#charsage

Bonus:

The Junior Chaotix AU: Poplin the Weasel

Sage isn't always content to rely on proxies and spy robots to gather Intel, sometimes to get something right you gotta do it yourself. So she made herself a disguise, but simply changing her hard light was insufficient and a robot would be a lost cause. So she looked at the past and found a solution from an old enemy. Using the blueprints from Starline she created and she made herself a body to inhabit in the form of 'Poplin the Weasel'. Her organic was made using the edited DNA of several weasels,(via blood samples in a blood drive), this was done to make sure her body was stable and her recent ancestry impossible to track.

The vessel was made for infiltration not combat. So she lacks any reinstalled weapons, but did inherit Surge's durability and agility, she can even tear through steel with her jaws. However, Poplin isn't actually a person for while she has a mostly organic brain, she has no consciousness of her own and is genuinely just an empty shell for Sage to fill. But there had to be tradeoffs for this plan to work properly. Sage installed a few personality modifications so she wouldn't be too recognizable, particularly making speech patterns more grounded, identifying herself as her alter ego, and being slightly more extroverted. But as a consequence and a safety measure to avoid hacking/creating a clone of herself, Poplin is no longer connected to the Eggnet which then runs automatically without her mind,(think like how you're heart, digestive, and immune system operate). She must connect directly to the network in order to get back to normal.

Being the most obvious side effect to being disconnected from her data means she no longer retains/processes information like a computer would. Leaving her to navigate the world solely through active thought/emotion. This was something she believed had gotten a grip on in her detached training and earlier missions as simply an observer. It wasn't until her most ambitious scheme until she realized how little she knew what being a person was. She found her way into the Chaotix household as a client at first and would hopefully gather intel to defeat her nemesis. It would have been an easy job if it was for a little charming detective however. Charmy caught on to the plan right away, but instead of ratting her out. He played along until he was able to confirm this with her in private. He made a bargain with Poplin that so long as she didn't use this disguise to steal from them or commit criminal activity, he'll help solve problems and protect her identity.

Under his careful watch, Poplin/Sage knew better than to risk compromising her entire project and behaved herself. But it wasn't long before her visits started to change, she wasn't looking for aid anymore but to simply spend time with them. Poplin was now a friend of the family and visited on a regular basis. Sage attempted to rationalize it to herself by simply getting to know her opponents. But she couldn't escape the obvious truth... It feels to be alive and loved.

Her Demon.

Her Protector.

Her Temptation.

Her Mission.

Espio and Charmy both having crazy love lives will never not be funny to me. Also I hadn't really thought too much about how I imagine Charmy falling for Sage, but I do think it would be really funny if he was sent on a mission to either capture her to stop her from doing something and then that's when he decided "Oh wait I think I'm in love with her" because then it would be similar to how Espio met and then immediately fell in love with Silver lmao.

Episode was REALLY good.

Charsage stuff and extended opinion under the cut