Rebirth
Chapter 3
What to do?
When Shadow and Scourge got back Knuckles was frantic, he had had no idea where they had gone and he'd forgotten Shadow had a cell phone now. "Knuckles what is wrong?!" Roared Shadow when he came in, noticing the echidna was close to breaking down.
"I can not do this! I can not do this ludicrous mission!" He mumbled as he frantically tried to forget it. Scourge sighed and took the paper from Knuckles. He read it. "Ooooh crap." He said. Shadow raised an eyeridge and took it. Then his eyes widened too. The mission was to kill Mephiles. "He's on the loose again?! I thought he was dead!?" Growled Shadow to hide his horror. Scourge shrugged, "I guess he isn't. And it's just our luck that we have to go kill him now." Knuckles was frightened out of his wits by this, why? Because Mephiles had almost destroyed the Master Emerald, permanently, last time, and he almost took Knuckles' life with it. So his fear was understandable.
Shadow glared at Knuckles. "Knuckles." "What?!" "We can kill Mephiles." "HOW?!" Knuckles practically screamed. Shadow sighed, "Scourge, find some way to shut him up so we can explain... the neighbors will get curious." So Scourge promptly tied Knuckles up and put a gag in his mouth.
"Good. Knuckles, we CAN kill Mephiles. I know that he's invincible to almost everything but he isn't invincible to poision. All Scourge and I have to do is distract him and you can get a clear shot." Knuckles nodded slowly.
"Good. Let's go."
***
Mephiles looked up and his eyes narrowed as he saw his visitors. They were in the middle of a mountain, the ceiling stretched high above their heads, and there was a raised section of flooring in the middle so that Mephiles was above those who came to see him. Scourge stared at him with slight alarm while Shadow looked simply bored.
"Hello Mephiles." Mephiles made no reply. Shadow sighed in exasperation and said, "Mephiles, you know that you could never intimidate me, so why not just give it up?" Mephiles grinned now, "Still the same old Shadow eh?" "More or less." "I somehow think less." Shadow rolled his eyes.
"Mephiles. We came to make you a deal."
Knuckles heard all this as he quietly scaled down the inside of the mountain, he'd have to time this right... being an assassin didn't appeal to Knuckles... but someone had to do the dirty jobs he supposed... like killing Mephiles. He was fine with THAT.
He raised the pipe slightly and waited for the signal.
".... and so we could actually get you information." Mephiles looked thoughtful. "But why now? Why join my side now?" He asked. Shadow shrugged, "If you can't be killed what is the point of fighting you?" He asked. "Yes... what is the point." But then he grinned, "Last time you almost DID kill me." "Oh?" "Yes, almost. That's the key word here. I was on the border. But NOTHING..." he boasted, "... NOTHING can send me farther than that."
"Not even poison?" Asked Scourge. Mephiles' grin became wider. "No, not even poison."
The signal. Knuckles blew. And three things happened in quick succession.
Mephiles felt the dart pierce his neck and let out a cry of rage as he fell to the floor, pain already blossoming across his chest. Shadow dodged to the side as thousands of clones came rushing back to melt into the now dead Mephiles' body. Scourge darted forward and grabbed a few nice looking jewels.
When that was done Shadow signaled to Knuckles to come down. The echidna looked pretty shaky. "What's wrong echidna? Never killed anything that isn't mechanical before?" Asked Scourge. Shadow gave him a glare to shut him up. "Knuckles, are you okay?" "Who do you think you're talking to?!" Knuckles yelled in the way that he usually would when he was challenging people who had stolen the Master Emerald.
Shadow smirked, "Oh you're recovered then? Good. Let's go." They strolled out of the mountain to were Scourge's Rat Rod was parked and they drove off.
***
A day after this, Shadow told Rouge about it. She blew out a sigh of relief, "Thank goodness. I never knew Dracsa would help us like that." "He didn't." "What do you mean?" "He did it so that his leadership wouldn't be challenged by a new person in the crime ring." Rouge shook her head. "They're all the same then aren't they?"
"If you think of it a certain way yes." Rouge looked at Shadow strangely. "What do you mean?" "Dracsa is a lot fairer to his "employees" than other crime lords are Rouge." "Are you talking about Eggman?" "Yes." Rouge started laughing, "I hardly think he'd be fair to anyone... how could he with such a wobbly stomach?" Shadow shook his head. "Rouge, you shouldn't mock him. For all you know we might be ordered to assassinate him next."
That shut Rouge up.
***
As it was, Rouge needn't have stopped. Dracsa never ordered them to kill Eggman, just certain associates of his. It turned out that Eggman had connections in very powerful places, Shadow did not feel regret at wiping them out.
Scourge was now perfectly contented... Shadow would go out and get things they needed while he could just stay at home and relax... if you called watching violent movies and listening to rather questionable music relaxing like he did.
Knuckles of course could not bear these times, and went with Shadow. But sometimes he'd stay and attempt to call Tikal without blowing a fuse in the middle of the conversation because of Scourge loudly singing along with the lyrics of his songs.
Shadow came back one of those days looking unusually grave. "Guys, we need to find a way to stop Dracsa, and fast." "Why?" "He's starting to set his sights on certain people. There is an assassin that he's afraid of, we're supposed to kill him. And he hired that assassin last week. We are going to be killing our colleagues." Scourge stared, flabbergasted.
How could this have happened while he was listening to Britney Spears?! He wondered. Knuckles wondered how this could have affected the Master Emerald. But what Shadow was wondering was whether or not Dracsa would start ordering them to kill GUN agents. Or friends of GUN.
Dracsa paced back and forth. "Oh yes..." he muttered feverishly. "Chop their heads off, poison their wine, slit their throats, cut off their hands..." His guards twitched a lot these days, Dracsa was now so paranoid he wouldn't hesitate to kill anyone, or chop off limbs. Two weeks ago, Shadow, Scourge, and Knuckles had destroyed Mephiles.
He stopped pacing and a mad light shone in his eyes. "Yes... that's exactly what I'll do!" He quickly went to his desk and wrote a quick note. "You." He said to the smaller of the guards, who jumped. "Take this to Shadow and Scourge. Do not read it. If you get caught swallow it."
The guard nodded, scared of Dracsa as always. He took the note and ran as if for his life.
***
Shadow took the note from the tired guard and sent him back as he opened it. He blinked, "Well this was... unexpected." Scourge read over his shoulder. "Kill that Commander guy? Fine. But what's this at the bottom?"
As Shadow read the footnote his blood went cold.
Rouge the Bat and Sonic the Hedgehog shall be guarding him, they got wind of this somehow. Maybe they read minds, but they will be there. Bring them back to me if possible, they will make good agents after they are put through enough pain. If not possible, kill them.
Shadow looked up as he heard Scourge's voice coming as if from far away. "... we have two days to prepare...." "You guys prepare in whatever way you need to. I'll be somewhere else." "But Shad...." A flash of light was all that replied, telling him Shadow had gone. He sighed, "What's up with him?"
Knuckles shrugged. "We'll have to figure out how to save Sonic and Rouge though." "Are you kidding? We can't save them! We'll get killed if we do. And Dracsa is way scarier than Mephiles Knuckles." Knuckles looked alarmed as he left the room.
***
Shadow took in a deep breath then exhaled. He was on an island he had discovered not too long ago, it wasn't inhabited, and no map had the location on it. He dove into the sea, the water parted smoothly and he was swimming strong strokes around the island. He circled it twenty times, then just sat on the sand watching the sun sink.
What was he going to do? He and Rouge had been team mates, but there was something else. Something he didn't quite understand. He sighed and stood. He would have to prepare, but if he was with Scourge and Knuckles it would be harder to do that, they were a constant reminder of... her. He didn't even give Sonic a thought, killing the faker didn't really bother him, after all, Sonic was very annoying, and he wouldn't be associated with it, he would be disguised and unrecognizable.
His fist smashed through a palm tree. He stared at his hand, completely devoid of splinters, filled with blood that would never stop flowing because his heart would never stop beating. He sighed again. Things were going to be tough. Another palm tree fell down.
***
The green hedgehog assassin looked at his wrist watch, "Shadow's late." He got the fright of his life when a voice behind him said, "I wasn't late, you were. By twenty minutes." "Shadow?!" Knuckles chuckled, Scourge had been driving him nuts the past two days. "Who else?" He asked.
"That sounded like Sonic." Said Knuckles. They fell quiet, "Shall we go?" Asked Scourge to break the uncomfortable silence. "Yes." They climbed into Scourge's rat rod and he "set a course" as he called it, for the GUN base the Commander was always at unless there was an attack.
Shadow did not like it when he saw that the whole area was deserted, "It's almost as if he wanted us to come here." Muttered Shadow, Scourge rolled his eyes. "Oh whatever Shadow! He probably has no idea what's gonna hit 'im." He grinned. Shadow raised an eyebrow.
"I somehow do not take him for a fool." Knuckles looked equally uneasy, but Scourge had not a care. Shadow stepped towards the entrance and stopped, his jaw taut, as a memory flashed through his mind.
Flashback:
Rouge was saying something to Shadow, they were both on board the Egg Fleet, Omega was blowing up the android room. He couldn't hear what Rouge said, he saw his own mouth move, but couldn't hear what he said either. Omega appeared, he heard what the robot said. "Shadow, you must remember that she is immortal and you are not." Then the image faded.
End Flashback.
They went through the building, finding each corridor deserted. They came to the corridor that led to the Commander's office. Rouge and Sonic were there, as Dracsa had said.
Rouge blinked, "Sh... Shadow?!" He kept his face as emotionless as he could. Scourge did not remain silent like Knuckles and Shadow. Oh no... he started yapping. "Hey Sonic! Hey Rouge! Newest mission from the old boss man is to put Commando in there to sleep. You too if required, if not then we're to bring you back to be agents."
Shadow's eye twitched as he saw Rouge's mouth open in disbelief. "Scourge, we didn't come here to talk. Let's just get this over with." Shadow hardly noticed what the others were doing, he attacked Rouge. In her surprise she flung out her foot in a kick and connected with his ribs. He crashed into the wall. But he was out almost instantly, he tossed a chaos spear at her. What interested Rouge most, when she wasn't having to dodge, was that he never made eye contact with her.
That was something strange for Shadow. He always made eye contact with his opponents, enemy or not. "Shadow!" She called as she dodged, his head turned, his eyes didn't look up though. "Shadow what is wrong with yo.. ugh!" She fell as a chaos spear hit her, combined with a punch that Knuckles' had aimed at Sonic and a chaos spear Scourge had aimed at the aforementioned blue hedgehog. Rouge landed heavily.
She looked up, "Sh... Shadow please." Chaos energy glowed in his hand, "Shadow please!!!!!!" Her scream tore through the sound barrier on the memory and let him hear the words. "Shadow, I will always stand by you." "Why? Because I can help you get jewels?" "No, because you are my friend...." The chaos energy hit the floor an inch from Rouge's head.
She fainted, either from exhaustion or fear he couldn't tell. He didn't want to tell. He stepped away from her, "Shadow help us here!" Yelled Scourge. But Shadow turned away and disappeared. That moment of distraction on Scourge's part made them fall, Sonic stood grinning tiredly as he tied Knuckles and Scourge up, "Good. Rouge will probably say what we should do with them when they wake up."
Shadow appeared in Dracsa's office. "Where are the other two? Don't tell me I have to give you new team mates again." Growled Dracsa, his growl turned into a strangled sob of fear, the guard rushed forward but was knocked back into the wall by a chaos spear. Shadow's red eyes seemed to glow in the dim light of Dracsa's office.
"You made a mistake Dracsa. A serious mistake." He whispered, a crack sounded, and Dracsa's body fell to the floor in a limp heap. Shadow looked at his former employer, venom filling his eyes, then he disappeared in another flash of light.
When Rouge saw Shadow appear in the office the Commander owned she started yelling. She was furious that he'd tried to kill her. "I thought you were my friend!... I TRUSTED YOU...!" Shadow started yelling at her, "It's not easy being me Rouge! Did you think it was?! Being able to live forever and ever and ever..... afraid to love, afraid to like someone because you know they are going to die and leave you alone!" "Oh yeah?!" Rouge practically screamed, she was still furious, "And who are you afraid to love Mr. Ultimate life form who can kill anyone he wants?!"
Shadow, who had turned around after he stopped yelling, whirled and grabbed her shoulders, shaking her. "You!" He roared in her face. Rouge's face went white, at least, whiter than before if possible. Shadow let go of her and stalked out of the room. Scourge put down his drink and was going to follow Shadow when Knuckles stopped him.
"The need time to themselves." He said as Rouge hesitated, then followed Shadow. "I didn't know you were a love doctor Knuckles!" Said Sonic. Knuckles glared at him in a Shadow-ish way. "Shut up hedgehog."
Shadow completely ignored Rouge as she came up behind him. "Shadow?" He didn't reply. "I... I'm sorry." Silence. "Dang it Shadow!" She twisted around in front of him and kissed him. He froze, shocked. Then he pushed her away, "What was that for?!" He asked, not in anger, but amazement. "I love you too Shadow. Can you please stop being angry at me?"
He was silent for a moment, then he nodded. "I guess." "Good." Then, she kissed him again, and this time, he didn't push her away.
Sonic wrinkled his nose. "Eeewwww......... love scenes. Yuck." Knuckles smacked the back of his head, "Shut up or they'll notice!" Scourge thought it would be funny if they (Sonic and Knuckles that is) were noticed. He called out in a pretty good imitation of Knuckles, "Shadow! Rouge! When can we expect the wedding?" The new couple whirled, Sonic and Knuckles screamed and ran for their lives as Shadow and Rouge thundered after them.
Sixteen years later.
Shadow ducked as Rodolfo tossed a chaos spear. He was panting, "Dad... how.. much... more... of.. this... do... I... have... to... take?" Before Shadow could answer Rouge called out, "Dinner time you two, the pizza arrived. Get in here or you're fur will be sensitive for a year!" They both rushed to the house and sat down, looking innocent.
Rodolfo was fifteen, and Shadow found out that he wasn't immortal anymore. He would live for a very long time still, maybe three hundred years, but Rodolfo was now the "ultimate life form". Shadow was still the same in every other way though. Rouge eyed them, "And what were you two doing." Before Rodolfo could say anything Shadow put a hand over his mouth and said, "Soccer."
Rouge raised an eyebrow. "I saw too much colour for it to be soccer." Rodolfo, who had caught on, said, "We were Mum. Honestly." Rouge sighed, "I guess I'd better bring the pizza out then."
"YES!" They both said. She laughed and lay two pizzas at each end.
That is the end of this story, but the sinister, light blue figure outside their house in a tree, watching them, with an ugly look on his face, suggests a new story.
I hope you enjoyed this story. ^^ I originally was going to have this divided into two chapters, but I couldn't decide were to break off! That's the problem with things like this. ^^ All characters except Rodolfo, Dracsa, the door keeper, Rodrigo, and Dracsa belong to me.