"You want me to what?" Shadow asked flatly. The fox nervously shifted from foot to foot as he gestured to the machine behind him.
"I asked if you could go in there so we can make sure it stops chaos control." Tails placed his hands together. "Don't want to catch Super without knowing if we'll be able to hold him."
Shadow glanced at the machine wearily. Tails had whipped it up in a matter of days. There had been several instances of someone finding him working far too late into the night and having to drag him off to bed. While in general Shadow felt he could trust the fox's inventions; he was understandably concerned about how well this one would work.
"You're certain it's safe?" Shadow returned his gaze to Tails.
"Based on all the safety checks I ran, yes." Tails nodded confidently. "And trust me, I ran a lot of checks."
Shadow was still reluctant. "Quit dragging your feet hun." Rouge walked up and started to lead him over to the machine. "Just suck it up and get in the ball."
Shooting the bat a glare he pulled his arm away from her grip and closed the rest of the distance to the machine himself. He could feel Rouge's smug look even if he couldn't see it. He tapped on the clear glass ball. It didn't seem all that strong. He turned to look at the fox and raised a brow in question. "How am I supposed to get in?"
Tails' face lit up. "You can chaos control in. I made it so it should be a one way trip." He puffed his chest out proudly. "You don't even have to aim to get in there specifically, if it works it should just pull you in so long as you're close enough."
"Very well." Shadow sighed and turned back around. Pulling out the white emerald he had stashed in his quills he attempted to chaos control next to Rouge. He felt a feeling almost like being yanked in a different direction and found himself inside the ball that acted as the container of the device.
Tails cheered. "Now try and get out." He said, smiling at the success.
Shadow nodded and reached for the chaos energy needed to warp. It felt almost like there was a wall there. He tried his best to get around whatever was preventing him from using chaos control but had no luck. Looking up at the fox he gave a nod. "It seems it works." He threw an attack at the container itself. It held just fine. Hopefully it was strong enough for Super.
"Great!" Tails smiled widely. His tails swished behind him happily. I'll go ahead and let you out now." The fox messed with some buttons on the nearby control panel and soon Shadow felt the "wall" vanish. He quickly warped out next to the fox and stashed the emerald away again.
"Wonderful, now all we have to do is bait the trap." Rouge said, walking over to Tails.
Tails' enthusiasm dropped slightly. He placed a hand on his chin as his ears dipped. "Yeah you're right… He might come for the chaos emeralds, but he hasn't shown much interest in them so far."
"He just has no taste." Rouge waved off the comment. "I know I'd come flying for a chaos emerald."
Shadow looked down as he thought through his past two interactions with Super. The more he thought about it the more he didn't like the conclusion he was coming to. Sonic owed him after all this. "I might have an idea for a better bait." Both Tails and Rouge looked over at him. "Me."
Interesting. This was interesting. While his first instinct was to lunge forward and rip the black hedgehog to shreds for the stunt he pulled in their previous encounter, he managed to stop himself for now. Clearly Shadow was here for a reason and Super would be lying if he said he wasn't a little curious. Tracking him down specifically and alone no less? Yes, Shadow wanted something and Super wanted to know what that was before he killed the other hedgehog at least. He grinned, showing off his sharp teeth. "Better be quick if you don't want me to just kill you Shads."
Shadow's ears lowered and Super's grin widened at the desired reaction to the nickname. "I've come with an offer. One final all out fight between you and I. No tricks, no running away. Simply me vs you."
Super tilted his head. Oh? Well that was not what he had been expecting. "What stops me from simply killing you here and now though? Or for you to break your word?" Super held out his arms in a sort of shrug. "Why would I even want to accept that?"
The other hedgehog attempted to shrug casually, but Super saw the tension in the motion. "I suppose we'd have nothing but each other's word. As for why…" the black hedgehog's ear twitched. "If you manage to beat and… kill me." A pause. "Any of Sonic's other friends will let you do as you please and not try to get Sonic back."
Oh? Now that was interesting. Super tilted his head. "Oh really?" He flexed his claws. "And if the impossible scenario of you winning happens?"
"You let Sonic have control of his body back." Shadow stated simply, fixing Super with a glare.
Super tapped his chin with a finger. Interesting, interesting. While he could easily deal with Sonic's pesky friends this seemed like a much quicker way to do it. Holding out a hand, Super grinned smugly. "Very well. I'll accept your little challenge. Better enjoy what little time you have left. When and where?"
Shadow took his hand after a moment; Super took pleasure in the suppressed wince from how hard he gripped the other's hand. "Three days from now, Angel Island." Shadow said after the handshake was broken.
"Angel Island huh… An interesting choice." Super's ears swiveled forward. "See you then~" For good measure he did attempt to lunge at the other hedgehog, but predictably he chaos controlled away before Super could grab him. Oh well. Can't blame him for trying right?
Super took a deep breath of the fresh air of Angel Island. He looked around to remember the sights; they wouldn't be around much longer. Once he was done with the cocky hedgehog he'd probably go around the island and let loose a bit. Not as fun as going after living things but the general destruction would still be fun. Plus, there were bound to be some things living on the island. Super's ears perked up as he heard the crunching of approaching footsteps. There he was. Super turned to face Shadow, who had a determined look on his face. Good. If his opponent had given up already this would be no fun. Super spread his arms wide. "Ready to die Shads?"
The frown on the other hedgehog's face deepened. Super would admittedly miss messing with him, but that wouldn't stop him from ending the black hedgehog. "I've made peace with what's about to happen." Shadow said, crossing his arms. He held up a finger to stop Super from saying anything. "Only rule here is we can't leave this island. If either of us do so we can consider this… agreement null and void."
"Fine by me. Let's get to it!" Super curled up and launched a spin dash at Shadow. It connected with a satisfying thud and puff of air from the wind being knocked out of Shadow. The black hedgehog skid across the ground before flipping himself over and standing back up. A chaos spear was launched at him and he laughed as he dodged it. Closing his eyes he smiled smugly. "Really now? You think that's going to wo-" Super recoiled as Shadow connected with a solid punch to his face. He stumbled back more out of surprise than anything. Frowning, he glared at his opponent. "So that's how you want to play this? Fine. I can play your game."
Super swiped at Shadow who, predictably, chaos controlled out of the way. Whipping his head around to meet where Shadow would reappear, he was met with a kick to the face. Growling, Super grabbed his leg and slammed him into the ground. Shadow growled back at him. Curling into a ball he impacted Super's chest. Once the two separated they both fell into fighting stances facing each other.
They circled each other wearily. Super rubbed at his chin. His opponent wasn't pulling his punches. Super would just have to respond in kind. He released a quick burst of laser from his eyes. Shadow dove and barely got skimmed by it. Taking advantage of Shadow's momentary distraction he shot forward and pinned Shadow to the ground.
The other hedgehog barely wasted any time in warping out of Super's grip. Getting to his feet quickly and turning around, Super caught the next punch Shadow threw at him. Chaos energy sparked off his body. He shot Shadow a fierce look which the other returned. Now this… this was a fight! The other was actually keeping pace with him! Sure in the end Super would overpower him, but for now he could enjoy what would likely be the last challenging fight he'd have to face. A shame really, but something he could deal with.
The two broke apart; a grin returning to Super's face. Though he was caught off guard by the build up of chaos energy in his opponent. As he was trying to figure out what that meant, Shadow lunged forward. "Chaos blast!"
A massive shockwave of chaos energy was released from the black hedgehog. The force of it blew Super back and he grunted painfully as he crashed through several trees. Finally he came to a stop and slowly rolled himself back onto his knees. What was that? Super winced as he got up. Shadow hadn't done that before. Shaking debris out of his quills he decided that was something to worry about later. Cause now he knew what to look out for, so he could avoid that attack should Shadow try it again.
Super rushed back to the clearing where they had started their fight; Shadow stood there panting. The black hedgehog's frown deepened as Super approached. "It seems I might be outmatched in terms of strength." He said between breaths. "But let's see how fast you are." Shadow turned and started skating off towards the center of the island.
This again huh? Super cracked his knuckles. This time he'd catch the other easily. After a couple moments he took off flying after the other hedgehog. Things would be over soon…
Shadow panted as he focused on staying out of the grasp of Super. A hand shot out at him from his right. He jumped and launched a chaos spear in the general direction. A shout of pain told him he'd hit. As soon as he landed on the ground again he took off as fast as he could. This chase was starting to wear him down, while Super seemed fine. Shadow was certain he wasn't 100% ok, his chaos blast from earlier did seem to do a lot, but Super was faring far better than he was.
Focus. Another attempt to grab him from the left. A quick chaos control to a few feet ahead dodged that attempt. He didn't even need to stop moving. Nearly there. He'd have to remember that once he brought them close he couldn't use chaos control anymore lest he risk trapping himself. The question was how could he get Super to do it once he led him to the right place? As far as Shadow could tell the body snatcher hadn't used it a single time since their fight started.
Shadow quickly put on the breaks as Super came from above. The golden hedgehog let out a disgruntled noise as he made contact with the ground. Shadow sped past him; he would take any advantage he could get. There. He spotted the shrine in the distance. Since Tails' machine required the master emerald to work it was set up nearby. Soon all Shadow would have to do was get Super to chaos control. Which was still an issue. Clearly Super was inexperienced in using it. Whether that was from Sonic not making use of it often or just Super himself only having learned the technique recently Shadow wasn't sure. The baseline was though that Super didn't freely use chaos control during combat like Shadow did so it would be hard to trick him into using it.
Shaking his head he focused. He'd figure it out; he had to. If he attempted to reach out to one of the others waiting on the island Super might notice and realize something was up. Shadow couldn't risk that. Like it or not he was on his own, and he had to get his part done.
He burst into the area of the shrine. Chancing a look back Shadow noticed Super hesitating at the sight of the shrine. Very quickly though he refocused on chasing Shadow. That was good at least. Shadow focused ahead again. Nearly there. Finally as he jumped to the side to avoid another attack of Super's he spotted the disguised machine. They were in range which meant he couldn't rely on chaos control to help him against Super right now. Well he supposed it was time to pull another page from Sonic's playbook: taunting. Perhaps he could goad the other into using chaos control that way.
"Is that all you have?" Shadow shouted as he quickly skidded around to face Super. "Clearly you greatly over exaggerate yourself. You kill me? Hah!" Shadow glared at Super, who had paused in shock. "You'd be lucky to even take out a flicky."
Super's eye twitched. He'd certainly hit a nerve with that. Good. "You have no idea who you're dealing with." Super growled out, low and dangerous.
"I think I do." Shadow firmly stood his ground and puffed his chest out; quills raising in a show of aggression. "Someone who thinks far too highly of themselves and can't back it up." He crossed his arms. "Someone who wields as much chaos energy as someone with all the emeralds and yet can barely even begin to use chaos control let alone other techniques. Perhaps if you had a better grasp of it you might stand a chance, but as I see it now you'll lose to me."
At this point Super looked furious and Shadow braced for the worst. "Chaos control…" Super trailed off. "Oh I'll fucking show you chaos control!" With that Super vanished and Shadow braced, just in case. When he heard angry shouting and banging he turned to look in the direction of Tails' machine. Through the covering on it he could spot a flash of gold.
Taking deep breaths to calm himself he made his way over and removed the covering from the machine. Super lunged at the glass as soon as the covering was discarded. The look of fury in his eyes sent an involuntary shiver down Shadow's spine. "You liar ." Super spit out. The small amount of playfulness that Super seemed to always have about him completely gone.
"Surely you must understand that we couldn't just let you go around and do what you please." Shadow sighed as the adrenaline slowly faded from his system. "I'm shocked you agreed to this in the first place."
"We had an agreement, hedgehog ." Super growled, ears pinned to his head as he attempted to get through the glass. "You broke that."
"I did." Shadow confirmed, unsure of what else to say to the other.
Instead of saying anything else Super stopped in his attempts to escape and turned around, facing his back to Shadow. He sat down and said nothing. Oddly his behavior reminded Shadow much of a sulking child who'd just gotten in trouble or had something not go their way. It was an odd comparison to make, considering the other had nearly killed him on multiple occasions already.
That wasn't his problem though. They had Super, so now they could get Sonic back. As he went to contact the others and let them know of the success he couldn't stop thinking about the odd behavior. At least things would be over soon and he wouldn't have to worry about it.