I want to thank everyone for their reviews, of course! Forgive me for the BIG time lapse, but I thought it would be more exciting to just jump right into it. As to some details of what happened before this fateful night, I'll leave that to your beautiful imaginations.

Present Day—Amy Rose

I stood at the counter of the local convenient store, holding my hand to my coat. It was bleeding through the tissues I brought to keep it clean. The cut wasn't big, but it was deep and stabbed personally by my kitchen knife. I had wanted to slice apples—probably should have remembered how clumsy I could be.

"You're sure you don't have anything?" I asked again. The cashier was getting on my nerves. "I've seen band-aids in here before."

He shrugged lazily. "Look, sweetheart, I can't help you. We're all out," he said.

"I'm bleeding," I repeated, struggling to keep calm. This was really bad. I'd tried four stores in the city and they were all out of things to treat the cut, but I had hoped I would get lucky with this one.

"I see, and I'm sorry about that. But I can't give you what I don't have," the cashier sighed, popping a little green mint into his mouth. "Just wrap it up in some tissue, that should do it."

I groaned, silently spitting: Um, hello? I have some on it now. Do you see it working? "You don't understand, sir. It needs to be covered right now."

"What, are you in a hurry?"

I glanced nervously at the darkening sky. Yes. Yes, I was. "You really don't understand the situation!" I snapped, losing my patience.

"Enlighten me," he muttered, rolling his eyes and putting his hand on his cheek—like I wasn't the first crazy girl to scream at him this week. "Alright, look. Don't you have someone at home you can bother with this? A parent, friend, relative?"

Suddenly, the store felt a lot more empty and cold. I swallowed. "No…no, I live alone."

"Then I can't help you. Please, don't hold up the line." The man smiled, showing me the four angry people waiting behind me.

With a glare at him, I moved for the next person. I tore a few new tissues from the counter's open box before leaving, wrapping them around my hand and stuffing it in my coat pocket. The bell on the door jingled as I closed it.

The sky was turning a beautiful orange as the sun went down. I looked around me as I walked, watching people's faces. Sonic had taught me that—you could never be too careful. A gust of cold air hit my face and I hugged my coat to my body, deciding to focus on getting home.

No, I will not enlighten you, I thought as I made my way through the street. You couldn't handle the truth anyway. I hope you cut your finger. I hope you're walking alone at night with your bloody finger and they come for you.

It had taken only two months for things to get this bad. So bad that a thought like that could be very close to the truth. So many people had disappeared all around the city, and the mortality rate kept rising. I couldn't watch TV anymore without hearing about another body found broken and empty in an alley or the woods.

At first, only Knuckles and Blaze had disappeared. Over a few weeks, everyone else became nervous, saying they had seen one of them watching them from the woods or wandering around the city at night. But it wasn't enough to put anyone on alert…yet.

After a third Blaze sighting, Silver went to find her and never came back. Then Espio vanished. Confused and scared, most of us stopped leaving home except on emergencies. Sonic closed the two of us inside the apartment, keeping out the outside world. We wouldn't tell the others what we knew. It would only make them panic, or get cocky and try to fight a battle they couldn't win. We would just lay low until the mess sorted itself out.

Of course lying low had never been Sonic's thing.

I turned onto the shopping district, passing the glass windows of numerous stores showing off their new holiday fashions. I loved winter—all of the creative lights and music decorating the city lifted my spirits, no matter the situation. A sparkle caught my attention from the corner of my eye and I paused to take a closer look. There were shiny gold chains and silver lockets laid on red velvet cases. Each piece of jewelry had a gemstone fit into its center: a beautiful emerald so polished I could see my reflection in the sides. It was so pretty…so green…so familiar…

"What's wrong, Sonic?"

Sonic lifted his head and turned to me. He had been standing near the door for at least twenty minutes with his arms folded to his chest, sighing every now and again.

"Nothing," he replied quietly. Then his ears erected and he looked back at me again. "Amy…does it ever bother you?" he asked.

I frowned, walking up to him and leaning into his shoulder. "Does what bother me?"

"Not knowing what happened to everyone."

He watched me sadly, something I'd never really known my hero to show. It was a hard thing to wonder over. If all our friends had turned into monsters or still hid out like we did. "Well, we know what happened to Blaze and Knuckles," I said.

"It makes me worry, ya' know?" He braced his hand on the door and let out a huff of air. "I mean, Blaze was a really good fighter and Knuckles took her down like it was nothing!"

"It wasn't her fault. He wasn't himself. He's a…" My voice lowered to say the word I hated so much. "…vampire."

"You don't get it," Sonic growled, narrowing his eyes. "She was strong. The same thing that happened to Knuckles happens to her, too, right? That's how the movies play out."

"Yes," I said, a little confused.

"What if she went after Cream? She was right next to her." His eyes widened as a thought dawned on him. "What if she goes after…Tails?"

I watched his teeth bare in pain at the thought of losing his friend, and it made my heart break in two to see. I flung my arms around him. "Don't!" I demanded. "Don't think like that!"

"I'll never know, because I'm hiding like a rat from my own friends."

"Sonniku," I frowned, pressing into his chest.

His gaze switched from the door to me. The door to me.

"Amy…" he finally murmured, hugging me to him and combing his fingers through my hair. "I…I have to go."

"Go—?"

"WATCH OUT!"

I opened my eyes with a scream as I ran straight into another girl and knocked us both to the pavement. Her shopping bag tore open and spilled colorful paper out that caught the wind and blew away. I groaned and picked myself up from the ground, lifting my head to find her and apologize.

But there was no one there.

Not just the missing girl. The whole street had emptied of people, leaving me alone in the dark holding a ripped bag. A streetlamp flickered to life and buzzed above me. My eyes widened in horror. How long had I been out here, daydreaming and losing track of time?

In the darkness behind me, I heard a growl.

This has been redone a little, but no matter. Others introduced in the next chapter, so stay tuned!