A/N: Have a merry, merry Christmas! This is sort of like my present to all of ya'll.

Dedicated to Marianne

-"There's no escape now, no mercy no more. No remorse cause...I still remember. The smile when you tore me apart. You took my heart, deceived me right from the start. You showed me dreams; I wish they'd turn into real. You broke a promise, and made me realize. It was all just a lie."

-Within Temptation
"Angels"

Whenever Amy dreamed, it was always the same thing.

It was always that exact moment, at that exact place, a complete replica of a memory she kept alive by thinking of it constantly.

Except this time, the gun seemed weightless in her hand, and as she stared back at a certain blue hedgehog, her eyes turned to slits.

She knew what she knew now, that she would leave him, and she remembered exactly where she was, out there in the real world. In the real world, she was two years older, stronger, and an indefinite improvement. In the real world, the children in her dream were not so little, but were growing, their smiles ones of absolute joy.

In the real world, Sonic was still alive.

In the dream, he lifted his face to settle his eyes on hers. Amy sighed, knowing how this would all end. First, she would talk to him, and then she would drop the gun and allow herself to be embraced by him.

But this time, instead of waiting for her, the dream hero took a step towards them. "How are you?" he asked courtly, and as she huffed, he gave a smile. "So you're still as defiant." He gave a laugh. "How are the twins? Naomi? Nathaniel?" he stopped laughing, his expression sobering. "I've missed you so much."

Amy jumped back, having no idea what to do. This was not her usual dream; this was not how it went. She could not mirror his movements or predict his words, not even as they came out of his mouth. Her eyes narrowed further, as they began to circle around each other. She kept the gun pointed to his face, unwilling to let her guard down.

To humor him, she gave the darkest chuckle. "Isn't that just irony?" she teased him, using the emotions she prayed he still felt. Her heart iced over, numbing as if ready to be broken. "You know, you put me through a lot of hell. I sleep with a gun in my hand because I'm afraid that you'll come. The twins haven't even finished the alphabet song, and they know how to turn the safety off a gun and blow." Amy lifted the gun for a second, her words like venom. "But I taught them that. I had to. Because if you come back, I might not be able to stop you." Amy grinned from ear-to-ear, knowing her words were like torture. "For a hero, you're awfully good at destroying lives."

Sonic winced, his eyes hurt. "For a criminal, you're awfully good at telling the truth." He countered back, his mouth tipping into a smile once more. "You always were good at that. But now you've grown into a good liar too, though I never would have thought." Sonic blinked. "I like your hair," he ran a hand through his own quills, as if justifying his completely outrageous and random comment. "It's pretty like that. All long and layered."

Amy stopped, bewildered. "You what?" she exclaimed, tilting her head. "After two years, that's all you want to say to me? 'I like your hair'?" Amy stumbled back, her expression one of confusion and anger. "You were always crazy." She commented, as she watched him give a laugh.

"You were crazy once too." He replied, taking a step towards her, as if memory lane was a place that he could cross into her.

Amy scowled, in a way that nearly ruined her beautiful face. She did not care; she wanted him to find her repulsive. As she scoffed, she lifted her chin.

"Wrong. I was foolish, once." Her eyes flickered. "Even an entire year of being hunted down, you still thought of it as a game." She felt a new surge of anger freeze her every bone and glue her finger on the trigger. "You're such a kid. You think this is fun?" she screamed, breathing hard. "You still think this is all just another little adventure!?" and with a snap, she was unfrozen, as she pounced.

She smacked the side of his face with the muzzle of the gun, watching the blood stream from his nose and mouth the second it hit. Amy gritted her teeth, raising both arms and crushing his skull as she struck a devastating blow on the side of his head, still half turned from the first hit.

He slammed into the ground, and she felt all her breath leave her. She was unable to let the gun go, still not certain he was dead. Had she looked down, she would have not been surprised to see that the gun had become a part of her. Her eyes narrowed as he staggered up, wiping his mouth with his gloved hand.

Amy shook horribly, caught between wanting to kill him and restraining herself.

"I was wrong to ever trust you with anything." She decided to speak, her voice ragged. "Why did I think you could do anything besides take care of yourself? That's all you care about." She watched his eyes widen as she clenched her free hand. "You never cared about me, or the twins. It was all just a stupid game for you. Just a stupid," her eyes watered. "Stupid game."

"Stop!" By now, Sonic had straightened, but the moment she realized the look of anger on his face, she froze once more. "Just stop." The blue hedgehog growled, glaring at her.

"Don't you dare say that I didn't care." He told her, his voice straining to be level. "I know I did a lot of bad things. I know I'm the scum of the earth and that right now, the only one that wants me alive is a God with a sick sense of humor." He was getting closer to her the whole while, until he was right in front of her. "But what I don't know, is how you could ever think that I never cared." His eyes alit with fire, his teeth barred. "You can tell yourself that, if it helps you sleep at night." Suddenly, he was grabbing her shoulders, her stiff arm making the gun graze his chest as he leaned over. "But don't you…for a single second, believe it."

Amy felt her throat close, until both palms were against him as she shoved so hard that he nearly fell over backwards.

"Really? Because the first chance you got, you rotted us out," she mocked. "If you ever cared, you would have protected us." Her voice was slowly rising. "You would have stopped wallowing in self-pity, instead of becoming a burden to the rest of us. You wouldn't have let this happen…" she shook her head, hysterical. "You wouldn't have let any of this happen."

The sound of a gun exploded into her mind, shattering stars and shaking shadows with its earthquake effect. She felt herself die away as she watched his body fall, until she looked down and saw the gaping hole that had previously been the area where her heart had been.

Amy threw her head back and screamed, knowing now that she could not kill him. In dreams, she could. But in the real world, she could never get that pleasure.

Not because she cared, not because he was once the person she dreamed about marrying every day. Not because he had eyes that were the brightest green, or because he had a smile that made her weak in the knees.

But because if she killed him; she would only be killing herself.

Vanilla watched her daughter through the stainless glass of the capsule.

Her eyes were brimming with tears that she wouldn't allow herself to cry.

"Oh Cream." She lay a hand where her daughter's cheek was visible, wishing that somehow her child could feel this now. "Darling daughter…" she sank to her knees, watching the little girl the entire time.

"I'm sorry it had to be you."

As she told Cream this one simple fact, she added with a purpose. "And if you can help it. Stay dead with the dead."

The first thing that the gardener of the cemetery saw that morning; was a dead girl that had crawled out of her grave.

She was stretched across a new headstone, lying so still and so preciously that anyone would have thought her to be a painting that had been purposely put there.

She had hair the color of cotton candy, glistening and long, like a river that looked so incredibly soft. There was a bruise across her forearm, and it wasn't until he looked closer that he noticed her eyes were underlined with purple, like she had not slept in weeks. Her knees were scraped raw; her legs curled as her dress flattened over her thighs modestly, like she had not died instantly, but collapsed here and thought to take a nap.

There was no blood puddle, no bullet to distort her petite body, no gaping wound or bruises around her slender neck. But she still did not move. As if it was not a chaotic work day here in town and the blaring sounds of people and machines did not exist.

The gardener bent down, wondering if maybe, a higher power had decided to just take her. She seemed too young, too pretty, and all too sad. Maybe she had been alive just minutes before, for her cheeks were still flushed and her body still warm. Her skin was as pale as the marble graves in this particular section, but something about her was absolutely lovely.

The gardener bent down low, his face hovering over hers, mesmerized by the simple curl of her eyelashes.

Only to jump back in terror when her eyes snapped open.

He spun around and took off, screaming something about an angel falling from heaven, or a demon back from hell.

Amy Rose parted her lips as she gasped for air, letting weak little coughs escape occasionally. The simple color of the sky was overwhelming; the brightest of blues with streaks of uncolored masses that she remembered were called clouds.

She blinked a couple of times, making sure it was real. Her bangs hung over her eyes, so that she had to brush them away, as she still lay sleepily, just staring at the atmosphere.

Her eyes caught the small fleeting birds that passed over, and she allowed herself to watch them, forgetting that they were an ordinary event. The softest summer wind came in, wrapping around her like a velvet blanket, the blades of grass tickling her skin as she closed her eyes and breathed. The world underneath her was rotating, so much that her head began to pound.
Amy shuddered, as she felt the sudden sting of her minor injuries, on her shaking knees and her body. She could not remember how she got here, or where she even was at all. Her head seemed to be making her whole body pulse now, as she weakly grabbed the side of the marble stone and lifted herself up.

Almost immediately, she fell flat onto her back, yelping as pain shot up like morphine traveling through her veins.

I must get home. Her eyes glazed over, as she realized something peculiar. As she stilled, she began to panic. Yesterday, it was covered in snow. She stopped breathing, staring at the season signs of the middle seasons. Where am I? It's supposed to be nearly Christmas time, where is my home? Where is my scarf? And my coat? Where are my…Her eyes snapped wide open in appalled shock.

"Nathaniel?" she called, still lying helplessly. "Naomi!?" she jumped at the pitch in her voice.

Despite her fatigue, she stood on her knees before managing to stay on her feet. When she opened her eyes, she saw that she was not alone.

There, before her, was Cream. Beside her was Knuckles, and Shadow. She limped to them, grabbing Shadow weakly, her eyes so heartbrokenly pained that he could see the world falling apart in her deeply colored irises.

"Where are they?" she whispered, her grip slipping. If his hands hadn't tenderly wrapped around her elbows to prop her upright, she would have collapsed. "What have you done?" she whispered, as his crimson eyes shifted.

With a sad smile, he pulled her closer. "They're safe. You're dreaming." He parted her hair. "We're still dead. And you're still okay." He gave a laugh, his voice still as monotone as ever.

Cream came to them, hugging Amy from the side, nuzzling her affectionately. "I missed you so much, Miss Amy." She mumbled into her skin, before tears slipped down her face. "I'm so sorry. I should have never let you go." Her caramel eyes seemed riddled with admiration that she could remember having once.

Knuckles came at her other side, not hugging or anything sappy like that, but laying his hand on her shoulder. "I'm sorry too." He told her, as Amy watched the beautiful amethyst of his eyes. "I was so mad at you, so wrapped up in keeping the world together. But I couldn't even see that I was the one tearing it apart."

Amy watched him, before she let out a smile that added beauty to the serene scene before them. "It doesn't matter now." She told him, as she turned her face back into Shadow's chest, breathing. "None of that matters now."

As they sank down into the grass, they all held onto the pink hedgehog. Shadow kept her close, so that she knew that not even death had stifled his love for her. They all wrapped lovingly around her, like a barrier, being her protectors, and allowing themselves to become a second skin that would always keep her warm.

Knuckles broke the silence. "You need to find Sonic." She stilled, while she noticed Shadow had jerked, while Cream had gasped.

After the longest while, she turned her head to face him, looking as if he had just impaled her. "What?" she whispered.

Knuckles looked away, his frown forming. "Something's coming." He finally replied, before he turned to look back at her. "It's coming for Nathaniel. Tikal warned us…that if you don't join forces with Sonic, and protect the little boy…the world will cease to exist."

Amy stared. "What in the world are you saying?" she asked, sitting up a little. "Who's coming? What do they want with Nathaniel?" her voice started to rise. "What good is Sonic to me?" she tried to sit up, but Cream wrapped her arms around her waist and hugged her tightly.

"Miss Amy," she sobbed. "You have to. You have to stay alive." Her tears became a waterfall. "If you don't, who will protect Cheese and my mother?" her voice softened. "And Tails?" she added. As she bawled, she held onto her tighter. "Pretty soon, we'll be back. But not if you don't join forces with Mister Sonic again." Her eyes sparkled. "Please. I have to see my mother one more time. Please Miss Amy. You can't let the world end. What will happen to the Chaos emeralds? And without you two to defend the galaxy, millions will suffer. People like Cosmo. With no home, family killed by powerful villains."

Amy closed her eyes, sinking back down. "But…" her voice trailed off. "But, I don't even know where he is, for starters."

It was Shadow that grinned. And she knew right then that he had his own reason to want to come back to the living. Her, just to be able to really see her, to really feel her in his arms.

Amy wondered if it bothered him to know nothing would ever happen. "Well," he sighed. "You had better start looking."

A/N: Merry Christmas, everyone! You know, Happy Holidays and the whole shtick.

... Uhh... not much else to say. Bathroom cleaners killed off my brain cells :P

Anonymous Reviews:

Lightnings Fury: YAY! An anonymous review! You love it? That's good :) Thanks for reading!

chibibunnies: Aww, give Tails a break... The little guy's going through a lot of torture right now (and whose fault is that? Ours, I know XD). Thanks for reading!

kalsanda: I take it that you like the story:) Thanks for reading!

That's all for now!

The Queen of Aces

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