I do not own Sonic the hedgehog, nor any of its characters. All rights belong to Sega!

Recovery

Amy's knees gave way and she fell to the floor, making the rest of the crew turn to her in worry. What was even worse was that she didn't seem to be able to keep herself up anymore. Whenever she tried, she would just fall back down again.

"You okay, hun?" Rouge asked concerned and helped the hedgehog up.

"No, she's not." Violett cut in. "From what I felt back in the ship, she's used up so much magic that any ordinary mage would've died just through trying to summon it."

"Magic?" The others all asked shocked. "You can use magic?"

"Well … yes, but …"

Chaos! Everybody tried to get information out of the exhausted hedgehog, but were asking new questions before she could even answer the first ones. Amy's head was spinning, she could hardly keep herself awake anymore. But she couldn't fall asleep. Who would take care of Sonic if she was out of it?

"That's enough", Blaze said loudly and everybody stood still, now knowing what she was able to do.

"Amy needs every piece of rest she can get now. She should go to sleep before she falls into unconsciousness." Violett added.

"No", Amy said weakly. "I can't. I have to take care of Sonic."

"If you don't go to sleep now, you'll collapse entirely and I don't know how long you'll be out of it once you do. It's safe to go to sleep, then you'll wake up naturally."

"Can I eat something first?"

"No!"

For a few seconds there was silence as the two female hedgehogs glared at each other and since Violett was strong and Amy stubborn, nobody thought that there would be an end anytime soon. But then Amy had another attack of faintness and knew that it was time to give in.

"Fine, I'll do what you say. But I want to stay by Sonic's side. He needs me!"

"What Sonic needs is medical attention and what you need is rest! There's no way I'd …"

"She's right, Vi", Tails interrupted. "Sure, Sonic needs to be treated, but I know – we all know – that the one thing Sonic always needed the most was the support of his friends. I give every bet that he'll heal faster if we all stay by his side."

Violett looked at him in silence for a few seconds, her face unreadable. But Tails countered her gaze just as untouched. Nothing would ever make him back down when it came to his brother. Her eyes were cold and frightening and it took Tails a lot of self control not to step back. He thought of Sonic, thought of how weak and helpless he had looked when Amy had brought him in and he heated up like fire. It worked. The endless amount of determination in his eyes made Violett look away. For the first time since she got to meet Sonic, Violett lost a staring contest.

"You're the captain", she said coldly and walked away, obviously not amused by the fact that she lost this round.

"Okay, now that this is cleared", Rouge broke the silence after Violett was gone; "you're coming with me!"

"Yeah, right! In your dreams, bat!" Knuckles spat when he realized she had spoken to him.

Rouge looked at him untouched for a few seconds before she grabbed one of the echidna's dreads and pulled him away. Of course, Knuckles didn't even think of going freely. He fought and punched and kicked about, cussed and cursed and yelled his lungs out, but Rouge didn't even blink. She just pulled him with her, untouched by his protest. Her grip was strong the pull on his hair hurt terribly, so that Knuckles had no choice but to follow, whether he liked it or not.

She pulled the injured male all the way to her room. It was darkly lit, but very elegant. Without saying a single word, she sat Knuckles down on a chair, went into her bathroom to get a first aid kit, cotton, a towel and a bowl with water and came back into the room, where she kneeled down in front of the echidna. She took some cotton, poured a bit of Alcohol on it and pressed it on Knuckles' side. He inhaled sharply at the burning feeling this caused, but didn't say a word. Just like Rouge, he stayed silent.

Meanwhile, the bat took the towel, dunked it into the water and started cleaning off the blood that was on his side. There was a lot of it. Once it was all gone, Rouge was able to see just how deep the cut was. With that cut and all the others as well, Knuckles must have lost a huge amount of blood. He must have had one heck of a headache for a long time, if he wasn't already fighting with dizziness. And yet he was sitting there, pouting and acting like his usual self as if nothing happened. He was trying to be tough and Rouge couldn't help but to be impressed at how far he pushed himself.

The wound was clean and Rouge started bandaging it, tightly enough to be sure that the bleeding would stop.

"You're cutting off my breath, woman", the echidna hissed.

"My, aren't we sensitive?" Rouge grinned.

That made Knuckles shut up until Rouge finished with his side. Next she took care of his shoulders. The cut there wasn't as bad as the one on his side, but right now, Rouge couldn't help but worry. He was injured and she hadn't been able to help him. Lost in thoughts like these, she cleaned and bandaged the wound, not even hearing Knuckles grunts and protests. The one on his leg was last.

He had protected her. He had put himself in danger to make sure nothing happened to her. And what had she done? She had freaked out and had frozen and that was the entire reason he was in that state now. It was always like this. If they weren't bickering or fighting, he was protecting her from something. But this was the first time he had been injured this badly because of it. It was her fault. Knuckles saw her face and got worried himself. He didn't understand why she was so down.

"OW! For heaven's sake, can't you be a little more careful?" Knuckles cried frustrated.

Rouge got ticked off by that and pulled the bandage extra hard, making him cry out for the uptenth time. They glared for each other for quite a while, until the reason they were in this situation came back into her head. Her shoulders sacked and she looked back on Knuckles' leg, avoiding his glance.

"Amy must feel terrible." The bat said sadly.

"Why?" Knuckles asked, completely forgetting that he had just been angry.

"You got injured like this because you were protecting me and I feel terrible because I couldn't help you. Wherever Sonic and Amy were, Amy wasn't able to prevent Sonic from getting hurt, Sonic's injury is far worse than yours are and the two of them are much closer than you and me. If I already feel terrible, I don't even want to start thinking about how she must feel."

Silence …

"Thank you …" Rouge whispered, "… for protecting me. I'd be dead without you."

Knuckles eyes widened for a second. It was rare that Rouge would show any sign of sentimentality towards anybody, let alone him. The only time when she had showed sentimentality at all was on Arc when Shadow died and in the final battle against the Metorex when Shadow and Cosmo had sacrificed themselves to save them.

"Don't mention it", Knuckles said, looking away so that Rouge wouldn't see his blush.

="="

An Infusion was hanging over Sonic's bed and the needle was in his arm. A few cables were attached to his arm and two to his chest, close to his injury.

Sonic himself was as white as a ghost. When Amy touched his skin, she got worried that he might already be dead because he was so cold. Only his shallow breathing is what held her hopes up. He didn't even show any signs of fighting for his life. No sweating, no twitching, not even a slight groan. He was just laying there, completely motionless. Only his short breaths were loud and sounded as if he was heaving Asthma. Amy had to control herself not to twitch at every single breath he took and not to feel the pain it must cause him.

"Is he any better?" Amy asked the young kitsune sitting at the computer.

"That would be too good to be true", Tails answered. "His injury is serious and his heartbeat very unstable. He's fighting for every single second. We'll have to keep an eye on him to ensure his survival."

If Amy had more energy, she would have cried, but the way she was now, she could only sit there, hardly able to move. She watched as Cream, her soft, wonderful little Cream, was cleaning the blood on the blur's chest together with Cheese, keeping it clean. Not once did they shed a tear, not once did they show fear or any other emotions for that matter. They were being so wonderfully strong that Amy felt like a total weakling next to them. The tables had been turned around.

Vanilla was the one treating the wound. Her hands were just as sure and practiced as hers were, if not even better. It calmed her down a bit, knowing that Sonic was in good hands. She was sitting there, watching as Sonic's wound got cleaner and cleaner, looked better and better and got bandaged until nothing of it was visible under the bandages.

But Sonic himself didn't look better. His breathing still sounded painful, his skin was still cold and he was still as white as a ghost. When she looked at him, all tied up in bandages, she swore she wouldn't leave his side until he was better.

)§)§

The lights were still on. Vanilla and Cream were long gone. Sonic's wound had been cleaned and bandaged two times. Knuckles and Rouge had paid him a visit, so had the Chaotix. The only ones still there were Amy and Tails. Tails had fallen asleep over the keyboard of the computer. Amy had fallen asleep as well. She was sitting at the bed, her head resting on the edge of it. Her right hand was on his chest and the very tips of her fingers on the bandage.

Violett couldn't help but to smile at this. It was amazing how far her companions went for their hero. All the anger she had felt earlier for being beaten vaporized at the sight she saw. Of all the things she hated, loosing was definitely in her top ten.

Chuckling just a tiny bit, she walked to the other side of the room, where a chair was standing. She took it and walked to Sonic's head. She sat down at the very end of the bed and put the tip of her fingers on Sonic's temple. Then she closed her eyes and concentrated. She concentrated on the one thing only she would ever be able to feel.

Her fingers started glowing a bit. It was a warm glow, like the sun. Slowly the glow started taking direction and went into Sonic's head. That went on for a few minutes. A frown showed appeared on the purple hedgehog's face that got deeper and deeper the more time passed. Sweat started running down her face and her even breath turned into pants.

Then she tore her hands away and gasped for breath. Her fingers stopped glowing and she leaned back on her chair. There she stayed motionless for a few seconds, trying to catch her breath and to regain her strength. When that was done, she looked back at Sonic sadly and ran her hands over his forehead. He didn't look the tiniest bit better. His face didn't have more color, his breathing didn't sound any less painful and he still didn't move.

"This should give your body a bit of extra strength. I'm just sorry that this is the only thing I can do to help you."

She put the chair back where she got it from, went to one of the lockers and snatched two blankets from it. She put one over Amy and one over Tails. Then she went to the switch and turned out the lights. But she stopped dead in her tracks just before she left the room and turned around. There it was, only visible in the dark; a faint pink glow on Sonic's chest, coming from the tip of the fingers on Amy's right hand.

"No way", the magician whispered with eyes wide. "It can't be. Not after all that. There's just no way."

Amy was still using magic. She had fought an army of shadow warriors, had used an allround attack that used up so much mana that even she would have collapsed on the spot had she tried using it, had dragged Sonic all the way out of Lupa's ship and had kept herself on her feet all the way throughout the explanation about Lupa and was still using up whatever she had left to perform healing magic on Sonic, a kind of magic that took up more magic like none else did and she did it in her sleep. Where did she get all that strength from? Or was that usual for a purehearted? When saying that her strength came from her love; was that what it meant.

As if struck by thunder, Violett stood there, watching Amy's fingers glow in the dark. Then she turned on her heels and ran out of the room as if she'd seen a ghost.

And the next chapter is done. Well, what do you think? Will Amy's treatment be successful? Or is it all futile? Oh, I absolutely love torturing Sonic. And if you think that's bad, then keep on reading; it'll get a lot worse. Poor Amy and Tails are at the end of their nerves.

And one more thing; I HAVE OFFICIALLY WRITTEN MY VERY FIRST KNOUGE MOMENT! All those Knouge fans out there, keep reading. There's more to come. But something even more important comes first. Wanna guess?

And yush, the first signs of the team gaining enough strength to oppose Violett have appeared. From here on, they'll be getting stronger and stronger. Strong enough to defeat Lupa and Eggman? Who knows …

Feel free to review. I would be very happy if you did ^^