Star: Ok, it's official: I suck. I keep on saying that I'll get to updating this story and then I go MIA for over a week. I promise that I'll continue to write for this, but I have no idea how my updates will go. School is starting, so it may be harder for me to update. Yep…I really suck, I know. Anyway, today I want to introduce the Sacred Charms…hopefully it'll work out well :)

Chapter 2

BOOM! Sonic took off from his conversation with Tails. Honestly, he was starting to get anxious for Eggman to make his next move. As much as he wanted to search for the man himself, Sonic didn't want to show his friends that he was getting worried as well. After all, it was Sonic who was keeping everyone as relaxed as possible for that last week, so showing his concern for the coming battle would only make things worse. The Blue Blur wasn't really going anywhere in particular since he had already scouted the whole area within a few hundred meters of Mystic Ruins. He knew that he should be checking in on Amy since she hadn't reported anything in the last 24 hours, but Sonic wanted to do a final check on the woods before heading over to Station Square.

Sonic stopped over a cliff edge and admired the scene below. There was nothing but an ocean of trees for as far as he could see. He wondered briefly how some of his old friends were doing back on South Island. To some they may just be simple Flickies, Peckies, Pockies, Rockies, Rickies, Cluckies, Pickies, etc [Star: There are even more of these believe it or not but for the sake of the story I'll just move on], but once you got to know them, (and learned their language) they were not just nice but also had very good morals that were more 'right' than the majority of the Overlander and Mobian population. They were full of innocence, and would often play games such as tag or hide-and-go-seek in the various land formations that made up South Island. Something occurred to Sonic. If there were tons of hidden caves and crevices back there, then that means that there could be plenty by the cliff sides of the whole Mystic Ruins!

Sure enough, as Sonic dashed off he noticed a small, nearly invisible cave that opened over a small pool of water. Sonic was sure that he hadn't seen this earlier, so he slowed down to take a better look at it. There were small inscriptions at the bottom of the entrance. "Savior's Shrine" Sonic read in his head. Now he was sure that he hadn't been by here before. Sonic jumped over the pond and walked cautiously into the mouth of the cave. Little did he know that the entrance closed as soon as he had gotten a safe distance into the cave.

c—(======-

Shadow stopped at a small pool of water. He listened, then cursed when he had confirmed it. There was no sign of the faker anywhere. The black hedgehog examine the area closely, but it was no use. Sonic had disappeared into thin air. Just as he was dashing off, his communicator went off. Looking down at the intricate device the two-tailed fox had given him, he hit the 'answer' button. He then flatted his ears at the loud noises coming from it.

"YOU WHAT?!"

"Amy, I can explain-"

"YOU. LOST. SONIC!"

"Tails! Watch o-" The voice Shadow recognized as Knuckles got cut off by an all too familiar sound of a hammer making contact with something."Amy! For the love of Chaos, calm down!"

"Are you going to continue to act childish or are you going to tell me why you called?" Shadow said after hearing enough of this conversation.

Silence.

"…Shadow?" Amy sounded shocked.

"Thank Chaos…" Tails muttered.

"Hey Shads" Rouge's voice came from nowhere.

Shadow ignored the greeting. "What do you need now?"

"Since Knuckles said you agreed to watch after Sonic, so we were wondering-"

"If I knew where the faker was? He vanished on my end as well" Shadow reported. He didn't like where this was going. It was going to be a long day.

c—(======-

Sonic heard his footsteps echo the cave as he ventured deeper into it. There was some kind of energy coming from the cave, and though it didn't feel like a Chaos it felt as if he had been in contact with it before. Sonic was racking his brains for some time he might've come across this cave but all he drew was a blank. Eventually, the tunnel opened into a larger cave and Sonic was temporarily blinded by the light.

It was designed like the Master Emerald's shrine, only there was nothing on the middle area. Each pillar held a stone that shone a different color. If you looked closer, you could see a symbol in each of them. There was a green, a pink, a blue, a red, a purple, a yellow, and a white one. Sonic only got close enough to the green one to see a leaf in it before he saw something in the corner of his eye. The center of the shrine was pulsing with alternating colors. "What the…" Sonic blinked, and it was gone.

He dashed over to it. Something about this situation made Sonic feel like this had happened before, like the murals on the Master Emerald's Shrine or when the Time Eater had attacked. Sonic cautiously stepped on the centerpiece. There was something engraved along the edge. Sonic read the engraving out loud this time for no particular reason except for it feeling right. " 'The Charms control the elements of life. The elements build the world around us. The guardian is the one that watches over and protects the Charms. The guardian balances the world.' " Sonic felt the ground shudder around him. "What's going on?!" He exclaimed as he looked around. Suddenly, a burst of energy came around him, entrapping the blue hedgehog.

c—(======-

"Now that we're all here-" "EXCEPT FOR SONIC!" Tails sighed. The team had gotten together to discuss the disappearance of Sonic. Amy was obviously still upset at them, mostly Shadow, about the whole situation. Speaking of that… Tails looked over to Shadow, who was in the corner as usual. "Yes, that's why we're here" Tails continued "Sonic has disappeared, which means that either Eggman has started his plan, or that something else has happened to him." Shadow spoke up "There was no sign of a struggle in any of the surrounding area that Sonic could've been in; he completely vanished." Rouge turned to him. "Shadow, what are you implying?" Shadow huffed. "The Faker has either gotten buried deep under the ground or he isn't on Mobius anymore." Silence. Amy raised her hammer. Before she could use it, a large earthquake came, causing everyone to reach for the nearest thing in order to keep themselves upright. "Woah!" Tails was knocked over by Amy and they both fell over in a heap. Knuckles had punched a fist into the wall to support himself and Shadow had grabbed the staircase railing. Rouge was standing next to an open window, so she had flown out of it. She looked around, expecting to see an army of robots but was instead greeted by a large beacon of energy coming from the top of a nearby mountain. The ground stopped shaking as the beam faded.

"Rouge!" The white bat landed back inside where her friends were recovering. Amy had called her in, and Rouge could see why. Tails was rather upset at Knuckles for ruining the wall and it was taking a rather large effort on Shadow's part to keep Tails off of the red echidna. "I HAD JUST FIXED THAT FROM THE LAST EGGMAN ATTACK!" Tails shouted, face going red from anger. Rouge broke up the fight. "Little guy, I think we have bigger problems than that right now. Amy's eyes widened. "What did you see?" Rouge described the sight. "Hmmm…I could've sworn I had read something about that a while ago…" Tails was pondering when a crash was heard from outside.

"Silver! What are you doing here?" Knuckles asked as the time traveler extracted himself from under a bookcase. Silver looked up to see everyone starring at him. "I came back in order to stop something from happening in the future. I need to speak with Sonic." The Sonic Crew exchanged glances. "Please don't tell me…is he already gone?" Silver said, panicked. "Umm…sorta?" Tall said reluctantly.

Star: CLIFFHANGER! So now Sonic is in a tricky situation with no friends to help him, and Silver is back just a bit too late. Please favorite, review, or both!