Chapter 2

It was a slow day that morning in G.U.N Headquarters, which left Shadow with little to do other than organizing the paperwork that had made a suitable pile on his desk. He absolutely hated it. The only physical stimulation he would recieve would be gliding his hand over flat pieces of paper, and then just put his pen down; it was nescessary,yet pointless. Sure, he wasn't asking for the Space Colony Ark to go on a collision course with Earth, he had already dealt with such a crisis before, but he was looking for something, anything, that could occupy his restless nerves. Just then, his desk phone buzzed, followed by the voice of his secretary, Ms. White, saying, "Mister Director, the new intern is here to see you."

"That's better than doing nothing at all," the ebony hedgehog thought before replying, "Send her in."

No sooner had he said the word, that in came bursting a young woman with red hair and robed in yellow blouse, black skirt, and a teal colored beret that fell from her head, along with a stack of papers she had been carrying, as she fell to the floor. Shadow leapt to his feet, then moved to help the girl to her feet. After retieving her hat and papers, she looked down on the hedgehog Director, and mustered a nervous chuckle.

"Good day, sir. Sorry about the mess."

Shadow merely shook his head and chuckled, then gestured for her to take a seat whilst he took his own.

"Now then," he began. "I am to understand you are here for an internship. May I have your name?"

"Felicia Dewey, sir." the girl replied. "Thank you so very much for seeing me sir."

"But of course." Shadow replied. "Now then, what particular field are you hoping to look into?"

"Well, sir," Felicia began as she sorted through her stack of papers. "Lately I've been studying in advanced robotics and I hope to major in the field of medical technology. From what I've observed, the Guardian Units of Nations have great advances in that field, and I felt that this would be the best place to gain the experience."

"Indeed," replied Shadow. "Following the example of my creator, Professor Gerald Robotnik, GUN has set an entire wing of their research and development division to medical advancements. May I have your resume?"

Felicia began to sift through her paper stack, searching for the proper document that he sought. Suddenly, from out of the girl's purse, there shot out a small object that smashed into the papers, scattering them in every directon.

"Ack!" Felicia screamed, reaching to capture the fast moving object. "Rodney, no! Bad boy! Get back here!"

The object zipped just beyond her reach, slammed into one of the bookcases on Shadow's wall, knocked several volumes from their respective places, and zoomed in Shadow's direction. The black hedgehog did nothing, merely sat still and waited. Then, when the object was just within three inches of his face, Shadow flexed out his arm, seizing the object in his hand. Ever slowly, Shadow retracted the fingers on his hand, and could now get a proper look at the source of all the trouble. It was small, no bigger than Shadow's palm, and was made completely out of metal aside from a glass surface on it's front. It was outfitted with four wings on its top and bottom which gave it an x-shape, and was even equiped with a tiny thruster.

"What is this...thing?"

Felicia was blushing. "That's...Rodney. He's a science project I have been working on for college, but his AI is still malfunctioning. I guess he was trying to help me find..." Just then one of the sheet of paper landed on her head, which she then handed to Shadow. "This."

Shadow took the paper. "Well, aside from the AI issues, I'd say your pretty skilled. There just may be an opening for you?"

"Oh really?" Felicia gasped, her face brightening. "Thank you so much! You won't..."

"Director Shadow!"

The two whirled around to see a GUN soldier rush inside.

"What is it?" Shadow demanded.

"Take my word for it, your gonna need to see it in order to believe it."

This caught Shadow's attention in full. He quickly scribbled something on a piece of paper, then handed it to Felicia. He told her to give it to his secretary, and that she would point her in the right direction from there. Then, with the soldier leading the way, Shadow charged out of his office.

...

It didn't take long for the GUN chopper to reach the site of the disturbance.

"Look down their, Sir!" yelled the pilot over the roar of the chopper's rotor blades. "Like I said, ya gotta see it to believe it!"

Shadow looked down, and there, just outside of the Westoplolis' city limits, was an entire armies worth of Eggpawns. Shadow was completely dumbfounded; back in the old days, the Eggpawns had made up the major bulk of Dr. Eggman's forces. It had been said that, since Eggman's fall, all remnants of this army had been melted down and sold off for scrap; Shadow had made certain of this personally.

"Well, you don't see things like that these days?" he muttered to himself. "Where's our forces?"

"They're positioned along the city's borders, Sir." the pilot replied. "They await your orders to attack."

"Well, then," Shadow began, risising from his seat. "Best not to keep them waiting."

He made his way to the sliding door on the side of the chopper, then opened it. The sudden gushing wind immediately caught the pilot's attention, and he looked back to notice a particular fact about the Director.

"Sir, you can't just jump! You need a parachute!"

"You forget, soldier." Shadow replied cooly. "I'm the Ultimate Lifeform! I don't need a parachute!"

With those parting words, Shadow removed his inhibitor rings around his wrists, then jumped. As Shadow decended, his body became enveloped in a golden light, and he was gradually gaining speed. Then, with a deafening BOOM, Shadow crashed down, sending several of the frontline Eggpawns flying. As he slowly rose to his feet, the ebony hedgehog turned to his troops positioned along the border, yelling out, " There they are, boys! Attack!"

With weapons blaring and calls ringing out, the Guardian Units of Nations moved in on their foes in full force. Shadow zoomed forward, flattening several of the robots underneath his feet. Several jumped him, but he was quickly cast them off with a spin. However, his soldiers were having more difficulty, which supprised the hedgehog director. Back in the old days, GUN militia-grade weaponry would have reduced seceral of these drones to scrap in a matter of seconds; these particular models weren't even being fazed by their bullets.

"General Cortes!"

There came a rusling of metal, followed by an eggpawn being tossed aside by a burly looking human with blonde hair and a long scar running along his right eye.

"Present, sir." replied the general.

"Status report."

"In a word: bad. These mechanical morons have us outnumbered a thousand to one, and our weapons, aside from grenades and missle launchers, are having little to no affect. I would suggest tank and artillery support, but we're too close to the city limits. We might cause more harm than good if we were to mobilize such forces."

"What about choppers?"

"I could send the order, but will there be enough time for them to gas up, lift off, and get here?"

Shadow looked behind his general, and began to weigh his options. Without options, this battle would be over soon; even he wasn't equiped to fight off all of the machines without at least one Chaos Emerald. But he wasn't about to let the city get overrun, either.

"Give the order for the choppers." the director finally replied. "We'll try to hold them off as long as we can."

Shadow charged past General Cortes, and went back into the fray, barking orders. "Grenadiers, take up the front and give them armagedon! Missle launchers, take up a safe distance, then unload in force. We have to do everything we can till the choppers arrive! Attack!"

His troops cried out again, then took their positions. Several pineapples were thrown througth the air, and all igniting with a brilliant BOOMS as they made contact. Behind them, more soldiers formed a comumn, their launchers positioned carefully along their shoulders. Each weapon started out with a FWOOSH, then followed up with thunderous KABOOMS as more robots were eliminated. As for Shadow, he charged through the line, careful to avoid any friendly fire, and began to wreak a little havoc of his own. He hammered his fists into one eggpawn, then sent it careening into several more like they were bowling pins. He followed up with launching a salvo of Chaos Spears, which reduced more into smoldering piles of scrap. A pawn tried to sneak up on him from, but he elbowed it and then tossed it into another that tried to jump him.

Suddenly, a stray grenade fell between Shadow's leg. The black hedgehog caught sight of it, but by then it was too late. It exploded, knocking Shadow to the ground. The eggpawns took advantage of this, and began to pile onto him. Shadow began to wiggle and squirm, but found he was unable to sort his way out of the entanglement of metallic bodies.

"Rust covered, tin-plated nuisances!" he cursed with a growl. "Get off of me!"

His options diminished, Shadow fell back on his contingency plan; he removed the inhibitor rings around his wrists, focused all of his energy into his core, then proclaimed, "Chaos Blast!" He expelled the energy in a single burst, scattering his foes in all directions and giving him enough room to rise. That had been a close one. Shadow had made it a habit not to use Chaos Blast unless it was absolutely necessary due to the fact that it drained his strength immensely. When he finally gathered himself, he looked up to see that several dozens of the machines were still on the approach, and, judging from the lessened amount of explosions that could be heard, his men were running out of ammunition.

"Director!" Shadow turned to see Cortes running up to him. "Bad news, sir. The choppers aren't coming. I don't know how, but someone had put sugar in the gas tanks. We're on our own."

This was indeed bad news for Shadow. The only strategic action to take would be to call a retreat, but that would only result in the eggpawns swarming the city and attacking the civilians. As he looked back to the oncoming horde, Shadow couldn't help but mutter, "I almost wish Sonic were here."

Suddenly, several eggpawns were sent flying as a blue blur burst through their ranks. The blur pulled a sharp U-turn, then proceded to do the same to another line of robots.

"Sir." gasped a somewhat surprised Cortes. "Is that...King Sonic?"

The blue blur finally came to a halt, and Shadow was able to get a better look at him; he was undeniably a hedgehog, and was covered in blue fur and and wore red sneakers just like Sonic. However, there was one particular fact that made Shadow certain that it wasn't him; he looked to be about fourteen, far too young to be the mobian monarch. Shadow's attention was diverted away from the newcomer when he heard a new commotion. His eyes jumped when he was a blue vortex swirling through the eggpawns, blowing them in all directions in its wake. When the storm cleared, Shadow smirked.

"That, my dear general, is King Sonic."

Indeed it was. Where a twirling column of wind once stood, there was now a blue hedgehog adorned with bright red sneakers, a red cape that flowed behind him, and a golden crown that sat cradled to his brow.

"Hey, Shadow." Sonic greeted with a cocky grin. "You should have called. Had I have know you were having a party, I would have brought the whole family."

Shadow chuckled. "It seems all that cushy living hasn't affected your ability to fight. You and little boy blue over there have accomplished in one instant what it would have taken my attack choppers to do."

"Hey!" the younger hedgehog snapped, clearly insulted at the remark reguarding him.

"Cool it, Manic." Sonic chided the youth. "That's just Shadow bein' Shadow."

The ebony hedgehog took a closer look at the boy.

"So this is your son...Manic was it? Huh, the resemblance is uncanny."

Manic puffed out his chest, a prideful grin plastered over his face. "Yep, thats me. I'm Manic the hedgehog, son of the famed king Sonic the hedghog, and one of the fastest creatures in the world."

"Yeah," Sonic chimed in. "Of course, your still slower than me."

"You want to test that little theory, old man." Manic shot back. "I'll be I could run circles around you."

This little conversation between father and son went on a little longer, but Shadow had opted to tune it out; it was mostly full of "oh yeah?" 's and "Yeah!" 's. Shadow merely shook his head, and chuckled lightly.

"That's all the world needs: two Sonics. You don't see Silver and me getting into conversations like this."

"Director!"

Shadow swiveled around to see Cortes running up to him.

"What is it, general."

"Sir, intel reveals that there Eggpawns in the vicinity. They are currently on the move."

"From what point on the city are they convering?"

Cortes face shifted into a confused expression.

"That's just it, sir. Satelite imaging reveals that they are moving away from the city. South by southwest to be exact."

Shadow's jaw dropped. The only destination in that particular direction was HIS house. Now these destructive, and nearly indestructible, machines were on a course towards his family. Anger began to etch it's way across his face, and Shadow surged off in the direction of his home. He had already lost one as close to him as a sister. He would NOT loose his wife, two children, and fellow soldier. He would NOT!