Shadow the Hedgehog: The Just and the Fallen
- Blueward Plunge, Redproof Shield -
"Everything…that I exist for…? Is it all a lie?"
The sea is scarlet, waters tiding over my feet. Sloshing pink brine, swashing through the course of time, shins and nerves abashed. It is all an unvarying shade, unceasing tone, undying hue—the monotony is difficult to stomach. Though not as a memento mori; just as an innocent reminder of what I was alive for. The past wontedly remembered. Never silent. If it were, I'd no longer remember to live. Merely exist.
'Mother…' I am able to recall.
Flashing bigger and bigger on the sea is the vessel I once called "Home." The moonlit hull grows on the red water's surface: The green light intensifies as the ship closes in on me. Such a vast, eerie, burning moonlight. I can feel it hastening the larger it grows, the more terrifying as it strengthens.
All I can think of is "Mother." All I will ever think of is "Mother."
Etchings of green loom in pink clouds. But they're cast away by the vessel's descent. The scorching atmosphere peels away titanium shelling and pops the Plexiglas cleanly from their frames. Everything I knew and loved about Space Colony ARK was dead and gone.
So, the ARK seeks revenge. It is coming, it is here. Denoted by its Blueward Plunge.
And there is no way I can differ.
"Then tell me why everything happened the way it did."
I lower my tears from my home. Agonize. Desensitize. Recognize none I loved were at fault—my creators, all mothers and fathers to me. They never bore me any ill will, never wished me any misfortune. Why sacrifice so much time, funding, and energy to something you wanted to destroy?
Professor Roderich never wanted to hurt me. His stoic smirk spoke volumes of signature fatherliness. He was never a physical "parent." There was always a different pencil somewhere on his person; I happened to learn my colors that way. The most he would do is pat my forehead or shoulder, where my quills couldn't prick him. Two pats: They were all I ever needed. To feel proud. To feel happy. And meaningful and loved.
Miss Irene made me feel the same way. She was always nice to me, and nitpicked at me whenever I was able to somehow prove her wrong. Over fairly simple things she would puff her cheek at me. I learned "sarcasm" and "playfulness" from her. Her laugh was twittery but genuine, always ready to make me smile. She was more active than her colleagues; she didn't like staying cooped up in her room. The ARK's Botanical Garden was a place for us to play in. And I could never turn away her delicious midday lunches.
Much to her surprise, Tsumura-san favored them, too. Native to "The Land of the Rising Sun," Tsumura-san had fascinating stories about legendary Earthling warriors called samurai. Their sense of responsibility was a different grade from what he and his colleagues had to uphold. He told me about the blessing—and liability—that was shared when Project Shadow commenced. I felt bad for creating such heavy tension for my creators, but he reassured me with positive affirmations. Of my innocence, my importance. My uniqueness.
Mother talked about it a lot. And, somehow, she could sense whenever I was in doubt, or a quandary. Her words never misled me, never discouraged me, or made me faint or sway in heart. So, when she told me anecdotes about the curious blue planet, something in me stirred.
Back then, Mother's hand was warm and kind. Open to hold, to lead, and to comfort. Not cold and lost. Still and stiff.
At that time, the Earth was worth saving.
"So tell me why our peace had to be disrupted and utterly destroyed that day…!"
My tears can no longer fall.
My fate was sealed the very day Chief Professor Robotnik desired a memorial for his late granddaughter. A soul I emulated, an artificial reincarnate of her memory. The very day I realized that she was not strong, healthy, or immortal like I am and could never be. The day her photographs were left, frozen in time and a lake of tears. The Chief Professor's glasses glared, the little girl's smiling visage only a shard of the past now.
It was the day I revealed my face to her mourners, who praised my synthetic birth, with the very sheet she had slept on. And began to learn the truth. A fast, grueling epiphany. It came like a tail beyond the ARK's glass. It translated from "This revolutionary life form is the epitome of immortality" to "This powerful weapon is a danger to society." The words came in harsh, demeaning tones, supposedly from a society I never really knew existed.
Tsumura-san's words of my innocence came to me. And, just as soon, left. Fleeting, vanishing. They were never untrue—just obsolete, now. I didn't want to feel like I'd been lied to, especially by the only "family" I knew and had. But something about this Project wasn't completely honest and heartfelt: My purpose was no longer to serve as Maria's reincarnation, but as a weapon of mass destruction.
Was that always my purpose? Was it ever what my other "parents" always described? Well, it doesn't matter, now. Operation: ARK's Indestructible Seal was rushing in, and drowning us all.
Flashing alarms and blaring lights alerted her of armed intruders, but I was thrown into a pit of panic. Unaccustomed to seeing swarms of suited fighters and blazing gunfire, my body's fight-or-flight mechanism was flawlessly engaged. Mother and I fled, trying to dodge the screams and the subsequent bloodshed. Tsumura-san lies to waste in the raid's midst; Prof. Roderich's valiant effort to save Miss Irene's life was in vain. My family was being massacred—or completely, for all Miss Laura and I knew. Even the Chief Professor fell victim to the chaos. My panic blurred needless details, but I can remember my mother's death to its entirety.
A single soul, with cold eyes and vengeful as sin, stood between her survival and fatality. It mirrored her own, though with cold vengeance. She commanded with a deranged steely gaze, merciless trigger finger, and unerring gunfire.
The Sword of Damocles never looked so disquieting.
"…Robotnik was truly a vengeful man…"
—"That is what he was created for!"
The word "Eject" has never been more prevalent to me than it is now.
"…You promised me you would always be with me—said you would never leave me alone!"
—"Promises are meant to be broken—!"
The white bat cannot reach my hand anymore. She is crying. She is screaming. She is unconscious in dark rain.
"…He promised his granddaughter a better world…by wiping out all of mankind for her…and to use you to do it."
—"Destiny cannot be changed!"
Tears from my descent cannot begin to describe my forlorn primal scream. There are no words to denote my anger, my fury and rage at the Humanity that took my family, their own kindred, away! There is only a being bearing a golden scythe, red scarves, six black wings, and porcelain skin. Her sharp ambers sends my vengeance asunder, and my understanding enlightens. Crimson tightens over them, curved blade prone and gleaming.
"…I don't want that to be your purpose to live…"
Contrariwise, another is waiting. Her flesh veneers the cosmos from which she hails. A mystifying power, she strongly resembles Mother. Six glorious wings embrace her, and her sky-blue scarves were cast over her eyes by a divine wind. A pearl staff glistened into her palms.
"Anymore."
My eyes face my home with a valiant luster. Pupils sliver at the glowing fiery mess. Once my motherland, now a catastrophic threat. To the Humans that killed Mother. To the Humans—like Mother.
"I must protect them," I reason.
"Promise me that you'll be strong, Shadow."
—"What difference does it make?!"
A blue hedgehog's valiance tears through my berserk defenses. His hand can no longer reach me either.
"…That you'll be good."
His friends were thrown into this mess unwillingly. Littler ones, as well as stronger, wiser, and more beautiful ones. They didn't ask for this apocalypse, nor did the rest of Humanity Mother wanted me to save. I will serve as the Earth's sole Redproof Shield.
"…That you will stay the way you are…okay?"
I could never dishonor my Mother's wish. And I'd be damned if I dishonored her smile. Now, with great and beautiful power, I lift into the air and rocket toward the vessel. I break the sound barrier with ease. The ARK must not come any closer; I will not let her world end like this. I know you were waiting to be pulled from your orbit just to satiate your vengefulness.
I'm sorry, Space Colony ARK, but I will not let you avenge them like this.
"How do you know when you love someone, Miss Laura?" I can remember blurting out the question.
Six wings of my own—half of light, half of dark—blast me further through the troposphere, stratosphere, mesosphere, thermosphere, closer toward the Space Colony.
The red sea is so far away, now. I still remember its purpose; its memory has never faded. It will never will, much like me. Immortal, immune to physical decline and metabolic destabilization, and impervious to death-dealing damage.
I can see nothing but blue, all of a sudden.
My Mother lets me go for a moment, smiles at me, and pulls me into her warm, motherly bosom. There is more tender firmness this time. She rasps, "You just never want to let them go."
I can see nothing but white.
"I love you, Shadow."
"Thank you, Mother."
I can't see anything, anymore.