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.

Chapter 2: Falling

Later that afternoon, Sally had regained consciousness, but was otherwise lying still in her bed. Amy was at the side of the bed trying to get her to eat a bowl of some oatmeal like food prepared at the hospital.

"Come on, your highness, you have to eat."

Sally laid there; she was aware of Amy and the spoon that was being held in front of her face, and simply ignored it.

The pink hedgehog was really getting frustrated and was almost pouting.

"Can't you see what you're doing to yourself? You have to stop this. Well, if you're going to act like a big baby, then fine."

Amy put the spoon back in the bowl and mixed up the contents a bit then took a fresh spoonful of the slop to Sally's mouth. "Open wide, the horsey's coming into the stable."

For the first time, Sally actually gave a slight response to Amy's taunting, but it was nothing more than a leer at her new retainer for the childish remark.

"I was talking to the doctor earlier, and if you don't eat this, he'll put it in a bag and siphon it through a tube going down your nose. Do you want that?"

Sally returned to her blank glaze and ignored Amy again.

Amy was getting more frustrated and returned the spoon to the bowl.

"I can wait here for hours until you eat this."

The door opened silently, though both Amy and Sally still heard it. Shadow crept in, not because he really thought he could get in unnoticed, but because it was a hospital.

"Hello ladies, anything going on?" He whispered.

"I've been trying to get Miss Sally to eat her supper, but she won't take it."

Shadow reached out and took the bowl from Amy's hands. "Let me have a try."

Amy got out of the chair to let Shadow take her place. "Thanks, you're a life saver."

"Whose, yours or Sally's?"

"Mine stupid, she's driving me nuts."

Shadow turned to Sally. "You haven't been a very nice princess, have you?"

Sally ignored the banter.

Amy walked out, leaving Shadow to try and get Sally to eat the semi-liquefied mass.

"You gonna eat this? If you don't I will."

Sally ignored the hedgehog and the spoon of food at her mouth.

Shadow shrugged, withdrew the spoon and put it in his own mouth. His eyes bulged out and his mouth drooped after getting the consumable in his mouth. With a warped frown, he gludged back the mouthful.

"So that's why you're not eating." Shadow set the bowl down. "Tell you what, I'll go out and get something from home and bring it here; some finger sandwiches, fruit punch, ice cream, we can set it out and have a little picnic without the ants. I'll get a checkered red cloth and lay it over the bed and we'll…"

"Shut up."

Shadow stopped and looked at Sally after the first two words she's said today.

"What was that?"

"I said for you to go away and leave me alone. Why don't you take that little tart and bang her a few hundred times, you'd probably rather being with her than me."

"Well now, isn't this a bit of a change. I don't recall you ever being this nasty or rude before."

"And what's it to you? Just go away and leave me alone."

"Seeing as how you'll actually talk to me, I think I'll have to stay here a bit longer."

Sally was going to respond, but decided to simply turn her head away instead, since it seemed that every word only made Shadow come closer.

"Now, now princess, you've got a lot of people worried about you, Geoffrey, Amy, your subjects."

"Fuck them."

Shadow was stunned, that Sally would ever use such a vulgar term, let alone use it to refer to the people that serve under her and that she has worked so hard for. He regained his composure a second later, thankful that Sally didn't see his momentary lapse while turned away.

"That's not how a princess should act."

Sally turned back and stared at the black visitor. "What the Hell do you know about how a princess should act?! Who are you to tell me to lighten up and eat that slop and tell me to go and be a happy little ruler?!"

"Hey, I didn't…"

"Shut up! You just don't know when you're not wanted."

"And what is that supposed to mean?"

"What?"

"Just what do you mean, 'I'm not wanted'?"

"I want you to leave me alone."

"Do you want me to leave this room, or leave period?"

Sally didn't bother answering; she just sat there, scowling.

"Come on Sally, what do you want?"

"I wish you never came here, and I mean came here, period. You ruined everything, everything's been so wrong since you came here."

"Ah, you'd be referring to the passing of my 'predecessor', Sonic."

Sally was really getting pissed off now. "How dare you even say his name? If you didn't show up, he'd still be here."

"Hey, I'm not the one who…"

"I don't want to hear it, I've heard your pathetic stories enough. It's your fault he's gone."

"And what am I supposed to do? I can't bring back the dead, and I've tried to help as much as I could. You have your kingdom back thanks to me."

"La dee da. I'm surprised you haven't given me the boot and taken it all for yourself."

"That's not fair. I know that Sonic would probably still be here if I didn't enter the picture, but you can't pin that on me."

"And tell me, why did you come and help, why did you bother to stay? Did you honestly come back because of me?"

Shadow stopped for a moment. He remembered exactly why he returned to Knothole, and why he joined the fight against Robotnik.

"No it wasn't, was it? You really haven't done anything to help me, just the opposite. You may not have killed Sonic yourself, but you came here to challenge him and to beat him; you hated him. Then when he was gone, you go off into battle and show up our troops."

"Now hold on, I was there to help, not to show up anybody."

"Oh yeah, what about Bunnie, you bringing her in here acting all big and such, the knight in shining armor rescuing the damsel in distress from the big bad robotic ogres. And then there was Rouge, that little bitch you screw every night. 'Aren't I the big bad hedgehog with the nicest piece of tail in the forest'!"

"That does it! Now you listen to me, every word of this conversation has been swimming through my head for the last year. I know how much Sonic meant to you, and I've been guilty of my part in his untimely demise ever since I laid eyes on you looking over him before the funeral. I have done a lot to help you out, and on your more depressing days, I even thought that it might help if I tried to take his place and be your boyfriend, or whatever he meant to you, since it seemed that's what you wanted; so don't you dare say I don't feel guilty for what happened. And if I could, I would do whatever I could to fix it; but I can't raise the dead or change history."

Sally turned her head back so that she was pointing straight forward, not looking at Shadow to her right.

"Sally? You can't keep doing this."

"You're right, I shouldn't."

Shadow was not pleased with Sally admission; her voice still had much anger, and didn't have the defeatist-accepting attitude of one who had realized the error of their ways.

"If that's what you want, then I forgive you, Shadow. Sonic's death really wasn't your fault; it was Robotnik who had him killed. You don't have to feel guilty anymore; I no longer blame you for what happened. You can go on with your life, and I can go my way."

"That depends on what 'your way is'."

"What's it to you? You don't have to care about me anymore, I forgive you."

"It's not that simple, and you know it. You're destroying yourself like this, I can't let you do that."

"How dare you, you may not have been the one to take Sonic from me, but now you're trying to keep us apart."

"You can't just throw your life away like this."

"What life? My life ended last year." Sally semi-enraged tone slumped again. "I have no life."

"And what about Mobotropolis, your kingdom."

"It'll do fine without me. I'd gladly trade a dozen kingdoms just to have Sonic back for a day."

"Would Sonic want you to do that? How would he feel if he could see you like this?"

"Just leave me alone in my misery until I can be with him in the cold ground."

Shadow grabbed Sally by her scrawny necrotizing arms. "Is that what you want?! Can you seriously look me in the face, and tell me that you want to die?"

Sally froze for a second at the harshness and force in Shadow's voice. She couldn't believe at how cold he had become, despite that she knew he was very dark inside, he never exhibited it around her. For the first time, Sally got a taste of the true darkness of Shadow's heart; but while it scared her, she also drew on its dark power. Her face contorted in a sickening glare and stared straight into Shadow's eyes, letting her own terror cut through his, and beating the black one at his own game. And from the back of her throat, came a voice so venomous that the princess didn't even know that she was capable of it.

"I want to die."

* * *

Shadow was a totally different person, never before had he faced something that scared him so. Back at his house, he was gazing into the large mirror in the main bathroom. Staring back was his face, the face he had seen so many times before in the glass, but not like this. The face that looked back was one of defeat, so dreary, so lost. The face that would often bear a sinister visage was totally beaten by Sally's appearance that afternoon.

Try as he would, he couldn't trigger the fire that often spurned from his eyes; his darkness would not emerge, and even if it did, Shadow felt it could never compete with the vicious glare of the sickly woman.

The door opened, and Rouge slowly crept into the room. "Shadow?"

Rouge walked in, stepping softly towards the hedgehog. "Come on, it's time for bed."

Shadow barely turned his attention long enough to notice that Rouge was standing beside him wearing a small pink nighty that barely covered her torso, ignoring her arms and legs; not that it mattered, the sheen pink fabric was almost totally transparent.

"My goodness, things must be bad; you're barely looking at me."

"Sally is really letting go; she just can't go on without him."

"So there's nothing we can do?"

"Not unless we have some blue paint."

To be continued