Sonic Origins

by Ri2

How did Sonic get his super speed? What made Amy fall in love with him? How did the Chaotix become detectives? Why is Rouge both a secret agent and a gem thief? How did Cream and Big meet their pets? Silver the Hedgehog needs to know the answers to these questions, and far more, for the future might depend on it...

4. The Chaotix Mystery

And we're back! I've been looking forward to this chapter for a number of reasons, one of which is because I'm going to be trying a somewhat experimental writing style for part of it. Experimental for me, anyway. I hope I do well!

This chapter is also noticeably longer than its predecessors. To longtime fans of my work, this should not come as a surprise, given how often things tend to run away from me. To new readers, I'm sorry and hope you have the patience to sit and read it all. Future chapters shouldn't be as long as this…I think.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything that doesn't belong to me

…

"How we became detectives, huh?" Vector said. "Well, that's a complicated story, and involves a bit of context."

"A backstory for our backstory, in a sense," Espio added.

"Oh, joy," Shadow deadpanned. Rouge shushed him.

"A few years back, the three of us, along with Sonic's childhood friend Mighty the Armadillo, were all on Carnival Island for one reason or another," Vector said. "I was looking for a job, Mighty was traveling all over the place for chance to prove himself a hero like his pal Sonic, Charmy was visiting with his parents, and Espio lived on the island before it got bought up and turned into a carnival without anyone asking his opinion on the matter."

"That wasn't very nice!" Said a shocked Cream.

Espio shrugged. "Eh, the island was kind of a dump beforehand anyway. Turning it into a giant Carnival actually improved it a bit."

"So your origin takes place in a carnival, just like Amy's?" Blaze asked.

Charmy nodded. "You, except none of us pissed off a fortune teller and got horribly cursed!"

"I wasn't cursed! She was a fraud!" Amy insisted. Nobody believed her.

"Who's this 'Mighty' character?" Rouge asked Sonic.

"An old pal of mine from South Island. We went to school together and hung out all the time, but after I started heroing full-time we saw less and less of each other," Sonic said regretfully. "He left to become a hero himself, in hopes of catching up to me. We used to compete all the time before I got my speed. Back then, he was nearly my equal. After that, not so much…he DID always have me beat in feats of strength, after all. Heck, I think he's even stronger than Knuckles!"

"Now, let's not exaggerate," Knuckles said with a huff.

"He's not exaggerating, Mighty really is stronger than you," Charmy said. Knuckles scowled.

"So there we were, just minding our own business and trying to enjoy the Carnival, when suddenly Eggman shows up and conquers the whole island, the big jerk!" Vector said, slamming a fist into a palm. "He wanted the Power Emerald, an experimental new energy source being used to power everything on the island, to fuel his evil world domination schemes! Most of us got captured, along with pretty much everyone else on the island, but Espio managed to escape and hooked up with Knuckles, who'd been passing by on Angel Island, saw what was going on, and stopped to lend a hand."

"That was very noble of you, Knuckles," Tails said, impressed." Usually, if something's happening on the surface, we have to drag you away from that island of yours to do something about it!"

"Sometimes literally," Amy added.

"Actually, the energy fluctuations being given off by the Power Emerald were interfering with the Master Emerald's power, so I kind of had to go down to see what was going on or else the island wouldn't budge," Knuckles said. "Otherwise I'd have just passed by without a second thought."

"Oh," Tails said, looking disappointed.

"That wasn't very nice of you, Mr. Knuckles," Cream said accusatorily.

"My job is to guard the Master Emerald first and foremost," Knuckles said with a huff. "The only reason I leave it to go on adventures with you guys is because you practically drag me kicking and screaming if I don't just say yes whenever you stop by."

"And because you're secretly bored and lonely and crave a distraction from your dull job?" Rouge said with a smirk.

"No!" Knuckles denied fiercely. Nobody believed him.

"The two of them managed to free the rest of us, and we also managed to team up with Heavy and Bomb, two of Eggman's mechanics who went rogue and decided they didn't want to help their boss do bad stuff anymore," Vector continued.

"Just like you, Mr. Omega!" Cream said.

"YES, EXCEPT-I-AM-INFINITELY-SUPERIOR-TO-THOSE-OUTDATED-MODELS," Omega scoffed. "ALSO-I-LOVE-DOING-'BAD-STUFF,' I-JUST-DON'T-WANT-TO-DO-IT-FOR-EGGMAN."

"Hear hear," Rouge said.

"By tapping into the power of some weird 'Chaos Rings' which happened to be lying all over the place, we managed to drive Eggman off the island, and save the day!" Vector continued.

"We also fought a giant red Metal Sonic for some reason," Espio added.

"We were heroes! Everybody loved us!" Charmy cheered. His face fell. "Unfortunately, we couldn't find my parents afterwards. To this day, I still don't know what happened to them. I'm sure they aren't dead… Maybe Eggman took them or something… Whatever the case, I know I'll find them someday!" Vector and Espio exchanged guilty looks, but said nothing.

"Afterwards, Mighty suggested that, instead of going our separate ways, we stuck together to form a team of heroes, seeing as how we'd worked so well together," the chameleon said. "And so the Chaotix were formed. We chose Knuckles to be our leader, and moved in with him to Angel Island, to help him continue guarding the Master Emerald as well as use the island as a floating base of operations that we could use to travel all over the world, fighting evil wherever we found it."

"And find my parents!" Charmy added.

"Ah, right, that," Espio said uncomfortably.

"I'm surprised at you, Knox. You seem to HATE anyone else living on that island with you!" Sonic commented. "Which is kind of weird, considering how big and empty and lonely it must be sometimes."

"It's not that bad," Knuckles lied. "And besides, they kind of grew on me. I thought it might be nice to have some company for a change to help me in my sacred duty."

"Then why aren't they still living on that island with you now?" Shadow asked.

"Because the jerk changed his mind and kicked us off a week later!" Vector snapped.

"You broke the Master Emerald 10 TIMES! And you were only up there a few days!" Knuckles shouted back.

"…Seriously? How did you manage that?" Asked an incredulous Sonic.

The Chaotix blushed. "We'd rather not talk about it," Espio said.

"Let's just say that mistakes were made, and leave it at that," Vector said.

"Yeah, mainly yours," Charmy said.

"Yeah, mainly… HEY!" Vector exclaimed. The bee snickered.

"We kind of figured that was it, and were willing to pack it in, but Mighty wasn't ready to throw in the towel just yet, and convinced us that, even though our leader had abandoned us, we could still be heroes," Espio said.

"Good old Mighty… That sounds like something he'd say," Sonic said fondly.

"I did not abandon you!" Knuckles insisted.

"Mighty took charge and suggested we become heroes back in his hometown of Southopolis, reasoning that since his old pal Sonic was usually on the move these days, it might be a good idea to have someone staying around to guard the home front," Vector said.

"That's reasonable," Shadow agreed.

"Unfortunately, we were flat broke, so couldn't afford transport to South Island, and Mighty was too proud and embarrassed to ask for his parents to send him money," Espeo said.

Sonic sighed. "Yeah, that ALSO sounds like Mighty."

"So, we figured we'd just stay where Knuckles dumped us and become heroes of that place!" Vector said.

"And that's how the Chaotix came to North- by- Northwestopolis!" Charmy declared.

"…North-by-Northwestopolis?" Asked the incredulous Blaze.

"Yeah, it's further east and north than Northwestopolis, but not as north as Northopolis," Vector said.

"Ah," Blaze said vaguely.

"North-by-Northwestopolis? I've been there," Sonic said. "They've got a nice bistro… Mighty bragged a few times in his letters that he'd set up shop there, but after a while, he stopped writing, and when I went by to visit, nobody seemed to want to talk about him."

"There's a reason for that," Espio said nervously.

"So, we got approval from the mayor to become official town heroes, got funding for our own headquarters, lots of publicity, very nice… And then nothing happened," Vector lamented.

"Nothing?" asked the confused Tails.

"Nothing," Vector said flatly.

"You know how in comics, usually supervillains and major mob bosses and whatnot only seem to start showing up AFTER the hero puts on his mask and starts running around fighting crime?" Charmy asked. "Well, that did not happen to us."

"Nothing happens in North-by-Northwestopolis. Ever," Espeo said angrily. "In fact, it's practically the city's motto. They have it written on a big plaque outside of town hall, for Chaos's sake!"

"Despite being an average sized city, there's barely any crime or violence or supervillainy at all in North-by-Northwestopolis," Vector complained. "Probably because it's not as scenic or historic as Northopolis, nor is it the big transit and industrial hub that is Northwestopolis. It's just… Kind of there in between. Like Espio said, nothing happens there… Which makes it a TERRIBLE place for a team of superheroes to live!"

"IT-SOUNDS-TERRIBLE-TO-ME," Omega commented.

"Yeah, not my kind of place," Rouge agreed.

"North-by-Northwestopolis is okay, but yeah, I didn't really spend long there…it's kind of dull, you know," Sonic said. "Not my thing."

"But isn't a peaceful town where nothing bad ever happens a good thing?" Asked a confused Cream.

"Not when you're a group of heroes who badly need to pay the bills and are unable to provide the city with justification to put you up," Espeo said.

"The most exciting thing that happened in our first few months was Eggman stopping by to get a bite to eat at the bistro," Vector said. "It's all the papers talked about for weeks afterwards. That and how he paid full price, instead of stiffing the bill or just blowing up the place so he wouldn't have to pay anything."

"Yeah, it really is a good bistro," Sonic reminisced fondly.

"It must be, for Eggman to pay full price," said an impressed Shadow.

"He STILL hasn't paid us for rescuing him from Metal Sonic," Espio grumbled.

"We also beat up a mime," Charmy said. "They threw us a parade for that."

"I still don't get why, it was just a mime. He wasn't doing anything evil," Espio complained.

"Espio, he was a MIME. He's inherently evil. That's all the excuse you need to beat one up," Vector said.

The others nodded in agreement, except for Big, who was fishing, and Cream, who did not agree, though it was less because she liked mimes and more because she hated violence in all its forms. "In my time, being a mime is punishable by death!" Silver said.

"What a wonderful future!" Amy gushed.

"It's the same in my world," Blaze said.

"What an awful place!" Amy hissed. Blaze rolled her eyes.

"We tried to expand our team roster in a desperate attempt to gain publicity and maybe attract some bad guys to town, or encourage the criminal element to step up their game," Vector said. "Mighty was able to convince one of his friends back on South Island, Ray the Squirrel, to come up to join us, and we also managed to recruit Bark the Polar Bear and Bean the Dynamite."

Rouge blinked. "Wait…I know those names…" Shadow shushed her.

"Ray?! He was on your team?!" Sonic exclaimed. "Huh, guess that explains why he up and left home one day…"

"Another old friend of yours?" Blaze asked.

Sonic nodded. "Yeah, but he was sort of Tails' rival and considered himself to be Mighty's sidekick for a little while…since, you know, they're both short, yellow, smart, flying mammals."

"It's been years since I've seen Ray," Tails recalled. "I wonder if he's still bitter about how I always beat him at everything… Races, flying, science fairs, mathletes, getting girls…"

"Girls? Really?" Amy asked skeptically.

"I'm a multiple-tailed fox. Practically a kitsune. You have no idea how attractive that makes me to some people," Tails said smugly.

"Aren't you too young for that sort of thing?" Knuckles asked.

"No," Tails said.

"You recruited some dynamite named Bean?" Asked the confused Cream.

"Well, if they already had a robot named Bomb, I suppose he could have been another walking explosive," Blaze reasoned.

"No, though 'walking explosive' is probably a good description for him. Bean's a duck who really, really, REALLY likes explosives," Amy said. She shuddered. "And I mean REALLY likes them. I was glad when I never saw him again after that whole fighting tournament thing to destroy the Death Egg."

"He was thrilled when he found out that he was on the same team as a walking bomb," Charmy said. He made a disgusted face. "And then they started dating… It was really weird."

"DISGUSTING," the revolted Omega agreed. "A-ROBOT-DEIGNING-TO-BE-WITH-A-SQUISHY-IN-THAT-MANNER? DISGRACEFUL!"

"Are you sure you aren't just angry that despite being an older-model heroic rogue Eggman robot, he was able to find love before you and so has another 'first' on you?" Shadow joked.

"NO," Omega said sullenly. "AND-BESIDES, IT'S-NOT-LIKE-HE-STAYED-"

"No spoilers!" Charmy hissed. "We aren't there yet!"

"Unfortunately, that move backfired on us," Vector said. "Not only did we have even more mouths to feed and take up space, but Bean kept blowing up buildings with Bomb on their dates, and the city wanted US to pay for them!"

"And then, one day, our big break came in," Espio said. "We heard that Fang the Sniper, the world's number one hit man and bounty hunter, and one of the top 10 most wanted criminals in just about every country on Earth, happened to be passing through town."

"Was he there for the bistro?" Sonic asked.

"He was indeed," Espio said.

"That must be a really good bistro," Blaze commented.

"I'll take you sometime," Sonic promised.

"I have no idea what a bistro is, nor do I actually care," Knuckles said.

"Fang, Bean, Bark…a lot of names from that tournament popping up all of a sudden," Amy commented.

"Fang the Sniper? What kind of animal is a Sniper?" Asked a confused Cream.

"Snipers aren't animals, Cream, they're people who can shoot and kill a target from really far away," Tails said. "Fang used to be called Nack the Weasel, but decided to change his name because he thought 'Fang the Sniper' would look better on his resume once he branched out into the professional killer business."

"Oh my," the rabbit said, frightened.

"Aw, he wasn't that tough! When he entered that tournament with us, he used pop guns!" Knuckles said.

"That's because it was a tournament, and he wasn't fighting to kill," Amy pointed out.

Rouge nodded. "Fang has a MASSIVE collection of guns, many of them so illegal that you could spend the rest of your life in prison for so much as LOOKING at one of them, let alone shooting it. He's so dangerous that even WE have hesitated to go after him just yet. We're good, but we're not quite at his level yet."

"We'll get there some day," Shadow said. "Omega and I have been training for quite some time on and off the shooting range for over a year now. When GUN finally sends us after Fang, we'll be ready."

"Well, WE certainly weren't ready, although we certainly thought we were," Vector said with a sigh. "Instead, we made possibly the biggest mistake of our lives…"

…

A purple and white weasel with a big brown stetson hat, brown boots with white gaiters, brown gloves with metal plates on them, one canine larger than the other, and a long, thick, purple tail pushed open the door to Sal's Bistro, one of the best eateries in all of North-by-Northwestopolis. "Good morning, sir!" A fancily-dressed blue and black armadillo with a big bushy brown mustache standing behind a lectern said cheerfully. "Welcome to Sal's Bistro! How may we be of service today?"

"I'm here for a bite to eat, please," the weasel said gruffly. He paused, regarding the armadillo with a frown. "Are you new here? I eat at this place pretty often – – best damn bistro in all the northern territories! – – But I don't believe I've ever seen you here before."

"I am indeed new, Sir," the armadillo said with a bow. "Just started a couple of weeks ago."

"Hmm. Dolores usually works the front at this time of day. She all right?" The weasel asked.

"She's just fine, sir. Decided to take a vacation to South Island. One of the best places on the planet to live in, except for good old North-by-Northwestopolis, of course!" The armadillo said.

"Eh, it's all right, I guess," the weasel said with a shrug.

…

"Just 'all right?!'" Sonic cried. "How dare he! South Island's the best damn place in the world!"

"I thought that was Spagonia," Tails said.

"Second best damn place in the world!" Sonic said, without changing his tone.

…

"Would you like a table or booth, sir?" The armadillo asked.

"Booth, please. The one in the back, that you can't see from any of the front windows, but gives a good view of the front door, backdoor, kitchen door, and bathrooms. You should know the one," the weasel said.

"Certainly, sir. Oh, but first… One little thing?" The armadillo pointed to a sign hanging from the front of his lectern, which said. 'No weapons allowed.'

The weasel frowned. "That's new. That's never been a problem before."

"There was an incident recently," the armadillo said vaguely.

"Really? But nothing ever happens in this town. It's one of the appeals," the weasel commented.

"Yeah, or one of the biggest drags… Err, I mean, a mime was involved," the armadillo said quickly.

"Oh, well, that explains everything," the weasel said. He sighed. "Normally I'd just turn and leave… But I'm rather hungry, and I like this place well enough to give it a pass just this once. So, you want me to leave my weapons here? Well, son, this might take a while…"

15 minutes later…

"And… Let's see… I think that should be the last of it," the weasel said, tossing a serrated knife into a pile of guns, blasters, staffs, knives, swords, blades, rocket launchers, bombs, grenades, ammunition belts, and pretty much every other implement that could be used to stab, shoot, bludgeon, obliterate, or otherwise kill someone imaginable that was at least five times as tall as he was, and just about reached the ceiling.

The armadillo gawked. "That's…Th-That's a lot of weapons," he said weakly, face pale.

"In my line of work, I find it's a good idea to never be left without a weapon," the weasel said. "So. That booth, please?"

…

"…I-THINK-I-AM-IN-LOVE," Omega said after a moment, awed.

"I thought you said romance between a robot and an organic was disgusting?" Rouge asked in amusement.

"I-WAS-SO-WRONG!" Omega cried.

"That's… A lot of things that could be used to kill a guy," said the disturbed Sonic.

"Not even I have that many," Shadow said. "Yet."

"Exactly how many people has this Fang killed?" Blaze asked.

"Let's just say 'a lot' and leave it at that," Rouge said.

"Oh my," Cream squeaked.

"Yeah, now I'm really glad we didn't let him use real guns during the tournament," Tails said.

…

The armadillo led the weasel to a booth near the back of the restaurant. As a bistro, the eatery was fancier than a diner, but less so than the sort of restaurant you might want to take a date on only to discover that the prices are way too high and the dishes way too small. The floors were made of hardwood so polished you could see your reflections in them, chandeliers with glittering bits of glass and crystal dangled from the ceiling along with a stuffed alligator wearing a top hat and monocle, their light refracting across the room, partial walls with mirrors and shelves containing small but tasteful works of art created partitions to make the place look a bit bigger than it actually was, and the walls were lined with pictures of famous people who'd dined there in the past. A surprising number of them were of legendary heroes, criminals, world leaders, and even supervillains; such as Sonic the Hedgehog, Dr. Eggman, the Commander of GUN, the president of the United Federation, and the weasel himself.

…

"… Wow. That must be a REALLY good bistro," said an amazed Amy.

"It really is," Sonic said fondly.

"Now I REALLY want to go," Blaze said.

…

Seating was provided in the form of round or square tables with masterfully carved chairs and booths with plush leather seating. Currently, only a handful of these seats were occupied. There was a grizzly bear drinking coffee and reading a newspaper in a booth near the window seated across from a fly filling in the pictures on his kids menu in crayon, a rather twitchy-looking pink duck sitting alone at a small table was picking at his casserole while tightly keeping his trench coat closed, and an orange-haired yellow crocodile in a flower-patterned dress was stuffing her face with gusto in a corner close to the kitchen door. "Slow day?" The weasel commented, noticing how few people there were in the bistro.

"We're going through a bit of a dry spell. Business will pick up soon, I'm sure of it," the armadillo said optimistically as he seated the weasel at the requested booth. "I'll send a server out in a moment. Would you like something to drink?"

"Peach tea with extra honey and a dash of lemons, please," The weasel said.

"Not coffee? Or, uh, something with a bit of alcohol in it?" Asked the surprised armadillo.

"Nah, can't handle the stuff," the weasel said.

"I'll, uh, see about getting you some, then," the armadillo said, heading for the kitchen.

While he was gone, the weasel opened the menu sitting on the table in front of him and perused the various delicious options presented to him. He wasn't really paying much attention to them, though; he already knew what he wanted.

A little later, a green squirrel dressed in the same uniform as the armadillo came up to the weasel and placed a steaming teacup on a saucer with a small biscuit on the table before him. "Here you go, sir. One peach tea with extra honey and a dash of lemon."

The weasel delicately picked up the cup and inhaled the sweet aroma wafting from the liquid within. A crooked smile forming on his angular face, he took a sip and sighed blissfully. "Ahhh, that's the stuff."

"Do you need more time to decide on your meal, or are you ready to order?" The squirrel asked, taking out a notepad.

"No, I'm ready. I'll take what I usually have: a French onion soup with a side salad and some French bread, please," The weasel said.

The squirrel jotted the order down and nodded. "Coming right up, sir." He headed for the kitchen.

…

"French onion soup with a side salad and some French bread? Not really what I'd expect a guy like that to eat," Amy commented.

"He may be a thug and a mercenary and an unrepentant killer, but he has rather refined tastes," Rouge said.

"I approve, that's a pretty good dish," Sonic said.

"I'll be sure to have some when we go then," Blaze said, smiling at Sonic, who grinned back.

"Just to be clear, those guys were you and the others in disguise, right?" Knuckles asked uncertainly.

"Yes. Why, wasn't it obvious?" Vector asked.

"O-of course it was! I just wanted to make sure for Cream's sake," the echidna spluttered.

"It seemed pretty obvious to me, Mr. Knuckles," Cream said. "Why, did you have trouble telling it was them?" Knuckles flushed and looked away.

"I-THOUGHT-THIS-WAS-SUPPOSED-TO-BE-A-STORY-OF-YOU-TRYING-AND-FAILING-TO-CATCH-FANG-THE-SNIPER, NOT-OF-HIM-HAVING-LUNCH! THIS-IS-BORING!" Omega complained.

"Give it time, it's gonna get good really soon!" Charmy assured the robot.

"Or really bad, depending on your perspective," Espio said with a grimace.

…

While the weasel waited, he took out his PDA and checked his mail and the latest information on local bounties. According to his sources, Gonorrhea the Goat was hiding in a cave somewhere north of town, and if he could catch him alive, it would be a sweet 50 million Rings in his account. And if he continued on his way to Northopolis, he could fulfill a contract Don Cornelius had put out on a scumbag who'd impregnated his daughter then ran out on her, and if he brought back the bastard's genitals, that would be another cool 100 million in the bank.

Oh, and his sister's birthday was coming up. He made a note to himself to find something nice to get her. Sure, she'd tried to kill him the last time she saw him, but that was just business, nothing personal, he'd have done the exact same thing in her position. Family's family, after all.

…

"…That's kind of messed up," said a disturbed Knuckles.

"He has a sister?!" Amy asked in disbelief.

"Yes, Nicolette the Weasel," Rouge explained. "She's also a bounty hunter, and may be even more competent than her brother, but she's not as vicious, which is why he ranks higher on the most wanted lists."

"I don't understand. They're siblings. Why would they try to kill each other?" Asked the confused Cream.

"Clearly you've never had a sibling," Blaze said.

"Neither have you," Tails pointed out.

"Well, yes, but I've encountered some pretty twisted and messed-up sibling relationships in my time," Blaze said.

"Am I the only one here who is wondering what sort of horrible parents would name their child GONORRHEA?!" Sonic asked.

"The same kind who'd name their son Hemorrhoid the Hippopotamus?" Shadow said.

Sonic blinked. "…That's a real person?!"

"Yep. And with a name like that, you can probably understand why he become a serial killer," Rouge said.

"What did Gonorrhea do, then?" Tails asked.

"Sexual predator," Rouge said.

"Ick," Tails said, face screwed up in disgust.

"What are gonorrhea or hemorrhoids?" Cream asked.

"You're better off not knowing," Tails said.

"Actually, I've no idea what those are either. I don't think we have those in the FYOO-CHURR," Silver said.

"We'll tell you when you're older," Shadow joked. Silver scowled.

"Wait, how did you know what Fang was thinking if you weren't Fang?" Knuckles asked in confusion.

Vector started to answer, and then paused, exchanging confused looks with the other two. "That's…actually a very good question…"

…

Several minutes later, the squirrel returned with the weasel's meal. "Here you go, sir," the squirrel said, putting out a steaming bowl with a crust of cheese over it, a smaller bowl of salad, and a small dish with slices of bread on it on the table before the weasel one by one.

Once more, the weasel inhaled the rich scent wafting off of his meal. "It smells delicious. Thank you."

"I'll pass your compliments to the chef," the squirrel said.

"Yeah, it's a shame I'm not going to get the chance to eat any of it," the weasel said sadly.

The squirrel blinked in confusion. "Why not?"

The weasel grabbed the squirrel's right wrist, slammed his hand on to the table, and drove his knife into it, pinning it to the wood. As the squirrel howled in surprise and agony, the weasel picked up the bowl of soup and slammed it into the squirrel's face, causing him to scream even higher as the scalding hot contents burned his face. As the other 'guests' and the armadillo stared in shock, the weasel grabbed the squirrel by the fur on the top of his head, and then slammed it into the table repeatedly, blood and bits of teeth flying everywhere, until he stopped moving. The weasel ripped the knife out of the squirrel's hand and calmly rose to his feet, regarding the horrified Mobians with a wry grin. "I must say, this is probably the most amateurish attempt to capture me I've seen yet. And just so you know, there has never been anyone by the name of Dolores who's ever worked here. You should have done your homework better before setting this up, boys."

"Get him!" The armadillo yelled. The bear and 'fly' rose from their seats and charged towards him, along with the crocodile and armadillo, while the duck started fiddling with something under his coat.

"This just gets better and better, because if you really HAD done your homework, lads…" Fang the Sniper's grin turned even more demented. "Then you would know that I don't NEED my guns to kill someone. So long as I can fit something into my hand, I'm never without a weapon!"

He snatched up the fork and spoon and flung them, along with the knife, at his assailants. The projectiles flew through the air faster than most silverware should've been capable of, ricocheting off the floors, wall, seats, and tables, before hitting the exact spots the weasel had calculated they'd impact. The fork pierced Charmy's wing just as he was passing by one of the partial walls, pinning it to the wooden surface. Charmy cried out and tried to pull free, only to flinch and stop when his wing started to tear, and gingerly tried to pull the fork out without hurting his wing any further. The knife pierced Bark's knee, and he stumbled, tripping over a chair and slamming into another wall, causing the little pieces of art on the shelves to fall down and land on his head, knocking him out. The spoon flew right down Vector's throat as he opened his mouth to shout something, and he gagged, choking on it. As he collapsed to the floor, heaving and gasping, Fang ran over and punched him in the chest, causing him to spit the spoon out. The weasel snatched it out of the air, and then spun around, smacking the crocodile in the face with his tail hard enough to fling him into a wall, his long snout smashing through it and getting stuck, as well as knocking him out.

Screaming in wordless fury, Mighty curled into a ball and rolled towards Fang. The weasel flung the spoon end-first at the floor right before the armadillo, causing it to embed at such an angle that when Mighty ran into it, he was knocked off course and flew into the air. Fang quickly ducked before the ball of plate armor could take his head off, and Mighty slammed into the wall behind him hard enough to crater it, smashing several of the pictures hanging there, though not, thankfully, Fang's own.

Suddenly, a big heavyset robot burst out of the door to the kitchen, raising a cartoonish round red bomb with a face and limbs into the air, fuse lit, at the same time as the duck stood up and threw off his coat, revealing he was wearing a bomb vest. Cackling insanely, he raised a hand, revealing he was holding a detonator. His thumb lifted, preparing to press down on the trigger…

And Fang whistled. With the roar of an engine, his hover bike, the Marvelous Queen, smashed through the plate glass window at the front of the bistro and rammed into Bean, flinging him into the air and causing him to drop the detonator. He slammed into Heavy's chest and fell to the ground, dazed. Heavy and Bomb looked down at their comrade and boyfriend respectively in concern, giving Fang the chance to whistle again. His hover bike responded, firing a harpoon from its front that embedded itself in Heavy's chest. The robot looked down at it in surprise, and Fang whistled a third time, causing the Marvelous Queen to reverse, yanking on the harpoon and causing Heavy to topple over and fall onto Bean, crushing him.

Fang raced over to the detonator, snatched it up, knocked over a table and leaped behind it, then pressed the trigger, setting off Bean's vest. There was a muffled explosion from underneath Heavy, but the robot's bulk compressed it and kept it from destroying the entire building, just as Fang had predicted it would. Heavy groaned and tried to pull himself up, relatively unharmed by the blast – – he had been built to work with Bomb, after all, and it wouldn't do for him to be vulnerable to his own partner's explosive nature, let alone anyone else's – – but Fang whistled a fourth time, and a pair of cables shot out from the front of the Marvelous Queen and planted themselves on the robots body, channeling several million gigawatts of electricity into him. Normally Heavy's body would've been insulated from something like that, but the Queen was preprogrammed to auto-target joints and armor chinks where such protection was imperfect and exploit them to maximum effectiveness. Giving a strangled cry of agony, the robot collapsed again, further flattening the charred – – but otherwise intact – – duck beneath him.

Fang heard a hissing noise, and turned in time to see the enraged Bomb charging at him, fuse almost burned out completely. Without breaking a sweat, Fang hocked up a loogie and spat it at the walking explosive, the glob of saliva soaring through the air and striking the fuse just before it could enter the top of Bomb's head, snuffing it out. As Bomb stumbled in surprise, Fang rushed over and lashed out with a kick, launching the robot at Charmy, who'd just managed to extricate himself from the wall without harming his wing any further, sending both of them flying through another plate glass window and out of the restaurant entirely.

"You… You BASTARD!"

Fang whipped his head around to see Mighty had recovered and was charging towards him, leaping into the air and preparing to crawl into a ball to bowl him over. The weasel grabbed his oversized fang, ripped it out of his mouth, and flung it at the armadillo's chest. Mighty blinked in surprise as the false tooth impacted his stomach and exploded, flinging him into Bark, who had managed to gain some semblance of consciousness and was starting to get up, knocking the bear out again. Mighty groaned, his head spinning, trying to get his act together…

But Fang didn't give him the opportunity. The weasel ran over and started laying into the stunned armadillo with a flurry of punches, kicks, slaps, and stomps, hitting Mighty over and over and over until even his natural thickness and body armor were not enough to protect him from the pain. After what felt like hours, but was really just a few minutes of sustained pounding, Fang finally stood up, wincing and shaking his hands in pain. "A tough one, aren't you? Think I almost broke a knuckle…" He paused and frowned. "Wait… Why do I feel like I'm forgetting…"

His fist snapped backwards, impacting what appeared to be thin air. There was a pause, and then Espio the Chameleon flickered into existence, Fang's fist embedded in his face. The chameleon's eyes rolled backwards, and with a groan, he fell to the ground, out cold. "There we go. That's everyone accounted for."

"You… This… This isn't…The end…" Mighty wheezed through broken and bleeding lips, struggling to get back up, only to find that his vaunted strength had abandoned him in his hour of need.

"Actually, I'm afraid it is," Fang said, walking over to his bike. He opened a compartment in its side, pulled out another false tooth, and screwed into his mouth. "I'll give you amateurs credit for one thing. It's not often I have to break out my fake teeth. Most people think this thing's just for show. They fail to realize that EVERY part of my body is a weapon, in more ways than one."

"You won't… Get away with this…" Mighty gasped.

"You're right, I certainly won't get away with the delightful lunch I was about to have before you idiots ruined things. Now I'll never be able to come back to this bistro, which is a shame, as it's one of the best in all the northern territories," Fang complained. "Given how unprofessional and badly you handled this trap of yours, I'm going to assume you aren't working for any of the thousands of people who want my head and were just a bunch of idiot kids trying to make a name for themselves as heroes by taking down the big bad Fang. Am I right?" Mighty gurgled, but by this point was incapable of saying anything more. "I'll take that as a yes. Let me give you a word of advice, kid. I've MET heroes. I've FOUGHT them. And you and your crew? You aren't heroes. You aren't even close. You aren't even fit to take on that idiot Eggman, let alone a REAL bad guy. If I were you, I'd get out of this game before it kills you. Better Mobians then you have tried to play and failed to make the mark. I should know. I've killed most of them."

He grabbed his bike by the handles and gently steered it over to the front of the restaurant, where he patiently inspected and stowed away his massive pile of weapons one by one, before writing out a check and placing it on the nearby lectern. "There, that should about cover the damages. Should be more than enough to fix this place up and get it back in business in no time. Oh, and before I forget…" He hurled some Rings over at Mighty. They hit the badly battered armadillo in the face, causing him to flinch. "A little something for your trouble, mate. Thanks for the entertainment." Chuckling, he swung himself up into the Marvelous Queen's saddle, gunned the engines, and left the bistro through the broken window the bike had come through in the first place, leaving the Chaotix behind to wallow in their failure… And the massive amounts of blood oozing from their horribly injured bodies as they waited for the ambulance to show up.

…

Everyone stared at the three sullen Chaotix in disbelief. "Holy crap," said the shocked Amy.

"He's even more dangerous than we'd heard," said the alarmed Rouge.

"I think we're going to need a bit more training," Shadow said.

"I-THINK-I-WANT-TO-MARRY-HIM," Omega said, lovestruck.

"How the… He wasn't that strong when we faced him before! How did he get that powerful?!" Asked the horrified Knuckles.

"He was holding back before? He didn't feel like going all out? He underwent lots of training and possibly illegal genetic and cybernetic modifications between now and then? Or maybe we were just that pathetic?" Espio said with a shrug. "We may never know for sure."

"How awful…" Cream whispered.

"Mighty… Ray… Were they…" Sonic asked anxiously.

"They survived," Vector said sadly. "But they were never quite the same after that."

"Yeah, and Charmy's face got horribly disfigured from that super-hot soup, so he won't be competing with you for girls anymore, Tails," Charmy said.

The fox grimaced. "Unfortunately, I can take no pleasure in that."

"That debacle spelled the end of the Chaotix as a team of superheroes," Espio said. "For trashing one of the city's finest establishments and driving away a frequent high paying visitor, we were stripped of our title and privileges, lost our hideout, and were told to either get a job and live like everyone else, or we could get the hell out."

"Most of us left after that," Vector said sadly. "Bark and Bean, who always had rather shaky moral compasses before then, decided that being good was for suckers and chased after Fang, hoping to join him. For whatever reason, he took them on as his apprentices, and together they formed Team Hooligan, a twisted Team with Fang on Speed, Bean on Flight, and Bark on Power. Together, they've committed even more crimes and become more dangerous than they ever could have alone."

"Which means we'll need to be even stronger and deadlier to take them down," Rouge murmured.

"Heavy and Bomb also decided to revert to their original evil programming, but instead of rejoining Eggman, they decided to become terrorists. They've killed hundreds of people around the world with their bombs, and often work together with Team Hooligan to kill even more people," Espio said.

"On the bright side, Bomb and Bean got married!" Charmy said. "The wedding was great! Well, until they blew up the chapel and killed most of the guests."

"It's a good thing we had some spare lives, or that would've been the end of us," Vector commented.

"Yeah, we're probably going to go after them too someday," Shadow said.

Rouge nodded. "They're on the most wanted list as well."

"AND-THEN-I-SHALL-PROVE-THAT-I-AM-THE-SUPERIOR-FORMER-EGGMAN-ROBOT!" Omega declared.

"And that you're just as good at killing as they are?" Shadow asked.

"THAT-TOO," Omega said.

"That's a horrible thing to aspire to!" Cream gasped.

"I-DON'T-KNOW-IF-YOU'VE-NOTICED, BUT-I'M-NOT-EXACTLY-A-GOOD-INDIVIDUAL," Omega said.

"Ray still wanted to be a hero despite it all, but was rather disillusioned with the whole solo vigilante or team thing, so wound up joining GUN to become a spy," Espio said. "We never heard from him again after that."

"I've met him a couple of times," Rouge said. "He works with a partner, Cowblink the Moose. They work in counter-espionage and often deal with spies from other countries."

"Well, I'm glad he's okay…" Sonic said uncertainly.

"Lucky, spies get all the girls," Tails said.

"Even horribly disfigured ones?" Amy asked.

Tails shrugged. "Some girls are into that sort of thing."

"…How do you know these things?!" Knuckle asked.

"Internet," Tails said.

"And the three of us stayed with Mighty, because he was so broken and depressed after that we were afraid of what would happen if we left him on his own," Vector said.

"And because we had nowhere else to go," Charmy said.

"That too," Vector said.

Sonic clenched his fist and ground his teeth. "Mighty…"

"You could not have known, beloved," Blaze said, putting a paw on his shoulder.

"I should have known! I should've been there!" Sonic snapped. "He was my friend…"

"Not even the fastest thing alive can be everywhere at every time," Blaze said sadly.

Sonic narrowed his eyes. "Not yet."

"Sonic, are you contemplating a course of action that would make you so fast you can LITERALLY be everywhere at every time, so you can be some sort of one-Mobian global police force?" Tails asked. "Because if so, I would highly recommend against it. That sort of thing NEVER works out well in comics."

"Well, if it doesn't work out in COMICS," Sonic grumbled, but subsided.

"Mighty was able to get an apartment where the four of us could all live together until we could all make enough money to move out and get a place of our own," Vector said.

"Which never happened, seeing as we're still living in that apartment now," Espio said.

"I tried to get a job as a DJ, but I was barred from every club in town because they claimed I had no musical talent whatsoever, and since I had absolutely no other marketable skills at all I wound up doing nothing but sitting on the couch all day watching television," Vector said.

"They couldn't afford to send me to school, so I got a job as a sign spinner at a strip mall until I was let go because I'm apparently too young to have a paying job due to child labor laws, so spent all my time at home watching television with Vector," Charmy said.

"I took a mail-order class to be a ninja, figuring that there'd probably be some big bucks in that field, but unfortunately I can't stand the sight of blood, so nobody would hire me to be an assassin, and so was forced to perform at birthday parties for horrible children," Espio said with a shudder. "It was like being in the same room with dozens of other Charmy's for hours on end… It was the most horrible experience of my life."

"Wait, so you weren't part of some ninja clan or trained in Far-Eastopolis?" Tails asked.

"I wish," Espio said wearily.

"How are all these cities actual places?" asked an incredulous Blaze.

"Personally, I've always thought it weird that you don't have an abundance of –opolises in your world," Sonic said.

"And Mighty got the only job available for someone of his skills… As a male escort," Vector said.

"A male escort?!" Sonic cried, aghast.

"Yes, a male escort," Vector repeated.

"What's a male escort?" Cream asked.

"Something you're too young for, sweetie," Rouge said, looking bemused.

Cream frowned. "I'm getting rather tired of those…"

"But Mighty has super strength! Why couldn't he get a job in construction, or demolition, or bodybuilding, or something like that?" Sonic asked.

"He tried to, but the problem was, his super strength made him TOO good at them," Espio explained. "The unions argued that because he could do the work of at least 10 or 20 men all by himself, it would deny lots of other people jobs, so lobbied for him to be denied employment in those areas."

"But that's ridiculous! Aren't there laws against that sort of thing?!" Amy demanded.

Espio shrugged. "Either they don't have them in North-by-Northwestopolis, or everyone was still angry at him for causing so much damage to Sal's, and were willing to look the other way. It's one of the city's biggest sources of revenue, after all."

"On the plus side, whenever he came home, he brought lots of money!" Charmy said. He frowned. "On the downside, he always looked like he hated himself and we could usually hear him crying himself to sleep."

"…Dang," Tails said.

"Knuckles, this is all your fault!" Sonic said angrily.

"My fault?! How is it my fault?!" Knuckles demanded.

"If you hadn't thrown them off of Angel Island, they wouldn't have wound up in that mess!" Sonic said.

"They broke the Master Emerald 10 times! 10! Times! What else was I supposed to do?!" Knuckles asked.

"Well, clearly something other than that, especially because by abandoning them you indirectly led to four people becoming incredibly evil and dangerous criminals, one of my oldest friends was permanently disfigured, and the other got stuck as a MALE ESCORT!" Sonic snapped.

"Yeah, well… I've absolutely no idea what a male escort is," Knuckles admitted. "Is it really that bad?"

"Yes, is it?" Cream asked.

Rouge sighed and whispered something in Knuckles' ear. His eyes widened. "Guys can DO that?!" She nodded. "Wow. Well, uh, now I feel bad."

"You totally should!" Sonic said angrily.

"This is all very informative, as well as hilarious, but how did it lead the three of you to become detectives?" Silver asked.

Vector sighed. "Now that's another sad, sordid tale. And it all began on the day when Mighty disappeared…"

Sonic blinked in confusion. "Disappeared?"

Vector nodded. "Yes, the saddest day in my life…next to getting thrashed by Fang, or when I got told I have no musical girlfriend, or when I found out my online girlfriend was actually a robot…anyway, it all started on a boiling hot summer day…"

…

North-by-Northwestopolis.

The city too far south to be Northopolis, but too far east to be Northwestopolis.

A city smack dab between two great metropolises, constantly reminded of the grandeur and wealth of its neighbors, but never quite able to achieve it itself.

A city with a million stories, all of them with sad endings.

MY city.

…

"Uh, Vector, what are you doing?" Asked the confused Tails.

"Oh, no…" Espio groaned. "Vector, you promised you wouldn't do this again!"

…

The sun was pounding down on the city like something really hot and heavy hammering down on something else really hard. The streets were so hot you could boil eggs on them, though why you would want to, I don't know, because it probably wouldn't be very hygienic, unless you were homeless, of course, in which case you'd probably be desperate and hungry enough to do it anyway, assuming that you hadn't already been killed from the intense heat or exposure, and there weren't really a lot of homeless people in North-by-Northwestopolis anyway, so the point is moot.

It was even hotter in the apartment where I and my three companions roosted, the air sizzling with sweltering heat, as if a tiny bit of Hell had been transported into our building and we somehow managed to rent it, and were now being punished for our myriad sins by burning in the infernal heat of that dark realm, though I've never really understood how Hell could be so dark anyway, if there was so much fire in it, though it was also as if the air conditioner had broken down and we didn't have enough money to fix it, which was the actual reason it was so hot and not because our apartment was from Hell, although considering how nasty our landlord was, he MIGHT have well been a demon, in which case maybe the entire building was actually part of Hell, we'll probably never know for sure, unless I spill holy water on our landlord or something, which is probably a bad idea because he'd evict us.

…

"What is he doing?" Asked the dumbfounded Blaze.

"Something really stupid," Espio said sourly.

…

I took a long, deep, sip from my can of soda, feeling a sliver of relief from the unrelenting heat as the refreshing liquid slid down my throat, though perhaps not as much as I would have if were beer instead of Chaosade (A bit of chaos in every can!™), but we didn't have beer so I had to make do, or if the liquid was actually cold, which it wasn't because the fridge had broken down and we didn't have enough money to pay for it to be fixed, so the energy drink was only marginally cooler than the rest of the apartment. The intense heat was causing my reptilian blood to go as sluggish as a slug crawling about the garden in the middle of summer, and were it not for my laser-sharp focus, and the several gallons of energy drinks I'd consumed over the last few dozen hours, I would probably have fallen into a deep, dark, slumber, not unlike death, except I would probably have returned from the slumber eventually, unlike death, from which there is no return, unless you have extra lives, which I also happened to possess.

Before me, resting upon a crooked end table that needed thick phone books and cheap-ass porno magazines to be propped under three of its legs to keep it from wobbling or toppling over, like a holy icon perched atop a rather shitty altar, was the only appliance in our hell of an apartment that actually worked: that most sacred of technological artifacts, the idiot's lantern that enthralled all who gazed upon it, a cruel and merciless God who provided hours upon hours of mind-numbing entertainment in return for your brain cells and an exorbitant cable bill, our television. (And it wasn't even a very good television, either, it didn't show color, the screen was cracked, and it had antenna that needed to be frequently adjusted to keep the picture even remotely clear, which came as a bit of a surprise to us when we got it because we hadn't thought television with antenna EXISTED anymore, that they'd gone extinct like the dinosaurs, so it was as if this machine was a relic of a bygone age, one which should have died out long, long ago.)

I had spent the last 72 hours wide awake, keeping my strength up with copious amounts of energy drink and pizza, watching a film noir movie marathon on the Hard-boiled Private Eye Network, and now yet another movie was winding down to the expected grin, tragic ending: the protagonist's faith in humanity or Mobianity even lower than before, his friends and loved ones either dead or turned traitor on him, the beautiful dame who roped him into this web of conspiracy and deceit laughing at him for his foolishness, and the real bad guys, the fat cats who run society, getting away with everything because the law enforcement was too incompetent or corrupt to stop them, because it's Eastopolis, son. (Granted, I'd drunken so much Chaosade at that point that I was having trouble telling reality from fiction and all the movies had started to blur together after a while, though whether that's because I was losing my mind from too much sugar and caffeine and lack of sleep or because so many of them were more or less exactly the same, I can't say.)

As the credits rolled, white text crawling up a black background, like lost souls rising from this sinful earth to the Paradise which is promised to them, unaware that that Paradise was nothing but a lie concocted by so-called holy men and philosophers to keep the working schmucks in line with promises of a blissful eternity if they allowed themselves to suffer under the thumb of whoever held all the power now, my eyes wandered the apartment, taking in the squalor of the squalid hovel—though that might be considered an insult to hovels-which was our home. Pizza boxes rose in towers around the ragged, worn couch covered in stains from liquids I did not dare to think about on which I was seated that we'd pulled out of a dumpster, like the skyscrapers of some great metropolis with flies and cockroaches scuttling about like mindless pedestrians going about their pointless everyday lives blissfully unaware of just how easily their life could be snuffed out at a moment's notice, much like the one I found myself in now, and I was a giant monster from the dawn of time here to wreak havoc and fight other monsters and the useless military and chase after busty dames for reasons which are never fully explained.

The door to the kitchen was shut, several wooden planks nailed over it, a sagging chair wedged under the door knob, and several paper slips which Espio swore were made with authentic ninja sealing magic were plastered all over its surface, an eerie glow occasionally shining through the cracks and grotesque noises periodically filtering through from the other side, much like how the dark secrets we keep from our friends and from ourselves occasionally peek out from the imperfect masks we use to guard ourselves and give others a glimpse of the horrible, bottomless evil lurking within us all. I once again made a note to see if we could get a priest, an exterminator, or possibly both in to take look at the horrible Abomination that had spawned from our broken refrigerator and merged with the Atrocity that slithered out of the dishwasher and sink to become a Thing That Should Not Be, which we were fairly certain would wipe out all life on Earth if released from the kitchen and allowed to feed on the filth from our apartment, and what's worse, would probably not pay the rent.

The door to the bedroom was open. Sometimes we slept in there, just like most people slept in bedrooms, or in the comforting lies they tell themselves to help them get through the day and keep from falling into despair at the sheer pointlessness that was everything, the sheets soiled by fluids of all sorts, though mainly urine since Charmy had a bed-wetting problem. It also had a bathroom. Not much else to say about that, except for…uh… Yeah, I got nothing. It was actually relatively clean compared to the rest of the apartment…Ooh, like how even in the most sordid, dirty, corrupt of souls can sometimes be found a single speck of purity and goodness, a spark of innocence that had not been crushed by the horrible weight of the world! Shit, this stuff's good, I should start writing it down!

The fan whirred overhead, but since it had only one blade, it was completely useless and unable to provide any respite from the boiling heat whatsoever, much like a one legged tripod is useless for anything but maybe serving as a walking stick if you were too cheap to buy a cane, which we most certainly were. The nearby window to the outside was open, though by open I mean we'd broken it in a desperate attempt to get some fresh air, one which had failed, and all it brought us was the stench of the overfilled dumpster in the alleyway several stories below, which the garbage men had yet to get around to because they were on strike. It smelled like broken dreams, but also like garbage, which it was.

…

"I'm feeling both incredibly confused as well as utterly depressed," Cream said.

"You aren't the only one," Shadow said.

"That's awful! How can anyone live like that?!" Amy demanded.

"Well, not all of us can have a nice uptown apartment paid for by our parents," Espio sneered.

"Hey! They don't pay for my apartment!" Amy protested. She hesitated. "Well… Not ALL of it..."

"Is he talking like the narrator of a hardboiled noir detective story? Is that what's going on here?" Rouge asked.

"I don't know what noir is. We don't have it in the FYOO-CHURR," Silver said.

"Film noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Many of the prototypical stories and much of the attitude of classic noir derive from the hardboiled school of crime fiction that emerged in the United Federation during the Great Depression, usually involving an incredibly cynical and heartbroken detective or cop struggling to solve a crime amidst massive corruption, getting in way over his head, and if he's lucky, gets a bittersweet ending at best," Tails explained.

"Oh," the time traveler said.

"Those don't sound like the sort of movies my mother would let me watch," Cream said.

"She'd be right not to," Shadow said. He smiled fondly. "I've always had a soft spot for them, though. I always used to watch them with–" He cut himself off with a grimace.

"Vector, why are you talking like the narrator of a hardboiled noir detective story?" Blaze asked.

"Because I'm a detective telling the story of how he got involved in a case! It's traditional!" Vector insisted.

"No, it's stupid," Espio said. Vector ignored him.

…

Dangling from the single fan blade snoring like a chainsaw cutting down a 10,000-year-old tree which had done nobody any harm and provided shelter and shade for countless animals and people over the years just because some housing development wanted to tear down the forest to make room for more cookie-cutter neighborhoods for the nouveau riche and was doomed to be converted into toothpicks and toilet paper to wipe the asses of the ignorant masses or pages in shitty porno mags like the ones propping up the television table to be read by the ignorant masses while they're wiping their asses in the bathroom was Charmy the Bee, the youngest and most innocent of my companions, his revolutions causing him to repeatedly bump into the stuffed alligator we'd swiped from Sal's after that awful debacle so we wouldn't feel like we'd left empty-handed also dangling from the ceiling and causing it to gently sway a little. I could not help but smile fondly, like a crocodile, which I was, as I looked up at him. I could not help but admire his cheerful spirit and boundless, naïve optimism. Despite all the horrible hardships life had dumped on him, despite being separated from his parents at a carnival and held captive by a madman who had a strange, almost fetishistic penchant for shoving animals into robots, despite getting a new home and immediately losing it because of some jerkface of an echidna going back on his word, despite trying to be a hero only to be spurned and turned on by the people we swore to protect, despite getting the crap kicked out of him by the most dangerous weasel alive, despite losing most of his newfound friends and having to share living space with three utter failures of adults in a horrible apartment in a crummy city far from proper civilization, despite not being able to go to school or play with kids his age or even being able to hold down a job to help out the rest of us, despite having to be exposed to all sorts of horrible things a child of his age should never have to witness, he still had hope that everything would turn out for the best, and that he would one day find his parents again. He should be our role model, instead of the other way around.

None of us had the heart to tell him that we'd actually found his parents a long time ago, but when we tried to get in touch with them about reuniting him with his family, they told us they didn't want anything to do with him and had in fact intentionally abandoned him at the carnival because his obnoxiously shrill voice got on their nerves.

…

"Wait, WHAT?!" Charmy shrieked.

Espio facepalmed. "Dammit, Vector! We promised never to tell him!"

"Whoops," Vector said sheepishly.

Amy gasped. "That's horrible! What parent could possibly do that to their child?!"

"Didn't your mother abandon you at the carnival so she could sleep with a belly dancer?" Blaze asked.

"…Well, yeah, but she came back!" Amy protested weakly.

"As horrible as it is, I can't exactly blame them," Shadow said. "His voice IS really annoying. I can't count the number of times I wanted to wring his neck when he kept shrieking about finding those data discs on Prison Island…It was almost as bad as when Vector kept harping on me to find the computer room!"

"…I wasn't THAT bad…" Vector said defensively.

"Yeah, you really were," Shadow said.

"Mom and dad…Don't love me?" Charmy whispered, horrified.

"Don't worry, Charmy…" Cream said compassionately, hugging the distraught bee. "Even if your parents don't love you, I know someone who does!"

Charmy looked at her, eyes wide with hope. "You do?"

Cream nodded, smiled, and turned Charmy around to face Vector and Espio. "Yes, them!"

"Oh," Charmy said, disappointed.

"Huh? Oh, uh, right. We, uh, totally…Err…Love you. Yes," Espeo said. "That is totally something we do, right, Vector?"

"Huh? Oh, right. Yes. That," Vector said awkwardly. Charmy glared at him. The crocodile swallowed. "Let's, ah, just continue then, shall we?"

"Can we do it without the hard-boiled detective narration?" Sonic asked.

"No," Vector said.

…

My gaze continued to tour our sordid kingdom until it came to a framed picture hanging crookedly from a nail in the wall. We tried straightening it once, but then the ceiling stirred to cave in, so we figured it was a loadbearing picture or something, and decided to leave it as it was. It showed the 9 of us, the Chaotix, in happier times, right after we'd officially become the city's heroes, got what we felt would be a complete roster, a brand-new hideout, and felt like we could take on anything that came at us. Before we'd suffered defeat after crushing defeat that broke our spirit and our team and sent many of our numbers away, into the waiting arms and bosom of pure evil, flocking to it like a lonely man flocks to a cheap whore. Several of Espio's kunai were embedded in the picture, cracking the glass, and it would've been symbolic and pretty freaking awesome if they pierced the faces or hearts of those of us who turned their backs on their team, their family, to seek their own fortune, but Espio had actually thrown them before his aim had gotten really good, so most of them were either piercing nothing or, somewhat eerily, the four of us who had stayed behind. There's probably something symbolic about that, but damned if I know– –or WANT to know– –what the heck it is.

I felt a profound sadness as I looked upon the smiling faces of the 9– –well, six, five of our faces were obscured by kunai– –Mobians in the picture, wondering yet again if things couldn't have gone any other way, or if everything, inevitably, would have led to the sad, sorry fate which had befallen us all. If we'd known then what we know now, would any of it have mattered? Would we have stuck with each other through thick and thin? Would we still be living in this awful apartment? God, I hoped not. Especially that last bit. Our apartment was terrible.

The apartment door opened, and someone entered. Unfortunately, it wasn't a busty dame with a mysterious past and dark purpose, but my companion Espio the Chameleon, who also had a mysterious past and dark purpose, but I wasn't into him at all. Even if his purple skin and yellow horn did look rather fetching in the right light…And I'd always found ninjas to be kind of sexy, like most people… And then there's that thing he could do with his tongue…

…

Espio coughed. Vector blushed and quickly changed the subject.

…

"Ugh, that was possibly the worst party yet," Espio groaned as he entered the room, slamming the door behind him and causing some of the pizza box skyscrapers to collapse on themselves. "All those children with grubby hands and runny noses TOUCHING me… Haven't their parents ever told them to wash their hands?! Not to mention that I think a good number of them were sick, and I barely avoided getting thrown up on several times…They asked me to do my invisibility trick so many times I feel like I need to shed my skin a few times, my hands are cramped from all the shurikens they insisted I throw, and the moms kept HITTING on me, and a couple of the dads did too!" He made a face. "Also, I think I might've stepped in something, and I really hope its mud, though I don't think it was."

Typical Espio. Even when the sun was shining on a cloudless day when nothing could go wrong in the world, he'd still find something to complain about, like how it was too hot or the sun was getting in his eyes or something like that. "Well, at least you got paid," I told him, having trouble keeping my eyes on both him and the television, which had just started to show another movie. "And I assume you had cake, which is always a nice bonus."

Espio growled. "It was CHEESECAKE. I HATE cheesecake. You know I'm lactose intolerant!" He shuddered. "Trust me, no amount of money is worth a lonely, lustful suburban mom pulling on your tail because she heard it was a turn-on for reptiles."

"But it is," I pointed out.

"That doesn't mean it's not sexual harassment!" he snapped. He frowned when he saw what I was doing. "You're STILL watching those stupid movies? Have you even left the couch since I left this morning?"

"Hey, they're great movies!" I said defensively. "And I can't stop now, the marathon isn't over!… I think," I said uncertainly. Considering that I was missing large gaps of time from my memory due to spending the last several hours without sleep while chugging way too much energy drink, it's possible the marathon had ended some time ago, but I didn't notice because it was the Private Eye Network, and just about every movie or show they aired could be considered film noir. Even the comedies. Heck, ESPECIALLY the comedies. "And I got off this couch! Probably. I mean, I must've gotten up at some point, to use the bathroom… Right?" I said, again, somewhat uncertain. The stain covering the ratty old cushion I was sitting on had been there before, right?

"And why is Charmy hanging from the fan?" The chameleon asked, looking upwards at the bee as he slowly revolved over our heads.

"…It's Charmy. Who can say?" I said with a shrug.

He grunted, conceding the point. "Where's Mighty? Now that I've completed another job, we need to pool our paychecks together to see if it's enough to pay for the rent this month. That hellspawn landlord of ours has been strongly insinuating that if we don't get it to him within the next week, he'll break our kneecaps and throw us onto the street. And while I'm starting to think at this point that living on the street may actually be marginally BETTER than living in this dump, I'd rather do with my knees intact."

"Oh, Mighty got a call from the agency that one of his most frequent clients wanted him, so he had to head out," I said. Poor Mighty. For a guy stuck doing a horrible, awful job that no sane self-respecting Mobian would ever get caught dead doing if he had any other option, he was awfully good at it.

"Which one?" Espio asked.

"Mr. Carruthers," I said. I mentioned he was awfully good at it, right? Good enough that his clientele weren't necessarily all of one gender?

Espio grimaced. "You mean the one that…"

"Yep," I said.

"Who has all those…"

"Yep."

"And likes to…"

"Yep."

"While wearing…"

"Yep."

We stared into space a moment before shuddering in revulsion. "That poor soul."

"Yeah."

"Still, better him than us."

And as horrible and selfish as that sentiment was, I could not help but agree with him. After all, even the most experienced of male escorts, who took the most enjoyment and pleasure in their jobs, all trembled in fear at the thought of having to service Mr. Carruthers, who –

…

"Uh, Vector?" Espio interupted. "I… Don't think they really need to know about that part."

Vector hesitated, noticing the horrified looks on everyone's face. "You… May have a point there."

"I take it back, I don't think I ever want to know what a male escort does," Cream said.

"A wise decision," Blaze said. "Well, you may change your mind when you're older, but you don't need to now."

"Oh, Mighty…" A horrified Sonic said, shaking his head in disbelief. "How could you let them DO that to you? Why didn't you just come home?"

"Because Mighty's the kind of guy who doesn't give up easy, nor is he one to ask for help if he doesn't think he needs it," Tails said sadly. "Kind of like you, Sonic."

Sonic smiled sadly. "That's something us South Island boys tend to have in common, huh?"

"How bad could this Carruthers guy be?" Rouge asked skeptically.

"Pretty bad," Espio said.

"I own a nightclub, am rather… Active, and have certain…Proclivities. I'm no stranger to unusual preferences," Rouge said, still skeptical.

Espio whispered something into her ear. She turned even paler than usual and immediately threw up. "Oh God! That is sick! SICK!" She shrieked.

Silver scoffed. "Please, in the FYOO-CHURR everyone's pansexual, and just about anything's acceptable. You need not hold anything back for the sake of my sensibilities."

Espio whispered something into his ear. Silver turned even paler than usual. "I stand corrected," he said before throwing up.

"Oh great, now I feel like throwing up too," Amy said.

"Please don't, or I might throw up!" Knuckles said anxiously.

"WILL-YOU-ALL-STOP-VOMITING-AND-GET-ON-WITH-THE-STORY-ALREADY?" A disgusted Omega asked.

Vector nodded. "Right, right. Anyway…"

…

"As horrible as Mr. Carruthers is, at least he pays well," Espeo said. "Granted, the agency gets far too much of a cut, but at least it'll be enough to get the landlord off our backs for another month or so. Maybe even clean this place up a bit, though I'm not particularly optimistic. Do you have any idea when he'll get back?"

I struggled to recall, my brain a murky haze resembling the swampland habitats of my unevolved ancestors and distant relatives, including my cousin Joe and his sister/wife Emily, on account of my lack of sleep and far too many energy drinks, as has been mentioned previously. "Um… Let's see… I believe he got called out yesterday evening…"

Espio frowned. "Last night? Why didn't you mention this before?"

"Because when you got home yesterday you spent a couple of hours ranting about how horrible little Timmy's birthday party was before storming off for bed, and didn't ask about Mighty," I said.

"Oh," Espio said, looking somewhat embarrassed. "Well, I'm asking now, so…"

I struggled to remember some more, sifting through sleepless and energy drink-addled memories like a prospector trying to pry tiny flakes of gold from dirt he found in a riverbed, desperately hoping that this is it, this was the big one, this was the one that would put him on easy street, either ignorant or willfully oblivious to the fact that all the gold worth getting had already been dug up ages ago, and all he had left were crumbs which would barely pay for the cost of the land he'd given up everything to stake a claim in, abandoning his wife and children for the dreams of a golden future in the West. Or North, depending on which time the hypothetical prospector was living in. "He called about…uh… I think it was just after dawn to say he'd finished up with Carruthers—he had to spend the night, the poor bastard-and would be home in a couple of hours."

"And you didn't mention it this morning because…? " Espio asked.

"Because you didn't ask, and because I was so enthralled by the movie I was watching I may or may not have noticed when you got up and left for work this morning," I admitted sheepishly.

Espio rolled his eyes in exasperation. "Vector, it's almost sunset. If Mighty called after dawn, doesn't that mean he should be home by now?"

I blinked in surprise. "Huh…Yeah, you're right. He SHOULD have been…"

"Vector, are you sure that's when he called? Are you absolutely certain you didn't get the times mixed up or anything like that?" Espio asked.

I thought very carefully. There was a chance he was right, given how much of a mess my head was at that moment, but… "No… No, I'm certain that's when he called, because a little before that I could hear the Hatcher family crowing, followed by just about everyone else in the building– –including you– –waking up and screaming invectives and curses and death threats at them, and you know they only do that when the sun rises."

Espio frowned in thought. "You're right, it must've been this morning… But then why isn't he home?"

I shrugged. "Maybe the agency had another job for him, and he didn't have time to come home to change and rest before it?"

"Perhaps, but if he had, surely he'd have called to let one of us know… Hold on," Espio said, pulling out his cell phone. He speed-dialed Mighty and turned away, holding the phone to his ear. Several seconds passed, and the chameleon's frown deepened, like the seafloor as you go further away from shore until it eventually bottoms out into a dark, dark abyss filled with horrible sea monsters and sunken cities and slumbering alien gods waiting for the stars to be right, so that they may awaken and destroy us all. "It's going straight to voicemail. Either his phone is off or it's out of juice."

"Try the agency," I suggested, my attention now almost completely drawn away from the television, though I was still watching the newest movie's opening out of the corner of my eye, glimpsing it just is one desperately tries to catch the past, always receding from them as they move ever forward into an uncertain future.

Espio tried the agency. It took him several minutes to navigate their infernal and overly complicated automated menu system, as labyrinthine and ever-changing as the great maze the ancient Minotaur was imprisoned in, or the line at the DMV, only with worse music to listen to while you were on hold. "Hello, this is Espio the Chameleon," he said when he finally got an actual person on the other end of the line. "I'm the roommate of Mighty the Armadillo, one of your employees? I heard he finished a job early this morning and should have been home by now. Did you happen to assign him any other work today?" His brow furrowed. "You didn't? I see. Have you had any contact with him since then? No? I see… Well, if you hear from him, please let us know. Our number should be on file. Thank you very much." He hung up and turned to me, a look of concern on his face. "They don't know where he is either."

"You think something happened to him?" I asked in alarm, worry for my friend, leader, and the highest earning member of our household cutting through the remaining fog crowding my consciousness and snapping me into full focus.

"Maybe, but I have no idea what," Espio said with a frown. "Someone still upset about what happened to Sal's Bistro? Team Hooligan returned to kill him as part of some twisted way for Bark and Bean to prove to Fang they've truly gone over to the dark side? Eggman, intending to use him as a way to strike at his childhood friend Sonic?" He grimaced. "Or worst of all, maybe Mr. Carruthers wasn't quite ready to let him go just yet?"

We both shuddered at that thought. There were fates far, far worse than death in this world, and that was one of them. "Let's hope it's one of those first options," I said.

"Yes, it would be preferable," Espio agreed. "Let's not leap to conclusions just yet. He might be late for any number of reasons. He might've had a problem with public transportation, or got held up playing Good Samaritan again, for example. He could be just fine."

"Or he could be in horrible danger!" I exclaimed.

"Or he might have ditched us," Espio said grimly.

"He would never do that!" I snapped furiously. Knuckles had left us, Bark had left us, Bean had left us, Heavy had left us, Bomb had left us, Ray had left us. Mighty would NEVER leave us. He was the glue that held us together, and not the cheap kind of glue that dissolves in water or the sort of glue you use to seal an envelope which tastes really horrible and I still don't understand why they make you lick the damn thing because there's probably all sorts of nasty toxins and poisons in it, but the expensive heavy-duty stuff. He was as dependable as the day was long, if not longer, since a day was either 12 or 24 hours long, depending on how you measured it, and Mighty would be reliable for way past that time. Even though he'd been more or less completely and utterly broken by Fang, his hopes and dreams shattered beneath the weasel's boot, and a bit of his soul dying every day he went to work, he would never leave us. We were all he had now, and he us. He couldn't leave, or he'd have to admit everything he'd done or strived for had been for nothing, which it kind of was, if you thought about it too hard.

"No, he probably wouldn't," Espio admitted. "You're right, he wouldn't do that." He thought for a few minutes. "If he isn't back by tomorrow, we'll call the police."

"It might be too late by then!" I protested. "And besides, do you REALLY think the cops will drop everything to find someone in Mighty's line of work? The fact that they all still blame him for wrecking Sal's can't help either, which is totally unfair, because it was all Fang's fault!"

Espio grimaced. "You may have a point there. But what else can we do?"

As I considered this, the television caught my eye again. The movie currently airing was an old one, one I'd seen a few times in the past. Four detectives, brothers in all but name, jointly ran an agency together, and when one of them vanished pursuing a case, his friends dropped everything to try and get him back. I couldn't remember how the story ended, but I'm sure they got him back in one piece, right? (As it turned out, that's not how it ended at all. The missing guy went bad, joined the mob, and killed the three heroes so that he could collect on their life insurance policies. He made out like a bandit and lived out the rest of his rather long life as a wealthy, happy man. Why did so many detective stories have to end so badly?) An idea hit me like a freight train, but not really, because if I'd been hit by a freight train. I would be dead, and ideas can't kill you, unless they're really stupid ones, like 'hey, I wonder what would happen if I jumped in front of a freight train?' "I've got it!" I shouted. "We'll find him ourselves!"

Espio frowned. "And how do you propose we go about doing that?"

"Well, we pretty much failed at being superheroes, so why not try being a different kind of hero? Namely, detectives?" I suggested. "We'd still be fighting in the name of justice, but we might actually get paid for it, too!"

Espio stared at me blankly. "Vector, none of us have even the slightest experience in being a detective."

"You're a ninja, I just finished watching a marathon of what felt like almost every detective movie ever made, and Charmy can fill out our ranks by being the requisite kid sidekick audiences despise, but the studios keep putting in anyway because they have absolutely no understanding whatsoever of what the public actually wants! I'd say we're overqualified!" I said enthusiastically.

Espio stared at me in wordless awe, clearly impressed by the brilliance of my idea. "Vector, you've come up with a lot of ridiculous and moronic ideas in your time, but I'm pretty sure this is the stupidest you've ever had." Or not.

"It's a great idea!" I insisted.

"Vector, watching a lot of television, being a ninja, or having a kid sidekick isn't enough to be real detectives!" My party pooper of a comrade insisted.

"Well, what will it take, then?" I asked.

"Well, you need… Oh no, you aren't going to fool me like that! If I tell you what you'll need to be a detective, you'll just use it to go and become one!" The chameleon said, seeing through my cunning plot which I had totally concocted just that minute, and had not been asking out of honest curiosity, really.

"Well, I don't care what you say, we're going to become detectives!" I said firmly, crossing my arms. "And Mighty left me in charge when he's not around, so that's that!"

"…Mighty left ME in charge!" Espio protested, clearly delusional. "After all, I'm the only one here other than him who actually brings in any money!"

"Hey, can you guys keep it down? I was trying to sleep," Charmy groaned from above us as he woke up. He blinked, noticing that the room, from his perspective, was spinning wildly around him. "Why is the room spinning?"

"We aren't spinning, you are," Espio said. "You're hanging from the fan."

"Oh," Charmy said. "How did I get up here?" We shrugged. He frowned at us. "What are you guys arguing about?"

"Well–" Espio started.

"Mighty's disappeared, and we're going to become detectives to find him!" I interjected quickly, seeing my chance.

"We are? Awesome!" Charmy said.

"What? No, we aren't!" Espio protested.

"Charmy wants to do it, and so do I! You're overruled two to one, Espio! We're going to be detectives!" I said triumphantly.

"But… That's… This isn't a democracy!" Espio screamed in indignation, clearly furious by how easily my reptilian cunning had outsmarted his own reptilian cunning, which was also reptilian and cunning, but less so than mine!

Charmy cheered and started dancing, or as well as he could, given that he was still dangling from the fan blade. "Oh boy! We're gonna be detectives, we're gonna be detectives, we're gonna be detect–whoa!"

As it turned out, trying to dance while dangling from an already rather unstable fan blade was not exactly the best idea. The blade snapped, and Charmy plummeted towards me like a yellow and black-striped winged bullet wearing goggles that could probably stand to lose some weight fired from a slow motion gun, the last thing I saw before he crashed into me his wide, terrified eyes.

There was a flash of pain, and then darkness, as I was enveloped by the cold, sweet embrace of death… Or I would've been if I were dead, but I was not, simply unconscious, which is sort of like being dead, except that you eventually wake up from it, whereas if you're dead, you can't, unless you're revived by magic or have an extra life or something, I dunno.

…

"And that's the story of how we became detectives!" Vector finished.

Everyone stared at him. "THAT-WAS-STUPID," Omega said finally.

Shadow snorted. "Well, what do you expect from those three clowns?"

"Come on, it wasn't that bad!" Vector said defensively.

"No offense, Vector, but… It kind of was," Tails said.

"Okay, now I think I really AM starting to blame myself for how they turned out," Knuckles said guiltily.

"As well you should," Sonic said angrily.

"I think I begin to understand why we don't have film noir in the FYOO-CHURR," Silver said.

"Well, at least Cream liked it, right?" Charmy asked his crush hopefully.

The rabbit fidgeted. "Well, um… I'm happy that Mr. Vector seemed happy telling it…"

"I think that means she hated it," Espio said as Charmy's face fell.

"Well, HATE is a very strong word," Cream said meekly.

"While I am not myself a detective, I'm fairly certain that there's a lot more involved in becoming one than just one day, deciding that you will be one," Blaze said.

Rouge nodded. "Yes, you need to take some tests, get a license or two, get the right education, spend money in the right places…"

"Yeah, but we didn't have enough cash for any of that stuff, so we just took an online exam, printed out the certificate, and then grabbed an office in a condemned building and used posters and word-of-mouth to advertise since we couldn't afford to put anything in the paper," Vector said.

"Just how poor are you?" Asked a disturbed Amy.

"When we pass homeless people on the street, they look down on us," Espio deadpanned.

"Oh come on, it's not that bad! They only spit at us some of the time…" Vector said weakly.

Sonic rubbed the back of his head awkwardly. "Would, uh, would you guys like some cash?"

Vector folded his arms firmly. "We don't take charity."

"Don't listen to him! We need as much money as we can get our hands on!" Espio said desperately.

"Yeah, if we don't pay off our debts soon, a shark's going to EAT me!" Charmy said.

"A shark?" asked a confused Silver.

"Long story," Vector said.

"Tails?" Sonic asked, glancing at his friend.

The fox sighed resignedly. "All right, I'll write them a check later."

"Score!" Charmy cheered as Vector scowled.

"You have enough money to pay off our debts?" Espio asked doubtfully.

"Considering all the patents I've developed and royalties I collect regularly, I think it's safe to say I'm kind of loaded," Tails said smugly.

"He certainly gets more on a regular basis than I do!" Sonic joked.

"Really? I was…Not aware of that," Rouge said, looking intrigued.

"I don't have any jewels," Tails said cautiously.

The bat pouted. "Well, that's a bit of a turnoff… But I'm sure I could work around it…" Tails gulped.

"Were you ever able to find Mighty?" Silver asked.

Vector sighed and shook his head. "Sadly, no. We looked high and low for months, years! We solved many mysteries, caught lots of criminals, beat lots of bad guys… But in all that time, we haven't seen hide nor hair of Mighty."

Everyone stared at him, glanced at something behind the crocodile, and then looked at him again. "Seriously?" Shadow said incredulously.

Vector nodded. "Yeah, it's like he vanished off the face of the Earth or something! When the Black Arms invaded, we thought we cut a lucky break and maybe they took him as a prelude to their attack, but no, they didn't have him either." He sighed wearily. "There are times I worry that will never find him…That he might be dead, or worse…But just as Mighty would never give up on us, I won't give up on him! I just know he's out there, somewhere, and someday, I'll find him!"

"I'm right here, you idiot!"

Vector sniffed. "Some days, I can swear it almost sounds like I can still hear his voice…"

"That's because it IS my voice! I'm right behind you!"

Vector started to cry. "Yes Mighty, I know you're behind me…pushing me forward, encouraging me to keep going, giving me the strength to persevere and never give up!"

"No, I mean I'm LITERALLY right behind you, you idiot!"

Vector began to openly bawl. "Thank you for always having my back, Mighty! I know I'm a terrible friend and an awful detective, and I'm sorry I keep letting you down!"

"Ugh, why do I even bother…" Mighty the Armadillo, who was indeed standing right behind the weeping Vector, grumbled.

The others stared awkwardly at each other for a moment. "…Is he blind or stupid? That's clearly Mighty right behind him!" Blaze hissed. "I am not the only one who sees this, yes?"

"No, I see it too," Knuckles said.

"We've actually known he was there for a while now, but we never said anything because Vector never brought it up, so we figured he must've known," Tails said, looking embarrassed.

"Which, in retrospect, might not have been the best idea, knowing Vector," Rouge said.

"Huh? What are you guys talking about?" Vector asked in confusion.

"Mr. Vector, Mighty's right behind you," Cream said.

Vector nodded sagely. "Yes, Cream, I know, he's behind me in spirit!"

"Well, yeah, but he's also there in person," Amy said. "If you look over your shoulder, you'll see him."

Vector glanced over his shoulder at Mighty, who waved at him frantically. Vector shook his head sadly and turned around again. "Oh, that's not Mighty, that's just a manifestation of my subconscious guilt over how I haven't found him yet, despite looking for ages and ages, a constant reminder of my failures as a detective."

Just about everyone facepalmed. "Unbelievable…" Shadow groaned.

"WHAT-AN-IDIOT," Omega said.

"Exactly how has he managed to solve any cases again?" Asked an incredulous Sonic.

"Largely with our help," Espio said.

"Vector," Tails said slowly and carefully, as if to a very stupid child. "If that's a manifestation of YOUR subconscious guilt, then how come all of us can see him?"

"Well, that's because…uh…" Vector paused for a very long time as the gears in his head slowly ground together towards the inevitable, albeit long put off, solution. "Wait…But if you all can see him, then…That means…MIGHTY!" He wrapped his arms around the armadillo in a hug and started sobbing uncontrollably. "I found you! After all these years, I've finally found you!"

"No, you haven't, you moron!" Mighty snapped, shoving Vector away from him. "I've been right behind you for ages, but you were too stupid to notice!"

"Well, why didn't you say something?!" Vector demanded.

"I DID! You just kept thinking I was a manifestation of your subconscious or something stupid like that!" Mighty shouted angrily.

"Well…uh…" Vector stammered, before whirling on his teammates. "Well, why didn't YOU chuckleheads say something?!"

"I was curious to see how long it would take you to figure it out yourself," Espio said. "And when you DIDN'T figure it out for yourself, it just felt awkward, and I was never sure when the right time to point it out would be without making you look like a bigger fool or me like a jerk."

"Plus, he didn't want to lose our bet!" Charmy chirped.

"That too," Espio admitted.

"You guys bet on how long it would take Vector to notice me instead of actually pointing it out?!" Mighty demanded. "God, you guys are assholes! I don't know why I ever thought we were friends! And speaking of which…" He glared angrily at the others. "Why didn't you jerks say something before now?!"

"We, um, didn't know that Vector didn't know you were there?" Sonic said weakly, well aware it wasn't a very good excuse.

"And we didn't want to be rude or embarrass ourselves by pointing it out and finding out that he was aware of it all long," Amy said.

"Or we just didn't care," Shadow said flatly.

"And I think there was usually some incredibly inconvenient distraction every time we were about to talk to or acknowledge you, as if the universe were conspiring to prevent it from happening until now," Tails said.

"I always assumed you were a manifestation of MY guilt or a ghost or something, trying to punish me for kicking the Chaotix off the island in the first place, so remained silent out of hopes that if I pretended you weren't there, you'd go away," Knuckles admitted. Everyone looked him. "What? Ghosts exist! It could happen!"

"I hate every last one of you and am beginning to understand why the others saw the appeal of turning evil," Mighty growled.

"Would a chili dog help?" Sonic asked hopefully, offering his old friend one of the snacks. "You used to love them just as much as any South Islander!"

The armadillo glared at the blue hedgehog in front of him, then at the chili dog, his expression faltering. "Well… While North-by-Northwestopolis has a lot of good stuff, great chili dogs were never one of them…" Hesitantly, he took the chili dog and bit into it. He chewed for a moment, a thoughtful look on his face…

Before he started bursting into tears. "Oh God, it's so good!" He wailed, greedily shoving the rest of the chili dog into his mouth and snatching more from a nearby table. "It's been so long since I've had a really good one, I'd almost forgotten what they tasted like! Oh God, it feels like home! I can't believe how much I missed this, and South Island, and EVERYTHING! Oh, Sonic, I should never have left!"

"Hey, buddy, it's okay," Sonic said, hugging his friend while everyone else fidgeted awkwardly. "You wanted to get out from under my shadow, make a name for yourself away from home. There's nothing wrong with that."

"But I screwed up, Sonic! I screwed up big time!" Mighty cried miserably. "I made a mess of my life, and the lives of those who looked to me for guidance! I'm no hero, I'm a failure!"

"Now, that is just not true!" Sonic said firmly. "Okay, you may have taken a few missteps, but that doesn't mean you're a failure! After all, if we don't make a few mistakes now and then, how can we ever learn to become better than we are now? Heck, you'd be surprised at some of the stupid things I've done over the years which I've tried my hardest to keep out of the public eye!"

"Like what?" Mighty asked.

"I once went out on a date with Amy, just to see what it would be like," Sonic said. "Biiiiiiiiiig mistake."

"Hey!" Amy exclaimed.

"Oh, wow, that really is a big mistake," said the surprised Mighty. "Whatever made you think something like that would be a good idea?"

Sonic sighed. "I felt sorry for constantly rebuffing her advances and running out on her. I shouldn't have. I really shouldn't have. I've fought all sorts of robots and monsters and cosmic and alien horrors––oh, and Eggman, I guess––but I can honestly tell you that date was one of the most horrible things I've ever experienced in my entire life."

"You poor thing," Mighty said sympathetically.

Amy's eye twitched. "Oh, come on! It wasn't that bad!"

"It kind of was," Tails said.

"You weren't even there!" Amy argued.

"Yes, I was, in disguise," Tails affirmed. "Sonic asked me to be his wingman to make sure you didn't try anything weird, and to get him out of there in case of emergency."

Amy stared at him in shock and anger. "I thought that waiter looked familiar…"

"My point is, even heroes can mess up sometimes," Sonic continued. "Sometimes we screw up big time, but that doesn't mean we should just give up when the going gets tough, now does it?"

Mighty considered this for a moment, then shook his head, a smile slowly returning to his face. It looked good, like he hadn't smiled in a very long time, which he probably hadn't. "No…No, it doesn't! You're right, Sonic! Even though my life for the last few years has been one horrible mess after another, I'm not going to let it get me down! I WILL be a hero, one just as good as you, if not even better someday! And plus, you're right, it's not all my fault this happened, if Knuckles hadn't kicked us off Angel Island in the first place, we'd never have been in a position to get trounced by Fang!"

"Yeah, this is all on you, Knuckles!" Charmy jeered.

"For the last time, you BROKE THE MASTER EMERALD TEN TIMES!" Knuckles shouted.

"But Mr. Knuckles, didn't you once mention that you accidentally broke the Master Emerald 40 times in one day?" Cream asked.

Knuckles blushed as everyone stared at him in disbelief. "Th-that was told in extreme confidence! And there were extenuating circumstances!" He cried shrilly.

"Unbelievable! You kicked us off for breaking your stupid Emerald 10 times, but you break it nearly as often in a single day?!" Espio said incredulously.

"Hypocrite!" Charmy yelled.

"It's different when I do it!" Knuckles protested lamely. Nobody bought it.

"Knuckles, considering how often that Emerald of yours gets broken or stolen, I have to say, you must be the worst Guardian of a magical artifact I've ever heard of," Shadow said.

"Hell, it might actually be safer in my care, and I'm a jewel thief!" Rouge agreed.

"Seriously, Knuckles, how the heck did YOU wind up with the responsibility of guarding that thing in the first place?" Sonic asked.

"Well, um–" Knuckles started.

"That can wait, we're still dealing with the Chaotix's history," Silver interjected, much to Knuckles' relief. "But make no mistake, Knuckles, your turn will come soon wnough, and we will know the truth!" The red echidna gulped nervously.

"So Mighty, does that mean you're going to rejoin the team and become our leader once more?" Charmy asked hopefully.

"And that we don't get to be detectives anymore?" Vector asked in disappointment.

"What? Hell no! Screw you guys, you ignored me for a couple of years now! I'm sick of putting up with your shenanigans, I'm going back home to South Island to put my life back in order and figure out my next step, and you'd better hope I NEVER see you again!" Mighty said angrily.

"You're leaving?! But you promised us you would never leave!" Charmy protested.

"That was before you ignored me, either out of petty malice or sheer stupidity, for YEARS!" Mighty snapped. "At least the others were just being polite and didn't have a clue was going on, I can forgive them for that, but you guys did it because you're either stupid or because of a dumb BET!"

The Chaotix sagged. "Yeah, that's fair," Espio said glumly.

"I guess it's what we deserve…" Charmy said unhappily.

"But Mighty, before you leave us forever… Can't you please tell us what happened to you, all those years ago?" Vector pleaded. "It's the one mystery I've never been able to solve––well, other than how to win Vanilla's heart, and how many licks it takes to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll––and even though I know you must hate me more than anything else, please, PLEASE tell me what happened!"

Mighty considered this for a moment. "I should say no," he said bitterly. "I should deny you this one last shred of satisfaction and solace, after ignoring me for so long…But I suppose I owe it to the others, to my real friends, to tell them what happened, if not you."

"Oh, thank you, Mighty! Thank you!" Vector said in relief.

"I'm not doing it for YOU," Mighty said scornfully. "I'm doing it so people I actually CARE about can know what happened. The fact that you just happen to be around to hear it too is purely incidental." Turning his back on the distraught crocodile, Mighty said, "So, here's what happened. I'd just completed a session with *shudder* Mr. Carruthers, called the agency to report it in and let Vector know I was on my way home, and just as I was crossing the street, I got hit by a GUN Military Truck."

Everyone gasped. "Seriously?! Ugh, those things are the WORST!" Sonic complained. "Especially after they got upgraded with rocket boosters, missiles, and buzzsaws… I swear, I don't know what gives me more nightmares, those things, or whales…"

"What about GUN trucks being driven by whales?" Knuckles suggested.

Sonic stared off into the distance for a long moment before finally saying, "Gee, thanks Knux, now I'll never be able to sleep again."

Blaze nodded solemnly. "Yes, truly whales are a foul plague upon both our worlds. It's why I've ordered all whales on my world to be exterminated on sight, something which Fleet Admiral Marine takes great pleasure in enforcing."

"That's horrible!" Said the aghast Cream.

"How could you do something so vile?!" Amy demanded in disgust.

"YOU-WISH-TO-ERADICATE-AN-ENTIRE-SPECIES? I-AM-SO-TURNED-ON-RIGHT-NOW," Omega said.

"Aren't you already turned on, because you aren't deactivated or in sleep mode or something?" Cream asked innocently.

"I-AM-THAT-AS-WELL," Omega conceded.

"I have literally never met a single whale that has not tried to kill me. I think it's justified," Blaze said.

Sonic nodded. "Yeah, I'm kind of with her on this. Just about every time I've gone to the beach whales have tried to kill me, and the first time I went to her world, we got attacked by a whale controlled by an evil robot pirate and I had to let it eat me three times so I could smash its heart until it died. It also froze a bunch of Vikings. I think the world would be a better place without creatures like that in them."

"To be fair, the whale was a robot too," Tails said. He frowned. "Or a ghost… Or a robot ghost? Is that possible?"

"I don't see why not," Sonic said. "After all, we've encountered robots, and we've encountered ghosts, so why not robot ghosts? Seems plausible to me."

"Don't you need a soul to leave a ghost?" Amy asked skeptically.

"ARE-YOU-SAYING-I-DON'T-HAVE-A-SOUL?" Omega asked threateningly.

Amy paled. "Ah, no. No, Omega, that's not what I was insinuating it all. I'm sure you have a soul."

"Actually, how could we tell?" Tails wondered, intrigued by the philosophical implications.

"I read somewhere that if you're smart enough to question if you have a soul, you probably have one," Rouge said.

Shadow smirked. "How poetic."

"But Orbot and Cubot don't have souls," Knuckles argued. "Eggman said so himself."

"One, do you really want to trust a guy like Eggman on the topic of souls?" Shadow said. "And two, I would hardly call Orbot and Cubot 'intelligent.'"

"Yeah, I think my plane is smarter than those two, and it doesn't even have an AI!" Tails said. "Well, not yet, anyway…"

"This is true," Knuckles conceded.

"Why does GUN use those giant trucks, anyway?" Espio wondered, bringing them back on topic. "They're massively impractical and cause a ridiculous amount of property damage while chasing down whomever or whatever they're dispatched to capture."

"GUN Commander loves trucks," Rouge said.

Shadow nodded. "When he was a little kid, he wanted to be a truck driver when he grew up. Or a truck himself. He wasn't picky. I wonder if part of the reason he's such an asshole is because he never got to fulfill his childhood dream… No, wait, he was an asshole when he was a little kid, too. Never mind."

"Why was a GUN truck there in the first place? And why did it hit you?" Sonic asked.

"You looked both ways before crossing the street, didn't you? Mother says that's always important," Cream said.

"I'll bet he saw some little kid playing in the street, utterly oblivious of the giant motorized death machine hurtling towards him, and Mighty valiantly ran out into the middle of the street and pushed the kid out of the way, taking the blow for himself!" Vector said.

"Yeah, that sounds like something he'd do!" Charmy agreed.

"Actually, it hit me on purpose," Mighty said. "This happened during the whole Space Colony ARK thing, back when everyone was convinced Sonic was going around stealing Chaos Emeralds instead of Shadow, and the truck driver thought that I was Sonic because apparently armadillos and hedgehogs are completely indistinct from each other, so tried to run me down."

Everyone facepalmed. "The horrible thing is, I can completely believe that," Tails said wearily.

"And these are the people we're trusting to protect our freedom and safety?!" Amy said in disbelief.

"I thought WE were the people we trusted to protect our freedom and safety," Knuckles said.

"I know, and we wouldn't have to if these idiots actually did their jobs right!" Amy said angrily.

"Okay, I'm getting sick and tired of GUN doing shit like this all the time," Sonic said angrily. "I know they're allegedly trying to do the right thing, but I'm starting to think their organization needs some serious retooling!"

"Or at the very least, the ability to tell Mobians apart from each other," Shadow agreed. "You and the armadillo look NOTHING like me. For example, I have much better hair."

"Don't worry, once I've accomplished everything I set out to do when I joined GUN, I promise you they won't be doing anything like this ever again," Rouge said.

"Why DID you join GUN, anyway?" Espio asked suspiciously.

The beautiful thief/spy smirked. "Well, you'll have to wait until it's my turn to find that out, now, won't you?"

"Thanks to my tough shell, I wasn't killed, but I wound up in a coma," Mighty said. "The driver freaked out when he realized that I wasn't Sonic-which should have been obvious, really, considering that I'm NOT EVEN A HEDGEHOG-and rushed me to the hospital. My phone got broken in the accident, and Mr. Carruthers must've swiped my wallet or something when I left his place, so I'd have an excuse to come back and spend more *shudder* time with him, so they had no way to ID me or call the others to let them know where I was. They labeled me a John Doe and shoved me in some back room to be forgotten, which was really to GUN's benefit, because it would mean one less lawsuit for them from someone who'd gotten attacked by their soldiers by mistake in their overzealous attempts to catch Sonic." He smiled grimly. "Oh, but trust me, once I can find a good lawyer, I'm going to squeeze every last Ring I can get from them for doing that to me."

"We'll help," Sonic promised coldly. Tails nodded in agreement.

"As will we," Rouge said, glancing at Shadow and Omega, who nodded. "Of course, we'll have to do so discreetly, since we work for GUN, which means we can't be seen openly helping you with something like this, but…Don't worry, we won't let them get away with this."

Mighty smirked. "Thanks, guys. Good to know you can be counted on more than the three I THOUGHT were my friends." The Chaotix flinched. "Anyway, despite being in a coma, I was far from inactive. While my body lay there, inert, my mind found itself summoned to the dreamscape of Maginaryworld by its ruler, Illumina, Goddess of Dreams."

"Ooh, that sounds marvelous!" Cream squealed.

"That's… Nice," Shadow said awkwardly, judiciously deciding not to comment on how it was quite possible that Mighty might have suffered brain damage from being in a coma for so long.

"Oh wow, Maginaryworld! I haven't been there in ages!" Amy gushed.

"Yeah, I'd almost forgotten about that adventure!" Tails agreed.

Shadow blinked. "Wait, you know what he's talking about?"

Sonic nodded. "Yeah, a few years ago, right after the Chaos incident in Station Square, me, Tails, Amy, Knuckles, E–102 Gamma, a random Chao, and Big all got summoned to Maginaryworld to save it from being destroyed at the hands of a sad, lonely being named Void by defeating him and his minions in a series of board games."

"…Board games," Shadow said flatly.

"Yep!" Sonic said.

"Why…Why would you play games?" Asked the bewildered black hedgehog.

Tails shrugged. "It was a dream world; you expect it to make sense?"

"…Fair point," Shadow admitted.

"So you've been there, too? They did mention it, but…hmm, well that's a good sign, then," Mighty murmured to himself.

"MY-BROTHER-GAMMA-WAS-THERE?" Omega asked in interest.

"Yeah! It was great seeing him again…" Amy said with a fond smile. She frowned. "…Though I'm not entirely sure how he got there in the first place, considering that he kind of sort of died fighting his brother Beta. Unless it was the bird who was REALLY Gamma dreaming about being a robot again? Does that make any sense?"

"It makes as much sense as anything else involving an adventure in a dream world," Tails said.

"Hey, Omega, have you ever dreamed? I think if you can dream, it might be a sign that you have a soul…or something," Vector said.

"I-AM-UNCERTAIN," Omega said. "WHEN-I-AM-DEACTIVATED, I-EXPERIENCE-NOTHING. AT-LEAST-NOTHING-I-AM-AWARE-OF. WHEN-I-AM-IN-SLEEP-MODE, THOUGH…HMM. THIS-WARRANTS-FURTHER-STUDY."

"Maginaryworld…Illumina…those names sound familiar…" Cream murmured. "I think I might have been there a few times in my dreams. Cheese, too."

"Chao, Chao!" Cheese agreed.

Blaze smirked. "A pure, sweet, innocent girl like yourself? It wouldn't surprise me if you went there every night." Cream blushed.

"Eggman was there, too," Knuckles recalled. "I don't think he did anything substantive, though."

"Like that's new," Sonic joked. "Hey, Knux, didn't you have a crush on that Lumina Flowlight girl?"

Rouge raised an eyebrow in amusement as the echidna flushed. "Oh? Should I be concerned that there's another woman, Knuckles?"

"I–it was a long time ago!" Knuckles spluttered. "And besides, it, it would never have worked out, anyway! Not only were we from two different worlds, but it turned out at the end that she and Void were actually two halves of the same person—Illumina-and fused together once we'd saved the day. It was kind of weird, actually." He shrugged. "But then again, what would you expect from a dream?"

"So, how was Maginaryworld doing?" Sonic asked.

"Not good," Mighty said. "Illumina had summoned me because there was a war between her world and another dream realm called Nightopia, instigated by the evil Wizeman the Wicked, Lord of the Nightmaren and God of Nightmares. He wanted to claim the power of the Precioustone so that he could use its energies to break through into our world and envelop the planet in an eternal nightmare."

"Wizeman?! Ugh, that dick! That sounds just like him!" Sonics swore. "What about NiGHTS? Was s/he there?"

"Who is NiGHTS?" Asked the very confused Vector.

"A hermaphrodite jester and reformed Nightmaren who fights hir former master and brethren to protect dreamers everywhere from nightmares," Sonic explained. "We've crossed paths a few times, most recently when I had a nightmare on Lost Hex and battled dream versions of the Deadly Six alongside some of Wizeman's most powerful minions, but NiGHTS was able to defeat hir sibling Reala, who'd drawn me into the nightmare in the first place, allowing me to wake up."

"…Ah," Vector said vaguely.

Shadow shook his head. "Of COURSE you've had adventures in multiple dream worlds. Only you could, Sonic. I don't know why this sort of thing surprises me anymore."

"Wait, there's more than one dream world?" Asked the confused Charmy.

"I don't see why not. After all, it's not like there's just one dreamer in the world, right?" Tails said reasonably.

"Then are there as many dream worlds as there are dreamers?" Amy wondered.

"It certainly started to feel like it after a while," Mighty commented. "Anyway, yeah, NiGHTS was there. S/he'd managed to escape from Wizeman's clutches to warn Illumina, and she asked the two of us to team up to help stop the war and save both worlds."

"Did the two of you have to fuse? I had to do that one time, it was kinda weird," Sonic said.

Mighty grimaced. "Yeah, it felt pretty unusual…On the other hand, being able to fly around and make loops around bad guys was pretty cool, if a little dizzying."

"Why did you have to fuse?" Asked a lost Rouge.

"NiGHTS is pretty strong on hir own, but is far more powerful when 'dualizing' with a dreamer," Sonic explained.

"It also allows hir to escape from cages, which… s/he gets stuck in a lot for some reason," Mighty said with a frown. "Anyway, together we battled all sorts of horrible Nightmaren, but just when it started looking as if we were making headway and might win the war, we suddenly got invaded by nightmares from ANOTHER dream world called Phantomile, led by some jackass named Ghadeon who claimed to be the true King of nightmares, and we wound up having to partner up with this strange rabbit-like thing called Klonoa who could pick up and throw things with his ears and a magic ring."

Sonic blinked. "…Okay, that's a new one on me," he confessed. "Never been there or met that guy, though something about a rabbit who can throw stuff with his ears seems vaguely familiar."

"Okay, now that does surprise me," Shadow said. The others nodded in agreement.

"And then things got REALLY crazy when the barriers between dream worlds started breaking down and all sorts of nightmares and bad guys and monsters from other dreams started attacking too, and we had to team up with the heroes of THOSE worlds," Mighty continued. "And they were pretty weird, too. There was that mute kid in green with a sword…That pink puffball that kept trying to eat everything, including me…A guy who didn't have any limbs and could fly using his hair…Two kids wielding giant keys commanding an army of friendly nightmares…Adorable but incredibly powerful creatures who could only say their names for some reason…a psychic kid with goggles…some sort of living sack doll…Yeah, it got pretty wild."

"Sounds it," said an impressed, but somewhat disturbed Tails.

"I've met a couple of those guys at the Smash Brothers tournament, but I've never heard of most of them," Sonic admitted.

"And then, of course, it turned out the whole thing was being orchestrated by an even greater evil –" Mighty started.

"Well, yeah, obviously!" Sonic said.

"Isn't it always?" Amy said, rolling her eyes.

"Been there, done that," Blaze said.

"It was all the work of some creepy-ass guy called Nyarlathotep, the Crawling Chaos, who brought all these nightmares together to create a bad dream so big and nasty it would shock an Eldritch Abomination named Cthulhu from his deathlike slumber so that he would destroy the world," Mighty continued. "And the psychic backlash from his awakening would be so great that it would also kill everyone dreaming those dream realms into existence as an added bonus."

It said something about the level of ridiculous, insane, and horrific stuff that he encountered on a regular basis that Sonic's only reaction to this was, "Huh."

"Quite ambitious," Shadow quipped

"That's not very nice of him," Cream said. "Why would he want to do that?"

"Because he's evil and insane, I guess," Mighty said. "Anyway, we managed to defeat him AND the giant super-nightmare he created from fusing all the other bad guys together, but the damage was done and Cthulhu started waking up, so we had to defeat the avatar of his dreaming self by gathering the superpowered items of all the dream worlds and combining their powers to create a lullaby strong enough to put him back to sleep until his destined time of awakening, saving the world from his wrath… For now."

"Eh, I'm not worried," Sonic said with a shrug. "If he wakes up anytime soon, we'll just put him back to sleep again."

"Do you think you can?" Knuckles asked doubtfully. "I think I've seen a few legends of Cthulhu in the ruins on Angel Island. He sounds pretty nasty, even for us."

"Knux, I've defeated a giant monster that sleeps within the center of the planet for millions of years at a time and has the power to literally shatter the world. I utterly demolished a monster capable of eating TIME itself. I think I can handle a big green thing with a squid for a face," Sonic said casually.

"Didn't you have help both those times?" Tails pointed out.

"Well, yeah, but I didn't say I'd be fighting it ALONE," Sonic said. "I mean, if something like that pops up, I figured we'd all work together to fight it, if it came to that."

Shadow smirked. "Fighting Cthulhu? Sure, why not? Fighting Devil Doom and some of the other things we've beaten probably makes for good practice…"

"And besides, Silver's time exists, which means if any giant ancient sleeping evils awaken in the near future, that means we MUST beat them, and anything else that threatens the world, or else he wouldn't even be alive," Rouge pointed out.

Silver nodded. "That's right, but don't think that means you can slack off on the job. After all, the FYOO-CHURR can be changed, otherwise I wouldn't even have to come here all the time!"

"So what happened next?" Cream asked Mighty.

"Well, with Nyarlyathotep and Cthulhu dealt with, the dream worlds started to go back to normal, and everyone had to return to their own realms," Mighty explained. "We said our goodbyes, and I woke up." He made a face. "Unfortunately, I wound up waking up in time for the whole Dark Gaia thing to occur, so it took a while for me to realize that I hadn't somehow screwed up, and that Cthulhu had not, in fact, woken up after all and destroyed the world. I was rather miffed to learn that it was some completely unrelated other sleeping ancient cosmic horror instead. Kind of made me wonder what the point of all that was if the world was nearly destroyed by another monster older than time, anyway. Like Nyarlyathotep needn't have bothered in the first place."

"Well, that's kind of the problem in our line of work. You save the world, but it doesn't STAY saved," Sonic said. "Well, at least it keep things interesting!"

"And the average citizen in a near constant state of dread that their world could be destroyed at any moment," Blaze said.

"That too," Sonic said.

"I eventually managed to find my way back to the others, where they proceeded to ignore me for the next few years," Mighty said coldly, causing his former friends to whence. "For a while I thought I might actually be DEAD or something, or that Nyarlyathotep had cursed me to make me somehow unnoticeable or unmemorable or something as one last big 'fuck you' for stopping him, given that Vector acted like he was the only person to see me, but treated me as if I were a ghost or something anyway. Not cool, guys. Not cool."

"Um… We're sorry?" Charmy said weakly.

"Too little, too late," Mighty said grimly.

"Well…Look at the bright side!" Amy said, trying to break the mood. "You got to be a hero after all!"

"Hey, yeah! You were!" Sonic realized. "You saved a bunch of dream worlds, real worlds, and lots of people in either reality! Nice job, pal!"

"Huh…Yeah, I guess I did, didn't I?" Mighty realized, face lighting up.

"If you did all that, then why were you even questioning whether or not you were good enough in the first place, just a minute ago?" Knuckles asked.

"Well, Knux, all that happened in a dream while I was in a coma. It's kind of understandable why, sometime after the fact, I might not exactly be certain that any of it ever happened at all," Mighty said. "Plus I was kind of in a bad mode due to being ignored for years. But since Sonic and some of you guys recognized the names and places I mentioned, that means that my dream adventures really happened after all. Good to know I'm not crazy."

"Yeah, that's always a good feeling," Rouge said.

"Though given the sort of thing we do regularly, I'm not sure 'sane' is something that can be applied to any of us," Shadow quipped.

"And that's my story," Mighty concluded.

"Well, thanks for telling it, buddy!" Sonic said, clapping a hand on his old friend's shoulder. "It's good to finally know where you've been all this time, and why you were standing behind Vector being more or less unnoticed by everyone. I know you must be raring to head back home to South Island to try and start things over and distance yourself from the Chaotix, but do you think you could hang out a little longer, at least until the party's over? It'd be good to catch up with you, after all this time."

Mighty smirked and smacked Sonic on the back so hard he was nearly faceplanted into the ground. "Sure thing! Anything for a REAL FRIEND."

Vector flinched. "That's gonna be hanging over us for a very long time, isn't it?"

"Yep," Espio said.

"We're terrible people," Charmy said sadly.

"Thank you for that series of stories, Team Chaotix. They were very…Illuminating, as well as traumatizing," Silver said. "And with that out of the way, I think it's time we move on the next tale. How about…You, Knuckles? After all, at one point you were a member of the Chaotix as well, and hearing your story would give us the last origin from a member of Team Sonic. It would help bring a sense of closure for both teams."

Knuckles grimaced. "I never agreed to that name, you know…I still think it should have been called Team Knuckles…"

"You are possibly the only person in the entire world who feels that way," Shadow said. Everyone nodded in agreement. Knuckles scowled.

"Okay, get it over with," the echidna grunted. He was pretty sure he knew what was coming. There wasn't much else it could possibly be.

"All right, Knuckles. This question should be easy…" Silver said. "How did you become the Guardian of the Master Emerald?"

…

And with that, another origin is done! Wow, that one took a bit longer to complete than I expected. Hope you enjoyed it, though!

Next time, we hear Knuckles' origin, told both by our favorite echidna and a surprise guest star. Before that, however, it's time to choose whose origin will go after Knuckles. Who will it be? Rouge, Cream, Big, the Babylon Rogues, Shade, or Sticks? (Or Blaze, possibly?) And again, if there are any others you would like to hear an origin from, please let me know and I will consider it.