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Sonic was staring up at the stars. They twinkled at him like old friends waving across a crowded room and then were swallowed by fast moving black clouds. It was snowing? Snowing flakes of hot, dark snow. He couldn’t move. He shouldn’t move. There were heavy things on each of his ankles and wrists. Had those been there before? Sonic couldn’t remember.
Where was he?
He heard someone sit down heavily into the grass near him, just out of his field of vision. They smelled of several irrelevant things like damp metal or a barbeque pit, but what caught his attention was the slight brush of lavender nearly drowned in a sea of saltwater. Was the ocean nearby?
“Shadow?” Sonic’s voice tasted unfamiliar in his mouth. Was that what he sounded like? Had he always sounded like that? It had to be, right?
Shadow sighed. “Sonic.” Sonic’s ear twitched. He sounded exhausted…and sad. Oh. That’s…
Sonic couldn’t turn his head to look, but he knew his dark rival was close. He didn’t like the tone. It made him nervous. Shadow should be mad at him. Furious even. Hit him, punch him, scream at him. Something Sonic could understand. Something he deserved.
Wait.
Deserved?
What had he been doing?
He’d been…Sonic blinked. Something was in his eyes, and he wanted it gone in case the stars came back. “What’s going to happen to me?” He found himself asking. Why’d he ask that? Right, because of what he’d done.
There was a slight pause. Just a fraction of a second, but for a creature as sensitive to speed as Sonic, it was noticeable. And it hurt for some reason. It felt like a betrayal. “I don’t know.” Shadow answered.
“That bad, huh?” Sonic chuckled. It was funny. So funny. Shadow should laugh, too. Why wasn’t he laughing? “So bad you’ve got to lie to me?” He grinned.
Shadow always thought he was so mysterious. All blank grey wall and no emotions. But Sonic knew. Shadow’s standoffishness had been a challenge, a puzzle to be solved. Over the years he’d learned where the cracks and fissures were. He couldn’t remember right now, but he knew he’d known before.
The memories…He was just tired, that was all. They’d come back in time. And if they didn’t…then they weren’t that important anyway.
Sonic heard Shadow’s quills bristle, the slight whisper of razor sharp spines gracing against one another. “I’m not-“ He heard Shadow’s shoulders tense, heard the muscles clench in his jaw, the blood rushing through fragile tubes. The slight breath of something delicious rising up. Starting to recover. Tickling his-
Shadow sighed with resignation. “They’re going to seal you.”
“Oh…” He didn’t feel anything in the moment. Sonic thought he should, but he didn’t. “That bad.” Bad. That was bad. Bad bad. So bad, maybe he didn’t want it to happen.
“That bad.” Shadow repeated.
Another break in the heavy cloud cover split open above and Sonic eyes darted from star to star as if trying to memorize their sizes, brightness, and placement before they were swaddled away again. He might not get another chance. Or maybe he would. There were other worlds out there. With things on them. People maybe. All sorts of things he might like to-
“How is Tails handling it? Does he know?” There were things here still. Some of them he cared about.
“He designed the containment device. Him and the Doctor.” That would have taken time. Both to get the team up going and to assemble the solution. It must have been bad. Bad for a while.
“Ah. Should be pretty good then, right?” It needed to be good.
“Yeah…” It needed to be really good.
“Will it work?” He couldn’t get out.
“It has to.” He couldn’t ever get out.
“What will you do if it doesn’t?” If he got out…
There was a long pause. Sonic listened to the rapid pulse of the hybrid’s heart. The churn of fluids in his organs. The sweet, delicious, delectable, mouth-watering chaos energy frittering through him. There wasn’t as much as normal and some part of him knew that if he was just patient, if he just waited, there would be more. So much more.
The things on his wrists and ankles were heating up. He didn’t like them. They’d been…something. Now they were annoying. Unpleasant. Why were they on him? Sonic tried to move. He couldn’t.
“Just relax.” Shadow’s voice cracked and Sonic felt like he should have cared about that. “It’s going to be over soon.”
He tried. He really tried. Sonic destroyed himself trying. Blew himself to bits against some wall of something. Something sharp and strong and oh it hurt to touch but he couldn’t get past it couldn’t get it out or beat it or whatever he needed to do to win and not not not-
The stars came out again. Sonic blinked away more stuff from his eyes. Little black flakes? They were getting in his nose too. He tried to blow them away but…something wasn’t working right. It was fine. He’d just ignore them.
It was fine. Everything was going to be fine. Didn’t he feel fine? Why couldn’t he just be happy with being fine. Look how fine he was!
“How’s…everyone?”
Shadow hummed. “Don’t trouble yourself about them.”
“Amy? Knux?”
He heard the squeak of leather straining. “You don’t have to worry about them anymore, Sonic.” Teeth pressed so tightly together, pain sparked. “You don’t need to worry about anyone anymore.”
Oh.
Okay.
The stars came out again. They’d shifted a little bit, but still their little twinkle waves beckoned him. Huh.
“Will I get to say good-bye?”
He heard Shadow startle. “What?”
“Can I say bye to Ames?”
“No, I’m afraid not.”
“Knux?”
“No, not him either.”
“What about Tails?”
“I’m sorry, Sonic.” Shadow swallowed. “But you can’t. He can’t- It’s not safe to be-” The hybrid was breathing hard.
There was stuff in Sonic’s eyes again. It smelled like the ocean. Salt water? Brine? Better than the wet metal that wasn’t important and he totally wasn’t smelling constantly and if maybe it was in his mouth, but it wasn’t-!
Something was tightening inside him. He didn’t like it, so he tried to ignore it. Whatever it was didn’t relax, but it felt like he was moving away from it. Like he was taking the tight, hurting thing and putting it in the back of a closet. Closing the doors. Leaving the room. Forgetting what it even was to begin with.
His skin was itching. A restlessness was brewing under his skin. How long had he been laying there? “Can I…go for a last run?”
Shadow took a deep breath. “I’m sorry, Sonic. I can’t let you.”
That didn’t seem fair. “I’ll come back, I promise.” He would. He would. “You can even run with me. I-I’ll go slow.”
“That’s not going to work.”
“J-just a little. Please, Shadow. You can’t leave me like this.”
“Sonic…” It was hard to hear him sometimes over the loud din of all his parts. The heartbeat the fluids moving around the crackles of electrical signals and ofcoursethechaosenergythatwasalmostallback.
Shadow was taunting him. Shadow was enjoying Sonic’s discomfort and pain. Shadow was happy he was going to get sealed away and would never get to run again. Ever.
Something broke. It had been fragile, actually. All these years, Sonic had protected for everyone’s sake but then it just…broke. How could he be so careless?
He cut himself on the pieces of it, but he wasn’t bleeding. You had to have blood to bleed. The stuff that came out wasn’t pleasant. Sticky. Tary. Heavy like lead, but rose in the air, burning his sinuses. He really wished he hadn’t broken it.
Well, if he was going to bother with noise, he might as well make a proper go at it.
“Please, Shadow! Please, let me up!”
“Calm down.”
“I’ll be good. I promise! I’ll be good”
“Stop.”
“I need your help, Shadow! Why are you doing this to me? I trusted you!”
“Stop it, Sonic, please.”
“I’ll do anything you want, just please let me go. I need to go.”
“I can’t, Sonic.”
“You’re enjoying this. You’ve always hated me, always was jealous of me!”
“Shut up!”
“How can you do this to me? I thought we were friends!”
“F-friends?”
Was it true? Didn’t matter as long as it worked. Keep going. There was so much to work with!
“What would Maria think of you?”
But it didn’t work. No matter what he said or screamed or whispered, Shadow didn’t release him. Eventually he stopped. This noise business really was stupid. Why’d he even bother?
Shadow was making a sound. It wasn’t the one that meant stuff. It sounded like…well it didn’t sound like Shadow taking the stupid things holding him down off so whatever it was didn’t matter.
The stars moved again. The sky was brightening. That sucked. He wouldn’t be able to see them soon. How would he know where to go when he was done here?
“Shadow?”
“Just relax.” He didn’t sound right. Like a book with all its pages torn out. “They’ll be here soon.”
“Tails?” Sonic took another swing at the thing. He missed. It obliterated him.
“No.” Sonic reformed and tried again.
“O-okay.” And again.
“Will you visit me?” And again.
“What?” And again.
“When I’m…” And again.
“Yes.” And again.
Sonic blinked. “Do you promise?”
Shadow made one of those unimportant sounds again. “Yes, Sonic, I promise I’ll visit you. I’ll visit you every day.” He sounded like he meant. Why would he mean something like that?
But it would be nice, wouldn’t it? “Will I be able to know you’re there?”
It seemed important. “I don’t know.”
That Shadow would visit every day. “Were you able to when…you know?”
Something about that felt nice. “No, I wasn’t able to tell when I was in stasis.”
But Sonic couldn’t put his finger on it. “Maybe this’ll be different.”
He tried though. “Maybe.”
He tried very hard. “Will it hurt? Like going under and staying down. Did it hurt?”
He couldn’t seem to do anything else. “Staying down, I don’t remember. Going under…You won’t be awake. Mabe that way…”
But maybe he could do this one thing. “I won’t be awake?”
He failed. “I won’t let you be. It’s the best I can do.”
It would just have to be nice without him knowing why. “Oh.”
Sonic’s not-stomach growled. Uh-oh, it was coming back. Maybe it never left. The stupid things holding him down, maybe that’s what they were for. Of course that’s what they’re for, how stupid could he be? It had taken-
Gold.
“You were Super there for a bit, weren’t you?”
“Yes, for a bit until you…”
Until he…Sonic couldn’t remember. His memories were jumbled. Like someone had taken the movie film and cut it all to pieces and scattered them. There was no telling which snapshot led to which and what came before. But Shadow was in a lot of them. But also-?
Silver.
“I think I- Silver?” He heard Shadow shuffle uncomfortably. “Is- was Silver here?”
“For a bit.”
“For a bit.” Sonic repeated. “I hope he’s doing okay.”
It wasn’t a question, so Shadow didn’t answer. Where was the ocean? He couldn’t hear it but the smell was driving him crazy. It was useless to him. He needed the other smells. This one hurt for some reason. Water. He always hated water. That’s it. That’s totally it and nothing else.
Sonic got a hit in. It retaliated.
Sonic became aware of an immense level of pain coursing through his body. He coughed, gagged on the wall hitting him. No ramp up. Zero to a million percent terrible in the blink of an eye. Dissolving him. Dislocating him. Disintegrating him.
“Sonic?”
Sonic whimpered.
“Oh, Sonic…” Something was touching him. Knives. Knives dragging down his face cutting him to ribbons before going back up to bite into him anew. Cold, hard knives. On his face, in his quills, along his chest, and on his lips.
And then he was fine.
Perfectly fine.
Never better.
How are you?
Except-
It was growing again. The hunger. On some level, Sonic knew it was a bad feeling, that he should fight it, that it was horrible, terrible, abominable. But to fight it was to keep it and he couldn’t stand it. The hunger drove him insane. Having it. Getting rid of it. It was too much.
The things on his ankles and wrists, the things holding him down, tying him to moment, were burning against his skin. Terrible, horrible searing sensations. He could barely stand it.
“Sonic…” The voice seemed like it was coming from further away. Had Shadow moved? Had Sonic moved?
The cookout smell returned. Was it him? Were the things holding him down burning him so badly, he could smell himself roasting. No. He knew what the smell of his own charred fleshed was like. This was something coming back on the wind. The smell of wet iron and charred meat and concrete dust and melting plastic. All the smells of something stupid and unimportant and NOT WHAT HE WANTED.
“Sonic, please.”
There was a pressure on his chest now. The weight of the world pressing down, crushing him, begging him to stay put. But he couldn’t. He needed to run. Had to run, had to get away. There wasn’t anything left here to help with the hunger. He had to go elsewhere and elsewhere and then elsewhere.
“Please, Sonic! Fight it! Stay here! Stay with me just a little longer.”
Had to go! Go anywhere. Didn’t matter, just not here! His legs! They ached they screamed they had to move why could he just move! Salt water on his face. Salt water in his mouth.
“Please! Please! I can’t-!”
Gotta get free gotta get gone
It hurts ithurtsithurtsithurts
Pressure on his neck, can’t breath. Didn’t need to breath, just needed to to to to
Mouth forced close over something. Fangs, sharp, way too sharp, why so sharp, stab into whatever it is. Stupid still needed the mouth. Iron. Carbon. Oxygen. Calcium. Sodium. So much hydrogen. Should just…could almost…
Sonic felt better.
He was on his side now. He couldn’t see the stars. He wished he could. Orange glows illuminate a strange and jagged landscape before him. Crumbled. Ruined. Utterly unimportant. Nothing here worth anything anymore. That’s why he needed to move, to go find better places with more of…
Breathing near him. Haggard. Rough. Strained. Smelled of wet metal, salt water, roasted meat, lavender. Sonic felt…nothing. There was a hand on his side.
Sonic tried his best to focus on it. Feel something about it. Endure the hunger. Endure the crippling desire to run, to move, to be free. It pinned him down with a desperate force. But that was fine. That was important and good and he should just…stay put. Stay down. No matter how it hurt.
“Shadow?” His voice hurt. Having it. Having a voice hurt. It meant…it meant other things had to be true if he had a voice.
“Y-yeah, Sonic?” Shadow sounded so weak. Smelled weak too.
“I’m sorry.”
“I know.”
“I really sorry. I…I can’t remember why but I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay. Just, please, please, try to rest.” Sonic wasn’t the one who sounded tired.
“I’m trying to. I promise I’m trying to.”
“I know. I know!”
“Why is this happening? D-did I do this to myself? Did I mess up?”
“It doesn’t matter, Sonic. Try not to think about it. Try not to think about anything. They’ll…They’ll find us soon, I think.”
“Can you- Can this be over?”
“What?”
“You said you’d make sure I wouldn’t be awake when…Can you do that now?”
There was a pause. Pulse rate increased. All that blood still in there. “I…”
He can’t.
The realization did something to Sonic. The bad thing rumbled through him, boiling him back into the heady nothingness that only felt hunger.
“Sonic!”
That wasn’t going to be him for much longer.
“G-good-bye, S-shadow.” Sound. Why bother with sound at all. Useless. “I-I’m sorry.”
“Good-bye, Sonic.”
It smelled like the ocean. It sounded wet.