Chapter Six

Coping

The team looked at each other and began to wonder, "Food" said Big "where do we get it?" said Charmy, "there sure are no shops around here!" Sonic had a thought, then his eyes lit up as he thought of a plan, "there could be some stuff on the plane!" "and there could be stuff around the island" said Rouge "I can go and look"

"Big!" said Tails, "you're good at fishing!" you can go and find some fish for us?" Big looked at the fishing rod he was always carrying and nodded "fishing!" he said "sounds fun huh Froggy?" he said looking at Froggy who hopped in excitement. "So if Big goes and looks for fish, Rouge, you go and explore and see if there's any wild fruit of anything that we can eat, the rest of us will go and search the plane to see if there's any food in the plane"

"Sure thing Tails" said Vector and Knuckles together, Rouge then was about to turn away to fly up into the sky to look for food, but before she could fly away, she was stopped by Shadow who had grabbed her arm. "What is it Shadow?" she asked, a little irritated.

"I'm not letting you go out there by yourself Rouge" said Shadow "I'm coming with you" Rouge looked a little bit surprised, but then she smiled, knowing that someone cared about her. "Ok Shadow" she said, "Hold onto my feet" she hovered in midair and Shadow grabbed hold of her ankles.

She then lifted into the air and Shadow kept a hold of her feet tightly, they flew high above the trees Rouge began to scan the area looking around to see if she could find trees that bore fruit. They flew over the area for a while until Shadow spotted a tree not far away.

"Rouge!" he called out "over there!" he let go of one of her ankles so he could point, Rouge saw and then began to fly towards the area, she gently set Shadow down and then looked up at a small tree that held some red and pink fruits. "Well spotted Shadow!" she said happily "it's a pomegranate tree!"

She looked at its juicy ripe fruit, "we can pick some of these!" she said excitedly, she then wondered "what are we going to put them in?" Shadow saw her ponder and took off his black tee-shirt; he then began to tie the sleeves and neckline to make a bag. Rouge saw him do that.

"Here" said Shadow handing him the shirt "it'll help!" "Shad" said Rouge "you're a genius!" she then began to pick some of the fruit off the low branches, Shadow helped, as he pulled down some high branches. As he did Rouge couldn't help but stare at his naked chest.

She looked at the muscles on his body and the way they pulsed as he pulled the branches down for her so she could pick more fruit. She then shook her head and began to place more tasty fruit into the tee-shirt. When it was full, Rouge nodded at Shadow and they decided to head back to the settlement.

When they arrived, the team was gathered around a pile of food that they had found from the wreaked plane. Big had caught a lot of fish, Vector, Espio and Charmy had found some vegetables. Sonic and Knuckles had found some packaged foods like crisps and chocolate, there sure were a lot of boxes.

When Rouge and Shadow arrived Tails looked at the tee-shirt full of pomegranates and was delighted, "I believe we now have enough food to last us a while!" he beamed "until we're rescued!" "if we ever get rescued!" said Knuckles sadly. Just then Amy and Cream came into the clearing carrying some bags.

"Look everybody!" said Amy "Cream and I found some more blankets and shawls for warmth!" "Well done Amy!" cried Tails happily "I guess we'll be ok for a while!" Amy smiled and blushed. Tails then looked at Blaze, the sun was going down and it was starting to get colder.

"Blaze" he asked "can you get a fire going?" "with pleasure!" said Blaze, she gathered up some sticks and leaves then she snapped her fingers and made a fire. "I suppose we'll be cooking over an open fire!" said Tails. "Man!" said Knuckles in a sarcastic tone "I love the great outdoors!"

Sonic glared at the echidna and sat down on a large log by the fire, Amy sat next to him along with Cream. Rouge, as she was wearing her trademark pink and black outfit, which made her arms bare, began to shiver so she went to sit closer to the fire and put her hands close to the flames.

Tails then picked up some of the fish that Big had caught, he then picked up a large frying pan that they had found in the wreaked plane and put some of the fish in it. As he cooked them, it began to get darker and the wind began to blow. Cream began to get a little scared; Cheese began to make scared Chao sounds.

"What do you think might be here at night?" she whispered, "oh don't worry Cream" said Sonic "we're all here to protect you!" "yeah!" said Tails "no worries Cream!" Rouge rubbed her arms more, then Shadow moved closer to her to put an arm around her to keep her warm and he did.

After a while, Tails began passing around fried fish to the team, he put the fish on some plastic plates found in the wreckage and handed them around. Sonic took a bit out of his fish and smiled "hmmm" he said "a chilli dog it ain't! But it's one good dish!" Tails blushed happily "thank you Sonic!" he said.

The others all agreed, "I don't know what we'd do without you Tails!" said Amy, "you astound me!" "You sure do Tails!" said Espio with a mouthful of fish. Shadow took a bite out of his fish but then spluttered, "You ok Shad?" asked Espio. Shadow coughed then looked up with his eyes watering.

"I nearly swallowed a bone" he said in a strange voice, Rouge smiled at him, "it's nice though yeah?" she asked "yeah" said Shadow taking another bite out of his fish. Sonic then looked up at the huts, "So where do we sleep?" he asked as he stared at the large huts.

"Who sleeps where?" asked Tails "yeah" said Sonic, Tails looked at everyone before making up his mind, "ok, we'll have to be split" he scratched his head, "ok, Vector, Espio, Charmy, Big and Froggy will take the first hut" he then looked at the girls "Blaze, Rouge, Amy and Cream, you will take the middle hut, and the rest of us…" he looked at Knuckles, Sonic, Shadow and Silver, "we'll take the last one"

"Ok" everyone said "seems fair" said Blaze, Shadow sighed, he looked at Rouge again and wished he was sleeping in the same hut as her, he had hoped that Rouge would turn to him for protection like she had done before when they were on missions whilst here if she got afraid at night.