Chapter 6: Pair of Kings:

After a few minutes of looking, Julie found the sack of rings in a desk drawer. Making a quick count, she declared that they had 74 to split three ways. The pink echidna made three piles of 24. The extra two were put back in the bag and set aside. Knuckles took the cards out and began to shuffle the worn deck with a practiced ease. Sally watched him mix and cut the deck over and over again. She guessed that he had plenty of practice considering he had little to do while he lived in total isolation for nearly a decade.

Once Knuckles reckoned he had shuffled them adequately, he set them face down in the center of the table while Julie pushed the meager piles of gold rings towards the players. "I think since we have only so much to play with," Julie ventured, "That we don't place a minimum and set a maximum of… say, 10 rings?" Sally and Knuckles nodded their agreement.

"I guess I'll deal first," Knuckles said. "What are we playing? Five card draw or Texas hold-em?"

Julie looked at Sally. "Either is fine by me. Which do you want to play, Sal?"

"Well, I don't know how to play, er, what was it?"

"Texas Hold-em?"

"Yeah, that. But I could try."

"Alrighty then, Texas it is!" Knuckles declared. He cut the deck a second time, passed two cards to each of them including himself facedown and hidden, then set back to take a peek at his hand. Sally and Julie followed suit then set the cards back down. "I'll start the bet at two rings," he announced as he placed the said rings in front of him.

Sally glanced at her cards again. An ace of spades and seven of diamonds. Not sure what that was worth, she decided to go ahead and meet (or check) the bet. She pushed her two rings forward. Julie agreed with that bet and added her two rings. Knuckles reached over and flipped the top three cards over. A five of clubs, an ace of hearts, and a king of spades.

Sally thought for a moment. There was ace there and an ace in her hand. An one pair wasn't too bad.

Knuckles grinned a bit and pushed another ring forward. "I raise the pot by one."

Julie checked her hand a second time then sighed and pushed her hand away. "I fold," she announced.

Knuckles turned to Sally.

"What about you?"

"Hmm. I'll go ahead and check it," she decided.

"Alright, betting is closed. Let's see them."

Sally flipped her hand over showing her one pair. Knuckles snickered a bit and revealed his three of a kind. He had two fives, one of diamonds and another of hearts. "Looks like I win this one." He scooped the rings up and added them to his pool.

Sally sighed, somewhat disappointed about losing this round, but knowing her luck would likely change. Knuckles reshuffled the deck and dealt a fresh hand. Sally downed her glass of wine and refilled it. Time to start winning.
*

Sometime later, after several hands, Julie ended up losing all her rings and was forced to watch Sally and Knuckles go back and forth while sipping what was left of the wine. Knuckles had nearly all the rings, which was surprising considering he sucked at poker. Perhaps he'd been practicing with Vector and them? Regardless, Sally was beginning to get desperate.

Knuckles dealt the new hand. Sally peeked at her hand. Good; it was two kings. One was a diamond and the other was a club. She glanced at Knuckles who appeared somewhat unhappy with his lot. Good, this was definitely good.

Knuckles put two rings in the pot and Sally followed suit. Knuckles flipped the top three cards, but Sally made a note to watch his reaction. His face lit up in the slightest of shades. Oh no. Sally looked at the cards. It was an ace of hearts, a king of spades, and a queen of clubs. This could be bad. Sally checked her hand. Well, she had three of a kind, but if he did have a straight, it would beat her.

She only had five rings counting the two she had already placed to bet with. 'Fuck it,' she thought. "I raise by three," she announced, with an 'I don't care' look.

Knuckles looked at her with surprise. "You sure?" he asked.

"Yeah, well are you going to meet?"

Knuckles grinned kind of evilly. "I'll do more than that. I'll raise it by the whole pool," he countered.

"What! I can't meet that!" Sally argued.

"That is pretty unsportsmanlike," Julie agreed.

"Well, she can offer something else," Knuckles suggested.

"Like what?" asked Julie.

"Whatever she wants, as long as I deem it worthy," Knuckles replied.

Sally pondered for a moment. She didn't bring anything of value except Tails's plane, but she seriously doubted the fox would appreciate her betting it for the equivalent of 72 rings. Suddenly a thought crossed her mind. She beckoned the echidna closer, much to Julie's confusion. Knuckles listened intently as Sally whispered an offer into his ear. Julie secretly hoped that it wasn't what she thought Sally might be suggesting. Although she knew Knuckles wouldn't willingly be unfaithful, it still bugged her that someone might be trying to seduce him right in front of her as she wasn't there.

Of course, Julie should be more used to the idea of promiscuity considering her heritage in the Dark Legion, where it wasn't uncommon for several hundred echidnas to be related closely or distantly due to their peculiar family arrangements. Regardless, it still rubbed Julie the wrong way.

Knuckles grinned eagerly and shook his head. Julie had to bite her tongue from lashing out for something that might not even really exist. Knuckles and Sally eyed each other than flipped over their hands. Sally had her three of a kind, but as it turned out Knuckles did have a straight. He had a two of clubs and three of diamonds. 'Damn. He wasn't bluffing,' Sally internally grumbled. But this played well into her plan.

"Alright, you win," Sally conceded, "Time to claim your prize." She stood, and Julie leapt up.

"Don't you-!" she started, but was cut off when Sally placed her mouth over Julie's. Julie was utterly shocked, but let Sally in. Knuckles sat there staring with his mouth slightly agape. The red echidna could scarcely believe the reality of what was happening before him. He'd thought of it in the past, of course, but never in his wildest dreams had he considered the possibilty of it actually happening.

Sally worked it, and ran her hands through Julie's locks while Julie's hands dangled helplessly by her sides. The tang of the citrus fruit was still lingering, and Sally could pick up on it. After a good minute or so, Sally pulled away and turned to Knuckles. "Satisfied?"

Knuckles shifted his legs, hoping to conceal something and shook his head agreeably. Sally sat and took the bottle and drank the last few sips left at the bottom. Julie however, just stood there dumbly, not quite finished processing this odd turn of events.

"Ah-hem, well, I have to go get some firewood before it gets dark," Knuckles excused himself. Julie blinked out of her stupor and glanced out the window. The sky was beginning to turn golden as the sun set in the far horizon.

"I'll go with you," Sally offered as she stood up yet again and crossed the room over to the echidna.

"Ok, I'll stay here," Julie told them. She sat back down, not quite trusting the integrity of her knees.

Knuckles and Sally left the cabin.
* * *

Cream was crying and Amy and Vanilla did their best to comfort the little bunny. "Hush, Creamie, darling," Vanilla soothed as she stroked her daughter's headfur.

"Miss Sally said she wasn't going anywhere," she whimpered, "but now she's gone. Why would she do that?"

"I don't know, darling."

"Hey, c'mon Cream, help me make dinner," Amy suggested, hoping to distract her. "We can't let the boys starve. We wouldn't want that right?"

"N-no," Cream stammered. She wiped her tears away and tried to smile. "Ok. Let's help Miss Amy cook, Mommy."

Vanilla gave the pink hedgehog a grateful look and let her daughter lead her to the kitchen. Amy started to follow, but was grabbed by Tails. "Amy, wait," he said.

"What?"

"We need to find Sally," he explained.

"Tails, you know what Sonic said," Amy began.

"I don't care!" he shot back. "We need her. She's our leader, not him. The longer she's gone, the more vulnerable we are and she is. It's only a matter of time before Eggman catches wind of this and takes his chance."

Amy sighed. "And how exactly do propose we find her? She took the Tornado and could be anywhere by now," she pointed out.

"Maybe, but I found this in her room on the dresser," he said as he flashed a faded photograph.

"You were snooping in her room?" Amy asked appalled.

"That's beside the point," he retorted short-temperedly. "Who are those two on the picture, I ask you?"

Amy took the picture and squinted at the image. "Looks like… Sally… and Knuckles?"

"Yeah. And it must've been taken quite awhile ago, if the condition is any clue."

"But Sally never told us that they were friends that long ago."

"Well, that's not true," Tails admitted.

"What! You mean she talked about this before?"

"Yeah, you were kinda absent for that, with Eggman kidnapping you and all."

"And nobody bothered to tell me?"

"It didn't seem important at the time."

"That was years ago! You would think that it might come up in the conversation at some point!"

"Well it didn't. Besides you're missing the point again! Sally must've went to Angel Island."

"So? Knuckles and Julie are there last I heard; they'll keep her safe."

"That's basically what Sonic said."

"So what's the problem?"

"The problem is that we're leaderless and Sonic doesn't care because he's too busy fighting with her."

Amy was about to argue more when Cream called from the kitchen, "Are you coming, Miss Amy?"

"Yes, Creamie!" Amy called over her shoulder; turning back to Tails she shook her head. "If Sally needed to get away that badly, then perhaps it's for the best that she's gone."

"But-"

"It's for the best," Amy repeated a little more firmly. With that, she turned on her heel and proceeded to the kitchen. Tails stood there awhile longer scowling after the hedgehog. He looked once more at the photograph and hoped that Sally didn't do something she'd regret.

New Author's Note: Still no major changes to the main story, but I'm currently rewriting the next chapter with a special segment featuring a little Knux x Sally. Well, rewrite is a little strong considering I'm not doing it from scratch, just re-editing it mostly. After all? How could one little kiss change things? On a side note, I'm still not sure how well I pulled of the poker scene, considering I've never played poker in my life and had to skim through Wikipedia when writing it the first time. That said, my favorite part was the scene where Sally kissed Julie-Su. I gotta admit, it's pretty hot, right fellas? I think Julie and Sally are the only characters I could see willing to engage in a little "experimentation", unlike Amy and Rouge, or Sally and Nicole. What are your guys' thoughts?

~TheEpicTales

Bonus! Original Author's Note:

Author's Note: For this chapter I had to do a little research on how to play Texas Hold-em. Thank you, Wikipedia! Anyways, I skipped a couple rules and probably botched the game completely from a gambler's point of view, but oh well. Hm, story-wise Sally has decided on the sneaky way of trying to get at Knuckles it would appear, playing on his fantasies. Originally she had intended on coming clean about her motives, but that just wouldn't do. Oh, Julie is getting jealous, but still giving Sally a fair chance. She doesn't want to come across as a total controlling and jealousy-bitten bitch of a girlfriend. Tails has been completely disillusioned of his former mentor, Sonic. He seems to have a rough idea of what Sally means to do, but is powerless to stop it. Now for credit to Julie's upbringing in the Dark Legion where promiscuity is commonplace, belongs to Soul Ender. Yes, I did skim over your story Chaos, Order, and Balance last night. I promise I will read it thoroughly once I get the chance. It looks great and well-crafted. Werewolf lover99, I'm not sure yet if your characters will make a second appearance, but if there is another flashback, then they should. Until then, read on.