Disclaimer: See first chapter.

Curiosity

Fern Valley was aptly named. For one, there were dozens of ferns everywhere. Despite the current snow level, it was clear that most of this place never saw snow for very long. The trees were tall and surprisingly large, and Whisper felt a sudden connection to the land as a whole.

She would always prefer cities, but something about being out here made all of her worries just drop away. And it wasn't because some of the wisps were talking in their natural language, she'd made sure of that.

"Remember that one time when Black decided he'd built the best bomb yet, and was rolling it down the mountain yelling 'look out below!'" Orange said, lost in her memories.

"I do remember that! That was a pain, because I had to hover that thing out of the way. There were a few whites down there that didn't realize what was going on until they saw the giant black bomb rolling down the mountain," Green said.

"That was you!?" Orange sounded shocked. "You kept that thing afloat for nearly a mile before you dropped it into the ocean."

"On an indigo actually, they were more than happy to take it apart and not let it explode. Black wasn't happy, let me tell you that much!"

"How big would that explosion have been? He was bragging about it making a new valley."

"I don't know, it was a big one. Those black bombs can hit hard, but I don't know about damage."

Pink sidled up to Lavender. "How much time did you spend on Planet Wisp?" He asked. "Those two are reminiscing about ancient times!"

"Not ancient..." Blue corrected with a smirk. Pink rolled his eye.

Lavender nodded. "Not long. Maybe...three, four hundred years? Six maybe."

"Wisp years or earth years? Found out there's a big difference between the two."

Whisper's ears perked back. Did that mean that Green's slip up meant they were even older than Whisper thought they were?

"Wisp years. How old is that?"

"About twenty per one. Twenty earth years for one wisp. Cyan figured out that calculation and told us all once we realized just how young Whisper actually is," Pink stated.

The forest encroached around Whisper, and her boots crunched against the snow and dirt. There was a path, ages ago, but it had been lost to time, and now Whisper was just finding her own direction. She knew which way she had to go, and Violet had said she wasn't far in.

She made sure to keep looking around and down, more than once taking care to look up too. Most animals that lived in woods like these liked to come up from the treetops, if only because no one looked up.

There was no sign of Violet and Metal Sonic, but the signal had been strong on the radio. It was unlikely that she was far. "Orange, no Time Eater?" She asked.

Orange blinked, before she rocketed up above the treeline. She came back down a minute later, Whisper staying in one place. "Nope! You're good, for now. Good catch, I always keep forgetting to keep a lookout."

Whisper's attention was suddenly turned away as the wisps slowly started teasing Orange about her being the eyes of the group but not being a good lookout. There was some movement of another color not far off.

Blue. It reminded her of Sonic strongly, but it couldn't have been him. For one, he was in Green Hill. Although he did have Chaos Control...could it be Metal Sonic?

She walked towards it, jumping over a fallen and dead log of a tree as she did. Her boots crushed a small fern as she did, before she started to see the clearing.

It was a small area, not too far in, exactly as Violet had described. There were a few stumps that had been broken down naturally in the middle, and Whisper could tell most of the trees came from those stumps. What was it they were called? Fairy circles? Something close to that.

The grass was mostly pure white, small stalks of green trying to poke out from the snow. Violet herself still had the mask on, a funny look considering that she was a fox herself, talking with Metal Sonic, who stood straight stall, his white scarf flowing silently in the small wind that was there.

Most of the dents in his torso and arms were gone. Had he taken Violet here for repairs? Whisper knew that he was intelligent, very intelligent, so it was likely that he knew Violet would help him if he asked.

Whisper trudged through the last bit of the snow covered ferns before she entered the clearing. "Whisper!" Violet shouted with a broad grin. "You made it! Metal checked this place out and said it's mostly clear. We can probably settle down here for the night. It's likely whatever caused those quakes will get us out here."

Oh right, Whisper hadn't told them. "We don't need to fear those. It was caused by a yellow wisp too young to understand," Whisper explained.

Violet blinked. "Oh. Oh that's neat I didn't think wisps were that powerful. I mean, I saw what they did to Green Hill...oh right you weren't there for that," she said, looking over to Metal Sonic. "They're really strong!"

Whisper sat down on one of the stumps as Violet started explaining what happened at Green Hill. There were more points that Whisper was aware of that she wasn't, but she didn't feel like she should mention those. Most of those were wisp secrets.

She reached down into her emergency pack again, grabbing that same tent that Tails had built for her. Immediately the wisps in the know gathered around, watching with excitement as the tent folded itself out and up. By the time Violet stopped talking, the tent was fully functional and ready to go. "When did that get there?" Violet asked.

"About three seconds ago!" Pink chimed in before he raced into the tent. The other wisps followed instantly, although Lavender stayed out. Cyan popped out of the fox mask, taking deep breaths even though Whisper knew she didn't need to.

"These people talk. A lot. A lot a lot. I ain't blaming you Metal but why. Does. Violet. Talk so much," Cyan muttered under her breath. Metal Sonic made an odd sound, as if he was chuckling at the wisp's words.

"I don't talk that much!" Violet retorted.

"Yes you do! Seriously! I mean it wasn't so bad at the beginning in fact it was kinda nice because Whisper don't talk at all basically-" Cyan started.

Whisper rolled her eyes. She did talk. She just didn't talk a lot.

"And then when it went on for the last four hours while you were helping Metal and please Whisper I need something!" Cyan begged and pleaded for a moment.

"Oh. Uh...hi?" Lavender said quietly. Cyan looked up at her.

"Hi! Welcome to Whisper's Wispy Wisps Woods! I'm Cyan, and I'm the host of this place! In first place, of least amount of talking, we have Whisper the Wolf, who probably has the least amount to say out of everyone. In normal things, this isn't okay but she's also usually surrounded by Tangle who does all the talking for her. In second place, we have Metal Sonic, who talks so robotically that I created a small subroutine in the mask to automatically translate so that way I could get some rest and take the juice out of the batteries. I'm not sorry Whisper."

That was why she had the batteries there in the first place. "I knew the mask was acting funny! It kept saying low battery but I thought that was impossible..." Violet said.

She unclasped the mask and handed it over to Whisper, who took it with a grateful nod. She checked the fittings for just a second before she set it again on her face, resting at its usual place. It did have the low battery warning, but that was only for the wisp batteries.

"It's fine," Whisper said.

"Cyan seems...odd. Is this behavior normal for cyan wisps or is she just unusual?" Metal Sonic's voice said into her ear from the mask.

"It's not unusual. Cyan wisps are...strange, at the best of the times."

"Just for that Whisper, you're back down to second, with Lavender in first," Cyan nodded.

"I don't know what I'm in first for."

"Least amount of words spoken in the last five hours. Or six hours. Or seven, I don't know," Cyan murmured.

"Oh, then Yellow would win. She doesn't talk."

Cyan turned to Whisper. "Yellow?" She asked without a slight bit of hesitation. Whisper nodded and opened up her cloak, showing off the canisters inside. Most were empty, although one showed a small sleeping yellow wisp. "Huh. You have the entire set now. You know, laser, cube, frenzy, rocket, hover, spikes, drill?" Cyan brought up.

No, actually, Whisper hadn't know that. She tilted her head to the wisp. "Yeah, all the wisps' that were in Sonic's adventure up there. Lavender, I'm not sure if you count as nega-wisp or a white wisp, so I'm counting as both," Cyan explained.

She shrugged, as best a nega-wisp could. "I...don't know either," she said softly.

"That's alright! We have time. Plenty of it. Kind of our thing by now," Cyan grinned, her tone teasing. "Come on! I'll show you the tent, it's awesome!" Cyan said, diving into the tent with the others. Lavender gave Whisper a quiet side-eye, before she took went into the tent.

"Is that one of Dad's?" Violet asked after a moment. "I know Mr. Sonic had one, but after the time Velocity and I went on a prank war he decided to not let us go camping again," she continued.

Whisper tilted her head, raising an eyebrow. That was a story she hadn't heard. She'd heard that Violet was mostly of the calm kind of kid, but...well, Whisper was an only child. An adopted kid with one blood sibling and two adopted ones? No way that there wouldn't be some kind of rivalry there.

Whisper nodded her head. "It is. He gave it to us after Tangle kept forgetting hers."

"Tangle is the lemur, correct?" Metal Sonic's voice paraded out of the mask. Whisper had an idea, and unclasped the mask, turning it over and increasing the volume to the point that if anyone had been wearing it, their hearing would be off.

"She is. Grey, yellow shoes, long stretchy tail and somewhat carefree attitude."

Metal Sonic's voice rang out through the clearing. "I know of her. Twenty years ago she demanded where my Master had misplaced you. Violently."

"That's horrible!" Violet said, her hands coming over her mouth.

Actually that seemed perfectly in character. "That was when Eggman was still around. Seems normal, actually, considering what the Restoration normally did," Whisper explained.

"Yes. Tangle and I have fought briefly only a few times. Whisper and I even less. But fighting with the Restoration was not uncommon."

"I don't think that anybody should have fought!"

"We had no choice," Whisper said. "Eggman wanted us all subjugated or dead. Or robots."

Metal Sonic nodded. It was odd agreeing with the blue hedgehog robot considering how many times they were at odds. "He would have, as well. I was not created at the time when he first stormed onto South Island, however that was his modus operandi. He would steal away everything that gave off heat energy, using that heat to power robots."

"And it was the heat that came off of people, wasn't it?" Violet asked.

Metal Sonic nodded. "It was. On Little Planet, he did not want to invoke Sonic's ire. He found that the plants there gave off the radiation needed to power his badniks, so he used that rather than living beings. When Sonic came after him anyways, he reverted back to his South Island style when he tried to find the seven Chaos Emeralds on Westside."

"Why did Sonic go after him on Little Planet? Da...Mr. Sonic never told me any of these. He mentioned them, briefly, but always in a 'and then I went here.'"

Whisper reached down to her emergency bag, grabbing a small boxed ration. She had a few extras in the tent, too, because somehow it was capable of that spacial distortion, but she also felt that when Metal Sonic told her of all the negative things that happened. All of the negative things that Sonic had deliberately withheld from her.

She'd seen bad things, but Violet had never actually seen just how bad the world was when her parents were kids. And as much as Whisper hated to admit, she was still one of those kids.

"Sonic went to stop my Master because the Time Stones were on Little Planet. If my Master had gotten his hands on all six of them, it would be quite unfavorable to living beings."

Whisper hadn't expected that. "You mean everyone else except robots. I get that. That's what the Metal Virus did, too, right?" Violet asked.

"More so," Whisper admitted. "It was...did your parents ever let you watch any zombie movies? Night of the Living Dead? The Dead Island Experience?"

Violet blinked at her. "Yeah! I loved the Dead Island Experience, especially the third one. The third one's the best in the series."

Metal Sonic's hand went to his forehead. Whisper hadn't even known there was a sequel in the works, let alone more than that. She turned to Metal Sonic. And he answered without Whisper having to even vocalize the question. "Five years after you disappeared for the second, thirteen years for the third. Fifteen for the fourth, sixteen for the fifth, ending with the sixth three years ago."

There were six of them!?

If she stayed in the future for long, she was definitely going to have to watch some of those. Or would those be undone as well? Probably, truthfully, but she'd have to figure that out. Someone would get the ideas anyway.

"It was like those," Whisper said. "Except...darker. More real. Tangle said that she could feel the virus in her arms and legs, and she'd done everything right, but had to make a call to hold everyone back."

Violet stared at her. "That's..."

"That was the Metal Virus. All things to metal and robotics, including grasses, trees, and all life. All organic life would be changed and altered."

"How did you all win? How could you win against a force of nature like that?"

"We used a force of nature back," Whisper explained. "Super Sonic and Super Silver."

"I've never met Silver. Mr. Sonic spoke of him a lot, as did Mom and Dad, especially Mom, but...I don't think he ever showed up."

"Nor would he. He is a being of the future. He was flung to the past by machinations made only possible by a being of outside time. The Time Eater would also most likely go for him. Although he has not shown himself in over twenty three years," Metal Sonic stated simply. He stared at Whisper for a moment. "Twenty three years, three weeks and four days, to be exact."

Whisper wondered for a moment the importance of such an exact date. Three weeks and four days...if someone included the time she was in Green Hills for an unknown amount of time, that sounded like the exact time that she'd been misplaced. She'd been in the current timeframe for three weeks and four days. Spiral Hill they were only at for a day. Central City just one day. Surge and Kit's...only a few days. Had she really spent so long at Green Hill? No wonder the Time Eater had been able to track her there.

"Huh. Why so exact?" Violet asked. She let out a loud yawn a few seconds later, almost interrupting herself. "Food first, then I'll turn in," she said, turning to the boxed meal Whisper was starting to light up.

It was a quick thing, some meaty soup with beans and a bit of hard cakes to go with it. Nothing sugary, but plenty of everything else. It took not long to cook, and by the time Whisper was halfway done, Violet was heading into the tent. Whisper overheard the wisps arguing about silly things again, as they were constantly doing.

"Why do you trust me?" Metal Sonic asked, his head tilted oddly to the side. "I have done nothing but hurt you especially. My Master has only caused you harm and grief. Sage is not alone in knowing that. And yet, you trust me."

"I don't," Whisper clarified. "But I also think that giving second chances is what Tangle would think is best. If you worked with her at all, if you knew anything about her-"

He nodded. "I understand, then. You wish to appeal to be like her nature, so that way she could say in which she influenced you. Just as you influenced her."

Whisper shook her head. "No. I wish to be like her because she was a good person. She didn't do everything right, I'm here after all, but no. I want to be like her, a good person. And a good person gives second chances."

"I have been given many more."

"And yet you're here. We aren't friends, Metal. I don't think we ever could be. But Violet trusts you. And I trust Violet."

"She will make mistakes."

"Everyone does."

Metal Sonic kept staring for a moment, before he nodded. "The Valley is not far from here. The Time Eater has yet to make a presence in this forest, and I believe that with the runaway yellow wisp no longer causing an issue, it will soon track you here."

"The Time Eater doesn't like wisp energy?"

"Correct. My Master has long associated that the Time Eaters as a whole were meant to be predators of wisps, and wisps in turn became predators of them. Ecosystems are odd, that far into space."

"Any way to kill it permanently?"

"Data unknown. Neither Miles nor my Master has ever seen another one outside of the White Space. And yes, my Master did check. Many times, in fact."

So she'd be playing that one by improvisation. That was fine with her. She could do that without too many issues. She'd made it this far, after all. "Anything you can tell me about this place?" Whisper asked, putting one of her boots over the other. Her hands glided over the variable wispon, and she noticed they were taking the same motions they did night after night. Cleaning it, scuffing out the dirt and scratches that had been built up over the day. Last few days. Weeks. She'd cleaned it just recently hadn't she?

"The Valley is a approximately thirty kilometers north to south and approximately forty kilometers east to west. The easiest points of entry, and thus the ones they'd expect if hostile, are the Fern Valley and the King's River to the east. Annual rainfall is around forty milliliters. Average conditions are harsh, rocky, barren. Considered to be not suitable for expansion, as heat waste drifts downwards rather than up, creating areas of obviousness when building fortresses. Mirage Desert to the east is considered to be better, as heat waste can be cycled into the ground."

When she'd asked him for anything he could tell, she hadn't meant for him to read the entire paragraph that Eggman had put together on the place. But on the other hand, knowing the general layout and conditions was priceless, especially if this place was as barren as he'd said. She said nothing then, allowing him to continue as he so needed.

"Average chaos levels are low, meaning that the giant rings and entrances to the Special Zones are unlikely. Majority of life are small mammals, non-sapient, with a single small town on the edges towards King's River. Name unknown. Plants..." Metal Sonic's voice trailed off, and Whisper could tell he was either pulling up a particularly old file...or...

"Bah," Eggman's voice rang out from the mask. An old voice file then? "This place is useless to me. Cacti and gophers. That's all that's out there. Metal, Sage, what other places have you found?" Sage's voice rang out. "It's a good place, Father. No one would search for you out there. We can lead Knuckles to have the Angel Island over it, the water from Hydrocity-"

Eggman's voice again. A definite recording then, especially if it had Sage's voice on there. But why was this recorded? There had to be a reason that this, more than anything else, was recorded. "Knuckles and Angel Island is half the problem! The Master Emerald is blocking temporal readings from stabilizing. If a fortress were to be put out there, and an anomaly structured itself there, the entire thing could be lost."

"Angel Island's stabilizing presence itself could act as the anchor!"

"I've dealt with the Master Emerald before, Sage. Chaos and Tikal have made sure that it can not be used as an anchor, for me at least. And how would you convince Knuckles that it needs to be here to begin with? I'm legitimately concerned about your friendship with them."

"They're not bad people."

"Of course they aren't. It's why I use them," Eggman's voice was quiet.

"We lead him there. We use the Master Emerald's signature, not the emerald itself. We stabilize a temporal anchor, and with such low chaos levels Sonic wouldn't be able to turn Super."

"I wouldn't put anything past the hedgehog. He is chaos personified. And that's to say nothing of the Restoration. The lemur, Prower, Shadow...they wouldn't need high chaos levels to make my plans disappear. No, we find somewhere else."

"Yes, Master."

The clearing went silent. "Apologies. It has been a long time since I've last played that voice file," Metal Sonic stated simply.

"How many others do you have?"

"Many. Some I listen to more often than others. I had forgotten that the desert here was one that my Master and Sage had a discussion about, until I went searching in my file banks."

Whisper stared at him for a long moment. "You miss them too, don't you?"

"I am a robot, Whisper the Wolf. I do not 'miss' things. I keep to the present, and do what my Master asked of me," Metal Sonic retorted flatly. Whisper didn't believe him; his voice, toneless though it was, had that air of memory to it. As if to agree with his words, however, the white scarf around his neck wrapped around him, fluttering into the wind.

Whisper's hands were done with the variable wispon. It had been cleaned to perfection, exactly as Smithy had taught her, and just as she'd taught Tangle the one time the lemur had asked. She'd only done it the once, but teaching Tangle anything was an example of pure patience.

"Why are you still here? The source of the quakes has been found," Whisper asked suddenly. Her mind went to the yellow wisp in the canister, still sleeping away. She'll probably let her out into the tent.

"Because I wish to see if Angel Island can be visible from the ground. Early reports from my Master stated that the island could become invisible at will, but I have never witnessed it. If the Island is over or even near the desert, if there is a civilization, it would likely cause a panic. The Echidna would not want that."

"So you're curious."

Metal Sonic looked away. "Yes. I suppose I am...curious."

Was curiosity a thing that she knew Metal Sonic could have or be? According to Sonic, Sage had shown that capability but Metal Sonic was always just a robot. Was it possible his AI had learned during the twenty three years?

Or was it possible that he'd always been 'curious' but had never been able to show it?

A better look into the mindset of Metal Sonic.

Until Next Time!