Alter Egos

Chapter 11

"Blaze?!" Amy said in disbelief.

"Yes, it's me. But something has happened, am I correct? Something bad." Blaze questioned.
"Yeah, how did you-" Sonic paused. "Wait a minute... if you're here, then that means..."

There was a soft rustling sound from above, and everyone but Blaze looked up into the night sky.
Perched on the tip of a pine tree, glowing softly, was Silver. A time traveling telekinetic hedgehog who always appeared when the future was in danger, and judging from the look on his face, the future probably wasn't doing very good at the moment. It was obvious he was trying keep an optimistic expression though.

"Hey..." he awkwardly greeted them, his smile seemed to be less forced and more relieved as he spoke, his voice seemed strained as if he was about to collapse on the spot.

Which he did.

The moment his feet touched the ground, his psychokinetic glow faded and he fell to the ground, clearly exhausted. Now that Sonic looked closer, Blaze looked like she was barely holding herself up, and she only managed to take two steps in Silver's direction before she collapsed as well, thankfully landing in Amy's arms.

"Let's take them to our house, they can rest there until they wake up." Tails suggested. There were a few head nods and Blaze was placed in Omega's arms along with Silver. As the group headed towards home, Sonic's mind started buzzing with internal chatter.

"Aw great. Now what do we do?" Super groaned softly, putting his head in his gloved hands. "Well, now that Silver guy is here, so the future must be pretty fucked up right now." Fleetway muttered. "Language."
"I'm pretty sure it has to do with that weird guy that came out of the ground."
Were said. "And if you asked me, he should have stayed in the ground." Dark muttered, annoyed. "Of course, but right now, we should be discussing how to deal with what's happening right now." Excalibur intervened.
Sonic was silent for most of this exchange, pondering, until a voice broke him out of his stupor. "Well? Ya got any ideas?"
Exe had a somewhat menacing aura to him, which probably made sense, being that he was one of Sonic's more... unhinged forms. The splatters of red on his chest didn't exactly help to calm Sonic's nerves.
"I don't know, but right now the only thing to do is to find out as much about that thing as we can a make a plan to take it down before something bad happens." Sonic replied tiredly. He started to fade in and out as the events of the night began to catch up with him. "Go to sleep, you'll need the energy to deal with the shit that's gonna be happening when you wake up."
"Okay..."

When Sonic came to, he felt something soft and warm beneath him, and as he shifted around, he heard a small noise. He opened his eyes and saw he was face to face with Shadow, who seemed pretty uncomfortable, with an expression of ineligible emotion on his face. Sonic shot up immediately, scooting away and falling off the side of what he recognized to be the couch at his and Tails' home. Groaning softly, he picked himself up off the ground and just stood there for awhile, trying not to make eye contact with Shadow, his face burning.

"Are you going to kiss him or something?"
"Hyper what the fu-"

"Sonic!" Tails came through the doorway, smiling happily as he flew into Sonic's arms. Everyone else followed him into the room, and found somewhere to sit. Rouge joined Shadow on the couch and scooted over to make room for Amy and Blaze, and behind them was Silver, who was looking a lot better now, floating beside Omega. Tails pulled up some folding chairs and some chose to sit on the floor. Then the air became more serious. "Alright Silver, let's start with you." Amy took charge of the situation and turned behind her. "The future. How bad is it looking right now?" There was a brief silence before he spoke, and when he did, he sounded scared.

"Fire. Death. The earth was breaking apart and the sky looked like it was split in half. Crumbling cities and falling buildings. And the screaming. So much screaming. I... almost didn't make it through the time portal... if it weren't for Blaze... i-it's been bad before, but not like this... it was the worst I've ever seen in my life."

By the time he finished, he was slowly trembling, and joined Blaze on the couch, where he curled up as she placed a comforting arm around him. Nobody said a word, still shocked and horrified by what he said.
He didn't say a lot, but it was enough.

"Holy shit."
"Damn, I actually feel kinda bad for him."
"Shhh. Quiet."

Sonic was deep in thought. "Let's review what we know, okay?" Silver nodded quietly.
"So first of all, we know his name at least, right? Achlys, which is a weird name, but for some reason I feel as if I heard it before." Sonic muttered the last part under his breath.
"Second, we know that he isn't like anything we've ever seen. Eggman said something about freeing him from his "eternal slumber" and after throwing me into the forest-" he winced slightly.
"He said that he needed to regain his powers or something after being in the ground for the past few centuries. Which means that we can establish two things from this: that this guy has been sealed in the ground below us for like, hundreds of years, and probably for good reason... and that he's also recovering from being sealed in the ground for so long. So we still have time to stop him before he gets back to full power.
And judging by how powerful he already was when he came out of the ground, I really don't feel like it would be a good thing if we had to face him at full power."

Tails spoke up suddenly. "I could try to research and try to find more information on him"
"That would be great Tails, we'll need as much of an advantage as we can get. By the way Silver..."
Silver flinched in surprise from his place on the couch as he was addressed. "Do you have anywhere to stay while you're here?" There was a slow head shake as he looked down. Tails leaned over and tapped him on the shoulder.
"Well, if you wouldn't mind, I have a small hut that I used for storage a little way out, it's pretty sturdy and I'm not really using it anymore. We could clean it out and you could live it it until you have to go..." He paused. "I don't know if it could fit both of you in though." He looked over at Blaze, then Amy jumped in. "She could stay with me, I have enough room in my house for one more, and it'd be nice to have some company!"
Blaze smiled gratefully at Amy, who shot a wide grin back.

"Alright if we're done here, everyone should probably get back to their own homes.
Silver, we got a pretty good air mattress you can use until we get you settled, and it almost time for Tails to go to bed. Sooo... yeah.
Not trying to be rude here, but everyone should get home and rest for the next couple of days."
Sonic began to urge everyone out of the house except Tails and Silver, and as they all said their goodbyes, Sonic's eyes landed on Shadow's. There was a moment of silence when they stared into the others eyes, until Sonic turned away, as he remembered what happened earlier.
Soon, the house was empty. Silver got out the air mattress and was loaned a number of pillows and blankets to make him more comfortable, which he thanked them for. The lights went out and Sonic was left in his room, staring at the ceiling.
"Achlys... why does that name sound so familiar to me? He felt drowsy, and drifted to sleep, hoping he would feel better in the morning.

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Surgery went pretty good, thank you to the people who wished me well during my time away, appreciate it. After I was allowed to write again, this chapter just kind of burst out of me to be honest. More than 1000 words, pretty sure that's a new record. Also, on a side note, unfortunately, school has started so I won't be able to post chapters as often. Hope y'all understand.
Happy reading!