The training grounds had been evacuated.
Not just cleared—evacuated. Every civilian within a two-mile radius had been moved to shelters. Every structure that could be reinforced had been reinforced. Every emergency protocol Knothole possessed had been activated.
Because today, for the first time since his rescue, Nazo was going to fight.
And he wasn't going to hold back.
"Are you sure about this?" Sally asked Sonic, her voice tight with barely concealed fear. "We don't know what he's capable of anymore. We don't know if he can even control his power without emotional regulation."
"That's exactly why we need to find out," Sonic replied, stretching his legs in preparation. "He's been sitting around for two months being empty. Maybe what he needs is action. Something to engage with that isn't just sitting and thinking."
"Or maybe he'll destroy half the Great Forest."
"Then we'll replant. Trees grow back." Sonic's grin was confident, but his eyes held a seriousness that betrayed his concern. "Besides, I've fought him before. I know what he can do."
"You fought him when he was holding back. When he had emotions telling him not to hurt you."
"Yeah, well." Sonic pulled out the seven Chaos Emeralds, their glow casting rainbow light across the devastated training grounds. "Guess we'll see what happens when he doesn't."
Nazo stood at the center of the cleared area, motionless as always.
Violet hovered at the edge of the designated combat zone, her golden eyes fixed on him with their usual desperate intensity. The other Freedom Fighters had taken positions at what they hoped was a safe distance—Shadow ready to intervene with Chaos Control if necessary, Tails monitoring energy readings from a reinforced bunker, Sally coordinating evacuation routes in case of catastrophic failure.
"You don't have to do this," Amy called out to Nazo. "Nobody's forcing you to fight."
"I know. I've agreed to participate because it serves a logical purpose."
"What purpose?"
"Determining my current capabilities. Understanding how my powers function without emotional regulation. Providing useful combat data for future strategic planning."
"That's very... practical."
"I am nothing if not practical."
Sonic approached, the Chaos Emeralds orbiting around him. "Ready when you are, buddy."
"I'm not your buddy. I don't experience friendship."
"Yeah, yeah, you're empty, feelings are gone, we get it." Sonic's grin widened. "But you can still fight, right?"
"My combat capabilities appear to be intact. Whether they function identically to before remains to be determined."
"Then let's determine it."
The Chaos Emeralds blazed with light, and Sonic transformed. His blue fur shifted to brilliant gold, his quills standing upright, his eyes burning red with chaos power. Super Sonic floated off the ground, radiating energy that warped the air around him.
"Your turn."
Nazo closed his eyes.
He had transformed many times before his capture. Perfect Nazo. Super Perfect Nazo. Chaos Nazo. Each form had been tied to emotion—anger triggering Perfect, desperation unlocking Super Perfect, connection to the Master Emerald enabling Chaos.
But he had no emotions now. No anger to fuel the transformation. No desperation to push him further. No sense of connection to anything.
Just emptiness.
And yet...
The power was still there. He could feel it—if "feel" was even the right word. The darkness that had always lurked within him, the negative chaos energy that had been accumulated from countless uses of the Emeralds. It hadn't disappeared with his emotions. It was simply... waiting.
He reached for it.
Not with anger. Not with desperation. Not with any feeling at all.
Just with intent. Pure, logical, emotionless intent.
Transform.
The transformation was different this time.
Before, Perfect Nazo had emerged in an explosion of darkness and rage, the crimson fur and yellow eyes reflecting the fury that drove the change. The black aura had crackled with malevolence, with the desire to destroy, with barely contained violence.
This time, there was no explosion.
The silver simply darkened, bleeding to crimson like ink spreading through water. The green eyes shifted to yellow with black pupils, but there was no fire in them—just the same empty observation that characterized his base form. The black aura materialized, but it didn't crackle or surge. It simply existed, a perfectly controlled field of darkness surrounding his form.
Perfect Nazo opened his eyes and looked at Super Sonic.
"Transformation complete," he observed. "Initiating combat assessment."
And then he moved.
Super Sonic barely had time to react.
One moment, Perfect Nazo was floating twenty feet away. The next, a fist was connecting with his jaw, sending him rocketing backward through three trees before he could arrest his momentum.
"Fast," Super Sonic grunted, wiping a trickle of blood from his lip. "Faster than before, actually. How—"
Perfect Nazo was already there, another strike incoming. Super Sonic dodged, countered, launched a spin attack that should have connected.
It didn't.
Perfect Nazo caught the spinning ball of golden energy in one hand, halting its momentum completely. He examined Super Sonic for a moment, as if studying an interesting specimen, then hurled him skyward with enough force to break the sound barrier.
"Your attack patterns are predictable," Perfect Nazo observed, appearing above Super Sonic before the golden hedgehog could recover. "You favor speed over power, evasion over direct confrontation. This allows me to anticipate your movements with high accuracy."
A chaos blast struck Super Sonic in the chest, driving him back toward the ground. He caught himself at the last moment, hovering just above the crater his impact had created.
"Okay, that HURT," Super Sonic admitted. "You're not holding back at all, are you?"
"You asked me not to hold back. I am complying with your request."
"Yeah, but I didn't think—"
Perfect Nazo appeared in front of him again, and Super Sonic barely managed to block the kick that would have shattered his ribs.
"Didn't think what? That I would actually use my full capabilities?" Perfect Nazo's voice remained flat, analytical. "Your assumption was based on previous encounters where I limited my power output due to emotional constraints. Those constraints no longer exist."
He launched a barrage of chaos attacks—not the wild, rage-fueled blasts of before, but precise, calculated strikes aimed at specific vulnerabilities. Super Sonic dodged most of them, but enough connected to drive him steadily backward.
"Without emotions to interfere with my combat processing, my reaction times have improved by approximately 34%. My power output has increased by approximately 28%. My tactical analysis is no longer clouded by considerations of restraint or mercy."
Another blow connected, and Super Sonic felt something crack in his shoulder.
"In essence, I am now a more efficient combatant than I was before my imprisonment."
From the observation bunker, Tails watched his readings with growing alarm.
"His power levels are off the charts," he reported to Sally via communicator. "Higher than anything we recorded before. And the control—it's perfect. No fluctuations, no energy waste, no emotional interference."
"Is Sonic in danger?"
"Sonic is getting demolished."
On the battlefield, Super Sonic was giving everything he had—every technique, every speed burst, every chaos attack in his arsenal. It wasn't enough. Perfect Nazo countered everything with mechanical precision, his empty eyes tracking Super Sonic's movements with inhuman accuracy.
"You are tiring," Perfect Nazo observed as Super Sonic's golden aura flickered. "Your transformation is drawing on finite reserves. Mine is not."
"What—what do you mean?"
"My Perfect form does not require the Chaos Emeralds. It is generated from internal reserves of negative chaos energy. These reserves are replenished continuously through my connection to the Chaos Force."
He paused, tilting his head.
"In practical terms: I do not tire. I do not deplete. I can maintain this form indefinitely while your Super form will fail within the next..." He calculated. "Approximately four minutes."
Super Sonic gritted his teeth. "Then I guess I need to end this in three."
He pushed himself harder than he ever had before, breaking speed barriers that should have been unbreakable, attacking with everything he had left. For a moment, it almost seemed like he was gaining ground.
Then Perfect Nazo raised one hand and said, simply: "Chaos Stop."
Reality froze.
Not time—reality itself. Super Sonic hung motionless in the air, his golden aura frozen mid-flicker, his expression captured in a moment of desperate effort.
Perfect Nazo floated around him, examining the frozen hedgehog with clinical interest.
"I did not know I could do that," he observed to himself. "Interesting."
He released the technique, and Super Sonic stumbled forward, gasping.
"What—what WAS that?!"
"A new ability, apparently. The absence of emotional limitations appears to have unlocked capabilities I was previously unable to access."
"You can just... STOP things?!"
"Temporarily. I estimate the duration of the effect scales inversely with the power level of the target. Against you, perhaps two to three seconds. Against a normal being..."
He didn't finish the sentence. He didn't need to.
The spar ended shortly after.
Super Sonic's transformation failed, his golden fur returning to blue as the Chaos Emeralds scattered around him. He lay on his back in the crater, breathing hard, covered in bruises and minor cuts.
Perfect Nazo floated above him, untouched. Not a single mark on his crimson fur. Not a single fluctuation in his black aura.
"Combat assessment complete," he said. "My capabilities appear to exceed previous levels. The absence of emotional regulation has improved rather than impaired my combat effectiveness."
"Great," Sonic wheezed. "That's... that's terrifying."
"Terror is an emotional response. I cannot evaluate its appropriateness."
The crimson faded to silver, the yellow eyes returning to green. Nazo descended to the ground, standing beside the fallen hedgehog.
"Do you require medical attention?"
"Probably. You broke at least two of my ribs."
"I apologize. My power output calculations were based on your Super form's durability. I did not account for residual damage affecting you after detransformation."
"Did you just... apologize?"
"I stated a regret for causing unintended harm. That is the functional definition of an apology."
"But you don't feel regret."
"I don't feel anything. But I can recognize when my actions produce suboptimal outcomes and express acknowledgment of that fact."
Sonic stared at him for a long moment. Then, despite the pain, he laughed.
"You know what? That's weird as hell. But it's also kind of nice. Nice to know you're still in there somewhere, even if it's just... logic and observations."
"I am not 'in here somewhere.' I am simply what I am."
"Yeah, well. What you are just kicked my ass harder than anyone ever has. So at least there's that."
The other Freedom Fighters were approaching now, medical teams moving toward Sonic, everyone else keeping a wary distance from Nazo.
Violet reached him first, her hands immediately checking him for injuries that didn't exist.
"You're okay. You're not hurt."
"I was never in danger of being hurt. The power differential was substantial."
"I know. I just—I needed to check."
She wrapped her arms around him, and he stood motionless in her embrace.
"You were incredible," she whispered. "Terrifying, but incredible."
"I was efficient. Those are different concepts."
"They looked the same from where I was standing."
Sally approached, her expression a complicated mixture of relief and concern.
"Well," she said. "Now we know what we're dealing with."
"Yes. My combat capabilities exceed previous recordings. I am more dangerous now than I was before my imprisonment."
"That's... one way to look at it."
"What is another way?"
Sally considered the question.
"You have a purpose now. Or at least, a function. Knothole's ultimate defender. Something even Eggman is afraid of. Something that might tip the balance of the entire war."
"I don't have preferences about how I'm utilized. If defending Knothole serves a logical purpose, I will do so."
"And if we asked you to attack? To take the fight to Eggman?"
Nazo was quiet for a moment.
"That would require evaluation of the strategic benefits and potential costs. I would need more information before making such a determination."
"But you'd consider it? You're not... opposed to violence?"
"I'm not capable of opposition. I would simply analyze the situation and determine the most efficient course of action."
Sally nodded slowly. "Okay. Good to know."
She turned and walked away, already planning, already strategizing, already thinking about how to use the weapon they had accidentally created.
Because that's what Nazo was now. Not a person. Not a friend. Not a lover.
A weapon.
The most powerful weapon Mobius had ever seen.
And he didn't even care.