Lightning-Dono: THANK FOR THE REVIEWS, PEOPLE!

Answers to the Reviewers

Sky the Hedgehog – What's with the maniacal laughter:P I'm really glad you liked it, since you said that you'd never seen one that you liked. Sonic rules! But he's the bad guy now. xD Don't worry, he'll undergo a change of heart...

Shadow's Dark Angel – Thank you so much! Oh, yes, I have plans for Shadow's return...:) Don't you think it's proper for the Master of Angst to come in? xD

inuhinamoongrl – Tee-hee, of course you were up there! All of my reviewers are special to me. -grin- I'm glad you like it! All of this just motivates me even more!

Inferno-Hero – xD Oh, great! But I'm sure they'll have a bad time trying to figure out how this would fit into an enjoyable plot. Then again, you said 'bad authors', so...

RemedytheThief – Tails is awesome, isn't he:D Thank you, thank you, THANK YOU! This chapter doesn't have much Sonamy suggestion, but it acts as a point in which the action starts...Wow, this is great...-flushes a deep red out of embarrassment-

-

It's not my fault

-

That you left me here

-

I'm beginning to feel

-

The pain of abandon

-

And the fear that's been held captive

-

Deep inside me

-

Sonic had been waiting for a whole two hours for Rouge to arrive at the café, and quite frankly, he had grown tired of tapping his toe and fingers. His coffee became colder and he wasn't getting any younger, either. For the past one hundred and twenty minutes, he had daydreamt and planned how he would react once she arrived. That is, if she ever arrived.

"When is she going to come?" Sonic grumbled, staring at the sidewalk through glass that desperately needed washing. "I scheduled it to be at two o'clock. What the hell is she doing!" He jerked his knee upwards and it hit it painfully against the table.

A capped, gruff looking wolf smoking a pipe took the seat infront of him that had been meant for Rouge.

"Hello, laddie," the wolf addressed cheerily, blasting smoke into Sonic's face. Sonic held his breath momentarily until the visible wisps of smoke disappeared. Suddenly he wished that he had never invited Rouge here. "The name's Drake. Just Drake." He took a deep breath that sounded very constricted and put the pipe back into his mouth.

Sonic felt like saying, "I didn't ask for your name. Or for you to sit there, blowing smoke in my face." But it seemed so rude, especially to such a homely fellow that was just looking for some conversation.

"Hey, Drake. How's everything?" It seemed too familiar, but since Drake seemed pretty old, he probably didn't mind as long as respect was given. The aged wolf flicked his hat up to give Sonic a dull, bored gaze with a pair of chocolate eyes.

"Horrible. I wouldn't be surprised if we were sitting in hell right now."

The hedgehog was mentally taken aback, but he kept his proud mien. Now that Drake mentioned it, everything did seem kind of hot...Sonic nervously threw his head towards the counter where steaming cups of coffee were spouting from a dispenser. People lined were around it, smoking and exchanging gossip...He was fighting the urge to leave when a certain bat stepped into the burning abyss, looking out-of-place with her light magenta eye shadow and dark purple outfit.

Drake took a long sip of a dark liquid that lay in his mug, watching the back of Sonic's head. "That's quite a girl there." He chuckled half-heartedly and continued on his pursuit to finish the mug of unmentionably bitter stuff.

Sonic ignored the comment, slipped out of the seat, and headed towards Rouge, who was watching the men around the counter with such interest that Sonic couldn't bear it anymore. His legs seemed to work like a clock; they seemed to be moving all too slow for his liking, but he got there faster than his brain expected.

"Finally, you're here," he said, trying to hide the impatience in his voice with something that seemed less strained. "I've been waiting for such a long time." Sonic let his arm slither around her waist until he was constricting her breathing.

The young woman shook him off disgustedly, her lips looking rather disfigured as she gave him a resentful look. "We're not starring in a sappy movie, Sonic. I'm only here because you told me to come. Two o'clock simply wouldn't do, so I figured that I'd come at a later time." She placed a hand on her hip and watched one of the guys wink suggestively at her, keeping his eyes far below her face. "My, my, aren't we sexy," she commented, winking back slowly at him.

"So, do you want to go someplace?" Sonic asked uncomfortably, noticing that Rouge was seemingly entranced by a bunch of rough looking guys that looked as though they had been thrown into the street for a few months, they were so gaunt and ragged.

Rouge reverted her attention back towards the matter at hand. "Oh, yes. I got myself a movie ticket for The Raven. The movie starts in half an hour, so I should get going...grab a few snacks...hop into the movie theatre..."

"Do you want to go someplace together?" Sonic rephrased, feeling his leg twitch involuntarily. This was what he got for standing still in one position for over two minutes.

"You can buy yourself a ticket, if you want, and come with me," Rouge said with a dismissive air, flaunting her cool manner and grinning.

Sonic dragged her out of the cafe by the arm, feeling a destructive force rise in his mind.

"What were you doing in there?" Sonic shouted, feeling his energy being drained with that one movement of his vocal cords. He realized that Rouge demanded much more than just his attention – she wanted him to compete with other men for her.

"Oh, cool it. Let a woman have some fun, won't ya? Anyway, we're going to Wolverine Theatre. See you there." She took off, not once turning to look at the dumbfounded hedgehog left behind on a crowded street.

-

Meanwhile, Tails and Amy were hiking a lonely path that was strewn with trees, shading out the blue of the sky.

"How do you expect to get him back?" Amy inquired, kicking at a rock that had tumbled her way. They were proceeding uphill to where Tails had built his personal base and home.

"I'm not sure, but we can't make it too quick. He needs to understand how tormenting he's made our lives." Tails snorted. "If he's even going to listen to us angst about it."

Amy smashed her fist down into her left hand's palm, yelping with happiness. "I know! We can trick him into it. Make something happen that'll make him regret doing this to us!"

"I'm sure he's done a lot of regretting already, Amy. He knows that he's been doing something wrong, but he's too thick to fix it." Tails' voice was bitter and it made his throat choke up, like he was swallowing a dose of Amy's herbal medicine. "Either way, we have to formulate a plan that will bring him back for good!"

"Can't we just cleanse his mind by using my meditation techniques?"

The dark yellow fox stared at her. "What meditation techniques? You mean that one where you sit cross-legged, clear out your mind, and hum for an hour?"

Amy coughed. "Yes."

"That's to purify the soul and bring internal calm, Amy. It's not going to help with conflicts outside of his body."

They got to the top of steep hill, and there it was. A quaint, technology-deprived looking house that Tails had done a very good job of disguising. The machine in the back used to generate power for his Tornado looked like a lean-to that was set up for putting horses in.

"Xero! XERO!" Tails crowed to no one in particular, his voice carrying out beyond the thick growth of vines and trees, linking all of the great wonders together.

"Who are you calling to?" Amy asked.

"I have a pet monkey," He explained briefly, not going into specifics as to how he even received it. Tails watched the peach tree hooding the house with it's branches intently, expecting a small, brown monkey to emerge from the shadows. Instead of a fleshy animal emerging, out came a roboticized behemoth the size of a tree itself, clanking lethargically towards the both of them.

-

"Oh, but John!" Wailed a miserable, well-dressed widow to a hedgehog that looked suspisciously like a photo-manipulated Sonic. "Please don't go!"

"I must go," replied the hedgehog, removing his hat, lowering it to his abdominal area and bowing deeply. "Sayonara (1), Miyoko-chan (2)." Leaving young lady sobbing uncontrollably into an ancient, tattered handkerchief, he boarded a buggy and as the horses trotted off, he waved somberly at her shaking figure. The woman chased after the buggy desperately, in a scene of utter panic and despair, but hope was lost as the buggy disappeared over a large hill.

Without her lover, she wandered back to her only means of shelter – a worn down shack with invaluable possessions.

White letters, accompanied by a sweet ballad, began to scroll down the screen. Through Sonic's hazy vision (he had been sleeping through the movie), it looked like random words dripping into a black, swirling void.

"Wake up, sleepyhead," Rouge urged, giving him a painful nudge in the ribs from where she sat beside him. "It's bad enough that the movie wasn't worth spit without you snoring through the climax!" This was, in fact, a lie, since the movie didn't really have a climax, but Rouge was inclined to say anything that would arouse the man that was dozing off next to her.

Sonic sighed, rubbing his eyes tiredly and slowly getting up on legs that felt more of less like cooked spaghetti. The world spiraled around him in a dizzying wave of colors, and for a moment, he thought he would be sick. Without hesitation, he trailed after Rouge's slim frame, hunched over and feeling his stomach writhe in a nauseating manner. Sonic didn't dare open his mouth, for he was afraid that he might vomit across the clean, carpeted floor.

"What is wrong with you?" Rouge queried as she lugged him out into the street where he immediately keeled over, face on the ground, breathing heavily. His stomach was churning and it felt like he had just swallowed a fireball. Seeing his unfortunate condition, she knelt over with concern. "Do you need a doctor?"

Sonic's reply was faint. "N-No." He struggled to get up, his legs barely supporting him. "I think I'll go home." His speed lost, he stumbled all the way to the apartment complex he resided in.

-

"What the-," Tails began before Amy fled down the hill, pulling him down with her...except he was running backwards.

"That's Eggman's robot! He must be trying to kidnap us!"

The gears in Tails' mind turned. "Let him kidnap us, Amy!" He could picture it now – Sonic would be informed of the disappearance of his friends and soon remember how much he owed them. Remembering their caliber in his life, he would race after Eggman, save his friends, and be with them once again.

The female hedgehog stared at him with an odd expression on her face. "Are you crazy? Eggman will more than likely kill us before anyone has time to react to the fact that the both of us are missing!"

"Sonic will come and rescue us! Then he'll realize how much he loves his friends when he sees us bound to a metal wall, about to be executed!"

"How much TV have you been watching?" Amy gasped as they continued to run down the hill, Amy's dress encumbering her legs as she clumsily tried to avoid obstacles in their path, such as a tree stump that was conveniently placed in the middle of the narrowest part of the trail.

"I haven't been watching any! This is a plan we can't avoid, Amy!" With that, he let go, walking aimlessly towards the robot, as though stepping forth to be sacrificed.

"TAILS, NO!" Amy screamed, scrambling after her friend, who stood bravely before the robotic horror. A giant metal hand clamped around his thin body, and with one movement of the wrist, Tails vanished into the dark hole that was the robot's mouth.

-

Footnotes

(1) Sayonara – A permanent good-bye in Japanese
(2) '-chan' – A suffix used after a name in Japanese when speaking to someone that is younger and is a child, or for a girlfriend/boyfriend.