//------------------------------// // Chapter 6 // Story: Friendship, Disharmony & Sonic // by natedeanmaan //------------------------------// Time Eater opened up a portal and watched the battle Sonic, his friends and the ponies had with the Moon Monster. The monster had thrown a punch at Rigby, but he dodged the punch and it punched a giant hole in the house instead. The rest of the park workers had used the cart to try and avoid the monster’s attacks. Discord reappeared in the Center of Time and asked, “So, what did I miss?” Time Eater said, “That Moon Monster had destroyed part of the house; it has thrown some punches and trees at the rest of the park workers and the rest of Sonic’s friends. Right now, it has Amy Rose in its hand.” Discord laughed in amusement at what he had caused for everyone at the park. His laughter was soon stopped after he heard what Sonic said in the portal. He said, “Hey Mordecai! I need that emerald!” Mordecai yelled, “All right! Here you go, dude!” He then threw the cyan emerald to Sonic, which he easily caught. Sonic then turned himself into a ball and launched himself in a spin-dash attack. He made contact with the monster’s stomach, bounced off it, and was ready to strike it again. Feeling nervous, Discord said, “That can’t be good.” Time Eater pointed at the portal and said, “And it doesn’t get any better.” Discord looked at the portal and saw the mane six arrive in front of the Moon Monster. Sonic continued his assault on the monster with the two emeralds he had. The monster desperately tried to swat him away, but he was too fast for it to follow. The monster eventually lost its grip on Amy, and she started falling to the ground. Mordecai caught her in time, and they joined the rest of the group, away from the Moon Monster. The ponies were off the ground and they were ready to use the Elements of Harmony. Sonic hit the Moon Monster one final time on the back of its head, and after the last hit, he distanced himself from it when the ponies fired the rainbow at it with their elements. Discord said, “I thought that monster could have handled them with ease.” Time Eater said, “It just shows you how powerful two emeralds can be!” He then said, “Don’t forget, one emerald was enough to get that thing from the moon to the park easily.” After saying this, Discord pulled out the yellow emerald and grinned from ear to ear. Time Eater said, “Your lucky you found that emerald or you could have been the one facing the Elements of Harmony instead of that Moon Monster.” **FLASHBACK** After the brief fight Discord had with Sonic, Time Eater pulled them back to the Center of Time, it was giving the draconequus a lecture and said, “You listen here! I need your chaos powers around to help me defeat Sonic! If you are killed before I get my revenge, it won't do me any favors!” Discord sighed in defeat and said, “Fine, so what do we do now?” Time Eater said, “We must get the other emeralds to help us out. There are six more out there, all we have to do is find them before Sonic and the ponies do.” Rolling his eyes at the obvious, Discord looked into the portal. A sudden sparkle caught his eye and he said, “Is that what I think it is,” while pointing at the portal. Time Eater looked at the portal and saw a yellow sparkle by Discord’s statue. It said, “Yes, I believe THAT is what we are looking for.” Not believing this, Discord said, “Are you serious? That’s one of the emeralds? How has that been overlooked?” Time Eater just said, “I don’t know, but it’s a lucky break for us. Now go get that emerald, before Sonic or anyone near that spot gets it.” Discord went back into the portal and arrived at the Canterlot Gardens near his statue. He looked around the spot and didn’t see Sonic or any of the guards around. He saw the emerald behind the statue, facing away from the castle. “Well, that could explain one reason it hasn’t been seen,” Discord thought to himself. He grabbed the emerald with his lion paw, and he immediately felt the power the yellow emerald was giving off. “Wow! Time Eater wasn’t kidding about the power this thing has, and it’s only one emerald,” Discord thought to himself with a wicked grin. He then saw Sonic leave the castle and run back to Ponyville with great speed. He also saw Princess Celestia write a letter and, in an instant, she sent it out of the castle. After seeing the letter fly off, he said, “This should be interesting.” Discord went back into the portal and returned to the Center of Time with the yellow emerald. After seeing Time Eater, he said, “You weren’t kidding about one emerald being very powerful.” It then said, “Now imagine that power times seven.” Discord then said, “I don’t want to imagine it, I want that to be a reality.” He laughed maniacally after the thought of the power all seven Chaos Emeralds could give him. Time Eater looked back at the portal and saw Tails, Knuckles, and Amy joined Sonic and the ponies. It also saw something in the fox’s hands. “That doesn’t look good,” Time Eater thought to himself. Everyone gathered around Sonic, and in an instant, he teleported the ponies and the rest of his friends out of Ponyville. Discord’s laughter stopped when he saw it himself. The trick confused him and he asked, “What was that?” Time Eater said, “That was Chaos Control. This ability allows the user to slow down time, or teleport themselves to another spot. I’ve seen Sonic use it during our fight. He, as well as Shadow, and Silver, are the only ones that can use this technique. It also looks like Tails has a radar to help them track the emeralds.” Discord said in anger, “Oh, that’s just great! How do we face them while trying to get the remaining emeralds, if they have a radar of their own?” Time Eater opened up a few portals and showed him what it had planned. Discord saw one portal had a monster on the moon. It then said, “I’d say let’s use that monster for the next emerald.” **END FLASHBACK** After the power from the elements faded, they saw that the Moon Monster was no longer there at the park. Before any questions were asked between them, they heard Rigby through the portal, saying, “I’m glad to see Beef Burrito is back!” To their surprise, the Moon Monster had been turned into a toy. After seeing this, Discord looked on in disbelief and said, “You’ve got to be kidding. That monster, the whole time was a toy?! How is something like that even possible? I’m the only one that can do something like that!” Time Eater opened up a portal and watched an incident with the Moon Monster. What it saw was Mordecai and Rigby in the events leading up to the Moon Monster’s creation. After seeing what happened, Time Eater then said, “It looks like the raccoon stole a keyboard from a wizard, and used it to create the Moon Monster. It doesn’t matter though. The keyboard was destroyed after they left the moon.” Discord said, “That’s good to hear.” He looked at the portal and saw something that caught his eye, leaving him with a sinister smirk. Time Eater looked at the portal, and an idea had clicked in its head. It then asked, “Discord, can you be a good distraction to Sonic and his friends?” He looked at it and said, “Easily. Why? Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” Time Eater said, “I think I am thinking what you’re thinking, and it’s time we played a little game called “divide and conquer” with these creatures, while we get the next emerald.” Discord chuckled at the thought of the plan working and he teleported himself out of the Center of Time. Sonic and the group had left the park and followed the next emerald that Tails’ radar had read. Unfortunately, the emerald on the radar disappeared once they arrived at the spot. The radar picked up another emerald that was one hundred miles from where they were. Sonic used Chaos Control again to teleport the group to the new area, but once again, the emerald disappeared on the radar. The pattern was done two more times, leaving an exhausted Sonic in the process. He fell on one knee after the fifth Chaos Control was done. The group was concerned for him after seeing him on his knee. Fluttershy asked in a worried tone, “Are you all right Sonic?” He took a couple of deep breaths, got back on his feet, and said, “I’m just a little tired. I’ll be fine, just give me a minute everyone.” While Sonic continued catching his breath, the rest of the group started getting to know each other better. Amy asked Twilight, “So, what do you guys do?” Twilight answered with a smile, “I work in a library back in Ponyville. I also enjoy helping my friends out whenever they need my help. My friends and I do friendship reports to Princess Celestia after we learn something about friendship.” Curious, Knuckles asked, “So, I’m guessing you might write a letter once this is all over.” Twilight then said, “We’ll see.” Wanting to get into the conversation, Applejack said, “My family and I work on an apple farm in Ponyville. As y’all can guess, we harvest the apples in Ponyville.” Surprised by this, Tails asked, “All the apples? That must be a lot of work.” She said, “It is, trust me. But it’s all worth it in the end.” After Applejack was done, Pinkie Pie said, “I work at Sugarcube Corner and help make all of the baked goods in Ponyville.” Rigby asked, “Does that include chocolate cake?” Mordecai looked over in excitement after hearing chocolate cake. She then said with a smile, “You bet it does!” Mordecai asked, “Do you think we can have chocolate cake when this is all done?” Pinkie said, “I don’t see why not.” Mordecai and Rigby yelled in unison, “OOOOHHH,” leaving the group to share a good laugh from their excitement over chocolate cake. After calming down from their laughter, Rarity said, “I design the dresses at Carousel Boutique in Ponyville.” Hearing this, Amy suddenly said, “Ooh, ooh! Would it be too much trouble if I asked you if you could make a dress for me?” Sonic shook his head at her after she asked her question. Rarity said, “No, it wouldn’t be too much trouble at all darling. I’ve offered to make a nice suit for Sonic later, just to try something new, and I can already see a dress perfect for you.” After Rarity was done, Rainbow Dash said, “Me, and the rest of the pegasi, manage the weather in Ponyville.” Rigby said, “That sounds cool. I bet you slack off every now and then.” She rubbed the back of her head and said, “Just when it’s too slow, I’d never leave Ponyville hanging. I also try to learn some new moves so I can try to impress the Wonderbolts, the greatest flyers in all of Equestria.” Impressed by this, Mordecai said, “Hmm-hmm, that sounds interesting.” Fluttershy felt embarrassed to talk to everyone, but she went against her shy attitude and said, “I take care of the animals at my cottage. I also train my own choir of birds.” Sonic looked at her in curiosity and said, “That sounds cool. I never heard of a choir of birds before. Are the birds easy to train?” She said, “Not always, some of them sing off-key. I also look after my friend’s pets when they need it, like Rarity’s cat Opal.” Everyone felt awkward after hearing the cat’s name. Mordecai then said, “That’s a very…unique name for a cat. It was great knowing the six of you. How about you guys? I’m sure you guys also have something interesting to talk about since you tag along with Sonic and all.” Tails said, “There is a lot to tell, but I think we should get going. I think Sonic should be good to go right now.” Sonic stood up and felt good again, but he still felt a little weak. However, he ignored it and wanted to look for that emerald. He said, “Yeah, I’m good to go. Let’s get going everyone.” The radar picked up the emerald and it read that it was 500 miles away from where they were. Everyone gathered around Sonic once again, and in an instant, everyone disappeared, going to the Chaos Emerald. The radar once again lost the emerald once the group arrived at the area the radar read. The emerald appeared again one thousand miles away. Everyone was becoming frustrated with the radar, thinking it might have a loose wire or some other malfunction to it. Sonic used Chaos Control once again, but he was still a little tired from the last set of Chaos Controls he used. He was able to get the group to the spot the radar last read the emerald’s location, but it disappeared once again. Tails this time, stopped him from using another Chaos Control and decided to inspect the radar himself. Out of frustration, Rigby asked, “Are you sure that radar is reading the emeralds, right?” Tails snapped at him and said, “I made the radar, so I’m sure it's working just fine Rigby.” Mordecai got between them before a fight broke and said, “Sorry Tails, but it’s been two hours already. We should have been able to find that emerald by now.” He rolled his eyes at Mordecai’s response. Catching his breath, Sonic said, “Not to go against you little bro, but we have had some problems with an invention of yours before.” Curious about the experience, Applejack asked, “Mind telling us that last experience?” Sonic felt a little uneasy about telling everyone about the Wisps and what he and Tails went through to save them. So, he figured it would be best to tell them about it another time and said, “It’s a long story, we’ll tell all of you about it later.” After hearing this, the group nodded in understanding. Tails started working on the radar once Sonic started talking to everyone. Sonic then said, “But we can still tell you about ourselves and how we met. All I can say is that I met Tails, Amy, and Knuckles from three instances of Dr. Eggman’s attempts to rule the world.” Rigby asked, “Who’s Eggman?” Before he could tell him, Twilight said, “He is an archenemy of Sonic’s.” Mordecai jumped in and said, “He was telling me and Twilight about that time he stopped that space colony that fell to Earth a while ago when we were looking for the emerald back at the park.” Remembering the incident, Rigby said, “The falling space colony… Wait, that was you?” Sonic nodded to his question. He then said, “Dude, that was awesome! Who was the other hedgehog that was with you?” Knuckles said, “That was Shadow.” Pinkie asked, “Is he a friend of yours?” Sonic said with a shrug, “Sort of, he’s more of my rival than anything.” Getting back to the topic he was going to tell them, he said, “Anyway, I met Tails and saved him after Eggman had kidnapped him for some sort of ransom. I still don’t know what the ransom was for. But regardless, he has been helping me stop Eggman ever since. I saved Amy from Metal Sonic, a robot that Eggman had made to match my speed and strength in hopes of it defeating me. It might have looked like me, but it was no match for my speed.” Amy clasped her hands together and remembered the day as if it were yesterday. From meeting Sonic in person for the first time after Little Planet arrived, to the kidnapping by Metal Sonic, to him saving her in the very end. He continued by saying, “I met Knuckles on Angel Island. Unfortunately for me, Eggman found him first and he told him I was there to steal the Master Emerald.” Confused by what she heard, Twilight asked, “The Master Emerald?” Knuckles then said, “It’s a giant emerald that has control over all of the Chaos Emeralds. It also keeps Angel Island floating in the sky.” Curious by this, Applejack asked, “Don’t you worry about leaving that emerald alone on the island?” He simply said, “I have some concerns, but stopping Discord and Time Eater is something a little bigger than the Master Emerald. Besides, no one can get on the island unless they can fly on there.” Sonic continued the story and said, “Later on, after I kicked Knuckles’ butt, he finally figured out that I was on his side after Eggman tried to steal the Master Emerald.” Angered by this, Knuckles said, “THAT WAS A LUCKY SHOT AND YOU KNOW IT!!” Sonic then said with a cocky smile, “If you call a punch to your chin a “lucky shot,” and you get knocked out from it, then yes that was a lucky shot.” Knuckles glared at him in annoyance, while everyone got a good laugh at the story. Tails was still working on the radar, but he was still able to listen to the conversation and had a laugh after remembering seeing the fight himself. Sonic looked over at Mordecai and Rigby and asked, “You guys know about us now. So, what do you guys do?” Mordecai answered by saying, “As you know, we work at the park. But there are days when it gets very boring. So, we usually do our things to keep ourselves entertained while we’re there.” He raised his eyebrow and asked, “Like, slacking off?” Mordecai tried to catch that by saying, “Dude, I uh, I wouldn’t say-” Sonic assured him by raising his hand and said, “There’s nothing wrong with taking a break here and there, but you also got to know when to get your jobs done.” Mordecai then said with a smile, “Trust me, I know that. It’s Rigby you should be telling that to.” Feeling insulted by the statement, Rigby said, “Hey! I know when to not slack off!” Mordecai looked at him and said, “No you don’t. There was that one time you kept complaining every five minutes about setting up the chairs for that kid's birthday.” He retorted by saying, “That job was boring, and you know it!” Mordecai said, “Maybe, but at least I knew the job needed to be done!” Rigby yelled, “SHUT UP!” Sonic looked at the duo in disbelief and said, “Seriously Mordecai? He complained about setting up chairs for a birthday?” Mordecai said, “Yeah, but that’s nothing compared to him paying someone to do his job so he could slack off.” Everyone looked at Rigby in disbelief from that revelation, even Tails stopped working on the radar as he heard this. He said, “You can’t be serious with that one Mordecai.” Mordecai said, “Trust me Tails, I wish that was a joke, but it’s not, and the guy he hired was a doppelganger.” Rainbow Dash said, “A doppelganger? As in, someone who looked just like Rigby?” Mordecai said, “Not exactly, he transformed himself into looking exactly like Rigby and tried to take over his life.” The ponies were surprised to hear this, they didn’t know that shapeshifting would be outside the realms of what the Changelings could do. Knuckles said, “Was it hard to figure out the real Rigby from the doppelganger?” Mordecai shrugged, “No, not really. If you’ve known Rigby for as long as I have, you can figure him out easily, and for me, I knew it was him because he’s the biggest whiner I know.” Everyone busted out laughing at that statement. Rigby was getting more annoyed at becoming the “butt of the joke” to everyone. He thought of a moment to tell everyone and got a grin on his face after thinking it over. He then said, “I got a story to tell as well. Mordecai once got some cologne to try to impress this one girl back at the park, but instead, he attracted these-OW!” Mordecai had punched Rigby as hard as he could in the back of the head, knowing full well of what he was going to tell everyone. He put on a fake smile and said, “Could you guys give us a minute?” He then dragged Rigby away as quickly as he could so he could talk to him in private. Twilight was left a little curious as to what Rigby was trying to tell everyone, she thought she might ask Mordecai when he gets back. Once they were out of sight and were sure no one could hear them, Mordecai said in anger, “Dude, what’s with you?!” Rigby said, “Why are you ruining my life with those stories?” Frustrated with him, Mordecai said, “UGH! Quit being such a baby! I’m trying to share a laugh with everyone, not try to scare them away!” Rigby said in dissatisfaction, “Scare who? You mean Twilight?” Saying the last part with great emphasis. Even in the short amount of time with Sonic and company, Rigby could pick up Mordecai giving special attention to Twilight and he already figured him out. Mordecai glared at him, becoming embarrassed and angry at his accusation. He then grabbed Rigby by the shoulders and lifted him, giving him a serious death stare when he was at his eye level, and said, “You listen here, if you breathe a word of that story to Twilight or anyone here, I swear we’ll leave you behind at the next stop from the Chaos Control!” Seeing the seriousness in his eyes, Rigby felt scared from the threat, took it to heart, and said, “Okay, okay! Jeez! I’m sorry, I just don’t like being made fun of.” After calming down, and thinking it over, he felt bad for telling those events. Mordecai said, “Come on man. Sonic told us that Knuckles got his butt kicked a while back. Do you think he wants to kill him right here, right now because of that? It was all in good fun going down memory lane.” Rigby got a chuckle after remembering the little spat between Sonic and Knuckles after he told everyone how they met, and what eventually happened later. He then said, “Yeah, that was funny.” Mordecai said, “See, I told you. I wasn’t trying to embarrass you, I just thought they were funny after going through them. Just be glad I didn’t say anything about you changing your name to ‘Trash Boat’.” Sonic was finishing up telling them about the space colony before the duo came back to the group. After arriving, Mordecai said, “Hey everyone.” After seeing him, Twilight said, “Hey Mordecai. Do you mind if I ask you something?” Mordecai simply said, “No, I don’t mind. What is it?” She then asked, “What did you attract with that cologne, and who were you trying to impress?” He stammered and said, “Uh, well…I, uh.” Fortunately for him, before anything was explained, Tails finished repairing the radar, and it picked up another emerald reading. After hearing the radar, he breathed a sigh of relief and said, “I’ll probably tell you another time. It sounds like we got an emerald to find.” Sonic was well-rested and was ready to use Chaos Control again. The radar was reading that it was at least five hundred miles from where they were at. Everyone gathered around, and in an instant, the group was gone.