Chapter Text
Sonic had spent a lot of time in his life dreaming about being able to come out into the open. Then again, he had spent a lot of time in his short years dreaming about a lot of things, most of all among them having a family. He could remember what coming to Earth had been like; cold, lonely and – to a four-year-old child – very scary. Longclaw had told him that people would want his power if they knew about it, knew about him, so he kept to himself, hiding in the forests of North America.
Until he came to Green Hills, came under investigation, and subsequently met the humans he had been pretending he had a connection to, and was promptly adopted after the last battle with Doctor Robotnik. Well, adopted not in the formal way – after all, he was a four-foot-tall anthropomorphic hedgehog that only the town knew about – but it was in the little ways, like how Maddie kissed him on the forehead and tucked him in at night, like how Tom helped him sign up for little league if he didn’t use his speed to cheat (and as long as he stayed in Green Hills but that went unsaid).
But funny enough this wasn’t about him (shocker!).
“Knux! Yo, Knucklehead, where you at?”
“Do you think he found a way back?”
Sonic looked down at Tails, the fox looking at him with a small frown on his face. In the few months since the kit had shown up in his life, he had gotten used to having him by his side, despite having lived alone for most of his life. It was like having a brother – something else he had dreamed of – and Sonic didn’t like the way Tails worried his lower lip as they searched for their red furred frienemy. He crossed his arms behind his head, looking out into the forests of the Pacific Northwest. “I dunno, bud, but Maddie asked me to look for him and invite him back home. She’s like that, mom is.”
Mom still felt weird to be said, after what happened with Longclaw.
“Still…” Tails looked down at his device, holding it in his paws. “I’m not picking up a lot of chaos energy on my scanner, and he gives off almost as much as you do.”
“Maybe he’s good at hiding.” It was like a high stakes game of hide and seek, but without the whole world ending. Sonic’s tail twitched, wondering why Maddie had asked him to look for Knuckles. After they’d parted ways, he didn’t think the echidna would want to stick around – and he hadn’t wanted him to, not after what the tribe had done to Longclaw. Tails tapped away at his scanner, walking along the path as Sonic zipped ahead in intervals, trees rustling in his wake, reaching the top of a cliff face, and cupping his hands around his mouth. “KNUUUUUCKLESSSSSSS? Ollie ollie oxen-free? Marco?”
There was a small rumble in the earth, causing Tails to stumble back a little with a squeal before Sonic caught him, having travelled back to where he was searching. The ground opened and a head popped out, mitts clinging to the curve of the hole that he’d just dug. Knuckles eyed them suspiciously and with a bit of annoyance, huffing. “Will you keep it down?”
“There you are!” Sonic beamed at him, scuffing Tails around the neck, and placing one hand on his hip as Knuckles climbed out of his hole, dusting himself off and shaking out his dreadlocks. There was a small beam of emerald green deeper in the hole. “We’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
“I know,” the older teenager grunted out, crossing his arms. “I was trying to avoid you.”
“Aw don’t be like that.” The hedgehog gave a pout before nudging him with his finger. “We’re all friends here, aren’t we?”
Knuckles brushed his hand away and paused, his jagged tail twitching behind his legs before Tails spoke up, looking up from his device for the first time since they’d entered the forest. “Maddie wanted us to come find you,” he said, blue eyes scanning the echidna with a relative unease. “She was worried about you.”
Surprised and taken aback, the guardian tilted his head as if trying to remember who “Maddie” was before he let his lips lift in a sneer. “I’m a teenager. I can take care of myself.”
“Knew you’d say something like that, bud.” Sonic waved his hand, shrugging. “Mom just gets weird about these kinds of things.”
“Then if that’s all, you can tell your…mother…that I’m fine.” Knuckles turned to step back into the hole, pausing before he did so. “I don’t need help.”
“Is the Master Emerald acting strange?” Tails’ question made him stop, both Mobians turning towards the kit as he fiddled with his scanner. Knuckles raised an eyebrow, casting a casual glance behind him at the hole, then returned his attention to him, sneaker scuffing the ground slightly as he did so. “I couldn’t help but notice the spikes in energy…”
“It’s fine,” was the response he got, though it was a little grouchy in the way it was delivered. “It’s just…having a bit of trouble adjusting to this weird planet.”
“It’s not the only one,” Sonic teased, before he poked a finger at Knuckles and received a swipe in return. “Have you even eaten at all?”
“I eat perfectly fine,” he groused out, snorting and wrinkling his muzzle. “The amount of garbage humans throw away is ridiculous in their so-called “national parks”.”
“Yeech. I haven’t dug through the trash in a while but I kind agree on that,” Sonic said while running his fingers through his quills, nudging Tails with his foot when the kit tried to get a look at the emerald from around Knuckles’ legs. “Well if you want a warm meal, mom and Donut Lord are always making extra.” He shrugged and gave Tails a little wink when Knuckles frowned at him, turning around to walk away with a jovial wave over his shoulder. “See ya.”
“But Sonic I thought we…”
The hedgehog put a finger to his lips as they started walking away from Knuckles. He knew they couldn’t convince the echidna to come with them by force, but if they made it look like they didn’t care about whether he did or not, it might spur him to follow. Tails frowned a little as he followed, his namesakes brushing the ground along behind them, looking at his scanner in puzzlement. He didn’t understand the blue hero sometimes, even in the last few months of getting to know him. They were a few meters down the path when the earth rumbled again and this time Knuckles was climbing out of the ground, looking at them over the top of his hole with distrusting purple eyes.
“…What kind of warm food?”
“Chili dogs for one,” Sonic responded as if they hadn’t been walking away from him before then. “Mom might make pancakes in the morning.”
Knuckles paused, climbing out of the ground with the Master Emerald tucked under one arm. Its gleam was bright enough to illuminate the forest around them before he covered it with a tarp that he had in his other hand, the shade muffled slightly now. “…Does she have any fruit?”
The hedgehog scratched his cheek. “Uh, I think I saw some bananas in the fruit basket…maybe some grapes in the fridge.”
The echidna scuffed his foot against the forest floor, his tail seeming to give away how excited that made him as he placed his free hand on his hip, attempting to look indifferent. It was actually kind of adorable. “I…accept your offering of food,” he huffed, chest puffed as Sonic and Tails shared a smirk and a grin at each other. “It’s substantial I suppose.”
“Great! You coming with or you gonna come by later…?”
Knuckles hefted the emerald under his arm, cradling it as though it was the most precious thing in the world, which it probably was. He looked a little uncertain, pursing his lips together. “I need to find a new chamber for the Master Emerald first, now that the two of you know where it is. The forest seemed to accept it but I am unsure of leaving it by itself.”
Sonic’s ears perked and he made a gesturing motion with his hand. “I know the perfect place.”
And that was how the Master Emerald came to reside in the Wachowski’s shed in a special chamber designed by Miles “Tails” Prower.