CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Shadow regains conscious, and looks around the room. He felt something dripping on the side of his face, he brought up his hand to touch his head, and brought it back to his view. He stared at the blood dripping on his white glove.
He looked back at Jasmine and Rouge making sure they were ok. He saw them stirring and saw Rouge's eyes snap open.
Rouge bolted up and saw Shadow already up, she also felt something dripping near her eyebrow, she put a finger to the eyebrow, where she felt the pain, bringing it to her view and saw the red on her glove. She looked back at Shadow, also seeing the blood run down the side of his head.
They both look at Jasmine, when they saw her standing up looking down at them. Shadow jumped a little. She looked worse than Shadow and Rouge, she had a split lip, blood running down to the side of her head and what looked like a broken shoulder. She stared down at Shadow and Rouge, using one of her hands to bring them up.
They're all standing looking for Mephiles, but they found someone else instead, Omega.
Omega is standing next to Mephiles. Mephiles with Shadow's Chaos Emerald in his hand, he laughed. He brought both of his hands up and both of the Chaos Emeralds glowed and made millions of Mephiles clones. They all surrounded them.
"You must realize now that you cannot hope to stop me with your limited power." Mephiles says, with the million of clones of him and Omega standing next to him.
Shadow looks at him, ignoring the pain on his head.
"So you say..." Mephiles laughed more. "It's futile. The world will betray you. Why fight it all? Why risk your life for those who persecute you later?"
Rouge and Jasmine move closer to Shadow, taking a side to defeat the clones. Shadow looks looks at the clones and back to him. "If the world chooses to become my enemy. I will fight like I always have!" he takes off the rings on his wrists, to unleash his power to destroy the clones, and him.
"That's my Shadow..." she whispers. Rouge looks at Shadow taking off the rings and smiled also.
The whole room glowed bright orange and blinded all the clones. Shadow ran through all the clones and they all became black goo. Jasmine still super Jasmine, came to the other side using her ice power to go through all the clones, and Rouge was taking the sky using her fighting skills to beat the clones on her side.
Shadow, Jasmine, and Rouge stand in the middle, looking at the black goo from the clones disappear.
Mephiles and Omega look at them and they start to leave.
"You don't have to do this Omega!" Rouge's voice yelled. Omega turned to look at Rouge. "I'm sorry, Rouge The Bat." Rouge puts her hand over her mouth, shaking her head. "But this is our mission." Omega turns to look at Mephiles. Mephiles laughs and touched his medal and they are gone in black smoke.
Rouge takes her hand off of her mouth and takes a deep shaky breath, and looks at Shadow and Jasmine. She doesn't say anything.
Shadow looks at where he took his rings off and walked to them. Picking them up he put them back on his wrists. He turns and found the two Chaos Emeralds and walked up to them, but a blind light came. They got their vision back, and saw the gems gone.
"Come on, let's go." Shadow says and he they all walk out of the ruin.
Jasmine's body went back to normal, but then something flashes in her head. She moves her both of her hands and presses them to her head. She falls to her knees and squeezes her eyes, feeling the pain in her head. She brings her head on the cement floor screaming in pain.
Shadow runs to Jasmine bends down to look at Jasmine's face but she kept moving her head to the floor and nowhere else. Rouge is looking at him, scarred. He brings his hands to her shoulders trying to calm her down, than her screams stop. Jasmine lifts her head from the ground and meets Shadow's red eyes.
"Are you OK, Jasmine?"
"Jasmine, you OK?!"
Shadow and Rouge asked at the same time.
She stands up, she brushed her hands on her dress, and looks at them. "I'm OK. Just a memory from the past. That's all." she lied.
Shadow nods his head and takes his leave, Rouge stayed behind but left.
Jasmine signs in relief. She closes her eyes and let a tear drop fall from her eyes. She brushed her hands on her face and was trying to smile, but it was a sad smile. All she can remember is a picture she saw from her vision.
Elise falling on the stone floor and not opening her eyes again.
Jasmine came back to reality and started crying. When she saw Elise's lifeless body, looking so peaceful. Jasmine cried more, she wanted to destroy something so bad or scream at the heavens and tell them not to take Elise. What would Sonic do? Would he move on? Why didn't I stop Elise? How did it come to this? More questions were asked and no one is there to answer them.
Taking deep shaky breath and ran her hands under her eyes to wipe the tears running over her cheeks, and looked outside. She walks slowly out of the ruins and found Shadow and Rouge waiting for her.
Shadow walks to her, putting his arms around her waist, pulling her into a hug. Jasmine accepts the hug, she buried her face in Shadow's neck, not wanting to see the world. "Are you sure you're OK?" Jasmine didn't trust her voice, so she nods her head and closes her eyes, trying to believe that Elise will live not die.