“Rick Ravette has died of a heart attack at age 58.”

Upon hearing those words come from the television Sonic and Tails sat on the couch in shock. Rick wasn’t a close friend but he was someone they were fans of and had known personally. Both of them didn’t know how to articulate their feelings at the moment. The pair watched the TV in silence.

The show, which scheduled an episode to be about Rick’s upcoming film, was obviously canceled. Instead what replaced it was an in-memoriam episode dedicated to Rick, his time as host of his show, and his personal life.

“Do you want to go out for a drive? I don’t want to watch this right now?” said Tails.

“A drive?”

“I will drive us around and we can talk. When I feel like I need to clear my head I usually drive around a bit.”

Sonic agreed and they both headed out. It was nighttime outside with a light fog. There wasn’t much traffic since it had been fairly late. At first, the two didn’t say anything, Tails drove and Sonic sat in the back looking through the window. The radio was turned off and the only thing that could be heard was the sound of the motor. The two had a lot of things they wanted to say but just couldn’t find a way to express it.

“58 years is too early. To go out so suddenly without any warning also is terrible. As far as I know, he didn’t have any health issues. I don’t even know what to say. It's always sad when you hear something like this” Sonic said.

“Whenever I hear about things like this it gets me anxious. Do you remember our talk a couple of days ago?” Tails said looking at Sonic through the rearview mirror.

“The thing about how terrified you are about wasting time and spending it on mediocre things?”

“Yes,” Tails firmly gripped the steering wheel. “That fear comes from the possibility of things like this happening. Your life can be cut short with an event you couldn’t see coming. We all make all sorts of plans for the future, we have ambitions and dreams on what we are going to do, and then poof all of it vanishes with your death. I think how I could meet the same fate as Rick at any point. Not necessarily a heart attack of course but some unforeseen thing that kills me.

“What would my life amount to? What have I done with my time and did I manage to achieve everything I wanted to do? If I died tomorrow I haven’t finished college. Currently, I am going nowhere, there is so many things I want to do. I may not get to do them and everything could be over. I am sorry, I’m spewing my random thoughts onto you, I feel lost, afraid, and sad is all.”

“No need to be sorry, we’re talking so say everything you want to say”, Sonic said and smiled at Tails through the rearview mirror.

“I don’t know what more to say. I don’t want to die prematurely and there is no way to impact if it's something random. You can take care of your health, you can be careful and you could still be killed by something random. That is extremely scary to me and I wish to finish everything I want to do before my time is up.”

Sonic waited for a moment before saying anything. He looked through his window and observed the Tokyo buildings around him. “I understand what you are feeling. A while back when I was still chasing for the next ‘Sonic game’ opportunity it did cross my mind that I could die. I would never fix my reputation and my legacy would be making bad games. I comforted myself that I with the idea that I was destined to get a second chance.

“I believed in the idea of a happy ending. Surely things won’t end the way they are now right? You are right though, things could end at any moment. Life isn’t clean like a film and in truth, there are no happy endings. They don’t exist. We all die at some point. Some die later, some die sooner, and many never accomplish their goals or attain their dreams. I learned with this experience with the mobile game offer that I will probably never get the shot at SEGA that I had been hoping for. I will never get the comeback I was dreaming of most likely.”

“that’s not true.” Tails cut Sonic off. “You can't be sure, they might want to make another Sonic game”

“It's always possible but I think I should let that dream go” Sonic continued. “It might sound like sinking into doom and gloom but I'm not. I won't ever get to be the video game star I was hoping to be and that’s okay. I realized that I was so focused on the future that I didn’t see what was right in front of me.

“The time outside of work we spent arguing, talking, and watching movies is what I’ve overlooked. I feel the best when the two of us do just about anything together. Our friendship is always something I’ve taken for granted and now I realize looking back some of my fondest memories are with you. It doesn’t matter to me that happy endings don’t exist, what matters to me is to spend the time until the end feeling happy.

“Right now I have to figure out what kind of job I am going to be doing and I know the time I spent making video games wasn’t a waste either since I do love making them. I think you should relax. I am sure you will finish college, you have to keep pushing yourself and both of us are probably going to find work that makes us feel fulfilled.”

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

Tails started to digest everything Sonic had said to him. “What if we die before we find fulfilling work”

“That’s okay too. The point is are you happy right now”

Tails frowned. “I don’t know”

“Is there something you wish to change?”

“I do want to finish college.”

“Work on that then, influence things you can. Death is, like you said earlier, something you cant influence. If it's something you have no control over then don’t worry about it.” Sonic said sounding inspired.

“I am surprised how quickly you became so positive”

“I think I came to some revelations”

“You are right though. There is no point in worrying about things you have no control over. Also, I love the time we hang out too. In those moments I almost forget about all of my worries. You have always been my best friend.”

Sonic had an embarrassed look on his face. “Well not always…”

Tails shook his arm in dismissal. “Ah forget about that. It’s over and behind us.” Sonic and Tails were alluding to their fight on the making of Sonic 06.

“I just want to say, thank you for forgiving me and giving me a second chance. I’ve been meaning to ask you, what did I say to you when I called you from jail? I don’t remember a thing I said. What did I say to you that made you forgive me?”

Tails once again shook his arm in dismissal. “It’s really not important anymore trust me, I don’t remember myself that much. All of that is behind us”

“Alright if you say so.” Sonic shrugged. Suddenly the thought came back to Sonic that Rick Ravette had died. Through this conversation, they moved far away from that. Upon remembering, he had a sad look on his face. The topic changed back to Rick and the enthusiastic atmosphere had gone away.

“What do you think, would have Rick been able to defeat Lupin the 3rd if he was still alive?” Tails attempted to lift the mood with their standard thing that always made them laugh.

“You know the answer. It’s Lupin”

“I know. I just wanted to ask.”

Both of them chuckled but they weren’t laughing out loud like ‘who would win’ usually brings out. This time it only slightly improved the mood.

After talking and driving a bit more they went back home. Tails was in his room thinking to himself.

When I remember the days back in the forest. Before the games, before Robotnik, when all of us were friends, Amy, Knuckles… when Sonic and I were inseparable. Sonic to me seemed larger than life. He was so cool, so confident and so capable. I looked up to him, he was like an idol to me. He also greatly depended on me.

There were many things he didn’t know about or things he didn’t know how to do. He often fell back on me for help and always wanted me to watch his back. It felt so great being needed by someone, especially since I looked up to him. We were also best friends. While we were close, we were also great friends with everyone else.

All of us were a tight nit group of friends. Always laughing together even though we were poor. Everything changed after Robotnik and the video games. Retrospectively, looking at things now it wasn’t Sonic the only one who changed back then. Everyone changed and we all grew apart.

Even though money and power changed the group, Sonic was without a doubt the worst. He became an unrecognizable person from the one he was before the fame. I wanted to believe that he could change. I wanted to believe that we could be close friends again. I wanted to believe that we would be a duo once again.

His ego was so far up in the clouds that he was unreachable. I had finally had enough of him during ‘Sonic 06’ and had decided to end our friendship. It was a very hard decision. He was someone I knew for most of my life and my closest friend.

During the years after our separation, I realized I had zero close friends left. I had lost contact with Knuckles, Amy, Cream, Rouge… and I was alone now. I had ‘friends’ but no close friends. Nobody who I was truly intimate with. Only people I knew on a surface level. Usually, at social events, I felt lonely.

After entering college I lead an almost completely isolated life. Studying all the time, barely seeing anyone for weeks sometimes. I thought I did something very wrong. If I ended up here I must’ve made a mistake, being alone all of the time. Should I have never left the game industry? Should I have stayed with Sonic and kept bearing the mistreatment?

Everything changed once I received the call. I was told that Sonic had a crash and he was in jail, he was told that he could make one call and he chose to call me.

Over the phone Sonic kept repeating over and over how sorry he was. He must’ve said I’m sorry a million times. If I remember correctly he said something along the lines of ‘I have no one left in the world to turn to. You’ve always been my one and only best friend. The brother I never had. Please forgive me. Please give me a chance. Ive changed. Im going to change. Please, I need you buddy. I’m sorry…’ he went on for quite a bit and rambled. He sounded drunk out of his mind.

Not even for one second did I believe that it was possible that he would ever change. I thought that after all of the years together working in SEGA he was long gone. So why did I forgive him and offered to help him?

A part of me still had the memories of our friendship and felt like because of those years I owed it to him as a once-upon-a-time best friend a helping hand. Since he was drunk I knew that his words were at least sincere. If he was calling me then he must’ve been really desperate. I also thought that maybe he would try to make things between us amicable at the very least. He said he desired to change, he probably wants to but I thought that it wouldn’t happen. Still, he said he wanted to, maybe I should give him a chance.

However, the biggest reason why I forgave him is because I wanted to feel needed again. I wanted to feel like someone is depending on me. Exactly like he used to do when we were a duo before the video games. I wanted to have a sense of superiority over someone that utterly destroyed his life, to be able to compare to mine and be like, hmmm I did it better than him.

For this selfish and disgusting reason, I decided to help him. I got a rush when he said I needed to drive him to work since they took away his license. It was exactly what I wanted. He needed me to literally survive. In the beginning, I was getting exactly what I wanted. Sonic also liked to obsess over how his reputation had been tarnished and how he was a laughing stock.

I felt vindicated at first since I thought, aha he truly hasn’t changed. He is obsessing over his image and how critics perceive him. Still the narcissist he was during our time together at SEGA. I listened to his rants, something he loved. It was evident he hadn’t had a chance to talk about this with anyone or if he has no one was willing to listen to him.

Very soon something happened that I couldn’t have imagined. We actually became friends again. I am not sure when did this happen exactly or how. I started to notice us together having fun while watching the morning show. I noticed we started laughing together. We began to have these rituals and I genuinely enjoyed his company.

Our friendship had been repaired somehow. I wanted to resist it. I didn’t want to write everything off and the way he treated me and everyone else. I wanted him to never be my friend again after ‘Sonic 06’. I couldn’t influence how I was going to feel but soon I saw him as my best friend again.

I was so ashamed of myself for the reasons I forgave him. I was so disgusted that he had a genuine attempt to reconcile and I accepted his hand purely out of a desire to be needed. I could never bring myself to tell him all of this. He sees me as a pure and kind-hearted person. I don’t want him to ever find out what horrible thoughts led me to help him.

In the end, I was also proven wrong in my belief that he was unable to change. Little by little I see the small steps he takes and how hard he tries to improve himself. He is right, there are no happy endings but I want to try as hard as I can that are friendship does have one. I think he feels the same way too.

Sonic and Tails continued with their lives after today’s events settled. Tails studied hard for his exams and Sonic kept searching for his

ideal job still without an idea what it is.