Chapter One: Blaze's Palace, it begins


"Your highness, you have a visitor."

Blaze the Cat finished putting on her makeup and turned around to face her servant, "Who is it?"

"It's Silver the Hedgehog your highness."

"Let him in please."

"Yes your highness." The servant bowed and made her way out, Blaze rolled her eyes, she couldn't stand everyone calling her "highness", but, being a princess did have it's perks. She looked around at her massive room and queen sized bed, it was all purple of course.

"Blaze!" The familiar voice came from the door, and Silver ran towards her with his arms out, however. he didn't expect her to move out of the way. "Ouch!" Silver yelped as he fell into the wall, his head fell on the mat beneath Blaze's feet. "Hi." He said simply.

Blaze raised an eyebrow, "You feel like getting up anytime soon?"

"Nah." Silver grinned, "Besides, I like the view."

Blaze paused for a moment, then realised what he meant. "Silver!" She shrieked and jumped away from him. Silver laughed as he got up. "What are you here for anyway?"

"Oh, that." His smile faded as he remembered, "Marine sent me, she said... erm..."

"What? What is it?" Blaze showed no emotion in her face, but was growing nervous.

"The jeweled scepter's been stolen."

"What!? How!?" Blaze's hands set on fire as she shrieked in fear and rage. "The jeweled scepter is in a locked safe, underground, with tons of gaurds and only I, Marine, Sonic and Tails know the code for her safe!"

"Was." Silver corrected her matter-of-factly

"Yes, Silver, was." The lillac feline rubbed her head, "Why didn't Marine tell me herself?"

"She tried to," Silver smirked as he said this, "but, the gaurds wouldn't let her in, then she verbally assaulted one of them and got thrown out."

"When will that kid learn!?" Blaze put her coat on and made for the door.

"Where are you going?" Silver shouted after her.

"Where do you think!?"

Silver sighed and ran after her.

It was a couple of hours before the two reached Marine's island, "Did I ever mention how sweet it was that you could get a helicopter on demand?" Silver kept glancing at the awesome machine with a grin as they walked towards Marine's house.

"You could stand to mention it more often," Blaze said this with a grin, as she was thinking before, being a princess did have it's perks.

"G'day cobbers!" Marine answered the door with her usual cheery aussie accent.

"Marine, what happened to the scepter?" the raccoon's grin faded, she sensed the seriousness in Blaze's voice.

"Well... 'e took it didn'e?" Marine raised an eyebrow, "I dan't know much else."

"Who, Marine, who took it?" Blaze was doing her best not to get mad at the twelve year old.

"It was that Eggman guy."

"Nega?"

"That's the blighter!"

"Uugh! What does he want now!?"

"Blaze, temper," Silver chipped in, "Don't get-"

"Who asked you!?" Blaze's hands set on fire again.

"Chill out Blaze." he put his hand on her shoulder, then quickly recoiled from the heat.

Blaze took a deep breath, and held back her emotions - as usual. She then sighed, her moment or tranquility didn't last for long when she remembered:

"The Sol Emeralds!" She shouted so loud she made Marine and Silver jump.

"What?" Silver asked, clutching his chest from the shock. He then found himself being dragged by his back quill. "Owowowow! Where are we going?"

"Where do you think!?"

"Hold on mates! Oi'm camin' too!" Marine dashed after them.

Within a couple of hours they were at the palace, in the room where the Sol Emeralds were kept underground, Blaze punched in a code on the wall and a number of locks unbolted, the foot-thick steel door infront of them rose. All three sighed in relief as the seven glistening gems came into view. "Erm...Blaze?" Marine's voice came nervously from outside.

"Can this wait Mar-" Blaze's eyes shot wide open as she turned around and saw what the raccoon had her eyes glued to. The sky was slowly changing to a dark, red colour over the city of Soleanna. Strange, black and red creatures fell from the sky, it wasn't long before the screams of terrified citizens could be heard.

"What the hell's going on!?" Silver looked terrified as he walked out of the room to join them.

"How should I know?" Blaze was sick of him always looking to her for answers.

"You always know!"

"Well not this time!" Blaze was getting stressed again, then she thought to herself for a moment, "I can think of someone who might know..." she grabbed a Sol Emerald, "Please work! Chaos control!" a spark flew from the emerald, but then nothing.

"Blaze? Help here?" Silver shouted as he fended off one of the black creatures with a piece of the metal door, it was knocked away pretty quickly. "Soon!?"

Blaze concentrated, "Chaos...control!". Nothing.

"Let me try it!" Silver picked up the monster with his telekinesis and threw it backward, "That'll buy us some time."

"You've never even held one of them!" as Blaze said this the emerald was snatched from her hand, she had never seen Silver act so serious.

"It's worth a try. Hold that... thing off!" Silver had no idea how to do this, but it felt almost as though he had done it before. "Chaos control!" Silver closed his eyes and focused his energy. A small spark flew from the emerald.

"Oh well done ya nutter!" Marine piped up, "Na what're we gonna- What the-!?"

All three were engulfed in a green light, then there was silence.

Blaze then felt her head fall against grass, she rubbed her head before opening her eyes and then looked up to see Silver and Marine rubbing thier backsides. They were in a forest of some sort.

"Need to practice yer landing mate." Marine said jokingly as she stood up. Silver just glared.

"Where are we?" he said.

"Blaze!" A familiar voice came from above them, Blaze looked up to see the cobalt hedgehog, sitting on a tree branch with one eye open.

"Who're you?" Silver asked, looking up questioningly.

Sonic seemed taken aback by not being recognised, but grinned anyway, "The names Sonic, Sonic the Hedgehog!"

Blaze let out a small smile, she'd been dying to see Sonic again, she had thought she would maybe never set her eyes on him again, "Still the usual introduction I see."

"As always." Sonic jumped down and gave her a hug, "It's good to see you. So, what's the occasion?"



Chapter Two: Tearing at the seems



As Blaze explained to Sonic, he nodded his head slowly, and paused to think once she had done. "No idea," he said blankly.

"Yer flippin' what!?" Marine made Sonic jump, he hadn't noticed her before.

"Tails might know more." he turned back to Blaze, "I'll be back in a sec." then, in a barrage of dust, Sonic was off, leaving Blaze stood in the middle of nowhere with her eyebrow raised.

"Oh great." Silver sighed, "What now?"

"We wait." Blaze walked over to a tree and leaned against it, closing her eyes.

"What?" Silver pouted, "We could be waiting for hours! I mean how fast could he b-?"

"Back!" the blue blur kicked up dust as he sped past and grinded to a hault, with Tails holding on to his arm.

"Tails!" Marine shrieked, loudly as always and gave the kitsune a hug.

"Sorry, Marine can it wait for a sec?" Tails pulled himself away from her and stumbled behind a tree, then throwing up. "I'm still not used to that..." He pulled himself up, "Couldn't we have gone a little slower?"

"Me?" Sonic laughed, "No way! We couldn't make Blaze wait!" he winked at her.

"Anyway," Blaze said as she stepped forward, "Do you think you can tell us what's going on?"

"You'd have to tell me first, Blaze." Tails replied.

"Oh, of course." Blaze recalled the events of the day the best she could, with each word she saw Tails face grow further fearful, when she finished the look on Tails' face could be described only as mortified.

"This is bad." he put his hand over his mouth, "This is very, very bad. Nega has done it this time..."

"What?" Sonic, Blaze, Silver and Marine said in unison.

"Tails." Sonic was staying calm for his friend, "Explain."

Tails turned to Sonic, and took a deep breath. "Last time we came here, you and Blaze turned to your super forms using the power of the Sol and Chaos Emeralds, when you recovered the jewelled sceptor, you left behind a residue of energy from both sets of emeralds. When Eggman Nega used the sceptor, this activated the energy and thus joined the two universes together, the black creatures Blaze, Silver and Marine saw were from our universe's past.

"Hold on Tails," Blaze raised an eyebrow at the fox. "We've travelled to each other's universe before, and nothing's happened."

Tails bent down and picked up a stick, "Imagine this stick, as space and time." he smacked the stick against the nearest tree. "Each time we travel through it, it weakens," He smacked the stick again, "Untill..." on the third hit the stick broke in half. There was a pause if shock.

"So where will all this end up?" Blaze asked.

"Where do you think?" Tails threw the stick away and leaned against a tree, closing his eyes. "All our enemies from all of our past could appear," He opened them and gave Sonic a look that made him feel morbid; "Space and time are tearing at the seems."

"Ah well," Sonic grinned and stuck his thumb up, "I've not seen any action in a couple of months!"

"You think you can stop this?" Blaze raised her eyebrow as Sonic gave her a warm smile.

"Well, with your help of course!" He put his arm around her, making her blush slightly.

"If I can get the sceptor to my workshop, I'll probably be able to fix it." Sonic's optimism seemed to cheer Tails up.

"Er, guys? D'you hear somethin'?" Marine looked behind the group and shrieked; "Look out!" It was too little, too late, the tidal wave speeding towards them was about twenty feet high. "Why did it have to be water?" Sonic and Blaze sighed at the same time. Both Silver and Tails managed to fly high enough in time, but Sonic, Blaze and Marine were washed away.

After shouting for his lost friends, Tails looked over the horizon, and saw what he had feared most; Perfect Chaos was in the distance, coming thier way. Fast.

As Sonic was being washed away, he managed to grasp onto a nearby rock, Marine was out of sight, but he saw Blaze not far away, she couldn't seem to swim either. He kicked off of the rock, and grabbed her, then did a poor attempt at a dog paddle which was just enough to find a tree branch to grab onto. He held onto Blaze with the other hand, but the current was strong. A tree-rattling roar from the distance confirmed what he thought; it was Perfect Chaos all over again, but this time, he had no emeralds.

"Sonic!" The lilac feline's voice came from behind him, "Let go of me! You could make it up the tree on your own."

"No way! You'll drown!" Sonic shouted back, over the sound of the water and collapsing trees.

"That's better than both of us!" She replied.

"The hell it is!" Sonic summoned what was left of his strength to pull Blaze up, untill she could grab the branch herself. He then, to Blaze's terror, let go. "What're you doing!?" she shrieked.

"That thing will come after me." Sonic replied calmly, "Good bye, Blaze."

"No! NO!" Blaze let go and managed to grab him, she held on, despite him trying to push her to the side.

"What are you doing!?" Sonic managed to shout, just keeping his head above the water.

"I'm not losing you again!" she managed to shout back, at this, he let her hold onto him, and held back. Despite knowing they were about to die, both had never felt so secure, however, neither knew why they felt this way.

Now the only question was whether they would be killed by Perfect Chaos, or drown first.

"Seen them yet!?" Tails shouted to Silver, who was about fifty metres away.

"No, I can't find them!" Silver shouted back. Perfect Chaos had already passed them, they were safe. Less could be said for their three lost friends, however.



Chapter 3:Perfect Chaos ensues



"Well...Blaze," Sonic spluttered, barely able to keep his head above the water, "It's been good."

"It has," Blaze managed to reply, she held onto him tightly, as the two fell under the water for the last time, they were both out of energy. They both knew this was it.

Then, everything happened suddenly, a hand grabbed onto Blaze's collar and pulled her head out of the water, and Sonic with her.

"Y'alroight guys?"Marine's cheery voice was music to their ears, she managed to pull them onto her jet ski.

"Marine?" Blaze choked, "How did you-?" she pointed to the machine.

"It folds up mate." Marine announced proudly.

"We can marvel over it later, look behind us!" Sonic shouted, then coughed again.

"Alroight ma- Whoa!" Marine pushed the accelerator just in time to avoid Perfect Chaos' giant tentacle, which completely destroyed the place where they were a millisecond later.

"Can't this thing go any faster!?" Sonic shouted over the combined roar of the engine and the sound of rushing water.

"Not with three bladdy people on it!" Marine shouted back, clearly stressed as she dodged an energy blast by a few inches, Blaze was trying to shoot fire balls at Perfect Chaos but the recent drenching she had got was not helping. Then, without warning, a whirlpool rose infront of them, resulting in a scream from Sonic and Blaze, Marine, however, just grinned. Spinning around the outside of the rapid water, she used it to gain a boost in speed, and sped out of it faster than ever, leaving even Sonic wondering how she could be so bold. "Yahoo!" The raccoon was actually enjoying this, however she was enjoying it less so, when the monster caught up with ease. "Got any tricks left!?" Sonic's voice was heard from the back, he was clinging for his life and holding onto Blaze too.

"Just one!" Marine grinned once again, this did not reassure Blaze. She flicked up a cover to reveal a shiny, black button, then hesitated before pushing it quickly. Blaze felt the whole machine jolt forward, and two, wings, she thought, emerged from the sides. Her eyes widened in terror.

"Marine! No! You said it wasn't ready!"

"I said it wasn't tested." She corrected Blaze and turned back around.

"Well there's a time and a place!"

"Like now!" Marine grabbed a lever and pulled it back with all of her might, she heard Sonic and Blaze yelp and the jet ski rose into the air, just in time to avoid another swipe from Perfect Chaos. "We're gonna make it!" Marine jumped up and down like an excited child, well, she was an excited child, "We're gonna actually make i-" the machine began to stutter, leaving Marine looking irritated, "Shi-"

"Marine!" Sonic and Blaze stopped her simultaniously, then focused on bracing for impact as the machine fell towards the water. Blaze closed her eyes and for the third time that day, knew she was about to die. That was untill she felt herself being lifted up, she opened her eyes to see herself floating in mid air, looking around she saw Sonic and Marine, with equally puzzled expressions.

She then felt herself being pulled, eventually into what she recognised as Tails' plane, the Tornado. "You ok guys?" Silver dropped them in and they managed to squeeze in, "Never better!" Sonic replied, with sarcasm in his voice. Blaze just nodded and Marine grinned; "G'day beastie!" She shouted out of the back as they flew out of Perfect Chaos' reach.

"Er, Marine?" Tails turned around from the controls, "Don't make this any worse please."

"Foine," Marine pouted.

"I think to solve this we need to get back to Blaze's universe," Tails flicked the autopilot switch and turned back to the others, "Anyone have a Chaos Emerald?"

All four passengers shrugged, then Sonic said; "I think I know where all seven are though..."

"Where?"

"Where do you think?" Sonic pointed backwards.

"Aw." Tails put his head down, "How could I forget?"

"Won't a Sol Emerald work?" Silver held up the red emerald that he had used to teleport them here.

"No," Tails sighed, "only the attraction between the different sets of emeralds is enough to travel through universes on demand." he added.

"Well," Sonic paused, "Do you have a plan?"

Tails slowly shook his head, "Things are looking grim."

"Aw! Cheer up cobber!" Marine put her arm around the golden kit, "We'll do it somehow roight?"

"I dunno Marine..." He put his head on her shoulder, "I dunno."

There was a long pause, everyone was stuck for words. Sonic eventually found two:

"Look out!" He shouted, a millisecond before something smashed into the plane, taking off the right wing. Sonic would recognise that blue blur anywhere. "Tails, I gotta take this." He climbed out of the plane and Tails nodded.

"I think I can still land this, but one more hit and we're done for!"

Sonic nodded back, and waited for the next strike. It came at what seemed like light speed. But Sonic was quicker than that, he kicked the blue blur as hard as he could and smashed it into the ground, luckily Tails was flying pretty low, but the kick still hurt his foot. "Aagh... What're you made of? Metal?" He rubbed his foot and then quickly rolled out of the way of Metal Sonic's third attack, but the robot spun around and kicked him in the stomach. Hard. The next was a blow to the head, whick sent him flying into a building, he had forgotten how hard this was.

Just before the final, lethal hit came, Sonic's savior came in the form of a fire ball, aimed with perfect accuracy, the blaze sent the robot flying back. Metal Sonic then rose into the air, and flew at great speed into a the nearest building, bursting out of the other side. Sonic looked up dizzily, his mouth was bleeding and his vision was slighty blurry, he could still make out the figures of Blaze and Silver, Blaze put her arm around him, supporting most of his weight and took him back to the Tornado, while Silver finished off Metal Sonic. He could make out Tails' voice as he came into view, "Well, the Tornado is shot, but, there are plenty of abandoned buildings here, we should rest for the night." he said.

Blaze nodded, and informed Silver as he came around the corner, brushing himself down. The three searched for somewhere suitable, leaving the somewhat delerious Sonic in the care of Marine.




Chapter Four: Too much thinking




The entire town seemed abandoned, the combination of the black creatures and the flood must have left everyone who hadn't fled in time dead, therefore, it took only a few hours to find a suitable house, it wasn't too big so as to not be conspicuous, but had enough room for all five to stay overnight.

Sonic was beggining to regain some sense after the hit from Metal Sonic, and looked to Tails, he was sifting through a pile of rubble and had been doing for the past couple of hours. Sonic's eyes trailed away to the skyline, it was getting dark. "What are you doing Tails?"

The kitsune turned to the cobalt hedgehog, "Looking for something suitable to work with, the Tornado only has a broken wing, so if I find a good piece of metal I can cut and fix it with the tools on the plane," He turned around, "I wonder if wood would even work..."

Tails started to mutter to himself. So Sonic's mind cast itself to other places. He wondered how Shadow was doing in all of this mess, Knuckles, Amy even! He prayed for Amy's safety, she couldn't defend herself much, and despite the fact that she was indeed an annoying little fan girl, Sonic would never forgive himself if she got herself hurt, and Blaze. Blaze. Such a beautiful name, he thought, uttering it once or twice - he shut up when he accidentally caught Tails' attention. He did indeed have many, many things to think about. It was going to be a long night, providing that they wouldn't be attacked. Sonic even almost scared himself thinking of what else was perhaps about to fall through the tear in time. The thought of any of his friends getting hurt sickened him, and what sickened him further was the fact that he could do nothing - nothing to protect them.

His mind directed itself to Blaze again, despite him trying to shake this feeling off. How long had it been? Two years? Almost every day his heart had ached, still, he could atleast protect her if no one else, the one most important to him.

Finally shaking away these wretched thoughts, Sonic made his way into the house that they were staying in for the night, and sat down in the front room across from Blaze, who was watching T.V. Forgetting himself, he stared at her for a few moments, his mind trailed back to earlier that day: "I'm not losing you again!" Why did Blaze take such a great risk? She knew she would almost definately die. What made her do it?

She loves you.

No. No, a commoner like you? She's a princess! Get real.

Why else would she do what she did?

She wasn't thinking rationall-

Because she is in love.

...

Sonic brought himself back to the real world, and realised that Blaze was staring back at him. He panicked, quickly coughing and turning back to the T.V.

Blaze herself, had a raging battle going on within the confines of her own mind, as Sonic came in, she was thinking of her future, seperated by an entire universe, how could a relationship be possible? In a year or two, she was to be betrothed - to who, she didn't know - but at that particular moment, that meant nothing. She sighed and looked up, gathering her thoughts just in time to see Sonic panic and turn away, her mind drifted away again, despite her best efforts:

See! See! He does like you! Look how he reacted when he saw you!

Maybe that means he doesn't like you...

No! Remember what he said yesterday?:

"No way! You'll drown!"

"That's better than both of us!"

"The hell it is!"

He tried to sacrifice himself to save you!

That doesn't mean he loves you, he was just being his normal, heroic, amazing self...

Blaze sighed and smiled to herself, before coming back to the real world, Sonic was watching the T.V. "Blaze?" He said to her in a stern voice.

"Hmm?"

"Remember what you did before? After I let go of the branch?" He looked at her.

"Er... Yes.."

Blaze could swear she could see a tear gathering in the hedgehog's eye, he shook it off and then carried on.

"Don't ever, ever do something that stupid, or dangerous, again. Please."

Blaze paused, holding back her own tears, she did this well. "You would have died for me."

Sonic looked up, and his eyes were back to watering slightly; "A thousand times over."

Silence filled the room. It was a few seconds before Sonic spoke up again.

"When... if we get through this... stay here."

"Here?"

"In this dimension... with me." Sonic stood up and sat next to Blaze.

"Why?" Blaze's lip quivered.

"Blaze... I-"

"Sonic!" Tails walked into the room, the twelve year old was completely oblivious to what was going on, and explained to Sonic: "I've found the right parts for the wing, I'll fix it tommorow. There are two rooms upstairs by the way, two beds in each. We can share a room, the girls can go in the other, and Silver's agreed to sleep down here. You coming?"

Sonic looked at Blaze, and then turned to Tails, his nerves got the better of him for the first time in his life. "Y-yeah, ok... goodnight... Blaze" He hesitated before following his friend upstairs. Blaze was left sat on the couch, she sat for a few seconds, thinking about nothing. Every emotion inside of her wanted her to cry out. No. She was a princess. She was better than that. She stood up shakily and made her way up to her room, where Marine was already asleep. Letting Silver finally come in and get on the couch. The grey hedgehog wasn't the smartest of mammals, and didn't notice the problem with the feline.

Blaze's saddness, no, not quite saddness, she couldn't put her finger on what it was, but it was beginning to get the better of her, tears filled her eyes as she walked into her room and put her head on hrer pillow, letting out a short moan.

This woke Marine up, she turned over quietly to see Blaze, sobbing very slightly. The raccoon didn't know what to say, so she said nothing, Tails taught her that one years back. Blaze always seemed to be able to handle things. Surely this would be no different.





Chapter Five: Daredevil stunt





Sonic woke up the next morning to the sound of a drill, turning over in his bed, he noticed Tails had gotten up. He then looked out of the window to see Tails, the wing of the Tornado was pretty much fixed, he then grunted, and decided to see if there was anything in the fridge.

"Marine!" Tails called his friend to see the plane, "This is the bit you wanted to see right?" He motioned to the underside of the wing.

"Ripper!" Marine ran over to him, abandoning her previous activity of throwing pebbles at pigeons. "How does it work?"

"Look under here." Tails climbed underneath the machine, Marine mimicking him, and pointed to the back. "This part here," he pointed to a flap at the back, "catches air underneath it, then it can move to direct air upwards or downwards, and making the plane move down or up!"

"Ah! I see!" Marine then raised an eyebrow as she saw something next to it, "Is that blue material?"

Tails looked back at her, impressed, "Yeah it is," he smiled at her, "How did you know?"

"I've been researching." she announced proudly. Marine looked back at the wing, and then to Tails again, "Why're you smilin' at me mate?"

"I was smiling? Er...sorry," Tails blushed and began to stand up, as did Marine, who slipped on some spilled oil, falling on top of Tails, who winced as he hit the floor, "Are you okay?" he asked quickly.

"Are you? Ya hit yer back pretty h-"

"I'm fine. Are you okay?"

"Never better mate." Marine blushed. Wow... you never realise how good looking a guy is untill you're an inch from 'is face.

There was a pause. It was fairly awkward. Tails was inching closer, then moving back, both were completely red in the face.

"I'll clean up that oil spill now, if that's ok..." he said slowly.

"...Sure thing." Marine climbed off of him.

Tails stood up to walk away.

I should do it… I really should. I think he wants to too… so why not?

In a lightning fast motion, Marine pulled Tails down, he fell on top of her accidentally, but she kissed him anyway, shocking Tails beyond belief. He pulled away slightly at first, but he wanted this as much as she did. He leaned in further, slowly, both were feeling amazing warmth, Marine put her arms around Tails' neck and brought him closer. Tails ran his fingers through her smooth hair. They both sighed at the same time and pulled away very slowly. Marine opened her eyes to see Tails with a warm smile on his face. The kitsune kissed her on the cheek, and kissed her again.

Marine, ovecome with joy, nearly hugged the life out of him, she let out small squeek of happiness, as Tails hugged back

"I knew you liked me." she said. Tails then looked up to see Sonic stood in the doorway, his usual cocky grin slapped upon his face. Tails jumped up, hitting his head on the plane and then uttering a swear quietly, then looking back to Sonic.

"Plane's done." He said, sounding casual - or trying to. Sonic cocked his head back slightly, still smiling, "Cool."

"Well, let's get going!" Silver walked out and jumped in the plane. Blaze following him, the split second that she glanced at Sonic could have been a year to him for what it felt like.

"So what's the plan now?" Sonic gathered his senses and looked back to Tails.

"There isn't one." Tails looked down, "We need to get atleast one chaos emerald. So I suppose we need to go back to Perfect Chaos."

Sonic looked down, deep in thought. There was no way that they could defeat the monster without the Chaos or Sol Emeralds.

"That's it!" he had a burst of inspiration. "We don't need to destroy it, we can just fly into it and steal an emerald from inside it."

Tails' expression didn't change, "That would still be near impossible."

"The key word in that sentence is near."

"I'm with Sonic." Blaze said from inside the plane. But as Sonic smiled towards her, she looked away.

Tails sighed, and after some convincing, he agreed to the daredevil stunt that Sonic had proposed.

It wasn't long before they found Perfect Chaos in the Tornado, the creature was on it's regular path of destruction, however the inhabitants of the city that it was terrorising were not screaming, they were dead. Tails squinted in disgust at the wreckage as they drew nearer and nearer. "Sonic, it hasn't noticed us yet, the emeralds are in it's head. Try and spin dash straight through and then use Chaos Control to get back here. This needs to be done quickly." As Tails said this his eyes remained glues to Chaos, his fingers were twitching, ready to abort as soon as the monster retaliated. What happened next was within a split second, but to the team it moved slower than was bearable, while the stunt worked successfully, Perfect Chaos quickly became Chaos 6, grabbing Sonic with it's tail and flinging him into the water below it before he could so much as blink.

Tails hands were moving madly, with such a mastery of the controls of his plane that even Chaos 6 could't catch him. He slowed down for a split second, letting Silver jump out to rescue Sonic. However this was all it took for the monster to swipe, taking off the tail of the Tornado, which crashed into the water. Sonic and Silver emerged as Tails, Marine and Blaze fell into the water, Chaos 6 appeared to be preparing for a final blast.

"Sonic. Hurry up there..." Silver was beggining to panic.

"Oh yeah," Sonic said casually.

Tails began panicking to; "Chaos Control soon please!"

"Chaos..." Chaos 6 blasted it's energy beam.

"...Control!" The green flash was replaced by a blast a microsecond later.

Blaze felt her face fall softly upon a cold marble floor, looking around, she recognised the place to be the Sol Emerald chamber, only it was different, it looked, well, completely destroyed. The walls were cracked and smashed, the steel door was virtually none existant. Poking her head overground, she quickly recoiled. "The palace has been taken over by those black...creatures!" she exclaimed.





Chapter Six: Storm the palace






"What're we gonna do na then!?" Marine asked - loudly.

"Marine!" Tails shouted at her in a whisper, "Volume! They're patrolling outside."

"Hehe, sorry mate." she whispered back.

"Eggman and Nega were always overly proud of themselves, I'll bet that they've taken the palace as a stronghold. I suggest we try and take it."

"That's easier said than done Tails." Sonic looked worried for one of the first times in his life, he sat down with his head in his hands.

"Who are you and what have you done with Sonic the Hedgehog?" Blaze joked. Sonic's expression didn't change.

"I'm no good, did you see me before? I'd have drowned if not for Silver! And did you see when I got my ass kicked by Metal Sonic? I sucked!"

Blaze was shocked. She walked to him and knelt down infront of him. "The Sonic the Hedgehog I know would never think that. The Sonic the Hedgehog I know, would jump at the challenge of a nintey nine percent chance of being killed!"

"Why do you care?" Sonic was still wearing the same blank expression.

Blaze paused, then said; "Because the Sonic the Hedghog I know..." she came millimeters from his face, and whispered so it was inaudible to the others, "... is the one I fell in love with."

Sonic looked up to her amber eyes and blinked twice in disbelief. "...I...I-I..."

"I know." Blaze leant on him and pressed her lips against his, he didn't resist, putting one arm behind her back and the other behind her head, she was mentally celebrating this moment, his feel, his taste, the warm aura he had- maybe that was just her, but she didn't care. She leaned in closer, pulling her body against his, pressing him against the wall, kissing him more deeply. Sonic felt her warmth crawl down his throat, wrapping his arms around her feminine form, kissing her more deeply too. A hand came up to her face and he stroked her cheek gently, every few seconds they both moved around a little, making themselves comfortable. They both even managed to ignore Silver's wolf whistling, and Tails was coughing pretty loudly, probably trying to attract thier attention, Marine had turned away, too much mushiness wasn't her thing. But niether were bothered. At that point in time, it was Sonic and Blaze, Blaze and Sonic, the only two people in the world. After about four minutes - though it felt a lot longer, which wasn't a bad thing - the two parted slowly, thier lips wet with each other's saliva. They opened thier eyes and sighed in unison. Tails coughed once more, this time getting the couple's attention. "Well if you two are done..." he said.

"Yes," Blaze rolled her eyes.

"Yup." Sonic put his arm around her.

"I don't know where they will be in the palace, so there's no need for planning, and with a combination of Sonic's speed, Blaze's pyrokinesis, Silver's telekinesis, Marine's energy blasts, and my... gun," he pulled a gun out, seemingly from nowhere, "we can-"

"Where the hell did you get that?" Silver looked stunned.

"I pulled it off the Tornado before we crashed." he said this strangely matter-of-factly, then continued, "as I was saying, we can storm the palace, retrieve the Jewelled Scepter and destroy it, so then-"

"You said a few days ago that you could fix it." Silver interrupted once more.

"It's too late for that, the hole in space and time is getting bigger," Tails explained, "so now the only way to get all of the things that came from it back, is to destroy the power source, which is-"

"The Jewelled Scepter." Silver interrupted yet again.

Tails held his gun the wrong way, and pointed it towards Silver; "Do that one more time and this goes straight up your-"

"Tails!" Blaze and Sonic shouted, Silver was frozen to the spot, and Marine was lay on the floor laughing. Then the look of anger on Tails' face quickly transformed into fear, as two armed black creatures jumped down the hole to where they were.

"We've got to go now!" Sonic yelled as he homing attacked the creatures, rendering them unconscious.

"Let's go! Hurry!" Tails shouted as he ran up to ground level, the rest of the team in hot persuit. They took down creature after creature untill they made it inside, locking most of them out. Tails ran to the first computer he saw and began to hack into it, his intellect astonished Marine as she fended off oncoming enemys with Tails' gun and her energy blasts. "Got it!" Tails announced proudly. "All comunication systems offline, they won't be able to alert their friends. I can't do much else from here, but it says that the master computer is on the top floor."

"I'll lead!" Blaze took off up the stairs, taking down anything in her path with numerous fire attacks. Sonic admired her skill for a split second, pausing to glance at her.

"Sonic!" Silver called him as he threw a monster which was about to attack him across the room, "Man, I know she's fit as but oggle another time!" Blaze heard this and glared at the grey hedgehog, recieving a mere shrug, she turned on and ran further upstairs with the other four on her heels.

With Blaze's expert navigating of her own home, they were on the top floor in no time. Taking down the two enemies inside was a sinch, but no Eggmans. "Tails, get the master-" she was interrupted.

"I'm on it. I think this will be more difficult to- oh, got it. This looks interesting." Tails hit enter, nothing happened.

"What the bladdy hell did that do?" Marine pouted, she was expecting fireworks.

"Look outside." he said.

Upon looking outside, Marine gasped, it looked like every black creature within a mile was, well, dead. Marine turned to Tails with a confused expression, he answered her question before she asked.

"Gene weapon, extremely advanced. They must have been implanted with it when the Eggmans recruited them, you can flick a switch, the gene activates, and kills them instantly."

"Why the 'eck would they 'ave that eh?" Marine looked at him in disbelief.

Tails explained, "These are creatures, they're unpredictable, my guess is that it was incase they try to rebel."

Sonic looked outside once more. "It's getting dark, will it be safe to sleep here overnight?"

"I'm pretty sure it is, I disabled the communications so the other bases won't know we're here, and even if they did then they would take untill atleast tommorow, midday to get here." Tails said this as he fiddled around with the computer some more, "Ah, I've ran a search on the Eggmans locations, it's a big database so it'll be done in a few hours for morning, one more reason to stay." Tails smiled, Sonic returned it.

It was a very big room, so they gathered five beds from throughout the palace and decided to stick together. All five got to sleep within a couple of hours, despite being worried about what was to happen tommorrow.