Chapter XVI: Separation

Two years ago.

"I was thinking Amethyst Flowering rose for the little boy."

"Hmmm. It does make sense, cause of his fur. What of the girl?"

Yes, what of me? Tessie thought impatiently, kicking her feet against the rungs of the chair. Marty was wriggling in his seat, delighted to finally be gifted with a name that was all his own.

Ame, Ame, Ame!

Shush, Amy!

AH-May! Ame protested mentally, pushing against his sister's mind forcefully. Tessie pushed right back.

They're about to give me one, so quiet! Her name was not something she could foresee in her premonitions, so she was genuinely excited about this.

Amy smiled, watching a three-year old Ame dig into his cake with gusto. He certainly had his father's famous appetite, and was the chubbier of the two for it. Sickly and delicate, the little girl picked at her food. She ate little, causing her parents to worry quite often.

"What about Whisper?" Sonic piped up after a moment of thought. The little girl nodded her head vigorously, her bangs falling out of the pins her mother used to hold them back and falling over her right eye. "Whisper in the Wind." He chuckled as his daughter grew dizzy and dug into the chocolate icing on her cake, licking it off the end of the fork she held with the grace and ease of any elder child.

"I think that fits her. She doesn't talk yet." Amy giggled as she watched the little girl Whisper pin a dab of chocolate icing on the end of her brother's black nose, she laughing loudly in amusement as her twin attempted to slurp it up with his tongue. Finally, jumping out of her seat, her white party dress billowing about her, Whisper licked the icing off Ame's nose with an air of superiority. Sonic laughed, cradling his daughter in his arms. She rested there for a minute comfortably, her head resting against his heart. In a second, she wriggled out of his grasp and went to glomp her brother, throwing her full weight at him.

"Come on, kids." Amy encouraged. "Would you like to go to the park?"

Both twins raised their heads. Whisper's eyes widened and her brother shouted: "Yes!"

Two years later.

The twins had turned five last month—called Tryande—and it was a time of important decisions. School would be starting up tomorrow, as Knuckles had reminded them earlier, and Sonic and Amy had to decide if the twins should join Rio in kindergarten.

In the homey living room, Ame and Whisper played with their birthday gifts. Ame had acquired a red fire chaser truck with a nifty ladder and noisy wheels from the Echidna family, a blue biplane with his name printed on it from Tails and Cream, and a pair of wind-up sneakers from his parents. Whisper had acquired a toy grappling hook in the shape of a butterfly from the Echidnas, a mechanical furry cat that blinked and could be made (by the pressing of buttons on its stomach) to sit, clean its paw, walk three steps, and say "meow" from Tails and Cream, and from her parents, a cloth doll with two fashions. Ame was eagerly whooshing his plane around in the air and playing with his fire chaser and setting off the wind-up sneakers, but Whisper was only pretending to dress and undress her doll. She was more intent on listening to her parents' hushed voices in the kitchen.

Under the soft light, Sonic was eating dinner and Amy was cleaning up the counter. But, they were having a serious conversation, and had set the twins to play so they could do so uninterrupted. Little did they know their clever daughter was listening in…! But I digress.

"Do you think the twins are ready for school?" Amy inquired, her sea green eyes trained on the reflection of her boyfriend eating quietly at the table.

Sonic sat back from his food, his form creaking the chair. His emerald eyes, glassy and far-off, concentrated on a place in time so far into the past and so infinitely stretching into the future, that what he saw before him was not steak and peas and rice and hot chili but deep fissures in rock races, green pastures miles wide, the white foam of snow atop many mountains, and the sleek heat of boiling lava or red sand, did not flow to her so easily as hers flowed to him. Of course, those eyes never had. It was only five or six years before this time that he had even begun to really look at her at all. "Ame is more than ready. He shows all the necessary qualities needed to get along with other children."

"But, how do we know how he'll act around other children?" Amy pondered with concern. And it was not at all falsely founded. Sometimes, twins are kind to no one but each other.

"He'll have Rio. And neither of us are so violent." Sonic scooped a spoonful of red chili, studying it. As he placed it to his lips, he thought of running over red sands…and his heart ached.

"I agree with you about Ame, but…" Amy looked around her, as if she suspected someone listening. And those tears were not pointlessly founded, either. "But what about Whisper? Surely she can't…"

Sonic chuckled. "I feel like she could, if she wanted to. But it's not best for her, no. Her muteness would be an invitation for children to make fun. And for all her silence, she is the protector, not Ame."

"What will I do with her? The twins haven't been apart once, since that fateful night…" both parents shivered in remembrance, "Will she be timid, or afraid without Ame?"

"Does it seem like she would?" Sonic humphed, imagining a pool of green grass on his spoon before him, "After all, Whisper can be alone. It's Ame who craves attention…" he smirked at Amy. "Not unlike a certain baby-mommy I know."

Amy arched her socked foot to kick him, only narrowly missing as he snickered. She growled, but it was out of love. "Yes, well…but then how will she learn?"

"The twins share more—probably have shared more—than we could ever hope to know. Like I did, Whisper will benefit from learning through trial and error in the woods and the world, while Ame, like you, will most likely prefer a classroom environment. He tends to fade into the crowd, but whisper will always want to stand out."

"Excuse me?" Amy didn't know as much as Sonic had deduced.

Sonic swallowed down a spoonful of warm rice, closing his eyes as a grin of bliss played across his lips. He didn't want to let on what he thought—that Whisper forced herself to be silent—because he wasn't quite sure if he was right. Instead, he replied: "Her attitude is of one who draws attention, don't you think?"

"You mean she takes after you?" Amy teased, only to be hit with a glove and trapped within his grasp.

"Dear, I think we're about to learn just how much the kids take after us."

Whisper gasped, breaking her brother out of his imaginary world. He looked at her with some concern he didn't need to voice. "Sister, what…?"

But Whisper only looked at him and grabbed his wrist, pulling them into the safety of their room. It was there, side by side on one of the two identical beds, Whisper told what she had heard in a hushed manner.

That school would begin tomorrow, that Ame was to go—alone—and that she was to stay at home, and that he would meet a new playmate. Her parents hadn't voiced this: this part she knew.

"No!" Ame shouted, only lowering his volume after Whisper shushed him. "We haven't been apart since Mama and Dada had to take you to the hospital!"

"Ah, so you knew about that?" Whisper sighed, blowing her bangs out of her face.

"Yeah! I won't leave you, Whisper!" As if to prove this fact, Ame firmly attached himself to his sister's side, crying bitterly into her shoulder.

"Now Ame," soothed Whisper, stroking her brother's short, flat quills. "Come now, it's all right. You mustn't cry. You'll ruin my dress." It was more of a tease—a joke to get him to smile—then it was her caring about the dress, but either way, it worked. He laughed shakily.

"Okay." He sniffled. "Who's the new playmate?"

Whisper leaned in close until their foreheads touched, pulsing against her brother's forehead the image she had seen of the boy. His name is Rio, Whisper's calm and familiar mental voice narrated. He's a couple months from us, born when the planet was windy and cold. His full name is Rosario Topaz, and he wants to be a spy like his mama one day. The image was of Rio, a five year old boy, standing in bright blue boots, his dark purple (almost black) immature wings laying still on his back. His eyes were bright blue like his mother's, as he was a bat like his mother. His cropped hair was still like quills, but not as long. He inherited his father's dreadlocks, even if, for all that, he was more his mother than anything. He seemed to prefer his gloves unrolled instead of cuffed.

Will I get gloves too? Wondered the mental voice of Ame as he thought it.

Dada will give you gloves tomorrow. Me too. Answered Whisper. As she pulled away from the mind melding, the vision of the boy Rio faded.

"What will you do while I'm at school?" Ame wondered, looking his sister over. "What if you have one of your…fits?"

"Mama will take care of me." Whisper reassured him. "I don't see any coming on tomorrow, anyway." She added, but her brother was unconvinced. Her predictions about her illness were not as reliable as those she made about everything else.

"How will you keep yourself from getting bored?"

"Me? Bored? Feh!" Whisper gave a hard laugh. "How can I be bored?! Me, Whisper Hedgehog?!" And she giggled. "Don't you worry about me, big brother. You go and learn your lessons, and I'll learn mine, okay?"

Ame nodded obediently. Whisper hugged him. "That's my Ame. C'mon, we'd better go resume playing with our toys before Mama and Dada notice we're gone."

"Okay." Ame nodded swiftly as he got up and, hand in hand, he and his sister walked off to resume playing with their toys.

So, when Sonic and Amy peeked in to check on the twins a few minutes later, they never suspected that the kids had left the room at all.