Pinkie, with her fresh pair of wings, walked into the Department of Insufficiently Advanced Technology. Ronyo followed close behind and closed the door behind them. He sat on a stool while Pinkie pronked onto a beat-up couch.

They sat and stared at each other for a moment.

And another.

"Get it out of your system," Ronyo said with a sigh.

"What system?" Pinkie blurted. "You had a nice program for organizing notes and everything, and now you're just using a markdown editor? And you're on like your third one?"

"I feel pretty good about this one," Ronyo mumbled.

"Yeah, because Scrivener was too 'complicated' for you to use so you just kept putting it off and now it doesn't even work on your Mac. Also how many different computers are you going to be writing this on?"

"Too many," Ronyo shot back. "It's almost like I'm the kind of person that keeps redesigning his website instead of actually writing content for his website."

"No kidding! Except you won't even put this on your website because it's a fanfic. Speaking of!"

She fixed Ronyo with a glare. "What was with that introduction?"

Ronyo shrank into himself. "What do you mean?"

"You know what I mean!"

They sat in silence.

And more silence.

Ronyo opened his mouth... and shut it. Several times.

"I need you to say it," he said finally.

Pinkie raised an eyebrow. "For the benefit of the audience?"

Ronyo shrugged. "Yeah, and I need to know what your problem is."

"But you know. You already know."

Ronyo sighed. "That's my problem, though," he groaned. "I know everything that happens so I just imagine everything happening and I don't write it down. That's why it's taken so long. That's why I keep going through so many programs and computers and things because I'm trying to find some spark of..." He threw his hands up in frustration.

Pinkie looked concerned. "Why are you like this?"

Ronyo groaned. "If I knew that—"

"No no," Pinkie waved him off. "Not Evan. I mean you. Ronyo. Why are you like this?"

Ronyo shifted uncomfortably. "What... what do you mean?"

"I mean you can be anything you want! You're in complete control here! Why did you weird me and Twilight out when we first met you? Why make me so suspicious of you? Why do you let me keep yelling at you like this?"

"I'm trying to be honest," Ronyo mumbled.

Pinkie scoffed. "Bucked up a perfectly good self-insert is what you did. Look at you, you've got anxiety now."

Ronyo laughed despite himself.

Pinkie smiled and poked him with a hoof. "Okay, so you're being 'honest.' What does that have to do with you acting like a weirdo?"

Ronyo exhaled loudly and leaned back in his chair. "It's like... I don't actually know what's going to happen. I'm putting us in these situations and seeing what happens."

"But you planned this?" She flexed her wings and motioned to her horn.

Ronyo nodded. "You know how there's 'plotters' and 'pantsers'? Writers that plan everything out and writers that just see what happens? A friend of mine described me as a 'quilter.' I want some things to happen, but that just means I have to get the circumstances right. If I can't get those circumstances, it can't happen.

"For example," he motioned to Pinkie's wings. "The original outline was you making Nine a meal that reminded him of growing up on Gallifrey. He'd laugh, you'd poof, heeeey Macarena. But when I sat down to write it, it wasn't enough."

"You pushed me farther," Pinkie said quietly.

"For this to happen," Ronyo said, "I had to push you as far as you could possibly go. Overextending your party powers over a huge amount of time and making a Ratatouille-level dish wasn't enough. You had to be pushed, and Nine had to be impacted more." He shook his head. "Otherwise, the story isn't real."

Pinkie's hair had slowly deflated through Ronyo's explanation. "And you're going to push the rest of them, too."

Ronyo nodded. "If I can."

Pinkie got up and stood at her full height, wings extended. "Why shouldn't I try to stop you?" she said. The quietness in her voice was more threatening than Ronyo had expected.

"Because I don't want you to be separated," he said after a moment.

Pinkie considered his answer and nodded. Her hair bounced back, though not at full buoyancy.

"That, and I just think y'all are awesome," Ronyo added with a smile. "I mean, I read through the MLP Loops at least three times. Seeing all six of y'all at the tops of your game like that... that's what I want for you."

Pinkie nodded slightly. "Just promise me you'll tell them."

Ronyo nodded back. "I will. When they're ready."

Pinkie opened her mouth to retort, thought for a second, then didn't. "Yeah," she said with disappointment, "you're right." She sat back down. "But I still don't get why you chose to be weird when we first met."

Ronyo shrugged. "It's how I think I would act were I to see Twilight Sparkle and Pinkie Pie walk into my life."

Pinkie blinked. Then she turned to the side an

Hey.

... did you just

Yeah. I did. Stop it.

Stop what?

Stop acting like everyone is secretly annoyed by you. They're not.

What are you talking about, Pinkie?

You had your self-insert meet me and, instead of getting in a meme-off or bonding over a shared love of key lime pie, just came off as kinda sus.

I'm trying to keep things believable.

I'm sure you are. And you did. But give yourself a little more credit than that.

... Thanks, Pinkie.

You're welcome! Though you probably–

Yes, I am talking to someone about it. Can we go back to at least acknowledging the fourth wall now.

"Yeppers!" Pinkie said.

"So!" Ronyo said. "I take it you're much more aware of the story now?"

Pinkie took a deep breath. "Yeah! I mean before I just knew that saying some things would be funny and make somepony laugh so I would just say them even though it didn't make a lot of sense to me and it made other ponies look at me funny but they figured it was just me being me but now I know who was laughing and I'm so happy I could make them laugh but now it's like my Pinkie Sense is up to eleven and I'm seeing things from so many different angles and it's kinda big and there's a bunch of things that don't make sense but I know they're funny and I want people to laugh but it's like I don't know what I'm looking at all over again and—"

Ronyo interrupted her. "What is love?"

"Baby don't hurt me."

"And I brought you myrrh?"

"Myrrh-der!"

"Get to Del Taco, they got?"

"Fre sha vaca do!"

"Not sure if laughing with me?"

"Or at me."

"Disregard females?"

"Acquire currency."

"There are some things money can't buy?"

"For everything else there's MasterCard."

"Do you love the color of the sky?"

"Which one."

"I've connected the two dots."

"YOU DIDN'T CONNECT SHIT!"

A beat of silence, and they both cracked up laughing.

"Yeah," Ronyo said. "You're making actual pop culture references now."

Pinkie's eyes widened. "You mean... that's your world?"

"Mmhmm. Well, the author's world."

"But aren't you...?"

Ronyo shook his head. "No, I'm the author's self-insert. There's a difference."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning I'm going to experience things the author doesn't, and I'm probably going to end up very different as a result."

"Eh," Pinkie said with a shrug. "Tomayto, tomahto."

Ronyo rolled his eyes but smiled. "Anything else, Deadpool?"

Pinkie's hair instantly went flat. "Don't..." she said quietly. "Don't call me that."

Ronyo nodded. "Right, sorry. You're both fourth wall aware, but you're much less..."

"Stabby," Pinkie finished.

"Yeah," Ronyo said. "People can't laugh if they're dead."

Pinkie nodded. She took a deep breath, put her hoof to her mouth, and re-inflated her hair.

Ronyo smiled. "We should probably get back," he said.

"Yeah," Pinkie said. "I mean, it's episode five and you're only just now getting around to the adventure hook."

"Hey, now, I brought the multiverse hook in at the first episode!"

Pinkie shook her head. "But not the excuse for traveling from universe to universe."

Ronyo sighed. "Look, I'm working with what I've got he—"

"G.M. BLACKJACK DID IT!" Pinkie yelled. "IN A CAVE! AND ALL HE HAD WERE SCRAPS!"

Ronyo stared blankly at Pinkie. "Well, I'm not G.M. Blackjack."

Pinkie did her level best to say hello to everycreature at the party, and everycreature said hello back. A few tried to bow, but they found themselves blocked by a wing, a hoof, a solid block of pink magic, or—in Spark Plug's case—a key lime pie.

He lifted his head up and attempted to lick what he could off his face. "I'm not complaining," he said.

"Good," Pinkie said with an embellished scowl, "because there's more where that came from, Buster."

Spark eventually gave up and magic-ed the rest of it off. "And from Publix too," he muttered before holding his hoof out to her. "Proud of you, Pinks."

Pinkie returned the hoof bump. "You didn't...?" she asked, gesturing to him.

Spark grinned. "You just gestured to a—MMPH"

Pinkie silenced him with another pie to the face.

Spark blinked, then shook his head to try to shake the new pie off.

"Like I said," Pinkie said with a grin. She leaned in close and whispered, "But seriously, still disguised?"

"Yeah," Spark said, "I just... still need to figure myself out."

"And that's okay," Pinkie whispered before leaning back. "Got a plan?" she said at a more normal volume.

Spark Plug shrugged. "Probably gonna play some Animal Crossing."

"Good idea! Send me a postcard when you get your airport."

"I will! Hey, do y'all show up as ponies there, or does it depend?"

Pinkie visibly pondered for a moment.

"I don't think you know yet," she finally said.

Spark sighed. "Yeah, I think you're right..."

They stared at each other for a couple of seconds.

Pinkie smirked. "You don't know how to end the episode, do you?"

Spark rubbed the back of his head. "Not really, n—"

Pinkie pronked out of the seaplane, not at all fazed by the water landing. "Thanks for the lift, Wilbur!"

"Always happy to lend a pair of wings," Wilbur the Dodo answered.

Pinkie—currently a bipedal cat with shockingly pink fur—looked at her back. "Yeah, I guess I do need those," she said with a smile. She skipped through the airport and stood on the brick plaza, taking in the sights.

A white bird walked up. "Hey, a visitor!" she called. "Welcome to Istoría!"

Pinkie waved back. "Hi, I'm Pinkie Pie! Do you live here?"

"Of course!" the bird answered. "I'm Piper; nice to meet you."

"It's nice to meet you!" Pinkie responded. "What do we do her—wait." She took a breath and settled herself. "Actually, I'm looking for Ronyo. Is he here?"

Piper's face fell. "Not for a few months at least," she said with a frown. "Honestly, the place is beautiful, and I know humans don't always stick around, but..."

Pinkie ignored the sinking feeling in her gut. "I'm sure he'll be back someday." She licked a finger and stuck it in the air. "Thanksgiving is soon, and I know he likes that."

Piper smiled slightly. "I hope so." She perked herself up a bit. "But we're alright here."

Pinkie nodded. "I..." She looked around, saw what she needed, and started walking towards the Warp Pipe. "I think I need to find him."

Piper waved goodbye. "Tell them we miss them!"

Pinkie glanced in a random direction. "I think he knows." She hopped onto the Warp Pipe and with a salute to Piper sank into it.

She fell out of a garden shed, once again an alicorn. She trotted past an unusually large pale blue flower and hopped over the fence.

She passed deep space and waved at the weird-looking guy with too many eyes and even more arms. She very specifically did not look behind her because even she didn't need that kind of insanity. At least not yet.

She waved a wing at the couple that were human from the waist up and Pokémon from the waist down...

She very carefully tip-toed around the clearing with the sleeping two—no, three—wait, four?!—too-many-headed monster...

And finally ended up falling out of a rift in space and time. Instinctively she unfurled her wings to slow her fall, and she felt herself start gliding even though she couldn't feel her wings. She looked up to see she was holding onto a strange contraption halfway between one of her flying machines and a parachute.

Holding on with arms. And hands.

"Okay, human," she muttered. She looked down at her hooved feet. "...ish." She shook her head a bit and crossed her eyes. "Unicorn-ish?"

She looked down at the island she was flying over. There were pockets of people running along, sometimes on golf carts, sometimes hoverboards. And they were... shooting each other. With guns. She was about to panic and try to go somewhere else when she noticed that the people getting shot weren't actually dying, just getting teleported out.

And it clicked.

She glared in a random direction. "Fortnite? Really?" She looked back at the players. "And how am I supposed to tell which one's actually Ronyo?"

She looked at a group of three players on the summit of a small tower. One of them was labelled "actuallyOddEvan."

Pinkie glared back at the fourth wall. "Well now, that's just lazy writing." She aimed her glider to the summit.

As she approached, a couple of shots went towards her before she heard one of the players—a white fox with red eartips—yell "Cease fire! That's a friendly!"

"We're playing trios!" the fire demon said, keeping a gun trained on Pinkie but not firing. "Is it an NPC?"

The fox sputtered for a moment before finally hanging her head. "It's Pinkie Pie."

"How did Pinkie Pie get here?" the third—Boba Fett—said, keeping a sniper rifle trained on the factory below them.

Pinkie landed. "Well, they've already got a deal with Hasbro for Transformers, so..."

The fox sighed and stowed the gun. "What are you doing here, Pinks?"

"Looking for you, silly!" she said, booping Ronyo on the nose. "Though you look silly without any tails."

Ronyo grumbled. "I get one tail for every elimination."

The three players stood up straight suddenly.

"We're outside the circle," Ronyo said. One of the others pulled out a small snow-globe-like thing that had a black hole inside of it.

"Pinkie," Ronyo said, "can I meet you back at the Lighthouse?"

"How do I get there?"

The others cracked the snow globe and disappeared into a crack in time and space.

"I'd say take the Rift," Ronyo said before diving into the same crack.

Pinkie glared at the fourth wall again before—

Nope! Call it something else, Mister!

...before hopping into the black hole and getting scattered across time and space and whatever is in those higher dimensions we don't know anything about and walking through the door back into the Department of Insufficiently Advanced Technology.

A bipedal cat in a beanie and pink t-shirt was lying on the couch staring at the ceiling. Pinkie poked it. "Change costumes?"

"Yeah," Ronyo said in a scratchy voice. "Got third in that match. Severely outplayed. So we switched it up and went back in." He sat up. "Everyone else was playing Meowscles, so I played Meow Skulls."

"Such a furry," Pinkie said with a smile.

Ronyo smiled back. "Making peace with it." He reached around his back and pulled out a shining golden crown. "Helps that we won."

He got up, stowed the crown, and turned around in place while turning back into a human. He pulled a laptop off a nearby shelf with a sticker on the lid that said "Ask me about my fanfiction."

"Now, where were we?" he said.

Pinkie sat, and her hair deflated a bit. "You said you were going to either keep writing or post a synopsis. And last night you changed the status from 'incomplete' to 'cancelled.'"

Ronyo sighed. "I'm sorry, Pinkie. I..." He scratched the back of his head. "I'm proud of where I got, what I had in mind, what I planned. I just... can't put in the work. Not for characters that aren't mine at least."

Pinkie nodded. "Wait, why does the fan fiction thing matter? It's not like you're selling stories anyway."

Ronyo rolled his eyes. "It hobbles everything. I can't even do something like a newsletter giveaway. And I don't want to have the specter of Hasbro looming over me. And..." He sighed. "Let's be honest, I haven't been on FiMfic in ages. My subscription list is a mile long." He grabbed his hair. "Pinkie, there's a chapter of the Loops that I haven't read yet."

Pinkie grimaced. "Oh."

Ronyo opened the laptop. "Besides, you saw what I've been writing lately. I've got characters and places that I want to develop that are a lot like..." He gestured around himself. "This. I wanted to use your story to get feedback on the ideas, show it to a bigger audience, but with the way I botched the upload and with how much time I'm spending on Smolblog, I think I need to just break it off now."

Pinkie just stared at the floor. "So what happens to us now?"

"Two things," Ronyo said. "First, I know most of y'all will end up here one way or another. Maybe a background cameo that's just vague enough to avoid copyright infringement."

"Ready Player One did it," Pinkie shot back.

Ronyo stuck out his tongue. "Second, I've got the outline of what would have happened in Friendship Is Multiversal. A few scenes, sketches, that sort of stuff. Wanna hash it out?"

Pinkie stood up. Her hair didn't inflate—it was still a sad occasion—but she put on a smile and hopped onto the couch next to Ronyo.

"So," she said, "I have my wings, everyone's home safely, what next..."

What's next is Sonic and Tails still have to get home. So naturally there's a lot of world hopping while we plant the beacons that should help us triangulate Mobius and get through whatever that distortion is.

Why are you calling Sonic's world Mobius? Nopony calls it that anymore.

Because SatAM was my first, okay?

Mostly we follow Sonic and Twilight around, but occasionally others. Probably Rainbow and you, and Clara and The Doctor as well. I didn't have much specific laid out, but my list of places to visit included the Pokémon world, The Librarians, and the grown-up kids from A Wrinkle In Time.

At one point they go to the Endless Mountain, which is the setting for Alto's Adventure. It's a fun mobile game, and I think it's on Epic too. The atmosphere of it is... really interesting, I think. So they're on a mountain that's stuck in a space loop (not to be confused with a time loop) and meet the crew which has a kind of Scooby-Do vibe going.

And the space loop is because the game is an endless runner?

Exactly. That's a fun one to find the way out of. Not sure what makes it fun, but it's fun.

At the tail end of one of these episodes, we see a clip of a different Sonic making a discovery...

Sonic was used to strange things. Eggman being a different pain than usual? Sure. Meh Burger making the occasionally good burger? Kinda fun! But this... this was next level.

He was floating a couple of inches off the ground. His spikes were defying gravity more than he was. His eyes were glowing red. The air around him was charged with power.

And his fur was gold-colored. And glowing. Also his bandanna changed colors?

"So..." Tails said, not entirely sure what was happening, "how do you feel?"

"Like I could run around the planet," Sonic said, stretching his arms. "Twice."

"Well, that's prepostero—" Tails was cut off by Sonic running off. Or was it flying? Either way, he heard the sonic boom in the distance.

He paused. "I hope I don't have to fin—"

He was cut off by a golden streak blazing through the island.

He looked around and sighed. "Four-one-thousand, five-one-thousand, si—"

Sonic skidded to a stop in front of Tails. "Like I said," he said with a smirk, "twice."

Tails looked at the deep furrow. "Clearly." He turned back to Sonic. "That didn't hurt?"

Sonic cocked his head. "Should it have?"

Tails just pointed at the three-foot-deep furrow that cut through several hills and buildings.

Sonic looked back. "Huh." He felt his face. "Yeah, still handsome," he said with a smile.

"What's going on?" Knuckles said. "Are we digging a new irrigation ditch?"

"Knuckles!" Sonic said, appearing in front of him in a blink and holding on to his shoulders.

"Who are you?" Knuckles said. "You sound like Sonic, but—wait, are you Roger?"

Sonic smirked. "Only if you're Travis." He shook his head. "Knuckles, it's me, Sonic!"

"Woah!" Knuckles said. "Did you dye your fur? And get hover boots?"

"No, it's Chaos Crystals! They had a reaction or something, and now..." He looked at Knuckles with the most earnest expression he could.

"Knuckles," he said as seriously as he could, "I want you to hit me as hard as you can."

"Okay!" Knuckles reared back and drove his fist into Sonic's stomach.

Sonic didn't budge.

"Nothing?" Tails said, jotting notes on a clipboard.

"Nothing," Sonic said.

Sonic and Knuckles met each other's gaze.

"Again!"

At two points over at Canterlot High, we have a couple of adventures. On one, Principal Celestia has to grapple with being a normal human in a school full of magic...

Sunset Shimmer leaned against the bathroom sink and sighed. "Can we just catch a break for Celestia's sake?" she groaned.

A flush from the first stall to her left startled her. Quickly, she busied herself washing her hands and forced herself not to make eye contact with whoever had just heard her outburst.

"So," an embarassingly familiar voice said, "is that an expression where you're from?"

Sunset looked up. "I'm afraid so, Principal," she said with a wry grin.

Principal Celestia smiled, though not as broadly as Sunset knew she could. "Do I want to know who my counterpart is?" she said. "If people are swearing by her..."

Sunset bit her lip. "She is kind of a big deal," she said uneasily. When the principal motioned her on, she continued. "Her full title is Celestia Dawnbringer, Princess of the Sun. And she literally raises the sun in the mornings." She paused and closed her eyes. "It's... It's amazing, watching it happen. Every year for the Summer Solstice there's a festival where everypony stays up all night to watch her raise the sun for the longest day of the year. And you can feel the love she puts into it, just the life that comes from her sunrise is... It's like nothing else."

Sunset opened her eyes and smirked broadly at the principal. "I've also seen her on the most normal days of the year, still in her flannel nightgown, a mug of heavily caffinated tea hovering next to her, just glaring at the sun while it rises." She thought dramatically. "Pretty sure I shouldn't repeat what I heard her say that one morning."

Principal Celestia blinked. "Every morning, you say?"

Sunset nodded.

She shook her head. "That sounds hellacious. I'll take horomonal, overdramatic teenagers any day over that as long as I get my summer vacation. No offense, of course."

Sunset smiled back as they walked out. "None taken."

Celestia paused with her hand on the door. "Thank you, Sunset Shimmer."

I had toyed with the idea of giving her and Luna some kind of magic. Most likely some kind of super charge from Destiny. Maybe. It's the other time that matters more.

Sci-Twi hasn't gotten any interest from colleges. Her friends aren't concerned ("you'll do great", "you're amazing", all that), but she's getting more and more freaked out by it.

Gentleheart finally hears back from one college off-the-record. They were told by "someone at Crystal Prep familiar with her abilities as a student" that she wouldn't be a good fit. It doesn't take long to put together that someone's trying to lock her out of her top schools.

Sci-Twi has a full-on Lesson Zero meltdown. Spike runs the journal to someone who's able to get a message through, and Princess Luna comes to visit. She talks Sci-Twi down from going full Midnight on everything and invites her back to Equestria sometime soon to talk further.

As Gentleheart is walking Luna out, Luna makes it clear that she's just going to pay Abacus Cinch a visit:

"A great injustice has been done here," Luna whispered harshly, "and if no one will correct it—"

"No, your highness," Gentleheart said firmly. "Your magic doesn't work here; you have no authority and no dominion. You may be royalty on the other side of the mirror, but here you have no title, no knowledge of the culture, and you bear an uncanny resemblance to a secondary school disciplinarian.”

Luna narrowed her eyes, not backing down but not escalating.

"Will it help," Gentleheart said, "if I swear by the Lion's mane that justice will be done."

Luna nodded and stepped back. "Only if you tell me," she said, "why true royalty plays at being a simple teacher?"

Dun dun DUN!

Oh yeah, having some fun there. We'll get to that. Anyway, Gentleheart pulls a Batman on Cinch and finds out that she's not doing it. She couldn't even do it if she wanted to; she has "no reputation" left. So that's a thread for another day.

Anyway, we get the beacons placed. Mobius and its corresponding Earth are revealed. And Robotnik's completely taken over.

So, Sonic Forces?

Exactly. Sonic, Tails, Twilight, Rainbow, and probably you, to be honest, all head over first-thing. Start shoring up the Resistance, start taking some potshots, but it's not doing a whole lot.

I'm assuming that's where you show up?

You got it, along with an army of fan characters. How else do you explain the avatar character in the game?

We get in, start making progress, Twilight cracks what the Phantom Ruby's doing and connects it to what happened with the portal back in episode 2. What Robotnik did was connect it to a computer system that was in turn connected to a living mind, Infinite. That allowed Infinite to control its reality-warping powers to create illusions, constructs, you name it. They're able to find a way to neutralize it just in time to stop the gigantic sun construct from destroying everything.

Wait, so the Phantom Ruby from Sonic Forces and Sonic Mania is a magic-sucking gem from the EQ-verse?

I thought it fit. Something able to send Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles across old places in Sonic Mania sounded like the overloaded amulet at the end of Friendship Games.

OK, so what's the twist?

What do you mean?

Come on, you set up that thing with Boom!Super Sonic, so what's the twist?

OK, fine. Then Robotnik shows up with his overclocked machine like he does in the game, there's a bit of a fight, and things start warping. So Sonic sees Twilight, and he gets an idea...

Sonic looked around, at the people following him, looking up to him... at his friends. He made eye contact with Twilight and smiled, then turned back to Robotnik.

"You think you're the only one with phenominal cosmic power here?" he yelled. "Because we have power of our own!

"Knuckles, who never hesitates to tell me when I'm being stupid, is Honesty!"

Knuckles raised an eyebrow.

"Tails, who will repair any machine in need—even yours!—is Kindness!"

Tails wasn't sure whether this was genius or madness.

"Tangle, who was willing to do anything to keep others safe, is Generosity!

"Charmy, who cracks way too many jokes, is Laughter!

"Amy, who never stops believing in us, is Loyalty!"

Amy gripped her hammer a little harder, readying herself for whatever was next.

"And Silver, who always makes sure to listen, is Empathy!

"Together," Sonic finished, "we have the greatest power of all. The power of Friendship!"

He raised his fist to the sky, the (real) sun glinting off his bracelet.

No one moved.

"Is that a joke?" Robotnik finally said over the loudspeaker.

Sonic just stared at him in defiance.

"It's not?!" Robotnik said before devolving into maniacal laughter. Several of the Mobians backed up just a little, not sure what was going on.

"Come on, Chip," Sonic said quietly. "Just give me one last go. Please."

And as Robotnik laughed, Sonic's bracelet—his last memento of his time with Light Gaia—began to glow. And the power of the Chaos Emeralds, still secure in their temples, began to flow.

And with a flourish, Sonic raised his other hand, and then flung both his arms down and back as he transformed into Super Sonic.

"Now I'll show you!" he yelled as he flew towards Robotnik's craft.

...I might need you to connect some dots.

Sure! So for mainline Sonic games, we've got Sonic Unleashed, then Sonic Generations, and now Sonic Forces. In Unleashed, which I directly call out in episode 4, the plot revolves around returning the Chaos Emeralds to the different Gaia temples around the human world. And Sonic never collects the Emeralds after that, he just has Chip's necklace that he keeps as a bracelet.

When Infinite is messing with time and space, he weakens the walls between the worlds. (That might have been a plot point later, might not.) But that allows Sonic—boosted by an Elements of Harmony invocation—to sort of "wake up" Light Gaia enough to turn him into Super Sonic.

Anyway, they fight, it's one-sided, and Robotnik disappears into Null Space. Sonic, of course, follows him. Alone. He gets there, and everything's weird and distorted, flashes of other realities and timelines and whatnot.

But there in the middle is three Robotniks. One's the one that Sonic followed, one has a different vest and honestly looks a little scared, and the last is younger and fighting with another robot. And they're all fighting over the Phantom Ruby.

And surrounding them is Sonic, another sonic that's younger, and another that's taller and has a bandanna.

So Modern, Classic, and Boom!Sonic?

Exactly. This is basically merging in the final boss fight from Sonic Mania and also giving us the three Sonics that we thought we were getting for Forces. Classic is pissed, like full-on ready to obliterate his Robotnik for real. Boom is just kinda vibing, but he knows how to fight when the chips are down. They fight, stuff blows up, and the ruby space starts collapsing.

Boom!Sonic grabs his Eggman (who, let's be honest, isn't that evil) and they escape back with the other Sonics' help because he's still not used to being Super Sonic. Sonic says some goodbye to Classic, and Classic flips him off before flying away.

Our Sonic tries to see if there's any Robotnik that needs saving, and the space deteriorates even further. And he realizes he can't get out. And he's almost ready to give up...

When a sonic rainboom shatters the space open. Rainbow grabs Sonic, and he steers her back towards the rift the rainboom made. They escape and crash into the ground on the cliff they were first fighting at. Or at least Sonic does.

And there's nothing there but Rainbow's cutie mark scorched into the ground?

You know.

So how does she get back?

Chip—Light Gaia—meets her. And she fully thinks she's dead. Like crashed full-tilt into the ground. And she doesn't think she did anything special, just what anyone would do for a friend. Chip reminds her that not only was she able to do what she did, but she also actually did it. And sends her back.

Superhero landing, everyone's happy, the day is saved, and...

LOYALTY has joined the party!

Ronyo shut the laptop. "And that's season one."

Pinkie nodded. "So that's half of us. Building toward something big?"

"I think it's big."

She nodded, thinking some more. "What about the Carly Rae scene?"

Ronyo grimaced. "I... don't know."

Pinkie grinned at him. "Come on, I know you ship them."

Ronyo sighed. "Fine." He cracked open the laptop. "If—and I do want to emphasize if—I ended up shipping them, here's how it would go."

The day is saved, Rainbow has ascended, and everyone starts having a party. Helps that the Princess Of Parties is there.

You know it.

Sonic and Tails are recounting the story of how they found their way back, the friends they met along the way. Knuckles notices that Twilight gets brought up every other sentence. So does Amy, but she and Sonic are solidly friends by now. Sonic makes sure to thank Knuckles and Amy for keeping things under control while he was gone. They make sure to ask him when he's going to ask Twilight out.

He’s completely taken aback by the question.

He talks it out with Tails. And he realizes.

And then the song starts up.

And he’s out in the middle, dancing in front of Twilight, and starts singing a song about how he likes what’s going on and he’s not sure entirely what it means, but he needs to tell her something…

Because it might not be love, but he really really really really really really likes her.

And they get to the bridge, and Sonic’s all “I need to tell you something.”

And Twilight puts her hoof up and whispers back “I need to tell you something.”

And Sonic cheers and everyone’s dancing and singing along and it’s just a big party and… yeah.

“So there’s the shipping,” Ronyo finished.

“Good,” Pinkie said. “Cadence will be happy with that.”

Ronyo rolled his eyes and shut the laptop. “Want me to get on with season two?”

Pinkie hopped off the couch. “Nah,” she said. “I think I’m gonna go throw a few parties and teach Dashie how to Earth Pony.”

Ronyo furrowed his brow. “You’re hardly a typical Earth Pony; are you sure you should be the one teaching her that?”

Pinkie smirked as she trotted out the door. “She’s hardly a typical Pegasus, but she insisted she be the one to teach me to fly. I’m just returning the favor.” She opened the door and called over her shoulder. “See you later!”