Hi people! I'm back! Been doing a reread to get my mind fresh

Politics are the least fun aspect of any point in life and for Sonic it was no different, having to ask for permission from the older folk was not Sonic's way to do things but he adhered to the system to not cause trouble. But of course, this didn't mean it always happened that way as there had been more than once when ran into problems and had to be lectured, and right now it was one of those moments. The recent battle had not been pretty and there was certainly more than one Sonic which was not part of the agreement he and the council had made previously, however, this didn't mean that Sonic was going to jail or anything like that.

At least not if he stopped the operation completely, that is, getting rid of any of the 'doppelgangers' as they were called, now Sonic had no idea how exactly getting rid of them would work but he had made the promise of just one back then. It wasn't exactly a promise but the way he guaranteed, made it seem as if that was the case.

"And… where is the king?" he asked "Shouldn't he also give his opinion?"

The council looked at each other with worry.

"The king is not feeling very well at the moment," Rosemary said.

That explanation looked suspicious but Sonic didn't mind, he accepted their final offer and left the building, although he had no idea how he would implement these changes, he didn't know how many Sonics there were nor the reason why there were so many in the first place, it didn't matter but it was still in his mind.

But among all of these thoughts, there was one that was the most important and that was the situation with Sally or better said, both of them, or whatever it was, solving that problem was the main goal, it always was and they were close to finally accomplish it, he quickly headed to the lab where he assumed Rotor would be waiting for him so they could finally understand what exactly the deal was. As he was on his way, he was called by someone from behind.

"Sonic!"

Turning around, it was none other than Tails who rushed into a hug that took Sonic by surprise.

"Tails? Are you… my Tails?"

"Only if you're my Sonic," the fox said smiling "I heard that you were having a discussion with the council and that you caught Sally".

"Yeah, I was heading there…" Sonic replied understanding that this was, indeed, the Tails he knew "But, where have you been this entire time buddy?"

"We were trying to stop the Death Egg and, you might not like this, but we accidentally brought in another batch of Freedom Fighters, not just its designated Sonic".

This piece of news hit Sonic quite heavily and he appeared to not fully comprehend.

"Another Freedom Fighters? Do you mean… another Sally?"

"Including that, I know that-" as Tails was explaining, Sonic dashed away leaving a blue blur and the fox behind before he ultimately came back, taking Tails along with him into the building where the final preparations were being done.

"You know I'm not as fast as you, you could have just asked," said Tails getting dizzy after they had arrived at the Science Center, the exact place where they brought the two Sallys in.

"Sorry buddy, but something happened when I was in the Death Egg and you should know it too" the hedgehog led him to the main room where Rotor was waiting for him.

"Hey Sonic! I get you finished your talk with the council".

"Yeah, went well, as you can imagine and Chuck's not coming so it's just us, now, where are the two Sallys?"

The walrus pointed to a nearby bed where both of them were unconscious but tied up, just in case. Tails took a closer look and was also amazed and shocked to see a duplicate of Mecha Sally except without color, this wasn't the Sally they had been adventuring with but it was still quite a discovery.

"You say you saw her in the Death Egg?" the fox asked.

"Yeah, didn't show any signs of attacking though… think is from another dimension? Don't know how many 'another dimension' we have already".

"It might be, the Sally from another dimension that accompanied us is not a robot… unless…"

"They're the same person you geniuses," said another voice coming from the door of the room "Didn't you guys lose her on the ship? And now you see a second one that comes from the same place".

"Who is she?" asked Tails.

"The name's Sticks, and I helped to bring down that ship you had trouble with".

The fox looked at Sonic looking for confirmation which he did confirm with a nod and crossed arms.

"And what are you doing here?" Sonic asked.

"Just figured you might need my help, I spent some time inside that thing, I'm sure I'll know anything you might want to know".

Tails looked back at Metal Sally once again and it did make sense, two plus two equals four, and unless there was another, another, another dimension that they had missed then that was the clear answer.

"What happened with Bunnie and Antoine?"

"You mean the other two? I dunno, they were already off the ship by the time it got here".

As she was talking, Metal Sally finally woke up realizing that she was strapped into a bed with her first instinct trying to break free, the rest took notice of this and immediately rushed towards her to calm down and it was pretty easy as the familiar faces were more than enough.

"You're alright, you're safe," said Sonic without much thinking, this version of Mecha Sally wasn't going to harm them.

"Sally?" Tails inquired "I'm Tails, you know, just Tails, can you recall that?"

Metal Sally nodded energetically given that she couldn't utter a word but having just Tails around was comforting but not for the little fox, the inclusion of a second robotized Sally threw every variable in for a loop again, furthermore, how would Archie Sonic react to this, it was scary to see that. And right then, the second Sally woke up and just like the first one after feeling she was restrained she tried to break free but was much more aggressive and everyone knew there was no calming down this one.

Without hesitation, Tails freed Metal Sally fully knowing she was on her side, Metal jumped immediately and pinned Mecha with her arms trying to stop her from even getting up, Mecha decided to get free of her by charging up the laser on her forehead causing Metal to fall back and Mecha to gather enough force to rip out the restraints and shoot the laser that everyone dodged. Instantly, everyone took the offense with the main goal to incapacitate her again and fast.

Metal took the initiative by hitting her repeatedly until Mecha grabbed her arm and threw her straight at Sonic, a wooden boomerang hitting her head right after with no effect, looking at the one who had thrown it was enough distraction for Sonic to charge a spin dash.

She activated her sword blades pushing Sonic away and tackling Tails away. Rotor activated his nanotech suit and landed some quick hits that didn't do much either as she was able to dispatch him as well, when she went for Sticks, the badger just dodged everything she could and jumped all around not engaging in physical contact, Mecha used her jets to propel forward and kick her into the ground and slash a final blow only to be blocked by Mecha firmly holding her arms with a look that could be defined as angry. Throwing her away she tried to ignite her own sword blades only to remember she didn't have those, not a problem, she also had a set of boosters that she used to gain speed and tackle Mecha.

It was an exchange of sword slashes and blocking. Metal managed to blow a kick to the chest that threw back Mecha and caused her to lose her balance which gave her a quick upper hand to repeatedly throw hit after hit after kick nonstop until she stopped realizing that she was down.

"And stay down," said Sticks giving her a final bat with the boomerang and the rest of the team getting up hurt although in good condition "Alright, now who fixes the machine?".

That final statement made everyone look at the machine and it had suffered quite some noticeable damage, enough to be concerned about it.

"Oh no," Sonic said with worry "Rotor, is it bad?"

"I believe it can still work," he said after deactivating his suit and inspecting the device "Although… I don't know… we can still try".

Everyone in the room looked at each other and Sonic couldn't let this opportunity pass, the final decision was to go ahead and try it anyways but Tails had a different idea in mind.

"I believe you should go first," the fox smiled at Metal Sally surprising both her and Sonic "After all, it's not fair you end up like this".

Metal Sally didn't know how to react to this and despite her lack of voice, she couldn't think of any reply, looking back at Sonic and the defeated Mecha Sally she quickly realized that despite the nice gesture from Tails, it was not her time which she showed with a shake of her head surprising the little fox.

"Huh? But we-" she stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

"Hey, we can un-robot the two of them, right Rotor?"

The walrus stared at the machine with an uncertain look and back at Sonic.

"Robotization hasn't been used in years, let alone how to reverse it, and with a machine like this… well, I cannot confidently say it'll work twice".

Sonic let out a small sigh and just like Tails, he also wished for this new Sally to go first, however, she also looked at Sonic and it was clear that she didn't want to be the one to go first.

"Alright. Tails, Rotor, let's do this".

And for the next minute or so, there was a silence across the room, just the three of them, setting everything up with Sticks and Metal as spectators, carrying Mecha Sally into the machine with Rotor making sure of the configurations as well as he could after their little fight around the room. The anxiety from everyone could be silently felt as they waited for whatever was intended to happen, to happen. The clunky door closed and with that, it was turned on, doing its thing for a few seconds with weird sounds all around, and after what felt like minutes, the door opened, except that it got stuck so they had to forcefully open it only to reveal what they most feared, Mecha Sally had not changed back, she was still unconscious, still inside the big metal can and still in that robotic body.

You could tell by their reactions that they were not prepared for this, especially Sonic, however, the most shocking thing in the room was yet to happen.

"Sonic?" said the weak and static voice of Sally, the hedgehog slowly walked towards her in disbelief reaching out until their hands finally met.

"Sally?"

Back in Freedom HQ, it was getting a bit crowded but everyone managed to make a bit of room for themselves, whether it was on the couch, leaning against a wall, or sitting on the stairs that led to the upper floor. Right now Prime Tails had gone to the city while everyone else was fine to wait until he got back, after all, some of them had some catch-up to do.

"I guess we're both out of our element," said Tom after hearing what his Sonic went through.

"I am so ready to go home," added Sonic "Seeing more than one me is getting weird".

Tom agreed with a nod.

"Yeah, they're trying to rescue someone, that's what we were doing near that ship… I don't think I know how that's going".

Rescue someone? -the hedgehog thought- he was now curious about who could be this person that needed rescue -that one could assume it wasn't him-. Now that he was having his first breather since he arrived in this new world there were a lot of things he was curious about, he looked around the room seeing the numerous Sonics, it was a weird image for sure but at the same time, he couldn't help but smile, the one that caught his attention was a human kid across the room that was also talking to a Sonic. Nice to know that there was another human besides Tom.

As for that kid, he also had stories to tell.

"Chris, none of this is your fault," X tried to explain once they had settled in, he was happy to finally reunite with him and it appeared that Chris had a lot of time to himself "This world is just weird".

"But you know what's gonna happen to the worlds… time will stop and I shouldn't have stopped you from going to your world, maybe we wouldn't even be here, I-… I want to fix things".

"Chris," X paused with a smile "You-".

"What worlds?" it was Knuckles who completely took them by surprise.

"Hey, Knux! Just catching up with an old buddy".

"I can see… so, buddy, you mind giving us space?" the sudden request confused Chris looking at Sonic who shrugged, granting the said request with Chris simply walking away looking at the echidna.

"Sonic, what are we doing here?" a head tilt from the hedgehog asked for elaboration "It's just that it feels that we've gotten nowhere and now we're here, waiting with all of these… I don't even know".

"Heh, I don't know either," he said smiling across the room "Wait- gotten nowhere? What about all that chaos thing?"

"The more I think about it the less it explains, I'm starting to believe it was nothing but a theory".

Sonic looked at him as he looked at the floor, the Knuckles he was used to had never experienced something like this and he was willing to help but at the same time, this was out of his element, he looked at Chris at the other side of the room to stop and think but everyone's attention was quickly pulled away to another Sonic, Archie Sonic to be precise who was having another of his episodes in the middle of the room, feeling a pain in his chest that grew and grew before finally going away leaving Archie coughing and everyone looking at him with serious concern.

"Sonic?" asked Archie Tails reaching out to him "You want to take a rest?"

Archie figured it would be for the best, sitting on the couch nearby still holding his chest without saying a word and not paying attention to the looks he was getting.

Tangle and Sonic looked at each other with a hint of curiosity, and Sonic especially looked at his hand as if he waited for something to happen but nothing did that led to a sigh.

-X-

As Super Sonic flew around with no clear destination, he was realizing that this place was off, nothing felt familiar and his hand still hurt, everything was pretty confusing about the whole situation. He remembered Sonic back in the city -or Sonics- something serious had happened while he was away, but now he was free and he was about to find out.

Fight scenes are not my forte, for sure.

Man, this story has a long way to go and I'm excited for it. Other than the ending i have just been winging it and doing what feels natural, that's why I'm having so much fun and I hope you guys are also having fun with it. I've had lots of work, lots of studies, lots of PC crashes all that slow the writing but I'm always gonna return, so yeah.

Thank you all for your support and see you soon!