Chapter 2: Recognition

Ivory gingerly nibbles on the street food Sonic had gotten for her while they walk through the alleys and backstreets of the southmost isle. Sonic notices her continue to steal glances at him, as if he might change his mind in an instant about helping her. He smiles. She turns away.

"I could call my buddy," Sonic says, "They can fly a plane over here. It would take a bit less than three days, we'd just have to hide out 'til then."

He didn't want to make Tails miss the holidays, but he was sure they'd want to help if they knew.

"That's not gonna work," Ivory says, mouth half-full.

She unzips a bit of her hoodie, pulling the sides out to show something at the base of her neck: a metal collar with a red blinking light.

"I don't like the look of that," Sonic says.

"Try being the one wearing it. It itches too."

"What even—"

"Explosive collar. If my handler doesn't give it a signal in the next twenty-four hours, my head goes pop."

"Holy crap."

She zips her hoodie back up.

"You're handling this remarkably well, I have to say," Sonic remarks.

"If I die, I die. I'm just glad to be out of that place."

Sonic stares at her. Ivory's face doesn't betray much of what she's feeling, but she holds onto her arm, not making eye contact. What had she been put through to give her that attitude? He remembers feeling similarly before, back in the prison on the Death Egg. He never wants to return to that headspace.

"Want me to try to break it?"

Ivory jumps backward, clutching at her neck.

"No! How stupid can you get? It'll explode."

"Right, right."

Ivory sighs, kicking a rock. It skids along the ground before getting caught in the grates of a drain.

"I was given help to escape by someone on the inside. They also gave me instructions. I'm supposed to get to the northmost isle, there someone will remove the collar, and help me get the hell out of here." Ivory stares at her shoes. "They were supposed to take me themself, but… they didn't make it."

There's a long silence. Sonic wants to say something, to do something to comfort her, but he was never good at that sort of thing.

"I'll get you there," Sonic says. "To the northmost isle."

Ivory stares at him, inspecting his expression.

"Aren't you going to ask why? Why was I locked up? I could be some kind of murderer or something."

Sonic looks her up and down.

"I don't get that vibe from you."

Ivory blinks.

"Vibes? You go off of vibes alone?"

Sonic grins.

"My sense for vibes is legendarily accurate, if I do say so myself."

Ivory glares at him.

"Whatever."

Rough concrete rubs against the fur on Sonic's chest as he lays atop the building, gazing through binoculars at a large boat bobbing slightly in the waves at a pier overlooking the path to the next island. The boat is white, paint cracking with age and wear, it has multiple floors of open-air seating. People in military gear wielding machine guns stand guarding the entrance ramp as a line of people, mostly human but with a good number of non-humans, wait to show their papers. The guard at the front of the line seems to look at each for an excruciating amount of time, before brusquely depositing them back into their owner's hands. Sonic cocks his brow.

"Why is the security so tight? It's just a ferry."

Ivory sighs.

"Don't you know anything?"

"No."

She yanks the binoculars away from him.

"Look, they've been cracking down on everything since the coup. There's been more resistance than General Ardent expected."

Sonic isn't aware of any coup, but he's not about to relay this information just to get berated again by the impertinent child. One would think she'd be a little nicer to the one trying to save her life, not that it particularly bothers him.

"You have a passport, right?"

"Yeah."

Not that he needed one until recently. Restrictions on travel had gone insane in the last decade or so.

"They shouldn't pay too much attention to a tourist, so we just need a way to sneak me onto the ferry… maybe I could pose as—"

"Or," Sonic interrupts, "I could run too fast for them to see me, and we could slip in, no trouble."

"We need to be discreet!"

"I can be discreet! Watch."

Sonic grabs Ivory and slings her over his shoulder like a sack of flour.

"Waitwaitwaitwait—"

"We're in a hurry, right?"

Sonic doesn't wait for a reply and the world becomes a blur. Operating on instinct more so than sight, Sonic runs and jumps lightly and quietly between rooftops, his camouflage is the wind itself. He skids to a stop atop the last building before the boat and backs up until his foot reaches the back edge of the roof.

"Stop!" Ivory complains in a hush.

Sonic ignores her, focusing on the jump he's about to make. He observes the boat, the where people are crowding, the sightlines of the guards, before deciding on a trajectory. He runs a few possibilities in his head before choosing the one he thinks is best. He aims for the far edge of the boat. It would be an impossible jump for damn near anyone other than Sonic The Hedgehog, but he's made much tighter leaps many times before.

"Hold on tight," Sonic whispers.

"Oh dear god please—"

Sonic pushes off from the edge, boosting himself forward at impossible speeds, he launches into the air just as he reaches the other edge of the building. The wind rustles through his fur and spines, he tightens his grip on Ivory who seems to stiffen in abject terror. Time slows down, Sonic can feel the minute droplets of water in the air, the temperature differences as he ascends and descends. He makes tiny rotational adjustments in fractions of fractions of seconds. He's headed exactly where he wanted to. His heartbeat is steady and calm, he's confident that his jump was perfect.

It was almost perfect, anyway. The angle as his feet reach the wooden deck of the ferry is very slightly off, and his left foot bends sharply outwards. A sharp pain shoots up his leg, he stumbles, nearly hitting the ferry's wall. He manages to stop himself, and lets Ivory down gently. He's bent over, a hand on his back, and putting weight on his left leg hurts. Sonic winces, stretching himself out, the landing threw off his back a bit too. His joints crackle. Only a few years ago, this kind of misstep wouldn't have phased him at all, but nowadays his whole body has to scream at him, and he didn't like the kind of thoughts it made him think. He wasn't old, not yet, why was this happening already? Straightening back up, he glances over at the girl balancing herself against the wall and glaring daggers at him.

"You good, Ivory?"

Ivory hammers her fists against his shoulder while muffling a scream. Sonic takes that as a 'yes'. He limps over to the nearest chair and lets himself down, sucking air through his teeth.

"I told you this was a bad idea!" Ivory whispers. "You've got yourself injured! How the hell are you supposed to help me if you're incapacitated?"

"Cool your jets, kid. I just need to keep the weight off for an hour or so and I'm golden."

She storms over to the chair next to him and sits down in a huff. She pulls her hood up and tightens the drawstrings.

"I should have stabbed you when I had the chance."

Sonic finds it cute that she thought she had the chance. Ivory twitches, still glaring.

"What are you smiling about, jackass?"

Enjoying the cool ocean breeze for a moment, Sonic closes his eyes. Even with the uneventful silence, the half-hour ferry ride passes fairly quickly. The boat slowly comes to a stop, so taking a deep breath, Sonic stands, testing his left foot with some of his weight. It still hurts, he needs more time. He notices Ivory looking at him oddly.

"Useless," she mutters, moving towards him.

She slings his arm around her shoulder and supports some of his weight. She looks so serious, Sonic can't help but let a little chuckle out.

"Shut up."

"Never," Sonic says, thinking. "Do you think they'll be checking us as we get off?"

"Nah, I don't think so."

Ivory helps Sonic towards the boat's ramp as the crowd slowly trickles off. Armed guards stand at either side of the ramp, but it seems Ivory was right, they aren't checking the passengers as they exit. They inch closer and closer to the front of the vague line. Ivory watches the guards with wide eyes. As the two step off the boat's ramp, Ivory holds her breath. Sonic isn't particularly worried.

The guards don't seem to notice them any more than the others in line. Ivory exhales. Sonic gives her a reassuring look.

A walkie-talkie bleeps at their left, a muffled voice talking to the guard. He turns to look at them. Ivory makes the mistake of making eye contact.
The guard starts walking towards them. On instinct, Sonic tries to take a running stance, but putting weight on his foot shocks him with pain and he slips up. The guard gets closer. Holding her by the wrist, Sonic takes off, limping faster than most can run, but nowhere near his top speed. Both guards give chase, shouting at the two hedgehogs to stop where they are.

The second isle is crowded, a market district with fresh fruit and fish sold at every stand, the fish is the most prominent smell. A tented roof covers large sections of the market, bathing the surroundings in dappled specks of filtered light, shifting in the wind. Sonic might enjoy a walk through the place on a less crowded day, particularly if armed men weren't chasing him. Sonic and Ivory pass by bartering customers and narrowly avoid knocking over a barrel of local fruit before turning into a dark alley.

The clattering sound of multiple guns' safeties being clicked off echoes off of the alley walls. They had run right into their trap. Sonic's heartbeat quickens as adrenaline starts to kick his system into gear. He's gotten out of worse. One of the armed men steps forward, still pointing his gun at the two hedgehogs.

"Subject Twenty-three, you will submit."

Ivory pulls out her knife, this time managing to flip the blade out.

"Submit, or we will shoot."

Sonic lowers his eyes. Careful of how he shifts his weight, he grabs the frontmost's gun and launches a headbut into his gut, sending him flying. He tosses the gun aside. There are three more guys, each training their weapon on him. He delivers a sweeping kick, knocking the legs of the second, and he falls into the third, his gun discharging into the sky.

Despite all his trying, Sonic lands back on his left foot and loses balance for the shortest moment. He feels the last guy's presence behind him, time slows as he hears the trigger being pulled. Sonic does his best to move out of the shot's trajectory. He estimates that the bullet will graze his shoulder, but his prediction could be off by a matter of inches, deadly if he's unlucky. Sonic braces himself for the pain. With a flash of light and a deafening crack, the gun fires.

The pain never comes. Did it miss entirely? Sonic doesn't hear a bullet hit the wall or the floor either. He turns around to see Ivory standing in between him and the gunman, facing the attacker in a wide stance, with her palms out. She's covered in a light blue aura.
The bullet hangs in midair, stopping completely.

Ivory's vague familiarity to Sonic suddenly morphs into alarming recognition.