CHAPTER 19

A month had passed by and everyone had finished rebuilding the Chaotix Detective Agency. As soon as it was done, everyone was trying to continue life as it was before their headquarters had gotten destroyed.

While everyone was trying to get back into their detective work again, Shadow and Rouge were busy getting ready for their big day.

It was early that sunny afternoon at Shadow's house. The living room was practically covered in huge bags and boxes. In exhaustion, Rouge sat down on the sofa. She sighed tiredly, "Well that's the last of my crap."

Shadow looked around the room and saw the many boxes and bags. "You sure? You didn't forget anything?"

Rouge glanced around the room and arched an eyebrow at the hedgehog, "What? You wanted me to pack my kitchen sick too?"

He pointed up at the ceiling, "I'm pretty sure it's in one of those other ninety nine boxes you have upstairs."

She made a smirk, "No. The stuff I have upstairs are all of my jewelry and makeup."

Shadow looked around the boxes and bags setting on the floor around him. "Then what the hell is all this?"

She giggled and crossed her legs. "My clothes duh!"

"No woman needs this many clothes." He stepped over all the boxes and bags that were practically covering the floor and sat beside Rouge on the sofa.

"A woman can never have too many clothes."

He had pulled her close to him and kissed her forehead. "I don't care what you're wearing or how much make up you have, you'll always look beautiful to me."

She looked up at him with a small smile, "Even if all of my hair falls out and my body becomes all wrinkly?"

He paused and bit his lip as his eyes wandered away from her, "…Eh maybe a little bit of clown make up won't kill you."

She huffed and then playfully smacked him in the head with a newspaper from the table setting beside the sofa. "You're such a jerk!"

He couldn't help but to laugh a bit over how she reacted. "I'm kidding!"

"You had better be!" She knew deep down that he was only teasing her. She leaned her head against his chest and sighed happily with a smile on her face. "I can't believe this is happening. We're engaged. I'm moving in with you. We're going to spend the rest of our lives with each other. I'm so excited."

He held her hand, "Yup and next month, you'll officially be my wife."

She nuzzled her head against him. "I can't wait. You make me so happy, Shad."

He held her closer to him, "You too, babe."

The next day, Tikal had decided to visit everyone at the agency. When she stepped inside, he looked around the huge lobby in amazement.

The headquarters were finally finished and the building had never looked better. Instead of it being one story, it was now two making the building much bigger than it originally was.

She walked around the lobby in admiration. She had then spotted Shadow talking to Rouge and Tonya. She decided to walk over to the group. "Hey, guys!"

Everyone turned to her with smiles and greeted her back.

Tikal looked over to the hedgehog, "Shadow, I can't get over how amazing the place looks."

"Thanks", he glanced around and was impressed with how everything looked as well. "This place looks even better than I had imagined it to be. Our hard work really paid off." He had then heard Midnight calling his name as he approached the group.

"Hey, Shadow? Can I talk to you for a moment?"

"Sure", Shadow looked back at the girls before he walked off with Midnight. "Excuse me, ladies."

Once Rouge saw Shadow walk away with Midnight, she turned to Tikal and Tonya in excitement. "Okay now we can get down to business!"

Tikal arched an eyebrow to Rouge, "Business?"

"Shopping for my wedding dress of course!"

With all of the excitement over having the agency finished, she almost forgot about Shadow and Rouge's wedding that was coming up. "Oh!"

"Since we're all off tomorrow, I thought you guys could help me pick out my dream dress."

"Of course!" Tonya exclaimed.

"We'd love to be there for you, Rouge", Tikal spoke in excitement.

Rouge was excited that her closest friends would be there for her while she decided on what dress she had wanted. "Great! Then it's a date, ladies!"

It was early in the evening the next day. Tikal and Tonya were at the bridal shop with Rouge helping her pick out her perfect wedding dress.

Rouge stared at her reflection in the mirror standing in front of her. She studied the wedding dress she was wearing.

The dress was white, the sleeves on the shoulders were poofy and the dress came down to her ankles and surprisingly it didn't show much of her cleavage.

Rouge sighed in frustration, "I don't know, guys."

Tonya sighed heavily. That was the eighth dress she had tried on and she was getting tired of Rouge's indecisiveness. "What's wrong with that one?"

Rouge turned to them, "It's ugly."

"I don't think it's ugly. I think it's kinda cute.", Tikal spoke with a small smile.

Tonya made a sly look, "What? You don't like it cause it doesn't show off more of that hot body?"

Rouge made a sarcastic laugh and rolled her eyes. "Very funny, Tonya." She began to look through the pile of dresses that she had already tried on.

Tikal suddenly became nervous as she was debating on asking Rouge if she would invite Nails to her wedding. "So, Rouge?" Tikal had began, "Are you planning on inviting Nails to the wedding?"

She paused for a moment and gave Tikal a look of disbelief. "No way." She then continued to look through the dresses.

"…Why not?"

She held a dress in her hands and turned to Tikal. "Gee I don't know. Maybe because she tried to kill me and my friends like a thousand times before."

Tikal was determined to make Rouge see that Nails had truly changed. She bit her lip before she tried to convince her, "Rouge, I know that you've had disagreements with your sister in the past, but believe me when I say that I feel a change in her."

"…Tikal."

"She means well now."

"Tikal!" Rouge snapped. "You just met her! You don't know the first thing about her! So please just drop it!" She could tell that Tikal had strong feelings for Nails and it made her feel uneasy.

Tikal had decided to let go of the subject of Nails after when she found out that she was only making her angry. "…I'm sorry, Rouge."

Tikal and Tonya watched as Rouge started to put on another dress.

Rouge was wearing a white dress that came down to her ankles. The arms of the sleeves were white lace. The dress fit her fairly tight and it showed off a lot of her cleavage.

Tonya thought she looked breathtaking, "Rouge, you look beautiful."

A blush had formed on Rouge's face as she looked at herself in the mirror. "You think so?"

The purple cat made a nod, "I'm completely jealous of you right now." Literally she had became envious of how gorgeous she had looked in the dress.

She turned to her with her face still red, "Oh thanks, Ton!"

Tonya couldn't take her eyes off of the beautiful dress. She couldn't believe that Rouge was actually getting married. "You're so lucky, Rouge."

Rouge and Tikal had their attention directed to Tonya when they saw her expressions change.

"You and Shadow…getting married. It's like a dream come true isn't it?"

"Well", Rouge spoke. "Yeah! I mean Shadow and I have been seeing slash dating each other for like ever. It's about time don't you think?" She bit her lip when she noticed Tonya's sudden melancholic expression. She seemed upset about something. Then she had began to think that maybe she thought that Tonya was perhaps jealous of her. She tried to make it seem like she wasn't trying to brag too much about how much her and Shadow had loved each other. "But don't get it wrong! He and I aren't perfect. We went through an ass ton of emotional drama before we actually started dating." She began to stroke her fingers through her hair as she started to remember all the bad moments they had encountered as their relationship progressed. "I mean Shadow and I absolutely hated each other at first sight. I was like a peppy cheerleader and he was that rebellious punk gothy guy. I loved the sunshine and he embraced the darkness."

A sweat drop had appeared on the side of Tikal's head. "This isn't high school, Rouge."

She made an uneasy smile, "I know! I'm just saying! That's how different we were." She continued to remember how she and Shadow first started liking each other. "Point being, we weren't really a perfect match for each other. Besides, he was still trying to get over his dead girlfriend at the time too. And by the time he realized he liked me, I was dating someone else."

Tikal arched an eyebrow. She never really recalled any major ex boyfriends Rouge had dated in the past. The only man besides Shadow that popped in her mind was Knuckles. "…Knuckles?"

Rouge made a small nod, "I loved Knuckles. I really did, but as Shadow and I worked together side by side each day, I began to fall for him too. Then we got into that clusterfuck of a situationship."

Tikal rose an eyebrow in confusion as she tried to understand what she was exactly saying.

When Rouge saw the confused look on Tikal's face, she sighed heavily, "I was starting to see Shadow behind Knuckles' back."

Tikal thought it would've made more sense to just simply break up with Knuckles and then be with Shadow. "But why didn't you just break up with Knuckles?"

"Because I loved Knuckles and Shadow. I wanted them both in my life. Besides, Shadow told me he wasn't ready for another serious relationship. His excuse was he didn't want to get too emotionally attached to me."

Tikal thought that Shadow's excuse wasn't really legitimate, "But you two were already sleeping with each other."

"Thank you!" Rouge exclaimed. "He was contradicting himself!"

Tonya made a cunning smile as she figured that some men did indeed use that excuse for not wanting to be in a relationship, "That's a guy for you."

"Besides, he was always getting butt hurt every time Knuckles was around me, but he was my boyfriend. What did he expect?"

Tonya crossed her arms, "So even though you two were fuck buddies, in Shadow's mind, he wasn't all for sharing you."

Rouge made a nod, "Yup! He acted like he was fine with me still being with Knuckles but deep down, he got jealous whenever I breathed Knuckles' name."

"So what happened?" Tikal asked.

"Towards the end, Shadow didn't care if Knuckles found out about us or not. And eventually that did happen and shit got ugly. Knuckles was enraged when he found out and came at Shadow."

"So they were both fighting over you?" Tikal asked.

Rouge made a slow nod.

"Must be nice having two guys fighting over you?" Tonya said.

Rouge shook her head, "No way! It was scary. Knuckles is a tough guy and all but Shadow was someone different. And back then, he had the tantrum of a two year old and he didn't think twice about taking a life. While they fought, Shadow really and truly could've snapped his neck and thought nothing of it."

"What stopped him?" Tikal asked.

Her eyes wandered down to the floor, "I told him if he killed him, I would hate him and I would never want anything to do with him again."

"I see…"

Rouge continued, "It took awhile after everything had stopped being so awkward between us. We eventually gotten close again but that time, we both decided to get into an actual relationship."

Tikal had figured even after all that, the two wouldn't stay away from each other too long. After all, they had worked with each other. It would've been a matter of time anyway.

"Even now, Shadow and Knuckles aren't on the best of terms, but they put the past behind them like grown men should." She bit her lip as she found it hard to face the two. She stared at her reflection in the mirror in sudden sadness. "Even though everything is fine now, I won't forget how much we hurt each other…"

Tikal could feel her heartbreaking when she saw tears swell in Rouge's eyes.

Rouge fought hard to hold her tears back, "It was awful…what I did. I used him and Knuckles." She placed her hand on her forehead as she tried hard not to cry. "Shadow was so hurt. The worst thing he ever said to me was when he called me a fucking slut." A tear fell from her cheek, "He doesn't deserve someone like me…"

When she saw her break down crying, Tikal ran over to her and hugged her in comfort . "Rouge, that was all in the past. What happened back then made your relationship stronger."

She nodded and tried to smile through her tears, "Yeah, you're right."

Tikal had made her look at herself in the mirror again. "Look at you, Rouge. You're gorgeous and Shadow's pretty lucky to be spending the rest of his life with you." When she saw Rouge smiling through her tears, she looked back at Tonya. "Right, Tonya?"

Tonya who was lost in her thoughts finally focused her attention back to them. "…Oh, right."

Rouge looked down at her dress and then smiled at Tikal. "You know what? I think I'm gonna get this dress."

Tikal happily smiled at her, "That's great! This dress is totally you!"

While Tikal was trying to lift Rouge's spirits back up, Tonya had went back deep in thought. She knew Shadow and Rouge went through a lot together to get where they were now, but she kept thinking about her own relationship with Espio. She thought what exactly was holding their relationship together?

In The Next Chapter…

Shadow: Nails?

Nails: Shadow! My future brother in law! It's so good to see you!

Shadow: Why the hell is your sister here!

Rouge: Uh…funny story actually…

Shadow: Get her out or I throw her out!

Espio: What's suddenly gotten into you?

Tonya: I just really need to know what's going on with us…