The shrill ringing of the phone broke through the muddled haze of Sonic's dreams. Beside the phone was his alarm clock which read out in blinking red numbers: 2:18. Wearily, his arms drifting out from the blankets, and he picked it up.

"Sonic. You're two weeks due on your rent."

Sonic sighed, and replied timidly.

"I know..."

"Well. Are you going to pay it or what."

Sonic's hand shook as he held the phone, and he simply dropped it back onto the h ook, and it fell

Sonic fumbled through his desk drawer, sorting through the cluttered assortment of condoms, unpaid bills, and now empty dope bags. Finally, he found what he was looking for - his address book. He flipped through, frantically, paranoia incr...easing, until he found the number he was looking for and dialed, getting the wrong number twice before Tails finally picked up.

"Hello?"

"Tails? It's Sonic."

The sigh was audible, grumbling, and Sonic suddenly thought this might be a bad idea; it had been three weeks since he'd spoken to someone.

"I need money, my rent is two weeks late, please, help me out, I'll pay you back, I promise." The words came out cluttered, one long sentence, and by the end, he was out of breath, and his anxiety was reaching its peak.

"Fuck off, Sonic. You still haven't paid me back for the last three times. Get a job, you bum."

The phone clicked off, and Sonic lost all hope.

It was as if a great stone pressed upon Sonic. It was all for naught. Suddenly, each and every one of his failures drifted through his mind, and he began to cry silently, aching with self loathing. He returned to bed and went under the cove...rs, where nobody could bother him and the light that burned his eyes was not welcome.

With one hand drifting out like a snake he felt for his computer, and brought it into his little alcove. He googled Sonic and articles from the 90's lit up upon the screen, along with one page, titled "Sonic, where is he now?"

"In a deep dark hole," he thought, as he googled "Sonic and tails slash into google," and reached down. He stared at the screen, thinking, "Look at how I used to be. I could get any bitch I wanted to, I could do the power spin in any moist twat, but now, I'm the moist twat."

He gazed at the pictures of him and tails and thought, "Is that really me. He's smiling there. He's enjoying himself! Did I really used to feel like that?"

Sonic's mind went silent, as he neared his climax. He finished and fell asleep under his stained covers.

It was just one more stain upon his life. The past lay before him like Eldorado, only his ship had capsized, and he couldn't swim. He was drowning in a heap of self-pity, but he couldn't bring himself to the surface of the situation. Sonic ...felt smothered, and he knew no help was coming, not unless he could get the courage to help himself.

As the player slammed down on the "x" button, Sonic felt himself slowly uncurling and headed toward the door. He was shaking, and as he reached the door handle, he collapsed into a pitiful, trembling ball.

The player gave a groan of frustration and threw the controller at the TV.

"This game sucks!" he heard an off screen voice proclaim.

Sonic reasoned out his options in his mind. "Find a source of money and pay the rent or watch animal planet all day, and hoping not to see a hedgehog, hoping not to see what could have been. If he was lucky, he would be able to catch Americ...a's funniest home videos. He had stopped laughing at whatever he watched, they were simply means to pass the time and to help him forget about his miserable life.

He went to the tv and turned it on, and sure enough, he saw a dog making funny faces at a camcorder. The audience laughed, and Sonic reached into his bag of doritos. After 30 minutes, the show was over, and the bag empty. Everything that was wrong with his life returned to him, crashing upon him like a tidal wave. He puckered his nose as he began to smell a musky odor emanating from his crusted fur, which was brown and yellowed in spots.

He hadn't showered in about two weeks. The only reason that he showered last time was because the methadone clinic had made him do so, because the doctors were becoming uncomfortable around him. His hair had grown long and had begun to gray. His eyes were red and black bags had formed under them, as dark as a moonless sky.

There were no mirrors around the house. Sonic did not want to see himself, he would not be able to bear it. He felt a stirring in his crotch and realized that he had to go to the bathroom, but he didn't want to get up. Would pissing himself really be an unacceptable option? There was no more dignity to harm.

An egg was thrown at him from somewhere off screen. It hit him square in the face, and he couldn't help it. It was true, he didn't have any dignity left, and now he was just another dirty hedgehog, covered in his own urine. His small cage h...adn't been cleaned in weeks.

Sonic looked around. He felt disgusted with himself. He faced the player boldly.

"You don't understand. I coulda had class. I coulda been a contender. I coulda been somebody, instead of a bum, which is what I am, let's face it."

Then, he walked into the bathroom, and he took out the razor blade. A small insert was made upon his furry arm, across the stream, not down. He prayed for the courage to press down. This time, the cuts went deeper.

"OWWWWW OWO OWOWOWOWOWOWOOWWWW" Sonic screamed, reaching for the medical cabinet, clearing away a shelf of syringes and stolen prescription meds.

"Oh god, I'm going to die, I'm going to die, I'm going to die," he thought to himself, pouring hydrogen peroxide on the wound and getting a band-aid. He froze; there was a knock on his door.

Sonic's heart pounded faster than the amount of time it took for his career to bomb. He slunk out from the bathroom, and he spat into his hand and rubbed it against the urine stains, but it just made his hand stink of piss too. He heard a ...voice shout from behind the door.

"Itsa me, Mario, mothafucka. Lemme in, bitch!"

Sonic felt each and every one of his nerves recoil in terror. "Oh, God, what is Mario doing here? He's already beaten me to submission, what else does he want from me? I have nothing to give but tears." Sonic's voice quivered and shook in fear, when he finally replied,

"Mario? The door's open. The lock broke months ago."

The door swung open and Mario strode in.

"Sup, Son-dick." He shook a golden mushroom medallion that hung upon his neck by a silver chain. "You like it? 2000 bucks, bitch!"

"What are you doing here, Mario?"

"Man, tails sent me. Said you got some problems. Hey, what the fuck smells so bad. Place smells like piss."

"Miserable, stupid, fuck-up, failure, bitch, loser..." the thoughts whirled through his mind like a cyclone.