Queen Aleena gave him a cruel and knowing smile. "I know they are all lies; my son really does love you, but… who do you think the people and jury will believe? A four month pregnant hedgehog that has a history of killing and trying to destroy the planet or the Queen?" She dusted off her dress and turned away and motioned for her goons to follow her out of the jail. However, before she reached the end of his cell, she turned back to him. "By the way, your trial is in one week's time. Have fun with your last days of life, Shadow."
Shadow didn't even register that the cruel Queen had even left. His tight grip on the jail house bars turned his knuckles white with tension and his eyes just stared through the bars. Dull, lifeless; as if the once scorching blaze that raged in them once before had been extinguished by the cold bucket of water the magenta female had unmercifully dumped on him.
He blinked once, gaining a little more composure, and forced himself to relinquish his death grip on the metal bars. Shadow walked over to the other side of his jail cell like a zombie and slid his back down on the wall and sat on the dirty and moist ground.
One week before the trial? His trial? Uncertain emotions twirled and gripped his senses; too strong and far too many of them for his hormonal body to take at the moment.
Shadow slowly brought his knees as close to his chest as possible because of his enlarged, pregnant stomach and wound his arms around his legs to keep them in place. Shadow held in a sob and buried his head into the hiding spot he had created. It was childish to think that he could hide himself from the cruel eyes of Sonic's mother and the uncaring ones of her goons by burying his head into his legs, but it was the only comfort he had at the moment.
Normally he would never act this way. Vulnerable. Defenseless. Weak. However, his situation was far from being normal. From a guy being able to get pregnant, to the child's father being a prince and a homicidal mother; this situation certainly wasn't normal even if you squinted, turned your head and sung the 'ABC's.
After what felt like days, but were probably only hours, Shadow's stomach let out a painful growl, demanding to be fed. He finally lifted his head, his eyes like weak embers of a dying fire, and Shadow shifted them to the blinking camera in the corner of his cell. "Do you guys feed your prisoners or do you let them starve?" Shadow asked; his voice monotone, not really believing his would get any answers.
Slightly surprised, Shadow was answered about ten minutes later when his sensitive ears caught the sound of two pairs of footsteps. Shadow watched as two guards came to the metal bars of his jail cell's door; one carrying a tray of food, the other holding a very lethal looking gun.
"Stay where you are, hedgehog, and I won't blast your head off," the guard with the gun grunted at him and pulled out a ring of bronze and silver keys.
Shadow wasn't stupid; he had no chance whatsoever of grabbing the keys. By the time he got off of the ground and rushed to the bars he, most likely, would have already been shot… Not to mention the added weight of the baby certainly wouldn't have helped him in any way and he also was quite hungry.
So Shadow stayed exactly where he was, not even moving a muscle in fear of losing the one meal he might ever get here. Shadow stopped a wince; he was acting like some goddamn pet!
Silently fuming, Shadow slowly counted to one hundred to calm himself and watched as the guards opened the door and entered his jail cell. The one with the food, cream of mushroom soup with a hard looking piece of bread and a glass of water, set it on his second-hand bed.
They were about to leave when a sudden buzz came from the gun-carrying guard's pocket. Giving each other annoyed looks; he pulled out the object making the noise, a small black walkie talkie, and pressed the side button.
"Get back up here you two," a snappy high pitched female voice screeched from the device. "Blue is acting up again and we need your help in holding him down again. He can be quite slippery for a hedgehog," the voice said and cut off. The two guards signed in unison and gave each other half lidded looks.
"I say they should just sedate him or place him back in that holding capsule he was in before. He's too much work to keep in check all the time, but that's never going to happen since he's the crown prince," the food guard commented and crossed his arms across his chest.
The two guards obviously didn't consider Shadow a threat anymore since they both stood comfortably inside the cell, the door wide open. Not to mention that when the guard with the gun put away his walkie talkie, he also put away his weapon.
As if Shadow thought the two guards couldn't get any more stupid, the guard who had brought in his food in reached out and attempted to eat his piece of bread. Shadow couldn't stop the deep throated growl that ripped out of his windpipe and the guard reaching for his food tore his hand away as if it would start on fire as soon as he touched it.
The two guards looked at him in surprise, as if they had forgotten he was even there, and narrowed their eyes. Shadow froze under their glares, not even daring to breath. Getting his food was the very least of his worries at the moment. No; he was far too worried about the bloodlust raging through the guards' eyes while they glared at him.
Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, they looked away, all the bloodlust draining out of their eyes. The guard with the gun pulled out his brass key ring again and turned to his companion. "Come on; we better go before she decides of put us on the bathroom duty for being late."
The other guard grunted in agreement and, after making sure that the door was locked up tight, they left Shadow to his own devices. He waited until his ears could no longer hear their heavy footsteps and irritated blabber before standing up. Shadow wandered over to his bed and silently started to eat the provided food. Even though the bread was stale and hard, the soup obviously being watered down beforehand, Shadow deemed the food edible and un-drugged.
Once he was finished, Shadow placed the now empty tray on the ground beside his bed and laid back. He placed one of his hands on his stomach, something that he found that he did unconsciously, and stared up at the moist ceiling of his jail cell.
The female voice from the walkie talkie episode had obviously been talking about Sonic. Despite not knowing where Shadow was and with the odds stacked against them, Sonic was still not giving up. This was either a rather stupid move being made by the cobalt hedgehog or one that took a lot of guts… Shadow was leaning towards the first.
Whether Sonic knew that Shadow was about to go to trial for false accusations by his mother or not, he did not know, but one thing was for sure.
Sonic had not given up… So why had he?
Shadow sighed in frustration and closed his eyes. His free hand found its way to his face and he started to massage it to relieve some of the tension. His life couldn't ever be easy and peaceful could it? He guessed someone with the title 'Ultimate Life Form' wasn't allowed to have a normal family… Again with the word normal; such a term could never describe him, his life, his family or just about anything about him.
Shadow would never admit it, but, at times, he wished that he could just wake up one day and find that his life was just a nightmare. That he was really just a regular hedgehog that went to school and his biggest worry being that if he passed or failed his math exam that he had been far too lazy to study for.
He stopped his hand and rested it on his stomach as well. A small bit of fury found its way into Shadow's chest; he was angry, not at his captures, but at himself. These useless dreams of his only proved that he was weak. He had given up and dreaming of a 'prince charming' to come and save him… No pun intended.
He was the Ultimate Life Form for Pete's sake! He shouldn't be just lying here, expecting someone to save him! Dreamers never got anything done; only the people who took action on those dreams do!
Shadow reopened his eyes; his ruby eyes back to their former blazing glory and, maybe, even brighter than they ever were before. With his strength and determination renewed, Shadow sat up in his bed and took another look around the jail cell. At first glance, his cell looked just like any other, but Shadow could locate the places in the room that Queen Aleena had taken precautions against him.
The cell housed no windows whatsoever; so Shadow couldn't tell how long he had been there or whether it was day or night. However, his jail cell had no light fixtures; so how was their enough light in here for both him and his non-enhanced visitors? A small smirk formed on his tan muzzle; the light was getting into here somehow and Shadow was prepared to find it.
Shadow got up from his bed and up to the bars of his cell. He stuck his head as far out of the bars as possible and started to look for the promising light source. He might only be getting his hopes up, it could have just a lamp or something outside his door, but it, at least, was something to play off of.
Nothing. Shadow furrowed his eyes in confusion. There was nothing on both sides of his cell but just other jail cells. He then looked up and Shadow deflated. Just out of view from inside his room, the hallway outside his jail cell had a light fixture just big enough to light his cell and the space around it.
Shadow sighed and took his head out of the bars. He looked back over to the place in the bars where he had attempted to wiggle out of before Queen Aleena had arrived and strode over to check it out again. Shadow was only able to try to loosen the bars for a couple minutes before two pairs of footsteps came running his way. He jumped away from the metal fixtures again and his eyes widened as magenta fur showed in the darkness.
Shadow folded his ears against his head, his fur stood on end and a deep throated growl started in his throat. He got into a defensive stance, waiting for the punishment he would undoubtedly receive for trying to break out of his cell.
"Shadow?" He froze; that voice was too… young, too concerned to be the sickeningly, sweet voice of Queen Aleena. Shadow almost collapsed in relief when Sonia the hedgehog and her brother, Manic, stepped out of the darkness. "Are you okay, Shadow?" Sonia asked again and gripped the bars of his cell.
He nodded and walked back over to the metal bars to talk with the siblings. He saw Manic smirk out of the corner of his eye and found the green hedgehog staring at his stomach. "Either you just went on a desert spree or mom wasn't lying about you being pregnant with my bro's kid," Manic commented and took out his drum sticks. He started to absentmindedly hit the bars of his cell with the wooden sticks, creating an echo of sounds off the jail hallway.
Sonia sighed at her brother and gave Shadow a heavily worried expression. "We don't have much time, Shadow. We need to get you out of here and well tell you the situation that our mother has created."
Shadow raised an eye ridge, "If you're talking about my trial in a week and the hundred percent chance of me dying from said trial, I already know."
The magenta hedgehog teen rapidly shook her head left to right and the strain of emotion in her voice was kicked up a notch. "No, it's much worse than that, Shadow. Much more elaborate than you know." Sonia's voice turned into a hushed tone, as if afraid that someone she didn't want to hear their conversation was nearby. "What do you think she's been doing the last four months? Building a jail to house you and how to capture you and Sonic from his house? No… she was planning many more things than just those."
Shadow's blood ran cold. Sonia was right, Queen Aleena could have been doing anything the last four months. It was definitely a lot of time for someone as calculating and privileged as the Queen Aleena to have for getting her revenge against him and turning the problem in front of her into something that could help her in the long run.
Shadows' ruby eyes hardened, "Okay, get me out of here." Sonia nodded and motioned for her brother to open the door to his cell. Manic grinned and twirled his drum sticks around in his hands. He tossed the sticks into the front pocket of his jacket and took out two small tools and started working away at the lock on Shadow's door.
"Come on, hurry up, Manic," Sonia said in the same hushed voice as before as she looked from left to right down each hallway looking for any guards.
"I know, I know. Don't rush me, Sis," Manic said and continued working at the lock. "Man, mom didn't go to any stops for you, Shads. This must be one of the hardest locks I've ever tried to break into." Shadow raised an eye ridge at the green hedgehog, wondering just what locks that someone like Manic would try to get into.
"Will you be able to open it?" Sonia asked, her voice rising in fear.
"Calm down, Sis. Don't think so little of my skill, I'll get your boyfriend out of here in no time, Manic replied and chuckled."
Even in the darkness, Shadow could make out the small blush that appeared on Sonia's face from Manic's accusation. "He's… Shadow isn't… What are you?... Gah!" She threw her arms in the air in frustration and Shadow thought, for a second, that the female would suddenly start kicking the living daylights out of her brother.
Just when Sonia lifted her leg to start her revenge, a click sounded and Manic grinned in triumph. He pulled open the door and motioned for Shadow to come through. "After you, Princess," Manic jeered.
Shadow crossed his arms across his chest and glared at the green prince as he walked through the doorway. "Just because I'm pregnant, doesn't mean I'm a girl," Shadow hissed back at Manic.
Manics' blue eyes lit up when the ebony hedgehog took his bait. "Oh really? Because from what I see-"
"Come on guys!" Sonia's sharp voice cut Manic off from whatever taunting the green hedgehog had come up with. "We don't have time for this! We need to get out of here before the guards figure out your out of your cell and come after us!"
Shadow and Manic share a look and nod in agreement that they would continue this later. Moments later, the three of them are dashing down the dark hallway of the jailhouse; Sonia leading with Manic at the back.
"Are you sure you should be running, Shadow? Or would you like me to carry you?" Manic taunted and Shadow sighed. Sonic's younger brother was worse than the blue blur himself.
"I can still run faster than you, hedgehog," Shadow said in a monotone voice; not really caring about the green princes' taunting any more. He just wanted to get out of there without any confrontations from Queen Aleenas' guards. Of course… fate had decided against him as he heard dozens of footfalls charging towards them. Shadow warned the two other hedgehogs of their approach and Sonia threw him a stun gun.
It looked like the royal siblings didn't want to cause any bloodshed during their escape; Shadow didn't mind as long as the three of them escaped without any serious injuries. The first of the guards came into view and Sonia jumped into the air. She landed on the first guard's head and used it as a spring board to kick the next one.
Shadow charged right through, shooting at anything that looked lethal and wishing he had the help of his famous chaos abilities. While Manic stayed almost glued to his side, punching at any of guards that Shadow either missed or hadn't bothered to hit.
Once the guards were disposed of, the three hedgehogs sprinted out of the jail and into the cool spring morning outside. Sonia grabbed Shadow's arm and guided him towards the right of the castle waiting outside. Using the darkness of the morning to their advantage, they snuck into the unused sewer pipe leading into the castle.
Sonia crutched to the ground and crawled into the still moist and grease filled pipe. Shadow went in next and scrunched up his nose in disgust as the smell of decay and old feces filled his nose… and he didn't even want to think about what kind of gunk was being hit against his hands and legs as he slowly crawled through the small space.
His ears twitched as he heard Manic enter in after him and a small snicker came from the green hedgehog. "No wonder Sonic fell for ya, Shads; I love the view I'm getting from back here." Shadow stiffened and a large blush presented itself onto his muzzle. He growled and lifted his leg and kicked Manic in the face. The green hedgehog yelped from the attack and Shadow snickered when Manic started crawling again, but without the added remarks.
Minutes later, Shadow saw Sonia stand up when a hole appeared on the top of the pipe and she took off the covering. She lifted herself up so the top of her head was the only thing that appeared overhead. "The cost is clear, come on," the magenta princess said and went through the hole.
Shadow went through soon after and saw that they had ended up a large and very expensive looking shower room. Sonia helped her brother up through the hole and screwed the covering back into place. Seeing the showers, Shadow almost groaned as he felt the gunk of the pipe caked all over his body.
Manic went over to the doorway, not looking any better than himself and having a large red bruise on his face, and looked out to see if anyone was out there. "No one, we better get going before everyone starts to wake up."
They silently dashed down the perfectly polished hallways, using the shadows when they could, and made it to Sonia and Manic's destination without any confrontations. They entered the out of place room and Shadow sighed in relief when he saw a shower to the left.
Sonia came up beside him and smiled. "Well, you'll be rooming here until we can find a way to stop our mother."
Something flickered at the back of Shadow's mind and he turned to the magenta princess that looked so much like her mother. "Sonia… why exactly are you so frightened about your mother's plan? What's worse than locking me up and almost getting me killed?"
She looked away, refusing to look at him. "Because…" She said, her voice caked in sadness, "Sonic is marrying Princess Sally in two days…"
Whoo! Another update! And this one took me less than a week! Even if you guys aren't proud, I am!
Sonic: What's up with you and cliffhangers?
I love them~ And I needed to say the last part in this chapter and since it was getting long I ended it there. ^w^
Shadow: I hate you.
Sonic: I agree! I didn't even get any screen time in this chapter!
You will next time~ Don't worry~
READ AND REVIEW PLEASE!