"Are you sure you're all right Sonic? You seem a little…different." Tails asked.

The fox was standing by Sonic's side, observing his brother with a wary eye. The hedgehog had been more than a little strange on the trip back to Tail's house – ignoring the fans that greeted him as they passed, snagging food from nearby food stands then leaving his friends to pay for him, and shutting down Amy's advances with more sass and finality than Tails had previously thought possible. By the time they had actually arrived at Tail's house, Amy had been in such a frenzy that the team had to physically restrain her before she used her hammer to turn Sonic into a hedgehog pancake. At that point, Knuckles had suggested they fall back inside and huddle up; all except for Sonic, who had elected to stay outside and enjoy the weather…and then never left.

"I already said I was fine," Sonic snapped from his spot on the grass by the fox's house. He had been laying out in the sun for hours now, just absorbing the warmth and feeling the cool breeze ruffling through his fur, only deigning to move whenever he wanted a drink from the cooler next to him or a chili dog from the kitchen. And Tails had to admit that, other than the previously mentioned incidents, Sonic did seem overtly the same. At least, he wasn't on a wild rampage raving about world domination or any of the things Tails would have expected after getting hit by a corruption ray. But there was still something off about the blue speedster.

Tails scratched behind his ear, puzzled about what to make of the situation, and then sighed. "Yeah, that you did," he muttered to himself as he turned around to head back into the house. He couldn't put his finger on what it was, but something was definitely wrong here.

He let himself into the house and was immediately bowled over by an anxious Amy.

"Is Sonic all right?" she asked, her grip on his shoulders like iron. "He isn't hurt is he? He's been acting strangely all afternoon. He wouldn't even let me hug him! Sonic would never do that, Eggman has to have done something to him, I just know it!"

The fox shot a pleading look at Knuckles but the echidna only shook his head, positioned in the far corner with his back against the wall and his arms crossed. There would be no help from that direction. It would be up to him then. Tails turned back to Amy and smiled awkwardly, opening his mouth to respond, when an urgent beeping in the background came to his rescue.

"Trouble!" Tails squeaked, glad for the distraction. He hurriedly untangled himself from Amy and crossed the room to the detector he always kept nearby. "It's the Lightning Bolt Society," he said, whirling around to face his companions. "This is perfect! Sonic hasn't battled anyone for hours, this will be the perfect thing to get him up on his feet and back to his normal self!" He rushed out of the door before either Amy or Knuckles could respond, waving the detector in his hand.

"Sonic!" he called as he used his tail to propel himself over the lawn to where the hedgehog lay, a big grin on his face. "My detector picked up something. Apparently the Lightning Bolt Society is at it again!"

Silence.

A blue ear twitched but that was the only acknowledgement he got. The fox hesitated, his smile dimming a little bit with uncertainty. He swallowed. "A-aren't you gonna go, you know, take them out?" he asked, peering down into his older brother's face. Perhaps the hedgehog was actually asleep and that's why he wasn't jumping to the rescue?

"Sonic?" he asked, leaning closer. He reached to remove the shades obscuring his brother's face – only for a white glove to shoot out and catch his hand. Tails startled, watching as Sonic sat himself up and glared at him over the rim of his glasses. He looked distinctly unamused.

"I heard you the first time Tails," he said, slowly climbing to his feet and Tails stepped back, preparing for a rush of air and dirt clods as the speedster took off…but Sonic just stood there. He stretched his arms over his head until they popped then sighed, scratching his chest lazily. The fox stared at him but the hedgehog made no move to leave.

"Well…aren't you going to go fight them?" he asked, perplexed, and Sonic shook his head.

"Nope," he said, popping the "p" for effect, "I don't feel like fighting." He looked around, closing his eyes to feel the breeze and smirked. "In fact," he drawled, turning back to Tails, "I think I'm going to go for a run."

"What?!" the kit yelped, moving to place himself in the hedgehog's path but before he could even take the first step Sonic was a blue blur moving towards the horizon. Tails stared after him, dumfounded, then shook his head and sighed. He turned back to the house to face the respectively concerned and exasperated gazes of Amy and Knuckles. He had no idea what he was going to tell them, but there was one thing he did know.

There was definitely something wrong with Sonic.

xxx

The sun had set by the time Shadow finally let himself in the front door of Club Rouge. He had been gone for almost the entire week on official business with G.U.N. without a single second to relax, and now his most important mission was getting himself up the stairs and into the room Rouge had lent him so he could collapse onto his bed.

He didn't bother calling out for the bat girl as he made his way to the back of the building where the rooms were located. If he knew her at all, then he was guessing she had taken advantage of the night fall and had already headed out to scout some potential gems to steal. Instead, he just groaned and massaged the back of his neck, concentrating on putting one foot in front of the other. He may be the Ultimate Life form, but even he had limits.

He was almost there, and already fantasizing about warm blankets and soft mattresses, when the phone rang. He stopped, hand on the door, and thunked his head against the wood. Of course, why had he expected anything different? He took a deep breath, straightened up, then headed back out into the main room to answer the stupid thing.

"What," he growled into the receiver, already impatient. This had better be damn important to stand in the way of him and blissful oblivion.

There was a momentary silence on the other end of the line then a series of harsh whispers and hissing. Shadow snarled. "Whoever's on the end of this line better start talking or so help me-"

"Hey Shadow!" the voice squeaked, cutting off his threat before it could really get rolling. "It's Tails…Sonic's sidekick?"

"I know who you are," the hedgehog growled. This late at night, a call from the fox kit could only mean trouble and he wasn't exactly savoring the idea of leaving Rouge's place so soon after he had arrived. "What do you want?"

"Well, it's about Sonic. You see-"

Sonic. Why was it always Sonic? How was it that the hedgehog always picked the most inconvenient time imaginable to be a nuisance? Shadow sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. "What's the faker done now?" he asked, cutting off the kit before he could start rambling. There was a pause on the line and then Tails spoke up again

"Well…he's disappeared."

At this, Shadow perked up, curious despite himself. "Disappeared? What do you mean disappeared?"

There was an even longer pause. "As in, he went on a run earlier this afternoon and has yet to come back."

Shadow blinked. Well that had been a letdown. For a moment there, he had actually believed the faker might be gone and out of his quills for good. "I'm hanging up," he sighed.

"No wait!" Tails cried and Shadow reluctantly brought the phone back to his ear. "That's not the only reason why we're worried. Sonic's been acting strangely ever since we fought with Eggman this morning!"

"And that concerns me how?" the hedgehog growled. The last time he checked, the anxieties of Sonic's weakling team were not his problem.

"Well, Robotnik grazed Sonic with some kind of corruption ray that was designed to destroy the target's morality," the fox explained. "He wanted to convert Sonic from a hero to a villain and make him his minion so that he would be unstoppable." At this the Ultimate Life form scoffed. Leave it to Eggman to believe that having an idiot faker on his side would be anything other than a disaster just waiting to happen. "But, it seems something went wrong," Tails continued. "Sonic's been acting off all day but he didn't actually respond to Eggman's commands, which leads me to believe that the ray only partially worked."

"Get to the point, fox," Shadow grunted and he could almost imagine the kit flustered on the other end of the line.

"Uh, well basically, instead of being morally bereft, Sonic just seems to have lost his impulse control and is now doing whatever he wants to do regardless of the consequences," Tails blurted. "He's not evil, but he's been running around unsupervised for almost the entire day. We need to get him back and figure out how to fix this before he does something drastic, but you're the only one who could actually catch him." The fox trailed off as he neared the end, waiting for a response.

Shadow sighed. As tempting as it was to just drop the entire matter and go about his business, he had to admit that an AWOL Sonic that was even more impulsive than usual basically translated to a nightmare of disastrous proportions. And he could already sense that the entire thing would come back to bite him if he didn't take care of it now.

Why was it that Rouge never seemed to have these problems?

He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and mentally counted to ten. Then he spoke into the receiver once again.

"Fine."