What A Long Hard Life

Chapter 1: A Disturbance In The South

For those of you who actually liked my first story, 'Shadow The Hedgehog: Why Do I Suffer So Much!' this is a remake. But this time, I've improved on all of my mistakes in the last one. You'll see why when you read it. I'm so exited about writing this, and I hope the remake is really worth it.

Shadow was stood to attention in the command room of GUN. He was now working for this military, with his companion, Rouge. He had joined them after the Black Arms attack, to make up for the bad things he had done during that awful time. He hoped the strict Commander would forgive him eventually.

GUN were really happy to have Shadow on their side, he did them well in battles and against threats and terrorists. They hoped Shadow would stay with them for as long as possible, as he was now a necessary ally for many missions.

Shadow would normally have many soldiers to work with him, and command. He was a higher rank than them, along with Rouge. She too was a higher ranked soldier because of her skills, and the two of them worked very well together.

Shadow awaited his orders, and was surprised when he received them. It was a solo mission, that required his skills only. Since it was a stealth mission, it would have been very daft to have soldiers around him while sneaking up on something.

So, he went it alone. He hadn't done this for a while so it made him slightly nervous, but he didn't show it, as that was unthinkable for the ultimate life form to do so. Thus, he grabbed his tools and objects needed for the task, and headed out.

He was greeted at the door by Rouge. "Good luck Shadow… though I'm sure you'll do very well." she said and winked at him. Shadow gave a slight smile and strode out of the door. This was it.

His task was to check up on suspicious activity, in an area far south of Station Square. It had been going on for a while, and it was obvious that Shadow was best suited for the job. The dark hedgehog started his journey, making his way out of station square, getting on the train that headed south.

He didn't like the looks he got when we was on the train, humans would always stare at him, as if he were some freak. Though he was a freak to them. He would just scowl at any person who looked at him in an unpleasant way and looked forward to the end of the train journey.

He wondered why GUN had made him get onto the train, when he was pretty much capable of using chaos control to teleport there in a second, "Such a waste of my time-" Shadow started to mumble, but then it all went dark. They were in a tunnel. Even though he knew it was safe, it made him feel uneasy.

The lights inside of the train went dim, then the light ceased completely. Scared mumbles were heard as the rumble of the train stopped, there was silence. "Typical." Shadow said to himself and got up. He had a better ability than the humans, to see in the dark.

A message from the front came from one of the assistants. The train had broken down, due to power shortages, so they all had to stay put. The assistant with the torch had explained to them. "Just my luck for the train to stop… in a tunnel." Shadow sighed, and sat down looking impatient. "Should have argued against the commander, to use chaos control." he said to himself, and got out his communicator and explained his situation.

"That's a part of the suspicious activity…" the voice on the other line said. "The whole area keeps getting power cuts, and no one knows why. Something has caused this, and it's most likely nothing a few repair men can deal with." Shadow listened, he noticed the other people in the train were listening too.

"Just a sec." Shadow said, he got up with his stuff and went into the little toilet on the side of the cabin.

"Sorry sir, but that's out of order." the assistant told him. Shadow sighed and showed him his GUN badge.

"I need some privacy." he said and went inside. He used the toilet as his seat and continued to listen to the information given, this was very strange. It sounded very suspicious too, he couldn't wait to investigate and get to the bottom of things.

After a while, the lights came back on and the humming of the train stared up again. Shadow turned off his communicator and went back to his seat. He was glad no one had taken it, he was really tired of this already.

When the train had finally reached it's destination Shadow was relived. He was sent the coordinates of the exact location on his communicator, and that was it. He was on his own, he would only ask for help if absolutely necessary, this was serious.

He got to the target, and right in front of him was a narrow hole. Just big enough, for him to get into. He squeezed through and fell a few feet, landing on his feet flawlessly. Again, it was dark but he didn't want to disrupt the surroundings, or he could endanger himself.

His heart beat sped up slightly, and his breathing more desperate, but he tired to keep it as quiet as possible. Something didn't feel right. It was as if he could sense the cause of this suspicious activity. He could see a dim light at the end of the narrow tunnel, that was becoming wider with each step.

It was a dim reddish-purple light. It reminded him of something, but what? His memory wasn't always on his side, so he had trouble placing it. He walked into the widened area and what he saw nearly made his heart stop.

Back at GUN HQ the help team, which included Rouge, waited nervously to hear from Shadow. They needed to know what the disturbance was. It had been a few hours since the Train incident, they knew he had gotten to the target, but hadn't heard from him since then.

Suddenly they heard a distraught cry from Shadow, on the communicator, something had happened. Rouge ran to the control panel, to speak to Shadow, she was worried for her friend. "Shadow, come in!" she cried, sounding upset and desperate. No reply. "Shadow!" she said again, only crackling was heard. They'd lost his signal. "Send out a search team!" Rouge said.

The commander, who was stood at the back of the team, shook his head calmly.

"Why not!" she yelled, getting upset. "We have to do something, Shadow never shows fear, to hear him scream like that, shows that this is something serious! We have to help him!" Rouge yelled, anger starting up in her voice.

"There's no need. No matter what, Shadow has always come through, and succeeded each time. Being short of a few of my men, can't have made it any harder for him. We're not going to send anyone miles and miles out, only to find out that Shadow is okay!" he said, starting to yell at the end.

Rouge left the room, she eyes narrowed at him. "And if Shadow doesn't come back in one piece, I'm blaming you." she said and slammed the door behind her. She hoped Shadow would be okay in the end, and that maybe he was off guard for a second and was owning whatever had attacked him.

She was wrong.

I think this is a good place to end the chapter. Very different from the original, but you'll see the close resemblances in a while, like next chapter.

Lucy Labrador