Shadic's Escape Chapter 27: Hunter and Hunted
Holy cheesy crackers, where have I been? I was still a Freshmen last time I updated! Iya...sorry for the insanely long wait folks, but the time frame here makes sense. See, most of my chapters are 15-ish written pages, and this one was, drum roll please, 51! So obviously, it took longer to get done! Whether or not it's 51 pages of goodness or agony, I don't know. I'm kinda half and half on this one... Be prepared to bounce back and forth between groups for awhile, because they are split up. Just remember that while you read one part, the other guys are still doing things too, so use your imagination to fill in any blanks, 'k? Should be fun, huh! Apologies if anything looks funky, too. This site seems to be handling my uploaded files differently than it used to...
Anyhow, happy holidays from Shadic 'n me, and we'll see you in another couple o' months or so! Hehe... (and just in case you're curious as to what I'm doing with all that silent time, there's a nice little spot in my profile page that'll tell how many pages of the next chapter I have written as of when, so you can tell when I'm cruising along nicely, or suffering from writer's block!)
HUNTER AND HUNTED
Shadic wasn't able to revel in her strange transformation for very long. Not five minutes later, her ears picked up a soft click from outside her door. Knowing that this meant that someone was about to enter, Shadic smiled. Who would be the first to see the new her?
A measly guard, she found to her disappointment. The young man, probably new, did a double-take.
"Whoa..." he awed. He quickly regained his composure and cleared his throat. "Um, I'm supposed to pick up a silver and blue hedgehog. She should be in here..." He scratched his head and looked around the room. "I guess I got the wrong place?"
Shadic rolled her eyes. Yup, this guy was definitely new... "No, it's me you're looking for." She briefly wondered what pointless task she was going to be given now.
"Are you sure? You're white, not silver," he said suspiciously.
"Trust me, I think I'd know," Shadic assured him. She began walking towards him and asked, "So what do they want now?"
"You're supposed to e-execute someone, I think," he stuttered as he checked his notes.
Shadic's eyes flashed. "Really?" she said slowly. "I think I can do that."
About the same time, Shadow and Soko were alerted by the sound of a door opening as well. Neither could see how morning had come so fast.
"Hope you've said your prayers, hedgehog," one of the two men said. Surprisingly, only one was human. The other, a gray fox, seemed wary of Shadow.
"Careful, John," the fox warned as the human unlocked Shadow's cell. "They say he bites."
Shadow said nothing, but let his so-called "fearsome appearance" speak for him. He walked out on his own, head held high to show that he was not afraid.
The human chuckled and to the fox whispered, "Dead man walking," just loud enough for Shadow to hear. Shadow paid him no attention. He instead turned to Soko who was watching with sadness etched on his young face. Shadow raised his hand in farewell; Soko inclined his head slightly.
"You'll get her back in one piece," Shadow said softly as he turned and took his leave, refusing to let either of the guards lead him.
"You know," Shadic said more to herself than to the guard she was following, "I've been thinking."
The man paused in opening the door that led to the large training room. "About what?"
"About how you people have been treating me. About how strong you imply those Emeralds make me. About how easy it would be to get rid of every last one of you now." She closed her eyes as if in thought and added, "Yeah, I think I'll do that. Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. But soon enough." She opened her eyes and smiled. The young man said nothing, but looked as if he had fainted on his feet. "Well, if you ever come out of it, pass that on to your boss, ok?" Shadic closed the man's dangling jaw for him, and took the card form his hand. "I'll let myself in."
Up in the balcony, several men and women in long, white lab coats stood around the length of the large windows. These men and women were the masterminds behind Project Shadow: Beta, and had insisted that they be allowed to view this great moment. To them, it was like a father watching his eldest daughter graduate as class valedictorian.
Once Shadic entered the room below them, they all leaned closer to the glass. But something didn't seem quite right... And it was awhile before anyone voiced their concern.
"I know she wasn't white the last time I saw her," one said slowly. He and the man next to him exchanged worried looks.
"We made sure she was homozygous silver didn't we?"
"If the fur decided to change, that will make it that much harder to identify her. There are thousands of white hedgehogs out there, but there's only one silver."
"Not anymore..."
"Listen, she couldn't have just changed color like that. It's simply genetically impossible!"
A heated argument soon erupted among the grown men and women. Individuals had to yell their thoughts, just to be drowned out by another. There was only one who didn't have to raise his voice at all, even though he spoke softly.
"She went Super..." the eldest man present said. As he spoke the room went deathly silent, but only for a moment. Clapping from the direction of the doorway broke the brief silence.
"Finally, somebody figured it out," mused Sam. He had entered several minutes before, but amongst all of the ruckus, no one had noticed. He strolled towards the window, taking his time. No one else seemed to be able to speak. "It's almost humbling, isn't it? Seeing our experiment at the height of her power."
"She's not meant to go Super," the stunned elder said. "We told you; warned you!"
"I know," Sam replied calmly.
"Then why the hell is she!" the man exploded.
"Because this way, we kill two birds with one stone," Sam told him. "Literally."
By now, most of the others had come out of their shock enough to speak for the paled old man. "After all the work we've done, you're just going to kill her?" said one.
"Think of all we could still learn from this project!" said another.
"You can't do this!"
"If you think about it, my decision makes sense," Sam spoke up. "Being the greatest minds of today, I'm disappointed that you haven't seen my point for yourselves."
"Oh, so there's a point behind all this?" one of the few women asked. "Well, we're listening."
Sam shook his head, and in a school teacher-like voice asked, "What is the primary purpose of Project Shadow: Beta?"
"To eliminate any threats," someone suggested.
"To eliminate the first project," Sam corrected. "We don't want Project Shadow to exist. It's a black mark on our record. We wanted it to just...disappear. So what did we do?" he asked. No one offered an answer for a long while.
"We created a second," the elder finally whispered. Sam nodded.
"And even with Shadow gone, little Shadic will still be proof that he existed. To clear our record, they both have to go. After today, Project Shadow, as a whole, will have never been."
Shadic spent a few brief moments observing the men high above her. That, however, soon grew boring. But it did tell her one thing. Such a big crowd meant that this fight wasn't going to be like the last one. This one would be important. Maybe that's why she was told to master the Chaos Emeralds. That must mean that her opponent was really good. The prospect of a real challenge made Shadic even more restless.
Even though it felt like a lifetime, only mere minutes had passed before her adversary had arrived, and Shadic couldn't have been more pleased. It was the black hedgehog!
He was escorted by two guards. After opening the door, they gave him a shove inside, nearly knocking him off balance. He turned and gave them a fierce growl; they simply waved and shut the door. He straightened and turned his gaze to Shadic. His face betrayed no emotion, but his prolonged silenced suggested that he was at least mildly surprised.
"Hello, Shadic," Shadow finally said, very plainly. "Remember me?"
Shadic took a moment to rack her fragmented mind for a name. "Shadow," she guessed. She wasn't sure where she had heard that name, but it was there. And it somehow seemed familiar.
Shadow closed his eyes and nodded once. "At least you can remember," he said softly. "They didn't take everything away from you."
He raised his head and found that he had left her confused. "So," he said instead, "I guess you're here to kill me."
"Yup," Shadic said with a smile. "I hope you put up more of a fight than the last guy."
"Sorry to disappoint you, but I promised that I would try not to hurt you."
Shadic frowned, then let out her own little growl. "What?" she hissed. She had grown rather angry in a split second, and in her anger happened to find that she could levitate. She hadn't meant to; it just happened, and quite quickly too. It was then that Shadow realized that she had been looking forward to this match. She really had changed...
"I don't want to fight you," he said.
"I'll make you," Shadic returned. She spared no further words and charged at Shadow.
Shadow instinctively leaped to the side, but Shadic was now many times faster than he, and had time to turn, catch one of his arms, complete the turn, and launch him into the wall, all in one, fluid motion that was quick enough to bewilder the mind. Shadow bounced off of the wall and landed heavily on the floor, momentarily stunned. He shook his head and started to get up, slowly as his vision was speckled with little spots.
"Come on, get up!" Shadic fumed.
Shadow looked up at her, unable to get used to this new, violent attitude. This definitely was not the Shadic he knew.
Soko sighed miserably. He blew it. Maybe if he had been smarter, he would have figured out how to get in and out of this place without getting caught. But no, he hadn't been careful enough. Everybody lost. Shadow... Shadic... And he'd be stuck in this cage for the rest of his life.
He heard the creaking of the door opening yet again and snorted. His first visitor, he thought grimly. Or maybe breakfast. He didn't want either.
And he didn't get either.
Soko did a double-take. "R-Rouge!"
Rouge the bat winked and slid a card through the lock, instantly unlocking the cell door.
"What's the guard doing in the jail?" she asked.
"What are you doing here?" he countered.
Rouge put a hand on her hip and sighed. "What's it look like? I'm bailing you out."
"But how did you-"
"Kept an eye on the prisoner count," she cut in. "It went up by two, and we figured it was you guys."
"How'd you get in!" Soko asked, only just beginning to register the situation. That bat had just broke into what was supposed to be a super secure facility!
"What's with all the questions? Come on, we've got work to do!" She started to turn, then paused. "Oh, and you really should have brought this with you."
She tossed him the card she had used to open the door. Soko caught it by the chain and gave her a questioning glance before turning it over. He found himself looking at this own picture. My ID... Of course!
He slipped it over his head and took off after Rouge.
"Did they already come for Shadow then?" Rouge asked.
"Yeah," Soko answered. He blinked. "How the hell do you know about this already?"
"Used to be a spy remember? I still got it."
Soko shook his head. He should have known... "Are the others here too?"
Rouge nodded. "Ready to launch a full-scale attack."
Soko flinched. "Do you have to put it that way?"
"Do you think we can just ask Shadic to come along nicely? Knuckles said that before we can do any good, we've got to take some fight out of her."
"There are other ways," he snapped. Half a second later, it hit him. He grabbed ahold of Rouge's arm and started running the other way.
"Hey!" Rouge cried. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Weapons lab," Soko answered simply. "We've got to get to the weapons lab!"
Shadow and Shadic stood at opposite sides of the room, glaring at one another. By now, Shadow was looking rather beat-up, while Shadic could have started frothing at the mouth for her anger at any time. She wanted a good fight, and she wasn't going to rest until she got one!
Shadow, too, was beginning to realize that. He figured that if he didn't do something soon, he would be massacred. But what could he do? Shadic was too fast! And worse off, she never seemed to do the same thing twice.
Like now.
She didn't seem to be doing anything. Just standing there, as if giving Shadow a chance to catch his breath. Or trying to catch him off guard.
Shadow wasn't buying it. He wouldn't let her psych out him out! He kept his wide stance and watched her attentively.
Soon Shadic tried yet another new tactic: she began feigning boredom. She loosened up and calmly took a step to the side. Shadow did the same, but went the other way. There was one thing he wanted between himself and her - and that was distance.
"How many blows is it gonna take before you decide to fight back?" Shadic asked as they slowly circled. Shadow offered no answer. "That many huh? Alright, have it your way."
The steady circling ceased as Shadic made a quick dash at Shadow. But he was prepared this time around, and was already moving to dodge.
"Chaos Control!" Shadic yelled, and she disappeared in a blinding flash of light. She had never intended on reaching Shadow after all.
Again, he had been tricked.
Shadow made a three-sixty degree turn in order to relocate her. But Shadic didn't appear to be anywhere in the room.
He knew he was mistaken when he felt a slender arm hook around his neck.
"Next time," Shadic whispered into his ear, "look up."
She used her free arm to hold one of Shadow's hands firmly behind his back. She could feel his quick pulse through his wrist. Whether it was from psychical exertion or plan fear was technically irrelevant, but she hoped it was a decent mixture of both.
Already feeling the burn from lack of proper oxygen levels, Shadow tried desperately to escape. Unable to free himself from the Super hedgehog's strong grasp, he tried the next thing that popped into his head without hesitation - basic instinct.
He curled himself as best he could into a spin dash. This time, Shadic was the one caught off guard. Her hold loosened then broke as Shadow threw her off of his back, nearly mowing her over as he continued rolling. He didn't bother making a graceful stop, either. With hands on knees, he took the time needed to refill his lungs. Even as he did this, his skin began to tingle, as if he could feel how angry Shadic was. A glance upward told him that this were probably true, as she was there before him, levitating a few inches off of the floor, glaring at him.
"Nice grip," Shadow panted.
"I'm still waiting for a decent hit from you," Shadic said. She spread her arms wide. "C'mon, I'm wide open!"
"You're the only person I know who actually wants to get hurt," Shadow sighed as he straightened again.
"This is a waste of my time otherwise!" Shadic snapped exasperatedly. "If you aren't even going to bother putting up a fight, then they might as well take you out back and shoot you!" She balled her hands into fists and dawned a very serious look. "I'm going to ask you one last time," she said slowly. "Will you, or will you not, make any attempt at a decent attack?"
"I believe I already answered that question," Shadow answered. He faintly heard a low-pitched growl from Shadic, but seemed to be able to feel her fury in full.
"Fine," she said in a slightly wavering voice. "We're done."
Shadow didn't even see her move, but the next thing that he was aware of was a knee in his stomach, followed by a fist to the face. Shadic didn't even give him enough time to fall. She grabbed him around the middle and used the power of the Emeralds to take them both towards the high ceiling. With a twist she was able to hurl him back to the ground. He landed with a sharp cry of pain.
Shadic let herself drop and landed on her hands and toes, eyes ablaze.
"Worthless waste of my time," she hissed as she slowly stood. The whites of her eyes slowly darkened to purple. She was preparing for her final attack, and she could already tell that her new power would enhance it ten fold.
Shadic took her time gathering energy for this last blow. It was amusing watching Shadow try to get back to his feet. She could tell that he must be in incredible pain, and that kept him from achieving his goal. The best he could manage was getting to his knees. He grimaced and held on to his left arm tightly, just between the elbow and shoulder. Blood seeped from beneath his fingers. Must be broken, Shadic mused.
She smiled and raised her right arm, taking aim. The aura, combined with the Chaos energy around her, was almost painfully bright, even to her. Sparks of energy danced playfully across her body, gathering at her arm, ready to go.
Shadow raised his head and the two made eye contact, though he could hardly see her. Not only was his vision swimming in and out of focus, but her temporally white fur blended so well with the blinding light around her.
Shadow knew what was coming, and also knew that there was no preparing for it. But somehow he felt that everything would be alright; nothing to worry about. She won't kill me, he found himself thinking. She'll hold back just enough... I know it...
And for a long while, nothing seemed to move. Shadic didn't understand why she paused. Something about the look on Shadow's face... He looked downright pathetic, just sitting there, bleeding all over the place. But something else was there as well - trust. Why? She simply did not get it, and the more she tried, the more she made her head hurt. That had to stop.
She attacked.
Instead of a wide blast extending in all directions, a single, concentrated beam left Shadic's arm and met Shadow head-on. Perfect aim.
Shadow was forced not only into the wall, but through it and the next. Pain like he'd never known seared his already injured body, like being bathed in searing fire and freezing ice, combined with the force of a truck.
Shadic watched with mild satisfaction as Shadow harshly hit the ground outside. He landed upon his stomach on the pile of debris from the two ruined walls. A few loosened pieces that didn't fall at first came down on top of him, but he didn't notice.
Shadic lowered her arm, disappointed that her battle had gone so poorly. She carefully made her way across the rubbish and looked down upon the mangled, bloody hedgehog.
"That's that," she said with a frown.
She wavered and put a hand on what was left of the wall. A dizzy spell had suddenly come on. She closed her eyes and shook her head, and then it passed. "Whoa...what was that?" she mumbled, wondering if she had somehow worn herself out more than she had thought. She also wondered if she would be allowed to maybe rest for awhile... A look over her shoulder towards the watching group didn't give her much hope of that.
"Soko, what are we looking for?" Rouge asked.
"Anything that could help us," he answered as both he and Rouge scanned the shelves of the weapon's lab. It was a huge, hangar-like room, filled to bursting with guns, lasers, robots, and traps galore.
"What would that look like?" Rouge asked again. She took a strange, claw-like item from a shelf and examined it. Just as she was putting it back, the metal teeth snapped open. She gave a cry of fright and dropped the item, which hit the concrete floor with a loud clatter.
"What are you doing?" Soko hissed as he poked his head into her isle.
"Sorry!" she quickly apologized.
"Don't touch anything else," he warned harshly as he reached down to return the artifact to its shelf. He rubbed his temple and gave a deep sigh. "You can fly, go up there and see what you can find," he told her, indicating the second level.
Rouge nodded in agreement and stretched her wings. A few strokes got her off the ground, and soon she stood on the landing of the second level. It looked more like where a hospital might store vaccines, and it was significantly cooler up here. Rouge folded her wings again and began searching through these shelves. They were mostly lined with clear, glass bottles filled with various liquids.
"Talk about a bio war..." Rouge whispered to herself. She gave a shudder when she thought about what some of those chemicals would do once inside a person's body...
It didn't take long to go though each isle. By the time she reached the end of the last isle, Rouge was somewhat disappointed. The clock was ticking, and they still hadn't found anything useful.
The dim light hardly reached this far, and because of that Rouge nearly missed the door hidden in the back of the room. She had only noticed it because she had looked back to make sure that there were no more shelves. She reached for the handle, but the door would not open. She narrowed her eyes in the semi-darkness, and saw the dim outline of an electronic lock.
"Hey Soko?" Rouge called. Her voice echoed eerily back to her.
"Yeah?" came Soko's voice, equally distorted.
"I think I found something... A door with a lock. Think your ID can open it?"
A pause.
"Maybe. Hold on."
Rouge's sharp ears followed Soko by the sound of his footsteps. She moved to the other end of the hall to watch his ascent up the metal ladder.
"Where is it?" he asked once he finally caught sight of her.
"This way," Rouge beckoned, and she led him back to the door. "Wonder what's in there?"
"Only one way to find out," Soko answered as he took the ID card from around his neck and slid it neatly through the lock. It beeped it's approval, and a click told them that they could now enter. Soko turned the handle and pushed the heavy door open.
"Whoa..." they both gasped in unison.
They stood before but a single hallway, lit eerily with evenly spaced, dull red lights. Said illumination caused the hundred of tiny jars and vials to glow, adding to the other-worldly effect. And if the second floor could be called cold, this one could only be deemed freezing.
"Check-it-out," Rouge said in a whisper, her breath rising in puffs of vapor before her.
"You may have found something." Soko said, clearly impressed.
"Look at this." Rouge pointed to the nearest container. It held a crystal clear liquid, and was labeled simply as "Power Down".
Soko looked over her shoulder, and carefully took the jar from the self. It felt like ice in his hands, and he wondered briefly how the liquid inside managed to escape freezing. "'Power Down'... he recited quietly. "I'll bet anything that this is what they use to neutralize Shadic's Chaos powers!" he said excitedly. "And look, 'Blood Sample'," he read off of another vial holding a familiar looking emerald green substance. "That could only be hers. I can't believe it, Rain was right! She does have a section all for herself!"
"And I found it," Rouge added proudly, even though she had hardly understood a word of Soko's rambling.
"That you did. Alright, now all we have to do is find something that we can use to our advantage. Something humane," he added as Rouge opened her mouth, probably to point out that anything in this room could be used to their advantage.
"Would a net be considered 'humane'?" Rouge asked before bending down to read a card on the bottom shelf. The very few things that were not liquid were kept down here and were labeled with cards. "Oh, never mind. This says it's an electrified net..."
"That's probably what most of them will say," Soko said with a said sigh. He scanned through more of the vials, picking some up, putting most back, but kept a few that may be helpful later on. When the time came to reverse what had happened, he figured that they would need as much of this stuff as possible.
He found what he needed at the very end of the isle. Three lone vials, a card under which labeled them as "Sedative - Levels 1, 2, & 3".
"Perfect!" he said with a smile. Yet it was a smile short lived. "But how can I get it to her?"
"What are you mumbling about now?" Rouge asked.
"I found exactly what we needed: sedatives. But how can we use them on Shadic?"
"Inject them of course. Aren't you supposed to be smart?"
"Rouge, we can't just walk up to her with a syringe in our hands and say, 'Alright Shadic, hold out your arm'," Soko said in an exasperated tone.
"Well, maybe that's what this thing is for," Rouge returned. She backtracked to where she had already looked and triumphantly picked out what looked like a rather oversized gun. "Voilà!"
Soko raised an eyebrow and gave her a disbelieving look. "We're going to shoot her...?"
"No!" Rouge exclaimed, clearly disappointed that he didn't see the magnificence of her find. "See, you fill a syringe, and put it here, I think," she explained, pointing to a space on the front of the object. "It's like a long-range shot!"
"And you just figured all of that out by looking at it?"
"Of course not. I read the label. Hey, how come there are three of those vials?" she asked as Soko took them from the shelf.
"The first one is probably only potent enough to calm Shadic down. So the second should put her out," he guessed.
"So...what about the third one?" Rouge questioned when he did not continue. He held the last vial in his hand and stared at it, as if trying to find the answer.
"I don't know about this one..." he eventually admitted.
"Maybe it knocks her out longer than the other one," Rouge suggested.
"Maybe... Come on, let's get out of here."
"Now hold on. Knuckles wants his Chaos Emeralds back, and I don't see them with you. I'm not going to put up with his whining, so where are they?"
"I've got a pretty good idea."
"Hey Sonic?" Tails called as he went through the Tornado's shutdown procedure.
"Yeah little bro?" Sonic answered after jumping off of the wing.
"Did you see that smoke right before we landed?"
"No, what smoke?"
Tails pointed over Sonic's shoulder, and the hedgehog turned and looked up. "Oh, that smoke," he remarked. Sure enough, the sky was darkened by a long, black trail.
"You might want to check that out, Tails," Knuckles suggested as he too lowered himself from the wing. "Could be trouble."
"Trouble?" Amy asked from the passengers seat. "What kind of trouble?"
"Oh who knows. Maybe this place is getting ready to blow, just like Prison Island did," Sonic told her with a smirk.
"Y-you really think so?" she asked slowly.
"Nah, not really," he admitted. "But that's why Tails is here, eh Tails?"
"Right!" the fox responded proudly. He crossed his two tails over each other until the tips were together, then snapped them with a flourish. His spinning tails, acting as helicopter blades, carried him into the air with ease.
"What d'ya see, buddy?" Sonic asked.
"Not much," Tails answered. "It looks like something took the wall out, and there's a lot of light coming from inside."
"We should go check it out too, Sonic," Knuckles said.
"Yeah, you're right."
"Shouldn't we wait 'til Rouge comes back?" Amy asked. Her request was unheard, as Sonic was already gone, and Knuckles was right on his heels. "Ooooh, they never listen to me!"
"C'mon Amy!" Tails called as he landed and jogged after them as well.
"Wait for me!" Amy cried. She scrambled out of her seat and took off to catch up.
"I can't believe we haven't hit any security yet," Rouge whispered to Soko as they crept through the hall. He put his hand up and she stopped. He looked past the wall, down into the next hallway.
"You spoke too soon," he murmured.
"How many?" Rouge asked.
"Just one."
"Male?"
"...yeah..."
"Leave him to me," Rouge said slyly.
"Wait, what? Rouge!"
"Relax, she said over her shoulder as she left their hidden location.
Once the guard caught sight of Rouge, he stood quickly and asked, "Are you authorized to be in this facility?"
"Well of course not," Rouge said calmly, at which point Soko covered his eyes out of dread. "I'd think that since that evac. order was issued, no one would be allowed in here."
"Evac? he man repeated slowly. Rouge chuckled and shook her head.
"As in 'evacuation', you know? Oh, you didn't hear about that?" she said before the guard opened his mouth again. "There was a leak up in the labs nearly half an hour ago! You'd better get out while you still can!"
At this, the man paled, and after the initial shock had warn off, bolted for the exit. "They don't pay me enough here! I quit!" he yelled on his way.
"Too easy, as always," Rouge chimed to herself. "The bad man's gone now, you can come out, Soko!"
"If he hadn't been so young and naive, he would have asked what you were still inside for, and we would have been dead!" he scolded.
"You're not so old yourself, believe it or not."
"Then maybe he's just stupid, like someone else I know."
"Well! You're snippy all of a sudden! Fine, go on, lead the way to the Emerald's and then we can go."
Soko gave Rouge another few seconds of glaring, then heaved a sigh. "They're probably still in Shadic's room, just up the hall."
"Oy, is that-?" Knuckles began as he and Sonic slowed.
"Shadow!" Sonic finished.
There he was - the great Ultimate Lifeform - stuck under a pile of rocks.
Amy and Tails arrived moments later, by which time Sonic and Knuckles were trying to free Shadow from the debris on top of his hopefully unconscious body.
"Shadow!" Amy cried as her hands went to her mouth. "Is he ok?"
"He's got a regular mountain on top of 'im," Knuckles grunted while he shoved aside a rather large chunk of concrete. "How do you think he is?"
"Uh...S-Sonic?" Tails stammered.
"Hm?" Sonic paused long enough to give his suddenly fearful friend a look of concern. Tails raised his arm and pointed to something behind Sonic and Knuckles, eyes wide and jaw slack. "Wha- Whoa!"
"Who is that!" Knuckles exclaimed.
"Who are you? Shadic demanded of them at nearly the same time. She had not yet been able to leave the room, as the door was refusing to open. She was beginning to suspect that perhaps her job was not yet complete...
"Hey guys, guess what? I think we found Shadic already!" Sonic announced unnecessarily. "How's it goin', Shadic?"
Shadic merely blinked; it was clear that she hadn't a clue what was going on. "You've got no tag," Shadic observed. Her eyes trailed slowly to the body of Shadow. "You're helping him." She returned her gaze to Sonic with a growing smile on her face. "You're Sonic the Hedgehog, my second toy for the day."
"Oh boy..." Sonic murmured, ears drooping.
"I sense much pain in your future if you don't move it!" Knuckles hissed.
"Right, you take care of Shad, and I'll keep her bus-aie!"
A certain white-blue ball of fuzz hit Sonic dead on with the force of a cannon ball. Together they flew back through the brush from whence Sonic and the others had just come. Shadic drove Sonic into the ground and flipped out of her spin dash, landing with cat-like grace just above his head. He gave a groan as he sat up, and rubbed the back of his neck.
"Okay...that hurt," he admitted. "I didn't know you could go Super," he added as well.
"Is that what this is called then?" Shadic asked as she looked over herself once more. "Can you go Super too?"
"For awhile, yeah." Sonic was back on his feet and watching Shadic tentatively. With Shadow down and out, he was the only one left who could take her on. She did seem to be curious at the moment though, so maybe he could just keep her talking until her power ran out. It had to eventually!
"Then do it," Shadic demanded.
"I can't just 'do it', I need the Emeralds."
As soon as Shadic heard the word "can't", she stopped listening and lunged again. They had been standing so close together that it was no problem seizing Sonic by the wrist without so much as a retort. Sonic soon found himself dangling by one arm many feet in the air, and looking into the eyes of a rather ticked off Shadic.
"You'll do it," Shadic spoke in a hiss so low that Sonic could hardly hear her, though they were barely two inches from each other, "or I'll drop you. And I doubt you'd be in one piece by the time you reach the ground."
"I told you, I don't have the Emerald's, so I can't!" he explained yet again. Shadic let her hold on him loosen just enough for him to slip a little. More than enough to make his heart skip a beat. He looked down over his shoulder to find the tree tops uncomfortably far below. He also noticed a much, much more comforting sight. Rouge and Soko had just emerged from the building, so far away it seemed, each with a number of colored shapes in their arms. Perfect timing, guys, Sonic thought gratefully.
"Okay, okay, you win," he said to Shadic. "Just let me down - gently! - and I'll get the Chaos Emeralds from those guys down there, okay?" He pointed them out to Shadic to give himself some preparation time before continuing. He seriously did not want to do this, for so many reasons. "Then I'll go Super, and," he swallowed with some difficulty, "and we'll have a battle. That's what you want, right? A fight?"
"A challenge," she corrected in a semi-snarl. She gave the offer some thought, then nodded her approval and brought Sonic back down to the ground. She didn't bother waiting until his feet touched the grass before letting go though.
"Right, just gimme a few minutes then," Sonic said as he regained his balance. He then gratefully left Shadic levitating where she was and jogged briskly to the rest of the group.
"What was all of that about?" Tails was the first to ask.
"Well, I think she's pretty darn determined to get into a good fight," Sonic said vaguely. "Rouge 'n Soko not here yet? I saw them coming from up there; guess they were farther off than I thought. They'd better hurry up."
"Would you quit talking so fast already?" Knuckles snapped before Sonic continued on, a mile a minute. "What, you want a bigger audience for when you get pounded? What are you even doing talking to us? What's goin' on!"
Sonic snickered. "Hey, calm down already Knux. I just need to nick the Chaos Emeralds from those guys. Shadic wants me to go Super too." He frowned. "Says that she wants a challenge..." He fell silent, and Knuckles took it that he was afraid.
"Aww, wittle Sonic doesn't have to be scawred," he taunted in a mock-up baby voice.
"I ain't scared!" Sonic cried. "I just don't wanna hurt her, you know? It'd be just like having to fight Tails. Besides, she doesn't mean to be like this."
"Um, Sonic?" Tails spoke up. "I think she kinda meant to do that." He pointed to the now free form of Shadow. Amy was using the first aid kit from the Tornado to clean up some of his smaller wounds, but she couldn't do much.
"Ah, well, you know what I mean..." Sonic muttered, his ears flattening. "Hey, it's about time those guys got here."
By the time Sonic had looked away from Shadow, Rouge and Soko had finally arrived, laden with all sorts of items, including all seven Chaos Emeralds.
"Is that Shadow? What happened!" Rouge gasped. Whatever she was holding was thrown at Sonic, and she ran off to get the story from Amy.
"Shadic..." Soko murmured, gazing at her with a lost, pained expression. It made Sonic pity him.
"No worries, Sok!" he said brightly. "I'll keep her occupied while you try and keep her from killing me, cool?"
Soko nodded but looked slightly sick. "Keep her attention off of us...just for awhile. We've found some sedatives to use, but we have to get close enough."
"Alright, we've got a plan! And I'll be needing these," Sonic said as he dropped what Rouge handed him and took the rest of the Emeralds from Soko. "Good luck."
"You...you too," Soko choked. Somehow seeing the wild looking Shadic and knowing that a broken Shadow lay a few feet away made this seem unusually, terribly real for the first time. He was dimly aware of setting the remaining objects he carried on the gently swaying grass, and sitting before the strange gun-like contraption. Hopefully, they could get it to work, and more importantly, get it to work right the first time.
Eventually, he noted that his fur was blowing about madly in a sudden, unnatural wind. He flattened his ears against the roar of this wind and looked up at Sonic, whom had just gone Super. Over his shoulder, Sonic grinned and gave Soko a thumbs-up, for he knew that the green hedgehog was going to need all the encouragement he could get. Then he turned and locked his glowing red eyes with the still purple of Shadic's. He allowed the Chaos energy now flowing all around to lift him from the ground, and slowly made his way to her. Regret clawed at his insides like a raging animal, but he knew what he had to do. He had to fight Shadic - really fight. Unless he could find ways to get around it, there wouldn't be any holding back, or it would probably cost him his life.
"Well, you've finally finished," Shadic said as he stopped, leaving a bit of room between them this time. "For being called Sonic, you seem pretty slow."
"Aww c'mon, you haven't even seen me at it yet," Sonic told her, rapidly coming up with a plan while he still could.
"Hmph," Shadic snorted. "Then show me what you can do."
The two launched at each other, Shadic with one fist raised. When they met, Shadic swung, but Sonic completely over-shot her, and soared over her head leap-frog style.
"If I'm so slow, come and get me!" he called. He had to laugh at the bewildered look upon Shadic's face. Shadic growled at him, revealing her sharp, white teeth, and gave chase.
"Well Sonic, you've got her attention," he muttered to himself while the two bolted in and out among the trees. "I hope they hurry up."
"Well Sir," a woman said coldly to Sam, while the rest of her colleagues remained silent, "I hope you're happy."
"Oh yes, quite," he replied.
"We just lost our multi-billion dollar project," the old man wailed in a daze.
"And it was a billion well spent," Sam added happily. "And now that this is all over, I think I'm taking a long vacation."
"It isn't over yet," a wolf in his thirties snapped. "She isn't dead, so maybe your plan won't work out after all."
"Bah, it's just as well. Shadic's going to kill Sonic, and if he doesn't take her out with him, the Chaos Emeralds will. You all might as well go home and get some rest. Every one of you could use it."
Sam held up a hand as if to ward off further argument and made his way out of the room. He practically bounced down the hall, and decided to take the stairs for once. He was absolutely joyous, for the first time in who knew how long.
At the bottom of the stairs, he passed by the door to the training room, still locked on his orders. Next to the door, a young man sat gloomily on the floor. Sam cleared his throat loudly, and the man looked up with a start. He jumped to his feet and mumbled a hasty apology.
"What are you doing down here?" Sam asked. The youth's eyes bolted back and forth nervously, and his hands shook terribly.
"Tha-that thing's gonna ki-ki-kill us," he stammered.
Sam immediately paled. "What thing...?"
"That girl...the hedgehog... I don't wanna die!" the man cried hysterically.
"Get ahold of yourself!" Sam snapped. "Listen, go home and get some sleep. A lot of us are doing just that. Don't worry about a thing, everything was taken care of. That girl's dead now."
"Dead...?" the man repeated. "Really?"
"Absolutely," Sam answered. He watched as the man heaved a sigh of relief, relaxed, nodded his thanks and started slowly away. "In fact," Sam started again, "tell everyone you see that they can have the rest of the day off. Spread the word for me."
"Yes, Sir!" the man responded enthusiastically.
Sam wished that he could share the youths enthusiasm. He had guessed, even expected to receive death threats from Shadic eventually. But somehow, it still scared him. Why? He could easily tell everyone that she was over and done with already, but why was he second-guessing himself now?
"I'm getting out of here," Sam said to himself as he began walking again, "before I change my mind."
Sonic learned two things so far. One: he was still the fastest thing alive. Two: that had to make Shadic the most agile. Through the woods there were few straight-aways, but when they hit them, it was Sonic's chance to get ahead. But most areas were covered with trees and branches that were difficult to dodge at these speeds. Sonic could stop and turn on a dime, but Shadic didn't need to. She used the trees as shortcuts, and would kick off of their trunks to get a speed boost.
They neared the last clearing, the one Sonic had seen on the way here. In fact, it was a cliff; one Shadic knew as well. But since the two could soar as well as any bird, it didn't pose the same threat.
Sonic stole a glance behind him, to see how close Shadic was now. To his surprise, he didn't see her, until a white flash to his right caught his eye.
Shadic kicked off of another tree, and launched herself at Sonic like a missile. She tackled him, and without thinking sunk her teeth into his soft ear. Sonic gave a wail of pain and tried to get loose, but didn't want to risk tearing his fragile ear.
The two bounced and rolled on the ground, and tumbled over the edge of the cliff. Levitation was impossible while one clung to the other, and so they fell. Either way there was pain to be dealt, and the water below helped Sonic to decide that a few stitches in the ear might not be so bad.
Sonic twisted, hard, and elbowed Shadic in the stomach. She let go with a gasp of pain, and though the wind had been knocked out of her, she managed to regain the balance necessary to keep from falling any further. Sonic had leveled out as well, though he grimaced against his damaged ear.
Shadic had to pause to catch her lost breath, as did Sonic, snarling hatefully as she waited. A thin coat of blood covered her front teeth, and Sonic knew that since it was red, it was his own.
I'm bleeding when I'm supposed to be invincible! Sonic thought to himself. He haphazardly dodged as Shadic charged him yet again, now that she had had enough time to breathe. He wanted nothing more than to be playing the chase game again, especially as Shadic turned and headed his way again, eyes blazing. But they had already come so far, and he was supposed to stay near the group so they could do their part.
He'd have to stay here.
Sonic took a fighting pose and a deep breath as well. As much as he detested it, there was no more he could do other than take Shadic head-on.
"I don't hear them anymore," Tails complained.
"So much for the 'staying close' plan..." Knuckles grumbled. "Better prep the Tornado."
"I'm on it!"
While Tails went to start the bi-plane, Knuckles took the job of updating the others.
"Looks like we're takin' to the skies," he told Rouge, Amy, and a greener-than-usual Soko.
"What should we do? We can't all fit," Amy reminded him.
"You and Rouge find somewhere to lie low. Take Shadow too." He turned to Soko, who was clutching his weapon tightly and staring at the ground. "You figure out how to work that thing?"
"I think so..." Soko answered quietly.
"C'mon then, you take back seat, I get the wing. Ever fly before?" he asked lightly as he headed towards the plane, motioning for Soko to follow. "I take your silence as a no. It's a hoot, but hold on tight; Tails likes to flip the thing, and he hasn't gotten around to installing passenger side seat belts yet."
At this, Soko's grip on the gun increased, and the look on his face told it all: I'm glad I didn't eat anything today...
By
the time Shadic reached Sonic, he was ready. She had her arm raised
again, ready for another punch, but didn't realize that this left her
right side unprotected. When Shadic threw her punch, Sonic had
already begun to duck. He kicked outward, and his foot connected with
her vulnerable side. She winced, but wasted no time for recovery.
Shadic caught ahold of his leg and threw him into the rock wall, much
as she had done with Shadow. A cloud of dust erupted upon his impact.
Before the dust had a chance to clear, Sonic exploded forth from the cloud, curled into a spin dash. His dash was so fast and unexpected that Shadic didn't even have time to think about moving, let alone doing it, and so he collided with her, and this time drove her into the rocky wall.
She was still seeing stars when she kicked of of the wall, but there was a strange sense of urgency that kept her moving. She couldn't so much as slow down, yet she couldn't tell if it was just because she didn't want to, or because she really, literally couldn't stop.
Sonic saw her coming, and was unsuccessful in his own thrown punch, though he did manage to graze her cheek. Shadic, on the other hand, was quite successful with her uppercut, which smashed into the underside of his chin. He must have bitten his tongue then, as Sonic had the metallic taste of blood in his mouth.
He vaguely heard Shadic yell the words "Chaos Control!", and so wasn't altogether surprised when she spin dashed him from below. The force of her attack sent both of them soaring skyward, though Shadic's flight was on a controlled path, and Sonic's wasn't. Once Shadic veered to the side, there was nothing to keep Sonic from falling again and gravity took over.
Sonic felt his change of direction, but was too disoriented to do anything about it. Those last three blows were doozy's, and he still felt the sting from the first one!
He slowly opened his eyes, and felt as if the bottom of his stomach dropped out. Sonic had heard of Shadic's specialty attack; he had even seen it briefly one time, but it wasn't aimed to hurt then.
"Oh no..." he murmured. Shadic was smirking knowingly at him, and her solid purple eyes and the additional bright outline dancing around her made Shadic seem simply all powerful, not to mention fearsome.
She didn't bother with carefully shaping this energy blast into a collective beam like last time. It took too much concentration, and she was starting to feel far too tired and overworked.
Her attack went in every direction, like a sphere pushing outward. From Sonic's perspective, it looked much like a tidal wave, heading straight for him. And since he was merely free falling, he could do nothing but wait for the wave to catch him. He didn't have to wait long; the attack turned his fall into a plummet, and felt like liquid fire flowing over him.
Sonic had no hope nor thought of being able to stop himself from the harsh landing he would receive. But when he did hit bottom, it was with a thud, and not a splash. So he had enough luck to hit the strip of land beside the small river, and not in the water itself.
He let out a soft groan. If he was in this much pain now, in his Super form, he hated to think how bad it would be once he went back to normal. That would be a moment he dreaded.
Even though he didn't think he'd be able to get up again, Sonic found himself rolling over, very slowly, very carefully, and began to rise. Once he was on his feet again, he stood half doubled-over, and could hear his own heavy breathing hissing through his teeth.
Sonic watched as Shadic descended back to his level, and was pleasantly surprised to find that she kept her distance, rather than handing it to him again. Was it just him, or did she seem awfully run down all of a sudden? Or had he simply not noticed until now?
Her transaction from air to land was not a smooth one. Levitation ceased when she was still a few inches from the ground, and the shock of a brief fall nearly made her knees buckle. Sweat rolled down her face, and she seemed to be panting even heavier than Sonic. She must be shaking as well, for the tips of her ears were quivering slightly.
"Are you okay?" Sonic asked, giving voice to concern in spite of himself.
"Fine," she spat, but then she added, "Why...?"
"You don't look so good," he said with a frown.
"Worry about yourself," she meant to say harshly, though it came out much quieter than she wanted. Shadic couldn't figure out just what was going on. She had remembered feeling a little dizzy after finishing with Shadow, but that had gone away as soon as she had started the battle with Sonic. But now it came back; much worse this time. Why should she, the one who had taken hardly any hits, be the one who was so exhausted? She had meant that last assault to be the end of it, for a good reason. Everything had gone into the previous attack, and it had left her with nothing. She didn't think she could fight much longer - she didn't even want to anymore!
"Maybe you ought to take a break," Sonic suggested tentatively. "You know, sit down before you fall down?"
"You gonna make me?"
"No," he said simply, "but you need it. And it's not like I plan to slit your throat or anything if you take a break. I'm just trying to help. And so are those guys."
Sonic took a chance and pointed out the quickly growing speck in the distance. Shadic wasn't going to look, but curiosity always won, even in times like this. She turned to the side, so that any movement made by Sonic could be still seen in her peripheral vision. It would have been impossible to miss the small plane traveling in their direction. Shadic would have dismissed it, if she hadn't have recognized the orange fox operating at the controls. It didn't take her long to figure out what was going on.
"You...you cheated!" she sputtered, her eyes growing wide and afraid.
"We're not cheating," Sonic said softly. "We don't wanna hurt you, really! You might not know it, but there's something really wrong with you, and we're gonna make it right, 'cause we're on your side!" he quickly explained.
"You cheated!" Shadic repeated the accusation again, this time in a panicky voice. She took a few fearful, jerky steps backward, then realized that this would put her nearer to the plane. She didn't want to be near any of these people anymore. What had she been thinking!
"Why don't you come with us?" Sonic continued, shamefully knowing that the odds had now tipped in his favor. "You can't stay here."
"I'm not going with you," Shadic cried. She took another look behind her, and decided what the best plan was...
She ran, ramming into Sonic's shoulder as she went. He went down, and she continued on as fast as she could away from the Tornado.
Shadic didn't know nor care where she was heading; she just wanted to get away. Earlier the idea of such uneven odds would have appealed to her. Then again, her limbs hadn't felt like jello before.
"I'm not going with them," she panted encouragingly to herself. "I'm not going!"
Knuckles raised a hand to shield his eyes and continued scanning the ground below.
"There they are!" he called to Tails. "Wait...why is Shadic running away?"
Tails straightened in his seat to see over his instruments better. "I don't know," he answered, "but we should be able to keep up. This might even make things easier for us!"
"I think Sonic's hurt," Soko said, barely loud enough for Tails to hear. Again the fox squirmed in his seat to see if this were true. It was an easy task to find the golden form of Sonic starting to rise once again.
"Knuckles!" Tails yelled. It was harder to get this attention, as he was standing above them on the wing. He must have heard, since he bent down to hear better. "How about you go and help Sonic? Soko and I should be able to take it from here."
Knuckles gave him an upside-down thumbs-up and disappeared off the back of the Tornado. Tails could feel Soko turning around in his seat.
"What's he doing?" he asked.
"Don't worry," Tails assured him. "Knuckles might not be able to fly, but he's very good at gliding."
Sure enough, Knuckles' fall was a slow one, and he landed quite safely. Once he was out of sight, Soko turned frontwards again with a long sigh. These people were going to give him a heart attack with all of their crazy stunts.
When Shadic saw the red shape fall off of the plane, she sped up, unsure of what is was, and unwilling to find out.
You're a coward.
It seemed that the same voice from a few nights before suddenly decided to speak again.
"Not...not now," Shadic grumbled tiredly. She looked back and saw that whatever had come from the plane wasn't following, but she still didn't bother to slow down any.
Your opponent gets a little assistance, and you run away. Coward.
Shadic made a noise somewhere between a growl and a whimper, and tried to ignore the voice hissing in her ears.
Turn around and finish your job!
"I'm too tired... I'll lose!"
You already lost anyway.
"I did not!" Shadic roared. After that, she heard nothing more from the strange other voice. It never even struck her as odd that she was hearing things in her head again.
Shadic took another step and stumbled, as her leg decided that it wasn't going to support her weight any longer, and she scrambled to keep moving. Anymore she was having a difficult time making her body do what she wanted.
Up ahead, the water to Shadic's left split into two streams. One continued flowing straight, while the other curved further left, seemingly into the rocky wall itself. If there were an opening, it would make a perfect hiding place - one where the plane couldn't go.
"I can make it," Shadic told herself. "I have to!"
"Soko!" Tails called over the wind. "We might have a problem!"
"What is it?" Soko said into Tails' ear as he leaned forward. Tails pointed to the stream of dust that was the fleeing Shadic, then slowly moved his arm towards where she seemed to be heading. "A cave...?" Soko murmured in bewilderment. Could nothing else go wrong?
Tails turned to face Soko, and in an urgent voice said, "If she goes in there, it's over - we won't be able to follow! All we can do is fly low and hope that thing shoots far enough. You're only gonna get one chance," he added with a frown. After seeing the lack of confidence on Soko's face, he boldly stated, "It's now or never!" and took the plane into a steep dive, leaving Soko with no time for doubt.
"What if I miss?" he asked as he gripped the sides of the Tornado to keep from sliding out of his seat.
"You won't," Tails said over his shoulder. "You hit all of us with tranquillizers before, remember? You can do it again!"
It was a strange way to give him encouragement, but it was all Tails could think of to say. Besides, they were out of time.
Tails jerked back on the control stick and brought the plane out of its dive. They were now close enough for him to see that Shadic wasn't quite as white as before.
"Shadic must be getting too tired to hold her Super form," he said more to himself than Soko. She was lasting an awfully long time for her first try.
"Get ready, Soko!"
Tails shifted to one side to give him a better shot, and Soko chanced half-standing so he was as close as he could possibly get. He still looked somewhat ill, but Tails had to admire him or his still steady hand.
"If this doesn't work," he said nervously to the fox, "we don't have a backup plan."
"We won't need one."
Soko closed his eyes for a moment. "I hope you're right..."
And as much as he didn't want to, as much as he hated it, Soko finally pulled the trigger.
Just as Shadic entered the cool, moist cave, she felt a stinging pain in the middle of her back. She gave a sharp cry and tried to reach whatever had struck her, but it was in a place that she couldn't get to - around where the two quills came off of her shoulder blades. Knowing that the object sticking to her must have come from those people following her, she desperately wanted to get rid of it.
Shadic curled into a ball and rolled, trying to knock it off that way, but she only succeeded in driving it in deeper. She wailed in frustration and came out of her roll, continuing on through the cave.
The area around where she had been struck had gone numb, and the sensation was beginning to spread rapidly. The ground seemed to be tilting, and the confusing illusion caused Shadic to stumble and veer into the wall. She scraped much of her left side on the coarse stone, but couldn't really feel any pain. Her vision became blurry, and her eyes refused to refocus. She could see or feel nothing...couldn't hear...couldn't think...
She never noticed when she came completely out of her Super form, and her fur darkened to silver again. Nor did she noticed dropping, and tumbling out of control due to the momentum she had.
By the time she stopped moving, Shadic was in a deep, drug-induced sleep. She lie on her side, somewhere far into the cave, her wet fur matted and stained green in places. And she remained aware of absolutely nothing.
Tails brought the bi-plane down in a relatively clear area not far away, keeping the propeller spinning so they could leave quickly. He was startled when he heard a loud metallic clunk just as he was starting to get out. Worried that something was wrong with the Tornado, he whirled towards the source of the sound, but only found Soko, already on the ground with the dart-gun at his feet. Tails gave him a questioning look, wondering why he had thrown it.
"I've shot at Shadic three times so far," Soko said solemnly, looking away from Tails. "Hit twice. I'd rather not do it again." He gave the fox an end-of-discussion sort of look before walking off towards the cave. "Come on. We have to find her."
"Right." As Tails scrambled after Soko, he was strongly tempted to ask about that third, missed shot at Shadic. Of course, he held his tongue, knowing that this wasn't the right time, not that there ever would be one. "You know, after we find her, we have to go get Sonic and Knuckles too," he said instead. "Not to mention Amy, Rouge, and Shadow..."
What he didn't tell Soko was that they had hardly been able to fit in the Tornado the first time, and that with three additional passengers, there wouldn't be room for everyone. It might be a big problem later, but he'd keep it to himself for now - at least until they regrouped.
When the two entered the cave, they both had to hold onto the wall to find their way. Tails' eyes were sharper than Soko's, so his were able to adjust to the darkness sooner.
"I really hope that tranquillizer worked, Soko," he said uneasily. "If it didn't, Shadic's gonna be really angry, and it's not exactly big in here..."
"Oh, it worked," Soko answered quietly. He pointed downward, where Tails could see faint footprints on the ground. "The strides aren't as even as they were further back, nor are they straight. She had to have been getting drowsy at this point."
"But she kept going," Tails noted. He paused before adding, "I wonder why she didn't stop?"
"Panic...fear... How was she to know what was going on?"
Tails could tell from Soko's tone that he was still feeling miserable. No wonder he had thrown the gun away; Tails didn't even pull the trigger and he felt guilty!
"That must have been scary," Tails said sadly. "Poor Shadic..." The fox hung his head shamefully, and in doing so happened to find that the footprints left by Shadic had all but disappeared, only to be replaced by random, splotchy shapes. He was just about to mention this to Soko when he instead ran right into him.
"Ow, what's-"
Tails didn't have to finish his sentence, and froze just as Soko had done.
"We found her..."
Soko slowly, almost cautiously began to approach the still form of Shadic. She lay with her back curved slightly, her limbs strewn before her and eyes closed. One hand rested palm-down near her face; the other lay stretched out farther from her body, the fingers half-curled and relaxed.
Soko dropped to his knees beside her, staring. He tentatively touched one of the many scrapes on Shadic's upper arm, knowing that if she could feel any pain at all, the action would at least cause her to flinch. But he got no reaction from her at all.
"That must have been a really strong sedative," Tails whispered oddly, unable to stand the awkward silence. Soko didn't seem to have heard, and was working on removing the dart from Shadic's back - something she seemed to have tried herself. He held it in the palms of his hands, eventually closing his fingers around it and continued to look blank. Tails shifted his weight back and forth, want to say something, but doubting that anything would get through to him.
"We'd better go..." he heard Soko mumble, "while she's still sleeping..."
"How long do you think that will be?"
Soko shook his head, but didn't really answer. He wasn't sure about the drugs potency, but if he and Rouge were right about number three being the strongest, it would probably be awhile.
He gently scooped Shadic into his arms and stood, his mouth a thin, straight line. He walked past Tails without a word, seeming to be off in his own little world. Tails flattened his ears and followed, keeping his silence as well during the short trip back through the cave.
The two headed straight to the Tornado, and while Tails jumped right into his seat, Soko waited. It seemed that he had spotted the little problem of space for himself.
"We won't all be able to fit," he said with a heavy voice.
"I know..." Tails sighed. "Don't worry though, we'll figure something out. You and Shadic are going to have to share a seat, and someone else will have to stand is all. Just be careful while you're climbing up."
Soko knew that even with that set-up there wouldn't be enough room. He pushed the issue from his mind, however; he had plenty to worry about as it was, and Tails was probably better at problem solving than he anyway.
Since he had to have at least one free hand to get to his seat, he had no choice but to drape Shadic's limp form over his shoulder and hold her around the waist. Then he was able to slowly climb into the plane, where he was faced with the second puzzle of how to fit two into a seat designed for one. Awkward as it was, the only was it could be comfortable done was for Shadic to sit on his lap, sideways so that her quills would not poke him in the chest.
"Ready?" Tails asked once Soko seemed settled.
Soko nodded, but another voice shouted, "Wait!"
Neither had been paying attention, and so neither had noticed Knuckles running as fast as he could towards them, burdened by what looked like an unconscious Sonic over his shoulders.
"Hey guys," Knuckles panted. "Mission success?"
"Yup, thanks to Soko!" Tails chimed. He gave Soko a friendly smile, but Soko continued to look glum and kept his gaze low. Tails frowned and turned away, shaking his head. He hated to see someone so blue for so long.
"You'd better watch yourself, Soko," Knuckles warned. "Hedgehogs seem to be dropping like flies today."
The hedgehog's reply was an icy sidelong glare that very clearly told both Knuckles and Tails to shut up.
"So how's Sonic?" Tails asked quietly, giving up on Soko for awhile. "Is he gonna be ok?"
"Yeah, but he's definitely going to need some patching up," Knuckles said seriously. "And he's not the only one."
"Will you be able to ride with him on the wing?"
"As long as you don't do any flips."
Three metallic bangs from above soon told Tails that Knuckles was set, and at long last he took off.
The young fox gave a sigh of relive and sat back in his seat, gratefully letting the cool wind blow the bangs out of his face. He'd love to say that this nightmare was over, but that wouldn't be true. He was going to have to ask Soko what he wanted to do with Shadic sometime soon. Sonic and Shadow were probably going to need medial attention. Then again, they still had the problem of transportation, and the fact that the group was still on dangerous grounds... And Sonic wasn't exactly in a position to help him like he usually was.
"I'm on my own," Tails murmured in a soft, sing-song voice. The sound was gone long before passing through anyone else's ears. "But that's ok.
He made a few passes over the area where he had thought they had left Amy, Rouge, and the downed Shadow, but failed in his efforts to spot them. A wave of fear nearly drove him into a panic, until a glint of light from below caught his eye.
Now deeper into the brush than they had started, both Amy and Rouge were jumping up and down, frantically waving their arms over their heads to draw Tails' attention. The light must had been the sun reflecting off of Amy's bracelets.
Tails allowed himself a laugh, instantly relieving the previous feelings of stress. He smiled and began the routine search for a clearing to land in.
"You had me worried for a second!" he called to them. This time he let the Tornado power down, so there wasn't as much noise, and to allow the machine time to cool.
"We had to move," Rouge explained, "some sentry 'bots were getting a little too close."
Meanwhile, Amy practically tackled Knuckles in her efforts to reach Sonic. "Oh, my poor Sonic!" she wailed. "What happened to his ear?"
"You tell me," Knuckles said with a shrug. "But if you're not careful, you're gonna end up strangling him."
"Somehow I think he's very lucky to be unconscious," Rouge whispered. She turned towards Soko and eyed the sleeping Shadic laying in his arms. "Guess that stuff really did the trick, huh?" She reached over to put a finger under Shadic's chin and lifted her head a little, to get a better look. "She could use a couple of bandages too. So what are you going to do with her now?"
"I've been meaning to ask you that myself," Tails jumped in. He unbuckled himself and turned around in his seat, resting his head upon his arm. "What do you think?"
Soko remained quiet before answering, being careful with his choice of words. "I don't know... We planned this poorly," he spoke slowly.
"Poorly?" Rouge repeated with a laugh. "I was under the impression that we didn't plane this at all!"
"What we need is a damn laboratory," Soko spat impatiently. "And we don't have one," he added in a softer tone.
"What about mine?" Tails asked.
"That's more of a robotics lab, Tails," Knuckles reminded him, now getting into the conversation himself. "Shadic's not a machine, you know. What about that one near the Mystic Ruins? You still have that don't you?"
"Oh, that's right!" Tails gasped. "It's kinda small, but it should work pretty well. I have a lot more hi-tech stuff there anyway."
"And it's out of the way," Knuckles added. "You know, just in case things get a little...out of hand..."
"Fine," Soko agreed after a brief, awkward silence, "we'll take her there. Now how do we do that?"
"Ah, right," Tails grumbled. "Well, the way I see it, Knuckles, Soko, and I should take Shadic to my workshop. Amy and Rouge should probably take Sonic and Shadow to the nearest hospital. Only problem is..."
"We've only got one ride," Rouge finished. "And a small one at that."
"Exactly. And I don't think we can really afford to make two trips. We need to get Shadic somewhere safe before that drug wears off, but we can't leave those two lying around like this - especially here. And there's no way we can get everyone in the Tornado at the same time."
"Are there any doctor's around here within walking distance?" Knuckles asked doubtfully.
"Not unless you turn around and go right back to GUN," Soko answered bluntly.
"Well what about Nena?" Amy suggested. "She has a car."
"Does it look like she's here?" Soko growled through gritted teeth. He obviously still was not on good terms with Nena.
"It was just an idea!" Amy retorted hotly. "You don't have to be so grouchy."
"Wait, Amy's idea is a good one!" Almost immediately, Tails was turned frontwards in his seat again and was booting up the Tornado's small on-board computer.
"But even if she had left before us, it would take Nena all day to get here," Rouge said.
"Yeah, but she does live around here, doesn't she Soko?"
Soko gave the fox a quizzical look, wondering where he was going with this. Not that Tails caught it, as he was busy with the control panel. "Yes... But still too far to walk," he answered with the idea that perhaps Tails planned for Rouge and Amy to await Nena's arrival there.
"They won't have to! Nena has three kids, and if they're home, maybe they could come pick you up."
"And how do you expect to ask them that?" Knuckles questioned. Tails answered by tapping the small screen before him.
"E-mail!" he proudly announced. "Lucky for us, the oldest son is almost always at a computer. That's how Sonic first met Shadic, remember? He told us that he just happened to be using my computer when Nena's son set up an instant message for them. Kind of ironic, if you think about it..." he mused.
"Why would Kevin do that?" Soko asked, an almost suspicious tone to his voice. He had never known of the time Nena had brought Shadic home, as it wasn't something he had to know at the time. He had only heard that Nena was the one who had first let Shadic run away. Perhaps it was actually Kevin's fault.
"I don't know," Tails said as he began typing a message. "But it's pretty lucky that he did, don't you think? We never would have met you two otherwise."
"Oh, yes you would have," Soko said to himself. He busied himself by smoothing the fur atop Shadic's head. "They would have met you, at least," he continued softly, though he knew that Shadic nor anyone else could hear when he spoke so quietly. "Just like this. Except instead of unconscious, they'd be dead. All of them." Such a chilling, morbid thought, true as it was.
By the time Soko glanced upward again, Tails had already sent his message, and the others were absorbed in another conversation as they hopefully awaited a reply. Knuckles seemed to be telling the story of his encounter with the injured Sonic.
"I told him he might as well give up the Super form, because Tails had the rest covered. He only would if I promised not to repeat anything he said once he did." He paused to snicker, as if he found something incredibly humorous. "And I won't. I'll just let you guys fill in the bleeps; trust me, there's a lot of them."
"Sonic swore?" Tails asked with wide eyes. "He hardly ever does that!"
"Hardly ever doesn't mean never."
"Geez, today's just full of surprises, isn't it?" Rouge said with a laugh and a shake of her head.
"Your screen is flashing," Soko warned Tails.
"Huh?" Tails wasn't paying attention, but found that he was right. "Hey, he answered already!"
"What's it say?" Amy asked as she and the others crowded around the screen.
"We're in luck!" Tails announced after skimming through the beginning of the return message. "He says that he'd be glad to help out, even though he's not supposed to use the car. But he agrees that this is an emergency, and that should justify the act. And he says that he'll leave right away, and when he gets here, he'll park somewhere unnoticeable by security, and will wait for you there. So you two have to keep an eye out for him," he told Amy and Rouge as he read more thoroughly. "It will still probably take Kevin awhile to get here though."
"We can take it," Rouge assured him. "Just drop Sonic over there by Shad, and we'll be good little girls and wait, won't we Amy?"
"No problem!"
"Alright, just keep hidden and watch out for any stray security 'bots, okay?"
"Quit worrying about us and get going already!" Rouge scolded to Tails. "You forget that you don't exactly have all the time in the world. You start the plane, Knuckles can help Amy get Sonic situated, and I'll go grab the stuff Soko and I picked up."
"Who made you the boss?" Knuckles grumbled, even as he did as told.
"I did. Somebody's gotta keep things organized here."
In no time at all, Sonic was carefully moved, the Tornado was again up and running, and Rouge and Knuckles were trying to fit all seven Chaos Emeralds plus the small stash of jars, vials, and what-not into the even smaller storage space.
"If you think of it," Tails told Amy as they waited, "give us a call once you get to the hospital. Do you have the number?"
"Yeah. Don't worry, we'll take good care of them," Amy promised once she saw the concerned look Tails threw in Sonic's direction. "And you make sure to do what you can for Shadic, okay?"
"We will."
"Looks like you're all set to fly guys," Rouge soon announced. "Good luck!"
"You too! Ready up there, Knuckles? It's gonna be a long flight."
"As ready as I'll get..."
"Come on, we'd better back up," Rouge warned Amy as Tails began to take off. They both waved and watched until eventually the small plane got smaller and smaller, until they could see it no more.
"Think they'll be able to reverse whatever those horrible people did to Shadic?" Amy asked.
"Sure!" Rouge answered with complete confidence. "They've got Tails for brains, to find out what to do and how to do it. Soko, who probably knows more about Shadic inside and out than she does. And on the off chance things get a little wild, Knuckles is there to hold her down."
"I hope you're right. We need more girls in the house."
The two had a good laugh at the remark, and found a nice, concealed spot to sit and wait for their ride.
"Everything will be just like it was soon enough," Rouge said. "We just have to give it a little time."
A/N: For anyone who's flipping out due to the whole sci-fi-ish twist of that "other voice", I'll try 'n do it justice in the next chapter. It may be a kind of spoiler, but there's more to it then just to cause sci-fi haters to wish pain on my head. /insert maybe sort of spoiler warning here/ You could think of it in terms of there being a "light" Shadic and a "dark" Shadic. There are enough cartoons with that plot in them for that to help confused ones out there. During times in the chapter you just read, there are slight differences in how she acts, maybe so slight that no one's gonna notice but me, but maybe you'll pick it up after reading this. You could say that the "light" and "dark" halves are having a tug-of-war type thing going on, and when she seems more cruel (kicking the can out of either Sonic or Shadow's rear end, acting all demanding and like a jerk, etc), the "dark" half is winning. Other times (when she holds back for Shadow, decides to run from the Sonic-crew instead of fighting more), the "light" half is more in control, so she's more like herself. It's not exactly how I should explain it, but it's the best way I can think of, 'cause my mind is fried and I wanna sleep...mehe! Maybe I made the message I wanted to send in the story actually visible to one of you, who knows?