The Missing Ingredient

Written by Felicia Rondo, Edited by Cluster, Rated 18+, Published: 10/2/2024

Summary: Sonic thinks he has everything he needs to make Chilidogs, but one missing ingredient makes all the difference and prompts him to call Tails for help. Little does he know, a can of beans isn’t all he’s missing…

Part of Sonails AU: Aerial Union.

Contains: Depression, Hurt/Comfort, Tails Being an Irresistible Nerd, Implied Sex, and Beans.

---

Being an adventure-loving hedgehog took Sonic to all sorts of places in his life. So many vibrant diverse locales he’d seen, people he’d met, memories he’d made… That morning, however, had brought him somewhere he was already sick of.

There were plenty of hills, like so many places he’d been before, lots of trees and lakes too. But though he’d searched high and low throughout the land, it all just blended together into one bland green mush - just another patch of dirt he ran around in, with nothing of substance to do and not one Chaos Emerald to be found.

This was not the morning Sonic thought he’d wake up to. No, when he saw the yellow Chaos Emerald fly off into this land the last time he finished using it with the other six emeralds, he thought he’d run over and pick it up for fun. With noon quickly approaching and no luck in finding the damn thing, he was losing his motivation.

Scanning the obnoxiously green and brown area for anything yellow, as he sat on one of the many dozens of nondescript hills the land had, the hedgehog’s gaze eventually fell upon the sight of the distinctive twin-tailed logo of Tails’s workshop!

“Huh?” reacted Sonic, “What’s Tails doing, having a workshop all the way out here?” he questioned, getting back on his feet and heading towards it, “How many workshops does he have, anyway…?” Standing outside of it, he could tell it hadn’t been visited in a little while. That his boyfriend had been somewhere before he’d gotten to it first was a surprise on its own.

“Grrrmble,” his belly growled. He hadn’t eaten all morning.

“Oookay,” Sonic sighed, placing his hand on his empty stomach, “with any luck, Tails’ll have something stocked in there that’s still edible.”

Maybe he just needed to eat, he reasoned. For all he knew, breakfast chilidogs could be the answer to his morning woes! Though, admittedly, chilidogs were often the answer to any of his woes.

As he entered into the ‘kitchen’ area of the workshop, Sonic mentally went over all the ingredients needed to make Uncle Chuck’s trademark family recipe of Good Ol’ Chilidogs. He could go without melted cheese if he had to, but he could probably bet on Tails having cans of red kidney beans and crushed tomatoes in stock.

“Tomatoes? Check. Barbecue sauce? Check. Worcestershire sauce? Check,” Sonic said, as he went through the pantry and fridge, taking inventory of what was available, “hey, we’ve even got cheese! Nice one, Tails!

“That should be everything I need,” Sonic nodded after having gone through the rest of the list, tapping his foot as he mentally collected it all together, “… wait, were there beans? I saw beans, right?”

He opened up the pantry again, pushed the canned tomatoes aside. Nothing. He reached into the darkest corner, feeling around for what would have to be the tiniest most inconspicuous can of red kidney beans ever made, but there was nothing. No matter how hard he looked, once again, Sonic came up short.

“Great, that’s just great,” Sonic groaned in frustration, “really batting a thousand today, aren’t I? Ugh…” He shook his head, closing the pantry back up and putting his head in his hand. At that point, he honestly wanted to quit the day - find somewhere relatively nice to lie down and try again tomorrow.

“Maybe Tails has some secret bedroom area I need to input a code to access,” he joked, for an audience of no one, before letting out a sigh.

“… Wait,” he stopped, “what if… Okay, what if there’s a secret pantry?” wondered the hedgehog, nonsensical in his desperation, “Yeah, yeah, a secret pantry where he keeps all the backup beans for making chilidogs!” Visions of some high-tech false wall turning over to reveal stacks upon stacks of canned beans, like if spy movies were about dumb shit, filled the hedgehog’s mind.

Unlikely as it would’ve seemed to any bystander, Sonic’s heart was set on this idea. With renewed resolve, he went over to the desktop station and pushed the power button.

The sapphire speedster looked around to see if anyone was watching, conspiratorially, then started mashing the keyboard’s space bar repeatedly to try and get it to turn on faster. It had no effect, besides maybe wearing the spacebar out quicker, but it made him feel like it was going faster.

He logged into the account designated for ‘guests’ as Tails requested, after the last time he was let into the admin account on one of his computers went… ‘sub-optimally’ was how Tails put it. But at last, he was in.

Grabbing hold of the mouse, he dragged the cursor over to the familiar icon of Tails’s proprietary Discord alternative - developed after Tails had one too many issues with the service while on call with friends that couldn’t simply speed over to his location, of course. After inputting his credentials into the username and password fields, Sonic was in… and, sure enough, Tails was online!

Without wasting another moment, Sonic slammed the Video Call button and lightly bobbed his head up and down as the cutesy computer-y jingle played while he waited for Tails to pick up. Seven seconds later, Tails picked up and the display blurrily showed the fox adjusting his webcam.

“Sonic!” Tails exclaimed, “Where are you calling from? What’s going on? How did you manage to log into the computer, is someone there helping you?” he fired off a barrage of questions, earning a chuckle out of Sonic with that last one.

“I’m calling from one of your workshops in the middle of… somewhere, don’t know if it has a name, and I’ve got a chilidog dilemma,” Sonic answered the first two questions, “and I logged in on my own, y’know, I’m learning,” he added with a wink, getting a giggle out of Tails.

His gaze falling from his webcam to his keyboard, Tails started typing away with a look in his eye that made him look really cute to the hedgehog. Sonic could see his boyfriend going through various ‘windows’ on his computer, in the reflection of his glasses, until at last those sky-blue eyes were filled with the distinct look of excitement and pride they had whenever he achieved a goal of his.

“You’re in Pine Shade Grove!” Tails declared victoriously, bringing a smile to Sonic’s face even though he hadn’t really expressed an interest in the specifics of where he was, “So what’s this ‘chilidog dilemma’ you were talking about?”

“Well I looked through the kitchen and I couldn’t find beans for making chilidogs,” Sonic explained, “sooo I was wondering if there was maybe someplace else where I could find beans…?” he inquired, getting nothing back but a blank expression from Tails even after waiting a moment, “Ahem,” he cleared his throat, “some secret room where there might be… more… beans…?” The dream of secret beans was dying with each word that passed through his lips.

“Uhh…” Tails responded, “Well, I don’t remember installing a secret bean room in the Pine Shade workshop - and I would’ve remembered if I did,” he said, gently dashing Sonic’s hopes, “but I can look and see what the workshop has in stock in the system log!”

With a few more strokes of his keyboard, since he had already accessed the data file for that workshop, Tails pulled up the spreadsheet of resources available at that workshop and shared it on Sonic’s screen as he looked over it himself.

“Hmm… yeah, it’s been a while since I last stocked the place,” Tails frowned, “I can come over and restock the place for you, though!” he offered, to a… not terribly receptive hedgehog.

“Tails…” Sonic replied, “it’s really not that big a deal, I don’t wanna put you out or anything, you can just go back to whatever you were working on and I’ll figure something else out,” he told his boyfriend, feeling a little guilty that Tails would go to so much trouble for him.

“It’s no big deal, I can take my work with me and continue there!” Tails assured Sonic, adding, “It’s decentralized!” before abruptly ending the call as he presumably went to prepare to visit him.

“Decentralized…?” Sonic repeated aloud, mystified by this word Tails had so casually dropped into their conversation, “That’s a new one for me…”

Setting the desktop to sleep mode, as he imagined Tails would be getting some use out of it later, Sonic sighed as he found himself alone again. Being with Tails again would be nice, but it was going to be quiet for some time in that workshop.

“… Hey, wait, right, I should’ve asked Tails why he has so many places!” Sonic remembered, “There’s this place, there’s the one in the Mystic Ruins, there’s that face house…” he listed to himself, shuddering a little as he remembered the last one, “I can ask him when he gets here,” the hedgehog told himself, “I’ll definitely remember.”

---

After what could’ve been anywhere between 50 minutes and forever, Sonic’s ears perked up at the sound of spinning propellers in the sky. Zooming out of the workshop, he looked up and saw Tails’s blue biplane coming in for a landing. He gave a wave, and Tails just gave a smile as he was preoccupied with landing the ‘Tornado.’

When it landed, Sonic felt all that agonizing time he’d spent waiting begin to fade peacefully from his memory as he walked up to greet him. None of those empty minutes mattered now that his patience was finally being rewarded.

“Hey Tails,” Sonic greeted, “say, uh…” he started, meaning to ask a question when the sight of Tails without any unwieldy tech with him raised a completely different question, “… I thought you said you were gonna bring your work with you when you got here?”

“Well, technically it was already here,” Tails corrected, before explaining, “the network that contains the database with my blueprints is connected to all my workshops so, even if a workshop of mine suffers a power failure, the database persists because the network isn’t tied to any one central location!

“Plus,” he added, “I don’t really have room for much more than the restock in this cockpit.” Tails gestured at the meticulously-assembled tower of canned goods beside him which contained, among other things, the beans Sonic was searching for.

“Makes… sense!” Sonic laughed, awkwardly, not sounding terribly convincing.

“Does it?” Tails asked.

“Yeah!… The last part did, anyway!” admitted the hedgehog, a bit more truthfully. He’d been dating Tails for years now and was a lot more capable of following him when he got tech-y than he used to be, but some things still flew over his head.

With a knowing nod, Tails unbuckled his seatbelt and got a handful of cans to carry out of the cockpit. It was… a little painful, entering back into the workshop and seeing everything that needed to be done - there were some quality-of-life improvements he had implemented into other workshops that he hadn’t yet brought to this one in particular - but he would live.

As he walked, the air around him felt unusually breezy. Tails idly wondered about it, until he arrived in the kitchen and saw Sonic waiting for him while whistling innocently like an old-timey cartoon character.

“You brought in the rest of the canned food, didn’t you?” guessed Tails, carefully putting his stack on the counter in order to place each of them in their corresponding spot.

“See for yourself~” Sonic shrugged, leaving Tails to open the cupboard to find…! The rest of the cans, hastily and ungracefully placed in approximately the right location.

“Thanks, Sonic,” Tails rolled his eyes as he began to tidy up, while Sonic took out what he needed to make his lunch. Admittedly, tidying up afterward took a little less time than making several trips back and forth from the Tornado-2 to the kitchen.

Before long, everything was in its proper place and the workshop was… if not fully restocked, given a decent boost to its existing supply. With that out of the way, Tails left Sonic to get cooking and happily excused himself to continue his work.

“By the way, ‘you eaten yet today?” asked Sonic right as Tails was about to leave, causing his boyfriend to stop in his tracks.

“… No,” Tails admitted, reluctantly, not turning to look back at Sonic but not leaving either.

“Cookin’ for two!” Sonic declared, without missing a beat, causing Tails to turn back around as the hedgehog browned the ground beef.

“Sonic…” Tails replied, trying not to get too distracted by how sexy Sonic looked over a kitchen counter, “it’s fine, honestly, I’m not even hungry!” Despite his protests, the fox knew there was no use arguing further when Sonic waved him off.

Giving into the ‘predicament’ he found himself in, Tails smiled and left to go work more on his latest project while he waited for lunch to be ready.

Time seemed to fly by after that. Sonic got to take his mind off of the cranky morning he had while he cooked, and Tails got back to work on the blueprint… blueprints, rather, for his latest project. They both had their ways of unwinding separately, but it was all a mere pastime that they would be happy to be done with as soon as it was time to have lunch together.

“Chilidogs!” Sonic announced as he set the table for two, leaving two chilidogs for Tails and four for himself, “Fresh chilidogs here, get ‘em while they’re hot!”

“I’m coming, I’m coming!” Tails giggled as he saved the latest work he’d put into his project and left the desktop for a moment. He had said he wasn’t hungry, but as he took in the scent of chili it became clear he was more distracted from hunger than he was free of it.

Once Tails had sat down and gotten a chance to see it for himself, the lunch Sonic had prepared was truly a sight to behold. Admittedly, if one cooked the same recipe thousands of times like Sonic had cooked these chilidogs they were bound to get good at it - but the fox couldn’t help but be impressed all the same.

“Thanks for the meal, Sonic,” Tails smiled before digging in, closing his eyes with his first bite and letting out a moan of delight at the taste without meaning to. When he opened his eyes back up, he caught Sonic staring at him eating with the most lovey-dovey expression on his face. “Sonic…!” the fox blushed.

“Sorry, sorry,” chuckled Sonic, as he picked his first chilidog up and began eating, “so how’s it goin’? Good, I hope?” he inquired, in between bites.

“Yeah, pretty good,” Tails replied, “my latest project’s been taking a while, since it’s kind of two projects? They both work toward the same objective, detecting the unique electromagnetic radiation emitted by gems,” he elaborated, “I ran into an issue where I couldn’t find a way to integrate them into one design, but I’ve gotten around it for the most part by slowly developing them both separately.”

Sonic looked back at Tails as he explained what he’d been up to, knowing basically what each word meant individually but not quite following how they worked together in the order they were said in. As he so often did in their relationship, as Tails understood and appreciated, he nodded and replied simply,

“Cool!”

“How about you?” asked Tails, politely giving his very lost boyfriend an out, “What were you up to before you called?” It was very faint, the hedgehog did his best to cover it, but the fox did detect a flash of melancholy in his boyfriend’s green eyes as he recalled his day.

“I was just looking for a Chaos Emerald…” Sonic sighed, “last time I depowered from ‘Super’ I tried to catch it before it got away, but I didn’t reach it in time… so I saw about where it went and decided I’d go get it when I had a minute to myself.

“So I come all the way here to grab it, but it just isn’t turning up…” Sonic said, “I dunno, I feel kinda dumb for spending so much time trying to find this thing at this point, but I don’t wanna quit…” he rubbed his eyes, as though the memory tired him out all over again.

But what he wasn’t seeing in that moment was the look of excitement growing in Tails’s eyes. Though he sympathized with the hedgehog’s frustration, the serendipitous timing of his dilemma coincided with the fox’s latest project almost too perfectly.

“Sonic, your problem is exactly what my project needed!” Tails exclaimed.

The hedgehog paused for a moment, taking in everything the love of his life said and processing it through each neuron in his brain. With everything he’d ever known about Tails fully loaded and recalled, filtered by the context of the conversation they had so far, Sonic responded to the fox’s latest exclamation,

“What?”

“We can help each other out!” Tails said, “Since you’re looking for a Chaos Emerald already, I can shift the timeline on my project to focus on the electromagnetic gem radar that doesn’t require an internal catalyst and save the other radar for later - that way I can wrap up work on it more efficiently while also helping you find your emerald!”

“Hold on, time out, I am so lost right now,” Sonic told his boyfriend, before asking, “are you saying you’re gonna use that electromagnet gem radar thing to find the Chaos Emerald? I thought it only detected gems!” He set aside the half-dozen other parts of the fox’s sentence that he missed the point of, just to focus on what little he could half-understand.

“… Yeah, Sonic, Chaos Emeralds are gems,” Tails answered, curiously.

“I thought they were… emeralds,” the hedgehog muttered under his breath in response, making the connection only after it was made for him, “wait, wait,” he questioned again, “then why not just say it detects Chaos Emeralds?”

“That’s because it would also detect the Sol Emeralds from Blaze’s world,” declared Tails, proudly, “or any other equivalent, for that matter - each of them carry electromagnetic properties that broadly overlap in such a way that can’t be found anywhere else in nature!”

With that all thoroughly explained, Tails went back to his computer station and finalized the design documentation for the gem-less variant of his electromagnetic gem radar. Once he finished, which would be soon, he’d be building their first prototype in no time.

“… Why not call it an Emerald Radar, then?” Sonic offered, leaning over the fox’s shoulder as he was apparently still thinking about the title of the radar.

“Then it just sounds like it’s for detecting boring old regular emeralds,” Tails shrugged, eliciting a shrug in response as Sonic walked off to whatever his next activity was. Maybe a jog? Tails faintly overheard the sound of his sneakers rapidly hitting the ground as he sprinted off into the distance and didn’t think much more of it.

Anyway, Tails was finally making some solid headway on the radar - with the PCB fully designed and a suitable enclosure already picked out, all that was left to do was to hit print and his 3D printer would begin to make physical what thus far had only existed in Tails’s mind and on his computer network.

He went to place his hand back on his mouse when, instead, it fell on something much smaller that made the distinct sound of a… plastic wrapper?

“Huh?” Tails said, lifting his hand up to investigate, only to find… “Mint candy?!” he exclaimed, eyes sparkling in awe at this unexpected development, only to be interrupted as he rediscovered his mouse - which had been moved just a few inches to the right.

“Thought you deserved a li’l treat, since you’re helpin’ me out and all,” Sonic chuckled, “I swung by the nearest town and picked it up for ya,” he said, before planting a kiss on the fox’s furry cheek, “Thanks!”

“Sonic… you didn’t have to, I’m happy to help,” Tails blushed, scratching the back of his head as the kindness of his boyfriend’s gesture almost overwhelmed him, “but thank you too,” he smiled warmly.

After clicking the print button, Tails gently unwrapped Sonic’s mint gift and placed it in his mouth as he patiently watched the computer take his latest creation from the digital world to reality. As it happened, Sonic pulled a chair over so he could sit beside him. The fox moaned softly in delight as he felt the sky-like flavor of the mint candy melt in his mouth.

The creation of the radar progressed swiftly from there. From Sonic’s perspective, all he knew was it had something with screwdrivers and wires that went into sockets. As the fox began to put the finishing touches on the prototype, Sonic inquired,

“How’s it work?” He knew he wouldn’t be able to follow for long, but he just couldn’t resist asking all the same. Tails never failed to oblige, after all.

“Well, it sends out waves to scan for the particular electromagnetic radiation that emanates from gems such as the Chaos Emeralds, which should allow it to locate the general area of a given emerald,” Tails replied, “the waves essentially ‘poke’ at the emerald, which in turn agitates the emerald and eventually causes its usually-consistent level of radiation to increase - which is part of why it can’t pinpoint the exact location.”

It all sounded very smart and technical, which was music to Sonic’s ears. Like listening to a song in another language he didn’t understand, all the hedgehog could really make out was the sound of Tails’s voice and the passion with which he spoke. That, combined with the look of excitement in the fox’s eyes as he got into the details of his device, made it impossible for him to resist the almost-magnetic pull that compelled Sonic to kiss Tails on the cheek.

“Since it covers a wider area than—oh, ah, hehe,” Tails giggled and blushed, rubbing the spot on his cheek that Sonic kissed before continuing, “it covers a wider area than the physical entity itsel—” only to be interrupted by another kiss from Sonic, this time on the nose. Then another kiss, on his forehead, followed by a kiss on his other cheek.

“Hey…!” Tails blushed harder, as his boyfriend’s body came closer to his and the kisses continued, “I’ve still got my glasses on…!” he stated, exasperatedly, as he saw where the hedgehog was going.

Thoughtfully, Sonic pulled away for a moment and gently lifted Tails’s glasses away from his eyes to place them safely onto the counter beside them. His boyfriend was still close enough that Tails could see his dreamy green eyes staring back at him clear as day.

“Ah, h-hehe, thanks,” Tails smiled, “as I was saying, I—whoa!” he yelped, as Sonic tackled him to the ground and proceeded to continue showing him just how much he loved him.

---

“Finished!” exclaimed Tails, holding the finished radar prototype in his hand, still just slightly out of breath from having only recently finished doing something else.

With no small amount of trepidation, Tails powered the radar on and… a crisp beep began to come from the speaker, as the display showed a Chaos Emerald’s electromagnetic radiation had been detected. Not far from there, too.

“There is a Chaos Emerald here!” Sonic beamed, “I knew it, I knew I saw it go this way, but after looking so long I was starting to doubt…!” He pulled Tails into a big hug that made the twin-tailed nerd’s cheeks heat up once more.

“It’s no big deal,” Tails giggled, “now let’s find that emerald!” he declared, before stepping out of the workshop and turning to face the direction the radar was pointing them to. Sonic followed shortly, but he let Tails take the lead as they walked past the same pine trees of the grove he’d spent the entire morning running through.

Somehow, even though it had all looked so dull earlier that day, Sonic was beginning to see the land in a new light. With the sun filtering through the leaves in the trees, shining playfully past the shade, it looked kind of… beautiful? Was it always like this and he just hadn’t noticed it before? Setting those thoughts aside, he looked back at Tails as the fox led them on their way.

Tails studied the radar closely. The initial blip on the radar was growing in size, but they were nearly to their destination. In fact, looking ahead, it was actually a straight shot to a clearing in the area where the Chaos Emerald’s ‘signal’ originated. With a smile, Tails shut off the wave that the radar sent out and placed it at his side as he continued to journey forward.

“Hey, why’d you turn the thing off?” asked Sonic, “… Wait, this isn’t something you already explained, is it?”

“Technically yes, it is,” Tails replied, patiently, “but I’m happy to go over it again!” Sonic bowed his head a little, embarrassed for asking but grateful Tails didn’t give him too hard a time for it.

“So, remember when I said the radar’s waves agitate the emerald?” Tails started, getting a nod from his technologically-challenged boyfriend, “The emerald’s usual level of electromagnetic radiation increases, which lets us detect the emerald in the first place, but it also risks damaging the delicate electronics I built into the radar.

“Basically,” the fox concluded, “if we get too close, it’ll probably break.”

“Ohh,” Sonic nodded, very much helped by the simplification provided at the end.

When Tails stopped, at the end of a path to a clearing outlined by pine trees all around, Sonic recognized the area. He’d given it a once-over, but admittedly he hadn’t searched it as thoroughly as he had elsewhere - which, if they found the emerald there after all that time he spent looking everywhere else, would make Sonic feel pretty silly… but he’d live.

So he looked again. He had Tails with him and he knew it was supposed to be around there somewhere, he reasoned, so this time had to be different. With each step he took, each place he looked, it felt like he was one step closer to finally seeing it - like at any moment he could turn around and find the emerald lying someplace obvious, or Tails would call him over to where he’d found it. Any moment.

That feeling stuck around for a little while, feeling closer than ever to getting that emerald and finally having some closure. But, just like the sun as it began to set, that feeling was fading away quickly.

Sonic started doubling back to check places he knew he’d already checked, or that Tails had checked. Having a fresh set of eyes somewhere could be useful and Tails was doing the same with spots he’d already been at, sure, but he doubted Tails was gonna be the one to miss something. Losing grasp of the hope he had just minutes ago, Sonic expected the sight of the emerald less and less.

“Have you tried checking over there?” Tails asked, pointing at the pond at the center of the area. A perfect place for an emerald, as Tails thought when he checked it the first three times.

“Twice,” Sonic replied, “I would’ve looked more, but every time I’d think of it you were already there,” he commented, before pointing at a pine tree whose leaves had spilled onto the pond, “Did you check the tree? I didn’t see it when I looked, and I tried to be thorough when I climbed it, but I can’t fly so…”

“Yeah, flying does give me an easier time of checking things like that,” Tails concurred, “but I did look there earlier and I didn’t see it anywhere either.” It was a nice thought but, again, it didn’t lead anywhere.

No luck. No emerald, or secret bean compartment for that matter, either. Sonic just kept striking out today, it seemed. Looking at Tails, Sonic noticed he was beginning to seem pretty hopeless about it too. Quietly, the thought that he shouldn’t have bothered Tails with this at all poked at Sonic like a needle.

He sat down, closing his eyes as the disappointment washed over him. Distantly, as his depression always seemed to make the world around him seem, he heard Tails join him as the twin-tailed fox sat down by his side.

“I never asked,” Tails started, “why’re you looking for a Chaos Emerald anyway?”

“It’s…” Sonic let out a sigh, “I’m not just looking for an emerald, it’s this one in particular…” he took in a deep breath, releasing the need to see the emerald from his heart, and said, “I’ve been looking for the yellow Chaos Emerald.”

“The yellow one?” questioned Tails, “Why that one in particular?”

“Well… ah…” Sonic responded, making the telltale sounds of having only just thought about something for the first time after Tails prompted him to, “Come to think of it,” he realized, “I think I was looking for it because of you.”

Images of a claustrophobic capsule shooting out of a space station and into the stars filled Sonic’s mind as the memory returned to him. His life flashing before his eyes, all hope seemingly lost… save for one last hope.

“Me?” Tails replied, still not quite recalling the significance of a yellow Chaos Emerald.

After being called a faker so many times, arrested and imprisoned like a villain by the people who called him ‘hero’ not so long ago, what did Sonic have left back then but the emerald he held in his hands that Tails had created?

“Do you remember that fake Chaos Emerald you made?” Sonic reminded Tails, “Back when we had to go to space to stop Robotnik?”

“Right, the artificial Chaos Emerald! I guess I did make it resemble the yellow emerald,” Tails recalled, nodding softly, before remarking, “I still feel a little ridiculous over it, how Robotnik managed to trick me into revealing it wasn’t the real one…”

“That’s not the part I remember,” Sonic told him, holding a finger up to put a stop to the fox beating himself up, “that emerald saved my life, Tails.” In that moment, all those years ago, he held that emerald tightly. He shut his eyes as the chaos of his life flashed before him, and focused with all his might on believing.

Not believing in his status as a ‘hero,’ not trying to believe Shadow was wrong to call him a faker, but believing in what he always had when everything else fell away - Tails.

After that, when he reopened his eyes, he was back on the ARK. Still alive, after everything that had happened to him and every time he’d fallen before, with a brand new chance to try and turn things around even though they looked grim.

“You saved my life,” Sonic stated, taking his finger from the sky and pointing it straight at Tails.

“So I guess I was looking for it because I was thinking of you,” Sonic thought aloud, his hand falling to his side once more, “missing you and all…” he muttered under his breath, “and it did lead to us hanging out in the end, so I guess it worked out after all even though we never found it!” He tried to end the thought on a light note, but it came out as bittersweet as it felt.

It was going to be dark soon. He should’ve thought the sunset was beautiful, it probably was, but this one only reminded him of all the time that had flown by. Somehow remembering a near-death experience hadn’t cured his depression, amazingly.

“I’m sorry,” apologized Sonic, each successive word that passed through his lips taking him another step deeper into a pool of depression, “you came all the way out here and now the day’s ending like this,” Sonic shook his head, “I should’ve let you work on your thing without taking you on a journey just to see the same dead-end I found this morning.”

“It’s okay, Sonic, really,” Tails assured the hedgehog, before adding, “this was actually good for my project anyway,” he pulled the radar back out for emphasis and turned it back on, “at the start of today I only had the concept, but now—” it proceeded to short out, due to its close proximity to the emerald’s electromagnetic radiation.

They both just stared for a moment, with Sonic wishing he’d somehow warned Tails not to turn it back on fast enough… only for the fox to start laughing.

“Ohh, this is going to be a pain to make all over again, but it’s still kind of perfect for this to happen after everything,” Tails giggled, wiping a tear from his eye and prompting Sonic to join in the laughter. Just a little.

“I can make another Emerald Radar, anyway,” the twin-tailed fox commented, causing the hedgehog to perk up.

“Emerald Radar?” Sonic repeated, a soft smile sneaking back onto his face.

“It has a nice ring to it, okay?” admitted Tails, recalling the conversation they had earlier back at the Pine Shade Workshop, “I’m sorry too,” he added, much to Sonic’s confusion, “I wish I’d had the workshop in better shape when you found it, so you wouldn’t have had to wait around for me.

“I try to keep up with them, but it’s a little hard to know when any given workshop will be needed since you do move around a lot,” he said.

Suddenly, it hit him - the question he’d been meaning to ask all day, since the moment he laid eyes on the workshop. Only now, in the end, he seemed to have stumbled on the sad answer.

“Is that why you have so many workshops?” asked Sonic, “Because I never stay in one place?” His voice couldn’t help but sound guilty as he asked. He’d never thought about how he might’ve been making Tails feel all this time…

But Tails shook his head.

“There are multiple factors I’ve taken into account as I’ve built my workshops,” Tails began to explain, “that is one of them, but it’s not the whole story!

“First, I wanted to be flexible - with the kind of lives we lead, you never know where or when something’ll come up!” he remarked, “Second, it gave me an excuse to build the decentralized network that the Miles Electric runs on today! Nothing on the market really fit the capabilities I wanted for the device, so challenging myself with building one all on my own was really fun!

“And third,” he concluded, putting his hand on Sonic’s shoulder and looking into his eyes with compassion as his voice softened, “yeah, you move from place to place a lot, but you also get lonely. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to try and always have some kind of home for you to come back to, y’know?”

With a smile filled with gratitude, Sonic placed his hand on Tails’s and looked back at the fox. Suddenly, when Tails stood in front of it, that sunset was looking a lot more beautiful than it was moments ago. He cupped the fox’s cheek with his other hand, though Tails was leaning into it even before it had quite reached him.

There was no use resisting it, Sonic thought, brushing Tails’s cheek softly with his thumb. He got what he really needed in the end so, when he leaned in closer until at last the distance between their lips was closed, he was happy. That was when something yellow besides the sun began to shine brightly nearby.

Both of them reluctantly pulled away, blinking their eyes open again and turning to look where this new light was coming from, only to find it shining through the dirt of some unsuspicious spot on the ground they had to have walked over a dozen times.

When they walked over to it, it looked just like it had when they wrote it off without a thought - only this time it had the distinctive glow of a yellow Chaos Emerald buried beneath it. It seemed that, though Tails’s Emerald Radar may have brought them there, it was their hearts that illuminated the rest of the way.

It was with just that thought in mind that Sonic turned to Tails and smiled,

“You were the beans.”

“… What?” Tails reacted, understandably.

“I mean, like when the last thing I needed to make chilidogs was beans, you were the last thing I needed to find the emerald!” Sonic exclaimed with excitement, finding meaning at long last in how his ridiculous day had gone, “Y’know?”

“Now I’m lost,” laughed Tails, causing Sonic to join in once again. Sonic could be a very silly boyfriend sometimes, Tails knew that better than anyone, but he was thankful that the fox didn’t mind at all.

Bending down, Tails dug the emerald out of the ground and picked it up. Holding it up to his non-functioning Emerald Radar, the fox couldn’t help but be filled with excitement for what he’d be making next.

“With this emerald, I can go ahead and begin developing the version of the Emerald Radar that’s powered by a Chaos Emerald!” he said, “That model should be able to hone in on other emeralds from a wider range and with far more accuracy, since it’ll be able to take advantage of the natural resonance between Chaos Emeralds!”

After saying that, Tails saw Sonic pause for a moment to think it over. But, instead of the usual look of confusion he found on the hedgehog after he spoke at all technically, Sonic nodded,

“Makes sense to me!”

“Wait, it does?” Tails asked in shock.

“I’m learning,” the hedgehog winked, before pulling his boyfriend into a hug and planting a kiss on his cheek. He knew Tails was happy to be patient for him, but it still felt good when he could surprise him like that.

So Pine Shade Grove turned out nicer than Sonic thought it was at the start of his day. After everything that happened, he wouldn’t be looking at it as just another patch of dirt to add to the pile.

But, even though he’d warmed up to it, he still wouldn’t call it his favorite place to be. No, of all the different places Sonic had traveled over the years, none could compare to his favorite spot - somewhere that gave him a light that could brighten up a day, no matter how badly his depression darkened it.

A spot Sonic could find anywhere, as long as he had Tails.

The End

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Author’s Notes: This is the first Sonails story I’ve published in 6 years. I used to write these two together all the time, but unfortunately I let other people ruin it for me for… well, years. I don’t currently feel comfortable bringing back the old stories, but I’m ready to start telling new ones.

Something that bugged me back in the day was I basically only ever wrote the beginning of their love story, in every story. Never an established relationship, just them falling in love for the first time. Every time.

I couldn’t figure it out for the longest time, until recently I realized I hadn’t written them since I left my abusive ex. I don’t think I was able to imagine anything going well past the very beginning of a relationship, back then.

The difference between then and now is I’ve spent the past 6 years loving someone with all my heart and building a long-lasting relationship with them where they love me back and better than I was ever loved by my ex. I guess I needed all this time to learn what love is supposed to be like, past “happily ever after.”

Thanks for reading. I hope you enjoyed it.

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