CHAPTER 6

JIMMY

It was the next morning and Rouge figured she should finish up Shadow's map, "Almost finished then Shadow can finally leave. I can't take it. I can't let him hang around me anymore, I hate it. He's always killing lives and I can't take the slaughter. Finishing this map will finally drive that nightmare away." She was startled when she heard a scream down stairs.

"Aunt Rouge!"

Rouge quickly took her mind away from the computer, "What the hell?" She quickly ran downstairs and saw Shadow strangling a little white bat boy. "Shadow, let go of him!"

Shadow didn't listen, "All right spill it, how did you get here and how do you know Rouge?"

The boy looked at Rouge in pain, "Aunt Rouge..."

"Shadow, I said let him go damn it!" She removed Shadow's hands away from the boy's neck and immediately held the boy close to her, "Dear god Jimmy, are you okay?"

"I'm fine, but your boyfriend here tried to kill me."

Rouge looked at Shadow angrily, "What the hell's wrong with you?"

Shadow tried to explain, "This boy just walked into the house demanding to see you and I wanted to know why."

"He's my nephew, damn it!"

Shadow gasped in surprise, "Uh, I'm...sorry."

Rouge kneeled down at the boy, "Jimmy, what are you doing here? You know your suppose to call me first if you want to visit me."

"I know, Aunt Rouge, but I wanted you to be surprised."

"I have enough surprises for one day", she looked over at Shadow.

"It was an accident", Shadow would kill the boy even if it was accident.

Later they sat down on the sofa talking.

The boy pointed at Shadow, "So what's with your new boyfriend?"

Rouge blushed at his comment, "He's not my boyfriend, he's just a friend."

The boy laughed, "With you blushing, it's a whole different story."

Shadow slapped his hand away from him.

The boy held his hand. He only felt a little pain from the hit, "Aunt Rouge, your boyfriend attacked me again."

"Don't you know it's not nice to point, brat?" Shadow clinched his fists and held it up at the boy, "Piss me off again and the next hit won't be pretty."

Rouge held the boy close, "Don't hit Jimmy Shadow, you'll scare him."

Shadow crossed his arms, "What a brat", Shadow muttered.

"My name is not brat, it's Jimmy!" He yelled.

"My name isn't boyfriend, it's Shadow!" He yelled back.

Rouge could see that they weren't getting along and she knew that Shadow would probably kill him if he was so called pissed off. "Come on Jimmy lets go upstairs okay?"

Jimmy turned away from the hedgehog, "Sure, Aunt Rouge." He and Rouge walked upstairs leaving Shadow on the sofa.

Shadow still was upset with him, "That kid gets on my nerves. Besides he interferes when Rouge is suppose to be working on my map. I'll get rid of that kid, no matter what."

Upstairs Rouge and Jimmy were looking at Rouge's unfinished map of the west.

"Nice map, Aunt Rouge. Is it for the military?"

"Well not really, it's for Shadow."

"He's going away?"

"I pray so."

"Good riddance."

"I know you don't like Shadow much, but could you try to get along with him? He could be nice to you if you're nice to him."

Jimmy thought for a moment, "You're right, Aunt Rouge if I'm nice to him, he'll be nice to me." Jimmy ran downstairs to find Shadow. He saw him sitting on the sofa looking into his eyes. Somehow that scared the boy, "Shadow, I came to say I'm sorry for before. Maybe we can be friends."

Shadow was silent.

Jimmy walked in front of him, "Are you still mad?"

Shadow stood from the sofa and began to suffocate the boy by grabbing his neck with his hand.

The boy tried to break free but he didn't have enough strength. He tried to call Rouge, but he couldn't say anything. Soon it was too much for him and he passed out on the floor. Shadow let his body drop to the floor. Then Shadow's fangs appeared from his mouth and he began to insert them into the boy's neck, not caring if blood appeared on the carpet. When he finished he heard crying behind him. He turned and saw Rouge standing there behind him crying. From there he had no shame for what he had done.

Rouge's tears met the carpet. "You killed him...", she said in a whisper, "You killed him!" She ran upstairs still crying.

Shadow followed her, "Rouge!" Once he got in the bedroom he was startled that Rouge appeared from a dark corner with a shiny object in her hand pointing it at him. "Rouge, don't."

"You killed him and you're going to pay", she pulled the trigger and fired the weapon at him.

Shadow touched his wound, "It'll take more than just that tiny thing to kill me and you know it."

"You have to die by something", She clinched her fist and tried to punch him, until he grabbed her fist.

He pushed her against the wall, "Look I'm sorry for killing him, but I didn't want him to waste your time on my map."

"Is that all you care about! You're so damn heartless, you don't care about anyone else except yourself!"

"That's not true!"

"Then who! Who the hell else do you care about!"

Shadow was quiet for a moment, "My family."

"What about your family?"

"I wasn't a vampire all my life. I had a family just my mother and my little sister. I never really got along with them very well. Either they didn't respect me, or I didn't respect them. When I became a vampire, all I thought about was killing people and my family was the first. I killed them both and I got rid of the evidence by burning the house down to the ground. After all the mayhem that happened I realized what I did was wrong. I-I didn't mean to hurt anyone. I couldn't control myself. All I thought about was blood. Everyone was right, I am a monster", he began to cry on Rouge's shoulder.

Rouge then felt sorry for him, "Shadow...I had no idea...", she made him sit on the bed with her, "It's okay, Shadow."

"No, it isn't. I just kill and kill, until I can't kill anymore. It isn't right. I don't deserve to live."

She made him lean on her shoulder, "Go to sleep."

Shadow slowly closed his eyes and went to sleep on her shoulder.