The Last Resort (A Sonic / Teen Titans Crossover)

XXXIV. Robin

I sighed as I put my mug in the coffee maker. I was still tired; I had spent a long time the night before trying to track down Red X. No matter where I looked, though, there had been no sightings of him anywhere. It was like he had disappeared after his fight with Sonic.

I couldn't imagine there being correlation between him and Slade. He was a mostly good guy and refused to join the Teen Titans. He wanted to work alone. And always appeared at the most desperate times.

After the coffee maker beeped, I took a sip from my mug and scowled. Beast Boy had used the last of the cream the week before playing a prank on Raven. It would have to do, though. I had to get some energy from some source.

I yawned as I grabbed the latest newspaper I had gotten in town. It was from a few days ago, but there were still sometimes some surprising things in it. Mostly things that didn't help me at all, like the 'Heroic Dog Saves Owner From Fire' article. It was cute, sure, but not helpful to finding Slade. I went through the pages, searching for something that didn't have to do with ads or dogs. But, as usual, there was nothing...

As I was closing it, something caught my eye. I put my mug on the table, focusing on the article. It talked about Robin. Me. And how I had broken into a top secret vault of some sort and stolen some valuable document.

It took me a few minutes to process that. Slade's kid was resorting to low measures. And wasn't Sonic the one they wanted? Maybe the document had something to do with the Teen Titans, and Slade wanted to read things he already knew.

I was about to shout for everyone to wake up when I heard the most blood curdling scream. It went on for so long that I had to cover my ears. It sent a shiver down my spine, and I had to take a few seconds to recover.

Starfire and Beast Boy ran down the stairs and saw me in the kitchen. "What was that?" Beast Boy asked. "It was like nails on a chalkboard!"

"It seemed worse than that to me," Starfire replied. She looked concerned. "Where is everyone else?"

"I don't think Cyborg was up when it happened, and Sonic went back to sleep. The only one awake should have been Raven."

"Raven cannot make sounds like that." Starfire commented.

"Come on, let's go!" I shouted, running between them and going upstairs. I went first to Sonic's room, and I stood in a bit of a trance for a few moments. Sonic wasn't there. Raven couldn't have made that sound. 

I sprinted to the medical bay. What in the world was Sonic thinking? Going by his own will to those emeralds... had he thought at all?

I threw the door open so hard that one of the hinges fell off. I took a step back as I saw Sonic. He was no longer blue - he was a disgusting black purple. He threw off an ugly aura. As he turned to me, his expression looked soft: a complete opposite of the rest of him.

"Sonic..." I muttered. "What did you do?"

"I..." He looked from me to where the fake emeralds should have been. "Now we can beat Slade! I'm more powerful than I was before. We won't have to worry about him anymore. I doubt he'll even dare to come near us!"

"Sonic, stop," I said as softly and nicely as I could manage. "We don't need power. We need your sanity!"

Sonic frowned, and I winced. "I... am sane. What made you think I wasn't?"

"You know what those emeralds have been doing to you, Sonic." I reached for his arm. "I don't know why you did it, but I'm sure you can still stop it."

He took a step back, looking warily at my arm. "Why would I want to stop this? I feel like I have enough adrenaline to run around the world a million times."

"That's not necessarily a good thing."

"When there's ten people after us, it is." Suddenly, Sonic smiled. "I get it. Oh, I get it, Robin. You're jealous. You want the emeralds all for yourself. You want to create weapons with them and use them to power yourself."

"Sonic, I can't even do that."

"That's exactly why you're jealous, kid."

I ground my teeth and turned my head for a few seconds. That only made the smug look on his face worse. "Sonic, this is ridiculous. Where's Tails? He would tell you that you were being crazy."

Sonic looked to his side. "It seems the poor guy worked himself to sleep." Sonic's face got brighter, his eyes lighting up as if he had an idea. "Hey! I can pour some energy into him!"

Sonic walked toward Tails, and my stomach dropped. "Sonic, I don't think that's such a good idea. These aren't your jewels of goodness that you're harnessing, remember? They're the ones that tried to kill you. They have their own will."

But it seemed like Sonic hadn't heard me. He put his hands over Tails and closed his eyes, and I saw Sonic in a completely different light. Well, literally and figuratively. He made the room seem to shine with blackness, covering every surface. He had no idea that was even happening, though. And seeing Sonic stand over something and transfer energy to it... well, that was a whole different kind of crazy. It was like reading something out of a fantasy book. This was something even Raven or Starfire couldn't really do.

Suddenly, though, there was a scream. And I knew the moment I heard it who it had been. Something had happened to Tails.

The black dissipated from the room, and I saw Sonic standing over his friend, staring into space. Tails was on the floor, shivering as if he had some terrible cold. I ran over to him, and seconds later the door opened and shut. I was really worried it would be Raven. She would not be able to amend the current situation. 

I sighed with relief as I saw Starfire. She would be the best person to calm Sonic down... if he could be calmed down. Sonic still looked like someone had been murdered right in front of him; then again, we didn't know if Tails was going to be okay. I just motioned my eyes to Sonic and hoped Starfire would get the message.

She stared at me for a few seconds, then said, "Oh! Okay!" (Really discrete, Starfire.) "Sonic, what's wrong?"

Sonic stayed still as if he hadn't heard her. I pointed to Tails and gave a thumbs up to Starfire.

"Sonic, Tails is okay," she said. He snapped back into reality, staring at her now. "He is alive. I am sure the goodness of the Chaos Emeralds can override the darkness of the ones inside of you."

"B-but there aren't enough!" Sonic yelled. "I can't turn into Super Sonic without all seven! Oh, man, I screwed up, I really screwed up this time..."

"You can try," I added. "And if it doesn't work, then you can try with just the ones you have. You don't necessarily have to turn into this other form."

"But... But... Tails told me that these emeralds are filled with nothing but negative energy. The Chaos Emeralds have both positive and negative energies. They might not be enough to override these..."

"There is no harm in trying, is there?" Starfire asked.

Sonic opened his mouth to say something, then looked back at Tails. He looked not only unsure, but scared. "I guess not."

Sonic disappeared for a few seconds, reappearing with the Chaos Emeralds in his arms next to Tails. He knelt down, his hands over Tails. He closed his eyes, looking like he was doing some sort of ritual I could only picture Raven doing.

"It's working!" I shouted as I saw Tails' eyes flutter open. "Keep going!"

Tails turned and looked at Sonic. "What... Sonic?"

I turned and looked at Sonic as well, and saw that he was only getting worse. There was something black from the Chaos Emeralds being sucked into him, and something pure into Tails. "Sorry, buddy... The world can't last without at least one of us."

"Sonic?" I shouted, shoving him away. "What are you talking about? What did you do to him!"

All of a sudden, Sonic started shaking. He wasn't shivering, though; was he crying? Then I heard something much more eerie than Sonic crying.

He looked up, and I saw that he was laughing.