Content warning: discussions of death, mild body horror?

Chapter 3: The Bridge

Feeling ripped off, Sonic glares at his prepaid cell phone in its impenetrable plastic packaging. He was never all that good at bartering, and he was in a hurry, so the man in the market emptied Sonic's pockets without a moment's remorse. Sonic can still hear the seller snickering while counting money. Sighing, Sonic hops between the walls of nearby buildings before landing on the roof where he left a sulking Ivory. She barely reacts to his arrival, not removing the hood from her head.

"What took you so long?" she asks.

"Look, I've gotta make a call, it will only take a minute."

Ivory groans.

Walking to the opposite edge of the roof, Sonic tears at the nuclear-grade plastic with his teeth, successfully getting it open, but sustaining a cut on his lip in the process. Bits of paper and tangled wires drop out of the package while he boots the phone up. After a moment's hesitation, he dials Tails' number. Their voice crackles through the tinny speaker.

"Another unknown number, Sonic?"

"Look, I left all my things in my hotel room, it's not important right now."

"You what?"

"Hey, is it possible to cause some kind of time paradox?"

"What the heck have you gotten yourself into now?"

"Just answer the question, please?"

"Fine. I'd say no . Considering that we've literally met our past selves and didn't change the present."

"I thought they were from another dimension?"

"Ehhh. It's complicated. When the timeline diverges, it creates an alternate dimension, and then we have to talk about what constitutes a deterministic view of the universe versus—"

"Okay, okay. Thanks, partner."

"Can you tell me what's going on now?"

"I may have run into an ancestor of Silver."

"What makes you say that?"

"Well, she has his eyes."

"That's it?"

"And she can move stuff with her mind."

"Ah. Well, we can't know for sure shy of a DNA test, and I don't exactly have his samples lying around, so ancestor would be a fair assumption. You've got a lot on your hands, it seems. I guess you won't be here in time for holiday dinner, but I kind of figured that already."

"Alright, I gotta go. I have to move quickly so that her head doesn't explode. Love ya, buddy, bye!"

"Wait wh—"

Exhaling deeply, Sonic clicks the phone off and stuffs it into his jacket pocket. He walks back over to where Ivory is sitting. His mind drifts to Silver. Even though she doesn't act anything like he did, the resemblance really is striking. Sonic hopes Silver is doing well (or will be doing well, considering he hasn't been born yet?), but things always seem fuzzy around the guy. Sonic remembers fighting him when they first met, but neither of them seemed to remember exactly why. He remembers rescuing Elise from Eggman, but what Eggman's plan actually was he doesn't remember in the slightest. Was Blaze there? If she was, why was she there? It's not like Sonic's memory is going, everything else he remembers clear as the wind.

Ivory stands up and stretches.

"Who was that, your kid?" she asks.

"What? No. My sibling. I don't have kids."

Ivory sighs with insincere pity.

"I'm guessing there's no Mrs. or Mr. The Hedgehog either."

"I'm not looking for a wife or husband. Spouse. Whatever." Sonic scratches his head. "Why do I feel the need to justify myself to you? You're a literal baby."

"Oooh, I'm striking a nerve, aren't I?"

" Goo goo ga ga . That's what you sound like."

Ivory lets go of her sarcastic grin and looks off into the distance. Sonic watches her eyes, concerned. It's quiet for a moment.

"I've never had any siblings," she says. "What's yours like?"

Sonic smiles.

"Tails is the best friend I could ever ask for. They're someone I can count on to always have my back, no matter what, and I'll always have theirs." Even as he says this, his gut twinges a little.

"That sounds… nice."

Sonic tilts his head. There's something in her tone of voice that makes him think.

"Hey," he says.

Ivory turns to meet his gaze. Sonic gives a thumbs up.

"I'm sure you'll find family. First, we need to focus on getting that bomb off of you."

"Yeah," Ivory whispers.

The next isle is closer to the current isle than the previous was, and is connected by a bridge rather than a ferry. Since Sonic and Ivory's presence was noticed, the whole isle is under increased scrutiny. The republic's military has a blockade on the bridge, a row of soldiers with gray trucks and a fleet of flying machines stand in the way. The machines look familiar to Sonic, with their wasp like shape, they seem to be an Eggman design, but even from a distance, he can tell through the binoculars that the robots are of lower quality, their movements are less precise, and they lack the brightly colored protective coat of paint that are distinctive of most of Eggman's robots. Sonic figures they must be unauthorized knock-offs of his former arch-nemesis' products, as Eggman had agreed he wouldn't sell any of his weapons tech after his retirement, and Omega was vigilant in seeing to that. Even if they are knockoffs, it's concerning if that kind of tech is being deployed at all.

"Welp," Sonic says, putting down the binoculars, "we might have to brute-force this one."

Sonic starts to do some leg stretches. If he's a little more limber maybe he'll be less likely to sprain something. Ivory stares disapprovingly.

"If last time wasn't brute force, I don't want to know what is."

"It's simple. I take out all the robots and guards, and then we cross to the other side before they can send reinforcements."

"How are you gonna pull that off?"

Grinning, Sonic flicks the tip of his nose with his thumb.

"In style," Sonic tells her.

Ivory massages her temples.

"You're so goddamn lame, it's not even funny. Just shut up," Ivory mutters.

Sonic's nose wrinkles. That was cool guy stuff. She's just a hater.

"Stay here," Sonic says.

"Wait, I don't think this is a good idea," Ivory says. "I still haven't told you everything."

"You can tell me later. We're in a hurry, right?"

Sonic takes off towards the bridge, he can barely hear Ivory call after him. He reaches the foot of the bridge in no time.

The knock-off Buzz Bombers take notice of him first, catapulting their round bodies stinger first towards him, dull metal glinting in the sunlight. Sonic jumps into the air, spinning himself into a destructive spiked ball, bouncing off the first robot and letting the resulting explosion propel him into the next, the heat singing his back. He grabs onto the machine and hangs in the air as the rest form up and attack him in a swarm. His arm muscles strain and his fingers squirm to keep a grip as he hangs off of the machine, his legs dangling. He uses the one he's grabbed as a shield, multiple crashing into it and falling crumpled into the ground. The machines move out of range, and Sonic lets himself fall to the ground.

Mounted guns whirr up and rattle fire at him, Sonic runs in zig-zags, too fast for their targeting algorithms to predict. Sonic has managed to thin their numbers significantly, and he's fairly easily avoiding their fire, but the robots are keeping their distance, just outside of Sonic's reach. They have to run out of ammo and battery eventually, but Sonic has no idea how long that might take, and he doesn't have time to wait around. Sonic looks around on the bridge, there has to be something that can help him.

His eyes trace the dappled paths that the projectiles made as they hit the road. Each shot penetrated relatively deep into the pavement, kicking up rocky chunks as they did. An idea forms in Sonic's head. He spins along the ground, reaching out with his hands and grabbing rocks as he does, and using the centripetal force of his rotation, he launches volleys of rocks at the robots at extreme speeds. It doesn't take long for each machine to drop smoking and sparking into the salty water below.

Turning to face the soldiers blocking the bridge, Sonic lowers his gaze. Guns still trained on him, the soldiers part as a truck backs up in Sonic's direction. Sonic watches carefully, unsure as to what to make of their strategy. The back door of the truck rolls open, and a ramp clatters to the ground. Sonic takes a fighting stance.

Out steps a child. A reddish wolf, short, younger than Ivory. They wear a gray jumpsuit and have the same collar that she has. Their eyes are puffy and red. The child walks closer to Sonic, quivering with dread. Sonic's heart sinks. He kneels down to meet the child's height.

"What are they doing to you?" Sonic asks.

A high pitched shout echoes from behind. Sonic immediately recognizes Ivory's voice.

"Sonic, get away! That's—"

The child reaches a shaking hand towards Sonic and

The magnets spun and lasers scanned up and down. The cramped space made Sonic uneasy, as did the sudden jerks and whirrs and beeps of the machine. It reminded him too much of Eggman's robots. He took deep breaths, calming the heavy thump in his chest. This machine was built by Tails, who would never do anything to hurt him. He tried to push Tails' many plane crashes out of his mind.

Rhythmic clanking sputtered to a stop, and the bed whined as it slid Sonic out. Sonic stood up and shook himself off, doing a little jog in place.

"Feels good to get out of there. It felt like ages! How long did that take, buddy?"

Tails was staring at the display on the machine, lines of numbers and letters in blocky typeface reflecting off of their reading glasses. Their tails swang in a steady gentle motion behind them.

"Five minutes, Sonic."

"Huh."

Sonic spun around on the swivel stool while he waited for Tails to finish reading the results of the testing. Sonic wasn't quite sure what Tails was testing for, but he trusted them with his life, so he didn't question it. Tails could be a bit of a worrier sometimes, so it was better to let them get this kind of stuff out of their system.

"Geez, I thought the only thing you were faster than me at was reading," Sonic said, egging his sibling on.

Tails didn't reply. Sonic stopped spinning, but the lab continued to whirl around him.

"Tails?"

"Yeah, sorry, I'm just double-checking."

Something was wrong.

"Everything good, partner?"

Tails turned away from the screen to look at Sonic. Their expression was one Sonic couldn't recall ever seeing on them before.

"Sonic…"

"What, I'm not dying, am I?"

"Don't!" Tails shouted, before getting quiet again. "Don't joke about that."

Sonic froze. Tails mumbled an apology while wiping their reading glasses and carefully folding them to put away. They tried to hide it, but they swiped a tear away with the tip of their finger.

"You're not dying, Sonic, but this isn't good."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Tails took a deep breath, as if preparing themself emotionally. It hurt to watch them like that.

"I've been worried about something like this for a while, I always knew it was a possibility, but I couldn't bring myself to talk about it with you, and I'm sorry." Tails stood up and walked closer to Sonic, looking down at him while they fiddled with their hands. Sonic wasn't sure what to say, he still didn't understand what was even happening. "You've… put your body through a lot, Sonic. You're the fastest thing alive, the speeds you move your body creates a lot of friction, a lot of damage to your tendons and joints in particular, your speed simply isn't meant to be sustained by a living creature. This damage is compounded by the effects of Chaos Energy. The emeralds were never meant to be used by a single person, every time you went Super Sonic, you were putting every cell in your body through a lot of stress. On top of that, with everything you went through; falling from space multiple times, whatever happened to you in Soleanna, the werehog transformations, your torture on The Death Egg, the metal virus, the cyber corruption on The Starfall Islands, that's just the start of it… frankly, your body can't take much more."

"Wh— What are you saying?"

Tails put their hands on Sonic's shoulders, staring intensely into his eyes.

"How long have you been doing this, Sonic? Twenty, thirty years?"

Sonic blinked. It couldn't really have been that long, could it?

"Yeah, why?"

"Well…"

Tails let go and looked away, rubbing their shoulder with their left hand.

"Sonic, you know… I know you don't like to stay in one spot for too long, but… there's always a place for you here."

Sonic gazed at their sibling. A snort escaped from Sonic's nose. Tails glanced back at him. Sonic stood up smiling, and pulled his sibling into a tight, but quick embrace. Tails blinked in surprise.

"I feel fine right now," Sonic said. "I've still got some fight left in me, right?"

"I mean, yeah, but…"

"Maybe I'll have to take on easier adventures soon, sure. We'll figure it out when we get there. You know I like to focus on the now."

Tails perked up a little.

"Sonic, promise me something."

"Anything. Well, almost anything."

Tails rolled their eyes.

"Promise me that when things start to feel bad, when it starts to hurt, you'll tell me."

"I promise."

Plopping back onto their chair, Tails exhaled deeply. Sonic reached his arms up and stretched from side to side.

"Well, that cramped machine of yours got me all stiff and sweaty. I'm going to go take a shower."

"Oh sure, I'll order in some chili dogs for dinner?"

Sonic pointed both fingers at the fox.

"You sure know me."

Sonic found his way to the bathroom and shut the door behind him, collapsing over the sink. The world spun around him as his heart felt like it was shoving its way up his throat. He clutched at his chest while sweat poured from his brow. It was wrong, it had to be wrong, this couldn't be happening. He was Sonic The Hedgehog. This kind of thing didn't happen to him.

The shower rings screeched against the curtain bar and he stepped into the tub, setting the water to its hottest and staring into the showerhead as water sprayed at his face. He tried to slow his breathing, trying to take deep breaths of the steamy air. He closed his eyes.

Why did he still feel so cold, if the water was supposed to be hot? He looked away from the showerhead to stare at the shower's tiled floor. The water started to run dark blue.

His spines went first, melted off his head like hot candle wax.

Blue swirled down the drain.

Next went his teeth, clattering out of his mouth onto the hard tiles.

He scrambled to open the curtain, to leave, but his legs too, were gone.

He tried to crawl, to pull his body with his arms, to retain what little was left of himself.

Then, his very consciousness spiraled away into nothing.