Recursion Error

Episode 24- Back in


Step one in Sorun's "commit suicide for the sake of the planet" plan: Sorun needed to get that red Chaos Emerald he'd left in Freedom HQ ASAP.

Before that, though, he needed some advice, or at least to talk to somebody about what he'd done. About some of his internal feelings. About something, because while he'd finally made up his mind on what he was going to do, Sorun felt that maybe some guidance was in order. Or at the very least a second voice to help clear his head of any lingering doubts. And there was no way he was just gonna fly right into Freedom HQ immediately, walk in, and pretend nothing happened to everybody that was there. That'd be too awkward.

No, he needed time and help from somebody else to prepare him for that disaster in waiting, and as it happened, there was one person that came in mind. Sorun had only ever had one conversation with him, but he was somebody that was technically outside the Freedom Fighters and who could at least barely relate to Sorun's plight.

It probably wasn't an ideal choice, but since he really needed to talk to somebody, he'd take it.

"Well, there it is, Knothole. And... it looks the exact same as I left it," Sorun thought. Flying through the sky, he and the one-winged Chao on his shoulder came to a halt as just above the city with the evening sun and an orange sky overhead. "Guess I was just gone for a day, so I... don't really know what I was expecting, actually. But it still isn't bombed out, at least. So that's great." His head tilted further downwards, towards Castle Acorn. "He better be in."

The Bringer Claws beat forwards and propelled Sorun's body towards the castle. He made sure to stay as high as possible as to remain unseen from those below, and then dropped straight down until he'd made it to the side of the castle. The Bringer Claws beat downwards, holding Sorun steady in the air as they slowly moved him towards the center of the castle, near the walls.

After flying around for a bit, he saw what he was looking for: large, vertical windows lining the side of the castle's wall. He chose the window furthest in the back, and then flew up towards the top where there was a small, secondary window on top of the main one that swung open. He flew up, slowly pushed the window open, and then climbed towards the top.

Looking inside the room on the other side of the window he was above, Sorun saw that the castle's throne room looked about the same as it had a month ago, when he'd visited on his second day here. Really long and really empty, aside from the large throne chair at the back. A chair with a familiar red-haired squirrel Mobian sitting in it.

Sorun didn't make a move at first. He just stayed still up on the window, staring down at Elias as he thought over what he was supposed to say to the king. He also was waiting from him to eventually notice Sorun was just hanging out up there so they could go from there, but much to Sorun's growing annoyance, whole minutes passed of him just staring at Elias waiting to be noticed. Eventually, he sighed in frustration and called down to him.

"Yo, Elias, you blind? Up here." The sudden voice startled Elias, practically forcing him to jump out of it as he looked up. His eyes widened and he looked even more startled when he saw the human up on the window, back against the wall and another leg pressing into the window's frame as his second leg hung down freely.

"S-Sorun?" Elias called back, voice in disbelief.

"Yep." Sorun tore his gaze away from Elias to look around at the empty throne room. "Hey, breaking into the castle like this doesn't make me an enemy of the state or anything like that, does it?" he asked as he turned back to Elias. "I woulda just used the front door, but, well, I didn't want people knowin' I was back yet."

The squirrel blinked his blue eyes in confusion, and then shook his head. "No, no it doesn't- can you please get down from there?"

Shrugging, Sorun leaned fully past the window and dropped down. His Bringer Claws flapped a few times to slow his fall, ending in his feet softly touching down on the ground as the winged arms disappeared completely from his back.

With both of them now at the same level, the human and the Mobian took a few minutes to take each other in. Sorun's expression was mainly passive, if a bit nervous from the way he would occasionally fidget. Elias seemed more baffled then anything, blinking over and over as if to make sure it was Sorun standing there in front of him and not an illusion. He was the first one to speak.

"So you're back," he said, and then looked towards Sorun's shoulder. "Pardon me, Sorun, but may I ask why you have a Chao on your shoulder?"

"Don't worry about the Chao." Sorun held a hand up to block Virgil, forcing him to let out a "chao!" of outrage. "You know, it's kinda creepy how you're just sitting here all alone in this giant room."

"I was just taking some time to myself to think."

"Ah." Sorun slowly nodded. "So, uh... nobody's mad at me, right?"

A few seconds of silence passed, ending with Elias' face turning into a wince as he gave Sorun a pitying look. "Well..."

Sorun's arms went limp. "Aw, that ain't the good noise."

Elias sighed, and then rubbed at his forehead. "Sorun, you ran away-"

"I know, kn-"

"Everybody was beyond upset, Sally was furious, Sonic almost ran off to go look for you-"

"Yeah, I figured something like that would happen, but-" Sorun paused, and his pupils shrunk in fear. "Wait, how mad was Sally, 'cause she really scares me somet-" He stopped himself at the withering look Elias shot him. "Okay, fine, I get it. Going AWOL wasn't an okay thing to do." He held his index finger up. "But you know, technically I was only gone a single day, so if I really wanted to I could just say I went out on a really long walk-"

"You told them you were never returning," Elias reminded him with an unamused face.

The finger wilted and fell to Sorun's side. "... Oh yeah, I did say that." He sighed, and then hung his head. "Ooh boy, it's gonna be way more awkward than I thought."

He slowly walked past Elias, letting out a tired breath as he sat down on one of the few steps leading up to the platform where the throne was. Elias stared down at the human's slumped form, and then gave an equally tired sigh as he stepped in front of the pale teen.

"Sorun," he began, "I don't know what possessed you to run away or to break into the castle like this, but something is clearly wrong with you. Just tell me what the matter is. What happened that made you so upset you needed to abandon Knothole?"

"I came back, didn't I?" He glanced up at Elias' face, but when he saw that it still had a stern if not worried look on it, he hung his head downwards again. "I needed to get out for a bit," he answered. "I just... look, it's been a lot, okay?"

"Okay," Elias said with a nod, "then why don't we start with why you chose to break into Castle Acorn's throne room?"

Sorun looked up towards the window he came in from. "Is it really breaking and entering when you leave the window unlocked?" he asked.

Elias's eyes narrowed. "If you don't start taking this seriously I'm calling Sally and the others to tell them you're here."

"Wait-wait-wait, hold up, let's not do anything crazy!" Eyes wide in panic, Sorun snapped his head towards Elias while waving his arms out in front of him. The squirrel's stern gaze hardened, causing him to sigh and have his arms fall back down. "I needed to talk to somebody," he said. "And I wanted to talk with somebody outside of the Freedom Fighters so I could, I don't know, mentally prepare myself and maybe get some advice. I wanted to talk to you because the only other candidates were Sonic's relatives, and there was no way I was gonna risk running into him."

"Okay..." The king nodded his head. "Why me and not somebody else? Sally had told me you and that tailor, Honey, became well acquainted."

"Seriously? I don't need more crazy right now," Sorun said with a scoff. "Geez, man, she drives me nuts, but I have to deal with her because she is literally my only source of pants in this world." His face scrunched in irritation. "Seriously, nobody wears pants. Nobody! I haven't met a single Mobian other than Rouge that wears pants, and I don't even know if those weird leggings she wears counts as pants!" He looked up at Elias's head, and then narrowed his eyes. His vision traveled down from the gold, acorn-shaped crown he wore, to the regal blue coat and red cape he had on, to his legs and feet, which were completely bare save for the red boots he wore. "Even you," he hissed. "You wear everything but pants. Why are you like this?" He looked back up to Elias' face. "What do you people have against pants!?"

"I don't- why-?" Elias palmed his face in exasperation. "Sorun, what does this have to do with anything!?"

"Nothing, I just- this is really uncomfortable for me, okay!?" he yelled out. Sorun took a deep breath, and then allowed his body to go lax as his muscles became less tense. "I came to you because you said you ran once, too."

The squirrel blinked his eyes in surprise, his expression softening a bit. "What?"

Sorun rose his hand to the Mobian, shook his head, and allowed his hand to fall back into his lap. "It was too much, okay?" he muttered out. "The-the-the whole thing with being a Freedom Fighter, the Emeralds, my home, almost dying on a practically weekly basis, it-it all just kept adding up, and I never talked to anybody about it, so I-I blew up when it became too much. I left because I thought that's what I wanted to do, but then I took a really hard look at myself and realized that it wasn't what I wanted to do, so I came back, but I just don't know what I'm supposed to say to everybody." He finished with a loud breath, looking down at the floor. "You said you ran away once. Because the whole king thing was too much or whatever, so you ran out but came back later." He sighed and looked back up at Elias. "I mean, look, I know it's really weird that we only ever had one conversation, and that was like a month ago, only for me to come back now with all this heavy stuff, but I am desperate for help here, man, and I can't go to anybody else with this."

Because he truly didn't know what he was supposed to say to everybody to explain himself. He knew a simple sorry wasn't gonna cut it, but what was there beyond that? There was only so much he could explain while leaving the Emeralds and their debilitating effect on his body out. Maybe he could string some lies together- say all the stress got him, and it wouldn't even be wholly untruthful- but what was there passed that? He had no clue.

Elias might have had a clue, though, because he had experience in this dilemma. So Sorun had gone to him because maybe he had some answers. More than that though, it was somebody to talk to. Somebody Sorun could just vent at for a bit so that maybe he could get some good advice. It wouldn't make him feel better about the fact he was planning on dying- nothing was going to make him feel better with that- but it was something, and right now he needed something to help him if just a little bit.

The silence held between them was broken when Elias let out a small, knowing sigh and began to step closer. Sorun didn't move at all when the young king settled next to him on the same step he was sitting in, hands folded over his knees as he leaned in closer to Sorun.

"I suppose it makes sense why you'd come to me if that's the problem," Elias said. "I'll admit that I am sympathetic towards you since, yes, I did run out on the people I had a duty to. Though, eh heh, I took a bit longer than a single day to return," he said with a light laugh. "And it took a great deal of convincing for me to return with my new family. I came back because I was shown that everybody in the kingdom needed me." He reached over and placed a gentle hand on his shoulder. "But you didn't even need that, Sorun! You came back all on your own. You should be happy that you managed to come to your senses before something awful happened."

Sorun looked up at the room's ceiling with a groan, not even bothering to remove the hand on his shoulder. "Yeah man, sure, but I never asked for all this responsibility," he mumbled. "I didn't ask to be a Freedom Fighter. I didn't asked to be ripped away from my home forever or to get super powers from Chaos Emeralds and all that. I never wanted any of this. I just... I just wanted some peace."

"I understand all too well what you mean," Elias assured him with a comforting squeeze on his shoulder. "I felt the exact same way when I ran. It's why I tried settling down to make a new life. I had never asked to be brought into royalty. I'd been living a peaceful life up on Angel Island until I was whisked away to take up the crown. I suppose, just like you, the pressure became too much and I folded. I felt what had happened to me was unfair and unjust, and I just wanted to go back to the life I had beforehand, or at least something close to it."

"That was pretty much what I was feeling, too," Sorun admitted.

Elias made small laugh. "I know it's difficult, Sorun. Believe me, I do, but whether we like it or not we do have responsibilities. Me with my kingly duties, you with your powers helping out with the Freedom Fighters... it's responsibilities like those that ensure we eventually will have that peaceful life we desire, is it not?"

It made Sorun upset at how right he thought Elias was being, but he didn't have it in him to manifest any of that anger. Instead he just released a listless breath. "Mh-hm, hey, Elias, you're not the one going out there getting stabbed at by robots." He didn't ask to die, either, but this was left unsaid as he turned his eyes back to the squirrel. "I don't know how you Mobians do it, but humans can't just brush off all these near-death situations I keep having like it's nothing. Or at least I can't. I... I'm getting better with it, but this is still hard, you know?"

"I know," he said with a nod. "I know. It's not as easy for us, either, believe it or not. But having those close to us around to help us through dark times make it all the easier. All of your friends in the Freedom Fighters would surely help you with this. They were all frustrated at you being so closed-off because they were worried something like this would happen to you."

Sorun rolled his eyes, though he did feel his heart warm a bit at the squirrel's words. "Why do you gotta use the 'F' word?" he mumbled out.

"... You mean 'friends'?"

"Yeah, right. My 'friends'."

Elias tilted his head to the side. "You do consider them your friends, correct?" he asked.

Yes, he did. "No, not really," he said. "... Maybe a couple, but... ugh. I don't wanna be mad at them for bringing me here, I know it wasn't their fault, and if I'm being real with you at this point I barely even feel mad at them over it anymore so eventually maybe, but... no, it's too soon for me to be calling them something like friends."

"But... there must be at least some you consider friends," Elias pressed.

"Well, I mean, you know, Nic-" Sorun roughly shook his head, causing Elias' hand to leave his shoulder. "Would you get off the friendship bit!? Geez." He breathed heavily through his nose, and then slumped forwards. "Beyond that, though, past all the stress of fighting for my life and the responsibility and everything else... on the day I ran, Tails told me it was impossible to return to my home zone. So I'm pretty much stuck here forever." He looked back at Elias, who continued to look at him somberly. "I needed to take some time to come to terms with that."

Elias didn't say anything at first, his face a mixture between sympathy and pity for the human next to him. He blinked, and his features relaxed as he lowered his head. "Tails had mentioned as such, but are you positive-"

"Elias. I can't go back."

"... I see," he said with a slow nod. "And you're quite understandably upset that you will never see your world again."

"Oh, I'm super depressed over it," Sorun agreed, the flippancy of such a statement making Elias freeze in shock, "and I... haven't really, you know, gotten over it or anything, but I'm getting there. I think." His voice lowered a bit. "I hope."

The squirrel next to him remained still for a few seconds, and then regained his composure. "You're very carefree over your... distraught condition," he noted.

"Dude, I'm not lying when I say all this dry humor and sarcasm of mine is the only thing keeping me from becoming a crying mess. It's how I cope with it. I think that's one of the only ways to deal with depression." It was his own best explanation for it, at least. He didn't know how he felt admitting this to Elias, but at this point, seeing as he planned on dying, he just didn't care enough to hide it. "Don't get too worried about me, Elias. I'm going back to the Freedom Fighters. Being around others'll help me. I just, you know... it's rough. Knowing I left everything there behind. It's really rough."

"I... imagine so," Elias said, voice lowered and saddened. "I won't pretend to understand how you're feeling, I simply can't imagine, but I think you're right in wanting to return to the others for healing in addition to continuing your Freedom Fighter duties." A beat passed. "Does this not then technically makes you homeless, Sorun?"

Sorun shrugged. "Guess so." He turned his head back to Elias. "Wait, am I technically an illegal citizen since I'm living at Sonic's house?"

"No, no it doesn't... well technically an argument can be made if you were to take up permanent residence here-"

"Where's my visa, Elias?" Sorun interrupted with a frown. "I want my green card. I'll marry you for it if I have to."

"Pardon me, but I don't know what those- w-what the-!?" Elias leaned back in shock, arms frozen to one side as he stared at Sorun with wide eyes. "S-Sorun, I'm married! And-and you're a-!"

"Ah, come on, everybody here is so progressive. I'm pretty sure they wouldn't look twice at polygamous marriage." A blush began to form on Elias' face, and he began to incoherently stammer. Sorun burst out in short laughter at the sight. "Relax, man, I'm just messin' around with you." He laughed again. "I really needed a laugh, though, you have no idea."

The king sighed in relief, and then crossed his arms with a pout. "That's not a very appropriate joke to make, Sorun," he muttered.

"You people have no sense of humor," Sorun claimed. "The shot was there. I had to take it."

"Eghh..." Elias ran a hand over his face, and then shook his head. "Back to what I was trying to say, if you wanted, it wouldn't be any issue to offer you official citizenship within the Kingdom of Acorn. After everything you've done for the Freedom Fighters already it's practically earned. And I am the king, you know."

"Pulling political favors for me? We're already practically married." A small grin formed on Sorun's face when Elias began sputtering again. "Seriously though, uh... don't worry about it," Sorun said with a shake of his head. "Right now I just wanna focus on the Freedom Fighter stuff. Maybe after the war has ended we can talk about my residency."

That's what he said, at least. Really Sorun wasn't worried about his citizenship at all considering he was going to die before it became important. It was nice to know it was something that could be done for him, though. Helped him feel like he belonged. It made the weight on his heart that much lighter.

"Of course, Sorun. You need only ask." Elias calmed down and gave Sorun a worried look. "Are you going to be okay, now?"

In response, Sorun blew out a long breath. "I don't know." He really didn't, he realized, as he stood up and began walking towards the windows. "I, um, feel better, though. Yeah. Talking helps. I guess that's why Sonic was always so insistent on it." His face fell as he came to a stop and stared out the window. "He can never know I admitted he was right." He did truly feel a bit better, though. Not by much, but it was progress. Enough that he felt he could go back to Freedom HQ with a reasonable amount of confidence, at least.

"Heh heh." Elias rose up from his sitting position on the stairs. "I'll be sure to keep mum on that around him."

"Ah-huh. Hey, Elias?"

"Yes?"

"What's with the giant, robot wasp over there?"

Upon Sorun's question, Elias ran over to the teen's side by the window. Sorun, in turn, pointed his finger in the direction of what he had been referring to.

It was definitely a wasp. Or something shaped like a bee, at least, with a silver carapace and fitted with a pair of buzzing wings that were somehow keeping it aloft. It was a fair distance away, at the edge of the city, and was flying off in a direction away from Knothole. It took Sorun a few moments to realize that was the direction of the HQ.

"... A goddamn bee? Are you kidding me?" He glanced over towards Elias, and sighed when he saw the concerned look growing on his face. "I swear to god if I have to fight something again when I already had to fight all those jackals this morning..."

"I don't know what that is, but based on its mechanical nature, I would have to assume it's of the Doctor's creation," Elias said, causing Sorun to groan in exasperation. "I'll go and inform-"

"Nah, don't worry about it." The Bringer Claws flashed into existence on Sorun's back. "I gotta make up for all the trouble I caused, and I'm in the mood, which is really unfortunate for that wasp." He took a step back and look up at the window. "Thanks for the talk, Elias. I gotta go now." He glanced back at the squirrel. "And for god's sake, man, lock your windows. You never know what kinda creep's gonna come sneaking in."

"Er... I'll be sure to relay your advice to the guards." Rather awkwardly, Elias gave Sorun a stiff parting wave. "Farewell, Sorun. Good luck."

"Mm." The pale teen looked back up at the windows. "Seeya, Kingy."

He flew up and out the open window without another word, with Elias silently watching the human fly off in the distance.


It wasn't even that he was upset at all this insanity that kept forcing Sorun to fight things. He'd long since accepted that this was just something he had to deal with. That wasn't the issue. The issue was the sheer frequency these events kept happening.

He realized the rest of the world was already taken over. He realized the current situation was bleak and the numbers and odds were really stacked against them all. He realized that, because of this, maybe an inordinate amount of fighting and missions was necessary. He couldn't even remember anymore if he'd ever even had a single week on Mobius that hadn't had at least one life-threatening event he'd been involved in. He understood the necessity of it all, but there was a certain limit of how much of this he could tolerate.

Then again, Sorun supposed he couldn't complain too much. Sonic and the rest had been doing this kind of thing all their lives since childhood, and they all still had their respective sanities perfectly intact. Whether it was because they were just that strong or because they'd all always had each other, he didn't quite know, but he couldn't help but respect their mental fortitude they had that allowed them to weather all the craziness. Because Sorun himself? He was on the brink of losing it. Because after dealing with the mountain yesterday, and the jackals this morning, and dreading whatever was gonna happen with the Freedom Fighters, the last thing, the absolute last thing, he needed right now was another fight.

And yet here he was, flying through the sky and racing towards a gigantic, house-sized robotic wasp flying towards Freedom HQ. And nine-to-ten odds said it was something from Eggman he'd have to smash. Because this was the rest of his life now until he died.

"Different day, same shit..." he internally sighed as he stopped in the air. He'd followed the wasp far enough that, down on the ground, he could see the small hill and the flagpole that Freedom HQ rested under. He could just barely see a blue shape and a black and red shape down there, too. Sorun winced and briefly wondered if Sonic or Shadow managed to spot him yet.

And of course, hovering in the air but still below Sorun, was the metal wasp. Sorun was tempted to rain down Summoned Swords on it right now from where he was, but he stopped himself when he heard a voice be projected out from the robotic insect.

"Alright, you mangy animals, give it up!" He knew that annoying voice anywhere despite only ever having heard it once- that was Snively's voice. And now that Sorun looked closer, he could see that there was a glass dome on the top of the wasp robot's head, and, indeed, the Overlander even shorter than Sorun was sitting inside of the dome operating what he assumed to be the controls to the wasp. "I have a Chaos energy detector right here telling me there's a Chaos Emerald in there! Now fork it over or else!"

Sorun's face fell. "Oh, he's attacking because I left the Emerald here. The same thing Shadow said could happen. The thing that's happening right now." He sighed as the Bringer Claws went slack and allowed Sorun to drop. "He's never gonna let me live that down, damn."

Well, all in all, it could have been worse. At least he got to slap Snively around now to relieve some of this stress. The thought alone was already making Sorun feel better.

A few moments of falling later and Sorun's feet landed right on top of the wasp's head dome with a loud thunk!Snively, from the inside, started at the loud noise, and then looked up in annoyance. His irritated expression shrank right down into worry when he saw Sorun standing above him, hands casually tucked into his pocket with the teen's blue eyes glaring angrily into Snively.

"Yo, Snively," Sorun greeted, the cold, angered edge to his tone betraying his otherwise casual demeanor, "your days of terrorizing people with a bee mech are over."

The worried expression Snively held morphed into rage when he finally recognized the human. "It's a wasp, not a bee," he disdainfully hissed out.

"Ah-huh." At that point, Sorun remembered the weight on his left shoulder, causing his head to turn towards the Chao angrily glaring down at Snively from the teen's shoulder. "Uhp, hold on," Sorun said as he turned back down to Snively. "Gimme a minute to take care of something real quick. I'll come back and slap you right after."

Ignoring the indignant yelling from the Overlander, Sorun lazily hopped off the wasp's head and safely floated down to the ground with the help of the Bringer Claws. He walked forwards a few steps after touching down, the spectral hands proceeding the rest on Sorun's shoulders, and then came to a halt when he felt he came to a satisfactory distance.

For a moment, the pale teen had glanced ahead to catch sight of Sonic and Shadow. And to his great discomfort, they were both staring straight at him with wide eyes and shocked expressions. He breathed out of his nose in worry, and then did his best to put them out of his mind as he crouched down. "Alright, Virgil," he muttered as he removed the Chao from his shoulder, "this is your stop. Stay here a second."

"Chao-chao! Chao!" Even after setting the Chao on the ground, Virgil didn't look at all pleased over his treatment. He was giving what Sorun assumed to be the equivalent of a Chao's frown as he hopped on his feet while reaching out towards Sorun. "Chao!"

"Huh? No, you're stayin' here," Sorun said with a shake of his head. "I got wing-arms and swords. You're down a wing."

Virgil shook his head and tried reached forwards again, only to be pushed back when Sorun pressed a single finger against his forehead. The dot floating above its head turned into a exclamation point. "Chao!"

"Not happening. I'm serious, it's too dangerous for you."

While Sorun continued arguing with his Chao, the giant mechanical wasp buzzing up above them flew back a few feet. From inside his control seat, Snively gave out a cruel smile as he pressed a few buttons on his control console. At the same time, the wasp's metal thorax, at the bottom of which was a giant, metal spike, shifted upwards so that the point of the spike was aimed right at Sorun's back.

There was the sound of a small explosion, and the conical spike fired out of the wasp and straight towards Sorun. Sonic and Shadow, who had been standing by nearby with baffled expressions, saw the spike rushing through the air towards Sorun and were both ready to sprint over him and carry both him and the Chao away to safety.

This proved to be unnecessary, however, as right before the spike made contact with Sorun, his right Bringer Claw snapped out behind him and clamped down on the spike, instantly stopping it completely in its hold. The sudden stop had carried enough power behind it that a heavy amount of wind rushed out from the action, causing the leaves on nearby trees to rustle and for Sorun's hair and clothes to flit about. The human, with his spectral arm holding the spike behind him, remained completely motionless in his crouched position for a few moments, and then slowly breathed out as he turned his head enough so that he could glare at Snively with one eye.

His face was completely passive, but his one visible eye was so livid that Snively began unconsciously sweating.

"... Seriously? You seriously just tried shooting me and my Chao in the back...?" The Bringer Claw chucked the spike in the air, the projectile spinning round and round as it flew up. The teen rose up to his feet with a sigh, and slowly began to walk over to the wasp mech. The Right Bringer Claw held its hand out, and then caught the spike when it fell into its grasp. "You really wanna earn that slap, don'tcha, Snively!?"

The Bringer Claw threw the spike like a spear right at the wasp mech. It buried itself right into its thorax with the accompanying sound of screeching metal and sparking wires. The wasp shuddered in the air, and Sorun's Bringer Claw reached up to grab it by the end of its thorax. The blue hand found a solid grip, squeezed down, and slammed the mech right onto the ground.

A large cloud of dust had picked up as a result of the mech being slammed down. Sorun, not missing a beat, willed the Bringer Claw to reach back and grab onto one of the large, metal antenna sticking out of the wasp's head. The spectral arm stretching out contracted, pulling Sorun right towards the fallen mech. He swung around the antenna and landed right on the wasp's back, where he proceeded to reach out with both Bringer Claws and grab each of the mech's wings right as they began to try and flap. And then they started pulling.

"Hey! Hey, stop!" Snively shouted from the inside of the wasp's head as the metallic insect wings were slowly torn out from the mech's body. "You can't just pull my Egg Wasp's wings off like that! It's not fair!"

"You don't get to talk after that cheap shot you took back there." With the sound of tearing metal, both of the wasp's wings were torn off by the Bringer Claws and casually tossed to the side. Afterwards, Sorun stepped over the wasp's head, hopped back down to the ground, and without even looking back willed the right Bringer Claw to grab onto the wasp's face. It did so, lifting the mech, and Snively who was screaming inside the cockpit, up into the air before slamming it back down in front of him on its back. At the same time, twenty Summoned Swords appeared over it and rained down on its body, impaling the mech and pinning it to the ground at various points along its body.

With the mech stuck into the ground, once more Sorun's right Bringer Claw gripped onto its head. It began pulling harder and harder, the metal on its neck beginning to give out as sparks and wires began to become exposed before, finally, the head was ripped off completely. The body instantly became lifeless as a result, and with a flick of its thumb talon the head Snively was in was sent spinning while balancing on the tip of the claw's index talon, the Overlander within's screams being distorted from the speed. Sorun continued to watch the spectacle for five seconds, let out a single, dry laugh, and then in an instant willed the Bringer Claw to grab the head and flick it up into the air.

Watching the spinning head rise up to its apex, Sorun let out a content sigh as gravity began bringing it down. "I could kill him right here. It'd be so easy, too. All I gotta do is hold the head down and turn Snively into a living pincushion with Summoned Swords. Or just crush the head." He began winding his right arm up, the right Bringer Claw moving in tandem with the real arm's movement. "Too bad I'm terrified that Eggman'll blow Knothole up in retribution if I kill his nephew. Ah, well."

The Bringer Claw reared back, its blue glow seemingly intensifying as the spinning head dropped nearer to the ground. Right before it impacted, the spectral hand lashed out and savagely slapped the head right on its face with enough force that, not only did the head go flying away, but the branches on the surrounding trees began to rustle.

Spinning uncontrollably through the air, the severed head eventually stabilized itself when four jets on the head's underside came to life. The flames from the jets stopped the spinning altogether, and made it so that the head was hovering midair. From where he stood, Sorun could clearly see Snively holding a hand to his mouth with a ill expression on his face, and deep inside he felt immense satisfaction.

There was a loud, electronic squealing sound as the speaker from earlier came back on. "Urp... oh... this... isn't over-"

Snively was interrupted when a Summoned Sword shot from Sorun's side and embedded itself through the dome, the tip of the sword resting mere centimetres from Snively's forehead. He screamed in fright after the sword shattered, and the wasp's head turned around and fly away after the jets of flame roaring out of the thrusters intensified. The satisfaction in Sorun only grew as he watched the heady fly away and shrink down until it disappeared completely.

"Ahhh... I'm gonna smack him every single time I see him," Sorun decided as he turned towards the spot he'd left Virgil. He began walking over towards the Chao, the ghost of a smile that had formed on his face disappearing quickly when he noted the blue and black and red colors from the corner of his vision. "Oh, man. This ain't gonna be fun." He shook his head. "Alright, Emerald first, then I can deal with this."

He hadn't been naive enough to assume nobody would be at the HQ, and if there wasn't that none of the Freedom Fighters would take notice of the fact there was a fight with a giant robot wasp happening, but he'd at least been hoping people like Sonic or Shadow wouldn't be there. He wasn't really sure he was ready to deal with them in particular quite yet. Didn't even know what to say, really.

Well, they were there, and it was way too late for him to run now. He'd have to deal with it one way or another anyways, but the Emerald and his Chao came first.

Stopping in front of his Chao, Sorun tilted his head downwards to see, with some amusement, that Virgil had crossed his arms and was pouting up at Sorun. The thing floating above its head at least turned back into a dot, so he figured that was a good sign. "Chao," he grumpily said.

"Come on, don't look so sour." Sorun bent down and picked the Chao up. "It's my job to do all the dangerous stuff. Your job is emotional support, remember?"

Virgil huffed and turned his head to the side as Sorun placed him in a sitting position on his left shoulder. "Chao-chao."

"Hey, no, you do help. Who else is gonna motivate me to be so stylish when I'm slapping somebody silly?" he asked as he turned towards Freedom HQ's entrance. "'Sides, you can't move that well with only one wing."

"Chao..."

Sorun sighed as he began walking towards the HQ's entrance. The fact that the two hedgehogs were to the side of his path and staring intently at him was not lost on him. "Look, Virgil, don't worry about it, okay?" he said. "If anything you're the lucky one. You don't have to fight."

Virgil didn't say anything in response, but the Chao still had an upset look on his face. Sorun didn't much know why. Upset at his own inadequacy to help his friend fight, probably, as he'd been really mad when Sorun had just offloaded him like that. Or maybe he just wanted to stay on Sorun's shoulder as he fought for the thrill. He didn't truly know, but no matter what face Virgil made he wasn't gonna put the Chao in danger by taking him into a fight with him. He just had to learn to live with it, Sorun supposed.

The human teen felt his heart rate increase a fair bit when he approached the two hedgehogs, though he kept his eyes forwards on the HQ's door entrance as he tried his best to look towards them. This proved to be in vain, however, as Sonic had stepped closer to him and held a hand out.

"Sorun-"

"Not a word, Sonic." Sorun stopped in his tracks and, not even looking towards Sonic, pointed his index finger at him. "Not. A single word. Out of you."

He lowered his hand back to his side and continued walking to the entrance. He opened the door, and then quickly descended the steps down into the HQ itself. He stepped into the HQ's living room, a bit of nostalgia hitting him as he looked around at the familiar surroundings along with relief when he didn't see anybody. He only got one step in further when Sonic zipped in front of him in a burst of super speed.

"Sorun, can you stop for a sec-!"

"What did I say- oh, forget it. Hold this." Without another word, Sorun picked Virgil up off his shoulder and deposited him into Sonic's hand. The blue hedgehog looked down at the Chao he was holding in bewilderment, and then looked back up as Sorun stepped to the lab's entrance.

Taking a deep breath, Sorun opened the door to the lab and stepped in. As he suspected, he saw the red Chaos Emerald resting on a nearby table. He also noticed that Tails was there at the computer, though the fox was mainly ignored by the human as he walked towards the Emerald. He wasn't ignored by Tails, however, who stopped whatever it was he was doing to stare bug-eyed at Sorun as he stopped in front of the table and reached to pick up the Emerald with his left hand. He made a small noise when he felt the red Emerald stick to his hand, and then promptly turned back around to walk back into the living room.

Walking back out into the living room, Sorun saw that Sonic was still there, his gaze shifting from Sorun to the Chao he was currently holding with confusion in his eyes. Shadow had arrived, too, looking just as confused as Sonic was as his eyes traveled down to the Chaos Emerald stuck to Sorun's left hand.

He avoided both of their gazes and turned towards the couch. Grumbling under his breath, he walked over to it and began removing the cushions from the furniture piece before he began laying them out on the ground.

"... Sorun, what are you doing?" he heard Sonic ask from behind him, voice almost exhausted at watching Sorun's antics.

"I want something soft to land on when this thing knocks me out," Sorun answered as he put down the last cushion.

"Fair enough," Sonic said with a frustrated sigh as the human turned towards him and Shadow. "Can you just please slow down so we can talk?"

"Mm. Sure, in a minute after I wake up," Sorun agreed as he looked down at the red Emerald. He stared down at it for a second, and then took in a deep breath to prepare himself for the coming shock. "Here goes... well, everything."

He slammed his right hand down onto the Emerald, his breath hitching in his throat when he felt the Chaos energy beginning to rapidly surge within him. All too suddenly he felt an overwhelming jolt of power run through him, and automatically began tilting backwards as a result. He'd gone unconscious before his body had even hit the cushions.