DOUBLE UPDATE! :D

I'll be honest, I was kinda stumped on how to transition from finding the latest Chaos Emerald to the next arc that shall be unnamed for now. But I want to give a shoutout to Okami1001 for the idea of this chapter. This is probably borderline plagiarism on episodes 5 and 6 of Volume 2, but it really was a great idea. It also gives me a perfect starting point for the next arc.

In a nutshell, after Okami1001 wrote that review suggesting I write what will happen, I had something called "Writer's Boom." Child at Heart Forever, you know what I'm talking about. ;D

I don't own RWBY or Sonic. Enjoy!

Beacon Academy Cafeteria, 2:00 p.m.

"Wait a minute. You're telling me you found Eggman's base while you were out?" Sonic asked incredulously.

The six that went to the Forest of Forever Fall to retrieve the Chaos Emerald had just come back, and Shadow was telling Sonic what happened. The rest of the Mobians, as well as Team RWBY, also attended. Sun and Neptune were there, too. Unfortunately, Team JNPR was still busy with schoolwork, and Pyrrha was helping Jaune with his combat skills.

"Yeah, that's right, Faker. Apparently, Monkey Boy's banana peel fell onto Eggman's base in the Forest of Forever Fall."

"See, this is why I love bananas," said Sun, who just happened to be eating another one. "Delicious and nutritious, but can also discover invisible bases."

"One must not forget its more sinister purpose in slapstick comedy," droned Omega. Everyone laughed at the robot's joke. "In all seriousness, why tell us now, and not when we were hovering over it?"

"Um, don't you get all psycho when Eggman is involved?" asked Yang. "Besides, wasn't Rouge injured?"

"Yes to both questions," the bat said from her upside down position on the ceiling.

"How the heck did you get up there without flying?" wondered Knuckles.

Rouge winked at the echidna. "Sorry, hon. That's a trade secret."

"More to the point," Neptune interjected, "we were kinda tired from fighting a Creature of Grimm that grew huge because it swallowed the Chaos Emerald we were looking for."

"Geez, you'd think that the Emeralds would know by now who or what they shouldn't give their powers to," groaned Silver.

"You're not wrong," said Tails. "The history of the Chaos Emeralds is full of people using their power for the wrong reasons. Eggman, Chaos, Mephiles… It really is a shame they don't have intelligences of their own."

A hologram emitter on the table flickered a bit, and Aeromi's avatar blinked into existence. "While I don't argue against the potential uses of the Chaos Emeralds gaining minds of their own, Eggman's base will probably be well fortified. Who knows what kind of devious schemes are going on in there."

"Changing the subject, but how are you doing on your Homing Chain, Ruby?" Shadow inquired.

"Uh, I think I did alright today," Ruby answered nervously.

Shadow looked at Sonic with a serious look in his red eyes. "Is she being honest here? We may have a difficult time ahead of us."

Sonic glanced at the energetic redhead, smiling. "She's doing great. I think she's ready for whatever may happen."

Ruby blushed at the praise.

"Hey, guys, have you seen Blake anywhere?" asked Weiss, who just now noticed the Faunus' absence.

"She's doing some research in the library," answered Aeromi.

"Again?" wondered Blaze. "She's gonna wear herself out at this rate."

Lately, Blake Belladonna had become more antisocial than usual upon hearing that Eggman was responsible for the communications disruption earlier in the week. She spent most of her time researching various places where Roman Torchwick could be hiding, and she figured that if they could find Torchwick, that would lead them straight to Eggman.

"I'm getting kinda worried here, guys," said Amy. "She doesn't have her usual energy, and she's barely eaten anything."

"I've got an idea," said Yang as she stood up. "Shadow, Omega, I could use your help with this. Aeromi, you too." The hedgehog and robot nodded, and followed the blonde out the cafeteria.

"Aye aye, Miss Xiao Long," the A.I. said, playfully saluting before blinking out of existence.

"I'll go too. I think I know what Blake's going through, and what Yang will do," said Tails.

"What do the rest of us do if your plan doesn't work?" asked Ruby with concern.

Yang winked at her sister. "Relax, Ruby. Her attitude will be changed," she said with confidence.

As the four walked towards the library, Sonic leaned close to Weiss. "Any idea what our blonde bombshell is planning?"

"No idea. I just hope it doesn't involve fighting," the heiress said, a worried expression on her face.

Beacon Library, a few minutes later

Blake Belladonna rubbed her tired eyes as she fought to stay awake. 'Should I just take a break for a little bit?' she thought to herself. She squelched that thought. 'No, evil never takes a break. There's no reason why I should, too.'

She focused her eyes again on the computer screen in front of her. The Faunus was getting closer to nailing the location of Torchwick's hideout. However, that work was interrupted as a red dot suddenly appeared on her screen.

Blake followed the dot with her eyes, feline instincts kicking in. 'Either I'm going crazy, or someone's pulling a prank on me,' she thought as the dot slid from the computer screen onto the table. She suppressed the need to bat at it, and got up to try and find the source of the laser dot. Her investigation took her in between two bookshelves, where she paused in shock as she saw the culprits: her teammate, Yang Xiao Long, who was holding a laser pointer, and Shadow the Hedgehog.

"Yang? Shadow? What are you doing here?"

Yang wasted no time in grabbing the Faunus' wrist. "We need to have a talk." The blonde turned to Shadow. The black hedgehog held up his green Chaos Emerald.

"Chaos… Control!"

The three vanished, then reappeared in an empty classroom, where Tails and Omega were waiting. Blake wrenched her wrist away. "Yang, what's this all about?" she asked angrily.

"Black-haired feline female has neglected essential duties needed to live, including but not limited to consumption of food products and nightly recharging of energy," the robot said. "Further abandonment will result in organic equivalent of self-destruction."

"What?! Who cares if I don't eat or sleep?!" snapped Blake. "An evil genius with the energy of the most powerful Creature of Grimm that ever existed is on the loose, and he's being helped by a criminal mastermind! We've got to find out where they are so we can beat them!"

"And we will," affirmed Tails. "This afternoon, Shadow discovered Eggman's base, and in a week's time, we'll make our assault on it."

"Are you serious?!" asked a horrified Blake. "We don't have time for that! We need to attack now!"

"She's a stubborn one, Yang," observed Shadow.

"Listen, Blake. You need to rest. You haven't eaten very much, and you've barely slept," said a concerned Tails.

"That's what I said, orange forest creature," Omega put in.

"Blake," Yang said softly. "I know what you're doing-"

"So don't tell me to stop!"

"Listen. I know what's going on in your head right now. You feel that you're the only one who can stop evil in this world, and you'll drive yourself so hard you'll ignore your body's needs. It's happened to me before, when I was trying to find my mother."

Any comment that Blake was going to make was silenced by this bit of news. Even Shadow and Tails started to listen closer to the story.

"See, Ruby and I are really half-sisters. Ruby's mother was named Summer Rose. She was, like, super-mom. Baker of cookies and slayer of giant monsters." Yang smiled fondly at the memory, then her expression became more solemn. "One day she went out on a mission, and she never came back. Ruby couldn't stop crying for days, but Dad was even more crushed."

"Why?" asked Shadow, even though he had a hunch about the answer.

"This wasn't the first love Dad had lost. The first one," Yang had to take a deep breath to settle her emotions, "was MY mom."

Blake looked at Yang through tired, yet attentive eyes. "What happened to her?"

"No one knows," the blonde answered. "I thought I came across a clue to her whereabouts, so I set out to find an abandoned house on the island me and Ruby grew up on- Patch, just north of Vale. I kept pushing myself to get there, carrying Ruby in a small wagon. When I finally got there, I was so exhausted- but I had made it. That's when I saw those devil eyes."

Tails gasped involuntarily at the image Yang described.

"There we were, a toddler asleep in a wagon and a stubborn girl too tired to cry for help. Our lives should have ended that day, if not for the timely arrival of our Uncle Qrow."

Blake looked at the blonde with new respect. "Yang, I can see what you're trying to tell me, but this is different-"

"Is it?" interrupted Shadow. "From my perspective, your stubbornness and disregard for those around you in pursuit of your goals will pretty much result in what happened to Yang, except there won't be anyone to save you."

"How would you know?!" Blake snapped, though it wasn't with as much venom as before.

"I was once like you, Blake. I thought, 'If I could reach my goal, everything will be alright.' Except that single-mindedness almost caused the destruction of Mobius itself. I wanted to get back my memories, but it was only thanks to Sonic and the others that I was able to remember my promise to Maria, and let everyone have a chance to be happy, and not just me."

"The point is, you need to think about others before you wear yourself out," finished Yang. "We're not asking you to stop, just slow down. If nothing else, do it for the people who care about you."

Blake was silent for a bit. She then sat down on an empty seat, head in her hands. "Shadow?"

"Yes, Blake?"

"Could you use Chaos Control to take me to the dorm room?" she asked, smiling for the first time in a while. "I think I might fall asleep on the way if I walked there by myself."

The Black Blur returned the smile and took out his Chaos Emerald. "Good to see you making a smart choice. I was afraid I would have to get Omega to threaten you to make sure you get your rest."

The thought of Blake trying to sleep at gunpoint made everyone laugh, especially the Faunus.

"But… what do I do about my research?"

Aeromi winked into view. "Miss Belladonna, I took the liberty to save your research and findings and sent them to Tails. You know, you could have asked for help from the rest of us."

The Mobian fox nodded. "Hey Blake. When you feel better, you should come join us on Sunday. We're planning to have a small party at seven. All casual, and everyone from the school's invited. There's even gonna be a small dance."

Blake looked confused. "Why does that matter?"

Tails gave her a sly look. "Well, if you went, you would make a certain Faunus from Vacuo very happy."

"I'll… think about it," said Blake, not wanting to commit just yet. "Right now, I just feel like sleeping."

"That's fine," said Yang, smiling. "We'll send you something to eat when you wake up."

"Chaos… Control!"

Shadow warped Blake to Team RWBY's dorm room, startling Zwei a little before realizing the person was one of her mistress' friends. Blake sighed, feeling like a great weight had been taken off her shoulders. She crawled into her bed, thanking whatever deity that gave her such good friends, and drifted quickly into a deep slumber. Zwei jumped onto her bed soon after, and fell asleep with her.

Meanwhile, back the classroom, Yang was feeling pretty pleased with herself. "Well, that went better than I thought it would," she said aloud.

"Thank goodness for that," agreed Shadow.

And with that, the group separated, all preparing for the party in their own way. All hoped that Blake would show up, but they weren't worried about it. They knew she would appear.

The hard part would be to make sure there was enough tuna for her.

To be honest, I was thinking about having Aeromi acting as Torchwick to prove the point that Blake was too tired to fight, but I decided against it. Maybe I'll add that scene in a rewrite or something like that.

Anyways, I hope you enjoyed the chapter, and don't forget to favorite and follow if you like it!