Recursion Error
Episode 22- That one jackal
By now the sky was beginning to slowly transition into an orange color as the sun slowly approached dusk. Not much had transpired in the amount of time that Sorun had found Virgil and now. Sorun had gone through a single apple and Virgil had thankfully remained silent, though whenever Sorun snuck a quick glance at him to make sure he was okay he saw that the thing still had a happy smile on his face. That wound on his back was still bothering Sorun, though. It stopped bleeding, at least, but that was still a large open wound on the creature's back. He was worried about infection, and he didn't have anything to clean and wrap the wound with.
Maybe it would be fine. Maybe Virgil's species was magic or something and didn't get infections. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking on Sorun's part as he hoped that the blue thing wouldn't just drop dead on him due to infection.
He didn't think he could handle something like that happening, especially after he already went and named him.
If there was a bright side, it was that the forest was beginning to thin out. There were still trees everywhere, but the forest wasn't even half as dense as it had been prior. Unfortunately, that did not mean that there was much more room for the human and his small companion to navigate around. Because everywhere they looked, for as far as the eye could see was, for lack of a better term, junk.
Robot junk.
Metal corpses and parts were strewn all around and bunched together into large piles. It wasn't just Egg Pawns, either, though he could see plenty of parts that belonged to that variety of Badnik randomly mixed in with all the other piles of junks. There were various makes and models of so many different robots he'd never seen before that he couldn't make one part out from another, and because everything was in pieces and wrecked he couldn't really identify anything, either. It was all just a chaotic mish-mash of electronics and metal parts.
"What, did we wander into a junkyard or something...?" Sorun wondered aloud as he stepped around a large pile of discarded robot parts. "What's with all this robot stuff?"
"Chao." Virgil gave as good a shrug as he could since he was still clinging to Sorun's shoulder.
"No idea either, huh?" Sorun commented as he weaved past another junk pile. "Yeah, well, at least this probably means we're makin' progress towards something."
The juxtaposition between the junk piles of robots all around and the serene scene of a forest mixed in was an odd one to Sorun, but the human teen tried to not let it distract him as he made his way through the junk-covered land. He did take some time to observe some of the piles of junk, as there were some neat-looking robots here and there that caught his eyes. Large humanoid ones, animal-shaped ones, whole aircraft that looked like things straight out of sci-fi comics... practically almost everything was here.
There was one other thing that didn't make Sorun nearly as interested, though, and that was Eggman's logo. He saw it frequently on a lot of the pieces of robots in a lot of the piles he came across, which lead him to suspect that a majority, if not flat-out all of these, were Eggman's robots. That'd explain why there was a junkyard full of dismantled robots, at least.
"I'll give Eggman credit for one thing: the man never runs out of ideas for new robots." He came across a large, deep groove cut into the ground, and nearby was the upper remains of a giant machine nearly the size of a small building. One of its arms was resting across the groove in the ground, and Sorun treated the robotic limb as a bridge as he slowly walked across it with his arms held out to his sides for balance. "Are these all old models of his or something? Is this some kind of dumping site for his robots?" He came to the other side of the arm and hopped down. "This world just keeps gettin' stranger all the time."
It all looked neat, at least. Something about all the different-looking robots tickled something inside of Sorun, that small bit of nerd in him that always liked looking at cool robot designs back on Earth when playing video games, but the Eggman logo he kept seeing brought him back down real fast.
The entire place was huge, though. Ten minutes of walking straight and traversing past small obstacles made from all the discarded robots and he saw no end to the junkyard. What he heard eventually, however, was a different story entirely. It was faint at first, but as Sorun approached the noise it became clearer: grunting. Grunting and sounds of frustration and disgruntlement, coming from, by the tone of it, an aged male.
"Alright... that's something." And something was better than nothing as far as Sorun was concerned. Hopefully it was a person he could talk to, and with luck they could tell him where the nearest village was. Or even better take him back to theirs if they were from one. At the very least it was somebody to talk to to relieve the monotony of being lost and hiking through a forest and junkyard full of robot corpses.
Slowly, Sorun made his way towards the sound of the grunting until he caught sight of the source, prompting him to take cover by a nearby pile of broken robots as he observed the sight before him. The grunting was coming from, by the looks of it, a cat Mobian with completely black fur. No clothing aside from shoes and gloves. Currently he was kneeling in front of a metal wagon, which was completely full of miscellaneous parts and pieces of machinery. The back left wheel of the wagon, Sorun noted, was dislodged completely, and seemed to be the source of the old Mobian's ire as he seemed to be grumbling loudly directly onto the broken wheel.
"What is he doing all the way out here with a wagon full of junk? He a scavenger or something?" Sorun thought to himself. "Well, scavver or not it's somebody, which is just what I need. Alright, Sorun, play it cool and confident. It's just a single Mobian and you need the help. I'm sure it'll turn out fine."
Meeting new people always made him nervous, and on Mobius this fear was amplified due to the world's unpredictable nature, but he didn't have many other options. So the teen jumped up to the top of the pile, sat down on the wrecked Egg Pawn, and waved towards the cat Mobian while shouting out, "Yo!"
The Mobian jumped right up to his feet and whirled around towards Sorun. By Mobian standards, his features were pretty average. The only notable features Sorun saw were that the tufts of fur on his cheeks had gray coloring near the edges and that his eyes were green, but otherwise he didn't seem all that different from any other cat Mobians he'd seen.
"O-oh! What in the...? Oh! Hello there!" The aged-sounding Mobian waved his hand towards Sorun, who became flooded with relief at the friendly gesture. "I didn't notice you there, ha ha! Not very surprising, I guess. My hearing ain't what it used to be."
Sorun slid off of the metal pile and began to slowly approach the black-furred Mobian. "Sorry if I spooked ya."
"Nah, don't worry about it." The cat waved a hand to the side, and then leaned his head closer towards Sorun as he stopped right in front of him. "A human, eh?" he mumbled. "Don't really see your kind around these parts, sonny. What on Mobius are you doing on this side of the world?"
"That... is a really long and complicated story," Sorun answered with an exasperated breath. "Long story short, I'm lost and wandered in here by mistake. How about you?"
"Ah, just doin' a bit a scavenging, though the goll-durned wheel on my wagon here decided to go and fall off on me." The cat Mobian glanced at the broken wagon, and then looked back to Sorun with a light laugh. "But it ain't no problem. Anyways, I'm Sam. Nice to meetcha."
"... Wow, okay." He'd met Mobians like Sally and Sonic's family that had relatively normal-sounding names, but compared to all the other ones it felt like people with names he was familiar with were in a minority. It still threw him for a loop whenever he met a Mobian like Sam with a name that would be commonplace on Earth. Sorun quickly regained his composure and introduced himself, saying, "My name's Sorun."
"Sorun, huh?" Sam nodded, and then turned back to his wagon. "Well, sonny, I dunno why you chose to get lost here of all places, but there's worse places to be wanderin' in, I suppose," he said as he walked over to and crouched down next to the wagon. "Place is a robot graveyard. Usually nothin' comes 'round here, 'cept me when I'm scavengin' parts."
Slowly approaching the cat and his wagon, Sorun took a single sweeping glance over the entire area. "I got that this place was a robot junkyard, but where'd all this stuff come from, anyways?" he asked.
"Eh, you know how it is. This world's been embroiled in a war for over a decade against a mad tyrant usin' robots to try and take everythin' over. Sure there's resistance fighters bustin' them up all the live-long day, but all those robots gotta go somewhere, and that crackpot Dr. Robotnik ain't too keen on recyclin', apparently," Sam gruffly stated as he inspected his wagon's wheel. "This ain't the only dumping site on the continent where people toss trashed robots, but it's one of the bigger ones. Keeps the rest of the place clean."
The human teen nodded in understanding, silently watching as the black-furred Mobian continued to examine the broken wagon. He felt a small tap on his left shoulder, prompting him to look towards Virgil. The little creature was pointing one of his arms towards Sam and the wagon while staring at Sorun with his round eyes.
"What, what is it?" he whispered in response. Virgil gestured towards the cart and Sam again, causing Sorun to look towards the two and then back to the creature. "You want me to help him?"
"Chao."
Rolling his eyes, Sorun shook his head in disagreement. "Virgil, come on, we got better things to do than help some old guy with his wagon."
"Chao?" Virgil tilted his head and gave Sorun a questioning look.
"... Okay, fine, we don't really have anything better to do," he admitted, "and... maybe he can give us some directions if we help out. Ugh, fine." With a sigh, he turned back towards the cat Mobian and his wagon, breathed in deeply, and stepped right next to the Mobian. "You need any help with the wagon, man?" he asked.
Sam stood upright in surprise and looked towards Sorun. "Er, I wouldn't really be one to turn down a helpin' hand," he said, "but do you know how to fix somethin' like this?"
Sorun hummed, and looked down towards the wagon. It seemed a simple enough construction: a simple wagon with four wheels all connected to a central axle under the actual wagon with a pull bar attached to the front. It seemed like an easy fix for somebody who had at least a small amount of technical knowledge.
Too bad Sorun's skills as a mechanic were absolute trash.
"Nah, not really," he said as he turned back to Sam. "I could, uh... carry it for you, though. If you want."
"Carry?" A unsure expression crossed the cat's features as he scratched the back of his head. "I appreciate the offer, sonny, but my home's a few miles back and I got the thing completely loaded down with parts. I don't think-"
Sam was interrupted when, in a flash of blue, Sorun's right Bringer Claw appeared resting on his shoulder. The cat stepped back in complete shock as the spectral claw unfolded itself, positioned its hand under the wagon, and lifted it up completely into the air with no effort whatsoever.
"It's not a problem," Sorun assured the cat as he turned towards the bewildered Mobian, not an ounce of strain to be seen on his face. "It's, uh, don't... don't think about it too hard."
He mentally prepared himself for any reaction, ranging from wide-eyed wonder to Sam screaming and running away in fear from the blue, spectral arm holding the wagon up. Instead what happened was that the cat's expression fell blank as he shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, okay. Neat."
"... Mobians, I swear..." Was he surprised that Sam was so flippant towards the reveal of the Bringer Claw? No, not really. That's how practically all Mobians acted around his powers. It still floored him each time. "So are we heading out, or what?"
"Er, yeah. 'Course. This way." Sam turned around and began walking away, and Sorun walked by his side with the wagon full of parts being suspended above them by the Bringer Claw. "Like I said, my home village is a few miles down the way."
"Ugh, miles?" He'd missed that part the first time he said it. His feet were already getting tired from all the hiking he'd done today. But he had to remind himself that he'd already promised Sam he'd carry the wagon, and back to a village, at that. That was everything he needed right there. Maybe he could get some directions afterwards. Or at least some medical attention for Virgil's wound. "I mean, uh, yeah. Miles. No sweat," Sorun laughed off. "So this village of yours. What's it like?"
"Well, it's a nice enough little place," Sam began as he tiredly stretched his arms over his head. "We keep to ourselves, mostly. Kinda have to these days what with everything going on in the world. We get a few travelers that come through from time to time that have been to a bunch of other settlements saying that a lotta folk out there have fallen on hard times, but fortunately for us we happen to live right next to one of the biggest junkyards in the world." The cat spread his arm out to the piles of dismantled robots they passed as they continued walking. "We sustain ourselves for the most part by scavenging anything we need from here." He paused to hum. "Actually, about near everythin' in our village is made of stuff scavenged from this junkyard now that I think about it. Homes, water purifiers, that hydroponics buildin' some of the others set up... yeah, that entire village was made up of parts taken from this place. The whole reason we set up the village there in the first place was because of all the free parts just sitting around that nobody was usin'. One thing lead to another and here we are just a few years later!"
Sorun nodded along to the history lesson, giving a small hum of acknowledgement. It made enough sense. He remembered being told that all the trade routes were all nonexistent at this point because of how far Eggman's conquest had progressed, so he could easily see that any villages that couldn't self-sustain were pretty much doomed without some alternative means of keeping themselves alive. That was the whole reason he'd been on that botched medicine mission.
From the way Sam was saying it, though, the people of his village found a pretty elegant workaround to this by using the discarded remains of Eggman's robots to sustain themselves. There was a bit of irony in there that gave Sorun enough amusement to huff a single breath of air out of his nose. Knowing Eggman's efforts were inadvertently letting at least one settlement out here thrive. It wasn't anything significant, not even enough to muster a bit of spite against him. Eggman could probably roll over them like it was nothing if he ever felt like it, but that was true for pretty much everywhere that hadn't been touched by him yet. Which as far as Sorun knew, wasn't a lot of places.
As far as villages went, this one was sounding like probably one of his best bets out here. They had to be somewhat advanced if they made a self-sustaining home out of advanced junk like this. Had to be at least one person there that could help out with Virgil's wound.
Speaking of which...
"Hey, Sam." Sorun reached over to his left shoulder, plucked Virgil off, and let the thing sit in his hand as he brought him into the older male's view. "You have any idea what this thing is?" If anybody would know, it would be a local. Maybe Sam could shine some light on this mysterious thing.
"Hm?" Sam turned his head towards Sorun, his eyes lighting up when he saw the creature sitting in his hand and staring at him. "Oh! That's a Chao you have there!"
"... They're called Chao? Seriously?" He looked down and gave Virgil a flat look. "Why does that sound so famili- wait, wasn't there a soda or something named like that...?"
"Heh heh! You really must not be from around here if you don't know what a Chao is," Sam commented, his features slowly turning inquisitive. "Usually you only find Chao in Chao Gardens. They always make little communities in groves and such and never really move on from there. What're you doing bringing along a Chao with you?"
Sorun made a light grimace, and turned his eyes from the Chao to Sam. "I think I ran into its Chao Garden," he explained. "Place was completely destroyed. Lot of Eggman's robots were there. They were destroyed- something cut them up, dunno what-, but the whole grove was completely trashed." He paused, and stroked Virgil's back with his thumb. "And... Virgil here was the only surviving Chao I found," he explained, causing both his and Sam's expression to turn dour. "He lost one of his wings, too, so I decided to take him with me so he wouldn't starve to death. But, to be honest with you, I don't really know what I'm doing with the little guy."
"Oh, I see... that's too bad. Chao are a bit rare these days, so hearin' that one of their Gardens just up and went like that... darn shame." The cat looked down towards the ground, sighed deeply, and looked back to Sorun and Virgil. "Well, the truth is I ain't too knowledgeable 'bout Chao myself. They're friendly enough creatures, real empathetic towards others and all that. Usually just survive off of fruits and nuts from what I heard, but other than that, I don't know much. You'd be better off talkin' to an expert on the critters, but I don't know where you'd find someone like that."
"Ah." Letting out a disappointed hum, Sorun placed Virgil back on his left shoulder. "How smart are they?" he asked. "I feel like he understands me, but all he does is say 'chao' all the time."
"Eh, sure they're smart. 'Bout as smart or you and I, really. They just ain't got the ability to speak words, that's all."
Well, that answered the question of if Virgil actually managed to understand Sorun or not. He suspected it to be true considering how responsive it was to his words, but he had to wonder seeing as it only ever said one word.
"Still," Sam continued, a smile taking over his features, "it was very generous of you, takin' in a wounded Chao like that. You must have a mighty kind heart to go out of your way to do somethin' like that, Sorun."
"... I wouldn't go that far," the teen mumbled out, eyes turning to the side to look away from Sam. Partly in abashment at the comment, and partly in guilt as his mind wandered back to Knothole. "Is there somebody back at your village that could look at Virgil?" he asked. "I'm worried about the giant gash on his back from where the wing was."
"Yeah, we got a doctor. Don't you worry none," Sam assured him. "I really gotta thank you for helpin' out with the wagon, though. I was worried I'd have to leave it and come back with some of the others later, but at the rate we're going we should hit home before nightfall."
"What is all this stuff I'm carrying, anyways?" Sorun questioned him.
Sam waved a hand. "Oh, nothin' important. Just some spare parts for if anything ever breaks down, stuff like that. We like to keep a large reserve just in case, you understand."
"Makes sense, I guess." The pale teen faced back forwards, a weary sigh escaping him. "I really hope you're right and we do get there before nightfall, 'cause my feet are killin' me here..."
In the end Sam had kept his promise, if barely. The sun was just beginning to touch the horizon, but after cresting a small hill Sorun had seen it. Nestled in an extremely large clearing, on top of a large hill, was a village. Sam had mentioned on the way there that their population was in the range of around two hundred, and from what Sorun saw he could believe it. Buildings and houses of all shapes and sizes were located in the giant compound, all of them seemingly cobbled together from sheet metal and other mechanical bits.
The most eye-catching thing that drew Sorun's attention, however, was the hundred-foot windmill slowly spinning in the center of the village. Like everything else, it looked like it was made completely out of scrap metal, which made Sorun hope it was built as sturdy as it looked.
"Well, here we are!" Sam announced as the settlement came into view. "Scrap City! Well, more of a village, really, but 'Scrap City' rolls off the tongue better."
"Ah-huh." Sorun's eyes had become half-lidded from exhaustion at this point, but he still had enough energy to maintain enough speed to keep alongside the cat Mobian as his Bringer Claw continued to carry the wagon above them. "About damned time we got here," he internally groused. "I was getting sick of walking around."
"Chao!" Virgil seemed more excited about the village than Sorun was, but he wasn't the one that had to walk around all day. At least it was a good sign that the wound wasn't bugging him too much, which gave Sorun some small relief.
"Gotta say, Sorun, you really saved me a lotta trouble helpin' me with the wagon. Plus these trips to and back from the junkyard get a bit lonesome some days," Sam continued as he turned towards the tired human. "I'll be upfront and say I've never actually seen a human before in my life outside of pictures, but I didn't know you people could have big feathery arms come outta your back like that."
Sorun sighed. "We can't. I just get to be 'special' is all."
"Hm? Special how?"
"Special in that the universe loves to punch me in the throat," Sorun replied in a dry tone. "I messed around with some stuff I shouldn't have messed around with and got weird powers out of it, alright? I told you not to think about them."
Sam rose his palms up. "Alright, alright. Didn't mean nothin' by it. Just curious is all."
The pale teen glanced to the side at Sam, and then faced back forwards. "I just don't like talking about them. They brought me a whole lot more trouble than they're worth."
"Hm. They sure are good for carrying wagons though, huh?"
He almost punched Sam right there for daring to say that, but when Sorun glanced back at the cat with slightly narrowed eyes he saw that his expression was genuinely teasing. Sorun's own expression softened, a long breath leaving him as he slowly nodded. "I guess, Sam, I guess."
"Chao?"
Sorun's ears perked up, and he glanced down at the Chao on his shoulder. He was looking up at the teen with curious and concerned eyes, causing Sorun to sigh and scratch the top of Virgil's head with a finger. "Empathetic. Right. I'm really gonna have to watch my mood around the little guy, aren't I?"
Maybe that would be a good thing. Help Sorun learn a little stress control. He really doubted it would, but if Chao really could pick up on emotions like Sam said, Sorun at least had to try. He didn't want any of his negative emotions to accidentally bleed into the Chao he was carrying around. The last thing he wanted was to leave bad impressions on Virgil.
The three of them eventually reached the entrance to the village, which wasn't so much as gated off. And now that he had a better look around, Sorun noticed there wasn't even a wall around the village, either. He was starting to suspect Mobian architects never discovered the concept of enclosure.
But inside the village itself, everything was relatively calm. Even with the day ending there were quite a few Mobians wandering about, either in the streets or near their buildings and homes. Some had stopped to smile and wave towards Sam. Others were staring at Sorun and his Bringer Claw, but they were also waving at the human, too. Sorun, feeling shy under all the looks, turned his head towards Sam so he didn't have to acknowledge them.
"You're, uh, pretty popular around here, huh, Sam?" Sorun mumbled to the cat. "Gettin' a lot of stares here."
"Actually, Sorun, I think they're all starin' at you. We don't really ever get any humans through here. Or people with weird glowing arms comin' outta their back." He somehow missed the deadpan stare Sorun shot his way. "But I'm not really surprised they're all excited to see me. Stuff's always breakin' down around town, and I'm the only one goin' out there for replacement pats these days."
Sorun nodded in understanding, and then did a double-take on the old cat. "Wait, you're the only guy here goin' out there poking around in that junkyard?"
Sam shrugged. "Everybody else is busy doin' this or that around here, and it's work that can be handled by a single person now that everything's up and running. The long walks can grow weary on the old bones, but I don't mind that none since everybody depends on me."
"That's... admirable."
"I suppose so. Anyways, my home's up here. You can put the wagon down in the garage."
After walking a bit more, they came upon a small field of similar-looking houses which were, like everything else, constructed from scrap metal. The one they stopped in front of, the house itself practically identical to the rest around it, had a small garage attached to its side. Sam walked over to the garage's door and opened it up towards the ceiling, and then gestured his hand towards the inside. In response, Sorun's Bringer Claw gently placed the wagon inside the garage, and then disappeared.
They wandered into the garage right after, Sam crouching down towards the wagon while Sorun idly inspected the garage's wall. He didn't see anything out of the ordinary: just some tools and parts hung up, a workbench to the side cluttered with pieces of metal, and a shelf nearby that held more tools and parts.
"Guy's a real gearhead. Wonder what Tails would say if he saw this place?" Frowning, Sorun ran a hand along the workbench's edge. "Wonder how they're all doing with me leaving and everything? I hope they don't come looking for me. Doubt they'd actually find me, but I dunno, they're real resourceful."
His greatest fear was that he would be minding his own business and all of a sudden a blue, blurry shape would stop in front of him. He could easily picture Sonic's stern face just staring at him, arms crossed as he rapidly tapped his foot on the ground. And if that happened, Sorun was just done. He couldn't even dream of getting away from a guy like that. Not with that speed. Or Shadow. Or the ship if they went as far as to bring that.
Come to think of it, he was done regardless of what they did as long as they found him. But he doubted they would. The chance was there, certainly, but it was low. He never gave hints that he wanted to run away. He didn't leave clues. He was in the clear. And yet the paranoia of them finding a way to find him regardless was still there.
"Nah, I'm overthinking it. They ain't gonna find me," Sorun dismissed with a shake of his head. "They're too busy dealing with Eggman to come and look for me. I'm in the clear. I can see it now. Sonic jumping at the ready to come and find me, Sally shooting him down with a regretful and remorseful face because she knows they can't spare the manpower. Sonic getting all sad 'cause he knows she's right, then he'd probably get all sulky for a bit. Then Sally'd get all sad, and Nicole would probably be there, too, so she'd get sad. Oh man, Nicole. I really hope she isn't taking me leaving too hard..." Sorun shook his head. "Don't worry about it, man, don't worry about it. You did what you had to do. They'll all move on."
"Welp, the damage don't look too bad." Sam's voice had roused Sorun from his thoughts, causing him to turn from staring at the wall to the black cat right behind him. "It's that same rusty bolt that's been givin' me trouble for a while now. I'll get it fixed up first thing tomorrow." With a light groan, Sam stood up and faced Sorun. "Don't mean to sound like a broken record here, sonny, but thanks for the help."
"Yeah, don't worry about it." Something outside the garage, in the street just outside the house, caught Sorun's eyes after he said this. A small, dark form that was rushing towards the garage, seemingly right towards Sam. "Uh, Sam? You got incoming."
"Huh?" Sam turned in the direction Sorun was looking towards, his shoulders immediately going slack at the sight. "Oh, bother."
The cat Mobian was instantly tackled by the small, dark form immediately after saying this. Sorun had reared his head back in surprise at the sight, but upon looking closer he calmed down when he saw it was just another Mobian. A child from the size of it, and another cat with black fur to boot. Even had the same clothes.
"Grandpa! Grandpa!" Sorun let out a silent "ah" of understanding after hearing this, stepping back away from the pair as he quietly observed them. "What took you so long!? You were supposed to be back an hour ago but you never came home and everybody got really worried and-!"
"Calm down, sport, calm down! I'm fine!" Sam smiled down at the child and ruffled the top of his head, making the child look up at him with a matching pair of green eyes. "I just ran into a bit of trouble with the wagon is all."
Sorun watched the small exchange for a bit, and then turned away from it as a spike of envy shot through him. "Must be nice, having people that like you enough that they just run up to you like that. Good for you, Sammy." The way Mobians could be so affectionate towards each other still amazed him every time he saw it. Being exposed to it by some of the other back with the Freedom Fighters had been a different experience, though. Feeling the borderline alien experience of all that friendship by some of those people had been... oddly nice, even if he was never able to reciprocate it. And seeing it for himself right in front of him made him realize how much he'd enjoyed all that friendly attention without even realizing it.
He felt something rustle on his shoulder, and automatically started to reassuringly rub the top of Virgil's head with his finger when he caught the Chao giving him a concerned look. He calmed down right after, thankfully, and the fact he showed concern for him in the first place made Sorun feel a bit better, but it didn't help that hollow feeling growing in him.
"What do you mean you lost your ball on top of the windmill again!?" The sudden yell tore Sorun out from his own thoughts, causing him to focus back on the pair of cat Mobians near him. Sam had risen to his full height with his hands held on his hips, while the child cat was looking up at him with a sheepish grin.
"It wasn't just me, grandpa! Me and all my friends were playing and somebody kicked the ball all the way up there."
"Consound it, Gary, again?" Groaning, Sam rubbed at the top of his head. "What am I gonna do with you...?"
Sorun watched the two for a bit longer, and then glanced towards Virgil. The Chao blinked up at Sorun, and then pointed his hand-less appendage at the cat duo. Releasing a consigned sigh, Sorun nodded at him and stepped towards the two.
"What's this about a ball?" he asked, turning his head to the side while rubbing the back of his head.
Both of the cats turned towards the human, the younger one's eyes brightening up considerably at the sight of Sorun. Sam's reaction was much more subdued as he opened his mouth to address the teen. "Oh, Gary, this is the one I was telling you about that helped me carry the wagon all the way back home!"
"Ohhh! So this is what a human looks like!" The smaller cat, Gary, bounded towards Sorun and stopped right in front of him. He flashed the teen with a grateful smile. "Thank you for helping my grandpa, mister!"
Feeling his cheeks begin to burn in embarrassment, the Sorun brushed some of his dark hair over his face to hide it. "It wasn't that big a deal," he mumbled out. "You didn't answer the question about the ball."
Sam's triangular ears rose up in surprise, and then lowered slightly as he shook his head in exhaustion. "My goofball grandson and his group of friends went and got their sports ball stuck up on the windmill again. I tell you, they do this all the time, and after the trip we had I don't think I'm in any condition to go and get it for them."
"Sounds like a real problem, alright." Giving a contemplative hum, Sorun turned his gaze from them to the Chao on his shoulder. He didn't have to- he really didn't- but it seemed Virgil obviously wanted him to, but more than that Sorun didn't feel right leaving a group of children's ball to its fate up on a windmill. Especially considering he had wings and could probably get it in around five seconds. And he still felt he owed Sam a bit for showing him to the village. "Tell you what, Sam," he said as he removed Virgil from his shoulder. "You get Virgil to that doctor you were talking about to look at the wing wound, and I'll go get that ball."
"Huh?" Gingerly taking the offered Chao in his hands, Sam looked to Sorun with surprise in his eyes. "Are you sure? After everything you-"
"Sam, it's just a ball and I got, you know, those arms. Don't worry about it."
"Well, I'd... I'd be mighty appreciative of you if ya did that for my grandson," he said at last, and then gave Sorun a nod and a smile. "Alright, Sorun, ya got yourself a deal my friend."
There it was again. The "friend" word that seemed to cause Sorun so much distress. Now it just made his chest ache for some reason.
"Okay, then." Sorun turned towards Gary. "I think I saw the windmill you were talking about on the way into town, but could you show me the way there?"
"Mm-hm!" Gary enthusiastically nodded at him and turned towards the garage door. "It's this way! Come on!"
Sorun made the move to follow him, but when he heard something call out to him, saying, "Chao! Chao!", he stopped and turned back around. Virgil, held in Sam's hands, was reaching out towards Sorun, the dot above his head shifting into a question mark.
"I'm just going away for a bit, Virgil," Sorun explained to the Chao. "Sam's gonna take you somewhere to get you looked at in the meantime. I'll come get you later, okay?"
The Chao continued to reach out to him for a bit, but then he nodded his teardrop-shaped head as the question mark turned back into a dot. Sam had laughed at the sight, and then slowly began stroking the side of Virgil's face with his finger.
"Don't worry none about your Chao, Sorun, I'm sure he'll be fine. Our doctor is top-notch," he assured the human.
"Hm. I'm gonna hold you to that." With that, Sorun turned his back to the old Mobian and made his way out of the garage and towards the younger Mobian. "Alright, so where's this windmill at?"
"It's this way, mister! C'mon!" Gary had turned towards the left side of the street, and began running down it. Sorun stared after his back, briefly turned back towards the garage to glance at Sam and Virgil, sighed, and then began following the cat child.
Following Gary through the moderately-sized village, Sorun got a good enough look around to get an impression of the place. He wasn't so sure of the place at first glance, mostly due to everything being made of scrap metal, but after going inside of that garage it seemed that everything was built relatively well enough. They all had to, he supposed, seeing as people lived here. And the few Mobians still out at this time of day all seemed happy enough as Sorun and Gary passed them.
If anything, the place had a fairly peaceful air about it. The same kind of peaceful air Knothole had. A nice open place in the woods full of nice people living a peaceful life. It gave him an odd sense of nostalgia, which was really strange as he never felt at ease in Knothole. Even so, he couldn't deny it was a place that was practically built to have people live at ease in it. A home for a community of people.
"This place ain't so bad," Sorun thought to himself as he continued following the Mobian child, hands tucked inside of his pockets. "How do you like living here?" he asked, eyes wandering left and right as he looked around at the metal village.
By now Gary had slowed down to a brisk walk as the two continued going forwards, though he did crane his head back to address Sorun. "Huh? It's nice, I guess. Grandpa takes care of me and all the other kids always play with me. All the other people are really nice, too!"
"Sounds great." About the answer he expected. Aside from the war going on in the outside he didn't really see what-
"Well, except... nah, it's nothing."
And now Sorun was interested. "Huh? Except what?"
Gary's features scrunched in discomfort, and he turned his head back forwards and away from Sorun. "Oh, it's nothing." He pointed ahead of them. "That's the windmill up there."
Sorun's eyes followed the pointed finger, and then traveled upwards. The four, gigantic spinning blades held aloft by the hundred-foot tower seemed even more large and imposing up close than it had seeing it at a distance. "So what's this giant windmill for again?" Sorun questioned aloud.
"Uh, I think it gives power to the village and stuff," Gary innocently answered, blinking up at the windmill's blades before going back down. "Oh, there they are! Guys, hey!"
Up ahead was a small gathering of a couple dozen or so Mobian children. They were all wildly varying species, like most other gatherings of Mobians Sorun saw. Mostly mammal-types, a few avians mixed in. Forest-type animals, mostly, with even more that he was sure were common animals but couldn't rightly place.
It was something that was a pretty ordinary sight at this point.
"Hey! Gary!" One of the children in the group- a bear, or badger, or some other third thing that looked like the first two- ran up to greet the cat Mobian, a few more children trailing behind that one. "What took you so long? And who's this? I thought you were bringing your grandpa?" The new child looked up at Sorun and tilted his head to the side. "Also, um... what species is he?"
"Yeah, he looks weird. Where's all his fur?" a second new child asked.
"And what's why is he wearing so much clothes?" asked a third.
"Is skin supposed to look so light like that?"
"You know, I almost forgot how unintentionally mean kids could be," Sorun thought to himself with a sour look on his face. "Calm it down, Sorun, calm it down. It's just a bunch of ignorant kids." He slowly exhaled. "At least these ones ain't throwing rocks at you."
"Grandpa couldn't make it, but this is his new friend Sorun! He said he'd go up and get the ball!" Gary gestured a hand out to Sorun. "Also he's a human."
There was a collective "ooohhh" among the crowd of children that had gathered around, along with a few comments like "so that's what they look like" and "I thought they were taller than that" mixed in. Sorun tried his best to ignore them, particularly the ones about his height, and began stomping towards the tower.
"I'm still taller than all you munchkins," he bitterly thought as he looked up towards windmill. "How'd you guys even kick it up that high?" he asked to the crowd behind him. Just barely, near the top of the windmill, he could see it. A red rubber ball that, at this distance, was practically a dot. It was wedged in between a support strut holding up the top part of the windmill the blades were attached to.
He looked back towards the crowd expecting an answer. What he got was a group of Mobian children looking down to the ground, avoiding his gaze and kicking guiltily at their feet. None of them spoke up at first. Soon, though, Gary was the one that stepped forwards. "It was my fault," he said. "I-"
"Hey, wait, it was me!" interrupted a rabbit boy who ran up besides Gary. "Gary didn't do anything wrong, so if you're gonna be mad at anybody-!"
"No, it was me!" cried out a third. "I-!"
"Alright, stop. I get it." Sorun softly groaned and rubbed at his forehead. "They must be really tight with each other, throwing themselves under the bus for their friends like this. Pretty sure all my friends on Earth woulda just sold me out for giggles. Eh, to be fair I woulda done the same thing probably if it was funny enough." He lowered his hand from his head and looked to the crowd of children. "I'm not mad at anybody, but please just promise me that you guys won't kick the ball all the way up there again. I'm pretty sure people around here have enough problems."
The sight of all the children snapping to attention and briskly nodding at Sorun was almost funny enough to make him laugh out loud. It did make him smirk, though, which he quickly hid by turning his head around and up towards the windmill. "Alright. Be back in a sec."
It was hard for him not to hear the various "oohs" and "ahhs" of wonder from the children when his two Bringer Claws manifested onto his back. They were probably even more shocked when he flew up into the sky, stopping right where the ball was within a few seconds. Hovering in the air next to the ball, he reached out and grabbed it with his hands before beginning to pull.
"G-geez, how hard did they kick this?" With a small grunt of exertion, Sorun finally managed to free the object from its wedged confines after a few hard tugs. He stared at the ball in his hand, and then gave himself a small nod of satisfaction before dropping back down to the ground. He landed with a small grunt, Bringer Claws disappearing off his back as he straightened up his posture while holding the ball up. He had to turn his head to hide his smile with his hair when he heard cheers of happiness from the children, and proceeded to lightly toss the ball at them.
The sudden pressure he felt on his legs rapidly made him startled, however, and he immediately turned his head downwards. Some of the children, to his growing embarrassment, had clung onto his legs in the form of a hug while the rest were beaming wide smiles at him. His anxiety was steadily rising and he greatly desired to shake the children off of him to satiate his nerves, but the knowledge that kicking kids off of him likely wouldn't do well for his image stayed Sorun from committing the act. He prayed none of the adults in the village were watching.
No, some of them were. He confirmed it by glancing towards the village. And they were all smiling, too. Goddammit.
"Well, if I had any masculine pride... it's gone now." Releasing a lamenting sigh, Sorun reached down and patted one of the kids on the top of their head. "Uh, yeah, yeah, you're all welcome. Let me go." Thankfully they did so, letting Sorun breath a sigh of relief at the new freedom. "Alright, kids, there's your ball back. I gotta go now. Have fun." He began briskly walking away. "And don't stay out too long, it's almost night!"
"Bye!"
"Thanks, mister!"
"Goodbye!"
"Come play with us sometime!"
"Tell grandpa I'll be back in a bit!"
Sorun recognized that last voice as Gary's, and gave the cat and the rest of a children a small two-fingered salute behind his back as he continued walking.
"Gah, man, if I don't get some sleep soon I'm gonna collapse right in the street." He decided to head back to Sam's place soon after the adventure with the windmill and the ball. He didn't go back immediately; he wanted to give as much time to visit the doctor as possible for Virgil's sake, and the teen wanted to explore the village a bit more. But he was tired, his feet were tired, and the sun was almost completely set past the horizon. He needed to find a place to rest. That and his worry for Virgil was steadily beginning to grow over time. Either way, he needed to go see Sam again. And if he wasn't home yet he'd just wait in the garage for the cat to return.
That is if Sorun didn't just up and fall asleep while waiting for him if he wasn't there yet.
"I guess... this place is actually pretty nice," Sorun internally admitted as he walked through the increasingly darkening streets. "It's no Knothole, but the people here are friendly enough. It's peaceful. There's no way I can stay here, but maybe I can spend a few days to chill out and plan out my next move. Whatever that is." He was still completely blank on what he was doing on the front of "what to do next", but he was confident he'd get there. Eventually. Maybe after a night of sleep his head would be cleared up and he'd get some better thinking in.
He was fairly sure that was what the issue was. Sleep deprivation and exhaustion. He'd be right as rain tomorrow morning, and then he could figure out what to do.
"Oh, hey, he's already there." The door to the house's garage was open, and Sorun could see light from a bulb shining onto the street. "That was fast. 'Least I don't gotta wait."
The pale human maneuvered past the garage's opening and entered the small structure. His eyes were immediately drawn towards the center, where he saw Sam crouching down next to his wagon again. Sitting on the wagon's rim was Virgil, who Sorun noticed now had gauze wrapping going all the way around his shoulder and body and a bandage over where he'd lost his wing. The teen allowed himself a small exhale at that. He seemed fine.
Sam must have heard Sorun's breath, as the cat rose his head up to the teen and stood up on his feet. "Oh, Sorun, there you are. Was wonderin' when you'd show up again."
Virgil seemed leagues more excited than Sam was, as he'd jumped up onto the wagon's rim while holding his arms out towards Sorun, calling out, "Chao! Chao!"
"Yeah, missed you too, buddy," Sorun mumbled quietly as he picked the Chao up and then turned him around in his hands. "So the doctor said he was alright?" he questioned as he inspected the bandage and gauze wrapped around Virgil.
The black-furred Mobian nodded at Sorun. "Yep, your little's pal's all good. He'll, uh, never really fly again on account of, y'know, the wing, but the doctor said that the damage should heal up nicely. Chao are real resilient."
"... Sure they are." He didn't really believe that after what he saw in the Chao Garden, but as long as Virgil was fine, that's all he cared about in the matter. "So," Sorun continued as he placed Virgil at his spot on his shoulder, "you all good, or...?"
Sam waved a hand. "Yeah, I'm alright. Don't you worry none about me, you've done plenty. How about Gary and his friends? You get their ball back?"
"Yeah. One of them's got a really good leg, man, 'cause they kicked that thing all the way to the top of the windmill."
A bark of laughter burst out of Sam. "Yep! That'd be Gary, alright. Little sport always did have a leg on him. Parents would be proud."
"Ah." Sorun didn't feel comfortable with the undertones of that statement. He awkwardly looked towards the garage's wall, where the house was attached to it, and clicked his tongue. "So, uh... kid's parents aren't in the house?"
When he turned back to Sam, the cat's features had grown a bit more somber. He practically felt Virgil wither a bit on his shoulder, too, meaning he likely felt something sad radiate out of Sam. It was enough to make Sorun fear he'd done something wrong by bringing this subject up.
"Don't gimme that look, sonny, I ain't mad," Sam assured him. It made Sorun breath out in relief, but he still stared expectantly at the Mobian for him to continue. "It ain't something too uncommon. Boy's family used to live in the big city before Robotnik took it over 'bout ten years ago. Parents were roboticized and everything. I heard that everybody on Mobius mysteriously got turned back to normal, but, well... not everybody made it back, you know? Usually the people that got broken down and destroyed while enslaved to that man before they got turned back." He sighed and leaned back on the wagon. "Dunno if that's what happened, but it's the likeliest story, as much as I hate to admit it."
"No chance that they just couldn't find the village?" Sorun asked in a quiet voice.
Sam shook his head. "No. They wouldn't have known about this place since it came into existence after the fact, but we had folks comin' in here looking for relatives back when all the roboticized Mobians turned back. If they managed to find this place, then they would have, especially for their son. They loved him like nothin' else in the world, lemme tell ya. So seein' as all them other people found us and they didn't..."
"It doesn't paint a good picture, yeah," Sorun finished with a slight grimace. "There's not a robot problem or anything like that around here, is there? No Eggman robots harassing the place or anything?"
"We wouldn't rightly still be here if that were the case," Sam said in a huff. "No, Eggman hasn't found us, yet. Or if he has he just doesn't seem to think we're important enough to attack, but that don't mean the prospect isn't hangin' over everybody's heads. Though I suppose the same could be said for every Mobian settlement around, even Knothole."
"Man, you got no idea," Sorun thought with a shudder. "So everything's okay here, then?"
Sam's face grew hesitant. "Relatively speaking, aside from... one problem. But you don't need to concern yourself with that." The cat's features turned back to being cheery as he pushed off the wagon he was leaning against. "So what's your plan now, Sorun?"
"Honestly? Still trying to figure that out," the teen admitted. "I was thinking of finding a place to sleep and then... I dunno. I'm sort of just figuring this out as I go."
"Hah! I can relate," Sam said with a laugh. "Well, I got a spare cot in the corner over there. You and your Chao are welcome to take it if you want."
Sorun glanced over to the back end of the garage, where there was indeed a cot set up in the corner. "You sleep in the garage?" Sorun asked with an incredulous glance back at the cat.
Sam shook his head with a shrug. "Nah, I get sleepy workin' on some projects sometimes and just rest here," he explained. "I feel kinda bad just offerin' you that, though, considering everything you've done. If you want-"
"Nah, nah it's fine. Don't worry about it," Sorun assured him. "I'll take the cot, man. Thanks."
"Ah, don't mention it," Sam said with a wave of his hand. "I'm gonna be fixin' dinner for me an' Gary pretty soon here. You're welcome to a place at the table if you feel like it."
"I'd love to, Sam," Sorun said, "but I'll be real with you. I'm so tired I don't think I'd make it to the table." With a soft groan, he went over to and sat down on the cot while leaned his head to the side to let Virgil hop down from him. "I'm just gonna go to sleep and figure out what to do after." He snapped his fingers and pointed towards Sam. "I'll take breakfast later on, though, if you're really offering."
"Hah hah! Sure thing, Sorun." With that, Sam walked over the garage door, leaning a hand out towards the room's light switch. "Well, I'll leave ya be for now. Good night, Sorun."
"Night, Sam." The lights flicked off, and the garage door closed behind Sam as he left Sorun in the garage. The pale human stared through the darkness at the closed door, and then let out a tired yawn as he settled onto the cot and rested his head on the pillow.
Not even ten second later he felt a small weight press itself onto his chest. He cracked an eye open, and through the darkness just barely made out Virgil sitting on his chest as the Chao rubbed a limb over a tired eye. The Chao yawned, and then leaned back until he was flat on his back on Sorun's abdomen.
"Musta been as tired as I was. Not very surprising, I guess. Little guy just lost everything." Sorun turned his eye up to a blackened ceiling, and then settled further into the cot as he slowly closed his eye again. "Guess it's fine if he sleeps there. Too tired to care.
"Ahhh, man... fadin' away, here. I should really thank Sam again tomorrow morning. He's a nice guy for a geezer. Everybody here's so kind." He felt his face settle into a slight frown as he felt his mind begin to drift off. "I'm sure everyone in Knothole's doin'... alright. I just... I'll figure out what to do in the morning..."
Too tired for any further thought, Sorun finally joined his Chao in sleep.
The next morning came when Sorun and Virgil were awoken to a peculiar sound. With the kind of setting he'd found himself in, Sorun had expected to wake up to a lot of things. Birds, laughing children nearby, Sam and Gary talking somewhere nearby and waking Sorun up with their voices. The sounds of living in a tightly-knit village in general. The kind of sounds that one would be glad to wake up to because it meant everything was peaceful and okay. A great way to wake up.
He didn't get that. He got terrified screaming instead.
"... It hasn't even been a full day." Groaning in irritation, Sorun slowly sat up in the cot Sam had lent him while rubbing at his groggy eyes. "Of course I can't catch a fucking break for a full twenty-four hours before something crazy happens again. Why the hell would I?"
Maybe it was too good to be true after all. Knothole was one thing- it had a full entourage of guardsmen and the Freedom Fighters living in it for defense. This was just some random village out in the sticks. But there were a lot of those around, and it seemed peaceful enough here that Sorun had assumed that, after everything that happened, he'd get at least one single goddamned day of peace and quiet before having to go back out into the fray. Everybody certainly acted like that was the case.
Nope. Couldn't have that, because this world always found some new crazy thing to throw at him.
"Sonofa- what is it, huh? Robots? Is it robots? Did the fucking windmill turn into a Transformer or something and I gotta go put it down?" He wouldn't even be surprised at this point. It'd be tame compared to some of the other stuff he'd seen so far.
Down to his side, he saw Virgil standing on the ground. He was way more awake than Sorun was, and looked frightened and worried as he looked towards the garage door towards where all the sounds were coming from outside.
"Don't worry, Virgil, it's gonna be alright," Sorun mumbled to the Chao as he scooped him up and placed him on his shoulder. "It's not gonna alright for whoever decided to start my morning off like this, but everything's gonna be fine. Don't worry."
With an irritable groan, Sorun shot up to his feet and stomped his way over to the garage's entrance. He reached down and practically wrenched the door open towards the ceiling as he stepped out into the street, widened and angry eyes sweeping left and right to try and identify the disturbance.
The screaming noises were a lot more apparent now that he was in the open, and the sight of panicked townsfolk running around with panicked expressions on their faces confirmed to Sorun that, yes, something was seriously wrong here. He heard something else that was much more peculiar, though- engines. Loud engines, like the kind Sorun had heard on dune buggies and bikes back on Earth. When he looked towards the source of the noise, in the distance past a lot of houses, he saw something that might have been the source: a buggy. A regular, four-wheeled dune buggy that was definitely being driven by Mobians, though from this distance he couldn't make them out. What was strange was that they were circling some of the townsfolk he recognized from last night.
"... Okay, wait, what's actually going on?" It wasn't robots, then. It was a bunch of... drivers disturbing the peace? Other Mobians? He didn't know; he only saw the one vehicle. "This... doesn't seem like an Eggman attack. I think? I don't- I need some answers."
He saw a small, dark form dart past him, and Sorun immediately recognized it as Gary. Sorun, eager to end his confusion, bolted forwards and grabbed onto the child's arm to slow him down. He yelped out in surprise at first and whipped his head towards Sorun with panicked eyes, though he calmed down just slightly when he saw it was just the human holding him.
"Gary, what's going on?" Sorun asked him. More panicked Mobians were running past, some holding or guiding children and going one way while others were going another way. "Everybody's going crazy, what happened?"
"O-oh, Sorun." The Mobian child blinked up at him, and then worriedly turned his head towards the edge of the village. "They-they're back. The bandits."
"Bandits? There's bandits now? Seriously?" Shaking his head in surprise, Sorun knelt down to Gary's eye level. "Okay, Gary? Slow down and explain."
"I-I-I don't know," Gary stammered, pulling his arm out from Sorun's grasp. "They come here once already and I'm supposed to go to the shelter and grandpa and a bunch of the older adults went to go see them and-"
"Alright, that's enough." The child was starting to hyperventilate at this point, and Sorun didn't want a kid passing out on him on top of everything else. "A bunch of people went to go see bandits. And there's bandits apparently," he muttered to himself as he looked back up towards the edge of the village. "Ugh, man... okay, Gary." He turned back to the child. "You say there's a shelter?"
"Mm-hm." Gary nodded his head, green eyes wide and glossy and his body shaking. "W-we're supposed to go there if-"
"Great, go there with everybody else." Sorun stood up to his feet and patted Gary on the back. "Go, go now."
"Huh? But what about y-?" Gary snapped his mouth shut when Sorun cast a glare down at him. "I-I'll go," he squeaked, turning around and running in the direction a majority of the other Mobians were going in.
Sorun watched the child run off for a couple of seconds, and then began walking towards the end of the village he'd seen that buggy. "So there's bandits now. Fan-flipping-tastic. Sam and Gary kept mentioning something, but goddamn. Bandits?" He supposed it wasn't completely out of the norm. He recalled that one city that Sally and Knuckles had mentioned back when he'd gone over that map, Sandblast. They'd alluded to the place being filled with Mobians that didn't have the best of intentions. Mobians may have been nice, but Sorun wasn't nearly naive enough to believe that it was a universal rule despite all the Mobians he encountered. The prospect of them having fought in wars all but snuffed that idea out.
But bandits? Was the war with Eggman really making people this desperate? It was possible, but Sorun didn't know. He didn't even know this was a problem until a few minutes ago. He didn't know that thing Sam mentioned but refused to elaborate on was this. Bandits harassing the town for... something. Something he didn't know about, and wasn't too inclined to find out. Something he'd rather just ignore and go away from just so he didn't have to get caught in the crossfire.
And yet his feet were carrying him forwards.
"Agh, this is stupid. What am I... I'm just gonna look," Sorun assured himself as he continued pressing forwards towards the village's edge. "Maybe it's not as bad as it looks. I'll just take a quick peak and if it looks too bad I'll get out."
Because dealing with bandits? Not in his purview. He ran away from the Freedom Fighters specifically to avoid danger such as this. And everybody seemed happy enough last night despite the fact this was apparently an ongoing problem. He'd just... go take a look. Make sure everything wasn't out of hand, and then he'd quietly make his exit.
Soon enough, he made it to the village'd edge, and hid behind a nearby house while peeking his head around a corner. At his end was a gathering of some of the townsfolk, all standing back with worried and grim looks on their faces as they looked ahead.
And in front of them, past the village's perimeter with light forest right behind them, were who he assumed were the bandits. Around twenty of them in total, with various motorcycles and buggies parked behind them. From here he could see that they were all Mobians, though he noted they all seemed to be the same species. What that species was he couldn't pin down exactly, but they seemed canine-ish from the wild hair and doglike ears and teeth they had, though they seemed like oddly sharp features for dogs or wolves. All had similarly colored fur, too, in various blacks and grays, and were holding different kinds of swords and knives as they all stared at and sneered at the crowd of townsfolk in front of them.
"Alright, it's a bunch of... canine Mobians. All the weapons they're holding is makin' me nervous, but nobody seems hurt yet. So far it's not looking catastrophic." His eyes trailed to the center of the bandit group, near the front, and he felt his body freeze up. "Oh, what the hell is he doing there!?"
If there was a sight Sorun really did not want to see, it was Sam right in front of the bandit group. He was on his knees and facing the crowd of villagers with his head down, but thankfully, he looked unharmed. It didn't change the fact that the position he was in did not look very good from his point of view.
"Oh man, that's... maybe it's nothing bad. And even if it is, I... should I just go right now?" he wondered to himself, grimacing slightly. "All the bandits seem to be right there and distracted by the villagers. None of them have guns. I could just fly away right now and not look back. That's what I should be doing right now. This doesn't have anything to do with me."
He wanted to fly away. Really, he did. But the sight of the faces the villagers had and seeing Sam on his knees over there was rooting Sorun to the spot for whatever reason, and he couldn't help but continue to observe. He flinched, however, when he heard one of the buggy's doors slam shut.
Focusing towards the source of the noise, he saw another one of the Mobian bandits strut towards the front of the group. The rest of the bandits, who had been jeering at the crowd, quieted down immediately and almost cowered back away from the new one. And when Sorun got a good look at him he had to blink multiple times just to make sure he was seeing right.
Black boots and black gloves only for clothing. Mobian standard. Body covered in black fur, with the exception of a long, black tail behind him with a whitened, wild tip, three white lines on either side of his chest where his ribs were, white muzzle, and a head full of wavy, tangled white hair flowing behind his head. He was heterochromatic, too: his right eye was blue and the left one yellow. And his overall disposition and the way he was glaring at the crowd of villagers with utter contempt made Sorun cringe back along with the Mobian's appearance.
"I didn't think being goth was a genetic predisposition in this world, but it looks like I was wrong. The hell is up with this guy?" His eyes narrowed at the blue-handled, curved sword the strange-looking Mobian was casually swinging in his right hand. A curved sword with a completely red blade that looked to be made of crystal. "Jesus, even his sword is edgy as hell."
"It was a simple arrangement," the Mobian spoke, the sound of his voice making Sorun's ears perk up. "It was my assumption that creating such a simple arrangement would be sufficient for you imbeciles' comprehension, but it appears that I was mistaken." The morning sunlight glinted off the red blade as he spun it around in his hand. "How very unfortunate for you."
"Holy hell, he looks ridiculous but his voice is smooth. How does that even work?" It was a tone lower than normal, but it came out completely clear and articulate. An authoritative tone undercut by a dulcet edge. "But what's he doing with Sam over there?"
"It is completely mystifying, too," the Mobian continued, "as when me and my associates first came across this hovel you showed an acute sense of recognizing your position in relation to us. You'd all kowtowed under us without so much as a single spark of resistance, and I truly thought after seeing such subservient behavior that you all knew better. And yet... here we are, with obligations unfulfilled despite my sincerest efforts of making the process as smooth and succinct as physically possible. I'm beginning to think your initial reaction towards us was nothing more than the instinctual throes of vacuous villagers eking out a meager existence, and it seems that, over a very shot amount of time, you've all forgotten your place." He looked down towards Sam, baring his teeth while tightening the grip on his sword. "That was a mistake."
It was honestly amazing how every single sentence spoken by that Mobian was making Sorun ill, but he did his best to ignore the feeling as he looked towards Sam. "This isn't looking good. He wouldn't... he's gonna hurt Sam," he realized. "I should help, shouldn't I? But I don't... I'd probably have to fight them, then." He grit his teeth, and the looked back towards the sky. "I don't want to get involved. I just wanna leave, but... but Sam and these people." He looked back towards the Mobians. "Goddammit, I don't wanna see him get hurt."
He felt that same urge beginning to rise in him. The same urge he'd felt when Shadow had held that Chaos Emerald in his hand. That he felt one his first few days on Mobius. The desire to flee away from the violence. But he couldn't ignore the fact that he felt genuinely worried over Sam's safety, either, especially after everything he'd done for Sorun. It was bad enough that the teen felt conflicted on what to do, though he did feel his feet begin to turn away in preparation for bolting away from the crowd.
But then that red sword in the Mobian bandit's hand was risen in the air, right above Sam's head. And in that moment, any thoughts of running away were completely dissolved from Sorun's mind as he sprung forwards, Bringer Claws flashing into existence as they flew him forwards.
The red sword was swung down. It never reached Sam's neck even though it was aimed at it. A blue, spectral sword had appeared right in its path, its blade held above Sam's neck and stopping the red sword in its place. The Mobian holding the sword looking down at the blue sword struggling against him with a perplexed expression, though he quickly jumped back when a spectral claw reached forwards, grabbed Sam, and pulled him back.
"Damn it all..." As the old cat Mobian was set aside next to Sorun, he couldn't help but mentally curse at himself. "This wasn't part of the plan. I just... Should've left. Why did this have to happen now?"
Despite the vast amount of frustration and self-anger filling Sorun, he managed to reach up and gently pluck Virgil off of his shoulder before nearly thrusting it into a confused Sam's grasp. "Take him. Go back with the others. Don't interfere," he said in a low voice.
"Wha...?" Wide-eyed, Sam looked down at the Chao in his hand, who looked just as confused if not worried as him, and then back to Sorun. "Wait, Sorun, you can't-!"
"You either step back or I throw you back." The glare Sorun had sent at the cat caused him to flinch, and he hesitantly nodded before backing up towards the crowd of villagers, who also moved back to give space. Virgil was reaching a limb out towards Sorun while calling out "chao! Chao!", but Sam held him back.
Sighing, Sorun turned his head down. He felt angry at himself for what he just did, but it paled in comparison to the absolute rage he was feeling towards the Mobians behind him. The one with the red sword in particular was drawing a majority of his ire, but he felt anger at all of them. For almost cutting down Sam like that, who Sorun liked. Possibly robbing Gary of his only family left. For harassing this nice little village. For making him feel these feelings and making him get involved.
He wasn't supposed to be getting involved in these things anymore, dammit. He ran away just to save his life, not put it in danger again. But even though he tried, he didn't want to ignore this.
Breathing out again, Sorun rose his head. "Oh fuckin' boy, here we go," he angrily thought as he slowly turned towards the bandit Mobians, Bringer Claws tightly squeezing his shoulders. "Well, too late to back down now."
Time to save the villagers from the bandits, then. He could berate himself for being an idiot and figure out why he'd done and made such a stupid choice later.
The villagers had gone far enough back that they'd taken cover behind some of the houses. The bandits in front of him were all staring wide-eyed at Sorun, particularly at the Bringer Claws, though some were almost eagerly running their claw-tipped fingers over their blades. The one with the red sword and blue and yellow eyes looked oddly calm, his expression going neutral as he and Sorun locked eyes.
"And here I thought all Mobians were nice. So much for that fantasy, huh?" Sorun was the first to speak, gesturing towards the group of armed Mobians with a single hand and a deep frown on his face. "Isn't it a bit stereotypical for a pack of wolves to prey on a helpless village like this?"
Some of the Mobian bandits snarled at him, and the one with the red sword seemed particularly affronted. "We are jackals," he hissed out, composure briefly wavering.
"Swing and a miss, what are you gonna do?" Sorun said with a shrug, not a care in his voice. "Honestly I'm not seeing it, but if you're jackals, you're jackals."
The odd-eyed jackal who Sorun assumed to be the leader regarded Sorun with narrowed eyes, and then scoffed as he rested the sword's blunt side on his shoulder. "I didn't expect to encounter a human anywhere in the continent," he said. "I'll admit that I've never even encountered a member of your kind before. I've heard the stories, though. We all have." The jackal leader began slowly pacing from left to right. "A weak, cowardice race who resorted to underhanded tactics and ranged weapons to kill from afar, and still lost in the Great War. A completely pathetic species, really. Nothing but weaklings in the face of Mobians."
The jab caused a bit of irritation to flow through the teen. "Yeah, you're not wrong. Our physical abilities are pretty pathetic compared to a Mobian's. Weak, though? I don't think so," Sorun said, voice as even as he could make it. "But pardon my mistake from earlier. What's a bunch of jackals doin' terrorizing a village and putting old folk to the sword?"
The jackal's eyes had widened just the slightest amount, as if he hadn't expected such a response. He'd tilted his head to the side in an interested manner, and then shifted his gaze to the villagers in the back. "The people who live here have a knack for fashioning working pieces of technology from scavenged junk for a living," he explained. "Water purifiers, transistors, conductors, and so on. Technological pieces such as those are a scarcity in these times due to the war with Dr. Eggman, and there are many who would be willing to pay a great price for such commodities." He gestured to the jackals at his sides. "We're simply a traveling pack of mercenaries attempting to forge a living in these trying times, human. But the villagers here decided they had the nerve to try and deny us our right to take what's ours."
Sorun gave the jackal a flat, unimpressed look. "You know there's a whole junkyard down the way full of that shit, right?" he asked as he stuck his thumb out behind him. "You seriously gotta raid a village instead of scavenging it yourself?"
If the harsh language bothered the jackal at all, he didn't show it. One of his eyelids did twitch, however. "Such work is completely beneath us," he claimed. "It's not as if this village would be completely helpless. They can simply create more of whatever we take from them. Such is their place."
"Their 'place', huh?" Sorun repeated. "So, what, you just roll into town with your boys and a buncha swords and you suddenly own the place?"
The jackal shook his head. "I wouldn't go that far," he denied. "It's simply the order of things." He pointed the tip of his sword past Sorun and at the townsfolk behind him. "The weak will always be inferior to the strong. That's simply the way of the world. Those who cannot resist the current of the strong have no choice but to submit or be crushed."
A weary breath left the teen. "Oh, brother, you're one of these guys," Sorun groaned as he pinched at the bridge of his nose. "Yeah, yeah, I've heard the spiel a million times before. Weak live to be crushed, strong can do whatever they want, blah blah blah, the fuck is your point?" He gestured back to the townsfolk. "You showed up with a bunch of guys with swords and demanded shit from them. Of course they went along with your demands at first. That's not weakness. That's trying to not get their loved ones stabbed to death by you idiots. The hell do you expect them to do?"
"To fight back, perhaps?" the jackal suggested. "Even if half their population is children and feeble oldfolk, they had more than enough to outnumber us and ample time to prepare. I went as far as to prepare for resistance, and with their numbers and technical know-how I half-expected I'd need to cut my losses and call this trashpit a loss. But what did they do instead?" He shook his head, glancing at the townsfolk with almost disgust lacing his features. "They denied us when we came to collect, but nothing else. No resistance. Nothing. They simply told us 'no' and hoped we would move on. Such weakness... it's despicable," he spat.
Sorun glanced back at the Mobians, and then back to the jackals and their leader. "They're Mobians," he said. "Unlike you guys, I don't think they like fighting. But I wouldn't really know; I'm kinda new here. But I've been around Mobians long enough that I can see that they really don't like violence. You're really gonna fault them for trying to take the peaceful, nonviolent route with you? If anything you should be grateful they tried just telling you off."
The jackal's response was to scoff. "You cannot possibly be that blind. In this world ravaged by the likes of Dr. Eggman, such weakness is fatal. They're fated for death, those weaklings, one way or another. We are simply trying to exploit that weakness to survive. The right to survive where others would perish is a right solely reserved for the strong. If scavenging off the efforts of the doomed weak is what it takes for us to remain strong, then so be it."
Sorun sighed, and hung his shoulders. "You know what you are?" he asked as he pointed at the jackal leader. "You're that one kid in the back of the class that learned one single philosophy lesson and suddenly thinks they're on the same level as somebody like Nietzsche because their smooth-ass brain managed to absorb that one nugget of knowledge. You're not Nietzsche. You can use as many pretty words as ya like, but you're nothin' but a bunch of opportunistic douchebags. Nothin' more, nothin' less."
The odd-eyed jackal quirked an eye ridge in confusion, perhaps at the mention of Nietzsche's name, but he quickly brushed it off. "And you are little more than a lowly human uselessly preaching morality on a subject you yourself believes in." The point of the sword shifted to Sorun. "You're little more than a fool begging for death by trying to defend those weaklings. Those such as you that would willingly jump into the jaws of death are worse than weak. I absolutely despise wastes of skin like you that would throw their pitiful lives away for nothing."
He lowered his sword back to his side after that. A few seconds passed as a gust of wind blew a handful of leaves between the two, after which they both began to laugh. Low, humorless laughs full of nothing but contempt for one another, their eyes still locked onto each other despite their shaking shoulders. The laughter ended as quickly as it began, though, with Sorun speaking first.
"Yeah, you're absolute scum," he decided. "I'm Sorun, by the way."
A rueful chuckle left the jackal. "You are certainly more than what I expected out of my first meeting with a human. I am Infinite."
Sorun made a "tsk" noise. "God, even your name is the most pretentious thing in the world," he muttered.
One of the ears on top of Infinite's head flicked, and he gave the human an irritated glare. "And just what is that supposed to mean?" he demanded.
"It means every single word you say makes me wanna punch your teeth in, and you know what, it just might come to that. But I guess I wouldn't really be doing my point justice if I didn't at least try the diplomatic route." He also really didn't want to fight, despite how he felt about the jackals. He doubted his words would be able to get to them, though, but he would at least try resolving this peacefully. If only because it meant there was a minute chance he didn't have to fight. "Alright, Infinite, here's what's gonna happen. You're gonna leave. You're gonna take your little jackal posse there, and you're never gonna come back to Scrap City ever again."
"And if I don't?" Infinite challenged.
"Then I'm gonna break all your arms and legs."
A beat passed between Sorun and the jackals. Infinite gave the human a critical glare, and then looked to the side at two of his comrades. "Take him," he ordered.
There was absolutely no hesitation in the jackals, and with swords bared they ran straight at Sorun with their eyes completely locked onto his body. The human, for his part, gave them a completely blank stare, and then proceeded to stand absolutely still as his two Bringer Claws shot forwards.
The first Bringer Claw had curled into a fist and punched the first jackal right in the face. The force was sufficient enough that the jackal was sent flying all the way back to his group before slamming into a buggy's door and falling down unconscious. The second jackal watched the display with a gaping mouth, and then yelped out in surprise when his leg was grabbed by the second Bringer Claw. He was lifted up into the air, slammed down into the ground, lifted up, slammed a second time, and then his knocked-out body was tossed at Infinite's feet.
The heterochromatic jackal watched the other jackal's form roll to his feet, and then glanced over at the other jackal that had been slammed into the buggy. His face still impassive, if not slightly irritated, he turned back towards Sorun as the Bringer Claws folded back onto his shoulders. "So. You are strong, then," he said. "Why ever are you endeavoring to defend these village simpletons with those abilities of yours?"
"You see, that's the problem with the 'strong always trample over the weak' philosophy. You morons never seem to realize that nice people, or as I like to call them, people with common fucking sense, can be strong, too, and usually don't appreciate people like you pushing the 'weaklings' around. Man, too bad common sense is such a precious commodity these days," Sorun answered with a shake of his head.
Infinite's face scrunched in dismissal at the claim. "I fail to see the logic in such a thing."
"Oh my g- fine, you want some cold, hard pragmatism? You want facts? I'll give you some fucking facts," Sorun ground out in frustration. "I know this may be a foreign concept to someone like you, but wouldn't you know it, if you're nice to people they're nice back. You may start to like each other, and you keep helping each other. You spread this to more people. You know what you get with that formula? A fucking community working together to survive!" Sorun screamed out as he gestured to the village behind him. "I mean, Jesus, the Kingdom of Acorn was founded on the idea of a whole bunch of different Mobian species coming together to form one gigantic community through, egh, can't believe I'm saying this, friendship and love and all that other surprisingly effective stuff. And you know what? It works! Because somehow they all managed to beat the Overlanders in the Great War! I don't know how, they fucking shouldn't have because guns, but they did! The Mobians figured out the system, Infinite! They cracked the code! Turns out love for your fellow man, a willingness to cooperate with people, and a desire to help and defend others is all you need to make it in life!" He took in a deep breath, and then exhaled as his shoulders relaxed. "Look, Infinite. Going it alone? Sure, some can do it. Some have the raw ability or the opportunity. The people that say everybody's born equal? They're liars trying to make themselves feel better. Some people are just born better than others. But everybody, even them, even the people born into royalty or born with super speed powers, need help sometimes. That's not weakness. That's trusting in the strength of others so that they can rely on your strength. What you're doing? You're just isolating yourself off from others and denying forming bonds with people just to try and keep yourselves alive in this world. It's not a sustainable economy. It's just not."
Throughout the entire speech, Infinite had only stared wide-eyed at Sorun, remaining silent as to let the human speak. When he finished, though, the jackal's features hardened as he shook his head. "What rubbish," he said. "You truly believe that tripe?"
Letting out a breathy chuckle, Sorun shrugged his shoulders. "To be fair, I'm ripping most of this off of 'Death Stranding'. Thing was a slog to get through, but the messages are relevant." He held a finger up, ignoring Infinite's confused look. "But I meant what I said about humans," he said. "Physically, yeah, we're weak. Everything else, though? Humans can accomplish anything they put their minds to. It's that same infinite willpower that made the modern age out of sticks and rocks. It's that same ability to go as low as possible if it means winning that let them create nukes that could level whole cities. It's the same infinite compassion needed to build communities and the same infinite cruelty tempered by mercy that wins wars. Humans are amazing, Infinite, and Overlanders are just humans evolved by the gene bombs. So if the Mobians managed to beat back the infinite willpower of humanity in the Great War?" He shook his head in a breathless chuckle. "There's gotta be some truth to that friendship trash."
He figured after all that, after that whole rousing speech that was one word away from making Sorun throw up for how cheesy it was, he'd get some positive reaction out of the jackal. But the reaction that Infinite gave as a response to Sorun was not one the human had expected at all. The jackal slowly closed his eyes as a smile formed, and he held two fingers up to Sorun.
"You're wrong on two points," he said, "and as it happens, they all revolve around the same man." He opened his eyes and looked up to Sorun. "You must have skipped a few history lessons, human. You're right about one thing: the Overlanders were ruthless in their campaign during the Great War. The Mobians were losing ground rapidly and were set to lose the war at a moment's notice. Do you know what changed?"
Infinite's words sparked some thought in his mind, and as he thought on them it hit him. Like a bolt of lightning going through his head, he realized he'd forgotten one crucial piece of information, and as a result his shoulders sagged. An important fact Sonic himself had told Sorun long ago. "Right," he mumbled. "Eggman was the Mobian war chief back then. I forgot about that part."
"I believe back then he was referred to as Julian Kintobor," Infinite supplied. "Were it not for his tactical advice, the Kingdom of Acorn would have fallen in the Great War. The Mobians only won because they followed his tactics. Tactics that were even more underhanded than the Overlanders'. How can you say that strength through Mobian bonds of friendship are enough to overcome 'humanity's infinite willpower', as you call it, if they needed the assistance of the absolute worst Overlander this planet has ever produced?" He sniffed harshly and looked to the side, towards the sky. "And secondly," he added, "if the strength of those bonds were truly enough, then the world wouldn't be at the cusp of being completely lost and conquered Dr. Eggman. Mobians such as us wouldn't be fighting and raiding just to survive if the Freedom Fighters were enough to beat him." He turned back to Sorun, his face in a harsh sneer. "The bonds of friendship are a fleeting thing against true strength, Sorun. The Freedom Fighters failing to defeat Eggman only prove it. It's not enough."
"Well, technically speaking they did beat him. A worse Eggman just came and took his place."
"I hardly think that is a valid point considering the current state of the world."
"Yeah..." Sorun's form had become much more relaxed. "You know, you sound pretty admiring of humans and Overlanders for a guy claiming that they're so weak."
Infinite scoffed. "Don't mistake respect for acknowledgement of strength. Without all their tricks, they'll never be stronger than Mobians. The same can be said for Eggman. He's nothing but an Overlander who used clever tricks and machines to cheat his way to victory."
"Well, yeah," Sorun admitted. "The Freedom Fighters still beat Eggman once, though. The first one, at least. That's proof enough for me it works." He paused, and then sighed. "You're not wrong, though. This current Eggman they're all dealing with? I just don't think they can beat him. Not with how everything is. It's just like you said, Infinite: if there's one thing humans excel at above everything else, it's their ability to cheat their way to victory. And this Eggman cheated like crazy with those seven Chaos Emeralds. The guy's insane enough not to steamroll everybody all at once just for the sport of it, but he's not at all afraid of playing dirty." He looked down at his right hand. "Friendship and trusting in others. It's important, but against him, I just don't think it's enough. So I don't know. Maybe if they had somebody on their side that could cheat just as hard as Eggman could by getting bullshit powers out of Chaos Emeralds they could pull a win out." A sad, conflicted smile formed on his face as the hand dropped. "Maybe if they had a friend just as bad as Eggman, they'd finally have a shot at winning."
Infinite tilted his head to the side, confusion lacing his features. "What are you getting at...?"
The smile dropped off of Sorun's face, set back into a neutral expression. "Eh, don't worry about it. Just thinking aloud over here. All this mushy talk about friends... I blame Mobians. They're starting to rub off on me I think. But you know, after living life among Mobians for a bit... I dunno. I think I like their method. Having friends like that felt... nice."
"Hmf." Infinite huffed, but a small smile soon overtook his features. "I don't get you, but you're an interesting human regardless, Sorun," he said. "A shame you'll die here. Nobody else has ever engaged me as thoroughly as you. It's... refreshing."
The teen felt his shoulders slump at that claim. He'd hoped after all that Infinite would at least think about reconsidering what he was doing here. But based on his wording, he seemed set on finishing what he started with the village. And he didn't mind mowing through Sorun to do it, it seemed.
Well, that was fine. He still felt like breaking his legs for almost killing Sam.
"I'm flattered. Really," Sorun sarcastically remarked. "None of this changes the fact you almost cut Sam's head off."
"Indeed it doesn't." Some of jackals at Infinite's sides rose up with their swords, but in a move that surprised both them and Sorun, he waved his hand down. "It's obvious your ability far outshines my compatriots here," he said as he brandished his red sword. "So why don't we fight? You and me. With just that sword of yours."
"... Just swords, huh?" In response, a single Summoned Sword manifested in Sorun's right hand. "Well, we could have a sick sword fight, Infinite. For sure we could. I could also just end it all right now and bust you up with the Bringer Claws, which sounds way easier to me."
Phenomenally easier, really. That wasn't even factoring in Sorun being vastly weaker than a Mobian like Infinite and having absolutely skill absolutely swinging a sword though. Punching and grabbing with the arms, though? He had that down pat. And he felt very confident in being able to beat the jackal into submission with those alone, but then he started chuckling.
"Alright, then how about this?" Infinite offered. "We fight, the both of us, with just swords. If you win then we'll leave, just like that. When I win, though, hmm..." He brought his red sword up and ran a finger along the edge. "Well, as thanks for giving me such thought-provoking entertainment, I'll at least make your death quick and painless."
Sorun sucked in air between his teeth. "Gee, I dunno. I wanna trust that smooth-as-butter voice of yours, but wouldn't you know it I just don't." He held his Summoned Sword up to peer through the barely-translucent, blue blade. "Then again, by the time I'm done with you you're never gonna wanna come back here anyways." He lowered the sword, and the blue wings hanging off of Sorun's shoulders disappeared. "Fine, whatever. Get over here so I can cripple you."
Were Sorun an outside observer, he would have called himself stupid for agreeing to do this. But, as it happened, he had a plan. It was in no way a clean or very "good" plan in that he doubted almost nobody in the Freedom Fighters would ever agree with the plan, but they weren't here and he wasn't a Freedom Fighter at the moment. But what the plan lacked for being clean it made up for being practical and easy.
The plan was he was going to cheat by using a bunch of Summoned Swords and then threaten Infinite's life once Sorun won. It wasn't very pretty at all, but it'd get results. And he doubted Infinite or his band of jackals would ever dare to come back here again seeing as he wasn't planning on letting Infinite leave in a walking state.
By now, Infinite had began slowly stepping towards Sorun, red, curved sword held to his far side as his eyes bored straight into Sorun's. The pale teen just stood there, Summoned Sword lazily held in his hand as he calmly waited for Infinite to make a move. It was when the human blinked that the jackal silently pushed forwards, raising his sword up without a sound in an effort to bring it down on Sorun.
He scoffed. "What a chump."
A blue flash of light stopped the red sword in its path right before it impacted Sorun. Infinite , gripping the sword tightly with one hand, had widened his eyes when he saw the dozen Summoned Swords hovering in front of Sorun and blocking the red sword with their own blades.
"You never said anything about how many swords I could use," Sorun said, "or how I could use them."
The red sword pressed against the blue ones began to slightly vibrate as Infinite struggled against them. "You cheating coward...!"
"Yeah, guess what, cowards win."
The blue swords locked against Infinite's sword pushed outwards. The jackal was sent backwards, feet skidding against the ground before he came to a full stop. "Tch!" He bent his legs slightly and jumped. Jumped high, Sorun noted, as the jackal's body had sprung all the way up to the top of the nearest tree, and then jumped right off that one to another treetop.
"Wow. Guy can jump," Sorun thought, eyes struggling to keep up with Infinite's form as he jumped from tree to tree while getting closer to Sorun. "Not gonna help you, though."
Right in Infinite's jump path spawned four Summoned Swords, their blades crossed into a shield. The jackal slammed right into them, and let out a soft grunt as he fell onto the ground. No sooner had he made contact with the ground did four more swords spawn near him, all four spinning in tandem with their tips converged at one point as they corkscrewed over to his body. Infinite, surprisingly, had managed to raise his red blade up just in time for its flat side to catch the Stinger Swords. Even more surprisingly managed to hold his ground against the four swords drilling into his own, sparks and red fragments of sword flying outwards.
Shatter!
Unfortunately for the jackal, the onslaught of the four blades proved to be too much, and the four swords managed to break right through his red sword. He gasped in shock as the blue hilt and red shards flew out of his hand, and then quickly backflipped backwards when the four swords swung upwards at him. The blades of the blue swords just barely missed grazing the jackal's chin mid-backflip, and he landed back into a crouch after having successfully dodged the blades.
He looked up just in time for a fifth Summoned Sword fired from Sorun's side to fly by and slash him across the face.
A spray of red flowed out from Infinite's face as he fell onto his back. Slowly, he pushed himself up into a sitting position, panting heavily as he held his wound with his hand. He removed his hand to look down on the blood that had leaked onto his glove, revealing a large, diagonal cut running right through his right eye. He opened it right after, the newly-made cut having untouched the blue eye underneath, though he still growled softly at the wound as he looked up to Sorun. He only became further enraged when he saw the human's passive expression.
"You lost your sword, dude," Sorun said, his hands tucked into his pocket as he glared down at Infinite. "Give it up, Infinite. You can't beat me. Not in a million years."
"Human..." Giving Sorun an indignant glare, Infinite slowly stood up to his feet. "I'm not conceding to somebody like you...!"
Sorun's response was to roll his eyes. "Pfft. Get real." His Bringer Claws manifested and quickly reached out towards Infinite.
To his credit, the jackal did try to dodge them, but the arms proved to be just too quick for him. The left claw reached his face first, wrapping its talons around his head and slamming him into the ground. The right claw grabbed onto his left arm.
"I'll make it real clear," Sorun began, blue eyes glaring furiously at the struggling jackal's body as he thrashed against the arms holding him down. "You're done. You lost. So here's what you're gonna do."
The Bringer Claw holding Infinite's arm squeezed down hard enough that an audible crack! was heard as the arm's humerus shattered. Infinite had done his best to stifle the resulting grunt of pain, though he still thrashed more violently as the limb was broken.
"You're gonna take yourself and your gang of losers out of here." The two spectral claws released the jackal, only to move lower and grab onto his legs. They lifted Infinite up into the air and slammed him down onto the ground hard enough so that when they released their grip, his legs were bent at odd angles. "You're never going to come back to this village again."
Infinite continued to softly growl in rage and pain as he attempted to lift himself up with his remaining, unbroken limb. Sorun's left Bringer Claw quickly slammed down onto his right arm, however, wrapping it in a tight grip and pulling upwards to lift the jackal into the air. The Bringer Claw then moved closer to Sorun, and Infinite, too exhausted and wounded to move, had no choice but to limply hang by the spectral arm holding him up.
The Bringer Claw eventually had moved Infinite right in front of Sorun's passive yet angry face. Infinite's eyes were practically searing into the human's, blood from the gash on his right eyelid seeping into an eye that was seething in rage at the sight of the human that had so thoroughly beaten and humiliated him in front of the pack of jackals fearfully watching from the back. Uncaring for the deathly stare being sent his way, Sorun willed the Bringer Claw to lightly shake Infinite before he spoke again.
"Listen, Infinite, here's the thing. I don't really wanna kill you and the rest of the jackals in front of those villagers. They don't need to see that," Sorun said, voice soft and tinged in anger. "Beyond that, though, you actually bothered to sit through that little debate of ours, so I legitimately think there's a bit of hope for you. I truly want to believe you're just an unfortunate byproduct of the messed up world created in the war against Eggman, and I really hope that some of what I said will get through to you in time so you can change for the better. So I'm letting you go. But if I hear you came back here and pulled this shit again after all this? If you go out of your way just to prove me wrong?" He rose his right hand out of his pocket and snapped his finger. A Summoned Sword appeared over Infinite's head, pointing down at him. The jackals in the back all yelped when more Summoned Swords appeared over them, each and every single one aimed at a jackal. Sorun had turned Infinite's head just enough so that he could see all the swords aimed at his squadron. "I'll kill you all myself. Don't waste your second chance, Infinite. Now take your weak ass and get out of my sight."
Once he was done talking, the Bringer Claw holding Infinite up squeezed down and broke his remaining humerus. The cry of pain elicited from the jackal was a bit more audible than the others, though Sorun ignored it as best as he could as he tossed the Mobian's broken body at the pack of jackals staring wide-eyed at him. Infinite's body rolled to a halt, and as soon as all the Summoned Swords above them shattered, they moved. Infinite's body, as well as the bodies of the other two jackals Sorun had knocked out, were quickly loaded up into the bandits' buggies as they mounted them and the motorcycles. Their engines revved up, just barely drowning out the fearful yelping of the jackals, and soon enough they were all peeling out and driving away at max speed away from the village.
"Well... that's that. I really hope he takes that warning to heart. Don't think I could ever find those guys again if I tried." He hadn't been bluffing, of course, but at the same time he had his own problems to worry about. Defending a village past the point of him coincidentally being there at the time was low on his list of priorities, but he was partly confident that he'd managed to scare them away from Scrap City for good. The villagers were saved.
The same villagers he had to address now that the threat had passed. One in particular, at least.
With a sigh, Sorun turned around. The small amount of villagers that had been hiding behind the houses far in the back were slowly poking their bodies out from their hiding spots as the jackals drove further and further away. Some were giving the retreating jackals looks of disbelief, though most eyes were on Sorun. Widened, grateful yet unreadable expressions Sorun couldn't place that immediately made him nervous.
"Gah, I hope they didn't hear me talking with Infinite. I said some explicit and embarrassing shit back there," Sorun thought to himself as his Bringer Claws lifted up into the air, only to bring him back down in front of the crowd of startled villagers. He only needed a quick glance to find who he was looking for.
Sam was amongst the villagers quietly staring at Sorun, and the cat Mobian's own eyes were equally as wide as he looked at the teen. The Chao he held in his hands seemed just as baffled as the rest of them, something Sorun had taken quick note of before addressing the Mobian holding him.
"Hey, Sam," Sorun greeted in a tired voice. "You okay? Nothing hurt?"
"Er... er, yeah. I'm fine. Thanks." The cat Mobian gave him a stiff nod. "Sorun-"
"Can you do me a quick favor?" Sorun quickly interrupted. "Hold on to Virgil for a little bit longer. I'll come back for him soon, but I..." He sighed, and looked up at the center of the village, towards where the windmill was. "There's something I gotta go do. Just a little bit, alright?"
"Okay-?" Sorun hadn't given Sam the time to finish his sentence. His Bringer Claws beat off the ground and lifted him up into the air the moment he heard the confirmation from the cat.
"The village should be fine now. Jackals are gone, and it doesn't look like they did any damage," he thought as he looked down at Scrap City. "They'll be fine. Me, though..."
Things had been said during that argument with Infinite. The jackal had raised valid points, and even more importantly Sorun himself had said some things that gave him pause. Pause that made him realize some uncomfortable truths about himself, and had lead him to question some of the things he was doing. More than that, though, he definitely didn't want to stick around this village after what had just happened. He didn't want the attention, and he had to move on anyways.
But where to move on to? That, he could not make up his mind on. So he needed to plan what he was going to do next. He needed to sort out his own thoughts and settle the doubts he was beginning to have because of that conversation with Infinite.
He needed some time alone to think.
A/N- Oh hey, it's that one villain everybody loves.
Alright, so here's what happened. Sonic Forces was the last Sonic thing I researched during my Sonic research binge prior to writing this story during the planning phase, since, well, it was the last game made. And I remember seeing all the low reviews saying the game was horrible, and as I was getting into it my thoughts were, "There's no way it's as bad as- ohhhh, yeah it's bad..."
That said I just watched a playthrough of the game, but from what I saw the story was bad, pacing was off, music was hit and miss for me. Overall just... bad. But I'm not here to review a game I never even played, we're here to talk about why I decided to put Infinite in the story.
I saw the guy, and my first impression of him was just, "Man, yeah, this guy's kind of a loser with a lot of power." And, you know what, during the planning phase when I was making Sorun I was also thinking, "You know, Sorun's kind of just a loser with power, too. Maybe I can do something with that."
So I do a deep dive into the character to get a feel for him, and what I get is really not encouraging to that idea. The guy, Infinite, he's just... he's just bad. Like, character-wise he's just awful. A one-dimensional, shallow character that revels in death and destruction and all that edgy goodness. And I mean, it's Sonic, I wasn't expecting the deepest character in the Sonic lore, but even by Sonic standards this guy had nothing going for him. He was edgy for the sake of being edgy. No depth at all past the weakness hangup. An evil psycho that was a evil psycho "just 'cause", basically. And the problem here is we kind of already have someone like that in the story, we have Eggman, but Eggman has a certain charm going for him that's likable and fun to play around with whereas Infinite is so out there with his brand of cartoonish evil that he really doesn't even feel like a Sonic character. Even his color scheme is off; he's just this weird, monochrome character standing next to all these other colorful characters in this colorful world.
I don't like him. I like what he could be, though.
So obviously the Infinite in this story isn't a 1:1 recreation of the game's version. My thoughts along those lines are, "Well, it's a fanfic and Archie is a separate universe from the games anyways so he doesn't have to be the exact same guy, so there's a ton of liberties I can take here." It's an attempt to give him some depth where there is none, but even then there's not a lot of room to work with without completely remaking him. But I know even after all that people still don't like him, so I'm not making him the final end-all-be-all villain or anything like that, or even a character that'll appear prominently in the story. This is more just to establish he's here in the world.
So yeah. There's that. Moving onto Sorun.
Sorun's a good boi who helps out and respects moms but is also a social neophyte allergic to friendly touching because he's a touch-starved gamer nerd. But despite that, he's still someone that knows right from wrong. That being said, almost every time he's said something deep it's come from a video game or movie. He's a guy that paid a lot of attention to those stories, and in that way he's kind of a walking, bastardized encyclopedia of story morals and life lessons absorbed through gaming walking around in a world where that kind of entertainment media doesn't really exist on that level anymore.
