T: Greetings loyal readers! I have returned and created this insane bit of work for you. Sorry for the wait but I got sidetracked and I wanted to write a few chapters for my other stories but never fear! I will be concentrating on completing this story now. Since we are now steadily approaching the end. Its not for awhile yet but it is slowly dawning. But no matter, here is the new Shadow the Hedgehog chapter!
It had been a few minutes since Shadow arrived in this mysterious jungle; he had been walking along this ridiculously long pathway for a while now. Shadow looked left and right and was able to confirm that this place belonged to none other than Dr Eggman, unless GUN or the Black Arms had chosen a new logo.
"Now...how to get out of-OWW!" It appeared that Shadow had walked into something.
"HEY WATCH...it..." Shadow paused to look at the thing he had walked into.
"...FAKER!!" Shadow's eyes widened at the sound of his own voice from the object in front of him.
It was a copy of himself, it looked exactly like him. It had the black fur with red stripes on his quills and the same eye colour, heck it even had the same gloves, hover shoes and rings around his wrists. Shadow looked at the copy of himself with surprise, it sounded just like him.
"WHO ARE YOU!?" Shadow yelled pointing at his copy.
"...FAKER!!" Came the reply from Shadow's copy.
"Faker? You're the faker!" Shadow and the copy began the ultimate showdown.
The two hedgehogs called each other faker for who knows how long, the match ended with Shadow tearing the copy's head clean off. Shadow chuckled at the now headless body.
"Hehe! Who's the faker now?" Shadow said blowing a raspberry at the 'faker' that wasn't Sonic.
"FAKER!!" Shadow looked up and what he saw made his mouth hang.
"FAKER!! FAKER!! FAKER!!" The sound echoed throughout the jungle, ringing in Shadow's ears.
There was thousands upon thousands of Shadow copies calling not only our furry hero but themselves as well. Shadow's eyes darted between the vast amounts of copies and had to cover his ears before his eardrums burst. Thankfully a voice stopped the mad 'faker' calling contest.
"Listen up Shadow Androids..." The 'Androids' as they had been called, looked up to see their master.
Shadow recognised the voice and turned his head to see none other than Eggman sitting in his Egg Mobile. He was overlooking the Shadow Androids and probably couldn't tell that the real Shadow was there amongst them. Eggman had taken months to build these androids, he wanted to make them just as strong as Shadow and so he crafted them in the Ultimate Life Form's image. He gave them homing missiles and even Shadow's personality for laugh.
"We may be strong, but those cursed black aliens are a formidable adversary. Them and the Larvae, they are a walking nightmare. Anyway, stay alert, and engage any enemies you encounter! Understand?" Eggman looked at his army of Shadow Androids.
It was silence for an entire minute, during this silence, Shadow could hear his own heartbeat it was that quiet. The Shadow Androids were silent, staring at their master before raising their right arms and extending their fingers and said at the same time.
"FAAAAAAKKKKKKEEEEEEERRR!!" The Shadow Androids yelled at Eggman.
Shadow let out a small chuckle while Eggman sighed, resting his head in his left hand. At times he seriously regretted giving them Shadow's personality, but it made them somehow more efficient in battle none the less. Eggman then left in his Egg Mobile, leaving the Shadow Androids to start calling themselves faker again. Shadow had developed a small bit of fear; he looked at himself and compared himself with the Androids.
"Am..am I...and android too?" Shadow asked himself, praying that he wasn't.
"DIE INFERIOR MODELS!!" A robotic voice yelled out.
Shadow looked further ahead, squinting his eyes to see none other than Omega, the final member of Team Dark engaging in battle with the Shadow Androids. By battle it was more like Omega shooting them all up while the Shadow Androids called him faker, luckily this didn't affect Omega and he continued to shoot them all. Shadow ran up to Omega to aid him in his battle, disposing of the Android copies of himself along the way.
Omega turned round to see Shadow approach, he pointed his guns at the hedgehog, the mini-guns still smoking from the amount of bullets that had been unleashed.
"Are you, the original?" Omega spoke in his metallic voice.
"Omega of course it's me! If I wasn't me, I would be calling you a faker." Shadow said looking at the red robot.
"You must aid me in-" Omega's eyes started flashing different colours before turning back to red "-destroying SONIC! I shall not rest until he is dead!" Omega spoke retracting his mini-guns and replacing them with two cannons now.
"You okay Omega?" Shadow could just tell something was wrong.
"Tails has been tampering with me! I can't control myself anymore!!" Omega started to spin out of control, literally.
Somewhere in a small house...
Tails was sitting in one of his chairs holding a controller; the monitor in front of him showed Tails what Omega was seeing. Sonic was sitting on the windowsill with a small smirk; he found it amusing watching Tails play around with his inventions. Unfortunately for Sonic, he didn't hear what Omega had just said.
"Heh-heh! This is great! My own toy robot!! This will be perfect for killing Sonic off!!" Tails said pressing buttons on a small controller that made Omega do a certain action.
"MUAHAHAHAAA!! I AM GOING TO MAKE HIM SUFFER!!" The young fox began laughing like an evil villain with an equally evil face.
The reason why Tails wanted to kill Sonic badly was to 'repay' him for all the times he was left behind in their old adventures. He hated being left with millions of Badniks who wanted to claw him and Sonic to bits, but since Tails was always left behind, he always received Sonic's share and was always horribly injured by the time they finished a zone. Tails swore on his tails that he would make Sonic suffer for this unforgivable act. Unfortunately, he had forgotten that Sonic was sitting on the windowsill and slowly turned his head to face his big brother.
"Err...hey Sonic." Tails gave a nervous chuckle.
Sonic stared at Tails with a horrified face before leaping off the windowsill and began running down the street, his screaming could be heard all the way to the heavens. Tails quickly cursed his stupidity of revealing his plan to kill Sonic when he was there and held the controller firmly in his hands.
"DESTROY HIM OMEGA!!" Tails pressed a button and back in Iron Jungle, Omega started doing a weird dance.
"Shadow!! SAVE ME!!" Omega's thrusters kicked in, resulting in the robot flying away from the jungle and towards Tails' house to appease his master's wish to see Sonic dead.
Shadow stared at the empty spot where Omega was before slowly walking away, too many strange things had been happening recently for the hedgehog. Shadow proceeded to continue onwards alone, dealing with Eggman's robots and the Shadow Androids who seemed to only be able to call him a faker, and couldn't even defend themselves despite having missiles. Everything was going smoothly before Shadow stumbled across Eggman's small monitor machine dealing with several GUN machines with some cool looking Kung-fu moves.
One thought ran through Shadow's mind.
When in the world did Eggman learn Kung-fu? I didn't think it was even possible for him to do such things, never mind a small monitor dealing Kung-fu moves.
The small machine looked up to see Shadow standing there with a dumbfounded look. It quickly hovered over to Shadow before bowing.
"Shadow! Great to see you! Did you catch my machine's awesome Kung-fu action?" Eggman's voice could be heard from the machine.
"Uhh, yeah. Nice job..." Shadow said in a sarcastic tone.
"Thanks! NOW GO FORTH AND DESTROY GUN'S MACHINES, MY SLAVE!!" Shadow winced at Eggman's raised voice.
And so Shadow started destroying the helpless GUN machines, he stopped mid-way and noticed a small balloon flying over head. It didn't take a genius to figure out it was Eggman's due to the ever popular smiling face.
"What's that?" Shadow asked looking at Eggman's small machine.
"That's my pimped out balloon of death! Cool huh?" Shadow was about to reply when out of nowhere Omega landed on the machine and began stomping on it.
"Omega?" Shadow stared with worry as Omega continued to jump up and down on the small machine.
"DIE! DIE! DDDDDDIIIIIIIEEEE!! Oh, Shadow! You must aid me in stopping Eggman and Tails!" Omega seemed to be normal again, you could tell since he wanted Eggman dead...again.
"I understand Eggman, but why Tails? Other than the fact he is the reason I keep jumping all over the sodding place." Shadow said looking at Omega.
"HE HAS ME ENSLAVED AND WANTS ME TO KILL SONIC!"
After a few minutes thinking Shadow agreed to help Omega stop Eggman and Tails, although he did it mainly to stop Tails. Shadow couldn't bear to go to another mad level due to Tails' constant habit of destroying the space-time continuum. And so the two began the hunt for Eggman's balloon, it was easy finding it since Eggman decided to play his theme music at the loudest volume possible his surround system could offer.
Soon Eggman noticed that Shadow was trying to blow up his balloon and gain access to his base, so then he foolishly came close to Shadow on the platform and declared "Shadow! I'm afraid I can't let you get past here!"
Shadow discovered a missile launcher and without hesitation began to fire missiles at the balloon. Eggman screamed and flew away. This began a game of cat and mouse, Shadow and Omega chasing down the balloon to get a good shot at it, although at times Omega was forced to leave because of Tails trying to use him to kill Sonic. After an hour of chasing and shooting, the Egg Balloon was now engulfed in flames and drawing ever closer to main base which lay in the centre of the jungle, but Shadow had run out of ammo for the missile launcher.
"Eggman is getting away!" Omega said now having returned for the 30th time today.
Eggman laughed at Shadow, swooping over him before continuing on his merry way. "What are you going to do? Take on a Hind D – er, balloon with your bare hands?!"
Shadow rubbed his nose before throwing away the empty missile launcher and pulling out the Shadow Rifle. He attached a scope to it to extend its range, since this seems to work in real life. He aimed at the Egg Balloon and fired a shot at it, as luck would have it, Shadow's remarkable aiming skills paid off and the Egg Balloon was now disabled.
"Oh yeah! GOT YA!" Shadow said with a triumphant smirk as the Egg Balloon ground to a halt.
The result screen appeared and Shadow stood in a triumphant pose along with Omega doing a fancy celebration dance.
"You aren't getting away from me doctor..." Shadow said as he received an 'A'.
Shadow began to do another mad victory dance; he was yelling how great he was and how nothing can stop him. He was so happy he didn't hear the Egg Balloon explode in a ball of fire and begin plummeting into the vast depths of the bottomless pit. Omega watched as Eggman's balloon fell into the abyss, with Eggman yelling something.
"SSSSHHHHHHHHHHHAAAAADDDDDDDDDOOOOOOOOWWWW!!" Shadow thought for a second that he could hear his name.
"…Why do I have the urge to talk about a cremation?" Then he shrugged it off and continued dancing.
"Oh yeah! I am the Ultimate Life Form! Do do do!" Shadow went on for ages.
During this Eggman had managed to escape his flaming Egg Balloon and had climbed up one of the support beams which stretched into the chasm. Once he got to the top he fled into his base, Omega saw this and dragged Shadow along since he was still celebrating his glorious achievement.
Shadow had finally recovered from his celebration dance and now, along with Omega, was in hot pursuit of Eggman. They had ended up in a circular room with large circular platform in the middle, they stopped to have a look around. Omega initiated his Eggman sensors which the doctor had so foolishly installed in Omega.
"...Eggman detected! Approaching this direction!" Omega armed his mini-guns and Shadow braced himself for a fight.
And a few seconds later Eggman fell from the sky, screaming his lungs out in the same old Egg Breaker machine he had fought Shadow with at the Cryptic Castle and in the Matrix place. It looked no different and even had a slight bit of rust on it. It landed with a loud crash and looked like it would fall apart soon.
"Shadow...and Omega? YOU CURSED TRAITORS!! I WILL MAKE YOU PAY FOR DESTROYING MY BALLOON!!" Eggman armed the Egg Breaker ready to attack.
Omega aimed at Eggman but Shadow put his hand in front of him, he needed to know something.
"Doctor, please tell me. Those androids, the ones that, look like me...am I an android too?" Shadow asked with a hint of desperation, he wanted to know if he was an android.
Eggman was going to say 'Of course not!' But then he realised he might be able to get a laugh out of seeing the hedgehog suffer. It had been a while since he had been able to torment a hedgehog.
"Um...yes, Shadow. I created you...yeah that works." Eggman mumbled the last part to himself.
Shadow on the other hand failed to notice the hints of Eggman lying and shock stained his face.
"W-what...?" Shadow couldn't believe it.
"Uh, yeesss. I created you and Omega, with my own hands. But since you have betrayed me I have no choice but to crush you!" Eggman put his keys into the Egg Breaker and turned them.
After several attempts to actually start it up, it sprung to life, slamming its hammer down hard on the ground. Shadow fainted from the shock while Omega began to dance and speak at the same time.
"Now I shall destroy you Eggman!"
The Egg Breaker leapt down and was going to smash Shadow and Omega into tiny pieces when suddenly the unthinkable happened. A strange noise echoed from the Egg Breaker.
'Phut phut phut phut' the noise repeated several more times before resulting in a dying squeak.
The Egg Breakers arms fell to its side, and its head dropped down ever so slightly. Eggman began cursing the machine while Shadow and Omega laughed heartily at the scene. But Shadow could hear something in the far off distance, it sounded like laughter, and it wasn't Omega's laughing.
"MUAHAHAHAHAAAA!!" The laugh drew closer and closer until suddenly something smashed through the roof of the building and headed straight for Eggman.
"AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!" Shadow and Omega closed their eyes as the mysterious object collided with Eggman's machine.
Shadow peeked his eyes open and saw a red spaceship perfectly parked. Our furry hero raised his eyebrows at this before seeing a small compartment open, and out of it stepped an awfully familiar figure.
"Hey there Shadow, Omega. How ya doing?" Out of the ship came Sonic with his ever classic grin etched into his face.
"Oh no, not you again! I am sick of you!!" Shadow yelled at his blue furred rival.
"You've seen me like what, twice?" Sonic said holding his fingers up.
"Two is too many times more than I wanted..." Shadow sent a glare at Sonic.
"Well that's a fine thank you!"
"What do you want now? Or did you just 'happen' to crash here by accident?" Shadow said walking nearer the craft.
"Well...Tails' computer went haywire and said it would kill us in an attempt to rule the world." Sonic said pointing to the bridge of the ship were Shadow could see the silhouette of the young fox strangling the computer. This caused Shadow to raise an eyebrow at.
"Oooook..." Shadow turned his attention back to Sonic.
"So what are you doing in that thing anyway?"
"Well we are planning to head to the ARK. Wanna come with us? There's more than enough room for you guys." Sonic said with a welcoming hand.
Shadow didn't want to be anywhere near the blue hedgehog, not until he had gathered the Chaos Emeralds, then he could start taunting him about how inferior Sonic is to him. But then Shadow recalled something vaguely about the ARK, like he knew the place or something about it. Shadow took a deep breath and accepted Sonic's invite, even Omega came along. The ship hovered off the ground and sped off towards the ARK, which sat in orbit around the Earth. Little did Shadow and the others know they had two stowaways.
"I'm not finished yet Shadow...!" Eggman said hanging onto the ships wing, somehow hiding from the occupants.
"IWILLKILLYOUSHADOWANDPLEASEMYMASTERS!!" The GUN commander was hiding in the cargo bay of the ship, polishing his pistol. He gave a loud crazy laugh which no one heard.
And so our heroes sped off into Space to get to the ARK, Shadow stood at the front of the ship, looking at the outside. Sonic walked up to him and joined him watching the view.
"Hey Sonic?" Shadow had just realised something.
"What is it?" Sonic looked at Shadow with a confused look.
"Why are we going there?" Shadow said looking at Sonic with a raised eyebrow.
Sonic was about to reply when his face dropped suddenly and he began tapping his head.
"...I don't know! I guess it was a spur of the moment thing, heh." Shadow's eye began to twitch.
He reared his head back and let forth a mighty ear piercing scream.
"AAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHH!!"
Indeed, this would be a fine space ride to the ARK indeed...
T: Well I hope you liked this chapter! The next chapter will be based on the trip going to the ARK. It will be full of insanity, but when has this story ever been sane to begin with huh? Anyway, till next time!