Come Together, a Tails fanfic

What's Going On? (Tails)

I still didn't understand how I'd gotten myself into this other world and knew Sonic wouldn't have managed to find me on his own. I thought of Vector and his smarts, but then I realized that he would have probably tried to keep Sonic from going (the fact that I've been gone this long would have made him think that I was either dead, which would have utterly destroyed Sonic and thus compelled Vector to keep him from finding out, or enjoying it wherever I was, which would have made him try to keep Sonic away so he didn't ruin it for me). But I knew he would have missed me, and that could have been his motivation to help Sonic find me.

All these thoughts were rushing through my head as I almost flew towards my former best friend, mixing with an almost overwhelming number of questions as I got closer. Why is he here? I wondered. Did he miss me? Is he here to apologize or just to convince me to come back? I almost couldn't focus on where I was going.

Actually, I definitely couldn't focus on where I was going. I ran right into Sonic, landing both of us flat on the concrete.

"Tails? What are you doing?" If Sonic was in pain, he wasn't making it obvious. He'd managed to almost catch himself and was already standing back up.

I hadn't been quite as lucky. Or, well, I wanted to make him think that. I wanted to see if he would ask if I was okay or not, maybe even help me up. It was a test, and he was failing it.

"What do you mean 'what am I doing?'" I asked him after deciding it had been long enough and getting off the ground.

"Why did you run into me? Who are they, and why were you with them?" (He gestured in Lusius's direction.) "And... what are you wearing?"

"I ran into you because I was thinking about how you might have gotten here and not about where I was going, running isn't built into my subconscious like it is in yours." I said that very matter-of-factly, trying not to lose my cool over his continued assumption that everything I do against him is intentional. "They are quite literally my family, and I was going to go swimming with them later today for my and Lusius's birthdays."

"Who's Lusius?"

I was about to turn around to call Lu over, but he must have somehow understood the context (or maybe he just heard Sonic's loud voice).

"I'm Lusius," he said as he ran up next to me.

"You? A lion? Family? How?" Sonic was more confused than he should have been.

"Yes, me. I'm part fox, and Tails's second cousin. We're still not sure on the 'how.'"

"Well, since you seem so happy here, Tails, with your new friend, doing fun things together..." Sonic was starting up on an old trick that I'd learned how to spot within a week of experiencing it.

"Don't guilt me into going back with you." I knew I had to interrupt him quickly, before he really got going. "I really do love it here. Besides, how am I supposed to get back? My machine probably broke after I used it, and knowing how things go when my machines break, you just ran at the speed of light or something to get here."

"I didn't, I'm not that desperate. I can't do lightspeed easily. We fixed your device and used it to find you."

"We?" I'd been thinking Sonic had done it mostly by himself.

"Yeah. Me and Vector and Eggman. I miss you, buddy. V does too. We missed you enough that we went to get Eggman- who also wants you back, by the way, he says you're the most enjoyable to fight- to help. And I have your device with me, somehow it got sucked through its own portal this time."

"Where is it?" I was getting suspicious.

He pointed to Luke's garage. "I put it in that shed because it was the most unique building around here, so it would be easier for me to remember where it was."

"That is not a shed," I told him. "That's a garage. It happens to be the garage to the house I live in."

"...Oh. The door was unlocked and everything... I'm sorry. At this point I just want to know I can go back home. Maybe you'll come with me, but I just want to know I have a way out."

"Follow me, then."

I properly let him in to Luke's garage, Lusius tailing both of us, and we got to work seeing what went wrong with my device this time.

The time seemed to fly past. Every five minutes we spent in there turned out to be 15. I... I was having fun. With Sonic. He actually seemed to be able to make sense of what was going on, and I didn't always have to rely on Lusius (who, while statistically more intelligent, doesn't have enough experience with my more complicated inventions to help with them just yet). He laughed with me, not at me, when I realized I'd done something stupid. He'd... he'd changed. I could tell he was trying to act like the old Sonic, the one that we both loved. He'd given me a bad initial impression, but I think he'd just been a little stunned from being knocked over. The old Sonic was finally back.

Something else was different too. Me and Sonic both noticed it once we weren't bending over my workbench.

"Tails... something's different about you here..." he said.

I knew this was a chance for me to be snarky but I didn't want to ruin the friendship that was slowly coming back together. "What do you mean?" I asked.

"You just seem a little taller than the last time I saw you."

"I am," I told him. "I'm over twice as tall and still not entirely sure why."

"I've never been twice your height... why aren't you taller than I am?" He was right about the first part. I facepalmed internally when I heard the second.

"I couldn't have grown this much. I think it has something to do with this wormhole thing, it made me taller somehow. Clearly it did the same for you, but I seem taller relative to you because you didn't gain as much height. You'd be seven feet tall or something if you'd gained the same amount relative to your original height as I had, that would be a bit ridiculous."

Then I turned to face Lusius. "Can you go get Luke?" I asked him. "I know how tall he is and I should be able to estimate Sonic's height that way."

"Sure." Lu ran back outside.