Authors Note: Oh my gosh guys I'm so sorry I haven't put anything up in such a freakishly long amount of time… I practically had to re-read the thing to get in the feel of it again. I'll be sure to finish it soon! 4 years late but I'll get it done!
Sonic sped through the mountains like a blur. His speed only increasing as the sun sank into the horizon, washing the valley between the mountains in color. It was already at least 5, but the size of the mountains were starting to block the sun now. Sonic looked desperately for tracks of some sort, not wanting to have to go up against the vampire at night, but his green eyes failed him as all he could see was the untouched dirt. There was no signs of live in these mountains. Just the ever present feeling that something was watching you.
He stopped suddenly, looking back to see if he could still see his friend. He saw a small red dot in the horizon. Knuckles no doubt. Gliding high to make it easy and to catch the rising air, but he was flying funny. Swerving and dropping suddenly, only to rise again, no doubt from his injury. 'That bastard vampire will get whats coming to him.' Sonic thoguht, waiting for his friend to catch up. 'And Amy... I'm coming for you.' he thoguht, pushing away the idea that she was a vampire now too.
After a little while, Knuckles skid to a stop a little ways away. Sonic went over to him, "You're losing your touch buddy, you missed me by like 10 yards." he said with a smile.
Knuckles shot a glare at him, he was doubled over holding his stomach. "Shut it." he grumbled and stood straight, only to grasp his thin waist again. Sonic saw the blood seeping through the bandages.
"This is why I didn't want you to come." he said with a frown.
"Yeah and this is why I wanted you to wait you thick headed moron."
Sonic smiled a little, he had the energy to fight with him, he would be ok. He opened his mouth to say something but Knuckles cut him off, "We can't stop now." he said trying to stand up again, this time managing it. "We're to close, I can sense it."
"You can sense it?" Sonic asked, Knuckles just nodded. "Woh woh woh wait a minute. You mean this whole time you could just sense what we were going after? That's cheating, I thoguht you were a master at tacking!"
"Oh come on, don't tell me you don't sense it either." he fought back shaking his head. "I can feel a great power residing in these mountains." he said looking around at the hundreds of peaks, cliffs, hills and caves surrounding them, "I just can't pick out which one it is..."
Sonic was for once quite, he had no idea what he was talking about. The last 10 mile stretch he just ran all felt the same to him. He looked around, completely lost. "Well then, you better come up with something, I have no idea what to do now." he sighed, no tracks to go off of and just bare rocks around them, he knew he'd at least see Amy if they passed them.
"Just give me a minute..." Knuckles mumbled and sat down in the patch of dirt they were on, taking up a meditative pose.
"Knuckles this isn't the time for-"
"Shut up." he hissed at him, "Just sit and eat your grapefruit."
"Aw but Knuckles that stuff is nasty!"
Knuckles smiled contently, closing his eyes, "Not my problem, I at least brought food with me. Now shut up I'm thinking."
Shadow walked the halls of the mountain, his footsteps were silent as if he wasn't there at all. His eyes were closed, going through the mountain off of a map he had in his head from his past, focusing on the entrance. His eyes flickered under his black eye lids as he thoguht of his current situation. All of the things that were around him were unplanned and unwanted. It was suppose to be simple. Just him and no one else. No Amy. No Sonic. No Knuckles. And defiantly no Terri.
Frustrated he swung a fist around to the wall and punched a whole through it as he continued walking. His red eyes flashed open, he was ready to fight these wanna be hunters. He would kill them himself. He could see the final turn, he took another step and something strange happened. He brought a hand to his head, an image appearing...
Her hair was golden, her eyes were the color of the distant ocean they could see from the ARK... her smile... pure innocence. She was so happy, she had his hand... she was speaking to him, her voice was calm and happy. She laughed...
Shadow gasped grabbing his chest, right above his forever silent heart. 'No.' was all he could think as it panged with pain, a pain he had hoped to keep at bay for the rest of his eternal life, 'Not now... I need to-' he stepped forward but fell to his knees as another pang followed, stronger then the last, consuming his mind and body.
The image of the girl became blurred, the edges slowly becoming white and advancing around her like a page burning, the fire consuming the words as the white consumed his memory. Shadow watched the as the girl sat her face twisting and contorting to a new shape, full of fear instead of love. He reached out in desperation and grasped her before she slipped into the growing whiteness. He held her close and she pulled away, Shadow shut his eyes and held on tighter, as tight as he could without crushing the small delicate girl. He would not loose her.
Her voice came through the echoing silence. She was calling to him, urging him to move on...he could hear her heart racing, he wouldn't let go... She pulled away from him and grabbed his hand and started to drag him away. He had no choice but to run. Run as fast as he could. They ran with her down the shadowy halls of the metal ARK they called home. But something was different then before... something stirred in the darkening picture around him that he dared not look back to see.
Suddenly there was a bang behind them. Shadow's ears rang as he called her name, but it was drowned out by the sound of another shot behind them. There was a flash of red to his left, then another. He felt a sudden drain in the life of the girl in front of him...
She led him into a room, the 3 layers of metal doors slamming shut behind them. "Shadow..." she said quietly going to a pedestal in the center of the room with an assortment of buttons on it. Shadow went over to her to help her... the image after that became fuzzy..
Now a new image appeared in it's place. They were still in the same room.. but there was more blood. The girls life energy he was so familiar with was suddenly gone and the doors that had once kept them safe from the unknown threat were opened. Shadow saw the men, they had guns pointed at them and were speaking to him. But he didn't hear the words. He only acted on his hate...
Another blur of the image as the death consumed his very soul. The image changed again. More blood. His fur was now soaked in a warm fluid that burned his senses. Driving itself into him. It smelt so good it was like a drug, no worse then that... He craved it... he wanted it... he needed it...
The strange image blurred once more and was fuzzy for a few minutes as the feelings slowly drained from him. The hate, passion, and sadness flowed down his cheeks. They were filled with a new feeling.. A sudden sensation of pain surged threw his body, it vibrated and pulsed through every nerve and vessel of his cold body. A hazy image came to him as his eyes opened to see he was in a puddle of crimson blood. He looked up, using all the mussels in his body to do such a simple task, he knew then that the blood was probably his own.
He was no longer on the ARK, he was somewhere unfamiliar. The air smelt different, the air felt different.. He saw the ever familiar strange dragon like creatures that stood before him, an image he had seen many a time before. He begged them to help him, the words escaping his lips before he could think. They said something to him... but the image faded and all was black...
Time stood still as the black hedgehog lay on the rusty red floor and held his head, trying to keep the pain subsided. He wanted to be dead then, nothing mattered to him, all he wanted was to be with the girl again... to be able to hold her close and laugh with her like he used to. But it was no good, the fate that awaited him was worse then death.
He lay silent, shaking, waiting for his fate to come and take him away into the unique darkness that welcomed his kind. A place worse then death, but better then this life. Something touched his cold skin. He didn't open his eyes, he just lay there quite. He could hear a distant voice.. the voice picked him up and shook him gently, but he still didn't move. His muscles still rang with pain from his mind. The voice now was around him, surrounding his silent world. He moved slightly, he wanted it to go away, he didn't want it's help.
Then the voice was gone, there was just it's lingering warmth around him. He felt his muscles loosen and his thoughts become more clear. His feeling came back and he could now hear a weak sniffling close to him. He turned his head to it but was stopped by something... something soft. He opened his eyes and pink came into his vision. He looked up to see a familiar face, it was Amy. He grumbled something and she held him tighter. He was surprised at how good that felt... he closed his eyes again and started to fade back into the darkness.
Amy shook him again, "Shadow!" he could hear her now. "Shadow wake up!"
He grumbled again, not wanting to return to reality, he wanted to just disappear. He turned away from the voice now and sat up, his head spun as he attempted to stand and he fell. Something caught him though and was now carrying him. Amy? No... Amy couldn't pick him up, wouldn't pick him up. He opened his eyes again to see who it was. He was surprised to see blue this time. He started to move but a lingering thoguht that was not his own came into his head and soothed his mind, encasing it once more into the darkness, this time though, it was not the darkness that would be his fate, it was simply... a dream.
Amy stood by the bed the blue figure had lay Shadow on. She held his hand and shouted to him, repeating his name, but nothing happened. She felt tears come to her eyes, her one chance to get out of this form and back to her life was gone. Her one shot at hope was dying.
"Don't worry." a familiar voice told her. Terri was standing behind her, "He's just reliving what happened to him 50 years ago.."
"What?" Amy asked looking back at her, "But that doesn't make any sense! What happened?" she asked, questions bubbling to her mind faster then she could speak.
"Shush." Terri said holding a finger to her lips and looked back at Shadow. "He's the only one that knows that. He'll be ok though." she reassured her and knelt next to Amy, "You know... you should have kissed him." she whispered like it was a secret.
"What?" Amy asked shocked felling her face flush.
"You know, like in the stories. You kiss him and then-"
"Oh come on, you can't be serious."
"No I am, really!" she said seeming offended, "It always works!" she exclaimed and crossed her arms, "It still might." she said with a smug look on her face, half hidden by a lock of blue hair.
Amy glared over her shoulder at her, sending her evil voodoo vampire magic at her. Terri simply laughed, "Well I still say you should do it!" she said and looked at Shadow, then back at her. "Oh I see! I'll leave you too alone." she said and smiled darting out of the room just fast enough to avoid Amy's hammer of death. Terri giggled as she flew her way down the hallways, just wide and tall enough for her to get her powerful flaps in. She traveled to the place where the mountain opened to the outside world, a barley visible crack flowed down it, showing where the mighty rock would give way and open. Open to a world she hadn't seen in much to long.
She sighed sitting down, thinking about her own love life. 'One day, I know he'll come for me.' she thoguht with a smile, thinking of her savior in red she saw once as a child, the one that took her to guard the mountain and all the secrets that lay within. Preferably it would have been Knuckles, but she knew it wasn't. She knew only faint pictures of her true savior, so she just let her imagination take it's course like she always did and waited, she could feel it. In some far reaches of her mind, the ancient dragon blood line, it knew and she waited.
Once Amy was sure that Terri wasn't coming back, she looked back at Shadow. She held one of his gloved hands in hers and with her other she stroked his head. She wondered what could have caused him so much pain to double over like that... she found him on the ground, him. Shadow. The vampire. The thought alone made her shudder. A pain fluttered inside her, but it was different then the constant pain that urged her for blood. No this one, this one was different, she had felt it before... with Sonic. When he was hurt like this and she couldn't help.
Thinking of Sonic only made her watery eyes worse, he would never love her now, not like this. She sighed stroking Shadows head again and rest her head on the soft fluffy white patch of fur on his chest.
He was so cold under her, it was like she was laying on a soft rock rather then a living breathing thing. She looked up at his face from there, looking at the red streaks across his face, around his eyes and quills. She suddenly felt sorry for him, living like he did for 50 years must have been hard, she was a vampire for a matter of days and she couldn't take it. 'Whatever it is they are talking about... I hope that it works.' she thought lifting her head up.
She kissed his cheek, then the corner of his mouth, somewhat glad he wasn't awake, he would have killed her for that. She let out a sigh when nothing happened, she new nothing would, she just hoped maybe.. she stood up and started to walk away, but Shadows hand gripped hers tightly before she could. "You'll regret that." he grumbled weakly.