Disclaimer! i don't own anything!

Roge couldn't sit still, "That's it! We need a plan of action!"

"Like WE didn't know that!" muttered Knuckles as he glared at Rouge who sat right back down next to Manic.

"So now that we find out Shadow is alive he's about to... die?" muttered Tails as he glanced at the door of the infirmary where Shadow was

"This is not the time to get distracted and wonder about things!" added Knuckles, they needed to think about what to do before thinking of the consequences.

Sonia turned off to the corridor heading to the main castle grounds, "I'm gonna look in the library..." Someone is going to die on my birthday? Why? Nit to mention... he's kinda cute...

Amy glanced at the door again. She never expected to see this happen. It terrified her. Eggman's machines were capable of... killing...

A flash seeped through the sides and window of the door that was soon bust open by Knuckles. The medics fled in shock. Before them was a being made of crystal in the form of a human girl. It looked confused- "Whe...Re... Am...I..." it muttered

Unconsciously words escaped from Amy's mouth, "Who are you?"

"..A...Ri...A..?" Shadow attempted to say something, the sounds muddled away as he was to weak to speak properly.

That second the crystal began to glow again slowly taking um the form of human skin. The now blond hair fluttered lightly in the air as she fell on her knees in front of Shadow's support pod, drops of water landed on the glass, "Finally..." began he sobbing voice, "We meet again... Little brother..."

Knuckles and Sonic stared at her before screaming out "LITTLE BROTHER?!" if one surprise wasn't enough this was too much for one day.

Sonic wanted to question Maria but she interrupted him before he could start, "Please! Not now! I need to save Shadow! I need the chaos emeralds!" she turned to Knuckles, "Please? Can I please borrow them?"

Startled, Knuckles did not know how to react, "What for?"

"Don't worry, I'm a chaos emerald myself..."

The gang stared at her like they just heard a bad joke... She is kidding... Right?

But Knuckles' jaw dropped, "WHAT?"

"I know it's hard to believe but please let me use their power to help Shadow! I'm not powerful enough on my own! I beg you!"

The team didn't know if they could help any other way so they got the seven chaos emeralds, taking the master emerald was too risky. as tails opened the case amy took one chaos emerald and presented it to Maria.

"Here ya go"

Before she knew it the emerald floated to Maria, "Thank you for trusting me..." said Maria with tears coming out of her eyes, "...knowing our differences..."

Tails lifted another emerald allowing it to float off to Maria, "The past is in the past! Shadow's our friend now"

Sonia, who also joined as she found out what happened, turned to Maria as she passed the chaos emerald. "Wait... How do you know?"

Them the chaos emeralds floated away and surrounded maria in an orbit, Maria giggled, "They told me..."

Soon the emeralds began to produce pulsating energy that everyone in the room felt. The energy then seeped towards Maria creating a glowing rainbow that surrounded Maria as the emeralds continued to orbit around her.

"No way..." Tails never thought this was possible.

"The chaos emeralds really are responding..." muttered Amy.

But most of the shock was on Knuckles, "I've never seen anything like this..."

But before they could do anything Maria turned to Shadow and the energy flowed from her hand towards him making his body have a slight glow, similar to the one he had in chaos control mode. The flow stopped and the emeralds fell to the floor as Maria collapsed on her knees, her breaths got heavier.

Rouge bent down next to her, petting Maria. "Did it work?" she asked quietly.

"Actually..." Maria continued with a shaking voice, "Since... He didn't... get... this kind of... treatment... in a while... I'm not too sure... myself..."

Sonic moved over to Shadow, it was hard to see if anything was happening because of the bandages, "So it may not work?"

"That's not very reassuring," added Tails as he gave Maria a glass of water.

The gang heard a whimper in the background. Cream's cheeks had rivers of tears on them that cheese was trying to wipe off with a hankie. "Mr Shadow might... might..."