After over 2 years, I'm finally back! Please review!

She bolted straight up, panting. Her heart was beating two times faster than it should. Quickly, she looked around; she knew it was just a dream, but her instincts were keeping her on high alert.

It had taken a while, despite Shadow's warmth and soothing scent, but eventually she had been able to fall asleep like everyone had wanted her to. That voice she had heard hadn't helped matters. But somehow, it had seemed… familiar.

But as soon as she closed her eyes, she wished she hadn't. All there had been was darkness. Endless black. She ran as fast as she could, trying to escape, but it didn't do any good. The darkness stayed, trapping her.

She could hear voices yelling her name. All of her friends and family.

"Sonica!"

"Sonica!"

She even heard Chip. She tried to reach out to them, tried to answer, but her voice was gone. Like it had been sucked up by the dark.

Then they all yelled at once…

"Come back to us! Wake up!"

And now she was here. Very awake and very shaken. The dream felt so real. Why had everyone been yelling at her? Why couldn't she answer? And what on Mobius did they mean by 'wake up'?

Sonica suddenly realized that Shadow was no longer next to her on the couch. She dragged herself up, swaying slightly upon standing. She would have to figure this out later. Until then, she might not want to tell the others. Might as well not worry them.

When she made it back to the office, the first thing she saw was Sonia and Professor Pickle eating some sandwiches. To the other side of the room, the guys were arguing about Extreme Gear.

"Dude, I swear. It goes faster if you-"

"No, it doesn't. I've tried it before. It did squat. Nothing."

"Well, maybe if the gear's thrusters were altered somehow, then it might actually make a difference doing that."

"How?"

"Don't ask him that. Last time he tried to explain that stuff, my head went spinning."

Tails started laughing at the memory. The others joined in as well, minus Shadow, which was when Tails noticed Sonica standing in the doorway. The fox eagerly motioned for her to come over.

"Hey, guys," she greeted as she approached the group. "How's it goin'?"

"Hey there, blue." Knux directed his attention from emerald to cobalt.

"Hey, Faker," Shadow greeted his mate, kissing her left temple as he wrapped his arm around her waist, pulling her closer. "Your brother seems to think doing some weird trick makes you go faster. Tell him he's wrong." He switched his gaze to the green hedgehog, who simply rolled his eyes.

Sonica thought for a moment. The hybrid forgot to actually tell her what the trick was, but it clicked almost immediately. "Oh! I know which one you're talking about. It had something to do with sticking close to the ground so there's more proportion pushing against the ground?"

"Yep. That's the one." He sent a smirk over to the echidna. A smirk that switched places when she spoke again.

"Won't work with Extreme Gear."

"What?" Manic's head shot toward the hedgehog, his bangs flying everywhere. "You saw me do it!"

"With your hoverboard." Sonica made sure to emphasize the last words. "Extreme Gear is a bit different. And before you try to say I haven't tried it," she added as she saw her brother start to protest. "I did. I tried it in one of my first races."

Chuckling softly at her brother's defeated expression, she turned to her best friend. "What time is it?"

"About noon."

"Noon?" the blue sow asked, startled. "Felt more like minutes."

"You must have really been out," Knuckles speculated, still giving Manic a triumphant smirk.

"You must be hungry. Care for some cucumber sandwiches?" Professor Pickle called from his seat with Sonia.

"No thanks," the pregnant hedgehog politely declined. "Actually I was thinking about heading out. I can just get something in the city."

Before anyone could answer, she rushed out the door, leaving only a blue trail and a gust of wind that didn't help the already messy room.

"I think I'll go with her." His words surprised the three hedgehogs left in the room. Knuckles, however, could see the reasoning.

"Why's that, TT?" Manic asked, calling him by the nickname he had coined for the two-tailed fox.

"I think I know what she's up to. I think she might need some help."

"And that is…?" Sonia prompted.

"She's looking for a friend of ours. We haven't seen him in a while though." The kitsune turned to the door. "I better head out or I'll never be able to catch her." He smiled, half-heartedly as the group noticed. "Later."

He zoomed out the door in pursuit of the blue blur, leaving a smaller mess behind than the previous.

"Uh." The three looked at Knuckles, who simply shrugged. Of course, he knew what they were doing. He and Professor Pickle both. But he didn't let on that he knew. That was part of the story Sonica was going to tell. And he really shouldn't give them spoilers.

It took a bit to track down the blue heroine, but he finally found her in a small plaza, sitting on one of the benches, her hand resting on her eyes. So when Tails came up to her, she jumped about five feet into the air. "You okay there, Sonica?"

"Yeah," she replied upon landing. "Just trying to figure out where to start." She looked up, a quizzical look in her eyes. "You know what I'm talking about right?"

"Yep." He plopped down on the bench next to his older sister. "You're looking for Chip."

"On the money, pal." Sonica leaned back, staring out into the clouds. "And I thought we'd never see him again."

"Me too," Tails agreed. "But our lives seem to like to prove us wrong a lot."

"Or try to kill us."

"Or tend to be very ironic."

"Our lives are a lot of things," the hedgehog laughed, breaking the streak of 'our lives seem to'. "I don't mind though. Keeps me from gettin' bored."

The cub laughed along with his friend. His life definitely was a lot of things, but boring was far from fitting the description.

He stopped, however, when he noticed that Sonica had stopped laughing and was looking down into her lap, an unreadable expression painting her face.

"That's not the only reason I'm out here," she mumbled.

"And what would be the other?" Tails questioned, although he felt he knew the answer.

"I'm building courage. I'm scared that they'll freak out or worry too much. And what'll Shadow think?" A small smile formed, but much like the one Tails had given at the university, it was only half-hearted. "The biggest hero on Mobius, who rides on missiles like they were surfboards and mocks the man controlling a deadly machine trying to kill her, and even laughing at death itself, can't get the nerve to tell her brother, sister, and husband about some stupid transformation."

Tails stared at her for a moment. He was the only one who could get something like this out of the hedgehog. And he knew how to deal with it too. "It'll be fine, Sonica. They'll understand." Sonica gave him a sidelong glance, but said nothing.

"They kept asking me about your weird behavior lately. They're as stubborn as you," he added, giving the sow an accusing glare.

"Take that up with my parents, not me," she chuckled, a real smile lighting her face. "It must run in the family." Tails simply rolled his eyes at her remark. "All right, I'll tell them." Tails' eyes darted from the sky back to Sonica. "I'll do it when we get back there. I did come out here to find Chip too."

Tails grinned to himself. 'Guess my little pep talk really did work.'

A couple hours later, the two walked back into the office empty-handed. They had looked at the windmill the two had first met at, the ice cream stand, and other places Sonica had run off to.

The four Mobians were having a quiet conversation while the professor was nowhere to be seen.

Sonica waved at her mate and siblings to catch their attention and pointed out the door, indicating that she needed to talk to them. Alone.

Sonica stood in the hallway waiting for them for a few seconds that felt like hours to her. She rapidly tapped on her communicator, a habit she had started when she was nervous or getting impatient, but couldn't tap her foot.

Shadow appeared first, followed by Sonia and Manic, all looking very worried.

"What's up, sis?"

"There's something I need to tell you guys," she began. Not the best start, but it would have to do.

"We're all ears." Shadow's ears perked and Sonia placed her hands behind her back, ready for what she predicted to be a very long story.

And she would've been right if there hadn't been a large boom outside, followed by maniacal laughter. All-too-familiar maniacal laughter.

"You have got to be kidding me."

Sonica was outside in three seconds flat, shortly followed by her mate, siblings, and friend. Just as they thought, Egghead was outside with a brand new robot. The villains seem to always know how to interrupt anything important.

Eggman was piloting from the top of the robot's beak with the fur on the end of its tail touching the back of the Eggmobile. Eggman's new robot was a griffin. That thing with the body, tail, and back legs of a lion but the head, wings, and front talons of an eagle. When would Eggman run out of robot ideas?

The eagle parts of the robot were painted black with red details of different hieroglyphs. That seemed kind of pointless to Sonica. The eyes were empty red sockets that weren't even glowing. The lion parts were an orange-red; the only decal was an oversized eye on its thigh.

To Sonica, this was just a new challenge waiting to become scrap metal. "Hey, Eggy!" The doctor immediately turned to the hedgehog, fury and surprise mixed onto his face. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Collecting power of course." He acted like it was obvious, but none of his audience seemed to understand, giving blank looks to the mad doctor. "If you haven't noticed, Dark Gaia has reawakened and so has his energy. It's the perfect chance to take power for my Eggman Land."

"Eggman Land?"

"Why do it here?" Sonica really didn't want to deal with this. She was already having a bad day as it was. Chip was nowhere to be found, she had to tell her family that she turns into a huge monster at night, and now this, not to mention her pregnancy hormones making her easily agitated. "It's not like this is the only place where his power is leaking. You're not being very inconspicuous doing it in a highly populated city."

"Perhaps, but this spot is a key escape route for the energy." Seeing the clueless stare he was getting from the hedgehog he simplified it. "This is a 'hot-spot', per sé, for the energy. Most of his power is flowing into this area."

"Just our luck."

"Hmph. Well," The robot turned its head toward the group, eyes glowing. "If you plan to stop me, then you're going to have to defeat me first."

"Cause that's going to be a problem." Sonica was about to run towards the Egg Griffin when Shadow suddenly grabbed the back of her shirt, stopping her.

"Faker, you are not fighting in your condition," he whispered harshly into his mate's ear.

"Shads, it's only been two weeks since I conceived; I don't really need to start being careful for another week or two. I'll be fine," Sonica whispered back. She then disappeared, becoming a blue streak running toward the robot.

As she came closer to the griffin, the hieroglyphs started to glow a bright red brighter than its eyes. A bright electric field surrounded the machine, shielding it. Sonica's momentum, despite her best efforts to stop, pushed her right into the shield. The hedgehog flew back, skidding to a stop in front of her friends.

"Right. Stay away from the shield." The blue blur hopped up off the ground, slightly charred, and turned back to her opponent. The electric field had disappeared, but she knew that it would appear as soon as she made a move. She was going to have to play this a bit more strategically.

"Nice lightshow there, doc." Time for some stalling and, if she was lucky, information.

"It's much more than a lightshow, Sonica." Bingo. "But I don't need to explain to the likes of you." Aaaaand, lost it.

"What do you mean 'the likes of me'?" Sonica was really only half paying attention. She was constantly scanning the robot for weaknesses. That was the big flaw in his creations; they always had that one spot on them that was their undoing. "Maybe you just don't want me finding something out. Maybe that little lightshow could help me."

The expression said it all. She hit the nail on the head.

"Called it."

"Do you even know how it's supposed to help you?" Shadow whispered through clenched teeth.

"No clue," she answered honestly. "But I'll figure it out."

He didn't say anything in reply, but she could see what he was thinking in his eyes. 'You're going to get yourself killed, you know.'

The daredevil smirked, giving a wink to her mate as if saying, 'Maybe,' and raced off in a cloud of dust, annoying the hybrid in the process.

"Sonica!"

Instead of going straight toward the robot, this time, she ran around it in a circle, searching the symbols on its body. The answer had to be somewhere in that writing, but she had no clue what any of it said.

"Sonica! The top! It's the only place unprotected by the shield!"

Sonica's ears flicked upward at Knuckles' voice. Of course! Knuckles was a treasure hunter! He read more complicated writings than this on a normal basis.

"Yikes!" Okay, so maybe she should focus more on the battle.

Knuckles' yelling what she should do so that Eggman could hear him might not have been the best idea. He still got the message off. Sonica ran up the wall of a nearby building, hoping she didn't startle anyone inside, for the higher ground she needed.

Missiles whizzed by her head as she climbed higher until she was flying up into the sky. The missile to come near her next was quickly turned into an Extreme Gear as she rode it down at the robot's body.

The deafening explosion ripped through the air along with the screams of promised revenge on the blue hedgehog, but she didn't hear it. She was too busy being flung back through the air, flipping head over heels.

"Sonica!"

"Come on! Let's go!"