Anonymous Review Replies!
The General Gist: ah, was it, though? Please read on to find out...:P
Shade GUA: Aw thank you, what a wonderful review! Yeah, I'm not the fastest writer, but I aim to be a VERY reliable one, finishing all fanfics that I start :) For comments like yours :P Please enjoy the continuing saga! (And, as to your second review - no worries, this is only a SEMI-sequel to "Life could have been so different". Only Shadow's past is the same, it doesn't mean that Tails must necessarily die in this story :) )
silverthepast: What a lovely long comment, thank you! And yeeeeah, the update speed still isn't very great, but it takes a VERY long time until I'm personally satisfied with a chapter...as for the "Rogue" the Bat thing - well, if you read her chapters again, there might just be a reason why it's spelled that way. ;p Catch Them If You Can also always gets updated straight after First Class, so no worries there :) Hope you like the new chapter!
Guest: Who indeed...
mohpiiiiii: ahahah, thank you! I'd of course be delighted if you wanted to review every chapter, I love hearing back about stuff and character interactions in detail what people thought of them! Meanwhile, please enjoy the new chapter :)
Guest: Heh, well, Maria's specialty is Chaos Energy theory, research, chemistry and emotional support, so I'm sure she'll find a role to be useful. Tails is the better pilot, fighter and engineer, but they do enjoy nerding out together. And yeeeeah, about that next UL, let's see what this chapter has in store...XD
DEV: Ahahah, yeeeah, wir brauchen jetzt nicht direkt Helden, die kapitellang nicht miteinander zusammenarbeiten wollen, Maria ist da schon der ideale Bombenentschärfungscharakter.^^; Die entsprechende TV Trope ist glaube ich "Poor Communication Kills" und ist SO ein cop-out, manchmal...aber jooo, der Action-Teil geht jetzt definitiv los! :D (auch wenn die high school Folter bei weitem noch nicht beendet ist, das wird jetzt der dermaßen absurde Mix ey XD) SA2 hat natürlich DIE BESTE storyline, auch wenn jetzt einige Sachen nicht so wie im Original laufen können...aber ansonsten wäre es ja auch nicht spannend! ;p Dass Sonic irgendwie umzingelt ist und dann nicht mehr wegrennen kann fand ich damals in der Cutscene im Spiel aber auch bizarr, der zischt denen doch weg, bevor die blinzeln können? Wenn man den Igel fangen will, geht mM nach nix ohne Betäubung...aber auf jeden Fall wie immer mega vielen Dank für das fantastische Review, ich freu mir hier immer n Keks :D Und jetzt auf zu einer Rescue mission und hoffentlich einem Aufeinandertreffen mit Sonic...:P
lianne: Thank you! Please enjoy the new chapter :)
MythicalMelodies: Hahah, yeeeeah, I do enjoy cliffhangers a bit...too much...^^; Knuckles will definitely have more appearances, he's my third fav character after Sonic and Shadow and is far too hilarious not to! :D
Guest: Oh, no worries, he DEFINITELY will before this fic is over :P
LAST TIME ON THIS FANFIC:
Sonic has been wrongfully accused of stealing an Emerald and now he is locked up in Prison Island! Oh noes! Tails to the rescue! With Shadow (and Maria?) tagging along (or at least, that's the plan), but we're still trying to figure out which hedgehog even *took* the Emerald! Luckily, Tails and Maria seem to have managed to descramble the bank vault surveillance footage. Right now, they're all in Shadow's family's basement, Tails is still sleeping, but Maria and Shadow are watching the recording of who the culprit is...
AUTHOR'S NOTE: For anyone not reading this fic for the first time, I did change the ending of last chapter a bit - mainly that Tails is still sleeping instead of with them at the laptop, but other than that, you can just straight up start reading from here. :) Please have fun!
xxx
Chapter 21: Jailbreak!
"No," Shadow whispered as it was his own face, his own red eyes caught on camera, clearly staring back at him.
"…what the…?" Maria managed, but other than that she was just as speechless as him. Together they watched the black-and-red-striped hedgehog on the recording, indeed moving with the same grace Shadow also possessed from camera angle to camera angle, wrenching doors open with familiar strength and dodging the defense laser-grid mechanisms of the vault with a speed no one but him or Sonic could match, rocket skates glowing in the dark as he moved.
"Hm...wha...?" Tails' sleepy voice came from the back of the room, and Shadow closed the video window with near sonic speed.
"Tails!" Maria exclaimed. "Good morning, did you manage to sleep okay?"
"Kiiiinda…." Tails gave another yawn, jaws gaping to reveal an impressive set of sharp fox teeth, then stretched. He blinked at Shadow and Maria sitting at the computer. "…has the video finished decoding?"
"No," Shadow said immediately, then thought that maybe he would need to add a little bit more. "It…it might take a little bit longer?"
"Huh," Tails said. "I thought it would be done by now."
"Well, hopefully it will be done before we leave," Maria said brightly. "Speaking of which, Tails, could you maybe see outside whether we need to prepare anything for a take-off runway for your plane?"
"Uh…sure…" Tails said, still looking at them a bit strangely, but turning and walking upstairs toward the garden anyway. Shadow's gaze snapped to Maria immediately.
"What is going on?! Did anyone manipulate that file?" he hissed.
"No, I really don't think so," Maria whispered back. "That hedgehog on it just really looks exactly like...but how…?"
"I don't know," Shadow swallowed. "All my clones were destroyed, right? And none of them ever looked quite like me, anyway-"
"I knew it!"
Shadow's and Maria's heads whipped around at the exclamation, Shadow internally cursing as he saw Tails standing in the door, large fox ears pricked forward to indicate the kit had likely heard them talking, if not all of what they said. "We did manage to descramble the recording!" Tails jabbed a finger at them accusingly. "And you know who is on there!" His eyes narrowed. "Is it you after all, then?"
"It's not," Shadow ground out, "Tails-"
"Tails," Maria interrupted him, sounding far more anxious than aggressive. She swallowed. "Tails. What is on that recording, it's…dangerous. For us. And for you. If we show you – you must swear that you won't tell anybody."
"What?" Tails blinked, now looking confused at her worried tone. "Why? What is on there?"
"Tails. Please," Maria said, ignoring Shadow's noises of protest. "If we show you this…we're trusting you with our lives. You have to promise not to tell anybody about this."
Tails swallowed, first looking at Shadow, then at Maria, but then seemed to decide and nod. "…okay."
"If this blows up in our faces and we have to become fugitives in Chun-nan, I'm holding you responsible," Shadow muttered to Maria, but moved aside as Tails stepped up to the screen. Predictably, Tails' eyes widened like saucers as soon as the video file started to play.
"It's not me," Shadow repeated for what felt like the umpteenth time today, glaring at the impostor on screen.
"It's…but…do you have a twin brother? I mean, he looks exactly like…" Tails trailed off, his eyes darting from the black, red-striped hedgehog on screen to Shadow and back. Shadow exchanged a brief glance with Maria – that could actually potentially be a lie they could be going with – but then sighed. A part of him was already so tired of the lies and the secrets.
"I…there used to be clones of me," Shadow said. "I thought there weren't anymore." Red eyes narrowed at the last, frozen image on the screen. "Clearly, I was wrong."
"Clones?" Tails, predictably, stared at him utterly baffled. "Why?"
"Tails, please, the more we tell you about this, the more you are in danger and we as well. Just please believe us that this isn't Shadow," Maria said, biting her lower lip.
"…No. It couldn't be," Tails finally said as the footage began to loop one more time. "Look, the guy on tape gets shot here," he leaned forward to hit the space bar and pointed to a particular scene where yes, now that Tails had pointed it out, it was evident that the hedgehog in the video suffered from a laser burn across his shoulder as he dodged the security measures in the vault.
"And you look like something once hit your shoulder, but it's an old wound, if that," Tails nodded toward the fur ridge on Shadow's right shoulder, Shadow instinctively resisting the urge to cover it with his hand under the fox kit's astute gaze. "You don't have any fresh laser burns and you heal quick, but not that quickly," Tails briefly glanced at a scrape still on Shadow's thigh that stemmed from their battle against the Kukku armada. "So that couldn't have been you on there," he finished, crossing his arms.
"That is, uh. Actually impressive reasoning," Maria blinked. But Shadow had frozen.
"…A shoulder wound," he repeated, more to himself. "Rogue checked my shoulder in school today! That means she must have known about this break-in…and the tape…?" Shadow trailed off, aware of both Maria and Tails staring at him questioningly and he was also rapidly realizing that he wasn't even sure what it meant that Rogue had apparently checked whether Shadow had been responsible for the break-in. How had she even known in the first place?
"Who?" Maria asked.
"There's this…bat. In school. Who I'm convinced isn't supposed to be there," Shadow shook his head. "Doesn't matter. What matters is that this isn't me on that tape," he said, at the same time grabbing the two Emerald drives still lying around on the lab table and shoving them into his quills, "And I will destroy whatever it is and who created it."
"We'll see what we do when we get to that point," Maria said, firmly. "For now, we should go before something else happens."
"We?" Shadow had paused in his stride toward the Tornado. "We sure as hell are not."
"Excuse me?" Maria asked, putting her hands on her hips. "What was that?"
"You are not going. I'm going with Tails," Shadow retorted, first jabbing a finger at her, then a thumb at himself. The fox kit in question was kind of standing between them now, looking a bit awkwardly from one to the other.
"Excuse me?" Maria repeated. "Did you forget who saved your life multiple times?"
"Yeah, but back then we didn't have another choice! And you almost died yourself in the process!" Shadow shot back, also casting a glance at Tails for support (but finding that the little fox had somehow found a forklift manual to hold in front of his face that he now pretended to be reading).
"Yes, well, now you don't have one either," Maria retorted, crossing her arms. "I am going there to find out who impersonated my brother and you're going to take me along because I am the one who developed the cloaking device that will even get us there without being shot down first."
"…Maria…." Shadow could feel the Chaos crackling between his fingers, unhelpful though it was in a sibling fight, and cast another glance at Tails. "Won't you say something?"
"Uh, if it, uh, helps, she can ride with me in the Typhoon in walker mode?" Tails suggested. "It's fairly well-shielded, too…."
"Not helping, Tails."
"I think he is, because he is speeding this up," Maria said, grabbing a small palmtop she put into the pocket of her dress. "Your plane seats two people, Tails, right?"
"Yeah, see?" Shadow seized onto that piece of information. "He can only take me along."
"No, you can ride on the wings," Maria shook her head, already walking over toward the plane and throwing a backpack inside. "I saw a picture on some Sonic the Hedgehog merch how he always does that, if he can do it, you can too. Let's go."
"…If we survive this, I will put a chain on your ankle."
"Fine." Maria rolled her eyes. "You guys coming now or what?"
"Yeah, right," Tails blinked, but then hurried toward the cockpit, also climbing into the plane, but then seemed to hesitate. "Only…" he swallowed, pausing to turn and look at Shadow. "Just one last question. You said there were clones of you? What was going on aboard the ARK?"
"Tails," Maria said, expression pained. "Please, believe us that we can't tell you more about that. We're…we're already on the edge of High Treason," she admitted, one hand rubbing her upper arm. The fox kit's eyes widened once again at that bit of information, but then he seemed to try and get himself under control again.
"Those...those rings of yours," he said, giving Shadow a worried glance, like someone who was perfectly aware they were walking into trouble if they knew too much, but just couldn't help themselves. Tails took a breath. "They aren't jewellery, are they?"
"…No," Shadow admitted, but then when Tails predictably started to look panicky again, quickly added, "Look, I haven't been banded because I'm a criminal," (which was true, after all – you have to be a person first before you can be a criminal, a cynical voice commented in Shadow's head). "My powers can become…unstable, when unrestricted. These rings help me keep them under control," Shadow said. "The professor made them himself so you can be sure they work."
Tails still looked at him with a deep furrow in between his brows, trepidation and determination about finding out the truth warring on his face like on a scientist's about to open the Necronomicon. Next, the fox kit took another deep breath, raising his chin. It would have been a convincing show of fortitude, had Shadow not seen Tails' hands grab the steering wheel of the plane so hard to keep them from trembling.
"…Unstable. So, so the accident…aboard the ARK, that shut everything aboard there down, the official explanation was a problem with the fusion reactor, but was it really to do…?"
"No, that 'accident' was still very much man-made, thank you," Maria finally cut in. "I can swear to you that none of the deaths that day had anything to do with Shadow's abilities being unstable."
"So then…why are you hiding his powers?" Tails asked again, a little bit more relaxed after being reassured that Shadow wasn't a bomb about to go off, but still pursuing his line of questioning with the stubbornness of eight year olds everywhere. "If you hadn't, Sonic wouldn't be in military jail by now, you know?" he asked, letting a note of reproach enter his voice.
"Again, classified," Maria sighed. "But if you want to know, my grandfather is currently working on at least getting them to drop that."
"And if you're still worried about my powers being a danger, don't be," he then added, angling one of his wrists so the smooth, lock-less inside of the ring was visible and giving Tails a wry smirk devoid of humour. "I can't take the rings off in any case."
"So," Maria said, taking her place next to Shadow. "We're willing to help you free Sonic because yeah, it's partly our fault that he's in jail. But there's things we're not allowed to talk about and we can't tell you why. So with that…" she swallowed. "Can you still trust us that we want to help?"
Once again, the silence seemed to stretch as Tails' eyes darted from one of them to the other, the fox kit's brain evidently working overdrive as he tried to process the information of the last few minutes –
"…okay, yeah," Tails said, nodding at Shadow and Maria. "You said you're my friend and…and Sonic thought so, too, of Shadow." He tried a small smile. "So thank you for coming with."
Finally, was on the tip of Shadow's tongue, but he didn't feel like saying it. Instead, he was more than a little bit surprised how that small remark, of Tails saying Sonic considered him not just an acquaintance but a friend, had felt like something inside just twisting a little, making it harder to speak for a moment or two.
"Alright," Maria said, also smiling back and then striding past to climb into the second seat of the plane, behind Tails. "Thank you for trusting us. Maybe – maybe we can tell you all about what happened at some point in the future."
"If we all live to have one," Shadow muttered, but then also pulled himself up to one of the wings, crouching on it and holding on to one of the metal support bars as Tails turned the plane around and prepared for take-off. But then the fox kit seemed to pause for a second time, hand hovering just over the lever for ignition.
"Oh," he said. "Oh, no."
"What, Tails?" Maria (who had just seated herself, and looked only a little bit cramped in what was obviously a seat meant for Mobians) asked, already uprighting herself in worry.
Tails twisted halfway around, facing them both with an expression of dismay. "We'll miss school, won't we?!"
Xxx
After only two hours of flight -
(and one conversation along the lines of "Tails, we are flying out now to break into a high security government facility and it's currently 5 am. We'll most definitely miss school, even if we don't all get killed."
"And I mean, isn't Sonic your legal guardian?" Maria had pointed out. "He can write an apology slip when we have busted him out of the military prison complex, right? And as for Shadow…hm…well I guess faking grandpa's signature could work…"
"No, it's not about being written up for playing truant," Tails had hedged, looking downward. "Only…I kind of wanted to ask Fiona out for prom today…"
"This can't possibly be my life," Shadow had muttered.)
later, Prison Island came into view.
At first it was only a speck on the horizon, but at the speed the Tornado was soaring over the water, Prison Island soon grew into a sprawl of jungle and beaches beneath them, green and cream in a dazzlingly azure ocean.
"That's...that's Prison Island?" Maria asked, staring at the beautiful southern archipelago beneath them. "It...kind of doesn't look like I imagined it..."
"Well, most of the jungle is completely uninhabited," Tails replied, looking at his instruments. "The relevant part of the island for us is just the military fortress built on the other side. I've flown in from this side and kept to a low altitude to avoid detection - and now it's time to see whether our stealth mode works as we hoped. Engage."
Shadow could feel his awareness heighten as Tails flicked a switch on the stealth prototype engine they had hastily installed into the Tornado. There was a low hum as the box sprang to life, but from their point of view, all that happened was that a...sort of flimmer seemed to surround them now, the air around them distorted just slightly as if you were looking through a heat haze over asphalt in the summer.
"Did it...did it work?" Maria asked with a swallow.
"Only one way to find out," Tails said, right before pulling up over the hills of the archipelago, now soaring in plain view over a military fortress jutting out from the island like a tentacle of concrete and steel. "Wait for us, Sonic," Tails took a deep breath. "We're on our way."
xxx
Their approach went flawlessly.
All of them had gone quiet, watching with pounding hearts as they pulled closer toward the fortress, Tails silencing their engines as much as possible as they sailed through the metal harbour sprawling out from the complex into the water. Around them, military ships were floating serenely on the waves, and Shadow frowned at the other things he saw - giant ramps and walkways on stilts were littered throughout the ocean seemingly at random, the centerpiece being for some reason a gigantic rocket of some sort, surrounded by scaffolding and maintenance catwalks.
In front of them, where the fortress proper began, a large airfield rising from the ocean lay already baking in the morning sun, but while there were squadrons of battle mechs standing in assembly, and various fighter jets standing around, absolutely no personnel or other human activity was visible yet. The one strange thing was that on the other side of the fortress there was a portion of the jungle just flattened, palm trees and shrubs unnaturally broken and pressed and glued against the ground, as if a large aircraft had landed there, but now there was no trace visible of what it could have been.
"No alarms," Tails whispered. "I think...I think it's worked. They have no idea we're here, yet."
"Good," Maria nodded. "I managed to download some rudimentary blueprints of the complex last night," she said as she briefly showed them a map. "There's four sectors to this base, A to D, and we're currently in sector B. It's mainly bureaus for support and logistics and it's also the one with the harbour where entry is easiest. There's a supply entryway further along the wall we can use. If you can set the Tornado down right behind that cannon tower, there should be a blind spot for their cameras where we can sneak along."
"Got it," Tails nodded, tilting the plane to glide past the airfield, managing an approach with pin-point precision toward a walkway along the walls of the airfield, a gate visible there where ships presumably were able to dock and unload cargo or personnel. As they neared, Shadow almost yelped as the Tornado suddenly started to transform again, becoming a walker that slowly hovered down onto the walkway.
"This is too quiet," Shadow narrowed his eyes as he looked around the abandoned area. "Even if they didn't notice our approach you'd expect to see some activity outside, no?" He turned to look at Tails. "Do you think this could be a trap?"
"I don't know," Tails swallowed. "But how many people there are really depends on the military complex you're trying to sneak into." He looked a bit helpless. "They can really differ in base activity level."
Shadow shot Tails a look. "Okay, so exactly how many-?"
"Guys, I've melted the lock," Maria interrupted their conversation, looking up from the locking mechanism of the entryway which she had poured something from a test tube on it and it, terrifyingly, eaten straight through the steel. "Less talking and more breaking-and-entering, okay?"
xxx
"Right, me and Maria will remain inside the walker while you scout ahead - Maria, do you have a reading on where we need to be going?" Tails asked as they had ventured inside, still no alarms blaring and only an empty corridor ahead, half-turning to her as she was trying to obviously make sense of a map on her palmtop.
"I...think I do. Yes," she said. "We need to head down this corridor and then turn right at the next intersection. That will take us to the surveillance room where we can take the cameras out." She shifted in the cramped cockpit where she and Tails were smushed together, the fox kit at the controls while Maria was concentrating on the readings on her pocket computer.
"Gotcha," Tails nodded. "Shadow, can you scout ahead and take anyone out we might run into? Because the walker is safe but not exactly quiet and otherwise I might have to shoot with this thing, and uh. Maybe collapse this whole fortress on top of us. Kind of went overboard with the fire power of this thing, now that I think about it..."
Shadow gave Tails (who was now rubbing the back of his head with an embarrassed grin) a look.
"...Sure. Just keep Maria safe. And if this is a trap, get the two of you out of here."
The next moment, he was already off, skating along the corridor while trying to shake off the unease that had settled on his shoulders and around his chest like steel bands the moment they had set foot inside this complex. This was where he had been trying to get to all along, hoping to find out why the Doctor had tried to break in here last week. But now that he was here, everything inside him felt on edge, far more so than even breaking into a dangerous military base warranted. There was something...unsettling about this place.
There were images flashing in front of his mind's eye, of the capsule closing above him when GUN had tried to imprison him here three months ago after the raid aboard the ARK, lobotomize and reprogram him, bury him beneath the ground for fifty years, frozen in a glass coffin until Maria would long have been dead...only now they felt almost as if that was what had really happened, a voice in his head suggesting that this reality was nothing but a crazy dream concocted by his dying brain, lungs filled with nothing but cryogas so far below the earth...
No. Focus, Shadow tried to marshal his uncooperative thoughts, tearing himself away from the feeling of the walls around him being too narrow, the air too thin. Their job was to get Sonic out, and maybe also find out what Robotnik had been looking for. He scanned the corridor stretching out in front of him, spotted the surveillance camera at its end and threw a well-aimed Chaos Spear at it that fried the electronic device, waving for Tails and Maria to follow.
But something definitely wasn't right here. The base still seemed to be strangely empty, not even so much as a human guard they ran into - the one exception being one or two hovering beetle-type GUN drones after they had turned the next corner, but Shadow managed to take them out before either of them could fire.
"Okay, this is really strange," Maria said, biting her lip as they arrived at a door encouragingly labelled "surveillance" like she had predicted. "I mean – if this were a trap, shouldn't it have been sprung by now? Where is everybody?"
"Well. Time to find out," Shadow said and smashed the door open.
xxx
Inside was finally the sea of red they were expecting.
"-ARNING! IMMINENT SECURITY BREACH! ALL PERSONNEL TO SECTOR D! WARNING! IMMINENT SECURITY BREACH! ALL PERSONNEL-!"
"TAILS! HELP ME SHUT IT OFF!" Maria yelled over the din, already scrambling out of the cockpit and trying to make herself heard over the cacophony of the wailing sirens and repetitive announcement blaring from the speakers. It seemed as if all lights that could be flashing red were doing so, more than half of the huge assembly of monitors at the wall were showing nothing but droning static, while half of the rest only showed unhelpful, blinking red exclamation marks and 'WARNING' signs.
Tails and Maria were already at the console, pushing buttons and turning leavers to try and get the speakers to quiet down, while Shadow took in the rest of the room - there were a few chairs, two of them knocked over and a half-filled coffee cup, still lukewarm, set on a table while another one had fallen to the floor, its liquid forming a brown puddle at Shadow's feet. There were papers scattered around, at first glance nothing of note but doodles, lunch menus and shift plans, but it was clear that the soldiers inside had left in a hurry not too long ago for whatever was going on in sector D.
"-IMMINENT SECURITY BREACH! ALL PERS-"
"There! Finally!" Tails exclaimed in relief as he hit a button and immediately, at least the noise stopped even if the red lights continued to bathe the entire room in red at intervals.
"What is going on?" Shadow asked, eyes roving over the few monitors that were actually still showing any pictures and looking for any sign of movement, "Is the blue maniac already staging a break-out?"
"No," Maria shook her head, "That wouldn't make sense, according to my notes the high security tract for prisoners is in sector C, not D." She shot a glance at Tails. "Is it...uh, is it possible Sonic broke out and got lost?"
"Well, usually he has a really good sense of orientation," Tails said with a wince. "But whatever is going in sector D also somehow managed to take all of the cameras of that section out and I don't know how Sonic would have managed that – you'd definitely need some tech know-how for that."
"Well, maybe it's our lucky day and it's a terrorist attack," Maria said with a grimace, looking distracted as her gaze roved over the monitors still working. "But in any case, it works as a distraction for us and we don't have time to waste, anyway." She turned toward the computer terminal and began typing in a command interface window, her fingers flying over the keys. "I can see whether I can get the cameras working again from here so we can get an overview what is going on in this base. Tails, can you plot a course Shadow can take from here to the prison complex in sector C and disable any electronic doors on the way?"
"Probably," Tails nodded, also hopping onto a chair and starting to furiously type at a second console station. "If you manage to get the cameras working in sector D again, I'll make sure they cameras in sector C go offline, so there's no record of Shadow and Sonic breaking out. And also maybe search and delete any footage they might have gotten of us already."
"Right," Maria replied. "Okay, I've bruteforced entry with a Heisenberg protocol, we're in."
Tails nodded. "Good. Lemme just create a GUI interface in Visual Basic to track through their code faster."
"Already prepared a macro for that, sending it to you."
"I'll add it to the executables."
Shadow stared at the two people currently hammering away on their own keyboard, occasionally each other's keyboards, and generally creating enough green lines of gibberish on the screens to make Neo proud, and felt like this situation had gotten a bit away from him.
"Uh," he said.
"Tails, SonicEXE in the registry is not responding!"
"Convert it to an array and re-route through the co-processor!"
"It's NO USE!"
"Oh no!" Tails looked at her, his face drawn in dismay, "Have you tried jamming with the console cowboys in cyberspace?!"
Shadow gave the two of them a flat stare. "Okay, now you're just pulling my quills."
"Yeah, okay, maybe," Maria threw him a quick grin over her shoulder. "Tails, can you display a map for Shadow so he can also go and do stuff?"
"Sure thing!" Tails hit another button and a blueprint of the prison island filled out one of the screens with one path through it lit up in a brighter blue than the rest.
"This is the way that leads to the section where they have the cells for holding prisoners," Tails pointed out. "Me and Maria will take care of the cameras and doors, you go there and get Sonic out, alright?"
"Fine with me. As long as you two stay here and keep yourselves safe," Shadow nodded.
"Sure we will - safe as a paraphoretic logic gate!" Maria called out and Tails went "Oooooh burn!" in appreciation before both burst out laughing, and Shadow decided to leave before the nerdery somehow turned out to be infectious.
Xxx
In movies, when it's about moving undetected through buildings, the classical thing is to have the hero crawl through the ventilation ducts. In real life, of course, this is a hugely impractical idea, mostly because most ventilation ducts are not only blocked by fans at inconvenient intervals, but also because their size on film sets is often grossly exaggerated and attempting to go through them as an adult more often results in something similar as when male teenagers get experimental with a vacuum cleaner.
But of course, none of this applies when you are approximately three feet tall and also have the ability to turn into a miniature wrecking ball.
Making his way through the base was easy for Shadow – the vents were often adequate shortcuts when corridors didn't lead into the direction he needed to go, and any doors he needed to pass through were either already unlocked or easily smashed open.
Still, there was something about this entire situation that just let the fur at the back of his neck stand on end. The red lights were still flashing, indicating that there was an alert going on somewhere, but there was simply nobody around, not even after he'd left sector B and was now in C.
Just what is going on here? Shadow wondered, just as he dropped down into the corridor that had to be the one leading into the prison wing, according to the map Tails had showed him. Someone breaking into Prison Island with enough tech know-how to disable all cameras – well, that screamed Robotnik, of course, but why would the man break into the complex again after already having been there two weeks ago? Or was Maria's cousin the equivalent of someone having to go back to the supermarket three times because they kept forgetting the milk?
Shadow shook his head at the nonsensical train of thought. There wasn't even anything in sector D, according to Maria's info, mainly just personnel lodgings, maintenance workshops and storage for supplies. When Robotnik had broken in two weeks ago, he had been in sector A, the part where highly classified weapons, tech, information, artefacts and experiments were stored – the sector were Shadow would have ended up in…
Once again the entire scenario – too narrow metal corridors and the flashing lights – made him even more uneasy than the base situation already warranted, but he managed to push the roiling in his stomach down once more. Shadow strode down the corridor, pushing open the already unlocked door at the end – and froze.
In the room he had stepped into was a glass security booth, but the front of the glass window (and surely that had to be reinforced bulletproof stuff or something?) had been shattered and the security guard sitting in the seat inside, a young, dark-skinned human man, was lolling on his chair, apparently unconscious.
Shadow remained frozen for one, two seconds; then carefully forced himself to let go of the door and moved toward the counter of the security booth, all muscles tense in case this could be a trap after all. The man inside didn't move, but now Shadow could discern a large bruise on his forehead, even if his breathing appeared to be even. Knocked out, but not hurt too badly, then.
After hesitating again for a second, Shadow drew himself up on the counter in front of the unconscious man, leaning forward to see…
Gotcha. I'm sure you won't mind me taking this, Shadow thought as he pulled the guard's handgun out of his holster, storing it securely in his quills. It did help with his unease with the entire situation already.
After a quick glance at the surveillance cameras – offline; Maria and Tails had been doing good work, so far – he then climbed down from the counter again and moved through the security lock into the prison wing. Several corridors breached off here; now it was just a matter of trial and error until he found the one door leading to the unit holding the blue nerve grater that was the reason for him being here in the first place…
xxx
"Sha – what the hell are you doing here?" Sonic's eyes had first widened in surprise as his gaze fell on Shadow after he had finally found the right door, but then rapidly narrowed in accusation. "Come to gloat, you faker?"
"Okay, that isn't even a word, why does – nevermind," Shadow ran a hand over his face, ignoring how the strange epiphet Sonic and Tails had somehow instinctually chosen stung.
Instead, he glared right back at the caged blue hedgehog, who had now crossed his arms and was tapping his foot as he beheld Shadow outside. It didn't escape Shadow how small the cell they had Sonic locked in was – no wonder the other was in an exceptionally foul mood. The room they were in didn't have windows, only metal plating from floor to ceiling, and Sonic was caged in the opposite half from the door that Shadow had entered through. Separating them was a shimmering force field of some sort and, behind that on Sonic's side, a row of metal bars as a secondary, more physical barrier. In Sonic's cell was nothing but a small hole in the floor in one of the corners, making the thing look more like a cage for an animal than a prison meant to hold a person captive. Or a cage for an experiment, a voice in Shadow's head added, but he ignored it.
"I'm not here to gloat, Sonic, I – we – are here to rescue you."
"You-" anger made way for the beginnings of confusion on Sonic's face. "'We'?" he asked.
"Your kid brother turned up in our garden with a battle mech yesterday," Shadow informed Sonic dryly. "The professor isn't going to be pleased with the dents that one left in his lawn, by the way."
"…Tails is here?" All signs of aggression had instantly vanished from Sonic's expression, the blue hedgehog now all at once at the bars of his cell, fingers wrapped tightly around the metal rods, searching Shadow's face for any hint of whether this was the truth. "Where? Is he safe?"
"Yes. He is also currently disabling the security and surveillance systems in this area of the prison so I could come here to get you out." Shadow reached into his quills. "Which I'm now going to do."
"Wait, hold on." Sonic raised a hand. "One, those bars are some adamantium-type crap, and if I can't slice through them, I'm pretty sure you can't either. And two, care to tell me what on Mobius is going on here?" He jabbed a pointy finger through the bars, careful not to touch the forcefield behind it. "Why did you first frame me for a crime just to bust me out now?"
"I didn't frame you," Shadow replied with some irritation. "I don't know what GUN told you or showed you, but the high-speed hedgehog who stole that Emerald from Central City Bank wasn't me, either. The first I heard about the theft or you being imprisoned for it was when your kid brother showed up at my place." He rifled through his quills, and then carefully extracted the two Chaos Drives. "Tails thinks it's mostly due to GUN needing a suspect and not liking you particularly that they locked you up."
"And the fact that I'm conveniently the only registered hedgehog with high-speed powers who is currently not in juvie already," Sonic commented wryly, but at least relaxing his stance a little and shifting to lean against a wall instead.
"Yes, thank you, your brother already took care to point that out to me," Shadow gave Sonic a flat look. "Which is why I'm here now, so you're welcome."
"Aw, not because of our great friendship and the goodness of your heart?"
"Sonic, I will leave you here," Shadow threatened, but also noticed with slight despair that in the face of Sonic's genuine (if teasing) smile he didn't even manage to make his tone as cutting as he wished to.
"Fine, fine," Sonic raised both his hands in an offering of peace. "Thanks for coming to get me. But that still leaves the question of how you're going to bust me out of this thing." He gave the bar closest to him a demonstrative knock with the knuckle of his index finger. "This cell was especially made to contain powered individuals, I think. And I tried busting out."
"Well," and here Shadow couldn't help but finally let a smirk cross his face. "I think I've got a trick up my sleeve that they haven't prepared for." He raised one of the Chaos Drives in front of him.
"Chaos Control!"
Xxx
Sonic's expression when Shadow materialized inside the cell almost made this entire trip worth it.
"You-!"
"Can teleport. Yes," Shadow replied smugly, tossing the now burnt-out Chaos drive once and catching it. "It's called 'Chaos Control' and I'm the only one with the ability to execute it."
"You're not."
"What?" Shadow almost dropped the Drive before recovering. "I'm pretty sure I am."
"No," Sonic shook his head. "Unless you've been lying to me and you really are the one who framed me."
"What are you talking about?" Shadow frowned. He knew technically he should grab Sonic and Chaos Control out of here, every second spent on Prison Island was a second too many, but something about the blue hedgehog's expression had let all the fur on the back of his neck stand on end.
"When GUN chased me through Central City after I escaped from their helicopter," Sonic said. "They didn't manage to recapture me. You did."
"I thought we already established that that wasn't me," Shadow snapped at Sonic. "We watched your capture on a live stream at my house. I was nowhere near Central City at the time."
"And I believe you," Sonic said. "But, Shads – what I meant is there was a guy who looked super similar to you. And he teleported behind me. That's how he managed to surprise me and knock me out."
No, a voice in Shadow's head whispered, cold tendrils of horror rising with it. This was not supposed to happen. Clones of him existing was one thing, but this…
"They…until now they never managed to recreate my Chaos powers…" Shadow could barely hear his own hoarse words over the rushing of blood in his ears. All the other hedgehog experiments the professor and the other scientists had created upon the ARK, both before and after Shadow had been awoken, had never been able to channel Chaos Energy like he was. This was why he was unique. This was why he was the true Ultimate Lifeform. If…
"What? Shadow, are you okay? You're suddenly looking pretty pale there," Sonic now looked at him with some concern. "What's going on? Do you know who that other hedgehog is?"
"…No," Shadow half-lied, finally managed to swallow, pushing down the dread trying to claw its way out of his stomach and into his chest. "We need to get out of here," he managed, trying to focus on something important right this moment. He shoved the burnt Chaos Drive into his quills, extracting the remaining fresh one instead. "Take my hand."
"So you can teleport other people with you? Neat," Sonic commented, grasping Shadow's wrist. The look he gave him that the blue hedgehog had very clearly noticed that there was something Shadow wasn't telling him but also recognized that their escape should probably take priority over any lengthy discussion. "Alright then, take us out."
Shadow nodded, raising the Chaos Drive with the other hand that wasn't gripping Sonic's forearm in turn.
"Chaos Control!"
xxx
"So. Uh."
"What-? Chaos Control!"
"Uhm."
"Chaos Control!"
"Yeeeeah, Shadow, I don't think it's working," Sonic said very carefully, his other hand gesturing at the surroundings of the holding cell which (embarrassingly) hadn't changed in the previous fifteen seconds at all.
"But – why isn't it working?!" Shadow stared at the Chaos Drive in his hand in shock. It couldn't be. Even if they had managed to perfect the creation process so that there were now other versions of him capable of channeling Chaos energy, this couldn't mean -
"Yeah, when I said that this cell was constructed to imprison powered people?" Sonic raised an eye ridge. "Apparently GUN are aware of teleportation abilities."
Because, a voice in Shadow's head added, whoever did construct this cell would be aware of Professor Gerald's research and any theoretical Chaos abilities. Seeing as the ARK was a joint project with GUN and all. Which you probably should have thought of before you teleported yourself right into their prison cell.
"So, uh, how long you think until Tails will notice we're now both stuck in here…?" Sonic asked, right as Shadow was checking whether he potentially could break any of these bars by maybe banging his head against them.
To be continued….
Whooo, another chapter done, and one of the longer ones, too! I hope you liked, even if it took a while, and would LOVE to hear what you thought of it - comments are some of the brightest spots of my days :) I'll do my best to get the next chapter out faster and if you read, please review!