CHAPTER 2

FRIENDSHIP FADING

Espio backed away from the monster trying to avoid it, but it jumped behind him swinging his claws trying to stab them into his skin. Espio backed away from his attacks with pace, until he tripped and fell on the floor, "What do you want?"

The monster didn't respond and tried to stab him while he was down on the floor, but fortunately for Espio he missed.

Espio took his foot and kicked the monster in his face making him fall on the floor. Espio and the monster stood from the floor at the same time. Espio stood in a stance, "Want more?"

The monster just growled under his breath and ran away.

Espio calmed down, "I guess not."

Vector and Charmy came behind Espio seeing everything that happened.

"Espio, what the hell happened?" Vector asked.

"What was that? It looked scary", Charmy trembled a bit.

Espio shrugged, "I don't know. It just attacked me for no apparent reason."

"We gotta go, Charmy and I already set the dynamite packs in the engine room. This place will go in ten minutes", Vector said checking his watch.

"No, we can't we gotta find Shadow", Espio wanted to look for him, but he didn't know where to look.

Vector acted like he didn't care, "Screw this shit. Charms and I are outta here. Anyway we'll wait for guys in the plane. If you guys don't show in approximately two minutes we're outta here."

"I knew I could count on you, Vec", Espio said sarcastically. He ran down the deep hallway trying to look for Shadow.

Espio ran around the corner and that's when he found Shadow.

Shadow was laying on the cold clean floor completely naked.

"Shadow!" He kneeled down on the floor shaking him, "Shadow, Shadow! Wake up, damn it! This place will go off in a matter of minutes, so this would be a great time for you to do your Chaos Control thing." Espio continued to shake him, until he woke up.

Shadow opened his eyes. He stood from the floor slowly looking kinda weak, "Espio, what am I doing here and why the hell am I naked!"

Espio shrugged, "I don't know, I just found you like this." Espio then looked at his watch knowing that time was getting short. "Shadow, Chaos Control now!"

Shadow held out a green Chaos Emerald, "Chaos Control!"

A bright green light appeared and warped Shadow and Espio out of the facility and back to Charmy's plane without harm. They flew away from the facility with the explosion taking place behind them

When they got back to the Chaotix Shadow had on new clothes and Espio told him what happened when Shadow had suddenly disappeared. "While you were taking a vacation I was attacked by a huge black monster."

"A monster?" Shadow thought he was imagining things.

"Yeah and that thing was hideous. It was trying to take my head off!"

"I'm sorry I wasn't there to help, Espio", Shadow truly was sorry.

Espio crossed his arms, "You ought to be. You didn't do anything on the mission except cough up blood."

Rouge had a worried look on her face, "He did what?"

"I couldn't do anything, Espio. I felt deeply ill."

"Whatever, because of your disappearance I had to go look for your sorry ass."

Shadow was getting upset over Espio's attitude, "What the fuck is your problem anyway? I helped you many times and you never thanked me."

"That's because I never thought about."

"You're so damn selfish!"

"And you're stubborn and always have attitude problems, even when your wife is around you still don't appreciate anything she does for you. I almost feel sorry for Rouge. Sorry that she had to end up marrying you."

Shadow couldn't take anymore of Espio's insults. He clinched his fist and hit him clear in his face with a strong impact.

Espio fell to the floor from the impact. He got up from the floor looking at Shadow with anger, "You son of a bitch! All the things I done for you and this is how you repay me? Well if it's a fight you want, I fight you'll get." Espio came at Shadow with a uppercut punch aiming directly at Shadow, until a white bat jumped in front of him. Instead of hitting Shadow he had hit Rouge instead.

Rouge was hit in the lower part of her stomach. She fell to the floor holding her stomach in pain. She even had a hard time breathing because of the strong hit.

Tonya ran to Rouge and tried to comfort her, "Breathe Rouge, breathe", she tried to say calmly.

Shadow's heart was now full of anger. He tackled Espio to the floor and started to punch him everywhere in the face.

Vector ran over to them pulling Shadow away from Espio. "Stop it, Shadow!" Vector stood between them, "Shadow, it was an accident. Espio didn't mean to..."

"Yes he did! That fucking chameleon is dead!" He tried to fight Espio again, but Vector pushed him back.

"Enough! Espio, you owe Shadow and Rouge an apology."

Before he could, Shadow didn't want to accept it, "He owes me more than an apology!"

"What more do you want?" Espio didn't have any clue what he wanted.

Shadow walked over to Rouge and picked her up in his arms. He made a cold stare in Espio's eyes, "You could have miscarried her and I'll never forgive you for that." He ran out of the Chaotix with the injured Rouge in his arms.

Espio hoped he didn't harm their child in anyway, but that wasn't the only thing he was upset about. He may have lost his friendship with Shadow.