Disclaimer: All of the Sonicverse characters and places inserted into this story are owned by SEGA, and used without permission or knowledge. All other characters belong to me. The places used as backdrops, except for SS, mentioned in this story are real.

Sonic- 18 years

Amy (Paloma)- 16 years

Tails- 13 years

Knuckles- 20 years

Shadow- 19 years

Cream- 9 years

Rouge- 22 years

Chapter 17: Genki Desu ka? (How is your Energy?)

What kind of hero was he? Sonic had contemplated that all the time that Eggman had spent gloating in front of him. He could not even protect one innocent female let alone keep himself from being captured. He should have treated her better, and respected her from the very beginning. It would have been hard to believe, but certain concepts were still new for the blue hedgehog wonder. He never had any friends before meeting Tails and the others. He had always been a loner without any ties to anyone, and for awhile that is how he had liked it. But living the life of a loner had soon caught up with him and eventually took its toll on the lonely traveler.

Sure he had fellow critters to hang out with growing up, but that is all they did. They were never truly opened like his current friends were. They never once shared how they felt about certain things that they where were feeling. At some point it felt as if they were using him in order to heighten their own popularity status from how things looked. Sonic never liked being used by anyone and this was one of those reasons. He was not born to make others look good. Sometimes he even wondered why he was born. Then again everyone wonders why they were born. Many times Sonic felt like one of the damned and that the only way he could break out of this curse was to do all these good deeds, but in time his train of thought changed. It felt so different when he actually started to make real friends. But when it came to Amy, a part of him still felt as if she was trying to use him. Even if nothing came out of it for her, except for love and friendship, it still felt like as if she was just like his old gang.

She just wanted him and only him. In all the time he assumed he knew her, she never looked twice at another guy. Not even when she started to hang out with Shadow did she ever show any romantic liking towards him, although the fact they were close friends did at one point make him jealous.

Amy loved Sonic and was always true to her word about her feelings for him. Attentive to his needs and wants even if his needs and wants meant that he wanted her out his sight. Guess it was just a natural defense, but why did it kick in whenever Amy was around and not when the others came near him. He had always thought that she was bad for him. Kind of like how sweets are bad for you once you get into your fifties.

How could he have been so cruel as to treat her the way he did without even considering other possibilities? Maybe he did love her and maybe he was just afraid to show it. It could be because he did not want to get his heart broken if he had ever found out that she was using him. How devastating that would be for him and not just because of his reputation as the ultimate definition of cool, but because she was someone who loved him for whom he was.

Eggman had long since departed the room, leaving the two hedgehogs alone. Except for the sounds from the computers, the darken room gave off a ghoulish sensation as if the room was made for death and the damned. Sonic let out a long sigh and looked over at where Amy rested. He wished he could talk to her and reassure her that everything was going to be okay. But he could not. He wished that she could talk back to him and hear her voice again. Her voice was always full of warmth and love, something he had searched for a very long time. She was in some kind of coma like state and did not know the first steps to reach her. He tried to let the machine try and take over his mind again, but it was not working this time. Eggman had probably turned off his connection to the machine. The most likely reason was to make him watch Amy and know that for once in his life he had to watch an innocent die. He wanted the hedgehog to know that he alone was responsible for his actions towards his female counterpart. What Sonic felt for Amy now placed him in some kind of emotional tail spin that he knew he could never brake free from. Sonic even wondered if everything he learned about Amy within the false reality of the machine was even true. For he knew it could have been a lie, but Amy was connected to it so by some crazy means she could have broadcasted some of her memories/feelings or what was left of them through his doppelganger friends.

Sonic gritted his teeth again. He hated thinking. Thinking was never his strong points. He was always someone would lived on the thrill of the moment. Then again all males are the same, but Sonic was the embodiment of what all males dreamed of being. He was cool. He was daring and careless. He was drop dead handsome and a pleasure to all the ladies except for one. Sonic slowly formed a fist. His nails digging into the skin of his palm as he punched the cylinder glass in front of him and watched it vibrate. He already knew by now that it had no effect and punching that hard as he had done so many times before would only make his hand hurt, but he did not care. He had of lot of stress, tension, and anger lumped into that one punch that it did make him feel a bit better in the end. But it did not solve his problems.

Sonic let out another sigh as he leaned back against the capsule, floating and staring at the air bubbles that surrounded him. He looked down and noticed a tube that was running into the capsule from an unknown source filling his and probably Amy's capsule with this special liquid. Then he noticed another on the other side, vacuuming out liquid. It was as if they were kept at equilibrium, but why? Then it came to him as if it was screaming at him for being stupid. The reason why he could not make a dent into the glass was because of the liquid. He had assumed all this time that Eggman had created some special glass from diamond or some kind of hard gemstone to keep him here. Now that he knew what the problem was, the next question was how would he stop the liquid from coming into his confinement? Obviously there were no rocks around or even garbage. But there was something he could use, his shoes and gloves. If he plugged it up with those things then maybe it would be enough to stop the liquid from coming in even if it was just for a minute. That might be long enough to break free depending on how much of his strength was not zapped by the liquid, but he had a life to save and he hoped that his determination would be enough to give him that needed extra boast.

The blue bomber looked at his hands and for a moment realized that this would be the first time he had ever removed his gloves. He never had any need to remove them. He could not even remember the first time he had ever put them on. They had become a part of him and if they were his own second skin. Sonic snapped out of his trance and took off his gloves without another thought. He then bent down and then removed his shoes, but as he was doing so he noticed that the shoes he was wearing were different then the ones he had been wearing for a few years now. These were his old shoes, the very same shoes he had started out on his adventures on. The same ones he wore when he first meet Tails, Knuckles, and even Amy. This must have been Eggman's way of being nostalgic. These could not possibly be his old shoes, he had them tucked away somewhere only he knew about. These were most likely a copy of his old pair. Still it did not stop him from taking them off his feet and shoving them along with his gloves into the feed. He held his breathe and hoped that this would work, if it did not then all hope would be lost and Amy would die in front of him without hearing the words "I'm sorry".

Sonic closed his eyes and something he never done in his entire life…he prayed. He was never one to believe in fate or that God existed, his belief was that life is what you make of it. He just hoped right now that God would listen to him. Even if this was his very first time trying to contact the deity, he just wished he knew some kind of prayer or chant to get the deity's attention. Sonic just hoped that God heard him and was willing to help a jerk like him.

The environment inside the tube felt different for the hedgehog. He could feel the liquid substance around him reseeding as it was being drained by the other connecting tube of his chamber. Sonic felt woozy at first, but it was nothing compared to how the muscle cramps he was feeling in his legs from lack of activity. He knew that he would need to work through the pain, no matter how much it fucking hurt him. Pain like this would be nothing if Amy died, and there was no cure for that. Everything Sonic was feeling right now made him stronger than he felt in years. He could not explain what he was feeling right now, but boy it sure felt good as it coursed through his veins. Most of all he could feel his strength returning to him as he formed another fist and aimed it at the glass in front of him, shattering his prison and sending the glass pieces all around the room. He was finally free, but he was still exhausted from having been in that liquid an awfully long time. Taking a deep breathe, Sonic flexed his hands as he felt a sting in his knuckles. He took a quick glance and noticed that he had cut his knuckles on the glass. It was bleeding, but the cut was not life threatening. He then kneeled down and gathered his belongings that he had use to plug the liquid tube feed for his escape.

They were wet, yet they did not have the same effect on him this time which he found a bit odd but nothing that would be threatening to take him down. He placed his gloves back on his hands, his blood soaking into his gloves. It would do as a make shift band-aid for now, but there was still a lot of work a head of him before he could relax and pamper Amy.

Sonic let himself crack a smile. It sure felt good doing it. He just hoped he would not get a cramp from not doing it for so long. He slowly and carefully stepped out of his capsule, making note of the pieces of glass on the ground in front him. He had no time to place his shoes on his feet, so had decided to tie the laces together and place it around his neck when he could get Amy as far away from this as possible. He was lucky that he left his socks as he carefully made his way towards the pink hedgehog. His feet would have been cut up pretty badly if he was barefoot, making his speed of no use to anyone until they were healed. Nothing would stop him from getting to her. Not even a pair of badly and bloody cut up feet.

Amy's capsule was in the darker side of the room. It had been a long time since he had seen her face. There were cuts and bruises on her body. Her clothes were nothing more than rugs now. It was almost erotic, but Sonic was not that type of perverted person to even consider getting a hard on in this kind of situation. Only a monster would do that, and he was no monster. She was so innocent. She did not deserve any of this, but she got it. He could tell from her facial expression that she was in great pain. He could only imagine and wish that he would know what she was feeling. She was probably still stuck in that damn nightmare that he helped create. He just prayed that she would find someway to forgive him, even if it would take an eternity and beyond.

Sonic ran his hands against the glass. He could not break the glass like he did before on his own tube. The glass would most likely hit her, and in her weaken condition do more harm than good. He had to find another way, but first he needed to drain her tube and do that he would need to pull both of tubes out. Even though he could, the air would have been vacuumed out and he knew she was not strong or alert to hold her own breathe like he was able to. That would mean he would need to time pulling them at the same time so that Amy would be safe. Even if he was able to do that, his next problem would be how to get her out of the capsule without the glass splattering against her. He took another deep breathe. He had to remain calm about this. If he lost his temper then he would lose his focus, and that would be no help to Amy. But right now time was of the essence and was already on borrowed time.

Sonic closed his eyes for a moment. He needed to think. Even if it was not his strongest of features, he could still come up with some good ideas when he was not doing something reckless. Then it dawned on him. He was in a room filled with computers of all size and most likely they interfaced with the capsules. But unlike Tails, Sonic was no computer wiz. He barely knew how to use one, and the only program he ever mastered was computerized solitaire. It looked like he would have to become a quick learner. He only prayed that he did not touch the wrong button or set off any alarms. That was another thing that Sonic noticed. Where were the alarms? Why have they not sounded yet? Probably because Eggman had assumed that there was no possible way for Sonic to break free. He shook his head. It did not surprise him that the old fart was still so gullible. Sonic let out a small chuckle as he went to looking for any button or switch on all of the consoles in room. Each one he pressed had no effect, he almost felt like he was being punished by God for all of the mean things he did to Amy. Even if God was trying to punish him, it still was not right to let Amy be a victim as he saw it. But if Amy died as part of God's plan, then she would finally be free from the suffering. Free from the pain and torment that he had put her through along with Eggman. He was no saint, but he would do anything now for her even if it meant dying with her too.