The coastal sunset cast the water in a dark purplish glow under a deep red sky. This sectioned off portion of the beach was void of tourist life, save a lone bat lounging in a chair and occasionally glancing at a thick packet.
In exchange for taking an extended vacation, GUN had given her extensive paperwork and reading material to peruse. Of course, she was leaning toward the plan of putting it all off until the last minute.
As the horizon darkened, she stood up and stretched. She folded up her beach chair and tucked it under one arm, picking up the packet and the novel she had been skimming with her free hand.
As she got back to the hotel, she felt a mild sense of dread. She had left all of her electronics in the hotel room, and she knew she would have to spend at least an hour clearing out all of the back logged messages before she could let herself go to bed. Rouge's fears were validated as she opened the door and heard her phone loudly buzzing. She decided to use the restroom before retrieving it from the nightstand, letting it go to voicemail.
As she was washing her hands, she could faintly hear the buzzing begin again. She rolled her eyes, wondering if anyone she worked with understood what a vacation actually was, and dried her hands. She plopped down on the bed, grabbing the device and answering it without even glancing at who was even calling.
"This is Rouge."
"Why haven't you picked up?" The voice on the other end sounded irritated. "I've been trying to get a hold of you for hours."
"Shadow? Long time no talk, hon. What's up?" As she said this, she took the phone away from her ear and switched to speaker phone. She pulled up her missed call log and grimaced. He had called her about thirty times.
"I found Omega."
She sat up in surprise.
"You did? Where?"
"I'll explain once you get here. I'm at base 301, level 7."
"Oh no, mister." As much as she missed her teammate and wanted to support Shadow, the allure of the bed was making her limbs feel heavy. She sighed. "I'm on vacation until the day after tomorrow. You're going to just have to tell me what happened."
"Rouge…" His voice sounded slightly strained. It unnerved the bat.
"Shadow? Are you okay?" Rouge's heart started to race a little. "Did something... happen to him?"
"He'll be okay, but… you need to come. Now."
Rouge took a deep breath. The emotion in his voice was a little too thick, it suggested too much urgency. She shook her head, the mattress underneath her painfully soft and inviting.
"I'll be right there, okay?"
There was a pause. "Thank you."
After he hung up, Rouge sighed deeply. Omega had only been missing a week, and the only person who had seemed genuinely concerned about it was Shadow. Shadow was attached to the robot in a weird way. He was almost overprotective, like a concerned older brother would be about a reckless younger sibling. Rouge knew that Shadow wouldn't have called her like that if there wasn't something serious going on.
"You better be okay, Omega." Rouge whispered to herself.
Rouge arrived at the GUN headquarters, which wasn't actually too far from the beach. As she rode up in the elevator, she continued to wonder why Shadow's tone had bothered her so much. She tried not to think about it. She was probably imagining things.
The double doors slid open. Shadow was waiting outside.
"This better be worth it, Shadow. I still have sand in my shoes."
He gestured for her to follow. Rouge thought it odd that he didn't respond.
They walked down the hall and came to a heavily armored door. Shadow leaned into a retinal scanner, and the door slid open soundlessly. They stepped inside, and Rouge held back a gasp.
Omega's lifeless form was hooked up to a number of wires and hooks. The lights of his eyes were dark, and there was no familiar humming to indicate he was conscious. Most of his exterior had been taken off, exposing the intricate handiwork underneath.
"What happened, Shadow?"
His voice was clinical and without inflection. "I found him like this deep in the Mystic Ruins. It seemed like he was attacked by something."
"Do you think it was Robotnik?"
"One would assume, but…"
"But what?"
"I have this strange feeling that it wasn't the Doctor's doing. If he intended to destroy Omega, he would have done it much earlier." He stared at the robot broodingly. "I know there are no other known suspects, but the only part of his programming that is missing is the self-repair unit, which is why he's being manually repaired here-"
"And no one else would know how to extract that except Robotnik." Rouge interrupted. The sight of Omega like this was getting to her as well. No wonder Shadow had sounded so distressed.
The hedgehog furrowed his brow. "Or someone with access to that information… but either way, why would they only take the self-repair unit and leave him partially intact? He was left in a repairable state."
"Perhaps they thought he wasn't. Only Robotnik would know how to fully destroy him."
Shadow lightly touched one of Omega's metal hands, then pulled away. "I can't figure it, Rouge. There are too many strange things, too many things I feel like I should have answers for…"
"What are you trying to get at, Shadow?" She grabbed his arm. He looked up, and her suspicions were confirmed. "There's something you're not telling me."
He blinked. It looked like he was trying to find the exact words to describe his thoughts. He held eye contact, which was slightly abnormal. "There was something… off about the scene. Something that could not have been caused by the doctor."
"What was it?" Rouge tried not to look over at Omega. There was the threat of terror in her gut. She pushed it down.
"There was an unusual amount of residual chaos energy surrounding him. It's the kind of stuff left over only after I've performed chaos attacks, but I think… I think the energy was left intentionally, almost as a… warning."
"Wait, hold up." Rouge raised an eyebrow. "You can see chaos energy?"
"Not in a visual sense, but I can definitely tell when it's there."
"So whoever attacked him-"
"Was some sort of chaotic being, yes." Shadow paused, crossing his arms. "And there's another thing that disturbs me."
"What?"
Shadow looked away finally. He avoided letting his gaze rest on Omega once more. "The energy was… familiar to me. I don't know how, but I know that I've… felt it before."
"What does that mean?" Rouge whispered, as if speaking any louder would attract terrible unknowns.
"I don't know…"
"Did you tell anyone else about this?"
Shadow shook his head. "You're the first person I've told. I want to investigate this further before I get anyone else involved."
"So you want to keep the energy thing a secret for now?"
"Yes."
Rouge finally couldn't stop herself from looking over again. This was different than other times she had seen Omega deactivated. Her lips twitched slightly. "I don't like this, Shadow."
But the hedgehog was already on his way out. She took one last look at Omega, at the wires feeding in and out of his half disassembled form, then followed Shadow down the hall towards the elevator. As they waited for the doors to open, Shadow's calculating stare lay fixed straight ahead.
"What are you thinking, then? Do we have a plan yet?"
He shook his head as the doors slid open and they stepped inside. "Not particularly. I'm a little hesitant on how to move forward. Whoever did this is clearly powerful, enough to take down someone like Omega. If I go at it alone, I might be led into some sort of trap. However, if I bring in reinforcements..." he trailed off.
"...You're afraid others will get hurt." Rouge finished the thought for him. He didn't reply, only stepped out of the opening doors rather abruptly and headed towards the main exit to the building.
Rouge was becoming a little agitated. Shadow seemed all too eager to leave the base. "And where are you off to in a hurry?" She quipped, stepping out before the doors could close her in.
He stopped, swinging open the glass door and holding it, a signal for her to go out first. "Just want to get to planning. This mission isn't going to execute itself."
She made her way over. "I guess that's true." She realized it was probably better to leave the base. After seeing Omega, they both seemed to be on edge.
They were soon outside. The sun had set by now, and the flat desert landscape surrounding the GUN base was unnervingly dark. Electric fences towered over the looming concrete structure behind them, and guard stations were posted every 10 yards.
"You need a ride home?" Rouge offered. She clicked the unlock button on her car keys, and lights flashed in the distance, haunting across the empty parking lot.
"I'll take up that offer." They made their way across the parking lot, climbing into the dark blue Prius. Rouge had to use something discreet when on government business, but her main car was a pale pink Corvette.
Shadow pushed some leftover Chik Fil A onto the floor as Rouge tore out of the parking lot at a slightly ludicrous speed, only slowing down to allow the road block to raise at the gate.
As they sped down the interstate towards the distant glow of Station Square, Shadow glanced back at the dark monolith that was the GUN base.
"There's something else I didn't tell you. I didn't want to talk about it at the base, on account of all of the surveillance systems installed there."
Rouge raised an eyebrow, keeping her eyes on the road. "Oh?"
"Omega has been harboring a chaos emerald inside of him. I wanted to see if hiding one inside his storage compartment would mask its energy so it couldn't be detected by GUN."
"Did it work?"
"I tested multiple energy trackers on him, and he was able to mask it pretty well." Shadow's frown deepened. "But when I found Omega, the emerald was missing. That means whoever attacked Omega knew about it, or at least could detect it."
"Why would you want to do that?" Rouge probed. "Hide the emerald, I mean."
"Just as an experiment, I suppose."
Silence followed this reply. Rouge kept her hand on the gear stick, slowly tapping it as she considered this new information.
"You don't fully trust them, then?"
Shadow sighed. "It's... complicated."
"You know I have a complicated relationship with GUN, too." She smirked. "I'm an ex jewel thief, after all. The only reason I'm not in prison is because I'm much more valuable as an agent."
"That's actually part of my reasoning for keeping the emerald in Omega." Shadow leaned back in his chair. "GUN has use for me, clearly, but I have a growing suspicion that if I ever step out of line again, or suddenly become useless to them, they're going to turn on me. You might have some superhuman abilities, but I was designed as a weapon." He glanced down and seemed to realize he was clenching his fists. He slowly relaxed them.
"And so you think having a back up emerald is going to help you when the entire country declares war on you?"
"Well, maybe not. But it offered some... superficial comfort, I guess." He sighed. "And now whatever is out there has an emerald as well."
"We'll figure this out." Rouge assured him. "I'm sure whatever it is, we've faced worse."
For the first time that night, Shadow smiled. "You know what? I think you're right. What are you doing tomorrow?"
"I'm on vacation, so nothing." Her tone became slightly teasing. "But I'm sure I can squeeze whatever you have in mind into my busy schedule."
"I want to find out whoever did this to Omega, and I want them to know how we feel about it."
The lights of the city were drawing closer now. The radio had been playing quietly in the background, but Rouge reached over and turned it up. An upbeat 80's ballad filled the empty spaces of the car. She shifted the gear, speeding up.
"Hell yeah, let's do it!"
