The Sonic Backpack

I found a Sonic the Hedgehog backpack on the street.
It was bigger than I expected, fit for a grown man rather than a child. It was made to look like Sonic's face, with four plush quills poking out the sides. The "fur" used to coat it was worn, clumps of blue fuzz falling off even as I held it. Like any upstanding citizen, my first instinct was to find who it belonged to. I peeked at every corner of the backpack for any identifying information, but there was nothing. Unzipping the main part of the backpack, I looked inside.  There were only two things: a bundle of medical tools, and a note. The tools seemed like the kind used for surgery, and were rusted with age, feeling as if they would crumble at my fingertips. The note was just as worn, crumpled and yellowed.
If you find this backpack, please return it to 3261 Lake Avenue as soon as possible. Thank you. 
You know what they say, the more the merrier!
Lake Avenue. I lived super close. Might as well drop this thing off, I thought.
I walked all the way back to my block, backpack in tow. As I strolled past my house, my cat Elsie glared at me from the front window. I waved at her and continued to the next few blocks. Looking at the note in my hand, I counted to myself as I passed the houses. 3258, 3259, 3260. I looked up from the paper. A blue house with the number 3261 beside the door stood in front of me. This was it.
There was no doorbell in sight, so I knocked on the front door, to no avail. The house was almost pitch black on the inside, although I could make out some things. There was a small table with a neat stack of manila envelopes on it, the kind that tend to hold important documents. Ready to give up, I sat the backpack on the front stoop and turned to leave. 
That was when I heard it. A shrill screech, one that stopped me dead in my tracks. It sounded like some kind of small animal, maybe a cat. It wasn't a simple caterwaul though. It was almost human-like in its tone, and was anguished in such a visceral way that it made my blood run cold. I almost started running. Almost. Something very deep and very stupid inside of me killed that urge. This wasn't a normal scream. It was like nothing I had ever heard before (and as a pet owner, I've heard a hell of a lot.) Another wail of pain rang out through the darkened halls. I thought of Elsie. If this happened to my cat, would I just sit there and do nothing? Out of curiosity, I tried the doorknob. The lock clicked, and the door swung open. Now there was no excuse. Before I could hear another one of those godawful sounds, I bolted through the entrance and into the living room. 
There was a lightswitch by the door, but it didn't seem to work no matter how much I flicked it. The living room was simple, with just a couch, TV, and that table with the envelopes. Another cry came from the room to the left of me. I ran into it and was met with three bolted metal doors. The one on the right said "Testing", the one in the middle said "Gallery", and the one on the left simply had the face of a smiling, mustachioed man printed onto it. The cat cried again, even more desperate from before. It came from the rightmost door. Despite appearing heavily fortified, it was fairly light and easy to open. The room in front of me was blood red. On both sides of it were Bunsen burners lined up like Roman columns, producing a steady stream of flames. In the middle of the room was a cat shackled to the floor. Its fur was dyed a light lavender, and it was shaking tremendously. Stepping into the room, I figured out why. The floor was as hot as an active stovetop, frying my soles and causing me to jump back. Steeling myself, I wiped the burnt rubber off the shoe and prepared to sprint back into the fire. Running as fast as I could, I reached the cat and prepared pull it out of its shackles. That's when I realized that I missed something on first glance. There were two burners directly beneath my feet, and dangerously close to the cat. Thinking fast, I lept back and held the hot shackles to the burner. They were so cheap that they immediately snapped in half upon contact with the flames. Scooping up the cat in both arms, I ran back to safety. Putting the feline down, I noticed some severe burns on its paws and stomach. Other than that, it seemed okay, other than being dyed lavender. I looked around for some water to treat the burns (both myself and the cat's) but there was not even a sink to be found. The cat limped away from me. He or she looked a lot like Elsie. Jesus, imagine if I hadn't gone in. It began licking its wounds, breathing deeply as it did. I pulled out my phone, ready to call the police on whatever sick fuck did this, when I noticed another stack of manila envelopes in the corner of the room, right beside the leftmost door. I hesitated even touching the things, but I curiosity got the best of me yet again. The top envelope contained a picture of a lavender tabby cat laying on a medical table, with a caption written below the image.
Blaze- Not resistant to heat. Has no tolerance for temperatures above 100 degrees Fahrenheit/ 37.78 degrees Celsius. Unfit for this project. Parts are ill-equipped for their purpose. Must find another.
I threw away the envelope in disgust. This was all for some project?
The cat was up and moving again, and a certain scent seemed to catch its nose. It trudged over to the "Gallery" door and began sniffing wildly. It pawed at the door, trying in vain to open it. I, too, started to smell a sickly sweet odor from behind the door. The cat looked at me pleadingly, and I hesitantly opened the door to the Gallery.
Like the rest of the house, there was barely any light. In front of me was what looked like a standee of Sonic, with some notes stuck on the wall beside him. As went forward into the dark, my eyes adjusted and I could make out what I was truly looking at.
A young boy, no more than 14 or 15, stood limply on the podium. His eyes were sewn shut and his head completely shaven. What looked to be blue-painted porcupine quills were jammed into the back of his head like darts on a dartboard. His nose was also missing, replaced with a rodent-like snout. While he was clearly dead, his body was in flawless condition. Still, the scent of rot corrupted my nostrils. I cupped my hands over my mouth to keep from vomiting. Trying to fix my gaze anywhere else, my eyes landed on the note stuck next to him. 
Sonic- Almost perfect. Just a few more adjustments. I love you. You're shaping up to be a great friend.
Stumbling back in shock, I turned to face the rest of the hall. Right beside me was a boy, even younger than the last. Or at least, he was a boy. For when I looked at podium next to me I was met with the head of a fox.
The fox head was sewn onto the child's torso, staring back at me. While the head was animalistic, the eyes were clearly, unmistakably human. On the boy's back were two fox tails, entwined together. His hands sported cartoonish white gloves, and were forever caught in a waving pose. There was a post-it note stuck on the wall beside him.
Tails- High tolerance for pain. Impressive willpower for such a diminutive subject. He may last a bit longer than I expected. One of my favorites.
My head was spinning. In a daze, I looked across the entire hallway.
There was a man with dreads that towered over the others. His fists had small spikes stitched to them, and his chest had a sort of crescent pattern cut into it. His face was stretched into a wicked smile, with unnaturally tiny, sharp teeth like that of an animal's. 
A buxom woman with her head cut off, replaced with that of a small bat. Its glossy eyes spoke to me, but I couldn't understand what they were saying. 
A young girl in a dress, sporting the ears and fur of a rabbit and holding a fleshy, mangled blue object that I couldn't make out.
A child with insect-like arms coming out of his torso, positioned next to a burly man with a crocodile head and a teenager with reptilian, chameleon-like skin.
There were also a few empty podiums, symbols of those whose future rested at the hands of a madman.
In the back of the hallway, there was a sign situated on the wall.
Dreams to Reality Hall
Where fantasy comes to life
I steadied myself against the door, trying to compose myself. That was when I heard footsteps. The front door slammed shut, with muffled exclamations of "goddamnit" and "fuckin' backpack" coming from the living room. The footsteps grew louder as I heard the person walk closer to the entrance to the gallery. Without thinking, I ran clear across the entire hallway, making a left turn at the sign and entering a side room. In front of me was a small table and chair with more manila envelopes. From the back of the house, I could hear the man scream in frustration. He must have noticed the missing cat. As I looked for a way to escape, I felt something rubbing up on my leg. Stifling a scream, I looked down and saw it was only the cat, who I had completely forgotten about amidst the horror of the Gallery. It looked up at me, tortured, but with a spark of life beneath the pain. It began to cough violently, causing me to cup my hand over its mouth in panic. I heard someone sprinting through the Gallery, footsteps growing in volume as the seconds of my inaction passed by. He was coming. Scanning the room again, I noticed a small window in the upper corner. It was certainly enough room for the cat, but what about me?
Picking up the chair, I forced one of its legs through the window. The cheap pane shattered like ice, and left a gaping hole big enough for the cat to fit through. With the cat in tow, I pulled myself up through the window, broken glass stabbing my sides. I was just barely thin enough to slide through to the other side. Landing face first in the grass, I got up immediately and ran to safety, wherever safety was. The cat bounded into the woods behind the house, lavender tail bouncing with every step. I gripped my sides, bleeding profusely from my abdomen. I ran until my body gave in, nearly collapsing on the sidewalk from the pain. At least I was far enough away from that hellhouse to safely stop and call the police.
After I gave the cops the address, they thanked me and said they would look into it. And look into it they did.
It hit the news a few days after they raided 3261 Lake Avenue. Dozens of corpses of missing people and pets were found in the house. All of them were made up to resemble Sonic characters, and all of them had been taxidermized at a near professional level. The envelopes found throughout the house contained details of each murder, as well as strange diary-style stories about the "adventures" the killer would go on with each character in the house. He wrote about spending upwards of 18 hours a day locked in the Gallery with his "friends". In an attempt to make the experience more authentic, he tried to create substances like invisible scales and fire-resistant fur. The third room, the one marked by a smiling face, was where he stored his failed attempts.
For all that was found, however, there was one thing the police couldn't locate. The killer himself. He had completely disappeared from the neighborhood overnight. Nobody even really knows what he looked like, as he almost never left the house.
I had spent the better part of a year trying to get over what I saw. Unfortunately, some things stay lodged in your subconscious forever. Most of my time was spent alone with Elsie, just trying to distract myself from the terrible reality of life. 
But something happened one Sunday morning.
I woke up as I usually did. Elsie is always perched next to me on her cat tower. I stretched, yawned, and opened my eyes. Turning to the cat tower, I called out to her.
But she was nowhere to be found. I got up, thinking that she was just off having a drink of water or using the litterbox. Walking past the bathroom, I caught something out of the corner of my eye. Tufts of cat fur were littered about the tiled floor, and blood was dripping off the side of the counter. I turned my attention upward. On the wall, above the window, was a message etched in blood. It was only 4 words.
The more the merrier.
Category:Sonic
Category:Mental Illness
Category:Dismemberment
Category:Disappearances