#Harold's sweet sad face throughout breaks my heart

[poi-rinch-lover]

🥺🥺🥺🥺

Person of Interest 5.10 — The Day The World Went Away

[aquillis-main]

The First Meeting -- Sonic the Hedgehog Fanfic

After @darklightheart asked me if I would do a ‘first meeting’ for Sonic and Ovi in general, I decided to write this out for the Gamesverse in general (as I do plan on doing a version for the Pack AU in comic form, and I kind of don’t want to spoil that). However, I do wish to mention that the Pack AU may be linked back to the Gamesverse I’ve got in my head, so there will be mentioning of this in time.

Anyways, the fic in general.

I wanted to try a ‘second-person’ perspective, so there’s a liberal amount of ‘you’ throughout all of this. Just letting you know that the ‘you’ is referring to Ovi in this experience, and is not necessarily a ‘you’re part of the story’ like most y/n fanfics. Also, there’s a lot of self-loathing in general, so keep in mind of that.

Here’s the fic!

The wanderlust was kicking in again.

It was the same thing every time you thought about the circus’ offer lately – their offer to adopt you into their family. It was something that you wanted, ever since escaping the cage that your former home had turned into – one where love was as existent as the presence your father and your mother had been--

You need to remind yourself that it’s not ‘father’ and ‘mother’ anymore. It’s Harold and Marian now.

Your thoughts turn back to the wanderlust, the yearning to run again. You hate thinking about the things that make you sad.

It’s why you’ve never been open about yourself to the troupe in the first place.

You love the feeling they give to you – from the Greyone acrobat’s own affectionate fondness over you, the strongman’s love of dressing you up in beautiful dresses from his mother, the care of the knife throwers when you got nicked on one of their knives, to the ringleader himself when you broke your arm and couldn’t preform for a month. But since your powers activated after breaking your arm, the wanderlust has been building. Every time Yuna Grayone dotted over you like a mother to her child, your mind drifted over to mom – Marian doing the same when you were still bright eyed and thought Harold and Marian could do no wrong. Every time Jacob Greyone touched your shoulder to congratulate you, you couldn’t help but drift back to when Harold did that when you won that Matheletes competition. You hated that yearning to run back to the cold, dark place that became your prison, and you didn’t understand why you were wanting to go back.

You looked yourself in the mirror again – the accursed orange hair that signified your status as a Chaos being was still prominent on your head. You glared at your now red eyes – which had once been a pretty teal before your change – in disgust. Your canines were, sadly, still long as ever – a mockery of a human face with animalistic features –

No, stop that. You don’t need to put your genetics down like that. You’re not part of the Rich Fops anymore.

Yet the more you glared at your reflection, the more it sunk in that the raven-haired boy with wide blue eyes wasn’t coming back.

You hid better without looking like a scene kid.

“Ovi? Are you alright?” A soft, yet gentle voice came from behind you, taking you out of your malicious thoughts. You turn to find a sweet squirrel anthron staring with a sombre expression. Her bushy tail flickered left to right as her stark red glistened in the sunlight. She smiled as you came down to her level, giving her the respect you think she deserves. She smiles sadly, giving you a hug before kissing you on the cheek. “You know you don’t have to leave. You have a home here, with us.”

“I know.” You say, voice dripped with an emotion you can’t identify. Your heart screams that you need to go, but it wouldn’t be right to just… rush off without stating at least part of the reason to the one that helped you out. “My body’s just yearning for me to see the world, though… I really do want to stay…” You look to the anthron that had felt more like a mother to you than Marian had ever been. “I wish I never had gotten my powers…”

Your mother-figure gave you a glare that told you to stop wallowing that instant. “Ovi the Marvelous, you do not berate the gift that saved you. If it hadn’t activated when it did… I don’t think…” there were tears appearing on your mother’s face, obscuring her vision immediately from you. Now, that just would not do. You should be the one being upset, not her. How dare you.

You wiped the tears from her eyes gently, carefully bring her into a hug while you whispered multiple apologies into her fuzzy ears. No matter how much you did this, it always felt like you needed to step back and berate yourself for letting someone cry, no matter how often you felt like it wasn’t your fault. Soon, soft sobs turned to hiccups, and words became more clearer as she regained her senses.

“We may not be blood-related, but I still think of you as my son.” Mother – Yuna Greyone said gently, wiping what little tears were left after her wallow in the what-if. “I had hoped to meet someone as Marvelous as you are, and had hoped that person would see me as a mother.” She combed through your awful, disgusting free of knots hair, tracing the godawful K-shape that reminded you of the jail you once lived in –

“Ovi, I wish you stopped putting yourself down like that.” Mother said, snapping you out of your spiral of self-loathing. She explained when you looked at her curiously “You get scowly when you berate yourself, Ovi. Don’t think I don’t know my own son.”

“There’s a lot you don’t know about me.” You wanted to say, but instead keep your trap shut. You don’t want to dump all the things that you’ve been through onto your mother – especially not before your last performance with the circus. You nod instead, hiding your want to speak behind a smile. Your mother smiled as well, tilting your head to meet her eyes.

“Perfect. Why don’t you come to practice with us?” Mother said, changing the topic completely. “We all would like to have some time with you before you leave us, and it’s good to keep your skills sharp.” She pulls out of your grip, walking out of the caravan to join the others practicing. As much as you want to leave right now, you know it would be bad for the circus to lose one of it’s stars tonight – you’re up and centre in all of the posters, after all.

You decide it’s better to not go, instead joining your family during their practice. It’s a lot of tough work – making sure the routines are fully memorized, keeping the tools they needed sharp and useable, replacing the ones that weren’t. You were told off a few times practicing your special art, but you couldn’t help but keep that sharp. You’ve got it now, not like when you broke your arm…

The day passes, and the more time whittles away from the day, the more you feel horrible about the wanderlust controlling you – every time Yuna and Jacob look at you with misery, the way the strongman is trying not to cry as you perform, how the ringleader tilts his hat to hide the tears on his face, the looks the knife thrower and his partner give each other whenever they look your way…

You can’t help but feel like the monster you think you are.

The day turns to afternoon, afternoon turns to night, and you need a break before the big event. You sit outside of the circus perimeter, leaning your back against one of the poles marking the area. You look to the sky, seeing the two moons up in the sky with the stars. If you tilted your head right, you’d be able to see the two moons in your peripheral vision. But you’re more attentive to the stars, hoping to see a speck of Little Planet over the horizon…

“Hey.” A confident, cool-sounding voice appeared as swiftly as the sudden wind chill around you, causing you to shiver immediately. The guy suddenly vanishes, before appearing two seconds later with your jacket from the caravan. You look at him – a blue hedgehog with quills sharper than the knives you’ve seen in the knife-thrower’s collection. With shoes as red as your eyes, and gloves as white as the moon above you two, you can’t help but stare into the green that surrounded his pupils. The hedgehog chuckled, startling you out of your thoughts.

“Sorry, couldn’t help but notice that you seem troubled.” The hedgehog said, sitting down alongside you. The wanderlust grew erratic as the hedgehog sat down, crossing his legs under him. You somehow relax a little, leaning away from the pole. “Noticed you’re the one that’s front and centre on the posters here.” He made small talk, yet it didn’t feel like the tiptoeing you’re used to. You nod at the rhetorical question, not caring if it wasn’t meant to be answered. “I’ve been meaning to watch you in your performance. Seems like I keep managing to catch the last one.”

He seems lazy in his speech, yet also lively that you couldn’t help but snort a little. The hedgehog turned his head, a quizzing expression on his face as he looked at you. You smiled, trying not to show your teeth in the night. “You sound sleepy, yet you’ve got boundless energy in you.” You cleared up, with the hedgehog smiling at that. You two sit in silence for a while, just enjoying the stars without mentioning anything else.

You notice, without realizing, that you don’t feel as… disordered as you have been the past while. The wanderlust feels satisfied as you stay near this hedgehog, and you wonder if you’re sensing something that you’ve haven’t noticed. Realization occurs when you remember the sudden gust of wind that appeared with the hedgehog, and the two seconds it took for the hedgehog to get your jacket from the caravan. You’ve heard stories of towns being saved from the notorious Dr. Eggman by gusts of wind, destroying robots with a flare that only some acrobats would do. You look at the hedgehog, and you recall seeing him at some cities your troupe has visited. Many anthrons were in awe of the mysterious wind, yet here he was – sitting beside you like you were his friend, enjoying the stars without really talking to you. You settle back into silence, wondering why a measly runaway gets the pleasure to have the famous Sonic the Hedgehog in their presence.

At that point, the circus starts lighting up, taking the star’s light away from the night. It’s the one thing you never liked about the circus – it’s ability to take the natural glow of the stars away. You groan loudly, knowing that it was nearly time for the performance to start. No matter how much you love seeing the people smile at your performance, you still feared the eventual freak-out of them noticing your teeth up close…

“Hey, I think you’ll do good.” The hedgehog stated, confusing your groan to be stage fright. You shake your head at that as you stand up.

“It’s not the performance I’m terrified of, it’s more the introduction to the performance.” You state, getting up and showcasing that you’re not terrified of your last show. Harold’s words of ‘Show nothing but exuberating confidence’ crosses through your mind, and you inwardly roll your eyes that it managed to stick in your head. “I don’t… I don’t have the best looks…”

“Well, I dunno. You look pretty handsome.” The hedgehog stated suddenly, crashing everything in your head. All thoughts stopped in your mind, trying to comprehend what he had just said. You blush harder than Yuna’s red fur, looking at the hedgehog with a look of disbelief. He chuckled at your reaction, not realizing what he’s done to you. “Not used to being called that?” He asked carefully, restarting your brain and allowing you to make a good comment.

“Well, it’s more…” You realize that you can’t think of anything but the truth, and you note your brain’s crashed still in the ‘snark’ department. “…Yeah.” You lamely say instead, crossing your arms and pulling the jacket around you like a blanket. The hedgehog smiles, standing up and bringing his arms over his head.

“Ah, sorry.” The hedgehog apologizes, waving his hand in your direction. “Didn’t think before acting again, bit of an issue I have.” He seemed to not really be bothered by his ‘issue’, smile as lazy as it was when he was sitting with you earlier. You can’t help but smile as well, not bothering to hide your teeth this time.

“Nah. I… like it.” You decide to say, putting the hedgehog in a spot like yours. You couldn’t help but laugh as he faltered a bit, his physical flailing reminding how your mental flailing felt to you. “I haven’t had someone tell me that in a while.”

“Really?” The hedgehog recovered at your statement, looking into your eyes in disbelief. It felt… kind of strange, having someone sincerely complement you without a hint of snark or having you see the disgust on their faces. A bubbling feeling came into your heart, touched by the kind-felt words. You were about to reply to that, but then a grey squirrel come running up to you, panting a bit as he leaned on your leg.

“Ovi… There you are, ol’ boy!” Your father huffed out, his glittering costume reminding you immediately what brought him to look for you. You smile sheepishly as his dark-chocolate eyes glared at you while he recovered. “You’re sitting out here, not getting ready for your last show! That’s not –”

“What a Professional Performer does, I know.” You finish off, taking a moment to scratch the side of your skull. “Sorry, it’s just – it’s my last day, and –”

“I understand. We’re not hiding our sadness well, aren’t we?” Jacobs stated, getting to his tiptoes to look into your eyes. You somberly nod, scrunching down to his level so he doesn’t have to strain too much. Jacobs relaxed a bit, returning to the balls of his feet as he slapped his hand onto your shoulder. “All of us are sad to see you go, Ovi.  Most of us don’t understand this Chaos thing, but we do understand that some people just don’t fit in the circus.” He squeezed your shoulder, smiling softly despite his eyes betraying the sadness in them. You bit your tongue, not wanting to correct him that you didn’t want to go – after all, what is wanderlust but yearning to travel?

You turned, hoping to see the hedgehog again, but empty space greeted your eyes instead. Part of you felt upset that you couldn’t say goodbye, but then you couldn’t help but smile. “He’s going to be in the crowd, anyways.” You tell yourself, immediately turning back to your father-figure and smiling. “We should get going.” You suggest to Jacobs, whom smiles along with you as you get up. “I need to get dressed for my last performance. Why don’t you and Yuna go ahead?” You state, rushing off before your father-figure could comment on you ordering him around.

As you stated to Jacobs, you immediately got dressed into a wonderful blue leotard, with black lines going down your legs and sequins decorating the front of your chest like bird feathers in the afternoon sun. To complete the look, you brought out a cape that shined gold in the bright light. You couldn’t help but smile excitedly, rushing back toward the circus tent once you got everything together. Your act wouldn’t come on for a little while, as your act is the last one in the lineup. You decide to watch from the entrance, eating popcorn that you got from the vendor earlier. While you knew everyone’s routines from top to bottom, you couldn’t help but agree with the crowd when impressive feats happened.  You couldn’t help but laugh as the knife-thrower ‘missed’ his shot at the strongman, even though it wasn’t going to hurt at all if he didn’t. You stared, starry-eyed, when your father-figure and your mother-figure soared through the sky on the trapeze. And you couldn’t help but join in when the strongman lifted the entire troupe.

This would be the thing you’d miss the most about the troupe.

Eventually, your turn came around, and now you decide to show off your acrobatics. At first, it seemed that your routine is similar to the Greyone’s, you end up switching it suddenly – pulling off obscene tricks that even the most skilled of acrobats would give pause to try. You pulled flips while flying without a net, held on the trapeze with a single hand – all the while balancing your body on top of it while it was moving. You’ve stopped the trapeze in the middle of the act, then pulled out the silk trapeze and tied it to the handle. Making sure that it was tight, you gripped onto the silk and jumped.

Long as you’ve been alive, you’ve considered yourself a daredevil. You’ve jumped off of tall buildings when trying to learn parkour without thinking a few times, gone rock-climbing without a harness, and tried to convince Harold once to try paragliding in the mountains. Even now, the shock from the crowd excites you as you use your momentum to dance in the air. Making sure to keep a grip on the silk, you’ve dipped and glided throughout the act, showing off your control and elegance at once. The crowd was awed at your performance, mesmerized by the control you’re keeping. You then flip on over and – there, in your peripheral, you spot him.

Sonic the Hedgehog.

You note that he had two others with him – a yellow fox with two tails and a pink hedgehog sitting beside him – yet you were too focused on the hedgehog to even notice their expressions. The expression that the hedgehog had shocked you enough to falter a little in your performance, shocking the crowd and your former troupe at the same time.

He was bored.

He was bored.

He was bored.

H̷̨̠͌̐͜͝E̷͚̰͌͗͝ ̵̛͎̲̤͂̂̓͑W̵̮̠͋̄́̾̌͋̉̍̕͠Ą̷̲̝͚̲͎̜̀̋S̶̱̯̹̮̬̪͌͆̅̓̕̚ ̴̨̳̹̦̫̗͒̾̅͌̚B̷̯̣̦͔̫̣̫̽̊͂̾͒̾͊͘̕͝O̷̤̝̞̙̳͒̀́̽̏̾͌̚Ṛ̶̡͎̥̩͚̰̑͋͗͑̓̿̚͝͠ͅḚ̸̢̛͍̖ͅD̵̟̖̘͍͇͙̦̼̒̾̾̿́̿.

He had the typical expression of someone that wanted the whole thing to end, his head resting on his knuckles. Eyes half-lidded, it seemed he was more interested in sleeping than he was in watching in the performance, and it. Pissed. You. OFF.

(In hindsight, you don’t know why it pissed you off so much, as Sonic and you had only just met that night. And Sonic did admit that it was his only performance he got to see you in. All you know what happened was that you saw red immediately – and couldn’t stop yourself from what you’ll do next.)

You decided to switch up your plans right then and there, abandoning the slower, calmer bits with the more frantic, high-energy stunts you were told not to do. Throwing yourself back up to the trapeze (and amazing the crowd with just being able to do that), you rock the trapeze back and forth, keeping a hold on the silk trapeze as you do so. Once the trapeze starts rocking enough, you jump off the trapeze and glided along the silk. You flipped off that and caught the bar trapeze a few times, making sure to count the number of flips you did as you repeated the action. Finally, on the fourth, you decide to cut the silk trapeze off, letting it fall straight down to the ground.

Building a bit of momentum before you started this last bit, you smirked as you looked over, watching Sonic’s expression. You can tell he’s paying attention now, and you can’t wait to hear his excitement along with the others. Suddenly, you felt your powers bubbling inside you, your stomach burbling in excitement. You nearly panic, but quickly realize how nice it would be to use them in this final act. Your smirk increased.

As soon as the trapeze was near enough to the platform on the other side, you jumped off, allowing the momentum to take you to the platform. As you did that, you flipped once, twice, three times, four times before landing feet first onto the platform. Then you fell off the platform, shocking the crowd as you did the quadruple backflip as you transformed into a bird. You flapped your wings, saving yourself before you hit the ground. As soon as you’ve done that, you transformed back, turning back into your human form and taking a bow to the crowd.

The crowd roared with excitement, and all your thoughts before about your abilities washed away from you.

You think you’ll miss the crowd the most.

 --

 To be honest, you don’t think you’ll ever be as full of self-worth and love as you had been in the circus.

You don’t feel like a freak when you perform, nor did you ever feel like you stood out. You just were under the spotlight, never once feeling like you didn’t belong. The crowd never seemed to care when you transformed in front of them, thinking it was part of the act.

Your acrobatic parent-figures always warned you of trying the quadruple flip when you were younger, which you never really learnt to listen to. It was the reason why you got your powers in the first place. Your neck still pops when you stretch it along your broken arm. Even today, a whiff of you hoping to do that quadruple flip would get you into a lecture of them telling you to ‘not do that again’… Which you often nod and agree with, but never really consider.

Like the Chaos that runs through your veins, you can’t seem to stop yourself from wanting to try it.

The night turned into day, and now you’ve gotten your things packed. You’re wearing your less flashy leotard underneath your jacket, having just gotten another lecture on using the quadruple backflip. You listened intently, understanding crossing your face as you finally said goodbye to them. You hugged each one of them – the knife-thrower and his assistant, the strongman, the ringleader, and your parental-figures – trying not to show that you want to stay with them.

Their tears as you turned away was harder to keep away from.

You kept going forward, keeping the cash you got on hand. The money you took from Harold still lingers in your wallet, some of it having been used by a friend that helped you how to survive on the streets.

Their influence still sticks with you, even now.

Suddenly, a gust of wind brushed past you, causing you to turn toward where you know the hedgehog was waiting for you. You looked to his confident smirk, though you can tell that he seemed confused about your decision.

“You don’t look impulsive, Mr. Marvelous.” He stated, and some part of you felt that was wrong of him to say. ‘Marvelous’ was your stage name, not your actual last name.

“My Chaos tells me I needed to go.” You simply stated, keeping your face neutral. He already knew this wasn’t what you wanted, but you didn’t think it would be wise to reveal anything about yourself. You started to walk again, passing by the hedgehog and trying to avoid the inevitable questions that the hedgehog wanted to ask.

“If you want, you can join me if you feel like it.” Sonic’s voice caught you before you completely shut him out, making you pause. You turned toward him, bemusement gracing your features. The hedgehog shrugged, closing his eyes as he stopped leaning on the tree you passed. “I think you’d like Tails and Amy. They were really impressed with your show last night.”

You suspect that the two were the two people that were with Sonic last night, yet you also feel that he’s trying to make it seem like he was less impressed than he really was. You did see him gasp with the rest of the crowd when you fell, after all.

“Don’t lie, you were gripping the edge of your seat, too.” You winked at him, seeing him pause completely in his mind. Sonic smirked at that moment, tapping his foot as he sassily put his knuckles onto his hips.

“You. I like you.” He simply stated.

You couldn’t help but smile at that.