The Soleanna Festival

Princess Elise dreamt of fire. Of an unstoppable flame spreading across the Kingdom of Soleanna. Consuming everyone and everything in its wake. Dark orange skies, charred grass, a boiling sea. The screams of her people. "N-no… no…" She stood in the center of the flames, bleeding lava from the coal scabs under her fingernails. "I don't want to… I can't…"

"I can't wake up!" The buildings were razed, the people cried her name. She wouldn't do anything to help them. Her body wouldn't move right. "Please… please… please…"

"... Please don't wake me up."

"Please let me be warm for a little bit longer."

She snapped awake, with a face devoid of color. "Miss Elise?" Elise's caretaker asked, her pale face blanketed by a thick shade from her hood. Elise looked all around, mortified. She had spaced out completely in front of her entire kingdom. They were all watching on that cold and sacred night at the Castle Town's bay.

"It's… the Festival of the Sun?" Elise asked her caretaker. A fickle hush befell the once bustling and roaring crowd. Elise couldn't distinguish the murmurs inside and outside of her own head.

"Yes, it is. Don't cry, it's okay," her caretaker whispered, sounding like she was nearly as panicked as Elise herself despite her words. Elise held in a scream as it suddenly shot up her throat.

"It's so cold…" Elise squeaked, holding a scepter with a purple flame at the tip.

"I'm sure it's just the wind," her caretaker replied. She regained a calm, official stance.

Elise stared past the fire at the orange core of the owl statue depicting the kingdom's god. Her eyes, protected by messy brown hair and a layer of dry glaze, were numb to the violet embers flying so close to her face. She took a deep breath.

"We give thanks to Solaris for another year of light. Light that illuminates our past, our present, and our future." Princess Elise recited. It was an incantation exactly as old as the kingdom itself. "May you watch over us and bless us with your insight forevermore." She held the scepter up to the core of the Solaris statue. Fire spread across the intricate rope network that covered the effigy of their god. As the smoke cleared from the dead flames, fireworks shot into the sky. The live orchestra swelled. The folk ensemble bowed out as the boats disappeared behind the Solaris monument. Their god was about to predict the country's future with the letters formed from the remaining rope. The whole country watched as the message became clear.

"EGG"

The castle town was immediately carpet bombed by an armada of hawklike airships haphazardly decorated to look like owls. At first, the blasts were indistinguishable from the fireworks. But as soon as their true nature became apparent, the cries of joy turned to screams of fear as the festival became a bloodbath.

Elise looked all around slowly at the loud sounds and explosions, oblivious to the carnage all around her until her caretaker pushed her away from the falling rubble of the Solaris statue. What appeared to be the flagship of the Eggman Empire lowered to the shrine they stood upon, leveling the statue until it was reduced to a stump. Eggman himself walked out onto a platform protruding from the cockpit.

"Princess Elise the Third! Congratulations on pushing through to the annual Sun Festival. The whole world is VERY impressed to see you even attempt to show up this year." Eggman cackled, spitting everywhere in his mad laughter. Elise stepped back confusedly until she bumped into the safety railing. Her caretaker reached out to her from under the rubble, motioning for Elise to run before her hand fell limp. "We both know you are feeling unwell. Instead of straining yourself any further, perhaps it would be best to hand me the Dark Scepter. Then I could run this ceremony myself… along with this ENTIRE KINGDOM! You will have nothing left to worry about." Elise turned away and ran. Only to be detained by an Egg Gunner Badmech. She screamed at the top of her lungs, as the Badmech pressed the barrel of its gun into her temple and attempted to wrestle the Dark Scepter from her hands.

"Ah, ah, princess. No tears," Eggman snickered, chugging a wine glass in celebration. "You mustn't cry. Take it from me, it's a bad look for a world leader." Eggman's glasses glinted in the fire. Until that fire was swept away by a whirlwind of blue energy.

"Well that's quite a flashy side show you've got here, Eggman!" A voice roared with the wind. Elise watched as a blue hedgehog materialized from the tornado. It was a sight she was used to at this point. The way he had arrived seemingly out of nowhere… his dark appearance… and those almost crystalline spines…

Then he smiled at her. Elise now knew it had to be a mix-up.

The Egg Gunner released her, and started firing at Midnight Sonic. Sonic jumped out of the way, Eggman ducked under the backfired bullets as they dented his Egg Carrier. "Gyaaah… SONIC! Quit WRECKING my ROBOTS!" Eggman was pelted by the countless remains of his finest mechanical army to date as Sonic toyed with them at speeds hundreds of times faster than light. It took being nailed in the nose by a whole gun to make Eggman run back into his Egg Carrier with his tail between his legs. "Oop… time to gooo-whoa!" The doors closed behind him, and the Egg Carrier took flight once more as the sole surviving ship of the Egg Fleet. Sonic screeched to a halt in front of Elise.

"You're…!" Elise exclaimed. Sonic picked her up in his arms.

"This is no place for a princess… let's get you back to your castle so you can roast marshmallows by the fires, your highness," Sonic jeered, rushing off as the Egg Carrier began firing missiles targeted only at Sonic and Elise. Sonic simply let them blow up behind them as if the threat was no problem at all. He let the Dark Scepter fall to the ground as if it was no problem at all.

A gloved hand with a strange symbol on it reached the top of a building. Up climbed a burnt, white hedgehog. "It's gone… all of it…" Silver the Hedgehog surveyed the damage, floating high above the burning ruins of the parade grounds. He landed by the crushed Solaris statue. "Isn't there more you could be doing to help them?!" He yelled at the statue, looking around at the damage. It seemed like many people surrounding the princess had attempted to hold the statue up, only for it to crush them. Silver shook his head, and brushed the rubble away with his psychokinetic gloves. "Hello? Is anyone in there?" Silver saw a single twitching hand reaching out to him. He lifted whoever was beneath the wreckage up. Out of the ruins climbed a violet cat, in a charred cloak. She coughed out some smoke. "Can you not breathe? Here, let me…" Silver put a hand on her chest, and carefully cleared out the smoke in her lungs from the flames. The cat finally gasped for air. She took deep, frantic breaths.

"Where's… Miss Elise?" The cat asked, falling forward. Silver held her up telekinetically. "She mustn't be alone. She mustn't be—!"

"I saw HIM with the princess. She's safe. For a little while. We'll have to follow them before they get too far," Silver looked in the direction Sonic had run off to with Elise. It was blocked off by a sea of flame spreading towards them slowly but surely. "It's gonna be here any second. We don't have much time. Is there anything you need to take with you? Is anyone else alive?" The cat shook her head.

"Not at all. Let's get moving," she clutched Silver's hand. Without too much hesitation, Silver flew them out of the fire. "My name is Blaze." Silver turned to her.

"I'm Silver the Hedgehog." They landed outside the ruins. Blaze stumbled forward as she touched the stone walkway. "Why did this have to happen? It seems like every day, there's a bunch of disasters all around the world. I was too late to save them…" Blaze followed a trail of owl feathers and strands of brown hair. "It seems like nobody wants a better world for tomorrow." Blaze arrived at a heap of broken robot parts, knelt down, and picked up the Dark Scepter in the middle of all the wreckage. "Hey… that's the scepter the princess used to light the flame. What's it doing here?" Blaze stared deep into the orb on the Dark Scepter's tip, clenching it so tightly it could have crumbled in her shaking hand. Silver then snatched it out of her hand with his telekinesis. "Hey. Careful. We don't want to break it, do we?" Silver's eyes snapped open.

Almost as soon as he grabbed the scepter, two hundred visions flashed in front of his very eyes. Wars. Flames, famine. Disease… Disaster. "GaaaAAAAH—!" Silver screamed, clutching his ears.

He dropped the scepter, stumbling backwards with foam spilling from his mouth. The scepter clattered on the ground, and a whirlwind of dark energy began to emerge from the orb. Silver's eyes wouldn't open on their own, so he forced them to open with his powers. He found himself in a rocky valley full of withered trees and volcanos. The ash in the air made it impossible to see too far in front of him, or to breathe. He heard the screams of the devil in the far distance.

"Is this another dream?" Silver thought to himself. A hand touched his shoulder. It was rigid and cold. Unnaturally colder than the environment around it. Silver turned around slowly to face what looked like the exact hedgehog who had run off with Princess Elise. It was someone he had seen many times throughout his life.

Mephiles.

"A dream of the absolute," Mephiles whispered. "Welcome again, Silver. To the end of all times." Silver leapt away and stood adjacent to the familiar stranger. "What you see before you is the exact river you stood by before picking up that wretched scepter. This is the world you call home, two days in the future."

"That's impossible!" Silver stepped even further back until he arrived at a cliff overlooking a mile-high drop into the volcano. "Erius is already a horrible place, but… how could it come to this in only two days?!" Mephiles stared Silver in the eyes, then pointed to the flames. "What… is that?" Silver heard a crash, then an explosion. His eardrums were nearly crushed.

"This fire is not natural," Mephiles told Silver. "It was spawned by a monster, yet remains manmade all the same. These are the Flames of Disaster… IBLIS!" Mephiles raised his arms to the flames. Volcanic rock crashed down just in front of Silver and Mephiles. Silver was knocked to the ground, hardly able to keep his eyes open. All he could see was Mephiles levitating above him. "Time is running out, Silver. Will you stand by and allow this to happen? Will you pray for Solaris to save you now, out of all the times your kingdom's unanimous prayers have gone ignored?"

Silver clenched his fists, burning alive. "How could you possibly be so calm about this?!"

"Who else do you think would have caused this? It was me, Silver. It was I who awakened the flames. I am the Iblis Trigger," Mephiles looked all around at his magnum opus.

"Mephiles, for what you did to this world, I will destroy you!" Silver held his hands up to Mephiles. Only to find his powers had no effect. "What…?!"

"You sure are quick to violence. Unfortunately, you're incapable of vanquishing me," Mephiles approached Silver, and stared into his eye. "Such foolishness… such drive and courage. Very well, let's see if you can entertain me. I will send you back to your present. You have two days to stop me before my plan comes to fruition, before Iblis is released." Mephiles chuckled. "But don't be concerned. There's always the coward's way out." Mephiles shambled closer to Silver. "After all… if you have time to worry, then RUN." The crackling fire grew louder, Mephiles disappeared into the embers. Silver was consumed by the flames.