The people on ao3 dont know this, but im planning on posting more concept art there somewhere around ch 60
dont tell them its a secret - and if you want to see previous concept art it is on A03 - CH 33 if you want to look
hehehe secrets
its so fun having a split audience
It was well past noon, and Shadow had not returned yet. Silver was worried at first, being alone with a strange woman and her son, but quickly loosened up after he started to bond with the other child. Skip was his name - and he was almost the same age as Silver.
Skip was a lot of fun. The golden retriever had a huge imagination, and as soon as the household chores were done; he invited the small hoglet to come out and play. Silver was polite enough to help with the chores, and the invitation left him confused at first. Play? Silver had never played before. Even back at the orphanage he was too busy trying to stay alive to even consider playing with Basil and Lyre. A starving child in a place lacking food was always searching the floorboards and the ground around the rotting building for scraps of nutrition.
However, Skip was more than happy to show the boy his age how to play. Patiently, he taught the ivory hedgehog how to use his imagination. By handing him a stick of course.
"This can be whatever I want?" Silver asked, staring at the leafless branch in his hands.
"Whatever you want!" Skip replied, waving his own stick around. "Mine is a sword - Excalibur as the stories go. I'm King Arthur!"
"And…um…" Silver stammered, trying to think of a story that Fliss had shared with him. "And I'm Sonic!"
"En garde!" Skip shouted, swinging the branch lazily into Silver's - creating a loud clack.
"On guard!" Silver responded, pulling from his memory how Shadow used swords in the past. Remarkably, the stick was an extension of his own arm - reacting to his movements in a similar way to his hands. Silver's brain ticked, trying to think of a way to defeat Skip in a way that wouldn't hurt him.
"You can't beat me!" Skip laughed, pulling himself into a sloppy stance and waving the wooden growth around. "I'm unbeatable!"
"We'll see about that!" Silver smiled, lunging at the dog with a precise poke.
Skip dodged - a clear expression of shock lining his features. Pearly white teeth bared in a smile as Silver swiped and stepped - muscle memory pulling moves from his kata as he advanced. Obviously, Skip didn't stand a chance. The fast sweeps and calculated movements very quickly overwhelmed the child. Before he could even register that Silver had knocked the branch out of his hand, blue eyes found the end of a stick pointed between his eyes.
"Oh…you got me!" He groaned, grabbing the branch and sticking it under his arm. Silver let go as the dog dramatically walked around - twisting and turning before he flopped on the ground in a theatrical groan.
"I've faded away." He coughed fakely. "You can take my scabbard - it makes you immortal."
"That wasn't very fun." Silver sighed. "It was too easy."
"You're right." Skip replied, sitting up. "It's not fair you're a Prodigy."
"So now what do we do?" The hoglet asked, staring into the eyes of the gold puppy.
"We can try toys?" Skip shrugged.
"Toys?" Silver asked, tilting his head to one side.
"Here - let me show you."
Before Silver could respond, Skip had bolted into his hut. Sounds of a chest opening and rummaging filled the air as the hoglet stood in the yard. What in the world was he doing? After a minute or two, Skip re-emerged - carved wooden objects in hand.
"Follow me!" He shouted, running down the unpaved trail to the main road. "Let's go get Aster!"
Silver found it very easy to keep pace with the other five-year-old. Despite how energetically the puppy ran, the hoglet had run greater distances on a daily basis. Bare paws and leather boots hit the cobbled road as they passed over the main road.
Silver took this time to get the lay of the land. Lining the cobbled bypass, the Prodigy noticed several businesses with signs and symbols handing from posts. He couldn't quite read the letters well enough to know what they said, but the symbols helped him discover what lay in the public buildings. An Inn, with a mug for some reason, was the largest building - an obvious attraction for people passing through. On one side stood a butcher's shop - with meats and hooks hanging free, draining blood from the fattened carcasses. Silver felt his mouth water as the two jogged past it. Shadow's honeyed rabbit would always haunt his thoughts. On the other side, was the Blacksmith. Gold eyes could see the strong bull tinkering away with his claw; carefully taking his time to do a good job with the prized crystal.
Skip turned, running between the Inn and the Blacksmith down another unpaved trail. Dodging a tree, the two continued on - past houses and huts with a small field barely visible within the walled bounds.
"Aster!" Skip called, stopping in front of a larger house. Giggling to himself, the golden puppy laid the toys on the dirt.
"Aster - come out!" He called again, this time earning an opened window.
"What?"
A bear cub poked his head out of the window - clearly the son of the Elder. He was slightly older than the two, maybe six or seven, but no less curious of what the two children had to say.
"Silver doesn't know how to play!" Skip called back, pointing at the prodigy next to him.
"Mom!" The bear called, poking his head back inside the window. It was unclear if the cub was grounded or not, but it was obvious he had to ask permission to join the other two children. It took a bit of shouting back and forth, but eventually the mother conceded. It took less than two seconds for Aster to burst out of the house when he received the go ahead - arms full of wooden carvings as well.
"Come on!" He cheered, sliding to a stop in front of the younger kids. "Let's do this."
Curious, Silver crouched next to the other children, shifting his hands over the toys. There were several different types of carvings. Some were Mobians, like himself, and others were wildlife. The other two children started divvying up the objects, bickering amongst themselves as to who got what.
"So these can be whatever I want?" Silver asked, holding up a wooden hedgehog.
"Yep." Aster responded, selecting a fox. "And then we get to make stories!"
Silver was immediately interested. He could make stories? The hoglet loved stories. He was always vehemently invested whenever Fliss would share tales or news from the outside world. Even when Shadow told of times long past, the young prodigy was listening with ears peeled for every detail. It never occurred to him that he could make his own. Now things were getting interesting.
"That's Sonic." Skip announced, pointing at the hedgehog figure in the cyan marked paws. "Why don't you play him."
"Oh…uh…ok." Silver responded, unsure of what to do.
"And I'm a bad guy." Aster evilly chuckled, bouncing the fox figure across the dirt. "I'm gonna steal the kids hahahaha!"
"Not on my watch!" Silver exclaimed, slamming the hedgehog figure down. "You can't do that!"
"Try to stop me!" Aster laughed.
"Help! Help!" Skip fakely called, holding a smaller figure next to the fox. "Save me Sonic!"
Silver didn't quite know why, but a twinge of anxiety flooded through his system.
"I'll save you!" "Sonic" responded.
Aster stood up, holding the toy against the ground and running off. Skip followed, pretending to have the child toy struggle against the wooden fox.
"Try to catch me!" The fox figure jeered.
"I'm coming!" The Sonic figure responded, running after the two.
For a while, the three kids ran around - circling a tree and jumping fences. Silver held his hedgehog figure close, trying to catch up to the other kids but knowing in his sinking heart that he would outrun them. He needed to catch them. That little toy was in serious danger, and Sonic needed to succeed. Or else the fox would hurt the little toy.
"Haha!" The fox figure laughed, being stuffed in a hole in the side of the village wall. "I'm in my secret base! You can't hurt me here!"
"Not if I burn it to the ground." The Sonic figure darkly responded.
"What?"
"There will be fire everywhere." The Sonic figure responded. "There will be death. Fire consumes everything. It takes the walls. It takes you guards. It takes your weapons."
"What?" Aster asked, voice growing less playful.
"It consumes everything as I come." The Sonic figure continued. "I'll kill your guards - their blood drenching my gloves and fur as I push onwards, leading the children behind me. It will be everywhere. Blood on the walls. Blood on the floor. Blood on my face."
"Silver?" Skip asked, removing his hand from the small wooden toy.
"It will consume everything." Silver continued, dropping the hedgehog toy into the dirt. "It consumes you…it consumes me…it…it takes everything…."
Gold eyes grew distant as memories flushed through the prodigy's head. Blood…blood and fire… dead teens…dead guards…dead…death… Everywhere… Loud pops…roaring fires….everything…everything consumed in an orange blaze of hate and rage….
"It will burn everyone…" Silver sniffed, wiping his eyes. "It will burn me…."
"You ok?" Aster asked, holding his paw out to the young hedgehog in concern.
"Y-yeah." Silver responded, leaning down and picking up the hedgehog toy. "Sorry…"
"It's ok." Skip replied cheerfully. "We can play something else if you want."
"Oh…uh…ok." Silver responded.
"How 'bout cops and robbers?"