Hello again! Sorry for... well, everything. I've been stuck with other priorities and I haven't been able to get things done properly. I know I said this probably a bunch of times, but it's true! I'm sure my good friend K gave you a message on my absence during this time. With that said, Enjoy this chapter and have a Merry Christmas!

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Also, a bit of a warning for the faint of heart later in the story (You'll see).

Amy was at the residence of Cream and Vanilla Rabbit, the stress and confusion from Sonic's admission was still fresh in her mind. It stressed her out so much, she does the only thing that calms her without smashing everything in sight with her hammer, Baking. She must've baked 4 cakes and over 3 dozen cupcakes before the rabbit mother intervened.

"Amy, dear, Are you alright? You've baked a lot of goods all night after Sonic revealed his past…" Vanilla said with worry.

"Huh? Oh… Sorry, Miss Vanilla. It's the only thing that helps me relax… without breaking everything in front of me."

"I see… Cream is starting to worry about you, you know. All night we heard you using so many pots and pans and she came to my room asking about you."
Amy's ears and brow drooped after hearing that she upset her little friend.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to."

"Would you like to talk about it before there is no more room for sweets in the kitchen?"

Amy looked around and saw that there is little room left for any more baked goods and gave a sheepish look before replying,

"Maybe I should…"

"Follow me into the living room, dear."

Vanilla walked away and Amy followed. Once they arrived, Vanilla sat in a rocking chair while Amy sat on the couch. She looked around the room where the little rabbit was nowhere in sight.

"Where's Cream?"

"I asked her to stay in her room and study while we talked. I do not wish to trouble her while she is still processing what happened."

"R-right, she is still very young. Miss Vanilla-"

Vanilla raised her hand to cut her off,

"Please, just call me Vanilla for now." She stated, taking Amy off guard for a moment.

"Ok… Vanilla… I don't even know where to start."

"Try from the beginning." She said with a never ending grin she always gives to anyone around.

"Alright, I guess I could start from when I first met Sonic. I was using my tarot cards one day and it revealed to me that I would meet him on Little Planet. I went there, but I got kidnapped instead. I was saved by him a little while after and I stayed by his side. I've always felt like he was the one after that." She remembered.

"The one?" Vanilla questioned.

"Uh… The one to be with, always? I guess I wanted to be by his side all the time, but after every adventure he never showed the same feelings. Now, years have passed and he still shows no sign. A part of me thought I wasn't getting through to him enough, but recently he seemed even more depressed. Especially when he sees me around."

Amy thought back hard for the memories she was trying to explain. She found one that she could use, a time when a certain blue hedgehog's special day.

"Vanilla, remember the party we tried to prepare for Sonic's birthday?"

"Of course, It was upsetting that it was interrupted by that time monster and we were sent across time and space. I did not like being frozen in time, I was so worried for cream and everyone else when he saved me, but we made it out alright." She casually replied.

Amy just shivered at the experience, but shook it off and continued explaining.

"Well, a few days before, I was trying to find Sonic and distract him so he wouldn't see the others gathering supplies…"

FLASHBACK

Amy's POV

I was trying to find Sonic in Green Hills as Tails said he was nearby. We had to make sure he didn't see Knuckles and the Chaotix gather party supplies to the house. I saw Sonic leaning against a tree facing away from us. I walked up behind him and I heard him whisper something. I don't think Tails heard it as he was trying to catch up to me, but I heard him say,

"Another year without you guys…"

I called out, "Hey, Sonic!" before I looked over his shoulder and saw what he was holding. He jumped and tried to hide it. His quick reflexes blurred the image from my eyesight. Then, he turned around and acted like I didn't just catch him off guard.

"H-hey, Amy! W-what's up, Tails. Need something?" He asked quickly.

"No…" I slowly replied.

"We were just in the area and we saw you here. Are you doing alright?" Tails asked.

"I'm doing just fine, little buddy! But now that you said that, I remembered something I gotta do. Seeya!"

He dashed away before I could stop him. I wanted to run after him, but Tails stopped me by grabbing my arm. Confused, I asked "What are you doing?"

"I've been with Sonic long enough to know something is up with him. I never saw him jump like that if he wasn't so focused on something. Usually, when that happens, something very important is distracting him."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. When we walked up to him, he was holding something, right? I couldn't see it, but did you?"

I raised one of my brows in thought about the object in his hands.

"I did, but I couldn't make it out. Before he hid it away, I could've sworn I saw a photo."

Tails gave me a puzzled look, like I just asked a stupid question.

"A photo? Did you see what it was?"

"No, All I saw was a blur of colors. What mainly stood out were the colors pink, purple, green and… blue."

After I said that, a new thought entered my mind. He said 'Another year without you guys…' Was that him in the picture with three others? I looked over at Tails who was still confused.

"Before you caught up with me, I heard Sonic whisper something. Something about another year without someone. Do you think he was in that photo?"

"It's possible, I suppose. I may have been with the longest, but I don't know anyone Sonic may have met before me. I don't recall meeting anyone who has those main colors. I mean, besides you with your pink fur, Jet with his green feathers, and Blaze or Espio with their colors being mainly purple, but we see them every now and then."

We were both stumped on who else could be in the photo that Sonic hasn't seen in supposedly years. I decided to drop it for now because we needed to get his birthday party ready in the coming days.

"I wanted to find out who he was talking about, but after I remembered what Tails said, I decided to leave it alone if they were really important to him." Amy finished.

"That was a wise choice. It sounds like he's facing something quite personal." Vanilla commented.

"From that point on, whenever I was not being captured or if there wasn't a threat to the world or if Eggman wasn't on his usual attempt to kill Sonic, he acted so weirdly and tried to avoid me at any given chance. Now, he has a whole family he never told us about? And he is royalty?! How could he keep that big of a secret for all these years?"

Amy was enraged by this, being lied to for so long like that. Her brow lowered, showing her rage at the blue blur to Vanilla.

"You were there when he explained everything, were you not? You know why he had to keep his past a secret. He wanted to protect his family."

"I know! But I can't help feeling like I wanna crush him with my hammer for not telling me. That fact that I could've been a queen didn't help either, but…"

Amy couldn't continue speaking as she was lost in thought. Vanilla was just rocking in her chair slowly, listening to every word Amy had to say. She never let her smile fall, no matter what.

"I just… I don't know. A part of me wants to help him, the other wants to fight him for keeping secrets. I don't know which side to listen to."

"Then, why don't you talk to him?"

Amy was startled at that question, that should've been the first thing she did.

"I wanted to, but when he started explaining his past and the way he reacted I…"

Amy sighed and lowered her head, looking like she got told by her mother. Vanilla's smile finally faltered, it was really upsetting to hear Sonic's side of losing friends when she lost her friend all those years ago before the war.

"But, you're right." Amy whispered.

Vanilla looked back at her before she continued,

"I should talk to him about it." She beamed, looking like she had new hope in her heart.

"I think it's almost noon, Sonic always grabs food right on the dot. He gets chilidogs, no doubt."

She got up from the couch and darted for the door. She flung open the door and said,

"Thank you, Vanilla. I appreciate this talk!"

"It was no trouble, dear. Good luck!" Vanilla waved.

She gave a nod with a bright smile and shut the door behind her. Vanilla stared at her door for a few moments before straightening her head and closed her eyes.

"I know you're there, Cream."

At the sound of her name, she slowly revealed herself from the hallway where she hid the entire time.

"It's not nice to spy on someone's conversation like that." She chuckled.

"How did you know I was here?" The little rabbit asked with her pet Chao on her head with a question mark on his head.

Vanilla only chuckled even more,

"Call it a motherly instinct."

Cream walked towards her mother shyly, almost afraid to ask the question,

"Does Miss Amy hate Mr. Sonic?"

"No, dear. She doesn't hate him. She just needs to talk, everything will be fine."

Vanilla wraps one arm around her daughter and is given a smile in return.

Amy was practically sprinting across the village to get to Sonic's house. Almost every time at noon, on the dot, he always eats a chili dog. If she could hurry, she might catch him before he speeds off to who knows where.

She made the final turn onto his street and slowed down to a walking pace when she was stepping up the stairs to his door. Breathing heavily, she raised her hand to knock on the door. Her hand was a second away from impacting the wooden door, but the sound of Tails stopped her.

"Amy?"

The pink hedgehog spun around to see Tails landing on the ground before running to her, rather a little fast.

"Tails? What's wrong?"

"You mean they didn't call you?" He asked with worry.

"No, I was trying to-"

Tails sped past her, pushed the door open, and started running up the stairs shouting,

"Sonic!"

Amy's blood went cold. Did something happen to him? Was he attacked in his own home? Maybe his so-called siblings weren't as innocent as they claimed. She shook her head and followed Tails' path up the stairs and into the guest bedroom. Peeking into the room the kitsune entered, she stopped dead in her tracks.

Amy let out a shocked gasp at the sight. Sonic was laying down on the bed with an ice pack on his head. His eyes were closed and his hands by his sides, almost like he was just sleeping. She saw Sonia next to him with Tails talking to Manic who had a hand scratching the back of his head. She didn't mind them as she went straight to Sonic's side standing next to Sonia.

"What happened to him?!"

"I don't know! One moment we were getting a plan ready, the next he was screaming and fell unconscious!" Sonia exclaimed.

Amy decided to pick an argument with Sonia more about what happened. Tails rolled his eyes and noticed Manic giving a confused and concerning look. His pupils shrink a third of their normal size every time they scream louder and louder at each other. Fear growing more and more.

"Are you alright?"

Manic snaps out of his daze and looks back at the fox, still half dazed.

"Uh, Yeah… Tails, who the heck is she?" He pointed at the pink hedgehog.

"That's Amy. You saw her yesterday, right?"

"Yeah, but… Where did that come from? She's almost just like Sonia when she's upset."

Tails does a double take and the realization hits him,

"If she is just like Amy with her attitude then…"

The two then look back at the screaming duo with fear in their eyes. Both Sonia and Amy have fire in their eyes, one pair of blue meeting a pair of green. They continue to scream at each other like they were responsible for Sonic's condition. Silver attempted to diffuse the situation from getting worse.

"Sonia, Amy, calm down! None of you are-"

"Stay out of this!" Sonia yelled.

"AHH!"

He was met with a fist to the face from Sonia which sent him towards a nearby wall. The pain intensified from the impact so much he passed out on the floor and fresh blood started to flow out of his already wounded head. Everyone gasped in shock, but Blaze's shock was replaced with anger and threw a small fire charge that flew in between them and dissipated on impact of the wall. She ran over and helped him into a chair not far from the bed. No words were exchanged after that as all eyes fell on Sonia scratching the back of her head in shame.

Manic looked over to Silver, then everyone else in the room. They all looked shocked at Sonia's sudden aggressive attack on him. He tried to reach out to her, placing a hand on her shoulder. She jerked forward from the contact and hesitantly started to walk away.

"Sonia…?"

There was only fear in her eyes as she slowly backed away towards the bedroom door. After another second of being the center of everyone's attention, she panicked. She ran and blew through the door, nearly busting it off its hinges before running down the stairs.

"Sonia!"

Manic starts to run after her. About halfway down the stairs, he heard the front door slam open. He sped up the pace to catch her before she was too far away. But when he runs past the door, he looks around in hopes to see a blur of pink running across the field.

"Sonia!"

He repeated, but saw nothing but open fields, flowers, and other homes in the village. His frantic search slowed down to a halt and fell onto his knees. Dark clouds loom overhead and start to slowly rain.

"Sonia…"

His eyes start tearing up and drops onto the grass and starts whimpering and whispering to himself over and over again.

"Not again… Not again, not again…"

Darkness… complete darkness. Nothing can be seen, not even a few feet in front of you.

"Uuugghh… Huh?"

Sonic looked around and saw himself floating in the darkness all alone.

"Hello? Where am I?"

His voice echoed like he was in the largest cave he's ever been in.

"Anyone there?"

He must've been floating around for hours before something other than his thoughts caught his ears. It sounded muffled, almost like something was covering the source of the noise. Once he got closer and closer, it started to sound more coherent. The sound itself was starting to sound similar to… crying…

He followed the sound blindly through the void, searching and searching. Until, he found a small patch of purple light shining very little, like how a flame of a candle is about to go out. The cries and whimpers got louder and louder before a figure started to form on the ground. He tried to communicate to them, maybe figure out what's going on.

"Hey, it's ok. Are you-"

A huge lump grew in his throat when he saw who it was. There was an audible gasp as the figure turned around and went wide eyed at the sight of her son…

"Mom?!"

Sonic's jaw dropped. His mother looked horrible! She looked like she left a boxing ring, but one wound nearly made Sonic's heart stop. Her face… Her right side of her face was completely mangled near her right eye. It was covered in thick blood, but you could see the torn skin through the mess almost as if someone tried to gouge her eye out! Besides that, cuts and bruises spread all over her face and body. Some spots look to have been caused from punctures or stabs, each wound was losing blood fast. Her only good eye was left to tears of pain.

"S-Sonic…?" She whimpered.

"Mom, what the hell happened to you?!" He nearly used his super speed to help her in his arms. "Did Egghead do this to you?"

"Y-You shouldn't be here, I thought I closed the connection."

"Closed the connection? What are you talking about?"

"You have to go, I can't let Robotnik find you through the telepathic link. I'm sorry for the pain I must've transferred to you. Please forgive me, goodbye…"

"Mom, Wait!"

Aleena quickly raised and placed the palm of her hand on Sonic's head which upon contact, he let out a painful grunt. A flash of bright white light attacked. Sonic couldn't do anything but shield his eyes from the brightness.

When the light started to fade, he started to recognize his surroundings. He saw the roof of his home through blurred vision. Sounds of thunder reverberated in the room. It all could've been a dream to him, but something felt missing, like it disappeared. It made him feel empty, that's what gave him the horrifying truth that it wasn't a dream.

He tilted his head to the right and saw Silver in a chair resting while Blaze is next to him on the floor in what looks like meditation. He looked down to his left side and saw Tails laying next to him, his back facing towards him. After slowly sitting up, he accidentally wakes up Tails and his head spun faster than his own namesake to face him.

There was nothing but the silence of a staring contest between the hedgehog and fox.

"Sonic?"

"H-Hey, buddy. I thought you would be in your workshop right now." He smiled.

"Huh? That can wait. What happened to you earlier? I got a call from Manic through your phone saying you screamed in pain and passed out!"

Tails' eyes were filled with nothing but worry just from the sound of his life long friend getting hurt. Sonic's smile faded, he always hates to see his buddy so worried.

"Sorry, Tails. I didn't do anything stupid before you ask, It came out of nowhere and…"

Sonic's voice died out as he recalled events. The scream, the void, his mom injured and left helpless… He went wide eyed, staring directly forward as the realization sunk in. He jumped off the bed and dashed to the door. The sudden action not only confused Tails, but startled Blaze as she was interrupted in her meditation.

"Manic! Sonia!" He called out.

"Sonic, Wait!" Tails protested.

Sonic was halfway down the stairs and was about to call out to his siblings once more, but what he saw next made him freeze up. Manic was laying on the couch with his face stuffed in a pillow. Amy was by his side, rubbing circles around his back as he's… crying?

"Manic?"

The green hedgehog didn't stir as Amy looked over to Sonic. She didn't say a word and motioned for him to come closer. Sonic came down the stairs followed by Tails and Blaze. Amy moved out of the way for him to kneel down and try to talk to his younger brother.

"Manic… what's wrong?" He whispered.

Manic's sobs quickly halted at his voice. He lifted his head to speak, but no words came out. He didn't need to, his red and teary eyes explained all the pain he was suffering from. Sonic nearly started to tear up just from the sight of his distraught brother, but instead he moved in closer and hugged him tightly.

Manic did his best to return the gesture with what little strength he had left. After a while, Sonic felt his arm slowly drop and went limp. He pulled himself away, saw that he fell asleep from all the sobs he gave, and lowered his head back on the pillow to rest. He looked over at Amy with a static expression,

"What happened while I was out?"

"Well, um… I accidentally started an argument with your sister after I found out what happened to you. She punched Silver and then ran out of the house."

"She punched Silver?! What did he do?!"

Blaze answered for her on that question,

"He tried to calm them down, but it got out of hand." She hissed.

"Yikes, I just hope she didn't hit him too hard."

"Sonic, I am so sorry. I didn't mean to-"

"It's fine, Amy. We have bigger problems now. I need to find Sonia, how long ago did she leave? Maybe I can catch her."

All was silent as he looked for answers from anyone in the room. Tails sheepishly walked up and spoke,

"It was maybe a couple hours ago, she could be anywhere with her limited speed."

Sonic lifted his finger to his chin and started to think of all the places that she would be at if she needed to calm down, But none of them would relieve this kind of stress.

"Guys?"

Everyone snapped their heads over to the sound of the newcomer.

"Silver?" everyone said in unison.

Silver was at the bottom of the stairs just staring at them.

"If we are gonna find Sonia, then we need to do it fast. Remember the letter Eggman sent you? We have nearly lost a day already."

"It doesn't matter anymore, Silver. That Egg for brains didn't keep his end of the deal."

Everyone looked at Sonic like he just said the stupidest thing in the world, not like its happened before or anything…

"What do you mean?" Blaze asked.

"We need to find Sonia and plan an attack ASAP."

"But where? Like Tails said, she could be anywhere!" Amy exclaimed.

Right back to square one, Sonic thought. Of all the locations they visited during their time together, he doesn't see her there at a time like this.

"What if she went back home?" Silver stated.

Sonic raised an eyebrow at the question, why would Sonia go there?

"Home? Mobotropolis? The town is destroyed, the resistance is gone, and under Eggman's rule. Why would she go there?"

Silver only scratched the back of his aching head, trying to think of a reason.

"Well, You three spent years taking back your home. Maybe she can't abandon it so easily or wanted one last look."

"We are not abandoning Mobotropolis, but you may be right. I'll start looking there, watch over Manic for me until I get back."

Everyone nodded in agreement before Sonic stood up and walked to the door. He reached for the door knob which now has dents from someone's strong grip.

"Wait a minute," He facepalms. "I have my mom's powers! I can just use Chaos Control."

After a round of disappointed looks, Sonic closed his eyes and used Chaos Control to locate his sister.

"So, what now?" Tails asked.

"Watch over Manic till Sonic comes back with Sonia. That's all we can do right now." Silver replied.

Amy sat on the floor next to the couch. If Sonia can pack a punch like that to Silver, she definitely needs to get off her bad side.

"I don't think I should be here when he does. How can I show my face after what I did?"

"Don't worry, Amy. I'm sure once you apologize, everything will calm down. Also, I highly doubt he is gonna let her do anything even remotely close to what she did to Silver to you or anyone else." Tails chuckled.

Amy did relax at the thought, but was still a little worried about the outcome. The suspense was actually killing her, how long will it be before she has to face someone with that kind of strength?

Only time will tell…

I wasn't kidding when I gave that warning. I don't know if more of that will resurface but we'll see.

K: Geez... That's a little too much, even for me.

What are on about? You're a Murder Drone for crying out loud!

K: My kind kills other droids (AGAINST OUR WILL, MIGHT I ADD), not living beings.

Whatever... You're lucky I found you in that shuttle and our scientists could give you a proper functioning system before you died out there.

K: Are you really gonna pull that card on me, Kirb? Pulling my personal past to these readers?

*Sigh* Let's just get on with the next chapter, See ya soon and Happy Holidays!