It was chaos. People were screaming, running everywhere as Eggman's perfect monster raged throughout Central City.
"Hahaha!" Eggman cackled from his perch on top of his robot monster, "Run and scream all you want! But you can never escape your rightful dictator!" To emphasise this, one of the robot's arms smashed into the side of an office block. It slowly broke down, concrete slabs and glass shards raining down on unfortunate citizens below.
The robot itself looked like it was ripped straight out of nightmare. It resembled a giant spider, and was at least 15 feet tall. It had long, robotic legs stretching 20 feet across the buildings. There were spikes dotted across the legs. On top, there was a large pod from where Eggman was controlling his beast.
"Don't worry, dear citizens of Robotnikland, all of these mundane buildings will be cleared away to make space for the magnificent capital of Robotnikland! Run along now, kiddies!" Eggman exclaimed, his voice booming across the whole city.
Inside the pod, Eggman flicked a switch to turn off the speakers.
"Lord Robotnik. King Robotnik. Emperor Robotnik. I just don't know, Orbot, I don't know which has the better ring!" Eggman complained to his small, spherical robot.
"Emperor Robotnik is certainly the most regal. After all, empires last the longest," Orbot replied.
"Haha! That is true. Emperor Robotnik it is!" Eggman turned his microphone on again. "Everybody bow down to Emperor Robotnik!"
"I dunno, I kinda prefer Sherriff Robotnik. I always thought it'd be the better choice," Cubot mumbled.
"Shut up Cubot!" Eggman shouted, kicking the offending robot. Unfortunately, his microphone was still on, so the exclamation was heard by everybody. "Oh, darnit," he mumbled, as he scrambled to switch it off again.
Meanwhile, a certain cobalt hedgehog, accompanied by Tails and Knuckles, arrived near the heart of the violence. Sonic whistled lowly as he surveyed the damage.
"Damn. Looks like we've joined the party a little," Sonic commented, pouting slightly.
"Well, we have the 6th emerald with us now," Tails pointing out, taking out the yellow gem out of his satchel and handing it to Sonic.
"Eh, true," Sonic said, accepting the emerald and tucking it into his quills. "Now, if only Shadow moved his bus, we'd have an awesome party going on…"
Just as he was finished his sentence, a tell-tale flash of green chaos energy appeared in front of them, and suddenly Shadow the hedgehog was standing in front of them.
"This better be worth it," he growled, tossing his green emerald up and down.
"Um, you better look behind you," Tails suggested. Shadow rose an eyebrow, but did anyway. His eyes widened tremendously, though unknowingly to the rest of his companions.
"Well then, we better get going quickly." He approached Sonic coolly. "The rest of the emeralds?"
"Coming right up!" In a flash of light, the rest of the emeralds appeared and surrounded the two hedgehogs. Shadow's green emerald floated up to join them, and they started spinning around the two faster and faster. Sonic began to float up, as his fur turned golden. Shadow had his eyes closed, but even though he was concentration fiercely, not a single hair on his hedgehog body turned golden. The emeralds were still floating around them, expecting another hedgehog to harness their power. But to no avail.
Sonic looked at Shadow, who was still struggling to turn super. He frowned, as it was incredibly odd for the hedgehog, who was so naturally attuned to the emeralds, to suddenly struggle to harness their energy. He floated down towards his darker counterpart, and took his wrists in his hands.
"What's up? This isn't exactly in the ordinary, Shadow." Shadow's eyes opened at the sound and feel of his friend.
"I don't know. It's like… my connection with the emeralds has suddenly stopped." Sonic's golden head cocked to one side, thinking. The only reason one's connection to the emeralds would close if one was dead… physically, or emotionally.
Emotionally…
Shadow shifted uncomfortably, not accustomed to the other hedgehog holding him, or standing in front of him deep in thought. Shadow caught Sonic's eye for a moment, and Sonic swore that he saw a little red go into Shadow's cheeks.
Is he… blushing?
Suddenly, Sonic remembered a conversation he overheard the other day.
Rouge had something to ask of the blue blur. Well, technically she was going on the behalf of G.U.N but nevertheless, here she was going to his and Tails' hideout in the middle of the Mystic Ruins.
Soon she arrived at the modest house. She knocked on the door a few times, to be answered by the two-tailed fox himself.
"Oh, Rouge! How can we help you?" Tails asked brightly, although confused as to what the thief would want from him.
"I'm here to speak with Sonic, if that's okay with you hun," Rouge asked in her silky smooth voice.
"Of course! Come on in, I'll get him now," Tails answered, stepping aside to let the bat in. Rouge entered the home, taking a look around as she did.
"You're lucky he's here at the moment," Tails continued, as he made his way to the living room, Rouge in tow. "He's usually only here in the evenings. But he'd hiding from Amy at the moment." This earnt a laugh from Rouge.
"Amy never really gives up, does she? With that kind of devotion you'd think Sonic would have fallen for her by now. Instead, I get the feeling he's not even straight." This theory surprised Tails.
"Well… I've never really thought about it before. It's not like he's ever gone out on dates… well, not that I've heard about. I just assumed that he's either asexual or that he's too busy for romance."
"Does he not even have a crush?"
"Maybe…" Tails looked coy. "But he'd kill me if I told anyone."
"Fair enough." Tails moved off to find Sonic. "I do know someone who does have a crush on him, though."
"Oh?" Tails asked, turning back around to face Rouge.
"He would kill me if I told anyone, so you have to promise me that what I say doesn't go to anyone else."
"I promise! Oh boy, I wonder who it is…"
Meanwhile, Sonic had heard the commotion downstairs, and had descended down the stairs to see what was going on.
"I wonder who it is…" he heard Tails say.
"It's Shadow." That was Rouge. What was Rouge doing here?
"Shadow has a crush on Sonic?!" Sonic's eyes widened at what Tails just said. When did that happen?
"Hey, not too loudly. Who knows who might be listening?" Sonic stayed dead still, to see if he could find out any more about this supposed 'crush.'
"Oh, this is perfect, actually…"
That much is true, Sonic thought, a grin growing on his face.
"Oh no, you're not going to go around playing matchmaker, are you?"
"Oh, you never know… Sonic might just have a crush on him as well."
Damn you, Tails! Sonic decided it was the perfect time to come speeding in – before Tails incriminated him even more – pretending to be oblivious to the exchange Tails and Rouge just had.
"Hey, bro-" Sonic pretended to just notice that Rouge was in the room. "Whoa, Rouge, what brings you here to our modest home?" Rouge gave him a knowing look, but decided not to say anything about his eavesdropping.
"Well, I'm actually here on the behalf of G.U.N…"
Sonic smiled as the pieces fit into place. Shadow was incredibly closed off at the moment, even more so since Sonic was around – he didn't want to be obvious in his crush towards Sonic.
Sonic grabbed Shadow's hands more tightly, and smiled as he looked Shadow in the eyes.
"I know exactly the problem, and I think I know the solution." Sonic leant in towards a suddenly flustered Shadow. Their lips met in an innocent kiss, which was interrupted by a loud, booming voice.
"You've got to be kidding me! This is a battlefield, not a bedroom! Get a room!" Both hedgehog's eyes widened as their nemesis interrupted their moment. Sonic gasped as he drew back, seeing as Shadow's fur was now the colour of white gold – he was finally in his super form.
"Yo egghead! You know what they say!" Sonic shouted, turning to face the robot, still holding on of Shadow's hands. "Make love, not war!"
Everyone was silent for a moment, horrified at the more… explicit implications of that statement.
"What?" Sonic asked, confused. He turned to look at his friend – boyfriend? – but saw that he had a blossoming blush on his face.
"Are you kidding me, faker?" Sonic's eyes widened, finally realising his mistake.
"I mean, uh, I mean, oh god… let'skicksomebutt!" He said the last part quickly, then without warning he flew up into the air, taking Shadow with him.
Shadow was startled at first, but then started to fly by himself. He gave Sonic a knowing look, which Sonic returned with a grin on his face.
"Ready?" Shadow asked his cobalt partner.
"Ready for what?" Sonic asked, wiggling his eyebrows.
Shadow's palm met with his face in a violent meeting.
"You know exactly what, Sonic!"
"Yeah, I know. Let's go!"
The two hedgehogs flew to either side of the giant, spider-like robot. Shadow started to shoot chaos emeralds at the leg's joints, while Sonic went straight for gold (or, in this case, the egg.)
"Hey!" Eggman shouted, the first time Sonic collided with the glass pod in his spinball form, making a large crack.
"Time to crack some eggs!" Sonic proclaimed, then sent his foot smashing down onto the glass, smack in the middle of the crack he made.
The glass shattered immediately. Eggman put his arms over his head, trying to shield himself from the flying glass shards. Sonic landed with a thump.
"Well done Eggman. This is a really cool machine you built." As Sonic said that, Shadow had finished taking out one of the robot's legs. The whole machine tipped violently, suddenly unsupported on one side. The machine managed to compensate by itself, however Shadow started his work on another leg.
Eggman groaned, as he removed his arms from his head, and groaned again as he saw Sonic standing there.
"Are you going to kill me here?" Eggman asked, bored, and knowing that Sonic wouldn't kill him with his bare hands.
"Nah, I just wanted to say how cool this machine was. And how unfortunate it will be when we smash it to little bits and pieces," Sonic answered, a smug look on his face. He then went into his spindash form, and started to drill himself into the floor.
"Hey! What are you doing?!" Sonic paid no mind to the sputtering scientist, as he drilled deeper and deeper into the floor, making himself a pathway to the sensitive wires under the floor.
Eggman watched the hedgehog, panicking about the damage the golden hedgehog could make, until he came to his senses. As he turned around to access the glove compartment at the controls, the machine violently tipped again, signalling that Shadow had destroyed yet another leg. Eggman lost his balance, crashing onto the controls. His fat body managed to press some buttons inadvertently.
Outside, as Shadow was beginning to working on the third leg, his eyes widened as the spikes on the legs suddenly moved, and shot out of their spots. Shadow danced out of their flight path, watching as more spikes replaced empty spots. He spun out of the way again when those spikes shot out. As he span, a beam shot out and collided into Shadow. He span backwards and landed on the body, rolling downwards. He caught himself and hovered for a minute, trying to regain his senses. He saw homing rockets coming after him, and he shot off under the body of the machine, trying to lose them. He saw the leg he was trying to collapse, and had an idea. He flew towards the leg, then at the last moment, dashed out of the way of it. The rockets flew into it and the whole leg exploded. The machine violently lent towards Shadow, barely having any support on the one side.
Sonic suddenly shot upwards from where he had entered, bringing up long cables with him. As he reached 10 meters above from where he had emerged, the cables snapped with a large fizzle. The lights on the machine powered down, and the machine stopped moving, though it was precariously tipping on its side, the rest of the legs anchoring it down. Shadow kicked in a fourth leg, and the whole thing finally toppled over, into the street. Eggman was seen falling out of his broken pod, and landing on the pavement. There was no more movement from him, so Shadow assumed that he had fallen unconscious.
He flew down to the pavement and joined Sonic.
"About time," Sonic joked. Shadow rolled his eyes.
"I did the best job I could," Shadow pointed out.
"You definitely did," Sonic agreed, observing Eggman's limp body. "Looks like we've really scrambled him this time."
"Yep," Shadow said simply, walking over to Eggman and rolling him over onto his back. Both Sonic and Shadow gasped when they saw a glass shard penetrating into Eggman's side.
"Oooh, that's got to hurt," Sonic said, grimacing. "You think we should help him?"
"No way, we should leave him to bleed out. That pest can be finally out of our way." Shadow turned his back on Eggman, and started to walk back. Sonic stared at Eggman a while longer, then looked around him. He saw medics rushing to help the innocent people caught up in Eggman's attack. He waved one over, and a couple rushed in with a stretched.
"I'll leave him to you guys," Sonic said, before walking away. He caught up to Shadow, and smiled as they both powered down. Sonic slipped his hand into Shadow's, and they both continued walking to their waiting friends.