CHAPTER 44: Failure

I still find it incredible, Shadow thought, tossing a golden key up and down in one hand. He was standing in front of a giant, golden, floating ring, which had a keyhole in the center. The challenge on the inside changes, the means of getting inside doesn't. Who- or whatever it is that changes the Chaos World must not have much imagination. Well, at least, as far as gateways go. I'd think that after Emeralds started disappearing, the gateway would change BEFORE they were all gone. Finishing with his thought, Shadow turned and looked at the setting sun before he threw the key at the keyhole and watched as it was sucked inside. The keyhole glowed a bright shade of gold, then expanded, filling the space inside the ring. Shadow jumped into the portal, which vanished as soon as he was inside.

The blobs met Shadow less than two seconds after he touched the ground inside the Chaos World. Once again, he was in a circular arena, 200 feet in diameter, the floor sloping upward and forming twenty-foot walls. Of course, the walls were complete with barriers to prevent anything from leaving the arena. The whole area was colored yellow, the same color as the Emerald, which floated hundreds of feet above. Shadow wasn't aware of its location, and at the present, he didn't care. He jumped up and forward, clearing the line of blobs in front of him. Upon landing, he turned around and saw that about twenty of them had been waiting in ambush.

"Clever little bastards," he said. "Must have been expecting me." He stepped forward to attack them, but stopped when he felt the ground shake. He heard an impact behind him at the same time and turned to look. His eyes went wide and he backed up, yelling, "Oh, now that's BULLSHIT!" He was staring at a thirty-foot robot of a very familiar design. It had very dark armor, wide legs, wide arms, a small head, a broad chest, and a very large hammer.

Matters couldn't be much worse, Shadow thought. I need Omega for this shit. Too bad he had to go and shut himself down. He'd be DAMN good to have around right now. He wouldn't even ask questions, so he'd be a perfect candidate! The sound of the robot beginning its slow approach jerked Shadow away from his thoughts, and he turned and skated toward the blobs. Rather than his Homing Attack, he gave a hard kick. In the process, he not only propelled himself off the ground, but he also provided himself an extra burst of speed. While he was airborne, he threw his legs out in front of him so that he was moving feet-first. His heels impacted the blobs, sending them flying up in the air. He cleared the group in one motion, then turned around to see what he'd done. The blobs all began to hit the ground, but there was a problem: none of them solidified.

"Bullshit!" Shadow repeated. "That impact was no different from my Black Tornado! What's the deal?" He turned and skated away as the blobs began to roll, hop, jump, and tumble over each other to get at him. The giant hammer bot continued its slow approach as well. It kept its blank yellow eyes on Shadow the whole time. Shadow was at a loss for what to do. If his kick attack didn't work, that meant Black Tornado wouldn't, as they both worked the same way, except that they had different means of propelling the target straight up. The impact both of these attacks utilized was similar to that of his Homing Attack, so that was unlikely to work as well.

Think Shadow, THINK! the black hedgehog thought over and over. He stopped at the point where the floor began to slope upward, then turned and looked again at the scene: twenty blobs were bearing down on him, there was a huge-ass robot slowly following those, and the Emerald was nowhere in sight. The only idea that dawned on him was crazy, even suicidal. But, it was the only idea he had, so he was willing to try it. He jumped forward to give himself a fast start, then landed skating. He closed in on the blobs quickly. He jumped over them easily, flipping in the air,landing on the other side of the pack. He stopped and let them turn around to come after him. This didn't take very long, then he led them back toward the robot. The blobs followed instinctively, unaware of what Shadow was fixing to employ them to do. As he closed in on the robot, he began to time his strike. Just before he entered hammer range, he jumped up, still moving forward. He clung to the robot's chest armor, using himself as bait. The blobs began to lunge at him one by one. He was about to jump away when the robot had a stroke of intelligence and scooped the hedgehog off its chest. It held him upside-down by one leg as the blobs attacked. Luckily for Shadow, the ones in the air couldn't stop, and they slammed into the robot. They exploded violently, damaging the robot's armor. But, the damage was not enough to stop the mechanical powerhouse. Shadow was slammed to the ground, stunned by the impact. He regained his senses just in time to see the massive hammer come down at him with all the force of a dozen pistons.

"JESUS!" Shadow yelled, jerking himself into a sitting position. Breathing heavily, he felt himself drenched with sweat, but otherwise fine. He wasn't even sore. It took him a moment to realize that he was being addressed.

"Shadow, what happened?" Sonic's voice demanded. Shadow shook his head, then turned and looked in the direction from which he heard the voice. Sonic was kneeling next to him, a look of extreme concern on his face.

"Sonic?" Shadow asked. "Where are we? What's going on?"

"You tell me!" Sonic exclaimed. "I was on my way home when I saw a bright light appear in the air. I saw it spit you out before it disappeared. I came to see what was going on, but you were unresponsive. For a few minutes you didn't have a pulse."

"I was dead?" Shadow asked.

"I think so," Sonic said, nodding. "Course, I'm no expert."

"You... didn't perform mouth-to-mouth, did you?" Shadow asked, putting his left hand on his forehead and shaking it again.

"We take that to our grave, agreed?" Sonic said.

"You got it," Shadow said, nodding. He stood up slowly, groaning. He looked up at the night sky for a few seconds before anyone said anything else.

"Kind ofmade me jump when you justjerkedup like that," Sonic said. "Anyway,I've told you my side of the story. Your turn, Shadow. What the hell happened to you?"

Quid pro quo, Shadow thought. He closed his eyes and shook his head yet again, saying, "I was messing around, having some fun and trying to see how many Emeralds I could get in one try. I suffered a minor setback, and I apparently paid for it with my life. It just... didn't last long."

"Why don't I believe that's all there is to the story?" Sonic asked, folding his arms over his chest.

"Why would I lie?" Shadow retorted.

Any number of reasons, Sonic thought. He turned his head a little to the left leered at Shadow. He said, "I'll take your word for it for now. But something in your voice tells me there's more to it than you let on."

"Whatever, Sonic," Shadow said. "I'm going home." He began to skate past Sonic, but the blue streak's arm shot out and grabbed Shadow's elbow.

"Wait," he said. Shadow stopped. Soinc asked, "How did it happen?"

"What?" Shadow asked.

"How did you die?" Sonic asked.

"Remember those huge-ass robots Eggman used to use?" Shadow asked. "The armored ones with the hammers?"

"One of those?" Sonic asked.

"It's like I said to myself on the inside, I need Omega for that kind of shit," Shadow said. Sonic released him, and he skated off.

"Shadow, man, I don't know what crawled up your ass and died," Sonic said to himself, "but it's going to come out sooner or later. It'd be in your best interest, I think, for it to be sooner."

Well then ladies, gents, boys, girls. Enjoying the show, I hope? Your reviews say yes, but I just wanted to ask anyway. Y'know. Just in case. Anyway, to summarize what happened... Shadow failed to obtain the third Emerald due to a "minor setback", as he so mildly put it. Well, he's died once before(or so I've heard), so it must not have been a big deal... He came to in a field, where he had been found by Sonic. Of course, there is the freakish occasion where a dead person comes back to life, and this was one of those. Don't expect Shadow to have ESP, though. That only happens in movies and books. That about does it for that. The rest just kinda fell into place. Well, review away. Oh, by the way, I hope to God you're enjoying these battles for the Emeralds. It's really hard for me to think up challenges to be met. Also, this just now came to me, but one of this story's two main genres is Action/Adventure. These battles are making up most of the action for now... Now that I think about it, I've got so many freaking elements of different genres in this story that I'm probably better off changing the genre to General, or putting a genre on each chapter or something. ANYWAY, I know I said it before, but I'll say it again. Review away.