Shackles: She doesn't own, blah, blah, blah....

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Flare sat alone in the cafeteria today, lost in thought thinking about what Shadow said. His siblings stared at him from a distance, worried. Trinket turned around and poked the ketchup on her plate with a french fry. "I wonder what's up with Flare...." She asked. "Yeah, its one thing to not talk to us, its another thing to avoid us." Shackles folded his arms and frowned. Shadow looked up from his meal at the other life-form. "It's Sonic."

Shackles looked at Shadow, confused. "What do you mean?" He asked. "Sonic has been pestering him." He picked up his hamburger and bit into it, eyes closed. "Greeeeeeeaaaaaat....." Shackles and Trinket sighed simultaneously. "You think you should talk to Sonic about this? You know Flare won't just ignore him." The blue and green hedgehog said. "Yeah, I'll corner the bugger in Athletics." The rest of lunch was mostly silent.

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The locker room was alive and busily with teenage boys rushing to get their uniforms on. Flare got dressed as quickly as he could, trying to get out to the field before a certain someone came into the locker room. Just as he was about to get to the door, it flew open and Sonic stood there, grinning. "Hey'a guys!" He greeted happily, then spotted Flare. "And hello, Bronzey!" Flare just stood there until Sonic moved out of the way and he ran out of the room.

Shackles just watched this, slowly growing pissed, and Shadow just watched. Sonic walked over to his locker and took his time changing, as usual, and waited there, chit-chatting with anyone nearest him. As soon as the last student left the room, Sonic was getting ready to high-tail it out to the track until two people stood in his way.

"Oh, hey, Captain! And, hey, Shakes." Sonic greeted. "Don't call me that. You don't have the right." Shackles growled, Shadow stepped forward. "We need to talk to you, Sonic." He emphasised the other hedgehog's name. "About what?" He stuck his pinky in his ear and twisted it.

"You need to watch out what you do to Flare." Shackles warned, holding up a fist, three dangerous spikes getting extremely close to his neck. Shadow held his hand up and Shackles took a step back. "You need to treat him better. I've seen how you've acted to him." Shadow said, only sounding slightly angry. "If you don't clean your act up around him, Sonic, you'll have to answer to me!" Shackles bellowed, his temper slowly rising.

"Shackles." Shadow said, the other backed down and just glared daggers at the small blue hedgehog. "Geeze, I didn't think my friendly joking was such a dellhemma." Sonic shrugged. "It is, Sonic. And it's not friendly. Friends don't cause other friends greif on purpose."

"Grief? Flare seems perfectly fine." Sonic leaned against the lockers, not understanding the point of this conversation. "Perfectly fine, right." Shadow said sarcastically. He's not one to admit it, but Shadow does have a soft spot for those he calls friends. He folded his arms. "Sonic, just be nicer to him. Because of you he has an inferiority complex."

"He has that affect on people." Shackles muttered, thinking about Knuckles. "Fine, fine." Sonic pushed off the lockers and brushed past the two life-forms. "I'll be nice to the kid and stop picking on him." He then turned and smirked, and idea popping in his head. "Heck, I'll even hang with him after school." He then disappeared in a blue flash and left Shadow and Shackles alone.

Shadow shook his head and headed for the door, the other close behind. "I can't believe that egotistical bastard." He muttered. "I'm gonna' kick his ass one of these days." Shackles said, punching the air. "No, that's my job. You stick to Knuckles." Shadow said. "Alright, I want to watch though." The tall echidna rested his elbow on the shorter hedgehog's head while they walked to the football field.

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Flare stood up after stretching his legs and popped his back. "Where are they?" One of the other track members asked and, as if on cue, Sonic sped out of the field house. Flare sighed when he saw Sonic come to a stop at his side. "Hey there, Flare!" He winced, getting ready for the inevitable slap on the back. When it didn't come and a hand was set on his shoulder, he opened his eyes. "H-hey, Sonic...."

"I was wondering if you were doing anything after school today." He asked, smiling. "No.... Why?" Flare asked, confused. "Well, would you like to hang out with me? I'm goin' to the park." Sonic folded his arms behind his head. "S-sure...." Flare gave him a weak smile.

"Alright, ladies!" The coach yelled. "On your marks, get set.... GO!" The team took off on their practice run. Five laps around the track was normally nothing, but two laps in Flare started to slow down. He stopped completely at three, his team mates looking at him oddly as they passed. He forced himself to continue, but wasn't able to make it half way around the track before....

.... Flare woke up in the nurses office. "Heheh, its about time you woke up." He looked around and saw the nurse standing in the doorway. "Hello, Nurse Vanilla." He said, sitting up. Vanilla walked over to him and handed him a glass of water. "Drink this." She said and Flare did so. "You passed out during class. Flare, have you eaten today?" She asked, sounding worried.

"Umm......" He thought. "N-no ma'am.... I skipped breakfast and I didn't feel like eating lunch." He sheepishly rubbed the back of his head. "An athlete like you shouldn't skip meals. Here." She gave him a sandwich. "It isn't healthy." Flare looked at the sandwich. "I'm sorry...." Vanilla patted him on the head. "It was quite lucky of you to have been in athletics, though. Sonic got you here faster than the coach could call me on the phone."

Flare looked up at the mention of Sonic. Sonic brought him here? He looked out the door and saw said hedgehog sitting in the waiting room, along with his brother. 'Wow....' He thought. 'Maybe Sonic does really want to be friends.' "When you finish that, I'll let you go back to class." Vanilla said, before walking out of the room. "Yes ma'am."

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And there's chapter two. Once again, apologies for the absence of slash, but if you can't tell, it WILL be in the next chapter. Just a little bit though. :P

Oh, and I talked about another OC, Shackles, a lot in this chapter. A bit about him: He was a failed attempt at creating the ultimate lifeform. And while three pods were launched to earth from Gerald's lab, his pod was left in the lab. Shackles ages and can not use Chaos Control. And his fur color is exactly like Shadow's, but he's an echidna. Also, his eyes are green. o3o