3 Chapter Two- ????? Universe

            Tails landed on the floor of a strange house. Groaning, he stood up.

            "Sonic, did you knock the movie shelf off the wall again?" A voice called in from another room down a hall, where the sound of a drill could be heard.

            Tails looked around, confused.

            Sounds like me, he thought, but it can't be. It's not possible.

            "Even if you did, you can at least answer," the voice called again.

            It could be me from a different dimension, but I doubt it, Tails thought.

            The drilling stopped, and the sound of footsteps were coming down the hall.

            "Now you're just messing with me. You know I hate being messed with..."

            A young fox emerged, and his sentence trailed off as he saw Tails in his living room. His eyes widened and he started trembling slightly.

            "Oh," he said in a little voice, then turned and ran back down the hall, calling, "Sonic! Knuckles! Can you get down here?"

            "Huh?" Tails said, confused.

            "What is it, Tails?" came a voice from what sounded like upstairs. It was Sonic! But different...

            "Tails"? Tails thought, it is me, but how?

            "Is it Classic Sonic again? Or maybe Classic Tails?" came Knuckles, but again different.

            "No, it's..." a small, hurt sigh, "it's the Sonic Boom Tails."

            "You're joking," the Sonic-like voice said.

            Tails crept into the hall.

            "Unfortunately, no," the young fox said.

            "Ok, what's the big idea?" Tails demanded, marching up to the fox.

            The fox jumped, then turned around, trembling.

            "What big idea?" he said nervously but steadily.

            Now that Tails got a good look at him, the fox was just a cub, 7, maybe 8 years old at most. Where Tails' fur was yellow, the cubs' was more orange. The cub had two tails (the reason for his nickname), but didn't wear a tool belt or aviation goggles, and wore normal gloves instead of work gloves.

            However, the gloves were streaked in grease and soot, as was his fur, marking him as a mechanic. He was also terrified, which made Tails a little sorry for scaring him.

            "Don't play dumb with me, cub. How come you are so much like me, but not me? What's up with these people who sound like my friends? Why am I here in the first place? Answer me!" Tails suddenly realized how mean he was being, but his stress didn't let him ease up.

             The cub trembled and looked at the floor.

             "I..." he gulped, "the answers I have won't please you. Just calm down, please. Don't be mad..."

             "Can you spill it already?" Tails asked, annoyed.

             "Well..." the cub started.

             "Tails- everything good down there?" the Sonic-like voice asked.

             "Um..." the cub started.

             "Yes," Tails called, "it's fine."

             Stunned silence from upstairs.

             "Well, well, well, what do you know," the Knuckles-like voice said, "there is another Tails here."

             "Another?" Tails' stressed furry turned to curiosity, "what do you mean another?"

             Tails turned to the cub.

             "What do you know that I don't?" he inquired.

             The cub relaxed.

             "Well..." The cub started again, but was interrupted by the sound of a saw coming down the stairs.

              A blue blur came into view and stopped in front of Tails. A blue hedgehog stood there, in-between him and the fox cub, arms crossed and facing Tails, calm for now, but obviously not sure if he would need to fight. When he saw that Tails was not going to, he relaxed, and turned to the cub.

             "Hey bud, what's going on?" he asked the cub.

             "Boom wants to know what we mean by 'another Tails'," the cub informed the hedgehog.

             The hedgehog turned to Tails.

             "You're probably confused about me, Tails, and Knuckles aren't you?" he asked.

             Tails nodded.

             "What's up with this?" He asked, "I can tell you two are me and Sonic, and are similar to me and the Sonic I know, but at the same time slightly different. What is this?"

             "This will sound confusing," the other Tails said, "But I'm Modern Tails. I'm the Tails from this universe. Nice to meet you."

             Tails and Modern Tails shook hands, then Modern Tails turned to the hedgehog.

             "This is Modern Sonic" he pointed to the hedgehog, "and Modern Knuckles," he pointed to a red echidna leaning against the wall.

             When did he get there?

             "Modern?" Tails turned to Modern Tails.

            "You've had other versions of yourselves around before, haven't you?" he asked.

             "Sonic and Tails have had other versions of themselves around before," Modern Knuckles corrected, and Tails turned to him, "I'm just happy you aren't a hallucination this time."

             "Hallucination?" Tails asked, confused.

             "That's not important." Modern Tails said a little too quickly.

             "Sonic!" came a female voice from outside the door.

             Modern Sonic suddenly looked scared, and Modern Tails and Knuckles got nervous.

             "Sonic, what's going on in there?" the voice called again.

             "A-Amy," muttered Modern Sonic.

             He turned to Tails.

             "Well, nice to meet you. Love to stay and chat, but I gotta go. See ya!" Modern Sonic was gone in an instant.

             "Sonic! Wait up!" Modern Tails called, and was gone too.

             "Oh, great," muttered Modern Knuckles, "they left me to deal with the insane dreamer. Thanks, guys."

             "What did you call me?!" a voice came from the door.

             Tails looked at the door, where who he guessed was Modern Amy was standing, looking shocked.

             Modern Amy was wearing clothes similar to Tails' Amy, but her skirt was much poofier than Tails' Amy would like. She was shorter, and had bigger hands, but then again, all the Moderns had big hands in comparison to body size.

            Modern Amy looked scary, but only because he knew that if his own Amy was wearing that face, someone was in big trouble.

            After a moment, Modern Amy turned to the Knuckles from her world.

            "Where did the other boys go?" she demanded.

            "Nowhere they want you to know." Knuckles replied.

            "So you're going to be difficult, are you?" Amy sounded annoyed.

            "Haven't you said before you could sense Sonic's presence? Why don't you find him that way?" Knuckles asked saltily.

            "Fine!" Amy stomped off.

            Modern Knuckles sighed, then turned and walked out the door.

            "Wait!" Tails called after him, but Modern Knuckles was gone.

            "You get used to it," Modern Tails' voice came from above.

            Tails looked up at him; he was on a wooden beam that was holding up the ceiling.

            "You were up there the whole time?" he asked.

            "Shh!" Modern Sonic was next to Modern Tails, "Don't let Amy know, please!"

            Both hopped down.

            "What do you have against Amy?" Tails asked, "I get she's strange, but..."

            He trailed off, thinking of the glare that would have earned him if Amy was here. A sharp stab of sadness sliced his chest.

            "You don't know our Amy," Modern Tails said.

            "Yeah. If you did and had a lick of sense, you'd run too." Modern Sonic agreed.

            "How did you get here, anyways?" Modern Tails asked.

            "I don't know," Tails replied, "I tripped, got zapped by a laser, then landed on your floor."

            "Out of the TV?" Modern Tails sounded sceptical.

            "It isn't too far-fetched," Modern Sonic pointed out, "Not as weird as some of the adventures we've gone on."

            "Right. Going through time and working with our younger selves, fixing the Earth after it was split in half, rescuing aliens in an interstellar amusement park; Yeah, the Sonic Boom Tails falling out of the TV sounds pretty normal compared with the other things," Modern Tails agreed.

            "What? That all happened? Actually happened?" Tails asked.

            "Yep," Modern Tails said.

            "What was your most recent adventure?" Tails asked.

            Both Moderns grew uncomfortable. Sonic glanced at Tails, who cleared his throat.

            "Well... um, you see...," Modern Tails stuttered.

             "Eggman was using more and more powerful weapons to get his way, and the last time, he got the better of me," Modern Sonic said, "unfortunately, everyone thought I was dead, and Tails saw it happen. He kind of lost it after that."

            Tails looked at Modern Tails, who looked at the ground, then Modern Sonic continued on with the story.

             "In 6 months, Eggman took over 99% of the world, with the resistance, headed by Knuckles, keeping hold of the last bit," Sonic finished.

             "His name was Infinite," Modern Tails said suddenly, "the thing that took down Sonic. He joined with the Phantom Ruby, making him very powerful. It made him faster than Sonic."

             "What?" said Tails, "you have to be kidding me. Sonic's the fastest thing alive!"

             Modern Sonic smiled and elbowed Tails.

             "Sounds like what Tails would say if he hadn't seen it," he commented, "and yes, he was faster than me. But only because that Ruby is a VR machine."

             "It is? Than how can it hurt you?" Tails asked.

             "It's a ruby, But is does much more than create virtual reality. It literally creates a new reality. A rock that lands on you under the Ruby's control will actually hurt you in real life. We nearly got killed by a sun falling on us," Modern Tails corrected.

            "Tails' least favorite part of the whole thing is the fact that he hallucinated Classic Sonic," Modern Sonic said.

             "So that's why Modern Knuckles, commented about hallucinations!" Tails realized, then thought of something, "Why did you hallucinate in the first place?"

            "I wasn't in my right mind," Modern Tails said, looking ashamed.  

            "I guess I'm just overly dependent on Sonic, so when I thought he was gone...," his voice trailed off, and he looked at the ground.

            The room was silent for a time. Tails didn't what to say. He put himself in Modern's shoes. Then he realized the exact same thing was probably happening to Sonic.

            "I know that's sad, but I want to get home," he turned to the Moderns, "you said you've met other versions of yourself. How did they get back?"

            "The portal back to their time just opened. We did nothing," Modern Sonic said.

             "And besides, they were our past selves, not different versions of us," Modern Tails pointed out.

             "We could ask Blaze and see what she thinks," Modern Sonic suggested.

             "Isn't she in her dimension this month?" Modern Tails asked.

             "Is she?" asked Modern Sonic.

             "If you weren't gone so often, you would have noticed others are on a schedule, not just dropping by when they feel like it," Modern Tails said, a slight hint of saltiness in his voice.

            "Oh," said Modern Sonic, oblivious to the tone of Tails' voice, "then Silver?"

            "Again, time travel, not dimension hopping," Modern Tails sighed.

            Tails shifted restlessly.

            "So... when does Eggman attack, anyways?" Tails asked, trying to change the subject, "I'm bored."

             Modern Sonic looked at Tails in surprise. Modern Tails was startled.

             "Eggman is dead," he explained, "He didn't provide a way for himself to get out of his most recent robot. It imploded, and he was trapped inside."

             "Oh," Tails paused, not sure how to feel about that.

            Sensing Tails' uncertainty, Modern turned to Modern Sonic.

            "I'd better get back to what I was working on," he commented to Modern Sonic.

            Tails straightened.

            "Can I see?" he asked.

            "Sure!" Modern Tails agreed, "come on!"

            The two went into the workshop, where Modern Tails had been before Tails fell through the TV.

            Maybe, just maybe, this will work, Tails thought, maybe...