Blaze the Cat looked much, much different.

Well, she looked the same, really; her furstyle was as Sonic had always remembered it, a good portion of her hair tied back in an upward facing ponytail, and the jewel embedded into her forehead remained present, but maturity had certainly taken hold, as it had done with the Blue Blur. She had clearly fought Eggman Nega as tirelessly and furiously as Sonic had fought Eggman; she was the same old Blaze, but her face had hardened. Sonic had wondered if the same had happened to him.

Her outfit was MUCH different. Her shoes were no longer high heels; Sonic had teased her endlessly for it when they'd first met, constantly ragging on her for their horrid combat ineffectiveness, and it appeared she'd taken the joking advice to heart. They now greatly resembled Sonic's shoes, but without the buckle, and the shade of red was a tad bit darker. Her purple top was now more of a trenchcoat style garmet, and looked much more rugged; it no longer had the frills on the cuffs her old one had, but the cuffs were now folded back in an ornate gold pattern. Likewise, her gold collar was now actually a collar instead on a lining, though as of right now it was folded upwards.

If he wasn't currently horrified of her presence under the current circumstances, he'd probably let off a chuckle; there was no doubt this was the same old Princess Blaze, but where protecting the Sol Emeralds and battling Eggman Nega was something she was just getting the hang of, it was now a cold profession. They'd been exposed to almost the exact same events, though with how the nature of their universes worked, this didn't surprise Sonic in the slightest.

"Blaze, I am so, so sorry!" Sonic started, now turning to his best friend. "Tails here took one of your Emeralds from you, which of course is wrong and he shouldn't have done it. BUT…" Sonic sighed and began to chuckle weakly, looking up at Blaze with pleading eyes.

"He saved my life. Possibly the lives of this entire planet." He gestured towards the scrap metal remnants of one of Eggman's finest creations. Blaze turned to look, and once she saw the wreckage, let her mouth hang open just a bit.

"You were in your Super Form," she said, only just loud enough so the other two could hear her. She had a very distant look in her eyes.

"Yeah…how did you know?" Asked Tails. Blaze turned back to the pair, her slight look of surprise and shock still adorning her face.

And then she smiled.

"You two must be hungry," she remarked. "Would you mind crossing dimensions for some lunch?"

Blaze the Cat was a princess. Being of royalty, although Blaze didn't really ever talk about it all that much, Sonic knew she lived in what was only one described as a castle, and could infer from her status it was probably quite a large one. Sonic didn't know what it looked like, so he had prepared himself for the large, rustic turrets hanging over a massive drawbridge that had filled his mind whenever he'd pictured a castle.

As such, he was very surprised when Blaze took them to a quaint little shack in the forest, just around the corner from where the now-complete collection of Sol Emeralds were currently held.

It looked downtrodden from the outside, but the inside was filled with numerous luxuries Sonic could only imagine she was able to obtain due to her royal status. A pink velvet carpet lined the floor of the small area, with a rather large TV and an EXTREMELY fancy chair made from a material Sonic didn't even recognize adorning the left side of the room. The right side had what looked to be a very comfy bed, and two beautiful paintings on the wooden walls, one of a beach scene and the other of a darkened cityscape. Finally, a fireplace completed the setup at the back of the room, and Sonic figured she likely had no trouble sparking the wood when the nights got cold.

"Wow Blaze, nice digs! But I gotta admit I was thinking you'd be staying in a place a little more…spectacular," Sonic said. Tails nodded in agreement as he looked around the room, and blaze merely chuckled.

"This is my home away from home. I'll stay in the castle for a while and participate in all the royal events, but I get real nervous when I'm around lots of people, so I like to come here to settle down and train. It's nice."

"Awesome! What's for dinner?" asked Tails, rubbing his stomach from hunger. Blaze removed her cell phone from her coat pocket, resting her thumb over the dials.

"What would you like?"

The answer, to the surprise of absolutely no one, was chili dogs. Blaze had a simple wooden round table near the center of her cottage, and Blaze ordered the food from what Sonic deduced to be the royal kitchen back at her castle. It took around twenty or twenty-five minutes, but the food eventually came, and the three dug into what Sonic believed HAD to be one of the best chili dogs he'd ever had. The three caught up, and shared some adventures of their recent fights with their equally irritating nemeses, before Tails got up at one point, a strange electronic reader in his hand.

"Hey Blaze, would you mind if I took some readings on these Sol Emeralds? I'd like to take some notes and compare them to my readings on the Chaos Emeralds." Blaze took a drink of the red wine she'd been sipping on before nodding her head.

"You may, but I better not see an empty pedestal." That got a round of laughter from Sonic and Tails and then, eventually, Blaze; Sonic had always found the cat's deadpan humor could make him laugh at the most unexpected of times. Tails strolled out the door, his technological instrument beeping long before he closed it shut, and the pair watched him go out. Once the door was shut, Blaze took another sip of wine before speaking.

"I missed you guys," she started, leaning back in her chair. "I didn't know if I'd ever see you all again. Things…things have been crazy around here. Eggman Nega just keeps getting stronger and stronger and stronger. I could tell you were fighting the Doctor in your Super Form," Blaze remarked. Sonic nodded solemnly as he, too, leaned back in his chair.

"Yeah, it was this suit thing…I was hitting him with all I had, but nothing was working. I don't know if he did something to the metal or if it's a new material, but…I felt helpless. I never feel helpless. From the dawn of time I've been able to stop Eggman's every machine, creation, or plan, but this…this was like nothing I've ever seen. If Tails didn't step in and save my ass with that Sol Emerald, he would have killed me. So, I guess you're going through the same thing?" Blaze gave a heavy sigh as she looked to the cabin roof.

"I haven't had to go Burning, not yet. But it gets harder and harder every time, Sonic. I've spent years perfecting my craft." Blaze immediately brought a spire of flame from her open palm. It burned a bright white, and Sonic felt slightly uncomfortable from the heat, even though Blaze was far across the table. In a second, she closed her palm and the flame perished with a cackle.

"I've trained so hard. I've fought so hard. I feel better than I have in years. And yet…I'll be fighting Nega, pouring my heart and soul into everything I have, and I feel like it's not enough. Like it'll never be enough. And the moment I have to go Burning…what the hell is happening to us?" Blaze directed that last question directly at Sonic, her mouth slightly agape and her eyes wider than the moon itself. To Blaze's surprise, Sonic didn't say anything at first; he merely chuckled.

"Blaze, do you remember when we first met? At the Dead Line?" Blaze's face immediately flooded red, and she looked down to the floor, drowning in a pool of embarrassment.

"Yes," she mumbled. "I attacked you." Sonic sighed with a smile and, contrary to the cat, looked up at the ceiling.

"You beat the hell out of me. I went through every move in my book; my spin dash, my homing attack, all the kicks and punches. You kept telling me you had to do it all yourself, that you had to carry the weight of the world on your shoulders, and I was telling you that wasn't the case. But as that fight dragged on, and I took more and more hits and you kept ignoring mine, I was beginning to think this girl on fire really could carry the world on her shoulders. I still assert to this day that that fight with you was one of my toughest. I honestly didn't know what was gonna happen. In fact, that's why I was so freaked out when I found out Tails stole that Emerald." Blaze looked up at the blue hedgehog, and this time, it was her turn to smile; she rolled her eyes.

"I certainly wasn't ignoring them. In fact, you beat me, if I recall." Sonic raised his eyebrows and donned a smirk like a mask as he once again leaned back in his chair.

"Well of course I did. I'm Sonic the Hedgehog." That got a booming laughter out of both of them, lasting a few precious seconds as they both reminisced about their younger days. Once the laughter slowly died down, Sonic looked at Blaze with a piercing gaze as spoke his next words.

"My point, Blaze, is that I've seen very few people with a fire and determination as yours. Trust me, I know perfectly well how it feels to fight an enemy that only gets smarter and stronger, but I can't think of anyone else with as much grit and fury as you. If Eggman Nega thinks he even has a sliver of a chance of victory, he really doesn't know who he's messing with."

Blaze started smiling before Sonic was even done. She slowly got up from her chair and began to walk over to Sonic and, to his surprise, wrapped her arms around him. Sonic embraced the hug after a moment of shock, and in a few seconds, she detached, standing over him.

"Thank you so much, Sonic. It makes me sad a whole dimension separates me from such a good friend." Sonic waved his hand in dismissal, and was about to speak when Tails came bursting through the door. The door rocked back and forth from the force, and both jumped in a startle; Blaze, however, much more so, as she jumped a bit in the air from shock. This cause Sonic to look over towards her, and Blaze, now firmly on the ground once again, closed her eyes and sighed heavily.

"Dear GODS, Tails!" she exclaimed, rather forcefully. Tails grew a sheepish grin across his face, but the reaction quickly died and was replaced by one of worry.

"Guys, we have a major problem. So you remember the Quantum Mechanical Time Portal Defilterer? The one that I used to bring us here, and the one I used to get back?" The pair nodded careful as they anticipated the fox's next words.

"Well, I left it near the back of the cottage while I went to go grab my tool belt that I left by the Sol Emeralds. And now it's gone."