Literally Screwed

by Taranea

xxx

High above a planet that had no idea about its immediate annihilation, the Egg Fleet waited.

And inside its bright red flag ship, looking down at the planet as a cat would look at a fat, oblivious mouse, Dr. Ivo Robotnik was grinning like a necrophiliac in a morgue.

"Finally! Oh ho ho ho ho! This time I will-!"

Whomp.

The evil scientist frowned. "'Whomp'?"

Then his head snapped up as he looked through the window of his observation station and gasped as the sirens started blaring.

The whomp, of course, had been the impact of none other than Sonic the Hedgehog, the rodent having landed atop the ships's runway in an explosion worthy of the strike of a comet. Down below, the hero of Mobius uprighted himself slowly, almost infuriatingly lazily and stared straight at Robotnik's control room as if in open challenge.

"What-?! How-?!" Robotnik sputtered and gasped, but of course, any reasoning of that sort was entirely futile. Of course Sonic would somehow manage to get to his fleet in outer space. Of course the rodent would also somehow actually be able to breathe in a goddamn vaccuum.

And of course, Robotnik smirked, I figured that into my plan long ago.

"FIRE!" he shouted, hitting a button that immediately let the gun turrets rise outside to face the hedgehog. And as if on cue Sonic's head snapped up and he smirked. Bullets, laserblasts and grenade shells exploded to the left and to the right of him, but the blue hedgehog weaved through them like a dancer among stars. Reaching the turrets, he curled up in the air, shooting forwards with deadly grace, hitting each of the cannon with pin point precision and making them explode in a firework of sparks, flames, and goddamn parts that cost me a small fortune, Robotnik added in his mind with gritted teeth. The hedgehog burst free of the chaos, uncurling in the air like an avenging angel, completely unscathed as if he was even actually mocking him.

Robotnik's moustache bristled. Very well. Time for a change of tactics. He marched out of the control room and into the special weapons chamber.

Time to bring out the big guns.

There was an audible jolt on the flagship as Robotnik, now inside his own private, armed-to-the-teeth mecha, jumped down onto the deck to take the fight to Sonic personally.

"Yo, Egghead! Your mom finally let you out to play?!"

Once again, the hedgehog's only responce was an infuriating quip (that technically should have been inaudible in space, but a long-suffering Robotnik knew that were the hedgehog was concerned ordinary physics had given up loooooong ago...) and a grin as he dodged the swipes the of the doctor's newest creation, the mecha's big, clumsy hands not standing a chance to grab the quicksilver speedster. Robotnik growled, sending out the missiles his battle suit was equipped with, but Sonic only laughed, leading the rockets homing in on his heat signature in a merry wild hog chase over the flag ship, racing up loop-de-loops and sliding underneath hulking robots as effortlessly as if this was a lethal ballet he had choreographed himself ages ago. Behind him, explosions, blasts and firebursts lit up the endless night in space like shooting stars, but as always, the hero of Mobius scarcely seemed to be worried. Instead, he was now shooting straight through a tunnel toward the command center, heedless of the mecha's rocket-powered elongated arm soaring through the tunnel behind him – and that, of course, was his mistake.

"You're not getting away!" Robotnik exclaimed in triumph as the hedgehog finally cried out as he was caught, the mechanic fist closing around him. Robotnik yanked it back immediately, shoved the giant fist with the captive Sonic in front of his cockpit, and couldn't help but gloat as the blue hedgehog futilely struggled to get free. Sonic was a devastating force with velocity behind him, sure, but when you had managed to immobilize him, there wasn't much any more he could do, just a small blue hedgehog after all.

At least, that was what Robotnik thought until Sonic stopped struggling, briefly glared at him, but then turned even that into a triumphant grin, and closed his eyes... and the next thing the human knew, the Chaos Emeralds were encircling his form.

"What-?! Where did you even store them, that doesn't-?!" Robotnik protested, but of course, by then it was too late. Within seconds, a Chaos-induced shockwave had knocked the robot backwards, there was a flash as bright as the sun, and when the scientist managed to open his eyes again, Super Sonic was hovering in the air in front of him like a terrible morning star.

Robotnik's moustache drooped only ever so slightly. "T-Time to get away...!"

Disattaching himself from his half-destroyed battle mecha, the rotund scientist fired up the boosters of his Egg-O-Matic hovercraft in a desperate attempt to return to his control center before Super Sonic could smash everything to bits. Luckily for him, the golden hedgehog for a moment seemed more interested in zigzagging wildly though his fleet, burrowing enough holes into the various ships to make them the mechanical equivalent of Swiss cheese, and Robotnik barely managed to careen onto the bridge of his main vessel before Super Sonic also burst through the locked door behind him. The scientist gave a serious of painful gasps as the Egg-O-Matic finally gave up and dumped him onto the floor, where he immediately threw himself onto his knees.

"S-Sonic! I'm sorry!" He shouted, scrambling backwards. "Really, look, go easy on me. I'll turn over another leaf, I swear! Just give me a chance!"

The golden hedgehog paused for a moment in the air, cocking his head. "Well, this is new. Showing remorse, Eggman?" he gave a cocky grin. "If you played nice, I wouldn't have to break all your toys!"

And then, Super Sonic only noticed something was wrong when he saw a split second too late that Robotnik was suddenly grinning like a shark.

"Gotcha!"

xxx

"Wha?!"

Within fractions of a second, metal poles had shot out of the floor surrounding Sonic, trapping him within a circle of lightning as energy started to dance between them. The hedgehog gasped, trying to escape from the crackling cage, but only bounced back when he flung himself against the barriers of his prison.

"No!" Sonic called out, actually having to suppress a brief flutter of shock. He was in his Super form. Nothing should be able to hurt him now, never had been, and if Robotnik suddenly had figured out something that could, this was seriously bad news.

This premonition was confirmed only a second later, when next, Sonic could feel the energy of his bonds like icy tendrils slipping inside him, reaching for the power flowing through his body, disrupting it and then wrapping itself around it, tearing it from his core, and the hero of Mobius would have wanted to thrash in horror to get away from the violating sensation, if he had only been able to move a muscle.

As it was, he struggled in the energy's grasp for two, three seconds – until it finally succeeded in its goal and Sonic in one, terrible moment, could feel the Chaos Energy ripped right out of his body. It crystallized back into its original form of seven Emeralds which then fell to the floor, all of them somehow turned ashen grey. The electric bonds mercifully also dropped the now once again blue hedgehog and Sonic collapsed onto the floor of the space station on his belly, feeling like he had been through the wringer and wanted nothing else but to either curl up or vomit.

Beneath the battleship, a beam of concentrated light and unholy energy sucked from the Emeralds shot out, hitting the planet and splitting it into pieces, Robotnik laughing at his success, but Sonic for the moment could have hardly cared. As his energy was slowly coming back, he only knew that he was still alive, his body still whole, and there was an egg-shaped scientist basically asking for an epic butt-kicking still in the room with him.

He struggled to get onto his hands and knees, valiantly trying to ignore the crackling lightning still dancing across his fur, making his muscles twitch and jerk. It wouldn't keep him down for much longer, though – he was Sonic the Hedgehog and he would show that lunatic what he thought of someone screwing with his Super form. Sucking in a breath, Sonic had almost suceeded in uprighting himself onto his knees, planning to get his legs under him next to shoot at Robotnik and crack the egghead wide open.

But he had never expected the sudden pain as the next spasm hit.

"Aaaaaaah!" Sonic screamed as he was suddenly thrown forward again, all of his muscles abruptly convulsing in pure agony. There was a distinctly surreal sensation, as suddenly, his arms started to stretch, bones breaking apart and reforming themselves with almost blinding pain. Sonic, completely in shock at what was happening to his body had to squeeze his eyes shut and scream as the next wave hit, flinging him onto the floor again as his shoulders shot apart, his torso expanded, gloves tore over his changing hands. What was happening?

Once again, the hedgehog screamed, almost choking as his neck and mouth were changing mid-yell, voice dripping lower, even his teeth shifting in his mouth, changing their forms with a little burst of pain for each as his entire jawbone had to recalibrate itself to accommodate them. Sonic rolled over, muscles seizing and letting his entire body flail like he was being electrocuted. The hero of Mobius for a moment wasn't even sure he would survive whatever this was...until it finally ended. The entire ordeal had left him slumped against a wall, and he shakingly, more on instinct than anything else, planted a hand in a torn glove against the floor and let his back collapse against it in a sitting position. For a moment, Sonic just leaned against the wall, panting...the wall...which suddenly seemed a whole lot colder than before. And a whole lot closer to his back, almost like there weren't any quills in the way.

Sonic's eyes snapped open. And stared down at his body.

Which somehow seemed to be almost twice as tall as previously, but also missing a distressing amount of fur. And quills.

Slowly, he lifted his hands in front of his face. His hands, too large for his gloves now that had torn over his round finger nails, and which were also as furless and pink-skinned as the rest of his new form.

Which now was in desperate need of clothing.

Finally, Sonic turned his head to stare at Robotnik in abject horror.

"What have you done to me?!"

Robotnik also seemed to be gaping. Sonic managed to upright himself, almost toppling over because his center of gravity was far too high now, and his sneakers too small. The scientist's mouth moved, but it took a while until words that made sense finally tumbled out.

"I, er, this definitely wasn't supposed to happen, I-"

Sonic gestured to his nether regions, furious. "Everything is hanging out!"

"Yes, I, uh, can see that-!"

"Give me pants!"

Robotnik made a strangled noise.

"What is this?!"

"I, uh, I..." Robotnik swallowed. "I think you are a werehog, now, Sonic."

"A what?!"

"It, er, it means man-hog, I-"

"Are you insane?"

"Look, I didn't plan this!" Robotnik barked, gesturing at the furious...blue-haired, mohawked, 5'7', horribly naked human teenager. "Why would I plan this?! Why would anyone plan this?!"

"I don't know, and I don't care," Sonic growled, and started to stride toward Robotnik behind his control panel. "But you're gonna turn me back, right now, or else you will regret this."

Robotnik stared. Then he did the natural thing most people would do when confronted with an unclothed man in a homicidal rage, and he pressed the button that finally jettisoned Sonic into outer space with a scream.

Then he collapsed onto his control panel. "Oh gods."

Sonic, of course, impacted on the Earth, impossibly survived, met Chip, and then the entire adventure proceeded in much the expected manner, except on occasions it involved a whole lot more frantic searching for underwear.

Fin

Yup. Silly etymology joke, because a lot of people don't seem to realize that 'Werehog' doesn't mean what they think it means. I blame cracky conversation at cons for the idea entirely. :p

(Also, annotation: Since 'Life Could Have Been So Different' is finished now (but the sequel's in the works :p), I put up a new poll on my profile page, this time about characters! After dropping a review here (hinthint) why don't you have a click on it?^^)