..It's been 18 years since she lost the battle to leukemia, just like Gerald. Shadow didn't know why he still bothered thinking about it.. okay yeah, so he did know, what's it to ya? Maria was the only person he was accustomed to, who he felt he could trust, in a better way of putting it. Shadow remembered always listening to her and her nightly fairy tales she used to tell him while he was a small hoglet still dressed up in overalls and dragging his stuffed bunny everywhere he went as well as following Maria everywhere she went.

Shadow was beginning to think he had a problem when he was smaller.

Shadow grunted and gulped down some ice cold water which had only temporarily snapped him out of his thoughts. The familiar noises of chattering that had faded long before were coming back from behind him and the cool sensation had came down this throat so suddenly that he almost mistook it for a burn at first, this was good for him as it was a summer night in July, about 30 or so degrees higher than usual in his town. He felt that cool water might've had the same effects that booze did, minus the embarrassment and aching head in the morning, and more positive results that benefited his body.

Okay so maybe it wasn't like booze at all, but the sensation was sure damn close. At least he thought it was, he was told it was supposed to burn, how should he know? He didn't actually drink or want to try it. Maria said it was bad for him years before so he assumed she was right as always. He was getting way off topic here, he shook his head and tried to focus back onto what he was thinking about before. He stared down onto his half empty glass of water, thinking.

Why was this memory just seemingly haunting him in every waking moment? He hadn't thought about that one night in such a long time, why is it coming up now. Sure, he always had Maria in his head somewhere, hiding. But this so suddenly, something that happened right before her death? He sighed, chugging down his drink completely, preparing himself to completely get sucked into his own thoughts once more.

Maria had always been interested in fairy tales, hell it's the reason why he liked them as a kid. He knew all of that, but what he was questioning was why so suddenly had the thought come up. He was tempted to bang his head against the counter, he was stuck on this. A piece of that memory was repeating itself in his mind in a faint whisper.

"They're called the Feathered"

'..The Feathered..'

The Feathered Mobians?

Shadow's ear twitched, now that he thought about it. He remembered that Maria had a fascination with flying high, with wings and birds and.. The Feathered Mobians? She had said she was studying them for as long as she could remember, probably since she was still with living with Gerald and him. Shadow would admit that he had a phase of fascination with them but soon had forgotten after all the loneliness he had to bear without his sister by his side. Shadow had turned cold and distant since then, he's matured to a point where if his eyes pierced through the souls of others they would instantly turn heel and run as fast as their legs could handle. Times were tough throughout the years and it just hardened him up some more since Maria wasn't there to help him with anything at all anymore.

Shadow was used to the thought that only one person would truly know the real side of him.

"The Feathered Mobians..", he muttered to himself.

"The what?"

Shadow's ear shifted upwards towards the mature, familiar voice, before he raised his head up and looked up to see the barista ( or rather, owner of the club ) and one of the only few people he talked to nowadays, Rouge the Bat.

Shadow grunted, sliding his empty glass towards Rouge and resting his head onto the palm of his hand. "Might I have the pleasure of knowing when you decided it'd be best to come over and eavesdrop on me?"

The bat smirked, taking the glass and pouring some more water into it. "You looked lonely over here, handsome. Thought I had to check up on you for a bit, seems I was right by the way you just talked to yourself." She winked in her usual flirtatious attire.

Shadow snorted, taking back the glass Rouge gave back to him and taking a huge gulp. The bat had sat down across from him on a chair nearby, resting her head onto the back of her hands as she looked at him with a glint of curiosity in her turquoise orbs. "So tell me, what were you thinking about over here? You looked a million miles away."

Shadow raised an eye ridge at her as he set down his glass, his tone suddenly bored, "You're not one to usually care what other people are thinking unless is for your own benefit." He adjusted his velvet vest and tried to slim down his chest fur that was sticking out, but with no avail. The bat pouted her lips, mocking a sad face at the black hedgehog and pretending to sound hurt.

"Oh, Shadow. How could you think someone like me isn't capable of feeling towards others?" She battled her eyes for special effect, but Shadow just rolled his eyes. Classic.

Once Rouge was done, she put on a more genuine smile, one that she oh so very rarely showed to people. "You know Shadow, despite me not being as close to you as your sister was. I can be just as caring if I wanted to, unless on another level you want to be taken care of." She purred, scratching the bottom of Shadow's chin until he pulled her hand away. "Also, don't stuff in your chest fur, ladies love the chest fur."

Shadow had rolled his eyes yet again. "I'll let you know that my chest fur is annoying when it's sticking out like this-" The chest fur tickled the bottom of his chin, he rather not have that irritating feeling everywhere he goes."- and that I'm completely fine." He attempted to shoo her away so he could continue his train of thought but the bat was determined to get him to spill the beans.

"You always say you're fine and then you go and space out in the corner section of my club." Rouge had stood up but this point with her hands on her hips, her brow still raised and her attitude glowing. "At least I know it'd be about your sister, but that's all I would know-" She slammed her hands down on the counter, making Shadow's glass jump and Shadow threw a semi-glare at her."-Talk to me, boy."

Shadow snorted, he knew how Rouge could get when she wanted information about something, even something as trivial as Shadow's thoughts. The girl would literally stop at nothing to keep nagging him about this sort of stuff, at least if it was as bad as it was now for him. Shadow pinched the skin between his eyes and sighed. He decided a direct approach towards the situation would be best and would get the conversation to finish soon before it started.

"The Feathered Mobians."

Rouge blinked, "The Feathered Mobians?", he was starting to regret saying it out loud and having Rouge say it even louder enough to turn a couple heads around.

He buried the rest of his face deep into his palm. Dammit Rouge, the now growing embarrassment could've been avoided if you just kept your fucking mouth shut.

"Yes, you heard me right. Feathered Mobians, indeed.", he growled lowly, a faint warmth had fled up into his cheeks. "Have a problem with that?"

Rouge simply shook her head, "No, no. But isn't that just a legend of some sort?" The ivory girl cocked a brow at ebony boy. "Like a kid's fairy tale?"

Shadow just nodded, "Maria told me about it before her.." Rouge noticed the pause and reached her arm out to give the poor hedgehog a pat on the shoulder.

"You don't have to say it, sugar." Rouge had sat down on her seat once again, legs crossed and arms now laid against the table, full attention focused on Shadow. "Though, I have to say.. even if Maria told you about it, what's the significance about it now?"

Shadow had taken another sip from his water, his tone uncertain"That's what I'm trying to figure out." Shadow looked up to Rouge again. "I have my suspicions, though all of them are just dead ends."

"Hmm," Rouge had raised a finger to her chin, posing a thinking expression of course. "Maybe, just maybe.. it's Maria's way of communicating to you?" She tried not to smirk, but Shadow instantly knew she was joking.

"That's.. literally impossible, Rouge."

She raised her hands up in defense, "Hey, hey. I'm just an insanely attractive bat lady throwing ideas out there." Her bat wings fluttered behind her. "Though, maybe you should read up on them.." She had noticed Shadow gave her the most bored look ever, eyelids half closed and everything. "I'm just saying, honey. I know you loved Maria, think of this as a way of remembering her. You'd both share the same amount of knowledge on these fairy tale sort of things, it'd be like keeping her spirits alive. Or something.. Hey Shadow, don't look at me like that, you said it yourself that I wasn't good at this sort of thing."

Shadow had considered it, he'll admit that he did the fact of rediscovering something that Maria had once loved, plus the 'keeping her spirits alive' things Rouge had just said was a bonus of some sort to him. Though he didn't actually believe in stuff like that, the thought seemed comforting at the very least. Shadow simply nodded at the Bat who was taking a sip of her drink. "Right," He had paused for a slight moment. " ..thank you, Rouge."

Rouge suddenly had a spark in her eyes, her wings had fluttered rapidly behind her and she gave the biggest mock happy face he'd ever seen. "Shadow. The Hedeghog. Thanking me?! Oh lord, is this real life right now?" She dropped the act in a second and snickered to herself.

Shadow was basically the king of eye rolling at this point.

Suddenly, a glass was heard breaking from the other side of the club as well as a scream from one of the drunken bozos. Shadow thought he heard something around the lines of "FROGGY WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME", okay. That was sudden.. and random. One of the bodyguards, a red echidna, Knuckles if Shadow could recall Rouge once calling him that, was trying to escort the big fat cat out the club door but appeared to be having trouble as the cat wouldn't let go of the door frame.

Rouge had face palmed, "This is the third time this week.." She muttered before turning to her fellow companion. "Duty calls. Sorry, but we'll talk more later, hun." She winked before flying over to the struggling duo. "Hey, don't worry Knucklehead! Mama Rouge is coming to the rescue!"

Shadow blinked, trying to process what had just happened but his mind had failed him. He shook his head, and had drank the remaining drops of water left in his cup before setting it down and walking out of his acquaintance's club. His house was far from the village, just how he liked it. He couldn't even stand the constant noise in Club Rouge, much less the whole damn place surrounding it. Places filled with crime and danger along with the disgusting scents of rotten perfume and dead fish were a big no-no to the young male. He could take on quite a few battles but would much rather like to not cause trouble unless he certainly had to. It was a long walk from Club Rouge, to the edge of the village and straight towards his own home. That time spent was not wasted though, as his mind seemed to drift off into the subject he had been discussing with Rouge earlier.

He did indeed keep Maria old books and other belongings up in the attic, he wasn't sure if they'd be the ones Maria had used to study the creatures. Really, he just kept whatever was given to him by the headmasters since they believed in something.. Eh, Shadow forgot what it was. He was obedient towards them but never quite understood what they said since they had used more advanced vocabulary whilst Shadow was still just learning how to spell 'hedgehog' at age 5. He didn't want to get his hopes up for the books left over though, they were probably tattered and beaten up from all the constant shuffling and moving around they had to suffer from all throughout these last 18 years without their original owner keeping them company.

Shadow got to his home sooner than expected and immediately went up to his attic to search for the old things. He came across several boxes and had thought that Maria's belongings were kept in a box much smaller than these. As if it were magic, it suddenly came into his view. It was in the corner of the room, he stepped over and had bent over to grab it. Maria it had written sloppily on the other side of the box, Shadow snorted as he remember just how bad he wrote out words when he was smaller. The box under the support of his arm, he climbed down from the attic on into his bedroom. Opening the box, he saw a few of Maria's old but slightly stained stuffed animals in there and grabbed one that seemed to have resemble her. It smelled of blueberries and apple juice, he carefully set it on top of his pillow before continuing on with looking for the books.

All of them seemed tattered like expected, and not what he was looking for. ( The Hungry Caterpillar, really? ) He seemed about ready to give up until he flipped open another useless child book and saw a small journal tucked in between the pages. Shadow had assumed Maria had used it as a type of bookmark, but had something written onto the cover.

The Feathered Mobians..

..So she had went so far as to document them? Huh, interesting.

While not exactly what he had expected, it was a start. Despite the journal being in absolutely perfect condition, Shadow cautiously flipped open the journal and read the first page.

'01/10/1856 – Feathered Mobians

First Entry

Feathered Mobians were shown in ancient times to have been worshiped by our ancestors for their control over weather patterns and angelic excellency. It has been said that Commoners and Feathered Mobians have once been kept in harmony before a disturbance was made. The Feathered were forced to flee into the clouds in the sky, never to be seen again.-'

..She started documenting this right before Shadow was even created for her. Huh.

Shadow had flipped through the pages and had seen that only 3 more were produced until Maria just seemly forgot all about it when Shadow came into her life. She had only just seemed to think about it again suddenly right before her demise, he had shook his head and continued to read her cursive. Once finished, he closed the book and laid down onto his bed. The held the book to his chest and stared up at the ceiling in the darkness of the night, the only light that came in was the moonlight.

Shadow muttered to himself, "..Would it be stupid of me to think that I could finish this? For her?" Shadow didn't even know if those kinds of books actually being informative about The Feathered would even be around at this time because literally all the books about them had to offer were piles of cringe-worthy, happy-go-lucky cliche children tales. No help from them whatsoever. Shadow knew he didn't necessarily need sleep, but Maria had made it into a habit for him to do so. He set the book aside and turned onto his side to face the window, staring into the stars dim light before closing his eyes and allowing himself to let go of reality.

He had a dream that night, he had of a mysterious Feathered Mobian reaching out towards him. Their warm smile almost immediately made his heart melt, the smile was all he could see, everything seemed so bright behind them that he couldn't even make out what they looked like. They faded away just as soon as he reached back out to them.

Back that wasn't important right now, as something seems to have stolen some of his crops.

A/N: oh shit itS COMING GUYS

SLOWLY YET SUREL Y

GET YOUR SONADOW FLAGS READY

R&R !