1 Body, 1 Soul, 1 Life, 8 Minds

Chapter 31

Third Person

It hurt.

Everything hurt.

Mainly his head, but still. Everything hurt.

The throbbing in his head wouldn't settle as he was forced to watch many flashes come and go. Some were so bright that it made his aching head pound harder. Why was he seeing such things? Why him? What was so special about him that this had to happen?

Too many questions, not enough answers.

Would Sonic give him these answers or was he forever to be kept in the dark until he died and became a reincarnation just for the same thing to go on a never ending cycle of unhappiness? Or maybe Sonic was trying to accomplish the same thing but in a different light... a menacing light full of evil- he shouldn't be thinking like this. But how could he think any differently? All of his life consisted of him looking up to the hedgehog as his best friend, his brother. But with the way the hedgehog is acting, he could only take all those good memories and chuck them out the window, never to be seen again.

Tails had enough.

It was high time he grew up and faced the cruel reality that was forced under his very noise.

As he recalled a time when he used to be too fragile to do anything, a flash interrupted his thoughts forcing him to watch the scene before him.

A figure clad in a black cloak was running through a forest occasionally looking back before slowing to a halt. The figure huffed and puffed, doubling over with one hand on a near-by tree and the other situated on a black covered knee. The figure looked behind themselves before letting out a sigh of relief. Once they straighten out themselves, the figure reached up to the hood of their cloak and let it fall. Their dark auburn hair swayed slightly from the light breeze while their light blue eyes surveyed the land before them. Never before have they seen something like this ever. It was like a dream come true. The figure stared in awe as they came up to touch the bark of a near-by tree. Feeling the roughness of the bark, the figure smiled and gave a small giggle. The figure couldn't help themselves into going up to each tree to see what they felt like but by the time they got to the fifth tree, they felt like they were being watched.

"H-Hello?" the figure asked out into the trees. "Is anyone there?" rustling from one tree caught the figure's attention making them jump slightly before subconsciously reaching down to pick up a near-by fallen branch and held it out like a sword.

"I know you're there. Show yourself! I'm, er, armed!" the figure watched as the tree swayed again then before the figure could blink, they yelled out in shock while falling backwards as whatever was in the tree, leaped out at them. The figure tried to scamper away but when they looked back at what had lept at them, they could only blink. Right before the figure was a small miniature fully blue bird. The bird was hoping up and down over the ground as a worm came out. Not wasting a second, the bird scooped the worm up with its beak and swallowed it whole. The figure tensed slightly as the bird looked at them. The bird's head cocked to the left then to the right, hopped a little forward then deeming that the figure wasn't a threat, flew towards the figure and perched on their head. The bird puffed up it's feathers to get all comfortable making the figure chuckle.

"Come here little- ow!" the figure tried to reach up towards the bird but said Mobini peeked at their hand. The figure frowned then reached up towards the bird to try again while speaking soothing words while also getting peeked at like crazy. "Hey, hey, I'm not going to -ow- hurt you. I'm just -ow- trying -hey- to -uh- help you." Once the figure got the bird off their head, they held the bird in their hands watching as said bird looked up at them annoyed for taking it away from it's comfy spot. "Hey, aren't you a flicky?" the figure smiled brightly as they recognized the species the little Mobini was. "Wow... I've read about flickies before but I've never seen one up close!" The figure moved one hand away to start petting the flicky which made said bird flinch slightly then slowly move it's head so the figure could get a better angle making the bird make a subtle 'coo' in pleasure.