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How long had he been here? One, two…? Hundred days…? Too… many? He didn’t know. At this point, he could barely remember how he ended up here, and if he were honest to himself, he didn’t very much care to try. Whether he could remember the day or not, he could remember the feeling.
Embarrassment. Shock. Maybe a hint of fear. He had never met anyone like him before, not even close. He seemed to come from nowhere and already know everything, already able to do everything. And yet, that seemed to only scratch the surface off what he could do.
He hadn’t seen anything like it.
How does someone come from nothing to be everything and still not account for all that could be? It made no sense, and no amount of juggling the few puzzle pieces he had was going to yield the full picture. Not from where he was sitting.
Gently, he pressed his head back against the wall and rolled it side to side to feel the cold carbon fibre against his quills. He closed his eyes and the tiredness sank in behind his eyelids. The faded shadows of the steel bars that blocked the incessant bright lights draped over his sunken face as the only shelter against the harsh environment of engineering and technology. He tried to drown out the sound of inane buzzing and droning from beyond the bars by thinking back to only days before he had been captured, when Green Hills was peaceful, and he could only hear his friends chattering to themselves with brimming delight and cheer.
His thoughts to his friends were what kept him sane locked up in here. He knew he would get back to them soon. He had to. Somehow. The war raged on beyond the confines of this base and he knew they needed him as much as he needed them.
Shadow included. His thoughts to Shadow were what pained him the most. He missed him - like a hole had been scratched into his chest, exposing everything he ever held dear, and it all fell out of him as he was dragged away. He couldn’t grasp the pieces, he couldn’t retrieve them, and their absence weighed heavily in the space they used to occupy.
He had every faith that Shadow was working tirelessly to rescue him, to take him back into his arms again and hold him close and never let him go. He knew that Shadow wouldn’t give up.
But it had been so long, his mind couldn’t help but flitter to the worst: that there was no team left to come for him. There was no-one to return to. The situation back home was dire when he was snatched from it; he couldn't bear to think about what desolation had transpired in the passing time since.
If there was anything left to show desolation.
His head dropped and he cracked open his eyes to the glowing restraints clamped around his wrists. He pulled at them to listen to their intensifying whirr as they fought back to keep his hands together like overpowering magnets that seemed to tighten against any resistance. They dug into the skin of his wrists, and the dents they had made created a dull ache that he couldn't relieve, no matter how much he fought to find purchase in the minute gap of the metal that bound him. He had done this every day. He had tried to wriggle free of them, tried to kick them off, tried whacking them against the walls, the bars. By now, he knew that they weren’t coming off on their own, but a part of him tried every day just in case the technology failed.
It wasn’t like they held him there for months.
Years? Could it really have been years?
No, he wouldn’t let his mind descend to madness like that. His team hadn’t left him for years; they weren’t gone for good. It hadn’t been that long. He refused to believe it had been that long.
He was tired. He hadn’t much fight left in him after so little hope, so little knowledge. Day in, day out, he sat there against the wall and twiddled his fingers and absentmindedly struggled against the restraints. Bots shoved scraps of food through the bars as they passed by - twice a day, at the same time with a chirp of acknowledgement - though he didn’t care much to eat them. Only when he couldn’t take the sounds of his hollow stomach trying to digest himself anymore.
Shadow was coming for him. Shadow was coming for him. He knew it, he felt it. He just had to keep telling himself that. It would happen. He could close his eyes right now and envision the soft gloved hands of the black hedgehog slipping the restraints from his wrists and cupping them in his palms to soothe them, to soothe him . The aches would stop and he could hold him as though for the last time.
Like he should have done before. But he couldn't have known– No one could have known–
It was only when his ears twitched to the low hum of an energy that had once overpowered him that he stopped fidgeting and zeroed in on the ground by his feet with fixed eyes. He wasn’t giving the jackal the satisfaction of sneaking up on him again as he had seemingly done for sport every week since the beginning.
He had grown tired of expecting his heinous presence, of even acknowledging his heinous presence.
“Surprised you haven’t learned, by now,” Sonic said with a smirk directed to his right.
In the corner of the cell where the light couldn’t reach, Infinite leant against the wall with his arms folded, shaking his head. He smiled from beneath his mask, enjoying the sight of the hedgehog defeated by his own patience. He scoffed. “What’s the matter, Sonic?” he chided. “Bored?”
“Of you, yeah.” Still, Sonic refused to look at the jackal, and maintained his focus in the opposite direction.
Infinite chuckled lowly as he emerged from the shadows to stand in Sonic’s full view. He waited until Sonic looked at him, even if it was with utter annoyance, almost disgust. “You still sound so defeated, and after such a long time. Have you not warmed to the occasion?”
“Funny you mention that.” Sonic displayed his restrained hands in the air with a raised eyebrow, then he dropped them with a huff. When Infinite didn’t seem to react, Sonic looked back up at his obscured visor and frowned. “What? Not enough for you?”
“Oh this is quite plenty,” Infinite said smoothly, with malice oozing from his fanged mouth in a sense of pleasure that made Sonic’s skin crawl. He tilted his head and lowered himself to Sonic’s level before reaching for the restraints and thumbing them in his palm. He admired Dr. Robotnik’s handiwork. “Where has the bravado that the great Sonic the Hedgehog so gallantly fought with gone, hm? Where is all your strength, all your… power?”
The restraints that Infinite had placed on Sonic from the beginning were designed to dampen his abilities - to siphon his energy into them so that he could not access it. It was his very speed that powered the cuffs. All the while they stayed tightened around his arms, they were feeding from him, keeping him subdued. For as long as they glowed the same blue as his quills, they were not coming off. Without his powers, he was just a blue hedgehog imprisoned by Dr. Eggman and his pet mercenary: helpless.
Hopeless.
Sonic snatched his hands from Infinite’s clawed calloused touch. He scowled at the jackal with all the energy he could find inside. He was sick of his helmeted face staring at him most days, eyeing him with an intention that he couldn’t quite figure out, but sent his blood cold. “Mitts off,” he said. “Were you never taught to look with your eyes, not your hands?”
Infinite couldn’t help but chuckle at Sonic’s dry attempt at humour in an environment that was choked of such pleasantries. Just how he liked it - where he couldn’t be laughed at. “Ironic, coming from you who attacked me without so much as a glance. I argue that you used your foot to… look at me, no?”
“Didn’t really wanna look at you. Just like I still don’t wanna look at you.”
“Now, what did I do to deserve that, hm?”
Sonic thinned his lips and raised a single eyebrow up at Infinite. He knew it wasn’t a serious question, but the flat tone with which it was delivered made him wonder what Infinite was trying to insinuate, if anything at all. It was hard to tell with only one eye to judge from beyond the visor.
“Do you really want me to answer that, buddy? Because I can, but you’ll be standing there for some time. Your feet might ache in those outdated kicks.” He nudged his eyes to Infinite’s shoes, an egregious mixture of metal and black with the most egotistical etching of his own insignia on the side. Then he looked back at Infinite begrudgingly with half a smirk inched on the side of his face.
Infinite rolled his eyes. It was always deflect, deflect, deflect with Sonic, never-ending - a constant barrage of dry wit and undesirable puns. Not a day went by where he didn’t think about ripping his throat out and watching him scramble to laugh his way out of drowning in his own blood. It brought him much-needed pleasure to think about that.
In fact, the longer this continued, the stronger the urge grew within him like a disease, curable only by committing the act with the utmost enthusiasm. But as Robotnik had told him: not yet.
“Spare me the obnoxious details,” he sighed with feigned interest. “You might wear out your dainty little voice, and we wouldn’t want that to happen, would we?”
“What do you want, filth?”
A tut was spat from Infinite’s mouth as he shook his head. “Deferring to insults so soon, Sonic? I thought you were better than that.”
“Ha!” Sonic squeezed a jested laugh from his throat and smiled from under his frown. “You got some data mixed up there, pal,” he taunted. “You don’t scare me. You never have.” He sat forward to thrust his index finger under the jackal’s nose in open defiance.
At first, Infinite didn’t react. He stared at Sonic’s tense finger in his face as if deep in thought. The only hint that the hedgehog had that Infinite was going to move was the jolt in his eye that turned sharp and turned on him. His wrists were grabbed and pinned to the floor and he was pulled into Infinite’s face where he was met with two claws pressed under his chin to force his head up.
Sonic tried to wrench his arms free of the jackal’s weight, but no amount of tugging or pulling was gaining him any ground. He couldn’t feel any give in his hands, but he could feel the claws break the skin under his chin and he clenched his jaw against it.
Infinite revelled in the sudden panic running through the hedgehog’s eyes as they darted every which way, looking for anything else to stare at that wasn’t him. He heard Sonic’s hitched breath as his chest steeled against the panic and he felt that jaw tighten against his pressure.
‘You don’t scare me?’ Was he so sure about that?
“Do you want to say that again?” he whispered. “Louder, this time. For the people at the back.”
Sonic gulped and forced his head against Infinite’s dangerous claws. He felt them slide into his skin and he bit back his pained groan as he aligned his eyes with the jackal’s. “You. Don’t. Scare me.”
“Perhaps not,” Infinite said as he lowered his hand from Sonic’s face, but his plain tone suggested that he was unbothered by Sonic’s show of defiance. It unnerved the hedgehog and he didn’t dare relax as he waited for the jackal to continue.
Slowly, he released his weight from Sonic’s hands and rose to his full height to tower over him, thinking and scanning. He analysed every breath that Sonic hesitantly took, he watched his chest tighten with anxiety from under his fur, he noticed every gulp that was swallowed. It didn’t matter whether what Sonic said was true or not. It didn’t matter whether he had that petrifying effect on him or not.
It wasn’t Sonic he was trying to overpower. Not anymore, although he was an added bonus. He was satisfied by his defeat for now.
But the longer that Infinite gazed down at Sonic with his single, monstrous yellow eye, the more nervous Sonic became. He was too calm for someone who was just openly defied. He was too collected for someone whose ego was through the roof since his capture.
Then Infinite’s face turned, and a bolt of energy shot across his eye. He reached for Sonic’s neck and pulled him up to dangle him where he couldn’t find solace by the comfort of the ground beneath his feet. He held him up firmly and stared at him long and hard. At first, there was no malice in his grip despite the strength behind it.
Instinctively, Sonic grabbed Infinite’s arm with his bound hands and tried to pry the jackal from his throat, writhing from beneath his grasp for air.
Infinite chuckled. “I don’t need to scare you,” he spat. “I just need to keep you here where you are useless, pathetic. After all, it’s just me and you. Who is going to save you?” He pulled Sonic closer to his face, and lowered his voice to such a harsh whisper that the cold rush of the winter would feel warm on the hedgehog’s face. “It won’t be your friends; they are nothing without you,” he hissed. “They can’t even find you. They will never find you, and I’ll make sure of it.”
As Sonic tried to create a gap between his throat and Infinite’s steeled grip, he groaned and struggled, wishing that he could reach the jackal in front of him, to hit him, to kick him, anything. “They aren’t alone like you,” he grunted. “They won’t stop until I’m home and you’re in the ground never to be heard from again. You will be filled with regret under the dirt, where you belong.”
With a growl, Infinite pushed Sonic into the wall and pressed against him with all his weight, and listened intently to his winces and wheezes under the pressure. It was then that his grip turned fierce and his claws scratched their way around his neck. “Your team won’t be a bother,” he said a hair’s breadth from Sonic’s face. “Their most prized possession is now mine.”
Sonic coughed, and with a smile, he eyed Infinite carefully. “You think I’m the only one?”
What he wasn’t expecting was Infinite’s laughter to shoot through his body with an evil that turned his blood cold with fear. The jackal pushed Sonic further into the wall to listen again to the groans of his captive regretting his words. “Oh, yes, the other,” he said with an unnerving level of confidence. “What’s his name? Shadow? Am I right?”
Sonic’s eyes widened in terror as his captor uttered the other hedgehog’s name with a bubbling poison in his throat that made him sick to the stomach. Infinite had turned his attention to Shadow, and there was something about his name being spoken by a tongue that licked malice from the knives of intent sent panic reeling through the blue hedgehog’s chest. He felt as though his lungs had been snatched and the air had been charred.
He swallowed hard against the malicious grasp of the jackal and no matter how hard he tried, words flew from his mind in terror.
Not Shadow. Please, god, not Shadow.
“The so-called Ultimate Lifeform,” Infinite purred. “Such a precious diamond in the rough, isn’t he? But where is he, Sonic? If he was truly coming for you, wouldn’t he have done so by now? Wouldn’t his valiant efforts have been rewarded by being able to free you from this infernal prison?” He gestured broadly with his free hand to the darkened cramped cell. Then he thumped Sonic into the wall for another groan. “Surely, he doesn’t want to see his knight in shining armour become his damsel in distress, tied up and roughed up by - what did you call me? Yes, Dr. Eggman’s pet.” His voice turned harsh and his gaze turned cold, irritated by the plethora of names that Sonic had hurled at him that came flooding back into his mind.
Sonic struggled harder against Infinite’s grip. He writhed and kicked aggressively, and he grunted and strained louder to get away. “You leave Shadow alone!”
What Sonic didn’t know was that Infinite and Shadow had already crossed paths. In fact, it was his engagement with Shadow that led Infinite to taking these desperate measures to ensure Eggman’s success with the new empire. He would never have taken the Phantom Ruby were it not for Shadow’s conniving words that cut into him.
He was not weak. He was not pathetic. He was the Ultimate Mercenary, and his Jackal Squad were the most formidable force on this planet, but what Shadow had done single-handedly was eliminate them all. He took them all on, and he took them all out.
He had never trembled in fear before.
Never.
Only Infinite remained. Eggman would never let him live it down if he didn’t take Shadow head-on. For some reason unbeknownst to both of them, Shadow had spared his life, leaving him with the parting words: “Don’t let me see your pathetic face again.” But the only feeling that remained was the fear. He was riddled with it. Like termites, it crawled all over him, and he quivered with a terror that he had never known.
But he did what Shadow told him. He hid his pathetic face. He would never show it again, and he devoted himself to Eggman’s empire, and he gave himself to the Phantom Ruby. He would never know fear again, but he sure as hell would instill it in everyone who ever dared to turn their nose up at him. He would make sure that it crawled all over them as it did with him, paralysing them in his path as though he had turned them to stone.
He didn’t need to scare Sonic. But it was fun to watch that fear rise in his eyes, and it turned out, it didn’t take a lot.
“Or what?” he chided with a heinous smile. “What is the sewer rat going to do to me if I lay a hand on his precious Shadow, hm? I thought you weren't scared of me?”
With a furious scowl stretched across his face, Sonic resulted to the only thing that he had left at his disposal to get Infinite off him at last. He took a deep breath and he sank his teeth into Infinite’s gloved hand, causing him to growl in pain.
The jackal threw Sonic across the cell and into the bars opposite, where under the pain and aching that flooded his body, the hedgehog panted and gasped for air. He struggled to right himself and his arms and legs shook as he found himself on all fours trying to get upright. In the end, he slumped against the bars and stared back at Infinite, whose face had turned to thunder.
Infinite rose into the air and cast a horrific gaze over Sonic as the ground shook beneath him. His hands curled to claws and violent purple energy swirled around his space. Sonic could feel his low growl rumble under his chest, but it promptly turned into laughter. He shuddered.
Evil, conniving laughter.
“Protective of the Ultimate Lifeform, are we?” he chuckled as he hovered closer to Sonic; a fistful of energy in the palm of each hand. “It’s certainly not a card I would have laid on the table.” He lowered himself back to the ground and stretched a fist of energy out towards Sonic. The incessant hissing and buzzing of this arcane energy as it sat beside his ears screeched inside his mind and he tried to turn away from the noise of a thousand locusts squealing in his ears. He tried to flatten them against it, but without his hands, it was a fruitless effort. Infinite narrowed his eyes. “Just think of what I could do to him if I found him,” he continued, smiling. “I am the last breath in his mouth, I am the rocks against which his seas crash, over and over again - whatever I wanted - and you would be here: powerless to stop me.”
From behind his fear-ridden eyes, Sonic scowled, still mustering the minute defiance he had left in him - for Shadow’s sake - and he bore his teeth. He snarled at the jackal and tried to inch closer to him. His bound hands rolled into fists and he pulled at the restraints, eager to feel freedom in his hands to hurl towards the animal who threatened the one he cared about more than himself. He rounded onto his knees and brought his face inches from Infinite’s, feeling his malicious smile stretch from under his helmet.
“You couldn’t,” Sonic hissed. “Shadow has come up against far better than the likes of you. You would pale in comparison, squashed like the bug you are.”
Silence. They studied each other’s eyes for a long moment. Infinite still held his energy in one hand, and his facial expression didn’t change, but his eye wandered up and down Sonic’s body. It took every ounce of energy within him not to react impulsively, for he may want to kill Sonic, but he knew there was a time and a place for such a show.
Plus, he was far from finished playing with him. How he enjoyed taunting the hedgehog with all the knowledge that he possessed that Sonic could not possibly pertain to. He had eyes on Eggman’s empire. He had eyes on the tiny resistance that operated where it all began. He had eyes on every single being that posed as even a miniscule threat - even Shadow. Nothing got past him.
Not while Sonic was his.
He scoffed. “Words are all you have, rat, and words have no effect on me. Not anymore. You missed your chance. And now, you have shown me your cards. You have no moves left to make, no pieces left to play. Your king - your Shadow - is mine to claim. Checkmate.” He grabbed Sonic’s restraints to yank him forward, and he thrust the ball of Ruby energy into his chest and watched as Sonic became enveloped in a spark of violent electricity.
Infinite stepped back as he watched the hedgehog convulse on the ground, screaming and shouting, writhing in pain. He waited. The energy would dissipate eventually, giving Sonic the chance to catch his breath once more, but it would be an agonising wait for him, bringing him closer to the feeling of death. He would know this pain as unlike any other.
And oh how the pride welled in Infinite that Sonic was no longer untouchable - all because of him. For too long, Sonic and his team were a blight under Eggman’s nose. Sonic and his team were an unstoppable force that none could pass.
But now, Infinite knew that he was breakable. When an unstoppable force meets an immovable object, one can - and will - give. What a shame that the unstoppable force caved in against the immovable object, and after such a long, free reign.
All the while Infinite was unmoved by Sonic’s pain and terror, he couldn’t help but think of what it would feel like to do this to everyone who stood in his way, to everyone who tried to stop him. To capture them all, to imprison them in this pain, to force them to watch one another as their fight faded away under the Phantom Ruby.
Shadow especially. Revenge was well overdue, and after Sonic’s display of love and passion for the Ultimate Lifeform, Infinite knew just what to do to Shadow to make his revenge taste that little bit sweeter, to know how ravishing it would be to satiate that incessant hunger.
Sonic still believed that his team was coming for him, that they would liberate him from this cell. Infinite believed that they couldn’t even find him. He knew they wouldn’t give up until they had, which was why he was going to run them into the ground trying. To drop subtle hints in the wrong directions, to watch as they frazzled their tiny minds trying to follow a trail that led them in circles. To taunt them with the knowledge that Sonic is still alive, but only barely.
All he needed was Shadow to complete his collection.
After what felt to be never-ending, Sonic’s torment finally ended, and he balled himself up to face away from the jackal, though his whimpers could not be disguised. His chest heaved, gasping for breath, and his throat was ripped hoarse from screaming. He shuddered as he came down from the adrenaline that showed him death’s door, and he tried desperately not to think about the jackal’s looming gaze as his fear leaked from his body.
Carefully, Infinite laid his foot on Sonic’s shoulder - just a tap to make him jump - before he pressed down to roll him over. Then he knelt down to the hedgehog and pinched his jaw to hold his gaze. “You are nothing,” he said, feeling his captive shake under his grip. “This is the Eggman Empire, and this is your life. You are not leaving this cell, and soon enough, neither will your friends.”
Sonic coughed and tried to pull away. “Shadow is coming for me,” he said breathlessly. “I know he is. This isn’t over.”
Infinite rolled his eyes and chuckled again. “Oh Sonic… It was over the moment I threw your worthless quills into this cell.” He grabbed Sonic by the scruff and dragged him to the back wall and tossed him against it. “And that’s how it’s going to stay.”
“He will find you,” Sonic continued in spite of Infinite’s boredom. “He will find you, and he will give you everything you deserve for this.”
As Infinite opened his mouth to speak, Dr. Eggman came up behind him on the other side of the bars with his hands clasped behind his back to peer over his shoulder. At first, he didn’t say anything, and simply smiled at the dishevelled mess in which his defeated enemy sat.
“Playing with your food, Infinite?” he chided humorously. “Does he taste good?” Infinite did not respond and simply stared at Sonic unamused with his arms folded. “How does it feel, Sonic?” Dr. Eggman turned his attention to the hedgehog in the back, looking as though he was going to pass out at any moment. “I always told you my time would come. All your years of kicking me while I’m down are over, and I am not about to squander the opportunity of a lifetime by granting you any kind of reprieve. Say goodbye to your home, Sonic. It won’t be long before we’ll be saying goodbye to you… for good.” Robotnik narrowed his eyes at Sonic. “Come, Infinite,” he commanded the jackal. “We have a resistance to quash.”
Infinite exited the cell in silence. But that was not to say that he didn’t have parting words for the hedgehog. “You still think Shadow is coming for you? We’ll see if you still think that when I come back here with his corpse.”
Although Sonic couldn’t see it, a smile as pure and potent as sunshine inched along Infinite’s face as Sonic fought his restraints to get to Infinite, to sink his claws under that jackal’s skin, to seep chaos hatred into his mind.
He could do nothing from here. He could not protect his friends. He could not even protect himself.
He couldn’t protect Shadow.
He couldn’t. He couldn’t.
Sonic slumped against the wall with a huffed whimper, throwing his hands down on the ground again. He bit back his cries at the uselessness that consumed him, and he shook his head hopelessly. This was his defeat, but he had no idea that it would sink him so low. It was like he had been shackled to a weight and thrown into the depths of an ocean in the far-off horizon of despair.
It angered him to no end that this was how he went out - that this wasn’t going to be fast, nor was it going to be painless. Infinite was going to make him suffer every day until there was nothing left of him or his world, and he was left with no other choice but to put him out of his misery.
If he even knew how to be so forthcoming and kind.
He closed his eyes and succumbed to his bruising. Infinite was gone for now, but Sonic knew the chances were slim that it would stay that way. So he closed his eyes and numbed the pain of his isolated suffering, and thought only of Shadow, thought of his soft touch, his wary gaze. He would feel it again. He would feel it again in a world that hadn’t been reduced to its knees under the weight of archaic power and unbridled fury.
If he could hold out for just a little bit longer.
How long had he been here? One, two…? Hundred days…? Too… many.
Too long.