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((Er, Aaron did talk to Aidrous; I guess you missed it.))

Aaron turned at the sound of his name, feeling almost sick with relief. As he jogged toward the source of the voice, he wondered at that. Chase was just like the people he was passing by without a second thought: a complete stranger. Madison? She might be like him, sure, but she was ultimately a stranger as well. And in spite of this, he was searching for them like they were his only link to sanity; was this healthy behavior? "It's time to go-oo!" came Chase's slightly petulant voice, and Aaron suppressed a smile. Whether it made sense or not, these people were his life line, and they seemed to know it as well as he did.

He caught sight sight of an extremely familiar orange head of hair, and then, after a moment, spotted Chase's dark head as well. He jogged up, slightly out of breath, and nodded to Chase. "Thank you for waiting," he said, his quiet voice filled with sincerity.

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Aidrious heard voices...familiar voices, and followed them. The had excellent hearing, but just happened to be passing by a wooded area. She crept up behind a group of people and tried to listen to what they were saying. When it got quiet, she walked out into the clearing and said, "Hey Aaron! What are you guys up to? I have a strange feeling about all of this...but I can't quite figure out why."

Madison beamed as she saw Aaron's blonde head of hair approaching. She held herself back from hugging him, but gave up after Chase had hugged him. "You're back!" she cried, hugging him quickly before pulling back to stand next to Chase again. She didn't know either very well, but they were definetly lifelines for her. Maybe they could even help me find out what happened to me, she thought ruefully. At the sound of another person's approach, Madison turned, giving a dimmer smile to the girl who had just come up. "I have a bad feeling about this also, but it might just be the fact that we just ran from thugs, and am now standing in the woods at night. I really don't want to find out if the thugs are coming back." she said, glncing at the streetlamp not to far away.

Aaron smiled at all three of them, suddenly feeling untouchable, like he’d just walked on the moon. When, in fact, you’ve just found two people you shouldn’t have lost in the first place. But even this shot of realism didn’t get rid of his emotional high. “Chase’s house, then?” He asked, his green eyes still sparkling with his smile. He paused, glancing at Adrious. “You should start home, too.” In an unusual display of levity, he winked. “Not that I’d really mind rescuing you from the bipolar Girl Scout again."

Laila continued to stare at Zara's head, determined not to lose her amongst the crowds of tourists and locals alike. Even so, it still came as a suprise to her when she walked straight into someone. And it suprised her even more that it appeard to be her fault.
"Watch where you're going!" She yelled angrily at the tourists face, a terrified looking person, still clutching their camera. "Are you blind? Don't you have eyes? Why didn't you see me and move? Get out my way! I have places to be!" She pushed the person and tried to keep walking, but she ntoiced there was quite a crowd now.

((Right, then. *cracks knuckles* I've read over everything, and I think I can get back to work now.))

Cari didn't notice how late it had gotten until she turned a corner and the neon signs blazed up at her. She blinked and looked up at the sky. It was a velvety purple, the closest it ever got to dark in the city that never slept.
Nothing like the deep, endless black of space that you could see where she had lived, so clear that you could see the Milky Way in all its glory -
Cari jerked her head up and stared wildly around her. Too late - the memory slipped away like a fish in a cloudy river. But her heart still beat fast. That was the first time she'd remembered something that was related to her, rather than the world in general.
It was time to head back to the warehouse she'd been sleeping in, for lack of anything else to call home. Cari checked the street signs and turned south. She'd somehow gotten almost to Central Park.
Cari heard a whispering sound and looked up, only to have a piece of paper fall on her face. She rocked back in surprise. Pulling it off her face, she stared at it. A girl-
"Hey! Move it!"
A man's urgent voice called out to her and Cari realized she was in the middle of an intersection. She dashed to the other side just as the first car whizzed through the space she'd left, honking angrily.
Cari put her hands on her knees and panted. She hadn't been that frightened the entire time she'd been in New York.
She turned to the man who'd warned her. "Thank... you..." she managed to get out.
The man shrugged uncomfortably. "Hey, no problem. You were about to be roadkill." He scratched the back of his head. "Just... watch it next time, okay?" With no further ado, he moved off into the crowd.
Cari watched him go. She felt a little more weight on her shoulders, as if the man's warning had canceled out her good deed earlier. So the pattern worked both ways.
But why was it there in the first place?
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It was only once she reached her warehouse that Cari remembered the piece of paper that nearly killed her. Pulling it out of her pocket, Cari nestled further in her blankets and angled the drawing so it best caught the slit of light that filtered in.
It was a charcoal drawing, done quickly but not without skill. The girl in the drawing was turning, looking over one shoulder, her long hair falling in waves across her back. Her form was slim and drawn with simple, curving lines. The artist had used lines both thick and thin to mimic shades almost perfectly.
But it was the girl's face that drew Cari in. The beauty of her features was overlaid with a sharp, calculating expression. Cari could almost hear her thinking of how she could get away with things, what lie to tell next. And below it all lay a deep, despairing darkness...
Cari brushed her hand across the paper and stopped. There was a line left unfinished. Her hands itched to finish it until she remembered that she had no art supplies. Without thinking about it, Cari brought her finger up to her mouth, nipped sharply, and smeared her own blood on the paper to finish the drawing.
Instantly, the drawing became even more alive than it already was. Cari was half sure the girl in the drawing would turn and speak to her. She felt a faint, persistent tugging coming from it.
"You want to go back to your true self?" she asked the paper quietly and got an even stronger tug from it.
Cari hesitated and then smiled. She folded up the drawing and tucked it underneath her arm, where it couldn't escape. The drawing felt warm through her hoodie.
"Tomorrow I will return you to the one you belong to," she murmured as she sank into sleep. She smiled.
Her life had just become a lot more interesting.

((Phew! That turned out longer than I meant it to. Ah well.
I have an idea that might speed up the action a little - have everybody find out about their deaths, in various ways. It doesn't have to be that they suddenly remember it or sit on their tombstone. Just a hint that something's not quite right besides their amnesia. That should raise some questions.))