I'm not fake!
Sonic had gone to collect more firewood, Shadow followed him.
"What d'ya want Faker?" Sonic snarled. Shadow again felt the anger sear through him, but he suppressed it.
"I wanted to ask you why Metal Sonic hates you so much"
"Because he was programmed to. Just like you're a weapon, you destroy things"
Shadow's anger increased "I am not a weapon"
"Yes you are" Sonic glared at him "That was what you were built for wasn't it?"
Shadow barely kept control of his rage, of the heat that seemed to be building up inside him.
"I'm not a weapon!!!"
"Well, ok then you're just a faker, Faker…"
"I'm not fake!" Shadow grabbed hold of Sonic's throat "No more than you are!"
Sonic smirked for a moment but as Shadow's anger intensified his smile faded. Shadow the heard footsteps running towards them suddenly stop.
"Sonic!" Tails called
"Shadow… you're hurting me"
Shadow laughed to himself; didn't he understand? That was the point. Then Shadow noticed a hot burning sensation in his hand on Sonic's neck.
"Does he have the Chaos Emeralds?"
"I don't think so…"
Shadow let him go and jumped back. He looked down at his hands. A strange dark fire seemed to be glowing around him. He was scared. Sonic on the ground in front of him stared up in what could only be described as terror.
"What are you?"
Shadow continued to stare at his hands "… I… don't know"
Shadow looked around the group, all edging slowly away, Sonic on the ground shuffling back. He looked to them for help. In searching for Rouge's eyes he met only Knuckles', Rouge was standing far at the back of the group. Knuckles stood there watching, uncertain, his fists bared protectively, the others shielded behind him. Shadow was terrified, the fire around him was growing and he had no control over it. It seemed to be consuming him. Sonic scurried away across the ground to Knuckles who hauled him to his feet before pushing him behind him.
"Run" Knuckles said
As Shadow's anger turned to fear the fire round him turned blue. Knuckles stepped closer to him as a tree above caught flame. Shadow's feet seemed to be planted into the ground. Knuckles ran at Shadow and grabbed hold of him.
"Run"
Knuckles lifted him up, allowing only a brief yelp of pain as the fire burnt his hands. As Knuckles prepared to throw him Shadow heard his voice again
"We'll find you"
The next thing Shadow knew he was flying through the air. He hit the ground, rolled and got to his feet again running through the trees as fast as they would carry him…
There was a blue flash. The fire in the trees went out. Then a crashing noise and the leaves were ripped off the branches. All but Knuckles cowered away, he stood, staring in the direction Shadow had gone. After a moment Sonic spoke
"Whoa! Talk about being full of surprises!"
"That's not funny Sonic" Knuckles growled and started to walk off
"Knux, where you going?"
"We have to go find him, come on!"
"It's unlikely he survived that Knuckles… I'm sorry" Tails said meekly
"We have to go and check!"
Knuckles was met by a row of blank faces
"Fine then. I'll go by myself!"
"You want to bring that back?!" Sonic cried "Knuckles are you crazy?"
"No"
"It nearly killed us! We're better off without it!"
"What if the Thousand can do that too? We need Shadow on our side, better to have one than none"
"I could argue otherwise"
Knuckles exhaled deeply "You have to ask yourself, do you really want to make an enemy of that? Besides, I promised him we'd find him."
Sonic said nothing. Knuckles turned and started walking off, following the trail of destruction.
"Wait! …I'll come too" Rouge flew up behind him "I owe him that much"
Knuckles frowned "Yes. You do. Sonic and the others conveniently forget that"
"Annoying Echidna!" Rouge laughed running through the trees. Helplessly Knuckles followed.
Shadow wasn't hard to track. Every few metres a footprint was scorched into the grass. They followed this until they came into a clearing in the trees, they had just been vaporised. A circular hole had been burnt away to ash. In the exact centre of the clearing something slightly blacker than the grey soot around it lay.
"Whoa…" Knuckles muttered
"Shadow!"
As one they ran forward. As they stared down at Shadow's sprawled form Knuckles was consumed by a bizarre sensation, a kind of creeping familiarity or nervous excitement, however he ignored it.
"Shadow? Can you hear me?" Rouge asked, not daring to touch him.
"Ugh…"
"He's alive! And in one piece! That's amazing!" Knuckles said, more relieved than he was willing to admit.
"Maria?"
"Nope, you're stuck with me again"
Shadow went to sit up, but failed. Knuckles helped him, wincing only slightly with the burning to his hands and forearms. He noticed, but ignored Rouge staring at them.
"You sure made quite a mess" Rouge chuckled
"Even I couldn't have managed this!"
Shadow, trembling sat up and looked around, aghast.
"I didn't hurt anyone… did I?"
"No" Knuckles said making sure his hands which were still supporting him were out of his sight "You got far enough away"
Shadow forced himself to stand. As he did so he brushed at the layer of ash that had settled on him, turning him more grey than black. With this gesture he also tried to dispel the tremor running through his body.
"What should I do now?"
"You come back with us. We still have to stop Metal Sonic!" Knuckles said without a moment's hesitation.
"But I'm a danger to you as long as I stay! I'm like a bomb waiting to go off!"
His words were met with silence for a moment
"Come back with us anyway" Knuckles said softly
Rouge and Shadow both stared at him
"Are you mad Echidna?" Shadow asked
"No Hedgehog, we need you" he started walking away "Because if those other Shαdøws can do even half what you can even Sonic with all the Chaos Emeralds in the world won't be able to beat them." Knuckles looked back over his shoulder "None of us can do it alone"
Knuckles should be terrified of him, but he didn't seem to be, Shadow couldn't understand why. Rouge and Shadow looked at one another for a moment, before following.
"I'm impressed, I'm not so sure about the others, but I'm impressed."
It was Espio who greeted them. All three jumped as his camouflaged form swam back into focus. Shadow knew it was rare to get such a compliment from him, but somehow he couldn't be pleased. A few moments later they walked into their camp.
"No way!"
"Shadow you're alive!" Tails shouted amazed
"That's a shame…" Sonic muttered turning away. Shadow was sure he saw anger in Knuckles' eyes aimed in his direction. He couldn't ponder this any longer as a black object making high pitched noises was buzzing round his head. After a moment he managed to identify Charmy.
"We were all taking bets on how many pieces you'd be in! No-one won!" He cried
"Charmy!" Vector shouted, promptly plucking him out of the sky "Err… Sorry Shadow"
Before he could answer Shadow was swept off his feet. His natural instinct was to struggle. A voice spoke to him.
"Now, now little hedgehog sit still and let me see you" When Shadow identified the owner of that voice he was inclined to struggle more. Eggman had a firm grip round his middle.
"Shadow, Eggman looked after you when you were hurt before, let him help you!" Tails pleaded.
Feeling suddenly sick Shadow gave up struggling, and was still.
"Knuckles, are you ok? Your hands are all burnt" Amy asked
"Huh?"
"Knuckles!!"
Sonic grabbed hold of his wrists to stare at his hands
"Ow!" he shouted, wrenching away.
"You have to do something about that!" Sonic shouted, as Knuckles clutched his arms close to his chest. He was aware of the pain now, and that he smelt of burnt flesh and ash. His head started to swirl.
"You should never have gone after that thing"
"That thing has a name, and if anyone else was willing to make an effort I wouldn't have had to"
"Doctor Eggman, Knuckles needs your help!" He heard Tails shout.
They watched him rise from covering Shadow with a blanket. He came over to them, he noticed the problem immediately.
"Oh dear… so you do have hands under there then?"
Knuckles too found himself lifted off his feet and carried away. Eggman took him far enough so that his pride wouldn't be damaged by allowing the others to hear him cry with pain.
Shadow was oblivious to the debate that went on around him. He'd inspired a great deal of fear among the group, or if not fear, confusion. Many of the group were uncertain as to the safety of allowing him to remain among their ranks. A debate raged into the night until it was almost unanimously decided that it was better to have Shadow with them, as a friend than risk rejecting and making an enemy of him. Though Rouge and Vector fought passionately to defend him as harmless for many the jury was still out. For Sonic the only thing that stopped him fighting harder against Shadow was Knuckles behaviour over the last weeks…
"Shadow don't be silly… that's the moon!"
"Oh… can we go there?"
"I can't Shadow, I wouldn't be able to breathe!"
Shadow peered out the window, briefly his reflection glinted in the glass.
"Maria… could I go…
When Shadow finally came to, he again found Knuckles by his side. He was staring up through the leafy canopy at the stars, his hands wrapped in bandages against his chest.
"Did I do that to you?"
Knuckles glanced across
"It doesn't matter"
He turned back to his stargazing.
"Sorry" Shadow said softly as he too turned to look up at the stars.
He watched the firsts of the fragments of the moon cross into his field of vision, partially obscured by the leaves of the trees.
"Knuckles…" Knuckles stirred as though drawn from deep thought "Was the moon always like that?"
"Huh?" he must have heard him wrong, nevertheless all of his muscles tensed into a tight knot and the tingling sensation redoubled "What do you mean?"
"Well… broken" Shadow said uncertainly.
"No… The moon wasn't always fragmented…" Knuckles said carefully "Do remember a time before it was broken Shadow?"
"I don't know… I dreamed… of… the moon… I… we… I was looking at it, and it was whole…" Shadow trailed off.
"Do you remember how it was shattered?"
Shadow paused "No…"
Knuckles sighed "Would you like me to tell you?"
Shadow nodded
"Back before you can remember there was a war… well not really a war, at least not for anyone but us. Back then the sides were drawn differently, back then Eggman was the enemy. He wanted to take over the world… you know, the usual… well him and Rouge and well you… went into space to a base up there… and discovered something they didn't expect" Knuckles paused "Something more powerful than any of us realised… a weapon. Eggman put the Chaos Emeralds in it and fired it at the moon as a demonstration to the people down here. That blew the moon apart"
"The Eclipse Cannon… I remember that… So the moon… it's my fault, I was helping him?"
"No. It was Eggman's hand on the trigger… and besides… you saved us. The weapon was too powerful, but by the time we realised that the countdown had already begun. The prototype Ultimate Life attacked us, the Biolizard. You bought Sonic and I time while I put the Master Emerald in place to stop the Chaos Emeralds. We were all up there by then… Well not Vector and his lot but you know the rest of us here. The Biolizard was determined to destroy us all. You and Sonic teamed up changed into your Super Forms and went out to stop it… the only one who can tell you what happened after that is Sonic. When he came back to escape with us he was really shaken… and he came back alone. He used Chaos Control, he came back… but you… didn't… All we could get out of him was that you… Fell… what that means none of us really understand. After that Chaos Emeralds were lost, until a few days ago… The rest of us escaped the ARK…"
When he said ARK a strange, warm bubbling sensation began in the bottom of Shadow's stomach, but soon faded.
"We all thought you were dead…" Knuckles said softly, for the first time since Shadow had known him letting some emotion come into his voice.
"That Shadow could have been one of the Thousand, one of the others… He did die. That's not me, I'm no hero"
"You helped us stop Metal Sonic. That's enough for me…"
As Shadow listened he heard Knuckles breathing change, becoming deeper, softer and slower as he fell to sleep. Shadow sighed softly, pulled the blankets closer around himself and closed his eyes.