#but they way sonic is so ready to sacrifice an entire village in order to safe his little bro is just 🥺🩵

[0vergrowngraveyard]

“high stakes sonic” my beloved…

[mobius-prime]

153. Sonic the Hedgehog #87

Heart of the Hedgehog (Part 2): Lava Story

Writer: Danny Fingeroth Pencils: Sam Maxwell and Jim Amash Colors: Frank Gagliardo

Things are getting dicier by the second, the lava within the volcano's mouth roiling and getting ready to erupt at any moment. With Tails still trapped mere feet above the lava pool, Sonic recovers from the blow delivered by Metal Sonic last issue and continues to push on at top speed to reach his friend. However, predictably, Metal Sonic has more traps set for his quarry along the path - including a net that entangles Sonic before he has time to stop.

Well well, the power gem gave Metal Sonic not only a personality and sentience, but also apparently a raging thirst for sadism! Metal Sonic cackles at Sonic's determination, reiterating that while he intends to give Sonic a fair chance to save Tails, "fair" is a highly relative term, as he can change the rules of his own game any time he wants. Sonic, uninterested in hearing his evil spiel, continues to run on, and Metal Sonic continues to show off how he's faster and stronger than Sonic, putting obstacles in his path at every opportunity.

Sonic is reminded of how powerful he himself was when transformed into Mecha Sonic, and decides that for the moment, instead of trying to outrace his doppelganger, he can perhaps put him out of commission until he's gotten Tails to safety. He grabs the remnants of the net he was trapped in and quickly uses it to wrap Metal Sonic up against a nearby tree, then races away, with Metal Sonic genuinely impressed at his ingenuity, as if it takes a special kind of genius to figure out that tying someone up when you want them out of your way is a good idea. With his main obstacle removed for now, Sonic makes it the rest of the way to the volcano unmolested and finds Tails, still hanging there above the lava.

With Tails freed, Sonic gets ready to race out of there before Metal Sonic shows back up, but of course, a net can only hold a superpowered robot for so long, and said robot chooses that moment to make his reappearance, mocking Sonic for thinking he stopped him.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, Metal Sonic, this is a comic for kids and teens! Don't be inserting your kinky sadistic fantasies into this situation! Sonic tries to reason with Metal Sonic, calling back to when he was also a robot and how instead of going with his programming he fought it, and citing the joys of life and love as a reason not to be a murderous asshole, but Metal Sonic refuses to listen, saying having power and strength is more important. Sonic, realizing the futility of talking to him, tells Tails to fly away to safety while he holds off Metal Sonic, but Tails refuses to leave his side even if it means death. At that moment, the volcano begins to quake, and Sonic and Tails both get their feet caught in a crack in the ground, unable to escape the lava or fight back. Things look bad, until…

Metal Sonic uses, uh… a blast of air, or something, to hold the lava back, while saying that he now realizes Sonic was right and he can be more than his programming. Sonic and Tails try to argue with his sacrifice, but he convinces them this is the only way any of them will survive, and as they run away from the volcano to safety, Metal Sonic sadly says that it's better if he sacrifices himself, as he's just a cold unfeeling robot. That's… actually hella tragic, man. Someone tell that robot we love him after all, already. It's interesting to note as well that in many ways this actually mirrors the ending of the Sonic OVA (which was released in English only a couple of years before this issue came out), in which Metal Sonic is similarly consumed by rising lava while sacrificing himself to save Sonic's life after coming to gain his own emotions and feelings. As Sonic and Tails look back from a safe distance at the lava pouring from the volcano, Sonic tells Tails that it was his actions that turned Metal Sonic around in the end, as while Sonic's words were just that, words, to him, Tails' refusal to abandon his friend made those words real, and in a way helped Metal Sonic gain a soul. And on that bittersweet note, they turn and head back to their friends at the crashed shuttle, ready to finally head home.

Against the Haunted Past (Part 2)

Writer/Pencils: Frank Strom Colors: Frank Gagliardo

So, back to Monkey - uh, sorry, I mean Ken Khan's predicament. Somehow, he's been captured by Eggman, who's turned the Temple of the Golden Lotus in Kar Leung into a base of operations for the roboticization of the locals. However, he wouldn't do something as demeaning as roboticizing Ken outright, no… instead, he's going to implant him, awake and without any anesthesia, with control chips directly into his brain to ensure he can never rebel again!

This! Is! Horrific! Seriously, what's with all the messed up stuff in these past couple issues? Ken is of course entirely unwilling to sit around and let this happen to him, and uses his strength, enhanced by the power of his headband made out of the golden ring, to break free from his restraints, which shocks Eggman as he doesn't remember him being so strong before. He orders his swatbots and roboticized slaves to recapture Ken immediately, and Ken makes a break for it down the hallway, looking for a way to take the facility out of commission so that Eggman can't roboticize his entire village. He successfully finds the main power generator of the place, but while he's looking for a way to disable it, the swatbots burst in and fire wildly, hitting the generator and causing it to go critical.

…welp, we just witnessed the creation of a brand new tragic backstory! Seriously, though, Ken has been through a ton of horrific events in his life - being used as an experiment for cybernetics against his will, losing all his friends and family to the same experiments, being sealed away alone in a tiny pod for ten years, and now, just when he thought he could settle down in his ancestral home and protect the citizens of his village, he loses all of that as well. This is a strong setup for some serious future angst.