-Shadow-
...Maria...
She's standing next to me, and we're looking out of the window...
"What do you think it's like down there, Shadow?"
"It's..."
I don't know what to say to her. It's beautiful, everything we thought it would be and more, and yet...
My leg hurts. I look down. For a moment, I see my scars showing through my fur, scars I've been constantly aware of over the past few weeks. Past few weeks? Maria, where have I been? I can't say anything. I don't know why. The beauty I remember is fading from my mind, and Maria looks at me, concerned.
"Shadow...?"
I shake my head. What's wrong with me? And I hear voices, voices calling me away, and Maria's drifting away from me...
I blink several times, waking up. Amy and Chess are talking by the side of my bed. They look worried... what's going on?
"Amy... what's happened?"
"Sonic's left. We don't know where he's gone... but he'll be fine. No doubt he'll come back soon enough." She pauses, more worried than she's trying to sound. "He can take care of himself, Shadow. I can't endanger everyone else... we don't even know where he is."
I nod... but I realise I'm afraid, too, more so than Amy. I sit up, slowly, and lift my good arm. Brushing the fur back with the metal fingers of my left hand, I look at the old scars underneath it. I don't know how I got them, where they came from – they've been there almost as long as I can remember. The only time I didn't have them was... was when I was still on the ARK, with Maria. As shrouded in the mists of my past as ever, they only serve to increase my fear. Fear for myself, though I don't know why, and for Sonic, a friend I thought I'd lost long ago.
Amy sits down next to me, just close enough that the fur of her arm brushes mine. She's seen these scars before, knows as much about them as I do... knows whatever secrets they hide still scare me. I give her a faint smile, but the shadows across my mind don't lift. I feel cold...
"Shadow...?"
Amy lifts my metal hand away from my arm, and my short fur falls back into place, hiding the scars beneath.
"He'll come back, Shadow. He's Sonic. He always comes back."
I nod, try to bury my fear with whatever part of the past it came from, but whatever happened to me, whatever it is that I still don't remember, still haunts me. After all this time, I don't think it will ever go away.