Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Sonic the Hedgehog had been dead for nearly two hundred years. The same could be said for almost all of his allies. Logistically, that would mean that Metal Sonic had won.

For when the world had succumbed to the wrath of Iblis, Metal had prevailed, and Sonic had fallen.

Metal’s purpose had finally been fulfilled. He was the one true Sonic.

And yet his creator, his father, had fallen as well.

Without any orders to fulfill, and facing a ruined wasteland of a world, Metal Sonic wandered. For years on end he traveled across the dusty, desolate terrain, without a single soul to accompany him. Solar panels that had been discretely added to his limbs allowed for Metal to remain charged and capable, even when he lacked outside electricity. He took shelter during the sparse rain to ensure his joints never rusted. He stayed in the shade when the sun became overbearing so he could keep from overheating and shutting down.

Yet, Metal could not escape all damage to his physical form. His paint chipped, and his inner mechanics grew… sluggish, especially considering how many years he had been active. Of course, Metal always took the time to scavenge for anything useful he could use to upgrade or repair himself. He frequented abandoned buildings and various shelters, looting the places for anything that had any value to him. He was able to restore much mobility to his fingers that way, and he had also improved the speed in which he ran.

It was during one of these scavenging sessions that something changed in his usual routine. For so many years, there had simply been… nothing. Sure, small villages and groups of surviving people had sprouted up in the years following the release of Iblis, but Metal had never bothered to come close to any. He had no reason to. The one he needed to destroy was already dead. So therefore, Metal had remained alone for the entire duration of his travels.

Except for now.

Something new had popped up in Metal Sonic’s audio processors. It was distinctly different from the typical dry breeze, accompanied by the crackle of a distant fire. This was something organic. Something alive .

A quiet, warbly sniffle.

Metal’s hulking steps paused. His foot scraped against the ground briefly as he turned, his ears swiveling towards the noise. His ocular sensors scanned his surroundings, taking in every little detail, every speck of dust. It was just a typical abandoned building, halfway there to just crumbling down altogether, but Metal estimated a 33.28% chance of there being something useful left behind.

It seemed he wasn’t entirely incorrect in that estimation.

His scanners detected an organic life form, lying just behind a toppled over bookshelf of sorts. Zooming in on the area, Metal Sonic could discern a little paw sticking out from behind the barrier.

Metal considered his options. The first option was to investigate further, and potentially waste his time with a weaker, inferior life form. Though, frankly, Metal had all the time in the world. It wasn’t like he had any true purpose anymore. The second option was to simply bypass the organic creature and continue scavenging around in the building. The third, and final prominent option, was to just leave altogether.

Metal Sonic did something for the first time at that moment. That was, he chose the option of most interest. Typically, he functioned by constantly acting in the most competent and convenient way. He was quick, always abiding by time limits and finding little loopholes in order to achieve his goals faster. Leaving the building, or walking past the life form would certainly be much simpler and faster. As the one true Sonic, Metal was all about being as fast as possible.

The wind howled outside, causing the cracked, dusty walls of the building to shift. The creature behind the bookshelf let out a muffled whimper. Metal approached, his footsteps loud and clanking, conveying the weight of his body.

The closer he got to the organic life form, the louder it seemed to grow. Metal’s ears twitched as he heard it scrambling, as if desperate to get away from any potential danger. Even still, he approached, his optic scanners feeding him new information with each deliberate stride.

Eventually, Metal Sonic rounded the corner, finally catching sight of the cowering creature he had decided to humor the existence of.

It was a hedgehog, much like himself. Dirt clung to its matted fur, muddying an original color that could not be discerned. It lacked gloves or shoes, or any other clothes at all. Metal briefly zoomed in on the strange cyan markings present on the hoglet’s hands and feet, before studying elsewhere. Its quills were unruly, and perched atop its head in a strange fashion. It was reminiscent of some kind of leaf, or bush, poking out in different directions almost ridiculously. Two longer quills stretched out from the back of its head. With one last quick scan, Metal Sonic determined that the hoglet was male.

The creature let out a terrified squeaking sound as Metal finally came into view. It then promptly attempted to scoot backwards, away from the robot, before finding itself backed up against the wall. It was there that the hoglet pressed itself as close to the floor as possible, trembling as it gazed up at Metal.

Another organic life form might’ve considered the sequence of events cute or perhaps even heart-wrenching. It was such a pathetic, terrified creature, after all. Metal had no personal feelings regarding the matter.

Even still, he steadily approached the little hoglet. The miserable thing continued trying to shrink away from the robot, but to no avail. When Metal was just a few paces away from the life form, he slowly knelt down. The movement was polished and silent, as he had been very careful to take care of his inner mechanisms throughout the years. If anything broke inside of him, it would be a terrible pain to fix by himself.

For a few stretched moments, Metal simply observed the tiny thing cowering before him. It let out a few terrified whimpers as its entire body shook with the force of its fear. As Metal got a closer look, his optical sensors automatically scanned the creature.

• SPECIES: HEDGEHOG

• AGE: 23 WEEKS

• SPEED: N/A

• STRENGTH: N/A

After another stretched moment of staring at the life form and letting his scanners do their thing, Metal Sonic saw another helpful pop-up in the corner of his vision.

• IDENTIFICATION: SILVER THE HEDGEHOG

• STATUS: ALLY OF SONIC

• ABILITY: PSYCHOKINESIS

Metal’s ears habitually twitched somewhat as he received this new information. The route of investigating was surely paying off. This was far more interesting than Metal had originally estimated.

He processed a few more tabs of information provided to him. Silver was a time traveler. Silver was close with Metal’s loathsome copy, as well as Princess Blaze of the Sol Dimension. Silver had previously involved himself with Mephiles the Dark. Silver was kind-hearted, Silver was well-meaning, Silver was naïve, Silver was a multitude of other worthless description words that Metal had no interest in. All he needed to know was that Silver’s alignment was that of the side of “good.”

The information being fed to Metal Sonic was the culmination of his sister’s extensive notes. She had always been insistent on keeping updated documents regarding all of the significant people they came across, and said documents were automatically linked to Metal’s internal processors. Thus, he had instant access to a grand multitude of statistics and data whenever he so pleased. It wasn’t utilized very often, as he already knew most things, but every so often it popped up automatically. That had been the case when Metal had identified the hoglet.

And yet, there were some glaring issues with the data presented to him. His sister’s notes clearly described a situation in which Silver had traveled to the past, worked with Sonic, and saved the future. However, the present was still a ruined apocalyptic wasteland, left to the hands of Iblis.

Metal Sonic’s memory storage did not recall anything regarding an ivory hedgehog known as “Silver.” He could find no instance in which a time traveler had come from the future, nor could he remember any situation where Iblis had been defeated. When the Flames of Disaster had been released upon the world, disaster had certainly followed, and society had subsequently fallen.

So why did his sister’s notes differ? Was it a blunder? Perhaps it was merely a simulation she had mistakenly written down as truth? Or maybe the information that had immediately popped up was just an error, or even a total fabrication?

No. His sister never made any mistakes, and neither did Metal. They were designed for perfection, and perfection was what they were. These notes were no mistake. There must have been something bigger at play, but none of Metal’s internal processors could come up with a suitable answer. The percentages were in the .0001s, the simulations far too crude when compared to his sister’s capabilities.

There was certainly something much more complex and intricate going on, something that Metal inexplicably needed to understand.

Now aware of the tiny creature’s importance, Metal had a few more options.

He could walk away and abandon the creature. He could kill the creature and prevent it from ever growing up. Or, perhaps the most curious but valuable option, Metal could take the creature with him. He could take care of the small little thing, he could nurse it and raise it beside him.

Just where had such a consideration come from? Was it his desire to understand the errors of his sister’s information?

Nevertheless, it was the option Metal Sonic decided upon.

In order to safely retrieve the creature known as Silver the Hedgehog, Metal would need to calm him down first. As soon as the thought had sparked in his brain chip, some more of his sister’s information popped up.

[A relaxed individual singing a lullaby for their infant creates a peaceful and calm environment, thus promoting attachment and bonding.]

Metal Sonic was not even capable of speech, let alone singing. How could he achieve something akin to a soothing melody for the frightened little hoglet? It took approximately 7.52 seconds to come up with a solution suitable enough.

Metal could not sing, but he could create a sound similar to humming if he activated his internal cooling fans. That would have to do. If soothing the hoglet proved to be more important down the line, then Metal might have to install a voice chip. Such an intricate and complicated task that had not been ordered of him. It would be something Metal would have to choose to do of his own volition. It was a notion of free will, something Metal had never truly seemed to grasp. His organic counterpart had often mentioned it to the robot after their skirmishes, and had always seemed somewhat confused when Metal dutifully returned to his father every time. It was in his programming. He was to obey. Doctor Robotnik was his father, his creator, and the only one who could give him a purpose.

Doctor Robotnik had been dead for nearly two hundred years.

Metal Sonic had been giving himself a purpose in that time, but it was almost always an inner battle against his programming that he had to fight. There was no real reason to keep moving every day. His job, what he had been created for, was complete. If anything, he should have just shut down years ago, and ceased to do anything since.

And yet, Metal continued to move.

Now here he was, letting his internal cooling fans whir to life, making a gentle humming sound from within the metal plates of his body. Metal’s eyes brightened their glow ever so slightly as he saw the hoglet lift his head a bit. The tiny thing’s ears twitched as he picked up on the soft whirring sound suddenly filling up the tense silence. Steadily, his frightened cries and whimpers died down, the trembles of his body seeping out of him soon after. His quills, which had been previously spiked and raised upwards in alarm, slowly lowered back down.

Soon, the hoglet would be calmed enough for Metal to grab him. In preparation, he decided to quiet his internal fans in favor of turning on his internal heating. He didn’t necessarily feel the heat, but he felt the air within him change, spreading out towards his sharpened fingers. Finally, he extended an arm out towards the now-still hoglet.

Sensing the warmth that was coming off of him, Silver carefully leaned towards Metal’s hand, his little black nose sniffing slightly. Cautiously, he nudged the robot’s hand with his muzzle, and that was all it took.

Feeling the comforting warmth seeping from the typically-cold metal of the machine’s extended limb, Silver eagerly leaned towards it, trying to absorb it into his own chilled skin. The hoglet crawled forwards, pressing against Metal Sonic’s hand, and in turn, Metal experimentally tried to run his hand down Silver’s upturned quills. The little creature practically purred at the stiff expression of affection, even if it was severely lacking. Metal simply could not recreate that aspect of organic life; he couldn’t understand the concept of physical affection.

With Silver seeming to trust him, and Metal’s body warmed up enough to comfortably grab him, the robot crept his hand backwards. Gently, he pinched at the scruff of Silver’s neck, lifting him up by his fluff. Startled, the hoglet started to squirm, but Metal quickly remedied the terror by settling him in his arms. He didn’t quite know how to hold a baby. Silver wriggled and kicked a bit in his arms, so Metal had to adjust several times to prevent him from falling back on the floor. Eventually, seeming to recognize a greater source of heat coming from Metal Sonic’s concave chest, Silver eagerly curled up and relaxed in the robot’s hold. Hoglet safe and secured, Metal stood up.

Carefully, Metal Sonic started to make his way out of the abandoned building, and considered his next course of action.

A voice chip. He would most likely require a voice chip should he decide to truly raise Silver to maturity. There was no other way the hoglet would learn to speak if he was raised in silence. Metal could scrounge around for an upgrade in one of his father’s old bases. As luck would have it, his internal map, while outdated, marked one of said bases nearby.

Metal instantly set out in that direction, overly aware of the life form he held in his arms. It was strange to be holding something alive for such a long period of time. Most of Metal Sonic’s experience with organics involved fighting. The most tender moments he’d shared with a non-robotic being typically involved his father, and even then, it had never been terribly affectionate.

It only took around 20 minutes to reach the base. The entrance was half buried under the rubble of a collapsed wall, but Metal maneuvered his way inside without issue, despite the creature nestled in his hold. He traversed the abandoned Robotnik lab, pulling up his internal map of the place, and sought out one of the specific rooms which held various badnik parts.

Metal reached the room without issue, and immediately began sifting through the various drawers, lockers, closets, and containers. There was a 93.34% chance of a voice chip being held somewhere within the room, and a 95.28% chance of a voice chip being somewhere within the entirety of the base altogether. To make the search more convenient, Metal initiated his search within that particular room.

Balancing the hoglet with one arm, Metal Sonic used the other to check around the room. It took merely 2 minutes and 53 seconds to procure a voice chip from one of the drawers. He held the item up to his optical scanners, checking it and noting that it was in rather pristine condition. It had been shielded from the elements within the drawer, so there should be little to no issue installing it.

Staring at the voice chip, Metal might have reminisced about the time his father had upgraded him, about the time he had been “Neo Metal Sonic.” It was the first time he’d ever truly had a voice, the first time he’d been able to truly give sound to every internal observation or judgment if he so pleased. Alas, Metal was just a machine. He did not reminisce about memories that served him no purpose in the present. The data from back then had already been accounted for.

Scrounging around the room a bit more, Metal Sonic gathered up all of the necessary tools for his new upgrade. Then, using other materials in the room, he hastily constructed a sturdy wired cage to temporarily drop Silver in. It would be cumbersome if the little hoglet decided to explore while Metal was busy inserting the voice chip. He could potentially harm his fragile body, or perhaps even get in the way of the upgrade, thus hindering the procedure. So, Metal ensured that Silver could not escape his little confinement.

Upon setting the child down into the cage, a strange little whine bubbled out of his throat. The hoglet promptly tried his very best to cling to Metal’s arm, making feeble little sounds that could be classified as whimpering. Strange, for an organic creature to willingly want to stay close to a machine such as Metal Sonic. The typical response would be to run away with a terrified shriek.

But things were different at that point. The world was dying. Metal hadn’t killed anything or anyone in decades. He didn't need to. His number one target had already rotted back into the soil by then.

Metal, albeit a bit too roughly, pushed Silver off of his arm and down into the cage. The hoglet squeaked as he tumbled back down onto the floor, and then immediately tried reaching back up towards the uninterested robot. Metal ignored such attempts, and moved further away from the cage to commence the process of installing the voice chip.

As Metal Sonic removed one of the plates of his torso to reach his internal wiring, Silver continued letting out pathetic little whines and yelps. The small thing seemed desperate for Metal to hold him again, but the machine completely blocked out such sounds, focusing on his upgrade. It shouldn’t take too long to install the voice chip, so he diverted all of his attention towards the process.

Silver’s cries gradually increased in volume and intensity, desperation bleeding into the little sounds he made as he called out for Metal. If he had been an organic creature, Metal’s “heart strings” might have been “tugged at”. Instead, his audio processors were instead starting to warp, detecting the high-pitched whines.

A bit irritated at his new inability to focus due to the noise, Metal temporarily shut down his audio processors, successfully silencing the shrill sound of Silver’s cries. With newfound concentration, he swiftly finished up his voice chip upgrade, setting everything back into place.

Reviving his audio processors, Metal was greeted with grating shrieks and yelps from the anguished hoglet. Metal’s optics flicked over to the cage Silver sat in, observing the tears rolling down the child’s face. Without moving closer towards him, Metal decided to test his new upgrade.

“CEASE THAT POINTLESS NOISE.”

Silver’s little eyes went wide, his mouth opening in a silent, shocked cry. He sat there in the cage, trembling in shock for a brief moment before more tears filled his eyes, overflowing and falling down his face. The sound that had escaped Metal Sonic had been deep, booming, and terrifying for the little thing.

Taking the reaction into account, Metal made some brief internal tweaks to the way he would go about speech. He slowly began approaching Silver, who started shying away in response. Carefully, Metal reached a hand down towards the hoglet, reactivating his internal heater. He tried once more to speak.

“Do not cry, small one.”

This time, the sound that escaped his chest was much gentler. Still rough and clearly robotic, but no longer did it come out as an emotionless shout. Metal took careful consideration of data regarding how one should converse with an infant, different speech patterns and how they corresponded to emotional connections, and even information on how his loathsome copy had spoken.

Sonic had always spoken so frustratingly easily. It was something Metal just… could not replicate. Sure, when he had been Neo Metal Sonic, he could utilize the same sass and cockiness in the voice his father had crafted for him, but even then it had been noticeably different from Sonic. Sonic had charm. Sonic had care. In an instant he could reassure just about anyone, and he could connect with others in a way Metal simply never understood. He’d never needed to connect with others for the majority of his life. And, even those he had connected with had all been linked to his father. His sister, for example.

From the very start, Sage had been different from any other life form or badnik that Metal Sonic had interacted with. She was blunt and analytical in the same way he was, but she wasn’t just a machine like him. While they both learned from the world they were created in, Sage took to imitating the human form, and therefore imitating the human mind. She understood others, she had wants and desires of her own. And so she had understood Metal as well, had desired to become close to him, had desired to be a loyal sibling.

She had succeeded.

Now, in the present, utilizing all of the information his sister had taken on forms of speech and dialect tones, Metal had done his best in replicating something that could be considered “soothing.” He had taken notes of the way his father’s assistants, Orbot and Cubot, had spoken as well. Any organic life forms that interacted with those two seemed to be more at ease when compared to interacting with Metal himself, even if he hadn’t done anything threatening. Something about the way those two spoke had just been so eerily natural, so Metal took some inspiration from them.

In response to the much quieter words Metal had said, Silver’s sniffles quieted down. He froze in place, no longer scooting back. As Metal reached out towards him, the hoglet sensed the heat coming from him once more. Tentatively, he crawled forwards, nudging the robot’s hand with his nose. And, just like before, Metal smoothed down some of the quills atop his little head. Still, it was a stiff gesture, awkward and relatively unaffectionate, but the little hoglet didn’t seem to mind. He accepted the gesture all the same, nuzzling towards it with a nearly inaudible sigh.

Metal retrieved the child from the makeshift cage, cradling him towards his chest cavity. Silver settled into the robot’s arms much easier, soaking up the warmth that had started seeping through the panels of his torso. It would be all too easy to just fall back into silence, to continue his life as such, but Metal Sonic knew that in order for Silver to learn to use his words, he’d have to hear speech. So, Metal decided to continue using his new voice chip.

“You are a small thing,” he said, his voice monotone and flat. Silver didn’t seem to mind the lack of emotion in his voice, instead just nestling closer to the warmth emanating from the machine. Metal was unsure of what else to say, so he just started voicing his observations as he began making his way out of the room, and out of his father’s abandoned base.

“You are very responsive to warmth. You like it very much,” Metal concluded. “That is typical of organic beings. You are no different, Silver the Hedgehog. You are an organic being.”

Silver’s body rumbled softly in a nearly inaudible purr. Metal Sonic’s audio processors picked up on the sound, and zeroed in on it. The hoglet seemed… content.

“You are purring,” Metal continued. “Hoglets are very communicative. They make low purring sounds when they are happy. You are a hoglet. The data matches.”

Silver did not respond to the robot’s words. Metal deduced that he had not yet developed the ability to understand the meaning of speech. That would be sure to change.

Metal traversed the deteriorating lab, the child held securely in his arms. All the while, he voiced his comments and conclusions, filling the silence with a monotone cadence. Recognizing that organic life forms required sustenance to continue functioning, the machine rummaged a bit more through the different rooms and drawers. He found a few old ration bars, as well as a small knapsack to hold everything in. Metal himself had no spare compartments to hold anything, as he had been designed for optimal speed and agility. Anything unnecessary would surely just slow him down.

Calculating ahead, Metal also nabbed a few spare parts and tools that could assist him in any future repairs or maintenance, and promptly dropped the items all into his newly-acquired bag. All the while, Silver remained curled up in his arms, purring and nestled against the warmth produced by Metal’s internal heater.

He was such a shockingly small creature. Metal had spent hardly any time with any organic life forms as tiny as the hoglet. Babies or toddlers just served no purpose to him. They were akin to obstacles that were better off ignored or eliminated.

However, the child he held now would surely be useful in some ways. Pulling from his data-banks, Sage stated that Silver would eventually be capable of psychokinesis. That could certainly be beneficial to Metal. He would be sure to utilize such an ability when Silver grew up.

Because he would grow up. Metal Sonic would ensure that. He would care for the hoglet and guarantee that the little thing reached maturity.

Tying the knapsack closed, Metal slung it over his shoulder with one hand, the other still holding Silver. Then, with careful and precise steps, he made his way to the exit of the old base. He had taken everything useful that he could take. It was time to return to his main place of residency.

It was, of course, yet another old base that had belonged to Metal’s father. However, it was most notably the main one that was used. It was by far much grander and elaborate, holding intricate tech that Doctor Robotnik designed as well as constructed. It contained a multitude of data, notes on past conflicts with Sonic or any other enemy, and blueprints for a vast array of weapons or badniks. It was where Metal had been working to restore his charging center. Sure, solar energy was adequate, but it was a bit underwhelming when compared to a fresh zap of electricity. Metal longed to feel that current of power rush through his circuits, refilling his battery totally and completely. If he were to bother with a comparison, it might be similar to a crisp drink of water in the middle of the night.

Towards that base was where Metal Sonic was headed. As he stepped back out into the world, hoglet in his arms, a world of disappointment was all that greeted him. Barren and ashy, and devoid of all life, with not so much as a speck of green. Silver sneezed against his chest as his nose was assaulted with the familiar substandard air. Metal gently dragged a clawed hand through his quills in response, a stiff and awkward attempt at reassuring him. It was unclear whether or not it worked.

Metal Sonic continued his trek through the apocalyptic wasteland, ensuring that the child he held wouldn’t slip from his grasp. It shouldn’t take very long, only a few days at most. A week, perhaps, if something postponed him further, but the chances of that were below 30%. It should mostly be smooth sailing from that point onwards. Metal pulled up his internal navigator and set off on his way.

The journey was mostly quiet. Metal filled the emptiness with small comments every now and then, almost forgetting to utilize his newly acquired voice. Silver’s only form of acknowledgment was a slight twitch of his tiny ears, as he remained nestled against the warmth of the robot’s chest. He let out a few yawns as well, most likely being lulled to sleep by the soothing heat and the slight rocking of Metal Sonic’s body as he walked. Still, Metal continued making comments every so often, only ceasing completely when his scanners detected that the hoglet in his arms was completely asleep. Sleep was necessary for an organic being to function, so he made sure not to interrupt it.

By the time the child awoke once more, there were only a few hours left until Metal made it to the main base. He shifted in the machine’s secure grip, stretching out his tiny limbs and letting out a small yawn that ended with a light whine. More whines soon followed, and the creature continued shifting and moving around, seemingly restless. Metal decided to quickly scan him once more.

Ah. The small thing was hungry.

Reaching behind to grab one of the ration bars from his backpack, Metal quickly unwrapped the nourishment and offered it to the hoglet. Silver sniffed it for a stretched moment, and then, upon realizing it was something edible, instantly surged forwards to snag a bite. He let out a happy trill, his little tail starting to wag as he continued to eat from Metal’s hand.

The whole thing was gone within minutes. And Silver was tiny . It was a total mystery when the child had last eaten something, especially considering the environment he had been found in. In fact, Metal could see some of the poor thing’s ribs poking out from his scraggly fur. There was a high likelihood that Silver would’ve died had Metal not decided to take him.

There was no point in dwelling upon such chances, or alternate outcomes. Silver was with Metal now. The hoglet was safe, and his survival was guaranteed.

Metal verbally commented on the speed of which Silver had consumed the ration bar, and then resumed the journey to his father’s main base. The remainder of the trip was as easy going as it could be.

Upon arrival at the base, Silver shivered at the cool air within. Metal paid little attention to this as he stepped inside, optics immediately scanning for anything that might be out of place. When everything appeared as it should be, he continued as normal. There was always the risk of unwanted visitors in a world as destroyed as the one they were stuck with.

In regards to the base, Metal would have to do some serious renovations. After some data-bank checks, it seemed that a “nursery” was in order. Setting Silver down where Metal could clearly see him at all times, the robot got straight to work.

It wasn’t very difficult, since the base housed plenty of spare supplies. When the end of the world had first dawned upon everyone, several protocols were in order to take shelter and gather anything that could be of use. Of course, such procedures proved meaningless, since Doctor Robotnik and the majority of his creations had perished regardless. Even Orbot and Cubot had failed to last very long, and their rusted forms laid dormant in a closet somewhere. Metal most likely could repair and restore them, but he had no inclination to do so.

Metal located some spare mattresses and bedsheets, promptly setting them up in a small room he cleared out. This would be a space dedicated to Silver. Private areas were crucial for an organics upbringing, as it allowed for a sense of self and could help establish good habits of keeping tidy. Metal certainly wouldn’t tolerate a child wreaking havoc upon the space he so diligently kept orderly, even in the fall of the world.

Once the bed was set up, unfortunately without a frame, Metal set the hoglet down onto it. Silver initially resisted the effort, wanting to stay closer to the robot for some unknown reason. However, upon feeling the inviting softness of  the bed, he settled down a bit.

“That is your bed,” Metal stated, breaking the silence. “It’s constructed with both innerspring support structures, as well as memory foam, to ensure complete comfort. It should serve you well for a multitude of years.”

Silver’s only response was a pleased little chirp as he snuggled into the comforting bedsheets.

Metal let the hoglet rest while he set some other things up in the room. He moved a dresser against the wall, as well as some shelves. Organics tended to like decoration and hosting collections within their living spaces. He was certain Silver would enjoy the same, so he made sure to properly prepare for that point of his life.

After Metal finished setting up the room, a bath was certainly in order for the little hoglet. The poor thing was absolutely filthy. Dirt and ash clung to his quills, giving his coat a patchy gray color. Not only that, but his quills were in a rather sorry condition as well. So, Metal scooped the hoglet up and set out to gather the necessary bathing supplies.

Thank goodness for his father’s stockpiling. Metal easily located a spare bottle of shampoo and a basin large enough to fit Silver. In addition to that, Metal was grateful for Doctor Robotnik’s water reserves within the base. He’d never needed to use them before this, and had never thought much of them. Who knew they would end up being so helpful?

Metal Sonic himself wasn’t entirely waterproof, but was instead water-resistant. He estimated that he should be fine to wash Silver, considering just his hands would be submerged in liquid. After setting the basin up with enough water, Metal dipped one clawed finger in to test the temperature. After his internal processor deemed it a safe temperature for Silver, he lowered the hoglet into the bath.

Silver didn’t exactly know what to do with the water surrounding him. He squirmed and splashed a little, letting out a squeak and staring up at Metal with large, confused eyes. One surprised squeak turned into several panicked squeaks, and eventually, the little thing was practically screaming as he twisted and turned, as if trying to escape the water. Metal wasn’t necessarily irritated, but he wasn’t the most equipped to deal with such a situation. He attempted to soothe the hoglet.

“Calm yourself,” his low voice rumbled. “It is merely water. Water is harmless for organic beings such as yourself. Water is vital for your survival. You drink it every day, do you not?”

Silver continued to shriek and flail.

Metal, a bit miffed by his initial failure to pacify him, continued on, “The temperature is well-suited for you. It will not harm you. I tested it myself, and my sensors have been tweaked to perfection.”

Either that statement actually reached Silver, or it was at that moment he finally felt the temperature of the water. Metal concluded it was most likely the latter, considering the hoglet had yet to truly acknowledge anything he had said thus far. As Silver finally settled into the basin of water, he let out a series of small clicks. Metal gave him some more time to adjust before starting to rub the shampoo into his quills, careful not to scratch him. By the time he was done, the water had turned a dark gray color; Silver’s fur had lightened several shades as well. Metal had needed to change the water out a few times until it remained clear, so he knew that Silver was completely clean. Then, he transferred Silver out of the basin and onto a towel. He did his best not to dry him too roughly, and once all of the excess water was out of his quills, Metal set out to properly groom them. His claws were perfect to brush through them, weeding out all of the dead or loose quills, and helping them back into shape.

Finally, after that whole endeavor was over, Metal Sonic had a fluffy white hoglet on his hands. Even Silver himself seemed pleased about the lack of dirt and grime clinging to him. He trilled and chirped, insistently pressing himself against Metal’s sleek, cold hand. Did he want something? Was he trying to get the robot to style his quills in a different fashion?

…Or did he just want more attention and affectionate scratches?

After taking a moment to store some information away in his data-banks, Metal obliged and gently scratched behind one of Silver’s ears, causing the hoglet to purr.

Minutes later, Metal Sonic had a clean, fed, and sleepy hoglet on his hands. Silver was eager to curl up onto his mattress and sleep, and Metal saw no problem in allowing him to do so. Soon, the little thing was out like a light.

Time seemed to crawl along at a slow pace. At a mortal pace.

Metal, being a machine, could easily let the hours pass him by as he went through his automated movements, completed his previously-set tasks. Days, weeks, and even months could pass in seemingly a blink. It had been two hundred years since he had lost his creator and completed his purpose, after all. The time in between then and now had been, in his eyes, utterly meaningless. He’d done nothing of importance, and nothing of importance had needed to be done.

Things were different now.

He had something, someone to care for now. It was something completely foreign to him. The only thing that could be somewhat comparable was Metal’s time spent with his sister, although she had always managed just fine on her own.

Silver was completely dependent on Metal. He could die if Metal wasn’t attentive to his needs. He could die if Metal decided to kill him, or decided to abandon him. He could perish so easily in such a hostile environment.

Metal watched the hoglet sleeping quietly on the mattress, a mattress far too large for his tiny little form. His small chest rose and fell with each breath he took. Metal’s scanners picked up his heartbeat: roughly 200 beats per minute. Perfectly average and healthy for a little hoglet such as Silver. His ears twitched, but he didn’t rouse from slumber.

Metal was still, watching him, scanning him every so often to ensure his health was still in order.

Silver would not be dying under his care.

Chapter Text

Metal Sonic was working in the garden. Everything so far was looking relatively well, and just required some watering. The garden had been established roughly 18 months ago. Metal had no need for such sustenance, but the hoglet he’d taken in certainly did. And to acquire up-to-standard nourishment in such a barren world? It was a task not even Metal would be able to fulfill efficiently each day. However, he could not let the hoglet suffer from starvation or malnourishment.

So, an indoor garden was the obvious solution. Metal didn’t even need to get very crafty; his father had plenty of things stockpiled within his base in such emergency cases. A garden fit for a hoglet was not very hard to throw together.

Said hoglet was currently crawling nearby, sometimes hobbling around on unsteady feet. Silver had recently taken up walking, which was relatively in line for baby milestones. At least, that’s what Metal’s various internal sources provided him with. When the baby had taken his first ever step, the camera’s in Metal’s eyes had gone off at once, with a barely audible click; the moment in time was since preserved infinitely within his memory chip.

Metal was tending to the tomatoes when the hoglet waddled over to him and lunged at his leg. His optics shifted towards Silver, who was looking up at him with large, golden eyes. His grip on Metal’s leg tightened.

“Ba!”

Metal’s optics shrunk, just barely.

“Ba!” Silver repeated, tugging on Metal’s leg more insistently. A small, white-furred arm waved about. Metal blinked, internal scanners working quickly to try and decipher what the child wanted. He had recently been fed, had plenty of water, and certainly didn’t need to go to the bathroom. Additionally, his energetic demeanor proved that he wasn’t in need of a nap. So then…?

Silver continued tugging on Metal’s leg, making adamant, babbling little noises. Metal was indifferent to such a small annoyance. In previous times, he may have roughly kicked the toddler off, or in a more extreme sense, eliminated it. But there was no need for that now.

Metal Sonic briefly shifted his focus from the tomatoes over to the little hoglet attached to his leg. Silver was pouting and babbling, looking up at the robot with a fierce little expression for his age. To any organic being, it would’ve been considered “cute” or perhaps even “adorable”. To Metal, he cared not. The expression was largely trivial, and didn’t represent anything harmful that Silver might be experiencing. It wasn’t an expression of fear or terror, so in the eyes of the robot, it wasn’t very important.

And yet the expression was still made regardless, as Silver continued to tug on Metal’s leg. Speech would most likely be a way to comprehend what the little thing wanted. If Metal never asked him to convey his feelings and wants, he would never learn on his own. So, in one of the softer tones he had managed to figure out,

“What is it that you require, Silver the Hedgehog?”

The hoglet babbled again, continuing to tug on Metal’s leg. He waved his arm a bit more frantically. “Ba! Ba!” More arm waving.

Oh. Was he trying to point to something?

“Do you wish for me to go somewhere?” Metal inquired. Silver’s leg-pulling increased, so the robot took it as an affirmative.

The second he stood up completely, Silver was toddling off somewhere, looking back frequently to ensure he was being followed. Metal felt a slight spark of amusement, somehow. Was this how a typical organic parent felt upon raising their child?

Metal Sonic followed the toddler as he led him to the corner of the room. Still relatively sterile and clean, with sleek walls and a large-tiled floor, all sporting the same shiny sheen. Except…

“That is a Periplaneta americana. Common name: cockroach,” the robot stated blandly, scanners working to detect the small insect as it scuttled across the floor. “You wanted to show me this?” Silver beamed and gestured at it happily. Metal couldn’t understand why the hoglet had brought him here. His sister was always the better one at determining such insignificant matters.

Unless…

“Ah. You wished for me to exterminate it for you?” Metal determined, giving the hoglet a questioning look. His head tilted with a soft clicking sound. Silver giggled at the look, clapping his hands. What other reason would the child have taken him to the bug?

Metal stepped closer to the insect, raising a singular, heavy foot over it. “Such creatures are dirty, pesky things,” he told Silver calmly. “They are a nuisance at best. They can spread disease. They can wriggle into the crevices of any device and disturb the inner mechanisms. However, admittedly, most of them are crucial and beneficial to the environment and ecosystem.”

Metal slammed his foot down with a heavy thud, right on top of the cockroach. Silver gasped.

“Though, they are ultimately unnecessary within the confines of this place.” Metal regarded the hoglet with a satisfied look. He was glad, in a way, that the toddler had asked for his aid in killing the bug. He was no fan of them. “Target exterminated.”

He lifted his foot. Silver stared at the spot where the cockroach had been. In its place was now a mangled, twitching brown corpse. He stared at the dead bug, then at Metal, then back at the dead bug. His expression of shock shifted to one of dismay.

Silver began to cry.

Metal felt a spark in his internal workings. The child was crying now? Why? What had led to such a response? The sound was shrill, and pierced the robot’s audio receptors. That simply wouldn’t do. Instantly, methods of soothing an upset toddler were flooding Metal Sonic’s processors.

Perhaps it was the aspect of a life being extinguished that had frightened the hoglet. Metal first attempted to calm him with a simple, “All living things will reach their end and die, Silver. It is inevitable. It is natural. The fate of that cockroach was natural.”

Silver just bawled harder, little hands wiping clumsily at his face. With a distraught look, he met Metal’s cold eyes and pointed at the dead bug on the floor, babbling out nonsense. Upon scanning his expression, it seemed vaguely… betrayed.

Metal let out a mechanical sigh. Purely for the sake of dramatics. He had no real need for breathing air or exhaling at all. “Are you upset that I killed it?” he questioned the blubbering hoglet. Predictably, Silver did not respond.

Metal knelt carefully to be more on his level, before gently resting a cold palm on top of his head. He was mindful to keep his claws away from the tender flesh, not wishing to accidentally harm him. “I am sorry for misunderstanding your wishes,” the robot continued trying to console the toddler. “Please do not cry.”

Silver sniffled, looking up at Metal with large, watery eyes. He seemed to sort of understand, or perhaps he just processed the gentle, apologetic tone. How strange, for a machine such as Metal Sonic to be gentle and apologetic. Oh, how things had changed since his purpose was fulfilled, since his father had died.

For the better or for the worse, he wondered?

For the majority of his existence, organic life had seemed so meaningless. They weren’t immortal, and therefore would be entirely erased at some point in time. Time was eternal. Beings such as “Sonic the Hedgehog” were not. Metal Sonic was perpetual. Fragile creatures such as the toddler Metal now cared for were anything but. And yet, there was still the peculiar existence of…

Irrelevant. Such questions mattered not to the robotic hedgehog. That being had vanished two centuries ago, and as far as Metal was aware, hadn’t been heard of since.

Regardless of such thoughts, Metal Sonic had a twitching cockroach corpse to dispose of, and a miserable hoglet to comfort.

Comfort. Another strange concept for the robot.

A mere hour later, after the bug was scraped from the floor, Silver seemed to have forgotten about it entirely. The child had a knack for cheering up quickly, far too easily entertained with whatever semblance of a toy Metal could give him. At the current moment, he sat on the floor while Metal mindlessly observed, playing with a small, rusted badnik that had long since been shut down. Silver puppeted the janky limbs, twisting the head this way and that, all while babbling some words only he could understand. His own little game, his own little story that was playing out before his eyes. Metal didn’t ask, merely watched. The bug issue from earlier had been completely forgotten about.

The very next day, Silver showed Metal another bug. A very similar-looking cockroach, much to the robot’s displeasure. How were the wretched things getting inside? He would most likely have to do a large-scale extermination of the base.

Metal Sonic watched the white-quilled hoglet lean down to swipe clumsily at the bug. It was almost amusing the way the toddler pouted and stumbled, uncoordinated hands reaching for the bug as it scuttled away. When he finally, miraculously, caught the small thing, he offered it to Metal with a large grin on his little face.

“Goh!” he exclaimed, and Metal, for the life of him, couldn’t even begin to understand what that meant. “Goh! Goh!”

Got?

Silver tried to hop up towards Metal, stumbling a little before regaining his balance. The cockroach did its best to scuttle up his arm but the child kept it securely in his hands as he waved it in front of Metal’s face.

Metal’s optics instinctively scanned it. “I see that you’ve trapped it within your hands,” he stated plainly. Deciding to throw a dog a bone, in a sense, he then roughly patted Silver’s head in some form of praise. “Your coordination most definitely requires some work, but you have still managed to succeed in your goal. That is still praiseworthy. What will you do with it now?”

Silver squealed with laughter, so caught up in the slipshod affection that he accidentally dropped the cockroach. And thus ensued a much longer chase, ending with a tearful hoglet after his target had eventually vanished from sight.

When Metal had finally wrangled the miserable toddler up and prepared him to shut down for the night, Silver was still upset over losing the cockroach. With a synthetic sigh, Metal placed him down onto his mattress before sitting down beside him. The mattress dipped heavily under his weight, and Silver eagerly crawled towards him, pressing against his side.

“I recognize your efforts in such a worthless goal,” Metal found himself commenting, his hands resting against the back of Silver’s head. His claws gave a tentative twitch, scratching gently at the spot behind his ear. The careful touch resulted in the hoglet purring quietly. A small pop-up in the corner of Metal’s vision readily supplied,

[Hedgehogs are very communicative. A low purring sound indicates happiness or contentment with a given situation.]

Metal continued scratching behind Silver’s ear with a light, unmalicious touch. A reward, one could think of it as, for being so diligent in what was most certainly a pointless task. There was no need to catch a cockroach, after all. But Silver seemed to soak up any and all affection, and so Metal continued to give it to him.

[Love and affection are critical for the healthy brain development of a child.]

Silence prevailed for a good while, broken only by the sound of muffled purring coming from Metal’s side. What a quiet existence he now found himself caught in. Even if his simulation abilities were as intricate as his sister’s, Metal doubted he ever would’ve believed he’d have ended up like this. Taking care of a child of all things.

However, it’d be inaccurate to say it wasn’t strangely fulfilling.

As Silver curled up beside Metal, preparing to sleep, the robot decided to tell him a story. Bedtime stories, as one note supplied, could be helpful in calming and lulling a child to sleep. Metal didn’t exactly have any stories for children previously downloaded, and so he did the one thing he could; he recounted one of his misadventures with his loathsome copy, when said copy had been alive.

Ceasing the gentle affection he had been giving the hoglet, Metal slowly began, “I was not the only Sonic, at one point in time. I do not think you were aware of such a fact.”

Silver yawned.

“It was a fierce rivalry. I, the superior, eternal Sonic, and he, the inferior, mortal Sonic,” Metal continued. “My one mission in life was to eliminate him. It was the very purpose of my being. Miraculously enough, the imposter Sonic always managed to triumph over me.”

Metal tapped Silver on the nose. A gentle, teasing gesture to get the child’s attention. If he were truly alive, there might’ve been a mischievous glimmer in his eyes, reminiscent of the mortal Sonic.

“But did you know, there was once a time in which I had taken over the entire world ?”

Silver perked up at that, as if he truly could grasp the meaning of the statement. And thus began the long tale, one of a distant past, a previous state of being. A Metal Sonic so starkly different from the one that existed in that current moment, the one who was caring for a life form smaller and weaker than himself.

Would the old him have scoffed at such a notion? Or perhaps deemed him faulty?

…Such things mattered not.

By the time Metal Sonic had almost finished his story of when he had nearly brought the organic world to its knees, the little hoglet curled up beside him was far away in dreamland. Metal smoothed one claw over the frankly ridiculous quills atop his head, lowering his voice as he finished speaking.

“It was true I had been defeated in that moment, and the version of myself called Neo was no more… but in the end, do you see who has prevailed? Organic Sonic is now the one who is no more. And I, the superior Sonic, remain.”

Silver snored.

And for the time being, Metal Sonic just listened.

***

Silver the Hedgehog was a growing boy. Growing boys, according to Metal Sonic’s internal database, required a multitude of things for their development. A well-balanced diet, for one, was critically important. Metal did his best with the indoor garden he had been cultivating, as well as any meat he could manage to hunt from the outside world. That was, admittedly, a much more difficult task, especially considering the terrain surrounding the base in which they resided. Most of the fauna that once occupied the area had fled long ago, or had been scorched to inedible ashes. Still, whenever Metal managed to snag a morsel free of diseases, he would cook it up for Silver. Meat was important for a well-balanced diet, and a well-balanced diet was important for a growing boy.

(A few times, the robot had caught the child gnawing on a dead, dirty rat. In the end, he had to wrestle it away from the hoglet.)

Another thing would be entertainment. Metal wasn’t exactly the best at that. As the child grew, he quickly came to love the stories Metal could tell him. But soon, Metal had run out of stories to tell. The only thing he could think to do was scrounge around for new material. His father kept a few books on robotics, technology, weaponry, and the like. Sometimes history. Most information was held in digital form, but Metal concluded that physical copies would be better for a still developing child.

Still, Silver couldn’t read. He was speaking more and more each day, but reading and writing were something Metal had forgotten to consider.

So he taught Silver both. Sitting with him in his room, Metal would help Silver’s small, clumsy hand trace letters and sound out words. It was fascinating, watching aimless scribbles slowly turn into legible, wobbly text. It was even more fascinating to hear meaningless babbling become real, coherent words. Metal wasn’t exactly the best teacher, but he could use his sister’s various notes for assistance. It… worked. But Silver had nothing to practice with.

With a glint of determination, Metal set out into the ravaged world to find some children’s books. It was, predictably, not an easy task in the slightest. He didn’t want to spend too long each day looking due to the predicament of having such a young child to care for.

He didn’t want to take Silver with him, because the air quality was less than favorable and it was, in general, dangerous. But, he also didn’t want to leave the small boy alone in the base for a long period of time. He could wander, and there were many things he could end up tampering with. Metal hadn’t properly toddler-proofed everything, instead relying on his own vigilance.

So, Metal settled for keeping Silver restricted to his room while he left. It wasn’t the best solution, but it was both the easiest and most effective solution he could produce.

His sister probably would’ve been able to come up with something far superior.

It only took a few weeks. Metal Sonic would lock Silver in his little room with a snack and a promise to return shortly before heading out into the world. His incredible speed made it easy to traverse the land, searching for suitable entertainment for a young child. He’d only search for a few hours before returning to the base. Some quick estimations revealed it would take anywhere from a week to several months to find something satisfactory for Silver to read.

Eventually, he stumbled across a burnt, run-down little store. A remnant of a world long gone. Metal looted it for all it was worth. He ended up returning to the base carrying a handful of children’s books of varying reading levels, small, pointless toys and knick-knacks, and a little plush toy. It was that of a dog, small and pink and not particularly soft anymore, with little matching pink ribbons on its ears. Children tended to cling to such things, did they not?

Metal presented the toy to Silver upon his return, who smiled brightly and reached for it eagerly.

“Pink!” he shouted, jumping up and clapping his hands. “Pink!”

…Yes, the stuffed toy was pink. Metal rewarded Silver for his correct statement with a fond ruffle of his quills. Silver giggled in response. When Metal handed him the little dog plush, he squeezed it tightly to his chest, his eyes sparkling. Metal was pleased that his assumptions were correct; Silver just adored the stuffed animal.

After giving him the plush toy, Metal introduced the hoglet to everything else he’d collected. Finally, Silver would be able to practice reading in a normal, effective way. He also now had a few toys to play with during the day, when Metal couldn’t entertain him. Things seemed to be going rather well.

Caring for a small child in a post-apocalyptic wasteland wasn’t an easy task by any means, but Metal Sonic was a hyper intelligent robot that could match the speed of the fastest thing alive. He had everything handled. When Silver was hungry, he could be fed from the indoor garden or whatever Metal hunted for him. When Silver was bored, he could read the books or play the games Metal got for him. When Silver was tired, he could sleep on the bed Metal set out for him, with the blankets Metal kept clean for him. When Silver got hurt, he would be bandaged with the bandaids and other first-aid supplies that Metal had on hand.

By all means, Silver was cared for perfectly well.

Which left Metal wondering: why would the hoglet refuse to let go of his legs?

It happened numerous times. When Metal had a task to attend to, one that usually involved the upkeep of the base, Silver would often latch onto him and adamantly refuse to let go. Metal would question him, nudge him, try to carefully pry him off. Still, he wouldn’t loosen his hold, and shaking him off was out of the question. Why was he so persistent with it, Metal wondered? The child had everything he needed. He had books, toys, food, a clean bed and a warm place to stay. A place that was safe from the neverending fires outside, the fires he most likely didn’t recall from when he’d only been 23 weeks old and abandoned.

It would take Metal Sonic a very long time to realize that the main thing Silver wanted was for him to stay.

Chapter Text

Silver was an irritating child. Fussy, curious to a fault, and horribly stubborn. He wasn’t keen on remaining in one spot, and always ended up in places he shouldn’t have been. He occasionally threw petty tantrums, despised being left alone for more than a few minutes, and was growing tired of his books and toys.

Metal had his hands completely full. For the first time in 200 years, he was busy every single day . He had things that needed to get done, chores, errands. A house to upkeep. A hoglet to care for.

It almost felt like slipping into some alternate universe. Metal Sonic, the one true Sonic, fastest thing on the planet, conqueror and Ultimate Overlord of organic beings… and he was spending his days gardening. Cleaning. Brushing the quills of a boy that hated sitting still.

The old him, the him that had been constantly pressed beneath his father’s thumb, would have hated it. He was meant for greatness. He was going to be the one to bring the world to its knees. He was the one who would prevail, the one who would send society spiraling, the one who would please his father and have his sister smiling.

But none of that mattered to him, not anymore. Sonic was dead. The world was in ruins. There was nothing left to conquer.

Nothing left to conquer, except for the mess that Silver’s quills had become. There was no point in scrounging around for a comb; Metal’s fine-tipped claws worked well enough. When the boy grew extra restless, a few scratches behind his ear calmed him down enough to get him to stay still. Occasionally, the robot could coax out a purr from him using such a tactic.

Had the other Sonic ever done something so… mundane? Was this a glimpse into what life was like for his loathsome copy?

Was this what his own life could have been like?

“Ma?” Silver asked suddenly, and Metal realized that he had gone still. Silver had been calling the robot by that name ever since he first started calling him anything at all. It was the hoglet’s attempt at saying “Metal Sonic”. Metal had tried his best to correct him, to teach the child to properly say his name; by that point, with the boy speaking more each day, it must have been pure stubbornness that kept Silver from learning.

Fine. Metal Sonic could be “Ma”. He did not care, and it mattered very little what he was called.

It was just a bit insulting.

With a brief shake of his head, Metal continued combing through the hoglet’s quills. He was almost done. His clawed finger snagged on one last knot, and Silver winced.

“Hurts,” he announced plainly, legs swinging up and kicking back against the mattress they were seated on. A synthetic hum escaped Metal’s torso.

“Estimate: 8.23 seconds remaining,” the robot reassured. His finger caught in Silver’s quills again, and Silver whined unhappily.

“Hurts!” he repeated again, voice a bit sharper. “Hurting me, Ma!”

Metal scratched behind the boy’s ear, and he went quiet, tilting his head into the touch. He was so quick to get frustrated, but so easy to please. A simple equation of give and take, that’s all that caring for a child was.

That’s all it should have been.

A week or so later, Silver was having another one of his pointless tantrums. The hoglet had worked himself into a frenzy, face scrunched up and red with anger, eyes watering in misplaced frustration.

“Outside!” he demanded, voice swaying like a rocking chair in a storm. Pitching up, dribbling back down into a whine, flying back up into a shriek, and then dwindling into a miserable grumble. “I wanna go outside! Outside! ”

Metal Sonic had found the time to take Silver out of the base regularly. It would not do him any good to be cooped up for his entire upbringing. And while the conditions of the planet were not ideal, he would need to build his resilience to it. The future was unpredictable. There might be a time in which the two had to leave for some reason.

Iblis showed no mercy, after all.

Silver enjoyed being outside, despite the poor state of it. He liked to play in the dirt and chase the bugs around. He liked to shove things into his mouth that definitely did not belong there, and he liked to run away when Metal tried to rip whatever it was out from between his sharp little teeth. Hoglet teeth were sharp to a ridiculous degree, two rows of pinprick needles. They left scratches and chips in the paint on Metal’s leg from where the boy had taken an interest in gnawing at. The robot could only hope that Silver grew out of that irksome habit before he himself ran out of paint.

At the current moment, the weather outside was unstable. Metal’s scanners could detect it even from within the base. The winds were fierce and scorching, and would be dangerous for a little hoglet such as Silver. The poor thing would practically be swept away, white fur blackened and charred. A toasted marshmallow left over an open flame for too long.

Metal was a logical creation. Logic mattered not to a small child. The robot’s efforts were useless in calming him, futile in trying to change his mind. Silver ended up on the ground, kicking and screaming about how unfair it was. Metal turned off his audio processors and stood by, watching and waiting for the hoglet to tire himself out.

When Silver was just curled up on the floor, whimpering and whining about going outside, Metal scooped him up. The child did not fight. Metal carried him back to his room, settling down with him on his mattress and situating him on his lap. When he restarted his audio processors and booted up his internal heating, Silver nestled against him with a worn out purr. A low, gravelly sound, born from exhaustion and a desire to relieve his frustration. Metal scratched behind his ear, and Silver’s little tail wagged slightly.

“There used to be Poaceae,” Metal began, and Silver’s ears pricked. “Also referred to as Gramineae. Common name: grass.” It was the start of a story, perhaps, though neither knew what kind of story it may be. Silver loved his stories regardless of the content, as if desperate to vicariously live in such a world through words alone. A world where the air didn’t burn the lungs and dry out the throat. A world where the skies were blue and civilization thrived, not restrained to just a few scattered villages across each continent. A world where grass still existed in the way that it used to.

Silver blinked up at him with tired, curious eyes. The boy was quiet, docile, compared to his recent meltdown.

Metal continued, “It was almost everywhere. 40% of the entire planet’s landmass was covered by some form of it. Poa pratensis, Lolium perenne, Cynodon dactylon—also known as Kentucky bluegrass, perennial ryegrass, and Bermuda grass respectively. Over 11,500 different varieties of grasses were classified.”

The red of his LED optics flickered, and then dulled.

“Little, if any of it, remains.”

Silver was unhappy by the news, as any child might have been. “Where’d it go?” he asked quietly, brows knitted together in confusion and displeasure. He was both so similar and so different from Metal, possessing the most fascinating yet contradicting habits. Most of the time, he took after the robot in the sense of empty expressions and a flat tone of voice. But there were other times, not necessarily rare but not exactly common, where his emotions bubbled out of his little body. Regardless of how he was being raised, his true nature was rearing its stubborn head, demanding that he express himself through his form by all means necessary.

Because Silver was alive. He was an organic being, with blood and veins and a heart that beat in his chest; so strong, despite the harsh fate of the world. He had a wild imagination, not a database, and the warmth that came from him was genuine and not artificial. He was alive.

And Metal Sonic was not.

Metal gently tapped the tip of Silver’s nose, making the boy’s face scrunch up. He answered the question readily, “Grass is a part of the kingdom Plantae. It is a plant. Plants, if their certain requirements aren’t met, will die. Plants are organic, just like you.”

“What was it like?” Silver asked, eyes large and glittering like multifaceted magnifying glasses, eager to discover something new, eager to understand.

Metal was silent for a moment. He was not one for flowery language, and his descriptions tended to be more scientific and blunt. He was better at speaking in statistics, pulling information from his internal database. But Silver deserved more than numbers and percentages. “Predominantly green,” the robot finally stated, “though it could also appear yellow or brown, depending on its health. Some grasses were rough, and some were soft. Festuca, common name: fescue grass, was described to be the softest. Most grasses were soft enough to lay comfortably on.”

Silver quickly shot back, voice whiny, “And it’s all gone? That’s not fair! I want to feel grass! All we have now is rocks and stuff…”

His voice trailed off into a miserable grumble, and Metal ruffled the fur atop the boy’s head. Instinctively, the child leaned into the touch. The two drifted into silence; it tended to happen. Metal was not particularly accustomed to holding a conversation, and Silver, who learned from the robot, had his bouts of silence as well. The only difference was that when Silver got upset, he got upset , although Sage’s notes supplied that it was normal for children his age. They learned, with time, how to self regulate and deal with frustrating emotions.

The quiet was not strained. It never truly was. For the majority of his existence, Metal had been silent. It was his natural state. To speak was to go out of his way for a pointless action, and he had been designed for pure efficiency. Speaking was inefficient and largely trivial for a being like Metal Sonic.

But living in silence would be detrimental to Silver, an organic creature who required the structure of language during his upbringing.

How much had Metal done for Silver thus far? Handfuls upon handfuls of small, insignificant tasks, surely. Little favors and scraps of comfort offered fleetingly—supplying the basic needs was integral and anything else seemed mostly irrelevant. Caring for the hoglet was nothing more than a bundle of objectives and tasks that had to be completed in a time-sensitive manner. Food, water, sleep, ensuring safety. Bedtime stories and scratches behind the ears weren’t necessary.

There was something about Silver’s eyes, however. A dejected look that occasionally crossed the child’s face, making Metal’s arm move without intention to pat his head. A glimmer of excitement, sometimes, that had Metal matching his energy, praising or affirming whatever it was that had happened. And the questions, the infinite and foolish and meaningless questions… The robot answered each and every one without hesitation.

It meant nothing, of course. Metal Sonic was a mechanical being who had no feelings. His main objective, since the death of the other Sonic, was to ensure the survival of Silver the Hedgehog. The most efficient way to accomplish that was through imitation; mimicry. Young children responded best to adults of the same species. It was the most logical way to approach the task.

An imitation, that’s all it was. Nothing more. Metal Sonic had no feelings and cared not for organic beings.

Silver was limp against him, his little chest rising and falling with his breaths. Sound asleep, just like that. When the child slept, it was uneasily, as if he could hear the roaring flames that licked at the planet all the way to the core, ever-hungry and unsparing. As if he was anticipating, even in rest, the way the ground might shudder and crack should Iblis choose to emerge, all for the sake of continuing his centuries-long tantrum. As if he was waiting for that inevitable attack, for the moment the roof would come crashing down onto his exposed, vulnerable body. His ribs might crack from the force of being squashed down. Perhaps he would sprain an ankle, trying desperately to wriggle out of the wreckage. Or maybe he would simply asphyxiate, trapped under all of the rubble, lungs constricted beneath the unforgiving weight of a metal ceiling; smoke filling the room as the fires breached what little safety he had, choking him and filling his vision with dusty black.

Small children died so easily. A subconscious part of Silver probably knew that, and could probably sense the danger that existed all around him. That was one potential reason the boy slept so lightly, positioned in such a way so that immediately getting up and bolting would be little effort at all. Akin to a newborn foal, never truly at rest when sleeping standing up. Always anticipating a predator, always prepared to run.

For some odd reason, however, the boy slept a little sounder whenever Metal was close. As if, in a previous life, the robot hadn’t been the predator. As if he wasn’t the danger, but instead was the protector. As if he was the umbrella in a storm, the blanket in the cold.

Metal was not who he used to be. He was Sonic, yes, and he would always be Sonic, the fastest thing alive. But outside of that?

He had wandered the planet for 200 empty years. Everything he had ever needed to do was done, completed, finished. Metal Sonic was, in simple terms, obsolete. Antediluvian. A product of the past, of an entirely different world.

Silver shifted in his sleep, little paws twitching. Metal was brought back to the present. The present, which was full of raging fires and destruction as far as the eye could see. A planet that was effectively dead, filled with more corpses than living people. Ashes, smoke, air that burned to breathe in.

And yet, it was a present in which Silver the Hedgehog had miraculously survived. Metal was inexplicably drawn to the hoglet. It could have been the anomalies that accompanied his existence. It could have been the change of routine he brought, the reason to continue existing, the tasks to complete.

Or perhaps he just reminded the robot of the old world. Of the family he once had. Of the lives that used to exist everywhere across the earth.

In the end, it mattered not. When Silver shifted once more in sleep, whimpering softly at some imperceivable nightmare, Metal Sonic gently scratched behind one of his ears. The child sighed, and then quieted.

Metal stayed with him the entire duration of the night, until the boy awoke the next morning.

Chapter Text

The crops in the garden were dead. It was a scenario Metal Sonic had considered before, and a scenario he was certain he would be fit to handle.

But the new seeds were refusing to grow. There were no issues with the seeds, nor the water, which meant that something was wrong with the soil. In the corner of Metal’s vision, a helpful pop-up reminded him of the existence of fertilizer. There was no fertilizer present within Doctor Robotnik’s base.

There were little options left. Metal would rather not, but what choice did he have? He had been neglecting such an aspect of Silver’s upbringing merely due to the inconvenience of it, but at that point…

Metal easily located Silver in his room. The boy was currently reading one of his books, little brows furrowed as he muttered the words aloud to himself. At the sound of his door opening, he turned around. A smile split across his face at the sight of Metal, and the kid wasted no time in jumping to his feet and scrambling over.

Silver made a happy trilling noise as Metal gently scratched behind one of his ears. With no time to waste, the robot bluntly declared, “We will be heading out now.”

Silver blinked up at Metal, mouth slightly open. He made a vaguely confused sound. Of course the hoglet was confused; he was scarcely allowed to leave home due to the inherently dangerous nature of the outside world.

Home. That was a funny word. Metal Sonic had never considered his father’s main base to ever be a home. It had always just been a base. With the new addition, however… ‘home’ seemed more fitting. It felt warmer. More lively. Comforting, in an unfamiliar sense.

Metal’s internal cooling fans made a sound akin to a sigh. “We will be traveling to the nearest village. There are things there which are necessary in order to ensure your survival.”

Silver just clung to Metal’s leg. Metal took that as a sign of acceptance.

Metal Sonic was efficient in preparing Silver for travel. He made sure to wrap the child’s hands and feet with makeshift gloves and socks, and bundled him up in a thick cloth that had been lying around. It was… serviceable. Metal made note to get ahold of more sturdy handwear and footwear through whatever means possible when they reached the village.

The trip would be a quick one; Metal would make sure of that. Therefore, it would be pointless to pack a bag with supplies such as food or water. With Silver sufficiently prepared, and Metal requiring nothing new, the two were ready to embark on their little adventure.

Securing the bundled hoglet to his side, Metal Sonic set out to exit the base. Silver had only left a handful of times, but this time would be special. This time, he would be permitted to explore once they reached their destination.

Upon taking one step into the outside world, Silver sneezed, and then coughed. Metal fixed the cloth he was wrapped in, pulling it up over his nose to try and limit the amount of smoke he inhaled. Iblis was far from them at that moment, so fortunately, there was less of a risk breathing in the air. The fires had not yet reached them.

Metal Sonic revved up his engine and prepared to leave. Silver squeaked beside him, startled by the sound and the rumbling sensation it produced. That was the reason they hadn’t gone to the nearest village sooner; walking at a normal speed would take far too long. Metal would have to utilize his real speed, and Silver had simply been too young to withstand it at the time. But now, older and able to talk, able to stand strongly on his two little legs, Metal deduced that there was only a 1.03% chance that the hoglet would get any kind of injury from fast-speed travel. Strangely enough, his body seemed to be more capable of handling intense speeds compared to the average organic being.

Metal adjusted his footing. Briefly, he scanned Silver and found that his health was fine. The only warning he gave before shooting off was a firm, direct, “Hold on.”

Metal blasted off in the direction his internal map told him to go. Silver shrieked in surprise and burrowed further into the cloth he was wrapped up in. It was over in just a few moments, Metal skidding to a halt on the outskirts of their destination. Immediately, he assessed the hoglet at his side.

Silver’s quills were all puffed out in alarm, his little eyes darting back and forth as he tried to understand what the heck just happened. That was the fastest the kid had ever traveled in his life thus far. Their entire surroundings had blurred and then changed into something totally different in the span of a few seconds. His little brain just couldn’t fathom it.

With large, anxious eyes, Silver looked up at Metal and reached up towards him. “Ma?” he squeaked out. The robot did not respond immediately.

With a stomp, Metal started walking towards the village. He gently smoothed Silver’s quills down with a singular clawed finger while they approached the small civilization, ensuring that the boy was orderly and presentable. “You are fine, Silver the Hedgehog,” he stated calmly. “You are healthy and unharmed. You are strong enough to handle my speed at your age.”

Silver, calmed by the familiar gesture, trilled happily and leaned into Metal’s touch with a mumble of, “Okay.” It was something the robot wondered if he would ever get used to. His entire life, ever since his creation, he had been feared and hated by almost all organic creatures. Now, there was one that was dependent on him. It was a completely new kind of relationship for Metal; nothing had ever depended on him before, and certainly nothing he was programmed to despise.

Every experience that came with Silver was something new. It was something that made time slow down for a moment, some new nugget of information that Metal tucked away carefully within his internal database. Something that Sage had never experienced. Something that his father would never know of. It was something for Metal, and Metal alone.

Something for Metal that Silver had given him.

“GO!” the child at his side suddenly shrieked, and Metal Sonic picked up the pace. Silver’s ears were twitching, his eyes transfixed on the little town that they were approaching. He started waving his arms a bit, struggling to wriggle out of the cloth he was bundled into. Metal shushed him and ensured he was still secure.

“You can walk alongside me once we reach it,” the robot reassured the fussy hoglet. “But you will tire quickly, and you will want to be carried again soon. Stay put for now.”

Silver whined in response and started squirming some more. He was growing up to be terribly bothersome, if Metal were to be honest. The boy just had a very… irritating energy around him. Whenever he wanted something, he was dead set on it, stopping at nothing until he got it. It was an exasperating aspect of his stubborn personality, one that often got him into danger or into trouble. Metal often caught the curious child trying to explore where he most certainly should not be exploring.

At his side, Silver suddenly made an excited chirping noise. Metal’s optics scanned their surroundings.

They had reached the village.

True to his word, Metal Sonic removed the hoglet from his bundle and set him down on the ground, keeping a firm hold of his little hand. Silver’s tail wagged excitedly as he immediately started to forge ahead.

There weren’t many others at first, but Metal had detected numerous heat signatures more towards the heart of the village. He was wary, but not afraid or intimidated. The robot hadn’t been around other organic beings for many, many years, excluding Silver. It was… difficult to determine how his existence might be received. It had been 200 years since Metal Sonic had been heard of. Numerous stories about his loathsome copy had been passed down through the generations, and while there were some rumors of a metallic rival, the truth had ultimately been lost to history. Metal Sonic was an enigma in this new, fragile world. Would he be met with fear, apprehension? Anger? Confusion? Violence, even?

There was only one way to find out.

The socialization would be good for Silver, Metal concluded. He deserved to be around other organic beings. He deserved to be around other children closer to his age, if there were any. Which, there were; Metal’s scanners told him that there were at least four other prepubescent organic beings.

Silver would be getting exposure to build his immune system as well, another positive of the trip. He couldn’t stay cooped up inside forever. That would render him weak, and Metal would have no ward of his being weak .

There was a figure up ahead. Silver, ever the curious child, tugged Metal along. One figure turned into two, two into three, and before they knew it, there were plenty of others all milling about around them. Silver quickly grew overwhelmed, clinging to Metal’s leg with a confused warble. There was a brief moment where the two just stood there, surrounded by all sorts of people going about their day.

The anxiety of the moment was shattered as a shrill voice suddenly exclaimed, “Look, Mama! Travelers!”

Metal whipped around, instantly in attack mode, ready to defend Silver if he had to. But there was no danger. Just another small child, a canine Mobian of some sort, pointing at the odd pair. The boy stood with who was presumably his mother, and while the kid looked excited, the woman seemed startled. Metal’s claws itched to tear through something, a desire he hadn’t been able to fulfill in quite some time. Now would not be that time. He had to be civil. Even if he cared not for organic creatures, he had to be respectful, for Silver’s sake.

The little boy trotted right up to Silver, wearing a big grin. He didn’t spare a single glance towards Metal. “Hi!” he greeted cheerfully. He had to have been a few years older than Silver. “I’m Skye. Who are you? I’ve never seen you before. And I know everyone here. You’re someone new!”

Silver, who at first seemed overwhelmed, quickly relaxed. He gave a single look towards Metal, and then stepped closer to the other child, offering a small smile. “Silver,” he mumbled. He shuffled a bit on his feet, having never talked to another kid before. Or anyone else besides Metal, for that matter. His little world had grown so much in the span of just a few minutes.

As the two children got to talking, Skye’s mother approached. She looked hesitant as she regarded Metal. Her eyes caught on the sharp tips of his fingers, which the robot had made sure to file twice a week on the dot. Falling into disrepair would do him no good. However, as the woman looked down at the two boys now excitedly conversing, she relaxed. Even just being accompanied by Silver somehow made Metal Sonic seem less intimidating.

“Hello,” the woman greeted with a small smile. “Are you two just passing through? It’s… rare that we see any outsiders.”

Metal offered a curt nod in response. His optics studied the woman, a canine just like her son. They had the same pricked ears, the same dark ashy coloring, an evolution trait. Her eyes showed a slight nervousness paired with a warmth that Metal couldn’t quite understand. He concluded that the woman was incapable of being a threat.

Skye’s mother clasped her hands together, gazing down at the two children still chattering away. Silver had opened up considerably when finally faced with someone around his age, someone who was like him in a way that Metal could never be. Silver, however, was speaking noticeably less than the other boy. He had always been a quiet one. Metal deduced that it was due to his own nature as a previously-mute robot.

“Is this little one yours?” the woman suddenly asked, tone a bit quieter. Metal found it odd.

“I found him in a crumbling building,” the robot replied stiffly. His voice made the woman jump a little. She had probably never heard anything sound quite like that before. “I have been caring for him ever since.”

The woman nodded, casting her inquisitive gaze back down to the two little boys. Skye was tugging on her sleeve.

“Mama,” the boy whispered. His voice remained clearly audible despite it. “Silver said he’s never had bread before. We’ve got to give him some. And I want to introduce him to everyone else, too.”

Bread. Metal had forgotten that such a thing even existed. The indoor garden, while plentiful, lacked any wheat or other grains that could be used to make bread.

Skye’s mother seemed startled by the prospect, but she readily nodded. “Of course. As long as it’s also alright with…” Her eyes met Metal’s as she realized they hadn’t introduced themselves with names. It didn’t matter to the robot. Nothing in the village was a threat to Silver, nor Metal.

With a nod, he instructed Silver, “Socialize well.” And then Skye had grabbed Silver’s hand, and was tugging the hoglet away with a happy shout. Metal watched them run off. The woman beside him chuckled fondly.

From there, Metal had a few things to get done. He had to get some fertilizer. He also had to get some things for Silver; clothes, shoes, perhaps even something sharp he could use to defend himself should he never need to.

The beginnings of a new civilization were sprouting up from the ashes of a destroyed world. Because of that, money from the old world held very little value. People were much more keen on trading food, or tools, or even trinkets. Metal Sonic had prepared accordingly, and had brought along things that might be of use to the people in the village.

He got fertilizer. He got clothes in a large size, clothes that Silver would eventually grow into. He got a small pair of shoes, a larger pair of shoes, and also got a pair of simple gloves. In return, he gave away seeds, tools, parts that could be used to build. It was a day well spent, Metal concluded, as his scanners searched for Silver. The boy wasn’t far, surrounded by the heat signatures of a handful of other children. He must have been having a good time.

Metal made his way closer at a leisurely pace. By then, the sun was halfway at its descent in the sky. They would have to return soon. Silver would surely be buzzing with energy and excitement. Perhaps they could continue to visit the village, as it would give the boy more chances to be around other children. That would be good for his development, undoubtedly.

Abruptly, Metal’s scanners detected a strong life signal roughly 94.68 yards away. It was unlike the other people in the village he had encountered thus far, but it was also difficult to properly assess for some reason. One thing was clear, however; it was going in the exact same direction that Metal was going.

Metal Sonic dismissed it. If it was a threat, he was more than capable of handling it alone. He had once rivaled that loathsome copy of his, after all. He was doubtful of there ever being another creature that could oppose him in such a way.

Silver was in sight by that point, and Metal stomped closer. He was surrounded by the other kids of the village, and upon closer inspection, the hoglet’s tail was wagging. It was a sight that had unknowingly endeared itself to the robot.

Metal Sonic paused, just to watch for a moment. Silver seemed to be speaking about something, but he was a bit too far for Metal’s audio processors to properly detect. The other kids, four little Mobians, were listening with intrigued expressions. One of them nudged at Silver with some kind of exclamation, and Silver’s expression seemed to freeze. He shuffled his feet a bit awkwardly, suddenly appearing uncomfortable. The boy from earlier, Skye, shoved at the kid who had said something to Silver.

Metal continued walking, but at a slightly quicker pace. He saw Silver’s little ears twitch, and then the hoglet caught sight of him. His eyes lit up with familiarity and what appeared to be relief. Relief at seeing him. Metal would have never imagined that any other organic being besides his father would be relieved to see him . When the other kids saw the robot approaching, they looked nervous and startled. At that, Metal Sonic felt a small spark of pride; even after all the time that had passed, he could still be intimidating.

Something strange happened abruptly, however. Silver’s expression twitched into one of slight discomfort. The boy was never particularly expressive in general, save for high-emotion reactions. That was presumably due to spending all of his time with Metal, who could not emote with any part of his face except for his eyes and occasionally his ears. But the look on his face was new, something the robot had never seen before.

Silver’s expression quickly shifted to one of intense pain, and Metal Sonic was instantly on high alert, already preparing to dash over and demand what was wrong. He had no purpose in this world except for taking care of Silver. If Silver died, Metal would have nothing, and he would go back to pointless wandering. Time would fly away from him like it didn’t matter, because it wouldn’t, and Metal… didn’t want that.

Metal didn’t want that. Metal wanted Silver to live. But wanting things was not something he had been programmed for, so in a more factual sense, Metal needed Silver to live. Yes, that was it. It was not something he ‘wanted’, because Metal did not want. Silver just needed to live. He needed to live in order for Metal to understand the anomalies he created.

There was a sudden burst of energy, and Metal’s systems nearly crashed trying to process it. His sensors and scanners and receptors were all overloaded, causing his steps to lag, his optics glitching, movements stuttering. His vision blacked out.

He was severely malfunctioning.

He was severely malfunctioning.

In the 200 years that had passed since the world collapsed beneath the weight of Iblis’ wrath, Metal had not once severely malfunctioned. There were little hiccups in his operations, sure, but they were just that; little. Small inconveniences that were not very hard to patch up with the parts and tools at his disposal.

This was completely different. Metal Sonic stumbled, his systems briefly shutting down and restarting. When his optical sensors were back online, when his audio processors cleared up, he was looking at a scene he could hardly comprehend.

Silver was doubled over. His legs must have given out, and his head was bowed low to the dusty ground. His face was scrunched up in anguish, his form quivering, but the most astounding thing about it was the energy radiating off of him.

Metal’s systems nearly crashed all over again as he tried to scan it. It was chaos energy, undoubtedly, and Silver was absolutely burning up with it. It was out of nowhere, completely unprompted. There had been no warnings. Silver sat there, trembling, and around him, the chaos energy had amassed into a glowing teal. It engulfed his entire body, semi-transparent and wavering, ebbing and flowing as if it moved with each wavering breath the boy took. And every time poor little Silver twitched or whimpered, the energy would lash out, sharp, volatile. It had already claimed the other children he had previously been talking with. They writhed, suspended in mid-air, faces wearing shock and fear. All four of them, enveloped in the fierce teal glow.

It was causing a ruckus and making a scene. Already, some of the other villagers were noticing and running over. Metal paused, red optics studying the situation, figuring out his next course of action. It would do him no good to run forth and get swallowed up by what appeared to be some psychic freakout. He would potentially be rendered helpless, depending on the strength of the energy. Which certainly appeared to be strong, if Metal’s systems crashing had anything to say about it. He had never had such a horrible glitch in his functions.

But Metal could move fast. It was what he was very good at. And truly, he didn’t bother spending any more time to consider. His sight was locked on Silver—Silver, whose face was screwed up with an agony he could not imagine. Silver, whose side he was not currently by.

Metal dashed forwards. He cleared the distance in a mere second, legs folding so he could kneel beside the boy. So close to the vicious energy radiating off of Silver, his vision sparked, and his fingers twitched erratically. It mattered not. Silver was in pain, and Silver was Metal’s responsibility. Therefore, Metal had to do something. Quickly, too, considering he felt the energy creeping close to his form, eager to take hold of him as well.

The first thing the robot did was reach out, force his hand past the bright glow that surrounded Silver, and press his palm against the boy’s back. And that was all he needed to do. That alone was enough to make Silver’s eyes snap open, to cause him to lift his head and meet Metal’s cold red eyes with his own golden ones. His eyes were wet, and when a sob burst from his throat, the glowing teal burst as well. It dissipated into nothingness, and the four children surrounding them fell to the ground with different shouts. The younger ones were crying. The older ones were scrambling away from Silver.

By that point, the other villagers had drawn near to see what the commotion was all about. Metal caught sight of Skye’s mother rushing over to her son, hastily gathering him into her arms and moving away. She wore a face of fear and disdain, the focus of her emotions solely on the white-furred hoglet who still sat on his hands and knees before the crowd that was forming.

“We just started floating!” one of the other children shrieked, and then pointed at Silver. “It came from him! He made us float!”

Another child, a young girl, sobbed to her father, “It was so hard to b-breathe! My whole body felt stuck, and then I fell down, and it hurts…”

Silver, who was finally recollecting himself properly, looked around at the villagers before him. The villagers who were collecting their kids and backing away from him in terror. In anger.

“What are you?” an older man demanded, eyes showing alarm more than anything.

Metal’s attention was focused entirely on Silver as the trembling boy did his best to stammer out an explanation. But he had no explanation. Nobody knew what had just occurred, or the reason for it, or even how it was possible. Metal himself was still internally sorting through tabs of information, trying to put together his own understanding.

• ABILITY: PSYCHOKINESIS

That was what Sage’s notes had stated, alongside an identification, when Metal had first found Silver. Undoubtedly, the hoglet’s powers had just awakened, seemingly spontaneously. The poor boy was very obviously frightened by it, by what he had accidentally done, by what he could not yet control.

An elderly woman stomped forwards and pointed an accusatory finger at Silver. She turned to the crowd as she shouted, voice raspy, “That thing must be some… some minion of Iblis! The old stories were right; it must have come here to wipe us all out!”

There was a startled murmur among the crowd. Skye was clinging to his mother, refusing to look at Silver, just like the other children. Metal, upon hearing the outrageous words of the elder, scooted protectively in front of Silver. Shielding him from the villagers.

The villagers were too frightened to get any closer, to put up any fight. Iblis had done that over the years, had worn down the spirits of those who managed to survive, had instilled a permanent fear within them. Life was so fickle. There was no telling how much time one had left, so the prospect of suddenly losing what little they had built up was certainly terrifying for the villagers.

There was a tense silence as the group stared at Metal Sonic and Silver, bodies rigid and ready to run or fight if they had to, just waiting to see what moves the unlikely pair might make. They made no moves. Metal remained in front of Silver while the hoglet sniffled and wiped at his face, recovering from the burning pain that had just recently overcome him.

A bolder voice suddenly yelled out, “Get out of here! Take that thing away from us before it kills us all, whether it means to or not!”

While Metal despised being told what to do from someone who was not his creator, there was no reason to linger. The robot scooped Silver up into his arms, who made a miserable sound and clung on tightly, little arms wrapped around his shoulders. He was warm. He was shaking. Was his heart hurting for the friends he had made and then so quickly scared off? Metal had no way of knowing, and the boy didn’t seem particularly keen on talking at the moment.

Ensuring that he still had all of his rightfully-earned goods, Metal Sonic turned and left. He walked slowly, not wanting to catch Silver off guard. He had never liked doing things slow, but this new world was different, the circumstances were different.

Was Metal different now, too?

The villagers watched the robot walk away, hoglet held securely in his arms, items wrapped in the cloth he had initially used to hold Silver in when they first arrived. It was quiet, save for the increasingly distant murmur of the crowd behind them. What they were discussing, Metal cared not. His only priority was the little being in his arms.

When they were on the outskirts of the village, Silver sniffled and tightened his embrace on Metal. “Papa,” he choked out, voice pathetically small, catching on each syllable—a tattered piece of cloth dragged through the woods, snagging and tearing on the branches and rocks. A lone bird with a broken wing, left twitching and bleeding on the ground, unable to fly. A child who missed his family, his parents. A child calling out for anyone who might hear.

Metal Sonic froze for the briefest of moments, ears twitching and swiveling towards Silver before he continued walking back home. Home. Their home.

Those slim arms around his shoulders squeezed again. “Papa,” Silver wept pitifully once more, voice significantly more broken, face buried against the robot’s shoulder-plate.

[ Papa : one’s father. A man in relation to his child or children.]

Peculiar. Was that what Silver considered the robot? Metal Sonic was not a father. He did not have any children. Previously, the hoglet had seemed insistent on referring to Metal as ‘ma’, butchering his actual title. Where in the world had ‘papa’ come from? Between that morning and the current moment, the only thing that Metal could think of was the other children at the village. They must have assumed that the robot was Silver’s father, and Silver most likely picked that up from them.

Papa.

A father.

Silver’s father?

Metal Sonic was not Silver’s father. That man must have been cowardly and weak, abandoning his own offspring in a crumbling building. Or perhaps he had died. It was unlikely that Metal would ever find out the truth. He did not care to find out. It was entirely irrelevant.

Silver’s father. A father cared for their progeny, and Silver was not related to Metal Sonic in any way. Surely that entirely canceled out the prospect of the robot being the hoglet’s father. But it was Metal who cared for the boy, was it not? It was Metal who fulfilled the role of a ‘parent’ when analyzing his information on the word and what it meant. What it meant to be a parent.

What, exactly, did it mean to be a parent? Metal fulfilled all of Silver’s biological requirements. Food, water, rest, shelter. He provided the occasional story or lesson. That was all.

And yet, Silver had always been a clingy one. It was possibly due to the fact that Metal was the only other sentient being in close range for the majority of the time. The boy was content to hug the robot’s leg, to tug on his arms and latch on to him. There were some points where he even tried to climb him, much to Metal Sonic’s chagrin.

And, quite frankly, Silver the Hedgehog stared at Metal as if the robot had hung the moon and the stars. As if the robot promised to heal the planet for him, to force the grass to regrow, to quell the fires, to banish Iblis. As if the robot was the future, a good future, one that wasn’t ravaged by the Flames of Disaster.

It was strange. Metal Sonic was not a good future. He was not any future at all. If anything, he represented the failed mistakes of the past. Petty triumph in the face of a dying world. A forgotten form of mechanical workings, an art lost to time. A fallen hero and a fulfilled purpose. His future was just a dead end.

But that was wrong, wasn’t it?

Metal Sonic’s future was in the shape of a young, golden-eyed boy. A child who would grow to become something great, something to rival the gods. Someone who would right the wrongs of the past and bring forth the future he deserved.

At least, that was what Sage’s notes had said. And Metal was nothing if not a loyal brother, loyal to the Robotnik name itself.

If Metal Sonic could be considered Silver’s father, would that make Silver a Robotnik?

The hoglet in his arms shifted and squeezed Metal harder, as if trying to disappear from the world. The decision was instantaneous, then. Metal would carefully stitch Silver back together, would wipe him free of grime and sorrow. He would be the one to tenderly cradle him in his hands, little bird with a broken wing, and he would nurse him back to health.

And maybe, just maybe, he could be the parent for that poor, forsaken child. He could answer the forlorn cry. He could be there, always, offering support and comfort and whatever else. Anything else. It would not matter to the robot.

If Metal had to give up his own functionality in order for Silver to live, it was a decision he would not hesitate to make. His purpose had been completed. There was no true reason for him to exist in the new, broken world. All he had was Silver, and the day that Silver no longer needed him was the day that Metal Sonic would become entirely irrelevant. Forgotten. Trivial. Left behind.

An empty reminder of a world long gone.

Silver began to squirm in his arms, growing restless. They weren’t far from the base by that point. Careful to ensure his balance, Metal set the boy down on the ground. The hoglet immediately grabbed his hand. It was as if he couldn’t bear to be without some kind of contact for even a second. A way of grounding him, most likely; of tethering him to the moment and the promise of solace.

The two walked hand-in-hand. The quiet sat on their shoulders like a beloved cloak, worn and familiar; little fuzzies springing up from the fabric that couldn’t be picked away, not entirely. Small fragments of warmth that clung to them like the ash, like the soot, regardless of how no words were exchanged.

A sense of contentment, if just barely.

It didn’t last very long.

Metal heard it before he saw it. The thud of footsteps, steadily growing louder. A whoosh as the air was displaced to make room for a body, a body that was moving quickly, incredibly quickly, far too quickly.

It was a speed that could rival that of the robot’s.

Metal Sonic tightened his grip on Silver, preparing to swoop the child up into his arms, but it was too late. He was too slow, reflexes sluggish from the sheer amount of processing he had just done. Too slow. How laughable was that?

Silver let out a shriek of surprise as a blur of black and brown barrelled into him, grabbing him, ripping him away from his father. He screamed, reaching, writhing, unable to escape the arms that caged him. They were gone in seconds, the child and some mysterious cloaked stranger, fast as the wind.

Fast as the wind… There were only a small handful of individuals who could go so fast. The profiles were flashing before his optical sensors, rapid-fire. Metal Sonic and his organic counterpart were two of them. That left just a few options. Could it be that—

It was only a 30.29% chance. Not very high, although not entirely impossible.

But percentages and profiles were entirely useless at the moment. Completely and utterly irrelevant. Silver had been taken. Metal Sonic had lost his child . Plenty of organic creatures tended to go into something known as “fight or flight mode” in times of high panic and adrenaline. Metal was not organic, and therefore went into fight AND flight mode; in mere milliseconds, barely even considering it, he gave chase.

Because his child had been taken. Ripped right from his arms. Why hadn’t his hold on Silver been stronger? Why hadn’t he been more aware that they were being followed? Was it due to the fact that Metal Sonic was distracted by the prospect of being truly considered a parental figure? The mistake of letting his guard down was so horrifically egregious—if the robot had messed up equally as badly on a task his father had him do, he was certain that the doctor would have scrapped him for parts.

Metal’s jets were fired up. His fans were whirring, optics zeroed in on the small speck of color that was disappearing over the horizon. He locked his trackers to the heat-signatures, pulling up scans of Silver’s chaos energy for reference. It was potent. Unmistakable.

Metal Sonic shot after the pair, crossing the distance in a manner of seconds. The stranger noticed, and immediately sped up. Metal’s audio processors singled out the sound of Silver’s crying, and his engine flared with a burst of energy. He was closing in on them. If he could just reach out… grab hold of Silver’s arm… He was right there —!

Metal Sonic slammed face first into the dirt, arms wrapping around nothing. He skidded, rolling across the rocky terrain, paint undoubtedly chipping from the force of how hard he had hit the ground. His leg hit a rock, ankle busting with a deafening CLANG that echoed through the empty clearing.

There was absolutely no time to spare. Shooting up to his feet, Metal redistributed his weight to account for his busted ankle joint. He scanned his surroundings in rapid-fire, head swiveling 360°, scanners frantically trying to find a match for Silver’s chaos energy, his heat signature, the beat of his heart, anything .

There was only the distant howl of the wind, harsh and hot from the everlasting fires.

Chapter Text

Without meaning to, several panicked beeps escaped Metal Sonic. The robot pulled up his memory logs, still processing due to being so fresh, and replayed what just happened. He was absolutely certain that he would have successfully grabbed Silver back. He had been so close. The boy had been in reach. Such miscalculations were incredibly rare, if they even occurred in the first place. Which, of course they didn’t. Why would they? Metal was always certain in his assertions of any given situation.

The memory log played before his optic sensors, and the scene rematerialized before him; arms reaching, Silver screaming, mysterious stranger running. It was perplexing. The robot had gotten so close, he absolutely should have been able to reclaim his child.

But then the stranger shouted something. Metal knowed not what the word was, as he was too focused on Silver, and yet the most brilliant green flash had followed the exclamation. Both heat signatures had vanished in an instant. And Metal Sonic, too focused on Silver and not the stranger, had lunged at thin air.

It was completely humiliating.

Metal Sonic continued to spin in circles, studying the horizon, scanners working rapidly to detect something. It was pointless. Nothing was there. The two could have gone anywhere.

The robot picked a direction at random and bolted. Skidding to a rocky halt (due to the ankle issue), he conducted another scan. He was, yet again, greeted with no results.

Error warnings were flashing across his vision as Metal dashed to another spot, scanning once more, before repeating the process. His optic sensors were glitching as he went through scan after scan, all of them yielding the same infuriating result.

Silver was gone.

Silver couldn’t be gone. He was somewhere. He was just somewhere without Metal Sonic.

Another series of beeps spilled out of Metal, his head twisting this way and that. Silver had depended on him. The child’s safety, his happiness, his comfort, all of it had landed on Metal’s shoulders. And now he was missing, taken by a stranger, completely off of the robot’s radar. Metal hadn’t even gotten the chance to teach him proper self defense. What kind of a father was he? Was he even truly a father? A good father wouldn’t have let his offspring be taken away like that.

A good father also wouldn’t give up.

Metal Sonic’s ability to track chaos signatures could only go so far, but there were ways he could extend his reach. He was close enough to home, where all of the necessary tools and parts were. Conducting a search at random would only waste time. If he wanted to find Silver, he needed to be calculating about it.

Metal’s body whirled around, and he immediately rocketed off towards home.

***

Silver was more scared than he had ever been in his entire life. More scared than when his body had burned and everything around him had started floating. More scared than when the villagers had shunned him away. More scared than when the nightmares of flames and crumbling buildings crept up on him.

Because his papa wasn’t with him.

His papa, who had made the burning anguish stop. His papa, who had taken him away from the angry villagers. His papa, who had held him and rocked him and informed him that nightmares were just dreams categorized by terror and anxiety, and dreams were only hallucinatory perceptions that the brain experienced during sleep. Silver hadn’t understood half of the words. He had asked if his papa had dreams too. His papa had responded with a firm negative.

Sure, Silver’s father was… different. Different from himself and different from all of the other fathers he had seen in the village. The other kids he had met had asked him about it. Why was he so shiny? How did he speak without a mouth, and why did his voice sound like that? Where was his fur? Why was his skin so cold, his joints so weird, his eyes so dark? Why did his eyes glow, and why didn’t his expression change? Why didn’t Silver’s expression change much, either?

The questions had been uncomfortable. Silver knew his papa had his differences, but he was still a good father. Silver felt safe with him.

Silver did not feel safe with the strange and scary man who had taken him away from his papa.

Dressed in a raggedy brown cloak and the strangest shoes and gloves the hoglet had ever seen, the older hedgehog had Silver locked in place with his stare alone. His eyes were red! Sort of like his papa’s, but more intense. And he was clearly a hedgehog once he had dropped the hood of his cloak, his quills pulled back with a torn ribbon of fabric.

His quills were so dark that Silver wondered if he was covered in ash from the fires. His red eyes, however, matched the streaks of color that ran down the top of each quill. Silver had never seen anything quite like it. Not even in the village.

The older hedgehog was pinching the bridge of his muzzle, his face screwed up as if he were in pain. He had been asking a bunch of weird questions, and Silver didn’t know if he was answering them well enough, because his replies just seemed to make the stranger unhappy. Which, in turn, made Silver more anxious. The stranger’s voice was all deep and raspy, but still loud.

“I will ask this one more time,” he exhaled sharply, seemingly frustrated. “Why were you with the robot?”

“He’s my papa,” Silver replied with a trembling voice, for the millionth time, and the stranger breathed deeply through his nose again. Silver had to keep reiterating that Metal was his father, and for some reason, the older hedgehog was not keen on accepting that answer.

“How long have you known him?” Each individual word sounded like it had been begrudgingly spat out.

Silver thought about it for a moment. Finally, he answered, “Forever?” because that seemed appropriate. His memories from before his papa were dark and fuzzy, completely irrelevant. He should have removed them from his database, but for some reason, they stuck around. He wished he was as good at clearing his internal storage as his papa was.

Silver was brought back to attention by the stranger muttering something and pacing briskly. He looked so stressed. Silver didn’t get why. Maybe it was because he was so scary?

The older hedgehog paused again, regarding Silver with a keen gaze. It made Silver shrink back nervously. The stranger, very calmly and very steadily, asked him, “Do you know who I am, Silver?”

Silver’s processors must have been glitching, because he did not recall telling the strange hedgehog his name. Or perhaps his voice box was acting up. Sometimes his papa’s voice box would need repairs. Maybe Silver needed to repair his own. He didn’t know how he would reach it; he lacked an easily-accessible chest compartment like his papa.

The stranger was staring at him expectantly, and Silver fidgeted in his seat. “No,” he finally responded honestly. Almost as an afterthought, he added, “You’re scary.”

That made the older hedgehog frown deeply, but he didn’t appear mad. He was quiet for a moment, ruby-red eyes flicking all over Silver’s face. Possibly adding him to some facial recognition database? Silver had no clue, but eventually, he spoke again.

“I see,” he muttered. “I owe you an introduction, then. You may call me Shadow.”

Silver thought that the name “Mr. ScaryFace” would have been more accurate, but “Shadow” worked too. His fur was as dark as a shadow, minus the crimson striped quills. The hoglet was starting to doubt that the inky color came from ash alone.

Oh, Shadow was staring at him expectantly. Silver wracked his memory bank for the reason why. Finally, he awkwardly stated, “Hi, Shadow.” That seemed to be enough for the other hedgehog, who nodded and stepped back, arms crossed over his white-furred chest. Silver had a similar patch of chest fluff. He wondered why his papa lacked that particular trait. Or why he lacked any fur at all. Hmm…

With the stilted introductions out of the way, Shadow readily continued, “Has… your papa… ever brought harm to you?” When Silver’s brow furrowed, he tacked on, “Intentionally or unintentionally?”

“No,” the child was quick to respond. “He’d never hurt me. He’s my papa.” It was then Shadow’s turn for his brows to furrow, almost incredulously. Was that really so hard to believe, that his papa took good care of him? Maybe it was because he was so different from everyone else that Silver had met.

Shadow took another step back, casting his inquisitive gaze elsewhere. They seemed to be in some kind of secluded base, sort of similar to home, but less… sleek. There were no metal panels or walls lined with steel; merely smooth, dark brown walls that appeared orangish due to the light of a lantern. There were three of them, the lanterns. The small fires contained within them flickered and danced, and Silver found himself wishing they weren’t there. Fire was bad. Fire was dangerous. Fire had devastated their world.

Aside from the lanterns, the space was rather filled. Small, but very lived in. There was a rack on the wall that held various tools, mostly different kinds of knives. Some labelled jars on a counter. Folded clothes on an open chair, one that had been seemingly hand-carved. A worn journal beside a bag that was tied tightly. Silver distantly wondered what the bag contained, but he didn’t have very long to ponder it. Shadow was speaking once more.

Or at least, he was about to. He opened his mouth and paused, ears suddenly pricked. Silver kicked his legs a bit, confused as the older hedgehog’s eyes flicked around. Were his audio processors picking something up? Silver didn’t hear anything. Maybe Shadow’s hearing was more fine-tuned, or maybe he had gotten some sort of upgrade. Silver briefly wondered what his internal components looked like. He wondered what his own looked like.

The boy was torn from his thoughts when Shadow tensed, barked out “Shit!” and then moved directly in front of him, as if to shield him. Immediately after the change in position, the wall exploded with a thunderous sound, and Silver squeaked. He was promptly grabbed, lifted, and there was a whoosh of air. Everything was happening so fast! There was dust, and rubble, and Silver’s nose twitched at the smell of dirt and ash. In a mere second, Shadow had brought him outside.

Shadow enveloped the hoglet in his cloak, and Silver’s muzzle wrinkled as the smell of the outdoors was replaced with something much less pleasant. Sweat? Something vaguely musty? When was the last time Shadow had washed the garment, if ever?

The smell quickly became the least of his concerns, however. Silver yelped as Shadow took off, sprinting away from his little home at breakneck speed. He tried to yell over the sound of rushing air, “What’s going on?” but either Shadow didn’t hear him, or didn’t acknowledge him. The hedgehog just ran, weird shoes lighting up with a dreadfully familiar kind of light, seemingly propelling himself forwards. And in the distance, a blur of deep blue was chasing.

Silver’s heart jumped, and he squirmed in Shadow’s arms, trying to rip the stupid cloak off of him. The older hedgehog tightened his hold and ran faster, but Silver managed to get a better look.

Deep blue. Fast. Accompanied by a trail of blazing orange and a smear of muted red at the bottom.

Silver kicked to get Shadow’s attention, screaming, “Stop! That’s my papa, stop!”

Shadow merely growled in response, rearranging Silver so he wasn’t within kicking distance. Why was he so adamant on keeping Silver away from his father? The child felt frustrated, angry tears welling up in his eyes. It wasn’t fair. What right did this stranger have, keeping him away from the only person on the whole charred planet that cared about him? That loved him?

Metal had never stated his love for Silver, of course, but it bled through in his every little action. In every relayed piece of information from a world long gone, in every bedtime story, in every meal, in every scrap of protection and comfort offered. Silver’s books had taught him what familial love meant. His cognitive abilities were not impaired, and he could easily see how his books translated into the real world.

His papa loved him. He had to.

Abruptly, Shadow swerved, kicking up dust and rocks. Silver let out a yipe at the shock, blinking rapidly, optics watering. He barely had the chance to understand the sudden change in direction before it was happening again, and again, and again. The boy had no choice but to cling onto Shadow, fearful the other hedgehog might drop him and send him tumbling.

When Silver finally had the courage to look up, he was baffled at the sight of his father just behind them. He felt a faint pulse of pride in his chest compartment. His papa was so fast. His papa would save him and take him home, and they could just forget all about the strange, dark hedgehog holding him. His papa was so close to him, if only he just stretched out his arm, he would be able to reach—

Shadow swerved hard again, a sudden burst of speed launching him forwards. Further out of reach of the robot. Silver wanted to scream and hit the guy, but with the rushing wind and the tight grip around him, it would be pointless.

In a blink, his father was close behind once more. He reached, and Shadow leapt out of the way. Rinse and repeat, like some silly game of feline and rodent. The metallic hedgehog wasn’t even trying to bring harm to Shadow, his crimson gaze locked solely on Silver. His entire focus directed towards the hoglet being held away from him.

Shadow picked up on it soon enough. There was a curious glint in his eyes. The ebony hedgehog’s pace faltered for the briefest of moments, akin to a cardiovascular structure skipping a beat, and he mumbled something. His words, whatever they might have been, were swiftly lost to the roaring wind, a constant presence in Silver’s audio processors.

Shadow’s pace deliberately slowed, and by that point, Metal was easily matching his strides. When the robot swiped, he was reaching for Silver alone, and not the hedgehog that held him. With that realization striking, the peculiar hedgehog slowed further. It was a steady decline in speed compared to the initial sprint.

Metal Sonic lurched forwards in one last attempt to reach Silver, but still, Shadow held him away. When Shadow inevitably lost all speed and stood still, so did the robot. They were stuck at a stalemate, glaring each other down as if they could shoot each other with their hatred alone. A warped, even more pointless version of feline and rodent. Two cockroaches staring down the last piece of sustenance. Which was, admittedly, an odd comparison. Silver was not sure if he was edible, but he was certain that neither Shadow nor his papa wanted to eat him.

The silence was broken roughly five beats later, with Shadow grunting out, “You just want the child?”

Metal’s only response was the slight downward tilt of his head, red optics glowing brighter, sharpened claws twitching. A threat and a challenge all at once. Silver held his breath. Shadow frowned.

When the dark hedgehog loosened his grip on him the slightest bit, Silver seized the chance. The boy squirmed and kicked, hard, causing Shadow to grunt in surprise. He let go completely, most likely to rearrange his hold, but Silver bolted. He couldn’t run as fast as the other hedgehogs could, but he saw his papa standing there, and all he desperately wanted was to be with him. His home, his safety, the only one who would never leave him behind. Silver had nothing else, no one else, and he felt a buzzing beneath his skin, vision briefly tinted teal as a sudden burst of speed overcame him.

When he jumped towards his father, he didn’t take note of his airtime, or the weird, floaty feeling of displacement that overcame him. No, all he could think about were his papa’s arms, open and awaiting him.

“PAPA!” Silver cried, launching himself at Metal. The robot easily caught him, holding him close, scanning him to assess his condition. But he was fine, he was more than fine, because he was back where he belonged.

Shadow’s grip had been suffocating. Metal’s hold was comforting and familiar. Silver sniffled as he pressed his face against the robot’s shoulder-plate.

“You are unharmed?” Metal Sonic verbally checked, voice low and rumbling. Silver nodded with a little “uh-huh”.

“I don’t understand,” Shadow stated, tone soft in an odd kind of way, “why you would care. I had assumed you’d been powered down. Your purpose was fulfilled. What use is a mere hoglet to you?”

Metal did not give Shadow the grace of a verbal response. Shadow continued, voice growing a bit harsher, “Do you know who he is?”

Again, Metal refused to reply, save for a squint towards the other hedgehog. The other hedgehog, who was growing a bit more irritated as the seconds of silence stretched on.

“Fine,” Shadow eventually grumbled, one ear flicking. “From what I can discern, you are raising him quite well. I trust you know that this is not the only meeting we will have.”

That finally garnered a response, albeit still not a verbal one. Metal made a low whirring sound, dipping his head slightly. An acknowledgement, at the very least. Shadow’s brows furrowed. A tense moment passed before Shadow’s posture relaxed the faintest bit. Metal Sonic moved to turn around and begin heading back, ending the peculiar interaction.

The robot paused, however, at the slight shuffle of Shadow’s feet against the dirt. He cast a brief glance over his shoulder to see that the ebony hedgehog’s expression was strange, one of slight relief, of the faintest bit of hope and longing.

The parting words that the Ultimate Lifeform bestowed upon the one true Sonic were ones that he found himself internally replaying numerous times that evening.

***

Silver was prancing around in his new shoes and gloves, Metal watching from the corner of his eye while he worked to fix his ankle. The boy had regarded the garments cautiously at first, claiming that they were too restrictive, that they felt strange. However, upon realizing the protection they brought to his delicate palms and nimble feet, he gladly donned them. A new permanent addition to his appearance, much to Metal Sonic’s relief.

The second they had returned home, he had thoroughly interrogated Silver on everything that had happened. Silver told him everything, not a speck of fear in those brilliant golden eyes. He was completely at ease once more, surrounded by familiarity.

Shadow hadn’t been seen for nearly two hundred years, not since the world had come crumbling to an end. Metal had known not what had become of him in the time since, but clearly, the Ultimate Lifeform was living up to his name. There had been some tidbits here and there, scraps of gossip. A long, long time ago he had heard his father muttering something about humanity putting blame where there was none. There had been no time to ponder or tie things together back then. The world was ending, and it was ending swiftly.

Metal had scanned Shadow and compared it to a previous scan once tensions had considerably lessened. His internal components were all identical. Physically, he remained the same as ever; a time capsule, eternal and unchanging. However, it was clear that he had, in casual terms, “let himself go”. His quills were notably scruffier, chest fluff unruly. His dark fur lacked the pristine shine it once had, roughly two centuries ago.

Metal didn’t blame him. It was difficult to keep oneself clean in the current conditions.

It had been exactly one week, two days, two hours, 29 minutes, and 15 seconds since that fateful encounter with Shadow. In that time, Metal Sonic had adjusted his daily routine with Silver accordingly. That being, he put a new emphasis on self defense. The robot would sooner dismantle himself than let any other foolish creature attempt to take his child away from him, and if it came to that once more, he wanted Silver to fight.

The lessons began simple. Blocking and redirecting. The necessary procedures to follow in the event of an attack, expected or surprise. The precise way to tell the cardinal directions so that the boy may return home should he ever get lost. Simple, basic, essential for survival. Silver needed to become independent and strong sooner rather than later.

There was also one last thing of great importance to note: the emerging psychokinetic abilities within Silver. Those would need to be contained, controlled, wielded. There was no doubt within Metal’s mainframe that such powers would be of great use.

However, there came a single, glaring issue with such powers. Namely, Silver refusing to even acknowledge them. When the robot first tried to introduce it into their daily routine, a specific amount of time neatly blocked off for it, the boy huffed and turned away.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Silver mumbled. “I’m normal.”

Metal tilted his head. “Your psychokinetic abilities,” he reminded. “They materialized in the village we last visited. Do you not recall?”

The child flinched, very obviously avoiding his father’s inquisitive gaze. He said nothing. Conducting a quick scan proved that there were no cranial or brain injuries, meaning Silver’s memory was not impaired in any sense.

Metal waited for a response. He did not receive one, so he continued, “It will be greatly beneficial for the entirety of your lifespan. You must learn how to utilize it.”

Silver’s brow twitched, furrowing. His mouth curled into a grumpy pout. “I don’t have sai… sai-ko-ki-nee-sis. I don’t. I’m normal, like all the other kids.”

The robot paused. Silver was not, by any means, considered a regular individual. He was an outlier, a special circumstance, a marvel of nature. A culmination of horrible circumstances, the imbalance of chaos, and pure willpower alone. Silver was an enigma within society due to the mere fact that he existed. A child imbued with psychokinetic abilities, brimming with chaos energy… From the state of the world alone, it was an impossibility.

An impossibility that was now petulantly staring at Metal Sonic, arms crossed and uncooperative.

The robot briefly scanned through every potential reason the boy might be acting difficult. “Are your energy levels running low?” he questioned, but Silver still refused to make eye contact. Instead, Metal tried, “Are you displeased about our current agenda? It may be adjusted accordingly.” The only response granted was a slight grimace.

That left one last prominent possibility. “Is your trepidation and unease a result of the internal chaos-related pain that afflicted you upon the initial release of your abilities?”

That garnered an anxious look towards the robot, signifying that yes, the statement was accurate. Metal considered it for a moment, deeming it in accordance with what he knew of organic children. They were more susceptible to injury, and more likely to avoid anything that had the chance of causing pain.

However, if Silver were to fear his own capabilities, it would leave them severely underdeveloped. The chances for more chaotic ejections of excess energy would rise throughout his lifetime; it could potentially eat away at him from the inside. When Metal conveyed that information, the poor boy looked stricken with fear.

“Cease your fretting,” the robot immediately began to soothe. Such anxiety had the potential to be harmful for a child with immense power. “In learning to control your psychokinetic abilities, your chances of pain will drop to around .78%. This is crucial for your overall development, Silver the Hedgehog.”

“That’s a low percentage,” Silver acknowledged in a quiet voice, ears lifting up slightly. Metal knew the boy was convinced then and there.

Utilizing his notes from Sage, his observations, and the repeated scannings of Silver, Metal Sonic guided Silver through the harnessing of his abilities. They were a sight to behold, most definitely, something that even the robot could identify as “aesthetically pleasing”. The cyan glow that emanated from the child whenever his psychokinesis was in use reflected off of the surfaces of the room, shining on Metal’s forearms, brilliant as a sparkling gemstone. It was as enchanting as the Chaos Emerald of a similar color, that sparkling, alluring teal. Perhaps Silver had come into contact with it when he was a mere hoglet. Perhaps his mother had, while still carrying the child. Metal could come up with numerous different theories as to why, as to how, but he was almost certain that he would never uncover the truth.

The past was the past. The present was where Metal’s responsibilities lay, where his focus had to remain. The future could be thrust into jeopardy otherwise. Day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute. The robot’s world had narrowed down to one singular, wonderful being; the one creature that had never regarded him with distrust, hate, or fear.

His son.

And Metal Sonic would never let anyone take him away ever again.