Ruby Haze [Archie Sonic SI]

[FTR2017]

Quite informative and justified in-universe.

Wouldn't want bad parties to take advantage of unknown sources of Chaos Energy that need incredibly particular circumstances to discover, right?

I am also pondering just why Chaos Energy prefers emeralds as its favorite conduit.

Pity that Morgan's Ring-producing engine is in all likelihood lost alongside its designer ... .

 

[weredrago2]

Here's the completed version of a Hedgehog family tree I made! I'm placing it in Apocrypha because it's mostly just for fun. To see if I could do it. I'll try not to do this again any time soon because it was really exhausting, but no promises.

The only parts that are even vaguely canon in Ruby Haze are the ones with Archie characters on it.

Do you see Sonic on it? I hope so, because there's four of them!

I'd like people to guess where all of these names came from, but if you get stuck, here's an answer key:

Spoiler: Name Origins Answer Key

From top to bottom, then left to right...

Sonugh Boghog: Archie Sonic.

Aman-Rapi: Sonic Underground.

Masonic Hnti: AOSTH. "Hnti" is an approximation of the word for "hedgehog" in ancient Egypt.

Penelope Abaset: AOSTH. "Abaset" was an obscure Egyptian goddess with a hedgehog on her head.

William "Bravehog" Hirchoun: STC. The "William" is William Wallace, a Scottish knight made famous in modern memory by the film Braveheart. "Hirchoun" is a dated word for a hedgehog.

Thomas Hedgehog: Tom from the Paramount films.

Madeline Furzepig: Maddie from the Paramount films. "Furzepig" is another name for a hedgehog.

Zephyr Nadelmaus: Sonic's infrequently been called the son of the Western Wind (either poetically or by people who are grasping at straws for where the hell he came from), so "Zephyr" it is. "Nadelmaus" is a purposefully direct/rough translation of "Needlemouse" to German.

Bonbon Rabbit: Bonbons are small, chocolate confections. Sometimes filled with liquer, or other things like nougat or truffle. Perhaps she's a distant relation to Vanilla and Cream?

Diamond Hedgyboar: The Diamond 3 Star was a slot machine produced by Service Games (AKA Sega) in the 60s. "Hedgyboar" is another name for a hedgehog.

Dean Hedgehog: Dean Sitton, a developer who helped localize the first Sonic game for a western audience. He's the one who gave Eggman the name of "Dr. Ivo Robotnik" and provided the English names for multiple badniks. To tie into Fonz and Artie, the name can also be read as an allusion to James Dean.

Ogilvie Hedgehog: Archie Sonic... From a certain point of view. The name is never uttered in the text, and was instead divulged in an online post by Ken Penders.

Alicia Kidd: Alex Kidd.

Byrnie Hirchoun: A byrnie is another word for chain mail. A play on Popful Mail, the would-be Sister Sonic!

Maurice Needlemouse: Archie Sonic. "Needlemouse" was a mistranslation of an early name for Sonic -- Mr. Hedgehog. From an old interview that was translated wrong, the name took on a life of its own in the fandom.

Ernst Rabbit: There was a gray rabbit from the early development period of Sonic the Hedgehog, before they settled on the Sonic we all know and love. This rabbit is sometimes called "Feels" by the fandom because that was the name for the protype version of Ristar, with whom the Sonic 1 Rabbit shared a gameplay gimmick. I... don't remember why I called him Ernst, actually. I've done like 40 of these and they all start to blur together.

Madonna Hedgepig: Madonna, the canned human girlfriend for Sonic. An idea they wouldn't revisit again until Sonic 06. "Hedgepig" is another word for a hedgehog.

Sarah-Grace Grand: The SG-1000. Sarah-Grace and her children are derived from the first draft of the western Sonic Bible, which Sonic as having a mother and five sisters.

Alphonse "Fonz" Hedgehog: The "Sega Fonz" was arcade hardware used for a variety of racing game cabinets in the mid 70s, including the 1976 Fonz game.

Arturo "Artie" Hedgehog: Artie was the brother of Arthur Herbert Fonzarelli in Happy Days.

Comet Pricklypig: Her first name alludes to the astronomical nature of The Super Sonic Sisters, a scrapped spinoff of the Sonic cartoons running in the early 90s. "Pricklypig" is another name for a hedgehog.

Charles Hedgehog: Archie Sonic.

Jules Hedgehog: Archie Sonic.

Bernadette Needlemouse: Archie Sonic.

Paul Parlouzer: Shogakukan. He goes by Paulie in the manga. The last name "Parlouzer" is, by all accounts, a fan surname for the family. While we know it wasn't in the manga, we have no idea where it came from. At all. Weird, huh?

Brenda Hedgepig: Shogakukan.

Arthur Hedgepig: Sonic is revealed to be none other than King Arthur in Sonic and the Black Knight (if this is the first time you're hearing about this, don't worry about it), so I figured the side of the family that's representing Sonic Underground should have royalty on both sides of it.

Aleena Larebelle: Sonic Underground. Her surname is a play on the French name for the show -- Sonic Le Rebelle.

Sonny Hedgehog: Sonic Bible first draft. In that, Sonic was known as "Sonny" until he got his super speed and blue quills when he first broke the sound barrier.

Genesis Hedgehog: Sonic Bible first draft. The Sega Genesis.

Mercury Hedgehog: Sonic Bible first draft. Sega's Project Mercury, which is also known as the Sega Game Gear.

Celia-Dean Hedgehog: Sonic Bible first draft. The Sega CD.

Saturnine Hedgehog: Sonic Bible first draft. The Sega Saturn.

Naomi Hedgehog: Sonic Bible first draft. The Naomi arcade board.

Monica Hedgehog: One of the two protagonists of the unproduced Super Sonic Sisters spinoff cartoon.

Isabelle Hedgehog: One of the two protagonists of the unproduced Super Sonic Sisters spinoff cartoon.

Ogilvie Maurice Hedgehog: Archie Sonic... again, only technically. Sonic's stated to be named after his two grandfathers, but we only learn that his middle name is Maurice. "Ogilvie" comes from Ken Penders after he left the comic, and is therefore not officially recognized. (For the given value of "official" here.) Archie Sonic later changed his name offscreen, making it a moot point in the story.

Nicholas Parlouzer: Shogakukan. The manga's version of Sonic is usually known by his civilian name of Nicky or Nikki, depending on the translation.

Tanya Parlouzer: Shogakukan. Different translations rendered her name as Tania or Anita. Here, I went with Tanya.

Sonia Larebelle: Sonic Underground.

Mordred Larebelle: Sonic Underground. I couldn't call him Sonic here, but I figured if he's going to be a son of King Arthur, then why not make him the most notable one?

Manic Larebelle: Sonic Underground.

Next chapter's still being worked on, pending some collaborations and hired work I've been pecking at. You can treat this as a fun puzzle to tide yourselves over with until then.

 

[weredrago2]

Ruby Haze
Chapter 39: Forgery in Fire

When I first reached Mobius, my eyes were permanently changed from gray to magenta. I was permanently touched -- changed -- by the Phantom Ruby. After I further tapped the Ruby's flow with Mania Mode, my body became more mutated. Clawed and fanged. Stretchier, hardier, and stronger than ever. The apex of that metamorphosis was spurred on by the influx of negative chaos energy radiated by Enerjak. When that negative energy hit critical mass, the curse of the weredragon was unleashed.

Another transformation. I gave it the uncreative name of Weredragon Scarlet.

As it turned out, shaking this curse wasn't as easy as putting the dark god back in its can. The weredragon lingered, as a kinesthetic presence that waxed and waned. Starkly different from the spirit that'd been doggedly ghosting me. A secondary body that was close enough to 'normal' me that I had the occasional neurological hiccup. The sensation of an invisible tail flicker, the stifled twitch of an ankle wing that wasn't attached to my foot. Moments where my skin felt especially sensitive because I didn't have scales. Brief flashes of dysphoria that were always fleeting, but never welcome.

◊ ♦ 60

Somebody must've thought my previous identity crises were getting stale, but if I could get this curse under control, then why couldn't I reframe it as a blessing in disguise?

"Easier said than done," I grumbled, meditating in the bitter cold under the pale moonlight.

Since my return from Angel Island, I searched for somewhere to perform arcane experiments in peace. Hideaway was small and cramped at the best of times, so that was out. I knew I could carve another space for myself in Sylvania Castle, but it was too close to people and the chao garden for comfort. I used Null Space as a testbed for spellwork in the past, though I wasn't in a hurry to discover what'd happen if I changed into a form that couldn't open portals in a pocket zone without a sun.

◊ ♦ 70

Eventually, I settled on an arboreal range northwest of Deerwood that'd developed a grim reputation as a haunted demesne. The tall trees that'd been stripped barren of leaves jutted out of the soil like skeletal hands, while the ones that kept their leaves concealed the forest floor from prying eyes. Thick, maleficent bramble snaked across the snowy ground, littered with the bones of mobini unfortunate enough to get in their ravenous path. I flew over the abandoned settlements while searching for a place to land, the air choked with an invisible miasma that'd grown familiar to my psionic radar.

Add in the moon overhead, and the Shrouded Forest was spooky enough that not even the High Sheriff bothered with it. I stopped at a clearing in view of a large, mutated 'tree' with fluorescent leaves, petals, or fronds. It might've been a gigantic flower or monstrous fungus. The Shrouded Forest was where I stress-tested the durability of the orichalcum door and potentially hazardous spells, because it wasn't like I could contaminate the ecosystem any more than it already was.

◊ ♦ 80

After over an hour of uncomfortably sitting in the cold, emerald scepter in my hands, I let out a shiver. Eurish was Europe, give or take, and that meant dealing with a European winter. My mutations did little to improve my thermal regulation, so it was as good a night as any to break out the gifts I'd received before heading to Angel Island. From the Highlanders, I got a flannel shirt of black and magenta lozenges, with a pair of copper-riveted black jeans in my size. Around my neck was a hand-knitted scarf. Unlike the outfit, which was in my 'theme colors', the scarf Amy gave me was dyed a shade of blue.

How'd she know it was my favorite color?

The clothes were greatly appreciated. More or less what I might've worn when the unreliable Florida weather allowed for it. I knew I could've made them myself with the Phantom Ruby, same as I did my usual tunic and trousers, but being given them like this made it feel more… real, for lack of a better term.

It felt real to know there were people that cared.

◊ ♦ 100

I felt a sudden spike of energy from the Master Emerald shard on my staff before it grayed out. This exercise was performed to draw energy from it gradually, while surrounded by the irritating miasma. With the fragment's magic supply exhausted, I was out of excuses not to move on to the main event.

Standing from my resting position on the snowy ground, I did a series of stretches. A hop in place. Rolling the neck. Practiced punches that started quick, and moved on to swings that pushed the elasticity of my arms. Rotating my shoulder, the left of which let out a slight pop as always.

The Phantom Ruby worked better when I had a framework for what I was trying to accomplish and how I would go about reaching that goal. I believed that my early usage had it behaving like a power ring because I was using it how I thought it was supposed to work, before I became more experienced. Structure and spells only arrived when I learned there were structure and spells. So long as I had a schema that held up to my own standards, the rest should fall into place.

It's like jazz. I just need to loosen up and go with the flow, without getting lost in the negativity.

I took a deep breath, feeling the swell of miasma enter into my body. It was acrid and rancid, like chlorinated carrion. Ozone fumes carried the taste of lightning and death into my bloodstream, a surge of negative energy exciting the gemstone until the heat flared up with a burning sensation that pulsated across the back of my hand.

"Okay," I said tentatively, attaching one golden ring to each wrist as I steeled myself for what came next. "Showtime."

Phantom Ruby, make me a monster.

♦ !!

A magenta film overwhelmed my vision. Bones stretched, muscles expanded, and dark purple scales grew over every inch of my body. Twin pairs of wings wove across my back and feet. A thick tail spawned from the end of my spine. Then came the horns over my head and spikes under my chin, followed by a set of claws and talons that absorbed the moonlight into their iridescent darkness. The last to arrive were two rows of triangular, crocodilian teeth that filled the gaps in a saurian snout.

It all happened in an instant. My clothes and the Phantom Ruby were subsumed into my form, as before. That meant I wasn't clothed, but my scales became a suit of armor over my skin. Protective, without being restraining. Untouched by the surrounding weather. Rather than feeling cold, my draconic blood ran hot.

Oh, good. I'm still warm-blooded.

I raised my arms, examining my wrists. I'd already been aware of the fact I could use rings to keep the mental effects of the Phantom Ruby at bay, and I wanted to confirm that they hadn't snapped off. My improvised inhibitor rings held strong, but they changed into a pair of black, spiked cuffs fit for a Koopa King.

That's… new.

The lingering emanations of negative energy around my body were thick enough to form an umbral cloud charged with magenta static. A beating of my wings scattered the miasma, causing it to dissipate into the ether.

"Wasn't so bad this time around," I huffed, my breath giving off sparks and brimstone.

♦ 90

Shame about the lack of pockets.

I took a heavy step forward, testing my balance. It felt as though this body had 'fallen asleep', and was gradually waking up.

Let's take this slow.

Once I had both feet planted firmly on the ground, I repeated my exercise. A hop, which resulted in a light tremor rippling across the ground. Rolling a widened, reptilian neck. Jabs and hooks that dispersed the air with their force. Shoulder rolls that resulted in the left one letting out a slight pop that it hadn't last time.

What would I even call this condition? Therianthropy? Zoanthropy? Mobianthropy?

I shook my head.

"Doesn't matter. I need to test my strength."

I approached a nearby pile of boulders and other debris. As a human, my strength reached the point where I could lift a busted-up refrigerator weighing hundreds of pounds.

"On three," I started, driving my enlarged hands into a massive stone. "Hands firm, back straight, legs up and--!"

The rock left my hands, and was catapulted high into the frigid air. Eerily, I didn't feel that weighing much at all. Several seconds later, the boulder careened back to the ground with a resounding crash.

Not being sure how to respond to that, I moved on, grabbing on a fallen log and hefting it upwards with ease. Then I tried my luck with even larger ones, which gave me increased resistance, but inevitably buckled when push came to shove.

"Vector did say I could give Knuckles a run for his money," I recalled.

This version of Vector took after his original incarnation and therefore wasn't a 'power' character like the one in the games. Frankly, it's a miracle my southpaw didn't kill him outright. Though that did give me an idea.

I reeled my arm back, balled my hand into a fist, and struck the largest rock present. One punch sent a crack rippling through the surface, snapping it in half.

"Ha!"

I can work with this!

"Next up's the fire breath!"

Taking aim at a thick branch jammed into the snow, I took a deep breath and held it in, until I could feel the ice collecting in my expanded lungs start to thaw. Frozen molecules were excited by the swirl of fire magic in my chest, until they broke free of their bonds as loose oxygen and hydrogen. Only then did I exhale, releasing a torrent of magenta fire that blasted the target to cinders.

"Radical!" I roared. "Now that's a warmup!"

I performed similar attacks on more dead logs and timber, careful not to get too excited. The last thing I wanted to do was start a wildfire and have Surveillance Orbs imported from Robotropolis start pointing their cameras pointing in this direction. I could launch several fireballs in quick succession before becoming short of breath, or exhale a continuous torrent of colorful flames.

"That'll do the trick."

I spread my wings wide, preparing to take off, when I heard a metallic squawk shatter the silence of the Shrouded Forest.

"WARK."

My hackles were raised, the sound of an oncoming badnik putting my whole body on edge. I ascended straight into the air, ready to take the adversary head-on. The tension in my nerves was justified when a small, penguin-shaped robot with skis for feet and a fuse on its head dropped down to detonate where I previously stood.

"Oi, watch it!" I snarled.

Hovering above the treeline, I locked eyes with a squat aircraft held aloft by a trio of micro thrusters. The super badnik had a blue, cylindrical chassis, a gray torso with a gray shutter, two red rings for eyes, and a yellow beak screwed shut into a furious scowl. There was no getting around that it was the giant penguin robot boss one from Triple Trouble.

So much for the High Sheriff not seeing me here. What was this one called, again? Giga Thomas "Pen", right?

"WARK," the mecha penguin warked forebodingly.

Why Thomas? Why the "Pen" in quotations?

"You wanna go, Pen Pen?" I challenged.

The super badnik turned its red eyes towards me, disgorging more exploding penguins from its gray hatch. I flew in aerobatic arcs around the penguin, dodging the bombs. A fireball to the badnik's center caused one of its jets to fizzle out from the force of the impact, and a ramming charge against its side disabled another.

"Looks like today ain't your lucky day!"

Man, weren't all of the bosses in that game really easy?

The penguin machine was already sputtering, kept afloat by a singular rocket.

No time to linger. It's time to go for the kill.

I made a snaggle-toothed grin, flew high, and flipped the winglets on my feet open to redirect my momentum into a backwards loop. When I was in position, I spiraled forward into an incendiary dive.

"Red Hot Kick!"

Pen Pen was driven to the ground and crushed underfoot.

- - -

While the fight wrapped up quickly, my flight back to the Tinker's smithy took longer than expected. Carrying the remains of a super badnik from Point A to Point B would've been easy enough if it wasn't so cumbersome. I had to yank the gnarled roots off the Shrouded Forest floor and tie them together into a crude pulley, hauling the wreck to my end destination.

I also had to put out all of those fires I started when I kicked the metal penguin so hard it exploded. Whoops. I stowed the scrap pile in a corner behind the covert foundry so that I could crystalize it when I went back to normal.

Once that was attended to, I stopped at my first obstacle to smelting the orichalcum: The entrance.

"Oh."

Wagstaff let me use his forge while he was away on a repair job in the Outlands, but he was less than half my size. In the past, the doors for the homes of commoners tended to be short to preserve heat. At a guess, I was presently taller than your average basketball player and shorter than a run-of-the-mill space marine. I already had to duck down to use the entrance before, and now I stood head and shoulders above it… with a pair of inhuman shoulders that were wider than the door frame's width.

I really didn't think this one through, did I?

"Let's uh, try the knob first?"

I reached down to wrap a large mitt around the handle, turned the lever with what I thought was a cautious amount of force, and heard the mechanism behind the knob snap. Turning the handle up and down a few times confirmed it was broken.

I sighed, and dug the broken lock out of the door by hand. Then I ducked low, wedged my horned head past the entrance, and tried to finesse my torso through the wooden frame one shoulder at a time until I got myself jammed.

"Come on!" I growled.

As a dragon, my chest was built more like an overstuffed steel drum than a barrel. Exhaling did little to narrow my profile, and breathing in made the timber creak. My struggle made me feel like a burglar trying to break into a doll house.

"I've got stretchy powers! This should be easy!"

I awkwardly folded my wings back, trying to ease my way in without getting them caught. Sonic's werehog state wasn't that much taller than him, but I had no good reason to remember that Dulcy was big enough to carry a mobian or two on her back until this very second. A frustrated shove got my bulky torso through the entrance, leaving a pair of unsightly dents on both sides of the frame.

I'm suddenly way more empathetic to Dulcy and her 'clumsy' accidents.

I got back up and stretched to my full height, horns grazing into the ceiling. Not expecting the friction, my errant tall flicked back and battered the door behind me, causing it to fall off its hinges.

"Aw, crap."

Deciding that I'd have to fix that later, I carried on, both 'thumbs' of my wings interlocking so that the resting patagium took on a shape akin to a cape. I carefully creeped into the pitch-black smithy, almost expecting that the stone floor might start cracking beneath my feet with each step. Stumbling in the dark would normally be a recipe for disaster, but my human eyes were altered to see areas cloaked in darkness as cast in shades of red. As a dragon, though, the room was cast in shades of green.

Did that mean my eyes were green, too?

I missed the chance to get a good look at my appearance on Angel Island. With everything going on, I was too nerve-wracked to check what I'd become. I scooped a candle tray off a counter and breathed life into it, illuminating the area. The orichalcum door in the corner gleamed like a mirror in the candlelight, the near face of the cylinder reflecting my own.

For the first time, I had the chance to see what I looked like in totality. After a moment of hesitation, I took it. One clawed hand caressing a spike-laden chin, I took stock of the finer details of my head and face. Black horns, dark magenta barbs running along my head in lieu of hair, patches of brighter scales that dotted my cheeks like freckles, and emerald green eyes staring back from the other side of the reflection.

I spent who knows how many hours playing the original Spyro games on Playstation.

Was this what male dragons were supposed to look like, or merely what the Phantom Ruby changed me into based on subconscious input? Or something in between?

It was a thought for another time. Wrenching the orichalcum safe door from its resting place, I rolled it towards a large crucible I made from ruby crystal. All I needed to do was bring it to the melting point.

The room was quiet, save for the dragging of my tail across the ground. I planned to do this by myself, in seclusion. Where no one could ask awkward questions about how I managed to turn myself into a 'weredragon by night' in the first place.

Oh, just a side effect of the crystal on my hands that is the real source of my powers causing me to become a monster. A monster that may or may not be associated with divinity, which I'm sure my cult would go ga-ga over.

I internally chastised myself over that latter thought. The Ruby Flame weren't that bad, once I'd gotten to know them better. This still wasn't something I wanted spreading around.

It wasn't like I planned to keep it a secret forever. I just needed it under wraps until I--

"Hail and well met!" a voice declared from behind me.

I stood ramrod straight, horns carving new gouges into the ceiling when I turned and saw--

"Rob!?" I squeaked.

It was a deep squeak. A deep, draconic squeak.

Really.

Rob o' the Hedge casually hopped over my tail as it involuntarily lashed around, swiping the leg off a workbench.

"The one and only!" Rob affirmed. "I take it thou art the 'guy' that Sir Scarlet had mentioned would be assisting with our great task?"

I set the candle down on a stone table, as my tail slithered back behind me.

"Yes?" I stated unconfidently. That was a technically-correct statement. "I wasn't expecting company."

"I hadst been searching for John, as his familiars lacked the capacity to explain where our fair wizard had wandered off to, but forsooth! He's likely returned to Hideaway by now."

"He could've," I implied.

"But 'tis no trifle to become acquainted with the friend of a friend!" Rob said easily. He extended his right hand to me, as I did to him months ago. When this madness started. "What be thy name, pilgrim?"

I took his hand. Slowly, and carefully. This time, my hand utterly engulfed his own.

"Er, Edward?" I insinuated.

It was one of my names, and not one I was intending to use. Ever.

I was gonna say Goliath!

"Edward the Dragon," Rob rephrased, testing the fake name. "A pleasure to meet thine acquaintance. Shall ye need assistance smelting the miracle metal? I am not as knowledgeable as Wagstaff himself, but--"

"I'm fine," I said brusquely, with more force than intended. "You'll want to take a step back. There's gonna be sparks."

I turned back towards the crystalline crucible. The sooner I wrapped up this job, the sooner I could fly out of here before sunrise.

It'd be easier if I could tell Rob about everything I'd gone through, but I've dumped enough on his plate as it was.

He doesn't know I'm a fraud.

Then there was Friar Buck, who likely wasn't sleeping right after hearing everything I've already 'confessed' to him.

He's the only one that knows that I haven't known what I was doing since I got here, but that I was playing it by ear well enough to fool them all.

I took a deep breath, my chest stretching outwards with mounting pressure, and spewed a gout of pink fire that set the charcoal under the crucible ablaze. The forge that was once cold and dim became awash with firelight.

He doesn't know yet that I'm not from the Overland, or that I'm not even from Mobius. I'm just some guy who lucked out. I was trying to keep my distance from Buck because I've burdened him enough with my faults.

I raised the heat and kept the fire going, the metal letting off embers as the impurities were scoured. Over several cycles of breathing and exhalation from my burning bellows, the gleaming surface of the orichalcum gradually took on an orange glow. As anticipated, the weredragon's mystical flames burned hotter than anything I produced on my own, bringing the orichalcum to melting point.

He already knows that I'm a goddamn liar, but not that I'm almost grateful for my excuse for why I don't have to tell the truth. Rob and the everyone else I'd helped already believed that I knew what I was some kind of hero, so why would I go and ruin that by being honest?

I refused to relent, the so-called invulnerable metal softening under the intensity of my flames. A molten puddle pooled at the bottom of the container, and I shoved the door into the liquid with both hands to speed up the process of destruction.

Nobody knows that I should be missing everyone and everything that I left behind, but I--!

"A shame that John couldn't be present for this impressive process," Rob cut in solemnly, grabbing my attention. "Prithee, didst he mention to thee why he was unable to attend?"

I almost clarified that I was him, and snapped my jaws before they got me exposed.

"He had an appointment," I replied, curtly. Breathlessly. "Needed to be somewhere."

That 'appointment' was now, and that 'somewhere' was here. I had an alternative alibi set up in advance, but for some reason, my throat clenched up when I tried to say it.

Keep it together, John!

Without saying another word, I extracted the crucible and prepared to pour the contents into a wooden tub. Thinking that water might not be enough, I snorted two beams of blue energy from my nostrils and froze it solid. The metal shrieked as it fell upon the rapidly-sublimating ice. When it stopped screaming, Rob and I both leaned in close, examining that smelted safe door had broken into large chunks of blackened drek and smaller, silvery flecks.

I wasn't expecting the alloy to un-alloy itself like that.

"That black stuff is the iron and impurities," I explained. "The rest, we want to keep."

Since I wanted to keep him at a safe distance, Rob had taken out a brown booklet from his… quiver? He pulled it from somewhere to pass the time, and I could see the title on the front cover said Le Morte d'Arfur.

"You know, I could tend to the forge while you--"

"No."

I picked up the orichalcum bits and tossed them back into the crucible. Then I grabbed the tub, tossed the lumps of iron, and scooped a lump of fresh snow from outside.

"The orichalcum's lost a fair bit of mass," Rob observed, following me as I worked.

"We don't need much," I replied, before beginning the smelting process anew.

Several breathing cycles into the process, working with pure orichalcum that was more stubborn to melt this time, Rob chimed in again.

"Prithee, where didst thou make thine first acquaintance with Sir Scarlet?"

Oh no.

"It… happened on Angel Island," I answered reluctantly.

"John was rather scarce on the details of what transpired on the fairy isle," Rob commented. "Perhaps ye could illuminate the situation?"

The forge was sweltering like a furnace, but that wasn't why I was sweating. There was definitely something wrong with me. I couldn't control the words coming out of my mouth!

"I'm trying to focus on the forge," I grimaced.

"Of course," he conceded. "I would be loath to distract you."

My fire breath quavered, but thankfully, the metal was most of the way to melting.

Why the &$#% can't I lie?!

Rob set down his book.

"Art thou familiar with the tale of Sir Marrok?" he inquired.

It did ring a bell, if only vaguely. Then it clicked.

"The character in the Arthurian Cycle?" I blurted out, as the pure orichalcum softened under the unrelenting heat.

"Arfurian, but yes," Rob affirmed. "He was a Knight of the Hound Table afflicted with a terrible curse. Forced to change into a beast at nightfall."

Dammit. The story was known as the Lay of Melion to the Bretons, and had a counterpart called Bisclarvet from France. Having been unable to find any useful information about the subject in the Ars Ixia, I pried for more 'Arfurian' lore from Rob.

"How'd he get cured?" I couldn't help but ask.

"The story varies by telling," Rob admitted. "In some versions of the tale, Marrok was cured by retrieving the magic ring that cursed him. But in other recitations, the affliction was permanent."

That was extremely unhelpful, and I was pretty sure Rob was doing this on purpose. He knew I was lying now, and he was pushing my buttons until I fessed up, wasn't he? Maybe he should mind his own damn business and--!

I shook my head. Breathe in, breathe out, and ignore the smoke coming out of my nostrils.

Bad thought. Rob's my friend, and I'm the one in the wrong.

There was a mold for ingots lying around, but they were too small. Searching around the room for another cast that'd fit the volume of molten orichalcum, my eyes locked onto a stout cask.

You're almost done. Take it to the cask.

"Is everything well, Edward?" the hedgehog who would be king asked.

I tried not to think about it, but he was a king. He was fighting the High Sheriff for years before I showed up. The amount of pressure he was under had to be unbearable, and I knew he was relying on me to hold it together!

That was when I felt my hand slip.

"I-I've got it!" I heard Rob exclaim from right below me.

Suddenly, Rob grabbed one side that was about to tumble over with a pair of the Tinker's gloves, and I had to scramble to avoid spilling the boiling metal in his face!

"Rob, let go!" I protested. "You're gonna get burned!"

"Walkers' Bones, are all dragons this stubborn?" Rob asked in exasperation, pulling the other side of the basin away from me. "You're in dire need of aid, and I've a spare set of hands to lighten your load right here!"

"I said I'm fine!" I roared, trying to pull the crucible back.

"Is that the case?" Rob challenged in turn, yanking the bowl again. "Dragons are known throughout the land as heralds of truth, and yet I find myself doubting thine testimony!"

Was that why I was so tongue-tied?!

"No, obviously not!" I barked out. "Let me do this so I feel less bad about trying to convince you I'm fine!"

A flash of recognition came into his eyes. Then, the shock consumed his expression.

"Gadzooks!" Rob gasped. "I wasn't certain, but that voice! That ever-irreverent tone! It's definitely you, John!"

"How could you not know!?"

"You're not normally a dragon, and I was trying to give Edward the benefit of the doubt!" He blinked. "Hold on, is your name truly Edward?"

"It's my middle name!" I snarled, taking the crucible off his hands with force. "Just let me pour the #%&$ing metal!"

I tilted the bowl over, only to realize that it was already empty.

"What?" we both said simultaneously.

Totally emptied, save for a lone thread of silvery string that dangled off the edge. Looking down, we saw that with all of the commotion during our argument, the crucible took the path of least resistance and poured itself. The cask was filled to the edge with glimmering orichalcum that'd settled into its new form, silently appreciating the sight of it for several seconds without saying a word.

"By Aurora," Rob eventually swore. "That was almost anticlimactic."

I dropped the crucible onto the fire pit.

"I-I'm sorry," I stammered out right away, stepping back to make more distance between us. "You shouldn't have seen me like this!"

I lumbered my way towards the exit.

"Halt!" Rob ordered.

"You're not my king!" I yelled behind me.

"I be not your rightful king, but I do be your brother-in-arms!" he insisted. Faster than I could reach the damaged door out of here, Rob o' the Hedge fired a bundled twine arrow to block my path. "So stand and deliver what's on your mind for once, you eternally-concerning enigma of a compatriot!"

I whirled back towards him.

"An archer versus a dragon is a bad matchup," I growled.

"Not if I know your weakness!" Rob countered, his bow at the ready.

"Then what's my weakness, then?" I said angrily.

I was mad, but as the words left my lips, I felt the emanations of dawn creeping against the back of my neck, without any scales acting as an intermediary.

♦ 70

I was back to normal. Rob walked forward, his bow returned to his back.

"Sunlight, apparently," Rob commented.

Feeling a sudden rush of exhaustion, I fell to my knees.

"John, art thou well?" he asked genuinely, trying to pull me back to my feet. "Walkers above, I think you've somehow become heavier since I pulled you away from Never Lake!"

I didn't think I was well, when he phrased it like that. It was the truth, and, honestly, I'd gotten tired of trying to keep him out of the loop on my problems.

He's no Sonic, but Rob's been there for me since the start, and I've been there for him in turn.

"Is the offer still open to talk about my feelings?" I asked weakly.

Having given up on helping me stand, Rob settled for sitting down next to me.

"Of course, friend. What weighs so heavily on thine spirit that you put up a fight to keep me away?"

I let out a weary chuckle.

"Where do I start?"

- - -

Spoiler: Author Notes

With Forgery in Fire complete, we're one step closer to Chapter 40! It's been a long ride, eh? This chapter took longer because I needed to get the emotional notes just right.

The penguin super badnik is the Giga Thomas "Pen" from Sonic the Hedgehog: Triple Trouble on Game Gear. Patrolling the Shrouded Forest almost makes him wish for a Robotnik Winter!

Not sure what the next chapter will be called yet, but I'm looking forward to what's lined up in the cards.

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This chapter has been brought to you by the following patrons and beta readers: C-Moon, Dredloki, Elite9934, Mark of Artemis, N'Oni, and Small Nerd!

Thank you all for the continuing support!

Don't forget to update the TV Tropes page!

Ruby Haze - TV Tropes

Waking up in orbit above a planet wasnât on Johnâs list of things to do. Nor was crash landing in Mercia and joining the Freedom Fighters. Fortunately heâs far from powerless, even if he is …

tvtropes.org

 

[FTR2017]

Character development ahoy with another chapter of the Peak Sonic SI story!

Rob demonstrates why he's the good local hedgehog, John learns something about his draconic self's own quirks, and the orichalcum got extracted from the door thanks to John's draconic self's dragon breath.

Quite curious to see that he not only breathes fire, but frost as well. Makes me wonder if other elements are available to him ... .

 

[weredrago2]

Quite curious to see that he not only breathes fire, but frost as well. Makes me wonder if other elements are available to him ... .

Click to shrink...

The nostril frost ray was (accidentally) used in the Enerjak Arc. It's one of several abilities demonstrated by Dulcy which is shared in common with Weredragon Scarlet.

 

[FTR2017]

The nostril frost ray was (accidentally) used in the Enerjak Arc. It's one of several abilities demonstrated by Dulcy which is shared in common with Weredragon Scarlet.

Click to shrink...

Huh. The more you know!

Gotta appreciate that attention to detail, 'cause I read the Archie comics online nine years ago and oh boy the sheer amount of contradictions was quite the sight!

Pretty much like staring at a puzzle made from many, many, different sets, lmao.

Makes me wonder when will the douchebags of Zone Polize will come knockin' on Scarlet's door and be their worthless nuisances for the cast.

Balance my ass, they got a Genesis Wave crumbling in return for letting that AI Psychotic Eggman come make his nest in this world ... .

 

[weredrago2]

Silver Wing
Non-Canon Bonus Chapter


"If it isn't the hedgehog of the hour!"

A cyan aura of psychokinetic energy carried me in view of a small, grass-covered hill on the farmost fringes of Knothole Village. With the fall of Colonel Stripe and his guerilla unit, the duty of protecting the survivors of Dr. Robotnik's coup fell to the next generation. While this limestone cave started life as a clubhouse for the war orphans congregate in, it was converted into a base for the Knothole Freedom Fighters when they came of age to strike back. Freedom HQ would serve in that role until it was mothballed at the end of the First Robotnik War, being all but forgotten up until its refurbishment in mid-3237.

I was, of course, getting ahead of myself. The point of time I was in happened to be early 3235. There was still a long way to go until we reached the point where the Second Robotnik War would be on anyone's radar. Even if I hadn't been here before, the blue goofball shouting and doing aircraft marshall gestures with his arms to draw my attention certainly was sufficient to tell me that I was in the right part of the Great Forest.

That goofball was none other than Sonic the Hedgehog. Hero of Mobius. At age 14 or so, Sonic was a shockingly-blue hedgehog with bright red sneakers and sharp quills styled into a punkish mohawk. It was easy to identify him as the Sonic of the First Robotnik War; mohawk aside, his hi-tops lacked the gold buckles he picked up right before the Perfect Chaos Incident, and his dark brown eyes had yet to turn bright green from exposure to the Super Emeralds.

An old friend to me, even if I was a new friend to him.

Sonic tapped his foot impatiently as I performed a three-point and landed next to him.

"I'm here, Sonic. What's the emergency?"

"Shouldn't you already know what this is about, Future Guy?"

The first time I heard his voice, I was shocked at how close he sounded to Jaleel White. My own vocal chords were a dead ringer for Quinton Flynn, but the way I used them put me closer to Raiden than a 'proper' Silver.

"I skipped my Mobian Studies class. Wanna give me the recap on 'This Day in History'?"

Sonic smirked. My banter had to be sharper each time we chatted, or I'd never keep up.

"Rotor's radar picked up fresh info about the latest something-or-other Robuttnik's been working on," he explained vaguely. "Nothing big."

"You weren't paying attention to the briefing, were you?"

Sonic gave a playful shrug.

"I figured Sal's gonna repeat everything to you anyways," he bantered. "So let's beat feet!"

I walked towards the cliff face of the old solutional cave, where a covert door had been mounted, when Sonic zipped ahead and held his arms out to block the entrance.

"Hold on, Silver!"

I frowned.

"Now what?"

Sonic redirected my attention to a lone tree stump sticking out of the ground. He kicked the stump's side, revealing the top to be a secret hatch leading to a downward shaft.

"It's a secret mission, so you've gotta take the secret entrance!"

I stepped up to the fake tree stump, appraising it curiously. Looking down, I saw that this 'secret entrance' didn't lead to a ladder, but a long slide.

"Come on, Silver!" Sonic goaded. "The Great Oak Slide doesn't bite!"

"Not gonna head in first?" I offered.

"And risk missing the look on your face?" Sonic said, as he jumped through the opened window on the side of Freedom HQ. "Meet you inside!"

"This better not be a prank!" I yelled after the energetic hedgehog.

Rolling my eyes at Sonic's antics, I hopped down the slide. I couldn't spin into a ball like Sonic or Shadow could without making myself sick, so I used my powers to ease my way through the loops and corkscrews without getting caught or chafing.

This was definitely designed by kids who didn't know or care about safety regulations.

The kooky slide ripped straight from the Action Park playbook deposited me onto a big bale of hay, and I was left sitting in a spacious limestone cavern awash with darkness.

"Hello?" I called out, unsure of why I'd been dropped off here. "Anyone here--?"

The lights flashed on, revealing Sonic the Hedgehog, Princess Sally Acorn, Miles "Tails" Prower, Antoine D'Coolette, Bunnie D'Coolete -- scratch that, she was still Bunnie Rabbot right now -- and Rotor Walrus with… party hats? Tails was using his tails to hover above the ground and see me.

"SURPRISE!" they shouted in unison.

"Surprise?" I echoed back, dumbfounded. "For what?"

"For you, of course!" Rotor answered, still leaving me confused.

The stout, purple walrus was one of the lesser-known Freedom Fighters. Practically forgotten two hundred years later, but that didn't make him unimportant. He was the team's resident gearhead for years before Tails came into his own.

"For saving Sonic!" Tails cheered.

That did sound familiar. It still took some adjusting on my part to see Tails this young. His brown fur hadn't even changed to its more famous orange hue yet!

I stood up from the hay bale, stretching.

"Oh, you mean the Mecha Sonic thing?" I asked, recalling my most recent intervention.

Everyone laughed.

"Bless yer heart, sugah," Bunnie teased.

Bunnie was the second-heaviest hitter the Freedom Fighters had, before Sonic. The bionic southern belle still had her original set of roboticized limbs. One bulky arm, and two bulky legs, both further modified for heavy combat.

"Silver, you scatterbrain!" Sonic chuckled, tossing me a party hat. "Don't you remember? If it wasn't for you showing up when you did, we would've been in big trouble!"

That was an understatement. I caught the party hat with my psychokinesis and put it on my centermost quill.

"I just try to do the best I can."

In truth, I'd gotten distracted with that damn shark. He chased me up and down the Time Warp until I lost track of what I was last doing at this point in the Freedom Fighters' history. By the time I got back to Knothole, Mecha Sonic had already scorched the place to the ground. I had to rewind and step in when the Butterfly Effect made Knuckles too late to fight Mecha Sonic himself, but I didn't think explaining the whole story was wise.

I'd learned the hard way that it was better when people didn't know the bullets they'd dodged, or the ones around the corner that I'd been trying to redirect.

"Plus, you got me off the hook for that trial!" Sonic added with a wide grin.

Sally crossed her arms.

"I wish you wouldn't put it that way," the chipmunk-in-chief chided. "We thought you blew off the council and got yourself roboticized on purpose to try out the neural-overrider chip!"

Temporary Royal Prosecutor Antoine awkwardly tugged the collar of his red and blue guardsman uniform.

"Aheh, oui. Many misunderstandings were had, but eet ees all een ze past!" Antoine pulled out a book to prove how 'over eet' he was. "I even brought Martha Shrewart's book on party planning for ze special occasion!"

"Didn't she get put away for stock fraud?" I asked.

Antoine looked aghast.

"Say eet eesn't so!" he gasped. "Shrewart would never!"

Never say never.

"Uh, pretend I didn't say that? I don't think it happened yet."

"I'll look into it later," Sally said dryly. "For now, we're just here to celebrate!"

"Three cheers for Silver!" Tails exclaimed, and three cheers were had.

From there, things cooled off into a more mellow atmosphere. It was a small party for the core membership of the Knothole Freedom Fighters, plus one anomaly who'd stumbled into their friend group. On the kitchen table, I could see the team had cooked up a veritable buffet. Fried clucky, mac & cheese, apple pie, eclairs, chocolate cupcakes, and, of course, chili dogs galore. Among other other mouth-watering options.

Thinking it over, Bunnie and Antoine probably did most of the cooking.

Using psionic powers took a lot out of a guy, so I grabbed a plate and helped myself. Gotta balance out the calories I was burning with my abilities. I started with a slice of pizza.

It was nice to forget about my duty. Even if it was only for a little while.

"Could we save some for Dulcy?" I asked after everyone had gotten some, knowing that she got claustrophobic indoors and couldn't attend.

"Of course, Silver," Sally answered. "Actually, do you have a moment?"

"Is this about the Shrewart thing? I don't think saying you got the knowledge from a time traveler is gonna hold up in court."

She shook her head.

"No, not that. I wanted to present you with a medal in a private ceremony."

I raised an eyebrow.

"A ceremony? Bit too formal for this kind of party, don't you think?"

Sally gave me a bemused smile.

"It's a bit on the formal side, I'll admit, but it's what my father did for his knights after they accomplished a great quest. A private ceremony we can do in Rotor's lab upstairs."

I slowly lowered the pizza slice from my mouth.

"Well…"

"Please?" the princess chipmunk asked.

Oh, I couldn't say no to Sally. This looked like something that meant a lot to her.

"Alright, alright. I'll be your practice dummy for when you have to do it official-like."

It looked like a weight came off her shoulders when I said 'yes'.

"I appreciate it, Silver. Follow me?"

I grabbed my mug of hot chocolate and took it with me. As we walked away from the party, I saw Rotor put a hand on Tails' shoulder.

"C'mon, pal," Rotor said gently. "It's getting late, and I think you've had enough sugar for one night."

"What?" Tails said, scandalized. "But it's not even dark out!"

Sally and I went upstairs, to the ground level where Rotor's workshop was set up. Lots of chunky monitors and other hardware. On one of his benches was a gray handheld device I'd recognize anywhere.

"Greetings, Sally, Silver," NICOLE said.

"Heya, NICOLE," I said back as Sally gave her own greeting in turn. "Here to take a picture for us?"

"Incorrect," the AI replied dryly. "I have been stationed here to record your testimony."

I stopped.

"Testimony?" I questioned. "Sally, what's she talking about?"

Sally's face shifted, becoming almost uncharacteristically diplomatic. She was a diplomat, sure, but this felt different.

After perusing the timesteam up and down for years, I learned to dislike 'different'.

"Oh, nothing. It's just that NICOLE recorded some interesting footage in the Forbidden Zone that I wanted to run by you."

I didn't like where this was going.

"Okay?" I replied, wanting to sound more befuddled than trepidacious. "I don't know what this has to do with the medal, but sure?"

NICOLE projected a three-dimensional hologram above her handheld, displaying a representation of myself standing in the wasteland on the northern border of Robotropolis. I knew this was going to become unpleasant, before the version of myself in the recording had the chance to speak into his covert communicator.

"Argent to Master Planner," my past self recited into the walkie-talkie-like handheld.

"Master Planner to Argent," the unmistakable voice of Doctor Robotnik answered back. "Would you care to enlighten me as to why you, of all people, decided to not only engage with Mecha Sonic in combat, but defeat and deroboticized him!?"

"It was necessary," I answered plainly. "You--"

"I HAD HIM! HE WAS MINE!" Robotnik screeched into my ear.

"You didn't have him," I lied smoothly. "Mecha Knuckles would've disabled Sonic, resulting in his derobotization all the same."

"Mecha Knuckles?!" Robotnik cried out indignantly. "Are you telling me that the Knothole Freedom Fighters have a roboticizer of their own?!"

"It was burned out already," I explained dismissively. "The only difference is that I took the credit for saving him from the echidna, cementing my position in their ranks. I had to stop you and save Knothole in a real attack, because I couldn't have faked the level of trust I built with that stunt."

"Can you at least tell me where their damnable base is?! I've been searching for years!"

"We both know you could've firebombed the Great Forest to ashes whenever you pleased, and that you wouldn't be grateful if I spoiled the surprise for you. I decline."

"Watch your tongue, Argent! If it wasn't for your future knowledge--!"

"You'd have lost months ago without me running interference," my past self interrupted. "So let's not engage in hypotheticals, shall we? Just stay the course with the Doomsday Project, don't get distracted by side dalliances, and I guarantee you that those meddlesome Freedom Fighters will be a… a thing of the past."

Sally's expression remained frustratingly neutral as the Silver in the recording made me look as bad as possible. What the hell was she thinking of me after seeing that?

"I don't understand how any future iteration of myself could ever tolerate working with a pest of your caliber," Robotnik complained. "And a hedgehog, no less!"

"With age comes wisdom," I rejoined sarcastically. "Hail the Robo Robotnik Empire."

NICOLE paused the footage. They'd both seen enough.

"Silver, what do you have to say for yourself?" Sally demanded. "Or would you prefer 'Argent'?"

I hesitated to respond. I needed to look at the incriminating video's timestamp.

Thank you, NICOLE.

"I know it looks bad," I understated. "But I'm working with Geoffrey St. John on a deep-cover mission, and it requires that I gain Robotnik's trust!"

"Silver, do you honestly expect me to believe that!?" she rebuked, her composure cracking. "No one's heard from Geoffrey in over a month! He's presumed missing in action!"

"That's a part of the mission!" I said quickly, walking towards the door.

"Where do you think you're going?" Sally protested.

"Look, I know it looks really bad, but I'm sure Sonic could help me clear up this whole misunderstanding!" I deflected, now floating to the exit. "I went to bat for him, and I'm sure he's willing to be a character witness for…"

When I went for the door, I was alarmed to see an unamused Sonic was already standing at the exit. With an irate Bunnie right next to him.

"…For me."

"Yer not runnin' from this one, Argent," Bunnie said, her tone laden with an undercurrent of righteous indignation.

"And buddy, if you try?" Sonic threatened. "I'll catch you. It's kinda what I do."

Sonic and Bunnie, showing up exactly when they're needed to pin me to the wall.

Clever as always, Sal. You really had me going there.

"This whole party was a setup, wasn't it?" I scowled, unable to fully contain my anger. "To keep me in one place while these two got into position for an arrest!"

Sally didn't answer as she stepped forward. Her face had smoothed out again, but I could see the conflicted tension beneath the surface.

"Silver, if you're serious about this being a misunderstanding, then come quietly. We'll determine the truth after we confirm your story with the Rebel Underground."

Well, I couldn't have that.

After all, Geoffrey St. John was dead, and I was already palming my escape route.

"Maybe next time," I responded coldly, thrusting the amber, hexagonal gemstone in my hands outwards. A sudden flush of chronal energy flowed through my system as I declared the spell needed to wield it. "Chronos--!"

In one instant, the Time Stone was in my hands. In the next, it was gone.

"--What?!"

"The old owl would've had to go cuckoo clock to trust a creep like you with one of these," Sonic snarked, the hexagonal gemstone precariously balanced along his fingertip. "I'm willing to bet you stole this rock from Little Planet without leaving so much as an I.O.U.!"

I felt my blood turn to ice in my veins.

"You… You recognize the Time Stone?!" I yelled, trying to ignore how Sally's face had become even more crestfallen.

"What, you thought this was my first rodeo with time travel?" Sonic spat. "Why do you think I took you at your word, Future Guy?"

No.

No no no no.

In all of my jaunts back and forth, how did I not notice?!

"How?! There was no record of you going to Little Planet! I checked!"

The revelation had severely thrown me off my game. My powers flared up to erratically chuck a desk and several chairs in the direction of Sonic and Bunnie. The former hopped over them with ease while the latter smashed them to bits.

"That's the funny thing about time travel!" Sonic joked, a subtle hint of bitterness creeping into his tone. The apparent confirmation of my 'betrayal' hit him harder than he wanted to let on. "We didn't have to time travel anymore after we did, so we didn't!"

I was separated from the yellow Time Stone for seconds, and already, the memories were flooding back to me. Memories that were kept suppressed for a reason.

"You're still so naive."

I lashed more machinery and furniture their way. I was desperately searching for a way to seize the Time Stone back, but for once, they were the ones prepared for this sudden turn and I wasn't. Sonic navigated his way around my telekinetic field of hazards, landing a heavy kick with his hi-tops to my head.

"Ugh!"

I was sent spiraling back, driven to my knees. Sonic hit like a damn freight train when he had a mind to, and he was mad.

"But…"

Bunnie's roboticized arm stretched and coiled around me like a metal serpent. The room was too cramped for me to fly away, leaving me ensnared by her coiling limb.

"Hold still, ya two-faced rattlesnake!" she swore.

I can't give up! Not after I've sacrificed so much!

"I... I've always liked that about you."

I can't do this alone!

"Good luck, Silver."

Please! Don't leave me!

My voice came out as a broken, animalistic snarl.

"You Freedom Fighters never make this easy," I growled, a crimson swirl of psionic energy rapidly coalescing around me. "It's always the hard way!"

Sally's eyes opened wide in alarm.

"Take cover!"

A wild burst of red psychokinesis radiated from my body, scattering furniture and causing all of the electronics in the room to go haywire. Lights flickered, stationary terminals fizzled out, and several devices on Rotor's workbench erupted into sparks. Sonic and Bunnie were both driven back by the sheer force of my power, and Sally had to retreat behind a piece of debris to avoid being harmed.

NICOLE was hardened against electromagnetic pulses, but not hardened against me.

"F-F-FATAL ERROR!" NICOLE shrieked, before the buzzing handheld was silenced.

"NICOLE!" Sally cried out, desperately trying to get her broken friend back online.

My powers caused volatile disruptions to electrical signals, disabling machinery.

"No more screwing around!" I screamed. "Give me the Time Stone! NOW!"

"In your dreams, traitor!" Sonic yelled back. "Right, Bunnie?"

Bunnie stumbled out of the rubble in a stupor, her cybernetic arms and legs giving off cyan sparks.

"Bunnie?" he repeated, less confident.

"A-Ah don't feel so good," she croaked out.

That was all she had the chance to say before her bionic arm and legs detonated.

I formed a psychokinetic wall to shield us from the worst of the backlash that shook Freedom HQ. When the dust settled, Bunnie wasn't there anymore.

First NICOLE, then Bunnie. Two Freedom Fighters down. Several seconds passed in which no one knew what to say. Then Sally was the first one to find the words.

"Silver… What have you done?"

I didn't mean for it to happen this way.

"N-Nothing that can't be undone," I insisted quickly. "If you give me the Time Stone, I can go back and--!"

"THERE'S NO GOING BACK FROM THAT!" Sonic roared, as he rammed towards me as a whirling buzzsaw of death!

I dodged out of the way before he could shred me in bits. This had gone too far, and needed to be ended decisively.

"I'm sorry you feel that way," I said firmly, telekinetically popping the cap off the hollow cylinder embedded in my left cuff. "Going back is my only option!"

I faced my wrist out towards Sonic, the opened capsule dispersing an opaque cloud of hot pink gas into the room. His reaction was immediate: From a raging tornado to furiously coughing on the ground, as the gas permeated his skin and lungs. Sonic's own super speed was working against him when it came to chemicals entering his bloodstream.

The Time Stone scattered across the floor to my feet.

"What did you do to him!?" Sally cried out, as she jumped at me with a flying kick.

I casually raised my hand and held her in place with psychokinesis.

"Aerosolized urushiol," I explained aloud. "Dr. Quack made note of Sonic's extreme reaction to poison sumac in his medical records. The dosage was meant for an older Sonic, but that gas pellet was purpose-built to force the Blue Blur into anaphylactic shock."

"You… you've done this all before, haven't you?" Sally accused.

"Correct," I answered joylessly. "I know that even a fatal allergic reaction won't keep Sonic at bay if he thinks your life's in danger."

Already, he's begun standing up again, fighting through convulsions. I couldn't have that.

I made a cyan skewer out of psionic energy and drove it down. Sonic's airways were too occupied for him to scream, but Sally did enough screaming for them both. The second I released my hold on her, she ran to Sonic, cradling him in her arms.

"You monster!" Sally sobbed. "Sonic was your friend! We all were!"

"I know," I replied softly. "I didn't want it to come to this. Genuinely."

The correction I needed to make to the past would only take a minute of my own time, but Sally would be left in the rubble for longer than that before the changes caught up to her.

It would be needlessly cruel to leave her in a state like this. Distraught, grieving, and overwhelmingly confused.

But… She isn't even fighting back.

I've made mistakes by having my duplicity exposed and revealing the Time Stone, but the 'cleanup' was such that the two champions of the Freedom Fighters were terminated. The Freedom Fighters as a resistance against Robotnik were doomed, and Sally was too shellshocked to mount a resistance if I was to put her out of her misery.

It'd be so easy. It's better if…

No. I can't.

I turned away from her.

I've done enough culling on this dead branch of the timeline.

"For what it's worth, Sally, I'm sorry." I held out the Time Stone and prepared to make this right. "Just close your eyes. When we meet again, this'll all be forgotten. Like a bad--"

I was cut off not by another fiery invective, but a saber thrusting through my chest.

"What is it today with everyone trying to stop me?!" I yelled, speaking as though the fatal wound wasn't there at all.

I didn't have to look around to know who'd done it.

Nothing he hasn't done to me before.

"You bastarde!" Antoine hissed. "Zat was for Bunnie!"

"I was wondering when you'd make an appearance," I commented, before throwing him into the metal wall. "Rotor and Tails have already retreated far away from here, I take it?"

I waited a second, and he didn't respond. I'd thrown him too hard.

…

Dammit!

"Whatever," I growled, drawing the yellow Time Stone back to my hand and reversing the stab wound milliseconds before Sally could snatch the gemstone away again. "I'd wasted too much time as it is. CHRONOS CONTROL!"

The ruined world fell away into a dazzling array of white sparkles.

"That was a complete disaster," I fumed aloud. "$&%@!"

When I opened my eyes again, I was back in the Time Warp. The intermediary realm that all passengers of the space-time continuum moved through on the way to their end destinations. The mortal mind struggled to behold the full spectrum of history, instead perceiving the Time Warp as many colors that only crystallized into solid images as one attempted to make sense of them. This temporal pareidolia often manifested itself as various timekeeping instruments passing me by. Clocks, sundials, hourglasses, watches, kitchen timers, clepsydras. One could interpret the shimmering sparkles of the Time Warp for stars, as they were used to track time as well.

Time was flying, whether I was having fun or not.

Killing most of the Freedom Fighters wasn't exactly my definition of 'fun'. I'd gotten sloppy, allowing NICOLE to see me in the Forbidden Zone. I should've insisted on another meeting place for the communications. Even Robotropolis itself would've been more secure! As much as it disgusts me to cooperate with any version of Robotnik, I couldn't kill him yet. Not without causing catastrophic ripples later down the line and inviting open intervention from the Zone Cops! No, I had to be sneaky if I was going to get access to the ruins of Castle Acorn. That meant making deals until I could discover the exact route of cause and effect that I needed to be leveraged for me to sideline him entirely.

Regardless of what Nicholas O'Tyme felt about it, he was no longer the only steward of my zone's timeline. My role was not unlike being a writer. Or, more accurately, an editor. I sometimes thought of myself as a better editor than a writer, in my old life. I would take what already happened, what is happening, or what will happen, and apply changes until the causal chain reached the preferred endpoint.

Plot elements were moved around to meet my requirements. Some characters don't make the cut, and are removed from the outline. Only the final draft matters, followed by the knowledge I gain from the experience.

I… I despise what I've had to do to cultivate my ideal future. The intended resolution of this will have all of the Freedom Fighters alive, obviously. I'd love to ease their burdens. Make it so they never even had a war to fight. The problem is that they just can't stop themselves from asking the wrong questions, jumping to the wrong conclusions, or finding out too much at the worst possible times.

I know they wouldn't understand why I'm doing this. They never do. It never happens. It makes me feel like I'm going insane, every time I try and fail to make them get it!

"One day, I'll be able to change things so my friends never have to be hurt again. Or join forces with Robotnik to try and stop me!"

Those timelines, those were the ones that drove me up a wall--!

Dead ahead, a dark spot of the Time Warp pulsed and shuddered.

A breach?

What could it be? An errant Knight of Kronos? A rogue gargoyle from Little Planet?

Is it that $%#&ing shark again?!

"Armagon, I am not in the mood!" I screamed at the void.

It wasn't Armagon this time.

"Congratulations, Silver," an all too familiar voice uttered. "On once again eliminating the Iblis Trigger."

The sound of his voice made my heart quicken. Every damn time.

"You're dead," I spat at the echo.

Deader than dead, but that didn't stop him from taking shape in a purple patch of the Time Warp. The dark spot expanded into an ephemeral shape that only resembled a hedgehog in the vaguest of senses. A statue sculpted in the image of a Shadow cast on the wall of Plato's Cave, left eternally unfinished. His body was made of cracked, black granite, with jagged white crystal formations for quills. No nose, mouth, or feet. Lacking elbows, his fragmentary hands and wrist were attached to forearms that floated freely.

Then there were his eyes. Green irises with reptilian slits, like emerald insets atop a canvas of veiny heliotrope.

"And yet, here I am," Mephiles the Dark crooned. "The same as you, Little Paradox."

"Don't call me that," I spat at him.

"Not a fan of that nickname? Would you prefer Ixis Argent instead?"

"Leave me!" I commanded the phantom. "I'll be out of the Time Warp soon enough, and you can go back to being a bad memory."

"Oh, I doubt that," Mephiles taunted. "Do you remember what I told you, Silver? Countless reiterations of history ago, when you asked me what could drive a being once worshiped as a benevolent god of the sun to what you called abject madness?"

I said nothing. He wasn't real, and I had nothing to say to him.

"I told you then, Silver, that you could never begin to comprehend my motivations! How could one such as you ever hope understand what it meant to be cursed to a miserable half-existence? Forced to persist as a hollow shell of what you once were, bereft of the animating flame needed to make you whole again?"

He wasn't real. His words weren't real. None of him was.

"And only now, do you finally understand."

He cackled.

"Is it not deliciously ironic, Silver? After every manipulation that failed to convert that stubborn black hedgehog to my side, I turn around to see that you've reshaped yourself in my image!"

"Shut up!" I barked at him. "You only had to win once, and it never happened! A whole multiverse of zones in which he made you, and no Solaris! You lost."

Mephiles was unimpressed with my logic.

"And with my defeat, you achieved a Pyrrhic victory," Mephiles pointed out. "Does it not burn you that no one knows the price she had to pay to save this worthless world you've devoted yourself to micromanaging? That those ingrates will never appreciate the cost she has to bear, all so that they're free to continue living their mediocre lives in ignorance?"

I said nothing.

"You could always go back and try again," the demon suggested. "By preventing Sonic and Elise from snuffing out my dormant state as the Flame of Hope, you bring yourself one step closer to undo her meaningless sacrifice!"

I wrenched one of the flying clocks out of the Time Warp and threw it at him in anger. Both the clock and Mephiles were illusions, making the gesture meaningless.

"It wasn't meaningless!" I yelled at him. "She gave her life to banish Iblis away to a pocket zone in our initial timeline. He's gone, and so are you."

"Then why am I still here?" he inquired.

"You're nothing more than a persistent hallucination caused by my persistent usage of the Time Stone," I said decisively. "A side effect of retaining my original memories. A ghost of a ghost, tormenting me because it doesn't want to admit defeat!"

Mephiles' eyes narrowed, as the rest of his body faded into oblivion.

"Say what you will about me, Silver, but know this. I may have tried to deceive you and countless others in the pursuit of my goals, but I never had the gall to deceive myself."

The Time Warp faded away with Mephiles, leaving me in another time, another place: The Forbidden Zone, a few days before that party went awry.

Right on time.

Let's try again.

I waited patiently, and, in a matter of minutes, NICOLE's cuttlefish-like recon drone buzzed overhead. She was using a modified Surveillance Orb that blended in with the rest of Robotnik's badnik horde, explaining why I thought little of it at the time.

With a wave of my hand, that oversight was corrected. A large stone telekinetically hurled with pinpoint precision smashed the drone out of the sky, taking any evidence of my wrongdoing with it. All without disrupting my own personal timeline.

I lifted up the Time Stone, the weight feeling heavier with each passing day.

But I can't give up now.

Not ever.

"CHRONOS CONTROL!"

- - -

"If it isn't the hedgehog of the hour!"

I landed down in view of Freedom HQ, where Sonic was signalling for me to land. Sonic tapped his foot impatiently as I performed a three-point and landed next to him.

"I'm here, Sonic. What's the sitch?"

"Shouldn't you already know what this is about, Future Guy?"

"I skipped my Mobian Studies class. Wanna give me the recap on 'This Day in History'?"

Sonic smirked.

"Rotor's radar picked up fresh info about the latest something-or-other Robuttnik's been working on," he explained vaguely. "Nothing big."

"You weren't paying attention to the briefing, were you?"

Sonic gave a playful shrug.

"I figured Sal's gonna repeat everything to you anyways," he bantered. "So let's beat feet!"

I hovered to the entrance of the stump slide, wedging it open with a psychokinetic tug.

"You wanna go first?" I offered.

"And risk missing the look on your face?" Sonic said, as he jumped through the opened window on the side of Freedom HQ. "Meet you inside!"

"This better not be a prank!" I yelled after the energetic hedgehog.

I stopped at the entrance of the slide, lost in thought.

If everything's the same so far… they must've been planning the party when NICOLE found the evidence of my betrayal.

My heart sank at how that turned out. I don't want that to happen this time, even if they still find evidence of my involvement in St. John's disappearance. I'd merely need to go further back in time and take care of him in a different way.

I hopped down the slide, using my powers to finesse my way through the loops and corkscrews. The trip was smoother than before, now that I knew what was coming. After a few seconds, I was deposited onto the hay bale in the darkness.

"Hello?" I called out. "Anyone here--?"

The lights flashed on, revealing Sonic, Sally, Tails, Antoine, Bunnie, and Rotor with party hats. Tails was using his tails to hover above the ground and see me.

"SURPRISE!" they shouted in unison.

"Oh, you guys!" I exclaimed. "You shouldn't have!"

"For a surprise party, you don't look surprised to see us," Sally said. My paranoia immediately spiked up, only to abate when she contintined. "Who spoiled it?"

Calm down, Silver. She doesn't know.

She can never know.

I rubbed the back of my head, feigning embarrassment.

"Sorry, guys! Antoine mentioned the party a couple months from now because he thought I was the Silver that already knew about it, and--"

"Antoine!" Sonic groused. "Why'd you have to go and spill the beans?"

Antoine shook his head.

"I did no spilling of ze beans!" the cowardly coyote countered testily. "Er, not yet, at least? Oh, sacre bleu! Ze tenses get so confusing!"

Everyone laughed.

From there, things cooled off into a more mellow atmosphere. Just as it had in my first attempt. It was a small party for the core membership of the Knothole Freedom Fighters, plus one anomaly. On the kitchen table, I could see all of the work that was put into the food, and resolved to be more careful this time around.

I don't want to put them through that again.

I… wasn't that hungry, honestly, but I had to keep up appearances. I started with a chili dog instead.

"Could we save some for Dulcy?" I repeated, after everyone had gotten some.

"Sho thing, sugah!" Bunnie said. After a moment, she gave me a tap on the shoulder. A much gentler touch than when she tried to break my ribs. "You've got some ketchup on yer glove."

I grabbed a napkin off the table. With my hands. Not my powers. I didn't want to risk it.

"T-Thanks, Bunnie."

"Mah pleasure."

I glanced at my left hand to rub the stain out.

Those--

Those weren't drops of ketchup.

I made a disposable comment about the chili as an excuse to go to the restroom, swiftly locking the door behind me with an audible click.

I checked in the mirror, confirming that the glove had to go. I shredded it with a psychokinetic surge, completely destroying the evidence of what I did.

My usage of the Time Stone made me a living paradox, unmoored from cause and effect. The sins were undone, but the blood was still on my hands.

It… hurts. It never stops hurting.

As I replaced the glove, I took out my one keepsake from her. A magenta headband that was the only thing remaining of our burned world.

I don't want to do this, but I have to.

"I promised," I repeated into my reflection. "I didn't forget. I'll never forget."

Despite everything, I was still me. I was still Silver the Hedgehog, and Silver always fought for a better future.

For both of us. For everyone. All I needed was the Acorn Family's dirty secret under the royal castle, and everything will be okay.

I promised that we'll be together again.

- - -

Spoiler: Author Notes

I know I was going to wait until Chapter 40 before posting this, but I ended up taking over a month on Chapter 39 and Silver Wing took less than a week. It also had a massive lead on the second-place What If (Blazy Lady) and I didn't expect that to shift.

The Silver SI is one I've had to keep quiet about for a long while. I've had the outline for this locked and loaded in my head for months. Yesterday, I got over 3500 words done just to get this finished for posting!

In regards to the chapter contents itself -- As a play on ESP Silver, the Silver SI's transformation is called Esper Mode. The Time Warp is a factor in both Sonic CD and AOSTH, so this Time Warp pulls from both. Lastly, if you need to ask who 'she' was… You're gonna need to play more Sonic games.

I know this isn't quite what folks were expecting when I pitched the chapter, but that's what made this a really fun surprise to spring.

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Ruby Haze - TV Tropes

Waking up in orbit above a planet wasnât on Johnâs list of things to do. Nor was crash landing in Mercia and joining the Freedom Fighters. Fortunately heâs far from powerless, even if he is …

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