So like, mini disclaimer before the post. I was not and am not a believer in the "Sonic is going to be forced to choose between his original friends and the shatterspace variants" theory, nor the companion to it "all the variants are just gonna essentially live with their memories inside the og friends' hearts"
However, I do have brainrot over the idea of Nine meeting Tails in his dreams, and some of these ideas require a prerequisite of "in which Nine exists within Tails' heart but does not currently have a body.
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Imagine, if you will, a setting post canon in which the variants exist within the hearts of the original and (kingdom hearts style) they would just need a body/vessel of their own to exist again. Tails is sleeping, and after dreams upon dreams of meeting the variants, experiencing their fleeting memories and their hurt (their feelings about everything), he comes across Nine.
Nine... Tails has had a hard time remembering much of his dreams while awake, but when he's dreaming, he remembers that Nine has been perhaps the angriest and most conflicted of all the variants. All of them want to be alive, of course. Tails wouldn't be surprised if *all* of them have been parsing through his own memories in exchange for sharing theirs.
But none have been so volatile as Nine, harder to reason with. The others at least face him more often than not, but Nine has directly done so few times.
But...Tails can't blame him for that, especially not after what he knows. He understands how Nine likely feels (abandoned, lonely, forgotten). Perhaps he wouldn't be so agreeable either if he fought tooth and nail for a better future, and the universe denied him that (nay, punished him to watch but to never have).
But tonight...
Nine is standing under a palm tree, facing the vast ocean past the beaches of Green Hill. Tails takes a few steps down the hill he's on, and soon enough he's standing off to the side (dream logic, he understands)—where he can see Nine from the front, but isn't standing directly in front of him or obstructing his view.
It's at this moment that Tails realizes he's never seen Nine so clearly before. The tips of his ears, to his permafrown, to his 7 mechanical tails, and down to his shoes. He's fought the fox before in his dreams, seen glimpses of him, but this is the first time he's had a chance to really see him.
Nine turns his head away from the sea, and suddenly Tails is beside him, mere feet away.
Tails opens his mouth, a dozen questions and sentence starters flying through his head. What eventually comes out is just a simple, "Nine?"
Nine smiles at that, and yet...Tails can tell almost instantly that it's not because he's happy or excited to see him. No, the smile is almost...accepting, if not a little bit sad.
Then, Nine sighs. "This could have been the other way around, but...it has to be you."
Tails hesitates for a moment before pointing at himself. "...Me? Why?"
"There are so many people connected to you—all of you, if my hypothesis is correct. It often is. You're me, so...you can feel what I felt. You could...feel how I feel."
And maybe it's true that Tails can feel what Mangey, Sails, and Nine are feeling, but all that proves is that one is affected by the presence of others residing within their own consciousness.
Tails shakes his head. "No. You're you, not me."
There's a moment of silence before Nine chuckles, and Tails continues, "I want you to know that you deserve to live as your own person, just as much as I do."
"Every time we've fought—here—I've asked you the same question. Do you remember it?"
Well, of course, Tails finds multiple questions as he tries to think back, but by keeping the terms of Nine's question in mind and employing process of elimination–
Nine turns back to the sea, squeezing both gloved hands into fists at his sides. "I was angry—among other things. I just couldn't understand why I was here. After everything I'd fought for, everything we'd been through together, I couldn't understand why he chose you. And every time I asked, you never gave me an answer."
Nine's right. Tails has never given him an answer to that question.
But to Tails...that question was never his to answer, at least in his opinion. Unless Sonic told him, Tails would never know why he put in for him, Amy, Knuckles, and Rouge over worlds of new friends. All he does know (straight from Sonic's own testimony) is that Sonic would have never made the choice he did had he known it would lead to all this. Sonic had wanted home, Tails, and all his friends back, but he never meant to erase the other worlds. Even as he tries to pretend otherwise, Tails knows Sonic has been beating himself up for the choice he made ever since.
Shouldn't Nine know that—that Sonic didn't mean to hurt him, that Sonic feels regret, that Sonic wasn't intending to choose between one or the other?
"Nine–"
"Save it," Nine says, cutting him off. "It doesn't matter anymore. Sonic made his choice, but you still have that chance."
Nine turns back to Tails and holds out a hand.
Tails looks down, then back up at Nine. He hesitates for a second, but ultimately takes Nine's hand.
Tails is an observer, a spectator without form, as memories begin to play out before him in quick succession. Despite the lack of form, somehow his head begins to ache in pain that only grows over the moments.
And then, he begins to notice a pattern in the memories shown to him. Despite the pain, he recognizes the clear shift since a certain blue hedgehog—Sonic, of course—saves Nine from being hit by a train.
Each and every memory, if Sonic wasn't centered or mentioned in it, then his palpable absense was the focal point. Nine fought him, he worked with him, he almost lost him, he thought he lost him, and then he fought him again.
Nine had spent most of his life lonely, though he hadn't realized that until his life was almost over.
A waterfall of emotions hit him then, just before the highlight reel crackles into black.
And then, Tails is standing beside Nine again, head pulsing and heart pounding. He can hardly remember what he's just seen, and that waterfall of emotions seeps through his fingers as he tries to catch them, to study them.
All he knows is that he understands. Somehow, he understands why Nine feels the way he does. Now, more than before, he understands why Nine is hung up on Sonic the way he is.
Perhaps, Tails thinks, he understands how it feels for Nine to be with Sonic (and without him) far more than anyone else.
Tails musters up a look of determination as he stares into Nine's eyes, and he squeezes his hand. "I'll figure it out. No matter how long it takes, I'll make sure you—you, and Sails, and Mangey, and the rest—can walk along the beach. You don't deserve to sit here and watch like this. None of you deserved to have your lives taken."
And Nine... Nine smiles, like he just can't help it. "Don't you see? That's why it has to be you."
There's a feeling, an almost indescribable feeling, that strikes Tails' heart at that.
"I promise," Tails says.
And then, he’s sitting up in his bed, breathing deeply.
As he makes himself get up, get ready, and rush into his lab, there's little he remembers from his dream as always.
But he knows what he has to do.
I'll make sure of it, Nine.
