Speedy's note: A little timeline note for this story is in order, also because it's based on assumptions and some headcanon on my part. It is set somewhere between "Sonic 3 and Knuckles" and "Sonic Adventure", and assumes that Sonic and Tails would occasionally visit Knuckles. Not only the characters look a little more grown up in "SA1", but also their interactions have changed. At the end of "Sonic 3", they're stuck at the tentative "so you're not the enemy after all", whereas in "SA1" they interact with some measure of familiarity, if not anywhere near the best pals thing they have going come "Sonic Heroes" and in the "Sonic Riders" games.
This story is one of the little gap fillers, a short little moment, slotting in somewhere along the way from "you're not the enemy" to "I might just kinda consider you friends (but I'm also so insecure about it that I let Eggman trick me)", though the latter primarily on Knuckles' part. ;-)

Bird's Eye View

This year came with a rather good harvest of grapes, Knuckles was pleased to notice, overlooking the full bags that sat in the shade of a tree. He had not expected anything good to come from this chaos of a year, not after he'd spent so much time of it ridding the various zones of the island of Eggman's robots and machines. His biggest and best vineyard was lost with Sky Sanctuary Zone, but the yards on the black slopes near Lava Reef had grown well this year. A good number of the fruits remained on the vines; some would stay there as food for the various animals that also liked them, and some for himself to pick later in autumn. The collection he had already picked he would bring down the hills to dry for the winter.

He grinned to himself. He would also eat some today. And tomorrow. And the day after. He'd already been tempted to put some of his favourite fruits into his mouth instead of into the bags while picking, but you didn't carry things downhill well with a full stomach.

After all the madness that had happened recently, Knuckles was glad for the simplicity of picking grapes and overlooking the island from up here. A few days without worrying about Emerald thieves or people betraying him or other people turning out to not be what he thought them to be.

Knuckles picked up one of the bags and slung it over his shoulders, starting out along a small, winding path downhill.

He'd walked for half an hour when a sudden ripple of disturbance passed through the Great Emerald's field, sharp and warning. Intruders!

Knuckles dropped his bag to the ground and scrambled up the hill again, through the bushes next to the path and up a cliff peaking out of the forest from there. At its top, he shaded his eyes with his hand and stared into the blue sky beset with countless puffy clouds. The sun was on his back, and he should see its reflection on any aircraft coming in.

His ears caught the engine noise a second before he spotted the red gleam against the blue of sky as the craft curved out from behind a cloud and he released his breath in a short sigh of relief, safe in the knowledge nobody could see or hear it. The blue hedgehog would certainly laugh himself silly if he knew their arrival still gave him heart attacks almost half a year after they had assured him they were friends.

Knuckles didn't know about the friends thing, but by now he didn't consider them a threat anymore.

More like, an irritation. He had no idea what to make of them, or what they really wanted from him. Or why exactly they kept coming to the island. They never seemed to actually want anything. They just came, talked to him about something entirely random, or asked him to partake in some weird activity they considered fun.

Sometimes, rarely, Knuckles too found the things fun, but as often, he was mostly puzzled by them.

Sometimes, he welcomed the company. Once he'd gotten over the initial shock and irritation, that was.

And then, sometimes, he would be content to listen to their chatter. He didn't understand them, but didn't outright dislike their company either. He just had no idea how to deal with them properly, and occasionally he'd wonder if they expected something from him, something he should do and just didn't know, but if they did, they never said so, and they didn't seem to mind his social ineptitude.

Up ahead in the sky, the small red gleaming dot had grown enough that he could really see the shape of the double wings and the outline of the blue hedgehog where he stood atop the wings. It seemed an odd place to ride the craft, especially considering they were not in a fight or didn't need to fit more people than the two-seater was build for, but then again, a lot of what Sonic did didn't make much sense to Knuckles, and at the end of the day his travel habits were just one point on a long list.

The engine noise had grown to a steady whir in his ears and Knuckles watched the biplane descend, flying a low level curve around the Marble Gardens to gently sink out of sight as it landed on the grassy hills behind.

Deciding to leave his bags where they were to pick up later, Knuckles jumped off the rocks, catching the autumn breeze and gliding along on it. It was a day of steady winds today and his glide carried him far, leaving just a short distance to make on foot.

He found his visitors easily. They were pulling and shoving at their biplane, turning it into the wind and tying it in place with weights on the ground and ropes at the wings and tail.

Knuckles watched from atop a hill. It was clear they had done it countless times, they were efficient in working together while chatting amiably about entirely unrelated, seemingly random topics.

It took less than a minute until the hedgehog, as always straying glances and attention, spotted Knuckles, and he waved an arm in greeting. "Hey, Knuckles!"

Tails peaked out from behind the plane, also waving, if possible even more wildly than Sonic. "Hello! Hello, Knuckles!"

The echidna slowly made his way down to their parking spot, opting for a nod in greeting instead of the wild gesturing. "Sonic, Tails."

Apparently satisfied with their work, or sufficiently distracted by his arrival, the other two met him halfway.

"Do you have surveillance around here? You always turn up right where we are. It's kinda cool, and kinda creepy." Sonic was grinning as he spoke, looking Knuckles up and down. "How're you doing?"

"Fine," Knuckles said, skipping over the first part of Sonic's speech. He didn't seem to expect answers to many of the things he said, which was kind of good, because he said things so quickly Knuckles had no chance to keep up with more than half of it on a good day.

How he was doing seemed to be one of their primary concerns, or it was part of being friendly, Knuckles hadn't entirely figured that out yet. Then again, he hadn't figured out what drove them up here in the first place, so he apparently had a lot of figuring out left to do as it was.

Tails was eyeing him somewhat expectantly without saying anything, and Knuckles frowned.

"Come on, say it, before it comes out and eats you." Sonic grinned.

Knuckles glared at him, but he complied anyway. "What are you doing here?"

Sonic elbowed Tails. "Told ya!"

"Okay, you win, fine." The little fox looked annoyed for a second, but then the blue eyes lit up. "But you prompted him; that totally doesn't count!"

"He was getting ready to say it anyway," Sonic insisted with a shrug.

"Are you going to answer me, Sonic?", Knuckles interrupted.

The hedgehog turned back to him. "Sorry." He was laughing even as he spoke. "We were out flying in the Tornado when we spotted your island; we didn't plan to come here, but it looked really pretty with the sun and clouds, so we flew over to look, and then we decided we might as well come and say hi."

Knuckles was by now getting used to the latter notion, and he was developing a habit of questioning it whenever he got the chance - "Well, you said it, now what do you want?" - but this time, he was too caught up wondering about the hedgehog's choice of words, also not a first time experience anymore.

'Pretty', he'd said. Knuckles could think of a lot of words to describe Angel Island, this floating sanctuary in the sky, refuge among the clouds, and the very place he belonged. Some of them translated badly into the surface people's language, other, more fitting ones he probably didn't know, the island too unique, too special and so utterly unlike any other place.

Sonic... Sonic just said 'pretty'. It seemed an utterly insufficient term.

"Pretty," he repeated it aloud, more to himself than to the others, testing its feel on his tongue and the sound of it as it left his mouth, softer, musing, not as quick and simple as when Sonic had said it.

"Well, yeah, it's really cool," Sonic remarked, taking Knuckles' repetition as questioning his words for their superficial content instead of the deeper meaning he'd stumbled over.

"Really awesome," Tails apparently felt compelled to add, with bright enthusiasm in his blue eyes and excitedly wagging double tails.

Knuckles was still unsure of what kind of reply was expected of him now when Sonic's ears suddenly tipped straight up and the green eyes fixed on the guardian.

"You've never seen it," he said. It was worded somewhat like a question, but not quite, and Knuckles blinked.

"What?"

Sonic waved an arm around. "Your island. You've never seen it."

Knuckles frowned. Sometimes, Sonic would say something ridiculous, and Knuckles was sure he did it to rile him up, and now seemed to be such a time. "I see it all the time, Sonic," he growled, irritated at being played with.

But Sonic lifted both hands in a gesture of innocence. "Easy, I'm not trying to insult you or something, Knux."

"Knuckles," he corrected, an automatism by now. Sonic threw around nicknames and the like on whims, it seemed, although this newest one was less irritating than previous ones he'd come up with. "Then tell me what you want, Sonic."

He'd thought he was getting gradually better at dealing with them and at understanding their behaviour. Apparently he was not.

"I think you should come with us and see it," Sonic said. "Your island, as it floats in the sky, I mean."

Knuckles crossed his arms on his chest. "We've been there; I'm not going to leave the island and Emerald unguarded just for some trip to the surface with you."

"But it's not about going to the surface," Tails cut in. Obviously the little fox had no trouble whatsoever to follow Sonic's chaotic speech. "We won't have to go far, but Sonic is right, it's really cool, and you should know what it looks like! Sonic took me flying over our home when we met, so I know what it looks like, so I know what we were fighting for." He was gesticulating agitatedly now, speaking with all the heavy importance of childhood.

Knuckles blinked at him, unsure how to respond. He looked at Sonic instead. "We don't have to go far? I can't do that."

The blue hedgehog smiled. "Nah, it won't take long and we won't go far, promise."

Well, maybe he could humour them this once? Knuckles nodded. "Okay then."

Sonic and Tails celebrated his agreement with a mutual whoop and a gesture he had learned recently was a high-five, before running off to untie their plane.

Knuckles moved to help them, a small smile on his face. He wasn't even sure what exactly had brought it on.

They were in the air quickly, Sonic back up there on the wings, Knuckles in the backseat, and Tails bringing the biplane up, first low over the hills, then climbing as he circled the island so they could look at the white peaks and glaciers at eye level, then straight over the volcano crater, the familiar thermals above its heat a shaky bumpiness to the Tornado's wings.

Eventually, Tails turned the plane to move away from the island, heading out into the clouds that surrounded it, and finally, he turned so the island was off to the side.

Knuckles stared. He'd seen his island from above, or, at least, he'd seen it from the highest peaks of the mountains in its center. He'd seen it from Sky Sanctuary Zone, too, before it fell apart, and occasionally he'd catch the updrafts and thermal winds over the crater of Lava Reef and use its lift to glide up and high over the island.

But this... This was nothing like it. At first, after the takeoff, it was like gliding down from the summits and looking down. Now... It didn't compare.

They were no longer over the island, but circling it in a wide sweeping arc, at almost the same level but gently curving away; Knuckles could feel it more than see it, the tug of distance between himself and the Master Emerald, a light, almost gentle pull. It wasn't like when Eggman had stolen it and taken it to space, not harsh and painful. There was no danger now, the Emerald was safe, he was safe, and they were still flying quite close to the island. Easily close enough to reach out to the Emerald power should need be.

But there wasn't, and the red echidna watched, mesmerised, as the Tornado circled his home. It looked tiny from the distance, a vibrantly colourful enclave of life in the endless, wide field of sky and clouds.

Tails pulled the plane up, the motion of the craft settling into its new level registered as a lightness in Knuckles' stomach familiar from gliding, and up ahead in the sky, the change of position made the sun move from its place between the clouds to fall behind the shape of Angel Island, and it turned the island into a sharp dark shadow with a blinding bright halo all around, and glowing white clouds swirling around its base.

Knuckles gaped. He'd not imagined it like this, had had no idea what the Floating Island would look like from afar, and it was breathtaking. Stunning. Magical. Beautiful.

"Now what do you say, Knux? Told ya it's pretty, didn't I?"

Knuckles didn't turn away from the view of his home, levitating among the clouds and sunlight, but he could hear the grin in Sonic's tone of voice, and he himself was smiling, too. "You did," he allowed. "And you were right." With effort, he tore his gaze away from the Floating Island to look at Sonic up on the wing. "Thank you."

The hedgehog smiled, spines windswept and eyes shining in the afternoon sunlight. In the pilot seat, Tails span round to face Knuckles, grinning in obvious happiness, and they chorused their response as if they'd practiced. "You're welcome!"