Amy was bored. That much she knew for certain.

Oh it was wonderful that she'd been invited along with the rest of the Freedom Fighters to the United Federation to celebrate the world coming back together. It was great that she had gotten to dress up for a formal function for the first time in forever (if ever, she'd never been invited to anything like this as far as she could recall). Heck, she was even happy for the food, what little of it that she ate.

But then...

She was slumped in her chair, nursing some punch she'd grabbed for herself about half an hour ago. Her eyes were half closed in an uncharacteristic combination of boredom and acceptance.

"I don't have anyone to talk to..." she thought to herself, "No one even really knows who I am."

She thought back to when she first came to the party... or rather "gala" as Sally kept pushing.

"Amy, it's going to be a bit different than the parties we've had in the Acorn Kingdom," she had warned, "It's going to be much more formal. Are you sure you want to go?"

"Of course I'll go!" Amy had cried, "I am every bit as grown-up and well behaved as everyone else."

"That's not what I'm saying, Amy," Sally had tried again, "Big and Cream are staying behind, I'm just worried you'll get bored at the gala..."

"I'll be fine!" Amy rolled her eyes while crossing her arms, "I'm mature, cute and engaging! Even if you all split up and do your own thing I'll be fine! Just watch. I'll be the belle of the ball before you know it."

Sally had given a pained smile but conceded the point. Amy had given her own smug smile and gone back to picking out a dress for the occasion. When the night finally came, she excitedly donned lavender knee length dress that swished around playfully when she moved. It had white lace trimming on the hem but that was where the embellishment ended. It cinched comfortably around her waist and firmly hugged her shoulders in a capped shoulder style leaving her back exposed. When she'd bought it, she felt it just oozed playfulness. Not totally innocent but still fun and just her personality. She even found a pair of ivory heels to match. Not particularly high but still grown up and even a little retro.

Amy's first move had been to engage with other people immediately after she'd been politely introduced by Sally. What she discovered, however, was that engaging the older human officials would be much harder than it seemed. For every official she was introduced to politely asked her two or three questions about herself before removing themselves politely from her conversation to engage with one of her other friends. Amy was quickly annoyed by this and decided a different tactic, by trying to engage people from outside of her group.

This, she found, was even harder than being introduced by royalty. No one engaged her for more than a moment to hear her name before moving on to conversations they were already in. One human even had the nerve to tell her to grab herself some punch and let the adults talk. She had to be pulled away by Sally before she caused a scene.

"Amy please, I know it was rude, but he was talking to someone else..."

"But he said...!"

"I know what he said Amy," Sally sternly chided, "But that doesn't mean you can just butt into his conversations like that. You represent the Acorn Kingdom. Just like Sonic, Tails and me."

"But I'm..."

"Amy please," Sally shot her a look of both stern disappointment and pity, "I warned you that this was going to be different. I'm sorry I couldn't really explain it as well, but now I hope you understand a bit better. This isn't... just celebrating the victory over Eggman. This is a Gala of the State. This is a diplomat's mixer."

Amy still shook with rage but the stubborn set in her jaw was starting to make way for resignation, "They just need to give me a chance and..."

Amy couldn't continue but Sally sighed in understanding, "You're more than welcome to stay, Amy but... just try to stay as close to the group as you can, okay? We'll help you through it."

She nodded at that but as the night wore on her friends began to separate. She tried to stay close to Sonic, who would engage her as much as possible. Still, he stayed by Sally's side who continued to engage with the diplomats in boring conversation with the King unless they were talking to Sonic who would take his attention away from her. She stayed for about an hour like this before she went in search of Bunnie. She left that when she found Bunnie and Antoine in a corner staring into each other's eyes. She quickly left to find Tails. He was with Rotor, talking to a bunch of men and women near the food table. When she approached she realized that they were speaking about... something. She couldn't really tell what it was but when Rotor began to speak on the subject she took that as her cue to leave. Rotor was shy but once he got talking that would be it.

So here she sat in her little corner of the gala, with her same drink she had gotten, consumed in her own self pity of not being as interesting as Sonic, as engaging as Sally, or as smart and witty as Tails and Rotor. She stared angrily down at her drink before shoving it away and whispering, "I wish I at least had one person to talk to! Bunnie and Antoine have each other and I'm just sitting here bored with nothing to do!"

She looked over at her fellow Freedom Fighters with no small amount of resentment. Antoine and Bunnie were waltzing together in the center of the room, whispering sweet nothings to each other as newly weds were wont to do. Rotor was with Tails, Uncle Chuck, and Professor Pickle speaking with who Amy had to guess were engineers or something from the animated way Rotor was speaking. She was even beginning to feel angry with Cream and Big, who had volunteered to stay on Sky Patrol together to pass the time. Big had not wanted to go to the party so Cream decided to stay and keep him company since everyone else was going. Nicole had decided to do the same, having a little party of their own. Amy growled a bit at her own foolishness at thinking she would have fun at this party.

"Gala," she corrected herself with a snort of bemusement.

What made her most forlorn, however, was where Sonic and Sally were. Sonic was with Sally, and her father who were speaking with the President of the UF and his wife. The group laughed together at something Sonic had said and more people began to congregate around them.

"You'd think Sonic would at least stick by my side," she thought, holding her head in her hands, "I'm always by his side, why isn't he on mine now?"

It was this thought that made her think of the old timeline.

While memories of the time were fading it was hard to let go of a few distinct ones. One of which was how close Sonic and Sally had been before and how they'd been dating before. At the time she was ok with it, as long as the relationship was temporary and she had her chance at Sonic in the end but...

...What was the deal now? Were they together? If they were, was it serious? Now that they had time to relax and analyse, what conclusion would they come to and where would that leave Amy?

A part of her wanted to forget about it. That part urged her that it wasn't important who Sonic was with now. What was important was that Sonic was happy and that she will someday be happy with him too. That the best thing to do would be for her to let it go for the time being and show that she was okay with Sonic having a life away from her. She clung to that hope on a daily basis, even as her heart clenched when she saw them holding hands or making goo-goo eyes at each other. Regardless of how sure she was about getting her chance with Sonic... she was jealous of what the two were having now.

It flared into an all out inferno when Sonic held out his hand to dance with Sally. Time seemed to freeze for Amy as Sally gracefully took his hand and made her way to the dance floor with him. Was it possible for ice to burn? That's what it certainly felt like as Sonic gently led Sally through the steps so gracefully that Amy had to wonder if he hadn't practiced beforehand. Tears welled up in her eyes as she saw the two of them laughing at something Sonic had said. But the moment slowed the dance down to gaze into Sally's deep blue eyes...was the moment Amy decided she didn't need to see the rest of the dance. She turned away...

... And ran into a young human girl. Amy gave a little 'oomph' before she pulled back to see the girl. She was taller than Amy, but then she was a human so that was to be expected, even if she looked about Amy's age. She had a pale complexion and chin length blonde hair with a little red barrette pulling her bangs to the left. Her eyes were a striking cerulean blue the held surprise but no ill will even as Amy bounced off of her own red sun dress.

"Oh gosh! I'm so sorry!" The girl cried out with a smile, "I really gotta watch where I'm going..."

Amy took this opportunity to push the burning, broken pieces of her heart aside. She could cry later. At this point, it would be stupid and immature to start crying in front of a total stranger over Sonic, "No it's fine. I ran into you. I'm just a bit distracted right now."

The girl rolled her eyes, "Bored out of your mind too?"

Amy gave a small twitch of her lip before sighing, "Something like that."

The girl gave a little laugh before she held out her hand, "I'm Hope, fellow bored party goer."

Amy smiled and held out her own gloved hand, "I'm Amy... I like your dress!"

Hope sighed, "I don't really like it, but Rouge told me if I was going to the party I at least had to look like a girl. Give me a shirt and a pair of overalls any day. Your dress is nice though."

That gave Amy pause. It was a welcome distraction so she clung to it before asking, "Wait, Rouge?"

"Ya?"

"Rouge the Bat. You know her?" Amy asked incredulously.

"Ya I work with Team Dark a lot. I'm part of the engineering team that works with them," Hope explained.

"You're an engineer? How old are you?" Amy asked incredulously.

"I'm twelve and a half thank you very much," Hope placed a hand on her hip and smirking, "And I'm the one who keeps Omega up to date and Shadow's shoes running in perfect condition. I develop all their gadgets for use and I help them to test them out! And how old are you, Ms Freedom Fighter?"

Amy blinked before giving a wry chuckled, "I turn fifteen in a few months actually. I feel kind of bad for being mad at the other people at this party now. They were saying the exact same things I was."

Hope rolled her eyes, "Ya well... they think I'm here with my dad. He's the Commander of the GUN. Everyone thinks that that's the only reason I got the job though. I mean, what other twelve year old is an engineer, you know?"

Amy gave a small laugh, "I'll have to introduce you to Tails later. He and Rotor are our tech guys. He's only ten though, so I hope you don't mind that much. Still, I don't see how that makes it easier to deal with Rouge of all people."

"She's...hard to get used to," Hope conceded, "But she's nice when she wants to be. She's great with Shadow and Omega!"

Amy had a small flash back to the time when Team Dark was fighting with her team to obtain a Sol Emerald... then again that hadn't happened anymore so could she really hold that against Rouge anymore?

"Ya, I've seen them in a fight before," Amy smiled, "They work really well together!"

"Oh ya, we're really..."

"Excuse me..."

Hope turned to face the human man behind her, holding a card in his hand.

"Is this yours? It was on the floor beside you and I don't want you to lose it."

Hope looked at the card in confusion but Amy recognized it immediately, "OH thanks so much! I don't know what I would have done if I'd lost it!"

The man looked to Amy and handed the card to her with a nod and a murmured, "Good evening." He left as Amy was placing the card in her lavender clutch.

"You brought a deck of cards with you?" Hope asked teasingly, "You came prepared and you didn't ask anyone to play with you?"

Amy blushed, "Well... they're not really playing cards. They're tarot cards."

"Whoa, no way, you believe in that?" Hope gave a small smirk, "When'd you get them?"

Amy had to think back a moment, "A... really long time ago. I can't remember not having them really."

"Cool!" Hope gave a small embarrassed smile before asking, "Would you mind doing a reading for me?"

Amy smiled before nodding and looking around for a place to sit. She gestured back towards her original seat and sat. She then began to gently shuffle the deck.

"When I'm shuffling think of a question you'd like answered. When you have it, just cut the deck with that question in mind," Amy explained, "Then I'll draw three cards and it'll tell you all about your question."

Hope nodded in understanding then cut the deck when Amy handed it to her. Amy placed them back together and flipped the cards over.

She didn't even see what she drew. Amy felt as though she was being pulled back. Her vision faded to black then brightened just as quickly to white. When her vision cleared up, she was at the same table but Hope and her cards were missing.

"What the...?" she slowly got up from the table before looking around, "Did I... pass out?"

That didn't feel right. If she'd passed out, she would have hoped her new companion would have done something other than steal her cards and run away.

"So I'm asleep?"

She'd heard of lucid dreaming but then why was she asleep?

"A vision?" she thought finally, "Maybe... but I've never had one before. Not like this..."

She took in the room a moment before giving a resigned sigh, "I better go check it out. Maybe I'll find a way back through here."

Even as she put on a brave face, she couldn't help the unnerving gnawing feeling in her gut. As she walked past the humans in the crowd, she noticed that no one seemed to pay any attention to her. Finally, after about ten minutes of searching Amy found a familiar face. Just at her 2 o'clock was Rouge dressed to the nines in a sultry sleeveless red gown that hugged her curves all the way down the slit that went up to mid thigh. Amy gave a sigh of relief, even if she had to deal with a little teasing from Rouge, she could at least figure out what had happened.

"Hey Rouge. Thank Goodness you're here! What's going on...?"

Rouge's ears didn't even twitch. Amy realized she was deep in conversation with someone else. Amy didn't see who, all she saw was Rouge ignoring her greeting.

"Hey!" Amy exclaimed as she reached her hand out, "Just because you don't like me doesn't mean you have to be so rude!"

However, when Amy set her hand down on Rouge's shoulder, it went right through.

Amy gave a small squeak and took several steps back. Her hands clasped together and flew to her mouth to cover her surprise. In her panic she flew past three more humans as though she was a ghost.

"This is a vision..."

Amy hovered around Rouge for a moment before realizing who she was talking to, "Hope?!"

But it wasn't really Hope, not anymore. She'd gone from the 12 year old little girl that she'd met not 15 minutes prior to the young woman towering over Rouge. She was tall, even for a human girl now. Rather than the sweeping gowns and formal wear everyone else was wearing she wore a doctor's coat over slacks and a violet blouse. She didn't wear any make up or jewelry but she seemed to make the room glow regardless.

It was then that Amy began to pay attention to her conversation with Rouge.

"...Still don't know how you put up with all that. That sort of thing just goes right over my head."

Hope chuckled before commenting, "That's what I'm here for, Rouge. Someone's gotta do it. Where's Omega and Shadow?"

Rouge snorted but stopped short of answering Hope, "Commander Towers!" she greeted.

Hope had a confused look on her face before spinning around to face an older gentleman. He was in his 60's pushing into 70's at least. His hair was mostly white but it still held small traces of black and grey. His eyes were... mismatched? One was brown the other blue, but both held a deep pride and love for the young woman in front of him.

"Dad!" Hope cried out and flung her arms around him. The man calmly but firmly did the same.

"Hey kiddo," he murmured, "Congratulations on the Kintobor Progressive. I'm so proud of you..."

Hope beamed back at him, "Thanks dad! Just think, this time next year the nanites will be at full capacity and we'll never have to worry about construction costs or damages ever again!"

The Commander gave a small wry smile, "Would that that had come several years earlier. God knows this city has seen it's fair share of destruction over the years."

Hope gave a small chuckle but then paused. She was looking at the dance floor before she gave a sly smile, "It's cost us a lot but it looks like someone is enjoying the benefits of the destruction. Finally!"

Rouge and the Commander looked at Hope in confusion before following her gaze. The Commander gave a smirk while Rouge outright rolled her eyes.

"I suppose it is about time something happened, but do they have to be so damned cute?"

Amy followed their eyes to the dance floor and saw Shadow. His back was to them but he was dressed in a rather nice black suit. His hover shoes were a bright contrast to his formal attire. Someone's hands where on his arm, firmly guiding him into the dance. Amy began to smile in confusion a bit. Who'd have thought Shadow would have a girlfriend? Amy's eyes widened in shock, however, when he turned around to show his partner.

Everything seemed to freeze in place as she saw the ever familiar pink hedgehog laughing as Shadow struggled through the dance steps in front of her. Amy's ears buzzed and her vision faded to white. She felt her whole body go numb before she let out a shriek of indignation.

"WHAT!?"

Amy was very suddenly brought back to the present when she found herself surrounded in silence. She looked in front of her to see the young Hope in front of her once more, a look of worry on her face. As Amy quickly gazed around the room she realized that she was also being stared at with looks of deepest concern. As she looked down she realized her hands were curled into fists and large indentations were on the tables beneath the cloth. She was leaned forward in a distinctly aggressive stance, she realized, and began to slowly move back from it.

"Um..." Hope started cautiously, "Are you... ok, Amy?"

Amy looked back at her then down at her cards then back up at Hope before standing up suddenly, "You will be successful in all your mechanical endeavors, good luck in everything else."

Amy quickly picked up her cards and walked away, even as Hope called out to her in concern.

"Am I going crazy?" she thought as she pushed past everyone around her, "Or did I just see the future?"

She gave a curt goodnight to Sonic and Sally before pushing past them as well. As she headed back to Sky Patrol, she placed a deeply determined look on her face, "No way. That couldn't have been the future. Even if it was, it was just me being friendly. It had nothing to do with us being a couple. I'll never give up on Sonic, NEVER!"

Amy repeated that in her head over and over as she made her way up the ramp to the flying fortress. She gave a weary goodnight to Cream, Big, and NICOLE before stomping her way into her room. She ditched her dress and got ready for bed. After doing all of that she plopped into bed and with a final fervent "NEVER" she snuggled in to sleep to dream of her future with Sonic...

Amy was in the woods. She knew that much but she didn't know exactly where. The trees towered above her on all sides but the woods were oddly clean. She wasn't entirely sure why but the leaves and twigs were cleared from the ground and all she saw the was the packed dirt beneath her.

"This place is really well traveled," she thought to herself, "Where am I?"

Suddenly she heard a crash with trees breaking and a loud "Oomph".

Amy began running towards the sound, willing her hammer to come to her. When she came to the clearing she saw... Shadow?

At least it looked like Shadow from behind. The same windswept quills, crimson stripes flying down his fur and his feet set apart in a familiar defensive stance. There was something off about the boy. Amy couldn't quite place it but inside she couldn't set aside the feeling that this wasn't Shadow.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of just standing there, there was a series of flashes and he was dodging back and forth between each flash of light. That was all he was doing, however, there was no move for the offensive. Finally he made a wrong move and the flash sent him flying towards Amy. He landed flat on his back in front of Amy. She automatically leaned forward to see if he was hurt but stopped short when she realized the mobian hedgehog was just a boy, not even 7 years old. He wore no clothes to speak of except for his plain white gloves and what looked like a rather intricate watch on his left wrist. Amy thought for a short moment that maybe she was in the past, seeing Shadow's childhood until the boy opened his eyes at her.

Amy froze when she realized the boys eyes were a glaring emerald green.

"Mom, tell Dad to stop being so cheap! It's not fair that he keeps knocking me into the dust using the Chaos Control!"

The boy was looking directly at her, so she twirled around to find herself facing...

Herself? It was definitely an older version of her but the woman was slightly taller with a more curvy figure than before. She was dressed in a long white dress that was intricately embroidered with pale pink roses all around it. It capped her shoulders but left her arms free. What stunned Amy the most was that her hair was longer and pulled up into an intricate french bun studded with jewelry and a crown perched on her head.

"A crown?!" Amy thought in shock, "How... why? But..."

She was interrupted when the woman began to giggle at the boy at her feet. She then smiled and said, "You're being a little too hard on him love. How's he going to learn if he keeps getting pushed into the dust?"

There was one final flash and in its place stood the one person Amy did not want to see. Shadow the Hedgehog stood in front of her but now he had a deep crimson cape and a matching crown on his head. Younger Amy was frozen with shock after shock. There was no questioning that the mobian woman was her. There was no questioning that this was her son.

"You're thinking too hard again, Gerald," he answered back smoothly, "Keep focused on your opponent instead of where you think you need to be and you won't have to worry about being 'knocked into the dust'."

"I thought you said I needed to be constantly aware of my surroundings and where I need to be in a fight?" the boy asked as he stood and brushed himself off, "I'm doing it as fast as I can..."

Shadow simply rolled his eyes, "I said to be aware, not to constantly cloud your mind with inane thoughts about what you should be doing. You're not prepared to be in an all out fight yet. You need to keep focusing on honing your instincts. The only way to do that would be to focus on an impossibly fast opponent."

He then folded his arms and shot a look at Amy, a small smirk playing on the side of his lips, "Or am I being too hard on the boy again?"

The woman, who had been the picture of demure womanhood, suddenly rolled her eyes and gave a smirk herself, "Fine. But just remember, if you're going to teach our son like that, you're going to have to be prepared to teach our daughters the same way."

This seemed to give Shadow some pause. He raised a brow in response, "Maria doesn't want to learn how to fight. Elaina's still too young to learn how to fight."

The conversation went on like this as the couple bartered and argued about how they were going to train their children. As this went on, Amy's mind buzzed with questions. How did this happen. Why was it happening? Why Shadow?! Even as the questions bred like flies in her mind and the two got closer together with their flirting and arguing, she found she wanted nothing more than to wake up from the nightmare she was seeing. However, the vision did not end with the couple being so close to kissing that Amy was about to go into full meltdown mode. Just as they were coming closer, about to kiss, a young rooster cleared his throat nervously at the couple.

"Pardon the intrusion your majesties, but Mercia needs their King and Queen..."

Amy gave a great gasp in shock when she woke up. She looked around the room from her bed frantically trying to come to grips with what she'd seen.

"You're majesties!?" she thought, "Mercia... queen?"

It took her a moment to gather herself and take deep, gulping breaths. She knew she was from Mercia originally. She knew she was in line for the throne, and not very far down the line either. It also explained the crowns in the dream. But now that she was aware that it wasn't just a lucid dream about what could very well have been the stuff of her worst imaginings, she was beginning to fear exactly what that meant for the future. Something was going on in Mercia. Something that had to do with her and eventually Shadow.

Amy slowly got up from her bed and checked the clock for time, "7 am huh?"

Amy shook the remaining drowsiness from her head and decided to get up completely. She got a glass of water before brushing her teeth and changing into her normal red dress and boots. She looked herself in the mirror and realized just how tired she still looked even after nine hours of sleep.

"Maybe I just need to go for a walk?" she thought to herself, "If I can just clear my head and figure out what the hell is rattling in my head I can make heads or tails of this..."

But as Amy crested a peak on the outskirts of Station Square an hour later, she felt she was no closer to finding any sort of answer to her problem as she was the night before.

"Why Shadow?" she repeated for the umpteenth time, "Why not Sonic? Sonic is sweeter! Sonic is more talkative! Sonic would dance with me..."

"Except for last night..." a dark voice in her head murmured.

Amy gave an angry growl and before she realized what was going on, her hammer was in her hands and she was giving a few practice swings.

"Sonic will get over Sally someday. Sonic is my true love! Sonic would never want to be the king of any country, he's way too free! I can't be the Queen of Mercia. I don't know anything about Mercia! I obviously left for a reason, so WHY AM I THE QUEEN?!"

There was no answer for that. As much as she racked her brain she couldn't remember anything before leaving for the Acorn Kingdom to see Sonic so many years ago. How long had that been? Maybe it was because of that genesis wave thing? Maybe Amy was simply too young to remember. Regardless of the reason, she was clueless about Mercia and it's political, ecological, economic and overall status in everything and WHY WAS SHE THE QUEEN?!

Amy had considered the idea that it was just a dream, but around half an hour into her walk she couldn't help but feel that was definitely not the case. It didn't explain her blank out moment at the celebration ball earlier and it didn't explain why the two would include Shadow of all people. Even if that was the most logical conclusion, and she wished more than anything that it was the case, something just kept telling her that not only was it not just a dream but something big was going to happen soon.

Finally Amy turned her rage to a nearby tree and started swinging wildly with her eyes closed, "WHAT THE HECK IS WRONG WITH ME!?"

Her hammer met with what she assumed was the side of the tree truck. That idea was quickly debunked when she tried to pull it back for another swing and she couldn't pull it back. She then opened her eyes and was met face to face with the one hedgehog she had sincerely hoped never to see again.

"I've been meaning to ask you the same question."

A deep chill went through Amy's body at the sound of that ever familiar voice. Shadow the Hedgehog stood just in front of her, his left hand catching the massive head of Amy's hammer with ease. Only one thought kept going through her mind.

"Dammit."

So here's the first chapter, the second chapter will be up immediately and the following chapters will be uploaded on a weekly basis on Sunday. Please let me know what you think and I'll try to upload in a timely manner from now on. I refuse to let this one die! See you next time!