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Outcasts in Need

Part 1

For EdgeofObsidian

By Draconicon

Soldier. Weapon. Prison.

All and none. I am all...and none...

Edge took a deep breath as he waited for his teacher to arrive. He knew that there was a meeting going on in the Glade, that the Freedom Fighters were discussing yet again what to do with him. The black hedgehog kept his head down, breathing slowly through his scarf as he focused on keeping himself calm. Calm, and not at all negative, not at all paranoid about what might happen at the end of it all.

He sat with his legs crossed, his pants ending in wraps around his feet since his boots had been shredded during the last mission. His hands rested backs against his knees, palms upright, and his head was down, the wind making the spiked fringes of his hair whip about almost as much as his scarf was. His eyes kept flicking, wanting to open, but he clenched them shut all the tighter.

It was hard to stay calm when a bunch of people were discussing his fate and he wasn't invited to hear what was going on. He sighed, but he refused to let himself wallow in it, finding distraction after distraction to keep himself busy.

Meditation. Meditation was good for that. It allowed him to think of nothing, to throw his fears and his anxieties into a place where they wouldn't affect him, where they wouldn't draw his attention.

Edge took a deep breath, then opened his eyes. He felt something, something moving at the edge of the training grounds. He flicked his eyes left and right, looking at the trees, and then at the tips of them.

There was no visual warning, only a sudden burst of energy that only he could have felt. Edge threw himself forward into a somersault, flicking his leg back to catch the follow-up punch that had followed the jab to the back of his head. A pink fist caught his sole, and he managed to swing his leg around and launch himself in a different direction.

His teacher slammed into the ground where he had been, a knife burying itself in the earth. Edge's heart leaped into his throat, but reacted on instinct, his mind still in the meditation, in the emptiness.

Hands moved, darting up to deflect and block the rapid blows Espio was sending his way, ducking under those that could not be blocked and frantically trying to keep up with the rain of punches and kicks that followed. His ability to read the electrical impulses of the brain and the firing of the nerves was the only thing that kept him on his feet, and even then, the chameleon was fast enough to overcome that half of them -

THUNK!

One open-palm blow hit him right in the forehead, and Edge went flying backwards. He slammed into a tree-trunk, only to hear metal on wood right at the side of his head. He froze, his eyes flicking to his right, and he saw his reflection in the knife edge.

He slowly looked from it to the chameleon, silent behind his scarf. After a few moments of an intense stare-down, Espio nodded, standing up and sheathing the knife at his waist once more.

"You have gained a much better hold on the entity. The rest of the Freedom Fighters will be happy to hear that."

Edge shook his head as he slowly got to his feet. Others might have been angry about that sudden, unannounced test, but considering the circumstances, he was more than happy that it had gone the way that it had. The way that things had gone in the past, the way that he had reacted during the war against Eggman and Infinite, he knew for a fact that this could have gone much worse.

As the chameleon patted his shoulder, Edge gestured at his throat, and then mimed cutting it, and then tapped his wrist. Had they decided that he needed to be executed, or was there still time?

"They're not going to decide anything of the sort. The only objection to keeping you around that they had was that you might lose control, that the Abyss entity might come out again. This proves that there is no such risk."

Edge cocked his head to the side.

"You were under direct assault, and you feared for your life. If you were able to keep control through that, I am sure that they will understand that you can keep yourself under control for other situations, as well."

The hedgehog nodded, though he wasn't sure that he agreed. He reached up, rubbing his throat lightly, and then shook his head.

"However, you are allowed freedom from today's training. I suggest that you take time to collect yourself, and then see if you can find a place with...people."

There was just enough of an edge to Espio's voice to put a smile on Edge's unseen face. The chameleon felt as awkward around others as he did, though he doubted that the ninja had the same sort of fears around other people that the hedgehog did. As far as he could tell, his mentor only had the issue of disliking crowds and people. Others liked him, he just didn't like them.

Edge had the opposite problem. He wanted to like other people, but other people...well, ever since the incident...the long-lasting incident...they'd had a hard time trusting him. And now, his teacher wanted him to spend time with people.

Well, that was going to go well, wasn't it?

The chameleon arched an eyebrow through the long silence, and Edge sighed, shaking his head. He nodded that he understood, and then bowed his head in submission to the master ninja.

"This is for your own good, Edge. It is one thing to be a soldier; it's another thing to be a weapon. One is a person, one is not."

He nodded.

"You may go, now. Practice while you can, but you know the rules. The moment that you feel anything from the entity..."

Edge nodded once more. He knew. There was no way for him to forget, considering that his life depended on him remembering those things.

"Then go."

The black hedgehog nodded, then turned back to the tree. He looked at the branches, and flickered. Dissipating into electricity, he leaped from branch to branch as he lunged higher and higher up the tree, until he reached the top. He leaned back, allowing his weight to pull at the springy plant, and then used it as a catapult to send him further into the forest. Spreading his arms out wide, he allowed it to carry him on the wind, not flying, but merely slowing his fall.

Flicker. Another electrical discharge, landing on a branch before leaping off at the apex of its bending and flexing. He flew again, fell, and then launched himself through the air once more. Every time, it felt almost like flying. Almost.

Through the forest he went, avoiding the edge of Knothole Glade for the moment, taking his time to do as his teacher had asked. He needed to calm down, to pull himself together once more, and that meant that he needed a little bit of time to himself.

Flicker, flicker, flicker -

Then he felt the stirring inside.

Edge paused on the next branch, immediately freezing in place and shoving his back against the trunk. He pressed his hands together, pulling all his focus into a place inside of himself.

Something stirred, briefly, weakly, but it would gain strength if he didn't do something about it now. He forced himself to breathe evenly, even as the weak turbulence inside started to bubble with frustration, with anger, with rage, but mostly, with annoyance.

Nnnngh...

No. You are not free.

I...will be...

No. You are going to stay -

Little weakling...Do you think you are anything more than a temporary cage for me...

Edge felt the sting of the words, but he pushed it down. He knew, knew above all else, that he could not trust whatever this thing said. Abyss had never been anything but a destroyer, a being of pure ravaging destruction, and he would say anything to return to that. The black hedgehog shook his head.

They are letting me live. If they thought that I was useless, they'd get rid of me.

Ha...useless...a cage is useful. A dog is useful. A weapon is useful. That doesn't mean that you are anything more. Anything you could have been, anyone you could have become? Gone. I took that from you...you may as well let me take the rest, because you will never be anything more than a cage...a weak, cracking cage that will eventually -

I am useful. That is all that matters.

And with that, Edge silenced the other voice, pushing it down into its cage in him once again. He held it there, using all that he had learned over the years, holding tight to every bit of encouragement that he had gained from Espio and the few friends that he had managed to keep since the incident. With difficulty, he managed to quiet Abyss's voice, and then silence it completely.

He slumped back against the tree trunk, rubbing one hand over his forehead. The shakes were coming down, fear-sweat cold on his forehead, his hair sagging down a bit more than usual. He knew, he knew that this was temporary, but that didn't stop him from shaking like a leaf as he fought the fear that came from hearing that voice again.

Abyss. The Destroyer. A great and powerful entity, Abyss was something that, until recently, he hadn't even known was part of him, hadn't known was responsible for the electrical powers that he had. They'd come about almost spontaneously, and until that day, that horrible day, he'd attributed those powers to wherever he had come from before arriving on Mobius.

And what a day that was...

For all that the Freedom Fighters were on the desperate side, they weren't entirely keen on outsiders. They were better than Eggman tended to be, for sure, but that only meant that they were willing to let him talk rather than shooting him on sight. The looks of suspicion had lasted well-past the interview stage, and once they figured out how good he was at picking up fighting skills - particularly the assassination and stealth-fighting skills that Espio was willing to teach him - it had only gotten worse.

But these days, he would give anything to go back to that.

The shakes started to dissipate as he slumped down along the tree, leaving him straddling the branch. Edge slumped his head back against the tree, staring up at the sky. Afternoon sun was slowly fading away, showing the signature deep oranges that usually came with the first bits of sunset. While there were hours of light left, he couldn't help but stare at the glow in the sky, drawn back to memory.

Explosions. Fire. Smoke. And through it all, lightning.

Edge gripped his hands into tight fists, forcing the fear and anger that came with the memories back down, forcing himself to be calmer than he wanted to be. He wanted to lash out, wanted to be angry, wanted to be upset, but he couldn't. Not if he wanted to keep Abyss where he was, locked up tight.

He dropped himself back into meditation, holding onto the nothingness that came from the state of mind that the meditation encouraged. He let the bad things rise, and then fall into the nothingness as if they had never been, throwing away the food that Abyss needed to become stronger.

I am better. I am stronger. I am not that.

With one more deep breath, the bad feelings disappeared. He was able to sit upright, looking at the sky, and he let out one of the shakiest breaths that he'd ever taken as he continued down memory lane.

Abyss had come out during the war. A horrible ambush had threatened him, had taken out half the squad that he was part of. They were trying to make a rush on one of Eggman's cities, to take it back before Infinite could show up and start screwing with them. It had all gone wrong, and when one of the badniks had started shooting at him, something happened.

It was still unclear, more of a burst of light than anything else, something that had consumed the world around him, made it hard to see what was going on, but he remembered that much. Remembered the lightning that burst from his body, the chains that formed from it, the exploding windows all around and the ripped-up streets...the torn-up bodies...

From there, Edge didn't remember anything, but Sonic, Espio, and the others had given him the highlights. The war had come to an end, and what he'd become started another one.

No, no. I didn't become that. That wasn't me.

And that wasn't an excuse. He had just talked to the other part that had done all that. Abyss. Abyss, something that had been snuck away with him when he'd been banished from his homeland, something that had taken up residence inside of his body, something that had taken the opportunity to 'save' him in order to step forward and take control.

He'd been in the back of his own skull for weeks, months, until Super Sonic and Super Shadow had worked together to beat Abyss into the ground. He didn't know how they'd managed to do it, but they did. The fact that it had taken both of them in their super form, however, meant that he had all the respect in the world for how much power Abyss actually had, and all the motivation to make sure that he was never released.

And he didn't get out. That's the important part. He didn't get out. He didn't. Get. Out.

Edge rubbed his forehead gently, slowly getting back to his feet. Probably best to take the electrical powers lighter for a few days. He had been training hard with them, and they were some of his most potent techniques, but they also opened that cage ever so slightly to allow them to come free. The only reason that Abyss remained in the depths was because of the other power that he had, and it was the power that he wished had remained his true one.

He didn't know where it had come from, but he suspected that it came from his old homeland. Back there, he remembered someone - his father, he imagined, since he didn't look like a hedgehog, but he had been married to one that Edge was pretty sure was his mother - someone that could cast barriers. Bubbles, reflectors, mirrors, various forms of force that could push something down and away. There'd been times when it had been used to amuse him, little bubbles cast through the air that reflected light, that bounced darkness away, that did anything that the caster could use.

He felt, at times, that he could almost use it himself, and maybe, maybe, that was what he was using, on an unconscious level, to hold Abyss in place. He imagined that, if he didn't have that, Abyss would have come out again already.

Shaking his head, Edge put that out of his mind. It was time to stop being negative. Time to stop letting old memories rise. The worse he felt, the more that the cage on Abyss weakened, and the harder it was to keep him in place. If he didn't want to become a possessed puppet, then he needed to keep his mind on happier, positive things.

And one of those, fortunately, was people.

Glancing toward the Glade, Edge stretched his arms over his head before taking a bouncing route in that direction. It was time to see if he could spend time with others.

#

He landed at the edge of the swimming hole that the Freedom Fighters had dug out over the last few days. As it was the heights of summer it was no surprise that the average fighter wanted a chance to relax from the sun. The one time that he had popped down where people could see him before, however, the place had cleared out almost instantly, leaving nobody around, nobody to spend time with.

Not that the hedgehog was sure what he could have done while around people, if he was completely honest. The thought alone was enough to send shivers up and down his spine and nervous butterflies into his belly. The very idea of being alone with a bunch of people that he didn't know was enough to make him feel sick.

So, both to keep the people around and to delay the urge to actually talk to them, he hid behind the bushes at the edge of the swimming hole. With everything that he had learned from Espio, that was easy, and he was able to take up a good position to watch everything in the water and on the shore from behind the greenery.

As he squatted in place, he could feel the slight tickle of the electrical pressure of everyone around him. He didn't know what they were doing - some of them were too far away for that - but he could feel them every time that they moved. He could feel the dozens of men and women around, and most of all, he could feel some of them walking together.

Edge pulled the bushes apart, looking at the couples that walked together along the waterfront. He watched as some held hands, and others hugged each other around the waist. He watched as some were nuzzling against each other, while others seemed to take it a bit further by squeezing the buttocks of their partner.

The hedgehog cocked his head to the side as he watched them, as envious as he was bewildered by the various actions. Despite his long time in service with the Freedom Fighters, he honestly didn't know what to make of the different couples among their ranks.

Espio said that it's like being friends, but more, but...

Frankly, Edge barely even had friends. He didn't know how to imagine something more than that.

So, he sat there, watching them, trying to figure out just how the couple thing worked. He watched the way that the women touched their men, occasionally reaching around and patting something naughty, and he watched as the men did the same thing back. More often, actually, going so far in some cases as to slide their hands inside the swimsuits that the women wore, or even go up and squeeze a breast.

Edge, of course, wasn't completely ignorant of all that. He knew what pleasure was, what sex was. When he'd been a normal soldier, back before he'd become what they were calling the 'Abyss-Holder', he'd heard them talk about sex all the time. He heard them talk about the girls back home, talk about how big their boobs were, or how fat their asses were, or what their girlfriends would let them do to each other. He knew what men wanted, and ostensibly, what women wanted, but...well...

He didn't really know what he wanted.

Edge sat back on his heels, the wraps on his feet coming a bit loose as he shuffled on the balls of his feet. Every time that he found himself staring at someone, it wasn't for the reason that all the other guys on the shore were staring. The black hedgehog wasn't keeping his eyes on the breasts of the women, wasn't trying to undress her with his eyes. Nor was he looking at the males, wondering what they would be like.

No, it was more just wondering...what was he supposed to feel?

Because he was obviously supposed to feel something. He looked at the women, he looked at the men, he looked at the couples, he looked at the ones that were single, but nothing gave him an answer to the mystery. All he felt was more confused than ever, and he groaned as he struggled to sort it out.

Everyone without someone keeps staring at the ones that are showing off the most...or are the biggest, he supposed, following the stares through the water and across the shore. They like the girls with the biggest breasts, or the guys with the biggest...bulges...but why?

Sex, he knew, but it was like they were treating attraction and sex as the same thing. Edge didn't get it. Why would you want to be with someone just because they looked good? You didn't know anything about them except for the fact that you wanted to put your dick in them.

And that wasn't a very good reason, he had to say.

The black hedgehog tried to look at them with the same sort of thought, but even though he had the occasional twitch in between his legs, he didn't feel what he was seeing on all the faces out there. He wanted to, but he didn't.

What am I doing wrong?

He tried looking at both men and women, seeing if there was any difference, but there was nothing. Not even a blip of attraction. That wasn't to say that the women out there didn't put a bit of a tingle down between his legs, but that was arousal, not attraction. He felt like he knew the difference, even though he hadn't felt the latter just yet.

Even though...

In his desperate attempt to find something to feel attracted to, his eyes wandered further and further south, and eventually, they alighted on a pair of bare feet that were sticking over the edge of a beach towel. Edge froze, his eyes widening as he stared at the wide pair of orange feet that were so close to him.

They were soft, lotioned with some sort of oil to the point where they shone in the afternoon sun. He blushed as he watched the mongoose girl curl her toes, her little digits pulling up, and then causing her soles to curl and wrinkle in the process. Almost instantly, his shaft started to rise, and he blushed worse than ever.

He turned away from her, but no sooner had he started to look for a distraction than his eyes settled on another pair of feet. A white rabbit walking along on her own, her soles getting smacked by sandals every time that she took her feet off the ground. He hissed, sucking in a breath at the sight, watching as she stretched out her foot again and again, her toes staying on the ground but the sweat-slick sole getting exposed every time that she took a step. Smack, step, smack, step, almost like she was deliberately exposing them.

Edge covered his eyes, but his cock was harder than ever. It throbbed hard in his pants, begging for attention, but he knew better than to reach down and touch it. It would just become a distraction, a disappointment as he failed to find something to keep his attention for long unless...

Unless he stared at the girls out there.

He knew that it was wrong, but now that he thought about it, the temptation was there. Nobody knew that he was around, and nobody knew that he could be staring at them through the little gaps in the bushes with his cock in hand. Edge could just sit down, pull his dick out, and get off as many times as he wanted without even...

...no...

He shook his head. No, that would be wrong. That would be -

"Oh god..."

Edge blushed hard, going stiff and still as he looked out the hole in the greenery again. One lady had stopped right by his bush, stretching her arms over her head. She was a chipmunk, with soft brown fur along her legs, a bikini bottom on that barely seemed to fit around her rump, but that...that was nothing compared to...

The hedgehog's eyes were drawn right down to the chipmunk's sole. Due to her species, it wasn't so long as the foxes and rabbits that were around, but it was nice and wide, and it looked vaguely pudgy, not that dissimilar to the woman that it was attached to, if he was honest. She was stretching out her leg, and her sandal was right on the verge of falling off, giving him an up-close look at her foot that he hadn't had on anyone for a long time.

His mouth fell open as he stared at it, blushing nearly as bad as he'd done the night that he discovered that he had a foot fetish at all. The other soldiers had decided to take in a night at a strip club, and they'd decided to drag the 'foreigner' along with them. Edge had been embarrassed as could be, but when he had freedom to stare at someone openly for the first time, it had been hard to resist. He remembered staring at dozens of soles that night, and jerking off hard when they left.

This...this was different. This was...naughty.

He felt wrong, but he wanted to lean in to smell it, to taste it. The hedgehog started to move, then stopped himself.

No...it's wrong...

Then the chipmunk put her foot down, and started to walk off. Edge whimpered, and she froze.

...Oops.

He didn't have a chance to move before she turned around and spread the bushes open. As he looked up at the chipmunk woman, he tried to wave as agreeably and nicely as he could, but she only gasped and backed away from him, staring at the bushes as if she'd seen a monster.

"It's...it's the Abyss-Holder!"

She shouted it at the top of her lungs, and he winced, jabbed right through to the core by the scream. All at once, the electrical impulses of everyone out there spiked as their heart rates surged, as they jumped to their feet and gathered their stuff. He tried to reach out a hand, getting to his feet to try and calm them. He opened his mouth...and nothing came out.

It was yet another effect of being bound to Abyss. He had been mute since the day he left home, and now, it meant that he couldn't say anything to apologize to people, to try and calm them down. All he could do was gesture helplessly at them as they ran off, leaving him alone by the swimming hole with nobody else willing to give him a second thought.

"Run!"

"Oh, man, what if he's already loose?"

"Forget it, just run!"

"He's a monster!"

Everything they shouted cut into him in a way that he had almost forgotten was possible. He knew that they were afraid of him, knew that they were more than terrified of everything that Abyss had done, and that was why he avoided them. He didn't want to scare them, didn't want to feed Abyss the negativity and fear that strengthened the entity.

Yet, at the same time, he couldn't help but be stung. He stared as they left, shaking his head helplessly. Towels, coolers, even sandals were left behind, and he watched as the crowd ran barefoot from him.

Somehow, his stupid kink took that and ran with it, and his boner continued to throb as he slumped back down. Edge slammed his head into his knees as he curled up in the fetal position under the tree.

Stupid, stupid, stupid!

Why did he make a sound? Why did he do something to give himself away? He'd been having a good time, even if it was a bit creepy, and he'd...he'd...

He made them remember that he was a dangerous person. That he could sneak up on them at any time, and they wouldn't even know it. Edge knew that they were already afraid of what might happen if he lost control again - and he knew that some of them were convinced that he was the monster, that Abyss was just a cover story - and now, he was reminding them of just how dangerous he could be.

Why the hell did he even try? Why did he...why did he bother trying to be a person when they were just going to...

No. No. Stop. You can't...you can't think that way...

Edge pulled at the far end of his scarf, dabbing it against his eyes to get rid of the tears before they could completely form. Shaking his head, he dragged himself to his feet again, taking a few deep breaths.

You're still useful. You're keeping Abyss from getting away, and that's important. You can still be useful.

That had been one thing that he had learned on the battlefield. If you were useful, then it didn't matter how much other people might suspect you or hate you. If you could be useful, then you were allowed to stick around. You were kept around. You weren't sent away, because there wasn't anyone else that could do what you did.

And that was how he had to be now. If he was nothing but a cage, then he would need to be the best cage that anyone had ever seen.

Edge nodded, and then braced himself for the pain that would come from inside. He knew that it had been a flood of negativity, and he knew that Abyss fed on that, grew stronger, pushed against the barriers when he felt that. And now...

He blinked.

Now, he didn't feel anything. No pressure, no anger, no turbulence that wanted to bubble up from the inside. All he felt was annoyance from the other side of the barrier, as if Abyss was lurching away from something. But...

Is he...

Edge blinked a few times, conjuring up the image of the chipmunk's foot in his mind's eye. As he imagined it, his cock twitched a bit, and -

And the presence of Abyss pushed itself further and further down in the back of his head. The feeling of silence, of willing solitude was something that he hadn't had for so long that he almost didn't recognize it at first. Abyss hadn't left him, obviously - there was no way for the spirit of destruction to do that - but it had pulled as far back from his mind as possible, burying itself away from the thoughts and sensations of arousal.

...Who would have thought that he was a prude?

Aside from the sheer strangeness of having Abyss pulling back from his usual commentary about the hedgehog's weakness, however, Edge slowly realized something else. He now had a reason to be around other people. A practical reason, admittedly, and one that wasn't really a kind reason for those that he would be asking to stick around him, but a reason, nonetheless.

If he was around people, he might have other people that were willing to help him with various things. He would have people that would be able to feed him positivity that didn't just sound like regurgitated compliments the way that it sometimes did with Espio, or the rare occasion that he saw Sonic. Rare, indeed, since having the blue hedgehog around brought Abyss closer to the surface for the entity's sheer rage at the other hedgehog.

And more than that...

More than that, he'd have someone that could help him with that part of himself.

Edge knew that it was wrong to see others as just sex objects, and he didn't actually see people that way. He had had his little fantasies just then, sure, but that was a fantasy. It wasn't like he was going to rush up and demand it from someone, particularly as he wasn't actually attracted to any of the girls whose feet had had been looking at.

Was he?

He didn't think so, but...well, this was one thing he had very little experience in. Without that, he had no answers for himself. But if it was enough to keep Abyss burrowing further and further away, not wanting to be out in the open...

The idea of trying to 'talk' to people made him feel sick again. The idea of trying to spend time with everyone that ran away from him, that called him a monster, that saw him as nothing more than the cage that kept Abyss from killing everyone, was downright horrifying. He wanted to run off and hide.

But that wouldn't be useful...and he had to be useful.

Okay...maybe...maybe there's a book somewhere about meeting people? Maybe...

The End

Summary: Edge, a hedgehog that is possessed of a monstrous spirit of destruction, goes about his daily life while fighting to keep things under control. However, today, he finally finds a key towards keeping this destroyer buried.

Tags: No sex, M/solo, erection, hedgehog, chipmunk, various species, foot fetish, foot focus, sandals, female feet, female, feet, series, outcast,