NOTE(S): Big thanks to Seproth and hi for pointing out some "plot holes" that were in the story. And a huge thanks to everyone who has been reviewing!

Another note is if anyone has been looking for the Disclaimer, it can be found on Chapter One!

[Also, please ignore my "Note" in Chapter Five].

So, here is the much-needed Prologue. ^_^ This story takes place AFTER Sonic Adventure 2 (:Battle).

Prologue

The ARK slowly landed on the Earth, and until it came to a complete stop, everyone boarded off.

Sonic stretched as he hopped out and looked around. "Good ol' Earth," he grinned. "It feels great to be back!"

"It sure does," Tails smiled as he stepped out and looked around Station Square.

Amy jumped out of the ARK and walked beside Sonic. "We should celebrate!" she said cheerfully.

"Yeah…" Sonic said, noticing something coming toward them, "but not right now – Reporters! Run!"

Amy grabbed Sonic's hand as they whizzed down the streets of Station Square, being chased by a mob of reporters. Tails followed in the air.

Eggman climbed out of the ARK carefully, followed by Knuckles and Rouge.

A group of reporters surrounded them all the minute they stepped out.

"So what's the deal, Rouge. Are you a hero, or a villain?"

"Is it true that Shadow the Hedgehog died?"

"Knuckles, why did you really save Rouge at Meteor Herd?"

"How did you feel when Tails beat you on the ARK, Eggman?"

"Rouge – what made you fall for Knuckles, when you could've had someone like Shadow or Sonic?"

"Where's Sonic and Amy?"

"Is it true Eggman, that you will infact be joining Weight Watchers? And why do your plans always seem to fail?"

Eggman scoffed. "Weight Watchers? Not in a million years!" he fumed. "My plans only fail because of that persistent hedgehog. I hate that hedgehog!"

"Uh…" Rouge was overwhelmed by the questions. She just blinked.

Knuckles rolled his eyes. "I definitely don't save the world for this," he growled, hinting at the reporters as he started to glide off.

"Wait!" Rouge called after him. "Where are you going? You can't leave me here!" she called angrily as she began to glide after him.

The reporters called after them. "Wait! Come back! You can't leave yet!"

Rouge and Knuckles easily escaped the reporters.

"Guys! Wait up!" Eggman called from the ground helplessly as reporters surrounded him and started bombarding him with questions.

Rouge winked at him and gave him a Captain's salute. "See ya later!"

Eggman groaned in response. "Thanks for nothing, bat girl!" he yelled. "After all I've done for you," he muttered under his breath.

"So…where are you going?" Rouge repeated, turning back to Knuckles.

"I'm going to my home on Angel Island, to watch over the Master Emerald," Knuckles said simply.

"Oh…" Rouge said simply before winking at Knuckles. "Well, it was fun being your rival – you were worthy competition," she smirked.

Knuckles chuckled. "You too, bat girl."

Rouge just smiled and then glided away.

***

Later that evening…

Knuckles sighed as he took one last gaze at the Master Emerald. "It feels so great to be home," he sighed again before adding, "and it feels great to know I can just relax…" he nodded off.

***

Also that evening…

Rouge wandered the streets of Station Square alone. One or two lonely cars slowly drove past her now and then, and crickets sounded in every direction. Twinkling stars lit up the sky and she sighed as she looked up at them.

She sat down on a curb beside the ocean and yawned as she covered her mouth. She blinked a few times as she felt her eyelids drooping. Rouge crossed her right leg over top of her left leg and stared at the stars for a while.

BEEP BEEP!

Rouge jumped at the noise. 'Who could be calling at this hour…?' she thought in slight frustration as she took out her cell phone and put it to her ear.

"Hello?"

"Hello, Rouge," a familiar, rather raspy male voice answered.

Rouge squinted her eyes slightly in confusion. "Doctor?"

"Yes Rouge, it's me," Eggman replied calmly. "Listen, bat girl. I need you to help me with a new mission…"

"Actually Doctor I-"

"You'd get triple the pay for doing something rather easy."

Rouge rolled her eyes. "And what exactly do you mean by something easy? If it's looking for gems, again I – "

"Well…that is part of the package, but I think you'd find it easy. All you'd have to do is find Knuckles and-"

Suddenly a middle-weight, middle-sized black object crashed into Rouge. Rouge was forced into the ocean.

She angrily got out of the water and ringed out the trim of her shirt and shook her head free of some of the water droplets. "How dare you! You-" she stopped in mid-sentence. She dropped her cell phone into the sand and stepped back a little in alarm.

She slowly approached the black creature.

"S-Shadow…?" she whispered incredulously.

The black object got out from the dirt, shook around briefly to get free of the sand and held its head in slight pain. It had hit the curb directly.

It weakly smiled. "Hey bat girl."

"Shadow!" Rouge repeated happily. "Shadow! You're alive! Everyone thought you died!"

Shadow looked taken back. "Me? The Ultimate Life Form? I don't die that easily," he grinned. "I used Chaos Control at the last minute, and I was transported here."

Rouge just smiled warmly.

"So uh…" Shadow pointed to her cell phone, "was I interrupting something?"

Rouge's eyes widened as she quickly remembered her conversation with Eggman. She panicked as she put her phone to her ear again, "Hello? Doctor? Hello?"

"Hello," Eggman responded. "What just happened there?"

Rouge smiled at Shadow as she continued. "I just found Shadow. He's alive!"

Eggman grinned wickedly. "Oh really? This makes things much easier…"

Rouge frowned. "What are you talking about?"

"Come to my base at once – bring Shadow too," Eggman said before briefly cackling. "Our temporary truce is officially over," he added.

Rouge grinned, knowing what he meant. "Okay. We'll be over in about 10 minutes."

***

At Eggman's Base…

Rouge and Shadow approached Eggman, who was busy typing away on the computer.

"Ahem," Shadow cleared his throat to get Eggman's attention.

Eggman spun around in his seat, to face them. He intertwined his fingers as he grinned wickedly.

"Welcome back," he greeted them and they smiled evilly as a response.

"First of all Shadow, I'd like you to go chase after Sonic, and –"

"Actually Doctor, I'm not really considered Sonic's rival anymore…" Shadow started to object.

"I don't care. Our truce is over with them. As I was saying, you will chase after Sonic and-"

"No," Shadow shook his head. "We're friends, now."

Eggman cackled briefly. "Shadow, Shadow, Shadow!" he teased. "You just don't get it, do you?"

He took out a large gun-like mechanism. Shadow backed up at the sight of it.

"Don't make me force you the hard way," Eggman said firmly, aiming the gun-like mechanism at Shadow.

Shadow frowned at him. His frown was full of hate. He did a homing attack aimed at Eggman, but narrowly missed.

Eggman frowned. "You asked for it," he said as the gun-like machine charged up. A blue aura filled the room.

BANG!

Rouge ran to Shadow's side. "Doctor! What have you done to him?" Rouge asked.

"All I did was knock some sense into him using my newest invention. It erases all feelings of love and friendship," Eggman said proudly. 'Beat that, fox boy!' he thought happily.

"Will I have to knock some sense into you too, bat girl?" he threatened.

Rouge decided she didn't want to end up like Shadow. "How may I serve you Doctor," she asked with a grin.

"I can get used to this," Eggman chortled.

"First of all, Rouge, I want you to go to Angel Island and break Knuckles' precious Master Emerald. Then I want you to wake him up from sleeping and tell him its broken. Then you'll most likely have his trust, so you can go look for the shards with him."

"Okay Doctor," Rouge nodded, "I'll be getting triple the pay thought, right?" Eggman nodded, and she glided off.

***

Rouge, dressed all in black, slowly approached the emerald. "Sorry Knuckles…but someone had to…" she muttered to herself before kicking the bottom of the Emerald. It lost its balance and shattered into what seemed like millions of pieces.

Knuckles awoke with a start. "Huh? What?" he turned back to look at the Master Emerald. He groaned. "Why does this always seem to happen!?"

He went to inspect the pieces but nothing was left. He guessed the pieces had shattered into different parts of the world.

Rouge quickly dressed out of her black camouflage and into her normal clothing. She jumped out from behind a tree. "I saw everything! Eggman came and was about to snatch the emerald but I accidentally kicked it in mid air while I was trying to get it back!"

"Uhh…" Knuckles was at a loss for words. "What were you doing here in the first place?" he asked finally.

Rouge blushed. "Uh…just gliding by…heh-heh," she lied.

"Uh huh…" Knuckles squinted at her suspiciously.

Rouge looked away. "So we better get looking for those pieces!"

"We?" Knuckles pointed at Rouge and then at himself. "No, no, no! It's my emerald. I'll go look for the pieces."

"Hey! What am I supposed to do?" Rouge complained.

Knuckles though. "Well if you really want to help me look, you can…" he paused. "Why don't we compete against each other, to make things interesting?" Knuckles grinned.

Rouge shrugged with a smirk. "Okay, but the pieces I find – I keep."

Knuckles smirked. "You're assuming you'll actually find some?"

Rouge put her hands on her hips. "Of course I'll find some!"

~

Eh, so it's not a perfect Prologue, but it's something for now. Things are slowly comin' together…