A Beacon of Hope
Dawn looked up at the hut ceiling as she laid on her makeshift cot. Now that she finally had a moment of downtime, she knew she had to start coming up with ideas on how to escape this world, but the events of the day had physically and emotionally exhausted her. Even though sleep called to her, she knew she had to make the most of this precious time.
She had a few ideas. Perhaps there were hints of some sort scattered across the island, and she could find them if she looked hard enough. Perhaps there was an adversary who held the answer, and she had to defeat them to obtain it. Her first thought was Eggman, but then it suddenly turned to Sonic. He was so unlike the mother she knew and loved, she wouldn’t be surprised if he turned out to be behind all of this. She still didn’t if know he was real, or some monster spawned from her worst nightmares.
Now having some idea on where to start, Dawn let herself fall asleep, hoping that the new day would bring her renewed confidence.
She woke to birds chirping outside her window. The golden morning light poured over the soft pink walls of her room, over her toys and the whimsical drawings she had made. Her belly rumbled, and she began crying out for nourishment. In minutes, her mother appeared before her and cradled her in his arms.
“Hey, baby girl.” he said sweetly. “It’s okay, Momma’s got you.”
Sonic held Dawn’s bottle close to her lips, and she hungrily suckled. Her father joined them just then and wrapped his arms around Sonic as they watched their daughter feed.
“Look at her.” Knuckles said. “Our little ray of sunshine.”
“The miracle born from our love.” Sonic said. “She’ll grow up to do great things. I just know it.”
Knuckles knew it, their friends knew it, and the villagers they protected would come to know it, too.
Dawn was comforted for a moment when she woke up. She had been given one of her fondest memories when she desperately needed it, and she clung to it for as long as she could. She had seen her mother, her real mother, the one who loved and cared about her. The one who was always there for her and supported her throughout everything. The one who would never dream about ever hurting her.
She missed him so badly, it hurt.
Dawn heard something splash on the ground, followed by a strong, unpleasant smell. She sat up and saw that a strange-looking liquid was spilling across her bedroom floor. Its smell was powerful and overwhelming, forcing Dawn to cover her nose, but at that moment she realized what it was. Gasoline.
She saw Knuckles standing outside her window, holding a lit match. His eyes were completely black and his face was covered in bright red war paint. Then, without a word, he tossed the match to a stream of gasoline near his feet, setting it ablaze.
The gas covering Dawn’s floor led across the room to the door. The strip of wood caught fire, and at the rate it was traveling, it would reach her very soon. Panicked, Dawn tried to punch through her window, but the glass was surprisingly tough, even with her strength-she only managed to create a few long cracks and two small holes left by her knuckle spikes. She tried again, and the damage increased, but the window still held. The smell of fire and smoke was growing stronger, and Dawn started to cough. She knew without looking behind her that the flames were getting closer.
Desperate, Dawn gathered all of her power into her fist and punched, finally shattering the window. She crawled out of the small space to freedom and took in gulps of fresh, clean air.
Suddenly, Knuckles had her trapped in his arms. Dawn struggled to break free, but he had been training for far longer than she had and was notably stronger that her. She heard an evil chuckle and saw that Sonic had arrived in his mech suit.
“Oh, Dawn, did you actually think you could hide from your parents forever?” he asked unpleasantly. “It’s time to face your punishment.” The right hand of the mech suit converted into a long blade, which Sonic prepared to slash at Dawn with.
The spike of fear gave Dawn the burst of strength she needed to pull her arm free and claw at Knuckles with her spikes, releasing her from his lock. She ducked in time to avoid the incoming blade and sped away from the nightmarish versions of her parents.
Sonic growled. “Dawn, get back here!” he screamed after her. “Don’t run away from your mother!”
“You’re not my mother! You’re a monster!” Dawn yelled back at him, which only angered him even more. He fired blasts of energy at her, which she spin dashed away from. Suddenly, there came the sound of a shock wave ringing out. Dawn looked back to see that Knuckles had pounded the ground, and she jumped to avoid the fissure he had created. Unfortunately, the ground she aimed to land on was broken off the cliff by the wave, sending her falling into the canyon below.
She lightened her fall by landing on stray ledges and was soon speeding down the narrow path. Sonic and Knuckles attempted to crush her by shooting and smashing giant chunks of earth off the plateaus above her, and she screamed each time one landed very close to her. After what felt like a long time, a river came into view, and Dawn dove into the water the second she was close enough. She swam beneath the surface and followed the current downstream, hopefully away from the psychotic freaks that resembled her parents.
Dawn could hold her breath for a long time, having spent ages practicing underwater, so she resolved to staying beneath the surface for as long as possible in the hopes of losing Sonic and Knuckles. She looked up, expecting to see them scanning the water looking for her, but all she could see was the watery reflection of the daytime sky. She lost them.
Relieved, Dawn continued downstream, not knowing where it would take her, but for the moment not caring. Although she was relaxed now, helped mostly by the water, she also felt sad. She finally had a moment of peace with whom she thought was her father, only for it to be ripped away and her father to be a horrifying manifestation of her nightmares, just like her mother. There really was no end to terrors of this world.
Dawn pushed back her sadness and continued on her way, still resolved to find a way out.
"Dawn, wake up." Shadow said urgently. After their fight with Metal Sonic, he had teleported to the bottom of the pit she had fallen into and found her. He had brought her to an abandoned wooden cottage and tried everything he could to wake her up, but nothing worked. She had been unconscious for a little over a day, and Shadow was growing increasingly worried. Sonic and Knuckles had tried to contact her twice, but the dark hedgehog was afraid to answer in her place for fear of them realizing something had gone wrong.
"Dawn, wake up. Please." he begged. "If you don't wake up, I'll never forgive myself for letting this happen to you, and neither will Sonic."
When Shadow found Dawn, he had searched her for any injuries or signs of head trauma, but aside from a few grazes, all she had was the cut on her wrist from their fight with Metal Sonic. Then it occurred to him: what if the robot had done something to her that somehow rendered her comatose?
He was hesitant to leave Dawn, but he promised to return as soon as he could. He quickly sped back through the cave-which seemed much less dangerous during the day-and to the complex they fought Metal Sonic at. His remains were still there.
As Shadow walked towards him, his foot caught something on the floor-Metal Sonic’s arm, the one Dawn had ripped off. He picked it up for a closer look, then noticed something that he could’ve sworn wasn’t there before. Needles on the tips of the fingers, covered in Dawn’s blood.
An injection? Shadow thought.
Pieces of the exoskeleton had fallen off. Beneath them, medical tubes connected to the needles ran down the arm. Shadow hurried over to Metal Sonic and lifted him onto his back, revealing his battle damage. There was a sort of storage unit in his torso. Shadow undid the latches on its right side, revealing a dull-colored liquid.
No doubt about it, it was an injection.
Suddenly, Metal Sonic’s eyes flared to life, startling Shadow. He jumped up, the liquid inside his storage unit spilling out and splattering at their feet, and flew out of the complex through the hole in the ceiling. Shadow stared after him as he made the connection.
So, Metal Sonic’s injected Dawn with something that put her in a coma. And he was built by Eggman, which means that…
Shadow's hands clenched into tight fists. Eggman. That imbecile is behind this, I just know it. I have to get him to tell me how to wake her up.
He quickly raced back to the wooden cottage where he brought Dawn. He knelt beside her bed and clasped her hand in both of his.
“Dawn, Eggman is responsible for what’s happened to you. I hate to leave you like this, but I need to go to him and force him into telling me how to wake you up, and once I have, I’ll come right back to you. I promise.”
Shadow took a second to rest his forehead on their joined hands, then stood up and hurried to Eggman’s lair, determined not to leave it without knowing how to save Dawn.
