CHAPTER 24

OVERTURN

Lien-Da let out a scream of pain as a gunshot had fired into her shoulder. She dropped the sword to the ground and quickly took out her handgun. She looked back at Julie-Su and Rouge standing across from her. She glared at Julie-Su who had fired the first shot at her. When she had began to aimlessly started to fire back at the both of them, Julie-Su and Rouge began to dodge her gunshots.

When the gunshots started firing back and forth, everyone had scattered and began to take cover.

With tears falling from his face after witnessing Sierra's gruesome death, Trevor fled behind a parked car along with Shadow beside him. He turned to the hedgehog as his body shook in distraught, "Lieutenant Shadow…"

Shadow glanced back at Sierra's body laying on the ground with blood still slowly gushing from her slashed throat. He turned away from the gruesome sight and knew what Trevor was feeling and he was feeling the same way. However , he knew how things were going and it wasn't a good time to lose focus on the situation. He tried his best to calm down the panicking lion. "Trevor…"

"She killed her…" He began to sob loudly, "That bitch killed Sierra!"

Shadow knew he was going into a state of panic and anger but he tried his best to try calm him down. "Trevor! Listen to me! I'm angry too but what's done is done! We can't help her now! We need to calm down and think of a way to end this before anyone else's life is taken!"

Before Trevor could say anything else, he and Shadow were both startled when they saw a white male fox taking cover next to them.

The white fox turned to the crying lion with a sympathetic look, "Trevor, I…"

All Trevor knew was that Gin had taken part in the entire thing and immediately blamed Sierra's death partially on him. "You bastard!"

Shadow saw Trevor practically almost throw himself at Gin and yelled at him to stop him. "Trevor, stop! It won't help!"

More tears swelled in his eyes as he didn't quite understand at the moment why Shadow didn't want to literally kill Gin as well. "But he…"

Gin looked down at Trevor's wrists that were still zip tied together. He paused for a moment until he took out a small pocket knife and held it near the lion's wrists.

Trevor flinched slightly as he had no idea what was quite running through Gin's mind when he first pulled out the knife.

Shadow had also gave Gin a defensive look when he lashed out the knife.

Shadow and Trevor watched in shock as Gin cut the zip ties and freed Trevor. There was an awkward silence between the three of them until they both saw Gin's eyes wander down to the ground.

The fox slowly shook his head in disbelief, "…I…I didn't know she would…"

Before Trevor could say anything else, Shadow had once again spoke out to him.

"Trevor…"

He noticed him looking down at the small black remote control he had held in his hand.

Gin suddenly noticed that Trevor had taken the key to Shadow's cuffs probably when he was unconscious when the van had crashed. He made a small nod towards him "…She needs to be stopped."

With a few warm tears still running down his cheeks, he turned back to Shadow. "…Lieutenant Shadow?"

"No…"

Trevor and Gin perked their ears up in confusion at the hedgehog.

The black hedgehog focused his attention towards the two. "My name is Shadow…Shadow The Hedgehog", he spoke in a deep and firm voice. "You got that?"

After when he spoke, Gin and Trevor knew exactly what Shadow had meant by saying that. They knew that after when the cuffs came off of him, Shadow would put behind everything that he had done while he worked for G.U.N.

Trevor made a small nod and held the remote tightly in his grip. "…Stop that crazy bitch." He pushed the button on the remote that had unlocked the cuffs that were on Shadow's wrists.

When the cuffs fell to the ground, Shadow could slowly feel himself regaining his energy one bit at a time. He looked over to Trevor and Gin and made a small nod, assuring them that he would help stop Lien-Da once and for all. He stood from the ground and turned to Lien-Da who continued to fire two handguns at Julie-Su and Rouge.

When Julie-Su ran over to Lien-Da and ready to strike her, she grabbed her by her wrist with one hand and used her clenched fist to punch her hard in the stomach. Julie-Su fell to the ground while holding her stomach.

An evil smirk formed on Lien-Da's lips as she stared down at Julie-Su who was in pain. She pointed one of her guns at the back of her head. "You're pathetic, baby sister."

Rouge gasped when she saw Lien-Da's finger laying on the trigger of the gun. She was afraid she wouldn't be able to confront her in time to stop her from killing Julie-Su. "Julie!" When she attempted to take a step forward, she saw Lien-Da suddenly get knocked to the ground by a strange yellow energy that struck her in her back. Her eyes widened in relief at the sight of a black hedgehog having his hand aimed in Lien-Da's direction. She was relieved that the cuffs Shadow wore were no longer restraining his wrists and Chaos powers. "Shadow!"

Angry, Lien-Da struggled to get off of the ground. Her back ached from the blast. She spun around and turned to Shadow and was surprised to see the cuffs off his wrists. She flashed her eyes over to Gin hatefully. "Fucking traitor…" she spoke while lowly groaning. She took her eyes from him and focused her attention back to Shadow. "So your finally up and at it again eh, Shadow? What are you going to do? Arrest me? Kill me? I know you could…"

A small sigh escaped from him. He admitted that everything she was saying was true. He was at enough strength to easily kill her and end it all right then. However, he figured if Gin could look past his ways then so could Lien-Da. "It doesn't have to be this way, Lien-Da."

A small laugh had came from her, "You're at full strength and you're hesitating on taking me out? What's wrong, Shadow? Do you still perhaps have feelings for me?"

"You can think that way all you like but it all falls down to me not wanting to be with anyone else except Rouge."

Rouge placed her hand on her chest as her heart happily raced when Shadow looked in her direction.

"Maybe I did have feelings for you Lien-Da, but I never loved you. My heart belongs with Rouge."

Tears swelled in her eyes in happiness as she knew that Shadow still apparently had always thought of her and loved her. A small and hopeful smile formed on her lips, "Shadow…"

"…I'm sorry if I ever hurt you." Shadow was looking back at his actions with Lien-Da and still felt terrible for basically leading her on.

Even though it was clear that her and Shadow would never be together, Lien-Da still couldn't help but to feel hurt from his words. She didn't know how she exactly felt about him but she had thought of him as the first man she was very close with in a very long time. "You're a fool, Shadow…" She fought back her tears and angrily spun around to Rouge. "…You should've killed me when you had the chance."

Rouge's heart raced as Lien-Da hatefully glared at her until she pulled out a magnum from the inside of her black and purple trench coat.

Shadow's eyes widened as she pointed the gun in Rouge's direction. "No!" Since he was standing fairly close to her, he figured he would be able to stop her before she fired the gun.

Lien-Da was tackled to the ground by Shadow which caused her to drop the gun from her hand. She fought to get Shadow off of her. She then used her knee and kicked him off of her body. She shoved him off of her and set her sights on the magnum laying next to her. Before she could reach out to it, she saw a purple boot step on top of the gun. She slowly looked up only to see a furious white bat woman.

"I've been waiting a long time to do this…" Rouge forcefully picked her body up from the ground and sent a hard punch to Lien-Da's face.

The hit was so powerful, she almost fell back to the ground. She focused her attention back to the angry bat woman while she wiped some of the blood from her mouth.

"Where's your authority now, bitch?" Rouge had growled under her breath.

An evil smirk formed on her face. "Don't tell me you're still upset over me screwing with your man?" She took out her black whip from her holster and glared at the bat woman. "You can have him back! I'm through with him! But I suppose it doesn't change the fact that he still cheated on you!" When she lashed the whip out at Rouge, she gasped in shock when she saw Rouge catch the whip and hold it in her hand. "You're a fool, Rouge! That piece of shit is lying to your face! He doesn't give a fuck about you or anyone! He's just using you until he can fuck another stupid bitch behind your back!"

Rouge's eyes widened from Lien-Da's sudden outburst.

"Men are lying pieces of shit! They'll walk all over you! Not giving a fuck about how hard people have had it in the past!" Tears once again started to swell in her eyes.

Rouge figured that Lien-Da have had some type of relationship problems in the past.

"No matter how hard you try to please them! No matter how nice you are to them! They'll just fuck you and use the fuck out of you! They think nothing of you and won't have any second thoughts about it! Leaving you hurt and scarred in the end!"

She paused for a second after hearing Lien-Da's words that were filled with hurt from experiences she had went through in the past. "…No…", she spoke. "It's true. It's hard finding a good guy that won't treat women like shit but Shadow is…different. He made a stupid mistake but it happens to all of us. Shadow isn't perfect and neither am I. No one is and that's why no relationship will ever be perfect. It's hard but if two people love each other enough, then everything will work out in the end. You just have to have faith."

A small smile formed on Shadow's face as he found out that Rouge had basically still loved him.

Her grip eased on the handle of the whip as she began to question if Rouge was right. But as haunting images came flooding back in her mind, she angrily gripped the end of the whip again. "Lies!"

When Rouge found out that there was no hope for Lien-Da, she figured the only way to stop her was to continue fighting her. When she tried to snatch the whip out of her grip, Lien-Da was pulled over to her. Rouge had sent another hard punch to her face repeatedly and kept doing so until Lien-Da broke away from her by grabbing one of her wrists and pulling out a dagger from the holster that was attached to her leg.

Shadow's eyes widened when he saw the weapon being pulled out. He quickly pulled Lien-Da's body from Rouge and slammed her onto the ground.

While Lien-Da was on the ground, she used her foot and tripped him to make him fall to the ground. She stood from the ground and approached him with her holding the dagger in her hand. "It didn't have to end this way…" Before she could do anything else, a loud gunshot was heard.

When Shadow looked up at Lien-Da, he saw her pause for second and then drop the dagger to the ground.

She slowly placed her hand on her left upper chest area and felt blood oozing from her gunshot wound.

Speechless, she turned to Rouge who had a handgun pointed in her direction. When she took a small step forward, Rouge had fired yet another shot to her chest and that time, it was enough to knock her down to the ground.

When Rouge saw her fall to the ground, she dropped the handgun and quickly ran over to Shadow in worry. "Shadow!" She kneeled down next to Shadow's body to make sure that he was okay. "Shadow, are you all right?"

He gently placed his hand in hers and made a warm smile. "Yeah. I am now."

She made a warm smile back when she knew that he was going to be okay.

Suddenly, they both saw Julie-Su slowly walking over to Lien-Da's body that was still laying on the ground. When Julie-Su approached her, she looked down and studied her weakened body that was laying in a puddle of her own blood.

With her eyes still barely open, she looked up at the furious pink echidna standing over her. Tears began to fall down her face as she laid on the pavement and looked up at Julie-Su. "…Ru…tan…"

A small sigh escaped Julie-Su as she pulled out her silver gun. She kneeled down next to Lien-Da and whispered softly. "…Rutan is alive and doing well."

After hearing that, more tears streamed down her face and a small warm smile formed on her lips. At last she knew that Rutan was alive and safe. She could now have a peaceful mind now that she discovered that her son was okay. She suddenly saw Julie-Su standing from the ground and pointing the gun at her forehead. She had wished that she could see her son's smiling face one last time. She closed her eyes with the same smile still on her face.

Before anyone could say anything, they all had heard a loud gunshot coming from Julie-Su's gun.

Gin looked down to the pavement in sadness. He was upset that Julie-Su killed her but he knew that it was all for the best

While everyone was distraught and confused, distant police sirens were heard.

Rouge had then saw Julie-Su running over to her. "Julie?"

She looked at her with a serious face. "If anyone asks, that bitch killed her own damn self."

Rouge was speechless from Julie-Su's sudden demands. When she saw her about to take off, she turned to her.

Julie-Su turned to her again before deciding to run off. "If I took her back to Angel Island, they would've executed her anyway and I don't want her own son to watch that shit happen…"

Without saying anything else, Shadow and Rouge watched as Julie-Su fled from the scene before the streets became full of cop cars.

When the police had arrived the rest of the Chaotix team had arrived as well.

Gin had police officers surround him and point their guns at him.

"Put your hands behind your back and get down on the ground!"

Without hesitation, Gin did as he was ordered to do. He kneeled down to the ground and placed his hands behind his back. As he felt his wrists being restrained in handcuffs, he noticed Trevor looking down at him in disappointment. When the cops forced him to stand on his feet, he gave the lion a sympathetic look. "I'm sorry, Trevor. I'm sorry for everything…"

Still angry over Gin's betrayal, he bit his lip as he watched the cops escort Gin away into a cop car.

As Espio looked around the scene, he had saw Sierra and Lien-Da's dead bodies laying on the pavement laying in a pool of their own blood. "Wha? What the hell happened here?"

With Rouge not knowing where to start explaining, she looked over to Shadow and felt his hand caressing her cheek letting her know that everything would be okay.

In the next chapter...The last chapter! Get stoked!

Sarah: It seems that G.U.N. will never recover from this madness...

Trevor: It's what Sierra would have wanted...

Gin: It's all my fault. I should've done something...

Rutan: Who is she?

Julie-Su: Your mother loved you very much...

Rouge: Will we ever go back to way things were?

Shadow:...