Finally! Chapter 10 is here! Sorry I haven't been updating much, I've been getting myself a deviantART account and uploading some Sonic fanart XD Yes, I do need a life. Anyway, if you wanna find out a bit more about Magenta and what she looks like, follow this link: #/d59a92q

It had been an hour since Blaze was admitted to the hospital. Cream had concluded that it wasn't serious enough for her to get immediate medical attention, but she was in quite a lot of pain.

"It's not even in syllabic patterns!" Blaze protested as she knelt at the side of a delivery bed. "I don't even think they're contractions – it's just lots of pain!"

Silver knelt behind her, holding both of her hands and telling her repeatedly to breathe through it. Eventually, Blaze lost her temper and snapped at him to get her a drink of water. Silver obeyed, leaving Cream alone with the cat who was swaying with the pain.

"Cream," she gasped. "It hurts..."

"I know, sweetie," said Cream, coming to her side and holding her hand. She then noticed that Blaze's eyes were filled with tears.

"What if something's wrong with the baby?" she cried as the tears spilled down her face.

"I think they would know by now if anything was wrong," said Cream, her eyes beginning to fill also. Cream was known for her sensitivity.

"But it hurts so much!" Blaze wept. "How can nothing be wrong?"

Just then, they heard a scuffle outside.

"Silver!" came one voice.

"Guys, what are you doing here?"

"Where's Sonic?" demanded what sounded like Knuckles.

"I don't know."

"Where's Cream?" came another voice that sounded like Tails.

"She's in there with Blaze – why?"

But instantly, the doors were open and Tails stumbled in. "Cream!"

"Tails? Why are you here?" said Cream, on her feet instantly.

The fox wobbled on his feet, but kept an unwavering stare at the nervous rabbit in front of him.

"I need to talk to you," he said, ambling towards her. "I need you to give me some answers."

There was something dangerous about his voice that made Cream stumble backwards.

"Tails, what's going on?" she asked timidly.

"Why don't you tell me?" Tails demanded.

"Way to show 'em, Tails," declared Knuckles in the doorway.

"Tails, what is this?" Blaze enquired importantly.

"She should tell me!" Tails shouted, pointing at Cream. "What's going on?"

"What do you mean?"

"You should know, you're the one who's going behind my back!"

"What?" Cream spluttered, moving around Tails so that he wouldn't corner her. "What on earth are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about you and your little backstabbing game, my love," said Tails, his eyes beginning to run. "About you and someone who up until now I considered my best friend – going behind my back and...and..."

"What?"

"You KNOW what!" Tails yelled, stamping his foot. His tails flicked angrily. Cream backed away, beginning to cry.

"No, Tails, I don't!" she wept angrily.

"Well, I do. And I don't know why you're..." he was broken off by a sob. "I don't know why you would do this!"

"Do what?" Cream demanded through hot tears.

Tails brought his hands to his face, crying into them. "You...I thought you were Cream...Cream, the innocent, naive, kind, helpful girl, who always stood by me...now you're..."

"What?" asked Cream, dreading the answer.

"You're just a..."

"What?"

Tails drew in a deep, haggard breath.

"You...are a cheat! You're an unfaithful cheat!"

Cream stood frozen in the middle of the room, shocked into silence.

"What?" demanded Blaze. "Tails, how dare you!"

"What are you talking about?" said a shocked Silver from the doorway.

"She has no way of redeeming herself," proclaimed Knuckles. "We caught her on tape."

"What?" said Blaze.

"Just now," said Knuckles. "She was in the car, doing the bad deed...with him."

"Who?" said Blaze.

"You don't mean...?" said Silver.

Knuckles didn't say a word.

"It's not true," Cream uttered defiantly, tears pouring down her face.

"Really? Should we play the tape, see what you make of it?" said Tails.

"Tails! It's not...true," the rabbit repeated, shaking.

"You know what? I would so believe that if I didn't already know you're lying through your little bunny teeth!"

Suddenly, he was bombarded by flying objects – a vase of daisies, a clipboard and an alarm clock – that Cream had grabbed from the side board and hurled at him with all her might. Then she turned and bolted out of the room, sobbing.

"Cream!" called Blaze. It was no use. "Silver, go after her!"

Silver obeyed. There was a silence in the room. Blaze cringed against the pain in her stomach.

"Someone help me up!" she snapped.

Knuckles raced to her and helped her to her feet.

"Thank you," she said. "Now. Can someone please tell me – calmly, and one at a time – what is going on here?"

"She cheated," Tails cried. "She cheated on me with...with Sonic! My best friend! My best friend and my girlfriend!"

Knuckles came to his aid. Tails hid his face against his shoulder and sobbed, a muffled cry of "Oh, the humanity!" coming from him. Blaze, however, perched herself on the bed, grinding her teeth.

"You're drunk," she said bluntly. "The both of you have been drinking."

"Now, I'm not that drunk," Knuckles said defensively.

"You!" Blaze said sharply at Knuckles. "I want you to tell me how you reached such a heinous conclusion!"

"You wanna know?" growled Knuckles. The scorching fire in Blaze's eyes pressed him to tell faster than he had intended. "Well, okay. So there I was, outside the bar, Sonic and Cream had just gone off together to come here. They're both pretty touchy about letting other people come with them."

"Oh, really?" said Blaze sarcastically. "The rest have been drinking too much to drive and probably aren't even sober enough to be given proper admission into the maternity ward and they advise them to stay – oh, the injustice!"

Knuckles bit his tongue just then – and he was more stung by Blaze's words. Unfortunately, he reasoned with himself, she had a point.

"S-So..." he stammered. "After they're gone, I talk to Sally outside the bar. She tells me that she's just seen Sonic and Cream go off together – like together, together – and normally, I'm not the one to trust someone like her, so I called Sonic up just to make sure and sure enough, they're together in the car, having sex!"

"They're what?" said Blaze.

"They're having sex!" said Knuckles frantically. "You know? Having sex? Banging? Screwing? Scoring a home run? Dunkin' the doughnut? Giving the dog a bone?"

"I know what having sex is, Knuckles," Blaze hissed, silencing him immediately. "But how do you know this?"

Knuckles stuttered for a moment, then took out his phone. Then Sonic himself came through the door, a worried look on his face.

"Guys, what's goin' on? I just saw Silver goin' after Cream – she seemed real upset."

"There he is!" barked Knuckles. "There's the dirty hog!"

Knuckles shoved the phone into Tails' hand, stormed up to Sonic and grabbed him by the scruff of the neck. Sonic cursed loudly at him and began a scuffle.

"Don't touch me, buddy!" he ordered.

"Don't you buddy me, you backstabbing son of a bitch!"

"Guys, what is this?" said Blaze, fiddling around with Knuckles' phone.

"It's proof of Cream and Sonic's crime!" cried Tails.

"I don't know who you think you are, gentlemen, but this is a hospital!" screeched another voice. Maude, a bright green parrot appeared in the room and held separate Knuckles and Sonic.

"What's going on?"

"I'm driving."

"Really? Then why'd you answer your phone?"

*Sonic! Give it to me!*

"I'm a bad hedgehog..."

*Give it to me!*

...

"Knuckles, I gotta go."

"Do you want me to catch up with you?"

*Faster, Sonic—*

"No! No, no—"

*Faster!*

"No, no don't catch up to us! We're, uh, we're okay...Uh-oh! I'm goin' in—"

"Sonic?"

...

*Fuck! Sonic!—ream—ow up and screw me hard—faster—baby—right here! Here? Yes! Oh!*

...

Silence flooded the room. Tails stood, breathing shallowly.

"Da fuq...?" said Sonic slowly. "What the hell is this?"

"Sonic, admit right now just what you are! You can't back down now and you owe it to Tails!" Knuckles said in a guttural growl.

"What...?" said Sonic, looking at Tails who stared back hard with wet eyes. "What the hell are you talkin' about?"

"I thought you were my best friend," said Tails. "I thought you were the good guy."

"I am your best friend, Tails!" Sonic protested.

"My best friend wouldn't try to take my Cream from me!" Tails yelled.

"What?" Sonic cried.

"Don't you try and deny it!" Knuckles bellowed. "You heard the tape! Being true to your nature and going behind the backs of all you love! Admit it right now – you and Cream were having sex in the car, weren't you?"

"I—"

"WEREN'T YOU?"

There was a small silence. Then Sonic spoke, every word weighted with grim self-justification.

"You total penis," he said. "We went through a tunnel while I was talking to you."

A beat.

"What?" said Knuckles, eyes wide.

"We wenT," said Sonic, over-emphasising certain letters. "Through a tunnel while I was oN the phoNe to You. That's why it sounded like what you wanted it to sound like."

"What I wanted it to...?" Knuckles argued, but Tails cut in.

"So that's why it sounded like sex noises?"

"Yes!" Sonic said evocatively.

Tails grabbed his own head. The room had started spinning and he began to feel very sick.

"How much have you had to drink, bud?" Sonic asked.

"Too much," mumbled the defeated fox.

"You can let go now, thanks," Sonic told the Maude, who reluctantly followed his order.

"But Sally said—"

"Sally?" Sonic spouted at Knuckles. "Since when is Sally an accurate source of info?"

Knuckles recoiled, coming to a revolting conclusion: he had done it again.

There was a long, uncomfortable pause in the room, finally finished by Blaze groaning. Maude came to her immediately.

"Gentlemen," said Blaze. "Leave."

"Now wait a minute—," said Knuckles.

"LEAVE!" the cat screamed as Maude knelt before her.

Finally getting the picture, the three heroes left the room at light speed.

Out in the corridor, Tails sank into a nearby chair, clutching his head. Knuckles did the same, dizzy with the horrid revelation that he and his two tailed companion had just come to. Finally, Sonic spoke.

"How could you do that?" he said at last, looking despairingly at Knuckles.

"Me?" Knuckles retorted.

"Both of you!" Sonic shot back.

Another disconcerting silence followed. Tails was looking extremely nauseous.

"Guys, I need to throw up," he said.
_

In the men's room, the sound of Tails vomiting in one of the stalls was almost drowned out by the hedgehog and the echidna rowing like nothing you'd ever heard before. A couple of confused and scared men outside opted to use the disabled toilet.

"I woulda thought you'd learned by now, Knucklehead!" Sonic bellowed.

"Don't push your luck, Sonic, I still have the urge to beat the crap outta you!"

"Ooh, momma!" Sonic said sarcastically. "The first time Eggman takes advantage of your gullible little brain – fine, I get it. The second time – that was just stupid. Third time – even stupider but granted, the guy was pretty manipulative. Sally fucking Acorn – that's a whole new level of lowness, dude!"

"Just shut up!" Knuckles roared. "I'll admit it, I made a mistake. There! I said it! You happy now?"

"A mistake, huh?" Sonic snapped. "What did you think Sally was trying to do – get us to put her on our Christmas wish list?"

"Last chance, hedgehog!"

"Knuckles, somewhere in this godforsaken hospital, there is a young woman crying her heart out because some guys just didn't have the brains to think logically and put things into perspective! This is Cream we're talking about – did you ever stop to consider that?"

"Of course I did!" Knuckles argued. "But there was someone like you to consider too in the same equation!"

"And just what...is that...supposed to mean?" Sonic demanded, planting himself in the floor and looking solidly into Knuckles' eyes. "Think very carefully about what you say next, pal."

Knuckles paused to grind his teeth. Tails coughed into the bowl.

"I think you know what it means," Knuckles said at last.

"Okay, Knuckles, just get the fuck out before I lose my rag," Sonic said in a clipped voice. "This is a nice place and I don't wanna have to ruin the linoleum."

Knuckles barged out of the men's room and stomped down the hall. Sonic turned to a sink, gripped it and sighed, forcing out all of his rage in his breath. Tails suddenly garbled and heaved up a huge surge of vomit into the toilet. Sonic went to his friend's side. He was having a rough night tonight.

"You okay?" he asked.

It took Tails a while to get all the toxins out of his system, but eventually, he spluttered and finished and sat there with his head half-inside the porcelain dish.

"I hope you know, Tails," said Sonic slowly. "That I would never, ever even think about doing something like that. You're my buddy and Cream's your girl. I have my own. Sure, I've screwed up in the past but..." He ran his hands over his quills. "I'm not that guy anymore. I've grown up. You of all people should have noticed. I'm not a player, I'm not a show off – well, mostly not anymore anyway. Girls don't mean as much to me anymore because, well, I've got one and she's perfect. She's absolutely perfect. And no disrespect to Cream or anything, but why would I have any interest in her? My last interest would be to hurt you, Tails. You're my best friend. Always have been."

Tails kept very quiet and very still. Sonic liked to think that somewhere in that china bowl, he was smiling in forgiveness. But then a beat turned into a pause and a pause turned into a silence.

"Okay, Tails, can you flush it down now cos the stench of puke is killing me," said Sonic.

No response. Tails had fallen asleep.
_

Silver led a tear-stained Cream back to the delivery room.

"I'm sorry," she sniffed. "I just—I just c-couldn't..."

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Cream," Silver soothed. "It was a heavy, unpredictable moment. A total misunderstanding, I'm guessing."

"How could he do that? How could he say such things?" she quivered.

"I don't know, sweet," said Silver. "Like I said, I'm sure it's just a big misunderstanding. And he'll have a lot to say sorry for in the morning."

They arrived in the delivery room. Surprisingly, Blaze was up on her feet, collecting her things and putting them back into the hospital bag.

"Huh?" both Silver and Cream chorused.

"Blaze?" said Cream.

"Honey, what's going on?" asked Silver.

"Nothing," said Blaze. "That's precisely the thing."

"What is?"

"It wasn't labour," said Blaze.

"Oh," said Silver. "Well, that's...that's a relief, I guess. Uh, wha-what was it, then?"

"Gas," said Maude, coming out of the adjacent bathroom. "No labour, no dilation, no sign of disturbance, just good old intestinal gas."

A beat.

"Oh," said Silver. He then heard, very momentarily, the sound of Blaze growling in embarrassment. He stifled a laugh.

"I said I was okay!" Blaze said loudly. "Now let's go home. Now."