A Horrifying, Yet Miraculous, Absolution

Ch. 12

[×]

A scrap piece of paper waved in front of bright blue. Narrowed in, as well as cross-eyed, the scribbles done hastily were not the easiest things to decode. Or maybe they were, but it certainly wasn't Mobian. Or Federationese. She turned her head up to address her brother, who had his hand propping up his head as he continued to stare towards outer space. The Sun had risen over the Earth by now and casted him back into the reds and blacks she was familiar with. "A-Ahem. Shadow?" Her pale finger tapped the four symbols that kept repeating themselves in random order: -, ፲, ፻, and ፩. "I thought you said you remembered what the binary code was?"

"I do."

She tapped again. "This whole thing… is gibberish." Maria took the time to look at the passage again: -፻፩-፻፲፩ -፻፲-፻፩ -፲፻- -፻፲-፻ -፻፲፲፻፩… and so on and so forth. Made her dizzy.

Confusion flashed on her brother's face as he made a small hop away from the window to pick up the paper she had written on. Erasure marks filled the entire thing, as were the creases from where she had shoved it in her pocket from Grandpa – who had come by for only a few seconds before running away towards his lab. Maria didn't want to worry him more, and she had a strong feeling that he would have not approved of this copy of a copy… "It's zero-one o one-zero-one eleven, zero-one ten-zero-one o one, zero-zero-thousand-zero-zero…"

He kept talking. That brain of his read it like it was nothing; like autopilot. Must be nice. Quickly, she asked him to start from the beginning. He nodded and waited as she pulled out a pen from her diary and tore out another page. The bright pink border with hearts was convenient for making it look innocuous, right? After a few minutes, she had it scribed exactly what the monitor held – or at least as good as her brother's memory of that event. "You gotta remember that I don't know future languages, Shadow," Maria trailed off, looking at the paper with squinting eyes. Her penmanship was good, but after writing down a hell of a lot of 0s and 1s, her fingers cramped somewhere ¾ths of the way down.

Self-doubt. "But this is not?" Maria saw movement from the corner of her mind – the hedgehog reached towards the side of his head with a deep frown; quill sash swayed as he shook it. "It looks like zeros and ones to me…"

Must be a future problem he forgot about. Or something. Her brother was weird – in a good way, of course! "Alright! Doesn't matter! Now that I got it in readable form, I can just sneak into the library and snag one of the books about this. I know everyone uses punch cards for their programming, which are binary, so there HAS to be a translator out there!" Her fist rose in an exclamation towards the skies.

She could tell that her brother didn't like the fact she was going to go on off alone. Still, he understood that she knew the ins and the outs of the ARK better than anyone that wasn't Grandpa. With him still being 'secret #1,' there was no way he was going to just be able to go POOF into the always-ever-cluttered-with-humans library.

"Speaking of that," Maria paused midway towards the sliding door, "what WAS that thing you did to get us into the server room and back?" Her stomach wasn't going to recover – she never wanted to eat lettuce ever again – and where did that vegetable even come from? She had beef soup for dinner, not a salad!

The bright red in Shadow's oculars dimmed instantly into something… else. "You should get going."

This certain sister did not need a translator for that.

[x]

A boy with duo-chromed eyes followed her the second she reached the center hub of the ARK. He had a red shirt with lateral yellow stripes, blue jean shorts, and small shoes that had evidence of being worn from running around. Maria made sure to gave a little wave, but seeing Abe again made her conflicted.

"Freak!"

"Monster!"

"Wait till I write to my aunt about that thing!"

He… had never had good words to say about Shadow… But…! That was also before. Now is now. If she was able to ensure Grandpa wasn't going to go down the wrong path, then she could also take the easy side route and show Abraham that Shadow was a good, just misunderstood, guy!

"Maria~!" the voice of a young child carried. "I knew I would see you today, here! We should play together. It's been a while!" There was a kind laughter as those eyes creased into little upside down 'u's. "There was a new shipment yesterday, too! My aunt got me a toy gun!" He pulled the gaudy yellow and red plastic thing out from behind his back and aimed the barrel right at-

SLAP!

There were hushed gasps in the background.

The sound of someone crying.

Grey diminished back to color and the sounds of the world rushed back to Maria's eyes and ears. She realized her chest was going in and out at a fast rate; right hand was brilliant pink from contact and high friction; knees were about to give out.

Worse, Abe was face planted onto the floor.

Toy gun very, very far away.

"A-Abe!" she cried out, running towards him. "I-I'm so SORRY! I saw the barrel aimed right me and I-!"

The kid was still crying, rubbing his cheek where Maria's fingerprints were clearly seen. "N-No it's okaaaaay. I should have…" Another giant cry erupted as the sounds in the background got closer. "I s-should have paid a-attention to p-proper trigger c-control like I was taught!"

Oh, no. Oh, no. This was bad. Maria had never, ever; EVER hit anyone before! Not even those scary dark aliens from the white region! Desperately, she turned to find where the nearest Heal Unit was. Fortunately, the adults had already moved to grab it, and one of them was tending to Abe's soon-to-be-bruised flesh. They had decided to split the two children apart, and were soon last seen rushing off towards the medical ward.

Maria looked at her own hand.

Disappointed in herself.

Is this… how Shadow feels?

She hated it.

[x]

Grandpa… was going to hear from this.

She forced herself to feel better for her mission.

[x]

The library of the ARK was a marvel to behold for those of the scientifically inclined. Levels upon levels of books about almost every intellectual discussion existed: science, engineering, mathematics, and technology. Apparently, the sheer weight so many books made this area alone require more than three shuttles of literature! THREE! To put in perspective, some of the satellites in low-Earth orbit only needed one!

Yet, no matter how awesome the room looked, it was not the place that made Maria welcomed. The number of tomes for children was nonexistent, she still felt like crap for hitting Abe, and while there was a technology section, it was very large. She had wanted to ask the human child to look for a book about binary with her, but that idea had been flushed out the window into the vacuum of space.

After talking to the librarian to at least get a general direction, the girl took a cart. Arriving at the designated section, she pulled anything that had the words 'binary,' 'zeros and ones,' or 'drum memory' into it. The entire collection she could find ended up totaling to eleven books and one pamphlet. Her fingers and shoulders were beginning to ache after how much reaching above her she had to accomplish, but this was the task she set off to do. It meant she had to finish, alright?

After gathering all within reach, Maria decided to backtrack towards the archeology section and grab some more books about the Chaos Emeralds – of which there was much less written about. Honestly, Grandpa's notes couldn't possibly be beaten, but maybe there was something missed?

There was not nearly as much results there. Two books, and one of them looked more like a long shot if the title had anything to say about it.

By now, it was almost lunch. Ergo, back towards the librarian she went. Standing in the line, she counted how many people were in front: eight. Maria was patient. This was not too bad.

She played with the balls of her feet, pleasantly surprised that she was able to maintain her balance. The last time she had tried this, she had fallen down…

Blonde hair flew as she shook her head. Nope. No sad thoughts!

Unfortunately, Maria was a little bored. Maybe she should find a book for… more personal enjoyment? O! She could read something with Shadow together, all snuggled up by a fake campfire! And then tell scary ghost stories afterwards? Nothing too serious – but all of the movies and radio shows mention storytelling was what young girls did at camp…

She roamed the alley where the latest books from Earth were proudly displayed. Most of them dealt with botany, electricity, and something called heavy water – whatever that was. None screamed a good, fun read, though. The covers were very scientific: perfect for the ARK, but not its kids.

Then, right before she reached the desk, was a book.

The cover had her favorite thing in the world. A picture from the Earth! A canyon, by the looks of it! White, brown; black! There seemed to be some sort of etchings on the walls of the natural phenomena, much larger than the humanoid shapes that were beneath it. The camera angle was as such that the ruins inside the slit had a sun bloom right at the lip. A brilliant blue sky with puffy clouds finished the entourage.

The name of the author caught her by surprise.

"O! Maria," the checkout clerk called her over. "I see you found it. We pulled it aside for you, being that your dad wrote it and all. Want to check it out for the long-term, sweetie?"

Her dad… had written a book?

… She didn't remember what he looked like anymore.

It had been too long.

Shaking her head away those thoughts, she ensured to give a smile to the other woman. "Yes! Thank you so much, ma'am!"

"Of course! Anything for you."

[x]

There was a mighty THUD as the stack of objects fell from her cart into the room she had claimed for herself in the observation tower. They landed right next to her homework, which had already been finished long ago. (Having had already done and studied this stuff once before was a major boost.) As long as she returned the metal carrying thing with wheels by tomorrow, it would be fine. They were meant for even more books from the big, important researchers.

Like Grandpa!

Who was still locked away in his lab.

"Come here, Shadow!" she whispered out towards the darkness. Uncertain where her brother had run off towards, she walked around the corners of the room and started to flip some switches to see better. "You around?"

"Behind you."

"EEEEEEEKK!" she screamed and jumped about four inches into the air.

There was a soft smile on his face when she turned. "I thought you said you were never scared of me," he joked.

Maria shook her fist. "Sha-Shadow! I could have flown to Spagonia with that. Geesh."

The face of taunt soon faded away back into his more 'default' facial expression as Shadow picked through the books one by one. All business. He was also under the assumption it was G.U.N. that had placed the message on the monitor – but nothing was concrete proof. Pulling out his thumb, he shuffled through each tome as rubies roamed. With one down, out came the next. And so on. And so forth.

Eventually, he stopped and pulled out the sixth book on a certain page. Maria took note it was a tabled graph. "O! A key!" she shouted in glee as she took the book from his hands. "This tells us how to translate bytes into standard alphanumerics! Great find, Shadow!"

He nodded. "I'll go get some hot chocolate heated for you while you translate." The female Robotnik nodded in approval as that black mass turned off towards where Maria had set up her camping stove.

There was no time like the present! She was going to translate even if this was to take her all night.

… Which it probably would.

[x]

Her pencil dropped at the end of the first sentence.

Forget the entire passage.

"We did what It wanted, Father."

By now, the mug with her drink was abandoned towards the side. Halfway full, even the thought of injecting her body with sugar was too far away from her conscious.

Shadow was sitting besides, also looking at her translated sheet with a stern, and confused, expression. "Capital 'I' for 'It?'" he mused at the same thing she had.

"And 'F' for 'Father,'" Maria added. "A deliberate stress on those two words, too. Binary is very specific. It wasn't done that way in error."

Her brother hummed. "So, whomever wrote this wanted this message read by someone he or she calls 'Father.'"

Both sat still.

"Not the Biolizard," Shadow started after the silence lasted too long. "She is not capable of much complex thought, even if she could have managed to get into the data without tearing thru the entire station."

Maria turned at that comment. "What did you mean, Shadow?"

He tapped the floor with his hand in thought. "Creation. The prototype and I are the only man-made, 'alive' items on this entire ARK. Or, we're supposed to be…" A shake of his head. "By definition, Professor would be…" He was incapable of finishing his words.

She did it for him. "'Father,' right? So, you think it's addressed to Grandpa?"

Was that sarcasm? "Unless it's meant for Dr. Tower. He's the only other male with an immediate child onboard."

No. She didn't think this was for him. "Well, that means it's probably not G.U.N.?"

"We'll see."

[x]

The next line was a little more ominous.

"But now we also want to see It."

It was another hour and Grandpa was possibly not going to back until midnight at the way things were shaping out. Odds were that he had already translated the full thing and was doing… research or something.

Research about THIS.

"There's that capital 'I' again," Maria muttered as she brushed away the numerous little erasure shards from the page once more.

Gloves traced the numbers. "There's a pattern in the remaining sections as well. A large chunk is the same."

It was a good catch! She had recognized it, too. "Do you think it was written by one of Grandpa's robots? Maybe an AI gained… something like sentience?"

There was a hum of thought in Shadow. "I knew a robot that was fueled by enough… passion to gain awareness, so… I guess it's not technically impossible."

The tone told her he didn't believe that was the case, though.

[x]

Both children stared down the full passage under the light of the midnight stars:

"We did what It wanted, Father.

But now we also want to see It.

Let us see.

Let us touch.

Let us admire."

"Make any sense to you?" Maria asked again.

"No."

"Yeah. Me, neither."

Now what?

[x]

It was three in the morning. Pillows were lodged underneath the tent to make it look like two naughty individuals were underneath. It would not work as a ruse for long – Grandpa apparently liked to talk to Shadow when he came back after a hard day at a 50/50 percent rate. She was going to have to gamble at this.

She gave herself a look over. Attached to her hip was an ugly utility belt that clashed with her blue dress, but where it lacked in grace, it made it up in functionality. Her diary was stuffed in one of the pockets, long pencils in another, a sharpener she borrowed from her school supply area, and her Polaroid camera with the last of her films. In her hand was the book with the binary table; on her feet were only socks as to make no noise in case Grandpa was already in there. The point was to not get caught, after all!

She gave her brother a small thumbs up.

His left hand hooked onto her right. Those crimson eyes shined in the darkness of the night cycle, as did the color in his wings. Gold erupted into a ring in the middle of her brother's iris as he continued to concentrate – a hue and appearance that made her think twice about her plan all of a sudden. It was too late, though: his right hand flexed and reached towards the ground beneath their shared feet, moved upwards, and then-

-she was sailing amidst the stars-

-was everywhere and nowhere all at once-

-crashed into a sudden, black pull-

-saw green!

The server room hummed with noise from many sources and none of them organic. There was the HVAC to keep the machines cool and functional, the spooling of the brown tapes that someone in a lab wanted access to; the rush of the Chaos rail lines that fed power to the hungry beast.

Maria did not add her vomit to the room.

This time, at least.

She gave a weak thumbs up again to Shadow. "I-I think I… am getting more used to whatever that was," she half-white lied, half-truth moaned. Ughhh. Her stomach was glad there was nothing left – not even the hot chocolate remained. She could still feel her tummy pull off loop-di-loops, though.

Careful hands picked her up and kept her steady. "Sonic complained the first time he was moved thru space as well," came the mutter of consul. "He's weaker than you, though, since he refused to do it with me more than once."

"That's not the…," Maria continued, refusing to submit to the nausea, "first time you mentioned him. Wasn't he your buddy?" She sorta remembered a blue hedgehog that ran around in the time anomaly…

The girl couldn't see her brother's face as he tsked away but had observed those hands tightly grip his Inhibitor Rings for the first time since the morning. In his voice, she heard the anger, betrayal, and acceptance all at once. "An irritation was who he was," were words loaded with conflicting thoughts. The tone immediately shifted into melancholy. Comradeship. Respect. "And a better person than me; a guy who ended up doing the 'right' thing; a hero. You… would have gotten along well with him."

Ah.

Sounded like… another dead friend-

Time to change the subject, Maria! To the matter at hand here in the present! "A-Anyways, let's find some evidence!" she ended with a fist pump and a wobble of her leg as she stepped forwards. Her shaky movement did the intended effect of breaking Shadow from his reverie to catch and steady her. Like stream cooling into vapor no longer able to be seen, those old thoughts were no longer haunting him. He was back in the current moment.

Yes, yes. She was very good at healing!

Call her Dr. Robotnik – Healer of Brotherly Hearts.

The terminal was her first stop. The monitor was still flickering the same message – she compared the numbers as fast as she could. Nothing new to be found here, or at least with what limited computer skills she had. However, that was alright. He real goal was to see if anything else had any messages or notes or hidden items that held clues over who made it.

Everything Grandpa made ran off Chaos: from the objects ran on Drives to her brother himself. If the writer was truly something that called the greatest scientist in the world 'Father,' then there had to be something here that Shadow could sniff out!

"Let's try the drum where your data was held?" Maria guessed. "They had to have touched it to make the message since Grandpa didn't mention a hack from the terminal itself!" She pulled up a copied note from Grandpa's journal. "Says here: Subfloor 19, Spools 569,330 thru 603,230. Oh. Oof. That's… a lot of… drums." The girl arched her neck up and flinched at the steep looking stairs. It was going to be a long climb.

At that, Shadow wrapped his arms around her. "Hold on," was the only warning she got as his appendages glowed – so freaking cool – and with a MIGHTY FLAP, she ascended into the air!

Maria could see the whole floor beneath her!

AHH!

"This is amazing!" the blonde squealed.

Her joy at seeing all the things beneath her must have made her brother's mood a little bit better because his mouth moved from a frown to something flatter. Not quite a smile – if it wasn't for the mystery of the night, he might have, though.

She'll take that.

In seconds, they landed on a grate layer. There was a lock, but Shadow merely made his index and middle finger join together and waved impassively. The air besides his hand warped at the gesture, and like a shooting star-

BAM!

A goldenrod spear with an ink trail behind it lodged right into the latch and broke a lock. Or melted it. Obliterated it off the face of the ARK? Yeah. That one.

She blinked. "Couldn't you have… teleported us to the other side instead?"

The look on his face was pretty comedic. "Yes."

"But you didn't because…?"

"Sometimes, a Chaos Spear is more appropriate. Requires less energy."

Ah. Shadow-ese for 'it was more fun.' Or 'I wanted to show off to my sister.' One of those two, Maria was pretty sure. "Ok. But you better fix the lock before someone realizes it was damaged."

He watched her. "It was already compromised. By breaking it, we are going to have a new one be mandatory."

"Grandpa isn't going to like that."

"Then we can blame the damage on the other intruder."

Ok. She had to give her brother that. He had a point – even if it was a lie! Maria took to giggling, but the Universe decided to play cruel tricks on her.

Shadow froze.

Did he see something? Her bangs flew as she turned left and right to try to spot what he did, but came up with nothing. "What is it?" Maria whispered, afraid that maybe there was someone hidden in the dark alleys that could hear her.

Her brother's red eyes shifted left and right. "Chaos Energy from a Drive. I can feel it. Faint, but all over the reels." At that, he led Maria into the region where he brought himself physically close to the enormous metal shelf where the data about Project: SHADOW resided. "It's embedded within the tape itself," he murmured as he pulled a spool out and unraveled it.

Maria crept closer. She could see the little bumps and empty places. As she flipped through her book, she read an introduction section aloud. "Zeros are represented as blanks; ones as ridges."

"Here," her brother offered. "You have smaller fingers than me."

Pale hands felt each ridge of each spool. They all started with the same patterns, and it looked like they continued the entire way into the core, too. This was a purposeful message… "Well, whomever it was certainly knows how to get Grandpa's attention."

There was a noncommittal hum as he activated his Air Shoes and skated around the entire shelf, looking for anyone or anything else. Eventually, he made it back with a strange appearance.

"What is it?"

Shadow tapped his finger on his lips in thought. "It's where the trail goes: into an HVAC vent. Unfortunately, the duct line runs by the utility Chaos rail system, and I lost track of it by the interference. On top of that, this duct isn't a main thoroughfare – it's too small for anything solid bigger than my hand to get in or out of."

Hmmmm. That was something. "So, no robots."

"I couldn't even fit in there as this current form," her brother continued as his eyes trailed towards the place where the air condition wafted from. "It would take me morphing into base matter to pull it off."

That comment confused her before the lightbulb flashed. Oh! His 'squid' state! "So, it wasn't just a newborn hoglet thing?"

"… No."

"Your Shadow Powers are so sick."

"Not the time, Maria."

"But they are! I mean, you can lose your hedgehog form and just be all… stretchy, like-" Her banter died mid-sentence as the gears of her brain whirled into overdrive.

Maria thinks she knows whom the culprit was.