Chapter Text
“Bum a smoke?”
Scourge looked up from the spot of asphalt he was staring at to the stranger. His eyes shifted over the coyote who had staggered out of the bar and leaned confidently against the same wall Scourge had his back to. Too well dressed for that part of town, that bar in particular, with a suit jacket and white button down tucked into black, fitted pants. But who was he to judge?
“Ain't nothing too fancy,” Scourge responded, fishing out a loose cigarette and lighter from his jacket pocket, “but it'll do the trick.”
The coyote shrugged, taking the cigarette into his lips and leaning over so Scourge could light it, “Beggars can't be choosers.”
The two smoked in silence. Sounds from the bar drifted outside through the cracked open side door the coyote had come through. Cars drove by, headlights illuminating the dingy parking lot in a flash of white before passing and the dull orange streetlights settling back over the two.
“You gotta name?” The coyote asked on an exhale, filling the silence.
“Doesn't everyone?”
“Hmmm. You want to give me yours?”
“Why? Ain't ya got one of your own?”
The coyote snickered, “Yeah, funny guy. I got one. But I’d like to know who to thank.”
Scourge gave one more once over to the stranger that was leaning in just a little too close. A little too personal. Not bad looking but not good looking either. Definitely had some rings in his pocket. If it got Scourge off the street for the night, maybe a warm bed and a shower, then he wouldn't turn his nose up at the guy.
“I can think of a couple ways you could thank me babe,” Scourge replied, cocky and licking his lips.
“Oh yeah, funny guy?” The coyote leaned in closer, exhaling over Scourge's face.
“Yeah,” Scourge responded with his own cloud of smoke, “Like your mouth. I can think of a lot of different ways you can thank me with it.”
That got another laugh out of the coyote, “Like what?”
“Bet it looks real fuckin’ thankful when it's stuffed full.”
The coyote paused, inhaling deeply on the cigarette before dropping the butt to the ground and stamping it out under too expensive loafers.
“I'm parked around the back,” the coyote said, twirling car keys he brought out of his jacket pocket, “Take you for a ride?”
Scourge grinned and stamped out his own cigarette before following the coyote down the alley, “Funny, I was gonna suggest the same thing babe.”
___________
Scourge roused from unconsciousness holding his head. The inside of his mouth felt like batteries mixed with pennies and the rest of his body felt like lead. He rolled to his side, expecting to find the outside of a bus stop, or a rooftop, or maybe even a total stranger. Instead, he was alone in a small, clean room on a warm, safe bed. He groaned.
“Fuckin’ right.”
The memories of the day before came flashing back to his dazed brain. Being picked up by the cops, seeing Zonic again, shuttled to his apartment and everything that had happened in it. Especially everything that had happened after dinner.
At least the fucker brought me here, Scourge thought, Didn't just leave me on the kitchen floor.
He stretched out his arms and a glint of silver flashing on his wrist caught his eye. A cuff attached to a long chain ending with another cuff clamped to the top of his bed frame.
“Oh you have gotta be fuckin’ kiddin’ me!”
Scourge gave an experimental tug on the chain. It was thick, sturdy, and didn't look like it was breaking anytime soon.
“Son of a bitch ,” Scourge breathed out, examining the metal. The chain had enough leeway to comfortably stretch the length of the room, giving Scourge access to all parts of the small space. It stopped just short of his door, he found after crawling out of bed. With a tug, he suddenly realized the bed was bolted to the floor. The chain was a sturdy leash, and he was the dog.
Scourge opened the door to the hallway, the smell of coffee and breakfast hitting his nose instantly. He had no idea what time it was but if there were food smells…
“Yo, Za-Nicky,” he called down the hall, “Real kinky babe but I gotta take a leak. Mind helpin’ me out?”
His ear twitched at the sound of soft music he hadn't heard before being stalled. Authoritative boots striking hardwood strolling down the hall to him. Zonic came into view around the corner in full uniform with a mug of coffee and a less than pleased expression.
“You're up,” he said flatly, sipping on his mug.
“Yeah, no thanks t' some prick shockin’ me into next week. Could ya hurry it with the shackles, warden? I gotta go.”
Zonic cocked his brow and gave his head a tilt, “Why would I do that?”
“I mean, unless ya want me t' piss all over your guest room.”
Zonic sighed and shook his head, stepping past Scourge and into the room. He walked to the closet and gestured at the door with a hooked thumb, “Here.”
Scourge just stared blankly at the zone cop, “There?”
“Did I stutter?”
Scourge took hesitant steps to the door, afraid he was being set up. He put his hand on the door handle and pushed it open. What he had, wrongly, assumed was a closet was actually a half bath.
“Oh,” Scourge let the surprise pass through unfiltered.
“What were you expecting?” Zonic asked, taking another sip.
Scourge's ears went red as he walked into the bathroom, “Fuckin’ nothin’. Now if ya don't mind, I'd like a little privacy…unless you're into that sorta thing babe?”
Zonic rolled his eyes and left down the hallway, shutting the bedroom door behind him. He had hoped that Scourge's attempt the night prior would lead to some shocking revelations on the green hedgehog's part. But apparently that was wishful thinking as the terrible jokes and insinuations just rolled on.
He found himself back in the kitchen. Pulling the frying pan of bacon back onto the burner, it began sizzling again almost instantly. He hit play on his phone’s playlist and the gentle sounds of lo-fi filled the space. He flipped the strips, losing himself in the methodical routine of his morning, nearly missing the incoming phone call as music shifted into his ringtone.
The familiar contact page lit up on the screen as Zonic rolled his eyes. He hit ‘accept’ and pushed ‘speaker’, not wanting to balance a phone and cook simultaneously.
“This is Zonic,” he answered.
“Good morning to you too, Sarge,” came the chipper voice of Zally, “I didn't wake you up did I?”
Zonic didn't grant the comment a response. He was well known as an early riser.
“Anyway,” she continued, “Are you really taking a sick day?”
“Something like that. Why?”
The line went quiet for a moment. Zonic could almost see the hesitant lip bite that was habit when the squirrel had bad news to give him.
“Spit it out, Zal,” Zonic sighed.
“Nine’s defense brought us a plea deal…and we’re going to take it.”
Zonic tensed, his hand curling into a fist so tightly it snapped the plastic spatula in his hands. He barely noticed.
“You WHAT?!” he yelled into the speaker, throwing the spatula pieces to the ground and grabbing the phone with both hands. He started pacing in aggravation around the kitchen, “Have you all lost your minds down in the prosecution office?! Do you know how long it took to bring that psychopath in? How many hours spent on that case?!”
“Breathe, Nic. I completely understand the situation,” Zally tried to placate, “But there isn't enough eviden-”
“ NOT ENOUGH EVIDENCE?! I SPENT MONTHS COMBING BARELY HELD TOGETHER ZONES, CANVASSING WITNESSES. WE HAVE HIS FUCKING ZONE-TRAVERSING VEHICLE IN THE IMPOUND LOT RIGHT NOW!”
Zonic set the phone back down, his limbs shaking. He took several huffy breaths as Zally waited out the tidal wave. She didn't have to wait long.
“Sorry, just- what the hell, Zally?” Zonic groaned. He leaned against the counter and put his forehead to the marble surface.
“Look. I know you put a lot of time into this. I know that someone had to go down for the whole Prism Incident. But he's a child, Zonic. And one with a pretty compelling reason for zone hopping that his defense team-”
A groan from Zonic cut into Zally’s explanation but she pushed on.
“-is going to be hitting us with hard and heavy. He was just a Prower variant that got dragged into a Sonic escapade. A jury won't convict.”
“It was that asshole, wasn't it?” Zonic asked, turning his face so his cheek pressed to the counter instead, “He waltzed in there with his stupid fucking weasly face and got into your heads. Now some power-hungry Miles, that has means and method to the multiverse, is going to walk. Fan- fucking -tastic.”
“I'm sorry, Nic. It's out of my hands,” Zally said. And to her credit, she did sound apologetic even through his phone, “You know how these things go. I just…figured you would want to hear it from me.”
Zonic sighed deeply down to his core, trying to let months of overtime and an injury that took two-weeks to heal have such an unsatisfying end, “It's fine, Zal. Thanks for the update.”
“So. Sick day?”
He mustered a small smile at her curiosity, “Houseguest. One that I should actually be checking on.”
“You and your bleeding heart,” Zally teased, “Be up at Zamy’s tonight?”
“Uhg. I wish. I could use a drink after the week I’ve had.”
“Then come?” Zally laughed, “Bring the guest. I'm sure an out-of-towner would love to see how the other ninety-degrees party.”
“Yeah. Not that kind of out-of-towner.”
“Well now I'm actually intrigued. Who are you hiding up there hedgehog?”
“That's on a need to know basis,” Zonic droned back the practiced response.
“But what if I need to know ?” She teased.
Zonic opened his mouth, taunt on his tongue when a voice called down the hall.
“Oh, Za-nicky~”
Zonic groaned much to Zally's chagrin.
“Is that your guest?” the smirk was barely contained in her voice.
“Unfortunately. I'm working from home. Let me know if anything else develops in Nine’s case, okay?”
“Sure thing…Za-Nicky,” she snickered.
“Don't-”
He barely had choked out dissent for the nickname when he noticed Zally had already hung up on him. He stifled a growl in the back of his throat. The rumor mill would be churning out all sorts of ridiculous things about him now. Zally would be sure about that. After all, what else was there to do but speculate about a mystery guest that spoke to him so informally. There were only a handful of people who were even allowed to call him Nic, and those were ones who had known him back at the academy. Not even Zespio, his beat partner for over five years before his promotion, called him Nic.
Turning back around, he pulled the pan off the stovetop, bacon burned but not cindered.
Salvageable, he hummed to himself before leaning over to pick up the broken spatula off the floor and tossing it in the garbage.
“Babe! You alive in there?” Scourge's voice called out again. Zonic rolled his eyes. At least Zally hadn't heard that one.
“What do you need?” Zonic yelled back, cracking eggs into the frying pan after pulling bacon out and onto a paper towel.
“I'm starvin’ here. Ya gonna unlatch me or what?”
Zonic pressed his lips together, hoping the silence would be an answer. He'd set his hopes too high.
“Normally I'd be all about this whip n’ chains shit babe, but this is literal torture. I'm wastin’ away t' nothin’.”
Zonic ignored it. Relegating it to background noise…barely.
“But hey, if this is what gets ya rocks off, sweetheart, who am I t' judge? Be a lot nicer t' see your oh-face though. By the way, what's your safe word? I’m guessin’ it’s somethin’ real lame. Like cucumber. Razzmatazz maybe? Parallelogram if ya feelin’ nasty?”
Scourge droned on for several more minutes, filling the air with random words and phrases. A few nearly had Zonic answering back in confusion or disbelief but he was resolute. He'd seen what happened when he played along and it was exhausting to put it into a single word.
“Shoeshine? Bluebird? Kapowie?”
“You talk just to hear yourself talk, don't you?” Zonic asked gruffly, walking down the hallway with a plate of food and a mug of coffee.
Scourge sneered and leaned against the door jam, “Don't act like ya don't love the sound of my voice, babe.”
“Uh huh.” Zonic pushed past and set the food and coffee on the dresser before walking back out again.
“Hey!” Scourge called out, scratching at the back of his ear, “What fuckin’ gives?”
Zonic stalled and took a deep breath in before turning around on his heel, patience running dangerously thin, “What now?”
“Ain't ya gonna uncuff me?”
“Why? So you can attack me again?”
Scourge blanched before red started to tip his ears, “I didn't…that was…”
“Look,” Zonic breathed out a sigh before leveling his eyes onto the hedgehog for the first time, “I get you have this…crush or something on me but last night was out of line.”
Scourge shuffled his feet under Zonic’s gaze, toying with the hem of the shirt he was still wearing from the day before. It wasn't anger he saw in the navy hedgehog’s eyes. Anger he could deal with, play with even. It was something else entirely. Discomfort or disappointment or unease. Whatever it was, it made Scourge feel guilty.
“I’m not Sonic. I'm not a replacement for the weird relationship you two had. There is nothing between us-”
“I know that,” Scourge growled out, upset at being chastised.
Zonic blinked and re-straigtened his already perfect posture, “Good.”
“Great,” Scourge snapped back. He turned into the bedroom and shut the door.
Zonic hesitated in the hallway for a few seconds longer. He felt like he had more to say but no way to say it. So instead, he went back to the kitchen to gather his own meal and burrowed himself into his study.
It was a long morning of emails and video meetings that should have been emails and copious faxes. Stacks of papers started to litter his desk, duplicates of what he knew he already had back in his office but he’d forgotten to grab on his way out the door the night prior. Things he could have been taking care of in person. His eyes grew tired after submitting the umpteenth request for a file copy before throwing his hands up in the air and walking to the guest room next door.
He wasn't being effective, his time wasn't being spent being productive . He needed to go into work. So if he was leaving, Scourge had to come too. No way in hell was he leaving that green menace in his apartment alone and unsupervised. And no way was he calling anyone over to help him supervise.
The door was still shut but Zonic could hear the sounds of the TV behind it. He knocked softly. No response. He tried again, a little firmer, and still received nothing. He sighed. Uncertain if Scourge was just being a petulant child and icing him out or if he was asleep. Like he did the night before when Scourge had ignored him, Zonic poked his head in.
He should have looked away. He knew he needed to look away. And really, he tried. Hand to Chaos he did. But the sight was too captivating.
Scourge was arched on his back, knees bent, eyes screwed shut. His shirt tail pulled up into his mouth like a gag. His fist sliding over and over a pre-come slick dick while his other hand fingered into himself deep and hard.
It could have been minutes. Hell, it could have been hours. But Zonic watched. He couldn't stop. The whimpering noises the other was making, the sight of him twitching, the look of pure frustration on his face that he just couldn't bring himself there, it stirred something deep. Zonic swallowed and found a lump caught in his throat as he continued staring on.
It wasn’t until Zonic took a step forward, moving further into the room that the captivation was broken. He shook the stupor off his person and backed away from the door silently. Praying to any god that may exist in the multiverse that Scourge hadn’t noticed him. He stumbled back to his study and collapsed into his office chair, head swimming.
What the hell is wrong with you? he thought, Why the hell would you watch ?!
His mortification only grew as he realized his own arousal pressing uncomfortably in his pouch under his uniform. He let out a groan of pure frustration and brought his face down onto his desk. Breathing deeply, he tried to will the bulge away. When that didn’t work he started on meditation, trying to center himself. He tried refocusing on work. He scrolled through social media on his phone. Nothing was working.
The more he tried to ignore it, the harder it persisted. Like the image now burned into his memory was refusing to be forgotten. But he would be even more obstinate. He absolutely, under no uncertain terms, was going to think about Scourge the Hedgehog of all people while jerking off. He had more self respect than that. Even if the hedgehog looked good tied up. The glint of the handcuff. And what would it be like to get a proper gag on-
“Fuck! Pull yourself together,” Zonic yelled after finding himself drifting back to the memory in the middle of a Sugar Smashers level. He threw his phone in disgust down onto the desk and spun around in the swivel chair.
Who does that in someone else’s home? Why didn’t that idiot lock the door? He planned this somehow, didn’t he?
Zonic’s thoughts circled in his mind as he brought the chair to a stop. The humiliation he felt for his actions being slowly replaced with anger at Scourge for causing such a circumstance to arise in the first place. The ire coming to a head when the hedgehog in question decided to call down the hall for the first time in hours.
“Zonic, babe, when’s lunch?”
Zonic brought the back of his head to rest on the office chair and stared at the ceiling. His pouch had finally stopped its swell. He’d mentally passed the shameful buck almost completely onto the convict. But something still gnawed at him, something he couldn’t quite name, and it made it difficult for him to stand and go answer Scourge.
He needed to walk, to stretch his legs and get out of the apartment. But that meant bringing along the very person he was trying to avoid. Zonic sighed and rose to his feet, shuffling out of his office and looking at the doorway next to him where Scourge was standing with his arms crossed. He was still in the same shirt and pants from the night before, but the shirt was obviously more wrinkled.
“Get dressed,” Zonic said, avoiding eye contact with the green hedgehog.
“Huh? Why?”
“Just-” Zonic took a deep breath and exhaled deeply, “We’re going out. For lunch.”
“Wait, really? No foolin’?” Scourge grinned, “You takin’ me out for a date, babe?”
“Don’t make me change my mind. I can just as easily go grab you a package of saltines.”
Scourge shut his mouth and hurried back into the room to change into his leather jacket and sunglasses before doubling back. He narrowed his eyes at the navy hedgehog, “Was that a fuckin’ joke?”
“You’ll never know.”