"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Wilt Rose asked, placing a warm tray on Sonic's lap. "Chili atop hot dogs is probably horrible for you."
"It wasn't popular where I come from either, I'm a bit of a trendsetter like that," Sonic said, taking a bite and feeling his pain vanish for as long as the flavor remained…
These weren't even on the hospital menu. Wilt had been combining items from the cafeteria just for him in secret. Sometimes she'd sit with him when a show that they agreed on was playing. Sonic wasn't sure if he could trust Wilt, but he knew he enjoyed being around her.
Wilt told him what exactly was going on in this place. Only a while ago, The Yolk was a giant metropolis. It was considered a safe haven for all sentient life after a fungal network known as "Greenhill" rapidly began spreading across the forests of Southbound Island 50 years ago. Greenhill would assimilate all life it came in contact with into its hivemind. Trees would turn into palm, water would turn into mud, the land itself became a checkerboarded husk… people turned to Ravagers. Thus, the Hillscape was born.
"So, Sonic… If you ended up here, does that mean there's still a chance we'll survive?" Wilt Rose pondered, staring at the ceiling while leaning against Sonic's hospital bed.
"Sure, I'll do what I can to help out if you let me," Sonic yawned. "But I can't do that from the hospital, right?" Wilt looked to the floor.
"What? No, I ask because… I can't find any records of you in the Yolk's citizen registry," Wilt said, projecting a hologram of Sonic's energy levels onto the wall through her visor. "This means you must have come here from another land." Sonic gulped. "Months ago, the nearby Grand Kingdom said they'd afford us helicopter support to get people out of the Yolk before Greenhill consumes what's left of the city. However, communications were lost before we could discuss further." Wilt turned to Sonic. "You haven't told me why you were out there in the Hillscape, are you a scout for the Grand Kingdom? Has your flight here been compromised?" Sonic averted his eyes. Wilt's hopeful demeanor was crushed.
"I dunno if this is what you want to hear, Wilt… but I came here through a—"
A Ring opened right behind Sonic's hospital bed. "Sonic? What's that?" Wilt asked, the optic in her visor flashing red as she got into a fighting stance.
"Oh no…" Sonic struggled to get up, but a pair of cleats came through the portal and kicked his bedframe. The entire bed crashed through the door, tipping over and nearly crushing Sonic between itself and the floor. Sonic weakly rolled out from under the bed, but was kicked like a soccer ball into the wall by… Reap. The gruesome hedgehog that had attacked him in Golden Capital.
"There's our little Space-hopper… Gotta say, this place is hardly my idea of a vacation!" Reap growled with a gross grin on his face. He held Wilt up in the air by her neck, tightened his fist, and dropped her to the floor. "Alright, 'Sonic'. I'll give you a chance to make the right choice. Run along back to your universe, and I'll leave you be." Reap peeled Sonic off the wall, and stared deep into his eyes. "Whaddya say?"
"Wilt, help… I don't… have any Rings," Sonic sputtered, dazed and confused. Reap scowled.
"No Rings? You came here without a portal back? How STUPID can you possibly be?!" Reap shouted, as the nurses and doctors fled. Reap pulled out a Ring, and showed it to Sonic. "Really didn't want to have to do this, but it'll be easier to use one of mine to send you back."
"Where'd you take Juice?" Sonic grunted, as the Portal Ring opened in Reap's hand.
"Don't worry, he'll heal when he's Roboticized," Reap chuckled. He shoved the Portal Ring towards Sonic, who grabbed the ring and tried to push it back. "Won't feel a thing. Which means… you have no reason to be here!" Sonic looked to the wrist watch that held Reap's version of Sage. It was glowing with newly acquired energy.
"Local Prismatic Drive installed," Rage said, appearing out of the wrist watch. "Wilt Rose absorption complete. Onto the next world, Sonic?" Rage looked at the battle unfolding in front of her, and glared at Reap. "What's he doing here? Unhand this Variant, please. If we cause too much trouble here, we'll be no different than any other Space-hoppers in the eyes of The Law."
"Shush, I'm almost done," Reap said, turning his head to Rage but keeping his eyes bolted on Sonic. Sonic kept struggling to hold back the Ring as Reap pushed even harder. The gold making up the Ring began to bend. But it wasn't just from the struggle between the two Sonics— now there was a scalding heat coming out of the portal. Sonic's eyes began to water, staring directly into the sun. "Figured it out, yet? My job is to send you back to your universe. Once you're back in, it doesn't matter to anybody exactly where you end up." Sonic's arms broke inwards, he could no longer hold back the Ring.
"Y'know, you're kinda top-heavy for another version of me," Sonic grunted with a smirk. Reap raised an eyebrow, before Sonic started kicking his legs. He split the Portal Ring in half with a backflip, and landed on his feet. He was now covered in molten gold. "Wanna act like the better Sonic while only using your arms? We haven't even had a proper race, you actually seem more interested in trying to make me stand still!" Rage put a hand over her mouth, giggling softly. Reap glared back at her, then at Sonic.
"Challenging me, little man? You won't be going anywhere once that gold hardens," Reap chuckled. He leaned down to face Sonic, who realized he was encased chest-down in a Portal Ring shell. He couldn't move at all… and it was spreading.
"My point still stands…" Sonic grumbled.
"Try punching me now, idiot!" Reap laughed, slapping Sonic across the face with the back of his hand. Sonic felt two bleeding scratches appear on his cheek. "Your limbs ain't gonna do you any good, so you shouldn't mind when I rip 'em off!" Reap whirled around a giant blunt hammer and whacked Sonic with it. Sonic's skull was reduced to dust, brain matter spewed all over the wall, encased in molten gold. "What a shame. Killing myself wasn't on the agenda." Reap tugged on the individual fingers of his glove, stretching them out and wringing Sonic's blood out onto the floor. A new Portal Ring opened, only Rage seemed to notice. "Just look what you made me do! This could've been avoided if you stayed back home."
"Stay back home? That's not the way things work. Not where he and I come from."
Reap glanced over at a pitch–black figure in the glare of the Portal Ring. "No way… it's you?" Reap asked. The gruesome hedgehog clenched his fist and created a Chaos Spear. His hand trembled as it materialized.
"Put that thing down. You're just embarrassing yourself, borrowing my technique," Shadow spat as Reap tackled him through the Ring. Reap crossed over into the dimension Shadow had tapped into this one from, before grabbing him by the neck and slamming him to the dirt. The skies were overcast, they were in the middle of a dreary decayed field that was shrouded in mist.
"Yeah? How about we see YOUR Chaos weapons?" Reap asked, holding his fist in the air as the dark hedgehog struggled underneath him. "No? Alright, then. You're not half the rival my version of Shadow was." Reap went to stab the Chaos Spear through Shadow's skull, only to realize there was nothing in his hand. Shadow took the punch in stride, before lighting his Rocket Skates and kicking Reap off of him. "What?! How?!"
"Chaos Energy is a fickle thing," Shadow muttered. He skated up to Reap and began beating him against the side of a mountain. "It's an infinite energy source, but it doesn't work when you can't focus." Shadow gave Reap a moment to breathe, to open his eyes. "I can tell by the look on your face that you're afraid!" Shadow grabbed Reap's face and bashed it into the wall one last time. "If I'm not HALF as powerful as the Shadow you knew, he must've been ruthless enough to put the fear of god into you. You invaded my universe, tried to kill Sonic! This won't be a fight, I'm going to keep hitting you until I can strike that same fear into your wretched soul." Shadow let out a flurry of attacks as Reap tried with all his strength just to move. Was that it? Was this fear…?
"I killed your Sonic. He's dead, didn't you see?" Reap chuckled, shakily. "I beat him to a pulp and smeared what was left onto the wall!" Reap swung his Piko Piko Hammer at Shadow, who held up his Inhibitor Ring instinctively to block it, only for the hammer to break the worthless object apart. Shadow's forearm was blown clean off. He was whacked by the handle, a long and deep split appeared right under his ear. "Just as I thought. You were tryna get in my head and make me doubt my own power. Please, THAT'S the plan?! I'm not as mentally vulnerable as your Sonic. What's really going on is that this world must not have Chaos Energy at all."
"I guess the cat's out of the bag," Shadow grunted, holding his head with his remaining hand. Reap tried slamming the hammer down onto Shadow, but he rolled out of the way. "I lured you out to a backwater dimension where no energies analogous to Chaos exist. Now you have to face me in a battle of physical strength, without your ill-gotten power boosts!" Shadow propelled himself backwards on his Rocket Skates, and shot right back over to Reap. Reap smirked, and dashed towards Shadow. Due to the absence of Gaia Energy to balance out the great amounts of kinetic force, the planet quaked under Reap as he ran! Each footfall triggered incidental blasts behind and around Reap each exceeding thermonuclear explosions. Reap and Shadow collided with a flash of light… The light faded quickly.
Shadow's face was drenched in blood, his Rocket Skates were puffing out smoke, his other Inhibitor Ring had fractured.
Reap had a black eye. He had Shadow in his hands.
"You fool!" Reap shouted, standing on a pillar of land amidst the now shattered planet. He held Shadow over the edge by his last arm, above a deep drop into the planet's core. "My speed doesn't come from any kind of special energy, it's just who I am. That's the one constant of every Sonic, you didn't ever learn that from yours?!" Reap tossed Shadow down into the chasm, into the planet, into a Portal Ring that had just opened under him.
…
Penumbra stepped through a Portal Ring, and into the massacred hospital in The Yoke. Looked like the coast was clear. She had no doubt that Shadow had taken care of whoever they had been up against. "Sonic?!" She called. She looked all around, but saw nobody there. "Sh-Shadow?" Her leg bumped into something. She looked down, and saw a mound of gold vaguely in the shape of Sonic. "What the… where'd he go?" A chill went down Penumbra's pedicel. She heard a voice, but nobody seemed to be in the room with her.
"Sonic the Hedgehog biodata retrieved," Sage's voice said. Penumbra walked forward, squinting. Her vision was now tinted red as she focused on what was really in front of her. She could now just barely see Rage carrying a holographic wireframe of Sonic away. A Portal Ring appeared in front of Rage.
"Hey! Where do you think you're going with Sonic?!" Penumbra asked. Rage stopped, and turned around.
"... Home," Rage replied. "It's not a place you can enter."
"Is that a challenge?" Penumbra chuckled. Rage stared deep into Penumbra's soul, and the spider's smile fell. Rage looked down.
"If you consider a volatile space that will tear apart and crush any living thing in an instant to be a 'challenge'... then be my guest," Rage muttered. She took Sonic into the Portal Ring, Penumbra reached her arm out, but knew it wasn't wise to follow her in. The spider gritted her fangs, powerless to do anything to help her friend. In a last ditch effort, she shot an RC Rocket Leg into the Ring as it closed.