Sonic Lost World: Lifeless
The first of hopefully many extremely depressing things I publish here. First written ten months ago in a YouTube comment section while listening to an extension of Thundercloud Acropolis (the comment's still there if you want to read the original), rewritten today in about an hour because I'm bored and want to compile all the vent writing I sometimes do. If this is my first work you've read, I'd advise you to check out my other stuff, but none of it is any better than this, nor lighter and softer tonally. Wow, it's been a while since I used this site.
Spoiler warnings: Sonic Lost World (major).
Trigger warnings: Discussion of death (not much stronger than the canon game, but it's there).
It was around that moment that the true gravity of the situation dawned on him. His best friend had been taken. Everybody he knew was dead. Nobody was left to comfort him in his pain. He had watched as everyone he loved had fallen, one way or another, as the world he fought to protect had been drained of all its life, and it was all his fault. He'd made a fast decision, kicked that stupid shell without thinking, and now he was facing endless consequences. If only he had left it alone. Maybe none of this would have ever happened…
He could almost hear the words of their leader in his head. Somehow, he knew that the red Zeti was watching him. "Your fate is to be destroyed. Why won't you just accept that? Lie down, and DIE." Were those words really being said somewhere? Maybe the hate radiating off the Deadly Six's leader was powerful enough to communicate directly to him. Perhaps it was a lucky guess. Or maybe he was just so lonely, driven insane by the crushing silence, so desperate to have somebody talk to him, that his mind invented the voice of one of the few people he could be certain was still alive. Just thinking about the most powerful of the Zeti ignited a fury inside him. That monster had killed everybody he knew and loved purely for petty revenge, and was turning his best friend into a robot for no obvious reason other than spite. Something else started burning inside him, something more powerful than anger born out of sadness. Hate was the best word, but just that didn't cut it. The sheer unbridled resentment for this loveless creature who had caused him nothing but suffering was like the heat and power of a supernova. Adrenaline coursed through his bloodstream, and he suddenly felt determined to find that Zeti and make him pay for what he had done.
The sudden negative thoughts scared him. He stopped himself. He wasn't like this, he was never driven by hate for anybody. Were they really getting through to him? Burning him out with all the fury and grief and confusion until there was nothing left of who he really was. He forced the feelings out of his mind. He didn't fight to spite people he hated. He fought to protect the people he loved, his friends.
And yet he couldn't protect his friends.
With the anger forcibly removed, other emotions had time to fill the empty space, and a wave of sadness washed over him. He stopped moving. He had been running silently for so long, but he couldn't do it anymore. There was nobody left for him to fight for. The people he loved and cared about and protected were all dead, everybody was dead, and he felt responsible. He found himself holding back tears, and quickly blinked them away. The Six must have been watching him, and he didn't want to risk giving them the satisfaction of knowing that they'd gotten to him. He could mourn in private later. His emotional pain wasn't something for them to know. They would use it to destroy him for good, and then he would never avenge his friends. Taking a deep breath, he kept walking forwards, then broke into a run. Driven by justice for his friends, for his world, for himself, he ran. The Deadly Six would pay for what they had done. He wanted to be sure of that.
He pushed forwards, step by step, determined to stop the Zeti, under a grey and lifeless sky.
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