordinary robot either. Furthermore, Knuckles didn't see Eggman's usual emblem anywhere on it.

Knuckles was sweating, and not because of the intensity of the heat around him. The robot appeared to be indestructible, and as he tried to circle the robot while keeping a considerable distance away from it, he couldn't find anything that looked like a weak spot. He was getting desperate, not to mention frustrated.

He flinched when he heard a new sound from somewhere above him, the sound of blaster fire as several bolts of light flew overhead and struck the giant robot with precision. Of course, none of the lasers did any visible damage. Knuckles didn't even need to look to hear the familiar drone of the Tornado's engine. But he looked anyway to see the red biplane soaring overhead, and Tails waving down at him.

Knuckles made his way across the treetops, which were rapidly becoming fewer and farther between, as he tried his hardest to approach Tails. It was rough going, especially since the tops of the pine trees were already unstable and not made to support a Mobian's weight.

"Tails!" the echidna called, trying to hide his desperation. "What on Mobius is this thing?!"

"I don't know!" Tails called over the sound of his plane's engine. "We should try and find a weak spot."

Knuckles let out a soft growl as he turned to face the robot, who was still savagely ripping up the forest around him. He still couldn't believe how large and durable it was, even more so that it didn't remotely resemble any of Eggman's usual robots.

"Not even my punches are working!" Knuckles reported to Tails. He didn't have his comlink with him, so he had to resort to shouting. But he wasn't about to give up just because he failed his one and only attack on the robot.

Outside Jungle Zone – Third-person POV

As Knuckles and Tails were beginning their combined onslaught against the robot, Amy, Cream, Cheese, Chocola, and Gemerl reached the outskirts of Jungle Zone, which bordered Green Hill Zone to the northeast. It wasn't hard for them to find it since they all knew the layout of the land very well, but even if they didn't, all they needed to do was follow the beacon of smoke and flames that rose into the air from the distant forest.

To say all of them were scared was very much an understatement. Amy was tense, but her heart was pounding in her chest. This was somehow worse than the Citadel invasion during the Phantom War, or any of Eggman's wartime schemes for that matter.

Cream, on the other hand, was completely distraught.

"Everything's burning…!" she repeated in disbelief for what must have been the tenth time. "It was so beautiful, and now… it's all on fire...!"

"Chao-chao chao!" Cheese responded in fright.

From the checkered hill that Amy was standing on, she watched the ensuing fight miles away from her. For once, she wasn't sure whether to pull out her hammer and join the fight or try to get as many people as she could out of the forest. On the one hand, her friends were not having any luck whatsoever, and in fact, the robot didn't appear to acknowledge them. But on the other hand, Jungle Zone was considered a protected zone by the governing branch of South Island. It was a sanctuary for all kinds of Mobini, and the zone's caretakers lived in surrounding zones so as not to intrude on the natural landscape of the zone. Amy knew that Mobini acted by their instincts, so to her that meant they all likely made it out safely at the first sign of danger.

Gemerl too stepped forward, before turning back to look at Cream. Even though he was incapable of facial expressions, Cream could sense his determination.

"Cream, remain here with Amy," he instructed. "It is a necessary protocol to ensure your protection."

"Okay," Cream said with a shaky nod. "Please be careful."

"You do not need to worry," Gemerl said as his rocket boosters ignited and he levitated into the air. "I will not be fighting alone."

With a worried look, Cream watched as her robot friend and guardian took toward the giant lumbering robot in the middle of the forest, until he was little more than a speck in the distance. She then looked up at Amy who was standing on the other side of her. However, the pink hedgehog was looking thoughtful about something, and she seemed to have a faraway look in her eyes.

"Miss Amy…?" she asked softly.

"This can't be a coincidence," Amy said at last, not looking up from the robot.

Cream tilted her head in confusion. "What do you mean?" she asked.

"That robot arrived less than an hour after the girl who's staying with you," Amy explained, crossing her arms. "And not only that, but she seemed to know exactly what it was. So maybe this is what she was trying to warn Sonic about." She let out a sigh. "If only she would just tell us…"

Red lightning continued to fly everywhere and decimate everything in the forest, thankfully coming short of where the two girls and Chao were standing. However, with each charred tree and uprooted shrub, the noise only seemed to get louder, further fueled by Tails, Knuckles, and the newly-arrived Gemerl's futile efforts to contain it.

Inside Jungle Zone – Third-person POV

Knuckles was nearly fried by some of the lightning as he made his way back to the robot's torso and punched it several times in rapid succession. He was tired because he was practically forced to fight the moment he woke up, so he wasn't at his prime. And even if he was, his attacks wouldn't have done any damage anyway, and right now they were doing even less than no damage.

Meanwhile, some of the lightning passed very close to the Tornado, and its pilot flinched at the close call. Each strike the lightning made on the forest below set the poor fox even more on edge; he was astraphobic, and this battle was not helping him at all. At the very least, it wasn't a real thunderstorm, although it seemed like it was almost as bad.

He glanced down to see that some of the fur on his arms and chest was singed, even though he was sure the lightning didn't come that close to him. As he banked to the left to avoid the robot's arm that threatened to swat him out of the sky, he told himself that he had to be more careful. It wasn't normal lightning at all.

The longer the battle went, the more he realized there was something different about the robot. It wasn't focusing on any of its opponents. Either it didn't register any of them as threats, or it was deeply concentrated on razing the forest around it.

He started to realize it may have been both.

Tails gritted his teeth in concentration and determination as he turned his plane around and opened fire on the robot's head, once again doing no damage. It didn't make any logical sense to the young fox. He had never seen metal this strong in his life.

"What is this thing made of…?!" he exclaimed, starting to sound a bit frustrated.

Meanwhile, a lightning bolt came dangerously close to hitting Gemerl, but with some quick calculations, he collected some of the energy from the bolt as it finished passing him. The energy he gathered was roughly the size of his own body. He was just about to throw it when sparks jumped from the energy ball and ran through his entire circuitry. He was forced to let it go to dissolve in the air because it was starting to overwhelm him.

Having aborted his attack, he flew alongside the Tornado, where Knuckles was now perched on the plane's right wing.

"I regret to inform you that there is nothing I can do in this scenario," Gemerl reported. "The electric discharge strength is 5.98 times as strong as lightning generated by thunderstorms."

"For real?!" Knuckles exclaimed.

A wide-eyed Tails gasped. "That's a lot of power," he remarked.

"A sound strategy will need to be devised so as not to run the risk of fatal injury," Gemerl suggested.

In what felt like the blink of an eye, the tide of the battle turned in the form of a bright blue flash that ran along the ground. The three heroes looked just in time to see a familiar spherical form hurtling onto the scene and slamming into the robot with all his might. To Tails and Knuckles' surprise, it actually did something. The robot briefly stopped its onslaught of electricity as it tumbled over and fell onto the ground. It landed in the fire it had made, there were no signs of burn damage.

"Yes!" Tails cheered, fist-pumping the air. "I knew you'd come, Sonic!"

From the safety of the outskirts of the Jungle Zone, Amy, Cream, Cheese, and Chocola were also cheering for their hero. They had held onto hope that he would find out about what's going on, and their hope had paid off. Then again, it was hard to miss a 100-foot tall robot that was laying waste to an entire forest.

"Way uncool, Eggman," Sonic said as he uncurled and faced the robot. "I had no idea you were making something like this. And here you just patched me up and everything."

Gemerl spotted Sonic below him and flew down to join him, having overheard him.

"As a unit designed by Dr. Eggman, this robot shares little to no characteristics of his technology," he stated.

"Huh…" Sonic said as he glanced the robot up and down. "So this means it's not an Eggman robot– whoa!"

The hedgehog was forced to scramble back, all the while keeping a fighting stance, as the robot slowly started to show signs of moving again.

"Sonic, look out! It's getting back up!" Tails warned from above.

"Well then, I'll just knock it down again!" Sonic said smugly, rubbing under his nose. "The bigger they are, the harder they fall, right?"

"Even I couldn't leave a dent in it," Knuckles added from the wing of the Tornado. "So I don't know how you did that just now."

"Took everything I had, I'll be honest," Sonic said as the robot stood back up to its full height again. For once, Sonic was not exaggerating.

Tails started to realize something was not right about this robot. Gemerl confirmed it wasn't created by Eggman, and on top of that, it was far more resilient than most of the doctor's robots thus far. Furthermore, whenever Sonic told him and his friends it took everything he had to defeat an opponent, he meant it. He tended to exaggerate the truth so no one would worry about him, but since he was like a brother to Sonic, Tails eventually learned to see through his facade. But whenever Sonic said he gave it his all, he really did give it his all.

But that's not what worried Tails now. What worried him was he gave it his all this early in the battle, after only one hit. Not only that, but when he looked down, he only saw a small, barely noticeable dent in the side of the robot where Sonic had hit it.

That only left him with one choice. Reaching down, he pulled out the bag of Power Rings with one hand while maintaining control of his plane with the other.

This was the first time Sonic needed a Power Ring since he returned to Mobius. Nearly every day, Sally Acorn had been collecting them when they rose from the Lake of Rings near Knothole Village every twelve hours, and she had since given the entire stash to Tails when he returned, much to his delight. This meant that he no longer needed to rely on his imitation Power Rings, since they were slightly less powerful than the real deal.

"Sonic, catch!" Tails called as he pulled out one of the Power Rings. As soon as he was within range, he dropped it down toward Sonic, then immediately banked to the left to avoid getting struck by the robot's lightning that suddenly started up again.

With a grin, Sonic ran back to catch it. Right as it was about to land in his open hand, a bolt of red lightning struck the ring, knocking it away.

"Hey, get your own ring, big guy!" Sonic whined as he ran after it. However, the moment he got close to it, he noticed red sparks jumping everywhere across its golden surface, and one of them leapt onto his hand. He let out a pained yell and staggered backward, clutching his hand that now felt like it was burning like crazy.

"Sonic!" Tails called in alarm. "What happened?! Are you okay?!"

"Huh? Yeah, I'll live," Sonic called back, waving his injured hand to try to alleviate the tingling pain. "Didn't think the lightning would hurt that much. Man, that packs a punch."

"Gemerl said it's like six times as strong as–"

Knuckles voice died in his throat as several small holes opened up in the robot's armor and slender, flexible pincers attached to cables protruded out of each one and stretched in every perceivable direction. Clenching his teeth, he dove off the plane's wing and sped toward Gemerl.

"We're gonna have to double-team it somehow!" he told the robot.

"Affirmative," Gemerl said as he turned to face the robot, which was still busy excavating the forest. But seconds after he and Knuckles sped forward, the robot pivoted its head to look at them. Before they knew it, Gemerl was shocked by the lightning and dropped toward the forest below like a dead fly, while Knuckles was grabbed by one of the pincers and thrown several hundred feet away from the robot.

The echidna landed on the ground with a grunt about fifty feet from where Sonic was standing. Seconds later, the two of them were joined by Amy, Cream, and the two Chao, who had seen the fight ensuing and rushed in to see what they could do.

"Are you guys okay?" Amy asked, her face full of concern. However, she paused when she noticed that Sonic was starting to pant. Something wasn't right. He never panted unless he ran for an absurdly long time or if it was very hot outside.

"Mr. Sonic…?" Cream voiced her own worry, clasping her small hands together.

"I'm good…" Sonic said, waving them both off as he stood up and looked up at the robot that towered above them. "So I'm thinking if we all team up and go at him all at once, we can kick his can once and for all."

"I like the sound of that," Knuckles said with a grin as he bumped his fists together, completely leaving out the fact that he tried exactly that with Gemerl moments earlier and failed spectacularly.

"Hey Sonic," Amy spoke up, glancing somewhere behind Sonic. "I don't see any more sparks on your ring, so you should try using it again."

"You think so?" Sonic asked as he turned around and spotted the golden ring lying in the charred grass, a stark contrast to the blackened ground it lay on. Sure enough, it was mostly free of red sparks, but there were a few that Amy had apparently not seen.

The moment he touched it, he felt a few mild sparks jumping to his hand, but he was able to absorb it regardless. Electrons orbited his body at hypersonic speeds as he practically glowed as a result of its energy, and he rocketed off through the remains of the forest toward the robot.

Cream suddenly let out a gasp of realization. "Gemerl!" she exclaimed as she ran through the forest.

"Careful, Cream!" Amy warily called after her as she followed her friend, followed in turn by Cheese and Chocola.

They could feel the heat of the distant flames as they stepped over burned underbrush, and branches cracked under their shoes as they made their way toward where their robot comrade had fallen. The sounds of Sonic's fight echoed all around them as they proceeded relatively undetected by the robot.

"Gemerl… Please be okay…" Cream lamented as she reached Gemerl. However, the robot did not respond to the young rabbit's pleas. Tears formed in her eyes.

"C'mon, let's get him out of here first," Amy urged. Cream nodded, and they each picked up half of Gemerl. With Amy holding the head and Cream carrying the legs, they carefully and precariously made their way back out of the forest.

Meanwhile, Sonic was able to get to the giant robot long before Knuckles with the help of his enhanced ring powers. He took a deep breath before leaping high into the air and curling into a tight ball. Since he was much closer to the robot than his last attempt, the direct hit he landed now didn't knock it over again. Not only that, but no visible damage was done at all.

Tails' stomach started to fall as worry overtook him. Even in his ring-powered state, Sonic wasn't moving as fast as he usually was, and his attacks were like throwing pebbles at a tree. He was able to catch a glimpse of his big brother's face. He wore a serious expression, a clear sign that he wasn't messing around.

What's going on with Sonic…? he wondered.

However, he had his own problems to deal with at the moment. Not only was the robot ravaging the forest, but it had added pincers to the mix, and any one of them could bring his plane down if he wasn't careful.

He turned the Tornado toward the robot and fired lasers at its horns where the lightning was coming from. As he expected, no damage was done, and one lightning bolt nearly hit the Tornado once again.

Okay… No more playing around. I HAVE to be careful.

"Sonic!" Knuckles called to the hedgehog, who turned to look at him once they were both a safe distance away from the robot. "Sonic, listen. At this point you're gonna have to go super, that's the only way I can see how we can beat this thing."

Sonic had an uneasy look, and his grin was forced when he heard that suggestion. He rubbed the back of his head behind his quills.

"Uh... About that… well…"

"Well, what?!"

Sonic let out a small sigh as he threw another glance up at the robot before looking back at Knuckles.

"Long story short, I was in a pinch and I had to go super against this new bad guy, but the only way out was to scatter the Emeralds through space."

It took a few seconds for Sonic's words to fully sink in, and with each passing second, Knuckles' jaw started to drop more and more.

"Scatter the Emeralds through– You mean we don't have any Emeralds on this whole planet?!"

Closing his eyes, Sonic slowly shook his head… until Knuckles grabbed him by the shoulders.

"You blue idiot! We need those Emeralds right now!" he exclaimed in shock and bewilderment as he shook Sonic.

"Hey, hey, easy there!" Sonic protested as he pulled loose from Sonic's grasp. His voice was an amazingly even contrast to Knuckles' frustration. "Look, I know you're upset, but hear me out. We'll find another way. There's always another way if you know where to look."

"But you don't get it! The Power Ring was our best shot and even that didn't work–"

"Get down!" Sonic shouted, leaping backwards to avoid the tethered claw that swung in his direction. It cleared him by about seven feet, but Knuckles reacted too late and was swept into a tree. He violently slammed into the trunk, causing the whole tree to topple over. Sonic winced at the impact.

Knuckles groaned as he slowly and shakily rose to his feet. He was shocked that he hadn't broken his back, but he credited his heightened adrenalin for that. Using the tree to support himself, he glanced up at the robot that towered above him and Sonic. As far as it seemed, there was no stopping it.

Green Hill Zone – Third-person POV

Meanwhile, Amy and Cream made it safely out of the remains of the forest and back into the relatively untouched Green Hill Zone. Gemerl was heavy, but with their combined strength and teamwork, along with some help from Cheese and Chocola, they were moving much quicker than they anticipated.

"When Mr. Tails comes back, I'll ask him if he can fix Gemerl," Cream stated.

"Good idea," Amy said, readjusting her grip on Gemerl's body, before leaning closer to him. "Gemerl, if you can hear me right now… I want you to know that you did an amazing job out there. Even if you couldn't beat it, you still did your best, and that's what counts."

"Chao-chaaoo!"

At the sound of Cheese's warning, Amy looked up just in time to see a rogue claw speeding straight toward them. She yelped and immediately dropped her half of Gemerl, then in the last split second she had, she pulled out her hammer and swatted the claw away before it reached her.

Amy was left panting after that close ordeal. She had no idea how she did that just now. It had to be a combination of instinct and adrenalin.

Cream, on the other hand, was rooted to the spot in shock, unable to move.

Amy barely had time to shake herself out of her own trance when she caught sight of a second claw speeding her way. This time, she was sure it was deliberately aimed for them, and thinking quickly, she tackled Cream to the ground as it soared above their heads, missing them by only a few feet.

Both girls were speechless at how far the claw could reach. There was at least half a mile between them and the robot, and at its current rate, it was more than capable of destroying some of the houses in Green Hill without moving an inch.

"C'mon… we're not safe here…" Amy gasped as she picked up her end of Gemerl again.

"I'm s-scared, Amy…" Cream whimpered, unable to take her eyes off the robot as she bent down to lift her end of her robot guardian. Her voice was shaking, and tears threatened to escape her eyes. "I'm really scared…"

Before Amy could respond, Cheese and Chocola suddenly cried out in fright and pointed behind them in the direction of the robot. Both Mobians looked to see something glowing in the middle of the forest in front of the robot. It was so bright that they were forced to squint and cover their eyes.

It didn't dawn on Amy until now that the robot had been excavating the forest in a specific spot this whole time.

"Is that a–"

"PHASE ONE COMPLETE," the robot spoke for the first time since they arrived. The four of them were caught off guard by its grating voice. "COMMENCING PHASE TWO: EXTRACTING PLANET EGG."

Even in her shock, Amy blinked in surprise, her grip never leaving Gemerl.

"Planet Egg…?"

"I-I never h-heard of one before," Cream admitted.

"Me neither," Amy said as she willed herself to keep moving again. "I thought it was a Chaos Emerald at first. That kind of glow…"

Her voice trailed off. She couldn't take her eyes off the glow in the distance. It was all too surreal for her, and she was still in a state of disbelief.

Jungle Zone was gone, practically reduced to ashes before her eyes.

And there was nothing she or her friends could do.

Jungle Zone – Third-person POV

Meanwhile, Sonic and Knuckles, who were much closer to the massive robot, both watched in shock as the ground practically opened up right in front of them. Grass, shrubs, dirt, and entire root systems were blown clear out of the gaping hole, and seconds later, a bright blue crystallized stone ripped its way up from the bedrock and out of the smoldering crater.

"What is that…?" Knuckles breathed in awe.

"Beats me," Sonic said with a shrug.

From his seat in the Tornado, Tails watched the object rise higher and higher out of the hole. He was too scared to get his plane any closer to the robot or the Planet Egg, as the robot called it.

Is that the Planet Egg he was talking about…? It doesn't look like any egg I've ever seen before. I'm gonna have to learn more about it if I can!

A moment later, the robot closed its hands around the Planet Egg, fully securing it.

"THIS IS DONE IN THE NAME OF TRANQUILITY AND ORDER IN THE UNIVERSE," the robot proclaimed to the entire zone.

Tails flinched at the robot's voice, before he tilted his head in confusion. He wasn't just confused, he was surprised too. Why would a robot who wants order destroy an entire forest? Why would anyone do that?

Whatever the reason, Tails tightened his resolve. He wouldn't let it cause any more destruction.

He steered the Tornado back toward the robot and opened fire once again, and as he expected, no damage was done. To add insult to injury, the robot took hold of the plane with its claws and promptly threw it away from itself. Tails cried out as he held onto the sides of the plane so he wouldn't fall out, even though he was buckled in.

But then he realized, if he did that, he would crash because no one was steering the plane. So with a grunt of determination, he grabbed the yokes and pulled up as hard as he could. At the last possible second, the plane regained control and swooped over the hills near the border with Jungle Zone at an incredibly low altitude.

That was a close scare… Tails thought, shaking a bit.

However, as he regained altitude, he was horrified to see what had become of the landscape below him. The trees across the entire zone within several miles were drying up, and the ground they were once rooted in appeared to be parched. It reminded him of the drought-stricken parts of the Great Basin back on Earth.

"RETRIVAL COMPLETE," the robot stated, and several engines roared to life on its underside. "WITHDRAW!"

Several booster rockets attached to the robot activated, and it slowly lifted off and rose into the air. Once it gained enough altitude several seconds later, it folded up its legs, allowing it to move even faster.

"You wanna run away?" Sonic challenged. "You wanna run from me, the fastest thing alive?"

He immediately curled into a ball and, using the trees as leverage, spun upward after the robot. However, one of its tethered claws took hold of him and administered a painful shock to his entire body. Red sparks illuminated his blue fur as the claw let him go, and he fell back toward the petrified forest below.

As the robot retracted its pincers and flew even faster, Knuckles ran toward Sonic and leaped into the air to catch him before he hit the ground. When the echidna landed, he set Sonic down, and the hedgehog wobbled a little but regained his footing.

That is definitely not normal… Knuckles thought.

Meanwhile, Tails was pushing the Tornado to its limit in pursuit of the robot. The plane he was flying wasn't the Tornado 2 or the X-Tornado, which meant his options were limited, but he was determined to stop the robot in any way he could.

He pressed a button which activated his plane's booster engine, allowing it to increase its speed several times over. But the higher he got, the more the Tornado started to shake, not to mention the air was getting quite thin. He was dismayed that he had come to the reality that he couldn't fly into space.

His heart was pounding, and it also sank in his chest when he realized that there was nothing more he could do. With no other choice, he was forced to go back down. On the bright side, he knew that none of this was his fault since he and his friends had done everything they could to stop the robot. In the past, he used to kick himself over small mistakes, and he still did sometimes, but this time he knew he had done everything he could and still failed. He knew it was not his fault.

Green Hill Zone – Third-person POV

Meanwhile, Amy and Cream finished carrying Gemerl across the last stretch of road to Cream's house, and carefully set him down on the front porch.

"We'll come back for you, okay, Gemerl?" Cream told him before she ran to rejoin Amy at the front gate. The two of them left the house again and made their way back toward what remained of Jungle Zone, throwing an occasional glance up at the escaping robot as it became little more than a speck in the starlit night sky. She could also see the Tornado following it, but it was eventually forced to break off the chase, much to her dismay.

Amy found herself wishing more and more that she and her friends were wearing comlinks. This was the exact kind of mission that would require them, but they were caught off guard by the attack, so none of them thought to strap them on before setting out to fight the robot. Otherwise, she would stay in contact with Sonic.

It took them a solid fifteen minutes of running, but they finally met up with Sonic and Knuckles who were stepping across the checkered terrain of Green Hill Zone. Sonic's arm was around Knuckles as the echidna helped him across the grasslands.

"For real, are you guys okay?" Amy asked them.

"Aside from being thrown into a tree?" Knuckles asked, and Amy winced at the response.

"It's no biggie," Sonic said with a shrug and a grin that only Cream found to be convincing enough. "I'll bounce back, just like always."

Knuckles frowned, before giving a short nod. He still looked suspicious of Sonic's condition despite his nonchalant attitude toward it. Amy, however, saw through Sonic's facade and knew that he was badly hurt in the fight, even though she wasn't on the front lines herself.

"Well, even so, I still think it's a good idea to get you home to rest," she insisted, before realization struck her. "Oh, I just remembered! There's something I have to tell you, it's super urgent!"

As they made their way back toward Cream's house, Amy and Cream filled Sonic and Knuckles in on the mysterious girl who quite literally crash-landed in their lives.

"So yeah, she's resting now," Amy finished. "She insists on talking to you. She wouldn't tell me or anyone else anything, not even her name."

"Sure, let's hear her out," Sonic said, trying to ignore the pain that racked his abdomen as Knuckles and Amy helped him to walk. He was about to say something else when the sound of the Tornado's engine got closer and closer to them.

"Hey Knuckles!" Tails called from above them. "The Master Emerald is glowing!"

"Wha–" Knuckles whipped his head upward to the Tornado, before looking back in the direction of Angel Island. Of course, he couldn't see the giant mystical gemstone from the ground, but he knew Tails never lied about these kinds of things.

"Perhaps it's trying to tell us something," Knuckles said at last. "Maybe some information on what's going on. At this point, anything would help. Okay, Tails, take us to Angel Island!"

Over the next ten minutes, Tails landed to pick up his four friends and then promptly take off again. Once the party of five, plus two Chao, arrived at Angel Island, they all raced toward the Master Emerald shrine as fast as they could, with Knuckles leading the way.

The echidna didn't know what to expect. This was not the first time the Master Emerald had beckoned him like this, but especially now when the fate of the world was uncertain, he needed answers now more than ever.

Sure enough, when Knuckles emerged from the clearing and saw the Master Emerald on top of the altar, it was pulsating rhythmically and almost hypnotically, like a heartbeat.

"Wait here," Knuckles told his friends before he ran up the stairs toward the altar. The closer he got to the Master Emerald, the more he could feel its raw power beckoning to him, calling to him from within. And Knuckles knew he needed to respond.

This never happens, he thought as he finally reached the top, having mastered the small, steep steps. The last time this happened is when–

Wait.

It's rippling.

It's not supposed to ripple.

As Knuckles stood there, his expression changed to surprise as a figure started to materialize within the Master Emerald. Its pristine surface was rippling, so he couldn't make out the figure.

"Tikal…?" he spoke aloud in an unsure voice.

However, the figure started to become taller and more prominent than it was before. It was now taller than any Mobian. Except maybe for Vector and Big, but this figure was too slender for its height.

Wait. No. It can't be.

It has hair.

And clothes.

"Ch-Chris…?!" he exclaimed, barely loud enough for those below him to hear.

"Is it Chris?!" came Tails' excited voice from behind Knuckles.

In a flash, Sonic was standing on the altar next to Knuckles, with bated breath and a look of pure anticipation. He could hear footsteps as the others made their way up the stairs to join them. Normally Knuckles was wary about having too many people up on the altar with him because he was paranoid of people stealing the Master Emerald, but he too had to admit he was eager to see his friend again, so he silently and mentally made an exception to his rule.

Sure enough, the figure became crystal clear, and Cream, Amy, and Tails all burst into cheers and leaped in joy when Chris took his last step forward out of the portal.

Sonic could not be more excited. Chris was here now! He made it through the portal he said he was going to build!

Except something looked off.

Chris… Sonic thought. What happened to you? Your clothes are too big for– You look like you're wearing your grandpa's labcoat, but I've never seen him wear that exact labcoat before. In fact, everything he's wearing look brand new. And they're too big on you.

What happened?

A/N: That concludes "A Cosmic Call"! For anyone who's seen Sonic X, you already know who this mysterious girl is :)

Also, Gemerl is part of the action now! Don't expect him to go up in space with everyone else though, since I don't want too many characters inundating the story, but he's here now for the time being since he lives with Cream. Let me know how I did writing his personality. Did I make him too human or anything?

I had a super fun time writing both Dark Oak and Cosmo's scenes, as well as their personalities! I thought it would probably be better for Dark Oak to use his cloaked battleship to return to wherever he came from rather than flying on his own since it would require a jump to hyperspace. Also, I named his battleship the Rafflesia since that's the name of the world's biggest flower, and his battleship is absolutely humongous.

As much fun as I had writing Dark Oak's villain lines and having Tails, Amy, Cream, and Gemerl pull Cosmo from the wreckage, my favorite scene this chapter, hands-down, is the scene where Cream talks to Cosmo about Chao and helps her to warm up a bit. I sure felt heartwarmed writing it :') Also, I hope it's not too late to introduce this, but I kinda headcanon that Chocola is Vanilla's Chao, which is why we don't see her often, but she tends to hang out with Cream a lot of the time. Also, Cheese is a boy and Chocola is a girl in my headcanon.

Just a heads up for the next chapter that episode 54 will be split into two chapters to give it room to breathe, since I had a ton of ideas for this episode.

Next time is part one of "Cosmic Crisis", where Chris and Cosmo get settled in, and the heroes plan their next move! Don't miss it!