A/N: Doot doot it an update. Beautiful. Glorious. I'm tired, Romeo and Juliet is amusing, and Shakespeare is confusing. English class is interesting. What? This has nothing to do with my fanfic, you ask? Well, you're completely right. Um. I updated my profile a little? Yeah, there you go. Enjoy.

"...A surprise?" Tails blinked at his wrist, where Vector's voice had come from. For whatever reason, the crocodile wasn't using his camera to help communicate. Was it broken? "Explain."

"I think you're gonna like this one, Tails! We're almost back. I'll show ya then." The radio turned off, indicating that the conversation was over. Tails scratched the back of his head in confusion. That was...odd.

"'Sup, little bro?" Sonic's voice pierced through Tails' thoughts. The fox turned to see him standing nearby, only slight curiosity showing on his features. "Who was that?"

"Vector. The Chaotix are almost back here, and apparently, they have a 'surprise', whatever that means."

"A surprise, huh?" Sonic paused for a moment. "With them, that could mean anything from an extra large chocolate bar to a device with the capacity to destroy the planet."

Tails chuckled, "Yeah, probably. Still, I don't see why they couldn't tell us. Oh well; we'll know soon either way."

"Fair enough."

Tails studied Sonic. He didn't seem to be acting differently...but then, what was all that back there? The fox had been trying his best to ignore the thoughts, but they kept resurfacing whenever Sonic was around, like a rather troublesome mosquito that refused to be swatted away. There was a problem; there had to be, else Tails wouldn't have seen what he had. Yet...shouldn't Sonic have explained what it was? Tails was Sonic's best friend, which meant there weren't to be any secrets between them.

"...the best of the best when it comes to lying to his friends…"

Sonic's words were like a gunshot in Tails' subconsciousness. As hard as he tried to think otherwise, there really wasn't any other interpretation. Yet despite it all, Sonic looked to be the same as ever.

"You alright, buddy?"

Trying, and failing, to hide his jump, Tails blinked up at Sonic with a nod. "Y-yeah," the fox said. He'd hoped Sonic would have at least mentioned the incident by now, the lack thereof doing nothing to calm his negative thoughts. "You know...you know you can talk to me if something's on your mind, right?"

Sonic seemed taken aback by the question. "Oh, well, yeah I know that. What's with the sudden change in topic?"

Wow...he really was acting like nothing happened. "It's just...earlier…" he trailed off, wordless gestures failing to express the end of the statement.

"Oh...ohhh...You mean that silly drama act Classic and I did?"

What?

"Drama act?" Tails echoed. That was...not at all what had come to mind.

"Yep!" He laughed, "We were getting a little bored, you know: not really going out to do anything for while; it catches up to you. So we had a little fun. Probably took the whole thing a little too far, but what can ya do?" He gave a half shrug.

Tails wanted to believe it. He wanted to believe every word he'd just heard and forget his earlier worries. It would be so easy. Except it wasn't. The way Sonic had looked at him back there: the voice, the tears...Either Sonic was the greatest actor in the world, or his words were as true as the idea of Eggman giving up on ruling everything and becoming a teacher in morals. Tails tried to ignore the fact that, currently, Eggman kinda did rule everything. That was irrelevant to the conversation topic.

So instead, it hurt. It hurt to think– to know he was being lied to by his big brother. It hurt to believe that Sonic didn't trust him with whatever had bothered him earlier. It hurt to know that there was something going on and Tails could do nothing to help because he didn't know what was wrong in the first place.

"...I see," Tails said eventually, unable to hide the discontent in his voice. He wanted to say more, to call Sonic out on his words, but he found himself unable. Alternatively, Tails chose to drop the topic entirely. "So...you think we should head to the lobby area to wait for the Chaotix?"

"Sounds good to me." Sonic sounded almost relieved at the change of subject, already walking away.

The old hotel had two stories, the second of those being the one Tails was currently moving down from. Each story had 20 bedrooms, which left plenty of space for everyone currently staying there. Well, five of those rooms were actually damaged beyond repair, meaning there were only 35 habitable rooms, but it was plenty regardless. Along with those was the main lobby and a restaurant area, where most of the food was kept. Mixed with the aesthetically pleasing blues and greens that were found outside the rooms, the place would have assumably made good revenue while it was still running for business. Too bad the city it was in was rendered practically inhabitable after Eggman was through with it, which Tails was certain was done as a means of threatening. No one even knew where the original owners were, never mind if they were even– well, best not to dwell on that.

Now, the once abandoned building had become the main base of operations for Tails and his friends. After all, who would look for them in the remains of a lost cause? The hotel was currently occupied by Tails, Sonic, Knuckles, Amy, Cream, Vanilla, the Chaotix, and Team Dark– though no one knew exactly where Shadow and Omega were at the moment.

Stepping off the stairs into the lobby (the elevators didn't work. Tails would have to do something about that later.), Tails saw Amy with her arms crossed, glaring at Sonic. Oh boy.

"You run off for hours after that, and when you come back, you don't even talk to me?!" She looked more concerned than angry. "I was worried!"

Sonic gave an awkward shrug, "Sorry Ames, guess it slipped my mind." Unlikely.

While Tails shuffled away from the two, and by extent the conversation, Amy did nothing but stare at Sonic. That is, before she dashed toward him with remarkable speed and engulfed him in a tight hug, knocking the blue hedgehog back a few steps. "At least tell us you're going to run off before you go and do it!"

"N-noted," Sonic said, sounding like he was being suffocated, which likely wasn't far from the truth knowing Amy. "Now. Please. Air."

She let him go with a stern look, opening her mouth again, though whatever she was going to say was cut off by the opening of the entrance door. In flew Charmy, followed more slowly by Espio, then Vector, then-

"Silver?" Sonic exclaimed.

The other hedgehog waved, "Hey, guys. Long time no see."

Tails gawked a little at Silver, not expecting him in the slightest. "What are you doing in, well, the present?"

"Believe it or not, it wasn't on purpose this time." Silver shrugged, "I'm not entirely sure what happened. There was a strange feeling, and something that felt similar to Chaos Control, and suddenly I'm somewhere completely different and there's a giant robot trying to kill me." He chuckled, "It was a relief to find someone familiar, to be honest. Not that I'm not used to finding myself in unfamiliar situations."

Charmy piped in, "He looked so cool! With random things being all floaty an' stuff 'round him! That robot had nothing on this guy! I wanted to help too, but Vector didn't let me get closer." He turned a rather grumpy expression to the crocodile. "Oh! Oh! And he wanted me to say, 'surprise'!" Confetti that Tails had not seen in the bee's hands was thrown into the air, scattering to the floor. Espio wore an amused smile.

"Speaking of surprises," Silver continued on, "I found something you might want." He pulled something bright from his quills, with the appearance of a large purple gemstone.

"Woah, you got one of the Chaos Emeralds!" Sonic exclaimed, shooting Silver a thumbs-up. "Nice job!"

"This is exactly what we needed!" Tails said, ecstatic. "Using that, I should be able to get a general location of the other six."

Vector smirked, "I told ya you'd like it." After a moment, he added, "We better be getting paid extra for that."

"Wait a minute, I'm the one who found the thing," Silver cut back. "If anyone's getting paid, shouldn't it be me? I mean, I don't actually care that much, but I thought I should mention."

"He has a point," Tails agreed. "That, and you said you'd be doing this without pay considering the situation."

Vector looked as though Tails' words had cut through every dark secret within, before sighing, "Well, I'm not a liar…"

"Say, where'd Amy go?" Sonic asked cautiously. Only then did Tails take note of her sudden absence from the scene.

"I...have no clue," Tails answered honestly.

Vector began towards the stairs, "Well, while you two deal with that, I have some bad news about bat spray I gotta deliver to a certain echidna. See ya!"

"Oh, okay!" Tails called after him as Charmy followed.

"...Bat spray?" Silver asked, clearly confused.

"I believe Knuckles has been having issues with Rouge as of recently," Espio said. "It's not my place to intrude, but Vector has been searching for 'bat spray' with the promise of payment. I...do not think it actually exists."

That sounded like a Knuckles thing, alright. Tails decided it would be best not to ask the echidna guardian directly.

Everyone's heads snapped to the entrance as the door flung open, revealing an ebony-colored hedgehog and a robot. Shadow didn't say a word, moving right by towards the staircase. Omega took a moment to glance at the room's occupants before following. Tails again wondered why they'd let the trigger-happy robot stay here.

"Welcome back!" Sonic yelled without a hint of mockery in his voice. The lobby was silent for about ten seconds. Well, at least they knew where Shadow was, now.

"So...I guess I'll be staying here, then?" Silver asked, looking around. "It looks a bit run-down...but so does everywhere else around here. This was Eggman's doing, right?"

"Yeah," Sonic said, "He's been wreaking havoc on the world for over a month now. No idea how someone like him managed it, but here we are." There was a note of bitterness in his voice.

Silver nodded in understanding. "Sounds rough. So you've all been staying here, it looks like? What happened? No offense, but the Sonic I know would have stopped this long before it got to this point."

That said, he probably would have, if he hadn't gone missing right before. Tails never learned the full reasoning for that. "As far as we know, Eggman has the Master Emerald, and apparently something related to time travel on his side. We still have no clue where the rest of the Chaos Emeralds are, but you finding one is proof enough that Eggman doesn't have them all."

"Time travel?" Sonic echoed. "I haven't heard that yet."

"We have a version of you from the past, and now Silver's here, so I thought it was a safe assumption." He was still trying to work out why it was those two specifically that were in the present now. Was it because both were hedgehogs? No, that didn't make any sense. Did Eggman want the two here? But then, lowering his chance of a full victory like that didn't sound like him. So what was it? What else did the two hedgehogs have in common? Well, that's another thing on my to-do list. Fixing elevators will have to wait a little longer.

Silver floated the Chaos Emerald over to Tails. "You'll know what to do with this better than I."

"Thanks," Tails said, taking it.

"We'll need to locate the others as soon as possible if we wanna end all this," Sonic winked at Tails. "Plus, I could really use some nice adventure retrieving one. I feel like I've done nothing but sit around for the past week." Never mind that he had recently returned from an hours-long run, but Tails got the idea. Time to get some emeralds, beat an egg, etc.

A full schedule indeed.

"Got it!" Tails shouted, knowing no one would hear him from his temporary room on the second floor. He held up a device showing a map of the world, zooming in on a flashing red dot. "Looks like the closest Chaos Emerald is...a little west of Station Square." He hummed thoughtfully. "That's still an ocean away, and I don't have my Tornado with me right now..." Then how was anyone supposed to get there? The fox glanced again at the purple Chaos Emerald.

Oh. Duh. Chaos Control. Which meant Shadow would have to help retrieve the second emerald. Not that Sonic couldn't use Chaos Control, but he was far less practiced to Tails' knowledge. So that meant the top candidates for getting the emerald were Sonic and Shadow. Maybe another. Sonic would insist on going after doing so much nothing, Tails was sure.

The fox sighed. He wished he wasn't so busy; maybe then he could go, too. He was starting to miss the adventure.

Well, this wasn't about him. Hopping off his chair, he moved to inform everyone of the current situation.

A/N: I looked it up, and bat spray is most definitely a thing. ~the more you know~

Curse all the characters confirmed for Forces because that means I have to write them all. (I say this while including Team Dark, despite them not being confirmed for the game. Except Team Dark is too amazing to leave out, so.)