You Can Bring the Villainy and I Can Bring the Sex Appeal

by majorasmasc

Summary:

“I kinda”—Sonic shrugs, laughing—“don't really remember a lot about last night.”

“Why?”

“Cause I was drunk.”

Shadow makes a disapproving sound. “Typical.”

“Hey, man, just 'cause you don't know how to let loose and have fun doesn't mean the rest of us can't.”

Shadow's fingers prod at the bite mark on his shoulder. “Is this your idea of having fun then? Someone chewing on you like you're some kind of toy?”

[Sonic deals with everything that happened on the Death Egg by not dealing with it. At all.

Honestly, what could possibly go wrong with that?]

Chapter 1: if you didn't come home injured, would you say it was a good show?

“Looks like someone had fun last night.”

Sonic claps a hand over the bite mark on his shoulder. He thought it wouldn't be as visible under his fur. He'd even mussed it up around it, ruffling it to try and hide it better, but Rouge has always had sharp eyes.

“Yeah, I wish," Sonic says. “If you call gettin’ hit with the bad end of a badnik fun, then I guess last night was a real killer.”

“Uh-huh,” Rouge says, eyeing him. “Is that why your breath smells like a distillery?”

He breathes against the palm of his glove and his brow furrows. He definitely doesn't smell like alcohol, so he's not sure where she's—

“Ah—” Rouge smirks. “So, you did go out.”

His ears droop. She played him right into her hands.

“Tell me, who'd you kick it up with, Blue? Anyone we know?” Rouge leans on the console, chin in her hands. “I want all the juicy details.”

Sonic raises his hands with a laugh. “Look, I'd share if I could, but I honestly don't remember their name.”

Rouge's brow raises. “My, my—and here I thought you'd be more of the romantic type. But I suppose you have never liked being tied down.”

“Yeah, really can't see myself doing the whole candlelit dinner thing, y’know? Dates are so—”Sonic grimaces“—awkward.”

“But getting bent over the table is fine?”

“Sure, I mean—sex is whatever.”

Rouge tilts her head. “Whatever?”

“It's something to do. It's—” Sonic shrugs, smiling. “No strings attached and all that. It's fun, I guess.”

“You're so fascinating.”

“Glad I can be of some entertainment to ya,” Sonic says, flatly.

“Ah, don't be like that. I just never thought you'd be so—” Rouge gestures, searching for the word.

“Loose?”

Rouge frowns. “Well, no. You're just having fun, aren't you? From one floozy to another—” She brushes his shoulders with her fingers, smirking again. “I like your style, Blue.”

Sonic laughs and steps backwards out of her grasp as the fur on his nape pricks uncomfortably. “Thanks.”

“Now, if only Knuckles could get the picture. I swear I could throw myself at him and he'd still think I was just trying to steal his emerald.”

“I mean—” Sonic grins. “You are trying to steal it.”

“Yes, yes, of course...” Rouge slumps against the computer console with a put-on sigh. “But I'd really like to steal something else while I'm at it, too.”

“Hey, I'm sure if you just ask him—”

“Oh, my. So forward of you." Rouge laughs. “Is that how you talk to Shadow?”

“Huh?”

“Don't play coy with me, Blue. I've seen you two bicker. That's certainly more than just rivals.”

“No, seriously," Sonic says. “We're not—”

“Oh, please.” Rouge waves him off. “You don't have to lie to me, I know you and Shadow—”

There's footsteps at the door. When he looks over, Shadow himself walks through. Sonic makes a stop talking motion at Rouge who looks at him slyly.

“Why hello, handsome,” Rouge says, turning to Shadow with a smirk. “Blue and I were just having a little chat about you.”

Shadow grimaces, eyes flicking towards him and then away. “How productive.”

Rouge laughs. “Nose to the grindstone as always. Don't you ever relax, Shadow? You can take a little time off, I'm sure Blue here could help you unwind a litt—”

Sonic puts a hand up to Rouge's muzzle. “Hah, wow, would ya look at the time? We really gotta—”

Rouge shoves his hand off. “Now, where are you off to in such a rush, Blue? We were just having the loveliest conversation about your—”

Sonic half-heartedly tries to muffle her again.

Rouge laughs, dodging backwards gracefully. “What? Was it something I said?”

Shadow scowls at the both of them. “When you two are done playing games, we have a mission to complete.”

Rouge sighs. “All work and no play for you, huh, sunshine?

“Tch.” Shadow turns and heads for the door. “Hedgehog, let's go.”

“Alright, geez,” Sonic says, “I'm coming."

Rouge coughs a laugh into her fist behind him.

Sonic shoots her a flat look.

“What can I say?” Rouge shrugs. “It writes itself.”

Shadow stands in the doorway, glaring at him. It's the kind of look Shadow throws to everyone when they take a little too long to do something. Sonic's never understood the guy's impatience. It's not like the guy isn't immortal. All the time in the world and Shadow's still acts like he's got two more days to live.

“Hurry up,” Shadow barks.

And there it is.

“Okay, yeesh, man.” Sonic looks at Rouge. “If he kills me—”

“I'll tell everyone you went down valiantly.” Rouge smirks. “And not on your hands and knees.”

"Yeah, I'd honestly expect nothin' less." Sonic shakes his head, laughing before giving her a mock salute as he heads for the door. "See ya later, Rouge."

Rouge waves. “Have fun you two.”

---

“You're limping.”

Sonic goes rigid, eyes flicking over to Shadow. “What? No, I'm not. What're you talking about?”

Shadow gestures to his leg, and its not until he takes his next step that he realizes he's been favoring it on the way out of HQ. It aches a little, yeah. Sure. Like whoever he was with last night held it in the wrong position a little too long. Maybe even pinned it down a little too wide. He didn't think it was that noticeable. But apparently nothing escapes the Ultimate Lifeform or whatever—

“If you're hurt, I'll have someone else take your place. You'll only slow us down," Shadow says.

“Nah, dude, I'm fine. I just"—Sonic wobbles a hand—"jogged it wrong the other day or somethin', it's totally not a big deal. I can still run just fine.”

Shadow eyes him more than skeptically.

He jogs ahead of Shadow, shooting him a thumbs up. “C'mon, let's get this show on the road already!"

---

The mission is a little bit of a disaster.

He keeps getting distracted by stupid stuff that shouldn't even matter. Ever since Shadow pointed out his limp he can't stop thinking about it. Overcorrecting it. The abandoned base they're trying to clear out of stray badniks should be a relatively simple one, but he zips down one corridor and then forgets which way he turned. It's annoying. And he can tell Shadow is getting annoyed every time he asks over the comm which way he needs to go.

It's just all the metal walls, it gets confusing where it shouldn't. Every base is like this somehow. Always the standard smooth metal, rivets breaking up the monotony. He’s counted them enough times to know there's usually forty-four of them, in a row, right up to the ceiling. It's the same design in nearly every base. On the Death Egg, too. In his cell. He knows the number like the back of his glove.

Sonic turns another corner in a flash and stops. He huffs out a breath. If Shadow would just give him the map of the base or at least some directions, he wouldn't have to—

“You're going the wrong way," Shadow says.

Shadow sounds tinny over the ear comm, like some kind of robot. Not that he doesn't usually sound a bit robotic anyway, but—

"Nah, pretty sure I'm not.” Sonic looks back towards where he came from, pieces of some security-class Badnik still sparking on the ground. “I know exactly where I'm going, dude.”

“Are you sure about that?” Shadow asks.

“Yup.” Nope.

“Meet me at the control room then," Shadow says.

"Not if I beat'cha there first," Sonic says with a grin.

The comm clicks off without another word from Shadow. He'll show him. He can get to the control room easily. Whatever. He looks at the wall, eyes sliding along the seam of it, his wrists itching and aching. Heavy with something that isn't there. He wrings at them until the sensation dulls out again.

Yeah. He'll totally get there in no time.

---

It takes him another ten minutes to find the door to the control room.

It's already pried open, the metal peeled back like it's aluminum and not steel. He stares at the indentations in the door, where he can tell Shadow grabbed it and pulled. When they aren't fighting, sometimes it’s easy to forget Shadow’s stronger than he looks and then he sees stuff like this. He's pretty sure Shadow could break his spine in half if he really wanted to. Putting Shadow in a cage would be about as smart as shoving a hand into a hornet's nest. He'd be out in no time at all—

“What are you doing? Get in here already,” Shadow's voice calls from inside.

Sonic hops through the crumpled door, stumbling when his leg suddenly twinges, his hip aching. A hand catches his arm and he looks up.

Shadow grimaces at him. “You said you weren't injured.”

"Yeah," Sonic says, yanking out of Shadow's grip, "'cause I'm not.”

Shadow's eyes move down to his shoulder.

Sonic covers up the partially hidden bite mark automatically.

“What is that?” Shadow asks.

“Huh? It's nothin', c'mon, let's just get the server blades and get outta her—”

Shadow grabs his wrist and pulls his hand off. “Did someone bite you?”

"No." Sonic's ears fold back slightly, eyes darting between the hand locked on him and Shadow's face. “Maybe. Sorta—look, this really doesn't matter, can we just go already?”

Shadow’s muzzle wrinkles. “Why haven't you treated the wound?”

Sonic wrenches out of Shadow’s grip, quills bristling. “'Cause it's not a big deal.”

“Saliva carries bacteria, you idiot.” Shadow’s teeth bare, his canines all too visible. “Have you never heard of an infection?”

“Relax, alright. I've never had a problem with it in the past.”

“This happens often?”

“Sure.” Sonic scratches at his snout. “Like, semi-frequently, I guess.”

“You guess?”

“Is this an interrogation or somethin', man? What's with all the questions?”

Shadow crosses his arms. “How did you acquire it?”

“Shadow, c'mon, do I really gotta spell it out for ya?”

Shadow stares at him, brow furrowing further when he says nothing.

Sonic laughs. “Seriously?”

“What?” Shadow grits out.

“You don't—?”

“I don't what? Spit it out already.”

“Okay, geez, fine—” Sonic raises his hands. “I got it last night.”

“That still doesn't answer my question.”

Shadow surely isn't this dense. It didn't take a lot to see where it was located and assume. “I kinda”—Sonic shrugs, laughing—“don't really remember a lot about last night.”

“Why?”

“Cause I was drunk.”

Shadow makes a disapproving sound. “Typical.”

“Hey, man, just 'cause you don't know how to let loose and have fun doesn't mean the rest of us can't.”

Shadow's fingers prod at the bite mark on his shoulder. “Is this your idea of having fun then? Someone chewing on you like you're some kind of toy?”

Sonic blanches and then glares, muzzle wrinkling up. Toy. Who even says something like that? He's not a—

He balls his hands into fists to cover up the annoying way his fingers keep trying to go unsteady. “I didn't let anyone do anything. I was just having sex, okay? Sue me.”

Shadow blinks.

It's like watching a computer try to work over a piece of data that doesn't fit. Shadow's eyes bounce between his shoulder and his leg, and then Shadow turns away all at once, without a word. Shadow goes for the panel in the wall near the door, a small red cross etched into it, before hitting it with the side of his fist and prying it open.

Sonic really didn't think Eggman would follow any kind of work safety procedures, but here they are. Shadow takes out the medkit and tosses it on the computer console.

“Sit down.”

“Dude, you don't gotta—”

Shadow marches over and grabs him by the scruff, walking him over to the chair and all but shoving him into it.

“Woah!” Sonic laughs. “You should really work on your bedside manner if you're gonna play nurse, y’know?”

“Shut up.”

He grits his teeth at the alcohol soaked cotton ball swiping at his fur. The antiseptic doesn't sting as bad at least. He sits there, staring at his knees while Shadow puts some kind of cream over the wound and then a bandage patch that itches where it sticks at his fur. When Shadow's done he shuts the box and tosses it aside, moving for the side of the console.

Sonic grabs at the bandage and rests his hand over it. The wound feels hot, all of him does, even though it doesn't hurt anymore. Not really. When he woke up that morning it kind of did. He'd been in someone else's home, bed long past empty, a note on the bedside table telling him to help himself to whatever was in the fridge and a number at the bottom. He'd crumpled it up and left the second he'd gotten his sneakers back on.

He should get up now, too, help grab the server blades so they can get out of here already, but he stares at his sneakers against the metal floor. For a moment his wrists feel heavy. Like there's something weighing them down. Someone else's fingers smoothing over the bandage on his shoulder, chilled metal brushing against his muzzle as breaths slip hot through the seam of the mask—

“Let's go.”

Sonic looks up at Shadow and grins. “Done already?”

Shadow hefts the bag Tails had made to transport the server blades over his shoulder. “No thanks to you.”

“Gee, you're welcome…”

Shadow walks out the ruined door. Sonic looks back up at the monitor, the Eggman logo smiling down at him. The fur on his nape rises, red slipping into his peripherals and sticking. Growing. A huff and a grunt panted into the curve of his shoulder, hands trapping his waist—

Sonic shakes his head.

He zips out to catch up with Shadow.

---

Sonic ends up back where he started last night.

The bandage Shadow had put on him long since torn off, the bite on full display. When they had gotten back to HQ Shadow hadn't even looked at him, they'd delivered the server blades to Amy and Tails and that was that. They'd parted ways without a word.

He bounces his leg, fast, restless, sneaker tacking against the bar stool. He can't stop thinking about the hand on his shoulder, smoothing over his fur, the warmth of someone pressed close while Shadow worked on cleaning and patching his wound. He shifts in his seat, the feeling under his skin becoming harder to ignore, his thighs hot.

Great. Awesome. Who even gets this worked up over something as small as that? Geez…

He drops his face into his arms.

“Rough day?”

He looks up to see a silver-furred mongoose slide into the stool next to him. Lanky, tall, light hair spiked into a small Mohawk down his skull. Fingerless gloves. A familiar look in his eye.

It's laughably easy to spot it now.

“Yeah, you could say that," Sonic says with a wry laugh.

A hand settles on his shoulder, thumb massaging circles into him that spark low in his gut. His stomach twists. Claws scrape through his fur and Sonic leans into the drag of them, his entire body lit up. It's the simplest thing, really, just a hand on his shoulder, and yet it's all he can think about. It's everything he could ever want.

And he knows exactly what this guy wants from him too.

“Y’know—” Sonic grins, leaning close. “I think there's a way you could make it better.”

The mongoose smiles as his hand wanders to the back of Sonic's neck—all sharp teeth and gold eyes.

Notes:

→ The drinking age for Mobians in this fic will be 18. (Considering Tails can drive and fly a plane as young as he is, I think 18 makes sense and it's convenient for the story.)

→ The Resistance has not been renamed to the Restoration, nor is Amy Commander yet as the events of the IDW comics haven't happened in this fic.

→ I have taken liberty from multiple Twitter takeovers in regards to Shadow’s hobbies/pastimes. Particularly his asides about volunteering at animal shelters and soup kitchens.

→ This fic is unbetaed. If you find a minor typo or spelling error that I have missed pls let me know in the comments.

--> parts of this have been somewhat rewritten or reworked since initial posting. The plot and major points are all the same however. (2/11/2025)

→This fic updates semi-monthly.

Chapter 2: i'll put my body to the test with yours

Sonic steps out of the bathroom a few minutes after the guy he had stumbled in there with does. Some dog. Fur just this side of gray enough, but not exact. Eyes brown. Also not right.

None of that really mattered when he'd had the side of his snout shoved against the tiles, when he braced himself best he could as the guy hitched him up into it with each thrust. He'd cleaned himself up after, avoiding the mirror above the sink and fixing his quills back into place with a few swipes.

Out in the hall, he can see that the usual numbers have already begun to thin out. At this point he should head to Tail’s workshop, Amy's place, HQ—anywhere that'll let him crash for the night. But he knows he'll just lay there regardless, wasting time staring at the ceiling until he decides to give up the whole act.

He weaves around the people still lingering in the corridor, moving fast as he turns the corner back onto the club floor.

“Yo, Sonic!”

He looks over his shoulder, already smiling. It's not exactly weird to run into people who recognize him most places he goes and—

He smacks right into someone else.

Sonic laughs, stumbling back. “Sorry, man, my ba—”

His teeth click shut.

He stares at the husky’s eyes. One yellow-gold. One blue. Inverted, but—

The husky laughs and says something like no problem and wait, you're that hero guy, aren't you? He doesn't care about any of that though. His ears ring. The guy goes to turn away and Sonic grabs his wrist, fingers shaking, a laugh punching out of him.

“Hey, maybe I can make it up to ya?” Sonic asks.

The husky's pupils are already blown through with whatever he's been taking. Sonic's never been more sober in his life. He gets up close to him, fingers twisting with his. He can't make it any more obvious. A hand settles on his waist and he grins, bile right at the back of his throat.

The stone countertop is cold under his stomach and chest, the husky's home some half rebuilt apartment on the fringe of Sunset City. He stares at the seam of the wall, where the countertop meets the paint. Thighs digging into the rounded lip of the counter as the husky huffs behind him, fingers curled into his waist and pulling him back on each shove forward. Sonic squints at the wall. There's panting above him. Swearing. The thrusts get faster. More desperate. And honestly the more he looks at it, the paint job in here is kind of bad. They must have rushed it while fixing this place up. Just like everything else on this bloc—

Hips smack flush against him with a low, satisfied groan from the husky's throat. Sharp teeth graze his shoulder and Sonic screws his eyes shut as the junction of the wall becomes metal flush with metal.

---

Sonic jolts awake and it's still night out.

His whole body aches. It doesn't take much to figure out what he'd been doing before this either. He looks over at the stranger in the sheets next to him. Still fast asleep thankfully. He scrubs at his face and sighs.

He needs to find his shoes.

Getting up, his tail twinges and there's a flash of something distant—like the memory is being flipped over and only shown to him for a moment—of the guy yanking on it. Like it's some kind of joystick and not connected right to his spine. He grimaces. Awesome. Just his luck.

He finds his sneakers near the front door, thrown down with his own gloves and someone else's. He tries to remember if they told him their name and there's nothing. When he opens the door there's another sensation that swims up the back of his neck, like fingers digging into him, shoving him up against it and someone's tongue slipped too far into his mouth.

He slams the door shut behind himself.

The street lights sit like little suns with how bright they seem once he's outside. Sonic shields his eyes and squints, looking up and down the road. He takes off down the street in a blur. He gets halfway to Tails' Workshop and skids to a stop, foot tapping. Knowing Tails he’s probably still up, tinkering on some doohickey or gadget thingy. Something about slinking in and Tails seeing him right now sits all wrong. He knows Tails would see it on him immediately. See everything and more the same way he always does. Be able to tell just by looking at him that he's—

No. Going to the Workshop isn't an option.

He paces in a tight circle and swipes at his quills. Rouge had said he was allowed on her couch anytime, but he still didn't think she was serious about that. It's hard to tell sometimes, how much of what she's saying is sincere and what’s just an innuendo he hasn't caught up to yet. Still. It's something.

He arrives at her apartment in a flash, all brick walls and fancy siding. She'd told him that one of the bricks was loose, a key hidden behind it. He searches over the wall and finds it, wriggling it out of place and snatching up the key that falls out. Once he gets the door shut behind him, he lets out the breath he'd been holding. Only the range hood above the stove offers any kind of light as he looks over the inside. Nobody's home at least. Small miracles.

He moves to the kitchen to get a glass of water, the taste stuck in the back of his mouth worsening the more he thinks about it. Putting the glass under the spout, he turns on the tap. His fingers dance along the sink’s edge. Maybe Rouge wouldn't mind if he also swiped something from the fridge while he's here, he's hungrier than he thought he was and he hasn't really eaten since—

“What are you doing here?”

Startled, Sonic drops the glass and water splashes everywhere.

“Unbelievable.” A hand reaches around him and turns off the sink before snatching the hand towel off the hook nearby and throwing it onto the spill. “Move.”

Shadow pushes him out of the way and Sonic blinks dumbly at him while the hedgehog cleans up the mess he just made.

“What're you doin' here?” Sonic asks.

Shadow drops the towel beside the sink, turning towards him. “I believe I asked you that first.”

“Rouge said I could crash here.”

“Of course she did.” Shadow shoulders past him.

“Hey, what's your problem, man?”

“You're being loud. Either go to bed or leave.”

“Huh.” Sonic tilts his head. “I didn't know you slept.”

Shadow glares at him. “Why wouldn't I sleep?”

“I dunno, aren't you like ‘the Ultimate Lifeform’, or whatever?” Sonic says, finger quoting.

Shadow stares at him, like he's stupid, like he's said the dumbest thing on the planet. “I'm not doing this with you right now.” Shadow takes a step and then looks back over his shoulder. “And you reek. Go take a shower.”

Sonic's ears go hot. “You can smell me?”

Shadow's lip curls up to show his teeth in a grimace. “It's not just you I can smell.”

“Oh, man, that's so—” Sonic laughs. “That's kinda messed up.” He wrinkles his snout. “And weird.”

“The shower's down the hall,” Shadow says, stalking down said hall, opening one of the doors and pulling a towel from the linen closet that he all but throws at him. “Try not to get water everywhere this time.”

Sonic catches it—thankfully without fumbling it—and holds it limply in his arms. "No promises."

The door to what he presumes is Shadow's room shuts behind the other hedgehog with a bang.

“Yeah...nice to see you, too,” Sonic grumbles, slinging the towel over his shoulder.

The shower at least helps a little, the dull ache in his legs and tail unwinding some. Finished, Sonic rolls the towel up and ropes it behind his neck as he leaves the bathroom. He settles on the couch in the living space, wincing as his tail hits the cushions. A hiss worms through his teeth as he tries to get comfortable.

There's the sound of a mug being set down on the counter in the kitchen.

Sonic looks over his shoulder. Shadow’s eyes glint bright red even in the dark, like there's a light stuck behind them. The fur on Sonic's arms prickles uncomfortably. He looks away and the red sticks behind his eyelids even when he blinks. He rubs at his wrists and plays off the grimace that crosses his muzzle with a tight laugh.

“Weren't you going to bed?” Sonic asks.

“You're injured,” Shadow says flatly. “Again.”

His head shoots up. Shadow's way closer than he thought he'd be. Sonic leans back with a nervous chuckle. “What? No, 'm just—” He winces when his tail hits the back of the couch.

Shadow settles onto the cushion beside him. “Turn around.”

“Dude, c'mon, it's not—”

Shadow grabs his shoulder, forcibly turning him and his face goes hot. His quills bristle. His skin breaks out in gooseflesh under his fur once Shadow touches his tail and he tenses further as Shadow's fingers search over it. He gets that same sort of tightness in his stomach the longer it goes on for. The one where he's not sure if he wants to sleep with someone or get up and start running. He worms out of Shadow’s grasp and pulls himself to the far side of the couch, ignoring the way his tail burns the whole way. He brushes it all off with a smile.

“Like I said, it's totally fine.”

“You're lucky. It should recover on its own,” Shadow says. “Next time, I recommend not repeating whatever caused this.”

“Eh..." Sonic waves Shadow off. “Some guy just got a little too excited, that's all.”

“Did you not tell him to stop?”

"No," Sonic says with a laugh. “I mean, c'mon, why would I even do that? It's not like it's a big deal.”

He's quite literally had way, way worse. Fighting a literal god (or two) and falling from space, crash landing right on his face (twice) to name a few.

Shadow stares at him. It's quiet enough he can hear the kettle Shadow must have put on gurgling in the kitchen.

“What?” Sonic asks, brow furrowing, shoulders going hot under the scrutiny.

Shadow gets up and goes back to the kitchen. After a beat, the kettle whistles. Shadow returns and sits next to him, pressing a mug into his hands before he can protest it.

“What’s this?”

“Chamomile and lavender,” Shadow says.

“Oh, uh, cool? I guess?"

Shadow sighs. “It helps with sleep.”

He squints at Shadow. “You have trouble sleeping?”

Shadow doesn't look at him. “At times.”

“So…” Sonic taps his fingers on the mug. “What do you usually do when you can't conk out?”

Shadow gives a flat look to the tea he's holding, like that explains everything.

“Right, yeah.” There's definitely easier ways to forget about whatever enough to get some shut eye. Sonic tilts the mug, watching the liquid brim at the lip. “Does this stuff even work?”

“Sometimes,” Shadow says.

“And if it doesn't?”

“There are other ways to find rest.”

Ha. If it wasn't Shadow saying it he'd definitely think that's just an innuendo for jacking off.

Sonic looks over. He sort of only half registered it before, but Shadow is sitting pretty close. Way closer than he usually would. Closer than he's probably ever sat next to him in all the time they've known each other. So, maybe there really is a double meaning here? And Shadow's been all nice, too. Like weirdly nice. And touchy. Super touchy. His gut flares hot when he remembers Shadow's fingers running over his tail in careful strokes. Maybe—

It's easy math, really.

He sets the mug down on the coffee table. They both can't sleep. Shadow's right there. Sitting near enough their legs are almost touching. Maybe that's why Shadow hasn't walked away yet? Gone back to his room and left him alone out here. He knows Shadow isn't exactly a man of a lot of words, so—

Heck, maybe Shadow hadn't even considered it an option until he blurted it out the other day, until Shadow smelled it on him in the kitchen. Sonic presses his leg further against Shadow’s and Shadow doesn't retreat.

It's honestly the only logical explanation for all of this.

Why else would Shadow do all of this junk for him if the guy didn't wanna have sex with him?

“Y’know...” Sonic's eyes flick over the side of Shadow’s face, his hands tapping against his thighs to avoid reaching out and touching him already. “I could help you.”

Shadow looks at him. His leg like a searing line against his—hot, too hot, he can't help but wonder if that's another alien thing, running like a furnace beside him. His skin itches like it's too tight. Sonic grabs Shadow's knee before he can think about it. Shadow doesn't pull away and he breathes out. The warmth under his glove sinks right down to his gut.

“If you wanted.” Sonic pets a thumb over the side of Shadow’s knee. “I mean, it helps me get to sleep, so.”

He can't tell if Shadow's eyes have gotten brighter or if it's just his imagination. “Whatever you're going to do, hedgehog, just get it over with already.”

Alright, rude.

Sonic takes off his gloves and moves to straddle Shadow’s lap, knees to either side of the hedgehog's legs. He hears the sound of a sharp breath, Shadow’s teeth clicking shut. He kisses Shadow before he can overthink it, before he can contemplate it too much.

It's easier to just not think about it anyway.

Shadow goes rigid under him and then slackens all at once. He kisses kind of like he imagined he would, tentative, a little stiff, like Shadow's not sure what he's supposed to do exactly. He can taste the lavender tea Shadow must have drank while he was in the shower. He slides a hand down Shadow’s side and then moves it between Shadow's legs, cupping him, pouch somehow even hotter under his palm.

Shadow arches under him with a small sound against his lips. Sonic rubs at him. Coaxing him out. Fingers curling around Shadow once he starts to come free and—

Sonic's back smacks into the coffee table, quills grating against the glass top with a horrible grinding sound before he even registers he's fallen. The mug he set on the table clatters to the floor alongside him, tea spilling hot against his thigh and underneath him. He blinks. What the hell? What the— Sonic looks up.

It's the most ruffled he's ever seen Shadow. Eyes wide, wild, chest rising and falling in erratic bursts, hands still in front of him where Shadow shoved him off. Sonic realizes, slowly—like claws digging into the back of his neck and shoving him down—that he's wildly misinterpreted something here.

His hands shake. He laughs.

He grabs his gloves off the floor and zips out of the door before he can hear a word out of Shadow’s mouth.

---

He's not even sure where he's going, just somewhere.

Sonic ends up at HQ before he even realizes it's where his feet are dragging him. Once inside, he stops the first person he sees in the corridor.

“Where’s Rouge?” he asks, mouth moving before he's thought of the words.

The raccoon points behind them. “She's in there, but—”

He’s off like a shot before they can finish. The door gives under his shoulder and he spills into the room.

“Rouge, I—”

She's already on a comm call at the central command console, fingers at her ear.

“—alk to him, all right?” Rouge's eyes meet his and narrow knowingly. “Actually, I'm gonna have to let you go, Shadow.”

His stomach sinks.

Rouge clicks off the comm and crosses her arms, settling back in her chair. “So, Blue…do you wanna tell me what happened in your own words or did you want me to slap you first?”

Sonic winces, ears folding down tight. He sinks down into the seat across from her. “I kinda messed up.”

“Yeah?” Rouge laughs, sharp enough it cuts. “That's certainly putting it mildly, hm? Whatever happened to the whole ‘be blunt with him’ schtick you were so set on selling to me the other day?”

All the playful teasing from a few days ago is gone. Rouge has a look in her eyes, like he'd gone and taken one of her gems, like he's touched something he should have thought way longer and way harder about before he did it. “I jus' thought that he—”

Rouge puts up a hand. “I'll stop you there. Thinking something and doing something are two very different things. You should be careful with what you're about to say or I might really follow through on the second part of this conversation.”

Sonic's hands shake, enough he can't even hide them in fists here. He's not like that. He wouldn't ever do something like that. He wouldn't! But Shadow had looked at him like he'd— “I dunno what happened, okay? I just—” His chest turns flighty against his will, the air rattling out fast. “It just happened 'n I didn't—”

“Breathe, Blue,” Rouge says. "I'm not exactly into the idea of scraping you up off the floor here."

Sonic takes a breath as instructed. “Look, I got to your apartment and I really didn't think he'd be there. And then he—” No, wait, wait, he needs to go back further. "When we raided that base, he saw the"—Sonic gestures at the mostly healed bite on his shoulder—"and he just kept askin' about it 'til I finally told him where I got it 'n that's when he started acting super weird.”

“How so?”

“Well he wouldn't even look at me for starters, but then he wrapped it up and he was bein' all nice 'n junk,” Sonic says. “Nice for him at least.”

“And?”

Sonic's shoulders flare hot. “I went back out tonight.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Needed a place to crash after, so I went to yours. Shadow was there, like I said. And he was...I dunno.”

“You don't know?”

“Touchy-feely? I guess?” Sonic cards his fingers through his quills, laughing, chest hurting. “He said he had trouble sleepin', so I just thought that was his way of saying he needed a hand, y'know.”

“Again with the thinking.”

Sonic looks at her, ears drooped. He must look miserable enough, because her face softens.

“Is he okay?”

“He's fine.” Rouge sighs. “Startled, obviously. And you ran out fast enough on him he didn't get a chance to talk it over with you.”

"Ugh." Sonic drops his face into his hands. “I'm an idiot.”

“Yeah, you got that part right at least,” Rouge says, patting his arm. “But you're also the idiot who can go back and apologize.”

He grimaces.

Rouge laughs. “Seriously? You two can't just avoid each other for the rest of time.”

Sonic rocks his hand back and forth making an eh sound.

“Unbelievable.” Rouge rolls her eyes. “Boys…”

“He's good though?”

“Yes, of course he is,” Rouge says. “Like I said, he just wasn't expecting it. You know, this would have been a perfect time for you to run your mouth. He doesn't exactly do well with...”

“With what?”

“Ah, nevermind.” Rouge waves him off. “He'll have to tell you himself, it's certainly not my place.”

Sonic groans, scrubbing at his face. “Do I really gotta?”

“Oh, please,” Rouge laughs. “You act like I'm torturing you, Blue.”

They both wince at that. His palms sting while she picks at her own gloves, inspecting the pristine fingers of them.

“I just—” Sonic makes a frustrated sound. “Talking things out, seriously? Can't we just, like, beat each other up or somethin'? It'd be way easier.”

“Well, I'll tell you this much.” Rouge pats the side of his face and smiles. “If you don't get back there real soon, he's not the one who's going to be kicking you in the back of the head.”

Sonic gets up with a laugh, backing up towards the door with raised hands. “Alright, alright, I'm goin'.”

---

Halfway down the hall, the sound of papers hitting the floor and someone muttering under their breath stops his feet. Sonic peeks into the open door to see Amy at her usual desk, looking over the lip of it at the stack of papers that must've been pushed off of it. Shoved, really.

Amy makes a frustrated sound as she gets up. “Just great—” She swipes a hand over her face and takes a deep breath, holding out her hands. “All right. You've got this, Amy. Okay…”

Before Amy can even crouch down, Sonic zips in, scooping up the papers in a flash. He holds them up with a grin. “Hey, what'd these guys ever do to ya?”

Amy blinks and then breaks out into a smile of her own, eyes lighting up. “Oh, Sonic, I didn't know you were here! Sorry about that, I'm"—she gestures to the desk—"just working on some last minute stuff for the supply runs. These inventory sheets need to be signed off before tomorrow, so...” Amy takes the stack of papers from him, her fingers brushing his.

Sonic goes rigid and tries not to flinch. It's certainly nothing worth even wincing over and yet—

Amy frowns slightly and then smiles again. “Thank you, Sonic.” She drops the stack of papers onto the desk with a heavy sigh. “Hopefully, I'll have these all done before sunrise this time.” Amy laughs, but he can see the way her shoulders are unsteady, the collecting bruise under her eyes.

It's familiar. The whole pretending thing. He just wishes she didn't feel like she had to put on an act for him.

“It's a little late to be here, isn't it? You pull a lotta all-nighters like this?”

Amy looks at him, weary around the edges. “There's a lot more paperwork to do then I thought there would be. And Knuckles is—”

“He's not exactly the paperwork type, huh?”

“No, he does what he can,” Amy says flatly. “But not really.”

He touches Amy's shoulder. The whole thing sits like someone else is doing all of it, like he's standing two steps behind himself. “Hey, I'm sure there's others who'd be willing to chip in if you just ask. I'd take a crack at it, but I think Knux ‘n I got that one in common.”

Amy waves him off with a laugh he knows is beyond fake. “Oh, no, it's fine, really. I've got it more than handled.”

“Alright.” Sonic raises his hands. “If ya say so.”

“What're you doing here anyways?” Amy asks, head tilting.

“Had a little chat with Rouge.”

“Oh? What about?”

Groping Shadow. “Ah, just some stuff,” Sonic says, scratching under his nose.

It should be easy to talk to her.

Him and Amy used to share a lot, the same way him and Tails do—did. The same way she's easy to get on with and he's never minded helping her when she’s frustrated or stuck on something. But, when he first stepped into HQ after his rescue, it was like this gap had opened up between them. All of them. She had hugged him, saying she was glad he was back, the same way everyone else had, looking at him, through him. Like they all could somehow see it all in an instant. Everything. He remembers smiling, saying it was good to be there, while he wondered whether it would've been easier to not come back at all. To just cut and run and go on forever.

And he can't stop seeing it.

Shadow's eyes. Scared. Of him. No other way to interpret it. He's never seen Shadow look like that before. Ever. Like he'd been backed into a corner. As if he'd go and hurt anyone like that, let alone Shadow. Like he'd ever do that. Like he'd—

“Sonic?” Amy touches his arm.

Sonic steps away with a laugh, shaking out the jitteriness in his fingers. “Look, I should probably get goin'. Tails asked me to come by to check out this thing, so—” He jabs a thumb towards the door.

“Oh, right. Yeah.” Amy's ears droop. “I'll see you later then. And...” Amy twists at one of her bangles. “You know, if you're ever up to it, feel free to stop by whenever. The door's always open and we've got the cafes up and running if you ever wanted to maybe sit down for a bite to eat or something.” She smiles, muzzle flushed. "With me, I mean."

He knows there's more there. She doesn't say the it's kinda weird we haven't chatted in a while, the I can totally tell something's going on and I'll get it out of you eventually parts out loud. She's always been pretty intuitive under all the stubbornness.

“Yeah, totally.” Sonic waves as he heads for the door. “Sure thing, Amy. See ya later.”

Amy's smile slips up at that, her face drawing and ears falling. His own smile slides right off as he steps past the threshold and out of sight.

---

It's like that split second before a fight starts.

The anticipation. Like coming up on a ramp, the speed tracks catching his shoes, flinging him out into open air. Heart tacking against his sternum, palm pads already sticky with sweat under his gloves. His feet carry him towards Rouge's apartment, and then he veers down the wrong street. Sliding under a construction barrier, zipping between the cranes and rubbled buildings, gravel kicked up as he rounds another corner and hits solid pavement again. He stops at the first place he hears music from.

Sonic throws a smile to the guy at the door who lets him in with a clap on the shoulder and a seriously, thanks for what you did for the city, man. A duo of drunken friends stumbles out as he tries to duck in, grabbing at each other's shoulders and laughing. One of them perks up when they see him, pointing and slurring his name. He gives a mock salute, a smile, before dashing past them and inside where everything becomes murky. Harder to see and harder to hear. Perfect.

He sharks around the crowd. Eyes skipping over whatever he can make out of who’s standing in front of him. Luckily enough, it's easy to find the biggest guy he can. Someone who looks at him in the worst possible way he can imagine.

He guns for him hard enough he ends up in a storage closet with him. A hand on his throat, pinned up against the wall with claws dragging down his side and sticking right into his thigh as he's hoisted up it. He says nothing, even when he sees spots in his vision from the fingers tightening around his neck. Even when it hurts as the guy grunts, hips harsh against him, breath sticking hot on his muzzle. He keeps his arms slung up on the guy's shoulders, legs clamped around him, encouraging him to go harder by digging his heels into him as he puts on the best show of his life.

Fur beyond damp with sweat by the end, once the guy finishes and he doesn't. Heart racing. Aching everywhere. His head at least a little more smoothed out than it was before. The guy leaves the closet first, ruffling the fur between his ears and laughing in a way that scrapes against him and festers. After it shuts, Sonic stares at the seam of light under the closet door, gone slack against the wall. Breathing through his teeth. Fingers numb. Shaking. Empty. Once he snaps back in, he gropes around in the low light for a towel, anything he can find, and mops himself up in stilted motions.

When he opens the door, his comm buzzes in his ear and he reaches up to connect the call.

“Yo, what's up?”

Geez. Does he really sound like that? He rubs at his throat and swipes someone's abandoned drink, downing the last of it. The burn doesn't help as much as he thought it would.

“Blue.”

Sonic's ears press back at Rouge's tone. “What?”

“I know how much you love doing your own thing, and ordinarily I wouldn't mind that, but I am going to need you to follow through on this one.”

Sonic looks at the other patrons mingling, drinking, laughing. “I'm literally on my way there right now.”

“Is that so?”

“Yeah.”

“Ah, so that's why I can hear Hot Honey. Must be a new thing they're trying out now. Music in the streets.”

His shoulders hike up, ears tipped hot. “Look, I'll be there soon, okay? It's not like he's gonna go anywhere.”

“By the end of the night, Blue.”

“Okay, okay.” Sonic looks towards the door at the far side, hardly visible between the low lighting and crowd. “ I got it…”

The call disconnects.

Sonic shakes out his hands. Whatever. He just needs to show up and say sorry and leave. That's it. Easy. He's dealt with worse. Way worse. This isn't like staring Metal Overlord in the eye or Perfect Chaos drowning a city while he tries to stop him. It's just a conversation.

He's totally got this.

When he leaves the club, it's raining.

He stumbles into a pothole cracked into the street right outside of it, the asphalt wound matching the outline of a badnik tread. In a flash he's down the road. The wrong way. Again. He winds through the rebuilt part of the district, up to where the buildings stair step down into burnt out husks, collapsed skeletons of twisted rebar and dead concrete. The rain falls harder. He runs his way up the neck of a crane and sits at the end of it. Feet kicking back and forth, staring at where the line between the old Sunset City and the new one begins until the rain soaks him down to the skin and his sneakers go waterlogged. Until he's shivering hard enough his teeth click together.

In between one blink and the next, he's at Rouge's apartment, water dripping onto the welcome mat beneath his feet.

He reaches for the door knob.

And turns it.

Chapter 3: separate me from my own two hands || so far, so fake

The apartment’s empty when Sonic steps inside. The balcony door on the far side shut tight, all the lights off besides a dim one from the range hood in the kitchen. Too dark. Too quiet. Shadow must have already left and, if that's the case, Rouge really is going to kill him for putting this off for so long. That is if Shadow doesn't find him later and finish him off first.

Rain water slides off his fingers and quills in sharp plips as he walks past the couch. Someone picked up the toppled mug already, the spilled tea cleaned up, even the dish towel has been grabbed out of the sink and the kettle put away. The more he looks it over, the whole place sits spotless. Not even an ounce of dust on any surface. Anywhere. He laughs under his breath, leaning heavily against the kitchen counter. Man, if only Shadow dropped by Tails' place, maybe he could make some sense of the chaos there.

Sonic's ears twitch towards the footsteps behind him.

“Your blood sugar's low and I assume you haven't taken the time to consume anything that doesn't come out of a bottle recently," Shadow says. “I'm sure you can find something in the pantry caustic enough for your palate.”

Sonic turns to look at Shadow, stomach curling despite the smile he puts on. “Says the guy who eats coffee beans like they're cereal.”

Shadow crosses his arms. “They have flavor.”

“So do chili dogs!”

“Tch. Debatable.”

“Yeah, whatever—look, how can you even tell, anyways?” Sonic asks, realizing how shaky his hands are, everything a little wobblier the more he thinks about it. “Is that another thing you got? Like some alien stuff or somethin’?”

Can Shadow smell his blood?

“No.” Shadow looks him over in a sweep. “You look like you’re about to fall over.”

Huh. Okay. Admittedly, he's not really sure when the last time he ate was anymore. Probably yesterday. Maybe. He checks the pantry and grimaces. Nothing looks appetizing. Honestly, the more he thinks about it the worse the nausea gets, his chest still too tight.

“Is there, like, soda or somethin’, I'm not really—”

“Sit down.”

Sonic sits in one of the chairs at the small kitchen table. The unsteadiness settling out as he leans over it, elbows keeping him propped up. Shadow grabs an apple from a bowl on the counter and pulls down a cutting board and starts to section it. He kicks his legs back and forth in the chair, listening to the sound of the knife chewing through the flesh and biting the board with a clack, sneakers scuffing against the tile.

“You really don't gotta do this, I'm—”

“Here.” Shadow drops the sliced apples in front of him and sits in the chair across from him.

Sonic picks at one of the pieces. When he bites into it, it's wet enough he doesn't want to spit it out immediately. It's at least not something dry, brittle and small enough to be shoved through the bars of a cell. He puts the skin of the apple back on the cutting board before grabbing another slice. “Thanks…”

“Of course you wouldn't eat the skin,” Shadow says.

“The texture’s all wrong, I can't chew that, man. It's all gross.”

Shadow rolls his eyes.

Sonic manages to eat another, picking at the leftover skin and twisting it apart with a snap as his stomach curls. “About earlier...”

“It was a misunderstanding. I gave you permission to ‘get it over with’.” Shadow finger quotes, frowning. “And you followed those conditions.”

“Still, I shouldn't have.” Sonic laughs, shrinking. “I should've known better. For what it's worth, I really should've.”

“It's behind us. As long as you don't do it again.”

“Yeah,” Sonic sighs. "Course not. I'd never—I wouldn't do that.”

Shadow eyes him.

Sonic shrinks again at that. Obviously, he wouldn't never, considering he literally already did. He mashes his hands against each other, legs jogging in place as he avoids looking at Shadow’s eyes.

“What endeavored you to come to such a conclusion in the first place?”

Sonic shrugs. “You were doin' all that stuff for me, so I thought I should, y'know, return the favor or something.”

“By sleeping with me?” Shadow asks.

“Yeah.”

“Why?”

Sonic blinks. “Why what?”

“Why is your assumption that what I choose to do is merely in order to receive something in return from you?”

“Cause, you're literally never nice to me.”

Shadow scoffs. “So my being ‘nice’ to you means that I want to sleep with you?”

Sonic grimaces. “When you put it like that it sounds kinda—”

“If you patched up a wound on my person, would you expect that I thank you on my knees after?” Shadow asks.

Sonic's muzzle wrinkles. “No.”

“So, then why does that logic apply to you?”

Sonic shrugs.“I dunno. I just didn't know what else to do. You said you had trouble sleeping and when you said there were other ways to get to sleep, I thought you meant—”

Shadow sneers. “You thought?”

Sonic's ears press back.

“Do you often seek out intercourse whenever sleep escapes you?”

Sonic scrunches up his snout. Intercourse is such a goofy way to put it. “I guess.”

“So most nights, then,” Shadow says.

“Not, like...every night.”

The look Shadow levels him with is beyond skeptical.

Sonic's hands sting and prick under his gloves.

“Okay, so what?” Sonic snaps, the sudden sharpness of it nearly startling himself. “You wanna rap sheet or somethin'? A calendar? Sorry I didn't print out the list of who I've slept with and who I haven't gotten to yet.”

“Do you even want to sleep with them? Or is it just a gratification drive for you?” Shadow asks.

“If you're askin' if I like it, sure, I guess. I don't really care. Half of them already know me anyways, it's just, like—whatever. They get to brag they slept with the war hero and I get to sleep for more than an hour, everybody wins.”

He doesn't mention the fact that some part of it feels good. Like, really good. Not whatever he's doing with them or with who—he doesn't really care about that, if he's being honest—but to be wanted like that. He can't explain it. It hardly even makes sense to himself. It's the same feeling he gets when things get down to the wire, when he's full of adrenaline, danger so hot on his heels that he can't even think. It's like...

“And what exactly keeps you from finding rest?”

Sonic stiffens. “Who knows. It's kinda like when I need to run except, y'know, not that. I just gotta do it.”

“There's a difference between wanting and needing something, hedgehog,” Shadow says evenly.

“Okay, but–” Sonic scrubs at his face. “Why does that even matter?”

“Why does what even matter?”

“The difference, the whole—” Sonic waves a hand. “It's whatever. It's just sex. It doesn't mean anything.”

“You do realize for many people it does,” Shadow says. “Or are you really that dense?”

Sonic makes an annoyed sound and collapses against the chair back, legs pushing against the floor until the front chair legs lean off the ground. “C’mon, man, seriously? It's like running or watching a movie, it's just something you do. It's not special or whatever. It's not like"—he gestures, searching for the right word—”some magical thing that changes everything about you once you have it.”

Shadow's shoe hits the chair leg, making the legs fall back to the ground with a thwack. “Do you actually believe any of the things you're saying or do you merely enjoy listening to yourself talk?”

“Whaddayou even know, huh?” Sonic laughs. “You're like the world's oldest virgin.”

“I've had sex,” Shadow says.

“Yeah, okay, sure. And I’m celibate.” Sonic rolls his eyes. “Really funny joke, dude.”

“What makes you think I'm joking?”

Sonic blinks. “You're serious?”

Shadow gives him a flat look. “Deadly.”

Hah. Rouge must have taught him that one. “Okay? Do ya want, like, a medal here or somethin'?”

“I want you to get it through your skull that you're not some thing merely for other people's amusement.”

“I know that.”

“Do you?” Shadow asks.

Sonic's eyes narrow. “Yeah, I'm pretty sure I do.”

“The evidence would state otherwise.”

“What evidence, man? You barely even know me!”

“I know enough about you to tell that you are going to get hurt—or worse,” Shadow says.

“Why do you even care?” Sonic asks.

“Would you prefer it if I didn't care?”

Sonic squirms in his seat. “It'd make this easier.”

“And what exactly is that?” Shadow asks.

“I don't know!” Sonic throws out an arm towards the rest of the apartment. “Can you lay off already? I didn't come here to be interrogated about my sex life, okay? I came here to say sorry and I said sorry, so we can just”—he gestures between them—“part ways and you can go back to hating my guts or whatever.”

Sonic pushes back from the table and stands. He gets a few steps towards the door when—

“I don't hate you…” Shadow says.

Sonic stops, looking over his shoulder. He smiles sharply. “That's really interesting, ‘cause you sure make it hard to tell that you don't.”

“I’m not—” Shadow sighs. “Rouge says I can be blunt. ‘Kind but not nice’, that's how she worded it. If I've given you the impression I hated you, that was not my intention.”

“It's fine, dude.”

Shadow looks away. “If you still wanted to go, I have no reason to stop you.”

Sonic wrings at his wrist, glancing between the door and Shadow. He walks back to the chair and sits down after a moment.

“Rouge sorta said somethin' before I came here,” he says.

Shadow's ears flick back.

“She kinda, I dunno, mentioned you don't do well with, y'know—” Sonic gestures vaguely. “But she didn't tell me what exactly, or why, really. Said I should ask you, so...”

Silence sits between them.

Sonic drums his fingers on the table, legs bouncing under his seat, the heels of his sneakers ticking off the floor as his eyes drift to the rest of the apple slices, where the flesh has started to brown at the edges. When he grabs another, he snaps it under his thumb, the sound sticking in his ears as he picks it apart and doesn't eat it.

Shadow sighs. Sonic looks up to see a scrunched look on Shadow's face, eyes farther away, somewhere else.

“There's still a number of things I don't remember clearly from my time on the ARK, and some memories are more vivid than others," Shadow says, looking up at him. “Shortly after the Professor first brought me out of stasis, there was a laboratory technician. An older human woman.” Shadow looks down, fingers tightening where they're balled into fists. “She told me what she was doing had been signed off by the Professor.” Shadow's muzzle wrinkles. “Later, I found out that wasn't the case.”

Sonic's chest tightens. “Dude, I'm so sorry. That's—”

“She called them ‘exams’.” Shadow sneers. “Pathetic. I presume she was sent back to the surface once they stripped her of her titles.”

“Wait.” Sonic holds up a hand. “Wasn't she charged with anything?”

Shadow laughs, like a dry bark of air. “You can't commit a crime against something that doesn't exist.”

Right. Top secret experiment. Space lab. Creation junk.

“Regardless, it hardly matters now,” Shadow says, face carefully blank.

“Yeah," Sonic says. “Geez, I don't even know what to say, man. I'm—I really shouldn't've—”

“It doesn't matter, hedgehog. It's in the past."

He's certainly not an expert on anything by any means, but he's pretty sure no one's supposed to say that sort of thing with the kind of hollowness Shadow just said it with.

Sonic's brow furrows. “Wait, okay, earlier you said you weren't a, y'know.” His stomach sinks. “So is that when you...?”

“I’ve had other encounters. I simply prefer my own company.”

Sonic laughs. “Nice way to say ya really like j-ing off.”

“Tch.” Shadow narrows his eyes. “You would find a way to make this vulgar.”

“What can I say? I got a talent for it.” Sonic tilts his head. “But, seriously, do you just really not at all?”

“I have no interest in it and see no point in wasting my time pursuing something I don't enjoy partaking in.”

Sonic winces. Wow. That one sure felt kinda pointed. “I enjoy it.”

“Congratulations,” Shadow says flatly.

Okay, maybe he really is just reading too much into things now.

He still can't help but backtrack to what Shadow said about his time on the ARK, though, everything about it circling the drain. Like something unseen breathing against the back of his neck, teeth bared against his nape, wet breaths panted right into his fur. He stares at the red on Shadow's arm, bouncing his line of sight up to his quills and back down again.

“I—” Sonic's shoe tacks off the ground as his leg jogs. “I, uh—”

“You what?”

Sonic shoots Shadow an annoyed look. “Geez, alright, man—I just wanted to say I get it.”

“Get what, exactly?”

“Not the, like, not sleepin' with people thing obviously, but the other thing.”

“You're not making any sense, hedgehog.”

Sonic scrubs at his face, hands jittery the whole of him on fire down to his feet. When did the room get so hot?

“What are you trying to say?” Shadow asks, eyes narrowing.

“The whole—” Sonic swipes at his quills in a self soothing motion. “Y’know—”

“No,” Shadow says flatly. “I don't know.”

“C'mon, why are you making this so difficult?”

“I’m the one making this difficult?” Shadow sneers. “You've hardly been coherent the past ten minutes.”

Sonic's hands shake, fire snapping up to his shoulders, down to his fists. “I'm trying!”

Shadow puts his hands on the table. “Trying to what?”

“I don't know—” Sonic mimics him, breathing sharp through his teeth. “But you're not exactly helping.”

“Well, do enlighten me how I can hold your hand through this as well then.”

Sonic's muzzle wrinkles. “You're a real jerk, you know that?”

“Perhaps, but at least I know what I am,” Shadow says

“What does that mean?” Sonic shoves his chair back. “What’re you tryna say here?”

“You need to calm down.”

It's like the desert all over again.

The Arabian Nights, the flame a ticking time bomb in his chest. Like grabbing the World Rings, fists shaking as everything floods in all at once, too much, stuffed full of an anger that's not even his so suddenly he can barely breath.

“No—” Sonic laughs, rocking to his feet and standing. “I'm—” He shakes his head, breath stuttering, the words pushing behind his teeth and out of him before he can stop them. “Why don’tcha just say it? Just call me a slut, alright? I get it. Sorry, I'm all used up or whatever. Gross, huh? I mean, hey, it makes sense you wouldn't want me to touch ya, maybe somethin' would rub off by accident.”

Shadow's eyes widen.

“What? Nothin' to say now?” Sonic laughs, the sound tearing out of him. “You sure had a lot to say before.”

“You should sit down.”

“Nah. I'm fine, but thanks.”

“You need to—”

“Yeah, I need to do a lot of things, don't I?” Sonic sneers. “Like stop throwin' myself at whoever looks at me long enough, or letting some guy yank on my tail cause he thinks it's hot or something. Isn't that what you said? I'm ‘gonna get myself hurt’.” He finger quotes. “Cool, fine. Maybe I'm asking for it.”

Shadow stares at him and somehow that's worse. Somehow that crawls right under his skin and itches. Burns. Hurts.

“Maybe I want them to do it. Maybe I don't. Who cares.” Sonic laughs. “What'd you call me before—a 'toy'? Yeah. Sure. That's me then.”

The quiet is loud enough it's like a smack right in the teeth. His breaths loud, heart right in his ears.

“Well?” Sonic asks, holding out his arms.

He wants nothing more than for Shadow to get up right now and hit him. For Shadow to stop looking at him like that and leave already. For Shadow to just—

“Are you done?” Shadow asks.

It's like hot air deflating from a balloon, he falls back into the chair, winded, legs numb, tail aching where it bumps against the seat. “I guess…”

Shadow stands up.

Sonic flinches back and he's not even sure why. It feels like he's got his fingers shoved in a live socket, like he's winding apart starting at every limb and he can't cinch himself closed fast enough. Shadow fills a cup with water and sits back down, sliding it over to him. He stares at it, still breathing heavily. His fingers curl around it before he can stop himself, tremoring hard enough it clicks against the table.

“Do you want to start from the beginning?” Shadow asks.

“What?”

Shadow sighs. “The Death Egg.”

“Yeah? What about it?” Sonic's heart kicks at his sternum.

“You truly are denser than I thought if you think I can't put two and two together.”

“What're you talking about, man?” Sonic laughs. “Nothin' happened up there.”

“And yet ‘you get it’?”

“I—”

“When we crossed paths after your rescue, I could still smell him on you.”

Sonic's ears ring, everything narrowing down to his hands around the glass.

“Rouge informed us you had been tortured. I assumed, at first, that it had something to do with that and merely dismissed it.”

“He didn't—”

“Everything else you've said has only painted a much clearer picture.”

Sonic shakes his head. “It wasn't—”

“You were not this promiscuous before the Death Egg. You hardly seemed interested in much at all besides your usual inanities.” Shadow ticks off two fingers and holds them up. “And now you're reckless. Blackout drunk with partners you can't even remember, injuries cropping up frequently enough it's hard to ignore. Do you even use protection, or do you not care about that either?”

Sonic's ears lay tight against his skull. “It doesn't matter, I can't even get...” He gestures miserably to his stomach.

“That doesn't mean you won't catch something.”

“Whaddya even want me to say here?”

Shadow makes a frustrated sound, kneading at his brow. “Whatever it is you need to.”

What? What does that even mean— “So, what? Maybe we had sex, okay? Who cares.”

“It's not sex if one of the parties is unable to consent," Shadow says, monotone, like he's reading it off a computer, like he's miming what someone else told him. Eyes hard and snout scrunched up like he's eaten something sour.

“Well, I said yeah, so—”

“Under duress.”

“I wasn't in duress or whatever! I just wanted to—it was just something to do. He offered and so I—” Sonic's hands shake, throat closing. “I dunno, I just didn't want to be by myself anymore, I guess. I just—”

“Breathe, hedgehog.”

Sonic takes a shaky breath. And then another. Everything feels far away. Muffled. Like he's pulled a sheet over his ears, hidden himself under it.

“Before then, had you slept with anyone?” Shadow asks.

“Nah," Sonic laughs breathlessly. "Not really.”

The table makes a groaning creak, he looks up to see Shadow’s hands clenched on the edges. Teeth bared in a silent snarl. If he looks too long at it all, it looks a lot like disgust. He can't even blame Shadow. He's seen the same look in the mirror.

“Yeah, I guess it's kinda pathetic, isn't it?” Sonic says, laughing wryly, a strange feeling creeping up behind his eyes. “Like, who swipes their v-card like that? It's so lame. It makes a pretty dumb story at parties, too. Yeah, I got locked up and slept with the guy who did it. Who even does that? Geez…”

“Sonic—”

It's the first time Shadow’s said his name during one of these back and forths and it jolts through him. It's weird. It's so weird, it's—

“Wow, honestly, I didn't even think you knew my name,” Sonic jokes, falling back onto that line like he's free-falling.

“How long did it go on for?”

“I dunno. A while. Long enough. What does it matter?” Sonic's shoulders hike up, heat shooting up his spine again and he grabs at it, because it's better than looking at Shadow’s disgust and the pity and— “Do you want all the details or somethin'? Is that what you're into?” He grins. “Here's one for ya, he liked to hold me against the bars sometimes—oh, and when he got bored he'd make me get on my knees and—”

“Stop—” Shadow holds up a hand, looking sick.

“What? Isn't this what you wanted?” Sonic barrels on, runaway train head on into runaway train. Heart crashing against his sternum. “The first time he asked me I told him no way. Like, what kinda guy just goes and asks somethin' like that outta the blue?" He scoffs and then sobers, staring at the table. His ears press down tight. “I dunno. It's all—” He laughs, gesturing at his head. “Y’know, everyone always acts like losing your virginity is some huge thing, like you'll remember it forever ‘n ever, but it just happened. It was like one second I was and then I wasn't. Big whoop.”

Shadow looks like he's punched him in the mouth. Like he's still reeling from the blow. There's something intoxicating—thrilling about it all, like throwing himself off the end of a ramp and reaching for the sun.

“It's whatever anyways. I didn't really mind it. It was way better than staring at the wall all day, countin' bolts. At least I was doin' something,” Sonic says. “It's not like it was even all bad. Guess that's why I keep doing it, like I got this itch now and I just can't scratch it.”

All he can hear in the kitchen is his own breaths. Shadow's. Like they've been trading blows. Like they've been fighting for hours.

“...sleeping with people, it scratches this ‘itch’ then?” Shadow asks after a moment.

“Sorta.” Sonic drops his chin into his arms folded on the table, huffing. “Sometimes. Sure.”

“And when it doesn't?”

“I just find somethin' else to get at it. Like running, or fighting, or giving some badniks the run around. Junk like that.” Sonic shrugs. “Sex is just super easy though. It's like—hey, you’ve done it once you've done it a thousand times. Whatever, y’know? If you're cool with letting someone put tab A into slot B they don't even care who you are, just that you're willing.”

“Are you?” Shadow asks.

“What?”

“Willing?”

“I'm not saying no, am I?” Sonic says with a too sharp grin.

Shadow grimaces.

"I mean." Sonic shrugs. “Yes or no, what does it even matter, really?”

“So if I said no and you continued to try to sleep with me—”

"No." Sonic's stomach curls with guilt. “That's totally different.”

“How is it any different?”

“You're—” Sonic gestures at Shadow. “I mean, you're you. And I'm just, y’know—”

“You’re what?”

“Me, I guess,” Sonic says.

Shadow blinks.

Sure, it feels a little cliche, just saying it like that, but what else is there to say? He made his bed a while ago, and now he's lying in it. “And honestly, I'd be kinda out of luck if I started picking ‘n choosing who I slept with.”

“So you just go along with whoever asks?”

“Sure,” Sonic says. “If they wanna ask.”

Shadow looks like he's going to throw up or something. Honestly he can't really tell what his facial expressions are doing. It's always been a little hard to read him. He can tell Shadow's stopped looking at him as much as he did before this though, he's got that much. He really can't blame Shadow for that either. He'd probably do the same.

“Look, I don't need you to, like, lecture me on this, alright?”

“Is that truly how you see yourself then? Something to be used and merely discarded when you're no longer useful?” Shadow asks.

“Yeah, I guess.” Sonic smiles, an empty thing that dies on impact. “Either way, I get what I want and they get what they want. So it all works out.”

Shadow is quiet, his eyes scanning over the table like he's picking up some kind of pieces and slotting them together.

Shadow huffs out a breath. “So, if I told you that perhaps there were times that what was done to me was ‘not bad’, as you said,” Shadow says, looking up at him. “And, maybe when I still didn't understand what was happening, I didn't mind certain parts of it, would that negate the fact that it was wrong?” Shadow narrows his eyes at him. “And, by your logic, would you consider me a ‘slut’—as you so delicately put it—for having a response to what was being done?”

“No? Dude, what? Of course not.”

“Then why do you not extend the same courtesy to yourself?”

“Cause, it's different,” Sonic says. “I dunno how to explain it, it just is.”

Shadow kneads at his brow, growling under his breath. “You’re not even listening to me.”

“I'm trying to! But you're just saying the same stuff over 'n over, man.”

“Because I'm trying to get you to understand something fundamental here!” Shadow snarls, louder than he's been this whole time.

“Understand what?"

“That you're allowed to say no.”

Sonic goes rigid, teeth clicking shut. “I know that.”

“Do you?” Shadow asks.

Sonic crosses his arms. “I literally say no all the time.”

“Interesting. All previous statements would point to the contrary.”

“I know how to say no, dude!”

Shadow shakes his head, laughing. It's a mean little thing, too, his teeth bared like some parody of a grin. “You keep saying that, but I find it hard to believe.”

“I can say it right now,” Sonic says.

“Tell me to stop then.”

Sonic's breaths pick up, eyes darting between Shadow and the door at the far end of the apartment. "What?"

Shadow pushes his chair back with a sharp grind. Metal on metal, red stuck in the corner of his vision no matter where he looks. “Say it.”

Sonic stares up at Shadow as he rounds the table and hooks a foot into his chair, wrenching it out from under the table. Shadow grabs the back of the chair, leaning in close, looming, breath hot on his muzzle. He presses against the chair back, quills flattening, chest rising and falling, faster and faster. A hand settles on his shoulder.

This isn't—

He tenses, eyes wide. It moves down to splay across his chest, heart thundering right underneath Shadow’s palm, hard enough he knows Shadow can't miss it. It slips lower. The world caves in around his ears. Numb fingers curled into the lip of the chair under him, the metal bench. He stares at a point past the grey furred shoulder, counts the rivets in the wall, the metal grooves. If he just plays along it'll be over faster anyway and then he can get some sleep after. He just needs to—

The hand settles on his hip. A sound builds in his throat, a tremor in him starting from his shoulders. Fingers trace down the line of his thigh and his teeth clench.

He—

He can't—

“Stop—” It rattles out of him and everything retreats, the heat looming over him pulling back, but he can't stop it once it's out, the words spilling out like he gutted himself. “Stop, okay. I did whatcha wanted. You—” Sonic's ears press down tight, the entirety of him trembling. “You got what you wanted. Jus'—”

“Sonic—”

Fingers brush his knee and he slams back from them, quills bristled, the chair smacking into the ground as he tumbles to the floor, shaking. The whole world tilts and his stomach churns with the motion. Red sticking everywhere he looks. Cold metal. Under his shins, all over, always. Always. He's— He's never getting out of here. He's never going to get out of here— He's—He's really going to die in here, isn't he? And he's never going to see Tails or Amy or Knuckles or—

“You need to breathe.”

No. No. Nonono. He's gotta get out of here before— He needs to get out or he'll—he’ll— He shakes his head, grabbing at his arms and curling over his legs. He can't—he has to—he needs to get out of here, but he can't— he can't—he— “I can’t—”

“Yes, you can.”

He tries to suck in a breath and it hurts. Everything hurts. He needs to get out. He's gotta get out of here. He has to. He has to. He— He needs to—to— “I—”

Someone kneels beside him.

Without touching him.

He has to—

He—

---

Cold tile under his knees is the first thing Sonic notices when he finally comes back down. The fridge humming is the second. His ears twitch towards the sound of someone getting up beside him, footsteps that go and then return. Something drapes over him and he blinks, grabbing the edges of the blanket as he uncurls. His legs tremble where they're folded under him, like he's been running way too fast for too long, pushed through mach one and far past it. His head pounds. He looks up.

Embarrassment settles hot on his shoulders, when he sees Shadow looking down at him.

“Ugh...” Sonic swipes a hand over his face. Gross. Why did he do that again? Geez. At least he didn't do something really stupid here like cry in front of Shadow, that would've been— “Sorry, man.”

“You're not the one at fault...” Shadow crouches next to him. “Are you able to stand?”

“Yeah.” Sonic pushes himself to his feet and the world wobbles before straightening out again. He pulls the blanket tight around his shoulders. “Yeah, 'm good.”

Shadow turns without another word and walks towards the hall. He follows, unsure if that's what he's supposed to do right now, but too wrung out to really care anymore. It's like someone grabbed him in their fist and kept squeezing. A towel is pressed into his hands, the blanket plucked off his shoulders as Shadow ushers him into the bathroom with a curt take a shower. He doesn't bring up the fact he already did. Earlier, when he first got to the apartment, before he mucked everything up. Shadow's right anyway. Whatever that earlier shower had done, it’s long ruined by this point.

He stares at the shower basin, the lights above the mirror too bright. There's an ache behind his eyes nestling in the longer he stands under them. Dry mouth, bad taste on the back of his teeth, he'd ask Shadow for a toothbrush, but he's already inconvenienced Shadow enough as it is.

He sits on the edge of the sink and peels off his still waterlogged sneakers, rain damp socks, his gloves and Shadow extends a hand for each one, setting it all aside, neat and bundled up under the lip of the sink cabinet. He has half a mind to recognize this as something ordinarily intimate in any other light. The other half simply wonders why his fingers sit so numb at the ends, as if he's stuck them in ice water and left them to wither. Undressed, he stares at the tiles.

Shadow turns without a word to leave.

Sonic grabs Shadow's arm, fingers still tremoring with aftershocks. “Don't tell them.”

Shadow looks down at where he's grabbed him and then back up at him. “Your business is your own. I have no intention of making it everyone else's.”

“And Rouge?”

Shadow gently pulls his hand off of him before releasing it. “Do you genuinely believe she doesn't already know?”

His ears droop. Knuckles had told him, once he'd gotten back, that she was the one that found him up there. For almost the entirety of his last month on the Death Egg, she reported back to Knuckles about his condition. She always kept his status vague, apparently. Tortured, sure, but alive. Breathing. Cause that's all that really mattered right?

“She won't bring it up if you don't. She at least has tact.” Shadow stops at the door. “Unlike you.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever…” Sonic says, glancing between Shadow and the shower. “Look, are you gonna leave or not?” He grins, all fake. “Or didja plan on joining me or something?”

Shadow wrenches the door shut behind him and the mirror rattles in the wake of his retreat.

Sonic laughs, sobering quickly as he stares at the tiles again, tracking over the grout lines lacing the white. Once he clambers in and starts the shower, he regrets getting in at all. The water slides under his fur like fingers. Skin crawling as he rubs his knuckles over his sternum. Heart racing again. He had hoped whatever had happened in the kitchen was over. Apparently not.

He rests his forehead against the tiles and breathes through his teeth, blunt claws catching in the grooves as he pushes at the wall, as if it'll give away under him. Disappear. He can't even tell if the sound plaguing him is the blood rushing in ears or the shower itself anymore. He—

Rouge knows something. Shadow knows too much.

And he can't just take that back. Play it off as a joke. He laughs, a strangled sound that turns into a keen. He's really messed this all up, hasn't he? It wasn't even that bad. It really wasn't. It just—He's fine, really. He's always fine. Yeah. Of course he is. That's kind of, like, his whole thing, so—

He screws his eyes shut. This wasn't supposed to happen, he's supposed to be fine—he has to be, ‘cause it wasn't even—honestly, compared to everything else, it really wasn't that bad—he wasn't—it's not like he was rap—

He breathes in sharply and water slides between his teeth as a hand grabs the back of his neck and shoves him down. Red light pulses under his knees, everywhere as the metallic floor falls away into void. Ink-black waves crash into him and drag him under.

When he looks up there's no sign of light. Nothing. Only the faint blue glow from the cuffs visible in the dark as he twists and flails, trying to kick up to the surface knowing like all the other times he'll never find it. His lungs burn. His eyes sting from the salt. He jerks as the last bit of air leaves him in a rush and sea water replaces it, sticking like swallowed glass in his lungs.

Claws dig into his scruff and pull him out with a scatter of red cubes. His knees strike metal as he hacks up bile and salt water. Shivering, soaked head to toe. Infinite grabs him by the jaw and yanks his chin up. Sonic's own gloveless fingers tremble against the grooves in the floor. The mask above him is empty, blank gray, red. Always red. The one visible eye nearly bored in its regard as it stares down at him.

He swipes at the spit on his muzzle and grins up at Infinite. Feral and with far too many teeth. “Is that all you got? Waterworks is weak, man, even for yo—”

There's a flash of red.

The floor disappears. Darkness laps him down into its belly and he stares at his hands flat against the shower floor. Panting, collapsed with his legs folded up beneath him and the water long gone cold.

Sonic fumbles for the handle and turns it off. The silence is somehow worse. His breaths somehow too loud as he slips out of the shower and sits on the bathroom mat, still shaking, water sliding down his ears and the end of his muzzle. He gropes around for the towel and drags it off the bar, scrubbing himself down in stiff motions. He scowls at it in his lap once he's finished. Red. Why did it always have to be— He tosses the towel onto the sink counter, grabs his stuff and yanks the bathroom door open.

Shadow stares at him, leaning against the opposite wall, arms crossed.

“What?” Sonic's fists go hot, teeth gritting. “Take a picture, it'll last longer.”

Shadow turns away without a word and opens another door in the hallway, standing aside. He blinks at the room. Militant, with the bed sheets tucked at the corners and folded back neatly, the walls bare. Clean, again. Immaculately clinical in some way he can't exactly place. He thought Shadow would at least have a poster or something up. A plant, maybe. Anything really. This is—

“You can take the bed,” Shadow says.

“Nah, I'm good with the couch, it's really not a big deal.” Sonic's chest still hurts, his head, like someone grabbed him by the shoulders and rattled him around for hours. “I slept on a metal bench thing for like half a year, I think I can handle some cushions ‘n springs.”

“Just get in.”

“Okay, okay, fine.” Sonic dumps his sneakers and gloves onto the carpet before sitting down on the edge of the bed.

He looks at Shadow and then the sheets. It's definitely big enough for two, and he'd feel bad about putting Shadow out on the couch like this. Rouge's own room is presumably off limits, not that he'd want to impose on her space here either. He should just let Shadow go and take the couch and settle for the bed. It's the most sensible solution here really.

Shadow turns away and starts to shut the door. Sonic's chest inexplicably aches. Heart tacking fast as his sliver of opportunity shrinks and shrinks.

“We could share,” Sonic blurts out. “If you want. I won't, y’know, do anything, I just…”

Shadow hesitates, eyes flicking over him. The door shuts with a soft click behind him as Shadow steps into the room and takes off his own shoes, setting them aside meticulously, like everything else he does. Flopping into the bed, Sonic pulls the sheets over himself as Shadow settles carefully into the bed on the other side.

And it's—

Super weird.

Way weirder than he thought it'd be. Like there's something missing. He hasn't exactly been in a bed without having sex with the other person first in long enough he's not even sure what he's supposed to do with himself here. He turns over and startles when Shadow’s eyes meet his.

“If you kick me, I'll shove you off,” Shadow says before turning away.

“Yeah—” Sonic laughs, thin and dried out. “Goodnight to you, too.”

He looks over Shadow's quills, his shoulders, down the spines on his back right to where the rest of him disappears under the sheets. He's so used to seeing the front of him, either throwing a fist in his face or sneering that it feels wrong. Like it's something he shouldn't be seeing. Too much trust shoved into his hands all at once and he can't quite get a hold of it now that it's there.

“Go to sleep, Sonic,” Shadow says.

For the first time in what feels like forever, when he closes his eyes he doesn't immediately see the cell there waiting for him. The presence of someone warm, breathing next to him at least a reminder he's not hundreds of miles above everything else right now. The restlessness is still there, though. Waiting. Rising the longer he stays still. He's pretty sure it can't go away. Like there's something inside of him—Dark Gaia, worse—something that got put there, slipped right under his skin and infected all of him. Everything.

And, no matter how hard he tries, he can never get it back out.

---

Sonic wakes up the next morning and Shadow is already gone.

It's like looking through someone else's eyes when he stares at the slight indentation left in the bed, the sheets folded back neatly on Shadow's side. His chest pinches, right under his sternum. He hadn't exactly given Shadow any incentive to stick around, so it makes sense. It's not like he fucked the guy. The times he doesn't wake up first and bolt out the door, whoever he's fallen in with will at least usually wake him up with a kiss, a hand already between his legs or something. Turn a night into a morning, maybe an afternoon if there's not a good enough opportunity to cut it off and jet.

Shadow hadn't even touched him.

And last night was obviously just some fluke. Him feeling bad about what he did and Shadow feeling the same way after everything he did. Two guilty hedgehogs and one bed. Sonic laughs, scrubbing at his face. It's like some kind of bad joke.

He slides out of the sheets and slips on his socks and sneakers, jogging the toe of one against the ground as he stretches his arms overhead. He rolls his shoulders and looks over at the nightstand. The drawer. The temptation zips right into his fingers and he pulls it open before he can think any better of it. Nothing. Just like the rest of the room, it's empty, like some kind of ghost lives here.

Sonic trudges into the kitchen while tugging on his gloves. Still no one. His chest pinches again. The part of him that hoped maybe Shadow would stick around at least until morning sits all shriveled up in his gut. It was obviously dumb to think something like that anyway. Honestly, he's pretty stupid for pretending Shadow would ever go and waste his time like that to begin with. Sonic shakes his head, swiping at his muzzle with his knuckles and grimacing. Whatever. As if he even cares that Shadow left without saying anything.

He yanks open the fridge and grabs out the half-used milk, bumping the door shut with his elbow before rummaging around in the pantry. Bingo. He snatches the cereal off the shelf—of course it's the old people stuff, too—and makes a meal of it. Or at least, he tries to. Cereal floating in lonely little islands as he stirs them around and doesn't take a bite, attention wandering to the wall, the calendar pinned to it. ‘Check in w/Omega’ is written in Rouge's handwriting on the third week, ‘Shelter’ once a week—whatever that means—‘Kitchen’, both of those in what he presumes is Shadow's handwriting based on the fact Omega is somewhere halfway across the globe doing what he does best. Killing Eggman's robots. At least there's a near endless supply of those now, considering how many factories Egghead propped up during the war. It's a little annoying to admit, but Eggman sure does work fast. Sonic frowns. Did work fast.

He squints at the calendar while trying, and failing, to chew through a bite of cereal. The more he looks at it the more it wriggles around, the feeling that he's forgetting something—but what? He’s pretty sure he didn't make any plans with anyone, definitely not ones he's thought about beforehand, and he's not exactly got anything he needs to—

Oh.

Shit.

Tails. He smacks the spoon back into the bowl and shoves it away before racing for the door. He's supposed to stop in like always, every two weeks on the dot. Both to say hey—Tails had called it their pulse check with a laugh and a shrug—but because he keeps his sharps stashed there. He can't believe it's already been two weeks. It's not like it's the complete and utter end of the world if he misses a T-shot at this point, but Tails will definitely get worried if he goes and forgets something like that entirely.

On the way out, he shuts the door behind himself a lot harder than he means to. He winces as the blue dog leaving the apartment next door looks over, startled and wide eyed. He waves a silent apology to her and zips down to the street in a flash, pushing faster, until everything blurs out into indistinguishable colors.

Chapter 4: but this is just me disguised as me || i said i don't want it, i just need it, to breathe, to feel, to know i'm alive

Notes:

There is a work posted that shows more of what happened on the Death Egg. For those who do not want to read it:

click here

-Sonic does not know that his friends and the world below think he is dead. Infinite later uses this to his advantage to begin to convince Sonic his friends have merely realized they don't actually need/want him, etc.
-Infinite keeps Sonic in solitary confinement for the first month or so, Cubot and Orbot bring him food, but neither are allowed to speak to/with sonic. Infinite does not tell Sonic his name and also does not speak with him or visit him much at all at first.
-Infinite eventually has the illusions fight him sonic. Infinite stops having food brought to Sonic's cell causing Sonic to weaken until he can't even stand up to fight the next illusion.
-infinite resumes having food brought to Sonic's cell. After a bit infinite drugs Sonic's food. And then sporadically drugs or doesn't drug the next meals to destabilize Sonic's understanding of the food being safe or not. Sonic starts to reject most food given to him.
-infinite begins to create illusions. He uses his knowledge of the plane crash he saw in the Doctor's database (the one from Sonic Adventure 1) and edits it so Tails is trapped in the cockpit and the plane is spiraling down towards open ocean and Sonic has to figure out how to get Tails out in time before the plane crashes. Sonic fails this exercise by design, but Sonic believes it is his own fault that he fails to pull Tails out in time.
-Infinite also designs an illusion that is basically the way the open ocean looks/feels at night. He drops Sonic into it still cuffed and Sonic is unable to tell which way the surface is nor can he ever find it and he repeatedly half drowns before Infinite pulls him back out and shoves him back into it, or into the Plane Crash scenario, back to back
-the cycle of these illusions only once Sonic lays on the floor and doesn't get up after enough repeats of either one.
-infinite moves on to ingratiating himself as a platonic source of comfort in the cell. He brings Sonic's meals, bandages his wounds, discontinues the illusions and stops the illusions from beating Sonic. He lets Sonic curl up next to him for warmth when he visits the cell, etc etc. Sonic, having been isolated for so long, takes whatever he can get and Infinite never crosses any lines so Sonic grows comfortable with Infinite's presence even though he still pretends to be annoyed, angry, etc at Infinite when he visits.
-Infinite eventually posits his question to Sonic who takes it not so well and immediately withdraws and refuses.
-Infinite resumes the Solitary Confinement conditions. Stops the food and water being brought to Sonic's cell and waits him out.
-It also is revealed during this course of events that Eggman is not aware of what Infinite has been doing, at least not fully. Eggman only visits Sonic to gloat about the conquering of the surface, further driving Sonic into a corner of guilt and turmoil when he sees the map of the planet being taken over, footage of raids/cities burning, etc.
-After a while of the continued isolation, Infinite visits Sonic again, stating his proposal again. Sonic agrees with a sort of tired reluctance, looking worn down. (In the fic, it is implied during his isolation that he has tried to get out of the cell by any means necessary to no avail, leaving him bruised and battered from where spin dashing or hitting the bars did nothing.)
-Infinite is called back to command center after he is finished with Sonic and Eggman pulls up the scrambled security camera footage complaining about the Ruby's interference. Eggman is completely unaware of what Infinite has done to Sonic.
-Infinite leaves Sonic in isolation again.
-When he returns to Sonic's cell, he waits for Sonic to come to him first, and when Sonic refuses to he starts to leave. Sonic grabs him before he can get out of the cell, and asks if Infinite can stay. The exchange for Infinite staying is having to sleep with Infinite which Sonic knows all to well by this point.
-This begins the rest of their time together on the Death Egg being transactional and lop-sided.

“A funny thing about notoriety, the more people know of you, the more of you those people feel belongs to them.” -Black Sails

“We should strike here and here, hit ‘em where they least expect it and take out those big Death Egg bots before the little ones even notice we're there. It's basically foolproof.”

Shadow sneers and Rouge sends him a look, not a warning, but a knowing one. She knows he's tired of listening to Knuckles come up with plans that will only result in more casualties. The Resistance's numbers have already thinned, and yet Knuckles continues to orchestrate frontal assaults against roaming Badnik bands as if the current supply of soldiers is endless. It's an unnecessary show of power for an enemy that's no longer organized. The Doctor is scattered to the wind, and yet he still finds that others continue to forget such a simple fact.

“Do you got a better idea?” Knuckles asks, flat and annoyed. Something Knuckles always seems to carry in the way he crosses his arms and glares at him.

“I do.”

“Of course you do,” Knuckles grumbles. “Hit me with it then.”

“I'll handle them myself.”

Knuckles looks at him flatly. “You know you don't have to be an arrogant jerk all the time, right? Your contract with that uppity-dot-org expired when Eggman wiped them off the map, unless you forgot that already.”

Shadow grits his teeth. It's not arrogance. It's practicality. Why risk more lives they can't afford to lose? Needless suffering and loss when the veritable solution is simple and readily available to them: they're mortal, and he's not.

“It would be more efficient to—”

“‘More efficient’? What're you even talking about?”

“Boys,” Rouge says, cutting Knuckles off and glancing between them. “I believe there's a simpler way to handle thi—”

“And you—” Knuckles says, jabbing a mitt at her. “You're lucky I haven't kicked you out of here after that stunt with the Emerald.”

Rouge laughs. “Oh, please, gorgeous. It was a harmless little fly by. I just had to see my girl after all. It's been so long since we had a moment alone together, you simply can't blame a lady for needing time with the one she loves.”

Knuckles scowls at her. “Stay off my island.”

“No promises, hon.” Rouge shrugs, smirking.

“Why you little—”

“Back to the matter at hand,” Shadow says, gesturing to the map on the monitor display.

If he lets them continue their bickering, they'll wind on for an hour, longer. It's some kind of strange ritual the two cannot seem to let alone.

This meeting is as useless as the rest of them regardless.

Precious time wasted when a conversation or a Comm Unit correspondence would've sufficed. He only indulges Knuckles because he's agreed to help the Resistance for the same reason Rouge has. Because it's convenient. It's something, at the least. G.U.N. is still nothing more than bombed out bases, all resources allocated to civilian centers and agricultural interests, and what little agents are left have scattered across the globe. The Commander himself is alive, but without a rebuilt Central Command for operations coordination, without the necessary firepower and control they had before—Rouge and him have become untethered.

It's a strange sensation still. Wrong. To not have a purpose as set in stone as what the Commander had offered him. As what G.U.N. had given him. As what he had on the ARK. His newfound work with the Resistance at least aligns with his promise to Maria.

The meeting concludes without further input from himself.

He concedes to Knuckle's plan only because there's no reason to waste the energy arguing with him when Knuckle’s stubbornness won't allow him to listen to reason. And because Rouge taps out a message onto her forearm. A succinct Morse Code that translates to a much rougher and cruder, we'll do whatever we want later, just shut up and let it go. Once Knuckles leaves, Rouge settles on the meeting table in front of him and raps her knuckles between his ears.

Shadow pulls away, quills clicking against the chair behind him as he does.

“What's going on up there?” Rouge asks. “Usually I'd have to practically pull the two of you off each other.”

“Perhaps he's simply right this time.”

Rouge laughs. “Now I know something's wrong.”

Shadow looks away, eyes flicking over the table. He's unsure how to word this. He hardly knows how to articulate it to himself. Last night he had gone to sleep next to Sonic and woken up beside him. And, when he had heard Sonic’s heartbeat—the slow, even breaths of someone beside him—he had experienced a unique brand of unease. Not due to Sonic's presence alone, but because Sonic, like all the others, is something that will never last. Dust to dust, and he'll remain, left behind. Alone. Never aging. He'll always be there to watch them become nothing in the end.

Shadow looks at his hands, the gloves the Professor had given him, the Limiters. One of the few things that remains of the man's legacy, himself among the tally.

“Shadow.”

Shadow looks up at Rouge. “Sonic stayed the night.”

“Oh, my—” Rouge's brow raises. “So, I take it that little talk went well then.”

He's grown accustomed to her tones enough to tell Rouge is spinning this one into an innuendo. More out of habit and reflex then because she genuinely believes they did anything. She knows better than anyone that that isn't his prerogative. “He's…unstable.”

“Ah, so the cat's out of the bag, is it? He certainly has a unique way of dealing with it all, doesn't he?” Rouge shrugs. “Though I suppose it works well enough for him at the end of the day.”

That's certainly one way to look at it.

Yet, the ideas Sonic regurgitated to him in the kitchen only solidified that Sonic has conscripted to a narrative Infinite fed to him upon the Death Egg. The conditions of Sonic's imprisonment are relatively unknown to him even still. What little Rouge has divulged to him in sparse conversations—terse exchanges that she laughs off with rigid shoulders—are hardly ever enlightening.

All he truly knows is what Sonic said to him last night. What was revealed through his own misstep. The violation of a careful boundary Shadow had shoved at when Sonic refused to budge, steadfast and stubborn, as he clung onto something. It's an ideal he's unsure Sonic even realizes he's latched onto.

He can still see the way Sonic had shaken on the floor in the kitchen after he shoved away from him and fell. Curled into himself like a wound. Clutching at his middle, his chest, like Sonic had been shot, like he was bleeding out, breaths frantic and fading—

At the least, the words Sonic had said to him were all too familiar. As if passed through a lens, prismatic and splintering: toy, weapon, cure. The difference is minute enough.

They're all, in the end, wholly discardable.

“You're doing it again,” Rouge says, flicking his ear.

Shadow turns his head, ears pressing back. “He's going to get hurt.”

“Maybe.”

Shadow glares at her.

“Oh, c'mon, don't look at me like that,” Rouge says. “You know as good as anyone that he won't listen to us, and definitely not you. If anything he'll do the exact opposite.”

“Are you saying I shouldn't care?”

Rouge laughs, her chin cupped in her hands, elbows on her knees. “No, handsome, I would never dream of telling you what to do. You and Sonic certainly have that in common.”

Shadow tenses his shoulders, arms crossed. Her verbal acumen has grown easier to navigate over the years, but it's still as if stumbling through a maze at times. A puzzle of sorts. He's meant to figure out precisely what she isn't saying outright and pick out what hides between every single word. At times it's admittedly tiring. Right now is no exception.

Shadow narrows his eyes. "We're nothing alike."

"Uh-huh. Sure you're not." Rouge tilts her head. “The real question here is, do you plan on going after him?”

“In what sense?”

“Hm, I suppose that's answer enough,” Rouge says.

Again with the word games. Shadow pushes his chair back and stands. He doesn't have time for this.

“If you come across him before I do, tell him I said hey,” Rouge calls as he marches for the door. “And use protection, kiddos!”

Shadow shuts the door behind himself. He can still hear her laughter through it regardless.

Stuck mid-step in the corridor an orange wolf stares at him, wide-eyed and breathless, before scurrying away. He still doesn't quite understand their continued wariness of him. It's been more than enough time since he first stepped into these Headquarters and ingratiated himself into their routine, yet they still skirt around him. As if they expect him to snap at them. Hurt them in the same ways Infinite's cheap imitation would have.

Shadow sighs, swiping at his quills in practiced movements. It's a familiar look nonetheless. Aligned with the way Sonic had stared at him, pressed as far back into the kitchen chair as the seat would allow. Trembling, cornered, stuck. It reminds him of the abandoned pets at the shelter, the ones the volunteer coordinator told him were picked up in the midst of the war. Something distant in their eyes. As if they can see it still, everything burning around them. A constant ruining.

Shadow's fingers tap idly against one another, attention flicking down the corridor. It hadn't been his intention to hurt Sonic, yet he can't deny he had in some way. Perhaps it hadn't been the most logical decision. And, while not an excuse, he had been upset, for lack of a better term. Plagued by a kind of discomforting simmer that grew the longer they exchanged words across the table. The longer Sonic denied everything and refused to listen to reason. Inexplicable. Yet, it roiled in his chest all the same, worsening until he was hardly able to think and had simply acted.

Sonic understood sparring, he had known that much, and so what he did was a form of a fight. However, he knows now, he shouldn't have touched Sonic at all.

Shadow picks the right side of the corridor and winds further into HQ. His thoughts turning with each corner, focusing down into the exact one he's been avoiding this whole time. Sonic sat on the couch beside him, the cup of tea settled on the coffee table. Sonic's hand on his knee. He had assumed, at first, that it was innocuous. It wasn't strange for those around him to reach out and touch him casually, even when he didn't permiss it. He had ignored Sonic's hand on him despite the familiar discomfort. The way the sensation sat like needles slotted under his skin, down to the marrow.

When Sonic had straddled his legs it was as if the ARK had flickered into view beyond him. A flash of heat in his chest, similar to the moment before Chaos Control slips him from one spot in reality to another. And then a full body numbness all over. Immobile. Trapped. Fluorescent lights overhead. The observation mirror over Sonic's shoulders. The exam table cold and metallic under his thighs, legs dangling off the lip of it, his hands and feet bare, snaking wires and intravenous tubing wrapped down his forearms. Sonic's lips on his own had turned the gauged syringes from before into scalpels. Numbed flesh giving around the press of them, the taste of an alcohol he hadn't consumed stuck on his teeth. A splitting open, an unraveling.

It wasn't until Sonic had moved his hand lower and grabbed at him that Shadow had shoved him off. Something hind and base taking hold. Telling him to get away from whatever was happening—a dissection—like he was being pulled apart on the table all over again. Even though he knows, without a doubt, that's not how any of it happened. It was a far quieter consumption than that. Measured and necess—

“Oh, no. Is the meeting over already?”

Shadow turns to see Amy with a collection of papers in her arms, a haggard sort of look to her that is unusual. She's generally well-groomed, put together, as Rouge would say. Right now she seems tired, a familiarity to it as she huffs, hoisting the stack further up.

“Yes.”

"Just great." Amy's ears drop, a frustrated sound leaving her. “I knew I was running late, but I thought I'd at least make it before it wrapped up.”

“It wasn't an important matter.”

That doesn't seem to reassure her. A crease in her brow forming, an uncharacteristic frown.

“I really should've been there, though. What kind of go-to liaison would I be if keep missing out on them?” Amy laughs and it's nothing like herself. "I guess that's why Knuckles is the Commander and al—"

“That echidna’s hardly a leader on his own.” Without Amy, Knuckles and the entire Resistance is practically dead in the water.

Amy handles the paperwork, the negotiations, the people. She organizes the movement of supplies, battalion deployments, the debriefs and communications. She contacts the families of the deceased, the missing, the wounded. Knuckles leads charges into battles that Amy has to clean up after. Knuckle's contributions are not comparable to Amy's. Commander? Hardly.

“Either way, it's really not a good look…” Amy says. “Is he still there? I really need to get him to approve a few of these.”

He doesn't understand why she allows Knuckles to maintain his position of authority. Perhaps it's because, at the least, Knuckles is quite good at rallying the troops. Knuckles certainly doesn't lack confidence either. A kind of bravado that's nearly infectious. And though he's somewhat loathed to admit it, Knuckles is a formidable fighter and a loyal comrade in arms to boot. Even if he does carry a temper. Rouge certainly never misses an opportunity to remind Shadow of how they're both hot-blooded. Alongside her continuous claims that it's their similarities that cause them to chafe at one another more than anything. He hardly understands how she ever drew such a conclusion in the first place, he's obviously nothing like Knuckl—

“Shadow?”

Shadow grimaces. “No, he's not.”

Amy's shoulders fall.

“I can bring the papers to him for you.”

“Oh, that'd be great! Thank you.” Amy smiles, handing over a partial sheath from the top.

Shadow glances over her shoulder, further down the corridor. This would be a natural breaking point in the conversation. A comfortable out before it stagnates and becomes a repeat of the usual awkward moment where he's unsure if he should continue speaking or leave. However—

“Have you spoken to Sonic lately?” Shadow asks.

“Hm? Oh—” Amy blinks and then perks up immediately, eyes brightening as she smiles wide. “I did actually!”

At least she hasn't lost her enthusiasm when it comes to this.

He listens to her ramble about the blue hedgehog, jumping from one aspect of Sonic to the next as he walks beside her. It's nearly impressive, how much she can talk about Sonic when prompted. There's a renewed bounce to her step as she speaks, balancing more on the toes of her shoes as she gestures with her free hand and talks fast enough he's unsure if she'll catch her breath before the next word. It's as if she becomes a whole different person.

A more familiar one.

---

---

Junk mail, sponsorship offer, brand deal, interview request, TV spot, junk, junk, more junk. Fan mail. Finally. Sonic tears that one open, peeling the side off and shaking the letter out. He can hear Tails banging away at the Tornado nearby, distracted by whatever he'd been working on since he first raced into the Workshop.

He'd found Tails on his mechanic creeper, up underneath the Tornado. Their song and dance was an easy one to slip into. He caught the board with his sneaker and dragged Tails out from under the biplane with a wry, it's been a while, stranger. Tails’ had gone from an annoyed scowl to a huge grin as he leapt up and hugged him, tails spinning behind him. A what have you been up to and a eh, not much later and he'd flopped down onto the ratty old sofa pushed up against the Workshop wall. Oh, yeah, there's more mail if you wanted to go through it. If not I can always use it as kindling, just lemme know, Tails had said, gesturing with a socket wrench towards the sagging heap near the workbench.

The fan mail always starts out the same way.

I'm a huge fan, your biggest fan, your greatest fan, you're my hero, etcetera, etcetera, blah, blah, blah. This letter is no different. The perfume that's obviously been sprayed on it is new though. And the lipstick marks at the bottom. Last night was— He crumples it up, face hot. Yeah. It's a good thing Tails never goes through his mail at least, even though he has to deal with it being dropped off here constantly.

“Anything good?” Tails asks.

“Nah, just the usual.”

“Bummer,” Tails says.

Sonic picks up another envelope. “There's one from Chao Cola, some sponsorship for a new drink. Blue Razzblur or something, I dunno.”

“Did you wanna take them up on it?”

“Eh. Not really feeling it.”

“You'd probably get some free cases out of it if you did.”

“True.” Sonic tosses the letter onto the floor. “But those photoshoots take way too long.”

Another piece of fan mail, a kid's drawing of Spiral Hill Village and a cartoon version of himself and what he assumes is the same kid who drew the picture standing beside him. A colorful thanks for saving me! above it all, but with a few letters dropped, flipped around. He stares at the version of himself this kid sees. Like he's some kind of superhero or something. Untouchable.

Sonic shoves the rest of the letters off himself and the couch, crossing his arms behind his head and shutting his eyes. Honestly, it couldn't hurt to try to grab a nap while he's here. It wasn't like the mail was going anywhere. He could always get to it later. He listens to Tails tinker away with the rhythmic shift, clang, clink of whatever he's doing, grateful for at least some kind of background noise to focus on. After a bit, the familiar hiss-spark of the welder starts up across the Workshop.

The tension in his shoulders slackens after a few minutes of listening to Tails weld. A heaviness in his limbs as he starts to drift off and the hands belted on his waist tighten enough to bruise, hips rocking into his as he jolts up and kicks at the cushions. He shoves himself up onto the arm of the couch, heart in his throat. No one's there. He's not—

“Sonic?”

He looks over at Tails who's brow is furrowed, welding mask pushed up, frowning in that way Tails usually does when he's picking apart something, trying to figure out how it works.

Sonic laughs, patting the couch. “Jus’ got stuck with a spring, this ol’ thing's certainly past its prime.”

“Hm.” Tails tilts his head. “I could probably gnab a new one from the junkyard if it's really that bad.”

Last time he went to the junkyard with Tails, he'd ended up helping haul back an entire fridge full of scraps. Filled to the brim with whatever Tails had deemed salvageable with a shake of his head and a who just goes and throws away perfectly good stuff like this?

“Nah, it's fine.” Sonic scratches under his nose. “Just wasn't expecting it ‘s all.”

“As long as you're sure,” Tails says, gesturing up towards the rafters. “You know you can always use the loft if you wanna try and get some sleep.”

“Eh. If I nap too long I'm gonna really mess up getting any shut-eye tonight.”

“So?” Tails asks.

Insomniac to insomniac communication, huh. “When's the last time you actually slept in a bed?”

Tails ears droop as he glances over to the workbench. The blanket draped over the stool and the half empty coffee mug on the tabletop all too incriminating. “Uh—”

“The workbench doesn't count.”

“I guess it's been a bit…” Tails scrubs at the back of his neck laughing all strained and too tight. “In my defense, I've been working on trying to get locations of the rest of Eggman's production facilities and hidden bases off those blades so we don't keep accidentally stumbling across more Badnik hubs. It's not pretty whenever the supply convoys get caught up in the path of a bunch of strays, and Amy really needs me to—”

“Woah, woah, slow down.” Sonic makes a time out motion with his hands. “You've also gotta rest, dude. You can't exactly help anyone when you're runnin’ on empty.”

“I'm fine though, really.”

Sonic gives Tails a flat look.

“Okay, okay—” Tails grabs up the welder, bumping the welding mask back down with the heel of his palm. “I’ll just finish this up and then that's it for today.”

“As long as you promise.”

“Promise!” Tails says with a thumbs up.

And then Tails dives back into the Tornado's internals, rummaging around in the gullet panel, his tails swaying behind him as he goes back to work. He sighs, flopping back onto the couch, quills sticking and snagging in the tweed. Tails keeps acting like he can't see the coffee mugs scattered around the workshop, the crumpled energy drinks and the gum wrappers, mint candies, a box of mint tea strewn over the workbench, tea bags spilling out like it's been gutted. All the frantic makings of a long string of all nighters. Not to mention there's the same sort of tired bruising under Tail’s eyes that he saw with Amy.

This whole Resistance thing really is a headache and a half.

“Shoot.” A clatter, the sound of Tails hopping up onto the wing and then diving into the cockpit.

“You good, bud?”

“Yeah!” A few more rummaging sounds and then Tails goes still. “Actually…I might need your help with something real quick, sorry.”

“Hey, no need for all the apologies.” Sonic zips up onto the wing. “Whatcha tryin’ to do anyway?”

Tails head pokes up from the lip of the cockpit, grease smudged in the fur on his muzzle, up to his forehead, like soot, like he'd poked his head into a chimney or something. “It's nothing too complicated, just a patch for the fuselage and the altimeter needs tweaking, I just can't get a good hold of it by myself, so—”

Tails extends his hand over the side of the Tornado.

Sonic's brow furrows, the creep of red sliding along the sides of his vision, chest tightening. He takes Tails' hand. Tails pulls him up. His sneaker gets a hold on the lip of the cockpit as he inhales sharply. Smoke in his teeth. Plumes of black billowing from the blown-out engine where a bite was taken out of the Tornado by whatever shot them. He stumbles into the cockpit, catching himself on the console and looking out over the other side of the biplane. At the jagged edge where the other wing is supposed to be. The struts left behind like broken teeth, tacking against one another as the plane begins to spiral.

His stomach drops at the descent. He grabs onto the windscreen to steady himself and stares out at the water that goes on for miles all around them. Nowhere to land in sight. Eggman just had to shoot at them over miles of open sea. Great.

“Tails, is there literally any way you can get her closer to shore from here? I dunno how well a water landing is gonna go like this…”

“No, we're way too far out now, it'd be—” Tails hisses through his teeth.

He looks back at Tails. Everything narrows in as he stares at the large piece of shrapnel bitten right through Tails’ torso, slotted under his collar bone. Long, toothed, like some kind of harpoon and sticking him right into the seat, sliced through the strap of Tail's seat harness.

“I'm fine! Trust me, it looks way worse than it is," Tails says, with a tight laugh, reaching for something in the cockpit’s side, eyes pinched.

The blood doesn't stop. Tails’ fur already clumping, stained red—something pops below his feet and the plane lurches. He grabs at the cockpit walls, heart hammering. “Tails…?”

“It's okay, I'm good—” Tails shoves the Miles Electric into his hands and claps something around his wrist. “Here. That should keep you above the water, and there's an SOS protocol on the M.E. just hit it and—”

“What're you talking about?”

Tails grabs at his wound, breathing heavily, smiling around the all too obvious pain he's in. “I'll get myself out after, but you should probably leave before we hit water. If you go down with the Tornado you could get stuck and that device won't help you stay afloat like it shoul—”

“I'm not leaving you, dude.”

Tails huffs out a breath, brows furrowed. “I can't exactly fly us out of here like this.”

“I don't care about that. I'm—” He grabs the shrapenal and tugs. It doesn't move, but Tails does, writhing and biting down on a yelp. He pulls harder. His fingers slide uselessly through the blood, gloves staining red. He puts pressure on the wound, everything shrinking down into the sound of the wind and the feeling of the world spinning out under his feet. “I'm not gonna leave you. I'll—”

“Sonic—”

He shakes his head.

“You need to go,” Tails says.

“I'm getting you out of here!” he shouts, tugging harder. “I'm gonna get you out of here, buddy, okay? Don't worry, I—” He breathes hard, eyes flicking around the cockpit. “I'll figure something out.”

There has to be some kind of gadget. There's always some device that gets them out of these situations at the last minute. Always. Something Tails hasn't thought to use yet. Anything. He tears around the cockpit. When he finds nothing he crawls behind the front seat and locates where the shrapnel end sticks out, sticky red, blood seeping through the foam and fabric. He kicks at it. If he can at least dislodge it from the seat then he can get Tails and it out of here and—

The plane jolts, another explosion rocking from the belly of it, more plumes of smoke and ash coughing from the side and kicking up into the cockpit. He swipes at the sting in his eyes, hears Tails coughing and keening when the movement jostles him too much.

He clambers back over into the front seat and grabs Tails hand, squeezing. He's not going to leave him behind. He'll figure something out. He'll— Once they hit the water maybe it'll be easier to pull him out once they're floating or something. He can't swim but he can at least get Tails out and push him towards the surface. His ears press back. Or the Tornado will just drag them both down with it—

He curls around Tails best he can, Tails' muzzle wet against his shoulder, hand shaking in his. “I'm sorry, bud, I'm sorry I couldn't—”

“It's okay…” Tails says, feeling colder than he should be.

All he can smell is blood, smoke from the sputtering engine, burning plastic and too hot metal. Hear the wind in his ears as they fall, until—

The world crashes into a scatter of red cubes and bright light.

He jerks up from the cell floor, clutching at nothing, looking around for Tails, the Tornado, any of it and it's all metal walls and floor and Infinite watching him.

He jumps to his feet, snarling. “Put me back.”

Infinite stares at him, mask as impassive as ever. “Your stubbornness would be admirable if you had not already failed the first five times you tried to save him.”

No. No. He'll get it right this time. He'll get him out. He'll get it right. He'll save him. He'll—

“Put me back right now or I swear I'll—”

The wing kicks underneath him, the plane rocking to the side with the hit. Eggman must have shot at them from the Egg Carrier. Tails yelps from the cockpit, shouting something as the Tornado starts its tailspin. A gloved hand reaches over the side of the cockpit as he clings onto the wing.

He grabs Tails' hand.

“Sonic?”

Sonic blinks, looking at where his hand sits in Tails, clinging on too tight. He jerks back, shaking his hand out and laughing. “Woah there, didn't realize you'd been taking handshake lessons from Knux.”

Tails eyes him, brow furrowed.

Sonic's ears flick back. “What?”

“Are you oka—”

“Hey, what was it you needed me to do anyway?” Sonic leans into the cockpit and pokes at the console. “She looks pretty alright to me.”

“Oh, uhm...” Tails blinks, seeming to shake off what he was about to ask. “Yeah, I just need you to keep this steady and out of the way while I put things together. I'd do it myself, but I need a more stable grip than what I can get with my tails, so...”

“Of course, yeah, whatever you need.” Sonic smiles and Tails smiles back, but in the same way Amy did, where it doesn't reach his eyes. “Just lemme know what I gotta do.”

---

“Ah, c'mon, no fair!” Tails shouts, gesturing with his controller at the screen. “That's cheating!”

“It's not cheating if you're just that good, dude,” Sonic says, grinning as his character on the screen celebrates with a victory tour of the track. “You're just mad I lapped you. Twice.”

“Yeah, because you took a totally illegal shortcut!”

Sonic puts up a finger. “‘s’not illegal if the game allows it.”

“I really don't think that's how that works,” Tails grumbles, bumping his knee with his shoe. “And scoot over already, you're hogging the couch.”

“Am I?” Sonic smiles, knowingly, scooting over further towards Tails. “And what about now?”

Tails shoves at him and Sonic laughs, leaning his weight onto Tails who pushes him up each time he ragdolls back towards him.

“Quit it!” Tails makes a frustrated sound. “I won't make chili dogs later if you don't—”

Sonic immediately zips to the other side of the couch, twirling the controller in his hand. “I want extra cheese on mine, thanks.”

Tails rolls his eyes.

“Ah, don't be such a sore loser, little bro. Maybe you'll finally catch a win after the fiftieth round.” Sonic smirks. “Emphasis on the maybe.”

“I'm changing the game—” Tails says, hopping off the couch and rummaging through the cartridges, holding one up. “Let's see you try to cheat at this.”

“Tomatopotamus 2? Seriously…?”

“What?” Tails smirks. “Are you chicken?”

Sonic laughs. “Bring it.”

Tails absolutely thrashes him at Tomatopotamus.

And, if anyone asks him, he totally lets Tails win each round. He isn't distracted at all. His brain definitely hasn't decided to, quite unhelpfully, feed him the image from Rouge's kitchen. The one where Shadow's muzzle had been an inch from his, his breath becoming his own, a hand hot on his shoulder and wandering lower. He shifts on the couch as heat flares low in him. He loses another round on the screen. Shadow's legs hot under his own as he straddled Shadow on the couch and kissed him. And if it's not Shadow it's some other nameless, faceless person, the idea of someone, the sensations playing on rota.

He tries to focus on the game and all he can think about is the weight of someone else's body on top of his. Someone else's hips against his. Hands on his waist, his thighs, fingers around his throat, teeth stuck in his shoulder. The harder he tries to not think about it, the more they crop up, with a meandering sort of escalation, each one more violent than the last.

He wants to throw up. He's never needed anything more in his life.

Another loss.

The wall of a cell grating against his quills, grunts in his ear as he's jolted up against it in harsh thrusts. A hand on the back of his neck, shoving his muzzle into the metallic bench, claws buried in his side as he’s dragged to the edge of it, his legs knocked wide and—

Sonic's shakes his head, legs jogging.

“You okay?” Tails asks.

“Yeah.” Sonic smiles, face hot, spine practically on fire. “Man, when did you get so good at this game?”

Tails stares at him and he tenses at that. He shouldn't be thinking about all of these things while sitting here. He should just focus on the game, on hanging out with Tails. He just needs to—

“Sonic?”

Sonic blinks at the screen showing another loss on his part. When did that even—

“C'mon, let's go.” Sonic laughs, shrugging. “Best of ten, right?”

---

Once they finally settle down for dinner, the sun's already mostly set outside the windows. The cast iron on the stove smokes with the hotdogs in its belly while Tails busies himself with prepping the rest of the ingredients. He had offered to help and was only met with a hand wave and a I got it, don't worry, you should probably go do your shot.

The bathroom lights snap on, the left bulb flickering like it always does. He rummages under the sink and pulls out the small tote. The process is routine enough he hardly has to think about it as he preps everything, attention wandering everywhere except the mirror above the sink. It's when he draws from the vial and switches out the needle heads that he catches a glimpse of himself.

And then he can't help but stare.

It's him. Sure.

He hasn't exactly stood around looking into mirrors much, the first and only time being the day he landed in HQ after his rescue. Since then, it's been months, over half a year—waning closer to an entire year since he's really gone and looked at himself in one of these. He touches his muzzle, the underside of his eyes. His fingers move to his shoulder, smoothing aside the fur to see the fresher bite mark still healing underneath it. The remains of others nestled around it. Ones that healed and reddened and then lightened over time. He follows the pattern of familiar teeth with his fingers, tracing the oldest one there. His hand shakes.

He finishes up his shot and packs everything away in a rush, shoving it all back into the cabinet before stumbling out of the bathroom. Chest tight enough he has to lean against the wall outside, knuckles pushing and rubbing at his sternum.

Not again. C'mon. He breathes fast, eyes following the seam of the baseboard. No rivets, no bolts, no metal. He's not there. It's fine. He's fine. He takes a deep breath, shaking his hands out, feet jittery, numb. He's got this. He paces outside the bathroom until everything starts to even out again. Until it stops feeling like he's running at Mach Speed while standing still.

“Everything okay?” Tails asks once he gets back into the kitchenette.

Sonic smiles. “Yeah, never better.”

Tails plates a chili dog for him and hands it over. “Here you go, extra cheese and everything.”

“Thanks, dude.”

Another dilemma presents itself as he stares at the food in front of him. He wants to eat. He needs to eat. He's practically starving right now with how hungry he feels. But he just can't. He glances over at Tails, settled down with his own meal, feet kicking back and forth in his stool, tails swishing behind him. It'd look pretty weird if he went and refused the one thing he usually couldn't go without.

He just keeps messing this whole routine up.

“I, uh—”

“Is it bad?” Tails asks, ears drooping.

“What? No!” Sonic laughs, waving a hand. “I'm just a lot less hungry than I thought I was. That's on me. I'm sure it's great.”

Tails looks between him and the untouched chili dog. The calculations are easy to read. It's the same way Tails looks at his computer monitors, the scrunch between his eyes, a pinning down, like he's picking apart the code in front of him. He shifts under the scrutiny.

“I'll just save it for later.” Sonic gets up and slides it into the fridge, amongst the unknown ingredients and tinctures Tails has shoved in there and labeled not food and do not eat, Sonic! He still remembers the time he found Tails’ nitroglycerin stash by accident. In his defense, it tasted kinda sweet, like burnt candy or—

“Did you plan on staying the night?” Tails asks, head tilting, a sort of hopeful air to it.

He looks towards the window. His skin already crawling, like muscle memory. Anticipation. The second the sun started to scurry off it settled in further. The restlessness, the tugging. Like he knows exactly where he needs to be right now, where he's supposed to go, and he just hasn't caught up with himself yet.

“Nah, I'm gonna probably go for a run and I was gonna check in on Knux too. ‘s been awhile since I saw him.”

He has absolutely zero plans to cross paths with Knuckles. He hasn't seen Knuckles since the war ended, and he's managed to dodge him at every opportunity since. Knuckles might be easy to trick when it comes to Eggman convincing him his Emerald is in danger, but Knuckles is also blunt enough to tell him like it is. To take one look at him and call him an idiot. You haven't been eating? What're you stupid?

He still remembers when he first got back, when Knuckles sat him down in some mock-up attempt at a debrief and asked him what happened up there. Knuckles hadn't taken nothing much for an answer either. Citing Rouge as his vague go-to on the last month of his life on the Death Egg. Words like prolonged torture, effects of imprisonment, left Knuckles when none of it sounded right coming from him at all. He'd denied everything he reasonably could. Smiling, dismissing himself when Knuckles frowned with an annoyed, you’ve gotta be kiddin’ me, following him on the way out.

All he could think about the whole time was how they knew he was up there towards the end, for at least a month, maybe even two, and they hadn't pulled him out the moment they found him—

“Hey, I'll be back around soon though, buddy. Don't worry.”

“Of course, yeah…” Tails says, picking at his gloves. A habit he knows Tails does when he's about to say something he's spent time scripting and rehearsing in his head. “It's just that I picked up some strange readings the other night, and I was thinking maybe we could go and check it out tomorrow. It wouldn't take too long, and we could take the Tornado to investigate it a little closer if you wanted to.”

“Where's it at?” Sonic's chest clenches. Phantom smoke in the back of his throat.

Tails grabs for the Miles Electric, tapping on the screen and sliding it over to him. “It's there. Honestly, it's probably nothing, but—”

“I've got it." Sonic snatches up the tablet. “Be back in a jiff.”

“Wait, Soni—”

It takes no time at all to get to the coordinates by himself.

Some inexplicable part of him hopes it's Eggman. Infinite. Both. Neither. After he'd beaten Infinite alongside Buddy, the jackal had vanished. Just like that. Like he'd never been there at all. He didn't even get to thrash Infinite around as much as he should've. It was like one second he was there and then the guy was running away.

Honestly, it's kinda pathetic in hindsight, but in the moment he'd barely been able to keep his head straight. All he could think about was how much he wanted to pummel Infinite’s stupid mask in every time the guy talked. Without Buddy there, he's not even sure what he would've done. He’s certainly never thought about outright killing a good chunk of the baddies he's faced over the years. (Though, admittedly, a lot left him no choice.) And, even after everything Eggman's done, he couldn't see himself doing something like that. But when he had looked at Infinite—hurting his friends, ripping apart the surface, acting like he owned the whole place or something—all he had thought about was tearing him to pieces. Like he'd do it with his bare hands if he had to.

Not like it mattered in the end, anyway.

Tails had said the Phantom Ruby most likely turned in on itself with the damage, some kind of cosmic folding mumbo jumbo. Infinite was most likely trapped in Null Space. Or dead.

The Eggman logo smiles down at him from the latticed metal of the radio tower, the red light all the way at the top blinking away as if its creator isn't currently nowhere to be found. Eggman had pulled a similar disappearing act to Infinite. He'd spent the first two weeks after the war ended scouring the entire planet for Egghead and nothing turned up. It was like he had up and vanished into thin air.

He sighs. Neither Infinite nor Eggman are here.

Only a scattering of Buzz Bombers and Moto Bugs and a forgotten radio signal calling them towards it. He spin dashes through a string of them and then bolts up the side of the tower, right up to the top. He's certainly not Tails and he's not sure what exactly he's looking at when it comes to the wires, the metal fuse box and the cables. He grabs a handful and yanks, stumbling back when sparks fly. The shock resistance Tails worked into his new gloves (the ones Tails had made for him after his ones from the Death Egg were deemed unsalvageable) and the rubber of his sneakers thankfully saving him from a crisping. He grabs another fistful, hands jittery. He pulls. The red light at the top of the tower blinks one last time. Slow and weak. And then dies. The remaining badniks go still before wandering off in random directions.

He sits on one of the metal struts near the top, legs swinging. The sunset long drawn to bruised purple, stars smattering the darkest parts.

Tails is probably upset—no, not probably. Is upset. He hadn't missed it. The way Tails had looked at him when he snatched up the Miles Electric and left. It'd been like this for a month, two, even longer, of Tails finding some new adventure to offer and him only thinking about the Tornado spiraling into the sea, Tails bleeding out under his hands, and him always unable to keep him safe. It's what he's supposed to do. So, as long as he can keep the Tornado grounded, Tails will be okay.

Tails’ll just have to get used to it.

---

He finds Tails in the loft when he gets back, curled up in his own bed for once, blanket drawn up over his eyes and ears, muzzle sticking out from under it. He sets the Miles Electric beside him and Tails stirs, uncurling with a slow blink.

“Sorry,” Sonic says, hands raised. “Didn't mean to wake you, bud.”

Tails looks between him and the Miles Electric, face pinched. “What was it?”

“What was what?”

“The signal,” Tails says.

“Oh, right, uh—” Sonic shrugs. “Just some radio tower thing left on. Nothin’ too big.”

Tails looks down, eyes flicking back and forth. The way he tends to do when faced with a mechanical issue, an engine he needs to diagnose and reassemble. “Makes sense...”

Sonic sighs and crouches beside the bed. “It would've been a waste to fly all the way out there with the Tornado ‘n everything. It's not like it was a big deal.”

“Yeah,” Tails says. “You're right, it's nothing.”

Tails is doing it again. The thing where he clams up, where he deflects and walls him out. It's not exactly new. He's gotten used to it cropping up occasionally ever since they started their sporadic routine of crossing paths a handful of times a month, rather than the near constant one they had before the war. Before the Death Egg. Before everything got flipped on its head. This time feels worse somehow. Like Tails is pulling as far away from as he can without leaving all together.

“Look, Tails, I'm sorry I—”

“Do you even want me to be your sidekick anymore?”

“What?” Sonic laughs tightly as he steadies himself with a hand on the sheets. “Dude, of course I do, what're you even talking about?”

Tails frowns. “Am I a burden to you?”

“No, Tails—what? You're not a—”

“Then why do you keep leaving me behind?”

“I'm not—” Sonic blinks. “I wasn't trying to leave you behind, I just figured it'd be faster to check it out myself. By the time you got the Tornado off the ground I could already be there and—”

“So, I'm too slow?” Tails asks, ears dropping.

It's like he keeps stumbling into spike pits. Like there's no right answer. Like everything he's saying keeps circling right back to wrong wrong wrong. Sonic's chest clenches, pinches, burns. “What's going on here? I don't understand where all of this is coming from.”

“I—” Tails scrubs at his face, messing up the fur tuft between his ears and making a frustrated little sound he hasn't heard from Tails in a very long time. “I just don't know what to do anymore. I'm sorry, okay? If I—if I did something to make you not trust me. I know I should've done something when Infinite attacked. I know I should've, but I didn't and I—”

“Tails, that's not—” Sonic reaches for Tails shoulder and Tails wrenches away from him, eyes bright and too shiny. He curls his hand up. “There's nothing else you could've done.”

“Then why won't you let me do anything? Why won't you let me help you?”

“You are doing a lot to help, bud. Here. With the Resistance and Amy and the others and—”

“You won't spend the night here. You don't eat anything I make. We don't go on adventures anymore. And I know you have to do things your own way, and I'm not even asking you to stay here or anything, and I'm fine if you don't, I really am— I just want to know if I did something wrong. If I—”

“Dude, seriously, you didn't do anything wrong, and I've just been—” Sonic gestures, hands hot under his gloves. “Busy with stuff. It's been hectic since I got out and, I dunno, it's just a lot. I guess.”

“‘...busy with stuff,’” Tails parrots, looking him over, sheet drawn tight over his shoulders, tails curled up around himself. “Is that why you have that bite on your shoulder?”

Sonic claps a hand over it. It should be barely visible at this point. Nothing, really. Yet when he'd delivered the server blades to Tails that day with Shadow, Tails eyes had tracked down to the dressing and then away just as quickly. At the time, he had dismissed it, distracted by remembering the way Shadow had bandaged him up. The way that the last time someone wrapped up a wound on him like that, he'd been a hundred miles above the surface, Infinite's fingers on his shoulder, gentler than they should be—

“What?” Sonic laughs. “It's not a bite.”

Tails gives him a flat look. “I'm not five years old.”

“Okay, but you're also, like, my kid brother so it’s kinda...”

Tails huffs. “You can tell me things, you know. You don't have to shelter me. I can literally synthesize napalm from kitchen scraps, I think I can handle it.”

“It's not a—” Sonic shakes his head, laughing, chest hurting. This isn't how this was supposed to go. “It's nothing, dude. Okay?”

“Is it from Shadow?”

Sonic winces. This conversation is spiraling out of his control faster than he can salvage it. His eyes dart to the edge of the loft. It's probably a pretty logical conclusion considering him and Shadow went to the base together and he returned with a bandage on his shoulder in the least inconspicuous place possible. “No, what? That's crazy, dude. It's just—”

“Then how'd you get it?”

Geez, why is everyone so concerned about some stupid bite? It's not even a big deal! “I dunno, I just did, okay? Look, Tails, I don't think you're a burden or whatever and you didn't do anything wrong. I don't even know where you got the idea I’d ever think anything like that for one thing, and two—”

“Because you're literally lying to me right now!” Tails' voice cracks, splitting on the high point of the ‘y’. “And you've been lying to me for weeks, months even. Practically ever since you got off the Death Egg.”

“But I'm not lying to you.”

Tails laughs, shaking his head. “If you don't wanna tell me what happened, fine.”

Sonic reaches for Tails' shoulder. “Tails—”

Tails pulls away from him again, knees drawn up into his chest. “I guess I'll just do what I do best and wait around for you to come back…”

It's scathing, self deprecating in a way that's all wrong. In a way that's not Tails. It's not right. This isn't what he wanted to happen. This isn't— “I can't tell you. I just—I can't, okay? I want to, but I—”

“I get it. It's fine,” Tails says, not looking at him.

Sonic swipes his fingers over his quills, hands unsteady. It's like free fall. Like being on the plane all over again, Tails heartbeat fading under his palm, the sea reaching up to catch them. And he can't stop it. He can't do anything to stop this. “I don't know what you want me to say here. I...”

“You don't have to say anything, I— It's not even you, really, I'm just—” Tails smooths his hands over his own shins in a self soothing motion. Something he's seen Tails do when he's overwhelmed, when it's too loud or bright somewhere and Tails has to sit down for a moment and reorient himself. “He killed you right in front of me and I didn't do anything, and I should've—I could've done something—but I didn't. I just stood there and he—” Tails looks at him, brow crumpled. “You were gone and I didn't think you were coming back and I didn't know what to do.” Tails shakes his head. “I just don't want that to happen again. I don't want to lose you again.”

“Hey, I'm not going anywhere. I swear, I'm—”

“I don't—” Tails bites off the words with a click of teeth, eyes shiny. “It's like you're here, but you're not here, and I can't— I don't know how to fix this, I can't fix it, I can't, I—” Tails shakes his head again, harder, grabbing at his ears and shrinking into himself.

“I'm here, buddy, okay?” Sonic grabs for Tails hand, holds it, shaking in his own, the world rattling under his feet, spinning, spiraling out. “I'm not gonna leave you again.”

Lies. Everything he's saying. He hates himself the more he talks. Hates everything about himself when Tails clambers into his lap and curls up with a devolving string of sorry’s, shaking, rattling with the kind of racking sobs that have to hurt on the way out—and he doesn't know what to do.

It sounds like Tails is dying. Like Tails has been holding it in forever. And all he can think about is how he's still lying.

---

Once he calms back down, Tails looks visibly embarrassed, his ears folded down, eyes refusing to meet his. Sonic leaves Tails with a box of tissues and goes and boils some tea for him, trying not to think about plane crashes and how Tails had grabbed onto him the exact same way the fake Tails in the fake Tornado did.

Grabbing the mug, he covers the top with his hand and runs back up to the loft in a blink. Tails is tapping at the Miles Electric, eyes still puffy, a straggling sniffle left. When Tails looks over at him there's a miserable curve to his shoulders, his ears still drooping.

“Here you go.” Sonic sits on the edge of the bed, holding the mug out to Tails. “One frankly disgusting cup of tea, as ordered. You do know they have other flavors, right?”

Tails laughs, swiping at his muzzle and grabbing the mug from him. “Thanks.”

Sonic taps his foot, glancing around the room before looking at the Miles Electric settled on the bed with some kind of schematic on it. He squints. “Whatcha working on?”

“Transceiver tech.”

“Right, yeah. And, for the non-nerds in the room, that is…?”

“It's sorta like the current Comms system we have, but more advanced.” Tails holds up the Miles Electric, showing him a more coherent view of the transceiver. It looks like a watch in his opinion, but knowing Tails it's a lot more than that. “It'll allow us to communicate over farther distances via video, hook up to any devices I add to their relay. I can even retrofit it with satellite tracking once my network is up so we can all keep tabs on each other easier. It could probably even keep up with you at top speed if I get it right.”

“Woah! That's super awesome, dude.” Sonic ruffles the fur between Tails ears and Tails bats his hand away, already trying to fix his fur with an annoyed huff. “And I’d like to see that thing even try to keep up with me. Betcha I can throw it off by at least a couple hundred miles, probably more if I get somewhere good and flat.”

Tails laughs, a determined look on his face. “We'll see about that.”

Once Tails finishes off his mug of tea, Tails finally starts to fall asleep, chin dipping as his work on the Miles Electric slows to a halt. He sits beside Tails the whole time, staring at the far wall of the loft, listening to Tails' breaths even out beside him. He gets up once he's sure Tails is far out enough. Takes the abandoned mug and the Miles Electric and sets both on the side table. Tails turns in his sleep and he tenses. Only settling again when nothing comes of it.

He tucks the sheets around Tails further, pulling them up tight around Tails' shoulders, something he hasn't done since Tails was much younger, lightly ruffling the fur between Tails ears and laughing when Tails muzzle wrinkles even in his sleep. He sobers quickly, looking down the side of the loft and frowning.

“I'm sorry, bud…” Sonic says. To an empty room. To no one in particular. To Tails, even though he knows Tails can't hear him. Even though Tails probably won't remember it even if he did.

And then, despite everything he said, he leaves. He slinks out of the Workshop all while knowing he’s doing exactly what he said he wouldn't do. Because maybe, at the end of the day, he really is a liar. Tails certainly isn't wrong about that.

And if he's such a liar, he might as well play the part.

---

Here you go.The guy's fingers tightens on his waist, squeezing before smoothing up and down his side again. He leans into him further. He takes the shot pressed into his hand and knocks it back. He swallows through the burn. Teeth grit as he swipes at his muzzle with the back of his glove and smacks the glass down onto the table. The guy laughs. He's not sure what number he's on anymore. He stopped caring around the time he was dragged over here and had a hand suction-cupped to his ribs like it was its own living breathing limpet.

Anything for hero boy, eh?, alcohol sticky breath against the side of his face. He chases the next shot with whatever his fingers find first on the table. Someone else slides into the booth on the other side of him and the two exchange words over his shoulders as he lists forward. How much has he had? A hand falls on his thigh. Slips higher. Enough. He stares at the other guy's hand in his lap like it's some kind of spider, a stupid bug or something. He laughs around the warmth in his chest. The other hand still on his waist moves to curl over his hip, thumb petting over him.

Ha! He thinks you're funny, mate. The hand on his leg retreats. Fingers dig into the back of his neck, yanking him up from where he had slumped against the table. Hot breath in his ear. He shivers. You wanna come home with us, don't you? A palm smooths right between his legs and he arches into it, bile in his throat, the whole world tilted sideways. He says something he can't even hear—half a yeah, half a sure—as he laughs, his mouth sliding all wrong on the words. He smiles. He grabs at the leg of the guy plastered along his side and gropes higher. Clumsy, uncoordinated. A chuckle from the flat chest snug against his upper arm answers him. All right, let's get you up, sweetheart.

He stumbles into the door jamb, catching himself on the wall once he gets past the threshold. He stares at the spackling under his gloves. How he got here registers the same way the arm slinging over his shoulders and tugging him somewhere else registers. He doesn't remember. And he also doesn't care.

He blinks. A different room. The back of his knees hit the edge of a bed. He falls. He props himself up on his elbows, but a palm smacks his shoulder, knocking him flat on his back, quills snagging at the sheets and mattress under him. I heard he was kinda loose, but I thought that was just some stupid TKZ shit. A laugh behind him, higher up on the bed, springs squeaking. With the way he was all over you, I'd say it ain't jus’ rumors. A hand lightly smacks his face. Isn't that right? He grabs their wrist in clumsy fingers, dragging their arm against his chest and hugging it to himself. Someone else crawls over him while he clings to the limb, heat settling along the whole of him, thighs pushed wide around where they settle between them. He holds on tighter, fingers shaking. I think he likes you. A sneer. Shut up. The arm in his grip yanks away and he fumbles around for it until someone snatches his wrists and pins them together above his head. Breaths in his ear, teeth against the shell of it. This is what you wanted, isn't it?

Liar. Liar. Tails crumpled face and tears, Amy frowning at him, Shadow telling him to stop talking, shoving him off, looking at him like he's a monster, like he's—he arches up against the body trapping his, his thighs tightening around them. All he can smell is alcohol, cheap cologne, taste it as a muzzle presses to his, teeth clicking, sloppy and uncoordinated. It sucks. It's probably the most lousy kiss he's ever had. The bed springs cough as the guy breaks it off and props himself up on one elbow, reaching down between them.

He stares at the ceiling fan spinning in circles overhead. Slacked. Like he's not even there, standing off the side of the bed instead of on it. Like its someone else who's pinned down here. Waiting. Pressure. Heat breaks out across his skin, fur prickling on his arms at the familiar sensation. A grunt in his ear. Hips worked flush to his. Still and then moving. Rhythmic huffs of air follow as his quills slide against the metal underneath him, jostling with each movement. The ozone bite of the Ruby on every inhale. Sonic clings onto the body rocking into his, pulling him in as close as he can as he lets him take whatever he wants.

---

It all sits like patchwork. Sliding in incoherent waves. Disjointed. Legs locked behind someone's back, fingers dug into their shoulders, being pulled off the bed after, tugging on his quills, behind his ears, shoving him down, pushing at someone's hips until he's let up for air, the bed again, an arm barred beside his throat as someone bares their teeth against the side of his muzzle and curses. Fingers in his mouth. On his teeth, fish hooking and wrenching his head to the side. Snout shoved right into someone's fur, the crook of their thigh. The sheets, knees sliding against them. A hand on his stomach, drifting lower. Inside of him. Everywhere. And then nothing. Thanks for the ride. Someone pats his hip as he pants, collapsed and spent. Thighs still trembling.

Sonic stares at the ceiling. Drifting. Room spinning out while lying dead still. His mouth dry. Sour. He needs to get up, use the bathroom, clean up, drink some water—do literally anything besides lay here. His head aches with the ghost of the hangover he's going to have tomorrow if he doesn't try to chase it off now. With a run they usually burn off pretty fast anyway, but—

Slut. Sonic winces. He hadn't really had anyone but himself just say it before. Not like that. Not with all the other stuff around it. Or, at least, not that he could remember. He was supposed to be black out this time too, that was the plan, but it was like he couldn't slip himself down into that blank space. He kept jerking awake and staring at everything. At nothing. Playing along with them like it was a game. Maybe he'd really enjoy it this time, too. Maybe it'd be different.

Once he pretended to be asleep for long enough, they left him alone, the two of them finally bored when he did little more than ragdoll between them. They had left the room laughing, the front door banging shut behind them. Sonic tracks the whirl of the ceiling fan blades above him as he slides a hand over the mess dried in patches over his fur. His stomach curdles. He turns over, curling up on his side, legs tucked close.

Am I a burden to you?

Why would Tails even think that? Tails has literally never been a burden. Ever. Not the same way he has been to Tails. Relying on him for the live-in labs to crash in, the food Tails makes, the plane that's technically his, but Tails puts all the effort into maintaining and running since he wouldn't even know where to start. Tails collects his mail. Tails keeps his sneakers in top form even after he runs them to nothing. Tails is the one who calculates what he needs to do next, who figures out how to stop Eggman whenever he can't. Without Tails he's basically useless. A nobody. If anybody is the burden, it's him. It's always been him. He's just a—

Teeth peeled against the side of his face, huffing. Fuck, you really are just a fucking slut, aren't you?

Sonic scrambles off the bed, slamming through the bathroom door, knees smacking into the tile before he throws up right into the bathtub. Fingers shaking. He rests his muzzle on the side of the porcelain after, cool against feverish fur and skin. He feels ill. Like the time he got sick enough Tails had to play nurse for him because he couldn't even stand up. He stares at the lines in the tiles.

He's not sure when they'll be back. If they'll be back. He should probably leave regardless. He doesn't want to sleep in that bed. Heated breaths in the junction of his shoulder, his neck, under his jaw, words panted right into his fur. Curses, insults as he arches up into the chest pinning his—

He clambers out of the window in the bedroom. Trembling. Head to toe. Like he's grabbed the radio tower’s wires without his gloves this time, limbs jolting in stiff movements as he stumbles down the fire escape. He smacks into the railing, nearly toppling over it.

Sonic stares at the alley below, still a drop down from the wire frame. He thinks about crashing into it. He thinks about the taste in his mouth, the soreness everywhere, the tackiness on his thighs, drying, itching, wrists burning like they're trapped all over again. His ears fold down tight.

Why did he just do that? Why did he ever let that happen at all? Who even does that? He could clobber those guys easy, so why the hell didn't he just—

He zips the rest of the way down in a flash, leaning against the brick facing, shivering. He needs to clean up. He's gotta— His heart tramples his sternum, breaths rattling fast through his teeth. He needs to—

He shakes his head and looks at a puddle spit into the pavement. He thinks about drowning. Again. And again. And again. And—

---

“If you're looking for sunshine, he's not here,” Rouge says the moment he's through the door.

Sonic goes rigid. He's never seen her in much else besides her usual attire, the occasional outfit change. This is all heart-patterned pajama pants, an oversized band tee and a robe, comfortable with none of the usual aura she presents herself with. He stares, trying to piece together what he's seeing with the idea of Rouge in his head.

“See something you like?” Rouge teases, mug in hand, leaning over the kitchen bar as she eyes him from across the living space.

Sonic raises his hands, laughing. “Just didn't expect you'd be home, thas’ all."

“Oh, trust me, Blue, I know exactly who you were expecting to be here instead. He'll be back eventually, if you wanted to stick around. I don't bite." Rouge smirks, a fang poking out from under her lip. “Unless you want me to, of course.”

“Hah, nope.” Sonic's face goes hot. “I'll just—” He points towards the hallway. “Borrow your shower really quick, then I'll be outta your hair.”

Rouge mock pouts, a hand on her chest. “I see how it is. You're just using me for my water pressure. A lady can't own a shower around here without every bachelor asking to use it, hm?”

“To be fair, it's pretty slick digs."

“My, my, interesting choice of words.”

Sonic rolls his eyes, heading for the bathroom. If he sticks around out here they'll round robin each other endlessly.

“Have fun in there, hon,” Rouge says. “The showerhead’s a real killer, if you know what I mean.”

At least, she didn't call him out on the mess he showed up in. Small mercies. Shadow would have probably stopped him at the door, at least commented about it. He grimaces. He's pretty sure even without all the evidence, Shadow can smell it on him anyway. Every single person he's ever let grab him, touch him, do whatever they want. Maybe those guys and Tails were right. Slut. Liar.

Out of everything since he got back from the Death Egg, at least that makes sense.

---

Once he's in the bathroom, he neglects to use the shower like he intended to, opting for a pitiful sink and wash cloth maneuver instead. He really doesn't want a repeat of what happened the last time he was in there, not when Rouge is right outside. He drops the washcloth in the sink after he's done. He glances at the mouthwash bottle and snatches it, listing against the counter after he chases the taste off his tongue.

Sonic sighs, scrubbing at his face and looking at the door. He's honestly way too sober for this. Whatever buzz he had left got burned off with the run over here, leaving him with an ache behind his eyes, like the flat of a spoon digging into them. He checks the mirror just long enough to make sure he hasn't missed anything too obvious and then pulls the door open.

Rouge is still in the kitchen, rummaging around, grabbing something out of the fridge and putting it on the counter as he settles on one of the stools at the kitchen bar. Leaving definitely crosses his mind. But she's also one of the only people left who doesn't sit around constantly asking if he's okay. There's something about the way she shrugs everything off that makes it feel like he's not getting backed into a corner for once. As if the war and the Death Egg and all that stuff doesn't even really matter.

Rouge shoves a bowl in the microwave, leaving it to heat up as she leans against the counter and eyes him.

"You know, I'd usually be a little more presentable when I've got company over,” Rouge says. “This place certainly leaves a lot to be desired compared to my old haunt. My poor silk robes…” She puts a hand to her forehead, mock swooning. “You shoulda seen it Blue, what they did to my beautiful girl. I have to say though, she at least looked gorgeous on the way out."

“Club Rouge's gone?” Sonic figured, like everything else, it probably didn't come out unscathed, but he'd also assumed she'd have the place back up in no time, too.

“Oh, trust me, I've tried my hand at getting her back on her feet, but you know how it is,” Rouge says, tilting her head. “And, I'm sure you know by now, there's plenty of others to choose from, isn't there?”

Sonic rubs the back of his neck, ears hot. “Yeah, there's certainly a handful.”

“I only wish I'd been able to gnab a few things before she went up. My, you should've seen Shadow after he found what was left of his motorcycle. I've never seen him that worked up before,” Rouge says, laughing.

“He really likes that thing, huh?"

“I'd say the two are practically married.” Rouge sighs. “Oh, but I can't even blame him. When I lost my place, I was ready to go at Infinite myself. He's only lucky my jewels are mostly fireproof otherwise—” She gives him a sideways look, a sharp grin. “Let's just say the war would've been a whole lot shorter.”

“He wouldn't've stood a chance against you.”

“You know me so well.” Rouge smirks, a conspiratorial kind of grin she does when he knows she's about to say something at someone else's expense. “Speaking of silk robes and evening wear...did you know I took Shadow browsing with me once?”

Sonic coughs, startled, bumping his fist against his sternum as he tries to restart whatever his lungs just decided to do. “You what?”

“He's so awfully dry about it. There's only so many ‘why does that matter’s’ a girl can take before she starts to lose steam after all.”

“You and—”Sonic points off to the side“—him?” He crosses his fingers over each other.

Rouge waves him off. “Oh, nothing like that, Blue. I offered to take him shopping with me and I may have neglected to mention where.”

“Wow, that's—” Sonic shakes his head. “I just can't see him going along with that, he's so—"

“He's got a good eye for color, I'll tell you that much."

Sonic laughs. He really can't see it. Shadow standing around in some lingerie shop. All out of place and everything. It's just not possible, but knowing Rouge, she's not lying. What he would give to see the look on Shadow's face the exact moment he realized where Rouge was dragging him.

Sonic smirks. “You gotta tell me, what was his—”

The microwave beeps.

He doesn't expect her to put the bowl she pulls out of the microwave in front of him. He stares at it. Some kind of broth, a soup, chunks of whatever's been tossed in floating around. He's hungry. He's beyond hungry at this point—but a familiar unease twists in his gut as well. He shifts in his chair, wincing as his thigh twinges, a too familiar ache in his tail.

“I'm sure you've worked up quite an appetite. Had fun tonight, I hope?” Rouge asks, watching him.

“Yeah,” Sonic says. “Something like that.”

Sonic stares at the steam curling off the soup. It's probably fine. Safe. Whatever. This shouldn't be so hard. He couldn't even eat the chili dog Tails made and now this. He—

"Not hungry?

Sonic frowns. “Yeah, I'm really just not—”

Rouge pulls it closer to herself without another word. She grabs the spoon and takes a bite of it before she nudges it back towards him and waits. A stalemate.

Do you genuinely believe she doesn't already know? Shadow was right. She'd seen more than anyone. She'd probably seen the meals handed to him through the bars, the ones Infinite brought in himself. Saw what happened after he finally gave in and ate them. It was always a gamble, whether it'd be safe or not. The lethargy would set in if it wasn't. Slow and then—

“It's clean, Blue,” Rouge says. “Trust me.”

Sonic grabs the spoon, shoulders tensing. “I know that.”

“Uh-huh.”

For the first time in a long time, he finishes a meal. He barely tastes it. In one blink he's holding the spoon and the next the bowl’s empty.

Sonic looks up at Rouge. “Did you make this?”

“Oh, please, I'm certainly no chef. Shadow sure is though.”

“He can cook?”

“Mhmm.”

Sonic looks between her and the bowl. “I just figured, y’know, since he's from space or whatever—”

Rouge laughs. “You act like he was on the ARK yesterday.”

“Well, he kinda acts like it...” Sonic thinks about the empty room. The lack of anything on the walls. All white, blank, like a hospital. Some kind of laboratory or something.

Rouge shrugs. “He has his quirks. You'd know a little something about that, wouldn't you?”

Sonic wouldn't really consider sleeping with people a quirk. He'd classify it under something like a necessity. Like something he has to do or he'll—

Sonic's ears flick towards the door as it opens.

“Welcome back,” Rouge says. “We've got a guest. I think you know him, baby blue and handsome like you.”

Shadow stares at him from the doorway—and then turns around, shutting the door behind him as he leaves. Rouge laughs way too loud. His ears press back. Is he really that bad to be around that Shadow can't even be in the same room as him? Or is it because Shadow can tell that, even after their whole talk, he went right back out and let someone—

Rouge pats his hand. “Ah, don't take it personally, Blue, he's in one of his moods. He'll come around eventually.”

“Yeah…”

Rouge grabs the empty bowl without another word, heading for the sink.

Sonic tugs at his gloves. Wrings at his wrists. He can't figure out where he messed it all up. Between what he did to Shadow and then the whole touchy-feely incident in the kitchen, he must've done something. There had to be some kind of explanation for it. He didn't do anything when they slept side by side. He knows he didn't. He's one hundred percent positive he didn't. So, then what?

He looks at his hands and hides them in fists, leg bouncing, shoe tapping. It's like with Tails and Amy, even Knuckles. Somehow, he's just not doing the right thing. Not saying the right stuff. They keep looking at him like he's doing everything wrong. Like there's something wrong with him.

Even Rouge. The more he thinks about it, the more he realizes she's not looking at him the same way the others are, but in a worse way somehow. Softer around the edges. Pitiable. Nothing like how she used to.

He just wants everything to go back to exactly how it was before the Death Egg. Before the war. It's not a lot to ask. He feels like on the relative scale of things he's ever asked for, it's a pretty small request. He just wants his friends back. He wants Rouge to treat him like he's an obstacle again, a frenemy, instead of whatever this is. He wants Shadow to at least look at him, offer a race, a spar, anything. He’d take literally anything over being treated like this.

He ducks out of the door in a flash.

He's out of the city before he can even register he's left, Green Hill’s checkered sprawl under his feet in an instant. The grass turns to sand and old scorched earth, a desert nestled in the midst of the greenery. He stops, staring at it past his sneakers. It's strange at night, the sand almost silver and shining in spots. Metallic.

He remembers running through here after the Death Egg mechs had already burned it. When Infinite had been attacking the city, Tails over the comm, telling him to hurry. He hadn't even worried about it. What was there to worry about? Whatever scheme Egghead had cooked up, it would fail like all the others. He always beat Eggman. Always. He had shown up in the square, cocky, unprepared, assuming it'd be an easy battle. Something quick that the tabloids would pick up and run a story on for a week until the next big thing grabbed their attention.

And then, he'd lost.

He remembers waking up on the Death Egg and laughing, thinking about how he'd be out of there in no time at all. A cell? Some janky cuffs? Yeah, right. It was all cheap tricks anyway. Eggman had tried to keep him pinned down before and this wouldn't work the same way all the other times hadn't. This would be easy.

A week passed.

Then another. Alone. He'd faced a lot of things up until that point, but being alone like that, all the time, endlessly. It was like something inside of him couldn't take it. Like this thing that grew in his chest until it became impossible to breathe past. He lost track of time after the third week. He'd turn and turn, spend most his time pacing, and the walls didn't change the cell bars, the metal none of it. Ever. At times he talked to himself just so he wouldn't forget his own voice, so he felt like he was actually there and not dead or something. Sometimes it felt like he'd been buried alive.

Later, when the illusions started to hit him at least it was something. At least it felt like something. The bruises would always linger after, a grounding comfort. He looked forward to it at some point. He remembers thinking about how he'd take anything he could get. At least they were touching him, even if it was just to punch him, kick him, whatever.

At least it meant he was still alive.

---

“What are you doing?”

Sonic cracks an eye open. Lounged in the sand and propped up against a stumped palm tree, the whole thing long since burnt and withered. “What does it look like?”

Shadow narrows his eyes at him. “You're going to get sand in your fur.”

“Pretty sure that boat already sailed, but thanks for the heads up.”

“It's unpleasant to comb it out.” Shadow grimaces. “It gets everywhere.”

“Eh, I'll just let the wind handle it or something.” Sonic turns over, arm tucked under the side of his face.

It's as good a bed as any. Sometimes the actual thing still feels too soft, like he's going to sink through it or something. At least the sand is gritty. It's hard to forget where he is when it sifts against him constantly.

Shadow sits next to him.

“What happened to all that stuff about sand in your fur?” Sonic asks, smirking.

“Shut up.”

“Nah…” Sonic says, eyes half lidded, a kind of sleepy murmur to it. “I think you actually like it when I talk. Why else would you keep comin' around?”

Shadow doesn't say anything, just looks away, at something else, maybe the horizon. It's hard to tell from this angle.

“Why'd you even come lookin' for me anyway?”

Shadow looks down at him. “Rouge said you ran out on her.”

Sonic's muzzle scrunches. “I didn't ‘run out on her’.”

Shadow gives him a flat look.

“Okay, maybe I did. I dunno. I just—” Sonic turns over, flopping onto his back, quills burying into the sand under him. “Needed to get outta there I guess.”

“Why?”

“You sure like asking that a lot, don't you?”

“That didn't answer my question,” Shadow says.

“Why do you even wanna know?”

Shadow doesn't say anything to that.

Sonic sighs and looks over the stars overhead, the constellations he still can never quite recall all the names of. The moment he got off the Death Egg, the world had unfolded from constricted metal hallways into sprawling void. All the colors dialed up to eleven, higher. He remembers staring, wide-eyed, at the endless expanse in front of him and thinking he was going to fall into it, as if it was going to swallow him whole. Like it'd all somehow become this living, breathing mass that wanted to crush him. It had been inexplicable. The way he had wanted to retreat to four walls. A box. Somewhere small. And then he hadn't been able to think much at all after that, the Death Egg imploding behind him, the surface waiting below him. The war. Infinite's defeat. The final battle. He hardly had a moment to stop until it was all over.

His eyes wander all the way to the moon. Bigger than usual. Enough that he can see the scars in it. Where the face of it never recovered from the Eclipse Cannon. Like someone had pinned it down and punched at it until it finally shattered.

“Do you ever regret it?” Sonic asks before he can stop himself.

“Regret what?” Shadow asks.

Sonic gestures towards the moon.

“No,” Shadow says.

“Seriously?”

“Why would I regret it?”

That's definitely a lie. He can't read a lot about Shadow, but he can tell when someone's lying to him. It sounds the same way he does it. Too sure of himself. Too confident. “So, you just don't regret anything? At all? Ever?”

“Would it matter if I did?” Shadow looks down at him, an unnatural brightness to his irises in the dark.

Sonic shrugs. “Probably not.”

“Even if I do regret what's happened, it can't be changed...”

Yeah, true, but—

“Y’know, we could probably figure something out.” Sonic grins, sitting up. “Hear me out, but I think if we both go Super there's a chance we can basically shove it back together, right? Or something? I dunno where the rest of the moon chunks went, but some of ‘em definitely hit here. It's been a while, but they're probably fine. So, that's one part down, we just gotta collect ‘em and—”

Shadow makes a sound.

“Was that—" Sonic's ears flick forward, smile widening. “Did you just laugh?”

“No.”

“No way, man, you definitely did.”

“You're merely hearing things.”

“I didn't even know you could laugh.”

Shadow scowls at him.

“C'mon, admit it,” Sonic says, poking Shadow's arm.

Shadow looks away from him, ears pressed back, an uncomfortable tension to his shoulders.

Sonic's chest clenches. He thinks about Amy's not all the way there smile, Tails’ face when he'd said he was lying, when Tails cried into his shoulder, shaking hard enough he thought Tails was hurt. The way Rouge looked at him in the doorway, with an unfamiliar pinch to her brow. And now Shadow, pulling away from him, looking anywhere but at him any chance he gets.

He just keeps doing it somehow. Ruining stuff.

Sonic swipes his hands over his quills, shifting out the sand stuck between them. Shadow says nothing when he stands and shakes out his fur, stomping his sneakers on the ground to get more out. Shadow's gone all closed off again. Shut out. He's pretty sure this used to be easy. Knowing what to say to everyone. The right stuff at the right moment. It hadn't been hard. He remembers it being like nothing, to keep everyone smiling around him. To make sure they didn't have to worry about anything. He'd save the day or whatever. Like always. So, why worry at all? Now, he can't even hold a conversation without the door slamming right back into his face—

Sonic bops Shadow's air shoe with his sneaker. “Race you to the loop-de-loop.”

“What are you—”

He's off before he can hear the rest of what Shadow is about to say. He tears across the grass and hears the familiar whine-glide of Shadow racing up behind him a moment later. He weaves in a slow zig-zag, letting Shadow catch up. Once he does, he circles Shadow once, twice, waiting—the anticipated leg sweep strikes and he dodges it, laughing.

“You're gonna have to be faster than that, man,” Sonic says, wagging a finger. “Is your age finally catching up to you or something?”

Shadow bares his teeth at him.

“Y’know, you could probably go a lot faster if you didn't waste all your energy swingin' your arms like that.”

“It's for balance. Something you wouldn't understand."

“Sounds like a pretty lame excuse to me.” Sonic puts up a peace sign. “Laters.”

“Get back he—”

Sonic zips off, putting a chunk of distance between him and Shadow as he churns up a half-ramp, bouncing off the spring he slides into and up onto a higher tiered track that stretches through the area. When he looks over the edge, he can see Shadow in a orange-red streak racing in tandem below. Beyond that, the water that circumvents parts of Green Hill.

“C'mon, pick up the pace already, grandpa!” Sonic shouts.

Shadow veers up the side in a spin dash, winding up onto the pass. He races ahead, trying to widen the gap between them. The tell-tale sound of Shadow's skates close in behind him, and then come up beside him.

Sonic grins. “Not bad, old man.”

“Stop calling me that.”

“What? And here I thought you'd love getting the senior citizen discount at every theater in tow—”

Shadow shoulder checks him, slamming him off the pass and out into open air. He hits the ground below, rolling into the side of a ledge with a thud and unfurling from where he'd tucked into a ball.

Sonic gets his feet under him and rubs at his side. “Geez, for a guy pushing retirement, you sure hit pretty hard.”

Shink-shink. Shadow barrels into him before he can even blink, pinning him to the ground.

“Really didn't like that one, huh?” Sonic grins up at Shadow, ignoring the way his skin flares hot at the breath against his muzzle. Shadow's legs straddled to either side of him. His wrists trapped under Shadow’s fingers. He pushes up against Shadow's grip and his sneakers slide along the grass when nothing budges.

“You do realize we're mechanically equivalent ages, or have you forgotten that as well?”

Mechanically? Ha! What a nerd. “Me? Forget stuff?" Sonic laughs. "Isn't that your problem?”

Shadow narrows his eyes, grip tightening.

Sonic's stomach twists, low and hot at the sensation. “Wait, wait—there actually is one thing I gotta know while I've gotcha here.”

“What?”

Sonic leans up closer, until their noses almost touch, his chest aching. A numbness stings his fingers as he shifts his wrists under Shadow's hold on them. “Why do you like grabbing me so much?”

Shadow immediately wrenches his hands off of his wrists. “Don't be stupid.”

Sonic laughs, putting his hands up. “Hey, you're the one still on top of me. Really makes a guy think, y'know. I mean, why else would you keep doing it unless you—”

Shadow’s knees lock into his sides.

Sonic brow furrows. “What're you—”

Shadow grabs his shoulders and twists, rolling over until their positions reverse with him falling forward onto his hands and knees over Shadow.

Sonic blinks, stupidly. Everything stutters. All the quips he usually has at his fingertips vanishing in an instant. It's probably just his imagination, but he swears Shadow almost smirks before he's shoved off, tumbling down the slant of the ramp beside them.

Sonic crashes to a stop at the bottom of it. Hands hot. A buzz wrapped around his neck. What the hell was that— He hears Shadow's air shoes kick on and he scrambles to his feet, wrenching himself forward using the trunk of a palm before he peels out across the checkered grass.

He races up one slope and then down another, flinging himself off a ledge and scrambling up the platform. Dirt gives under the toes of his sneakers as he pulls himself up onto it. Shadow clears the gap easily overhead, spin dashing up onto the platform and landing in front of him as he finally gets to his feet. He puts up his fists, shuffling a step back. His heel shifts against empty air.

“Are you finished playing games yet?” Shadow asks.

Sonic smirks. “Nah, I'm just getting started.”

He gives Shadow a two-finger salute as he tips backwards, tucking into a ball before striking the curved ground below and looping up and over a hill before he unrolls and runs again. Wind rushes around him, tugging through his quills, his heart beating faster and faster. Everything blurs out into nothing as he pushes forward. The air shoves back against him. Bending. It gives as he ventures right up to the speed of sound and slingshots himself past it with the familiar crack-boom echoing off the entirety of Green Hill. His ears ring. White noise. He laughs and he can no longer hear the sound of it at all, only feel it in his chest.

There's literally no way Shadow can keep up with him at this speed, even with his skates.

He forgets about Shadow’s other ability until he sees the crackle of light. He tries to put the brakes on so he doesn't smack right into Shadow at top speed to no avail.

Warping during a race definitely has to be cheating in some kind of way.

Crack. They go tumbling head over heels. Shadow grabs his wrist mid-flip and he twists around, getting a knee and then a sneaker wedged between them. He kicks. Hard. They fling apart. Shadow smacks into a palm and he laughs, continuing to roll over—sky, grass, sky, grass—as he slides right up to the teeth of a ledge with his own momentum.

Sonic's eyes widen. “Wait, wait, wai—”

He scrabbles at the cragged lip, and then goes over.

Falling is a bit weird. Like weightlessness. Floating or something. There's always a comical element to it he can't place. And a weird, temporary—

He smacks into the water. Everything blurs out into bubbles and turbidity. He kicks to no avail, reaching for the surface, the world oscillating between the bright moonlight stuck in the water’s surface to a dark nothing. No way up or out. The cuffs around his wrist dragging him down faster.

A flash. A hand grabs him by the scruff. Another flash and it goes dark for a moment. There's a tugging sensation somewhere in his chest and then he smacks into the grass of Green Hill. He collapses on his hands and knees, hacking up water and shaking.

Shadow snarls something out he can't understand through the blood rushing in his ears.

“What? Dude?” Sonic swipes at his face, still breathing heavy. “What're you even saying?”

“What were you thinking?!” Shadow wrenches him up by his arm, teeth bared. “You could have drowned!”

Sonic pulls out of Shadow's grip, shivering. “You're the one who jumped in front of me, in case you forgot.”

Shadow snarls under his breath. “And you're the one who chose to run about in a place that's half water.”

“Yeah, well, I don't usually have Ultimate Lameforms pushing me into it.”

“You call that pushing?”

“Would you prefer I call it shoving?”

Shadow scoffs, arms crossed. “You got yourself into that mess. I hardly touched you.”

"That's usually how it goes, right?” Sonic laughs, bitter and scathing. “Just can't keep myself out of trouble, can I?”

Shadow frowns, tilting his head back and looking down his muzzle at him.

“If it's all my fault, why'd you even pull me out?” Sonic asks.

“Because you're an idiot.” Shadow turns away and starts walking.

He grabs Shadow's arm and Shadow tenses completely under his hand, like he's gone and electrocuted him or something. “So, that's it? You just show up, insult me and then leave again? Is this a thing for you? Do you get off on being a huge jerk?”

Shadow pulls out of his grip. “Your incessant need to run your mouth constantly is certainly a talent."

“Wow, real clever. Bet it took you a few business days to come up with that one.”

Something about that has Shadow spinning back around to jab a finger into his chest. “Some of us prefer to think before we speak, not after. A lesson you would do well to learn.”

Sonic snatches Shadow's hand, lacing their fingers together before he can think better of it. “Man, you really want me to think awfully long and hard about you, dontcha?”

“Don't be an idiot—” Shadow yanks his hand away with an annoyed sound as he stumbles back. “What is your problem?”

“My problem?”

“I didn't realize the question required clarifying. It's obvious enough.” Shadow gives him a flat look.

“Just making sure you didn't miss a word there. Considering you're the one who constantly has an issue with me.”

“I don't have an issue with you.”

“Really?” Sonic asks. “You don't?"

Shadow stares at him and then looks away. Nothing. The blankness again. Door slammed. He's so tired of this. He's so— It's getting old. Sometimes he's really starting to think he's better off just leaving or something. At least they all wouldn't have to deal with him saying something stupid—

Sonic takes a step back and then another.

“Where are you going?” Shadow asks.

“Somewhere else, since this patch of Green Hill is obviously taken at the moment.” Sonic's fists clench, teeth grit. “Why do you care?”

Instead of answering, Shadow swipes his hands over his own quills, fixing them from where the fight jostled everything. Something about it annoys him. Everything about it. It's stupid that it even bothers him, but it just does. All of it.

Shadow sighs, still not looking at him. “You can stay at Rouge's tonight.”

“I'm not going back there. I'll figure something else out.” Sonic starts to walk away, jogging his sneaker against the ground and getting ready to run.

Shadow grabs his wrist. “You're being needlessly stubborn.”

Sonic's skin flares hot, then cold, heart kicking at his sternum, blood in his nose that isn't there, on his teeth, everywhere. “Let go of me.”

Shadow's hand drops immediately.

Sonic breathes hard. It's the same as the way he felt in the kitchen all over again. The tangled sort of mess in his chest, like he's chewed through barbed wire, decided it'd be fun to swallow it. “I don't need your stupid bed or whatever. I'm fine.”

Shadow scoffs. “You're hardly fine.”

“Yeah? That so?” Sonic whirls on Shadow, teeth bared. “Y’know, I don't get it. One second you're doing all of this and the next you won't even look at me.”

Shadow stares after he says it, impassive, blank. He wishes Shadow would at least react or something. It's like bearing down on a brick wall. Like looking at blank metal and wishing literally anyone else was looking back at him.

Sonic turns away again.

This isn't doing anything. His chest just keeps getting tighter and tighter, the burning numbness in his knuckles and at the back of his skull worse.

“If you don't want to stay at Rouge's, your fox friend will most likely allow you to—"

Sonic glares over his shoulder. “He has a name you know. It's only been, what? Years at this point, and you still haven't learned it. I get you have a memory problem or whatever, but I feel like he's at least earned your respect considering everything he's done.”

Shadow ears flick back. It's a fraction of a fraction of a second before they're back to normal, but he sees it. Again, with the saying things he shouldn't, with messing this up, with not being able to just shut up and stop himself from—

“It’s not safe for you to—”

Sonic goes rigid, losing the rest of what Shadow says in the sudden rush in his ears.

“Not safe for me?” Sonic stalks up into Shadow's face, feet moving without his permission. “Is that all this is then? You and Rouge just both think I'm too stupid to take care of myself now? So she sent you out to babysit me?”

“No, that's n—”

“Newsflash, man, but I don't need your help.” Sonic wrinkles his muzzle. “I was fine before you came along, and I'm fine now. I've been doing this whole 'hero' thing way longer than you, anyway. And at least I can say I never tried to blow up the entire planet because of some girl. But, hey, we all make mistakes, don't we?”

Shadow's brow furrows. “You should stop talking.”

Ha! So, now Shadow wants him to shut up again? “What? Don't like hearing the truth? What would she think if she saw what you did during the Black Arms Invasion, huh?"

“Sonic.” It's low, dangerous. A warning.

“It’s whatever anyways—” Sonic's hands shake. It's like he's standing next to himself, watching himself bare his own teeth, smile like a snarl. Mean and wrong. “Why do you even care what she thinks? It's not like it matters. She's dead.”

Shadow slams him into the grass and he rolls with it, smacking his elbow right into Shadow's jaw as he scrambles out from under him. Sonic shoves himself to his feet and puts a few steps between them. Breathing heavy. His skin on fire under his fur.

Shadow glares at him. “Don't ever talk about her like that again.”

Finally! Something! A single iota of emotion!

And he knows he should stop it all here.

He really should. He's already pushed it too far. Gone more than far enough. His fingers shake, his hands trembling in fists. He should stop, but he doesn't want to. He can't. He just needs to—

“It's jus’ funny ‘cause—” Sonic tilts his head. “You sure said a lot of stuff about not regretting things earlier. How do you think she'd feel hearing you say you don't regret letting her di—”

He expects a lot of things. A punch. Shadow tackling him again. The kick right up under his jaw is not something he anticipated however. His teeth click, a flash, and then nothing.

Sonic blinks. There's grass underneath him. His entire muzzle is on fire. His eyes drift to Shadow standing over him.

“Are you finished making a fool of yourself?” Shadow asks.

Sonic rubs at his jaw, working it a few times before attempting to talk. Thankfully, he didn't bite his tongue. “What was that for?”

“Would you have stopped otherwise?”

Probably not. "Geez, okay, alright.”

“Do you need a hand getting up?”

“No.” Sonic pushes himself to his feet. “I got it.”

“Where do you plan on sleeping tonight?” Shadow asks.

The question grates at him. His jaw aches too much to care about why it even bothers him anymore. “Wherever I pass out first.”

Shadow rolls his eyes. “Unbelievable..."

"Aw, Shads—" Sonic grins the best he can, chest empty, teeth hurting around the sharp edges of the smile. “If you wanted to sleep with me again so bad, why didn't you just say so?”

“Hardly.” Shadow scoffs. “You snore.”

“What?” Sonic blinks. “No I don't. You're making that up.”

“And how would you know you don't?”

“I definitely don't, I'd know. I'm good like that.”

Shadow kneads at his brow, sighing. “Just go back to Rouge's already.”

“Fine, okay, I got it.” Sonic waves a hand towards the disturbed parts of the checkered grass. “Sorry about all the junk I said, I just—I dunno, I shouldn't have said any of it…”

“It’s fine.”

No. It's really not. He doesn't even know why he said half of it now that he's past it. It's like it's him, but not him. The same way the him before the Death Egg is also him, but not him. They're absolutely nothing alike. They're horribly similar.

He's starting to not like either very much.

“I guess I'll see ya later,” Sonic says, ears flicking back.

“Goodnight, Sonic.”

“Yeah...”

When he gets back to Rouge's, it's just him in the living room. He flops down on the couch, fidgeting with the TV remote, picking at the buttons and flipping it over in his hands. He turns it on. Keeps it low, background noise, something that isn't stifling, dead silence. Just to fill the space. He watches the people, colors, nonsensical shapes melting together. He settles back against the couch, and then lists after a few minutes, and then closes his eyes.

Sonic jolts awake, heart racing. Shaking as he looks around—no metal, no rivets—the couch under him soft comparatively, the beginning of a sunrise in the windows. A blanket he didn't have before he went to sleep draped over him. Pain pills and a glass of water on the coffee table. His jaw aches.

Guilt has become a very familiar sensation since the Death Egg. It always sticks low in him. Heavy. Cradled tight around his stomach.

He leaves the second he hears a door open in the hall.

---

---

"He just bolted, didn't he?” Rouge says, leaning out of the doorway of her room, already dressed for the day.

“Yes.”

Rouge sighs. “I suppose it can't be helped.”

Shadow gathers the discarded blanket in the living room, folding it up and setting it on the couch. Somehow Sonic manages to leave a mess wherever he goes. He looks at the untouched pain pills on the coffee table and grits his teeth. Stubborn for no reason. He can tell Sonic is in a latent amount of pain based on how he holds himself, constantly favoring one leg over the other, voice a hair hoarse from what he assumes is a result of whatever he'd been doing before he showed up at Rouge's. The stench on him certainly leaves little to the imagination.

And Rouge knows that he dislikes being unaware of guests she plays host to. If she had simply called him ahead of time to inform him of Sonic's impromptu visit, he wouldn't have immediately left upon seeing him. He assumes some part of his sudden departure had a hand in what sent Sonic turning tail on Rouge and heading for Green Hill.

Finding where Sonic ran off to after Rouge called him had been easy. It always is. Sonic leaves a clear enough trail in his wake and there's always an undercurrent to his movements, an energy not dissimilar to the latent traces left behind by a Chaos Emerald's presence, but fainter. However, when he finally found him, he hadn't expected Sonic to be curled up in the sand.

Sonic had looked small. For lack of a better way to conceptualize it. Strange, even. None of it fit the loud, nearly grating way Sonic usually presented himself. And, to his surprise, their conversation had started out pleasantly enough, winding up with Sonic talking animatedly while offering up a ridiculous enough plan that he laughed at it. A moment that admittedly startled Shadow. When Sonic poked at his arm, all he saw was Maria, needling at him, smiling, it's fine, Shadow, it's just a joke. Sonic's scrutiny of his reaction had burned for a reason he's still unable to explain nor extrapolate.

Mercifully, Sonic had started a race following his freeze up. The challenge of it had been welcome in a way, and when he had finally spun Sonic into a position that made the hedgehog shut up for once, it was amusing to say the least. It all culminated into an ending he still regrets. Sonic had tumbled into the water and Shadow knew all too well drowning doesn't take long. Seconds if the fall's enough of a shock. Nearly instant if it's too cold. He had only learned to tread water himself after enough times dropped into testing tanks in the name of endurance limits, hypothermia recovery and cold shock response tests. Sonic, on the other hand, doesn't know how to swim at all.

And, what occurred after he pulled Sonic out of the water was a series of events he still doesn't quite understand. He heard the moment Sonic's heart rate skyrocketed the same way it had in Rouge's kitchen, except Sonic didn't collapse this time. Instead, it was like watching one of the animals at the shelter. Teeth bared, hackles raised. He knows exactly what it looks like when something is about to bite him and Sonic had looked nearly identical in that moment.

Inexplicably, it seems as if his silence continues to be a catalyst for Sonic's unease, though he still doesn't doesn't fully understand why. Rouge has told him he has a tendency to draw inwards at times. She'd laughed and pointed to the picture of a snail in one of the vintage books he collected that matched a bottom-shelf title he remembered from Maria's quarters. Hard on the outside, soft on the inside, just like you, handsome.

“Thoughts on a breakfast date?” Rouge asks, nudging him. “There's this cute little place that just reopened down the way. I heard the coffee's to die for, and I'm sure they'll be able to cater to your particulars as well.”

“Fine.”

---

“Hm."

"What?" Shadow asks.

"Apparently, our waitress thinks you're quite pretty,” Rouge says nonchalantly, inspecting her gloves. “I can hear her and the barista in the back talking about you. if you wanted to leave your comm frequency, I'm sure she'd get back to you about a date within the day.”

Shadow grimaces. He'd hardly consider himself pretty, let alone any descriptor remotely similar. He's all too aware of what he looks like: unnatural, alien, strange. None on the ARK had shared any similarities to him and the pattern has only continued on the surface as well. Sonic comes close, but his blue and green are at least synonymous with the surface’s own color palette. His own markings only match those of the Black Arms. The Androids. Infinite's copy. All things that destroy and ruin whatever they touch.

"Not interested."

Rouge chuckles. “Your loss, handsome.” Rouge holds up a wallet, the canary waitress’s he presumes. “She seems like a good girl, head on her shoulders and all. Chronic business card hoarder, too—that's pretty reliable of her if you ask me."

“Rouge.”

“What?” Rouge shrugs. “I'll slip it back to her before we leave. Maybe a little on the lighter side, but who's gonna miss a few bills."

Shadow sighs.

Rouge tucks the wallet away again and cups her chin in her hands, elbows on the table as she leans forward. “So, tell me…how'd you 'n Sonic's little rendezvous go last night?”

Shadow grimaces.

“That bad, huh?” Rouge laughs. “Suppose that's why he dashed outta there this morning.”

“He's erratic and unwilling to listen to reason. And, as he said himself, it's not our job to ‘babysit’ him.”

“Oo, he must've really said somethin' to tick you off.”

Shadow jerks his head to the side, muzzle wrinkled. “He doesn't think before he leaps, he says whatever comes to mind without regard for the consequences. I don't have time to deal with his antics.”

“Uh-huh.” Rouge settles back in her chair, legs crossing. “So, now what?”

Shadow glares at her.

“Oh, please, as if you're going to stop. I've seen you at the shelter you know, you always go for the meanest critter first. Whichever one tries to bite you, that's the one you're going to focus all your attention on. I think you like it," Rouge says. “The challenge.”

“This isn't a game.”

Rouge sighs. “I know, hon. I'd say we both know that better than anyone, don't we?”

Shadow stares at the table, arms crossed. “He's going to end up getting caught up in something he can't get out of."

“Yeah, he probably will,” she says.

Shadow blinks. She, at the least, doesn't deny it.

“But, if you try to stop him by trapping him in, you'll be no different than what happened up there. He's gotta figure this out his own way.”

“That's not good enough.”

Rouge shrugs. “Well, it's what works for him.”

“There are support groups for other prisoners of war, counseling services that have reopened for those affected by the—”

“He's not gonna go to those,” Rouge says.

Shadow glares at the table. He's well aware of that. It doesn't mean someone can't make the attempt to do something.

“And he certainly won't let you drag him there either. Besides, you're one to talk, aren't you, handsome?”

“That's different.”

Rouge rolls her eyes. “Whatever you say.”

The waitress comes back with Rouge's drink, handing him a cup of coffee beans and a spoon. Shadow accepts it with a curt thank you and the waitress stammers out a barely coherent response before fleeing. Rouge watches him pointedly the entire exchange.

“You could at least amuse her, you know,” Rouge says. “It wouldn't hurt to put on a little charm every once in a while, Sonic’s certainly better at that than you.”

“I'm not Sonic.”

Rouge snorts. “You sure say that a lot.”

Shadow's brow furrows.

“Ah, don't think about it too hard, sunshine. Just enjoy your meal, it's on the house after all,” Rouge says, holding up one of the bills she took from the waitress.

He neglects to partake in his own meal, instead he watches Rouge nurse her own drink as patrons shuffle around them. Her eyes flick between coin purses and jewelry and whatever else piques her interest, a grin crossing her muzzle when she sees something she most likely plans on grabbing before they leave.

Shadow settles back in his chair. Do you ever regret it? The question had been sudden, unexpected. Without the necessary context before it, he hardly knew what Sonic was referring to by it.

He looks out the window. Shiny, new. The repairs to this area of the city commenced months ago. Yet, with the continued variabilities in available materials, it's been slow. Across the street there's still evidence of the fires, a restaurant long boarded up, sign charred down to the hanging chains it used to swing on, blackened brick facing. He remembers it vaguely, the same way he recalls most of the missing pieces of this place. He knows that something used to be there. And now, it's gone.

So, you just don't regret anything? At all? Ever?

He looks at his hands. He regrets many things. Singular threads that wind over one another into a larger mass. Yet, there's one more recent than all the others. Tangled around the possibility of what could have been prevented had he simply acted when it was necessary.

He should have never allowed Infinite to live.

Chapter 5: [the past] feed them, fucking starve them, keep begging a little more, i'm (not) gonna be your whore || and if you go, i wanna go with you. and if you die, i wanna die with you

Summary:

A non-linear look into the War, the Death Egg and where it all started…

---

“And still, here I am. A decade later—the dog part of me grappled at the nape of the neck. Held under water, drowning. My tired limbs flailing.”
Living in the SHU
C.F. VILLA [“Hell is a Very Small Place”]

Notes:

[During Sonic's time on the Death Egg he is 17 until halfway through the last month, Infinite is in his 30's.]

“Research shows that some of the clinical impacts of isolation can be similar to those of physical torture. People subjected to solitary confinement exhibit a variety of negative physiological and psychological reactions, including hypersensitivity to stimuli; perceptual distortions and hallucinations; increased anxiety and nervousness; revenge fantasies, rage, and irrational anger; fears of persecution; lack of impulse control; severe and chronic depression; appetite loss and weight loss; heart palpitations; withdrawal; blunting of affect and apathy; talking to oneself; headaches; problems sleeping; confusing thought processes; nightmares; dizziness; self-mutilation; and lower levels of brain function, including a decline in EEG activity after only seven days in solitary confinement.”
Hell is a Very Small Place

Shadow can no longer remain in any singular location.

Infinite always finds him eventually. No matter what husked out city, cave, or crevice he crawls his way into to try and find a moment of rest. He hasn't slept in a week. He hasn't eaten in longer. Any attempts to encroach upon Resistance movements is met with a pushback he doesn't fully understand. His Comm Unit remains disabled, leaving him unable to contact Rouge or locate the others. He's continually forced to retreat from the squadrons and company units and their captains every time he attempts to get close to where they've begun to defend the cities.

Ever since Infinite’s initial attempt to trap him in the illusory visage of Green Hill, nothing has been the same. That facsimile that bled red at the seams, Omega and Rouge among the props used against him. Thankfully, Infinite's initial trick had been weak. Easy to shrug off as nothing more than a game. Now, whenever he's foolish enough to let his guard down, the scenarios he's met with have grown into sprawling nightmares. Near perfected. Where before it was twisting apart as he ran through it, the puppets Infinite creates now have a substance to them. Emotive faces. Coherent voices. Maria and the ARK, the Laboratory and its technicians, the Professor, Rouge, Omega, others. It's easy to fall for them if he's caught unawares. Therefore, rest is no longer an option available to him.

There's no longer any protocol to turn to either. Infinite wiped G.U.N. out beneath his fist at the start and with the aid of Eggman’s robot army and Infinite's own ever replicating one, even Spider Troupe and the DOG units stood little chance. As a result of the raids, he knows Infinite has access to the Doctor's files on him, G.U.N.’s own now, the Professor's notes and journals as well. Infinite must be all too aware he's incapable of dying. Therefore this petty revenge will not be exacted through a mere mortal end. Capture is the only logical conclusion he can consider at the end of Infinite's chase.

Shadow finds his own home destroyed when he tries to return to it. What little he had built up, cordoned off for himself in this world, reduced to nothing. Perhaps he was foolish enough to believe it wouldn't happen again. That losing everything was somehow behind him, in the past, something that only happened on the ARK and not here. He has nowhere to go. No place to turn to. Half the continent becomes cut off from him in weeks. The islands taken first and then the rest as the Eggman Empire crawls onto the mainlands trailing an endless swath of fires and scorched earth.

And Infinite's words, the taunting remarks about Sonic during his and Infinite's 'reunion', finally come to clarity once he catches word of what's happened. Sonic is dead. Impossible in itself. Sonic's inordinately stubborn. He's seen it before, the blue hedgehog simply refuses to die no matter the threat. It's most likely another trick. Paltry lies. Sonic would sooner laugh at the idea of someone even suggesting such a thing than it ever be a reality.

Only Sonic's friends can confirm or deny such rumors.

Locating them becomes another matter entirely, however. Getting to them as well. He's only able to get within a sight of what Headquarters he's gathered the location of before weapons turn on him. Orders barked amongst the forces stationed around it. They waste precious firepower on him and their attention as well. Death Egg Robots, Egg Pawns, the usual constructs the Doctor brings to life already marching on the city nearby, their efforts squandered on stopping him when he's not even the true enemy.

It's not until he sees his own copy that he understands what Infinite has done. It's convincing enough. He can no longer blame them for their wariness of him.

He follows the trails of destruction through the cities, the towns and villages, he knows without a doubt some of the worst of it all lies at the hands of his cheapened fake. Without his Comm Unit and with his G.U.N. Identifier Implant non-operational, they're no longer able to differentiate him from the illusion. It wouldn't be the first time, either. Android look-alikes, Neo Metal Sonic, Black Arms Hive Mind. He knows not even Rouge can discern him from his copy without a far closer look, and he doesn't have time to stop, to prove himself to them when every moment he spends idling is another moment slipped into the clutches of an illusion at Infinite's hands.

Their hostility towards him only becomes more justified after he stops his copy's wanton destruction of another village. He scatters it into spilling red cubes and then nothing. When he surveys the destruction and searches for survivors in the fallout, it's as if something far larger has torn through it all. For the first time in a long while, he thinks of Maria's old storybooks, of dragons and villages burnt and stomped underfoot as he lifts a beam pinning a civilian’s legs. He tries to help them up. They only flinch, wide-eyed, and scramble away with raised hands. ‘Please, don't hurt me, I—’

He's the villain of this story now, whether he wants to be or not, and the longer the war wages on without a glimpse of Sonic, the more the murmurings from before become all too real. Solidified. Impossible to avoid.

His copy returns again. And again. And he chases it across the surface, destroying it each time. Only for it to rear its head in another city. The nearer he trails it, the further he stumbles into Infinite's traps, and the closer Infinite gets to him as well. Taunting, endlessly.

Shadow finds another town. Too late. He searches through the remains of the buildings, picking over the heat-bleached skeletons of them and hoping he doesn't find anyone buried beneath them this time. He picks up a stuffed animal from the dirt, left behind by someone who hopefully escaped before the flames reached here. Blackened and melted stuffing spilling from its side, empty glass eyes staring into nothing. He drops it back into the ashes.

Sonic is dead.

There's no hero in this tale, only a monster wearing his face. And no matter how many times he kills it, it never stays dead.

---

---

Rouge has to admit, after over thirty days cooped up in space, it’s nice to have her heels back on the ground again. Her debrief with Amy had gone about as she expected, with her offering as little as possible and Amy trying her very best to figure out everything she was refusing to say. She'd given them all the kid glove’s version of the story during her patch in with Knuckles and that new recruit and she could tell it frustrated them all to no end. But Blue's wounds were his own to lick at, not theirs.

She had bid Pinky farewell after all was said and done, winking and telling her to go and greet her boy already. Sonic could use a friendly face or two after everything, that was for sure. She knows all too well that Sonic’ll never reciprocate, but who is she to deny indulging oneself the small pleasures in life.

It's not like she can blame the girl. She's after her own handsome crush as well. It's been forever since she laid eyes on him, and she's dying to revitalize the image in her head already. Her imagination can only take her so far, after all.

Finding him is another matter entirely. Knuckles had gone off with Sonic the second his sneakers hit the dirt at HQ. Protocol, or something or other. She'd watched Knuckles do the same song and dance with the prisoners Espio pried out of Eggman's clutches before. Espio is certainly good at what he does, sure, she can admit that much, but she's the one that got them back their prettiest jewel. And curiosity killed the cat, of course, but a part of her is just dying to know how that talk with Sonic went. She can see it all now. Knuckles having to restrain himself from leaping over the table and shaking Sonic by the shoulders as he does that signature sharp grin, the laugh and shrug of it all. I'm fine, Knux. See? Made it back in one piece, didn't I?

“Bat girl,” Knuckles grumbles the moment she's through the door.

She can tell he's still doing his whole macho no sleeping, no eating campaign. ’Food’s for the troops and the survivors.’ That's something she's just never understood, being so selflessly stubborn. While the stores are low, it's not as if there isn't plenty to go around either. She's certainly spent enough time checking them herself for anything better than what the Commissary serves up. A refined palate, even in war times, needs to be upkept somehow.

“Ah.” Rouge grins. “Just the man I was looking for.”

“What do you want now?”

“Can I not check in on my favorite Commander on a whim?” Rouge asks.

Knuckles scoffs. “Favorite?”

“Well, considering you're the only one now, the competition's in your favor, hon.”

“Just my luck.” Knuckles side eyes her, his arms crossed. “What're you really doing here?”

“Depends who's asking, I suppose.” Rouge settles onto the table, legs crossing over one another.

Knuckles huffs. “Honestly, I still don't get it. I thought you would've split the second we got him back.”

“The feeling’s mutual.”

Knuckles brow furrows.

“Oh, I know you miss your cute little rock.”

Knuckles grimaces.

“And I don't mean just the Emerald,” Rouge says.

There's a stiffness to Knuckles shoulders, one she'd love to get under her fingers and pry at with her thumbs, work out until it all unravels under her. Until she finds what she knows is really hidden under that rocky bauxite facade. A soft sort of loneliness. It must be quite the burden to carry the weight of being the last of your kind after all. To have a task set to such solitude.

Knuckles is about as astute as Shadow when it comes to covering it up too. Walling everything and everyone out. She can't exactly blame either of them. Who needs everyone prying into their business constantly. Everyone's so nosy these days. She's always preferred a more distracting way of slipping it all into the background herself though. Something with a little more style.

“I have a duty here,” Knuckles says finally. Stiffly. Annoyed. “I can't just leave.”

Rouge laughs. “Two duties at once? My, handsome, aren't you greedy?”

“What’re you trying to say?”

“I'm not trying to say anything.” Rouge shrugs. “Besides, you're the one who doesn't know where he's supposed to be.”

Knuckles growls under his breath, turning towards her fully, those unbelievable charoite eyes bright with a temper that heats her up the same way the prospect of a heist does. The flash of a well-cut gem, the promise of a good time.

“I'm supposed to be here,” Knuckles says.

“Are you?”

Knuckles waves her off, turning away again. “I don't have time for this. Go bother someone else already.”

“Need more alone time for your brooding, hm?”

“Some of us have an actual job to do.”

Rouge laughs. “My, my, and here I thought I'd done my part plenty.”

Knuckles stiffens.

“Well—” Rouge slides off the edge of the table, stretching her arms overhead in a languid movement that stretches her suit tight against her. She doesn't miss the way Knuckle's eyes track down and then back up in an instant. She smirks. “I suppose if there's no need for me here, then I'll be going.”

“Wait—” Knuckles grabs her wrist.

Rouge stares down at his mitt, head cocked. “Is this where you confess your undying love to me, gorgeous?”

Knuckles scoffs, dropping her wrist like he's been burned. “As if.”

“You've got quite the grip on you. Makes a lady think, you know,” Rouge says, leaning close, wings flared out.

“Don't get any ideas,” Knuckles says.

“Oh, I've already got plenty.”

Knuckles rolls his eyes.

“Well?” Rouge asks.

“Well, what?”

“You were going to ask me something weren't you?” Rouge tilts her head. “Why else would you stop me? Unless you were really just waiting for a—”

“Did we make the right call?” Knuckles asks.

Rouge hums. It doesn't take a lot to put together what he's referring to. A simple sort of configuration. Murky, dusted with the finery of a hard decision. She remembers the day she heard word of the Death Egg on the wind, like a whisper, from the loose lips of two little robots trailing behind the wreckage of a town once shiny, blackened into jagged obsidian, carnelian rubble. Opportunity rarely striked where she most expected it. She had kept her hopes low until then. Higher than others, she knew Blue was made of tougher stuff than the rest, but lower than she'd wanted. For her own sake. Disappointment was a familiar taste in the mouth after all, a bitterness she didn't enjoy revisiting.

“Do you think we did?” Rouge asks.

It wasn't her who made it. Not entirely. Getting onto the Death Egg had been a master class in patience. It wasn't laser grids and security cameras or hair trigger glass cases, but it was teeming with eyes. Mechanical ones she had to disable as she went, and re-up before they caught wind of her interference. Disappearing into the vents the moment she found them. A map in her head the further she slipped behind the teeth of the base, sliding into the stomach of it, right down to the center where she found what it had been digesting for months in the cold and the wet.

Sonic. No longer brilliant-cut lapis or tanzanite, but dulled. Blue calcite. Cloudy. Rough. Raw. Her view of the cell had been a limited one. When he paced at the bars, she could see him, when he retreated further in, she couldn't. Perhaps it had been for the best. Her ears have always been sharper than most, and there are certain things even she can't shrug off so easily.

What's his status?

Alive. She remembers saying it like a breath. Tucked into the cradle of metal that would be her home for the next month. Her supplies set out and a plan to get more should she need them. They had to be careful about all of it. Turncoats, spys, moles. Any one of them could be under Eggman's thumb. Infinite's. If word got out they had a secure hit on Sonic's location, they'd lose him again. But she also couldn't get him out alone. Not like this. The guards were constant. Vigilant. Almost unnerving in the way they never wavered, until the illusory nature of them became clear later. The surveillance in the corridors looped into a separate circuit as well, a system even she didn't have access to despite her attempts to crack into it. She was lucky to have found that service vent at all.

Two weeks in and she almost tapped out. Called it. She'd watched Blue slump against the bars at the front of the cell and stare at the wall outside of it for hours when he wasn't pacing. Waiting. Sitting there, dull-eyed and empty, until Infinite came back for him, and the way Sonic perked up at the sight of the jackal turned her stomach. Made her skin crawl in a way it never had before. She knew exactly what kind of happenings occurred outside her view of the cell. It didn't take a lot of imagination, really. And yet, Blue smiled at him. Smiled. Every single time.

He's hurting him, she'd said. A rare moment of needing to just tell someone something for once. Knuckles had listened, silent over the line. Her eyes hot, the whole of her under pressure, diamond edge cuts with each whine, whimper, cry that wasn't even hers. She prided herself on never needing anyone. On being just fine on her own. She never thought she'd want nothing more than to be anywhere but.

We can't pull him out yet, we just don't have the supplies or manpower to spare right now... Knuckles had ended the call and then it had just been her, and Blue, and the metal closing in all around the both of them.

---

---

---

Welcome back, welcome home, it's good to have you back, we missed you, Sonic, Sonic, Sonic—

It's the first time in what feels like forever since Sonic's heard his name so many times. Since so many people have reached out and touched him all at once. His skin stings under his fur with every single new hand added to the pile, and he's smiled his way through everyone so far. It's an easy reflex to jog back to life immediately. Sure, maybe he does it a little too wide, a little too sharp. None of them seem to notice though. He's dealt with bear hugs, pats on the back—a slap that nearly knocked him over on Vector's part—even Silver had hugged him after their dual encounter with Infinite, saying he knew he couldn't have been dead, something about how it just didn't make sense in the timeline.

And that particular detail was one of the first things he found out from Knuckles once he got into HQ. Apparently, he was dead. On paper at least. Officially. Filed away under another casualty of war. It wasn't until Rouge located him on the Death Egg that they all found out he was far from six feet under. More like six thousand feet up and counting. He'd joked about it, said if they'd just looked up maybe they would’ve seen him up there. Amy and Knuckles didn't find the joke as funny as he did. Neither did Silver, or the Chaotix or really anyone in the room that heard it.

Sonic stares at the meeting table past his snout, arms crossed on it, chin resting in them. The meeting's been droning on long enough it's a wonder they even have this much to talk about. Tails whereabouts have come up a few times, Shadow's as well. M.I.A and A.W.O.L; all acronyms that stand for nowhere to be found and no longer in the picture. Omega’s missing too. Big and Froggy haven't been heard from. Vanilla and Cream supposedly got out with Gemerl’s help according to Vector, but no one knows where the robot took them after Infinite razed Floral Forest Village to the ground.

He closes his eyes as Knuckles and Vector argue about something or other, Amy off to the side adding in her own two cents. It's strange, but despite how loud they're all being, he's tired. The tension in his shoulders unwinds the longer he sits, slumped against the table as they bicker around him. He drifts out before he knows it. For long enough that when he wakes up Amy's shaking his shoulder, asking if he's okay.

He stares at her hand on him. The momentary disconnect between what he is seeing and feeling makes him pause as he tries to figure out why she's touching him at all, what she wants from him in the first place. Until he remembers, like a rubber band snapping against his face, they're all looking right at him.

Sonic brushes Amy's hand off, laughing. “I'm fine, Ames. Just figured I'd get a nap in while Knucklehead comes up with a plan.”

“Gee…” Knuckles deadpans. “Thanks for the help.”

Sonic shrugs. “Hey, I figure you've all been at this longer than me, just point me in a direction and I'll run. Easy.”

Knuckles sighs, shaking his head. “You're useless like this.”

Sonic stiffens, ears folding back. “What?”

Amy shoots Knuckles a sharp look before glancing back towards him, her face softening. “What Knuckles meant to say is you should really try and get some rest, Sonic.”

Get some rest? As if. All he's been doing is resting for—

“Yeah, I'm no expert, pal, but you look pretty dead on your feet,” Vector says.

Espio hums his agreement beside Vector, eyes sharp in their scrutiny.

He looks between all of them, settling on Silver at the far end of the table who's fiddling with one of the pens scattered across the surface. Silver glances up at him and then away.

“C'mon, I'm fine, guys. I can still, y’know—” Sonic gestures towards the map on the large monitor. “I'm not even tired, really.”

Knuckles grimaces. “Do you want me to throw you out of here or are you gonna walk out on your own?”

---

Sonic ends up outside, the door banging shut behind him after Knuckles shoved him out of it. Get some sleep, Sonic. He stares at the far wall, eyes flicking over the little imperfections, pocked concrete, red paint from the corridor numbers, the evacuation directionals. The fluorescents hum overhead, too loud, too bright. He scrubs at his face, holding his hands over his eyes for a moment and breathing before dropping his arms back to his side. He ends up pacing, like usual, winding back and forth.

“Whatever, it's fine. It's—”

Sonic shakes his head. He really needs to stop talking to himself already.

It's the same as the pacing. The way he circled the inside of the command room an hour ago, before Amy told him he should probably sit down. It's like the habits are stuck in his feet, his hands, every inch of him. Like he knows what's about to happen, what's supposed to happen. And the way this usually goes is soon enough he'll sit against the cell bars once he's gotten bored of walking in circles for hours. Listing under the dim lights and staring at the floor, cuffs always on his wrists. Always. Nothing changed. Nothing new. Sometimes, if he's lucky, there's already a hand on his shoulder before he realizes Infinite's even returned. Fingers wandering further into the quills on his back, claws shifting through his fur. And then he has a choice to make. The same one every single time. Lean into it or pull away.

You're useless like this. Yeah. He scratches under his nose. He's heard that one before. It's not his fault it's hard to stay steady on his knees when he's drugged up to his eyeballs. Not like it matters anyway. Coherent or not, it doesn't take a lot of coordination to flop onto the floor and keep his legs open. And getting what he wants is always as easy as doing or saying whatever he thinks Infinite wants from him. Plus, if he wears Infinite out enough he gets to cling onto him after, keep his muzzle tucked up above the Ruby and listen to it hum, all warm under his jaw. Sometimes Infinite will even wrap an arm over his shoulders, his waist if he gets real lucky. Sometimes, he'll even stick around long enough to go again. Which is always better since it means Infinite can stay longer, maybe even let him catch some sleep with his face hidden in Infinite's fur, listening to his breaths.

He'll always wake up alone though. Pacing. Waiting. Infinite returning. Him smiling and reaching through the bars for Infinite before Infinite can even slip through them. Rinse. Repeat. Rinse. Repeat.

Zavok arriving at his cell had been new. It'd been like pulling on some kind of old, dead skin, slipping into familiar quips as the Zeti told him this was it. Airlock. Space. Void. He'd be dead soon. Lucky him. And then his cuffs had vanished, like they were never there at all. An explosion rocking through his feet and the end of his stay finally rushing up to meet him. Kicking Zavok's tail had at least been satisfying. Finding Buddy in the corridors after was a welcome surprise though. He's only glad the kid hadn't arrived hours earlier, it would've been pretty awkward to say the least considering—

“Uhm…”

His ears flick back. Silver must have followed him out. 'You reek of fear'. He remembers snippets of the whole encounter. Getting between Silver fighting Infinite, the conversation that felt like someone else was having it the whole time, the way he couldn't stop pacing during it. He'd laughed, he'd shrugged. 'I don't know anything about you!' And Infinite had played along. He still doesn't know why exactly, but Infinite had. Something about that sits worse than if Infinite had just called him out on his bluff. Silver mercifully didn't mention the way his hands had shaken either. Exertion. Exhaustion. Running non-stop after months of standing still. Yeah. That's all it was.

“How’re you holding up?” Silver asks.

Sonic grimaces. Everyone keeps asking that. He's pretty sure they don't actually want the answer anyway. He's not even sure if he knows the answer himself. He's got an amalgamation of one though. Something like:

’Oh, y’know, awesome as usual. I definitely wasn't getting it on with that masked guy—yeah, that one—before you all got me outta there and the fact I can't shower due to the water rationing totally isn't a problem at all. So, I guess I'm doing pretty great actually! Happy to be here. Not sure this is all real though, and it'll probably be super funny when this gets taken away again, but beggars can't be choosers and all that. And hey, maybe once I get yanked out of here, I'll be lucky enough to get to do it all over again. Wouldn't that be somethin’?’

Sonic turns to face Silver with a grin instead.

“Great, honestly. It's good to be back, man.” Sonic smiles wider. “I'd kill for a chili dog right about now, but I get everything's a little hard to come by at the moment, so—” He shrugs. “It is what it is, I guess.”

“I could see what commissary can whip up. I'm sure someone can try to make somethin—”

“Nah.” Sonic waves Silver off. “I'm sure they've got enough on their plates. Literally. It's really not a big deal, dude.”

“Oh, yeah.” Silver laughs, scratching at his quills. “Of course. Uh—”

“You should probably head back in there.”

“They don't really need my input at the moment, so…” Silver says, looking away.

“Says who?” Sonic tilts his head. It's not like Silver to be this doubtful in the first place. It's a weird look on him, really. “I'm sure there's something they haven't thought of that your tele-whatever stuff could help with.”

Silver sets his jaw, nodding. “Right. I'll just—” Silver points back down the hall with a more confident smile. “I'll see you around, Sonic.”

“For sure, dude.” Sonic waves. “Give 'em a hard time in there for me, alright?”

“Can do!” Silver jogs off back down the hallway.

Sonic sags against the wall once Silver's out of sight and stares at his sneakers. They're kinda ratty. Messed up. Probably from being waterlogged, charred, scuffed and ripped where he'd kicked at the bars and the cell walls enough times. His gloves are hardly any better. Soot-stained, pinkish in the seams from old blood, the poly-coating Tails swears by having long worn off, the end of the fingers starting to split where he'd dug at metal flooring and grooves one too many times. He knows his claws aren't in any better shape underneath them.

At least Infinite had the courtesy to stop biting him hard enough to leave open wounds before his rescue. He's not sure how he would've explained those away. He's pretty sure saying, oh, wow, how’d those get there? wouldn't have gone over very well with Knux. It's not his fault Infinite had some weird fascination with using his teeth constantly. He can't even count the amount of times he had to get bandaged up right after, blood still drying on Infinite's muzzle the whole time.

Sonic grimaces and pushes off the wall. The corridor stretches too long and too far in front of him, behind him, all around him. It's way bigger than he remembers. Everything is. He scrubs his fingers over the dirt on his arm, the soot from the Death Egg’s demise still stuck in his fur.

He'd kill for a shower right about now.

---

Sonic stares out at the ruined city that borders HQ. Lightning doesn't strike the same place twice, or whatever Knuckles had said. It must be true considering they've avoided a direct raid since the first one that apparently blew through here. He finds a space under the lip of the outside wall, somewhere where he can still look up and see concrete and not too much open sky. He still can't get over how huge the sky is. He remembers it seeming kind of small. But now it just goes on forever and ever—

A squadron leader barks orders at soldiers deploying from a convoy, civilians following close behind them. Kids and their families with their belongings in whatever they had shoved them into, pillowcases, luggage, boxes and bins, still dusted with ash and dirt and wide-eyed as a refugee coordinator leads them into HQ to get settled with the rest of them. It's constant. The amount of people, faces. Eyes he has to remember to force himself to meet. He thinks about offering a hand when someone fumbles the crate in their arms and he stays stuck to the wall instead. It should be easy. To just go and help them out. It's kind of his whole deal, so—

He glances up and stares at where the concrete spills into empty sky and the fur on his nape prickles.

“Blue.”

Sonic looks over to see Rouge settling against the wall beside him, her arms crossed. A mirror image of himself as she tilts her head to look at him.

“Heard you were the one that found me up there,” Sonic says. He's not really sure what else he's supposed to say. Thank you, probably. He knows Rouge doesn't really do thanks like that though and she looks like she's already on her way out on another mission regardless.

“Headed off?” Sonic asks when he realizes she's probably waiting for him to say something else here.

Rouge hums, looking out at the next group of people being ushered into HQ. “Something like that.”

“Going after Shadow?”

Rouge shoots him a smile. “Am I really that predictable?”

“Hey, I'd do the same for Tails if I could.”

Rouge frowns at that. “Kid's been out there doing his own thing for a bit now. Once word reaches him, I'm sure he'll come back your way.”

“Yeah…”

“Well, the night’s still young, I suppose.” Rouge pushes off the wall, a hand on her hip as she eyes him. “I've got another wayward hedgehog to collect, but it's been lovely as always Blue.” She winks. “I'll see ya around, yeah?”

“For sure.” Sonic laughs. A kind of ragged edge to it. “And if you find him, knock some sense into him, will ya?”

“Oh, don't worry—” Rouge smirks. “He won't even know what hit him.”

Rouge leaves and he settles back against the wall with a frown. He stares at the cracked concrete under his sneakers. Amy told him that most of the world's been ravaged in some way, that there's not a corner of the planet untouched anymore. Their headquarters is one of the last places still standing, a scattering of others across the surface, but this is the heart of them. He looks at the sky. Sunset tinged all too red with the distant smoke from whatever city or forest is burning next.

There's no Flickys or Rickys or whatever animals might've been here before. It's quieter than it's supposed to be. The skyline lopsided where skyscrapers got swiped down like building blocks. And the more he looks at it, the less he recognizes the city, or even remembers it at all. There's this layer of grime to everything now, a white film from powdered concrete and ash, motor oil from badniks on the asphalt that's hard to tell apart from scatters of old blood.

It's like he went to sleep and woke up somewhere else entirely, like the whole world up and ended while he was tucked away, safe in his little box in the stars.

He zips back into HQ once the sky gets too big. When it starts to feel like he's going to crash into it and never crawl back out.

---

Sonic's fist cracks across Infinite's muzzle, the plot lost with the way his hands won't stop shaking—stuck side by side in their cuffs, one always following the other in an endless march. It sends him overcorrecting and smacking into the metal floor with one shoulder, the other already caught under Infinite's fingers.

“Wait, wait—”

Claws rake down to the skin and he scrabbles at the hand latched into him—teeth, claws, spit, blood—it doesn't matter, all he knows is it burns as he's hauled to his feet. The wall smacks into his snout. An arm bars up under his quills, along the back of his neck, the other moving to his ribs and sliding along the blunted edges of him. He turns his face against the wall. His fingers curl, arms pinned between his chest and the grooves that slips under his fur and always leaves impressions behind after. A body shoves against his, sticking him further into the metal, trying to crush him through it.

He hasn't eaten anything in two days. He hasn't slept in one. He can't remember what he even got worked up about in the first place when a shoe slips between his sneakers and knocks them wide. Heat woven breaths lick right into the back of his ear, a tongue sliding over it and the spit left behind already drying on his fur.

It's all he can think about. The sticky, tightening of it, the seam of the wall past his snout, the huffs of air, the arm in his neck. Crushing. Shrinking. Folding inwards past the point anything can. You can only fold paper seven times, actually! Anything else beyond that is an impossibility. It's called exponential growth, Tails had said, showing him the process with the paper he'd crumpled up and chucked at the wall out of boredom. He's far past seven. Nine. Eleven. Fifteen. He's lost count, he's stopped caring.

The walls crumple in around him as he's held in place, right where he's supposed to be. Always. Totally and impossibly still under someone else's teeth.

---

Like a sudden slap to the jaw, Sonic realizes that it's been months since he was able to do his T-shots.

When he wanders into the infirmary the doctor smiles at him and the nurses look him over the same way they did when he first got shoved in here at the behest of Amy and Knuckles. Underweight, malnourished, bruising, minor lacerations, healed fractures— His initial blood work showed the last supplements Infinite shoved down his throat to keep him from withering away entirely. The last bit of drugged food left in his system as well. They'd asked questions. He shrugged them off.

Thankfully, the Doc is able to get him the supplies he needs, a new pack for it all too, and whatever else he asks for. He's too nice about it. The same way everyone else is. Always smiling at him, trying to do whatever he even half mentions, jokes about, or what they think he wants them to do without him asking for anything at all. The Doc pats him on the shoulder, says if he needs anything else to let him know, and he all but sprints once he shoulders past the door and stumbles out of the infirmary.

Back in the privacy of his quarters—the one he's pretty sure is Knuckles’, but never gets used—he does his shot finally. He slips the sharp into the pack to discard it properly some time later and flops onto the bed to stare at the ceiling. The Doc had said the change in his levels were ‘nominal’. Whatever that means. Thankfully, he hadn't noticed too many effects while in his cell at least. He'd always kind of ridden the line enough anyway before it all, and considering he'd gotten the harder parts out of the way the moment he'd been approved for everything, he was lucky to dodge a few bullets. If he had to deal with a period and being in that cell he's pretty sure he would've really snapped. Honestly, he could kiss whoever invented hysterectomies right on the mouth. Of course, the added bonus is that he didn't accidentally get—

Sonic wrinkles his snout. He never really thought about it ‘til now, but unless Infinite had access to his medical records, it's not like the guy could've known he couldn't get— And it's not like they ever used protection either. He stares at the ceiling. A miserable pit growing in his stomach.

Whatever. It's not like it really matters anyway. It didn't happen, so it's fine. Sonic turns over onto his side and stares at the sheets. He runs his bare hand over them, the fabric smooth against his palm pads. Soft. Too soft. The sensation shivers through him. He closes his eyes and thinks about fur under his fingers, about running his hand along the arm resting under the side of his face, hot against his muzzle.

He curls his hand into the sheets, slotting his fingers between another person's who isn't actually there. Holding on tight as they press up behind him, an arm wrapped over his waist, heavy, possessive, pulling him tighter against them. The too warm point of the Ruby digs into his quills, right against his spine.

He slips a hand between his thighs and pretends it's someone else's.

---

It's like he can't catch a break. A week in and he's about to lose it.

He vaguely remembers how worked up he could get when he first started T, but this is somehow beyond that. It almost hurts, the whole of him so hot and bothered at times he can't even think. Even in the middle of battle, he's so distracted by his heart constantly racing, thighs hot, pelvis hotter, that he fights sloppy. Enough Buddy takes the lead in battle, the others, giving the badniks a real whooping before he has to race in after.

Even worse, whenever Infinite shows his face it's like the feeling multiplies. Triplicates or whatever Tails would call it. Sometimes it folds in on itself and basically explodes until he's so horny he's practically shaking with it. It's like taking Badnik shrapnel right to the face. It's impossible to ignore. It won't leave him alone. Some twisted up contradiction slips its way in as he looks at Infinite and thinks about grabbing the stupid mask and slamming it into the wall hard enough it cracks apart into nothing. About hurting him. Killing him. Tearing him apart. With his teeth. His hands.

He also thinks about wrenching it off and putting his snout right against Infinite's. About hands on his waist, all over him, a mouth latched into his shoulder. He wants something he can't even name. He wants to fight Infinite until he's bruised. Until he's bloody. Until he can't even stand. He wants Infinite to just go ahead and fuck him until there's nothing left. He wants everything and nothing at all and he's got nowhere to put any of it besides the next Death Egg Robot he goes toe to toe with and buzzsaws through like it's not even made of metal.

He starts to find any excuse he can to duck out of most of the battle map meetings, the recon workups, whenever else there's a pause or a lull or a moment that goes on a little too long. He holes up in his room. He turns down hang outs between fighting. He turns down anything that isn't him showing Eggman that he means actual business this time. Whenever there's a hit on Infinite's location, he's there. And then Infinite's gone again and it's back to square one. Four walls. A box. Back to pacing around the room they assigned him to. Back to standing in front of the door and waiting for someone that'll never show up even if he feels sick the whole time he's doing it.

It gets worse. If he even begins to think about it too much, he has to go and take care of himself. Jerk off like he's falling face first into puberty all over again. It gets to the point where he knows the exact spots he can run off to, where he can handle himself in a few minutes, faster. Biting at his hand as he works at himself. Infinite's words in his ears. Whatever dumb new thing Infinite's said to try and intimidate him. You reek of fear. What a loser. What a freak. He thinks about being pinned to the floor, about staring at the far wall, a hand splayed over the side of his face while Infinite hitched into him hard enough he whined around the feeling in his chest.

He comes. He makes himself presentable. He runs off to fight again.

Rinse.

Repeat.

---

Sometimes he can actually sleep in HQ.

Only for bits and pieces at a time and usually only after jerking off enough times the usual restlessness leaves him alone. It's probably not the greatest way to go about this. But it's something at least. It works. A numb sedation creeps in once it's all said and done, thighs still shivering and heart pounding, and he stares at the ceiling until the world slips away.

It never lasts.

He jolts awake. Electrocuted nerves. A shout bitten between his teeth as he slams off the side of the bed, shaking as he tries to stand up. His quills smack into the bed frame instead and he whines through his teeth. Limbs trembling hard enough he thinks maybe he's finally lost control of them. Fingers numb. Legs locked tight enough his knees ache.

He stares wide-eyed at the room as he tries to piece together where he is. Metal, but concrete, a bed frame pressed into his quills and shoulders, fabric sheet tangled around his legs. He blinks at it all. HQ. Right. He's not on the Death Egg. Yeah. At least, he's pretty sure he's not. It'd be impressive if an illusion held up this long. Impossible without some kind of defect. Books without words, eggs without yolks, flowers with no pollen. Little imperfections, details that are hard to keep up with.

Sonic steps outside of his room and stares at the opposite wall of the corridor. Sometimes he forgets how weird it feels to just be able to leave whenever he wants to. The hall is dead. Empty. It must be late. Super late, probably. He's pretty sure whatever sleep schedule he had before is completely shot. It's not like he could follow the sun rising and setting up there in his cell. He'd mostly kept his sleep scheduled around Infinite, so he wouldn't miss him whenever he came by.

He starts pacing again before he can stop himself, walking further down the hall then he intends to. No one is around. He's all alone. Again. Somehow. He really thought it'd be different coming back. Tails would be here for one thing. Amy would constantly trail him with her usual enthusiasm and Knuckles would punch him in the arm and they'd get into a fight eventually and it’d be just like old times. It'd all be the same. Like he never left.

Like nothing ever happened at all…

---

Sonic looks over the spread of food. Dishes. Stuff he hasn't seen in months. Too long. He knows it's supposed to be easy to choose something, but his palms prickle, his ears flick back as he tries to make a decision and nothing sounds good enough. Nothing sounds like the right one. Like the one he's supposed to make here. It's just two words. It shouldn't be hard to say them at all.

“Was there something in particular you wanted, Mister Sonic?” The Head of Commissary asks, tilting their head at him, tusks shiny under the harsh lights.

Sonic grimaces without realizing it and then yanks a smile on when he remembers they're staring at him. “Nah, I'm actually—” He points to the door and takes a step back. “All fueled up already. So I'll just…”

He all but bolts from the room. The others are most likely getting ready to head out on the next mission anyway so he should probably go and find them. Something about Eggman mobilizing forces west of here, Shadow wreaking havoc on some city again.

He still doesn't get why Shadow's even working with Egghead or the one mask wonder in the first place. It's not like him, and unless Shadow got his head wiped again, it's weird. He remembers the way Shadow was in his cell. Blank-faced. Staring at him constantly, an empty kind of angry, pissed—about something. Shadow hadn't said a word though. Nothing. He'd taken a lick from Shadow's air shoe right across the muzzle, blood on his teeth where his lip split, and then Shadow continued like that despite his best efforts to pry him back out of whatever Eggman had done to his head.

He only saw Shadow a few times after those initial beatings. He couldn't even call them fights. It's not like his cuffs had given him much to work with, and Shadow certainly hadn't cared that it wasn't exactly a fair match. Which is totally not right either. Shadow likes a challenge. Not wailing on someone who's already down. The more he thinks about it, everything about the Shadow he encountered on the Death Egg is off.

Zavok had vanished after he beat the Zeti right into the ground. Followed by that same sound as when the scenarios Infinite usually makes up fall apart. He perks up. So, if Zavok is a fake, then that means—

The Shadow from the Death Egg is too.

---

Cold metal grooves bite at the fur and skin of Sonic's knees as he kneels beside Infinite's legs. Claws pet over his ear, his chin settled on Infinite's thigh as he closes his eyes and lists against the lip of the metal bench Infinite’s sitting on. He shivers as Infinite pricks the tip of his ear and slides his fingers back down the side of it. He hasn't been given any directions just yet, which is a little grating, but there's also something nice about being able to enjoy the moment for once. No expectations.

He turns the side of his face against the warm thigh under his muzzle. His own tail flicks side to side as Infinite's fingers wander further into his quills, pulling and musing at them idly.

“What didja want me to do?” Sonic asks. Usually Infinite would've decided by now and his skin prickles under his fur the longer it takes for Infinite to tell him what he's supposed to do with himself.

Infinite says nothing. He's probably here to drop him somewhere then. Sometimes he gets small chances to see something besides the cell. Snippets of greenery. The planet. Places like one of Tail's Workshop, Emerald Coast, Sunset City. They're always empty, but it's home at least. Close to the real thing even if the sunlight feels cold, the wind fake. Infinite usually sticks around too. Watching him dart around to different parts of the illusions. He's not sure what Infinite gets out of it all, but it has to be something if he keeps doing it.

Sonic pulls back and shuffles up close to Infinite's legs, hands settling on Infinite's knees and prompting them wider, as much as he can with his cuffs at least. He slides up closer, right between them, chin coming to rest on Infinite's stomach fur as he stares up at him. He grins at the mask staring down at him.

“Couldja put me in Green Hill this time?”

Infinite's hand falls between his ears, petting. “I'll consider it.”

Heck, that's way better than a no. “Alright, well—what'll it take to getcha to say yeah?”

Infinite's fingers move from his quills to cup the side of his face, the other hand moving to mirror it. Sonic follows the gentle pull of them, up onto the bench as Infinite lies back, until he's straddling Infinite's lap, until he's the one settled over Infinite instead. His hands rest on Infinite's chest, steadying himself as his breaths slip through his teeth. A familiar warmth in his gut swells, a tremor in his fingers. He smiles around it all.

Sonic smooths his hands up the rib pattern in Infinite's fur, tracing the white lines, feeling the bunch and tense of Infinite under his bare palm pads. He leans close and noses up under Infinite's jaw, the metal edge of the mask digging into his muzzle. With his chest pressed against Infinite's like this, he can feel the Ruby’s point stick into his sternum, like it'll stab right through him if he drops his full weight onto it. Infinite's hands fall on his waist, guiding. Too gentle. He scrunches his muzzle. Claws finally find his skin, biting and sticking into him, and he relaxes into the sensation. A nudge. A reminder to follow through with the task he's been set to.

He laughs as Infinite’s fingers dig in harder, enough to bruise later, and then he reaches down between them.

---

The first night after the war ends, after he parts ways with Buddy and after he leaves HQ far behind him, he finds some burnt out village, a flame eaten shack with half the roof caved in. He manages to salvage what he can of the bed left behind, dragging sheets onto the floor and bundling them into a corner. The hard ground sits stiff against his side. Solid. Comforting. He stares at the hole in the roof, the stars glaring down at him like tiny eyes, and then he turns away from it all and stares at the wall instead. Sonic doesn't sleep that night. Or the night after.

He heads out for the next place soon enough. And the next. An unconnected string of carpet bombed towns and abandoned villages. He stays away from the city centers, where the Resistance is allegedly concentrating its efforts.

Eggman's bases begin to happen upon him by accident. Like they're magnetized right to his feet. He pries his way easily through steel trap doors, hungry teeth, and slips into the dark. They're all the same. The constant drip-drip of forgotten cooling systems, abandoned mech labs. Nothing. No one. They're always empty. He's never there.

None of them are.

---

Shadow's fist cracks across his face and he goes down with the hit. Shoulder smacking into the ground as he tries to catch himself with cuffed hands to no avail.

Sonic glares up at Shadow. “So, what? You're just gonna go back to working for Egghead after everything, then?”

Shadow says nothing.

Sonic tastes blood on the back of his teeth, nose clogged with it, muzzle itching where it's drying on his fur from where Shadow spent the first five minutes in this cell beating him into the floor. “Nothing to say for yourself? That's pretty typical. Whatever happened to turnin’ over a new leaf? The whole protectin’ humanity n’ everyone else thin—”

Another punch rattles his head and a ringing kicks up in his ears.

Sonic raises his fists. “I'm not gonna fight you, dude. You're too stubborn to be mind controlled so just snap outta it already and—”

The toe of an air shoe buries into his side and he coughs, curling into himself. Shadow hits like a freight train. An angry one. And he really can't afford a broken rib up here. His quills bristle. He tucks himself into a ball so tight all Shadow can hit is his spines.

Sonic takes each strike until he's laying on the floor panting, uncurled after a particularly hard hit. Part of him wonders why Shadow doesn't just kill him. If Eggman's brainwashing or that new guy's whatever manipulation has pulled out some kind of innate hatred in Shadow and it's all directed right at him, then he doesn't see why Shadow doesn't just get it over with already.

Blank red eyes. Empty. There's nothing behind them. An air shoe settles on his chest and presses down. He slams his cuffs into it and tries to get a hold of Shadow's ankle, pushing and pulling, legs kicking at the ground. It pushes down harder. A sound sticks in his ribs, his sternum aching, lungs like they're going to pop. He can't breath, he can't—

“Shad—” Sonic gasps around the word, fingers scrabbling at Shadow's shoe, his leg, claws digging in.

Nothing. There's no reaction. He's really just going to—

The pressure vanishes. Shadow leaves the cell. He watches him go, chest heaving. Shaking. When Zavok comes into the cell hours later, he can't stop thinking about how Shadow had looked down at him.

Like he wasn't even there.

---

After the first week since waking up in his cell—of nothing and pacing and pacing and more nothing—the tightness in his chest finally grows bigger than him. Large enough it has to go somewhere. He ends up tearing at the floor the first time it does. Scrabbling at it, digging to nowhere. The sound of his claws on the metal sticks in his ears even after they bleed bad enough he has to stop. He hits the bars after that. With his quills and then his shoulders and then his fists, knuckles cracking against the metal until the skin splits under his gloves. He slams himself into the walls. Kicks at them. Shoves at them. Nothing moves. Nothing gives.

Sonic curls up against the bars after the feeling in his chest shrinks down to something manageable. Shaking and sweat damp, staring at the wall. None of it ever changes. It can't. It won't. Coffin. Tomb. Sarcophagus.

After two weeks of no one, nobody, only him and his box, he can no longer stop himself from considering it. Thinking about it. Turning it over after every time he jolts awake to metal, metal, metal.

He's really going to rot in here.

---

“You don't have to.”

Mask Guy grabs his cuffs regardless of his protests, dragging his arms over his lap as he pushes the metal further up his forearms, revealing the angry red banding hidden under them. The start of blood smears Sonic's thinned down fur.

“I’m fine, man, seriously—”

Mask Guy seizes his wrist and tightens his fingers right over the wound. He hisses through his teeth and yanks out of Mask Guy's grip, holding his arms against his chest.

“What the heck was that for?” Sonic asks, teeth bared.

Mask Guy stares at him blankly without a word, the eye under the red window of the mask regarding him flatly. Unamused. Point already made.

Mask Guy holds out his hand. Sonic stares at it. The usual black leather glove removed. Speckled palms and finger pads, white fur at the fingertips. Innocuous enough. They don't look like the hands of an egotistical mass murderer. Or whatever this is either.

Sonic hesitates, and then sets his hands right into Mask Guy's own.

---

He finds another empty Eggman Lab.

It's not even disappointment or relief anymore. It's just nothing. The absence of something. He can't remember how he’s supposed to feel about this anymore so he just doesn't. At all.

This one is at least more recently abandoned. Some evidence of life having been here once. The lights still kick on as he wanders down the corridors, its security systems intact as he reduces the bots down to nothing but spindashed scatters of metal, bolts and hydraulic fluids. It's promising at least.

Sonic takes his time winding down to the center of it. He gets to the usual command space. Empty. A computer console, large desk, gaudy chair, the usual flair. The map table is new. The figurines. He looks over the spread. Egghead's almost got one for everybody. Even Metal Sonic. He picks up the Metal Sonic figurine and twists it around in the low light of the Lab’s reserve power. He laughs. Eggman even made it where the chest turbine spins.

He tosses it up in the air, catching it idly as he looks over the map itself. Little flags representing what he assumes are more factories and production facilities, Resistance HQ movements. Figurines for Tails, Knuckles, Amy, the Chaotix, Silver, Zavok, Shadow, Chaos—

He drops the Metal Sonic toy on the table and grabs the Infinite one. It's small in his hand. The Ruby looks all wrong too. He knows the lines on it don't look like that at all. Up close it's like they fade in and out, constantly moving, some kind of coiled snake winding under the surface. Even the mask isn't right. The number of stripes in each ear is off by one. He traces his thumb over the rib patterns. His neck flares hot, like there's breaths panted against it. An ache crawls right up his ribs. His fingers tighten around the figurine and shake.

He hurls it at the wall. Crack, plink. It hits the ground and lies there. Still. Unmoving. Useless. He steadies himself on the map table, the feeling on his wrists like cinched metal, heavy and tight and constantly there. His eyes jump to a small container to the side of the map. He plucks out the figure inside and stares at it. Blue. Green. Smile.

He shoves it back into the box where it belongs and he leaves.

---

“Look, can you at least, like…make him turn around or somethin’?” Sonic asks, quieter than usual, his face burning.

Infinite's hips sit flush to him, his legs wrapped loosely over the jackal's as Infinite pulls back and rocks forward harder, jostling him against the bench. He grabs at Infinite's arms braced to either side of him to try to steady to himself as the pace picks up.

He's used to the guards watching by now. Whoever's stationed there at the time. Zavok Chaos, Metal. Today, for once it's Shadow. Brainwashed or whatever is up with him, he still doesn't really want Shadow's eyes on him, not like this.

“I just—”

A hand falls on his muzzle, shutting him up. Infinite turns his head towards the bars and pins it there and Sonic stares wide-eyed past them. Infinite curls over him further, claws digging into his snout as he hitches into him. Shadow looks back through the bars of the cell with empty eyes. Nothing. Like a ghost. A robot. Dead. Mechanical. He screws his eyes shut, but he can still feel Shadow watching regardless. Infinite moves faster. Hot breaths smother the side of his face. The claws dig in again and teeth move to bury themselves in his shoulder as Infinite finally comes with a low groan.

Sonic eyes snap open. Infinite pants harshly, his blood-wet muzzle rested in the crook of his neck as Shadow does nothing but stare through him.

---

Sonic leans into the bars after Infinite leaves, fingers curled around them as Shadow stands sentinel outside his cell. Entirely unmoving.

“Why'd you even join them?”

Shadow says nothing.

“What about Rouge n’ Omega and everyone else? Do’ya think they'd really wanna see you like this?”

…

“Dude, jus’ say something.”

…

“Please.”

…

Sonic rests his forehead against the bars. Eyes closed.

“‘m sorry…” Sonic turns his face against the metal. “I know you wouldn't wanna do all this stuff if you had a choice. I know this isn't you, man…” He laughs, eyes stinging. “I guess we're both stuck here, huh.”

Shadow stares at him like always and says nothing.

---

A hand yanks him up off the floor by the scruff, fur and quills bunched in Infinite's fist as he's dragged to the metal bench. Thrown at it. He slams into the edge of it, coughing as it smacks into his ribs and sticks. A shoe drives into the spines on his back and pins him in place.

Sonic scrabbles at the metal. “Sorry, okay, whatever I did, I'm sor—”

---

“Hey, is it okay if we maybe don't do anything today? I'm…” Sonic lists to the side, eyes hot. He can't tell if it's another drugged meal working through him or some kind of sickness. The white flashes, the pressure in his head, behind his eyes. He threw up before Infinite came here. His vision laced with static around the edges. He can feel bile in his throat again. Taste it. “I think I'm gonna be sick, dude, I—”

Hands grab his shoulders and shove him, making him fall backwards. His quills hit metal. Infinite straddles him. He pushes at Infinite's chest with his palms and tries to backpedal out from under him, shove him off. Nothing budges. He sags against the metal slab instead. He drifts in and out. Skin hot. Sweating with fever. Infinite fucks him and, for the first time in a long time, it hurts.

Everything hurts.

---

“Get up, rodent. This isn't a hotel.”

Sonic jerks awake, staring at Eggman crouched beside him, Infinite past his shoulder. “Whaddaya want now?”

Eggman makes an annoyed sound. “I'm here to gloat, what else would I be doing here? Your annoying little friends might have caused trouble for me in the beginning, but no more. Infinite—” Eggman snaps his fingers.

Infinite hands over a tablet. Like he's just some kind of secretary. He almost laughs at that. Almost.

“Here. Read it and weep, rat.”

Sonic stares at the colored map. It's way more red than it was last time Eggman showed it to him. Almost the entire thing, really. The whole planet under Eggman's control, and he's up here napping away while they've all been fighting.

Eggman taps the tablet, bringing up a view of a battle, Death Egg Robots marching through a city, knocking over buildings, people's homes like they're not even there. Fires everywhere. He can barely make out the shapes of people running, fleeing, fighting. “Don't worry, I've even got eyes on the ground just so I can get good angles for my scrapbook.”

Sonic tears his eyes away from it, skin hurting. “Scrapbook? Okay, old man. What's next? Knitting?”

“Some of us have hobbies other than being a nuisance.”

“Whatever you say, Egghead.”

The banter’s at least familiar. Comforting in a weird way. His eyes drift to Infinite before he can stop himself and he stiffens. The question has bothered him since their arrangement started. Since the first time Infinite asked him. Since he finally agreed. To all of it. Everything. All the stuff that keeps happening because he just can't stop saying yes.

Does Eggman even know what they've been doing?

---

Sonic slumps against the cell bars, curled up. Shivering. The headache is back. The fever. The white flashes. The way his vision isn't right. His skin. His bones. Sand grit between his joints. Everything feels wrong. He pushes his forehead against the bars, chasing the cool metal while shivering. Blood in his mouth that shouldn't be there. Shadow's back today. It registers the same way everything else does. In snippets. Standing outside the cell, arms crossed. Staring down at him.

“I really don't wanna die in here, dude…” Sonic mutters, his muzzle sliding against the bars as he looks up at Shadow. “I jus’ wanna go home.”

Shadow stares at him blankly. He closes his eyes and tries to remember what real sunlight used to feel like on his fur.

---

Infinite pries his mouth open, fingers hooked in his teeth and a pill shoved down his throat. Sonic gags and tries to pry off the hand clamped over his mouth and nose to no avail. He swallows it. Infinite releases him and he shivers and lists against the floor as he tries to figure out what he's even taken. If it'll be like the other stuff ground up in his food. His water.

Infinite pets a hand between his ears. Soothing, almost cold compared to the fever on his skin. He leans into it, eyes slipping closed. The taste left on his tongue is familiar. Orange, citrus. He thinks about peeling Triangle Fruits open with his thumbs as Infinite pushes him to the floor. The sharp stench of pulped flesh in his nose as Infinite grabs the back of his neck and pins him down underneath him.

Other supplements get added to his meals after that and the grittiness in his limbs starts to get better with each one. Infinite always pets through his fur after he swallows it, soothing strokes that he curls up into, waits for, anticipates, wants, needs. Sometimes Infinite lets him lay with his head in his lap after, his muzzle rested against Infinite's thigh, careful not to stick Infinite with his quills as a hand strokes over the side of his face and settles there. Soft. Warm.

Sonic can always feel the shift as it happens. Infinite's legs widening slightly underneath him, the hand on his face tightening until it hurts and turning his snout down as another buries in the quills behind his ear.

---

After the war and after Eggman Lab’s and Factories continue to turn up empty he starts to go wherever his feet carry him instead. He tries to find places where he doesn't hear his name the second he steps foot in them. He doesn't stop until he's halfway across the planet. Until finally the people recognize him a lot less, until he's just some guy on an adventure and not Sonic the Hedgehog.

He explores. He runs around. He does all the stuff he used to do before the Death Egg and the war. Seeing something new is usually enough to satiate what the constant motor churning away in his head wants. But it doesn't care about any of this anymore, apparently. There's a bored tilt to it now. A lazy routine that's lost the charm and the novelty he's pretty sure it used to have. Maybe he's doing it all wrong. Maybe there's something missing.

Maybe he just needs to meet some new people. Mingle some.

He scrounges around for whatever's been propped back up. The pickings are slim, the supplies short and the labor to rebuild even shorter. He finds a half rebuilt bar in the still opened mouth of a crumpled building. Badniks slumped outside where they'd been shot through and battered with Wispons. Someone's even painted them, strung lights over the chassis and arms and added them to the decor.

No one immediately barks out his name once he steps inside so it's at least not like he'll get swarmed here. Hopefully. He clambers up into a stool at the bar. The badger bartender eyes him, asks his age and he gives him the big one-eight with a grin.

It's still strange to think about. Going from being seventeen one day to eighteen. Like a blink. Like he tripped into it. A lot can happen in six months apparently.

He had stared dumbly at the calendar he found in HQ, the X’s marked off up until the current date and he'd flipped the pages back all the way to the one he remembers before Tails called him. Before the fight in the square. And the date didn't feel right at all. It felt like it'd been six years, a decade, something way longer than what it was. He remembers staring at the current date and thinking about how his birthday had happened last month, while he was still on the Death Egg. How it had felt like any other day. Like nothing was happening at all.

“Well, kid, what'll it be?”

“Surprise me.” He has no idea what to order here and he also doesn't really care.

A drink is placed in front of him. He barely registers what he's even looking at before he grabs it, pretends to clink glasses with no one and takes a swig. His snout wrinkles, the feeling going right up to his nose. Alcohol swabs, sticky syrup, like he bumped the lid off sanitizer and cherry jam and decided to slurry them together. Before he knows it, he downs the whole thing. The bartender looks as equally skeptical as he is impressed as he takes the empty glass.

“Another one?”

“Sure, why not.”

The feeling in his chest is nice. Beyond nice. Warm, buzzy.

Someone sits next to him. He glances over and then freezes. The whole of him locks up, like he's staring down a Badnik's fist and he's somehow forgotten how to get out of the way. Grey fur, big ears, muzzle, silver-near-white hair, blue eyes. She's definitely not him. In any way shape or form, but— His eyes jump between the white markings on her snout and brow as she smiles at the bartender and orders her own drink.

Her eyes slide over to him, her own hand coming up to touch her muzzle right as he realizes he's been staring at her for a little too long. “Is there something on my face?”

It's like every ounce of tension unlocks at that. Sonic leans against the bar, sliding into a familiar routine as he smiles. “Nah, sorry, you just look a lot like someone I know. You definitely got him beat in the looks department though.”

Why he says any of it at all registers about as fast as the way he sees her muzzle go red under the thin fur on it. And, well, at least he kinda knows how this goes.

It's—

Boring. Not her fault at all. And he's pretty sure it's not his either. Everyone leaves mutually satisfied as he puts his sneakers back on and leaves her apartment, but there's something missing still.

He goes back to the same bar. Gets properly drunk this time. Tries his luck again. Someone different. He doesn't remember a lot about it, but the next morning they ask if they'll see each other again and something about that sends him clambering out of their place, shaking the whole way. He tries again. Nothing. Again. They ask if he wants to go on a proper date after and he ditches them while they're in the bathroom. He goes back. He tries again. The bartender learns exactly what he usually drinks by the end of the week. More patrons trickle in. Enough the place starts to actually fill up most nights.

Tonight's no exception. Music loud, bass jumping in his chest. Club scenes attract more business these days, the bartender had said, an annoyed grimace to all of it. The guy obviously isn't a fan of cutting loose. Especially considering he'd propositioned the bartender no less than four times now and gotten turned down just as many. I'm old enough to be your dad, kid.' Whatever. Like that even matters.

Sonic sighs and slumps against the bar. Nothing's clicking into place the ways he's pretty sure it's supposed to. The way he remembers it feeling. There's a thrill to being wanted, sure, a kind of satisfaction to having someone fawn over him, to the whole rigamarole of flirting and the back and forth before he lands in bed with someone, but it's not completely right somehow. Doe-y, moon-eyed adoration. A fondness in the way they look at him.

It's just not right at all.

Someone shuffles between the bodies behind him, their hands falling right on his waist in the tight space between the crowded dance floor and the bar. They leave one of their hands on his side and lean over the bar beside him as they for the bartender. He has half a mind to tell them to get their hand off of him already. To just shove it off regardless.

Before he can open his mouth, the coyote turns to him, all sharp teeth, fingers squeezing into his ribs. His shoulder aches, blood in his nose, metal under his gloves instead of bar top. Eyes rake over the whole of him and back up, like they're picking him to pieces already. Like he's just a cut of meat or something.

“You're that Sonic guy, aren't you?” the coyote says, barely audible over the music.

Sonic smiles on reflex, muscle memory. “Sure am. Who's asking?”

He lets the coyote draw him in tighter and he grabs at the hand curled over his side, pressing it in further with his own. He can feel the laugh from the coyote as he does it, breath hot, right against his face.

At that moment, he knows exactly what he’s been missing.

---

“My offer still stands.”

Mask Guy never talks much. Words sparse and carefully chosen for whatever reason. The amount of times he's heard the guy's voice aren't even enough to fill a page at this point, and he still doesn't know what that thing in Mask Guy's chest is really capable of yet. He also doesn't know why he's here other than Eggman wants him to be and he's put Mask Guy in charge of him for some reason.

He knows this guy is weird too. He knows he's also really warm and that his palm pads are strangely soft under his gloves. He knows Mask Guy likes to run his claws over his ears when he's got his chin pillowed in Mask Guy’s lap. And maybe it's his fault. Maybe he shouldn't have gotten so close to this guy. It wouldn't be the first time he's assumed everything was above board, and then found out later the person was flirting with him or something. He's no stranger to misreading a room. He didn't think he was this bad at it though.

He turns over their interactions in his head. He sets them up against his own idea of coming onto someone and he still can't see where he fumbled across the line hard enough to warrant the first time this guy asked if he wanted to sleep with him.

He looks over Mask Guy, chest tightening in a way he's become all too familiar with. A cornered sort of sensation. Four walls, a ceiling, a floor, all of it closing in on him constantly. He hasn't seen his friends in who knows how long. The last time he saw Tails was the couple hundred times he died in the simulation thing this guy somehow created.

He doesn't want to be here anymore. He's sick of turning around only to see more metal. To jolting awake and staring at a ceiling instead of stars. He wants grass. The sun. Heck, he'd take water at this point. A lake. The beach. He'd throw himself into the ocean if it meant he didn't have to sit and look at another wall.

He stares at the floor, at his sneakers. Tattered and scuffed and worse for wear. Dull fur. He hasn't showered since they put him in here. He never thought he'd ever want to take one this bad. He wants a bed too. A fridge to crack open and choose whatever he wants from it. He wishes he had soda, candy, teeth rotting stuff. Chili dogs. He’d kill for a good one right now. Even flipping a light switch would feel rapturous compared to laying on the floor and staring at the dim lights that never turn off. He misses the TV at Tails’ place. He misses the Tornado. The Workshop. He misses Tails beating him at whatever new AGES game hit the shelves and laughing in his face with a grin and a, ha, take that!

He misses running. The wind. Rain, thunder, lightning, sweating on a super hot day, trees, bugs, Flickys, Rickys, Chao. He misses movie nights with Amy. Roping Knuckles into petty fist fights and bad jokes with stupid punchlines. He misses everything, all of it, more than he thought he ever could. He wants his life back. He knows exactly what he wants more than anything. He also knows what he doesn't want.

My offer still stands.

He figured, if it ever came down to it, it'd at least be someone he liked. Trusted at the least. He doesn't even know Mask Guy's name. What his face looks like. Anything about him. He really, really doesn't want to have sex with him.

But he also doesn't know when Mask Guy's gonna come back this time. If he's gonna come back at all. The time between his visits, anyone's visits—Chaos, Metal, Zavok, Shadow, Eggman—have become sporadic, spaced out and few and far between. He hasn't been given food by Cubot and Orbot in days, and it's not like the little robots ever say much to him anyway. Occasionally, but even that's random chance. They look at him in that sort of way they usually do, where he's not sure whose side they're on anymore. LED eye’s turned down. Sad almost. He doesn't want their pity, he just wishes they'd talk to him for once.

He shrinks under Mask Guy's stare. He's gotta make a choice here. At the expense of his next meal. Next drink. Losing all the contact he's gotten used to. Grown too comfortable with. Maybe he leaned into it too much. Maybe he should've pulled away more. Maybe he did something to make Mask Guy think he wanted to—as if he'd ever want to—maybe he could've—should've—

Mask Guy turns to leave.

No. No. He can't do it. If he leaves, that's it. He just needs someone else to be here. He doesn't even care who anymore. And it's not like it'll be that bad, right? People have sex all the time, so it can't be terrible. Maybe he'll even—heck, maybe it won't—

“Fine,” Sonic says, teeth grit, hands balled into fists. “Whatever, just—” His jaw clicks shut on the rest of the words.

It can't be that bad. It can't be. It's just something people do. So, whatever. Whatever. His heart tacks loud in his ears, breaths fast. It's whatever. It'll be easier for him anyway, cause he's— Theoretically, it's fine, because this is what he's supposed to want, or something like that. He remembers entertaining the idea when he first started T, when everything got ramped up fast and hard, and he'd gone from flat disinterested to constantly thinking about something. It'd simmered down into a manageable sort of feeling again after long enough. It just wasn't something he thought about. Cared about. Gave much consideration to. He'd rather go for a run, hang out with his friends, fight badniks and—

Mask Guy steps towards him and his muscles lock up all at once, like he's staring down his first fight all over again. A hole growing in his stomach, eating up the rest of him as Mask Guy gets closer. His ears press back. He stares at Mask Guy's hands, his arms, his chest, bouncing his line of sight lower and then slamming his attention into the wall behind Mask Guy instead as bile pushes up his throat. They're snout to mask too fast too soon, his thoughts spinning as the warmth of Mask Guy is undeniable this close. He laughs as hands fall on his shoulders. Smiles, grimaces. He doesn't know what else he's supposed to do with himself really.

He understands it all in theory, of course. He's not stupid. He's not an idiot. He knows how sex is supposed to work. It's not rocket science. His stomach drops the second the backs of his knees hit the metal bench. Legs giving under him, elbows smacking into it, and then his shoulders, his quills. It's like all the feeling is bleeding out of his fingers, like he can't hold onto it all anymore. His vision narrows into a spot on the ceiling over the furred shoulder that comes into view as someone crawls over him.

He should punch him. He should kick him. Bite him. Say something. Do something. He's pretty sure that's what he’s supposed to do if he doesn't want this to happen—

Hands dig into his thighs and pull them apart. He shivers. He can't move his hands. He can't move at all. He stares up at nothing. It feels like he's falling. His whole body hot and cold and far away as the weight of someone else settles between his legs, over him. On top of him.

Everything wrenches, like a dial in his head, flipping from one incident to another, inspecting and picking himself apart. He had to have messed it up somewhere. Given the wrong impression. He must've. He thinks about curling up next to the warmth Mask Guy exudes like he's got a constant fever. Maybe that's where it started. The claws pinching his ear between them and him leaning into it. Maybe he should have told him to stop right then. Maybe he should've just—

The metal snout of the mask grazes his shoulder. The crook of his neck. Hands smooth up his sides, thumbs petting over his ribs. Part of him wants this over with, fast and quick, like ripping off a bandaid, like taking a punch right in the teeth. The other part appreciates this much comfort. It makes it easier to pretend maybe it's okay. At least this part is fine. He doesn't really mind being held in someone else's hands like this.

Reality smacks back into his chest as knees knock his legs wider, and he stiffens at the hands grabbing him under his thighs and belting his legs around someone's waist. He's pretty sure there's supposed to be more to this. Kissing or whatever. Stuff to ease him into it. Instead, his entire body is wound tight as he listens to this guy huff and work himself out. The sound sticks in his ears. Sheath. Cock. Stupid, dumb words. Almost hilarious.

His gut shrivels. He doesn't look down between them. He grits his teeth. He waits. He stares at the ceiling. He counts the bolts. He waits. Jaw clenched harder. And he waits and he waits and—

---

He throws up after Mask Guy finally leaves. Right off the edge of the bench. A delayed jitteriness snapping through him as he shakes and stares and jerks his head to the side at some sound that isn't there. His tail aches where it had folded under him, pinned between him and the metal the whole time. His legs burn right at the inside of his thighs, where they'd pushed wider than he's used to. He spits the last of the bile off his tongue. Swipes at the mess between his legs and tries to smear it off his gloves with the edge of the bench. He ignores the spots of blood in it. He ignores everything.

He goes to bed. He wakes up a minute later, shaking hard and hot all over. He slams his cuffs against the edge of the bench until his wrists hurt, a yell stuck right between his teeth and growing. He tears around the cell and there's nothing to break, or hit or throw except for himself. His shoulder hits the bars hard enough the feeling rattles his teeth. He throws himself into them until it's all he can think about. Until he's lying on the floor, the ceiling spinning above him. He thinks about going home. He thinks about Tails smiling at him. If anyone can do this, you can, Sonic!

He can't though. He can't. He—

---

It hardly matters after the second time.

The third. By the fifth he's at least figured out how to make it better for himself. He learns Infinite's name. He learns there's a face under the mask. He learns how to kiss him properly. How to get on his knees and use his mouth. He learns what Infinite likes and doesn't like. He learns how to get Infinite to stick around longer. He learns his body is a lure as much as it is a weapon. He uses it to his advantage. He forgets what he ever even hated about any of this in the first place.

He smiles. He laughs. He shoves the hollowness in his chest so far down it stops existing. Fills it with whatever he wants, needs, gets.

He kills that stupid, naive kid in his dumb little box, and he comes out better.

---

“Sonic!”

Sonic barely manages to turn around before Tails is barreling into him, tails spinning wildly, arms wrapped so tight around him he can only laugh and smile as Tails does his best to squeeze the air out of him.

“Woah! I missed you too, little bro,” Sonic says.

The rest of the room stares at him, torn away from their maps and battle plans and comms to watch the reunion they've all anticipated since he got off the Death Egg. His hands start to jitter and he covers it up by grabbing Tails shoulders and all but pulling him off of him. He keeps it playful, despite the way he's barely keeping the rattle in his limbs under control.

Sonic pretends to wince and rubs at his side. “I think you crushed at least two ribs with that bear hug, dude.”

“Sorry, it's just—” Tails laughs, a sort of manic disbelief pinched around shiny eyes. “You're alive!”

“Yeah, I sure am. Last time I checked at least.” The joke falls flat with the rest of the room, but Tails laughs again and that's all that really matters.

And he missed this. All of it. He looks at Tails and he thinks about plane crashes as much as he thinks about all the times he thought about what Tails would want him to do in that cell. Live. Survive. Come back in one piece. Do whatever he had to in order to make it. His chest hurts. Everything hurts. He feels like he's wound so tight he's going to fling apart. He smiles. He laughs. He forces his lungs to work.

Everyone's watching him. Everyone's looking right at him. He's pretty sure he's smiling wide enough. He’s pretty sure he said the right stuff too. He's playing the part, he's looking the part. He's doing his part here.

He came back alive, after all.

Tails hugs him again and he forgets how to hug him back as he stares at another version of himself that is entirely unrecognizable. The Sonic that Tails ran in here with. Him, but not him.

He came back alive—

Didn't he?

Notes:

“”Over time you experience a “social death.” You wake up every morning to the reality that if everyone you knew hasn’t already forgotten you, chances are they eventually will. Even if you do get out, you fear the “you” who has walked through the world since the day you were born might be irrevocably damaged, changed, and unrecognizable. If days, weeks, months can pass without a single person on the outside seeing or (as far as you know) even thinking about you—who’s to say you even exist?””

Preface: A Human Forever
Sarah Shourd [Hell is a Very Small Place]

Chapter 6: i'll say yes, i'll undress, i've done more for less || shake hands, and shoot smiles all around as i sell my body by the pound || smiling pretty, well, pretty will swallow you forever

Summary:

Hitting rock bottom’s sorta got a nice ring to it.

(or, the chapter where Sonic has a time and a half of it. A parallel to the past if you will.)

“Y’know, I'm not exactly a mailman, right?” Sonic says, leaned against the desk scattered with such a mess of busy work he can hardly imagine picking through it.

Vector's call had been unexpected, the request for help even more so. The Chaotix weren't above asking for an assist when they needed it, sure, but Vector had contacted him personally about a delivery. Something pretty simple, all things considered. Something the Chaotix could totally handle on their own.

Vector tosses a file into a bin labeled ‘Closed’ and sighs. “Look, I wouldn't’ve wasted your time on this if I got another option, but seein’ as how Charmy ‘n Espio won't be back for a while still and I got plenty to handle here, I need someone fast enough to get this where it needs to go ASAP.”

“Do I get the reward for doin’ all the work?” Sonic asks.

Vector gives him a flat look.

Sonic holds up his hands with a smile. “Kiddin’, man, loosen up a little.”

“A cut of the commission's on the table if you're into that kinda thing.”

“Nah, you can keep it.” Sonic picks up the box and rattles it. Whatever's in it rolls around inside, heavier than he thought it would be, but not unmanageable. “What's this anyways?”

“Who knows. It just needs to make its way to Barricade Town before lights out." Vector puts his hand on top of the box. “And don't even think about openin’ it. The Chaotix got a reputation to maintain here, so if I hear you've stuck your nose in, we're gonna have words.”

“‘Course, sure.”

Vector lets him go and turns back to the mountain of papers on his desk. Headphones pulled down around Vector's neck for once, a stoop to him that's unusual as he picks up one of the manilla folders and flips through it.

Sonic lingers, fingers tapping on the box as he rocks back on his heels. He can faintly hear the music from Vector's headphones from here, but he can't discern the song, everything about it muffled and too far away. He should probably head off and get the delivery over with already. His eyes dart to the door and then back to Vector.

“So…” Sonic starts. “Has work been steady for you guys?”

The Chaotix always ran pretty thin margins in the past, but now—not a single inch of the office is untouched by something that needs to be handled, checked out, or worked up. It's a headache just to look at, he can't even imagine being the one who has to handle any of it.

Vector glances at him and laughs. “Whaddayou think?”

“Yeah.” Sonic hikes the box up higher and sighs. “Good luck with all of this, I guess.”

Vector tosses the folder he finishes rummaging through into ‘Open’ and picks up another one without a word.

---

Predictably, Barricade Town takes no time to reach at all.

Sonic races up the wall in a flash, ignoring the actual entrances into the fortified city. With the toes of his sneakers perched on the lip of the concrete edge, he looks down at the houses sprawled out far below. When he looks behind him it's all forests and meadows and he can almost see the river he ran alongside on the way here. Everything reduced to miniature, like the whole world's gone and shrunk down while he's stayed the same.

He makes his way down the wall and into the streets in a blur, the address scrawled on the box only as helpful as the numbers stuck on a quarter of the buildings. He comes to a stop at the center of the city. It should be pretty easy to find the place he's supposed to get to, but as he turns around in a full circle, he realizes it's like the Eggman base all over again. His ears flick back. For a moment, he can't even pick out which way North is either, which is a bit new. Usually he has no problem knowing exactly which direction he's facing, but the sun is already hidden behind the circular curve of the wall. The only hint it was ever there is the burned part of the sky that peeks over one end.

Even knowing which way he's facing doesn't help clear up where the drop off point is. He'll have to ask someone for directions. He grimaces. Or he could just canvas the entire city and hope he stumbles on the correct door. Heck, he could probably run the length of the whole place in a minute or two tops anyway.

“Alright, let's do this,” Sonic mutters, holding the box tighter as he jogs his sneaker against the ground.

It takes him a little longer than it should to finally find the address. Maybe it's just his imagination, but he breathes a little heavier, too. His chest beyond tight. He raps his knuckles on the door and waits, every inch of him like it's been stretched too thin. His foot taps a mile a minute, tacking loudly against the cobblestone. He contemplates just abandoning the box outside the place and splitting. It's not like Vector said he had to hand it off face to face, only that it had to make it to the city. Well, mission accomplished.

Before Sonic can set the box down, the door swings open. The conversation with the culpeo happens in snapshots he can hardly pick apart from one another as he hands it off with a grin that isn't his doing and words that aren't his either, and then the door shuts. His face falls flat. He stares at the wood grain. The whole world slipped off his shoulders, void to either side of him and closing in the longer he stands there.

Oh, hey—didn't expect you to be the one making the delivery. I'll be sure to pass it onto Vector that you got this our way safe and sound though.

He thinks about how the culpeo looked him over when the door opened. A knowing show of teeth. An amused huff. A notably ungloved hand on his shoulder that patted with a linger, claws lightly snagging his fur.

Seriously, Sonic, thanks for everything.

Sonic remembers the culpeo the way he remembers most of the people who have fucked him before. Like a silhouette. The outline always unmistakable.

He rests his fist against the door. He thinks about leaving. His skin crawls and something pulls in his chest. Palms clammy. Heartbeat too loud. He wants to high tail it outta the city. He wants to do anything besides waste the opportunity in front of him. The flat of his hand hits the door. One knock. Two.

All he can think about is Shadow scoffing at him, frowning, staring. ‘You're hardly fine.’ Sonic waits. He breathes too loud. ‘It’s not safe for you to—’ Yeah. No shit. Isn't that the whole point? What would be the point of doing any of this if it wasn't dangerous? It's practically his middle name. Right up there beside the other ones they all constantly plaster over Sonic, thumbs smoothing over some duct-taped replacement with hero this, savior that. Names he never even asked for in the first place—

The door swings open. Sonic smiles.

The culpeo grabs him and as the door’s shut and he's shoved into it, all he can hear is the culpeo's voice in his ear—sometime else, someplace else—muffled by an alcohol-slurred memory with wrists pinned above his head and hips flattening his to the mattress. You really are just a fucking slut, aren't you?

---

“Must be pretty nice, being the big hero all the time,” the collie says with a limp arm slung over his shoulders. Drunken, not fully wasted yet. “I bet it never gets boring, does it?”

He doesn't answer the question.

He thinks about the board of missing person's information tacked up outside the bar, all of it similar to what he saw at the Chaotix’s place. Some more formal with pull-away tabs of contact information, a reward offered. Others are just desperate. Crumple edged photos with only a name penned underneath in unsteady letters, colorful scraps left behind where other flyers have been torn down already. Remnants caught in empty staple jaws. It's impossible to tell from where they've been torn down whether the ending was a good one or a bad one.

He hobbles the collie through the front entrance and out into a low drizzle. The board perches in his peripherals, water-logged, the ink unsteady on the pages. Faces weeped.

There's no longer a need for the whole smile and laugh and fuck-me-eyes routine out here in the dim lot lights and constant patter of slow rain. Not with another soul in sight to be seen. He knows the collie half-collapsed into him is both far too horny and a few drinks shy of too drunk to care anyway. Dulled construction barriers stand lopsided on the far side of the lot, the asphalt littered with pock marks that he maneuvers his second pair of feet around, a hand on the collie's chest to steady him. An arm slips down his back and fingers tighten on his side with a pained hiss in his ear. He doesn't offer an apology. If this guy wants to risk wrapping his arms around a pincushion, that's his problem.

Sonic almost asks which way the collie lives, but the thought of stepping foot into the collie's apartment sours in his mouth. He stops to scan over the mostly empty lot, the few cars parked in it. Ever since the Resistance efforts have helped reconnect the roadways and patch up where the streets buckled into one another, people have started driving again. And here, in this city at least, everything's starting to sit somewhere between a pale of what it used to be and nothing like it ever was.

His sneaker slips into a muddied pothole on the tail end of another step. All of this effort to fix everything and they somehow still manage to never get around to patching up the things everyone hated the most.

“Did you drive here?” Sonic asks flatly, shaking out his water-logged sneaker and trying to keep the collie upright as they both teeter.

“Uh, yeah, just gimme a sec to—” The collie fumbles around for his keys and pulls them out, hooked loosely on a finger.

Sonic catches the keys before he even registers they've fallen and he presses the first button he finds under his thumb. It lights up the headlights on a car at the far end of the lot, tucked up where the building wraps around into a brick edge and a dark alley. It's good enough. It'll do.

It's better than wasting his night being dragged all the way back to this guy's place—and it's not like anyone's around.

He drops the collie against the passenger side and yanks open the back door. Hands grab at his waist before he can get either himself or the collie inside. A clumsy snout bumps up under his chin and slick breaths find his pulse, tongue sliding rough over his fur, lips following it in a sloppy pattern down his neck.

“You didn't answer my question,” the collie says.

“Yeah?” Sonic stares at the window of the car, his dull reflection in it, the collie’s hands on him, the snout buried along his throat. “Must've slipped my mind...”

The collie finds the flat of his shoulder and rests his chin there. “You never said if it was boring or not, being the hero.”

Great. Somehow he managed to find the most talkative guy in the whole bar. He should've settled for the dingo. Even the dhole. At least those two seemed like the kinda douchey, but silent types who'd take what he was offering and leave it at that.

Sonic laughs and watches himself do the same in the rain spackled window pane. “I mean, it's way more borin’ than this,” he says, hands settled somewhere on the collie's waist. Disconnected. Like they're someone else's. Ball and socket, wrenched out, shoved back in. “Can't exactly bang out with the eggbots, can I?”

“Hah, yeah, true…least you've got taste,” the collie says, snout dropped into his fur, nosing at him.

He's not sure he'd call it taste anymore.

The arms wrapped around him aren't quite right. The collie smells like smoke under the alcohol, the chewing gum he ground through earlier and stuck under the bar, the asphalt- petrichor everywhere. But his voice is close. A sort of sound to it he couldn't unstick since the guy looked at him with wide-eyed recognition and said his name in all the ways he never heard him say it. It's certainly not perfect.

It'll have to do though. He lets the collie push him by his shoulders and into the mouth of the car where he spills over the back seat. He keeps his legs spread, pushing himself back until his quills hit the car door as the collie clambers in after him. The door shuts with a low rock. He eyes the collection of water drops on the window as he tips his head back to rest along the door’s arm.

A panting, drunken thing settles between his legs. One leg pressed further into the give of the seat by the hip pinning his thigh, the other hiked up with a palm under his knee. His legs tense, everything down to his feet—a kick primed in the banded strength of them—and then the feeling passes like it always does.

Sonic keeps his head tipped back and watches the rain. The windows fog over the longer it all takes, the collie curled atop him, panting into the side of his muzzle. The coordination of it becomes sloppy enough he's surprised the collie hasn't gone full whiskey dick here. And he wishes—with a kind of regretful clarity—that this guy wasn't so obsessed with using his name constantly. Like every other word. Huffed and moaned and low and grunted out as the collie finally comes, hands scrabbling at him, his quills tacking into the car door behind him on every frantic shove.

Everything goes still again.

Sonic sighs. Skin warm under his fur, eyes slipped shut, the tension bleeding out of his shoulders. At least they're done here. A hand slides over his stomach fur and wanders lower. He jolts up, grabbing the collie's wrist and smacking into the car door as he fumbles for the handle.

“What're you—” the collie starts.

Sonic spills out into the muggy air. A burn where his spine folded, an ache in his thighs, heart kicking at his chest.

The collie reaches for him. “Hey, seriously, what's your problem, Sonic—”

Sonic smacks the door shut on the collie's wide-eyed look. They're more than done here and he's got the rest of the night ahead of him.

He ends up in the bar in a flash and rummages through the bathroom in the back for something to wipe down with. The reek of sex-sweat-smoke stained fabric sticks all over him even after he cups his hands under the faucet and birdbaths with the sink.

He eyes the regulars once he's cleaned up and back inside. The usuals. Barstool-permanents, booth-huggers, dart-jockeys, the three man trio on the rickety excuse for a stage at the back, feedback whine on the speaker clicking and popping, set already played and drinks passed between them.

Bored, he makes a game of it in his head. He spins an imaginary wheel as he idles at the bar and listens to the tick-tick-tick of the arrow hit each knob, the faces all whirling into one unrecognizable mass like the board outside. It slows. It points. He slips into the third booth for his prize for the night and offers to buy the bear a drink. Nothing's even remotely right about this guy. Brown eyes, soft edges, no reds or grays or blue or golds or whites. It doesn't matter anymore.

He wakes up in an apartment with a heavy arm slung over his waist. He stares at the far wall. At the window. The sunrise outside the flimsy curtains. An exit he should slip through before the person behind him wakes up. That's just how it's supposed to go. Instead, he lays there and listens to the breathing behind him, his skin crawling under each hot slither of it on his nape. Sometimes he wonders how this would all be if it was a room with no doors. No windows.

Just walls and the floor and a hinged box lid that he never has to think about opening or closing. He could do something as simple as sit and wait and stare. And wait. And wait—

The bear stirs behind him, muzzle settled on his shoulder, the arm around him drawing him in closer. His extraction period thins out with the satisfied sigh in his fur, snapping shut as a hand finds the flat of his chest and wanders low, down over his hip and between his thighs. He shuts his eyes. It's someone else entirely as he bucks into their fingers, holding onto the bear’s arm a little too hard as he grinds into his palm. His quills bristle and he hears the bear hiss through his teeth, fur thick enough to avoid real damage, but definitely not discomfort.

His legs shiver. He turns his snout into the bear’s arm and keeps his eyes closed. Pinned by his throat. Teeth. Spit. Face down, arms stuck under him, tied wrist to wrist. Blood in his nose. His muzzle swollen with one fresh bruise and then another and another. Red. Grey. Shoving him down by the shoulders. Thighs stuck open. Panting and silent, quiet, sighing breaths. Cold metal under his back. Everywhere.

Sonic's teeth clench down around nothing as he comes. The room spins, he catches himself from drowning in the sheets with a shaking hand. A plane crash whines in his ears. The bear pets fingers over his damp and heaving side and his jaw grinds, muzzle wrinkled up enough to bare his teeth as he glares at the window.

---

He's sat at the same dive bar he was at last night when Tails calls him out of the blue. He answers immediately, suspecting an emergency considering it's well past one in the morning and Tails doesn't usually contact him this late unless—Sonic! Sorry if I caught you sleeping, just working on some things for HQ and wanted to see if you—

Somehow, it's like nothing ever happened.

He's not sure if it's worse than if Tails had demanded he come back to the Workshop and hash things out. Instead, they talk about everything except what actually happened. Neither of them acknowledge the fact he turned tail, split, and hasn't been back around for more than doing his shot and hightailing it again for weeks now. They've hardly exchanged two words since the fight and subsequent breakdown—and yet, it's like Tails has everything else in the world to talk about here and more.

Maybe it's just easier this way, without being face to face and over the Comms. Being able to talk without all the expectations. Without the way Tails eyes look over him like he's trying to find something that's gone missing. Worse is when Tails looks at him the same way Tails looks at the discarded and crumpled inventions stuffed in the corners of his Labs. Something already broken. Something in need of repair.

“—ve you spoken to Knuckles lately? He asked about you last time I saw him at HQ, but I didn't know if you'd already dropped by to see him yet.”

“Nah, tell Knux I'll swing by soon. Jus’ been a little caught up in some stuff.”

“Oh? Is it stuff you need an assist with? Badniks? Eggman Bases? I can get the Tornado enroute any time, just give me the coordinates and I'll be there.”

Sonic laughs and then grimaces. He can hear the whistle of wind through punched out metal, the stench of blood and smoke and burning plastic and hot metal. “Nah, just been helpin’ Vector out with some junk. Nothin’ too big. I'll let y’know when there's something though, promise.”

“Okay, yeah. Of course. Just lemme know,” Tails says, trailing off and then: “I did have a new idea for the next, potential sneakers upgrade by the way. I'm thinking we should probably explore our zero-G options since we've dealt with space recently and in the past with the Wisps and all. I've been looking at some kind of mag-type capability for metallic surfaces specifically, but I think there's also something I could do purely gravitational wise with them as well. Maybe even a limited field of it's own centered on the wearer that could allow you some more stability and maintain your planar orientation as well as the ability to—”

Despite the interruption to his usual plans, it's nice to hear Tails rambling again. He finds himself nursing his drink instead of slamming it the way he usually does when his agenda is something a little less coherent. Tails talks while he works and he can hear the occasional clang-bang in the background, something being thrown across the Workshop as Tails hurries around and chatters excitedly the whole while. He can almost see it all playing out in his head: Tails tripping over something he left lying around and forgot about as he finds it again with his foot and an exasperated oh, shit.

“Hey, language, bud.”

“I'm going to put cement in your shoes next time you run them bald,” Tails says flatly.

Sonic laughs. “Yeah, like that'll slow me down.”

“Well, we'll find out, won't we?” Tails says.

“Challenge accepted, dude. Better start putting feelers out for the finest concrete aroun—”

“Oh, right, I almost forgot!” Tails says in a burst, the sound of something being slammed down on the workbench clattering down the line. “Did you have any plans for your birthday? I know we didn't get to do anything last year, so I was thinking maybe we could ask Amy if we can use HQ to host, if not we can totally just do a barbeque here again or something. I could maybe see if Miss Vanilla is willing to help put something together as well.”

Sonic squints at the drink in his hand, down to a thin sliver of amber, nothing much left. A year approaching him head on. Spiraling, crashing into it. Nineteen ahead of him, eighteen on his heels. The year still doesn't sit right when he stares at a calendar too long, the same way six months didn't feel right coming off the Death Egg.

It's also funny, in a weird sort of way. His body count was at a piddly one this time last year and now he's way into the doubles. He's not sure if he's broken triple yet. It's not like he's kept track. Maybe he's already passed it. One body a night, for a hundred nights, he could clear that easily. Double it even. Heck, shooting past three hundred before the holidays might just be a cake walk if he really puts his nose to the grindstone.

Idly, he thinks about the time Tails showed him an encyclopedia on tectonics, Tails hands vibrating as he talked about it in long winded sentences he hardly finished before jumping into the next. Pressurized layers stacked one on top of the other. A foundational one hidden all the way at the bottom, the oldest, defining the rest above it with fault lines and magma buoying it.

“Eh. I don't got any plans really, was just sorta plannin’ on wingin’ it to be honest. Not exactly feeling the whole party thing this year anyways. Plus everyone seems sorta busy, so—” Sonic laughs tightly. “Sorry if you were countin’ on a real rager, little bro.”

“No, it's okay,” Tails says. “Honestly, that's totally fine with me considering all the stuff I need to finish here. I suppose we could just make it a two of us thing then?”

“Sure, bud.” Sonic's ears press back, he frowns at the wood grain of the bar under his hands. “That’d be perfect.”

Maybe three hundred layers will be enough.

---

Maybe it's nostalgia.

Maybe it's because it feels like an anniversary of something he can't place. Regardless of the reason, after Tails' call, he returns to the first bar-turned-club he ever sat at. The one he found after the Death Egg and the War wrapped up. A still semi-regular haunt on his routine rounds of places to trawl at since it's always got new patrons in and out the doors with its junction on the edge of the city and the revamped rail system. Plus, he gets away with not paying for drinks here more often than most places, all courtesy of the man that's usually behind the bar.

The badger in question wipes down the serving counter with an annoyed grimace. Brown eyes flick up to him, narrowing as he knocks back the rest of the drink the badger served him without a word exchanged between them. He still doesn't know the badger's name. With the TV networks back up and broadcasting again, there's no way the badger doesn't know his name by now though. He's been here enough times in the past it feels like he should've asked, but he just hasn't and never does and maybe it's better this way. At least this guy never uses his name either.

“You should probably slow down, kid,” the badger says.

“Nah.” Sonic laughs. “Where's the fun in that?”

“You're starting to make me think I should cut you off right about now.”

“You wouldn't.” Sonic beams, leaning over the bar. “I'm pretty much your favorite customer, aren't I?”

“You're certainly pushing it with that attitude,” the badger says, dropping the next drink in front of him regardless of his words. “I'm not gonna be the one picking you up off the floor tonight, you hear?”

That's fine by him. He's got other plans anyway.

The first rejection of the night is new, stinging in a way that sits on his skin and itches. The second one has him laughing and waving it off and his chest clenching to the point breathing feels more chore than instinct. By the third and then the fourth he wants to curl up in the corner. He smiles instead, giving a thumbs up send off to the coati and her girlfriend, well wishes passed between them. Oh, sorry, I'm actually here with someone. Right, yeah. That's just something that happens sometimes…

Sonic gets up onto a barstool and stares at the bar, everything aching, head pounding. It's like someone's taken an ice pick and shoved it though one ear and hooked it out the other. Trying again crosses his mind. His skull buzzes, neck hot—striking out’s not exactly what he banked on here. He grabs a bottle from behind the service counter, he doesn't even check the label before he slams it back until he has to take a breath. Sagged against the bar, he drops his head in his arms, a boneless sort of weightlessness to every limb.

“Guess that luck of yours finally ran out.”

Sonic moves his face out of his arms enough to side-eye the badger with all the annoyance he can muster.

The badger sighs and collects the bottle he pilfered. “Told you. You should've quit while you were ahead.”

“Yeah, whaddayou know?” Sonic grumbles before miserably rolling his face back into his arms.

“I know you're way past last call, kid, and I gotta close this place up already,” the badger says. “Up you go, c'mon.”

Sonic shoves himself to his feet and lingers, ears drooped miserably. He'll probably have to run off the alcohol and then try to rest wherever he can find somewhere to curl up at. Or try to see if there's another place that's still open. With bodies in it. The potential for someone else's bed for the night.

The badger looks him over, face drawn. “You got a place to stay tonight?”

Sonic grins emptily. “Nope.”

“All right, kid...” The badger grabs up a pair of keys. “Let's go.”

The badger’s apartment is the kind of one bedroom studio that's all modest and nice despite the guy practically running the whole joint he just got hauled away from. It smells like something he can't place, like old carpet, unlit candles, floral scented wax. Sonic slumps onto the couch and the badger hands him a glass of water, settling down beside him with a weary sigh.

He thinks about the dog that turned him down at the bar, disgust pinched in his muzzle. The rat. The vicuña. The coati. All with the same look in their eyes. Like he's not even the guy that helped save the planet, again, for absolutely nothing in return, like usual, but instead like he's some worthless, gross little thing underfoot. Like he's not anyone or anything. Just a stupid, desperate idiot. His skin aches.

Sonic grabs the badger’s wrist before he can retreat fully and slides his fingers up to hook under the warm fabric of the badger's glove.

—you really are just a fucking slut, aren't you? This is all you're good for, huh? Like some kind of toy. My offer still stands—

He's seen it, whenever he zips behind the service counter to grab at the bottles and pour himself his own drink when the badger pretends to refuse to serve him. When he bends over the bar with a smile, tail wagging. When he's practically sitting in another guy's lap, an arm around him and fingers dug into his side. He knows what wanting something looks like. He knows this guy wants him. He knows it.

He tugs off the badger's glove in one motion and drops it onto the couch. The space becomes too wide between them. ‘We've already been over this, I'm old enough to be your dad, kid.’ His own glove comes off, pulled with his teeth. He holds their palms together and he doesn't miss the sharp breath from the badger. ‘The answer’s still a no, so stop asking.’ Sonic pushes closer, drunk on luck, his knees on the couch, hand locked in place with the badger's own as he straddles him. Wide, brown eyes stare up at him, the grays in the black parts of the badger's fur is all he can see, like the faded strands are overtaking the rest of him. Hands fall on his waist and wander to his hips, tentative and too soft. He thinks of different ones. Of something else. ‘No and no. Seriously, stop hitting on me, kid. There's plenty of other fish to chase.’

“What're you doing?” the badger asks, voice rough with a sound that's far too familiar.

He didn't call him kid this time.

It's like watching everything click into place, the way the badger's face changes the longer he sits in his lap. When Sonic laces his fingers behind the badger’s neck and tugs at the fur on his nape, when he puts his muzzle close enough to taste his breath on his. This isn't like with the people at the bar or Shadow in Rouge's apartment when he was shoved away. He knows this guy wants to fuck him. He's one hundred percent sure of it. Heck, who doesn't?

When he kisses the badger all he can taste is the alcohol on his own teeth. All he can think about is how he doesn't get pushed away this time. How he gets dragged closer, held tighter. He reaches a hand down between them and slips away.

.
..
...
He comes to like slamming head first into concrete. Breathing heavy, sweat-sticky fur trapped under his thighs, the badger's fingers limp on his waist, muzzle red-tinged, jaw slacked with harsh pants, head thrown back against the couch cushion. Hips with a pleasant ache from where fingers dug in as the badger bucked up under him and came. His knees and thighs pinch where he leveraged himself up using the badger's shoulders. He feels the unmistakable trail of heat down the underside of his thigh, the heady-thick stench of sex everywhere between them, the badger limp and already slipped out. Brown eyes roll up to meet his. Pupils far too blown and heavy.

Sonic no longer recognizes anything about them.

“Kid—” the badger says, fucked-out, like he's seen a ghost, like he can't believe anything that's happened. “Sonic, that was…”

Sonic stiffens. He's not supposed to use his name. Not like that. Never like that. Liar. Slut. What did he just do? What the hell did he do? This wasn't supposed to happen.

The badger's fingers brush the side of his face—warm, soft, too soft—and Sonic flinches, slipping off his lap and onto his own feet in jerky movements. A hand grabs his wrist and he yanks away, legs smacking into the coffee table behind him, the whole world shrinking in on the badger's eyes. There's something new in them that wasn't there before. It's like he can see himself stuck fast under the weight of it. A wanting.

This is what he wanted isn't it? His stomach turns over. Isn't it?

The badger holds out his hands towards him like he's a spooked animal. “Hey, we can talk about this, okay? Seriously, kid, just calm down, it's fine. You didn't—”

Sonic's ears ring. Everything plummets, like the floors gone out from under him, like he's standing in the belly of a plane, trapped in its death spiral.

He needs to leave. He needs to—

He clambers for his gloves and his shoes. He's got his hands covered and one sneaker on, the other viced in an unraveling grip when the badger grabs his arm. It takes little more than a shove to send the badger flat onto the couch, collapsed and wide-eyed. Scared. Of him. Again. His stomach clenches hard. His fingers shiver, everything shaking. He considers vomiting.

He smacks through the front door instead and hops over the apartment's railing, his feet crashing into the pavement and already churning as he disappears.

---

---

“It's definitely salvageable. The chassis’ at least intact so that's good, and I can always get some new fairings fitted for it. Did you want the original color scheme or…?” Tails asks, tilting his head.

Shadow eyes him, the same way he has since Rouge practically ushered him into the Workshop, bike in tow. “If possible.”

“Of course.” Tails gives Shadow a thumbs up. “Okay, I'll see what I can do! It'll probably take me a few days, I've got still got some things I need to finish up for HQ…but then I'll be able to get her fixed up for you pronto!” Tails pats the seat of the motorcycle, or what used to be a seat. “She's in good hands with me.”

“There’s no rush, if you require more time to—”

“Nope.” Tails laughs and waves Shadow off. “It's totally fine. It'll give me something to do on the side, besides I've always wanted to have an excuse to get my hands on a motorcycle.”

Shadow grimaces.

Tails puts his hands up, smile turned sheepish. “Hey, I'm not gonna test her out, don't worry.”

He's definitely going to take it for at least a little bit of a spin once he gets it running again. But just to test out the clutch and ensure it doesn't slip. The integrity of the brake discs, too. It's very important to test out both and the only way it can be done is by riding it, of course. Yup. He smiles, eyes jumping over the different parts, already picking apart what he'll have to scrap, refit, and what he can salvage of the old bike.

“I'll leave you to it then,” Shadow says, before turning abruptly and leaving.

Tails watches Shadow go, a spanner spun between his fingers, tails twisting behind him. He pushes the wrist of his glove up and checks his watch. It'll be another week before Sonic stops in again. He looks at the crumpled Badnik he dragged into the middle of the lab, the one with the chassis he tore open and the core he gutted out to harvest materials from.

The metals it is composed of are difficult to locate and mine for himself, and he's not above taking them from Eggman's own creations. A sort of genius to genius material exchange if you will. Part of him still wonders if Eggman is really actually gone or not. It wouldn't even be the first time he's seen someone come back against all odds.

Tails frowns, dropping the spanner on the workbench and reaching for the pack of mint gum he threw a little too hard across it. Wedged tight in the back lip of the bench and the tool wall. He yanks it free and grabs one stick and then two. He works at the chewing gum and rummages through his current projects. Half-abandoned, half-done. It's been days since he actually finished something. It's easier to move onto the next thing once he loses interest than to force himself to finish it, and he'll usually bounce back to it eventually anyway.

He grabs the transceiver prototype. He picked yellow for the band of the watch and the rim of the face. He's pretty sure Sonic would've said red, green, blue maybe, but yellow's better since he knows Sonic has a tendency to leave things where they shouldn't be and then forget about them, so it'll make it easier for Sonic to find it if he takes it off. He brushes his thumb over the glass face, the video screen. Liquid crystal display. Full color. Ballistic glass. It's even waterproof, with an S.O.S. signal and everything built in just in case. All the bells and whistles he could shove into it. The screen’s probably a little unnecessary, sure, but he wants to be sure the video footage is sharp so Sonic can see whoever's calling with full clarity.

He turns the watch over and inspects the locking mechanism on the band. Imprint detection, registered to the user only. It would take a lot more than a blade or a saw to chew through it. Practically irremovable by any outside party (barring something as unlikely as amputation) if, say, the wearer became captured. And was locked up. And was stuck somewhere and no one knew he was alive and he couldn't call for help or let anyone know he was okay and everybody thought he was dead and—

He puts the watch down, ears flipped back. He needs to finish the other ones. Amy's been asking about his progress on them and he can't keep telling her really great without actually having something to show for it.

But I'm not lying to you.

Tails mashes one hand into the other, knuckles kneading at the tension in his palm, tails twisting over one another in tighter bands. He looks at the Tornado, the usual centerpiece of this particular Workshop hangar when he doesn't have it settled somewhere else. His eyes jump to the ratty couch before he can stop them.

It still doesn't make any sense. Sonic usually practically drapes himself on the Tornado, lounging on the wings, napping in the seats or on the tail. Leaning against it, laughing, smiling, asking what he's up to or joking about something, telling a story about the latest weird thing he saw halfway across the world or something Eggman did that makes them both roll their eyes and laugh. Sonic hadn't even looked at the Tornado the last time he was here. Had barely even touched it and only when he'd asked Sonic to help him. The whole time it was like someone else was standing in the room, wearing his brother's skin. His smile.

I can't tell you. I just—I can't, okay? I want to, but I—

He's not an idiot. The opposite, really. There's no point in beating around the bush with it, he surpasses most in intelligence except a few and one of them is the evil genius they're usually trying to stop, and even than. He knows something happened on the Death Egg. And maybe at first it was easy to pretend like maybe nothing did happen when Sonic told him exactly that with a grin and a laugh and an eye-roll. But not so much now. He knows it in the way Sonic hardly touches him anymore. Hardly looks at him. Hardly stops by. The way Sonic's fur has gone duller, his smile tired, eyes bruised, his voice a little lower, slower, wrung out. Still smiling, of course. Always when Sonic thinks anyone's looking. Maybe someone else wouldn't be able to spot it all, but he can. He always can.

Hey, I'm not going anywhere. I swear—

It's like a wound. Like he can feel it under his own ribs, metastasizing and pushing aside everything else in his chest. Sonic's hurt. Hurting. It's something Sonic'll never admit or say. Sometimes he looks at Sonic and all he can see is the same dullness in his eyes from the City Square. Empty and all wrong. Like everything that made Sonic Sonic already slipped out before he even went lifeless in Infinite's grasp. He's researched it. Enough times it's plastered to the back of his eyelids. Watching someone die goes in stages. Everyone always says the same thing: that you watch the light leave the eyes first and the body catches up after.

I'm not gonna leave you again.

Tails grabs up the transceiver prototype and clings onto it until it hurts.

---

Rouge smirks at Shadow the second he's outside the Workshop’s roll-up door. “Now, was that so hard, handsome?”

“Hmph.” It's not as if he is above entertaining the idea of asking Tails for help, he merely understands the fox has a lot on his plate as well. The same way everyone else has since the War ended, but even more so when it comes to the fox’s expertise and specialities in terms of the current restoration efforts. “I didn't need you to hold my hand with this.”

Rouge rolls her eyes. “You're lucky you're cute. I didn't drag you here because I wanted to hold your hand, though I certainly won't turn down an opportunity to hold yours if you're offering," she says with a playful smirk. "I brought you here so you'll stop moping all over the place. Do you know how many quills I've had to pick out of the couch this week alone?”

Shadow's ear twitches. “I don't mope.”

“Uh-huh.” Rouge pats him on the shoulder. “Like I said, it's a good thing you're cute.”

Shadow glances back towards the chaos Tails has been working around, eyeing the mess left in the fox's wake as he works. He looks back at Rouge who's inspecting a fixture on the side of the Workshop, her fingers tracing the shine of glass.

“What’s that saying?” Shadow asks.

“Which one?”

“The apple one.” Something about trees. Not falling far from them. He remembers it vaguely, but not enough to register it.

“Ah,” Rouge laughs. “Well, what'd you expect? The two practically raised each other.”

Shadow frowns. “Where were their families?”

“Where was yours?”

Shadow curls his lip up, showing his teeth before shouldering past her. Rouge laughs and he hears her wings snap out as she catches up.

“What? Are you mad there's something else you and Blue have in common?”

“No.” Why would he be mad about any of this? It's merely none of his business. “I had the Professor and Maria.”

“Right.” Rouge looks at him incredulously. “I suppose that counts.”

He had the lab technicians as well. Maria's tutors later. Her doctors. Everything he learned, he learned from all of them. When he had been wiped clean of his memories after his fall from the ARK it had been disorienting. Knowing nothing and being nothing. Rouge and Omega had been there to fill the gaps and yet it had always felt like something was missing until his memories started to return later. And then it was like resting a film over the halves of him. A new life and an old one, bisected and spliced together at the seams.

“Off to anywhere in particular?” Rouge asks when Shadow realizes he's started walking again.

“Not here.”

“My, how astute of you. Where would we be without you leading the team?”

Rouge jokes about it often. The fact the Commander put him in charge of their unit instead of her when she's the one who develops most of their plans and ploys. Sticking to them is another matter entirely however, Omega isn't one to sit idle and wait around in subterfuge, and he's reluctant to do the same when there is a much clearer, more efficient path to take.

“Are there any updates on Omega?” Shadow asks.

“Oh, he's having the time of his life. Somewhere near Spagonia at the moment, found himself quite a few little Badnik nests apparently.” Rouge cocks her head. “You know, I'm sure he'd let you join in on the fun if you wanted to drop in for a weekend. Or maybe two.”

Shadow looks off to the side, ears tilting down. A part of him wouldn't mind the easy work of clearing out bases, putting down the strays and ensuring they can't do further harm than they already have. Something else continues to tell him he needs to stay here. A tightness under his sternum he can't explain.

“Perhaps…” Shadow says in lieu of anything else. Outright denial would be uncharacteristic enough as to have Rouge asking questions, prying where she shouldn't.

Rouge hums consideringly. “Alright, well, in the meantime lunch is on me if you wanted to make a moment of it.”

“You do realize you'll have to learn to use something other than a microwave eventually.”

Rouge laughs. “And miss out on a whole world of wonders at my fingertips? Some are made for cooking and others are made for indulging themselves, and I'm certainly not the former.”

“I’m not your personal chef.”

“Oh, please. Don't pretend you don't enjoy doing it.” Rouge eyes him. “Blue certainly liked that nice little number you made.”

Shadow's ears press back. Birria would be something Sonic could stand considering what he usually consumes. A part of him is centered on the fact Rouge fed him the portion intended for her—it's not as if he's running a soup kitchen from her apartment—the other part is at least glad Sonic ate something for once. Even if his contentment at the thought is inexplicable.

Rouge pokes him in the muzzle. “Don't tell me you're blushing.”

He isn't.

His face isn't even hot. Nor are his ears. He has no idea what she’s even referring to nor why. It's her usual antics at play most likely, and for some reason she's continually latched onto Sonic and him as her victims lately.

“You should invite him over some time. Cook a proper meal for him, I'm sure he'd just love to see you at work in the kitchen. I've even got that Kiss the Chef apron Omega likes so much.”

Shadow rolls his eyes.

“Oh, you're such a spoilsport. Live a little! Do something for yourself for once. I'm sure Sonic would absolutely jump at the opportunity to play taste tester for you,” Rouge puts her hands on his shoulders, a playfully lascivious look on her face. Everything about her words suggestive and pointing to one thing.

“You do realize I don't actually want to sleep with him, correct?”

“Who said anything about sleeping with him?” Rouge leans close. “That's all on you, hon.”

Shadow wrenches out of her grip and turns away.

Rouge all but cackles behind him. He cannot even blame her, he practically walked into that one. ‘Rake to face’, as she would say.

“Slip of the tongue, hm?” Rouge asks.

“Rouge.”

“I know, I know. Such a buzzkill.” Rouge clicks her tongue. “Besides, there's far more ways to have a good time than just getting someone in bed.”

Shadow says nothing. He doesn't understand her insistence on this matter at all.

“Well, did you wanna workshop ideas?” Rouge asks.

“No.”

Rouge sighs. “You're no fun.”

“Then go find Sonic to entertain you,” Shadow bites out, muzzle wrinkled. She talks about him often enough, and the two are obviously close now considering Sonic keeps showing up at her apartment as well.

“What's this?” Rouge asks, circling closer again, a hand trailing up his arm and tip-toeing until she taps him on the nose and he recoils from it. “Are you jealous?”

“That's absurd.”

“I don't know whether to be flattered or offended that I can't tell if it's me or Blue you're being all growly over.”

“Neither of you.”

It's not as if he has any say or bearing on who either of them keep company with nor what they do with their free time. And when Rouge isn't locating her next treasure or scouting out her next delicacy to partake in, she's on dates. Rendezvous. ‘Flings’ as she calls them. One night stands is the cruder truth. She never sees the same person twice, unless she finds something she likes as she puts it. Sonic and her have that in common it seems.

Perhaps it's why they get on so well. At this rate he's surprised the two have not fallen in with each other. Maybe it's the fact they already know each other that strips the novelty from it, or something else he doesn't understand. It seems logical. If they're after the same objective then he doesn't see why the conclusion wouldn't be drawn between them.

Rouge taps her fingers against his muzzle and Shadow wrinkles it. “What?”

“Sunshine," Rouge says playfully. "Thought I lost you up there for a sec."

Shadow grimaces. “Don't call me that.”

“Well?” Rouge asks.

“Well, what?” Shadow grits out.

“Lunch?”

Shadow looks towards where he can still see the barest hint of Tail's’ Workshop. Perhaps he should have asked Tails about how Sonic's visits have gone. If Tails has noticed anything as well. If Sonic's told Tails anything. If it's just him and Rouge who know too much now and somehow nothing at all at the same time.

“Fine…”

Rouge claps her hands together, smiling a little too wide. “Perfect.”

---

There's not a chance in hell or otherwise Rouge did not plan this whole thing ahead of time.

Shadow stares at where Sonic has stopped at the edge of the table, scratching at his quills and smiling with a shrug. Shadow swings his attention back to Rouge and narrows his eyes at her.

“Oh my, this is quite the surprise, isn't it?” Rouge says, glancing between the two of them. “What’re the odds?”

Shadow grits his teeth. This is all merely another game to her and he doesn't know what she intends the end of this one to be.

Sonic laughs. “Pretty sure you're the one that called me here.”

“Oh, did I?” Rouge pretends to think about it, tapping her muzzle. “Oops, I'm afraid I must've double booked. How silly of me. Well, I suppose you might as well join us now that you're here, Blue. My treat.”

“Can't exactly argue with that, long as you're paying,” Sonic says as he slips into the curved booth, on Rouge's side—notably opposite of him.

Shadow goes to stand and leave and Rouge’s boot slams right into his shin. He jolts back into his seat.

Sonic looks at him, ears flicking as he tilts his head in a silent question.

Shadow grimaces in response.

Rouge shoots Shadow a pointed look, tapping a rhythm on the table that says relax.

He is relaxed. He's perfectly calm. He just doesn't see why he has to be here if she has someone else to toy with for the afternoon. He can also smell it from here, the last person Sonic was with. Shadow wrinkles his snout and grabs at the menu in lieu of anything else to put idle hands on. He had figured a single talk about everything wouldn't dissuade Sonic’s habitual routine, but it's another thing to be faced with the evidence so plainly.

Rouge kicks him again and he glares at her. She tilts her head in Sonic's direction who's looking around at the restaurant with a sort of harried lean, a strange corneredness to it he can't place. Sonic glances behind himself when the table at his back becomes loud with laughter and then only settles when they quiet down again.

Rouge sighs, signing a seriously? at Shadow and his continued silence before propping her hand in her chin and leaning towards Sonic. "So, what’ve you been up to lately, Blue?”

Sonic snaps his attention back to Rouge, unwinding the tension in his shoulders like he's spinning a bolt out of place. Shadow watches Sonic put his elbows on the table and lean into them with a smile that seems genuine yet odd. He doesn't miss the bands of discoloration on Sonic's forearms. He knows exactly what bruising looks like under fur.

“Just the usual. Runnin’ around, kicking Badniks. Stuff like that,” Sonic says, eyes darting to him and then away, ears pressing down. “Anythin’ super interesting happening with Team Dark these days? Some light breakin’ ‘n enterin’? Stealin’ candy from babies?”

“Oh, you know how hard it is to say no to a bit of harmless larceny.” Rouge rests the toe of her boot against Shadow's shin. A silent prompt.

“We've done nothing of the sort,” Shadow says. It's not as if Team Dark is currently in commission considering one third of their Team is halfway across the planet.

Rouge gives him a flat look. She flips her hand, swiping it in a you're hopeless gesture. He can also see the moment she decides on a new tactic, her foot drawing away from his leg as she leans closer to Sonic and smiles, wings flexing out so the one closest to Sonic brushes him.

“I heard there's quite the nightlife popping up in Seaside. Perhaps we should check it out some time, Blue, just me and you—” Rouge waves a hand pointedly at Shadow. “He's not exactly the partying type. Such a snooze.”

Shadow's fists clench.

“I dunno—” Sonic plays right into her hands with a grin, sliding his elbow further over the table as he props his chin on his fist. “Sounds kinda like a date.”

“And here I didn't think you were the type,” Rouge says.

“Hey, I never said I wouldn't make an exception just for you.”

Rouge puts a hand to her chest. “My, my, flattery will get you far.”

“Yeah?” Sonic smirks. “How far?”

Shadow wants to crack his head through the table. He balls his hands under the lip of the tablecloth instead and clenches his teeth so hard he can hear it in his ears. This is tantamount to torture. He doesn't understand why Rouge brought him here to play at whatever this is. The two could have just gone about this on their own without involving him between them.

“What are you two doing?” Shadow asks, biting it out before he can stop himself.

Rouge laughs. “Oh, so now he talks.”

“I don't understand why you dragged me here if you’re just going to flirt the whole time. I don't need to be in the middle of whatever this is.”

“Did you wanna be in the middle of it?” Sonic asks.

“No.” Shadow's snout wrinkles and he has to stop himself from snarling. “I don't want any part of this. You two can sleep with each other and leave me be.”

They look at each other and then laugh. Loud enough that other patrons look their way. Rouge holds onto Sonic's shoulder and Sonic smacks a hand onto the table as he doubles over before swiping at his eyes. Like this is all the funniest thing in the universe.

“We're not—” Sonic points between him and Rouge. “This is just us having fun, dude. Try it out some time.”

“Like Blue said, lighten up, Shadow.”

Sonic leans close to Rouge raising a hand to whisper conspiratorially. “Is he always this jealous?”

“I can hear you,” Shadow says flatly.

“Oh, so you got super hearing too, huh?”

“You're loud enough I'm sure the whole restaurant can hear you.”

“Yeah?” Sonic eyes him. “I can be even louder if you want me to.”

Shadow's ears press back. “I'd prefer anything but.”

“So, you wanna shut me up?” Sonic asks. “Gonna use your mouth to do it? Or is there somethin’ else you had in mind?”

“Don't be crass.”

Sonic shrugs. “I meant your fist, dude. What'd you think I was tryna say?”

Shadow's ears flare hot.

Rouge laughs. “He's got you there, handsome.”

“Tch. It's not particularly hard to draw such a conclusion when you continue to—” Shadow gestures with a sharp motion at all of Sonic.

Sonic narrows his eyes. “When I what?”

Shadow narrows his eyes back. “Have you never heard of a shower?”

Sonic smiles, rakish and tight. “Sorry I didn't clean up just for you.”

“Do you enjoy walking around like this?” Shadow asks. “Is this some kind of egoist ritual for you?”

“A what?” Sonic laughs. “You're just mashing words together, man. How does that even make any sense?”

“And this does?”

“What's that supposed to mean?” Sonic barks, hunching over the table. Ears pressed back and teeth bared.

Shadow thinks of Rouge's kitchen, Sonic under the pale light, all but snarling at him, rattling apart at the seams as Sonic admitted to far too much and not enough at all. His chest clenches, hard enough it nearly hurts. He shoves it aside and grabs onto something simpler. Annoyance has always been an easier feeling to slip into anyway.

“It certainly doesn't take genetic engineering to see what you’ve been up to recently.”

“So?” Sonic says, shoulders tensing further. “Who cares.”

Rouge glances between them like she's watching a sparring match, eyes sharp, her frown deepening the whole while.

“Have you even seen the tabloids?” Shadow asks.

Sonic stiffens all at once. “What’re you talking about, dude?”

Shadow sneers. “Let's just say your reputation precedes you, hedgehog.”

“My repu—what?” Sonic looks over at Rouge. “What's he blabbin' about?”

Rouge shrugs. “Oh, you know how people are Blue, they love their gossip.”

Sonic's ears flatten down completely, his eyes widening. A familiar tremble starts in Sonic's fingers and he regrets the words he's already said. It's not as if he can take them back now regardless.

Shadow watches Sonic scramble out of the booth, sneakers sliding like he's caught in quicksand as he fumbles to his feet and bolts out of the door in a streak of blue and a rush of wind in his wake. He grabs the menu and the wrapped silverware on the table before it can be swept off the table.

“Well, that went well,” Rouge says, staring at him with a flat look.

Shadow sighs, the heat from before simmering low, turning into something thicker. Guilty. Again. Shadow's ears flick down. “...why did you even bring us here?”

“I was curious for one.” Rouge settles back, gesturing vaguely. “And I wanted to confirm something for myself.”

“Are you satisfied with what you found then?”

Rouge hums and then smiles. “More than satisfied.”

---

“Do you mind if I—?” Rouge asks, gesturing to where Shadow has his legs propped up on the coffee table.

Shadow huffs out a noncommittal response, watching whatever Rouge put on the screen in the kind of idle awareness of a plot happening, but not remembering who any of the characters are nor caring.

Rouge pillows her head in his lap, looking up at him and smiling, her hands crossed over her stomach. “I truly don't know how you can stand it sometimes. It's like a hot car on a bad day. Don't you ever overheat in there?”

“No.”

He remembers the time she called him a walking, talking space heater. At Club Rouge, in her old place, above the sound and rabble of the club. In the winter months, she'd stick her hands under his arms or against his shoulders until they warmed up again when it got cold enough. He always indulged her. Like every other time she reached out to touch him, it was always innocuous enough despite her words. She may flirt and poke at him more than most, but she also knows exactly when to back down and let something alone.

“There was a double of you up there, you know,” Rouge says.

Shadow glances down at her. It doesn't require much clarification. Up there can only mean one place considering all that has happened. She doesn't ever talk about it much, except for like this, randomly and without prompting.

“He'd talk to it sometimes. As if you'd ever amuse him like that in the slightest, fake or not—” Rouge laughs, but it's not her usual one. It's small, an unsure pinch to her face. “I think he really thought it was you. Or, I suppose, a brainwashed you.”

Shadow grimaces. Entertaining the thought is an unpleasant one. He's unsure what lengths Infinite may have gone in his puppet show, nor what the illusions were similarly capable of.

“Did it—” Shadow's teeth click shut on the words. He's unsure how to ask what he wants to know, nor if he wants to know the answer at all. His copy hurt many people, all over the planet, the evidence of the wounded and dead scattered across the surface. Sonic being among the tally would only be logical.

“Not like that, no,” Rouge says, her hands grabbing at his own as she runs her thumbs over the red stripe down the back of his knuckles. “At least, not while I was there.”

A slip of tension leaves Shadow's shoulders. “He didn't say anything about it when we talked.”

“Well, I'm surprised he even said anything to you at all,” Rouge says.

Shadow narrows his eyes.

“Oh, don't be like that. You're just not exactly the type I can see Sonic airing out his baggage to—let alone anyone, really. He's quite tight-lipped despite the motormouth, isn't he?”

“He takes his time getting to the point, that's for certain.”

Rouge sighs. A heavy one. Uncharacteristic. She winds her fingers with his and clasps their hands together, her palms pads cold under his. In a way it reminds him of Maria's hands, the Professor's. He can feel a tremor in them. An unease.

“What’s wrong?” Shadow asks.

Rouge stiffens, pulling away from him and extracting herself to the other side of the couch, the brief vulnerability covered up under a smile as Rouge waves him off. “Oh, nothing…”

“Rouge.”

“It's silly, honestly.” Rouge frowns, head tilted as she side eyes him. “Those vents weren't exactly my idea of spacious after all and the cold was absolutely dreadful. I simply can't imagine more than a month up there, let alone six. Why, I think it'd be enough to make anyone desperate.”

Shadow watches her compose herself the way she usually does, drawing herself up with an arch, wings splayed behind her as if she never let her shoulders bow at all.

“He'd enjoy himself sometimes. I'm not even quite sure if that was worse or not, truly, but at least it wasn't all bad, you know?” Rouge says, ears tense. “Maybe that counts for something.”

He remembers Sonic in the kitchen, at the dining table behind the living space. Looking everywhere except for right at him, an unsteadiness to the edges of him. Blurred out. Like a bad photo. ’It's not like it was even all bad.’ Always with a laugh, a smile slid into a lopsided grimace, something about his eyes. The same look he's seen somewhere in his own. ‘I didn't really mind it.’

“It will add to the weight regardless.”

Rouge eyes him skeptically. “The weight?”

“Carrying it.”

“My, my…how cheesily poetic of you,” Rouge teases, nudging his shoulder.

Shadow drops his feet onto the ground from the coffee table. “There's no poetry to it.”

Shadow stands, swiping his palms over his quills. Turning in for the night now is as good a time as any.

Rouge cocks her head at him. “Oh, off to bed already?”

Shadow heads for the room he's been borrowing from her since the end of the war. She insists on calling it his room. His. Like he owns it. His actual place burnt down with the rest of his things. The only salvageable items were what he kept in his gun safe and what was left of his motorcycle—the one he'd hauled out of the rubble once Infinite was gone and the Doctor was no more—and moved right into Rouge's new home for lack of anywhere else to store it.

There are no longer any G.U.N. barracks, no old domicile unit. Nothing. Everything else he had ever collected and decorated with and made a home out of is gone.

He knows he won't find sleep tonight, but perhaps there’s something to be gained in getting away from everything for a while. Pretending to sleep even if he can't. He curls up on top of the sheets, eyes on the blank white of the wall. Rouge insists he can decorate the space, but he sees no reason to when it will inevitably go up in flames again somewhere down the line.

And if not by fire, then by time. He'll outlive Rouge, this apartment complex, every single person in it. He'll have to move on eventually. Rouge always tells him she wishes she had what he had, the ability to live forever, to never age. Imagine the hoard, all those jewels, all the time in the world, why it's enough to make a girl swoon. To her and the others immortality is a boon.

He doesn't need to look at his hands to know they are the same exact ones in his memories. Unchanged from the first moment he woke up on the ARK.

---

---

Sonic tosses the tabloid magazine back onto the stand before the guy running the booth even realizes he’s there. He bolts off, taking a straight shot out of the city and into fields and forests and a whole lot of not much.

Stopping only once he's far enough away. He stands at the lip of some meadow and watches a lone Motobug trundle through it and scare off a Pocky. He scatters it into pieces too easily. Sparks spit off the broken wires and chewed up chassis before it slumps over, dead. The disoriented Flicky tumbles out of the wreckage and blinks at him before flying off in unsteady circles. He toes at the metal corpse with his sneaker.

Have you even seen the tabloids? Of course Shadow would do something like read the paper or crack open a magazine. Who even reads that stuff anymore? His shoulders burn hot as he thinks about the one he rifled through, the gossip section towards the back. All dramatic and flared up for no reason with punchy words. On a bender, scandalous hook-ups— black-out partying— the War Hero getting in over his head with another stint of— before going off with so and so and yada yada—

Sonic frowns. It isn't anyone's business what he does in his free time, but apparently no one else got that memo. Crowded in pictures of himself in someone's lap in the low light of a club. Someone's face turned into his neck while he laughed. Him draped over someone's shoulder and smiling, very obviously drunk beyond reason. There's the smaller things he noticed, too, the stuff someone else could as well if they looked close enough. Bruised arms under his fur, hickies, bitten lips. He looks tired, haggard, beat up and run down, every collaged image is someone else's arm or hand or fingers on him, grinning and unaware of the camera somewhere in the crowd. He's not sure when they even got those pictures. Why they even took them in the first place. But they're out there. They exist. He's not really sure there's anything he can even do about it.

He's never really poked at the legality of much of the stuff that's cropped up over the years. Keychains that look like him, dash hangers, t-shirts, posters, stuffed animals, whatever junk someone can think of to hawk off and sell. It's not like he needs the money for anything, so he never really cared. It just never mattered much. It was even funny sometimes. Tails and him would laugh about it when they'd stumble across some new, ridiculous little thing, and he'd tell him it's not fair everyone's always only using his face for stuff when Tails is half the duo.

He scrubs a hand over his quills and sighs. There's no way Tails hasn't come across something—or maybe he's been too absorbed in whatever he's been doing. Maybe he'll be lucky enough to dodge a bullet there, but Amy loves gossip mags. Heck, even he's not immune to them when he sees them chilling on her coffee table and rifles through them because it's something to do with his hands.

Whatever. He shakes his hands out. What. Ever. He's a grown adult. He can do whatever he wants in his free time. So what? He kicks at a cracked metal plate from the Motobug and sends it skittering over the dirt and into the grass. It's not even a big deal. Yeah, sure, he sleeps around. Sue him. Shit, so do a lot of people. It's just something people do. It's just what he does now. If his friends find out he's kind of loose with it, who cares. He certainly doesn't—

His ear twitches towards the sound of another, smaller Motobug lazily winding through the treeline. He walks towards it, knowing there's no point in running after it. It's not going anywhere fast anytime soon. All disoriented and lost like that. Half these strays barely seem to know where they're headed, if they're headed anywhere at all.

He gets up to it and it flickers to life from its dull rolling, mechanical eyes shuttering and then narrowing at him. He puts a sneaker right on its head and watches its singular wheel peel out in the dirt uselessly. Its little, robotic insect arms scrabble at him to no avail.

“Nice try, dude.”

He almost feels bad for it. It's way smaller than other Motobugs. It's barely even trying to get away or come at him, just kind of going through the motions really. He drops his foot and it blinks at him, just as confused as he is.

“Look, just—” Sonic nudges at it with the toe of his sneaker. “Get outta here already.”

It tries to roll forward and he shoves it back.

“What's the matter with you?” Sonic asks. He puts his foot up again as it wheels up and smacks into the bottom of his sneaker. He pushes it away harder than before. “Y,’know, you don't gotta fight me anymore.”

It charges again and Sonic kicks it back, ears pressed back with an annoyed snarl. “Seriously, Egghead's gone. You can go do whatever ya want now.”

It rolls forward again. Sonic cracks his sneaker down into it and it wobbles, tiny limbs scrabbling at its face, antenna flicking.

“Just stop, alright. It's done. Whatever it is—”Sonic gestures around them as if the little robot’s going to understand him at all“—you were doing before doesn't even matter. It's over. You already lost, man.”

For a moment he thinks maybe it's finally gotten the picture here. Its antenna jerk forward. Its eyes narrow. It tries again.

“Geezus, dontcha get it yet?” Sonic stomps his foot right down onto the red and black-dotted shell, fists and neck burning. “He's not coming back!”

It warbles. It spins its wheel. His skin hurts. His chest. He scatters it into metal chunks under a spindash before he can think about it too much. The sparks jitter over him, shrapnel sticking in his quills. He uncurls and slumps against the nearest tree, arm barred across the bark, stomach curling up to his throat. He swallows back the bile and shakes his head.

He thinks about himself smiling in the pictures. He thinks about the little robot shuttering its eyes at him, a moment of clarity before the directive took it back over. The culpeo, the badger, endless eyes, hands, mouths—bodies between his legs. He picks the metal shards out of his quills and ignores the unsteadiness in his fingers.

---

“It's sure been a while.”

Sonic looks at Knuckles, grinning lazily, arms crossed behind his quills. “Yeah, guess it has.”

Knuckles eyes him, sentinel under the large screen, a map displayed on it that details the current Restoration efforts and movements. “And what exactly have you been up to?”

“Running around ‘n stuff. The ushe.” Sonic shrugs. “Figured it was better late than never to drop by to see my favorite knucklehead though.”

Knuckles scoffs. “I'm not stupid. You've been in HQ plenty of times since the war ended, but somehow we just never seem to cross paths,” Knuckles says. “Now why’s that?”

“What?” Sonic laughs. “Dude, you're just always doing something else whenever I'm here. It's not like I'm trying to avoid you. Why would I even do that?”

Knuckles gives him a flat look. “I dunno, you tell me.”

“Look, if you don't want me around just say so. I can see you're busy with—” Sonic gestures to the map behind Knuckles. “Whatever all this is, so I'll just—” He turns on his heel, pointing towards the door.

Knuckles snatches his wrist firmly under his mitt. “No, you don't get to rush out on this one. We're gonna have a little chat.”

Sonic laughs, eyes darting between the hand on him and Knuckles glare. “Knux, seriously, what’re you—”

Knuckles drags him to a chair and he blinks when he's all but shoved into it. It's a mirror image of when he got off the Death Egg. Knuckles even pulls up a chair across from him to sit in and stares like he already knows way too much.

“What’s this about, man?” Sonic asks, shoulders hiking up. “You don't gotta drag me around like I'm five or something.”

“Yeah?” Knuckles says, laughing. That same sort of mean laugh he hasn't done in a long time. The one that's also a sign Knuckles is tired of his bullshit. “Well you're sure acting like it, so—”

“Didja just wrangle me over here to insult me?”

“No, as much as that'd just make my day, I'm here to ask you a few questions,” Knuckles says.

“Yeah?” Sonic crosses his arms, settling back in his chair. “Like what?”

“Like why you haven't punched in any meals in Commissary for three weeks,” Knuckles says.

“Because I can get food somewhere else, duh.”

Knuckles grimaces at that, fists clenching. “Clearly you've done a real bang up job of that.”

“What's that mean?”

“You look like shit,” Knuckles says.

“You're no looker yourself, dude. Those bags under your eyes could go on vacation.”

Knuckles narrows his eyes. “Yours aren't any better.”

“I get sleep.” Sonic raises a finger and then another. “And I eat. Sorry I don't look all picture perfect for you though. I'll be sure to doll up next time I come by waggin’ my tail around.”

“What’s the matter with you?” Knuckles asks, muzzle wrinkled.

“Nothing.”

“So, you just say stuff like that all the time then?”

“Maybe I do.”

“This is exactly what I'm talking about,” Knuckles says, scoffing. “You're all over the place.”

“I’m literally fine.”

Knuckles laughs. “That's hilarious. At least your sense of humor’s intact.”

“Glad I'm such a riot to you, Knux. Makes a guy feel all warm and fuzzy, sayin’ stuff like that.”

“You're doing it again,” Knuckles says flatly.

Sonic doesn't even know what Knuckles is referring to anymore. He also doesn't care.

He goes to stand and Knuckle’s shoe knocks into his knee, sending him back down.

“What the hell is your problem?” Sonic asks, teeth bared, composure slipping the further his fists clench.

“That's pretty rich coming from you,” Knuckles says.

“You're the one acting weird here!” Sonic throws out an arm towards HQ. “I just came to say hey to my best bud and I'm being thrown into a chair and lamp-lighted like I'm a criminal or something.”

“Sonic—”

“No, dude, I don't get it. Did I, like, do something to piss you off? Sorry I'm not eating the food here or whatever. Sorry I have a life outside of puttering around here staring at maps all day. Some of us aren't exactly cut out for standing still the way you are.”

“So instead of helping with the clean up you—what? Go around partying and acting stupid?” Knuckles asks.

Sonic blinks. “What? Is that what you're mad about, that I'm out there having fun while you're stuck in here playing war games? Sorry you got the short end of the stick, man, but I'm not the one who started this thing and I never agreed to join it either. I already did my part. Egghead's gone. I don't get what you want from me here.”

Knuckles sighs and he's never seen Knuckles look this tired and strung out in all the time they've known each other. “What really happened on the Death Egg, Sonic?”

Sonic wants to fling himself out of the room. Wrench the chair out from under him and hurl it into the wall. He can't do any of those things because Sonic wouldn't, because he's supposed to be calm and cool and cocky about this. He smirks instead. He settles back against the chair and slings an arm on the back of it for good measure.

“I already told you, Knux. ‘s’not my fault you got a bad memory.”

“If you're talking about your little debrief, then that was a pretty pitiful attempt at lying on your part,” Knuckles says. “I only let you have it ‘cause we needed you out in the field, but I'm not gonna let you leave this room until you give me the actual story here.”

“Nothing happened.”

“Wrong.” Knuckles crosses his arms. “Try again.”

Sonic grits his teeth. “Nothing happened that I couldn't handle.”

Knuckles laughs. “Closer, but not quite.”

“Knux.”

“You realize you weren't the only prisoner up there, right?”

Sonic stiffens.

“Espio confirmed signatures onboard.” Knuckles closes his eyes. “We didn't get to them in time.”

“But I was—”

“I know. They housed you alone and away from the others for pretty obvious reasons.”

“So no one else was…?” Sonic's ears droop.

“They were long dead before we even got up there.”

At least he didn't abandon anyone he could've pulled out of there. He also knows he didn't do anything to stop it all either. He assumes they all went out the same way fake Zavok planned his farewell—through the airlock—and he was just up there fucking the guy who killed them all like it was nothing. Bile pulses in his throat. His chest clenches.

“There were others on the ground too, but we managed to pull them out,” Knuckles says.

“Okay…? ‘n what does this all have to do with me?”

Knuckles kneads at his brow. “They all had no problem sharin’ what went down. You're the only one who keeps sayin’ the same thing over and over again.”

“Because it's not a big deal.”

“I've got eyes. You didn't come outta there looking like sunshine ‘n rainbows. You looked like you hadn't bathed in months. Somehow you were even thinner than you are now and that's sure sayin’ something.”

“Sorry I didn't look awesome coming out of six months in a box. How ‘bout next time I stock up in case some other villain of the week decides to rat trap me.”

“See?” Knuckles says, gesturing at him. “This is exactly what I'm talking about.”

“Whaddya want from me here?” Sonic asks, shoulders tensed so much they hurt. “I don't get it. I just—” He shakes his head. “What's the point of all of this? It doesn't even matter. It's whatever. It already happened so—can't we just move on?”

“You obviously can't.”

Sonic clenches his teeth hard. “I already did.”

Knuckles narrows his eyes. “This is what you call moving on?”

“Yes!” Sonic barks it before he can stop himself, rocking forward in the chair. “I'm moved on, man. I've been moved on. It's not my fault the rest of the world can't catch up to me.” He grins. “Guess I've just always been a little too fast for it.”

Knuckles swipes a hand over his face, sighing. “Man, you're actually unbelievable, y'know that?”

Sonic grimaces. “You and Shadow do the same thing.”

“Oh, so you talked to him, too?”

“Maybe.”

Knuckles laughs. “I'm sure that went great.”

“Well he didn't hit me until later, so—”

“Sounds about right.”

Sonic perks up, ears swiveling forward with a smile. “Didja wanna punch me too?”

“Kinda. But I know that's what you're jonesin’ for so I'm gonna keep my fists to myself.”

“Bummer,” Sonic says, flat, inflectionless. “And here I was hoping for a haymaker to put my lights out.”

Knuckles wrinkles his snout. “Do you take anything seriously?”

“Yeah.” Sonic shrugs. “Sure, totally.”

Knuckles sighs. “It's like talking to a brick wall…”

“Hey, at least I'm a pretty solid brick wall to look at.”

“Again, what're you doin’ here?”

“I'm just talking.”

“No, you keep doing that—” Knuckles jabs a mitt at him.

“Saying funny and clever stuff? Yeah, it's kinda what I'm known for. I'm all mouth, and it's not just words I'm good with.”

“You literally just did it again!”

“So?”

“So what’s that all about?” Knuckles asks.

Sonic squints. “...you mean flirting?” He laughs. “Gee, Knux. I knew you were a prude, but I thought you could spot a come on from a mile away.”

“I'm not an idiot, I just don't get why the hell you're trying to come onto me.”

“I'm not comin’ onto anythin’.”

Knuckles snarls at that, mitts balled into fists. “You're impossible to talk to like this.”

“Like what?”

“Whatever this is. Your little acting routine. It's getting annoying.”

Sonic blinks, mock innocently. “I dunno what you're talking about.”

“Either stop playing around or leave.”

“Well—” Sonic rocks to his feet, stretching his arms overhead. “If you insist.”

Sonic gets one step towards the door before Knuckles grabs him and wrenches him back into the chair he just left.

“Sit down, you idiot,” Knuckles says.

“What gives, man?”

“You're not leaving until we both get to the bottom of this.”

“Well, with all your brains and mine, I'm sure we'll be here all day.”

“Ha, ha, very funny,” Knuckles grumbles.

“What're we getting to the bottom of anyways?” Sonic leans forward, smirking. “Is it my—”

Knuckles slams a shoe right into his shin and he yelps, jerking away from him.

“What was that for?” he barks.

“To stop you from saying something that was gonna make my ears bleed.”

“You got ears?” Sonic asks, mock disbelieved.

“I can't stand you sometimes,” Knuckles says.

“Then that makes two of us.”

Knuckles glares at him. “You know you can make this easier for the both of us by just saying something.”

Sonic grins. “Somethin’.”

Knuckles snarls. “I want to hit you so bad right now it's unreal.”

“Do it then.”

“And give you the satisfaction?” Knuckles laughs. “What a joke.”

Sonic's ears flip down. “When's the last time we sparred anyway?”

Knuckles holds up a hand. “Don't. I'm not falling for that.”

“You've certainly fallen for less from Eggman…” Sonic mutters.

Knuckles makes an annoyed sound. “Those were different—look, that stuff doesn't matter right now, what matters is you start talking or we're spending a very long evening together. And not a fun one.”

“See!” Sonic points. “You can do it too!”

Knuckles grins sharply. “Never said I couldn't.”

“Didn't know you had it in you Knux. Guess you're just full of surprises.”

“And now you pushed it too far.”

Sonic smiles. “Okay, but, purely hypothetically, do I got a shot here or—”

“Shut up.”

“I thought you wanted me talking?”

“About that other stuff. You're not here to make passes at me, you're here to explain what the hell you're not saying,” Knuckles says.

“How's that even make any sense?”

“You tell me.”

Sonic grits his teeth, jaw working. “Whaddya even wanna know?”

“The basics.” Knuckles settles back in his chair, arms crossed. “Whatever you wanna start with.”

“I mean…” Sonic's ears flip back. “I was alone I guess.”

“In what way?” Knuckles asks.

“In what other way is there? There was nobody else. It was just me. Sometimes I'd get, y’know, beat up or whatever, but that wasn't til later—”

Knuckles holds up a hand. “See this is exactly what I'm talking about. You were beat on and you're acting like that's just whatever to you.”

“I literally get throttled all the time. If it's not you, it's some Badniks or the next souped up god-figure who wants to take a crack at ruling the universe. Taking punches is like a walk in the park.”

Knuckles stares at him, long and hard. “There's something seriously wrong with you.”

Sonic shrugs. “It's the truth. It's jus’ not a big deal. I don't think I got any permanent damage from any of it.” He gives a thumbs up. “So, it's all good.”

“You ‘don't think’?”

“The Doc did all those scans and stuff and it came back clean. Brains A-okay.” Sonic gestures at his head. “Whatever’s up there I mean.”

Knuckles frowns. “How hard were you getting hit?”

“Uh…I'd pass out sometimes, I guess? That Shadow fake hits pretty hard. Zavok's nothing to sneeze at either. Can only really do so much cuffed up like that, but I gave ‘em business when I could.”

“Shadow fake?” Knuckles asks.

“The one messing up the surface down here. He was up there too.”

“Right, that guy,” Knuckles says, grimacing.

“So…can I go now, or—?”

“What?”

“Well I said ‘something’—”Sonic points to the door. “That was my ticket out of here, wasn't it?”

“No,” Knuckles says.

Sonic has to resist the urge to bare his teeth at Knuckles. “Whaddya mean ‘no’?”

“It means we're not done yet.”

Sonic slumps in his chair. “I don't get why you're so hung up on this.”

“I'm the one who's hung up on it?” Knuckles asks

“You're the one asking the questions aren'tcha?”

“You're the one who can't go a sentence without tryin’ to hit on me,” Knuckles says.

Sonic frowns. “Well, it usually doesn't take this much work to get anywhere.”

Knuckles scoffs. “Wow. Did your stupid routine work on Shadow?”

“What? No. Why does everyone keep asking that?”

“Because you look like you got run through a Badnik’s tread.”

“Whatever—” Sonic looks over his arms, blinking at the bruising. “It's from a fight.”

“With Shadow?”

Sonic's ears droop. “Maybe.”

“That's totally believable,” Knuckles says dryly.

“I mean, I told you earlier we got into it, so what's not believable?”

“Because he's not gonna fight you while you're like this.”

Sonic shows his teeth in a smile. “Like what?”

“Down for the count.”

“Down for the—what does that even mean?”

“It means you can barely throw a punch let alone take one right now,” Knuckles says.

“Hit me right now 'n I'll prove you wrong.”

Knuckles shakes his head. “Nope.”

“Now who's acting weird? You'd never turn down an opportunity to punch me in the past.”

“Yeah, when I wasn't afraid I'd kill you doin’ it,” Knuckles says.

Sonic scoffs. “Little overconfident there, pal. Cool it with the ego.”

Knuckles rolls his eyes. “I'm not the one trippin’ on my ego here.”

“‘s not my fault everyone wants a piece of me.”

“Here we go again...” Knuckles mutters.

“What?” Sonic asks, arms crossed. “You jealous or somethin’?”

“Jealous of being bagged to the point I look like I crawled out of a Black Arm’s bad end? No. I'm everythin’ but actually,” Knuckles says.

“You're kinda a jackass.”

“And you can't keep your hands to yourself for five seconds.”

“I haven't even touched you!”

“It's implied.” Knuckles says.

“Implied—dude, what? I wouldn't do that.” The incident with Shadow flickers up, the badger. Sonic's mouth sours. “I'm not like that.”

Knuckles sighs, shoulders falling. “Not like what?”

Sonic curls his lip over his teeth, ears pressed down flat. “I don't do stuff unless someone wants me to.”

“There's a word for that, y’know.”

“Lemme get my dictionary real quick for ya.”

Knuckles eyes him. “It's not that hard to just say it. Unless there's some other reason you're not.”

Sonic stares at Knuckles, his feet solid on the ground, but the rest of him untethered, like he's floating. “Yeah? And what would that be?”

“I dunno yet. But I'm starting to get a few ideas.”

“You're not exactly the brainiac of the bunch.”

“It doesn't take a lot of thinking to put this one together,” Knuckles says.

“Yeah?” Sonic leans forward. “And what've you got on this one, Knux?”

Knuckles looks at him from down his muzzle and then grabs a file off the Command Desk and holds it out to him without a word.

Sonic takes it and flips it open. He skims over his name at the top, the basic stuff he already knows and down to the typed notes. Intake Patient Physical-Post Captivity. His fur prickles on his arms, jaw clenching. Noted, present: healed perforated lacerations on shoulders consistent with bite wounds, healed tear lacerations on torso and hips consistent with claw marks. Contusions evident on extremities and throat-column of neck, possible non-fatal strangulation. Abrasions on wrists consistent with prolonged restraint use. Blood found in fur. Semen. Possible evidence of Indecent/Sexual Assault. Patient declined further examination. Inconclusive. Recommend further evaluation, psychological workup before return to duty. He jumps all the way to the bottom, the familiar scrawl of Knuckle's name. Commander Override.

“What’s this?” Sonic asks, snapping the file shut and holding it up.

“Whaddya think it is, genius? It's your intake.”

“Cool. Isn't it, like, y’know…illegal to have access to this?”

“No,” Knuckles says. “I'm the one who authorized it in the first place. Unless you forgot, I kinda run this joint.”

Sonic's ears press back as he tosses the file back on the table. “Well, whatever. It doesn't mean anythin’, so—”

“He raped you, didn't he?” Knuckles asks.

Sonic goes rigid so fast the chair legs scrape on the ground. His limbs lock up. He stares at Knuckles and it's like he's left the room entirely. He can't hear anything beside his own heart in his ears.

Shadow hadn't even said it like that—

“What…?” Sonic tries and it trails off lamely. He snatches his thoughts up from where they've scattered and shoves them right back into his skull. He laughs. “Who are you talking about, man?”

“Don't play dumb.”

Sonic's face flattens. “No seriously, Knux. I don't know what you're talking about.”

“The mask guy. Do you need me to draw a picture? You're not this dense, so give the act a rest.”

“It's not an act, dude. Why would he even do somethin' like that? That's so—” Sonic laughs “That's crazy man. I mean—” He gestures to himself. “Why would someone even wanna do that to me? You said it yourself, I looked like shit up there. You think he was just falling all over himself to fuck me or somethin’? That he—what? Just pinned me down and went to town?”

Knuckles makes an annoyed sound. “Maybe.”

“Well, he didn't. Guy barely touched me or talked to me. Heck, just ask Silver!” Sonic throws an arm out, gesturing sharply. “First time we introduced ourselves was once I got off the Death Egg. He was hardly in my cell. I already told you I was alone most the time so I don't get how you're drawin’ all these conclusions and actin’ all—”

“You do realize Rouge had comms when she was up there.”

“Okay? And?”

“I don't think she'd call you just getting smacked around torture. She said he was hurting you,” Knuckles says.

“The ‘torture’?” Sonic finger quotes. “Is that what this is about? The worst thing that happened up there was the lack of a TV.”

“You can't just pretend everything's fine and then start barking at us when we call you out on it. We've known you long enough to get the difference.”

“Well, sorry I'm not super pleasant to be around anymore.” Sonic smiles, heart racing. “I'll be sure to work on my attitude just for you.”

“This is exactly what I'm talkin’ about.”

Sonic launches forward in his chair before he can stop himself, fingers dug into fists. “Just spit it out already then!”

Knuckles eyes widen.

It's the same thing all over again, like being shoved underwater, wrenched out and shaking, like he needs to sink his teeth into something and tear it to shreds. “Just say whatever it is you're trying to say here. I don't have time for this junk. Either tell me what to fix already or stop sayin’ anythin’ at all.”

“‘’What to fix?’’” Knuckles eyes him. “What're you talking about?”

“Well obviously there's a problem with the way I'm conducting myself or you wouldn't have hauled me into this chair, right?” Sonic laughs sharply. “Is it the sleepin’ around? Is is the fuckin’ people, Knux? You want me to go cold turkey just for you.” He grabs Knuckles knees before he can stop himself. “I'll stop right now if that's whatcha really want me to do.”

Knuckles shoves him back into his chair. “What the fuck are you playing at right now?”

“Playin’ at?” Sonic asks, fists trembling against his thighs.

Knuckles gestures at him. “This whole thing you keep doing. It's not cute and it's not funny. It's weird.”

“So I'm weird now?”

“Well you're certainly not you.”

Sonic's ears shove down at that, eyes narrowing. “I'm as me as I've ever been.”

“Are you?”

It's like getting kicked in the chest. All the pent up anger snuffs out like he's shoved his hands over the flame and buried it. He sits there and stares for too long. Chest empty. “I guess maybe this was me all along. Maybe we're just not simpatico, Knux.” Sonic stands up. “We did always have trouble seein’ eye to eye.”

Knuckles grabs him by the wrist. All he can see is red, gray concrete melting into metal, blood stuck in his nose, shoulder aching, every inch of him too hot, always too cold.

Sonic wrenches away hard enough he knocks into the chair he just got out of. “Stop grabbing me, man.”

“Where’re you going?” Knuckles asks, brow furrowed.

“I dunno yet, but not here,” Sonic says, bee-lining for the door. If he doesn't get outta here he's not going to be able to, and he needs to leave. Run. Just keep going and not stop.

“So, that's it? You're just gonna go off and keep pretending like everything's fine ‘n dandy?” Knuckles asks.

Sonic throws a rakish smile over his shoulder. “Because everything is fine. You're the only one who's acting like anything's different.”

Knuckles frowns. “Don't do anything stupid.”

“Didn't plan on it,” Sonic says.

He hesitates in the threshold, hand on the doorknob, an apology twisted up somewhere under his sternum. He raped you, didn't he? He jerks his head to the side and bares his teeth.

He slams the door behind him.

---

---

Shadow agreed to help Amy handle the inventory stocks when she practically begged him to. He can tell she's run thin and down to the wire, so it would've been illogical to refuse her request for help. Even if checking through the routine counts of supplies is not exactly the most ideal way to spend his evening. It's not as if he can sleep anyway. It's either this, or time wasted staring at the ceiling until the sun rises.

Inside HQ, the halls stand emptier than usual. Most reasonable people are asleep by now. He can only hope Amy has given up her endeavor of pulling all-nighters and found sleep the same way the rest of them have.

He heads for Central Command, assuming Amy most likely keeps her paperwork on her own desk or Knuckles. Footsteps echo around the bend of the corridor up ahead. When Shadow finally rounds the corner, he doesn't expect to come nose to nose with Sonic.

Sonic blinks at him and then immediately scowls. He's unsure what he’s done this time to warrant such a reaction this time, but he grimaces back nearly involuntarily.

“If you're here to see Knux, he's in a bit of a mood, so good luck,” Sonic says, moving to shoulder past him.

Shadow grabs Sonic's arm before he can think about it. Sonic goes rigid under his grip, ears pressing back and the entirety of him tensing. “About earlier—”

“Hands off, dude.” Sonic wrenches out of his hold hard enough he smacks into the wall shoulder first, quills puffed up and bristling.

Shadow raises his hands and then drops them slowly. “Okay…”

Sonic's eyes dart down the corridor behind him and then back to him, foot shifting back. “Look, I gotta—there's this thing Tails needs me to, y’know—so—”

It's all lies. Not even half-truths. The attempts all leave Sonic between visibly clenched teeth. “I wanted to apologize for what I said earlier.”

Sonic’s brow crumples at that. “Why?”

“Because I shouldn't have said it.”

“I mean, it's whatever. Honestly.” Sonic shrugs. “‘s not like you're wrong.”

Shadow eyes Sonic, inspecting him under the harsh lights of HQ’s hallways. Sonic seems to bristle further at that, shoulders hiking up. “If you need somewhere to stay tonight. Rouge's door is still open to you.”

Sonic grimaces and then smiles and nothing reaches his eyes. “Look, I really gotta go, so—” Sonic brushes past him in a hurry. “See ya later, I guess.”

And then Sonic's gone before he can even blink.

Knuckles doesn't turn to look at him when he enters Central Command. The echidna keeps his eyes on the map screen, staring at a singular point like it'll change somehow.

He gets to Amy's desk and finds the sheets she left behind, rifling through the papers for the incomplete ones. Something about that rouses Knuckles from his stupor who clears his throat. Shadow looks up to see the echidna eyeing him.

“You saw him on your way in, didn't you?” Knuckles asks. Less a question and more a statement.

Shadow says nothing, jogging the papers against the desk.

“He said you two talked.”

Shadow stiffens, an ear flicking towards Knuckles and then away. “We did.”

“About what?” Knuckles asks.

Shadow sighs. “It doesn't concern you.”

Knuckles scoffs. “If it was Rouge who got hurt, wouldn't you wanna know what happened to her? So you could try to be there for her?”

Shadow grimaces, fingers tightening on the papers in his hands. “It's not my place to share his personal matters with you.”

“Why'd he even go to you at all?” Knuckles asks, a unique bitterness to it. “We've known each other longer. I've been there for everything else and you're—”

“What?”

“Look, you're kinda the new guy on the block in comparison, let's be real here. You two tried to kill each other not even that long ago.”

“Then I suppose we have something in common,” Shadow says flatly.

“Yeah.” Knuckles laughs at that. “But seriously, I just don't get it. Out of everyone, why you?”

Shadow's shoulders prickle uncomfortably with a tightness in his chest he has not felt in a long time. “Perhaps it’s the lack of familiarity that made it easier for him to say anything at all.”

“No,” Knuckles says. “That's not it.”

“And suddenly you're an expert on these kinds of things now?”

Knuckles laughs. “You two really are like a coin’s toss from each other.”

“What does that even mean?”

“Forget I said anything.” Knuckles turns towards the map on the screen, waving a mitt dismissively. “Just go do whatever you came here to do.”

Shadow scowls at Knuckles’ back. “Gladly.”

---

---

He raped you, didn't he?

Didn't he?

Didn't h—

Sonic smacks his fist into the wall, knuckles aching under his glove. He never understood why Knuckles liked punching so much until now, until all he can think about is the concrete under his hand instead of everything else. He rests his forehead against the wall, eyes screwed shut.

Knuckles is totally wrong anyway. And the Doc, too. Sure, all of it looks bad put together like that, without all the context. Anyone else would probably draw the same conclusion. Knuckles doesn't know he agreed to it anyway. Knuckles also doesn't know he reached out for Infinite every time. That he wanted it, too. And maybe there were a few times it wasn't super great. His ears fold down, fingers trembling where he's flattened them along the wall. Maybe it sucked sometimes, but that still doesn't mean it was—

“Uhm, hey, Sonic, I—”

He straightens up, jerking around to see Silver. He honestly expected Silver to split a long time ago, but something still has him lingering with the Resistance apparently. “Don't tell me there's still something wrong with the timeline, dude.”

Silver laughs, scratching at his quills. “Well, kinda. I tried goin’ back, but there's still something a bit off.”

Sonic smiles. “Y’know you can just say you missed us.”

“Yeah,” Silver says, shrugging. “Honestly, I can't even deny that part. It's nice having—” Silver gestures to HQ“—all of this.”

Maybe he never really considered it, but where he sees a concrete box and the metal striations of something that should've never needed to be built, Silver sees a place where all his friends are. A place that isn't some burnt out, apocalyptic wasteland. Sometimes he has to wonder how close the world got to looking like Silver's old future though. A part of him doesn't want to know the answer.

“Anyways, you're probably busy, so I should—” Silver points to the side.

He didn't realize they'd been standing in dead silence until now. “Right, yeah. I'll see ya around, man.”

“For sure,” Silver says, brow pinched a little and eyes looking him over. “Hey, try to, y’know, get some rest if you can.”

Silver leaves and he stands there until it's nothing but him and dead concrete again. Does he really look bad enough to warrant everyone telling him to get some sleep? He feels like he looks fine. Obviously, he looks okay enough people want to fuck him, and that measure has to count for something. Shadow obviously doesn't though. Knuckles, too. Those people at the bar as well.

He grimaces. Shadow looked at him in the hallway the same way someone might regard roadkill smashed on asphalt. In the restaurant with Rouge, too. Really ever since their conversation in the kitchen. It's like Shadow can see it on him—some kind of sticky, putrid rot.

He raped you, didn't he?

He shakes out his hands, head jerking to the side. It’s not like he cares what Shadow thinks about him anyways.

His Comm buzzes. When he answers it, Amy's words swim in one ear and out the other. He doesn't even question why she's up so late, or calling him at this hour. He hears himself agree to meet up with her tomorrow without thinking about it.

Of course he's gonna hang out with her. Knuckles and Tails are wrong. Shadow, too. He's totally fine. More than fine, even. And because everything's super duper okay, he says, yeah, sure thing.

---

Getting through a meal with Amy should basically be a cake walk. Easy peasy. A breeze. It's nothing he hasn't done before.

He just wishes he could pay attention to whatever Amy's been saying, but every time he tries to look up at her, it's all red fabric and the wrong color eyes and he buries his fingers into the basket of fries he's barely eaten from and picks them apart instead. Amy's usually pretty content to talk his ear off when he's not the one yapping away at her, so it's not like it's too unusual. And he likes hearing what she’s got to say anyways, so it's fine. Everything’s totally—

“—we’ve gotten tons of new recruits recently, which is nice and sorta unexpected if I'm being honest, but we'll totally take all the help we can get. And rebuilding’s gone super smoothly on the Seaside City projects so far, especially with Tails’ help. Sometimes, I'm kinda worried he's doing a little too much, but he always says he can handle it. I mean, you'd probably know better than anyone if he's been working himself to the bone or not and—”

“He's fine.” Sonic tosses another smashed french fry back into the basket.

Amy huffs. “Have you even been listening to anything I've said?”

He stares at the table for a second and then looks up with a smile. “Yeah, course I have. You're talking about Tails ‘n the Resistance projects ‘n all.”

“And nothing else before that apparently,” Amy says flatly, eyeing him. “You've hardly said two words since we sat down.”

“‘Cause there's really not a lot to share on my end. Just the usual junk anyway.”

“Uh-huh.”

“Didja want me to bore you to death here or somethin’? ‘cause I can talk about the thousandth bots face I've smashed this month alone if that's whatcha really want?”

“Well, I'd like to feel like I'm not talking to myself here actually.”

“Right...” Sonic puts his hands up, leaning back in his seat. “My bad. Sorry for not being super entertaining and funny here or whatever.”

“What?” Amy asks, ears tensing back. “Sonic, what're you—”

“Look, I should probably just get goin’. Thanks for inviting me out.” Sonic pushes the tray away, the food beyond crumpled and ruined.

“Sonic, seriously, what is going on?” Amy asks, reaching for him.

Sonic pulls away before she can grab him and smooths out the jerky motion with a thumbs up. “Nothing, m’fine. Doing great. Awesome even. Literally never been better.”

“Right.” Amy crosses her arms, eyes narrowed. “That's so totally believable.”

First Tails and Shadow, then Knuckles and now her. His shoulders burn. Heat settles at the back of his neck, like the anger is a hand cupping his skull.

“Whatever, it's the truth so—” Sonic stands up. “No point in sitting around hashin’ it out.”

Amy looks mad. Pissed even. Her ears folded down and her muzzle ruddy with it. He's pretty sure she's two steps from pulling her Piko Hammer on him and a tactical retreat before he says something he really can't take back starts to sound better than anything else.

“Knuckles said something was up, but I thought maybe he meant you needed help with something and— like usual—you weren't gonna tell us,” Amy says sharply. “Obviously, he failed to mention that you're being a huge jerk, too.”

“So Knux is just airing my laundry out to everyone that asks?”

“We're your friends, Sonic. I think we're entitled to worry about you—”

“Yeah, well, I didn't sign up for that. I didn't ask anyone to worry about me and I don't need anyone to either,” Sonic says. “‘Sides, everyone’s already got enough to deal with. And you know me, ‘m fine anyways. Always am. Knux is just doin’ his whole mother hen thing. Guy's been away from his little rock too long, going all empty nester and his crosshairs got stuck on me.”

Amy makes an annoyed face and reaches into the pocket of her dress and pulls a small, cloth bundle out and tosses it at him without a word.

Sonic catches it easily, turning it over. “What're these?”

“They would've been a whole batch of cookies and a movie night, but you can come get the rest and make a day of it when you're in a better mood.”

Sonic's ears droop and then slip back as he steels himself. The meanness bubbles back to the surface, chest tightening with it. “I've seen enough romcoms for a lifetime. Trust me.” He tosses the cookies back on the table. “‘n you should really give these to Knux. He needs ‘em way more than I do.”

“But they're your favorite,” Amy says.

“Cool. Then I know the knucklehead will love ‘em seein’ as I got great taste ‘n all.”

Amy’s eyes narrow. “You never turn down free food. Especially my baking.”

“‘’m jus’ not hungry I ‘spose.”

“You hardly ate anything.”

“Cause I grabbed some grub on the go on my way here.”

“Oh, and I'm assuming you stopped by Ron's stand on the way in?” Amy asks.

He remembers the rabbit vaguely, barely. “Yeah, totally. Best dogs around.”

“Mm-hm” Amy hums and raises a finger. “That's very interesting, considering I heard he moved his cart out to Spiral Hill recently.”

“Then some other stand, I dunno, they all blend together anyways.”

“No,” Amy says, with a huff. “You're not that forgetful either. Dang it, Sonic, why won't you just tell us what's going on? You're totally off kilter, it's starting to get a little—”

“A little what?”

“Well, concerning for one.”

Sonic scrubs at his face, teeth gritting. “Okay? I mean, I'm doing great for the record. Just to be clear here. Sorry if I've been ‘off’ or something. Not really sure what that even means, honestly.”

“It means you're not really you,” Amy says.

Sonic winces. If anyone knows him like the back of her hand it's Amy. Other than Tails and Knux, he's pretty much known her the longest. She's one of the first people he ever told about his new name when they were younger, after the Little Planet incident. She's the one who corrected anyone who messed up using the wrong one, she's the one who picked it all up instantly the moment he told her and ran with it. She's always looked at him and just seen Sonic and nobody else.

She's not supposed to look at him like this though—like she's seeing a stranger. Like he's—

“Did something happen?” Amy asks. “You're getting enough sleep, aren't you? I hate to say it, but honestly you look sorta run dow—”

“Can you just give it a rest already?”

The table beside theirs goes dead silent. Half the food court really. He could drop a pin and hear it scatter over the floor it's so quiet.

All he can think about is how there's gray and gold there, red on Amy's dress, green eyes too close to blue, Knuckles words, all of it—like fingers clamped on the back of his neck and wrenching him around. Constantly. Something feral shoving him aside in favor of baring its teeth and hackles the further the corner drives into his back, the smaller the room gets.

Sonic smiles, but it's more like baring his teeth at the wolf staring at him from the table nearby. “See somethin’ you like here, pal?”

The wolf's eyes snap back down to their own food.

“Hey!” Amy snaps. “It's one thing if you're gonna do this on me or Knuckles, but you don't treat them like that. They're just here to help, they don't need to deal with—”Amy gestures at him“—whatever this is, too. Got it?”

“Cmon, Ames, I'm not even doin’ anything.”

“Got it?” Amy emphasizes pointedly.

“Sure...” Sonic's ears flip back. “Loud ‘n clear, miss Captain Commander.”

Amy huffs. “I'm certainly not the Commander of anything, but I’ll say this much. Your new attitude is a real eye sore, so figure this out or I'm gonna figure it out for myself.”

“Fine. I got it.” Sonic glares at the table, the red of Amy's dress stuck in his peripherals. “Can I go now or is this, like—” He swirls a finger. “A whole thing?”

“No one's keeping you here, Sonic...”

His stomach inexplicably drops at that, the ceiling somehow lower than ever, the walls melting into reflective metal broken up by bolts. “Cool. Later then.”

Outside, it's like the sky's grown too big. He tries to ignore it and ends up taking shelter in an alleyway, brick walls blotting out the view. The occasional passerby’s eyes catch on him as they wander past the mouth of the alley and the same feeling slips in again. Too small. Too big. None of it’s right somehow. Another person's eyes slide over him and he glares at them before remembering he's not supposed to do that.

He scrubs his hands through his quills and sighs. He needs a drink. Maybe four. Shoot, make it five. More. He needs to fuck somebody and pass out in their bed yesterday.

---

Someone grinds up on him from behind, the club floor thick with humidity, sweat, alcohol. Hands grope at his waist and he laughs, putting on a show of leaning into all of it. He lets the guy drag him through the throng of people and past the line outside the single stall bathroom to a chorus of indignant hey’s and what the fuck, dude’s. He's tugged inside regardless of their protests, the door shut and locked.

The broken light overhead wavers in and out as he’s bent over the sink. Braced with one hand on the sink’s lip and the other on the mirror, he watches the guy box up behind him and grope at his waist and grab his hips. He stares at his own face in the tarnished and cracked glass. Nearly fogged beyond recognition.

He watches the way his eyes wince, the grimace, his teeth clenched and then bared on a particularly hard thrust. The grind and crackle of the glass breaking further sticks in his ears as he presses down a little too hard against the mirror. The guy huffs, hands tightening on him and pulling him back on each thrust. He wants to smack his fist through the remainder of his reflection and scatter it.

Someone is pounding on the door. The guy behind him is close. Fingers bruising in his waist, all grunts and moans, his thighs and hips cut into the sinks edge as he's jostled over it. He keeps his quills from bristling, flat and as harmless as he can manage while someone's fucking him. With a heavy groan the guy collapses part way over him, folding him further into the sink under his chest. He ends up muzzle to muzzle with the Sonic in the mirror, panting hard enough to fog it up.

Cum slides down the inside of his thighs as the guy shoves off of him. A pat to the small of his back and up under his quills makes him shiver. A word or two he doesn't register echoes off the tiles and then the door opens and he has to shut and lock it before the next angry patron who's been waiting tries to shove their way in.

Leaned against the door, he thinks about just letting them inside. Either a miserable discovery or an opportunity. It would eliminate wasting his time having to chase around someone else tonight if he just stayed bent over the sink and let whatever happens happen. Heck, maybe half the club will fuck him. Based on the way the tabloids worded it, it's not like any of them would be surprised to find him free to use.

He turns on the sink and thinks about the lock on the door crunching over. Hands shoving him down. Cold metal under his chest, arms pinned under him, cuffed and folded. He stares at the mirror. He stares at the door in the reflection over his shoulder. Maybe if he's really lucky one of them will push it too far. Smack his skull into the sink fixture and knock him out, and even if they keep fucking him while he's unconscious and drooling on the floor, at least he'll get some sleep tonight. At least he can't think about anything if he's half-dead.

He cleans up instead. He opens the door, a closed fist rests right in front of his snout from the angry beaver who's been knocking on it. He waits for the beaver to actually hit him and when he doesn't he shoves the door wide.

“Here ya go. Sorry for the wait, your highness,” Sonic says dryly.

The guy grimaces at him in clear annoyance and distaste and Sonic grins back. The door slams shut without even a smack across his snout and he scowls. So much for that then. Everyone’s always all bark and no bite. Fist-fight, getting fucked—what's the difference really? One’s way harder to get people to do than the other, that's for sure. He doesn't get it either. Obviously, he's pretty punchable considering Knux and the rest of them kind of look like they'd like to punch him across the muzzle these days. So it's not him. It's gotta be them.

Maybe he's just not going after the right guy.

He finds someone bigger, meaner and goads at him, practically attaches himself to their side and gets bundled into an apartment door an hour later and smacked against the closed door, hiked up it, teeth on his neck before he can blink. It's alright, sure, but he had hoped for something a little more than this though.

He manages to wriggle out of their grasp and pretend like he's leaving—like he's gotten cold feet all of a sudden and he'd rather be anywhere else. He lets them grab him by the scruff and smack him into the wall, knees hitting the tile floor. He smiles. He laughs. Finally. A fist slams into his snout, and then again and he tastes blood on his teeth and it's more than he could've asked for.

Somehow, the guy still goes all soft on the bed sheets once he's tossed onto them and he has to do all the work to get the guy to hit him again. Not even an attempt to break something, or choke him, or smother him. When the guy's finally fucking him he stares at the window and thinks about leaving and finding someone else. Bored. Flat. What a waste. There's nothing here for him. His legs hooked up on their shoulders, practically bent in half, he doesn't feel an ounce of it. Only the bruising on his face and what could've been the potential for a good night.

In bed after, sweat damp and panting, with the sheets stuck around his ankle like a manacle, he thinks about getting up. A cutting ‘thanks for nothing’ sits on his tongue. He glares at the ceiling. He thinks about fingers on his throat. He rests his own hand over his neck and squeezes.

---

Lacerations consistent with claw marks, bite wound punctures, semen found in fur, evidence of sexual assault. Possible. Presumed. Assumed.

Evidence of—

And yet you ‘get it’? Further examination required. Patient denied—

Further. Wounds consistent with. Fuck, you really are just a fucking slut, aren't you? Bite wounds, claw marks, semen, blood, saliva, bruises, fractures, concussion, malnourishment, starvation, evidence of— He raped you didn't he? Didn't he?

My offer still stands.

You've had sex before, haven't you? Bite wounds consistent with— Regardless, if what you desire here is intimacy, then I see no point in delaying the inevitable.

Semen. Blood found in fur.

Inevitable. Fine. Whatever. Sure. Yes. There's a word for that, y’know. What happened up there? He raped you, didn't he, didn't he—

“Sonic?” Fingers brush his shoulder.

He jerks away from them, ears pressed down. He's supposed to do his shot. Or something. He's been stuck on the couch in Tails workshop for a few minutes. He looks at the sunset outside the rolled up hangar door and knows it's definitely been more like an hour. Maybe two. Three. He can't tell. It's like everything else now, all of it trapped at arm’s length, like it just keeps slipping through his fingers the harder he tries to grab onto it.

“Everything okay?” Tails asks.

“Yeah.” He shouldn't have come here. It was a bad idea to come here. “I'm fine, bud. Jus’ tired.”

He smiles. It doesn't reach his snout. His face doesn't move the way it's supposed to. He stares at the floor, sneakers red against the gray concrete. He thinks about dying in space. Airlocks. Stars. He wonders if it's cold. If he'd even feel it.

He thinks about a hundred other empty cells. Corridors he could never see all the way down. People he never met. The only common denominator the warden that visited them. ‘Espio confirmed signatures on board.’ He wonders how many others got the same offer he did. ‘They were long dead before we even got up there.’

He thinks about how he was the only one that said yes.

---

Happy birthday, Sonic!

He stares out of the side of the bucket on the ferris wheel, arms folded under his chin. Twinkle Park. Of all the haunts to ghost at, Tails had to propose this one. Half-decommissioned, mostly abandoned, parts of it rusted out and unsalvageable, some of it burned like the rest of the planet, but with Tails, Yacker and the other Wisps on board, they've managed to scrape together a semi-functional theme park so far.

The shiny new transceiver watch buzzes under his glove and he pushes the wrist of it back to see Tails phoning him in. Tails had handed him the watch that morning with a wide and beaming smile, obviously proud of the little doo-hickey he'd put together. He wants to be fine with it. He should just be fine with it. It's a convenient replacement for the ear comms and all, but—

He twists the band around the tighter it feels like it's getting and lets the call go through.

“Hey! I think I figured out how to get this thing going way faster, just gimme a sec,” Tails says, voice only slightly tinny, a marked improvement from the other comm.

Tails' face also takes up most of the screen which is new, and he only assumes his own takes up the other end. He's not sure how he feels about that. Cuffs. Leash. Tether. Some part of him can't help but feel like he should gnaw the thing right off his arm and start running.

“And…there.” Tails says. “Okay, Yacker, now!”

The wheel starts to spin faster. He hops up on the rim of the bucket and feels the whole thing sway as the ferris wheel picks up speed.

Sonic grins. “Alright. That's more like it!”

He jumps the gap to the next bucket, grabbing the bars on the side and swinging wildly. He drops himself into one of the buckets as it angles perfectly below. As it nears the top he tumbles out, sneakers sliding down one of the wheel’s spokes and knocking into the center shaft. He drags his sneaker along it and feels the rubber catch just enough that his idea might work. He raises his watch and smiles at Tails.

“Wanna see how fast this thing can really go?” Sonic asks.

“You bet!”

“You asked for it.”

He digs his sneakers in and runs. The whole wheel groans as it starts to move faster. And then faster. The buckets start to tilt outwards as everything creaks dangerously. He can hear Tails shouting through the watch, but he can't make out the words. There's a guttural snap, a massive groan of metal, a bolt whizzes off and then another and another, all with sharp pops as they zing past his face.

The ferris wheel lurches. He grabs onto the next spoke that whirs by him and remembers in hindsight, that's a very bad idea as it flings him around the wheel. The sky spins and he laughs, clinging on for dear life. One last, massive snapping sound echoes and then the wheel slams into the ground as it falls off the frame, jolting him completely off at the apex of the spin. He tries to grab at one of the buckets on the way down, anything he can reach and all he can see is the sky as he falls. His heart hammers in his ears, every part of him thrumming and alive.

Something snags him by the foot and he looks up to see Tails looking back down at him.

Sonic smiles. “Nice catch, little bro!”

The crash and clatter of the out of control ferris wheel is far too audible as Tails drops him back down onto the ground. They both collapse on the stone as the ferris wheel finally rolls to a stop with an end to the nightmare orchestra of metal from the buckets. It wobbles for a moment and then teeters. It slams onto its side with a bang that snaps at his ears.

Tails looks at him, wide-eyed, and then they both burst out laughing.

After the Ferris Wheel Fiasco, they end up inside an abandoned gift shop that Tails lock-picked in order to get at the Hello Doggy merch he spotted through the smudged window. He finds an old dash-hanger keychain made to look just like himself and Tails laughs. Hey, I could add that to the Tornado, maybe. He feels himself agreeing with a chuckle of his own even as he smells smoke and his stomach turns over.

They end up at the back of the store, bumming stale Winkies from the old snack counter. Wrappers tossed on the grimy tile and legs swinging off the edge of the bright-colored countertop.

“Ya think these are gonna make us chuck later?” Sonic asks, holding up one of the Winkies towards Tails.

“Eh.” Tails shrugs, having worked through four of his own already. “Maybe.”

Sonic drops his half-eaten one on the ground, the sugar rush from the ones he already packed in buzzing in his head and making his ears hot. “Totally worth it.”

Tails hums his agreement around another bite. Sometimes it's impressive how much the kid can eat, and then he remembers how much he used to tuck in at Tails' age. At the rate Tails is going, he's starting to think Tails might really end up taller than him. He'll seriously never live it down if he ends up being the short end of the duo.

“I'm glad you're feeling better.” Tails says.

It's out of the blue. It has him pulling his legs up onto the counter and crossing them. “Whaddya mean?”

Tails looks at him, smile pinched. “I just mean you seem kinda, I dunno…happier.”

It's like the ferris wheel smacking into the ground all over again, the sensation jolting through him. His chest aches. That same void sitting heavy and unmistakable in the pit of him.

“Yeah. I guess I am,” Sonic says.

He looks outside the store windows. The sky has drawn darker the longer they've been here. Graying as the day has gone on. It usually means a storm is coming when it starts to look all gloomy like that, and where there's a storm, there's lightning—and thunder. They'll have to make the rest of their trip here quick or hope it'll somehow miss them. Otherwise—

Sonic nudges Tails with his shoulder and hops off the counter. “C’mon, dude. Race ya to bumper cars?”

---

He should've figured the storm wouldn't just blow over. It rolls in as night falls and perches itself right over the Workshop of all places.

Lightning cracks outside the window and Tails pushes in closer against him, shaking. They haven't co-slept like this since Tails was super small and he wasn't sure how to make the thunderstorms less scary. He's never been afraid of lightning the way Tails is. Even when he was little, the crack of thunder reminded him of hitting mach speed. There was always a comfort there during the storms, in the way it shook him to the core.

There's another clap of thunder and Tails curls up smaller, hiding his face in his fur, Tails' hand viced in his. He can smell blood that isn't there. Smoke. Hear the sound of the engine sputtering and coughing and the whining descent to the sea. Tails shakes the same way he did as he bled out while he tried to curl up around Tails in order to take the brunt of the blow.

“Hey, it's okay,” Sonic says.

With his chin rested between Tail’s ears, he looks at the far wall and all he can see is rivets and bolts. All he can feel is steel sliding against him. Hear the breathing in his ear that isn't there. The fur that isn't Tails’ under his snout. Red in his peripherals. Phantom claws petting over his nape. A flash of light bathes the room. The roar of thunder rattles the picture frames and the house quivers before settling. Tails shivers.

“You're okay, bud. I got you…”

Tails shoves his snout against his shoulder and he wants to tell him not to do that. It's too close to the tangled mess of scars and wounds under his fur. For a moment he's afraid there's still spit there, blood drying hot on his shoulder, and he doesn't want any of it to rub off on Tails.

Sometimes he's sure that when any of them grab him, they can feel the grit there, the indentations of someone else's hands, like he's leaving something behind on their fingers when they let go. As if the same layer of whatever he can't scrub off will somehow slough off onto everyone that touches him. He lets Tails cling onto him despite it all and it's someone else's hands on him, the metal snout of a mask pushed into his shoulder, the Ruby thrumming where it touches his chest.

Eventually, the storm passes like it always does.

Tails finally falls asleep to the slow rain and he extracts himself from Tails’ grip once it slackens. He thinks about staying. ‘I’m glad you're feeling better.’ Tails smiling, eyes bright. ‘You seem kinda, I dunno…happier’. He doesn't want to ruin that image Tails has of him. If he stays too long, he knows it'll all fall apart again. That Tails’ll get hurt eventually.

He hops down from the loft. He looks at the Tornado and smoke stings his eyes and nose. Maybe Infinite was right all along. It was his fault anyways, every time it happened.

It's just better this way.

He leaves.

---

He thinks about going to Rouge's apartment. Shadow's offer. His skin crawls at the thought. Red eyes watching him from behind cell bars, a hand pinning the side of his face into the metal below him, panting and sighing and— He ends up at another familiar bar instead.

In one blink and the next, he's already found someone to hone in on. He laughs at the wolf's bad joke. The third one this guy’s told him. He's only half listened to all of them, the punchlines weakening every time either of them stops long enough to drink. His eyes track the claws on the glass, mercilessly fingerless gloves, the gray fur visible, white fur on the ends of his fingers. He grabs the guy's hand in his and shivers at the drag of the claws that find his wrist. The wolf smiles at him with all his teeth and his shoulder aches at the sight.

Every time Knuckle's words bubble back up he chases them down with another swig. He forces out the tremble in his fingers and he gets rid of the tightness in his chest in favor of an artificial warmth.

The wolf drags him closer and his ears go flat against his head. An arm slips over his shoulders and he has to remember to sag into it. A laugh curls against his muzzle and he stiffens all at once. Red, white, gray, blood in his mouth, his nose, sticky in his fur, sweat-salt stench, copper-penny metal, smoke and burnt oil—

He raped you didn't he?

Sonic shoves out from under the wolf's arm, breaths punching through his teeth, shivering. He looks at the wolf and tries to smile and grimaces instead, fingers clumsy on the table as he gets up. “I jus’ need to—”

He retreats to the bar and hides himself on the other side of a panda who side eyes him and then thankfully goes back to their own business. When he glances back towards where he fled from, the wolf's already gotten up. Hopefully to find someone else and forget any of that ever happened. What a total loser thing to do, getting cold feet like that. He's not supposed to do that. It feels all kinds of pathetic, letting some stupid words get the best of him like that.

And he's pretty sure that wolf guy probably doesn't think too highly of him after leading him on half the night just to bail. He shrinks, curling over the bar. Maybe he should've just sucked it up. It probably would've been fine anyway. Now he's stuck here with no one for the night.

“Great…” Sonic sighs, scrubbing at his face.

“Here you go, hon.” He doesn't expect a drink to get shoved in front of him, or the bunny that hops up into the stool next to him. She smiles, lashes long against her muzzle. “You sure look like you could use another.”

“Nah, it's—”

“Don't worry, this one's on me, sweetie,” she says with a hand on his forearm.

“Thanks.” Sonic looks at the glass and then her. “I think?”

“It's not every day you meet the fella who saved Sunset City,” she says. “Plus, no one ever said you were this cute up close.”

His ears go hot. Sonic laughs. “Hey, saving the city's one thing, looking this good’s where it gets tricky.”

She nudges the drink into his fingers, her hand cradling the back of his, smoothing over the knuckles of his gloves. “You sure make it look easy.”

He takes an immoderate swig by any standard. Salty, kinda bitter—besides that, it's nothing new. He downs half the glass before he realizes it. She runs her fingers over his forearm the whole time and he stares at the junction of it all. She talks about the city, her job, her boyfriend, and he's pretty sure the latter topic is something she shouldn't be telling him about when she puts a hand on his knee and leaves it there. He's aware of her fingers creeping higher the same way he knows she deliberately pulled the hem of her shirt low before she walked over here.

Leaned close the way she is, her eyes lidded with a knowing smile, it's like being on the outside looking in at a routine he knows like the back of his hand. She fills the gaps of silence he leaves easily. Like he's not even there. He stares at her fingers petting over his thigh and tries to think of what he's supposed to say here and listens to her talking while hearing nothing instead. After a while, he loses track of how much time’s even passed. Like it's someone else sitting in the stool. Someone else's hand on the glass. Someone else the bunny's smiling at and smoothing her fingers over.

Her hand slides under the bottom of the drink after he lets it sit for a bit too long and she lifts it up towards his snout again. He takes the silent prompt and finishes off the last swig. He almost drops it when he tries to put it back down. When he looks over at her, he tries to follow the way the lights slip around overhead. He squints. He scrubs at his face with fingers that don't move the way they should.

“Aw, honey...” Her hand brushes the side of his snout. “You don't look so good.”

He tries to brush her off, but lists against the bar instead, blinking stupidly. She grabs his arm and—despite being way shorter than him—she hauls him out of his chair. His feet tangle over one another and he slumps against her.

“M’...sor—” Sonic's mouth moves like it's grown in wrong. Jaw heavy. Sticky. Fuzzy.

She just laughs.

He's not really sure when or why he agreed to go to her place, but he ends up there. On the couch. Legs kicked over the edge of it and numb. He tries to pick up one hand and then the other and laughs when he can't, slipping down against the sofa, quills snagging the fabric. Everything feels warm. Like when he comes down from Super, but even better. Tingly and far away. His eyes drift over to the bunny beside him, her legs tucked up under her on the sofa.

She pets over the inside of his thigh in slow sweeps. Nausea creeps up slow and then fast, squeezing his stomach. The whole world rocks, like moving from one side of a boat to another. The room spins while standing still.

Sonic laughs with a sigh and tries to unstick his tongue from his jaw, but it's all too clumsy. A whine of air leaves him instead of the words he's trying to push out.

“Oh, you're okay, baby.” She cups the sides of his face, his nerves dulled and sharpened all at once. “It was just something to help you relax a little. You looked awfully tense back there.”

That makes sense. That totally makes sense… He sighs again. His head lolls against the couch and he stares at the ceiling. Dopey smile, stupid grin, he's sure he looks all kinds of blasted out of his ears, but it's like the room keeps turning over while he's dead still. His attention drifts hazily to the bunny and her smile and he thinks about how nice it looks, how her hand sits on his knee and sweeps higher in languid passes that light up his skin all over.

Someone else grabs him—someone he didn't even realize was there—and he's dragged onto their lap. His forehead comes to rest against a furred chest as he sags forward against them. Whoever they are, they're big. Big-big. Large hands pet circles over his ribs, his sides heaving slow under their palms. Syrupy breaths clog his lungs.

He tries to lift his head. He manages to turn his neck just enough to see the bunny again. And just like every time before—swamped in an endless rota of nameless faces—he can't even remember if he asked or if she told him or if he ever cared in the first place. He follows the line of her lashes down to her cheeks, the ruddy smile on her muzzle, the same exact one she gave him at the bar. The hands that don't belong to her move down to his hips and squeeze.

A small sound slips past his teeth before he can bite down on it. He tries to say anything, syllables slurring into nothing in his mouth. The hands holding him pull him closer and drag him into a slow rock against the legs straddled under him. His arms folded up somewhere uselessly between his own chest and the chest he distantly hopes he isn't drooling against, but keeping his spit in his mouth has become harder than it's supposed to be. Heavy. Warm. His eyelids droop. It's nice like this. All of it. Every part of him. Even the unknown hands grabbing at him, the arms that wrap around him.

The bunny grabs him by the chin and tilts his snout towards her. She kisses him and he can taste her chapstick, smell her perfume, something floral, something that stings his nose. It's like everything's lights up all at once at that. Too much. He tries to draw back and her fingers tighten on his jaw. He whines into her mouth. Someone else laughs underneath him, their chest convulsing into his.

She pulls away, eyes flicking over his as she smiles and smiles. “You don't mind if my boyfriend joins us, do you?”

---

Tick. His ear twitches. Tick. Sonic shoves his snout further into the fabric under him. Tick. He curls up tighter. Tick. His jaw clenches. Tick. Geezus. He's not sure who's annoying ass wall clock that is, but he's this close to grabbing it and—

His stomach lurches violently.

He bolts up and rolls off the side of the couch and smacks into the floor, hoisting himself up on unsteady arms while he tries to swallow back the bile in his throat. He throws up regardless. His skin aches, hot all over—his gloves are missing, shoes, socks, everything—the wood flooring seeps cold against the pads of his hands.

He sags against the floor after and pants. His head pounds. Like someone decided to pummel it to a pulp right between his ears. His tongue sticks when he tries to talk, mouth dry despite what just came out of it. A sour thickness on his teeth. He tries to sit up again and groans, shoving the heels of his palms against his eyelids when the light from the nearby window jabs at him.

He gropes around at the cushions of the couch next to him for leverage and pulls his knees up under him. He hisses through his teeth as he settles back on his heels. His legs hurt. His everything hurts. There's a tingling in his fingers and palms, like he's stuck them into sockets and the sensation gnaws higher the more he tries to steady himself.

His ears jerk towards footsteps that approach from behind him. Someone crouches beside him and wraps their arm around him. Sticky perfume. Chapstick left on his lips from someone else’s. Smaller hands petting over his face, his muzzle, you're okay, baby, it's okay. Just relax.

They help him up onto the couch and he looks down at the floor between his feet. He lifts his head after a beat. She's the same chick from the bar, he knows that much. The rest is blank space. It's like he took one step off of that barstool and then woke up here. He's gone black-out, sloppy drunk and messy before, sure. But nothing like this.

“Sorry about the mess,” Sonic says with a smile. On automatic. Autopilot engaged. Laughing even though it makes his stomach curdle.

“Oh, don't worry about it too much, it's totally seen worse.” She brushes the fur on his brow with the back of her bare hand and tsks. “I'll getcha some water, hon.”

She heads for what he presumes is the kitchen, disappearing around the corner. His eyes track around the apartment before settling on the couch cushions beside him. His skull throbs in time with his heartbeat as he stares at them. Spots of blood stain the fabric.

He runs his fingers over his sides and finds fresh furrows there, claw marks, deep ones on his hips and a few nasty sets to match on his thighs. He twists his back and feels the same sharp pinch and pull there as well. His fingers find teeth marks buried into one shoulder and the other, more indentations along his ribs, his chest, like he got chewed up and spit out. An aching stretch nestles along the inside of his thighs. Fur dried and tight with someone’s spend, the copper-wire flake of old blood—more than there rightfully should be. Wrists bruised under his fur. Patterned like fingers, the span of them far larger than the bunny's.

It definitely doesn't take a lot to put together that he got fucked on this couch last night.

The who and the when is the question he can't quite get a grip on. He stares at the brown-red blemishes on the puce fabric and makes up a familiar scenario in his head to fill in the blank space. Himself, black-out and limp—or just dull-eyed and slackened—a mass of gray and white fur smothering him under it as it grunts and huffs and forces his legs wider around it. His arm dangled lifelessly off the couch, shoulders jerking against the fabric, spines sticking the stuffing. Bloodied teeth. Claws dug into his waist. His hips. Dragging. Pinning. Gold-blue eyes. Fucking him until he—

The bunny comes back and sets the water down on the coffee table before dropping a towel over the mess on the floor. Where exactly she fits into this equation, he's not entirely sure yet.

She flops down next to him, laughing as she grabs his hand and places it along the inside of her thigh. “My boyfriend had to go to work early, but I've still got some time before my shift starts.”

Her hand hikes his higher.

At least that answers the question of why she's here and what she wants from him.

’Yes or no—’

She kisses him while crawling into his lap. She straddles him before he can say anything and he slides his hand the rest of the way up against her before he can think about it. She moans against his teeth in a rush of air, pulling him in closer and all he can smell is her perfume, taste it all like it's stuck in the back of his throat.

‘—what does it even matter, really?’

---

---

---

“Ugh, I can't believe he just—” Amy grumbles, shoving a file into the cabinet a little harder than she probably should. “The nerve of that hedgehog. Sometimes, I swear—”

“Hedgehog troubles, Pinky?”

“Rouge!” Amy gasps, a hand on her chest. “Gosh, sorry, I didn't even see you there.”

Rouge smirks, hopping down from her perch on the storage crates stacked along the back wall. “If I had a ring for every time I heard that line.”

“How long have you been up there?” Amy asks, face hot.

“Long enough,” Rouge says.

“Great.” Amy sighs. “So you heard all of that?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“I just don't get it. He was totally fine last time we spoke. Well—” Amy scrunches her face. “He seemed a bit tired, but I'm pretty sure that's just the norm considering all of the places Tails and I’ve found him napping before. Sonic could probably sleep the whole year away if there wasn't some next big thing to run off to.”

“Maybe that's the problem, hon.”

“Whaddya mean?”

“Well, there's not exactly another Eggman scheme for him to dive headfirst into, is there? Why, it must be like clipping his wings. The wind right out of poor Blue’s sails.” Rouge clicks her tongue. “After all, what's a hero without anything to really save? Though, I'm sure Sonic doesn't care much for that sentiment regardless.”

Amy huffs. “He could help with the Resistance if he's so bored.”

Rouge laughs. “I don't mean tying him down to this stuffy ol’ place.”

“Then what?”

“Oh, he's certainly not going to pop up every time you call—though I'm sure I don't need to tell you that he’ll listen to you more than most. But, maybe if this trouble's just interesting enough, he'll—”

The door to Command opens and Shadow walks in, a stack of BOL’s tucked under his arm. The exact ones she asked him to help her handle and pick through to verify the contents of this morning so they could get the next round of supplies shipped out already.

“Speaking of trouble—” Rouge says with a grin. “Hey, handsome.”

Shadow sends Rouge a look that most would consider withering, but knowing these two Amy can only assume it's all part of their usual routine. With the way Rouge has talked about Shadow before, she's one-hundred percent sure Shadow has a super soft spot for the bat, even if she's pretty sure Shadow would never ever admit it. It's kinda cute, in a grumpy-adorable sort of way.

“Here.” Shadow says, holding out the papers to her.

“Oh.” Amy takes them and glances them over. All neatly filled out, orderly, completed in record time. She sighs with a relieved smile. It's one less thing she has to worry about at least. “Thank you, Shadow.”

Shadow makes a non-committal sound, ear twitching towards the door.

Rouge sidles closer to Shadow, fingers brushing his arm. “My, I didn't know you were helping Amy out personally. You're just full of surprises, aren't you?”

“At least I'm not wasting Resistance resources and time.”

Rouge scoffs, a hand on her chest. “Moi? I would simply never. Such bold words, all baseless accusations regardless.”

“Then why is the count for the raw quartz fill shipment coming up below numbers?” Shadow asks.

“You think I shaved some off the top?” Rouge laughs. “As if I'd want such crude little cuts in my collection. Not even brilliants, hardly worth the time it'd take to pocket them. Practically slag stone.”

“It’s a—” Shadow narrows his eyes, muzzle wrinkling. His ear flicks towards the door. Amy swears she hears him breath through his teeth. “Was there a run-in recently?”

“Hm?” Amy asks, head tilted. “Like what? With Badniks or…?”

“There's blood,” Shadow says.

Amy looks at Rouge, her eyes wide. Rouge's own brow furrows up, the bat’s head tilting curiously.

“Shadow?” Amy starts, confused at what thread the conversation has been tugged into. “Whaddya mean there's—”

Shadow's out of the door before either of them can get a word in.

Rouge laughs. “Oh, don't worry, he does that sometimes. He's honestly worse than Blue with it.”

“Yeah,” Amy says, ears drooping, eyes stuck on the door Shadow just left out of.

“I'm sure he'll clue us in if it's something worth fussing over, Pinky. I wouldn't worry about it too much,” Rouge says.

She knows that. She also can't stop thinking about what Shadow said.

There are no movements she knows of occuring today. No battles or skirmishes, no Badnik nests or Labs to clear out. No current injuries, though it's not as if she keeps a running tab on who enters and exits the infirmary at all times. Knuckles is off duty for once, forced out the doors after she finally got him to admit he needed to rest. Visit Angel Island for a bit. Clear his head hopefully. She knows he misses his home more than anything and Knuckles could certainly use the break after everything.

Rouge tries to draw her into a conversation about anything but HQ, the Resistance or Sonic, and all she can think about is Sonic sitting at the table and picking at his food, his face blank. Everything about him right in front of her and still somehow so far away.

Chapter 7: i feel like i know him, but sometimes my arms bend back

The Master Emerald hums softly under Knuckles’ back; safe and sound, exactly where it's supposed to be. He can't help but relax into all of it. The warmth of it, the sun, the air—all dry, clean and thin from the altitude, it's what it's all supposed to be like. No beeping, humming, bright lights and concrete and this needs to be finished by tomorrow, sir and we need to contact the families of the deceased immediately.

He sighs. As much as he doesn't want to admit it, he's missed this.

Maybe Amy had been right. A day or two away to check on the Emerald, the unspoken order to clear his head more than obvious. He'd been a little miffed at first, sure. It's not like he enjoys admitting he can't handle something, and Sonic—

He frowns. The Emerald's hum ebbs and warbles in response to his own unease.

“That idiot…” Knuckles mutters.

The Emerald resonates, seemingly in agreement. He huffs out a laugh.

“At least we can agree on something.”

There's another warble from the Emerald and then the babbles of Chao slipping into angrier tones. He cracks an eye open and sits up. He'd brought fruit back from the surface for the Chao that live up here. The trees scattered across the place provide plenty of food, but there's certain variations that just don't grow well this high up. Apparently, there's a few Chao who've taken it upon themselves to squabble over the grub.

He slides off the edge of the Emerald and hops down, stalking over to assess what exactly the problem is. It's a deep blue Chao and a darker one with red markings and a bushel of grapes tug-of-war’ed between them.

“Hey, cut it out already, there's plenty to go aroun—”

The blue Chao lets the grapes go and the momentum sends the black and red one toppling over, wide-eyed and stupefied. With a sound like a laugh, the blue Chao snags the grapes and makes a mocking motion at the other.

“Nope—” Knuckles snatches the blue Chao by the scruff before it can beat its hasty retreat. “Whatever happened to sharin’?”

The Chao nearly scowls at him. Nearly.

“Look, I'll put you back down if you agree to play nice.”

The blue Chao makes a few sounds and then huffs.

“Alright, but if you mess up my nap again we're gonna have a problem.”

The blue Chao crosses its tiny arms, the bubble above its head morphing from an exclamation mark into a neutral ball once more.

“Okay, fine—” Knuckles drops it back onto its stubby feet. “I'm watchin’ you, got it?”

The Chao makes a motion at him like it's giving him a thumbs up before winding its way back to the red and black one. Thankfully, the two sit down with the grapes and pluck at the vines together instead of pulling it back and forth like before. Mission accomplished he supposes. Even up here he can't escape having to babysit and mediate apparently.

There's a slight beeping tone. He tilts his head, snout wrinkling. He's beyond tired of that specific sound, but he also knows he has to answer the call at some point. Finding the tablet-thingy Tails shoved at him is easier said than done, and he manages to pull it free of the stone outcropping, dust off the face and answer it before the call falls through.

“Oh! Hey, Knuckles!”

Knuckles settles on the steps of the shrine, tablet balanced on his knees. “What's happened now?”

Amy laughs sheepishly, looking at something off-screen. “Sorry, shoulda mentioned this isn't a bad news kind of call, I'm just checking in to see how things are going.”

“Good.”

Amy's smile flattens for a moment. “Well, that's…good.”

“Yeah.”

There's a gap between their words, the space distinctly hedgehog shaped, blue, and more annoying the longer it lingers.

“I—”

“How—”

Amy laughs. “My bad, you first.”

“How's HQ?”

“It's good,” Amy says in the kind of way someone might talk through a stubbed toe. He knows she's been handling a lot since the War started. He'd hoped the end of it would mean she could go back to focusing on herself, but even he hasn't had that luxury. “Everything's ship-shape as ever.”

“Right…”

Amy sighs. “I talked to him, after you did.”

Knuckles sets his jaw, a familiar aggravated simmer low in him. “And how'd that go?”

Amy looks away again, rubbing at her neck. “Not super well. He's—”

“Stupid?”

“Well—” Amy trails off with a so-so tone. “He's certainly not about to let any of us butt in.”

“Typical…”

“I was going to see if Tails could maybe get through to him. He's probably the one who really could out of all of us, so—”

Knuckles laughs wryly. “Good luck with that. It seems like he's pretty set on hitting the pavement here.”

Amy huffs. “We have to try something.”

He knows she doesn't have access to Medical the same way he does. He's read the files of the other P.O.W.’s more than enough times to know what he found in Sonic's was something else entirely. It just doesn't add up either. Not really. He tries to picture it and it's all black space, void.

What he read on those papers simply just isn't synonymous with the whole ‘Sonic the Hedgehog’ thing. It's just not something he ever really considered happening or even thought about. Not to Sonic. Not to anyone he knows really. The mask guy had been weird in his own ways, sure. But that?

Not to mention Sonic denied it, every single bit if it. Like he can't read the files, like he couldn't see Sonic after he got off the Death Egg or smell it all on him. It'd been new and old blood mixed with sweat and soot. He'd assumed from the run to HQ, fighting, any number of things. The headier underlying one had been hard to place. He knows exactly what it is now.

His shoulders hunch, a burning gathered on them, a pit in his stomach growing. He just left Sonic up there for months; to do who knows what with that guy and—

“Knuckles?”

“He talked to Shadow apparently.”

“Oh…” Amy blinks. “Did Shadow say what about?”

“No. Getting a word out of that guy's like pullin’ teeth.”

“I could try talking to him,” Amy says with a determined nod, “he'll talk to me.”

“Yeah.” Knuckles huffs. “Good luck with that.”

“He was just here.”

Knuckles raises a brow ridge skeptically.

“He's been helping out a lot, actually!” Amy says, holding up a hand. “Honestly, I didn't expect him to agree to pitch in with any of this, but he's taken to the paperwork part pretty well.”

“Good for him.” At least someone can handle that who's not himself. He's tired of staring at tiny lines typed on white paper. And his handwriting has never been the best, all things considered. It's not like he fills out lots of forms up here, and certainly nothing much before the War.

Amy's face scrunches, the way it does when she's thinking about something she's unsure if she should say out loud or not.

“What?” Knuckles asks.

“Oh, nothing. He just—” Amy looks off to the side. “He sorta bee-lined out of here a bit ago and…”

“And?”

Amy smiles, fake and plastered on, her ears pressing back. “It's probably nothing really. You should enjoy your vacation.”

He grunts noncommittally. There's something she's not saying, but he knows trying to pry at her will only make her deflect harder.

“If you need to take some more time off, too, just lemme know. I know it's been a while since you've been back home, so—”

“I'll be back before the end of the week,” Knuckles says firmly.

There's more than just Headquarters and troops to handle. There's a certain blue hedgehog he needs to make sure doesn't get in over his head like usual. And he's got another hedgehog to pry some answers out of once he gets back.

---

---

Sonic's long gone cold from the wicking sweat dried off his fur. The only warmth is the body beside him, wrapped around him. An arm tangled over his shoulders and a leg wedged between his own. Wormed in close like this, his snout rests across the steady, jumping pulse in Infinite's throat. Only an inch of fur, skin, fat, muscle and it'd be over. Like that. All he'd have to do is bite down.

Gooseflesh breaks out under his fur with each pass of fingers through the quills on his back. One hand wanders higher, claws sliding through the spines on his head idly, slowly. Always careful to avoid the ends of them.

“I thought about trimming them down when you first arrived.”

The voice rumbles under his chin and he turns his nose into the crook of Infinite's neck, his own arms stuck between them, tied at the wrists by his cuffs.

“I think I prefer them like this, however,” Infinite says.

Red-hot. The blood just under the skin. It'd be easy. To end it. Like this, with his teeth bared against Infinite's throat. It'd only take one bite. Only one. He's killed gods. Put the whole damn planet back together after it cracked apart. It'd take nothing to do this. Nothing—

Infinite laughs quietly. “Entirely harmless either way.”

Fingers smooth down his spine. Coaxing, caressing, finding every divot, every depression and lingering. His teeth stay clenched shut. He burrows closer into the warmth Infinite has to offer and tucks his chin over Infinite's shoulder. He counts every bolt in the wall without seeing them fully. They're always there regardless, the same number of them. It never changes.

A clawed finger butchers an invisible line across his flank, over his hip and down his thigh. He pushes in impossibly closer. He thinks about skin and fur under his teeth, about crushing his hands through Infinite's chest and yanking the Ruby out. Instead, he splays his palm over the thrum of it. He drags his fingers along the seam of fur and stone and feels Infinite shudder and tense against him. A rumble starts under his chin and cheek. All over.

Infinite's hand tangles in his quills and pulls his face out of the junction of the jackal’s shoulder. Their eyes meet and he grins ferally. He smooths his palm down the flat of Infinite's torso, lower, the maneuver clumsy with cuffed hands, but his intent more than obvious. He kisses Infinite first, before the jackal has a chance to move. He pushes at Infinite's shoulder, he shoves the jackal onto his back and rolls up to his knees.

When he straddles Infinite, he doesn't miss the flash of teeth, no mask this time, the sharp knowing gaze under lidded eyes. With his hands on Infinite's chest, he keeps Infinite pinned under him and with Infinite's hands smoothing over his waist, the jackal amuses his endeavor.

He takes what he can get. Like this. It's not the keys to his cell. It's not his friends coming to bust him out. It's not his teeth sunk into Infinite's neck or this whole thing brought to a screeching halt. But it's something. He kisses Infinite the way he wants to and Infinite's claws drag at his fur. He responds in kind, digging his fingers into Infinite's chest as hard as he can, his blunted nails scratching down until there's blood.

Infinite merely laughs against his mouth.

---

There's still chapstick tacky on his lips, perfume smeared in his fur. Shutting the door behind him, Sonic slumps against it, head tipped back. He asked to use her bathroom once the bunny finally sagged against the couch, red muzzled and satisfied. Her thighs still shivering.

He scrubs the drying slick off his fingers and palm first. Until his hand pads are raw and stinging. Every inch of his fur gets scoured under the washcloth he swiped from the towel bar, until he gives up on that and pushes and pulls at his fur instead. The claw marks weep. The bites pulse and ache. He presses tissues into the wounds, packs them all until the box runs dry and he stares at the lip of the sink after. Red half-handprints matching his own mark up the marble. The taste in his mouth sits like stagnant liquor, rotten cherries, bitter—too familiar.

He almost smacks his snout into the faucet in his haste to stick his muzzle under the water. When he comes up for air, he's shivering. His fingers reach for his ear comm on reflex only to find it missing. He remembers the transceiver watch a second later. He shoves his gloves back on and shoulders out of the bathroom instead.

The bunny blinks at him from the couch as he bee-lines for the front door. Wide-eyed. Innocent. “Everything alright, hon?”

He buries the hitch in his step. He smiles. He cracks a thumbs up at her and then doubles it. “Yeah, totally. Hey, sorry, to juice like this, but I really gotta get goin’, thanks for everything though. Really.”

“Oh, well, I suppose I'll see ya around then?” The bunny asks, eyes half-lidded and entirely suggestive.

“Sure, y’know where to find me.”

He lets the door fall shut behind him and then it's just him, and the concrete hallway of an apartment he doesn't recognize in the slightest. His head pounds, the unsteadiness chewing its way front and center again. His legs still don't feel right under him. It's like a hangover, close to one, but its like someone's grabbed the back of his neck and pinched off the connection to the rest of him between their fingers.

He can't run like this. He doesn't even know what city he's in. His fingers smooth over the watch face. He should call Tails, he should—

No, what a stupid idea. He'll ask how he got here, what he was doing last night. It’s a can of worms he’d rather not crack open over feeling a little woozy. It's just some scrapes. Some bruises. It's really not worth bothering him. Amy or Knux, either. Rouge? Nope. Shadow? His ears press back. No and heck no.

He'll figure this out on his own. It's not the first time he's had to and it won't be the last.

---

He figured with the morning commute over for the day, the train line would've been empty. And thankfully it is, for the most part at least. Except for the green cat lady at the far end and her kid in the train car with him. Said kid who's been plastered to the partition behind his seat and peeking over it to stare wide-eyed at him since he got on and sat down. It's not super unusual for kids to kind of stare at him, or point, or grab at their parents and say his name and all. He supposes it comes with the territory of ending up on TV and all.

If it isn't the news stations somehow getting footage of a fight or two, it's the commercials, the old cameos, the stuff he agreed to a while ago and they plaster up in reruns. The last time he stepped into a store it'd been his face on a Chaos Soda poster, four years younger and a lot more naive to how one yes to a company turns into a never-ending chain of offers and letters and headaches.

It's not like he minds it. Really. The attention never bothered him before. He looks up at the ads along the ceiling strips, beneath the shut-off lights. Chao Cola, Honey Clothing, Meh Burger. The Ring Snacks ad is an old one of himself with the little snack pack and a thumbs up. It's cheesy. His grin is the kind of thing he knows like the back of his hand. He stares at his own eyes stuck in time on the roof.

His hands prickle and he shifts in his seat, getting one sneaker heel up onto the lip of his chair and slinging his arm up onto the back of it casually. It's just a dumb ad. Some junk he said yes to ages ago. He thinks about the eyes in the plastic image regardless. He remembers his own eyes in the fogged-up mirror. His leg jogs. Breaths slick over the side of his snout, panted and tight. Do you truly think they'd even recognize you like this? He jerks in his seat, quills smacking into the hard backing, eyes wide, chest rising and falling faster than it should be.

His middle aches, his whole bottom half. The claw marks in his hips burn and itch. Nobody's even there. The whole train cars empty except for the kid and his mom and—

Sonic looks over at the two of them and grounds himself in the fact it's not just him and his metal box, but him and two people that don't actually belong in here with him. It's not something Infinite would waste his time on making up anyways. They don't usually start like this either. It's usually somewhere familiar. Something familiar. Someone. Enough to make him buy it.

It's fine. He's fine.

He blinks and realizes the kid's waving at him. He waves back half-heartedly, putting on a smile for him, and the kid grabs at his mom excitedly.

“Look, Mom, look, it's Sonic. Look! Look—”

“Yes, dear, I know.”

His ears fold down at her tone. He didn't miss the way she looked at him when he first got on. A cursory surprise, scrutiny and then thinly veiled unease. A mixture of distaste somewhere in there.

“I think he's hurt,” the kid whispers, in that kind of loud-quiet way kids tend to do when they think they're being super covert.

The mother sighs. “I'm sure he doesn't want to be pestered to death over a few scratches.”

“But he's—”

The arrival announcement interrupts the kid. The train slows to a stop and he feels the sway and the soft jostle. The doors open.

He's out of them in a flash.

When he finally stops, he leans against the brick-facing of an old shop. Some place that never reopened after everything was said and done. His hips feel all jolted, like his legs aren't put in right. His tail hurts. His head. His middle. Lower, somehow. He tries not to hunch over when the pain sharpens and then dulls again. It's like getting punched by a Badnik in the gut, but nothing like it at all. There's a hot dog stand down the way and the smell of it turns his stomach, nausea clogging the back of his throat.

He runs again.

He stumbles to a stop, sagged against the concrete hallway just inside HQ. Breathing heavy and grabbing at the row of tears lining his hip, teeth grit. It shouldn't be this hard to run like this. It's just a few scratches, like that lady said. It's just—

When he takes his hand away from his fur, there's red smeared on his gloves. He grimaces. Showers. He needs to get to the showers. He tries to remember if hot water or cold water helps open wounds and he can't remember a thing. With a deep breath, he braces himself and zips down the hall towards the recruits showers.

Thankfully, it's vacant. He shucks off his gloves and sneakers and smacks into one of the tiled stalls and wrenches the shower on. The claw marks on his back sting immediately. The bite marks. The wounds ripped open on his thighs. The water swirls reddish-pink around his feet, darkening the longer he stands under the spray. After a while, it peters back out into barely a tint.

Right. He's fine. It's fine. It's just a few scratches anyway. It's just—

When he gets out and towels off, it's like scraping sand paper over his fur and skin. He winces despite his best efforts not to, the dull pain sitting low in him flares again as he hunches over to dry the fur on his calves. The towel comes away muddled by time he's finished, splotched and mottled red. He frowns at it. He bundles it up and shoves it to the bottom of the laundering collection and grabs a new one. A darker towel this time.

Not that he needs one. It's really not that bad anyway. It'll all clot over soon. They'll scab over and then they'll itch for a bit and then poof. Presto. Gone. Forever. Like they were never there.

Yeah.

It's nothing.

He gets his gloves scrubbed off and spick and span again and toes his socks and sneakers back on without a hitch. Throwing the towel over his head, he scrubs at his ears and quills as he heads for the exit—and then promptly collides with someone else.

Hands steady him by the arms. He wrenches backwards out of their grip with a sudden snarl, the towel he'd been drying off with slipping around his shoulders as his quills bristle.

He blinks at the sight of Shadow in front of him. His chest shrivels. “What’re you doing here?”

Shadow's eyes flick down from his face to his shoulder, hip, legs, everywhere, frown deepening. “You look like you were mauled.”

Sonic crosses his arms, not so subtly covering the wounds gathered on his chest. “You didn't answer my question.”

“What do you think?” Shadow asks flatly.

“Alright, geez…” Sonic holds up his hands and shuffles aside so Shadow can get to the showers behind him. “Don't let me hold you up then.”

“You need to have those looked at.”

Sonic laughs, ears flicking back. “I'm fine, man. ‘s nothin’ I haven't had before.”

Shadow makes an annoyed sound low in his throat. Instead of turning into the showers like he expected him to, Shadow grabs him by the upper arm and hauls him out of the locker room and into the corridor. He stumbles over his feet the whole way, teeth gritting and everything aching. His fist smacks into Shadow's hand cinched on his arm and when it doesn't budge he rakes his fingers into it. Skin itching under his fur. Heart heavy in his ears.

“Dude, let go’a m—”

Shadow releases him immediately.

He almost smacks into the wall before he catches himself on it, breathing heavily. He whirls on Shadow, muzzle wrinkled up. “What gives?”

Shadow eyes him. “At least you're learning.”

“What does that even mean?” Sonic asks, stalking up into Shadow's face. “Why’re you so obsessed with me saying it anyways? You into it or somethin’? That's real kinky of ya.” He breathes sharply, eyes darting down the corridor and towards his escape route. “You want me to beg you to stop, huh?”

It's just enough to stupify Shadow into going rigid.

His window of opportunity sits wide open. He gets one foot in the direction of freedom, pushing off with the other, the anticipation of hitting top speed bunched in every muscle as he—

Shadow surges forward and sticks him against the wall before he can blink. “You must enjoy running your mouth as much as getting bitten. You do both often enough.”

Sonic scoffs despite the way the blood thrums in his ears, his chest too tight. “What? You mad you're not the one gettin’ your teeth in me?”

Shadow's ears press back and the arm barred across his chest pushes in harder. “Your attempts to antagonize me are pitiful at best.”

“I dunno, Shads, it seems like it's really doing something for you.”

Shadow snarls, teeth baring. “You're impossible.”

“Yeah? I'll take that as a compliment.”

“You would.”

“Look, man, you're the one pinning me to the wall. What's a guy supposed to think, huh? If I didn't know any better, I'd think you're trying to kiss me.” Sonic grins, leaning close enough his nose brushes Shadow's. “You just had to ask if you wanted one.”

“I don't want to—” Shadow's mouth clicks shut, ear flicking to the side. “I’d prefer not to do this out here.”

He looks down the hallway, to where a turtle has stopped at the end of it, staring, their eyes widening when they notice him looking, head snapping back towards their shell as they scurry off.

“Oh, okay, I get it.” Sonic looks back at Shadow with a grin. “You want me all to yourself, huh?”

This is easy at least. The antagonizing. The teasing. Poking at Shadow til he's pissed off and snarling in his face. It's easier than dealing with the way Shadow had looked at him in the showers or thinking about the blood he saw when he'd cleaned himself.

Shadow backs off with an annoyed sound, letting him go. “Either walk to the infirmary or I drag you there. Those are your options.”

He contemplates bolting again. His thighs ache enough he reconsiders it.

“I don't need to go, man.” Sonic rubs at his chest with his sternum, heart stamping a little too fast under it still. “It's fine. I'm good.”

A shoe suddenly kicks Sonic's leg out wide enough he has to catch himself on the wall behind him and his hip sears, leg jolting in an ache that snaps up his spine. He breathes hard through his teeth, fist clenched. “What is your problem?”

“You're the picture of health it seems.”

Wait— “Was that sarcasm?”

Shadow says nothing, staring at him, pinning him down with the scrutiny alone.

“Man, I didn't think you even knew what a joke was.”

“You’re stalling, hedgehog,” Shadow says, punctuating each word like a threat.

“What? So, we're not even on a first name basis anymore?”

“That's what you're concerned about? Out of everything at hand here, that's what you're choosing to focus on? Truly?”

“I mean, yeah, sure.” Sonic shrugs. “Why not?”

Shadow scoffs, dry and wrung out. “It's almost impressive how much you manage to waste my time.”

Waste, slut, burden, liar— Sonic's chest clenches so hard he almost chokes. He jabs a finger into Shadow’s chest. “Yeah, well, If I'm such a waste of time, then why do you keep doin’ all of this?”

Shadow looks at him flatly, his muzzle slightly turned up. And he knows exactly what it looks like when someone's looking down on him, he's more than familiar with it. His shoulders burn hot, his skull buzzing. He wants to smack his fist into Shadow's face, he wants to leave, he—

“Whatever—” Sonic scrubs a hand over his face and through his quills as he pivots on his heel. “I'm goin’ for a run.”

Shadow snatches his shoulder under light fingers. “Can you even run like this?”

“Sure.” Sonic wrenches out of his grip and keeps walking. He ignores the limp. The hitch on one side. His middle aches in a way that's too familiar and like nothing he's ever felt. He shoots Shadow a tight grin. “Watch me.”

Another few steps in and there's a far sharper stab. A tight pain. Cradled along his pelvis and below his stomach. He hasn't had cramps in so long he's forgotten what it was like. It's impossible though, he doesn't even have the means anymore, it has to be something else entirely.

But ever since Shadow kicked him, ever since his run to HQ, it's grown into something that's far harder to ignore. He huffs through his nose, hunching. There's a bead of heat between his legs. He swipes at it and stares at the spot of blood on his glove, ears ringing.

“Sonic?”

Everything narrows in. He looks at Shadow with wide eyes and there's metal bars, walls, the cell unfolding around him.

---

“Set him down here,” the Doc says, a worried frown on his bill.

He doesn't really remember being marched to the infirmary. Not exactly. He remembers Shadow in the hallway, the hedgehog ducking under his arm and helping him carry most of his weight. He remembers Shadow saying something, the side of his ribs plastered to his, the rumble of it, the lights passing overhead sticking in his eyes. Bile in his throat. His hand limp at his side, smeared with blood. Staring at it and hearing it in his ears; the breathing, the panting, the grunting, the smell of smoke-tinged fur, sweat, metal. Someone on top of him. Someone—

“Sonic?” the Doc starts, carefully and evenly, settled on a stool past his knee. “I'll need to do a full examination to determine what's causing the bleeding. However, I'll also need your permission to perform it.”

“I—” Sonic laughs thinly. He wants to say he's fine. He needs to. This is stupid anyway. It's just— “I'm—”

“I understand this procedure isn't comfortable. Your partner can stay in the room if that will make it easier for you.”

His ears press down tight. He looks at Shadow standing closer to the door, visibly uncomfortable and beyond tense, his fists balled and arms crossed tight over his chest. A deep frown on Shadow's muzzle. Neither of them correct the Doc's assumption.

“Is it okay if it's just me, Doc?” he asks, chest tightening.

Shadow steps out of the room without a word.

A part of him tenses up further now that it's just him and the elderly duck. The Doc's always been more than nice to him though, even right off the Death Egg. Only touching him when necessary and always with careful hands and a measured lightness. He still stiffens when the Doc tells him he'll have to lay back on the table. His quills fold under him and he stares at the ceiling, his hands balled into fists at his sides, jaw clenched. He counts the indentions on the ceiling. He waits.

The exam passes in sparks of uncomfortable coherency, of fingers searching over him, of talking during it all, confirming that no he can't have a period anymore, that it has to be something else. Metal inserted where it shouldn't be, being prodded at, staring at the ceiling tiles, the far wall, until finally he's looking at the floor and listening to the Doc tell him all the things he definitely can't do for the next week or so. Steroid cream for inflammation. Hot and cold compresses if needed. Rest.

He's handed lined boxers and basic recruit clothing. He hasn't had to wear pants since he stopped having a period, but now he's got the equivalent of the most average gym uniform he's ever seen hanging off his arms and legs. All scratchy and uncomfortable. There's a reason he stopped wearing clothes entirely the second he could. Barring all the other junk, it's just inconvenient, it gets in the way, and the seams and tags are more than annoying.

Unfortunately, the Doc said he could spot for a bit, that he's gotta keep the stitches on the rest of himself clean and ship-shape as well. I know it's not exactly comfortable, but it's merely temporary. He'd even been handed a liner. He'd laughed at it, but when he had to actually put it in the boxers, he couldn't help but think about how he'd somehow gone full circle right back to square one. Like some nightmare, mobius strip hamster wheel he's somehow found the end of.

Distantly, he can hear the Doc’s intonations, all dry and clinical. External wounds, the number of stitches like a casualty read out. Internal bruising and lacerations from the same claws that raked up his outsides.

The Doc clears his throat, pen tapping on his clipboard. “Due to the nature of your wounds, it's customary I ask, but would you like a kit to be done?”

He stares at the red pen in the Doc’s hand. “For what?”

“To collect evidence.”

He wrinkles his muzzle. He smiles weakly, eyes dragging back up to meet the Doc's. “It wasn't like that. Jus’ got a bit rough.”

The Doc frowns. “Next time ensure your partner files and trims down his claws. I'd advise proper lubrication as well, and if something is uncomfortable, communicate your needs.”

He doesn't miss the way the Doc's eyes drift towards the door to the infirmary pointedly.

Shadow's somewhere out there, waiting probably. His stomach twists. He doesn't have the ability to say it, jaw locked too tight. He knows he should scrub out the Doc’s assumption, snip and rip the rumor out by the root. It's simple to say, to open his mouth and tell the Doc that him and Shadow aren't—that Shadow wouldn't ever do something like that anyways.

“Yeah. Can do, Doc…”

When he finally leaves, there's a dull ringing in his ears. There's medication and sleeping pills he tried to decline shoved in the pocket of his brand new attire with a folded up piece of paper that he'd stared at for too long, treatment plan glaring at him from the top of the sheet. With a prescribed diet to regain and maintain his weight and everything. Yay him.

Shadow's leaned against the wall of the corridor outside of the infirmary, arms crossed. Narrowed red eyes immediately flick to the clothes, the bandages.

Sonic scowls at Shadow before he can stop himself. “You didn't have to shove me at the Doc. I was fine.”

Shadow's eyes sweep back up to meet his. “Clearly.”

“Whatever, man…” Sonic brushes past Shadow and heads further down the hall. “I'm outta here.”

There's footsteps behind him. A hand falls lightly on his shoulder, barely there.

“Where are you going?”

Sonic shrugs Shadow’s hand off and looks at him with drooped ears. “Does it matter?”

“You need to rest.”

He wonders if Shadow has super hearing, too. If he could hear everything through that door the whole time. About how he had someone's claws shoved into him last night. About how someone was less than careful with him and left him a little worse for wear. Toy. Slut. Waste. Whatever.

“Yeah?” Sonic smiles meanly. “You some kinda expert on what I need to do now?”

Shadow's lip curls. “Anything else will only prolong your recovery, you obstinate fool.”

He laughs. “Got that one out of a thesaurus, didja?"

“Do you have somewhere to stay?” Shadow asks, voice lower than usual. Almost quiet. Weirdly soft.

Sonic frowns. A rougher voice needles its way in at Shadow's words, black and white fur, hands firm, but gentle on his waist. Alcohol heady on his lips. All of it a mistake. His ears press back.

He could crash at Amy or Tails’ place, but then he's gotta answer the clothes question. The stitches. The fact he got messed up at all. He doesn't really want to have them look at him the same way Shadow did in the infirmary, in the showers, in Green Hill, in Rouge's kitchen. Ever since he got stupid enough to open his mouth and say something that wasn't even that true. He raped you, didn't he? He jerks his head to the side, teeth grit. Knuckles is dead wrong. He wanted to fuck Infinite. He—

“You can stay at Rouge's lodging.”

“Lodging? Dude, you can say apartment.”

Shadow looks at him flatly. “Do I have to drag you there as well or will you make it there yourself?”

“No.” Sonic scowls. “I can get there.”

“Are you sure?”

He looks between Shadow and the corridor. He doesn't really want to go out there looking like this at all. It's too obvious for one thing. He can't exactly run either. The Doc had even said it. Told him with a worried frown to at least try to take it easy for the first few days. Just in case.

“Yeah, totally, I'm—” Sonic jabs a thumb towards the exit sign plastered on the wall, ignoring the unnatural waver in his words. “I'll just—”

“The train runs beside her place,” Shadow says. “I can accompany you.”

His face goes hot. He doesn't need Shadow to escort him around like he's some stupid idiot. He's fine. It's just some scratches and junk. He'll get over them just like the rest. Maybe some of the scratches are inside of him, but whatever. They'll still heal all the same.

When Sonic looks back down the hall there's someone lingering there, he watches their eyes jump to the clothes he's wearing and his skin itches. A familiar discomfort he hasn't felt in a long time settles in.

He looks at Shadow and the strange smallness comes back to him the same way it did in the infirmary. “Okay...”

Chapter 8: you're gonna carry that weight

Summary:

finally, some much needed rest for the blue blur.
(the past still has a funny way of sticking around though.)

Notes:

annoying the sonadow side of the fandom by updating this thing again
and honestly I needed to put something up after that absolute shit show of an [redacted]...

My surgery was a success at least though. And the surgeon crew and care staff were all super sweet. woo.🙂‍↕️💓🏳️‍⚧️

If I missed typos or anything egregious spelling/editing wise in this sorry in advance, I'm kinda loopy AF from the pain meds and I'm very, very very sore 🥲

Plot relevant I swear but this doodle I did is somewhat close to the stuffed animal/squish mallow-esque thing that pops up in this chapter.

(And yes, there is a shadow one I cropped out lmao.)

Also! I haven't added it to the additional tags because it's brief but there's a vague masturbation scene in this chapter🫡
(Sonic refers to his t-dick by just dick for reference.)

There's a hitch and stiffness to Sonic's steps that Shadow is careful not to bring attention to. He knows the hedgehog will cover it up the moment he thinks it's too visible and adjust his gait into a manner that's even more painful for himself if he does.

He's unsure if the Doctor would recommend Sonic walk on his own this way without any support, but Sonic brushed off his attempts to help him again. The only reason he was able to get under Sonic's arm in the hallway at all before was because of the way Sonic's entire frame trembled from head to toe. Blue quills puffed out like he’d seen a ghost and his eyes wide, far away and drifting further.

Sonic's idiotically placed pride won't allow him to be supported let alone carried here. Shadow grits his teeth. If Sonic rips a stitch trying to be the hero to his own pain he's going to throw the first aid kit in Rouge's apartment at the imbecile’s head.

Transporting Sonic via Chaos Control crosses his mind as they make their way out of HQ, but it presents its own slew of issues. Namely the fact Sonic's own energy has dulled down to nearly nothing. The usual bright, glancing sparks that skitter around Sonic and make it impossible to ignore the hedgehog have vanished. It's not something the Doctor in the infirmary would be able to measure nor see, but it's difficult for Shadow not to.

Regardless, teleporting Sonic such a distance could be potentially harmful at this rate. Sonic's already unstable on his feet, he can tell there's a dizziness, a nausea as Sonic swipes at his mouth the same way Maria used to, taking a deep breath through his nose every so often and sighing heavily.

The train station is busy with the afternoon commuters and he keeps Sonic behind him, moving a path between people and keeping one ear flicked towards Sonic to ensure he doesn't lose track of him in the throng. He contemplates grabbing Sonic's hand to make the maneuvering easier, and then remembers the hallway, the way Sonic snarled at him everytime he so much as touched him.

Shadow stops abruptly when a large owl steps in his path and Sonic knocks into him from behind, hands grabbing him reflexively. For a moment, it's the deck of the ARK, the white-metal flooring, sprawled windows, the sunlight from the sky panels of the train station seeping into harsh fluorescence.

“Shadow?”

Maria's heartbeat, the fast signature of it behind him. A hand grabs his shoulder more firmly, gloved instead of bare and he blinks.

There's bodies moving around him. The sound of pings, announcements, the hiss of brakes, turnstiles turning over, the rumble of many voices all at once. The train station. He's—

“Keep up,” Shadow says, rolling the hand off of his shoulder and heading for the turnstiles.

He'll have to swipe the G.U.N. funded fare card twice. He's not sure why the Commander hasn't suspended them while G.U.N. is currently out of commission, but he's not above utilizing it for the sake of avoiding waiting in a line or interacting with anyone he doesn't have to at the moment.

Thankfully, they arrive with the train, the doors opening and the off-loading passengers exiting in a trickle of bodies. He has to herd Sonic onto it by grabbing the sleeve of the shirt he was given at the infirmary and gently tugging at it to remind the hedgehog that they’re supposed to be boarding. Again, he considers how grabbing Sonic's hand for this endeavor would have been more efficient, but he’s not about to posit the idea out loud. Sonic would shrug him off per usual at best and laugh at him at worst.

Shadow eyes the plastic shell seats, the metallic stanchion poles and the ceiling straps dangling down. “Can you sit?”

“Uh.” Sonic grimaces, ears tensed back as he tries to laugh. “Nah, probably not right now...”

It's the same way Sonic's voice trailed off in the hallway outside the infirmary. A weak ending to a usually quite confident statement. Shadow's hands prick under his gloves. He never thought he would miss the annoying grin and the cocky half-scoff, half-jeer punctuating every sentence, but it'd be far preferable to ushering around whatever this is.

The doors close and the train jolts to life. Sonic stumbles, off balance and unsteady even still. Shadow grabs his arm to ground him and he can't help but contemplate the frigidness under his fingers. Like a point of cold and dark compared to the other blips of Chaos Energy on the train car with them. Sonic's somehow become negative space, inverted.

He drops his hand once he notices Sonic's quills have flattened down, his eyes trained on the point of contact on his arm and unwavering. Once he releases him, he watches Sonic's ears flick towards the hushed talking of the other passengers around them, quills beginning to bristle defensively instead. It's akin to watching one of the cats at the shelter try to figure out if the food and the bedding and the new warmth around it is something it should run away from or claw at.

Shadow grimaces and grabs onto the stanchion closest to himself. Sonic grabs onto the same one.

After a moment, Sonic lists his weight against the stanchion, his face pinched as he shifts his legs, tail curling down. There's pain stamped in the crease above Sonic's eyes.

“Here.” Shadow maneuvers closer, turning his shoulder towards Sonic. “If it's easier, you can rest your weight on my shoul—”

Sonic practically plasters himself to his side, arms wrapped around his middle, chin on his shoulder. Shadow's fingers tighten on the metal pole. He can feel Sonic's heart tacking against him, breaths heavy in the junction of his neck.

“Sorry, man, heh…” Sonic goes to draw back.

“It's fine.”

Shadow forces his muscles to relax. A familiar procedure of taking whatever he's feeling and slipping it behind the wall of the current task he's meant to accomplish. Sonic needs help staying upright. That's all that matters.

“You're really warm, y’know,” Sonic murmurs, voice rumbling somewhere in Sonic's chest that's currently stuck against his arm. Inexplicably, the sensation curls up under Shadow's own ribs and festers. “Like a lizard or somethin’.”

“Lizards aren't warm.” Shadow huffs. “They're cold-blooded.”

Even if incorrect factually, at the least Sonic is talking again.

“So, you're an animal facts guy now?”

“It's simple knowledge. Perhaps if you took the time to read a book instead of constantly running about.”

“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say,” Sonic says. “‘n for the record I read plenty. Even got sucked into a few a’ the books.”

Shadow blinks. “What?”

“Seriously? You guys never…?” Sonic laughs. “Yeah, course not. Guess I jus’ got some weird ones.”

“You went inside of the story books?”

“Eh. Sorta?” Sonic shrugs. “In one of ‘em I was kinda supposed to stop this weird king guy, but there's a whole other story with that. You were there too, ‘n you challenged me to some kinda Knight's duel thingy or whatever. You sure talked some pretty big game, but I totally kicked your tail.”

Shadow scoffs. “Hardly an accurate tale then.”

“Hey, next time we go toe to toe I'll get some swords and we'll see exactly why I wiped the floor with ya the first time.”

The train continues along under them with a rhythmic, barely there sway to it. He never made a habit of taking the rail lines before the War nor did he after the fact once it had been all but destroyed and then rebuilt from the scraps. It had been one of the first things the Resistance focused on besides reestablishing a stable agricultural system and ridding the water table of the Doctor's factories and chemical plants. Connecting a majority of the cities was imperative to the mass movement and distribution of supplies needed for rebuilding. After all, carriers and aerial means can only do so much.

Sonic's breaths slow down measurably, the arms around him slackening as Sonic leans further into him.

Shadow's brow furrows. “Are you falling asleep?”

Sonic jolts with a breathy laugh against his neck. “What? No way. Just restin’ my eyes, thas’ all.”

He sighs. He supposes it can't be helped. The train comes to a stop and Sonic holds onto him tighter for a moment as the momentum pulls them forward.

“We're here.” Shadow figures that should be enough to signal to Sonic to release him, however— “Are you unable to walk?”

“I'm good,” Sonic says and nearly shoves off of him, wincing as he stumbles a step back. “ Just peachy—” Sonic jabs a thumb behind him. “We should probably get goin' already.”

This particular station is unfortunately far more alive with activity.

Families crowded around benches, refugee coordinators with clipboards calling out names. There are still those who have not been able to return home despite the efforts to bring the world back to how it was before the war. Shadow only hopes they will be able to eventually. Not only to clear out the crowded space and the headache the noise starts between his ears, but because he knows it’s a disquieting sensation, to be separated from all you’ve ever known so suddenly.

Sonic's steps hitch beside him and the blue hedgehog rests his shoulder against a wall while he takes a sharp breath, and then another. He's not sure Sonic’s meant to be in this much pain. The Doctor had seemed confident it would be somewhat persistent, but not debilitating.

Sonic's heart rate climbs erratically, his fingers shaking against the brick facing of the wall. It's not entirely pain then. Something else.

“Sonic.”

It's as if he’s not all there. Sonic's eyes dart towards him and then away with a strange quality to them, like he’s looking at something farther away.

“You’re in the train station in—”

Sonic laughs. “I know that, I—” A hissed breath, a curse. Uncharacteristic. Crude. “I'm fine, I just—” Sonic knuckles rub and knead at his own chest. “It just does this sometimes, I'll be good in a sec.”

It can't be normal to have something close to tachycardia in someone who runs as much as Sonic does. Sonic's resting heart rate is generally slow. Loud. Far stronger than the others around it. Currently it sounds as if it’s stampeding towards cardiac arrest.

Shadow reaches for his shoulder. “You should—”

Sonic bats his hand away. “I said I'm fine, dude.”

“At least sit down.”

Sonic glares at him. “I don't need to sit down.”

Shadow looks Sonic up and down pointedly, face flat.

“It's whatever, okay—” Sonic mashes his knuckles against his sternum. “Let's just get outta here.”

Shadow watches Sonic bee-line for the exit of the terminal and all but collapse once he's past the doors. His shoulder resting against the retaining wall, eyes wide and stuck on the concrete below his feet, a jitter in his hands. Sonic looks more cornered animal than anything else as he pants in short bursts of air. A part of him wonders what about the train or the station or the crowd caused such a reaction, but he also knows it's never so logical.

“Are you—”

Sonic shoves himself away from the wall, jerking upright near mechanically. “Which way’s her place?”

Sonic's sense of direction should be immaculate. It always has been. Shadow presumes it must be the only way to navigate the world at mach speed. However, it’s like the Eggman base all over again. Watching Sonic wind himself into circles on the cameras in the control room and then finally find the correct door by accident. Limping only when he thinks no one's looking.

Shadow narrows his eyes and Sonic's shoulders hike up.

“I—” Sonic turns one way and then another. “It's not like I take the train a lot, I jus’ dunno which direction we got off, so—”

“It's this way.”

Sonic blinks and then smiles. Wide and empty. “Right. Yeah, I totally knew that.”

He's quite sure Sonic didn't.

They make it a few blocks before he turns to find Sonic a few more paces behind him than he expected. Grimacing and holding his side, right over the particularly large set of claw marks he saw on Sonic in the showers. Without the shirt and gym shorts, he's sure he would see blood on the bandages. Perhaps he should have simply risked transporting him with Chaos Control before. The distance is shorter this time, the effects should be lesser—

“Why'd you stop?” Sonic asks, breaths tighter than normal.

“Perhaps we should—”

“I'm fine. We're almost there anyway. Let's just go.”

‘I'm fine.’ He's quite sure saying it a hundred times doesn't actually make it a reality and yet Sonic insists on continually saying it as if it’ll somehow miraculously come true.

Shadow holds out his hand.

Sonic eyes it skeptically. “What're you doin’?”

If Sonic won't listen to his well-being, than perhaps his ego. “You're slowing us down. It's faster this way.”

Sonic gives him a flat look, ears drooped. “Well, sorry for keeping you from your prime times, gramps.”

Shadow grimaces at the nickname, but persists regardless, keeping his hand held out.

“Is this just an excuse for you to hold hands with me?” Sonic asks with a put on smile.

“Just take the damn offer.”

“Geez, someone's extra grumpy today.”

Shadow meets Sonic halfway, grabbing his hand firmly in his.

---

---

Sonic's first thought is that Shadow's hand is very, very warm, even through the glove. Like touching a stovetop that's been used recently. The second is that he hopes he doesn't hurl as the world blinks out, tilts wildly and then reappears in a snap of color and light.

“Hey, do’ya really gotta call out the move you're gonna do every time or—woah.” The room spins and Sonic laughs.

Rouge's apartment surrounds them where sidewalk and street used to be. He wobbles harder and barely catches himself on the couch before he gracefully falls onto it. Graceful as in he doesn't face plant immediately. He has a calculated sort of plunge, landing on his side, arm pinned under him before he wriggles onto his back. The room spirals overhead, everything rocking like he's fallen into the ocean somehow, smacked face first into a boat being tossed around like it's nothing.

“The dizziness will wear off soon,” Shadow says.

“Woof...” Sonic touches his brow. “Talk about a head rush. I don't remember this happenin’ last time, so what gives?”

“You're injured.”

“So?”

Shadow sighs. “Your energy is concentrated on repairs.”

“Yeah,” Sonic says with a laugh. “That doesn't really clear anythin’ up, but thanks.”

“How do you use the Emeralds and still know this little about Chaos Energy?”

“I dunno. It's all just vibes mostly. Like here—” Sonic taps his chest. “They just kinda do their thing ‘n so do I.”

“Tch…it's a wonder you've survived this long.”

“Yeah.” Sonic shrugs with a smile. “It's a talent.”

Sonic pushes himself up once the dizziness dies down, shifting on the couch at the low burn stuck between his thighs, the quiet cramping, the way his new clothes stick to his bandages and fur. Somehow everything itches ever since the Doc stitched him up. He grimaces and tugs at the front of his shirt and when the neckline rubs against the back of his neck uncomfortably, he pulls at it harder.

“I'll be back soon.”

Sonic tilts his head at Shadow, but before he can get a word out the door opens and then shuts behind him. Great… Awesome. He's alone again. He gives an annoyed look to the apartment, ears flattened.

Well, he might as well explore the place. The media cabinet seems as good a place to start as any. He finds an old game console, one that's two generations before the AGES model Tails and him still use. MEATSACKS DO NOT TOUCH scrawled on the taped up side is more than a dead giveaway to the owner. There's old VHS tapes as well, a dinky VCR itself, dusty outdated stuff he hasn't seen in a while. Movies and shows from decades ago with neatly-penned labels on the sides of them. Alphabetical. Pristine. DVD cases litter the bottom drawer along with more modern junk that's strange compared to the geezer collection near it. A record player reveals itself from behind one of the bookshelf doors. A small, compact little thing with a small tonearm, a capped needle and a protected platter. Rifling through the vinyls placed carefully upright beside it, he finds they're just as dated as the old movies and shows are.

He shuts the door with a grin. Despite all his protests, Shadow really is just a grandpa at heart.

There's a jar on the kitchen counter he didn't notice before, a tin, flat-top with Grumpy Chow scrawled on the side in Rouge's handwriting. He shakes it and the coffee beans rattle incriminatingly. He still doesn't get how Shadow eats this stuff like cereal, but to each their own.

Shadow's room is empty as ever when he wanders down the hall. Bed made like a military soldier and immaculate. When he opens the sliding closet door he blinks at the safe. There's evidence of heat warping along the bubbled edges of it, where the coating got licked by a fire or something else. He squints at the faded keypad and pushes 1-2-3-4-5 just to see if Shadow's lazy enough to pick the combo and it tones negatively. 1-1-1-1-1 gives a similar result. He shrugs. It's a mystery for later at least. Besides the safe, there's not much else. A drawer in the otherwise empty dresser filled with clean socks, a bare set of keys shoved to one side of it that he assumes is for Shadow's motorcycle. Nothing else.

Rouge's is at least a little more entertaining. He doesn't dare step in fully, but even peeking in is enough to send his ears perked forward. It's way more opulent and decadent than Shadow's. All silky sheets and a large four poster bed. A decorated vanity and jewelry on display, the walls lined with shelves and shadow boxes all carefully and meticulously labeled, displaying jewels, gems and the like. He catches a glimpse of one of the placards and it's a date and location without context. Without a doubt he knows it's a recollection of where it was taken from and when. He laughs and shuts the door.

Walking back down the hall is grating in a way he can't place. He'd gotten so used to zipping everywhere in an instant that slowing down feels nearly torturous, like wading through molasses. In the living space he tugs at the front of his shirt again, pulling the neckline away from his throat with a frown. Being grounded sucks. He genuinely doesn't get how everyone just moves around this slowly all the time without losing it.

His hands smooth over the gym shorts and the pill bottle rattles in his pocket. Right. The meds. He fishes them out and tosses them onto the kitchen counter where it rolls and clatters into the sink alongside the steroid cream. He'll grab them out later. Probably. He flops onto the couch and stares at the ceiling, feet pedaling idly over the arm of it. A run would be great. Anything really.

When he closes his eyes he can see the Doc looking up at him from his clipboard, a tense smile on his beak. Polite, but uneasy. It'd been a run down of basic stuff since his last visit a year ago, a physical apparently shoved in for convenience amongst the rest of the junk. Admitting he's more than sexually active was whatever, it's the way the Doc asked if he uses protection and then frowned when he said he doesn't really keep track that made him reconsider ever opening his mouth. Before he left the Doc had put a hand on his forearm, gentle and barely there, Sonic, if there's ever anything else you need, the door's always open. All he could think about is the way Knuckles had his medical file. Confidentiality? He scrubs a hand over his face and laughs wryly. Yeah, right.

There's the other stuff the Doc said, too. No running, obviously. No fights. And then the cherry on top of it all: no sex for a bit and then he's supposed to ‘be careful and take it easy’. Whatever that means.

Sonic huffs out a sigh. It basically means he's stuck with the age old question: what's he supposed to do with himself now?

He flops over to look at the TV and grabs the remote.

---

Once flipping through daytime channels proves fruitless, he switches to the DVD player, putting on whatever was already shoved inside. Some cheesy, B-movie horror flick. The exact kind Amy and him used to turn on and make popcorn together for and laugh at the shitty one-liners or shout at the main character's more than stupid decisions.

He tries to stay honed in on it, but everything starts to go restless, a familiar ache and heat between his thighs growing the longer he lays there. The hammed up, half off-screen sex scene doesn't help things. It's like every single thought he has spins back around and concentrates right between his legs. All pressure and restlessness, his heart tacking fast under his sternum the more he thinks about it.

When the final girl gets pinned by a werewolf and snapped at for the second time in five minutes, he turns over onto his back, looks at the ceiling and decides trying to jerk off on his rival’s couch isn't that weird. It's not like Shadow's here. Or Rouge. And the Doc didn't say anything about not jerking off and it's not like he's ever really needed to shove anything inside himself to get off before. So no harm, no foul.

Getting a hand down his boxers at least helps unwind some of the tension. There's the dull, background reminder of pain alongside the persistent burn lower in him, but it floods out once he actually works at himself, the hotter his skin gets under his fur, the tighter his belly winds. He slings an arm over his eyes and plucks at nebulous, broken up images of someone's fingers on him, rutting against someone else's thigh. All friction. Nameless, faceless, sensation and just something.

It doesn't stay there. The hands turn to pinning him, crushing him, holding him against the metal floor while someone rocks forward on top of him. His stomach curls. Bile thickens his throat. He breathes tightly through his nose, snout crumpling and hips shifting against the couch, tail trying to wag where it's stuck under him. His legs shiver, his stomach tautening up further.

He pushes his heels against the couch and hits the arm of it, hitching up into his fingers. Before he knows it, the edge gets closer and closer. He grabs at the cushion beside his head hard enough his fingers hurt, eyes crumpled shut, breaths tight and—

The door opens.

He yanks his hand out of his boxers so fast he smacks into his own chin. When he tries to bolt upright on the couch, he wildly miscalculates it and smacks into the ground with a punch of air. Sweat-sticky, face hot, dick aching and breaths beyond heavy; it's all a little too incriminating.

Shadow stares at him unamusedly from the open door, handle caught in one hand, bags of groceries in the other.

Sonic's ears press back and he laughs. “What?”

Shadow shuts the door behind him and stalks for the kitchen. “Go wash your hands.”

“I totally wasn't—”

“I don't care what you get up to.”

Sonic huffs, getting to his feet and heading for the kitchen. Great. He slaps the tap on with the heel of his palm and washes them in jerky, annoyed motions. He didn't even get to finish.

“You're kind of the world's biggest cock block, y’know that?”

Shadow says nothing, moving around the kitchen behind him.

Sonic turns only for a grater to be shoved into one hand and a still wrapped block of cheese in the other. “Wha—?”

“I assume you at least know how how to do this much,” Shadow says, turning to unload the rest of the items from the grocery bag on the counter.

“I know how to grate cheese, man.”

“Then do it.”

He looks over the ingredients settled on the counter and then at Shadow. “What're you doing?”

“What does it look like?” Shadow moves for the stove top, a flat, shallow belly cast iron settled on the surface with a sharp thud. “You haven't eaten since yesterday afternoon I assume.”

“Maybe.”

Shadow grabs a bowl from the lower cabinet beside the oven and sets it on the counter. “Here.”

Sonic grates the cheese slowly while Shadow prepares all the other ingredients. When the block gets down to the nubby end, he tosses it inside the bowl and chucks the grater into the sink. He sits on the counter to watch Shadow work, legs swinging, heels bumping against the cabinet below him.

“Okay, but seriously, dude, why’re you doing this?”

Shadow side eyes him, sentinel in front of the stove top, hot dogs popping and hissing from the oil in the pan. “Because you need to eat.”

“No I mean all of this.”

“All of what?”

“You coulda just grabbed one to go. You didn't have to make it yourself.”

Shadow’s eyes drift away from him and then back like they never wandered at all. “Would you prefer if I stopped cooking?”

“No, ‘course not.”

It'd sound absolutely bonkers to explain to Shadow, but there's something specifically about the guy making food for him that makes him uneasy in the gut. Like he's being chased or something. Like he's got this tether on his neck and the more he lets Shadow do for him another length of chain ratchets up with every shiny new thing. Like he's cashing debts he can't possibly pay back here.

He doesn't know what to do with all of it. What he's supposed to do. He can't exactly just get on his knees and thank Shadow that way. He's pretty sure Shadow would kick his teeth in. Or laugh at him like he's some kinda joke. He's not even sure which would be worse, honestly.

“Get off the counter.”

Sonic slips off the counters’ lip, the smell of a more than familiar meal clawing the hunger in him right to the forefront.

“Sit down.”

He sits at the kitchen table, legs jogging under him. A plate is dropped in front of him unceremoniously. It's a chili dog. Standard fare, the usual works. He fidgets with the edge of the plate, stomach twisting despite the way he feels like he could down five hundred of these things if given the chance. It's still warm when he picks it up, beyond fresh. It's more than clean, he literally watched Shadow make it in front of him. It's fine. It's…

When he finally takes a bite he looks over at Shadow with wide eyes. “Woah, this is actually really good.”

“Hmph.” Shadow turns away and grabs the pan and the pot off the stove without a word, like he already knew it would be, like he never had a doubt at all.

Shadow starts cleaning up the kitchen while he eats. It takes a bit longer than usual for him to work down to nothing but a scrap of bun, but it's more than he's managed in a while. Finished he grabs up his plate and rinses it off, slotting it into the sink when he opens the dishwasher and sees it's full already. Not just with dishes, but lots of other junk he's pretty sure definitely doesn't belong in a dishwasher. He shuts the door and shrugs. It's none of his business how Rouge and Shadow use the space really.

As he turns, something is tossed into his chest. Sonic catches it easily and looks down at the can of Chao Cola.

“There's only one case,” Shadow says evenly. “I assume you lack the self control to pace yourself, so if you require more, you'll have to get them yourself.”

“Wow, you must really be tryna butter me up here.” Sonic tosses up the can and snatches it midair with a grin. “What's the special occasion?”

Shadow's frowns, ears flicking towards him and then away. “Your medications are on the counter.”

Oh, yeah… He grimaces. He forgot about those. Shadow must have fished them out of the sink when he saw where he'd tossed them. He rattles the pill bottle once he picks it up, eyes flicking over to Shadow who watches him the way someone might inspect a skittish animal, something unpredictable.

“How many do’ya think it'll take to knock me flat?” Sonic asks with a tight smile.

Shadow doesn't laugh.

“Man. Tough crowd…” Sonic unscrews the cap, pressing the child safety sides down and popping it open. “Guess two couldn't hurt.”

Shadow snatches the bottle out of his hand and turns it so the instructions are facing him. “Read the side, you imbecile.”

Sonic squints. “One? C'mon, dude. That's not gonna do squat. I had horse tranqs shoved into my food for like six months straight.”

There's an acridness on his tongue. A blank space in his head. A photo folded and sealed shut at the edges. He remembers the bar stool under his thighs, the sweat of his own breaths, the alcohol thick in his nose. Perfume. Blood. Someone's tongue in his mouth, running over his teeth, bitter, too cold spit and—

Shadow shakes out one pill and closes the bottle with a click. “You get one. Two if this doesn't work in an hour.”

Sonic stares at the pill Shadow presses into the center of his palm. It's small. Unassuming. His mouth feels chalky, his tongue too dry. “Yeah. Sounds good.”

It's different. Swallowing it like this. When he pushes it between his teeth and grabs the Chao Cola to down it, everything's far away. Like he's sitting in the back seat of someone else's car. Like he's not the one who takes the swig and washes it all away. Nothing happens. His ears press back and he sets the cup down with a click on the counter.

He stares at his hand on the countertop and it's not really his. The fingers, the palm pads, the peachy tan of it. There's no cuff on his wrist and out of all of the illusions Infinite's made up for him, this one is by far the most elaborate. This one almost hurts the most.

Something brushes his shoulder. It's like tapping on a window pane three panels deep. He hears it more than he feels it. The fingers dig in.

“—ic. Sonic.”

Everything snaps back into place and he blinks. “Yeah? What?”

Shadow lets go of him. “You should lay down.”

“Right.” Sonic laughs, fingers wringing at his wrist. “Good call…”

He doesn't miss the way Shadow's ears flick down, or the way his brow pinches as he trudges past him without another word.

The couch is at least comfortable. It only takes a while of lazing on it and mindlessly staring at the textured ceiling for a more than familiar feeling to set in. He blinks and the white spackle overhead becomes sectioned panels cut up by rivets.

His heart beats slowly in his ears as everything goes sluggish. When he closes his eyes he can hear the drip of a condensation leak from a nearby vent outside his cell. Plip, plip, plip. Infinite should be back soon. Plip…

He'll be back any minute…

He…

---

Sonic bolts awake, breathing fast, arm smacking into the couch cushion as he sits up with shivers in his limbs. He stares wide-eyed at Shadow standing behind the back of the sofa, the other hedgehog’s hand raised towards him. Shadow slowly drops his arm back to his side with a frown.

Sonic's eyes snap over to the window, the balcony door beyond the kitchen, the darkness outside of it, the small sliver of a punched out sunset. When he looks over at the cable box under the TV and the time blinking on it, he realizes it's a sunrise instead. Shit. When the hell did he—

“Man…how long was I out?” Sonic asks, scrubbing at his face, heart still beating heavy in his chest. An unease ripples like something turning under the surface of his skin.

“A while.”

Sonic cards a hand through his quills and sighs. It's like he went six hundred rounds with Perfect Chaos. Got chewed up in Dark Gaia’s magma maw and spit out. Every inch of him throbs and aches in a way he can't remember it doing in a long time.

“Did you want a sitz bath drawn?” Shadow asks without any fanfare.

Sonic squints at him. “For what?”

“Healing,” Shadow says, "and the pain.”

“Right.” Sonic's ears droop. “I guess, sure.”

“If you don't want to, you can—”

“Nah, it's fine. I should probably—” Sonic laughs thinly. “If it'll help, then yeah, totally.” He makes a face. “I'll sit in some water or whatever…”

Shadow eyes him. “Why do you dislike water so much?”

“I don't dislike it, dude. I don't like drowning. There's a big difference.”

“And baths?”

“I mean…” Sonic scratches at his muzzle. “They're kinda gross. Sitting in your own dirty water, like, how does that get you clean?”

Shadow rolls his eyes and turns towards the hall, heading for the bathroom.

Sonic pushes himself off the couch and trots after him, hands held out. “What? C'mon, I'm right. You know I'm right about this.”

Shadow opens the bathroom door and looks over at him. “Go grab the bag in the kitchen.”

It's when he actually picks up the bag that he realizes there's more than just groceries that Shadow went out and bought. He glances over everything and his ears flip down, face hot.

Shadow's already cleaning the bathtub when he walks into the bathroom. And it's admittedly a little bizarre to see him kneeling and doing something so weirdly domestic and not very Ultimate Lifeform-y. It's nothing like fighting or racing. Or cool, government agent spy stuff. Or really anything that's synonymous with Shadow the Hedgehog.

Sonic drops the bag next to Shadow's legs and plops himself on the closed toilet seat lid, careful to roll his weight onto one thigh. “So…”

Shadow flips on the tap. The sound of water hitting the basin fills the quiet as Shadow keeps his hand held under the spray of water, testing the temperature. Shadow glances at him out of the corner of his eye. “What?”

“How do you even know what a pad is?”

Shadow’s eyes narrow. “Why wouldn't I?”

“Well.” Sonic's looks pointedly down at Shadow's waist and then back up. He got more than acquainted with Shadow Jr. once, enough to know without a doubt what the guy's packing. “It's not like you need them.”

Shadow scoffs. “And that means I'm supposed to be ignorant?”

“Nah, it's just—” Sonic fidgets with his gloves. “Isn't it weird to stand around in the aisle and, y’know, buy something?”

“It's a similar premise to purchasing any other essential. I don't see what you're trying to get at here.”

He sighs. Maybe being raised in space really is weird. Shadow's only friend was a girl after all, so maybe that's—

Shadow shuts off the water and stands. “Check the temperature for yourself.”

Sonic shucks off his gloves and sticks his hand in the shallow water. It's hot. Like hot hot. He winces back, rubbing at his fingers. “Geez, dude—” He glances at Shadow's hand that he definitely saw under the tap. “Didja not even feel that? It's practically lava.”

Shadow flexes his fingers, fur still damp, the red line down the back of his hand shiny and wet. “No.”

“Really?”

Shadow grabs the bag off the floor, pulling out the items and setting them out on the counter methodically. Epsom salt, pads, toothbrush, toothpaste, the same soap he remembers from the last time he had to care for the incisions on his chest. He assumes all of it's meant for himself.

He stares at the box of pads and his ears go hot. He hasn't had to look one of those in the face in a bit, long enough he forgot how kitschy and weird the branding can be. Shadow tears the top off the Epsom salt bag and measures it out into his palm before dropping it into the shallow bath and stirring it around with his hand. Not even flinching even though Sonic can still see steam curling off the water.

“It should cool down soon…keep your stitches above the water line if you can,” Shadow says. And then he leaves, the door shutting softly behind him.

Sonic sits and stares at all the stuff Shadow bought, the bath, the moisture heavy in his nose and salt-tinged. A strange feeling in his chest creeps in as he looks under the counter for a place to shove all of it. He definitely doesn't want to be that guy and take up all the counter space while he's here. Tucking out a small corner for his things, he shoves everything as far into the back and as out of sight as he can.

Finished, Sonic looks at the bath skeptically. It's shallow at least. He picks at the fabric of his gym shorts, his shirt. He looks at his gloves discarded on the floor and a shriveling sensation chews at him. Now that he's got clothes on for the first time in a while, he wants them off again. He also doesn't. It hardly makes any sense.

He locks the door before he can gather what he's even doing and the unease evens out slightly. Usually he likes to keep the door wide open, the lock and latch as far away from each other as possible. He tests the handle and it doesn't budge. It's stupid, but it helps make it easier to peel off his shirt and his shorts and the boxers with the liner he trashes, wadding it up in toilet paper to hide it for good measure. He bundles up the clothes and throws them in the corner.

The bandages itch fiercely and the bath is thankfully shallow enough to not get the bulk of them wet. He removes the ones on his hips just in case, yanking at where the adhesive tugs at his fur and skin.

The bath is warm when he settles into it. He lies back slowly, the sound of the water gurgling and displacing around him crawls up his spine and he breathes shallowly. Gooseflesh breaks out under his fur.

It only comes up to his hips anyways. It's fine. He's totally fine. It's not like anyone's ever drowned in less than half a foot of water. He tries to relax, but there's a tension snagged under his skin that won't go away.

He looks at the door. He scrubs a waterlogged hand over his shoulder, massages at the net of overlapping scars bitten into him and the warmth of the water slides through his fur like blood.

---

Sonic's ear twitches towards the footsteps outside, his shoulderblades pressed against the cold porcelain behind him as the sound gets louder. A tightness in his chest that he's become too familiar with worsens. His heart tacks loud in his ears. The footfalls take on a hollower sound, longer, wider—the corridor past his cell is mostly invisible to him outside the view of the bars, but he's memorized Infinite's footfalls. The exact cadence, the beat. He knows the guy can float, but Infinite still chooses to do this just for him every time. The steps get closer. Louder.

Sonic jerks his snout down, ears pressing back. It's not that big of a deal, really. It'll just be like any other time. He stares at the bathroom door. The gaps in his cell. The bolts and metal and dimly lit panelings.

When the footsteps pass by without stopping, Sonic shrinks. It's fine. Maybe he won't get water today, or food. Maybe he won't be able to sleep comfortably. A shiver wracks his hands. It's okay, though. It's—

He'll just eat whatever he managed to stash in his quills from the scraps of the meal Infinite brought him before they had sex the last time. And he can go without water for a bit. Infinite will come back soon anyway. He always does. He's given the guy plenty enough incentive to come back around to him. He's still more than fuckable. He knows Infinite wants to fuck him. And maybe he didn't really do that great last time, sure, but he'll just do better than ever next time then. It's foolproof. Solid. It's an indisputable fact.

The footsteps come back and he grabs at the lip of the tub, leaning towards it. There's a knock. A lock disengaging. Sonic's skin crawls, every inch of him like there's ants burrowed under his skin. The door pushes open and for a moment it's him listing against the unyielding bars of his cell instead of the edge of a bath.

“Here,” Shadow says, setting the towels on the counter. “So you don't make a mess.”

Sonic stares up at Shadow, heart beating too fast under his ribs. Every point of red in his vision sticking and sliding around the more he can't tear his eyes away from Shadow's own.

“Sonic.”

Sonic jolts and laughs, face scrunching and muzzle pulling to the side. “Yeah, ’m not gonna mess up your tiles. Got it.”

Shadow's brow furrows and he doesn't leave. He just stares. And—

“What?” Sonic asks, ears flipped back. “You gonna stick around to watch?”

The fur on his nape rises as he says it, his quills flattening. What would they think if they saw you now? There's someone huffing on top of him, a hand shoved into the side of his snout, empty red eyes meeting his from outside the cell. A low groan. Teeth in his shoulder. Still nothing. Not even a flinch. Shadow doesn't do anything. He just keeps watching and he—

A hand touches the arm he's slung over the rim of the bath and Sonic jerks away, teeth bared.

“Are you—”

“Can you just leave me alone for five seconds, man,” Sonic snaps out, chest heaving.

Shadow's gone and the door's closed before he can register the words he's even said. He can hear his own breaths against the tiles, loud and harsher than they're supposed to be. Water sloshes faintly as he presses his forehead into his knees and closes his eyes.

The faint hum of fluorescent lights overhead doesn't go away. It never really does.

---

There's another knock, softer this time and Sonic blinks.

He got out of the bath at some point. Apparently. Now sitting and leaned against the tub with a towel cradled under him, the bath mat fuzzy under his shins, another towel wrapped around his shoulders. Soft and warm.

When the door opens he looks up at Shadow and his stomach curdles.

“Sorry about earlier… I really shouldn't’ve said that, I—”

“Those need to be rewrapped.” Shadow says, glancing down at where the stitched wounds on his lower half are bare. “Go sit on the couch.”

“Okay, but what if I—”

“Then sit in one of the chairs.”

Once he sits down at the dining table, Shadow brings out another, clean set of clothes he must've bought with the groceries and sets them aside on the table, all carefully folded. There's a medkit as well. Gauze, ointments, scissors. Shadow crouches beside him and starts to wrap his wounds. It's oddly tender and strangely soft. He almost squirms in his seat as Shadow works and he tries not to compare any part of it to the Infinite stuck in his head, but all he can see is the same concentrated distance in Shadow's eyes, black fur bleeding into gray as Shadow smooths his palm over a bandage and moves onto the next wound.

There's a click as Shadow snaps the medkit shut, finished. Everything is rewrapped more than perfectly. Shadow hadn't lingered more than necessary, didn't dig his fingers into a wound to watch him writhe in place and bite down on the sound the pain pried out of him. If anything, Shadow had been more meticulous and gentle than he's ever seen the hedgehog be with anything.

Somehow, even still, all Sonic can feel is hands running over the bandages on his thighs and shoving his legs apart. He shifts in his seat, scrubbing at his quills and pressing his knees together as tightly as he can. It's like there's something breathing on his back. Like if he turns around he'll finally see whatever keeps following him around. When he glances behind himself, there's nothing there. Something about that feels worse.

He doesn't miss the way Shadow watches him the whole time either.

“Thanks,” Sonic says quieter than he means to. “For all this, I mean, I—you don't gotta, y’know, stick around.” Sonic laughs tightly. “I'll be totally fine on my own if you needed to go.”

“I have no current obligations.”

“What a way to say you've got no life.”

“Tch.” Shadow snaps the medkit shut. “As if you're one to talk.”

“Oh?” Sonic laughs. “Another joke?”

Shadow's ears flick back.

“Two in one day, Shads? You must really like me.”

Shadow grimaces. “Shut up.”

“Mm, nope,” he says, with a grin.

Shadow huffs at that, almost a laugh and grumbles something.

“Didn't catch that one, but I'm just gonna assume you said something about how awesome and cool and great I am so—”

Shadow tosses the clothes at him. “Get dressed.”

“And here I thoughtcha liked me better naked.”

Shadow sighs and looks at the wall with the flattest expression he's ever seen and then back at him. “You're usually naked. We don't normally wear clothes.”

Sonic smiles, rakishly. “So, you're saying you miss the view?”

Shadow makes an annoyed sound, low in his throat. “Either get dressed or don't, I don't care, but if you bleed on the furniture, you'll be the one cleaning it up.”

“Alright, alright,” Sonic laughs. “Fine.”

---

Shadow busies himself with cleaning the kitchen after Sonic tugs his clothes back on. Some kind of meticulous routine thing that he watches Shadow mark off on the calendar and then go about more than robotically. He expects at the least for Shadow to flip on some tunes, bop his head to music or turn on a show in the living room to halfway entertain him through it. But Shadow scrubs at the sink like it's the most interesting thing on the planet and Sonic's never been more bored in his life.

He finds the guts of the media cabinet again and digs around for anything that looks remotely interesting. Nothing pings and he smacks the drawer shut with a sigh. Flopping onto the couch he snatches up the remote and turns the TV on. He can hear Shadow rummaging around in the kitchen, smell disinfectants and the slight sting of bleach and the tap being turned on. He flips through the channels idly, eyes half-lidded. Rerun after rerun. Bor-ing. He gets it though, it's probably hard to get the show and movie studios back up and running after everything that happened, but there has to be something new. Next. Next. Nex—

"—e've definitely seen this kind of thing with other too-famous, too-young types before, it's not really anything new, just never thought Sonic'd be the type to—"

Sonic slams the channel-up button, chest aching the whole way. Gossip news isn't exactly what he's after here either. The next channel is stuck on commercials and he lets them play out, feet tapping at the floor. His eyes drift shut the longer it goes on for. There's a familiar chime, a jingle, he bolts up and fumbles with the remote, dropping it onto the cushions and groping for it blindly, eyes glued to the screen. He manages to snatch it up and shut the whole thing off a moment too late.

He stares at his reflection stuck in the blank black box of the dead TV, wide-eyed and too tiny. He thought they would've stopped running that ad ages ago. It'd been some commercial spot deal he'd done way before the Death Egg. He scrubs a hand over his eyes and keeps them screwed shut, muzzle wrinkled with how hard he grits his teeth.

It's like he's got his own smile carved on the inside of his eyelids. A too big, too sharp cut of sincere white that grows and festers the longer he thinks about it. His own voice too, nearly unrecognizable and wriggling in his ears, growing larger and louder.

He swallows the bad taste in his mouth. It's— Fuck, it's really not even anything big, it's just— He—

He feels the slight dip as Shadow settles onto the opposite side of the couch. There’s something dropped into his lap and he opens his eyes and stares at it.

To his surprise, it's some kind of stuffed animal. The fact it has a similar color scheme to himself doesn't escape him, nor the threaded embroidery made to mimic his quills. It's definitely a hedgehog, but more like a real animal though, all four-legged and not like them. It's weirdly kind of cute. Blue fur with round black eyes. It's heavier than he thought it'd be, too. Weighted by the beads in its belly.

“What’s this?” Sonic asks, turning it over to see the little paw pads sewn and embroidered on each foot. The tiny blue nub tail.

“A gag gift from Rouge.”

“Gag gift?” Sonic chuckles. “Didn't think you even knew what those were. Why was it in her room?” He can only assume that's where Shadow pilfered it from considering he didn't see it anywhere before.

“I didn't accept it.”

“C'mon, what? You can't just refuse a gift.”

Shadow side eyes him. “Why not?”

Sonic opens his mouth and then closes it. He never really thought about it like that to be honest. “Like, I guess you can? But it's kinda not somethin’ you really do.”

“She obviously wanted it more than I did,” Shadow says. “It was only gifted to me out of obligation.”

“Obligation?”

Shadow crosses his arms.

“What does that even mean?” Sonic asks, setting the hedgehog plush back down in his lap. “Gifts are just stuff you want to give someone.”

“I suppose.”

“You ‘spose?” Sonic slowly tucks his legs up under himself and turns towards Shadow on the sofa.

Shadow is stiff, almost leaning away from him, eyes firmly locked on the blank-screened TV.

“Did she get it for your birthday?”

“I don't see why that matters.”

“Because it's your birthday, dude. It's kinda a big deal.”

“I don't age,” Shadow says.

“So?”

Shadow glances at him, top lip curled up enough to show a fang. “What is the purpose of a birthday in regards to me then?”

Sonic supposes on paper its a celebration of another year, sure. Of getting older. Aging and all that, but— “You can just celebrate still bein’ around, I guess.”

“It doesn't seem worth celebrating if it’s a guarantee.”

“It's also fun too, y’know. To party. To be around friends.”

Shadow looks away, face carefully blank.

“You do know how to have fun, don'tcha?”

“Yes.”

Sonic laughs. “Sure, sure. Bein’ all edgy and broody doesn't count though.”

Shadow's muzzle wrinkles. “I don't brood.”

“So you're admitting you're edgy then?”

“Hardly.”

“Well, you're not exactly soft around the edges, pal…”

Shadow turns to him, abandoning his feint of watching the empty TV at all. “And am I supposed to befriend every buffoon I cross paths with on a whim like you do?”

“No,” Sonic says, snout wrinkling up. “And whatever, man, I'm just bein’ nice. Maybe try it out some time. Might really blow your mind.”

“My apologies then that I don't particularly enjoy smiling at strangers.”

“Well, I could help ya practice.”

Shadow's brow furrows. “I don't need practice. I just don't do it. I don't understand what's so hard to grasp about this.”

“Dontcha you wanna come across friendlier? I mean, it's gotta get old, scaring off everyone within five miles of your whole attitude.”

“No.”

Sonic raises his hands. “Alright then.”

Shadow huffs, eyes turned down towards the couch cushions between them. “Why do you do it?”

Sonic tilts his head. “Do what?”

“Smile when you don't actually mean it.”

Sonic mashes the hedgehog stuffed animals face in-between his hands until it's unrecognizable, his chest tightening strangely. “I dunno. It's just easier.”

“Easier than what?”

“Anythin’ else, I guess.” Sonic shrugs. “It's just whatever. If it makes someone feel better than it's worth keepin’ it on jus’ for them, y'know.”

“Hm…”

Sonic's ears flip down at that, he pulls the hedgehog stuffed animal further up his lap and keeps his arms cradled around it. “Well why dontcha smile at all?”

Shadow stiffens, his ear flicking towards him and then away with a rigid set to his shoulders. “I smile.”

Sonic snorts. “Yeah, okay. Sure ya do.”

Shadow frowns. “I don't need to prove myself to you.”

Sonic raises his hands. “Okay, I get it. You're embarrassed to admitcha don't know how to smi—”

Shadow suddenly snatches the hedgehog stuffed animal out of his lap to hold it hostage on the other side of the couch.

“Hey! C'mon, man. What gives?”

“I believe the saying is ‘dibs’.” Shadow huffs through his nose, the corner of his lip lifting. “You're the one who said it was my gift, after all.”

Sonic laughs, subtly reaching for the kitschy throw pillow beside his thigh. “Oh, I see how it is.”

Shadow scoffs. “As if you can see anything past your inflated ego—”

Sonic slams the pillow right into the side of Shadow's head. The fabric snags on his quills, tearing loudly, and Shadow takes the hit with all the give and posture of a brick wall.

Shadow narrows his eyes at him.

“Wait—” Sonic drops the pillow putting his hands up, smiling. “Hey, hey, look, I know l sorta started this, but we can be civil here, can't we? Just hand over the—”

There's a pillow smacked across his snout and Sonic splutters. He rolls up to his knees, already grabbing his own pillow-made-weapon again and getting another strike in before he scrambles over the back of the couch to hide behind it with a laugh.

“What about shared custody?” Sonic calls, looking up. “You get it on weekends, and I’ll get it on—”

“No.”

Sonic's shoulders sag.

He doesn't expect the hedgehog stuffed animal to suddenly be dropped into his lap, or for Shadow to be standing in front of him. His hands knead at the blue fabric and fluff near reflexively, squashing down until the thing's almost flat before letting it puff back up.

“It's your problem now,” Shadow says before walking towards the kitchen.

Sonic squishes the hedgehog’s face between his palms and laughs tightly. “Didja hear that, little buddy? He called you a problem...”

---

It all started out pretty good, so he's not really sure how it soured so badly.

Shadow started making dinner after the fiasco in the living room and he tried to help at the other hedgehog's insistence to pitch in. Sonic didn't really know where to start and after only a bit he was told to sit back down, the kitchen acrid with smoke-pointed olive oil and burnt minced garlic.

He glares at the tabletop, fingers drumming against it.

He's not stupid. He just needs some directions. It's not like he enjoys spending time in the kitchen, not when the convenience of take out exists and there's places to be, people to see. And it's not his fault Shadow likes to go all Master Chef in his free time. Or that the guy sucks at giving explanations. And he'd been a little distracted. Sure. Even now he can still feel it, someone's hand cupping the back of his neck that isn't there, sliding down the flat of his chest and over his stomach, lower, until—

Sonic shoves his chair back.

He snatches the hedgehog stuffed animal from the couch on his way towards Shadow's room. The door smacks shut behind him and the sheets are colder than he expected them to be as he clambers into them. He shudders under them, tucking into a ball around the stuffed animal in his arms, quills bristled out. He'd rather go for a run right about now. Be at a bar. A club. Wherever people are who know him enough to recognize him, but not enough to give a shit about him. Not enough to warrant all of this. Whatever this is.

Toy. Liar. Burden. Slut. Waste. Problem. Sonic turns the words over, sifts through them like sand slipping through his fingers. He wants to leave, but he can't. He wants to tell Shadow to stop making food for him and doing all of this stuff and he can't either. He wants to be somewhere else. Anywhere else. He wants to stay. He wants to never step foot outside ever again. It oscillates wildly in his head and getting a grip on it feels about as pleasant as the prospect of plucking out his own teeth.

The door opens a moment later. Something is set on the sheets and then the door shuts quietly again. Sonic uncurls and looks at the foot of the bed. Eyes skipping over the sweating bottle of water right to the folded up blanket beside it, wrapped up and bundled with an electrical cord. He shakes it out. It's the super soft kind of heated blanket, with filaments snaking under the fabric flesh of it like flexible little spinal chords. He plugs it in and turns it on and it starts to warm under his fingers almost instantly. It's nice. It's more than nice. He looks at the door, his chest hurting and ears flat. He's not sure why Shadow dropped it off in here at all.

He curls up under it after it heats up all the way, pulling the stuffed animal under his chin, arms wrapped around it tightly. Legs tucked up towards his chest as he hides his face away. He probably looks dumb like this. It's not exactly awesomely cool hero guy material. It's nothing like the Sonic he saw on the TV screen or the one in the train; all grinning billboard ghosts, some kind of endless haunting.

The curtains are drawn over the window and the room is dark. And, at the least, nobody can see him in here…

---

---

Shadow sighs and lowers the burner. He leaves the cuts of flank steak to simmer in the pan after remedying Sonic's mishap at the stove.

He hadn't meant to come across so harshly about the mistake. He merely knew that left on the heat much longer the oil could flash fire, that Sonic had been too close to it, and the kinds of injuries from something like that would be non conducive to Sonic's recovery.

He didn't expect Sonic to leave so abruptly after. Or to hear his bedroom door shut with a slight rattle through the apartment. He'd gone in to check on Sonic briefly after, and the other hedgehog had already been curled up tightly under the sheets.

Outside of his own room now, Shadow contemplates going inside to check on him again. Sonic had shivered badly enough when he fell asleep on the couch earlier that he figured Rouge's heated blanket could only do the hedgehog favors. It had also been a while since he'd seen the hedgehog drink anything besides the soda from earlier. So he had brought him both, hoping at the least Sonic will eventually use one or the other. Ideally both. Part of him wants to go in and ensure Sonic's at least hydrating properly. Resting. Healing.

Can you just leave me alone for five seconds, man.

Deciding against going inside, Shadow sits down cross-legged outside of the door instead, one ear flicked towards the sound of the sear in the kitchen, the other towards Sonic.

He’s unsure what exactly he's meant to do here. He knows whenever Maria was feeling particularly unwell she sometimes preferred to be left alone on the worst days of it. But this isn't merely an illness. Not in the same way at least.

It's an injury. A wound. There had been a slight pink tinge to the bath water before he drained it and disinfected it again, whether from the claw marks, the bites or what the Doctor diagnosed in the infirmary he doesn't know.

He hadn't meant to eavesdrop on the conversation behind the closed door either, but the corridor had been quiet. The Doctor loud in the relative silence. Sonic's heartbeat had been strangely slow as well considering the situation. And Sonic himself uncharacteristically unresponsive, giving monosyllabic responses when prompted until certain questions jumped his heart rate back up only to give empty platitudes, to laugh, to smile. Shadow knows exactly what that smile looks like now. The fake one.

He doesn't quite understand why anyone would lie to a medical professional. They're not merely there to judge, only to treat. It doesn't make logical sense. When prompted Sonic had claimed he hadn't been assaulted and yet all the evidence clearly points to the contrary. He doesn't understand the benefit of covering it up. It hardly makes a difference. The event occurred regardless.

Shadow listens to Sonic's breaths even out behind the door, the faint hum of the heated blanket working away. Heartbeat steady, more than alive and well. This isn't a physical ailment. There's no wheeze or crackle, no irregularity to any part of Sonic's physiology that can attempt to be cured by any means he’s familiar with nor capable of.

There's no protocol for this. No understanding from his time on the ARK besides a succinct disclosure of the acts perpetrated against his own person. Something Sonic continually refuses to do unless it's to make a joke, some rote minimization of it all or a snarled affront. There's no training from G.U.N either. Nothing he's gained in his own personal research of the surface and its people to aid him in the treatment of this.

Shadow rests his face in his palms, eyes closed, and, for the first time in a very long time, he feels particularly useless.

Notes:

Thank you for reading all my silly little words!
And I know this fic isn't exactly the masterful escape fantasy fiction that a lot of us need right now @my fellow USAmericans, especially my fellow trans southerners.

I wish the best for y'all always, genuinely and truly. 💓🫂 Take care of yourselves and each other. Solidarity and action in our local communities will always be our greatest strength. 💓🏳️‍⚧️

Chapter 9: damn the man, save the empire

Notes:

Hello. It's been a while. Infecting the sonadow tag with an update again :3

So...Sonic says some not so chill stuff in this chapter. Like he's really putting his foot in his mouth in parts of this with unintentional consequences to those who happen to hear it (Shadow).

...sorry to these hedgehogs... they're still adjusting to being stuck together. like two cats having to be slowly introduced to each other in the same apartment. they're also still very much both not in therapy, despite whatever Shadow's intellectualized and packaged away about himself and his own trauma (it's all words and technical jargon and it's still not him feeling the feelings properly 😮‍💨...)

warning: this chapter includes mostly thinking, talking and snoozing im so sorry🫠
and Doctor Quack is an actual character in the Archie Comics lmao, I'm just borrowing him to be HQ's doc

Amy still remembers the exact moment she heard Sonic was alive.

She'd always wondered what those secret, one on one meetings with Knuckles and Rouge consisted of and at one point she'd even chalked it up to the two of them merely working off steam behind closed doors. It's not like she could ever fault either of them for finding company in each other during the War. She'd spent enough nights by herself, hugging her own arms under the too cold sheets of a too cold base and watching the wall as she thought about all the things she should be doing instead of sleeping. All the things she needed to do. That Sonic would want her to do. He'd want her to help fix the world. Make it free again. Give everyone back the chance to nap under the sun, eat whatever they want, go wherever they want; all small, little things that always felt pretty big the way Sonic described them.

Knuckles had patched everyone into the same call that day. There'd been a mountain of paperwork on her desk, the constant blinking of the comm unit hooked over her ears and slid along her muzzle. Call after call. Squadron leaders barking status movements and charges and the map she used to follow them that only gave her the cold, hard facts and none of the actual loss. The front line is where she'd been at the start. And then they needed someone to coordinate the patterns of attack, they'd all chosen Knuckles to be Commander because he was the most bluntly charismatic about it. The most enthusiastic. Angry, even, sometimes. She remembers the way the anger felt too.

It hadn't been fair. What happened to Sonic, to Tails, to all the families they couldn't save. To all the soldiers whose names crossed her desk and she signed at the bottom and checked deceased and got what remains could be gathered sent where they needed to go.

That day had been no different. Another death certificate penned through followed by a ping on the comm. Amy assumed she was about to bear witness to another frantic scramble down the line that would leave her heart aching all night and the next day. With a frown, she had reached up and patched the call through.

The second she heard Sonic's voice, nothing else really mattered. It didn't feel real. She felt like she was somewhere else entirely, her hand numb where she clasped it over her snout and stared at a map that blurred into nonsense colors, tears springing to her eyes and tracking down her muzzle.

Amy had covered up the choked sound that tried to leave her. Laughing at something Sonic said, because of course even after six months of being dead he'd still be Sonic. Alive, she had thought. Alive and coming home and smiling and laughing and okay. He's okay! Everything will be okay again…

She still remembers how the only thought in her head was that she hoped this one wasn't a dream too.

Amy sighs, resting her face in her hands as she bends over her desk. Sonic saved the day in record time once his feet hit the ground. She'd hugged him. He'd hugged her back. He smiled. She hadn't really noticed it or seen it. He looked about as fine as someone who spent half a year in a cell ‘under torture’, as Rouge had put it. She didn't see any scars or marks that were too bad. Some bruising. Under his eyes, around his wrists, the same rubbed raw chafing the other prisoners of war that Espio and the Chaotix managed to retrieve had on them. Sonic laughed a lot those first few days. Too much maybe. At everything. Like a reflex kicking in, even at bad news. Like a smile he couldn't really turn off.

He looked tired, too. Amy noticed that much. But they all were during the War. And for the first week, he slept at the desk opposite of hers instead of in the room they'd decided he could use that was once meant for Knuckles. She hadn't minded it at first. It meant she knew she wasn't merely dreaming or seeing things, he was alive, more than alive. Sometimes someone would drop something off behind him and Sonic would jolt awake hard enough she could hear where his knees smacked into the desk’s underbelly. It wasn't even fear she'd see cross his face. It was a snarl, something ugly and uncharacteristic on Sonic’s snout, matched by bristled quills and balled fists. Like he was waking up already anticipating a fight.

It never lasted long. He'd catch her eyes and smile again, back to normal. Everything was back to normal. Even when Sonic started spending more and more time holed up in his room at HQ. Even when he began to miss meetings. Even when contacting him at times proved fruitless and he'd answer after the fifth ring, out of breath to the point where Amy could only assume he’d been on a run he still wasn't used to yet.

Amy didn't even blink when he vanished after the War was over. Off to a new adventure like always. She knew he'd be back around eventually.

And then…Sonic stayed gone. From her at least. From HQ. When she'd asked Tails over the months, even he only saw Sonic sparingly. It was the time critical mission that Sonic showed back up for, after months of nothing. When she'd called him and said there was a potential planet wide issue if they didn't get the data from Eggman's original base at the start of the War and have Tails and Rouge farm everything they could from it, he'd immediately agreed to it. She can't deny even now, she'd been happy to see him again when he entered the debrief with her before he left with Shadow. Rouge had explained the basics of the situation, the reason she couldn't access it herself and Sonic had nodded along, cracking a quip or two on rota.

Amy can't quite explain it to herself even in hindsight, but his voice had been flatter. Something dull and dragging at the end of the sentences that didn't used to be there. She'd found herself looking at a bent and broken quill behind Sonic's ear and wondering when the last time he really sat down to comb through and prune himself was. A call had come through from one of the clean up squadrons in Sunset Heights and she rushed out of the room to answer it. By time she got back into the room, it'd only been Rouge sat at the console, staring up at the map with a slight frown.

Amy had sent word to Tails to come to HQ while Sonic and Shadow completed the mission. She'd watched with the thumb of her glove wedged between her teeth as Shadow and Sonic's icons moved on the map of the base layout, the trackers in their ears feeding a basic status back to them. Heartbeats. Vitals. Nothing too fancy. She watched Sonic's spike into the red erratically. Tail’s ears had perked up beside her, the device he'd been working on abandoned as he looked at the map screen.

“Do you think something happened?” Tails had asked, nervous hands already moving over the keys.

Amy placed a hand over his gently. “I'm sure they would've called if they were in trouble, Tails. It's okay.”

Tails didn't look at her the rest of the mission, eyes firmly glued on Sonic's little puck icon and the way his heart rate slowed back down into the blue. Shadow sent a clipped comm message to her about their return and hung up before she could reply. Sonic walked into the room after Shadow, a smile on his face, but with a hint of sharpness, like when he gets annoyed by something and won't say what caused it. She immediately noticed the new bandage on his shoulder as well.

Amy and Tails' eyes had met for a moment at the sight of it. There wasn't any blood. Neither reported any kind of altercation that went badly either. Shadow practically shoved the server blades into Tails hands and turned heel and left before any of them could say a word. Sonic rocked back onto his heels with a platitude, some script she can't even recall anymore, and saluted both of them smarmily before he followed in Shadow's wake. Her eyes had fallen down to something on his back. Along his ribs. Under the fur. She hadn't been sure what she'd been seeing, but having seen the scrapes and cuts under her own fur after a battle before, it looked almost like he'd fallen into a Badnik's claws. Like it had grabbed his waist and—

Amy frowns, fidgeting with the remote for the map screen as she sighs. There's certainly no sense in dwelling on the past like this. She flips the input over before she can stop herself and the nighttime news takes up the screen.

“—spotted leaving the station yesterday with none other than Shadow the Hedgehog. Can you believe it? Some of our on site media specialists managed to get a picture, which you'll see here in a moment.”

Amy huffs and rolls her eyes. ‘Media specialists’ is a funny way to word paparazzi. Huffy camera vultures. She's had her fair share of one or two approach her about Sonic, about her relationship with him, feelings, whatever they can pry out for a few more views. The picture that pops up on screen and covers up the host is of Sonic stepping out of a set of open train doors, Shadow beside him, gently pulling on the sleeve of his shirt with an expression on his face she'd almost call concerned. It's the bandages covering the parts of Sonic not swamped in clothes that have her putting a hand over her mouth. The bruising under his eyes. He looks sick. She just saw him, too. She's not even sure what could've happened between her seeing Sonic at the cafe and then this.

And why didn't Shadow tell her what had happened?

‘There's blood.’

Amy's ears press back. Shadow had caught onto something inside HQ and then the train photo with a bandaged up Sonic cropped up after the fact. Something just isn't adding up here.

She's standing before she can even register she's gotten up, the door and the hallway pass like blurs until she finds the infirmary. She's seen that outfit Sonic's wearing before. The kind of soft cotton-y recruit clothes used for those who come to them with nothing left of their own. Doctor Quack's in the room once she opens it and he smiles at her before it all falls into a slight frown.

“Miss Rose, how can I help you? Is everything all right?”

“Was Sonic here recently?”

“I…” Doctor Quack clears his throat. “I'm technically not at patient liberty to disclose that information to you, I'm sorry. If you have an order from the Commander or authorization from Sonic to release medical information to you, then I could disclose any recent visitations.”

Amy digs out the tablet shoved into the pocket of her dress, and thank goodness she modified these ones herself to have the kind of pockets that can hold just about anything. Ringing up Knuckles is easier said than done. She got off her call with him that afternoon with the promise to talk to Shadow again, and now she's starting to really think Shadow does know a lot more about what's been going on than she thought.

“What?” Knuckles asks groggily, scrubbing at his face. “Don't tell me the place is on fire already.”

“I need an override to get Sonic's medical information.”

Knuckles stares blankly at her, brows furrowing. “Why?”

“Please, Knuckles, it's important. I wouldn't ask for it if it wasn't.”

“Amy…you're not gonna like what you find in there, trust me, it's not worth it, just let it g—”

“Knuckles.”

“Okay. All right. Fine.”

Knuckles intones the override lifelessly as she turns up the volume and flips the tablet around for the Doctor to witness it. The duck smiles uncomfortably, fidgeting with the lapels of his white coat.

“There. Happy?”

“Very,” Amy says. “Thank you, Knuckles.”

Knuckles sighs heavily. “Don't thank me for this...”

The connection lost screen pops up and she assumes Knuckles disconnected the call on his end. She puts the tablet back in her pocket and looks at the Doctor. “Was Sonic here recently?”

“Yes,” the Doctor says, resigned, almost tired. “He was.”

Amy's shoulders fall. Why hadn't Shadow called her the moment he found Sonic? Why hadn't he— “Was Shadow here too?”

The Doctor's eyes shift left. “I'm not at liberty to disclose that information.”

Amy huffs. “Fine. What was Sonic here for?”

“Untreated injuries.”

A rush of air leaves her as her ears press back. “What kind?”

“It may be wise to be seated for this, I don't know how much of this you've already been privy to.” The Doctor gestures to a patient chair and then rolls his own closer before taking a seat stiffly.

When she sits, it feels like something slamming shut behind her. Something final. Like the second her tail hits the back of the seat she can't go back from the Amy that walked through the door and demanded answers she didn't have.

“Please,” Amy says, her chest already aching. “Just tell me what happened.”

---

Possible sexual assault. Internal injuries. External lacerations. Bruising. Damage to the—

Those were only the results of Sonic's latest visit. Amy finds herself stuck in the hallway, a fist curled up over her heart and eyes hot with tears. The Doctor had given her the entire file when she asked for it. The whole story. From the moment Sonic got off the Death Egg to now. Each new line was somehow worse than the first one. She closed it when she got to the documented photos from that first day back home, Sonic’s chin tilted up, a clear close-up view of old bruising around his neck visible under the thin fur. It's usually hard to see it, she didn't even notice it when he got into HQ and was ushered to the infirmary when Knuckles and her saw how thin he looked.

She doesn't really know how it's all possible, anything she read in that file. Half of it is terrible speculation noted with Sonic's repeated denials and the Doctor's own guesstimates. The evidence of something horribly awful, even without any details. Surely she would've known. Surely she would've been able to tell if Infinite—if Sonic was—if he'd been…

She covers her snout with her hand, nausea thick in her throat. How could she have missed something like this?

“I'm so sorry…” Amy says to an empty hallway. Most people have turned in for the night or gone home. It's just her and typed black ink on white paper burned into the back of her mind.

She still remembers the way she hugged Sonic after the Death Egg. The way he tensed under her like usual, always sort of bracing himself and leaning back. Sometimes, even before everything, he'd playfully push her away gently with a laugh and she'd let him because it's what he was more comfortable with. He'd gone still under her hug that time though. Limp after a moment and quiet, not even breathing. She'd been the one to retreat first and his arms had stayed by his sides. He smiled after with a delay, like he was remembering he was supposed to. She's not sure if it met his eyes anymore.

And Sonic flinched away from her that day when she tried to invite him to one of the cafes for a bite to eat. He recoiled when she reached for his hands across the table after he finally accepted her offer. He didn't eat a single ounce of food, not even her baking. He stared at the table like it wasn't there, like he was seeing something else. He got mad at that wolf in the cafe, too, the one with the grey fur and the white hair and the blue eyes—

Amy feels the sick climb up her throat, her stomach heavy with it. Why didn't she realize it before? Why didn't she see it?

Her hands cover her face and her shoulders hitch. Why didn't they find him and get him off the Death Egg sooner?

Why didn't she do anything sooner?

---

---

By Sonic's best guestimate, he gets a few hours of sleep in before he's stuck sitting against the headboard and staring at the closed door.

Swinging it open and leaving it ajar so he can try to get some more shuteye crosses Sonic’s mind the same way the prospect of the front door to the apartment giving under his shoulder does. Green Hill, some distant siren song, Station Square, Sunset City—it's a weekend. The night club scene is more than alive tonight and he's got a spot reserved in every single one of them that starts with a smile.

He's never had to wait in line at the more exclusive joints. Never had to worry about VIP lists or the question of ‘who do ya know' before. Heck, he could pick any place in any city and he'd be inside before the bouncer finishes checking his ID and clapping him on the back and telling him some story or other about how he saved so and so’s mom's cousin or whatever.

‘Just you?’ Some heavyweight with a clipboard twisting his head around like that'll conjure up some imaginary second place beside him. He never understood the point of that. Why would he pull up to the one place on the planet where you can find the three best things at once—bass, booze, bodies—and bring a date? He's no expert, but he's pretty sure half the point of showing up to a club is to not leave it alone. If he's lucky he can get run through twice before he's even back out the doors at lights up, wobbling on someone else's arm and a step from blacked out.

But now—now he's all grounded. Wings clipped. Some pitiful baby-bird parody stuck in a little makeshift nest, or whatever it is this whole thing is supposed to be.

And Shadow never came to bed apparently.

Sonic stares at the metallic shine of the door knob. He supposes that tracks, logically or whatever. However Shadow would put it. Maybe there really is something wrong with him and Shadow can see it, like an impression pushing up under his skin, warping the way his fur and his quills sit on him. Maybe Shadow saw it on him that first time they shared a bed. Woke up before him and looked over and realized that he really didn't want to stick around for a second longer.

Sonic turns his palm over and slides his thumb over the face of the pads of it. Going back to bed now sounds about as good an idea as trying to convince Shadow to let him leave the apartment. If it isn't the dream where his feet hit pavement and he leaves the Death Egg far, far behind him only to find an empty planet—some dried out husk without bodies left behind—like everyone heard he was coming back and decided that was the perfect time to book it. If it's not that one, it's the one where he's stuck in the burning corridors. Every turn another hallway that stretches further the faster he runs and he never finds the stars.

At least the one where he's drowning are nothing new really. Small miracles, he supposes as he pushes the sheets all the way off with his feet and stares at the dry belly of the mattress. There's not a drop of water in sight and yet there's the burn of salt in the back of his throat, the sting of it stuck in his nose. He's a hundred miles from the ocean and yet he can taste it like he's underwater and can't find the surface all over again. The more he stares at the sheets, the sensation of something grabbing his ankles and dragging him down grows.

Sonic shoves out of the bed with a stumble. He rakes a hand through his quills as he eyes the flooring past his feet like it's the most interesting thing on the planet. He just needs a glass of water to get the taste out of his mouth. To smooth the clogged up feeling in his throat. Keep his hands on something that's steadier than they are. That's all. He's pretty sure Shadow can't fault him for that.

The corridor is empty and dark when he pushes his way into it and he blinks at the lack of metal-concrete lifelessness. There's a blue-purple sliver of light from under Rouge's bedroom door that illuminates his socks and the fur on his ankles. He stares at the strange glow it casts on his fur for a lot longer than he should.

She must've gotten home while he was trying his best to get some sleep. There's an amalgamation of a conversation in his head, an estimate of what Rouge and Shadow probably said to each other when they inevitably crossed paths somewhere in the hallway or the kitchen. All he can hear is the word trouble. Again.

Sonic slinks past her door with hot shoulders, shame sticky on his neck. The kitchen is clean and empty, the way he assumes it usually is, and he stands in front of the sink long enough he's sure he's worried footprints into the floor by the time he decides against dirtying the place up by touching anything. It's not like he needs the water that badly anyways.

Rounding back to Shadow's room is an easy enough routine. It's way longer than six paces. Which is bigger than his cell. The hallway is more like seven alone, then there's four or five to the kitchen, two or three more to the fridge. If he shortens his strides it feels longer. Wider. The space feels way bigger if he just pretends like it is. He pauses behind the sofa in the living room and looks at the front door, ears flicked back.

Maybe this is what freedom is supposed to be like…getting to choose whatever room he's stuck in next.

He turns towards the kitchen and then the hallway. It's never felt this hard to choose before. He's thirsty. He's tired. He wants to go for a run that he can't go on. It's like spinning in place as he looks between all of his options and feels the room shrink around him. The bandages rasp under his fingers as he slips a hand under his shirt and scratches at them, dull claws dragging at the lip of the gauze tape. A grimace flickers across his face. Sonic hooks his finger under it and tugs harshly until it stings as he yanks a few furs free with it and his stitches protest the motion. He pulls at it harder.

There's a sudden sound from the couch. He jolts away at first, startling himself with the action, his quills bristled and eyes wide. When Sonic finally peers over the back of the sofa, he's pretty sure he's not supposed to be seeing what he finds there. Shadow's asleep. Curled up on one half of it like he's making room for someone else, or like he doesn't think he's supposed to let his legs take up too much space. One or the other, and Sonic knows Rouge is the one who put that blanket over him when she walked by here earlier. Snout half-hidden against the couch's arm, Shadow looks way smaller than he remembers him seeming when he'd sat next to him a few hours ago. All tucked up, his shoulders turned inward and contorted in a way that almost looks painful.

It's a little voyeuristic maybe, but Sonic settles on the other side of the coffee table and sits cross legged, his knees tucked up underneath it. Keeping it like a barrier between them, Sonic slumps over it, his chin pillowed in his arms as he watches Shadow sleep. Maybe it's mega creepy. Maybe he's all kinds of weird for finding it even a little bit reassuring or soothing or whatever about it eases the tension in his chest, but he finds his eyes drifting closed the longer he sits there.

It's always like there's something gently pushing at his ears as he falls asleep these days. Everything cutting down and dulling out. After a moment, he slackens against the table and breathes slowly.

..
…
. . . .

Something grabs the back of his neck. There's metal under his chest, digging into his chin and he can't breathe right like this, shoved up against the bench of his cell with someone's weight on top of him. He tries to wrench the words out of his mouth and it's a whine of air. Something unintelligible. He can't breathe. He can't move.

“Sonic.”

The fingers dig in harder. He hears panting. An arm bars beside his snout and somehow without seeing it he knows it's grey. Or white. Or black. Or red. Or—

“Soni—”

Sonic slams awake, his knees knocking the underside of the table as he shoves backwards and into the media cabinet, the TV rattling its protest over his shoulder. All he can hear is his heart in his ears. His own harsh breaths. It takes him a moment to realize he's staring at Shadow who's more than a handful of paces away and sitting up on the couch, absolutely nowhere near him. He's in Rouge's living room. There's wood flooring under him and not metal. Nobody's touching him. Nobody touched him.

He laughs around the tightness in his chest and scrubs at his ears. He can still feel hands on him somehow. Bile pulses in his throat and he covers his mouth to stop it from heaving up further.

“Lower your head between your knees,” Shadow says evenly, like he's talking to a child or something.

That alone grates at him, but he tries his best to get his body to obey and it's like wrenching it around on strings. Sonic gets his legs up, knees bent as he drops his forehead between them like Shadow said. Admittedly, it helps a tiny bit. Until the image from his dream flickers behind his eyes and heat flares all over him again. It's like the sound and the smell is everywhere. Like he can feel someone pressed along his back and panting into his neck. The sickness in his throat twists up higher.

The Shadow clone never touched him. The illusion, the copy, the whatever. He's one hundred percent sure Infinite didn't ever have it do that. Shadow wouldn't—

“What happened?” Shadow asks.

Sonic screws his eyes shut tighter, keeping his head down. There has to be something wrong with him. Fundamentally and down to the core, all rotten and picked over, to ever come up with something like that. He wraps his arms over his shins and tries to keep his hands from shivering the way they want to.

“Sonic.”

“''m fine, man.” Sonic breathes out heavier than he should. “I‘m good.”

He hears Shadow get up and he presses back against the cabinet behind him with a laugh, throwing a smile on for good measure as he looks up.

“Seriously, I'm—” It all wobbles when he looks up and sees Shadow frowning down at him. “I'm okay. I'm…I dunno, just a—its jus’ a stupid dream. Nothing big. ‘s really not…” His eyes prick against his will for the first time in forever and Sonic shakes off the sensation and blinks it all away quickly. He shrugs it off instead and smiles sharper. “It's not real, so whatever.”

Shadow pauses at that. Sonic would never admit it, but he breathes easier when Shadow crouches down, when the blank look from before actually crumples into something more like concern.

“What's not real?” Shadow asks quietly. Quieter than he's supposed to.

Sonic realizes that this all kind of sounds bad. As if he can't tell what's some stupid Infinite mind game and what's right in front of his face. Of course he can tell what's real! It's easy. Sonic looks along the seam of the floorboard next to his foot and imagines it unraveling with a flicker of red light.

For a moment, he considers a possibility; that his dreams are the reality and that this is somehow the hopeful nightmare. Maybe he's still stuck under some other body, doped out on whatever drugs Infinite’s fed him enough times he can barely wake up and this is the stupid little fantasy he's clinging onto. Some impossible possibility where he actually got out. Where he went home and then decided he didn't like any of the stuff he missed the way he thought he would've.

Maybe Infinite did have the illusions fuck him and he just forgot. Maybe it's happening right now. Maybe he's still in his cell. Maybe he never left. Maybe he—

“You're here.”

“I know that. I'm not stupid,” Sonic says sharply.

“No one's saying you are.”

“Sure you're not.” Sonic barks out a laugh and then sobers, his face falling flat. “Why’re you even doin’ this?”

Shadow blinks at him, brow furrowed. “Doing what?”

He bares his teeth. “Isn't this kinda beneath you? Y’know, being the Ultimate Lifeform and all. Don't you got better things to do? Kinda a waste playing nursemaid to some guy who can't handle a little bit of claw action.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You heard the Doc, didn't’cha? Your ears are better than mine.”

“You were assaulted, it wasn't—”

“No,” Sonic says firmly. “I wasn't.”

Shadows ears fold back suddenly.

“Heck, Shadow—” Sonic smiles through every word, bile high in his throat as he leans forward. “I practically begged him to do it.”

“That's—”

“You actually think someone could ever get the drop on me like that? Really?” Sonic laughs bitterly, throwing a hand out for good measure. “I'm kinda the fastest thing alive. Pinning me down’s next to pigs flying on the list of stuff that just doesn't happen.”

Shadow's quiet for a moment, eyes pinched oddly and hands clenching around nothing as he looks away. “Your injuries are consistent with a more violent encounter...”

‘He raped you, didn't he?’

“What? You think someone could actually rape me? Me?” Sonic bites out, shoulders hiked high, smile bared in a grimace. “Dude, c'mon. Like yeah I'm not at the top of my game or whatever, but I'm not totally pathetic.”

Shadow's face falls instantly and there's a beat of silence before: “So you're saying I'm pathetic?”

All of Sonic's artificial pomp takes a nosedive and he feels his stomach drop, his chest choking up in an instant like he's been punched in the sternum. “No? No. What? I didn't say that. I wouldn't—why would I ever say that, man?”

Shadow bares his teeth silently and gets to his feet before heading for the kitchen without looking at him.

Sonic feels like his stomach goes past falling at that and slams through the ground. Every inch of him burns up as his hands shake. He's never felt more like the slimiest, grossest thing on the planet then right now. He quickly shoves himself to his feet and follows after Shadow, keeping the kitchen counter between them so Shadow can't see the way he can't keep his limbs under control anymore.

“Shadow, I didn't mean you, I just meant, like…” he trails off, gesturing lamely as the words stumble into nothing in his mouth.

“Meant what?” Shadow asks, grabbing something off the counter and shifting it over in what seems more like a way to keep his hands occupied than anything else.

“I don't know, okay? It just came out, but I'd never mean it like that, I wouldn't ever mean that. You know I wouldn't.”

Shadow finally looks up at him with a frown. “Your insatiable need to continuously dodge the truth at every junction isn't my problem. If you genuinely believe I'm pathetic for something I didn't ask for, then fine.” Shadow turns towards the fridge and opens it, side-eyeing him from over the low door. “At least I know what happened to me.”

His heart thuds in his ears, mouth dry. “You're not pathetic, dude.”

Shadow shuts the fridge a bit too hard and sets a carton of eggs on the counter with a sharp thunk. “I don't care about your platitudes. Either go back to sleep or help me make breakfast.”

Fine. Okay. Okay, okay, okay. He can do that. He can totally do that. Shadow abandons the carton on the counter and goes back to the fridge. Sonic takes that as a silent signal to get to work. It's easier said than done; flipping open the carton, grabbing a pan out and setting it on the stove and rummaging around for some kind of oil or lard to grease it with. He fumbles with the knob on the cooktop and watches the element go bright, violent red under the glass. The fur on the nape of his neck immediately stands on end. He flicks the knob over to the smaller burner setting so it's hidden underneath the pan fully.

Pathetic. His shoulders and neck burn as he listens to Shadow go about his own routine behind him. The sound of a knife chopping through its chosen victim is loud in the quiet and he flinches when he hears it tack sharply against the wood.

He grimaces and reaches for one of the eggs, cracking it against the edge of the pan easily before dumping its contents in. Some of it clings stubbornly to the shell and he runs his finger along the inside. A nauseous swirl grabs him by the gut at the viscous sensation against his fur and finger pad. The sink can't get turned on fast enough as he slams it on with the heel of his palm and scrubs at his hand under the water. He only notices the water is too hot when he sees the steam. When his hand pads turn an angry red.

Sonic shuts off the sink quickly and presses a hand towel into the sting. Shadow cuts through another unwilling vegetable behind him and he feels bile climb up his throat. It's too quiet. He can hear his heartbeat like it's knocking against his ribs, feel his pulse where its climbed up under his chin. Getting back to where the eggs are already popping and sizzling, he grabs the handle of the pan and shifts it slightly. The white discs slide wetly, the yolks glaring at him accusingly. Even this somehow makes him feel sick. Like the whole kitchen’s armed against him. And Shadow still isn't saying anything. The knife cuts behind him and hits the board again and Sonic stares down at the eggs looking back at him in all their gold-yellow coldness.

He opens his mouth before he can think any better of it. “I think she put something in my drink.”

He hears Shadow freeze behind him, the knife stopped halfway through some unsuspecting carrot.

He looks away from the sliver of red light he can see from under the pan as he shifts it again. “I dunno…I shoulda realized it. I mean, she was pushy ‘n all but I just thought it's cause she wanted to sleep with me, cause I mean, c'mon, who doesn't? And I guess she did, y'know, but I woulda gone with her anyway. I didn't know there was something in that drink, I just—” Sonic shrugs and stares at the metallic glare spilling over the stove. “It's not like I wouldn't’ve gone home with her anyway.”

Shadow's silent. Maybe that's worse. Maybe that's better. He doesn't know anymore. All he can hear is himself calling Shadow pathetic in the living room. Someone else's voice a hundred million miles away saying it even quieter, hissed into the side of his throat like a brand.

“And her boyfriend was pretty big. I can't really—” Sonic laughs, ears shoved down. “I remember that much. I jus’ don't get why she didn't ask…I mean, I don't really care, it's whatever.”

“She drugged you,” Shadow says with a note of epiphany and something else that stings even worse.

“Yeah. I guess she did.”

“So you were date raped.”

He winces. “No.”

Shadow sighs heavily. “Then what else could it have possibly been?”

“I don't know, okay. I—it wasn't that though.” Sonic glances back at Shadow over his shoulder. The strange softness to Shadow's face somehow scares him more than anything else. “It's different. Like I said I woulda fucked her anyways. Her stupid boyfriend, too. So…”

“Did you even want to be there?”

He shrugs. “I mean I stayed the mornin’ after cause she wanted me to—” Sonic laughs and grins tightly. “I stuck around for that and it was fine.”

Shadow's ears press back tightly, a grimace overtaking his snout.

“I'm totally okay, promise. I'm good. It wasn't even that bad. I've had way worse, so it's really not that—”

“The eggs are burning.”

Sonic whips around and wrenches the pan off the burner, almost shoving it too far up the back lip of the flattop. “Shit, dude, why didn'tcha say something sooner?”

He hears Shadow put the knife down and his steps suddenly get closer. Something in him sends him turning around to face Shadow's approach head on. His fists clenched at his sides and the heat of the stovetop warm at his back as he leans away before he can stop himself. He watches Shadow loom closer. Ears slammed tight against his skull, breath stuck in his chest and everything locked up, like if he doesn't move then he can't be seen. He distantly hears the click-click of the burner being turned off, feels Shadow's arm reach around where he's backed into the stove, the heat on his spine worse than ever. There's a tug at his shirt as Shadow pulls him away from it and then another harder more insistent one.

Sonic grabs Shadow's wrist, his hand numb at the fingertips. “Don't—”

“You burnt your shirt on the stove top,” Shadow says. “It could melt into your fur.”

He wants to tell Shadow to stop as he grabs the bottom hem and carefully rolls the shirt higher on his torso, but he can't. Everything crashes sideways, like shoving some horribly built block tower over. Sonic can almost hear the clatter of each piece as Shadow's fingers brush the fur of his torso, his bandages, higher.

There's the harsh panting of someone on top of him. A burnt smell. Sweat. Like wood-smoke stained fur shoved against his muzzle, his own spit smeared on his snout and his teeth aching from how hard he's clenched his jaw shut. Fingers paw at his sides, grabbing at him and his shoulders and holding him in place. Thighs trapped wide. There's metal scraping under his back with each movement. Bolts overhead. It hurts more than he thought it would. He's counted the rivets three times already and it's still not done yet. Thirty-nine, forty, forty-one, forty-two. There's a grunt of air from the mask shoved into the side of his throat. He's still—

“Look, I'll—” Sonic squirms out of Shadow's grip with a hard breath, shoving the shirt back down where it's supposed to sit on him. “I'll do whatever you want later, jus’ lemme keep it on.”

It's dead silent. The eggs already burnt to crisps in the pan hiss softly. He can feel the heat from the charred parts of his shirt sticking to his fur, see where Shadow's hands are still frozen from where he shoved out of reach of them.

Sonic turns back to the stove and smears the back of his hand across his muzzle with a sharp huff. He's gotta fix this whole mess. He screwed up the eggs, but it's not like there isn't a full carton of them. Grabbing the pan he realizes it's too hot to trash them and the oil into the trash bag, so he heads for the recycling bin and digs around for a container to temporarily dump his mistake into. There's an empty, flat-top one for yogurt or something or other that he manages to fish out, the label on the side refusing to focus the longer he stares at it. It's good enough. It has to be good enough. It's—

“What are you doing?” Shadow asks.

He sends a tight smile to Shadow and the room wobbles from how fast he looks over his shoulder. He steadies himself on the counter. “What's it look like? I'm making breakfast.”

“You should sit down, your medication hasn't completely worn off.”

“I can do this, okay. Just lemme do, like, one thing. I don't—” Sonic puts the container down on the stove top harder than he intended to. “I don't need you to do everything for me. I'm not some stupid kid.”

“I know you're not.”

“Then why won't’cha lemme do anything, dude? I don't need you to coddle me constantly, I can still do stuff. I just got scraped up, big whoop, okay. You act like I can't even hold a spoon the right way anymore.”

Shadow looks taken aback, eyes pinched. “I just wanted to make sure you were—”

“That I'm what? You act like I'm gonna choke on my food if you don't cut it up small enough first. I'm literally nineteen, not nine. Stop treating me like I can't do anything.”

“I'm not trying to coddle you, I'm trying to make sure you don't get hurt.”

“Oh, cool.” Sonic scoffs. “So you think I can't do anything and that I wanna hurt myself?”

Shadow scowls at him and opens his mouth. The sound of someone clearing their throat pointedly interrupts him however.

“My, my, handsome would be more the wrong to ever think so, Blue. I for one love my eggs over-easy. Be a dear and plate me a couple while you're at it.”

Sonic turns to see Rouge settled at the kitchen bar, her chin cupped languidly in her hands. He's not sure how long she's been there, but he knows that's also nearly always the point of her waiting to announce her presence the way she usually does.

Rouge's eyes drift to Shadow pointedly. “Shadow, I know how much you love your little stovetop, but give someone else a chance to toil away over it for once. I'm sure she'll be just fine in Sonic's hands.”

Shadow frowns, eyes flicking between him and Rouge before settling on neither of them. “Fine.”

There's barely a warning before Shadow reaches into his quills and then blinks out in a flash of light, presumably on the heels of a Chaos Emerald. Sonic deflates slightly at the sudden absence. He looks towards the hall like he'll see Shadow step around the corner of it, like he didn't vanish into thin air like he was never real in the first place.

“So dramatic,” Rouge laughs, turning a knowing look towards him. “Trouble in paradise?”

“Yeah…something like that.”

“Oh, don't worry he'll boil it off after a nap. He gets grumpy when he gets woken up too early.” She drums her fingers on the counter. “He'll never admit it either, but he definitely missed his bed last night. Not a fan of sharing?”

“More like the other way around,” Sonic sighs.

“Did you happen to ask if he'd wanna share or did you do the usual and leave it up to a game of let's assume?” Rouge asks.

He grimaces.

“You know what they say about assuming, Blue,” Rouge says with a laugh. “Shadow's a precise creature, I'm sure you've gathered as much. He takes words very literally and he honors them the same way.”

“Yeah, I can tell.”

“Mm, speaking of words.” Rouge eyes him slyly. “About earlier…”

Sonic winces, ears flat to his head at the insinuation.

“I've got something of a good ear. Even when I'm not trying to, I just can't help but overhear things. A bit of a curse, if you will,” Rouge says with a smile that's anything but sheepish or regretful. “Abe certainly hates it when I poke my nose where I shouldn't. Though, I've never quite been party to a conversation as delicate as whatever you and handsome seem to get up to. Can't quite keep the fighting to the race track can you two? You know what they say about rivals, hon.”

Sonic gives her a flat look. “Just cut to the chase already.”

“You're certainly no fun. No wonder you and Shadow get along so well when you're both not shoving your heels in your mouths.”

He snorts at the visual, a smile pulling at his muzzle against his will.

“He lives!” Rouge crows playfully. “Oh, it's good to see those pearly whites again. And here I thought you'd gone and taken a page out of Shadow's book. Broody just doesn't suit you I'm afraid.”

Sonic scrubs at his face and can't help the way his muzzle hurts with how wide his grin gets, the laugh that leaves him. “All right, all right, I get it. Two over easy, you said? Comin’ right up.”

“You sure know how to treat a lady right. Pass me those veggies sunshine was butchering while you're at it and we'll call it more than even.”

He has to admit, it's almost nice listening to Rouge talk away while he makes breakfast for her. She runs down the details of her latest heist with exaggerated hand motions and he listens with the occasional interject and nod, enough to show he's paying attention, but not enough to dominate the conversation by any means. His ears perk up when she mentions Omega will be back soon.

He's not sure how things will be with the bot puttering around here too, but at least the place won't feel as empty when Rouge and Shadow have to leave it. He's never really talked to the guy a whole lot, more like in passing and with an Egghead robot or two chewed up under his quills, but he's got nothing but respect for the big lug at the end of the day. Their goals are pretty similar. Destroy Eggman's robots when they crop up. Simple as. Plus the guy's got the whole bigger explosion equals better thing going on, and what's not to like about that?

Even after he gets Rouge fed, he keeps cooking. Something about it is a little soothing in a weird way. The repetitiveness of it all and the sort of mindless motions. And Shadow's probably hungry anyway. He kind of chased the guy out of the kitchen so the least he can do is make him up a plate while he's at it.

Once the eggs are done and the toast, Sonic almost grabs a glass of OJ like he would for Tails and then remembers the coffee beans on the counter. He shakes some out into a mug and sticks a spoon in it for good measure. He raises a silent eye ridge at Rouge who shrugs and says ‘good enough’ around a bite.

When he's finally got it all arranged nicely on a tray that he found tucked up in the cabinets, he stares at the concoction, guilt sticky in the middle of him.

“Well,” Rouge says, her fork turned sideways as she works over the last remnants of her own plate of food. “He's in his room if you wanted to bring it to him. I can hear him moping from here.”

He taps his fingers on the counter, the fur on his nape pricking. “Can’t you just take it to him?”

“Nope.” Rouge smiles before going back to her own meal.

Of course not. He sighs. Just his luck. The hallway feels impossibly long somehow as he carries the tray down it, his palms tacky under his gloves. He has to awkwardly maneuver the tray up into his elbow to get the door open and he gently knocks it wider with his shoulder as he gets inside.

Shadow's propped against the headboard with a book open in his lap, hands cradling it softly like it'll crumble to dust if he puts too much pressure on it or something. Red eyes flick up towards him as he enters and Shadow's ears twitch down at the sight of him.

Sonic laughs tightly, his shoulders hot. “Only burnt two more eggs after you left. I'd say that's a success.”

Shadow's ears press back further.

“Uh, yeah—so…” Sonic trails off as he rounds the bed and sets the tray on the side table. “I wasn't sure whatcha wanted to drink so I just grabbed the ushe.”

Shadow looks at the food and then up at him. “Thank you.”

Sonic blinks. It's probably the first time he's ever heard Shadow say those words in that exact order. It sounds unbelievably delicate coming from him in a weird way. “Sure…no problem.”

He turns to go, bee-lining for the door now that they've managed to say more than two words to each other without him messing it all up somehow.

“I shouldn't have touched your shirt without asking first,” Shadow says behind him. “I'm sorry for scaring you.”

“Pfft. Scaring me?” He pivots on his heel and waves Shadow off with a shrug. “You totally didn't scare me.”

Shadow gives him an unamused look and Sonic grimaces in return.

“Well, whatever dude. It's in the past, yeah?”

“Yes…”

There's a beat of silence that feels worse somehow. Sonic clears his throat, rocking his weight back on his heels. “And I'm sorry, y’know, for the record and all.”

“For what?”

“Sayin’ all that stuff before. I didn't mean for it to come across like that. I jus’...I dunno. I guess I wasn't thinkin’ at all really.” It feels like he's been doing a lot of that lately.

Shadow makes a sound low in his throat and closes the book on his lap before setting it aside carefully.

“Wow, not even gonna try ‘n deny it to lighten the blow for me here?” He jokes and deflates slightly as it falls flat.

“No,” Shadow says, eyes boring into him.“Hand me the coffee.”

Okay, well. It's like a foot from the guy and Shadow could just reach over and grab it, but fine. Fine. He did sort of insult him earlier so whatever, it's the least he can do.

He makes it back to the bedside table and snatches the mug up, holding it out to Shadow with a put-on smile. “Here ya go, fresh beans from the tin ‘n all. Extra crunchy, extra dry. They do make this thing called a coffee machine. Super cool, y’know it puts hot water over them and digs out the flavor. Who'da thought?”

Shadow huffs out a sharp breath, his teeth bared. It's a laugh and a smile if Sonic ever saw one. Fingers brush his as Shadow takes the mug and Sonic resists the urge to shake his hand out at the strange lingering feeling that gets left behind, a warmth stuck in his palm that wasn't there before.

He's not really sure if he should stay or if he should go. Shadow hasn't given him an indication of either, so that's not helpful. He decides to sit towards the foot of the bed, perched on the edge of the mattress so he can zip out of the room if he needs to. Especially if he starts to say something else that he'll only regret later.

And watching Shadow eat is…odd. It's weirdly vulnerable. Weirdly personable of him. Shadow conducts himself so perfectly it's almost funny to see him chew over the coffee beans he spoons into his mouth like anyone else would. It's a stark reminder that without the Ultimate Lifeform title, without everything else Shadow claims sets him apart from the rest of them, he's just some hedgehog at the end of the day, too.

And someone Sonic hurt in the living room because he couldn't keep his mouth shut when he needed to.

“You're not pathetic,” Sonic says quietly, foot tapping at the floor and hands trapped under his crossed arms.

Shadow sets the spoon into the now empty mug with a click and a rattle. “Neither are you.”

His chest hurts for a reason he can't pick apart. “I…”

Shadow watches him carefully, eyes soft without the usual intensity. Like something about being in this room makes him more comfortable, relaxed even. Sonic can't even fault Shadow for that. There's something about four walls and nobody's eyes on him that's as scarily familiar as it is unnervingly comforting these days.

“I shouldn't’ve taken that drink from her. She shoved it my hand, held it to my snout, it's practically textbook, open top and all. I didn't even see the bartender pour it and I still just took it.”

“Why did you drink it?” Shadow asks.

And at least Shadow didn't try for the empty platitudes this time. The ‘she shouldn't have done that’s. The classic ‘it's not your fault’. “It was a free drink for one thing. She was practically in my lap the whole time and it was just easier.”

“Than what?”

“Shoving her off, I guess. It's not like I was there not to get laid.”

Shadow hums consideringly. “Sometimes it's safer to play along.”

Sonic scoffs at that. “Dude, she was like a whole foot shorter than me ‘n I'm kinda the guy who can hit three hundred flat in a half-second. If anyone was in danger, it's her.”

Shadow eyes him silently. He knows Shadow's not really talking about just her anymore.

He leans back at that, pulling his legs up onto the mattress, socked heels balanced on the edge as he tucks them in close. He tries to sling his arms around his shins casually and pretend like the room isn't shrinking in on itself and fails miserably.

“Sometimes I find myself doing routines I can't quite remember the start of,” Shadow says finally, breaking the silence. “I assume they're holdovers from my time on the ARK, but the origins of them are still relatively unknown to me.”

“‘s that why you clean so much?”

Shadow nods.

Sonic laughs with a small smile. “Pretty sure you could eat off the floor in this place.”

“I'd advise against doing such a thing regardless.”

“Don't worry, ‘m not exactly a fan of scraping my chilidogs off the hardwood.”

“How fortunate,” Shadow deadpans.

He huffs out a laugh and then squirms. Now that it's quiet and it's not like his head is deciding to shove movie reels between his ears every five seconds, he can feel the low burn in him. The scraped out, strange, almost sharp-scratchiness from where he's sitting. It's been a long time since he had to deal with the way bottom growth felt on T, but it's almost similar in its weird, sometimes there sometimes not discomfort. Sonic readjusts on the bed and then huffs when it doesn't feel any better.

Shadow sets aside the coffee mug. “Did you want to take another bath?”

He glances at Shadow, his ears flipped back. “Sure, yeah, I—is there like pain killers somewhere, too?”

“Yes.”

“Cool…”

Shadow maneuvers off the bed, grabbing the tray and all its contents as he heads for the door. “Go ask Rouge to show you where they are, I'll draw the water.”

Sonic wrinkles his snout at that. “You act like you're gonna go pull up water from the well, man.”

Shadow gives him a flat look and then heads into the hallway.

---

---

The meal Sonic prepared for him isn't bad.

It's slightly over seasoned in the way someone who enjoys a very particular flavor profile might decorate a plate of eggs, but it's perfectly edible. Shadow can only assume Sonic had to learn to cook when Tails was still young enough for it to be an issue reaching a stove or a microwave or the counters at all. And it seems Rouge was treated to her own plate as well as he collects her abandoned dish in the sink and cleans it off with the rest of the cooking utensils left behind in the kitchen. If only either of them could develop a penchant for cleanliness instead of distractions…

Rouge is already on the couch, a lukewarm mug of brewed coffee balanced on her thigh as the news plays on the TV. When Shadow glances up at it, there's a photo of a familiar train station, a train car and himself. Sonic plastered to his side and far closer and clingier than he remembers the encounter feeling from the inside. From the outside looking in, it looks like they might as well be hugging. Worse.

His ears flick back and he dries off the pan with forceful swipes before shoving it back under the cabinets. Rouge is already looking at him from over the couch when he straightens back up, her fingers drumming languidly at the fabric.

“So…” Rouge starts, her smirk widening. “What was that all about?”

“He needed help getting back here.”

“Mm, you sure looked pretty cozy. The gossips certainly think you're an item after a little show like that.”

Shadow’s snout flares hot with his ears. He should've just let Sonic fall over on that damn train. “We're not.”

Rouge raises her hands. “Testy, testy. C'mon, would it be so bad if the news harpies thought you two were a thing?”

He grits his teeth and unfurls the damp dish towel, laying it out to dry on the counter. The rest of the kitchen is already wiped up. There's nothing left to clean or to do or to occupy his mind with besides whatever conversation it is Rouge wants to strong arm him into here.

Settling on the couch is easier said than done. The TV churns away with some other news story. Debris of a newly disposed Death Egg Bot collapsing a cafe front, an argument of who's responsible for the damages, whether HQ is going to expedite repairs as an apology. It's always the same endless griping.

Rouge turns the TV down so low it might as well be muted as she turns towards him, her legs drawn up and crossed in front of her. In the moment between her saying anything and the silence, he hears the slight slosh of water down the hall. Sonic must've finally climbed into the bath then. He keeps one ear flicked towards the bathroom and the other towards Rouge. It's not like Sonic could possibly drown in such a small amount of water, but slipping and smacking his forehead into the porcelain isn't out of the realm of possibility.

‘I'm literally nineteen, not nine. Stop treating me like I can't do anything.’

He's not trying to coddle the hedgehog. He just knows Sonic can't afford to get more injuries while he's in the process of already healing ones off. It's merely practical. It's not like he cares if the buffoon wants to make his own decisions—especially ones that get him hurt...

When he glances up at Rouge, she's still staring at him, her ears perked forward like she can somehow hear everything he's thinking. He knows it's a preposterous notion, but his ears press back regardless.

“What?” Shadow grits out, arms crossed and fists balled close.

“Nothing,” Rouge says nonchalantly, in the way that she does when there's obviously something she wants to say.

“Just say whatever it is you were going to.”

Rouge laughs, but her wings droop behind her. There's a tiredness under her eyes even makeup can't cover up. “And what good would that do, handsome?”

Shadow sighs. Somehow he's become stuck with the two most stubborn individuals on the planet. “You know you're allowed to share things,” he says finally, “instead of pretending you never have any feelings on anything at all.”

“Do me a favor, hon.” Rouge sharply smiles at him. “Look in the mirror sometime and say those exact words, just like that.”

He sneers, arms crossing tighter as he looks away from her. “You're the one who hides everything behind wordplay. At least I'm honest.”

“Uh-huh, is that what we're calling it now?”

“Just spit it out already.”

Rouge sighs and he can hear her fingers drumming rapidly on the arm of the couch. “Sometimes, I would rather simply pretend I don't care about any of this. Guilt? Ha! Who needs it?”

Shadow looks back at her and her shoulders are hunched slightly, nothing like the usual pushed back permanent confidence they're seemingly stuck with.

Rouge frowns as she glances towards him. “But when I look at him…all I can remember is what I heard in there.”

He reaches slowly for her shoulder and she draws back, her wings folding in tight around her.

Her smile is still there, but her eyes are bright. Hurt. “A month, Shadow. I let it go on for a month longer than it should have.”

“He had already been—”

Rouge holds up a hand. “I know what you're going to say, trust me. I've heard it all before.”

“I don't see how you’re the one at fault here. You didn't put him in that cell.” She also didn't let Infinite crawl away from a fight he should have never left alive. She didn't let Infinite become what Eggman made him into. Rouge didn't cause the War that landed Sonic in that cell in the first place. Shadow knows exactly where the blame lies, and it's not with her.

“He's just a kid, you know? It's easy to forget that…” Rouge sighs, slumping back against the couch cushions as she looks up at the ceiling. “He hit the big one-eight up there. Did he tell you that?”

Shadow stares at the side of her face. Sonic hadn't. Sonic's eighteenth birthday had been the farthest thing from his mind when he'd been pulling villagers from burning rubble, trying to find Omega and chasing Infinite across the globe in a game of cat and mouse. His own ‘birthday’ had passed with little fanfare as all the others had after the ARK fell. With him curled up wherever he tried to find sleep that night and lying there until the sun rose the next day after.

“Some kinda party, huh?” Rouge laughs wryly.

“There's nothing you could've done differently.”

She scoffs and levels him with a tired look. “Do you ever take your own advice?”

Shadow grits his teeth.

“Exactly.” Rouge's eyes are sharpened over a frown. It's the first time in a while he's seen her pull the mask off and let it drop away.

“You didn't know he would—”

“I would love to pretend I could've done nothing more, I really would. But that's not the truth, is it? If it had been you up there, would you have sat back and listened to it all or would you have done something?”

He glances over her crumpled face, the scrunch of her muzzle, a fang poking past her lip. She's angry. With herself. With everything. It’s a familiar look. Shadow recognizes it only because he’s seen it enough times on himself he's memorized it.

“It was not advantageous to pull him out the moment he was found,” Shadow starts. “It would've caused the Doctor to retaliate before we had a chance to secure him. The Resistance would've lost him all over again and potentially revealed their own whereabouts in the scrutiny.”

“Ah, yes! Of course, how could I forget. Anything for the Resistance, right? For the world?” Rouge kneads at her brow, laughing tightly. “So noble and heroic of everyone to constantly let him take all the punches. He always bounces back, doesn't he? So why risk it?” She scoffs. “Honestly, why save him at all? Oh, I'm sure he would've gone and dragged himself out of there eventually, he always does, doesn't he?”

“Rouge...”

“Damn the man, but save the empire,” Rouge says and screws her eyes shut, looking away from him. “Not for a moment did I think he was dead. Tails story, it simply didn't add up. None of it made sense.” She laughs. “Sonic doesn't die. It's just not what he does. But Amy needed my help, Knuckles, too, and you know how he is, he never asks me for anything... If I had just done what I do best and forgotten about all of them, I could've found him sooner. Perhaps I could've even—”

“You can't change the past.”

Perhaps it's hypocritical to say. Paradoxical. He knows when he looks up at the stars and sees one a little too bright, moving in orbit fast enough it can only be an artificial satellite, that he can never go back home. And yet—he understands it. The yearning for things to be different. Like there’s something missing from his chest, and he merely needs to find what was lost in the first place. As if any of it can ever be fixed at all.

Rouge scrubs at her face with both hands as she sighs and rests it there for a moment. “You of all people should know how hard it is to remember that.”

Shadow says nothing to that. She already knows the truth regardless.

Rouge looks over at him wearily and with a small smile. “Just look at us now. A couple’a downers, sitting here on such a gorgeous day, feeling bad for ourselves.” Rouge tsks. “I'm sure if Blue heard us now he'd have a few strong words to say about it.”

Sonic probably would. Sonic's also the same hedgehog who can't even say the word ‘rape’ unless ‘pathetic’ is in the same sentence. He's not sure anyone in this apartment should be a measure for emotional intelligence, let alone have a say in what anyone should be doing with their day. If it was up to himself, he'd spend it in bed and staring at the wall. If it was up to Sonic, he's sure the hedgehog would be out and about, doing whatever it is he's decided he's supposed to be doing with very little regard for his own well being.

A door creaks open down the hall.

Shadow watches Rouge compose herself quickly, the backs of her hands swiping at her eyes, fingers smearing the slightly run mascara off in quick swipes. Sonic rounds the corner a moment later his fur ruffled from where he toweled himself dry and the towel itself slung over his head still, ears poking out from in front of it as he scrubs it side to side idly. Eyes focused entirely on something playing on the tablet in his hand as he walks into the living room and then heads for the kitchen seemingly on autopilot. Shadow had only handed him the thing when Sonic complained about being bored in the bath the last time. He hadn't missed the way Sonic's fingers jittered nervously over it, or the way his heartbeat spiked when Shadow told him to get in the bath before it got cold. He supposes it's an adequate enough distraction. He's not sure what Sonic's doing on the thing, but right now it's like the rest of the world doesn't even exist.

He finds himself tracking Sonic's movements up to the kitchen counter. For a moment, Shadow considers the entire image he's seeing and his face heats up inexplicably. It's like seeing one of the Pockies at the shelter freshly bathed, fur puffed up and sticking up in small damp clumps. It's…strangely endearing. He immediately grimaces at the thought and glares at Rouge when he catches her hiding a grin behind her hand beside him. She nudges him with her elbow and mouths a ‘be nice.’

Shadow rolls his eyes at her and crosses his arms even tighter, his ears somehow even hotter than they were before.

“Thoughts on Ice Spiders for a little brunch-in movie, Blue?” Rouge asks, twisting on the couch so she can see Sonic from over the back of it.

There's the sound of Sonic setting the tablet down on the kitchen counter. “Never heard of it. What's it about?”

“Spiders on ice,” Shadow deadpans without looking at him.

Sonic snorts. “Yeah? Keepin’ it simple, huh?”

“The plot certainly leaves much to be desired.”

Rouge laughs. “Oh, come now, you had fun last time we watched it.”

“I was cooking the last time you made me sit through it,” Shadow says.

“Well, today you get to sit all front and center. I'll order lunch in, how's that sound?”

“Long as I‘m not payin’,” Sonic says as he rounds the kitchen counter and the bar extension and flops onto the empty side of the couch on Rouge's opposite side.

A part of Shadow is both grateful and disappointed at the seating arrangement for a reason he doesn't care to extrapolate at the moment.

“Preferences, boys?” Rouge asks looking between both of them.

Shadow grunts noncommittally.

Sonic shrugs. “Eh, feelin’ like some Chun-nan might hit the spot.”

“Meat buns it is,” Rouge says with a smile.

And this Rouge is different from the one he just talked to before Sonic made his reappearance. It's the same way sometimes it feels like there's two different Sonic's.

Both of them came back from the Death Egg and brought something back with them, too. That much he knows.

---

---

Shadow hasn't really looked at him since he got out of the shower.

Which is whatever. Not like he cares that much where the guy puts his eyes. Sonic did think they were on better terms since the talk in the bedroom, but maybe he just read into things a bit too much. And he would never say it out loud, but he is a little grateful that Rouge is playing temporary buffer between them for now. If only because it makes it harder for him to entirely shove his foot in his mouth and say something really stupid here.

He also doesn't mind when she nudges him and asks to sling her legs into his lap and lays back against Shadow's shoulder in turn with a grin. It's almost funny how Shadow doesn't immediately shove her off and even begrudgingly goes along with her antics. To his surprise, Shadow even lets Rouge grab his hand and fuss with his glove. Sonic's pretty sure if anyone else grabbed at the Ultimate Lifeform like he was a big oversized puppy, they'd find an elbow jammed in their teeth. Team Dark is apparently an exception to all of Shadow's careful little rules.

Waiting for the food to arrive winds into an hour and then close to two and still nothing. The first movie ends and they're onto the next one before he even realizes it. Something about giant mosquitoes this time? He's not really paying attention anymore honestly. Sonic sneaks glances at Shadow instead and catalogues away the relaxed slouch the other hedgehog’s leaned into the sofa with, his face smoothed out entirely for once, eyes focused on the film like it's the most interesting thing on the planet. When Shadow's ears perk forward before a jumpscare, it almost makes Sonic grin reflexively. It's a weird little tell on Shadow's part. And he has to wonder how many times Shadow's sat through these films at the behest of Rouge or if it's the other way around. Some of the horror movies he saw in that cabinet have to be at least fifty years old after all…

There's a knock on the door that sends Shadow’s attention swiveling in his direction. When their eyes meet, he knows without a doubt that Shadow can tell he's been staring at him this whole time. Sonic hops to his feet before anyone else can. His snout burning as he answers the door in a rush. The rabbit on the other side is a fan, fortunately or unfortunately, asking for an autograph on the back of the receipt copy, taking the tip Rouge left on the coffee table with excited, shaking fingers. It's a whirlwind of an interaction Sonic hardly recalls as he bumps the door shut with his heel and sighs heavily.

He still keeps seeing the way the rabbit smiled at him, their nose crinkling with the size of it, glasses pushed up as they handed over the bags. And then the way it faltered as they looked at the shirt he was wearing. The bandages peeking out from under the neckline and sleeves. And then further down.

His skin pricks uncomfortably under his fur.

“Need a hand over there, Blue?”

He glances up at Rouge who's perked up on the couch, her slouch into Shadow abandoned as she looks over at him.

“Nope.” He almost zips over in an instant and then remembers the whole ‘no running’ thing. There's a low burn in him, a dull reminder of why it's a bad idea as he walks over, slow and annoying-like, and sets the bags on the table.

“Did you know them?” Shadow asks, eyeing him carefully.

“Hm?” Sonic busies his hands with unpacking all the trays and cartons, shoving them onto the coffee table and crunching the plastic bags into one another before tossing them on the floor. “Nah, just a fan.”

Shadow says nothing and Sonic's shoulders tense at that. He doesn't know how to explain this one. That he's never seen that particular rabbit before in his life, but when he looked at them, he saw someone else's face, smelled someone else, heard someone else talking to him and felt actual, genuine unease. It wasn't her, and he's sure she's like three hundred miles away in a city he's probably never going to step foot into after this, but for a second she'd been standing in that doorway and smiling at him all over again. Handing him a drink he didn't ask for. Smoothing a hand up his leg and leaning into him with a sigh.

“Well, let's dig in then,” Rouge says, clapping her hands together before reaching for one of the chopstick packets on the table. “Wouldn't want the food to get cold, would we?”

Sonic blinks out of his daze and grabs for his own pair. He doesn't miss the way Shadow watches him break them apart and fumble with them for a moment. It's like his coordination comes and goes sometimes, like it's the same as it ever was and then sometimes his limbs are barely his own.

When he sits down to eat, it's at least easier this time. Something about grazing through different textures and flavors and picking at whatever he wants in small amounts is better than trying to eat one thing all at once. It's certainly hot enough to not make him feel like he's chewing up and swallowing something mucous-y, which is a bonus.

Notably, Shadow doesn't touch any of it. And whenever Sonic looks over at him, Shadow's eyes are glued on him and it only makes the tightness in his chest worse the longer it goes on for. He's not even sure Shadow realizes he's doing it either. He can't exactly snap at Shadow to stop. Not without rousing Rouge's suspicion or poking more holes in Shadow's feelings than he already has. Instead, he keeps his head down and tries to pretend it doesn't feel like he's the hedgehog equivalent of a bug stuck in a jar. Like he's waiting for Shadow to rattle him around or open it and smash him between his fingers.

Rouge proposes finishing the film and Sonic practically leaps at the opportunity to do anything except sit under Shadow's continued scrutiny. Hiding on the other side of the couch and away from him is probably a coward's way out, but he doesn't really care anymore. He just wants the weight of it off his shoulders for a second so he can think. So he can breathe. So he can stop tasting blood in the back of his throat and feeling metal shoved up against his back and shoulders.

Thankfully, the too full feeling and the give of the couch under him makes his eyes droop after a moment. He can hear Rouge talking about the film, the sound of Shadow mumbling something in response and the more they talk, the more tired he gets.

He doesn't realize he's fallen asleep until he jerks awake to a soft static TV screen, the sound buzzing incessantly in his ears. The VCR counter ticking away endlessly in the corner without someone to manually rewind it. He pushes himself up and scrubs at his eyes, looking over the container littered table under the glow of the TV, the rest of the apartment outside of the halo plunged into the dark.

Sonic slumps forward with a sigh. Face dropped into his palms as he brushes his hands over his ears and quills. The taste of whatever he ate before has gone sour in his mouth by now. When he gets up and looks over at Rouge and Shadow, they're both dead asleep somehow. Rouge's head knocked onto Shadow's shoulder, her whole body leaned into him and Shadow's pushed into the arm of the sofa, his own arm pillowed under his snout. He kind of wishes he had a camera on hand as he watches Shadow's ear twitch. He's not sure how hard HQ—or whoever they're with these days—is working them, but it has to be quite a lot for them to both be this tired.

Sonic tries to flick on the bathroom light once he gets to the sink and immediately regrets it. He slams it back off with a wince and gropes around for his new toothbrush that's somewhere in here. Teeth finally brushed, water splashed on his face for good measure, Sonic wanders back into the kitchen to find the pill bottle he abandoned in it.

It's not that he needs them to fall asleep. They just help. And he knows with the way his chest has gone all tight and his stomach keeps doing its best impression of rock climbing his spine, he's not about to fall asleep again so easily. Sonic opens the bottle and shakes out one pill and then a second one for good measure. It's not like Shadow has a stash of liquor hanging around for some liquid encouragement of the passing out face down variety. So, sleeping pills it is. The Doc wouldn't have prescribed them if he wasn't supposed to use them anyway.

He knocks them back and turns on the sink, tilting his muzzle under the stream of water to get the pills down without grabbing out another glass that'll have to be cleaned up. Maybe he stays under the spray of it for a second longer than he means to. Eyes dully watching the way the light from the TV seems to breathe across the countertop. He shuts off the water. He holds his hand against the chilled metal handle, fingers stuck and numb around it. Still hunched over the sink, he watches the last swirl of water disappear down the drain and wonders—in the kind of way similar thoughts always seem to pop up without prompt now—if anyone's ever actually managed to drown themselves in a sink.

Sonic laughs bitterly and under his breath. What a way to go. Doing the impossible. He's pretty sure that's one of Tails’ factoids he's heard before. That there's this ‘biological safety net’ in almost everyone's heads, that a person can't actually drown themselves willingly.

He curls his hands over where the edge of the counter and sink meet. He should probably call Tails. Have him bring his T and shots by, drop off any mail for him, see how Tails is doing, make sure he's not working himself too hard and not pulling any more all-nighters. His ears press back and his grip tightens on the sink rim. He should probably apologize for up and poofing into thin air again and doing exactly what he said he wouldn't do. He— He'll handle that in the morning. First thing. He's not going to forget his little bro again.

There's another string of guilt that tugs at him and he drops his head against the counter. Amy, too. Geez…he really messed things up back there, but he can totally fix it. He'll just call her and plan another outing or something. Just—later. Not right now. When he can finally take off these stupid clothes and the bandages and look like himself again.

And then there's Knuckles.

He shoves himself up off the counter and grimaces. He's not even sure where to start with that at all. It's a mess, start to finish. He wishes they'd never let Knuckles snoop through his stuff like that, made the guy worry over something that wasn't even that big to begin with. He came off the Death Egg walking and talking and able to run just fine, that's all that really should've mattered. But now Knuckles wants to pick at old scabs for no reason. He just wants Knuckles to stop looking at him like that and just go back to before HQ, before the War and before everything else. He doesn't want ‘Commander Knuckles of the Resistance.’ He just wants his friend back.

His friends. Plural. All of them.

Trudging back to the couch is easier said than done. It's like his feet are leaden. Walking around everywhere is starting to grate in a way he can't even begin to describe and everything hurts more than it did before. Probably ever. His head, his shoulders, his entire back. It's like he got run over by some invisible ghost bus while he wasn't looking.

Rouge's legs have taken up his spot on the couch, her arm slung around Shadow and he's pretty sure she's gonna end up drooling into Shadow's fur like that. Which is equal parts hilarious as much as it is just plain bizarre to him. Sonic didn't think he'd ever see Shadow let someone puppy pile on him, but his entire time in this apartment has felt like something out of the Twilight Zone so far. Next thing he knows, someone's gonna tell him up is down and down is up and he's been thinking about gravity all wrong.

He takes a deep breath, stretching his arms overhead with a yawn. Whatever. Floor it is. Sonic settles with his back against the cushions at first and then decides committing fully to it is just easier. He curls up on his side on the ground, his back quills squished up against the fabric and foam behind him. The bed in Shadow's room is totally empty. He knows that much. He can hear the quiet whuffs of air of Rouge and Shadow breathing softly on the couch and the TV’s static hum overlaying it. It's an auditory roadmap that doesn't exist in the dead silence of Shadow's room.

It's weirdly…comforting.

A cold chill seeps up through his fur and he pillows his arm under his snout. Weirdly enough wood and metal flooring feels about the same if he closes his eyes. And sleeping on the floor is nothing new for him, even before the Death Egg. It's not like he never taken naps wherever his head hit the dirt.

And there's the times he's slept next to Tails’ bed when he didn't wanna disturb the kid, but he had to make sure nothing was going to come in and gnab him. Or that he wasn't just imagining things. Like after that fiasco with Mecha Sonic. Or the restless nights after Perfect Chaos, when he kept having that same nightmare about drowning, or worse, finding Tails body somewhere in the flood after. Or when Tails got brainwashed at Eggman's goofy little space amusement park and he was almost forced to fight him. And then there's the time the Zeti’s tried to roboticize Tails and he almost—

Nope.

He needs to sleep. He'll call Tails in the morning or whenever he wakes up and then things will be fine again. Easy peasy. Sonic closes his eyes and tries to let the sticky, fatigued feeling take over as much as he can.

It's like no time's passed at all as he blinks awake to an even darker living room somehow. The TV is shut off and everything has been plunged into pitch black. The couch is mostly empty now. Rouge is gone. Shadow's still there for some reason, curled up even tighter somehow, his quills bristled out uncomfortably. A shiver wracks through Shadow’s frame and Sonic frowns. Maybe the flimsy blanket Shadow's got wrapped over him isn't enough to keep him warm.

Finding his way around in the dark is easier said than done, but Sonic manages to get back into Shadow's room and grab the heated blanket from before. He goes back for the stuffed animal after a moment of deliberation, feeling dumb as he carries it back to the couch. When he drops it near where Shadow's dug his claws into the couch cushion, he's pretty sure he's going to get glared at in the morning for it all. He nudges it until it's partially wedged under Shadow's arm anyway. He doesn't expect Shadow to pull it closer to himself and curl up even tighter around it, but somehow that's exactly what happens.

Sonic dusts off his hands and nods to himself. Okay. Mission Accomplished. Now to find a wall plug. He smooths his hand over the closest wall and bumps into the outlet plate. Trying to be quiet is easier said than done as he fumbles with the plug for a moment and finally gets it into place. Carefully draping the blanket on top of Shadow without waking him up is another feat in patience. It's something he's only perfected from all the times he's had to pick Tails up from his workbench and carry him to bed. He turns the heated blanket onto its second highest setting.

There. Hopefully that helps with the whole ‘Shadow looking like he ate something sour while sleeping’ problem.

Sonic sits on the opposite side of the couch and after a moment he lists against the arm of it, still tired in his middle. Like someone's scooped out his breath, replaced everything that beats inside him with something sluggish. In his endeavor to get comfortable in the limited space, his foot bumps against where Shadow's own foot is tucked up under the blanket. The initial urge to yank away thrums hotly under his fur. A warmth seeps into his paw pads the longer he lingers however. And Shadow doesn't pull away either, his breathing evened out from how it was before, the shivering tension all but gone now, too.

Maybe this isn't so bad... It's a thought that flickers sporadically. The heaviness in his limbs becoming harder to ignore as the pills finally do their job.

‘You’re not pathetic.’

'Neither are you.’

His ears slip tight to his skull and he draws further into himself, quills bristled out. If Shadow knew all of what really happened on the Death Egg, then he wouldn't have ever said something like that as a reassurance in the first place. Even with all the rinky-dink medical files on the planet, Knuckles still doesn't know how it all went down. Shadow and Rouge either. None of them really do.

There's the sensation of someone's arm wrapped around his middle, the slide of a muzzle along his throat and a laugh as fingers drag his snout gently around to meet theirs. Sonic screws his eyes shut, fingers curling into the couch cushion under him. Infinite's not there, not anymore, but he is regardless. He's always there. Slipped somewhere along his shoulders and breathing softly into the back of his neck.

Notes:

this part of the narrative is gonna drag its feet a little, sorry 😔 getting my writing to cooperate with this chapter was also a test in patience. The words were not happening properly 😭....
This fic is also still not beta read so sorry for any egregious run on sentences or typos. 🫡

thanks for reading as always!! i hope everyone is having a wonderful winter/summer so far :3 💕

Chapter 10: who am i supposed to please? (who am I?)

Notes:

chapter title is from the song 'wutiwant'

sorry for the massive delay. lots of stuff happened since january and it was hard to get back into this headspace, but we're so back 📝

while there's comfort in this chapter it still is as heavy as the rest of this fic, pls keep all tags in mind when proceeding.

I have not dealt with chronic sleep paralysis episodes in a very long time (thankfully), so forgive me if the one depicted at the start of this chapter is not as accurate as it could be 😔

After what feels like forever, Infinite finally releases his quills. Sonic pulls off and away as he smears the back of his ungloved hand over his muzzle, taking the spit and otherwise off of his mouth and chin with it. He learned to ignore the taste and swallow after he figured out wedging his thumbs into his fists is at least something else to focus on during it all. It never quite takes away the soreness in his jaw and throat afterwards, though.

Settled back on his haunches, he gives Infinite a flatter look than he means to. It's a bit hard to dig up the usual enthusiasm when his knees ache something fierce. Kneeling on metal for this long's not exactly his idea of a good time by any means.

“So—” Sonic starts, clearing his throat and swallowing back the bitter salt-thick spit when his voice rasps more than he expects it to. “About that run.”

Infinite cards a hand through the quills behind his ear idly with a low hum.

Sonic tries not to let the annoyance flicker across his muzzle. He knows Infinite will just use it as an excuse to not bring up Green Hill or Emerald Coast or wherever else the jackal figures is good enough to turn into a racetrack for a few minutes. He also didn't just spend the last however long sucking this guy off for nothing.

A leather clad hand falls along the side of his jaw and a grimace slides onto his snout before Sonic can stop it.

“G.U.N. 's early files claimed you were nearly identical to the so called ‘Ultimate Lifeform’,” Infinite says, softly sneering Shadow's title more like an insult than anything else.

Sonic chews at the side of his cheek to stop the words on the tip of his tongue. He imagines turning his snout into Infinite's palm, snapping his teeth into the thumb petting at him the longer it stays there, but he stays still instead. He waits. He's run head first into enough dead ends to know it doesn't get him anywhere far in here.

“Quite a foolish observation, don't you think?” Infinite asks, swiping a claw under his eye, close enough to make Sonic’s quills flex as it nicks the delicate skin.

“Yeah, well…” Sonic laughs through a clenched jaw, “didn't you make the same mistake?”

Infinite's grip tightens around Sonic's muzzle as he yanks his face up towards him. He fully bares his teeth under the cage of gloved fingers trapped over his snout, eyes narrowed and face gnarled up as far as he can muster. Blue-yellow eyes regard him coldly. Flat and dull. The scar etched deep into Infinite's brow and cheek stands out in the low light without the usual mask to hide it.

Infinite hums consideringly, turning his face slightly as if to appreciate it from a new angle, under a new light. “I suppose like this I can see the resemblance.”

---

Somehow, the wall beside the couch is made of flowers. Chewed up in them, devoured by it. Which is weird in itself. He remembers falling asleep next to Shadow on it, curled up on the opposite side of the cushions, but not how he got here. Or there. Or wherever this is now.

Upside down, Sonic stares at the dripping petals. Their hungry, teeth-lined mouths slick with drool. He keeps his head tipped back over the sofa's soft arm, his view narrowed onto the wall and only the wall. The longer he lies there, the more he can no longer tell what's under his quills anymore. If it's fabric or fur. The give of someone else's arm. Someone’s chest. A wood-slat floor, a bed. Something harder, something colder and farther away.

A heavy weight abruptly settles itself onto his legs, draping along his hips before settling firmly on top of his chest. It presses down all at once. He's not sure if he’s breathing anymore or if he ever was. Dew and spit slides down the petaled wall and falls onto his snout. There's a sudden jostle, the sound of something's jaws finding purchase. He can't feel it. He can't feel anything besides the weight. Crushing. There's another hard yank and the scattering splatter of liquid sticks in his ears. A whine punches out of his throat noiselessly. He tries to lift his leg, but there's nothing there. No response. He's stuck in place. He can't even look down to see what it is. His breathing chokes. The thing on his chest presses down harder. Harder. A sound rings in his ears. Metal grinding into metal. He can't breathe. The sound grows louder. He can't move. And he's—something’s there, it's teeth buried in him, his ribs caving under its weight and he's—

A hand falls on his shoulder and the pressure vanishes all at once as he slams his fist into whatever grabbed him as hard as he can. A clatter follows. A punch of air from someone else's mouth. He needs to— Something brushes his ankle and he jerks away from it, breaths hissing fast through his teeth. He kicks his leg out and catches whatever it is under his foot. He has to— He scrambles up onto the arm of the couch, shaking limbs pulled in close.

“—onic! You're not there anymore.”

What? His face scrunches, throat hoarse as he pants harshly.

He jerks his head to the side, scrubbing at his quills to smooth them back down, fingers trembling, knuckles aching right where he struck something. He's—where is he? It's…Rouge's apartment. Right. Yeah. And that means.

Shit.

He looks over and sees Shadow collasped on the floor beside the couch, his legs sprawled in front of him like he took a hit and fell with it. There's a hand pushed into the side of his muzzle, a dark purple-red smear of blood under his nose.

“Oh, shit, dude, I—” Sonic slips unsteadily off the couch with a weak laugh, his hands held low. “I totally didn't mean to do that.”

“It's fine…” Shadow says, pushing himself to his own feet with a labored grunt.

“Is it?” he asks with a miserable flatness, ears pressed back tightly.

“You were distressed. I thought waking you up would make it better.” Shadow grimaces, swiping at his snout, more blood coming away on his glove with it. “Obviously, not.”

His chest clenches. He must've hit harder than he thought…“I—” Sonic huffs, scrubbing at his face. “So you're saying I was—what?” He laughs, out of breath, rife with something he can't even name. “Having a nightmare?”

Shadow regards him with a slow glance up and down the whole of him. “Something like that.”

He frowns. It's not there anymore. He looks down at his hands and clenches them. The shakiness in them still betraying him, swirling all over like he's a bad step from going unsteady again. It's gone, though. Whatever that was. Whatever he can feel making his heart race even now. It's like it never happened at all, and yet he can still somehow feel it right there regardless.

He smiles instead. He picks up the feeling and puts it somewhere he doesn't have to deal with it right now. “Okay. Sure. Whatever. I don't even remember what I was dreaming about, so it probably wasn't that bad.”

“Do you enjoy being this needlessly stubborn?”

“Yeah.” Sonic crosses his arms. “Maybe I love it.”

Shadow mutters something under his breath, shaking his head before heading for the kitchen without another word.

His stomach sinks at that, his feet moving before he can think better of it. “Where’re you going?”

“To make dinner.”

His eyes dart towards the tiny time display on the microwave. How did he not notice that many hours passing? Surely he would have noticed it, felt it, something— “Already?”

“You’ve been asleep all day.”

His attention turns to where the sun is setting outside the balcony doors. Two sleeping pills did a better job than just one then, but his skull feels dry, his mouth even drier somehow. It feels more like he went twenty rounds with Zavok and took every punch square on the skull than any kind of rest. His stitches itch, the bandages, too. All of it. He tugs at the hem of his shirt and then plucks at where it sits on his chest with a grimace.

“You should be able to go without the shirt if it's bothering you,” Shadow says, rummaging around in the guts of the kitchen without a glance towards him.

Sonic smirks, shakily, without the usual backbone of reassurance as he tries not to look at every exit all at once. “You just wanna see me topless, huh?”

Shadow closes the cabinet door with a tired sigh. “Keep it on forever then. I don't care either way.”

He idles in the wake of the quick rebuttal, a smart remark of his own somewhere on the tip of his tongue, but the tightness in his chest and throat keeps it from leaving. The quiet stretches on too long after. The opportunity to fill it with something else passes and he looks at the apartment door again. He looks at Shadow. He tugs at the sleeve of his shirt and wonders if eight hours of shut-eye and then some is enough to warrant a run already.

“Are you going to help or not?” Shadow asks.

He frowns, fingers twitching like the door knob’s already within reach. “Well, you could ask a little nicer.”

“Just get in here already.”

There's a relief he tries not to dwell on too much in being given the answer he didn't realize he was even waiting for. Staying or going—he at least knows which one is supposed to happen right now. Which one is easier to deal with.

Sonic turns on his heel with a smile, away from the door, hands raised like an old habit he can't quite shake off. “Okay, fine. Just tell me where ya need me.”

---

‘Helping’ is a loose and relative term for what he manages to do in the kitchen. It's easier this time to find a flow without Shadow haranguing him all the while about overdoing some steaks. And out of all of the things he could've guessed that the ‘Ultimate Lifeform’ didn't know how to do, making pancakes never really crossed his mind. So much for all the fancy recipes and meticulous cook times when three ingredient flapjacks exist.

He uses the pan to toss the pancakes up and catch them perfectly on the gooey side. It's a trick he used to do to entertain a way younger, way antsier Tails when he had to cook him breakfast. Shadow doesn't seem to be as much of a fan of the artistic flair as Tails, and makes his impatience more than known by citing a lack of efficiency while leaning against the counter, arms carefully crossed. Deep down, Sonic knows the guy's just jealous. It's not like Shadow knows how to flip a flapjack the fun way let alone make one from scratch apparently.

By the time they're sitting at the kitchen table with everything plated, he's already winded. Which is…new. Or not new-new, but not something he thought he'd have to experience ever again. It was supposed to just be a fluke. Something that only happened a thousand and one moments away from here. He doesn't get tired. He doesn't ever feel out of breath. Those things aren't synonymous with Sonic the Hedgehog.

He shifts uncomfortably in his seat and rubs his side at the answering sting. There's a hot feeling under the bandages. He can only assume it's a string of stitches that's grown angry beneath them. Amongst the swirl of everything, the Doc had mentioned swelling in the first few days and some irritation. He hadn't expected it to smart and pull like this exactly, though.

He tries to less than subtly tug his shirt away from where it keeps snagging against the dressings. And somehow, despite the discomfort there, it's far easier to think about the claw marks in his sides rather than the burning even lower. The dull ache gathered all the way from one hip to the other. Deeper. Harder to ignore.

“Is it uncomfortable?” Shadow asks, eyeing him from across the small table.

“Eh, it's not the worst I've ever had. Let's just say top surgery still beats this one by a mile, least I can put my arms over my head like this. Hysto sucked a little, sure, but mostly just from the stupid—” He trails off at Shadow's blank stare. “Uh…”

“Why would you require surgery?”

Awesome. Fifty year old grandpa, space station living, he probably should've seen this coming. “Guess I just came with a few manufacturer's parts that I thought were a little extra.”

Shadow's eyes drift down to where the usual dual faded scars on his chest are now hidden under his shirt, the accompanying pinhole drain marks tucked up higher, underneath his arms. The tiny intermittent hysterectomy ones that have faded to almost nothing on his belly as well.

Sonic squints. “Have you really never heard of—”

“I merely assumed they were from combat.”

“No way!” Sonic laughs, slapping a hand on the table and leaning forward. “Egghead's got some robots with a weird sense of humor, huh?”

Shadow's ears flick back, his muzzle wrinkling.

“Listen, why don'tcha ask Rouge for a crash course sometime, I'm sure she'll be more than happy to break it down for ya.”

“That won't be necessary.”

Sonic blinks. “Whaddya mean?”

Shadow picks up his own silverware, shifting his plate ever so slightly with his knuckles without looking up at him. “You're Sonic the Hedgehog regardless.”

Sonic's ears perk forward as he smiles smaller this time, the first sincere one he's felt in a while. “Sure am! And there's not a hedgehog who can match me.”

Shadow curls his lip up at him in a put-on sneer, still playful around the edges. “Perhaps they should have excised the overinflated part of your brain during the operation, then maybe your head wouldn't be quite so big.”

“Wow.” His jaw almost drops, almost—but he laughs instead, too loud and long. “Look who's talking, pal. Mister dubbed yourself the world's Ultimate Lifeform before I could get two words out. Even flexed with the whole teleportin’ thing, too! Nice touch by the way. Heck of a’ introduction.”

“Tch…as if you wouldn't have shown off as well.”

He smiles knowingly. “Maybe.”

He reaches for the table syrup and his side pulls again, worse this time. He grabs at the burn of it and clenches his teeth, a small sweat breaking out on his brow. Usually it's not this hard to just ignore the pain. Shake it off, grit his teeth and swipe off the blood so he can get to the next Badnik already. It's different when he's stuck sitting in a chair in someone else's kitchen and forced to feel every single inch of it. It doesn't help that there's aches and pains in places he'd rather not deal with right now. Not when his clothes are getting beyond uncomfortable, the bandages even more so. All he knows is it's not going away and it's not like he can go out on a run to forget about it or do anything else about it. Replace it with a different kind of hurt, a way more pleasant one.

He's just…stuck.

Shadow pushes his chair back and his ears flinch down at the sharp sound. He taps his fingers on the table, watching as Shadow grabs something from the cabinets below the counter and sets it on the table. He doesn't miss the way this is a little too familiar by now. Another first aid kit. Another instance of Shadow offering to bandage him up. He's not sure how he keeps ending up here. Again and again and—

“I can put something on it that will help, but you'll have to lift your shirt,” Shadow says.

And he's glad at least, that Shadow's giving him the ability to do it himself instead of grabbing at him this time. Maybe they're both starting to learn a thing or two here. Maybe.

“I knew you just wanted to see me shirtless, dude.”

Shadow sighs. “Just do it or don't.”

He yanks up the hem of his shirt, bunching it under his chin to hold it in place and out off the way while Shadow works. Shadow crouches beside him and slowly peels back the bandage without another word. It takes some fur on the way with it and he winces. Getting hit full on by a Badnik fist: nothing, the sticky side of a strong bandaid: a real killer apparently. He's starting to find the small stuff hurts a lot more for some reason.

He hisses through his teeth at another biting sting from the disinfectant before Shadow sets it aside. Once Shadow gets the bacitracin solution applied, the relief is almost instantaneous. He stares carefully at the tabletop as Shadow smooths a collection of new dressings into place with a firm hand on his waist. His ears tip hot at the sensation. He glances at Shadow's hand still resting on him. Somehow he can feel someone else's hand there, far less kind, pressing into the growing indents between each of his ribs. Leather clad knuckles kneading cruelly at a fresh wound and sticking in further, until he has to grit his teeth, grin and bear it. ‘If you would simply learn to stay still, these things wouldn't happen, would they?’

He jerks his head to the side, ears tensed back. He closes his eyes and when he opens them again Shadow's already sat down again on his side of the table, eyeing him over his plate.

Right. Okay. Food. Eating. He's supposed to be— He grabs up the bottle of syrup. It pours out slowly, in one thick spill, and the smell lingers, sticky and way too sweet. He wishes there was chili oil, hot sauce, something else to add to the pancakes instead. Anything else. He rakes his fork over the pancake’s face. His stomach clenches uneasily and he scrubs at the smell stuck in his nose.

“Kinda wish there was like a pill or somethin’ that'd just make it easy to get all your food for the day at once,” he says, the words leaving him merely more noise to fill the growing quiet rather than coherent thought.

“A pill?” Shadow asks slowly.

“Yeah. I mean, I don't really gotta lotta time to sit around stuffin’ my face constantly, so—”

“You have time right now.”

“Right. Wouldja look at that.” Sonic grimaces. “Guess I do…”

He cuts a piece of pancake off and jabs at it with a loud tink from the tines hitting the plate. He sticks it in his mouth. It's sickly. He has to lock his teeth tight to keep from immediately hawking it back out. There's an impression curled under his jaw, like a hand hinging it open, fingers pressing food to the back of his throat. Maple-cinnamon sticky. He can hear himself coughing, gagging after he finally swallows. Infinite's muzzle rests against his brow after, hot and humming. ‘Very good.’ Another unseen hand smooths up his side and then wanders lower over his chest and down over his belly.

“Sonic?”

He drops his fork. It clatters too loud on the tabletop and he fumbles for it, sending it hurling off the table and spinning out on the tile.

“Shit, man, my bad.” He laughs. He grits his teeth. His stomach lurches and bile thickens his throat.

He picks his fork up off the floor and sets it down a bit too hard on the tabletop. He reaches for the orange juice instead, hoping for safer territory, something he can use to wash back the sudden queasiness at least. He can feel Shadow staring at him the whole while. His fur damp with sweat, palms tacky. He stops mid-sip when the filled glass is stuck under his nose. The smell grows worse, caustic and unavoidable. He doesn't remember setting it back down. He doesn't remember letting it go.

He stares at the rim of his plate and the table and sees a small round pill, citrus-flavored, tinged yellow-orange, in the palm of a leather glove instead. Feels it pressed between his teeth, pushed into the back of his throat with harsh fingers. The same taste, the same smell. Somehow. His chest winds tighter.

He scrubs at his ears and swallows loud enough it crackles in them. Focus. Okay. Focus. He can do this. He just needs to eat his food. He just needs to eat. If he doesn't eat he'll feel worse and then it's more pills and more stuff shoved down his throat and—

“Sonic?”

“I'm fine.” He looks up. He laughs. He smiles. He— “I'm good, I just…”

The taste doesn't go away, and there's fingers petting over his nape and between his legs that aren't supposed to be there and Shadow's staring at him from across the table and nowhere near him and the lights take on a dimmer, harsher cant. The image only broken up by buzzing striations of fluorescent light, cell bars, a hand shoved into the side of his face, holding his muzzle shut, keeping him in place and there's someone on top of him, inside of him and he—

He jerks up from his seat and grins even tighter, teeth clenched even harder. Cold sweat slicks the fur on the back of his neck. “I gotta go.”

He makes it to the bathroom just before he throws up. Or tries to. It's nothing really. All air and what mostly digested food he managed to shove in his mouth earlier in the day. His stitches ache with an undulating pain starting low and ending high in the burn in his throat. He rests the side of his face on the rim after and breathes heavily. His head pounding. His ears gummy.

The bathroom door creaks open quietly behind him.

Shadow slowly crouches down next to him and sets down a glass of water that he gropes for immediately. He gets a loose hold on it, but Shadow gently grabs his wrist before he can get it to his mouth. He stiffens, heart jumping as his eyes flick between Shadow’s, waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the act to finally fold in on itself, for any of the unwarranted kindness to make sense.

“Drink it slowly,” Shadow says and then releases him.

He hesitates, eyeing the glass before he nurses at it slowly. No filmy powder or bitter taste follows and his shoulders finally relax. While he drinks, Shadow uncaps a small bottle he recognizes from the first aid kit. The astringent stench of rubbing alcohol smacks into him instantly.

“Hold this under your nose,” Shadow says, holding it out towards him.

“Huh? What's that gonna do?”

“Just do it.”

He grabs it from Shadow and sticks it under his snout. When he breathes in, it's sharp and more than potent. It goes right to the back of his mouth and sits in his nose. Before long, the sour heaviness in his gut diffuses. It leaves him a tad lighter between the ears for it, but at the least his stomach has stopped rock walling his esophagus.

“Where'd you learn that trick?” he asks, holding it back out to Shadow.

“From someone else a long time ago.” Shadow recollects the rubbing alcohol bottle and caps it before placing it aside. “I assume certain solid foods are out of the question then.”

“No,” Sonic says. “I'm fine, seriously. it's just…it's whatever, I can eat just fine usually.”

“Clearly.” Shadow sighs. “We can start small. Meal replacement alternatives exist, and it's no use feeding you anything else right now if it's just going to come up later. It'll cause more harm than good.”

“Well, I handled that food from earlier just fine.” He did. He knows he did. ‘It's no use feeding you when you merely waste it.’ His chest clenches. He kept it down. He ate it and didn't spit it back out. He didn't waste it. He knows he didn't.

Shadow says nothing. Just stares. Somehow that's worse.

“I didn't upchuck it behind your back, stop looking at me like that, dude.”

“Regardless, you're still underweight. Malnourished, if the doctor at Headquarters is to be believed.”

“Okay? And?”

Shadow grits his teeth, muzzle wrinkling like he's frustrated at him for not understanding what he isn't grasping here. “I have to make sure you're keeping food down.”

His shoulders hike at that. “Listen, I don't need you to come in here and hold my hand, I'm totally f—” Sonic jolts to his feet and his head rushes, his hearing cutting out like someone's jammed their fingers into his ears.

He catches himself on the wall, and then realizes the wall under him is a lot warmer and softer than it should be.

Shadow makes a displeased sound against him. “You clearly haven't eaten enough today to be steady on your feet.”

His muzzle goes hot. He shoves out of Shadow's arms, ears pressed back. “Stop tellin’ me what I can't do already.”

Shadow's snout wrinkles. “I’m not telling you what to do, I'm simply making an observation.”

“Well, it kinda feels like it from here.”

“Fine.” Shadow scrubs a hand down his face and drops it at his side with a sigh. “Then conduct yourself however you see fit.”

“Great. Awesome. That's fine by me.”

There's a moment of hesitation, a concerned furrow that takes root on Shadow's brow. It almost looks like Shadow wants to reach out for him again, say something, his fists clenching and unclenching at his sides uncertainly.

“Well?” Sonic asks before he can stop himself. “You stickin’ around for the autograph or something?”

Shadow crouches down to grab the water glass and leaves the bathroom at that, the door shutting behind him far more quietly than it should. Something about it all immediately makes the tension in his shoulders wash away. His chest clenches instead.

Shadow's just trying to help... He knows that. He heads for the tap and washes off his hands, scrubbing the spit and bile off his snout for good measure before swiping his hands over his quills, more self soothing than vain as he only glances at the mirror briefly before turning away from it. Shadow wants to help. Sure. He gets that now. But he also doesn't want to be babied or coddled or handled with kid gloves and treated like he's stupid here. He frowns at the tile under his feet. But Shadow's not doing any of that either, is he? Not really…

He slinks his way out of the bathroom and back towards the kitchen. An apology plays over and over again in his head. Not a great one. Not even a mediocre one. But it's better than nothing. Shadow's already there, dumping ingredients into a blender and muttering to himself. Before he can open his mouth and mangle his way through saying sorry, Shadow turns it on. There's a minute or so of standing there awkwardly, listening to it grind away, where he debates calling it quits and heading for the bedroom to curl up under the bedsheets instead. To just forget about it entirely. To take the easy way out here.

“Here,” Shadow says, disconnecting the container and pouring the contents into a tall cup before he can manage to get any words out.

A straw is added to it a moment later, one Shadow must've dredged up from somewhere, curly and translucent blue, bendy in all the places a straw probably shouldn't be. And Shadow must've added a generous amount of lemon or lime juice to it, something to offset the rest of it. The sour notes make it easier to tolerate at the least. He sips at it slowly, the chill aching his teeth slightly as he watches Shadow tidy up the kitchen before he's ushered towards the living room with a tired wave of a hand and a quiet ‘go sit down’.

He settles on the couch and promptly shoves the abandoned stuffed animal doppelganger up under the coffee table with his foot. It squashes up against the metal frame, distorting oddly in places, face folding in on itself, stubby hedgehog legs disappearing under it without a trace. He frowns and presses it further under the table until he can't see it anymore. Until it's out of sight and out of mind. Shadow must've shoved it off the couch last night once he found it wedged into his arms. For a moment, he has to wonder if Shadow knows it was himself that put it there. If that's the reason he left it discarded on the floor or—

“What do you want to watch?” Shadow asks, cordial, somehow too easy, as he grabs the remote from the coffee table.

“Eh, anything's fine with me.”

Shadow switches over to the DVD player’s input and Sonic snorts when he sees what Rouge must've put on at some point during the day while he was conked out.

“This one? Really?”

“Apparently she likes the actor that plays the Forger.”

“Mm, you know what, that tracks actually.”

He settles back into the couch, legs pulled up criss-cross onto the cushion, smoothie loosely cradled in his lap. The opening credits play and Shadow seems to unstiffen as well, the awkward tension from before easing out as Shadow leans back into the cushions, pulling one leg up onto the sofa, his knee almost brushing his. He finds himself looking at Shadow's face instead of the film. There's the same sort of tiredness etched there that he saw on him the day before when he caught Shadow sleeping on the couch. His ears tip hot as he remembers the way Shadow's foot felt pressed up to his when he made the impromptu decision to take up the other half of it. He can't help but wonder if Shadow woke up and saw him first, or if Rouge woke Shadow up to point it out to him later.

And he's still not entirely sure why none of them woke him up earlier, why they just meandered around him and let him continue to play dead weight in their living room for so long. He still can't quite wrap himself around the idea that they've let him stick around this long at all.

Especially Shadow.

A loud sound from the TV snaps his attention back to it and his face goes even hotter. He can only hope Shadow didn't just witness him staring at him for who knows how long. At the least, it doesn't feel like he's about to have a heart attack anymore. He gets three-quarters of the way through the smoothie concoction before he calls it quits and sets it on the coffee table. When he looks back up, the scene playing out is in a hallway the characters walked through earlier, except it's become entirely untethered as it warps and then starts to rotate.

He laughs, more a sharp puff of air through his nose. “Oh, man, I totally forgot about this scene.”

He can practically feel the way Shadow’s eyes flick over towards him.

“Ah, sorry,” he says, scratching at his muzzle. “It's just weirdly kinda accurate how they got the whole illusion-dream thing going on in this.”

Shadow's quiet for a moment. “Accurate how?”

Sonic waves a hand vaguely. “Those Phantom Ruby gizmos or whatever. They're always a bit wonky. I mean, yeah, sometimes they're like the normalish, borin’ stuff in this, but otherwise—” Sonic gestures at the screen while looking over at Shadow. “They're all taffy ‘n putty.”

Shadow’s ears flick down. “Did you spend a lot of time inside of illusionary spaces?”

“Sure.” Sonic shrugs. “Kinda.”

Shadow's quiet again, a frown slowly taking root on his muzzle.

“Hey, it's really nothing big, honest. I mean, it was nice sometimes.” Sonic presses his hands into his own thighs, pushing at the muscles with the heels of his palms before repeating the motion. Like he can expel the sudden jitteriness from himself. “Seeing home ‘n stuff. He'd let me run around in Green Hill, too. I even got to see Tails Workshop, y’know, the one in Mystic Ru—” His teeth click shut so abruptly he almost bites his tongue. His heart stutters in his chest with a sudden flash of heat under his fur that turns into a cold chill.

“The Ruins?”

Sonic laughs and jogs his leg. “Uh, yeah. Yup, that one. Emerald Coast, too. Guy didn't even have the courtesy to get rid of the orcas. Can you believe it? I think he thought it was funny watchin’ me run around or something.”

“Sonic.”

Sonic looks over at Shadow, wincing at the unamused look Shadow levels him with. “What?”

“If he brought you to the other locations for ‘running around in’, why did he take you to Tails’ Workshop?”

“Oh? So you learned his name finally?”

“You're deflecting.”

Sonic grimaces and his foot tacks against the ground faster than ever. “Look, I dunno. Just cause he could, I guess,” Sonic says. “That guy was weird. Into weird stuff.”

Shadow's silence is heavier than anything else.

Sonic hunches slightly, leaning away as much as he can without seeming like he's trying to bolt.

“Such as?” Shadow asks finally.

“Oh, y’know, nothing too big—” He kicks one foot back and forth, heel hitting the couch rhythmically. “I guess we sorta had sex in there.”

“In the Workshop?”

“Well, no, cause it’s all just fakes. But yeah, sorta, in a way.” Sonic shrugs with one shoulder. “It's not like it's the only place we hit up either, so…”

Shadow's eyes don't leave him, but nothing leaves Shadow's mouth either. The dead silence itches at him the longer it lingers.

“I mean, I wanted to do it. There wasn't really a bed in my cell ‘n all. An’ lying on metal all the time gets pretty old, messes up the quills after a bit—” Sonic smiles at Shadow. “And hey, fake beds feel pretty close to real ones anyway.”

Shadow's face pinches up, his brow furrowing.

“Y’know, I've tried to do the math, too. With the days ‘n all. How many times we had sex and everything. I'm not even sure if he's good enough to make illusions of himself that’ve got everythin’ in order, but he totally had to be in two places at once a lot, right? Like, how could the guy’ve been railing me at noon and burning down the next village at one? Just doesn't really add up, does it?”

Not like he ever talked a whole lot when we had sex anyways. So who knows.” Sonic tips his head back against the couch, gesturing towards the ceiling vaguely. It’s like someone else is running his mouth, like he can't stop talking even if he wanted to. His heart beating somewhere in his throat all the while. “Like he'd always come and stuff, duh, but I mean, c'mon. The guy almost dropped the sun on us, I feel like some illusion spunk’s not outta this guy's wheelhouse by any means ‘n—”

Shadow makes a sudden sound.

He blinks at the ceiling, the texture of it coming into focus abruptly, everything snapping back into place all at once. He rolls his head to the side and looks over at Shadow. He looks more than tense. Beyond uncomfortable. His fists curled at his sides and ears tight against his head.

“Uh…?” He swallows thickly. “You good, dude?”

“I—” Shadow's hand comes up to swipe over his own muzzle, holding over it for a lingering moment before dropping away. “Can we discuss this another time?”

“Oh.” A sticky, heavy feeling settles all over him, his stomach flip-flopping with it. “Uh, sorry, yeah. Sure...my bad.”

It's basically undeniable now. Shadow thinks he's gross. Because yeah, of course he would. Why did he even say all of that? Geezus, who even does that? Shadow was down here fighting a war alongside everyone else, and he was just up there messing around when he should've been— Why didn't he just—

There were no survivors on the Death Egg. Just you. Geezus. Who says yes to fucking the enemy? Who does that? You should've been there to stop it. To save them. Why weren't you there? What kind of hero gets on his knees when the world is burning? Pathetic. People died up there. And you didn't. Why didn't you take the noble way out? Disgusting. There were no other survivors from the Death Egg. Just you. Just. He raped you didn't he? No. No. Because if it was, then— It can't be rape because that's not—it’s not— If it is. If. No. Then why does he keep coming back to it? Why does he— Why can't he stop being so fucking—why can't he—why—why

He pushes himself to his feet and heads for the hallway, only stopping to glance back over his shoulder when Shadow pauses the film. “Think I'm gonna hit the hay early.”

Shadow doesn't say anything further. His chest tightens at that.

Look what you did. Look what you did. He knows. They know. You know what you did. You wanted it didn't you. Your—your—

“Is it okay if I snag your bed for a nap?” he asks, voice flatter than he means for it to be.

Shadow seems to hesitate for a moment. “Yes.”

Why didn't you just say no why didn't you say no why didn't you—

“Cool. See ya later.”

Only once he gets the door shut behind himself does it go a little bit quieter. He slips under the sheets and curls into himself. Knuckles’ words sit at the forefront despite his best efforts to ball them up and throw them away. All of them. Every single line. He replays that conversation in his head as many times as he does the one he just had with Shadow. He's not even sure how he screwed up both so badly. How he keeps screwing them up. Maybe his mouth really is just better for other things.

—he was right. They all are. Better at being a slut than a savior. They didn't come to get you because maybe they finally realized they were always better off without you, not even a hero just a whor—

He shoves his hand down his boxers before he can think about it. Heart thudding in his ears, every inch of him jittery like a live wire. He thinks about the time in the fake workshop, on the fake couch in the live-in area of the fake Tornado hangar. Something semi-proper for once. The lighting drawn low. He could almost fool himself into thinking maybe it was all something romantic. Or at least something he wanted. Hot all over as he laid back on the cushions. Smiling on reflex as Infinite settled between his legs and draped over him. No mask. Snout to snout. He'd wound his arms behind Infinite's neck and pulled him into the kiss first. And he'd laid there after and thought about how soft the fabric felt, the foam, Infinite’s fur against his. How warm everything was. How he didn't mind this, whatever it all was because at least it was something.

He'd woken up in his cell later. Cold. Alone.

so you wanted it so you wanted it so you

His face crumples up in a frustrated snarl and he wrenches his hands out of his boxers. He presses his thighs together, feet pushing at the sheets. He needs to get rid of the heat between his legs, but it's not going away and he can't finish like this. And Shadow won't fuck him. Won't even touch him or look at him. Not now. Nobody will. Not like this.

He shoves his snout against the pillow and his eyes go hot for the first time in forever. He could just leave and find someone else to take care of it. He could. But then he'll have to start back at square one with healing up after. That is if they aren't put off by the fact someone played scratching post and chew toy with him. Damaged goods, or whatever. Used up. No one's ever going to want him like this. Not when they can see it all on him.

disgusting disgustingdisgustingdisgustingdisgustingdisgustingdisgustingdisgustingdisgusting

He grabs one of the pillows and shoves it between his legs and holds it tight. It'll have to do. He grabs at his own throat and suddenly it's someone else bearing down on it. His vision narrows, blurs, stripes and darkens at the edges. There's a snout huffing in his ear, a tongue on it, teeth latched into it and tearing, someone grunting and groaning over him as the fingers dig into his neck harder. He imagines the indents of a cell floor under the side of his snout, being shoved into it, hit, spit, taken, smothered—

He winds back down after he finishes with full-body shivers, panting hard. Blissfully numb all over as he rolls over to stare at the ceiling. Nausea thickens in his throat all too suddenly when he remembers where he is.

again you did it again you

He shouldn't be doing all of this in Shadow's bed. And certainly not with the guy's pillow. He kicks the pillow off the edge and listens to it thud limply against the floor. Now he'll have to figure out where the guy keeps clean cases for them tomorrow…

He'll fix it later. He'll…His eyes drift shut before he can stop them. He'll get up in a sec. Just a sec. He just needs to.

---

A sharp knock on the door startles him awake. His heart practically leaps out of his mouth as he scrambles upright and stares wide-eyed at it. He glances down at his boxers and grimaces. At the least, they're dry now. Small victories. He tugs the top sheet over his lap just in case.

“You can come in,” he says, and wow, his throat sounds bad. Geez.

The door opens and Shadow steps in, a bowl in his hands, one that's a little bit less shallow and nearing something like cup territory.

“What's that?” he asks, pulling his legs in closer, remembering what happened out in the living room like watching a bad movie, the urge to cringe at everything he said more than overwhelming.

Shadow steps over the pillow fallen on the ground, giving it a cursory glance before ignoring it. Sonic's ears fold down in silent mortification.

Shadow holds out the bowl towards him. “Rouge insisted I bring you some.”

“Oh…” He takes it and glances down at it. It's slices of strawberries in some kind of watery cream mixture. “Uh, thanks? I think?”

He's not exactly the biggest fan of strawberries, despite Amy's insistence strawberry shortcake and all adjacent desserts are superior in every way, but it's something cool and easy to eat at least. And Shadow looks enough like a kicked puppy that he's not about to say no to him either. He polishes off as much as he can muster and sets the spoon inside with a sharp clink. Shadow collects the bowl from him without a word and goes to leave.

“Hey, uh—” he starts, ears tilted forward. “Did you wanna, I dunno, maybe share the bed again? I feel kinda bad about constantly putting you out on the couch.”

Shadow considers it for a moment. “If it means you won't sleep on the floor.”

“Listen, sometimes a real good spot on the floor is where it's at.”

“And the sand in Green Hill? Is that somehow comfortable to you as well?” Shadow asks.

“Honestly, yeah, that was pretty cozy, not gonna lie.”

Shadow huffs. He's starting to understand that's the way Shadow laughs most of the time, and that the slight crinkle in his muzzle isn't just annoyance, it's amusement.

He lifts up the sheet for Shadow as a silent prompt. He can tell the clean freak in Shadow is conflicted about returning the bowl to the sink and washing it out already. After a moment, Shadow finally concedes and sets it on the nightstand. With his shoes removed and gloves neatly folded and set aside, Shadow accepts the offer and slips into the bed beside him.

There's a noticeable amount of space between them, himself kept carefully contained on his own side, and Shadow with his limbs drawn into himself as he stays sitting upright and tensed, like he's about to go into a fight instead of get some shut-eye. That same feeling from before swamps in slowly, aching in his chest.

“Do you always take your gloves off when you sleep?” Sonic asks. A pitiful attempt to break the ice, but an attempt nonetheless.

Shadow settles further against the headboard and Sonic takes it as a win. “Yes, why wouldn't I?”

“It's just—” It's not like he really has room to talk here, he already shucked his off a while ago. And the last time they shared a bed he wasn't wearing any after his kitchen-shower freak out fiasco or whatever that was. So…maybe it's really not as big of a deal as everyone makes it out to be if even Shadow of all people doesn't see it as something weird to go gloveless. “Nevermind, forget about it.”

Shadow side eyes him and readjusts until he's finally laying down, tucked under the sheet before pulling it over his shoulder as he turns his back towards him. Abruptly, he realizes Shadow has the only pillow left on the bed under his head right now.

He stares at Shadow's quills and debates whether it's better to just go without one or risk getting up and embarrassing himself by rummaging around for a new case for the one he messed up earlier.

Shadow sighs loudly. “The clean pillowcases are in the linen closet.”

Without a word, he slinks out of bed and snatches the new pillowcase from the closet before returning to change it out and shove the fresh one back onto the bed. He lays down again and stares at the ceiling, fingers tapping where he's folded his hands over his stomach.

“Next time you decide to use one of my pillows, at least put a towel between you and it.”

He snorts. “Gross, dude. Whaddya think I am drippy or something?”

“You're not the one who has to constantly smell you on it.”

He wrinkles his snout. “Have you ever considered, like, vaporub under the nose? Some plugs? I feel like it's against some kinda code of conduct to go around smelling everyone's business constantly.”

Shadow says nothing.

“Look, I don't mean that in a bad way, it's just—” Sonic’s face scrunches up. “Don't you get tired of it or something?”

“No,” Shadow says.

Sonic turns over onto his side, arm folded under the side of his face as he looks at Shadow’s scrunched up quills. “Really? Never?”

“I don't see what good it would do regardless.”

“Uh-huh.”

“It's useful,” Shadow asserts. “It's not meant to be a hindrance. It's how I was designed.”

“Yeah, totally.”

Shadow's shoulders tense up, quills bristling. “What are you trying to get at here?”

“Nothing. Just wondering how much they had to sell you on that up in that tin can to make you believe it.”

In a rush, Shadow turns over to face him finally, his eyes narrowed. “There's no ‘selling it.’ It's the truth.”

Like this, almost snout to snout, it's nothing like fighting with Shadow topside. When they're at each other's throats in Green Hill or running around somewhere else and bashing each other into the dirt. There's only a few inches of bed left between them now, if that. And where Shadow's hand fell is close enough to his own that he can feel the heat radiating from it. His eyes dart down to where Shadow's fist is curled up on top of the sheets.

“What?” Shadow grits out.

He stares at the red stripe on the back of Shadow's hand. He pokes it before he can think better of it, his fingers lingering in the wake. Shadow tenses under his touch.

“The other Black Arms don't got these exact ones,” he says quietly, only glad Shadow hasn't yanked away from him, that he doesn't have that same look he had on his face earlier, like he was going to throw up, like he'd seen something putrid and rotting.

“So where do you think you picked ‘em up from?”

“Some part of my creation most likely.”

“You mean your other dad's side of the family?” Sonic asks cheekily.

Shadow rolls his eyes. “No.”

“Then where'd ya get it?”

“The Black Arms all share a similar color scheme. I'm no different.”

“Huh?” He taps the red stripe again. “But they don't have just the stripes going on like this.”

“Doom’s Eye does,” Shadow says.

“Eugh. That guy…” Sonic grimaces. “Talk about a creep with a capital C. He was practically stalkin’ you that whole invasion! ‘Shadow, kill the enemy soldiers, turn on the glyph crystals.’ Man, whatever. He's the jerk that went out for milk and never bothered comin’ back.”

Shadow huffs out a laugh.

He grins at that. A win is a win. “I'm glad you didn't, y’know—help them take over the planet ‘n all.”

“Likewise…”

“I know it got a bit iffy there with the memories stuff and the, like—” He finally lifts his hand away from the back of Shadow’s to waggle his fingers at him. “Weird junky influence and all, but it's good to have you on our side. Or at least, your own side. Honestly, whatever side you wanna be on that isn't a buncha hungry aliens.”

Shadow hums consideringly, his face gone slack the further he relaxes into his pillow. He's never seen Shadow like this before, but it's almost like the more he talks, the more tired Shadow gets.

“Hey, did I ever tell you about Shahra?”

Shadow makes a negative sound under his breath, eyes drifted shut.

He launches into the story of the Arabian Nights and the World Rings and his showdown with the Erazor Djinn. By the end of the tale, Shadow's more than asleep. And it must be both later and earlier than he thought, because light starts to scatter through the curtains. The sound of traffic picking up and the doors of the other apartments opening and closing drowns out everything else before long. He listens to Shadow breathe and doesn't move his hand away from where Shadow's knuckles have accidentally brushed up against the back of his own hand. He finds himself watching the way the light plays across Shadow’s face, a softness to him that he never noticed before.

he pities you he thinks you're weak and pathetic and disgusting and

He shuts his eyes and shoves out everything else besides the fact there's someone else beside him, breathing, alive. Real. He rests his hand over Shadow's and the warmth bleeds into his palm. Before long, he finally falls asleep.

---

He's forgetting something. He knows what it is, but he can't remember, he just needs to remember so he can…so he can….

He jerks awake, tense all over, ears pricked towards the door that he swears he just heard click shut. When he looks over, Shadow's already gone, the indention of where he was still left behind, the sun more than high in the sky outside the window, the curtains drawn back to start the day. His hand brushes over the spot where Shadow was laying and it comes away warmed. There's a sound from the kitchen, the fridge opening and shutting and then the front door soon after with the sort of finality that means Shadow has more than likely left the apartment. He falls backwards onto the mattress at that, scrubbing at his face before sighing, an arm slung lazily over his eyes.

What is he forgetting? It's gonna eat at him all day if he can't remember what it is…

He slides out of bed, yawning, stretching his arms over his head with a pop-click from his shoulders. On the bed, there's small collections of fur shed into the sheets, a handful of blue quills spined into the pillow itself. It's nothing like he remembers it being on the Death Egg, but it's also enough to make him dust it all up into his hands as best he can before dumping it into the wastebin beside the nightstand.

Finished, he brushes off his hands and looks around. Shadow's most likely headed off to HQ and Rouge's either done the same or gone off who knows where. It's just him in the apartment then. Okay. He scrunches his face, trying to recall the day before, all the little things about it, and parts of it come up fuzzy. There was something. What was that thing he told himself he needed to do again? He scans the room slowly. Something, something, uh, phone? Call someone maybe? Sure. But who…

His eyes land on the closet door and he's in front of it before he can even blink. He slides it open and sees the safe from way before, from when he first snooped around in Shadow’s room. The keypad looks simple, but he knows he's never going to be able to guess the combination all by himself.

Like a lightbulb snapping on, it all comes stumbling back into his head.

“Tails!” Oh, shit. He totally forgot he meant to call him. Amy, too. He frowns. He'll get to Knuckles eventually, but that one's more of an in person, round two kind of endeavor.

He thumbs at the transceiver watch on his wrist, searching through its features to find the call only function. Video calling isn't exactly in the books for him at the moment, for a number of reasons. It rings enough times he's afraid for a moment Tails won't pick up. Which…fair. That's fair. He's not exactly been super stellar in a lot of departments lately, but—

“Sonic?”

“Hey, bud!” He winces. Too eager. Okay. Reel it back. “Quick question for ya. If you were going to set a password on the weird safe in your closet what would it be? Hypothetically.”

“Well…I'd probably make it something simple and easy to remember if I had to access it frequently. So, for most people I'd say a four digit code is relatively quick to recall, but anything longer than that might be a little more difficult depending on the person.”

“Of course. Sure.”

“And I probably wouldn't keep anything valuable in a safe that isn't super well hidden. Maybe some things I wouldn't want to get damaged, but definitely not jewels or anything like that. Hypothetically, of course.”

“Yeah. Hypothetically. And, let's say, hypothetically, I'm staring at a safe
right now. Would you be able to help me crack it?”

“Sonic,” Tails starts, “are you inside of an Eggman base right now?”

“Nah, just Rouge's apartment.”

Somehow Tails seems even more nervous at that prospect as the sounds of fidgeting increases over the connection. “I really don't think she'd want you getting into her things…”

“What? Dude, are you chickening out right now?”

“No! I just—” Tails sighs heavily and it crackles down the line. “She's practically the only person that can go key to key with me. Do you know what kind of damage she could do to my network if she found out that I—”

“Relax, Tails! It's not hers anyway, it's Shadow's stuff.”

“Shadow…? Wait.” Tails pauses. “Are you in Shadow's room?” Tails asks incredulously, voice rising in pitch at the end.

“They’re both letting me crash here for a couple days while I—” He grimaces. “While we handle some stuff. Nothing too big.”

“So, you want me to help you get into Shadow's safe then?”

“Sure do. C'mon, dude, I know you've gotta be at least a little bit curious.”

“All right,” Tails concedes with a smile he can practically hear. “Let's do it.”

“Yes!” He fist pumps the air before realizing Tails can't see it. “Okay, just lemme know what you need, bud.”

“First up, is there an electronic keypad or a dial?”

“Keypad.”

“And how many digits does it let you put in before failure?”

He squints, trying to remember his first failed attempt. “Five. Yeah, definitely five.”

He hears typing on a keyboard from Tails’ end, and he didn't realize how much he missed the ease of this, of them solving something, putting two and two together. It's not face to face, side by side, not like how it used to be. But it's still something at least.

“Try 62742.”

“Got it.” When he inputs the code, there's a thunk and the door comes free when he tugs on it. “Woah! Awesome work, dude.”

Tails laughs and he can hear the desk chair creak as Tails most likely settles back into it smugly. “I have my moments.”

“So, how'd you figure it out?” he asks as he pulls the door wide.

“First off, there's only a few things Shadow cares about, really. That we know of, of course. I figured that he also has experience with keypads considering the ARK had a more antiqued telecommunications system. So, I pulled up what one of the ARK communicators looked like and found another reference for how each number corresponds to certain letters on older telephones. The rest was easy.”

“Lemme guess,” Sonic starts amusedly, “it spells out Maria.”

“Yup.”

“The guy's nothing if not predictable.”

“Well, what's inside?” Tails asks. “You gotta share now since I helped you get in.”

“All right, all right. Hold on a sec,” he mutters before taking it all in.

His fur pricks, ears strained forward as he stares at the line-up of firearms on the upper shelf of the safe. Some kind of insert bought to keep them secure, neatly lined up, ammo boxes collected in another compartment beside them.

“Well, he definitely has a thing for guns.”

Tails laughs nervously. “I guess we already knew that from the Black Arms incident.”

“Yeah.”

And at the least, that whole thing is more than behind them now. Shadow's issues with his memory had caused more than a few hiccups along the way. He still remembers the way Shadow's eyes looked when he first came upon him at the start of the Black Arms invasion. Confused, desperate, angry at something or someone, like he didn't remember what had happened on the ARK, but that something was wrong regardless. It didn't help that he had Doom whispering in his ear the whole time, making things even worse.

“Is there anything else?” Tails asks.

He looks lower, getting on his hands and knees as he sees the corner of something tucked up under the lowest shelf. Gnabbing it between his fingers, he pulls it free. A large manila envelope slides out, the kind with the little metal clasp to keep it neatly shut and everything.

“Huh…”

“What?”

“Guess he's got mail.”

“Are you gonna open it?” Tails asks.

“We came this far, don't see why not.”

For a moment, he hesitates. Shadow probably doesn't want anyone to see what's in here. The guns he gets, those are supposed to be stored like this, it's unsurprising, practically a boring find. If not one that scratches at him in a way he'd rather not inspect too closely. He's only glad he has no idea where to even start with handling a firearm, let alone loading one and getting the safety off.

He undoes the clasp and tips the envelope until the contents slide out. He'll put everything back exactly how he found it after. No harm no, no foul. He blinks at the tape deck, the unlabeled cassette inside of it, the retro headphones tangled around it that tumbled out alongside it all. A round data disk falls out next, encased in a heavy-duty plastic cover. Weird. Another smaller envelope spills out last and he snatches it up instead. It's thick and off-white, yellowed with age at the seams and where the glue bit at it over the years. When he pours its guts into his hand, a stack of Polaroids greets him. Distorted in places, warped like they'd been held near a fire too long. He frowns as he files through them.

The first one is obviously a photo from the ARK, of the Professor sitting in a chair with Maria standing at his shoulder. He flips to the next one and it's some kind of laboratory. Empty and sparse except for the backdrop of stars outside the large windows. He goes to the next one. Shadow’s settled on the edge of an exam table, hooked up with wires and nodes, looking away from whoever took the photo and towards the same windows from before. Another one. It's Maria this time, pointing up at the ceiling of the observation deck—he recognizes the floor, he's pretty sure he can't forget it—with Shadow kneeled beside her, following her lead. There's something softer about him in these photos. Something he can't quite place. Younger maybe. Less…whatever he is now. It's—

“Sonic?” Tails asks.

He snaps back into himself. This definitely isn't something he should be seeing. He shoves them all back in the envelope and puts everything back where he found it in a rush before shutting the safe and locking it again. His face burns hot. The realization he knew all along hitting him only after he'd already done it.

He shouldn't have touched that. It was obviously private.

“Sonic? What happened?” Tails asks.

“Nothing, I—” He looks over his shoulder like Shadow’s already going to be standing there. An empty room greets him instead. Shit. Shit. Something else. He needs to think of something else. Do something else. “Hey, do you think you could figure out how to rig up something so we can get two-player on an old console, but long distance?”

“Hm…” Tails hums, seeming to contemplate calling him out on the abrupt subject change. “Yeah, definitely. Just give me a sec, and I'll need the name of the console when you get a chance.”

“Can do.”

Maybe it's a coward's way out, but he jogs out into the living room and far away from the safe and the guns and its photos and everything else about it that he can't quite put a name to.

---

“No, no—” His pixelated car skids off the blocky race track and abruptly explodes into tiny 8-bit smithereens. He slams his controller down with a groan. “What?! That's literally cheating! You're literally cheating, dude!”

“Nope, that one was fair and square,” Tails says smugly. “You're just mad you're the one who missed the shortcut this time.”

“No way! My guy can't even use it, c'mon.”

Tails laughs. “Maybe next time check those stats before you pick your vehicle.”

Sonic rolls his eyes. “Yeah, whatever, pull up another race already and let's see how you do this time.”

“You're on.”

It took a bit of finagling and rummaging around in the kitchen and media cabinet for him to find what he needed, but they somehow got a decent setup going. He's only lost six out of ten races, but it's definitely the controller he's using being all weird. One hundred percent. Tails whoops loudly over the call as he wins another race. Sonic shakes his head, smiling. He feels…good. It's the best way he can put it. For once it's just this and nothing else.

He glances over his shoulder, fingers tapping at the controller as he picks it back up. He should probably apologize to Tails. He should. For everything. For making Tails think he was dead that day. For not being there for six months. For leaving him all alone like that. For leaving him behind when he shouldn't have. For being a shitty big bro and an even shittier friend lately.

He clears his throat. “Hey, bud. I…”

There's an abrupt beep-beep tone that cuts through on Tails' end of the call.

“Oh, shoot! I really really need to finish this thing for Amy real quick,” Tails says, the sound of him scrambling up and grabbing something echoing from the speakers on his transceiver. “I'll call you later, Sonic!”

“Yeah, sure thing, bud.”

Tails hangs up and the line goes dead. He watches the little line flatline on the transceiver, only jumping ever so slightly from the static left behind from the disconnected call before he finally cuts it off on his end too. Slumping back against the couch, he gropes around for the remote and hits the power button. He stares at the blacked out screen, face flat. From this angle, he can barely make out the reflection of familiar blues and tans, of his stuffed animal counterpart still trapped under the coffee table right where he shoved it.

see? all alone again. it always comes back to this doesn't it doesn't it doesn't i

The kitchen tiles are cold under his bare feet as he trudges into it. There's a note on the counter, bright neon green. He plucks it off and reads over it dully. ‘Take two every four hours if needed’. The pain pill bottle and mechanical timer settled beside it start to make a lot more sense. He tosses the note back onto the counter and heads for the fridge. There's another note waiting for him there, this one more detailed, explaining what he can eat and what he should avoid for now. Nestled below it, he finds another one with Rouge's own handwriting. ‘Call if you need anything <3’. He pulls both of the notes off the fridge and tosses them onto the counter with the other one he already ignored, hot all over from head to toe.

He's not some house pet, and he's not a complete idiot either. He looks towards the hallway, the balcony, and walks into the living room instead to stare at the front door. His hands work in and out of fists, eyes jumping from the knob to the seam of light sneaking in under the decayed weather strip. Like sleepwalking, he finds himself back inside the kitchen a moment later. No one's here except for himself. The tiles sting under his feet at the realization. His wrists ache and itch without reason. He wrings at them and then shakes them out in an attempt to get rid of the feeling.

A glance at the wall clock proves fruitless. It'll be a while before either of them come back around.

they're not coming to get you they're not coming they're not going to save you no one's coming to

He's pacing back and forth inside the kitchen before he realizes it, his stomach turning over and over, his chest starting to go too tight all over again. He can't tell if it's hunger or nausea or both or neither. He opens the fridge and stares at the labeled tupperware containers neatly stacked to one side, pre-portioned, pre-made, his name in dry erase marker on the lids. He bypasses them for the egg carton and smacks the fridge door closed again with his foot. He can make his own food. He doesn't need anyone to cook for him or spoon feed him here.

burden you'll always be a burden to them dead weight pathetic

It takes a bit of rummaging around until he finally finds where the pans are stashed. He sets it on the stove with a thud and goes to dig the olive oil out of the pantry. Black pepper. Hot sauce. Anything to drown the taste of them in after. He lets the oil heat up before cracking two eggs into its belly, quickly washing the slime of the viscera off his hands under the tap before scraping them dry with the handtowel until his handpads sting.

He watches them turn from clear to off-white, going opaque at the center and edges. The wall clock ticks away loudly in the silence. He stares at the counter. The reflective metal trim of the stove top. Hands settle on his waist and he whips around, heart in his throat to see nothing and no one. He scrubs his hands over his sides, pushing the sensation off and away, tugging at the hem of his shirt, pulling at it until a hem in the neckline pops.

“It's fine, man, you're fine, just forget about it.” Great. Talking to himself again. He thought he kicked that habit to the curb already.

He huffs, smoothing his hands over his quills and taking a deep breath. Okay. He just needs to turn the eggs over. Easy. Spatula. He needs a— His eyes rove over the countertop. Where do they keep the—there it is. He leans over to pluck it out of the container pushed up against the backsplash and the edge of the counter digs into his hips. There's teeth buried in his shoulder, someone draped over his back, heavy and huffing around his blood and fur, pinning him down into the metal bench under his chest and stomach, spread knees dug into the floor, hips carved against the lip of it on each thrust forward. He jerks away so fast the spatula slips out of his hand and smacks into the pan’s handle, sending it flipping up on the stove. Oil splatters onto the stove top and hisses and spits. One of the eggs nearly slips out and he rights it all as fast as he can, panting frantically through his teeth.

he's there he's there still there you never left you never left you never

He digs the heel of his palm into his brow until it hurts. His wrists feel heavy. His fur sticky and too tight. His other hand massages at his shoulder, kneading at the scar tissue, at the sensation of spit and blood gathered and drying that isn't there.

wash it off wash it off wash it off

“Okay! Okay, maybe, just…” he trails off, eyes jumping towards the hallway. “A shower. And then food. And then…”

Wait. Can you shower with stitches? Geez. He can't even remember what the Doc said anymore. He wasn't supposed to with his surgeries, but only after so much time. And he's not about to call Shadow here. Hell no. The guy already probably thinks he can't take care of himself half the time and he's not about to reinforce that rhetoric. He's probably busy doing more important stuff anyway. There's no point in bothering him for no reason.

The eggs start to pop incessantly and he knows he's overdone the frying on them by now. He plates them and stares at them, twisting the fork around in his hand. The metal tines flash under the overhead light and he hears panting in his ears, someone breathing hard, wet, frantic. He drops the fork onto the countertop with a clatter and screws his eyes shut.

Right, yeah. Yeah. Fine. Whatever. It's— Sonic scrubs at his face and sighs. It's whatever. He'll just shower first and then eat after. It's a foolproof plan. He's long overdue for another one anyway…

What could possibly go wrong?

---

The shower helps.

It also doesn't. His heart won't settle down for even a moment after he steps out and towels off. More quills and fur come away and he stares at them caught in the fabric and littering the bathroom floor and he throws the towel down over it all in a futile attempt to cover up the evidence. In the living room, he finds the tablet Shadow handed over to him before his bath yesterday.

He rifles through it, finding a collection of books downloaded, romance ones, crime thrillers, way too many texts on gemstone composites and minerals. He can only assume this is Rouge's device then. It only takes a few minutes of reading about calcite before his eyes start to glaze over, restlessness turning him to clicking into the same browser he opened before. The news article he opened in the bath spills out onto the screen and he skims it, back to front, front to back, xeroxing every word into the back of his eyelids. It's pretty much what he expected from an op-ed section. He just never expected to see an entire article span dedicated to himself like this. More specifically his quote unquote ‘slow descent into depravity’. He wrinkles his snout, swiping his thumb over the screen to highlight a section of the interview portion where a woman he's never spoken to, doesn't even know, has more than a lot to say about him.

‘I don't think he understands how many kids look up to him. I mean, he's on everything these days. TV, cereal boxes, they've even made action figures of him. You'd think he'd understand he needs to conduct himself a little more maturely. He's a role model, and frankly, as a parent, I don't think he's safe for kids to be around. Did you see that last piece TKZ put out? The things he's getting up to, it's not something I'd want my teenager to stumble across and think ‘well, if Sonic is doing it, then I can, too’.’

He grits his teeth and closes the article. He tries to look at anything else and then opens the history tab and pulls it up again. The title glares back at him. ‘Hometown Hero or Another Childhood Celebrity Off the Rails?’

He's not a celebrity. He's not a role model. He's not even a hero. He's not supposed to have kids looking up to him like that. Commercials and TV spots and all the stupid things he signed on for when he was younger. Maybe it was just the attention. Money. Paying rent. Helping Tails establish his workshop network across the Islands and then the continent proper. But contracts are forever if you don't read the fine print. It's not like he can tell them to stop putting his face everywhere and anywhere they want to put it.

He lets the tablet flop over onto his stomach, his eyes roving over the ceiling instead. After a moment, he picks it back up and closes out of all the tabs. He opens a new one, fingers hovering over the keys. One letter and then the other follows, and it's like they have a kind of their own. When he looks back up at the search bar, indecent assault stares back at him.

‘Blood found in fur. Semen. Possible evidence of Indecent/Sexual Assault. Patient declined further examination.’

The results scroll out over the page and he hits the first one.

A person commits an offense if, without the other person's consent and with the intent to arouse or gratify the sexual desire of any person

(1) touches the anus, breast, or any part of the genitals of another person;

He immediately closes the search results and opens up a fresh page, throat tight.

indecent assault vs rape

He hits search. The first few results he scrolls past. A forum entry presents itself and he lingers over it. [Serious] Male victims of sexual assault, harassment, or rape, to clear some common misconceptions, what were your experiences like?

When he opens the forum board, he skims through the answers, scrolling too fast to read too much, vision unfocused and too fuzzy to catch onto anything. There's snippets of things, repeated words and phrases and a common sentiment that's easy to gather the further he goes. It's a feeling he hasn't felt in a very long time. Like an outsider looking in. A suggested list of Q and A threads sits at the bottom. He scrolls through them, a small part of him hoping maybe there's at least one person who's asked a question that's just like him.

[AITA] why doesn't my boyfriend understand that women would rather die than be r**ed?

It's not what he's looking for in the slightest. There's a handful of down votes on it as much as there are up votes. He clicks on it anyways. A sinking feeling drags at his stomach as he reads through the top answers.

‘I’d literally rather slit my throat than live with that’ ‘its cause he doesn't understand we'd rather get mauled to death ☠️.’ ‘guys just don't get that literally any girl would rather choose to die than be 🍇d. they just dont have to deal with this bullshit🙄’

there were no survivors on the Death Egg. there were no survivors. there were no other survivors. just you. no one else said yes except for you. no one fucked him except you. you let him. you let him. you let him. you let him. you wanted him to—

‘He raped you, didn't he?’

He closes out of the forum board and swipes at the sweat clumping his fur, the sting in his eyes.

No. He can't call it that. He can't. Obviously. Because. Because…

anyone else would've just slit their own throat, right? chosen the airlock instead. died a hero. died a—

It's not what happened in that cell. It's not the same. He's a stain on that record if he lumps himself in with the people in that first forum thread, with people like Shadow who never deserved for any of that to happen to them in the first place.

He pushes the tablet off of his stomach and lets it fall onto the couch cushions. He turns over, curling his knees up towards his chest as he stares at the TV and gropes around for the remote blindly.

he wanted to live he wanted to see his friends again he wanted to get out he wanted to get out he did what he had to he just did what he had to he just did what he had—

really? are you sure that's all it was?

He turns on the TV and switches over to the DVD player input. Shadow must've not finished the movie off last night then. It’d explain all the food cooked and boxed up in the fridge that wasn't there yesterday. He continues it, watching it idly, arm half-hanging off the couch, limp and lifeless.

why did he tell Shadow any of that last night. why. he shouldn't have ever said anything. so why did he—

it's because you grabbed him that night. you're no better. you're just as bad. how many people have you hurt. how many people have you—

He screws his eyes shut and twists over onto his back, reaching for the tablet again before he can reconsider it. Flickers of moments, pieced together loosely and ill-fitted, flit through his head, grinding at the edges like broken glass. The collie in the car, too past drunk to know half of what he was doing, the badger bartender who just wanted to make sure he didn't end up face down in the street. More and more. Faces, no names. Shadow staring at him, wide-eyed from the couch, limbs drawn in like he'd bit him, like he was going to keep biting him. Some kind of rabid, feral dog gone bad.

He scrambles for the remote, switching it all over to cable instead. He flicks through channels for something to fill up the space between his ears that isn't himself. An action movie, guns, fight scenes. He lets it play out and watches it like it's the most riveting thing he's ever seen. Before long, the stoic tiger leads a gazelle in a tight red dress back to his room, all stereotypical, raunchy, the kind of thing he'd roll his eyes at if the way he grabs her and hoists her against the wall to mouth at her neck didn't make his heart race. Every drop of blood goes south before he can think about it. The actors end up in bed with each other before long and his hand finds its way under the hem of his boxers alongside them. It's not even good. It's not even satisfying. He comes down from it and the movie’s long moved onto something else and he stares at it like he's seen a ghost. Still restless. Still hot all over.

He swipes his fingers off on his shirt and snatches up the tablet again. He opens an incognito browser, following a familiar routine he hasn't done since he hit puberty like a freight train and then the second round of it hit even harder. At least with porn he doesn't have to read the comments. At least he doesn't have to accidentally see his name or what they think about him or anything else. At least he doesn't have to think about it at all. About anything. He can just disappear for a little while...

…

It's only when he glances at the time display in the left corner that he realizes it's been hours of the same routine. That he even zoned out at all. He's beyond over-sensitive when he finally yanks his hand out of his shorts. It's not even a blissful numbness anymore. He's practically chafed. Aching. On this side of a little too raw. He doesn't even remember coming this time. The last thing he watched idles on the screen and he quickly exits out of it. ‘Brutal’, ‘extreme’, ‘rapeplay’, the title a scatter of words that sends bile up behind his teeth. He's tacky with sweat, the fabric from his shirt sticking to him in all the wrong places, his calves stuck like velcro to the sofa cushions.

There's no spike of adrenaline left. No doped up wave crash to get him to sleep, to knock him flat and out on his ass. His hand is tacky with slick at the fingertips, finger pads pruny. And somehow he can still smell breath-wet metal, fevered sweat mingled with too cold steel, the raised lines of it pressed into his shoulders. He can hear the grunting in his ears. Huffing. Labored breaths. Smell his own blood where he's driven ragged, blunted claws into his palms as hard as he can.

Laying on his back, he stares up at the ceiling light and the unease grows. He can't tear his eyes away from the recessed metal casing. The bright glare of it. The way it never turns off. His heart stamps in his chest, mouth dry as he tries to swallow and look away, but he can't. He can't. He counts the lines that unfurl from around the light, the spackled ceiling plaster fading into smooth metal, the whole room shrinking in around him. His cell. His bunk. His. All of it. It's all he has. This is all he has now; the hands that grab him by the knees and wrench them apart.

It's like his arms are locked to his sides all over again. A wire wound through his jaw, clenched shut so tight his molars ache. He thinks he tries to say something. His breath whining out of his chest in rapid seams through his teeth. It's. it's.. it's…

There's a superposition. Two negatives sliding over one another, clear through the whites, coherence somewhere underneath. He knows where he is, he knows exactly where he is, but he doesn't at the same time. There's fabric cradled under his shoulders, the bite of unkind steel roughly gnawing at them on each thrust. His hands grab at the cushioned foam under them, at nothing, at themselves. Unyielding metal. Everywhere, always.

He counts the lines on the ceiling overhead. Five…. Fifteen…. Thirty-eight... Forty-one... For—his jaw cinches harder. Hot air collects sticky in the junction of his neck and shoulder from someone else's mouth—ty. Where? His eyes jump along the seams. He lost track. He has to start over. He has to. There's tiles slipping around overhead, everything dead still and frantic at the edges. One. He forgets how to breathe. Two. Three. Four. Everything burns right where it shouldn't. Fi— five? Six? No. No. Not again. He can't do it again. He can't. He can't he can't he—

He doesn't want to be here anymore. He wants to go home. He wants to—

He jolts upright, wide-eyed, shaking. Knees locked, hands grabbing at his chest like he can smother out the beating there. He laughs and feels the reflexive smile slide into a grimace, his breath leaving him faster than he can suck it back in. His head aches, his entire body. From his neck to his navel to his tail. Like he's thrown himself through a Badnik’s gears, let himself get chewed through them again and again. He laughs like it's being wrenched out of him, loud and tight, his eyes hot. Practically burning. He smears at them shakily with his hands before slapping them tight over his muzzle as he dry heaves into stale air and curls over his legs.

“Shit…” He feels beyond sick now. From his stomach all the way to the back of his throat. “Get it together already, man.”

He smacks the heel of his palms into his ears and snarls. He needs to go for a run. Fight someone. He needs a drink. He needs to do something. Anything else besides sit here. He's sick and tired of feeling sick and tired.

Maybe he just needs to fuck someone.

He doesn't even care who or how or why. Maybe he misses the rush of it, the crash, the numbness, the nothingness. The floating away, the forgetting, the far away drag. Maybe it's because it's someone actually looking at him, talking at him—not even to him, but touching him. Just there, real and there, and something else besides himself. It's just anything else. Holding him, fucking him; it's all the same thing anyway. It's all the same. It all does the same thing. He just needs to be anywhere else right now. Drunk or high or passed out or fucked or all four at once.

Shadow isn't here. Rouge isn't here. No one's here. He's all alone again. He draws his legs in tight, chin resting on his knees, arms wrapped around himself. He stares at the door.

It's just him up here. It's just him…

Shit. Maybe he is losing it.

Another shower. He can take another shower. That's something he can do. Maybe it'll put his head on straight or something. He's pretty sure Tails has rambled about something like that before. Some kind of mammal-water reflex thingy or other. Yeah. He can do that. He'll just go get clean again.

filthydisgustingpatheticyouveseenthewaytheylookatyouhaventyou

He scrubs dully at his arms as he stands, a thickness that isn't really there settled over his fur. Invisible dirt, stubborn grime. He'll wash up and then try to make something to eat and then figure out the rest of his evening after. It'll all be fine after. Shadow and Rouge have to come back eventually. They'll be back eventually.

They'll…

He looks at the door to the apartment.

It's fine.

He's fine.

They'll come back.

He'll come back.

---

He's beyond tired of the stitches. He can feel them right there under his skin, like every single one is chewing into him, crawling their way deeper and deeper. He scrubs and scrubs and scrubs at them under the spray of near scalding water and thinks about knocking on the neighbor's door, about finding out who the owner of the deep voice he heard outside was. If that blue dog chick he saw at the complex before is around anywhere. Someone. Anyone. Literally anyone else. He doesn't care anymore. It doesn't even matter. It never really did or does. that's not true though, is it? Just another warm body with a pulse who wants to fuck him and touch him and grab him just because they can.

He thinks about grey fur and claws and endless rows of bared teeth. He thinks about jerking off, about shoving his fingers inside himself so far that he ruins all the progress he's already made with healing. About finding someone else who will make it even worse. Someone that'll make him bleed until there's nothing else to even think about. He scrubs his hands over his throat and pushes his thumbs in. He feels like throwing up. He feels like he's going to fall apart, scatter into pieces of meat at the bottom of the tub. It all feels so much larger than him. Bigger. The need. It's all he can even think about.

He presses his face into the chilled tiles and reaches down between his legs and ignores the way his side pinches and pulls and burns the whole while. An arm wraps around himself. His own, no one else's. he's not coming back this time is he is he is he. Dull nails dig their way into one of the long scratches down his side. He hears the pop-tear of the stitches before he feels them.

---

He'd anticipated the footsteps. He'd anticipated the food and water in Infinite's hands. He'd anticipated a lot today and still he hadn't anticipated Infinite trying to rope him into an actual conversation. Maybe it's because he’d usually be at the cell’s bars by now, waiting for the jackal to no-clip through them already. Today, he's tired. Plain, simple, and he spent the last who knows how long having to convince himself he didn't hear the Tornado's engine outside his cell. That there's no way for a plane to fit in the corridor regardless. He knows that. But it didn't stop it from being right there. Like he could reach out and touch it if he tried.

“A conversation wouldn't hurt now and then, would it?” Infinite asks.

So now Infinite feels like opening his mouth for once. Great. “Maybe if you gave me literally anything to look at ‘sides the walls I'd be a little more chatty.”

“Such as?”

He perks up at that. And he hates himself all the more for thinking there's even a chance Infinite might listen to him for once. “I, uh,” he clears his throat, swiping a hand down his muzzle as he racks his brain for literally anything besides all the blanks he's suddenly drawing. He really didn't think he'd get this far. “I dunno, a book, I guess? Some paper ‘n a pencil maybe. Dealer's choice.”

“And have you given a reason for me to provide you with any of those things?”

No. Not really. Not today at least. He knows how he could, but—

Without another word, Infinite tosses in a protein bar and a half-filled water bottle. The latter rolls lazily along the floor, the inside a sloshing collection of powder tinted water. His mouth tastes chalky at the sight of it. He knows the cap isn't sealed on this one, they almost never are.

Definitely a no go on the water then. He snatches up the foil wrapped protein bar. He can't see any tampering with it, but it doesn't mean it's not there. His stomach clenches, a cold sweat breaking out under his fur. Today's a sedate-the-hog kind of day then. Awesome. He laughs, because what else is he supposed to do? He's tired of staring at the same damn Chao waving back at him. ‘Protein Chao Max’ might as well be emblazoned on the back of his eyelids at this point. He wants to throw the bar back in Infinite’s face. He wants to smash it into the ground and grind it up into every groove in his cell. He doesn't want to eat another one of these things as long as he lives.

“Another protein bar. Wow,” he says tonelessly as he tears it open. It's a task easier said than done. There's an involuntary tremor in his fingers that hasn't stopped since he started finding quills and fur on the floor that he's one hundred percent sure he's not supposed to be shedding this fast. “What a surprise...”

“Would you rather I bring you nothing at all?” Infinite asks.

He grimaces, more to himself than Infinite. He should just keep his mouth shut. Nothing good ever comes in here when he runs his mouth apparently.

“Then stick with a flavor change. Just…” He knows the only thing that appeals to Infinite's reason is a hassle and a mess to handle. “If I eat one more cinnamon maple anything I'm gonna upchuck.”

There's a long pause. “Noted.”

It's better than a flat out no.

Sonic turns on his heel without another word, kicking the water bottle under the cell’s bench for later when he feels like stomaching it. Eventually he'll get thirsty enough he won't care what happens after anyway. That's how it always goes.

His shoulders hit the wall as he slumps down into a bent-knee sit in the farthest corner from where Infinite is still standing outside his cell. It's like the guy has nothing better to do than watch him sometimes. His fur pricks uncomfortably. He pulls on a feral grin and waggles the bitten protein bar at Infinite like a taunt. All dredged muscle memory, sludge-sticky. It falls flat after a moment and he takes another dent out of his breakfast, lunch and probably dinner with the way things are going. Infinite merely watches it all.

Nothing he tries ever really does anything to rile Infinite in here. And if it does, it never really pans out how he expects anyway. There's the little things he's learned that he has to do in here regardless. Like counting the ceiling. Like remembering his friends' names. Like remembering his own.

He takes another too dry bite, chews and swallows. “Not comin’ inside today?” he deadpans. It's partially a joke. Partially.

“Is that what you would prefer?” Infinite asks.

Helpfully. Cordially. Like he doesn't have him locked in a cage. It's even posed like a genuine question too.

Sonic stares at his sneakers. He chews off another piece and tries not to spit it out.

“Well?”

He's tired. He's so tired and it's funny almost, that out of everything he didn't expect to ever feel so damn— “Sure…whatever.”

He finishes off the last of the protein bar and crumples up the wrapper before tossing it as far away from himself as he can. It falls limply onto the floor and stays there. He knows it bothers Infinite when he trashes his cell. It's why he stopped getting fed anything that didn't come wrapped up in plastic or otherwise. He just likes that the wrappers briefly make it one less scrap of floor he has to look at.

“I don't really care either way,” he adds for good measure.

In a scatter of red light, Infinite is there, crouching in front of him, grabbing his jaw in firm fingers and wrenching his face up towards him. “That's not entirely true though, is it?”

They both know it's not.

He's got nothing to say anymore anyway. He knows how this one's supposed to go. He smiles around the bad aftertaste and grit stuck in his mouth. It's sharp, entirely feral at every angle. He reaches for the wrists of Infinite’s gloves and starts to tug them off.

---

---

While G.U.N. is still out of commission, apparently the Commander’s ability to call them out on a mission is not.

Rouge had gotten the call first, him shortly after. A cursory investigation into an illegal fighting ring. Something underground, something they don't usually handle or cover if it weren't for the use of neural implant technology. Something similar to Gerald Robotnik's own memory rewrite network. The design would've had to have been scraped from ARK files, something that would've ordinarily been kept behind enough firewalls it'd be impossible to scrape. But with G.U.N. headquarters having sat as little more than rubble for well over a year now, it's not surprising that some individuals have been scraping through its innards for anything to sell off or use for themselves.

It had taken longer than he would've liked for them to wrap up the initial scouting. To even find an opening for Rouge to slip inside the casino and down into the basement levels of it. Once the sun started to set and she'd gotten settled in to where she was going to stay until she got all the intel she needed to bring back to the Commander, she told him to go home. Check on the apartment. To stop pacing around so much, that she could practically hear him from inside.

The unspoken words were far too easy to gather: ‘go see how Sonic's doing already.’

He blinks into place outside the apartment’s door, wedging the key out of its hiding place before unlocking it and pushing it wide. A thought crosses his mind, about knocking, about the last time he walked in unannounced and found Sonic becoming a lot more acquainted with himself than he needed to be. On the living room couch no less. And again, in his room, with his own pillow. He supposes it's better than the alternative. He only wishes the hedgehog was slightly more hygienic about it all.

He smells the burnt oil and plate of fried eggs before he sees them. The kitchen is empty. He can tell the lightbulbs have been cool for a long while. No one's been out here for some time. The stove is no longer warm either. Sonic must've made his own food and then abandoned it just as quickly the moment something else caught his attention. Typical. There's another smell, water, soap—a shower then. At the least, Sonic is keeping himself clean.

Another sharp breath through his nose reveals the familiar iron-penny stench hidden underneath it all. He's at the bathroom door in an instant, reaching for the knob and pushing it wide before he can think better of it.

Sonic looks up at him, wide-eyed, settled on the edge of the bathtub with one hand holding his side, pulling at the fur and skin to get a better view while the other pushes a needle and suture thread through it.

He clenches his teeth. Why can't Sonic just stay still for once?

“Uh,” Sonic laughs tightly. “Hey. How was it out there?”

“What happened?” he asks.

Sonic shrugs. “Not much really.”

Shadow takes a deep breath, his eyes closed for a moment. “What. Happened.”

“Fine, okay. I took a shower—two, actually, and I guess it messed up some of these,” Sonic says, glancing down at his side. “But hey, look! I got one of them back in! See? It's way easier than it looks honestly, so no big deal,” Sonic says, beaming, holding up the suturing needle with the thread still attached, not even flinching as it tugs at his side.

The conclusion comes to him in the kind of way he's always known it but never acknowledged it. There's something wrong with Sonic. There's something deeply seriously wrong with him.

“Did you properly sterilize the needle before you started?” Shadow asks, moving to kneel beside him before carefully plucking the needle from between Sonic's fingers as he reaches for the disinfectant bottle in the first aid kit.

“I mean…I got it out of there, so it's probably fine, right?”

Shadow frowns. “Then no.”

Shadow swipes a solution-soaked cotton swab over the needle. When he looks over Sonic to assess the situation a little more closely, there's blood on Sonic's fingers, on the sink counter, bare hand prints left behind on half the surfaces.

He disinfects and sterilizes his own paws before palpating at the stitches Sonic already wove into himself, mildly grateful the whole while that the doctor from Resistance Headquarters shaved down the fur in the area and that it's only begun to grow back sparsely. It's easy to see that the new handiwork is beyond sloppy. Shaky and uneven, and he can see where Sonic didn't pull the thread enough and pulled it too hard on the next pass. It's not even the right kind of stitches for a wound, more what someone would do if they'd seen one too many scenes in the movies and thought it was anything like the actual reality.

Sonic gropes at his wrist, tugging at him. “I can do it myself, man, I got it—”

Shadow pushes Sonic's attempts aside, the blood rushing in his ears. If he had gotten home any later, if he stayed away, if he hadn't come back in time, it could've been worse. It could've been so much worse. He can smell blood everywhere. The light strip above the mirror hums in the quiet between each of their breaths and when he closes his eyes there's blonde hair, stringy and red-wet-heavy across the floor and when he opens them there's tan and blue fur clumped and darkening in front of him.

“Shadow?”

He should clean the wound site. He should, but he doesn't have time to. His hands are shaking as he pulls the needle through the unraveled incision. ‘Promise me, Shadow. Promise me you'll—’ He grits his teeth and pulls it through and ties off the stitch before cutting it. He rethreads. He loops the point of the needle through skin again. Skin that gives way too easy, that bleeds too much. There's too much blood. There's so much of it and he can't—he can't—Maria’s going to—she’s—

“Hey, hey,” Sonic starts, grabbing his hands in his, the needle held so tight in Shadow's palm it bites in where it curves. “It's okay! I'm okay. I'm fine.”

There's a strangling sensation in his throat, a sound stuck in his chest. The march of heavy boots echo against metal flooring, someone shouts, the crack so loud his hearing cuts out into a sharp whine. Smoke, burnt oil, the glass in front of his snout scattered in red mist. There's someone breathing too fast, too frantically, and when he hisses the next pant in through his teeth he knows it's himself.

“Nope, no. Look at me, Shadow. You're not there.”

He tucks his chin, he stares at the blood and a sound leaves his throat that he's never heard before.

Sonic pats the side of his face gently. “C'mon, where's the Ultimate Lifeform gone off to? Cause I sure don't see him here.”

He wrinkles his muzzle at that, glaring up at Sonic.

“Oo, there he is!” Sonic crows, grabbing his bloodied hands between his and rubbing the backs of them soothingly. “Welcome back! Thought we lost you there for a sec.”

He pulls his hands free of Sonic's. The drying blood smeared over his aching palms lingers and lingers.

“I—” Shadow swallows around the thickened spit stuck in his throat. “I need to finish the stitching…”

Sonic snaps the last of the suture thread off and sets the needle aside with a sharp click on the counter. “I'm sure it's fine.”

“No, I'm supposed to bandage it. I have to make sure it's secured or they could pull again. You have to keep them dry or you'll—you could get—”

“Hey, no, no, it's good. I'm all good.” Sonic pats his own side, over the finished row of stitching. “Everything's totally peachy, see?”

Shadow reaches for it, his fingers lightly tracing the edges. The blood is not fresh anymore. There's less than he thought there was. Far less. He splays his hand over the wound and feels Sonic's ribs push back against his palm as he rests it there. Alive. Breathing. He's okay. He's…

The heel of Sonic's hand falls against his brow and playfully pushes at it. “Where'd you wander off to up there anyway?”

He brushes Sonic's hand aside. He stands. He methodically cleans his hands in the sink and scrubs at the fur up to his elbows until his skin stings. The basin swirls with steam and pinkish water. His eyes stay down, trained on the slowly disappearing film of blood as he shuts the tap off.

“Nowhere important.”

Before Sonic can get another word in, he's out of the door, the crackle-wheeze-rattle of a bullet punctured lung stuck in his ears.

---

---

Sonic watches the door shut behind Shadow. It's a familiar picture by this point, the other hedgehog always seeming to leave the second it feels like he's managed to see any part of Shadow the other doesn't want him to see. He washes his hands off in the sink and uses a washcloth to tidy up everything else. It'll probably have to get hit with a cleaner or two later, but that's for another day.

At the least, Shadow came back home way after he got out of the shower. Shadow didn't see the moment he saw the thinned blood streaked down his side and leg in the mirror, the way he split the wound open wider, digging his fingers into it like he could reach in and rip out whatever won't stop festering in there. It hadn't even hurt. The opposite really. He swipes his hands dry with the hand towel and frowns at the opened first-aid kit, the abandoned needle and thread.

At least Shadow’s home now. At least someone else is in the apartment. He can hear footsteps making their way back down the hall, the presence of someone somehow making everything else from before seem so small, practically insignificant. Like it doesn't even really matter now.

There's a sleeping pill shoved into Sonic's hand the moment he makes his way out of the bathroom.

“Take the bed again tonight,” Shadow says before going to turn on his heel.

He catches Shadow by the shoulder. “Wait, dude.”

It's not like he can just forget the way Shadow looked in there. Shaking, ears pressed back, eyes wide and beyond haunted, flicking back and forth over everything and nothing all at once. The sound, too. Tight, fast breaths, a low distressed whine like it came straight from Shadow's throat. His fur prickles even just remembering how it sounded.

“What?” Shadow grits out.

“Didja wanna share again? With me?” Sonic almost winces. Stupid. Duh. There's no need to clarify. Who else is even here? He hasn't heard Rouge yet, so he can only assume she's still out and about.

Shadow's muzzle wrinkles into a gnarled grimace. “Fine.” Shadow says it like he's spitting the word. For a moment he regrets asking, but he recognizes that look on Shadow's face now. Embassassment. Regret.

“Cool, all right.”

‘Nowhere important.’ Yeah, he'd bet a million rings it begins with AR and ends with K. It's the first time he's ever seen all the careful walls Shadow keeps around himself come down. Maybe the guy really is a softy somewhere deep, deep down there.

Sonic grins toothily before he can stop himself.

“Stop making that face,” Shadow says flatly.

“What face?” he asks, smile widening.

“That one.”

“Well?” Sonic asks, not dropping it in the slightest. “Aren't you gonna lead the way to your chambers, your majesty?”

Shadow sneers with a crinkle to his mouth that can't be anything other than slightly fond. “Idiot...”

“Yeah, you sure like callin’ me that. I'm startin’ to think it's like a thing for ya.”

“You would think that,” Shadow says, shouldering past him and heading for the door to his room before wrenching it open. Shadow waits for him to go first.

“One sec.” Dry swallowing the pill is easier said than done and it nearly sticks to the back of his tongue before he manages to down it. The bitter taste lingers behind after and he grimaces. “Eugh, geez—” He scrubs the back of his hand over his snout with a shudder. “Remind me to never do that again.”

Shadow sighs heavily. “Just get in the bed.”

“Can do.”

The sleeping pill works slowly. Not as effectively with only one in his system. He feels it settle in like a stagger, the sluggishness pressing in, the sort of fuzziness growing in his skull. He sticks his snout into the mattress, turning over in bed and pulling the sheets tighter around himself. It's cold. Always just a little too cold. He gropes around for something else to drape over himself, an extra pillow, another blanket, anything. His fingers catch something warm and he drags it closer. He only realizes he's grabbed Shadow's arm when the other goes rigid, when he feels fur and sinew shift under his palm.

“Shoot, my bad,” he huffs out, letting go.

Without a word, Shadow shifts his arm towards him again. He blinks, peeking out from under the blanket at the other hedgehog who's watching him carefully. Tentatively, he takes it as an invitation, latching on with gentle fingers. It's something, but not enough. He shivers, teeth clicking. He wouldn't ordinarily say anything, wouldn't even dare to ask, but a lot of things don't matter as much as they did before he took the sleeping pill Shadow handed him.

“Is it okay if I—” He's not even sure how to word it. How to put it. Shadow will probably just say no anyway. Call him stupid or childish or something else. pathetic clingy needy

“If you what?” Shadow asks.

He pushes himself up by his hands and looks down at Shadow. He raises one hand and places it on the other side of Shadow until he's straddling over him by the arms. Slowly. Carefully. Watching Shadow’s face for a moment of rejection, for any kind of unease. He shuffles one knee over and then the other until his legs are between Shadow's slightly spread ones. Shadow's eyes don't leave his. He lowers himself slowly, until his chin rests on Shadow’s chest fur, the whole of him draped along Shadow like a living breathing blanket.

It's warm. Warmer than he ever expected. He can feel Shadow breathing, his heartbeat, the way his belly rises on each inhale and falls on each exhale. He tucks his arms in close around Shadow's sides, half a hug, half a way to make sure this is actually really something that is happening and not a strange dream.

Shadow huffs. When he looks up, there's an expression he can't really read on the other hedgehog’s face.

“Is this okay?” Sonic asks, ready to leave. Ready for him to say no. To push him off. Shove him away.

“Yes.”

Okay. Okay okay okay. So this is a thing. It's a thing that's happening. That's cool. He's so cool about this. He turns his head to the side and looks at the wall, anywhere but at Shadow, his face on fire for a reason he can't even explain to himself. He's literally done pretty much everything under the sun and more at this point, with complete and total strangers to boot, and this is somehow more embarrassing and terrifying than all of that combined.

“You're really warm, you know that?” It's rushed out, something to cover up the way he's pretty sure Shadow can hear how his heart has gone runaway.

“So I've been told.”

Shadow's hands move to tentatively settle on his shoulders and he stiffens at first, the fur on his nape standing on end. For a moment, Shadow starts to draw them away and he pushes up into the touch before he can retreat entirely. Once they settle on him again, he closes his eyes, relaxing into every inch of it. Maybe it's greedy to want this. Selfish. It's not like he's done anything for Shadow, hasn't even touched the guy's dick or slept with him or paid him back for the food and the bed and the everything else the hedgehog’s up and handed over more than freely. He curls his fingers in the sheets, wraps his arms tighter around Shadow like he's going to somehow disappear the moment he lets go.

He can't help but compare the two of them. Like a reflex. Like an on switch he can't seem to flick off. Everything always circles back and back. It's nothing like Infinite was, though. For one, the patch of white fur under his muzzle is much more comfortable than the Ruby ever was. He burrows his face into Shadow's fur and huffs in a deep breath. Lavender, clean linens, the slight acridness of the outside, city smog, somewhere from a different part of the world.

His ears flick back tightly when he realizes what he just did. Attempting to play it cool and pretend like he didn't just sniff him crosses his mind as he turns his head and looks pointedly at the wall instead of anywhere up towards Shadow who he can practically feel looking down at him.

“Did you just smell me?” Shadow asks, flat, and yet somehow beyond amused.

“No, dude—no, what?” Sonic laughs weakly. “You're totally hearin’ things.”

“Of course...”

“Hey, you're the one with the fancy body wash and fur moisturizer here. Sue me for takin’ a whiff.”

“At least I don't smell like two-in-one.”

Sonic scoffs, sleepily rolling his face against Shadow's chest. “’s three-in one usually. Or whatever the next shower I land in has got in it. I just used the bar soap by the sink this time. Didn't wanna use your fancy stuff in case you bit me for it.”

“Disgusting,” Shadow says, both somehow like an insult and strangely soft.

“Mmhm, thas’ me.”

“I’m buying you proper body wash tomorrow.” Shadow's fingers smooth over his shoulder. “And quill oil.”

“Whatever floats your boat….” Sonic wriggles his legs in an attempt to get more comfortable, his calves sliding along Shadow's in a slide of fur on fur that tickles up his spine. “Just not stuff that smells like a buncha flowers threw up on me, please.”

“There's other scents besides floral ones, you'd think you've never stepped foot in a store with the way you talk.”

“Sure I have, loads of times...” Sonic says.

“Tagging along behind your friends doesn't count.”

“Amy knows way more than me when it comes to getting a good deal ‘n Tails is always the one with the list. I'd basically be lost without ‘em.”

Shadow hums his acknowledgement. The light rumble of it under his snout is soothing somehow, in a way he can't really place. Slowly, his eyes drift shut, further and further.

Shadow's fingers continue to brush lightly over his shoulders and slowly smooth lower, into his back quills, weaving small patterns on the way down. Gentle hands card through the spines, grooming at the old ones he's neglected to pluck out himself, picking the keratin off the others. It's been a long time since someone else groomed him. Forever maybe. Since he was little enough he hardly remembers much of it besides the sensation.

It's nearly too much. Not enough. He's not really sure what it is. What he's supposed to do in return.

“Go to bed, hedgehog…” Shadow says, more a murmur, hardly a breath.

He closes his eyes and sleeps without dreaming for once.

---

---

When his Comm buzzes, Shadow can only assume that Rouge is on the other end of the line, her half of the mission wrapped up finally. Another case they can hopefully put behind them with minimal casualty and no journalists sniffing around for a story to peddle out. He sighs, looking down at the hedgehog spilled over his chest and lap. Extracting himself from underneath Sonic is difficult, but not impossible. Once he's up, he finds the discarded heated blanket and drapes it over the hedgehog’s already shivering shoulders and turns it on.

Hedgehog's get cold faster than other mammals. Normal hedgehogs at least. He read that much in his research on Rouge's tablet while querying the ‘search bar' the way she showed him to. Buying an actual space heater might be an endeavor he has to look into for when Sonic's here alone and needs to traverse around without a blanket constantly at arm’s length. The heating in the building is centrally controlled by the owner, or more aptly whoever is in the office at the time, kept at a temperature comfortable for most, but certainly not all. If Sonic plans to stay here longer, he'll have to make sure the environment is at least comfortable when he's not here.

He opens the door and steps into the hall, shutting it carefully behind him as he reaches up for the communications unit in his ear. When Sonic had wrapped his arms around him and smothered his face in his chest, he hadn't expected to find anything but discomfort in the action. He's tried before, to understand what kind of comfort it brings others and only ever found distaste in it. Unease. With Sonic, he hadn't felt it at all. Not a moment of feeling trapped or smothered, none of the usual sensations he can't quite shake off. It had been warm. As warm as any of them can be to him. The weight of someone else draped over him was somehow oddly comforting. Grounding.

He finally clicks the comm call through on the final ring and his ear twitches at the familiar crackle. His thoughts wander in the brief pause between the connection going through and someone talking. How many times did Sonic have to cling onto Infinite for warmth in his cell?

“Shadow?”

Shadow blinks. Amy doesn't generally contact him unless she needs something with the Resistance these days. “Is there an error with the papers I filed?”

“No, no, nothing like that! Everything was totally perfect last time I checked.” Amy laughs, but there's a tightness to it that belays her nervousness. “But, uhm, is there a way you could swing by HQ tomorrow maybe? I know you're probably super busy, and it's totally okay if you can't make it, I just—”

“I'll be there at 0800.”

“Oh,” Amy says. “Right, awesome. Okay! See ya then.”

He nods with an affirmed sound and remembers she can't see him a moment later. “Goodnight, Amy.”

There's a pause and he can almost see the way she usually blinks when she's surprised by something, ears perked forward and eyes bright. “Goodnight to you too, Shadow! Get some rest, okay? You deserve it.”

He's hardly done enough to warrant her well wishes. “You as well.”

The call falls through and he drops his hand back down to his side.

When he carefully settles back into bed, it's like Sonic is magnetized to him. The hedgehog instantly reaching for him and suctioning to his side, arms wrapped tightly around his middle. Sonic's muzzle comes to rest on him, puffing warm breaths into his chest fur. He tentatively wraps his arm around Sonic in response and leaves it there. The same sentiment as before circles endlessly. It no longer feels like he's constantly drifting like this, like he's barely there, more ghost than person. For once, he feels like maybe he's done as much as he could today and that maybe there's a tomorrow to look forward to.

Notes:

my Tumblr: link

Not so subtley inserts AU ideas I've had into the background of multichapter fics because I have free will ✨ the fighting ring thing is a scrapped a canon divergent AU where mobians were making money off making other mobians do underground illegal fighting using these spinal/neural chips to rewrite memories. In the AU idea Shadow ended up stuck in the underground ring for a while and no one could locate him for a sec. Literally never going to write that idea out probably so it gets a brief cameo in here as an aside.

!!Also, because I don't want to make everyone dig back into 100k words after a seven months break, here's a small guide to specific triggers Sonic's accumulating in this fic:
--> the flowers in his sleep paralysis dream is from the perfume he smelled on the rabbit girl during his roofied assault/the next morning.
--> maple syrup reminds him of the shitty breakfast granola dry bar things Infinite kept tossing into his cell
-> the orange/triangle fruit juice reminds him of the vitamin C pills infinite would shove down his throat so he didn't keep having scurvy symptoms from the lack of sunlight and nutrition
--> the mucus-y consistency of raw eggs wigs him out. you can put that one together yourself.
--->hopefully all other ones are a bit more obvious where they come from or why they affect him.

If you ever have any questions about the fic or there's something you don't understand or want clarification on, please feel free to ask! :3 I know this fic is kind of dense and a lot to take in sometimes.

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of And I Who Am Here Dissembled