Okay, well, here's the battle between Knuckles and Shadow. And no one will die! (Hopefully. Muhahaha)
Shadow sighed as he headed towards where he saw Knuckles and kicked a pebble off the island. He didn't want to do it, but it was the only way to keep Maria alive. He heard something beside him, and dashed off to where he heard it. There was Knuckles, and he looked ready to fight.
"You know, I don't want to kill you, but it's the only way I can assure Maria's life."
"I don't want to kill you, but it's my job as the guardian of the emeralds, so let's get this over with."
Shadow jumped up and launched a chaos spear,(he still had the chaos emerald he used to get the Master Emerald) but Knuckles reflected it by punching it away and jumped at Shadow. He attempted to knock him down but Shadow teleported behind him and kicked him down, hard. He landed beside him, but wasn't expecting Knuckles next attack.
Knuckles grabbed his leg and knocked him down, then dug underground. Shadow got up and started watching the ground carefully, when Knuckles jumped out and uppercut him. Considering Knuckles strength, that really hurt. But while he was up, Shadow used chaos control to freeze time and get behind Knuckles, then kicked him as hard as he could straight in the head.
With time unfrozen again, Knuckles got up. He smiled slightly, knowing that Shadow was running out of rings for his attacks. He decided to use one of his. He smashed the ground so hard it caused an earthquake, causing Shadow to fall. That gave Knuckles enough time to run up to him and kick him while he was stunned.
Shadow knew that at the rate it was going, he was sure to lose the fight. He only had one thing that might be ale to save him. He jumped into the air and started glowing red. Knuckles knew what was happening, and knew he couldn't avoid the attack. As Shadow prepared the attack, he braced himself for impact. Then Shadow called out. "Chaos blast!" A dome of chaos energy came out from around Shadow, and Knuckles knew it was over.
Then he was hit. He didn't actually feel pain, even though he knew he was hurt. That's the thing about chaos energy. It does damage but you don't actually feel anything. Until it's over anyway. Then you feel all the pain from it in one second, and then it's just gone. Knuckles just laid there, knowing that Shadow was going to kill him. Shadow charged up his spindash, but as it was about to hit Knuckles, he stopped.
"Maria! No!"
"Shadow. I don't want any one to be hurt because of me. It's better this way." She had taken off a piece of the Master Emerald from the machine, causing it to lose it's power and causing her to disappear.
"Maria? Maria! Noooooooo!" Maria was gone, and Shadow knew there was nothing else he could do about it.
"She's gone." He started crying He knew it wasn't like him, and that he should stop, but he couldn't help it. The only person hr ever saw as a friend just died for the second time. You'd be sad too. Knuckles had somehow gotten up and walked over to Shadow. He looked at the shard Maria had taken.
Knuckles thought about this 'She sacrificed her life to save mine, someone she doesn't even know. She's truly a good person.' He decided to try to talk to Shadow. "I understand now. She really was a person worth fighting for. Maybe, one day, there'll be another way to bring her back."
"I hope you're right."