The sci-fi beam fractured—splitting around me like water does around stone.
The blast tore into the ground right behind me, detonating in a violent eruption that shook the plateau.
When the light faded, I was somehow still standing.
Smoke curled from my hands.
My fur stood on end.
Sonic stared at me.
Eggman stared at me.
Even the drones paused, optics flickering in confused recalibration.
"…Fascinating," Eggman whispered.
I slowly lowered my arms.
My hands were shaking.
But I was still me.
Sonic stepped up beside me, eyes wide but grin slowly returning. "Okay," he said softly. "That was cool."
I let out a breath I hadn't realized I'd been holding. "I did not plan that at all."
"Doesn't matter," he said. "You did it anyways."
Above us, the hovercraft's energy core flickered erratically.
Gold light began to shimmer at the edge of the plateau.
Silver's voice echoed faintly through the distortion.
"Sonic!"
Eggman snarled, slamming controls again. "RETREAT! RETREAT!"
The hovercraft began ascending rapidly, engines roaring as it pulled back into the clouds.
Sonic crouched slightly, ready to chase.
Then he looked at me.
I swayed.
Just a little.
He straightened.
"Next time, Eggman!" he shouted instead.
The hovercraft vanished into the sky.
Silence fell heavy over the battlefield.
Broken machines lay scattered across scorched stone. Smoke drifted lazily upward. The ocean continued crashing below, indifferent.
Sonic turned to me fully now.
"You okay?"
I looked down at my hands.
No claws.
No fur distortion.
Just faint scorch marks.
"I think so," I said.
The golden shimmer intensified behind us as Silver's teleportation signature fully formed.
And as the light washed over the battlefield, I realized something quietly terrifying.
Eggman hadn't just attacked.
He'd tested.
And whatever he'd seen when that beam hit me?
He liked it.
And that one single fact scared me a lot.
"So," Sonic said casually, kicking a smoking robot arm aside, "we should probably figure out what Eggman meant by 'destabilize' before he comes back with bigger guns." He stretched his arms behind his head like we'd just finished a casual jog instead of surviving orbital bombardment.
The golden light behind us solidified into Silver and Gold hovering mid-air, Silver's eyes darting between the wreckage and my slightly singed fur. "I leave this time period for *one hour*," he muttered, rubbing his temples. A broken drone beeped pathetically at his feet before short-circuiting into silence.
"Hey, Silv!" Sonic grinned, giving a lazy two-fingered salute. "You've almost missed the fun—unless you count Eggman trying to microwave my grandson here as 'fun.'" Silver's expression flatlined.
Gold drifted closer, tilting her head at me with almost child like wonder.
Despite this being the second time we've met.
I slowly raised a hand in greeting—my stupidly deep voice sounding even more strained than usual. "Uh. Hi." Gold blinked twice, then reached out with a single finger and poked my nose like I might be an illusion. I sighed. "Yeah, I'm real. Unfortunately." She gasped and clapped her hands together, floating an inch higher in excitement.
Silver groaned louder. "Sonic. Explain. Now. What's Eggman doing this time?"
Sonic shrugged—one shoulder lifting in that infuriatingly casual way that meant *everything* was either fine or about to get way worse. "Eh, y'know Eggman. Saw something shiny, tried to grab it, failed spectacularly." He nudged a smoking robot carcass with his foot. "Standard Tuesday."
I cleared my throat—which, thanks to my stupid edgy voice, sounded like a motorcycle trying to start in winter. "Technically, he called me a 'temporal anomaly' before shooting me with what I can only describe as a *delete button*." Silver's quills bristled visibly at that. Gold gasped again, clutching her cheeks like I'd just announced the plot of a particularly good and dramatic soap opera.
Silver pinched the bridge of his nose hard enough to leave marks. "Okay. Let's get this fight over with then." He all but groaned, floating slightly higher as Gold clapped excitedly—clearly thrilled at the prospect of impending chaos. The golden shimmer around them pulsed brighter as Silver summoned his telekinetic energy, casting eerie shadows across the wreckage-strewn battlefield.
I took a deep breath—inhaling that weirdly nostalgic mix of grass and ozone—and immediately tripped over my own damn scarf. Faceplanting into the dirt, I groaned into displaced soil as Silver sighed audibly above me.
Doctor Eggman then appeared in some type of egg shaped hover craft and began to fire lasers at me and Sonic. "I'll get you next time Sonic!" He yelled as he flew away.
Welp...
That just happened I huess.
Silver's eye twitched so hard I could hear it. "Sonic," he said, voice dangerously calm, like a bomb technician explaining why you shouldn't lick the wires, "Now we can talk about what how you've somehow already influenced my original time 200 years from now.
I rubbed my temples, my claws scraping against my forehead. "Wait—so in the future, I somehow have already altered it to the point where Silver's time has changed? That makes literally no sense. I've just been following Sonic pretty much." Silver crossed his arms, floating slightly higher as Gold nodded enthusiastically beside him.
Silver sighed. "Temporal mechanics rarely do."� out of nowhere—which is why I usually just punch things until they make sense." Gold giggled, twirling mid-air like this was the best field trip ever.
I scratched my head—a terrible idea, given the claws—and winced as my stupidly deep voice rumbled out: "Okay, but hypothetically... what could I possibly do to the point where your future is unrecognizable?" Silver's expression darkened like I'd just asked him to explain taxes.
"I don't know, and Gold can't tell any of us because since I'm staying in this time it would alter my future as well." He said somewhat annoyed, but still rationally understanding. I groaned, rubbing my face—which still felt weirdly angular and edgy. "Great. So I'm basically a walking temporal landmine." Sonic clapped me on the shoulder with enough force to make my teeth rattle.
"Relax, kid! Worst case scenario, we reboot some part of the timeline again. I've lost count how many times we've done that." Silver just looked like he wanted to strangle something at that.
Preferably Sonic if I had to hazard a guess.
Gold suddenly gasped, her golden eyes widening as she clutched her head like she'd just remembered something vitally important—or accidentally left the stove on two centuries from now. "Oh no no no!" she blurted, floating erratically in circles. "I was supposed to—the portal—future me is *so* grounded right now!" Before anyone could react, she grabbed Silver's arm with both hands, her voice dropping to a dramatic whisper. "Silv, I've *gotta* go. Like, *now*-now. The paradox butterflies are starting to hatch." Silver didn't even argue, just sighed and summoned a telekinetic bubble around her.
I took a step forward—inhaling that weirdly nostalgic mix of grass and ozone—only for Gold to suddenly dematerialize in a burst of golden light, leaving behind the faint smell of burnt toast and existential dread. Silver rubbed his temples like he was mentally calculating how many temporal violations this trip had just racked up.
"Right," Sonic said, scratching his chin. "So. Grandkid time-travel shenanigans. Classic Tuesday." He turned to me with a grin that somehow made everything worse. "Congrats, Noxxie! You've officially messed up the timeline so bad someone besides Silver panicked. That's, like, a family record."
The wind picked up, carrying the distant sound of Eggman's retreating hovercraft and the faint *boing* of a spring somewhere. My tail twitched involuntarily—still not used to having one—as I stared at the spot where Gold had vanished.
"So," I said slowly, "I become a big shot in the future somehow..."
"Don't we all?" Sonic joked, tossing a pebble into the air and catching it effortlessly. "Trust me, kid—if anyone understands time paradoxes, it's me, Silver, and Shadow. Just ask Silver how many times we've had to fix alternate futures. Actually, don't. He might cry." Silver shot him a glare that could melt steel beams.
I rolled my shoulders—still weirdly broad and muscular for a hedgehog—and tried to ignore how my stupidly tight pants were now permanently fused to my thighs. "Okay, so where is Shadow anyways?"
Sonic tapped his chin. "Eh, probably brooding on a roof somewhere. Or punching Eggman robots. Or blowing up stuff with Omega, why?"
"Why not? If I'm going to be in this time, I might as well get familiar with my new allies," I muttered, rubbing my forehead—then freezing when my claws scraped against my skull.
Right.
Still an anthropomorphic hedgehog.
Still edgy.
Still very much stuck in this nightmare(?).