Shadow X Sonic (Chapter 8)
Shadow snapped awake, with a huge gasp of breath, sitting up straight he realized he also woke up with a throbbing headache. "Ow, my head." Shadow made a garb for his head when he noticed the bandages on his arm and on his body. He felt the sharp pain that covered his body, which was no surprised considering he did fall off a cliff and by the sore muscles meant he had been in bed for a while. Shadow took a look around the room he was in; it was a quiet little cabin by the looks of it and by staring out the window he could see it was getting dark and that they lived in the middle of the woods by all the trees that surrounded the place. Shadow continued to look about the room. It seemed the owner of the house had left a teapot boiling on the stove. It was a nice enough place and the owners seem to be people that live in homey times, but the question still remained where he was now and who had bandaged him? As if answering his question, an old man walked into the cabin. Shadow quickly took in every detail that he could about the old man, he was gray hair with glasses wearing simple jeans and a button up light brown shirt. The old man looked tired but when he glanced at Shadow, his faced seemed to light up.
"Ah, you're awake. Good." The old man smiled, "We were starting to get worried." The old man went to the stove to check on the teapot.
"We?" Shadow figured there had to be one person looking after him but several? The old man turned off the stove.
"Yes, my family and I." The old man went to find a cup so he could start pouring tea. He continued like nothing. "My son had found you washed up by the river. He brought you here asking me and my wife to help you." The old man handed the cup to Shadow. Shadow took the cup but was surprised at hearing this fact.
"Your son?" Shadow stared into the tea cup. The old man sat down on a chair. If Shadow wasn't mistaken he thought he saw a sad expression on the man's face if only for a second.
"Yes my son…" The old man paused as if to seem like he was trying to think about the next thing he was going to say. "I'll be honest; my family and I tend to keep to ourselves but… My son seemed to have known you personally. So when he came to me asking to help you, I just couldn't say no." Shadow's brows rose.
"Your son, huh?" Shadow continued staring into the cup. He hadn't known a lot of people since being awaken; in fact he didn't have a lot of memories from before being asleep. A few quiet moments had passed when Shadow finally took a drink of his tea. He glanced up at the old man, "I'm not ungrateful. Even if it was your son's request and I don't have a lot of memories so I'm not sure if I would remember your son, but I want to thank you and your family." The old man smiled softly at Shadow's words.
"You're a good lad it seems, and if my son says he knows you then that's good enough for me. Besides I was happy to have helped." The old man continued to sit there for a few seconds more when two more figures came in through the door. Shadow turned to see a lady that portrait that typically grandma look, with her silver hair, blue dress and a purple scarf that hung around her neck. She quickly took in the scene and gave out a sigh of relief.
"Good you're awake, we were starting to worry." The lady came over to Shadow to look him over, "It seems your injuries are healing quite nicely. In fact I would say they are almost completely healed! You heal really fast, did you know that? We thought it was going to be at least a month before you were able to walk around!" Shadow was taken aback by the fierceness of the lady. It was then that he heard the old man laughing.
"Darling, why don't you let him breathe? The boy just woke up not too long ago." The old lady turned around and gave her husband a pout.
"You can hardly blame me, we were all worried sick. Isn't that right, Oscar?" The old lady turned to the young man that was standing in the back. Shadow quickly glanced toward his way, although Shadow thought, this must be their son; but he had never meet the guy. Oscar quickly took a few steps towards them.
"Yes mother." Shadow looked the guy over; he looked to be about 6 feet tall. He had blonde short hair. He wore a black shirt with a jacket that was red, black and yellow. He also wore black jeans and black shoes. Shadow noticed he wore black biker gloves with he granted him to have good taste at least. But more importantly Shadow was confused. The old man had said his son had known him, but Shadow couldn't recall this guy at all. But when he looked into Oscar's face one more time he noticed something odd about him, he had red eyes…. No normal human would have red eyes like that. Shadow felt they were familiar somehow but could not place them. The lady slapped Shadow on the back.
"Well now that you're awake, I should start making dinner." The little old lady turned towards her son, "Oscar why don't you take your friend to go wash up." Oscar quickly nodded,
"Yes mother." The old women turned to walk away while Shadow struggled to get out of bed in a hurry.
"Wait, Shouldn't I know your names first? You guys helped me but …" Shadow left off mid-sentence, not sure what to say next. The old lady turned around with a soft lovely smile.
"You can call me Darla and this…" Darla pointed to her husband, "Is my husband Jed. Now off you go, quickly now. You want to be back before your supper turns cold." Shadow nodded and went after Oscar who had just gone out the front door.
It didn't take long for Shadow to find Oscar; he followed him to a river that was just a little ways south of the cabin they were staying in. Shadow got on his knees to scoop up some water and splash his face. The water felt wonderful, especially with the cool night air. It felt heavenly. Shadow sat there for a while staring into his reflection. The water started to bring back memories. Memories like the one at the hot spring or the last one of Sonic… Sonic? Shadow had wondered if he was safe, he knew he made the decision to save Sonic at the cost of his own well-being, but did he get away? How was his leg doing? All these thoughts kept swimming in Shadow's head that he had almost forgot the figure behind him staring at him… almost. Shadow stood leveling his eyes with his audience. "I should thank you as well for saving me, your father told me it was at your request that he saved me." Oscar continued to stare at the once be hedgehog. Both boys stared at each other in silence, until it was Oscar that finally spoke.
"I will admit, I almost did not recognize you in your current form at first but after I found you I did a quick DNA and a bio scan to see if you were still alive. What I found surprising was what it had matched up to in my database, but only someone of your genetic makeup would survive a fall like the one you had taken off the cliff, so I had no doubts it was you, Shadow." Shadow was taken by surprised a bit,
"…Database? … So you're telling me you're not human?" Oscar quickly nodded, as to confirmed Shadow's statement.
"I know my appearance has changed as well. When Father… Jed found me I was broken at the bottom of the same cliff as well. Jed used to be a brilliant engineer scientist before retiring. When he found me, he fixed me up. But he could not restore my body so he built me a new one. He and his wife have always wanted children so they build me to look like a son." Shadow stood there with his arms crossed taking in all the information that Oscar was telling him.
"So you're really just an android."
"This is correct, although it still seems like you don't recognize me." Shadow quickly took offense to that but paused before saying something...
"… No at first I did not know who were you, I don't have a lot of memories after being awaken but your eyes did seem familiar like I have seen them before." Oscar nodded as if accepting this. He quickly turned around and begin walking away. Shadow quickly went to follow him.
"Where are you going?" Oscar stopped to take a look back at Shadow.
"We must hurry… or supper would get cold… Mother wouldn't want that." Shadow picked up his pace when suddenly while looking at Oscar's back he had a flash image of a robot, black yellow and red walking in front of him. Shadow smirked, as he caught up with Oscar.
"Lead the way… Omega." Omega gave a Shadow a returning smirked of his own.
"Then let us hurry."
Shadow came into the cabin right behind Omega. He noticed that Omega had stopped in the middle of the room. Before Shadow had a chance to ask Omega what was up, Shadow heard a voice that he recognized right away.
"Well thank you, now boys and girls the special announcement that I have today is that in 3 days" Shadow stared at the TV screen. He continued to stare as he watched Eggman hold three fingers up and continued his speech. "There will be a big conference right here at Eggman's casino, featuring all the world's leaders!" Eggman threw his arms in the air to show his excitement. "There will be plenty of things to do besides gambling." Eggman gave an evil chuckled. "But be warned if the leaders aren't here in 3 days…" Eggman held up three fingers again, but his face continued to have an evil look to it. "…There will be consequences." Eggman laughed and the program shut off, leaving only a black blank screen. Shadow felt his hand forming into a fist.
"Damn that Eggman…" Shadow to continue to stare at the blank screen, Shadow was lost in thought when Jed spoke.
"Well that was something." Darla nodded in agreement.
"Yes dear, very entertaining." Shadow took a step forward,
"Eggman must have made this announcement thinking he is winning."
"It doesn't matter the reason as to why, all that is clear is that Eggman must be stop." It was Omega who spoke. Shadow glanced in Omega's direction. Omega continued to speak. "I'm going to stop Eggman." Darla stood up.
"Oscar you mustn't. What if you get hurt again …" Darla had a worried look. Omega gave his mother a sad smile, and then turned towards Shadow.
"Shadow, May I speak to my parents alone?" Shadow was surprised by Omega's request. The whole time he knew Omega, he never knew Omega to show such concern for a human, But Omega's face was serious, he could tell that much. Shadow sighed.
"Alright, I'll be outside waiting." Shadow stepped outside. The night felt cool. Shadow sighed again. What to do with Eggman? Shadow kept thinking about this over and over again, and then sighed again. The only thing to do with Eggman is to find him and take him out. Shadow punched his own hand. "Alright Eggman you're going down."
"I agree." Shadow spun around and came faced with Omega standing outside. "Eggman is going down." Shadow nodded.
"Did you do what you had to do?" It was Omega that nodded this time.
"Yes… and thank you Shadow." Omega eyes went blank for a minute before he spoke again. "I have pin pointed where Eggman's location is. All there is left is to follow this path and we will find ourselves at Eggman's base."
"Good, then we will go there together and pay Eggman a visit… Besides I think I owe him for the last time." Shadow had a smirked on his f ace. "Let's go Omega. We have a pay a certain doctor a home visit."