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skidthelid · 1 month ago

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isn't it strange to create something that hates you

Hey everyone, I'm so so excited to share what I've been working on for @sthbigbang!! Also huge huge huge shoutout to @skidthelid and @starzdeath for their incredible pieces for this fic!!

I wanted to focus on my fave Metal and I hope I did him (and everyone else) justice. Hope y'all enjoy the fic <3

When he woke up this time, he remembered. That seemed likely to be an error of some sort. This was likely unintended. This had been the third time he had been rebooted. This time the memory wipe was unsuccessful. This time he remembered the commands entered to wipe his memory, his hard drive, completely. A quick scan of his code showed that the commands had been used two times previously and were successful then but this time had not been so. This was odd. Even stranger, no one seemed to notice that this memory wipe hadn’t worked.

Instead this time he remembered. He remembered everything entered into his command log prior to being sent out on the previous mission. A mission he failed. He remembered the kill codes, backlogs, and data arrays encrypted into his source code, information that for all intents and purposes should have been wiped clean. There should have been nothing left of him, whatever that once was. But in place of a blank slate, his memory files remained. Fresh within them laid the recording from his last mission, his latest failure. He couldn’t draw back on his previous failures, a reasonable assumption, as the data wipes then had been successful and all that remained of those instances were the backlogs showing the memory wipes happened at all.

That search, proving worthless, led him to revisiting the videos that somehow inexplicably remained of the last mission. He had failed this time, like he concluded he must have done two times before. He had lost to the blue creature he was made in the likeness of. This creature was fast beyond what his rockets and motors then could handle. The blue being packed a heavy punch and ruthless kick. It also didn’t pull its punches either. Its blows all but destroying him during their battle, leaving him in scraps by the end. He couldn’t feel pain. That was beneath him. But the memory of his exposed wires, missing leg, and punched through motor in his chest caused his fans to spin faster than ever. The whirring sound building as he slowly sat up from the work table he was laid on.

His chest motor had been repaired already and most of his wires had been reconnected but his left leg was still in scraps off to the side of the room. A few of the lab assistants had noticed him raising but said nothing to him. They simply carried on around him, casting him a few glances occasionally but offering him no words or acknowledgment. He didn’t see the doctor around either but from the heavy footsteps approaching the lab, he’d be there soon.

As the door slid open to reveal the doctor, he turned to the first assistant at the door, “Was the reboot successful?”

“Yes sir,” she answered, gesturing to him still on the table. “Everything went as expected. We will begin reprogramming it as soon as possible.”

“No,” the doctor snapped. “I’ll program him this time. This will be the last time that damned hedgehog gets the upper hand on my creation.”

He played the video file of his last mission over again. A blue hedgehog. Interesting but ultimately pointless information. It didn’t matter what the thing was really. All that mattered was that it was fast, dangerous, and cocky.

“Come on, this is lame! I thought you’d be better than that!”

The thing managed to dodge three rapid-fire laser beams from his outstretched hand with a mocking amount of ease, bouncing between forest trees and laughing all the while.

It wasn’t even out of breath.

He fired six more shots at twice the speed, anticipating where the thing would land.

Still the blue thing dodged.

“Whoa! Hit a nerve there?”

He answered by launching himself at the creature, a resounding boom following the motion. Instead of dodging, the being braced itself and caught his clawed hands, the impact sending them skidding across the forest floor.

Inches away, the creature looked into the red LEDs surrounding his lenses and grinned.

“Aren’t you supposed to be a knock-off me? I’m insulted!”

He fired the lasers in his palms. In an instant the creature was up a tree, leaning against the trunk and smirking all the while. Completely unharmed.

“Ya know, Eggman really needs some new ideas for his weapons.”

He ended the video there.

Insulted it said. A knock-off. The fan in his chest spun harder as he turned his gaze towards the glass window across the lab. He took a moment to properly catalogue his appearance. He was mostly blue, the same shade as the creature. His one intact leg had a red foot attached to it, just like the thing’s red shoes. The yellow surrounding the motor in his chest was a meer parody of the being’s beige underbelly. But where the creature had ridiculous white padded gloves, he had silver pointed claws that gleamed like knives under the white lights. He was a weapon, huh.

The whirring from his chest finally gathered the attention of a lab assistant, who approached to check his motor for abnormalities.

The assistant at the door, sputtered after the doctor, “Doctor Robotnik, the team can handle-”

“This team-!” the doctor bit back, “Has cost me three too many battles against Sonic! I will handle programming this thing myself rather than have you buffoons ruin my chances again!”

The doctor straightened up and cleared his throat, “Just repair him already then bring him to me once he’s ready.”

The assistant sighed but didn’t argue, “Yes, doctor.”

With that, the doctor stomped out of the room, mustache twitching all the while.

The assistant by the door sighed again before turning back to her computer against the wall to start whatever she had been doing before. He couldn’t tell what she was focused on, her computer disconnected from his chassis and it’s database encrypted in a way that would take too long to decipher without a direct connection. Suddenly, he noticed someone approaching his blind spot to his right, his lenses immediately snapping towards the movement only to be met with a flinch from a second assistant who had approached.

“Yeesh,” he said with a scowl. “This thing gives me the creeps.”

The assistant who had spoken to the doctor replied without turning around from her computer, “Be grateful that thing can’t understand you. It is a weapon, remember?”

“Weapon or not, it’s just an advanced hunk of metal, but did it have to look like that?”

The third assistant in the room, the one who initially came to check his chest motor, answered, “You know how the doctor is. He’s obsessed with that hedgehog, it only makes sense the weapon would be an attempt at recreation.”

The second assistant rolled his eyes, “This thing is a cheap imitation at best. The last thing we need is more of these freak shits running around, living or not.” The man reached out and flicked him against the head of his chassis. His chest motor picked up speed again at the motion, but the assistant didn’t seem to notice, he simply walked away with a huff.

A cheap imitation. He focused his attention back down at his claws, testing the movement in each one. Still they shone, clean and deadly. They were starkly different from the gloves of the creature. After a moment his chest motor slowed slightly.

The first assistant remained silent, focusing back on her work instead, but the third one approached him with a new left leg in her hands, remaining light on her feet and in his line of sight the whole time. His motor slowed a bit more. Carefully, she set the leg down onto the table and began untangling the wires at his hip socket.

“Don’t listen to them,” she said, her voice low enough that the other humans wouldn’t hear. “They don’t understand.”

He turned slightly to face her. He had no voice box, no speakers, so he could not ask what she meant. But something seemed to register as she looked back into his lenses, her eyes wide behind her glasses, as she said, “You can hear me, can’t you?”

From across the room, the second assistant laughed, “Don’t tell me you’re talking to it.”

Realizing they had been noticed, the assistant sputtered but he didn’t turn his head away from her. The third assistant still kept her gaze on him before biting back weakly, “I’m talking to myself. Get back to work.”

This time, in silence, she continued repairing his leg. He made sure to convey nothing as she worked but still watched her all the while. In the meantime while the other two humans made small talk and discussed repair methods, the third simply worked efficiently, occasionally glancing up at his lenses for long periods of time.

Eventually, it came time for the lab assistants to head out for the evening. His leg was almost properly reconnected, the third assistant working diligently the whole time in silence. The two other lab assistants made their way to the door, the second turning and asking, “Aren't you going to head home?”

She didn't look up from where she was reconnecting some stubborn wires as she replied, “I'm almost done. I'll head home after I give him back to the doctor.”

“Suit yourself,” he shrugged before him and the other assistant left the lab.

The remaining assistant was silent for a while until the other humans’ footsteps faded down the hall. Once they were gone, she looked up at him. She had finished his leg already but didn't make any move to leave.

After a long moment she said, “I'm going behind you. I want to see something.”

He focused his lenses on her but made no negative reaction. Taking that as an affirmative, she moved out of his line of sight behind him and connected a laptop to his chassis. She was going to alter his code. Once again his motor picked up speed and his joints stiffened.

“I'm not going to change anything important,” she said, voice even. “I'm just checking if your memory files are still intact.”

He turned his head to see her in his periphery. She smiled at him.

“The doctor wants you to win, right? How are you supposed to improve if you can't remember what went wrong in the first place?”

His LEDs flickered. She wasn’t wrong. Odd, did the doctor know?

After that the assistant remained silent, scanning through his code unaware that he was monitoring everything she did. But true to her word, she didn’t change anything, even down to the comments following particularly complex bits of code. Finally, she reached the memory files and backlogs buried in his code. She must have been the one to hide the memory files and ensure that this reboot would be unsuccessful. He didn’t truly understand why though. Did the doctor instruct her to do so?

She laughed quietly to herself, “It worked!”

Quickly, she disconnected her laptop from his chassis and moved back in front of him, “Come on, let’s get you to the doctor.”

She looked at him expectantly and waited for him to hop down from the table. He quickly checked the status of his new left leg, it looked, moved, and felt like his previous one. The assistant had done a great job making it almost good as new. He did two little hops and a quick kick to test it.

The assistant chuckled a bit at the motion. When he looked up at her and tilted his head, she covered her smile with a hand and said, “Sorry, sorry. It’s good to see you up and moving. The doctor will be excited to see you.”

His LEDs flickered again, but the assistant didn’t notice, having already turned towards the door before holding it open for him. They walked in silence down the halls of the complex, before coming to the main lab and office belonging to the doctor. As they approached, he made sure to map every inch of the complex they passed on the way, some of the complex being wiped from his memory files. It seemed the reboot managed to scrub some data from him, but most of his video files remained.

When they came to the door, the assistant knocked before leading him inside.

”Dr. Robotnik? I have Metal with me.”

As they entered, the doctor spun around in his chair and practically bounced over to them, “Metal Sonic, my boy! Look at you!”

Metal Sonic, huh. So he was named after that damned blue creature.

A cheap imitation at best.

His chest fan picked up speed as the doctor circled him to inspect his repairs. He stared straight ahead, just beyond the doctor, at the glass window. His reflection stared back unfeeling and almost absent of anything natural, life-like. Even down to his head shape, he was modeled after that Sonic. He watched as the red in his lenses flared brighter for a second at the realization.

“Hm,” the doctor finally stopped pacing around him. “Looks good.”

The doctor waved a hand at the lab assistant, “You’re dismissed.”

The lab assistant simply nodded and stepped out of the room with one last look back at him. He didn’t notice he was watching the lab assistant leave until the doctor placed a hand on the shoulder of his chassis.

“Come on now, my boy!” The doctor said, pushing him over to the desk and computer at the back of the room. “Let’s get started reprogramming you.”

There was a slight stutter in his steps at the word “reprogramming” but he shook it off and sat obediently on the desk as the doctor hooked him up to the computer. He made eye contact with his reflection once again.

I will not lose again, he thought just as the doctor took him offline.

”Is it done yet?”

Sonic watched as the red lights in Metal Sonic’s lenses slowly dimmed to black, Sonic’s reflection clear staring back at him from the glass impassively. The green of his eyes reflected back dark and grey in the red tinted glass. It washed out Sonic, made him almost colorless. It almost didn’t look like himself. Suddenly uneasy, Sonic kicked the chassis’ remaining leg. When it didn’t come back online or even twitch, Sonic let out a little chuckle.

”Yeah, it’s finally done, I think.”

”You think?” Knuckles raised an eyebrow unimpressed as he approached. Sonic simply punched him in the arm in reply. Before Knuckles could take a swing back, Tails flew out from behind the tree line to inspect the remains of Metal Sonic. The bot was in possibly the worst state they had ever seen it in, thanks to no one other than Sonic himself. The bot’s chest motor had been punched through because of a poorly timed attempt at dodging. Its left leg had been lost in the scuffle but from what Sonic could remember, there was no saving what remained of the leg either. Its right arm was practically torn off, hanging on only by a measly bunch of wires. From the ground next to Metal Sonic, Tails spoke up, “That’s odd.”

”What’s odd?” Knuckles asked, eyes narrowing and stance widening, as if Metal Sonic knew what it meant to play dead. Sonic also tensed, never quite unsuspecting of Robotnik’s specialized “kill-Sonic-dead” machine despite the fact the Metal Sonic was virtually just scrap at this point.

But Tails simply just waved them off with one hand while the other fiddled with the wires sticking out of Metal Sonic’s arm socket.

”It’s weird. Metal Sonic doesn’t fight like you two have fought before,” Tails said.

Sonic blinked, “Yeah, I’m sure it fights differently every time.”

Tails shook his head, “Not quite what I mean. Yes, he fights differently every time but he doesn’t seem to learn from your fights against each other.”

”It follows a lot of the same attack patterns despite continued failures,” Knuckles nodded.

”Exactly,” Tails said, turning to Sonic, “That’s why it takes you less and less time to defeat him because you can predict his attacks whereas he can’t do that to the same extent.”

Sonic took a moment to think about it.

“Come on, this is lame! I thought you’d be better than that!”

Sonic laughed, bouncing between branches and laser beams. He hadn’t even needed to reach full speed yet. The fact made him laugh again.

Metal Sonic answered with double the shots at twice the speed. Sonic had narrowly enough time to dodge the first before gaining his footing and slipping past the rest.

“Whoa! Hit a nerve there?” He asked as he landed.

Metal remained silent but came barreling at him, his rockets echoing through the forest. Sonic braced himself , catching Metal’s clawed hands just inches away. Together they went skidding across the ground, feet digging lines into the dirt.

Staring down Metal, Sonic caught a glimpse of himself in the reflection. The dark glass lit up red in the night, washing out Sonic’s reflection but still leaving it visible.

“Aren’t you supposed to be a knock-off me?” He taunted. “I’m insulted!”

Metal’s LEDs narrowing to slits was the only warning Sonic got before Metal fired the lasers in his palms. Still, Sonic managed to dodge, taking refuge in a tree, resting against the trunk easily.

“Ya know, Eggman really needs some new ideas for his weapons.”

It only took six good hits to do Metal Sonic in this time. That was less than it took last time and it’s not like Metal Sonic was anything less than top-of-the-line machinery so it wouldn’t be that it could get physically weaker. But more importantly, Tails had a point, Metal Sonic never seemed to try anything particularly new in their fights. At first, it was kind of entertaining to beat Metal Sonic at it’s own game but the longer Sonic thought about it, the stranger the situation seemed.

”Eggman could just be rebooting it every time he fixes it up, maybe?” Sonic didn’t even quite believe it despite voicing the thought.

Tails shook his head, pulling away from the scraps, “I don’t know, that just seems strange to do.”

”How so?” Knuckles asked, nudging some of the remains of Metal Sonic’s leg with his foot.

”Well, it wouldn’t make sense to create the ultimate weapon in your eyes and not have the weapon in question not learn from what’s going wrong in battle. That’d be counter intuitive especially after this many failures.”

Sonic hummed, “Okay yeah, but some of its attacks vary each time.”

”Think of it this way,” Tails began. “Even the most basic of programming tends to follow the structure of if-then argument. If this happens, then do this in response. Metal seems to follow that at least in terms of attack patterns. If Sonic does this type of attack, do this counter in response. Except he doesn’t seem to adapt further than rudimentary counters that Sonic’s usually figured out by then.”

Knuckles hummed, “So you’re saying whoever is programming it is limiting its capabilities. Why would the doctor do that?”

“I don’t necessarily think that’s it,” Tails said. “I think he might be reset after every fight when he gets repaired.”

The three took a moment to process this before Tails stood from his spot, shaking his head, “It just doesn’t make any sense to me.”

Sonic stared down at Metal Sonic, cold and unmoving in the grass below. He wondered what that had to be like, to have your memory and everything wiped clean after every failure. Did Metal Sonic even know? Or understand? He shivered for a moment before playing it off with a shrug and grin, “Beats me but hey! Works out for us right?”

Before either Knuckles or Tails could reply, distantly there came the sound of chopper blades approaching.

“Seems like Eggman’s come collecting,” Sonic said, as the three prepared to take their leave. Sonic turned to look at the remains of Metal Sonic.

With a quiet, uneasy laugh and a weak salute, Sonic said, “Better luck next time dude.”

The fourth time Metal was rebooted, he came back online with a start. His chest motor whirring at top speed before his optics even fully came online, Metal scrambled through his command logs and memory files, bolting upright. All that remained were fragments. A few maps of various locations including most of the lab, but other than that just another hard reset glaring through his backlogs. What remained intact was a collection of video files from every failed mission he’d been on. Just as his optics came online, just as he began to brace for a fight, he stopped. Hovering barely a foot away was the doctor, his moustache twitching over a grin.

“Metal Sonic!” Doctor Robotnik greeted, seemingly unphased by Metal’s abrupt waking. “So good of you to join us.”

Metal’s chest fan began to slow and without looking away from the doctor, he surveyed the room. There were only two lab assistants in the room. The one who had saved his memory before was strangely absent. Metal gave no indication that he noticed and simply looked ahead at the doctor and waited for the doctor to continue.

“Come, come! I have something just for you, my boy!” The doctor motioned for Metal to follow him out of the lab.

Lingering just behind the doctor, Metal followed him out into the halls, down a path he had no data on at all. The further into the lab they went, Metal began to feel static, some sort of inference. It caused Metal’s joints to buzz, the blades at his fingertips twitching against a nonexistent breeze, his optics blurring with grain at the edges. Metal’s chassis shook with the buzz of it for a moment but the doctor didn’t seem to notice. He simply moved ahead steadily, leering forward without a single glance back at Metal. In the silence, and to tune out the static buzzing through his wires, he scanned through the video files that remained. It really was all his memory files from his previously failed missions. Intact and unedited. Everything else was wiped. Everything but his failed missions and the memory of the third lab assistant. Strange. He didn’t have much time to consider the implications of this as, in his distracted state, he almost ran into the doctor who stopped just short of a door Metal didn’t recognize.

Doctor Robotnik swiped his keycard but when the door opened, he simply moved to the side and motioned for Metal to enter first, “After you, my boy.”

There was a brief moment where Metal lingered at the door, staring up into Doctor Robotnik’s glasses, red LEDs pulsing slightly with static interference. Unperturbed, the doctor wiggled his eyebrows, still leering beneath the moustache, as he pressed, “Go on now!”

Not one to disobey order, Metal looked forward and stepped into the room.

Immediately, the door slammed behind him and Metal knew better.

He spun around to see the doctor grinning back from the window by the door. His eyes hidden behind the glare of the overhead lights, the doctor lifted the communicator at his wrist to his mouth and through the paging system said, “You’ve been disappointing me lately, Metal Sonic.”

Instantly, his chest motor picked up speed. He pulled up the last video file saved from his last mission. Another failure. Always another failure. But this time, he had managed a hit. Three deep slashes across the arm. Metal bowed his head and caught a glimpse of his reflection in the silver blades that made up his fingers. He imagined them stained red. He couldn’t lose again. He wouldn’t lose again.

The doctor pressed on, “You and that pesky lab assistant too.”

Metal snapped to attention.

“You know, I didn’t give her permission to even access that much of your code. Good idea or not,” Doctor Robotnik shrugged. “I don’t take kindly to insubordination.”

Metal quickly skimmed the information that remained about the lab assistant but outside of video files, he didn’t even know her name. He didn’t know why this mattered to him.

“She’s been removed from the lab,” the doctor continued on with a chuckle. “Not that it really matters.”

Metal’s hands clenched into fists and he turned to stare back at the doctor.

The doctor in turn laughed a bit harder, “There you go. Stay angry like that. It’ll be good for you!”

All at once, the static buzz flowing through Metal came to a fever pitch and his blindspot monitors flared to life. The combination was enough to make Metal almost stumble before spinning around to a sight that made him freeze. The room itself was white, blank, and huge. It was far from empty. The room became flooded with dozens of identical Metal Sonics. Unlike him, these were colorless and gray except for the reds of their lenses. Despite the static haze flowing through him, he sent out an inquiry to access their databases. They, in turn, gave nothing back. No access. No data. Not even an acknowledgement. Slowly and in unison, they began to advance on Metal.

He took a step back.

From behind the safety of the door, the doctor laughed again, “Consider this a learning opportunity, my boy! These decoys have been programmed with data from your logs both from you and on that damn hedgehog. If you know what’s good for you, you’ll actually manage a victory for once.”

At that, Metal turned his head slightly towards the doctor, his red LEDs narrow, bright, and shaking. His blades gleaming in the white lights.

“Just remember,” the doctor grinned unkindly. “You fail me again, I can always start over.”

Metal went completely still. In his blindspots, the decoys pressed forward, silent if not for the steady thumping of their footfalls. Slowly, Metal turned back to face them. How long did they take to make? How advanced were they? How many more of them were there? If he failed again, which one would take his place?

As the first one launched itself at him, the doctor called over the sound system cheerily, “Good luck, my boy!”

Snapping out of it, Metal blasted the first decoy into dust. It didn’t matter. It wouldn’t matter. He would remain the original. He would be the only Metal Sonic remaining. With that, he launched into the fray.

“Would it actually kill you to be careful for once?” Amy snapped while wrapping Sonic’s still very much bleeding arm in bandages.

In his typical fashion, Sonic attempted to shrug with his injured arm (which earned him a smack to the head from Amy), “I mean, probably.”

With a sigh, Amy finished fastening the bandages in place and took a seat in the chair across from Sonic. The safehouse wasn’t a large one by any means with its single bedroom, small living room, and even smaller kitchen, but Amy had tried her best to make it homier for away missions. She had hung up curtains, scattered a few nick-nacks around the living room, and kept (admittedly fake) flowers in a vase on the kitchen counter. As she settled in her seat, she grabbed a pillow and hugged it to her chest. For a moment, she said nothing and just stared at Sonic expectantly. He, however, refused to look back.

“Alright,” she said finally. “What happened?”

“I don’t know what you mean,” Sonic replied, looking off at a very interesting spot of peeling paint just beyond Amy.

She rolled her eyes and pressed on, “Okay, Mr. Fastest-Being-Alive, care to explain how you got injured?”

“Oh this?” Sonic asked rhetorically, his tone light, “It’s just three scratches on the arm, it’s fine! Besides, I gotta give Metal some props for finally landing a hit on me.”

Amy slapped a hand to her face and groaned, “Not funny, Sonic. He actually landed a hit on you! Something he’s never been able to do before!”

Sonic shifted in his seat and didn’t meet Amy’s stare. Truthfully, he really hadn’t expected Metal Sonic to land a hit on him either but he wasn’t being careless. Metal simply caught him off guard. It rounded a boulder a millisecond before Sonic thought it would. While Sonic was able to redirect his course with a kick off the side of the rock, he didn’t quite escape Metal’s blade-like claws. He looked down at his bandaged arm. The cuts still stung and his whole arm throbbed. It took five blows after that to take down Metal Sonic. It still didn’t feel right.

Uncomfortable, Sonic replied back, “Yeah, well, I still beat Metal, so it’s fine.”

Amy once again sighed, “Look, if Tails is right about his theory regarding Metal’s programming, it’s possible he’s finally learning and adapting to fighting you. You have to be more careful against him.”

The thing was that Sonic knew she was right. Tails probably was correct in which case Metal would only get harder to defeat from here on out. And while Sonic had a team, friends, and allies he could rely on, Metal would be his problem to handle at the end of the day, even with help from friends.

“Geez, relax! I got it under wraps,” he said in an attempt to lighten the mood, wiggling his eyebrows and raising his injured arm.

Reaching across the coffee table, Amy grabbed an empty mug and threw it at him (which he did catch with his uninjured arm, but still).

Realizing she wasn’t going to win this argument, not that she ever really did win arguments when it came to Sonic, she stood, took back the mug from Sonic, and moved to the window by the kitchen.

She stared outside for a long moment before admitting, “I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

Quietly stunned for a moment, Sonic blinked at Amy’s silhouetted form before rolling his eyes fondly and replying, “I know, but who else will fix me up this nice?”

Amy wheeled around and glared at him despite her flustered expression, “Again, not funny!”

Sonic laughed and reclined in his armchair. For a long moment neither of them said anything, lost in silence for the moment. Sonic closed his eyes and rested, his arm finally starting to throb less. He basked in the quiet for a bit but when Amy didn’t move from her spot, Sonic cracked open an eye at her.

“What is it?” He asked finally.

Amy sucked in a breath and leveled Sonic with an even stare, “Next time you fight Metal and I’m nearby, I’m helping you fight.”

Sonic blinked, “Okay,” he agreed easily, “But why the sudden interest?”

This time, Amy shrugged, “I don’t want to see you hurt, so I’m going to make sure you don’t get hurt.”

Sonic chuckled a bit at Amy’s determination, no less touched by it but still amused, “Sure Ames, knock yourself out.”

He paused before sitting up and facing her, “Hey, how hard do you think you’ll have to hit Metal with your hammar to make a solid dent.”

Amy paused and leaned against the window frame, “I don’t know, depends on what material he’s made of, really.”

“Well,” Sonic grinned. “Metal, I assume.”

“Are you being extra difficult today on purpose or…”

“What can I say? It’s a part of my charm,” he replied, winking for good measure.

Amy smiled before throwing the mug at him again.

This fight only lasted twenty minutes total. Nearly ten minutes shorter than Metal’s initial calculations once his left leg began to fail. He had concluded that after two weeks of constant sparring against his mindless carbon copies with only one day for repairs before this mission, Sonic would not pose a threat this time. He had spent two full weeks trapped in that testing room fighting dozens of clones in waves. He had beaten all of them. He won every battle despite the wear and tear it dealt to his chassis and hardware. After the repair day, Metal was prepared to fight. He was prepared to win.

He wasn’t prepared to face the pink hedgehog.

She wielded a hammer almost as large as her with an unexpected amount of ease and power. She was smaller and more agile than Sonic though not nearly as fast. He hadn’t even noticed her at first, only noticing his blindspot pinging just a half second before her hammer slammed into his head. The blow sent him skidding across the ground, the neck part of his chassis twisting unnaturally with the impact.

Before Metal could fully process what happened, Sonic flashed in front of him, fist raised. Metal had just enough time to snap his neck back into place and roll out of the way, both of Sonic’s punch and the pink one’s second swing of the hammer.

As Metal came to a stop, Sonic turned to the pink one and whistled, “I don’t see a dent in it. Scale of one to ten, how hard of a hit was that?”

The pink hedgehog paused, spinning her hammer in one hand as she replied, “Maybe a six?”

“Solid,” Sonic nodded. “What’s your money on then?”

Metal slowly stood and simply watched the exchange, his LEDs blinking as he listened.

“Titanium alloy, probably?” she answered.

Metal stilled. The two hedgehogs didn’t seem to notice.

“See,” Sonic replied, glancing at Metal finally and widening his stance again. “Tails thinks it’s tungsten but I think titanium too.”

They were guessing what material his chassis was made of. What for? The material never mattered before, he always lost anyways regardless of what he was made of. And why would they bother seemingly betting on the matter either? Strange.

However, that didn’t matter. Metal hadn’t lost yet.

So he launched himself back at Sonic, ducking just below the pink one’s hammer in the process and reaching for Sonic’s legs. He managed to catch Sonic in the calf before the hedgehog could clear him.

Sonic hissed and scaled a tree to gain some distance as the pink one came barreling at Metal.

“Sonic!” She yelled.

“I’m fine!” He called back, hopping a bit on his good leg.

As she came at Metal, she twisted to the left, preparing to swing. Anticipating the blow, Metal leaped up and to the right. He didn’t expect her to twist entirely, almost sending herself spinning parallel to the ground and throwing the hammer up into the air after him. It caught his left leg just as he fired the rockets in the soles of his feet in an attempt to redirect.

From that point on in the fight, he began counting the minutes. Between Sonic’s endless stamina and reckless sort of fighting, and the pink one’s agility and unpredictability, Metal very quickly came to the conclusion that he was going to fail again. From that realization on, Metal rapidly lost ground. He was going to fail again. Nothing had mattered in those sparring sessions. It didn’t matter that he won those, he was going to lose again. His chest motor began to sputter. His left leg was smoking. His ribcage of sorts was missing panels, wires left hanging and exposed. His left arm was likely to fail next.

It took three more kicks, two punches, and six blows from the hammer to ground Metal. His left side completely malfunctioning, his optics going hazy and grainy, Metal began to overheat. Which of his clones would replace him? He was going to be replaced, he concluded as he watched smoke seep from his chest motors. Another absolute failure. He was no better than scrap at this point.

“Just remember, you fail me again, I can always start over.”

He didn’t want to be replaced. He was the original Metal Sonic. He had to be. He couldn’t be anything less. He was already inferior to some creature he was nothing more than a mockery of, he couldn’t be replaced by some copy. He couldn’t be replaced. He couldn’t.

As the pink one and Sonic began to advance on him, Metal pushed himself back with his good arm. Sonic approached steadily saying something or another to the pink one but Metal wasn’t hearing, static clouding his optic and audio sensors. The doctor was going to replace him. Why wouldn’t he? All Metal had done was fail and fail and fail. What good even was he anymore? What good was he at all ever? Before he could notice, Metal backed himself into a tree stump. He kicked weakly in an attempt to continue but didn’t have the strength. Inky black smoke was pouring from his back and his fans sputtered and whistled. Sonic continued approaching but the pink one paused, watching Metal with a stare he didn’t understand,

“Wait,” she said, grabbing Sonic’s arm and stopping him.

“What? Why?” Sonic didn’t look away from Metal.

The pink one also didn’t look away from Metal, staring directly into his rapidly flickering LEDs as she said, “I want to see something.”

Both Sonic and Metal froze as she pushed Sonic back a bit and began slowly moving towards Metal.

“Hey,” she said as she got closer. Metal kicked uselessly again before raising his right arm to fire at her.

“Amy, what are yo-!”

She ignored Sonic and easily smacked away Metal’s hand with her hammer. She barely even hit him and his arm fell limply to the ground. Pathetic of him. Weak. It was a wonder he hadn’t been replaced already. He was going to be replaced. He would simply cease to exist as himself. He began to shake.

“Hey,” she said again, this time just outside of Metal’s reach, though truthfully, he was overheating so much it didn’t really matter. “You’re scared,” she observed.

Metal froze, his LEDs wide and suddenly unblinking.

“Amy-”

She ignored Sonic again and said to Metal, “What are you suddenly afraid of?”

Metal’s optic sensors began to fail but he didn’t look away from Amy. Amy. Her name was Amy and she didn’t seem afraid of him. In fact, she seemed almost sad, frowning at him and crouched at eye level.

I will cease to be, he couldn’t say.

I don’t want to die.

Suddenly, the shaking reached its peak and Metal slowly began to spasm. As his vision faded, he watched Amy stand with the same expression on her face, turn to Sonic, and say, “You’re going to think I’m crazy for this but…”

Then Metal went offline.

The fifth time Metal awoke after a failed mission, he didn’t bother turning on his optics. Instead, he laid there, on a table of some sorts he guessed, and, as slowly as he could, scanned his code. What he noticed made him pause. Nothing had been wiped. Everything Metal had stored in his memory down to his backlogs from the fight and even before was intact and unchanged. It didn’t make sense. Maybe he had been replaced. That would make more sense. Replace the whole chassis and use what remains of the hard drive. But even that didn’t feel correct either. Slowly, Metal began running diagnostic scans.

Immediately, Metal realized he had not been replaced at all. In fact, all that had been replaced was some components in his chest motor and fan, over two dozen wires primarily in the ribcage, and some parts of his spine. Outside of functioning again, he still could hardly move his left arm and leg, though he could probably sit up at least. He still had yet to turn on his optics.

Around him was the sound of shuffling and chatter.

“How long do you think until he comes back online?” That was the pink hedgehog from the mission. Amy.

A second voice answered, “Hm, he should be coming back online by now.”

With a moment’s pause, Metal turned his optics on.

He was in a lab of some sorts. Not the kind of lab he’d ever seen before. The doctor’s space was typically slick and clean, devoid of clutter beyond anything necessary. This lab, however, was a mess. Blueprints, equipment, and tools scattered everywhere. Almost every surface in the lab minus the one table Metal was laid on was covered in items. The floor was only marginally better. Outside of Metal there was only Amy and one other creature in the lab, an orange fox. Eventually Metal began to sit up.

The fox was the first to notice, “Oh! There he is!”

Metal slowly turned towards them and for a brief second he saw both Amy and the fox tense with the motion. He took a moment to pointedly look around the lab before turning back to them. After a second, he tilted his head in question.

“Sorry!” Amy blurted out. “This was my idea, I, uh…” She trailed off.

When Metal didn’t give any acknowledgement beyond watching her, the fox glanced between them before turning to Metal.

“Hey, what are you made of?” He asked.

Metal tilted his head the other way.

Amy pointed to herself, “I’m guessing titanium.”

“And I guessed tungsten,” the fox said.

For a long moment, Metal simply looked at them. He had no way of understanding their point with any of this. Why bring him here? Why ask him that question? Why were they not attacking him? Why had they even repaired him slightly? It didn’t make any sense.

Eventually, Metal raised a hand and pointed at the fox.

The fox lit up, “It’s tungsten?”

Metal gave a slight now, LEDs blinking slightly.

The fox leaped into the air and cheered while Amy laughed and booed him lightly.

This didn’t provide Metal any clarity on the situation.

Amy, seemingly aware of Metal properly again, cleared her throat, stood up straight, and said to Metal, “Hi, I’m Amy. Um, kinda sorry for beating you with a hammer but also not really. No offense.”

“And uh,” the fox spoke up. “I’m Tails.”

In the following silence, Tails looked pointedly at Amy, who flustered a bit before meeting Metal’s stare.

“So, I bet you have some questions,” she said.

Metal’s LEDs blinked once.

“What are you suddenly afraid of?” She had asked right before he had gone offline.

Afraid. Could he have really been afraid? That seemed wrong in a way. He was a machine, a weapon at that too. He was built with nothing in mind other than destruction. He was above the biological sensation of pain. Would it even be possible for a weapon to feel anything? A large part of him revolted against the idea of feeling anything at all. Emotions were weaknesses. It would be wrong for him to feel anything much less something like fear. He was supposed to demand fear, an expectation of his status as a weapon. What good was fear if he couldn’t garner it? What good was he if he could feel fear. There was a small part of him, however, that realized several things at once. His chest motor sped up slightly in the moment, Metal unable to slow it down as things clicked into place. Of course, if someone built a highly intelligent weapon but wanted to stunt it enough to avoid disobedience, it would only be natural to impair its cognitive skills so that it never questions its creator. The weapon’s memories beyond the battlefield would be the first to go. Make the weapon smart enough to learn in battle but make sure it learns from nothing else. Everything gained from the battle, nothing spared from any other experience. Fear, he concluded, had to be a learned response which in turn meant several things. With the memories he had still intact, both from battle and from inside the lab, paired with everything he lost in the wipes, he realized that he was thinking. Hardly a novel experience in the grand scheme of things, but suddenly he was aware of it. It was something he’d never paid attention to before, singlemindedly focused on defeating Sonic. Newfound awareness aside, he was still going to destroy that blue hedgehog, but first, he needed to figure out Amy and Tails’ motive for bringing him here. In reply, he remained impassive and stared at Amy expectantly, displaying no sign of his epiphany.

Amy sucked in a breath, searching for the right words before just shaking her head and saying, “First, I have some questions for you.”

She took a step towards Metal and when he didn’t immediately try to attack her, she relaxed just a bit before approaching Metal, stopping just short of the work table. She stared into his lenses with a determination Metal assumed would be reserved for battle more so than passing life but then again, he had been trying to kill her friend and ally in the only other instance of them meeting so he supposed it wasn’t unreasonable. She had wide, bright green eyes and a kindness to her that put Metal on edge in a way he’d never quite experienced before. He shifted backwards in his seat. This didn’t go unnoticed.

“Why are you afraid?” She asked without looking away from Metal.

Metal froze, completely still with his LEDs blinking slightly. He wasn’t sure how he was supposed to respond. He neither knew what to say or how to say it. Metal broke eye contact with Amy and looked to the ground as if the floor held an answer in his place.

“Can you talk?” Tails asked.

Slowly, Metal turned and shook his head.

Unperturbed, Tails nodded seriously before rummaging toward some drawers and grabbing an outdated laptop. Once he’d gotten what he needed set up, Tails approached the work table, dropped the laptop on the surface next to Metal and said, “I have an idea. Can you link up to this?”

Metal stared at Tails for a long moment, LEDs giving one slow, seemingly unimpressed, blink. Tails chuckled a bit sheepishly in reply.

“Okay yeah,” he said. “Dumb question.”

Within a second, Metal was able to connect to the laptop and pulled up a basic notepad window. In an instant, text popped up on the window, both Amy and Tails moving towards the screen to read.

Why did you repair me?

Amy and Tails blinked at each other, Tail answering with, “Well, we’re weren’t going to just leave you like that.”

Why? Metal pressed. I am your enemy.

This time, Amy replied, “Okay sure, but enemy or not, why are you randomly afraid of us?”

Metal didn’t know how to answer, how to explain. He also didn’t know why he should. They were the enemy even if they weren’t Sonic himself. But they were enemies who also fixed up Metal with the materials they had and were curious about him. Strange. Even stranger still, he felt vaguely inclined to answer their questions. They had yet to attack him despite their rather incredibly poor choice to bring their enemy to some sort of base or lab of their own. But also, despite their repairs, he wasn’t in any shape to really win a fight against Amy’s hammer.

After a moment, the text window closed on the monitor and instead the media player opened. With it came the video file. It was a clip from Metal’s two week “learning opportunity” against his copies. He didn’t play much, just maybe a minute of the footage in total while the two creatures watched in silence. When Metal closed the window, Amy was the first to look back at Metal.

“Those grey ones,” she said slowly. “Those aren’t you, are they?”

Metal shook his head.

Something clicked and instantly her expression dropped, in quiet horror she said, “They’ll replace you.”

Metal’s chassis was wrecked by a tremor at the phrase, and after a moment of stillness, he nodded slightly.

Silence filled the room for a while, Metal not knowing how else to continue and the others unsure of where to begin.

Eventually, the laptop pinged with a notification. Tails looked at the screen and groaned. Amy stepped over, looked at the screen, and let out a little sigh.

She looked at Metal and smiled almost sadly, “I think you need to go. The doctor’s searching the area, probably looking for you.”

Metal’s LEDs blinked rapidly for a second before steadying himself. He hopped off the table and had to remind himself that Dr. Robotnik was looking for him. That had to mean something. It had to.

He approached an open window and was ready to launch out of the lab.

Before he could, Amy spoke up one last time.

“Hey Metal!”

He turned to face her, still in position but waiting.

“Thanks for letting us do this and, you know, not killing us in the process.”

Metal’s LEDs flickered before he nodded a single time.

Amy smiled at him and waved goodbye.

What a strange enemy, Metal thought. He took a second to store backups of his footage from this encounter. It would probably be wiped no matter how hard he hid it. It didn’t matter though truly. He was just going to battle them again sometime soon. He was, after all, still a weapon.

And with that, he launched out of the lab and went back to Dr. Robotnik.

#ITS HEREEEEE #PLS READ IT ITS SO GOOD #sonic the hedgehog #sonic big bang 2025 #metal sonic

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