I always thought Sonic knew how to raise kids, considering how well he did with Tails in the cartoons. I wanted to write a fanfic where it showed his maternal instincts coming into play, so here you go! I also figured that Sonic raised Tails differently than other parents, so he wouldn't understand why they worried so much over every decision a child would make. So… here you go!

Sonic knew how to raise kids. He knew how hard it was to get them to sleep at night, how terrible the terrible two's really were, and so on and so forth.

One thing he had forgotten however, was how hard it was for first time parents to figure out how to survive raising kids. Watching new parents hard at work trying to figure things out not only amused him but bothered him as well. It was humorous to see them freaking out over a diaper change or feeding time, but bothering to the fact they could do something wrong and injure the kid.

While he was as new to childbirth as everyone else when Sonia first got pregnant, it was the fact that a child was growing in her that bothered him, it was more of the fact that bartleby got her knocked up in the middle of a war with a psychopath hell-bent on destroying the last of the royal family, something that the child would obviously be.

He'd grilled bartleby for an hour, not angry, more worried. Bartleby had understood what he had done wrong, and he admitted at he loved Sonia with all his heart and wanted to be the father, no matter what. Sonic and manic had both raised skeptical eyebrows, but sonic didn't argue further. He'd done the same for Sal, but with different things sacrificed. He sacrificed the freedom of running forever alone; he gave up his fortune and shoe-licking life.

Pregnancy had been a nightmare, and Sonic dearly hoped that if he and Sal ever lived to be old enough to be permanent mates that if he ever got her pregnant she wouldn't be anywhere near as bad as his sister was. He'd been as patient as he could be with everything, but he still had needed air, regularly.

Birth itself had been both disgusting yet magical in its own way. Then again, the magic may have been bartleby fainting when the head came out. That was magical. He still teased him about it, but he blatantly denied it's ever happening.

What had been the frosting on the cake though, had been when they all realized at once that none of them had a clue how to raise a child. Sonic had to leave the ship because he was laughing so hard at them and none of them knew why he had left. He'd never told them about Tails and Sal, but then again, they'd never asked. They seemed to honestly believe he'd spent his entire life fighting robutnik with no breaks to be a normal hedgehog... As normal as he could be, anyway.

They didn't seem to acknowledge the fact that there was a small chance he had friends or even love interests, besides his robotizied uncle chuck. So, in return, he never told them anything.

Little hog (his nickname for her. They'd named her Sara) grew fast enough to Sonics' knowledge, and the others were clumsily figuring things out while sonic watched from the sidelines. They never asked for his help, he never offered it. He laughed when they did something wrong, gaining glares, but he never felt any heat in them. They were too tired to be irritable. He spent most of his time blowing up plants for them while they were parenting. He wasn't the parent, they were. He left them to their own devices when it came to little hog, not matter how much he had truly wanted to hold her.

In the end, he wasn't the parent. He couldn't be as close to little hog as Sonia or bartleby. And while he was okay with that, seeing them so close brought of pain of sadness into his heart. When was the last time he'd heard from tails? Was he okay? Was he robizited? He didn't know, and he doubted he'd find out soon. Seeing how close little hog was to the others but not him, brought back happy memories of tails as a fox cub. As much as he hated to admit it, he missed those days. But he knew they'd never return. Tails was an airplane engineer and flyer in the resistance now, he wasn't a small kid.

And sometimes, when the others were out, he played babysitter. He took good care of the kid and put her to bed on time and gave her the right foods and so on and so forth. The others were more worried about his tendencies to run off and leave everything behind, and so they didn't notice how happy he was when he got the chance to babysit, they just worried he'd speed off.

It had taken years for them to finally realize that the reason Sonic had been laughing at them meant he might know what they were doing wrong. By then, most of the most troublesome parts of toddler dome had finally finished off.

"Hey, Sonic?" Sonia spoke, holding little hog in her arms "do you know anything about kids?"

"Of course I do!" he answered, making everyone look at him "what? I happen to have raised a son myself a long time ago. If you needed help, you could have just asked." He laughed at their expressions, then sped off.

They didn't talk to him for a month, but it was so worth it.

Stupid and short, I know, but it was just something I felt like writing. REVIEW! I want your opinions!