Work Text:
The sun glistened down on the floating island in the clouds. It was a late morning for the red echidna who guarded the master emerald, who could have been tricked easily whilst sleeping on the job. It appears today hadn’t much to worry about regarding the emerald, thanks to Sonic managing to thwart whatever plan Eggman had cooked up his sleeve that week. Rouge had been out of the picture for a little while as well, likely her GUN work catching up to her.
Knowing he could rest easy today, knuckles stretched outwards, clicking his shoulders and back in the process. The lack of punching things influenced his level of energy recently. Noticing this, Knuckles needed to do something about it. He walked down the steps of the emerald shrine towards the nearby palm trees. Knuckles approached a palm tree to use as practice. Knuckles looked down at his right arm, flexing. He still had the muscle but needed to know if he still had the punch in him. Knuckles readied himself, getting in a fighting stance.
He lets out a few smaller punches, making large dents into the tree bark. He followed up with a flurry of punches, knocking out large portions of the tree trunk. The palm tree barely had enough weight to keep upwards at this point. Knuckles decided to finish it off with a jump, followed by a larger final blow.
“HIYAAAAUURRGGHH!” Knuckles grunted aloud, knocking the tree far off upwards. Six seconds later, a large thud could be heard from a distance, followed by nearby flickies fleeing in fear. “Yup, still got it in me” Knuckles boasted to himself, placing one foot on the tree stump and both hands on his waist, looking very accomplished at the fact that he destroyed a random tree for the fun of it.
“Awww, poor tree! What did they do to hurt your feelings?” A somewhat familiar voice teased from behind. Knuckles darted behind him. “Sonic?! I did not give you permission to co-“
Sonic was leaning against another palm tree, with hand on one hip and one foot against the tree trunk. Knuckles was cut off upon seeing Sonic’s appearance. Sonic was wearing a black hairband with a ribbon on her head, a white low-cut shirt with a cute chao design, a black body suit underneath, white fingerless gloves with black painted nails, a soft and round trainer version of her iconic shoes and a small amount of makeup. To anyone else they could tell that this was Sonic, but to Knuckles this looked like a completely different person.
“Oh, I um, I’m incredibly sorry ma’am. I thought you were another person for a moment, and I, um-“ Knuckles was blushing so hard that his muzzle was almost the same colour as his fur. He was incredibly embarrassed and shy, looking downwards and towards Sonic indecisively, shoulders slouched down a bit and pressing two fingers together. He quickly tries to adjust his posture, one hand behind his dreadlocks and another held out for a handshake. “I um, don’t believe we’ve met before. I’m Knuckles!” He said, with an awkward smile and chuckle.
Sonic was lost for words by what she had just witnessed, and mere seconds later she burst into laughter. On one hand it felt incredibly affirming that a friend of hers mistook her for someone else, and on the other hand it was so funny witnessing Knuckles pulling his usual shyness around girls on her. Knuckles was incredibly confused and panicked, thinking he might have said something wrong. Sonic was on the floor at this point, finally able to get some words out.
“Hoo boy, the other girls weren’t kidding when they said you get shy around girls!” Sonic remarked, finally recovering from her laughter. Sonic grabbed Knuckles’ hand that was still held out to pull herself from the floor, wiping a tear of laughter from her eye. “It’s me, Sonic, you don’t have to worry abo-“
Knuckles pulled his hand away and looked at Sonic with an expression of anger and embarrassment. “How dare you play with my emotions like that! I didn’t think you were one to take pranks this far! Who else was in on this? Was it Amy? I bet it was her!” Knuckles yelled, feeling very fed up at what just happened. Sonic was shocked at Knuckles’ misunderstanding of the situation and was about to correct him, only for Knuckles turn his back and walk away to the shrine.
“Wait! Knuckles! I didn’t come here to prank you! I-“
“Then why are you dressed like that?!” Knuckles snapped. “You always know how to take a prank too far!”
Sonic panicked, she had only come here to talk to Knuckles and was now being accused of doing something she did in the past. Sonic was going to have to ditch the explanation she had in her mind and just summarise it in a few words.
“Knuckles, I’m transgender!” Sonic yelled up the altar stairs.
Knuckles stopped and looked back at Sonic. He was caught by surprise, only because he didn’t really understand what Sonic meant for a moment. Sonic had a look on her face that was a bit more serious this time, clearly asking for forgiveness and understanding. Sonic waited a few seconds before making her way up the stairs. Knuckles helped her up on the last few steps, and the two of them sat down together by the master emerald.
“Sorry about that whole… situation. I wanted to have a playful entrance as I tend to do, and I wasn’t intending on any harm” apologised Sonic, looking off into the clouds that surrounded the island.
“I forgive you” responded Knuckles, head partially buried in his arms. “I’m sorry for assuming the worst of your intentions”
There was a bit of an awkward silence for a moment as the two tried to formulate what they were going to say to each other. They both were about to speak at the same time, with Knuckles gesturing to let Sonic speak first.
“I was going to go through the whole thing a bit differently but I kinda just yelled the short version of it earlier” Sonic looked over to Knuckles, waiting for a reaction. “I just wanted to ease you in, because I didn’t know whether or not you’d be cool with it”
“What made you think I would be against you being a girl?” Knuckles raised an eyebrow. “My culture may not look it, but we expressed gender very differently from catholic societies down below, thousands of years before the term ‘transgender’ came about. I know my stuff, Sonic” Knuckles turned his head to Sonic. “Wait, do you go by a new name now?” Sonic shook her head.
“That’s rad though! I never that about echidna culture!” Sonic was fascinated to hear about the echidna culture’s view on gender. She laid down on her front with her hands on her cheeks and feet in the air. Knuckles smirked at Sonic’s sudden interest in his culture, though all blushing at how cute Sonic looked right now. “While there weren’t any terms that we used to describe being transgender as you lot describe it as these days, it wasn’t all that uncommon for people of the culture to change out how they would appear or how they would be referred to as. Nobody looked down upon it, and for a matter of fact it was even encouraged for young ones to express themselves however they may please. Whether that be clothing, jewellery, markings, or speech, people of the echidna race expressed themselves outside of the gender binary a lot”
“And for those wishing to completely become a man or a woman, they had the power of this bad boy right here” Knuckles added, putting his hand upon the master emerald. Sonic got up off of her front and into a kneeling position, looking at the emerald with mouth open wide. “The master emerald could have made me a girl the entire time?!” Sonic blurted out, completely flabbergasted. Knuckles held up his hand to remind Sonic to let him finish. “This power from the emerald was one of the many powers that were lost when the emerald’s power was used to lift Angel Island away from the earth, after the incident with Chaos thousands of years ago”
“Drat. Of course, there was a caveat” Sonic sulked. Knuckles put a hand on her shoulder to reaffirm her. “Not that you’d need the master emerald’s help though, you had me thinking you were someone else entirely!” Sonic smiled at Knuckles’ kind words. She was glad that Knuckles seemed to know his stuff and was totally cool with all of this. The two of them hugged on the spot, making it the first time Sonic and Knuckles had ever hugged each other.
As they were hugging, the two of them could hear some sort of oddly familiar jingling sound from close by. The two of them looked around to see a floating red aura near the master emerald, one that was present during their adventure against Chaos years ago. This little ball of aura would begin to spin around the large emerald, forming into a spirit body of Tikal. Knuckles kneeled to show respect to Tikal, while Sonic was completely thrown off guard by Tikal’s sudden appearance. Tikal’s spirit stood above the master emerald, looking down at the two of them.
“Hello once again, Sonic and Knuckles. There is no need for formalities today, for I only wish to forward a message” she spoke aloud, with a light echo. “I overheard the conversation that was had between the two of you, and I would like the congratulate Sonic on her discovery” Sonic had her hand behind her quills, blushing a little bit. “Aw shucks, thanks Tikal!” Tikal let out a small giggle before continuing.
“As Knuckles has stated, the master emerald has indeed lost many of its original powers since the fall of the echidna race. I had used much of its energy to contain Chaos and help the island stay afloat” Sonic did sulk a little, hearing it from the spirit that embodied the emerald. “However, there is a way that we can restore many of the master emerald’s original abilities. In order for this to happen, we need the seven chaos emeralds and seven hero chao as part of the ritual. The ritual would have to be performed by those with the strongest connection to the emeralds, which would happen to include you two”
Sonic and Knuckles looked to each other and thought about it. To bring back the master emerald’s original powers would not just benefit Sonic and friends, but society. From what Knuckles could recall, this could help solve issues like world hunger and the energy crisis as well as helping trans people. On the other hand, this makes Angel Island and the master emerald a larger target for more than just Eggman. Every government would want to have power from the emerald, especially America and Russia. Sonic also thought about her transition as well. While it would be ideal to just transform into a cis woman at the blink of an emerald’s power, Sonic was more than okay with how she appeared, and liked to be a queer icon for the world to look up to. Regardless, it was a tough decision that would require a lot more time and people to think about.
“We may need more time to decide if we can go through with that” Knuckles responded, putting the safety of the island above all else. “I’m… I’m also content with myself for now, and I’m happy” Sonic added, somewhat firmly. Tikal nodded. “When you’re ready for the ritual to take place, I will be here to guide you through the steps” Tikal floats down from the emerald and placed her hands on Sonic’s, bringing them close to her. “Sonic, just remember that I will also be here to support your journey! I too am one with a similar lived life!” Sonic couldn’t help but smile at that, now knowing another person who was also trans. Sonic and Tikal shared a hug, before she faded back into a spirit aura and back into the master emerald.
It was silent now, with the jingling aura now gone and the two of them taking in what Tikal had explained. It was a hefty decision for only the two of them to make, for the reasons they concluded to earlier.
“You okay, Sonic?” Knuckles asked, looking over at the conflicted hedgehog.
“Yeah, I’m okay. I was just thinking over that stuff and…” Sonic looked off into the clouds again. “Maybe I’ll talk to it with Tails later”
Knuckles nodded, and they continued to sit by the emerald silently, uninterrupted for a good thirty seconds.
“Sooooo, you seeing anyone?” Knuckles asks, fingers pressed together while blushing. Sonic looked over to Knuckles, feeling a bit bad to have to turn him down. “Blaze” responded Sonic, witnessing Knuckles’ emotional defeat. “Ah, I see. Kind of a long-distance relationship though, right?” Sonic sighed at the question, knowing how difficult it was going back and forth to see her girlfriend. “Well, it is a bit tricky now. The two of us are trying to make plans, though Blaze is constantly caught up in royal duties that make it difficult to live together” Sonic vented to Knuckles, very frustrated about how Blaze’s royal duties prevent the two of them from spending more time together. “Sorry about that vent, I don’t really have many people to offload that to without outing myself to them yet” Sonic dug her head into her arms.
Knuckles put his hand on Sonic’s shoulder. “Things will get better for the two of you, I can promise you that. I don’t know much about the Sol Dimension, but hopefully things on Blaze’s end will settle down to allow your relationship to work out” affirmed Knuckles, trying his best to word everything. Sonic looked up and let out one of her iconic smirks. It wasn’t certain whether Knuckles’ emotional support came from a place of genuine care or suddenly having a crush on her, but she was thankful for having him as a friend by her side.
The two of them sat and chatted for a little while longer, general catch-up chat and tidbits about Sonic’s transition and journey, all before the sun began to set. Sonic gave Knuckles one last hug and waved him goodbye as she made her way to the edge of the island, awaiting Tails with the Tornado to pick her up. As she rode on top the biplane’s wing, she was still conflicted about everything to do with the master emerald’s power. A part of her wanted it, and the other part felt like it was cheating in some sort of self-serving heroine sort of way. Sonic looked off into the sunset, only time will tell whether she and the gang will go forward with it.