Chapter 8

Here's The Clincher

Hi, I'm back! I was trying to develop an ...outline for this chapter before I wrote it, but as usual, I failed utterly and decided to just wing it...AGAIN! It's gone okay so far, this chapter...is probably going to contain the last bit of action this story will have. Though it hasn't had much! And for that, I apologize!

Disclaimer: I still don't own the bloody Sonic characters! I'm never going to own them! Man, I swear!

'Kay, here goes!

Tails sighed resignedly as he stared at Shadow, who stopped. This sudden decrease in friction flung the poor fox forward, until Shadow's grip on his arm jerked him back to where he had been before. The black hedgehog didn't notice, but Tails almost screamed in pain. "What am I doing?"

"Hurting me," Tails said sourly, but as usual, the black and red hedgehog completely ignored him. He looked at Tails as if he might apologize, but then he just glared at him. Tails wondered what Shadow could possibly be having a revelation about. His ears fell back, the thought of it being something bad flashing through his mind.

"I can use chaos control." Tails just let out a sigh of complete exasperation. Why had he even thought Shadow could be expressing any sort of feeling toward anything at all. Other than the fact he knew he was being completely stupid. Well, at least he was admitting it was his own fault, and not somehow blaming it on Tails. "Why didn't you tell me, you're the one with mind bottling intelligence!" Nevermind that!

"You're the Ultimate Life Form, Shadow." He said in a monotonous tone, Shadow seemed to agree with this. He was still sulking though. Tails shook the hedgehog's arm slightly, "C'mon, Shadow...we need to go...so, if you're going to use chaos control, it would be a good idea!"

"Oh, so now you're yelling at me?" Shadow glared at Tails and Tails just gave him a look. They had been arguing over the fact, standing there, when running they probably could have already been there. The hum of a machine brought them both to their senses, jerking them out of their childish argument.

"Mecha!" Tails almost screamed as he saw the machine. He had been wondering where the metal version of Sonic had gotten off to. They hadn't seen him since they had gotten here. The metallic hedgehog made its way toward the two of them. Tails clung to Shadow like some sort of a little girl, earning him a strange glance from the red-eyed hedgehog.

"Identities confirmed...Shadow the Hedgehog and Miles "Tails" Prower." Tails gulped slowly, his grip on Shadow's arm nearly cutting off the hedgehog's circulation. He advanced forward for a moment and stopped.

"Tails...let go of me." Tails didn't comply with the request though, he actually just clung tighter. Shadow simply repeated himself, as if Tails hadn't understood, "Tails, detach yourself from me immediately." Mecha seemed to be studying the two of them, almost seeming amused at Shadow's annoyance. Tails' hand dug past Shadow's quills and into his skin, Shadow winced and glared at the frightened fox. He jerked his arm away viciously, taking his attention from Mecha, "That hurts!" He hissed.

"Primary target: Eggman, if you do not stand in my way...I will not disturb either of you." Shadow arched an eyebrow at him. This was new, it may have been because they weren't Sonic, but he didn't say his primary target was the blue hedgehog either. He had said Eggman was his target.

Tails stared blankly at him, "So, Eggman did lose control of you?" He spoke to Mecha, and the metal hedgehog didn't seem like he wanted to have a conversation with Tails nor Shadow. Though, he reluctantly, responded in a condescending, almost annoyed tone.

"Eggman never had control of me." Tails scratched his head, but figured arguing the point with their metal enemy was not the thing to do. He nodded his head timidly and stepped back. "Now, stand aside." Abruptly, and somewhat rudely, Mecha spoke again.

Shadow complied reluctantly, though it was unlike him to follow orders handed out in such a brutish manner. His eyes stayed on the metal hedgehog as he watched him leave, "That might just be something I can laugh at." Tails grabbed Shadow's arm again, Shadow was not liking the attention he was getting from the fox. Tails simply shook him again, urging him to use chaos control again.

"Stop touching me." Before Tails could respond though, the black hedgehog had fulfilled his request. Tails blinked again and realized they were standing in a black room. His eyes scanned the room, already being accustomed to the dark. His voice wanted to whisper, but he found no need to. The darkness just had that effect on him.

--

"Tails! Shadow!" Amy got out in the most excited tone she could muster in her current state. She was glad they were back, though part of her was wishing the dark hedgehog would simply drop dead.

"Shadow...you pain in the ass!" The doctor screamed in frustration. Shadow sent him a smirk, the red of his eyes contrasting the blackness brilliantly. He gave him a nod of the head and then pondered whether to tell him he was about to get his ass seriously kicked by Mecha or not. He decided not to. Shadow simply crossed his arms across his chest and shook his head sympathetically, well, it was more of a mock-sympathy than anything. This just infuriated the doctor as he thrashed about the room like a two-year-old.

"Doctor, really...sometimes I question your intelligence." Shadow scoffed and looked away from the tantrum-throwing doctor. He smirked in the direction of Knuckles, who seemed to want to ask him a few questions. That was to be expected, but he really didn't want the red echidna screaming in his face.

"Shadow, I–!" Shadow held up a hand, somehow Knuckles noticed it and stopped talking. Shadow's smirk widened as he heard the expected 'bang' on the door. Tails gave a small murmur and looked around the room. He desperately wished some lights would come on, not like he was afraid of the dark, but he still didn't like the fact of what could be in the dark! Everyone but Tails and Shadow were slightly confused at who else could be on the ARK.

Before they had too much of a chance to ponder, the door slung forward with a destructive force. That same door happened to slam cruelly into the already injured blue hedgehog. Which was quickly ensued with a scream, and a grunt of annoyance from the aforementioned. Amy finally pulled herself from her knees, "Sonic! Are you okay?"

In all actuality, he may have been slightly injured, as his ribs felt like they had each individually been snapped into two separate pieces. Though, the prideful hero was simply embarrassed that a door had hit him. Mecha stepped through the doorway, his red lit eyes proving to be quite menacing in the darkness of the room. Shadow gritted his teeth and gave a worried expression in the direction of Sonic. Upon getting over to the injured creature he lifted the severed door from his friend's aching body and Sonic pulled himself painstakingly out from the immediate range of the door. Shadow released it, causing an exploding sound to echo through the room. "Doctor Eggman and Sonic..." Mecha seemed more humanoid than usual. No, 'identity confirmed' came before this.

"Hey!" Tails argued, "You said you were after Eggman." Shadow cursed himself mentally for not grasping that Mecha wouldn't tell them he was after Sonic. He may have been created by Eggman, but his practicality level was somehow far superior to that of the doctor's. Rouge gave the familiar enemy a dissatisfied stare, Knuckles just glowered furiously since he had been interrupted for the umpteenth time.

"I said I was after Eggman, and I am after Eggman. I just simply did not inform you pathetic meat bags that I was after Sonic as well." Tails fumed. Shadow clenched his fists angrily in complete fury over the lying trash compactor. His red eyes lit with nothing but absolute rage as he watched the jerky movements of Mecha as he seemed to scan the room.

"Metal Sonic?" Eggman questioned savagely as he stared at the metal form of the poor hedgehog that had just been nailed with a door, "I thought I shut you down earlier?" He eyed his metal creation with a sort of annoyance.

"I will not be controlled by anyone...any longer." Tails placed a hand on his head after this. But, someone interrupted him before he could speak.

"You're right, Mecha! You won't be! Because I'm going to dismember you piece by piece right now!" Knuckles threateningly stared at Mecha, Mecha gave him nothing more than an idle glance. Knuckles dully stared back, his fury gradually evaporated into nothing more than an intense dislike for the idle nature he was being given as of late.

"I have no intention of eliminating anyone in this room other than Doctor Eggman and Sonic, but I will destroy anyone who attempts to stop me from doing this." Eggman stared blankly at Mecha for a minute, anger swelling inside his mind. This was his creation! How was it that he seemed to have lost control of it more times than he could count? If he survived this, he was just going to destroy Mecha, and not have to worry about it anymore! But, for the time being, he figured he could use the help of everyone else to get out of this.

"Now, if we just work together here...we can easi–!" A furious shout interrupted his what would have been long and drawn out speech. But, the bruised and slightly battered hedgehog was not in the mood for someone sounding like he had sounded for so many battles.

"Just shut up...as if we're going to help you out after all you're annoying attempts to utterly and completely kill us! You think we're just going to forget that and help you out...again?" Sonic drew a breath and just gritted his teeth together, it looked like the hedgehog was livid, when truth be known, he was just in a good deal of pain. "I'll defend myself and you defend yourself, it's no one's fault but your own that your creation wants nothing more than to tear both of us limb from limb!"

Eggman stared, dumbfounded, at Sonic's enraged outburst. Well, crap, now he had one choice and one choice alone.

Everyone stared blankly as Eggman fled like a two-year-old through the open space of the door the Mecha had blown open. Even Metal Sonic was slightly bemused by Eggman's pathetic attempt to escape him, but the metal hedgehog did not deem him worthy enough to chase after at the moment. He had no means of getting off the ARK, and Mecha was well aware of that fact. "Mecha..." Sonic desperately argued with the overzealous murdering machine.

"You cannot defend yourself, now, Sonic the Hedgehog. So, why not just sit back and accept your fate...?" Sonic scoffed at Mecha's words, and had no intention of 'accepting his fate'. But, a black arm in front of him, proved Shadow had no intention of allowing him to even attempt to defend himself. Metal Sonic gave a sadistic smirk to the black hedgehog.

"If you try and defend him, I will destroy you too...like before, Shadow the Hedgehog." Amy shrank slightly behind Sonic, clinging to him like a five-year-old, or for reference, as Tails was clinging to Shadow not too long ago.

"You got lucky before...you're still nothing but an overrated toaster." Mecha seemed to actually be slightly annoyed with this comment as he got in the customary ready stance for a battle, he intended to win with much ease, obviously. Shadow silently got himself all worked up over the fact that he had basically gotten brutally mauled last time the two battled. Then a thought struck him, "Wait...Mecha, why in the hell did you gather the emeralds for Eggman?" Mecha simply glared at him.

"So he would get Sonic and himself and once place, which would make it far easier on me."

"In other words you were being lazy." Even Mecha had some of the doctor's intelligence flaws, he had given up the emeralds, meaning the emeralds he had absorbed were no longer contributing to his own power.

"Shut it." An irate tone came over Mecha's voice.

Sonic chuckled slightly, then looked at Shadow, "Shadow, I can handle this...seriously." His voice was soft for some reason, he couldn't figure out why. A burning sensation of pain ran rampantly through his ribs and leg. He didn't let any of the sudden pain show in his expression, but obviously Shadow had better eyes than most as he just looked at him, cocking his head back slightly so he stared at the blue hedgehog at something of an angle.

"Get over it and relax, Faker...I've got a score to settle with this metal freak, anyway." A smirk gradually fell across Shadow's lips as he watched Sonic's pitiful expression. A whirl back towards Eggman proved there was no further argument to make. The green-eyed hedgehog just backed off, or allowed Amy to pull him back.

Something in Mecha ignited, like someone flicked a switch. A switch from calm to angry, he furiously jerked forward toward Shadow, who jerked out of the way. Seeming to have lost all interest in Sonic for the time being, he whirled ferociously back around to face the darker hedgehog. "You have gotten in my way for the final time."

"Wow...how scary are you?" Shadow's tone was so mocking it fueled Mecha's anger to unimaginable degrees. He flew at him again, seemingly, less...coordinated and...powerful than before. Shadow dodged and delivered a roundhouse kick to the robot's face. "So, you must have been using the emeralds for power? How sad." A noise, probably meant to be a growl, escaped Mecha as he landed a punch to the side of Shadow's head. Only to be annoyed by the fact that Knuckles grabbed him roughly and flung him backwards.

Knuckles grinned, "Two on one? Do you really think you have a chance?" Rouge smiled slightly and shook her head. She simply sat down and watched the three fight out their little skirmish.

Their skirmish consisted of quite a complex number of movements, something Rouge the Bat could not even keep up with. Mainly a mixture of Knuckles getting forced back into a wall, denting Mecha's face in horrifically, Shadow coming out of random locations and knocking Mecha across the room, and the occasional mock Shadow and Knuckles would give the metal hedgehog. The point was, Shadow and Knuckles were technically winning. Therefore, her attention was elsewhere. A familiar cry forced her attention back to the fight though. A gash, cruelly placed along Knuckles' torso, was the cause.

A mix of fury and anger seemed evident in the dented and sparking creation. Quite a pitiful sight, indeed, though one that was no where near finished. Shadow finally came to his senses and used a chaos spear to get Mecha away from beating poor Knuckles' into a pulp. Metal Sonic turned angrily around to face the black hedgehog. "You are becoming increasingly annoying." This just put a smug look on Shadow's face.

A dazed Knuckles stated something strange and jumbled shortly before he passed out. Mecha didn't seem to care much for finishing him off, as Shadow had his anger reaching to new and unforeseen levels. "Glad to hear it." Mecha was quite a sight, a malfunction within his systems, probably from a punch delivered by the now unconscious echidna, was forcing a twitch every so often, which was amusing Shadow.

Rouge walked over to Knuckles after a second, kneeling down carefully, making sure he was all right. He was, but he didn't look like he was going to be jumping back up and taking on Mecha again any time soon. She didn't leave his side though, suppressing serious worry for the stubborn echidna. "Shadow, it looks like you're gonna have to finish him off." This didn't seem to surprise Shadow in the least.

"Good." He didn't seem any too excited about it though. The fact that Mecha seemed to be getting increasingly powerful with every level of rage he reached. Mecha glowered cruelly, or, you would think he was glowering, you really couldn't tell since his eyes didn't give away much, other than was he functioning or not.

Both of the hedgehog's, one flesh and blood the other metallic jerked towards each other. For everyone in the room, except Knuckles and Espio, the battle seemed to take hours. They literally thought they were going to be staring at the two stubborn creations fighting each other endlessly. Charmy and Vector even seemed to be getting bored, though formerly, they had been so very into the fighting, "Come on, Shadow...finish him off." Shadow sent a glare towards the previously silent bee.

"Shut up...I'm doing my best." This slight distraction was enough to get Shadow a severe blow to the head. Severe enough to leave him in something of a daze, this jerking the blue hedgehog to his feet. Charmy was going to apologize, but decided better of it, as he would probably just get cussed out by one of the two real hedgehogs in the room.

Amy released Sonic after a moment of trying to keep him where he was, there was really no point in it at all. She watched him, frightened for his own safety, she couldn't bring herself to say anything though. It wasn't her place to argue the point with him. Obviously, he cared for Shadow a lot more than he cared for her. The thought brought back that familiar blow to her heart, as she fought back tears again.

Sonic jerked in front of his incredibly dazed mate, clenching his fists intensely, closing him hard enough to cause blood to slip down his palms. Mecha seemed surprised for a moment, then pleased as he saw the blood still seeping down Sonic's leg from the bullet wounds. "You said you wanted to kill me, you idiotic faker...so...why don't you see if you can?" Truthfully, he was bluffing like he had never bluffed before. He couldn't fight Mecha, no matter if he did have the hilarious twitch, with most likely a few broken ribs, a leg consisting primarily of bullet wholes, a burn mark from a laser in his chest, and random obscured bruises and gashes all over him. Honestly, he didn't see how Mecha wasn't going to see through the bluff as a two-year-old could have.

"You are a fool for even interfering...you cannot even fight in your current condition." Sonic's eyes twitched. He knew this, but his pride would not allow him to admit it. He could fight perfectly fine, the fact that his vision kept blurring then coming back to normal and the severe pains that would randomly hit him like a hammer meant nothing. He could fight, and beat Metal Sonic. Yeah, and Amy was the queen of England.

"But, fine...if that is the way you want to play it, then be a fool." Thrusting himself forward, the metallic hedgehog jerked Sonic backwards. A deep wish that the wall had not been so close to his back overwhelmed the green-eyed hedgehog as he slammed into it, feeling as if every bone in his body snapped on impact.

Meanwhile, Shadow was staring at a mixture of colorful stars and what was actually going on. He forced himself to blink a few times, and gradually the stars started to disappear, replaced with a few blotches in his vision. "Ow..." He mumbled and weakly sat up, noticing Mecha knocking Sonic around like a rag doll, "...hn, deja vu." He weakly stood up, his legs shaking as he proceeded to do so.

Amy's alarmed scream brought him fully back to reality, no, he had not unfortunately gotten amnesia all over again. That would be completely idiotic, why would anyone even think of that? It's completely mental. Shadow forced himself to realize what was going on, sucking in a breath as he saw Mecha bring down a...claw-like...thing across Sonic's torso, then head. The hedgehog seemed to have taken a few more injuries than he was limited to, because he completely passed out. "Good timing, Faker." Shadow jerked to his feet, wishing he could randomly find a rock to fling at Mecha, as he felt as if he was moving in slow motion. Though, he wasn't, and did manage to nail Mecha before he did anything else. "Man, Sonic...you really gotta shake this stream of bad luck you have going. ...for both our sakes." He said the last part lowly.

One of Mecha's rims of red, or the red area of his eye, flickered out after a second. He seemed idly fed up with the group of them, suddenly Shadow got extremely annoyed as he glared at Vector, "Why aren't you helping? You are HUGE! The least you could do would be to help us out to a slight degree, sit on him...do...something!" Shadow gave him a frenzied look. Vector gave a smile of guilt.

Mecha's twitch continued, finally getting to him. The other eye, in turn, flickered out. Shadow sighed and walked over to him, flicking the metallic forehead and the machine simply fell over. "We are SO leaving."

"What about us?" The conscious members of Team Chaotix felt slightly saddened by the fact that Shadow probably wasn't including them in the "we" he mentioned. They were proven correct as he gave a harsh glare in their direction.

"You can stay and rot!" Charmy lowered his head shamefully as he stared at the black hedgehog. Who didn't even deem him worthy enough to keep staring at, or actually, it was probably because he was too worried about Sonic to let any more mean comments go in his direction. He watched as the black and red hedgehog knelt down over the injured one.

Tails ran over to him, followed by Amy, Rouge was contented to stay over by Knuckles, figuring if the three of them couldn't morally support Sonic enough, he needed some kind of an institution. "Is he gonna be okay?" Shadow raised an eyebrow at the curious fox, a smirk lighting his face as he looked back down.

"He's Sonic, he'll be fine." Tails relaxed.

"What about Espio?" Shadow rolled his eyes in Vector's direction. He didn't think the gator deserved an answer, but Tails thought otherwise.

"Don't worry, guys...he just used some sleeping gas on him...he just likes to blow things completely out of proportion, he should be up in a few hours." Vector and Charmy seemed pleased to hear this explanation. Though, Espio would probably prefer unconsciousness.

---

Amy glared furiously at Shadow, who simply leaned against one of her walls, shutting his eyes. "I don't see why we couldn't just take him to the hospital! They could take good care of him there." The black hedgehog got up and walked across the hardwood floor of her house. He rested his shoulder against the window seal, letting her finish whatever it was she was babbling at him about.

"There's no point...he's almost well now...you can put bandages on just as well as any nurse." Shadow's smirk turned to a sour look as he realized she took this as a really sweet compliment. "...Amy, I didn't even mean it like that." He despised how she always took his insults and turned them into great things. It drove him completely insane. They would have continued arguing, had a familiar blue hedgehog not shut them up.

"Hey..." He mumbled, still slightly tired as he had just woken up. Shadow turned to him after another moment of glaring furiously at Amy, he smiled when he saw Sonic though. Though, the determined blue hedgehog looked slightly exhausted still though. "Were you guys fighting again?" Amy shook her head reassuringly, trying to get him to go back to bed. But, he obviously didn't want to. "Yes you were." He seemed to wake up a little more, "Where are Knuckles and Rouge?"

"Probably out on a date or something, maybe he professed his undying love for her, but who knows?" Sonic had to turn completely around to find that the voice was from Tails. He was sitting on Amy's couch, smiling at Sonic as he met his gaze. "So are you feeling any better now, Sonic?" Sonic nodded his head, though, no one knew why Tails asked this question. What was Sonic going to do? Scream no, run back in the room and hide under the covers? "Good!" Tails seemed okay with the response though, as Sonic did look considerably better as well, save a few bandages around his torso and arms.

"Knuckles professing undying love, I'm not thinking so." Sonic cocked his head to the side, Shadow watched Sonic's movements intently. He blinked his eyes, his mind not wanting to focus on anything but the injured blue hedgehog. His mind wandered, but he redirected his gaze past him, not wanting to get caught staring dead at him. True, he had said he loved him, but he still had that childish nature of not wanting to get caught in the act of staring, not like anybody wanted to get caught doing that, though.

His thoughts didn't do as his glance though, remaining on Sonic even after his gaze left him, 'He's...so cute.' Admittedly, in his mind, he even sounded confused at why he thought this. It was a confusing concept to grasp.

"Well...I said I wasn't sure." Tails started, he sounded like he was going to finish, but the pink hedgehog interrupted him. Guys never got the point across when they were trying to talk about what had happened. She had come to realize that all of them tended to mumble and mix things up, it was like they lacked the capability to tell at story.

"They went back to angel island, I hope they get together! How sweet would that be?" Sonic just stared at her dully, he didn't mean to seem so uninterested, but he really couldn't care less. He tried not to show this in his expression, obviously it worked too, or either she wasn't paying much attention because she kept right on going with the story. Shadow eventually looked over to her, wondering when she intended to shut up. "Well...she did hug him when he woke up, then they both left separately, but I'm not sure if they're together now or not."

"If they are, I'm sure they're arguing." Amy scowled at Shadow. Why did he always have to ruin everything? And by everything, at this moment, she meant everything. He sent her a smirk and then shifted his glance back out the window.

Amy put her hands on her hips and gave the black and red hedgehog a menacing stare, when after two minutes this still had no effect, she resorted to shouting, "Shadow! You jerk! I bet they aren't!" His red eyes left the window long enough to meet hers for only a moment. He was quite amused with the annoyed expression though.

He turned completely this time, then rolled his eyes at her. This action seemed to drive Amy crazy as she stared at him and waited for him to respond with some smart-ass remark. He could really get to you if he tried, she would know, "That's all that echidna ever does is argue, why wouldn't they be arguing now? You never know what happened...they could hate each other now."

Before Amy could shout again, as his head was beginning to hurt, Sonic spoke up, "Well, Shadow, don't be optimistic or anything." He grinned and Shadow shrugged his shoulders. He had no real reason to be optimistic in the least. Sonic stared at Shadow now, the black hedgehog became intensely interested in the floor and didn't look up at him. For some reason, a nervous feeling had crept over him.

"No problem." He smirked, feeling the green eyes remain on him. He wanted to look up, but he was severely flustered for a reason not understandable to him. Tails bounded up and down on the couch, though, before Sonic could say anything in return.

"So, I guess we saved the world again!" Tails seemed seriously pleased with this fact, the three others in the room simply looked at him in bemusement.

"Not really...I just warped Eggman and Mecha to some remote location on an island to work out their differences," He said this mock pleasantly, sarcasm present in the tone, "and we got off the ARK...not really a big deal." Tails twitched as he hated the fact that Shadow had completely and totally crushed his enthusiasm. His eyes stumbled across the pink hedgehog, who seemed like something was upsetting her. He wondered what the matter was, it was unlike Amy to be depressed. He hated the fact that she seemed to be, he liked her abnormally cheery behavior. He was one of a few that did. Or he might have been the only one that did.

"But, Sonic..." Amy's voice seemed somewhat pleading as she addressed the blue hedgehog, he looked at her. His glance shifted back over to Shadow after a moment though, his heart sped up, as he felt it pound drastically against his rib cage. All three of them desperately wanted Tails to leave. Tails was being slightly oblivious now though, so finally Shadow had to speak up for himself.

"Hey, Tails...get out." Amy winced at the harshness in Shadow's tone. Sonic blinked, shocked that the hedgehog had been so forward with Tails. Then he wondered why it seemed so strange to him that he had been, as Shadow was always rather blunt. Tails seemed slightly surprised that Shadow had just up and said this, he blinked and then slowly stood up. He stared at Shadow as if he had two heads. Amy smiled and sympathetically urged him out with a motion of her hands. He lowered his ears slightly and headed for the door of her house.

Amy's ears fell backwards upon the sad looking fox, "We just need to talk to Sonic, we'll come get you in a minute!" Her voice changed back to it's usual upbeat cheeriness as she spoke. Tails smiled and nodded his head, having a little less sulk about him as he left.

Shadow sent Sonic a quick glance, a weak smile crossing his lips. Sonic returned it after a second, his thoughts racing faster than he could run. 'I do love him...but what am I going to say to her?'

Yay! I'm finished! That didn't take too long! I wasn't really pleased with how this came out, but I tried reconfiguring it like ten times and this was the best result I had. So yeah, hope it wasn't too horrendous. The next chapter should be a lot better. As I've been planning it the whole time I wrote this one. Yay? Please review!