The rest of Sonic's sleep was fitful. The nightmares began with Martin coming after him and pinning him to the wall over and over with his blades, blood spilling across his vision as it splashed onto their faces. Martin's snarling grin widened as he dug his knife straight into Sonic's side, and the pain echoed in the real wounds in his sides.

Then it changed to Sonia and Manic reaching out to him as he strained, stretching out his arm, unable to close the distance between them before they fell into the yawning darkness in the chasm beyond. He dove after them, and everything went dark as he fell. It was almost as if the dark were choking him, and it was as if were he to take a breath in he would drown in it. He screamed their names, but no sound came back, his own desperation swallowed by the thick ink around him.

Then, suddenly, he wasn't falling anymore. He was back on the ship, and Amy's sobs echoed around him. He searched every nook and cranny on the ship, his search growing steadily more frantic as her sobs grew louder in her anguish. Tears poured down his own cheeks as fear gripped him, but he desperately continued his search. Beneath her crying, a familiar 'I'm sorry' whispered in his ears over and over, reaching a crescendo as he continued his fruitless search. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm–"

He woke with a start around early dawn, his heart pounding like a Mazuri drum in his chest. He took a deep, steadying breath, then quietly climbed down the mast, not wanting to draw attention to himself as Bean and Bark passed by. Fortunately Jet and his friends weren't around, the only other sailors he could see being Tangle and Whisper, who were huddling close together by the prow. They hardly noticed him.

Sonic approached the rail, looking out over the horizon, but it didn't help him to calm down. Not with the salt water crashing against the hull and spraying in his face and stinging his eyes. Not with the miles of said water surrounding the ship with no land in sight. Sonic wanted to get back to solid ground. He felt antsier than ever, anxious to just get off this stupid boat and find Sonia and Manic. But he also wanted to find Amy and make sure she was okay. He knew that was irrational, but he couldn't quite get himself to calm down and think.

He was so absorbed in the fever pitch rising in his head that he didn't even notice Shadow coming up behind him until he tapped him on the shoulder, startling him. Sonic whipped around and stumbled backward, almost falling over the rail before Shadow caught him by the arm. "Sorry," said the captain. "I didn't mean to frighten you."

"S'fine," said Sonic, pulling his arm out of Shadow's grasp. "What do you want?"

"To explain myself," Shadow replied. He had left his tricorn hat behind, once again revealing the red stripe on the top of one of his quills. "And to tell you we'll be going back to shore immediately. Between you and Silver and Martin's sudden appearance yesterday, I'm fairly certain you're not lying to me about your friends being in danger. And… I need to see what he's doing for myself."

"Finally!" Sonic said with a grin. "I can get off this bobbing hunk of wood!" He tried to muster as much of a chipper tone as he could, still trying to banish the lingering vestiges of the nightmares, but the news did help a little bit.

Shadow glared at him a little, but then his face softened. "I realize that I might have reacted inappropriately yesterday when Martin said Rose had snuck you on board…"

"Might have?" Sonic said, tapping his foot in irritation as he leveled the captain with a glare. Shaken or not, he was still miffed about the whole thing.

"Fine, I did!" Shadow growled, then took a breath. "Sorry. Finding out that a man I put a great deal of trust in lied to me and manipulated me and had a hand in killing my best friend… I'm not ruling out all possibilities of betrayal. If I couldn't trust Kintobor, who showed me nothing but kindness to my face, then who's to say I can trust her."

The way Shadow said these words, as if they caused him physical pain, softened something in Sonic's chest. "I get it," Sonic said. "Betrayal hurts, and it's hard to tell who you can trust. But… I don't think that means you can take it out on Amy like that."

Shadow's ears drooped in shame. "I know," he said quietly. "And I don't want to do that to her. But what's to say she didn't? What if she's not the person I thought she was and she's been lying to me about everything for the past two years?" He paused, then shook his head with a grimace. "Why am I even telling you this?"

Sonic hesitated for a moment, then tentatively put a hand out on Shadow's shoulder, ignoring the sudden butterflies in his stomach, and Shadow narrowed his eyes at him quizzically. "Look," Sonic said. "I don't know you guys all that well. But I know that Amy would never purposefully hurt someone she loves. And she adores you. Everyone can see it." He tried to ignore the hollow feeling in his chest as the words left his mouth.

Shadow looked away for a moment, then he put his hand over Sonic's, his touch warm and firm and yet… scared, Sonic realized, as he felt his hand shaking on top of his. "Every rational voice in my mind agrees with you," Shadow said. "But it seems I'm not very rational at the moment." He squeezed Sonic's hand, sending a new swarm of butterflies into flight in Sonic's stomach, then carefully removed it from his shoulder, setting it down on the rail and letting go. "I don't know what to do or what to think," Shadow said. "But I know that the only way I'm going to get any real answers is by going back to the island."

Sonic nodded. "In the meantime, we can try and figure out who hid me in the hold," he said. "I ended up talking to Whisper last night, and she said she'd keep an eye out. I don't think she did it or she would have been the one to toss me overboard, not Jet."

"Nor Tangle," Shadow agreed. "She didn't even wait for me to tell her before she dove in after you. And I would say Jet is a strong possibility except for the fact that he sent Storm to come and get me when he found you."

"Okay, so his initial plan wasn't to kill me," Sonic laughed. "But that kinda leaves Miles, because no one else even pays any attention to me."

Shadow frowned. "Given Martin visiting him yesterday, I won't deny that it's within the realm of possibility," he said. "But I still doubt a twelve-year-old would have been able to drag an adult into the hold without assistance, especially him."

"Yeah," Sonic agreed, and then they lapsed into silence, both of them turning it over in their minds. What Shadow had said was true, but Sonic's mind kept coming back to Miles as the strongest possibility. If it had been him, how had he gotten him on board without anyone noticing? And anyway, Martin had said it had been Amy specifically, but they already knew it wasn't her.

It still wasn't making any sense.

"I'll check with Whisper this afternoon," Shadow finally said after a few minutes. "See if she knows anything we don't."

Sonic nodded, and as Shadow turned to walk away, he had to stop himself from reaching out. All the anger he'd felt at the beginning of the conversation was gone, and now he didn't want the captain to leave. His heart squeezed in panic, but he tried his best to school his features, to look indifferent. But he at least had to ask…

"Is Amy alright?"

Shadow looked back at him, giving Sonic a quizzical look. "She's perfectly fine," he replied. "Why wouldn't she be?"

Sonic felt his cheeks warm, but relief filled his chest at the answer.. "No reason," he replied with a chuckle. "Just… had a nightmare is all."

Shadow's expression softened. "I see," he said. "Well, she is just fine. Still maybe a little angry with me, but fine." He turned to leave, then seemed to hesitate before turning his head to look back at Sonic. "Is there anything else?" he asked.

"No," Sonic said, but they could both hear the lie in it. But how was he supposed to say 'I don't want you to leave' without sounding strange and desperate for no good reason? Without betraying the thoughts swimming around in circles in his mind?

Shadow waited for him to speak the truth, but after a moment, understanding seemed to dawn in his eyes. "We'll talk more later," he promised, then turned and parted without a backwards glance, his steps purposeful as he walked down below deck, leaving Sonic cringing inwardly at his stupid emotions.

Why did he feel this way about Shadow? Why him and not a man with fewer emotional issues? A man who he could maybe joke with?

Why a man at all?

Why couldn't it just have been Amy? Why did it have to be both of them?

Sonic groaned, burying his blushing face in his hands. Get me off this stupid ship…


Later that day, Shadow called for the whole crew to gather at the mast, and Sonic situated himself next to Amy, who looked a little tired, but less so than yesterday morning. He was glad to see her though. Even despite Shadow's assurance, it was only now that he had seen her face to face that the knot loosened in his chest. She turned to him and gave him a little smile, and Sonic smiled back, hoping he didn't look too much like a lovesick puppy.

"Listen up!" barked Shadow, and everyone stood up straight, Sonic turning his attention to the captain. Shadow eyed everyone carefully. "There has been a change of plan," Shadow said. "We're going back to South Island."

Several groans emanated from the crowd, the loudest of them coming from Jet. "Did Stowaway over here convince you to play hero?" he jeered. "He's scum, just like all the rest of 'em. Why are we listening to a glorified pin cushion?"

Jet faced Shadow's glare head on, and they stared at each other for several moments, Shadow's piercing crimson eyes never wavering. Sonic could practically feel Amy's fuming glare directed at Jet. The hawk did realize that the captain was a 'glorified pin cushion,' right? And the first mate? And the mage that could totally throw him off the ship if he wanted to?

Did he even hear what was coming out of his beak?

Finally, Jet looked away, and Sonic silently pumped his fist, earning a milder glare of his own from Shadow before the captain continued. "I want to know the truth of King Kintobor's actions," he said coldly. "Nothing more, nothing less."

Jet scoffed. "And you think we're just going to go along with that?" he challenged.

"I don't see that you have much of a choice in the matter," Shadow replied. "Last I checked, we're far at sea and I am your captain."

Sonic bit back a laugh at Jet's incredulous expression, but Jet recovered quickly, schooling his features, though his stormy blue eyes raged. Before he could say anything else, Miles stepped forward and spoke up. "That sounds kinda risky to me," he said. "What if you get caught yourselves?"

"What reason would we have to worry about that?" Amy asked. "We've been working for Kintobor."

"Yeah, but…" He pointed at Sonic. "In his eyes, Sonic's supposed to be dead, if anything Martin was saying yesterday was true, and if he's really working for King Kintobor, like Sonic's saying."

Shadow narrowed his eyes at Miles, who curled into his tails for a moment under his scrutiny. "How do you know what Sonic said?" he asked. "I don't remember you being privy to that particular conversation."

"Oh, I had to extrapolate," Miles replied. "I heard you yelling about how Kintobor lied to you–I think the whole crew did–and with how to dragged Sonic back into your quarters after your blast, I figured it had to be something Sonic had said. And a few years ago, right before we left shore for the first time, I remember Martin finding me to tell me that the royal family was dead. I didn't know he was even telling the truth until the announcement that they'd all been assassinated the following morning. And I know the only thing that makes you angry like that is anything having to do with Princess Maria's death, so I finally had enough information to figure out who'd employed Martin to do it in the first place. So if what Sonic is saying is true, which seems pretty likely to me, Kintobor really did hire Martin and Infinite to assassinate the royal family. Ergo, he probably told Martin to kill Sonic too, though I don't know why."

Shadow slowly nodded in agreement, though he still looked at the fox with suspicion, then turned his gaze to Sonic. "Any reason he'd be after you?" he asked.

Sonic shrugged. "No idea," he said. "I mean, I've helped with supply raids and stuff for the rebellion, but I can't think of any reason he'd go after me in particular." Then he smirked. "Unless he's jealous of my roguish good looks," he joked.

Shadow, to Sonic's amusement, blushed just a little bit as Amy giggled, then cleared his throat and raised an eyebrow. "Really? That's… strange," he said. But he turned back to Miles. "You've got a point," he admitted. "But we'll cross that bridge if we get to it. I'm hoping we can do this relatively quietly."

Miles still looked unsure, but he didn't say anything else, stepping back again. Sonic saw his tails flicking back and forth, his ghost blue eyes lost in thought as he put a hand to his chin. What's going on in that kid's brain? Sonic wondered, squinting at the fox.

"You're all dismissed," said Shadow. "Get back to work. Except you, Whisper. I need to speak with you."

Whisper nodded, her mask bobbing as she followed Shadow to the captain's quarters. Amy looked over at Sonic with a mischievous smile. "How much you wanna bet Jet's gonna get dunked overboard?" she asked.

Sonic laughed. "I don't have money, but I'd be willing to help you do it," he said, earning a giggle from Amy. "Shadow might be a willing accomplice too."

"I'll see if I can convince him," Amy joked. Then the mischief faded into a more genuine smile, and she punched Sonic playfully in the arm. "Also, you're welcome for finally convincing Shadow to go back to shore," she said. "You can go find your brother and sister the minute we set foot on land."

Sonic smiled.

Hang on, guys. I'm coming.