True Speed

Heroes

Rated: T, for violence, possible swearing&blood, and to be safe.

Pairings: Future!Sonadow(Friendship&romantic)

Disclaimer: Not mineeee….It'd be very bad if it was.

Warning; AU! At least for everything Post!SA2...

Full Summary

Sonic finally found him—Shadow. Along the way, he saves a telekinetic white hedgehog and, finally, returns to an old home. Then, it's decided. They'll form a team to get to the bottom of all this…Sonic, Shadow, and Silver the Hedgehogs.

AN; Oh yes, muahahahaha. Sonic Heroes AU, and I may very possibly continue it beyond SH(probably, 99.98% sure), so watch for that. Also. This is my first StH only fanfic yet, so, I'm terribly sorry for any strange characterizations. I might have been stuck in another writing mode at that moment.

Also, My theory concerning both Sonic and Shadow will be popping up some point in here(as in the story, prolly later, or last, chapters), so watch for it!

Chapter 01

Your Truth


There is three sides to every story: Their side, your side, and The Truth.


Unknown where the Cursed Wave was born...

After the skies doth cross the heavens,

The sky in the East doth darken and air doth fill with mourning.

From the chosen land beyond the forest,

a sign of The Wave comes.

~Epitaph of Twilight, Emma Wielant, .hack


Sonic sighed.

He'd be doing that a little bit too much lately, he reflected, but with the way things were, he couldn't help it. It didn't help that the others were avoiding him...Or, well, he was avoiding them. Except for, really, Tails. The blue speedster had been having problems with the others every since the ARK...

The hedgehog winced: Crap, he'd thought about it again. He swore to Tails he wouldn't think about it. Sonic rolled his eyes lightly to himself. He loved Tails, really, he did, but he worried about the most stupid things. After all, what would happen, would happen.

At least, that's what he used to tell himself, up until he was unable to save Shadow. With Perfect Chaos, the lives lost then he could accept because there was nothing he could have done...But, Shadow...He had him there, right in his hand. How could I have let him go so easily?

Fiercely, he shook his head.

Need to focus,The Blue hedgehog peered across the cratered valley. The whole place had been rather annoying, as he couldn't really tell which of the craters were new and which were old. Without knowing that, he couldn't tell if any of these craters were fresher then a few decades. Though, if the rumors from the nearby village were to be believed, then there was a meteor that night that did crash in Crater Valley.

He could only hope these rumors were truth, and not fiction.

The blue hedgehog stepped down the many boulders that made a rather easy climb down to the valley. Sonic frowned lightly: Scattered across several of the craters were bits and pieces of what looked like old robot parts. Huh. He hoped that if the old Egg-head had gotten here first, then maybe...

He would have died in re-entry, Sonic! came his mental-Tails voice. The speed demon sucked in a breath and shook his head. He was going nuts, especially if he now had 'mental-So-and-so' voices. Sonic stepped around the largest pile of robot parts, not willing to possibly set off a badnik or the like from inside it.

Sonic finally found something that could classified as 'suspicious': Several of Robotnik's robot drone were all gathered around a single, large crater, seeming to be searching for something. He narrowed his eyes towards them before moving forth to engage the enemy...

Then, he stopped.

Wait a sec, he thought, If I let them go, I can probably follow them and find Egg-head's base. With a faint grin and nod, he leaned back against his hiding boulder. Sonic waited for what felt like forever, but he knew he needed to wait. This was for Shadow, to make sure he was really alive. I need to know.

Then, the bots began to leave in a strangely straight line, the leader of them clutching something in it's dirty, rusty claws. Better not be Shadow, those things could give him an infection. Sonic tutted a bit before moving forward. Even as he snuck around the littering tree(fallen or up-right) and boulders, the blue hedgehog grinned to himself: No matter what the others said, he could be sneaky.

The speedster followed for what felt like several hours, until he came upon the base. Like he'd hoped, the 20 or so bots had lead him straight to the rather round genius. With a bright smirk, Sonic scaled a part of the metal structure up to the air vents, which he slipped into.

"Ha, take that, Knuckles," He snickered lightly, allowing himself a small smile of triumph before sliding down the vent. The blue hedgehog soon slid to a stop at the bottom of the vent slide and leaned forward onto his knees to crawl through the vent. Sonic slid across the vent very slowly, wishing with all his heart that Robotnik had not added heat alarms to the vents.

That would be bad. Very bad.

Sonic went along the vent like this for nearly a hour before finding Robotnik. Robotnik, who was chuckling darkly to himself. The blue hedgehog leaned forward toward the grill as close as he could without falling through. The genius was tapping away at the keyboard in front of him. Every now and again, he'd turn slightly to the opposite side of the room, where a small metal stand lay on it's side.

Within those next few seconds, Sonic noted that the missing Green Chaos Emerald was connected to the machine that had begun to whir. The blue hedgehog edged back a bit, narrowing his eyes. This...Didn't look too good. Especially as a strange portal-like...thing had appeared on the metal disc. Moments after, something that was silvery-white tumbled out onto the ground with a cry of surprise.

Robotnik look very pleased by this.

Sonic, on the other hand, was furious. Robotnik had just dragged a rather innocent bystander from their home and into his base, against their will. No way was he going to let the egg-head get away with that. The blue hedgehog moved forward again and removed the vent just as the bundle of white fur popped up, "W-where am I?"

The furry mobian was in reality another hedgehog, mainly a silvery-white. His quill were into two main sets with five more that were more fur then quills perched on his head. Amber eyes blinked confusedly toward the Robotnik before he scooted back away from him, a look of confused horror decorating his face. Sonic took this chance to slip down from the vent to land with a quiet thump just behind the large, whirring machine.

"You, my young friend," Robotnik said, his mustache twitching, "Are in my base. And will be helping me." The young silver hedgehog frowned, "I won't." The genius sighed, "If you don't, then you will never make it back to your dimension." The hedgehog froze and his mouth fell open. Sonic himself was too busy sneaking forward to grab the green chaos emerald to notice the conversation.

The blue hedgehog finally reached out and snatched the green emerald out of the glass container. Just as he did, an alarm went off. Robotnik spun around and Sonic shot him a cheeky grin. "Rodent!" He roared, obviously angered by the speedster's sudden entry. He stuck his tongue out and dodged around round man to skid to a stop next the furry white mobian, "C`mon, follow me, I can get us out of here...But I need to find someone first."

The other nodded weakly and the two sped out of the room. Sonic was grateful for the fact that he didn't have to go to what he called 'slow-mo' speed for the other mobian. The silver hedgehog was able to keep up with him at his slowest(and yet, to most, it was still very fast) speed.

The two turned a corner and Sonic suddenly stopped, surprising his companion. The blue speed demon turned his gaze to the nearby door and then kicked it lightly. It slid open, to the other hedgehog's surprise. But what they saw was a lot more surprising, especially for Sonic.

Lying in a hospital-like bed was a black mobian hedgehog, one that Sonic recongnized. For a brief moment, the blue hedgehog was enraged. Robotnik had hidden Shadow away for his own benefit and the speedster couldn't forgive that. However, being angry would not get the apparently comatose hedgehog and silver hedgehog out of the base.

Sonic straightened and gestured to the other mobian to help him get the wires and other things attached to Shadow off. The silver hedgehog looked hesitant to comply but did so despite this. Just as Sonic placed his hand on Shadow's chest, Robotnik and several of his bots appeared in the doorway. "Get him away from Shadow!" He ordered the bots who then moved forward to engage. But Sonic didn't feel like fighting right now.

The white hedgehog squeaked in surprise when Sonic grasped his wrist, and, with the chaos emerald clutched in his hand over Shadow's chest, the blue hedgehog cried, "Chaos Control!"

The next thing the group of three knew, they were on a beach near a worn out hut-like house. Sonic pulled Shadow into his arms and gestured for the silver hedgehog to follow him. The white mobian followed slowly behind, staring at the blue speedster's back in what could be called impressed awe.

The next few minutes were spend in silence as Sonic edged the old door open with his foot and led the other mobian to the living room. There, an old and moth-eaten couch lay, where Sonic placed Shadow, leaving the green chaos emerald on his chest. For all Sonic knew, the other hedgehog might be suffering from a lack of chaos energy.

The blue speedster gestured to the only other chair in the room before settling on the ground, "So. I'm Sonic, Sonic the Hedgehog. And, you are...?" The white mobian blinked from his new seat, "Oh. I...I'm Silver. Sorry, I don't really have a very long introduction." Sonic laughed lightly, "That's fine. I don't mind."

Silver nodded weakly. Then, he turned lightly to the mobian laid out on the couch, "Who is he?" "Shadow," Sonic's eyes fell onto the black hedgehog's half-curled up form, "I've been looking around for him for awhile...I'm glad he's alive." The other hedgehog stared at Sonic with an unreadable look in his eyes, "Why was he in that base? If you don't mind me asking..."

"Dunno," Sonic shrugged, "All I know is that old egg-butt was up to no good and I wasn't going to let him get hurt for it." Silver's lips twitched, "'Egg-butt?'" The blue speedster snickered, "One of my many nicknames for ye olde Robotnik. It annoys him so much, which is the point, ya know?"

They shared a quiet laugh then, Silver smiling finally. Maybe, he thought, it wouldn't be so bad here after all.


The next four days were spent in quiet chatting and a few excursions to the near by village(all by Silver: Sonic seemed uncomfortable about entering South Village). Silver learned that he, Sonic, and Shadow were on South Island, which was one of the few places in the world left that still had Zones.

It was during one of these visits, to pick up food, you see, that Silver ran into a couple that were strangely familiar to him. He ended up talking with them and learned a few crucial facts about them: One, they were not a couple. In fact, they were 'twins', or really, two siblings out of a set of triplets. Two, their brother had been missing since the three were twleve, which the white mobian thought a bit sad. Three, their names were Sonia and Manic.

He had found two new friends, but he knew he needed to return to another friend: The one who had saved him.

Of course, while this was going on, another hedgehog, one with ebony fur, was stirring awake. Sonic didn't see it, as he himself was slumped over the other chair in the living room in a deep sleep. When Shadow's eyes finally opened, he ended up blinking several times to clear his vision of the small dots that clouded it. Finally, when Shadow could see with tiny black dots showing up he sat up.

The next thing he did was take note of just what he had been laying on. Which happened to be, to his faint horror, a rather disgusting, mouth-eaten couch. A blanket in nearly the same condition was now mostly shifted onto his lap(though, his legs were still covered) along with the green chaos emerald. He frowned, scrunching up his nose in thought. Where was he?

A snort and several rapid mutterings answered his question as he turned and stared at Sonic, who was moving around in his chair. Seconds later, he fell out of it and smacked his head, hard, onto the wooden floorboards. Before the dark mobian knew what he was doing, he was next to the blue hedgehog to find that he was still fast asleep, albeit with a large bruise both to his head and to his ego.

Shadow himself snorted lightly. Of course the moron was still asleep. He grabbed the hedgehog, hefted him up, pulled him to the couch he had previously occupied, and dropped him there, unconciously rubbing his head just above his left eye as he did so. He yawned a little before turning away and leaving the room. The black hedgehog felt like he hadn't eaten in forever.

Just as he finished making a quick and simple sandwich to eat, someone entered the kitchen. Shadow turned to look at the entree, expecting the two-tailed fox that was usually with Sonic. Instead, a white hedgehog stands there, staring at him in surprise.

Then, he cried out.

The other hedgehog leapt towards the white mobian and shoved his sandwich into his mouth, "Shut up." The young mobian chewed a little then swallowed, "You're awake?" Then, "Does Sonic know?" Shadow raised an eyebrow, "He's still asleep. That's why I told you to shut up." The silver hedgehog frowned a little before turning his head to the living room. "Wake him up and die."

Silver winced.

"W-why not?"

"Why not? I don't want to deal with his loud voice this early in the morning. That, and I'm still trying to figure out what happened."

"'What happened'?"

"It. Doesn't. Matter," Shadow shot him a dirty look before working on another sandwich, the other laid forgotten on the table. While the strange pain in his head was gone, the black hedgehog was still rubbing it, frowning lightly. Why did he have, even faint, a bruise there?

It was when he had begun to(politely, unlike Sonic) eat his new sandwich, with Silver staring at him with wide eyes, that he noticed something.

His right power band was gone.

The black hedgehog nearly had heart-attack just at the sight of it's missing presence. Shadow all but dropped the sandwich in his hand, turned to Silver, and demanded in anger, "Where is my right power band? !" The white hedgehog jumped back fearfully, shocked by his sudden verbal attack. Neither noticed the third hedgehog of the house enter, yawning, "Wazzgoin`on?"

Shadow spun on his heel and glared instead on the blue hedgehog. "Right. Power. Band. Now." Sonic waved his hand in Shadow's face, "Hey, it's too early for this sort of thing. Don't yell," He yawned again, "So, what was it you wanted, Shad-SHADOW? !" The blue hedgehog leaned forward towards the black hedgehog, grabbed his ears, and pulled.

The other was surprised enough by the speedster's reaction that he let out a quiet squeak when Sonic pulled. Thankfully, the blue hedgehog was too stunned by the fact Shadow was awake to notice: Silver, too, was stunned, mostly by Sonic's reaction then the fact that the black hedgehog was up and walking around.

Sonic leaned back then, "Holy Chaos, you're awake!" "What does that mean?" He scowled in response. "How long?" The blue speed demon turned his head to Silver, who shrugged. Shadow glared at him, irritated by Sonic's cold shoulder. "Oi," He snapped, "What in the name of Chaos do you mean 'Awake'?"

He coughed, "Well, me and Silver picked you up in Robotnik's place: See, I guess he found you in this place called 'Crater Valley' and took you to his base. Don't know what he was planning to do with you, but I do know that it was not going to be good. Uh, and he seemed pretty ticked when I grabbed Silver and you and Chaos Control`ed out of there."

Shadow snorted: That explanation made absolutely no sense. Of course, it seemed the white hedgehog had understood a bit of it and began his own explanation, leaving Sonic by the table with a pout on his tan muzzle. Then, he popped up and scooted towards his dark counterpart, "I've been looking for you, you know, for a whole month."

The silver and black mobians turned to stare at Sonic, who shifted a little under the stares, "What? I'm serious!" Shadow frowned and Silver edged out of the room, knowing this was a personal discussion that didn't involve him. "Why?"

"Wha-Why not?"

"Because, I tried to kill you, several times."

"So? You made up for all of that by helping us get to the Chaos Emeralds by distracting the Biolizard. And, then, I'd say we're friends, with how the fight against the Final-Hazard went."

Both hedgehogs flinched briefly at the thought of the proto-type: That had not been a fun fight. "Still," Shadow murmured, "I doubt that warrants a full month-long search. Especially if all of your other friends believed me dead." Sonic scratched his ear lightly, "Rouge was pretty upset by the whole ordeal, told me to tell you(when I found you, of course) she's sorry for what she said on the ARK."

"How do you know you're the real Shadow?"

Shadow flinched ever so slightly and his blue counter-part frowned lightly in his direction. Sonic didn't know what had been said, but whatever it was had torn at Rouge, especially after she had been unable to apologize after...The speedster straightened, "The others did think you were dead, and didn't look. I...There was a really slim chance, according to Tails, so I decided to take it. And, well, looks like I was right to take it, wasn't I?"

The two hedgehog stared at one another before Sonic groaned lightly, "Look, let's talk about this later, okay? You wanted your right power band, right?" The blue speed demon made a gesture for the dark mobian to follow him. With a soft sigh, Shadow complied and the two returned to the living room, where Silver looked up.

"Good to know you didn't scalp each other."

Sonic managed a grin and replied with, "Naw, that's just how we show our love." Silver snorted and rolled his eyes, having spent enough time with the blue hedgehog to know he was joking around. The speedster turned and plucked something from the only set of shelves in the room, the gold glinting from the sunlight drifting in from the nearby window.

The youngest of the three hedgehogs watched as Shadow took the power band from Sonic's hand slowly, as if expecting it to bite him. The other two were silent as the black hedgehog attached the binder, listening to the soft 'click' it made as it snapped shut.

"So," Silver began, "What now?" The other two blinked at the same time(a rare sight, at least for Shadow), and Sonic tipped his head to the side, "Well, I was going to help you out, right? Help you get back to your dimension-Yes, Shadow, Silver is from another dimension, Robotnik is crazy." The lats bit had been added on after the dark mobian had frowned lightly.

How Sonic knew he was confused was beyond him.

Silver ignored the last comment, "True, but I don't want to burden you or anything-" "No, no!" Sonic waved his hands, "It's not a burden. In fact, it'd be like killing two birds with one stone! `Cause I was going to go search for more info about Shadow's condition." The darker speeder mouthed 'condition' before muttering, "I don't have a condition."

"Yes, you do."

"Wha-How the hell did you even hear me?"

"Now, now, Shadow, language. And you were being kind of loud about it."

The white mobian sighed and shook his head: These two argued like an old married couple. And he had seen quite a few of those.

He looked back up, "You know, I want to know why Robotnik pulled me from my dimension. I mean, why me? There are a lot of others he could have picked..." "Maybe," Shadow murmured softly, "It was the Chaos Emerald that chose you." Silver looked confused, but Sonic seemed to catch on, "Oh, you mean that the Emerald picked Silver to be the one to be brought to this dimension, and not someone else." Silver's eyes flashed in some understanding, but..."I don't really get it, but I get it. Does that make sense?"

"Sort of. But...," Sonic sighed, "We can figure it all out later...but first!" He turned his head to his dark counterpart, "What are you going to do, Shadow? Now, that you're away from Robotnik." The dark mobian moved away before saying softly, "I don't know." Silence reigned once more as the three hedgehogs stared at different points in the room. Then, Sonic turned to Shadow, "Why don't you come with me and Silver? We could find out in Robotnik tried anything with you."

Shadow stared into Sonic's bright emerald eyes and felt a weary sigh pass his lips.

He had a feeling he might regret it in the future, but...

"All right. I'll team up with you two."


Holy. Nuts.

Super epically long first chapter for True Speed: Heroes!(`Course, it's only technically called 'Heroes')

The series is going to be called 'True Speed'(the top title), but due to space on title for the stories, I'm just going to keep at 'Heroes'(This story, or 'Book 1').

Anyway.

Sonadow, yeah. But any sonadow romantic stuff won't be till, like, 'Brothers in Night', and even then, it's pretty bare mininium(like a couple of affectionate hugs, holding hands, a brush of lips on lips-That's it. So, no heavy duty kissing). `Cause I suck at writing romance XD

Chapters 3 for Sky's Heart, Earth's Soul, and 4 for VV: Chamber of Secrets will be up some time soon, too.

Also, am I the only one who would be disgustingly happy of a possibility of a Chao Garden in any future Sonic Games? Pffft, Chao. I love Chao.