Yes, I is back! (laughs maniacally) Aren't you sad now? Well, too bad! I have decided that today's pairing will be Silver/Shadowpaw! Weee! Random, huh? So, with today's pairing announced, let's have some fun!

A Brighter Future

The silver hedgehog floated on through the giant skyscrapers, memories of them all in ruin fading away as he examined the new peaceful looking city, bustling with activity and life. He stared in awe as people were walking down below him, hurrying to possibly their jobs or their homes, unaware of Silver watching over them like a guardian angel. As he felt his mind begin to slip away, he tried to summon every memory he possibly could, but it seemed as if they were, too, being erased by the reflowing of time like the old future had. Saving the future seemed to have changed everything drastically, and it was all slowly sliding away into the unknown as he struggled against it. He wanted to remember everything, he wanted to know what happened…

"Blaze…" His voice was filled with sorrow and grief, mourning his lost friend who had left to protect him. She had told him that only she was able to do it, to finally defeat Iblis…but, he hadn't expected this to happen. He hadn't been expecting her sacrifice. Now…she was gone forever, and there was nothing he could do about it except remember.

But even that was becoming a problem.

"No…" He held his head with a groan, his psychokinesis weakening a bit as he tried to fight it away, but everything was being torn up in his mind like paper in a paper-shredder. He feebly tried to grab memories, to hold onto them tightly, but they just slipped out of his grasp and disappeared forever. Panicking, he landed on top of a building so that he could focus all of his power on his mind. Valiantly standing up to whatever it was that threatened to tear him away from his memories, he was still no match, and he found his memory depleting into something different. Blaze wasn't here anymore in this changing city, he was all alone on the cold, dark streets, only he was left…who was Blaze? Was that…someone important? What…how did he get here? He gripped his head and groaned, wanting the pressure on his head to dissipate, wanting to be able to breathe…

Suddenly, the terrible sound of something ripping and shattering to pieces made his head snap up to find the source of the sound, completely tearing his attention from the pain in his head, and as he squinted his eyes he saw a bluish-greenish vortex opening up in the sky. He wondered aloud, "What could that be?" It was like some freakish portal to another galaxy, and he caught sight of a leafy green forest that for some reason looked eerily familiar. Then, he saw something shot out of it, like an arrow on a deadly course, and he tried to identify it when he realized it was someone falling from the sky. Immediately leaping into action, he levitated himself and rushed quickly to catch the person, hoping that he wouldn't be too late, he couldn't let another person die on him…

Wait, another…? Puzzled momentarily by his thoughts, he noticed that he wasn't going fast enough, and suddenly the pulsing of something he had in his possession made him open his mouth and yell, "Blaze!" He didn't know why, but his mouth opened of its own accord and let loose that name that suddenly felt familiar to him. He felt a strange but powerful energy course through him at it, almost as if the name was pushing him onward, strengthening his psychokinesis as he blasted towards the person and quickly caught them before slowing down to a swift halt in the air. After getting over the energy rush he had, he looked down at the unconscious black feline in his arms, and for some reason one name came across his mind…

"Blaze?"

Slowly, the cat moaned and stirred awake, blinking her amber eyes open and squinting them against the bright sun above them as she looked up at his face. She had a soft white furry muzzle with the edges of her cheeks up in something like whiskers, and she had silky black hair-like fur that just went past her shoulders, brushing up against his arms in whispers like soft sheets as you make a bed. Her outfit was a bit out-of-this-world-ish to him, with the shining leather overcoat making a sort of dress on her as its length covered her legs and shoes completely, and the collar being a bit pointed to stick out like devilish wings on either side of her face. At first blinded by the light, she got a good look of his face when he tilted his head curiously at her, his own golden eyes staring at her in confusion. She blinked once more, remaining quiet for the time being, and Silver asked her, "What happened? You suddenly fell from the sky, and…" He frowned, a sudden feeling of recognition coming over him seemingly out of nowhere. "Why do I feel as if I know you from somewhere?"

After a moment more of a confused look in her eyes, he descended so they could stand atop firm ground and let her out of his arms. She was a little wobbly at first, to which he quickly grabbed her shoulder to steady her, but she waved him off with a shake of her head, and he reluctantly let go as he eyed her for any more unbalance. She looked extremely dizzy and lightheaded, and it took a while for her to regain her bearing. Finally, she looked at the white hedgehog and said carefully, as if perhaps a little unsure, "Your name is Silver."

His eyes widened in shock, and he asked incredibly, "How did you know?" To suddenly find a stranger in an odd outfit who fell from a hole in the sky and then find out that she knows your name…it was kind of creepy.

She sighed and shook her head. "I guess that time has been fixed in the future, or otherwise you would have recognized me." She then looked over his shoulder towards the buildings standing tall and proud behind him, dwarfing them in comparison. It was as if she was a little relieved to see them, and as his bewilderment grew she asked if they could sit down since she was still feeling a bit dizzy. They found some crates to rest on, and as Silver continued to stare at her eager for answers, she looked up at him and started to explain.

"So," he carefully summarized her story after she was done, "you say that I returned to the future?"

"Yeah," she nodded and swept her gaze around the city, "along with a purple cat named Blaze."

"…Blaze?" The name that he had said before came back to him like turning on a light bulb, almost as if he had forgotten it as soon as he said it, but this time he felt a small pressure on the back of his head. He raised a hand to brush over it, finding nothing unusual there, and shrugged as he deduced that it was probably his imagination. He then looked at the feline incredibly and told her, "You know, that all really sounds hard to believe."

"I know." She sighed and shook her head, looking doubtful even to herself. "I can still feel doubt about it all whenever I think about it myself. But…" Her gaze went up to the sky, where she had fallen through the vortex to here. "Another hedgehog I know had the same memories as I did about you, and I don't think we're both delusional."

"Another hedgehog?"

"Yeah." She looked back down at him and nodded. "His name is Shadow, and he still remembered everything even though the others couldn't. He was the one who got Sonic to help him create a portal to bring me here, to the future."

"What is your name?"

"Hm?" The question seemed to have been out of the blue, and it took her a moment to answer. "Shadowpaw. It's kind of ironic, really, since my hands are really white." To show him, she grabbed the fingers of the glove on her right hand and pulled it off, revealing her hands to be just as she said; they were white all the way up until her wrist, where it was overtaken by black fur once more. The contrast between the two colors was like night and day, and it gave someone the sense of yin and yang when staring at it. As she went to put the glove back on, Silver stopped her by suddenly grabbing hand and staring at the back of it intently. A scar that went from right under the pinky to the base of her thumb glared angrily at him, and he asked carefully, "Where'd you get this from?" He didn't know why he asked, but he was also curious about the mark.

She shifted uneasily on the crate and looked down at the ground. "Well…I got that while I was fighting robots on my way to Eggman's hidden base." Then, although she looked a little sad, she smiled and said, "That was where I first met you and Blaze; you used your psychokinesis and accidentally shoved me along with a bunch of robots at one of Eggman's security robots." She rubbed the back of her neck and chuckled. "It hurt."

"Err…sorry?" Silver didn't exactly know how to respond to that, and was confused when she laughed and shook her head at him. She took her hand out of his and put the glove back on, and as she made sure it was on right and tight, she told him, "It's alright, though; it turns out that, because of this, I remember everything that happened. It's like a glitch in the system or something; I don't think anyone was supposed to remember it." She crossed her arms and tilted her head slightly, thinking deeply about the matter, and as the white hedgehog once again got the feeling that it looked so familiar, she muttered to herself, "Shadow does, too, but he seems to know a lot of things that we don't…"

Then, as a thought seemed to just come to her, she frowned and tilted her head to the other side, curiosity coming to her eyes as she asked, "Hey, where is Blaze?"

Silver shook his head, having trouble grasping what she was trying to tell him as his head started to ache. "I don't have any clue what you're talking about…" He couldn't remember the name even after he said it, and yet it felt so familiar…who was this 'Blaze'?

"So…" She looked at him with an almost sympathetic frown on her face. "Does that mean that…

"You're all alone?"

Suddenly, as the last word hit his eardrums, he received a splitting headache that threatened to tear open his skull, and he cried out in pain before holding his head and leaning forward to get into a sort of fetal position while sitting. It was as if that word – 'alone' – was the key to opening a bunch of memories he couldn't remember himself, like a cheat code for a game. Shadowpaw gasped and reached out to him, asking worriedly, "Are you alright?"

Instead of answering her question, he suddenly sat right back up with his golden eyes wide, causing her to leap backwards as he shouted, "Blaze!" Everything was coming back to him at last, with the memories and such of all the things that the stranger had talked about, even the time where he noticed he had smashed her into a robot on accident. All the moments that he had dreaded their eminent demise in the old future that was controlled by lava, and every memory back in the past that included a blue hedgehog. He remembered the betrayal he had felt when he found out Mephalis was lying to him, and the rage he had had could only have been calmed down by Blaze, who said that they had to focus on saving the future. He wished he could be with his childhood friend right now. But, he knew that it was impossible, and yet he still wished…he needed to see her again…Blaze…but he was alone…

"Blaze…" Tears sprung to his eyes as the entire world dimmed into a murky underwater nightmare, and he closed them and held his head in his hands as he started to cry silently. I can never seem to be happy… His hands gripped into fists with anger and rage. Every time something good happened, there always had to be something equally bad to even it out… When he had met Blaze a long time ago in his childhood, she had become his only friend. But, her responsibility to the Sol Emeralds kept her from playing, and since she was constantly teased about her fire abilities, he was teased about being friends with her. Although the price wasn't too expensive for the award, it still irked him badly, and he never really understood why they were picking on her. Blaze had only said it was because of her 'current state', but he still didn't comprehend the problem.

And, as soon as the Iblis is destroyed, she's taken away from me. The most horrible feeling in his gut tore away at him, devouring him little by little as it laughed at him for being unable to protect her, or stop her. I couldn't do anything…

To his surprise, he felt slender arms wrap around him as he huddled on the crate, and as he felt the feline sigh mournfully he wondered how she could be so selfless, so thoughtful and considerate to someone that wasn't really a close friend. After all, if it were him watching her, he would personally keep far away, not wanting to get into the awkward position of comforting somebody. But…that was how Blaze was; she was always looking out for him, and, although she didn't hug him like this, she would always be there to comfort him. And, this feline, Shadowpaw, was as caring and compassionate as she was. Surprising himself, he reached up and wrapped his arms around her in return, and although she gasped in shock she did not pull away, and eventually she just hugged him tighter, trying to comfort him as best as she could.

As the twittering of birds in the morning pulled him from his slumber, Silver felt the strangely familiar terror of a blank presence in his mind, as if there was something missing. Confused, he opened his eyes and sat up form the bench he remembered he had chosen especially to sleep on, but the day before was fuzzy as if he had been drunk the whole day. In fact, much of his life was a blank, with only little bits and pieces shining in his memories. He glanced around the park, baffled, before his eyes landed on a feline beside him that made something click in his mind. Her amber eyes were open and staring back at him, like two needles piercing his soul in an uncomfortable yet gentle way, and he frowned as he tried to form words but only let a name slip from him that seemed to fit, and yet didn't.

"Blaze?"

She had been in a sort of calm contemplation with an almost grim cloud slightly shadowing her mouth, but then it dropped low into a disappointed frown as her eyes dimmed because of a single word, and he felt he had done something wrong as she shook her head slowly. "No," she sounded sad with her monotone voice, "not Blaze."

After a while of frowning, suddenly he was overwhelmed in a wave of memories that seemed to completely chill him to the bone. As he realized his utter mistake, the black cat before him turned away and got up from the bench they had shared as a bed, because (if he remembered right) 'it would be too chilly to sleep alone this time of year'. He had slept on one side while she slept on the other, with their legs kind of mingling together on accident in the middle. The seasons' changing was still a new thing to him, and so trusted Shadowpaw's word about 'winter' as he looked up at the gray clouds hanging far overhead and around at the dismal colors and mumbled, "Winter is almost upon us…"

"Yeah," she replied, maybe a little stiffly, "and soon we'll have to finally get a room or something. I've heard there's a nice hotel down the road." She jerked her head in the direction it was to let him glance over there and examine the tall building as she smoothed out the sleeping wrinkles in her clothes. He found the place kind of looming over them, but it was a very nice place and would protect them from the cold of the seasons. He didn't know why he bothered, though, since they had nice coats of fur to protect them, but Shadowpaw said they wouldn't want to have to endure the cold and she would get them a room at a hotel. They didn't mind sleeping on benches or beds together, because if they had to they would, but it was a bit awkward when people would assume things and give them these looks. It made things all the more uncomfortable for the feline, who still wasn't used to the future after a month of living her. Getting there around the middle of October, she said that although she felt the warmth of Thanksgiving in November, she didn't see any signs of it around her, and it made her a little sad.

As they started to walk in some random direction as they always did, he tilted his head up to look at the clouds again, seeming to mimic the feline down below as they both went along grimly and quietly. She always seemed to be a bit sad lately, with the way she would glance at him occasionally and give a silent sigh you could only see by examining her closely, or whenever she would slouch down in a seat while ordering food as if she just wanted to eat and leave. She did smile and was happy, but it seemed that most of her life was filled with some sort of disappointments.

And yet, the thing that really struck him as the most distressing of it all was whenever he would call her 'Blaze', and she would always say 'no, not Blaze'; a routine they had come up with in the past weeks. It seemed that it was the worse thing to do, to call a woman by another woman's name. And, with how often he did it accidentally, it was a miracle she didn't explode on him one day, or leave him for a while to show how angry she was. He remembered now, back when he was in the past, how the people he met would talk about her temper, and how she was a ticking time-bomb waiting to burst. Where, now, was that cat? Had she ran off and left an empty shell behind her? That was all Shadowpaw was: a shell, a mask, a shadow of what she used to be. Now…

She seemed so…broken down.

He had to ask her.

He stopped walking, and after a moment of her continuing on her way she halted as well, waiting for a moment before looking back at him and tilting her head in puzzlement. "Silver?" The simple call showed that she was confused, wondering why he wasn't moving and was giving her a look that wanted to interrogate her posture for answers. Eventually, she turned back towards him and took a few tentative steps over so that she stood before him, still looking for the reason that he was so disturbed.

He tilted his head down so he could look at her eyes, for she was just a bit shorter than him (her height was roughly 3", give or take an inch or two) and he had to use all of his willpower to not break at the bewildered look on her face and pretend he was just troubled by something. Instead, he reached out and grabbed her right hand, the one that he had accidentally hurt a long, long time ago, and asked her softly, "What's wrong?" Whenever he really wanted to connect with her, he for some reason grabbed that hand even when he didn't want to, because it seemed to really affect her attention and focus when he did it. Even now, she gave a short gasp and gazed down at the hand that gripped hers firmly, but then he loosened it so that it wasn't as harsh and desperate and just cradled hers gently as he looked down at it as well. He didn't hold hands a lot when he knew Blaze, mostly because she wasn't that much of a physical-comforting person, but with Shadowpaw it seemed to be most affective when conveying messages, such as a pat on the back or a hand on the shoulder; as the timeless saying goes, 'actions speak louder than words'.

With her full attention, he asked her, "Are you alright? You seem so…" He couldn't find the right word to describe it.

"Gloomy? Miserable? Depressed?" She slipped her hand from his and turned away so that he could only stare at her back, wrapping her arms around herself as if to protect her body from the cold. Concerned by the strange behavior, he stepped around her to face her again, examining her closed eyes with a frown as he debated about grabbing her hand again, but his arms stayed limp at his side as he just waited, for she could not stand there forever in the cold. Finally, she opened her eyes and looked up at him, startling him by how deep and pain-filled they seemed. She sighed and held a hand up to put it on his shoulder, but it wavered as she hesitated for a moment, and Silver found the courage once more to grab it. As he held up her hand in the chilling wind like a beacon, the volume of her voice lowered to a whisper as she said quietly, "I'm sorry…I'm making you worry." She closed her eyes and shook her head. "Don't. I'm supposed to be taking care of you." She gave a faint smile. "A guardian."

A guardian…angel… Silver looked at her and said, "But, why are you supposed to take care of me? Why are you here? Why don't you…" He gulped as a lump formed in his throat, afraid to say what he dreaded the most.

She opened her eyes and looked up at him, tears seeming to brim in her eyes. "Why don't I run away?" She finished his sentence a hundred times over with that phrase, but she kept going as her voice raised back up into a nearly angry accusation. "Why don't I turn my back on you and leave, knowing that you wouldn't remember me? Why don't I return to the past, where I belong?" One tear did find itself a way down her cheek, but before she could wipe it away the wind did it for her, tearing it from her cheek and freezing it before it hit the ground with a soft smash to break it. She closed her eyes, as if to not let anymore come out, and bowed her head, as if ashamed to have cried at all in front of him. He may have done the same to her, but she seemed to have a sort of pride he couldn't relate to. He felt, as Shadowpaw did to him, that he had a duty to comfort her if she was sad, and since she was crying he found that know was his chance. Before he could speak, however, she got the courage to speak up first.

"Because I can't.

"I can't leave you here, knowing that you would forever be unaware and wouldn't be able to care less." She opened her eyes to stare down at the ground, wet with the thought of future snow banks covering the world. "After I left, I wouldn't know what was important in my life anymore, because I had just walked away from possibly the only person who I really cared for other than myself. I know that you need me, and, as funny as it sounds, I need you." She looked up at him and gave him another smile, but this one seemed as if it truly had some meaning behind it, not a feeble one made for show. She reached up and ruffled some of the fur on his head, and as he let go of her hand so that both of his could reach up and fix it all, she gave a small laugh and added, "Besides, I can't go back, as in I physically can't. I need two hedgehogs who know Chaos Control to create a portal to the past, you dork!"

He scowled, hating it whenever she would mess with his fur or called him 'dork', but she always had fun with it, and now as she started walking again with a grin on her face he found that he had one as well. Well…I guess I'll let it slide, this time. He quickly caught up to her and walked beside her on her right, making sure to reach over and grab her hand like a little kid would their mother.

She needs me… For some reason, that made his smile that much brighter, and he found himself nearly dragging her along as she laughed and told him to slow down. And I definitely need her.

He woke up once more a couple of days after that, and to his surprise he just stared at a sleeping feline in shock as he collected thoughts in his mind. As soon as he had felt conscious, something felt different, and his heart nearly stopped beating as he sat in amazement. I'm…I'm… His eyes were wide, his hands were shaking slightly, and he couldn't believe it. Everything sat untouched since the day before, and as he sat with the picture in his mind of the room last night, his jaw fell open.

He remembered everything.

He sat up in the bed they were in and stared at the opposite wall as he went over everything that happened yesterday. We went to a theatre and watched a movie, and she spilled her popcorn halfway because she was laughing so hard, and then I went to go bring more, and… He smiled as everything that had ever happened to him was there, in his mind, milling about as if to say 'what, did you expect something different?', and he nearly jumped up and cheered loudly in joy before suddenly he realized that Shadowpaw was still asleep.

He stopped in his small happy dance to glance over again at the sleeping feline, dead to the world as she gave a soft sight and curled up more under the blanket. His overjoyed expression softened into a small smile as he crept over beside her and laid down, staring at her calm face in slight bewilderment. He had never seen her asleep before; he always fell asleep before her, and by the time he woke up she would be there watching him like the guardian angels she compared herself to. He had began to wonder if she ever slept, and now here she was, letting the rest of the world go by as she sat in sweet dreams with a wonderful smile on her face. She seems to be having a very good dream, he assumed, and as he was still overcome by the two amazements of the morning, he just kept smiling as he watched her instead, feeling like they had switched places. She must be tired, always staying up in the cold night to take care of me, so now it's my turn.

Feeling that time couldn't touch him in the early hours of the morning (the clock read five), he reached over and traced a finger down her cheek in amazement, wondering, she looks so calm when she's asleep; there are no traces of sadness or grief like she usually has, and she looks quite pleasant when she's smiling. It was as if she couldn't help herself, as if she was thinking of something so happy and joyful that she couldn't help but smile. His finger stopped in annoyance when he thought it might be because she was dreaming of the past, but then he shook it off as ridiculous and let his finger slide off to lay beside him once more. She took off her gloves whenever she went to sleep (for a reason that still escaped him), and as his hand itched to grab it again he wondered why it called to him so. Maybe it's because it's the tie between us, he suggested to himself, and it gets such attention because it is another mistake I've made. A bit saddened, he finally gave in to his finger's twitching and crept his hand over to cover the scar with his palm, but gave a sharp intake of air as she moaned softly in her sleep and moved her legs a bit, perhaps uncomfortable in the unusual heat she found in the hotel room. That was probably what was keeping her asleep; heat did what the cold operated against, to let the living slumber in peace and not tear at them with icy fingers.

His hand cradled hers like a fragile snowflake and he whispered to sleeping form, "Why do you remind me of someone who is gone?" When he got this close and had the time to examine her, he realized that she didn't look that much like Blaze; including that she did not have the feathers on her head or the same eye color, she was a black feline with white hands and a white tip on her tail, and although the outfit looked similar, it was definitely not identical.

So why? Was it just because she was a cat? Was he that desperate to have Blaze back that he would symbolize someone else as her? And at that person's expense?

He knew that it hurt her, to be compared to someone else she knew that, no matter how much someone wished, she could never be the same or live up to the same expectations. And, although she had said so many reasons that she couldn't leave, that couldn't just be it. There was something she was hiding from him; some fact, some thought, some secret, something that she didn't want him to know. Despite the age-old saying Shadowpaw had said she hated ('Curiosity killed the cat'), he wanted to know what tied her to him still, like the scar on her hand and the memories they both, when together at least, shared.

Finally, as the hours seemed to wear away slower than molasses in wintertime (not that he would know how fast that is), he felt her begin to stir, and he quickly let go of her hand and held his breath as she stretched her arms over her head to touch the headboard there and her legs to attempt to reach the foot of the bed. Acting truly like the feline she was, it made him smile a bit in the reminder of how Blaze would wake up, but when he realized that he was comparing them again he mentally shook it from his mind as her eyes fluttered open, a little reluctant at first until she noticed that he was staring at her. Then, her eyes shot open and got wide, probably wondering what he was doing so close to her and why he was awake before her, but before she could speak a word he avoided any questions by instead saying quietly, "You look awfully pretty when you're sleeping." Although it was something used to distract her from the strangeness of the morning momentarily, he found that his face got a bit red as he thought of how true the statement was, and Shadowpaw's face mirrored that blush before she sat up and got off of the bed, stepping into the bathroom to do whatever it was that girls did in there.

He sat up as well, but he stayed on the bed as he rested his back against the rather short headboard and let his head smack the wall softly with a thunk, closing his eyes to think about what he had just said. You look awfully pretty when you're sleeping… He hadn't been able to see that until just this morning, so it was a recent thought that he really had no control over and hadn't been nagging at his mind since he met her. At first, he had thought of her as strange but welcome company, since it kept all of his memories intact whenever she was around, but now it was kind of strange thinking of her leaving. They didn't really do anything monumental, because unlike when he was with Blaze, they didn't have anything important to do, no duties that required their immediate attention. A bit irked he was comparing her to Blaze again, he took his fist and pounded it on his forehead a few times, grumbling, "She's not Blaze! She doesn't even look like her! So…"

Then, he heard a heavy thud in the bathroom, and he shot off of the bed like a bullet as he asked the feline inside, "Are you alright? Shadowpaw?" A bit worried when he didn't hear anything, he used his psychokinesis to open the door carefully to see her sitting on the ground, as if she had been swept off of her feet by something incredible, and she looked up at him with such an expression of surprise and shock he guessed what had made her fall.

She had realized that he hadn't called her Blaze that entire morning.

At the sight of him, she shakily got up onto her feet and nearly stumbled over to him, making him take a step back before she could run into him or anything, but she took that extra step and fell into him, collapsing into his arms as she nearly slipped out of his grip and onto the floor. He held on tightly either way, albeit awkwardly because he wasn't used to such weight and, to be frank, he used his psychokinesis powers so much that he had neglected his muscles. Using said powers to help her up a bit (proving my point), he looked down at her and tried to say something but couldn't find the right words to say. Before he could think for too long, she instead looked up at him and spoke before he could even plan to start, "You…your memory…" Not knowing what to say, he just nodded, and slowly a smile came to her face as her eyes shimmered with tears. Confused of why she was crying when she was happy, he was surprised when she hugged him fiercely and started sobbing into his fur, leaving him standing there with no clue what to do.

"What…" He looked down at her puzzled, a frown spoiling his face. "Why are you crying? Aren't you happy?"

"They're tears of joy, you dork," she gave a sort of choked laugh combined with a sob, and he found a smile creep its way onto his face as the feline continued to cry. Slowly, he got down to sit on the floor with her and hugged her gently, letting her sob into his chest with her arms wrapped around him like a teddy bear. Feeling better now that he finally got to comfort her, he closed his eyes and told her, "I don't want you to keep your emotions bottled up all the time, okay?" She gave a faint nod, and he continued, "And, if you ever need someone to talk to…" He hugged her tighter. "I'll be there."

"Thank you…"

Suddenly, he felt her tighten her grip on his waist and lean into him, and he opened his eyes just as her nose touched his and their lips connected. Shocked beyond any kind of surprise that could ever happen, he gazed in a sort of daze as she hovered there for a moment before withdrawing away from him and opening her eyes, looking a bit embarrassed that she had done that. When she saw the look on his face, however, she blinked and said carefully, "…Silver?" She looked as if she was scared she had broken him, like a favorite toy or an important vase that had been her mother's.

After a moment, a grin slowly came upon his face, and he told her, "That was my first kiss." A feeling he couldn't understand was welling up inside him, and he couldn't stop grinning as the feline looked at him sheepishly. She admitted timidly, "That was my first, too…" She looked as if she didn't know what the hell she was thinking, doing that.

His grin stayed evident on his face as he told her, "Well, how about we fix that?" He reached out and grabbed a hold of her arm, and her gasp was cut short as she was pulled forward to him and into another kiss, this one longer than the first. At first sitting with her eyes open wide in shock, ever so slowly she closed her eyes and let herself go, surprisingly relaxed as he kept her close to him. He didn't know what compelled him to do that, yet now that he did he couldn't help but feel like a weight was being lifted off of his shoulders that he didn't even know existed. His arms wrapped around her almost possessively, and he found he didn't ever want to let go. Unfortunately, the feline had other ideas.

"…Silver…wait!" She struggled a bit to sit up before he let go, confused at her behavior. Hadn't she been the first to kiss him? He looked at her amber orbs with questions but didn't say a word as he saw something like fear in her eyes. Why was she scared?

"Silver…" She looked down, as if ashamed that she had done something wrong, and then looked back up at him searchingly. "Is this…is this because…"

"Because…?" He frowned. What could make her so frightened that she didn't want to kiss? Girls make no sense…

"…Of her?"

"Oh…that…" Well, at least now he knew what bothered her. But now, he felt a bit hurt by the accusation, that he was only kissing her because of Blaze. And then, as that sentence went through his mind, he realized that it didn't make sense. Why would he kiss another girl because of her? After all… He looked at her steadily and said, "You look nothing like her."

For some reason, a smile came across the feline's face, and she gave a small laugh before she grabbed him into a fierce hug, burying his face against her chest. He blushed, feeling a bit awkward there, before she laughed again and gave him a small peck on the cheek. "Silver, you dork!" His face really red now, he gave a small groan when she ruffled his fur again, but she just laughed and continued to hug him tightly. And, frankly, he didn't want to move.

As long as he had her, he knew he could move on…to a brighter future. For the both of them.

Aww, isn't that so sweet? (Geez, what is with me lately…?) FINALLY, a pairing where Shadowpaw gets a kiss! Haven't you noticed that? Oh, well, guess it's only me… So, I finally had to wrap this up before I went nuts, and so I give you the clue for the next pairing!

Extreme!

Ha, try to figure THAT one out! Have fun, and remember: Reviewing makes my heart grow fonder for you guys! (wink-wink, nudge-nudge, hint-hint) Bye!

DL ('Dragon Lover')