Tails' Journey

Chapter One

ShadTikal4ever owns Vinny, kai-senpai owns Kai, and Jayln the Hedgehog owns Jayln. Everyone else is owned by Sega and Sonic Team.

It was a cold afternoon in the Mystic Ruins, and Tails was inside his workshop, tinkering with his plane, the Tornado 2. He stood up and stretched after having worked for a few hours, and sat down at his desk. He noticed his mug of hot chocolate was empty, so he ran and put more mix into a bowl, poured in some water, and began to heat it up. Tails began to walk back to his plane when he looked outside the nearby window to see brand new snow calmly drifting past his window. Tails turned back to his plane with a smile on his face, but did a double take. He jumped up and ran to the window. Tails looked outside and saw a small group of Christmas carolers walking towards his house. Amongst the group was an incredibly hard to miss mid-to bright green hedgehog, Vinny, the only non-human in the bunch. His usual black cloak was covered in snow, and his pink and green shoes were hardly visible in the snow.

"Why is Vinny with them?" Tails asked. Vinny glanced up, and saw Tails at the window. Vinny started talking to the carolers, and the carolers left. Tails sighed in relief as he backed away from the window. Once carolers came to his house, he could never get away. There was a knock on the front door, and Tails hesitated before answering it. Vinny stepped inside, shivering in the cold.

"Man, its cold out there!" Vinny said. Tails ran and grabbed a new mug and filled it with the just-finished hot chocolate. Vinny took it as he nodded his thanks, and took a sip.

"Why were you with the carolers Vinny?" Tails asked. Vinny took another sip of hot chocolate before he spoke.

"I needed to talk with you, Tails, and they were on their way over here, so I joined them for a bit. It's actually serious this time, Tails." Vinny said.

"Hey, what's wrong?" Tails asked.

"Well, you see, Vanilla sent me over here. You know, Cream's mom?" Tails just nodded. "Yeah, well, you see...Cream kind of...well, she ran away from home late last night, and Vanilla told me just this morning to tell you. She thinks you could help her find Cream." Tails almost dropped and shattered his own mug of hot chocolate and gasped in surprise.

"Vinny, we need to go right away! Do you know why she ran away...and why Vanilla picked me, and not Sonic?" Tails asked. Vinny started brushing snow from his cloak onto the floor, which he promptly began to sweep up, taking the nearby broom from it's spot on the wall.

"Well, Vanilla found a guy she really liked and brought him over to her house, only he had too much of the wine with their dinner, so he got drunk and would up slapping Cream out of the blue. Vanilla believes that you are the only one who can help, for whatever reason, but she sent Kai, Jayln, and I are to accompany you. Sonic would be here too, only we couldn't find him...he's probably running through the desert or beach or something." Vinny said. He then remembered Vanilla's words to him, just a few hours ago...

Flashback...

"Tails is the only one who can find and comfort her because she has always secretly nursed a soft spot for him, and would do anything for him. But you must promise me to not tell Tails that, okay?"

End of Flashback...

"I understand. When will Jayln and Kai be here?" Tails asked. Vinny shrugged, and stood up. He then walked towards the window, and stared out of it, his elbow on the windowsill, and his head in his hand.

"Its days like this where I miss the old winters...snowboarding with my friends...having snowball fights, sled races...even just chilling in snow forts...it was really fun..." Vinny sighed. Tails looked out the window as well, and saw Kai and Jayln walking towards Tails' house.

"They're here!" Tails exclaimed. Sure enough, there was a knock at the door. Tails took a quick look at Vinny and ran to get the door, since it was his house and Vinny was too busy being nostalgic.

"Hey Kai! Hey Jayln! Vinny's upstairs...and I heard about what happened." Tails said, walking up the stairs. Kai and Jayln exchanged worried glances, and walked upstairs. They found Vinny how they left him. It took Tails yelling to make Vinny snap back to reality.

"Huh, what?" Vinny muttered. He saw Kai, who was wearing a black jacket, and long pants, and Jayln, who was wearing long, black pants and a red jacket. Vinny shrugged, and put on a camouflage jacket. Kai rolled her eyes.

"How will we find Cream in the middle of winter?" Jayln asked. Tails shrugged, and started fusing scrap pieces of metal together, as well as tinkering with random spare wires and circuits. Vinny watched closely as Tails put in a few batteries, and a clipped on a thin, green screen. A small grid appeared on the screen, red dot began blinking the left-hand corner of the screen.

"With this tracker, we will be able to find Cream!" Tails exclaimed, holding above his head in Legend of Zelda fashion. Vinny sweat dropped.

"Er...how does that one work, again?" Jayln asked, ignoring the glares that were being shot at her.

"You see, this device, a tracker, it looks for a specific type of DNA-in this case, Cream's. I got it because she left a few hairs on the back seat of the Tornado 2 here. It locks onto her genetic signature, and pretty much-"

"What are we waiting for? C'mon, guys!" Kai quickly said, cutting Tails off before his techo-babble got any further. The four of them then walked out the door, and into the winter wonderland. The snow had doubled in height from when Vinny was outside, so it was a quarter of the way up their shins.

"Y'know, it's never this easy. Usually, something bad happens, or there's an interference, or some kind of evil plot, or we meet a new friend!" Vinny exclaimed.

"You make this sound like this is a video game, or someone's twisted fan fiction, or something." Kai replied. Vinny shrugged, and they continued walking, following the small, red dot on the tracker. Before the moon fell, however, they found themselves standing before a long, complicated forest.

"The interference!" Vinny exclaimed. Jayln whacked him on the back of the head. Tails heard a loud crunching sound from behind and he immediately froze, the tracker slipping from his grasp into the wet snow. He slow turned around, his electric blue eyes slowly glancing behind him to see...a squirrel eating a twig. Tails sighed, and picked up the tracker, but forgot the first rule of snow: its water. The now wet tracker instantly sent volt upon volt of electricity into his body. He blacked out, hearing someone distant calling "Tails? TAILS!"

Jayln picked up Tails, and ran over underneath a nearby tree. Vinny and Kai followed. Jayln laid Tails down on the ground, and made sure nothing touched the tracer. Using her gloves as a shield, she placed the tracer on the ground, causing an electric shock to course through everyone's bodies.

"Ouch! That hurt!" Vinny exclaimed. Kai looked at Vinny in surprise, then Jayln in confusion.

"I never knew you knew had such a...low pain-tolerance for this sort of thing." Jayln said nicely. Vinny scratched the back of his head and looked down at the ground somewhat awkwardly.

"Look, was anyone in Girl Scouts, or Boy Scouts, or something? We need to know how to survive here, if we're going to be staying here until Tails wakes up!" Kai exclaimed. Jayln shook her head whilst Vinny nodded. Vinny started digging four small tunnels underneath the tree. A few hours later, he was done.

"And these are our temporary beds." Vinny said, wiping his forebrow with his arm. Jayln carefully laid down Tails in the smallest bed, being a perfect fit, and slithered into the one next to it.

"This feels...awkward." Jayln said. Vinny sighed, whilst Kai looked confused.

"I can make it longer or wider, it'll take a while though." Vinny said. Jayln shook her head.

"No, no, that's okay. I just didn't realize it could be so...comfortable and slightly warm, yet somehow uncomfortable and cold." Jayln said. Vinny thought about this for a moment.

"Wait, where will we put the tracer? Last time it was on the ground, it shocked us. Who says it won't happen again?" Kai asked. Jayln climbed out of her bed...thing and used her gloves to pick up the tracer. She slowly placed it upon a branch of the tree.

"Electricity doesn't pass through wood." Jayln said, and Vinny nodded. Jayln slid back into her bed, and fell asleep within seconds. Kai then chose a bed, and jumped, mostly fell, into it. Vinny sighed.

"I was about to recommend having a night shift for guarding, but I guess I'll just pull an all-nighter..." Vinny muttered to no one in particular. He watched the moon slowly rose into the night sky, and fall again.

The next morning, Jayln was the first to wake up. She saw Vinny attending to a fire. He had dark bags underneath his eyes, and his eyelids would lower, then open again.

"Vinny...you OK?" Jayln asked softly. Vinny turned to her and nodded, adding kindling to the fire. Without warning, a figure dropped down from the tree they were camping under, and landed in front of Vinny.

He was a bright yellow hedgehog, with piercing yellow eyes that could penetrate steel. His quills were spiked, pointed up to the heavens, so they looked like Super Sonic's. He even wore the same style shoes, down to the one white stripe down the side.

"This forest is a trap. Many have come in, and never come out. I advise precaution if you wish to live. For now, consider me an ally...but only for now." the mysterious hedgehog said.

"I understand. But what is your name?" Vinny asked. Jayln looked at the mysterious hedgehog, and instantly thought that he looked like a Sonic-wanna be.

"My name is Flash, controller of electricity. Those with names gathering around a type of element have powers too, even if they don't know it." Flash said. Flash snapped his fingers, and disappeared in a bolt of lightning, leaving a small scorched circle around where he stood.

"That was...weird." said Jayln Vinny looked at her and nodded, desperately trying to stay awake.

"Tell me about it." Vinny nodded, but the force pushed him backwards to the ground, falling asleep on impact.

"Do you think he was telling the truth? Being able to have elements...just by your name?" Kai asked Jayln from inside her tunnel; apparently she'd been awake in time to see Flash, too. However, Jayln just looked over at Vinny, and at the scorch mark that was all that remained of Flash.

'Who else do we know with a name like that...' Jayln thought.

That's the end of the first chapter of Tails' Journey. And I think that's all I have to say at the moment besides 'please review', so...Later!

ShadTikal4ever