Shadow's Odyssey 2: The Chaos Continues

High heeled boots clicked back and forth across the floor. The bat wearing the boots wracked her brain as she paced, ears flattened in frustration and worry.

"Did he catch some weird space virus that's making him crazy? Or did Eggman do something?" Rouge muttered as she reached the wall and turned back to pace the other way again.

Omgea spoke up from his place in the corner. "Are you certain it was the real Shadow?"

"He made it home last night. The dust was disturbed. But he's not there anymore. But that could just mean that he's captured and held prisoner while this fake impersonates him. But if so, where did the fake come from? And if Eggman was already in jail, who could've captured Shadow? Not that many people even knew he was back!" Rouge wanted to scream. "None of this makes sense!"

The door to Team Dark's office opened, and the commander strode in. "Can someone explain what the hell Shadow is doing?"

"We cannot." Omega answered

"Can you at least explain where he's been all this time?"

"Oh yeah, he probably hasn't told you. Well that's kind of a long story, but the short version is that Shadow ended up in a different dimension and got mixed up in a big war." Rouge summarized. "Eggman and the Chaos Emeralds were there too, which is why we hadn't seen them around either."

"So, did something from that dimension have something to do with this?"

Rouge thought for a moment. "Maybe… Shadow told us that there was this evil wizard guy who could go inside his head. Maybe he broke something inside Shadow's brain."

"So, Shadow has gone insane." Commander Abraham concluded. "Then we'll have to kill him."

The thought of losing Shadow right after they just got him back caused Rouge's heart to falter in its rhythm. "No! You can't just kill him!"

"We also can't let him roam around slaughtering people with a laser sword."

"But it isn't his fault! We just need to fix him!"

"And fix him how? You said that this is the result of some weird space magic. And you're not even sure that that's the case. For all you know, Shadow is choosing to do this."

"You don't know that either!" Rouge shot back.

The commander was unyielding. "What we do know is that Shadow is killing people. And his choice or not, that can't be allowed."

"Can't we at least try to fix him before we just kill him?" Rouge was trying very hard not to sound too pleading.

Abraham sighed. "I will give you twenty-four hours to find out what's wrong with him. After that, I promise nothing."

Rouge wanted to complain that it wasn't enough time, that the commander wasn't being fair, but she knew that this was the best she was going to get. She and Omega rushed out the door.

"Where are we going?" Omega asked.

"To find Eggman."


Eggman stared in disbelief. "How are you alive?"

Shadow's face scrunched in annoyance, not an unusual expression even when the hedgehog himself was in control. "I told you to build me a gateway. Not waste my time with your questions."

"How can I not ask questions?"

Sidious raised Shadow's hand, then growled and dropped it in favor of bringing out the Darksaber.

"I should have already killed you for your betrayal. You should consider yourself very fortunate. Don't press your luck any further."

Eggman eyed the dark lightsaber, then headed for the lab.

Sidious put the Darksaber away with another growl. He despised his new body, even though in some ways, it was ideal. Not just because of Shadow's strength, but because he was ageless, a quality Sidious greatly desired. But ever since he woke up inside the recesses of Shadow's mind, he could feel no connection to the Force. Shadow had massive power of his own, but Sidious hadn't figured out how to use it.

Adding insult to injury, was the fact that Shadow was small. He was going to have to learn how to fight all over again. He would have to adopt a fighting style similar to Yoda's and that rankled Sidious.

His thoughts were then interrupted by another annoyance.

"Let me out!"

"Ah yes, I almost forgot about you."

"What the hell did you do to me?"

"I took your body. I would've preferred to take control of literally anyone else, but I needed a new body quickly and I already had a connection with your mind."

Indeed, Sidious's transfer into Shadow's mind had essentially been a desperate, ungainly scramble and the effort had caused him to pass out. He had no intention of letting the hedgehog know just how close of a call it had been.

"So you possessed me? Shouldn't I be dead then?"

"Believe me, I could snuff you out any time I wish. But I won't. Not yet. Not until you watch everything you care about get destroyed. By your own hands."

Sidious then delivered the mental equivalent of a slap, sending Shadow back to the corner of his mind. Refocusing on his outward environment, Sidious decided to take himself on a tour of Eggman's base.

He was currently in the hanger, where Eggman had parked the stolen copter. There were many brightly painted ships of varying sizes scattered about.

Having seen their like before, Sidious disregarded them went over to the wall, where there was a door and an elevator. Eggman had taken the elevator earlier. Opening the door painfully reminded Sidious that Shadow's ears were more sensitive than his own.

On the other side of the door was an automated factory, hard at work producing robots. Sidious only gave it a quick glance before deciding he'd seen enough.

He went over to the elevator and was reminded of Shadow's shortness again as he had to stretch to reach the button. After a brief ride upwards, Sidious found himself in Eggman's laboratory.

The middle of the room was dominated by a massive workbench for constructing specialized robots too sophisticated for the factory downstairs to handle. One wall had chalk boards with calculations and notes scribbled all over them. Another had cork boards with blueprints and newspaper clippings pined to them. (Sidious blinked in astonishment that this planet was still so primitive as to use physical newspapers).

Yet another wall had a massive bank of computers, in front of which sat the fat scientist himself. Sidious left him to his work and went through another door.

This one led to a living area with a kitchen, bathroom, and bedroom. Sidious promptly decided that these would be his quarters now.

Reclining on the bed, he realized that he'd better learn as much as he could about this new world. Sidious sank down into Shadow's mind.

He started with people Shadow knew. Two results came up at once, Rouge the bat and E-123 Omega. He had seen them in previous excursions into Shadow's head, and knew Shadow valued them highly. When he examined Shadow's thoughts about Omega, Sidious discovered a connection to another person.

Miles Prower or Tails was the one Team Dark went to when Omega needed extensive repairs. Young, but highly intelligent and a talented pilot, he could be useful, particularly if he had to kill Eggman. Connected to him was the blue hedgehog Eggman so loved to rant about. Feeling he knew enough about him already, Sidious looked for another connection.

This led to Knuckles the Echidna. Shadow didn't know him very well, but what he did know caught Sidious's interest immediately.

There existed a gem that was not only more powerful than the Chaos Emeralds, it held dominion over them. The Master Emerald. Knuckles was its guardian, and rarely left the floating island where the Emerald was kept.

With this information in mind, Sidious decided it was time he learned more about how Shadow's powers worked.


Shadow still had all seven Emeralds in his possession, so Rouge was able to use a Chaos Emerald tracker to find him. Even as she and Omega followed the signal, Rouge berated herself for not being able to nip it in the bud.

I shouldn't have let him go. I knew something was wrong last night. I knew he was probably trying to downplay it. I shouldn't have let him go off by himself. I'm never letting him go anywhere alone ever again. Why did he always have to be like this? Why does he always have to be so stubborn? Why did he have to be so-

Rouge slammed into Omega's back.

"Ow! Omega, why did you stop?"

"We have arrived."

Rouge looked past Omega to see one of Eggman's bases.

"Okay Omega, here's the plan. You attack the front while I sneak in through the east vent."

"Mission accepted."

Omega promptly began launching missiles at the main entrance. Rouge made her way over to the air vent and slipped inside.


Eggman sat at his desk, crunching numbers. Shadow- 'Sidious' Eggman reminded himself, came in again.

"What is your progress?"

"Well, I'm pretty sure I can recreate the events that sent me to your galaxy in the first place, however Chaos energy is very unpredictable. We call it 'Chaos' for a reason. You could end up inside an already existing object or appear over a pool of lava. I can't even guarantee that you'll end up in that same galaxy. This did all originally happen by accident, you know."

Sidious slowly approached. "Whether you live or die depends on your usefulness to me. If you're going to be useless…"

The base rumbled and alarms began wailing.

Sidious growled. "Now what?"

"We're under attack!" Eggman answered.

"You stay here." The Sith in Shadow's body ran from the room.

As Eggman wondered if this was a good opportunity to escape, Rouge dropped down from the ceiling. He wasn't sure if he should be happy to see her.

"What did you do!?" Rouge snarled.

"I've done a lot of things. But I'm assuming you're talking about Shadow, in which case I did nothing."

"Then why did he break you out of prison?" Rouge demanded.

"He didn't, exactly. It was Sidious."

Rouge blinked. "But Shadow said he was dead! He made sure of it!"

"Well, apparently he didn't. Because Sidious is now in control of Shadow's body."

"That's impossible!"

"Well clearly it's possible, or else we wouldn't be here." Eggman pointed out.

"How do we fix him?" Rouge asked, becoming less angry and more desperate.

"How should I know? This has to do with all that crazy Force nonsense!"

"Then we need to find those Jedi people."

Eggman figured his odds of survival were best if he helped Rouge. "He wants to go back to his galaxy and tasked me with finding a way."

"Do you have a way?"

"Sort of. I have… ideas. But I need to run tests before I can guarantee anything."

"What kind of tests?" Rouge questioned.

"Well mainly, pinpointing exactly where this other galaxy is. Which could take years."

There was no question that that was going to take way too long.

"What if you were to take a guess?" Rouge ventured.

"A guess?" Eggman exclaimed in disbelief. "You want me to take a look at the whole multiverse and just guess?"

"There has to be some factor or science-y bullshit that narrows it down!" Rouge insisted.

Eggman groaned. "Well their universe seems to operate on a completely different type of energy than ours. We have Chaos energy, they have the Force. That didn't stop Shadow from being able to use his powers, though that could be because of the presence of the Chaos Emeralds or Shadow being a fount of Chaos energy himself. I've noticed Sidious can't seem to use the Force here, but that could be because he's in Shadow's body-"

Getting impatient with Eggman's rambling, Rouge cut in. "So what does all that tell you?"

"It can't be any dimension remotely close to ours. And then there's the strange fact that when Shadow and I were brought to that galaxy, the Chaos Emeralds were scattered all over it. Millions of light-years apart, much further than they usually disperse. That could have been the power of the Force interfering with them-"

"Can we focus please? We don't have much time here!"

"Well sorry, it's just this stuff is fascinating! Plus, my life kind of depends on me figuring it out, so cut me some slack! I'm being asked to find the tiniest needle in an infinite haystack!"

"Well you've jumped dimensions before, haven't you?"

"Yes, to similar dimensions. Ones that are home to slightly different versions of ourselves." Eggman explained.

"Well, you went to that dimension and you built shit. Can't you trace any of those things?"

"I have tracing devices for them, but they're all in that dimension. All my stuff got taken away from me and scraped when I was captured. I do have my emergency distress signaler hidden in my glove, but if they can't come to me that's useless. The only way…" Eggman paused, a thoughtful look on his face. "Orbot."

Rouge was confused, but hopeful. "What about Orbot?"

Eggman was grinning now. "He's still in that other dimension. I left him behind when he got broken. And he, like many of the robots I use now, was powered by a Chaos Drive. And Chaos energy… is something I can track."