#i am listening again since it's been reposted and the sheer chaos

[mandrellaeffect]

chicken shooting a rocket launcher out of her ass like the baddest bitch to get her revenge

[sonic-wildfire]

Aftermath: A Sonic Forces AU Fanfiction - Chapter 2

Six Months After the War

(Reposting because of a colossal grammatical error I made in the chapter heading)

Sonic was sitting in his living room, feeling incredibly melancholy. Ever since the meltdown, Sonic had experienced repeated sudden mood swings, restless sleep, and has been more physically fatigued. He knew he had to remain calm, but he also knew from experience that was an onerous task.

It wasn’t long before the azure rodent heard a knock on the door.

“Come in,” Sonic invited the unknown guest without so much as looking over his shoulder.

The guest let themselves in; it was Knuckles. The red echidna wordlessly set a coffee mug on the table adjacent to Sonic’s couch before he sat himself down on a couch opposite of Sonic.

“Where are the others?” Sonic asked.

With a moment’s hesitation, Knuckles answered, “They’re running a bit late, but they should be here soon.”

He took a sip of his own drink and slowly put it back down before sloped his shoulders and gazed at the limestone floor beneath his feet. Sonic noticed that Knuckles was enervated; his once brilliant dark orchid eyes had dulled to an uninteresting plum, he was far more pale, and the white streak across his chest had begun to turn grey.

“Whatcha thinkin’ about, Knux? Someone lay a finger on the Master Emerald?” Sonic jested.

Knuckles suppressed a laugh at the unexpected inquiry. Even in his dire mood, Sonic still had some esprit. That was always something Knuckles could count on, aside from his inordinate amount of hubris.

“We wanted to check in and touch base to see how you’re handling things,” Knuckles told Sonic, brushing aside the hedgehog’s previous question.

“Don’t worry about me, dude,” Sonic quickly riposted, the words coming out harsher than he meant them to be. He hesitated for a moment, feeling bad about how that last sentence came out of his mouth.

With a sigh, Sonic apologized and stated, “It’s just…I’m doing alright. There’s really no need to think about me. I’ll be fine. I think it’s more important that you focus on yourself.”

Knuckles saw right through his falsification. Sonic was smirking, but his legs were trembling as he subtly and impatiently tapped his foot and his pointy ears, once standing on his head as sturdy as oak trees, had now sagged.

“You look bad, man,” the echidna insisted. “You’re anything but fine.”

The accusation vexed Sonic. His forehead corrugated and his eyes narrowed, nearly hissing at the prototherian as he clenched his teeth together.

“I know how you feel,” Knuckles continued slowly. “I’m dealing with the same type of feelings. No need to be bashful about it.”

Sonic felt slightly reassured, but quickly began to wallow in his own thoughts again. ‘I shouldn’t be relying on others for comfort,’ Sonic angrily thought to himself. ‘You know who does that? Cowardly pieces of shit.’

The hedgehog repeated these words under his breath. As he repeated it a fourth time, Knuckles heard it. He began to speak, but Sonic steadily raised his voice and the echidna kept quiet. Eventually, his mumbling turned into yelling. It was at this point Knuckles tried to intervene.

“Sonic, is everything alright?” he asked, truly beginning to worry.

“It’s the same thing with me every day! I have no right to calm down!” Sonic retaliated.

Knuckles tried to say something else—anything else—but Sonic’s rampage was so fierce he couldn’t roll the words off his tongue. He was pissed. At last, Sonic practically went postal.

“What kind of maniac am I?!” Sonic roared, twice slamming his fists onto the table. He immediately looked up and realized that, in his episode of blind rage, he forgot that he had company. The rodent instantly felt shame for his actions and denounced himself harshly. He picked up his coffee mug, drank the rest of the coffee inside, and then furiously hurled the mug at the back wall, splintering it.

All the while, the auburn-quilled monotreme sat motionless trying to process what had just happened. It was then that he heard a knock at the door. It was the others, he had figured.

“Give us just a moment!” Knuckles bellowed. He quickly maneuvered over to the couch Sonic was sitting on, trying to console him.

“It’s okay,” the echidna whispered softly. “You’re okay. It’s all right.”

After a few seconds, Sonic, still slightly ticked, let out a long drawn-out sigh as he rubbed his eyes.

“Alright, you can come in now,” Knuckles yelled to the door.

Tails, Amy, Shadow, and Silver filed into the house. Judging by the looks on their faces, Knuckles thought, they had probably heard the commotion. Sonic turned towards the others and lowered his eyelids in chagrin.

“…I’m… uh… I’m s-sorry…” he managed to stammer.

“For what?” susurrated Amy and Tails simultaneously.

Sonic’s ears drooped and he, without answering the question, lowered his head as he clenched his hands together and rested his forearms on his thighs. In a despondent manner, he stared down at his bright red sneakers.

Silver walked over to the couch where Sonic was sitting, sat himself down next to the blue blur, and put a hand on his shoulder in an attempt to reassure him. Shadow walked over to the couch and stood behind the two, standing akimbo and looking down upon the limestone floor.

“I’ve failed you,” insinuated Sonic.

“Failed? Sonic, what on Earth are you talking about?” exclaimed Amy.

“I’ve lost all motivation to do anything, no matter how much I want to do it. I’ve been missing out on sleep thanks to…”

Sonic faltered as he felt his throat constrict again. He didn’t want to outright say he was experiencing night terrors. ‘What will they think of me if I say that?’ he thought.

“…outlying factors, if you will.” asserted Sonic.

“Sonic, we kn—” Silver began, but was interrupted.

“Fine, I’ll get to the point.” Sonic took a deep breath, trying not to tear up.

“I phrased the answer to the first question wrongly. What I meant to say was that I’m a failure.”

The others were appalled. They had a thousand words swirling in their heads, but neither could choke out a single one.

“Twenty-seven years, guys. Twenty-seven fucking years. That’s how long I’ve been fighting to keep this world safe, but it never stays that way. Every time I defeat Eggman, I should’ve been beating him to death. But, no, I just have to keep him alive for the sheer thrill of stopping him. Now it’s beginning to all catch up with me. Why didn’t I rid him once and for all when I had numerous chances to do so? I’m a fool, guys.”

Sonic began tearing up and he felt a lump growing in his throat. The silence persisted. Nobody knew what to say.

Continuing his rant, Sonic vented. “It’s my own dumb decisions that gets everybody else into trouble. Not putting the fake Chaos Emerald into the Eclipse Cannon before going to save Amy so we could have avoided the entire thing with the giant lizard. Being careless in my super state and getting captured because of it, subsequently tearing the planet into pieces. Nearly losing my closest friend because of my dimwitted ways back on the Lost Hex.”

Everybody was intently listening now. Even Shadow, who had been relatively indifferent up to this point, was now bewildered by the words coming out of the blue hedgehog’s mouth; him, of all people.

“I don’t deserve any of you as friends. I don’t deserve your respect. I don’t deserve anything from you guys. The majority of you all have nearly been killed because of my actions. I am completely selfish.”

Sonic had been rambling for a while, but the others still knew better than to speak up now. Tails sat on the couch next to Sonic and Silver. Amy sat on the opposite couch next to Knuckles. Shadow remained standing behind Sonic’s couch. Sonic knew this and, thanks to his experiences while incarcerated aboard the Death Egg, interpreted this as a threatening move. As Shadow saw Sonic arch his back, however, he stepped out from behind the couch and sat next to Amy and Knuckles.

Sonic continued his emotional tirade for another five minutes before he finally fell silent.

“Why can’t things just go back to normal, like they’ve always been?” Sonic sadly pondered.

The room was now silent enough that you could hear a fly’s wings flap. Everybody was aghast while reflecting on what the cobalt hedgehog had just told them.

Finally, Shadow piped up. “Did you need advice or did you just need to vent?”

“Both,” Sonic whimpered.

There was yet another brief period of silence.

“Sonic…” Knuckles admitted. “If I’m being honest, I can’t truly understand how you’re feeling, but I want to help.”

“…I know exactly how he feels,” Shadow acknowledged. “After the whole incident with the Black Arms, I swore to myself that I’d put the past behind me. But… it still haunts me to this day. No matter how hard I try, I can never seem to elude it.”

Silver echoed the ebony hedgehog’s statements, emphasizing how his constant duty of keeping his future bright was near-impossible to do, with or without massive stress.

“But what’s important to know, Sonic, is that as we’ve done so much for you, you’ve done so much for us. If the world’s not destroyed, then that must mean you’ve succeeded in your efforts.”

“Sonic… you matter to us.” Tails emphasized. “We’re here for you. That’s what friends are for. I know it probably doesn’t help much, but we just wanted you to know that.”

“It’s okay to feel this way,” Amy added. “You make such a great impact on our lives that it would be stupid of us to abandon you now. We know how much your—”

Amy stopped. She didn’t want to mention Sonic’s 6-month hostage crisis to him, fearing he may become paranoid and panic. Clearing her throat, she resumed.

“We know what’s been happening over the past year. You aren’t weak for having feelings you have no control over. We care.”

Those two words pierced Sonic’s heart like an arrow.

‘We care.’

The blue blur wiped away a tear welling in the corner of his eye.

“I don’t know what to say…” Sonic breathed. “…Thank you. You all are too kind.”

Tails embraced Sonic in a brief hug before the blue hedgehog turned back towards Knuckles.

“What were you all coming here for anyway?” he contemplated.

“It’s been a while since we’ve actually seen each other,” Knuckles proclaimed, “so we all thought maybe we’d head on over here and catch up.”

Sonic simpered. “I suppose we’ve already done all that over the past five minutes.”

He guffawed at his own answer and everybody else, save for Shadow, did so too.

[Prelude] [Previous Chapter] [Next Chapter]