*I forgot to let ya'll know! For those of you who have been with me for a while, I tried to keep a pretty regular posting schedule. Well, now that everything is opening up again, I'm gonna have less time to work on my stories. Busy working, helping a friend with illustrations for her book, my own book, and other stuff; I'll still be writing, don't you worry! Just posting will be less frequent, like 1 or 2x's a month.
Sorry for the change but C'est la vie!*
"WooooHoooo!" Shadow hears Sonic holler as he spin dashes through several rows of Egg-bots that explode behind him, taking out another dozen of Eggman's army. The dark hog pauses to look over to where another small battalion has just been destroyed by Omega.
If the robot had an actual face, Shadow was sure that Omega's would be smiling like a maniac, perfectly matching the definition of a gun-happy soldier. Even without such features, Omega's glee was evident by his mechanical laughter and loud proclamations of, "ALL MUST BE DESTROYED!" The excited yell threatened to crack a smile on Shadow's face, and honestly, if they were not under so much pressure to cause as much damage as they could in their narrow frame of time, Shadow would find the ex-Eggman robot's antics amusing.
Perhaps later, when the situation has been handled, he can look back and chuckle fondly over this moment. For now, he's just grateful that they have another set of hands to help out.
Speaking of which...Shadow staunchly faces back to the task, forming a handful of chaos spears in each hand as he charges forward to the next unit of soldiers. The energy from the smaller spears in his hands spark and crackle as he yells, "Chaos Spear!" throwing the projectiles at his targets that burst apart on impact.
The 3 continue their smash, dash, and bash routine, making a sizeable dent, but Shadow knows their efforts are meager. There's only so much that can be done with their minuscule numbers. There's no possible way we can finish this before Eggman finds out and comes back. There's got to be some way we can take out more of these things...like a bomb or emergency, self-destruct button!
Deciding to make a slight detour, Shadow turns to the wall and runs along it, searching for any indication of a control room or station hidden in the base. He blows through any robot in his way while keeping an eye out for anything that might help. A failsafe, a power source, heck, even something that serves as a communication link connecting all the Egg-bots would do for him to destroy if it means that they can finish that much quicker.
Unfortunately, not even halfway through his investigation, a low rumbling through the building catches his attention; Shadow screeches to a stop with a tilt of his head, twisting and turning his ears, scouring the area for the mysterious ominous noise. "I don't like the sound of this," he murmurs, eyebrows rising to attention when the Egg-bots begin rattling and shaking as if the base were in the middle of an earthquake. He hears Sonic somewhere in the distance missing his mark and yelling, "What the hell?!" while Omega emits some angrily confused beeps.
Before the dark hog can blink, the wall beside him explodes, tossing Shadow facefirst into a pile of discarded robot parts. Shadow groans trying to sit upright from the painful landing, dread filling his stomach as his ears ring yet still pick up the sound of familiar laughter.
"Ahahahahaha hohohohoho! Lookie what I've found! If it isn't, my two best pals, Sonic and Shadow."
"Eggman! It's about time you showed up!" Sonic crows, leaping on top of a pile of rubble, undeterred that his greatest enemy showed up. The hedgehog cracks his knuckles and neck with a smirk, "Now that you're here, we can take out the trash."
Eggman darkly chuckles with a slimy smile twisting the end of his mustache. "Oh, I agree, but I think we have different ideas about what identifies as...rubbish." Sonic crosses his arms, "For once, Eggbreath, I agree. Let me guess your treasure-" the blue blur waves his hands out to the Egg-bots still standing, "My traaash!?" he yelps as one of the Egg-bots flies over, nearly knocking Sonic over the head.
Both hedgehogs watch in surprise as the multitudes of robots they had yet to finish suddenly come to life, flying to the Doctor's hovercraft, swarming like bees around their nest.
Shadow's dread in his stomach quickly changes into rarely felt fear, his head slowly lifting as he watches the Egg-bot soldiers seamlessly connect like Lego pieces around the Eggmoblie. Growing taller and turning into a gigantic machine of nightmarish proportions.
He can do nothing but watch as the last few pieces click into place, forming a dragon-like monster complete with fangs. The horned head where Eggman resides now rises into the air like a cobra analyzing its prey; the Doctor's mocking voice comes out from a set of speakers hidden somewhere in the body. "Hmmm, your right, Sonic. This place is filthy! Good thing I came up with this little gizmo to help me take out the trash." before either hedgehog can comprehend what this means, Eggman strikes. The base instantly descends into a chaotic battlefield with explosions all around them.
Finding himself on the ground again, smoke fills Shadow's vision, and now he can't hear anything from the continuous noise. The ground-shaking underneath his fingers and the air vibrating from the dragon's roar overwhelm the hedgehog's senses. Being the Ultimate Lifeform, the dark hog can only imagine how this overloading mess is much worse for his rival if he feels this way. Almost paralyzing.
Shadow staggers to his feet, stumbles his way around, teleporting to a 'safer' area, and gathers his wits. Avoiding the deadly laser beams, missile shots, and gunfire. "Sonic! Omega!" he yells, then immediately scolds himself for the useless action. Stupid, they won't be able to hear me with all of this racket. I've got to get to higher ground-wait! My communicator!
Quickly dodging another missile blowing past him, Shadow leaps then rolls to a crouch hiding behind a pile of warped metal that covers him. The smoke, surrounding metal, and his dark fur effectively blend him with his surroundings. He prays that Omega's communication system isn't offline or damaged from the sudden offense. His prayer is answered when a digital voice comes out after a few moments, "SHADOW."
"Omega, listen to what I say and don't argue. We need to get out of here, or Eggman will blow us sky-high. We can't do any more damage than what we've already done. We're outgunned and outnumbered." the hedgehog orders with a not to be defied tone. "AFFIRMATIVE, CALCULATING THE FASTEST ROUTE TO THE CHECK-IN LOCATION. I WILL MEET YOU THERE." replies the reluctant robot, and Shadow sighs with relief that his zealous partner didn't fight him on this. Logic always gets Omega no matter how much that robot behaves, almost Mobian. He immediately regrets his large intake of polluted air, coughing from the lung full of smoke he just inhaled.
Once his lungs are mostly clear, the dark hog croaks, "Excellent, as soon as I find Sonic, we'll meet you there."
"AFFIRMATIVE. 10/4."
Cutting off the connection, Shadow peers over his hideout, looking for some indication of where his rival might be. It only takes a few seconds and a gust of wind clearing the smoke for him to spot Sonic curling up into a ball to rev himself up for a spin dash. The dark hog curses under his breath, bracing himself for the fight ahead; taking his rival away from the battle will not be easy, as he knows the only way Sonic will go is by being dragged away either unconscious or injured. If only they had the Chaos emeralds!
He shakes the thought away. Now is not the time to think of the 'if only's he needs to get into action!
Jumping into the fray, Shadow follows his rival to the best of his ability without giving his position away, trying to catch Sonic's attention between attacks. It takes several attempts, close calls, and misses before Shadow can catch Sonic unaware, pulling him aside behind a pile of burning rubble away from Eggman's targeting system.
The blue blur yelps in surprise when a firm grip on his arm pulls him back, almost making him fall. Just in the knick of time, as a laser blasts where the hedgehog had been standing moments ago. Sonic's jaw drops at almost being fried, then turns to see what had grabbed him. He glares fiercely with bared fangs, seeing that his rival had saved him, "What the hell, dude!"
"We need to get out of here!" Shadow yells, cutting him off; Sonic refutes, not about to listen even if the dark hog had saved his skin. "What?! No way! I told you! I'm not leaving!"
"Sonic, we're outgunned and outnumbered. We did as much damage as we could now; it's time to get out of here. I only have one emerald, which isn't enough to help. Maybe if we leave without Eggman noticing, he will blow this place to shreds looking for us."
"I said I'm not leaving. Not until everything is gone! I don't care if you leave, but I'm not gonna stop until this is over!" Shadow growls in frustration, throwing a fist to the side and hitting the metal sheet next to him with a reverberating bang! "You have to be the biggest idiot on the planet! This is suicide! There's nothing more you can do before Eggman blasts you into a blue smear on the floor. This isn't one of your solo adventures. I'm in charge of this team, and I'm ordering you to come with me!" Shadow knew it was stupid to say as the words came out of his mouth. His rival never obeyed orders from anyone, let alone someone affiliated with an organization he had very little respect for and a Mobian he clashed with regularly.
"The hell, I'm going to listen to you!" Sonic growls yanking his wrist out of Shadow's grip. Without another word, the blue blur dashes back into battle while his rival calls for him to come back.
"Sonic!" Shadow yells, reaching out, but the blue hedgehog is long gone; Shadow curses once again and goes after his annoyingly stubborn rival, determined to drag him out of this battle.
Sonic twisted, flipped, spun, dashed, and bashed between Eggman and Shadow. Inflicting as much damage as possible while evading the Doctor and his annoying rival's clutches, but it was evident that this was a losing battle. Shadow kept getting in his way, and Eggman got in more than a few good hits on the blue hedgehog, slowing him down. Despite his growing collection of injuries, this wasn't a battle Sonic was willing to give up on.
With each hit, Shadow could tell Sonic was getting increasingly stubborn and desperate, searching for something to give him the upper hand, but in doing so, he lost his focus. His hits were sloppy and had less force; the blue blur made mistakes and bad calls left and right as he got nearer his rope's end. After a nasty hit at the leg, the dark hog noticed Sonic's offensive maneuvers switch to defensive, which was not a good sign. With growing urgency, Shadow teleported himself as close as he could to his rival while not risking being shot, but Eggman's relentless attacks kept him at bay.
Suddenly something in the atmosphere seemed to change. The Ultimate Lifeform could tell what had shifted; he hadn't a clue, but once he lost sight of his rival, everything seemed to slow down to a snail's pace and go quiet.
The ear-piercing explosions ceased, the air stilled, and even the small roaring fires surrounding him seemed to quiet as if time had stopped entirely. The eerie atmosphere caused an uneasy chill to run down his spine and his quills to extend to their full as he waited, watching everything come to a standstill.
Suddenly an explosion very different from the others went off. It wasn't the kind that almost burst your eardrums. It was the kind you could feel vibrating in your chest, the sensation causing him to lose his balance and snapping Shadow out of his frozen state. "Sonic!" Shadow calls in alarm, searching for any sign of blue in the thick smoke. Another explosion goes off exactly like the first. The ground quakes as a distressed mechanical roar sounds along with the screech of metal bending and breaking.
The smoke passes at last, and Shadow gasps when he sees a blue dot not where it was before but now in the dragon's jaws, "That idiot, what the heck is he doing?!" he screams in alarm. Before he can take a step, the blue dot disappears inside the mechanical beast, Eggman screeching profanities in a panic. The Doctor quickly detaches the Eggmobile from his creation, calling out his famous, "Curse you, Sonic the Hedgehog!" before flying away as fast as possible.
Knew that the Doctor's hurry to leave meant something horrible was about to happen. With nothing left to lose, Shadow dashes to the robot dragon. The machine is now smoking from the mouth, sparking everywhere, and sounding like it was being torn from the inside out, undoubtedly the destruction being done by the blue blur himself. The warning groaning of metal pulls Shadow's attention back to the head, the foreboding noise generated from inside the beast.
The jaw still hanging wide open leaves the perfect opening for Sonic to shoot out of the dragon like a bullet out of a gun. As Shadow calls out, the mechanical dragon drowns it out, letting out one last moan before erupting into flames. The massive blast blew him and Sonic in opposite directions.
Shadow curls into a ball, rolling along with the force of the explosion just in time before hitting the ground; he yelps and grunts from the impact, keeping himself curled up as the robot ruptures, falling apart piece by piece for several seconds that feel like hours. The Ultimate Lifeform listens from his cocoon to the sounds of large cuts of blackened melting metal falling like a decrepit building and the creaking noises of the dying dragon, similar to what the actual creature might sound like in its last moments.
All goes quiet after the last eruption; the dark hog waits for several heartbeats before slowly and cautiously uncurling himself, watching and listening for anything else that might go off or come out and attack.
Keeping his hands and knees on the ground, Shadow fully unrolls himself letting the ringing in his ears fade away, coughing from the ash floating in the air. Did that little shit pull it off? He wondered as the ache in his joints and back from his earlier landing began to make itself known; Shadow winces, getting back on his feet, "Ah! That's going to bruise good tomorrow." gasping from the twinge of pain, he shakes himself off. Taking a moment to concentrate on the Chaos flowing inside his body, he searches for any severe injuries he might have sustained from the battle. The powerful force of explosions having sent him further into the remains of the factory than he had been in initially, but he finds nothing warranting a few tender spots and scrapes.
Good now to find Sonic.
Switching from looking inside himself to out beyond, Shadow, in his mind's eye, searches for a fellow Chaos user turning in the direction he saw his rival fall towards. The Ultimate Lifeform's eyes snap open, pinpointing a fading burning energy; strangely, his heart pinches at the realization that if he was reading the energy flow correctly, Sonic might be dying. "No, no, no, no!" Shadow mutters with growing alarm, panic crawling up his spine as he hurries to get around the massive piles of burning metal and rubble in his way.
It takes several precious minutes for Shadow to reach the area where he detected Sonic's Chaos energy, and he feels his heart sink in despair seeing the massive pile-up, knowing Sonic was somewhere inside the mess. Quickly the dark hog closes his eyes to figure out where his rival could be; now that he is much closer, Shadow finds the glowing signature no more than a few feet under and rapidly losing strength.
The ebony hog gets to work pushing, tossing, and breaking away massive pieces of the metal dragon, concrete, and rebar as fast as he can, pleading in a broken mumble for the spark of Chaos energy underneath not to die when he is so close.
"Shadow! Do you read me? This is Rouge. Can you hear me, Shadow!" A panicked staticky voice on the hedgehog's communicator fizzes. All the bat gets on the other end are Shadow's heaving breaths in between the barely audible utters of, "Come on, don't die on me, you stupid hedgehog. Stubborn idiot should have listened to me."
Shadow doesn't hear Rouge calling for him, too focused on getting his rival out in one piece and begging the Master Emerald that the one person who could understand him doesn't die.
Finally, with a loud groan of effort, Shadow pulls away the last piece of rubble separating him from his rival. When the dark hog looks down, he all but freezes with a silent wheeze at the sight before him. Time seems to stop, and he can't hear anything but his rapidly beating heart as he stares at the bloody broken hedgehog below, more purple than blue, body twisted in unnatural angles. It takes Shadow a minute to process seeing Sonic like this for him to catch that Sonic's chest is still rising with breaths of life but just barely.
"Shadow! Shadow!" A louder voice calls, pulling his attention from the bloodied hedgehog; the Ultimate Lifeform startles, looking over his shoulder to see Rouge and Omega coming towards him. The bat approaches with an uncommon expression of worry on her features, "Shadow, are you ok?"
The dark hog thinks about the question glancing in his peripheral at the ash covering his dark tousled fur. I must look like a wreak, but that's not important right now; I've got to get Sonic to a hospital. Nodding once, he says, "I'm fine, but Sonic is badly injured."
"He is?" Rogue questions, and Shadow gestures to the hole in the rubble he had just made where the bat gasps seeing their temporary partner's bad state. "Oh my goodness! What happened?"
"I'll tell you later. Is medical on the way?"
"Yes, I called them before Megs, and I came to look for you two when you didn't meet up at the checkpoint. Here help me get him out so I can do a field exam before the team gets here." Rouge pushes her way closer to the opening, and Shadow assists her, carefully taking the blue blur out of danger while trying not to cause further injuries. Once out of what would have been his grave, Sonic is laid flat, and the white bat begins her examination. Omega stands as a silent guard watching for the medical team to arrive.
With the worst of the adrenaline fading away, the strength in Shadow's legs fades, and he kneels at the blue blur's head, resting a hand on Sonic's forehead, feeling the pulse of Chaos energy moving slowly, growing weaker.
In all of their adventures, no one has ever been this badly injured; finding his strong rival almost buried alive and broken petrifies Shadow. The situation is a grim reminder of how fragile they all were, how fast a mission could go wrong, and one of them ending up dead.
The depressing thoughts leave Shadow's mind paralyzed and empty with shock. It takes a curling swirl of Sonic's Chaos energy to brush against his hand softly, and the invisible touch jump-starts his brain enough to refocus on the present. Stretching his fingers, Shadow focuses on gradually feeding his energy into Sonic's to keep the blue hedgehog stable until help arrives.