This whole fanfic was an experiment to see how dark I could make a post-Forces fanfic. I also wanted to make Infinite fucked up, like really fucked up. As a matter of fact, one of my unused ideas was to have a flashback showing Infinite in an incestuous relationship with his sister and killing his parents when they found out. I scrapped that idea in favor of "Infinite may or may not have lit his parents on fire for unknown reasons."

I don't think I'll be able to get any more boundary-pushing than the last chapter. So this chapter won't have anything transgressive, but it will still be very VERY dreary, but with one small bright spot. In fact, I'm close to finishing up the Infinite subplot. After that's out of the way, I'd like to lighten the mood a bit. No more dark things.

CHAPTER 11

Sonic and Avery stumbled back into their home exhausted, both physically and emotionally. Avery's clothes were torn up and her neck was covered in hickeys from Infinite. She also reeked of sperm. Sonic was still out-of-breath from being kicked in the gut by Infinite twice. Fortunately, the blood in his mouth came from his tongue, which he involuntarily bit upon being kicked, and not from something that Infinite ruptured. The two collapsed onto the couch.

Sonic and Avery sat there in silence. Sonic in particular, still seemed to be somewhat catatonic from witnessing firsthand Infinite's debauchery. He was clearly a perfect choice for Eggman's commander. He had the sadism and the complete lack of regard for social norms. Give someone like that illusionary powers from the Phantom Ruby prototype and you have the perfect killing machine. Avery finally spoke after a couple minutes.

"Sonic...this is all my fault."

"Once again, Buddy, it's not your fault. There was nothing you could do." Sonic whispered calmly.

"Yes! Yes there was!" Avery snapped back. "I could have yelled at you to run away rather than fight Infinite. You didn't have to see Infinite take me..."

"...'Didn't have to see Infinite take you'?" Sonic gasped. "Partner, you make it sound like you deserve what Infinite does to you."

"Because I do!" Avery cried. "You saw the way I reacted! I'm a filthy freaking slut! I enjoy it when Infinite does that to me!"

"Don't say that!" Sonic blurted out while grabbing Avery's hands. "You are not a-"

"Yes! Yes I am! I am a nasty slut!" Avery wailed. "I'll enjoy Infinite even if I don't want to! I don't even know why I don't just run off and live with him."

"Partner! Please!" Sonic begged. "Once Infinite is locked away, you will not be like this anymore!"

"How do you know he'll be locked away? Don't act so sure about that!" Avery leaned over and began to cry into Sonic's shoulder.

"Listen. We'll find a way to get through this." Sonic reassured while rubbing Avery's head. Avery looked up at Sonic.

"Why? Why must you always tell me these things that are so positive even when things are not alright?" Avery asked. Sonic looked nervous for a little bit, then he spoke.

"Because I don't want you to beat yourself up all the time. I hate to see you like this. I care about you, Partner. I really do." Sonic took a deep breath and continued. "You were there for me when I was imprisoned on the Death Egg, remember? If it weren't for you, I would have been eventually thrown out the airlock."

"...You're welcome." Avery thanked, albeit weakly.

Sonic continued. "You were there for me, so I will be there for you. I want you to be safe and happy. I really, really hope your son turns out happy too."

"Thank you. Thank you, for everything you've done." Avery said with gratitude.

"No prob-" Sonic didn't get to finish his sentence. Without thinking, Avery got up and pressed her lips onto Sonic's. The hedgehog was surprised initially, then relaxed and went along with the kiss. Avery wasn't sure why she did this, but she just did. The two soon pulled their lips away from each other and looked at each other in shock.

"Uh. Thank you for that." Sonic said sheepishly. "Good night, I guess?"

Avery nodded. "Yeah. Good night." Sonic went upstairs to his bedroom and Avery laid back on the couch and closed her eyes. Things were very awkward between Sonic and Avery the next day. Not only were they still troubled by what Infinite had done to them, they were especially hesitant to discuss their kiss and what this means for their relationship. It was a spur of the moment thing for Avery. The dog did not know why she kissed Sonic, but she did. Sonic did have some feelings for Avery, but he didn't think that she had any for him. The kiss came as a major surprise to him.

The two were silent, not saying a word to each other as they got up to eat their breakfast and get dressed. Upon turning on the television to watch the news, their jaws fell open in shock. "SHOCKING MURDER" is what the headline said and above it was a photo of Blaze. The blood visibly drained from Sonic's face as he watched the TV frozen in horror.

"Police were shocked to discover the remains of Blaze the Cat this morning after a frantic 911 call from an acquaintance of hers." The news anchor, a female pink hawk, spoke calmly. The TV then cut to a police officer, a black wolf, standing outside Blaze's house.

"I couldn't believe it when we found her. She had been mutilated, but not with a knife. The assailant seems to have used his fangs to rip off parts of her and consume them." The cop hesitated for a moment and continued. "There also seems to have been a sexual aspect to this crime. She was raped not only before her murder, but the killer also had sex with her corpse".

With that, Sonic grabbed the remote and turned off the TV. The two knew who did it. It was Infinite. No other person could have done it. Who else would be crazy enough to commit cannibalism and necrophilia? After sitting there with pale faces for a couple seconds, Sonic immediately stood up and ran over to the phone. Silver. He must have found her.

Silver did pick up the phone, but he didn't speak a single word to Sonic. He simply cried wordlessly into the phone. Sonic didn't know why, but he stood there and listened to Silver sob for about a minute before hanging up. Avery had gotten up and was standing by Sonic, who then turned to her.

"Come on. Let's see how Silver is doing." Silver...Oh Silver... Avery thought. She would hated to see him broken by the gruesome murder of a close friend. He would very likely have to go through what she went through after being defiled by Infinite. So she left with Sonic to find Silver.

Silver lived at the former Resistance base out of convenience. The place still had plenty of food down in the storage area. Knuckles has been trying to convince him to rent a home, but he wouldn't budge. When Sonic and Avery arrived, they went down to the basement where Silver lived and slept. And there he was, sitting up against the wall and curled up into a ball with his head in his knees.

"Silver?" Sonic asked.

"...He killed her. Didn't he?" Silver mumbled.

"Yeah. It probably was Infinite." Avery replied. Silver looked up at them with reddened eyes.

"He'll pay..." He growled.

"Yes. Yes he will pay eventually." Sonic said almost nonchalantly. "But first we need you to calm down and-"

"CALM DOWN!?" Silver bellowed. "BLAZE IS DEAD!" A chair levitated in the air and flew to the other side of the room. Silver's fury died down and tears began to fill his eyes, he bowed his head back down to his knees and began to sob. Avery knelt down to console him.

"I'm sorry, Silver. I really wish I had gotten to know Blaze more before this happened. You must have been really close to her." Silver replied by mumbling something unintelligible.

"What?" Avery asked.

"I-I loved her." Silver moaned weakly. Avery already knew the answer to what she was going to ask, but she did it anyway.

"Did she know?"

"NO! NO SHE DIDN'T!" Silver cried. "I was too scared to tell her that I loved her. Now she'll never know that because she's...she's..." The white hedgehog began to wordlessly cry. Avery turned to Sonic.

"Should we leave him be?" She asked. Sonic leaned over to her.

"I'll keep an eye on him." Avery silently went back upstairs and sat down in the former meeting area in silence.

"...Sonic..." Silver weakly mumbled.

"Yeah?" Sonic replied.

"Infinite...he has the Sol Emeralds." Silver groaned.

"WHAT!?"

"Yeah. They weren't there when I found Blaze." Silver said as he shifted over to lie down on the cold, hard floor.

"Oh God..." Sonic said in horror. "Now we really need to find Infinite."

The week leading up to Blaze's funeral was a slog. Any happiness and optimism that was present from post-Resistance rebuilding was gone. Silver especially took it hard. He never talked to anyone. He never even really left the basement except to eat and use the restroom. Everyone tried everything to bring Silver out of his slump, but nothing worked. Therapy sessions were out of the question. You can't take someone to a therapist if they won't budge.

They had decided to cremate the parts of Blaze that weren't eaten by Infinite. Her ashes were to be placed into an urn that would be handed over to Silver. Finding Infinite was now more urgent than ever. God knows what he could do with the Sol Emeralds.

Nobody spoke a word at the funeral that was held at the former Resistance base. Almost everybody stared blankly at ceremony. Silver was trembling erratically. Even the normally po-faced Shadow had a look of despair on his face. Nobody really wanted to be there and who could blame them?

The only person who went up to say some words were Sonic and even then, the blue hedgehog had trouble speaking what he wanted to say. What came out of Sonic's mouth was a disjointed speech that he could barely get through. A massive weight was lifted off of everybody's shoulders when that depressing moment finally ended. Avery walked up to retrieve the urn containing Blaze to hand over to Silver. But she could not find the white hedgehog.

"Sonic? Where's Silver?" Avery asked.

"Huh?" Sonic answered. "I could have sworn he was here throughout the whole funeral."

"Well, he's gone now." Avery said while looking around.

"Check the base." Sonic instructed. "I'll go ask the others if they saw him."

Avery had a really bad feeling about this. She went into the base and walked down into the basement. The lights were turned off. Huh. I could have sworn they were on before the funeral started. Avery flicked the lights and screamed in horror at what she saw. She almost dropped Blaze's urn.

Silver was suspended from the ceiling by a rope around his neck. Underneath the white hedgehog, was a white paper. Avery slowly walked over to the paper with tears in her eyes. She picked up the paper to read it. Three words were written on it.

I'M COMING BLAZE.

At least one good thing came out of this rather sepulchral chapter. Sonavatar is now the official couple of this fanfic. I know the description still says "Avanite", but I'm not going to change it due to the fact that this whole story is about an extremely dysfunctional Avanite relationship that the Avatar is trying to escape from.

Amy's gonna get paired up with Shadow due to my own personal biases.

As for Infinite, he will be paired up with his right hand and a stack of porn mags.