Chapter Text
“Man, you got to see the future too?” Sonic whistled. “Lucky. I mean, reliving fun times from the past can be cool, but I feel like I missed out now! What did you see?”
He’d recognized everywhere he’d been whilst pursuing the Time Eater to some extent. Well, everywhere except the… empty white void where everyone had been stuck, but wasn’t that more of a rift in time and space anyway? Those things were never recognizable.
Point was, he was actually a little jealous of Shadow, now. Not of all of the facing evil dads and going back through traumatic memories stuff, but between Shadow and mini-him, Sonic felt left out not having glimpsed the future. He held a certain curiosity about what it might be like — not that it mattered, since he’d deal with whatever happened, come what may, but who wouldn’t want to at least see a little of it?
“Professor Gerald theorized that it could be a different type of anomaly to the others, actually. I told him that I’d seen someone I didn’t recognize, and he suggested that they could be from a different timeline altogether,” Shadow corrected.
“And you saw a person!? C’mon, gimme the details!”
Future, alternate timeline, alternate dimension… what did it matter? It was still objectively cool.
“It was a bunch of places I didn’t recognize. What do you want from me here?” Shadow scowled.
“Descriptions? Just, did you see anything exciting!?”
“There was a volcanic island, some city being attacked, and… ruins. Ruins with a giant bird. There.”
“But do you think they’re from the future, or an alternate timeline?” Sonic hummed.
“I couldn’t say,” impassively, Shadow shrugged. “I’m just quite certain I’ve never been to any of them.”
“Well, your descriptions are a bit… lacking, but I definitely don’t recognize the first one,” he noted idly.
A city being attacked could easily be some disaster Silver averted, but it could also be a bad omen. Sonic had definitely seen his share of attacks on cities, so he could hardly say such a scene wasn’t familiar to him…
And then the ruins sounded like Soleanna.
“But you do the last?” Shadow questioned, a note of surprise in his tone.
“Yeah?” Sonic answered. “Lemme guess, the giant bird was an eagle?”
“Yes… but how did you know?”
“I’ve been there before? Sounds like the old Soleanna castle ruins to me. Guess you’re heading back there soon!”
“Back? I’ve never been before! When did you even go, hedgehog?”
When? Did it matter? Why was it even surprising!? He was a well-travelled guy! And he’d already been quite literally all over the planet during the Dark Gaia incident, so what was one more place to add to his list of travels?
“I dunno, a while back? Ran through there during some festival or something, I think.”
For some reason, this didn’t seem to satiate Shadow. Sonic really couldn’t get what the problem was at all.
“If you went for a festival, why go to ruins, and not the actual city?”
“I really don’t get what the big deal is, dude,” he huffed.
“Well, I suppose you’ll be next be telling me that you know exactly who that being I fought and didn’t know is too? He seemed to know me, but perhaps he was just mistaking me for you,” sarcastically, Shadow gritted out.
“Woah, first off,” Sonic elbowed his rival lightly, “chill out! It’s not that important! But you haven’t even told me who that guy is yet, for the record.”
“That would be because I don’t know who he was.”
“Describe him! We’ve been over this!”
“I don’t know… Some pitiful creature who thought he could defeat me, and usurp my place in the timeline. He was… a hedgehog, I think, though the strangest one I’ve ever seen.”
That was probably saying something coming from Shadow himself. Sonic couldn’t help looking at the scarring on Shadow’s back from his recent stint with most certainly less-hedgehog-like features.
“How so?”
“I suppose I would describe him as having a crystalline appearance? I wasn’t paying that much attention. He spent a lot of time whining, and I hadn’t the time for any of it, to be honest.”
“Crystalline…” Sonic murmured, running a hand down the front of his torso without thinking. “Oh, uh… What was his name again? …Mephiles? He had creepy pink eyes. Like, a diseased kinda colour, right? And no mouth!”
“…I was joking before, Sonic. How do you know who he was?”
“I mean, know is a strong word… I think I just met him a couple of times?”
“How? From the way he talks, I’m quite certain that he does not even exist in our current time.”
Shadow was staring at him, expression harsh. Sonic didn’t exactly know how to respond. He didn’t exactly remember how he knew Mephiles, but he could place a face to the name, and he had the distinct feeling that whilst he didn’t know much about the guy, he really didn’t like him.
In other words, he would just figure it was some guy who he’d had an altercation with before, but that just wouldn’t line up with what Shadow was saying. Huh. How did Sonic know him then? He tried to think a little harder.
“I guess… did I meet him in Soleanna?” he pondered. “Feel like I saw him out in one of the forests there. Could have been somewhere else, though. Soleanna just feels right.”
“I repeat, when did you go to Soleanna?” Shadow said, voice slipping into a growl.
“Well, I’ll repeat too! I dunno! Not recently or anything!”
“This doesn’t make any sense.”
“Yeah, you don’t say…” Sonic sighed. “Does it really matter, though? For all we know, this is just some weird consequence of whatever the Time Eater did! And I mean, as long as you defeated that jerk, none of that matters anyway!”
“Perhaps it matters not for you,” Shadow huffed, “but I for one want to know what’s going on.”
“Of course you do…”
Total one-track mind on that guy. Sonic wondered if something Mephiles had said had particularly spooked Shadow; that could explain his current behavior.
“You don’t remember anything else about him?” Shadow pressed.
“Nope! And I couldn’t even tell you that much about Soleanna! It seemed nice… Had a bunch of cool sights, and the princess was lovely, but nothing too remarkable, y’know?
“The princess? You met her too!?”
“Oh, come on… Big’s met the princess of Soleanna! It’s not that special!” Sonic retorted, beginning to grow a little irritated himself.
“I don’t believe this…” Shadow scowled. “Prove it, hedgehog.”
“Prove it? What? How am I supposed to do that? That’s ridiculous! I still don’t get why it even matters!”
“You, me, we’ll go to Soleanna. If it’s not a big deal, then that shouldn’t matter either, right?”
Did Shadow want him to run there right now? Come on, it wasn’t exactly close… And besides, what business did they even have there!? Sonic wouldn’t mind the trip, but he didn’t exactly care for the motive behind it.
“Woah, woah, you want us to leave now? Dude, just relax a moment! Don’t you have stuff to do?”
“I… I suppose Rouge would be concerned if I just left now… And if we waited, we could perhaps get transport there,” Shadow gave a long-suffering sigh. “Fine. How does next week sound?”
“I mean, if you’re really serious about this, then sure… but I really don’t see the problem,” he replied, eyeing his rival carefully.
What really was Shadow’s motive for this?
“I… I just get the feeling that something about this is wrong. I don’t like it.”
With another sigh, Sonic relented. “Yeah, okay. I guess it wouldn’t hurt to check this whole deal out… Just in case the Time Eater meddled with more stuff. And like I said, Soleanna’s nice, so another visit couldn’t hurt!”
“It won’t be a sightseeing trip,” Shadow warned.
“But we will have to see the sights…” he snickered. “And besides! This might even just be the reason you saw the old castle ruins, right? Because we’re about to head there!”
Shadow shook his head. “That would be a paradox. It’s only in my future because I saw it in that past.”
“If you’d call the timeless white void your past, sure… And it’s not like this is our first time with paradoxes.”
Sonic laughed at his own joke.
“Hilarious,” Shadow deadpanned. “I’ll be seeing you next week, faker.”
“Leaving already?” he asked.
“I have to make preparations.”
He waved casually. “See ya, then.”
Shadow left without another word, leaving Sonic alone. He’d been feeling perfectly fine earlier, but now that his rival had brought up that feeling about something being wrong…
Did something feel off? He couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but something about this conversation had unsettled him slightly, and there was only one thing still lingering on the tip of his tongue.
“Mephiles…” he murmured, for reasons he wasn’t quite sure of. “Weird… Maybe there is more going on with him after all…”
He decided to swing by Tails’s lab to get a better reading on the situation. He was still largely of the opinion that there was nothing strange going on, but given his earlier unease, he thought it was probably better to, just in case.
And besides, this way, he got to hang out with his little buddy!
“Yo, Tails!” he called, skidding in through the open back door.
“Oh, hey, Sonic,” Tails greeted, not looking up from over his work bench. “What’s up?”
“Just a quick question, no biggie.”
“Sure,” his brother nodded.
“Alright, so this might sound a little strange, but I was talking with Shadow… Have I ever been to Soleanna?”
He had to have. He was quite sure he remembered dropping by the main city… And he remembered those ruins Shadow was talking about. Not to mention Princess Elise… He was sure he knew her. All signs pointed to him having visited, but if it was causing as much surprise for Shadow as it was, maybe there was something more going on there that he’d just forgotten about.
His memory wasn’t great, but not terrible either, and between him and Shadow, he wasn’t the one who’d had multiple amnesia episodes. So his general memory of the event being a little hazy wasn’t exactly surprising, so if it had just been a fairly uneventful trip, he’d understand that.
He was pretty sure Tails was likely to remember even if he’d gone for the most boring reason ever, though.
“Soleanna? I’m pretty sure you went there for their festival of the sun a while back. Last year, I think? I’m not too certain, since I wasn’t there, but I nearly went with you, so clearly you have been before.”
“Alright, cool, cool,” Sonic nodded. At least he wasn’t going proper crazy. But all the same… he could have sworn Tails had been there too, now that he thought about it. “But I was alone?”
“I thought you just went for sightseeing. You were in the area, and were really insistent you wanted to see the festival, or something,” Tails continued. “Why do you ask? Did you think you didn’t go alone?”
“Dunno. I just got the impression there were a bunch of us there. You, me… even Knuckles, but heh, that doesn’t really make much sense, does it? Why would that knucklehead leave his island just for some festival?”
But hadn’t Knuckles met them, him and Tails, at the docks there?
“No, that couldn’t be right,” Tails agreed. “I think you must be getting muddled up, Sonic. Finally been to too many places!”
“Too many places?” he scoffed. “C’mon, bud, there’s no such thing! Probably just a dream I had.”
Tails finally turned to him, looking a little concerned.
“Are your dreams usually so vivid you can’t tell if they were real events or not?”
“What? No, no, it’s more like… when you have a dream about something that happened a while back, and since you can’t remember the original event clearly, they start to blend a little. Or like remembering a dream you had a while ago, when you’ve kinda forgotten that it was just a dream,” he clarified.
“Um… I guess I understand…” slowly, Tails said. “…Just be careful, won’t you?”
“Huh? What are you talking about? Is this some weird symptom of something?”
“No, nothing like that… It’s just strange, but I got sort of uneasy after you mentioned Knuckles in Soleanna. Are you planning on going there?”
Tails was feeling that now too? Maybe Shadow really was onto something…
“Yeah, with Shadow next week. He wanted to check out a couple of places, and since he didn’t believe I knew the princess there, I was hoping to catch a moment with her too,” Sonic explained.
Tails blinked. “You’ve met the princess of Soleanna? Wow, Sonic, that’s cool!”
“Er… Thanks? I thought you knew, though.”
Shadow not knowing he got. They weren’t the kind of hedgehogs to share details of everything with each other, and Sonic didn’t think Shadow would especially respect that kind of claim anyway. So yeah, if Shadow didn’t know, whatever — that would just be another chance to show him up. But Tails? That… did kinda surprise him.
“Well, you’ve never told me before… You probably just forgot to,” his brother said, beginning to relax a little again.
“Yeah… probably…” uncomfortably, Sonic agreed. “You still getting that uneasy feeling, by the way?”
He was feeling it stronger now than ever.
“No…? Huh, it passed pretty quickly… Maybe it just triggered a memory of a bad dream for me, hehe,” bashfully, Tails replied.
“Ah, probably,” he said, putting on a grin. “If something actually bad had happened in Soleanna, I’m pretty sure I’d remember it.”
“So it must be fine!” Tails finished.
“Exactly!” Sonic chuckled, throwing his brother finger guns.
“Well, enjoy your trip, then. Just you and Shadow?”
“Unless he’s decided to bring Rouge or Omega without asking me, yeah, just us two. It’s mostly about proving stuff between the two of us anyway,” he answered, chuckling at the last part.
“Oh, so standard fair for both of you, then,” Tails teased.
Sonic grinned, “Pretty much!”
“I’ve heard it’s nice this time of year,” his brother noted. “You’d probably know better than me, since you’ve actually been before, but still. I think you picked a good time! Do you think you’ll stay long?”
That still sounded wrong. That he was the only one to have been to Soleanna. He couldn’t put his finger on it at all, but he was certain it felt wrong…
If he still felt this uneasy, could he be sure nothing bad had happened there before?
Or maybe he was just buying into Shadow’s paranoia. It was probably fine. Nothing he couldn’t deal with, anyway.
“Eh, probably not. Just need to see a few bits, and then we’ll be off. Plus, this is Shadow. Can’t imagine he’d be too thrilled to stick around me for too long…”
“He is still going with you in the first place, Sonic.”
“He thinks it’s an investigation, and you know how he is about missions…”
“Whatever you say,” Tails snickered. “Though… What are you investigating?”
“Nothing, really. Just wanted to check out some of the ruins there, since they’ve got Shadow in a bit of a tizz,” he explained.
“So, just tourism with extra steps?”
“Right on, lil’ bro!”
“Alright,” Tails nodded. “Well, let me know if you need anything before you leave.”
Sonic flashed a grin. “Will do!”
“You’re late,” Shadow said, sounding already displeased.
“Fashionably so, I hope,” Sonic grinned. When his rival’s scowl only served to deepen though, he felt the need to defend himself. “Okay, but you didn’t even give me a place to meet you.”
“That’s your excuse? It’s never stopped you from finding me to bother before,” his rival huffed.
“Well, I’m here now, aren’t I?”
In this… empty field. He’d found Shadow through a little information-grabbing in the nearby town, a little trying to hope he could actually sense chaos energy, a decent amount of just following the wind, and a lot of hoping for the best.
“Hmph. I suppose better late than never…” Shadow sighed.
“That’s the spirit!”
Sonic went to go pat him on the back, but stopped when he remembered, and subsequently noticed, the rough scarring still across Shadow’s back. Probably… not a good idea to potentially irritate that. It already looked kinda painful. He could only imagine the kind of wings that must have caused that level of damage appearing…
Fortunately, Shadow either didn’t notice his little slip-up, or chose to ignore it. Instead, he chose to plow on with their little mission.
“You’re ready, this time?”
“Dude, I was always ready. I just thought you’d be all whiny if I didn’t give you a chance to prepare first,” with a smirk, he explained. “You got a chaos emerald?”
“A chaos emerald?” Shadow gave him a funny look whilst retrieving the green emerald from his quills. “Yes, but why would I need one?”
“I kinda figured we were Chaos Controlling there,” casually, Sonic stated.
“You can’t be serious,” his rival said, pinching his forehead. “It’s much too far for that, not to mention I don’t know the place well enough to warp us both there.”
“Shame,” he sighed, pulling the cyan emerald out of his own quills, “and after I spent my week grabbing this baby and everything…”
“You spent the week finding an emerald? Keep it just in case, but… seriously, hedgehog?”
“Hey, Tails’s emerald detector was just lying around, so I figured I might as well put it to good use! Plus it might still come in handy!”
“I concur… Though I still think you’re a moron for this,” Shadow huffed.
“Whatever, man… What was your plan to get there, then?”
“I thought we might take your plane.”
Chaos, maybe they should have just ran there last week…
“Uh…” profoundly, he managed.
Shadow crossed his arms. “Is that an issue?”
“Not… exactly, but… the Tornado’s with Tails.”
As it always was, because what need did Sonic usually have for a plane?
“And? It’s your plane, is it not?”
“I mean… technically. But I don’t usually even fly it! I'm more of a stand on the wings kinda guy, y’know?” he explained hurriedly.
“That’s fine. I can pilot, and you can… stand on the wings all you’d like.”
Right, because Shadow was some kind of vehicle genius who was way too attached to his motorcycle, and was just weirdly good at picking up other types too. Or something. Had Shadow flown a plane before? Sonic wasn’t sure, but then again, that wasn’t exactly his issue with this.
“You sure we can’t just Chaos Control?” one more time, he tried. Shadow shot him a look. “Yeah, alright… I gotcha… I can ask Tails to borrow it…”
With a sigh, Shadow sidled up to him and nudged him gently. “It’ll be fine. I doubt we’ll be gone very long at all, to be honest.”
“I know… But it’s like tryin’ to take away a kid’s favorite toy, y’know? I feel bad about it!”
“How about this, if we can't Chaos Control to Soleanna, I could at least Chaos Control us to Prower’s lab?” his rival offered.
“Why would that make me feel better?” Sonic asked, chuckling slightly.
Shadow looked rather affronted at that. “Well, I don’t know, but you seemed oddly insistent earlier.”
“That was—” he stopped himself, because this was Shadow actually trying to do something nice for him. “Yeah, sure thing. Sounds great.”
So much for not needing anything else from Tails…
The funny thing was, after complaining about wanting to be out of his seat for their impromptu flight, Sonic ended up in the passenger seat in the back for most of the trip anyway.
Sure, he’d been on the wings for all of the early part of the journey, but he’d certainly underestimated just quite how long it would be, and Shadow wasn’t exactly the type to make good conversation with whilst he was piloting.
(“You fly planes often?”
“No.”
“Ah, but you like this one right? The Tornado’s great!”
“Yes.”
“…Could I get more than a one-word answer maybe?”
“No.”)
So Sonic had figured after a while that he could probably find better things to do. Like napping. The back seat of the plane wasn’t comfy exactly, but he’d slept in way worse places, so it was hardly an issue.
That was all a few hours or so ago now, because he’d woken up from… something to find that uneasy feeling back in full force. Shadow didn’t seem to be feeling it, and given how suddenly he’d woken up, Sonic was inclined to believe it was probably just something from a dream. But… it must have been some dream, huh? His heart was racing!
Absently, he rubbed his chest. He wasn’t really sure why, because that had never been an area he’d wanted to remind himself of much. It was way better these days, when poking his scars would be the worst that he’d find up there, but still. He could usually do without the reminder that he couldn’t grow nice fluffy chest fur like someone like Shadow, thanks very much.
But his hand was there now, tracing a line right down his torso, without him even thinking too much about it. Was that relevant? He wasn’t sure.
“Hey, uh… how long was I out for?” trying to shake himself out of his funk, he asked.
“How should I know?” Shadow grunted. “I’m flying, not timing you.”
“Hey, that was more than one word!” Sonic grinned.
“Hm,” Shadow hummed.
“Okay, point taken,” he chuckled. “Was just wonderin’, is all.”
“As I said, I couldn’t tell you, even if I wanted to.”
“Well… did I sound like I was having a bad dream or anything in however long it was?”
“What? I couldn’t hear much over that snoring of yours, hedgehog, but that does mean you weren’t… screaming or anything, if that helps.”
“Eh, dunno. Just woke up feeling kinda off, so I figured maybe I had a nightmare or something and just forgot,” he said.
“Typically, nightmares aren’t just forgotten that easily,” bitterly, Shadow responded.
Sonic felt a sting of sympathy, but let it pass over, because he knew Shadow wouldn’t want it.
“Okay, but… I wasn’t breathing funny or anything? No normal nightmare sounds?”
“Only your obnoxious snoring,” Shadow retorted. “And besides, how would you expect me to hear your breathing over the sounds of all of this?” He took one hand off of the control sticks to gesture around himself.
Alright, fair point, it was pretty noisy… Planes weren’t exactly silent… They weren’t as loud as Shadow’s motorbike either, but that was neither here nor now.
Besides, if he couldn’t remember it, then Shadow was right — it couldn’t have been a big deal. As long as it didn’t turn into a chronic thing, Sonic didn’t care.
This was a good chance to get a dig at his rival, though…
“Guess it’s a bit of a tall ask… But y’know, you are the Ultimate Lifeform, so maybe I assumed better of you…”
“You’re lucky I need you for this,” Shadow warned.
“Aw, you need me?” Sonic teased.
“Very lucky.”
Soleanna was just as nice as he remembered it. They’d picked a good day to visit, because the weather was beautiful, and funnily enough, the city named after the sun really benefited from getting a good bit of light in its streets.
“So…” he began, spreading his arms out wide towards the streets of Soleanna New City before them. “What do you think?”
“Of the city?” Shadow frowned. “We only just got here. I haven’t had time to form an opinion.”
“Right, right… But it looks nice, yeah?”
His rival shrugged. “I suppose.”
And this was going nowhere… Ah, well, Sonic guessed Shadow just wasn’t as much of the type to enjoy seeing the sights as he was. It was probably lucky that the trio was, at least in some part, an investigation rather than a sightseeing tourism stint. (Though Sonic was going to make sure Shadow saw and appreciated some of Soleanna’s beautiful scenery anyway.)
“To business, then?”
“Right,” Shadow nodded. “You know this place much better than me, apparently, so do you have any ideas of where to begin our search?”
“Hey, hey…” He held his hands up. “You’re the one who wanted to check stuff out, remember? What’s your plan?”
“I would like to establish a baseline for your time here by speaking to the Princes, if possible.”
“I still don’t get why you don’t just believe that one. I’m a pretty famous guy, so why wouldn’t I have met her?”
“It’s just…” Shadow scowled. “I can’t explain why, but it rubs me the wrong way. Wouldn’t it have been in the news if you’re as famous as you say?”
“Shadow, one, you read the news? And two, okay, I’m not that famous! That would have to have been a real slow news day!”
“Of course I read the news!” his rival snapped back. “But… I suppose you’re correct on that last account.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“As I said, I can’t explain it, but something’s off. I intend to get the full story, and I intend to solve what exactly that something is.”
Sonic gave him a look. “Dude, I could have given you the full story.”
Not that he wouldn't have appreciated a trip to Soleanna anyway, but if Shadow was going to be this sour the whole time, then yeesh… It would kinda kill the vibe.
“Go on, then. As you would, hedgehog,” wryly, Shadow said, gesturing towards him.
He felt a little caught off-guard at that. Okay… so now he was being listened to?
“Uh, well… I stopped by for the Festival of the Sun… Eggman showed up to be a nuance, so I rescued the princess from him… I think, and then,” he scratched the side of his head, trying to piece together the rest of his story. “I’m not sure. I guess I dealt with Eggman. But I could have sworn Knuckles and Tails were with me…”
And yet apparently he was the only one who had any recollection of that…
“And there’s my point. Your story is a jumbled mess,” Shadow huffed, before rolling his eyes and adding, “and you tease me for having memory issues…”
“Hey! I swear I do know what happened! It’s just… I dunno, kinda foggy? Gimme a sec, I’ll get a better version for you.”
Shadow studied him for a moment. Sonic wanted to make a quip, but he just couldn’t get one out right — something in his rival’s expressions was holding him back.
“No, this is exactly it. You said foggy? I think something strange is going on with your memory specifically. First order of business would be to see if you remember more or less than you should do,” Shadow explained.
He was pretty sure he already knew which of the two it was based on his conversation with Tails, but he held his tongue for the moment.
“Gotcha,” he replied instead. “So you wanna ask the princess?”
“If you really rescued her as you claim, she would most certainly remember that.”
“I’m not exactly sure how we’d find her, but… it’s probably a good bet to check the old Castle Town,” Sonic said. “Follow me!”
He leaped down into the street below them, the correct path through the city coming to his mind as if he’d run this over and over before. He could hear Shadow skating behind him though; that was new.
“Hey, over there! That’s her!” grabbing Shadow’s arm, he pointed out the obvious figure of Elise just getting off of a boat in the canal.
Some luck, huh? It would have been a royal pain to have to ask after her, but once again, they seemed to have come on a good day! At a good time too!
“What?” Shadow startled. “Already?”
“It’s not that surprising,” he said, pulling his rival over in the right direction. “She’s not really the type to enjoy being cooped up in the palace too much.”
“Yes, but… to find her like this so quickly…”
It was a little bit of a coincidence, but what was the problem with that? So what if Lady Luck was on their side?
“Just… c’mon!” he huffed.
Elise stopped in place when she noticed him, and something lit up in her eyes.
“Sonic? Sonic the Hedgehog?”
“Elise, hey! What’s up?” easily, he greeted.
The palace guard — or at least, that’s what Sonic assumed the guy was — beside her looked a bit put out by him, but he ignored it.
Shadow elbowed him sharply, “Introduce me as well, moron.”
“Oh, and, uh… this is Shadow. He’s with me.”
His rival gave a stiff sort of wave. Hesitantly, Elise copied him, before turning her attention back to Sonic.
“It’s really you! Ah, wow… I… It’s wonderful to meet you! What brings you to Soleanna?” she said. “Oh, we’re not… in danger, are we?”
To… meet him?
But he remembered carrying Elise in his arms as they fled Eggman. He remembered so clearly, even more so now that she was right in front of him.
He remembered introducing himself to her mid-fight, because it was typical Egghead to interrupt an important cultural festival for his schemes… But now she knew his name but nothing more?
Shadow answered for him, whilst he was still standing shell-shocked. “No, princess, we’re just here as tourists,” smoothly, his rival stated. “Your kingdom is fine.”
“Yeah, haha, we’re… just visitin’ for our own stuff,” uncomfortably, he chuckled.
“I do hope you enjoy it,” Elise nodded. “I… Honestly, I feel quite lucky to have run into someone as elusive as yourself like this. I hadn’t even planned to be out as I am now, but then I got the strangest feeling — like Deja vu, I believe — and I felt like I should go for a stroll. I wouldn’t have imagined that would have led me to meeting you, though!”
“Deja—” Shadow began, but Sonic cut him off.
“You… You’ve heard of me?”
Maybe there was still hope. Maybe her memories were just like his — all foggy and stuff.
“Of course! After you put the planet back together, who wouldn’t? I heard it was you who did that, and I was… inspired, so I looked into you a little more.” Shyly, she looked away. “Ah, that’s a little embarrassing to admit, isn’t it? I hope you don’t mind.”
Nevermind…
“Not at all!” he answered, schooling his expression into his natural grin. “I’m flattered!”
“Thank you…” Elise said. “Would it be strange if I asked you for an autograph? I wouldn’t want to bother you, but… if you wouldn’t mind…”
She still had a lovely smile, he noticed.
“No problem! What do you want me to sign?”
“Ah, uhm…” she foundered for a moment, before producing a page of some notebook and a pen. There was writing on the back of the page, but Sonic couldn’t quite make out what it said. “There’s a to-do list on the back, but you can just ignore it! It’s yesterday’s, anyway.”
“Alright. Any special message you want me to write?” he asked, accepting the pen and paper.
“Oh, I don’t mind really… I’m honored that you’d even do this in the first place!”
Sonic nodded, and then wrote ‘Just smile!’ underneath his name. Elise accepted the paper back, and seemed to stare at his message for a moment.
She was clearly taking her time to respond.
“What did you write?” Shadow whispered, staring intensely at Elise.
“Nothin’ much,” he whispered back. “Just something I thought I remembered telling her before.”
“…I see.”
When Elise didn’t react for another few moments, Sonic coughed politely and waved at her.
“Hey… You alright over there?”
“Oh, yes, sorry! I’m fine!” flustered, the princess responded. “It was only that I thought what you wrote seemed… familiar, somehow?”
“Yeah?” Sonic hummed.
“I thought that maybe I’d heard it before, but I can’t place it… Thank you, anyway though. It’s lovely advice.”
So maybe she just remembered pieces. That was interesting…
“Comes from the heart!” sporting his own brilliant smile, he announced.
“Well… Is there anything I can help you with… Sonic? And… Shadow, was it?”
“Shadow,” his rival confirmed, giving a slight nod. “And I don’t suppose there’s anywhere around here that might be good for researching the culture of the city?”
“You could certainly get a lot from just asking the locals, but…”
“We preferably want something that goes a little further back, y’know?” Sonic added.
“You could try the castle’s library,” Elise suggested.
“Is that open to us?” curiously, Shadow asked.
“Of course! And it has quite the selection of books. There’s a good chance it might have whatever it is that you’re looking for!”
“Thank you for your aid, princess.”
“Yeah, pleasure see— uh, meeting you, Elise! Maybe we’ll see you around again!”
Shadow glared at him for his little slip-up, but Elise didn’t seem to think much of it.
“Are you staying in Soleanna for long?”
“We’ll have to see really, but… maybe!” cheerily, Sonic answered.
“Then hopefully we will meet again! You’ll have to excuse me now, as I do have duties to attend to, but I wish you a nice time on your trip! And thank you again for signing this for me,” she finished, shyly cradling the bit of paper he'd written on.
“Any time!” he told her. “Hope your duties all go well and everything!”
“You’re too kind,” Elise started, but was cut-off by the guard.
“Miss Elise…”
“Right, sorry. I really do have to be off,” apologetically, she said, already walking away.
Her guard seemed to be hurrying her along quite a lot, and it made Sonic wonder why he’d even let her out walking now of all times in the first place, if she was so busy…
Or maybe the guard just really didn’t like him specifically. Heh, that was also a possibility.
Shadow waited until she was clearly out of earshot to turn back to him. Sonic reckoned he’d probably done his theorizing for that conversation already. Hopefully he’d figured out more than Sonic, because honestly, Sonic was just even more confused than before…
“She didn’t know you,” Shadow accused.
“You could at least say what you thought of her first…?” weakly, he protested.
“She seemed perfectly nice, but that is not the point,” his rival hissed.
“So maybe she didn’t remember any of the stuff I did, but she said my message sounded familiar! So maybe she remembers that?”
“Or maybe she’d just read it somewhere else and you’d accidentally plagiarised it.”
“You’re really going to deny that something funky’s going on here?” Sonic said, feeling a bit unimpressed now himself.
“No… That conversation only cemented my belief that there is more going on here than meets the eye,” Shadow replied, crossing his arms and scowling. “Really, I think I should be saying ‘I told you so’, Sonic.”
“So you believe me? That I’m sure I saved her before and stuff?”
“...I believe you,” Shadow conceded. (What a miracle!) “Our next goal should be to ascertain the source of these extra memories.”
Yeah, they had to come from somewhere, but what condition could possibly make only him remember? Shadow was right; something fishy was clearly happening here, and honestly, Sonic couldn’t believe he’d never put together that there was something up with his memories before.
The more he heard, the more the discrepancies in what he was sure had happened appeared to him. Seeing Soleanna again now, he was sure he’d raced through the city streets over and over again fighting Eggman and helping out Elise, but he also recalled only passing through for the festival, just like Tails and claimed. He’d previously assumed those were just congruent memories — that they happened concurrently — but what if that wasn’t it?
What if they were two different sets of memories entirely?
“So we’re headed to the library?” he guessed.
“We could,” Shadow agreed. “However… What would we look for there? I would posit that what we really look into is that Mephiles I met. You said you thought you met him here, and he clearly knew more than he should when I fought him. So who is he?”
“You think we’d have trouble finding stuff on him in the library, huh…” Sonic said. “Hm… Where’d you see him, when you fought him? Maybe we could find traces of him there!”
“…I don’t suppose there’s a desert in Soleanna?” Shadow offered.
Somehow, Sonic was able to answer without thinking at all. “Yep, there’s definitely one! Pretty sure I carried Elise through it. Uh… If those memories are real, anyway…”
He wasn’t sure what else they would be, but he also couldn’t exactly prove they weren’t manufactured somehow.
“Does that desert have ruins? The kind that could house an arena-like sanctum? Because that was where I fought Mephiles, when the Time Eater brought him out.”
“You’re bang on for Dusty Desert,” he answered. “You think we should check out there first?”
“Probably. I think that would be more efficient than scouring books for any mention of the name ‘Mephiles’. At least we could be certain that the ruins have a connection to the right Mephiles.”
“Guess I’ll lead the way, then!”
He led them back off in the direction of the desert, once again not knowing how he knew the way so well, just that he did.
Hopefully they’d find answers for stuff like that in those desert ruins…
The main desert had certainly been familiar, because that quick sand was as obnoxious as ever, but these ruins? He wasn’t so sure he’d explored them before.
“You, er, recognize any of this?” he asked, not quite sure how to navigate to somewhere like this when he hadn’t seen it before.
“Not exactly,” Shadow responded. “But the architecture looks the same as where I fought Mephiles. We must be close.”
“Maybe you lead then,” Sonic suggested, chuckling to himself.
His rival sighed, “Fine, but quit that. We don’t know what we might find down here, so we need to be on guard.”
A little bit of fooling around had never stopped him before, but he had a feeling Shadow wouldn’t take too kindly to him trying to point that out, so he decided to remain silent. No point in needlessly angering the guy.
Shadow was slower in leading than he’d been, but he was also methodical — every turn they took was calculated, and he spent his time staring at wall patterns, trying to decipher or recognize them or something. Sonic didn’t really get it, but soon enough, they found themselves at the end of the path anyway.
They were in a large circular room, definitely kinda arena-like, and probably what you could describe as a ‘sanctum’. So there clearly had been some method to Shadow’s madness. Or maybe he’d just gotten lucky. Who could say?
“This it?” he affirmed.
“I believe so, yes,” slowly, Shadow answered. “It certainly seems familiar, and it’s a distinct location. I wonder…”
He broke off towards the center of the room, and began to inspect the floor there. Sonic took the chance to shake some of the sand off of his shoes.
“Something special about that spot?”
“There was a seal of sorts here, before Mephiles appeared. It looked to be some kind of scepter, but I didn’t get a chance to examine it before he showed up and picked a fight.”
“Doesn’t look like there’s anything here now…”
“No, but… there isn’t so much sand in here, so I don’t mind sticking around a little, just to make certain of that.”
Sonic snickered, “Scared of a little sand, faker?”
“I’m not scared of it,” Shadow growled. “But I don’t like the feeling of it in my skates. I’m already going to have to clean them out later, so I’d rather not exacerbate the issue.”
“Fair enough,” he shrugged. “Doesn’t bother me, but… I wouldn’t want to ruin my kicks, so I’ll probably still give ‘em a quick clean too.”
“Yes, well, mine would be a pain to repair if sand damaged them, so that’s only further reason to be careful. Here should be fine though. I can actually see the floor.”
“Makes you wonder what this place was originally used for,” Sonic remarked.
“Does it?” sullenly, Shadow muttered. “And how is that relevant? We’re getting side-tracked.”
“Alright, alright…” he laughed. “You finding much?”
“No, there’s nothing here… I suppose whatever it is that I saw, it must have been from a different time.”
“Or timeline!” Sonic corrected, recalling what Shadow had been telling him at the start of all of this.
“In either case, we're not going to find anything here.”
“So it’s a bust?”
Guess they’d be checking out the library after all… Sonic could think of worse things to do, but still, he didn’t especially fancy combing through a whole massive palace library for mentions of one guy…
“Not necessarily,” Shadow noted, almost hesitant in tone. “If I understood something Professor Gerald was telling me in White Space correctly… we might still have a chance yet.”
“Oh, yeah?” he prompted, joining his rival in the center of the room.
“He claimed that it was likely possible to move through time, if two people wielded Chaos Control at the same time. You and I are both capable of using it, and we both have an emerald, so it’s worth a shot, is it not?”
Shadow retrieved his emerald from his quills whilst he was talking, and began to toy with it, throwing it up and down in the air.
“This isn’t likely to blow up in our faces, is it?” he asked.
Well, he said that, but something about that idea felt right to him. Like he’d also done that before. Had he? Sonic tried to think, but he was drawing a blank that moment, so he wrote it off as an issue for later.
Besides, he and Shadow had to both know that he’d be up for trying this even if it was risky.
“It’s unlike you to ask, but…” Shadow nodded. “I trust the Professor. In his science, anyway. If he says it’s possible, I believe him.”
“I was just askin’ what I figured you'd been thinking,” Sonic grinned, grabbing his own emerald. “We doing this, then?”
“It’s worth testing,” his rival decided. “Though… When should we be aiming to travel to? Perhaps the future? That could explain why there’s currently no trace of Mephiles having been here at all.”
Mephiles wasn’t from the future. As soon as that had been suggested, Sonic had become certain that it wasn’t the case.
“No,” he insisted. “A year ago. We need to go back to a year ago.”
“What?” sharply, Shadow asked. “Why?”
“I checked with Tails — that was when I was last in Soleanna. So that’s when the discrepancy in my memories is. Besides… no future can account for an alternate past, right?”
“If you’re certain… We’ll try it,” Shadow agreed.
He snatched up the green emerald midair, and held it out in front of him. Sonic got the message loud and clear. Good thing he was ready.
“Better hope I’m not rusty!” he joked.
“If you could figure it out from a fake emerald the first time, you’ll do just fine with a real one now, faker.”
Well, if even Shadow believed in him…
Sonic lunged forward, crossing his arm with Shadow’s outstretched one.
“Chaos—”
“—Control!”
Some kind of rift appeared behind them, swirling and fixing violently. It didn’t look especially stable, but then again, this was a literal tear in space time from dual Chaos Control… Who would have expected it to be stable?
With a grin, he turned towards the rift.
“Well, better go through it before it closes, right?”
He turned around to wink at Shadow, and let himself fall into it backwards. His rival rolled his eyes, but followed him in wordlessly anyway.
The process was no smoother than he remembered it being — though, remembered? Since when? But experience had him land on his feet. That meant he got to laugh at Shadow stumbling slightly once it had deposited him on the other side.
He smirked at his rival. “Need a hand?” he taunted, reaching out to try and steady Shadow.
“Quit it,” Shadow hissed.
“What? The Ultimate Lifeform can’t handle a little time travel?”
“No, Sonic, look,” he said forcefully, spinning Sonic around.
At first he didn’t get it, because there was just some weird smoke. That could easily be a side effect of their rift, Sonic figured, so he waited for it to dissipate.
Except… smoke didn’t move back in towards a central point to dissipate. That wasn’t natural… And it couldn’t even just be smoke moving backwards in time, because its pathway was much too smooth, much too controlled, much too intentional.
Sonic began to feel uneasy, just like he had talking to Tails last week, just like he had after waking from his nap on the plane, and just like he had trying to consider what had actually happened when he’d visited Soleanna. He felt Shadow tense beside him, but for once, he couldn’t quite get himself to move.
The smoke formed some kind of inky sludge at the center-most point of the chamber, and began to ooze out in viscous trickles. Now that looked like the kind of stuff he wouldn’t want to get on his shoes, but once again, he couldn’t find it in himself to step backwards, out of its reach.
But then from it, began to rise a being. As its form solidified, Sonic recognized its shape. Quills, icy and crystalline. Limbs, sharp and unnatural. Muzzle, smooth and without a mouth. Claws, sharp and blade-like. Eyes, injected and green.
“…Mephiles,” he mumbled, almost subconsciously.
He wasn’t the only one staring.
And as Mephiles’s gaze met his, Sonic remembered the first time his eyes had met the other’s.