Sonic Boom!

Into The Wilderness

"Penny, you have the map?" Amy asked as she met Penny in the village. Penny nodded happily at Amy. "Yes! You ready?"

"As ready as I'll ever be." Amy grinned at her. The two girls started walking, and Sonic and the rest of the gang walked up. Sonic wrapped an arm around Penny and smiled at her. "Hey, Princess. Where you headed?"

Penny smiled at him. "Amy and I are going to collect Gum tree berries for our holiday wreaths. "Sticks glanced at them curiously. "Exploding berries? Little grenades for when the holidays get out of hand?"

"No," Amy told Sticks. "They just look nice on your door."

"But pretty things attract government agents. And opossums. And you know how horrible they smell. The opossums too."

"Penny and I'll take that chance!" Amy said. "See you when we get back from Hidden Meadows."

Sticks glanced curiously at Amy. "Hidden Meadows, huh? How are you and Penny genna get there?"

"Well, we were gonna go through Hazard Jungle, past Peril River, over Danger Falls, through Pleasant Gardens and around Jeopardy Lake." Amy said, looking over the map.

"Oh, no." Sonic frowned, pulling Penny close to him. "I'm NOT letting Penny take that trip."

"Sonic!" Penny groaned.

"Are you kidding me?" Sticks asked, ignoring Sonic. You two will never make it through Pleasant Gardens. I got to teach you two some survival skills."

The boys started laughing. Tails stopped and frowned. "What are we laughing at?"

"If anyone should teach Penny survival skills, it's me. After everything Eggman's thrown at him, surviving in the wilderness is a piece of..." Sonic let out a yell as he fell into the well. "Cake."

"SONIC!" Penny yelled, running over to the well. "Are you okay?!"

"I'm OK. I'll use my survival skills to fashion a ladder out of... Water. Tails, pull me up."

Tails flew down to the bottom of the well and pulled out a dripping wet blue hedgehog. Sonic grinned at Tails. "Great work, Tails. You passed "Well Rescue"." He turned to Sticks. "See, I can teach anyone."

Sticks smirked. " How about Knuckles?"

The gang turned to see Knuckles attempting to break a walnut using a stone.

Sticks grinned. " I bet that I can teach Penny and Amy survival skills better than you can teach Knuckles."

Penny cringed as Knuckles yelled out, "OW!" And then a second later, slurping could be heard. "Mmm! This is tasty."

"And the losers have to do the winners' laundry for a month." Amy said with a grin.

Sonic frowned. "That's not a fair bet. Knuckles and I don't wear pants. But I'll do it just to teach you a lesson."

"Yes!" Penny grinned. "Girls against boys!"

Sticks nodded. " So, we'll race to Hidden Meadows. That'll take a good four days. And some serious survival skills."

Sonic ran off and came back, holding a cup of gum berries. "Ta-da! Gum tree berries. Now Penny won't have to take that dangerous quest!"

Penny sighed in annoyance.

Amy frowned at him. "It's teams, Sonic. You and Knuckles versus Sticks, me, and Penny. To win, both of you need to get there. Good luck with that." Amy and Penny and Sticks walked off, giggling.