Sonic Returns

Chapter seven: conversation

While Sonic and Amy Rose were on their 'date', Tails and Crazy Carl spent the day working on the old bi-plane in Carl's rickety old barn. The two had been busy fixing, welding, and replacing parts on the Tornado, slowly restoring the ancient plane to its former glory. As the two worked on the plane, Tails complained, about what had been occurring recently.

"Man, I can't believe that Amy Rose, talking about her magical mumbo-jumbo." The fox groaned, tightening a bolt with a wrench. "And Sonic's way too goo-goo eyed over her to see how silly she is."

"Sonic's just in love, it's normal for a boy- er, hedgehog his age, I suppose." Crazy Carl replied, handing a screwdriver to Tails. "As to this Amy, her claiming everything is magic is just a way of looking at things. Didn't your ancestors on mobius declare everything new and strange they encountered to be magic? I believe in big foot, the Loch Ness monster, and UFO's, and people call me crazy for it."

"That's not right! The job of any scientist to examine any claim without bias, either for or against the fantastic claim. No one should just..."Tails stopped for a moment, then facepalmed. "Oh... that's exactly what I have been doing, isn't it?"

"There are people in this world who would laugh at the existence of you and your furry friends, or your chaos emeralds, but yet here you are." Crazy Carl shook his head."I think there are many fantastical things science can explain, rather than just dismiss them outright. But then again, I'm supposed to be crazy." Both of them had a laugh at that, before Crazy Carl continued; "Speaking of which, how is the hunt for that last Chaos emerald you are looking for going?"

"Well, Sonic told me he banished Eggman to the Mushroom Hill Zone, so I believe he found the emerald located there." The fox replied. "So far we haven't been able to locate the final emerald, because my dad didn't mark it on the map."

"Wait, what exactly is a 'zone'?" Carl asked, confused. "And where do you think the last emerald is located?"

"Oh, a 'zone' is a mobian term for a region or place on a planet separate from other places, our meaning of the word is similar to the earth-English language term. Also, a zone can be a province or state." Tails explained. "As to where the last emerald might be, I'm starting to suspect it might be located in the special zone, far away from any of the inhabited worlds."

"Uhhhh. not to sound like an idiot, but-" Carl asked sheepishly. "What exactly is the special zone?"

"Ohhh-kay, let me try to explain this." Tails replied. Looking up from his work under the Tornado's hood, and pulled out the galaxy map both he and Sonic had a copy of. "First, there are the six inhabited worlds; Mobius, the homeworld of all anthropomorphic animals like me. Next, there is the little planet, mobius's moon. Then there is the lost hex, the home of the evil zeti, and your own earth, the human race are from. There is Green Gate, homeworld of the plant-like seedarians, thoguh I don't know much about them." The two-tailed fox explained. "Most of the inhabitants of these planets get between the worlds via warp rings. But, there is a world between worlds... a gap between dimensions, that is the special zone."

"A space between spaces." Crazy Carl nodded, understanding. "like the phantom zone from fiction."

"Uh, something like that." Tails shrugged. "It is a strange dimension, really hard to get to, and influenced by the subconscious of all the sentient beings in universe. The special zone is filled with tilting mazes, psychedelic birds, circus-like obstacle courses, and lots and lots of blue spheres. If the last emerald is there, getting it is going to be like going through an obstacle course."

"Good grief... special zones, chaos emeralds..." Crazy Carl looked at Tails in wonder. "How did you mobians come about?"

"Ancient aliens, crazy evolution, a deity with a sense of humor... who knows?" Tails just shrugged. " The only important thing is we are here, and we have to each do our best."