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Chapter Text

His face collided with a palm tree and all he saw was black.

His hearing was but a dull static. The infuriated yells and blame from his master fell on dull ears. It was all about the same subject. Failure. Failure. Failure.

He felt a harsh kick against his metal cranium, further hammering in his master’s disappointment and outrage. Then, in a final fit of anger, muffled stomps against the grass grew quieter and quieter, leaving him all alone with the whistle of the wind against his body.

Some illogical force kept him pinned down to the grassy terrain, preventing him from catching up to his master. Not one of his circuits would budge, even with all his effort. Damage reports weren’t favourable, but certainly not enough to prevent him from moving. So, what was stopping him from getting up?

He lost the will to know.

So, there he remained. Face down in the grimy earth. He didn’t know how long he stayed there. The only indicator being his still-functioning external diagnostics, detecting a gradual but consistent decrease in environmental temperature. His hearing also grew worse, with every chirp of an insect or tweet of a bird being drowned out by rushing winds and storms, until his only companion was the swirling static in his mind.

But then he felt something. Something that wasn’t his tomb. A trip against his head.

Identifying the source of the accident, he turned his head with the pain of rusty nails to see a startled and frightened girl, shuffling away from him on her behind. He knew the girl. He had met her before. But he saw no point in interacting with her, so he returned to the blackness.

A loud crack, a falling of many leaves, a hard shove, and a thunderous crash.

He found himself staring down at his mechanical blue arms, dented and rusted in several places with time. His hands had sunk into what appeared to be snow, so deep that he couldn’t see past his wrists. Craning his head to the side once more, he surveyed the source of the noise. The same palm tree that he had collided with prior had snapped at the trunk and fallen, directly into where he was lying face-down just seconds prior. And drowning out his peripheral vision was the pink visage of the girl. In place of her usual fear was a different expression. It was still one of worry and concern, but with an air of relief as her facial muscles relaxed. It had appeared that she had attempted to rescue him from the tree’s collision.

Only for her initial fear to return seconds later as a giant hammer brought him back down to the snow. It was ineffective, of course, and his sustained damages hadn’t worsened more than they already have. Even if they did, his defensive measures didn’t operate. He expected this to be the end of the brief encounter, with him scaring the girl into hiding and him returning to the earth and letting the snow consume him.

But something happened that day that all the calculations in the world couldn’t have seen coming. The girl proceeded to grab him by his foot and drag his body through the white frost. His metal frame clinked and clanked against every accidental stone or twig, and the crunch of each of the girl’s footprints distracted him from the static in his ears. He digital eyes moved up to the girl, watching her wipe sweat from her brow as her arms and legs strained against the uphill route she had decided to take. But even through the struggle, she seemed determined to press on. It was nonsensical in his eyes, but he didn’t seem ready to resist.

The girl’s arduous trek continued, pushing through hills of colossal mushrooms and towering crystalline structures. The winds were growing ever stronger, determined to stop her in her tracks and send the two careening back down. But through gritted teeth and an even scarier scowl, she fought back against the forces of nature and pushed through successfully.

He had lost track of the time of how long they had been travelling, but as they finally began to slow, he could see the girl panting and heaving, eventually stopping to lean forward and catch her breath. He looked up and recognised their location all too well. The smoky grey building resembling his master’s moustached appearance loomed over them like insects. She had brought him back home.

Heaving him up from the snowy terrain and carefully standing him up on his own two feet, the girl proceeded to reach into her puffy green coat and rummage around for something. A gentle thump on his forehead, and she had adorned him with what appeared to be a bright pink ribbon bow. While typically used for decorating gifts, it helped bring new life into his rusted and dented appearance. The girl shuffled past him, and he turned his head to see her moving up to the large door of the towering base. Stretching up on the tips of her toes, she prodded the door buzzer and the bell chimed. Questions continued to run through his mind as the girl was quick to scurry off, likely attempting to hide before the host answered the door. But she stopped in her tracks as she had one more idea.

The girl slowly walked back up to him, a gentle smile on her face. She reached into her coat one more time, pulled something out, and slowly took his hand and closed his claws around it. It was a small blooming flower, glowing with a vibrant yellow and orange. He looked into the girl’s eyes, and against the cold of their surroundings, her warm and bubbly demeanour was all he could focus on. And, with her gloved hands still around his, the words she spoke that night would stick with him longer than he could have anticipated.

“It’s going to be okay, Metal.”

She gently turned him to face the door, and the frantic crunching of feet on snow signalled her farewell. And as he looked down at the flower nestled gently in his hand, a second set of feet slowly approached the door.

Chapter Text

SUNDAY – 6:35PM

All systems at optimal efficiency.

Metal Sonic’s physical report readouts displayed on the bottom left corner of his field of vision as he readied his battle stance. His sharp titanium claws splayed out at his sides like a predatorial lizard spreading its crests as a death warning. The RGB digital lights of his eyes shone a blood red as they darted from side to side of the empty chamber he stood in. His body was as frozen as a statue in anticipation, waiting all too eagerly for his opposition to make its first move.

The scratching of steel on steel as a hatch opened, and the stoic visage of a certain red echidna appeared on his right. In an instant, his Orgone Fusion Engine built into his chest exploded into life, and the mechanical assassin thundered towards him with a trail of blue fire in his wake. A single slash of his right arm immediately turned the echidna into ribbons. But before the remains could slump to the ground, a second figure had emerged from behind him at the other end of the chamber, this being a small and timid two-tailed fox. He kept his flight on course, performing a sharp u-turn and avoiding a hard collision with the metal walls, before charging towards his second opponent with just as much ferocity. The fox fell just as easily, his tails thumping against the floor before his body followed suit. But Metal Sonic didn’t slow down, beginning to roar around the chamber at lightning speed, waiting for his final target to come out of hiding. There was no sighting, but the robotic blue blur’s eyes remained calm and vigilant as he kept his field of view as wide and unobscured as possible.

And soon enough, a second blue blur had joined him in the chamber. The cocky and spiny appearance of a hedgehog blipped from hatch to hatch. Their path was uncoordinated, but through incoordination birthed chaos and unpredictability. Metal Sonic bared both claws at the ready as he barrelled towards his target, already bringing them forward for a final massacre. But the memory of the hedgehog’s smirk taunted him in his mind as his claws split nothing but the air. Split second calculations ran in his main and sub CPU as he formulated his next attack. The target hadn’t remerged anywhere in his peripheral vision, so logically they must have moved somewhere behind him. Metal Sonic noticed as he was imminently about to collide with the second wall of the chamber and began to curl his legs up to his chest as he rotated his body. His metal shoes crashed into the wall, cracks shooting out from the crater formed. But with his legs still bent inward, he used the wall to propel himself by kicking against it, while also increasing the output of his fusion engine to its maximum limits. He exploded in the opposite direction, sparks crackling out of the gaps in his shell as he barrelled towards the now visible hedgehog at double his previous speed. An ear-bleeding screech echoed throughout the room as Metal Sonic’s feet skidded against the ground, dust kicking up behind him as he brought himself to a stop. And as the dust cloud faded, the shredded remains of his long-time rival were bare for all to see.

“Hmm. Satisfactory, but with obvious room for improvement.”

A gruff male voice spoke out through built-in speakers lining the top of the chamber walls. The hiss of machinery rang in Metal Sonic’s ears as he watched several additional wall hatches open, and many miniature badniks rolled out and began to clean up the aftermath of his sparring match. Egg Pawns holding dustpans and brushes wasted no time in sweeping up the tattered remains of the training dolls, emptying their fabric carcases into disposal bins. Another large hatch opened, revealing a hidden observation room, with computer monitors displaying reems of data and security camera footage. And sitting in the large lab chair and writing away on a clipboard was none other than his master, Dr. Eggman. He swivelled around in his chair to face Metal Sonic but kept his attention on his notes, with Metal marching over to his station for his debriefing.

“Your specs are all running optimally. You successfully achieved maximum output with your final manoeuvre against the Sonic doll, and you’ve beaten your previous time by 5.4 seconds,” Eggman explained, tapping his pencil against the clipboard as he ran his eyes down his notes. The robot stood firmly with his fists at his sides and his shoulders squared.

“However…”

Standing up from his seat, Eggman swung his clipboard until it clacked against one of the many computer monitors. This one showed looping footage from the training regimen seconds prior. It showcased Metal Sonic lunging for the training doll of Sonic the Hedgehog, only for it to zip into its hatch in the floor and out of his grasp. Eggman allowed the two second clip to repeat ten times, before turning back to the robot in front of him.

“This…” Eggman sternly lectured. “…can’t keep getting brushed aside, Metal Sonic! The Sonic doll’s specs were set up with the real deal’s standard speed in mind. STANDARD speed, I must emphasise! The pincushion has shown moments of exceeding this limit, and yet you are struggling to land an immediate blow!” He let out a long groan, rubbing his hand against his temple as he slumped back into his swivel chair. The fists at Metal Sonic’s sides had loosened into open palms, his eyes remaining focused on the looping footage. “You were built to match and surpass Sonic’s capabilities. And I know for a fact that I have given you everything need to accomplish this. You’re the only one responsible for these lacklustre results, and I can’t keep making excuses for you.”

Eggman tossed his clipboard onto the countertop, sighing before he swivelled back to the monitors.

“I’ll have Sage schedule our next training session in two weeks’ time. And I expect us to not have this conversation again,” he concluded. “You’re dismissed, Metal Sonic."

Without giving a wave or even a hand flick, the doctor returned to his work, clacking away on his keyboard as he catalogued his results. Metal silently made his way to the exit door, but not before giving one more sideways glance at the speedy hedgehog doll in the camera footage.

Eggman’s base of operations was in their usual rush, with hundreds of thousands of worker badniks constructing, moving supplies, delivering documents, or being constructed themselves. But despite their colossal numbers, there wasn’t a single essence of disorganised chaos. Everyone moving from station to station walked in perfect double-file lines, their feet marching perfectly in sync with each other. It’s like this community was in and of itself a perfectly well-oiled machine. And Metal Sonic marched right alongside them, not paying any mind to any of his colleagues. He passed through giant warehouses stationing towering battle mechs and construction scaffolding, computer rooms screening reams upon reams of data, and many more. But once he had arrived at the corridor marked “Recharge Stations”, he took a left turn at the intersection, splitting off from the workers.

Dr. Eggman, as the ultimate mortal enemy to the fastest thing alive, knew that from the get-go he would have to keep up with him. And while he couldn’t keep up with Sonic in the literal sense, he could keep up by never ceasing his onslaught of tireless mechanical menaces. This system he had running required around the clock 24/7 work, with his operation not allowing even a second of down-time. So, to assure that this was feasible without his machines emptying their batteries after a day, he dedicated multiple spread-out sectors of his fortress to holding recharge stations for his minions, allowing them to juice themselves up in a few seconds before getting back to work. And Metal Sonic, as one of the doctor’s more unique robots, had a separated room solely for his use.

The smooth mechanical door slid open, and Metal Sonic stepped into the darkness as it closed back up behind him. A single flickering ceiling light dangled from a cable, and with no windows in sight it was the only source of illumination. The room’s contents were beyond sparse. The only things that occupied this room were the recharge booth, which resembled a high-tech phone booth designed for easy walk-in use, a heavy barren work counter up against the back wall, a small mirror that hung above the counter and the thick layer of dust coating everything. It was more of a broom cupboard than a room, but it was his. As Metal Sonic turned to double-check the closed door, he slowly trudged over to the side of the work counter. Bending his knees and pressing both hands against it, he proceeded to push hard against it, the brief moments where it budged emitting ear-grating screeches against the rough metal flooring. But with each successful miniscule push, a slightly skewed wall panel was slowly revealed to be hidden behind it. The moving ceased once it was fully revealed, and Metal Sonic knelt in front of it. Baring his sharp fingers, he dug them into the thin crevices of the sides of the panel, gently and delicately prying it open. A cloud of dust puffed around him as it was removed, and he placed it down quietly as his side. His head rotated to the entrance door one more time, his ears listening out for any sound of potential footprints. But as silence was all that greeted him, he turned back and reached his hands inside the wall.

Behind all the cables and wires that hung from within the metal walls, his arms retrieved a large spherical item the size of his head. It was an Item Capsule, designed by Dr. Eggman as a means of preserving specimens for an indefinite amount of time. These were typically used to house combat items that would be scattered throughout designated areas he plotted to take over, but this capsule was a different case. Decorating this item capsule was a tattered pink bow, the edges frayed and torn at almost every part of it with age. But, in stark contrast to this, inside the capsule itself rested a single yellow and orange flower, still carrying so much colour and life in it despite the passage of time. Compared to the grey room it resided in, it was practically glowing. As the floating dust around him was the only thing that moved, Metal Sonic remained kneeling on the floor, looking down at the flower as he held it in his lap.

“I wasn’t aware you had an interest in botany.”

A quick shove forcing the capsule back into the wall, and Metal Sonic whipped around and bared both his claws in defensive aggression, eliciting a small and startled yelp from the intruder.

“I apologise! I would’ve knocked if I could!”

Floating in front of Metal Sonic was a small girl robed in white, raising her hands up in innocent surrender. A light blue aura emanated from her, draping the small room in a calm and soothing glow. Her skin, clothing, and swirling white hair glitched in certain parts, revealing a digital blue wireframe beneath. She was human in appearance but was anything but. Metal Sonic relaxed his claws at his sides, allowing the girl to sigh in relief. As the robot turned to the side to rest his hands on the work counter, the girl flinched in surprise as a small text message appeared in the bottom right corner of her vision.

>> Hello, Sage.

Sage was Dr. Eggman’s most recent creation, and by far his most cherished. She was an artificial intelligence, capable of carrying out thousands of tasks simultaneously, as well as hold a visible presence when projected as a hologram throughout the headquarters. She was powered by and in charge of the Egg Network. Alternatively nicknamed “the Egg Net”, it was the doctor’s means of having all his machines and creations interconnected neurally, and therefore better able to cooperate and communicate through text-like speech from many miles away. Metal Sonic, as a robot who wasn’t given the gift of a voice, could not communicate through any other means. Not that he often wanted to. Sage’s first digital message was immediately followed by another.

>> What are you doing here?

“Forgive me, brother,” Sage apologized, her soft voice far calmer and more collected. “I finished scheduling your next training session and I wanted to see how you were doing.” Metal Sonic’s head leaned down in exasperation.

>> We are not siblings. We aren’t remotely similar models.

“But father said we are by technicality, as he created both you and I,” Sage rebutted, frowning dejectedly. She hovered over to just above the work counter, pretending to sit down without phasing through it. “And even if it is only by technicality, I was hoping we would be able to have conversations like siblings. Orbot and Cubot seemed quite fond of the prospect.” The robotic hedgehog looked back up towards her.

>> You are new here. Orbot and Cubot are idiots.

“I don’t believe intelligence has anything to do with the sentiment,” Sage replied, the insult flying over her head. “So, I don’t see it as being impossible for us both.” She gave a small and pure smile, and Metal Sonic was unable to give an immediate reply. Her eyes moved down to the hole in the wall, and the mess of wires and cables that protruded from it. “How long have you had that flower?” she asked curiously. Metal Sonic swiftly stood up and moved over to the other side of the work counter, placing his hands against it as he prepared to push.

>> It is not mine. Leave.

The counter scraped loudly against the metal floor as he began to move it back into its original position to cover up the hole.

“It’s okay, brother,” Sage reassured, floating directly in front of his face and obstructing his vision. “This is what you call a ‘hobby’, correct?” Metal Sonic paused his pushing, which invited her to continue. “I’ve been recently taking part in them myself when I can devote more of my processing power to down time. I’ve been studying on the human condition and as an example. I’ve been reading many engaging essays on the topic.”

>> It is not a hobby. Leave immediately.

He resumed his pushing, phasing through Sage’s projected 3D image. But his response only created more curiosity for the AI.

“But if it isn’t a hobby, why do you have it in your possession?” she questioned, turning around and floating at his side. He didn’t respond, and this got the girl to ponder his rationale. Why was he being so secretive? It was only a single frail flower after all. And he had kept it so well hidden too. A thought then crossed her mind, and she decided to act on it.

“Are you afraid of father finding out?”

Metal Sonic stopped in his tracks once more, the counter mere inches away from covering the hole back up. Sage didn’t receive any communication from him, but the silence spoke a thousand words. “I doubt a single flower would upset him. He has his own garden for botanical and biological experimentation, after all,” she encouraged. She then placed a small and delicate hand on her chest. “But I can promise you that I won’t tell him about the flower if that makes it easier.”

The robot stared down at nothing, seeming to ponder her offer in his mind. Sage then received a communication.

>> No one else can know.

“Of course,” she agreed, she smiled solemnly. This could quite possibly be the first time that her brother was willing to open to something with her, and she couldn’t help but feel inner excitement. But simultaneously, her mind was whirring at what could be so important about this flower that made it so vital to be kept a secret? Did it hold an unknown power she wasn’t aware of? Was it stolen from father’s garden? A nagging anticipation bubbled as she kept her comforting expression up. After many seconds of silence between the two, Metal Sonic relented, and removed his hands from the counter.

He walked back around to the hole, removing the item capsule once more from its confines. Sage curled up and leaned in closely to the sphere, analysing it for as much information as she could discover. Judging from the frayed age of the bow that adorned it, she deduced that the flower contained was many years old, which made it more impressive that its life signs were all healthy. “It was a good idea to repurpose the item capsule for preserving plant life,” Sage complimented. “Considering it wouldn’t have much chance of surviving in this environment.” Metal Sonic simply nodded in agreement, joining her as they both stared at the dwindle of life in front of them. “How did you acquire it?”

>> A gift.

Sage raised her eyebrows. A present? Did Eggman give it to him? That can’t be if Metal Sonic was so determined to keep it a secret from him and everyone else.

“Who gave it to you?” she instinctively asked, wanting to unravel this mystery. After a few more seconds of paused silence, she got her answer.

>> Amy Rose.

Sage clasped her hand over her mouth. None of her calculations could have possibly predicted that this gift was from not just someone outside of the Eggman Empire, but one of Sonic the Hedgehog’s close companions actively fighting to stop her father’s goals. Suddenly, his secrecy and defensiveness made perfect sense, as she only dreaded what the ensuing anger would look like if Eggman found out.

“If you don’t mind me enquiring,” Sage continued, her mind still reeling from the revelation. “When did she give it to you?”

Metal Sonic, through his own time and words, proceeded to send brief but meaningful messages to her detailing the day he was abandoned by Dr. Eggman, left to rust for what could have been forever, until Amy Rose happened to stumble upon him by happenstance. And despite their oppositions and her fear, she rescued him and travelled far to return him to his home. Sage’s eyes moved back and forth between Metal Sonic and the flower, patiently taking the whole story in piece by piece.

>> She disappeared before Dr. Eggman arrived. He brought me back in like nothing had happened. Like I hadn’t been missing for months. And I would still be missing if it weren’t for her actions. So, I have kept this flower and ribbon in my possession, to assure that I don’t forget.

The holographic girl’s eyes glimmered as he finished his story, her mouth slightly ajar in wonder. To think that there’s a chance they wouldn’t be sitting in this room talking to each other were it not for Amy. She frowned as the image of Eggman leaving him in the cold appeared in her mind, but quickly pushed those thoughts away as she shook her head. He was most assuredly planning to find Metal Sonic eventually, surely.

“It continues to intrigue me how organics will let feelings drive their decisions, even when it only puts them at further risk,” Sage said, holding her hand to her chest in contemplation. She couldn’t help but think back to the first time she ever met the pink hedgehog in person, during her first mission on the Starfall Islands. Her task was to keep Sonic and his friends at bay to keep her father safe while he was trapped in Cyberspace. She witnessed as Amy was determined enough to delay her own rescue, and even go against her ally whom she greatly admired, to assist the innocent Koco who needed help as well. She was truly someone who constantly put others before herself, no matter what the circumstance. “Is she aware that you still have this flower?” Metal Sonic shook his head.

>> It is futile. She is an enemy to the Eggman Empire. Contact is forbidden.

“You appear to be referring to you telling her yourself, and not just Amy Rose finding out on her own.” Metal Sonic froze, his grip tightening by an increment around the capsule. The organic eye wouldn’t have noticed, but the AI took note of it instantaneously. “Is telling her something you would wish to accomplish?” The robot’s body shifted as he got up from his knees, returning the capsule to the hole in the wall.

>> I have orders to complete.

He began to place the metal wall covering back over the hole and move over to the counter, before Sage hastily hovered in front of him.

“Brother, please,” she quietly pleaded, a frown on her face. “Is that something you wish to do?” Metal Sonic’s joints slumped in defeat. The girl was gentle and calm, but annoyingly persistent. She promised she wouldn’t mention the flower to the doctor, but he had to quell this before misinformation began to spread.

>> I only wished to repay the debt owed. To thank her. Continuing this conversation is pointless. I’m leaving.

“Is it pointless though?” she interrupted. She didn’t receive any response, as Metal just stared up at her blankly. “If it wasn’t futile as you claimed, would you still desire to repay that debt?”

>> Elaborate.

Sage looked off to the side, her digitalised brow furrowing in thought as she placed a finger against her lips. Metal Sonic remained motionless, now waiting to hear what she was trying to say.

“As you are aware, father has placed me in charge of hundreds of tasks and routines that he and his headquarters require,” she began to explain. “He was previously the supervisor for many of them, but he handed them over to me to increase work efficiency, as well as give him more time for tasks only he was capable of. One of the tasks I assist him with is time scheduling. I worked with him to create an effective work schedule that catered to his specifications, and I therefore have knowledge of what father is doing at all times.” Sage turned back to Metal. “There is a specific window of time father allocates towards personal leisure activities and relaxation. Every Monday from precisely 10pm to midnight, he retires to his quarters and orders no disturbance aside from emergency situations. Those two hours may be your best and only opportunity to leave headquarters temporarily and do what you must. During sleep is not an option, as he insists on a Dymaxion schedule, restricting himself to multiple thirty-minute naps throughout the day, which will not allow you enough time.”

Metal continued to remain silent. This all seemed too good to be true. Errors already cropped up in his mind as he ran through Sage’s proposal.

>> Security tracks everything that enters and leaves. He will know.

“Also my jurisdiction,” Sage counteracted. “With me having eyes all around Eggman Empire territory, and many times more processing speed than any robot or human, father decided that I was most fit for the job.”

>> There are still security cameras that record 24/7. My departure would be on the database, and Dr. Eggman would notice altered or deleted footage.

“While the security cameras are plentiful, during my maintenance checks throughout this base, I have discovered a series of blind spots. Particularly leading to Exit Gate Theta.” With a swipe of Sage’s hand, a holographic screen displayed in front of Metal Sonic’s face. The screen detailed a top-down map of the corridors that led to Exit Gate Theta, and all the specific blind spots were marked in red. “I was originally planning to have construction badniks fix the issue, but to overhaul and alter an entire base-wide security feed takes a lot of coordination, and it is currently a work in progress. The blind spots are tight, but if you are careful and follow my specific directions, you should be able to navigate past them undetected.”

Metal Sonic tilted his head down as his eyes shifted subtly from side to side. He had dismissed and thrown away this foolish plan years back. There had to be some other flaw in Sage’s plan that she hadn’t accounted for, surely. He refused to accept that it was even possible. He gave up on it for a reason. But as he ran through every calculation and scenario, he couldn’t find any further argument to add to the debate. Could circumstances have lined into place? One night, and he could finally return her favour. And tomorrow night, no less? Sage’s smile grew ever so slightly as she watched her brother ponder without another word. It was a good sign.

“I must however stress one thing.”

Metal Sonic snapped out from his thinking at returned his eyes to Sage. Her smile had lowered.

“I was created to assist in father’s best interests. I want to help you in this, but I will still make sure that nothing impedes his progress for world domination. As his most vital ally, he needs you. So, if you disappear, stray from our plan, or father starts to ask questions…” The blue aura that emanated from Sage’s body began to shift, now bathing the room in a foreboding red. Her gown changed from an innocent white into a deathly black. Her brow furrowed as she looked down at him in stern seriousness.

“I will be obligated to tell him.”

Metal Sonic remained unphased as her tone changed but did not intend to ignore this warning. He nodded his head, acknowledging her words. Her smile returned, along with her calming blue glow.

“Thank you,” she said, bowing her head. “I just didn’t want any information to be hidden from you. I appreciate your understanding.”

>> Why are you doing this?

“Hm?” Sage cocked her head to the side. “I don’t believe I follow.”

>> What do you gain from this? You are intelligent enough to know what can go wrong. Why do you want to help me despite the risk?

Sage smiled sadly, holding her hands to her chest. She knew that Metal Sonic was far more closed off than her other brothers, but was he suspecting ulterior motives? She couldn’t help but feel a small pain in her heart from the thought. But she believed that this gesture would soon change that. She finally answered his query, remaining steadfast.

“Because…I wish for my family to be happy.”

Chapter Text

MONDAY - 9:58pm

Metal Sonic sat alone in his empty recharge station, motionless with his hands on his knee joints as he faced directly at the door. He remained fixated on the local time displayed in his visual interface, counting down each passing second. Sage’s plan from the previous day relayed in his head like a mantra. He was to remain inconspicuous in his quarters until the allotted time, and she would organise all the worker badniks into prioritising the other end of the base, giving him an unobstructed and peaceful path to Exit Gate Theta. All he’d need to do is remember the precise path he was given to remain in the blind spots, and the camera feed would be none the wiser.

9:59pm.

The mechanical hedgehog’s hands clenched into fists as he rose to his feet. He almost had to restrain himself from warming up his turbine engine. He wouldn’t reach the blind spots until a few corridors down, and thus he’d need to remain slow and patient to not draw any attention. He refocused his racing mind on Sage’s plan, levelling his thoughts out until his hands relaxed into open palms once again. This was going to work. This WILL work.

10:00pm. He stepped through the door.

An eerie silence was all that filled the corridors as he walked out. The metal clanks of his footsteps seemed far louder now than they ever had before. But with no ears around to hear, that was of no concern to him. He strode swiftly through the first few corridors but slowed his pace once he had reached the entrance to one of Eggman’s many colossal mech warehouses. Sage stated that this is where his path would begin to diverge, and that caution would be paramount from this point onward. He made a left, and after a few paces began to hug the wall as he continued to slink sideways, sticking to it like glue.

A message blipped in his corner vision.

>>  You are doing well, brother. I am monitoring the camera feed, and you are completely out of sight.

Metal Sonic remained silent, keeping on his path as he assumed Sage would want him to. As he kept to the wall, a vent cover was soon visible next to his legs. Following the instructions, he inched his claws downward, so they dug into the side of the metal panelling. With a single swift yank, the vent cover popped out from the wall, giving access to the ventilation shaft. The robot curled up, shuffling himself backwards into the opening, and closed the vent back up as he entered.

What greeted him was the dusty and grimy ventilation tunnels. The red glow of his eyes acted as the only source of light, which only extenuated the unpleasant state they were in. On his hands and knees, Metal Sonic crawled delicately through the winding tunnel. With both him and the shafts being made of metal, one slight scrape, bump or scratch would create the most unholy clang that would ring throughout the whole complex. So, each shuffle forward was like moving through the most claustrophobic minefield in history. He was unnaturally careful, but he remained steadfast, staring dead ahead as he made every turn left, right, up, down and everywhere.

Eventually, another source of light had joined him in the ventilation shafts. It wasn’t another blood red glow, but rather the bleak white of the base’s lighting. Another ventilation cover was coming up, and if Sage’s directions were correct, it would lead to Exit Gate Theta’s chamber. He’d still need to avoid the camera feed, but he was almost there. With a gentle but firm push, he popped open the panel, making sure to catch it before it hit the ground and caused a racket. Just like the corridors, not a single mechanical soul was present. Sage had done a good job in keeping them at bay, he thought. Planting his metal feet back on the ground and closing the vent behind him, he saw the dreary grey of the outside world across the other end of the large chamber, through the giant cargo-bay doors designed to allow in vehicles and other large machines. Just like before, he followed Sage’s instruction to the T, going from hugging the walls, to crawling behind wooden crates, to shuffling underneath large trucks. The fact that he wasn’t getting any further messages from Sage indicated his success in staying out of sight. And with one last crawl, the cold nighttime air greeted him.

Taking a side route away from further cameras, Metal Sonic clambered and stumbled across a rough, uneven and rocky terrain, making sure he was a safe enough distance from the compound before he could make his departure. His vision was obscured by polluted smog, most likely a biproduct of Dr. Eggman’s 24-7 operations. But that smog was quickly cut off by a sudden holographic light.

“You managed to leave the headquarters undetected,” Sage stated, her smile being the smallest hint of congratulations. “I knew you could do it, brother.” He visage was less well-defined than their fist meeting, with her graphics stuttering and glitching at random intervals. This was likely because she was reaching the border of Eggman territory she could occupy from the servers.

>> Stop calling me that.

“Apologies, I can’t help it, I suppose,” she replied, looking away sheepishly. “I’m just glad our plan worked.” Metal Sonic soon saw as a long series of numbers was transmitted to his visual monitor. “These are coordinates. Father has logged what he believes are estimated coordinates for the homes of each of his adversaries, including Amy Rose. It won’t be exact, as he could only make educated calculations based off his past encounters with them, but you should hopefully be able to go off it to find her.”

Metal Sonic nodded in understanding, logging the given coordinates into his databanks. The two stared in silence at each other, uncertain of what to say next. Sage was getting ready to say her farewells, before she flinched at another message.

>> Thank you.

She couldn’t help but smile with a rosy tint in her cheeks. That had to have been the first time she had heard Metal Sonic thank anyone, let alone her.

“The pleasure’s all mine, Metal,” she said with a bow of her head. “I wish you good luck on your travels.”

Metal Sonic nodded once more, proceeding to stare up at the blackened sky as his turbine began to rumble into life. Sage watched in admiration as the robot’s frame began to lift off the rocky earth, and in an explosion of flame, he rocketed off through the clouds and out of sight in the blink of an eye. Sage clasped her hands to her chest as she spoke her parting words, her holographic display fading away.

“You can do it, brother.”

The rushing wind whistled over Metal Sonic’s features, his aerodynamic design cutting through the air like fudge. Escaping all the pollution and smoke that coated Eggman’s territory, the gentle glow of moonlight reflected off his smooth sheen. And at the speed he was flying, he was like his own shooting star zooming over the untouched forests and fields below. But he wasn’t here to sightsee. Nor did he have the time to.

He remained fixated on his current GPS coordinates, the numbers changing rapidly like a slot machine. Sage’s coordinates were pulled up next to them, and the robot blasted full speed ahead, making slight angle changes here and there as he calculated the most optimal trajectory forward. If there was one thing he could count on, it was arriving at his goal at record time. He began to see the twinkle of more lights further in the distance. And these ones didn’t belong to stars. Seemingly hundreds of skyscrapers and buildings towered, starkly contrasting the luscious greenery that surrounded it. Seeing an opening in the clouds beneath him, Metal Sonic began his descent.

Central City’s bustling streets still had just as much life as if it were daytime, with many stores remaining open for their final hours of the night as last-minute shoppers were strolling the streets and chatting. It was only expected for the capital of the United Federation, even for the first day of the week. With everyone being so engrossed in their chores and bargains, none could see the insignificant figure hover down from the sky and into a murky alleyway.

Metal Sonic’s turbine slowly wound to a stop as his feet gently landed on the concrete ground, crinkling a discarded burger wrapper he stood on. The brightly illuminated streets of the shopping district were but a faint glow in the darkness that was the alleyway, and he preferred to keep it that way, lest the killer robot cause a crowd-wide panic. Comparing his sets of coordinates once more, he realised he was but multiple blocks away from his destination. He’d need to choose his paths precisely if he wanted to avoid unwanted attention, but it wasn’t anything he couldn’t accomplish if his departure from Eggman’s base was any indication. He turned around to proceed further into the alleyway, only for him to stop briefly as an idea occurred. He turned back, knelt, and picked up the burger wrapper he had previously landed on. It was crinkled, frayed and torn in a couple places, but it would do the trick. Gently holding it in his right hand, he returned to following the coordinates.

Like cheating in a corn maze, Metal Sonic paced through the winding alleyways without so much of a sign of slowing down. Not even stopping to pick which direction to go next, he would instantly make his choices without a second thought and be just as determined as ever. The blurred chatter of the Central City shoppers faded further into the background as he transitioned into the suburbs. The glow of streetlights began to return as he neared his exit.

A line of looming apartment buildings stood in front of him on the opposite end of the quiet street. They were three stories tall and of lower-middle class construction, being easily dwarfed by the skyscrapers that encircled them. Many of the windows were black as night, but a few were still alight as the residents remained comfy in their homes. It was a humble location, but that wasn’t innately a bad thing. It looked like just the cosy place to go to after a long day of work to kick back and relax. Metal Sonic checked his coordinates one more time. This was the place. He surveyed each of the many windows in front of him. Looking at how long he had until midnight, he surmised that he had approximately half an hour to lay out his plan, to leave him enough time to return to headquarters without alerting suspicion. But which apartment was hers? The coordinates he was given confirmed the general area, but not a specific address. With the seconds ticking, Metal Sonic needed to act on a solution fast. Maybe if he could glimpse into each window for just long enough to identify each resident, he would eventually find the right one? It was a long shot, but he had already come this far.

Stepping out from the darkness of the alleyway, he decided he should start with…

He immediately skidded on his feet as he retreated backwards, hiding once again in the shadows of the alley. In one of the lit third floor rooms of the complex, a figure began to appear as they opened their windows, letting the cool night air inside their apartment. She wore a red button-up pyjama top with a pocket over the chest, and it was adorned in a pattern of light pink hearts. Her pink quills were the slightest bit dishevelled after a long and productive day. Her expression was an unusual one to Metal Sonic. There wasn’t a sign of fear, aggression or agitation. But instead, she had a soft and gentle smile, letting out a soft exhale as she wordlessly greeted the night. She was very different, but there was no way he could be mistaken.

It was Amy Rose.

Metal Sonic’s hand clenched around his burger wrapper, his feet shuffling a few more inches away into the darkness. It almost felt like she was looking directly at him, but straight through him simultaneously. He couldn’t help but freeze up. The wind even seemed to quiet down throughout the street, and the robot had to fight the urge to retreat further. Only a few seconds passed, but to him it felt like minutes. But as quickly as she appeared, Amy moved back into her apartment and out of sight, before the lights of her room flicked off. Metal Sonic slowly stepped forward once more, looking up at the still open window. She must have wanted to let some cool air in as she slept for the night. This was his chance. It was now or never.

Gripping his free hand on the corner of one of the buildings next to him, he poked his head out from the pitch black to survey his surroundings. There were no civilians in the streets in both directions, but something else caught his attention. Off in the distance down the road, he spotted what appeared to be an entrance to a considerably greener city park area. And next to this entrance was a closed down tourist booth. Looking down at his wrapper, he turned right and headed towards the booth, making sure to stick to the walls as much as possible in case anyone came by. At every slightest sign of noise, the robot ducked and curled up behind the nearest post box or trash can like a paranoid raccoon. He would remain still, listening intently for any further sign of noise, and only reappear from his hiding spot when the coast was clear. With the tourist booth now but a few yards away, he quickened his pace for the final stretch. The front window of the hexagonal booth was inaccessible, with metal shutters locking down the miniature building from the outside world. A small wooden desk counter protruded from below the front window, and on top of said counter was a small ink pen attached to a chain. Metal Sonic rushed up, snapped the pen from the chain in a single hard yank, and raced behind the nearest cover. This happened to be a murky second-hand model car parked just outside the park. Leaning up against the car’s side door, he flattened out the burger wrapper, readied his pen, and proceeded to write.

“To Amy Rose…”

Instantaneously, his vision was flooded with bright red as warning symbols obscured his sight, causing him to flinch. A bright pop-up window appeared in his central view:

“WARNING - COMMUNICATING WITH THE ENEMY - ALERTING DR. EGGMAN”

Metal Sonic’s body jolted in a panic, accidentally crushing the pen in his right hand and causing ink to explode everywhere. In a fight or flight instinct, he frantically crumpled up the burger wrapper and threw it away. It landed in a bush just by the park entrance, and the pop-up windows proceeded to vanish. He paused, staring down at his ink drenched claws. That was new.

A small pop-up message appeared in the lower corner of his vision. He was hesitantly expecting the worst, only to realise that it had come from Sage.

>>  Is everything alright, brother? Security just received a warning signal about abnormal activity. What is going on?

As much as he wanted to stop her calling him that, that was the least of his worries. Metal Sonic remained still, not even sure of how to answer. It had to be quick though, lest Sage get too worried and go against the plan. He sent a neural text message back.

>>  A communication filter. No written messages allowed.

The robot clenched his fists as he awaited Sage’s response. What would the point of this mission be if his brain was literally coded to stop him from sending something as simple as a thank you? He pulled his fist back, getting ready to punch the car he was leaning against in rage. But his own deathly glare staring back at him interrupted his assault. He yanked his fist back, cursing at himself mentally. He had to keep himself under control, lest he cause a scene and blow his cover.

A new message came back.

>> Understood. Try something else perhaps. I can take care of the last warning signal before father is aware. Be safe.

At least he wasn’t needing to call off the mission. But he only had so much time to think of something else before he’d need to return to headquarters. In twenty minutes time, to be exact. He remained seated against the car, his artificial brain running this problem like it was a battle strategy for his life. He kept facing forward, in the direction of the burger wrapper that he threw away. But then he looked further down the street. A few yards away was the entrance way to the Central City Gardens. The gate was tall and made of sturdy iron, but it was still open to the public. He pondered. Its chances of working were unknown, but what other options did he have? Picking up his resolve, he rose to his feet and strode through the garden gateway.

The many trees that occupied the park casted shadows upon Metal Sonic as they blocked out the moonlight. The leaves swayed in the night breeze so peacefully that not even the sound of rustling could be heard. The previous clanking of his metal feet against the concrete was now dulled by the worn-down earth of the pathway, which was lined by neatly trimmed hedges. It was clear that this large area had been monitored rigorously over a considerable amount of time. But he wasn’t here to sightsee. He guided his eyes along all the botanical life that surrounded him, hoping to find any sign of flora. Considering Amy Rose had previously given him a flower after saving him, it seemed only fair that to return the favour and repay his debt, he should find an equally worthwhile flower. It's the least he could do when a burger wrapper letter was off the table. But as he surveyed further, something was wrong. None of these flowers seemed to be operating. Unlike his bright and colourful flower that had spread open petals, all of these had shrunken in size and closed, barely showing any of their colour. They were clearly faulty and wouldn’t do at all.

So onwards he marched, continuing to survey every outcrop of plant life he could find. But each one had the same result with none of them being open. Maybe he was wrong to assume that this garden was well taken care of, because this was just unacceptable. He began to pick up his pace, the ever-present clock ticking down further as he began to grow more and more desperate in his search. What if he couldn’t find anything appropriate? Would he have to settle for one of these broken flowers? Or should he just give up this pointless endeavour and return home?

The other end of the park encroached further towards him, with the iron bar fences cutting it off from the city streets being the impending failure of his mission. But when all hope seemed fruitless, a final sight towered over him. A colossal tree stood on top of a large hill, its leaves glowing with a fiery orange amidst the moonlight. It eclipsed the rest of the park in its sheer size and aura, and its mere presence felt like an invitation for the robotic hedgehog to have a closer look. He moved up the steady incline, leaning ever so slightly forward to keep his balance. And as he reached the top, he found himself overlooking the park about approximately fifty feet from the ground. The trees that overlooked him previously felt so puny and insignificant now. But that hardly mattered, as the orange tree before him was like a building by comparison. It was incalculable how old it likely was, but it had to be older than anything else in the park at the very least. There had to be something here, surely.

And as his eyes moved lower down, something bright caught his attention. More bushes circled the great tree like it was being hugged, and adorning each bush were large white flowers. Their colour was very visible in the night time darkness, and their petals were as large as his open palm. They were perfect. He couldn’t dawdle now. He strode forwards and immediately reached out to grab the first flower his eyes landed on. His claws clenched around the plant, and it let out an audible crunch. This was followed by a loud and frantic squeak. A Ricky, a small rodent with a large bushy tail, scrambled and cried out in fear as the sudden visitor had already begun destroying its habitat. It lunged out onto Metal Sonic’s face, causing him to stumble backwards as it leapt over his head and away to safety. While Metal was certainly annoyed, it was to be expected. He was used to the fear that he elicited from small animals. Or most organic life for that matter.

What annoyed him more was the now crushed white flower laying in pieces in his palm. He wasn’t built for delicacy, but the flowers had to be intact if he was going to give them as a gift. Tossing the remains on the grassy floor, he reached forward, kneeling this time, and tried again. His knife-like fingers felt like they were performing surgery as he slowly severed each flower by its stem, doing his best to preserve the large petals as much as possible. His inner- programming felt like it was causing a headache as he was going against his built-in purpose. And as he successfully obtained his first flower, it gradually began to get easier for the robot. He pondered how many would be enough? It would be nice to gather more than one, to increase the value of the gift. But taking too many could gather unwanted attention from the garden’s hosts, not to mention take away valuable seconds. With ten white flowers clasped firmly in his grasp, he decided it was enough. He rose back up to his feet and strode back the way he came.

He found himself once again standing outside the apartment complex, new bouquet in hand. The window to Amy’s room was still open, and the lights were still off. Three minutes remained before he had to start his journey back home. It was time.

The turbine built into Metal Sonic’s back gently began to whir once more. Scattered leaves and pebbles around him rolled away as the pavement disappeared from his feet. He slowly ascended past the first-floor window, and then the second. Just like before, his movements had to be delicate, as to avoid waking up the residents. The third-floor window was now within arm’s reach. He could do this. Looking down at his pure white bouquet, he couldn’t help but remember the fear and terror that the Ricky had in reaction to him. This caused him to hesitate, his grip tightening around the flowers. Why? He elicited fear from others all the time, so what made this any different? He snapped out of it, giving himself one last push of determination and stretching his arm up, placing the flowers atop the windowsill. His claws slowly let go, making extra sure that he couldn’t be seen. His arm slinked back, and he pulled it to his side. He had done it. He had repaid his debt.

His internal timer beeped as his time to return home had arrived. He was about to fly off, only for a memory to blip in his head. That's right. The other part of his mission. Wasting no time, he pried open the golden metal panelling that covered the top of his hand. A cluster of wires and circuitry were revealed, and nestled inside was a small device the size of a penny. Taking it out with his thumb and forefinger, he reached up once more and nestled it beneath the windowsill. It stuck to the brick surface and remained out of sight. And once he was certain it would remain, he hovered away from the building, and shot swiftly into the starry night sky.

Chapter Text

Blotches of indistinguishable light appeared in the darkness, followed abruptly by the blaring of an alarm clock.

Amy Rose tried to pry her eyelids open, but the weight of them felt like they were glued shut. Giving up the endeavour, she attempted to cease the harsh beeping of her alarm clock that was still blaring in her ears. Her right hand fumbled along the nightstand as she blindly fished for the clock, only to hear something fall to the floor when her fingers brushed against it.

“Oh, come on…” she mumbled groggily, realising that she had just knocked the alarm clock on the floor. Dragging her limp body by one working arm, she turned herself over and began to dangle herself from the side of her double bed. Her hand pressed down against the carpet as she scraped around aimlessly for the alarm’s new location. The moment her skin contacted plastic, she scrambled fast to click the clock’s button and silence the noise. Letting out a groan of relief but also anguish, she flipped back onto her back, rubbed her eyes with her balled fists, and groggily stared up at the ceiling. She wondered how as a society they were so accepting of having self-torture as an everyday at-home appliance? But her brain was far too asleep to be asking such grand questions.

Slotting her feet into her red slippers at her bedside, she sluggishly rose from the comfort of her bed and stretched, her spine popping audibly as she trudged over to her en suite bathroom. The gentle rush of tap water preceded the cold splash that she woke herself up with, her eyes at least now a little more alert and ready for the day ahead as she buried her face in a towel.

Once she removed the towel however, the surroundings of her bedroom passed by her, the vivid familiarity making it practically invisible to her half-awake mind. But as she was getting ready to leave the blurs of colour behind to make breakfast, an alien colour of white stood out in the corner of her vision, catching her attention.

Amy approached her window, the cool morning breeze enveloping her body as she looked down at what appeared to be a bouquet of white flowers.

“What the…?”

She poked her head out over the windowsill, looking down at the streets below her. A few stray humans and mobians walked along the pavements, idly locked into their daily routines, and none were even aware of the confused and perplexed pair of eyes on them. Pulling herself back inside, she retrieved the bouquet and quickly closed the window shut. Her eyes gently sparkled in the glow of the morning sunlight as she turned the flowers around in her hands. The questions were multiplying in her head so much that it was giving her a headache.

Amy paused, a light bulb flicking on in her head. Returning to her bedside, she delicately placed the arrangement of flowers on her blanket. Checking to make sure the flowers weren’t tarnished, she then rushed to her nightstand where she retrieved the only other appliance that wasn’t previously knocked onto the floor: her smartphone. It had a sparkling pink glitter phone case covered in star stickers that her friend Cream once made for her as a birthday present from years back, and its age and scratches showed how long she had kept it around. The phone blipped into life; Amy scrolled through her contacts list, tapped the screen and held the phone up to her cheek.

“Hey! It’s Amy. Uh…how soon can you come over?”

Dressed in an expensive matching red coat and beret, Rouge the Bat’s high heels clacked along the Central City pavement, holding a jewel-encrusted hand mirror up to her face as she applied a shiny strawberry lip stick to her puckered lips. It wasn’t often that Amy would call her in general, let alone out of the blue like this. And judging the tone over the phone it sounded quite urgent. So, she made sure to walk at a brisk pace, while also retaining her stylish aura with every step. As she vigorously scanned her facial appearance, checking for any slight flaw or smudge of her eyeliner in her reflection, she couldn’t help but pick up on an intense conversation of two humans she passed by.

“Thank God they didn’t steal anything more, but what kind of weirdo goes this out of their way just for a pen?” a bewildered male voice spoke.

“That’s very strange,” a female voice responded. “Like, they could’ve just written what they needed to here and left or something. Maybe they were in a hurry?”

“A hurry for what? It’s just a pen!”

“It’s probably the same person who broke into the bookstore a few blocks down. Did you hear about that?”

Rouge toned out the rest of unimportant talk, closing her hand mirror and stowing it away in her black purse that was as pricey as a car. She strode up to the front door of Amy’s apartment complex and buzzed at her numbered doorbell. The bat only had to wait for a few seconds before the host immediately flung open the door. She had managed to quickly change out from her heart pyjamas and into her iconic backless red dress with a white trim and matching boots. Rouge instantly picked up on her still slightly messy quills, guessing that she had likely gotten ready in a rush. But she decided to pay it no mind.

“Hi sweetie,” Rouge greeted warmly with a gentle embrace, to which Amy quickly returned the gesture.

“Hi Rouge! Sorry for the surprise call and all that,” Amy replied with a hint of embarrassment. She removed her arms as she looked to the side awkwardly, brushing aside one of her quills. “I promise I won’t take up too much of your time.”

“As long as there’s a coffee brewing for me, it was a worthwhile trip, hon~” Rouge cooed with a playful wink, already making herself at home as she clacked past Amy and up her apartment floor stairway. Amy blinked a couple times, caught off guard by her forward and friendly behaviour, before she regained herself.

“Uh yeah! No, of course I can get you a coffee,” she exclaimed bashfully, shuffling around and quickly catching up to the mature bat woman. “I could probably use one myself, to be honest.”

Amy opened her apartment door to Rouge as they both walked inside. Her lounge area was cozy and modern, with a sleek open kitchen in the same room and a countertop separating the two. A couple of oakwood bookshelves stood by the white walls, with many novels, notepads, binders and photo albums filling it up to the brim. A small wide screen TV faced opposite of a single couch and coffee table and a large fluffy black rug lay beneath. Rouge was a bit taken aback by this room, and Amy seemed to pick up on this as she turned over.

“Is something wrong?” Amy asked with faint curiosity.

“I’ll confess, I expected it to be a lot pinker” Rouge admitted, looking around the room like it had come straight out of an apartment catalogue. Amy chuckled sheepishly to herself, averting her eyes.

“I’m not that bad, am I? Who has a bright pink kitchen lounge?”

“Touché,” Rouge conceded with a smile, realising that the apartment catalogue was at least more natural than the potential Barbie playset look that she pictured in her mind. But the interior designer within her couldn’t help but envision spicing up the place with dark red velvet drapes over the curtains, or a new coat of paint for the walls, or even a chandelier for the ceiling.

“How are the boys doing?” Amy asked playfully, changing the subject as she strolled through to the kitchen area. This earned a hearty laugh from Rouge in return. What were they? Middle-aged housewives?

“About as much of a handful as yours,” Rouge answered. “Shadow’s off in his own world as per usual and Omega’s Omega. What else is new?”

Amy chuckled jovially alongside her as she set the kettle to boil, pulling out a couple of mugs and setting them down on the counter with a clink. Rouge meanwhile made herself comfortable on the living room sofa, passing the time by further looking around her room. What if Amy had a nice landscape mural piece along that wall there? She had a connection that Amy could hit up. No, that might be a bit too cluttered given the limited space in this small apartment. Rouge was about to feel a bit of pity for her before something caught her eye. Something that stood out from the rest of the décor. A large bouquet of white flowers nestled in a water-filled metal stock pot, predominantly used for cooking stews, was placed on the coffee table directly in front of her. Rouge couldn’t hold back anymore. She had to say something.

“Amy. Honey. I can buy you a flowerpot. They’re like ten rings each,” the bat insisted, the bafflement apparent in her voice.

“What?” Amy asked perplexed, poking her head up from over the countertop with a cocked brow. She saw Rouge looking almost offended at her flower display and her eyes widened. “Oh! Sorry! It was a last-minute thing. The pot was the best thing I had in the house for them.”

Well that only created more questions. They were pushed to the side though as Amy finally arrived with two steaming cups in hand. She placed them down on her two black coasters, to which Rouge gently retrieved her mug and blew gently against the heat. She took a small sip. Hey, it was no Black Ivory, but it was nice.

“It’s a funny thing actually,” Amy continued, staring down at the floral arrangement. “These flowers are actually why I called you here in the first place.”

“And is this because of-?”

“No. It’s not because of the cooking pot,” Amy interrupted, closing her eyes in light exasperation. Rouge cocked a brow, but decided to hold her tongue until Amy had finished what she had on her mind. The hedgehog took a sip from her own coffee and sat down in the spot next to Rouge. She faced the bright flowers as she continued to speak, her face already going bright red before the words even left her mouth.

“Rouge,” Amy began. “You’ve had a lot of guys fawn after you, right?”

“Hm?”

Instead of spitting her drink out like almost anyone else would, Rouge calmly finished her current sip of coffee, and a devilish smile left the rim of her mug.

“Ohhhhh. So that’s where you got the flowers from~?” Rouge deduced, leaning towards the hedgehog girl. If she knew she was going to get some juicy gossip like this she would have come sooner. But Amy neither nodded nor shook her head.

“I…don’t know?” Amy asked, her questioning tone trailing off as her brain still couldn’t stick to a single answer. Rouge’s smile lowered, but she still leaned in towards her, her large ears flicking as she began to listen. “I woke up this morning and just found them on my bedroom windowsill. I don’t know where they came from or how they even got there. But surely, they had to have been placed there by someone, right? It’s not like the wind could have blown them up here to a third storey floor by accident or chance. Especially all together in a neat bundle.”

Rouge’s eyes turned from Amy to the white bouquet. The flowers looked very pretty and well-grown, and the petals and leaves didn’t show a single scratch. Even in the highly unlikely event of a gust of wind sending all the flowers through her window, some of the petals and leaves must have been torn off at the very least. So, Amy’s theory did at least hold some water. She took more sips of coffee as she pondered.

“Assuming they are from someone, you can rule out anyone who can’t get up to a third storey window in the first place,” Rouge added, her agent’s intuition coming in handy. Amy nodded in agreement, relieved that she chose to call Rouge of all people for this. The bat wasn’t done however as she reached for the bouquet, taking it out from the pot of water as she looked over it in her hands from all angles. “You said your bedroom windowsill?”

“Yes,” Amy confirmed. She stood up from the sofa, coffee mug in hand as she gestured over to a door at the end of the living room. “I’ll show you.”

Taking her mug and the bouquet, Rouge followed behind as Amy opened the white door to her bedroom. What greeted her on the other side was blinding pink. The wallpaper? Pink stripes. Her closet and drawers? Strawberry red with pink hearts for handles. Her bed duvet? Baby pink with even more hearts decorating it. Her carpet? Pink and so cushiony their feet sunk into it like snow. Even the photo frames that were displayed on top of the furniture were decorated with multiple pink heart stickers.

“See? This is what I was expecting,” Rouge commented with all the smugness she could muster. Amy immediately hid her embarrassment in her hands. Was she really that predictable?

“Look, I’ve had this stuff since I was a kid. I couldn’t just get rid of it, okay?” she defended, trying desperately to move back to the topic at hand as soon as possible.

“Don’t worry hon, I get you,” she teased reassuringly, sneaking a victory chuckle under her breath. She strutted over to the bedroom window overlooking the city streets beneath them. It didn’t seem like too hectic of a neighbourhood, with only an odd one or two citizens passing by. She pushed gently against the windows, seeing if they would open on their own without turning the indoor handles, which they did not. “I assume your windows were open last night?”

“Mhm. Something to let some cool air in for the hot summer,” Amy answered. Her brows began to furrow as implications began to circle through her mind. “Why? Do you think this guy is a stalker or a burglar or something?”

“I wouldn’t say so,” Rouge reassured, placing the mug and bouquet on the windowsill. “I’ve dealt with the odd stalker before, hon. If they managed to get through an open window, they would’ve done far more than just leave some flowers here. Not that they survived to tell the tale though~”

She emphasised her point by punching her open palm with a calm and collected smirk on her muzzle. Amy was both incredibly relieved and a little apprehensive. At least she knew she didn’t have to worry about someone breaking in. But was she still too careless last night?

“Who you’re dealing with is a shy guy, sweetie,” Rouge continued. “They’re being mysterious for a reason. Not good with talking face to face, embarrassment, shame that might be brought upon them by their family, that sort of thing.”

Amy pondered Rouge’s words, staring down at the bouquet. Her eyes couldn’t help but sparkle slightly in the morning light that was cast into her room.

“How are you feeling about all this?” Rouge asked, picking up on this.

“Honestly?” Amy didn’t take her eyes off the flowers. “I know I don’t know who this person is and all. But it kind of feels… nice. To know that someone would want to do something like this for me.”

“I’ll bet it’s refreshing after all that Sonic swooning as well,” Rouge added with a wink, earning a flustered scowl from the hedgehog.

“Zip it,” Amy scoffed, fighting off her blushing cheeks. But as much as she wanted to deny it, Rouge once again had a point. She looked back on all the years she spent trying to win over Sonic the Hedgehog, and all the times she was shut down, that the idea of someone giving that sentiment to her instead was very abnormal and unexpected for her. It was almost kind of exciting. She shook her head as she brought herself back to reality. “But I can’t jump to any conclusions yet. I still don’t know anything about who they are. I wish I could learn more about them.”

“Well, we can learn one thing about them…” Rouge picked up the bouquet once more, turned it around, and pointed at a specific area of their stems. “They seem to be on the messier side.”

Staining multiple parts of the flowers’ stems was what appeared to be a dried black substance. But it wasn’t just a stray splatter either. It seemed to take up most of the area in the middle, where someone would likely hold the bouquet in their hand. Amy took the flowers from her and squinted her eyes to get a closer look.

“Ink?”

“And from the looks of it, no fingerprints,” Rouge followed with a sigh. “So much for running these beauties through the G.U.N. databases.”

“We shouldn’t need to go that far,” Amy reassured, not taking her eyes off the newly discovered clue. “Were they wearing gloves maybe?”

“You better hope so. Anyone with no fingerprints is never a good sign.”

“Good point,” Amy responded, chuckling at the ridiculous notion. All this mystery had begun to grab her attention, and she couldn’t help but try to formulate solutions. Was this what it was like to be a detective? She was finding it kind of fun! “What if they show up again? Maybe I can stay up and try to look out for them?”

“Oh honey,” Rouge interrupted, placing a hand on her forehead in exasperation. “You don’t know how to keep guys going, do you?”

“…Your point being?” Amy grumbled.

“Shy guy, remember? You’ll scare ‘em off if you catch them too soon.” Rouge proceeded to sit down on the side of her bed, drinking the last of her cup of coffee. “At least wait until you get a diamond necklace out of them first.”

“Uh huh…”

“Hey. You called me up for my advice, sweetie. It’s down to you if you want to be correct or not.”

Air deflated from Amy’s cheeks like a disappointing saggy balloon. Every hope of getting more answers only seemed to get shut down bit by bit. And she still couldn’t rule out the possibility that this was all a freak coincidence. How did she know this didn’t get blown onto her windowsill by a gust of wind? How does she know these flowers weren’t meant for someone else? She didn’t exactly have a way of proving otherwise. And far more unlikely things have happened in the world before. And even if this was an intentional gesture, there’s no guarantee that this isn’t just a one-time thing that’ll never happen again. But if Amy was anything, she was always ever the optimist. She looked down at the white blooms in her hands, gently caressing the petals with her thumb.

“I guess even if this was just a coincidence or a mistake, at least they’re really pretty,” she spoke partly to herself, her smile returning. Rouge silently nodded in agreement, joining in her smile.

“Just promise me you’ll get them out of that god forsaken cooking pot. That’s all I ask.”

“Ha! I promise,” Amy concluded, her joy returning to her face.  “I guess maybe I could- “

The ring of her apartment doorbell grabbed both girls’ attention. Someone else was here? She didn’t order any package delivery, did she?

“Oh! Sorry. You don’t mind if I take this real quick, do you?” Amy haphazardly asked, smoothing her quills out with her free hand as she made her way to the bedroom door.

“It’s your place. It’s not like I’m going to answer it,” Rouge dismissed with a smirk, playfully shooing her away with her hand. Amy rolled her eyes, strolling out of the bedroom. She delicately placed the flowers back into the water-filled stock pot and then dashed out.

The doorbell could be heard buzzing a second time from out the front door, the tone much longer and urgent than the first, as Amy scrambled down the apartment stairs two steps at a time.

“I’m coming! Hold on!” she blurted out, practically skidding on the heels of her boots as she caught her breath by the other side of the door. Turning the handle and throwing the door open, her expression changed from frantic exhaustion to unexpected surprise.

Standing in the doorway was a shorter fox boy with yellow and white fur, two large fluffy tails that swayed behind him, and wearing a brown backpack and pilot headwear. His expression wasn’t one of panic, but it didn’t seem to be a totally calm one either.

“Tails?” Amy identified with a cocked head.

“Hey Amy!” the fox greeted back with a wave. He smiled, but the hedgehog girl could tell there was something off about it. “Sorry. Is now a bad time at all?”

“UHHHHH…” Amy slowly leaned her arm against the doorframe, keeping up casual appearances. “Why what’s going on?”

“I’ve been following the news as well as keeping tabs on what Egg Net frequencies I can find,” Tails explained, reaching into his brown burlap backpack and pulling out his signature yellow handheld device, the Miles Electric, and monitoring the incoming data that flooded the screen as he spoke. “It’s currently an educated hunch of mine, but it looks like Eggman might be planning to launch a raid at Empire City. We don’t know what for yet, but Sonic’s already decided he wants to go check it out.”

“Sonic?

“Yeah! He’s currently waiting at the Tornado. We were flying by, and I decided I’d stop by to pick you up in case you wanted to tag along too!”

“Aha… is that so?”

Amy sank slightly where she stood while still smiling. She had absolutely grown up a lot from how she used to be, she could at least admit that. But she still at least wished that Sonic had offered her a proper invitation instead of picking her up because they happened to pass by. Tails didn’t catch onto this, instead stowing away the Miles Electric back into his backpack.

“So, what do you think? You’re not busy at all today, are you?” he asked pleasantly.

“She’s not busy at all, Foxboy~”

Before Amy could open her mouth with an answer, Rouge the Bat had appeared behind her and placed an encouraging hand on her shoulder. Tails’ eyes shot open as he could barely process the situation, his head darting back and forth between the two while Amy was just as flustered.

“R-Rouge??” he gasped. “Um…hello? What are you doing with Amy?”

“It’s a girl thing, sweetie. You’ll understand when you’re older,” she deflected, teasing him as much as she could and revelling in every second of his reactions. Tails’ brow furrowed as he silently pouted through flustered cheeks, while Amy was able to let out a subtle sigh of relief. She wished Rouge didn’t turn this into this big of a deal, but at least the bat knew how to keep a secret when it mattered. Rouge strutted past the two, her heels clacking against the paved pathway once more. She put her red beret back on and she bid a parting farewell with a single hand wave. “Well, I’ll leave you two heroes to it. Thank you for the coffee, Amy, as well as our delightful chat! Do keep me updated, hm? A lady needs her news!”

Rouge made her departure, and the bewildered Tails and Amy were left all alone in the apartment doorway. Tails looked back to the hedgehog, his bewilderment not changing, and all she could do was grumble.

“Can we just go already?”

“*krrrrzt* Honestly? I know I don’t know who this person is and all. But it kind of feels *krrrrrzt* nice. To know that someone would want to do something like this for me.”

Amy’s voice emanated with a static aura through the transceiver on the countertop. Metal Sonic stood motionless, standing perfectly upright as he only focused on the audio that he received. He had first realised that she had noticed the bouquet when her call to the bat girl was picked up by the bug he placed by her window. He had only placed the bug to make certain that the plan went off without a hitch, in the unfortunate possible circumstance of the wind blowing them away. But once he received her voice, he decided to continue listening. What if she didn’t like the flowers? That wouldn’t be repaying his debt at all. He’d at least be able to know if that was the case and then think of an alternative solution. But he got his answer. She really liked the flowers. There was a genuine calm joy in her voice. He can cut off the communication now. But once she started speaking positively about the gesture, about what he did, he wanted to wait just a little longer. To see if she would say anything else nice like that again.

A message pinged in the corner of Metal Sonic’s vision.

>>  May I come in?

The mechanical hedgehog could hear Amy scrambling out of her room, followed shortly after by the bat. He flicked off the power switch for the transceiver, cutting off the communication, and he responded to the message with his own.

>>  Go ahead.

Sage appeared in the small room in an electronic flicker of light, taking her seat on top of the work counter.

“Greetings. I take it your outing was a success?” the AI asked softly. Metal Sonic remained stood upright, looking up at her as he responded through another message.

>>  It was. Amy received the gesture, and my debt has been repaid.

“I’m glad to hear it,” Sage replied with a gentle smile. “It was quite enjoyable working together with you. Even with our hurdle of the communication filter.”

Metal Sonic did not respond, averting his eyes slightly while Sage’s smile sank slightly. The two of them had big suspicions of why that filter was likely there in the first place, but neither one of them wanted to be the one to address it. It’s not like they would need to anyway. It won’t be an issue worth worrying about anymore now that their goal was complete. But that didn’t make the awkwardness any less frustrating. Before the silence could get anymore deafening, the two of them were startled by the sound of a crackling speaker coming from Metal Sonic’s inner hardware. They both knew it wasn’t another badnik, but rather someone else far more important.

“Metal Sonic!” the gruff male voice barked, grabbing both their attention. “I am en route to Empire City with a badnik squadron. And if I know that annoying pin cushion, which I do, him and his equally annoying friends will be showing up to spoil the fun! You are to join up immediately and keep them busy!”

What followed was a new set of coordinates marked ‘MISSION DESTINATION’ appearing in Metal Sonic’s visor. Sage hovered down from the counter, nodding her head with understanding.

“I wish you and father good luck,” she encouraged with a returning smile. “I shall assist you both however I can from here.” Metal Sonic nodded in return, his fists clenching with determination. But instead of immediately heading towards the doorway out, he first moved around to the side of the work counter, bending down to pick something up. Sage cocked a brow as she tried to look over to what he was doing. “Metal?”

Metal brought up an object and placed it firmly on the work counter. The object in question was a book. A well-kept hard cover book with the title ‘Our Connections with Bonds’, by Dr. Harvey Flock. Sage stared down at the book, wide-eyed and perplexed, then looked up to see Metal Sonic making his way out of the room.

“Wait, Metal, what is this?” she asked, her voice rising in the hopes he’d respond. Metal Sonic stopped briefly in his tracks, turned over his shoulder to look at her, and a message blipped in Sage’s own vision.

>>  You have been studying the human condition. I got you this. I have now repaid my debt to you as well.

Sage remained still as Metal Sonic turned the corner, and she was now left alone in his recharge station. She turned around to look back down at the book. Her smile grew. And it grew a little further.

Chapter Text

“For God’s sake. Can we listen to anything other than this?”

“Who’s the one driving?”

“Look- I get that. But if we’re on a three-hour journey, surely some variety wouldn’t kill you?”

“Well, Mr Passenger Princess. When you get promoted to Driver of the Truck in five years, you can play all the chart toppers you please. How does that sound?”

G.U.N. Officers Gerald Boyd and Carl Briggs were seated in an armour-plated delivery truck moving along the thick and bustling motorway. Gerald was only able to make efficient time by snaking and weaving around all the many cars and vans that clogged up each lane. He knew that it was always busier in this part of the city, but it was like they were all rats being funnelled into increasingly claustrophobic tunnels, where only the most daring and reckless would make it out the other side. And the amount of time spent in traffic only made Gerald’s music playlist all the more grating on Carl, who already wasn’t the biggest fan of Forget Me Knots’ music to begin with.

“Oh, har har,” Carl groaned sarcastically, rolling his eyes. “I was only asking, you moron. No need to pull rank on me.”

“I’ll stop pulling rank when you finally admit they’re good,” Gerald retorted with a smirk, casually tapping his fingers on the steering wheel to the upbeat rock.

“Buy me a coffee and some ear plugs and I’ll consider it,” Carl concluded, looking out the window to find anything that could distract his mind from the shredding guitars from the speaker. But as the guitars became more erratic and distorted, it stabbed into his brain like sharpened chalk as he felt his skin crawl. “Okay, seriously, if you don’t change that music pronto, the next song we’re playing will be with your head against the dashboard!”

He whipped his head around in irritation, but to Carl’s surprise, Gerald seemed to be in just as much agony as he was. His face was scrunched up in pain as he tried to frantically twist the dials of the radio, but the music only continued to turn more into a high-pitched whining static.

“Must be some damn interference or something,” Gerald grumbled, continuing to pointlessly meddle with the radio dials.

The oddities didn’t stop there. The dashboard monitor, which previously showed a digitalised GPS map of their route, jumbled and stuttered like it was a completed puzzle being torn apart. The previous calm white of the display was corrupted beyond recognition, showing a horrific rainbow of pixels and broken graphics. Both Gerald and Carl broke into a panic.

“What’s the hell is going on!?” Carl yelled, joining in with Gerald as he feebly pressed all the buttons in the hope that one would just end this nonsense. Gerald ripped his walkie talkie from his uniform and held it up to his mouth, speaking into the transceiver.

“Can anyone hear me? This is Officer Gerald Boyd, driving Armoured Transport Vehicle 201 KHT!” he barked at the top of his lungs. “We appear to be getting hacked by an unknown source! We need immediate investigation and backup, over!!”

“I’m afraid you’ll be needing more than that, Mr. Boyd.”

Both Carl and Gerald froze as they heard what sounded like a child’s voice over the radio. It didn’t sound like anyone they remembered from headquarters. It was cold and unwavering in tone, sending a chill up their spines that drowned out the static. Gerald spoke into his radio once more.

“Who is this? Give your name and rank! Over!” Gerald shouted, sputtering spit over the radio. The response was quick.

“My name is Sage, assistant to Dr. Eggman. Your vehicle and its contents are being seized by the Eggman Empire. You are to both exit the vehicle and place your hands on your head immediately. Failure to comply or calling for back-up will result in imminent extermination for you and the surrounding public.”

Amy went in and out of staring at her own reflection as she passed by each parked car, taking quick secretive moments to smooth out her quills while Tails wasn’t looking. The fox meanwhile had his eyes buried back in his Miles Electric, monitoring the streams of data to keep an eye on any changes.

“Not to be that person, but how much further do we have?” Amy asked, feeling the light strain of her legs. “How far away did you park the Tornado?”

“Outskirts of the city. You sadly can’t leave a plane in a parking lot,” Tails replied, half apologetically half begrudgingly. “I tried to get permission to land in one of those government landing fields, mentioning that Sonic was with me. But they wouldn’t have it regardless without official ID.”

“Seriously? After all we’ve done for them too?”

“I was just as surprised,” Tails continued. “Sonic didn’t seem too fussed about it, saying the longer we spent chatting with them, the longer it would take us to ‘crack some eggs’.”

Amy snickered under her breath, and Tails joined in not long after. Yep, that sounded like Sonic alright. As the two continued to walk, the towering buildings began to peter out bit by bit. More fields of grass could be seen stretching alongside the concrete roads. The two came across a pathway of dirt that split off from the pavement, where multiple people seem to have walked over the grass over the years. Tails diverted from the main road and Amy quickly followed suit.

“Hey. Out of curiosity, do you know if there are any flower shops in Empire City?” Amy asked. Tails turned his head over his shoulder with a surprised puzzled expression.

“Flower shop? I’d be shocked if they didn’t. It’s a big city. Why? Were you wanting to pick some up?”

“Oh, no reason!” Amy replied, keeping her strange visitation from the previous night to herself. “I was just thinking about getting a vase or something to help pretty-up the apartment. If I’m already travelling with you guys, I might as well make the most of it, you know?”

“Oh, no worries!” said Tails. “I’m sure we should be able to find one after we’ve dealt with Eggman.”

“Find one what?”

Both Amy and Tails’ heads darted forwards. Laying on top of a biplane in the middle of a clearing was an all too familiar blue hedgehog with white gloves and red sneakers. He sat up and stretched his back as he waved over to them with a smirk. Amy’s face lit up.

“Hi Sonic!!” Amy beamed, running ahead of Tails to jump up and give Sonic a high five. Sonic chuckled at her enthusiasm as Tails span his twin tails in a propeller formation to catch up.

“Glad to have you with us, Amy,” Sonic exclaimed with a smirk. “I know this was all a last-minute joint and everything.”

“Oh, prrrft, no need to worry,” she reassured, waving a dismissive hand. Swallow your pride, Amy, she thought. Now’s not the time. “I needed to get myself out of the apartment today anyway.”

“That’s the attitude!” Sonic encouraged, fuelling his own hype. He turned over to their designated pilot. “How long do you reckon it’ll take us to get there, Cap?”

“With minimal turbulence it should only take an hour,” Tails relayed, hopping into the cockpit and already starting up the turbine engines. “We’re not expecting any weather issues either. We should make it there in record time.”

“That’s what I like to hear! What are we waiting for then?”

The bitter cold wind resistance beat hard against the trio as the Tornado cruised above the stretching fields and roads beneath them. Amy thought that she would’ve flown out from the passenger’s seat and plummeted if she wasn’t seat-belted down. But then she would look up at Sonic standing casually with his arms crossed on the wing of the plane and his eyes forward. His quills shook against the air in a futile effort to dislodge him, but his feet never budged a single inch as he just waited eagerly to arrive at their destination. Amy always wondered how he was able to manage all this on all his adventures with Tails. It was always so admirable…

“So, Amy! What’ve you been up to lately?” Sonic called out, turned his head around and looking down at her with his signature grin.

“Huh?” Amy was snapped out of her train of thought at the sound of Sonic’s voice, quickly regaining her composure. “Oh! Not much, other than having some catch up with the girls. Since Starfall Islands I figured I’d decompress a bit. World-Ending threats can be a little exhausting after a while, you know?”

“Tell me about it,” Tails added with a sighing chuckle. Sonic simply let out a hearty scoff in response.

“Don’t worry guys. Next time a god decides to pick a fight with us, I’ll see if they can reschedule for next month,” Sonic quipped with a caring aura. “Wouldn’t want you two getting burnout or anything, would I?”

“You’re too kind,” Amy replied, half sarcastically, half genuinely.

“What about Knuckles?” said Tails. “Have we heard much from him since the Starfall Islands?”

“He’s finally taken some advice of mine and gone AWOL,” Sonic answered, earning surprised looks from his two partners.

“Knuckles is gone?” Amy gasped in stunned bewilderment. “Like…gone gone? Where is he??”

“The less you know, the better!” Sonic quoted, putting on a dorky macho impersonation of the echidna in question. “If I’m going on this break to rediscover myself, the last thing I need to see is your stupid blue face checking up on me!”

“I mean, fair,” Amy groaned, rubbing her temple. “But what about the Master Emerald? Isn’t guarding it like his 24/7 job? Is it going to be okay?”

“He was very proud of his defence setup. You two shoulda seen it! It’s like if Mouse Trap was built with vines and boulders,” Sonic explained, Knuckles’ hype admittedly rubbing off on him. “He spent a whole month building it apparently. I would’ve loved to give it a spin had he not blown a fuse at the idea.”

“Vines and boulders?” Tails muttered apprehensively. “I wish he could’ve at least come to me for help. I would’ve been happy to set up a sentry for him or something.”

“Awww, don’t take it personally, Tails,” Amy reassured, offering Tails a soft pat on the back. “You know him. Tough as a brick, but stubborn as one too.”

“Yeah, I wouldn’t worry about him, bud!” Sonic joined in. “Besides, he certainly needed the time off. Just no one mention anything to Rouge, and he should be fine.”

Tails’ ears perked up at the mention of the bat’s name, while Amy averted her eyes shyly. As Tails continued to pilot the plane, he used his free hand to boot up a monitor on the panel of his dashboard. He seemed to be typing in something, but Amy couldn’t make out what it was from where she was sitting.

“Well would you look at that!”

The horizon soon gave way to an ocean of skyscrapers and roads as Empire City came into view. Amy couldn’t help but gasp. She had never been to Empire City before, and the sheer scale of the megalopolis made Central City look like a cozy village. Sonic and Amy surveyed the skies. There didn’t seem to be any sign of Eggman yet, and the lack of smoke and mayhem confirmed that they hadn’t shown up too late.

“Get those muscles ready, everyone!” Sonic announced, warming up by stretching his arms. “Ol’ bald and barking could be planning anything, so prepare for everything.”

“Right!” Amy and Tails agreed, pumping themselves up for what was to come.

Tails fiddled with the knobs of the plane’s radio, trying to see if they could tap into any potential news broadcasts about an Eggman attack taking place. He didn’t seem to have much luck, only gathering news about the weather, some author’s interview about their latest book, and an odd traffic jam occurring around the centre of the city. With no further leads to go off, the fox decided to turn the plane towards the jam.

“Oh, Amy!” Tails called out to behind him. “Holly and Molly’s!”

“…Wha?” Amy blurted in confusion. “Who are they?” Tails tapped on his monitor panel, which revealed a map layout of Empire City.

“Looks like your best bet for a flower shop is a place called Holly and Molly’s,” he explained, pointing out a specifically tagged store with a flower icon. “It’s not too far from where we’ll be checking out, so you should be able to stop by after we’re done here.”

“Flower shop?” Sonic questioned curiously, turning over to Amy. “What’s all that for?”

Amy went bright red, her voice getting lodged in her throat. Why was she getting so embarrassed by all this? She didn’t get this flustered when Tails asked about it, so what made this any different? She looked up at Sonic’s smiling face, desperately trying to force her mouth to say something before her brain could catch up with it.

“Um- uhhh…well, you see-”

“Hey guys? Looks like we’ve got a situation,” Tails interrupted, pointing out from his plane to the roads below them. Sonic looked down with him, while Amy let out a pent-up sigh of relief before joining them.

The city’s long stretch of road had been completely clogged to oblivion by trucks and cars in the hundreds. There was barely any breathing space between each vehicle, and all the monstrously angry car honks could be heard clearly from the many miles up they were. The traffic jam seemed to continue all the way into an equally clogged tunnel.

“I know Empire City’s usually very busy, but never to this degree,” Tails explained.

“You think this is Eggman’s doing?” Amy asked, her brow furrowing in concern. “I’m not seeing any badniks.”

“Yeah, and where’s his signature maniacal boasting?” Sonic added.

“I don’t know. But it’s probably worth investigating at least,” Tails replied, slowly descending the Tornado so they could get a closer eye on the scene.

When all hell broke loose.

Tails’ monitors soon became nothing but a garbled mess of incomprehensible colours, and the Tornado’s engine began to jitter, screech and whine. Tails broke out into a sweat.

“What the-??” he gasped, his hands becoming a blur as they frantically fiddled with every button and lever he had to try and fix the problem. The engine rumbling only got worse, resulting in Amy’s and Sonic’s eyes widening too. Amy clutched anxiously onto her seatbelt while Sonic knelt and clung onto the plane’s wing tightly.

“Tails?? What’s going on!?” Amy screamed, her heart getting ready to explode from her ribcage.

“Some sort of interference! I think we’re being hacked!” Tails blurted out, still doing everything he could to stop the painful grinding sound of the engine. But not before long, the worst noise of all came. Silence. The plane’s propeller slowed to a gentle stop before the vehicle began to slowly turn downwards, starting a violent plummet towards the city below. “The engine’s dead! We’re going to have to abandon the plane!”

“WHAT? Like, NOW??”

“I’m going to redirect the crash landing to an empty area! Don’t jump until I say so!” Tails ordered, his fight or flight kicking in as he turned the steering wheel so hard that he prayed he wouldn’t yank it off.

“Do your Genius Magic, bud!” Sonic yelled, his faith in his #1 Pilot masking his own shock.

Tails used the wind resistance and drag to keep the plane airborne for as long as he could, fighting against the laws of gravity like a dog wanting to be let off its leash. He frantically darted his eyes in every direction, attempting to find an empty enough landing sight.

“Down there!” Amy bellowed, reaching her arm out to point down at a clearing behind a cluster of buildings. It was likely a delivery docking bay for the neighbouring stores, but most importantly, it wasn’t populated.

“Good find! It’ll have to do!” Tails grunted, praying to whoever that the circumstances will prevent them from getting a fine. He wrestled with the controls, gritting his teeth as he wore his gloves down to his palms. The plane writhed and heaved for as much air as it can, before Tails managed to find the final trajectory. He locked the wheel in place and turned around to his two straining passengers. “On three, jump out of the plane! Ready?”

Amy and Sonic, through their vein pumping adrenaline, nodded in acknowledgement. Amy gripped onto her seatbelt, getting ready to unbuckle herself.

“One! Two! THREE!!!”

The plane swiftly disappeared from everyone’s feet as it continued its shaking descent down to the earth. Amy found herself spinning in free fall, the skies above and the streets below spinning in a dizzying cycle. She screamed at the top of her lungs, only for a gloved hand to grip tightly around her’s. She looked up to see Sonic holding tightly onto her, while Tails held them both up while using his propeller twin tails, saving them from a messy demise.

The three of them watched on in horror as the Tornado careened down into the docking bay. The crash and tear of metal roared for miles, before an eruption of smoke ascended and mixed with the clouds. Tails grumbled under his exhausted breath.

“And I just got it tuned up too…”

The trio scampered and darted past the cramped queue of vehicles as they got closer to their destination. Sonic quickly took the lead, leaping from car to car at blinking speed. Tails flew above, keeping his Miles Electric active and searching for any potential local source of their mystery hacker. And Amy readied herself not far behind, making frequent stops to knock on windows to make sure the disgruntled and confused drivers were okay, reassuring them that they were on the case with as much optimism as she could muster. The light of the blue sky was replaced by the dim orange glow of the motorway tunnel, the honking of horns only echoing louder and angrier.

“This must have been going on for a while,” Tails calculated. “Judging from how far back the traffic jam goes, I’d say it’s been over thirty minutes or so. Maybe an hour!”

“And I think we have the culprit!” Sonic called out.

Looking ahead, it appeared that a blockade of many traffic cones and tape had been haphazardly set up, cutting off all lanes in the road. Many of the passengers had gotten out of their vehicles and were hurling obscenities at two G.U.N. Officers yards away behind it. They were standing by their parked armoured truck, hands on their heads and sweating up a storm. One of them, an older gentleman with a bushy moustache, must have been yelling for so long that his throat was on the verge of bleeding.

“For everyone’s safety, please leave this scene immediately! You are in danger! Get everyone else to do the same!” the officer wheezed, trying his best to ease his voice without removing his hands.

“Hey Gerald!” the second officer interrupted, nudging him with his knee. “Isn’t that-?”

The famous blue hedgehog whizzed underneath the barrier, flashing in front of them in the blink of an eye.

“Afternoon, officers! What’s with the parking spot?” he asked, tapping his shoe on the tarmac impatiently. Their eyes lit up at his sudden appearance.

“Sonic the Hedgehog!” Gerald gasped. His heart rate skyrocketed at the turn of this good fortune, and he wasn’t going to waste one second of it. “You need to help get these people away from the area! If me or my colleague move from this spot or call in support, everyone is dead!”

“Why? Is it a bomb?” Tails probed, appearing at Sonic’s side, followed swiftly by Amy.

“Negative. It’s-!”

“OHOHOHOHOHO!”

A monstrous and bellowing laugh rang through the whole tunnel, demanding the attention of everyone at the scene. The distant screams of the public welcomed an oncoming horde of whirring mechanical badniks. Many buzzed above the cluster of cars, while many more stampeded forwards, crashing into and flipping over whatever vehicles were in the way.

Whelp. That confirmed Tails’ suspicions.

“Tails! Amy!” Sonic called out, revving his legs up into a figure-8 and kicking up a cloud of dust behind him. “Cover me while I get the people out of here!”

They both nodded with determined scowls, and Sonic zoomed off back through the barrier. Tails span his twin tails once more and followed, as did Amy. As she ran, she closed her eyes and reached out her open hands in front of her. She took in a calm breath, and with a flick of her wrists, she willed her mighty Piko Piko Hammer into her grasp. Sonic hadn’t even reached the first civilian yet before the hammer was thrown into the skull of an attacking Buzz Bomber, showering his entrance in a dazzling flurry of sparks.

“Woah! Go Amy!” Sonic briefly cheered before zooming ahead. Amy would’ve gotten giddy at the praise, but she saved that for later.

As Tails and Amy turned badnik after badnik into unusable scrap metal, Sonic dashed from car to car, picking up each passenger and driver one at a time and carrying them all out of the tunnel before they could process being escorted out. The nearby barren streetside was growing increasingly filled by a blur of frazzled and startled bystanders. Some turned to each other for the slightest ounce of clarity, while many more high-tailed it out of there. But there were far more people in danger to go.

A hovering capsule craft surveyed the frenzy happening below them from a comfortable height, and its pilot couldn’t stop himself from grinning at the art of the struggle. He remained on top of the constant stream of battle data accumulated from his ensuing armada of badniks as he fidgeted with his moustache.

“You’ll slip up eventually, my prickly pest!” Dr. Eggman announced to his busy archnemesis. “One stray blade or trip will be all it takes, and this road will soon become a memorial! Will it be for you? Or those poor fools you’re saving, I wonder?”

Sonic took a brief stop while placing down a hyperventilating woman to glare up at the perpetrator. He brushed under his nose with his finger, smirking at the doctor’s usual attempts to get under his skin.

“I’d say this is a new low Doc, but who am I kidding?” Sonic retorted, briefly disappearing to save another driver from the tunnel’s carnage and dropping them off in the crowd. “Care to spill what you’re doing all this for? It’ll save us a lot of time, and we can skip straight to the part where we kick your butt.”

“Oh, don’t you worry! I don’t plan on keeping it a secret for long!” Dr. Eggman teased. “After all, isn’t the anticipation the best part of any gift?”

“PLEASE!!”

Sonic was broken out of his back and forth with the doctor by two hands shaking him so hard that his head felt like it would fly off his shoulders. It was the hyperventilating woman he saved seconds prior, tears running down her face.

“My baby!!” she screamed, her face so pale and ragged that it looked like her skeleton was trying to escape her skin. “He’s still in my car!” Sonic gently removed her vice-like grip from him and flashed a reassuring thumbs up.

“On it, ma’am!”

The hedgehog disappeared in an instant, the spectating bystanders seeing a silhouette of the vacuum of space he left behind for a split millisecond. Sonic continued to spin and weave around all the scattered cars and scrap metal left behind by Tails and Amy’s wrath. Through the whirs and clangs and screeches, the wailing of a human child pierced through all of it. Sonic’s head darted quickly to a dented red car, the source of the crying, and quickly rushed over to fling the door open. In the back seat of the vehicle was a small boy in a strapped-in booster seat, red-faced with tears as he could hardly comprehend all the chaos going on outside.

“Shh…shh…it’s okay, lil’ buddy,” Sonic whispered, clearly not used to being this gentle, but put on a smile regardless. He slowly began to climb into the front seat, trying to unlock the back door from the inside. “We’ll get you back to your mom at Sonic Spee- GAHK!!”

Sonic felt the air be forced out of his lungs as a sharp pain clung around his neck, and the car and wailing child was yanked away from him. As Amy and Tails continued to hold off the badnik barrage, their attention was drawn by a sudden oncoming force sending cars flying in all directions.

“Amy! Duck!” Tails yelled, quickly leaping behind a nearby emptied car while Amy followed suit, clutching tightly onto her hammer as the storm crashed past them. And at the centre of this storm was two figures in blue.

Sonic felt his ribs being crushed as a metallic red boot pinned him to the tarmac. And all he could see as he looked up was two glowing lights glaring down at him.

“Kh…heh…I was wondering when you’d join the party, Metal,” Sonic taunted, struggling to breathe but forcing a smirk regardless. “It’s not like you to be fashionably late. What’s the hold up?”

He felt a strangling grip around his neck once more. Metal Sonic began to hover and lift his hedgehog rival from the ground, his body hanging limply in his grasp. He threw him at full force into the tunnel’s wall, and cracks erupted along the concrete. Tails and Amy gasped as they got up from their hiding spot.

“Sonic!” Amy cried, rushing over to the cloud of debris to help her partner up on his feet.

“Took you long enough!” Dr. Eggman’s voice rang from the other end of the tunnel. “Now stop wasting time and take care of them!”

Metal Sonic’s fist clenched as his jet turbine revved up further. Sonic dusted himself off, giving Amy a thankful pat on her shoulder before strutting up to the robot doppelgänger and stretching his arms.

“Change of plan guys,” Sonic spoke, looking over his shoulder to Amy and Tails. “I’ll hold off Twosome Gruesome here. You two get the remaining folk out of here. Especially the kid.”

“Right!” Amy and Tails responded in unison, quickly dispersing from the oncoming bout. Sonic stretched his legs and returned his full attention to the robot.

“Listen, bud,” he started, his voice growing more serious. “I’m all down for a good scrap as much as the next hog, but wouldn’t you rather scrap somewhere where no one’s in the way?”

Aaaand that’s Metal Sonic barrelling towards him at full speed.

“Shhhh..! It’s gonna be okay..! It’s gonna be okay…!”

Amy held the wailing baby tightly to her chest, exhaustedly repeating soothing whispers to them as best as she could as she whipped and sped through the scattered traffic. A Spinner Badnik with sharp-bladed wings locked onto the pink target and whizzed towards her as a buzzsaw of incoming pain. She leapt up the air, narrowly somersaulting over the badnik and landing gracefully back on her feet. She picked up her pace, and the Spinner prepared to turn around and make another attack, only to be smashed into pieces by a well-landed slam of Tails’ twin tails.

“The horde is beginning to thin, but it’s still dangerous! Keep your guard up!” he called out, still monitoring his Miles Electric as he covered her from behind.

Daylight soon welcomed their return as they escaped the garish orange glow of the tunnel, and Amy could already see an overwhelmingly relieved woman pushing past the crowd of onlookers towards her.

“Thank you! Thank you so much!” the woman wept, immediately taking the baby from Amy’s arms and rocking them gently.

“It’s…no trouble!” Amy reassured her, winded but still with a smile as sweet as strawberries. She gave the woman a gentle squeeze on her arm to ease her shock. “You two should get home, or at least somewhere safer than here.”

Amy darted back to the fray, rejoining Tails who was still holding off as much of the onslaught as possible.

“How many people do you think are left?” Amy worriedly asked, only briefly looking away to flatten an Egg Pawn into a pancake with her resummoned hammer.

“Judging from the size of the tunnel, the estimated car total, and the crowd over there, I reckon that should be close to everyone!” Tails calculated on the fly, tail smacking a Moto Bug into a lamp post and splitting it in two. “Any stragglers left would’ve abandoned their cars the moment the badniks showed up. But we should double-check when we’re done here!”

“Oh, thank goodness,” Amy huffed exhaustedly. “We should rejoin with Sonic! He needs all the help he can get!”

As if he was summoned by name, Sonic’s body was thrown out from the tunnel with the power of a cannonball, skidding past Tails and Amy against the asphalt road before grinding to a stop.

“W-What’re you talking about? I didn’t hear no bell!” he coughed with a humorous tone, his arms quivering as he tried to get back on his feet. But that effort was wasted as a second cannon burst of speed erupted from the tunnel, and Metal Sonic’s boot slammed into his back with spine-cracking power, making Sonic scream in pain.

“SONIC!” Amy and Tails cried in horror. Counter to this, Dr. Eggman’s laughter was hitting its peak.

“Music to my ears!” Eggman bellowed from up high, wiping an imaginary tear from his eye. “Now then. I reckon we’re done toying with them for one day. Metal Sonic! For what we came for!”

But before Amy and Tails could react, Metal Sonic had already zoomed off back into the tunnel, allowing Sonic to struggle back up to his feet.

“Oh no you don’t!!” he growled, revving his sneakers up once more and blasting off after the escaping robot, as Amy and Tails frantically chased behind them.

“Maybe I can hack into him!” Tails exclaimed, typing frantically into the Miles Electric and homing in on Metal Sonic’s unique frequency, while simultaneously dodging the still relentless badniks. “Or at least mess with his processors!”

“Good! Do it!” Amy yelled, resummoning her Piko Hammer with a refuelled determination.

The Miles Electric Screen swiftly locked onto Metal Sonic’s geo location, and Tails’ face lit up as he wasted no time in trying to crack the Egg Net’s master passwords. But this hope was short lived. A similar corrupted rainbow like on the Tornado flooded the display, and the broken image of a small girl with a red aura appeared for a brief second.

“I can’t let you do that, Miles,” she uttered through the speakers, flickering away and leaving the monitor a deathly black. Tails’ and Amy’s blood ran cold, recognition in their eyes.

“That voice..!” Amy gasped. “Was that Sage??”

Meanwhile, Metal Sonic gaze was locked onto the armoured truck at the end of the vehicle wreckage. His turbine exploded even further, sending more empty cars crashing into the walls, only to feel a sudden weight tugging down on his leg.

“Gh-! Hey buddy!” Sonic taunted viciously. “You had a head start! Let’s fix that!”

Focusing on his weight, Sonic curled up and swung on Metal’s leg, forcing his forward momentum to change direction, and only propelling Sonic’s swing further as he flung the robot into the wall at top speed. But instead of smashing into pieces, Metal bent his legs against the impact, and propelled himself at double his initial speed, ramming into Sonic before he had even landed back on the ground. He slammed and flipped over another parked car, denting it considerably before the robot returned his attention to the armoured truck. He barrelled towards it, his claws bared at the ready..!

“STOP IT!!”

Metal Sonic’s turbine abruptly stopped, his feet skidding loudly against the road as sparks sprayed in all directions until he came to a complete stop. Standing in front of his was a shaking and furious Amy Rose, Piko Piko Hammer at the ready and her quills and clothing tattered and damaged from non-stop chaos. She gritted her teeth, taking her battle stance between him and the armoured truck.

“I don’t know what Eggman is after in this truck, but you’ve scared and hurt a lot of people today, Metal!” Amy growled. “And I’m not going to let you or him keep doing what you’re doing!”

Amy’s expression stayed determined, but her whole body was shaking. Metal Sonic opposed her, his claws still bared and primed, as the piles of wrecked cars behind him acted as his backdrop. The glow of his red eyes felt like they were suffocating all the other light in the tunnel, and his permanent built-in scowl only matched and surpassed her’s. Another voice soon echoed. It was Eggman’s.

“What’s the hold-up, scrap heap!?” his voice roared from the outside. Amy flinched and dug her heels harder into the ground. “It’s been one minute and we’re still here! HURRY UP!!”

But why wasn’t he moving? He was in such a hurry to get to this truck. He had to be preparing a surprise attack or something. Amy’s hands clenched tighter around her hammer, preparing for the worst.

Then Metal Sonic moved. He slowly lowered his claws, bringing them to his sides. Amy’s expressions subtly softened in surprise. He took a step forward. Amy hesitantly took a step back. He began to raise his right hand, showing an open palm…

“AMY!!”

Sonic leapt back into action, followed swiftly behind by Tails. The hedgehog hopped over a toppled car to deliver a flying kick into the side of Metal Sonic’s head. But this was made futile as Metal’s torso whipped around abruptly like a puppet being yanked by strings, and Sonic’s foot was caught in his sharp right hand. Sonic’s eyes widened, as he saw Metal’s pupils begin to flicker between blood red and cyan blue. A small speaker crackled into life in Metal Sonic’s chest.

“I won’t let you hurt him,” Sage’s voice rang, Metal’s claws digging deep into Sonic’s foot, forcing out another cry of pain. But before Sonic was reacquainted with the tarmac, Metal Sonic was smacked away by the Piko Piko Hammer, his body tumbling and screeching against the ground.

“And I won’t let you hurt Sonic!” Amy barked, her fiery determination returning in full force. Sonic pulled himself back onto his feet, giving her a thankful pat on the shoulder.

“Good save, Amy. Let’s finish this!” Sonic chimed to all of them, turning back to the hunched over Metal Sonic. Amy nodded with a confident smile, as did Tails.

Metal Sonic lurched upright, his normal red eyes returning with even more intensity. His fists were clenched so hard he could break his own hands. Sonic simply stretched his legs and smirked. And in the blink of an eye, the two speedsters once again clashed in a frenzy of blinding blows, ricocheting off the walls and illuminating the scene in many beams of light.

Amy and Tails found themselves backing away, not wanting to take a wrong step and wind up directly in the crossfire. But Tails’ eyes then lit up, and he started calculating. He began taking notice of the specific angles Sonic and Metal were ricocheting off from. If Tails could work out the trigonometry of their movements, he could predict where Metal was going to end up, and he could deliver a well-placed blow. He pointed a finger outward, tracing the patterns of their movement as his eyes rapidly darted from surface to surface. The walls and wreckage were broken down into their basic angles and measurements. He wasn’t on a battlefield. He was in his workshop, putting together his latest contraption. As Tails locked onto their patterns, his other arm slowly reached down for a warped engine pipe on the ground. Its edges were sharp and jagged from where it was broken off from one of the many crumpled vehicles surrounding them. It had to do. He only had seconds to act.

“One…two…three…four…”

He began to quietly count to himself, timing his every move. He revved up his tails and kept himself stationary in the air.

“Five…six…seven…”

He pulled back the sharpened pipe. He took his aim.

“Eight…nine…TEN!!”

He thrust the pipe forward in a stabbing motion, and an eruption of fire and sparks gushed from Metal Sonic’s neck joint. The robot’s sharp flying formation was now turned into a spiralling tornado as he was sent careening around the tunnelway, unable to control his direction of flight but still maintaining his lightning speed. Sonic landed on his feet, pumping his fists in the air.

“Tails! That was AMAZI- WOAH!!”

Sonic’s celebration was cut short as he narrowly avoided Metal Sonic flying straight into him. The three mobians were now finding themselves in an unpredictable death trap, with any accidental move landing them directly in the malfunctioning robot’s deadly path. Amy stepped up.

“GUYS! COVER!” she called out. The three quickly tried to make their way to the nearest wreckage they could find. Amy huddled up behind a toppled sedan, panting heavily as she waited for the torrent of clashing noises to stop. She closed her eyes tightly.

Then the noise rushed past her ears, and a splitting pain shot up her entire right arm. She looked down to see four red cracks in her skin bleeding down her bicep. Amy’s sharp cry rang throughout the whole tunnel as she clutched the wound tightly.

Metal Sonic’s engine eventually gave out, sputtering and grinding as he collapsed against the concrete once more. Sparks still crackled from the gash in his neck as his visor glitched. His joints whined and jittered as he tried in vain to push himself back up on his feet. But as he faced the ground, he looked down at his claws. A foreign red liquid coated the sharp bladed tips of his right hand. He slowly looked up and, for a brief moment, he saw Tails rushing over to the hunched over Amy, the same red substance colouring her arm. But that red was soon interrupted by blue. He looked up to see Sonic, his signature cocky demeanour gone.

“Party’s over, bud.”

A hard kick was delivered straight into Metal’s dented face, and he was sent flying backwards. Then there was another kick, and another, and another. The onslaught didn’t stop as he was sent blasting outside, his damaged body unable to defend himself. Sonic rocketed after him with his spin dash, grinding him further against the ruined roads. The momentum threw the mangled robot into the air, and as the Blue Blur followed directly behind, he delivered one last spinning roundhouse kick into the doppelgänger’s stomach. A sonic boom exploded in the sky as Metal Sonic was sent flying over the horizon and out of sight in the blink of an eye.

Sonic landed back on his feet, an erupting applause from the bystanders welcoming him back. But he didn’t focus on that. He was about rush back inside, only for him to dodge being tripped up by a sudden remaining badnik, a tiny bug-like robot on a motorized wheel, seemingly escaping from the premises after their powerhouse was defeated. But his theory was soon proven false as an exhausted Tails was trying to follow, skidding in front of the blue hedgehog to a stop.

“Sonic! They got into the truck!! We’ve been distracted!” he blurted out.

Sonic whipped his head around. The droid was already clinging onto the bottom of Dr. Eggman’s Egg Mobile, and in its claws was a sturdy black case. The doctor’s maniacal laughter was like nails on a chalkboard in their duped ears as he quickly flew out of reach.

“Thanks for the party, rodents! Would love to stick around longer, but I have some obligations to attend to!” he taunted, twirling his moustache. “Thank you for the gift bag!”

And before Tails and Sonic could leap into action, the vehicle swiftly turned around, dumping smoke bombs against them before he sped off into the distance, his haunting laughter still being heard for miles.

Metal Sonic remembered only one last thing before he eventually hit the ground. His face collided with a palm tree and all he saw was black.