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Knuckles doesn't understand.
What do the blue and red lights mean?
He doesn't understand.
Those sounds - like a war cry. They come from the same vehicles as the lights.
He doesn't -
Why had Tom screamed when Knuckles touched him? He hadn't meant to be threatening - the opposite was his intention. Instead -
"How could you do that?"
Sonic had yelled at him. Sonic had hit him - the same way Knuckles had done to Tom, the way Robotnik had done to Knuckles - but his expression wasn't one of love, as Knuckles had expected. It was an expression of anger.
It looked too much like himself for Knuckles' liking.
So instead of attempting to make sense of the situation, he'd run away. Off into the woods, like a coward. Like he'd done when he was little, running from the fallen bodies of his tribe as if their spirits would crawl from the ground for revenge son, why didn't you save me?
But this wasn't the same. These people weren't his family. He'd gotten too comfortable in an unfamiliar world; of course he'd done something wrong.
He'd hurt someone else.
"Stupid," he exclaims, in his mother tongue. Then, reaching around himself, he grasps into the darkness. Curse his lack of foresight.
In the distance, behind him, the red and blue lights can still be seen. The war cries can still be heard. And with a lack of other options, the echidna burrows into the wet ground to find shelter for the night.
~ ~ ~
Knuckles doesn't know what to do. This is a new experience to him in itself. His whole life he's had one objective: to find the master emerald, to regain the master emerald, to protect the master emerald.
But now. Well he'd left it behind. He can imagine it, right in the spot he'd left it, tucked into his temporary bed (a 'sleeping bag' they'd told him) and unaware of Knuckles' absence. Or probably unaware. He is still unsure of its full potential as a sentient being.
He knows he must continue to protect the emerald. How to do so is the correct question. Buried underground, alone and in the dark, Knuckles is unsure if he's fit to be the guardian. Perhaps it'd be better left to Sonic -
"You hurt him, you big idiot -"
"Urgh!" He punches the ground. At only a quarter of his strength, the ground trembles and parts beneath his fist. The hole he's dug himself has become bigger.
"Knuckles!" The voice from above is entirely unwelcome and yet - something about it calms his racing heart. "Knuckles, I know you're here, I just heard you! My tracker says -"
Knuckles' punches his way to the surface - one thrust, that's all it takes. Tails leaps back, startled. "What is it that you want, Fox?"
Tails gulps nervously. The tracker in his hands beeps incessantly until he flips a switch. And then he keeps flicking switches, anxiously fiddling with the invention. "I don't - I don't really want anything."
Knuckles crosses his arms. He's in no mood for difficulty in speech. "You would not have come searching for me if you had no need. Now be clear with me. What is it that you want?"
Tails sighs. His eyes find the ground and - what is he doing? Has he no idea that making oneself small like that is dangerous? "I - I wanted to see if you were okay. You ran off yesterday and - I know we've only known each other for three days but I thought we were becoming…friends."
Knuckles narrows his eyes. "Yes. Well I thought so too."
Tails 'eyes widen in alarm. "Really?" He takes another step towards the warrior, tentative and yet entirely confident at the same time. Knuckles has never seen someone look so weak and so strong at the same time. He hadn't thought it possible. "Well then can't we be? Friends, I mean?"
Knuckles frowns. "Friends are. I've been told friends are…unnecessary."
Tails' eyes are blue, Knuckles realizes, as he peers up at Knuckles. Blue like the sky above Angel Island, like the lagoons below. Blue like the hole he'd dug himself. Blue like sadness.
"But perhaps…I've been told wrong?"
Tails lights up. He takes flight, traversing the last few feet between them to grab Knuckles' hands - as well as he can with as small as his are. His blue eyes now more resemble the Earth's skies, or the clear Hawaiian waters where he'd first met Sonic. Blue like hope.
Tails smiles, wide. "Can you come home?"
Knuckles frowns. "Am I still welcome?"
Tails nods fervently. His bangs bounce delightfully with the movement of his head. "'Course you are! C'mon," and Knuckles is dragged along by the flying boy, back through the woods he'd traversed in the darkness, now illuminated in the light.
~ ~ ~
He'd broken Tom's arm, Knuckles is told the next hour. Maddie says it gently, as if he is not to blame for the damage.
Sonic is not so hesitant.
"Why did you do it," he mumbles. His eyes won't catch Knuckles', but the reflection is there, in the glass table the four of them sit around. Tom is not present. Tom is at the 'hospital.' Knuckles does not know what a hospital is, but he assumes it is like a medicine tent.
"I thought it was a sign of love," he explains. "That is what Robotnik told me."
Maddie furrows her eyebrows. "He told you…hitting someone is a sigh of love?" She leans in, and Knuckles can smell the scent she wears. Sweet and thick, it confuses Knuckles' senses. But beneath that is her - natural, refreshing. Like grapes. It clears Knuckles' mind as he answers.
"Yes. He often did that - hit me, I mean. I was offended at first, that he should think me weak enough to be bested by a blow such as that. But he explained that it is a sign of love on Earth. I thought - I thought Tom had rejected my admission of admiration. I see now that…that was yet another lie." Knuckles averts his gaze, flexing his hands beneath the table. Watching them through the glass is surreal - they are his, and yet they are separate. Weapons of mass destruction. They that are used to dig his hole.
Sonic grasps his hands, lifting them above the table - out of his hole - easily. "I'm sorry. I should've realized…Eggman is the first human you ever met. That's not a good impression. Trust me. Not all humans are that. Not all beings are like that."
Knuckles peers around the table. Maddie, Tails…Sonic. They aren't like that. "I see."
Sonic doesn't release his hands. Instead, he tugs them closer. Knuckles braces himself, prepared to be pulled into a fight, to be slammed against newly shattered glass. Instead, his cheek meets soft muscle, held against Sonic's shoulder. It's an awkward position. Sonic is smaller than him, and yet determined to be in the taller position. Knuckles can't say the experience is unpleasant, though he has no idea what it means. He does remember, however, seeing the four of them perform this ritual as he gathered the crushed gray pieces of the emerald. They had seemed happy, at the time.
"What is this," he asks, voice quiet against Sonic's shoulder. His own voice surprises him. Why does it sound so weak? Why does his own voice betray him so?
Sonic's voice is a light in his dark hole, illuminating what he could not at first see. His arms tighten around Knuckles, acting for all the world as if he should never let go. As if he should never have to leave as Knuckles' father once had. What a lie. But for this moment, Knuckles allows himself to believe it. "This is how humans show love. How beings show love. I love you Knuckles. I love you, brother."
Knuckles feels his cheeks dampen as two more pairs of arms conjoin around him. "What about Tom," he gasps. "Will he be alright? Will he forgive me my mistake?"
Maddie gasps - a sort of half chuckle, wet with tears. "Oh honey, he already has."