Outside, the sun was beating down mercilessly. Heat shimmered in the air, driving sweat into Shadow and Rouge's fur almost immediately. Omega's cooling system kicked in with a soft hiss.
"Where is everybody?" asked Shadow impatiently.
"In this weather?" said Rouge. "I'm thinking we should check the swimming hole."
Sure enough, everyone in the area had gathered around the old limestone pool in the woods, looking to swim or wade or at least enjoy the cool, heavy shade of the trees.
"Hey guys!" called Tails, waving. "Come to cool off, huh?"
Shadow shrugged and exchanged glances with Rouge. If they were going to get Sonic's shoes, they were going to have to make him take them off. Easy enough; they'd just have to play along for a bit.
"It's a bit hot, true," agreed Rouge lightly. "I didn't bring a swimsuit though, so I guess I'll just read. Got any spare magazines, Omega?"
"Secured, as always," replied Omega, tossing Rouge a magazine, settling down, and going into a peaceful semi-standby mode.
"Another automotive magazine?" sighed Rouge. "Omega, what did I tell you about reading those?"
Omega made no reply, so Rouge rolled her eyes and opened the magazine. Shadow half-heartedly dabbled his feet in the water—shoes and all! Some of the others exchanged glances. It was a long-debated question: did Shadow's shoes even come off, or were they part of his body? He had never once been seen without those jet shoes on his feet, and he grew touchy when asked to remove them. Besides that, they powered on and off seemingly at his will, not by any visible switch or trigger. Sonic had once attempted to test the matter scientifically, but had quickly learned not to do that again.
For a while things remained peaceful. Most of the older Mobians swam, while the younger set waded in the shallows at the edge of the pool. They had put up a new rope swing a while ago, and it was a big hit. Meanwhile, Sonic sat very determinedly away from the water, of course.
"SHARK!" screamed Marine suddenly, pointing. Sure enough, there was a gray fin slicing the water nearby. There followed a general commotion and scramble for the land.
The shark surfaced presently. It turned out to be Silver, whose long back quills could easily pass for a sharkfin if he swam low in the water.
"Oh, did I scare you?" he asked, mischief glinting in his eyes.
"Agh! SILVER!" Marine threw herself at the hedgehog and pushed him underwater. "Not funny, mate!"
Laughing, Cream, Maria, and Tails joined the water fight. Rouge glanced up from her magazine and scooted away from the water a bit.
"Come on Sonic, you really should come in!" called Amy, waving. "The water's great!"
"No thanks. 'Great' and 'water' don't belong in the same sentence," shuddered Sonic.
"Come on, just once?" called Marine. "You should try the rope swing! It's ripper!"
Sonic eyed the rope dangling from a tree branch at the water's edge.
"Well . . . okay."
Striding boldly up to the rope, he grabbed it, pulled it back, and took a running start. He swung way out over the water, then arced back over the land again and landed neatly on his feet.
"Ta-da!"
"Very funny, Sonic," said Tails, grinning. "But you do have to actually let go of the rope, you know."
"What?" Sonic feigned disbelief. "Well now you're just asking too much!"
There came a chorus of protests and calls for him to try again.
"Scared?" grinned Knuckles.
"Well, that's a given," offered Shadow helpfully.
"All right, all right, okay!" protested Sonic. "Sheeeesh!"
Again he grabbed the rope, and took the longest running start you could imagine. He sailed out to the center of the pond, swinging high over the surface. At the very peak of the swing, he disconnected from the rope and tumbled into a spindash. The momentum of the swing carried the spinning hedgehog-ball several meters farther. When he uncurled, he landed on his feet squarely on the edge of the opposite bank.
Smugly, he glanced over his shoulder and smirked. The pause cost him, however, because the bank suddenly caved in and sent him splashing into the shallow water after all. The others shouted with laughter.
"Ugh," groaned Sonic, shaking water from his quills. He chuckled resignedly. "Oh, all right. You win. I guess I'm wet anyway, so I might as well stay wet. Blegh."
Slipping off his shoes and socks and tossing them onto the bank, he joined the youngsters in the shallows.
Shadow and Rouge exchanged glances again. Perfect! Now all they had to do was swipe the shoes from where they lay. They would need a distraction, however . . .
With this in mind, Shadow slipped into the water as well. Only a little while ago, he hadn't even known how to swim, but after nearly drowning in the Sol dimension, he had quickly decided to learn. And what Shadow learned, he learned thoroughly; he was now quite an expert, nimble and swift.
Speaking of experts, Knuckles was a champion at swimming himself. While the others clowned around in the shallows, the echidna zipped smoothly back and forth along the deeper parts of the swimming hole, his dreadlocks streaming behind him. He was practically made for the water; he spun and tumbled like a porpoise, diving deep and breaching slightly when he resurfaced. You could easily mistake him for an otter.
This could be used to Team Dark's advantage. When Knuckles returned from a dive, Shadow paddled over. As the echidna resumed plowing from one end of the swimming hole to the other, Shadow deliberately kept pace with him, and at last pulled slightly ahead. At length Knuckles bobbed upright and began to tread water.
"Hey," he demanded good-naturedly. "You wanna race or somethin'?"
"If you have the nerve," smirked Shadow.
"You're on!" Knuckles flourished a fist out of the water. "Three laps?"
"Five."
"No problem!"
They warned the others to stay in the shallows, then headed to one end of the swimming hole, bracing their feet against the bank for a solid start. One lap counted as a full trip from one deep end of the pond to the other, then back. Maria called it.
The race was very close. Knuckles skimmed through the water smoothly, arcing up and down as he surfaced for breath and submerged for speed. Shadow followed the same basic pattern, but his stints underwater were much longer. He surfaced only once or twice from one end of the swimming hole to the other, and it was quite a distance.
The spectators hollered encouragement more and more enthusiastically as the last lap drew to a close. At the last minute Shadow lunged ahead, salmon-like, and won by a good three meters or more. He grabbed the bank and shook water from his ears coolly, as Knuckles shot into the finish and slammed his hands against the wall of the swimming hole. The echidna exploded above the surface and flopped against the bank briefly, half-panting, half-laughing from the adrenaline rush. Catching his breath, he promptly slid back underwater and bobbed up again, only just far enough for his eyes to show above the surface.
"Five laps a bit much?" Shadow asked the eyes sardonically.
Abruptly Knuckles popped back up to the surface and blew a mouthful of water into Shadow's face. There was an eternal second during which Shadow, one eye shut, dripped silently. Then he threw himself at the echidna and drove them both underwater. The others scrambled onto the bank as the brawlers tumbled into the shallows, tossing up masses of foamy water.
"Help, help, they're trying to kill each other!" cried Maria, as the water roiled and foamed.
"Is there blood?" called Rouge, looking up from her magazine.
"I don't think so . . . " Maria replied, squinting into the frothing tangle.
"They'll be fine, then," said Rouge, going back to reading. "Don't intervene unless there's blood."
For the most part, she was right. Shadow and Knuckles fought every now and then, just like Knuckles and Sonic did. They had never caused each other any severe or permanent damage—as long as they weren't on opposite sides of the moral battleline, it always carried a note of friendly sparring. That didn't mean they were pulling their punches any, though.
The others were mostly busy keeping an eye on Shadow and Knuckles in case they got carried away, so Rouge saw where the opportunity stood. Carefully, she laid aside her magazine and edged over to where Sonic's shoes still lay on the bank. If she could just grab them and toss them to Omega, he could conceal them until Team Dark made a graceful but early exit, and then the plan would begin in earnest. Piece of cake!
Only there had to be a complication. Just as Rouge grabbed the tied-together laces of the shoes, Knuckles attempted some kind of strange underwater jujitsu throw. He actually applied enough leverage to tumble Shadow out of the water and up onto the bank, where he succeeded in knocking down Rouge. Rouge, still clutching Sonic's shoes, somehow got tangled up in Shadow's rebound, and was dragged into the water with him.
"Calling halt!" she hollered, surfacing. "That's enough!" She ducked underwater and kicked Knuckles in the shoulder lightly to make her point. The echidna and hedgehog both surfaced, coughing and panting, while Rouge surfaced right after them. She was a good swimmer, and even her jumpsuit was well-adapted for it, but that wasn't what was on her mind just then. Glaring at Shadow, she shook her head vehemently to indicate there had just been a severe setback. He grimaced in understanding.
"Are you all right?" called Amy from the shore.
"Fine, fine," grumbled Rouge, stroking back to the bank. "But I think Sonic's shoes just got knocked to the bottom of the swimming hole."
"What?!" yelped Sonic. "You're kidding, right?"
"Nope," said Rouge, swinging up onto dry land and wringing water from her wings. "I accidentally kicked the shoes into the water when Shadow crashed into me."
"Aw, man!" Sonic rubbed his head unhappily. "That was my only pair!"
"Yeah, yeah," sighed Rouge. "A pity your shoes don't float. Is the water deep there?"
Knuckles flipped underwater briefly, then back upright.
"Deepest part of the swimming hole," he announced grimly.
"How deep is that?"
"Uh . . . " Knuckles grinned sheepishly. "Nobody's actually tried to go down that far to find out."
"Awww, great." Sonic gave a rueful chuckle. "Well, guess I'll just have to get a replacement pair fast, before the Egghead attacks again."
"You could always go down and get them," said Shadow sardonically.
"Thaaaanks, Shadster. I'd love to have them back, but I'm not so desperate that I'd join them down there!"
"Relax," said Knuckles, waving one hand impatiently. "If you're going to raise such a fuss, I'll dive down and get 'em."
"Are you sure you can make it that deep, Mr. Knuckles?" asked Cream.
"Yeah, sure. Heck, I don't see him volunteering," said Knuckles, giving Shadow a dirty look.
"I can also make it down that far," said Shadow calmly.
"Oh yeah? Well then, how about another competition?" smirked Knuckles. "Let's see if we can both make it down to the bottom, and who can find Sonic's shoes and get back to the surface first!"
Shadow nodded curtly, mirroring Knuckles' smirk.
"Guys, hey—" began Sonic, but received only a dismissive glance from Shadow.
"Don't get yourselves killed," warned Amy anxiously.
"We'll be fine," retorted Knuckles, already starting to take deep breaths in preparation for a stint underwater. "Maria, call it again?"
Maria glanced uneasily at the others, but got only some helpless shrugs in return. Sighing, she counted down from three and called "go!". Shadow and Knuckles both disappeared underwater. Two pairs of feet, one in jet-skates, flashed briefly above the surface, then disappeared.
"I really hope they don't get themselves killed," sighed Amy.
Far below the surface, Knuckles and Shadow stayed even, their feet stroking in a steady rhythm as they plunged deeper and deeper. The water around them turned from a transparent blue to a translucent green to a murky purple-black. Knuckles soon couldn't see where he was going, and had to hope that he would feel the bottom with his hands when he reached it. Shadow was beginning to have difficulty too, even with his superior night vision. When something struck him briefly in the shin, he assumed it was Knuckles' foot, but couldn't say for sure. Heck knew what kind of strange creatures might be lurking down here . . .
The water pressure was getting excruciating. It pressed in from every direction, firm and dark, looking for weak angles at which to crush one's skull. Where was the bottom? Dang . . . was there a bottom?
Back on the surface, everyone was crowded around watching anxiously as the occasional bubble of air popped out of the water. The bubbles became less and less frequent over time . . . and it was a long time. Tails' twin tails kicked up a frothing eggbeater-like vortex as he twirled them in the water, spinning them just enough to keep himself submerged as he watched for Shadow and Knuckles. He surfaced for air only occasionally, then forced his head underwater again and kept looking.
"What do we do if they don't come back?" asked Amy fretfully, chewing on the knuckle of one finger. "They could die down there!"
"How long has it been?" asked Silver.
"Approximately two point three minutes," announced Omega.
"Man, this is killing me," groaned Sonic, pacing. He did not like the idea of someone being somewhere he couldn't save them from, particularly since it was his shoes that caused this whole mess.
Suddenly Tails burst up to the surface, grinning from ear to ear.
"They're coming! They're coming!" he coughed, waving his arms. A cheer went up, and only intensified when Shadow and Knuckles finally exploded up into the fresh air, alive and intact. They began to tread in place reflexively, both hauling laboriously for air and retching up lungfulls of water.
"Dammit," was the first thing Shadow managed to say between gasps. Meanwhile Knuckles, still not quite capable of speech, managed a smug grin and a toss. A pair of wet and somewhat compressed shoes splashed up onto the bank.
"Hope—you're—satisfied," panted Knuckles. He waved one hand abstractly and threw himself onto his back in the water to float while catching his breath.
"Darnit Knucklehead, next time leave them down there," said Sonic, scruffing up his quills with relief. "But thanks."
Knuckles grinned and tossed Shadow a smug glance.
"You did well," conceded Shadow tersely.
"Thanks. You weren't so bad y'self," smirked Knuckles.
Shadow made no further comment. He stuck about just a little while longer, then quietly left. Rouge and Omega glanced at each other and followed.
"What about the hostage?" asked Rouge under her breath, catching up to Shadow and shaking her head.
"I think we can do without a hostage," replied Shadow tightly.
"What, you mad that you didn't win the contest?"
"No," shrugged Shadow. "As far as I care the Faker's shoes could have stayed down there. But while I was searching for them, I found something better."
Smirking, he produced the green Chaos Emerald.