And the next morning, Sonic woke up.

He was blinded by light streaming in through a window on the other side of the room. Despite the curtain, the sunlight immediately knocked him out of his sleep.

His eyes still ached dryly. As much as he tried to turn away and ignore the light, it was keeping him up…

He thought of getting up to see if he could close those curtains more. But as he tried to pull himself into a sitting position, his entire body ached down to his bones and he remembered his condition. He couldn't remember if it had been this bad the night before.

He glanced around as the events of last night slowly came back to him, but his eyes were too tired to see, they passed over the room around him almost entirely. and he gave up trying to get up. He glanced at the clock.

It was really early. In fact, it shocked him since the sun was up. How could it possibly be 4 AM? It was probably sunrise.

He could do nothing but lie down and think.

It was, in truth, so difficult to adjust to the real world. He only briefly noticed that he was half asleep.

This body stung and felt so heavy and this place felt unsafe.

He could only vaguely remember that painful dream he had, and the time he spent caked in weightless liquid, he remembered it as being slow, silent, and nauseating. But here, theoretically, he could go fast...'Right now, that's not a good idea.'...

For a second he was asleep again but he jolted out of it by his own thoughts.

He was stuck here. For now. What on earth was going on? What was he going to do now?

His options weren't clear.

Though he assumed he could stay with the Freedom Fighters or perhaps go off on his own somehow. But in the state he was in, that couldn't happen. This iteration of the Freedom Fighters was militaristic. It wasn't going to work for him to stay. On the other hand, this was where all his friends were.

He found himself drifting off into a light sleep.

This place was peaceful enough. And it was completely silent.

Barely 10 minutes had passed.

The door slid open.

The blue hedgehog opened his eyes to see who walked in.

He flinched somewhat when he saw the pink hedgehog in a navy blue blazer who stepped in. She still had that air of authority, and her glare was still unwavering. He was trying to forget about what happened with Amy.

"You're up early." He said to her. "It's only four AM."

The girl glanced at the clock.

"That clock is wrong." She stated.

"Oh." Sonic responded. He had no idea what time it really was, then. "Could you close those curtains?" he asked.

"I've come to offer you a deal." Amy closed her eyes and walked closer to the foot of the stretcher, Completely ignoring his request. "We will oversee your rehabilitation. I have agreed to provide for you until you recover. Under the condition that you don't interfere with any of our business."

"That's all? I have no interest in messing with you in the first place."

"I mean it. This means you can't go out or be careless at all. In fact I would discourage you from thinking of yourself as having anything to do with the Freedom Fighters." She was keeping her gaze steady, staring him down yet again. This time though, she wasn't being so aggressive. But that didn't make matters much better. She sighed and smiled to herself. "I'm letting you know now that as of 6 years ago you were officially let go from the Freedom Fighters. You have no business here."

Sonic scowled. So they kicked him out, huh?

"you should be thankful." She continued "Back then there were some strong arguments that you should be branded a public enemy." She looked at him expectantly.

"What do you want from me, an apology? A thank you?" he was getting fed up with her treating him like this. She noticed. And she shifted her expression and narrowed her glare on him.

"I'm expecting for you to understand the gravity of what you've done."

"What exactly did I do?"

"behaving carelessly and underestimating your circumstances. You didn't think about your situation. And you didn't consider who was relying on you."

"I made one mistake!"

"you made a critical mistake! And you weren't in such a position to make such a mistake!"She walked up to the side of the stretcher.

"you know for a fact that this wasn't my fault, Amy!"

She grabbed the side of the stretcher, she wasn't really yelling, but she was raising her voice and burning a glare into his eyes.

"You are not in any position to be calling me 'Amy'! You are my enemy!"

"enemy!? Amy you're being ridiculous. It was an accident!" Sonic started yelling in response. His voice ached.

"10 years of war is not an accident! Countless have lost their lives because of you and your absence." Amy stood up straight.

"I didn't have a choice! If I could have, I would have come back!"

"But you could have! How do you think you got rescued?! You were the one who chose to wake up!

You only believed you didn't have a choice."

"I…"

Damnit.

He couldn't remember.

"Are you satisfied now? Do you understand what you've done?"

He didn't. He really didn't. But he got the feeling Amy wouldn't stop yelling and badgering him about it until he stopped fighting. He stayed quiet.

It seemed he had appeased her. She calmed down, eased off, back away, and changed the subject, turning away from him.

"That commotion you caused in town caused quite a stir. We're unsure what to tell everyone.

Mostly people were just surprised. Everyone forgot about Sonic the Hedgehog." She took a sideways glance at him.

Somehow that really stung. He hoped Amy wouldn't notice that he tensed up. But oh, she did. She let loose a malicious smirk.

"It's been years since anyone's even asked about you. I don't remember the last time I heard anyone talking about you.

Other than perhaps… I think someone once expressed that they were glad that I was so unlike Sonic the Hedgehog.

Other than that. Everyone sure is willing to forget. Of course, I'm no exception.

So don't worry, I'm sure they'll forget about you and your embarrassing little incident sooner or later."

He cringed again as he remembered throwing up in the town center. Everyone looking at him with anger and disgust… he felt weak.

"Is that true… you forgot about me? Everyone Forgot about me?" he hadn't meant to say that out loud, really. Amy's sinister grin widened as she exacted her revenge.

"That's right, not a murmur about you for more than 5 years. We gave up on you.

You let us down, you're unnecessary and you disappointed us."

She leaned in closer so she was towering over him. "Are you getting this? Do you want me to spell it out? We don't need you anymore." Sonic stared sideways at the pillow, avoiding looking at her " Once you have enough meat on your bones, I would encourage you to leave this place. Or, die." She was staring him down "whichever you prefer.

Your other option is to stay with the Freedom Fighters."

Sonic turned his head to her aggressively.

"oh, I can assure you, I'll be out of your hair. I have no interest in helping you or the Freedom Fighters.

You can go ahead and tell anyone who asks that Sonic the Hedgehog is not staying with the Freedom Fighters and in fact, has rejected them entirely. Sonic the hedgehog is free, outside the city, who knows where he is or what he'll do?

That will be true enough in time anyway, General Rose." He scowled at her.

"Good to hear that.

Thank you for thinking of the public image of the Freedom Fighters. It doesn't look good for us to be associating with a public enemy." She seemed to relax for a second, backing off and lowering her voice.

"I wasn't thinking of your image, I was thinking of mine. But whatever helps you sleep at night, my Princess!" he smirked.

She sneered, as if she was going to spit at him, but she scoffed and turned away, trying to brush it off. She walked toward the door. And she waved dismissively, not looking back at him as she walked through the doorway.

So that was that.

Goodbye Freedom Fighters.

End of chapter 8

hey all, sooo, you may have noticed the next two chapters were actually deleted, that was by me, don't worry.

a review (by Roxa814, thank you by the way!) pointed out that going on hiatus with the last two or so chapters lacking any actual progression... yeah not a great idea, and i completely agree.

so i tried to write continuing the little arc i was planning to do, so in the very least i could put up something more interesting, but instead i wrote myself into a corner, so yeah, double whoops.

the hiatus i still on since i need to reroute the story slightly, plus ive been more busy as of late, despite it being summer vacation.

speaking of, i hope everyones having a good summer!

see you when i get back on track!