Notes: I had planned not to post this story for another while yet, but I just couldn't resist putting it out there! I've been working on this for quite a while, so I hope you enjoy it!

Disclaimer: All characters belong to SEGA and Archie Comics. The writing itself belongs to me.

Takes place directly after Generations.

"Sonic... Did we win?"

The twenty-year-old hedgehog huffed in exhaustion. He turned towards his little brother. The fox was staring at the spot where the mysterious monster known as the Time-Eater disappeared. Sonic smiled.

"Yeah, Tails. We won." Another one of Eggman's plots foiled, and the universe was saved. When the strange monster suddenly appeared at his birthday party and abducted all his friends, Sonic wasn't sure what to think. But it had been a pretty fun adventure, running through places he had already been, and hanging out with a past version of himself. Actually, it had been loads of fun! Thrashing the corrupt water god, Chaos, without having to go Super Sonic; snowboarding through the city streets and getting chased by a massive truck; blowing up the Chemical Plant and practically riding on the explosion to grab one of the legendary Chaos Emeralds. Of course, there was that one flaming city that he only had a vague memory of, and that no one else seemed to remember at all, but it didn't bother him much. All that mattered to him was that he saved the day and he had fun doing it.

His younger self and the younger Tails approached them with tired grins on their faces. "You did good out there, lil' me," the elder hedgehog said. He extended his fist, which his double happily fist-bumped.

"Thanks. You weren't too shabby yourself, gramps," the twelve-year-old smirked.

"H-hey! I'm only twenty! Twenty is NOT old!" the taller one protested. His younger incarnation and he two Tailses laughed. Sonic rolled his eyes. "Either way, the Time Eater is gone, the time-space continuum is back to normal, and everyone is safe and sound," he said.

A portal suddenly opened up in front of the group, grabbing everyone's attention. From where they were standing, they could see through to the other side of the trans-dimensional passageway. It seemed to lead to a grassy field with a large tree and a picnic table; the whole area was filled with balloons, streamers, and a banner that read 'Happy Birthday Sonic.'

"That looks like our ride home," the older Tails said. "Just the way we left it."

"Can we go with you, older me?" the smaller fox pleaded. "Pleeeaaassee? Just for a little bit! I love birthday parties!" The older Tails looked to the dark blue hedgehog standing next to him for his opinion. Of course, Sonic gave an enthusiastic nod.

"No prob! You know what they say- the more the merrier!" he said in his best impression of Doctor Eggman. The younger Sonic burst out laughing.

"Okay, that was actually pretty good," he said, wiping a tear from his eye. He took a few breaths to regain his composure. "I guess we can stick around for cake. Shouldn't take too long, and besides, the portal to get back to our time hasn't popped up yet."

"Yes, there's that. And..." the green-eyed hedgehog said, leaning down next to his double and putting his arm around the kid's shoulders, "... cake is DELICIOUS," he whispered dramatically. He leapt back to his feet with a huge, goofy grin on his face. "And besides, we just saved all of time and space! We deserve to celebrate!" Tiny Tails grabbed the twenty-year-old's gloved hand and started flying towards the portal.

"What are we waiting for, then! Let's hurry before this thing closes!" he cheered with excitement. The other three quickly followed his lead, and they all jumped through the portal, leaving the empty white limbo behind.

The portal closed up behind them as the four landed on the soft grass. The sun was shining from up above, warming the air and making it feel truly like late June. There was a gentle breeze that blew through the grass, creating ripples in the surrounding hills. It was so different, being back in the real world after being trapped in that bizarre, timeless white expanse. It even smelled different. The air here was rich with the scent of flowers, birthday cake, and...

"My chili dog!" the eldest hedgehog said, noticing the delicious foodstuff falling through the air in front of him. He dove for it, belly-sliding on the grass with his arms stretched out in front of him. As if it were a miracle, the chili dog fell right into his open hands. Sonic sighed with relief and sat back up. He bit off half the dog in one bite, savoring the flavor explosion that hit his taste buds. "Still warm!" he said, mouth still full of chili. He swallowed. "Heh heh! Gotta love time travel." He took another bite out of his favorite food. He stood, facing himself and the Tailses, who were approaching the picnic table. The speedster smiled at what he saw. All of his friends who had been sucked through the Time Eater's portals- Knuckles, Amy, Cream and Cheese, Shadow, and Rouge, to name a few- were popping back into existence in bright flashes of purple light.

Sonic sauntered over to the others, tossing the rest of the chili dog in his mouth. The culinary confection no sooner hit his tongue then a flash of pink suddenly appeared in his peripheral vision. Before he knew what was happening, he was stumbling to the side, with Amy Rose clenching her arms around his chest.

"Ohmigosh, Sonic, you were so great! You totally saved the day!" she cheered. "My hero..." she snuggled her head underneath Sonic's chin as he desperately tried to pull away.

"Yeah, sure, no problem, Amy," he said, choking out the words. "Now, if you could just stop breaking my spine for a minute, that would be phenomenal!" He managed to wedge his arm in between her face and his and pushed her away as she tried to move in for a kiss. He squirmed as he tried to break free from her iron grip. "Yo, Tails! Would you mind?" he shouted, trying to get his little brother to help him out.

"No, it's okay, I don't mind! You two keep having fun!" Tails called back, waving with a sly grin.

"OH, YOU LITTLE- That's it, you are going straight to bed when we get home, mister!" Sonic cried, still struggling to escape from Amy's love-onslaught. This only made Tails laugh.

"Please," he began explaining to his six-year-old self, "he never actually follows through on that threat. He's too nice when it comes to that kind of stuff." The child was watching the scene unfold while trying not to laugh and choke on his cake. He had never expected his older big brother to be frightened by a girl, especially when he had been saving the world for years.

Next to him, Lil' Sonic grimaced. "Man, Amy's still gonna be obsessed with me in eight years? Girl needs a hobby," he shuddered. He watched as his future self finally managed to get the pink hedgehog off of him. The dark blue Mobian then raced up the tree that was next to the picnic table, poking his head out between the leaves.

"C'mon, Amy, it's my birthday! I just wanna relax! Do we really have to go through this?" he pleaded. Amy walked over to the base of the tree, hands on her hips. She pouted angrily up at him before sighing. "Fine, I'll leave you alone. But ONLY because it's your birthday, Sonic!" she said, winking up at him. His muscles relaxed. He was finally safe. He dropped down from the tree and landed next to a certain chuckling red echidna. He punched Knuckles in the arm.

"Oh, shut up, Knucklehead."

"Can't help it. It doesn't get old," Knuckles shrugged. "Now, birthday boy, you going to eat your cake? Because I will gladly take it from you."

"How you gonna take cake away from someone you can't catch?" Sonic smirked.

"Is that a challenge?"

"You could say that. Another time, though. I mean, it's not very often that you get to spend time with a younger version of yourself, am I right?" the hedgehog grinned, elbowing his rival jokingly.

"Alright, another time. I'm holding you to that, alright?"

"You've got yourself a deal, pal." Sonic slapped Knuckles on the back before snatching up a slice of cake for himself. Chocolate. The hedgehog's favorite kind. He happily dug into the dessert; he didn't realize how hungry he had been until he returned to the 'real world.' Maybe it had something to do with time not progressing normally in the strange white dimension, but even with all the crazy places that he and his younger self had ran through, they had noticed that neither of them were getting the least bit hungry or tired. Although Sonic had simply ignored this strangeness before, he was starting to feel the effects wear off. His hunger had come back with a vengeance, meaning the quickster would probably eat any food put in front of him.

He took a seat on one of the benches back at the picnic table, next to his younger self. He crossed his legs and leaned backward, relaxing. "Been one heck of a day, huh?"

"That sounds like the understatement of the century," the younger Sonic remarked, raising an eyeridge. "I mean, I'm eight years in the future right now, hanging out at my twentieth birthday party. With my twenty-year-old self. I still can't get over that. It's so... weird." The older hedgehog chuckled.

"Man, I've seen so many weird things over the years, stuff like this doesn't particularly phase me anymore," he smiled. The younger Sonic simply shook his head.

"What the heck was so weird that this seems normal to you? Actually- you know what, I don't even want to know."

"Good, because I wasn't gonna tell you. You're going to have to find that out on your own, kid."

"What is this, I can't tell you, or else I'll have to kill you? Afraid of causing a time paradox or something?"

"Nah. You just need to have some surprises in life, after all!" He patted the smaller hedgehog on the head.

"I'm getting a pat on the head. From myself. There is something inherently wrong with this picture," was the small hedgehog's only response.

"Yeah, well, you're going home soon, anyway, so why not just chill out? We've time traveled before, this shouldn't be COMPLETELY new to you. Remember Little Planet? That's happened to you by now, right?"

"Well, YEAH, but- but that didn't involve more than one Sonic at any given time!"

"What about Metal?"

"He's a robot, he doesn't count," the child pouted. He paused for a moment. "Hey, can I ask you something?"

"Hm?" the twenty-year-old said, his mouth full of cake. "Yeah, shoot," he mumbled. He licked the icing off his lips.

"Well... Do you think Robotnik is ever going to give up? Or will we just... put him out of commission one of these days? I mean, whenever he's defeated, I always feel like that's the end of that. He couldn't possibly consider trying something again, especially when sometimes it seems like he's gone for good. I'm going to be fighting Robuttnik for at least eight more years, for Pete's sake. I know you said we win every time, but will we ever... win?"

The older hedgehog stopped shoveling cake into his mouth and rested his plate on his knees. He stared off into the distance, thinking. He supposed he had never though of the war being over. It was always just find Eggman, get the Chaos Emeralds, foil whatever evil scheme he's come up with, rinse, repeat. He'd been doing it for so long, it had become some sort of routine for the speedster. To be honest, the thought of not having anyone to save the planet from anymore troubled Sonic a little bit. He was all for peace and all, but he wasn't the kind of guy who could just retire from the hero business and settle down. He shuddered slightly. He detested the thought of settling down.

He sighed. "I'm not sure, kiddo. I mean, yeah, it would be great if the world was safe once and for all, but at this point I think it would just be weird NOT having the Doc around to attempt to take over the world every now and then. And, to be perfectly honest, I think that if Eggman ever goes down for good, there'll be someone else to take his place as the resident threat to Mobius."

"So, what, I'm just going to be saving the world for the rest of my life?" the young hedgehog said disappointedly. Sonic placed a hand on his shoulder.

"I'm not saying that. But trust me, it'll get easier. You'll have help in the future. Eventually, it'll get to the point where you enjoy trashing badniks every once in a while," he said. The dark-eyed one sighed.

"If it were anyone else saying that, I wouldn't believe a word of it." A small smile crept across his face. "In fact, I can barely believe it when YOU say it. And you're ME." His older self laughed at that. All of a sudden, they were both attacked by a small ball of orange-yellow fluff who had dove onto their laps. The older Sonic barely had time to get his cake out of the way of the excited toddler.

"Sonic! There's a PIÑATA! I didn't know there was a piñata here!" Tiny Tails ecstatically informed his big brother. He turned to the green-eyed hedgehog. "Older big bro, did you know there was a piñata here?"

"What? No way! Hey, you wanna take a whack at it? I'll give you the first try," Sonic said, lifting the child up off of his lap and letting Tails sit on his shoulders. He made extra sure that he wouldn't be poking the tyke with his extra sharp quills as Tails bounced up and down excitedly.

"Alright!" the fox kit cheered, pumping a fist into the air. Sonic paraded around the party with the young child sitting atop his shoulders, with the younger of the hedgehogs in tow. He was following along less for the piñata, and more to make sure that Tails didn't fall off of the taller hog's back and hurt himself.

Sonic passed by his own fourteen-year-old brother. "Why can't you be this cute anymore?" Sonic asked him.

The older Tails smiled. "Well, for one, I can't exactly fit up on your shoulders anymore. Not without getting myself torn to shreds by your quills, anyway."

"Excuses, excuses!" Sonic said with a laugh. "Well, if you can't be my adorable baby bro, I guess I'll just have to keep this little guy!" he said, reaching behind his head and giving the young kit on his back a tickle. The child squirmed as he laughed, making the younger Sonic nervous.

"Cut it out, or else he'll end up cutting himself on those razor blades on your back," he said, in a tone that was both serious and joking at the same time.

Suddenly, he heard a loud WHOOSHing sound come from behind them. The smaller hedgehog instinctively whipped his head around to see what was happening.

A portal had opened up about 100 yards away. Through its deep purple haze, the hedgehog was able to make out the landscape of Green Hill Zone. Home.

The twenty-year-old hedgehog gently lifted Tiny Tails off of his shoulders and placed him down on the ground. "Well, looks like I won't get to keep you after all. Bummer," he said.

"It's okay, you'll still have older-me to play with!" the small fox kit said, wrapping his arms around the green-eyed hedgehog's legs. "Right, older-me?" he said, looking up at his future-self. The older fox nodded. "You bet," he said, giving his other self a high-five. Sonic- both of them- smiled at their little brothers.

"Still, it's been cool hanging out with you two. We'll have to do it again sometime," said the older hedgehog with a smile and a thumbs up.

"Yeah, if time and space starts to get ripped apart again, I'll be sure to give you a call," his younger incarnation said.

"Promise?" the elder Sonic said in an attempt to be purposely annoying. The younger rolled his eyes.

"Yeah, sure, promise," he said with a laugh. He received a friendly noogie from his double, as well as a fistbump from the older Tails.

Given that the Sonics and the Tailses were just different versions of one another, their goodbyes didn't take long. It was the goodbyes of everyone ELSE at the party which took a while. It was like they were never going to see Sonic or Tails again. After the two time-travelers had said goodbye to everyone, the preteen gathered his little brother up and the two prepared to go through the portal. Speaking of which, did the portal seem... smaller?

"Wha-? It's closing! Go, go!" the light blue hedgehog said, running towards the rapidly closing portal with Tails close behind. They had wasted too much time on goodbyes. The gateway was getting smaller and smaller, shrinking exponentially with every step Sonic took towards it. It nearly felt as if he were running in slow motion, the portal closing faster and faster. 'C'mon, go go go!' the young hedgehog thought. 'We've got to get through!'

By the time he had reached it, the portal was barely big enough for him to stick his head through. Not willing to risk his head getting stuck, he shoved his arm through the portal instead, hoping to somehow pull himself through.

The portal closed up around his wrist, and surely would have sliced his hand clean off if his older self hadn't run over to pull him out in time. The two hedgehogs fell backwards, the younger landing on top of the older. Mini-Tails stared at the place where the portal once was.

"Sonic... It's gone," he said, his voice barely louder than a whimper. The small speedster scrambled to his feet and frantically inspected the empty air in front of him.

"It can't be gone! That portal was our only way back home! It can't just be GONE!" he shouted, feeling around for any trace of the dimensional gateway, as if it had simply turned invisible. He fumbled about in the empty air, finding nothing. He quickly lost hope after only thirty seconds. His arms fell to his sides, shoulders slumped. "It's gone," he admitted after what had felt like an eternity.

He felt a firm grip on his shoulder. He looked up to see his older self looking down at him, with a concerned and serious look on his face. The fact that the older hedgehog had done nothing but smile since they met only made this change in attitude more worrisome.

"It'll be alright," Macro-Sonic said calmly. "You guys can stay with me and Tails until we find a way to get you back home again. Okay?"

"It's not like we have much of a choice at this point," the newly stranded hedgehog said quietly, looking down at his shoes. Tiny Tails wormed himself into his big brother's arms, scared now that they suddenly had no way of returning home. The younger Sonic held his best friend tight in his arms, looking back up at his future-self again.

"Thanks, Sonic," he said. The older hedgehog smiled.

"Don't mention it, Sonic," he replied.

Notes: So that was chapter one! This is the first story I've posted anywhere, so I hope you like it so far. I plan to update this story once a week, so stay tuned! I would love if you would leave me a review to let me know what you think.