New story time! Surprise! (To all of you as much as me, if I'm being honest.) To tell you the truth, this story came out of nowhere a few months ago. I woke up from a dream (nope, not kidding) about Sonic and Amy. At first, I just dismissed it, but the dream turned into a fluffy story that I knew I had to write if I was to ever get it out of my head. What follows is that story!

It's a bit of a novella, coming in at about 20K words once all is said and done. I've got the first chapter edited and ready for you now and more should be coming your way soon. Feel free to leave a comment and a favorite/follow to make sure you're notified of future installments.

With that said, let's start this thing...with a bit of aftermath...

Chapter One: Smoke and Mirrors

The smell of smoke stung his nostrils. He wrinkled his nose to try to suppress the urge to sneeze building up behind his eyes. But by then the smoke slid down his throat to blossom heat in his lungs. He choked on the fire, sending the smoke back up his throat, burning his esophagus the whole way. It took a moment for the choking to fully recede. Only then could he muster enough of his voice to groan.

Except, he didn't recognize the sound.

His eyes flashed open. He hadn't realized they were closed until the moment he wrenched back his eyelids. But now they were open and staring at a heavy gray sky hanging in the air above his head. Or maybe it was just the rising smoke. For a moment, he just lay there, staring at that sky. He breathed shallowly while the smoke worked slowly toward its own dissipation. But the smoke smelled less like a house fire or forest fire or bonfire, all built of wood and telling eerie stories of fall nights and clam bakes.

No, this was the suffocation of burning rubber, sickly sweet and turning your stomach.

Burning metal of a car accident.

The sort of fire that did not allow for the growth of new things.

He moved his arms experimentally and released a hiss through gritted teeth at the pain flooding through his muscles. As if the reminder that he had muscles in the first place was enough to send them into revolt. He paused, waiting for the wave of pain to pass before he tried moving again, slower this time. Pain still twisted his thoughts, tension enough to build into a headache in his forehead. But he pushed through the pain, holding his breath, allowing the headache to build and build until it felt like his very brain was bashing itself against the skull that had once been its protection. He heard his heart beating in his ears in time with his brain until it was all he could hear. The beating of his heart consumed his whole world.

He assumed it was sheer willpower that got his arms braced firmly enough against the ground that he could push himself up into a sitting position. Even if all that meant was he could take stock. Two arms, sure, he'd moved them enough to push himself upright. Two legs covered with blue fur. Not to mention burns and lacerations. But at least they looked whole enough, even if he didn't try to use them just yet. His red and white sneakers were scuffed and torn in places. But that could just be overuse, rather than the aftermath of what had just happened to him.

Whatever that was.

He scanned the scene surrounding him, moving his eyes but not his head in an attempt to avoid further angering his brain. He had been sprawled out on concrete, broken into pieces like tectonic plates after years of exposure to the elements. Ragged ruins stood around him as if this space had once been a room. That seemed hard to believe, considering the state of things. But there were the melted remains of a computer, glass shattered at its base.

Pain shot through his side, and he winced. He reached across his stomach to push his gloved hand against the pain. When he pulled his hand away, he saw the palm of his white glove stained with blood.

He pressed his hand down against the wound again to try to staunch the bleeding. He gritted his teeth as pain hissed through his body once more. And despite his better judgement, he pulled his legs beneath him and rose to his feet.

Blood rushed from his head and he stumbled a couple steps before he steadied. He gasped, and his chest heaved with each breath. His thoughts spun as if the disturbance of his physical equilibrium unsettled them as well. Maybe he had hit his head at some point? That would explain why he couldn't remember how he had gotten here.

Or…anything at all, for that matter.

He sucked in a deep breath and urged the wave of anxiety to settle back into the sea. One thing at a time. No point worrying about his missing memories if he died here anyway. Instead, he pressed his hand more firmly against his side and turned haltingly on the spot to take in the scene surrounding him.

Gray smoke continued trickling down his throat so that he needed to pause every few seconds to cough into his shoulder. But the smoke was rising higher every moment to join the world's atmosphere. A few flames danced across the scattered debris in the distance, but it seemed as though any worse fire had already died out. As far as he could tell, a building had once stood here, the one instance of height in an otherwise flat landscape. But whatever had happened before left the structure broken open like the bottom half of an eggshell.

And then his skimming bleary eyes fell on a body.

His heart dropped to his stomach only to fall deeper down through a hole at the bottom. After that stomach wrenching moment, he urged his legs to carry him forward. One step. Then two. Closing the distance between him and the…

He hoped it wasn't just a body.

He dropped to his knees beside the body. He grunted when his kneecaps hit the ground. But he didn't wince. He didn't dare blink. Instead, he willed every fiber of his being into the prayer that this body, this face-down form, still held a soul within. He pulled his hand away from his wounded side and reach out with soiled gloves to carefully roll the body from its stomach onto its back.

A sigh escaped their lips as their shoulders hit the ground.

The small gesture sent his heart shooting up to his throat. He yanked his hands back. But other than the sigh and the barely-there rise and fall of the body's chest, they made no other movement.

After a moment of holding his breath, waiting for reality to shatter around him, his heart descended to its proper place in his chest once more. He leaned in closer. Based on the downturned quills, this was a girl, though not someone he recognized. A violet-blue bruise bled through the pink fur at her forehead and the remainder of her body was marred by lacerations, much like his own. Gray char like scars stained her red dress.

He reached out to grab her shoulder, shake her awake, but hesitated so his hand hung in midair between them. Was it bad to try to wake someone up after a head injury? Or what if she was dangerous and the reason they were both hurt in the first place?

But what kind of person would he be if he didn't try to help her?

He breached the distance between them, wrapped his fingers around her shoulder, and shook. "Hey," he whispered. His voice cracked, probably from the lack of moisture in the air. The voice sounded like it belonged to a stranger.

Either way, she didn't stir. He withdrew his hands. Better to wait and see if she woke up on her own then. He twisted away from her to glance back over his shoulder, examining the rest of the space beyond the girl.

To find two more bodies.

His forehead furrowed; he felt the tension build up above his eyes. That made four. Four (hopefully all) unconscious bodies in the midst of a ruin that had before held a fire as well.

How? How could this have happened? Did he know the souls within these bodies? Were they all his friends? Or was any among them his enemy as well as victim of their own kamikaze attack?

He pushed himself back up onto unsteady legs to stumble over to the two more unconscious forms. And they were indeed unconscious, rather than…the alternative. A red echidna, the knuckles of his gloves torn open to reveal bloody skin beneath. Plus a young fox who looked too much like a child to have any business being a victim amidst this wreckage. The fox curled in on himself, almost in the fetal position, making him look even younger. Twin tails wrapped protectively around his bruised limbs like a safety blanket.

Nausea curled up in his stomach that had nothing to do with the insistent pounding in his head. All he wanted was to curl in on himself like the fox kid and squeeze his eyes shut until he woke up from his horrible nightmare.

And then he heard a soft gasp behind him.

It was more breath than sound but he zeroed in on that gasp in a heartbeat. He spun around, though even when his body stilled, it felt like his sight continued rotating for a few extra seconds. And in the moment it took his eyes to settle, the pink hedgehog pushed herself into a sitting position.

Her eyes landed on his. His eyes locked on hers. Neither of them said a word. Instead, they hung in limbo, waiting for the paradigm to shift.

Ultimately, it was she who broke the silence.

"Who are you?" she barked. Her voice was high-pitched and broken—probably from the same smoke damage affecting his. But despite all that, she shoved force behind the words. Not a force that sent her eyes widening with fear, but a force that narrowed her eyes instead. Despite the bruise bleeding across her skin, she looked seconds from jumping into a fight.

Which made his position a bit difficult.

He held his hands out in front of him in a gesture of surrender. The bloodstain on his left glove drew her gaze. "Honestly, couldn't tell you," he said. He tried to add a laugh onto the end but the sound was hysterical rather than reassuring, he was sure. He cleared his throat and tried to rearrange his features into something hopefully balanced. "Maybe it would help if you told me who you were?"

She opened her mouth. Furrowed her brow. Opened her mouth again. "I asked you first," she snapped. But he didn't miss the flash of color across her cheekbones.

"So you don't know what happened here either," he said. He gestured at the space he assumed had once been a room surrounding them.

She scanned the space and as she did, she drew her knees in toward her chest. "What do you mean, 'don't remember?'" she asked defensively.

Something in him urged the corner of his lips to twitch up into a smirk. Maybe some instinct belonging to who he had been before? He brushed his hand against his forehead and winced at the flash of pain. "Remember. As in what happened here. Who you are. Who I am." He shrugged. Even though what he was saying probably wasn't nonchalant enough for such a dismissive gesture. "I've got nothing."

She drew her hand to her own forehead. "Careful!" he tried to warn her. But her gloved fingers brushed the bruise before he could get the word out. She winced, yanking her hand away though the damage was already done.

"Why should I believe you?" she demanded, even as her shoulders curled forward in pain and she was too busy squeezing her eyes shut to look at him.

"You don't have to," he admitted. "Maybe when one of the others wake up, they can explain what happened."

That was enough to snap the girl to attention. She straightened suddenly, a quick wince the only reveal of her continuing pain. "Others?" she repeated.

He stepped aside to offer her a clearer view of the two others sprawled in the crater with them. She stared at them a moment before her eyes cut back to his face. "And if one of them is the reason we're in this situation in the first place?"

He frowned, turned to look at the bodies much like their own before they had awoken. "Then I guess we find out the kind of creatures we are to have been in the middle of all this."

She said nothing when he shifted his gaze back to her face, he saw her leveling an even, unamused expression his way. "Not exactly reassuring."

He shrugged. A grin widened across his features, another instinctual reaction of who he had been before. Weirdly, his heart beat faster but not with shivering anxiety—adrenaline. Joyous anticipation? He felt energized. If this was fight or flight, he felt ready to fight with a smile. Was that the kind of creature he was? He curled his fingers into fists experimentally, just to see how it felt. But all it did was remind him of the bloodied glove. The wound in his side.

Even if he could, he was in no state to fight.

A masculine groan snapped him from his contemplation in a second. He returned his hand to his wounded side to brace it as he turned.

The red figure, the echidna, rolled to his side without opening his eyes. He braced his elbow against the concrete ground and lifted his head, eyes still squeezed shut.

But then they flashed open.

Snapped up.

Locked on his.

"Who are you?" the echidna demanded. The low gravel of his voice conflicted with the softness of color in his violet eyes.

He shrugged in response, again leaning into a nonchalance he didn't actually feel. "Question of the day. Along with, 'who am I?' You joining the party?"

The echidna opened his mouth, fury painted into the creases on his face. But whatever he intended to say evaporated along with the tension in his face. His mouth hung open for a moment. Then he pressed the heel of his hand into his forehead. "How—"

"Your guess is as good as ours."

The echidna's eyes flashed open again and looked beyond the wounded figure in front of him to the girl just behind. He started to turn to follow the echidna's gaze.

Until a sudden sharp intake of breath snapped his attention to the two-failed fox.

The fox's chest heaved with each heavy breath. For a split second, he looked more like a little kid waking up from a nightmare than…whatever the truth of the situation was.

The pink hedgehog brushed past before he was even aware she had climbed to her feet. Though she limped with each step, she moved quickly to the young fox's side and dropped awkwardly to her knees beside him. "It's okay, you're okay," she whispered to him.

The fox's eyes blinked open, breaths slowing as consciousness became more and more real to him. "Where…who…" Each breathless question he started he failed to finish.

The blue hedgehog stumbled forward a step. The wound in his side was growing from an irritant to a distraction. But the fear in the fox's blue eyes drew him forward. Even if the only way he could answer the questions was by saying, "Questions of the day."

"Could you be less helpful?" the echidna muttered.

But the girl didn't look at either of them. She instead slid her arm under the fox's shoulders to help into a sitting position. "Are you hurt?" she asked.

"Um…" He winced. "Sort of everywhere," he said eventually. "Mostly my head. But I think I'm okay. Except…well…"

The girl smiled. "Right." She glanced around the space. "Must have been some accident, I guess. An explosion maybe? We're probably lucky to be alive."

She stood by the fox's side as he climbed to his feet, arms hovering to catch him if he fell. His legs shook beneath him but once he stood, he remained standing. He turned on the spot, taking in his surroundings, including the echidna and the blue hedgehog. "Must have been some accident," he repeated.

But when the fox's eyes landed on the blue hedgehog, he stilled. His eyes widened. "Are you hurt?" he asked, eyeing the gash still dying the white glove red.

The hedgehog waved his hand dismissively. "Aren't we all? I'll live."

But the girl turned his way as well and narrowed her eyes, probably daring to see him as an ally rather than a potential enemy for the first time since awakening. "He's right; we need to find help. You're still bleeding and all of us need to get the memory loss checked out. We could have brain damage."

"Brain damage?" the echidna shouted. Though his voice reflected anger, the color drained from his cheeks.

The girl said nothing. Instead, she left the fox's side to approach the other hedgehog. As she bridged the distance between them, she pulled the red ribbon holding her quills in place from her head. He narrowed his eyes in confusion. But she didn't bother with an explanation. Her fingers picked out the knot in the ribbon. And then, without a word, she wrapped the ribbon around his stomach so that it covered most of the wound in his side. Blood still seeped slowly around the edges of the ribbon. But it was better than just trying to hold the blood inside him as he had been doing before. "You must have been closest to the blast," she told him as she knotted the ribbon at his back.

He shrugged. Said nothing about his unsteady legs or the way the world shifted as if he slowly slid down through quicksand. "I can deal," he said instead.

"You better," she said. She stepped in front of him, bracing her hands on her hips. Without the ribbon, her pink quills swayed a little more freely around her face. "We have no idea where we are. We have no idea who we are. So we all have to hold on until we can find some help."

She spun away from him to eye the echidna and young fox, as if sizing the both of them up in case one of them dared to disagree. The fox's tails wrapped around from behind him and he twisted the end of one of them with nervous fingers. The echidna locked his arms against his chest. For the first time, the spikes lining his knuckles were on full display. But while the echidna's jaw shifted as if he was grinding his teeth behind closed lips, he nodded just the once.

The hedgehog went to step forward, to stand beside the girl, but his knee turned to gelatin beneath him. He stumbled, and the girl's arms snapped out, catching him before he crashed to the concrete. "You can deal, huh?" she said evenly.

But he was too busy catching his breath to offer her a smirk this time. The scene slid before his eyes like the world was melting in some late winter thaw.

"We're probably all hurt worse than we think," the young fox piped up. The hedgehog lifted his head to look at the fox who now was more blur than figure. "If we all lost consciousness and our memories, we probably also have neurological damage we haven't noticed yet."

The hedgehog blinked.

Had…had that kid just used the word "neurological" so casually? Like it was just some part of his vocabulary?

The echidna recovered first. He grunted, "Seems like your brain's working just fine."