(Based on 'The Devil and Daniel Mouse' and 'The Party of the First Part')

'The lights go on, and the curtain lifts. The stage is set, and the actors begin.'

-Blazing Shadow

Amy walked into her dressing room. Tonight's gig had less people than usual. She wasn't a professional, so the pink hedgehog wasn't too surprised by it, but she definitely wished for a bigger audience. In fact, for a while now, it had been her dream to become a famous musical artist. She wanted fame, she wanted money, she wanted everything, but most of all, she wanted to impress a boy she new. A certain hedgehog she just loved to hang around. A certain hedgehog whose name was unforgettable; the name as memorable as his signature quills and their blue hue.

The dressing room was fairly small. There was a standing mirror, a vanity, two chairs in the corner, and a small table in front of the chairs.

She walked up to her mirror and started to fix her quills when she noticed two dark figures sitting in the chairs behind her on the other side of the room. One was a black hedgehog with crimson highlights in his quills and matching streaks running down his arms and legs. He was sitting with his left leg crossed over his right. The other figure was a red hedgehog with a bass guitar.

"Who are you?" she asked.

The black hedgehog tilted his head back and held out his hand.

"My card... pretty lady," he replied in an almost sinister, frighteningly deep voice.

Amy took the business card and read it aloud,"Devil May-Care Music Productions... Shadow the Hedgehog, President."

A music rep! The president of his own music company at that! This could be her chance to land it in the big time!

Amy simply stood there staring at the man who could make her dreams come true. She couldn't feel her toes, she was in a state of shock.

"I like your style," Shadow finally said to break the awkward silence in the room,"Too bad you're not a singer-"

Amy gave herself a mental bop on the forehead. He was interested in her singing!

"O-oh, but I am! I am a singer, Mr. Shadow!"

"Hmm... No fooling..."

"No, no listen," she begged before giving the president a sample of her voice talent.

"Fantastic, erm... different!" said Shadow. He didn't exactly say it in the most sincere fashion, nor was he truly earnest in his compliments,"What do you think, Nick?"

The red hedgehog looked up to his boss from his guitar,"Fabulous, boss... so angelic, so solid, so... sexy, so PINK!You've done it again, Shads!"

The black hedgehog felt that introduction for his energetic lackey were in order.

"This is my associate and personal servant, Naughty-Nick."

"Hello."

Something about this black hedgehog and his companion didn't seem right. This entire time, although it did not register in Amy's mind at first, the black hedgehog's companion had been eying her in a way that made her feel uncomfortable. He had been playing his bass guitar the entire time.

Playing four repetitive notes. Four rather haunting notes.

The pink-quilled musician decided to dismiss their behavior and sinister apparel as nothing more than the way one acts when they have a lot of money and a lot of power.

"I want to be a star, oh please!" the pink haired girl begged with her hands together in a pleading gesture.

"Hmm," Shadow's head tilted down so he was staring into his lap.

"Please, Mr. Shadow, I'll do whatever it takes to make it big!"

"I don't know, Miss Amy, we are kind of booked. We just happened to be passing through the neighborhood..."

"Oh please, Mr. Shadow, I'll do whatever you want," she said as she dropped to her knees.

"Alright. You talked me into it," said the crimson on ebony-hued hedgehog. He definitely liked the idea of her doing whatever he wanted.

Shadow looked to his right where his lackey sat playing his instrument.

"Contract," he demanded as he snapped his fingers

Nick then snapped his fingers, and on the coffee table in front of Shadow, a blinding fire erupted and illuminated the room with an eerie red glow for a brief moment. A large stack of papers materialized on the table before the fire before it died out.

There was definitely something not right about this music rep, but Amy just couldn't put her finger on it.

"Just our... standard contract, nothing fancy," he said as he handed her the heavy stack of papers.

Amy once again dismissed the ebony hedgehog's behavior, and demonic powers, and began to skim through the papers one by one.

'Fame, fortune, fans, gold records, world tours, your name in lights!'

Amy continued to read and shuffle through the white papers.

Shadow began nodding his head as Amy read paper after paper.

"Take your time... read it all," said the dark one with a devilish smirk on the side of his face. His head was still gently nodding.

She sat there for thirty minutes just reading and reading... and reading... and some more reading to make sure she didn't miss a single detail Unfortunately, she hadn't been able to get through even a fourth of the stack.

"Oh... I give up," she conceded. The contract was simply too much for her to read in one sitting, and she couldn't afford to risk missing this opportunity,"Can I trust you?"

Shadow's small smirk shot up to a wide grin. It was as if heavenly lights were emanating from the back of his head. As if he were a saint in paint. He even tilted his head a bit to the side and held his hands to the side of his head to signify a picture frame. You could almost hear the angels sing.

Of course she could trust him! After all, this was the man who would make her famous and filthy rich.

"Okay... I'll sign!"

Shadow's smile kept getting bigger and bigger. His unholy smile began to defy the laws of physics as his lips parted to form a gaping chasm of sharp white teeth.

"Right," Shadow snapped his fingers,"Pen," ordered the hedgehog as he held his hand out to his associate. The red hedgehog handed him his special pen. It was black with an ivory tip and ornate red carvings curving around the circumference of the cylindrical writing utensil.

Amy tried to put her name on the dotted line in her best handwriting until she realized nothing was coming out of the pen.

"Where's the ink?" she asked.

Shadow uncrossed his legs and leaned over to take the pen from her hand.

"We always use blood," he replied as he pricked her finger with the sharp point of the pen,"It's more permanent."

"Oh... I don't know... can't we wait for my Dad to check this out?"

"Sure, sure. I'll be back next year. Come on, Nick!"

Next year? No, she couldn't wait for a whole year! She wanted to be a star now! She wanted to impress her soon-to-be husband Sonic the Hedgehog!

"Next YEAR!? No, wait! Stop, I'll sign!" she shouted to the Black hedgehog as she dipped the pen into the small droplet of blood forming on the tip of her white gloved finger.

It was done; her full name, Amy Rose, signed in her own blood on the contract paper that would change her life forever.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

After a year of 'sudden' success, Amy 'rose' to the top of the music charts. Every song she produced was a smash hit. It seemed that, music-wise, the Wild Rose could do no wrong.

Unfortunately, even though she became immensely popular, poor Amy never got Sonic the Hedgehog to take her hand in marriage. He never cared to settle down with anyone.

The press never gave her a moment of rest. In an interview on channel 616, 'Music on Mobius', she began to cry and pour her heart out. This made headlines all over the world, but it didn't seem to harm her musical career.

Her biggest and final night was August 28th of that year.

Naughty-Nick was lying on Amy's bed playing his bass guitar as Amy was getting dressed in for tonight's concert.

"You're the biggest thing ever to hit rock, Amy!" Nick told the sweet pink girl who was in the bathroom still changing.

"Thank you, Nick."

"Have any regrets, my little rose petal?" The red hedgehog had taken to calling her his 'rose petal'. She didn't like it, and she hated that Shadow had assigned the nuisance as her manager.

"Not at all," she told him with as much enthusiasm as she could muster. Amy lied. She was miserable. The pink girl only wanted to settle down with Sonic; she thought being a big star would get his attention. What a mistake that was.

Thankfully, she was paid to sing, not to think.

Nick slithered his way behind her and placed his gloved hands on her bare shoulders.

"Was it worth it?"

Was it? No. Not in Amy's opinion. Sure, she had money. She had money, fame and power. Amy Rose had it all, but for some reason she just wasn't happy.

And things weren't going to improve any time soon.

"Don't worry, my sweet scarlet petal. You're at the top now!"

"Well, yeah, but where do I go from here?"

"Oh... Shadow has a plan for you."

"He does?" she turned around and asked her manager.

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

After the concert, she returned to the hotel. Waiting in the lobby was her manager, playing the bass as always, and his handler, Shadow the Hedgehog. There were also three other people in the elevator room. They all wore smokey-gray cloaks that shrouded their faces from her.

"Oh, hello, Mr. Shadow!" she greeted the ebony hedgehog with a curtsy.

Shadow stood up and walked over to her. She smelled of sweet rose petals.

"Hello, Amy. How was the concert?"

"There were so many people, Shadow, it was amazing!"

"I should hope so. After all, it was your biggest concert to date," he responded as he placed a hand on her shoulder.

She felt rather uncomfortable around him right now.

"What do you want?"

"I want you."

"What?"

"Our contract. It's time to fulfill your obligation to the contract."

"W-wait, what obligation?" she asked him as she stared into his sinister eyes. Those red irises seemed so... unholy.

Shadow snapped his fingers. The two cloaked figures grabbed her by the shoulders. Shadow took out a pen. It was the very same pen used to sign the contract that night almost a year ago. He brandished the pen menacingly in front of her.

"Sh-Shadow, what are you doing?" she asked him in a frightened voice. Amy began to struggle. She tried to get out of the hooded figures' grasps, but to no avail.

The black hedgehog slid the pen between his quills and took out a familiar stack of papers.

"According to our contract," the sinister one began shuffling through the pages,"at precisely midnight of her greatest triumph, the party of the first part, that's you," he said with an evil grin on his face as he pointed to her with his gloved pinky,"agrees to render up her soul now and forevermore to the party of the second part," his smile died off as he pointed a left thump at his ivory crest,"That's me."

"No, Shadow! I didn't mean that!" she began to panic and struggle.

"I've been waiting, now it's MY turn!" he told her in a blood curdling voice as he handed the contract to the third hooded figure and took the pen from his quills.

"No-" her cry was cut short as Shadow the Hedgehog slashed the tip of the pen across her neck. Fresh blood began to flow from the crude incision.

The delicate rose was slain on the spot. Shadow looked to his servant, Nick.

"Shall we go?"

His servant nodded in response as the elevator door opened and the four figures stepped in. Two of the hooded figures carried the corpse of poor Amy Rose, and the third stood by the elevator controls. Shadow tapped on the third hooded figure.

"Straight to hell, boy."

The elevator descended past the parking below, past the basement... past any bottom floor the hotel had and continued to descend. The entire time, Nick never stopped playing his bass guitar. Those four hauntingly repetitive notes.

"Can you change the tune, please, Nick?"

"Yes, Sir," Nick replied obediently,"Mountain Song, sir?"

"Hell yeah."