The Last Resort (A Sonic / Teen Titans Crossover)

XXXIII. Sonic the Hedgehog

Beast Boy and I played video games late into the night. One by one, the Teen Titans left the room. Starfire was the first to go, followed by Robin. Raven and Cyborg went, and that's when I realized that Tails wasn't in the room. It distracted me for a few races and I kept losing, but eventually I got back in the game and started winning again. A few more hours passed until Beast Boy got annoyed and left the room, leaving me alone in the room. 

I yawned, raising my hands into the air. "Time for bed," I said to myself. Then I hesitated. It felt like I was forgetting something... Something at least slightly important...

Then I remembered I had a 'date' with Raven. What would she possibly want? There was no way that she was actually Slade's kid... right?

I shivered. Raven's room was seriously soundproof, so she could kill me easily. Regular Raven wouldn't do that, but I still wasn't really sure what Slade's plans were.

I stood up and looked back at the stairs. Maybe there was just something she wanted to tell me without Robin hovering and asking a thousand questions.

After slipping on the stairs, I moaned and crawled back up them. Would the curse ever stop? After another small staircase, I walked down the hall of all the rooms. I looked back at the room Tails and I stayed in, wondering what the little guy was doing. The last thing I wanted him to do was work his brain to death. It was a nice brain. Very helpful.

A sigh escaped me, and I walked to Raven's room. She had told me to knock a certain way... was it two times, pause, then three? Or was it three, pause, three? I couldn't remember, so I just knocked five times without the pause.

The door opened, and I walked in slowly. I had never really gotten the chance to look around her room. It was dark and creepy, with dozens of bookshelves lining the walls. Most of them were in alphabets I couldn't read. There was one open on the floor, and it had lists and lists of funny looking words.

"Your knock was incorrect, Sonic," Raven said. I turned around and jumped, because she was suddenly behind me. "Do you have any idea why you're here?"

"Um," I muttered, "no, not really."

"Your focus with the regular Chaos Emerald has caused you to unconsciously draw the dark jewels toward you," Raven explained. "That is causing them to become even stronger: because you focus on them."

"I'm not quite sure I understand..." I said, taking a step back.

"We are going to make you reject the dark Emeralds."

I blinked, looking around again. There were so many books everywhere that it was more than intimidating. And distracting. They were filled with symbols and strange words that I couldn't understand. "How am I supposed to do that?"

Raven smiled slightly. It scared me. "Not easily. Not easily at all."

"So... pain." I sighed.

"Probably," Raven nodded, "but a pain well worth is. My job is going to be to hold the energy of the dark Emeralds next to you. We'll start off small, with just one. You are going to need to try and not let the Emerald control you."

"Why exactly are we doing this?" I asked.

"If anything, it could help you hold the Emeralds off when the time comes. Hopefully, it will help you ward the Emeralds off completely. Let's start."

I suddenly felt the overwhelming power of one of the jewels come over me. I held my head and screamed; I heard Raven yelling 'focus' over and over again, but I didn't know what to focus on. I thought of my friends, I thought of the planet I lived on, but I couldn't do it.