"Nice house… or… nice lab? Tails," I said, slowing to a stop just inside the threshold as the automatic doors hissed shut behind us.
Calling it a room felt wrong. Calling it a building wasn't quite right either. The space sprawled outward in layered platforms and suspended walkways, each one cluttered with tools, screens, and half finished projects in various states of "this will definitely work" and "this might explode if you look at it wrong." It felt like someone had taken a suburban garage, duct-taped it to a NASA control room, and then handed the entire thing over to an eight year old with an unlimited credit line and no adult supervision.
Which, now that I thought about it, might be exactly what had happened.
A half dismantled Egg Pawn sat slumped against one wall, its once-pristine white armor scuffed and opened up like a patient on an operating table. Someone: almost certainly Tails. Had placed a bright, lopsided party hat on its head. A sticky note was taped to its chest plate that read: "DO NOT TURN ON (AGAIN)" in red marker, underlined three times.
Tails beamed at me, chest puffing up just a little. He adjusted his goggles with one hand while the other gestured broadly at the chaos around us. "Thanks! It's technically a classified research facility, but Sonic keeps leaving chili dog crumbs in the server racks, so I feel like secrecy's already kind of out the window."
"Hey," Sonic protested from behind me, already wandering toward a workbench. "That happened only once last week."
"And it caused a thermal cascade in the cooling system," Tails replied cheerfully.
"It only caused a tiny thermal cascade in the cooling system."
A holographic blueprint rotated lazily above a nearby table, its blue light washing over the surrounding tools. As I leaned closer, the image resolved into something that looked like a jet engine crossed with a toaster, complete with arrows, labels, and a warning symbol I didn't recognize but instinctively did not trust.
Somewhere behind us, a soldering iron popped, releasing a spark that fizzed out midair like a firework that had lost confidence.
I leaned back against a console, careful not to bump anything that had been labeled in Sharpie. The surface was warm under my gloves, thrumming faintly with idle energy, like a machine dreaming while it waited to be useful. The vibration crawled up my arms and settled somewhere in my chest, oddly familiar.
Tails' twin nick namesakes twitched, brushing the edge of a nearby toolbox. Not the excited, wagging flick I'd seen earlier, but something sharper. Calculated. His ears angled slightly as his gaze drifted from my face down to my hands.
"Huh," he murmured, crouching slightly. He pulled out a handheld scanner with a soft beep, sweeping it over my arms and legs. "These tread patterns aren't standard for Mobian hedgehogs. Heck, they aren't even standard for Mobian hedgehogs with high levels of chaos energy."
Sonic snorted, tossing a loose gear into the air and catching it again. "Buddy, when have we ever done that could even hope to be called 'standard?'"
The overhead lights flickered.
It was just once—but it was enough to make my shoulders tense. A low bass thrum rolled through the facility, vibrating through the floor and rattling loose screws in their trays. A few tools chimed together like nervous wind chimes.
Tails didn't even look up. "That's either the backup generator or the self destruct sequence."
I straightened. "Either?"
"We'll know in thirty seconds."
His tone was so calm, so practiced, that it took a second for the words to actually sink in. Sonic didn't even blink.
"Relax," Sonic said, spinning the gear on his fingertip. "It's usually the generator."
"Usually?" I echoed.
The thrum faded. The lights stabilized. Somewhere deeper in the lab, a vending machine whirred to life and dispensed a soda can with cheerful efficiency.
The PA system crackled, "Self destruct sequence canceled. Have a nice day."
Sonic flicked the gear back into a bin without looking. It landed dead center with a soft clink. "Told ya. Tuesday stuff."
I shifted my weight, feeling the unfamiliar give of my leg muscles—coiled, springy, built for speed I hadn't actually tested yet. The motion sent a ripple of sensation through me, like my body was quietly reminding me of capabilities it was eager to demonstrate.
The spring in my pocket pulsed warmly against my thigh.
Not randomly.
In rhythm.
Its vibration synced with the lab's machines, matching the residual hum of the generators like two metronomes locking into step. The sensation was… intimate. Less like carrying an object and more like sharing a conversation I didn't fully understand.
Sonic watched me with that sideways smirk—the one that meant he'd already noticed something and was waiting to see if I'd catch up. His foot tapped once against the floor. Not impatient. Anticipatory.
Tails circled me again, scanner chirping softly. "Your energy signature keeps fluctuating," he said, brow furrowed. "Like you're tuned to a frequency no one's broadcasting yet."
He stopped in front of me and tilted his head. "Ever done anything… strange?"
I opened my mouth to answer—and then hesitated.
Before I could decide how honest I wanted to be, the scanner let out a sharp series of beeps.
Tails' ears perked up. He tapped the screen, then frowned. "That's… very odd."
"Define 'very odd,'" Sonic said.
"Well," Tails replied slowly, "this reading shouldn't be possible at all."
That got Sonic's attention. He stopped leaning and straightened slightly. "You say that a lot."
"Yes, but it's usually in a very fun way."
Tails set the scanner aside and reached for another device on the workbench. This one was bulkier, older. The casing was scuffed, the screen cracked and held together by duct tape and sheer optimism. He wiped dust off the lens with his sleeve.
"Calibration's a little off,I should probably get around to recalibrating this" he muttered, mostly to himself. "But if this usually works…"
The device powered up with a series of erratic beeps.
He aimed it at my chest.
The second the beam touched me, the scanner screamed.
Not beeped.
Not chirped.
Screamed—high-pitched, staticky, like a dial-up modem choking on its own connection. The sound made my teeth vibrate and sent a spike of pressure through my skull. I clenched my jaw, fighting the urge to step back.
Tails winced, fumbling with the settings. "That's not—hold on—"
The noise intensified.
Then, abruptly, it stopped.
The lab fell dead silent.
The scanner's screen flashed once.
Then displayed two DNA helices side by side.
One was labeled: Subject NX-0
The other: Sonic (Baseline)
They weren't identical.
But they weren't not identical either.
Tails' breath caught. The scanner slipped from his fingers and clattered onto the workbench. He took a step back without realizing it, eyes darting between me, Sonic, and the frozen image on the screen.
"That's…" His voice dropped to a whisper. "That's not possible at all."
Sonic straightened fully now, all humor draining from his expression. He stepped closer to the bench, eyes narrowing as he studied the readout. "Define 'not possible,' Tails."
Tails swallowed. "Your genetic markers," he said slowly, reverently, "are reading as derived from Sonic's DNA."
The word hung in the air like a live wire.
"Derived," Sonic repeated. "As in…"
"As in," Tails said, barely audible, "you two are related in some way."
Sonic laughed once, sharp and disbelieving. "Okay. So what, we're cousins? Distant relatives? That weird thing where everyone's technically related if you go back far enough?"
Tails shook his head. "No. With how the markers align…" He leaned closer to the screen, tails swishing uneasily. "Part of Nox's DNA comes from you."
They both turned to look at me.
Really looked this time.
My stomach dropped.
Shit.
There it was. The moment I'd been half expecting, half dreading long before the scanner even started screaming. My mind raced, scrambling for an explanation—any explanation—that didn't involve saying hey, 'I'm from a universe where you're all fictional.'
Because that wouldn't just sound fucking insane.
Even by their high standards.
That would also just sound cruel.
I took a deep breath.
"Well," I said, forcing a crooked smile, "you do got me there."
Both of them stiffened.
It was time to come up with the best bullshit I could come up with on the spot.
"I honestly thought I could hide it for a little while longer." I rubbed the back of my neck, claws scraping faintly against my glove. "But yeah. Sonic… you are my grandfather."
The scanner hit the floor this time.
The clang echoed through the lab, sharp and metallic.
Tails' jaw dropped.
Sonic's ears flattened against his head like a startled cat.
But you know, as a hedgehog.
His mouth opened.
Closed.
Opened again.
For several seconds, no one spoke.
Finally, Sonic managed, "Excuse me—WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK?!"