Kj: Thanks :) The adventure game...it'll probably start in the next chapter and get going in the one after that :P

Awdures: Thanks, glad you're enjoying it :D Mighty meeting Knuckles...hmm, maybe I'll try and write that :P

Pyrokinesis: Heh, yep, I play Sonic. I actually managed to beat Chemical Plant Zone 2 (twice; big thing for me!) Actually, Tails got stuck in Robotnik's machine and kept pummeling him until he exploded...all I did was sit there ;) I'm starting to think my cousins are my lucky charms; I've gotten further than ever before with them :P Maybe if we play Sonic 3 together I'll get to see a little more of Knux ;)

Poridet: Heh...usually I'd agree with you about the drinking, but in case you hadn't noticed, Emerald Hill Zone doesn't tend to pay much attention to such things ;) Thanks for the kind words though; it makes writing worthwhile :D Sequel...there is a sequel in the works but it's the story of Sonic 3 (and a prequel – Sonic 1) Sonic raising Tails...well, that's covered in most stories featuring both of them :P

Master hunter: (blushes) Wow, thanks :D Glad you're enjoying it!

TrueVulcanRaven: (grins) Thanks; I'll try :P

Taryn Wander'r: (happy smile) Thanks...and the next chapter is below as requested :P

FriedBrickWall: Hee hee :P That's the problem when you read future stories; it kinda takes the suspense out of ones like this (grins) And thanks, glad you're enjoying it :D

SaffraEchidna: Heh, no worries :P Mighty fan? Ooh boy, is it that obvious:P I did like him in the comics though...

Sonic-Addict: (blushes) Thanks :)

Shaddress: Mighty...well, the answer to that depends on who you ask :P For the sake of this fic, he's an armadillo and was Sonic's best friend growing up. As for the rest, hey, I never give away the story ahead of time ;) You'll have to keep reading to find out

Dr. Cat: Heh...when it comes to the language I go for realism more than anything ;) Anyway, thanks; glad you're enjoying it :D

Kirby-Chan263: Thanks :D

Lewisty: Thanks; glad you enjoyed it :P

Toboe16: (happy smile) Thanks. I liked Sonic's drunkenness as well; I had a lot of fun writing out the full version of that song :P

Asher Tye: (blushes) Thanks :D I kind of started this as a not-quite random sideline, so I'm glad people are enjoying it so much :D

It took a good three days before Tails stopped throwing up everything Sonic gave him, and at least as many weeks before he was back to normal. Inwardly cursing Mighty – who had left Westside Island not long after seeing Sonic again – Sonic did the best he could for the fox, keeping him warm and (despite Tails' protests) practically forcing water down his throat. That got a little easier once the vomiting and diarrhea had run its course, but Tails was still inclined to avoid food wherever possible. The salmonella had taken a lot of weight off him, and you didn't have to be a genius to realise that the kid hadn't had much to spare to begin with. If Tails had been skinny when Sonic had met him, now he was positively emaciated.

For what seemed like the thousandth time that day, Sonic offered Tails some supper.

"Here."

The fox shook his head. "Uh uh."

Sonic withdrew the chicken sandwich and sighed. "Tails, you gotta eat something. In the past three weeks you've been living off water and lettuce with the odd pella fruit, and that's not enough. You're growing, kiddo, and your body needs food. You've thrown off the bug and now you need to start eating again."

Tails eyed the sandwich as though it were pure poison. "Nuh uh. It's okay. I'm not hungry," he said, and his stomach promptly made him a liar by rumbling loudly.

"It's not gonna make you sick again, if that's what you're scared of."

"I'm not scared! I jus'..." Tails bit his lip. "I heard your buddy talking an' he mentioned chicken an' how it would do what the ice cream did. I don't wanna go through that again, Sonic, not never. Can't I have what you're having?"

"I'm having chicken sandwich, kiddo."

"I'll..." Tails hesitated. "I'll eat the bread," he bargained. "That won't hurt me, right?"

"Yeah. Yeah, that's right. Okay. You eat the bread and I'll eat the chicken, how about that?"

Tails took the bread with a hand that quivered slightly. "It won't make me sick, right Sonic? Promise it won't make me sick like the ice cream did?"

"I promise. Where'd you get that ice cream, anyway?"

"It was jus' sitting around."

"You stole it?"

"Nuh uh! It's not stealing to take stuff out the trashcan! If people wanted it, they wouldn'ta chucked it away, right? I'm not a thief."

"You got it out the trashcan?" Sonic had hoped that part had been a bad dream.

"Uh huh. See, I knew Ursam's mum would be up for a midnight snack 'cause she can't sleep no more 'cause of having got insanity."

"Insomnia, Tails, although based on what I've seen so far I shouldn't wonder if it was insanity."

"Yeah, an' when she's up she does housework an' that includes chucking stuff away. Sonic...it's not stealing to take stuff that's been thrown away, is it? 'Specially when that stuff's been there for a whole morning. It's not stealing then, right Sonic? 'Cause if it is I'm not gonna get anything to eat this winter 'cause all the fruit finishes then an' the fishes are asleep an' so I gotta eat from the trash an'...an' why're you looking at me with your mouth open like that?"

Sonic, who hadn't realised he was, closed it with a snap. "I just...you eat out the trash? No wonder you get food poisoning."

Tails looked puzzled. "Well, where else'm I s'posed to get food from?"

"I don't know...isn't there a soup kitchen anywhere in this Zone? Or couldn't you have gone to one of the other Zones?"

"Nah. They're all building sites an' factories. This an' Aquatic Ruin're the only nice Zones. An' Hill Top."

Sonic shook his head. "If this is what you call nice, Tails, I'd hate to see what you call nasty." He took a bite of chicken and chewed, relishing the taste. He had to admit, Emerald Hill Zone did great food; the chicken was nice and juicy, with just a hint of spice.

Tails sniffed the lightly toasted bread warily, then nibbled off a corner.

"Sonic?"

"Yeah?"

"How'd your plane crash?"

The hedgehog snorted. "Like I know. I'm not much good with machinery. All I know is the engine cut out and I had to make a crash landing. You must've seen me."

Tails shook his head. "Uh uh. All I saw that night was a yellow light racing across the sky. I thought it was a falling star an' so I wished on it like I did the other but I didn't think anything happened. Then I got whumped into a pricklebush." Tails looked up at Sonic with shining eyes. "Stars take their time to grant your wish but when they do they sure work fast, huh?"

Sonic blinked. "You wished to be run over by a blue hedgehog travelling at three hundred miles per hour?"

Tails shook his head, fixing Sonic with a solemn look. "No, I just wished to have someone who'd lemme play with them."

Sonic hesitated. "Tails...I can't stay here forever. You understand that, right?"

"Oh sure. I mean, I never wished to have someone who'd lemme play with 'em forever. I thought it'd be easier for the star if I wasn't too picky, you know? An' we played this morning an' even after you've gone to save the world again I can tell all the other kids that I can't be all that bad 'cause at least someone wanted to be my friend, even if only for a morning. An' not jus' any someone, but the coolest someone on Mobius! That star really did a good job, huh?"

"Yeah, it did," Sonic said, smiling at the fox, a smile which hid the hedgehog's true feelings. Something about the sheer...what? Innocence, he supposed, although that wasn't quite the right word; something about the sheer innocence and childish faith about wishing on a star, and wishing for something that most kids took for granted every day of their lives...that disturbed Sonic deeply, although he couldn't say why.

A sudden sensation of warmth jerked his attention down to where Tails had scrambled over to snuggle trustingly against his ribs, winding both arms around his waist.

"I used to get real worried on cloudy nights," Tails said confidentially, "'cause I couldn't see it to wish. You know you gotta see 'em, else it doesn't work. I used to worry that it'd think I'd forgotten it, but I guess it understood after all, right?"

"Yeah, I guess it did. If it's powerful enough to grant wishes, it's gotta be able to understand little things like that." Sonic paused. "So where exactly do you live when you're not squatting with me?"

"I got a cave in the mountains." Tails' ears drooped. "But I gotta get to it through an underwater passage an' the water's all frozen, so now I'm staying in my secret place."

"Your secret place?" Sonic echoed, smiling slightly.

"Uh huh. It's real cool, Sonic. Nobody else knows where it is an' it's jus' me." Tails looked away. "I think my dad might've liked it though. He liked 'sploring."

"What happened to your family?" Sonic asked very quietly.

Tails frowned at the sky. "Dunno. Don't 'member; it happened a couple years ago. Don't hardly 'member them either. It mighta been diff'rent when they were alive, but I don't 'member if it was. They died an' I had to leave home for closure."

"What's closure got to do with you leaving home?"

Tails gave the hedgehog a withering look. "Not closure, for closure. Some people come to the house an' said I had to leave 'cause of for closure."

Light dawned on Sonic. "Oh, foreclosure."

"That's what I said."

"They just kicked you out? Wasn't there anyone else who could take you in?"

"Nuh uh. The on'y kids' parents with spare places wouldn't have anything to do with me."

Sonic frowned. "Why not?"

"Well..." Tails' own frown deepened perplexedly and he scratched his head. "I think it was 'cause they'd all met me," he said, perfectly seriously. "Y'know, they didn't want a freak in their fam'ly."

And the kids would take the cue from their parents, Sonic thought grimly. Aloud he said, "You're not a freak, Tails."

"I am. There's on'y one kid on Mobius like me an' that makes me a freak."

"There's only one person on Mobius like me, but I'm not a freak."

Tails shot him a withering look. "Course you're not. Heroes aren't s'posed to be freaks. But if you'd grown up here an' been blue an' not saved the worl' you'da been a freak. Why are you blue?"

"It happened when I broke through the sound barrier." Sonic shrugged. "I dunno why exactly. Whatever it was fused my quills as well."

Tails got to his feet and padded around to inspect the quills in question, then touched one and withdrew his hand with a yelp.

"Yeah," Sonic said with a certain amount of resignation, "they're sharp. How else do you think I sliced through those bots?"

The fox returned to Sonic's front, sucking his injured finger, then sat down next to the hedgehog.

"Sonic? Tell me about what it was like. Tell me how you smashed Robotnik's bots, how you whumped 'em into pieces an' how you whumped ol' Robotnik?"

Sonic blanched. He'd been trying as hard as he could to forget all that; it was bad enough having the nightmares of those battles without reliving it during the day as well.

"There's not much to tell. I don't like talking about it."

"Well, I don't like eating chicken sandwiches anymore," Tails pointed out in tones of utmost reason, "but I'm still doing it, aren't I?"

Sonic glanced at him, an appreciative glint in those eyes. "Tell you what. You eat the sandwich – all the sandwich, not just the bread – and I'll tell you a little. Deal?"

Tails hesitated. "But that guy said the chicken would—"

"It'll only make you sick if you eat it when it's mouldy or if you get it out the trashcan. Okay?"

The fox looked at the chicken part of the sandwich Sonic was offering with suspicious eyes, then reluctantly took it, put it back into the bread and bit into it with an expression that suggested he was sawing through a limb.

"You'll tell me, right?" he said somewhat indistinctly; his first bite had filled his mouth to bursting point.

"Not if you don't finish that sandwich first," Sonic said flatly. "And by finish, I mean for you to actually swallow between bites."

Tails, who had been about to take another bite, swallowed gamely, choked and regurgitated, then threw the sandwich away as though it had burned him and spat the mouthful onto the sand.

"You said it wouldn't make me sick!" he accused Sonic.

"The sandwich won't," Sonic said, wondering how the hell he was supposed to get over this one, "but if you stuff your face like that, of course you're not gonna be able to swallow it. Go on, eat smaller bites and you'll be okay."

Tails shook his head stubbornly. "Uh uh. 'Sides, it's all sandy now, look."

Sonic closed his eyes and counted to ten. It didn't seem to help.

"Tails..."

The fox flattened his ears. "I'm sorry. But it's not you who's gonna get sick."

"And it's not you either." When Tails continued to glower at him mutinously, Sonic sighed. "Fine. Have it your way for tonight. I'm too damn tired to argue with you, kid. All I can say is that I busted my ass for almost a month trying to stop you from dying of food poisoning, and your committing suicide through starvation doesn't seem like a good way to say thanks." Turning, he leapt for the Tornado's cockpit, settling himself in the seat and pulling a blanket over himself. "I'll see you in the morning, Tails."

Left alone on the beach, Tails bit his lip furiously in an effort to staunch the tears. Tears were for babies. Sonic never cried, did he?

You're not likely to find out, since you made him mad at you, a nasty little voice inside him whispered. The tears came then and Tails abruptly whirled and bolted for the safety of his secret place.

The next morning, Tails opened his eyes and looked around, a sensation of happiness followed by utter misery flooding through him. Sonic had been friends with him and he'd made the hedgehog mad. His first real friend and he'd never play with him again.

Tails sniffed once, then abruptly scrambled out of his secret place and flew towards the beach, landing a hundred yards away and stretching. Looked like it was back to the Pounce Attack Game.

The sight of a familiar blue figure among the normal sunbathers caused Tails to stop and stare.

Sonic. Could he...dare he risk another pounce attack on the hedgehog? It had made Sonic be friends with him before, so maybe it'd work again?

Quietly, not liking to think about the consequences if he was wrong, Tails snuck up and pounced, landing squarely on Sonic's stomach. The hedgehog didn't move, didn't react. Puzzled – he'd never done a pounce attack that was met with total indifference before – Tails padded on all fours up Sonic's prone body to peer into his face. The eyes were still closed and, in spite of the weight that had just crashed onto it, the hedgehog's chest rose and fell evenly.

Sighing, Tails slumped on top of Sonic. Looked like his new friend didn't want to play after all. He must really be mad at Tails to ignore him like that. Well...lying napping was kinda nice too...and at least Sonic hadn't yelled at him or thrown things at him or chased him away like most pounce attackees...Tails closed his eyes.

Someone flicked his ear lightly and Tails yipped in surprise, then opened his eyes to stare at Sonic's right hand, which was lying passively by its owner's side. Crouching down, squinting at his target, he prepared to pounce again when someone flicked his other ear. Startled, Tails spun around, tried to pounce on both the hedgehog's hands at once, overbalanced and fell sideways to land squarely in the crook of Sonic's suddenly outstretched arm, which caught hold of him firmly while the other hand arced over to tickle the fox until Tails was shrieking and breathless with laughter.

Rolling over to fix him with a mock-stern look, Sonic said, "So what's all this about? You don't want me to nap in peace anymore, is that it?"

Impulsively, Tails flung both arms around the hedgehog and hugged him tightly.

"Hey." Startled, and secretly more than a little touched, Sonic returned the gesture. "What was that for?"

Suddenly shy again, half frightened by his own audacity, Tails buried his face in Sonic's chest and didn't answer.

"Nothin'," he mumbled at last. "Jus' wanted to, 'sall." Abruptly he lifted his head to fix Sonic with a solemn, big-eyed look. "Sonic, you're not gonna leave, right? 'Cause you been here ages an' you're still here."

Sonic took a long, deep breath. "Tails, I can't stay. This place is...well, it's beautiful, but it's not my home."

"It could be! You could move in an' live with me in the cave an' I'd even let you have my secret place if you want!"

"Tails, I wouldn't expect you to give that up—"

"I wouldn't be giving it up, honest. Well, I kinda would, but I'll do it if you stay. Sonic, I don't ever wanna be alone again. Promise you'll stay with me. Please?"

The fox's pleading tones struck a deep chord in Sonic, but he still shook his head.

"No. I won't make you that promise, Tails, because I can't keep it."

"Well...promise you'll stay on Westside Island then. C'mon Sonic, there's loadsa cool Zones you can live in, you can even move around if you don't wanna tie yourself down to one an' I could still come see you an'...an'...even if you're not gonna stay, can't you at least tell me you are so's I can pretend?"

"How is that fair? I tell you I'm going to stay, send you onto cloud nine and then turn around and say, 'Sorry, I lied'. I'll stay with you all the time I stay in this Zone, that I do promise, but I'm not gonna give you false hope; one day before the year's out, I'm going to leave."

"It's not fair," Tails mumbled.

"The world isn't fair, Tails. You'll learn that one day."

"I already have. It's not fair 'cause people don't wanna play with me 'cause I'm a freak an' it's not fair that you're gonna leave me alone again even though I know you probably gotta do important stuff an' I know that everybody's gonna blame me for you leaving 'cause either you got sick of hanging out with a freak or you thought everyone here was like me or you got bored 'cause you were always hanging out with me and not doing fun stuff an'...an'...an' I on'y wanted somebody to play with me..." Tails' voice rose almost to a wail on this last part and he started to cry.

"Oh, hey." Somewhat taken aback by the reaction he'd unwittingly provoked, Sonic hugged the fox tightly. Tails attempted to wriggle free, but the hedgehog refused to let go and in the end Tails gave up and collapsed against him. "Tails, c'mon, it's gonna be okay."

"Sonic, don't go. You can stay, honest you can." Tails was now clinging determinedly to the hedgehog.

"No. I can't. You said you understood that."

Tails' small body quivered. "I do...kinda. But I didn't know I was gonna miss you this much."

"Miss me? I haven't left yet, kiddo."

"But you're gonna...an' then I'll be all alone again." Tails sniffed loudly. "Wish you'd gone earlier, then it...it..."

"It wouldn't be so painful?" Sonic said quietly.

A nod. "Uh huh. But then you wouldn't be able to see my secret place or my cave." The fox fixed him with a hopeful look. "It's really cool in autumn, mister. All the trees an' stuff ref...reflexive in the water."

"Reflected."

"Yeah, that. It's real cool, I don't want you to miss it." Tails took a long, quivering breath. "Sonic, if you leave me I'm gonna die. That's what that guy said an'...an' I don't wanna die. I wanna stay with you an' live."

Sonic closed his eyes. Damn Mighty! First the chicken incident and now this! Had the armadillo known Tails was listening? Probably not; although he wasn't above using guilt and shock tactics as weapons, he wouldn't say or do anything if he thought it might hurt a kid.

Mighty's right though. I can't leave him, not like this. He'll most likely be dead before that autumn comes round.

"Sonic?" Tails said suddenly.

"Yeah?"

"Will you do something for me?"

"Depends what it is."

The fox sniffled, wriggling around to shove his head hard under Sonic's jaw. "That spindash thing you do, it's real powerful, right?"

Sonic hesitated. "Yeah, but Tails, if you're gonna ask me to go sort out the jerks who keep picking on you—"

"Uh uh. They'd never wanna be friends with me then."

The hedgehog took a long, deep breath. "Tails...kiddo, some people just...they don't want to be friends no matter what you say or do."

"They will after you do this!"

"I'm not going to hurt them." Remembering the reaction he tended to get, Sonic added, "Or bribe them either."

"N-no, it's...Sonic, it's..." Tails gulped and went on a little shakily. "Sonic...if we pegged it out so's you had something to aim for, c'n you spindash me an' cut off one of my tails?"

"Can I what!" Shock caused Sonic to drop his hands, only realising his mistake when Tails seized them and dragged them around his shoulders again.

"C'n you cut off one of my tails? You can do that, right?"

"No! I mean, yeah, I can, but I'm not gonna." Sonic shook his head. "Jeez, kiddo, what put such a crazy idea into your head?"

"It's not crazy! The kids all hate me an' call me a freak 'cause I got two tails. So if I on'y had one, they'd see I was jus' like them an' lemme play with them an' we could be friends an' I could show 'em my cave an' my secret place an' stuff. An' don't you dare laugh at my idea either!"

"I'm not laughing," Sonic said soberly. He didn't think he'd ever heard anything less funny in all his life; in fact, he was fighting a strange and inexplicable urge to cry. The idea that Tails was so desperate for friends and playmates that he'd resort to something like that...

"You're gonna do it, right? 'Cause I don't wanna have to do it myself...I might mess up."

"Tails, the—" Sonic began, then stopped. He'd been about to say the risk of infection, but bit down on that hard; talking about little, specific parts of a problem was the first step on the road to acceptance. "I don't hurt my friends," he said instead.

"You hurt me plenty when you said you were gonna leave."

The hedgehog closed his eyes. "I deserved that, I guess. But I am not going to maim and put you through who knows how much pain and blood loss for something that's not gonna work. I'd..." he stopped again. What he wanted to say was that he'd only do something like that if Tails' tail was so badly injured or crushed it couldn't be mended, like underneath a rock or something, but he swallowed that on the ghastly basis that the little fox might actually take him at his word.

"Sonic, please...jus' a li'l pain an' it'll all be over, an' I'll have friends. Please? I won't hate you or get mad at you or tell people you did it if that's why you don't wanna—"

"I don't wanna do it because it's wrong. I know you think having only one tail would solve things, but it wouldn't. Instead of being known as the freak with two tails you'd be known as the freak who went around maiming himself—do you know what maiming is?"

A shake of the head.

"Hurting, but very badly."

Tails swallowed. "Sonic...please let's not drag it out any longer, 'kay? 'Cause I know it's gonna hurt real bad, at least twice as bad as the time I cut my foot on that bit of glass, so I wanna get it done before I change my mind."

"It's not gonna be done, Tails."

The fox looked up at Sonic, hurt. "I thought you didn't like me being picked on."

"I don't, kiddo, not at all, but this isn't the way to stop it."

"Yes it is! I asked Caud's gang what they wanted me to do an' they said if I cut off one of my tails they'd lemme play with them!"

Sonic shook his head. "They were lying, kiddo. They were playing a very nasty joke on you."

He regretted his honesty a second later as Tails' face crumpled.

"You mean...they're not gonna play with me? Even if I do what they want they're still gonna jus' laugh an' call me a freak?"

Sonic met the little fox's huge blue eyes with his own quiet ones, wishing he'd kept his mouth shut.

"No, Tails. They're not going to play with you. Not now, not ever."

"An' you're not neither, not when you 'bandon me."

The fox's choice of words shocked Sonic to the core. "Tails, I'm not gonna abandon you!"

Tails looked up at him. "Then what are you gonna do with me?"

I wish I knew, Sonic thought wretchedly. Deep down he knew that the fox was right, that there was no other word for what he was going to do.

But that didn't make it any easier.

"Sonic, promise me one thing, 'kay?" Tails said.

"Depends what it is."

The fox gulped. "When you...when you do go, c'n you take me for a ride in your plane first?"

Sonic glanced down at him and ruffled the fur on Tails' head. "Sure."

"I'll keep wishing, though," Tails said, with all the fervour of a true believer. "I'll ask the star for a way to stop us being sep'rated."

"Or ask it to send you another friend," Sonic suggested. "One that doesn't have to keep on the move."

"You don't have to, Sonic, you on'y want to." Tails half turned, snuggling his head up under Sonic's chin. "'Sides, I don't wanna 'nother friend. I want you. Can't you at least stay long enough to see my cave an' my secret place?" Before the hedgehog had a chance to answer, Tails suddenly leapt to his feet. "Oh boy, I forgot!"

"Huh?"

"Wait here, Sonic! You gotta wait; I gotta go get something to show you!" Tails turned and raced for the forest. Somewhat taken aback – as well as curious – Sonic lay back against the hot sand.

It was about fifteen minutes later when Tails returned and skidded to a stop.

"Uh. Sonic?"

The hedgehog spat out a mouthful of sand; Tails' skid had been a little too enthusiastic and Sonic had been sprayed in sand.

"Yeah?"

Tails squirmed, shifting awkwardly from one foot to the other. "I, uh, I got something for you."

"For me?" Sonic blinked. "What?"

"Well...I didn't want you to forget me when you left so I, uh, I did this for you..." Tracing patterns on the ground with his toe, Tails held out a folded piece of paper, studying his feet with a singularly bashful expression.

"What's this?" Sonic took it carefully and opened it, looking at the contents. It was a crayon drawing of him holding hands with Tails on a green hill with the sun shining in the background. Art wasn't the fox's strong point, and the kindest thing that could be said about the picture was that at least Tails had got the colours right. Written across the top in straggling letters that had probably taken as long as the drawing to complete, if not longer, were the words my frend sonnick.

"If you don't like it you c'n throw it away," Tails said, possibly mistaking the hedgehog's stunned silence for distaste.

Sonic looked down at the fox. "No. It's great." He swallowed past an obstruction that had suddenly formed in his throat. "Really, kiddo, it's great. Thanks."

Tails looked up at him, then away despondently. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean it to make you sad. I jus' thought, mebbe it'd be easier for you to 'member me if you had a...well..." He shook his head. "Doesn't matter. I'll take it back. I on'y thought that mebbe..."

"Tails, I..." Sonic looked down at the drawing again, then at the little fox. "I don't know what to say." Placing the drawing carefully to one side, he caught hold of Tails and hugged him hard.

"Sonic!" Tails protested; the hedgehog's hug really was uncomfortably tight. "You'll squirt my brains out my ears!"

"Sorry li'l buddy." Sonic eased the hold a little and Tails wriggled closer.

"'S not a good picture. I jus' noticed you on'y got two spines on your side. But I couldn't ask you to sit there an' let me draw you 'cause that would've spoiled the surprise."

"True." Sonic reached down with one hand to ruffle the fox's fur. "You're one great kid, you know that?" He looked over at the drawing again and felt a grin appear on his face. Two spikes or not (by the looks of it, Tails had given him about ten, with mundanities like the hedgehog's arms and legs being added in as a kind of afterthought) the effort that had gone into it alone made it worthwhile. Except...

"I think you forgot something," Sonic said aloud.

"Yeah?" Tails clambered up onto Sonic's shoulders to peer at the drawing. "What?"

The hedgehog pointed. "Well, you only have one tail in the picture."

Tails squirmed. "Yeah. I kinda left the other one off deliberately. I don't want you to 'member I was some kinda freak. I want you to think I was normal an' after a long time you'll forget I got two tails."

Sonic rolled his eyes. "Kiddo, I'm never gonna forget something like that and I don't intend to try. I want to remember you as you, not as just an ordinary kid."

"But I wanna be a...a nornery kid."

"Yeah, so did I when I was your age." Sonic conveniently left out the fact that he had been. "Some things just can't be helped."

An idea occurred to Tails and he looked up. "Sonic?"

"Yeah?"

"If I add the extra tail on me, then will you stay to see my cave an' my secret place?"

Sonic took a deep breath. "Tails..."

"Not forever. Jus'...jus' until the waterfall melts an' we can get into my cave. It'll melt in spring, promise."

Sonic looked down at the fox and felt something inside him give way, something he hadn't even been aware of until it had gone.

"Yeah. Okay, yeah. You add the extra tail and start eating again," Sonic added pointedly, "and I'll stay here until the spring."

"Promise?"

"Promise."

And who knew, Sonic thought as he settled back in the hot sand again and closed his eyes, maybe he'd even decide to stay longer? This Zone was pretty cool, at least as far as weather and location went...

"Pounce attack!"

Sonic winced as fifty pounds of baby fox crashed down onto his midriff. Of course, every silver lining had a cloud...

Okay, another chapter done :D Sorry it took longer than usual; been busy revelling in my freshly decorated flat (happy sigh) Anyways, more will be along very soon and if you read, please review :)