Disclaimer: Everyone belongs to whoever made them up originally. Yeah.
Author's note: Climax time!
Shadow and Prisal stared at one another. Shadow's cold stare being matched by the puppet that was Yang. Through the fake, hedgehog exterior lay the calculating and broken mind of the once genius that created and raised Shadow, and now, looking at him through the eyes of another hedgehog, he seemed more like a father than ever before. A sliver of a smile crossed Yang's face, as he turned to Sonic and Metal Sonic, laughing lowly.
"Fools." Prisal simply exclaimed. Prisal turned back to Shadow. "You have brought with you your own destruction." There was a short pause. Metal Sonic was about to fire a missile, but Sonic stopped him. Shadow turned around to face his two companions.
"He's right." Shadow remarked, his voice devoid of any emotion. Without warning, Shadow jumped upon the two, giving them a punch each. In a flash they were both on the floor.
"You traitor!" Metal Sonic shouted, he attempted to jump to his feet, but Sonic restrained him for some reason. "You can't do this! Think of everyone on earth! Think of Amy!" Metal Sonic shouted. Shadow smirked.
"Can't do it? Professor, may I have the privilege of destroying this planet, to show this metal monstrosity that I can?" Shadow asked. Prisal grinned like a Cheshire cat.
"That is what you were made for." He simply replied, gesturing at the control panel. Shadow nodded and walked over to the controls. Prisal turned to the fallen Sonics. "You see, I turned him. He saw the light after Knuckles died, and he has deceived you ever since, and now, because you couldn't see through his charade, the world goes. However, saving the world is what you do, and by destroying this world I will be saving it from itself, so it's another job well done hedgehog." It was hard to tell if Prisal was mocking, or stating what he believed to be fact. "Shadow, is everything ready? Do you know what to do?" Shadow turned to Prisal, his smirk had since evolved into an uncharacteristically large smile.
"Oh yes." The red and black hedgehog claimed. Sonic picked himself off the floor, a grin equal to Shadow's on his face. "Prisal, to get to this moment I have had to ride a rollercoaster of emotions, take part in Sonic's absurd plot, which included putting up with three of him at a time, and worse of all, almost lost Amy, but all of this was so worth it." Prisal looked from Shadow to Sonic, confused and slightly scared. Shadow's finger slowly pressed down on a button, never taking his eyes off Prisal, savouring the moment. As soon as the button clicked down, the cannon fired. However, this was not what Prisal wanted. The laser that was just fired was too weak to destroy the planet; it had been powered down so much it would only destroy the immediate area beneath. Also the trajectory had been changed. The immediate area below the cannon was now the GUN base.
"NO!" Prisal screamed. "Shadow! How could you! You were meant to work for me!" Shadow, for the first time Sonic could recall, laughed. The laugh was chilling, coming from the deepest regions of Shadow's throat.
"Don't you get it? You've been set up! Sonic has been playing this before we even knew you were alive!"
"I love time travel." Sonic added mockingly.
"Also, I may have been altered by you to follow your dream. I may have experienced the pain and loss that turned you to this, but I only work for those I chose to. Good or Evil, I decide."
The laser flew through the air, Nack covered his eyes with his hat, not which was likely to help, the Ultimate Weapon started swearing loudly and Amy's eyes widened in fear. Had they failed? Was this the end? Not a chance. The laser ripped through the GUN base. It struck it from a corner and cut through to the other side. Like paper the base crumbled, rafters falling, beams being destroyed under there own weight. Ceilings crushed floors, which in turn destroyed lower floors. Walls fell in and technology hidden in the structure was lost in the rubble. It was lucky that the base had been empty due to current events, well, empty except one man.
Sonic, Metal Sonic, Shadow and Yang all looked at a monitor displaying the destruction that had happened below. Sonic uneasily turned to Shadow.
"Say, you didn't... you know..." Shadow let out a disapproving grunt.
"Kill him? I don't know." Shadow replied. "The base has been destroyed, but somehow I doubt that..." Shadow trailed off. Metal Sonic nodded his head and sighed.
"Pessimistic much? Gerald... or Prisal, whatever, can not have survived that. Now if you hedgehogs don't mind, I have a computer to see about a disk." Metal Sonic muttered to himself various insults aimed at Sonic and Shadow as he made his way towards the computer with a punched in monitor. A simple press of a button and the disk containing all that was Metal Amy sprang out, as if it was willing to be freed. Metal Sonic picked up the disk carefully, then placing it in one of his hidden compartments with an uncharacteristically soft touch. "It's over for you now." Metal Sonic told the disk, his voice containing a surprising amount of humanity in it. Metal Sonic turned back to the two hedgehogs, and almost instantly he transformed back to a cold, machine. "Sonic. Next time we meet, we shall be enemies once again. I shall let you go without a fight now; for I think I speak for both of us when I say fighting has gotten tiring. So, goodbye. Chaos Con..." Laughter interrupted Metal Sonic. Laughter from the voices of two twisted creatures meshed into one. Prisal, in the body of Yang, turned to look at the group.
"Do you think I could have survived in secret for fifty years without being careful? The room I am in could have resisted three nuclear wars, let alone your pathetic attack!" Prisal announced. Shadow swore angrily. "I've told you, I will cleanse the world! Yes, I will save it! It will be destroyed! Yes!"
"Listen to yourself!" Sonic shouted. "You don't even know what you're doing anymore!" Yang's eye had begun twitching madly.
"I am doing... saving... destroying the world! Maria..." Yang's eye stopped twitching. "I am going to use that cannon, and use that cannon... use the cannon... cannon use... I am going to destroy this world." Shadow stared sadly into the adopted eyes of his once creator.
"My god. Something has happened in down there with Prisal. Sonic, I think we may have pushed him other the edge. I mean more so."
"Isn't it obvious?" Metal Sonic questioned. "He must have connected his brain to Yang's by machine. We've partly destroyed the machine, along with part of his already fractured mind. Yang suddenly ran up to Metal Sonic, warping his hands around his neck.
"Insane? Insane, insane... You call me insane! I am, I am, I am not!" Prisal began breathing deeply. "Maybe I exaggerate this room's satiability, but that does not matter. No. No matter. Matter not... Before I fire the cannon, I shall make sure that all three of you meet with death. Even you Shadow, Hedgehog... Shadow... Shadow, my once loyal experiment."
"I was only ever loyal to Gerald." Shadow sneered. Prisal began breathing rapidly again.
"Gerald! Gerald! Weak, insecure, pitiful being!" Yang's eyes closed as Prisal desperately fought to keep the strands of coherent thought he had left in order. "You fool! Fool! What I do is what Gerald wants. His wants. He wants... I am only what he truly desires."
"Well this is what I desire." Claimed Shadow, jumping upwards and bringing his foot down on the Prisal controlled Yang. Metal Sonic instantly assisted by delivering the mind controlled hedgehog a firm punch to the gut. Prisal winced in pain. Metal Sonic used his shoulder to whack Yang to the floor.
"Well, well Prisal, so you've tapped into Yang's nervous system. This should be fun." Metal Sonic forced Yang back onto his feet, and then pummelled him with unrestrained anger. Shadow and Sonic watched in shook. Even when facing Sonic had Metal Sonic never fought so viciously. Metal fist tore at skin, Prisal screamed in agony, but Metal Sonic remained unaffected. "Listen to me well Prisal. No one, but no one, ever takes Metal Amy. No one!" Metal Sonic punctuated his statement with a nose shattering punch. The punch was strong enough to send Yang skidding across the floor and up against the wall. However, Prisal did not scream. He laughed.
"Guess what I just did, what I did, guess... I've severed the connection with Yang's nervous system. I no longer feel your attacks!" Yang suddenly sprang into action. With Prisal's connection on his mind weakened, and the actual Yang knocked unconscious by Metal Sonic, he looked like a deranged puppet (first person to think 'Tails doll' gets punched). Yangs head was limp and bobbed around with every move, his arms also seemed allot more lose. "Feel attacks no longer..." Yang flailed around wildly at Metal Sonic, attacking in an unpredictable and ludicrously fast pattern. Metal Sonic desperately punched at Yang, only to receive no reaction. "Affect, no, attack..." Shadow and Sonic jumped into the fray, knocking the monstrosity backwards with a well timed kick. With no signs of damage the madman's puppet ran towards the three, one arm raised with a hand curled into a fist perched at the end. Sonic spin dashed at Yang, only to bounce of him without inflicting any noticeable pain. "Feel...feel...no..." Yang threw his curled hand at Shadow, who ducked it easily. An uppercut was then thrown by Yang, and dodged by Shadow. Sonic and Metal Sonic were attacking Yang in vain as Prisal made him unleash super sonic speed punches at Shadow, who was desperately attempting to dodge or counter them.
"We need a plan!" Shadow shouted. "We could kill Yang and he would still attack us!"
"You're right, I'm going after Prisal." Metal Sonic announced, backing out of the fray.
"NO!" Prisal shouted. Yang jump kicked Metal Sonic onto the floor then aimed his hand in the direction of the chaos emeralds. "Chaos control!" He shouted. All twenty emeralds were engulfed into green light and disappeared, as were the time stones. "Fail, fall, kill... The Final Death Egg is being held up with the lingering chaos energy, use that to chaos control away and it will fall, fall without the chaos energy, the lack of energy will make it fall... destroying all below."
"You fool! You can't activate the cannon now!" Shadow remarked. Prisal laughed.
"Where do you think the chaos emeralds were just teleported to? There in my lap as we speak! As we speak..." Shadow swore loudly.
"Great! We're caught in a battle against an unfeeling enemy with no way to escape!" Shadow shouted.
"Plus the fact the lingering energy will only keep this thing up for a few more minutes!" Metal Sonic added.
"In that case, let's not waste any of them." Sonic stated, Shadow sighed.
"So what do you suggest? Do you see any possible way to win?" Shadow retaliated.
"Hay, Metal Sonic built this place, I bet he knows what to do in this situation." Sonic claimed, turning towards Metal Sonic. The robot was sitting on the floor, his arms and legs crossed.
"We die." Metal Sonic simply replied. Shadow and Sonic looked at the robot in an unsure silence. Thoughts raced through there heads. Was this the end? Had they failed?
"No." Shadow turned to Yang. "You can't win. You will not kill Amy." Metal Sonic got off the floor and turned to face Shadow. "I will not let my loved ones, or anyone's loved ones, to be sacrificed for the ideals of a madman."
"How heroic." Mocked Yang.
"CHAOS CONTROL!" Shadow shouted. Metal Sonic and Sonic both disappeared into green light, both taken by surprise. The control room, which now only held Shadow and Yang, began shaking. A smirk crossed Shadow's face. "I've teleported this entire device above the deserted Prison island. It will be crash and be destroyed, along with us."
"There was not enough power to teleport two people and a ship of this size!" Prisal claimed. "How... how?" Shadow turned away from Yang.
"Thanks to Amy, I have other powers besides those given to me by the chaos emeralds." Shadow announced.
"Not enough to save yourself." Prisal pointed out bitterly.
"Looks like I'll have to do that then." A third voice announced. Both hedgehogs turned around to locate this new person. The mysterious visitor grabbed Shadow and disappeared with him in a bright white light. It happened so fast Prisal couldn't comprehend what it was that had just happened. All he could tell was that his plan had been completely destroyed. Prisal swore and relinquished his control over Yang, who fell to the floor unconscious.
A large metal orb fell onto Prison Island. The following explosion sent shockwaves travelling for hundreds of miles, as well as obliterating almost all of the island, leaving what was left in a worse state than it was already in. When the scene was later investigated it was determined the device that blew was of Eggman's technology. No bodies were found.
Shadow found himself back on the field just outside the G.U.N base. It was riddled with G.U.N robots that had been shut down when the base was destroyed. The recent battle had charred the grass and given the field a criss-crossing black and green colouring. Above and around Shadow the mechs that the army had been piloting prepared to land. Shadow was given long to inspect this spectacle, as Amy ran up to him and wrapped her arms tightly around him.
"You did it! You're alright!" She shouted. Shadow hugged her back.
"But how?" He asked. A staged cough emitted from behind Shadow. The two hedgehogs slightly grudgingly let go of each other and turned to look at Shadow's saviour, a red echidna.
"Knuckles!" Sonic shouted as he ran towards the three, followed by Lamont, Rouge, Nack and the Ultimate Weapon. Knuckles smirked at the group.
"Good to be ba..." Knuckles was cut off as Rouge forced him into an intense kiss. Shadow turned back to Amy and looked into her emerald eyes. All the fighting, all the worry, all the pain, it had been worth it to keep her safe. Shadow and Amy connected lips slowly and with meaning.
"And I have no one." Sonic remarked with mock sadness.
"Wait, I thought Red was dead?" Lamont remarked. Knuckles parted lips with Rouge to answer the question.
"I was. Follow me." Knuckles turned and was about to run off, until Shadow stopped him.
"Wait. I have something to finish."
Prisal sat in his room surrounded by chaos emeralds and time stones. The pure white room had been obliterated by the cannon and so had the connecting wall, revealing the light of the sun to Prisal for the first time in years. Prisal was unmoving as he watched a silhouette climbing through the rubble towards him. He knew the silhouette all to well. It was his creation, it had worked for him, but now, it was his enemy. Shadow came close enough that the sun did not obscure him to a black blob. Shadow looked at Prisal, who looked back with empty eyes.
"What now Shadow? Now what Shadow? Shadow... What...?" In person it was now clear that Prisal's mouth flinched every time he repeated himself. Shadow looked at the destroyed man with something that almost can be described as pity, but Prisal was far beyond that now. "Come to finish the job?"
"I have to." Commented Shadow. Prisal laughed. The laugh unnerved Shadow.
"You are weak. Weak like Gerald. You can't kill me. Unable to kill me. Killing me not possible for you." Shadow nodded.
"True. No matter how mad you are, how dangerous, I can't help but see what is no longer there. I pay respect at you, Prisal, the grave of Professor Gerald Robotnik." Shadow threw a half burnt flower he had picked up from the field at Prisal's feet. Shadow grabbed the chaos emeralds and time stones, knowing that leaving them with Prisal would be stupid. He then took one last look at Prisal. At Gerald, then he turned and walked away from the once great man forever.
"Now what! Humanity will always fear you! You are blind! Everyone is blind to the truth! Those friends of yours! Gerald! Maria! Even the Black Arms! Blind to the undeniable truth that they will be there own end, like they are the end of so much! I AM RIGHT!" Prisal became aware of someone else watching him. He spun around to see the Ultimate Weapon perched on an extruding piece of rubble.
"Gerald Robotnik. For crimes against humanity you were meant to be executed, but you seem to have not been." Prisal stared up at the weapon that he had created with large eyes of fear. "I, by the orders of G.U.N, must fix this mistake." Prisal watched helplessly as the Ultimate Weapon jumped down and advanced on him.
"No... you... you can't! Can't! You can not! NO!"
Knuckles lead Sonic, Shadow, Rouge and Amy to the Emerald shrine on the floating island. Lamont had left for 'reason that would be stupid to tell the heroes', Nack had left because he had enough and no one knew where the Ultimate Weapon was. Knuckles lead them behind a bush near the shrine and they all looked up at the shrine. On top of it was a blue echidna. His left arm was bleeding; some of the blood had landed on the Master Emerald. In his hand he was holding the unconscious form of Knuckles.
"Listen brat, there is only one reason I have done this. It is because a resurrection can only be done once, and if I kill you after resurrecting you, then I can destroy all daddy's hopes on saving you, you got it!" Fistika was angry, mostly at himself.
"Is that really the only reason?" General Knuckles asked, walking towards Fistika with a shoulder on Tikal. Tikal walked up to Fistika and grabbed him by the hand.
"Thank you." She remarked. Fistika swiped his hand out of her grip.
"I did it not for you kid, I did it for the reason I've specified. I will kill Knuckles again then watch you all cry yourselves to sleep for eternity." Fistika looked at General Knuckles. "General, if I could kill you twice I would have an extra knife right now." Fistika commented.
"And if I was of your cold kind, so I would have a knife aimed at your head." General Knuckles replied. Fistika gave harsh glares at both of his present company, then fled into the wilderness. The Knuckles hidden in the bushes smiled.
"Odd that if he planned to kill me again, he didn't do it right then." He remarked. He turned to the others. "Come on, we have to fill me in."
A week passed. The truth of G.U.N was never brought public as it was put under the control of a much saner commander and began working at doing what it was meant to, guarding the nation. The entire incident that ended with the G.U.N base being destroyed was glossed over with the simple statement that 'Sonic and friends had once again stopped a major terrorist action'. The event was in the news for a while until it was overshadowed by over news, like the black comet reappearing in the sky after fifty years. Shadow set out once again to discover all the secrets of his past. Knuckles got back to guarding the Master Emerald, frequently with Rouge by his side, and Omega hang around by the destroyed G.U.N base for a few days, realised everyone was gone, and returned to his mission of destroying Eggman's robotic empire.
Metal Sonic admired his new creation. It was ready. He ran a wire out of his creation and inserted it into the nearby computer. A few clicks of the mouse and the programs began to download into Metal Sonic's creation. Metal Sonic waited patiently for the procedure to complete itself. He hadn't stopped working for a week straight and that was about to pay off. His creation came to life as the programs all installed themselves in its system. As Metal Sonic watched his creation looking around slightly confused, he would have smiled if he had a mouth.
"Welcome back Metal Amy, I hope you like your new body, I made it to be perfect." Metal Amy looked at herself slightly bemused.
"Isn't it exactly like my old one?" She asked.
"Exactly." Metal Sonic replied. "Oh, except I gave you a few fighting skills, just in case." Metal Amy nodded and crossed her arms.
"So what's the plan today boss, any weapons to build, any battles to fight?" Metal Sonic shook his head.
"First, we shall fix the Tails Doll, he's been offline in the corner for way too long, and then you and I are going to have a vacation." Metal Amy smiled and placed her hands on Metal Sonic's hips.
"Really? Where will we go?" She questioned.
"I don't think it matters." Metal Sonic replied. The two robots wrapped an arm around each other and left the room.
There are only two things which are certain to warp friendships, absorb your soul and turn reality into an illusion you won't want to return to. These are love and power, and you have watched as both have changed many people's lives. For the better, like Shadow and Metal Sonic, for the worse, like Gerald and sometimes it is hard to tell where the person sits after there encounter with the forces of power and love, as is the case with Fistika. There is only one certainty in this world, and that is, thanks to these two powers, that you will never stay the same, which, much like the two powers, can be good or bad.
My final note: FINISHED! Thank you for all the reviews, cookies for all! I hope you all enjoyed this story. Thank you Celestial Moonshine for letting me use Yang, and lamont-the-ultimate for letting me use Lamont, I hope I didn't mess them up or anything. I think that's it.