Chapter Text
“Mm-hm.”
“…”
“Okay…”
“…”
“I know.”
No, Tails wasn’t losing his mind; his seemingly one-sided conversation was simply a phone call.
“…”
“Yeah, yeah.”
A very uninteresting phone call, if his tone was any indication. Not only was the conversation extremely unbalanced, as Tails’ one-or-two-word replies were in response to the other person talking for at least a solid 20 seconds each time, but it was also way too late for this kind of thing.
“…”
“Yes, I got it.”
“…”
*Beep*
The other guy finally hung up!
It’s about time.
“Who’s calling you this late?”
The brown voice would have to be Cream the Rabbit, Tails’ newlywed wife, who was patiently waiting in bed while her husband was stuck on the phone.
(I wrote this bit when I thought I'd have colored text! I had a joke here and everything!!!)
“Sigh. It’s a work thing.” Tails responded.
“At 10:27 at night??”
“…Yeah.”
Tails’ reply came with a grumble, but there was nothing to be done about it now. He had been just about to get to bed when he received the phone call, and he exited the room while talking in an attempt to minimize his disturbance of Cream.
Now that it was over he could return and get to sleep for real. Tails sat down on the side of the bed to take a breather from the annoying call, and put the phone on his bedside table. Yet, despite his desires, he didn’t turn off the volume. No matter how much Tails hates it, these calls are too important to risk missing.
But I really wish I could…
As Tails got himself situated for sleep, Cream recalled her own conversation that she’d had earlier that day.
“Oh, I completely forgot, Charmy called this afternoon! He was really happy to hear things have been going well with us, and he asked to me to say hi.”
“Mhmhmhm…” Tails let out some muffled laughter.
“What?”
“It’s pretty ironic, y’know?”
“…No?”
“Remember how much he hated it when we started dating?”
“No he didn’t?”
“Ehh, maybe not to you.”
Tails rolled over and got comfy in the assumption that the conversation was over, but his comment made Cream too concerned. She sat up and became more attentive.
“What is that supposed to mean?” She asked.
“It’s nothing. Don’ worry bout it.” Tails muttered half-asleep.
When you say it like that I’m not very convinced. “Are you sure?”
“I… uh… I promised not to mention it.”
Now Tails was really starting to sweat (metaphorically). His demeanor only confirmed Cream’s suspicions, and she doubled down.
“Miles…”
“Okay, fine.” Tails sat up as well to recount his tale.
“It was just after we started dating, but before we told everyone…”
*fwip-fwip-fwip*
The teenaged Tails’ titular tails’ spinning slowed to a stop as he landed in front of his house. It was the early evening, and his arms were full with two massive bags of groceries. He’d just flown from the store, and boy were his arms tired! From carrying the bags the whole time, of course. The bags obscured his vision so much that he had to carefully watch his step while walking up to his front door, humming a tune to himself as he went on his way.
What’s he humming? Put your guesses in the comments below!!!
With both hands occupied, Tails scanned his tailprint (???) to unlock the door, and also opened the door with said tail. He entered the house, flipped on the light with the same tail.
“…Hm.”
Well he tried to turn it on, but the light failed to do. He flicked it few more times, but to no avail.
Aw man, I thought I fixed it for good this time.
Well, he’d have to fix it again. For now, the groceries had to be put away. When I say ‘groceries,’ I mean the tools and other mechanical thingamabobs he’d picked up at the hardware store.
…So they’re not even remotely groceries (though it sure explains why carrying the bags for so long got so tiring).
Tails was feeling his way through the house with his tails when all of a sudden, a sliver of light appeared! It was extremely dim, but it was just enough to catch Tails’ eye and prompt him to follow it to its source.
“What the…”
In the kitchen sat a lone table—his dining room table, except that most of the chairs were missing, and the two that remained were placed directly opposite each other. There also sat an office lamp which was supposed to sit on Tails’ desk, and yet for some reason had been placed on the table and shone upon the far chair.
There’s no way this mysterious scene couldn’t pique Tails’ interest! The curious fox tiptoed over to the chair, and carefully peeked between his bags to see what the lamp was illuminating.
Aaaaaand iiiiit’s…
Nothing.
Well, that’s lame.
*SLAM*
“GAH!”
The sudden slam made Tails drop both his bags as both his head and ears sprung up! Something had just shut the kitchen door… Or should I say someone:
CHARMY?!
Charmy Bee stepped out of the darkness, approaching the table.
“What are you doing here?! No—how’d you get in?!” Tails was aghast!
“I could ask you the same question.” Charmy responded.
“Wha- THIS IS MY HOUSE???”
“…Anyways.”
Charmy decided to change the topic (y’know, because Tails is clearly right) to the crux of what he’s here for.
“Why don’t you have a seat over there. We need to talk.” He pointed at the lit-up chair.
You’d think there’s no way Tails would agree to that, and you’d almost be right—Tails was moments away from personally kicking Charmy out of his house! However, the bee’s grave tone made him pause. After all, how often does Charmy sound serious about anything? His precise tone was especially strange, with the way he simply stated his intent rather than making the kind of boisterous demand Tails would expect out of him.
“…Okay.”
Tails was willing to comply, so he sat down. Charmy did likewise with the other seat.
Why is he dressed like that?
Now that Charmy was closer to the light, Tails could tell that he was wearing a fedora and had a toothpick in his mouth. He was even wearing a trenchcoat that was clearly too big—suspiciously Vector-sized, if anything.
“Now looksee here pal, we can do dis the easy way, or we can do dis da hard way, capiche?”
“…Why are you talking like that?” It’s like 5 different imitations all shoved together.
“I’ll be the one asking the questions around here! So tell me what were you doing from 12 to 5 PM on August 9th?!” Charmy dramatically demanded.
“Umm… I… er…”
“Yes??”
Tails still didn’t respond. He looked down at the desk as his eyes slowly widened; he couldn’t admit what he was thinking. Charmy caught on to Tails’ unease, and jumped out of his seat to hammer it home.
“TELL ME!” Charmy shouted as he ferociously slammed the table!
“Fine! I’ll admit it! …What day is it?”
“…”
“...What?” Charmy was so confused that he even stopped doing the fake voice.
“I’ve been busy recently and I lost track of time, okay?!”
Yep, that was Tails’ big admission. He slumped in his seat, and was feeling very defensive about this. I mean come on, he doesn’t even know what day it is?
“…It’s the 12th.” Charmy responded.
“So it was six days ago… uh, what day was tha-”
“It was Friday!”
Oh…
This is a bit of an issue for our foxy friend. After all, that was the day he went out with Cream. The two teens aren’t exactly dating yet, except that they totally are and just haven’t acknowledged it yet. To be more precise, they hadn’t admitted it—not until last Friday, that is. After all, that was when-
“Well?”
“Huh?! Oh, yeah.” Tails didn’t even realize he had went silent.
“…So what did you do that day?” Charmy impatiently demanded to know.
As I was getting at before being rudely interrupted, it’s an issue because although Cream and Tails agree that they’re dating, they haven’t actually told anyone else. They were waiting for the right time, but now Charmy has somehow figured it out before they were ready.
I can’t tell HIM of all people! Better play it cool. “Nothing in particular. Actually, didn’t we play Crossworlds that night?”
“Yeah, you seemed pretty distracted.”
Gulp. “R-Really? I wonder why.”
“Uh-huh. Didn’t you do something with Cream that day?” Charmy wasn't buying it.
“Did I? Y-Yeah, I guess we hung out a bit. It wasn’t very eventful.”
“Oh? Then why don’t you explain THESE!”
*WHAP*
Charmy slapped a pile of photos onto the table in front of Tails! He took a close look, and found that the photos chronicled the events of that fateful day. Every single one of them contained Tails and Cream doing things, and all of them were noticeably taken from a distance.
“Whaddaya have to say about these?!” Charmy took out his toothpick, which turned out to actually be a lollipop, and pointed it directly at Tails’ face.
“W-Well, I, uh…”
…Wait a minute. Why am I still going along with this?
Tails didn’t have a good answer. Sure, he’d been concerned about Charmy’s tone, but this has gone way too far. This time, it was his turn to stand up.
“You were stalking us?!”
“That’s not importa-”
“Yes it is! You were stalking us last week! And now you broke into MY house, you somehow messed with my electricity, and you’re trying to interrogate me in my own kitchen!”
“So… are you gonna answer?”
“GET OUT!!”
Charmy remained motionless as Tails glared him down, suppressing the urge to yell back and actually thinking through his actions for once. All his thoughts lead to one irrefutable conclusion.
He’d completely destroy me.
Okay, so combat is out of the question. Fortunately, Charmy had a contingency plan in mind.
“Fine. I guess I’ll just have to show these photos to… Vanilla.”
*plop*
Tails immediately sat back down—he is not messing with her.
“What do you want.” He hissed out.
Charmy made no effort to hide his satisfaction.
Blackmail is awesome! “You can tell me what you were really doing with Cream that day.”
Tails looked over the photos again. Although many of them could be interpreted romantically, they all had some amount of plausible deniability—exactly what he needed.
“I already told you. We were just hanging out.”
“Oh, is that how it’s gonna be?” Charmy narrowed his eyes at Tails.
“That’s how it is.” Tails narrowed his eyes back.
“I could still take these to Vanilla.”
“And I could tell her you just misunderstood things.”
“Do you think she’d believe you?”
“Do you think she wouldn’t?”
The truth is, neither of them were certain of anything. Maybe Vanilla would believe Tails’ claim, or maybe she wouldn’t be convinced. If she did believe him, Charmy would be in big trouble for stalking the two of them—if she didn’t, Tails might be in even bigger trouble. They were at an impasse, and neither of them had any plans of backing down, so there was only one way out.
…The hard way it is.
“Take a look at this.”
Charmy held up a photo of the couple at a diner. It was a bit blurry by virtue of being taken from across the street, and the camera also wasn’t very good on account of the Chaotix’s eternal money struggles, but you could still clearly see Tails and Cream sitting on opposite sides of a booth taking spoonfuls from a single comedically large ice cream sundae.
Yet, Tails was completely unfazed.
“And?”
“You’re both eating the same sundae. Why’s that?”
“It’s cheaper than getting two. That’s it.”
As you can tell by Tails’ quick response, he already had that reply planned. His little smirk as he spoke infuriated Charmy, but the bee managed to keep it in. He was rapidly losing his patience, though.
“Okay, what about this??”
Charmy slapped his former photo down and picked up a new one. It was of the same scene, but it showed something else—Tails and Cream giving each other spoonfuls of ice cream!
…Maybe. As previously stated, the photos are blurry, a fact that Tails took full advantage of.
“What is this supposed to be?”
“You’re feeding each other ice cream! That’s not something that friends do!”
“Really?” Tails tilted his head with faux (hehehe) confusion. “I don’t see it.”
“No, you… you totally were!” Tails’ gaslighting worked on Charmy like a charm.
“I guess we were goofing off a lot in there, maybe you saw that and thought it was something else.”
“I… but I… Gaaahh!”
With his head in his hands, Charmy had no choice but to admit defeat.
But only in this battle!
That’s right, he’s not giving up yet! He went back to the photos, and tried to find something more.
Looking at them now, most of the photos weren’t all that incriminating (for the crime of love?), but he’d have to take what he could get—there were a few of them at an arcade, but he couldn’t find anything useful in there. They passed by Tails’ house, but only for a brief moment. They also went to a park, but… actually…
“Ho ho ho!”
“What now?”
“Care to explain this?”
Charmy pulled up a new photo, staring Tails and Cream in the park, and—gasp—holding hands!
“What of it?” Tails asked, unconcerned.
“You- You’re holding hands! What do you think??”
“Okay. And?”
“It means you’re boyfriend and girlfriend!”
“No it doesn’t, we’re just close friends.”
“You can’t say that!”
“Why not?”
“Grrrr…”
Charmy grumbled, and checked another photo that had been taken seconds later.
“You’re leaning your heads on each other!!”
“…Very close friends.”
“Oh, COME ON!”
“What? That’s how we are. I guess you just can’t understand.” Tails shrugged with fake disappointment.
“Well, then, uh… why wasn’t Cheese there? Cream always takes Cheese with her everywhere, but she left him home! Why would she do that unless it was a date, HMMM???”
“I dunno.” Tails shrugged. “Why don’t you ask her?”
“I-I uh…”
Of course Charmy couldn’t ask Cream! She’d also be mad about his prying, but it’d be so much worse than with Tails. He certainly couldn’t blackmail her either—she would never go along with it, and there’s no way Vanilla would take Charmy’s side against Cream.
“Stop it! Shut up!!”
“Oh? I thought you want me to talk?”
“GRRRRAAAAGH!”
Charmy was at his limit! It’s plainly obvious that Tails and Cream were on a date that day, there’s no question about it. Tails’ smug demeanor makes it even worse—he knows that Charmy knows, and yet he just can’t prove it.
Yes I can.
…Wait what?
Yeah, I can totally prove it.
Oh.
Wait, if this story is being told by Tails in the future, how do we know Charmy’s thoughts?
Don’t worry about it.
O… kay…
Regardless of any logical inconsistencies, Charmy had an ace up his sleeve this whole time.
“Well? You got any other questions, or are you done yet? If you’re done, you’re free to leave at any ti-”
“TAKE THAT!”
Charmy shouted at the top of his lungs, stunning Tails into silence! He pulled out a photo that was hidden up his sleeve (obviously), and-
*SLAM*
-slammed it down on the table with such intensity that it blew all the others onto the floor.
Tails looked at the photo, wary of Charmy’s confidence, and his stomach dropped. Captured in film were Tails and Cream, standing in a meadow and right smack in the middle of their first kiss. There’s no way he could feasibly deny this one, you could see both of their faces and everything.
But it sure wouldn’t stop him from trying!
“I… I… uh…”
No matter how difficult it was.
“Ooh, I know, It’s just the camera angle! It looks like our faces are touching, but they’re just next to each other horizontally like this!” You can’t see it, but Tails' desperate excuses came with frantic hand gestures. “See?”
“Hmm…”
Charmy pretended to consider what Tails had said, but his slowly widening smile betrayed his true thoughts.
Gottem.
“Oh, that’s possible. Yeah, actually, that makes a lot of sense…”
Tails wasn’t falling for it. He knew it was over the second he heard Charmy doing a new fake voice.
“…Just one more thing. Ya see, I also saw Cream that day, and I must have accidentally bumped into her face, the area around her mouth in particular, because I got a bunch of white hairs on my shirt.”
“C-Cream’s face has white hair too!” Tails blurted out.
“Oh, I know, but something about those hairs seemed off to me, so I sent them off to get the DNA tested.”
“…Wha- HOW???”
“We solved a case for one of those genealogy companies and they owed us a favor. I got them to do a rush job, and the results came in last night.”
“…”
“Most of the hairs were from a rabbit, but a couple were different—94% Fox.”
“…”
Tails was about to break when he realized something.
“Wait. 94%?”
“Yeah, they couldn’t figure out the other 6%. It wasn’t any species they knew of.” Charmy shrugged.
“W-Weird.”
Tails had no clue how to react to that information. His (two) tails flicked themselves, as if they were trying to send some sort of message, but he ignored them.
“Yeah… But uh anyways- Care to explain why there was fox hair right next to Cream’s mouth?? And don’t even try to claim it was from a different fox, because I can have them run more tests!”
The thought did cross Tails’ mind, but suggesting that Cream had kissed a different fox was way too far for him.
“Well? ANSWER ME, PROWER!!”
“OKAY! Fine! You’re right, I’m dating Cream and we kissed!”
With his head in his hands and his ears pinned down, Tails had no choice but to admit defeat.
But he still had one question:
“…if you had this, why’d you waste time with all the other photos?”
“Gotta save the best for last!” Charmy replied without missing a beat.
There is something wrong with your head. “Whatever, you won, what’s your problem anyways?”
At that remark, Charmy—who had been hovering midair for a while now—suddenly stopped. He dropped down on the table (he’s way too short to look intimidating from on the floor) and stared Tails dead in the eyes. He hated Tails’ flippant tone, and he certainly hated the way the fox was looking at him like he’s an idiot!
“What’s my problem? MY problem is what you’re doing with my little sister!”
“…Little sister?” Tails incredulously muttered. You’re the same age.
“Yeah, that’s right! She’s my little sister, and I’m her big brother, so I’ve gotta watch out for her!”
He suddenly grabbed the photo and shoved it in Tails’ face!
“And I can’t do that if you’re running around and SMOOCHING HER behind my back!” He shouted with brotherly fury! “Who do you think you are anyways? You should know she’s super easy to convince to do things (trust me I know) so when you set up all this romantic stuff it’s no wonder she went along with it but you should know better cause shes just a little girl and shes really naive and impressionable and i dont know what naive means vector said it but i can tell its nothing good and i know youre a tricky fox so you knew exactlywhatyouweredoingdidntyouyeahthatsrightiknowexcactlywhatyouhadplanedandicantjuststandhereandwatchithappendoyouknowhowsensitivesheisifyoubreakherheartshemightjustdieokayandasherbigbrotherihavetoprotectherfrompeoplelikeyoutryingtotakeadvantageofherbecauseiknowhowgreatsheisandhowprettysheisimeandontgetmewronecauseimherbrothersoobviouslyidontseeherlikethatbutiknowwhateveryonethinksofhersoigottakeepwatchandstopguyslikeyoufromgoingtoofarandactuallywaitaminuteAREYOUEVENLISTENING?!”
Tails clearly was not. Charmy’s enraged rambling dissolved into background noise because of the photo currently shoved into the fox’s face. Being confronted with the memory of that moment was quite distracting.
“Tails!”
“…W-What?”
Even his reaction to that shout was delayed. When he finally did raise his head, Tails’ obvious blushing and his tails’ unconscious spinning displayed his thoughts well enough.
“…Oh- UGH!” Charmy huffed and slapped the photo face down on the table. Tails very clearly looked disappointed as he did so, but Charmy ignored it.
“S-So what, do you want me to break up with her?”
“…No.”
In spite of everything Charmy screeched about in his rant (not that you’d know unless you read it), he still recognized that it could always be worse than Tails. Plus, he was feeling generous.
“How about this:” Charmy sat back down his seat and crossed his arms in a businesslike manner. “I’ll let you date Cream, BUT! You have to tell me every time you go out with her, and tell me exactly where you’re going so I can keep an eye on you.”
“…and if I refuse?” Tails hazarded to ask.
Charmy’s smile didn’t change as he reached into his pocket and-
“You’re right, I’m dating Cream and we kissed!”
-Tails’ recorded voice came out.
“…Ah.”
“Yeah.”
Welp. That's checkmate. “Fine. I agree.”
Tails naturally didn’t want to, but he was pretty trapped by this point. Plus, he was a bit impressed—he never would’ve expected Charmy to be that clever.
“And Cream doesn’t need to hear anything about this.” Charmy added
“Fine.”
“Great, be seeing ya soon!” The bee suddenly jumped into flight and flicked off the table lamp, covering the room in darkness once again. “Gotta buzz!”
*BUZZZZZzzzzzzzz-THUNK* “OW!”
“Charmy??”
“I’m okay! …Oh, there’s the window!”
*BZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz*
And off he went.
Once the buzzing of wings became inaudible and he was absolutely sure that Charmy wasn’t returning, Tails got up to close the window.
I have to remember to close those. At least I know how he got in.
Unfortunately, it was so dark that he couldn’t even tell which window Charmy had left out of. That, and moment he got out of his seat-
“WAAAGH!”
He nearly slipped and fell on the floor. He managed to brace himself against the table before completely collapsing, and quickly turned the lamp back on before anything else went wrong. The light also showed him exactly what happened—he had slipped on a photo.
“Oh yeah, those…”
He picked it up off the floor, and found that it was one of the photos of him and Cream at the diner. Despite everything that had just happened, the memory of the cold sundae still made him warm inside. And if Charmy left all the photos here, then there was no reason for Tails not to keep them. He might as well get something out of this ordeal.
But first, back to business. He picked up the (wireless) lamp, and used it to illuminate his steps.
Now, to see if he messed with anything other than the circuit breaker.
…Now that I think about it, I don’t hear the fridge.
Uh oh.
“…and that’s how I got all those photos of our first date.”
Tails’ tale was complete, and he relaxed back into bed—that had been a lot of talking!
And, uh, he was kind of expecting Cream to say something right about now.
“Cream?”
He turned to take a better look at her, and found that she was stiffly sitting straight up, and staring at him with unblinking eyes and an agape mouth.
“…WwwwwwWHAT?!”
Tails flinched, but Cream was so shocked that she couldn’t even notice! At first she had thought he was joking, but as the story continued she realized this was no joke. Sure, she’s always wondered where all those photos came from, but this pushes the limits of credibility. If Tails didn’t speak with so much detail, she would’ve had a hard time believing that it was true.
“He blackmailed you?? Charmy??? Him????” Cream, much like her husband 5 years ago, couldn’t believe that Charmy could act like that.
“Yep.”
Cream paused, and really, really, thought.
It’s time for the second stage: Anger.
“…Charmy blackmailed you.”
“Right.”
“And he made you not tell me.”
“Mhm.”
“Because of me.”
“Y-Yeah?”
“Because he thinks he’s my big brother, and didn’t think I could be trusted to make my own choices.” Her calm voice still clearly displayed her true feelings.
“Uh…” This is the point at which Tails begins to brace himself.
“Miles. Did you tell him?”
“…Y-Yes.”
Cream paused to think.
“…”
“…sigh. Oh well. How long did he make you do that?”
Phew! “Only the first… year.”
Aaand there Cream’s jaw dropped again. She sat in stunned silence for a few moments before recomposing herself.
“You know you really didn’t need to do that. You remember how happy my mother was when we announced we were dating, don’t you? If Charmy told her, it would’ve been okay.”
“Yes, but that happened before we told her.”
“I’m sure she would’ve been fine with it.”
“I… really don’t think so.” Tails hesitatingly said.
“…Why??”
Tails knew what was coming next.
Oh boy.
Looks like they’re not getting to sleep any time soon.