After eight long, difficult weeks of fighting, you've finally done it. You've put an end to Neo Metal Sonic's dreams of conquest and with it, you've saved not only this world, but all worlds. Perhaps not everything is wrapped up as neatly as some of you would like, but you've done what you set out to do, and now you can breathe a sigh of relief.
In the hours that follow the immediate aftermath of Neo Metal Sonic's defeat, Tails sets about figuring out how to control the Egg Fleet and recall them to where Neo Metal Sonic had them stationed. Sonic heads out into the city - and then even further beyond - to ensure that the people are starting to regain their senses without anyone to suppress their free will anymore. Knuckles escorts you back to the base, then takes a ring to hop into the Void to let Shadow and Infinite know what's going on.
As for you all? You aren't expected to do any work, because you've done so much today. Take a load off and take the time to rest - you deserve it.
For those of you who can't wait to get home, you're welcome to grab a ring from one of your colorful friends and head straight back, but for those of you willing to take the night off and regroup in the morning, you'll find that said colorful friends have put together a party for you - or, well, they tried their best. The decorations are store-bought (or not) and simple, Sonic seems to have thought confetti is the best way to throw a party and there is so much of it getting showered on all of you the moment you walk into the room, and someone obtained a sheet cake that did not have any sort of message on it, so an awkwardly scrawled message of "THANKS FOR HELP" is written in bright green icing that clashes with the cake's soft pink and red color scheme. An attempt was made.
You're welcome to hang out here - both in the new base and in this world as a whole - for as long as you'd like. Permanently, even, if you don't have any intention of going home. After all, you've more than earned it. Sonic and friends will gladly help you figure out a way to get settled here.
If you do choose to stay for any length of time and head out into the city, you'll find that people are indeed starting to return to their daily lives. They don't really understand - or remember - what happened, but they do recognize you as someone they have some innate fondness for, regardless of how startling your appearance may be to them. The city itself has seen better days thanks to the spread of Eggman's chroma, but thankfully the natural elements are recovering from that just fine. The buildings, streets, and the like will not naturally recover, so it seems Chicago's going to require some pretty intensive rebuilding...
But for the time being, everything is going smoothly, and you've done everything that was asked of you. You're free to return home. If you do, your shard may eventually come loose and simply fall off, ridding you of both the shard and its powers. Or maybe it won't, and you'll have that memory of your time in this world forever, along with the power innate to you and the ones you can activate from your fellow shardbearers whenever you're near each other.
Congratulations, shardbearers. You've done the impossible, and maybe even formed some new bonds along the way.
( Welcome to the final log of Shardbond! With this, you have successfully navigated your way through the Sonic friendship game and no one died! Hooray!!! For this final log, you may do whatever you'd like - if you want to use this to do an immediate aftermath top level, go for it! Party top level? Sure? Post-game top level? Have fun! You want to bring a castmate in and NPC them or have someone else play them? Also cool! Generally speaking, you are now free to do what you will with the setting as a whole - your fuzzy little friends will be hard at work making sure that you all are able to get home and/or get settled just fine, and they'll also be keeping an eye out for one (1) Neo Metal Sonic. And also Infinite, I guess, unless someone wants to take that stray jackal with them but like, no one needs that. )
Mm. Were it not such a fragile thing to degrade quickly over time, I wouldn't take such caution. There is many a reason Matoran carve out our records.
[But wait... Piltover?]
...Alone? [Concern immediately knits his expression as he straightens up in his seat.] After everything that had happened, Viktor, weren't you...
[In danger? But he cuts off the sentence with visible effort. It's worry that has no place, a chiding for something that's come and gone. Viktor had managed that trip once already for his tools and come back in one piece.
So he exhales, eyes drifting to the floor as he rewords his question.]
I would not have just wandered straight into the city on my own, I was able to open a portal straight to the laboratory this time. Call it practice, I suppose.
[He smiled crookedly, huffing out a laugh that almost sounded embarrassed.]
[The way his expression comically flattens with a raise of his brow at the start of that sentence should speak his opinions on how much he believes that. Viktor, holding off on the possible danger of something if he really had to get somewhere he believed he needed to be? Sounds fake.
The confirmation does ease his tension considerably, though.]
Good, good... [He doesn't need to ask why. Tools aside, there was only one primary reason Vakama knows that Viktor wanted to make sure he ever went back to Runeterra in the first place.]
[Viktor's smile found a mischievous edge as he tilted his head slightly.]
Of course, I know exactly where he is. [A small gesture with the hand not on his staff.] Down the hallway and probably considering dissecting a surveillance camera.
[Viktor laughed with a bright crooked smile, what violet lights were left uncovered by his outfit flickering and brightening--the kind of thing he did where an ordinary human would probably have flushed scarlet.]
Obviously, I was here to suggest you should talk to him. Besides, he has already been my second shadow, so it is not as though you two would fail to cross paths.
[He stifles a last at the last comment, though he does move to try and dig for one of his other notebooks.]
I'll make sure my diagrams of your brace stay with my notebooks, then... there wasn't too much I was able to determine with the alloys we worked with, but I recorded what I could... it will be a starting ground if anything needs to be adjusted.
No testing ground quite like a fight for our lives, I suppose... and it held together alright? I don't mind making what fixes I need while I still can.
It still feels fine to me. [Shifting his weight from one foot to the other, behind his right knee slightly to test the range of motion.] Held together quite well, I have nothing to complain about.
[His eyes stay tracked on the movement, but he nods his agreement.]
So long as you're still comfortable with it.
Maybe now that the threats have diminished from the streets, it could be a good excuse to show Jayce the broader scope. I'm sure there's going to be a lot rebuilding that needs to take place here, let alone outside where we've had to travel.
I am...in truth, still a little uneasy. Our ambitions with magic aimed too high, and nearly brought all the world down with our foolishness. With this one already in so fragile a state...
[Viktor trailed off, eyes a blue-silver as they glanced around anxiously.]
I know that we can help this world. But we have to be cautious, and learn from our missteps with Runeterra. Mostly mine.
[Satisfied he's found the pages he needs, Vakama closes his notes back up once more, pausing only for his eyes to drift over the masks that now sit against the far corner of his desk. Viktor has seen them both weeks ago, one golden and a full shape like Vakama's own, while the other is a golden-orange that is far smaller, mottled with exposure to some sort of corrosive element, deliberately set as far back from the workspace as possible.
With a sigh, Vakama carefully plucks it up in his hand, a delicacy to its handling that he hasn't used with much else.
...]
Even with our most frightening mistakes sitting in front of us, we cannot backtrack everything at once.
Start with what you can do now, and start small. The world does not always need to be saved with the powerful.
[...The corrosion was a little too familiar judging by the look on Viktor's face--as well as the similar oil-slick iridescence where human skin met machine and circuitry. He glanced from the mask to Vakama as if wanting to question it--having a good idea he knew the object's nature--but ultimately decided to say nothing.]
You're right, of course. Worrying though the risk may be, we can not allow ourselves to stagnate for fear of the unknown. It is simply...finding a balance, I think.
[He forgoes his chair this time, choosing to drop his weight to a seat against the bed instead, sitting cross legged with the mask settled between his palms.]
You remember what I told you of, back when we sat together on those foreign beaches? What you told me in return?
There is no prize to perfection. Either in its completion, or in total absence for fear of it, I think it still applies.
[Viktor made the telltale hitching metal sound of quiet and tired laughter, stepping closer to sit on the edge of the bed and leaning his staff against his shoulder.]
'When every equation was solved, all that remained...' [Just as he had on the beach, he spoke in the tone of echoing a recollection. Another's words, yet not quite someone else's.] '...were fields of dreamless solitude.'
Progress and innovation necessitates mistakes. It is how we learn and improve, iterate, evolve. So we must never confuse stumbling points for unsalvageable failures--nothing is ever so far gone that it can not improve.
[His eyes flick to the side, to where the golden mask sits against the desk. All he has left of Lhikan. But it's brief.]
Mm. Regardless of the cost.
[There is no bringing back the dead. No taking back the scarring left from choices already made.]
How I wish I could toss this into the sea and be done with it. That I could just feign ignorance. It is all that is responsible for what little peace my people have for now, but if it ever ends up in the wrong hands...
Too many beings in power know that it exists. The Makuta himself would have levelled what remained of our city to take it away again, and it was only when I threatened to destroy it that he finally gave some ground on a stalemate.
The last time I lost it entirely, he immediately attempted to kill me where I stood when he found out. If he were to find out it was gone again under my hand, then the brutality he would unleash on our people would be immediate. He would have no reason to stay his hand.
Given that I won't be a Toa for much longer, we would have no protection.
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[the perils of steampunk]
I...went back to Piltover for a moment.
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[But wait... Piltover?]
...Alone? [Concern immediately knits his expression as he straightens up in his seat.] After everything that had happened, Viktor, weren't you...
[In danger? But he cuts off the sentence with visible effort. It's worry that has no place, a chiding for something that's come and gone. Viktor had managed that trip once already for his tools and come back in one piece.
So he exhales, eyes drifting to the floor as he rewords his question.]
...Did you find what you were looking for?
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[He smiled crookedly, huffing out a laugh that almost sounded embarrassed.]
...Yes. I did.
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The confirmation does ease his tension considerably, though.]
Good, good... [He doesn't need to ask why. Tools aside, there was only one primary reason Vakama knows that Viktor wanted to make sure he ever went back to Runeterra in the first place.]
...Were you able to figure out where he is?
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Of course, I know exactly where he is. [A small gesture with the hand not on his staff.] Down the hallway and probably considering dissecting a surveillance camera.
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At least the realization dawns pretty quickly.]
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I told you, I told you you could do it, my friend--!
[His hand claps to Viktor's shoulder with an excitement he hasn't held for quite a while. Oh, blessed be Mata Nui to see courage in practice.]
Would you introduce us, when there is time?
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Obviously, I was here to suggest you should talk to him. Besides, he has already been my second shadow, so it is not as though you two would fail to cross paths.
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I'll be on the lookout for him, then -- ah, provided he still looks somewhat the same as the last time?
I'm proud of you for sticking through with it, Viktor.
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...Thank you. I do not think I would have had the courage to reach this conclusion without you and the others.
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It still was on you to follow through. But I am glad we could have been the encouragement that led you to this.
Do you plan to stay here, then? Or does Jayce wish for you to go back with him?
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[unfortunately he has kids to look after now]
...He's staying with me. Janna's grace, he's probably getting menaced by Fukuda as we speak.
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I'll make sure my diagrams of your brace stay with my notebooks, then... there wasn't too much I was able to determine with the alloys we worked with, but I recorded what I could... it will be a starting ground if anything needs to be adjusted.
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So long as you're still comfortable with it.
Maybe now that the threats have diminished from the streets, it could be a good excuse to show Jayce the broader scope. I'm sure there's going to be a lot rebuilding that needs to take place here, let alone outside where we've had to travel.
This world could really use the two of you.
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[Viktor trailed off, eyes a blue-silver as they glanced around anxiously.]
I know that we can help this world. But we have to be cautious, and learn from our missteps with Runeterra. Mostly mine.
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[Satisfied he's found the pages he needs, Vakama closes his notes back up once more, pausing only for his eyes to drift over the masks that now sit against the far corner of his desk. Viktor has seen them both weeks ago, one golden and a full shape like Vakama's own, while the other is a golden-orange that is far smaller, mottled with exposure to some sort of corrosive element, deliberately set as far back from the workspace as possible.
With a sigh, Vakama carefully plucks it up in his hand, a delicacy to its handling that he hasn't used with much else.
...]
Even with our most frightening mistakes sitting in front of us, we cannot backtrack everything at once.
Start with what you can do now, and start small. The world does not always need to be saved with the powerful.
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You're right, of course. Worrying though the risk may be, we can not allow ourselves to stagnate for fear of the unknown. It is simply...finding a balance, I think.
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[He forgoes his chair this time, choosing to drop his weight to a seat against the bed instead, sitting cross legged with the mask settled between his palms.]
You remember what I told you of, back when we sat together on those foreign beaches? What you told me in return?
There is no prize to perfection. Either in its completion, or in total absence for fear of it, I think it still applies.
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'When every equation was solved, all that remained...' [Just as he had on the beach, he spoke in the tone of echoing a recollection. Another's words, yet not quite someone else's.] '...were fields of dreamless solitude.'
Progress and innovation necessitates mistakes. It is how we learn and improve, iterate, evolve. So we must never confuse stumbling points for unsalvageable failures--nothing is ever so far gone that it can not improve.
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Mm. Regardless of the cost.
[There is no bringing back the dead. No taking back the scarring left from choices already made.]
How I wish I could toss this into the sea and be done with it. That I could just feign ignorance. It is all that is responsible for what little peace my people have for now, but if it ever ends up in the wrong hands...
[He exhales, frustrated.]
I will need to find a way to hide it. Somehow.
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Too many beings in power know that it exists. The Makuta himself would have levelled what remained of our city to take it away again, and it was only when I threatened to destroy it that he finally gave some ground on a stalemate.
The last time I lost it entirely, he immediately attempted to kill me where I stood when he found out. If he were to find out it was gone again under my hand, then the brutality he would unleash on our people would be immediate. He would have no reason to stay his hand.
Given that I won't be a Toa for much longer, we would have no protection.
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