Disclaimer: Please refer to the last two chapters. Thank You.
- Amy's P.O.V. –
Shadow, a remnant, a copy, Were you like that?
To shelter, to follow, to observe, did you do that?
Darkness, A threat, you seemed like that…
Those were the notes I'd jotted down on Shadow's during my break. Since Eggmans passing many years ago, I'd been going to school. It was the only reasonable thing to do, but recently I'd been drifting from my real friends.
This was my fourth year of university, making me the only twenty year old in the city that was ready for a job. Scratch that, Cross Elementary School was my job. I taught there, maybe thrice a week, but I taught there; and the children were ecstatic.
"And that's all class!" the grotesque belly of my professor jiggled as he practically waddled across the classroom. Many a time had I tried to convince him that none would judge him if he walked on his flippers instead of uncomfortable shoes that scrunched his feet. In short, it was very hard not to notice. "Is there a problem Miss Rose? You're still writing but I stopped giving notes ten minutes ago."
I heard myself say out loud, "cemeteries… he liked cemeteries…," He nodded wisely, as if he understood my gibberish.
"Yes Miss Rose, this particular genius did like cemeteries, we must talk later on to hear how you managed to gather that information." That shut up the sniggering striped feline behind me, who had been laughing at someone making a 'fool' of themselves.
Afterwards I walked to my teacher,"Mr. Purgins?" Somehow this seemed to last a lot longer than a few moments.
He almost jumped out of his seat, "Miss Rose!" he took a long drag on his puffer, "I was joking before. You may go!" his face straightened out as if someone had freshly ironed it, "but you need to stop murmuring in class." I didn't hear the rest because his room was far away from where I stood.
The Northgate Cemetery (a.k.a. the richest place a dead guy can live) was embedded on the large peach wall before me. I climbed over it because the door had been sealed shut after over populating the burial ground. The further in I walked, the more broken the tombstones became. We had buried him at the furthest back of the cemetery; he had liked cemeteries, especially those ones. There was one with the Name Maria Robotnick engraved on it and another with the name Molly scribed into it.
I knelt down nigh Shadow's grave. There was a green plant that curved and covered the whole stone; you could barely make out Shadows name. I brought the black leathered book from my satchel and put it on the grave. "C'mon Shadow! If you wanted me to have this then show me how to open this!" there was no point, I knew that. But I still had hope. There was no body, no trace of DNA at the crime scene. He could still be out there, somewhere.
As usual there was no response. I laid my head on the tip o f the stone and uncharacteristically began to trace around the edges. But then, a new thought popped into my head. Sonic might come to town! The thought of my blue knight makes me forget all my troubles, sometimes it even helps me forget that I am laying in a cemetery.
And then I heard a small sob in a wind that I could've sworn wasn't that loud half a minute ago. The sobs became more melodic, like a sad drowning siren telling of her woes. I followed the sound even further to the lesser modernized part of the cemetery.
There were fewer graves, more spread apart, and many more flowers. Eventually I kicked off my knee length go-go boots and started walking amongst the flowers, the sound had deserted me. It reminded me of many childhood days that were filled with happiness.
But these were interrupted by the feeling of crumpled paper under my foot. I picked it up (angrily I might add) and opened it, wondering what kind of insensitive jerk would litter in a place like this. Dear Mommy. My dear gosh, it was a note! My teacher said that I should right out my feelings on paper as if it were a letter. So this is the first of many letters to you. How ironic, I remember telling that to one of my students. I really miss you. Malty came back and said that I might need to go to a home. Poor little guy! I knew just how he felt, my parents too had died. I had spent close to a year in a home before being adopted by Mr. and Mrs. Rose, my now mom and dad.
I found another, the paper was the color of a clear noon sky, Mom it's me. Today I went back to school and I hated it. There's this bully, he heard that you were gone and started picking on me. I felt a little guilty for reading this, they were the personal property of the writer, and he said 'your mom must really hate you. Before you said that your first mom loved you because she gave you to her. But now she's dead and you're all alone!' I spent the whole day thinking about that. That's not true, is it?'
I searched around for another and found it near a tree stump, Mom I wish you were here right now. That was all that was written on it, but it was covered in tear stains and dried up blood spots. That poor little kid.
Mom, I want to die now, this one made my heart ache, Malty had an accident. He can't get up anymore. I felt my eyes sting, I think they're right. I looked in every possible place, finding small hand drawn pictures and one 'Happy Mother's Day' card.
Finally I found a more recent one. It was on slate grey paper and written in white chalk, I'm going to you mom. It looked about a week old. "Achoo!" I looked up to see a blanketed figure. "This must be the kid!" I tried walking over to the figure. It shivered with my every step until finally it yelled "Leave me alone!"
I instantly recognized the voice of one of my students, a bunny named Craig who'd missed school for a week because his foster mother had died of… something. I stretched out my arm like I'd seen happen many times before in TV. Shows and cheap Broadway musicals. "Honey?" The quivering ceased but he was given away by another sneeze causing me to smirk, "Peanut?" he poked his white head out from under the blanket, followed by the rest of his body. I was shocked by what I saw.
His face had scratch marks all over and was tearstained. His Albino fur was covered in black splotches, probably from laying on a tomb entrance. His eyes shifted around unpleasantly and his face was coated in misery. "Miss Rose?" he took a few steps forward, "Miss Rose!" he ran at me and gave me a hug that knocked me back into the floor.
Well… This is unexpected. I not sure if it was from the force of the little bunny's hug, or the fact that he'd been through so much that made the tears I had so professionally hid come pouring down my cheeks. Apparently he must've felt them because he lifted his head to face me with his now bloodshot amethyst eyes.
"From what I can see, Miss Rose, you look very pretty." From what I can see? Then it struck me, he wasn't wearing his contacts! Now that I thought about it, he wasn't even wearing socks or shoes. All he was wearing was a pair of yellow mittens with light green buttons stitched into them.
Normal P.O.V.
Amy wiped away the little albino's tears and brushed minimal amounts of debris out of his tuft of head fur. "Peanut, why are out so far?" the bunny started to giggle, but tried to stop it. There was a loud grumbled from the infants stomach, "How about you come with me?" Amy looked into his purple irises for a second before the bunny recoiled and ran to the safety of his mother's grave.
Amy let out a low breath, "Why won't you come? We'll go to a really good restaurant on the way back," her voice dripped with enthusiasm, and Craig nearly came out from behind the burial place, his eyes had a hungry glint in them and twinkled brightly, "And you can even meet Sonic the hedgehog!" In a split second, all the ground he'd covered was reverted back and he'd lost the glint in his eyes. This shocked Amy, how could someone not like Sonic?
Little known to her, she'd said the last bit out loud and the bunny responded, "I can't trust in him all the time. If I meet him, I need to trust him. He already lost that trust."
Same Place as Chappie Two
A brave hedgehog has gone missing. They're blaming Mommy.
Today I wasn't even allowed to go outside. When I did they took me over to a tree and tried tying me to it.
By my neck.
But Mommy came home, and boy was she mad. She did something's that would take too long to explain. She told them to never return. That and many other things.
She did something I'd never seen her do before. She sat down and cried.
I've cried many times before. But I'd never seen mommy cry… She looked ugly when she cried.
She called me over to her; I cleaned up her tears, trying to get her to smile. Which she did, but a pathetic 'don't be sad' smile that always made me feel empty.
She says we need the 'Gone', I've heard of them. The papers call them outlaws. Mommy calls them friends. Everyone who associates with them always ends up dead.
Everything got really hot after, Mommy looked out a window. The people had come back. They'd set our house on fire! She tried breaking the window, only to find it had been replaced by a see through rubber.
She grabbed my arm and started flying up the stairwell, every moment it got hotter. I looked down and saw flames of orange and white, rising to meet us. Mom had seen without even looking down and had started flying even faster. All the windows were blocked with wood or rubber.
Mom told me to try to not listen. She took a deep breath and yelled. A sound that made my ears feels like bleeding. But it made a large hole in our roof. Mommy flew us out of it. The people saw us and started throwing things at us, they all missed but one grazed my calve.
Whoever these 'Gone' people are, we need them.
Castel
Father, Father, Father. My poor foolish Father.
He let a whole crowd get away with burning down her house. Doesn't he know she's on our side?
She's been gone for many days now. I miss her presence. My father would too if he were to listen to me.
So instead I'll run. Run so far away that I'll have to find her. I might even get her to adopt me.
This kingdom is corrupt, the bad are the advisors, and the good are hunted on streets. Does that seem right to you?
Maybe one day I'll return, but for now I will find her. For what she's done for me, I'll make sure of it.
Back to Mobius
"I can't trust…," Amy recalled what the sleeping bunny had said. True to her word, they had gone to a really nice eatery. The bunny had eaten up to three times his weight and had fallen asleep while in the restaurant. But that was only after getting out of the cemetery "He lost that trust..," that's not true, was it? Sonic had everyone's trust. He was probably the most trustworthy Mobian in the whole of Mobius!
She looked at the little bunny that she had piggybacked all the way to her small apartment. Contrary to popular opinion, she did live alone, and was rather happy with it. Most of the time.
The day had left her winded out and tired. After many moments of silence, Amy just sat there, waiting for the chime of her old cherry wood grandfather clock. 'Sonic could've saved her if he knew about it…' she tried banishing thoughts like that. Finally, her awaited ring came. She pulled herself off the couch, careful to make sure the bunny stayed asleep, and made her way to her room in preparation of her 'date' with Sonic. She took a heated shower before prancing to her walk in closet and picking a new, white, turtleneck dress with diamonds stitching on the collars and a plain black Lolita skirt.
"Miss Rose? Where are you?" she heard the panicked voice of Craig come from her living room, "Miss Rose?" Amy remembered that he was blind without his glasses or his contacts and after putting on a fresh coat of 'berry cherry mocha loca' lipstick she went to guide him. Craig had heard her coming and stood still for her to take him.
Amy looked at the bunny, who had been once again crying, "Peanut, where are your glasses?" Craig scrunched his lips together.
"I threw them out. I'd hoped I wouldn't wa-a-a CHOOO!" sticky green pigments hung from the young bunny's nostrils. Only then did Amy notice the deep dark circles around his eyes. Amy tut-tutted and took his temperature (the conventional back-of-the-hand way) to find that his was burning up.
"Peanut, do you feel at all dizzy?" the bunny seemed to sway from side to side until Amy took hold of each of his hands, "Do I need to take you to a Doctor?" this seemed to terrify Craig as he took a step away from Amy and shook his head vigorously, now his eyes were barely open and he didn't see the small wooden bench behind him as he tripped and fell back onto the couch he was previously sleeping on. He tried getting up but was once again pushed back with a mighty sneeze.
Amy took hold of his small paws once more as she led him into a room with dim lighting, "We'll have to take you to a Doctor honey," she said sweetly as she could while she sat him down on a bench in the room. She left him alone for a mere moment before reappearing with the only articles of unisex clothing small enough for him that she had; an evergreen loose shirt that reached the little bunny's knees which had an attachable hood and two custard yellow lines around every opening and a pair of blue shorts that only poked under the long shirt. Of course, he was still practically blind and was not able to object to these choices.
Instead, he silently walked with hand in hand Amy as they made their way to the nearest doctor, nearly four blocks away from the apartment building. "Yo Ames!" A male voice caused them to stop in their tracks. Amy spun around to see the blue blur himself; standing on the edge of the building they'd just walked past, "It's not like you to miss a date." Amy let go of Craig's hand and ran to Sonics side.
"I'm sorry, I needed to get Craig here some help," she explained in a 'please, please forgive me' tone. meanwhile, the bunny was still facing foreword. His hand had gradually fallen to his side and he remained in that position, like he'd done many times before with his mother, "Craig, do you want to say hi to Sonic?" Craig turned possesedly (so he looked like he was possessed) and made his way to Amy's awaiting hand.
"Hey there bud! I don't think we've met before. The name's Sonic the Hedgehog," Sonic was trying his best to make the little bunny smile but his efforts failed as the stone faced bunny just whispered, 'Hello, my name is Craig Kregent, Please don't call me Kregent though ,' in an extremely quiet voice without even looking up at the azure hero hedgehog. He then turned to Amy and, in a little bit louder than the voice prior, asked if she could carry him the rest of the way, adding on –as if he needed to explain- that he felt a million times worse than before.
Amy looked unsure for a moment until Sonic suggested that he carry Craig the rest of the way. Sonic bent down to eye level and let the bunny climb onto his back. When on, Sonic allowed him to cross his arms across his neck.
Further down, Amy didn't seem to notice when Sonic grunted and didn't seem to mind when he'd let her walk far in front of him then run right back up to her. She did, however, notice how often Peanut tried to avoid eye contact with her hero. When they walked past a mirrored window, he always looked the way opposite to Sonic. But she nonchalantly put all these thoughts behind her.
"Oh!" they had already reached the doctor's office. "Sonic, would you mind coming in with us?" Sonic looked over his shoulder at the now sleeping bunny.
"Sure."
==-END-==
And so it continues.
For you out there who were wondering about that last chappie, it'll now just go Mobius, that, then Mobius again. The first one is a journal entry most of the time (I won't tell you who's) and the second is someone's perspective (same applies as before). If you didn't like how it was written then just skip between the grey ish lines but know that it adds to the story.
Hope that clears up things. And for future reference 'Gone' is said like 'gun' in the upper one.
Oc's Used:
Craig Peanut Kregent
Age: Eight Years of Age
Affiliation with character: Amy taught at his school for many years. He has grown to trust her. He doesn't trust Sonic at all though.
