CHAPTER 2

(Cream the Rabbit)

Tails was dragged through Twinkle Park where the two had played 'ring around the rosy' until everyone there joined in, stuffed with sweets and other junk foods before actually having a late lunch, and then watched a romantic movie from which they got kicked out of because Cream wouldn't stop talking about how the movie related to them. By the time Cream started to calm down a little bit, it was late in the afternoon with the sun barely peeking over the edge and the moon partly shining in the other half of the sky. Now, they were on the beach making sand castles as the low tide prepared to rise.

'What am I doing?' Tails thought miserably. 'I need to get the machine working again. If Cream became this much trouble...what happened to Rouge and Amy?' Tails suddenly stopped putting sand in a bucket and gasped. 'What if they died?'

"Tails? What's wrong?" Cream said.

Tails blinked and looked at Cream who was decorating their sand castle with seashells.

"Nothing!" Tails said, laughing nervously and shaking his hands in front of him. "I was just thinking that you needed more seashells. I'll go get you some!"

Tails got up and rushed away as Cream called after him. "I'll be waiting here, my foxy bundle of hay!"

Tails shook his head as he ran. The nicknames were just getting more and more ridiculous.

He could only go far enough to the point where Cream was just a little yellow dot in the sand. He sighed as he remembered how after the movie, he went to the bathroom only to return and see Cream threatening strangers all because she didn't know where he was. He faced the sand and kicked a rock absentmindedly.

'Did Sonic have to deal with Amy like this? Wait, they never went on a date so he wouldn't know...' Tails peeked over at Cream. 'I don't think Amy was this bad though...Woah. Maybe...just maybe...did the machine intensify the personalities?'

Tails silently screamed while covering his ears with his hands.

"Tails! Finally!"

Tails looked up just in time to be tackled by none other than Knuckles.

"Kn-Knuckles? What are you doing here?"

Knuckles grabbed Tails by the ear and started dragging him away. "What are you doing here? I've been running around trying to find you!"

"What? Why were you trying to find me for?" Tails shouted.

"It's Rouge. She's...sick."

"What?"

The commotion entered Cream's super-sensitive ears, but the words were all jumbled together.

Rouge...finally...find you... trying...for...sick...

She jumped up in shocked anger. "Rouge is trying to get a piece of my honeybun?" Cream whipped around, destroying the nearly complete sand castle, just in time to see Knuckles kidnapping Tails. "KNUCKLES! YOU'RE A DEAD ECHIDNA!"

(Rouge the Bat)

Knuckles had left Rouge in the same place- the beautiful spring meadow with the rainbow colored flowers. She had stopped crying and was now picking flowers again.

"These would look great around Knuckles' place by the Master Emerald!" Rouge thought aloud. She looked up towards Angel Island that still floated above her.

-With Knuckles and Tails-

"Gaahhh! Cream! Drop that! That's dangerous!" Knuckles had tears streaming out from his eyes and so did Tails.

The two males were desperately trying to evade the wrath of the petite rabbit who was currently swinging around a street lamp.

"DIE, YOU MAN-STEALING FURBALL!" Cream screamed as she slammed the lamp onto the side walk.

Knuckles was running around the city, holding Tails above high as if he was an ancient Chinese vase that needed to be protected. They weren't too far from the beach, so the streets were full of stores which were strangely vacant. Perhaps it was because there was a lunatic rabbit screaming with a swing lamp out in the streets...

"Knuckles! Just give her what she wants! Just give it to her!" Tails cried.

"No way! I need you to come look at Rouge!"

"Mr. Knuckles? Mr. Tails?" The three looked up to see Rouge descending with a basket full of rainbows. "Oh! And Miss Cream is here, too!" She smiled brightly at everyone.

Knuckles smiled back, but then he felt an oppressing aura scald his back. He peeked over at Cream to see an angry demon in her place.

"Rouge! How dare you send Knuckles to steal my boyfriend!" Cream shouted.

"What?" Rouge exclaimed, looking shocked and hurt.

"B-boyfriend?" Knuckles and Tails said simultaneously.

Cream picked up her street lamp again, raising it high. "Friends just don't steal their friends' boyfriends!"

"Miss Cream, I'm sure this all a big misunderstanding..." Rouge tried to calm Cream down, but the angry rabbit refused to listen and started bashing away on the road again. "Miss Cream! Please! Aahhh!"

Rouge flew away screaming with Cream chasing after all.

"Oh, great! Now look at what you've done!" Tails cried. "If Cream kills Rouge, this is all your fault!"

"My fault? Why would it be all my fault?"

"Because you kidnapped me!"

"I had to! There was something wrong with Rouge! She's acting all sugary sweet!" Knuckles shuddered at the memory. "It's...it's... unsanitary!"

"...I don't think 'unsanitary' is the right word..." Tails sighed. "Besides. If Amy hadn't blown up my machine at that time, we wouldn't be arguing and Cream wouldn't be trying to murder Rouge!"

"Amy? What does Amy have to do with this?"

"Well-"

Before Tails could explain to Knuckles, the local news came up on all the televisions on display in the store beside them.

"NEWS! Just today, about five jewelry stores have been robbed of all their gems by the same person. No one has yet seen her, but from this security camera image, it appears to be a female hedgehog. Police are advising all stores to lock down until this dangerous phenomenon has been caught. Now onto today's weather..."

Knuckles and Tails' jaws dropped as they saw the image appear. There was no mistake about it. The thieving female hedgehog had to be Amy Rose.

"Is that...A-Amy?" Knuckles shouted, pointing wildly at the televisions. "What the heck is she doing stealing jewels!"

"Oh no..." Tails smacked himself in the face.

(Amy Rose)

Sonic and Shadow were racing through the streets as they were finally reaching their finish line.

"Finished!" Sonic yelled, already celebrating his 'victory'.

Shadow coolly walked over to the camera they had taped onto some mailbox so that they could catch the picture of the winner. It was set to snap a picture at the precise moment that they finished. Sonic went to stand by Shadow and they looked at the picture together. Most of it was just a blurry mass, but at the way right side of the picture was a single, blurry black dot.

"There! I did win!" Sonic said triumphantly. "That black dot has got to be my nose."

"How are you sure it's your nose? It could be mine." Shadow said calmly.

"I know it's my nose, because it's a wonderful black dot!"

"...We have similar looking noses, faker."

Sonic grit his teeth. "You-!" Sonic started to say when he a piece of paper flew onto his face, muffling whatever he was planning to say. Shadow's face remained emotionless the entire time Sonic ripped off the paper from his face. "As I was saying-" Another piece of paper hit Sonic in the face.

Sonic threw the paper on the ground and stomped on it. That was when the two realized that the same message was posted on both of the papers. Looking around, they realized that the street was littered with them. Sonic picked one up and read it out loud.

"Caution: Female Bandit on the Loose."

Shadow's ears twitched a little. "Rouge started stealing from stores again?"

Sonic looked up to say something when he caught a glimpse of something that turned his face ash white. The color drained from his body and he pointed a shaky finger at something behind Shadow, so Shadow turned around to see what it was. Among the busy crowd was Amy and some male neither of the hedgehogs recognized.

"We've got to follow them!" Sonic declared.

Shadow glanced at Sonic who looked like he was about to get sick and grimaced. "Fine."

***LATER***

Amy licked her fingers as she finished off her dinner. She had seduced a rich stranger into buying her a meal at La Rue, the most famous restaurant in the part of town she was currently at. The poor victim was in the bathroom right now. Amy turned her head to look out at the city. La Rue was partly famous for being at the top floor of one of the tallest buildings in the city, so it had a lot of windows for its customers to enjoy seeing the city in a bird's eye-view.

The neon lights twinkled like a thousand rubies and Amy couldn't help grinning to herself as she played with the amethyst around her neck- the first gem she stole that day. That was when she recognized a familiar face on the mirror- a reflection of a particular blue hedgehog who was surprisingly with his arch nemesis, Shadow.

'Well, this is interesting...' she thought with a smirk.

She got up and sauntered over to them, swinging her hips a little. "Hey, Shadow. Sonic. What brings a pair of hunks like you two here?"

Shadow said nothing and just looked over Amy. Then he raised one eyebrow. "What's with the new look?"

Amy smacked him lightly. "Oh, stop it. You're going to make me blush." She smiled brazenly at him, batting her eye lashes in a flirty way.

Shadow was unimpressed. Sonic, however, was so completely under her spell that he began to drool. He had a star struck look about him that made Shadow want to knock him awake.

"What are you up to, Rose?" Shadow asked.

Amy pouted. "I was just about to go home." Then she smiled again. "Would you like to walk me home?"

Sonic immediately agreed and Shadow decided to follow, too, fearing that his nemesis would embarrass himself without his presence there to be witness. The three hedgehogs walked out of the restaurant and into an elevator. (Amy had left her victim to pay for the dinner alone.)

Once in the elevator, Sonic started making his move.

"You know, Amy. There's something different about you today." Sonic said.

'Really, Sonic? That's how you're going to start?' Shadow thought.

"Are you trying to flirt Sonic?" Amy cooed. "You're too cute for words!"

Sonic blushed despite himself. "Uhm. So what have you been doing today?"

Amy bat her eyes. "Oh, just shopping here and there."

The way she said 'shopping' made Shadow look up in suspicion. As soon as he opened his eyes, they met with Amy's and her smile faltered just for a moment. Shadow let a frown show on his feet. This was not the Amy he knew.

Pushing Sonic aside, Shadow placed his hands on both sides of Amy and leaned in so close that their noses were almost touching. Amy's eyes widened in surprise.

"What are you doing, Rose?" he whispered, his breath caressing her cheeks.

Ding!

The moment the elevator doors opened, Amy screamed. "AAHHH! Someone help me! Pervert! This guy is a pervert!"

Everyone at the ground floor looked up. Amy shoved Shadow away from her and ran as the police ran up to Shadow and Sonic with their bats. Shadow closed his eyes calmly, but Sonic was starting to panic.

"Pervert? Who?" Sonic screamed. Shadow casually took out his chaos emerald and disappeared. "Shadow! Don't leave me here alone!"

The police surrounded Sonic.

"So...You're a pervert, eh?"

"No! Please, spare me!" Sonic cried.

Shadow: Sorry, Sonic. I don't want to bother with the police right now...

Sonic: You could have at least Chaos Controlled with me! Q.Q

Shadow: ...No

lol Poor Sonic...