3. Pattern Weaver


They gave her food, and she ate it. She ate it because it was given to her, and if she didn't eat she would starve. She sort-of knew that she could get her own food, but how was a puzzling puzzle, and until she figured it out she was content to eat what she was given.

Creatures came with the food. Some were tall, but most were short and fuzzy. The biggest was scaly and couldn't really fit through the door, and made sounds through the window instead. One was covered in spikes, and talked very fast. She kind of liked him, but he didn't come very often. She thought she scared him – just a little.

She thought she scared a lot of people. She thought she didn't used to know how to know that, too, but now she did. It was strange, but the less she knew about some things, the more she knew about others. She couldn't remember names, couldn't remember happenings, couldn't even remember how to walk sometimes. Once or twice she'd forgotten how to breathe, and Pretty Blue had to do it for her until she remembered. Yet for all she'd forgotten, was forgetting, would forget, there were a hundred things she knew better than ever.

She knew how to balance on one hand. She knew how to read patterns in those funny picture cards. She knew what those patterns meant. She knew how to snap a spinal column in three easy moves, and how to cave in a ribcage with a single shove. She could break bones and crush tendons. She could peel a creature's trachea out of its throat with her bare hands, or drive its ribs into its lungs with her feet if she wanted to.

Pretty Blue didn't like it when she told her things like that. Pretty Blue always brought nice things to eat, and would sit by her while she stuffed them into her mouth. Sometimes Pretty Blue would talk quietly, others she'd just sit there, watching and drawing invisible pictures on her palms so she wouldn't have to look up.

She used to know her name, but now she was just Pretty Blue, with her pretty blue vest, pretty blue boots and pretty blue eyes.

Today Pretty Blue had brought apples with her. They sat on the floor, she and Pretty Blue, taking bites and chewing loudly. Golden light streamed in through the window, and every now and then she would try and catch some in her hands.

Pretty Blue looked at her strangely. "Trying to catch a sunbeam?"

"Is that what they're called?"

"Uh-huh."

She tried to catch another. It must have been very quick, because it slipped from her grasp without her even seeing it. She stared at her hands, mystified. "Sunbeams are very fast."

"Yes. They are."

"Are they even faster than Spiky-Spike?"

"You mean Sonic? His name is Sonic." It was said without much feeling.

The words were old and dusty, and she didn't take much notice of them anymore. Spiky-Spike suited him much better.

"And yes, they're even faster than him," Pretty Blue added.

She nodded and took another bite of apple. If Pretty Blue said it was true, then it was true. Pretty Blue knew everything worth knowing – even if sometimes she didn't say it all out loud. Sometimes, she got the feeling Pretty Blue wasn't telling her something really important. Sometimes she got the feeling she might like to know what it was, but she usually forgot about it soon after. Pretty Blue knew what was best.

The apples were really quite pretty. Much prettier than her drab little room, which was all she'd seen for… as long as she could remember. They were shiny and red, or sometimes green, or yellow. Occasionally they were mixtures of all three, but most of the time they were red, and shone like blood on glass.

"Apples are pretty," she declared.

"Hm?" Pretty Blue looked up. She hadn't been listening.

"I said, apples are pretty." She spun one on her finger. It fell off and bounced across the floor. Bits of juice spurted from the broken skin. "Pretty apples. Like li'l bleedin' hearts in my hands."

Pretty Blue's pretty blue eyes widened.

She shrank away. "I'm sorry. Is that sumthin' I'm not s'posed to talk about?"

"No, no, it's okay, Bu- It's okay."

She looked hard at Pretty Blue, who looked back with sad eyes.

"Do you want me to do another readin' for you?" She was scrabbling for her cards even as she said it. "Please?" Next to eating apples and talking to Spiky-Spike, reading the cards was her most favourite thing in the world today.

Pretty Blue bit her lip. "Sure… sure you can do a reading, if you like." Her jaw was doing that clenchy grim thing. It didn't fit right around her smile.

"You're worried about sumthin'. I don't gotta do a readin' to know that."

"I'm not worried - "

"Are too!"

"All right, all right, I'm worried about something."

"Tell me what it is." She didn't stop laying out the cards. They were a present from Two Tails, and her most treasured possession. He used to watch when she tossed sticks and pebbles about and read the patterns in them. One day, he'd turned up with some corncobs and a pack of cards he'd made and coloured himself. He let her do readings more than anyone else when he came to see her. Whenever one of her cards tore or wore out, he would make her another, and she would prize it until the day that it, too, was gone.

Pretty Blue gave her another funny look, and then asked, "How much do you remember about… when you got your metal parts?"

She paused, looked at her shiny silver bits and sniffed them. She'd forgotten they were there. They smelled tangy and brisk, and she suddenly recalled what freshly fallen snow smelled like. "I remember lots of yellow light. And hurt. Lots of hurt. Hurt that made my head go funny…" She rubbed at the base of one ear, then reached up and folded it in on itself to stop it up. Pretty Blue gently pried her fingers away before she made it sore again. "The yellow light made my legs and arm go hard, and it made me good at patterns. But… but it made me forget lots, too. Is that right?"

"Yes and no."

"Oh. Is that what you're worried about?"

"Yes and no."

"You ain't givin' proper answers!"

"Sorry." Pretty Blue sighed and scrubbed a hand through her hair. It was getting long again, all soft and wavy. She wanted to touch it, but the last time she did Pretty Blue got all strange and left in a hurry. She didn't want Pretty Blue to leave again. She didn't like being alone.

"Spiky-Spike says gettin' my silver bits screwed up my head. But I got me a real pretty head, don't I? I got long eyelashes and a cute button nose."

"Cute as a gumdrop," Pretty Blue agreed, distracted and cheerless.

She paused in turning over her cards, cocking her head to one side. It took a second to cross the space between them and cup Pretty Blue's face so she couldn't look anywhere else. "Don't be sad," she said sternly. "Things get bad when you're sad. The sky goes dark and nasty things pop into my head. I don't like thinkin' those things. I don't like tryin' to hurt folk."

"I'm not sad, I'm just… apprehensive," Pretty Blue said, prying her off with the same gentle touch as before. "Spiky-Spike and I are going on a journey. An important one."

"Oh." She sat back on her haunches. She never got to go anywhere. It was too dangerous to let her out, in case the bad thoughts came and she tried to make others hurt like she did, to make the thoughts go away again. Mental mishaps dogged her, and whenever the pinball machine in her head speeded up and went tilt, all bets were off. "Where to?"

"We're going to see someone."

"Who?"

"You don't remember the old legends, do you?"

"What's a legend?"

Pretty Blue let out a long breath. "We're going to try and fix things. We're going to go back and stop… stop Robotnik from… we're going to fix all this."

"All what?" She turned over a card and studied it thoughtfully.

"Everything."

She turned another, and another. They sang at her, voices sweet and bitter as homemade sin. "Even me?"

"Especially you."

"Hm." She frowned. "These ain't right."

"What?"

"The cards." She gestured at them. "There's sumthin' weird about this readin'."

"Maybe you didn't do it right."

"I always do it right. It's what I do. I'm real good at patterns."

"Yeah. I guess so…"

She slapped her fuzzy palm on top of the arrangement. It made a sound like a book snapping shut, and Pretty Blue jumped a little. It wasn't a very loud or scary noise, and when Pretty Blue jumped she looked very small indeed. "Pretty Blue, you'd tell me if'n you needed me, right?"

"What a strange question - "

"Wouldn't you?"

"Why - "

"Wouldn't you?"

Pretty Blue blinked, smiled a fake smile, and said, "Of course I would, Bunnie."

She pursed her lips, wrinkled her nose, and swept the cards away with her metal hand. They scattered haphazardly across the floor. "Who's Bunnie?"


And because I'm such a scatterbrain I forgot to upload this, last time, here are some Review Replies!

Hey, Orin! Or should that be yay! Orin! I'm a Bunnie girl at heart, but Sally is a fascinating character all the same. So much potential. So royally screwed up by so many writers on so many levels. Hmf. Regarding Knuckles/Bunnie, I think I've had a soft spot for them since I rediscovered SatAM on channel POP! Around the same time I discovered Sonic X for the first time. They just sort of… melded in my head, for no discernable reason than they wanted to. I can't explain it. And I believe I'm the only one who thinks they'd be cute together, so I'll just sit in the corner with my kinks and not other anyone.

Oh. Mygod. CarriePika.This is, like… I'm having difficulty finding my words, here. Which is unusual for me. When you first enter a fandom and poke around a little, you find a couple of names being thrown willy-nilly as the Authority on one thing or another. And… it's always scary when these archetypes of ficcery prove they're actually real, honest to god, live people. So… yeah. Excuse me a second while I go make some squealy noises of joy at your review.

Thanks, celestical cimmerian catalystAs for you question, Bunnie and Sally switched in that segment, and Sonic and Knuckles switched, too. Also, Knuckles's father Locke swapped with uncle Chuck, but that's only significant if you know the Archie-(comic)-verse. If you don't, it doesn't matter. I'm just pleased you liked it.

They are, aren't they, Robert JF? Not that I'm classing myself in any of the upper echelons but… even lower echelons are difficult to come by for SatAM.

Thanks, Dano the Overlander. Hope it lived up to expectations.

Will do, Treasurehunter!


Hope to see y'all next time. But meanwhile, a review or two might be nice. Hint-hint.