A Plea To Kill: Chapter 2
A/N: I have no real idea of where this second chapter came from, but it's here and I hope you like it. Thanks to Dark Riven, YumeTakato and ShadowSpirits for the feedback last time; good for my ego.
As it turned out when Knuckles finally awoke, offering comfort and emotional support wasn't very high on anyone's list of priorities. Indeed, it had been three days since Sonic had returned carrying the unconscious Echidna and they had yet to get the bleeding to stop.
It wasn't a torrent of blood, barely a trickle, but it was continuous and didn't look to be stopping anytime soon. That itself wasn't too much of a problem as the Echidna's body could keep up with that with only some faintness for its trouble. The fact that Knuckles was acutely aware of the fact that his body was wringing itself out like a sponge, though, did not play well in his mind. Sonic dragging him along on that little sprint had apparently done a lot more damage that he'd previously thought. He would recover though, physically at least. It wasn't going to kill him.
However the infection that had developed was less than pleasing.
That was why he now found himself in the bath in a more secluded part of the woods surrounding the Knothole. It was close to a stream, which was where he'd filled it from, boiling the water with a heater he'd put beneath the bath under the metal base. The water was a cloudy white from the copious amount of salt he'd dumped into it; being a Freedom Fighter had the downside of having to make do with what was available, and antibiotics were not something readily available. The salt would do fine though. Being in the water was calming his mind as an added bonus, so he had no qualms.
He'd built this bath several months ago out of necessity. He would have built it on the Island but when word got that he was going to make a luxury item he suddenly found himself with a lot of offers to help on the condition that it would be in or near the Knothole. In the end he only accepted the help to get the wood needed; he built the thing himself.
It was practical. Knuckles had come back from more than one mission covered in oil or Lord knows what else that needed far more than a quick hose-down with cold water to remove. A bath was good for soaking out grime and for working out knots and aches that came with running like hell at the risk of losing your life.
It was a big bath, hexagon shape and tall. He hadn't bothered to put in a shelf to sit on or anything; he preferred drifting his body in the water and just keeping his head above with his arms on the side. He would have sunken it into the ground to step into it but he preferred being able to move it easily if required. Sonic had had a lot to do with that idea.
Sonic. He hadn't seen the hedgehog since the evening he'd finally returned to the world of the waking. The other hadn't been able to look at him straight, obviously feeling a great deal of guilt and confusion over what had transpired only hours earlier. He'd disappeared at his usual speed when Amy had begun twittering about internal bleeding, and Knuckles had caught a snippet of a conversation about a rescue operation to retrieve someone's kid from Robotnick's clutches. Suffice to say, Knuckles didn't expect to see Sonic again for a good few days.
Sighing despite himself and lowering a bare hand into the cloudy water, he swung his arm absently through the liquid and frowned at the hue of pink that appeared and spread to darken the entire vat's content. He wasn't perturbed by the idea of bathing in his own blood. On the contrary, he knew that he'd had to soak in worse. He just wished for it to stop so that he could start forgetting about the whole damn thing and move on.
He couldn't though, not yet. Not when stitches needed checking and dressings changed and he had to escape from concerned faces and hollow comforts in the middle of the night just for the sake of his sanity. At least his fur was starting to grow back where it had had to be shaved. That had played merry hell with his dignity for a while, so much to the extent that he'd taken to wearing trousers for the last two days. They helped to keep the dressings clean even if they were strange and uncomfortable to wear. Right now they were in a pile next to the bath with a towel for when he decided to get out. He was still stinging though, meaning that the salt still had some more work to do, so that wasn't likely to be anytime soon.
There was a progressively loud series of rustles in the undergrowth he had travelled through to get here, the sounds of someone approaching without making any attempt to hide their presence. It was common knowledge that this was his space, and whoever was approaching was giving him a long time to shout them away if that was what he wanted. Instead, Knuckles straightened and put his feet flat on the floor of the bath, interested to see who had come out at this time to seek him. He doubted it was Sonic, and Amy had already seen enough of him for one day; far too much for his liking in some respects.
He wasn't overly surprised when Tails appeared through the bushes, a grease-paper bag held almost protectively to his chest. He hadn't seen the elusive fox for a good week with one of them being out and the other in the guts of some sort of contraption. Now Tails regarded him with large eyes, stopping silently on the edge of this clearing and obviously waiting for a sign as to whether or not he could continue or if he should turn away now. Knuckles did nothing but quirk a brow, which seemed to be enough. Tails approached the bath.
Knuckles noted with satisfaction that Tails rounded that bath as he neared it, moving to the opposite side to where the pile of cloth and dirty dressings was. He wouldn't have felt comfortable with Tails standing there. Shifting about and crossing his arms on the side of the tub facing the young fox, Knuckles let his chest press against the wood as he waited for Tails to speak.
Tails offered up the bag before he opened his mouth, damp hands taking the wrapped goods out of his before he spoke. "I figured that you'd be hungry," he said simply.
Peeling back the paper carefully, Knuckles smiled thinly at the bunch of grapes, apple and slice of bread he found inside. "Thanks," he murmured, meeting the bright eyes as he spoke before wrapping the food back up again. He'd eat it when he dried off. A thought occurred to him, dry and sardonic, but he voiced it anyway. "Did Amy send you? All concerned about keeping my strength up and that?"
Tails shook his head slightly, Knuckles having to suppress a look of surprise as a result. "No, I just figured that you hadn't eaten today and that you could do with something."
The Echidna raised a brow as he handed the parcel back to Tails, watching him place it in the grass as was obviously bid of him. The moon began to sneak behind a cloud, casting cold odd shadows over his fur. "Does anyone know you're here?"
"Sonic does," he replied whilst straightening, placing his hands on his hips and taking in his surroundings absently before looking back to Knuckles. "He told me how to find you here. It's a pretty cool place."
Knuckles took a moment to look about himself for a moment as well, seemingly taking it in again. The clearing didn't extend much wider than the edges of the bath, but there was enough bare ground to make it impossible for the tops of the trees to meet, letting in the light from the moon and giving a good view of the stars. The downside was that it let in the rain undisrupted as well, but that wasn't something that bothered him.
"Yeah, it's a nice place to unwind, get a few hours to myself."
Immediately Tails took a half-step back, his hands dropping from his hips to his sides slack. "If I'm disturbing you I'll-"
"You're not disturbing me," Knuckles broke in quickly, raising a hand to halt Tail's hurried words. "You aren't prodding me where I don't want to be prodded, so you're not disturbing me. I'm nearly done anyway."
A bit more assured by those words, Tail's brought his retreating foot back to where it had been before. A minute of silence passed between them, each following their own thoughts before Tails found enough courage to voice his. "Can I ask you a question?"
"You can ask. I won't guarantee an answer though, or an answer you'll like," Knuckles replied flatly. He wouldn't pussyfoot around that. Tails knew what had been going on recently and obviously anything that he asked now was going to be related to it. Knuckles was still smarting, literally and figuratively, over the whole ordeal, meaning that his answers were going to be blunt and raw enough to warrant a warning beforehand. If he chose to answer that was.
A bit taken aback by that answer but composing himself quickly, Tails rubbed awkwardly at the back of his neck. "Why'd you do it?"
He hadn't expected that sort of bluntness from the substantially younger fox, but he respected him for it. His answer was simple and almost automatic, although he did wait a few moments to answer it so that it would at least seem that he had pondered it. "This just isn't a good time or place to raise a kid. Too dangerous."
Tails frowned. He could probably sense on some level that that was a hollow answer, but he couldn't pinpoint the feeling enough to actually realize that. A problem that came with youth and left with experience. He settled for what words worked in the end. "I don't think I like that."
Knuckles knew what he was getting at even if he didn't totally identify with it. "Yeah well, life's a bitch. I did say I couldn't promise you an answer you'd like."
A softly cracking twig signalled a new presence in the clearing. This one had covered its presence until the last moment, now on the border of the trees and still lurking in the shadows. "Tails?" It was Sonic, Knuckles noted with a certain degree of surprise. He didn't move to face the hedgehog though, keeping his back to where the voice had come from.
"Come on kid, it's late and Amy's worrying about ya."
Tails offered Knuckles a small smile that the Echidna returned before scurrying over to Sonic. There was some murmuring between them and then the fox left completely. Knuckles didn't move to face Sonic though. He was quite certain that the hedgehog had only come here to retrieve Tails at Amy's insistence and would be turning around and leaving any moment now.
Truth be told, that was precisely what Sonic had intended to do right up until he set eyes on Knuckle's back in the water. There had been an odd feeling in his gut then and, although awkward, he felt that he should stay. He'd been there, been the one to help Knuckles and been the one to carry him bleeding back to the Knothole. He was probably the only one that the Echidna would possibly talk to about it, and he felt some resentment about that.
Sonic didn't want to have to think about this, about having left a thing that was going to be a child to die in the woods just because Knuckles didn't want it. It was unfair in his eyes. He fought for freedom but more than that he fought for life. Knuckles destroyed one for the sake of convenience and that didn't sit well with him, hadn't done since he'd allowed himself to be a co-conspirator. He deeply regretted helping.
That was perhaps why he lingered now, approaching Knuckle's unmoving back and stopping at the edge of the bath, his hands planting themselves on its ledge and his left sneaker almost touching the pile of material the Echidna had left in the grass. Knuckles didn't move. The water barely rippled, and that was only from his breathing.
"So why'd you really want to do it? And not the crap that you gave Tails just now or what you said when you got me to help. A real answer." Sonic wasn't entirely sure why he was demanding this of Knuckles. He knew that the best thing now was to leave him in peace, to bury the whole ordeal and just get on with life. But it rubbed him wrong to the severest extent and he needed an answer that would keep the niggling guilt quiet at night when it worked to keep him awake.
Knuckles pivoted gracefully in the water, the tips of his dreadlocks spilling out and pulling away from him as he slowly stepped into the middle of the bath facing Sonic. The water was murky and completely impenetrable in terms of sight, not that he had any modesty when it came to the hedgehog, even with his fur soaked and clinging fiercely to his skin. He didn't feel particularly exposed in the overly salty water, which would make this conversation easier.
"I gave you my answer then. I shouldn't have to repeat it for you," Knuckles replied roughly, crossing his arms out of force of habit.
"Bull," Sonic snapped with his eyes narrowing, putting a frame at the edges of a glare filled with intensity. "You prattled onto me about having choices then. You didn't give me a reason other than cowardice."
Knuckles had always been slower to anger than Sonic. He could still be as passionate, yes, but it manifested in other ways. Right now Knuckles was seething, particularly at the 'cowardice' comment, but he refused to bite. "Why are you so desperate to know? It was my choice."
"And I helped you carry it out." The bitterness in those words was very significant to Knuckles who had a knack for picking up on subtle intonation such as this. "I helped you kill it, all but did it for you, and I want to know what reason you have that could justify me being a murderer."
They stared at each other for long moments, silence dragging out each second into something excruciating. Sonic trembled from the intensity of his outburst and the anger the coursed through him now, and Knuckles carefully considered his words. This was something he had not expected; he hadn't realized that the hedgehog felt so strongly, but given what he fought so valiantly for it should have at least occurred to him. But he'd been too engrossed in his own problems at the time to consider what effects what he wanted done would have had on the young Freedom Fighter. Not very good ones apparently, and it was more or less his fault. Sonic deserved answers, and as a creature of honour and respect, the echidna saw little choice but to give them.
His tail twitched anxious and unseen in the water as he put his hands together, lowering his head to gather himself before finally speaking in smooth and level tones. Sonic hadn't exactly entered this conversation with the best disposition, and so now it was up to him to keep this entire thing as calm as possible. "Well for starters I didn't believe it was really mine."
A muscle in Sonic's jaw twitched slightly as his teeth clamped together even harder but he remained silent, seemingly forcing himself to hear Knuckles out. The echidna hadn't seen this kind of restraint in him before and didn't hesitate to make the most of it.
"I got jabbed gathering information by a 'bot I'd never seen before and it started building something in me. I thought I'd become dangerous, a walking bomb that would eventually put some sort of biomechanical hybrid right in the middle of this operation. I couldn't risk that," Knuckles continued, his gaze steady and unwavering on Sonic's eyes, strengthening his point.
Sonic went to interrupt then but Knuckles held up a hand and continued before he could start. The hedgehog had to listen to him before he ran off on a verbal tangent and caused even more upset. "I didn't believe you when you said that the nanobots were gone, that the kid was completely organic. I wouldn't. But seeing it…"
Words escaped him as his throat suddenly became very tight. Images flickered through his mind for a few dangerous seconds and Knuckles forced them out again. It wouldn't do to brood over something that he couldn't change. He thought he'd made the right decision at the time, and he could make his peace with that. It was possibly one of the worst mistakes he'd made to date, but he'd live with it.
He forced his gaze up from where it had drifted to the water to meet Sonic's once again. The hedgehog didn't look like he was going to say anything and his own gaze had softened a little. It obviously helped to know that Knuckles felt something similar about the child's death, that it hadn't been a completely heartless killing.
"It wasn't just that though." This was the part that he was finding very difficult to say, even moreso than his previous words. This was the part he hadn't even begun to come to peace with. This was what hurt as much as the salt that dug into his flesh and seared to make it clean. "I didn't get a say in the matter."
A flicker across Sonic's face, barely perceptible but speaking volumes to the echidna that was scrutinizing so intensely, showed that the hedgehog saw that as a very weak answer. Unexpected. Low. With an internal sigh Knuckles conceded that he'd have to expand on it.
"I was attacked and ultimately left with a kid that I hadn't asked for, or even considered a possibility. I was…" He gestured vaguely with one hand, seemingly hoping to pluck the word he wanted out of the air. What occurred wasn't perfect but it was close enough. "Violated?"
Sonic shifted at the word, disturbed by it on a very deep and basic level. He hated that word, what it meant, what it was, that his friend could say it and it could apply. Understanding was settling like a balm over the raw guilt though, dampening a bit of his anger and leaving him feeling cold and uncertain.
This wasn't something he'd considered before, yet it was true. There had been no rape per-say but there might as well have been. There had been penetration, albeit with a thick needle through skin and muscle, physical and emotional abuse had followed and, for a brief and strange period, there had even been a child. He could sympathise with Knuckle's reaction. It didn't sit well with him though, and he couldn't help but look at Knuckles a little differently now. He hadn't yet had time to know if it was in a better or a worse way, just differently.
"You still had me kill it though. It didn't deserve that, no matter what happened to make it in the first place," Sonic chewed out, feeling like he was having to wrestle with the words to keep them even. There was no rational need to lose it now aside from what he felt. And Knuckles didn't have a lot of say in that.
The Echidna stood quite still for a few moments just watching Sonic, reading him in his own way before his mind came up with a somewhat outlandish idea. It was certainly a bit of a jump but it would serve to break this potential tirade of smarting feelings. Knuckles wasn't even sure why it had occurred to him but it seemed relevant. It might explain a few things.
"That girl the other day, what happened to her?" Knuckles was aware that Sonic would know who he was talking about, and he was also aware that he was being very aggressive right now, not in his tone but in his lack of tact. It was required though. Things needed to be said.
The hedgehog hadn't expected the sudden tangent, and had expected the subject of the girl even less. He'd been the one to go for her, naturally; anything to get away from Knuckles and focus on something else for a few hours. She'd been a pretty little thing. A fox, looking very much like Tails except for the single tail and bigger eyes. Just about came up to his hip. Reached for him with short claws and cried for her mother. Had sniffled and tugged at her flattened ears when he'd stuck her behind an oil barrel whilst he took care of security. Didn't make a sound when the 'bot had found her. Still had her eyes open when he came back.
"Dead," he finally replied, his eyes narrowed and downcast, silently damning Knuckles for bringing her up at all. He didn't know but he must have guessed. His friend had a nasty habit for being able to do that. "I got her out alright, but I left her and when I came back she was dead."
Knuckles nodded slowly, solemnly, his arms still crossed and his hands locked against his sides. Quite obviously he didn't like to hear of the death of innocents, even moreso when it was a child that had died. A cold part of his mind murmured that it could have been worse, that from the sounds of it she'd died quite quickly and that she could have suffered instead. He knew better than to say anything like that to Sonic right now though. Logic wasn't always the best policy, even if it was meant to comfort.
"You blame yourself?" He spoke it as a question but it was most definitely a statement. They both knew that, but they both also played along to it.
"Yeah. I shouldn't have left her. I played too safe for once when I should've just grabbed her and run like Hell." Bitterness laced his voice. It wasn't misplaced. He was still berating himself.
Knuckles finally approached the side of the bath, the double barrier of wood the only thing separating them now as the Echidna rested his hands either side of Sonic's on the ledge. "You handled the situation as best you could. You weren't at fault. You didn't get her killed intentionally," he stated quietly, secretly musing that such an event really had been the last thing that Sonic had needed. No wonder he hadn't seen him until now.
Sonic's rebuttal held none of the same calm as Knuckle's had. "But I killed yours intentionally," he almost growled, a hiss rattling as a rebuke to himself and the words heated against Knuckles for even having asked it of him in the first place.
Guilt was not something that Knuckles felt often and now it came and settled in his gut in waves. Shrugging slightly, his mouth quirked a little and he replied without meeting Sonic's eyes. "I would have found a way to do it myself in the end, which would probably have wound up getting me killed as well because I was starting to get desperate by the time you came to me."
"It went against everything I believe in."
"And yet you still did it."
Sonic's gloved fingers tightened around the ledge of the bath, the wood creaking in protest. He was stronger than most people expected just from looking at him. "I was helping a friend."
Knuckle's eyes would have lit up if able to do so at that. There was hope yet. "Yes, you were. Sonic, our views on this whole abortion deal are different; under certain circumstances, I see it as acceptable, whereas you see every life as precious. That's just something we're going to have to live with."
A quiet noise conceded to that. It was a harsh truth and a large difference of opinion, but they'd get by with it.
"You helped me when I needed it and put aside a lot of your own feelings to do that, which speaks well of you." A sort of facial shrug that looked a bit like a grimace distorted Knuckle's features for a second. "To put it crudely, you did me a favour."
A look that could freeze in its seriousness appeared at that and Sonic's words were clipped when he spoke, his hands receding from the ledge of the bath and away from Knuckles'. "Then you owe me. Big."
Knuckles nodded, resisting the urge to shift under the gaze prompted by his ill-chosen words. "Of course," was all he could say to that, although he did mean it sincerely and most seriously.
Sonic moved as if to leave but hesitated, his eyes somewhere off to the side as he thought. Finally one hand touched back on the ledge of the bath, just a way from Knuckle's left hand. "One last question, and then we'll bury this for a few days."
Knuckles noted that that was a sort of warning; much like the one he'd given Tails earlier. He unconsciously braced himself for the question although his body remained lax in all appearances.
"Do you regret getting rid of it now?" Sonic didn't look at him as he asked but did so quite intently as he waited for an answer, wanting to see for himself if the answer was the truth. To see if there was nothing else being hidden behind the Echidna's substantial emotional shields.
Sonic had developed something of a knack over their last few meetings of getting through his shields though, Knuckles mused internally. Taking a breath he answered slowly and carefully, attempting to justify himself as he went along rather than jus letting Sonic pounce at the end of it.
"With the information I had at the time, what I believed, I did the right thing. I don't regret doing it in that sense. After seeing it, I've thought about what it might have been like, what potential for a future there was, the good things as well as the trials and hardships. I could regret losing it for that, but I can't change what happened so why bother?"
Not any happier than when he had first entered this clearing but certainly more satisfied now, Sonic acknowledged the answer but gave no reply. There was nothing to be said for the moment, nothing that needed to be said. A cricket or some other noisy insect chirped as a reminder that it was still very late into the night, or early now. There wasn't a way of knowing right now.
"You'd better get back. Amy'll be worried about you too; you know what she's like," Knuckles suggested, breaking the moment. That was all Sonic needed to make him turn away finally, walking back into the woods with only one backwards glance as he reached the tree-line before he began to make his way back to the Knothole, his speed not as impressive as it could have been.
Knuckles watched him leave before the realisation of how cool the water had become hit his flesh almost afresh, his fur bristling instantly as a result. Moving to one side, he put a hand under a specific section of the ledge and wrenched it up as hard as he could. The section of wood, barely eight inches wide, jolted up a few inches above the rest of the ledge and water began to gush out of the hole at the base of the bath. Knuckles felt the strong pull as the torrent rushed through his ankles and whipped his tail, threatening to drag him out through the new gap too.
He waited patiently until the tub was half empty, watching the dirty water spread out through the grass and gradually absorb into the ground. He then slowly and methodically began to shift some of the salt that had failed to dissolve and now sat on the floor towards the drainage gap, his movements fluid and gently as he worked to prevent upsetting his sore flesh. Once satisfied, he retrieved the towel from the dry ground on the opposite side and began dabbing off the moisture from his fur, keeping the material out of the water still lapping about his knees.
The last half hour or so had been uncomfortable to say the least, he mused internally as he wrapped the towel about his waist and began wringing out his dreadlocks. Painful to a degree, but it had needed doing.
And it had certainly helped to clean up a few things.
Hopefully the real end this time. ;; Again, I hope you enjoyed this, and I'd appreciate any and all feedback on this.