Chapter 2
While Knuckles was doing his thing with the invisible Master Emerald, with Shadow watching next to him, Tails and Sonic talked.
"So, the emerald," Sonic started.
"Yeah…I'm surprised Eggman did what he did. There are too many variables. It just doesn't sound like him," Tails said.
"He's probably just trying different things after all his failed attempts."
"Like he's getting desperate? But wouldn't the chaos emeralds be easier to use?"
He thought about that. "I think so. They're smaller and still have a lot of power."
"I hope Eggman isn't going after the Master Emerald because he already has the chaos emeralds. We need to check, but with who?" Tails wondered.
"Well, Shadow's right here. Shadow!" Sonic yelled. "You still got your chaos emerald?"
He came over. "Yeah, it's right over there." He pointed to one side at the bottom of the temple.
The pair headed over to where he pointed. They looked around for the emerald, but didn't see it.
"Shad! What color is it?" Sonic yelled up to him.
"It's the dark blue one!" He shouted back.
They looked around some more, then climbed back up to Shadow and Knuckles.
"Bad news, guys. We can't find the chaos emerald," Sonic said nervously.
"What?! Are you sure it's not invisible? Look harder! It might still be there!" Shadow demanded.
The black hedgehog looked ready to jump at him. "Cool it, Shads. It's not there. I'm positive."
"To be sure that Tails is right, we should check with another person," Sonic continued. "Anyone know who?" He asked.
They thought a bit.
"Rouge," They all said simultaneously.
Sonic smiled. "Exactly."
XXXX
Since Shadow worked with Rouge from time to time, he called her on their wrist communicators.
"Hey, we've got a problem here. Something to do with the chaos emeralds."
"But your geographical location is over the ocean," She said in confusion.
"I'm on Angel Island," he replied.
"Oh. And the Master Emerald…"
"Yeah. Knuckles thought it was stolen."
"What do you mean 'thought'?" She asked.
"Well, it turns out it was just invisible," He answered.
"Invisible?!"
"Yeah. Do you have your chaos emerald? Because mine's gone."
"How?!"
"We don't know."
"We? Alright, that's it. I think I need to see this for myself. I'll be there in 20 minutes. And I'll bring my chaos emerald, too." She ended the call.
Shadow walked back to us. "Rouge is on her way."
"Yeah, we heard," Knuckles said.
They were quiet for a while.
"Now that that's settled, what do we do?" Tails asked.
"I guess we wait," Sonic plainly stated.
"I'm going to search for my chaos emerald some more. You probably missed it, faker," Shadow said.
Sonic growled. "Fine, go ahead and try. But I know you won't find anything, faker.
"Whatever."
He walked down to the ground and began combing the dirt for any sign of his chaos emerald. Tails and Knuckles exchanged glances, and also went down the pyramid. Sonic followed, exasperated.
Shadow apparently thought that if he kicked up enough dust while running, some would land on the emerald, and then they would see it.
Well, the only thing the dust landed on was the three figures standing by.
Sonic sighed, annoyed. "See? What did I tell you? Your chaos emerald is gone, Shadow."
"I know," he replied.
"Sheesh. The only good that came out of this is that it took up time. If she's not late, Rouge will be here in less than 10 minutes," Knuckles said.
Tails, Knuckles, and Sonic used that time to brush off all the dust. Shadow kept looking for his emerald, although they all knew it was hopeless.
While cleaning up, Knuckles described his talk with Tikal. "She wasn't aware that anything had happened. She said she just felt a shock, and then everything was normal again. I don't think being invisible has affected the Master Emerald." He concluded.
"The only way this business with the emeralds could've happened is if Eggman built an invisibility ray or something," Tails said. "How else could he have stolen Shadow's chaos emerald when we were only 50 feet away?"
"Rouge might be able to help," I said. "If anything happened to her chaos emerald, she'd know it right away."
The trio went back to waiting.
Finally, Rouge appeared in the sky. As she landed, Sonic saw her face clearly. Immediately, he knew something was wrong. She looked frustrated and upset.
"I've got really bad news. My green chaos emerald was stolen from me, too," she said glumly. Then she pouted. "And I thought I could never lose a jewel..."