Sorry it took so long! I made it twice as long to make up for missing two months. Thanks for the support everyone!
The first thing Shadow notices are Amy's eyes. The memory he carried of her was always a warm green light yet as he stared at her now, she reflected an electric shade that he found unnerving. She smiled casually, as if she had seen them two hours prior rather than the three years she had vanished. Sonic seems to open his mouth to say something but instead his jaw clamps shut and he rushes over to take Tails away from her. Rouge lifts her hand to give a tense wave and Amy nods her head in acknowledgement. Only one person manages to destroy the uncomfortable silence in one fell swoop of his voice, "Amy! Where've you been, girl?"
Knuckles wraps his arms around Amy and lifts her off the ground in a bear hug causing her to drop her hammer with a clang only Shadow seemed to notice. She gasps at the sudden contact but recovers quickly and squeezes Knuckles back.
"Oh, you know, here and there." She says with a fluttery laugh.
"How long has it been? Three years? You're all grown up!" He replies, ruffling her quills.
Tails clears his throat, "It's great to see you Amy, but I think I might have a concussion." His weak voice wavers over to them with a hint of playfulness. This gets a bit of a laugh from the rest of the group and they begin to head off to one of Rouge's many properties around town to patch themselves up. By the time they arrive to one of the cafés Rouge owns, everyone has gotten over the shock and has begun joking and talking with Amy about the battle that had just occurred. All but two speak: Shadow and Sonic. Everyone is accustomed to Shadow's guarded space but Sonic's silence creates a tangible hole in their usual dynamic.
Everyone settles into their usual seat at one of the tables. Sonic takes the seat at the head of the table while the others sit on the sides; Shadow notices Amy lingering by the door and realizes that the only seat left is on the other side directly facing Sonic. But before he can offer her his seat, Amy announces, "I- uh. I need to use the bathroom."
Rouge nods her head towards the back of the café and Amy seems to retreat hurriedly away. This allows for the table to burst into conversation.
"Where do you think she's been all this time?" Tails asks.
"Why does it matter? She's back. We're lucky she showed up! You'd probably be way more injured than you are now," Knuckles replies as he precariously leans back on the hind legs of his chair.
Sonic gently pushes the front legs of Knuckles' chair back with his foot causing Knuckles to loses his balance and nearly falls before righting himself back, "Is it just me, or does she seem different?"
Sonic's observation recreates the somber mood and Shadow comments, "Well, what do you expect? You ran her out of town."
The table becomes tense as Shadow stands to go to the restroom, leaving the room with his dead panned observation. He knows they feel guilty, knows that they searched and searched for the better part of the first year, knows that Sonic wishes he could take it back. But Shadow finds that he doesn't care. Instead, he's more interested in the fact that Amy has been snooping around in the back for quite a while now.
Just as he turns the corner to the hall leading past the kitchen and into the door to the back alleyway, he staggers back and feels Amy's hammer graze his chest. He barely manages to control his voice, "What the hell, Rose!?"
Amy has a crazed look in her eye, like a caged animal, if only for a second before she blinks and drops her hammer. Uneasily slipping out of a defensive position, Shadow realizes that Amy has stripped herself of her maroon petticoat and gray scarf, leaving her in black leggings and a black bandeau. Shadow quickly narrows his gaze at Amy, partly because he didn't want to stare and partly because he was becoming warier of this person with an old friend's face.
"Oh, I'm sorry Shadow. You startled me is all."
"What are you doing sneaking around back here?"
"Nothing," Amy says with an uneasy smile, "Just looking around."
And with that, Amy picks up her hammer and shrinks it into a palm sized baton. But as she walks past him, Shadow firmly grasps her wrist. She turns slowly, but what meets his eyes is not the Amy from seconds before. Her eyes are narrowed in a way he's only seen in his own reflection and her teeth are bared. These observations weaken his grip and she easily slips away.
Shadow stands in the hallway pondering what he's just come across. What happened to Amy Rose? He plays the situation back in his mind, looking for abnormalities or hints to the past three years. But the only thing that stood out was a long scar from her shoulder blade to the wrist he had grabbed hold of. Realizing that there was nothing more he could possibly do, Shadow makes his way back to the table where Amy is already seated where he was.
"So Ames," Sonic begins, "How've you been?"
For the first time since she arrived, Amy looks Sonic in the eyes and smiles, "I've been great. Traveling, camping, and working my way through the continent. And what's new with you guys?"
Shadow finds himself slightly disturbed by the abrupt personality change from the hallway but the rest of the group excitedly jumps onto the chance of pretending nothing ever happened.
Tails is the first to pipe up, "Well, Knuckles and Rouge started officially dating two years ago."
Rouge simply giggles while Knuckles' muzzle is splashed with a shade of pink that rivaled Amy's. Trying to recover, Knuckles blurts out, "Oh yeah? Well Tails confessed to Cream yesterday!" This causes Tails and Knuckles to go into an argument about privacy that veers off into its own world.
Rouge turns her attention away from the bickering boys on Sonic's left and right to the politely smiling Rose. However, before she's able to begin a conversation, she notices Shadow watching Amy from the corner of his eyes in a very obvious manner. Rouge wonders if this is because he'd always had a soft spot for the pink flower. Whether he knew it or not was another question entirely.
Shaking her head, Rouge calls for Amy's attention with a question in her direction, "So just where have you been, hun? Here and there must have names."
Amy's eyes light up as she goes into detail about some of the cities she visited and the nights she had had on the road. Amy had become quite the story teller over the years because by the time she had reached the end of her story, even Shadow seemed entranced by the way she wove together paintings of the night sky blanketed in millions of stars, cities of bustling innovation, or roads that glistened with the fire of the setting sun. When she was done, a comfortable silence hung over the group.
Surprisingly, Sonic was the first to pipe up, "But where was the last place you stayed?"
Amy's expression wavered for a moment before she was able to shoot back with, "Oh, I didn't really settle anywhere for too long in the previous year." The falter would have been unnoticeable had Sonic and Shadow not been looking for it.