Act I: An Unwelcome Hero

A Sonic the Hedgehog fanfiction by Black Mantle

This is a fanfiction, and as such, most of the characters in the story are not mine. Most characters are © Sega, and are not used with permission.

Imagine if you will, that the only thing you knew was that there was someone out there like you, and that you didn't like them, that you wanted to beat them at anything and everything, that your intense dislike of that person was growing into full-blown hatred.

Then imagine that circumstances changed, and soon, you would have no choice but to forget your hatred, and would have to face life without the only thing you knew, or worse, becoming that which you despised.

For in the troubled land of Mobius, a stranger named "Shadow" has come to this land and would face that very scenario.

Just a quick note on Shadow: Although he is based on Shadow from Sonic Adventure 2 for the DreamCast and GameCube (SA2:Battle), there are a few changes. In the games, his Chaos Control power was active when he held a Chaos Emerald; but here, a Chaos Emerald awakened the Chaos Control and it is now powered by Power Rings. At this point, no one knew what Chaos Emeralds were except for the Guardians of the Master Emerald, like Knuckles the Echidna. I am taking some liberties as to the full power of the Chaos Control.

Also, in place of his hover shoes, Shadow possesses what is called a "phase run" power. He can't run as fast as Sonic on his feet, but his phase run acts like a series of teleportations. With each step, Shadow transports to a point several metres in front of him. This has a few advantages, such as he's invisible for the most part, except on "phase in". Also, he can instantaneously change speed or direction, unlike Sonic who would have to speed up, slow down, or turn. However, if he overshoots the mark or phases in mid-air, he can't maintain it and falls back to normal speed. So jumping over a large expanse or skipping over water is out of the question; for that, he needs the Chaos Control.

If you have trouble picturing it, think of an anime ninja, preferably a cartoony one, jumping from rooftop to rooftop. All you would see is the ninja on one rooftop, then a blur, and then they're on the other rooftop. The phase run works like that, only you wouldn't see the blur in the middle, and Shadow only remains in one spot for a fraction of a second, making him very hard to see. Actually, pick a fight scene from Dragonball Z, and you should have it.

One last thing, Shadow's history is also different. In the games, he was created by Dr. Eggman/Robotnik's grandfather, Dr. Gerald Robotnik. The Shadow in this story has a different history, which I will bring up in a later act.