Chapter Fifteen: Bedtime Stories

And so she sleeps.

And beside her, I do not.

Instead, I watch her breathe.

Over the years that have since been undone, I had believed I had memorized the pace of Nova's breaths, waking or sleeping. But in sickness, her breathing mutates into an entirely different creature.

I love her in weakness. I love her in health.

I would give my own life if it meant she returned to me.

Shadow draped another cool damp cloth across Nova's forehead so that it covered her eyes before he lowered himself back into the chair he had pulled up beside her bed. As much as he wanted to see her eyes the moment they opened again—if they opened again (and they had to; they had to)—the last thing he wanted her to do was panic when she saw the IV in her arm, the stitches in her wing. At least they had taken the time to wash the blood away from her wounds so the sight of blood wouldn't send her over the edge.

But wasn't she already over that edge? Nova gasped for air like she was still running, even with an oxygen mask helping her. Shadow cursed himself for leaving her, even if it had been in an effort to find them help. If he had been there, could he have prevented this from happening to her? Airin'swas classified as a disease but it so often had a trigger. And with Nova's wings in the shape that they were…

Which Metarex tore open her wing? Shadow would shred them apart piece by piece. He would make every remaining moment of their life agony. And Shadow would relish it.

Not now, though. Now he brushed his hand against Nova's. Maybe instinct alone would make her twitch. But no, her body didn't react. It spent every shred of its energy keeping Nova alive.

"Nova," he whispered, "I'm here. And I will never leave your side. Never again. For as long as you shall live."

-X-X-X-

Amy's View

"I need to get us off-world."

Amy jumped at the sound of Tails's voice behind her. Because she was in the midst of scrubbing her hands clean before she checked Nova's bandages, her sudden motion only succeeding in splashing an excessive amount of water down her front. Water soaked through her red dress, darkening the fabric. Rivulets of water ran down her arms and face as she turned to face Tails, grabbing blindly for a clean towel.

To his credit, Tails at least had the decency to blush apologetically. Dark bruises rimmed the bottom edges of his eyes. Had any of them spent any more than accidentally stolen hours on sleep since they had landed on Majyk? Tails cleared his throat and tried again, "Nova's probably as stable as she's going to get and sitting in the same place for so long makes us too easy a target for the Metarex."

Amy buried her face in the towel a moment to soak up the water. When she pulled it away again, she said, "Why are you telling me? Shouldn't you be working with Chris on that?"

She turned away again to drop the towel into the hamper. After a beat, Tails muttered, "Yeah. Yeah, I'll go talk to Chris then."

Amy didn't turn back around again until she heard Tails's footsteps fade away behind her. But even then, all she did was release a heavy sigh and lift her head so she could meet her own tired eyes in the mirror. C2's eyes. "What are the Metarex making us become?" she breathed.

-X-X-X-

Tails's View

Tails didn't sleep anymore.

If he wasn't in the infirmary, he was on the bridge. If he wasn't on the bridge, he was in the infirmary. Busy, always busy, because it was far better than the alternative. He hated having the space to think.

His thoughts were consumed by Sonic and Cosmo.

They couldn't be okay; it was no use wasting time on such a frivolous hope. Instead, he spent those spare moments merely praying they were alive. The Metarex wouldn't just kill them, would they? What would be the point of such an execution?

The very idea made Tails's stomach turn.

But the Metarex had done it before. They hadn't known they were dealing with a Chaos Double when Shining Birch had Sonic executed during the Changed War. So why wouldn't the Metarex just do the same thing again? The memory rang through his head every time he closed his eyes.

And so he made a point of never closing his eyes.

But his mind was deteriorating. The edges of who he was felt like they were breaking off and crumbling to dust. Who would he be when all this was over (because this all had to end eventually, didn't it? For better or worse, this all had to end?)?

Would anything remain of Miles Prower?

He had no answers. He hardly had next steps or future plans or the strength it took to continue in their pursuit. But if one thing could be known for certain, it was this:

He was not alone.

As Tails paced around the back-up bridge of the Blue Typhoon (since he knew if he sat, the exhaustion weighing his body down would surely take over), Chris slipped inside and the doors slid closed behind him. Tails frowned, glancing at the communicator around his wrist for the time. "Weren't we switching command in an hour?" he asked. The words slurred as they fell away from his tongue. He cringed at the reminder of his exhaustion.

Chris shook his head. "No, I know. I just thought we could talk for a minute."

Tails frowned. "Why, what's wrong? Is the engine back-up not holding up?" What a way for their current situation to go from bad to worse. The Blue Typhoon and her crew were basically being held together by nothing more than spit and prayer at this point.

But Chris's eyes widened and he quickly shook his head. "No, nothing like that. The ship's fine. Or as fine as it can be, considering. I just…wanted to talk."

Tails blinked a few times as his brain took a moment to make sense of Chris's words. And when it finally did, all Tails could think to say in reply was, "Oh."

Chris smiled. He stepped further into the room and wandered over to the captain's chair. But rather than sitting in it, he leaned against its side, crossing his arms against his chest. The gesture was so Sonic-like that a film of tears rose up in Tails's eyes. He had to swallow the building lump in his throat several times before he reclaimed control of his body.

"Do you remember," Chris began, "when you told me it was better to slow down and make a plan as opposed to running into danger, back when we were in the first war against the Metarex?"

Tails's already heavy heart sank further in his chest. He recalled that when they left Mobius for the first time during their conflict with the Metarex, their first mission had taken them to a planet drowning beneath an ocean. And during an encounter with the Metarex on that planet, Sonic had been captured. Chris had wanted to run in and rescue him. Tails had argued for a more tactical approach.

My, how the tables had turned.

"It's not that I'm trying to rush, Chris," Tails explained tiredly. He slumped back so that he sat on the very edge on one of the control consoles lining the edges of the room. "We just don't have the luxury of time. The Metarex are on top of us with every move we make and with the Blue Typhoon all banged up and without Sonic, there's no way we'll stand a chance if we don't keep moving."

"Tails, I agree with you," Chris insisted slowly. "And I'm not saying we can stop or slow down. But…what I am saying is that none of us is an island. We always talk about how we're all in this together, and when the going gets tough, we all jump. I mean, just look at how we mobilized to get Nova stable!"

Chris's shoulders fell. His expression softened. The smile that spread across his lips was almost sad. "But when it comes to emotional weight, all of us still keep trying to bear it alone."

Tails's mouth drifted open, like he intended to reply. But no words sprang to the forefront of his mind.

Chris continued, "We're all tired. We're all scared. And angry. So maybe, instead of each of us trying to carry the weight of the universe, we can carry it together? Which means that no one has to be the strong one. We can each be weak alone, since our strength is in the bonds between us."

Still, nothing more than air spilled through Tails's lips. After a moment, he didn't even have the strength to hold Chris's gaze anymore and instead averted his gaze to look down at the floor just in front of the toes of his sneakers. And then—

"I'm so tired, Chris."

The words spilled from Tails before he even realized he was speaking at all. And once they started coming again, they didn't stop there. "All of this, it's all too much. The Blue Typhoon's a wreck, we don't have a maintainable power source, and the Metarex are on top of us with every turn. Then Cosmo and Sonic get kidnapped. And then there's Nova dying in our infirmary. And we can't even do anything for her."

Tails pressed his palm against his eye to brush the tears away before Chris saw but it was no use. "I'm supposed to be the captain, Chris. I'm supposed to know what to do. But I don't know how to fix this. And every day, I just wish I'd wake up from this horrible nightmare and go back to the life I'm supposed to have. Because this can't be it. We've lived through this timeline three times now and this can't be the one we're left with."

"I'm tired too," Chris admitted softly. "We all are. And no one expects you to have all the answers. You might be our captain, but you're also our friend. And our friend first. So let's do this together. All of this. Including carrying the weight."

Tails lifted his head to find that Chris had taken a step forward to bridge the space between them. "Remember," Chris continued, "this is how we started the Changed War, right? Sonic missing. Cosmo lost. And by the end, we rebuilt our family. We can do it again. And besides—" Chris's smile widened until it was almost a smirk. "—we've already beaten them three times. What's one more?"

At the sound of that, Tails straightened. Less at Chris's words and more at his tone. His confidence. Tails inhaled a deep breath. He slowly exhaled it again. His heart still beat a million miles a minute. His heart still ached.

But it gave him enough strength to say, "So what do you think we should do next?"