Alright, I'm finally back! Sorry for the delay, with everything that happened, haven't been in the mood for writing in a while. 2020 has been a very eventful year, and I've been taking breaks from social media and focusing on myself and learning to enjoy my company!
I then decided to return back to this story when I re-read it in July and realised it was not the way I wanted it to go. It wasn't necessarily awful, but it wasn't how I wanted the story to go. This is mainly because my writing style had changed and looked from when I started Ivory & Ruby, it has completely changed and is now in a format that I like.
I'll like to thank everyone who has reviewed, favourite, followed or even simply read this story while I was going through the ten thousand changes. The changes were due to my lack of self-confidence as a writer and trying to find a writing style. Now that both have improved, I can confidently introduce what I believe is a proud new version of Ivory & Ruby, the first of the trilogy series that I have planned! [And when I mean planned, I mean I have planned this. I used to just write whatever came to my head and formulate it as I go on and I realised this was good for one-shots, not for longer stories!]
This mostly came from the fact that there are not a lot of Knuxouge stories on this site, particularly Knuxouge highschool stories and I wanted to change that. I could have easily made this a Sonamy story (I love them!), but I figured that there are so many of those (no hate to anyone who has written a story like that, I'm sure it is terrific!) so I wanted to make it focus on a new couple!
At first I was going to write the first twenty chapters, then I reduced it to ten, and now I'm merely giving you five. Not only because I want to keep to my date of upholding chapters on the 14th, but also wanted to stop putting so much pressure on myself! Also, I'm very proud of what I have so far!
Also wanted to use this opportunity to say please do all you can to support the BLM movement, Yemen crisis and all the other events in this crazy 2020. I will not force people to donate because I'm not aware of everyone's financial situation, but I will say do what you can. Educate yourself, Spread awareness, Donate, Hold yourself accountable. This is just different things you can do to help out in all these situations.
Hope y'all are okay and keeping safe!
WARNINGS & DISCLAIMERS
Hey y'all, just somethings I believe you'll like to know before reading this story:
- This story is a Sonic Highschool AU. I'm not following the format of the games, comics or tv shows, so the teens do not have any superpowers of any kind, Eggman is not a supervillain lousy guy—but he is annoying—and the teens aren't fighting bad guys every day. However, their superpowers would be hinting at (e.g. the Hedgehogs in the track team, Knuckles on the wrestling team)
- I use British English as I schooled within the British system, meaning that the styling of the school and the language that I use will be influence from the British system. This means that when I say the boys play 'football', I don't mean American football but rather soccer. Additionally, the school that they attend is called Greenhill College, which is what secondary schools are called. I will be making reference to the university system rather than the American college system. I will have some American influences such as the cheerleaders, importance of sports and them being in 'junior year' mainly because I was found those more refreshing to use. XD
- This story would be rated M. If you're not a fan of mature topics, please don't read this book. I will put warnings on top of chapters, but just so you know, this book will not censor mature topics including; explicit language, sexual content, use of drugs and alcohol, mature talks (sexism, homophobia). If you are not a fan of stories that involve mature content, I advise you to skip the chapters!
- There will be set couples in this story. Couples aside from Knuckles/Rouge would include; Sonic/Amy, Tails/Cosmo, Shadow/Tikal, Silver/Blaze, Manic/Sally and Mighty/Sonia. If you don't support any of these couples, do not show any hate towards them, simply read a story with your favourite pair, it's that simple.
- This story would include different perspective from different characters' point of view. Chapters will be long as I will be dealing with a lot of characters. I know that they are people who prefer one perspective stories (which is okay, everyone is entitled to their opinion!), I don't think this story would be for you.
- This story will include OCs. It took a while with this, but I figured that I did want to create some OCs. I will dedicate a chapter to the OCs (which are just parents). You don't need to ask permission to use them, but please give me credit! However, aside from some of the character's parents, the majority of characters will not belong to me. They will be used from different branches of the franchise such as games, TV shows, and comics.
- As I will be using a lot of characters, there will be some OOCness. Not to a large extent where the characters are barely recognisable but because there are characters that have not interreacted before, some personality traits will add for the sake of moving the plot forward.
- I will be making parodies of places, celebrities and locations in this story. I was very excited to make these mainly because I decided to rewatch Victorious in June and I enjoyed the parodies in them. I wanted to really highlight that they were in Mobius and they have their own version of things. This will be listed correctly in the chapter with the OCs.
- Finally, I will just highlight that majority of the characters or the locations that are used do not belong to me. All characters belong to SEGA, Archie comics or IDW publishing respectively. The only thing that I own is the plot.
So, on that note, kick back, relax and welcome to book one of the ivory and ruby series.
prologue.
Knuckles hated her at first.
They were in the 3rd grade. The ivory bat in the purple dress threw ice-cream on his favourite sneakers. The girl laughed, he was angry, the two exchanged insults and Knuckles believed from that day, the ivory bat with the bluish-green eyes would never be his friend.
They were partners for a history project in the fourth grade. Knuckles argued with the teacher and begged her for a trade, but the teacher refused, claiming that they should all be friends. Knuckles frowned, glancing at the annoying Bat that ruined his favourite sneakers. He scowled about how much he hated history. And she agreed. And while the two were stuck inside for break as they didn't do the work they were supposed to, he learnt that her eyes were teal.
They became inseparable from the fifth grade. It was odd how two years ago, Knuckles would have never pictured being friends with someone like her, and now, he couldn't imagine his life without her. She infuriated him, insulted him and made him want to kill her every minute of the day, but yet, he was still proud to call her his best friend.
He knew that they weren't typical best friends. Sure, best friends were close, but they didn't share the closeness that they did. They held hands, cuddled and slept on the same bed, mainly when one of their parents was fighting. It seemed weird to their other friends, he knew, even though they never said anything, but it didn't matter to him. Rouge and he were best friends, and that was all that mattered.
Freshmen year began weird feelings. She had changed physically, they all did, but her change was significant. He had always found her pretty, but she looked even prettier. Her smile warmed him in a different way, a more substantial way. Looking at her made his heart flutter, in a way that he had never thought could happen, but he was enjoying the feeling.
He had started dating Sonia. He liked her, there was nothing not to like about her; but her relationship with Rouge always made her worried. The two never really saw eye to eye and always ended up fighting, putting Knuckles in the middle. He always managed to make it up with Rouge, talking to her to apologise to Sonia as Rouge laughs and claims how much he's a Knucklehead. Usually, he would simply laugh and punch her lightly on the arm. This time, he simply laughed, trying to hide the blush on his face.
He didn't like Rouge. He really couldn't; he was in a relationship with Sonia and Rouge had stated that she had a crush on Shadow. He should have been happy for her, she was entering a relationship that she wanted. She was pursuing the guy she wanted, and he was with the girl that he wanted. So why had it bothered him so much whenever she was pursuing Shadow the Hedgehog?
Rouge and Knuckles were hanging out a lot more now. One, to make Shadow jealous and also because of her parents going through their marital problems. He had experience in that area, considering his parents had gone through the same thing before getting divorced just before they started college. He started seeing a different side of her, a softer, sweeter, kinder side. A side that he never imagined was a part of Rouge, but was starting to fall for it.
Things started feeling weird. Holding her hand no longer had the friendly sentiment it once had, instead, it made his heartbeat rapidly. The thought of her brought a light blush on his face, and thinking of Rouge was more consistent than thinking of Sonia. One night, Rouge had stated that her parents were fighting and that she wanted to spend the night. He remembered the thoughts in his mind when she had given him one of his shirts, how sexy she looked in his shirt. He always knew that Rouge was pretty, but seeing her without any make-up, bare and vulnerable, something that she rarely shown was one of the most beautiful things he ever saw.
She was now dating Shadow. He should have been happy; his best friend was happy, and that was all that mattered, right? But why did he get so angry at the two of them being together? He was with Sonia, he should have been happy. They were both in the relationships that they wanted, even though Knuckles wasn't too sure that he wanted to be with Sonia anymore.
Towards the end of their sophomore year, he knew his feelings. Rouge had come over the night that her parents had stated they were going through a divorce. She wanted a sense of familiarity, she stated when she laid down beside him. He tried to make things familiar but he couldn't, considering all he wanted to do was kiss her. What type of best friend was he? Wanting to kiss his best friend while he still had a girlfriend? Then he knew, in that moment, Rouge and him were no longer best friends.
He was in love with her.
It was wrong. Not only because he had a girlfriend—even though that turned sour—but she wasn't single. She was with the great Shadow the Hedgehog, a reminder that he was probably never going to get her.
It was now junior year. Only two more years until they reach university and move on with their lives. Surely he could last two years of avoiding his feelings? There was no way that he could confess to her, especially now.
But love is a roller coaster and Knuckles and Rouge are just about to begin theirs.
Cheesy ending, I know but I really like this! I'm actually so proud of this story, and I hope you all like it! See you all soon!
Queen Taurus