#tailouge

The buzz of an incoming call broke Rouge's concentration, pulling her attention away from the blueprints she was annotating for her upcoming assignment. Her brow furrowed in annoyance, she keyed the console on her desk and was met with a holographic portrait of her head of security. "Go ahead, Bruno."

"A thousan' pardons, mem. There's a little lady here on the shortlist what says she needs to see yeh righ'way, name'a Amy Rose."

"Great," she muttered. "Have you asked her if it can wait?"

"Yessem, she insis- mem, please, I'm on the phone with Miss Rooj' right now. Please, mem? Than'yeh. Miss Rooj', she's said she won't leave 'til she sees you an' she's makin' a scene pacin' around with an awful big hammer."

"Ugh." Rouge rolled her eyes involuntarily. "Send her up, plus one."

"Yessem, righ'way." A faint clink followed, signalling that Bruno had set down the phone. Rouge had finished returning her mission intel into its folder when the billy goat picked up the call again. "Eh, mem?"

"Yes, Bruno?"

"I sent her with Guard'bo Ken, they're on the way now."

"Thank you, Bruno."

"Mem, pardon me for askin', but will everythin' be alright? Miss Rose was awful mad, an' that hammer means business."

"It'll be fine, I can handle her on my own if it comes to that. Plus, Ken will be here, and he's one of the Guard Robos that Tails worked on." She paused after stashing her briefing file in her desk. "Still, it might be best to put everyone on standby, just in case."

"As ye says, mem. We'll be ready if'n you need us."

The call ended, Rouge went back to considering the blueprints. After realizing that she couldn't continue working on them because she had lost track of what she had last annotated, she set them aside with a frustrated sigh. Almost on cue, a series of taps on the door signaled the arrival of company.

"[Miss Rouge], a [Miss Amy] is here to see you," a distinctly artificial voice announced from beyond the door.

"Show her in, please."

The door opened to reveal a fuming Amy Rose and a very conspicuous Piko-Piko Hammer. "Rouge," she spat with as much venom as she could muster.

"Hello, Amy." Rouge responded with a polite smile.

Amy stomped into the office with both hands firmly grasping her weapon, stopping short of the desk and glaring menacingly. Ken's massive bulk leaned into view from behind the open door. "[Miss Rouge], I will remain nearby in case I am needed."

"Thank you, darling. I'll let you know."

After the door had closed and the Guard Robo's heavy footsteps crossed the hall, Rouge placed her folded hands on her desk. "Well, what can I do for you?"

"You can get up so I can beat you to a pulp," Amy snarled. "Tails?! REALLY?!"

Rouge groaned and squeezed the bridge of her nose. "So that's what you're here about. Can we talk about this?"

"What is there to talk about?" Amy demanded with a scowl, brandishing her hammer.

"Maybe how you've NEVER won a fight with me," Rouge snapped. "Or maybe how you're on my turf, and I wouldn't have to lift a finger to throw you out." She glared at Amy for a tense moment, then heaved a great sigh and slumped in her chair. "Or maybe we could talk about how I don't want to fight because Tails would be upset," she said, sounding utterly defeated. When Amy responded with bewildered silence, Rouge continued: "Listen, I'll make you a deal. If I can't convince you that everything is on the up and up, I leave Tails alone. Okay?"

"... That's it? No catch?"

"That's it. If I don't get your blessing, I tell him we should just be friends and that's the end of it."

Amy considered it for several long moments before hesitantly putting her hammer away. "Alright. But I'm going to hold you to that."

"That's fine," Rouge said with no small amount of relief in her voice, motioning for Amy to take a seat. "I've needed to figure out what I'm doing anyway."

"What do you mean?" Amy asked as she sat down.

"I didn't plan for any of this," Rouge said with a halfhearted shrug. "If I'm being honest, Tails and me…" she trailed off, and then looked away in shame. "... just kinda happened."

Amy's bracelets clinked against each other as she crossed her arms. "I have a hard time believing that."

"And THAT," Rouge snapped as she turned back towards Amy with a vicious glare, pointing an accusatory finger towards the pink hedgehog, "is part of why it happened!"

"What?" Amy was taken aback by Rouge's sudden intensity.

"It's always 'oh, it's Rouge, she's probably up to something'. You guys are always assuming I have a plan, or a scheme, or an angle." Rouge stood, slamming her palms on her desk and leaning forward. "Do you know how it makes me feel when the closest things I have to friends treat me like that all the time? God, I bet you don't even know what Knuckles said when he invited me to Sonic's birthday party."

"I… no, he… didn't mention."

"'You should come so I know the Master Emerald is safe while I'm at the party, ha ha.'"

Amy shifted uncomfortably in her chair as Rouge stared her down, eventually losing the will to maintain eye contact and opting to stare at the floor in front of her seat. "He... probably meant it as a joke?"

"No." Rouge flopped into her chair unceremoniously, sagging so low that her eyes were barely visible above the desk. "You and I both know he was serious and that was his way of being polite about it."

Several moments of awkward silence passed before Amy asked, "So… what does this have to do with Tails?"

"It doesn't. That's the point."

"... Huh?"

"Tails doesn't treat me like that. He's never once tried to make fun of me for what I do, or joke that I'm untrustworthy. He…" Rouge trailed off for a moment, then frowned and sighed in frustration. "He treats me like a person, and apparently I'm so desperate that 'not being teased all the time' is all it took for me to catch feelings for him." Her frown was replaced by a wan smile. "But he makes me happy, and I make him happy, so I guess being desperate isn't all that bad."

"You make him happy?" Amy utterly failed to keep the apprehension out of her voice. "What does that mean?"

"Kinda the same thing he does for me," Rouge said as she sat up, leaning over to rest her chin on her palm. "He's talked about how he's usually 'the little brother being treated with kid gloves' or 'the engineer that nobody even tries to understand', and how both options suck." She smiled wistfully and chuckled a little. "You should've seen how excited he was when I offered to help him with upgrading the Guard Robos; it was like I asked him out on his first date. I guess that's what it was, in retrospect."

"Have you guys… well, I mean. If it was a date."

"Not in the way you're thinking. Did you know that he works himself to sleep? He'll just keep going until he gets tired and then curl up wherever he is. I saw him grab a blanket from his bag and I told him 'no guest of mine is going to sleep in a workshop,' so I took him to bed and gave him a goodnight kiss once he was settled in." She paused and then quickly added; "And I slept on the couch, before you panic." Amy had taken up studying the floor again, so Rouge continued. "Really though, we don't do anything crazy, we just spend time together. All he wants is to be treated like an equal."

"But you're not, though!" Amy blurted, then winced in apprehension of Rouge's retort. When she looked up to see that Rouge was calmly waiting for an explanation, Amy tried again. "I mean. Doesn't it bother you how… different you guys are?" When Rouge only blinked in response, Amy balled her hands into fists at the hem of her dress and shouted "I mean his age, okay?! I was trying to be nice about it, but isn't it weird that you're ten years older than him?!"

Rouge's brows shot up. "Wait. How old do you think Tails is?"

Caught off-guard by the question, Amy deflated. "I, uh. He's eight, isn't he?"

"Oh, honey," Rouge laughed, "he's a year older than you."

"WHAT? When I asked Sonic, he said Tails was eight!"

"Yeah, when they MET. Jeez, now I understand why you were so ready to fight." After politely averting her eyes so Amy could stew in her embarrassment without being watched and stifling her laughter, Rouge continued: "Anyway, yes. While the gap isn't as big as you thought, it does bother me - I've got five years on him, and I admit that the idea of that makes me uncomfortable."

"Well… if it bothers you, why not pursue someone else?" Amy offered hopefully.

Rouge gave Amy a pointed look. "Like who?"

"Maybe Knuckles?" Rouge scoffed in response, but Amy pressed on. "I mean, he did invite you, and you two seemed to be getting along!"

"I was being polite because I didn't want to ruin the party. Besides, even if we decided to forgive the most backhanded invitation the world has ever known, Knuckles is an idiot."

"Oh come on, he's not that bad."

"Oh yeah?" Rouge said, crossing her arms. "Do you remember Operation Big Wave, Amy? Do you recall how he committed to a plan that he thought up in a minute and a half that destroyed eighty percent of our forces and left the other twenty percent missing?"

Suddenly, Amy was inspecting the floor again. "... Yes. I remember."

"And do you remember what he had to say about that?"

"... 'Our Big Wave has washed out'," she said in a small voice.

"Yeah. Not a retreat order, not a mote of regret, a quip that took him a full minute to think up. Amy, Knuckles is dumb. I'm not saying that to be mean, I'm saying he's seriously stupid. The only reason he's a good guardian of the Master Emerald is because he doesn't have the capacity to think of anything else!" Rouge realized she was shouting, so she took a moment to compose herself before continuing. "Listen. Knuckles is nice enough, and he's handsome in a hunky kind of way, and sometimes it's kinda cute how simple he is, but I could never stand being with someone who is that much of a meathead. Half the time I think the only reason he remembers me is because I joked about stealing the Master Emerald once."

"Okay, well," Amy said, looking up again and spreading her hands in a pleading gesture. "What about Shadow?"

"No way. When he's not brooding about Sonic being better than him at something, he's brooding about his dead sister or girlfriend or whatever Maria was." Rouge leaned back, looking at the ceiling. "I care about Shadow, but I definitely don't have those kinds of feelings for him. I have enough baggage as it is, I don't need an extra mountain of it."

"And the age difference is baggage you can handle?"

Rouge shot Amy an annoyed glance, but eased up when she realized that the question was genuine. "Yeah, I guess. I mean, when I THINK about it, it feels weird. But then, when I'm with him, it just…" She leaned back in her chair, covering her face with her hands. "I just FORGET, you know? He's so much more mature than the other boys that it doesn't even register that he's three years younger than them. When we're together, all I can think of is… how much I love to see him smile."

Amy sighed wistfully. "Yeah. I get that." They sat in silence for many moments, Rouge staring at the ceiling and Amy quietly fiddling with the hem of her skirt while she processed everything they'd talked about. Suddenly, something occurred to her. "Hey, Rouge."

"Hm?"

"What did you mean earlier, when you said that you had to figure out what you're doing?"

"Well, it's like I said - Tails and me just kinda happened," Rouge answered as she sat up. "I invited him over because Eggman trashed his place, and I figured it'd be an okay way to repay him for saving my life. I didn't really think about the long-term prospects of him living here, or what to do if I needed him to leave." She sighed and rubbed her forehead. "And since I've been happily single for a while, I definitely didn't think about how my feelings might shift my priorities."

"Oh? How'd they shift?"

"Right now…" Rouge stared at nothing as she searched for the right words. "All I care about is doing right by Tails."

"Yeah?" Amy said, suddenly taking a stern tone and crossing her arms. "And what if doing right by Tails means breaking up with him because I don't think you're good for him?"

The question hit Rouge harder than she expected it to. Unable to face Amy, she looked downwards and mumbled a dejected "yeah".

After a moment of silence, the pink hedgehog suddenly stood, hands on her hips. "I've made a decision," Amy announced.

"Yeah?" Rouge asked, obviously riddled with anxiety.

"I'm going to reserve judgement."

Rouge blinked, uncertainty plainly plastered across her face. "What... does that mean?"

"It means that you can keep it up, for now. But!" Amy jabbed a finger towards Rouge. "I don't know if I trust you yet."

Rouge laughed bitterly. "I pour my heart out and that's the best I get?"

"You got that because you poured your heart out," Amy said, wagging a finger at Rouge. "When you said that I could decide, I thought there was no way you could convince me. But, then..." Amy looked away in shame, rubbing her arm. "But then I realized how unfair we've been to you, and how unfair we've been to Tails, and... a couple other things."

"Like how old Tails actually is?" Rouge said with a smirk.

"Listen, he's really short, okay?" Amy said, laughing with embarrassment. "It's an easy mistake to make."

"Oh, so it's like mistaking Shadow for Sonic?"

Amy groaned and covered her face. "Heard about that one, huh?"

"And Silver."

"I'm never going to live that down."

"Probably not."

"Really, though." Amy composed herself, putting her hands on her hips again. "I don't feel great about this. Pretty much everything about it gives me a bad feeling, in fact. But… I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt. After everything you've told me, you deserve that much."

"So you're going to wait and see if I screw up, then."

"Yes. And if you do... well." Amy's hands balled into fists and her tone turned deadly serious. "You may be able to take me in a fight, but I'm not the only one who cares about Tails."

"I'm so glad I have your vote of confidence."

"I mean it, Rouge. If you hurt him, none of us would ever trust you again, and I wouldn't be surprised if Sonic or Knuckles were mad enough to fight you."

"You know, it's actually kind of sweet how you threaten so much on his behalf."

"Do you think I'm joking?"

"Not at all. That's why it's sweet."

Amy smiled a little in spite of herself. "Alright, then. In that case…" Her bravado spent, Amy ran her fingers through her hair. "Keep me posted. Please? The last thing I want to do is to make Tails anxious by asking too many questions."

"Yeah, I can do that." Rouge stood and stretched. "Anyway. I'd show you out, but I've got to get back to work."

"Yeah, sure. Good luck with work," Amy said as she walked into the hallway, closing the door behind her. Rouge waited until the heavy footsteps of Amy's escort had faded completely before allowing herself to collapse into her chair.