Back to Chapter 61

The journey home was relatively uneventful. Rather than attempting to scale any mountains- or travel through their hollowed-out insides- Sonic and Tails had instead elected to take a scenic run through grassy plainlands. After the day Sonic had had, he felt a bit of pleasantry was the least he deserved- plus it would probably cheer Tails up a bit.
“Wow, Sonic,” Tails said, impressed, “I can’t believe Robotnik was going to use the power of the weather itself just to get you! He must really have it in for you”
Sonic had spent the last little while regaling Tails with the story of his rescue adventure, usually leaving out the bits that he found personally embarrassing. Tails marvelled at the story. Sonic had to admit he liked having a captive audience.
“Well, that’s what happens when you keep stopping someone’s plans to take over the world,” Sonic shrugged, downplaying things slightly, “They get a bit funny with you”
“And you found all of the Chaos Emeralds?”
“Well, yes and no. I found all six of the ones we know of. But Doctor Kintobor- before he became Robotnik- he always said there was a seventh emerald. The control emerald, he called it. It has power over the other six. Problem is, we don’t know where it is- and it doesn’t show up on the Emerald Radar. Maybe it has a slightly different signal. Maybe it’s in another dimension. Maybe it doesn’t exist, it could just be a theory or legend the doc misinterpreted. He was a bit scatter-brained.” Sonic sighed, “I do miss him though. He’d know what to do. Well, I suppose he wouldn’t have to, if he was here we wouldn’t have Robotnik in the first place”
“How did Doctor Kintobor become Doctor Robotnik?” Tails inquired.
“Oh, that’s right, I never told you. Well, little buddy, there was an accident. Kintobor was using a machine called the Retro Orbital Chaos Compressor- the R.O.C.C.- to try and absorb all the evil on Mobius and turn the planet into a perfect world. Problem was…” Sonic tried to think of how best to tell the story without adding in the unfortunate detail that his involvement had caused the good doctor to lose his already tenuous grip on concentration, “The problem was, the machine blew up and all the evil energy it had absorbed got transferred right into Kintobor. He became a sort of evil opposite of himself. And that’s Robotnik”
“That’s incredible,” Tails shook his head in disbelief, “It almost sounds like science fiction”
“Well, it made a lot more sense in context,” Sonic admitted, “One of those things where you really did have to be there”
“I guess. Hey, Sonic- can I see the Chaos Emeralds?”
Sonic stopped. He paused for a moment. “Sure, I don’t see why not. You ought to know what these things are if you’re going to be part of my group of friends- it’s up to us to make sure the emeralds never fall into Robotnik’s hands, after all!”
Sonic concentrated. He focused his mind on the Chaos Emeralds. Tails didn’t understand what was happening, but he could see Sonic was trying to do something so he didn’t interrupt.
Suddenly, the six gems- now all sporting their original hues- blinked into the air with a white flash. They dropped to the grass by Sonic’s feet.
“Wow!” Tails exclaimed, “That’s amazing! How did you do that?!”
“Honestly? I don’t know!” Sonic smiled, “You can sort of will the emeralds to blink out of reality until you need them. Same thing with Power Rings. Hey, maybe they’re related? That would explain why the Warps of Confusion to get into the Special Zone where the Chaos Emeralds come from look like giant Power Rings!”
“This is a lot to take in,” Tails noted, “I just think they’re pretty”
“Well, that they are,” Sonic rolled his eyes, amused.
“Do they usually glow like that?”
Sonic snapped his glance down, “No they do not. I’ve seen this before, we need to—” The glow around the Chaos Emeralds intensified. Sonic leapt at Tails and shoved him to the ground, shielding him with his body, “GET DOWN!”
With a FRSSSSHHH! sort of sound, the Chaos Emeralds burst away in an explosion of light. Sonic had managed to get Tails out of the way just in time. He didn’t like the idea of both of them taking a blast of chaos energy at close range. Fortunately, this time he’d managed to avoid the blast himself and didn’t undergo any kind of transformation as he had when he turned into the glowing yellow version of himself.
“Are… are they supposed to do that?!” Tails gasped.
“No,” Sonic punched the ground, “I can’t believe I found them all and lost them again. Still, probably better they blasted away like this than while I was carrying them. That could have been ugly”
“What are we going to do now?”
“It’s getting dark,” Sonic stood up and dusted himself off, “First things first, we’re going to head home. We’re going to let everyone know we’re alright. Then we’re going to get our friend Porker Lewis to work on a device to help stop this from happening. We can’t keep losing the Chaos Emeralds like this… one day our luck might just run out”

On to Chapter 63