Chapter 12: Divided

"Long time no see," Sonic said. "And I see you're trying even harder than ever to be just like me, but you're still totally hideous, Metal."

Amy gasped, both because she was shocked that Sonic recognised Metal as he was, but also because at the moment Sonic said his name, Metal's eyes began to glow brightly.

"So what's all this about, huh?" Sonic asked him. "Did you run away from home?"

Metal said nothing, but after a short pause, Sonic continued.

"Okay," he said, nodding his head. "You started hanging out with Tails, huh?"

Tails's face dropped instantly.

"And now, you're..."

Sonic slowly turned his head to look over at Amy, who felt her blood turn cold in her veins.

"You're living with Amy?"

"How does he know what Thistle's saying?" Knuckles asked Tails. "Is it like a twin thing?"

"They're not twins, Knuckles," Tails quietly told him.

Sonic turned back to Metal.

"If you wanna join Team Sonic, that's fine with me," he said.

He held out a hand towards Metal, and even before Metal responded Amy knew it wasn't going to go well. Rather than place his right hand into Sonic's to shake it, Metal reached out his left hand, grabbing Sonic's wrist and yanking him forward as he sunk his other hand, balled into a fist, into Sonic's gut.

"No!" Tails cried out.

Amy started towards them, but they rolled over each other. Sonic initially only defended himself from Metal's assault, but, when Metal punched at his face and Sonic dodged, Metal's fist punching a dent into the surface of the road, Sonic started to fight back.

"No, stop!" Amy cried.

She and Tails ran at them to stop them, but they rolled around and over each other and moved so quickly, they struggled to catch up to them. Shadow appeared suddenly between them, and, for a moment, they paused.

"What is this, Sonic?" he asked.

"Eggman made Pinocchio here into a real boy," Sonic replied.

"Are you saying this is supposed to be Metal Sonic?" Shadow asked.

Amy yelped when Metal shamelessly punched Shadow in the face.

"Metal Sonic?" Knuckles echoed as Shadow body-tackled Metal to the ground. "That's Metal Sonic?"

"Yes, but he's on our side!" Tails replied.

Knuckles ignored him, charging towards the melee.

"Stop it!" Amy cried, racing after them.

When she finally managed to get close to Metal, Knuckles had an arm locked around his neck and Sonic and Shadow were each restraining one of his arms.

"Let him go!" Amy shouted.

"Stay back, this thing is dangerous," Shadow warned her.

"No he's not!" Tails insisted. "It's okay, he's on our side!"

"Stop strangling him, Knuckles!" Amy yelled.

She glared at Knuckles, who faltered slightly, his grip loosening just enough that Metal was able to drop out of his hold. He then wrenched his arms free from Sonic and Shadow. Tails stepped in front of him and spread out his arms to stop the others from trying to grab him again and Amy quickly grabbed Metal's wrists in her hands. He glared intensely burning red eyes at her, his irises shining so brightly she had to squint to maintain eye contact with him.

"Stop," she told him.

His eyebrows flickered, and she knew what he was thinking: it was not like she could physically stop him if he wanted to break out of her hold.

"Just stop, okay?" she insisted.

"It's okay!" Tails said to the others.

"It hardly is, is this seriously Metal Sonic?" Rouge asked as she joined them.

"Yes, it is," Tails began. "But he's changed–"

"Why don't you let him talk for himself?" Rouge cut him off.

"He can't!" Tails replied.

"He can't talk?" Shadow asked.

"He uses sign language," Knuckles added.

"That's right, he does," Tails agreed. "I taught him that."

"You taught the killer robot sign language?" Rouge asked sarcastically. "You're out of your mind, boy!"

"Please, just give him a chance!" Tails pleaded.

Rouge stepped around Tails and fixed her glare onto Metal. Still firmly holding onto his wrists, Amy looked back over her shoulder at Rouge.

"He just saved your life, Rouge," she pointed out.

"Yes, but the last time I saw him, he wasn't quite so friendly," Rouge flatly replied. "He was also a lot more talkative. I seem to remember he was calling himself "Metal Overlord" and spouting nonsense about wanting to eliminate us all."

Amy looked up at Metal. His eyes were still glowing, though only about half as brightly as they had been during his scuffle with Sonic, Shadow and Knuckles. She turned her head back again to look at Rouge, who had suddenly lost all of her ire, her eyes wide.

"Wait a minute..." she said slowly. "He was at your house... Oh, Amy!"

Amy sighed.

"Don't start that again, please!" she complained.

"Oh honey, it was one thing when you were hooking up with a hedgehog who looked just like Sonic," Rouge responded. "But you're hooking up with his robot clone – the same robot clone who's tried to kill us all countless times – what is wrong with you?"

"This is just another Eggman trap!" Shadow added. "We should destroy this monstrosity just like we did all those others he sent out here today!"

Amy looked about the street, her pulse hitching at what she saw. The shops and cafes were deserted, and the road and pavements around them were littered with the remains of the cyborgs she had managed to smash. Just like the dogs that had attacked her in the woods, the child cyborgs were just robots wearing skins – and, as their skins were all identical, she silently hoped that they had been grown in a lab like Tails had told her Metal's biological parts had been, because the alternative source didn't bear thinking about.

"This is different," she said, turning her attention back to Sonic, Shadow, Rouge and Knuckles, who were all staring her and Tails down.

"This is totally different!" Tails agreed. "Those things are robots Eggman enhanced. Metal is almost entirely biological. He has thoughts and feelings just like the rest of us!"

Amy wanted to add that Metal had always had thoughts and feelings just like everyone standing around her, but decided to make that argument another day.

"The two of you are hardly a reliable opinion on the matter," Rouge said.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Tails asked her.

Amy already knew exactly what Rouge meant, she had already heard it from the bat herself.

"Amy's in love with Sonic and you idolise him," Rouge told Tails. "And that thing looks exactly like him – you're both blinded by your own naivety!"

Amy tightened her grip of Metal's arms and narrowed her eyes at Rouge.

"Hey, Rouge? Do you remember that garland I made for the gala committee?" she said.

"Sure, it was darling," Rouge replied.

"That took me two days, working all day, to make," Amy continued.

"I remember," Rouge replied, giving her a withering look.

"Metal made five of them yesterday in under two hours."

Rouge's eyes suddenly opened wide.

"Yeah," Amy said.

Rouge stepped forwards and turned around so that she was standing alongside Tails.

"You boys are being ridiculous," she said to Sonic, Shadow and Knuckles. "If Metal Sonic wants to turn on Eggman and join us, we should let him."

"That's so typical of you!" Knuckles said to her. "You only changed your mind because you think you can make money off him!"

"That's not true," Rouge replied. "I have a lot of respect for Amy, and if she's this determined that he can be trusted, then I trust him: because I trust Amy."

"This is about the lowest I've ever seen you fall," Shadow said to her darkly.

"Shadow, you're only here because we all gave you a second chance," she pointed out.

"That thing is an Eggman robot," Shadow argued back.

"Your best friend is an Eggman robot."

Shadow paused.

"Omega?" Rouge reminded him.

Shadow fell silent, but still looked far from convinced.

"Hey, if Metal wants to switch sides, I don't have a problem with that," Sonic said with a shrug. "Just so long as we know we can trust him."

Sonic took a step forwards and extended a hand towards Metal. Amy looked up at him expectantly, and found his eyes on Sonic's hand. His own hands fidgeted in that way they did when he was unsure.

"Shake his hand, buddy, it's okay," Tails prompted him.

Metal shifted his eyes to Tails, but only briefly, before slapping his hand at Sonic's gesture. Sonic snatched back his hand and Amy gasped when she noticed the tears in his glove, one of which was starting to bloom red with blood.

"What was that?" Knuckles asked, glancing back and forth between Sonic and Metal.

"He attacked Sonic!" Shadow said.

"Stop!" Amy cried when Shadow lunged at Metal again.

She staggered back, and, in a whirlwind of confusion, Shadow, Knuckles and Sonic once more surrounded Metal. Amy and Tails shouted at them to stop, and, after a brief scuffle, they duly did, stepping back to their original positions: but, Amy noted, Sonic was holding Metal's gloves.

"It's armed!" Shadow declared, pointing at Metal's robotic hands.

"No he's not!" Amy argued.

"That's just his hands!" Tails added. "They've always looked that way!"

"Yeah, and Metal's always been a weapon," Sonic said, in an unusually serious tone. "Did he attack you the same way he just did with me, Tails?"

Tails gulped and self-consciously covered his right hand with his left.

"Yeah, I noticed," Sonic told him. "I thought you'd just cut yourself on a screwdriver or something. But it was him, right? He attacked you?"

Tails shook his head rapidly.

"No, Sonic!" he said desperately. "It wasn't like that! I did it to myself!"

"How?" Shadow asked him sternly.

"Well, I..."

Tails looked back and forth between Shadow, Knuckles and Sonic before sighing and continuing.

"I forgot he wasn't wearing his gloves, and I tried to give him a high five," Tails admitted.

"He did this to me with gloves on, buddy," Sonic pointed out, holding up his scratched hand.

"His gloves are ripped, it's not his fault!" Amy argued.

Sonic moved his eyes to her and she gulped and felt a shiver pass over her. It wasn't often that she openly defied Sonic over anything, and as he looked at her, she remembered that she was, in fact, trying to convince him that his long-time enemy was now her friend.

"Please, Sonic!" she tried. "He's really not that bad!"

Sonic looked at Rouge for a prolonged moment before moving his eyes back to Metal's hands.

"Does he touch you with those things, Amy?" he asked.

Amy quickly shook her head.

"This is ridiculous!" Shadow cut in. "You all saw how strong he was, he threw those things into the air like it was nothing! If he turned those hands onto one of us, he could tear us apart in a second!"

"Yeah, he could!" Tails burst out suddenly.

"Tails!" Amy cried.

"He totally could do that!" Tails continued. "He could do it right now! He could have done it when you were all fighting with him! He always could – but he doesn't! That's why you should all give him a chance! Having that much power and choosing not to use it against people who are punching him in the face is what makes him good!"

Sonic watched Tails, but the fox held his ground, fists clenched at his sides, eyes blazing with determination.

"Metal is the one who told me about Eggman's bioengineering projects in the first place!" Tails continued after a short pause. "I lied about hacking into his computer – it was Metal. It was all Metal! All those times I told you what was coming, when it was coming, and how to fight it? I got all that information from Metal! If he really was bad, why would he do that for us?"

Shadow muttered something Amy couldn't quite make out, and when she found him fixing critical eyes onto her, she tensed.

"What was that?" she demanded.

"Leave it, honey," Rouge quietly advised her.

"No, I wanna know what he just said!" Amy argued.

"Well, he made a good point, Ames," Sonic said, turning his attention to her. "He said Metal isn't doing this for us."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Amy demanded. "Stop being so cryptic, Shadow! It doesn't make you look cool, it just makes you seem mean!"

Sonic turned his attention back to Metal, eying him over thoughtfully. Amy looked at Metal herself to see how he was responding, but she found him looking down at his upturned hands, exactly as he had done the day before when Tails had tried to high five him.

"How far does that biological change go?" Sonic asked, looking at Metal's face. "What you got going on down there, Metal?"

"Sonic!" Tails yelped.

"I don't think that's necessary," Rouge added. "Even if he was... "Real" down there, do you honestly think he would know what to do with it?"

Amy balked at the realisation of what they were talking about.

"The point is, he has it, he has super strength, knives for fingers, and he's living with girl too naïve to see him for what he really is," Shadow said coldly.

"Hey, I am not naïve!" Amy argued. "I know exactly what I'm doing! And, in case you all forgot, I'm the first one of all of us that Metal ever attacked! I have more reasons to not trust him than any of you, but I've lived with him for several days now, and honestly, other then being kinda socially awkward and bit rude sometimes, he's fine!"

Sonic narrowed his eyes a little as he regarded Metal.

"I hear you, Ames," he said, his eyes still on Metal. "But Metal's telling a different story."

"He's not saying anything!" Amy pointed out. "Or... I mean, unless you understand sign language too...?"

"He doesn't need to say anything for me to understand him," Sonic replied, his eyes still on Metal.

Metal finally lifted his eyes from his hands to meet Sonic's glare.

"With all due respect, Sonic, just because Metal is a copy of you, doesn't mean you can read his mind," Tails tried.

"I know he's sleeping on Amy's couch," Sonic replied.

Amy faltered slightly.

"Well, that's obvious, right?" Tails responded, sounding considerably less confident than he had with his last remark. "Because she doesn't have a spare room or a spare bed?"

"But he's been in your bedroom, right Ames?"

Amy tensed, and, from the corner of her eye, she could see Rouge staring at her with a frown and her mouth open.

"Oh, Amy!" the bat said. "Honey, he's a robot!"

"It's not like that!" Amy snapped at her. "He's my friend! And he's a good friend! And he's saved me – and all of you – more times than you know! If he hadn't come out here today, who knows what would have happened? We only won this battle because of Metal!"

Sonic gave Metal a long hard look before speaking again.

"Alright you can stay," he concluded. "But if you hurt any of us again, I'm sending you back to Eggman."

"Sonic!" Tails cried.

"Tails, Eggman is only attacking us now because he wants Metal back," Sonic told him. "He maybe helped us fight today, but he's the reason we were in danger in the first place."

The memory of the little messages Eggman had put inside his cyborgs flashed to the front of Amy's mind.

"Sonic, we can't ever let Eggman get his hands on Metal!" she insisted.

"Amy, if he's fighting Eggman that's fine," Knuckles said gently. "But if I ever have to choose between him and anyone else, I'm not choosing him."

"This is ridiculous," Shadow grumbled.

"You can stay, Metal," Sonic told Metal. "But you need to find another place to stay, because you can't stay with Amy."

"You can't tell me what to do, Sonic!" Amy argued. "He's been a perfect house guest, it's not your concern!"

"He's been a perfect house guest?" Sonic asked, turning his attention to Amy. "Really?"

Amy felt her face burn: she was still incapable of lying to Sonic, even in a way that would benefit her.

"Well, I don't care!" she eventually said. "It's not up to you, it's up to me! Come on, Metal, let's go home."

She turned to Metal, who turned to her, tilting his head.

"Let's go home," she said again.

He nodded once in understanding and Amy turned around to leave, with the expectation that they would walk away together. As she started to move, she noticed the mess in the street, and, just as she was thinking to herself that this was one mess she would not be offering to clean up, she suddenly felt her feet leave the ground. Before she could argue, Metal had picked her up and was running back home with her. Although she was pleased it would get them home quickly, she was a little worried about how her friends had reacted to seeing Metal Sonic scoop her up and flee with her.

As it turned out, she didn't have to wonder for long.

Metal carried her all the way into the house, as he usually did, but, when he reached the living room, he didn't set her down on her feet like he usually would: instead he stopped, in the middle of the room, and held onto her. She looked up at him with a frown, but, when she found his eyes looking elsewhere, she turned her head, following the direction of his gaze, making a soft yelping sound when she saw Sonic standing in her living room.

"Not as fast as you used to be, huh Metal?" he asked.

Amy gulped as she felt Metal's hold of her tighten slightly.

"You forgot these, and it looks like you definitely need them," Sonic said, holding up Metal's leather gloves in one hand.

Metal suddenly, and a little awkwardly, put Amy down. She stumbled a step, confused by his actions, as he had always been so gentle when placing her down the other times he had carried her. When she looked to him for an explanation, she found him looking down at one of his hands.

"Be careful, Amy," Sonic said to her. "If he tries anything, just call me."

Amy shook her head and started to tell him he was wrong, but stopped when he took a step towards her and pointed at her arm.

"Just be careful, okay Ames?" he said as she looked down at the four small red dots on her upper arm.

She looked at Sonic again and shook her head, but words failed her. She looked down at her arm, where, although it was minor, Metal's fingers had bitten into her – apparently when he had tightened his hold of her – puncturing her skin.

"I'm watching you, Metal," Sonic warned Metal. "And I know what you're thinking, and I know what you're doing, so the second you try something, I'll be there."

"Don't be like that, Sonic!" Amy argued.

Sonic started to leave, but she followed after him.

"I can look after myself and I know what I'm doing!" she insisted as they exited the house.

Sonic stopped and turned around to face her.

"I'm just looking out for you, Ames," he said.

"No you're not!" she argued. "You're just treating me like a stupid little girl!"

She started to shake and her eyes burned, but she pressed on.

"You always do! But I'm not a little girl any more, Sonic! I can look after myself!"

"I know you can handle yourself, but this is different," he replied. "This isn't one of Eggman's shoddy little robots you can easily smash with your hammer, Metal is an actual threat."

Amy's face fell, and a single tear escaped one of her eyes, rolling down over her cheek.

"What does that mean?" she asked.

"It means he is actually dangerous," Sonic replied. "Fighting him is serious."

"And all the other times I've fought Eggman haven't been serious?" Amy echoed.

"You know what I mean, Amy."

"What about the time I fought Metal Sonic for you? To buy you time to transform with the chaos emeralds? Was that not serious?"

"Yeah, that was serious, and that same giant monster you fought then is now living in your house, eating all your food, sleeping on your couch and..."

"And what?"

"Amy, just keep your eyes open–"

"My eyes are open! You're the one not opening your eyes!"

"You need to open your eyes, not your heart."

"What?"

"You think the best of people too easily sometimes, Amy."

"That's not a bad quality!"

"If Eggman turned up at your house one night begging for food, you'd probably take him in and treat him like family too."

"No I would not!"

"Really?"

Amy gulped as another tear escaped her.

"Oh come on, Ames, I didn't mean to make you cry," Sonic said, his tone softening.

"I'm not crying!" she snapped, as hot, fat tears welled up and spilled out of her eyes. "You're just being such a jerk right now!"

"Look, Amy, I'm fine with Metal joining us, if that's what he wants," he said gently. "But we don't know this isn't some drawn out Eggman scheme, so I just don't think it's safe for Metal to live with you."

"He's been living with me for days, it's fine!"

"Sometimes you're just a little too quick to think the best of people, and–"

"I'm not stupid, Sonic!"

"I never said you were, I just don't think you've thought this through!"

Amy cried out in frustration, and, before she could stop herself, she shoved Sonic back. She knew he had let her do it, because her attack had been fairly weak, and he stumbled back a step without resistance, but knowing that only made her feel worse.

"Just go away and leave me alone!" she yelled at him.

She snatched Metal's gloves from his hand and started to go back inside, and, as she stepped over the threshold of her front door, Sonic started to ask her to stop: but she continued inside and closed the door in his face. Swiping the backs of her hands at her eyes, she stomped into the living room, bypassing Metal, who was standing where she had left him. His head turned and his eyes followed her, but she continued out the back of the house and down her garden to her shed. Once there, she slapped his gloves down against her crafting table, the slapping sound the soft leather made against the hard plastic feeling oddly satisfying. She then hauled out what was in fact one of Tails's "old" toolboxes – he was so meticulous about his toolboxes, he scrapped them when they were still practically in mint condition – and opened it up, clawing through the buttons, threads and packs of sewing needles she stored within it. Once she had the sturdy needle and thread she sought, she sat down at the chair furthest into the shed and turned Metal's gloves inside out to commence the painstaking job of repairing the seams within.

Amy's tears gradually dried as she worked, and, by the time she was starting on the second glove, her concentration on the task had overtaken her immediate frustration. A shadow fell over her, but she did not respond to it, continuing with her work. When something touched the table in front of her she paused, lifting her eyes from her hands to see Metal's hand in front of her, placing down a mug of tea. She blinked a couple of times, surprised by the gesture: and her hands lowered to her lap when Metal's other hand placed something else down onto the table next to the mug of tea.

Amy swallowed carefully, her eyes locked onto the familiar sight of her special something. She reached out one hand to pick up the stuffed brown hedgehog, holding it to her face and sighing into its softness. She then looked up at Metal, and found him standing at her side, a mug of tea in his hand, watching her as emotionlessly as he usually did. He pointed at the empty seat next to her and she nodded. He sat down, and placed his drink onto the table.

Amy picked up her mug and took a drink. She turned a smile to Metal, who nodded in reply. They sat together as she finished fixing his second glove. They then finished their drinks and Metal stood up to leave. Amy stood up behind him, briefly touching her hand to his shoulder. He turned around, looking at her expectantly. She opened her mouth, and hesitated that way for some time, before closing her mouth again and giving into the one instinct that felt stronger than the need to talk right then.

Amy opened out her arms and fell forwards, grabbing Metal into a hug.

He didn't return her gesture, though she had neither expected him to nor needed him to. She was holding him mostly for selfish reasons, she silently admitted to herself. She needed the comfort, and she felt that he maybe did too. She held him tightly, so tightly that she could feel his heartbeat against her. She felt it increase as she held him, and she wondered why: did he not like being touched? Was it fear? Was it anger? She sighed and finally pulled back from him, holding him at arms' length.

It was only then that she noticed his hands, balled into tight fists and held up in the air away from her and that he was showing more of the whites of his eyes than usual.

"Hey, it's okay," she said softly, moving her hands towards his. "I know you didn't do it deliberately."

He jerked his hands out of her reach as she made to take hold of them and his eyes widened further: but he did not move away from her. She smiled gently and held out her hands, palm up, towards him. He looked down at her hands before meeting her eyes with a small, curious frown. She nodded and, after some hesitation, he slowly and carefully lowered his clenched fists into her open hands.

"It's okay," she said again. "I trust you. Do you trust me?"

He studied her eyes for a moment before looking down at her hands again as he cautiously unclenched his fists, opening out his sharp, metallic fingers. As soon as she could, Amy closed her hands around his, holding onto each of them tightly in each of hers. He kept his fingers open wide, and so she tried squeezing his hands a little – before realising that he would not be able to feel the gesture.

"It's okay," she said again.

He met her eyes again, studying her a little longer this time, before looking down at their hands and very gradually closing his fingers around her hands.

"See?" she said, once they were successfully holding hands. "It's okay."

After a few seconds, he exhaled softly, and Amy realised that he had been holding his breath ever since she took hold of his hands.

"Let's go back inside, I'm tired," she said.

He nodded his head and she let him go. He did the same, and she gathered up his gloves, their mugs and Thistle, and together they headed back into the house. Once inside, Amy did something she rarely did, and put the mugs into the sink to be washed later. She then held out Metal's repaired gloves towards him.

"These are all fixed now," she told him. "But you don't have to wear them. Not unless you want to, okay?"

He hesitated before accepting them back from her. He didn't put them on, but rather moved over to the couch and sat down, placing them down onto one arm of the couch before resting his arm along the back of the couch cushions. Amy moved over to stand at his side and he looked up at her for a moment before seeming to understand what she was thinking, as he shuffled himself from the middle of the couch to one side of it. He kept his arms where they were, and Amy sat down at his side, sinking herself back against the backrest. She hadn't sat on her couch since Metal's arrival, and she had forgotten how comfortable it was: perhaps that was why he always looked so relaxed when sleeping on it.

After a moment of relaxing into the couch, Amy finally felt herself start to relax, and the aches and pains of her battle start to kick in. She sighed softly and, without really thinking about it, she leaned into Metal, resting her head on his shoulder. With his arm still over the back of the couch, she was able to snuggle into his side. He didn't tense up the way he had when she had hugged him, and she thought that maybe he was becoming more relaxed and familiar with being touched. She smiled at the thought and, when she heard a soft purring sound coming from him, she turned to look at him.

Amy groaned when she saw Metal's head tilted back, his mouth hanging open, his chest rhythmically rising and falling.

"I wish I could fall asleep that easily," she grumbled.

She sighed, but, not particularly feeling motivated to do anything else, and, feeling comforted by his closeness, she leaned into him again and rested her head on his shoulder, closing her eyes and sighing softly.

Next Chapter: Amy wakes up to find she has been sleeping on the couch next to Metal. Cream surprises her with a visit, surprises her by revealing she knows who Metal is, and surprises Amy further still by revealing something personal that Amy never knew about her. Afterwards, in a moment of self-doubt, Amy pulls out her special seven cards that foretold her future all those years ago: but this time when she looks at them, she realises they could be read to mean something entirely different. Chapter 13: Understanding