Please note: My OCs speak French, so translations are at the bottom of the page. Also note, I still don't own any of the Sonic Team characters (oh if only…) but I do however own Seraphy, Shadowrose, Megin, and Midnight. HANDS OFF.

Chapter 2

"J'ai trouvé quelque chose" A voice said. The voice belonged to a teenage girl, who was wandering the valley slowly. The words were French, a language Sonic wasn't familiar with, even if he was conscious. Slowly, the girl approached the unconscious figure skeptically. "Non! C'est quelqu'un!" Excitement reflected in the girl's voice as she came even closer and saw Sonic breathing.

"Est-ce mon amour?" A male voice's rang out from a speaker in the girl's ear, in the same unfamiliar language. The tone was worried, and anticipation of the answer hung in his voice. The girl came closer to Sonic, and knelt down next to him. Slowly, she brushed her fingers through his quills, eyes sparkling with surprise.

"Non… C'est… un hérisson?" Confusion echoed in the girl's voice. As she spoke, Sonic opened one eye and groaned. Slowly, he sat up and looked around, and found himself face to face with the girl.

Her hair, a shade of violet dark like raven feathers, framed her face and made her skin seemed pale in comparison. Her eyes were green like the chaos emerald, and glittered in the sunlight as she looked at him. Slowly, she lifted a hand to brush a lock of dark hair behind her ear, and Sonic saw the painted nails and recently cleaned cuticles. Her ears were pierced, a small silver heart earring in each. Slowly she stood, resting her hands on her knees to stand up right, and Sonic noticed the holes in the knees of her jeans, and the torn-up cuffs on each pant leg.

"Salut." She said calmly, a small smile stretched across her face. Sonic tilted his head to one side, confused, because he didn't know what she had just said.

"Pardon?" He said quietly, starting to think he was dreaming or this was a hallucination from a very bad concussion. The girl's smile twisted with embarrassment, and her cheeks flushed a rosy red.

"Sorry. Hi, my name is Midnight, what's yours?" Slowly she reached a hand out to him, offering to help him stand. He took her hand cautiously, muscles tensed warily.

"I'm Sonic the Hedgehog." His voice remained quiet and weak, and as he stood, he realized just how ache-y he was. He managed to keep his balance, but just barely. Midnight noticed his jerky movements and stretched out her arm, hooking it around his shoulders to support him. "Thanks." He murmured quietly, eyes starting to droop. All he wanted to do was sleep, for some reason.

"How long have you been here, Sonic?" Midnight's tone took a worried sound to it. As she waited for him to think about it, she looked over his body. Her eyes caught something, and she stepped away from him, withdrawing her arm, and looked shocked. "What is that?"

Sonic looked down to where she was looking, and tucked in his glove were four cards he had never seen before. Before he could even start to reach for them to pull them out of his glove, Midnight reached and pulled them out.

The cards were like playing cards for poker, only the design on the back were different. The back was black, with a red vortex drawn on top of it and a fancy looking red border around it. Midnight wasn't all that interested in the back, but her eyes were widened as she glanced over the front of each card. Slowly, she pulled one out, and turned it to face Sonic. "Do you know the person on the front of this card?"

It was Amy. In an instant, Sonic regained all of his energy, and he looked around. Amy had just been here a few minutes ago, hadn't she? Then a flashback of the last time he saw Amy hit him, along with the mental image of Seraphy sketched in his mind. "Amy…" He whispered sadly, ears drooping with remorse as he looked to the ground. "I didn't protect her…"

"Don't beat yourself up over it, Sonic." Midnight said quietly as she shifted through the cards. "Telling by the back of these cards, this was Seraphy's work, and unless you know his weakness, no one can defeat him." She put the cards back into a neat stack, not even bothering to look at them all, and grabbed Sonic's wrist. "Come with me." Sonic hesitated at first, but followed her anyway. If she knew the weakness of this Seraphy guy, maybe he could defeat him and save Amy.

Adrenaline fueled Sonic as he sprinted along side Midnight, running across the valley and through the forest that surrounded it. Midnight wove through the trees like there was a specific path set on the ground for her, although Sonic could only see tangles of weeds and tree roots everywhere on the ground he looked.

After five minutes of an even-paced sprint (which was surprising for a human, in Sonic's eyes), they came to a small clearing in the middle of the forest, and there sat a large wooden house, much like the Team Chaotix Headquarters, only larger. Midnight stepped in front of the door, and a small metal box jutted toward her, demanding a code to be punched in.

'High tech. Tails would have loved to see this.' Sonic thought, and his heart seemed to leap into his throat. Tails had been there that night with him and Amy, and Knuckles too. Had Tails and Knuckles made it out okay, or were they victims of the same fate as Amy? His heart was thudding in his chest as he followed Midnight through the door that automatically opened, and he gasped at what he saw.

The first thing he noticed was the computer screen that was three times longer than Sonic's height. Beneath it sat a very advanced looking keyboard, with thousands of unfamiliar keys compared to the keyboards Tails used, and the keyboard was placed on a very heavyset wooden desk in front of a tall, black leather chair.

The room itself was two stories, and there was a spiral staircase in another room on the left, which probably lead to the bedrooms. Every wall in the room was lined with bookshelves, filled completely with books, and there was a ladder with wheels to reach the higher shelves. Even with all the room to put books on, there were still stacks of books in various places because they couldn't fit on the shelves.

Amongst one of the giant heaps of books, there was a man crouching, digging for a particular book but having no idea where to look. At the sound of the door thudding shut automatically behind Sonic and Midnight, he stood and turned in their direction.

At first glance, he looked like Seraphy by his facial features. They were built the same, with high cheekbones and flawless skin with a dark complexion. But at a closer look, the man's hair was a shade of teal that was more blue than green, and his eyes were jet black. Beneath his eyes were dark circles, reflecting a lack of sleep, and even his eyes were bloodshot from exhaustion. His eyes were protected beneath thin-rimmed black glasses that sat at the very end of his nose, and he pushed them back up to the bridge. His lips were pulled into a frustrated scowl as he turned back to the stack of books, hardly noting the arrival of Midnight and Sonic.

"What are you doing?" Midnight asked as she approached the man. By comparison, Midnight was even lither in build, and Sonic guessed her age to be about sixteen. Sonic himself was eighteen. The man turned his attention away from the books and back to Midnight, and they silently looked at each other for a few seconds, as if they were talking without words.

"Why am I here?" Sonic asked after a few more seconds of silence. To him, the silence had felt awkward, but it was probably natural to Midnight and the man, since they seemed to have a strong connection and probably could tell what the other was thinking without asking.

"Oui… Porquoi, Minuit? Et qui est il?" The man asked, eyes glittering with skepticism.

"No French speaking in front of a guest, Shadowrose, you know that's rude." Midnight scolded, wagging her finger at him playfully. Shadowrose attempted to smile, but only shook his head sadly. "And his name is Sonic."

"Why is he here?" Shadowrose asked, this time so Sonic could understand. Midnight pulled the cards she had taken from Sonic out of a pocket and spread them out in her hands, backs to Shadowrose. Shadowrose's eyes rose in alarm, and he turned his attention to Sonic.

"Where did you get these? When?" He demanded, not taking the time to properly introduce himself. Sonic shifted uneasily from foot to foot, not sure of what was going on. Sonic turned his gaze to Midnight for answers as she was putting the cards back in her pocket.

"You know how he got them, Shadowrose. Stop being so hostile to our guest!" She snapped, eyes seeming to burn a hole through his skin. Shadowrose turned his eyes away to avoid hers, looking sad about something. Midnight's glare softened. "You really can't function without her, can you?"

"Non…" He whispered, and even Sonic knew what that meant. Obviously he and Shadowrose were in the same boat, they had both lost a girl dear to them. Midnight turned to Sonic, looking apologetic.

"Shadowrose normally isn't like that; he just can't live without his fiancée, Megin." She explained, looking as though she had lost someone too. "We lost her a few weeks ago, and he can barely eat or sleep anymore."

"Lost her as in… she died?" Sonic asked slowly. Shadowrose tensed, closing his eyes and turning away from Sonic and Midnight, obviously nearly in tears.

"She isn't dead…" He whispered, mostly to himself like he was trying to reassure himself. "I would have felt her die. She's just lost somewhere… I'll find her."

"We haven't seen her since we came here." Midnight explained as Shadowrose whispered to himself, fighting back tears.

"Came here? What do you mean by that?" Sonic asked, confused.

Midnight sighed slowly, realizing she had quite a story to tell. "You see, Sonic, your world is not the only one out there. Shadowrose, Seraphy, Megin and I come from another world. Somehow, we ended up here, and we haven't seen Megin since." Suddenly, Shadowrose scoffed angrily and turned back toward Midnight, eyes burning with anger.

"Somehow?! You know very well how we ended up in this god forsaken place. Seraphy did it. And Seraphy took my poor sweet Megin away from me!" He accused bitterly, growling under his breath. Sonic frowned.

"How do you know Seraphy?" He asked, trying to wrap his mind around this confusing concept. Shadowrose chuckled bitterly to himself.

"The son of a bitch is my twin brother. And yet, we differ so much, both by appearance and personality. He's a manipulating son of a bitch with hair the same shade of the flame of hell where he was conceived, and I'm a loving guy with hair the shade of the ocean water."

As Shadowrose spoke, Sonic took a closer look at him. His shoulders were far narrower than Seraphy's and he lacked muscle tone, while Seraphy had broad shoulders and well defined muscles. Sonic summed the two brothers up in a very easy way: Shadowrose was the brains while Seraphy was the brawn.

"You don't seem like such a loving guy right now, Shad." Midnight teased. Shadowrose slowly shook his head again, sighing.

"I know." He replied softly. "I apologize, Sonic. This is very out-of-character for me."

"It's alright," Sonic said with a smile. "We all have our days, right?"

"Shadowrose has been having 'his month' really." Midnight said as she pulled the cards out again, without reason. Absently, she flipped through them. She sat down, and threw Amy's card to the floor, face-up, turned toward Sonic. Sonic shivered at the image on the card.

On the card, Amy stood with her hands covering her mouth, like she was trying to muffle her own screaming. Her pink quills and her red dress were blown in every direction, and her eyes were widened and bloodshot. Sonic looked away from the card, and Shadowrose sighed sympathetically.

"Seraphy views love as nothing more than a person's weakness. He embodied your girlfriend in the most devastating pose so you could never lay your eyes on it without feeling guilty." Slowly, Shadowrose sat down by the card and flipped it over, so Amy's image was to the carpet, and the red vortex showed. "The vortex is his trademark symbol for his insanity." He informed Sonic, who also sat down, feeling sick.

Midnight tossed out another card. This one was of Tails. Sonic's stomach twisted into a hard knot. Tails hadn't made it out safe. The image of Tails was much like Amy's, only there were tears in the corners of Tails' eyes, which seemed to take a knife through Sonic's heart. Shadowrose turned it face-down again, glaring at Midnight, but she didn't notice.

The third card was tossed next to the ones of Tails and Amy. This one was of Knuckles. Instead of embodying fear in Knuckles' pose, Knuckles had cuts all over his body, and blood matted his red fur. His eyes were drooping, consciousness seeming to slip from his body as he stood, with his fists loose and hanging from his body limply. His eyes, violet in color, were dull and nearly lifeless. Sonic closed his eyes, forcing himself to keep his stomach contents right where they were.

"Oh my god…" Midnight whispered as she held the final card. Sonic opened one eye warily, and noticed Shadowrose had turned down Knuckles' card, looking worried about Sonic. Midnight was staring wide eyed at the card, and finally she dropped it on top of the others.

The girl on this card, Sonic had never seen. She looked like Midnight in build, only her skin was dark toned like Shadowrose and Seraphy's. Her eyes were almost an unnaturally light shade of crystal blue, and her hair was jet black and reached down to her hips. In the image, blood was seeping from her neck and she was starting to sink to her knees.

Shadowrose gasped as his eyes fell on the image, and he closed his eyes, tears welling in the corners. Blindly, he grasped at the card and held it close. "Mon amour…" He whispered softly as a tear trickled down his cheek.

"We can save her, Shadowrose. We can save all of them." Midnight said quickly, getting to her feet and turning toward the computer. Rapidly, she began to type into the complex keyboard as Shadowrose kept a tight grasp on the card.

"You won't find answers on the computer." Shadowrose murmured through his tears. "Only I know the answers to unlocking Seraphy's curse on people." He held the card tighter, tears still trickling down his face. "These images…" He croaked quietly, trying to force himself to speak. "They depict the last stance of the person cursed."

"You don't really think Seraphy would do that… Do you?" Midnight said quietly, tears starting to well in her eyes too. Sonic started seeing the image of Knuckles in his head, and he felt like he was going to be sick. What did Seraphy do to him?

"Of course he would. He cares about no one but himself."

Sonic couldn't even think straight. Why would Seraphy target his friends? Sonic, Amy, Knuckles, and Tails… They didn't even know him, what did Seraphy have against them? Then his memory of that night hit him. Before the screaming… Before the blinding light…

"Eggman." Sonic murmured, realization hitting him hard. Midnight and Shadowrose turned their attention to Sonic, not understanding what he was saying. "Eggman was with Seraphy, the night when there were fireworks in the sky. He said Eggman chose me and my friends as the target, not him."

"What would he want with you?" Shadowrose asked. Sonic shrugged, unable to think clearly. His head began to sag slightly as he struggled to stay awake. Everything that had happened today had drained the energy from him. Midnight noticed his fatigue, and probably felt her own hit her suddenly, because she seemed as tired as Sonic was. Shadowrose glanced at the clock.

"You guys, get to bed. It's almost one in the morning. I'll think out how we're going to face this situation tomorrow." He said as he stood, his eyes were still puffy from the few tears he shed. He sniffed, wiped his nose on his sleeve, and turned back to his books. Sonic didn't refuse, and slowly got to his feet with Midnight and followed her up the spiral staircase to the bedrooms.

Sonic had been too tired to take in any detail of the walls around him as Midnight lead him to a small bedroom, and he kicked his shoes off with his eyes closed as he fell forward onto the mattress. Sleep claimed him almost instantly, but his dreams were nothing more than the images of Amy, Tails, Knuckles, and now Megin, that had been engraved in his head a few minutes earlier.

Translations and Author's Notes-

1. J'ai trouvé quelque chose – I found something

2. Non! C'est quelqu'un! - No! It's someone!

3. Est-ce mon amour? – Is it my love?

4. Non… C'est… un hérisson? – No… It's… a hedgehog?

5. Salut – Hi

6. Oui… Porquoi, Minuit? Et qui est il? – Yes… Why, Midnight? And who is he?

Fun chapter. Long, but really fun. I'm glad people like this story, because I'm going to have a lot of fun writing it. Well, now the title makes sense, right? Thank you to everyone who reviewed, and a special thanks to Dezerango for reminding me to describe my OCs a little more. Keep Reviewing! It keeps me motivated to write more, since I know I have fans.