It was several minutes before Shadow finally moved off of Sonic, rolling onto the floor with a groan. "Damn, that hurts," he said with a hiss. "Are you okay?"

"Nope," Sonic said, and his voice sounded strangely far away. "They shot my leg." Why did everything feel so fuzzy? He tried to move again, but that just sent another jolt of pain up his body, so he laid right back down again. He realized his breath was coming in sharp gasps as panic fluttered in his chest, his pulse thumping in his ears.

Shadow crawled over quickly, grimacing and hissing in pain. "Look at me," he said, carefully picking Sonic up by the torso. Sonic turned his head to find Shadow's steady crimson gaze on him, his eyes the only thing with definition in the room, the only thing he could focus on. He barely heard it when Shadow said, "I'm going to pull it out, but this is going to hurt like hell. Be ready."

Sonic couldn't even think to protest before the pain shot up his body again, only this time even worse, the burning sensation accompanied by a tearing, searing hot pain and he couldn't stifle the scream and the reflex to get away. But Shadow had a tight grip on his ankle, which also twinged from landing on it wrong, and he couldn't think clearly enough beyond the panic to escape. And then suddenly the pain began to dim, and Sonic slumped to the floor in relief, tears streaming down his cheeks as he took a shaky breath.

Distantly, he heard the ping of metal hitting stone. "Hold still," Shadow's voice said. "Understood?"

Sonic managed a nod and braced himself before a warm feeling enveloped the bullet wound, and it burned, but more like a mild sunburn. It didn't cause that same shooting pain that the wound itself did when jostled. Strangely, it actually felt kind of nice…

His ears popped, and suddenly he heard Shadow's steady, even breaths more clearly as the pain from the wound finally faded away. Once that pain was gone, Shadow moved away from Sonic, his breaths deeper, as if he were winded. "You can move now," Shadow said.

Sonic sat up. His ankle still twinged, and he winced, but his knee felt fine now. He tested it, flexing it a little, and found no limit of motion that he could feel. He stared at Shadow. "You can heal people?" he asked incredulously.

"In a rather limited capacity," Shadow replied, grimacing. He moved to take off his shirt, and Sonic awkwardly averted his eyes, earning a huff of a laugh from Shadow. "Relax, it's not like you haven't seen this before, Sonic," he said.

"I know," Sonic said, his cheeks burning. "But that doesn't mean I should just ogle you every time I see you shirtless."

"Does that mean you were ogling me last night?"

"Shut up!"

Shadow chuckled, and Sonic heard the shush of fabric as Shadow set the shirt down on the stone floor, then a hiss of pain. Sonic turned around to see Shadow putting both of his hands to his back, beads of sweat dripping from his forehead as he grimaced. After several moments, he slumped forward, and Sonic rushed forward to catch him, his ankle protesting at the quick movement.

He looked at Shadow's wound, and while it wasn't bleeding anymore, it still looked easy to reopen. But Shadow looked like he might pass out if he kept going, looking up with glazed eyes at Sonic. "Don't overdo it," Sonic said softly. "We're just going to have to rest here until you can finish healing."

"But Rose–"

"She'll be fine. She's a tough cookie, and we won't be getting out of here if we can't even walk."

Shadow grunted, then pulled away from Sonic, leaning up against the stone wall with a sigh. "I hate it when you're right, you know that?" he said, though a tiny smile pulled at the corners of his lips. "First Kintobor's bullshit, now you actually being a rational person for once."

Sonic grinned. "I'm always a rational person," he said. "You're just stubborn."

"I am not."

"Are too."

Shadow scoffed. "Would a rational person try to infiltrate a highly guarded internment camp alone?"

"Hey, I wasn't alone! Silver was with me!"

"Fine, alone with a single mage with very limited power."

Sonic was silent after that. Shadow was right, but he wasn't going to admit that aloud. He was glad that he and Rouge had insisted on coming with. Otherwise he would probably be dead. Or if not dead, trapped all alone in this cell, still in excruciating pain with no one to help him, no one to joke with in the darkness.

He looked at Shadow, at his smirking lips, and found himself leaning just the slightest bit forward before stopping himself. No, this was all wrong. He shouldn't want this so bad.

So instead, Sonic moved to sit next to Shadow, close enough that he could feel Shadow's warmth, but not quite touching him. He kept his gaze away from Shadow's face as he said, "Why did you come with anyway? I didn't think you were that attached to me."

He heard Shadow shift next to him, and turned to find him staring at Sonic with a confused expression. "What do you mean by that?" he asked.

"Well," Sonic said. "I mean, I didn't think you cared enough about me to go with me into a life-or-death situation. I figured you were willing to just move on and do your own thing when we got to shore."

"Plans change," Shadow said. "And as annoying as you are sometimes, yes, I care about you and don't wish to see you dead. Rose and the crew would have done the same if they had been able to keep up with us." He was quiet for a moment. "But… I've lost enough people in my life and I honestly don't want you to be one of them," he admitted.

Sonic felt his cheeks warm, but he didn't want to stray too far into compliments lest he give in to the temptation he was already fighting. "Lost enough people?" he asked instead. "What do you mean?"

Shadow sighed. "I guess I walked into that one," he admitted. "I lost my parents at a young age. I told you I was rather sickly as a child, didn't I? It was bad enough that the common cold nearly killed me twice, and I was almost always bedridden with a fever. When I was three years old, they took me to Black Doom to try and make me stronger, so I wouldn't get sick so easily. He did just that–he made me much stronger, gave me all these magical abilities. But there is always a price for Doom. My parents didn't have money, but he assured them he was doing this for free. But he didn't, as he told me years later. He took their memories of me. They left me with him with no recollection of having a son."

Shadow was quiet for a moment, and Sonic felt his heart crack in two as he continued. "My entire life with him was a nightmare," he said. "On top of being separated from my parents, I was… I was treated more like a guard dog than a person. Doom taught me how to destroy things, taught me to kill people, and punished me when I refused. It wasn't until I was around fourteen or so that I met Princess Maria."

Shadow's expression softened just a little, looking almost wistful. "Doom had managed to get into the good graces of the king as the court mage," he continued, "and he brought me with him to the palace. I was forbidden to speak to anyone, but Maria was rather adventuresome, despite being sickly herself, and she found me sneaking into the kitchens one day. The first time I saw her I…" He chuckled softly. "I panicked and ran. But the next day I came back and she was there waiting for me with a loaf of bread she'd asked the chefs to make.

"Every day after that, for months, she would sit there and wait for me, and we never spoke, but I couldn't help but grow attached to her. She was the first person in years to show me any kindness. One day, I told her 'thank you' before I left, and she smiled so wide and said, 'So you can talk.'"

Sonic laughed, and Shadow huffed a tiny laugh of his own before he continued.

"After that, we gradually started talking more and having actual conversations with each other. At first we managed to keep it quiet—no one but her bodyguard and the kitchen staff knew we were talking. It wasn't until Doom found me gone one afternoon and went looking for me that he found out.

"Sneaking around after that got a lot harder. But I was also rebelling more against him, avoiding the tasks he wanted to fulfill, whether that was something as mundane as chores or gruesome as… torture. He had a lot of enemies, and I suspect now that many of them were Ivo's."

Sonic frowned. "Who's Ivo?" he asked.

"That's Kintobor's first name," Shadow answered. "He's never been fond of it. He always preferred his family name. But anyway, Ivo was always charismatic, and I never once suspected him of anything sinister—he acted kind towards me… I wonder how much of that was an act now.

"But anyway, time passed, and Princess Maria and I grew practically inseparable. Her grandfather seemed pretty fond of me too when he discovered me. He was curious, liked to ask me questions about my abilities, and study what they did. One time he asked if I could shoot a pane of glass with my spear, which I did. It took them months to find all the shards."

Shadow chuckled, but then his smile faded. "About a month before Maria died, Gerald started acting strange. He asked me to protect Maria the best I could–said he had reason to believe that someone was plotting against the throne, against her. At the time I thought his paranoia was simply the result of an aging mind. But I wasn't there when I should have been..."

Shadow squeezed his eyes tight, and Sonic's heart sank when he heard the slight tremble in Shadow's voice, knowing what was coming next.

"The night it happened, Doom had locked me in the dungeons, and the minute he did that I knew Gerald had been right. I tried for hours to release myself, but he'd put spells on my cell to ward against my magic. Finally I got angry enough to simply appear somewhere else—I'd never pulled that trick before—but by the time I got to her, I was minutes too late."

Shadow was silent for a moment. "If I'd figured that trick out even just a few minutes sooner, I could have saved her," he said, his voice thick. "Then I wouldn't feel like there's this gaping hole in my chest where she's supposed to be. Then maybe we could have celebrated her twentieth birthday the way we should have this year instead of just… acknowledging when it was. She shouldn't have to be acknowledged. She should just… be here!"

Sonic wrapped his arms around Shadow, ignoring the fact that he was shirtless and pulling him close as he heard him stifle a sob. "It wasn't your fault, Shadow," he whispered, gently rubbing his back. "And you're right, it sucks. It really sucks that she isn't here now. This entire situation sucks. But… what's done is done. We can't dwell on the past. And from what I heard of her… I don't think she would have wanted you to anyway."

He pulled away, looking straight into Shadow's eyes, and Shadow nodded, his teary crimson eyes downcast. Then he leaned back into Sonic, leaning his head on his shoulder. Sonic froze, unsure of what to do. Then Shadow said, "You're right… But it's so much easier said than done."

Sonic felt his shoulders droop as he remembered the people he'd also lost. "I know," he said. "I miss my mom and dad all the time. I mean, my siblings and I were only eighteen when they died… We were barely adults. Even now, I still feel… lost without them. I felt even more lost when I thought I'd never be able to see my siblings again. But I know that Mom and Dad wouldn't want us moping. They'd want us to keep going strong, and to be happy. And I think Maria would want the same for you too."

They stayed quiet for a little while, and a little bit later, Sonic realized Shadow had fallen asleep on his shoulder. He decided to just let him sleep. They'd both had an exhausting morning, between little sleep last night and Shadow attempting to heal them both. Sonic found his own eyes drifting closed, and he leaned his head on top of Shadow's, listening to his quiet breathing as he dozed off.

It felt like no time at all had passed before he woke to Shadow shifting away from him, his sudden absence chilling him, making him want to lean back into his warmth. But Sonic made himself pull away with a yawn. "Sorry," he said. "Didn't mean to fall asleep."

"Neither did I," said Shadow, his voice irritated. "That was foolish. We're lucky they didn't come back to check on us." He put his hands to the wound on his side, frowning in concentration as they glowed red. Sonic moved to grab Shadow's shirt, although having seen him shirtless for so long, he'd gotten used to it.

Once the wound was healed completely, Shadow took the shirt gratefully and put it on, and Sonic buried the part of him that was disappointed about it. Now Shadow didn't look quite so vulnerable, so open. He was back to being the captain he'd come to know rather than the hurting young man he'd held in his arms just minutes before.

Sonic stood up, then grimaced as his ankle protested again. "Any chance you could fix my ankle before you go?" he asked.

Shadow shook his head. "I need to save my energy," he said. "That nap just barely replenished it enough that I could finish healing myself. If I do any more healing, I'll pass out."

Sonic nodded. "Okay, then how do we get out of here? I can try rolling into it, but I don't think my ankle's gonna like that either."

"Agreed," said Shadow. He walked over and inspected the iron door, frowning thoughtfully. "Stay back," he told Sonic, and Sonic hobbled away from the door as familiar red energy crackled at Shadow's fingertips. The energy shaped itself into a red spear, almost like a lightning bolt, and then Shadow backed up and threw it like a javelin at the hinges. The door fell with a loud clang, and Shadow dropped to the ground, shaking.

"Shadow!" Sonic cried. "Are you okay?"

"Fine," Shadow replied, his teeth clenched. He reached up towards Sonic, who pulled him up and let him lean into him, both hedgehogs now supporting each other. "Let's get the hell out of here," growled Shadow, and they walked out of the cell and into a dark hallway, towards the light at the top of a set of stairs at the end.

Suddenly, a shadow obscured the light, and Sonic felt his quills raise and cross before he recognized the silhouette and relief washed over him as Amy hurried into the space, still wearing Sonic's vest from last night, a magenta hedgehog hot on her heels.

"You idiots!" Amy cried, sobbing as she grabbed both of them in a tight hug. "Don't you ever run off like that again! I thought you were dead!"

Sonic moved one arm to return her embrace, then felt another pair of arms envelop him from behind, and looked to find Sonia hugging him tight, her teeth bared in a grimace, her lower lip quivering. Suddenly, Sonic felt a warm sting in his eyes, and a lump lodged itself in his throat as he hugged them both tight. He could feel Shadow's arms around him and Amy, clutching both of them tightly.

After a moment, Amy finally pulled away, taking Shadow and supporting him while Sonia did the same with her brother. Sonic reached out towards Shadow, then let his arm drop as the four of them made their way back to the beach.